Andromeda Expedition

by Carlos Arroyo González

  “Mr. Stockton,” Edelmann said. “I think you should do something about your personal hygiene.”

  “What are you implying?”

  “I've noticed that it's a matter you keep somewhat neglected.”

  “Yes, don't you like it? You can't call this a high society gentlemen's convention on a night at the opera. Besides, what would it matter if, say, we continued the rest of the mission in our underpants? Would it make any difference?”

  “I think somehow you find a certain pleasure in all this. Would you at least mind shaving and showering regularly?”

  “At least? Anything else, your excellency?”

  Edelmann drummed his fingers on the notebook without taking it out of his pocket. Just a small warning. Yellow card. And he left the cockpit.

  For a moment, Fox thought he saw a shadow the size of a continent beneath the surface of the ocean. But when he looked at the sky, he realized that it was only one of the incandescent clouds of that sky of cotton soaked in blood and black ink, which had crossed his path with that of Kronos.

  At least, of course, that's the story he told himself.

  Today, the possibilities for humanity have been multiplied by several trillions.

  Rodrigo Diaz, Chief of Operations of the first manned voyage using quantum leaping.

  The Titan's deck was a surface of about ten thousand square feet, with an almost smooth floor except for the access hatches to the cockpit and common area, and the numerous bulges and irregularities, which gave it the appearance of having been hammered into shape. The “titanium” reflected the meager light from Pharex, which was now struggling to break through the dense black haze that covered the sky. It was surrounded all around by a railing whose design was reminiscent of the joints of an arthropod. Leaning against it at the bow, Fox gazed at the horizon towards which they were heading at full speed, opening two arcs of water in their path. He allowed himself to remove his helmet, despite Dr. Edelmann's recommendations. Immediately he felt the water hitting his face, and the gray coolness of Erebus. For a moment he felt that everything would be all right. That image in the photograph could have been anything. They would find what they were looking for. They would get out of there, erase that burden at last. And save Emily.

  Footsteps echoed on the metal.

  “Fascinating place,” Isaac said, leaning on the railing next to Fox. A wave crashed against the bow, sending a volley of fine droplets into his helmet visor. “I've never seen anything like it.”

  Through the ocean droplets trickling down his helmet, Fox thought he saw a tear.

  “This is what I've dedicated my life to. This is what I've dreamed of,” Isaac tightened his grip on the railing. “These are the things that give meaning to the effort. To bring these wonders within the reach of man's hand, I think it's a noble enterprise, don't you think?”

  “No doubt.”

  They remained silent for a few minutes, contemplating the enormous ocean that seemed to extend beyond infinity, and that beneath its waters hid unimaginable wonders and dangers.

  “I still remember the first spacecraft I built. Do you know what I made it out of? With popsicle sticks. It was two feet long. It was as light as the wind. The Lightning, I called it. When I came home from school I worked on it. I had to manage not to be overheard by my parents. They wanted me to be an actor like my father, you know? So I'd wait for them to fall asleep, and by the light of a flashlight I'd get to work on the Lightning. I couldn't use anything too noisy, so I used the sticks from the ice cream I ate during the day, and the ones I asked my friends for. Yes, it was pretty gross although I made sure to wash them well. I glued them together, no screws or hinges. In the right places I made notches in the pieces to make them fit together. I made the propulsion system out of corn syrup, sugar, distilled water and potassium nitrate that I stole from the school lab. But I wanted to go further, so I figured what was the point of a spacecraft if there was no crew to carry and no destination to reach.

  “I was very fond of my hamster, Tarzan. But sometimes it made me sad to see him there in his cage every day, running in that wheel that never took him anywhere. On the rooftop of the town hall there was a garden where they cared for little animals as if they were kept in a palace. I calculated the height based on the angles of the shadows at different times. On launch day, from a nearby park, surrounded by several friends, I sent Tarzan towards his destination. And when I saw the Lightning arrive, it was clear to me what I wanted to devote the rest of my life to.

