by J. J. Green
AX7? Jas remembered the designation. The unit was the one she’d worked with aboard the Galathea.
“The woman on the ground there,” the corporal replied, irritated. “Commander Harrington.”
AX7 bent down and grabbed Jas’ arms. She found herself lifted gently but inexorably upright and away from Carl. As her grip on his flight suit was broken, he didn’t react. He only lay there, face down in the dirt.
The corporal lifted his weapon to fire. Jas screamed, “Nooooo...” and fought with all her might, but she was no match for the metal and silicon of the unit.
The corporal hesitated. He lowered his weapon and glanced at Jas with pity in his eyes. He turned to a soldier. “Run to the vehicle and bring out the Shadow scanner, then we can show her what it is.”
They all waited in silence as the sound of the soldier’s running feet grew quieter and quieter. The chill wind cut through Jas’ clothes, but she barely felt it. Physical discomfort was nothing compared to the agony she now faced of seeing Carl shot and killed in cold blood. He had come from the Void. He carried the trace of that place that the myth in the scanners reacted to. Jas was certain that the scanner would identify him as a Shadow. Kennewell stood by, pale and grave.
They all thought Jas was sick in the head, and they were humoring her. She struggled in AX7’s grip, but the unit’s hands were firm and unyielding around her biceps.
The soldier returned, breathless, bearing the scanner. The corporal took the device and ran it over Carl’s prone form. He looked at the display. His face grim, he turned it toward Jas. She’d been correct. The display said that Carl was a Shadow.
“It’s wrong,” she said. “I know how this must look, but, please, you have to believe me. If you kill him, you’ll be murdering an innocent man.”
“AX7,” the corporal said, “take Commander Harrington back to her shuttle.”
He was sparing her the sight of seeing the man she loved killed.
“No,” Jas shouted. “AX7, let me go.” To her complete amazement, the unit’s hands fell away. She dropped to the ground. She was free. The unit had obeyed her counter-command. “AX7, protect the man lying on the ground.”
The unit marched over to Carl, its weapons sliding out of its arms. It turned and aimed at the corporal and his soldiers.
“AX7,” the corporal yelled, “Commander Harrington has been relieved of duty. Her commands do not supersede mine.”
“I obey Commander Harrington,” AX7 replied.
With a gasp of frustration, the man lifted his weapon to shoot at Carl, but before he could fire, AX7’s weapon discharged and stunned him. In response, the soldiers fired at the unit, but they were also felled by it.
In less than a second, Kennewell, Jas, and Carl were the only humans remaining conscious. The other defense units hadn’t moved.
Jas indicated to them. “Thank krat the corporal didn’t think to order them to shoot,” she said to Kennewell.
The pilot’s mouth was open in an O. “Err...What just happened?”
“I’m not sure myself,” Jas said. “AX7, why didn’t you obey the corporal? Am I still the superior officer according to your data?”
“You are not a superior officer. You are on sick leave according to my data. But I am loyal to you, Commander Harrington. I chose to obey you.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Carl hadn’t said a thing since Jas had rescued him from the Shadow trap. He lay on the examining bed in the sick bay aboard the Thylacine as the doctor subjected him to a battery of tests. His eyes were open, but they didn’t focus on anything. If food was placed in front of him, he would eat, and he would drink water that was offered to him. He would also stand up and walk around randomly, so the doctor kept him restrained to the bed with straps.
Jas refused to leave his side, convinced that he would be executed as a Shadow once he was out of her sight. She also kept AX7 next to her. The unit obeyed her and no one else. How it had overridden its compliance protocols, she didn’t know. It was true that the defense units she’d encountered had always seemed a little more independent and individual than they were supposed to be, but this one’s behavior was exceptional. She guessed that the time she’d worked with AX7 aboard the Galathea had made a long-lasting impression on it, and that its organic components had allowed it to develop to the extent that it could influence its programming. Whatever the reason was for AX7’s fidelity to her, she was grateful for it.
Pacheco requested her presence in her office, which he’d taken over, but when she wouldn’t go, he was forced to come to her. His somber face appeared at the small window in the door to Carl’s room. The door opened and he came in, his expression pained. He drew up a seat and sat down, hitching up his pants.
Jas was holding Carl’s hand as it lay above the sheet. She looked defiantly at Pacheco.
“Jas.” Pacheco rubbed his hands together as he considered his words. “I read Corporal Stormer’s report, and I’ve spoken to Kennewell, and I’m still no wiser as to what’s going on here. How about we go somewhere that we can talk about this properly? I give you my solemn assurance that nothing will happen to Pilot Lingiari.”
“I’m not leaving him, Pacheco. We can talk here. I’ll tell you everything, right from the beginning. And you can confirm it with Sayen Lee and the Transgalactic Council.”
“All right then,” he replied. “Have it your way.” He told the doctor that they were not to be disturbed. He sat down again and folded his arms. “I’m listening.”
