《Starfall》
Prologue
We did not, of course, realize we were doomed until it was far, far too late.
Our scientists had long since ruled out the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and with no unifying enemy to bind us together, we did as we always had.
The mega-corporations who ruled our worlds were no strangers to warfare. They would spend entire planet¡¯s worth of resources on petty feuds, squabbling over dominion rights and esoteric points of contracts. In the early days, there had been governments, expeditions, hope¡ but that was all gone now. The corporations controlled everything. As the air of our homeworld soured and the ice caps melted, you were given a simple choice. You could go into debt, tremendous debt, to buy a ticket off-world to one of the colonies. Or, you could drown.
Indentured servitude became the order of our lives, a wealthy elite at the very top of society holding the leashes of our impossible debt. Everyone worked for a megacorporation. They controlled what we could eat, what we would see. Out in the cold vacuum of space, a pink slip was as good as a death sentence.Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
There were rebellions, of course. The occasional riot or uprising, quickly put down by the corp¡¯s hired mercenaries and papered over by the corp-branded media. It went on for centuries. It could not be otherwise, we thought. How else could it be?
In our disbelief, we were slow to react as the first of our frontier worlds fell silent. A shadow war between competing corps, perhaps. As they struck into the core worlds, our ignorance was torn from us.
Too late we realized that the descendents of ancient ark vessels, long thought lost, had finally returned. Too late we realized that they had gone a different way. The harsh reaches of space and foreign worlds had reforged them across all divisions of class. We rallied as best we could, thinking that perhaps our ancient cousins might have overextended themselves. But with each world that fell, their lines did not stretch, their power did not dim. Instead, their fleets and armies seemed to only grow with each victory.
Horror dawned on us as we realized our civilization was doomed. They were not conquering our worlds. They were liberating them.
Chapter 1
Lam kept me sane. I never learned his first name, if he remembered it, he kept that particular secret to himself. But when I was first decanted and spilled out of the tube I was grown in, sputtering and naked, his voice was the first familiar thing I heard.
¡°Take it easy there, man. Breathe. Remember to breathe.¡±
I took big gulps of air, and then hacked a cough that wretched my whole body, like something was trying to push its way out my esophagus. I threw up something wet and vile onto the cold floor.
Cold. That was the first thing I felt. A cold floor. I shivered, and reached for my face. Clawing at whatever was stopping up my eyes from seeing.
¡°Easy. Easy. They¡¯re bandaged up for a reason.¡± Lam¡¯s voice again, I could hear it properly this time. He sounded young, my age maybe. An accent that didn¡¯t quite place. But in it was something else, a bit of the listless resignation, that lilt that marked him out as someone in my generation. It put me at ease, if only a little bit. I could feel the gauze fabric, holding tight to my face.
¡°What happened to my eyes?¡±
Years later, I was grateful that he didn¡¯t tell me the truth, not right away. I probably would¡¯ve just laid down and died right there, if I even understood what had happened to me. I was that particular kind of furious and terrified, all at once.
Better to find out later, once I understood that I wasn¡¯t alone. That it wasn¡¯t what had been done to me, it was what was done to us.
Years later, I could look back and laugh, at the sheer existential horror of it all. When I wasn¡¯t covered in some gelatinous goop, kneeling in my own vomit and who-knows-what-else. So I did, I laughed.
I could tell it caught Lam off-guard, my strange, barking laugh. We were standing on a balcony above the presidium. Pointless extravagance, since we couldn¡¯t see the view, but it was nice enough to hear the crowds cheering and the distant music playing far below. Feel what felt like real wind across our skin, ruffling the collars of our uniforms.
I heard Lam shift a bit, startled. I imagined his face, a bit quizzical, looking at me like I¡¯d finally lost it. But that was just my own conjecture. What I heard instead was his quiet wheeze, the noise he made when he¡¯d decided not to worry about something. Instead, he clapped his hand to my shoulder and thankfully let it linger there.
We heard the anxious tap-tap-tap of a cane on the floor, a particular rhythm that marked out Hamad and his nervous energy. He¡¯d always been fidgety, even before being decanted according to him, and he never seemed to quite trust that he¡¯d gotten a fix on anyone or anything in his immediate vicinity. A particular paranoia, a desire to double- and triple-check that was probably more asset then liability to a Navigator.
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¡°Harper? Lam?¡± He asked, still tap-tap-tapping on his way out the balcony. He shuddered a bit at the sudden wind.
¡°Here, Hamad.¡± I answered, tapping my own cane against the rail of the balcony, ¡°Lam¡¯s at you¡¯re 3-o-clock.¡± Usually it was Lam that gave out precise directions to assuage Hamad¡¯s frayed nerves.
Lam¡¯s hand left my shoulder as Hamad tapped over to the railing, shuddering again, ¡°Bloody high. Can¡¯t even see it, but I know it¡¯s bloody high.¡±
¡°Did you get your assignment yet, Hamad?¡± Lam asked, his tone a bit distracted.
