Amongst the Immortals

by Luigi Robles

  “These suits are different from the ones we practiced with before coming on board Sodenia,” Chey said as her cheeks began to turn pink.

  “Not a good excuse,” Pycca said as she finished helping her into the suit. “And you guys aren’t exempt from the disappointment.” Pycca turned and looked at the rest of the group.

  “Well, we thought that they didn’t need help,” Rad said, halfway shrugging.

  “Bad answer,” Pycca said. “You don’t feel, and you don’t think of anyone else but yourself. If it hasn’t been expressed to you, ask.”

  Rad simply nodded.

  “Are we ready to go?” Pycca asked. “Are our tools already on board? Do we have long-range coms?”

  “Yes, yes and yes,” Zerb said. “The pilot is already inside; the shuttle is hot and ready to go.”

  “Let’s not waste any more time,” Pycca said as she entered the shuttle.

  Pycca and the rest of the engineers made it to the Jones in less than five minutes, though it took another five minutes to communicate through the Jones’s outer analog communication system. As soon as they entered the ship, they saw that, in fact, gravity was non-existent. A group of Jones personnel was already in the docks, waiting to greet Pycca. They didn’t have their helmets on, meaning that at least life support was working properly.

  “Looks like we won’t be needing our helmets,” Pycca said as she took hers off and got up from her seat. “But still bring it with you. Just attach it to one of your rear hip attachment hooks.” She demonstrated as she walked towards the exit door. “We’ll go straight to the gravity rooms; we’ll worry about the communication later.”

  “I vaguely remember this ship having nine gravity rooms,” Zerb said as he too got up from his seat. “Which room do you want to go to first?”

  “To the nearest one,” Pycca said as she grabbed one of the bags of tools. “There are two near the dock; we should split up. Chey and Tom, you’re coming with me. Zerb, take Rad, Bico and Zu.”

  “You got it,” Zerb said as the shuttle door opened.

  Everything that hadn’t been secured to the floor, including the large twenty-two-ton forklift, was floating in zero-g. The Jones personnel had a sort of cord with an expandable sphere at one end and a quickdraw. The sphere cord allowed them to attach themselves to the rails on the floor, thus keeping them from floating around, and it looked like they had brought extra.

  “Chief Master Engineer Evans, I’m—” the Jones’s lieutenant junior grade managed to say before Pycca cut him off.

  “Where are your gravity rooms here?”

  “We have nine of them on the John Paul Jones, which—” the lieutenant junior grade managed before being interrupted once again by Pycca.

  “The nearest ones.”

  “Well, there are three accessible from the dock.”

  “Where?”

  “They are marked by yellow doors,” the lieutenant junior grade said as he pointed in three opposite directions around the dock.

  “Change of plans,” Pycca said as she reached for one of the handles of the shuttle with her right hand. “Zerb and Rad, you go east; Zu, Bico and Tom, go north; Chey and I will go west. Wear the sphere cords if you want.”

  Holding the shuttle’s handle, Pycca lifted herself up until her body was perpendicular to the shuttle. Since her body was weightless, it was an easy feat. She then moved her feet towards the handle, bending her body and knees.

  “Wait,” Chey said, sounding alarmed. “Am I supposed to do that too?”

  Pycca didn’t answer; she instead focused on what she was attempting to do.

  “No,” Zerb said. “But I’d suggest that we get going. Put on your sphere cords.”

  She scanned for the clearest path towards the west gravity room and spring launched herself towards it. She kept her eyes on the path, successfully avoiding floating objects and using some to keep her course and add momentum.

  Her plan worked; she got to the yellow door handle within a minute. Without losing any time, she whipped her badge through the entry slot, but a red light flashed at the top of the door, and it did not open. She tried a few more times only for the same thing to happen.

  “What in blazes is going on here?” Pycca said with frustration as she took out a small high-speed driver to undo the badge entry slot. “I don’t have time for any of this.”

  Even with her specialized tools, it took her a while to remove the cap of the card slider. She dug through the wires and spliced them with wires of her own that were attached to a manual code entry device. She punched in her chief engineering code, 3375869708-PE, and the door reluctantly began to open. Not wasting any time, she pulled out the manual code entry device, yanking half the wires with it, and entered the room.

  The door began to close behind her, and she rolled her eyes and decided not to bother with it.

  “Of course the door is going to close behind me. Chey is going to have to figure out how to get in herself.”

  Once inside, Pycca made her way to the nearest gravity core in the room. She secured herself to the gravity core using a magnetic tether from her tool bag. Said tether was meant to be used with the tool bag itself, but at this point, Pycca couldn’t care less. She began operating the functions screen on the gravity core, thought it seemed as if the core had only one message for her:

  Access Denied

  She let out a clear and frustrating sigh as she reached for her tool bag, but she stopped reaching as her wristband vibrated. She turned it to face her; it was an incoming call from Fain Jegga. Her heart dropped to the bottom of her stomach as quickly as if gravity had suddenly been restored.

  She felt the need to take her wristband off and smash it against the nearest wall. She didn’t want to answer, because deep down she knew what the call would be about; she had always known.

