Mare Tranquillitatis, Moon
Valiant Shuttle
“Who the hell am I talking to?”
Ranlin’s ears folded back slightly as she glanced down at the radio, then over to the tablet that was translating. The voice from the tablet was the same dull tone it always was, but the sound coming out of the radio was most definitely not Allen’s.
“Allen?” she asked, confused.
“I said, who the hell I am talking to!”
Ranlin looked up at the others in the shuttle. They all seemed to be just as confused.
“My name is Ranlin. I am the one that Allen spoke with in the shuttle not even [half an hour] ago. Why isn’t he the one on the communication line?” she asked.
“He’s dead, the virus you infected him with killed him already. We didn’t let him back into the bunker proper, so he didn’t have a chance to infect the rest of us,” spat whoever was on the other end of the communication.
Ranlin’s ears went slack, and she gasped. The virus! The thing that had destroyed the entirety of the Human population on Earth! Before they exposed themselves to the planet’s atmosphere, they had run scans of every kind and had determined that nothing present would be dangerous to them. What they hadn’t done was compare anything against a Human base; without that they could have easily carried whatever virus it was the Empire had created with them. She just killed the first Human she had encountered through sheer negligence!
“He’s dead!?” she asked.
There was a pause on the other side of the communication,
“He’s dead. Now leave the moon, or we will fire on you. You have five minutes to comply.”
Ranlin stared at the radio unit for several moments before turning to look at Klyn and Drienil. Klyn was already moving towards the front of the shuttle to tell the pilot to get moving.
“What could have happened to him?” asked Ranlin.
Drienil shrugged. “Any number of things. You might also want to consider the possibility that the Humans don’t want to interact with us, that this is simply an excuse to make us leave.”
Ranlin frowned, her ears going up and down as she thought.
“But Allen… he liked us, didn’t he?” asked Ranlin.
Drienil didn’t say anything.
“You now have four minutes to leave,” the voice on the other end of the radio reminded them.
“Ranlin, we’re not here to fight,” Klyn said as he stepped back into the compartment.
“I know.”
She looked at the radio again.
“We didn’t mean to hurt anyone. I’m sorry this has happened,” Ranlin said into it.
There was no response.
Groaning, Allen opened his eyes and vomited. He tried to regain control of his body, but his stomach rebelled and he vomited again. He was face down in the dust of the moon, locked out of the hellhole he had called home for eight years, and his helmet was now filled with sick. He was miserable. The suit’s automatic systems dealt with the vomit by spraying it with something that gelled it up and killed most of the smell.
Allen stared out at the thin layer of dust and the closed doors of the airlock for another moment before forcing himself to his feet, fighting against the nausea and the effects of the gas that had knocked him out. Staggering along the wall of the tunnel, Allen made his way to the airlock. The screen inlaid on it was blank, and wouldn’t activate. He tried to activate the airlock with his Link, but the connection was being blocked. As he tapped uselessly at the device on his wrist, a small text message appeared.
“You’re awake! Get moving, you idiot, I can’t loop the video forever!”
Startled at receiving a message on an un-linked Link, Allen re-read the message, then looked at the source. It was a broadcast message from Mack sent through the emergency bands. He started moving back up the ramp out of the human base of operations on the moon.
Loping up the ramp in the limited gravity, Allen started to pick up speed, quickly reaching a velocity that would be dangerous under most other circumstances. Less gravity did not mean less mass, and without an atmosphere and limited gravity it was easy for a human to accelerate up to dangerous speeds without much thought.
Exiting the mouth of the cave at a flat out sprint, Allen arced up over the surface of the moon. On Earth, he would have been described as ‘soaring through the air’, but then the moon had nothing of the sort. In fact, that very fact could be trouble – one bad landing and a breach too large for the automatic systems of his suit to patch, and he would be dead.
Allen looked ahead to see where he would be landing. It was going to hurt, to say the least. There was no nice pile of moon dust in his landing zone; only the sheer rock that the base had been drilled out of. This was the side of a crater after all, formed from frozen rock after the impact of some asteroid millions of years ago.
