ACHERON—CHAPTER 1 15
Chapter 1
Year 2187
The great ship floated silently. A mammoth relic to a bygone era, she nevertheless seemed to hover almost gracefully in the cold vacuum of space. Whatever sleekness and grace her initial designers envisioned had long since vanished beneath endless coats of upgrades, revisions, and enhancements. Her once-elegant design had given way to a more bulky and misaligned frame, disproportionate in many ways and signaling the inevitable consequence of age. She was the Costaguana.
Neither time nor her owners had been kind. Modifications had transformed her from the research vessel she had been designed for into an interstellar transport. Multiple sensor protrusions added over time to comply with mandates and expand her reach gave her an insect-like appearance, and her darkened interiors seemed to hint at something haunted and abandoned. Most of her lights ran dark, with only the barest rumble from her engines. Function may have superseded form, but she nevertheless continued prowling effortlessly through hyperspace.
Still, she was not a derelict. Far from it, in fact. Like her exterior, her interior was lit only occasionally with running lights flashing periodically in sequence across her hull and within her many compartments. Nothing stirred within her bulkheads. The Costaguana, like her cargo, gave every impression of being asleep but still alert.
Her bridge, like her exterior, was a further testimony to necessity's triumph over practicality. Screens and monitors hung precariously from ceilings while accessways twisted between various stations, giving the command center an almost maze-like appearance. Maintenance requirements, like the ship herself, had faded more into memory than practice; consoles were littered with plastic cups, papers, and napkins that gave every impression of being thrown about in haste rather than intention.
One of the main consoles sprang suddenly to life, its black background giving way first to the mess of interference before surrendering to a single blinking cursor. A yellow siren light above the screen followed as a low hum began to sound from deep within the ship. Other monitors quickly followed in sequence, bathing the entire room in the faint glow of warning lights and readouts. The sleeper was now awake.
Function still reigned supreme, however. The Costaguana would not awaken her slumbering cargo until all her systems had fully powered up. The ship's energy would be directed solely toward where it would be needed first and nowhere else. The command center and engines would be brought online, followed by atmospherics, medical, and other necessities. Crew quarters, eating facilities, and other comforts would follow next, and only once all were operational capabilities confirmed would the cryosleep sections be powered up to wake the crew.
Interstellear Commerce Commission regulations had once stipulated that androids could enter hypersleep along with their assigned crews; but this had later been rescinded for security reasons to ensure that at least one able-bodied member was available to address any issues that arose during interstellar travel. The consequence, however, had been an increased wear and tear on the "synthetics," resulting in higher maintenance and replacement costs. Consequently, the rules had once again been adjusted to allow artificials to enter hypersleep with the programming stipulation that their pods be given priority resuscitation in the event of emergency.
Deep in the sleeper hold, a series of screens identical to those on the bridge flickered to life. The same darkness gave way to identical flashes that led to the familiar blinking cursors and sounds. A brief flickering was followed by a running transcript of names and ranks beneath the words INITIATING HYPERSLEEP DEACTIVATION.
The list was surprisingly small, for despite her prestigious girth, the Costaguana was selective in her cargo and carried barely two dozen sleepers, each selected for one of the ship's two primary missions.
Grey was the first one to stir. As the ship's assigned synthetic, he was used to waking first. The green lights above the other pods indicated they were waking together, which signaled an uneventful arrival and successful journey. Lifting his head slowly, he blinked several times and flexed his wrists and fingers. Synthetic or not, cold was still cold.
Austin was the next to shift in the adjacent pod. As ship's captain, he had spent most of his adult life in and out of the freezers, never wanting to consider what effects they might have on his long-term health. Science was still debating that. He rubbed his goatee and winced. He had meant to shave before entering sleep; and now it would itch until he could recondition his skin to more normal temperatures.
