The Hollow Stars - Chapter One
Mar. 5th, 2004 08:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rosipheleeFloating alone in space, she tries desperately to remember who she is and what happened to her...
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Chapter 1: Adrift
Deep Space, 5.32 light years from Aldebaran, Terran date 03.03.13140
Caroline…
She was in space - she knew that much. She could feel the emptiness of it, the silence of it slithering into her soul. She could feel the pull of the turning stars, like thorns brushing her skin, and she wondered if it should concern her that she felt as if she could gather the stars into the curve of her hand like embers from the hearth.
Caroline… A child’s voice calling. Caroline… Caroline… A boy, his voice on the edge of breaking, a teenage girl with the sneer drowned by fear.
Were they calling her? Was she Caroline? Where were they? She tried to open her eyes but could feel nothing, not even the sweep of her lashes against her cheek, and could see nothing, not even the radiant stars. She had always loved that when they travelled the star roads – the way that the stars had blazed, free of the taint of atmosphere. Time after time, she had begged her way onto the bridge to watch as they made the transition to non-space and the stars shrank and expanded like water, if water could be so brightly aflame.
Caroline…
Was she a pilot, then? No, she thought, nothing so useful. A teacher, perhaps, to explain why she heard children’s voices. But no, she could not imagine herself standing before a class. Then she realised that she could not imagine herself at all. She had no idea how tall she was, how old, what the hue of her skin was or the colour of her eyes. A wave of hot panic swept through her, and, as it subsided, she realised she was cold. Not cold in the quick thrill of fresh water or a few steps through a chill wind, but cold into her bones and veins. She was so cold that her heart beat sluggishly and limbs were heavy; so heavy with it she could not shiver. She could not tell if she was breathing.
She had never been truly cold before. She was certain of that, though she did not know why. She tried to move herself, and failed and again fought panic. Only her mind worked, it seemed, and even it did not work fully.
Caroline!
The voices were wailing her name but she ignored them and concentrated. Who? Why? What? Where? When? The eternal questions, she thought and wondered why that made her want to laugh.
She heard a woman’s voice in her memory saying sharply, There are no eternal truths - only eternal questions. And she could see the woman – tall, slim, dressed in a grey, expensive hand-tailored suit, honey-blonde hair drawn back severely from her face. Mother, she thought and it was something to know that she would recognise her if she saw her.
She could probably dispense with what and when, she decided, which left her with three questions. Who am I? Where am I and why?
Since it was the only name she knew, she assumed she was Caroline. She could not prove it, of course, but she wanted something definite, something to cling to in the absolute darkness.
Caroline. Her name was Caroline, and she was alive.
I was obviously a pampered child, Caroline thought. I have never been truly cold; I don’t appear to work for my living – and I resent it; my mother can afford hand-sewn clothes when anyone can have fitted clothes woven by asking a computer. So – I am a rich woman’s daughter. Do I know where the wealth is from? Trade? Inherited? She waited but nothing came out of her memory. What else could she tell about herself? I am not given to panicking. I suspect I am rather sensible. I love to look at the stars. Perhaps I should move on to where? And why? Why is some rich woman’s useless daughter floating in space? How the hell did I get here? Where is here? What happened to me?
Then she remembered:
The floor was cold under her fee,t and she was thrown sideways as the ship heaved beneath her. She scrabbled at the wall for support. The ship listed and stilled, but she could hear strange hissings and spittings all around her. The other woman in the corridor grabbed at her arm and tried to move her, but she resisted.
“Get in your pod, Caro!” the other woman snapped.
“No.”
The other woman leant forward, glancing at the children huddled further along the corridor, and hissed, “The ship’s going to go up. I’m in contact with the bridge. We evacuate now, Caro.”
She should have been memorable but Caroline, watching her own memories as if she were a stranger, had no idea who she was. She wore black, tight-fitting and high-necked, and a plain, functional belt slung over her hips. She was black, slim, tall, with her hair bound into masses of braids, which whipped around her waist. Caroline thought she was elegant and terrifying.
“I’ll go in one of the normal pods. Put the kids in that thing. You know we can’t get them all in what we’ve got left. They’ll have a chance in that over-supplied monstrosity my mother’s dumped us with.”
“Caro – it’s my job to put you in it.”
“I don’t give a s***!” The ship lurched again. “I’m a grown woman, Arwen. I’m old enough to make a choice and live with the consequences. The kids aren’t. They deserve the chance.”
She shoved down the corridor and slapped her hand onto a panel. Doors slid open, and she began to hustle the kids through.
Arwen came to join her, and they bundled the children through with more speed than gentleness. The last through was a half-grown girl, her hair and skin dyed lurid colours and her cheeks stitched with flashing threads. She half-turned as she crossed into the evacuation pod, and Caroline met her gaze.
“You’re in charge, Maddy,” she said. “You know the drill.”