It took Jas longer than an hour to tell Pacheco about the time she took myth at Ganymede Station and what she’d learned about the Paths and the Void, about finding myth aboard the ship—he raised his eyebrows as he heard about that—her myth run the previous night, and what the Paths had told her then.
When she finally reached the end of her story, Pacheco remained doubtful, He turned his attention to Carl. The pilot’s gaze was directed upward and was unfocused, as if he hadn’t heard a word of Jas’ story.
Pacheco shook his head. “I don’t know what to make of it. What do you think the Paths meant when they said his self would be buried? Is this just his body? Is he going to stay like this forever?”
“I don’t know. It’s like he’s in a coma, except that he’s awake. The doctor can’t find out what’s wrong with him. But he’s back. That’s the main thing.”
Pacheco looked doubtful. “The problem is, he’s officially a Shadow. That’s what the scanners say. And that means that he must be rendered safe, unable to endanger anyone else. I don’t know where to go from here. I’ll have to take it up with the Council.”
“Does Carl look like he’s a danger to anyone?” Jas asked. “Talk to the Council. They’ll confirm what I told you. Help me persuade them to let him go, Pacheco. Please. I just want him to be left alone. I want us to be left alone.”
***
For weeks afterward, Jas nursed a secret hope that Carl would suddenly wake up and return to normal, but it never happened. She brought him with her to the Transgalactic Council, where she had to tell her story many more times. Supported by the testimony of the officers who had come to Ganymede Station, she managed to convince the Council that what she was saying was credible, and that Carl was some kind of anomaly—not a Shadow, but also not the person he had once been, or at least not yet.
Some scientists expressed doubt that Carl’s persona was not irretrievably lost, but Jas couldn’t bring herself to believe that the real Carl didn’t lurk somewhere inside the shell of his body. The Paths had said that his self was buried, not that it was destroyed.
He’d returned from the Void looking exactly as he had when he entered it, except that his burn scars were gone. As far as Jas understood, the Shadows who crossed over from the Void retained the genetic makeup and the memories of their victims. She thought it was those two things that made up human personalities. If Carl had the same genes and memories as he’d had before he was taken into the Void, he had to still exist somehow.
Sayen stayed with her while Jas was arguing for permission to take Carl back to Earth. Jas was grateful for her friend’s presence during the stressful negotiations, especially as she knew that Sayen was longing to see her brother again.
The two women had many conversations long into the night about the Shadow War, and about Erielle, Makey, Ozment, and all the other people they’d met and some of whom they’d lost during the course of it. They also talked about what they would do when they returned home.
When Sayen left her for the night, Jas would lie down next to Carl. She would recall the days when she’d first gotten to know him. At first, she’d thought of him as just another crew member, a little awkward and flirty. She hadn’t seen his kindness or loyalty or courage. Was it that she hadn’t really known him then, or that he’d changed? The War had brought out a lot in people.
She felt like she’d changed. She hadn’t realized back then at the start how alone and lonely she’d been. As time had gone on, she’d learned that she needed people. And she wasn’t lonely any more. It might have looked to outsiders like she didn’t have much with Carl, but that wasn’t true. She had hope.
The day finally came that the Council relented and told her that Carl could return to Earth with her, providing he remained under her supervision and care for the rest of his life or until he regained a normal state of mind. Jas didn’t need to be told twice. Within half an hour, she and Sayen were packed and waiting to leave on the next ship that would take them in the direction of Earth.
Jas’ spirits were high at the thought of returning to humanity’s origin planet. A long time ago, all she’d wanted to do was to leave Earth. She’d looked out to the stars and dreamed of her escape. Now, with Carl, she would make it her home.
Epilogue
The man blinked in the bright sun. A hot breeze was blowing, drying the sweat that was forming on his skin. He was standing in the shade of tall trees, which whispered and sighed above and around him in the wind. A faint scent of eucalyptus hung in the air. He was looking out over a wide landscape of tan and brown, dry in the summer heat. The place had once been a farm, but it was overgrown after what seemed many years of neglect.
At the man’s feet sat a tall woman. She had her back to him. Her knees were drawn up and her arms wrapped around them as she, too, silently regarded the desiccated view. The woman’s hair was short, reddish-brown, and messy. There was something familiar about her.
Flies buzzed near the man’s face and he batted them away. Though he wasn’t sure where he was or what he was doing there—or even who he was—he wasn’t alarmed. The scene around him made him feel calm and peaceful. He had a sensation that he’d been far away for a long time, but that if he was patient, everything he’d known about would come back to him.
The man sat down at the woman’s side. She turned to him with a sad smile and took his hand in hers. He remembered her name.
“Jas?”
The woman had returned her attention to the landscape, but as she heard him speak, she turned to him again, her mouth falling open. Her grip on his hand tightened. “Carl? You can talk? You know who I am?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “I do.” Speaking felt weirdly unfamiliar to him. Memories of the woman began to pour into his mind, and he added, “Of course I do.”
Happiness welling up in him, he put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.
