Paragon

by Autumn Kalquist

  “We were working over there—they thought the exit was that direction.” Dritan pointed toward a series of dark crevices.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  Dritan cradled his bad arm and scanned the area, trying not to look too hard at his fallen crewmates. He didn’t want to know who they were. Who they had been. “We need to search all the bodies. Move the rocks to find supplies.”

  “Corinth?” Jan lightly touched his arm.

  “What?”

  “I didn’t want to say it when the others were still…”

  Dritan waited, but she didn’t finish. “Just say it.”

  “That explosion wasn’t right.”

  Dritan looked down at Jan. “We followed procedure. Something went wrong—the cavern was unstable.”

  “No,” Jan’s deep blue eyes met his. “I originally came from mining—from the Perth.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “My parents managed to get me off there—and now here I am… buried beneath rock anyway.” Jan knit her brows together. “As a half, I helped mine the meteors a few times.”

  “And…?”

  “And I saw the charge the guys planted down here. It didn’t have enough powder to cause that kind of explosion. Nowhere near enough. The Artex powder had to be augmented. With… Zenith or something, as crazy as that sounds.”

  A bitter taste rose in Dritan’s mouth, and he risked another small sip of their water. “I don’t understand. Zenith?”

  “It increases the power of a blast. But, my point is… What if no rescue’s coming?” Jan said. “What if… what if this wasn’t an accident? All the crews from Paragon were on this mission.”

  Dritan shook his head. “No. No way. We had nothing to do with—”

  “With the terrorists?” Her eyes narrowed. “But we did. We worked alongside them. And that was treason enough. That’s why they sent us all here—to get rid of us.”

  “No,” Dritan said firmly. He walked away from her, toward the cluster of boulders, more bodies crushed beneath them. “They sent us because everyone has to serve a term here. We all need to do our part.”

  “They sent us here to send everyone a message.” Jan said, her voice rising. “How many others in the fleet would be happy to see the president—the board—dead? My family’s up there on the Paragon. I need to protect them. And I’m… stuck here. What if it’s not safe up there either?”

  Dritan’s gut twisted. Era. I have to get back to Era. And to our baby. But he didn’t say it. He hunkered down beside the bodies and reached his hand beneath the boulder, eyes closed, feeling around until his hand touched a work belt. One more oxygen pack. He pulled it out slowly, fighting the urge to vomit as the corpse squished against his arm. He stood up and took a step back, staring down at the pack. “The Paragon is safe now.”

  “How do you know?” Jan’s voice cracked, and her eyes went a little wild. “And what if there are colonists like Sam, Tati, and Jonas still up there? They talked to so many others—not just us. All those people are still up there on the Paragon. Did you know Tati even had a lover? My husband Gavin told me the rumor. But no one seemed to know who it was. What if—”

  “Stop it. Our families are safe up there,” Dritan repeated. He went to Jan and squeezed her arm until her fearful gaze met his. “We need to focus on surviving. Rescue will come. They won’t leave us here.”

  Jan let out a harsh laugh and grimaced against some pain inside her. She pulled her arm away and leaned against a rock. “If they think sending us down here will stop people from talking treason—they’re wrong. All of us dying down here—it’ll be like dumping Artex on a fire.”

  “We’re not going to die. And don’t say that kak.”

  “Who’s going to hear me? Is it fair all the subs have to die young to take care of the rest of the fleet? When’s the last time they sent a crew of techs to blow a hole in rock?”

  “Is it fair? I don’t know. But it’s not their job. It’s ours. We all have to play our part so this fleet—”

  “Corinth. Are you listening to yourself?” Jan focused on Dritan’s face, clearly trying not to look at the corpses behind him. “I’m worried about my family. Aren’t you?”

  Dritan pulled at his short curls, thinking of Era—alone on the Paragon—and winced as his fingers brushed the gash on his head. “Look. Others might talk, but that’s all they do. Talk. The terrorists did more than just talk. They crossed a line. And they’re dead now. People will see that—no one else will want to cross that line.”

  “I wish they’d succeeded,” Jan said through gritted teeth. “I shouldn’t be here. We wouldn’t be here if they had.”

