by J. N. Chaney
“So you’re willing to chance it?”
For the first time, Dash heard the AI falter. “I…do not recommend this course of action.”
“But you’ll do it?”
“If that is your wish, Dash.”
“Okay, so…yeah, do it!”
Power surged through the Archetype, tapped from the unimaginable radiation of the singularity, the kugelblitz buried deep inside her great hull. Dash could also feel the power tearing at the Archetype’s systems, not properly channeled or constrained, shredding her conduits. More than a moment of this, he knew, and the Archetype might be irreparably damaged. The AI was right. This was a terrible course of action. Absolutely, ridiculously risky.
Just the sort of thing I would do, Dash thought.
“I really have rubbed off on you, haven’t I?” he asked the Sentinel.
The AI didn’t answer. But the power suddenly coursing through the Archetype lifted both it and the Slipwing at ever increasing speed…now they soared through the cloud layer above…and now they erupted from it, trailing a plume of vapor, and raced ever higher.
“I must terminate—”
“What you’re doing, yeah, I know,” Dash said. “That’s fine, if we can make it the rest of the way to orbit on what we have left.”
“It would appear that that is possible.”
Despite his aching weariness, his jabs and flashes of pain, and the pounding agony of his burned leg, Dash chuckled.
“Just don’t want to admit I’m right, do you?”
The AI didn’t answer. That just made Dash chuckle even more.
Epilogue
Dash settled into the Slipwing’s pilot seat with a groan. Despite the slick comfort of the Archetype’s cradle, the familiar contour of the seat against him was, somehow, even more comfortable.
“You look like shit,” Leira said, smiling.
“Yeah, well, you try some exposure to hard vacuum and see what it does to your complexion.”
He did look like shit. Aside from his severely burned leg, Dash was covered with bruises, his skin was spider-webbed with crimson streaks of vacuum-induced hemorrhaging, and both of his eyes were severely bloodshot. Leira leaned in and hugged him anyway. It made Dash wince and yelp.
“Easy, woman,” he said and she pulled back, still smiling.
“Sorry,” she replied. Then she her head and added, “Actually, no, I’m not. It’s so good to see you again, Dash.”
From behind him, crowded into their accustomed places, Viktor and Conover both nodded like the creepy bobbleheads Dash had seen some pilots stick atop their consoles. “You showing up when you did…that was a miracle, Dash,” Viktor said. “A true miracle. We were—well, let’s just say that’s the first time in my life I’ve truly tried to find peace with my imminent demise. And I’ve been through some serious shit.”
“So that—what did you call it?” Conover asked. “The Archetype?”
“Yeah,” Dash said, bemused that the kid had managed to look concerned for him, but had then gone right to the technology.
“So that’s actually Unseen tech? And somehow you’ve bonded with it?”
Dash glanced out the viewport. The Archetype loomed alongside the Slipwing, both in a high orbit over the gas giant. He’d already given them the thumbnail version of everything that had happened from the time he’d left them aboard the Halfwing. As he had, he’d found himself shaking his head at his own story. Almost dying, finding the mech, leaving the galaxy, almost dying again, coming back to confront Nathis, and almost dying yet again.
“Holy shit,” he’d said, interrupting his own tale, “I almost died a whole bunch of times.”
Now, he looked at Conover and nodded. “Yeah. I’m the Messenger, it seems.”
“Because you stumbled across that Archetype? That makes it sound like it was somehow—I don’t know, fated to happen.”
Leira, still smiling, shrugged. “Maybe it was.”
But Conover scowled. “There are no mystical, guiding powers affecting the universe.”
“That’s right,” Leira replied. “Dash just happened to crash-land on the one comet in the Pasture containing this thing, in a way that gave him access to it, so he could reach it right before he died.”
Even Viktor had given a huh look. “What were the odds of that even happening?”
Conover crossed his arms. “One hundred percent, because it did happen. No matter how unlikely, it was just coincidence.”
The kid tried to sound absolutely certain but didn’t quite manage it.
Leira turned back to Dash. “So, what happens now?”
“Well,” Dash said, “the Archetype is repairing itself. That’s going to take some time, though, so we’ll be here a while, I guess. And I’m going to do the same thing—take some time to rest and heal up because, Leira, not only do I look like shit, I feel like it, too.”
“Yes,” Viktor said, “but what then?”
Dash shrugged. “Clan Shirna has had its ass kicked pretty bad. I don’t know how much of a threat they’re going to be. But they’re not the real threat anyway.”
“That would be those Golden, you called them,” Leira said.
“Yeah. But before we can do anything about that, that Archetype needs to be fully powered up. The Unseen—okay, I’m glad they seem to be…well, kind of on our side, or at least not on the let’s exterminate all life in the galaxy side, but they made getting the Archetype there a true pain-in-the-ass ordeal.” He touched the console in front of him. “My poor old ship here needs some tender loving care, too.”
“So, ultimately, we have to go find these power cores you mentioned,” Viktor said.
Dash looked at him, noting he’d said, we. “You guys really sure you want to be involved in this? If what’s happened so far is any indication, this may not be good for your health at all.”
All three of them nodded. Leira said, “If you were us, Dash, would you bail out now?”
It struck Dash that, before all of this happened, if someone had told them he was going to risk his life again and again to save the galaxy from a war between two hyper-advanced alien races, he would have said, you’re fucking crazy.
But this wasn’t then. So he just shook his head.
“Okay,” Conover said, “that brings us back to the same question. Once we’re ready to leave here, what then?”
Somehow finding the energy for his own smile, Dash pulled out his comm and thumbed up an image of the Archetype, the Ribbon, and the Lens.
“This is just the beginning of what the Unseen have stashed out there,” Dash said, his eyes fixated on the screen.
“And? Leira asked with a curve of her lips.
Dash smiled back. “So, let’s go get what they left us.”
DASH, LEIRA, VIKTOR, and CONOVER will return in THE DARK BETWEEN, coming October, 2019.
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About the Authors
J. N. Chaney has a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing and fancies himself quite the Super Mario Bros. fan. When he isn’t writing or gaming, you can find him online at www.jnchaney.com.
He migrates often but was last seen in Avon Park, Fl
orida. Any sightings should be reported, as they are rare.
Terry Maggert is left-handed, likes dragons, coffee, waffles, running, and giraffes; order unimportant. He’s also half of author Daniel Pierce, and half of the humor team at Cledus du Drizzle.
With thirty-one titles, he has something to thrill, entertain, or make you cringe in horror. Guaranteed.
Note: He doesn’t sleep. But you sort of guessed that already.
