Star stuff, p.6
Star Stuff, page 6
"Hello?" he said. "Anyone home?"
The snow stormed around him. Was this base abandoned?
He was just about to return to his shuttle when a voice rose behind him.
"So! Look who comes crawling back to me like a bitch."
Tom spun around.
Winter.
* * * * *
Major Winter Emery stood there in the courtyard, a hand on her hip, a smirk on her lips. She wore a padded white uniform, the fabric insulated with layers of cotton. A wolfbear pelt hung around her shoulders, its fur fluttering in tiny white ripples. That piece was not standard issue—probably a trophy from a local hunt. The animal's head, teeth still attached, formed a snarling hood. A string of claws, perhaps once belonging to the same beast, dangled in a clinking necklace. Winter seemed barely human, more like a hybrid, some wild huntress fused with the predator she had slain.
She's gone native, Tom thought.
But even those thick clothes could not hide her muscular form. She had always been tall and powerful, excelling at rugby, wrestling, and later the military. Her blue eyes sparkled like frozen lakes. A thick black braid fell from her hood, draped across her shoulder, and dangled to her waist. A mean-looking assault rifle, as white as her uniform, hung at her side.
Tom nodded. "Hello again, sister."
Winter snorted. "Get off my planet."
He took a step toward her. "Winter, I didn't ask to come here. But—"
"Get off my planet!" She growled and gripped her rifle.
Tom stood his ground. His sister stomped closer, leaned forward until their noses almost touched, and sneered. He still refused to back down.
"Winter, we found something." His breath frosted, and his teeth chattered, but he forced himself to retain some composure. "A signal from deep space, far beyond this frozen outpost. We're going out there. The Galapagos and her crew. I need your help."
She grabbed and twisted his collar. "After the shit you said about me—you can fuck right off."
Tom pursed his lips. So there would be no beating about the bush. No awkward silences. Very well then.
"Winter, I said some things that hurt you, I know." He stared steadily into her eyes, though his insides roiled. "I was crazy that day. I had just lost my brother, and—"
"He was my brother too!"
"And he died in my arms!" Tom said. "Burnt. In agony." He took a shuddering breath, trying to calm himself. "I regret what I said. I know it hurt our family. And I'm willing to move on now, but—"
"You think you can blame me for Aaron's death?" she said. "And that I'll just move on? It cost me everything! Why do you think they sent me to this frozen ball of ice?"
Tom frowned. He tilted his head. "Winter, I thought that … That after what happened, you volunteered to serve here, that—"
"Because nowhere else would take me!" She growled again, but now tears were rolling down her cheeks. "They all heard what you said about me. That I fucked up the rescue operation. That because of my incompetence, Aaron died. Never mind that your fucking robot was the one who called the shots. They all heard your words! And they blamed me. My superiors. My fellow soldiers." She yowled like an enraged wolf. "I lost everything that day!"
"Oi, Winter Wolf!" A deep voice rose from across the courtyard. "That civvie bloke giving you trouble?"
Tom turned to see an enormous marine stomp into the courtyard. He must have stood seven feet tall, and his layers of fur couldn't hide his bulging muscles. A massive wolfbear pelt hung across his shoulders, billowing in the wind. He held an electric spear, the blade crackling, and three rifles hung across his back.
A few other soldiers emerged from the barracks, joining the giant in the snowy courtyard. They were all giants, their fur cloaks and toothy hoods making them appear like feral predators of the ice caves. Weapons bristled across their backs.
They've been genetically engineered, Tom realized. Illegally.
Genetic engineering was tightly regulated across the Human Commonwealth. Curing Down syndrome or cerebral palsy was legal. Designing giant warrior babies was not. But not everyone obeyed the laws. Especially not out here on the frontier. Tom recognized gen-men when he saw them. These ones had been designed to kill.
One of the giants snarled, revealing gleaming fangs. Another man was shirtless—he wore a fur cape but left his chest bare. That chest was covered with scars, tribal tattoos, and muscles like roast hams. One man had three arms—the middle one grew between his collar bones. He cracked three fists and grinned from the depths of his flaming red beard.
