Blackstar Command 1: Prominence

by A. C. Hadfield

  “What is it?” Marella said.

  “Something’s in the water,” Kai said.

  The surface of the pool rippled around the pedestal.

  Senaya screamed.

  Kai pocketed the artifact and raised the P&G.

  A wormlike creature burst from the pool, spraying the cavern with an explosion of water. Kai’s heart thumped hard against his chest. He stumbled back. The animal’s head must have been at least a meter wide. Its thick body coiled around itself and disappeared into the pool.

  “Get out of the wa—” Kai began to say.

  It was too late.

  The worm raised its muscular body further up and a second pseudopod tentacle thrashed out, knocking Marella hard against the left wall of the cavern. Her head cracked against the inside of her helmet, and she slid unconscious to the ground.

  “You ugly bastard!” Senaya screamed as she opened fire, shooting her twin laser pistols at the creature’s head. The two shots didn’t seem to have much effect, the lasers’ energy dissipating into lines of crackling blue filament against the creature’s dark skin.

  Kai backed up and out of the pool and sprinted over to Marella’s prone body, taking advantage of Senaya’s covering fire.

  The creature turned its flat, broad head toward Senaya, opened its slit of a mouth, and displayed row upon row of razor-edged teeth. It let out a high-pitched wail and lashed its tentacle toward her.

  “Over here,” Kai yelled before firing a three-shot burst from his P&G into the creature’s chest. This time there was no resisting; the armor-piercing rounds thudded into the meaty flesh, spraying dark blood from the wounds.

  The worm seemed to barely notice the damage. It whipped its tentacle around in an arc, just missing Kai’s head. He rolled to his right, came up on a knee, and fired another burst, but this time, just a single shot hit the target.

  “Flank it,” Kai yelled.

  Senaya was already one step ahead of him and was wading through the pool to the creature’s right. She had holstered her laser pistols and was now arming her plasma blaster. She aimed for its head.

  Kai did the same and was about to pull the trigger when a second tentacle, hidden beneath the pool, snaked around his ankles and yanked him under the water.

  He pulled the trigger as he went down, the rounds firing into the cavern ceiling and ricocheting harmlessly into the water.

  Kai’s air tanks snapped away from his back as the creature dragged him against the cavern floor. His visor cracked open on the base of the plinth.

  Cold, stagnant water trickled into his helmet.

  Stars and lights flashed in his vision. The tentacle reached up around his legs and tightened around his waist, forcing the air from his lungs as it lifted him clear out of the water.

  Kai thrashed uselessly against the powerful constriction. His chest ached, and his heart beat faster and faster as panic began to set in.

  But then his hand fell on his hip. The stun baton was still in its holder. With the last of his energy, Kai ripped it free, stabbed it deep into the flesh of the tentacle, and activated the charge.

  At first, the constriction tightened further and then with a terrible screech it loosened. The creature thrashed in the water, splashing against the electrical charge that was flowing through its body. Kai slumped back into the pool with a splash.

  A pair of hands grabbed Kai by the shoulders and lifted him out. He spluttered the water from his mouth and took a deep breath. The cold air burned his lungs, but sweet relief soon followed.

  “I thought you were dead,” Senaya shouted, shaking him.

  “I will be if you keep shaking me,” Kai said between deep breaths.

  Senaya helped him back to the slope, where he fell to his hands and knees and coughed out the remaining water. Marella staggered toward him, her face covered in blood from a gash on the side of her head.

  “Are you okay?” Kai asked.

  “I should be asking you,” she said.

  “Both of you sit down and be quiet—let me run some health checks, see how you both are.”

  Kai and Marella did as they were instructed. Senaya pulled one of her devices from her leg pocket. It appeared to be a holographic handheld analyzer. She hovered it around Kai and then Marella.

  “Results will take a minute,” she said. “I couldn’t find a faster processor.”

  “It’s fine,” Kai said. “I’m just glad all that is over.”

