by Maksim Malik
I do have a romance to read, Nadani said. Is Dr. Tysgan reading already?
Park says he is, Adan said.
I suppose I’ll join him, she said.
She opened the book she read on her mental overlay and started reading. While she read some questions formed in her head. Would Trisha be there? What would she do to get Trisha back?
#
At 10:03:05 GST seven sols later, Astromancer came out of foldspace. The small station stood out like a shining gem amongst the stars, reflecting light from the local star at the ship’s cameras.
“Astromancer SM522-16A, do you need access to any labs?” came a woman’s voice from Zarzycki docking control.
“Negative, Zarzycki,” she answered.
“Docking pad six—that’s zero six,” came the immediate response. “Fees are hourly.”
“Understood, Zarzycki. Thank you,” Nadani said. Docking control sent the docking path to the ship and Nadani set the course.
“Not much traffic, so we get to go straight to the docks,” Nadani said over the com to Dr. Tysgan. She had secured herself inside the pilot’s pit several minutes before their arrival.
“Excellent, yes,” he responded.
Once Astromancer docked, Nadani left the pit and found Dr. Tysgan standing at the exit of the bridge.
“Are we calling ahead or going to the office?” a new voice said over the intercom. It startled her for a moment.
Park, Adan said. It still has access to the ship.
Ah, right, Nadani said. She had not removed Park’s access to the ship for two reasons. Firstly, Park could acquire access any time it wanted and secondly, she trusted Dr. Tysgan and Park with her life. After what they did to save her, she had implicit trust in them.
“We’re going straight to the office,” Nadani said. “If we’re not allowed in within a reasonable time then Adan will open the door if it’s locked.”
“Good approach,” Dr. Tysgan said. “This is urgent. More important than anything they must talk about now.”
“Let’s go,” Nadani said as she walked to Dr. Tysgan. He let her pass and followed.
Leaving the docks behind they stepped into the station proper.
Here’s a map of the place and where we’re going, Adan said, bringing up a small map on her overlay. It’s not far. The station is rather diminutive.
It is compared to Sulai, Nadani said. Then she remembered Sulai no longer existed and frowned as a surge of depression tried to overwhelm her. She took a deep breath and forced it back, locking it away as best she could. Adan watched her with keen interest but said nothing.
As they walked through the station Nadani received several stares. Unrecognizable Commanders in border stations were a rare thing, most especially if they left the docks to pursue something inside the station itself. She resisted the urge to glare back at people and continued walking. She wondered if Dr. Tysgan had the same happening to him. A small community like this one might look in askance at any newcomer.
When they arrived at the station manager’s office, they found an empty waiting room filled with plush sofa chairs, and a desk occupied by a female parton. Her light blue skin was the only splash of color in the all-white room. The parton’s ident showed her to be Jithya Tabak, secretary to the station manager. Nadani walked forward to speak to her.
“Yes, how can I be of assistance this sol?” Tabak said politely.
“We’d like to see the station manager,” Nadani began, “over a matter of great urgency regarding the station and an impending alien attack.”
“What?” Tabak said, looking Nadani in the eye. “You think they’ll attack here? I saw the reports about Sulai and Jehlengen stations. Everyone is in a panic.”
“We do. I’m sorry,” Nadani said feeling a pang in her heart. This was where these people lived, but they would have to leave it—and everything they knew—behind.
“Aishwarya, you have two people waiting to see you,” Tabak said, pausing as she heard a response. “I know you are busy, but this is an emergency. They have reason to believe the Squitoes will attack here next.” She paused again. “You can go right in,” she said to Nadani, indicating the large door to the back of the room.
“Thank you,” Nadani said, truly grateful.
Nadani looked back to Dr. Tysgan, and he gave her an encouraging grin. Nadani took the lead and headed to the larger door. Once through the doorway she found herself nearly face-to-face with a woman about her height, but broader and more muscular—certainly not what she expected of a station manager.