Yes, it's certainly a special type that serves out here, Tom thought.
"Is this little squirt from Earth stirring shit?" One marine stomped forward, shaking the courtyard.
"Want me to crush him like a bug, Miss Winter?" said another marine. The beast's torso was so muscular he walked stooped over like a gorilla, dragging his knuckles.
The marines surrounded Tom, snarling. Frost filled their beards. Their hoods were formed from wolfbear heads, fangs still attached, eyes still gleaming. The soldiers seemed to Tom more like wolfbears themselves, not human. Outcasts who had taken on the wolfbear spirit, morphing with the alien predators. Tom was not a small man, but among them, he suspected he looked like a penguin among polar bears.
"Little HOPEy!" One marine reached toward the pin on Tom's lapel.
The pin was shaped like telescope among the stars—symbol of HOPE, the Human Outreach Program of Exploration, the fleet Tom was proud to serve in. But the marine just ripped off the brooch like it was a patch of lint. He dropped the precious symbol and crushed it under his boot.
"HOPE is for sissies!" barked another marine. The giant laughed, revealing golden fangs and tattooed gums. "Bunch of science bitches, if you ask me. Space belongs to us! The warriors!"
The other marines cheered. One man shoved Tom. "Get off our planet! Go explore someplace warm. Leave the frontier to us."
Tom spun around in a slow circle, glaring at the larger men. "Has the Human Defense Force fallen so far in standards? Will enlisted marines behave like errant children before an officer of the Human Commonwealth?"
"You ain't our officer, shrimp!" barked one marine—the one who had crushed the pin. "You work for HOPE. That ain't military!"
Tom stared steadily at the man. "HOPE is a uniformed branch of the Human Commonwealth, same as the military. And one more word out of you, and I will court martial you here and now. We serve in different branches, but I still outrank you. And if you disobey me, I will rain down the punishment of an empire on your head. You might think the One Season Hotel is bad. This is a whorehouse. I've seen mines on Corpus that make this look like paradise." Tom allowed himself a small smile. "Kneel. Kneel and pick up my pin. Give it a polish and put it in my hand."
The burly marine went red. A snarl twitched across his face. Tom stood there, calmly, staring him down.
Finally the massive marine grunted. He knelt, lifted the pin, gave it a polish, and returned it.
A languid clapping rose from behind. Tom turned to see his sister watching him.
"Well done, brother!" Winter smiled crookedly. "You tamed the beasts. But they are wild animals. And they will not remain tame for long."
Tom walked back toward her. "Winter, you're coming with me. All of you. On direct orders of the president. And on my orders. Get your shuttles ready. You can dock them on the Galapagos. And make sure you pack a change of underwear. I will need you for a while."
CHAPTER FIVE
For the second time this month, a song echoed through the corridors and cabins of the HSS Galapagos.
But this time it was no mysterious Filipino folk song. It was a marines song. A marching song. Accompanying it: the sound of four hundred boots thumping down the starship corridors. Tom winced as the words echoed by him.
I don't know but I've been told
Outer space is mighty cold
We're going out among the stars
Looking for some whores and bars!
Sound off
One, two
Sound off
Three, four …
Tom stood by the bulkhead, waiting for them to clamor by. Their voices rang out, deep and thundering. The marine with three arms was pounding his chest with three fists. A colossal beast of a marine—he was probably genetically mixed with an ogre—was beating a drum. The leather drumhead was stretched over a wolfbear's skull. Some of the starship's crew, all brilliant HOPE scientists, peeked from their cabins, then quickly retreated to safety. One spectacled astrobiologist didn't even pause to grab his fallen retainer.
Major Winter Emery herself, the Winter Wolf, led the pack. The tall woman marched with her chin raised, her voice ringing out, and several rifles jangled across her back like some ancient hunter's spears. As she passed by Tom, she paused to give him a sly grin. Her necklace of fangs chinked. Then she marched onward, and her soldiers thundered in pursuit.
