Invasive Species

Inside a shop that looked to have been abandoned years prior, the remaining four sat in the near total silence. Sam was lying sprawled on the floor where Mandy had dropped him, resting off the effects of the barbs. Mandy was crouched in a corner staring at her combat knife, Maria’s blood now drying on the serrated edge. Her expression was a mix of admiration and disbelief. David knew how she felt. Even though he had known her for years, her act of selfless sacrifice was unreal.

Tamsyn sat cross-legged on the shop counter, facing the door with her eyes closed. David, however, was making the most noise and movement of all of them. He felt restless; ready to run out of the room at the first opportunity. With the death of Maria, he was lonely and exposed. He was now the only surviving member of the customs department on the Orion hub.

His pacing in the small space was starting to make him dizzy, so he stopped at the counter and leaned on it. Looking over to Tamsyn, who sat just inches away from him, he said to her, “I may not get another chance to say this, so I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry for interrogating you about your gifts. It wasn’t fair.”

Tamsyn scoffed but her eyes remained closed. “’Gifts is not what I would call them.”

“Why not? I’ve seen you do amazing things. Your abilities have saved our asses more than once.”

“But, it also makes me different,” she snapped. Finally opening her eyes, she took a deep breath to calm her temper. “I’m extremely unique. I didn’t have anyone to train me in using my powers. I didn’t have anyone to talk to about it. My mother knew more than she said, I could tell. But, she never wanted to talk about it.”

“You’re really the only person anywhere to have these abilities?”

“Maybe the only human. At least around here. I did a lot of research about it, trying to find answers. Most of it was rumor and speculation, but a lot of people believe the indigenous Martians, the Zodiacs had these powers, and more. It’s said that humans with certain qualities can have these powers unlocked by the Zodiacs, and a lot of people have gone out looking for them.

“Why haven’t you? Maybe they could give you answers.”

“Well, the one power I really do consider a gift is the genetic memory. My father died when I was very young, so I never really got to know him. That’s why I really travel so much; to learn about him through the places he went. He only left the human territories twice that anyone knows of. Once was in a location no one has records of, and the other was Salaxian territory.”

“Your father went on the mission that ended the Salaxian war?”

She nodded. “That’s where the first stories of the Zodiacs came from, but most of the records from that mission were redacted by the U.N.C. and never recovered. So, no one knows if the Zodiacs really exist. I could waste a lot of valuable time for nothing. Although...”

“What is it?”

“There’s some things about this situation that don’t make a lot of sense.”

David laughed. “Just some?”

“I mean besides the obvious. You remember I told you I could sense living things?”

“Of course.”

“Not long after we met, the second time, I sensed someone...different.”

“You mean...someone like you.”

“I think so. When I sense life, everyone is different, just like they are physically. I could close my eyes and sense where each of you are in this room. But, he really stood out. I could feel him reaching into the station. He was only here for a moment, then he was gone.”

David’s mind went back to the strange object that approached the station before the whole mess began. “So, you sensed someone else like you. Does that have anything to do with these creatures.”

“It might.”

“How?”

Tamsyn closed her eyes. Shortly after he left, is when I started feeling them. I didn’t realize what I was feeling at first, because it didn’t make any sense.”

“How so?”

“Like I told you, every living thing has it’s own distinct life force. They all have the same one. His..”

“You think he’s controlling them?”

“Maybe. Or he just jump started their life force. It could be nothing at all. I’m on my own with this, so I have no frame of reference.”

David ran his hands through his hair. “That makes sense.”

She stared at him for a moment. “Your turn.”

“My turn what?”

“Spill your guts. Who was the girl in the hologram?”

David was startled by her use of the word “was.” He wasn’t sure if that was her powers or just good old-fashioned intuition and observation. It didn’t matter. She sensed enough that he couldn’t be dishonest about it. “She was my fiancée.”

“Did she leave you?”

“In a way. That’s how I look at it. She had a rough childhood. Caused some serious depression problems later in life. I thought our relationship was helping her, but she still took to self-medicating with some seriously dangerous drugs. I tried to get her to stop, but she just kept doing it behind my back. Till she overdosed and left me alone.”

Tamsyn put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “I’m sorry.”