Maddy nodded, and said shakily, but with a spark of her usual sneer, “Trust me, why don’t you? Luck.”
“Luck,” Arwen said, and closed the doors on her. After a moment they heard a rumble, and the corridor shook as the pod began its roll to join the evacuation queue. The two women began to move back along the corridor, checking lights to find an undamaged pod. Suddenly Arwen stiffened and snapped, “Suit up, Caro!”
Caroline reached back and pulled a hood over her hair and immediately a transparent cloth slithered over her face, sealing her in. The ship shook again, and the corridor seemed to go grey.
Her feet rose from the floor and she spun gracelessly. Beyond her, she could see Arwen twirling, grasping the side of the corridor to pull herself along, and she thought dimly, Too late. Too, too late.
And everything was falling apart. The walls were collapsing silently, floating apart at the seams. She saw a sparkling knot of wires drift past and shuddered as it went black. A wave of fire flashed up and then failed, with nothing to make it burn. She went tumbling onwards, one more speck in the stream of metal, plastic and ceramic plating. Then she saw the darkness, the stars blazing, and thought incongruously, I have lived longer than Achilles.
The night was full of shadows. Parts of the Louisa May spun through space, dark against the star strewn night. Through it all were the thin beams, the laser claws which had been set against them. There was a black spot in space before them, and it resolved itself before her eyes as a ship, painted black as night, the source of those cruel beams. And she thought, Why? Why bother? Black paint would not fool any sensors and all shipboard views were built from sensor arrays. Almost never did anyone in space rely on physical visuals. There was no point, no point at all.
She could see the evacuation pods rocketing away in all directions and she was glad of that, at least. She was glad they had insisted on the drills when they started the cruise, even though none of them had thought they would be needed. She was glad…
She almost giggled and then stopped it as it rose in her throat. The suit she wore was the best available: could insulate her and provide food, air and fluids in an airless ship or damaged pod, but it was not designed for open space. Already something was failing, making her giddy.
There was a flash that stung her eyes, and she heard screaming. As she blinked, she dismissed the sounds. There was no comlink in her suit and sound didn’t carry through a vacuum. Another flash, another set of screams. A third.
This time she saw it and understood. The black ship was targeting the evacuation pods. A part of her brain babbled of the rules of war, the Sirius Conventions, the law of the star roads. Another part of her just watched as the large pod spun into her view. She tried to push towards it, though it was kilometres away by now. She could see the insignia emblazoned on its side and screamed, Maddy!
Already lasers were licking at its sides. Golden flame washed across it, so it glowed like honey in its last moment.
Then, almost slowly, it exploded. She thought she heard Maddy call her, a voice shrieking, Caroline!
It was too late, and she could only scream to herself as voice after voice around her called, Caroline! Caroline! She could feel their dying, the coldness blotting them away; the roar of their pain. There was something in the darkness, something foul and bloated and hungry and she could feel it drawing their pain to it, swallowing their deaths.
No! Caroline thought.
There rang in her mind a voice like thunder, bright with rage. This shall not be! Mark you, I bear witness!
Arwen came floating out of the wreckage. She was still shrouded in her suit, but now she glowed. Light poured from her and Caroline looked on her with the beginning of hope. The light that spread from her seemed so clean in this darkness that the horror dimmed a little. She was almost too bright to look upon. Every one of her braids had risen on end in a corona around her head and each one burnt with white light. Her skin glowed, and her eyes were like suns. Dimly, Caroline thought, Arwen has become a star.
Again that thunderous voice rang forth, I live in the service of the Light and this shall not be!
And all that light went flashing forth to strike at the black shi,p and suddenly the children’s voices rang through Caroline’s mind again. The black ship shuddered, and the sense of foulness withdrew slightly. Still the light poured through Arwen, and the black ship turned, began to dwindle into non-space.
Caroline! Maddy’s voice wailed.
I’m here! Caroline thought. Here!
The black ship hovered on the edge of transition, and Caroline heard Arwen whisper, Caro. I need your help. We need rescuing and I’ve got nothing left.
Concentrate! Caroline screamed but it was too late. In the instant of transition, darkness came flowing from the black ship. It passed above Caroline, and struck Arwen, sending her spinning away. For a moment her light blazed through, but then darkness wrapt around her. For a last instant, the light blazed and Caroline heard, quite clearly, Arwen say, But I know who you are!
Then she was gone, and the darkness whipped back to its source. The black ship faded, and she was alone in the cold emptiness of space.
For a few moments, remembering, Caroline could make no sense of it. Such things could not happen, not to her. It felt like she had slipped into the mind of a stranger. Then she regained her sense and thought, When? How long had she been floating here, slipping between consciousness and oblivion, delusion and sanity? She was hearing the voices of dead children.
Perhaps I am dead, she thought calmly. I was very close when Arwen died, and the suit couldn't have lasted long. How long ago was that?
