The Oceans between Stars

by Kevin Emerson

  “Hey.”

  Phoebe appeared, walking down the hall toward him and looking this way and that as she did. “What were you talking about?” she asked quietly. “Is there someone here?”

  Liam shook his head. The fire had faded completely, just echoes when he blinked, the smoke and collapsed walls gone. The hall was back to normal. He looked behind him again. The body—my body, that was me, dying in an explosion—was gone, too, and the watch was no longer blinking red. “I guess not,” he said.

  “But you heard voices?”

  “I thought I did. It, um . . . I must have just been freaking out.” Liam felt woozy, a metallic taste in his mouth. He put a hand against the wall. It was strange; this feeling reminded him of those moments right after he’d used the watch. Also of those times recently when he’d pictured the sun about to go supernova. What was going on with him?

  Phoebe rubbed his arm. “You all right?”

  “Sorta. I’m not sure. Did you activate the recorder?”

  “Yeah. It seems to be transmitting, so JEFF should be able to connect to it. But . . .” Phoebe narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re not telling me something. Did you use the watch just now?”

  “No. I saw something, though, like a hallucination. I don’t know.”

  “What was it?”

  “I thought I heard voices, but it was, like, you and me, fighting about something, and then I saw this version of me running away from you and there was this massive explosion and it killed us both.”

  Phoebe looked around. “You saw that here? Just now? What were we fighting about?”

  The details were hazy in his mind. He could barely recall it, like it was fading from his memory the same way it had faded from the hallway. “I don’t know. I wasn’t going to let you do something.”

  “That is usually what we fight about.”

  One fragment bubbled up in his mind: I knew I couldn’t trust you, the other version of him had said, but Liam kept that to himself.

  Maybe it really had been some kind of hallucination. Maybe an aftereffect of using the watch, coupled with disorientation from stasis, and multiplied by the stress and fear since they’d arrived on Delphi. All of that was bound to confuse his brain, taking his worries and making stuff up. Except the watch had been blinking; he was pretty sure he hadn’t imagined that. What did that strange red color mean?

  “We’re under a lot of stress,” said Phoebe, patting his shoulder. “Finding out what happened to the Scorpius should help. Can you make it back up to the cruiser?”

  Liam nodded. Phoebe took him by the arm. He looked back one more time, but the corridor was silent and still.

  The stairwell was fully lit and full of rapidly warming air. As they climbed, their steps became shorter and heavier, and by the top level they felt the full effect of the artificial gravity field. The lights were on in the elevator hallway, and the airlocks had shut at both ends of the baths.

  Inside the bubble-walled corridor, the air was stifling and damp. Orange heat lamps glowed overhead. Liam saw that the big, clear containers were flooding with purplish steam, the melting ice sparkling in the multicolored lights that ringed each bubble and blinked on and off in slow, soothing patterns. A couple of the containers had cracked, and lavender clouds seeped out into the hallway. Phoebe coughed, slipped her helmet back on, and zipped it up. She stumbled as she took her next step. Liam caught her by the arm. “You all right?”

  “Yeah, just—cough—it’s hot in here. Messes with my lungs.”

  They stepped into the airlock at the far end of the baths and peered through the small, thick windows. The power was still out to the casino and beyond. Liam put on his helmet and Phoebe pressed the button to open the door. They were greeted by the stiff, frigid wind, and pinpricks of ice.

  “JEFF,” said Liam, “we’re almost back.”

  “Acknowledged. I have finished replacing the thermal tiles and am now analyzing the data from the scanner.” There was a click and then JEFF continued. “Is everything all right?”

  Liam tried to catch Phoebe’s eye, but she was just gazing straight ahead. “Um, yeah. Why?”

  Phoebe cocked her head. “Huh?”

  “Just making sure,” said JEFF. There was a pause, and Liam could almost picture his eyes flickering. “I will see you on board.”

  “He’s being weird,” Liam said.

  “What do you mean?” Phoebe replied absently.