The rest of the ship's crew awoke more or less with him. Paulson, the navigator, raised her head only to let it sink back into the pillow with a groan. Instead of blinking, she squinted her eyes, as if hoping that she could block out the consciousness and lights. Her neighbor, Hobson, was roughly her age but less experienced with the challenges of deep-space travel. Like Paulson, she had at least remembered to slick back her hair prior to entering the pod to keep it from cold temperature damage, but unlike her colleague, she had applied only a light amount of the recommended cream to keep her skin from drying. The result was a light layer of what almost resembled freezer burn to her face, something Paulson knew about all too well. Her companion would be essentially sunburned for the first few days of their excursion.
Dover and Francisco awoke next. As the "technical duo" of the ship, the two were as notorious for their expertise as they were for their pranks and persistent body odor. Engineering technicians were seldom expected to represent themselves with culture and finesse, and they were no exception. Profanities peppered their sentences, yet no one on the ship questioned their knowledge and abilities. Of the entire crew, Dover and Francisco had served with the Costaguana longest and could manage miracles few would conceive as possible, not that they would do so without insisting on the goddamned respect they seldom felt they received.
On the next two decks below were the science and military holds, each with identical sets of pods and crew. Seven freezers housed the research team, led by Dr. Presley Richards, a veteran terraformer and research biologist. Tall and athletic, he was a walking anachronism who had refused standard optical surgery and insisted on wearing the same bifocals as his grandfather, another scientist.
In the pod beside him, Steve "Scope" Richards moved with the same lethargic hesitancy as the others, his small hands rubbing his eyes and face. Richards was a planetary transformation specialist, which meant he knew as much about atmospheric processing engineering as he did about climate research and meteorology. The ship's resident geek, he was also built for space travel, standing barely five foot six, a fact which gave him plenty of space in the freezer pods compared to his older and taller colleagues. The extra space afforded him opportunities others did not necessarily respect or envision, such as smuggling personal technological devices and snacks into the pod in violation of standard procedures, a fact which he relished and for which, he was proud to point out, had yet to cause harm to himself or ship equipment. True to form, he smiled as he sat up, placing a power bar in his mouth and a headset on his ears almost immediately as pounding rock music began to blare.
Other researchers stirred, their only sounds an occasional groan or snort. In the third pod, a young woman winced as she sat up. Unlike Richards, Perez had followed the procedures for hypersleep to the letter but had erred on the side of consuming too many fluids to avoid dehydration. The result was obvious discomfort that registered on her face and in the way she grasped her abdomen.
"Anybody gets between me and the head is going to get my pee all over them," Perez said as she yanked the sensors from her skin. Almost leaping from her pod, she ran rather than walked to the restroom while doubled over.
Her immediate neighbors, Karls and Carter, watched as their colleague raced past. Though nearly the same in age as Perez, both had the benefit of additional experiences with the ups and downs of space travel. Karls looked at Carter and brushed her long blonde ponytail over her shoulder before winking mischievously. "Rookie mistake," she said simply. Carter merely nodded and began removing her sensor wires. "Some things they don't tell you about when you sign up."
Karls nodded. "Hurry," she added. "You'll need to get to the cafeteria before the grunts do." Carter winced. Sometimes she envied her synthetic counterpart.
Karls's warning was both timely and accurate. The hold directly beneath them was reserved for the Colonial Marines. Unlike the crew and research sleeper pods, theirs were more decorative and personalized. Where the scientists' pods were immaculate and clear, the Marines had slapped bumper stickers and decals across their glass covers. The displays were inconsistent with regulations, but each could be removed and stowed quickly, a fact which encouraged the troops and offered a slight boost to the otherwise strained morale that always accompanied lengthy travel with civilians.
Kriegs's pod was the first to open, followed almost immediately by the rest of the platoon. Unlike the rest, her cocoon was spotless, marked by only the slightest traces of frost. Though in her early thirties, she still possessed the same lean, muscular frame that she had had since her tomboy days growing up on her grandfather's farm.