She couldn’t remember. She had no way of marking the time within the darkness of her solitary mind.
Caroline… Maddy whined.
Get lost, Caroline thought. You’re dead. I might be. Or I might not. But you definitely are. That struck her as funny, and hysteria rose through her like bile. In its wake came real, screaming, mad fear, and she felt herself battering at the confines of her mind, trying desperately to crack her eyes open, to move her hand, to see or feel in this nothingness.
Something in her mind unfolded, as if all the crinkled layers of her brain had flattened themselves. Suddenly, the constraints of her thoughts were not the constraints of her skull. She was in utter darkness, but she knew now where all the wreckage hung; where the frozen bodies waited. Her own body was as still as if she was dead, but now there was a universe beyond her physical confines. Her mind brushed through the kilometres of cluttered space around her, and she found Arwen. Still she stood spread-eagled, as she had in her glory, but now she was as brittle as the wind. She had shone, but now she glittered with ice where the last water in her body had frozen around her as it evaporated, sheathing her in a crystal shroud.
No! Caroline thought and flinched away. Her mind went soaring, out across light-years of empty space. No! At last she added, Help me! Please! Please! Somebody help me!
Fleet Battlecruiser Anansi, 5.34 light years from Aldebaran, Terran date 03.03.13140
Ben Arslan, Junior Grade Lieutenant, third scan tech and newest and most junior bridge officer of the Interplanetary Security Force Ship Anansi, jerked back in his seat as if he’d been punched in the ribs. His coffee mug went flying off the console to cascade down the front of his clean, and very new, uniform. For a moment, he didn’t even notice for he was lost in the depths of space, surrounded by death and debris and shivering on the edge of terror.
The hot liquid seeping through his trousers recalled him to himself in time to hear Captain Chen say, “Mr Arslan?”
He shot to his feet, said, “Sir!” and waited miserably. The captain waited, looking at him, and he kept his stance still and straight despite the disconcerting trickle of something warm and wet down his thigh. Captain Chen regarded him from the raised command chair at the centre of the bridge, but said nothing. Behind her he could see Honora Reyna, the com officer, choke back a snicker. Ben wished he could vanish or that the floor would open neatly below him and remove him from the bridge. The captain looked him up and down, a slight smile curving her lips, and he flashed back to the time when he was ten years old and his Aunt Ria, home on leave, had caught him filling his sister Judit’s bed with spiders.
“If we were at any degree of battle readiness, Mr Arslan, I would leave you to drip. As we are not, I am sure Mr Kamei can spare your genius while you ensure you are dressed appropriately for an officer. Dismissed, Mr Arslan.”
Ben knew better than to argue, so he saluted and squelched off the bridge. As the doors slid shut behind him, he went across to put his hand to the lift doors. Immediately words flashed up on the doors – ‘Genetic profile recognised. Access denied.’
He almost groaned, but thought better of it and began the walk back towards the crew quarters in the hub of the ship. He had a fair idea what Aunt Ria would have done under the same circumstances, and if Captain Chen thought he would learn a useful lesson from walking the two kilometres back to his quarters with a large, wet stain spreading across his groin – well, it could easily have been worse.
Ben was tall, like most of the Arslan family, and he covered the ground quickly enough. The sting of embarrassment wore off in seconds, and he began to think. He did not consider himself to be particularly clumsy, and he was not given to wild flights of imagination. The more he turned that flash of terror around in his mind, the more uneasy he became with the conclusions he was drawing.
He wedged himself into his assigned quarters and stripped off his trousers, twisting to chuck them into the laundry chute to his left hand. To his right was his bunk, with storage space below it, before him a wash cubicle of his own, a lieutenant’s privilege. The floor space he stood on was less than a metre square. Crew quarters were not a priority on a warship, even for its officers. Wriggling into clean trousers he began to work through the implications of that flash of vision.
He might be only twenty-five and the most junior of junior officers on board Anansi but amongst his own people he was a veteran of sorts. He knew who he was expecting to encounter in this sector, and the nearest of them was back on Aldebaran station. The pure panic of the encounter tended to confirm that. One of the first things he had been drilled in, when he was barely into his teens, was how to keep calm in a crisis. If that was one of his people out there, they had been pushed to a point beyond all their training. If, as seemed more and more likely, whoever was out there was not one of his people they needed help. Either way, he was the only one available.
He decided that he would have to risk Chen’s sarcasm and leant against his bunk to let his mind flow free. Through the innards of the ship he flashed, tight beamed, dodging around the bright cores of his shipmates’ minds. Then he was sliding through Anansi’s skin and out into space. He locked his shields around his own mind, protecting his vulnerability, and let his probes flood out.
He found what he sought soon enough, only a light-week away. They were cruising just within non-space at a relative speed only a few times the speed of light. Here the stars still shone dimly, and mass still had some relative meaning. He could tell that the lumpen shapes he found were wreckage, but could not perceive their exact nature. He could have forced his mind to make the wrenching transition to space-time, but it always gave him headaches. He had enough now to satisfy himself that someone was out there but he needed sensor evidence now. No one would believe the sole evidence of his mind.
