Stranded (Shadows of the Void Space Opera Serial Book 2) Read online

  “It really depends on what’s left,” replied Sparks. “Lee’s mind was exceptional—highly modded, highly developed, which increases the chances of some parts of it surviving. Like spilling water from a container, to put it crudely. Most of us carry a couple of cups of water. A severe injury like this would mean both cups are empty. But Lee’s mind was like a bowl. She had water to spare.” He reached for the panel. “The electrodes will both stimulate her brain and read the activity in whatever remains of her mind.”

  A knot formed in Jas’ stomach. Lingiari was standing on the other side of the receptacle where Lee was lying. The pilot’s features were clouded. He and Lee had grown close in their fight for control of the ship.

  “But, what I want to know is,” insisted Jas, “will we be able to talk to her? And if we can, how will she understand? Will she know where she is? Will we have to tell her what’s happened?”

  Sparks shook his head. “I just can’t tell you for sure. I really have very little experience with this. I’d forgotten that accessing the mind of the person in stasis was a possibility. It was only when I saw that Pilot Lingiari had come to visit and talk to her that I was reminded. So I checked, and the equipment is here. If Lee’s auditory nerves are functioning, she will hear us, and she may respond. If not, we may only be able to listen to her thoughts. Of course, the worst case scenario is that we hear nothing.”

  Lingiari had been visiting Lee? Jas’ insides twisted up some more. Yeah, they’d gotten close, but she should have visited her too. She’d been so busy...

  Sparks was watching her, waiting for her.

  “Go ahead,” she said.

  The doctor pressed the screen. He, Jas, and Lingiari waited, watching the still figure and listening. Jas wondered what they were listening for. What did an active mind sound like? Sparks had said they might hear silence. Did the silence mean there was nothing there? Was her mind destroyed? The doctor cleared his throat and nodded at her. He wanted her to speak.

  Jas swallowed. “Lee? Can you hear me?”

  Nothing.

  Lingiari leaned over the prone figure. “Sayen, it’s Carl Lingiari.” He reached out and gripped her small, perfectly manicured hand. “Don’t be scared, okay? You’re all right.”

  A voice came from the speaker. “Carl?” All present except for Lee breathed out, and the collective sigh was audible. But the voice wasn’t Lee’s voice. It was the digitally generated sound of a random, female voice. It sounded human, but not anything like how Lee had spoken. The hair on the back of Jas’ neck stood up. It was like talking to the dead, as if the barrier that divided life from death had distorted Lee’s personality, and turned her into something else.

  “Yeah, it’s Carl. Harrington’s here, too, and Dr. Sparks.”

  “Am I in the medical center? How come I can’t see you? Have I gone blind? What happened to me?” Despite the panicked words, Lee’s face and body were utterly motionless. The voice was flat and conveyed no emotion.

  “Navigator Lee,” said Sparks, “I’m sorry to inform you that the Galathea crash-landed on the surface of the planet we were surveying. During that crash, you sustained considerable injuries.”

  “What kind of injuries? What’s happened to me?”

  Jas waited as the doctor explained to Lee what her injuries were. She was almost grateful that the machine-generated voice didn’t express the emotions that impacted Lee one after another as Sparks told her, essentially, that she had died, and that the chances of recovering her personality and memories—of recovering everything that had made her who she was—hung by the finest thread.

  Jas found it difficult to look at the dead woman’s immobile face as she listened to her talk to the doctor. Her gaze roamed the room, not settling anywhere, especially not meeting Lingiari’s eyes. She thought if she looked into the sadness that hung there, she might break.

  The doctor finished his explanation, and Lee was quiet.

  After a moment’s silence, Jas said, “I’m so sorry.”

  “You don’t have anything to apologize for, Harrington,” came the electronic voice. “You must have defeated the infected officers if you’re here talking to me. You did well. You and Carl saved us.”

  That wasn’t how Jas saw it, but she wasn’t about to argue.