¡°Valence, a battlecruiser out of Outtenhampt. Going to be a riot moving all that brass,¡± there was a note of pride, battlecruisers were heavy ships, nearly ship-of-the-line, assigned to competent (or very well-connected) captains and the best of our Navigator class. I wasn¡¯t quite sure it was a reward, the responsibility for guiding 10,000 souls across the aether, though Hamad was likely the best cut out for it. ¡°You lot?¡±
¡°Nobilis,¡± Lam replied, earning a soft whistle from Hamad. It was only a cruiser, but it was one of the newest in all the corp fleets. All the latest bells and whistles, advanced batteries of railguns and the fastest jump drives. ¡°Harper got the Eschaton.¡±
I grunted in annoyance as I marked Lam¡¯s teasing tone. Eschaton had been top-of-the-line. Nearly fifty years ago. Now it was a junker, a glorified parade float, cargo-pusher or diplomatic run-about when someone wanted to make a point in some photo-op. A jump drive made before the latest in safety innovations, which gave rise to the rumor was that it had splatted it¡¯s last Navigator somewhere in the middle of an asteroid. All fixed now, of course. It was (probably) fine.
Hamad hissed, ¡°Bad luck, mate. Well. You¡¯re lucky ¡®nuff. Maybe you¡¯ll splat into something nice!¡± Jokes about dying horribly were common enough before we¡¯d been decanted. Now, they took on a sort of comforting familiarity. I grinned a bit.
¡°...I¡¯ve got some fresh prints on the stellar array, and you got my notes on cartographic interpolation, yeah?¡± Hamad¡¯s tone was conciliatory. He¡¯d been the type to let you copy his homework, or even try to teach you a bit, if you had the patience for his tangents.
¡°I¡¯ll be alright. Mostly pushing cargo tonnage. And it¡¯s a skeleton crew besides. Aim small, miss small.¡±
I heard Lam wheeze in, likely to try and get Hamad to shove off, but we all heard a long, low blare before he got the chance. Assembly call. It was time to report in to the rest of our lives.
Life at the Navigator Collegia hadn¡¯t been easy by any stretch, but there¡¯d been upsides. A sense of camaraderie, we were all in the same boat, whether we liked it or not. The proctors were apathetic at best, looking down on us the way you¡¯d look at a wrench or a screwdriver that would occasionally refuse to do what it was meant to We¡¯d trade hushed stories about what the world was like before we decanted, when we were sure the proctors couldn¡¯t overhear. Hamad told us about London, about the smell of tikki marsala the way his mom used to cook it, the sights of horrible architecture blighted skyscrapers next to stonework centuries old. Lam spoke about California, the waves, the surf, the weed, the long, looping sidewalks and lines and lines of identical stucco houses. There was a sadder story we didn¡¯t talk about, but each could infer from the parts we left out. How Hamad¡¯s parent¡¯s must have felt when the realized how he¡¯d never be a doctor, or an engineer, an architect. How Lam¡¯s sister grew up without an older brother surfing next to her.
We rode the elevator down in silence. Lam¡¯s hand wrapped around mine. As Hamad started to sniffle, I reached out to him, feeling his shoulder before pulling him into a hug. But then the elevator chimed, and we each had to let go.
Chapter 2
The Eschaton hissed and bellowed in it¡¯s moorings, the sound of heating and cooling metal, pumping coolant, and the steady grind of not-well-oiled machinery. It sounded like I felt. Ornery. Tired. Heartbroken. I tapped along until my cane found the plate of loading ramp, and leaned at parade rest as I was taught to. Navigators were hardly heard, and best not seen to boot. We were to wait in darkness until someone so graciously deigned to address us.
I didn¡¯t have to wait long though, ¡°Name and Designation?¡± came a call a few meters up the ramp. Masculine voice, likely the quartermaster if he was bothering to address me.
¡°Navigator 362, Harper. Yeoman-Class,¡± I answered mechanically. No one likes an uppity tool.
¡°Ah.¡± There was a frown in his voice, ¡°Your aide will be along in a moment. Wait there.¡± Aide. That was a lark. As if anyone on the ship was subordinate to us. But they did want someone checking up on us, making sure we didn¡¯t bang into too many bulwarks.
There was a sharp tap on my right side and officious tone, ¡°Navigator? I¡¯m your aide. This way.¡± The voice was feminine, a bit sharp, but not malicious. Hurried. I followed along behind it. The hissing of the ship became muted as we crossed from the entryway into the cramped corridors of the vessel, allowing me to put a hand on the side of the wall and walk along with it.
Walls, especially ship walls, were a Navigator¡¯s best friend. There was an indent at each corner or break with a few lines of tick we could read to tell us which way to the galley, the bridge, what have you. The Eschaton¡¯s walls were a bit rough, sanded to coarsness over it¡¯s career of bangs, scrapes, and near misses.
My Aide didn¡¯t speak to me again until we arrived outside a door, my number in tick hurriedly engraved next to it. She tapped a holo-panel¡¯s surface next to the door, ¡°Your ident-chip will grant you access to your quarters, the galley, the bridge, and any other areas of the vessel you are authorized to visit,¡± she explained. I nodded in her direction and swept my wrist over the holo-panel, and the door hissed as the pneumatics fired to open it. I stepped through into my quarters, the Aide following on my heels.
¡°From your left, along the wall is a desk. On the desk is a tic-terminal with haptic interface, where you will receive the intended destination of the vessel for you to review, along with star charts and course-plotting tools you should be familiar with. You will also have access to this tic-terminal through an interface on the bridge, but you should endeavor to complete all navigational tasks ahead of jump-time.¡±
I followed along the wall until my foot banged lightly against the desk. It felt oddly chintsy, like it was made of a cheap plastic. The edge was scratched, with a quick note in tic on it.
¡°Watch your step.¡± A message from my predecessor, too late to make a difference. Ass.