King and Duke, her immediate subordinates, had insisted on making their pods a contest in sick humor. King, the sergeant, tacitly encouraged the horseplay as a means of letting off steam while still insisting on adherence to basic protocols. His "Mess with the Best and Die Like the Rest" summarized both his commitment to the Corps along with his belief in his troops. Duke, on the other hand, had taken a more provocative while still playful approach, proudly displaying "Your Mom Was Great" on his chosen sticker and clarifying it with "But Your Sister Was Better" on his sleepshirt.
In the pods next to them were the gunners and marksmen. Trained in all aspects of field combat operations, they could quickly assemble, disassemble, and operate every known type of firearm and convoy transport. Unlike their civilian counterparts, their sleepwear did not hang from their bodies but instead clung tightly to their bodies like shrunken laundry.
Marshall, a young man in his late twenties, blinked several times as he struggled to focus on the increasingly brightly lit room. Lifting his head slowly, he glanced at his comrades almost expectantly. Slowly, a faint smile began to cross his face.
The catalyst for that smile was his colleague Rosen, a young woman his same age whose pod was directly across from his. After groggily removing her sensors, she stifled a cough before suddenly leaning over the side of her sleeper and retching onto the floor.
Marshall grinned and looked at his immediate neighbor. "Alvarez," he said proudly. "You owe me twenty bucks. Rosen barfed again."
His companion frowned. "Fuck you," he said simply, pulling a bill from a hidden pocket in his boxers. He crumpled it and threw it at Marshall.
"Shut up," Rosen spatted, coughing as she did so. She wiped her chin with her arm.
"Hey, you signed up for this privilege, remember?" Marshall taunted.
"Yeah," Rosen replied. "But some things they don't tell you about when you sign up."
"You prima donnas knock it off," Duke growled. "Shake it off. We got work to do."
"Sorry, Sarge," Marshall said, barely suppressing his grin.
"Sorry, my ass," Duke responded. "Just get moving." He turned back to removing his own sensors and rubbing his limbs vigorously. As a result, he did not see Marshall kissing the bill Alvarez had just thrown him. Nor did he see the raised middle fingers Alvarez displayed back at his tormentor. He did not have to.
"And quick jerking each other off," he said.
For centuries, ship mess halls have been the subject of both suffering and respite. Respite because, no matter how challenging their creations were in terms of digestion, few comforts were as rewarding as a hot meal after a long day. This was especially true in the era of space travel and hypersleep freezers. Still, even the most elaborately fitted and capable hall was not without its drawbacks: It was not home, and the food was never fresh.
Adding a further difficulty, seating limitations often required crews to dine in shifts. But following emergence from cryogenic slumber, there was no established shift routine. Everyone ate at once, which provided additional challenges if for no other reason than the subtle reinforcement of group identity and hierarchy was still too much in evidence: Grunts sat with grunts, civilians with civilians, and men and women self-segregated to ensure each could spend time with those around whom they felt most comfortable.
Marshall sat down with his tray and took a mouthful of a yellow cake-like substance. They dry composition made him gag almost instantly. He spat the matted crumbs onto the table.
"Nice," Ladnier scolded. A fellow gunner, he took pride in seeing how far he could push his colleague.
"Shut up," Marshall answered, reaching for his water. "What the hell is that stuff supposed to be, anyway?"
"It's what you get when you go with the lowest bidder," Lee, his blond counterpart offered.
"Well, whoever hired the contractor doesn't have to eat this shit," Marshall complained.
A large form drifted over to join them. Standing nearly six and a half-feet tall, Sullivan was by far the largest in the platoon if not the ship's crew. Muscular and tattooed, his craggy face betrayed little unless he chose to offer an opinion or expression, which was seldom. Sweeping a leg over his chair, he stood rather than sat, pausing only long enough to spit repeatedly on the pizza he brought with him.
Rosen's eyes widened. "That is the most sickening thing I have ever seen," she said, shaking her head. "Why in the world would you spit on your own food before eating it?"
