Lacuna: Demons of the Void Read online

  Chapter XII

  “Salvation”

  *****

  Docking Umbilical

  TFR Beijing

  Three days later

  The hatchway’s seal was made, the Beijing’s docking umbilical forming an airtight link with a soft hiss. Liao, Cheung, Summer, Saeed and a whole team of marines stood by the doorway, ready to rush across the boarding platform and render whatever assistance they could. It had been a long three days journey time to the Lagrange point the Tehran had arrived at... and Liao had spent most of the time trying to determine what state the Tehran was in and how they could assist.

  And worrying. Liao had done her fair share of that.

  There had still been no word from the Tehran aside from the repeated radar signal… Although, as the Beijing had approached their sister ship, their own eyes had told the story of what had happened to the ship better than words could.

  The Tehran’s hull was visibly pockmarked with deep gouges and craters, the armoured plates of its hull broken and warped from the pounding of enemy weapons. Many of her cooling fins were holed or broken off entirely, and there were many significant structural breaches... places where the Beijing’s crew, via long-range optics, had observed ominous gaps in the hull. Some were the size of a man’s fist, others were larger than a car.

  Most alarming, however, was the huge damage done to the stern of the vessel. A giant crescent had cut away almost twenty cubic metres of material, like curved scissors through cloth; a huge chunk of the ship was simply scooped away as though by some huge blade. Only the thick titanium beams of her superstructure remained, like the exposed bones of a rotting carcass.

  Aside from the blackened, charred and partially melted superstructure beams, the cut was fairly clean. The damage was only fifty metres from the reactor cores, a fact Liao was extraordinarily thankful for. Whatever the Tehran had been hit with, if it had been even slightly more on target, there would in all likelihood not be anything left of them at all.

  The sharp optics on the Beijing revealed more than Liao wanted to know – she knew that the Tehran had suffered extensively in the time before it was able to jump back – but at the same time the prime, burning question of hers had not been answered.

  Where was James?

  He was alive at one point, that much was obvious, since the radar was ‘transmitting’ a signal only she would have been able to understand… But had this been his dying command? Or even a fail-safe he had entrusted to his first officer, Commander Farah Sabeen?

  Based on Rowe’s analysis of the Tehran’s battle damage, it was anticipated that the ship’s computers, long range radios and short range radios along with their entire radar system would be basically fried or, at the very least, operating at dramatically reduced efficiency.

  Given the extensive damage that seemed to affect every single system, Melissa was surprised that the ship had been able to jump back at all.

  The airlock swung open. Liao and her marines found themselves staring down the barrels of a dozen exhausted looking marines from the Tehran who, thankfully, quickly lowered their rifles.

  “Commander Liao, TFR Beijing. Permission to come aboard?” She glanced between the fatigued faces who stared at her from across the gulf of the docking umbilical. She hoped to spot James’ dark face amongst the Iranians, but it was Farah – a bloodied Farah, her green head-scarf stained with sweat and showing three day old blood stains – who limped forward, favouring her left leg, and extended her heavily bandaged right hand.

  “Permission granted, Commander. Welcome aboard the Tehran…” The Iranian woman gave a sardonic grin, gesturing at the debris strewn corridor with her left hand, the right extended towards the other officer. “…At least, what’s left of her.”

  Liao took Sabeen’s hand, squeezing it very gently – but even this light touch sent a visible wince over the woman’s features. “It’s good to be here.”

  Sabeen gave a relieved chuckle, her smile a thousand miles wide. “We’re very glad to see you…”

  Liao ended the handshake and retracted her hand, subtly wiping the blood off on her pants. She turned and gave a nod to her crew; almost immediately, marines, doctors and engineers rushed through the cramped docking umbilical. To clear the room and make way for the surge of assistance coming from the Beijing, Liao and Sabeen stepped into the corridor, casually stepping over fallen debris as they did so. The lighting was poor and Liao had to constantly watch her footing.