  “Where have you got me?” Lee asked. “If my injuries are so bad, how come I can talk to you? I feel weird.”

  “You’re in the stasis room,” replied Lingiari. “We’re keeping you alive, and we’re going to take you back to Earth, where they can help you. We’ll fix the engines, or we’ll get rescued. We’re not—”

  “Is it clean?”

  “What?” asked Jas.

  “I must be in a stasis container. There isn’t any dust or anything, is there? I can’t stand dirt. I don’t want to be lying in some dirty box.”

  Jas laughed. “Yeah, it’s pretty clean.”

  “Pretty clean isn’t good enough. Can you get someone to wipe it out for me? I’ve got some sanitized wipes in my cabin.”

  Lingiari was laughing now, too.

  “I’m glad y’all find it so funny. Hey, what I can’t figure out is, why did you wake me up? Must be pretty creepy talking to a body.”

  “You’re right. We did wake you up for a reason,” said Jas. “We need to know something. That packet I asked you to send to Earth, telling them what was happening. Did you manage to send it?”

  “I sure did. Got it off right before we crashed. I included everything. About Loba, Margret, and the officers, and K. 67092d. I told them everything. It took me a while, and I didn’t have time to get to my crash seat before we hit.”

  Jas and Lingiari locked eyes. If Lee had sent the packet, that meant Earth had had plenty of time to reply. But no message had come as far as they knew.

  “Is there anything else you want to know?” asked Lee.

  “Not right now,” replied Jas, “but we might need your help. Is it okay to wake you up to talk to you like this? Or would you prefer to sleep until we get you back to Earth?”

  “I’d like you to wake me up and speak to me whenever you can, even if you don’t have anything to ask me. It’s kinda lonely here.”

  Jas recalled how the navigator had been the only one to come to her room when Loba had confined her to her cabin, and how chatty she’d been. “I’ll come talk to you whenever I can.”

  “So will I,” said Lingiari.

  Sparks left them alone as they spent the next half hour bringing the navigator up to speed on everything that had happened since the crash-landing. When no one had anything else to say, Jas asked her if she wanted them to turn off the electrodes until next time.

  “No, leave them on,” replied Lee. “I’d like to think a while.

  Chapter Eight

  Jas awaited MacAdam’s arrival at the mission room, which remained a meeting and planning place during the emergency situation. It was the only part of the ship apart from the flight deck where the emergency power extended to computer access.

  Jas had asked the engineer to meet with her to give a full verbal report on the state of the engines, but she had another reason for requesting a one-to-one with the engineer. She hadn’t yet gotten over her shock at finding the woman drunk. Jas wasn’t naive. Though she didn’t take part in the alcohol and drug abuse that everyone knew went on aboard the ship—a minor part of her job was to try to keep it under control, in fact—she couldn’t comprehend what had gotten into the engineer’s head that she’d thought it was an acceptable alternative to reporting on the state of the engines. It was beyond her comprehension that someone who had everyone relying on her would mess up so badly.

  But Jas also knew she hadn’t handled the situation well, and she needed to put that right. Losing her cool like that hadn’t been the reaction of a good master. What was more, MacAdam was possibly the most important person aboard the Galathea. Her judgment and capabilities had to be unimpaired, and that meant Jas had to treat her with kid gloves. She had to make the woman und
erstand how important she was, but not put so much pressure on her that she needed to escape.

  While waiting for the engineer to arrive, Jas switched on the hologram of K. 67092d. She recalled the last view she’d had of the image, when Loba had been quizzing her as to why she wouldn’t give the all-clear to Resource Assess the surface. That moment seemed like a long time ago.

  A cough caught her attention. MacAdam had arrived and was waiting in the doorway. Jas had a feeling it was the second time she’d coughed.

  “Thanks for coming. Sit down.”

  The woman took a seat on the other side of the horizontal screen that displayed the spinning globe. Jas switched it off and took another seat. Everyone looked ill in the ghostly emergency light, but the engineer looked particularly bad. Her cheeks and eyes were hollow and shadowed. Jas could almost make out the shape of her bony skull beneath her ginger curls. An acne spot flared almost comically at the end of her snub nose.