  “I don’t know, maybe it’s nothing.” Except as they retraced their path through the complex, Liam wondered if Phoebe had heard JEFF. The way the signal had clicked: Had JEFF only been talking to him?

  “I call bathroom,” Phoebe said the moment they’d climbed back on board the cruiser. She hurried straight to it, not even taking her helmet off.

  Liam pulled his off and checked the beacon, but it was silent as ever. He peeled off his pressure suit, hung it up, and found JEFF in the cockpit analyzing a three-dimensional holoscreen that showed a spherical map of space. “How’s it going?”

  “Unfortunately there are no available parts for repairing the rear thruster, or the antenna. And we still need to refuel. But I have also been analyzing the data from the scanner.”

  Liam studied the holoscreen map. Delphi was a large ball at its center. Objects blinked, rotating in orbit around it.

  Liam’s heart skipped a beat. “Is that—”

  “No,” said JEFF, “these objects are far too small to be the Scorpius. They do appear, however, to be wreckage. One is a transport ship like the kind that would have been stationed here. Another is emitting an extremely strong radiation signal; I believe it is another of the Scorpius’s engines. There are also pieces of its front array, which would explain the solar sail we saw out on the ice. There is further evidence of radiation in the atmosphere, which may indicate warhead detonation—perhaps the Scorpius trying to defend itself.”

  “What does it all mean?”

  “Most likely that the Scorpius was in a significant battle,” said JEFF, “but managed to escape. That said, its condition is not promising, but it could be worse. The front array holds most of the navigation and communication systems, but as long as the remaining engines and cores are intact, the ship could still fly. In theory.”

  “So then where is it?”

  JEFF tapped the menu on the side of the screen, and the view changed to a wider map of space, with Delphi now just a small point in the center, surrounded by concentric circles almost like shells, getting larger and larger from the middle. Every few seconds, the map refreshed, adding another shell, and shrinking the spaces between the existing ones. “The scanner is progressively mapping more and more of the local region, but as the signal is limited by light speed, it is a slow process.”

  With the next refresh, the circles shrank significantly, and a large white dot appeared far beyond where the scanner had mapped. JEFF tapped it and checked its readings. “That is the Starliner Saga,” he said. “It is broadcasting its normal call sign and status information. It seems to be unharmed and functioning normally.” The circles scaled smaller and a second dot appeared, even farther out. “There is the Rhea,” said JEFF, “also transmitting normally. They are both part of the second-to-last fleet.”

  “Shouldn’t the Scorpius be closer than those two?” said Liam.

  “Yes. The fact that we cannot yet see the Scorpius likely confirms that its comms are down. That makes sense, tactically speaking. Whoever attacked the ship tried to take out its ability to move and to call for help, to keep the rest of the fleet from knowing about the attack. And now, since it is not transmitting, we must wait for our scanner to find it.”

  “How long is that going to take?”

  “Calculating. . . . If the Scorpius was indeed attacked upon its arrival four days ago, and if it could depart at something close to its maximum speed, then it would currently be about nine light-hours away. Which means nine hours for our scanner signal to reach it, and nine more hours for that reading to return to
us.”

  “Eighteen hours. . . .” Liam felt himself deflating. “We can’t wait around that long.”

  “Likely not.”

  “Got anything?” Phoebe asked, joining them.

  “Other starliners,” said Liam. “And wreckage, but no Scorpius. Can we use this backup scanner to reach anyone?” he asked JEFF.

  “Yes, I sent a message on the all-colony frequency, identifying us and explaining our situation. But that message will not reach the Saga for nearly six weeks.”

  “But how come we can see its signal now?” Phoebe asked.

  “That signal we see is five weeks old. The Saga has been transmitting continuously in this direction since its departure. Same for the Rhea, which is a week farther ahead. We are also picking up an all-colony emergency broadcast, which I wanted both of you to hear.”