  “The feeling is mutual, believe me, Commander Sabeen... When you didn’t jump back with us we thought you hadn’t made it. What happened?”

  Farah glanced towards Melissa, casually stepping over a pile of exposed wires, her expression grave. “We almost didn’t. Although things started out well, pretty rapidly the Toralii picked up their game and knocked out our railguns. Not wanting to push our luck, we recalled our strike fighters and moved out of the jump point to try and evade their fire while we waited for them, but... then we received your signal to withdraw. We began moving back into the point, but as we got close – still charging our jump drive, mind you – a Toralii scout ship appeared right in the middle of the point... just as we were about to enter it.”

  Liao nodded. “So you couldn’t jump because there was already a ship there.”

  Farah gave a crooked grin, stepping over a hunk of dislodged bulkhead. “Correct. We nearly smashed right into it, but some clever piloting got us out of the way. When we were clear we nuked the hell out of it, of course, but the debris was still in one large hunk of metal... so we still couldn’t jump. At that point we could see way, way too many Toralii long-range missiles coming in, so we knew we were short on time… and we didn’t have many options left.”

  “Sounds dire. What did you do?”

  Farah had to stop her story to give some instructions to one of the engineers from the Beijing, then she and Liao resumed walking. “I ordered the ship to about face and steam away at sub-light to the nearest jump point... which, as you know, was some distance away. We used the point-defence cannons to shoot down the incoming missiles as best we could, but those bastards are tenacious... No matter how many we hit, they just kept shooting right up until we limped into the Lagrange point.”

  “And then you jumped?”

  Farah shook her head. “We were going to, but the lead ship, the biggest one, it let loose with this thing... a wave of light so bright and so hot it overloaded our thermal sensors. The whole ship shook and, apparently, Engineering tells me they sliced a nice little piece out of my girl’s hide. You probably saw that giant hole on the way in.”

  “We did, yes. One of our engineers, Rowe, had a theory that it was the same weapon that the Toralii used to bombard Earth with.”

  Sabeen flashed a wry grin. “We’ve been thinking the same, actually.” She paused a moment to step over some debris. “So, we very nearly didn’t make it out. The Toralii were pretty far away when they fired that thing... if they’d used it sooner, we would have been toast. We jumped before they got a chance to fire again.”

  Melissa was heartened by the use of the term we, figuring the first officer was speaking of James, but quickly realized her turn of phrase was not itself confirmation of his survival. The First Office was referring to the ship and crew as a whole...

  So, steeling herself, Liao took a breath and asked the million dollar question. “How is J-… the Captain?”

  A shadow fell across Farah’s face and Liao felt a clenching in her chest.

  “...Well, I honestly can’t say. He received a severe concussion when the Toralii fired their energy weapon at us. The weapon sent a huge shudder through the ship and he cracked his head on the jump console. Blood everywhere, I’ve never seen anything like it. I had him stretchered out as we were making our run for the jump point. He was admitted three days ago and to be honest, I just haven’t had time to check in on him. Between the jump, our reactors nearly overloading, severe decompressions scattered across all decks, the irradiation of our
food and perishables when reactor four broke containment… we’ve been living from crisis to crisis. I haven’t slept since the battle.”

  Liao gave her a nod. “I know the feeling. We’re here now, though, and we’re going to render whatever assistance we can. And... that leads me to my next point.” She straightened her back, giving the other woman a determined look. “With James out of action the Tehran needs her Commanding Officer, which at this point in time is you... and all CO’s need their rest.” She extended a hand, putting it on the Arabic woman’s shoulder and giving a comradely squeeze. “Our lead engineer will direct the repair teams and take over for your boys, who no-doubt will need some rack time as well. There’s nothing more you can do here, so go get some shut-eye before I get my doctor to order you to.”

  Sabeen seemed, for a moment, to be ready to fight Liao on her suggestion but then just gave a tired salute, grinning impishly despite it all. “...Doctor’s orders, huh? How could I refuse?”

