The Eden's Rest
Zara, former stowaway and the Consortium's youngest merchant marine, defends her deep space freighter against a demonic warp entity.
"Where are you going?" Zara chased after Major Cleves as he clomped through the armory and towards the distant sound of screams. He tucked the formerly well-fitted mirrored armor tighter around his expansive chest.
"To buy the Captain another few seconds," the Major said.
An unseen explosion rocked the space freighter, throwing them from side to side. The klaxons blared the undulating song of a trapped ship dying in the warp. Zara leapt in front of her commanding officer, digging her boots into the sure-step rubber matting to push against his chest. Her small size had taught her the importance of leverage when fighting. "You’ll die!"
Cleves tapped a quick set of keys on the shipboard display. A Soulshade made of holo-lights appeared between them. Incorporeal jaws smashed through metal shipping containers. Tentacles of psychic energy whipped through bulkheads like butter, flaying minds and infecting the crew with diseases that killed in seconds. "Half of the marines I sent are already dead. The other half won't last long. They need me!"
"Your death won’t change theirs."
Cleves shoved her aside and kept walking. "I thought you'd learned better than that."
From the time he'd found her stowed away on board the deep space cargo freighter, Major Cleves had taken Zara under his wing. Multiple tours as a shock assault commander defending corporate interests against pirate raiders had given him plenty of stories, but even legends needed to retire. In honor of his years of service he'd been given a security command role on a milk run. A training ship used to condition new marines to the rigors of warp travel before they headed out for more dangerous missions.
With no way to return home after the long haul freighter had left, and no other children on board, Zara had taken up training as her one outlet. She'd passed the officer's exam at thirteen and could cook a rat with her las-rifle faster than anyone but Cleves himself. No one in her unit could beat her time on the gravity bike.
And yet he treated her like a child.
"Then take me with you," she shouted after him. "Don’t leave me here!"
He'd taught her everything he knew about defending a ship; how to hold hard corners and delay; how to hem in a boarding party with overlapping fields of fire and use their entry gap as a killing zone; how to trade bulkheads for time if needed to protect the crew. But, most of all, he'd taught her to obey orders.
"Protect the Captain. Help the survivors," He tossed her the command signet he wore on a chain around his neck.
She almost dropped it from the unexpected weight. The metal felt warm when she tucked it against her own chest. "How the hell am I going to do that?"
"Figure it out. Or don't," His las shield ignited, coating him in a swirling blue energy mist that they both knew would do nothing against the psychic entity they faced. He gave her a crisp salute. "You have command."
His two personal honor guard waited in the hallway outside, their faces pale and ashen, their lips drawn in a tight line. Together they marched towards their deaths.
Zara grabbed a helmet and sprinted towards the bridge of the Eden's Rest. Terrified crew members crowded the passageways, following their training and headed to battle stations that would be scrap metal in minutes. She cursed them for their incompetence between heaving breaths.
They'd rather let someone else do the dying.
She found the Captain and his executive crew surrounding a holo-display on the bridge. They argued amongst each other in low, quiet tones while the combat alarms shrieked and marines died.
"Captain, you've got to call the marines back. They're getting slaughtered," she said.
Flashing lights illuminated the Captain's swollen eyes, his haggard face. "That’s their job. I'd throw myself and half the crew down there as well if I thought it would buy the rest of us another minute," he said. "How much longer until the warp jump is complete?"
The navigator shook his head, his beaded dreadlocks clicking against each other with the motion. "Don't matter now. Once a Shade gets its claws in--" His fingers twisted through a prayer sigil that would have made the Chaplain jealous in it's fervency.
"Belay that talk. There has to be something we can try. Engineering-- What happens once the Netherfield is fixed? Would it throw the demon back into the warp?"
