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Since there were a number of favorable reviews to the story I posted earlier in the general forum, I've decided to play a bit more with that....flesh out the characters, give more detais and so forth. And to that end, here's the first installment. Enjoy....:-)
Episode I: From One Prison To Another - 2158
Psi-Lock College - Sparta Command
The bomb had done its work well. The building that had housed one of the most terrifying projects envisioned since Planetfall had been destroyed. Had the research been allowed to continue unchecked, the Spartans could well have created an all-but invincible army of Psi-talented men and women. Trained legions of human soldiery whose mental talents went well beyond even what the Mindworms had proved capable of.
Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang of the Human Hive studied the images with the watchful, narrow eyes of a hunter. Eyes that missed nothing.
“Doctor Banks?” He asked after a long moment, eyes flickering briefly to the Assassin who stood before him.
“Killed in the blast, and their data core was completely destroyed as well. If they ever rebuilt the project, it will be from scratch.”
Yang nodded. A barely perceptible nod of his head. “Which gives us time to do our own research....excellent. A commendable job, Commander.”
“Thank you sir.” The black-clad Commander whispered as he bowed deeply. He maintained that position for a long moment, feeling Yang’s awful, penetrating eyes on him.
His heart nearly stopped beating.
*He is going to ask....* the tortured thought barely escaped his mind before Yang spoke again. “That will be all, Commander. Dismissed.”
Relief flood like an almost tangible thing through the Assassin’s body, but he took great care not to let his face betray anything he was feeling. Chairman Yang had an uncanny knack for being able to root out gray truths and white lies, but not this time apparently.
Still, he did not breathe his sigh of relief until he was safely out of the Chairman’s inner chamber and headed for his bunker. Only then did he feel safe enough even to bring the image to his mind.
It was a small thing. Probably, it would amount to nothing at all, but it *was* a loose end.
The intelligence report detailed eight test subjects at the center. Eight native born Chrionians, genetically altered to suppress self-awareness and to enhance their Psi-Potential.
Before he detonated the bomb, he had only verified the locations of seven, so he couldn’t be sure....
He retraced every step he had taken in his mind’s eye.
No.
If he had it to do over again, he would have done it the same way. There had been no time to find the eighth....not if he had wanted to get out.
Besides, even if the eighth was not in the building when the bomb leveled it, he’d would never be any use to anyone. Doctor Banks had been the Psi-Master, and with that link severed, the surviving eighth would be little more than a drooling, psychotic vegetable. Not the kind of person who’d last terribly long in Chrion’s unforgiving environment.
Satisfied with that conclusion, he shrugged off the last of his misgivings about it, and by the time he reached the Hab-Wards, there was a lightness in his step. It was the sure stride of a completely confident man.
***
Gaian Science Patrol 6B - Gamma Sector - Near the Spartan Border
Kevin Aldridge - Science Officer
Gayle McGinnes - Pilot
“Bring us to a stop, Gayle, and swing ‘round to two-five-seven.”
“Two-five-seven, roger that.” She said with an impish grin. “God I love all this military talk.....turns me on like you wouldn’t believe.”
Kevin looked away from his viewfinder long enough to shoot his pilot a wry grin. “Marry me.” He said simply, which illicited the now-expected eye-roll in response.
He held her gaze for a moment, and then dropped back to work, fiddling with the controls, murmuring and muttering to himself all the while, and Gayle watched him. An attractive man, no doubt. Sort of a rakish, dangerous look about him, which was completely at odds with the person he truly was. A classic, timid researcher. If she were ever to act on her occasional impulses toward him, it’d probably give him a heart attack.
The smile returned to her lips as she traced the lines of concentration in Kevin’s forehead with her eyes. Dark, bold features. A handsome man, by any definition.
Her thoughts were about to drift in a delicious, more dangerous direction when he looked up and smiled like a bright-eyed child at her, completely ruining the image forming in her head. “Found it!”
She turned around to face her console again and put her mind firmly on her work. “What are we out here looking for again, and where do you want me?”
“Keep this heading for another six hundred meters, ahead one third, then change to one-one-six.”
She quickly plotted their course, then turned partway around. “But won’t that take us too close to the Fungal Beds? After the incident at Cutter’s Canyon all the science teams were told....”
Kevin waved her concern away. “This is bigger than some stupid regulation....we’ve got a live one out there.”
“Live....what?” She asked pensively.
“Human. Or at least, we think it’s Human. Showed up all weird on our scans, but that might be interference from the Fungal Beds. The call came in from Science Station Two last night, which is why I rolled you out of bed to come with me.”
Gayle considered saying something about wishing he’d come over to join her rather than whisking her off to the outer edges of Gaian land, but only shrugged in response. “So what’s the big deal. We’ve got another Cryo-Pod. I don’t get why all the excitement.”