  “Will we make it back alive?” Fox said.

  Isaac looked at him as if he had seen a ghost.

  “Of course we will. What's that about, Stockton?”

  “I found something on the Albatross I'd like you to see.”

  They went down into the spacecraft. When they closed the airtight hatch it was as if they entered another world. They went to Fox's compartment. He opened his bag and took out the envelope with the photographs. He passed them through one by one, shook the envelope, looked inside the bag, but there was no trace of the image of that colossal beast.

  “It's not here. But I know where to look for it.”

  He went into Edelmann's room.

  “Mr. Stockton, you shouldn't come in here without Dr. Edelmann's permission.”

  “It's got to be here somewhere, that lunatic has taken it.”

  He rummaged through everything. He opened the cabinet.

  “Apparently,” Edelmann said from the doorway. “This is a habitual pattern of behavior for you. Snatching where you shouldn't.”

  “You took it! Where did you keep it!?”

  “What are you talking about, Stockton?”

  “The photo!”

  “I’m sorry to tell you that I do not know which photo you are referring to, and that I am beginning to seriously worry as a professional about your mental integrity. Mr. Norton, I'm afraid Mr. Stockton is somewhat disturbed.”

  Isaac nodded, with some pity.

  “Come with me, please,” Edelmann said. “I'll give you a sedative.”

  Fox spat in his face.

  Edelmann cast a meaningful glance at Isaac.

  “Mr. Stockton, don't make us do it by force,” he said, wiping his coat sleeve.

  “And how will that be? I' d like to see it.”

  Edelmann sighed and pulled a syringe from a drawer.

  “Are you out of your mind?” Fox tried to leave the room, but Edelmann blocked the door.

  Fox felt hands holding him from behind.

  “I'm so sorry, Stockton,” Isaac said. “It' s only until you feel better.”

  Fox kicked the air in front of him, trying to block Edelmann's advance, but Edelmann jabbed the syringe into his side.

  “It's for your own good, Fox.”

  Rocked by the gentle waves of the sedative, watching the patterns that the surface of the ocean drew on the ceiling of his bedroom, Fox imagined he was lying on that water mat forty years ago. The waves rocked him gently, but this time no one was with him and no one was pulling on the mat. Only the water dragged him out to sea. Sparkles on the crests of the waves. The icy water kissing his feet and hands. The pungent smell of the salt flooding his nostrils. A lethargic murmur. And in the background, the hint of a shadow as big as an island, lost in the horizon.

  It was impossible, and yet there it was. I saw it as clearly as I see that tomato stain on your tie.

  Julian F. Malek , Silk Bullets

  Lying on his narrow mattress, his body numbed by the sedative, much more potent than Dr. Edelmann had implied, Fox watched the reflections of the ocean's surface on the methacrylate ceiling, dancing and twisting in hypnotic loops. He was falling into a pleasant stupor when the door opened again.

  “Sorry to disturb you,” said Edelmann. He was holding something covered with a white sheet. “I just can't find a place to put this. I hope you don't mind if I leave it here.” He placed it on a low table. “It's just for tonight. Rest well.”

  As his footsteps rec
eded down the hallway, all was silent again, except for the constant chatter of the waves, which seemed to have intensified their chatter, as if they were wondering what was under that sheet. Or perhaps as if they were trying to warn him of what was there.

  It was a conical or pyramidal shape, about three feet high. The sheet fell around it in gentle undulations. He remembered Bruce's silhouette under the sheet in which he had wrapped him so that he did not have to see the expression on his face. He remembered the angles his joints formed under the cloth, and how somehow it was even more chilling not to be able to see what was underneath.

  Apparently, a shoal of creatures emitting a phosphorescent glow were swimming near the surface, their reflections fluttering on the ceiling like the visions of a kaleidoscope. Lights wandered across the furniture and crisscrossed over the wrinkles of the sheet. A merry dance on the sinister silhouette hidden under the white cloth.

