Escape Velocity

by Jason M. Hough

  Beth shrugged. “Nothing to check with the computers offline. Vanessa will be able to confirm from the outside, but my guess is the ship’s automatic emergency systems jettisoned the core when the explosion hit.”

  “Could you rig some emergency power?”

  The engineer considered that for a moment. “There’re a few ultracaps in here, I think? They could be rewired. In theory.”

  Gloria forced herself to remember that this wasn’t Beth’s ship. She’d been assigned because she knew the imploder tech. It was unreasonable to expect her to be an expert on the rest of the Wildflower’s systems. “Try,” she said.

  Beth gave a halfhearted nod and moved off again.

  Battling back a wave of fatigue, Gloria shifted all her focus to Vanessa. She explained the process of exiting the vessel and talked the other woman through the process until the moment the air was purged and talking became impossible.

  “Testing comms,” Vanessa said, the spare helmet pressed to her own. Shouted, really.

  Gloria heard the voice only as a tinny garble coming through her earpiece. She gave Vanessa a thumbs-up through the window.

  “Well,” the woman said, turning about and taking in the scene outside, “the good news is there’s plenty of scrap I can use to try and seal these ruptures.”

  That bad. Gloria swallowed.

  “We skidded for about a klick before coming to rest.”

  Gloria recalled the long scraping sound she’d heard in one of her moments of consciousness after the explosion out in deep space.

  “I’m afraid the rest is all bad news. I don’t know your ship, but all that seems to be left of it is the main body that you’re in right now. The rest is…debris.”

  She turned to look through the porthole, as if for direction. Gloria held up a finger, asking her to wait. Then she activated the screen mounted on her forearm and tapped out some text. She held her arm up to the porthole and waited.

  “ ‘Beth wants to know about status of the reactor core,’ ” Vanessa read. “Describe it for me.”

  You had small thorium reactors in your time, yes?

  “Never saw one personally, but I know what you mean.”

  Like that, just smaller. A pair of them. The housing is painted yellow.

  “Hold on.”

  Out the porthole, Gloria caught a glimpse of Vanessa’s form as she went about her circuit of the ship. The woman crouched and then leapt, jets of gas firing from hidden vents along her legs. The combination powered her upward and out of sight.

  There was a groan from the med bay. Warthen’s sedation wearing off. Xavi immediately went to check on him, and when he returned he said, “Used a spare bungee to secure him. Besides, there’s nowhere to go.”

  Gloria nodded.

  A moment of strange calm passed. No one saying anything. No alarms or fires or panicked voices. Just…quiet. Gloria reveled in it. One had to take such chances—

  “Yes? I’m here! I read you!” Vanessa said. “I am receiving—hello? Ah shit.”

  The comm abruptly clicked.

  “Vanessa?” Gloria asked. “What’s happening? Can you hear me?”

  Nothing. Thirty seconds passed. A minute. She was about to suit up and go out after the woman when the connection returned. A second later, Vanessa’s face appeared at the porthole again.

  “Are you okay?” Gloria asked, knowing she couldn’t be heard, but hoping her lip movement got the question across.

  “We’ve got a problem,” Vanessa said. There was a terrible shake to her voice.

  Come back in.

  “It’s not that,” she replied. “It’s Skyler.”

  Gloria held her breath. The others in the cabin went silent, too.

  “He made it,” Vanessa said. “Down to the surface of Carthage, I think. I heard him talking with Tim.”

  This is good, isn’t it? Why is this a problem?

  “That’s not the problem. Something’s messing with the comm. I can hear Skyler, and so can Tim. Tim is able to reply to him, but I cannot. I don’t think either of them can hear me. They don’t react when I talk. Must be too far. But that’s not it, either. It’s the others. They’re with Tim based on what he said, but they seem unaware of any of this.”

  “A range problem,” Xavi said. “Maybe we can boost it somehow—”

  Gloria tapped out a paraphrased version.

  “No,” Vanessa said. “You don’t understand. This isn’t a malfunction. It’s contrived. Eve did this. I never trusted that…entity. Is Alex awake? I need to talk to him.”

  “I’m here,” Alex replied. Both to Vanessa and via his speaker, so they could all hear him. Gloria hadn’t thought to use him as a conduit to talk with her. She still hadn’t decided if he was friend or foe.

