First Encounter

by Jasper T. Scott

  She smiled, revealing sharply pointed white teeth. “Admiral Keera Reed. Welcome to the Kyron Federation.”

  Confusion swirled in Clayton’s head. He grabbed his chair for support and slowly shook his head. “I don’t understand. What Federation?”

  “My people, the Kyra—the ones you call the Avari—annexed Earth. Humanity has joined a larger galactic community, Captain.” He caught a glimpse of another chalky humanoid walking by behind Keera. It was too tall and human-looking to be an Avari. Another hybrid.

  “How are you still alive?” Clayton asked.

  “I’ll explain everything once we come aboard. Power down your engines and stand down all weapons.”

  “You can’t let them aboard this ship,” Ambassador Morgan whispered.

  Keera’s head turned fractionally, and her smile faded. “Hello, Father.”

  “Turn the ship around,” Morgan insisted.

  Clayton looked to Lieutenant Stevens. He was gaping at the viewscreen, eyes wide and staring. “Power down engines, Lieutenant.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Keera said, inclining her head to him. “If it makes you feel better, I only asked as a courtesy. You have no other option.”

  “Does that sound friendly to you?” Morgan gritted out.

  “Shut up ambassador,” Clayton snapped. “Where should we expect you, Admiral?”

  An image of the Forerunner replaced Keera’s head and shoulders. The amidships airlock was flashing in red. Her features returned a few seconds later. She was smiling again. “I have a few surprises waiting for you, Captain.”

  “Good ones I hope.”

  “The very best. See you soon.”

  The transmission vanished, and Keera’s ship returned, front and center. Smaller wedge-shaped vessels began streaking out of it.

  “What do we do, sir?” Stevens whispered.

  “We go meet them at the airlock,” Clayton replied.

  “I’ll inform the Marines.”

  “No. No soldiers, and no weapons, Lieutenant. We’re going to greet them unarmed.”

  “Are you insane?” Ambassador Morgan cried. “They’ll kill us!”

  Clayton turned to regard him. “They wouldn’t need to board us for that, Ambassador. So that’s obviously not their goal.”

  Morgan’s cheeks bulged with another objection, but he swallowed it.

  Clayton knew what was really behind his concerns: he’d never been very nice to his half alien daughter, and now she was all grown up, maybe with a big chip on her shoulder.

  “Admiral Keera Reed...” Stevens muttered.

  “Maybe she’ll be the bigger person,” Clayton said.

  Morgan’s face was ashen, his jaw slack. The ambassador’s eyes darted briefly to him, then back to the alien starship on the viewscreens.

  “There must be a reason why she came here to greet us personally,” Clayton said.

  “Revenge,” Morgan rasped.

  “I doubt it’s anything as petty as that,” Clayton replied. He nodded to the bridge doors. “Let’s go.”

  “I’m not going.”

  “You’re the ambassador.”

  “The Union is gone.”

  Clayton’s eyes hardened. “She’s your daughter.”

  Morgan just shook his head.

  “Look at it this way. If you’re right, better to fix things now with a happy reunion. She won’t be any happier with you if you snub her.”

  Morgan made an aggravated sound in the back of his throat. “This is a mistake, Captain.”

  “Maybe, but as Keera pointed out, we don’t have much of a choice.”

  “Stevens?” Clayton asked.

  “Sir?”

  “You have the conn.”

  “I’m coming with you, sir,” Stevens said, already unbuckling from his seat.

  Clayton frowned, watching the man as he stood up. “Someone needs to man the bridge.”

  “Ensign Reynolds can handle it.”

  Clayton’s gaze strayed to the helm where Reynolds sat in Delta’s old chair, a painful reminder that he was dead and gone. An ensign in command of the bridge? He was about to object further, but what difference did it make who had the conn? They couldn’t run, they couldn’t fight, and they’d already surrendered.

  “Very well, Lieutenant. Fall in. Reynolds—you have the conn.”

  “Aye-aye, sir.”