Continuing along, the next wall you will find the closet, with your personal effects and uniforms.¡± She paused, a catch in her voice. Some Navigators got lost down the tunnel of their studies and needed help changing in and out of clothes. I wasn¡¯t one of them.
¡°Next?¡± I asked, brushing past the awkwardness.
¡°Next along the wall is the lavatory, with sink on the immediate right, sani-stall to the left of the sink, and the head across from that.¡±
Sani-stalls. Eugh. Water was precious in space, so we made do with the weird foam-like sani-gel. Thoroughly unpleasant.
¡°Finally, along the last wall, directly to the right of the entrance is your bunk. That completes an account of your quarters, Navigator,¡± She ended the description with a tap against the wall to the right of the door, likely to let me place her in the room. All in all, it was a useful description, and she seemed to have bothered paying enough attention to Navigator etiquette to not just shove me into a closet. To be treated with professionalism, if not respect or warmth, was at least some small blessing.
¡°Will you require anything else, Navigator?¡± She asked.
¡°Nothing at the moment, thank you,¡± I replied. ¡°When will we be departing?¡±
¡°In approximately three hours, at which time you will be confined to quarters for the duration of the day. Our first jump is scheduled for 1600 hours tomorrow, and you are expected to lay in your course by 1400. Clear?¡±
¡°As crystal.¡±
The hiss of the pneumatic door confirmed her exit, and I was left alone. Alone, for the first time in how long? I¡¯d heard they used to keep us isolated, from decanting, all through our training. Worse than the darkness was the silence, the isolation. The loneliness that set in with nothing to feel, nothing to hear but a proctor¡¯s drone. It drove quite a few of us insane, so they at least let us mingle while we studied. But each of us had to face the loneliness once we were assigned out. Some dealt with it better than others.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
I sighed and made my way to the cheap desk and tic-terminal. Sitting down at it and feeling the buzz of the haptics at my fingertips was oddly comforting. Tic was a ¡°modern¡± innovation, before I¡¯d been decanted, there¡¯d been such a thing as braille, and I suppose tic was close to it, though with dashes instead of strictly being dots. The holographic sensors and haptic interface let the words scroll past our fingers, reading slower of faster with a twitch of the wrist. It took some getting used to, but was fairly intuitive. I scanned across my terminal, checking for the destination my aide had mentioned.
Fortuna. An outlier system, minor in importance, with some mining colonies and deep-ice hauling. A 5-hop jump, 4 if the cargo wasn¡¯t too bulky and the drive cooperated. I flicked the interface towards the cargo manifest and felt an angry buzz. Classified, read the tic. I hmmed, annoyed. Not knowing the cargo made my life more difficult. I couldn¡¯t calculate the jumps as precisely up-front, I¡¯d have to feel out the weight in the moment. Not impossible, but not ideal.
I put in another flick, looking for some information on the infamous jump-drive. If I could get a hold of a manual, I might be able to put together a reasonable guess at my predecessors fate, or at least avoid it myself. Another buzz. Classified. Were they joking? Pushing an unknown tonnage with a drive I knew nothing about? Did they want to vaporize in the mantle of some angry star because I didn¡¯t have a clue what I was doing?
I flicked angrily across the terminal. More Classified notices. All they gave me was the navigational suite, some star-charts, and a destination. It was absurd. I considered my options.
Complain to my aide. Likely she didn¡¯t have anything to do with it, and might make a perfunctory note to the captain of my complaint. Instantly, I¡¯d be tarnished as ¡°difficult.¡±
Option Two. Find someone on the engineer staff, try and get the lowdown from them. Difficult, though not impossible. Harder would be finding someone with the patience to explain the drive-tech to me, let alone the inclination.
Last option, and the one I pretty much had to take: Plot a safe, circuitous route, leaving a margin of error wide enough to push a planetoid through. Eight jumps, minimum. If this was a fast-runner or an important mission, the captain would be furious. But that wasn¡¯t very likely. Worst case, the crew would be annoyed by the jump-sickness, but we wouldn¡¯t all splat because I decided to try and guess what the hell kind of metal I was pushing.
As an added bonus, it would take me longer to calculate all the jump-points. I sighed and pulled up the star charts and navigation tools. It was time to work.
Plotting a jump-course was an exercise in tedium under the best of circumstances. The ship would accelerate to an entry point, usually just on the lip of a star¡¯s gravity well, using the momentum to accelerate to near-lightspeed and break into the aether. There was a technical term for the aether, non-congruent z-space something or other. Essentially, it was a side-dimension to our own, one that was less picky about things like ¡°time¡± and ¡°space.¡± A ship could pop in, navigate a few currents of space-time dilation, and pop right back out half-way across the galaxy. In theory. In actuality, longer jumps required more navigational time, though the difference was measured in seconds. Spend too long in the aether in one go and you¡¯d likely ¡°splat¡±, getting caught by a wild current that dumped you far off-course with no hope of slipping back into the aether, dropping your ship into the middle of a star, or, best case scenario, flinging the atomized corpse of your Navigator across the cosmos and dumping your ship pretty close to the entry point. Besides, more navigational time required higher mass-slingshots, the largest of which were stars, and more powerful jump-drives. There were theories about using planetoids, rocks, hell, even the ship itself to slingshot into the aether for fast, rapid in-system jumps, but after the shutter-drive program was shut down, no one bothered to try anymore. Effectively, there was a minimum and maximum distance for every drive, every tonnage, every ship. And I was missing every single variable.
