Frontier's Shadow: A Space Opera Adventure (Frontiers Book 3), page 15
She touched the relevant keys. “Commlink open.”
“To the representatives of Tadrosia, this is Jason Cassidy of the Cargo Ship Argo. We’ve traveled far and are in need of respite after a very exhausting journey. We come here with—”
“Our commlink’s being jammed,” Aly interrupted him.
“Jammed! By who?”
“I can’t tell exactly. But…”
“But?”
“We have three ships on an intercept course,” Aly continued. “I’m also receiving an incoming commlink.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“Cargo Ship Argo, you have entered the security perimeter of the planet Tadrosia. Stand down your engines and bring your vessel to a halt.”
Jason’s eyes narrowed. “You’re the boss here, but I assure you we are of no harm to you or your people. We’re simply—”
“Your vessel will be boarded and inspected.”
“Now hold on just a minute.” Jason stood from his chair. “Don’t you think we should get to know each other first?”
The three fighter-style Tadrosian vessels closed in, flying in a concerted formation toward the Argo. Marissa went to Jason’s side and put a hand on the arm of his chair.
Aly stared at her for just a moment before she blushed and refocused her attention on Jason. “They’ve terminated the commlink and won’t respond to further hails.”
Jason stroked his beard. “Kevin, bring us to a full stop.”
Althaus glared at him. “We have to be very careful—”
“We’re the road team,” Jason cut him off. “This is their turf, and that gateway is our best chance at getting Tyler back.”
The lead vessel fired something from its bow and latched onto the Argo. The long, metallic, grapple-like tube connected to the hull, reverberating the ship around them.
“What is that!” Marissa shrieked, joining the others gazing at Aly for an answer.
“Whatever it is, it’s clamped on hard.” She stopped, and her eyes widened. “Oh God, it’s cutting into the hull!”
Althaus leaped from his seat. “Where?”
“B Deck at the stern.”
Without so much as eye contact, Jason and Althaus raced out the hatchway. Marissa, ever the investigative journalist, followed.
Althaus grabbed a pair of rifles from the weapons locker and handed one to Jason. They proceeded down the elevator to B Deck and crept toward the rear of the ship with their weapons at the ready. Ahead of them a blinding flash of light emanated from the bulkhead.
“It’s carving into us all right,” Althaus said. “It’s like a laser cutter, but much more advanced.”
It slashed a circular shape out of the hull, and the wayward piece of bulkhead clanged to the deck with a thud. Jason and Althaus stepped backward cautiously, while Marissa didn’t budge. It took a touch of her shoulder from Jason to move her to relative safety.
“What do you suppose it is?” she asked.
As if to answer her, a red burst of dust flew out of it. Althaus received the lion’s share, and his eyes rolled into the back of his head. He fell into Jason’s arms, but his nephew wasn’t able hold him up, and he crashed into the deck beneath him.
Jason stumbled, and his feet gave way. “Get the hell out of here!” he told Marissa.
She looked at the burgeoning red dust and made a run for it, dashing toward the elevator. But it was too late. The cloud rapidly engulfed her. Its smell packed her nostrils, and a dry taste tingled her tongue. She coughed, and her throat filled with a fiery sensation burning all the way to her stomach. She tried to get up, but her body went limp and her head dropped into her chest.
The last thing she remembered seeing was a bloody-red haze surrounding her.
Thirty-Six
Unknown Facility
Jason coughed and opened his eyelids. He tried to pull up his hands to rub his weary eyes, but they wouldn’t budge.
The blurriness of his vision subsided, and he stared down at the cold, sterile white bed his arms and legs were strapped to. His clothes had been stripped from his body and replaced with a thin surgical down. Much too thin for his liking.
“Where the hell am I?”
He tried to break free again, but he was locked down tight. Above his head, a small spherical object, no bigger than a baseball, hovered over him. It shone a bright light in his eyes and moved on to other parts of his body.
Jason gazed around the room as best he could at the white that surrounded him. White walls, white floor, white ceiling. And there wasn’t another soul in sight.
He tried to speak, but nothing came out. His throat itched so bad. Then he remembered what’d happened.
The red dust…
One of the Tadrosian fighters had cut into the hull of the Argo and dispersed a strange substance throughout the ship. Althaus had been struck down quickly, and Jason had told Marissa to hightail it out of there. He wondered what happened to the rest of the crew, hoping they weren’t in the same situation as him.
“What do…?” Jason coughed to rid his gullet of the roughness stopping him from expressing himself. “What do you want with us?”
The spherical probe stopped for a moment, as if flinching, but resumed its activities without reply. Jason thought back to the commlink with the Tadrosians when the Argo had arrived, remembering they told him they’d be performing an inspection.
Jason obviously wasn’t keen on the idea but realized there was little choice. They had to play the Tadrosian’s game, hoping to use their trans-space gateway. However, being strapped down to an examination table wasn’t something he’d counted on. He touched the solid alloy restraints with his fingers. He was unlikely to break free or slink his wrists through them.
“Where are my friends?” he asked, knowing someone was surely listening to him.
