Catalina and Alexander went on exploring for another half an hour, encountering all kinds of supplies—food, blankets, crop seeds, medical supplies, computers, solar-powered heaters, inflatable hab modules, but no androids, and no Benevolence. Catalina stopped walking.
“What’s wrong?” Alexander asked.
She shook her head. “You’re right. They’re not here. I don’t get it. Benevolence recorded a message for us, telling us what to do aboard the harvester. Why would he lead us to believe we were going to join him if that wasn’t true?”
“Maybe it wasn’t him,” Alexander replied.
“The Grays tricked us?”
“It was the chance we took when we accepted their offer to bring us here. They did bring us to the Avilon, but they failed to mention that Benevolence and his androids had already moved on.”
“But why?!” Catalina leaned heavily against the nearest wall and slid slowly to the deck. She spent a moment staring at the floor, shaking her head in disbelief. This can’t be how it ends, she thought. Alexander sat down beside her.
“Look, Caty, life isn’t a right. It’s a gift. However long we get, we just have to live our lives as fully as we can. And even as an immortal, tomorrow isn’t a given. How do you know you won’t die a decade from now in some tragic accident? Maybe a local predator will eat you.”
Catalina scowled at him. “Thanks for making me feel better.”
“That’s life. Death is part of the deal.”
“Well, it shouldn’t be. The Grays brought us back once. They could do it again. So why don’t they? What makes them think only they deserve to live forever?”
“According to them, that’s not what this is about. Humans aren’t supposed to live forever, but our souls are.”
“Don’t tell me they’ve converted you now, too.”
“I’m just saying, if a race as advanced and intelligent as the Grays believes that a god exists, then it just might be possible that they know something we don’t. And whether or not that’s true, sooner or later we’re going to find out.”
“You mean you’re going to find out. I’m still immortal, remember?”
He took her hand between both of his and smiled. “Caty, you’re not listening to me. Everyone dies. It might take you longer than me, but eventually something will kill you, too.”
“You say that like it’s a good thing.”
“And what if it is?”
“Again, who converted you when I wasn’t looking?”
Alexander’s face clouded over. “I don’t know what to believe, okay? But I’m not going to waste what time I have left worrying about it! Maybe there’s a life waiting for us after this one, and maybe there isn’t. Let’s just be thankful for the time we have and make the best of it.”
“You want to believe that there’s still hope.”
“I have to believe that there is.”
Something occurred to her then, and her lips parted in a broad grin. “You’re right.”
“I am?” Alexander asked. Her sudden change of heart obviously had him confused.
“We don’t need Benevolence! We just need to know what he knew—how to digitize our consciousness and how to grow new bodies to transfer our minds to after we die.”
“That’s all?” Alexander asked, looking dubious.
“He evacuated Earth. He wouldn’t do that without taking our accumulated knowledge with him. It has to be here, stored somewhere aboard this ship!”
“Unless the Grays erased it,” Alex said.
“There’s only one way to find out. Come on!” Catalina bounced to her feet and ran down the corridor.
“Where are you going?” Alexander called after her.
“To the bridge!”
Chapter 44
They arrived at the bridge to find it already full of colonists, a few of whom Catalina recognized—Commander Johnson, Remo, Deedee...
“You’re all here,” Catalina said, leaning on the nearest bulkhead to catch her breath.
Everyone turned to look at her, but there were no signs of recognition in their eyes.
“Who’s you all?” Commander Johnson asked.
The amnesia, Catalina recalled. “Never mind. Did you check the databanks yet? There might be—” She gasped for air. “—information in there that could help us.”
Commander Johnson nodded and pointed to a man sitting in the ship’s command chair. Admiral Urikov. He was busy scrolling through reams of files.
“Found it!” he said.
Everyone crowded around, peering over the admiral’s shoulders. Catalina read the file in question. It was a detailed guide to recording and storing organic data in digital archives. She didn’t understand any of it, but surely someone would.
“This is exactly what we need,” Commander Johnson whispered.