  Liao walked the exhausted woman to the Tehran’s first officer’s quarters, only to find upon arrival that they had been breached during the fighting and had decompressed. A ragged looking engineer, his face smeared with grease and thick bags under his eyes, informed them that the contents of the room were gone; every possession smaller than a basketball had almost certainly been sucked out of the breach and was at this moment floating in space somewhere near the solar L4 point in the Hades system. That, or being picked over for intelligence by the Toralii survivors.

  So rather than bother the extraordinarily overworked Chief of Operations for new quarters, Liao simply gave her permission to uses James’. After all, Liao mused, the man was still in the infirmary and Liao was not about to let him get back to those quarters any time soon. The moment he was well enough to move she was going to drag him back to the Beijing to... “recover”.

  With the Tehran’s first officer safely tucked into bed, the memories of her last argument with James – and the termination of their ‘arrangement’ – weighed heavily on Liao’s conscience. For a moment she almost reconsidered even seeing him, but that was a passing weakness; she forced down those thoughts as she walked towards the Tehran’s infirmary. Yes, she had broken it off with him, and yes she was still angry at him for the way he had interfered with her career, interfered with her judgement, and compromised his own tactical reasoning because of her... And she told herself, over and over again, that it would take more than one of his infamous post-playtime back rubs to make things completely better in that regard...

  …But the thought of losing James permanently significantly outweighed the anger she felt at his noble but misguided gesture. He had merely been attempting to do the right thing by her and, while she despised this kind of interference in her life, she understood why he had done it. After all, in the aftermath of the battle she herself had tried to jump her ship back to save James. And while Iraj had eventually agreed with her assessment, she knew in her heart that she was doing the right thing but for the wrong reasons.

  As her boots clicked along the hallway, she tried over and over again to convince herself that this was only a temporary lack of judgement and that she would not make the same mistake again.

  Stopping outside the infirmary, Liao mulled over her course of action in her mind. She would have to talk to James, yes, but she should have a plan. The Chinese woman spent some time playing through the various hypothetical possibilities until she settled on one she found appealing. She decided that she would appear initially professional, but a little angry, then – after a small amount of time had passed – would broach the subject of forgiveness... which she would make him earn. Her dignity would be satisfied. Her point – that both she and James had to keep their professionalism despite everything – would come across loud and clear, and they could resume where they had left off...

  …But the moment she stepped into the sickbay and saw James laying flat on a surgical bed, the plan she’d carefully formulated in her mind flew away like a flock of chickens bursting free of an open coop.

  “James?”

  She fought hard to keep her emotions in check but it was basically useless; already she could feel thin trails of tears spilling down her cheeks, tumbling towards her chin like little raindrops. Unable to keep her fingers from trembling Melissa reached out for his hand, taking it and giving a squeeze.

  James’ forehead was bandaged and it was clear from the dull, dopey look in his eyes that he was heavily medicated. The man turned towards her, cracking a smile, blinking groggily.

  “Weeell, now... heh. Now I know I’m dead, because there’s an angel by my bed poised to take me away.”

  Liao gave a childish, happy snort, her lips curling up in a relieved smile, casually dabbing her cheeks with her sleeve to dry it. “I thought you didn’t believe in God.”

  “Well, I certainly didn’t before, but... I’m very glad to see you. Regarding the presence or absence of divine beings who may or may not watch over us and protect us... after that last battle, I might change my mind. Only divine intervention could have gotten us out of that mess.”

  Liao gave a relieved sigh, even managing the beginnings of a playful chuckle despite the tears trickling down her face. “Well, it’s good to see that at least your sense of humour managed to make it back to the jump point with the rest of you.” A light smile formed on her face, and Liao let it play over her lips for a bit. “Additionally, despite any angelic qualities I may possesses, and despite the fact I may, on occasion, have made you shout ‘Oh God!’... I’m no angel.”