Star charts were best-guesses, observing the aether was difficult, since looking at it had the nasty probabilistic effect of altering it. The work of course plotting was consulting the charts, comparing them, and trying to find an approach vector that would get us into aether somewhere close to where we wanted to be and leave enough time to navigate the currents. The safest approach was to aim small, short time in the aether, shallow entry vectors, short hops between systems that were near-adjacent in the aether. Aim small, miss small. So that¡¯s what I did. It was a tedious, boring grind, matching together star charts and calculating vectors, but at least it was safe.
By the time I finished the work, someone had brought in a thin meal of nutri-paste, which had long since gone cold (if they¡¯d bother to heat it). Still, there was a ration of water and a crunchy bar of something we called ¡°not-granola¡± back at the collegia. I dumped the paste and gnawed on the not-granola, thinking about Hamad and Lam.
I hoped their situation was better than mine. Hamad was probably doing well enough, buried in schematics and charts, finding new discrepancies and adding addenda to every diagram or tic-spiel he could get his hands on. Think about Lam put a tightness in my chest. I tried to tell myself it would be better if he was happy. Lost in his work in the quiet, zen-like way he handled every indignity of the collegia. To think of him miserable was unbearable, but to imagine him too happy was it¡¯s own pain, that he could let go, as he had of his pre-decanted life, he could let go of me. I felt ashamed for hoping that he felt like I felt, and I squeezed my eyes tight and shook my head, trying to get rid of the thought. I shuffled my way to my cot, laid down, and tried not to cry. It wouln¡¯t bring back my family, my home, and I didn¡¯t want any of these fucking people to see the bluish-purple stains where my tears would soak through the clean white gauze Lam had bandaged for me.
Chapter 3
¡°The captain wishes to inform you that while eight jumps is acceptable given your academic performance at the collegia and being new to the ship, you would do well to endeavor to try and minimize both our travel time and the crew¡¯s discomfort.¡±
I bit my lip. My aide spoke professionally, mechanically. It wouldn¡¯t do any good to be spiteful, to remind her that their last Navigator might well have tried to shave a jump or two, and was rewarded for his efforts and efficiency by being imploded. That classifying cargo and ship specs might seem by-the-book for a warship, it was wholly unnecessary for a junker like the Eschaton, and what''s more profoundly goddamn unwise not to at least give me some redacted hint as to what, precisely, I was meant to push through a tear in spacetime.
So, instead, I nodded.
¡°This way to the bridge, please. We are approaching close-stellar orbit.¡± The ship shook as if to emphasize her point, and I instinctively grabbed for the handrail, letting my knees loosen and wobble. ¡°Sea legs¡± we called it during training. As a vessel approached a star, it¡¯s flares and radiation would begin to act a bit like waves, bucking the ship around. A skilled pilot could minimize the effect, but a good pilot knew to line up the vector of the entry point, no matter what, and let people slide around like marbles if it meant the ship didn¡¯t enter the aether wrong.
There was a split of a gasp from my aide, and I stretched out my other arm, catching hers with what either looked like practised ease or an entirely psychotic gesture. She tensed, and I let go.
¡°...Sorry about that.¡± I mumbled.
If she was phased by the shaking, she made no further indication of it, but I did hear her clasp the guide rail as I did.
Bridges were noisy places. The whir and hum of terminals, quiet voices speaking into comms, and the occasional shrill, barked command of an officer. If anyone noticed me entering, they made no sign of it.
My aide took my arm and led me forward before putting my hand on another guide rail, this one a semi-circle, directly in front of me. ¡°You¡¯re crow¡¯s nest, Navigator.¡± I nodded and swallowed hard. I¡¯d pushed training vessels configured with all sorts of weights and bulks, a few different jump-drives, and I¡¯d double-checked my star charts, but my nerves still prickled.
¡°Navigator is at the ready!¡± My aide shouted, raising her voice above the din. Another voice answered her after a moment.
¡°Good. Pilot?¡± A deep tone. The captain, most likely.
¡°On final approach vector. Corrections?¡±
I slid my hand across the haptic interface of the railing, feeling the tic read out the velocity and direction of the vessel. Lucky me, I had a good pilot. ¡°No correction. Navigator ready.¡±
¡°Send him down,¡± the captain ordered, and a mechanical whirr intensified below my feet. The pedestal I was standing on sank and tilted, slowly but surely, the din of the bridge fading softly away. There was a click and a jamming noise as it locked into place, putting me into the proper ¡°crow¡¯s nest¡±, a bubble of transparent plastic and polymer that jutted out of the vessel¡¯s prow, like some sort of living figurehead, though the reef of plastic was currently covered with heavy metal shutters.
The pilot¡¯s voice buzzed from a comm, ¡°What¡¯s your name, Navigator?¡±
I hesitated. ¡°...362.¡±
The voice repeated, a bit annoyed, ¡°Not your designation. Your real name. I fly with humans, not gears.¡±
I sighed a bit internally. Some pilots were like this. Superstitious about Navigators, they tried to be nice to us. Treat us humanely, like people. It was a bit forced, after all, I was in even more danger than them.
¡°Harper,¡± I answered, undoing the bandages around my eyes.
¡°Harper? You guys always have odd names. I¡¯m Mezka. You any good at this Harper?¡± the pilot asked.
¡°I¡¯d be better if I knew what I was pushing,¡± I clicked my tongue. Stupid to complain. The pilot might scrap the entry, and then there¡¯d be hell to pay with the captain. But instead, the pilot only laughed, a tinny thing.
