by William Wood
of large metal crates. He was confident that he was well hidden. Calvin made sure both of his rifles were loaded with safety
switches off. If the barrier failed to trap a Dark Terror, they’d have to
deal with the monster quickly. There wouldn’t be time to do anything at
that point except shoot at it, and hope they hit something. He
programmed the range of his mini plasma bombs to the area around the
barrier trap, then made sure it was loaded and ready to fire. When he was sure everything was ready, he fixed his gaze on the
still form of the repair robot.
Heavy silence descended as everyone became as still as statues.
Calvin sat frozen in tense anticipation. If Astra was right, a Dark Terror
was on its way, in search of the robot that came back to life. His mind
raced with fear. What were they doing? His fear demanded an answer.
Where was it going to come from? There was only one way in. Calvin
turned his head and stared at the door, even though he knew the monster
was invisible.
Time passed slowly. How long would it take? He wanted to ask,
but was afraid to make a sound. How sensitive was a Dark Terror’s
hearing? It was genetically engineered by the Goremog, so Calvin
assumed they gave it exceptionally good hearing. Even if it weren’t
actively targeting humans, there was no reason to risk it. So he sat, and
waited in dread. All his senses were on full alert, his body pumped full of
adrenaline.
Five minutes passed, then ten. Calvin was just a few seconds
from raising his hand to get Astra’s attention, or clearing his throat
loudly, and then asking if this was going to work, but he didn’t. He was
frozen to the ground in fear, anticipation and intense fascination. He glanced at the clock. Twelve minutes had passed. What if the
Dark Terror didn’t come? Were they even sure it was a Dark Terror? The
doubts began to cast down on him like shadows across the floor. Suddenly, the robot lifted off the floor three feet. At first, Calvin
thought he was seeing things, but his Helcomp confirmed what he was
seeing. All at once, the body of the robot was crushed in by an invisible
force, the head was ripped off, and smashed into the floor. It was more of
a spiteful move, Calvin thought, as if the monster was tired of having to
keep putting robots down, as if to say, ‘take that’ and ‘stay down.’ The body of the little robot was sent hurling across the room, but
it didn’t go far. It stopped three feet later, into an invisible wall, and fell
to the floor. Astra stood up and shouted, “Got it!” For a second, when the
robot hit the force field, the entire field shimmered, revealing the box
shaped trap.
She bounded forward to the edge of the force field and stared in.
Wexton walked quickly ahead and joined her. Calvin took a more cautious approach, and walked up much slower. Dev stayed hidden in the shadows.
“How can you tell?” Calvin asked, getting closer to the force
field than he wanted to.
Suddenly there was a bright flash and an ear piercing scream that
hurt Calvin’s head until his Helcomp lowered the sound. The invisible
monster pounded on the force field and screamed. Calvin jumped back
and aimed his rifle.
Wexton laughed. “Come on out Dev, its safe,” he said. Calvin wanted to ask, “Is it?” but he stayed quiet. If it wasn’t
safe, he believed that Astra wouldn’t have stood so close to it. He
decided to trust her, because he knew she was usually right about this
stuff.
“It’s safe,” Astra said, confirming his thoughts. “The force field
is holding, more or less.”
“More or less?” Dev asked.
“Well, it’s probably nothing,” Astra said. “The field is
fluctuating. Don’t worry, it’s within normal tolerance.”
“Oh, that’s comforting,” Dev said, stepping out of the shadows.
Calvin smiled and looked at Dev. He was happy that Dev was there to
say everything out loud that Calvin was afraid to.
Calvin stepped forward, closer to the trap. He looked at the barrier.
He didn’t see it at first, but after a few seconds, data from Astra’s
Helcomp streamed across his vision, and he could see it. Tiny white
sparkles of light dancing across the energy field.
The monster exploded with rage. It screamed and pounded on
the field, it remained invisible, mostly. Calvin caught glimpses of parts
of it with each impact. When it slammed the barrier, he could see its
claws, its legs, its arms. It was clear the monster was throwing its body at
the barrier. It was terrifying to watch.
“OK, we got it,” Calvin said, walking to the door, well out of the
way. “Now what?”
Astra circled the trap, staring into it. “Now,” she said. “We find
out how it’s invisible. You guys ever dissect a Dark Terror before?” Wexton smiled, and Dev frowned.
“Just how do you plan on doing that?” Dev asked. “It’s awake,
and oh yeah, invisible.”
“Not for long,” Astra said.
“Have you ever caught a live one before?” Dev asked. “No,” Astra said. “Never.”
“We could suck the oxygen out of there,” Wexton said. “Suffocate it.”
“You forget they don’t need oxygen. I was thinking we could
flood it with radiation.”
“That won’t work either. They survived the radiation on my ship,
and the radiation in space.”
“You’re right,” Astra said, visibly deflated. “Micro-bots might be
the answer. It wouldn’t take too long to get some ready, and then we can
experiment, to find out what works.”