  Heat spread in Dritan’s chest. “Succeeded in what? Blowing a hole in exec sector?” He stepped toward her. “Killing the president and the board? Everyone has a place in the fleet. That is theirs. This is ours. It’s how we all survive.”

  “What if getting rid of them is the only way to survive? What if… doing the right thing means doing the wrong thing?” Jan‘s eyes went to the bodies beneath the rocks, and her jaw went tight.

  Dritan closed his eyes, and the anger drained from him. Tati, Jonas, and Sam had all talked treason. And when Dritan saw Sam attack the president’s daughter—when he’d realized the three of them caused the hull breach, he’d turned on them—turned on his own people. Subs never turned on each other. Shame flooded him, but he pushed it down. I did the right thing.

  “Yeah,” he said, “sometimes doing the right thing means doing the wrong thing. But I draw the line at trying to take someone else’s life.”

  Jan licked her lips. “They take ours. And maybe this accident wasn’t an accident. Maybe no one is coming for us.”

  Dritan swallowed and met her gaze. She was wrong. He was loyal, and he’d proved it to the president. No one had a reason to want them dead. “We need to focus on the here and now. On surviving. Get it together, Lanar. The Paragon’s safe, and there’s no conspiracy to kill us.”

  Jan pressed her lips together, and her eyes shone in the yellow light of the helio. “I just want to see my daughter again.”

  “And you will. We will both see our families.” He slid the oxygen pack into his work belt and turned away from her.

  He was not going to die down here. He’d been a small child when his parents went to fix a hull breach and never came back. And he wouldn’t leave Era and their baby the way his parents had left him. He was getting off this damn planet.

  He started around the boulders, searching for more of his fallen crewmates. He’d made it three feet when another quake reverberated beneath his boots. His heart sped up, and he snatched the helio from the air, crouching low against a boulder as more rocks began to fall. He closed his eyes and pictured Era as the planet shook around him.

  The day they paired. Her laughing brown eyes. The feel of her lips against his, holding her in his arms. Would he ever see her again?

  She had been laughing on their way to the tattoo cubic. She even smiled through the pain of the infinity tattoo, so proud to finally leave her half status behind. Afterward, they had a special meal up on command level. Something Zephyr smuggled out of the galley for them.

  “I never thought I’d feel this happy again,” Era said, her bright eyes meeting his over a meal better than any Dritan had ever eaten.

  “Now you’ll have to live in paired couples sector with me,” he replied. “You won’t get to live up here on command level anymore.”

  “I don’t care. I’ve told you—I’ll be happy anywhere, as long as I’m with you.”

  Era needed him, like no one else ever had. He had to get back to her.

  The quake seemed to last forever, but finally, it ended. Dritan stood, his legs weak as fresh poured metal. His “lucky gene” had saved him again.

  “Dritan,” Jan called, her voice weak.

  He released the helio, and it floated beside him as he pushed around the new debris, seeking her.

  “J
an!” Dust flew through the air, obscuring his vision.

  “I’m here.”

  Dritan moved through the dust and found her. She was trapped against the rock wall, a trail of red running down her head and neck. An enormous boulder pinned her leg to the ground, and blood gushed from it, pooling beneath her. She turned her head, pale eyes watering, and a whimper croaked from her throat.

  He reached her just as her eyes fluttered shut.

  Darkness enveloped Tadeo, and he sensed he’d stayed in his bunk too long. But when he lay here in the dark, he could pretend Kit was still alive—that he was still on the Meso, and he could run down to the sublevels and meet her there. In secret. Breaking the rules.

  I killed them. Era… and Kit.

  He hadn’t felt this bad since he first got to the Paragon. Grimp would make it all go away. But his mother had made sure no one on medlevel would give it to him. She’d saved him from his addiction and his grief.

  Tadeo opened his eyes, blinking in the darkness to banish the vision of pregnant Era—standing naked in the airlock, staring down at the infinity symbol on her wrist, tears streaming down her face. This nightmare would not follow him around every waking shift, because Era had deserved to die.