¡°Yeah¡ well, you should talk to Slevin about that. I¡¯ll introduce you later. Sorry I didn¡¯t jaw with you before this.¡±
¡°Mm.¡± I answered, not sure how long this conversation could last. I heard the grinding of gears as the panels blocking my plastiglass shell rolled away.
¡°Just take it easy, feel it out. You want me to count you in?¡±
¡°Please.¡± I answered. It was unnecessary, I¡¯d feel the aether kick just as I always had, but I still liked the warning.
¡°3¡¡± I draped my bandages around my neck.
¡°2¡¡± Slowly, I let my hands fall back to the metal of the guiderail.
¡°1¡¡± The voice slowed, drawling as the dilation became to wear in. Somewhere, far away, the jump drive began to reach out to me.
¡°Entry.¡± My eyes shot open.
All around me was blinding white. I blinked, willing my ¡°eyes¡± to dissipate the flash and focus on what I needed to find. The light dimmed, and I saw all around me the aether, flowing, crackling, rivers of inky blackness, trails of smoke and sparks of pitch crackling against an endless white expanse. Every navigator saw the aether differently, hence the difficulty in plotting a course or making concrete observations. But Hamad¡¯s extra lectures paid off. I searched the ink and saw one of the sparking cracks of night peeling through the blinding day. My next jump point. I just had to ease over a single current and then I¡¯d be through it, back out into real-space.
I reached with my hand for the rail, and felt the hook-and-pull of the jump drive tear into my consciousness. Like a rake across your soul, Lam had called it. But I was in. Slowly, steadily, I started to push, willing the drive to coast us gently around the current. The drive hummed, it¡¯s familiar warmth spreading as we eased forward. And then, just as quickly as it came, it went away. The warmth died, and a terrible cold stayed in its place. It was impossible. The sheer stupidity of it. I had been prepared for nearly everything. Tons and tons of cargo. Ancient drives that could barely be controlled. But not this. No one was prepared for this. Every curse I had ever heard flowed out of my mouth in one, elongated, screaming syllable. They¡¯d assigned me a ship with a shutter drive.
And I knew I was going to die.
¡°To give them credit, the theory was sound,¡± Hamad opined, squeaking a bit in the busted-down arm-chair of the common room.
¡°What are we discussing?¡± Lam asked, drying his head with a towel, dripping water everywhere. He¡¯d just come from the shower. I tried not to think about it.
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¡°Shutter drive,¡± I said, half-bored. ¡°Hamad thinks they were a smart idea.¡±
¡°Not smart,¡± he cut back, ¡°Just¡ y¡¯know. Interesting. In theory.¡±
¡°How so?¡± Lam humored him. He always did.
Hamad creaked again, ¡°OK. So, in the aether, physics breaks down, right? We know we can push mass with a drive, but we¡¯re not sure how, right? The relationship between force, size, velocity, it all goes out the window. So we do all these calculations, hop in, and let the jump-drive cruise us where we need to go, right?¡±
¡°Little trickier than that.¡± I grumbled.
Hamad clicked his tongue, ¡°Yeah, I know, Mr. Best-Marks-In-Aether-Piloting.¡± It was still a sore point. Logically, it should¡¯ve been Hamad to take top-score. Even Lam would make sense, given his history with surfing.
¡°But, we know the jump-drive can push mass, right? Not just cruise. That¡¯s the theory with the shutter drive. The Navigator controls the throttle. You don¡¯t even need an entry point to coast on, the ship can literally flip in on itself, go into aether wherever it wants, pop back out in a localized space, meters from where it was.¡±
¡°And if you miss, even a little, splat,¡± I slapped my hands together for dramatic effect. ¡°A bug on the windshield of space-time.¡±
¡°Not if you can really get sink into the time dilation. Take all the time in the universe to line up your shot. It¡¯s just¡ y¡¯know.¡±
¡°No one has that kinda concentration,¡± I finished with a nod. ¡°Dilate for long enough, your brain will liquify. How long was it the average shutter-Navigator lasted?¡±
¡°...Two jumps. Two-point-three, to be exact.¡± Hamad clarified. He couldn¡¯t resist a factoid, even if it messed up his argument, ¡°But! I heard from a guy who heard from a guy. The average was so low because almost everyone they tried it on splatted. But someone was dragging that average up. Someone made it through, time and time again.¡±
¡°Right. An ubermensch Navigator. Screw that.¡± I waved dismissively.
Lam wheezed, as if considering something. ¡°Not necessarily. We¡¯re always getting better, aren¡¯t we? The old Navigators teach us, we get a little better, we teach each other¡ we all row together. We get a little better each time. Maybe someday¡¡±
His voice trailed off. We were getting better. But what was the point? Better tools, in someone else¡¯s hands.
I squeezed my eyes tight. I wanted to scream, and keep screaming, until I vaporized into cosmic dust. I was going to die. I wasn¡¯t an ubermensch. I wasn¡¯t even a particularly good Navigator. Something flashed across my brain. Not despair, but fury. Raw, primal anger. How dare they? How dare they take me out of a bottle, train me up, take my eyes, my soul, make me into this thing, and then, on top of it all, lie to me? How dare they do this to all of us? I had no choice.
I fought back hot, angry tears. Lam¡¯s voice echoed in my head. We all row together. There was always a choice. I could give up, or I could do something about it. I could ram this goddamn ship through a supernova, obliterate it, so no other Navigator ever got called up to where I was.
