by Damon Alan
Sarah opened her mouth, but Corriea spoke first. “I think, Captain, that you're our family and our commanding officer. I'd sooner shoot myself in the foot than betray you. Every one of us knows that you put your crew first. The regular crew, they don't get to see that every day. Especially on the other ships.”
“But seeing the destination with their own eyes... that might be enough to keep the calm,” Harmeen added.
“Or it might make them demand that last step. I'm not in the habit of making my decisions to improve crew morale. I don’t accede to demands. But maybe I need to think more about morale now that we're marooned.” Sarah considered her options. “If we determine the locals are human, and pre-tech, you want to move to Refuge orbit?”
They all nodded.
“It makes my military side uncomfortable, but we'll move once we know it's Hive free.”
“How about shore leave once we find an uninhabited spot?” Gilbert pushed.
“We’re not at that bridge, Commander. There is no need to cross it yet.” Sarah’s voice must have reflected her irritation.
Gilbert yielded with a smile, palms out in surrender. “Fair enough, Captain, one step at a time.”
“I'm still uneasy, so we'll do something for me that will help with that. Mr. Gilbert, I want a few dozen of your marines standing by at all times, on the Yascurra, with six combat shuttles ready to go. Tell Captain Batalova to make sure those shuttles are in top shape.”
“I'll let the Captain know what's happening myself once we rendezvous at the fourth moon.” Gilbert started to his task of planning his marine squad, but Sarah wasn’t done yet.
“We should keep our options open. If initial contact with the locals goes bad your boys will be the extraction team,” she said.
“Full combat gear?”
Sarah nodded. “Yes. And get a few tanks loaded onto the shuttles, just in case.”
“Tanks? Captain, I love the way you think.”
“Explain to the marines the situation, then isolate them from the regular crew. If the junior crew see combatants ready to go, who knows what they'll think. If anyone does get wind of it, it's a training drill.”
“We have that in common, Captain. Marines at the ready make us both more comfortable,” Gilbert said.
“Let's hope we don't need them.”
“Agreed,” Gilbert said. “All of this assumes the planet isn’t Hive infested anyway.”
Sarah nodded her unhappy agreement. “Alright, everyone, I think we have our plans. Let's hope they survive contact with the unknown.”
“We’ve fixed this ship from near scrap status, we did the first ever tandem jump through highspace. We can handle about anything now,” Harmeen said.
Sarah appreciated the sentiment, but caution had saved her more often than bravado. “Never underestimate our ability to screw things up, Mr. Harmeen.”
“No ma'am, I wouldn't think of it.”
“You have the bridge, Commander Gilbert. I'll be in the zero gym thinking this over.” Sarah rubbed the front of her upper thigh. “I’ve got a lot of work to do if I'm going to walk in one point one six G.”
“We all do,” Seto said. “We're going to hurt for months.”
Sarah grinned. “You're younger. That makes it easier.”
“I have the conn,” Gilbert said as he transferred the command holodisplays to his station.
Chapter 5 - Captain's Personal Log
24 JUNI 15327
AI Lucy82A recording, captain’s personal log, Michael Stennis archive: Galactic Standard Date 23:40:07 24 Juni, 15327
Personal log entry #665, Captain Sarah Dayson, origin Korvand, Pallus Sector.
Current Location: Star System designated Oasis by Seventh Fleet Commander.
I can't win, at least not the big win.
Every time I turn around, it seems the end game is pulled from my grasp. I really thought we had found a place for humanity to survive the extinction of our species in the galaxy proper, but then we find out it's already inhabited. The question now is by what. If it's Hive we'll burn Refuge like Hamor, then drop rocks on it. I’ll use the antimatter we have left if I need to, and that won’t be pretty.
I hope it doesn't come to that.
[18 second pause, sound of a slurping straw]
What if they’re aliens? Those images showed farms, paths, even a herd of animals. It sure looks like a human settlement. I guess if they're alien—
[a snort, AI estimates 82% probability to be a gesture of derision]
— we'll make first contact and hope it goes well.