Kevin shook his head. “Long range sensors indicate no debris in the area, and, according to our heat-signature scan, he’s not armed, and appears to be wounded. My guess, a refugee.”
Now Gayle’s eyebrows arched slightly. “From Sparta? But I thought their people were loyal almost to the point of fanaticism. Why would?....How?”
He shrugged elaborately. “Don’t know....but the fact is, he’s lying over there in the edge of the Fungal Bed, about a thousand meters away.....I want to approach slow so we don’t scare him.”
Gayle nodded and turned once more to her console, her own excitement building. A refugee! If it turned out to be true, it would be the first such incident since Planetfall. Inside news on what life in another faction might be like could be invaluable to say the least, as up til now, the Gaians had only infrequent contacts with the Peace Keepers. They knew the Spartans were out there, sure, and had seen their territory markers clearly enough, but all attempts to contact them had met with an ominous silence. This was big. This was very big.
***
An angry, growling sound, growing closer. It set off an alarm bell in his head. His eyes snapped open and the machine portion of his brain took over.
**Defense Option Zulu-Three. Psi-Tracking activated. Target Acquisition.....waiting.....waiting....waiting.... .**
**No valid targets. Partial stand-down.**
**Attempting to establish like with Psi-Command for further instructions....**
**Attempt two.....**
**Attempt three....**
**Attempt four.....**
**Psi-Link failed.....emergency shutdown sequence commencing.....**
In order to prevent their capture and study, the Psi-Trained warriors were created with their own built-in destruct code. If ever there was a time when they could not establish a link with the Psi-Master, they were designed to go into meltdown. Vital functions were shut down one after another until death resulted, and then the body was flooded with programmed free-radicals which quickly devoured the “experimental” organs of the warrior’s body. The success of this self-destruct code, however, was dependent on the central computer and datacore at the Psi-College. Without the raw power of the central computer to override the Human survival instinct, the imbedded processor found itself much more evenly matched with the Human Will, and as the computer began shutting his body down, he fought back against it. Eyes still open, staring blankly up at Chrion’s twin-sunned sky, betraying nothing of the titanic struggle taking place within him.
***
“I think I see him but....Christ, he’s really wedged in here....Gayle, break out that cutter-stick, will you? I can’t make any headway against this damned Fungus.”
“Here you are, Doctor.” She said with a characteristic smile as she handed him the laser cutter. “What’s the prognosis?”
“Well I think if I can get this big trunk vine off of him, I’ll....”
Without any warning at all, the stranger’s hand shifted, parting the stubborn Fungus as though it were a flimsy curtain. Unlike the unchanged man before him, he seemed to have no difficulty moving among the Fungus.
**Target acquired.**
The stranger’s eyes narrowed as they met Kevin’s, and the Gaian Researcher clutched the sides of his head and started screaming.
***
For a moment, Gayle couldn’t make sense of what she was seeing.
Kevin had been struggling with the Fungus, hardly able to move it at all, and the stranger....
Then Kevin started screaming.
She looked around frantically for a worm-boil, expecting to see the terrifying creatures writhing up out of the Fungal Bed, but she saw nothing.
Then how?
She looked back at Kevin with tears in her eyes, knowing he was in agony, and knowing that if she didn’t do something quickly it would spiral up and up and up until it killed him.
Then she noticed where he was looking.
Right into the narrowed eyes of the stranger.
So somehow the stranger must be....
Nevermind that it didn’t make any sense. Nevermind that no Human had ever been Psi-talented. This one was, apparently, and he was killing Kevin.
Thinking quickly, she pried the cutter-stick out of Kevin’s hand and deftly flipped it around. Raised it high, and then brought it crashing down against the stranger’s temple. Hard. “Leave him alone you bastard, we’re trying to help!” She hissed.
The light in the stranger’s eyes went out, and Kevin’s screaming stopped. He sank slowly to his knees with a weak groan, still clutching his head.
Silence reigned for a long moment, and Gayle knelt beside Kevin. “How bad is it?” She asked quietly.
He waved her off. “I’ll be okay....it was a weak attack....I think if he hadn’t been wounded he could have killed me in a second with that, but....” Kevin shook his head. “That shouldn’t even be possible....in fifty-eight years there hasn’t been a single case of a Human being able to....”
“I know....” She half-whispered, and her words hung ominously in the air.
“Is he....”
She shook her head. “I think I just knocked him out, but if we’re going to get him back to base, then we’ve got to sedate him.”
Kevin nodded. “Let’s do it. Deidre’s going to want to see him.”
