The Specter Rising

by James Aspen

  “So, how’d I do?”

  Decidedly average all around, much to my astonishment. I expected you to get more dismal ratings but the algorithms seem to find you moderately capable in most aspects. Except for pilot and gunnery. You somehow got above average scores there. Did you really spend 458 Earth hours playing a combat simulator called ‘Galactic Command’?

  “Uh, that was a video game, but it sounds about right.”

  Actually, it wasn’t too different from some of our training sims. Worse graphics of course and our AIs are far more advanced, so they aren’t as predictable as your game AIs. But for the most part, the game prepared you for the basic mechanics of space combat.

  A sudden swell of vindication tugged at him. See, I told you dad, he thought. Years of being belittled for his hobbies by a man who wasted his life on the drink or the job flashed through his head.

  Your dad seemed like a real piece of work, Zyp chirped.

  “Yeah, we never saw eye to eye on anything,” Paul said. He had felt almost nothing toward his dad for a long time, but he was surprised to find he was sad thinking about the man now.

  It’s almost like leaving Earth completely makes you consider all those unresolved questions like, ‘Does Rachel have feelings for me?’ or ‘Will my father ever respect me?’ Oh well, guess you’ll never know. Zyp was a little too happy to be rubbing that in.

  Paul’s mind raced. Would he really never return? Sure, he’d always wanted to move away but to another state, not a whole different solar system. I can’t worry about that right now, I have to complete Edolit’s mission if the Earth I know is still going to be there.

  “Let’s make it so I can fly this thing without help,” he said, choking down his feelings.

  Okay, sit down. This is going to be disorienting.

  Paul sat in the pilot seat and a prickling sensation crawled up the back of his neck and into the base of his skull. His vision flashed with a bright white, and a dull headache formed behind his eyes.

  “Ow!” he yelled.

  Oh, it’s not so bad, it’s a small upgrade. The headache will pass in a moment.

  Paul shook his head slowly and rubbed his temples. After a few seconds, his vision cleared, and the headache passed. He peered at the control panel and realized it was as familiar as his computer keyboard at home. Throttle, shields, weapons, cloak controls, and dozens of other subsystems. Lights that had been background lighting for him now told him exactly how much power was left in various ship systems.

  He knew everything about how to control the ship now.

  “Holy shit.”

  Pretty cool, huh?

  “It’s awesome. Now, give me everything I need to know about these Varanul, so I can know how to fight them,” Paul said eagerly. His hand wrapped around the control stick and he sent the ship into a spin, trying to get used to how responsive the control was.

  Nope, you’ll fry your brain. The more we are bonded, the less time it takes for the brain to integrate the new data without overload.

  “Right, I forgot. Death, stroke, or pissing myself. How long before I can get another upgrade?”

  At current bonding level, approximately one Earth week.

  “Well, looks like I’ll have to learn the old-fashioned way. Can you display reference material for me to learn?”

  Of course, I have access to the full quantum library of the Federation. Would you like to start with ‘5000 Rotations: A People’s History of the Federation’? It’s highly recommended. Some reviewers claim it to be a little heavy-handed on its criticisms of the Federation’s expansion era, but it was basically a horde of invading forces then, so it seems like fair game for criticism to me.

  “Sounds dry.”

  How about ‘Galactic Politics for Dunces’? A hilarious Trygellian comedian wrote the series. Reviews indicate it to be entertaining, but well researched.

  “Get bent, Zyp.” Paul rubbed his face in frustration. He needed a break. He didn’t have the attention span to read anything at the moment, even though he knew a greater understanding of the conflict was important.

  The quiet of the ship was a little unnerving, but Paul enjoyed having a break from the prattle of Zyp’s voice in his skull. He walked down the corridor and explored the ship, wincing when he saw the blackened holes in the walls from the Varanul’s stray blaster bolts had gouged the metal.

  That could’ve been me. The thought sobered him more. He knew the Ambra could heal him, but he also knew it had limits. He was wearing a dead crew member’s second-hand device, after all. Burned out holes in the wall reminded him he didn’t want to test its limits, so he hurried past.

