Guardian

by Matthew S. Cox

  Kirsten sat at the top of the little stairway and set her left arm across her lap to get to the computer. “I’m going to an orbital construction platform to investigate a report of a malignant paranormal entity attempting to kill the living.”

  “Man,” said the guy up front. “I need to transfer over to the civvie police. I’m so sick of random drug tests.”

  Kirsten ran a hand over her head, smoothing her hair back. “Some days I wish it was bullshit too.”

  She tapped her armguard to open a holo-panel. The case record Captain Eze assigned her hadn’t made the transition from report to Inquest yet. Idle swipes of her finger leafed past a few pages and images, though none of the pictures contained unusual sights, mostly long silver hallways and people floating along in e-suits. An office with a view of the Moon in a window came next, followed by an exterior view of the station.

  Gravion Interstellar’s orbital platform resembled a bizarre comb made for a titan. The main body consisted of a loaf-shaped brick from which ten long tines extended. Four narrow spars made up each bay, a scaffold in which starships came to life. Five berths contained vessels in various stages of construction, attached to the spars by mooring lines. A large, rotating, ring-shaped section mounted on a spindle connected to the main body made the whole thing look like a windup toy.

  According to the report, one of Gravion’s employees was out at the end of Bay Seven, refusing to come back inside and screaming nonsense like “he’s out here” and “he’s after me” as well as shrieking like a victim in a cheesy horror vid.

  Kirsten brought up the personnel record. Lindsey Park, age 26, employed as a hull inspector/tester for the past seven years. The smile on the Korean girl staring back at her from the holo-panel made the flight feel intolerably long. She pressed a hand to her stomach, hoping Captain Eze’s opinion erred on the alarmist side.

  “Do you have comms with the installation?”

  Lieutenant Learner glanced at her. “That’s a civilian facility, but we can try to patch in. Best bet would be a relay to Earth to hop the laser… otherwise there’s a bit of a delay.” She pulled a small boom mic up to her mouth. “Control, this is 3-2-3 Delta, copy?” She waited a few seconds. “Requesting a patch to the…” She looked at Kirsten, who held up the armband display. “Uhh, Gravion Interstellar build platform in Lunar orbit. Right. Yeah, the Zero’s asking. Okay.” The pilot covered the mic. “They’re trying.”

  Kirsten nodded. “I’m looking for a status update. Is the Park woman still out on the berth? Any other details?”

  Learner fiddled with dials and buttons. “As soon as I hear anything I’ll―Copy. Yeah, what’s the sit-rep on station?” She “mm-hmm’ed” a few times. “Thanks, Control.”

  “Looks like your girl’s still hiding out on the wire. They say she’s panicking. One guy they sent out to pull her in got halfway down the spar before coming back in. All he’ll say is ‘nope.’”

  “Ugh.” Kirsten grabbed two handfuls of hair. “Not good. Two normals have seen it.”

  “That’s bad?” asked Learner.

  “Yeah. Usually takes a ghost ten years or more to feel their way around being a ghost to manifest to the living… unless they’re really pissed. Thanks for that. I’m gonna go sit down.”

  The Lieutenant nodded.

  Kirsten floated back down the narrow channel and struggled into the harness of the same seat she’d used for takeoff. With nothing else to do, and no way in hell able to sleep, she whipped out her NetMini and started up a Monwyn RPG.

  The DS2 set down on a military pad at Plymouth station. All shuttles between the Earth and Moon landed here; the civilian starport sat a few hundred yards away at the end of a glimmering white segmented tube. This part of the station looked like an enormous hamster habitat.

  Vibration in the hull startled her. Hours of utter stillness had become normal. She unbuckled and wobbled on shaky legs to the cockpit tunnel. Gravity had returned, though noticeably weaker than Earth’s. Outside, the hexagonal landing pad revealed itself as an elevator, sinking into the Lunar surface. Soon, the ceiling closed overhead and a great hissing roar came from outside.

  Lieutenant Learner flicked switches and buttons on her left and overhead. The pervasive thrum of electronics faded to deafening silence. “Shutdown complete, we’re landed. Confirm all systems nominal.” She hooked her thumb on a large plastic lever-switch. Hydraulic whine filled the air. “Opening ramp.”