  “Dammit, Fain, you’re really going to have me go through this?” she muttered in defeat.

  She pressed the side of the band to answer the call, though she didn’t say a word.

  “Pycca? Fain asked.

  Pycca’s chest hurt at the sound of his voice.

  “Fain…” Pycca said.

  “I’m guessing you’ve figured it out.”

  “Deep down, I’ve always known, but I just hoped, I hoped with everything in me that I’d be wrong. This is just too much.”

  “Pycca—”

  “No, you can’t. You promised. You promised me.”

  “And I’m keeping my promise. It’s not a sacrifice or a one-way trip; I’m doing this in order to win.”

  “Will it be just you? Everyone else is chasing unicorns thanks to Kya?”

  “Kya and August knew about it, but he’s staying behind.”

  “Shit,” Pycca said between gritted teeth.

  “I have to go. I have to do this. If I could have you with me and still win, I’d do that in a heartbeat. But the thing is that I’m not sure what will happen, and worrying about if it’s going to happen or not might make it not happen.”

  “So, you’re going without knowing if you have a chance? Are you fucking kidding me? Why go at all? Just stay here; we’ll face this together.”

  “No. I’m going there to take my chance. I’m doing what I think I should do, what everything in Sodenia has been pointing at this whole time. If it could be any other way, I would take it. But it’s what I’ve chosen to do, to try and keep all of you safe.”

  Pycca began to feel tears running down her cheeks.

  “And just when I was beginning to think that I would get to have a normal life, to get married like people used to, to have a family and grow old alongside someone I love. Here comes the galaxy once again and takes that all away from me.”

  “I feel the same way,” Fain said.

  “Then why not face it together?”

  “Because above all else, I want what you’ve described, and I want to experience those things with you. I just need you to trust me on this one, and I will do everything that’s necessary to ma
ke that happen. Remember, I intend to keep my promise.”

  Pycca didn’t say anything, but she felt the sincerity in Fain’s voice.

  “For now, I need you to head back to Earth,” Fain said as his voice cracked. “Take both of the gates with you, form a perimeter with the entire ESAF fleet and wait for my return.”

  “Fain, do you realize what you’re telling me? You’re asking me to wait for you.”

  “I’m coming back.”

  Pycca sighed in resignation. She knew there was little she could do now, and especially from her current location. Fain had been smart in getting the fleet here half-empty and then emptying it out completely. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have gotten to go alone; there would be too much opposition.

  “Destroy one or two of them for me,” Pycca said as she wiped tears off her cheeks.

  “See you soon.”

  The gravity aboard the Jones slowly returned back to normal, and Pycca landed softly on the metal floor. Though she couldn’t care less about her landing at this point.

  “Don’t make me wait too long,” Pycca said, sobbing.

  No response.

  “Did you already leave?”

  No response.

  “Are you there?”

  No response.

  The door opened behind Pycca, and she heard footsteps approaching. She didn’t bother to look back; she had a feeling that it could only be Chey.

  “Chief Evans, you were able to restore gravity back to the John Paul Jones.”

  Pycca simply nodded as she pulled out a rag from the tool bag now hanging from a magnetic tether to clean her face.

  15

  Machines

  Fain didn’t have the heart to keep on talking to Pycca; it felt heavy and loaded with guilt. He was a world away from being convinced to stay, so he left for the machines’ territory. Sodenia quickly reached the theoretical maximum and was well on the way. The countdown timer appeared alongside the course; it would be less than ten minutes before he reached the machines.

  Quiet settled in the now empty ship, along with Fain’s doubts and fears. He feared not returning to Earth, losing the battle, and most of all losing Pycca. Though he was keenly aware that to fear was to be human, and that same fear would keep him wanting to go back to Earth alive.

  “I never thought this would be so hard,” Fain said to no one in particular, but he knew Kya was listening. “It took everything I had just to say goodbye.”

  He sighed.

  “May I?” Kya’s voice sounded in Fain’s command center.

  “Of course,” Fain said warmly. “If there’s anyone that can, it’s you.”

  “I know it’s hard saying goodbye; I get overloaded with emotion just thinking about it. But that’s just it. You see, when we think of goodbye, we think we aren’t going to see that person again. There’s always a chance of that happening, and it can be totally out of our control at times. But there’s also the other side of that coin—it’s possible that we will see them again; it’s possible the goodbye only means see you later. I believe that our thoughts are directly connected to our actions and outcomes. In other words, believe that you will see them again, truly believe, and you will.”

  Kya’s words sent an electrifying surge through Fain.

  “We’ll be back to Earth in no time, right, Kya?”

  “That’s right.”

  “You know what I was thinking?”

  “Since there is absolutely no possible way to know what another person is thinking, no, I don’t know. But please do tell.”

  Fain chuckled slightly.

  “OK, so besides all that,” Fain said. “When we get back to Earth, after all of this is over, we’ll ask Truman for a long vacation, and maybe, if you want, we can search for your own house or apartment. What do you say?”