  “No angel, huh? Well… I dunno. See, I have a theory that heaven is meant to be a paradise... However, it wouldn’t be a paradise if you weren’t there with me. So, well, no matter what you do, you’re coming along with me when I croak. Although…” the man indicated towards her hip. “…I kind of expected a ‘naughty schoolgirl’ uniform, or cheerleader’s outfit, or maybe something in black with a riding crop…”

  “Well, if things aren’t perfect for you, maybe this isn’t a paradise after all. Maybe you’re in hell and I’m here to torture you.”

  James chuckled, closing his eyes for a moment and slowly shaking his head. “Well, you’d just have a bigger riding crop if that were the case. But to be honest... I’m not sure if that’s as terrible as I make it out to be. Maybe I might like that. Riding crop, huh...”

  Melissa repressed an extremely inappropriate giggle, instead choosing to dab at her cheeks and the corners of her eyes again. “I’ll remember that. Next resupply run, I promise. I’ll slip something into the CO2 scrubbers...”

  There was a long silence, broken only by the soft beeping of the various machines, as the two regarded each other, her hand holding his and saying nothing. The two enjoyed a moment in time where words were mutually, silently, declared to be unnecessary.

  When finally it ended, Liao struggled to keep the tremor out of her voice.

  “...Dammit James, I thought you’d gone and gotten yourself killed back there. You fucking dick. Do you know how frightened I was?”

  He smiled warmly, giving the woman’s hand a squeeze. “Oh, don’t worry. I thought I was fucked, too, especially when Sabeen had me stretchered away. But it turns out we made it after all... I was wrong.” James’ smile faded, although the squeeze on her hand did not. “…I’ve been wrong about a few things lately.”

  Liao shook her head, firmly and resolutely, her fingers gripping his and returning the squeeze in earnest. “James… don’t. Just don’t say it... You don’t need to-”

  “No, it’s important. It’s important to me. I’m sorry I tried to... interfere with your career. I know, I know... well intentioned and all, but those are the pavings on the road to hell. I mean... I know that- well, at least, I imagine that... that you’ve had it a little rough in the love and romance department. You must have had it up to your neck with people fawning over you, doing you favours... sycophants, suck-ups and arse-kisses everywhere you turn. I know that the situation in China for pretty,
smart, upwardly mobile young women is one part awesome, one part terrifying, but believe me... it was never my intention to hurt you or to offend you in any wa-”

  Liao leaned down and put her lips to his, closing her eyes and cutting off the words she didn’t need to hear. It was some time before their lips finally parted. When she finally, after some time, broke the kiss, Melissa straightened her back and brushed down her uniform. A glance around sickbay revealed a small group of doctors and nurses clustered around their patients or noses buried in their charts, all trying their best – with limited success – to pretend they hadn’t seen anything.

  “That part of my life is well behind me.” She grinned impishly. “I’m into my thirties now, James. I’m not exactly young any more…”

  The man snickered. “You’re only as young as the person you’re feeling.”

  Liao raised an eyebrow. “You’re fifty, so if I’m feeling you that means I’m fifty too. Don’t drag me down with you, old man...”

  The two exchanged a laugh, though it was short, and when it faded silence once again reigned between them.

  Liao casually wiped her mouth. “You taste like hospital, by the way. Blech.”

  “And you taste like you just threw up.” He gave an apologetic, sheepish grin. “Sorry, it’s true.”

  Liao closed her eyes a moment. “…I know. Um, actually, that’s because I did, right before I came on board. I… I thought I’d lost you. And before that... ever since our fight, I’ve been sick with worry.” She paused. “…I mean, literally sick, like... I can’t hold down my food, I can’t sleep, I can’t… I can’t get you out of my head. You’re stuck in my every thought.”

  She opened her eyes again, looking down at him once more. “I was so angry over what happened, but now… now I’m just relieved. I thought that I’d lost you for good, that you might have just died over there in that place, or worse – never come back at all… so nobody would know what happened to you… so... so I’d never know.”