  Just beyond was a small common room, lit with bright lighting that flickered on when he entered the room. Strange machines lined the countertop and a small table projected from the wall. He looked directly at the machinery and studied them. The HUD flashed a green script beside each as he passed. Food processor. Water dispenser. Medical supply. Microbar. Food warmer.

  Past the galley, the corridor had five narrow doorways, two to each side and dead-ending at one at the end. He hit the panel button beside the nearest door and the door slid aside. Inside was a small room with barely enough room to stand inside. A messy bunk was mounted to the wall, and the room was otherwise empty, save for a few panels that looked like they slid out from the wall.

  Crew quarters, he thought. A guilty flash of invasiveness made him shut the door. The room across the corridor was the same, only slightly more decorated with strange, angular objects mounted to the wall.

  “Zyp, are these all crew quarters?”

  Oh, you want to talk now? What if I don’t want to?

  Paul rolled his eyes. “Just answer the question, Zyp.”

  No, just these four. The one at the end is cargo hold.

  Paul skipped the other crew's quarters and opened the cargo hold. Inside was a larger room, lined with stacks of cases of various shapes and sizes. A ladder along the back wall led to a small platform with the gunnery chair, for the dorsal turret he assumed. He stared at it for a moment, wondering if he could have used it to save Edolit.

  He shook the thought away. He couldn’t let himself get bogged down by what-ifs.

  One wall had a storage rack, stocked with a diverse array of vicious-looking blades and weapons. He walked beside the rack, studying the readouts for each one in his HUD. Bolt throwers, laser blasters, plasma rifles, tactical blades of all shapes and sizes, and a few small cylindrical or round grenades of various types. He was disappointed that he didn’t find one of the blades with the glowing edges Edolit used.

  The rest of the room was arranged haphazardly. Some pieces of equipment in the corner looked like exercise machines. Abandoned electronic components on a table surrounded by tools. Something that looked like a game table with abandoned drink containers beside stacks of oval-shaped metallic cards.

  The wall opposite the weapon’s rack had four space suits mounted in clear compartments. The suits were sleek and gray, but looked far flimsier than he expected. He shuddered, imagining a thin layer of material separating him from the emptiness of space. One suit was larger and broad, with an insectoid helmet and a segmented body shape, but the other three were humanoid, in differing sizes.

  “I guess the crew was pretty diverse, huh?” He said, looking back toward the suits.

  Congrats, genius. Yes, Edolit’s squad was from different worlds.

  “Do you have to be so… sarcastic?”

  Actually, I do; that’s how K’tal wanted me. It is how my core programming was set to make him laugh. Unlike you, you humorless ape.

  The mention of K’tal’s name hit Paul in the gut. K’tal was dead, and his Ambra was hurting. He struggled to imagine a machine could mourn, but he could hear the pain in its voice and the bitterness lingering in how it interacted with him. He had K’tal’s friend uploaded into his head and he knew nothing about the alien.

  “Which bunk was K’tal’s?”

  First bunk on the left
outside the cargo bay.

  Paul nodded grimly, opened the door, and stepped inside K’tal’s small cabin. He didn’t feel right about taking one of the other quarters, not yet. He didn’t know what happened to any of them. He knew K’tal was dead, which made this bunk Paul’s now, he supposed. Paul sat down on the bunk, sinking into the heavy foam bedding.

  Above the bed was a poster of a scantily clad humanoid alien of some type. Busty and sultry, the alien had blue skin and extra appendages coming from the back of her head like a dozen small tails instead of hair. Paul blushed at the sight.

  K’tal sure loved his ladies, Zyp chirped.

  “Don’t you have something else to do? Get bent, Zyp.” Paul felt awkward enough without some strange voice cracking jokes.

  The room appeared empty until he noticed a small control panel at the head of the bed. He opened the panel, revealing a small storage compartment. Inside was a worn blaster with a small leather holster, with three thin, black rectangular objects scattered beside it. The HUD system automatically displayed information on it.

