“No,” he smiled, “on the contrary.”
Doc stared at him, waiting for an explanation.
Chet seemed amused by this. “I’m just very glad you’re here.”
“He gives me the creeps!” Colt said, eyeing Doc’s monitor, which showed a close-up of Chet staring directly into the camera.
“Who’s watching us, lieutenant?” Chet asked, the thermometer dancing around in his mouth as he did.
“Some people,” Doc answered, as the BP monitor beeped. He looked at the reading. “Blood pressure is pretty high,” he said, shooting Chet a glance, then noting the result on the e-clip. He removed the thermometer, checked the reading, and a concerned furrow grew across his brow. He placed his free hand on Chet’s forehead. “You’re burning up.”
“I feel fine,” Chet replied, his voice still devoid of emotion.
Doc’s hand moved down to Chet’s eyes and placed his thumb across the survivor’s eyebrow, lifting his eyelid open for a closer look, then checked the other. He turned back to his e-clip and wrote the figure from the thermometer down.
Chet, still staring into the camera over Doc’s ear, asked slowly, calmly. “How many people?”
Doc didn’t answer.
“How many people are watching? With Hunter? He must be your pilot, yes?” Chet asked again.
From the angle of Smith’s camera it seemed as if Doc glanced at the Aurora team, then looked back at Chet before quipping, “I see you’ve been paying attention.”
“I am a scientist. That’s what I do.”
“Take off your shirt,” Doc ordered, ignoring Chet’s initial question.
Chet looked down at his white T-shirt and began to pull it up over his head, revealing a muscular torso covered with several scars and a large, black tattoo of a dragon over the right half of his chest.
The Aurora crew watching from the flight deck reacted. “Whoa!” Colt said, “he’s pretty buff for a scientist!”
“They all are,” Packham agreed.
“What’s with those scars?” Hunter mused.
“Those are some pretty nasty scars …” Bolkov nodded in agreement.
“You’ve got a few scars there,” they heard Doc say, as though reading their minds.
Chet gave a single nod.
“How’d you get them?” Doc asked casually, pulling the cart a bit closer.
Chet shrugged. “Here and there.”
Doc picked up the three discs. “I’ve got to put these on you.”
Chet nodded. Doc leaned over, watching Chet’s eyes, as he placed one disc on his upper chest, one over his heart and one below his chest. The machine immediately began beeping rather quickly. Doc glanced over at it. From what Carrie could tell, it sounded like Chet’s heart was racing, although his breathing seemed steady.
Doc looked back at Chet, “Are you sure you’re okay? You’re not lightheaded? Any pain in your shoulder? Your arm?”
Chet shook his head. “I am fine.”
Doc looked between the machine and Chet. “According to this you’re on the verge of a mild heart attack.”
Chet shrugged. “I feel fine.”
“So why is your heart racing, then?”
Chet looked over at the Aurora team on guard, then back at Doc. “There are four soldiers aiming their weapons at me. Perhaps that is why?” he said calmly.
The machine beeped, Doc hit a series of buttons and the e-clip lit up. Chet was staring back down the camera again. Carrie could see a sheen of sweat gathering on his brow.
Doc held up the white tube. “Blow long and hard into this when I tell you.”
Chet took it and held it to his mouth.
“Go,” Doc said.
Chet blew into the tube, all the while staring into the camera.
“Stop,” Doc ordered. He hit another series of buttons on the machine and again the e-clip lit up.
“You never answered my question, lieutenant?” Chet asked calmly, looking from the camera to Doc. “Who else is on the ship with your pilots?”
“No, I didn’t answer your question, Chet, but you don’t need to worry about who or what is on our ship,” Doc replied firmly, writing down the figures on the e-clip, then glancing back up at Chet. “Alright? Now, I’ve just got to scan you and take some blood samples, then we’ll be done.”
Doc took a syringe, along with a rubber cord, off the cart.
“You won’t need that,” Chet said, rolling his arm over to expose the bulging veins again.
Doc looked down at his arm. “No, I guess I won’t.” He took the needle and held it up to Chet’s inner elbow; glanced up to make eye contact with him, then proceeded to insert the needle and begin to withdraw blood.
“Ugh! I can’t watch that,” Packham said, averting her eyes from the screen on the flight deck.
Hunter gave her a crazy look. “You can’t look at blood? Then what the hell are you doing in the UNF?”
“Flying ships!” she shot back, then returned her eyes to the screens.
After two vials were taken, Doc fed them back through the glass chamber to Smith. “Head back to the examination room and switch the autoanalyzer on,” he ordered the private.
Smith nodded and departed, seemingly understanding what he was talking about.
Doc grabbed another device off the cart, pulling it out of its black pouch. It was shaped like a silver paddle. He turned it on and held it in front of Chet’s face. “I’m just going to scan your head and neck.”
Chet nodded, as Doc began to run the paddle over him. Carrie, watching Louis’s screen, noted that Doc seemed to pause when he scanned the back of Chet’s head, but said nothing. Once he was done, he processed the information as normal and the e-clip lit up again.