David shrugged his other shoulder. “I’ve been stuck on anger for so long… I realize it wasn’t her fault, but part of me can’t help but feel betrayed. So, I’ve been running away for years. I haven’t wanted to go home and face the reality of the situation.”

“Running away lets you cling to the past.”

“I’ve been struggling to understand what I’m doing for years, and you just summed it up perfectly.”

“If you survive this, will you go home?”

David nodded. “I think it’s time.”

Sam let out a long sigh and propped himself up. “And speaking of which, how are you feeling, Sam?” David said, eager to leave old wounds behind. “Ready to move?”

“Believe it or not, man, I kinda feel rejuvenated,” Sam quipped.

David let a small smile at play across his face, then turned to Mandy. “What about you?”

“I’m never not ready,” she replied as she stood.

He looked to Tamsyn, and she simply nodded in affirmation. “All right. We’ve got less than 2 miles left to go. Let’s move fast and keep your eyes peeled.”

David opened the door and quickly checked both directions of the hall before signaling them to follow. They proceeded at a mild jog, weapons always at the ready. The end of their journey was so close David could almost taste it. But, there was no relief. No sense of elation. The halls were shrinking, the lights getting dimmer, and the air was thin. Some of this could have been the deteriorating station systems, but part of him knew that wasn’t it. It was the higher stakes.

Getting this far had been a miracle, but now that the end was so close, the thought of failure was paralyzing. He wondered if they had been foolish. Maybe this entire attempt at escape had been a suicide run. Prolonging the inevitable only to watch their friends die in front of them.

The halls were being squeezed by a Madallum’s spider-like legs. The darkness they were running into was the inside of it’s mouth, waiting patiently to grind them to bits. It was all a game. Let their food run around and think they can escape. Maybe the chemicals released in the human fear response made them taste better.

David collided with something solid. His vision blurred. The taste of copper in his mouth the only real clue that he had struck his head as everything else had gone numb. Tamsyn pulled him to his feet. “You should watch where you’re going,” Tamsyn said.

“What did I hit?”

“Big hatch of some kind.”

David waited for his vision to clear and searched for a control panel. “That’s not good. This shouldn’t be closed.” He hit the cycle button several times with no effect. The panel was dead.

“Want me to cut through it,” Tamsyn said, raising her pistol.

“Wait,” David shouted grabbing the muzzle of her gun. She seemed taken aback, but lowered it. David approached the hatch and reached out. After a moment of hesitation he touched it. “Shit.” He yanked his hand back and shoot it violently.

“What’s wrong? Is it hot,” Mandy asked.

“Cold. That’s why the hatch sealed. The other side is exposed to vacuum.”

“Really glad you stopped me from cutting that open,” Tamsyn sighed.

“I think we all are. How did you know,” Sam added.

“We’re about 200 yards from the generators. This must have been the first bulkhead to escape the blast, and it sealed to keep the air in. “

“What now,” Sam asked.

David paced, nursing his hand as he thought. Stopping so suddenly he startled the others, he pulled up the station map. His eyes darted to the nearest airlock, only 20 meters back down the hall.

“We’re going outside.”

The world seemed to drain away from him as the air was sucked from the airlock. As the sound from outside his suit disappeared, it was replaced by an overwhelming awareness of the sounds of his body. His heart sounded like drum. The blood coursing through his veins like a rocky river. His stomach giving off a monstrous groan of displeasure at its emptiness.

He switched on the suits com system. His voice sounded muffled, as if stopped by several pillows over his face. “Can everyone hear me?”

They all remained motionless but acknowledged him verbally. He wanted them to move. Wave. Anything. The dark visors and lack of motion made him feel like he was standing around with corpses in space suits.

“When we clear the airlock and I get us tethered, we’re going to be walking to the right. We’ll probably have to head up to get around the crater that generator formed, but we should be able to get back inside near Electric avenue. Mandy, please be careful with that knife. These are just maintenance suits. You slice anything and you’ll suffocate in minutes.”

“Done this before. Don’t worry about me,” she replied, patting the sheath on her suit thigh.

The outer airlock door popped open and he pushed it the rest of the way. He swung himself to the outside control panel and pulled the tether, flinging it into space. He typed a number in from memory. The panel turned green, and he smiled. Their destination airlock.

