The Corrupted Star

by Martin HC

  Kaelo, his communications specialist betrayed him. As they broke free from the gas giant's outer atmosphere, the large flagship transmitted an almost complete data dump of their records. The lockout programming was impressive, teams of his master technicians worked feverishly during the fight but couldn't break through it, in the end they destroyed the flagship's hard lines.

  After the repairs were conducted, an investigation had been carried out, it led right back to his communications specialist, an unforgivable betrayal. After the conclusion of the investigation he walked up to her, drew his side-arm from its holster and raised it to her head, she looked up at him, closed her eyes and smiled softly. He didn't remember pulling the trigger, only the sound of her lifeless body hitting the floor.

  He had not reported the circumstances of her death or the connection with the data transmission. Babaidou did not know why he couldn't bring himself to revoke her honour for the crime, it was upsetting to him to feel so unbalanced.

  The cartel woman though was tough, strong and full of vigour, her first and only response was to resist, which naturally upset him to begin with but the more it continued, the more he found he enjoyed it this way. Babaidou would use the distraction, relishing the challenge as it empowered his release.

  Reckless Openings and an Unlikely Ally

  Alarms blared through the smoky air and dim emergency lighting, displays all around the Maelstrom's command deck were in the process of resetting, the massive tactical holo display began powering back up bringing entire sections of the outside view back, piece by piece.

  “What was that?” Hilden shouted. “Come on people, back on your feet and in your seats, I need to know what just hit us.”

  “Sir, I have nothing on sensors but cameras feeds are seeing movement and identifying the fugitive stealth ship.”

  “Track it, what the hell are they doing here?”

  “They've turned in between us and the signal source, an unknown energy pulse was detected and the enemy's cloaking systems are down, we see them all, repeat enemy cloaking is down. Count five assault craft and one further single unknown type.”

  Hilden looked to his side, the Admiral hadn't recovered with the others, she lay on the floor, unmoving with blood pooling under her. He moved to her and reached down, a pulse, weak but still alive, there was time. “Medics,” he screamed.

  The fleet had started taking losses again, and in answer had almost closed the gap on the advancing enemy. Tira knew their intent and couldn't let it happen. She chose not to decelerate, and the hard collapse of her drive fields shaved precious seconds of their arrival, allowing her to drop out right in front of the Mergence ships.

  The resulting wave of pent up drive energy released as one massive force, blowing through the remains of the seventh fleet, and crashing into their hulls. Internal explosions rocked the closest ships of war. It hurt them, but they would ultimately live.

  “Tira, did it work?” Haydn asked, recovering himself as the hard drop out had rocked them almost as much as it rocked the fleet.

  “We arrived on target and the pulse wave has disabled the enemy cloaking, but their drives have recovered and they're moving again.”

  “Destroy them.”

  The overlay showing the tactical situation around them highlighted the six drones, a target lock confirmed and two energy beams erupted into the night. One by one the drones fell as her shielding shrugged off their returning blows, all that remained in the end was the single larger craft.

  She zoomed the image of the craft bringing it to view, it looked like an oddly shaped seashell, which turned away from them now as it began to run.

  “What are you doing? Are you letting it get away?” Jill asked Tira.

  “No, I want to know more about them, so I'm going to hack it.”

  She could feel her mind reach out through the distance between her and the seashell shaped craft, searching, once she found it she pushed herself inside and killed its engine core permanently, but that's where it stopped being easy.

  The drone's computer, sensing the electronic attack hit back, strands of digital coding wrapped themselves around her hold and tore into it, following it back into her own digital paradise, corrupting and poisoning her. Tira's neck jerked back, her hands raised up to grab at the sides of her head, then dropped to her knees and screamed in agony.

  “Tira, kill the link, destroy the ship,” Haydn shouted and ran to her side, grabbing the girl as she fell to the floor. “Tira, let it go.”

  The light of the room began to flicker as the three sixty display around them changed, the now grainy display around the bridge showed a visual digital space. A greenish red hue flickered throughout the room as an imperfect eyeless face began to form in front, never holding shape, always breaking up and reforming.

  Her pain was tremendous and it was visible on the outside of her hull as well as the inside. In response to her discomfort, the tendrils of her fearsome looking exterior were shifting slowly and a brilliant energy jumped between them.

  She couldn't hear what was going on around her, every inch of her willpower and strength was being used to fight back the powerful Al's counter attack, preventing it from taking her over.

  “What are you?” she demanded to know both at it and out loud as her body jerked.