They were wandering; no plan of action and unable to make a
decision. Calvin remembered this from one of his command courses at
the academy. It was at times like this his command came out. But he also
knew that nobody in this room was under his command. They were a
mismatch of survivors and volunteers who could have just run away and
hid somewhere. Instead they decided to stay and help. He always knew
that he couldn’t domineer them, he had to talk to them with respect;
delicately. But they always seemed open to orders. Wexton saw the
command ability in Calvin. He either allowed him to, or was happy to
have him in charge and called him captain. They had to get organized. “This is what we’ll do,” Calvin said calmly. “We’ve got the monster
trapped, that will be good enough for now. Now we need to get the ship
patched up, quickly in case the portable power fails and we accidentally
let the monster out.”
“OK, you’re right,” Astra said. “Dev, let’s get main power
restored.”
“Alright,” Dev said.
“But first, let’s fix Ion. We’ll need his help.”
Ion, the most intelligent and advanced robot the Alerians had ever
created. Certainly the most advanced robot Calvin had ever seen. In the
chaos, Calvin had forgotten that Ion had been destroyed. He went to the
back of the room and found his main body. Calvin stood over his
charred, broken remains with disbelief. Calvin had never seen him that
damaged. Even Dev was shocked, and said there was no way he could
repair the robot. Dev said he needed help. So he got to
work fixing one
of the less damaged repair robots.
“We’ll stay here and guard the monster,” Calvin said. “Wexton and
I.” Astra nodded and left the room with Dev.
“After all,” Calvin said. “It’s about all we can do at this point, isn’t
it?”
“Pretty much.”
Ion was a large robot, and very heavy. But fortunately, they
didn’t have to carry him. They had small anti-gravity devices. Astra and
Dev took all the pieces of Ion to the repair lab.
Everything was going well, except that Calvin got bored rather
quickly just pacing back and forth in the hangar bay. Wexton wasn’t a
great conversationalist, and the monster wasn’t doing much except
occasionally bang on the barrier and scream. That was nice and
disturbing at the same time. Nice because it re-enforced to Calvin that
the monster was still trapped.
Calvin was wrong about not having a job. He found one. He
searched the ship for damaged robots, and carried their remains back to
the robot repair facility. It was back breaking work, but Calvin was
grateful to have something to do.
Once Dev and Astra had two repair robots back on their feet, they
instructed them to get to work on Ion, while they went to work on a third
robot.
Real progress didn’t take place until Ion was back up and running
and able to conduct the higher end repair work.
Wexton though, had not left the room, preferring to stay and keep
an eye on the invisible monster.
It took a full eight hours, and the repair work was proceeding at a
much quicker and more organized pace. When they got hungry, they
snacked on emergency rations; it was their only choice. Normally, Calvin
was a very picky eater, and hated emergency rations, but now he was so
hungry he didn’t care. They actually tasted good to him.
Ten hours after they caught the Dark Terror in their trap, main
power was restored and the lights came on, along with that came life
support, and oxygen. Calvin was overjoyed. But it was at that moment,
he allowed his guard to come down a little and he realized how tired he
was.
At seven in the evening, they all met in the dining room for
something to eat, even Wexton was there.
Astra was happy to report repairs were coming along nicely. Once
main power had been restored they were able to enclose the monster in a
stronger, more stable barrier.
“In the morning I’m going to start experimenting with our Dark
Terror,” Astra said. “I can’t keep my eyes open any longer.” Calvin knew how she felt. It had been a long day, one that he
was happy to have over with. He went to his room and took off his
combat suit. He put it by his bed, because no matter what anyone said, he
insisted on keeping it close by, just in case.
When he went to bed, he had trouble falling asleep. He couldn’t
relax, and he couldn’t feel at ease. There was a Dark Terror on the ship.
It was enclosed in a powerful force field, but that didn’t make Calvin feel
better.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO:
EXPERIMENTS
Calvin had a rough night. His whole body ached. He couldn’t get comfortable no matter how hard he tried. He woke up in pain at one a.m., but didn’t feel like getting out of bed to take any pain killers; he was too tired and didn’t want to move. When he did manage to fall asleep, he had terrible nightmares; dreams where Dark Terrors hunted him and his legs wouldn’t work properly.
He woke up more times than he could count, so he gave up around four. He turned the lights on, got dressed and walked down to the medical bay to ask the recently repaired MD-71 to give him something for the pain. At first, the robot didn’t want to give him anything, insisting the pain was all in his head. But Calvin was determined to get some sleep, and convinced MD-71 to give him a small dose; enough to get through the night.
On his way back to his room, he stopped by the library. He was surprised to find Astra there, sitting in the big reclining chair. She was staring into space with a cup of coffee in her hand.
If she heard him walk in, she didn’t respond. Calvin quietly walked in and sat down on the couch next to her.
“Hey,” he said. “How are you?”
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. She sounded very tired. When he saw her cup of coffee Calvin got up and got a cup of tea from the food processor. “Me neither,” he said, sitting back down next to her. “I had bad dreams all night.”
“Me too,” she said, turning in her seat to face him. “A giant monster was chasing me around in the dark, in a space station.”