Doc grabbed one of the vials he’d collected from the cabinet on the Aurora, then taking another needle, filled the syringe with the liquid. “You’re a little dehydrated. This will help hydrate you,” he said, holding up the needle to Chet.
Chet nodded and Doc injected the fluid into his vein. When he was done he threw the syringe into a waste box that was sitting on the bottom shelf of the cart.
“Okay, we’re done,” Doc announced.
Chet nodded, then stood and walked, shirt in hand, over to the wall with the others.
“Who’s next?” Doc asked.
Logan moved forward silently. His face was expressionless, but his strange emerald-green eyes focused sharply on Doc.
13
Quarantine
Harris sat at Sharley’s desk, trying to get his head around what had happened here. There was nothing of substance in the offices. Certainly nothing classified. It looked like the station was ready for a handover, like one team was moving out and another moving in. There were no signs of a struggle. Nothing. Where was the Spector? The other five must have left; abandoned the station. Maybe there was a falling out with the four “survivors”?
There was only one way to get answers and that was by speaking to the four men. He left the office and approached the holding cell, watching as Doc tested Logan’s lungs.
“Brown,” Harris called. “Get the corridor lights on, then get the Aurora locked into the Darwin’s external power source on the dock. Then go to the station’s control room and see what’s going on with the comms. I’ll send Smith to help you when he gets back.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied, then left.
Louis moved over beside Carter to take up his spot.
“How’s it going, Doc?” Harris asked, scanning his eyes around the cell. It was an extremely minimalist, sterile room. There looked to be only four beds for sleeping, pulled in and out from slots in the wall, and a toilet inside a small cubicle. Everything looked as though it were made from a glossy white fiberglass material.
“We’re getting there,” Doc answered, not taking his eyes off Logan.
McKinley walked back in to join the group. “Nothing in the cargo office, captain,” he said. “La
st ship to dock was a cargo runner called the Belgo and that was about four weeks ago.”
Harris turned around to look at the survivors and walked up to the glass wall of the cell. “What is the last thing you remember before the blackout?”
They all looked to Chet.
“What was going on right before it happened?” Harris asked firmly. “What were you doing?”
“I was in the gym, working out,” Chet answered.
Harris studied his build, and nodded, then turned to Logan. “And you?”
“Eating.”
“You two?” Harris turned back to Grolsh and Fairmont.
“Sleeping,” Fairmont answered.
Harris looked over at Grolsh, who was smirking.
“Taking a shower and … jerking off.”
Everyone stared at Grolsh. Harris gave him an unaffected look. Fairmont started smirking too, but when Chet gave Grolsh a cold look they both instantly dropped their smiles.
“What was everyone else doing?” Harris asked.
“It was a staggered shift change,” Chet answered for them. “Some had just come off shift and were eating, some were still getting out of bed, some were on duty already.”
Harris looked at him hard. “So, the lights went out and you woke up in this bio cell?”
“Yes. That is correct.”
“Can we have some food now?” Logan asked in his low gravelly voice, as Doc took blood from his arm.
Harris eyed Logan for a moment, then called out over his shoulder, “Louis, fetch these guys something to eat.”
Louis nodded and headed for the ship, just as Smith came back.
“Smith, head to the comms room and help Brown figure out what’s wrong,” Harris ordered.
“Yes, sir,” Smith said, turning around and heading back down the corridor.
Harris turned his attention back to the survivors. “And Professor Sharley was on the station when this happened?” he asked.
“Yes,” Chet answered.
“We’re done,” Doc told Logan. “Fairmont, you’re next.”
Logan walked slowly over to the other men, as Fairmont quietly stepped forward.
*
Carrie studied the survivors though Harris’s camera. Logan was a bit shorter than the others, and seemed to stalk like a panther, his long, shiny raven hair slinking down his back.
Fairmont was the tallest and broadest, and looked younger than Chet and Logan in the face, despite his gray hair. Grolsh was the leanest of the four but he was still muscular, like a greyhound. He seemed to be the youngest, watching the others constantly for his lead.
Carrie focused back on the captain as he continued with his questions.
“Where was Sharley when this happened?”
Chet shrugged.
“What programs were you developing here?” Harris continued.
Chet smiled. “You know that’s classified, otherwise your superiors would’ve told you.” His voice distantly echoed through the speakers.
“Let me rephrase the question,” Harris said, his voice a little tighter. “Could one of your programs have caused this blackout?”
Chet eyed him, face expressionless, the sweat still building on his brow. “Anything’s possible, Captain Harris.”
The two men stared at each other for a few moments.
“What I’m looking for here, Chet, is a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ response,” Harris said firmly, as though it were an order.
Chet smiled again, cocking his head to the side, in contemplation. After a moment he gave his response. “No.”
Harris nodded at him. “Then do you have any idea what could’ve caused this blackout?”
Chet shook his head.
“You’re a scientist and you’re second-in-command on this station. You have no theories whatsoever?” Harris asked in a flat tone, suggesting disbelief.
Again Chet shook his head.
“Nothing suspicious has taken place here and no person has behaved suspiciously?” Harris asked. “No visitor or visitors to the station have behaved strangely? No unidentified comms were received? Nothing out of the ordinary with any of your equipment? No strange cargo? Nothing?”
