by Joshua James
“I’m seeing my dead goddamn husband,” Clarissa said again. She felt tears on her cheeks, and it just made her angrier. “Is that funny enough for you?”
“Shit,” LeFay said.
“That’s all you have to say?” Clarissa asked.
“Really shit,” offered LeFay.
Clarissa blew out her cheeks. “Why do I bother?”
“That’s damn interesting,” LeFay said. “Do you hear him all the time?”
“No.”
“When did this start? On Earth?” LeFay shook her head. “Does everyone on Earth hear ghosts? Must be all the pollution.”
“God, you’re a bitch,” Clarissa said, wiping her tears away. “And no, it wasn’t Earth. It was those creepy alien bastards on that ship.”
At that, LeFay sat forward. “No shit?”‘
Clarissa was instantly uncomfortable. Seeing LeFay taking something seriously was unnerving. “I don’t know how to describe it. They reached into my mind, made me relive my memories.” She shook her head. “Really bad memories. Ever since, I’ve been hearing him. It’s like they imported him, or the memory of him, into me.”
LeFay rubbed her chin. “Here’s the real question. Does he try and make you do anything?”
“Like what?”
“Anything you wouldn’t do otherwise?”
“Not that I can think of,” Clarissa said. “If I’m being honest, it’s … kinda nice to have him there.”
Clarissa meant it. His spectral comfort had helped her survive out on the streets of the city, and escape the Shapeless and cultists. “Not sure I’d have dragged your ass all the way here without his encouragement.”
“Well, I never met your better half in that arranged marriage the AIC put you in, but he sounds nice.”
Clarissa rolled her eyes, knowing how little LeFay cared for the institution. “Lots of agents were like that.”
“You seem to have gone with it. A real family gal.”
Clarissa sighed. “I suppose I did.”
“And the girls? Do you hear them?”
Clarissa was silent, but her lip must have trembled.
“My bad,” LeFay said, hands raised. “Really, that’s on me. I just figured you might see them, too.”
“God, you’re a bitch, LeFay.”
“So what’s the plan, then?” Tomas asked.
“We need to get to UEF space,” Ben said. “I still know some people in the military. I can warn them of what’s coming.”
“And then what?” Ada asked. “Just leave the AIC to the Shapeless?”
“They aren’t going to spread to other planets in AIC space. Not yet, at least.”
“What makes you so sure? If you want us to trust you and go with your plan, you need to tell us what you’re hiding.”
Ben took a deep breath then exhaled slowly. “Okay, so, where do I start? Back when I was on Earth, before the Atlas launched and there were those terrorist attacks on Annapolis. Wait, I should probably….before the attacks. I was on my way to my parents’ place. They were having a party for my old man. They wanted to celebrate the launch of his historic mission on a historic ship. I was running late because I’d had a…a long night.
“Anyway, I was running late, decided to take the mag rail from my apartment to the Naval Base and my parents. But before I got there, I was stopped by an Oblivion cultist. At least, he looked like one. He gave me a hyper drive. At the time I didn’t think anything of it. But turns out…” Ben shook his head.
“What was on it?” Tomas asked as he cleaned the barrel of his rifle.
“It was a conversation, a series of communications back and forth between someone from the UEF and the AIC.”
“Who?” Ada asked.
“I’m not sure, but they were sharing information back and forth. They knew about the Shapeless, though they just referred to them as the Oblivion does, as the ‘saviors’. These two, they knew that the Shapeless were coming. They knew that they’d strike both Vassar-1 and Earth. They knew their plans. At least, that’s what it read like.”
“What do they want? Or what did these two sources say they wanted?”
“They want the total devastation of humankind, and to replace them. Apparently these two sources on the hyper drive were going to try and negotiate with the aliens, find some way to spare a planet for survivors to live on.”
“Negotiating with these things seems a bit … far-fetched,” Tomas said.
“No kidding,” Ben said. “I truly don’t think they realized what they were up against.”