[a heavy sigh]
But my gut says they're human. I'm sure the Hive need to feed their biological component, but Corriea is right, they'd use machines, not draft animals. Filthy things would eat all the animals… or infect them. I think the locals are human, because, well, let's face it, we humans do really stupid shit. We do things like spend ridiculous amounts to colonize distant worlds hoping nobody will ever find us.
But someone always does.
If these people are human, they're lucky it was our fleet that got knocked off course, and not a Hive fleet. They probably don’t even know the Hive exists.
[sound of cooler opening, a popping noise as a seal is broken]
I want to find an uninhabited island... with surf, sandy beaches, maybe some edible tropical plants. The crews need it. I need it. I haven’t really felt like I needed to leave my ship for years. But something is different here. It… it wouldn’t hurt if I lived on that island with someone who mattered to me.
Since Vonn and Jac died at Korvand…
[17 second pause, with an indecipherable sound several seconds long]
Well, I’ve avoided anything to do with another man in my life. Romantically, I mean. But I have to admit, now that we’re out of the war and probably safe I’m thinking about it a lot. Being a colonist instead of a combatant changes things. Gilbert seems concerned regarding my well being, something my last XO wouldn’t even have considered.
I sort of like it. Not sure what he feels about it.
[32 second pause]
Enough of that. Business calls. We're going to have to start space operations soon, mining, some automated factories, and eventually an antimatter production facility. We’re going to want to spread to the other star Corriea found five hundred light-years away. Extinction insurance. All of this will be a lot easier if I have happy crewmen, not just surviving crewmen. The key is to figure out how to keep them happy and focused.
There’s also the question of whether to use nanite factories to make the spares we need. I hate those dirty little…
It's hard to plan with so many unknowns, so I'll stop there.
End log and file, Lucy.
Chapter 6 - Beetle Demon
Mid Firstday, sometime after lunch
It was mid-Firstday, and the goats flocked around Eislen, chewing swathgrass. A warm breeze fluttered across his skin. A few bugs crawled on him as he lay in the field, but he didn’t care. Above him white clouds danced across a sky of emerald green. He closed his eyes, and sleep came rapidly in the swaying grass.
A strange sound reached his ears, a sound he'd not heard before. It flooded his dream, and his sleep reality changed as he dreamed of an arrow racing toward him but never quite striking.
BOOM!
Eislen woke with a start and jumped to his feet. His heart pounded, and he took a moment to grasp his surroundings. Goats scattered in all directions. He heard a distant sound like thunder rattling among the hills. Yet there was no storm.
Above Eislen a trail cut across the sky, a line of cloud in an unnaturally straight line. The cloud was wider in back and narrower at its tip. At the front of the cloud a pinpoint of light shot eastward, leaving the cottony line behind it.
I've never seen a burning soul like that before...
Inexplicably the pinpoint of light changed direction before breaking into several glistening dots. The dots sparkled as they moved, but no longer left tr
ails. The sparkles moved apart in graceful arcs. The last of the thunderous sound faded in the echoing hills.
“What are the gods up to?” Eislen asked Mattie, who stood near him, bleating.
Not many days ago the light between Jalai and Fandama restored some of his faith. Today’s events were scrumpleberry jelly on the pastry. The gods were speaking.
Miker told him there would be trials to come, that because it disappeared the light in the sky was a sign, not a god. God or sign, clearly powers greater than Eislen were active in the world.
Eislen remembered his duty as a goatherd. His flock was scattered, and it dawned on him with a jolt. Gods, signs, or whatever, his immediate duty was to the village herd.
As he ran to gather them he tried to ignore the strange happenings in the sky. A short time later the flock was rounded up against a short stone wall, and Eislen counted them.
“Forty-three, forty-f—”
Eislen stopped in mid count, his eyes drawn to a sight down the hill.
