Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity

by David Adams

  “A whole fucking day.” Bobbitt folded his arms. “Great.”

  He was always that way. Shaba knew how to handle him. “Go play video games back on the ship if you can’t be bothered. We don’t need you here if you’re going to be a useless cunt wasting oxygen, complaining about things we can’t change.”

  Again, everyone stared at her. Nobody said anything. The silence was worse than words. Maybe she’d gone too far.

  Fortunately, it was broken by a series of faint tapping sounds coming through the blast doors—morse code.

  .... . .-.. .-.. --- --..-- -.. --- -. --- - --- .--. . -. .-.-.-

  Hello, do not open.

  “Well,” said Shaba. “Guess we won’t be needing to shoot our way in.” She thumped back on the door.

  .- -.. ...- .. ... ..-- .... . -. .-. . .- -.. -.-- .-.-.-

  Advise when ready.

  “Now we wait, I guess,” said Mace.

  The minutes ticked away. Almost half an hour later, the immense steel door groaned as it cracked open, the high-pitched whine of engines working to pull the metal wall apart.

  Air rushed out, a side effect of the overpressure, to prevent gasses leaking in. A man in his sixties, wearing a dirty uniform, was waiting for them, his neatly cut black hair streaked with grey. The secondary blast door behind him was, wisely, closed. As the outside and inside equalised, he approached.

  “I’m Brigadier General Andrew Decker-Sheng, United States Air Force.” He extended his hand. “Thank you for coming back for us.”

  Shaba took it, shaking firmly. “Not a concern. Would have done the same for anyone.”

  “What’s the situation?” asked Decker-Sheng. “How bad’s the damage?”

  She bit her tongue. How could she tell him the Earth was gone? Shaba gestured to the tunnel. “Grab what you can and leave,” she said. “We’ll explain on the way.”

  “Where are we going?”

  Away from the bones. Away from the death. Away from here. “Eden.”

  Decker-Sheng guided the evacuation. The facility’s personnel filed out one by one, uniforms dishevelled, faces tired and hungry, all endlessly gushing about how grateful they were to be saved. They had been living in an underground facility for months, with little hope that any members of their species were alive at all. Could they even see the outside world, or was their only comfort the faint radiation-inspired hiss of static on their radios?

  They grasped her hands as though she were offering them a life raft, doing the same to all her crew. Such a breakdown of discipline was staggering. Mace was practically engulfed in hands, each trying to shake his, clap him on the shoulder, or hug him. Some laughed. Some cried. Some practically ran out the blast doors.

  All Shaba could think of was him.

  There was little time to get to know each other. Together, the crew and survivors looted the place, filling the belly of Piggyback with anything that whirred, clicked, or beeped. Her ship was crammed with people and hard drives and filing cabinets.

  Finally, the ship was powered up again. It groaned in protest as it lifted off, its body bloated and every available space filled with useless crap.

  She worried that the ship would not make it out of the atmosphere, but Lockheed and Chengdu had overengineered it sufficiently well. The extra weight was not without its cost. It slowed acceleration, and it would be hours until the ship reached the Lagrange point. Shaba flicked on the autopilot, letting the ship guide itself. It would accelerate for half the journey and decelerate for the other half. Radar would watch for obstacles. There was nothing she could do here.

  Time to meet the survivors.

  She pushed herself out of the pilot’s seat and headed back to the stern of the ship, to the cargo bay. She melted into the sea of United States Air Force uniforms, following the voices of her crew.

  Mace, Ginger, and Bobbitt worked with the survivors, breaking out MREs and water canisters, chatting energetically with the survivors. Space was at a premium, as was talking time. Each one juggled several conversations at once, with the same information being repeated verbatim, over and over. She joined in, adding her voice to the chorus.

  The Toralii Alliance had attacked Earth. Everything was gone. NORAD had housed the only survivors who had not escaped with the three Pillars of the Earth. They had settled on the world of Velsharn, in a city called Eden.