He almost sprinted back to the bridge, but although Captain Chen murmured something about ‘the late Mr Arslan’ she contented herself with that. He slid back into his place, and Commander Kamei nodded at him silently. Like many veteran scan techs, Kamei spoke reluctantly. Beyond Kamei, Lieutenant Cora Badran smirked at him and he thought, as he brought his systems back up, that he would never understand the chance that had set him in partnership with the one person from his Academy days he had truly disliked. Then he sat back in his chair and let the systems tune in with his mind. The bridge faded from his sight, and instead he saw space, as his sensors drew it. To represent the degree of non-space they occupied everything he saw was shaded in pastel tones. As if he looked with his own eyes, he saw the universe around them and where he turned his gaze the computer followed.
He took his place between Kamei and Badran and for a moment was disorientated as the systems adjusted their segments. Then he was back into the watch, and he relaxed. They were patrolling at a slow speed. This sector was not marked as high-risk, and their single battlecruiser was deemed enough to criss-cross it in patrol. This was a long-civilised sector, one of the first wave to be colonised, and their assignment was more a sop to the rich commuters of the sector than a serious Fleet presence. Which, Ben thought, was yet another reason to worry.
Confirm systems up, Kamei’s voice murmured in his physical ears.
Systems up, he replied.
Stopped dreaming about your sweet Caroline? Badran asked snidely.
He didn’t know anyone called Caroline. You might know what you’re talking about, he replied.
You called her name before your little accident. Mind on the job, is it, Arslan?
That was interesting. Now he had a name.
They were maintaining standard patrol scans – electronically live objects were picked up as they crossed the light-week distance, dead objects, the assorted, slow-moving debris of space, at two light-days. The non-space data they received was vague, but they maintained minimal scans in space-time. The data from those feeds was long out-of-date by the time it reached them but running it against non-space data was usually enough to give a detailed profile. Patrol scans filtered most of the space-time data out. Only at battle-stations were the multiple feeds deemed essential, and then the scan tech’s role became vital as they filtered and integrated data from different temporal points, their minds merged with machines. Inexperienced techs often opened too many feeds or forgot that the system would follow their gaze. Ben Arslan knew that he was well beyond that stage, but his new crewmates did not. With an internal cringe for what Cora Badran would make of it, he opened his space-time feeds fully. At the same moment he leant sideways and pushed the system with his mind, in a way its designers would not have thought possible, and opened Badran and Kameis’ feeds. That was more risky – if anyone knowledgable ever thought to examine the computer’s log they might be suspicious of just how clumsy a certain junior lieutenant really was. But it worked.
“Holy s***!” Badran said and Captain Chen’s voice rang out distantly, “Lieutenant!”
Kamei was muttering something reverant under his breath. Ben heard him say, “Captain. Transferring real time data to your screen now!” and was somehow surprised to hear a snap in his superior’s voice. Ben himself could only gaze on what he had just revealed in horror.
He had fought evil before; had looked on darkness more than once. But there were rules even in the great battle between light and dark he had been born into. Even those rules had been broken by what he saw before them.
He was snapped out of the system and back to the bridge. Kamei had exercised his control and bounced all three of them out of the system. The captain nodded to him, and the main display screen, currently showing the almost abstract vistas of non-space, flickered and filled with the scene Ben had sought. At the same moment, eerie sirens began to howl throughout the ship to demand amber readiness.
Looking at the time on his console, Ben saw it was only fifty seconds since he had opened the scan feeds.
“Assume any vessel is hostile,” the captain said and, a wave of awareness swept through the bridge as the crew’s horror was pushed aside. “Assume whoever is responsible for this is still in the area. Mr Kamei!”
“Ma’am.”
“I need a time since this happened and a plot of estimated debris movement. Helm – take us in at current speed. Assume a wide debris trail.”
“Ma’am,” said Thea Tung on helm, and slowly the great ship began to turn from its plotted course. Chen continued, “Tactical, run me scenarios. Guns – warm up Emmeline. Let’s not be taken by surprise.”
There was more, but Kamei merged them back into the systems and Ben heard no more. Data rushed at him from all sides, in all shades, and his mind became a floodgate, controlling here, directing there, merging past and present, modelling might-have-beens and might-yet-bes. He forced his mind into formalism, refused to see the debris as other than geometric objects, subject to the implacable laws of physics. He did not let himself see the torn cables, the shattered hulls, or the frozen bodies. He did not let himself reflect on what type of enemy would not only destroy their target, but deliberately focus on and destroy evacuation pods.
It would take them approximately forty-two hours to reach the wreck at their current speed. They would slow to make the transfer to space-time so it would be more than two days before they could be physically there. Ben fervently hoped that Caroline, whoever she was, could hold out for two more days.