Sullivan said nothing at first, pausing only to raise an eyebrow mischievously. Lifting a slice, he took an enormous bite and chewed slowly. Swallowing loudly, he smiled back. "You really don't know?"
"No," Rosen answered.
Sullivan took another bite, nodding over his shoulder where Alvarez was approaching. "Watch," he said.
"About time you got here," Marshall grunted as his colleague sat down.
"Shut up," his friend answered. "You already won twenty off me, but now I get to enjoy my first hot lunch." He reached for the pepper and began to liberally apply it to his pizza. He did not see Sullivan wink at Rosen. Moving stealthily, he tapped Alvarez on his opposite shoulder. When his comrade turned, Sullivan and the rest of the group quickly grabbed every slice from Alvarez's plate. When the soldier turned back, he groaned and closed his eyes.
"God, I hate you people," he said, reluctantly rising to refill his tray.
Across from the marines, the scientists clustered at their own table. Like their military counterparts, they had their own hierarchies and differences; unlike them, they did their best to hide them.
Perez and Carter sat silently, still waiting for the coffee to shake the lingering cobwebs from their brains. Karls brushed quickly past, her long ponytail sashaying back and forth as she did so.
"Damn synthetic," Perez grumbled.
Carter looked at her in surprise. "Got something against artificials?" she asked.
Perez chewed her breakfast slowly, nodding. "It's bad enough there's so little opposite sex mingling here," she said. "And it's worse when we have to compete for such questionable opportunities." She nodded to the marines across from them. "But now, on top of all that, we have to compete with some nerdy manufacturer's wet dream of an ideal woman on top of it."
Carter looked back at Karls as the android filled her tray with her required operational nutrients. To the untrained eye, she was a remarkable woman in every physical respect, standing nearly six feet in height and amply proportioned. Like all synethetics, however, her personality was programmed, leaving her with little to liven up a conversation other than programmed insights and replies.
"And on top of that? She's blonde." Perez added.
"Oh, come on," Carter whispered, nodding at the crew table only a few meters away. "Surely, you could strike up an intimate conversation with a planetary biologist for one trip?"
"Keep 'em," Perez responded. She made the slightest gesture with her fork toward the marines. "I'll take mine well-done and muscular, thank you."
Carter looked over at the soldiers' table. Her friend's observations were accurate, but there was nevertheless something about the behavior she usually found in the presence of grunts that she found intimidating. That, and they smelled.
"Problem is," Perez continued. "When it comes to deep-space travel, know what they always say. The odds are pretty good, but the goods? They're pretty odd…"
Carter nodded. Her eyes widened. Karls had finished loading her try and was heading back toward their table. "Here she comes."
The blonde synthetic moved quickly to their table, respecting the social self-segregation practiced by the entire crew. She set down her tray and smiled at her companions, not understanding that the smiles and expressions they extended in return were in fact equally artificial. Programming was as social as it was scientific.
At the crew table, Austin slowly nursed his coffee as he exchanged schedules and timetables with Grey. Paulson, the navigator, sat directly next to them along with her companion Hobson, the ship's medic. Dover sat across from them, leaving space for his colleague Francisco.
"What time is our briefing?" Hobson inquired.
Austin turned from Grey. "Eleven hundred," he said.
"Good," she replied. "That should give us time for at least a quick walk around the ship to stretch our legs." She rubbed her thighs through her jumpsuit. Even in the warmth of the cafeteria, the cold temperatures of the freezers took some time to fade.
Paulson opened her mouth to ask a follow-up question when Francisco sat down noisily. Unlike the rest of the group, he had selected the lunch option instead of breakfast, and his tray was piled high with almost nothing but carbohydrates: tortillas, chips, and refried beans. Lifting his spoon, he glanced quickly at Dover's tray, his eyes widening suddenly.