  Chapter 46

  Clayton stood at the amidships airlock with Doctor Stevens, Ambassador Morgan, and an entire squad of thirteen unarmed Marines in full body armor—a show of force without any force. That was Morgan’s idea.

  A clunk sounded from the airlock as the outer doors shut, followed by a loud hissing sound as the decon sprays started up. Hopefully that didn’t piss off the Avari—Kyra, Clayton corrected himself.

  The inner doors swished open, and a group of humanoids wearing familiar fish-scale armor and glossy black helmets appeared. The one standing in the center of the group removed its helmet, and Keera’s face appeared. Four flexible stalks unfolded from the back of her head, their cone-shaped orifices turning to face him.

  She and her entourage marched out of the airlock, coming to a stop just a few feet away. Clayton noticed that all of them were armed with sleek black rifles. Except for Keera. She wore a familiar long-barreled sidearm on her hip.

  These soldiers all stood just as tall as the average human—yet more confirmation that they weren’t Avari. They were probably all hybrids like Keera, which meant that they would be able to co-exist in the same environments as humans.

  Assuming that there were any humans left.

  Clayton put on a grim smile. “Welcome aboard, Admiral Reed.”

  “Thank you, Captain.” Her gaze swept to her father, then back, and then she matched Clayton’s smile with a predatory version of her own.

  A chill coursed down Clayton’s spine as he stared into her bright red eyes. “You mentioned a Federation,” he prompted.

  “The Kyron Federation,” Keera said.

  “And humans are now members of it?”

  “Yes and no. Perhaps we should go somewhere that we can speak more comfortably.”

  “Why?” Morgan asked in a shaky voice. “If you’re just going to kill us, you may as well do it here.”

  She looked to him with narrowed eyes. “You’ve always thought the worst of me, Father. But perhaps that says more about you than it does about me, or my kind.” Her gaze swept back to Clayton. “The Chimeras—others like me—” She spread her hands to indicate the soldiers surrounding her. “—are all citizens. We’re free to come and go as we please. Humans and other naturally evolved species like them are not. It is the Kyra’s way of unifying their empire, of giving us all a common thread to tie us together.”

  “So there are others,” Clayton said. “Do you all look the same?”

  “Of course not. But we all share common features.”

  Clayton’s eyes skipped over the helmeted soldiers present. “None of them look different.”

  “They’re not. They are Human Chimeras, like me. Each sub-species is different.”

  “Are there any humans left on Earth? Or just Chimeras?”

  “Not everyone is compatible with Kyra DNA,” Keera explained. “Some don’t qualify for ascendance. Others die during the transformation, and some fall short to become Dregs.”

  “Ascendance,” Clayton said. “You make it sound as though you’re superior to us.”

  “We are. Physically, at least. All Chimeras are equally at home in at least two different environments—that of their native species, and that of the Kyra themselves. This means that we can serve the Kyra on their worlds and starships just as easily as we can on our own.”

  Clayton’s Marines shuffled their feet, their armor clattering. Taking umbrage no doubt. Tell a squad of Space Marines that they’re physically inferior and watch them bristle with indignation. A smile tugged at the corners of Clayton’s mouth, but the gravity of the situation quickly squelched it.


  “So we’re not under arrest or slated for execution.”

  “No. My mother told me about you. She said that you were the one who always insisted that I be treated fairly, without any prejudice or contempt.” Her eyes flicked to her father, then back. “I would like to return that favor to you now. You and your crew will not be held accountable for the two Kyra that you killed.”

  A sudden burst of anger flashed through Clayton’s system, making it hard to think straight. What about the officers that they killed? Delta, Taylor, Devon, Davies, Asher, Ferris... He bit his tongue and smiled thinly at Keera. “That’s very generous of the Kyra.”

  “In addition to this pardon, I have a surprise for you—” Her eyes slid to Morgan again. “And for you, Father.”

  Morgan paled, and Keera nodded to one of the soldiers standing in the back of her entourage. “You can take off your helmets now.”

  Two soldiers pressed through to the front of the group, and Clayton noticed that both of them were unarmed. They reached up to remove their helmets, and a pair of familiar faces appeared—

  Lori’s.

