Spinward Fringe Broadcast 7: Framework (40 page)

“Wasteful thinking,” Alaka said. He was in
full armour. It was a suit made from vacsuit material and enough
machined plating to cover a starfighter. The design of the helmet
made his long, narrowing snout look exaggerated, since it had extra
space for his mouth to open and close.

“You couldn’t be more right,” Liam
replied.

The shuttle swept down onto the rooftop and
landed on a general purpose pad. Ayan was glad to get out of the
ship; it felt like all attention was on her, and she liked that
less and less. The whole half-squad and her guards started to stand
up. “I need the regulars to stay back. Liam, Jenny, and Vince,
you’re with me,” Ayan ordered.

Alaka was through the door first, ducking
down so he could fit. He’d left the starfighter class beam weapon
he normally kept slung across his back behind, but it was obvious
that he was going to accompany her whether she liked it or not. A
long fingered, gentle hand, or paw, she was never sure, was offered
as she was about to take the three steps down from the shuttle. She
accepted to be kind.

When Vincent, Jenny, and Liam were out of
the shuttle, Alaka disappeared, cloaking right in front of the
Carthan soldiers. They’d know he was there, but never be sure
where. It was an excellent security tactic.

“He’s going to stay like that for your
entire visit?” asked a smiling officer. His uniform was formal: a
loose fitting white shirt under a dark blue long jacket.

“I can never be sure,” Ayan replied. “Let’s
get through this quickly. I have more important things to do, I’m
sure.”

“Yes Ma’am, this way,” replied the Officer,
caught off guard. He led them to the roof lift and they were in the
bowels of the old hospital building in seconds.

The marred white and blue halls of the
fourteenth floor of the hospital seemed to stretch on forever. From
the dust and disrepair, Ayan could only assume that no one had used
the floor for a fair amount of time. A few rooms were filled with
the remains of defeated medical robots and androids, one of which
seemed to stare at her with a violet eye as she passed. The female
machine's face was frozen in a hateful expression that reminded her
of the androids she'd met on Pandem. She turned her thoughts to
more pressing matters.

“Why were you called here, Ayan?” asked Liam
Grady.

“I don’t know. The message was rated as red
level, their highest priority, sent by the Fleet Warden herself.
I’m assuming this is about the Triton,” Ayan replied.

Ayan was relieved when Jenny asked, “Why do
they call her Fleet Warden?”

“Over half the Carthan military are
criminals serving a sentence,” Liam answered. “The inmates
volunteer for service instead of execution or close
confinement.”

“Close confinement?”

“Carthan prisons are housed in orbital
stations where they keep inmates in life support holds,” Liam
replied.

“Like penal cryogenics?” asked Alaka,
stepping out of a side room.

Ayan had read about it and decided not to
spare her companions the details. “They age normally in space large
enough to turn your head. Life support systems prevent atrophy,
remove waste, and take care of everything else while the inmates
are punished with neural projections of what it’s like to be a
victim. After that sentence is completed they begin direct
manipulation therapy.”

“You mean they remap parts of their brain?”
asked Jenny.

Ayan nodded. “Soldiers and specialists in
the military are remapped as well, but not to the same degree. They
just make sure they don’t have any rebellious notions or rough
edges left before they enter boot camp. Carthans make Freeground
Academy look like a day spa.”

Soldiers in dark brown plated armour and
angular helmets stood guard in front of the main reception area.
They surrounded a woman Ayan had seen on the Stellarnet news
several times: Fleet Warden Kimberly Harrison. Her brown and blue
coat was pristine, chained together with fine silver links down the
front. Compared to her mother, Ayan didn't find the woman
intimidating, but she held an equivalent rank. She should be
intimidated, or nervous. If there was anyone who could change the
situation she and her people found themselves in with a single
decision for better or worse, it was Fleet Warden Harrison.
"Commander Rice, thank you for coming so quickly."

"You can call me Ayan, Fleet Warden."

"Thank you," Fleet Warden Harrison replied
with a cool smile. "I wish we weren't pressed for time, but the
reality of this situation is dire. I will be as clear and as brief
as I can."

