Desperation, p.1
Desperation, page 1
part #3 of Forgotten Colony Series
Desperation
Forgotten Colony, Book Three
M.R. Forbes
Chapter 1
“Dante!” Caleb leaned over the sheriff, putting his fingers on her neck and checking for a pulse. He found it right away, strong and steady. “Dante, can you hear me?”
His eyes traveled from her pale face to the two deputies and the nurse standing together about four meters away. Their postures had slumped, their faces expressing their confusion.
“Bashir, Casper, Reed,” he said. “Do you know where you are?”
“Sergeant?” Deputy Bashir said. His eyes widened when he saw Sheriff Dante on the ground, with him leaning over her. His hand went to his revolver, and he stepped toward Caleb. “What did you do to her?”
“Stand down, Deputy,” Doctor Brom said, rising from his position beside Riley. “Sergeant Card didn’t do this.”
“Doctor Brom?” Reed said. “What’s going on?”
Sheriff Dante groaned softly. Brom shifted to where she was lying. “Lasandra, it’s Doc Brom. Can you hear me?”
She groaned again in reply.
“Don’t move too fast. It looks like you got clocked in the jaw.”
Caleb noticed the left side of Sheriff Dante’s face was already swelling and bruising. Riley must have sucker-punched her.
“I don’t understand this,” Deputy Casper said.
“What do you remember?” Caleb asked.
“You went into the exam room with Doctor Brom.” He paused and then shook his head. “Then a trife attacked Sheriff Dante. But it wasn’t a trife like I’ve ever seen before. It was made of dark metal, like your hand. But then it was gone, and you were there, and — ” He stopped talking when his eyes flicked over to Riley. “Is she dead?”
“Very,” Caleb replied.
“You shot her?”
“I don’t have a gun. She shot herself.”
“We don’t have bullets.”
“I know. There may be an alien in Metro.”
“A what?”
“It’s another long story. There’s a lot you still don’t know. It doesn’t matter right now. I need you to go back to the bridge and get Flores and Washington. Get Governor Stone too. If there’s an alien still on the ship, we have a major problem.”
Deputy Casper didn’t move. “Uh, Sergeant, I… Well… you’re under arrest.”
“I know that. I’m not trying to escape.”
“It’s not that. I.. Uh.. Well… I can’t take orders from a prisoner.”
“Damn it, Casper,” Doctor Brom said. “Will you take orders from me? Just go.”
Casper nodded, turning and rushing out of the waiting room.
“Thank you,” Caleb said.
“You’re welcome,” Brom replied. “I don’t know what all of this is about or why Dante arrested you, but I’m pretty sure you’re not a bad guy.”
“I’m not. My duty is to protect the people of Metro. Contractually, it ended the moment we reached solid ground, but I wasn’t made that way.”
Dr. Brom frowned. “Bridge? Reached solid ground? I get the feeling there’s a lot more going on here than meets the eye.”
Caleb opened his mouth to explain, realizing he had hinted at something the vast majority of people in Metro didn’t and weren’t supposed to know.
“Don’t strain yourself, Sergeant,” Brom said. “You’re injured enough already. Long story, I get it. I’ve been around long enough to know better than to ask too many questions too soon. Reed, get me a gurney, will you?”
Reed held up a small device. “Do you still want the gun, Doctor?”
“Just leave it here.”
Reed put it down and left the room.
Dante groaned again, trying to lift her head.
“Take it easy, Sam,” Brom said.
“Bitch punched me,” Dante said. Her eyes shifted, noticing Caleb on his knees beside her. “Sergeant Card? What the hell happened?”
“Riley punched you.”
She ran her tongue along the inside of her mouth, wincing at the pain. “I know that. Where is she?”
“About a meter to your left,” Caleb said. “She’s dead.”
“What?” Dante lifted her head too quickly, turning it to see Riley’s corpse. She put her hand to her temple. “Oh, damn that hurts.”
“I told you to take it easy,” Doctor Brom said.