Got my orders from top brass
I'm here to kick some alien ass!
Sound off
One, two …
"Two hundred marines," Tom muttered, watching them march by. "Two hundred burly, hairy, genetically-engineered marines in wolfbear coats, carrying a skull for a drum. Two hundred lunatics! Half crazy enough to volunteer for New Siberia. The other half exiled there for crimes. Lunatics and criminals with guns! On my ship!"
Titania stood beside him. The android tilted her head. "Is that a 'rant,' sir?"
He snapped his head toward the android. "What?"
"Helmswoman Floribeth said that sometimes you like to rant."
"Did she," Tom said, dryly.
"She did, sir!" Titania grinned. "She also said you're a cranky old man."
"Well, I'm old now," Tom muttered, feeling much older than his thirty-nine years. "I've been standing here listening to these marines march for years. Feels like it, at least."
He watched them vanish around the corner, but he knew they'd be back for another round soon. On a ship the size of the Galapagos, there was no place to hide.
Titania frowned. "Why do they march when we've offered them chairs?"
"They're not really the sit-at-a-computer type." Tom put a hand on the android's shoulder. "Come on, Titania. To the bridge. We're almost at the wormhole."
They walked down the corridor. The marines from New Siberia had tracked snow and ice across the starship. Chunks of ice crunched beneath Tom's boots. Titania, though shaped as a slender woman, weighed more than him. One of her feet crushed a fallen icicle caked with red hair.
Tom and the android stepped onto the bridge. He could see it ahead now, displayed in all its glory across the viewport. A sphere of light in the distance, shining like a nebula.
The wormhole.
It's glorious, Tom thought.
For a moment all his troubles faded, and he gazed in wonder at the sight. An ancient portal between the stars.
Nobody knew who had built these wormholes. Ancient civilizations, a million years old, had carved maps of the Wormhole Road across cliffs, asteroids, and temple walls. Tom had traveled through them before. But they never ceased to amaze him.
"Santiago, would you mind if I took the helm?" Tom smiled. "For old time's sake."
The young helmswoman nodded and vacated her station. "Of course, sir! She's all yours."
Tom sat the helm and grabbed the yoke. The handlebars were warm, comforting in his hands. He had begun his career as a helmsman. Sometimes he wondered: If not for his last name, would he be a humble helmsman still?
This is what I love, he thought, nudging the yoke forward. Flying among the stars. God, I missed this.
They flew closer to the wormhole. It shone in the emptiness, a luminous sphere like a sun of a thousand colors. The HSS Galapagos was not the only starship here. For many months, exploring the galaxy, Tom and his crew had encountered no other craft. But now hundreds of starships flew around them, heading to and from the wormhole.
No two starships were alike. And none, aside from the Galapagos, were human in origin.
We're in deep space now, Tom thought. Outside the Human Commonwealth. Here is a panoply of life. Endless forms most beautiful.
Deep in his mind, he remembered Ben-Ari's warning about monsters in the dark. But Tom saw no monsters here, only wonders.
A spiral starship, her hull shaped like an azure nautilus, glided by. The light of the wormhole glimmered against her whorls. A hundred smaller ships, all perfect Fibonacci spirals, fluttered around the mothership like baby mollusks.
A cargo ship trundled past the Galapagos, belching out smoke. It was a ship like some spiky, ill-mannered dinosaur, all covered in horns and plates of armor, puffing and grumbling with every step. Beside it the Galapagos seemed as small as a mouse.
Another ship flew by. She was the size of a skyscraper and made entirely of crystals. Within her glimmering halls traveled beings of pure light. Like spirits, they danced between a million polished crystal walls.
An asteroid rolled by. The tumbling boulder had been hollowed out, and motors thrummed on the stony shell. Portholes allowed a view inside. Within halls of rock and iron flew a race of mole-like aliens, whiskers twitching on their furry faces. They hopped back and forth, pulling levers, turning gears, clumsily trying to control their lurching asteroid.
A huge glass starship followed the asteroid. Water filled it instead of air. Fish swam inside, their fins billowing like lavender banners. They blew bubbles into glass tubes, and liquid swirled through vials, and their starship flew onward.