"Oh, man!" he exclaimed. "I didn't know they had tapioca!" He quickly began scooping the refried beans from his tray onto his napkin.
"Hold it," said Austin, his eyes narrowing. "You're not seriously going to put tapioca on that same tray as your beans?" He nodded to the metal platform on the table.
"Yeah," said Dover. "That would really gross me out."
Francisco paused. Slowly, a sinister smile crossed his face. "Really?" he said. Carefully, he began to spoon the beans back onto his tray.
"Oh, my God," Hobson exclaimed. "You wouldn't…"
Grinning, Francisco rose and moved back to the dispensing machines. Pausing only to punch in a new combination, he soon returned with a heaping pile of cream-colored pudding atop his mountain of refried beans. It looked like a sundae from hell.
Lifting his spoon, he slowly began to eat his culinary disaster, smacking his lips loudly as he watched Dover's face.
Across the room, Perez elbowed her colleague and pointed. "Like I said," she added. "The odds may be good, but the goods are pretty odd…"
Unlike the rest of the Costaguana, the ship's briefing room was virtually a state-of-the-art creation. In keeping with her initial mission, little expense had been spared to provide her with the ultimate in display technology and projection. She could display three dimensional holography, virtual reality, and even time-worn slide displays from years past. She was also spacious, capable of holding more than twice her entire crew. Spread out on her floor were two sets of folding chairs with a single accessway between them that led to the front of the room. Behind the main panel was the viewing screen, which displayed the whitish planet that orbited beneath them.
The crew sat silently as Richards and Kriegs punched in their respective display requirements, each frowning in turn until the system beeped in acquiescence. In the front row to their right sat Austin and the rest of the operational crew. They would have no part in the briefing; theirs was simply to transport and assist.
Kriegs finished entering her data and looked up at the assembly. Tired pairs of eyes looked back at her. She wondered how much of what they were about to review would be heard, let alone retained. Still, rules were rules.
"Attention!" she barked. Startled faces looked back at her. Her words had had the intended effect. "Be seated," she added cheerfully. Chuckles echoed around the room. No one had been standing at all.
"The first part of this briefing will be science," she said. "Give your attention to Dr. Richards."
Richards cleared his throat. Like most scientists, his comfort zone was restricted to the laboratory. He hated public speaking.
"Good morning," he said, his throat quivering slightly. He coughed and cleared his throat again. "This briefing is to update you on our respective missions and priorities now that we've arrived."
"Arrived where?" Marshall broke in. "We don't even know where we are. Nobody told us nothin' before we shipped out – "
Kriegs cut in, "She's getting to that, Marshall. Keep your powder dry."
Richards paused before resuming. "The reasons for your lack of briefing before departure was for security purposes. This mission is coded top secret with full denial, which means none of what occurs here can be discussed without full and proper authorization from both ICC and the Colonial Marines." He waited several seconds for his words to sink in before punching a button.
"In answer to your question, we are in the Zeta Reticuli system, about 39 light-years from Earth outside the outer rim."
"So, we're nowhere," Alvarez whispered.
"Our mission here is twofold," Richards continued. "We have been ordered by ICC to work in conjunction with the Colonial Marines to conduct a research operation that may or may not involve hostile life forms in a hazardous environment – "
Marshall shook his head and piped in once more. "What the hell does all that mean?" he asked. "Are we here to hold hands or kick ass or what?"
"Stow that, Marshall," Krieg shot back.
"We're here because ICC wants us to find an answer to a mystery that has gone unsolved for more than sixty years."
"What kind of mystery?" Alvarez asked
"What happened to an outpost terraforming colony that was posted here decades ago and was never heard from again."
"And just where is here?" Marshall asked, ignoring the look from Krieg.
Richards paused again as if hesitant to reply. "We're currently in orbit above a small planetoid body about 12 thousand kilometers in diameter." He watched as the faces staring back at him registered nothing. "You may have heard of it as LV-426." Still no reaction.
"It's now known as Acheron."