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Tag: Interconnected Series

Have to stop and take stock of what’s going on.

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So where are we in the broader sense of my story series. The Company has finally mobilized a newly built and as of yet untested fighting force. Flinging them from the earth’s moon base known as Torus station to head out to UB313 near Pluto Charon. Travel time estimated at nine weeks. The newly developed fire teams and walking tanks are in stasis aboard the Righteous Chord for the entire trip, but are suffering longer and longer migraines and waking nightmares, more often as the trip goes on. Attempts to awaken various types of soldiers has yielded unsatisfactory results.

The final straw to unleash the new fighting force was the mysterious death aboard the Dirty Starling of The Company’s oldest Admiral’s great grand son, also named Mark Garneau. However, there is another Ghost crew member named Mark, ready and waiting to assume the role should The Dirty Starling make its scheduled stop for resupply. A coincidence or something deeper? Conspiracy theory on the ship says brain worms, but the tech guys are looking for answers in the programming code for the nanotech upgrades. Could somebody have altered the code from the originals?

On the base UB313 Dr Jang has suffered a recent upset by finding out at least one of his away teams has failed to secure the asset. Lil Boat Peep has been destroyed, along with its crew, but what of The Mangelo? Rumors from Company moles say that the doctor has been building engineered soldiers from what he’s learned from his decades of unnecessary surgeries on unsuspecting corporate victims. Are they upgraded people or conglomerate monstrosities like the moles have been reporting?

It was also revealed that Admiral Garneau’s great grandson was disappeared by a secret protocol initiated by a tenacious mole aboard The Dirty Starling. How did the UB313 doctor know of the assets appearance out of thin air and where to look is a mystery. Who were the two modulated voices trying to take control of the ghost crew member? Who planted and sent the message out into the ether? What does the message say?

Out in the far flung reaches of the solar system a strange vessel has appeared out of thin air. It seems to move and replicate and change unlike anything seen before. But it knows about humanity with one humanoid artificial intelligence figure on board. The last surviving member of team Theta, named Racquelle, out of UB313, from the now inert rescue ship The Mangelo is still alive and being questioned. We learn that the mysterious android formerly known as Kelvin, is now named Katayna, and has taken on Racquelle’s appearance.

The wheels are in motion as all the forces are drawn together for a battle of the ages. Stay tuned for the remaining chapters of book two of this interconnected series.

I hope you’re having as much fun reading along, as I’ve had writing it all down in these weekly, and sometimes daily installments. After I complete the rough drafts here, I’ll go on to edit book two as a whole, then will make the updated version available on Kindle Unlimited. So stay tuned if you want to read it for free in its earliest form. All the best. Happy Friday.

“This is some serious A-grade level of bureaucratic bullshit…”

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“How the fuck am I supposed to get a sign off on these TMP’s without this stupid bastard program giving me access to the Oracle network.” Shouts a lone voice buried deep down in the bowels of the black ops base. A dungeon of an office space set aside from the general crowd due to the sensitivity of the raw data processed. Formerly consisting of a team of seven people, six of which have now been transferred, promoted or disappeared in the subterfuge sense of the word. In a dank corner of a sub-basement, where condensation trickles down the walls and languishes in stagnant pools that collect near the walls of the room. It’s low bare rock ceilings a glistening cold brown grey, which hangs heavily over the last operational computer terminal. The beige box is stained with finger prints and gathered blotches of mould at the edges. The warm orange text on a black field offers minimal illumination in the cold space. Empty of people, but cluttered with papers and three ring binders full of cross reference materials. The last member of the risk assessment team sits at his creaking chair, banging his fists on his table, and shouting raucously into the bleak cavernous room around him.

