Orchestra of Shadows

by Charles Nall

  A lady next to the troubled man began apologizing to the attendant as the man put his face in his palms and muttered nonsense to himself.

  “What's with that guy? Ah, here's my seat.” A woman, who looked like she was in her mid-thirties sat next to Jacob. Her eyes were brown, but her right eye was a bit off-color, perhaps an artificial eye. A scar ran down her face through that eye. The wound must have gone through where her real eye used to be. She looked at Jacob and smiled. “Hi there, I'll be your neighbor!”

  Jacob just smiled and nodded. The woman darted her eyes around, as if she was searching for someone.

  “Looking for somebody?” asked Jacob.

  The woman chuckled. “Not really. It's better if I don't see them.”

  “What do you mean?”

  The woman chuckled some more and continued, “Oh, just some... friends. In my line of work I can meet some well, interesting people to say the least.”

  “I see, well at least you have a job,” Jacob said.

  The woman smiled. “I suppose.”

  A few minutes later, the transport launched. It eventually broke atmosphere and soared above Urbania. Jacob stared at the world he was leaving behind. Although a good portion of the planet was covered with smog and cloud cover, a dense fresco of lights managed to illuminate most of the continents. Urbania looked far more beautiful from space.

  “Well, where's an unemployed guy like you going? Going to go find some work?” asked the woman sitting next to Jacob.

  “Something like that. Exodus,” Jacob replied.

  The woman's eyes grew wide. “No, you can't go there. Artemis is a complete mess. I fear for Exodus, I really do. I think it'd be in your best interest not to volunteer for that,” said the woman. “There is something not right with the whole thing.”

  Jacob sighed. “My gut tells me to go there. We'll see what happens.”

  “Well, I admire your bravery and feel sorry for your ignorance at the same time.”

  “Thanks?”

  “Sadly, I'm actually heading to Artemis as well. Someone I know is as dumb as you and is heading off to Andromeda. I'm going to beat some sense into him. Actually I'm very sure he won't listen. I'm just going to surprise him and say goodbye.”

  A voice came across the speakers, “Hello, I'm Captain Harris of this transport vessel. We'll be departing soon. The attendants are just about done with some final checks. Your health and safety are our number one priority. Please, if you feel discomfort during any part of the travel, let us know promptly. Of course, you probably won't feel discomfort during the stasis! It will be administered through the neural contacts on your headrest. Don't worry. It's completely safe and handy for these relatively short trips and prevents any hyperspace nausea. We're coming around to the U-L4 jumpgate. A destroyer en route to Diana will accompany us in our journey. Our little transport isn’t built for deep hyperspace travel. We need a traveling buddy and USS Freedom has kindly allowed us to use their wake to travel to the Grauer space station. We will be in hyperspace for a few days. As such, a few moments into the flight through hyperspace we will engage stasis systems. Please talk to an attendant if something bothers you about our plans, or if you feel any discomfort at all. We will be departing soon and heading rim-spinward to Grauer. Thanks for traveling with us.”

  “Rim-spinward?” asked Jacob as he slid the neural contact headband onto his head.

  “Galactic directions,” said the woman. “It's how ships know the direction to go in relation to the galactic core. Keep in mind that you can't really use cardinal directions like north and south for traveling in space.”

  “Oh I guess that makes sense,” Jacob said.

  “It's all based on your position relative to the galactic core. Coreward is toward the core, rimward is the opposite – toward the rim of the galaxy, spinward follows the spin of the galaxy, and trailward is the opposite of that. Generally, on a typical map of the galaxy, coreward is north, rimward is south, spinward is west, and trailward is east. Of course, it's all relative. Oh, get ready, I think we're about to hit hyperspace.” She put her headband on.

