Aurora Renegades

by G. S. Jennsen

  Again.

  Again.

  Her connection to Valkyrie toggled on and off and on in succession like a strobe. The lights in the cabin also began dimming and brightening, but the pattern clashed, out of sync with her eyes.

  “Hey, hey, hey….” He tried to gently hold her still, but she was shaking, her head and arms jerking as if being subjected to low-level shocks. Was she having a seizure?

  His hands clasped the sides of her face and forcibly held it stationary. “Alex?”

  She stared at him but did not see him, blinking rapidly—on off on off on off—and for the first time ever, what he saw frightened him. The being staring blankly at him in between blinks couldn’t be human.

  She started coughing. Gagged on blood and spit it up—then abruptly she slumped over sideways until her head hit the floor.

  He’d been too slow to catch her, too slow to let his hand take the blow for her.

  He lifted her shoulders and propped her up against the couch, but her eyes were now closed and her body limp. Unconscious.

  Jesus. Panic clawed at the edges of his perception, but he had to stay in control. He needed—

  The ship shook violently and swung to port. That had been weapons fire hitting the hull. “Valkyrie, are you there?”

  Silence.

  Another hit sent them canting at a forty-five-degree angle.

  He forced air into his lungs, lifted Alex up into his arms and carried her to the cockpit. He strapped her into her chair; the restraints would keep her from being flung around the cabin like a ragdoll, as well as upright and not choking on the blood still flowing from her nostrils.

  Next he took the controls. The adiamene should theoretically hold for some period of time, but there were no guarantees. Obviously their cloaking shield was down.

  The master portal hung off to starboard, and they were clearly still in the lobby space. He fired the thrusters. The ship fought him, jolting turbulently back and forth. “Dammit! Valkyrie, give me control of the goddamn ship!”

  The ship moved—and stopped again. More vessels—or possibly different vessels—fired on them. The impacts threw him forward into the dash then to the floor.

  He crawled back into his chair and strapped himself in, ignoring the warm ooze of blood dribbling down his temple. It had been stupid not to do it first, but it had seemed like there wasn’t time.

  In desperation he engaged the sLume drive. Just a quick, seconds-long sprint to put distance between them, the portal and the attackers.

  Alarms screamed but the drive didn’t engage. The lights blinked more furiously.

  Valkyrie had control of the ship, and she was out of control. Unless he found a way to wrest command from her, they were dead in the air, floating helpless and easy pickings for the enemy.

  The ship now shuddered continuously from a barrage of fire, and yet more, louder alarms sounded. No metal could withstand this level of onslaught forever.

  His fists slammed down on the dash in frustration. “Bloody hell!”

  Was he helpless? Was there not one single goddamn thing he could do to save them? What options did he have left—

  —the space outside the viewport brightened to gleam in pinpricks of light. Blue light, like the portal.

  When the luminance overpowered all he could see, there was the sensation of motion. Smooth, not jarring as with the impacts, but still excessive enough to make his stomach lurch.

  Then everything stilled.

  He blinked. The light outside dissipated to reveal…mountains? And a meadow?

  The scene was instantly recognizable. They were on Portal Prime, in sight of Mesme’s lake.

  He didn’t stop to wonder how. He raced into the cabin for the med kit and a towel, then returned to lean over Alex and wipe the copious blood off her face. She’d lost a lot, though not a life-threatening amount. Once he’d cleared some of it away it looked as if the flow had slowed to a trickle.

  Cloak yourselves.

  He jumped at the voice. Mesme? Surely Mesme. “We can’t.”

  No alternative instruction followed. He set the towel aside and ran the med scanner across her forehead and temple, hoping it would tell him what to do to help her.

  She blinked, hesitantly this time, and opened her eyelids halfway.

  “Hey. Don’t try to connect to Valkyrie.”

  He saw the glint in her eyes as she began to do exactly that. He doubted it was out of spite or defiance, but instead merely instinctual. He grasped her shoulders firmly. “Don’t.”

