Andromeda

by Jason M. Hough

  Nnebron’s brow furrowed.

  Smart one. Like Irida, but with less tact.

  “Rations are tight,” Calix continued. Nods peppered the team. “The station is in need of more repairs than it has crew to repair her.” More nods, a few emphatic grunts. “Whenever we ask for updates, we get the same song and dance we always have.” Calix met the eyes of his crew as he listed them off. “Scouts will return soon with planet coordinates. Rations will lift. The Pathfinders will find us. Just work a little harder, a little longer, and everything will turn out fine.

  “New homes,” he added as he turned and paced to the edge of the team. “New food and resources. A chance to create that new life we’ve all been promised. Away from the prejudices and the disasters of the old worlds from which we came.”

  The world they’d left behind. Six hundred years in the dust.

  Calix had to take a moment, rest a hand on Nnebron’s shoulder and swallow the pang of homesickness he didn’t know he’d carried until he saw it in the faces of his team. His friends. His mandibles moved. He paused. Then said the words nobody had wanted to say.

  “We all know what we left,” he said quietly. “The kind of crap that happened on the Warsaw.” Nnebron nodded at that, his mouth a thin line. “Leaders who order us to try and cover up their mistakes, or worse, withhold the truth from us and let us toil while they plan an escape.”

  Eyes widened. Calix nodded. “We thought Andromeda would be different. That we’d be leaving that kind of thing behind. And then we lost Na’to.”

  “Boss?” Nnebron took a step forward. His dark eyes spoke volumes, echoing the uncertainty in every face. “What’s this about? Is it Irida?”

  He closed his eyes. Took a deep breath.

  “Secrets,” he said, enunciating every syllable, “plague the Nexus leadership. Like a drug, a habit they can’t break.” He opened his eyes. Met the stares of his team, and made the call he knew he could never take back. “They told us we’d have new planets.” His hands clenched. “It’s false. They’ve known for weeks that the planets around us are dead.”

  Andria paled.

  “Wait, dead?”

  He nodded. Andria had been there when Na’to died. Reg and she both had taken time off to get it together.

  Reg came back first.

  Andria’s tone earned an instant and total state of focus from the entire group. Her question echoed through them all.

  “Dead,” Calix confirmed. “Torn apart by the same Scourge that nearly took us.”

  She flinched, half-turning to hide the worry in her face. Nnebron put a hand on her shoulder.

  “They lied,” Nnebron said blankly, then he swore.

  “Weeks?” Andria whispered, and she looked at Calix. Her freckles had almost paled out. “They’ve known for weeks?”

  “So it seems.”

  She blew out a hard breath and jammed her hands in the pockets of her pants. “I don’t—I can’t believe it.”

  “Believe it,” Nnebron said bitterly. He turned to the rest of the team, his slim back to Calix, and gestured expansively. “How long have we been working down here, eating every word they sent us? Like we were some kind of orphans begging for scraps.” His voice rose, the anger growing. “We’re part of the Nexus, too!”

  “Nnebron, nobody is saying we don’t exist.” Calix tilted his head. “Only that—”

  “Only that we’re not important,” Andria cut in, her pallor replaced by an angry flush. Calix knew then he couldn’t let her down. Couldn’t let any of them down.

  “The planets aren’t going to save us,” he added, raising his own voice, “nor the Pathfinders. We need new plans, friends. New contingencies. New directions—”

  “And new leaders!”

  Who said it, he didn’t see, but the words started a fire. Andria darted around Nnebron to grab Calix by the arm. Her grip bit.

  “How long?” she demanded. “Until the supplies run out? Will they let us starve?”

  Whoa. He hadn’t expected this to move quite that fast. Calix covered her hand with his free one, pressing her fingers against his arm in what he hoped was a firm, comforting method. He had a hard time gauging human comfort, sometimes.

  “Easy,” he said, trying for soothing. “We aren’t going to starve.”

  “No way the boss would let us starve,” Nnebron added.