“Aishwarya Latessa at your service,” the woman said gruffly and held out her hand for Nadani to shake.
Nadani shook the proffered hand and tried not to wince. The woman’s hand clamped around hers tightly and painfully. Relief flooded through her when the brief contact broke.
“I’m Nadani Jagi, and this is Dr. Tysgan,” she said, indicating Dr. Tysgan with a nod of her head.
“What’s this about an alien attack?” Latessa asked, folding straight to the issue. “Is this about the Squitoes?”
“Yes, it’s about those. We’ve discovered among the data we have a reason to believe the next strike target is meant to be here, Zarzycki station.”
“How did you figure that out?” Latessa asked.
“There is coordinate, date, and time data embedded on images of station from data hack we performed,” Dr. Tysgan said. “It became matter of finding station and decoding data.”
“Any estimate on the time of attack?” Latessa asked, putting her hands behind her back, and paced around the room.
About three hours and eight minutes, Adan said.
“Around three hours,” Nadani said. “We can show you the data if you’d like.”
“Send it via Exanet. And you would have me, what, evacuate the entire station?” Latessa asked and shook her head. “The whole thing seems impossible.”
“We saw what happened to both stations firsthand,” Nadani said. “And we saw the force that did it. It didn’t take them long to destroy the station, I guarantee it.”
“I understand,” Aishwarya Latessa said, nodding and waving her head in Nadani’s direction. A long moment passed—perhaps she examined the information sent to her. “I’ll do it, but I don’t believe it’s happening. It doesn’t feel real, does it? I mean, everything seems like a normal sol until you two show up.”
“So,” Dr. Tysgan said. “Pods for everyone?”
“Not quite enough pods,” Latessa said. “But I’ll hold some of the larger ships and funnel the rest of the citizens to those. There’s a transport ship that is basically empty which will hold many people. We have a pretty strict contingency plan and thankfully one of our local news reports went over that plan lately, so a good amount of people will know it.”
“Is there anything we need to do to help out?” Nadani asked.
“No, best get back to your ship and stay clear of the station,” Latessa said. “I’m signaling for Gershan fleet backup just in case. Maybe we won’t lose the station—at least not without a fight.”
Signaling the fleet is a good idea, Adan said. There might be some ships on the border already—possibly close enough to get here within three hours.
I hope the Gershani get here fast enough to collect the escape pods or this is all for nothing if the Squitoes go after those, Nadani said.
I am certain with heightened alert from the previous attacks we will receive a ship or two at least, Adan said.
“—have your own, Aishwarya?” Dr. Tysgan asked.
Nadani had no idea what they talked about. She focused too much on talking to Adan.
Dr. Tysgan asked if the station manager has her own ship, Adan said.
“I do. A small craft, but I’ll take on some others just as well,” Latessa responded.
“Okay, contact us if you need us for some reason,” Nadani continued. “We’ll hang around until everyone is scooped up.”
“Will do, and my thanks,” Latessa said a
nd nodded at both Nadani and Dr. Tysgan.
With that, Nadani nodded, turned, and strode toward the exit. By the time they were halfway to their ship the streets were bustling with people. Latessa must have given the orders already. Nobody seemed to panic, which was a relief, although plenty of people appeared angry or grumpy.
“That wasn’t so bad,” Nadani said as they entered the ship.
“No, thought she would refuse, at first,” Dr. Tysgan said. “Good that she acts.”
“The sooner we undock the better,” Nadani said and walked swiftly to the bridge. “The traffic is going to get crazy with all those pods coming out soon.”
Nadani secured herself into the pit as fast as possible.
“Zarzycki docking control, Astromancer SM522-16A requesting undocking privileges,” she said over the appropriate channel.
“Astromancer, docking control has set mode to free undock—undock at your own discretion,” said the same woman from before. “Please watch for traffic on your way out and do not exceed station speed limits.”