“Ranlin!” Allen shouted as he keyed the local Link. The radio in the suit was only supposed to work over short distances, but he was hoping it would get through. Allen wouldn’t have put it past Pastore to be flooding all of the standard channels to block communications, though.
Allen hit the ground and rolled hard into a boulder, clipping his shoulder and knocking the air out of his lungs. Gasping, Allen ignored the throbbing pain from the injury and continued out of the crater.
“Ranlin!” repeated Allen.
Still nothing.
Cursing under his breath, Allen continued to run, passing over the lip of the crater and loping across the surface with exaggerated leaping bounds not unlike those the first astronauts had employed. They had never been in a hurry like he was though, and his suit was significantly lighter.
He shot across the surface, bouncing off rocks and up into the proverbial air. He soared over small craters and jumped into the larger ones as he followed his own footprints back towards the alien shuttle. The shuttle was maybe two or three kilometers away, but without a vehicle that wasn’t a distance he could cover in an instant. If the shuttle left without him, Allen would die on the surface of the moon – unless everyone else on the base rebelled against Pastore. The chances of that were probably 50-50, in Allen’s mind at least.
As he bounced out of one particularly large crater, he spotted the alien shuttle just a hundred meters away, hovering over the surface – were they taking off? The alien shuttle slowly spun and pointed its engines back towards Allen, just to his right, once again not disturbing the dust as it continue to gently rise up from the surface and spin. The shuttle’s nose began to lift up towards the horizon – they were getting ready to leave!
Not even slowing down, Allen pushed as hard as he could off the lip of the crater he had just come out of, and leapt. Flying towards the alien shuttle, Allen desperately looked over the hull for something to grab onto. Thankfully what looked like a seamless surface from a distance was actually a patchwork of metal and hasty repairs, so there might be something for his gloved fingers to grab, but now he was also worried about his suit being punctured by an edge in the metal.
Allen closed his eyes and spread his arms wide. There was no changing his trajectory now – either he hit the shuttle and managed to grab something, or he missed and eventually fell back down to the moon.
Allen hit the shuttle, the air once again getting knocked from his lungs. The shuttle was still moving, though, slipping away under him. Allen scrabbled at the surface, managing to get his hands and feet hooked on exposed lips of metal. It wasn’t much, though, and his precarious handholds slipped as the shuttle began to accelerate harder. Just as his feet moved off of the end of the vehicle, he felt a small handle which he grabbed with both hands and held on as hard as he could.
Allen swore as the shuttle continued to accelerate, and foolishly glanced down at the surface of the moon, now far below him, and nearly threw up again. There was no such thing as terminal velocity on the moon; if he lost his grip, he would accelerate at a steady 1.6 meters a second until he hit the ground. No amount of nano-machines would save him from that impact; his brain would be jelly against the inside of his skull.
“Ranlin!” he shouted again, keying the mike.
There was a crackle of static.
“Allen?”
Allen sighed in relief. “It’s me yeah! Could you open up the back of your shuttle?” he said quickly.
“Someone over the radio said you were dead! Some virus killed you!”
“I don’t have a virus. Pastore might be trying to kill me, though. Could you open up the back of your shuttle, please? I’m kind of hanging off of the side here!”
“You’re… on the shuttle!?” Ranlin shouted, her distress apparent even through the translation.
“I am!”
After a moment, the shuttle stopped accelerating and Allen felt weightlessness. You can’t just stop in space, he and the shuttle were still moving at thousands of meters per second; it was only the g-forces of acceleration that stopped. The slightest wrong move could easily send Allen flying off on a tangent, so he continue to hold on tight to the handle. A small hatch soon opened to Allen’s right. Looking over, he saw the same large Vakurian from before.
“You Humans aren’t all insane, are you?” asked the man, his voice apparently being routed through all of the comm devices with a small delay.
“I’d like to say no,” muttered Allen.
The man’s ears wiggled at that, even confined inside his helmet.