“I still don’t understand what these aliens are doing in the first place,” Ada said. “Why not just wipe us out and have that be that? Why try and replace us?”
“I dunno,” Ben said. “As far as I can tell, nobody does. But it all started with the Atlas. In the documents on the drive, it was clear that they wanted the weapon that was on the Atlas. I’m not entirely sure what that weapon was; only my dad and maybe a few generals and the Prime Minister knew what that was. But the drive had the location on the ship, and it suggested that it was a planet killer.” Ben hesitated. “And that part, at least, I can confirm. ‘Planet killer’ wasn’t a term my father ever used, but others did.”
“Well, they pretty faithfully recreated the Atlas,” Ada said. “So they must have it.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” Ben said.
“It’s a wreck now,” Tomas said.
“You saw what they were using it for on those people,” Ada snapped. “I think these aliens are pretty good at turning lemons into lemonade. Hell, for all we know, they planned to put it down on the planet’s surface anyway. Maybe we just sped it up.”
Ben was silent for a moment while he digested that thought. Had everything he and the others done only hastened the Shapeless’ plan? It felt like a rock had landed in the pit of his stomach. He tried to shake it off and continue.
“Whatever the case with the Atlas, it seems the assumption of the men on the drive was that the Shapeless weren’t going to take over every planet in human-occupied space, not at first. First they wanted to sow seeds of discontent between the UEF and AIC.”
“That’s not much of a challenge,” Tomas said.
“Once they ramped up the fighting, they’d take over key colonies.” Ben shrugged. “Then they’d destroy the other planets instead of trying to turn them.”
“Is that really what they said?” Tomas asked, sounding incredulous.
“I filled in some blanks, but it makes sense. It’s what I’d do if I was an evil genocidal shapeshifting alien. My only issue is whether or not they actually got this mystery weapon from the Atlas. When we saw her, she was pretty totaled. Without that, I don’t what else they could use.”
“They have another option,” Clarissa said.
The others turned to her. “How’s LeFay?” Ada asked.
“She’s fine.”
“What’s this other option?” Ben asked.
“The AIC had one of those planet killers themselves. That’s why they abducted me, I think. To try and find out where it is.”
“And do you know where it is?” asked Ada.
Clarissa crossed her arms. “I do. And it’s closer to Earth then you’d think.”
“Where?” Ben asked.
Clarissa’s eye twitched. “Europa,” she croaked out before a coughing fit overcame her.
“Europa?” Tomas asked incredulously. “That’s a constant battlefield! I can’t believe the AIC would hide anything so important on that disaster of a planet.”
“Ballsy,” Ada said.
“Stupid,” said Tomas. For the duration of the war between the two factions, Jupiter’s most hospitable moon had been in a never-ending stalemate that had cost both sides several million lives.
“No wonder those bastards refuse to surrender,” Ben said. He thought back to his time on Europa, as well as his father’s time there.
“So with all this new info, what’s the plan? Because we need to make some moves,” Ada
said.
Ben sat back, an idea forming in his head. He just needed to talk it out of there, as his old man would say. “First things first. We need to raid that assimilation center at the Atlas.”
Tomas frowned. “Why?”
“In case there are others on this planet that know about the AIC’s planet killer.”
Ada nodded agreement. “Plus we can check to see if the fake Atlas had the UEF’s planet killer as well.” She stood up, effectively ending the meeting. “We need to rendezvous with my other group first. Get more manpower. Probably going to need as many people as we can get.”
“Agreed,” Ben said. “Once we do that, and hopefully all make it out alive, we need a ride off-planet. We need to make it out of AIC space to Europa first, then Earth.”
“The bunker is totaled, so that cruiser is out of the question,” Tomas said.
Ben shook his head. “If we don’t have a ride off this rock, we can’t go blowing things up.” He tried to think of a way to get off Vassar-1.
“I got a ride,” said LeFay.