  The Toralii fleet that had attacked Earth had been destroyed. Since then, the Alliance had been eerily silent. Travel was now possible. Other colonisation options were being considered.

  Captain Liao had been critically wounded.

  An alarm cut over the hubbub, a radar contact. Conversation ceased. Shaba readied herself to fight through the crowd, but they parted and let her through. She returned to the cockpit, studying her instruments with practised, concerned eyes. Decker-Sheng followed her.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  A lone contact, large and reflecting plenty of radar, had arrived in the L1 Lagrange point. It hadn’t been there when Piggyback had jumped in-system. She analysed the results of each radar ping. It was far too large to be a Forerunner, the style of probe used by the Toralii Alliance used to scout distant worlds, too big even to be a freighter, and too spherical and oddly shaped to be a cruiser.

  “Trouble,” she said.

  If they had to run, escape would be easy. Even though they were ballistic, adjusting the ship’s course to avoid the jump point would take minimal adjustment. They could swing around the Moon and head for the L2 point or even swing out farther to the L3 or L4.

  However, their strange contact didn’t seem to be moving. Radar pings came back evenly and without weapons fire, hovering in the same spot. The target was changing its shape, possibly, based on the view through the long-range thermal camera, but doing precious little else. As far as Shaba could tell, it was just sitting there.

  Whoever it was, that contact was not hunting them, but not shooting didn’t mean it was friendly.

  “Contact,” said Shaba, touching the internal comm unit. “All hands, action stations, action stations. Weapons tight—go to condition two.” The radar screen betrayed no telemetry information. Whoever the contact was, it wasn’t identifying itself. “We have a single bogey in the L1 Lagrange point.” She flipped switches in the panel above her, bringing the ship out of its idle, cruising state and increasing the reactor to full power.

  The unidentified ship didn’t react to their presence. It just sat there. The Piggyback should have been visible for some time now. They could run, but she knew, deep down, she should at least talk to them to find out who those intruders in their system were and what they wanted.

  Or let them blast her and her crew to atoms—dead, just like everyone on the graveyard planet at their six.

  The other ship didn’t fire. It just sat there.

  “What’s the plan?” asked Decker-Sheng.

  Some people used to ask her, why she dated the guy after he’d raped her, why she continued to date him after he continued to rape her.

  Her abuser was her terror, her creator of pain and fear, but also her saviour. When he was kind, the badness instantly went away. Suddenly, everything was okay. Suddenly, they were just a normal couple in love—a normal, healthy situation.

  That familiar feeling returned when her console lit up. The strange ship was hailing them.

  Were these people abusers too?

  “The plan is to talk to them,” she said, reaching for the radio call button.

  Time for some answers.

  ACT I

  CHAPTER I

  Green

  *****

  Medical Bay

  TFR Rubens

  Location Unknown

  COMMANDER MELISSA LIAO WAS TORN from unconsciousness by tingling pain all over her body, with something stuffed down her nose and throat, smothering her to death. Air came as a trickle.

  Bright-green water surrounded her. Her instincts revolted—she snatched at the something with her left hand, yan
king at it frantically, trying to dislodge the blockage in her airway.

  “Commander,” said a voice, thin and robotic as it filtered through a radio. “It’s Doctor Saeed. You need to relax. Everything’s going to be okay. You can breathe. You’re in a recovery chamber—you’re not on Eden anymore.”

  The words held no weight for her. She sloshed and thrashed, lashing at nothing, her feet kicking against glass. Plugs extended from her body, thick black cables running to the edges of the tank, restraining her movements. Her skin was pruned and wrinkled as though she were a hundred years old, pale and bleached by a lack of sunlight.

  The whole chamber listed to one side, and a roar filtered through the water.

  “Listen to my voice,” said Saeed. “It’s a breathing tube. You must calm down. We can’t afford to sedate you this time, Commander.”

  This time? Had this happened before? Her body couldn’t process it. She reached up with her right hand, trying to pull the long black tube from her, but stopped as she saw her arm.

  The limb was just a stump.