Fuck it. If I couldn¡¯t do it for me, I could do it for my brothers and sisters. I¡¯d smash this rotten husk of a sick joke scrap heap across the heavens.
I concentrated. Feeling for the drive, the drift of the aether. I was halfway down the dilation. Seconds were days now. I could push it further. I felt the slight tingle of the tic interface beneath my fingers. Microscopic pulses of electrons. Concentrate, concentrate. They ticked past, slower and slower, like grains getting stuck together in an hourglass. Seconds. Days. Weeks. Years.
I opened my eyes for an hour. Turned, saw the blink of a distant sparkling tear. My hand pulsed towards the throttle. Slowly, slowly, we turned. Micron by micron. Inch by inch. I lined up to take my shot. The tear glimmered in the distance. Aim small, miss small.
My eyes watered, crisps of distortion at the edges of my vision, creeping towards the center. I kept my eyes locked on the tear. Almost. I was so close now, even as my vision sank into a pinprick of darkness.
And then, I opened the throttle.
The drive roared like an angry beast, it rushed through me, through the ship, and we were off, skipping across the currents, blasting through them like they were never even there. On the scale of micro-seconds I adjusted and turned, skipping over waves, feeling the line I¡¯d drawn to my exit. To my death. I hoped it would be quick.
I felt the tear grow all around me, and the time dilation began to slip away. A small mercy. Smashing through a star probably hurt a lot less if you didn¡¯t stretch the experience out over an aeon. The roaring grew, louder and louder, deafening in it¡¯s shaking fury, until I couldn¡¯t tell if I was screaming or the ship was. Time sped past, focusing to a single point that went on to infinity.
Death wasn¡¯t so bad. It was bright. Brighter than it had any right to be. I hoped Lam would be there. But there was only the light. And then, it started to burn, and with a howl of agony, I realized I was still alive.
¡°The gauze, the gauze you idiot! Put it back on him!¡± There was a crashing of clumsy hands, and the gauze slipped back over my eyes, binding the lids shut against the impossible, blinding light of our demented universe.
I groaned, miserably. Why wasn¡¯t I dead?
¡°You missed, by the way. If you were aiming for Fortuna.¡± Someone spoke, a bright, chipper tone. ¡°Ow- Hey!¡±
¡°Shut up, Slevin.¡± The pilot¡¯s voice. I could hear it better now. More mature, less mechanical and static-y.
¡°The captain wants him back on deck to make a full report.¡± That was my Aide. Officious as ever, but a tinge of anxiety in her voice.
¡°Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck that,¡± drawled Slevin. ¡°Not ¡®til we get our stories straight, Valle.¡±
I groaned again, gritted my teeth, and asked the question I was dreading, ¡°Where are we?¡±
¡°A lovely system with the charming name of DS-512. Oh? Haven¡¯t heard of it? Well that is because we are on the wrong fuckin¡¯ side of the cluster. We are deep in it now. You threw us straight off the grid, deep, deep in Collective space.¡±
¡°Focus. The Collective doesn¡¯t matter right now. You got us here, you can get us back again, yeah?¡± The pilot spoke, Mezka. ¡°Wait, first of all, do you remember anything of what happened?¡±
¡°This¡ ship¡ has¡ a¡ shutter... drive.¡± I gritted my teeth and spoke over a wracking headache. Silence ensued.
¡°...What.¡± My aide. I guess Valle was her name.
¡°...Technically, this ship has a converted shutter drive-¡± The bright, chipper tone.
¡°...What.¡± Valle again. ¡°And no one thought to tell me, so as to potentially warn our Navigator, that we are flying with a drive that, under ideal conditions, has a fatality rate approaching 99 percent?¡±
¡°...Hey! I didn¡¯t break it. It was supposed to run like a standard jump drive, coast on through. But he- he did something to it! The aether shielding plates ended up embedded three decks down! The conversion held for years!¡±
Ah. Blame. Hello again, my old friend. Screw it. They could airlock me for all I cared. Let them find their own way home.
I twitched a bit as something occurred to me, a tiny dot in aether, a floating orb I had seen at the corner of my vision as I first awoke, ¡°...How long have I been out?¡±
¡°Three days. Give or take. The captain ordered us to drift back towards the nearest stellar body until you woke up.¡± Valle answered. I got the impression that she, like Hamad, couldn¡¯t resist answering a question she knew the answer to.
I struggled to sit up. ¡°We have to leave. We have to get out of here. The Collective¡¯s seen us, they¡¯ll be on us in-¡±
And then, all hell broke loose.
Chapter 4
Hannibal sat on the shore, watching the waves tug gently at the beach. If he peered just so, he could see the sails of a leisure yacht or two peek over the horizon.
Closer to shore, his children played, splashing and laughing in the water. It had been a holiday for them, he was back from campaign, their mother had taken a leave of absence from the Assembly, and the children were not occupied by school.
He stretched out and lied down, enjoying the feeling of warmth that radiated over him from the sun and the sand.
¡°Sir?¡±
With a buzz, the holo-emitters flicked off, one after another, replacing the sun with a sterile fluorescent glow and the sand with the hard metal floor.
Jinn stood over him, her lanky frame framed against the harsh metallic light.
¡°It¡¯s ¡®comrade,¡¯ Jinn. I¡¯m no gentleman,¡± he grumbled a bit, rubbing his eyes. She ignored him.