  He sat up and slammed a hand against the switch beside his bunk. The lume bars in his sleeping compartment flickered to life, and Tadeo groaned, tossing his sweat-soaked blanket to the floor. He rose, naked, and walked across his cubic.

  His muscles ached from his run through the sublevels the night before, but the spongy rubber tiles felt cool under his feet, and the drafty air chilled his overheated skin. The small, square holo screen on his wall displayed the time. Kak. He was late for mess again.

  When he reached his lav unit, he turned on the faucet and splashed water on his face. He glanced at himself in the cracked mirror. A hunk of his black hair hung in his bloodshot brown eyes. He pushed it off his forehead and smoothed it back. “You’re an idiot.”

  Why couldn’t he forget Kit? He gripped the edges of the sink and tried to focus. There were traitors on this ship. And today he needed to find whatever it was Era had stolen for them.

  Tadeo’s comcuff went off from inside the curved metal cabinet bolted to the wall. He pulled it out and checked the ID. It was Darren Omar, son of the Vancouver’s navigator, and one of Tadeo’s few true peers on this ship. He was the closest thing Tadeo had ever had to a friend here. Tadeo sighed and pressed the button to answer it.

  “Raines.”

  “Where are you?”

  “My bunk.”

  “Seriously? I figured. You’re late for mess. Again.”

  “I’ll get there.”

  “Yeah, you will.”

  A loud bang resonated from Tadeo’s door. He groaned and walked over to open it, realizing at the last second he was still naked.

  “Kak, man.” Omar’s eyes widened, bright against his black skin, and he shielded them with one hand. “I don’t go like that.”

  Tadeo’s gut twisted at the remark, but he smirked at Omar with forced amusement. He knew what some people said about him—that he didn’t like women—just because he hadn’t paired with anyone yet. But people also whispered he’d seduced a girl back on the Meso—and then she’d disappeared. He’d rather them believe he didn’t like women than the rumors that came so close to the truth.

  Tadeo stepped out of the way, spreading his arm wide. “Come on in.”

  Omar pressed his lips together, clearly embarrassed by what he’d insinuated. He focused on Tadeo’s face, trying not to look at the rest of him, and reluctantly crossed the threshold, keeping his distance.

  Tadeo took his time walking back to his cabinet, forcing Omar to feel discomfort at his full-on nudity. He pulled a fresh guard suit out, and as he stepped into it, he gestured to the small couch across from his bunk. “You can sit.”

  Omar ran a hand over his shaved head and sank down on the bench, averting his eyes as Tadeo suited up. Once he zipped his suit, Omar’s shoulders relaxed, and he leaned back against the wall panel.

  “Wow,” Omar said, glancing around at Tadeo’s spacious quarters. “You have your own lav? Damn. My new cubic’s half this size. When do I get one of these?”

  “Never. Just be happy you’re not sharing with bunkmates anymore.”

  Tadeo had lived in the guard barracks for four years—until his promotion to the president’s guard. When Tadeo moved up, he’d pulled for Omar to get promoted, too. But Tadeo had gotten a better cubic because he was the heir to the Meso. And Omar… wasn’t.

  “Hurry up man, we’re gonna miss mess.”

  “You know, you don’t have to caretake me,” Tadeo said in a mocking tone. “Unless you feel like getting demoted to caretaker sector. You wanna guard the kids?”

  “Do you wanna guard kids?” Omar fired right back. “’Cause Chief wasn’t too happy with you earlier. You need to learn to answer your comm. He tried to comm you before mess, but you didn’t answer. So he commed me, and since he just happened to have me on the cuff, he ordered me to run those treason talkers down to the hangar bay. How ’bout you answer your damn cuff next time, yeah?”

  Tadeo attached his comcuff to his wrist, slipped in his earbud, and holstered his pulse gun to his belt. Omar was one of the few guards who didn’t act like he was going to piss himself whenever Tadeo talked to him. He liked that about him. That, and he didn’t ask too many questions, despite the rumors about Tadeo.

  “Are the treason talkers going somewhere?” Tadeo asked, feigning surprise.

  “The president and board decided to send ’em down to Soren.”

  “They finished questioning them?”