  “Check,” said the man up front. “We’re green across the board.”

  “Out the way I came in?” asked Kirsten.

  “Yep.” Learner smiled at her. “You must have friends. Looks like we’re going to be your ride home too… unless you’d rather fly civ. Food’s better, but it’s a long ass flight.”

  “I’d rather get home sooner.” She patted Learner’s shoulder. “Thanks for the ride.”

  Kirsten made her way back across the cabin, down the ladder, and past the APC. The landing bay air fogged in her breath and made her feel as though she’d walked into a subzero freezer. She swallowed the urge to ‘eep’ and ran to the only obvious door. The outer airlock closed on its own, and after a few seconds, the inner door opened to beautiful warmth.

  A light-haired man of about thirty in a pale blue jumpsuit and ball cap met her inside. He smiled at her, his gaze went to her chest, and he shifted away with a bit of blush in his cheeks. “Hi. Welcome to Plymouth. I’m Rick with starport facilities. Sorry. I guess they forgot to warn you about how cold it gets in the airlock chambers. If you need a warm up, the coffee or tea at Luna’s isn’t too bad.” He gestured at a distant café counter.

  She considered covering her prominent nipples, but chickened out fearing it would draw more attention. “How much time do I have before the shuttle leaves?”

  “At least enough for coffee. They’ve been holding it for you.” He walked off, heading for the café.

  Beep.

  Kirsten glanced down at her NetMini. Momentary terror tickled the underside of her heart at a message from Evan about a hostile spirit in the school who wanted to harm children. Naturally, her brain conjured up an image of a Konstantin-demon thing with claws stomping along the hallways. She tapped the patrol craft in the contact list. After two rings, silence answered.

  Not Vidmail? Oh, please be Dorian. “Dorian?”

  An unintelligible whisper replied.

  “Evan texted me… he said there’s a spirit in the school who wants to harm the kids… can you please check on it?”

  She listened for a few seconds before a hissing “Yeah, sure” came back, a trace of Dorian’s voice recognizable in the sped up audio.

  “Thanks.” She waited a moment, but when no further reply came, she hung up. A flick of a finger switched back to the text interface and she sent Evan a message telling him Dorian would check on the school.

  Rick kept quiet; his over-pleasant smile hinted he wanted as little to do with ‘weird things’ as he could get away with.

  Worried to the point of her hands shaking, she shuffled over to the café counter. After grabbing a standard cappuccino, she followed him to a small security station in front of a waiting area where fourteen people―six women and eight men―sat scattered among four banks of attached seats. A nervous-looking man of Indian descent shot her an impatient look and muttered something. The man next to him, a hulk with a grey afro, seemed much happier to see her.

  Kirsten ducked around the sensor, causing a woman with paper white skin and black hair to jump out of her seat at the console and get in front of her. Despite being eye-level with the other woman’s chin, she didn’t feel intimidated by the royal blue security guard uniform.

  The guard shot a rather pointed look at Kirsten’s E-90. “Sorry kid, but I can’t let you skip the scanner.”

  “Thanks, but I’m not a kid.” She held up her ID. “Agent Wren, Division 0.”

  “Uhh.” The guard looked at Rick. “There’s a zero? Is that a real uniform? This girl looks like she’s
thirteen.”

  “I don’t think she’s thirteen,” said Rick. “She came in on a military DS2.”

  “Argh!” An urge to go off on this woman welled up from deep within, but Kirsten fought it back down. She set her coffee on a baggage-inspection table. “Look”―she glanced at the woman’s badge―“Landis, A, if I had ten credits for every time some idiot behind a security desk gave me shit about not being a ‘real cop,’ I could buy two of these starports. What do they pay you for if you can’t recognize a commissioned officer of the National Police Force? If I wasn’t in a damned hurry, I’d be half tempted to bury you in a mountain of bureaucratic horseshit it would take you three weeks to dig out from under.”

  “Ma’am. There’s no need to get agitated.” The guard went to grab her shoulder. “Perhaps we need to go to a quieter―”

  Kirsten twisted the woman’s arm up behind her back, slammed her chest-first over the security console, and held the tip of a stunrod within three inches of her right eye. “Does this look real?”