“Wilco,” Nadani said. “3, 2, 1—blastoff,” she said to herself as the ship lifted from the docking pad. She had to wait for some traffic, but soon she took toward the stars. Once she reached what she thought a safe distance, a few kilometers, she slowed the ship and turned it to face the station. It was amazing and awful to see the pods ejecting all around the station.
The people in the pods must be terrified, she thought. Although safe from the station’s destruction, they were still vulnerable.
“Now we wait, yes?” Dr. Tysgan asked.
“Yes, we wait until the armada arrives,” Nadani said. And then what?
We go after Trisha. She’s probably in the large ship behind the bulk of the armada, Adan said.
Do you think Dr. Tysgan is okay with it? Nadani asked.
I’m not certain, Adan said. But you can ask.
“Dr. Tysgan,” she began. “When the armada arrives, I want to go after Trisha. If you don’t want to do that, maybe we can find another ship for you before then.”
“No, I go for Trisha too,” Dr. Tysgan said. “I did not leave you. I cannot leave her either,” Dr. Tysgan said.
“Thank you,” Nadani said after a long pause, surprised Dr. Tysgan felt so strongly about it.
It took two hours of waiting before dreadnoughts arrived. One Gershani dreadnought came, Krytan, and the other, surprisingly, was a JUS navy ship, Koyanagi. JUS ships rarely came into Gershan space since Gershan had its own strong military, but Gershan was a part of the JUS, so the attacks might have drawn the interest of the core politicians as well. Both the Gershani and the JUS ship began collecting escape pods. Some ships—probably the ones without foldspace systems—docked with the larger ships.
Nadani sighed with relief. At least help arrived.
If These Walls Could Talk
Trisha drank from the makeshift fountain she created into the pipeline behind the walls of the ship. The storage room she used as her first hiding spot had plenty of building supplies; she just needed to be careful about making noise. Too much noise and she knew they would discover her behind the walls.
This sol she would execute the next step in her plan. Her stomach complained greatly, and she needed to get out of there—though truth be told she ought to be hungrier. Trisha assumed the sweetened water had something to do with it. Whatever mixed with the water helped stave off her hunger but not in its entirety. The mere thought of reducing herself to eating meat from the aliens made her nauseated. She hoped the aliens fed the captured people more than sweetened water.
After getting her fill of water, she walked away from the fountain, probably for the last time, multitool in her pocket, and modified blaster at her hip. She followed the wall a certain direction, imagining the hallway outside as she did, focusing hard on what she had learned of the layout of the ship. Whenever she reached an intersection, she climbed over the wall in front of her and flattened herself through a crawlspace at the top to cross to the other side of the hallway. The alien crawlspaces were Trisha-sized. A cramped space, the area above the wall reminded her of some of the spaces she crawled into to fix ships, so claustrophobia never came to her.
It took much longer to travel the ship this way, but safety was paramount. Fifteen minutes later of quietly walking, climbing, and crawling Trisha made it to her destination—she hoped. She crouched low, put her ear on the wall, and stilled her breathing. She heard nothing but the quiet roar of her blood flow echoing in her own ear. Taking out her multitool, she carefully, purposely, and quietly removed a small section of the wall. The wall had smaller sections near the bottom and larger sections above it, perhaps for the simple reason of easy access for maintenance.
Trisha held the section of metal by the small handle at the top of it on the back, so it wouldn’t go screeching and clattering to the floor. She carefully leaned out of the wall and appraised the area, finding it clear, and slid the section to the floor as softly as she could. She made it.
Stepping out of the wall-space, her anxiety mixed with surprise. The docking area had not a single alien in it. She slipped her multitool back into her pocket and unhooked the blaster from her belt and held it at the ready. No cameras in evidence anywhere in the ship, Trisha could feel eyes on her, prickling her back. All the ships, small fighters, lined up almost perfectly and each had the cockpit open. They were flat, wide ships, like pebbles used to skip across lakes and ponds, made of the same greenish material the interior of the larger ship used.