Ben turned to see her leaning against the doorframe, looking remarkably better than the last time he’d seen her. “You clean up decent for a cyborg,” he said.
“So do you, pretty boy.”
“You have a ride?” Tomas asked. “Where? I know damn well there isn’t one on the roof.”
“Don’t worry about it, big boy. I’ll take you guys there.”
“Why can’t you just tell us?”
“You can’t find your way off this block without a map,” LeFay said. “So how can I explain it to you?”
Ben grunted. “So it’s far from here?”
“It should be,” Clarissa said. “Otherwise it would be toast.”
“But first we gotta hit that assimilation center, huh?” LeFay asked. “I’m in.”
“Good,” Ada said, hands on hips. “Five hours. Everyone rest, try to get some sleep.”
Ben stood with her. “Five hours from now we get out of here,” he said. “And then we get off this damn planet.”
“Amen,” Tomas said. “I’m going to bed.”
Five
Failure
Ducar stood outside the same train station that Vesta and a handful of other zealots had chased Clarissa into. “And she never came back up?”
“None of them did,” answered one of the zealots. He’d been aboard the ship that had dropped them off.
Ducar’s grip tightened on the submachine gun in his hands. He tried his best to hide his anger, but it was hard. The Oblivion not only gave him purpose, but also sparked a passion inside him that could easily turn to rage. “I don’t care about the others,” he said.
“Yes, sir.”
“And you haven’t heard from her since?”
“No sir, we haven’t. We tried to raise her on her HUD, but…”
“Did you go down there and try to find her?”
The cultist pilot looked a little panicked. He knew that he hadn’t, and was afraid of Ducar’s reaction when he told him so. It was funny how, even clad in his body armor, face fiercely painted with blood and armed to the teeth, he could still be and look so scared.
“No, you didn’t, did you? You just left her and the others to their fate, didn’t even back them up.”
Ducar didn’t give the pilot time to answer. He walked into the train station. Two other zealots followed him in. The pilot tried to stay behind.
Ducar stopped, turned around, and looked at the nervous pilot. “What are you waiting for? Come. We need to find our brothers and sisters.”
Glass cracked and scraped under Ducar and his fellow zealots’ feet as they traversed the train station. Without any witnesses to guide them, he had to use what remained of his city sentinel skills to help him track down where his Vesta and Clarissa had gone.
“Sir! Empty cartridges.” One of Ducar’s zealots knelt down and sifted through the shards of glass with gloved hands. He picked up a couple of spent bullet casings.
Ducar went over to his man and took a spent cartridge from him. He smelled it. The aroma of gunpowder still lingered on the metal. They’d been just recently fired.
“We have to follow the trail of bullets,” Ducar said aloud to no one in particular. He kept his eyes on the ground as he did exactly that. The trail of bullet casings led him just outside the entrance to the Vassar-1 Gold Line. He took out his flashlight and shined it on the archway that served as that entrance; he didn’t see anything at first, but he had to keep looking.
“You three, with me.” Ducar attached his flashlight to his submachine gun, snapping it on easily right below the barrel.
His boots hit the gravel around and under the subway tracks. They made a crunching sound that echoed throughout the tunnel, rocks rubbing together. It wasn’t just his footsteps; the two zealots that came with him and the pilot that brought up the rear made just as much noise.
“Vesta!” Ducar called out in the darkness. He hated himself for feeling what he felt: worry, sadness, and the bitterness of bile rising in his soul.
He was worried that he’d find what he expected. The Oblivion had taught Ducar that the death of a human being was in no way a loss. It shouldn’t be mourned or avoided, but promoted and celebrated, because in death a person became one with the Abyss and experienced everlasting peace. Their memory, their visage, the person they were, would continue in the waking world as a better Shapeless version of themselves. So why mourn?
With all that said, Ducar dreaded finding his only friend and companion dead. Vesta was the only person that got him on any level. Though love was strictly forbidden in the Oblivion, he thought he loved her, as much as a broken man such as himself could.