  The pervasive din in the starport fell to dead quiet.

  “Alia, she’s genuine.” Rick reached as if to pull Kirsten off her, but hesitated. “Psionic branch of the NPR. There aren’t too many of them.”

  “Is there a problem?” asked a deep-voiced man in a similar security uniform, with more pins on his chest.

  Kirsten shoved away from the woman. “You should stop recruiting from Mars and hire some people capable of telling the difference between a sworn officer and a kid in a costume. You’re the supervisor?”

  “That’s right.” He glanced at the female guard who scooted away while rubbing her arm. “I’m sorry for the disturbance, officer.”

  “Agent,” snapped Kirsten. She closed her eyes and exhaled. Evan’s fine. He said the ghost was weak. Dorian’s there. I’m on edge because I’m out of my comfort zone. “Sorry. I’m not myself right now. I haven’t gotten a lot of info about the situation I’m heading into.”

  “You didn’t have to rip my arm out of socket.” Alia grumbled. “What are you, augged?”

  “Agent Wren is from Earth. Higher gravity equals higher muscle density.” Rick offered Kirsten back her coffee.

  She slid her stunrod back into its ring on her belt and took the cup. “Is she really that clueless or just messing with me?”

  “You tell me,” said Alia. “You’re the psychic.”

  Kirsten stared at the coffee cup, daydreaming of an embarrassing psionic suggestion. Not worth it.

  “That’s enough, Landis,” barked the supervisor. “Don’t forget, despite that badge, your ass is still a civilian employed by a private security company.”

  “No problems.” Kirsten forced a smile. “Neither being incompetent at one’s job nor an asshole is illegal.”

  Alia wandered back to the security console, grumbling about how she thought she’d be ‘safe’ from psionics on the Moon since they’d ‘taken over’ Mars. Kirsten glowered at the windows overlooking a shuttle pad where an arrowhead-shaped vessel waited. Wisps of vapor lapped at ports around the landing gear, dissipating the instant they hit vacuum.

  The nervous looking man who’d glared at her earlier approached Rick. “Excuse me. I couldn’t help but overhear that you’re letting a psionic on the shuttle? I demand an alternate flight.”

  A middle-aged woman still sitting a short distance away raised a hand. “I’m not comfortable being that close to one either.”

  Two more men nodded.

  “She’s probably reading our minds now,” whined a slender pale man who scrunched up his face as if concentrating. “Think random thoughts so she can’t get your bank information.”

  Kirsten pursed her lips. Why do I try to protect these people? If they knew what―

  “All right, the lot of you need to secure that horseshit right now.” The large dark-skinned man leapt to his feet. He pointed at the crowd, sweeping a forearm as big as Kirsten’s thigh in a purposeful arc, a dark black UCMC tattoo clear as day below his sleeve. “You all’s got some god-damned nerve. She took an oath to defend yer sorry asses. You think a normal cop is gonna be able to deal with some psionic dude who gone crazy?”

  The people got quiet, all eyes on the huge retired Marine.

  “You.” The Marine pointed at one of the guys who nodded. “You carryin’?”

  “Yeah,” said the man.

  “What about you?” he pointed at the nervous Indian. “Got a piece?”

  “Yes.”

  “How many y’all got a gun on ya right now?” yelled the Marine.

  All but two of the others in the waiting area raised hands, including two elderly women.

  “Any you all killin’ each other? You got guns; that must mean you just itchin’ ta kill someone.” The Marine set his hands on his hips, glaring at the crowd. “You thinkin’ ‘cause she’s psionic she’s gonna use it just because?” He poked the whiny man in the chest with one finger hard enough to knock him back into his chair. “Havin’ a tool and usin’ that tool the wrong way ain’t even the same thing. She’s a damned commissioned officer. Might not be the same branch o’ service, but she’s my sister in spirit.”

  Kirsten smiled at him, though felt a little embarrassed at the overly loud display. Her chest warmed with a mixture of pride and gratitude.

  “Now, you thinkin’ it ain’t the same ‘cause anyone can buy a gun and they ain’t got no store where ya can buy psionics. Even more reason ta want her around. If someone psionic lookin’ ta use that shit for ill intentions comes by, y’ain’t got a better thing than havin’ her here ta stop ‘em. That uniform means she’s passed psych tests and has the trust of generals.”