“She’s dead?” Dante said. “I don’t see a scratch on her.”
“Strangest damn thing I’ve ever seen, Sam,” Brom said. “She shot herself with your unloaded revolver, and it killed her.”
“Sheriff Dante,” Deputy Bashir said. “I think we were seeing things.”
“Seeing things?”
“Hallucinations,” Caleb said. “The short version is that the enemy possesses a weapon that screws with brainwave patterns and can cause targets to hallucinate. I don’t know exactly how or why it affects different people at different times, but I can tell you that the only way anybody in this room should see things is if one of the enemy was nearby.”
Then again, he wasn’t sure if that was entirely true. They had landed on the enemy’s planet. Who was to say they weren’t broadcasting the same signals? Who was to say the Deliverance wasn’t already under attack?
He tried to stand up, nearly falling over when his ankle wouldn’t support his weight. He hopped back, putting his hand on the nearest wall. “We may be in trouble. From outside.”
Dante nodded, setting herself and standing up. Fortunately, Brom stood with her, and he grabbed her when she started swaying.
“I’m a little dizzy,” she said.
“You two make a great pair,” Brom said. “What’s going on, and how can I help?”
“I already sent Casper to the bridge,” Caleb said. “If there’s trouble, he’ll report back.”
“Not if he’s hallucinating again,” Dante said. “Shit. What if the whole city is seeing things?”
“That should be easy to figure out,” Brom said, pointing to a window.
Caleb hopped over to it, looking out. They were on the eighth floor of the hospital building, with a decent view of the strand below. There were people gathered outside milling around together in a general state of confusion, but none of them were acting violent or fearful. None of them appeared to be reacting to anything that wasn’t there.
“I don’t think the city’s affected,” he said.
“Just up here?” Dante asked. “What does that mean?”
Caleb turned away from the window. “It means the enemy was close and it decided to attack. I don’t know. Maybe it wanted Doctor Valentine dead.”
“And not us?”
“I don’t know how much control it has over what each person sees. I hardly know anything about them. There was one loose on the ship. We managed to get it out of the main hangar blast doors and into space.”
“Are you sure?”
Caleb’s mind flashed back to his last vision of Sho tumbling out into space with the alien AI wrapped in the arms of her Strongman exosuit. A twinge of sadness caused him to grimace. “I saw it go out. I’m sure.”
“Sorry, Sergeant. I mean, are you sure we left it behind? Is it possible it could survive in space? Is it possible it got back on board?”
Caleb stared at her. Was it possible it could survive in space? It was an artificial intelligence. A machine. Of course it could. Could it have freed itself from Sho’s grip and found its way back to the ship? He couldn’t rule it out. But then why would it follow him, or Riley, back here? “I don’t know. It might not be the same one. For all we know, one of them has been hiding in Metro.”
“Can we hold on a second?” Doctor Brom said, getting their attention. “It’s become painfully clear to me that you two are carrying on about parts of a spaceship as if we’re actually on a spaceship. Is that right?”
“Yes, Doctor,” Dante said, glancing over at Reed. “We’re on a spaceship. We’ve been on a spaceship since we were born.”
“Not in an underground bunker?”
“No.”
Brom whistled. “Well, that’s a kick in the pants. Metro is over two hundred years old. Are you telling me we’ve been in space that whole time?”
“Yes,” Caleb said. “I thought you weren’t going to ask too many questions too soon?”
“Sorry, it’s my curious nature. Well, where in the universe are we now?”
“About forty-five light years from Earth,” Caleb said. “We landed on an Earth-like planet we were calling Essex about an hour ago.”
“So we reached our new home?” Doctor Brom smiled hopefully.
“You could say that,” Dante said.
“You don’t sound that happy about it.”
“That’s because the planet might already be occupied,” Caleb said. “By the same aliens that just killed Doctor Valentine, and sent the trife to Earth.”
Brom’s smile vanished, his face hardening. “Who’s idea was it to travel to an already occupied planet?”