Gayle helped him to his feet. Steadied him, and then they turned their attention to the mysterious stranger in the Fungal Bed. The mysterious and apparently deadly stranger.
Episode I: From One Prison To Another - 2158
Psi-Lock College - Sparta Command
The bomb had done its work well. The building that had housed one of the most terrifying projects envisioned since Planetfall had been destroyed. Had the research been allowed to continue unchecked, the Spartans could well have created an all-but invincible army of Psi-talented men and women. Trained legions of human soldiery whose mental talents went well beyond even what the Mindworms had proved capable of.
Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang of the Human Hive studied the images with the watchful, narrow eyes of a hunter. Eyes that missed nothing.
“Doctor Banks?” He asked after a long moment, eyes flickering briefly to the Assassin who stood before him.
“Killed in the blast, and their data core was completely destroyed as well. If they ever rebuilt the project, it will be from scratch.”
Yang nodded. A barely perceptible nod of his head. “Which gives us time to do our own research....excellent. A commendable job, Commander.”
“Thank you sir.” The black-clad Commander whispered as he bowed deeply. He maintained that position for a long moment, feeling Yang’s awful, penetrating eyes on him.
His heart nearly stopped beating.
*He is going to ask....* the tortured thought barely escaped his mind before Yang spoke again. “That will be all, Commander. Dismissed.”
Relief flood like an almost tangible thing through the Assassin’s body, but he took great care not to let his face betray anything he was feeling. Chairman Yang had an uncanny knack for being able to root out gray truths and white lies, but not this time apparently.
Still, he did not breathe his sigh of relief until he was safely out of the Chairman’s inner chamber and headed for his bunker. Only then did he feel safe enough even to bring the image to his mind.
It was a small thing. Probably, it would amount to nothing at all, but it *was* a loose end.
The intelligence report detailed eight test subjects at the center. Eight native born Chrionians, genetically altered to suppress self-awareness and to enhance their Psi-Potential.
Before he detonated the bomb, he had only verified the locations of seven, so he couldn’t be sure....
He retraced every step he had taken in his mind’s eye.
No.
If he had it to do over again, he would have done it the same way. There had been no time to find the eighth....not if he had wanted to get out.
Besides, even if the eighth was not in the building when the bomb leveled it, he’d would never be any use to anyone. Doctor Banks had been the Psi-Master, and with that link severed, the surviving eighth would be little more than a drooling, psychotic vegetable. Not the kind of person who’d last terribly long in Chrion’s unforgiving environment.
Satisfied with that conclusion, he shrugged off the last of his misgivings about it, and by the time he reached the Hab-Wards, there was a lightness in his step. It was the sure stride of a completely confident man.
***
Gaian Science Patrol 6B - Gamma Sector - Near the Spartan Border
Kevin Aldridge - Science Officer
Gayle McGinnes - Pilot
“Bring us to a stop, Gayle, and swing ‘round to two-five-seven.”
“Two-five-seven, roger that.” She said with an impish grin. “God I love all this military talk.....turns me on like you wouldn’t believe.”
Kevin looked away from his viewfinder long enough to shoot his pilot a wry grin. “Marry me.” He said simply, which illicited the now-expected eye-roll in response.
He held her gaze for a moment, and then dropped back to work, fiddling with the controls, murmuring and muttering to himself all the while, and Gayle watched him. An attractive man, no doubt. Sort of a rakish, dangerous look about him, which was completely at odds with the person he truly was. A classic, timid researcher. If she were ever to act on her occasional impulses toward him, it’d probably give him a heart attack.
The smile returned to her lips as she traced the lines of concentration in Kevin’s forehead with her eyes. Dark, bold features. A handsome man, by any definition.
Her thoughts were about to drift in a delicious, more dangerous direction when he looked up and smiled like a bright-eyed child at her, completely ruining the image forming in her head. “Found it!”
She turned around to face her console again and put her mind firmly on her work. “What are we out here looking for again, and where do you want me?”
“Keep this heading for another six hundred meters, ahead one third, then change to one-one-six.”
She quickly plotted their course, then turned partway around. “But won’t that take us too close to the Fungal Beds? After the incident at Cutter’s Canyon all the science teams were told....”
Kevin waved her concern away. “This is bigger than some stupid regulation....we’ve got a live one out there.”
“Live....what?” She asked pensively.
“Human. Or at least, we think it’s Human. Showed up all weird on our scans, but that might be interference from the Fungal Beds. The call came in from Science Station Two last night, which is why I rolled you out of bed to come with me.”
Gayle considered saying something about wishing he’d come over to join her rather than whisking her off to the outer edges of Gaian land, but only shrugged in response. “So what’s the big deal. We’ve got another Cryo-Pod. I don’t get why all the excitement.”