  “Shh,” said Saeed. “Melissa, everything’s going to be okay. We’re going to evacuate you once you’re stable… dammit. Okay, hold tight, we’ll have to risk a mild sedative.”

  She couldn’t see him. She couldn’t see anything. Adrenaline pumped through her veins and fought the invading chemicals. She forced herself to remain still. Doctor Saeed was a trusted friend—he’d never lied to her. He’d kept her secrets and earned her confidence.

  She heard the dull thump-roar of weapons impact. The lights in the med-bay flickered. What the hell was going on?

  “Good,” Saeed said. “Now, there’s a mask in the tank. Clip it over the breathing tube. It will drain the liquid out of your mouth so you can talk.”

  She could see it, a black device similar to a gas mask, clipped onto the hose. She pulled it down over her nose and mouth, and there was a faint gurgle as the green liquid drained away. Soon she could breathe through her mouth and tried to speak.

  “Doctor, you need to get me out of here. The Toralii hit the Beijing, the worldshatter device went straight through the hull. The reactor’s been breached, and Operations has been damaged. I need to get back there, Kamal is missing, and—”

  “Melissa, the attack on Eden was three months ago.” His tone was edged with aggravation. Gone was the calm Saeed she’d expected. “It’s January the twenty-fourth.”

  She heard another dull thump. “What’s happening? Where are we?”

  “This is the TFR Rubens. We’re under attack.”

  A combination of drugs and genuine confusion clouded her mind. “But you said the attack was months ago. Wait, no. That doesn’t make sense. It was just—”

  “You’ve been sedated for some time.”

  She held up her left hand, her remaining hand. It was thin, gaunt, atrophied.

  “Where are you?” she asked. Her voice sounded as though it were coming from someone else—distant, distorted. “I can’t see.”

  “Wipe the glass with your hand. The inside’s fogged. The systems are damaged.”

  She did so. Saeed stood behind one of the Toralii consoles of the Rubens, the entire room bathed in purple light. Liao met his gaze, holding it for a moment.

  “I know this is difficult for you,” said Saeed. “You’re probably in shock.”

  “I don’t feel like I’m in shock.”

  “That’s what they all say,” he said. “The feeling of being out of time. I know it’s hard. Believe me, I’d love to say you can take your time, as much as you need, but we don’t have that luxury.”

  “Where am I?”

  “You’re on the Rubens.” The ship rocked, and the soft groan of stressed metal echoed throughout the vessel. “Just try to process things one at a time until we get you out of there.”

  “One thing at a time,” Liao echoed. “Right.” She tried to clear her mind of everything: the falling plasma shots; her body on fire; her evacuation to the captured Toralii ship repurposed as a Human warship. “How long has it been?”

  The edges of his mouth turned downward. “You already asked me that. Three months ago, or near enough.”

  “Okay,” she said, trying to take that in, to store it in her mind so it didn’t escape again. “Three months. What’s happened in the meantime?”

  “Right now,” said Saeed, “we are attempting to recover the wreckage of the Broadsword Scarecrow.” Right on cue, another wave of weapons fire struck the ship, and the lights whimpered. “I gather it is not going well. Captain Williams has requested additional power to weapons. The recovery chamber takes too much, so we had to wake you up.” Bitterness crept in. “It was less than ideal to wake you, Captain, but having the med-bay exposed to vacuum is also less than ideal.”

  She couldn’t contest that. Liao searched her mind for what she knew about Scarecrow but came up empty. “Do what you need to,” she said. Being blind to operations in the fleet vexed her. When she had lost command of the Beijing, Commodore Vong was placed in charge. He made a point of telling her little. Apparently, her own injuries were currently keeping her blind.

  A faint, familiar hum ran through the whole ship. Abruptly, the rocking ceased. Saeed’s whole face seemed to relax, the tension draining out of it. He tapped at his console. “We’ve jumped.”