The tether hook piloted itself to the requested anchor point, sending a confirmation when it arrived. He smiled. He couldn’t remember feeling this happy. Outside the station they were the safest they had been in almost 48 hours. 300 yards away an airlock was cycling, awaiting their arrival. From there it was only, as his father would say, “a two and a skip” to the ship that would take them away from this orbiting hell.

He hooked himself to the tether and directed the others to do the same. When everyone was ready, they began their slow march to freedom. It was only 20 feet before they reached the damage from the anti-matter explosion. Nothing like David had ever expected. The blast came out at an angle, creating a gash rather than a crater. Like someone had taken a large knife to slice off a piece of the station, then abandoned the effort.

Inside he could almost make out the generator room, and the cross section of the station that had survived. “I think we can jump it.” He looked back and saw they were all giving him the thumbs up. He dug his feet in. For a moment he even let himself enjoy what he was about to do. A running start and a leap, he was gliding across the chasm. At the peak of his jump, he couldn’t see the station. Only the darkness and the stars. He had never felt so free of his problems in all his life.

A jolt dragged him back into reality, and to the ground. A series of beeps told him the tether system didn’t approve of what he had done, and it pulled him to a landing. “What was that noise,” Mandy asked.

“That was the tether system telling on us. Recommending we get written up for dangerous maneuvers on a space walk.”

“I’ve never been written up before.”

“Your record is safe,” David said as he continued ahead. “You don’t work for the station, and there’s no one left to write the—“ He stopped so suddenly that Tamsyn collided with him, nearly bouncing off the surface of the station.

“What’s wrong, David,” Tamsyn asked when she regained her bearings.

David stared at the hill to his right. The grey surface of the was rough. The horizontal sunlight casting dark and jagged shadows across its face. “I thought I saw something move.”

Tamsyn stared in the same direction for a long moment. “You’re eyes are just playing tricks on you. Nothing alive out here but us.”

David nodded before he could stop himself, knowing the gesture wouldn’t be seen. “Right. Let’s move.” They continued forward. The sense of peace having been drained from him. He knew it was irrational. The danger was inside. His peripheral vision was spinning, making every shadow move. The color of the surface rock and the dark spots were too close to the creatures that terrorized them for two days. He tried to ignore them.

“David, lookout,” Sam shouted.

David didn’t see it, but his most recent hallucination of movement had been from the left, so he took the clue. Falling on his back, a Mandallum slug flew towards him. Reflexively covering his torso, he kneed the slug into space. He rushed to his feet. Scanning the area he could see them clearly for the first time, swarming over the surface.

He wasn’t imagining things. They were everywhere. Crawling over every hill. Out of every shadow. He found to his surprise that he missed the sound they made. In the vacuum, the threat was silent. Dear God, they can survive in vacuum, he thought in despair.

Looking to his right he could just see the airlock door. “Run!”

They charged forward, but the faster pace was only slowing them down. Sam dove to avoid a flying slug and dragged the line down. Tamsyn leaped to avoid one that nearly took her ankle, and they were all flung space-ward. The tether system threatened them again. David had barely regained his footing when another slug came for his head. No time to avoid it. A blur flew perpendicular to the slug and it was gone. Looking ahead he understood what had happened. Mandy had detached herself from the tether to intercept it. With one hand on the tether she slammed the impaled slug on the ground and gutted it.

He couldn’t help but smile. “Mandy, get your ass back on that tether,” he ordered through a grin. She obliged, and not a moment too soon. Another slug flew from a nearby crevice. In the length of a breath, Mandy was on her knees. A cloud of shattered glass and compressed air was all David could see. No blood. “Get her to the airlock!,” he shouted. In unison, the team charged forward pushing Mandy’s limp body forward. They reached the airlock in what seemed like an eternity, and flung it open. He detached her and threw her in, then pushed the rest of the team in ahead of him before following.

Slamming the door behind him, the airlock began to cycle. Too slow, he thought. He reached for the emergency override and hesitated. With their suits synced, the rapid compression wouldn’t harm them, but Mandy was exposed, and could die in the process. She would also die if they waited for the normal cycle. There was no choice. He slammed his fist into the button and the compression accelerated. In a matter of moments the overhead light turned green, and they dragged her into to station.

He collapsed against the wall. Tamsyn and Sam quickly removed their helmets and checked on Mandy’s condition.

