Chapter 25
Cadet Nida Harper
She kept falling in and out of consciousness. But it didn't seem to matter. The presence in her mind commanded the ship, and there was little Nida could do but simply sit there and watch.
Yet as time passed, slowly her attention returned to her. In scraps at first, and it was hard won, but eventually she could string together enough concentration to really consider what had just happened to her.
She'd broken out of the Academy hospital, stolen this vessel, and was now traveling at many times light speed, back to a planet she'd only visited once but now called home.
The more Nida pondered those facts, the more they scared her.
Who knew what forces were after her, and far more chillingly, who knew what the presence in her mind had really done to everyone at the Academy. Yet whenever she questioned that fact, the presence always reassured her that nobody had been hurt.
But the fact was she had left the Academy and Earth far behind her now.
She was on her own in this tiny cruiser.
Nida had very rarely traveled in spaceships. She'd certainly been in her fair share of hover transports over the years, but she'd never had cause to embark on interstellar travel. In fact, her recent mission to Remus 12 was the furthest she'd ever been from Earth.
Yet now, as she stared at the viewscreen before her and the black depths of space streaked with the lines and speckles of stars, she felt as if she'd seen this exact sight millions of times before.
It was such an alien sensation that it didn't take her long to realize it was not hers.
It belonged to the presence in her mind.
Home. All it wanted was to get home.
That one word seemed to calm her more than anything else could, because it focused the presence in her mind. And when the presence was focused, its influence on Nida lessened.
She tried to talk to it, but there was little it would say beyond the fact they were returning home. Yet occasionally, and quite frighteningly, it would point out that if they didn't return fast enough, they would become corrupted.
At the word corrupted, she would always see the same visions flash before her eyes. Walking through the halls of the Academy, destroying the building as she passed. Or standing on the surface of Remus 12 and watching the entire planet break up into dust and stone, and swirl around her in a vortex of destruction.
That was what the entity meant by corrupted.
And it scared Nida senseless.
As time wound on, and the days ticked by, slowly she learned more about the entity.
It seemed it could only speak certain words, and when it tried to convey other information, it did so with half-remembered dreams and contorted imagery.
So, in a fugue of dreams, visions, and sleepy hours spent staring at the viewscreen, time wound on.
As it did, she truly awakened as her natural faculties returned to her, until the sharpness of her attention and focus rivaled that which it had once been.
Yet with her intelligence and focus came a fear far more exquisite than she'd experienced before. Now she had the faculties to understand exactly what was happening to her, it crippled her.
All she could do was sit there and stare at the viewscreen and wait, wait for the ship to reach Remus 12.
She had to get there. She had to return the entity to the statue.
She had to do it before they became corrupted.
Occasionally Nida tried talking to herself, or humming, or listening to music, but nothing would distract her.
She did try, however, to use the ship's communication functions to get in contact with the Academy, or to scan all frequencies for any news.
She couldn't do it.
The computer would block her out, and all too soon, she realized the entity in her mind didn't want her to make contact.
Because it couldn't be stopped.
If she tried to reach the Academy, they would find out where she was. If they found out where she was, they would stop her. They would prevent Nida and the entity from returning to Remus 12.
Feeling far more trapped than she ever had in her life, Nida somehow managed to soldier on.
As the minutes ticked by into hours, she didn't crumple her hands over her eyes and burst into sorrowful tears.
She simply sat there, and she tried to think about what would happen next.
After she got to the planet. After she returned the entity to its home.
?
Then what? Could she go back to the Academy?
Though Nida had always been an optimistic and hopeful girl, she doubted it.
In fact, she could paint an almost perfect picture of what would happen to her. She'd be remanded into custody, studied, and quite possibly kept in a laboratory for the rest of her life.
Okay, the Academy was a lot more ethical than that, but her future would not be bright.
Trying not to think of it, she distracted herself by reading the navigational data displayed on the ship's primary console. It charted a path through the various solar systems they were yet to traverse on their way to Remus 12.
She remembered from her time aboard the United Galactic Coalition heavy cruiser Orion that Remus 12 was very close to the outer border of the United Galactic Coalition. In fact, it was in an area that had once seen very heavy activity by the Kore Empire.
While the United Galactic Coalition was by far the most powerful group in all of the galaxy, it still had adversaries. Though thankfully there had been no open hostilities for years, occasionally there were skirmishes, and areas like the solar system Remus 12 belonged to, were not considered 100 percent safe.
Occasionally you could run across Kore scouting ships. Far more frightful, though, very occasionally you could run into the Barbarians.
The Barbarians were a tightly organized alliance of about 10 alien races from the far rim of the Milky Way. Though they were a small group, they were incredibly powerful.
While the Kore were the primary threat to the United Galactic Coalition, the Barbarians, in many ways, were far more dangerous. They had an insatiable desire for technology, and would often engage in industrial espionage, peaceful or violent, to glean the secrets of new Coalition devices.
Worse than that, the Barbarians were not above capturing passing transports and survey vessels to kidnap the crew, steal the cargo, and strip down the vessel for parts.
They were vicious, underhanded, and desperate. By all means, a deadly combination of traits. And when you factored in that the two main races of the Barbarians were two of the most violent alien species in all of the Milky Way, you would begin to understand how truly and terrifyingly dangerous the Barbarians were.
Still, when Nida had been aboard the Orion, she'd learned there hadn't been any Barbarian or Kore activity in this system for a very long time.
She held onto that fact now. Tightly. The last thing she could put up with right now was another surprise.
"Come on, come on, come on," she said to herself, her quiet voice nonetheless echoing through the small cockpit of the ship.
Though the ship barely had any amenities, and just enough to keep one person alive, that fact alone didn't bother her. She didn't seem to need much food; the blue light infesting her palm somehow kept her energized.
Still, incapable of distracting herself further, Nida pushed up from her seat and walked all of about a meter to the tiny receptacle that manufactured food. She pressed several buttons and soon got a glob of gray substance known as a complete nutritional mass.
She stood with her back pressed against one of the cramped walls as she nibbled at the unappetizing food, picking at bits of the lump with the tips of her fingers and considering them with little enthusiasm before popping them in her mouth.
As she stood there, the presence stirred, and for about the millionth time it told her they were heading home.
Home.
That one word lifted Nida's world, and suddenly the terrible food she was eat
ing tasted like the very ambrosia of the gods.
Her levity would not last.
For despite the entity's assurance, they would not get home.