by C. M. Kane
Tae gasped in surprise as she finally realized exactly where she was. The giant hanger bay, just like the Olympus’, the turbo lifts, the long wide corridors; she was on the Ouranos.
‘When I arrived she had half covered herself with rock and other debris, drawing it in to her with her tractor beams and having the nanites extract what they needed to continue with repairs, before it was discarded for new material. It must have been slow work, but there was nothing and no-one else around.
I assumed the original design schematics must have been stored onboard; either that or it started working off of its own plans. The rebuilding has been going on for thousands of years. It is only now, in the last twentysix years that it has finally stopped, although we still cannot access certain areas. When I first arrived I didn’t even notice the energy field I passed through. I had no idea the ship had somehow put up the field to protect itself. I certainly didn’t know that it distorted time as it does, but the Ouranos uses it to control what it does and doesn’t want to approach it. For example, if it hadn’t wanted me near it I simply would have died as I crossed the threshold. So chin up, young Tae, you have passed the Dreadnaught’s first hurdle.’
Tae felt a chill run down her spine as she remembered blithely passing through the field. She hadn’t even thought about it being anything dangerous.
‘I already had some supplies in my little jumper,’ Cassandra continued, ‘so I stayed outside the Ouranos with my eyes closed and my mind open. After fourteen hours I had a vision of myself entering a small hatch. When I opened my eyes again there was an open hatch in front of me, just before the ship met the rock; she had allowed me in.’
‘She?’ Tae asked in confusion. ‘You speak as though the Ouranos is alive.’
‘She is,’ said Cassandra. ‘The Ouranos has slowly been becoming selfaware ever since I found her.’
‘That’s impossible,’ Tae said, ‘it’s a machine, it can’t be, you must be confusing being alive with a sophisticated interactive AI.’
‘And what are we, Tae? What is the human body except a machine made of different parts of meat and bone? Believe me when I tell you that the Ouranos is very much alive, although probably not in the sense you are thinking. She cannot talk to you or cook you a candlelit dinner, she is more like … a very clever dog, I suspect. I know she understands emotions and tone of voice and, I think, some words.’
‘You suspect?’ Tae asked. ‘I thought you said you know.’
‘I know she’s alive because I can feel her. Tae, I can only feel or connect with living, sentient, creatures. Beings with a soul, besides, my own visions have since confirmed my original assumption. Unfortunately she won’t let me join with her, so I have no idea of how intelligent she really is. That will be your job,’ she said. ‘That’s why I had Sebastian inject you with a minuscule amount of the Ouranos’ nanites.’
Tae let out a yelp of shock at all that Cassandra had just said finally registered with her.
‘What the hell?’ She yelled. ‘My nanites come from the Ouranos? What the hell is wrong with you? Who gave you the right?’
‘Please, Tae, allow me to finish, all your questions will be answered very soon, I promise. I have stayed with the Ouranos on and off for all this time for several reasons. This nebula is an anomaly, and somehow it has been able to expand my abilities to heights I had previously never dreamed possible. Since arriving here I have learnt to move the very gases and rocks that surround us. It’s wondrous, Tae. I have come to theorize that everything in the universe is made up of energy at its most fundamental level. All of us, from a god to a rock, we are all the same when broken down to our most basic selves. That is why I am able do what I can do; we are all connected by the same energy from whence we come, some of it good, some of it bad. It is all balance, Tae, everything in life is energy and balance.’
Tae was only half listening; she was still trying to come to terms with the fact that she had the battleship’s nanites running around loose in her brain. She shook herself mentally and tried to refocus on Cassandra’s voice.
