New Game Plus: Sigma Star Saga
Chapter 2
I stared at her in shock. The first time around, none of the Krill had known my codename until much later. That Psyme knew meant she must have been sent in time as well. At that point, I stopped thinking. I just turned, grabbed her, and kissed her passionately. How could I not? It was only after we broke apart that I realized there were other explanations for her question. What if it wasn't her that had been sent back? Perhaps it had been someone else, who had coached her in what to say for some unknown reason. However, before I could start coming up with conspiracy theories, she interrupted my train of thought.
"Is it really you, Ian? You came back too?" The look in her eyes convinced me I wasn't just dealing with a well-coached Psyme, but with my wife.
"Yes, dear. It really is me. The flier crash that got you killed me too, just not quite as fast. Then there was this voice, it said I'd encountered it before, offered me the chance to go back, and said I needed to do something for it in return. Then I came to here, with you asking if it was the first time I'd seen anyone get skinned."
Psyme got the look she gets when she's thinking about something. It makes her look adorable, although I'm not exactly unbiased.
"Huh. That happened to me too, but I've been here a couple of hours- long enough to get my bearings." A wave of sadness passed over her face, "Ian, what about the kids? Do you know what happened to them?"
Grief hit me like a wave. "Dead in the crash, I think."
"And since they weren't alive now, they probably didn't get sent back." Psyme had tears in her eyes as the implications hit her. "They didn't just die, they never existed." She grabbed me and held tight, like if she let go, the same would happen to us. I put my arms around her.
"There, there." I said, patting her back and feeling inane at using such a clichéd phrase. I'm not used to seeing my wife crying. She usually gets angry, rather than sad. "We still remember them, and we always will, but we have bigger problems right now."
Psyme looked up at me, and her expression hardened. "Right. Tyrannical Overlord, your spymaster what's-his-name, and the impending Cataclysm." She blinked in realization, "Ian, we can save everybody!"
"My God, you're right! If we can get the virus now, we can stop the bioweapons from hatching and trashing the sector! Then we-"
"Sorry to interrupt, love, but I don't think that'll work. Otherwise, it'll just leave the puppetmasters on both sides alone. On a more practical note, I'm not sure we can get to Starbase 3 right now."
"Oh. I hadn't thought about that. So what do we do?"
Psyme thought for a moment before responding.
"We'll go dirtside like we're supposed to so we can take readings. I've got something of a plan, but I think we've already spent too long talking in here- much longer and we'll raise suspicion."
"What, will they think I've used my Earthman charms to seduce you or something?" I grinned, "But I understand what you're saying- we should have some time alone down there to plan."
"Right. As it is, we'd better head over to the landing segment so we can get started," she paused for a moment before continuing, "And we'll have to keep, you know, us, a secret, at least for now."
"Gotcha. No telling anyone we're a married couple from the future."
Psyme giggled, then sobered.
"Seriously, Ian. I'm just a disgraced ex-commander and you're just a new recruit. If we get too friendly too fast, that'll raise alarm bells that we can't afford right now."
"I understand. I don't like it, but I understand."
"I hate it as much as you do, dear, but now we really do have to get going."
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Fifteen minutes later, the landing party, including Psyme and myself, were stepping from the starbase's lander onto the surface of the forest planet, while the shell fleet deployed to scan for threats. We immediately split up and spread out to search for what Krill High Command wanted us to find. In a matter of minutes, however, I felt a familiar tingle in my spine, though one I hadn't felt in a long time. I smiled as the world momentarily dissolved into blue light. Krill fighters were such a joy to pilot, and it had been years since I'd flown anything better than a civilian flier.
Settling into the acceleration couch I had been summoned onto, I quickly took stock of the situation as my parasite began communicating with the ship. I was in a Type 1 Scout ship- small and fast, but with awful standard armament. Then I saw something that shocked me.
"I have helper nodes? How did that happen?"
