by Joshua James
LeFleur frowned again and took a deep breath. Ironically, the annoyance on her face actually softened her features. Beneath the severe demeanor, she was pretty in her own imposing way. She also just had a blaster to your temple, he reminded himself.
“I’ve met a lot of people who think that they’re good liars,” she said. “None of them are. You can fool this tech, but you can’t fool me, yah?”
Ben nodded.
“Second,” she said, before he could speak. “Just because you aren’t in restraints or locked up with your crew right now doesn’t mean that that’s not where you’ll end up, depending on the answers you give me. And don’t see the lack of restraints as an opportunity to try and escape. I’d hate to have to kill you before we got to know each other.” LeFleur’s steely gaze was unwavering.
Ben raised his hands with a smile. “Promise,” he said, in what he hoped was a winningly casual manner.
LeFleur sat back and softened her features. Ben knew it was an interview trick, but he still felt himself relax. She was very pretty, he realized.
“Good. You said that you trained to be on the Atlas. How is that possible with that?” LeFleur pointed at Ben’s metallic robotic arm.
“This ole thing? It’s a long story—”
“Make it short.”
“I was in training for the Atlas mission when a terrorist attack a couple of days before the launch took my arm and leg.”
And my mother.
He glanced up as the truthteller drone changed positions. It was still recording, even if it wasn’t reading his eyes.
“I’m familiar. We all heard about that. It was the Oblivion cult, correct?”
“Yup…they attacked multiple points throughout the city. I was unlucky enough to be on one of the trains they bombed. Anyway, there’s a strict UEF policy for any soldier who suffered wounds as egregious as mine to take a mandatory minimum leave from active duty. I wasn’t happy about that, and made my reservations about their policies very public.”
“So they terminated your service?”
Ben nodded. His first outright lie.
“That would never happen here,” LeFleur said. “As long as you can fight…we need all the soldiers we can get. Can’t afford to just let one go.”
“Really? Looks like you got plenty of souls on board here.”
“We’re not here to talk about us. We’re here to talk about you and what you know. Tell me what you know about the mission. Do you know where the Atlas went?”
Ben paused for a second and thought about his next words. He’d tried to make the conversation more personable, but LeFleur had shut that down pretty expertly. It was time to get down to business.
“I have no idea where the Atlas went. That’s just the truth; in fact, it’s why I’m out here in the middle of bumfuck nowhere space. As far as information about the mission, what do you want to know?” Ben wasn’t sure how far he’d go, but he wasn’t a soldier anymore. Strictly speaking, he had no real loyalty to the UEF, though he was no turncoat.
“For starters, what was their mission, to the best of your knowledge? I know that sometimes only the command knows the specifics, but tell me what you were told.”
“Pretty simple, actually. We were to depart from Annapolis on Earth and make a fold jump to these coordinates along the edge of AIC space.”
“Inside AIC space,” LeFleur said. “Continue.”
Ben rolled his eyes. “From there, it was beyond my scope of knowledge. I understand there was supposed to be a series of diplomatic hoops to jump through that was supposed to build trust”—he used air quotes—“and then we’d make our way deeper into AIC space until we got within range to communicate with your home planet, Vassar-1.” He shrugged. “We were told that we had an understanding that our ship wouldn’t be met as the enemy. I suspect my father was to spearhead negotiations with your high command, although nobody expressly told me that.” Ben told the truth as LeFleur listened intently.
“If it was indeed a mission of peace, why send such a big, heavily-armed ship?”
“Because we didn’t trust you.”
LeFleur looked skeptical.
“I mean, can you blame us for taking precautions in case things went south?” Ben asked. “Which, by the look of things, they did,” he offered.
“We didn’t attack the Atlas. The AIC wants peace just as badly as the Terrans do. With that said…”
Ben watched LeFleur’s cool demeanor waver. She looked away from him, and was silent for a second. He could hear the whir of the drone floating nearby. He guessed she was again accessing something on her HUD.