  Vanessa went on. “Just now, could you hear Skyler, or Tim?”

  “No,” Alex said. All business, that one.

  “I still don’t understand what you’re upset about,” Gloria said. “This is progress, isn’t it?”

  Alex relayed the message.

  “You’re right,” Vanessa said. “You don’t understand. The problem is Tim. In theory, he could relay Skyler’s messages to the others. But he isn’t doing that. In fact, he just lied to them, said he hadn’t heard from Skyler. Instead of relaying the news, he just fucking abandoned him.”

  As she spoke her voice grew more and more steady. The quavering, a manifestation of shock, congealed into a steady anger. “Skyler has saved my life more times than I can count. We have to help him. Get to him somehow. Contact the others, at least, and let them know Tim is lying.”

  Gloria moved to Alex Warthen and leaned in close to his face. He understood instantly and enabled his transmitter. “Listen to me,” Gloria said into it. “At least we know they’re alive. And Xavi’s right, perhaps. Maybe both Tim and Skyler will be able to hear you if we can figure out a way to boost your signal. At least then you can let Skyler know we’re here, and that if Tim won’t help him, we will. Agreed?”

  “Agreed,” Vanessa said, after a moment’s thought.

  Gloria Tsandi waited. To see if Vanessa would say more, and if not, to give her time to get control of herself. After five seconds or so, she spoke with all the maternal calm she could muster. “Here’s what we’re going to do. First priority is survival. Second is finding a way to get a message to the others. Okay? Let them know we’re still out here, and let them know what Tim has done. Beyond that, well, you all know what needs to be done. We can’t leave the Wildflower sitting here all gift wrapped.”

  For one terrible moment Gloria thought the woman might disagree. That the burden of this knowledge and the slim chances of being able to do anything about it might crush what little spirit remained in her. The reply, when it came, was terse and monotone. “Okay. Okay. Expanding my search radius.”

  “Understood,” Gloria replied. “I can talk to you through Alex.”

  A minute passed. Then two. Finally, Vanessa spoke again. “Wow.”

  “What is it?” Gloria asked.

  “We’re not the only thing that crashed here.”

  “Do…” Gloria swallowed, tried again. “You mean the others? They’re here?”

  “No, no. This is debris. There’re impact sites all over the place.”

  Xavi cut in. “Debris from the Chameleon, probably.”

  “Or debris from us,” Gloria countered. “Vanessa, is any of it intact?”

  “It would take days to survey it all. But, my guess? No. Nothing larger than a…Hold on. Oh my God.”

  “What?”

  Silence stretched.

  “What is it?” Gloria tried again.

  “We’re not alone on this moon,” Vanessa replied.

  A lance of electric ice shot up Gloria’s spine. She pulled Alex over to the porthole.

  “Meaning what?” Xavi asked. Gloria echoed his question.

  “I…” Vanessa paused. “I see buildings. Lights. A small outpost or something, about six kilometers away.”r />
  Gloria felt her stomach tighten. “Scipio?”

  Outside the window, Vanessa fell into view, back to the ground. She landed, rolled, and bounded off toward a small outcropping about fifty meters away. Gloria watched, her fists clenched, as the woman crawled up to the peak and peered over. Vanessa whispered now, not that there was any reason to. “Yes. I think so. And there’s more. About thirty impact sites between here and there. If I’m not mistaken, the Scipios are searching each.”

  “Radio silence, everyone,” Gloria said. “Vanessa, get back inside.”

  The captain of the ruined ship glanced left. Beth Lee stood near the engineering console, her face the very picture of dread. Gloria turned to her right, and saw Alex Warthen beside her. An unknown element. At least he’d stopped shooting at everyone.

  Beside him, Xavi, her navigator and trusted companion of many years. For the first time since she’d known him, he looked like a defeated man, resigned to the fate coming for them. A fate incongruous with everything the man believed.

  He didn’t care about scuttling the ship, Gloria realized. He cared about going down with a fight. Not being a lamb awaiting slaughter. And deep down, Gloria found the same desire within herself, outshining her sworn duty.

  “Belay that order, Vanessa,” Gloria said.