“She’s breathing,” Sam said with an involuntary laugh of relief. “I think she’s okay.”

“She’s out cold,” Tamsyn said. “But, her vitals are good. Sooner we get to the ship’s sickbay the better.” She collapsed and tried to catch her breath. As she removed pieces of her suit she looked at David. “Are you alright?”

Her voice came to him in muffled cadences. “What?”

“I said, are you alright?”

He had to think about it for a moment. “I’m fine.” He looked around for a moment and forced himself to his feet. They were in what station employees referred to as “Electric Avenue”; the corridor that granted access to the station’s seven antimatter reactors. He wandered over to the hatch where sunlight shone through the porthole window. “We were right. There used to be an auxiliary antimatter generator about five feet from this door. That’s the crevice we had to jump over.”

“How the hell is the door still here,” Sam exclaimed.

“Must have been a directional blast. If they had chewed on this side, it would have cracked the station like an egg. If it had been the primary generator, we would have been vaporized.”

Tamsyn was still staring at him. Her concern becoming more apparent. Something about the way David was talking and moving was signaling distress. No matter how he tried to hide it. “David…”

He looked at her, trying to seem cheerful. Maybe too hard.

“What’s going on,” she beseechingly asked.

“Why would you…”

“Empath…remember. Plus, you’re really easy to read right now.”

“She’s right,” Sam said. “What’s up? We’ve been through too much together to hide stuff.”

David sighed and looked out the window. “They’re on the outside of the station.”

“Well, Dan did blow a bunch out the airlock, didn’t he,” Tamsyn said

“Obviously for nothing. The vacuum doesn’t hurt them.”

“Dan didn’t for nothing, man. Don’t start thinking that,” Sam said. “His sacrifice still saved us.”

“That’s not what I mean. When they were inside, they were contained. Now they’re out.”

“Is this really our problem? It’s not like they have organic warp engines, so even if they did try to spread, it would take millions of years,” Tamsyn scoffed.

“Or, they could jump on the first ship to show up before the system is quarantined, sail away on a solar flare, hitch a ride on a fucking comet. Again, we don’t know enough about these things to make assumptions. They can survive in space, they need to be destroyed now.”

“Well, how do you propose we do that,” Tamsyn asked.

David looked out the viewport without really seeing the space beyond. A tear formed in his eye, but he smiled. “Not we, me.”

Tamsyn and Sam stiffened in protest at the mere notion.

“You three, get over to the ship. I’ll blow the main generator. I should be able to set up an antimatter explosion big enough to blow the station to quarks.” David was resolved now, free of fear and shock.

“You’re going to sacrifice yourself? Why not just set it to blow, and leave,” Sam said.

“This isn’t a cheesy twentieth-century sci-fi movie. There is no self-destruct button. I’ll have to do it manually.”

Tamsyn seemed to deflate, as if finally beginning accept something she knew was coming. “Does it have to be you?”

David smiled again, but the smile was a little less sincere this time. “Yeah. It’s my job as a customs officer to get you off the station alive, and protect the territory from the threat of this invasive species. I’m going to do my job, but you knew this was going to happen, didn’t you?”

She stared at the ground, “I told you, it doesn’t work like that.”

David laughed. “Yeah, I know. One of many possible futures.”

He pulled the lockout key out of his pocket, and tossed it to Sam. “That’ll disable the lockout and open the docking bay. You may have to re-enable the engines as well.” He entered several sequences on his wrist comp, and tossed it to Tamsyn. “There’s the map to the docking bay, and if you wouldn’t mind, try to get it back to my family on Zuhause. There’s is a message to them, in case I ever…”

Tamsyn gripped him tightly, and he felt the weight lifted from his shoulders. “I will. I promise,” she said. David took a deep breath and felt true relief for the first time in years. Meeting Tamsyn had given him a small glimmer of hope that he would find love again, but now, it seemed like she had served her purpose in his life. This was the end he was meant for.

“It’ll take me about three minutes to power up the generator, and another minute to burn through the containment. That’s your time limit. Good luck.”

Tamsyn lifted Mandy’s limp body over her shoulder. “That’s my job. She carried me last time,” Sam objected.