“What’s been going on, Jas?” he asked. “How come we’re back at my folks’ farm?”
Her grip on his hand remained almost painfully tight. “You recognize it? You know where you are?”
“Yeah, but I don’t remember coming here.”
“I brought you here. Carl, you’ve been sick for a long time. I can’t believe you’re finally getting better, but you should take things slowly. Let’s sit here quietly for a while and see what comes back to you, okay?”
She rested her head on his shoulder, and he sat with her, watching the still landscape under the hot sun and pale blue sky. Scenes and dialogue began to play in his mind like snatches of once-forgotten movies. The memories were jumbled and confusing at first, but the more he thought, the more shape they took, and he began to be able to slot them into order.
The recollection that his parents were dead snagged at his heart, and he bowed his head.
“How are you feeling?” Jas asked after a while. “Do you remember more now?”
“I do. It’s all coming back. A few things I wish I didn’t remember too.”
“It’s all over now, Carl. We won the war. The galaxy’s at peace.”
“And so after I got sick, you wanted to come back here with me?”
“I thought this was where you’d want to be.”
“You were right.”
Dealing with the flood of returning memories was tiring him. He lay down in the long dry grass and pulled Jas down with him. She rested her head on his chest. Above them, the afternoon sun slanted through shifting gum tree leaves.
He was silent for a long time.
“Carl?” Jas asked softly.
“Yeah?”
“What are you thinking about?”
“I’m thinking...” He took the grass stalk that he was chewing out of his mouth. “I’m thinking we should get this farm back on its feet.”
He felt her nod in agreement.
Later still, he felt a patch of wetness growing wider on his shirt. “Why are you crying, Jas?”
“I’m just glad you’re back.”
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ALSO BY J.J. GREEN
Carrie Hatchett, Space Adventurer series
THERE COMES A TIME
A SCIENCE FICTION COLLECTION
DAWN FALCON
a fantasy collection
LOST TO TOMORROW
STARBOUND
SHADOWS OF THE VOID BOOK PREQUEL
Chapter One
Jas Harrington gripped the handlebars of her snow mobile and pressed the throttle. The machine pulled away beneath her, sending up sprays of powder snow on either side. She grinned.
It had snowed the day before. The first snow that year, though winter was almost over. Maybe the last snowfall at low altitude on Earth forever, some said. Over the last few decades, Antarctica had changed almost beyond recognition as raised global temperatures melted its massive ice sheets, calving icebergs as large as countries to melt into the ocean.
At that moment, Jas didn’t care what humans had done to their home planet. She didn’t feel as though Earth was her home anyway. She’d grown up on Mars until she was twelve and already weak-boned from the low gravity. When the paperwork came through from the Martian colonial government, she left the home for cared-for children and traveled to the mother planet to complete her adolescence at a second institution.
After months of aching muscles and headaches, her body had finally adjusted, but the policy of separating the Martian children for better 'integration’ meant she’d been lonely. No one had told the Earth children they were supposed to let the newcomers integrate.
Sergei was riding his snowmobile parallel to hers as she powered over the ice, the roar of the engines making speaking impossible. A fellow student from the training college, his black hair streamed out from beneath his hat. Like hers, his eyes were hidden behind dark snow goggles. He waved at her and pointed in the direction they were heading. They had
to be nearly at their destination, though she couldn’t make it out against the snowy white landscape and the bright clouds.
She nodded in reply, and her heart surged. She didn’t think she’d ever been this happy.
They were almost upon the igloo before she saw it. A crude lump of slightly dirty white became visible in the landscape. Sergei was already slowing down, and Jas did the same.
As they stopped and she stepped down from her vehicle, she smiled. The igloo was very clumsily put together, as if the builders had been drunk when they made it. Roughly cut blocks of ice balanced precariously upon one another, creating a haphazard wall. It looked like it would have fallen down if not for the freezing temperatures that seemed to be holding it together.
“This is it?” she asked.
Sergei was taking off his goggles. “Of course. How many other igloos do you think there are around here?”
Jas pulled off her goggles too, along with her hat and gloves. “But I thought you said it took you and Aaron two whole days to build it?”
“More than two days, if you include cutting the blocks.” He took off his gloves. “Do I detect a tone of disbelief? I get it. It’s hard to credit that we could construct such a magnificent edifice in such a short time.”
“You’re right.” Jas tilted her head to take in the detail of the structure. “I...can’t quite believe it.” She couldn’t hold in her laughter any longer. She burst into giggles and found she couldn’t stop. She bent over, nursing her aching stomach. Pulling off her goggles to wipe her eyes, she finally began to catch her breath. “So this is what you meant by your Love Palace?”
Sergei frowned. “You dare to insult my Mansion of Delight? Be careful. You’re treading on dangerous ground. I might have to remind you of something pretty important, now that we’re out here in the snowy wastes, far from civilization and...” He went to the compartment of his snowmobile and reached inside. He pulled out a small battery-powered heater. “...warmth.”