  “Yeah… Hey, yeah!” The others started to nod. To look Calix’s way. To… to almost vibrate. The tension was palpable.

  “Plans,” one repeated. “Priorities… we need to lock down supplies.”

  “We need to spread the word!”

  Andria stared, her gaze pleading. “We can’t let everyone else starve. What about Reg? Emory? Some of us have friends out there…”

  “We won’t.” He said the words before he could fully weigh them. Saw them take hold in her features, create a vortex of confidence he’d never known he could inspire. Suddenly his crew surrounded him, all reaching out to touch his shoulder, his arm. Pats of confidence, of pride.

  Of support.

  “Irida needs to be freed,” he heard.

  From someone else, “We need to secure the rations!”

  “What about security?”

  “Screw them,” someone jeered.

  It spun around and around him, a heady mix of anger and relief and confidence. All because of him. They looked at him as a leader. Calix’s shoulders squared. He squeezed Andria’s hand, then stepped back far enough that he could see them all in his field of view.

  “First things first,” he said, loudly enough to cut through the voices. They all went silent. Watching. Listening.

  Really listening.

  Heady stuff, that power.

  He summoned every ounce of meritocratic confidence he never knew he possessed. But instead of laying down his orders and forcing them to obey, he met them as equals.

  As friends.

  He spread his hands. “We need a plan.”

  Nnebron’s grin stretched ear-to-ear. “I think we can help you there, boss.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  “What a fucking mess,” Sloane said. The words were directed not at Tann, who paced behind the desk in Operations, or Addison, who sat head-in-hands against the wall by the door. The farthest she could be from Sloane and still be in the room. No, her words were directed at the floor.

  At the whole damned station.

  Rage had got the better of her, weeks back. She’d stormed out of that crowded control room and kept on going, rampaging around like a petty tyrant, doing anything she could to get her mind off Kandros. The failure of the scouts was bad enough, but she couldn’t get past the fact that those scout missions had cost her the best first officer she’d never had.

  His ship had not been found, or heard from, since. Some had wanted to declare them lost, and to stop using critical resources to continue the search, but Sloane was having none of it.

  Time had passed, which only made the situation worse, both in terms of Kandros and the fact that the general population had yet to be told of the scout’s failure.

  In fact, time had become a physical source of pain. Every day that passed without answers, without showing the guts to admit the truth to everyone, only made that inevitable moment all the worse.

  “This cannot go on, my friends,” Tann said. “We have only one option left.”

  This is it, Sloane thought, bile in her mouth. The end of denial. Jarun Tann, all business, as usual. The past, to him, was merely data. Sloane glared. “If you say that we turn around and go back to the Milky Way…”

  “No,” Tann said. The word cut like a knife. Unusual for him. Despite herself Sloane straightened her back. An involuntary reaction every soldier learned when they heard that tone. “I’m not ready to give up yet,” he added, casting his gaze between Sloane and Addison. “None of us should be.”

  Slowly, like a marionette, Addison lifted her head and blinked.

  “What option, then?”

 
; “Cryostasis,” Tann said.

  Sloane laughed. Or would have. She wanted to, but nothing came out. Tann, she realized, was right.

  The salarian went on. “Everyone goes back in, save a skeleton crew. We wait and hope the Pathfinders reach us. That we don’t encounter the Scourge again. It’s all we can do.”

  “Risky move,” Addison said, though little conviction stood behind her words. She also knew he was right. Sloane could hear it.

  “Absolutely,” Tann agreed, “but then everything is these days.”

  The words settled. Like a blanket over a corpse, Sloane thought. For a long time no one said anything.

  “I’ll do it,” Addison said. “I’ll make the announcement.”

  “Are you sure?” Tann asked, thinking the same thing as Sloane—that Addison wasn’t up for it. Her mood was… complicated, to say the least.

  “Well, you can’t do it,” Addison said, almost laughing. “Remember your call for volunteers?”