  The Gravion terminal hung in awkward silence. People exchanged stares.

  “Thanks.” Kirsten sipped her coffee. “I’m sorry they made you wait. I don’t expect you to be comfortable around me, but I’m not here to hurt anyone.”

  Rick walked to a small podium and hit a button, which opened the door to the boarding tube. “We regret the inconvenience of the delay. Please note that Agent Wren is responding to an emergency call on board the Gravion build station. Thank you for your understanding. Please board at your earliest convenience.”

  People formed up in a line. Kirsten hung back, sipping coffee. The Marine wandered over and offered a handshake, which she accepted.

  “Thanks.”

  “Master Sergeant James E. Silver, United Coalition Front Marine Corps, retired. Shame watchin’ stupidity like that in action.”

  “Yeah. Glad to see there’s a few people out there who appreciate us.”

  “Damn straight.” He ducked through the entry door. “What they sendin’ you up here for? If you don’t mind the askin’.”

  “Unexplained events with a high probability of being paranormal in nature have a woman stranded out on one of the construction bays. I’m trying to get up there fast enough to save her life… and deal with whatever it is.”

  “That like ghosts and shit?”

  “Yep.”

  “Right on.”

  Whoa. He didn’t even bat an eyelash. She sat across the aisle from him in the tiny twenty-passenger craft. The shuttle lifted off with a minute amount of sway. Aside from gravity increasing, the windows offering a view of the lunar surface falling away may as well have been monitors showing a flight simulator that remained on solid ground. The trip from the surface station out to the Gravion starship berth took sixteen minutes, which passed mostly listening to James talk about his time with the Marine Corps on Mars as well as the jungles of Central America. He’d pulled three tours on colony patrol, hopping from one settled planet to another wherever a fire needed to be put out.

  Kirsten shared a little of her story as well, which got him talking about an overly religious guy in his old unit, though his opinion seemed far more positive than her early views on the subject. Every time anyone mentioned ‘the G word,’ her mind filled with memories of Mother.

  “Kinda hard not to hope for something when peop
le lobbin’ missiles at you.” He grinned. “Figure it’s like a teddy bear. Deep down, you know it can’t do a damn thing for you, but holding it makes ya feel better anyway.”

  She smiled. “I guess some hope is better than nothing.”

  His lower lip stuck out with a frown as he shrugged. “Yeah, somethin’ like that.”

  “Attention passengers,” said a female voice. “We are on final approach to the Orbital Build Platform. Please secure seat belts at this time.”

  Most of the passengers had left them on, preferring not to float around the cabin. Kirsten tightened hers. When they say to put it on, that usually means they’re about to fly like idiots.

  The rush of maneuvering thrusters shook the shuttle. Stiff deceleration caused everyone to lurch forward. The whiny man who accused her of stealing bank information flew into the seat in front of him, flipped over it, and sailed ass-first into the wall separating the cockpit from the passenger cabin. Once the rumble of the maneuvering thrusters cut out, he groped his way into a seat in the front row, moaning. Seconds later, a creak groaned from the airframe as the shuttle’s weight settled onto its landing struts.

  Okay. Game time. She unbuckled and pulled herself upright as the glowing white interior of a docking bay engulfed the side windows. “I regret the inconvenience, but please remain seated for a moment.”

  “Is there really a ghost on the station?” asked the whiny man.

  Kirsten clung to a handle by the exit door. “It’s possible. All I know is there’s a woman stranded almost five hundred meters out on a spar, and no one can explain why.”

  The passengers quieted. Kirsten stared at the clock on her forearm computer, which still showed West City Earth time at 4:56 p.m. Three minutes later, lights embedded in strips around the door glowed green, and it opened.

  She jumped across a two-foot gap, not waiting for the boarding ramp to fully extend, and sprinted to a platform against a white wall decorated only with a Gravion Interstellar logo, a wedge-shaped spaceship pointing out of the top right of a round-cornered blue square. The shuttle bay came close to causing snow blindness, though the air wasn’t near as cold as where the DS2 had landed.