Tom gazed at them all with wide eyes.
"This is why I joined HOPE," he whispered. "To view the wonders of the cosmos." He couldn't help but smile. "We're in the unknown. We fly among a thousand alien travelers. We're about to shoot through a wormhole to another part of the galaxy—to solve a mystery of an impossible song. How wonderful is exploration!"
Titania smiled. "Sir, I've been studying human expressions and body language. This is the first time I've seen you smile in a year."
He gazed at the wormhole. "I feel like a young cadet again," he said softly. "This is how I felt during my first years on a starship. I've lost this sense of wonder. I lost it in …"
He could not complete the sentence. He would not ruminate on that now. Today was for magic. Right now, he didn't even mind the marines on his starship.
He glided the Galapagos among the alien starships, queuing up to enter the wormhole. Rows of glowing buoys hovered outside the portal, directing traffic. There would be a bit of a wait. Even interstellar civilizations, it seemed, had not managed to solve the problem of traffic jams.
As they waited, Tom turned from the viewport. He faced his bridge officers. They were all gaping at the alien starships.
Tom cleared his throat and tapped his comm. He stood before his bridge crew, but he broadcast his words across the Galapagos.
"This is Captain Tom Emery speaking from the bridge. In a few moments, the Galapagos will make her way through a wormhole. Many of you have traveled through wormholes before. As you know, they all involve a bit of time dilation. You probably remember, sometimes in your careers, traveling through a wormhole for only a few moments, while back on Earth weeks or months went by. Well, we've run calculations. This wormhole is longer than those humans normally travel. It will transport us hundreds of light-years. We calculate that back on Earth, two years will go by."
Some bridge officers turned toward him in shock.
"My boy will have graduated high school," the geologist whispered.
"I'll miss two years of paying taxes," mumbled a navigator.
"I can't believe I'll miss All Systems Go season 3," said the exobiologist. "It's only the best anime series ever produced, and—"
"All right!" Tom said, raising his hands. "Smartasses. Joking aside, this is a big move. Remember that we have to fly home through the wormhole too. That means we'll miss four years of Earth time. Now, you all knew the risk of time dilation when you chose to put on a uniform, fly into space, and serve Mother Earth's glorious empire. I can order you through this wormhole. But I'm giving you a choice. If you want off now, take a shuttle. It'll be cramped, but it'll take you back to the Human Commonwealth. Once you're at the colonies, you can hitchhike back to Earth. If you have a sick relative, a rocky relationship, a young child you want to see grow up, or any other reason you can't tolerate time dilation—I'll understand. You can leave now. But you better hurry, because the line to the wormhole is moving fast."
He expected most of them to stay. They had all sworn to serve the empire. But it surprised him that nobody wanted to leave. Not a single man or woman.
Hancock rose from his seat, joints creaking. The old bulldog puffed out his chest, and his white mustache bristled. "Dammit, Tommy, we're all here for a reason. And that reason is shining like a giant disco ball ahead." He saluted, lips tight. "Let's go exploring."
Tom gave his old friend a nod. "Very well then. If you don't mind, I'll do the honors." He held the yoke. "Full speed ahead! Straight on into the light."
The HSS Galapagos gained speed. Tom leaned forward over the controls.
I wish you could be here, Aaron.
The starship flew into the wormhole and flowed down a tunnel of light.
CHAPTER SIX
The Galapagos flowed down the wormhole, and Tom gazed around in wonder. The great cylinder of light swirled around them, shining with countless colors. Tom had never flown through a wormhole this long. Within the Human Commonwealth, wormholes were rare and mostly short, skipping between neighboring stars, mere twigs in the great Tree of Light. Those trips only took a second or two. Blink and you've missed it.
But this was a long line. The minutes ticked by, and they were still flying down the shimmering rabbit hole. For a dizzying moment, Tom felt like they were falling, plunging headfirst down a galactic well. Vertigo took over.
And then it ended.
They spilled out the other end.