  “I’m still trying to forget.” He frowned. “Why not Sloane?”

  “Screw that,” Sloane said. “You got us into this mess, Acting Director.”

  “That’s unfair,” Tann fired back. “I’ve done my best to consult the two of you in every decision—”

  “You mean whichever of us was most likely to agree.”

  Addison hauled herself to her feet. “It’s obvious, isn’t it? No one’s going to like this. It can’t come from Sloane because while we make the announcement, she’ll be getting security ready for the crew’s reaction.” She studied each of them. “It’s why we’ve sat on our thumbs for two weeks and avoided this. People aren’t going to go willingly.”

  “They must,” Tann said.

  “They won’t,” Addison replied. “Not unless they are… compelled.”

  Sloane Kelly clenched her jaw, shook her head. “What a fucking mess.” Addison was right, though. No arguing that. “When do you want to announce it?”

  “As soon as possible, I think,” the woman replied.

  “Okay. Okay.” Sloane’s mind raced through the preparations that would be required. Her team was already spread too thin, but that couldn’t be helped. She’d pull them all in, brief them, and get ready for the party. Calix, she’d need to talk to Calix. Fuck, this was exactly what he’d warned her about.

  They could at least drink to that.

  His team would have to enter cryo last, so they could assist the rest. She wondered how willingly that bunch of hard-asses would help. They all looked at her now with one thing written across their faces.

  You imprisoned Irida.

  Sloane went to the door. “Give me an hour,” she said as she left.

  * * *

  Exactly an hour later she had her entire team gathered at headquarters, a space little better than a ruin. Every time Kesh offered to send a team to fix it up Sloane waved her off. Too many other places were more important. Besides, other than the occasional arrest, her team hardly spent any time here.

  Strange to see all their faces gathered. Stranger still not to see Kandros at the front of the group.

  Her team had been briefed, and they were just waiting for the announcement. Sloane could have dispersed them ahead of Addison’s speech, in order to have a security presence “in the streets,” so to speak. An old tactic from the tyrant’s playbook, that. In the end, though, she thought this might work better. A little reverse psychology. Let people think, hopefully subconsciously, that security wasn’t even worried. That this was a perfectly acceptable step in the station’s recovery.

  Mostly, though, she wanted to be nimble. Dispatch her squads where the reactions—if any—were the most extreme. Calm things down before they got down to the business of shoving people back into their pods.

  The public address system crackled and Addison’s voice boomed out through the speakers, echoing in the hallways.

  “This is Director Addison,” she began. “As many of you know, ten weeks ago Colonial Affairs sent out a fleet of vessels to scout the nearest worlds—ones that might be suitable for habitats or, in some cases, offer resources from which to resupply our dwindling stores. Barring that, to find a place where we could move our population in the event that the station ceases to support the mission.

  “I am sad to announce that those missions have failed. The worlds we identified from afar have all been struck by the same mysterious phenomenon that so damaged the Nexus—what most of us now refer to as ‘the Scourge.’”

  Not a bad start, all things considered, Sloane thought. She studied her team. Saw resolve and, more importantly, cool-headedness in each of their faces.

  Addison continued. “One of our ships did not return, and search-and-rescue efforts are continuing as I speak. While we all hope for the safety of the members of that mission, we must now turn our focus to the survival of the Nexus and its inhabitants.

  “You’ve all done an amazing job these last few months. Critical problems have been resolved. The station may still require an incredible amount of work before it is ready to perform its mission, but it is stable. You should all be extremely proud of this accomplishment!”

  Another pause, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

  “Our primary concern now is one of supplies,” Addison said. “We simply do not have the resources needed to sustain our revived population. With the lack of habitable worlds near us, and the continued issues plaguing hydroponics, we have no choice but to wait until several crops can be harvested and stored. Alternatively, we will be contacted by the Pathfinders and a solution will come from them.