  “Sounds like a plan to me, although I have to say that your apartment looked cozy. I might like something like that. But I’m happy that you’re offering that to me. Maybe I can also be in Neo LA, so that I can visit you from time to time.”

  “I’ll be looking forward to that. But first, let’s not let our ancestors down, and especially let’s not let humanity down. Let’s give it everything we’ve got.”

  “I’m ready,” Kya said as she took in a deep, audible breath. “Switching to analog and taking control of all weapons, though I’m not sure I can control them all at once. Readying drones.”

  They approached the t-minus one minute mark.

  “Here goes our shot,” Fain said, paying close attention to the timer. “Shields up at full power, weapons hot. Turn off all incoming transmissions and lock the devices. If we get attacked, fire at will.”

  “Got it.”

  Fain’s heart kept increasing its pace as he waited for the timer. Those last forty-three seconds were the longest seconds he had ever lived through. He had his hand on the FTL lever, and when the counter got to t-minus three seconds, he slid it back to zero. The space around them slowed and materialized, revealing the machines’ space territory.

  At once, the enemies were highlighted on the spherical screen, a mere 73,000 miles away. At that point in time, there were 2,641 Immortals and three larger ship-like machines surrounding one massive planet-like structure with what had to be millions of orbiting satellites. The machine territory was dark, the stars around were scarce, and even the machines appeared to be unmoving.

  “Though come to think of it,” Fain said, “this doesn’t look like a force capable of ending all biological life in the galaxy.”

  “Perhaps it’s because the majority of their forces are already doing just that.”

  “And then again, why would they need to keep a large force standing by? Who do they need to fear?”

  Fain then saw the opening he had seen back in the scrap drone transmission. He counted in his head until he saw it again—an opening in the satellites circling the massive structure. Twenty seconds separated each opening.

  “Let’s not waste any time; creatures, civilizations, could be dying right now,” Fain said as he accelerated Sodenia towards the opening, trying to time the speed as best he could. “Get the Fate cannons ready.”

  As Sodenia accelerated, the Immortals began to move towards the speeding ship in large clusters.

  “Of course, it’s not going to be easy,” Fain said, concentrating on his end destination. “Looks like we are going to have some company soon. Don’t let them get near.”

  As Fain closed the distance, the many hundreds of clusters of Immortals began to glow.

  “The enemy appears to be accumulating energy,” Kya said hurriedly. “Perhaps getting ready for an energy blast. Perhaps it might not be wise to wait to be attacked.”

  “Fire at will.”

  It had to be milliseconds after Fain gave the order that Sodenia opened continuous fire, thoroughly lighting up the space before it. It looked like a direct hit on all accounts; there was no way the Immortals could have moved out of the way of all that firepower. And that’s when Fain saw what was really happening. The Immortal clusters were curving the space around them, thus avoiding Sodenia’s firepower.

  “You have to be kidding me,” Fain said, exasperated.

  “It looks like it’s the basic function of that formation,” Kya said as she stopped firing. “I first noticed it when they took the first hits head-on. Though I kept the fire on them, there was no noticeable disruption in their warping of space.”

  “Dammit,” Fain said as he began to maneuver the ship into a spiral approach. “But for now, there’s no sense in possibly overheating, damaging or wasting ammo this early on. We’ll wait for the right opportunity, but if you see one, take it.”

  The clusters of Immortals began to fire at Sodenia, getting too close for comfort with the first few shots. The massive beams of energy seemed powerful, and Fain would much rather not find out if the ship could take a hit from them.

  “Looks like we’re going to have to cut our visit short,” Fain said as he accelerated the ship. H
e had planned on making it to the opening within two minutes. He had chosen two minutes to try and better study the enemy, but seeing as every second that passed got them closer to getting hit by the Immortal clusters’ beams, he decided to go all out.

  The other three ship-like machines noticed Sodenia and hurled themselves towards the ship. At the same time, the machine planet began to move back. The ship-like machines fired relentlessly and at a much faster rate than the clusters of Immortals. At that point, it was impossible for Fain to avoid all hits, and he felt the ones that did manage to land as the ship reverberated.

  Sodenia countered and fired with its large cannons, but Fain wasn’t sure whether it was having any effect on the machine ships. Then the third machine-like ship joined in, making it three against one.

  We aren’t going to survive another approach, Fain thought as he pressed on. Their weapons are powerful.

  “Shields are dropping,” Kya said hurriedly.

  “Keep them up for as long as you can. We’re almost there.”

  As Fain got closer to the machine structure, he noticed that the space between the orbiting satellites and the machine planet had increased drastically, at least doubling in size. Though his chance was still there, the orbiting satellites didn’t change their rhythm as they expanded; if anything they were accelerating. Fain didn’t know if the satellites would form an effective shield against the Fate cannons.

  “On my mark, fire the Fate cannons,” Fain said as he ignored everything else, getting dangerously close to the orbiting satellites. He kept approaching at a reduced speed as he waited for the opening he had seen to appear once more. Fain had gotten so close to the machine planet’s satellites that the enemy ships were firing at Sodenia from an angle. “Fire the Fate cannons.”