  When they ceased it seemed to him that the sea was calmer too. It was then that something moved under the sheet, peeked over the edge and fell from the table with a thud. In the gloom of the cubicle he could barely make out what it was, but his body was so numb that he couldn't turn on the light. That thing was coming closer, crawling at a steady pace. In a brief flash of light that managed to sneak through the dark mist covering the sky, he could make out elongated legs, and a shiny black carcass. Then the darkness enveloped it again. When that creature reached the angle of the bed that hid his view of the floor, he lost sight of it completely. But in the vibrations of the mattress he could feel it ascending, little by little. Some of his small steps caused a tearing sound in the sheet with which he was covered. And then he saw it appear, at the height of his legs. A horror of almost two feet, an arachnoid with a black abdomen whose small protuberances reflected the scarce light that managed to enter through the glass smoked by the black mist of the planet. Its mouth was a dark pit surrounded by several rows of hundreds of small teeth, located at the end of a proboscis.

  He was hit by a strong smell of salt and rotten fish. He felt the smell hit the roof of his mouth.

  The creature climbed up his leg. As it advanced, Fox felt the creature's sharp legs clawing into his skin. And then it bit him. Or rather it pierced him with that hollow proboscis protruding from the center of his head. He felt pain like never before in his life. There was a sucking sound along with a gurgling, like that of a saliva ejector. A shock of despair overcame him completely. He screamed at the top of his lungs.

  The creature ran back to the sheet. Towards its sheet. And he crawled under it.

  The door burst open.

  “What is it?” Edelmann said, turning on the light.

  Fox pointed to the sheet, barely lifting a finger, with as little movement as his daze would allow.

  “It bit me! That thing bit me!”

  Dr. Edelmann reached over to the small table and pulled back the sheet with a jerk. Underneath was the huge shell that Fox had seen him pull out of the water during the diving session.

  “I checked it before, it was empty.”

  “Well, it's not!”

  “I need you to calm down. This is not good for your recovery.”

  “No, of course it's not good! It was eating my leg!”

  Edelmann approached. Rocked by the effects of the powerful anxiolytic, for a moment Fox clearly saw Bruce's profile silhouetted against the halogens on the wall. He had put on a few pounds and had grown a beard, but he knew that if he could see what the beard concealed he would find a pale scar where he had plunged the knife. He probably still had some of the dirt under his fingernails that he had broken through during the escape from his makeshift grave.”

  “That looks pretty nasty. I'll go get some disinfectant and antibiotics.”

  Before walking away he glanced at his watch and jotted something in his notebook. Fox could read: “3:43 a.m. Severe self-injury.”

  Fox was showering in a darkened bathroom. He came out, orienting himself by the dim glow coming from the door. He was barefoot. The floor oozed some dense, sticky substance. He walked through a long hallway to the stairs leading down to what he knew would be the exit. In the gloom of the stairway he saw a pale figure approaching. He was assaulted by an intense rotten smell. He turned and walked back through the corridor, stepping carefully so as not to slip on the slime that covered everything. The putrid smell became much stronger. When he turned around to convince himself that he had nothing to fear, and that there was nothing there that could hurt him, he saw Bruce's face, white as plaster, his mouth unhinged in an impossible grimace.

  He woke with restrained screams, as if someone was placing an icy hand over his mouth. He was relieved to find that the thing was no longer on the table. In fact, it was hard to believe that a few hours earlier it had really been there. Also the effect of whatever Dr. Edelmann had given him seemed to have worn off, and he was grateful to be able to move. On his right thigh was a white bandage taped with duct tape, as an anchor to the reality of what had happened during the night. On the bedside table, a bloody fountain pen. Had Edelmann put it there to make him think he had done it to himself? And hadn't he allowed him to see what he had written in the notebook for the first time?

  The Titan cut across the surface of the ocean, shot toward the place where all communication with the crew of the Albatross Expedition had been lost.

  He looked as if there was nothing, as if nothing was watching him from that abyss.