"My tech lead couldn’t tell me how that antique generator worked on their best day. They're not gonna magically understand it now that the sirens are going off," The chief engineer hit a few buttons on the display. Simulated explosions danced across the holo-display between them. "Only option we have is to dump the reactor core. Pro: the impact would throw us out of the warp stream and back into the safety of real-space. Cons: radiation would cook us like sausages. I'm talking melting metal, g'night Gracie. They wouldn’t be able to tell us apart from a neutron star." He tugged off his glasses, wiped them on the corner of a stained shirt. "Might be a blessing"
Zara straightened her back and tilted her head until the oversized helmet no longer covered her eyes. "Requesting permission to join the marines in defense,"
"Denied," The Captain said. "I'm the idiot who let Cleves talk me into keeping you. I'll be court-martialed if I let you die."
"We’re all going to die anyway. Sir."
The Captain swore, damning six generations of his forefathers for their love of space travel. He added a few choice slurs for the Kaldarian's love of fresh solar radiation fed lepids. "Fine. Tell the old man that if he has any magic tricks, now is the time."
Zara dashed for the cargo lift.
Deck section markings blurred past through the lift display, visible for an instant as white smears on metal. Her hand clenched and re-clenched around Cleves' command ring. She'd never attended Chapel services on board the Eden’s Rest. No free time after endless defense drills, she'd told Chaplain Frost. Never saw the use, maybe. Now she'd have given anything to believe the Blessed One was listening.
The lift door slid open to the pulse of blood red emergency lights. Translucent tentacles dripped out of the exterior hull plates, fishing for crew members as they coalesced. A few platoons from First company had managed to fight their way to the crosswalks overhead. Sheets of ice fell with every burst of heat from their pre-ranged las-cannon positions. The fire did nothing but scorch the metal cargo containers stacked around the cargo bay.
Ksh, ksh, ksh.
Zara shivered as the lift door slid shut behind her. Her boots crunched through a thin sheen of ice that had formed despite the stringent temperature controls. She took two quick breaths, one of Cleves' secret tricks to stay calm. She scanned the crosswalks looking for him. He liked to command from up high for a better view.
Ksh, ksh, ksh.
Soulshade teeth the size of torpedo bays scraped against the central cargo containment field. The energy discharge backlit a tongue with a thousand ends probing out of glowing portal cut into the air.
Two solar cycles had ripened the lipids inside the field to near bursting. The cargo bay erupted burst into a frenzy at the power surge. In every cage, feathery wings and snapping mandibles beat against the containment fields. At full power the cages could hold up against nearly anything, but this?
A wave of physic energy roared through her mind. Zara slipped backwards, her feet pinwheeling on the ice. The las-fire overhead stopped cold. A thought burrowed itself inside of her.
WHO DARES TRESPASS IN MY REALM
Gareth from Second company flew off the catwalk in front of her, his screams cut short as he hit the ground with a sickening impact. A glowing tendril formed beneath him, reaching up to caress his face like a mother tending to a wounded child.
And then-- Gareth stood up.
He shambled towards her on one good leg, the other twisted and trailing behind him. His head titled sideways at an unnatural angle.
Zara screamed. Her las-rifle swung up, firing on full auto before she'd aimed. The rounds blew chunks through Gareth's body, but he kept coming... kept crawling... kept living. A round hit his good leg and he pitched forward with the crack of bone on metal. He pulled himself across the floor towards her with his hands instead.
DO ALL LIVING THINGS BREAK SO EASILY?
"Form lines!" Major Cleves yelled, his voice hoarse and ragged. "Keep them contained!"
He stood on top of a nearby cargo container, attempting to coordinate the defense. A tentacle grabbed for his legs. He danced to avoid it. The honor guard fired wildly to no effect. The translucent purple ooze forced Cleves’ to the edge of the container, growing larger and larger until— pop— it burst like a spore balloon.
Cleves clutched at his throat, his feet searching for more container and finding only air.
Zara leapt. Pain crashed into her shoulder. She rolled with Cleves anyway, using his momentum to tumble them into what little cover remained. "Breathe, old man. C'mon."
He coughed and slumped heavily in her lap.
She cradled his head, tears streaming down her face. "What do I do? How do we stop it?"
Cleves coughed again, wet and bloody. "You showed up,"
"Let me help you up. I can get you to sick bay; Doc can fix this. He can fix this. He can fix this."