“There were reports that there was more to the Atlas. We knew it was heavily armed and advanced, even by our standards. But our spies told us that there was some kind of super-weapon on board.”
“Reading the underground media, are you?” Ben asked.
“Excuse me?”
Ben shook his head. “Joke. They’re always accusing us of something crazy.”
“Is it crazy?”
Ben tried a different tack. “So is this is why you’re out here combing the debris? You’re really buying into that?”
“One of the reasons, yes. But you haven’t answered the question. Was there a super-weapon of some kind on board? We were told it was strong enough to destroy a planet. Maybe Vassar-1?”
“Well, that’d definitely be one way to end the war,” Ben chuckled. “But no, I don’t know anything about that. And I don’t know anybody who gave that mumbo-jumbo any real credibility.”
LeFleur didn’t seem amused. “We’ve seen plenty of mumbo-jumbo from your side, yah?”
Ben raised an eyebrow. “Look, I’m just telling you what I know. It sounds far-fetched to me, but I guess that doesn’t mean there wasn’t anything like that on board. I mean, not everything got vetted by a junior officer like me.”
“Even the son of the captain?”
“Even so.”
LeFleur stared Ben straight in his eyes for another long moment. She had piercing green eyes, and he found it hard to look away.
“What can you tell me about your father, the man helming the Atlas, Captain Lee Saito?”
Where do you want me to start? “A good officer,” Ben said honestly. “A leader. Respected.”
“That sounds pretty rote,” she said. “Considering he was your father.”
Ben leaned forward. “Well, this might come to a shock to you, Captain, but my old man and I didn’t always see eye-to-eye.”
For the first time since he’d sat down, LeFleur cracked a smile. “You don’t say.”
“Shocker, I know,” Ben said, leaning back.
LeFleur seemed to glance at one of the pictures on her desk facing her. “Shocker,” she agreed somewhat wistfully.
“I’ll tell you this, though. Hard bastard or not, he always completed his mission, no matter the cost.” Ben thought about that ill-fated mission aboard the Valiant. The fire in the engine room. His friends who’d died. “At least he used to.”
“Why do you refer to him in the past tense? Do you have reason to believe he’s dead?”
“Besides the fact that no one has heard from him and his crew for weeks? Maybe it’s the fact that the majority of his ship is floating out in that debris field,” Ben scoffed. “Call it a hunch, but I don’t think things are looking good.”
“And yet here you are,” LeFleur said, steely-eyed as ever. “Chasing after a dead man.”
Ben sat back in his chair. “Dickhead or not, he’s still my father. I have to know for sure.”
LeFleur looked at him for another long moment; then she waved away the spherical drone, which returned to its perch atop of a nearby table. She stood up as two AIC soldiers walked in. “Thank you for your candor, Mr. Saito.”
The soldiers took Ben back to the cell with Ace and Morgan.
“And here he is,” Ace said derisively. “Use that silver tongue of yours to sweeten up that reb Captain?”
Ben took a seat on
the bunk in the corner of the cell. “Oh, yeah, it went great. She really warmed up to me.”
“So are we as good as dead, or are we gonna be locked up for the rest of our lives?” asked Morgan.
“Same difference,” Ace spat.
“I dunno. Both. Neither. That LeFleur is hard to read.”
“What did you tell her?” asked Morgan.
“I told her the truth,” Ben said, assuming for sure there would be listening devices down here. “Let’s see where that gets us.”
Ace spat. “Never done much for me.”
Seven
When Ada reached the end of the duct, she dropped down into an office. She knew it well, even if she didn’t know whose it was. There was a debate between the other survivors if it was some station official’s office or simply a fancier form of janitor’s closet. The truth didn’t matter. What did was that one of the walls had been broken up and removed. Behind it there was piping and electrical wires.
A week of being hungry made the survivors get innovative. Ada helped as they looked at schematics and blueprints through their HUDs. It was another unintended gift from Royce, the dead engineer they owed their lives to.