“Stop!” Ducar halted his fellow zealots. In the near distance, he saw a body lying across the train tracks. It was a man’s body. From the wounds and the amount of blood, it was clear that zealot had been cut up with a knife.
And he wasn’t alone.
Another body was quickly found. There were more bullet casings, and the displacement of the gravel around them showed that there had been a fight. Ducar determined that Clarissa must’ve had the advantage. He remembered the Pale Man and the Shapeless examining her after her capture; she had artificial eyes, so it didn’t take much for him to put things together and realize that she’d ambushed the zealots in the dark—had used her night vision as the advantage and pretty much slaughtered them.
Vesta should’ve known that Clarissa could see in the dark just as easily as in afternoon daylight. Had she forgotten? Ducar couldn’t understand why she’d walk into such a situation, where she was at a clear disadvantage against a cornered animal.
That confusion just intensified when he saw her body. Lit up by Ducar’s flashlight, Vesta lay dead on the subway tunnel’s floor.
One of her hands held in her spilled guts, now cold, bulging through her fingers. She had several more cuts on her body. Clarissa had made her suffer. That only angered Ducar more.
He kept his back to his men. He didn’t want them to see him cry as he saw Vesta’s face, devoid of life, turning blue under the blood face paint. Part of him was disgusted with himself.
The pilot slowly walked up from behind. “Sir? Is she—”
Ducar calmly spun around and put one perfectly placed bullet into his forehead, taking a chunk of skull and paint off. Angry and determined to make Clarissa pay for what she’d done, he wiped his tears and stood up straight.
“Sir?” asked one of the other zealots.
“We follow these tracks. See where they take us. None of us go home until we find this … person … and put them down. Understood?” Ducar’s bloodshot eyes trembled with barely contained rage.
“I know where they lead.”
Ducar turned toward the deep, unfamiliar voice. It had come from the darkest part of the tunnel. His light shined on what looked like a man, at first.
Lee Saito, wearing a partially open button-down shirt, slowly walked toward him.
Ducar lowered his light. “Sir,” he said. He knew who Lee was, even if he’d never met him directly. Still, he was surprised to see him. The last he’d heard, the fabled Captain Saito, commander of the UEF Atlas and war hero, was still in the process of being turned. But it looked like that process was now complete.
“Ducar,” Saito said. “Is that right?” He looked at Ducar with eyes clouded by a black, oily, moving substance.
“That’s right, sir.”
“We have orders, Ducar. You’re to follow me. Follow me, and we’ll find them.”
“Orders from whom?” Ducar asked. He was happy to go hunting for Clarissa, but he was skeptical of Saito. He’d never met him before, and he knew from personal experience that the turning process wasn’t always instant.
Saito unfastened the remaining buttons of his shirt, revealing the churning black liquid that had replaced most of his stomach. A face appeared and emerged from it. It was the Pale Man’s face, made from that oily onyx substance.
The Pale Man’s face gave the instructions. “Orders from me, Ducar. Follow Mr. Saito. He’s in charge now, until I recover. Follow his orders as you would mine, son.”
Though it was certainly odd for Ducar to take orders from a face protruding from a man’s belly, he obeyed. After all, it was the Pale Man who’d showed him the way.
“Understood,” Ducar said. He took one last look at Vesta. The only person he cared about had died painfully, slowly, and desperately. He wouldn’t forget. Ever.
Deep down, in the last vestige of light in him that was now extinguished and merely smoking, he felt bad for Clarissa for what he planned on doing to her when he found her.
Six
Battle Plans
Ben looked at the assembled survivors that Ada had saved—or that had saved each other, as Ada insisted. There were a priest, a couple of able-bodied men of fighting age, and an older woman looking after a couple of kids.
LeFay whistled softly to herself. “This is it, huh?”
Ada crossed her arms, looking annoyed. “This is it,” she said. “Good people.”