The man stepped up onto the hull of the shuttle and drifted over to Allen, a thin but undoubtedly strong line on his waist. He held out a hand to Allen, who happily took it with one hand, only letting go with the other when he had a firm grip on the alien.
“I got him,” said the Vakurian.
Again the voice was delayed, something that was starting to annoy Allen.
The large Vakurian pulled on his line and someone inside began to pull the line back in, along with the two of them. Allen felt gravity return as they slipped in through the hatch and promptly collapsed onto the ground of the small shuttle.
“You alright?” Ranlin was leaning over to look at him, trying to determine what was in the bottom of his helmet. “Is that?” she trailed off, pointing vaguely at it.
Getting to his feet, Allen nodded. “Yeah, Pastore knocked me out with something. My stomach didn’t really like it.”
“He said you were dead!” Ranlin said, clearly distressed.
“Probably thought I was. Our medical scanners picked up some alien virus inside the airlock.”
Allen paused and looked around at the different aliens.
“Did you infect me with something?” he asked.
Ranlin was silent for a moment, debating. “I don’t think so. The information we have about Humans says that nothing we carry would even be compatible with you. Do you have any information on it?” she asked.
Allen frowned and nodded. “Yeah, one second.”
Tapping at his wrist computer, he quickly backed up his own helmet camera footage to when he was in the airlock and Mack had flashed a picture of the alien organic structure up on the screen.
He tilted the computer so Ranlin could see it.
She looked at it for a moment and let out a nervous laugh. “Uh, yeah. I guess we did give that to you. Or rather, I did. But not intentionally!”
Allen slowly lowered his arm. “Alright, what are the symptoms, then?”
The atmosphere finished cycling back into the shuttle and Ranlin removed her helmet, turning away from him.
“It’s, uh, not a virus, exactly,” Ranlin said, still facing away, her ears folded down. Suddenly, she perked up, both head and ears lifting as she turned around to face Allen. “We do have something for you though! Something that the Human Lover came up with to block it. He was a biochemist!”
Allen stepped forward, his boots clanking on the floor of the shuttle. The other female alien on the shuttle stepped in front of him, blocking his path.
“What you detected was not in any way lethal, but it is something rather private. The fact you are an alien makes it even more embarrassing,” she said.
Allen paused, listening to the translation, and frowned.
“Maybe a mistranslation, but not lethal. Does that mean it’s still dangerous in some way?” he asked.
The woman’s eyes narrowed and her ears went flat, but she nodded. “Yes, but not in the way you’re thinking.” The woman paused, her ears relaxing slightly. “She will explain when she is ready.”
“Might as well get it over with, Drienil.” Ranlin said to the other woman, turning back around. She sighed, her ears going down again. “It’s part of the mating process for our species,” she paused and glanced back at the others in the shuttle, including Klyn. “Females go into a period of heat, and release pheromones to entice a mate. The pheromones are more biologically complicated then what Humans are used to; I’m not surprised your systems identified it as a pathogen.”
Allen held up his hand to stop her, his face turning red. “Uh, alright, you can stop there. Thanks.”
Leaning down, Allen undid the latches on his helmet and pulled it off, keeping the majority of the vomit inside of it.
Ranlin and everyone else in the back of the shuttle recoiled away. “What happened to you?” asked Klyn.
Allen glanced over at him. “You can smell it? The stuff the suit sprayed is supposed to cut down on that.”
He looked at the gross mess inside of his helmet, winced, and set it down.
“Pastore knocked me out with some gas. I didn’t breathe too much of it, but the human body usually works hard to get rid of whatever poisons it. I vomited.”
Ranlin nodded. “We vomit as well. It’s not that; the chemicals in with it are what smell horrible.”
Allen shrugged. “Sorry?”
Drienil reached under a seat, grabbing a kit and tossing it to Allen. He missed grabbing it completely, watching as it sailed past his hand.
“Ah, I’ve been in low gravity for a few years.”
“How is it you’re able to stand up in normal gravity, in any case? Do Humans not suffer bone degeneration in zero-g?”