  The transport vessel and Freedom moved closer to the jumpgate. The metallic, segmented jumpgate slowly separated into three pieces. These segments moved away from each other to allow enough room for the destroyer and transport access into hyperspace. The entire jumpgate system started to spin. The jumpgate gave off some sparks and energy pulsed. Space seemed to warp and bend between the three points of the jumpgate triangle. Arcs of electricity shot between the machinery of the jumpgate. The destroyer shot out a beam of energy focused directly into the middle of the swirling, warping space. A swirling mess of many different colors was now in the middle of the warped space. The destroyer stopped firing its beam, and a red flash of light was emitted from the center of the warping space. It was time to make the jump into hyperspace. The destroyer and transport flew into the area between the sections of the jumpgate and vanished. The colorful energies of hyperspace faded away as the jumpgate slowly collapsed back into its smaller original form.

  Inside the transport vessel, now in hyperspace, the woman next to Jacob listened intently. “I can tell there's a destroyer out there. Probably a Newcastle-class destroyer... hmm, or it could be a Virginia. Nope, definitely a Newcastle.”

  “How can you tell?” Jacob asked.

  “When you have been around hyper-drives long enough you can tell. It'd be humming a different tune if there was a different ship out there. Different ships leave different wakes. This transport doesn't have a hyper-drive, so we are depending on the ship out there to help us out.”

  Jacob looked out the window at the swirling colors of hyperspace. “I wasn't even aware a ship without a hyper-drive could travel in hyperspace.”

  “It's a common misconception, really. If your ship has adequate shielding and plating, it can survive for a little while in hyperspace. Won’t get very far without a powerful wake, though. Ships without hyper-drives cannot easily support themselves in hyperspace, they need help,” the woman replied.

  Jacob smiled. “You know quite a bit about starships.”

  “I work for a delivery service if you know what I mean.”

  “Oh, are you something like a pirate?”

  The woman placed a finger on her lips. “Shhh! Just say 'mercenary' or something, it's much nicer. There are times where we may–well, I'm talking too much. It can be a—” the woman darted her eyes around the transport again, “fulfilling career.”

  Hyperspace glowed a bright blue. Clouds of brown gas streamed around the ships. The two ships were now traveling great distances in relation to “standard space.”

  “You have a ship? Massive. I've always wanted a ship.”

  “Then go find an old beat-up corvette or frigate somewhere and pursue your dream!”

  “That would require spending money.”

  The woman laughed. “Not if you know where to look, and hey, gotta spend money to make money, right?”

  “I guess, Miss, actually, I don't think you told me your name,” Jacob said.

  “Oh, I figure there is no harm in introducing myself, my name is Teresa Day.”

  “Jacob Carp–” the transport shook as it hit some sort of turbulence that startled Jacob. He continued, “Carpenter. What was that?”

  “Probably some gravitational turbulence. Although there aren't any stars in hyperspace, you can still feel their gravity from standard space. It can pull you off your hyper-conduit and the hyper-drive has to compensate quickly if it is not expecting it. If we had dropped out of hyperspace just then, we might have crashed into a star! It'd take a lot of turbulence to do that though, or, if you knew someone's hyper-coordinates, a well-placed dimensional explosive. I've been known to use those in my line of work. Knocks people right out of the sky.”

  “I can tell why you’re so popular.”

  Teresa replied, “Comes with the territory, I suppose.”

  Jacob smiled and looked out his side window at the
swirling vortex of hyperspace.

  Teresa leaned back in her seat. “Anyways, you were saying earlier you wanted a ship? I know people, if you want me to pull some strings. You may have potential.”

  Jacob shook his head. “I don't know if I want to get caught up in that line of work.”

  “It puts food on the table. It's pretty fun stuff, I have a great group of people under my command. We have an old, faithful corvette. It's not bad work.”

  Jacob pondered. “I suppose, but I think–”

  Teresa interrupted, “You are going to the Andromeda galaxy instead. Right. I'm sure that will work out fine for you. People say my line of work is dangerous.”

  Jacob sighed. “Ms. Day, I appreciate the offer, I guess, but I'm just not interested in that.”

  “I didn't want to get in this line of work either. It just sort of happens. Just what god planned for me,” Teresa said.