Caleb pointed at Riley.
“Figures,” Brom said, shaking his head. “I have a feeling I don’t want to know the rest.”
“You can’t tell anyone,” Dante said. “This is classified intel. Governor’s order. Do you understand?”
“I get it,” Brom said. “The secret’s safe with me. I don’t want to be responsible for causing a panic.” He looked at Caleb again. “What do you think, Sarge? Did we come all this way just to lose again?”
Caleb could tell how much Brom wanted him to say things were going to be f ine, and not to worry. He forced a smile. “The best way for us to win a war is not to fight one.”
“Sound advice. Let’s hope we can follow it.” He sighed heavily. “Well, neither of you are in any shape to do much of anything for anyone at the moment. Sergeant, let’s get you stitched and braced. Sheriff, let me have a look at your head.”
“We don’t have time,” Dante said.
“Bullshit,” Brom replied. “Casper went to get the Governor, and there’s not a thing you can do to help in your current condition. You may be a sheriff, you may be a soldier, but right now you’re both my patients, and I want you in the exam room now.”
Caleb smiled and glanced at Dante. “He has a point.”
“I know,” she replied. “Make it fast, Doc.”
Brom nodded. “Right this way.”
Chapter 2
The lacerations on Caleb’s back were patched, and his ankle was in the process of being braced when Flores, Washington, and Governor Stone finally arrived at the hospital. The two Guardians were happy to see him, while Stone looked like he was struggling to keep himself together.
Caleb didn’t blame him. Four hours ago the Governor was living in relative peace, unaware of anything that was happening outside the sealed hatches leading into the city. Not only had that peace been destroyed by their arrival in Metro, but then his daughter Orla had been killed by an alien drone while helping Caleb stop it from destroying the Deliverance.
He had lost people. Friends. Family. Brothers and sisters in arms. Banks, Habib, Sho. He had seen more corpses than anyone should ever have to see. Every one of them was somebody’s son, daughter, brother, sister, husband or friend. Every one of them had meant something to someone. He understood the pain of it but he still couldn’t imagine what it was like to lose a child, especially the way the Governor had. Unexpectedly. Violently.
Caleb struggled not to blame himself for the loss. It had been his idea to bring her into the fight. If he had gone out there alone, she might still be alive. Or they might all be dead. He had to keep reminding himself of that. Her skill had caused the drone to react the way it did. Her skill had given him the chance to destroy it. Without her talent, the Deliverance may have never reached the surface.
He hoped they didn’t come to regret that it had.
“What happened here, Sheriff?” Governor Stone said before anyone else had a chance to speak.
“I brought Sergeant Card and Doctor Valentine to Metro like you ordered, Governor,” Dante said. “Sergeant Card needed treatment for his wounds, so I rerouted them here before taking them to the law office. Doctor Brom took Sergeant Card into the examination room, while Bashir, Casper, and I kept an eye on Doctor Valentine. She seemed angry, but she didn’t look like she was planning to do anything stupid. In fact, her head drooped and she closed her eyes. Then next thing I know, I’m waking up on the floor with pain in my jaw. I don’t remember her punching me, but I assumed she must have punched me.”
“I see,” Stone said. “I heard Doctor Valentine was dead. That she shot herself with an unloaded weapon.”
“That’s right, Governor,” Doctor Brom said. “I had Reed bring her body down to storage, to put her on ice until I have time to do an autopsy. I’m particularly interested in the state of her brain at the moment of death.”
“So am I,” Stone said. “I’m interested in a lot of things. The problem is, I don’t even know where to start.” He turned to Caleb. “Maybe you can help me with that, Sergeant? Maybe you can tell me why Doctor Valentine is dead? Maybe you can tell me why Orla had to die?” He shook his head, wiping his suddenly running eyes. “I haven’t told her mother yet. What am I supposed to tell her mother?”
“She died a hero,” Caleb said. “I know it doesn’t ease the pain, but it’s something.”