“Nano-machine injections, they prevent the decalcification of the bones.” Said Allen.
“Interesting,” Drienil said.
Allen, still shaky on his feet, picked up what she had tossed at him and opened it up. Inside were towels of some sort; he quickly began to clean around the neck seal of the suit, trying to get rid the smell.
His wrist computer Link pinged and Allen paused, looking down at it.
“Well, it seems I still have one human friend, at least.”
“What’s that mean?” asked Ranlin.
Allen held up his wrist. “A buddy looped a video feed to keep Pastore from realizing I was leaving the base. He has continued to feed me telemetry from the Bunker. The idiot just found out that I’m gone, and now he’s trying to convince everyone you took me.”
“We did, though,” said Ranlin, a small smile on her face.
Allen glanced over at her and chuckled. “Yeah, I guess you did. Doesn’t mean he’s not still an asshole.”
The Vakurians looked around at one another.
“I’m going to assume that’s an insult?” asked Klyn.
Allen again chuckled. “Yeah, it is, although now that I think about it, it is an odd one.”
Ranlin looked over at Allen as they approached the Valiant. His face was plastered to the clear metal of the cockpit, staring at the ship as they approached.
“What the hell has your ship been though?” asked Allen as he stared out at it.
Ranlin glanced up at her home; it was true, the hull of the ship was a patchwork of metal and repair welds much like the shuttle. What had once been a sleek and lethal looking Empire ship now more closely resembled something made out of orbital salvage. The ship looked homey, like it didn’t house just military personnel, but people too. She was proud of it. The Valiant might have been originally a ship of the Empire, but she was now most decidedly of Vakurian design.
“She’s been through a lot. The Valiant has hosted seven generations of Vakurians since we escaped the Empire.”
Allen glanced back at her for a moment before looking back to the ship.
“Well, I’ll admit it shows. Still, the Valliant’s far bigger than anything Earth or Mars ever created. It has artificial gravity as well, right?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“It’s just not something we ever figured out,” Allen said. “Not without centripetal force, at least, but most ships can’t do that.”
“We use charged strange matter in the deck plating. Even if we lose power, it remains charged for a few hours, keeping gravity in place,” Drienil said from the co-pilot seat.
Allen glanced down at her and nodded. “Well that’s certainly convenient. Although I have to admit, I’m still getting used to this… do you know what the gravity is compared to Earth? I’ve been on the moon so long I can’t tell.”
Drienil glanced back at Ranlin. Allen followed her gaze.
“We use about 87% Earth gravity. That’s our normal level, at least. Empire standard is around 106% of Earth,” Ranlin informed him.
“Good to know.” Allen turned back to watch as the large ship continued to grow in the view of the shuttle.
“So, you grew up on this ship?” asked Allen, his eyes still on it.
“I did. Some people rotate between the ships of the fleet, but most remain on the ships of their birth. It’s the family.”
“That sounds amazing, growing up in space!”
Ranlin was silent for a moment. “You grew up on a planet. I think that’s better.”
Allen glanced back at her. “I guess it’s all in the eye of the beholder then.”
“Eye of the beholder?” Ranlin asked, the phrase not translating cleanly to Vakurian.
“Everyone sees what someone else has as being better, too used to their own life.”
Ranlin considered his words for a moment. “I suppose so.”
The shuttle shuddered as it landed, and a click and a hiss as the rear hatch opened. There was a slight depressurization as the atmospheres between the two vessels equalized, and some small clunks as whatever mechanical stops kept the shuttle locked moved into place. The Vakurians all moved to the back hatch to exit. Following Ranlin, Allen stepped out into the ship and apprehensively looked around.
An older looking Vakurian stepped up to him, his hand out. Allen graciously took it and the two shook; either the custom was universal or he was making an effort based on what they knew. In either case, Allen appreciated the gesture.
“I am the Captain of the Valiant, Maunt,” said the man. Allen noticed that he looked older than everyone else, his face lined and aged. Still, his hair was jet black, not a hint of grey in it.