He ran to look over the herding wall. Half a man or so tall, the wall ran parallel with the valley below. He didn't see the beauty of the valley below him, or the purple magnificence of the hills across the way. His eyes were focused on one thing as he scratched Mattie behind the ear.
A strange bird raced above a copse of trees, heading straight toward him. As it approached, a sound tickled his ears, growing in volume. The bird sounded as if all the old women in the village were angry at once, wailing at him while beating on a drum.
Eislen grabbed his bow and strung it, then nocked an arrow. The sound from the bird grew until it hurt his ears, but he stood ready to defend his flock. The creature drew close, and again his flock scattered into the tall grasses.
“Damn the gods,” he muttered as he watched the goats run for their lives. Probably not the best time for blasphemy, but surely they’d understand.
The beast was soon above him, and he saw it wasn’t a bird at all.
It looked like a giant insect. The size of a small cow, it buzzed loudly, as loud as the thunderstorms that ravaged the hills on summer nights. It threw wind down toward the ground causing the grass at Eislen’s feet to whip about wildly.
The height of two men in the air, Eislen guessed the creature to be the length of a man long if he didn’t count the tail. On top of it was a disk that looked as if something were there, but he could see through it, like glass. It had a long tail behind a round body, and perched on the tail it had another round see-through disk. On the bottom of the body a giant eye swiveled on the end of a short stalk.
As the beast floated above him, Eislen smelled an acrid scent riding the wind the thing blew down. The smell burned his nose, and made his eyes sting. Tears flowed on his cheeks. The black eye under the beast stared at him, unblinking, and he felt fear growing in the pit of his stomach.
I shouldn’t have blasphemed. This demon has come to punish me.
Eislen settled his mind. He was no adept, but he was touched by the gift. Miker told him to never use it, but this was an emergency. Eislen concentrated and the shape of the beast filled his mind. He saw the wind currents around it, and realized it was made of something even harder than most insects. Concentrating, he pushed the creature away from him. For a moment, the beetle veered away, but overcame the small force that Eislen's gift allowed him to exert. The creature swarmed back, despite Eislen's push to warn it off.
He raised his bow and fired.
The arrow flew high, passing above the eye to hit near the top of the spherical body. Surprisingly the arrow slid across the creature instead of penetrating. It skidded to the top, near a stick to which the see-through disk was attached. The arrow inexplicably shattered, the remnants hurled away in splinters.
The creature went wild.
It bucked to the left, turning partly on its side. For a moment it went higher, then flipped over and plummeted toward the ground. The disk on top struck the ground first, then came apart. Grass, dirt, and parts of the creature ripped through the air. A piece of it missed Eislen by the span of a hand as it shrieked past him and landed somewhere down hill. He looked toward where the piece had gone, and saw his goats far downhill and running as fast as they could go. The creature wailed and shrieked behind him. He looked at it, with his fear at the edge of panic.
It screamed a low pitched growl and smoke flew from a mouth on its side.
That was all it took. This thing was a demon, and Eislen wasn’t sure if he’d wounded it bad enough to keep it from killing him. Eislen bolted, running down the hill after his goats. He hurdled the fence in one leap and didn't look back until he was winded. His breath ragged and his body shaking, he turned to see if it pursued him.
The creature's growl had changed, and the disk on the tail stopped. It wasn't a disk at all, but two sticks that had moved so quickly they blurred. The demon was unable to rise from the ground, causing courage to rise somewhere within Eislen. He walked back toward the wall and the injured creature. He watched it carefully as he approached. Any sign of trouble and he’d flee for help.
The black glossy eye on the stalk stared at him. Then Eislen heard something strange. The beetle spoke in short words, but he couldn't understand what it said. He stooped behind the wall and listened, his bow ready.
It sounded harmless enough. The voice was strangely flat and carried no emotion. At least its eye no longer looked at him.