  She blinked once more, and the relief that surged through him when her irises remained normal was enough to make him dizzy. She gazed at him in confusion, but also in recognition.

  He smiled and ran a hand along her cheek. His chest had seized up so viciously he wasn’t sure he would be able to speak; it took tremendous effort but he managed to force out a weak breath. “Welcome back, baby.”

  “What—” She started coughing, grabbed the towel in her lap and held it to her mouth as her shoulders wracked. When it dropped from her hand it had darkened considerably. He hoped it was from blood she’d swallowed and not something worse.

  “Where are we?” Her voice croaked, shaky and tentative. She cleared her throat and peered out the viewport. “Is this…Portal Prime?”

  “I think so. I think Mesme transported us here.”

  “The whole ship? Wait, why?”

  He exhaled. It came out harsh, rough, frayed by the ragged edges of panic. “The portal bounced us, hard. Valkyrie went berserk, and you…you had some kind of seizure then passed out. I couldn’t get control of the ship away from her, and we came under attack by Metigen vessels.”

  “Valkyrie? Are you all right?”

  Silence lingered for several seconds, but eventually a response came. Soft and uncertain as well, but a response. ‘I…I believe I will be. Allow me to execute a full restart. I will return momentarily.’

  Alex frowned and dragged a hand down her face, then deepened the frown when it came away streaked in blood. She gazed around in disbelief and mounting horror. “Why is there blood on everything? Why is there always fucking blood fucking everywhere when I wake up from being unconscious?”

  “Hey!”

  Startled, she gaped at him in shock for a beat, then deflated completely and sank bonelessly against the backrest. “What happened to me?”

  He knelt beside her. “You were bleeding from your nose. A lot. You should take an iron supplement soon, or you’re going to be feeling really weak.”

  “I had a brain hemorrhage?”

  “I don’t….” He shook his head. Helplessly. “I don’t know.” The terror-turned-euphoria pounding in his chest and against his eardrums had begun to recede, leaving in its wake something he didn’t expect: anger.

  “You were connected to the ship when we hit the portal, I’m assuming?”

  She gave a weak nod in answer.

  “You’re insane, I’m assuming?”

  Her lips parted to convey what might have been a retort, when the lights brightened and stayed that way.

  ‘I’m pleased to report I have regained full functionality.’

  45

  AURORA THESI (PORTAL PRIME)

  Enisle Seventeen (Portal: Aurora)

  * * *

  Alex ran a hand over the nose of the ship…and scowled. The adiamene was dented. The repulsion from the portal—whatever force the Metigens used to effect it—had been that strong.

  Her brain felt dented. Dulled, with faint, jagged cracks splintering it. Valkyrie said there was no significant damage to the neural tissue. But then again, the Artificial might be dented, too.

  Near as Valkyrie was able to determine, most of what had happened was Alex’s fault. Her mind, assimilated as it was into the atoms of the Siyane, had not been able to process the force of the ricochet the ship experienced when it impacted the portal. The resulting shock kicked off a chain reaction in her brain, which among other things disrupted the connection mechan
ism to Valkyrie—but not before the problems ricocheted further into Valkyrie’s processes as well.

  If she hadn’t been linked to the ship when they made a run at the portal, Valkyrie might not have malfunctioned, she definitely would not have passed out, and they probably would have been able to leave under their own power before coming under attack.

  The nose of the ship would still be dented, though. She focused her scowl on the hull; it seemed as suitable a victim as any to suffer her misdirected vexation and angst.

  At least they weren’t going to need to remove the panel and physically repair the damage. Valkyrie was now so extensively integrated into the ship she claimed she’d be able to mold and shape the metal back to its normal configuration within a few hours.

  Mesme was nowhere to be found. Not its consciousness, that was. They’d checked, and its unnerving little gray body still lay dormant in the stasis pod inside the small cabin.