He eyed the walls, but once more, no reply came his way. “We mean you no harm. We’re a long way from home on a journey to find people dear to us. We entered your space to—”
The object he assumed was a probe zoomed toward his head, and a black circle appeared on it. Jason wasn’t sure if it was looking at him or not. It whirred and rose, disappearing into the white of the ceiling. The pressure from the shackles loosened, and Jason’s wrists and ankles were set free.
He threw his legs from the bed and planted them on the floor. The room spun around him as if he’d drunk far too many beers.
He placed his hands on the wall and regained his bearings. Whatever was in the red dust had affected him more than he’d thought. He breathed in and tried to move again.
Jason ran his hands over the wall from top to bottom. There didn’t seem to be any windows or reverse mirrors. “Can you hear me?” he called out.
Why don’t you say something?
He stopped at the narrowest wall and felt a crack down the middle of it.
A door!
But there was no handle. He wedged his fingernails in as far as he could and tried to force it open, but it wouldn’t budge. He stood back and attempted busting it apart by ramming into it with his shoulder.
Unable to shift it, he gave himself space and kicked at it. But all he ended up doing was bouncing off it and scattering to the floor.
Jason sighed and walked to the middle of the room. “What do you want with me!”
“I have something to tell you.”
Marissa approached Marcus who was leaning on the railing of their apartment balcony overlooking the landscape of the Martian metropolis of Holden City. She shielded her eyes from the setting sun and took her partner’s hands, placing one on her stomach.
Marcus eyed her with a bemused smile.
“I’m pregnant,” she said, overjoyed.
He pulled his hands away from her. “But I’m not the father.”
“What do you mean?”
Marcus pointed past her through the glass sliding door in their apartment. “He is.”
Marissa spun to find Jason stepping onto the balcony.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
She turned back, and Marcus was gone. Her partner of so many years on Mars had vanished. Jason approached her and put his arms around her waist.
On the horizon, three shapes appeared. They zoomed toward her apartment, and their forms became clear.
Tadrosian fighter crafts…
Jason held her hand while the buildings of Holden City collapsed in on themselves. The ground shook violently beneath them, and they both fell to the floor.
“Jason, I’m frightened.”
He stared deep into her eyes. “Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.”
The force of the fighters blew up a wind of ominous red dust around them as if a cyclone had come down on their heads. Marissa’s hair fluttered in the storm, and Jason’s smile faded.
His face froze and began to disintegrate. His skin peeled away, and his eyeballs disappeared. Before she knew it, she was gazing into the soulless hollow sockets of a skeleton.
Marissa screamed and tried to break free, but the form that was once Jason Cassidy wouldn’t let her go. The red dust filled her vision, and she threw her head backwards, closing her eyes.
The sound of the robust gale disappeared, and she reopened her eyes. But instead of being on the balcony of her Holden City apartment, she was restrained down on a strange bed in a very white room.
The red dust…
A small ball hung above her, seemingly studying her. “What the hell do you want?” she said to the buzzard.
The probe zoomed over the rest of her body before disappearing into the ceiling. She darted her eyes around and tried to break free of her shackles. But all she did was cut up her wrists on the tight restraints.
At the end of the room, a sliver of light appeared through a crack. A door opened, and three figures emerged, stepping toward her. Bright-red hazmat-style suits covered their bodies, and the visors of their helmets obscured their faces.
“What are you going to do with me?” she asked them, trying to be as calm as possible.
One looked at her and pulled a device from their belt. Marissa recoiled at the lengthy probe-like instrument.
They waved it over her stomach and showed the others the results.
Marissa narrowed her eyes. “You know I’m pregnant, don’t you?”
They all stared at her. Not that she could see their eyes.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” she assumed.
An alert echoed throughout the room, followed by a bright-blue light from the ceiling. The suited individual stashed the medical instrument in their belt, and the other two figures followed them out, without saying so much as thank you.
The doors closed behind them, leaving Marissa once again alone with her thoughts.
Thirty-Seven
Jason wondered if he stared at the ceiling long enough, whether any other color but white might appear. He quickly learned he was kidding himself.
It’d been hours since he’d woken from his incarceration and the weird medical probe had finished its scans of him. He’d done a hundred laps of the confined space hoping to find an escape route but failed miserably with every attempt.
Then a noise emanated from the immovable door at the other end of the room. He pulled himself up from his bed, and a figure emerged in a red protective suit. With a wave of their hand, they gestured for Jason to follow. He didn’t need to be asked twice, and he hurried off with them into a narrow corridor painted in the same damned white paint from the examination room.
His escort stopped at the end of the passageway and put out a hand toward a solitary door. Jason pushed it open and cautiously walked through. On the other side was a tiny cubicle. The door behind him closed him in, and a spray of liquid fired from the walls, floor, and ceiling, drenching him head to toe.
“What the hell are you doing to me!”
His surgical gown disintegrated, leaving him as naked as the day he was born. The shower switched itself off, and heating elements activated, bathing him in a warm orange glow.
Hey, that’s kinda nice.