"No shame in losing, Zar-- long as you show up," His eyes slid up and his body went slack.
Zara's heart shattered.
She'd listened to Cleves' battle stories for years, lived every whining ricochet and moment of terror that he'd ever experienced. His stories were exciting, filled with adventure and ending with tactical lessons that inspired her. His stories weren't supposed to end an icy floor in another dimension. Not guarding a bunch of space bugs destined for an expensive plate. Not leaving her behind.
A purple tendril sprouted from the deck, grabbing for her. She dropped Cleves and scrambled backwards by instinct. Las-fire poured in from the honor guard flanking her. The rounds burnt thick holes into the floor. The tendril shifted target, diving into Major Cleves' mouth instead. His body shuddered, flexed, relaxed. He sat up until his back looked straighter than parade rest. And then his head spun to face her.
GIVE ME MORE
"Can't shoot 'em. Can't argue with 'em,'" One of the honor guard said, pulling her up off the ground. "What's the plan, boss?"
The other honor guard peered around the corner of the container behind of them. "Back to the bridge? Not sure we can fight this forest of octopus mushrooms,"
Zara's body shook as a deep cold settled in her bones. Cleves slowly rotated his body to match his head. The skin on his face rippled outward like a finger trailed against the inside of a balloon. Like there was something-- inside trying to escape.
"ZARA!" a voice yelled in her ear.
She shook her head. Took two quick breaths.
Just show up.
"Get us to the control room," she said. “Can't stay on the ground floor,”
They took off at a run for the stairs on the near wall. Few marines on the crosswalk had survived the psychic blast. The distraction of possessing the dead had slowed the attack more than the las-rounds expended. The tendrils had all but disappeared, reborn as bloodied marines shambling through the cargo bay.
Ksh, ksh, ksh.
For now they seemed safe enough. With no tendrils in sight, the only danger real danger came from the giant ghost mouth trying to eat the cargo. The possessed marines moved too slowly, too clumsily to present anything but a hurdle to dodge.
A sudden thought struck her as the group pounded up the stairs together. She couldn’t kill the ghost tentacles, but after possessing a body they became real, didn’t they? And there was only one thing out here that terrified every living creature.
She grabbed the control desk, searching for the emergency cargo override button. Through the window overlooking the cargo bay she could see more tendrils spawning. They moved with slow circular motions towards the interior of the ship.
Zara found the button. Ripped the plastic cover off. Slammed Major Cleves command signet onto it. Millions of fluttering wings erupted into open space as the containment fields dropped. Ink black insects coated every exposed surface, their orange proboscis slurping residual energy leaking through the power conduits. The remaining tentacles began to swarm.
FEED MY CHILDREN. GORGE YOURSELVES
"Captain, you know that crazy idea the old man had?" Zara said into the room's comm unit.
The Captain’s voice crackled in immediate response. “What is it?”
“He’s gonna dump the cargo bay. Hold on.”
She keyed in the sequence while the Captain shouted orders through the PA.
Emergency decompression shields dropped over the window. An earthquake hit the Eden’s Rest, shaking it from side to side like a dog shakes a toy. The whining klaxons pitched higher and higher. Through closed eyelids she watched as a burst of translucent purple, a finger outstretched from the warp itself, tried to claw its way through the decompression shield.
Reality reappeared five feet below her. Zara hit the deck hard, her shoulder crumpling beneath her. She screamed until her lungs burned with frustration and anger.
She’d let him die.
----
They didn't waste time looking for survivors.
The Eden's Rest entered real-space a hundred million miles off course. The explosive decompression had damaged the reactor, and the ship had lost it's entire cargo haul and two companies of marines in a matter of minutes.
Yet the system carried on. Insurance would pay for the damaged cargo. Their owning corporation would pay for repairs to the Eden’s Rest. Major Cleves got a medal for his brilliant defense of the ship. With a few coats of paint, and a new crew, no one would ever remember what an over-traveled and under-maintained Netherfield generator had lost.
What she had lost.
Zara would remember.