‘At times I feel as though I am almost one with the universe itself,’ she was saying in awe. ‘It took me hundreds of years but I learnt how to flow with the very tidal forces that exist in here. I can move a plasma hurricane from one spot to another with my mind. Most amazingly of all though, I have been able to reach my mind out to follow the lives of other races. I have been able to learn their most closely guarded secrets by joining my mind with theirs in their dreams, where all is laid bare to me. I have learnt the history of the gods from the very gods themselves, and I have learnt the history of the races from both the gods’ perspectives and that of the individual races. Along with all of my wanderings and imaginings I have, for the last seventy years, begun to feel a need developing in the Ouranos.’
That grabbed Tae’s attention fully; she had a nasty suspicion that they were starting to get to the meat of why she was here.
‘I think it is beginning to search for something more, especially now that its rebuilding is done, it needs purpose. It needs a captain and crew again. I came to understand that I needed to help the Ouranos; the realms of the gods will be dependent on her in the future. But to help her I needed to find its captain if you will, so they can bond.’
‘Bond?’ Tae said, wary and confused.
‘I think the ship is like a faithful animal, desperately needing its master. In return, the Ouranos will make someone a wonderful home, friend, ally and protector. It is a ship and weapon the likes of which these realms have never known,’ she paused again, ‘even since Cronus first came through. The problem I have had to try to avoid is finding someone that is not going to become insane with power, or a mere disciple of some god. I need someone who won’t use the ship for purposes she should never be used for. Despite her formidable armaments I have become convinced that the Ouranos has, for all intents and purposes, a gentle soul. I can feel its need as if it’s my own.’
‘What about you?’ Tae asked, stating what she thought was the obvious solution.
Cassandra sighed. ‘I tried to see if she would bond with me, but I was forcibly castigated for my temerity; a very unpleasant experience I can assure you. It took me over five years to regain full use of my mind again after that little escapade. I had seen various possible futures both with and without the ship in it, and I kept coming back to the same conclusion.
If the gods’ realms and all that they helped to create are to survive intact, then their best chance is if the Ouranos is a part of their forces in some way. So I set my mind to reach out, searching for those that might be compatible with this great ship, and to try to plan what to do once I found them. I had to be careful, I tried to see down as many paths as I could, to try to make sure my choices were valid, but I was wrong so many times … so many.
The future is a living, moving entity, Tae. Every choice you take opens up a plethora of possibilities, and each of those opens up yet more. Every action, every turn we take in life, changes not only our life and destiny, but the destinies of those around us. Like dropping a stone into the water, it ripples outward, each ripple creating another after it. Remember when you entered the Island?
Because of that one choice you made, think of all the other lives that were affected by your decision, that is what I had to try to ascertain,’ she said, as if trying to justify her actions.
‘I have done my best to try to help shape and move certain destinies down certain paths when I have felt it was necessary, but I am not perfect Tae. I have made some terrible mistakes, and when I make an error people tend to die; but I swear to you I have done my utmost to never deliberately injure anyone.’
Tae looked at Cassandra in dawning horror; she now thought she knew where the woman was headed with this.
‘I have been aided in my quest by my faithful friends, the chief of who is Adam. He has been with me since his grandfather, Sebastian, died. Sebastian was the man who gave you your nanites.
The time bub
ble ages us in here while outside it things remain virtually the same,’ she said for Tae’s benefit.
Over the years I found several candidates I thought might be compatible with the ship, but ultimately only the ship can choose who she wishes to bond with. The Dreadnaught does have controls like a normal ship, and she can be flown as such, but it cannot fly or fight yet. We have tried everything with her but, apart from basic operations, her main reactors – her heart if you will – remain dormant, only a small fusion reactor works; it’s enough to maintain all life support, hydroponics and artificial gravity basically. Any left over power has been fed directly to her power crystals. I believe the bonding may bring her main reactors to life once more. With this in mind I tried to communicate to the ship my hopes and ideas of trying to find it a captain. I requested to be able to draw some nanites from its conduits and inject them into each individual that my visions led me to. The ship would then be able to get a true sense of what each individual’s personality and beliefs were like, long before they ever tried to make contact.’