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Chapter 1: Adrift
Deep Space, 5.32 light years from Aldebaran, Terran date 03.03.13140
Caroline…
She was in space - she knew that much. She could feel the emptiness of it, the silence of it slithering into her soul. She could feel the pull of the turning stars, like thorns brushing her skin, and she wondered if it should concern her that she felt as if she could gather the stars into the curve of her hand like embers from the hearth.
Caroline… A child’s voice calling. Caroline… Caroline… A boy, his voice on the edge of breaking, a teenage girl with the sneer drowned by fear.
Were they calling her? Was she Caroline? Where were they? She tried to open her eyes but could feel nothing, not even the sweep of her lashes against her cheek, and could see nothing, not even the radiant stars. She had always loved that when they travelled the star roads – the way that the stars had blazed, free of the taint of atmosphere. Time after time, she had begged her way onto the bridge to watch as they made the transition to non-space and the stars shrank and expanded like water, if water could be so brightly aflame.
Caroline…
Was she a pilot, then? No, she thought, nothing so useful. A teacher, perhaps, to explain why she heard children’s voices. But no, she could not imagine herself standing before a class. Then she realised that she could not imagine herself at all. She had no idea how tall she was, how old, what the hue of her skin was or the colour of her eyes. A wave of hot panic swept through her, and, as it subsided, she realised she was cold. Not cold in the quick thrill of fresh water or a few steps through a chill wind, but cold into her bones and veins. She was so cold that her heart beat sluggishly and limbs were heavy; so heavy with it she could not shiver. She could not tell if she was breathing.
She had never been truly cold before. She was certain of that, though she did not know why. She tried to move herself, and failed and again fought panic. Only her mind worked, it seemed, and even it did not work fully.
Caroline!
The voices were wailing her name but she ignored them and concentrated. Who? Why? What? Where? When? The eternal questions, she thought and wondered why that made her want to laugh.
She heard a woman’s voice in her memory saying sharply, There are no eternal truths - only eternal questions. And she could see the woman – tall, slim, dressed in a grey, expensive hand-tailored suit, honey-blonde hair drawn back severely from her face. Mother, she thought and it was something to know that she would recognise her if she saw her.
She could probably dispense with what and when, she decided, which left her with three questions. Who am I? Where am I and why?
Since it was the only name she knew, she assumed she was Caroline. She could not prove it, of course, but she wanted something definite, something to cling to in the absolute darkness.
Caroline. Her name was Caroline, and she was alive.
I was obviously a pampered child, Caroline thought. I have never been truly cold; I don’t appear to work for my living – and I resent it; my mother can afford hand-sewn clothes when anyone can have fitted clothes woven by asking a computer. So – I am a rich woman’s daughter. Do I know where the wealth is from? Trade? Inherited? She waited but nothing came out of her memory. What else could she tell about herself? I am not given to panicking. I suspect I am rather sensible. I love to look at the stars. Perhaps I should move on to where? And why? Why is some rich woman’s useless daughter floating in space? How the hell did I get here? Where is here? What happened to me?
Then she remembered:
The floor was cold under her fee,t and she was thrown sideways as the ship heaved beneath her. She scrabbled at the wall for support. The ship listed and stilled, but she could hear strange hissings and spittings all around her. The other woman in the corridor grabbed at her arm and tried to move her, but she resisted.
“Get in your pod, Caro!” the other woman snapped.
“No.”
The other woman leant forward, glancing at the children huddled further along the corridor, and hissed, “The ship’s going to go up. I’m in contact with the bridge. We evacuate now, Caro.”
She should have been memorable but Caroline, watching her own memories as if she were a stranger, had no idea who she was. She wore black, tight-fitting and high-necked, and a plain, functional belt slung over her hips. She was black, slim, tall, with her hair bound into masses of braids, which whipped around her waist. Caroline thought she was elegant and terrifying.
“I’ll go in one of the normal pods. Put the kids in that thing. You know we can’t get them all in what we’ve got left. They’ll have a chance in that over-supplied monstrosity my mother’s dumped us with.”
“Caro – it’s my job to put you in it.”
“I don’t give a s***!” The ship lurched again. “I’m a grown woman, Arwen. I’m old enough to make a choice and live with the consequences. The kids aren’t. They deserve the chance.”
She shoved down the corridor and slapped her hand onto a panel. Doors slid open, and she began to hustle the kids through.
Arwen came to join her, and they bundled the children through with more speed than gentleness. The last through was a half-grown girl, her hair and skin dyed lurid colours and her cheeks stitched with flashing threads. She half-turned as she crossed into the evacuation pod, and Caroline met her gaze.
“You’re in charge, Maddy,” she said. “You know the drill.”
Maddy nodded, and said shakily, but with a spark of her usual sneer, “Trust me, why don’t you? Luck.”