Kevin shook his head. “Long range sensors indicate no debris in the area, and, according to our heat-signature scan, he’s not armed, and appears to be wounded. My guess, a refugee.”
Now Gayle’s eyebrows arched slightly. “From Sparta? But I thought their people were loyal almost to the point of fanaticism. Why would?....How?”
He shrugged elaborately. “Don’t know....but the fact is, he’s lying over there in the edge of the Fungal Bed, about a thousand meters away.....I want to approach slow so we don’t scare him.”
Gayle nodded and turned once more to her console, her own excitement building. A refugee! If it turned out to be true, it would be the first such incident since Planetfall. Inside news on what life in another faction might be like could be invaluable to say the least, as up til now, the Gaians had only infrequent contacts with the Peace Keepers. They knew the Spartans were out there, sure, and had seen their territory markers clearly enough, but all attempts to contact them had met with an ominous silence. This was big. This was very big.
***
An angry, growling sound, growing closer. It set off an alarm bell in his head. His eyes snapped open and the machine portion of his brain took over.
**Defense Option Zulu-Three. Psi-Tracking activated. Target Acquisition.....waiting.....waiting....waiting.... .**
**No valid targets. Partial stand-down.**
**Attempting to establish like with Psi-Command for further instructions....**
**Attempt two.....**
**Attempt three....**
**Attempt four.....**
**Psi-Link failed.....emergency shutdown sequence commencing.....**
In order to prevent their capture and study, the Psi-Trained warriors were created with their own built-in destruct code. If ever there was a time when they could not establish a link with the Psi-Master, they were designed to go into meltdown. Vital functions were shut down one after another until death resulted, and then the body was flooded with programmed free-radicals which quickly devoured the “experimental” organs of the warrior’s body. The success of this self-destruct code, however, was dependent on the central computer and datacore at the Psi-College. Without the raw power of the central computer to override the Human survival instinct, the imbedded processor found itself much more evenly matched with the Human Will, and as the computer began shutting his body down, he fought back against it. Eyes still open, staring blankly up at Chrion’s twin-sunned sky, betraying nothing of the titanic struggle taking place within him.
***
“I think I see him but....Christ, he’s really wedged in here....Gayle, break out that cutter-stick, will you? I can’t make any headway against this damned Fungus.”
“Here you are, Doctor.” She said with a characteristic smile as she handed him the laser cutter. “What’s the prognosis?”
“Well I think if I can get this big trunk vine off of him, I’ll....”
Without any warning at all, the stranger’s hand shifted, parting the stubborn Fungus as though it were a flimsy curtain. Unlike the unchanged man before him, he seemed to have no difficulty moving among the Fungus.
**Target acquired.**
The stranger’s eyes narrowed as they met Kevin’s, and the Gaian Researcher clutched the sides of his head and started screaming.
***
For a moment, Gayle couldn’t make sense of what she was seeing.
Kevin had been struggling with the Fungus, hardly able to move it at all, and the stranger....
Then Kevin started screaming.
She looked around frantically for a worm-boil, expecting to see the terrifying creatures writhing up out of the Fungal Bed, but she saw nothing.
Then how?
She looked back at Kevin with tears in her eyes, knowing he was in agony, and knowing that if she didn’t do something quickly it would spiral up and up and up until it killed him.
Then she noticed where he was looking.
Right into the narrowed eyes of the stranger.
So somehow the stranger must be....
Nevermind that it didn’t make any sense. Nevermind that no Human had ever been Psi-talented. This one was, apparently, and he was killing Kevin.
Thinking quickly, she pried the cutter-stick out of Kevin’s hand and deftly flipped it around. Raised it high, and then brought it crashing down against the stranger’s temple. Hard. “Leave him alone you bastard, we’re trying to help!” She hissed.
The light in the stranger’s eyes went out, and Kevin’s screaming stopped. He sank slowly to his knees with a weak groan, still clutching his head.
Silence reigned for a long moment, and Gayle knelt beside Kevin. “How bad is it?” She asked quietly.
He waved her off. “I’ll be okay....it was a weak attack....I think if he hadn’t been wounded he could have killed me in a second with that, but....” Kevin shook his head. “That shouldn’t even be possible....in fifty-eight years there hasn’t been a single case of a Human being able to....”
“I know....” She half-whispered, and her words hung ominously in the air.
“Is he....”
She shook her head. “I think I just knocked him out, but if we’re going to get him back to base, then we’ve got to sedate him.”
Kevin nodded. “Let’s do it. Deidre’s going to want to see him.”
Gayle helped him to his feet. Steadied him, and then they turned their attention to the mysterious stranger in the Fungal Bed. The mysterious and apparently deadly stranger.