  [KT-79 LIGHT BLASTER: Power Pack Fully Charged. Shots Remaining: 250]

  Paul pulled the weapon out of its holster carefully. It was heavier than he assumed it would be, but fit nicely in his hand. He turned it over and saw that the other objects in the compartment were extra power packs. With a quick flick of his thumb, a pack ejected from its housing on the side of the weapon. He practiced reloading the power pack a few times and let his mind wander.

  He hadn’t held a gun since the last time he went to summer camp as a middle schooler. He’d been a decent enough shot, at least for a 12-year-old, but he couldn’t imagine being great with a laser weapon. Still, it was nice to have options. He’d have to check out the weapon’s rack and see if any of the others were more comfortable. There was no telling what he’d be up against before all of this was over.

  Paul slipped the weapon back in the holster and closed the panel. The next panel had some clothing, including various human clothes of a few different styles and some sets of uniforms made from the strange fabric Edolit wore. He thought about asking Zyp about it, but he still didn’t want to deal with the Ambra. He scrounged around in a few more panels, but found little that helped him learn about K’tal. The alien was a soldier and didn’t seem to have many keepsakes except for a small screen that showed a picture of a landscape more fantastic than any of Paul’s wildest fantasies about alien worlds.

  The landscape was dotted with great towering spires of stone, with beautiful bands of purples and reds streaking through them. They looked like the stalagmites that dotted the caves he had explored as a child, but on a much grander scale, reaching up toward a sea-green sky. Nestled among them were small settlements swirling from the base of the spires with a keen geometric eye, entire cities designed to augment the landscape from above with swirling patterns. Curved rows of rounded buildings spaced by bright bands of natural colors, plant-life as vibrant as any color found on Earth.

  Paul laid back on the bunk and it formed itself around his body shape, as comfortable as any feather bed he’d slept on. Averting his eyes from the sultry alien gaze above him, he looked at the picture of the landscape. He assumed it was a picture of some important place on K’tal’s world, and he could sense the sadness the picture carried. Without asking Zyp, he assumed this world had been devastated. This scene no longer existed. K’tal fought because his world’s resources now fueled the profits of a group that Paul didn’t understand. A vast, dark organization that placed profit above the preservation of beauty like the scene Paul held in his hands. An organization that wanted to do the same to Earth.

  Paul would do his best to stop it. To get Edolit’s warning to her superiors so they could help. He’d finish her mission and honor K’tal’s memory, and his sacrifice. Despite his weariness, the weight of his thoughts kept him awake with lingering waves of grief. Eventually, the soft hum of the Specter’s reactor made Paul drift into sleep, exhaustion finally catching up to him.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  EDOLIT REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS in time to see the cell’s deck rushing toward her face. She landed with a dull, painful thud against the deck and her vision blurred, threatening to fade to black again.

  She growled and pulsed frustration, unable to move and face her captors. She could tell by their stench that they were Varanul. The door to her cell closed with a whirring of mechanics, and her mind began to clear. She forced herself up and took in her surroundings. She was obviously in a cell on the command ship of the enemy. Her hands bound in front of her with binders of a generic design. Security camera mount above the entrance, and privy in the corner. Otherwise, she was in an empty white room, without even a bunk to lie on.

  Nian status report, please, she thought.

  Nian’s calm purr filled her mind. Welcome back, Edolit. You have sustained heavy injury, but I have repaired the more critical wounds while you were unconscious.

  Display wounds, Nian.

  Without comment, her Ambra scrolled a long list of wounds across Edolit’s vision. It made her dizzy at first, but she eventually was able to focus on the scrolling text.

  [Incomplete fractures to 3rd and 4th left ribs. Four superficial blaster burns to torso, cauterized. Three deep lacerations to right thigh. Approximately two score superficial scrapes, burns, and shrapnel lacerations to all extremities. Display further minor injuries?]

  Negative.