“Luck,” Arwen said, and closed the doors on her. After a moment they heard a rumble, and the corridor shook as the pod began its roll to join the evacuation queue. The two women began to move back along the corridor, checking lights to find an undamaged pod. Suddenly Arwen stiffened and snapped, “Suit up, Caro!”
Caroline reached back and pulled a hood over her hair and immediately a transparent cloth slithered over her face, sealing her in. The ship shook again, and the corridor seemed to go grey.
Her feet rose from the floor and she spun gracelessly. Beyond her, she could see Arwen twirling, grasping the side of the corridor to pull herself along, and she thought dimly, Too late. Too, too late.
And everything was falling apart. The walls were collapsing silently, floating apart at the seams. She saw a sparkling knot of wires drift past and shuddered as it went black. A wave of fire flashed up and then failed, with nothing to make it burn. She went tumbling onwards, one more speck in the stream of metal, plastic and ceramic plating. Then she saw the darkness, the stars blazing, and thought incongruously, I have lived longer than Achilles.
The night was full of shadows. Parts of the Louisa May spun through space, dark against the star strewn night. Through it all were the thin beams, the laser claws which had been set against them. There was a black spot in space before them, and it resolved itself before her eyes as a ship, painted black as night, the source of those cruel beams. And she thought, Why? Why bother? Black paint would not fool any sensors and all shipboard views were built from sensor arrays. Almost never did anyone in space rely on physical visuals. There was no point, no point at all.
She could see the evacuation pods rocketing away in all directions and she was glad of that, at least. She was glad they had insisted on the drills when they started the cruise, even though none of them had thought they would be needed. She was glad…
She almost giggled and then stopped it as it rose in her throat. The suit she wore was the best available: could insulate her and provide food, air and fluids in an airless ship or damaged pod, but it was not designed for open space. Already something was failing, making her giddy.
There was a flash that stung her eyes, and she heard screaming. As she blinked, she dismissed the sounds. There was no comlink in her suit and sound didn’t carry through a vacuum. Another flash, another set of screams. A third.
This time she saw it and understood. The black ship was targeting the evacuation pods. A part of her brain babbled of the rules of war, the Sirius Conventions, the law of the star roads. Another part of her just watched as the large pod spun into her view. She tried to push towards it, though it was kilometres away by now. She could see the insignia emblazoned on its side and screamed, Maddy!
Already lasers were licking at its sides. Golden flame washed across it, so it glowed like honey in its last moment.
Then, almost slowly, it exploded. She thought she heard Maddy call her, a voice shrieking, Caroline!
It was too late, and she could only scream to herself as voice after voice around her called, Caroline! Caroline! She could feel their dying, the coldness blotting them away; the roar of their pain. There was something in the darkness, something foul and bloated and hungry and she could feel it drawing their pain to it, swallowing their deaths.
No! Caroline thought.
There rang in her mind a voice like thunder, bright with rage. This shall not be! Mark you, I bear witness!
Arwen came floating out of the wreckage. She was still shrouded in her suit, but now she glowed. Light poured from her and Caroline looked on her with the beginning of hope. The light that spread from her seemed so clean in this darkness that the horror dimmed a little. She was almost too bright to look upon. Every one of her braids had risen on end in a corona around her head and each one burnt with white light. Her skin glowed, and her eyes were like suns. Dimly, Caroline thought, Arwen has become a star.
Again that thunderous voice rang forth, I live in the service of the Light and this shall not be!
And all that light went flashing forth to strike at the black shi,p and suddenly the children’s voices rang through Caroline’s mind again. The black ship shuddered, and the sense of foulness withdrew slightly. Still the light poured through Arwen, and the black ship turned, began to dwindle into non-space.
Caroline! Maddy’s voice wailed.
I’m here! Caroline thought. Here!
The black ship hovered on the edge of transition, and Caroline heard Arwen whisper, Caro. I need your help. We need rescuing and I’ve got nothing left.
Concentrate! Caroline screamed but it was too late. In the instant of transition, darkness came flowing from the black ship. It passed above Caroline, and struck Arwen, sending her spinning away. For a moment her light blazed through, but then darkness wrapt around her. For a last instant, the light blazed and Caroline heard, quite clearly, Arwen say, But I know who you are!
Then she was gone, and the darkness whipped back to its source. The black ship faded, and she was alone in the cold emptiness of space.
For a few moments, remembering, Caroline could make no sense of it. Such things could not happen, not to her. It felt like she had slipped into the mind of a stranger. Then she regained her sense and thought, When? How long had she been floating here, slipping between consciousness and oblivion, delusion and sanity? She was hearing the voices of dead children.
Perhaps I am dead, she thought calmly. I was very close when Arwen died, and the suit couldn't have lasted long. How long ago was that?
She couldn’t remember. She had no way of marking the time within the darkness of her solitary mind.
Caroline… Maddy whined.