Armed with the blueprints, they’d figured out that the office was right above apartment 254. So they made a hole in the ceiling, the office’s floor, to climb through. That way they’d pretty much have direct access to the vents, their lifeline throughout the station.
“Sorry I took so long,” Ada said as soon as the other survivors grabbed her legs and helped pull her down into the apartment.
“It’s okay. Shit happens out there,” Rollins said. The Atlas’ commander was, as usual, the first to greet Ada. He took one look at her face and said, “You don’t have to tell me and I don’t want to know.”
“I got…” Ada looked around. Things were in bad shape in the apartment. The plumbing on the station had lasted for a little while but with the staff dead, it had eventually gone to hell. Their floor had a water tank with enough clean water for what the survivors hoped would be another week. After that, things were going to get dicey. Bringing food back from the cafeterias was one thing, but water was a greater challenge to get and move.
Their lone toilet had backed up, filling the quarters with the smell of human waste. Add to that the smell of death from those injured who didn’t make it. No one had washed since before the Atlas set off from Annapolis.
“You got exactly as much as we need,” Rollins said. Even without a left hand or a captain, the commander stayed positive. He took the backpack off of Ada and handed it off to one of the survivors. She and Rollins took turns on the food scavenging efforts. They’d get together later and talk about where she’d gone and what she’d seen out there.
There were six people left. Ada and Rollins were the defacto leaders of the group. They were joined by two other members of the Atlas crew, Private Tomas Ruis and a cook, Tanisha Grimes. Lastly, there were two survivors from the station. A sixteen-year-old girl, Francesca DeLeon, had actually found them. Her story of how was a little murky, but they’d confirmed she wasn’t a Shapeless. And then there was the elderly Walter Van Ryan, a lifelong resident of the station. In fact, he swore that he’d helped build it. If the three stories he told over and over were any indication, it was true. Ada couldn’t imagine how hard it must be to see the station in its current condition, but Walter was an optimist. Ada knew that because he loved to remind everyone of this fact. “At my age, you have to be an optimist,” he’d said once, right after Ada had found him in one of her early food excursions. “All my pessimistic friends are dead.”
“You ready?” asked Tomas as he approached Ada with a rifle. He wasn’t being particularly aggressive, but made it clear there were consequences if she wasn’t.
“Yeah, of course.” Ada knew what was next. For the safety of the survivors, they needed to be sure that she was human and not an alien posing to be her. It’d happened before. Safety first.
“Mmmm, beans, my favorite,” said Tanisha sarcastically as she took inventory of the food Ada had gathered.
“You want some prime rib, maybe some fresh fruits and vegetables? Feel free to crawl out there and take a stroll around the market,” Ada said as she put down her gun and headed towards the apartment’s bathroom at the end of Tomas’ rifle. She was already bracing herself for the smell.
“No, that’s okay. I can make beans work,” Tanisha said, her voice trailing off. Ada could tell the cook was already formulating possible recipes in her head.
“At this point anything would be good,” Rollins said, ever the peacekeeper.
“I’ll never forget the first spaceship I ever flew on,” Walter said, beginning a story that must have been triggered by the thought of eating beans. At least, that was probably it. Ada had heard plenty of Walter’s stories that seemed to have nothing to do with the subject at hand. He wasn’t prone to let little things like context get in the way of a good story.
Along the way to the bathroom, Ada passed by the doorway to the only bedroom. Francesca was lying on the bed. The circle of red light just under the skin on her temple let Ada know the teen was listening to music through her HUD.
“Okay, in ya go,” ordered Tomas. His nose twitched, and Ada put her hand over hers. He watched as Ada entered the bathroom. Thankfully, there was a door between the toilet and the rest of the bathroom. Unfortunately, it didn’t seal enough to contain the smell.
“Now…I’ll turn around. Okay?” Tomas turned to his side, careful not to have his back to her, but still not watching her undress.