All Krill fighters have two different weapons systems, creatively named 'custom' and 'default.' The default system is the one "built" into the structure of the ship, typically some sort of plasma bolt generator. The custom weapons system, however, is actually a highly adaptable organic production unit, controlled by the pilot's parasite. This system allows a pilot to use the same weapons even across ship types, provided the parasite contains the schematics on how to grow the weapons in the first place. The question was, how the hell did I end up with the data for a weapon system I know I didn't have at this point the first time around? I resolved to think about it more later, and turned my attention to piloting.
There were dozens of indigenous creatures in my path, and without a pilot, the brainless scout ship would have been obliterated in seconds. Unfortunately for the native creatures, I was one of the best fighter pilots alive, my parasite allowed me to control the ship at the speed of thought, and the helper nodes circling my ship could fire their tri-barreled plasma guns at an astonishing rate. It took me less than a minute to deal with the threat, and the blue light of Krill teleportation was sending me back to the planet's surface.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
An hour later, the landing party had reconvened atop a large ridge, which seemed to be vibrating slightly underfoot. Psyme immediately took charge.
"Alright people. I expect whatever's causing this shaking is what High Command sent us here to find. You three," and here she pointed to the others in the landing party, "stay here, do full scans and record them, then get back to the lander. The new guy and I are going to see if we can get more information. New guy, you go first- consider yourself promoted to trap detector."
We left the other three, looking for the human mine both of us already knew we'd find. Half an hour of navigating through heavy forest later and we were well out of earshot of the others. That was when we stopped to discuss things further.
"You know, Ian, somehow I didn't expect the afterlife to include tromping around on Endor."
"Just be glad we haven't run into any Ewoks, sweetheart."
Yes, Psyme is a fan of old human sci-fi movies. A surprising number of Krill are.
"Seriously, though, Psyme, how do you want to do this? We need a good, solid plan for how to deal with everyone."
"Well, I think we shouldn't make too many major changes to the timeline until we can at least get the virus. So here's what I think we ought to do…"
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Two hours later, we had finished plotting and found the side entrance to the mine.
"Are you sure you're okay with this part of the plan?"
"Yeah. Remember, Tierney's using criminals who'd otherwise get the death sentence for most of this stuff, and the rest is automated. There's nobody here I'll lose sleep over killing. Besides, I'm just the distraction, you're the one sneaking in and taking their data."
"If you're sure. Here's the summoning pad."
I walked over to her, hugged her close, cupped her chin with my hand, and looked into her worry-filled eyes.
"Don't worry. I got through this once before, right? I'll be fine."
"Just… come back safe, alright? I thought I'd lost you before. I couldn't bear to lose you again."
"I will. I promise. You come back too, okay? Don't get caught."
"Right," she smiled weakly, "now let's go before they send out a search party to find us."
I stepped onto the summoning platform, and the world went blue.
Surprisingly, my flight through the mine was actually almost boring. Admittedly, there were a tremendous number of obstacles, including things shooting at me, but I had lots of experience with that sort of thing. Most of the turrets were automated, and I took care to obliterate them, as well as anything else that looked important. My primary concern was remembering my goal- distraction rather than destruction. Even the enormous tunneling machine at the end was something of a letdown- rather than engage in something like "honorable combat", a few well-placed plasma bursts were enough to destroy the magnetized rails it traveled along. Lacking any form of ranged weapon, the immobilized machine was easy prey.
My part of the mission accomplished, I teleported back to the entrance, where Psyme was already waiting for my return.
"There, see? That wasn't so hard," I assured her. "How did you do?"
"Well, I got all the sensor data we'll need to convince High Command we're useful, and I grabbed a couple of handheld scanners- one for each of us."
"Nice."
While Krill biotechnology was much more advanced than human biotech (except germ warfare), and human technology in general in many cases, there were a few areas where humans had the advantage. Sensor technology was one of those areas- human-built scanners were generally half the size of the Krill equivalents, and still had superior range and sensitivity.
"So, now that we got what we came for, let's get back to base. The sooner we get that virus, the sooner we can stop what's going to happen."
End Chapter 2
A/N: I had fun writing this chapter. The Ian/Psyme interactions just seem to write themselves, and the idea of Psyme liking Star Wars just wouldn't get out of my head. Next up, Bloss is happy, the transfer to Starbase 2, and things start going off the rails.