  It gave no answer and only continued its onslaught against her. She focussed on it again, dragging its image to the forefront of the unseen battle. She would not be ignored and so pushed hard, forcing back the attack she grabbed the intelligence and smashed her way into it as it had tried to do to her.

  “What are you?” she screamed at it now.

  The broken features of the eyeless face spoke both in her mind and on the display for all to hear, a deep, digital tone reverberated around them as its coarse words pierced the air.

  “I am a protector of the timeless mirror and a keeper of the immortal gardens, I am a guardian,” It answered her.

  “Who controls you? Where is the mirror?” she commanded it to tell her.

  “You have the strength of the masters, but I sense it weakening.”

  Her grip was weakening now just as the digital monstrosity stated, a body took form under its face. As it gained strength, it reached out towards her mind, and surged in its attack once more.

  “Haydn, what's happening?” Jill shouted over the noise and kneeling down beside them.

  “She's being attacked by an AI, she needs help,” the girl's body twisted in his arms as the pain shot through her.

  Raw energy arced across her hull and into the darkness as she screamed, her body tensed again in Haydn's arms and she looked up at him, the bluish glow of the darkness inside visible again behind her eyes.

  Haydn could feel it watching and studying him, its light growing ever more slowly in intensity.

  He stared back at it, his eyes piercing her own and he spoke to the darkness inside her, his voice low against the backdrop of the static and noise around them, his tone aggressive.

  “Whatever you are, I see you, I know you're in there watching, if you can fight, then help her fight.”

  Through all the noise, it heard him and accepted the invitation. The light grew and the blue energy snaked its way from her eyes down into her skin, her body jerked violently in his arms again and her spine arched back.

  Around them several glowing bluish tendrils invaded the fight between the pair, changing the aura of the space they were in, the intelligence recognised the threat and redirected its main attack. The entity struck with multiple attacks at the body and face of their enemy, its structure began to disintegrate as they pierced and ripped apart the digital world it defended, Tira used the newly combined power to tear down the digital enemy.

  The Darkspace ship's intelligence began to die, and Tira feeling her control return shifted her focus, powered her weapons and turned the enemy craft to space dust. The entity subsided, she could feel its own exhaustion as it sunk back into the depths of her being, the blue energy that snak
ed in her skin faded and left her back in control, back in her body and aware again. Her eyes opened and looking up she saw Haydn, she felt weak but content again. Reaching up to his face and touching it lightly, she smiled, then slipped into her own slumber.

  Strange Awakenings

  Y'Riell opened her eyes, the light strained them causing her to squint at first, distant memories of a fight swam in and out, then an explosion. She wriggled her fingers and moved her feet, this was good, this meant she hadn't died or lost any part of her body, perhaps it was a dream. The crux came when she tried to get up but found she was bound to a bed.

  “Please try to remain calm,” a feminine voice she recognised told her softly. “You're in a medical station.”

  Memories continued to swim in her head, more coming to the front every second, the events prior becoming clearer as she lay there.

  “I, I can't move, I can't see you, who are you?” she asked the voice.

  “You can't move because you are being restrained, a precaution only. I'm going to remove the restraints now, if you choose to sit up, please do so slowly.”

  The girl who spoke appeared above her, she did nothing physically yet the force binding the admiral to the bed dissipated, allowing Y'Riell to sit up. Looking down she took in the plain white shorts and t-shirt she wore, then looked around. There were no windows or doors to the room, and no source of light yet plenty of it. The girl herself was youthful and pretty, then she remembered everything.

  “You, where am I?”

  “You were severely injured on board your ship, your own medical team were losing you, so we agreed to bring you here for medical attention.”

  “What happened to my ship? My fleet?”

  “They survived,” the girl told her. “If you wish to return, you can at any time.”

  Y'Riell noticed the skin covering her hands, arms and legs was different. It was not what she recognised, it appeared tighter and smoother, younger even, but not by too much.

  “I will return now.”

  “Very well, this way and please take your time to get up.”

  A doorway formed in the previously door-less room and the girl left, Y'Riell stood and walked through it following her. She felt good, there were no aches, pains or strains, her muscles felt stronger and leaner than she'd remembered them feeling in a long time.

  For a minute they walked, doors forming on walls where she would walk until finally they entered a small hangar. Three Mergence hard-strike assault craft sat in its centre, teams of heavily armed boarding troops mingled in various areas. Two senior officers approached her, braced themselves to attention and threw up salutes. She recognised them, they were Hilden's top security officers, they looked harmless in front of the armoured troops however they were anything but. Haydn stood with the troopers he was talking to and they stopped mid laugh after noticing she entered the hanger.

  “Gentlemen, I trust we are all good here.”