¡°We¡¯re coming into orbit around Europa. You¡¯re needed on the bridge.¡± Her tone was flat, authoritative, a mirror of her features. She wore the military dress of the Collective smartly, all red hues along sharp, creased lines of black linen. One could almost mistake her as a born and bred officer. The shaved sides of her head and her tight, braided cornrows were all that remained of her history as a pirate. Well. That and her penchant for viciously marauding along the corp trade lanes.
¡°Anything on the sensors yet?¡±
She grinned, a hint of malevolence at the corners of her mouth, ¡°A corp trade-galleon sir. Loaded with tonnage. Hit a spot of luck, sir.¡±
He nodded. Likely they were freighting raw ore back from the outer belts, more sweat and blood pried out from the asteroids by the indentured laborers the corps were so fond of employing. The galleons themselves were likely crewed by private captains, insured against theft and piracy by the corps. Some were honest men and women, trying to make a buck or two out in the rim. However, they all turned a blind eye to the excesses of whichever corp signed their paychecks.
¡°Mm. Well. Time to be wicked.¡±
Like the rest of his vessel, the bridge of the Tanit was an exercise in efficient beauty. Curved, organic lines, gleaming steel, and banks of flashing terminals. The duty crew sat at their stations, each monitoring some key function of the cruiser. Hannibal knew each of his crew by name, but the bridge crew were sometimes difficult to pick apart. Their shaved heads, the gleam of the I/O nodes at the base of their neck, and the uncanny blue glow of their eyes marked them with a certain ubiquity.
¡°Comrade Captain on the deck,¡± Jinn announced as they stepped through the bulkhead door. The crew made no visible sign of respect, nor any motion save for the careful attenuations and flicks of dextrous mechanofingers. Jinn sighed, perhaps wondering why she even bothered.
Hannibal took up his position in front of the main holoprojector in the center of the room, and Jinn followed suit, standing on the left side of the ¡°box¡± of holos that formed their tactical grid. At present, it showed the Tanit, making its way slowly around the curve of Europa. In the distance, the freighter could be made out. With a flick of her hand, Jinn focused the view upon their opposition. An odd ship, frigate-sized, but pushing a load meant for a heavy-freighter.
¡°Military surplus,¡± Jinn cooed, her mouth a tight line. ¡°Could still have its fangs.¡±
¡°Mm. Perhaps.¡± Hannibal was thinking. Something wasn¡¯t quite right. A false assumption may have been made somewhere. Why would a private captain push such an over-sized tonnage? The risk was enormous. Desperation? Greed? Difficult to tell. In the back of his mind, another possibility scratched.
He watched the ship arc slowly around the gas giant. Where was it headed? To a collection point? But those were typically on the fringe of the sector. No¡ they were headed inwards. Towards the small red dwarf that smoldered at the heart of this system.
¡°Bring us in over them, and let loose a cutter-volley. Make them drop their tonnage,¡± he ordered.
¡°...That¡¯ll rip up some of the cargo,¡± Jinn quirked an eyebrow, ¡°And if they lose tonnage, they can try and get away. Run us out to the black until they call in an escort.¡±
¡°If they run towards the black, Jinn.¡± She raised her eyebrows, and Hannibal smiled. ¡°If they run towards the black.¡±
The Eschaton leaped and screamed as the cutter-volley of mass-driver projectiles smashed through the moorings locking it¡¯s cargo into place at the bow of the ship, sending it tumbling outward into space.
¡°No, no.¡± I hissed, scrambling to my feet and feeling desperately for the wall. ¡°Don¡¯t run to the star.¡± I nearly tripped over a groaning pile of limbs.
¡°Valle, Valle?¡± I pulled at the pile, hoping to extract my aide. ¡°We need to get to the bridge, I have to tell the captain-¡±
Another volley rocketed the ship, and we tumbled together out the door and into the hall. Someone grabbed me, roughly by the collar, and hauled me up to my feet. Mizka shouted, ¡°Bridge, right? Let¡¯s go. Grab an arm, Slevin!¡± Someone else grabbed me by the other arm, and they both lifted, carrying me down the hallway as the ship shook and spun.
¡°If we make it to a jump-point, can you get us out of here!?¡± Mizka screamed as we ran.
¡°No! It¡¯s impossible! I don¡¯t know where we are! I¡¯ve got no course, no calculations. We need to run for the black! Call in another corp vessel!¡±The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
There was a shearing tear, and the Eschaton screamed down at us.
¡°Yeah, that¡¯s not happening,¡± Mizka dismissed, their tone clipped. ¡°Reinforcements aren¡¯t an option for us. If we make it to a jump point, can you at least try!?¡±
¡°If I had coordinates, and if I knew where I was, I still wouldn¡¯t, because our drive is a-¡± I stopped. Horrible realization dawning on me.
¡°...It¡¯s a shutter drive!¡± Slevin positively cried with joy.
¡°No. I-.¡± I remembered Hamad. ¡°Theoretically possible.¡±
¡°Good enough!¡± came Mizka¡¯s reply, as they tossed me down into the crow¡¯s nest.
My head banged against the railing, but there was no time to even register the pain. I tore with my fingers at the gauze, praying the shutters were open.
Mizka¡¯s voice crackled in the speaker. They sounded calmer now. In control. They spoke slowly, authoritatively.