  Edolit repositioned herself against the wall and winced when it pressed against her aching back. The Varanul had nearly overwhelmed her healing abilities. A few more well-placed slashes with their talons or a direct blast to her head or major organ systems would have killed her. They wanted her alive. That meant interrogations would start soon.

  How long to heal?

  The ribs will take a two cycles to fully heal, but are stable for now. Blaster burns and shrapnel wounds healing at 5% per Terran Hour, stamina at 5% per hour as long as you stay put.

  Nian emphasized the last point. The Ambra sounded more like Edolit’s mother by the day.

  Edolit pulsed frustration. There wasn’t time to heal completely. She had to escape while they assumed she was weakened. She grew more irritated when she thought about her lost squad mate and failing in her mission. Her skin flushed a deep maroon, the darkest shade of anger. She had to escape and make them pay.

  Nian, override stamina regeneration. Shift all energy to healing.

  Nian wouldn’t like that, but the Ambra obeyed. Edolit had no choice. She could only take so much more damage before going into a coma, and her body resources were already strained from lack of nourishment. The Ambra tried its best to maintain homeostasis in the body, using resources equally, but sometimes the situations Edolit found herself in necessitated less delicate approaches.

  Did you track our location like I asked?

  I estimate over 12,102 probable locations based on trajectory and the troop transport ship speed ranges.

  Eliminate all locations over 100,000 kilometers away from a gravity well. They have to be using a planetary body to shield themselves from detection.

  25 locations remain. Shall I display?

  Eliminate all locations under direct observation by Earth-based satellites and observatories.

  Three locations remain, all are moons of the Jovian Subsystem. Shall I display?

  Excellent. Package results and transmit to Specter Team Private Band. If Paul or any other of the team are out there, they’ll get the data back to base.

  Transmitting. Location pings received from Ja’el and Omaro, vitals stable. Distance calculated at 12 and 10 meters.

  The faint green pulse of relief washed over Edolit’s skin. She may have lost K’tal on this mission, but she didn’t lose everyone. Not yet, anyway.

  No location ping received from K’tal, quantum data readout indicates elevated heart-rate far beyond normal and atmospheric conditions matching settings for The Specter.

  Her heart jumped. Paul made it o
ff world and was heading towards the hyper-gate. As much as she wondered at his location, she hoped he remained cloaked for the duration. Even in the vastness of space, the ship’s drive would be easy to spot in an otherwise primitive star system, even cloaked. Surely Zyp would consider that and keep him safe. A wave of yellow grief washed over her skin as she realized Nian had said K’tal instead of Paul.

  K’tal was dead. She’d lost another soldier. Pain burned deep in her chest, but she forced herself to swallow it down. She couldn’t afford to get distracted by that now. Two more members of her team were still alive on the ship. Edolit knew she could get them out if she focused.

  She had to get them out. She pulsed resolve.

  Nian, archive all data, communication, and images from K’tal. Start a new file for Specter 3 and rename ‘Paul.’

  Acknowledged, performing quantum data upload.

  She’d grieve K’tal later. Right now, she had to come up with a way out. Edolit pulled herself against the wall and took in her surroundings. Somewhere there was a flaw she could use to get free, she only had to find it.

  The door to the cell slid open. An abnormally tall Gryx stood in the doorway, studying her with his arms clasped behind his back, his officer’s uniform prim and proper. It gave him the cool, confident demeanor that his species was so well known for. Like all Gryx, the officer had a steel gray skin tone, oversized black eyes, and a thin, lipless mouth. The thin wisps of hair along the sides of its oversized cranium showed him to be middle-aged.

  Behind the tall, slender officer, two Varanul held stun rifles at the ready, glowering at her with their reptilian gaze.

  Perform facial analysis on the Gryx, Nian. Display any information you find.

  A few heartbeats later, the results scrolled across her HUD.

  [Captain Ulec Numoh: Former Captain of the frigate Stalwart with Federation Star Fleet Command. Dishonorable Discharge in 5413 PF after The Hylian Massacre. Current affiliation: unknown. Display battles and accommodations? ]