  JEFF tapped the console and a message blared over the speaker. “—will be needed to assist with passenger reassignment and possible military actions. Please send your modified course corrections to tactical command on this frequency, and safe travels. End message. Begin message. Attention all colonial craft: this is an emergency message priority urgent. Reports indicate destruction of Delphi station and significant damage to Starliner Scorpius. Limited data points to a hostile attack of unknown origin. We have lost contact with the Scorpius, but their last transmitted message and trajectory indicates that they are making for the emergency rendezvous point. Therefore all colonial craft, fleet-wide, are ordered to make an emergency course correction to Destina, for triage and defensive maneuvers. Repeat. All colonial craft are ordered to disregard Human Long Travel Protocol and initiate the latest emergency protocol, received on eleven, twelve, twenty-two. Proceed immediately to Destina. All ships will be needed to assist with passenger reassignment—”

  JEFF clicked off the message.

  Wind buffeted the cruiser. Ice raked across the windshield.

  Liam gazed at the screen, the dot of Delphi with circle after circle of space. All the nothingness around them, like they were marooned on the tiniest island. The map refreshed again. A new small light blinked, a few concentric circles away from Delphi.

  JEFF checked the reading. “A military cruiser. Destroyed, I’m afraid.”

  “Where is Destina?” The last time Liam had seen an updated map of the route to Aaru-5, none of the waypoints past Danos had been officially named yet, but those maps were a decade old now.

  JEFF’s eyes flickered. “The name Destina does not appear in any information about the journey. The third waypoint had a proposed name of Fortuna but had not been officially added to the logs, as secondary scanning satellites had not reached it yet by the time of our departure from Mars. The message refers to an emergency protocol sent last year, but with our antenna down, we were unable to receive it.”

  “It could be anywhere,” said Phoebe, gazing at the map, her expression similar to how Liam felt.

  “What was the fourth waypoint supposed to be?” Liam asked.

  “It was unnamed, but its planned location was the second planet of Proxima.”

  “Proxima,” said Liam. “It sounds familiar.” He tried to remember their space studies back in Ms. Avi’s class.

  “It is a red dwarf star, part of the Alpha Centauri system.”

  “Wait.” Liam thought back to the message from Mina that he’d awakened to. Before she’d said “hurry,” there had been those other letters. U-R-I-B. “Alpha Centauri is a binary star, right?”

  “Correct. The two stars are Centauri A and B.”

  “Centauri B,” said Liam. “That’s where they’re going. That’s what Mina was trying to tell me. I bet that’s where Destina is!”

  “That calculates,” said JEFF. “Centauri B is not too far from Fortuna, but perhaps it has some greater strategic or tactical value as a rendezvous point.”

  “Okay,” said Liam. “So what did the backup recorder say? Do we know who we’re up against? Who the Saturn attackers really are?”

  “Here is what I found.” JEFF tapped the console and a second holoscreen appeared. Below a series of readouts, a message flashed, green letters on a black background:

  NO DATA.

  “The backup recorder has been erased.” JEFF pointed to the top lines of the readouts. “You can see that it is fully online, transmitting correctly, but its hard drives are empty.”

  “Was it the power outage?” Liam asked.

  “The box is built to withstand power outages and surges and is shielded from an electromagnetic attack. I’m afraid someone must have erased it manually.”

  “So all the records of what happened here and who did it . . .”

  “Gone.” JEFF swiped the screen away.

  Liam turned to Phoebe. “Did the recorder look like it had been tampered with?”

  “I couldn’t tell,” said Phoebe. “All I did was turn it on.”

  Liam found JEFF looking at him. He shrugged. “I didn’t see anything.” But the scene from down in the corridor flashed through his mind. That other version of him shouting at Phoebe. I’m not going to let you hurt anyone else! But that had just been his mind messing with him, spinning his worries.

  The scanner map refreshed again; more darkness.

  “Well, it doesn’t matter who they are,” said Liam. “We have to head for Destina. How far is that from here?”