  Jas had expected MacAdam to offer an apology for her behavior, but none seemed forthcoming. The engineer didn’t meet her eyes. An angry rebuke rose to Jas’ lips, but she bit her tongue. “What can you tell me about the engines? Did you complete a full survey?”

  “I did. I tested each part. The upper levels have normal function according to the readouts, but I didn’t get much information about the lower halves of the engines. It’s to be expected. Judging by what the impact did to the engine housing, both the starjump and RaptorX engines are damaged, as far as I can tell.”

  “So, do you know what’s broken, and the minimum we need to fix to get them working again? Can we cannibalize the upper levels for replacement parts?”

  MacAdam shrugged. “I only know how to do diagnostic checks and some servicing and maintenance. I don’t have a good idea of how each part functions. Engineers train for six years, and this was my first year.” The woman glanced up. “Is there any news on a rescue?”

  Jas rubbed between her eyebrows. “Please don’t say anything to the rest of the crew, but we can’t rely on being rescued. We might have to make it out of here ourselves, and we need more information on the engines than the function readouts.”

  MacAdam studied the backs of her hands. “I understand, but what can I do?”

  You could start by not getting off your legs. “I was disappointed to find you drunk in your cabin yesterday. You understand that alcohol and all other drugs are banned aboard ship? You know that, right?”

  The engineer was silent.

  Jas wished the woman would meet her halfway at least, not this silence. What did it mean? She couldn’t figure her out. She wished she was back with her defense units, who were much easier to understand than people. “MacAdam, I know there’s a lot of pressure on you right now. When you signed up, you didn’t know we would crash or that you would be the last engineer on board, with all of us depending on you. But I can’t help that. No one can. It’s just how it is. But I can try to help. If it ever feels too much...if you ever feel the need for someone to talk to...Dr. Sparks can offer counseling.” Jas’ stomach turned at the thought of sending the woman to the bigoted quack, but she had to admit he did have people skills.

  The engineer’s head was still down, and she was slowly shaking it. Tears splashed on her hands, which lay folded in her lap. Jas felt for her, but she didn’t know what she could do to help the woman’s situation. MacAdam was saying something.

  “What?” asked Jas.

  “I said, I’ll do my best.”

  “Thanks, MacAdam. I appreciate it. We all do. You can access the ship’s databanks in this room. They contain the engine schematics. Feel free to come here whenever you want, and whatever help you need, just let me know, okay?”

  The engineer nodded but didn’t raise her head. The woman seemed so crushed, so sad. Jas got the feeling there was more to her problems than the pressure she was under to fix the engines. “MacAdam, is there anything else I should know?”

  “No...I, I’ll study the schematics.”

  “And if you need a defense unit for some heavy lifting, I’ve got one or two to spare.”

  “It’s okay. We—I—have my own equipment for that.”

  “Right, come over here, then.” Jas took her across to an interface where she could access the database. After she’d shown the engineer how to retrieve the information, she returned to the hologram screen and switched on the image of K. 67092d. She wondered how much danger they were in from the planet’s inhabitants. They’d crashed near one of the planet’s poles, in an area that hadn’t been close-scanned or RA’d. Not that it would have made much difference. They hadn’t found anything that had seemed dangerous before, yet look at them now.

  Jas’ mind returned to the structure she’d seen when they’d disposed of the officers’ bodies. It had seemed identical to all the others. Something in those structures infected people with an alien life form that took possession of them. But the answer as to what those things were, and how they operated, eluded her. Were they going to come out and attack their sitting-duck ship? If possessed officers remained on board—maybe someone like Haggardy—would they try to retrieve them?

  Leaning over her data screen, MacAdam gave a satisfied hmpf.

  “Have you found something?” asked Jas.

  “No, but I’ve found out how I might be able to find something.”

  “Huh?”