  “We're assuming there is only one," Marella added. "The chamber goes further. For all we know, that could be the baby, and their parents will be coming for it soon."

  “Thanks for the positive thinking,” Senaya said, giving Marella a stern look.

  A moment later the device flashed its results. A scrolling holographic column spewed out metrics Kai didn’t understand. “What’s the verdict?” he asked.

  “You’re fine apart from a small hairline fracture of the lower rib. A nanoshot can heal it. Marella… you’ve got a concussion. It’s minor, though, and the medical facilities on the ship will sort that. We just have to be careful until then.”

  Marella rubbed her head and removed the remains of her broken helmet. “I’m glad the air is okay, even if it is a little thin.”

  Kai knew what she meant. He had to take three breaths to get the same oxygen he'd usually get from one. He practiced a little breathing meditation for a few minutes to get the rhythm right and clear his light-headedness.

  He then stood with Senaya’s help and checked his pocket for the tetrahedron. Thankfully, it was still there.

  “Let’s get this show started,” he said, stepping once more toward the pedestal, but this time with an eye specifically on the now-still water for any telltale signs of more creatures.

  Marella joined him at his left, Senaya to his right. They surrounded the pedestal and waited for him to place the tetrahedron in the triangular depression.

  Kai reached out his hand. A field of static energy built around him as he lowered the artifact into place, and…

  Nothing happened.

  “Well, that’s an anticlimax,” Senaya said.

  “Are you sure it’s seated in properly?” Marella said, leaning in closer.

  Kai removed the artifact, placed it back in, and wiggled it about. Nothing happened. “Sen, you’re the engineer here, any ideas?”

  “I’m an engineer, sure, but this is some super rare Navigator tech. Let me have a look.”

  Senaya pulled the sleeves of her suit up, stepped closer, and inspected the pedestal and the depression around the artifact. She tapped all around it with a knuckle, sucked in her breath, and sighed. “It’s not hollow,” she finally said.

  Marella rolled her eyes. “And that gets you into the Engineers Guild?”

  “Well,” Senaya said, hands on hips, “you’re supposed to be the big-shot historian. Shouldn’t you know more about all this stuff?”

  Marella just shrugged. “It’s the first I’ve seen it.”

  “Ladies,” Kai said, raising his hands in the air, “this is getting us nowhere. Sen, take your time. There must be some kind of activation mechanism somewhere.”

  Senaya walked around the pedestal, running her hands across its surface slowly and methodically. She nodded and hummed and finally came back around to stand next to Kai. She rubbed her chin. “There’s one thing we could try…”

  “Go on then,” Kai urged.

  Senaya held his gaze for a moment before turning back to the ancient piece of Navigator technology and kicked it once at the base.

  “Hey!” Marella said, alarm in her voice. “That’s precious. You can’t just—”

  The cavern pitched into darkness.

  Kai swore and was about to remove the artifact when the static electricity field expanded from the pedestal to surround his entire body. Pressure built inside his head as though he were reentering a thick atmosphere. He squeezed his eyes shut and knelt before he collapsed.

  When he opened his eyes, the place was still i
n darkness, but a curious pale blue matrix of information swirled around him just inches from his face.

  Senaya and Marella were nowhere to be seen or heard. In fact, he couldn’t discern any sound whatsoever, including his own heartbeat.

  The information coalesced from arcane, unknown symbols into recognizable words. Only these weren’t any words Kai had previously known. He’d never seen this language before, yet despite that, he intuited their meaning as though he were fluent. The information came at him faster and faster still, until, unable to resist, he relaxed and accepted the download of data into his consciousness.

  A feeling of incredible lightness overwhelmed him.

  Tears welled up as yet more knowledge from distant stars and distant times poured into him, catalyzing a rapid growth of dendrites and synaptic activity.

