“Rolling in money for the perfectly legal ones, are we? Brekt is right, it’s our best bet. Plus, you know, he makes it sound considerably less awesome than it is.” Aileena was smiling, her eyes wide.
“It’s full of pirates!”
“See, awesome.”
The tiny ship hung on the screen, a minute dot against the giant blue-green orb behind it. It looked harmless, a single defensive turret to its name. It was barely big enough for more than a handful of crew members. Still, red icons blared around it, highlighting the craft, demanding its destruction. Commander Orson gripped the edge of his chair, knuckles turning white.
The orders coming through were conflicting. Fire. Don’t fire. It was confusing. Orson sighed. His crew were unique, special, amongst the first humans recruited into the Council’s forces, and the only ones to have their own ship. Sure, it was a tiny patrol vessel, barely armed and hardly manned, but it was their ship none the less. Now it was being told to fire on a ship leaving earth’s orbit, or told not to fire. There were still orders and countermands rolling up the screen.
“What do we do Commander?” said Trooper Johnson, his hands deliberately held several inches above the fire controls. “Do we fire? What if we miss?”
“I know Trooper, orders are… muddy.” Whoever was on that ship the Council wanted them dead, but they were as concerned as Johnson was. Even the tiny patrol crafts weapons would deal devastating damage to the surface if they missed. The Earth was sacred after all. “We are the closest vessel.”
“We need to do something, sir.”
“Open a channel,” Orson said. “Maybe we can convince them to stand down?”
“I’m detecting a build-up in the jump drive,” said the third person on the cramped bridge. Corporal Nguyen was sat as what the crew had termed the science station, a collection of communications and scanning displays. “They’re preparing to jump.”
“Can we calculate the course?”
“Yes, sir. I think so?”
“You think so,” Orson said, turning his chair around. “Can we or can’t we.”
“This is all… new sir. The Council training wasn’t exactly thorough. We can calculate it, even match it but the trace won’t last long if they do jump.”
“And how long is that?”
“Oh, uh. Now. They just jumped.”
“Jesus Christ. The first human ship and we look like idiots. Fine, fine. Let me think.” Commander Orson closed his eyes, placing his fist to his head. “Ok,” he said. “We have the course matched?”
“Yes, but the trace will fade soon.”
Orson nodded. He had to save face somehow. Everything was riding on him to show the Council that humans were competent. His government debrief had been very clear on how much was resting on his shoulders. With that in mind, Orson made the first in a long line of stupid decisions. “Let’s get after them. Initiate our jump drive.”
Chapter Five
Michael didn’t like it. His stomach felt like it was spiralling about in his gut. Space had given way, the stars replaced by a cascading waterfall of colours. It was difficult to look at, a barrage of visual noise that assaulted the mind. Michael could feel his lunch, a staid boring coronation chicken sandwich, worming its way back up his gullet. There was a clattering rumble, a scraping of metal on metal. Each section of the grand window at the front of the control room was unfurling a folded sheet of metal. The screen sealed completely, blocking out all the light. Michael started feeling immediately better, the nausea falling away. A dull ache remained in his head, a low-level humming that needled at him.
“What the fuck was that?” Michael rubbed his stomach, bending over, his head tilted towards the ground. The stance of a Friday night drunk.
“First time my boy?” Mellok said, placing his feathered hand onto Michaels back. “Don’t worry about it, you’ll get your legs under you before too long. I remember my first jump point journey. Bit of a stomach turner that one.”
“I have no idea what’s going on! Jump points, people shooting at me, weird fucking aliens snatching me from my job, none of this makes sense. I have… I have to go. Somewhere, anywhere. Let me off this goddamn ship.” Michael had begun pacing about, sweat forming on its brow. He was shaking slightly. “Yeah, yeah that’s it. Drop me off at the nearest planet, and I’ll catch a taxi or a bus, or whatever space shit you have instead. You’ll do that right? Drop me off?” He clutched at Mellok’s robe, pulling the alien closer. “Please? Please?”
“I’m… I’m sorry. I am, but we need you. Everyone needs you.” The alien’s voice was calm, considered. Michael noticed for the first time that his words were careful, deliberate. “You are the knower of truths. We had to come to get you.”
“You’ve said that before, what does it mean?” Michael’s hands tugged at the slippery cloth, anger escaping in a frenzied shaking.
“That you know things. The truths of the universe. The ancient secrets that will overthrow the Council. I’ve searched a long time for you. I delved into the dead belt, plumbing libraries for their treasures. I spoke with the mummified monks of the Troven nebula. I threw runes upon the living branches of Kosika. I did everything I could, all to find you.” Mellok’s eyes were welling up, tears forming at their edges. “My whole life, spent tracking you down.”
Michael let him go, staggering backwards, slumping onto the couch behind him. He placed his hands in his hair, fingers scratching at his scalp. “You made a mistake,” he said quietly. “I’m not who you’re looking for. I’m just a London lad, from a shit job, living alone in my flat. I’m not some mystic, or messiah or whatever the fuck you think I am.”
“No, I know I’m right. Everything pointed to you, every sign, every message. Finding Earth, that was it, that was the key to putting everything together.
“Why is Earth so fucking special anyway? Why us?”
“Because of the Rhythm.”
“That word again. Rhythm, I’ve heard Aileena use it as a curse. What do you mean?”
There was a loud click, Aileena’s pistol tapping against the console nearest Michael. She had strolled up the ramp and was leaning against the blinking panel of lights and buttons. “You really don’t know? Hasn’t the Council said anything?”
“No? They seem content to leave us alone, mostly. We see troopers on the streets now and then, to keep us safe. They were supposed to keep me safe…”
Aileena stood up off the panel and took a seat in the couch beside him, stretching out her legs for a second. “The Rhythm is, well everything. It’s our religion, well the religion in Council space. Usually, with newly conquered worlds they’re pretty quick to start what they love to call ‘re-education’. Indoctrination is more like it.”
“Their version of it is a perversion though. Belief in the Rhythm existed long before the Council, a theology that arose on a hundred worlds independently,” Mellok said. It was difficult to read his facial expressions, the beak unchanging, but somehow Michael knew he was happy to explain, a sense of joy emanating from the rainbow-coloured creature.
“The idea is that there is well, a rhythm to the universe,” Aileena said. “A drumbeat to reality, the first note being the spark that caused reality to explode into being.”
“You mean the big bang?” Michael had paid only the barest attention in school, scraping by with a technically passing grade.
“That is what they call it, Aileena,” Mellok said.
“That’s a good a name as any I guess.” She shrugged. “Anyway, the idea goes that the Rhythm predetermines everything, that we’re all just notes and chords in a galactic song.”