Ayan listened as the highest ranking
commander she'd ever met from the Carthan Fleet passed on
everything she knew about the stranger and his Victory Machine. The
cadence of the Warden as she relayed the information didn't allow
for interruption or questions. When she came to the end, she asked:
"Do you know a man named Roman from Pandem? Our records indicate
that he was a Sergeant in the Mount Elbrus police force."

"He was one of the resistance leaders there.
Several of my officers fought Holocaust Virus infected machines
with him while they were trapped on that world. Why do you
ask?"

"We have been able to determine that he was
the keeper of a reliquary, the centrepiece of which was the Victory
Machine. When the reliquary was put at risk, he took the Victory
Machine from its containment and began travelling. We don't know
where he's been, or who he's been transmitting information to, not
for sure. The one thing he's been insisting on since we found him
on the Triton is that he be allowed to see you. That's why, when we
listened in on his connection with the Victory Machine, he opened a
crush gate here. At least, that's my theory. He may have missed his
mark when he tried to connect with you on the Triton, but he
managed to find the nearest medical facility to you. We ask that
you speak to him, discover what it is that he's trying to tell
you."

"You'll be listening in?" Ayan asked
warily.

"Of course. He's giving us information about
the future and for some reason he's placed you right in the middle
of the grand design, if there is such a thing."

"I'll speak to him, but how can you be sure
that listening in won't provoke him to disappear again?" Ayan
asked.

"We can't, but this information is too
important to pass up," Fleet Warden Harrison insisted. "This
happens our way or he dies without seeing you."

"What kind of exposure am I looking at?"

"None. We've left his suit sealed. I don't
like making the same mistake twice."

Ayan looked over her shoulder to Alaka, who
nodded once, slowly. Her hood sealed and the horizontal slats
banded across the entire surface glowed momentarily as the energy
shield systems tested themselves. “Let’s see what he has to say,”
Ayan said to Liam.

“I’m sorry, only Ayan was requested,” the
Fleet Warden stated. “I don’t want to add factors to this
situation.”

“I’ll wait here then,” Liam said with a
bow.

“I’ll be back soon," Ayan stated.

After a long decontamination cycle in a
large red and yellow striped airlock, Ayan entered the intensive
care room. The man on the table wasn't the Roman she'd come to know
months before on Mount Elbrus. He had lost weight, and the face she
saw though his worn visor was wasted. With gnashing teeth, he
writhed slowly on the hospital bed. She couldn't imagine the kind
of agony that would break a person like Roman down.

Ayan was halfway across the room when he
noticed her and the pain in his expression eased into a smile.
"Been a while," he rasped. "You're looking good." A shaking hand
rose up off the mattress.

It was clasped in hers. She looked into his
visor, no matter how much she hated seeing him suffer. It exposed a
belief she secretly held about her predecessor. No matter how many
people told her that she'd passed gracefully and painlessly out of
life, Ayan never believed them. When she pictured the passing of
the first Ayan, it always looked more like what she was seeing:
isolation and pain. "I'll be honest; you've looked better," she
chuckled, shaking a tear loose.

"Hey, no tears for me. I'm a man about to
complete his mission.”

"No thanks to our Carthan friends out
there," Ayan added.

"They're just trying to protect the city,"
he managed before a weak coughing fit.

"Is there anything I can do?" Ayan asked
after he recovered a little.

Roman's leg twitched and his voice was
strained as another wave of pain seized him. "I have a message for
you, what you do with it is up to you. Remember, this machine will
only present you with information. It might present it as advice,
but it's still just information."

"I'm sorry, I can't make the same sacrifice
you have," Ayan said, real fear making an appearance at the thought
of being poisoned by temporal radiation.

"You don't have to. I'm going to be your
relay. Open your mind."

Ayan closed her eyes and did her best to
clear her head.

* * *

A wave of vertigo forced Ayan’s eyes to snap
open to discover that she was standing on wasted ground. The wrecks
of countless ships surrounded her. The edge of Kambis blocked out
part of the bright sky, bathing the ship graveyard in yellow-red
light.