Ada stripped down to her underwear and climbed into the shower/spa. Every apartment in Sanctuary Station 33 had these combo units. Since each unit technically had a spa, the company that built them could legally market them as “luxury” housing, and charge a little more.
A bit leaky and completely unreliable, the spa was the only way the survivors had to tell friend from foe. The Shapeless didn’t do well with extreme temperatures. If the spa was jacked up to the max, a person could only last maybe five minutes at most, but one of those monsters would react almost instantly, at least in theory. They hadn’t detected one yet.
“Ready?” asked Tomas, still staring away from Ada. He was actually staring at Francesca’s legs, which could be seen in through the bedroom doorway from his position. She was wearing shorts, giving him a good view of her bare skin.
“Let’s get this over with,” said Ada. She sealed the spa door and watched as the leak protocol system checked the seal. Because the shower used the same recycled water, it worked even while the plumbing around them didn’t, but it also meant that loss of water had to be carefully limited. Some water loss was inevitable, and the system had been designed to periodically refill, but that wasn’t happening now. So every time they ran it, a little more water was lost. Since it had become their makeshift alien detector, they were restricting themselves to no showers at the moment. Better to be dirty and monster-free.
A green light told Ada everything looked good. She sat down on the shower bench in her underwear and waited.
Tomas didn’t bother with easing Ada into the heat. He cranked it up to ten and watched as the shower/spa glass fogged up. Closing the door behind him, he stepped into the bathroom and kept the rifle trained forward.
“You still you?” asked Tomas after a couple of minutes. He glanced over at the thermometer for the spa. It was maxing out. The red area meant the water temperature was unsafe.
Ada sat in the steam and heat, sweat dripping off her forehead. Her thoughts drifted to what she’d seen in the vents. Now, more than ever, she thought about death. Not just dying; that’d been on her mind since the Atlas was ambushed what seemed like years ago. No, she thought about what would happen to her after.
Would Ada become like that poor dead little girl, simply a subject for one of the Shapeless to copy? How would her family know she was dead or where she died? Her whole family was buried back home in Sweden, outside their family home, even th
ose who’d died in the war. Was there any chance that she would join them, or would she be nothing but a frozen half-rotted corpse when the life support eventually failed on Sanctuary Station 33?
“Yeah, I’m still me. And I’m about ready to get out of here.”
“Give it one more minute. Sorry, Ada, just need to be sure. You know?”
“Yeah, yeah, no problem. Just do me a favor, huh?”
“What’s that?” Tomas asked.
“Count faster? It’s hot as hell in here.”
Tomas laughed. “Sure thing. Already at thirty seconds.”
“Good man.”
Once her session in the shower/spa was done, Ada left the bathroom after Tomas. Her pants, shoes, and boots already back on, she put on her shirt as she stepped out, thankful to put the smell of the bathroom behind her.
Tomas wasn’t even pinching his nose. “How do you stand that?” she asked.
“Smells don’t bother me,” he said. “Aliens do.”
Ada walked into the bedroom to talk to Francesca, who didn’t even acknowledge her presence. The shine in her eyes indicated that she wasn’t only listening to music; she was watching videos through her HUD, too.
Ada sat down on the bed next to her. In order to get her attention, she gently shook the teen’s leg.
“Hey,” said Ada once she had Francesca’s attention.
“What? What’s up?” asked Francesca. Her response started with a shitty teenager tone, but quickly changed to something genuine. Ada couldn’t imagine what she was going through. A teenager who saw her whole family slaughtered by alien monsters? Ada assumed she was in something like prolonged shock, even if outwardly she appeared like any other teenager Ada had ever known, and she included herself in that list.
“What ya watching?”
“Oh…I, I was just watching this dumb show on the Free Network. It’s like, I dunno, what’d they used to call them back in the day? Reality show! Yeah, it’s just some dumb reality show about a family of rich miners on the edge of space. It’s stupid, but my mom and I never missed—” Francesca caught herself. “It’s just dumb fun,” she finished.