Beams of electricity tore across the hull. The searing-hot energy drew up lines that the scorch marks traced over, performing a type of fire dance. Past the outer beam, which they had broken through, the inside of the ribbon was hollow, with smaller bolts of lightning striking at random intervals. A smoky river ran down the middle. Nathan brought the ship to it. Clouds of white smoke engulfed them as the ship flew through, and then the screens went blind.
“Did we just survive that?” Trevor put his hand over his face and laughed.
Nathan nodded his head up and down, thoughtfully. “So it would seem.” Then, not taking his eyes off the screen, he asked Trevor, “Are they still on us?”
Trev looked down at the radar. It was a static rainbow of sporadically shifting colors. “There’s too much interference to tell.” In fact, all the flight systems were acting wonky.
“Good. That means they’ll be just as blind to us.” Nathan scratched at his beard. “Does this ribbon run past a spaceport down the way?”
Trevor brightened up. “Yes. Flora. It’s between the Outer Rim and Ecath Space. If we took this all the way, it would take about six hours at this rate of travel.” He brought out a series of old charts. “It’ll take me a few minutes, but I can calculate an exit time.”
He went to work in the seat, drawing up diagrams, connecting points, calculating averages, and then plugging the data into long computations.
Nathan watched him patiently from the corner of his eye. Sometimes, Trev was so much like his mother, Carrie. He looked a lot like her. He had her sharp features, dark hair, and green eyes—but his father Scott’s scrawny build. And just like his mother, Nathan’s little sister, he had a mind for mathematics. It was probably one of the many things she had in common with Trev’s father, the engineer. He hated to admit that he missed them both, even though he’d been such a thorn in their relationship, even after she had passed away at such a young age. But what’s done is done, he thought. He hoped watching after Trevor after their deaths made up for it.
Trev punched his results into the only remaining flight computer that still worked: the timer.
“Good work,” Nathan growled. “Now go get some sleep. I’ll get you when I need to close my eyes.”
Trevor looked at the old space captain and nodded. “All right.” He clearly wanted to say something more, but Nathan waved him off.
Nathan watched him grab his sword and take the steps down. He knew he should have confronted Trevor on it years ago, but now it was too late. Trev’s affixation with the blade stemmed from the fact it was all he had connecting him to his father. It might be a symbol he was using as a reminder of what happened that night, or maybe he intended to carry it in hopes of using it on his father’s killer. Nathan didn’t know, and he wasn’t going to ask. A man’s problems were his own.
He felt the ring he wore around his neck and saw this as an affirmation. Everyone had his own cross to bear.
Trevor left the cockpit and entered the passenger compartment. He found both passengers passed out. Kaida was snoring loudly, sitting up and covered in a blanket. Daphkalian was behind her on the ground, bundled up underneath the seats.
He looked at the empty seat where the alien had died. This wasn’t the first time anyone had ever passed away on their ship.
Losing the Nymarian reminded him of the last person who had died aboard the Wrath. At one time, they used to have a true copilot, an Asterion named Epherus Vallmar. Eph was gunned down in one of the worst double-crosses they’d experienced as a crew. Desperate to get his shipping career going, Nathan had accepted a shipment of cargo that wasn’t owned by the shipper. So essentially, they ended up helping a rogue faction of Bregomon steal something off a planet. When they arrived on Crystalis, the true owner, Plath, had been waiting with a retinue of armed guards. Epherus died as they took off; he had been sitting in Trevor’s seat. They never went through Crystalis again for fear of running into Plath.
And since then, Trevor had tried to make what Epherus had taught him matter—well, when it came to piloting, not his warnings on trying to get revenge.
Having assured himself the passengers were all right, he walked into his own room and set his sword in his closet. He closed the door and locked it up.
His room was plain when it came down to it, especially for someone in his late twenties. There was only a closet, a desk, and a cot. No posters hung on the wall; there were no TV monitors and no games. His only entertainment was his father’s book collection, which he kept in the bottom drawer of his desk. It contained books like Homer’s Odyssey, Orwell’s Animal Farm, and Welles’s Time Machine. That was all he needed.
Trevor lay in his cot and pulled out a faded photograph. It had obviously been through many tough times; it was a picture of his missing girl. She was smiling off into the distance in the photo, her black hair blowing in the wind. She was fair skinned with a few freckles and a beauty mark on her upper left cheek. She was a beautiful girl, and they’d been together since he’d met her in college. That was until that faceless assassin took her and his father away.