“I know, but I need you to get to the cockpit as quickly as you can. I’ve got her.” She nodded at David and charged down the hall with Sam in tow.

David watched them disappear from view, before making his way to the primary generator room. In the darkened viewport he saw his reflection; and beside it, he saw her. Dark hair bristling in a Zuhause summer breeze. The same smile she had in the now deleted hologram. But now, he saw no malice behind it. Only the warmth of her welcoming him home.

He looked back to where Tamsyn, Sam and Mandy had disappeared, and silently wished them luck. Turning the hatch, he slipped inside, and closed it behind him.

It was only moments later, but seemed like an eternity when they finally made the last turn. The path was blocked by half a dozen slugs, but determined not to fail so close to their goal, Tamsyn and Sam dispatched them before they even knew they were there.

Sam rushed to the panel next to the hatch, and stuck the lockout key inside, twisting it till the panel turned green. A painful minute passed as the bay pressurized, the hatch slammed open, and the screen confirmed that the flight lockout had been lifted.

As they ran inside, the access ramp to the ship’s cargo bay automatically descended. Sam tossed the lockout key over his shoulder to Tamsyn. “I’ll head to the cockpit, you make sure the engines are ready.”

They climbed the ramp, and Sam headed for the nearest staircase to get to the cockpit. Tamsyn slammed the close button on the control panel, set Mandy on the floor, and made her way back to the engine room.

Inside the main generator room, David smiled as the containment tank reached 100%, and activated the flow to the other remaining auxiliary generators. He thought for a moment about death, amazed at how it felt such a different thing now that it was imminent. Looking around the clean, well lit room that would be the last one he ever saw, he nodded. All things considered, its wasn’t the worst place anyone had died. He began to firing a beam from his pistol into the containment tank, getting lost in the orange glow of the metal. He had made significant progress when the pistol ran out of juice and fizzled out. He dropped the energy mag, and thought he heard a scream as it hit the ground. Looking around, he could find no explanation for the sound, and loaded a new mag into his pistol.

He kept thinking about the sound as resumed burning the containment tank. It was long moment before he realized it was not a scream but the sound of tearing metal. No sooner had the thought crossed his mind, he heard the clicking to his left. He released the trigger and tried to move, but he was too slow. There was a terrible burning sensation in his shoulder, then dull warmth. He was on his back before he realized it had taken his arm.

“I can’t. I can’t anymore,” he said to no one. He too exhausted to fight. Physically and emotionally. Everything he had done for the past couple days had ended in disaster. “No. I have to,” He said, picturing the horrible things that could happen if he failed this time. “Just...need...something to keep me going.” The blood loss was already blurring his vision. He saw a figure kneeling over him. It was her again. “Lovely, but not helping right now.”

The figure changed, and he was staring through the grizzly beard of his father. “It’s time to get up, son. Do what you have to do.”

David turned his head to the right to the railing that had been behind him. Taking a deep breath, he grabbed the railing with his remaining arm and forced himself up just in time to see the slug going for another pass. He instinctively kicked it as it approached, punting it to the left. There was a sizzle and loud pop before it landed behind him. He strained to turn. Finding only a burnt husk where the slug had landed.

He looked back at the the containment tank and saw that it had hit the exposed field under the metal. It had interrupted him only a second before detonation. Frantically searching for his dropped pistol, he caught a glint from the barrel under the burnt slug. He let himself fall towards it and landed on his damaged shoulder. Screaming through gritted teeth he took several fast breaths and began pulling himself by one arm towards the gun. Pulling it out and lifting himself back into a seated position with only one arm was the hardest thing he had ever done in his life. He appreciated the irony of that coming at the end of it. After catching his breath, he raised the pistol towards the exposed exposed field just as he heard the clicking again. Several more had crawled through the hole created by the first.

The slug in front raised it’s open towards him and clicked threateningly. With only one short burst to end it all, David found it, not terrifying, but pathetic. So, he smiled, said, “Happy Birthday, you son of a bitch.” And pulled the trigger.

The ship lifted off, and glided towards the doors as it turned. As soon as they were clear, Sam pushed the ship to full throttle, and warmed up the warp engines. Five-hundred kilometers from the station, the ship disappeared in a blinding flash of light. A fraction of a second later, The Orion shipping hub exploded, leaving only dust.