Get lost, Caroline thought. You’re dead. I might be. Or I might not. But you definitely are. That struck her as funny, and hysteria rose through her like bile. In its wake came real, screaming, mad fear, and she felt herself battering at the confines of her mind, trying desperately to crack her eyes open, to move her hand, to see or feel in this nothingness.
Something in her mind unfolded, as if all the crinkled layers of her brain had flattened themselves. Suddenly, the constraints of her thoughts were not the constraints of her skull. She was in utter darkness, but she knew now where all the wreckage hung; where the frozen bodies waited. Her own body was as still as if she was dead, but now there was a universe beyond her physical confines. Her mind brushed through the kilometres of cluttered space around her, and she found Arwen. Still she stood spread-eagled, as she had in her glory, but now she was as brittle as the wind. She had shone, but now she glittered with ice where the last water in her body had frozen around her as it evaporated, sheathing her in a crystal shroud.
No! Caroline thought and flinched away. Her mind went soaring, out across light-years of empty space. No! At last she added, Help me! Please! Please! Somebody help me!
Fleet Battlecruiser Anansi, 5.34 light years from Aldebaran, Terran date 03.03.13140
Ben Arslan, Junior Grade Lieutenant, third scan tech and newest and most junior bridge officer of the Interplanetary Security Force Ship Anansi, jerked back in his seat as if he’d been punched in the ribs. His coffee mug went flying off the console to cascade down the front of his clean, and very new, uniform. For a moment, he didn’t even notice for he was lost in the depths of space, surrounded by death and debris and shivering on the edge of terror.
The hot liquid seeping through his trousers recalled him to himself in time to hear Captain Chen say, “Mr Arslan?”
He shot to his feet, said, “Sir!” and waited miserably. The captain waited, looking at him, and he kept his stance still and straight despite the disconcerting trickle of something warm and wet down his thigh. Captain Chen regarded him from the raised command chair at the centre of the bridge, but said nothing. Behind her he could see Honora Reyna, the com officer, choke back a snicker. Ben wished he could vanish or that the floor would open neatly below him and remove him from the bridge. The captain looked him up and down, a slight smile curving her lips, and he flashed back to the time when he was ten years old and his Aunt Ria, home on leave, had caught him filling his sister Judit’s bed with spiders.
“If we were at any degree of battle readiness, Mr Arslan, I would leave you to drip. As we are not, I am sure Mr Kamei can spare your genius while you ensure you are dressed appropriately for an officer. Dismissed, Mr Arslan.”
Ben knew better than to argue, so he saluted and squelched off the bridge. As the doors slid shut behind him, he went across to put his hand to the lift doors. Immediately words flashed up on the doors – ‘Genetic profile recognised. Access denied.’
He almost groaned, but thought better of it and began the walk back towards the crew quarters in the hub of the ship. He had a fair idea what Aunt Ria would have done under the same circumstances, and if Captain Chen thought he would learn a useful lesson from walking the two kilometres back to his quarters with a large, wet stain spreading across his groin – well, it could easily have been worse.
Ben was tall, like most of the Arslan family, and he covered the ground quickly enough. The sting of embarrassment wore off in seconds, and he began to think. He did not consider himself to be particularly clumsy, and he was not given to wild flights of imagination. The more he turned that flash of terror around in his mind, the more uneasy he became with the conclusions he was drawing.
He wedged himself into his assigned quarters and stripped off his trousers, twisting to chuck them into the laundry chute to his left hand. To his right was his bunk, with storage space below it, before him a wash cubicle of his own, a lieutenant’s privilege. The floor space he stood on was less than a metre square. Crew quarters were not a priority on a warship, even for its officers. Wriggling into clean trousers he began to work through the implications of that flash of vision.
He might be only twenty-five and the most junior of junior officers on board Anansi but amongst his own people he was a veteran of sorts. He knew who he was expecting to encounter in this sector, and the nearest of them was back on Aldebaran station. The pure panic of the encounter tended to confirm that. One of the first things he had been drilled in, when he was barely into his teens, was how to keep calm in a crisis. If that was one of his people out there, they had been pushed to a point beyond all their training. If, as seemed more and more likely, whoever was out there was not one of his people they needed help. Either way, he was the only one available.
He decided that he would have to risk Chen’s sarcasm and leant against his bunk to let his mind flow free. Through the innards of the ship he flashed, tight beamed, dodging around the bright cores of his shipmates’ minds. Then he was sliding through Anansi’s skin and out into space. He locked his shields around his own mind, protecting his vulnerability, and let his probes flood out.
He found what he sought soon enough, only a light-week away. They were cruising just within non-space at a relative speed only a few times the speed of light. Here the stars still shone dimly, and mass still had some relative meaning. He could tell that the lumpen shapes he found were wreckage, but could not perceive their exact nature. He could have forced his mind to make the wrenching transition to space-time, but it always gave him headaches. He had enough now to satisfy himself that someone was out there but he needed sensor evidence now. No one would believe the sole evidence of his mind.