His room might have appeared empty, but it was filled with what he no longer had: his parents, his girl, his health. All he really held onto, going from job to job, from one galaxy to the next, was the thought that one day, he would encounter his father’s killer. But after eight years of no sign coupled with his deteriorating health, he worried his father might never be avenged. His soul would never rest.
He placed the picture back into his pocket and lay back in his cot. Sleep didn’t come immediately, but eventually, it found him.
Fifty feet away, outside his room, Daphkalian saw the light go out in the kid’s room. He unrolled, flicked on his flashlight, and looked back down at the papers the alien had been carrying. What had seemed like trash at first was turning into an opportunity of a lifetime. With a wry smile, he continued to read.
-o-
Kaida slept peacefully, dreaming of her home world, a place she hadn’t seen in years. She was tending her garden, singing softly, and watching birds swoop down to steal her fruit bushes’ berries. The sun was bright and warm on her skin. It was a wonderful spring day.
A small airship flew overhead and landed at her cousin’s shipyard. Oran came out of his business to welcome his customer, saw her, and waved. She returned the gesture.
“Traitor.”
She felt the word more than heard it. It cut through her like a dagger. She didn’t recognize the voice, but at the same time, she knew exactly who it was.
Oran hadn’t heard and went about his own tasks.
She walked back into her house by way of the kitchen. It was a cottage, like the ones in the old world had been like, with pots and pans hanging in the center over a butcher block table. It was small. She was able to see that the voice hadn’t come from there.
Kaida passed through the kitchen, went down the hall, and arrived in her family room. The chair that always faced the middle of the room was turned away toward the window. A figure was sitting there, rocking ominously slow.
“Gastoff. I didn’t know you were home,” she found herself explaining.
The rocking stopped for a moment and then continued. “You are surprised to see me again?”
Kaida felt her stomach churning uncomfortably. She was so afraid, and yet her feet kept drawing her closer.
“I know about your new love interest.” Something fell from the fingers of the mysterious figure. “Something tells me you have forgotten your vows.”
The object rolled away from the rocking chair and spun to a stop next to her feet. She picked up the little metallic circle. It was her old wedding band.
“I haven’t, Gastoff. I never will.” The ring in her hand turned to dust and blew away. “But you died years ago. I have to move on.”
Now her dead husband laughed as he sat in the chair, the chair he had made for her. He shot up and confronted her.
He appeared like she had last seen him, wearing a military uniform for Earth’s Roya
l Guard. He had light-colored hair and eyes, but there was no warmth to him. This was not her husband. It was a wraith, a nightmare of him.
“You are falling for the very man who got me killed?” He laughed, but it came out like venom. “You wanted me to leave. Perhaps you wanted me dead. If you loved me, you should have stopped me. I would still be alive if not for you.” He spat.
Kaida felt tears streak down her face. “No. I tried. You wouldn’t listen. You never listened to me, Gastoff. You said you had to do it, but I disagreed.”
He scoffed at her. “And what have you done lately? You can’t even figure out the truth of their rift technology. You’re a failure.” He now stood right before her. “I curse this new love of yours. You are a plague to any man that would have you. The darkness will come for you both soon enough.”
Kaida felt his hands grab hers and pull her into him. His fingers were like bony icicles. He opened his mouth at her and flies erupted from the depths of darkness. They flew into her face, and she was helpless to stop them.
She was batting them away, when she realized she had thrown her covers off and was attacking air. The tiny beating and buzzing of the flies had ceased.
Kaida breathed in fresh gasps of air. It was over.
She gathered her wits and got up. Her watch indicated she’d been asleep for a few hours. She fished out a sleep aid.
The dream had left her shaken. She didn’t believe in the afterlife or ghosts. She was an objective scientist and rarely ever dreamed. Her scientific mind explained it away. It was even possible the energy in the ribbon was having an effect on her, making dreams feel more real, maybe even making hallucinations possible.
Daphkalian was out cold behind her. He was purring loudly. It appeared as if he were clutching something in his sleep, maybe even a small pillow. She smiled at the funny thought.
Kaida walked over to the galley and poured herself some water. She downed a couple of cups and felt a little better. She washed the sleeping pill down.