“No, captain.” Chet spoke slowly and deliberately, as though he were talking to a child, whose game he was beginning to tire of. “I have not identified anything out of the ordinary that could have possibly caused this blackout or the loss of comms with Command.”
“So, you weren’t the one sending out those comms signals we picked up en route?”
“I’m sorry, captain?” A look of confusion swept across Chet’s face.
“We picked up some scrambled comms that came from this station. That wasn’t you?”
Chet shook his head, then motioned around the bio cell. “We have no transmission facilities in here as you can see. We were working, then we were in here. There was no in-between.”
“Someone sent them from this station. You’re all that’s left.”
Chet shrugged casually. “We’ve obviously had technical difficulties, that’s why you’re here. Perhaps some pre-recorded transmissions were released into the ether when the comms went down?”
Harris eyed him for another moment, as the silence sat around them. Eventually he turned to McKinley. “Guard these men. When Louis comes back, he and Carter are on first watch.”
Carrie watched as the captain turned and stalked off down the corridor.
*
Harris stared at the screen in front of him, waiting for it to connect with Colonel Isaack and Professor Martin back on Earth.
“Captain Harris,” Isaack greeted him. “We weren’t expecting to speak to you so soon. Talk to me.”
“Well, sir, the Darwin is fine—” Harris began, but Isaack cut him off.
“What’s the story with the comms?”
“Are you on the Darwin’s power supply?” Martin added.
“Not yet. We’re still on the Aurora’s, but I’ve got Brown working on it.”
“So the team are safe?” Martin asked anxiously.
“We found four of your crew locked up in the bio cell. Chet, Logan, Fairmont and Grolsh. There are no other people on board and the Spector is missing. There are no other ships docked here and there are no signs of any struggle. The whole station is clean as a whistle, like there’s been no-one here at all.”
“Only four team members?” Martin asked, his brow furrowed. “The rest must’ve left on the Spector. That’s odd. We’ve had absolutely no communication from them.”
“What explanation did the four remaining crew provide for their absence?” Isaack asked.
“None. They said there was a blackout and they woke up in the bio cell,” Harris said, leaning back in his chair.
“And the remaining four. Do they seem okay?” Martin asked, the furrow in his brow still prominent. “Are they injured in any way?”
“No, no obvious injuries. Doc is checking them out now, though. We’ll know more in a few hours.”
“And the station is stable?” Isaack focused his eyes in concentration.
Harris nodded. “The station is structurally A-OK. Looks like it’s just the comms, sir.”
“So what’s your plan moving forward?” Isaack asked.
“Doc’s going to run some tests to find out if there’s any health risk to my men, in case the survivors have been exposed to something. Until I’m satisfied, they will remain in the bio cell. In the meantime, we’ll work on the comms and keep searching through this place until we find out what happened here.”
“And the women?” Martin asked.
Harris’s eyes darted to Martin’s and eyed him for a moment. “They remain here on the Aurora as instructed.” Then he looked back at Isaack. “Although as there appears to be no obvious danger, sir, I would like your permission to put them to work.”
Isaack considered his request for a moment, then shook his head. “No. They’ll remain on the Aurora
until further notice. Let’s see what Lieutenant Walker comes up with first.”
Harris bit his tongue, subtly exhaling any comments through his nose.
“If there’s nothing else to report, captain, then we’d better let you get back to it,” Isaack said firmly. “We’ll put a trace out on the missing ship and contact you when we locate it. You get in touch when you have any further information.”
“Yes, sir,” Harris replied.
Isaack nodded back, then turned to Professor Martin, as the screen went black.
Harris stood up from his desk and put his headpiece back on.
“Captain Harris back on comms,” he announced into his mouthpiece, as he made his way out of his office.
“Captain, this is Brown. We’ve locked the Aurora into the external power source and it appears to be A-OK. Await permission to switch over, sir.”
“Good,” Harris responded. “Hunter, do you copy? Over.”
“Yes, sir!” Hunter’s voice now came over his earpiece.
“Switch the Aurora over to the external power supply effective immediately. Over,” Harris ordered.
“Yes, sir. Switching from onboard power cells to external source. Over.”
The lights on the Aurora flickered and blinked for a moment, then came on brightly again. Harris studied them carefully as he made his way off the ship and back onto the Darwin’s dock. As he headed for the station’s entrance, Doc and McKinley came walking out.
“You done?” Harris asked Doc, motioning to the vials in the cart he was pushing along.
“Yes, sir. I’ll start the lab work now. I would like to speak with you, though.”
Harris nodded. “I’ll come and see you in a bit.” He turned to his second lieutenant. “McKinley, you might as well get some sleep and tell Bulk he can head off too. We’ll need some fresh heads in the morning.”
“Yes, sir.”
Harris continued on, making his way toward the Darwin’s control room. When he arrived, Smith was at the main control desk and Brown was off to the side checking some wiring in an opened panel.
“What’s the story, gentlemen?” Harris asked, entering the room.
Brown looked up at him. “Well, we’ve confirmed the comms are down, sir, but we can’t find out why. Nothing appears to be blown out or damaged. We’re investigating the possibilities now.”
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