“What about genetic engineering?” Catalina asked. “We might be able to skip the transfer process if we can figure out what the Grays did to us and how to reverse it.”
The admiral issued a verbal search of the ship’s records, and they waited for the result. A moment later the words, No Records Found, flashed on the holoscreen.
“Why erase one thing but not the other?”
“Maybe the Grays don’t care if we live forever by digitizing ourselves,” Remo said.
“Or maybe they don’t think we’ll have enough time to figure it out,” Alexander suggested.
“We will,” Catalina said, her jaw set.
“Well, it’s all here,” Admiral Urikov added. “All we have to do is wrap our heads around the science. I’m sure we’ll get it eventually. If nothing else, we should at least be able to find a way to store our consciousnesses before we die. Cloning new bodies might be a stretch in the time we have, but I’m sure that our children or grandchildren will find a way to bring us back.”
Children, that word took root in Catalina’s brain, reminding her of something Ben had said about synthetics like her. She took Alexander aside and whispered to him, “I’m immortal because I’m a synthetic.”
“I know,” he whispered back, smiling.
“You don’t get it. Benjamin told us that when synthetics have children with humans, their children are born as synthetics like them.”
Alexander considered that. “So our children...”
“And their children, and theirs, and so on. They’re all going to be immortal.”
“Our family line will live forever, and everyone else will have to clone themselves and transfer their memories to achieve the same thing?” Alexander asked.
Catalina nodded.
“Well, shit,” Alexander said, still whispering. “We get to live forever and no one else does? People were burned at the stake for less.” He spent a moment looking around the bridge. Hard lines of worry etched his brow. “Don’t tell anyone what you just told me,” he said.
“Don’t tell anyone what?” Remo asked as he swaggered over to them.
Alexander turned to him and smiled. “Well, it was supposed to be a surprise...”
Remo frowned, his eyes darting between them. “But?” he tried, pressing for more details.
“We found a crate full of champagne from Earth on level four,” Catalina explained.
“Aha! And you two love birds were planning to drink it all by yourselves? Not anymore! We could use a little something to celebrate! Let’s go crack open the bubbly!”
They all went down to level four together and brought up as much champagne as they could carry. Halfway back to the bridge, Admiral Urikov came on the PA system explaining the good news to the rest of the colonists. After that, they ended up passing the bottles of champagne around to jubilant passersby and then going back for more. This time they avoided the grasping hands of the crowds, and rather gave directions to their stash.
They returned to the bridge of the Avilon, and corks popped all around the room, crisscrossing in the air above their heads. Champagne fizzed out, splattering to the deck as they passed the bottles around.
“To Avilon, home of the immortals!” Remo added, raising a bottle in one hand, and pulling Deedee close with the other.
“To the future. Now at least we have one,” Commander Johnson put in.
Catalina added a more conservative, “To Avilon,” and they drank the toast. Her mind went back to what Alexander had said as the champagne tingled on her tongue and warmed her veins. What if he was right? What if people began to hate and persecute their family just because they were different? It was hard to celebrate knowing how uncertain the future was.
Alexander wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close, clinking his bottle with hers. “Don’t worry, Caty.”
She looked up at him, her eyes searching his, but he looked just as worried as she felt.
“Everything’s going to be okay,” he added.
She nodded and lifted her bottle to her lips once more, washing her worries down with another warm, fizzy gulp of champagne. A pleasant buzz crept through her head, making it feel light. Maybe Alex was wrong, and there was nothing to worry about. Humanity had come a long way since their witch-burning days. Maybe she was worrying for nothing.
She took another gulp of champagne and pushed those thoughts from her head. At least now, with what they’d found in the Avilon’s databanks, she could rest assured knowing that whatever trials they had to face, she and Alexander would be facing them together. She turned to him with a sudden grin and took his hand, leading him off the bridge. “Where are we going?” Alexander asked.
She didn’t reply until she had him all alone in a nearby office. She fumbled with the control panel by the door to engage the lock; then she stripped out of her jumpsuit and stood there naked in front of him. Alexander set his empty champagne bottle down and got undressed, too.