  And Samara’s.

  Clayton’s heart nearly stopped. He stood there for the longest second of his life, rooted to the spot, unable to believe his eyes.

  “Hello, Clay,” she said in a trembling whisper of a voice. Her vibrant blue eyes darted around, as if all of this was somehow just as alien to her as it was to him.

  “The Kyra are good to their subjects, Captain,” Keera said. “And their technology is beyond anything you can possibly imagine.”

  “Lori?” Morgan asked in a shaking voice.

  She whispered a cutting remark under her breath, but Clayton didn’t hear it over the roaring drumbeat of his pulse. He took a quick step forward, then stopped abruptly, worried that the Chimeran soldiers might shoot him if he ran to greet Samara.

  Keera nodded. “It’s okay, Captain.” Then to her soldiers, she said, “Stand down.”

  So Clayton ran, crashing into Samara, sweeping her up in his arms, and burying his face in her hair. It even smelled like her.

  “How is this possible?” he sobbed. “You were dead!”

  “It’s okay,” Samara whispered. “I’m here now.”

  Clayton withdrew and kissed her repeatedly. She laughed against his lips.

  Keera answered his question as he withdrew, “There were many records of the deceased in your archives by the time we arrived. Samara was one of many. My mother suggested that we bring her back as our way of saying thank you.”

  Clayton looked his wife in the eyes—the same vibrant blue eyes that he remembered. Her cheeks were stained with tears, the same as his. She gave a shaky smile, and glanced about furtively once more.

  “Is everything okay?” Clayton asked.

  She nodded quickly. “I’m just overwhelmed, that’s all. I only woke up yesterday, and to me it’s still the 21st century.”

  “That must be a shock...” He looked to Keera, and she nodded.

  “She’s adapting very well.”

  “Are there others who were resurrected?”

  “No. The Kyra don’t believe in resurrecting the dead from their memories. Your wife is the only exception that I know of. It was not easy to get their approval.”

  “Thank you,” Clayton said. His eyes went to Lori. “Both of you.”

  She nodded back.

  And then it hit him. Lori didn’t look a day older than when she’d left. “How old are you? When did the Kyra arrive?”

  Lori laughed, then quickly sobered. “Almost eighty years ago. Just six months after they took Keera and me from the Forerunner. So to answer your question—a lot older than I like to admit.”

  “But you look the same...” Doctor Stevens murmured.

  “Biological organisms need not age,” Keera explained. “Membership in the Kyron Federation has many benefits.”

  “Was it voluntary?” Morgan asked.

  “Was what voluntary?” Keera asked.

  “Us joining it,” Morgan said.

  “Did dogs or horses voluntarily submit to domestication by their human masters?”

  That reply gave Clayton pause. “So it’s like that.”

  “Your people still have significant autonomy, and the Kyra care for their subjects far better than humans ever did for their pets—I can assure you of that.”

  “Good,” was all Clayton could think to say. “Now what?”

  “Now, we take you back to Earth. I’d let you take your ship, but it would take you years to return, and we can get you there much faster.”

  “We’ll need some time to wake the colonists and ready the crew.”

  “I’ll give you a quarter of a cycle.”

  “A cycle?”

  “Five hours. I assume that will be enough time?”

  Clayton nodded. “It will. Thank you.”

  “Good.” Keera nodded to him, and smiled.

  Clayton returned that smile. He’d been right about her. His eyes drifted to Lori and she nodded to him. “It’s good to see you again, Captain.”

  “Likewise,” he replied.

  And then Keera and the Chimeras turned and marched back into the airlock.

  “We’ll be waiting,” Keera said, catching his eye as the airlock doors slid shut.

  Ambassador Morgan blew out a breath, looking thoroughly shaken. “She didn’t kill me.”

  “It looks like the Avari—the Kyra, I mean—might not be all bad,” Clayton replied.

  But no one seconded his opinion.

  Chapter 47

  Eight hours Later...