  Caleb paced in erratic circles around the lush meadow behind her. He’d been unusually quiet, bordering on taciturn, since the first minutes after she’d woken up. Now the tension radiated off of him in waves, ruffling the blades of grass on its way to suffocate her.

  She pinched the bridge of her nose, in the hope applying pressure there could alleviate the pressure everywhere else. She didn’t want to have this conversation. But every minute they didn’t stood to make it so much more catastrophic.

  She turned and leaned against the hull, crossing her arms at her waist. “I’m sorry, okay?” She tried to sound genuinely apologetic, but the words emerged pinched and strained. Pretty much like her.

  He halted midway through a traversal and stared at her. His mouth opened. After a pause, he closed it.

  “Please, just say what you want to say. This brooding is worse than anything you can throw at me.”

  “Are you so sure about that?”

  A warning fluttered in her chest, but she nodded.

  “You could have died. We all could have died. What in the hell were you thinking?”

  Well, she had asked for this. She worked past the raw lump in her throat…and chose the truth. “I wasn’t.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means…it means I got caught up in the rush.” Judging by the solidifying bleakness of his expression, the truth had been a mistake. She hurriedly backtracked in a bit of a panic. “But in my defense, it may not have mattered. Valkyrie may have gotten her circuits scrambled regardless.”

  I told you I’m not at all certain that’s true.

  Later, Valkyrie.

  You are lying to him.

  No, I’m not. We don’t know for sure.

  But in her heart she did know, which explained the queasiness churning her stomach. They had a word for it: guilt.

  “Then we’ll need to address that problem, too, because I had no control over the ship. None. I had no ability to act, to defend us or save us, and that is unacceptable.”

  “More safeguards, more failsafes. I get it.” It came out tinged in sarcasm. She hadn’t meant it that way. Everything was coming out wrong.

  Caleb expression contorted into something she was afraid to decipher. “You think? Do you get what I’m saying? There was nothing I could do. Nothing except yank Valkyrie’s power. But considering how much of yourself you’ve given over to the ship, I would probably be unplugging you as well and—”

  She gasped in abject dismay. It elicited a cringe from him, and his voice softened a touch. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  She’d been on his side; she’d been trying her damnedest to apologize. She understood how important being able to act when threatened was to him, and she knew she’d frightened him.

  But his words were a bucket of ice water pitched in her face. She could hardly breathe from the shock of it. “Really? Because it kind of sounded like you did.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut, amplifying the effect of the clenched muscles in his jaw and the fierce streaks of discontentment his eyebrows had become. “Really. I only meant…you were unconscious, and Valkyrie was not in control of her functions, and I had no way to predict what might happen to you if I shut her down improperly.”

  His eyes reopened to reveal dark, storming irises, almost black against the fair periwinkle sky. “Alex, I have never in my life been so terrified, and…angry and frustrated and…helpless. Are you hearing me? There was nothing I could do. Helplessness is not a place I visit often, and for damn good reason. Jesus, I can’t….”

  He threw his hands in the air rather than finish the sentence. Something told her it was for the best.

  “I know. I am sorry. Please believe me, I didn’t mean to put you in that position.”

  “But you did put me in that position. Your stunt was reckless and idiotic. Alex, you can’t be so careless with your safety! If you choose to place yourself in danger when the risk is worth it, when there’s a larger, more important goal at stake, I am there with you. I will stand beside you and risk everything without question. But you cannot continue acting like this on your random whim.”

  Every ingrained instinct she had, including several she’d assumed long buried, flared in outrage. Bitter memories taunted her from the recesses of her mind. She scrunched her face up to the point of pain from the effort of holding back words she would surely regret in epic ways if they made it past her lips.

  She raised a hand only to hold it out, warding him off, and inhaled deeply. Slowly, buying herself time.