The opposite side of the cubicle opened, and a new escort awaited. Jason did his best to cover his modesty and followed them into the next corridor.
They instructed Jason through another exit. This time a much larger room greeted him. In the center was a table and two chairs. Atop the table were his clothes, neatly folded, and his shoes cleaned and polished.
“Talk about service…”
He was left in privacy to get dressed.
With his pants on, a knock sounded at the door. Jason looked at it with bemusement, wondering why he was suddenly being treated so hospitably. He threw on his shirt and put on his jacket, completing his usual ensemble. “Uh, come in.”
A figure walked in, sans the red suit, in formal attire—a female as far as he could tell. Her face had a tinge of blue to it, while her eyes were green. Her head was hairless, and her ears had small crinkles along them.
“Can you understand me?” she said to him.
“Every word.” Jason noted the miniature device on her shoulder. A translation matrix similar to the one the Natrusians employed.
She took an additional one from her pocket and placed it on his arm. “My name is Tahlouri.”
“I assume I’ve been cleared of cooties then?” he asked.
“Cooties?” She furrowed her brow and prodded at her translator. “There doesn’t seem to be a translation for that word. Perhaps they require further calibration.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Jason smirked, putting on his boots and lacing them up.
“Very well. Are you ready?”
“That would depend. What do I need to be ready for?”
She smiled and led him from the room where his eyes had to adjust. No longer was he amongst a sea of white, instead surrounded by earthy browns, oranges, and reds.
“So, your people have a broader concept of the color spectrum after all…”
Tahlouri ignored Jason’s quip and they entered an elevator. By vocal instruction, the car ascended and swooshed open at their destination.
The circular room on the other side was unlike any he’d ever seen. There were no noticeable bulkheads or ceiling. If it weren’t for the floor, Jason would swear he’d stepped out into the vacuum of open space.
Beyond the transparent walls was the planet Tadrosia. While a dull lifeless world, in this setting it looked spectacular. Ahead of them, a man turned, dressed just as elaborately as Tahlouri. He smiled at Jason and put both hands in the air, waving them three times like a fan.
Jason assumed it was a Tadrosian greeting and politely imitated the gesture.
“I am Hahkiri,” the man introduced himself. “Chief Councilor of the Tadrosian people. Welcome to Valkeris Station.”
“Jason Cassidy of the Cargo Ship Argo.”
Hahkiri motioned him toward a pair of plush chairs near the transparent bulkhead, and they sat. “Thank you, Tahlouri, that’ll be all.”
The Tadrosian woman exited via the elevator, leaving the two men alone.
“I want to apologize for your welcome,” Hahkiri began. “We’re a very private people here on Tadrosia. Since your species is new here, we had to ensure you were put through all the necessary assessments before being allowed to circulate amongst us.”
“Did we pass?” Jason asked.
“Our medical experts have determined that you’re no threat to us.”
“Perhaps next time you come across a wayward crew, you might explain yourselves a little better.” Jason sat up. “I’m not sure how others have reacted, but I must say I felt quite violated by your examination.”
“I am sorry, but we have our reasons.”
Jason frowned. “How are the rest of my people?”
“All have passed through the same quarantine procedures and are being released as we speak.”
Thank god.
“I am curious,” Hahkiri continued. “Nobody from Tadrosia has ever seen a member of your race before. Where do you call home?”
“We come from Earth. It’s a planet several hundred light-years away,” Jason told him, not wishing to be any more specific than that.
“You’re not a member of the Alliance then?”
“No, we’ve only recently been made aware of the Alliance. We traveled here hoping to establish contact with your organization.”
Hahkiri raised his eyebrows. “I think you’re confused, Mister Cassidy.”
“Oh? In what way?”
“Tadrosia is not a member of the Alliance either.”
“I was led to believe…” Jason squirmed. “You have an Alliance gateway—”
“We have a commerce agreement with them,” Hahkiri said. “We extract minerals from the surface of our planet, and the Alliance procure them to take back to their many worlds. It’s more of an affiliate arrangement.”
“Sounds like a beneficial relationship for both sides. How are you then lucky enough to have an Alliance gateway in orbit of your planet?”
“Part of the agreement between Tadrosia and the Alliance is we get access to their trans-space gateways, while they use the permanent construct to move their goods home.”
“I suppose that makes sense.” Jason peered out at the ring-like structure beyond Valkeris Station. “And in terms of its use—”
“You want to use the gateway?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“It’s a long story. Suffice to say, there’s people depending on us to get to them and bring them home.”
Hahkiri, too, gazed out at the gateway. “Unfortunately, there’s little I can do to assist you in that regard.”
“What do you mean? You said you were the head honcho around here.”
“Honcho?”
Jason rolled his eyes. “Why can’t you help me?”
The Tadrosian Councilor got up and walked to the edge of the observation gallery. “While the gateway is located in our space, it is technically Alliance property.”
“By technically, you mean it is Alliance property.”
Hahkiri nodded. “Yes.”
Jason peered at the ceiling in frustration, a little thrown off by the beauty of the vast constellations above his head. “Who do I need to see?”