  “Calculating.” JEFF’s eyes flickered. Kept flickering. “Thirty-three years.”

  “Thirty-three . . .” Liam trailed off.

  “I’ve run some calculations, and the good news is that, if we adjust our burn for maximum efficiency, and with proper power-saving routines, I believe we can make the trip with only five to six stops for refueling and three course corrections.”

  “If we don’t drift off course again.”

  “I believe I now know how to keep that from happening,” said JEFF.

  “Thirty-three years,” Liam repeated. “Will we even be okay in stasis that long?”

  “It should be fine. That said, there is no data yet on the effects of such a trip. Even the First Fleet hasn’t traveled that far.”

  “It’s just so long.” Imagining it made all the space between here and there feel heavy, crushing.

  “Back at Saturn, you said our parents were going to be in trouble if it really took us twenty-five years to get here,” said Phoebe. “Now it’s been ten, and we’re talking about thirty-three more. Are they going to be okay?”

  “It does increase the risk,” said JEFF, “but I’m afraid we have no other choice.”

  Liam checked the scanner map again. “What about the Scorpius? Are we sure they can make it there?”

  “Well, we’ve already scanned a few hundred thousand kilometers in all directions and there’s no sign of them, which does suggest that they were able to execute a burn, and the colonial message said their last known trajectory was Destina. If they do indeed have four of their engines intact, they should be able to make it.”

  “Can we catch them?”

  “I will have to make a more in-depth calculation. We will be following an essentially identical flight path. We may be able to find them along the way.”

  Liam looked at Phoebe. “So that’s it, then? Get out of here and make for Destina?”

  Phoebe’s arms were crossed tight across her chest, and she stared at the map. “I guess so.”

  “Liam,” said JEFF, “I have collected additional information that indicates that it is not that simple.”

  “Why, because we still need fuel?”

  “Forgive me while I search for the most tactful wording. . . .” JEFF’s eyes flickered. “Before we can depart, I am afraid that we must make some choices that you will find extremely difficult.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  JEFF rotated toward Phoebe. She looked up, and when she found JEFF facing her, her eyes widened, the color draining out.

  “I’m sorry,” said JEFF. He raised his right arm and pointed at Phoebe.

  �
�Wait! You don’t—” She started toward the doorway, but JEFF pressed his finger against her shoulder and a bright blue flash sparked there. Phoebe’s eyes fluttered and she slumped into the copilot’s seat.

  “JEFF!” Liam shouted. “What are you doing?”

  JEFF’s hand flipped back to reveal a set of holes in his wrist. Red plastic cable shot out. JEFF grabbed it with his other hand and quickly bound Phoebe’s wrists together. He then straightened her up, looped more cable around her and the copilot’s chair, and tied it off behind her.

  “JEFF, stop!” Liam gaped, frozen in place.

  Phoebe groaned, her head lolling, and as the stun effect wore off, she looked around groggily. “What was that?” She felt the restraints and started to writhe against them. “Hey! Let me go!”

  Liam instinctively moved to help, but JEFF held him back. “I am sorry, Liam. Given your emotional connection to Phoebe, I calculated that it was in your best interest to delay this until we reached the Scorpius, but at this point I must follow my primary safety protocol, which is always to protect the lives of the humans on board.”

  “Don’t listen to him, Liam! He’s malfunctioning!”

  Liam stepped back. “JEFF, what are you talking about?”

  “I believe,” said JEFF, “that I have gathered enough evidence to reasonably suspect that Phoebe is in fact working to sabotage our journey, and may be acting on direct orders from the enemy who attacked Saturn, Delphi, and the Scorpius.”

  “He’s lying, Liam!” Phoebe’s eyes were wild and red. “Don’t listen to him! You stupid bot!”

  “What kind of evidence?” Liam stammered.

  JEFF tapped the console, and the holoscreen between them changed to a wide-angle view of the cockpit. There was JEFF, in the pilot’s chair, not moving. Phoebe appeared, floating in behind him.