  “Yeah,” Omar said. “They weren’t happy. They talked kak about the president and board. Said they fight all the time, and that’s the reason the jumpgate’s not done. Doesn’t matter what they think now, though. They’re on their way to Soren.”

  Tadeo tightened his jaw. The board sometimes did stand in the way of progress, but the fleet had to follow the laws it had made for itself, or everything would disintegrate long before they reached New Earth.

  “Tough kak for them,” Tadeo said. “Let’s get to mess.”

  Omar and Tadeo headed toward command level galley, and two girls walked by, daughters of some bridge crew member or another. He should remember their names after four years on this ship, but he didn’t. They stared at him as they walked past, one whispering something to the other. Omar smiled broadly at them, but they didn’t pay attention to him, because their eyes were glued to Tadeo. Omar let out an exaggerated sigh at their disinterest, but Tadeo just frowned and kept his eyes straight ahead.

  They entered the galley, and the scents from the buffet wafted over them. Tadeo’s stomach growled in response. It was a small room, tiny compared to the guard galley or the massive main galley. A few tall, white hydropods stood at the corners of the room, and leaves hung over the edges of each ovoid pod. Rare greenery on the flagship. He suppressed a pang of homesickness. The president and command galley might have plants, but the Paragon was seriously short on green. Some considered this to be the best ship in the fleet, but it would never be that to him.

  Farida Mittal, the youngest member of the board, sat next to Nyssa at the table, as always. Farida represented the London and Perth, but her family had only held the position for one generation. A precarious position to be in. One mistake, and she could lose it. That was probably why she brown-nosed the president at every opportunity.

  Nyssa had a plate and cup before her, but she wasn’t eating. Her eyes flicked to Tadeo, and she inclined her head. She had that look, the one that said, “We share something, and I’m grateful for your discretion.”

  Tadeo’s mind shrunk from that look, tried to escape the thought of their shared secret. He nodded in return and broke eye contact, heading for the buffet. The reminder of today’s mission made him restless—energy surging through him as if he were a charged pulse gun.

  The rest of the board members and
their families sat clustered at tables beside Nyssa’s. Nicolas Gonzalez, representative for the recyc deka, Seattle, and Omar’s ship, the Vancouver, sat with his son and wife sipping a flask, his fair complexion mottled.

  “Wow, drunk already and not even first shift?” Omar said, raising his voice.

  Tadeo slammed an elbow into Omar’s side to shut him up before he started ranting about how much Nic had screwed over the Vancouver.

  “Watch your mouth, Omar. We’re not on six anymore.”

  “Well, someone should say it.”

  As they waited in line, Tadeo surveyed the rest of the board members. If the flagship Paragon was the beating heart of the fleet, then the dekas were its lifeblood. Each of the ten dekas manufactured something vital to the fleet’s survival. And each of the five board members represented the interests of two of the ships.

  Nassef Yasin, representative for the Dubai and Moscow, sat with his family beside Jon Lau, representative for the Beijing and Kyoto. Nyssa had seemed impressed with how Jon had handled the Kyoto incident during the riots—when traitors had airlocked the captain and the entire crew. But Nassef was a wild card.

  Tom Nielsen, the fifth board member, sat at his own table with his family, his face a perpetual scowl. Tomas represented the Oslo and the Meso and constantly raised the quotas on water and food, which led to overworked colonists and messed up population management calculations. Tomas was the real cause of all the shortages. If there was one kak board member, it was Tomas Nielsen.

  Tadeo ground his teeth and stepped up to the buffet to grab a plate.

  The lights flickered above them, and Tadeo exchanged a worried glance with Omar. The low chatter in the galley ceased.

  Then they were plunged into darkness.

  Tadeo’s heart sped up, and his hand went to his pulse gun. He could sense Omar doing the same in the darkness. A few helios went up, and the palm-sized spheres floated beside their owners, casting a yellow glow over drawn faces.

  Everyone waited—tense, silent—to see if the bridge crew would trigger the sirens. Was it another emergency lockdown? Another terrorist attack, like the hull breach on six? Everyone here was thinking the same thing—he could see it on their faces.