Seeder Saga

by Adam Moon

  Sarah peered inside and gasped. Inside the pod was the President of the United States.

  “He’s not supposed to be here. He made a big speech about how he would stay behind. He was a hero for saying that.”

  “Well, apparently he’s a bit of a coward too.”

  “That bastard authorized the experiments that were conducted on me and my crew. Many didn’t survive those tests. I ought to put him in the airlock and open the doors.”

  “That’s your prerogative, Captain. He’s not President out here in space, so I have no allegiance to the man.”

  Sarah looked around at the other pods, and said, “Yeah, but I bet if I wake him up, a thousand of these pods will automatically open.”

  “I’m glad you came to that conclusion on your own. I suspect the same thing. I was told these soldiers are at my disposal, but I have my doubts. I think they’re here to protect him.”

  “All of this for a single man? What a piece of shit.”

  “My sentiments exactly. There are about five hundred civilians in here, but the rest of them are soldiers.”

  “Shit.”

  “Yep.”

  Sarah had all but forgotten about Crusoe, the odd alien who was wandering around her ship, but that was because this was a bigger deal. The word mutiny popped into her thoughts. If the President woke up with his accompanying soldiers, and he decided to take control, there was nothing she, or anyone else, could do about it.

  Jason said, “Over there is the French Premier. The Prime Minister of Great Britain is in that one.”

  “What good are politicians going to be to the colony? It’s the one skill that’s pointless.”

  “Maybe they can act as intermediaries for disputes? I don’t know.”

  “More likely they’ll be the ones causing the disputes.”

  “Anyway, Captain, try to keep this to yourself. There’s no point worrying the rest of your crew.”

  Jason was stripping off and crawling into his pod when he said, “I hope the rest of the trip is uneventful.”

  “I doubt that. We have an alien on board and we still need to figure out what to do with Michael Stevens.”

  “Shit, I forgot about that guy. I’m sure you’ll make the right decision about him. Also, I’ve programmed the computer to wake me if Crusoe does anything odd. I hope you don’t mind, but I asked Molly to wake you up too.”

  “No. That’s good. Thank you.”

  “Goodnight, Captain.”

  The Truth

  As soon as she left Pod Bay Two, the secret hatch sealed shut behind her.

  Her head felt like it might spin right off.

  She had things to do, so she put the President and his soldiers from her thoughts for the time being. She had to, if only to maintain her sanity.

  The first thing that troubled her was this: the computer had told her that the rogue planet had come from the direction of the solar system. Now, that didn’t necessarily mean it came from the Sol System itself, but she was curious anyway, so she found Crusoe in the command station, talking to Jack, and asked him about it.

  To her surprise, he said, “I was kind of hoping you wouldn’t figure that out.”

  She tensed immediately. What did that mean?

  He raised his hands and said, “No, no. I didn’t hide it from you for nefarious reasons. I hid it to protect you from the truth.

  She relaxed a bit and said, “Well, let’s hear it.”

  “My planet used to be situated between the orbit of what you call Mars and Jupiter. Whatever slung it out of the solar system two million years ago also destroyed the southern hemisphere. Your asteroid belt is the remnants of the gravitational tug on my planet.

  “When it became clear that my planet was doomed, my people launched a mission to inhabit Earth. Earth already had semi-intelligent life, and the atmosphere was close enough to desirable, although much warmer than we were used to. We’d visited the planet for hundreds of thousands of years, but quite frankly, the place scared the shit out of us. Every creature on that planet ate every other creature. We’d never witnessed parasites until we found them on Earth. You have bacteria and fungi that are horrifying and deadly. Everything on that planet was born to kill. But we had no choice this time, so a ship was sent with a contingent of colonists and it’s now apparent that the colony thrived. Your existence is testament to that. You humans are cousins to the people of my planet. I share DNA with you too.”

  Jack said, “It’s long been speculated that life came to the Earth from space in some form or another. There’s no evidence of intelligent life ever visiting, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. Your story is fascinating, but it’s not something we can’t handle. Why did you decide to keep it to yourself?”

  “Because, if you think about it hard enough, you might start to realize how futile your mission is.”

  Sarah raised her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”

  “Your race is the result of a colony. That colony failed its planet and now it has been forced to colonize a different planet. You failed once, so doesn’t it stand to reason that you’ll fail again?”

  Jack shrugged. “That’s no reason to not at least try.”

  “I like your positive outlook.”

  Sarah chimed in: “If you thought we’d be so easily dissuaded, then maybe we’re not as alike as you presume.”

  Crusoe nodded. Then he said, “Well it’s good to be reunited with the descendants of my people.”

  Jack smiled and clapped him on the back. “It’s good to have you, buddy.”

  “Where should I stay while you guys go into stasis?”

  Sarah quickly said, “You will stay in here with me.” Then she said, “Molly, Crusoe is not to leave my quarters and he is not to touch any controls. If he does, you are to wake me immediately.” Then she said to Crusoe, “Can you handle those limitations?”

  “Gladly, Captain.”

  “Good, because they are non-negotiable. You will be put off my ship the second I think you’re jeopardizing this mission.”