“Wow, that’s what I dreamt too,” Calvin said. “Did your parents ever tell you there were no such things as monsters?”
“Yes, I think they did, when I was really little.”
“Yeah well, they lied.”
“Obviously,” Astra said, sarcastically.
“This is what happens when you keep a live Terror on the ship,” Calvin said. “You get nightmares.”
“Yeah,” Astra said with a tinge of sadness in her voice. Was it regret over having nightmares, or for keeping it alive? Calvin wasn’t sure, but he noted that she made no indication that she planned to change her mind.
“Since you’re awake, and already having nightmares, look at this.” She handed him a computer pad. On the screen was a picture of a small robot. It was the size of a dog and had two rows of razor sharp teeth. There was something familiar about it, it was small but looked very scary.
“What is it?” Calvin asked.
“That’s what chased us out of the space station. That’s what tried to take a bite out of your leg. One of our cameras was able to take this picture outside the airlock, just before we left.”
“That doesn’t look so scary,” Calvin lied.
“No, but it moved like lightning,” Astra pointed out. “Imagine if three or four of them latched onto you with those teeth.”
“Thanks,” Calvin said. “One was enough. It looks like a smaller version of a Dark Terror.”
“That’s what I thought. And it seems to be equipped with an advanced tracking system.”
“So they send those out to hunt their prey first.”
“That’s what I think. As if the Dark Terrors weren’t fast enough.”
“It makes sense. These little things can move faster, and fit into spaces that the big Terrors can’t fit in.” Calvin stared at the image and shuddered. He could still feel its teeth clamped around his leg. It still hurt. When was it going to stop? He rubbed his leg and decided to change the subject.
“How’s Nils?”
“He’s fine,” Astra said. “He’s resting in his room now. MD-71 says he’ll make a full recovery. He was lucky. If we hadn’t found him when we did, he would have died.”
OK, another depressing subject. He almost died. Well, he didn’t, and that was good. He wanted to focus on the good. Maybe he could get some good news from their mission. Maybe the next segment was on a small planet in the middle of nowhere.
“Do you have anything on the eighth segment?”
“I think so,” Astra said. “Nothing concrete, but I pulled this from the old records. Here, look at this,” she changed the view on her computer pad and handed it to Calvin. On the screen was a green and blue planet. “It’s called Cusendea,” Astra said. “It used to be part of the Alerian Empire. It was destroyed by the Goremog near the end of the war. The records say the eighth segment is supposed to be here, in an underground lab.” She pointed to a ruined metropolis in the southern hemisphere.
“That looks like it’s in Gore
mog territory,” Calvin noted. There was no point trying to find good news, so he’d stop looking. Why was he feeling this way? Oh yeah, he was exhausted. Nothing ever felt good when he was tired; he had a tendency to only see the dark side of things.
“Yes, it is,” Astra said. “Let’s hope the facility is still there, and they haven’t found it.”
“How about our pet monster?”
“It stopped making noises,” Astra said. “I don’t know if that’s good or bad. Let’s assume it’s bad.”
Calvin took the pain killers, but didn’t bother trying to go back to sleep. Instead, the two of them went to the dining room for breakfast. He may have been tired and feeling depressed, but that didn’t affect his appetite. He ate all of the things that made him feel good; eggs, sausage and toast and a big cup of coffee. That would keep him going for a while.
When they were done eating, Astra went to her lab to get what she needed to start experiments on the Dark Terror.
Everyone quickly fell into their favorite, comfortable routines. Although, it felt to Calvin like there was a gloomy, dark shadow over Azure Frost. Every time he walked down a corridor he wondered if he was being followed by an invisible Dark Terror. Even when he was in his room he was scared that he was not alone. Any empty space could contain a monster.
He knew he wouldn’t stop feeling that way until Astra was able to figure out how they were invisible and find a way to scan for them. Astra switched back and forth between working on the segments and running experiments. Dev help Astra repair the damaged segments. Calvin practiced in the simulator and learned hand to hand combat from Wexton. Each evening Calvin and Astra had a quiet, private candlelit dinner in the library at the fancy table by the big window; always with the curtains open so they could see the hyperspace cloud, and distorted stars beyond.
Nils was finally up and feeling better. He worked with Ion and some of the other robots in the engine room, repairing everything that had been damaged by the Dark Terror rampage.
When Dev wasn’t helping Astra he was trying to upgrade and improve his cloaking generators. Wexton stayed in shape by training anyone else who was interested in learning self-defense. He moved beyond hand to hand combat and conducted weapons training. Two weeks passed slowly. On the fourteenth night, Calvin found Astra sitting in the library, in their usual place, but she was very upset. “Nothing is working,” she answered when he asked what was wrong. “I’ve tried everything on it. I’ve tried sending in micro-bots, but every time I do they’re destroyed. I tried super-charged gas, radioactive isotopes, extreme pressure, no pressure, acid defragmentation, ugh.” She put her hands on her head. “It’s almost as if it’s not even there.” “That’s impossible,” Calvin said. “Right? There’s no way it could have escaped, right? Please tell me it didn’t escape.”