  Hank Levingston, Chronicles

  Pharex had hidden behind a layer of thick clouds. The surface of the Great Ocean was an ochre desert and the high waves its dunes, outlined by the white moss of the foam.

  “I'm glad to see you're feeling better,” said Dr. Edelmann as Fox limped into the common room. It smelled like overheated pasta. On the table was a bowl of half-eaten food. Fox didn't answer. He picked up a mug and poured himself coffee. It was still burning. He had to restrain the urge to throw it in Edelmann's face. On the other hand, he was glad that the impression that Dr. Edelmann was actually Bruce seemed to have been just a bad trick of his drugged mind.

  “I hope you don't hold it against me.” Edelmann said. “I simply did what I had to do. Any slip-up could cause everything to go down the drain.”

  Fox took a bite of a bagel.

  “You know,” Edelmann continued, “I worked for years on the first prototype of the Tentzer cortical implant. It's one of the ones that made my company famous.”

  Fox stopped mid-chew.

  “Of course, we didn't call it that at first,” the doctor said. A rather thick crumb had become entangled in his beard, and it moved as Edelmann spoke, but never quite fell out. “For us it was simply Project TX. By chance we discovered the right neural connections. The exact right switch. We had before us a world of possibilities. I know those marks under the eyes, Mr. Stockton. I know you'd kill for one of those things.”

  “I don't know what you're talking about,” Fox popped the rest of the bagel into his mouth.

  Dr. Edelmann smiled.

  “Of course not.”

  “Gentlemen,” Isaac's voice said over the internal PA system. “Prepare for the dive. During the storm we will be safer below the surface.”

  As the first drops of the storm began to trickle down the Titan's sight glass, Isaac activated the dive system. The spacecraft submerged with a bubbling sigh. They turned on the exterior lights and their surroundings were illuminated with a ghostly glow. A few feet to starboard they were followed by a shoal formed by beings of about two feet, whose bodies consisted of two planes joined perpendicularly across their central axis. At the front, a large suction cup, and around it, thin appendages that floated around, probing the water in front of them. The planes that formed their bodies were white and furrowed with dark veins that seemed to pulsate as the creature propelled itself through the gloom. They were edged by lights that outlined its silhouette. They reminded Fox of the snake of light that ran across the Pendant Gun's ceiling, a place that now might as well be
the magical kingdom of Oz.

  One of them broke away from the rest and headed toward the Titan. The luminous snake ran along the inside of the cockpit. Suddenly, picking up extra momentum, the creature rushed against the cockpit window and stuck there with its large suction cup. And then they could see a thin row of teeth, or rather spines, running along the suction cup's entire diameter. The creature was trying to suck, and as it did so, there were squeaking noises on the glass, as when someone runs his hand over a fogged mirror.

  Mesmerized by the sucking, they were startled when a much larger animal, about ten feet tall, emerged from the darkness and captured the wretched creature. A dark mist formed in the water in front of the glass.

  Shortly afterwards the predator showed itself again. It was now making movements with its head to swallow the suckerfish. It was about to leave again when it suddenly seemed to become aware of something. It turned around and looked at them, although perhaps that was not the most appropriate word since that horror had no eyes.

  It plunged down, melting into the darkness. A few seconds later, they felt a thump on the underside of the spacecraft.

  Isaac put on the viewfinder, and suddenly he was staring into the gloom of the water, illuminated only by the yellowish glow of the Titan's lights. He flicked the camera with his thumb, and when the creature took up his entire field of view, he jumped back in his chair, feeling the scope dig into the bridge of his nose.

  “It's just below.”

  He readied one of the Titan's stingers, an articulated harpoon ending in a carbon tip, which he had explained to them, upon contact with an organic body, released two liters of a neurotoxic poison. Fox had learned to believe only half of Isaac's explanations, so that might as well be orange juice. But then again, he supposed, a two-liter injection of orange juice would have an equally lethal effect.