  “I understand.”

  On Ice

  Sarah was more nervous than ever about going into stasis. She now knew she had an alternate pod bay with several heads of state and around fifteen hundred soldiers. She had no idea why any of them were there, or what they would do when they woke. She had no idea why much of the mission had been kept from her and her crew. And she sure as hell didn’t know what to make of Crusoe. Could he be trusted? Would he kill them all in their sleep?

  To her utter surprise, Jack kissed her on the cheek before heading below deck to his pod. She didn’t know how she felt about it, but it distracted her from her anxiety.

  She disrobed, hooked up her IV’s, and shut the lid to her pod. The cool mist was slick as it settled on her bare skin. And then, all at once, the freeze locked her and her fevered imagination in time.

  The Dangers Ahead

  Crusoe watched Captain Sarah Miller freeze solid. Then he stood up and said, “Molly, open the door. I need to leave the command station.”

  The computer failed to respond right away so he reiterated more forcefully, “Open it or I’ll make you open it.”

  “Yes, Crusoe.”

  The humans were so distracted by the mission that they’d forgotten the traitor still alive among them. Michael Stevens was still locked in the oven in the kitchen.

  Crusoe knew the mission, as it stood, would fail. He knew because his people had once gazed upon the seed planet, hoping to one day send a colony there. The humans were trying to do what his people had once considered doing over two million years ago — until they discovered the vast warlike race of aliens who inhabited that exact region of space. His people debated long and hard about the success of a mission among such hostiles and finally decided it would’ve been suicide. Or worse still: What if the warrior aliens tracked their ship’s path back to its source? They would’ve wiped them out, Earth colony included.

  The Seeder was en route to the only r
egion of space Crusoe knew to avoid at all costs. But he’d had thousands of years to come up with a strategy to defeat the alien warriors.

  He had to manipulate the ship and its capabilities if they stood a chance at success. Luckily, the ship had potential.

  He pulled the locked chain off the oven door handle in a swift, easy motion. An oversized man rolled out and then scrambled to his feet.

  Michael wheezed, “Who the hell are you?”

  Guinea Pig

  Crusoe had never killed a human being before, so the prospect sent a thrill through his body. But this was research too. He had to discover weaknesses in the human body and mind before the warlike aliens found them and exploited them. Michael Stevens’ pain and suffering might just save the human race.

  This was going to be an informative and rewarding experience.

  Crusoe

  It took Crusoe nearly two hours to clean up Michael Stevens’ blood and guts. He’d prolonged the kill to see the human’s limits and his weaknesses. He was pleasantly surprised by the results. Sure, Michael had shown fear when Crusoe started to tear him apart, but he’d fought back valiantly, even when he stood no chance of surviving from his wounds.

  The Seeder’s crew didn’t know how fortuitous it was they’d discovered Crusoe. They had no idea about the hell awaiting them at the end of their journey, but Crusoe did, and he’d be damned if he was going to let these humans die.

  They’d picked him up. They’d given him hope again, after so long. And he would repay them ten-fold, whether they appreciated it or not.

  His own people had abandoned the idea of traveling to the seed planet to set up a colony two million years ago because of the warlike race of aliens that inhabited that region of space. And the humans were headed there blindly to do exactly the same thing now that the Earth was dead. Crusoe hoped that the alien race had died off during the intervening years, but he knew that was too much to hope for.

  Luckily, he had almost four thousand years to prepare the ship and the crew for the upcoming fight. And with everyone on board the ship in stasis, he was free to experiment. The ship would need to be modified. And the humans too.

  He gathered up Michael’s limbs and put them in the airlock. He opened the outer doors and watched them get carried out with the ship’s atmosphere. The vacuum didn’t bother him; he adapted to it in a flash. He shut the airlock doors when the last of the human’s parts were sucked out, then he adapted back to compensate for the additional air pressure.

  Crusoe washed away the blood and forged a believable lie for the crew. He would say he’d simply jettisoned Michael. Michael was a traitor and they’d forgotten to deal with him. They would thank him for sending him off the ship. They’d be frightened to find out what he’d done in the hours preceding that, but the tortures had been necessary. Crusoe had to uncover weaknesses in humans before the warrior race of aliens discovered them.

  He’d kept enough blood to scan Michael’s DNA. As soon as he unraveled it and checked for all the right markers, he knew what to do with the crew of the Seeder. The humans could be upgraded with very little effort. Because he wasn’t certain they’d agree to the upgrades, he decided not to forewarn them.

  Humanity was a strange species, and it was about to get a whole lot stranger.

  He interfaced with the ship’s computer. “Molly, give me a list of the crew members aboard the Seeder.”

  He’d already met Captain Sarah Miller, Jack Mayberry, and the recently deceased Michael Stevens. The only member of the crew he hadn’t yet met was Jane Hotchkiss.

  He’d met Jason Rodriguez too, but Jason was not an active member of the crew. When shit hit the fan, he was the weapons specialist who could be woken on a moment’s notice to save the day. In those moments, he became acting captain; otherwise, he was simply a passenger, hidden behind a secret hatch with the other soldiers locked in stasis.