"Hello, Sister," said her previous
incarnation as she stepped out from behind the wall of an old
shelter. She was wearing an older Freeground vacsuit with the hood
up, her hair concealed by a tighter cap beneath.

"Are you Roman?"

"I'm a representation of the records of the
Ayan who came before you. The Victory Machine is using my
personality and image because I reflect the grief and general
mindset that you’re experiencing right now. It's the quickest way
to get the point across."

"And Roman?"

"He's relaying everything. I’d explain the
technology, but there’s not much point. You’ll figure it out if
it’s important later. You’re lucky, this hasn’t happened in
decades.”

Ayan considered the area they were in for a
moment. The waste and destruction was old. Signs of small and
medium scale weaponry were everywhere. The port wasn’t attacked
from orbit, but assaulted from the air and ground. The reek of
rotting bodies and toxic contamination burned in her nostrils. The
corpses were out of sight, but all around her. Ships and shelters
had become tombs and mausoleums. Ayan regarded the image of her
predecessor. "This is Tamber. When?"

"Nine years on. The fighting continues
fitfully. We’re near the site of a rebel hold that was just razed.
In a few hours, you'll be able to see the fires on Kambis.”

"Most of these ships look much older, like
they’ve been wasting here for years since their destruction. When
did that happen?"

"About two days from your time. This is me
being generous," the gaunt Ayan said with a smirk. "Here's
something you can fight against, the kind of thing the Victory
Machine was made to predict.”

"So there's an attack coming. How large? Is
it the Order?”

“Yes. The Order of Eden has completely taken
over Regent Galactic, and they've sent their resource harvesting
ship - the Leviathan - along with a sizeable fleet towards Kambis.
Everything the Carthans need to know about the Leviathan is in the
Triton's logs."

"I'm a pivotal figure in a battle of this
scale?" Ayan asked.

"Only if you take a moment to realize
something very important about yourself," the former Ayan said
flatly.

"Preventing this can't come down to just me,
there's so much destruction here," Ayan replied.

"This future history came to pass because
you were killed before you had a chance to become involved here.
You were making too much of an effort to avoid mourning all the
people you’ve lost. You got involved with the Carthan fleet, let
them put you and most of your crew aboard the Triton before it was
ready. It, you, and most of your people were killed before you
could make the least bit of a difference.”

"So I have to stay on Tamber with my
people," Ayan replied, looking away from her wasted
predecessor.

“Yes, but don’t decide to be there simply
because I told you about this,” the hooded woman said with a broad
gesture. “There are walls around your mind that have to be broken
down if you want to survive the coming days. You have to learn to
think without considering what I would have done in your place. The
advice of friends and colleagues is more important than what my
ghost can offer.”

“I made that realization before Tamber,”
Ayan replied. “I know I’m something, someone, different.”

“No. You still think you can invoke the
disposition of my mother and look just as confident as I did.
People see a petulant princess when you adopt that guise because
your true confidence comes from somewhere better. I was satisfied
being a soldier and a builder. They went hand in hand and it was
good for my lifetime. You enjoy both, but they are like opposites
in you. The warrior and the architect are always presenting options
that are at odds and you haven’t found a balance. If you’re
wondering why you don’t feel comfortable in your own skin, that’s
it. It’s not the extra pounds, or the fact that you’ll never look
like me while I was in my prime. It’s the fight you carry with
you.”

“What am I supposed to do about that?” Ayan
asked. “I can meditate, stay healthy, but you’re saying my
personality is having a row with itself? I agree, but I don’t see
your point.”

“Learn to use each perspective in turn and
you’ll learn to think in a way that I never even considered.
Imagine if all our generals and admirals were trained to build
instead of destroy? The best commanders always gave thought to what
the battlefield would look like after the war was over. You have
that potential, and it’s time you started tapping into it. To do
that, you have to allow yourself to become someone new, Ayan the
Second, or take another name entirely if you have to.”