  “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. But…” she winced “…don’t tell me I cannot do something for my own good. Please, I’m begging you here. Those words are a ridiculous trigger for me, and I don’t want to lash out at you when you don’t deserve it, or get myself killed trying to prove you wrong. I know it’s my own failing—I know—and I’m trying to be better than that, but just don’t…please.”

  “Right. Not your keeper. Forgot for a minute.” He abused his jaw with both hands. “Fuck. Okay, we need to run some tests to confirm all the systems are operating correctly. I don’t want to find out something’s still broken once we’re back in space.”

  Cold. She felt cold. Shivering, goosebumps prickling her arms in the warm afternoon air. “Caleb….”

  “No, it’s fine. Everything is…fine.”

  “Like hell it is!”

  I drifted in the woods behind the lake, behind the small house I had built as if it were somehow a home.

  Constructing it had involved directing wood and stone, millions thick with atoms, yet now I commanded but a few precious particles. I rested, working to regain my energy, and imposed patience upon myself. Only serenity could hasten regeneration of will.

  Moving an ethereal, semi-physical manifestation of oneself was the simplest of matters, done without thought. Transporting small objects—timber, rocks, a Human or two—while I remained stationary and whole was nearly as trivial to accomplish. Doing so with and within myself required the application of greater resources and effort, but it was not what I considered a notably difficult task.

  Transporting myself and a forty-two-meter-long ship across space and a demi-portal and through a planetary atmosphere was, as Humans were prone to say, another matter entirely. I had barely managed it, and it left me sapped of all but the faintest spark.

  But that had been many moments ago. I evaluated myself…yes. I was nearly recharged enough to return to my normal external form. Nevertheless, I elected to wait until I reached my full strength and allow them to argue in the meantime.

  There were times I believed Humans did little else but argue with one another. It was one of their traits I found most confounding, for it should have inevitably led to their consummate demise many thousands of times, but somehow it had not. Not as of yet.

  I did not have the ability to observe the details of Alexis and Caleb’s explorations through the other portals, so I dared not speculate as to what this argument in particular was regarding. A reasonable supposition to make was it pertained to the l
ess than optimal state they were in when I had arrived on the scene. They were most—

  —I sensed the approach of another like a growing darkness on the horizon. Never in my remembrance had one of my own radiated such malevolence.

  So news of the events at the Amaranthe gateway had reached the Idryma.

  It was with a great, sorrowful dread that I gathered up my energies, which I judged to be woefully regenerated for the task at hand, and surged out of the woods to the lake below.

  Retreat to the ship and cloak. Do it now.

  “Mesme?” Where the hell was the damn alien?

  Alex glared at the empty air and threw her hands up in exasperation. But she obeyed the order like the proper little girl in military school she’d once been for twelve weeks in another life.

  Caleb closed the hatch behind them. “Valkyrie, tell me the cloaking shield is working.”

  ‘There is one way to find out. Cloaking shield engaged. All readings indicate it is functioning to specifications.’

  Alex hurried to the cockpit to peer out the viewport, because there better be something worth seeing outside. At first nothing appeared out of the ordinary, and her rising blood pressure chased away any remaining shivers.

  Then Mesme materialized in empyreal, winged form to hover above the center of the lake. Sneaky bugger had been hiding from them?

  Several seconds later another Metigen soared down the slope in a projected air of urgency. It halted directly opposite Mesme.

  Where are they?

  Mnemosyne: Where are who, Hyperion?

  Hyperion…Aguirre and Hervé’s alien contact, and the one who threatened their safety the first time they were here.

  “Why can we understand them? Why can we hear them?”

  Caleb gave her a surprisingly mild shrug, considering his current state of mind and the rather disharmonic state of the world and all who resided in it—most notably them. “Maybe Mesme wants us to?”

  Hyperion: Do not play coy with me, Mnemosyne. Your Human pets tried to breach a gateway to Amaranthe. Their presence in the Mosaic is too dangerous to continue to be tolerated. Send them home and eradicate the Aurora portal, or I will do it for you.