  “Religious? I don't believe in anything divine.”

  “Well, I don't really believe in god, either, But I do believe there is a plan. Do you believe in fate, destiny?”

  “No, not really. The fact that everything might already be decided bothers me. I have free will.”

  “Well, even if the future is set, I think we do have free will. I don't know. Say you had a time machine–”

  Jacob groaned. “A time machine.”

  Teresa continued, “About as far-fetched as the divine for you, eh? It’s just a hypothetical. I heard there was some research done into time travel. It seems possible under current hyper-quantum mechanics.”

  Jacob nodded. “I heard that, it takes way too much power to ever be possible.”

  “Perhaps, but suppose some alien race had a power source that could run a time machine.”

  “It just gets better and better! Are they god-fearing aliens from the future?”

  Teresa laughed. “You are worse than my crew. Yeah, most life-forms we have found in the galaxy are slimes on the back of rocks and nothing that could invent a time machine, or any type of machine for that matter, but we're doing a thought experiment about fate and free will. If I went back in time a few minutes before Earth was destroyed and watched it turn to rubble, does that mean anything? Just because I knew it was going to happen, did I have anything to do with it? Just because I may witness Jesus get nailed to the cross, does that mean those men didn't use their own free will to drive those nails?”

  “I see what you are saying, I guess, but if everything is written, maybe it’s telling me to go to Exodus right now! I don't have much choice, then,” Jacob said.

  “If everything is written, you still don’t know what it says. You'll just have to use your own free will!”

  Jacob glanced at the passengers of the transport. “A time machine would be intriguing. You mentioned Earth.”

  “Ah. Earth.”

  “I'd love to figure out what exactly transpired there.”

  Teresa smiled. “Maybe those god-fearing alien time travelers?”

  “I really don't know what to think about that. It's a bit taboo anyways,” Jacob said with an uneasy tone.

  “Mother Earth destroyed. The Cataclysm. Thank fate for colonization and hyper-travel.” Teresa listened to the hum of the engines. “I think that destroyer isn't traveling nearly as fast it could be. Doesn't sound quite right. Sort of sounds like there is a third ship nearby or something.”

  “Nah, should be only two ships. But, yeah, I've always just wanted to set foot on Earth. I know it’s silly. That ship destroyed it.”

  “The infamous 'Double-Crescent.' Two crescent-shaped objects connected by a support structure. With a weapon that destroyed Earth.”

  “I don't think we're meant to know what transpired there. I've heard so many theories. Talks of government cover-ups, aliens, parallel universes, time-travel.”

  “What do you think happened, though?” Teresa asked.

  “I don't know, and I really don't want to know. I'd kill whoever caused that atrocity.”

  Teresa chuckled. “If you could.”

  “Of course. What do you think happened, Teresa?”

  “The best theory I've heard, and the most logical one I can wrap my head around is a hostile alien race. Yeah, even though we've only found slime on rocks and no other traces of Double-Crescent ships. Maybe they live in Andromeda and you'll get your wish about killing them soon.”

  Jacob laughed. “See, now you’re making Exodus sound appealing to me again.”

  “I'm sure Exodus could stand against an army of those DCs right?”

  Jacob thought a moment. “Okay, maybe not.”

  The captain came across the speakers again, “Hi, it's your captain. We've only had one batch of turbulence and it looks like everyone is handling hyperspace well! We're going to induce sleep now. I'm sure you'll wake up pretty hungry, but according to medical scans, everyone should be fine. Prepare for a hearty meal on the space station. See you again when we exit hyperspace. Have a good night.”

  Jacob yawned, “How fast is this sleep inducing thing?”

  Teresa shrugged. “Not sure, I always just listen to the hum of the engines until I...”

  “Until you what?”

  Teresa slumped in her seat and fell into a deep sleep.

  Jacob laughed. “Oh. I guess that answers that.”

  Jacob stared out the window. “So, listen to the hum of the engine. Wait, what is...”