Trisha held the blaster with both hands and stepped away from the wall and into the open area of the docks, looking all around her as she went. The nerve-wracking few seconds ended fast as she made it to the ships. She wondered which one to take. If she took the first one at the end row where she was now, then it would be more obvious there was a missing ship. That meant she needed to take one of the ships farther down the column. She decided on the second-to-last ship.
A ladder extended from the cockpit to the floor. The rungs were close together and easy to climb. Getting into the ship itself was another matter. She had to lie down on top of the ship and scoot inside the opened slit. The pilots flew their ships lying down. As soon as she pulled her arm in after scooting inside, the cockpit slid shut. The seat of the ship had no give to it, like she sat on large rocks. She supposed since they were designed for chitinous bodies, soft cushions were unnecessary.
The docking bay remained open, showing an expanse of stars. Trisha examined the controls in front of her—on the ceiling—and made no sense of it. Nothing glowed or lit up, for the ship needed to be powered on, but she couldn’t even figure out which button did that. She guessed and pressed a large yellow button, wincing in anticipation—but nothing happened. Pressing several other buttons yielded the same lack of response.
This was a terrible idea, Trisha thought, yawning.
She tried some of the levers and dials—nothing.
Her eyelids grew heavy; she knew she should have slept before attempting this. She operated for sols without sleep and now she laid flat, sleep caught up to her as her eyes closed and the world blurred around her.
#
Trisha jolted awake. She panicked for a moment, not recognizing her location, but after a few seconds, she remembered.
Right, the ship, she thought and berated herself for falling asleep.
The ship! All the lights shined, and panels displayed information in a language she didn’t recognize. Trisha could even see it had a few cameras and found herself astonished at what she viewed. The docks swarmed with aliens rushing to spaceships.
Oh, stars, Trisha said, thinking herself caught. Please don’t have assigned ships!
After her initial panic, she observed more carefully. Aliens headed toward the same ship, even climbing the same ladder, but the first one in made the ship power itself on and cause the other aliens to rush to another ship. She thought it was inefficient behavior, but in her favor with her ship already powered.
Soon all the ships were filled, and the rest of the aliens filed out of the docking bay. She focused her attention on the docking slot and this time saw a station in the distance. Suddenly red beams struck at it coming from her direction and the station exploded. There were two massive ships waiting—dreadnoughts.
Her ship lifted off without Trisha pressing a single button. It flew toward the exit slot at such a speed she thought another ship would crash into it, but she made it out into open space. After about fifteen seconds the bright red controls shifted to light blue. As she waited, scared to press anything, the engines died down and she stopped—relative to the two large dreadnoughts in the distance.
Should I try flying it? If I fly it, then will they shoot at me? she thought. The dreadnoughts had set loose their own fighters. What do I do?
For Trisha
Without so much as a warning, the Squito armada popped into local space, targeted the station, and fired, all within a few seconds. The station shields held for nearly three seconds before the Squito firepower—all firing on the exact same spot—burst through. The station exploded spectacularly, filling the viewscreen with white-orange light. The dreadnoughts returned fire almost as fast and instead of vanishing the armada broke formation and sped toward the two large ships, firing at them.
Nadani put thrusters on full and transferred power from weapons to thrusters to boost their speed even higher. She aimed the ship toward the large ship which stayed disengaged from the fighting. Astromancer burned in a straight line for a good half a minute before any of the Squito ships took notice.
Two on our tail, Adan said.
Nadani acknowledged it wordlessly and flew evasively, rolling, looping, and diving frequently, but kept the ship pointed in the general direction of her destination. Adan knew what to do and already adjusted shields to strengthen in areas where enemy fire would hit. Nadani split the extra power from weapons to both shields and thrusters.
Behind her, Nadani noticed the dreadnoughts deployed fighters to engage the Squitoes. It seemed the smaller alien crafts did not anticipate this and were destroyed with rapid speed. Nadani hoped some friendly fighters would come their way, but she realized they traveled at such a speed that it would take too long for anyone to catch up to Astromancer.