  He slumped forward against the pedestal, cradling it as if he were a child clinging to one of his parents. The warmth from the machine emanated around his body, bringing him comfort as his mind and body continued its rapid metamorphosis.

  Pictures of his father flashed into his consciousness, followed by desert landscapes, alien worlds, indescribably massive structures spinning in space, rocky planets, water worlds, ships of exotic design that defied known geometry and logic. Songs and speeches played out. Entire books of narrative sprawled out before him, building a living history of the Navigators right there in his mind.

  How could his brain handle all this?

  Would it ever stop?

  What did it all mean?

  As he considered these things, the deluge of details increased until they coalesced into a single, soul-shattering conclusion. A single idea formed in his mind, demanding he focus on it, understand it, accept it. He perceived the message, and it delivered a bolt of lightning to the very core of his existence.

  “I’m… I’m not human,” he whispered. “I’m…”

  Although he couldn’t speak it, he knew it in every cell of his body.

  I’m a Navigator.

  All his life up until now had been a cover, a false identity.

  But now, finally, he felt whole, correct.

  Chapter 23

  Brenna sat up and pushed the doctor’s hands away from her.

  A flashback of her time being interrogated by the shrain bloomed in her mind. It took her a few moments to catch her breath and remind herself of where she was: a singular, private med-bay on the Spearhead.

  She controlled her breathing and took in her surroundings, using the analysis of each detail as a way of calming herself down.

  The room was cool and quiet. It had cream-colored walls that featured the usual array of holographic screens scrolling and twisting with data and information.

  She noted her medical information on the nearest screen. It told her, not that she needed telling, given she could feel it coursing through her system, that she was responding well to a shot of Equilibrium.

  Although her mind was still foggy and her body ached, the crushing fatigue and subspace effects had thankfully abated.

  From behind her, out of view, a neutral-sounding voice said, “Agent Locke, I need you to remain still. Your body is in need of many essential nutrients.”

  Brenna blinked the blurriness from her eyes and turned her head toward the voice. A medical-issue android was standing patiently to her right, holding a drug dispenser in its right hand.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Brenna said. “I didn’t mean to push you away… it’s just I’ve been…” she trailed off. She wasn’t comfortable telling this android her tale of woe; she had never learned to trust them.

  It had all stemmed from the uprising she’d witnessed on Volbeta. It was brief but brutal. The androids and other mechanized population turned on their fleshy compatriots. At the time, the analysts had suggested it was a Host virus. Later it was shown not to be the case: the androids had initiated the uprising themselves.

  Since then, the makers of the androids and bots had been under strict Coalition regulations to implement stronger safeguards. Brenna often wondered if that were enough. The machines had bypassed their programming once before.

  Who was to say they wouldn’t again?

  One thing Brenna had learned about computer-based entities was that their programming was not set in stone as per the conventional wisdom. Sure, their processors might run on logic, but there was something within AI that broke those laws, turning the current belief on its head.

  Scientists might point to their evidence, but there was an intangibility there that she had seen and experienced regardless of what the data said.

  “Agent Locke?” the android said again, remaining neutral in its tone of voice and breaking her out of her moment of thought. “Are you able to hear me?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I can hear you perfectly well.”

  That was another thing that bothered her: their attempt at normality. She’d rather they were blunt, mechanistic, or perhaps developed a unique personality of their own; at least then she could take them on their terms instead of having to accept their existence as a metaphor for sentient beings.

  This particular unit was modeled on a male, a human with a kind smile and vibrant coffee skin: a design the Coalition technologists had settled on for medical bots due to the familiar and non-threatening appearance.

  Its emotion-reading algorithm must have finally acknowledged her discomfort, and he said, "My name is Ketch, and I'm here to help you. But I won't insist you take the drugs; it's entirely your choice, of course. I'm working under orders from Captain Lopek, who wanted you as healthy as possible for your briefing."

  Brenna sighed and held out her arm. “Fine. Shoot me, Ketch. Better get this over with. Given Lopek risked the Spearhead and its crew to rescue me, I ought to show my gratitude, right?”