“I’m Allen.” He didn’t really know what else to say.
“I’ve been informed that you’re not exactly a representative of your species?” asked Maunt.
Allen shrugged. “There are twenty of us left that I know about. The man in charge has gotten a little xenophobic since you guys started investigating Earth.”
Maunt’s ears went back. “Understandable. Still, we did not come here to perform rescue operations. We came to this system to seek an alliance with Humanity against the Empire. Now that this is out of the question, it is better we do not remain. The Empire will no doubt have patrols.”
Allen looked at the alien captain for a moment, weighing his options.
“Could I ask something of you first?”
Maunt looked at the Human.
“What would that be?”
“Phobos. They’re the only other bunker we’ve had contact with in the last few years, and their communications went dead a few months ago. They had close to 200 people, and not just grunts like me. They had scientists and the like. People who were actually important.”
Maunt pursed his lips, considering.
“Maunt, think about it! Even if the Humans deleted all of the data on the advanced FTL designs, their technology and scientists will be able to duplicate it much more easily than anyone else! Not to mention anything else they might have.”
Maunt looked over at Ranlin and then at his Human guest, and sighed.
“Are there any additional threats that would be introduced from this? Your satellites have already done considerable damage to my vessel.”
Allen winced. “Well, the Phobos bunker controls the largest magnetic rail gun ever constructed by Humanity. The aliens knocked it out in the battle of Mars, but the scientists at Phobos spent the next 8 years repairing it. They haven’t fired it since the repairs, but the last communication was that they had it online.”
Maunt looked at Allen for a moment and raised an eyebrow.
Allen reached back and scratched at his neck.
“No point lying to you,” he mumbled.
“You might have phrased it more tactfully if you wanted us to help,” Maunt said with a small smile on his face.
Allen shrugged. “I’m a glorified space carpenter, not a politician or solider. I’ve only ever fired a gun on the range.”
Maunt looked at him for a moment and nodded. “You are willing to fight if you need to, though?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Then you are willing to put your own life on the line to travel to this Phobos Bunker?”
Allen looked at the alien Captain, confused. “That means?” he asked.
“You will come with us?”
Allen glanced back at Ranlin. “I actually kind of assumed I was. My bunker won’t take me back at the moment.”
Maunt grunted and nodded. “Anything we should transmit so they don’t fire on us?”
Allen smiled and held up his Link. “Yeah. I’ve got codes here that will work as a transponder.”
“Good. Ranlin, load them up. You’re also responsible for him.”
“Yes sir!” said Ranlin, obviously not going to argue with the orders.
Maunt’s ears went up and down several more times as he turned and strode off through the vessel.
“Come on!” said Ranlin, grabbing Allen’s sleeve and dragging the startled human through the ship.
“What are we doing?” asked Allen.
“I’ve got a whole lab full of the Human stuff from the shuttle! I want you to go over it!” said Ranlin.
“I don’t want to sound needy, but do you have a shower or something? I’m half covered in sick!” said Allen.
Ranlin paused and glanced back at the Human. Allen, for his part, felt another gobsmacking slap of interest in the woman in front of him, which was apparently something to do with her mating process.
“And you said you have something to deal with these pheromones?” asked Allen.
Ranlin blushed. “Uh, yeah. Sorry. You can notice them?” she asked.
Allen nodded. “Now that I’m paying attention to them, yeah. Not to say you aren’t attractive, but they’re driving me crazy. I haven’t had ideas like this running through my head since I was a teenager!”
“Right, uh… follow me.”
Allen nodded and followed her through the ship. She was trying to move quickly, but for his part Allen couldn’t help but stare at everything around him as they walked. As distracting as Ranlin was, due in part to the pheromones, the technology around him was even more exciting.
The Vakurians they passed all looked at him, and he couldn’t help but marvel at the ship around him. Everything was old, and like the hull of the ship, a patchwork of different materials and plates. At first glance, the ship was a nightmare, a deathtrap ready to kill its inhabitants. On closer inspection, though, the welds and repairs were perfect, bonding together what little was left of the original hull so strongly that each scar, each repair, strengthened the ship.