¡°The captain¡¯s dead, Harper. Do you understand what we¡¯re going to try and do? Short hops. Turn and shoot. Rinse, repeat.¡±
I gritted my teeth. ¡°Yeah. I got it.¡±
¡°No count this time. We¡¯re going to be in-and-out. Slevin¡¯s going to keep it pulsing as long as she can. You ready?¡±
I gripped the control rail, my knuckles white. ¡°Ready.¡±
The entire ship seemed to flip on itself. A ghost of nothing, as it slid like a knife into the aether. I opened my eyes to a blinding white, but then I saw it. The spark I¡¯d noticed in the corner of my eye.
I grinned. ¡°Got you.¡±
Hannibal stood, arms folded, watching the holo screen.
¡°They¡¯re not running for the black. They¡¯re running for the center of the system. Why would they, unless-¡± Jinn¡¯s eyes widened as the realization dawned.
¡°They have a Navigator,¡± she muttered.
¡°Indeed.¡± Hannibal answered, matter-of-factly.
¡°We can disable them. Take out their local drives, leave them drifting.¡± Jinn suggested.
¡°A reasonable plan.¡± Hannibal noted.
And then the ship vanished from the holo-screen.
Jinn¡¯s eyes narrowed as she barked for an update, ¡°Sensors!? Find me that ship!¡±
Hannibal tersely clipped over her, ¡°Belay that. Armor up. Seal bulkheads.¡±
There was a flash, and the small hologram of the corp vessel re-appeared on the screen, this time, directly aft of the Tanit. A rip of mass drivers shuddered out towards them, ripping into the Tanit¡¯s hull.
The ship shook, but held. ¡°Armor is holding, Comrade Captain.¡±
Hannibal¡¯s voice was ice. ¡°Very good. Full stop, go to drift. Full power to armor relays.¡±
¡°...We¡¯re not firing back?¡± Jinn asked.
¡°Can¡¯t hit what you can¡¯t see, Jinn.¡±
His eyes locked to the holoscreen. The ship blipped out. A moment later, it was back, this time on their port-side. Another volley. Another blip. The Tanit shook and blared, a shrill scream of metal on metal, but the armor held, most of the mass drivers deflecting harmlessly off into the abyss of space.
Three more times the ship blipped across the screen. Three more times it fired, until, finally, it stilled. Hannibal and Jinn stared at it, not daring to blink.
¡°Status?¡± asked Hannibal calmly.
¡°Breaches on decks 3 and 4, but bulkheads are holding steady. 36 injuries, no fatalities. Corp ship is¡ no energy signature from their engines. They¡¯re dead in the water.¡± Jinn read out diligently, an icy tinge of panic draining from her voice.
¡°Very good. Hail them.¡±
It had gotten a bit easier as it went along. The first time we punched out of the aether, my stomach flipped and my eyes screamed at the light. But, I shut my eyes, tight tight tight, and waited for the drive to punch us back in.
There was a thundering boom as our mass drivers slung towards the Collective vessel. Mizka¡¯s voice was ecstatic in my ear. ¡°Nailed ¡®em! Clean across the bow! This just might work! Okay, we¡¯re going back in.¡±
Each time we punched our way out, the panic in Mizka¡¯s voice rose. ¡°Deflection, deflection! What the fuck do they make their ships out of!? Hold on, hold on, one more time-¡±
But I knew the Eschaton was spent. It guttered and moaned, like some dying leviathan, and the wan hum of the shutter drive at last stilled.
¡°No, no!¡± Slevin wailed through the comms. ¡°We were so close!¡±
¡°Grenades and horse-shoes,¡± I grumbled, stretching my arm up, feeling blindly for the rim of the crow¡¯s nest. A long, slender arm reached down and wrapped around mine, pulling me up.
¡°Are you alright, Navigator?¡± it was my aide, Valle. She pulled me unsteadily to my feet.
¡°Guh.¡± I made a guttural noise and leaned against something hard.
¡°They¡¯re hailing us!¡± someone shouted, their tone panicked.
There was a terse silence, until Mizka took charge. ¡°...Open the channel.¡±
A voice crackled in from the Collective vessel. ¡°This is Hannibal Symes, captain of the Collective Vessel Tanit. I would like to speak with your Navigator.¡±
I could hear the swivel of chairs as our crewmates turned to stare at me.
¡°...Ah, Navigator? We don¡¯t have a-¡± Mizka started.
¡°You are in an intensely precarious position, Corporate Vessel. Do not further endanger it by lying.¡±
I felt someone jab me with an elbow.
¡°Er. This is the ship¡¯s Navigator,¡± I replied, uncertainly.
There was a sigh of relief along the line, ¡°Ah, excellent. We were worried about you, brother. That was quite the trick you pulled in the aether.¡±
¡°Uhm.¡± If I still had my sight, I would have looked around for someone, anyone to help me out. Instead, I shrugged helplessly.
¡°T-thank you?¡±
The voice laughed, a warm, hearty thing, ¡°We¡¯re all in one piece over here. We¡¯d like to send some shuttles over to start on repairs, and help with any injuries you have. I¡¯d also like to continue this conversation face to face, if you don¡¯t mind.¡±
¡°Uhm.¡± My mouth worked noiselessly for a few minutes. We were, to my knowledge, completely at their mercy. We didn¡¯t have the crew to fend off a boarding party, and even if we did, they¡¯d just blast us into the vacuum from their ship. ¡°Alright. That would be¡ helpful?¡±
Another laugh, ¡°See you soon, brother.¡± And the comm line went dead.
Silence.
There was a squeaking noise right next to me. Slevin¡¯s shrill voice demanded, ¡°What in the fuck just happened?¡±