As she made her way to her seat, she saw the door to the captain’s room was slightly ajar. It might have come unhinged in all the ruckus.
Before Kaida realized it, her curiosity had pulled her to it. She opened it further and looked in. She expected to see some semblance of an inhabited room but didn’t find one. There was a thin mattress on the floor in the corner. All there was to see was a single blanket and pillow neatly stacked on top. There were no personal effects, nothing that could tell her what kind of a man Nathan was.
Just as she realized there was a framed picture of him, a woman, and a young child, something bumped into her.
“Can I help you?” a robotic voice asked.
Kaida looked down at Boost and closed the door, which locked automatically. “No, I was just…closing the door.”
Boost searched her face for a moment longer and then without another peep, rolled himself into his port and powered down.
With the door locked, Kaida shoved her nosy curiosity back down. She was still tired, and though fearful of going back to the nightmare she had left behind, she sat back down and returned to the world of dreams.
-o-
“And that’s what happened to the United States of America. They stand as a reminder of what happens when you don’t adapt to the times.” Inside a lecture hall, the aged professor surveyed his students’ reactions. “Now I want you to study and compare the fall of the United States with fall of Communist Russia and China, the lessons we learned and how they can apply to the present day. You are dismissed.”
Trevor closed his notebook and slipped it back into his backpack. He didn’t use data pads.
The other students were on their feet, groaning after the long lecture, as they set about finding their way to the next class.
For some reason, Trevor had this feeling that this day had already happened, that this wasn’t present day. But just in case he was wrong, he decided to play along.
He left his history class and walked out to the quad. There were cliques here and there he recognized. A feeling in his stomach told him these people were all dead, but he ignored it. How could they be gone when they were laughing, throwing a ball around, and eating their lunches like nothing was wrong?
The grass was cropped short and stood with their arms raised to the bright sun. He made his way across the campus lawn toward the small town beyond its walls when-
“Trevor Andrews?”
Trev turned to the sound of the musical voice, which belonged to a young raven-haired girl. She was the most gorgeous thing he had ever seen, from her head down.
He knew her, but yet on this day, he didn’t. “I’m sorry. I don’t think we’ve met.”
The girl smiled at him, like she knew a secret. “I’m Nya. We have Physics 302 together.”
He knew that was a lie. He would’ve remembered her from that class, and there was the fact he wasn’t in that class at all. He used his hand to comb his hair down absentmindedly.
“Right,” Trev answered. “Well, you know my name. I guess we’re well met now.”
“You look so much like your father; I could have picked you out a mile away.”
His father was kind of a celebrity to the geekier side of their society. “Oh. You know my dad?”
“Scott Andrews is a legend. I’m trying to get into his apprenticeship program.”
Trevor knew then she might be using him to get the position, but she was quite fetching. And he’d let this happen before. A few times. “Well let’s get something to eat, eh?”
And just like it had happened in the past, the two of them went out for a burger and fries. Trev was mostly led by his libido, but they did have a lot in common. Well seemed to at the time.
Like looking through translucent glass, he saw a glimpse of things to come in the burger shack. Their unlikely relationship bloomed from that chance meeting on campus. The aggressive girl who got what she wanted, the tiger under the sheets, the girl with a fiery-hot temper and equally hot passion—the girl he was close to breaking it off with when the unthinkable happened.
“Is this how it was?” she asked suddenly across from him. The words echoed in his mind as his eyes shot open.
He was sitting on his cot, the fingers of his left hand resting over her picture. He was sweating even though his room was surprisingly cool. He found the sword that had murdered his father in his right hand. He saw his closet was open, and the sheath stood between the two.
He had a flash of the worst night of his life—the explosion at the lab that killed his fiancée, his father in a pool of his own blood, the dark figure of his dad’s assassin looking at him through his opaque visor—the mysterious killer, the one he continued to look for.
Trevor clutched the assassin’s sword hard until it hurt. He needed to have his revenge.
Before he knew it, the sword had fallen from his hands and he was balled up on the ground. The tremors were painfully contracting his muscles. When he went to yell in agony, nothing, not even air, escaped his lips. Stabbed over and over again, he winced. Then the hot needles stopped and ebbed back down.
Another attack. So close in frequency to the last one. Was his disease finally running its due course?