No, No, No, please don’t say it’s me. I don’t want this, please thought Tae desperately.
‘The ship agreed and allowed us to take the samples, just a sparing few, but enough so she could learn a little of each individual it was now a part of. It seemed a simple solution to a difficult problem and, with Sebastian’s assistance I was able to accomplish my plans. When each of the people injected reached sexual maturity they began to feel an overwhelming urge to come to the nebula, until eventually the need overwhelmed them and they travelled here. Of the eighteen that were injected with the Ouranos’ nanites all have now arrived. You were the last to come, and you are the only one who has ever been allowed through the distortion field.’
Tae sat dumbfounded, momentarily forgetting her own predicament for a moment as she took in what Cassandra had just said. ‘What happened to the rest?’
‘Dead,’ Cassandra said. ‘When they entered the time field we think the nanites Sebastian had injected them with killed them. They were dead before we even got to them.’
‘Did you know that could happen?’ Tae asked.
‘Yes,’ Cassandra said, ‘but do not blame Adam or his family, they were merely following my orders. Tae, please try to understand. I have had to allow the deaths of a few in order to find the one person who could prevent the deaths of millions, possibly billions. I swear to you that I regret their deaths, but I do not regret my actions. Too much was, and is, at stake. What would you do if you were asked to choose between your brother’s life and the lives of millions? It’s an impossible choice, and one I hope you never have to make, but if you do, you will begin to understand the choices I was faced with.’
Tae sat quietly, going over everything silently in her head. What is so important that Cassandra is willing to have innocent children injected with a spaceship’s nanites before manipulating them into coming here, causing their deaths? And what the hell does this bonding thing mean? More importantly, what the hell would happen if I decide I don’t want to bond with Fido here? Will the ship turn its nanites on me and kill me, too? Damn everyone here all to Hell! Why does this shit keep happening to me! She raged at the universe silently.
Aloud she said, ‘So, let me get this straight. You want me to bond with a mega battle ship you think is a bit like a dog and who will, in all probability, kill me if I don’t give it a try,’ she said, laughing a little hysterically. ‘Haven’t I been through enough?’
‘Tae, I won’t lie to you,’ Cassandra said. ‘I’m not sorry for anything you have been through. Everything that has happened to you has shaped you into the strong, resilient young woman that sits before me now. A woman who is, hopefully, strong enough to control the first living Dreadnaught battleship; and believe me when I say that it will take some doing.’
Tae glared at the old woman, determined to be unmoved by her soft words.
‘I watched as you grew to become someone who is kind enough and brave enough to risk her own life to save another. And for no reward, doing it simply because she knew it is the right thing to do. You are a woman who is strong enough to never allow anyone to change who you really are, because you have come to recognize your own selfworth. You have grown to become someone who is prepared to go it alone, rather than compromise herself for either a man or god. Tae, this is the type of person the Ouranos must bond with. The ship needs someone who can protect and love her as she protects and loves them. She needs someone whose soul will not be corrupted by power, so they never corrupt hers, and someone who can look beyond their own anger or disappointment and love when love is needed. I am hoping that person is you, Tae Rames.’
‘You make me sound perfect,’ said Tae, frowning. ‘Believe me, I’m not.’
Cassandra laughed. ‘You’re hardly perfect, Tae. You’re extremely impatient, not to mention impulsive. I’m also well aware of your quick temper and stubbornness, as well as your penchant to have the last word when you believe someone has wronged you. Ares is still fuming, by the way.’
Tae grinned, genuinely pleased at that statement.
‘Not to mention your thievery of jumpers, along with breaking into places with your nanites that you know very well you are not allowed to be in.
And all of that is nothing compared to the numerous times when you have thought that you are the only one who could ever possibly be right. Or that nobody could ever have been through what you’re going through. But those last two complaints are the scourge of all youth, because youth has always been filled with that kind of vanity and arrogance. It is something I am hoping you will grow out of, given time.’