Just as Eislen’s courage surged again and he stood up from cover, the creature turned to flame. A flash of heat seared the young herdsman as the insect beast vanished. A wall of debris ripped downhill, tearing apart the herding stones and hurling Eislen into the air. Pain ripped through his shoulder. It seemed like an eternity of agony later, but he hit the ground and rolled, stopping face down.
He tried to rise, but searing pain tore at his chest. Blackness engulfed him.
Chapter 7 - First Contact
36 JUNI 15327
Sarah worked hard to control her temper. Corriea floated in her office, trying to stand at attention in zero G. She hadn’t given him time to lock in his magboots before tearing into him. “There are no damned excuses, Mr. Corriea. I have irreplaceable technology lost, and you're telling me it's because the AI doesn't recognize a bow as a weapon?”
Corriea’s face was red. “It won't happen again, sir, we've reset all the remaining drones. From now on they'll maintain five hundred meters from intelligent targets.”
“We can't afford to lose a single AI chip. They’re irreplaceable.”
Corriea agreed with her. “No sir, we can't.”
Sarah paused and looked at the young man.
He can't be more than twenty-five.
The war created a lot of young officers. Sarah sighed. “At ease, Mr. Corriea. Let's make this person to person.”
He relaxed and exhaled.
Sarah heard his boots click to the floor. “Five hundred meters, Peter? I don't want the locals to see, hear, or even know our drones exist. Don't the cameras have a zoom function?”
“Sir, you don’t know how embarrassed I am.” Corriea’s face finally revealed his emotions. Desperation, from what Sarah could tell. “I didn't consider that primitive weapons would fail to register with the AI threat assessment protocols.”
Sarah shook her head. “To be honest, I don't know if I would have thought of it either, although you shouldn’t have let the drones get that close anyway. The good news is these people are not Hive. I’m ordering the fleet to stand down.”
“That's a relief,” Corriea replied. “Living in a star system while expecting a Hive attack at any time wouldn’t be fun.”
“No, it wouldn’t. I don’t see any threat here, although I’m not sure what to do about what we have found.”
“They’re no threat, Captain. I've watched most of the video feed from several drones. No sign of any modern industrial technology.”
Sarah didn’t answer him, instead she played the drone’s holovid recording on her office monitor.
> “It's beautiful.” Sarah’s voice no longer had any edge.
“Sir?”
“The moon is beautiful. Purple seems to be the most common color for the plant life.”
“Ensign Dantora says that allows the plants to absorb more energy in the lower light levels of Oasis. These people seem to be well adapted to it. They're not using much, or maybe any, metal. I studied the weapon used by the man on the video. The arrow was wood, feather, and what looks like flint. The most technology we’ve seen are sailing ships at sea and carts drawn by draft animals. Some watermills. Overall there is little mechanization.”
Sarah wondered if Corriea even saw the beauty of the moon. Young men were so dense sometimes. “I'm not sure if their tech level is a good thing or not, but at least we don't have to worry about them shooting at us in orbit. While I intend to treat them fairly, it’s nice that we can bargain from a position of power.”
“Yes, sir. The locals seem peaceful toward each other, no real war making capability. They have some organized militia, in leather armor. They carry spears and bows. Their purpose is mostly to patrol trade routes judging by the video the AIs returned.”
The mention of trade routes was a great sign. Trade required both the ability to communicate and that a long term peace be in place. “They sound remarkably normal in the ways that matter. Dismissed, Mr. Corriea.”
Corriea clutched a wall grip and pulled himself toward the hatch to leave.
“Oh, one more thing. Move the fleet to Refuge. As low as you can go and still have a long term stable orbit. Save shuttle fuel.”
Corriea nodded. “Aye, sir. Do you want the habitation ring extended when we arrive?”
“If we're in orbit twenty-four hours and everything’s good, we'll extend it. Spin up to point six G initially, then we'll step it up to local gravity within a week or two depending on how people are handling it.”
“That’ll improve morale a lot.”