He almost sprinted back to the bridge, but although Captain Chen murmured something about ‘the late Mr Arslan’ she contented herself with that. He slid back into his place, and Commander Kamei nodded at him silently. Like many veteran scan techs, Kamei spoke reluctantly. Beyond Kamei, Lieutenant Cora Badran smirked at him and he thought, as he brought his systems back up, that he would never understand the chance that had set him in partnership with the one person from his Academy days he had truly disliked. Then he sat back in his chair and let the systems tune in with his mind. The bridge faded from his sight, and instead he saw space, as his sensors drew it. To represent the degree of non-space they occupied everything he saw was shaded in pastel tones. As if he looked with his own eyes, he saw the universe around them and where he turned his gaze the computer followed.
He took his place between Kamei and Badran and for a moment was disorientated as the systems adjusted their segments. Then he was back into the watch, and he relaxed. They were patrolling at a slow speed. This sector was not marked as high-risk, and their single battlecruiser was deemed enough to criss-cross it in patrol. This was a long-civilised sector, one of the first wave to be colonised, and their assignment was more a sop to the rich commuters of the sector than a serious Fleet presence. Which, Ben thought, was yet another reason to worry.
Confirm systems up, Kamei’s voice murmured in his physical ears.
Systems up, he replied.
Stopped dreaming about your sweet Caroline? Badran asked snidely.
He didn’t know anyone called Caroline. You might know what you’re talking about, he replied.
You called her name before your little accident. Mind on the job, is it, Arslan?
That was interesting. Now he had a name.
They were maintaining standard patrol scans – electronically live objects were picked up as they crossed the light-week distance, dead objects, the assorted, slow-moving debris of space, at two light-days. The non-space data they received was vague, but they maintained minimal scans in space-time. The data from those feeds was long out-of-date by the time it reached them but running it against non-space data was usually enough to give a detailed profile. Patrol scans filtered most of the space-time data out. Only at battle-stations were the multiple feeds deemed essential, and then the scan tech’s role became vital as they filtered and integrated data from different temporal points, their minds merged with machines. Inexperienced techs often opened too many feeds or forgot that the system would follow their gaze. Ben Arslan knew that he was well beyond that stage, but his new crewmates did not. With an internal cringe for what Cora Badran would make of it, he opened his space-time feeds fully. At the same moment he leant sideways and pushed the system with his mind, in a way its designers would not have thought possible, and opened Badran and Kameis’ feeds. That was more risky – if anyone knowledgable ever thought to examine the computer’s log they might be suspicious of just how clumsy a certain junior lieutenant really was. But it worked.
“Holy s***!” Badran said and Captain Chen’s voice rang out distantly, “Lieutenant!”
Kamei was muttering something reverant under his breath. Ben heard him say, “Captain. Transferring real time data to your screen now!” and was somehow surprised to hear a snap in his superior’s voice. Ben himself could only gaze on what he had just revealed in horror.
He had fought evil before; had looked on darkness more than once. But there were rules even in the great battle between light and dark he had been born into. Even those rules had been broken by what he saw before them.
He was snapped out of the system and back to the bridge. Kamei had exercised his control and bounced all three of them out of the system. The captain nodded to him, and the main display screen, currently showing the almost abstract vistas of non-space, flickered and filled with the scene Ben had sought. At the same moment, eerie sirens began to howl throughout the ship to demand amber readiness.
Looking at the time on his console, Ben saw it was only fifty seconds since he had opened the scan feeds.
“Assume any vessel is hostile,” the captain said and, a wave of awareness swept through the bridge as the crew’s horror was pushed aside. “Assume whoever is responsible for this is still in the area. Mr Kamei!”
“Ma’am.”
“I need a time since this happened and a plot of estimated debris movement. Helm – take us in at current speed. Assume a wide debris trail.”
“Ma’am,” said Thea Tung on helm, and slowly the great ship began to turn from its plotted course. Chen continued, “Tactical, run me scenarios. Guns – warm up Emmeline. Let’s not be taken by surprise.”
There was more, but Kamei merged them back into the systems and Ben heard no more. Data rushed at him from all sides, in all shades, and his mind became a floodgate, controlling here, directing there, merging past and present, modelling might-have-beens and might-yet-bes. He forced his mind into formalism, refused to see the debris as other than geometric objects, subject to the implacable laws of physics. He did not let himself see the torn cables, the shattered hulls, or the frozen bodies. He did not let himself reflect on what type of enemy would not only destroy their target, but deliberately focus on and destroy evacuation pods.
It would take them approximately forty-two hours to reach the wreck at their current speed. They would slow to make the transfer to space-time so it would be more than two days before they could be physically there. Ben fervently hoped that Caroline, whoever she was, could hold out for two more days.