  The Kyra lander shivered and shook violently as it sliced down through Earth’s atmosphere. Samara sat beside Clayton, squeezing his hand. Several armed Chimeras were seated around them. Sweeping viewports framed the nose and sides of the cabin, making it feel bright and airy inside.

  Clayton’s row of seats was twelve wide, and there were at least a hundred rows just like it spread across three separate decks. Over a thousand people. All of the crew and colonists from the Forerunner crammed into one giant transport. One of several inside the Kyra destroyer that served as Keera’s flagship.

  A fluffy carpet of clouds swept up fast beneath them. The turbulence and G-forces of re-entry were somehow buffered by the ship’s technology. The Kyra were so advanced that they were like gods. Everywhere Clayton looked there was something new to astound him—not the least of which, FTL drives. They’d traveled the four light years from Proxima to Earth in just under two hours. Two light years per hour. Clayton kept wanting to ask questions, but he hadn’t seen either Lori or Keera again since being marched off to temporary quarters aboard her ship. And Samara didn’t seem to know much more than he did.

  He glanced over at her, noting the tension in her face and rigid posture.

  “Hey.”

  She looked at him with wide eyes.

  “It’s going to be okay.”

  She gave a shallow nod before looking away.

  The transport ducked into the clouds. Gauzy curtains of moisture swept by to all sides. Dr. Stevens caught Clayton looking his way. He was sitting on the aisle seat of the same row. Stevens nodded, and Clayton smiled tightly back.

  And then the clouds parted, and a futuristic city appeared beneath them. Tall, glittering towers caught the light of the afternoon sun, blinding him and everyone else. The ship sank below the glaring eye of the sun a moment later, and more details snapped into focus.

  A collective gasp sounded from the passengers. A vast field of charred and crumbling ruins appeared below, stretching out to the horizon in all directions. The ruins were overgrown and shot through with rivers of green, but a tiny freckle of civilization shone like a pearl from the center of that devastation: tall skyscrapers guarded by thick gray walls.

  “What the hell happened here? Where is this?” Clayton asked.

  No ventured an answer. His eyes fell on the nearest Chimera, sitting two rows up from him. “Hey! You want to explain this? I thoug
ht the Kyra treat their subjects well.”

  A low hiss sounded as the Chimera turned its head. Red eyes found him and quickly narrowed. “Your people did not surrender easily.” And with that, its head turned back around.

  Samara had Clayton’s hand in a death grip now.

  He studied her. “You haven’t seen this?”

  “No,” she breathed. “They must have killed millions!”

  “Billions,” a husky Chimera voice replied. This from a second Chimera sitting beside the first. It twisted around, revealing slightly more feminine features, like Keera’s. Cranial stalks swiveled to face them. “Your people are still recovering nearly a century later. The smart ones choose to ascend so that they don’t have to stay in this dumpster. That’s why I did it.”

  “You used to be human?”

  The chimera nodded.

  “Where are we? What is this city called?” Clayton asked again, gesturing to it through the viewports.

  “Houston.”

  Shock coursed through him. The Houston he remembered had been a sprawling metropolis with over three million people living in it.

  “Why haven’t we rebuilt?” Samara asked.

  “The ruins are populated by the Dregs,” the Chimera replied. “It is dangerous to reclaim territory outside the walls.”

  “Dregs?” Clayton asked.

  “People who failed to ascend. The virus doesn’t always work.”

  Clayton wanted to ask more questions, but the Chimera turned around again. Samara’s nails dug into his arm, her horror radiating through that touch. They sat silently and watched as the transport hovered down to a large, flat rooftop in the middle of the high rises. The transport touched down with a gentle thump, followed by the sound of seat restraints clicking free and Chimeras rising to their feet.

  “Everybody up!” one of them yelled. “Let’s go! Let’s go!”

  One by one, people rose slowly and reluctantly to their feet. Some were slower than others. Clayton and Samara joined them in standing and began shuffling down their row toward the end.

  Somewhere in the cabin someone was sobbing loudly.

  “On your feet, Dakka!”