  “Several weeks ago we asked for volunteers to return to stasis. None of you were willing to do that, and we understood your reasons. Unfortunately we have no alternative now. I must ask you to remember the words of Jien Garson. ‘We make the greatest sacrifice any of us have ever, or will ever, make.’ The time has come for a mandatory return to stasis for all non-essential personnel.”

  Another short silence, to let that sink in.

  “Team leaders will be briefed shortly. Within the next twenty-four hours you will be contacted by security, who will escort you to your stasis pod and oversee the process. We look forward to your cooperation in salvaging the mission of the Nexus.”

  Twenty-four hours and this will be over, Sloane thought. And then she’d need to get her own team to go back under. To enter a coma aboard a station held together with tape and spit and foul language, surrounded by a mysterious phenomenon that seemed to destroy everything that came near.

  Of course she’d get to remain awake. Of course. Wasn’t that how leaders always did things?Others have to make the sacrifice. But us? Oh no, we’re much too fucking important.

  Sloane waited for more, but Addison appeared to be done. Odd that she didn’t add a little thanks or godspeed or whatever. Well, beggars can’t be choosers. At least it wasn’t Tann making the speech, or Spender writing it. Sloane still cringed at that memory, and thought she would for the rest of her life.

  “Listen up,” she said. No need—her officers were already listening. “Stick the plan, okay? We have no idea how this is going to go, but we have to treat this situation like it’s a group of colonists who don’t want to evacuate their doomed planet. Some of us have been on duty like that before, and it’s never fun. Just remember that we’re saving their lives, even if they don’t see it that way. They have their own best interests in mind. It’s our job to remind them of the bigger picture. Understood?”

  Nods all around.

  “Alright then. Let’s get this over with.” Her omni-tool chimed. Kesh. Sloane raised a finger to her crew and stepped away to the wall. “Hey, what’s the status? Are the krogan on board with all this?”

  “I’m not worried about the clan,” Kesh said, “but there is a problem.”

  “How can there be a problem already? It’s been, like, thirty seconds.”

  “I’m unable to contact Calix.”

  Sloane’s pulse jumped. Her mouth went dry. Calix was crucial
to this effort—perhaps even more important than she was herself.

  “Alright. Don’t panic. Who’s his second?”

  “That’s just it,” Kesh said. “I can’t seem to raise anyone on the life-support team. And without them—”

  “—none of the pods can be prepped for activation.”

  “Exactly,” Kesh said, then she added, “I could do it, but I’m not trained in monitoring the process.”

  “I hear you. Let’s keep that option as plan B for the moment. I’ll see if I can track down Calix. They might be in a rad-shielded area, making sure the infrastructure is ready for these pods to come back online.” But Sloane didn’t believe her own words. Something—some deep-seeded security officer’s intuition—told her that something else was going on here.

  Whatever it was, it wasn’t good.

  Because if someone out there, some group, wanted to avoid a return to stasis, taking out Calix and his team would be a damned good way to go about it.

  “Right,” she said, returning to her team. “I need four volunteers. We’ve got some people missing and—”

  The PA crackled. Sloane stopped talking. Maybe Addison wasn’t quite done after all. But it wasn’t her voice that filled the halls of the Nexus. It was a turian voice. A familiar one.

  “This is Calix Corvannis,” the turian’s voice boomed, “and I am here to tell you all to say no. Say no! Resist the order to return to stasis.”

  Oh, shit. No.

  Sloane’s omni chirped again. Spender calling.

  “Not now,” she barked as she answered, her mind reeling.

  “No problem,” Spender said. “I just thought you might want to dispatch a team to the armory.”

  “Who the hell do you think you are, telling me where to…” Then his words registered, and her wrath bled out. “Why the armory?”

  “Well, I happened to be going past there and noticed the doors were open. Wide open. No guards.”

  “How the fuck…?”

  Another alert erupted from her wrist. This one automated, a direct feed from the station’s emergency systems.

  “Fire in Hydroponics,” Sloane read, unable to believe it.