  “I know.” The smaller the ship, the larger the effect. A jump was imperceptible from the inside of the Beijing, but for a smaller ship like the Rubens, despite its more advanced Toralii jump drive, she could feel the tremble as the ship was engulfed in light and transported between the stars. Liao had been through enough jumps in Broadswords to identify the vibrations. “To where?”

  “I’m not sure Captain Williams cares too much. ‘Not here’ is probably sufficient for him.”

  “Probably,” said Liao, the strength draining from her body. “I feel exhausted.”

  “Good,” said Saeed. “I’m resuming your naptime, Captain.”

  One of the plugs attached to her body jerked as a fluid pumped into it. An ice-cold trickle crept up the vein on her left arm. The world went grey and colourless, even the bright-green water.

  “Give them hell for me,” she said, her words barely a murmur. Her eyes fell on the stump of her arm. “Kill them all.”

  “I’ll see you soon,” Saeed promised as she slipped back under and energy built up around them, heralding another jump.

  The next time Liao dragged herself back to consciousness, the green world was a much calmer place, and Saeed’s pleasant smile had returned. A team of nurses stood around him, monitoring various things. She recognised none of them. Most were Caucasian—imports from the Washington, presumably.

  “Welcome back,” he said, his voice gentle. “Don’t rush the process. Be calm, easy.”

  Liao did so, blinking sluggishly. She did nothing as teams of medical technicians stood around, silently watching things.

  They were under attack.

  “Wait,” said Liao, her eyes wide. “Wait, the Beijing was hit—Kamal is missing, and we’re under attack! Operations has been breached by a worldshatter device!”

  “Captain,” said Saeed in a way she found familiar. “It’s February the twelfth. Commander Iraj has been commanding the Beijing in your absence, and the repairs are coming along nicely. They’ve patched the hole in four decks now, and the remainder will be done in time.”

  She shook her head, trying to drag faint ghosts of a memory to the surface. “Wait… February. Isn’t it January?”

  “That was during the attempt to recover Scarecrow.”

  Scarecrow. That name triggered memories for her, memories of weapons impacts, of a ship groaning in pain as it was struck.

  “How much do you remember?” Saeed asked.

  “Not much.”

  “Your memory will come back. The drugs will have an effect on your ability to retrieve long-term memories, but that effect will subside in time.”

  “I see.” The dull cloud over her mind made i
t hard to think and store information. “Okay, so… since the attack. What’s happened?”

  “A lot.” Saeed’s words came out smoothly and well prepared. “We had to operate on your arm. The burns ran deep. As hard as we fought, the infection and necrosis spread. We were almost forced to amputate the remainder of the arm to the shoulder. Fortunately, we saved it. We lost the muscle, though.”

  “Thanks, doc’.” Her gratitude felt hollow. “Not that it matters much.”

  “A partial limb is still better than nothing.”

  “Hardly.”

  “I can’t imagine how you must feel.” Saeed smiled, softly and genuinely. “It’s not all bad. I don’t want to get your hopes up, but we’ve been exploring options for you while you were unconscious. The Rubens contains a wealth of Toralii science, including medical information. There are a number of prosthetics available that we might be able to outfit you with.”

  “Prosthetics? We have prosthetics aboard?”

  “Not quite. They are merely schematics. The Toralii use a standard construction template which the Iilan constructs can read and replicate. They are incredibly advanced. As far as we can tell, they can link directly into your nervous system, provide tactile response through sensors embedded in the surface, and they’re quite strong. Strong compared to Humans, of course. Saara didn’t think much of them, but I think you’ll find it to be a substantial improvement.”

  Her head refused to process all this information. It was just a string of words to her. Saara was still here? That was the most standout thing, but the other words would have to come first. “So you’re saying you can fix my arm, and it’ll be mostly the same, right?”

  “Similar. I’m more concerned about the psychological effects a prosthetic can have. Phantom limb pain can be crippling, and everyone reacts to it differently. How this kind of alien prosthetic can affect you… well, nobody can say for sure. We completed some preliminary reports, but they’re far from conclusive. I can have them given to you when you’re out of there.”