  “I just noticed the ship’s scanners are still operating. They weren’t affected by the crash-landing, though the computer isn’t logging the information. I think I can turn them a little closer to home and get a detailed scan of the engines. Maybe I can see what’s happened down there. If I can find out what’s broken, I might be able to figure out how to repair or replace the parts to get the engines working again.”

  Jas turned to the image of K. 67092d. “What about the rest of the planet? Can you scan the area around us?” The ship’s scanners were long-range. Now that they were on the planet surface, maybe they could penetrate deep underground and see what she and the defense units had missed inside the structures.

  “I’ll try to...doing it,” said MacAdam. Jas waited in silence while the scanners did their work. After a few minutes, MacAdam said, “Sending the data over to you.”

  The hologram of K. 67092d disappeared and was replaced by an image of the planet surface and what lay beneath. The representation was a confused jumble of lines and textures that Jas couldn’t interpret at first. The image scrolled slowly across, too large for the screen to display all at once. She plunged her hand into the picture to stop it. She had spotted the Galathea.

  Everything around them seemed to be innocuous except for the regularly shaped hexagonal blocks, which lay on the surface but also extended far underground. Jas moved her hand to the spot and widened her fingers to expand the area.

  MacAdam joined her at the screen. As the hologram zoomed in, something came into view that they both spotted simultaneously. “What’s that?” asked MacAdam. Near the base of the artificial structure was a dark blob. Jas closed in on the blob. It looked nothing like the geology surrounding it. Black, vaguely rectangular, and large compared to the nearest block, the image gave no clue as to what it might be.

  Jas shrank the hologram until they could see the Galathea, the hexagonal structures, and the button-sized blob beneath it. According to the hologram readout, the structure was about twenty kilometers away, and the blob was a hundred meters below the surface.

  With a handful of defense units, Jas could get to it and find out what it was.

  Chapter Nine

  Outside the Galathea’ s access hatch, the sky was lightening with the approaching sun. Jas looked down the side of the ship. It was a long, long drop to the ground, where she could make out the remains of the body bags they’d thrown out a few days earlier. Strapped to the back of a defense unit, she should be safe enough on the trip to the surface. The units could climb up or down anything, gripping with specially textured hands and boots.

  If only Lingiari w
eren’t being so difficult about it. The expedition made perfect sense to her, but he wouldn’t stop glaring, and with that animal sitting on his shoulder, she was having difficulty taking his objections seriously.

  “What if you don’t make it back, huh?” asked the pilot. “What happens then? You’re in charge of the ship.” His pet, Flux, was preening his bat-like, transparent wings, messing up the man’s hair.

  “Lingiari, it isn’t like this is my first time. I know what I’m doing. If anyone should go and investigate that structure, and maybe find the aliens that infected those officers, it should be me. If I don’t come back—which is very, very unlikely—someone else will have to take over. Whoever’s next in command.” Jas looked upward as she took a moment to figure out who that was. “Which is you.”

  The pilot had his hands on his jutting hipbones, where his uniform trousers clung to his rangy frame. An earring curved from one ear, and his sugar glider/bat alien pet was inadvertently pulling his hair over his face. Maybe the man had a point about the next in command. But that couldn’t be helped. As long as they were stranded on the planet, they were vulnerable to the alien presence, which had demonstrated its hostility. Knowing what they were up against was the best defense they had.

  “What makes you think you’re going to find what you missed last time?” asked Lingiari.

  A pang ran through Jas’ conscience. “I’ve got something to look for now. A target. That thing under the structure has to be important. It’s like nothing else I saw in them. Maybe there was another one under the structure where Margret and the others were infected, but the shuttle scanners didn’t pick it up.”

  MacAdam stood by, ready to bolt closed the access hatch as soon as Jas left. The engineer stood silently waiting. The steady, chill wind that seemed to blow everywhere on K. 67092d was making her blink.

  Lingiari sighed. “Just promise me you won’t do anything different from what you did before. Wear your combat suit, send the defense units ahead—”