  Xavi studied her, one eyebrow suddenly arched.

  “Everyone, get your helmets on,” she said. “Pack food and water, and anything that might be useful as a weapon.”

  Her navigator’s eyes widened. “This goes against orders, boss.”

  “You’re damn right it does.”

  A grin tugged at one corner of his mouth. “What are you thinking?”

  “There’s a Scipio outpost six klicks away. What I’m thinking is that we make a nuisance of ourselves.”

  “What does that mean?” Beth asked.

  Gloria ignored the question for a moment. She placed a hand on the smooth metal of the bulkhead, trailed her gloved fingers along its length, wishing more than anything that this wouldn’t be the last time. “It means,” she finally said, and with total calm, “all hands abandon ship.”

  Carthage

  SKYLER LET HIS feet guide him this way and that. Dark streets and plazas and alleys, all devoid of life, all in various stages of being reclaimed by the plant life of this world. Broad, gnarled root systems that spread wide above ground before plunging into the soil. The plants themselves were a mottled creamy-green hue and translucent. No flowers that he could see, though some had seedlike bulbs, which hung below corkscrewing leafy tendrils that stretched outward in domes vaguely resembling jellyfish.

  It should have fascinated him. He knew that on some level. Extraterrestrial plants. An alien city on an alien planet. Tania would have stopped to marvel, even theorize their evolutionary reasons for being shaped so, but he found no thirst for it. Quite the opposite, the thought only made him want to find her that much more. He kept his gaze firmly on the distant wispy thread of the Elevator. The way up, to the others.

  A climber had descended through the clouds. At least he thought it to be so. From here, it looked no more than a blob, like a tiny dewdrop trailing along a line of spider silk. Whatever it was it reflected the lights of the city below it. Skyler watched it until it vanished behind the silent monoliths of blackness on this side of the bay.

  Two cities, separated by a wide channel open to the frothy ocean. One alive and with a way to reach orbit, and one—the one he’d landed in—dead save for the responders who’d come to investigate his crash.

  How well had his instincts served him, back there? he wondered as he hiked ever downward toward the shore. Had the Scipios come from that city? Should he have simply allowed himself to be captured? No, he decided. Too much risk in that. They could just as easily have shot him without a second thought as capture him. And if they’d bound him, what then? What kind of prison would a species like this have waiting for an alien visitor on a world—indeed in a solar system—hell-bent on keeping prying eyes away?

  Ahead, the shore came into view. Massive smooth boulders piled into a seawall as old as anything on Earth. Here and there the buildings seemed to reach out from the city, right up to the water’s edge. Boathouses? Perhaps, but he couldn’t imagine anything working, much less afloat, in this run-down place.

  Lights caught his eye. Skyler glanced toward the flaring motion and went still. They were coming from the direction of the city. Spreading out, creating little glowing disks on the milky ocean waves. They were racing toward him.

  He turned and began to run, fighting for every breath in the alien air. He found a pocket of shadow between two curving pillars, diving between them just as the fleet of aircraft streaked overhead. They roared past, riding an eerie sound unlike any engine noise he’d ever heard. Crucially, they’d flown right over and kept going. Coming to help their friends, of that he had no doubt. Another response to his presence, and in force this time. No longer a curious inspection, but instead a reaction to a hostile situation. Skyler remained in the shadow, counted off twenty seconds. How long would it be before they figured out they had a killer on the loose? Worse, an agent of their chief enemy.

  He was about to move, when the sky exploded.

  A crackling sound that came from everywhere assaulted his ears, as if he’d been suddenly surrounded by a bunch of trigger-happy machine gunners. Little white flashes of light erupted all around him. The small explosions, like firecrackers, died in a rolling echo that went on for many seconds.

  Then the snow fell.

  Skyler watched, utterly shocked, completely fascinated, as the air as far as he could see was filled by a fine dust that swirled and swarmed. Eddies formed. Vortexes and currents. Great cords of dust that seemed almost intelligent as they flocked, coalescing into snakelike bands that dove out of the sky and vanished into open doorways or down side streets. A blast of warm air hit Skyler and he fell backward. The powder washed over his exposed face and neck. It seemed to crawl through his hair. Somehow Skyler had the presence of mind to keep his mouth and eyes closed. He held his breath, no easy feat in the poor air.