“What’s your job?” asked Allen as he followed Ranlin.
“I’m a sensor data analyst. I was the one who spotted the signal from the Lovers’ shuttle, as weak as it was, when we were traveling near the home system.”
Ranlin paused, letting several small Vakurian children run past them. Allen glanced down at them, noticing that despite their small stature, their ears were as large as the adults. One child with red and black hair stopped to look up at him as she passed, letting out a small startled squeak before she ran off and caught up to the others she was following.
“Humans look much closer to the Empire aliens, the Dorvakians. The children might fear you for a little while,” Ranlin cautioned.
Allen watched as all of the children dove into a service hatch and disappeared. A moment later, a rather hustled looking Vakurian woman rounded the corner. Her ears moving and nose twitching, she quickly zeroed in on the hatch the children had dove into.
“I haven’t seen kids in years,” breathed Allen.
Ranlin glanced back at him, sobered for a moment. She knew of the loss of a planet second hand; she missed the home world like anyone else, but in an almost existential way. It had not been torn away from her. She had been born on the ship; it would always be her home.
For Allen, though, the pain of losing his world was fresh, a wound that would never heal.
“We have to exercise population control. Not every couple is allowed to have children, and even then usually just one,” Ranlin said.
Allen looked over at her and nodded. “Understandable. You only need to replace those you have lost.”
“And we have lost ships over the years. Our fleet began with nearly fifty stolen ships. We are now at just over half that number.”
She paused and glanced back at Allen.
“It’s why I was so desperate to find Humanity, you were the first glimmer of hope in my life time. A friend among the stars that might be able to help us.”
Allen frowned. “I’m sorry-” he began.
“No! Don’t apologize!” Ranlin quickly interrupted, shaking her head.
“That’s not what I meant. You can’t be blamed for what the Empire did to you. We, at least, had a chance to fight them on the ground. Your species never got that chance.”
Allen didn’t say anything for a moment. “I’m going to do as much as I can to help, even if only to convince your Captain to let me stay on this ship.”
Ranlin blinked. “You want to stay on an alien ship?”
“The Human Lover you told me about had no trouble leaving the planet with his beloved even when it was perfect. I can’t go back to Earth now, and if I have to go back to that Bunker I’m going to go insane. So if I can help you guys survive, help you find the Ark fleet, then I will. If you won’t have me, then I don’t know what I’ll do.”
Ranlin considered him for a moment. “Humans are strange. No Vakurian would want to live among complete aliens.”
Allen shrugged. “Sounds like fun to me.” He glanced down. “Might be more fun if I had a change of clothes, though. You’ve implied you got a better sense of smell than me, I must not smell very good.”
“Yeah, it’s bad.”
She gestured for him to follow and led Allen to one of the few remaining guest suites on the ship, suites usually reserved for other visiting Captains.
“You clean up here, I think you’ll be able to figure things out. I’ll find you something to wear as well as something to nullify the pheromones,” Ranlin said.
Allen glanced over at her. “These pheromones… they’re not directional, are they?”
Ranlin hesitated at the door to the quarters. “What?”
“Are you attracted to me?” he asked.
“Uhhh,” Ranlin swallowed. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, I mean, I’m not averse to taking after the Lovers.”
Ranlin briefly considered it before coming to her senses. “Uhh, that’s the pheromones speaking. Let’s get the inhibitor in your system and see how you feel.”
Allen frowned. “That’s probably a good idea, yeah.”
Ranlin stepped out of the quarters and hit the door control. For several moments she stood there, taking in several deep breaths, trying to keep herself under control. All she had to do was open the doors and pounce on him. The Vakurian Lover had detailed what Human males liked in one of her journal entries… actually, several journal entries.
If she duplicated that…
Shaking her head, Ranlin turned away and strode towards the lab. She had to keep herself under control, regardless of the fact she was nearing the peak of her heat and would eventually drag either Klyn or the Human into her quarters. And the former was not an attractive option to her.