  Ketch diplomatically dipped his chin and said nothing. He pressed the drug dispenser’s flat round surface to the skin of her upper arm and activated it.

  A dozen nanoneedles penetrated through her skin and delivered a cocktail of drugs that would help replace essential minerals and nutrients she had lost while on the shrain ship.

  “Please hold still for a moment,” Ketch said. “Let the drugs flow.”

  While she was waiting for the smart particles to do their thing, she asked Ketch where they were and how long she had been out since her rescue.

  “You’ve been out for half a standard hour,” Ketch said. “And we’re heading back to Capsis Prime. I believe we’re to make the subspace jump as soon as Captain Lopek has briefed you.”

  “And the shrain ship?”

  “Completely destroyed.”

  A warm sensation spread throughout Brenna’s body. She felt light-headed for a moment, but it quickly passed. The effect of the drugs, along with the Equilibrium already in her system, gave her an inner warm glow that wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

  Ketch fussed around her and worked on the holoscreen for a minute or so. His work was ultimately interrupted when the door to the med-bay slid open.

  Lopek entered. His usually gaunt face seemed even more drawn than usual. A concerned expression pinched at the edges of his deep-set eyes, which seemed more shadowed than normal.

  “Thank you, Ketch,” he said. “You may leave us now.”

  The android obeyed the order, leaving Brenna’s side and exiting the room.

  “They never cease to creep me out,” Brenna said, breathing a long exhalation and leaning against the backrest of the medical bed with some degree of relaxation.

  Lopek’s grim demeanor prevented her from completely relaxing. She straightened her back and fidgeted.

  “Well, what is it? Is it Kai? Has something happened to him?”

  Lopek paced the room, hands behind his back. Although he was trying to communicate an air of calm and control, she could tell from the tightness in his shoulders and his jaw that he was on edge.

  He approached a video screen on the far side of the room and peered at the feed of the external view outside of t
he Spearhead. Half a dozen ships were returning from the wreckage of the shrain ship and preparing to dock.

  “Captain, my son…”

  “We’ve not heard from him since he left for the remote moon with Maio. We’re operating on the basis of no news is good news. We sent a couple of scout ships to follow him from Parsephus, and I’m expecting a report from them soon.”

  “So would they know if the Host had got to him?”

  “Their orders were to stay as close as possible, so, yes. For now, we are deeming your son’s condition as safe. You’ll be the first to know when there’s more to tell.”

  Despite the captain’s gray complexion and stiff movements, Brenna had no reason to believe he was lying. He looked tired, stressed, but she would expect that from someone in his position at a time of war.

  A moment passed. Lopek shot his cuffs and wiped some lint from his dark blue jacket. He turned, took a shallow breath, and spoke in his usual precise, professional pattern. “The intelligence you gathered from the shrain ship has brought to our attention a Host tactic that is currently away.” He stepped closer, looming over the end of the bed.

  “Go on… don’t hold back now, Captain. What do the Host have in store for us?”

  “The shrain have infiltrated Capsis Prime and its neighboring planets. One of our agents took over your mission on Protsima. We… extracted information from the shrain controller.”

  “Was it of any use?”

  “At the time, no, but the information you retrieved for us has pointed us in the right direction. With our other agents across the galaxy reporting in, we’ve built a picture of the Host’s movements and strategies. And it’s not good.”

  “You’re going to tell me that the CDF underestimated our previous intel and warnings about the Host’s resources and that the war is truly on, right?”

  “Of a sort, yes. That’s not all, however.” Lopek ran a hand through his already-slicked hair. “A large contingent of Host destroyers are currently due to arrive in Capsis space within hours, or, if we’re lucky, days.”

  “Surely they can’t just fly into the system without triggering the defense…” Brenna trailed off and finally grasped it. “The shrain have infiltrated our defense systems too.”