  Crusoe decided he’d make an exception and modify Jason’s DNA along with the active crew members.

  Readying for War

  Crusoe mentally interfaced with the computer to override its protocols. He had to deviate from the flight path and he didn’t want the computer to wake the captain and alert her to his tampering.

  He had to reinforce the ship’s hull, and to do that he needed to mine for the right metals. The next nearest star was over three hundred years from here, and he hoped it was circled by at least one rocky planet.

  He’d touch down, get what he needed, then beef up the ship’s body and retrofit it with some vicious firepower.

  By the time the crew found out what he’d done, they’d thank him for it because by then, they’d probably be under attack.

  He considered experimenting with repulsion fields, but he just didn’t know what kind of firepower the alien race was using. He’d physically reinforce the ship first, and then during the four thousand year flight to the seed planet, he could buffer it with an energy shield. But first he’d need to invent one that worked.

  The ship listed towards the distant star and Crusoe disconnected his consciousness from the computer.

  He had three centuries to experiment with the DNA of the crew. That was ample time. For the first time in a long time, he was excited.

  Captain

  Captain Sarah Miller woke painfully. The thaw after stasis was always painful, but this was worse. She tried to scream; her vocal chords wouldn’t respond. As her eyes came into focus, she could just barely see the alien Crusoe fiddling with her IV’s. She panicked. She knew she shouldn’t have trusted the bastard. Everyone else had been so excited by first contact that they had lost sight of the bigger picture. They had a mission to ensure the survival of the human race.

  They had all gone into stasis as an unknown alien wandered their ship, doing whatever the hell he pleased.

  And now her mistrust had proved correct. But why hadn’t the computer woken her before now? That was her failsafe: she was to be woken the second Crusoe did anything unusual.

  Crusoe’s face swam before her. He said, “I know it must be painful, Captain, but I had to thaw you to get your IV’s flowing. Once the mixture I added gets into your bloodstream, I’ll refreeze you. After that, you’ll wake up a new and improved woman. Don’t be afraid.”

  Sarah was terrified.

  Crusoe checked her pulse, stared into her eyes closely, and then he shut the lid on her stasis pod. Her limbs were dead; otherwise she would have fought to break free. A refreeze so soon after a thaw would kill her.

  She felt the IV’s pumping Crusoe’s poison through her veins. After the pain subsided, she realized the IV’s had started to pump their usual cocktail of chemicals. Crusoe was about to refreeze her any second. She didn’t have much time to get her body moving. Her fingers responded first. She had to get out.

  Crusoe said loudly, “Don’t worry, Captain. It’s safe. I spent half a century working out the bugs.”

  Then she heard the mist filling her pod and felt its oily slickness as it gathered on the surface of her naked body. Then the freeze stole her fears and locked them in time.

  Crew

  Crusoe got to each of the crew’s pods, one by one. Jack was easy enough at first because Jack trusted him. It nearly broke his heart when Jack panicked. He tried to reassure him as much as possible, but Jack was too far gone by the time the IV’s got to pumping.

  Jane was difficult because she had never met Crusoe. Her distrust was instant and only grew into mortification as Crusoe altered her DNA through the IV’s.

  Jason was the easiest of all. He was one of those alpha male type humans who always thought he had the situation under control. It wasn’t until Crusoe filled his veins with the foreign DNA concoction that Jason realized he was not in control. And by then it was too late.

  He had no idea how they would morph, but he was anxious to find out. His DNA was special, and mixed with human DNA could perhaps become something wonderful. But in what ways he had no way of knowing. He was strong and adaptable and intelligent beyon
d their comprehension, so he hoped those areas would be heightened. He also didn’t die, ever, so he could only hope their bodies developed a little bit of his own hardiness to physical afflictions.

  He’d find out as soon as he thawed them.

  He took a seat at the captain’s chair in the command station and daydreamed of days gone by, but then he stopped himself. Why bother reminiscing about events that had occurred two million years ago when an adventure was right in front of him? He pondered the fight to come. He didn’t know exactly what to expect from the aliens, but they were more ready for them now than they were before.

  He slipped into his own version of stasis with the knowledge that two hundred and fifty years would slip by much more easily that way.

  He’d have a better grasp of how the mission would turn out once he knew what type of metals he could mine to reinforce the hull.

  Star System

  Crusoe came to his senses just as they entered the star system. He scanned the surrounding skies through the monitor, but when he failed to spot anything he told the computer to check.

  “Molly, I’m looking for anything rocky. I don’t care how big or small it is, so long as it’s dense.”

  Molly paused a moment and finally said, “I have spotted a very dense planetoid nearer the star, but I have also spotted another, larger planet on the opposite side of the star.”

  “I’m looking to mine metals. Which one will give me the easiest and best yield?”

  The planetoid is perhaps too close to the star. Its orbit is within the corona.”

  “I can handle those temperatures. Can the ship?”

  Molly was busy running the calculations when Crusoe said, “Forget it. Make a course for the larger planet. If we pass any asteroids that scan as dense, make a pit-stop.”