They came together like two magnets. Their lips and tongues met in a blissful haze of desire, alcohol, and triumph.
When they took a break for air, she whispered, “Give me a son just like you.”
“You still have an implant,” he breathed beside her ear. “We have to find a way to disable it if you want to get pregnant.”
“You don’t have one anymore,” she replied. “And one by itself isn’t a hundred percent effective. We could get lucky.”
“Oh, yes, we definitely could,” Alexander replied, grinning. He pulled her close and kissed her again. They stumbled over to a nearby desk, and he laid her out on top of it.
And then they did get lucky. Twice.
* * *
Nine months later that luck proved more literal than euphemistic, with the birth of their son, Kain. But somehow de Leon didn’t seem to fit for a last name. They didn’t even speak Spanish anymore, and this was a new world.
“Our family should have a new name to mark our transition to life on Avilon.”
“A new name to mark the transition, or to mark us?” Alexander asked, reminding her of their family’s secret.
Kain would be immortal like her. Never aging a day past adulthood, and never dying—at least not of natural causes, anyway.
Catalina regarded her baby with a worried frown. She sat in a chair in the corner of her room in the Avilon’s med bay, nursing Kain for the first time. As he suckled her breast, she felt an almost indescribable feeling of completeness—of a love so powerful and overwhelming that it made her whole body tremble and her head feel light.
“We do have a mark on us, don’t we, Kain?” she said, stroking the wisps of hair on his head. “But it’s not something to be ashamed of. It’s a blessing.” She looked up to find Alexander smiling at the two of them. He reached out and grabbed their son’s hand, and Kain wrapped a fist around Alexander’s index finger.
“He’s a strong one.”
“He’s a mark-on-us.”
“A what?” Alexander asked, his eyes twinkling with amusement.
“A Markonus.”
Alexander appeared to consider that. “What if we make it a little less obvious? How about Markonis with an I?”
“Sounds perfect,” Catalina replied.
Alexander wrapped them both in a hug and smiled down on their son. “Welcome to the Markonis family, little guy. Not everyone can say eternity is their birthright.”
Kain’s eyes were shut, but he went on suckling, proving he was awake and listening.
Catalina couldn’t help but wonder what lay ahead for him. Assuming no unfortunate accidents befell their son, he would live forever. He’d probably even live long enough to see the colonists in Dark Space reunited with the ones in Avilon.
But for now, you sleep, my little prince. You’re safe here with me. I won’t let anything happen to you. The Grays could keep their promise of life in paradise after death. She had her paradise right here, in the land of the living, on Avilon.
Alexander bent down to kiss their son’s forehead.
Love is the only truth, she thought, watching them with a smile. Let ours be yours.
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Thousands of years later, the story continues in...
Dark Space
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OTHER BOOKS BY JASPER SCOTT
New Frontiers Series
Excelsior (Book 1)
Mindscape (Book 2)
Exodus (Book 3)
Dark Space Series
Dark Space
Dark Space 2: The Invisible War
Dark Space 3: Origin
Dark Space 4: Revenge
Dark Space 5: Avilon
Dark Space 6: Armageddon
Dark Space Universe Series
Dark Space Universe (Book 1): Heretic
Coming April 2017!
Dark Space Universe (Book 2)
Coming August 2017!
Dark Space Universe (Book 3)
Coming November 2017!
Early Work
Escape
Mrythdom
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jasper Scott is a USA TODAY bestselling science fiction author. He's best known for writing intricate plots with unexpected twists and flawed characters. His books have been translated into Japanese and German and adapted for audio, with collectively over 500,000 copies read, borrowed, or sold.
Jasper was born and raised in Canada by South African parents, with a British cultural heritage on his mother's side and German on his father's, to which he has now added Latin culture with his wonderful wife.
After spending years living as a starving artist, he finally quit his various jobs to become a full-time writer. In his spare time he enjoys reading, traveling, going to the gym, and spending time with his family.
Exodus: Book 3 of the New Frontiers Series (A Dark Space Tie-In) Page 28