He had to find his father’s killer—before it was too late.
-o-
Nathan sat watching his ship blow through alien clouds. It was much like flying through weather back at the academy’s pilot training. In blind-man drills, you weren’t allowed to know where you were going or what lay ahead. It was about instinct, training your senses, facing the fear of what you couldn’t see, and coming out on top.
His eyes felt heavy watching the same clouds pass by. He knew deep down that he’d flown this tired before, yet still, it kept at him. Hounding him. It was like something in the air. He pinched his arm to stay awake—hard enough to draw a bruise. It worked for a moment, then…
“Nathan! Hold still.” His wife was straightening the collar on his Royal Air Force uniform.
He looked around and found himself at a loss for words. He was at the academy. His wife, Maura, was looking at him and smiling. She was so young, younger than he could have ever remembered, and she was pregnant. They were backstage somewhere.
“What’s going on?” he asked. He had no idea how he’d gotten there. Wasn’t he flying? It was like a distant memory that no longer mattered.
“Honey, you’re about to go on.” Maura winked at him, jokingly. “I hope you didn’t forget your speech.”
What speech? was all he could think.
He felt a pat on his back. He turned and looked into the eyes of his mentor: the Armiger of Earth, Callius. He was a younger man too.
It was then that he saw his reflection in the mirror; he was a kid. Trevor’s age.
Wait, who was Trevor?
He had no clue. He did look sharp though. His face was clean shaven. His military dress fatigues were white and freshly pressed. They had a hint of Maura’s laundry detergent smell and starch. He had no rank, but that was about to change.
“Cadet Sutherland, you have made us all very proud.” the Armiger told him. “Top of your class. Cheers, mate. If I’m not mistaken, I may be looking at the next captain of the Royal Air Force.”
Nathan shook the compliment off. “I’m just glad I get to serve my world, sir.”
“He’s always so professional.” Maura laughed.
Callius chuckled to himself. “Indeed. Knock ‘em dead out there. And in the days to come, watch over my boy, Fox. Lord knows, he only listens to you.”
“I will, sir,” Nathan answered. Fox was like his little brother.
The Armiger nodded and left to go watch his speech.
“You’ll do fine, sweetheart,” Maura said. She always had a way of reading him, even when he didn’t give anyone something to react to.
“I know.” Nathan kissed his young wife on the cheek. “Go take your seat. I’ll be out there in a minute.”
Maura smiled and let him finish getting ready himself.
In a way, he knew how the rest played out. He gave an inspirational speech about the future of Earth and how it would be a major player in the years to come and he would help lead them into an era of peace. That the envoy that had made contact with Ruvera was going to bridge the two people together.
There was a blur in the audience next to his friend Fox and another classmate, Gastoff. A person he should be able to see but couldn’t. It almost cleared, and then his eyes were drawn elsewhere.
In this moment, he was just a young kid, who didn’t know that right around the bend, the Ruveran Empire would see Earth as a threat, that a war would come, that dark days were all that remained ahead, that Earth would be lost, that his wife and son would be on the very planet as it blew apart, their screams never heard.
Nathan straightened his lapels, took a deep breath, and finally entered the stage.
A hand on his shoulder stopped him. He turned and looked into the familiar eyes of his nephew. He was back in his spaceship, flying through a cloud bank. Miraculously, they were still in the middle of it.
“You all right?” Trevor asked.
“Yeah,” Nathan answered. He shook off the remnants of the dream.
He must have blinked his eyes for a moment and gone under. He checked and made sure the ship was still fine. When he saw the timer, he noticed hours had passed. Maybe it had been longer than a blink.
Trevor found his seat, still shaking off his own dream. They were close to the exit point.
“Want to get everyone up?”
“Yeah. That’s fine.” Unconsciously, Nathan felt for his wedding band around his neck. He slid it back under his collared shirt.
Trevor saw the movement but didn’t ask. Instead, he walked back the way he’d just come, turning on the lights and making sure everyone was strapped in. Boost turned himself back on when he heard Trev get the others up. They both returned to the cockpit.
“Ready?” Nathan called as the timer counted to zero.
Trevor buckled himself down and made sure his copilot systems were at least on, even if they were on the fritz. “Yup.”
With that, Nathan grabbed the steering yoke and they exited the safety of the clouds, emerging back into the lightning storm.
Chapter 5