  “Yes ma'am, no complaints to the hospitality, and glad to see you on your feet again.”

  That they had allowed such a sizeable force onto their ship relaxed her slightly, so she approached Haydn, the girl Tiralyn followed and took up a position slightly beside him.

  “Feeling better?” he asked, noticing how the unjust clothing of a medical ward done nothing to hinder her natural authoritative credence.

  “Yes I am, thank you,” she answered him. “As I understand it, I was quite badly injured.”

  “Yes, a piece of metal hit you in the spine, another split open your skull and another smashed through the back of your neck, breaking it and slicing up a lot of nerves.”

  “Really, well that was descriptive.”

  “Sorry... but the good news is Tiralyn fixed you up.”

  “Thank you, for saving my life.”

  “It was our entry to the fight that kind of caused you to die, so really we owed it to you.”

  “I died?”

  “You were registered as deceased for nine minutes,” Tiralyn informed her.

  “I see, well I feel good for someone who just died, I feel different, younger.”

  “Yeah, Tira might have overdone it on the rejuve bed, I think maybe she felt bad.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You're about fifteen years younger than you were before you got here.”

  “What... how could you... I mean how is that even possible?”

  “She's a good surgeon.”

  “OK, thank you, I'll be returning to the Maelstrom now, unless the doctor has an issue with that of course,” she said, looking to her teenage surgeon.

  “I have no immediate concerns, although, I would recommend drinking lots of fluids and taking it easy for the next three to four days, I would also recommend against operating any heavy machinery in that time.”

  “She doesn't get humour when she's like this,” Haydn told the Admiral while shaking his head. “So you can leave when you like, you've been out for two days though and one of your support fleets arrived early, they're waiting for you, oh and Hilden, the captain guy? Really intense?”

  “Yes, I know who he is.”

  “Oh good, he wants a meeting with us, again, when your back on your feet, so just send us a shuttle when you're ready, we'll come over.”

  “Thank you, again,” she told him, then looked to her security team. “We're leaving.”

  “Yes ma'am,” one answered. The other turned, walked away and began shouting. “Alright people, wrap up, pack up, you heard the boss, we're leaving this boat, and I want nothing left behind.”

  Marines began scrambling in all directions, collecting gear and equipment while reloading the shuttles, she had a sixty metre walk to reach the nearest shuttle and a guard formed around her. Amazingly by the time she had boarded and sat in the back of the closest one, all three shuttles were already lifting off. The speed with which they cleared the deck and left through the temporary opening Tira made was astounding. Haydn looked around the empty and surprisingly tidy hangar, completely amazed at how quickly it became so quiet.

  Jill walked through a door now with some food, “where did they all go?”

  “The Admiral woke up, they just left.”

  “So whose going to eat all this now?” she said disappointedly, it was a large tray of food and she was using both hands to support it.

  “Well we can try.”

  “Seriously, it took me ages to make all this, why did they have to leave so fast, some of them were cute.”

  “Thanks Jill.”

  “Oh you know what I mean, hey what's that?” she nodded out a direction.

  “What?”

  “That in the corner,” she nodded again, a little more pronouncedly.

  Haydn walked over to the dark object half hidden behind a pillar.

  “It's a rifle, someone left their rifle.”

  Jill sucked in a small sharp breath “Ohhhh, he is so getting screwed when the armourer finds out.”

  “You think so? It was just an accident, I forget things all the time.”

  “Yeah but these guys don't, trust me, they'll make him do press-ups until his eyes bleed... or her,” she laughed at the thought.

  They didn't have to wait long, Y'Riell contacted Tira only an hour after returning to her fleet, a shuttle was dispatched and all three were brought onto the Maelstrom, led once more through the flagship's corridors and into a briefing room.

  This time the setting was different, it was a large room built for purpose, and a large holo image in the centre displayed the two different types of Darkspace ships known so far. The fleet admiral was sat at a large round table in the centre of the room, Captain Hilden immediately to her right and numerous others flanked them both.

  “Please, sit,” Y'Riell told them, Haydn and Tira did, Jill walked to the wall behind them and remained standing.

  Warm beverages were served along with a small plate of biscuits, Haydn took one.

  “I understand we all have you to thank for our lives, the
re is no threat here,” she told them, indicating to the assault rifle slung over Jill's back.

  Haydn paused mid bite, then tried to answer but failed as broken biscuit fell from his mouth.

  “Well it was Tira really, she done everything and this is your rifle, we're just returning it.” Jill said, unslinging the weapon she walked around the table and handed it to the first officer she met.

  “Thank you, ma'am,” he told her awkwardly. She flashed slightly at this.