  A Double-Crescent, the type of ship that had destroyed Earth, seemed to shimmer into existence. The Double-Crescent was matching the transport's speed. Jacob couldn't mutter a word. It felt like an eternity, but after a few seconds it shimmered out of existence again. Jacob then felt a sharp pain in his head.

  A familiar voice asked, “Are you having a nightmare or something?”

  Jacob woke up and glanced over to his right. Teresa shook her head and said, “You probably didn't listen to the hum of the engines did you?”

  “I saw–”

  “You were having a nightmare, it's okay. We're about to come out of hyperspace I imagine. You have a nice trip to Artemis, hope you find what you are looking for.”

  Jacob was shaking. “Yeah, you too. I swear I just–”

  Jacob stared back out the window. The pain resided. There was no Double-Crescent. Was the ship still out there, somewhere, lurking?

  Jacob glanced over at the man that was having some difficulties at the beginning of the trip. The man noticed that Jacob was looking at him. The man nodded and grinned toothily.

  The woman next to the grinning man poked his side. “Why does space flight always do this to you. Sorry, sir, if my husband was bothering you.”

  The man turned away from Jacob with the grin still plastered on his face. The captain announced over the speakers that they would be leaving hyperspace soon, and soon thereafter docking at the Grauer space station. Jacob ignored it and just stared back through his window into hyperspace. He wondered if something was staring back at him.

  January 28, 0270 AC - 12:02

  Mess Hall, USS Freedom

  Hyperspace, En route to Grauer

  Admiral Akeldamas picked at his meal in the mess hall of Freedom. Although the mess hall was crowded with people, no one else sat at his table. Akeldamas didn't mind that and just stared out through a large window that stretched across the wall of the mess hall. The colors of hyperspace twisted and curled. The admiral kept running the events of the transmission from his master through his mind.

  Captain Devereaux approached the admiral with his meal on a tray. The captain sat down at an empty chair on the table that the admiral had claimed.

  “...Captain.”

  “Admiral.”

  They didn't speak for a few minutes. They calmly ate.

  “Admiral, I think we got off on the wrong foot.”

  The admiral remained silent.

  “I think we probably have a lot in common. You looked like you could use some company, so I decided to bother you. Do you want to talk about what is on yo
ur mind?”

  Akeldamas scoffed, “Hah. It's business that does not have anything to do with you.”

  Devereaux stabbed another piece of meat with his fork. “Well, does it have anything to do with the last transmission that went from Blood Dynasty space to your current living quarters? Some sort of 'black priority'?”

  Akeldamas turned from his view of hyperspace and stared into the captain instead. “That's highly top secret and not for your eyes.”

  “Oh, I'm aware. We happened to get a signal from Blood Dynasty territory, though, and we investigated.”

  “I thought my room was secure!” the admiral yelled.

  “It is, sir. But as captain of this ship I need to make sure it is protected from any threat. It is secure, but I need to know what happens on my ship.”

  Akeldamas was livid. “You have no right. I can get you discharged for this.”

  The captain smiled. “I'd imagine the same thing goes for you. You can just tell me what the message contained. I just want this ship to be safe, sir.”

  “To hell with you.”

  The captain smirked. “I think we're getting off on that wrong foot again.”

  Akeldamas growled, “You have no right to go snooping in the affairs of someone higher ranked than you. I will not talk about the message.”

  “Well, it didn't use Galactic Union security codes. In fact, they were closer to Blood Dynasty codes. So if you are working for the vampires, well, you won't be higher ranked than me for long.”

  The admiral slammed his fist into the table. “I will not tolerate this. I would be better off sleeping the day away in that little transport flying with us! I will not tell you!”

  The captain leaned back in his chair. “Well, you don't have to tell me. It's fine. We're running tests on the message and will probably break the cipher soon. It is extremely good encryption, but I have some good code-breakers on my ship. In fact, they tell me if they can get access to the computer in your room, there will be a good chance they'll break the encryption. Is it true that the Blood Dynasty haven't even updated their encryption methods in ten years?”