  As quickly as it had begun, the assault faded. The grit in the atmosphere danced lazily on the breeze, like winter’s first snow, as if it had all just…died. Maybe that was exactly the case. Skyler ran a hand over his face and studied the whitish powder. He could swear some of it still moved, jerky and inelegant, as if in death throes.

  He just stared at it, wondering if the conclusions his mind reached could possibly be true. Those aircraft had just strafed the entire city with a virus. Trillions upon trillions of tiny…what? Detectors? Sensors? Poisons? Looking for him?

  Anything foreign, probably. And he’d made a gaping hole in his visor. His fancy armored suit had been shredded. The specks on his hand that still crawled, were they even now transmitting their findings?

  Skyler leapt to his feet and bolted, running as fast as the thin atmosphere would let him. His breath came in heaving gulps. Never enough. The exertion left him wobbling, his footfalls unsure. He fell and did a clumsy roll down an embankment of polished stone. A building loomed in front of him, low and squat, just meters from the shore. Above, he heard the growing sounds of the aircraft. Skyler came to his knees, blinked away his disorientation, and studied the building. There, an open doorway, nothing but shadows beyond. He crawled to it and flopped onto the floor just inside, pulling his feet in to his chest at the last second as the aircraft howled overhead. They sounded only a scant few meters off the ground, moving very fast. The strange hum of their engines receded.

  For a time Skyler simply lay there. He put all his focus on his breathing, and did not move again until he could dictate mentally the pace and depth at which his lungs drew in the tangy thin air.

  Propped against a wall, he let his eyes adjust.

  The small chamber, perhaps five meters on a side, reeked of something like vinegar and mold. Along one wall there were bundles of fabric, the colors faded and obscured by years
of dust. Skyler stared at that filth for a moment, wondering just how much of it was truly “dust,” and how much were the dead or dormant viruses unleashed by the Scipios.

  A movement in the shadows across the room. The barest hint of noise, like a sheet being drawn from a bed. A snake? Something had slid back into shadow, the motion smooth and ominously quiet. Skyler sat very still. He held his breath, what little he had, but soon his lungs were screaming and he had to let the air out. He raised one shaking arm up and pointed his wrist toward the inky blackness across from him. Whatever it had been, it had either slinked away into the dark or coiled. He had to be ready for anything. Razor-sharp teeth, or the howling alarm of some terrified vermin. He had to stay awake. This he thought as he found his chin had come to rest against his chest and he could not say how long he’d been that way.

  Movement again. A face appeared. The barest hint of one, just gray skin in the void. The outline of cheekbones, and a long chin that protruded down and outward. A large vertical scar, long healed, ran down the length of its face. Two huge eyes like pools of calm water, and a third, smaller eye, higher up on the massive forehead. No nose. The mouth just a line of upper jaw covering the lower. Lips, teeth, all covered if they existed at all.

  Skyler stared, transfixed. Terrified. Two translucent eyelids slid slowly out from the center of the creature’s face and then, once they reached the edges, whipped back into their recessed position. Then, as if it had been waiting for that to happen, the third central eye up on the forehead blinked very purposefully, almost robotically.

  It simply looked at Skyler. He let it, did not move a muscle, though he kept his wrist aimed right between those two huge eyes.

  The upper jaw rose, revealing a thin pale lip and the mottled glint of filthy teeth. The lower jaw—no, jaws, for there were two connected by a flap of skin—spread out and down. There came a soft, almost melodic moan. Hoooooon. The sorrowful noise brought goosebumps to Skyler’s arms and up his spine. He fought to control his breathing, to keep himself still.

  Again the snakelike motion. Its arm, or perhaps a tail, curled around the side of the creature’s face from below and rubbed at a spot under one of its eyes. It was, Skyler realized, very much like a combination of tail and arm. Or rather, the upper arm and elbow of something mammalian with the lower arm able to move with the segmentation of a snake. Near the tip, the serpentine portion of the appendage changed again, separating into several—four, perhaps—fingers. Thin, long, nimble things that appeared able to entwine themselves in such a way as to appear as one solid end, a bit like the rattler of a rattlesnake.