“Maybe being a hero means something to a soldier like you. It doesn’t mean anything to me. She’ll always be my little girl.” He closed his eyes. For a moment, Caleb thought he might break down into an all-out sob. He didn’t. He pulled himself together, opening his eyes and wiping them one last time. “I want answers, Sergeant. I want to know everything, starting from the beginning.”
“I’m sure you do, sir,” Caleb said. “But I think we need to skip ahead to the parts that are the most relevant to our current situation.” He paused, trying to decide exactly where to start. “The Deliverance left Earth two hundred and thirty-six years ago. During its departure, it was attacked by a large group of xenotrife. They breached the ship and gained a foothold on board, while also killing every senior officer and ninety-percent of the Marines defending the ship. It was left to me, Privates Flores, Washington, and a handful of Marines to repel their attack and eliminate them. Since you’re familiar with the protocols, you know at that point the Guardians were to begin cycling through one-year tours as caretakers of the ship. Originally, the protocols called for ten soldiers per tour on a ten-year cycle. Our reduced numbers forced us to one soldier per tour on a six-year cycle. At least, that was the plan.”
“I take it things didn’t go according to plan?” Stone said.
“Not at all.” Caleb paused again. He glanced over at Flores and Washington, who nodded in support. “Let me back up a step. Before launch, Doctor Valentine informed the senior officers that she had orders from Space Force Command to reprogram the ship’s navigation computers. Instead of making the twenty-five light-year trip to Earth-6, which would take over a hundred years, we were being redirected to Proxima Centauri, only four and a half light years away. The majority of the generation ships were gathering there to form a new colony much closer to home than originally planned.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, Sergeant, but we just spent over two hundred years in space, and I didn’t see any other starships on the way down. Which leads me to believe we aren’t in the Proxima system?”
“You aren’t wrong, Governor. And that’s where things start to get ugly.”
“What do you mean, ugly?”
“Doctor Riley Valentine,” Flores said. “They don’t come any uglier than that.”
“Flores!” Caleb snapped.
“Sorry, Alpha.”
“What I came to learn later was that while the generation ships all shared a common mission statement and set of protocols, Space Force Command had different ideas for the aptly named Deliverance. Doctor Valentine was placed in charge of a clandestine operation whose end goal was to use the citizens of Metro to create an army of what I can only define as super-soldiers, and then deliver those soldiers to enemy territory to launch an attack.”
“What?” Governor Stone said.
“That’s crazy,” Doctor Brom added.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Flores quipped.
“Hold on a moment, Sergeant,” Governor Stone said. “You’re saying that Metro, my city, was slated to become what, exactly? A resource pool for a new military?”
“In part,” Caleb said. “First, it was going to be a resource pool for Doctor Valentine’s experiments. She was working to create genetic modifications that would allow humans to heal much faster than normal, to regenerate similar to jellyfish or lizards. Once she perfected her editing, the next phase was to start administering it across the colony. I don’t know how she planned to do that.”
“But none of us knew she existed before she came into Metro with you,” Sheriff Dante said. “I assume that means her research didn’t pan out?”
“Dr. Moreau,” Flores muttered.
Caleb flicked his eyes toward her, and she lowered her head and tightened her lips once again.
“Her research panned out, in a sinister sort of way,” Caleb said. “There was a stowaway on the Deliverance named David. She captured him and used him for her experiments. The edits she made allowed him to heal from a gunshot wound to the head. They also gave him increased intelligence and near-immortality.”
“That’s amazing,” Brom said.
“I wouldn’t mind either one,” Deputy Casper said.
“Not being able to die isn’t as great as it may seem,” Caleb said. “Especially when you’re alone on a starship for over two hundred years.”
“Yes, sir,” Casper replied.
“What happened to David?” Governor Stone asked.
“Like I mentioned on the bridge, Riley killed him and then dumped him out into space. I have no idea if he’s dead or in some living hell, where his body regenerates, wakes up, and then suffocates again.”