Tae, whose ego had rapidly deflated as Cassandra had listed her faults, went back to glaring at her.
‘You have some very good people around you; you must listen to them, Tae. If you take anything from our talk then take this: always remember to keep your mind open to another’s point of view, lest you become closed off and lost forever … just like Hera.’
That last sentence scared the daylights out of Tae, to even consider that she could become like that murderous bitch was terrifying. She focused her thoughts back on Cassandra as she continued her talk.
‘You’re not perfect, Tae, you’re far from it, but you are good. You are decent, kind, and loving, your heart is pure if you will. Yes, you allow your temper to get the better of you, and you do the wrong thing sometimes, but you’re not a deliberately cruel person. I believe that is why you have made it this far,’ she said in a tired voice.
‘Why do you need someone so badly? You mentioned millions of people dying’ Tae asked.
Cassandra’s voice filled with anger. ‘Make no mistake, Tae. Should she succeed in her plans to topple Zeus and his followers, Hera will change the course of all the worlds. Her heart has been buried under a layer of hatred, jealousy and bitterness for so long that there is nothing left of the woman she once was. She is not powerful enough at the moment to take on Zeus and his supporters, but she has laid a trap. She knows you freed Loki and has marked you for death, especially since word of the Hindishah’s destruction and the death of Pan and of her occasional lovers, the brothers Jalek and Jaden.’
Tae’s eyes widened, although Cassandra had told her of her ‘sight’ the knowledge that she knew about her recent activities still shocked her. So did the thought of having a God gunning for her, was it only a few weeks ago she was sitting in school happily oblivious to all of this?
Well … Crap!
‘Zeus and his companions have just entered through the portal and are headed toward my nebula in the hope of rescuing Ares. Soon the seven ships that attacked you will be joined by Hera and the rest of the ships under her somewhat tenuous control.
Zeus’ five Orion class cruisers, along with Ares who will join him shortly, are about to be attacked by all of Hera’s forces – four Orion class battle cruisers and twentythree Khopesh class destroyers. Unless you are able to bond with the Ouranos, Tae, every scenario I have seen in my visions
point to the imminent demise of Zeus and most of those gods that were at the pavilion with him, along with your brother who is still onboard the Olympus.’
Not Jase, not again, please no she thought, before her mind shifted away from her brother, to be filled with the image of black eyes looking at her with intensity.
‘When do I try to bond with the ship?’ she asked, pushing her thoughts of dark eyes firmly aside.
‘We have time, Tae. Do not be alarmed, remember the time equation in here, it will be years before the first shot is fired. As to how they know? Hera has a spy. Ares’ second in command, Solath has been promised command of the Kydomois for his help; he has a small transmitter he uses to contact her under the skin of his right wrist.
He is how they knew where Ares was in the first place, they did attempt to follow him into the nebula but I attacked one of their ships with a plasma hurricane, it barely escaped. That is why they never tried to follow you, they have been waiting outside behind Tuvarna ever since. I’m afraid when you informed Ares that Zeus was coming to rescue him, Solath immediately contacted Hera. ‘
‘She has assembled her fleet near the portal at Ithaca and as soon as she receives word they have arrived she will follow them in, cutting off any escape back through the portal. She will have them trapped between her fleet and the nebula. Zeus will not run from her, Tae; despite his wandering eye he still has enough of the warrior and leader in him to stand his ground. He may not be the same man he was when they first arrived here, mores’ the pity, but he still has the capacity to become that man again, if ever he’s forced. Never forget that.
He will fight to the death before he surrenders to her, and that’s exactly what Hera is counting on. She will break the back of his power base in one fell swoop, effectively leaving herself in charge.’
Tae was now terrified; what Cassandra said had the ring of truth to it. It all made a terrible sense to her. ‘If I do this, and if the ship accepts me, what happens then? There’s no crew here, so how in Hades’ name do I help them?’