The young man is apoplectic and turning purple with rage. “I can’t get sign off to complete them without access, and they refuse me access because I don’t have any completed tmp’s to trigger the fucking alarms. What the fuck is going on?” The man shouts at his monitor from his sub terranean cubicle. “The shit I’ve got being reported here would have triggered a full on melt down from the top down only nine weeks ago, but now I’m totally shut out! What the fuck!” He bellows into his dim work space. The only source of illumination are the orange glyphs on his black CRTV screen. That and a dim red bulb on his coffee maker, seated beside his computer terminal. The cubicle itself, a sickly pallid green of rough canvas stretched over moulded plastic forms. The canvas torn and well worn from people resting their hands on the half wall when they bother to stop and complain about the speed, or lack there of associated with Trevor completing his TMP’s. With the soft echo of his last rant bouncing up the desolate hallway a repeated clicking of heels can be heard against the alternating rough stone, and metal grate flooring that makes up most of the ground at UB313. “Oh shit.” Trevor says, ducking down, trying to bury himself into his work station, his pulse increasing rapidly with every foot step he hears. With a jangle and the tell tale click of a ring finger tapping against the plastic knee wall of his cubicle, Trevor holds his breath hoping whomever it is will walk away if he looks engrossed in his work. “Ahem… Trevor, I know that’s you squawking like an idiot down here. What is so difficult about filing your TMP’s you have to shriek like an upset school boy? Hmmm. Forget how to collate the data sets from the pivot tables? Can’t get the amounts to not get listed as dates? What? – Well speak up I don’t have all fucking day to baby sit you Trev.” Demands the lithe woman in an ill fitting black uniform. Her grey hair pulled back into a taut and severe bun at the very top of her head. Making the angles of her nose and cheeks look more pointed than usual. “Well – Darla.” We drawls out her name, it tastes like ash on his tongue. “My access to the Oracle network has been collapsed, and I can’t complete my TMP’s because of it.” He bites off the end of his sentence sharply. “Don’t be an asshole with me Trev. You probably got caught selling short positions again based on the closures you’re reports trigger.” She cracks her knuckles and steps further into the cubicle. Having to duck low from the hall way to step under the heavy low ceilings of wet sharp rock. Trevor scoots back a few paces on his wheeled chair, nodding to himself. “It’s not going to work. It won’t matter.” He murmurs in a sing song voice of someone nearing their wits end. “Shut up would you. I’m trying to clear your denied attempts. Hmmm.” With a couple of taps, then more clicks and some grunts the woman looks around the cubicle, and pulls up an over turned storage bin to sit on. “I tried that. Yes, that too. I looked into the key stroke counter, and rerouting through my alternate accounts. I’m locked out.” Trevor says while watching the woman from under her arm. “Well fuck.” She exclaims. “I have one last trick. I’ll go get my physical code key from my office lock box. We’ll need to open up the hard drive and toggle the over rides manually.” She says flatly. Her lips pursed tightly together. “What the hell would trigger this kind of a lock out on risk assessments?” She asks, semi rhetorically. “I don’t know. Are we at war? We have several teams out on assignment but no asset retrieval that I know of has ever caused this kind of a thing before?” Offers Trevor in a calmer and more conciliatory tone. “War? Why the fuck would you say that? Probably some higher ups debugging the system to open up space for yet another long term project for Ze Goot Doctor!” She chuckles. Trevor shivers with disgust at the thought. “If the manual over ride doesn’t fix it you’ll have to go up to the admin at bridge level and ask them to fix it.” She says quietly. “What! That’s bullshit! I’m trying to keep a department of seven people running by myself. I don’t have the time for that.” Trevor shrieks defensively. “You just don’t want to run into the…” A shouted curse catches the two huddled employees unawares. Looking back from the dim screen in the cubicle to see the bright halo of light shrouding a solid black silhouette standing at the mouth of the cubicle clutching at their head. “Forgot about the low ceilings. Lady and gentleman. Who don’t you wish to go see? Hmmm…” asks the distinctive voice of Dr. Jang the defacto leader of UB313. Looking past the two seated analysts to the orange monitor to see the flashing access denied prompt flickering on the monitor. “A couple of busy bees down here huh. Do I have a treat in store for you two!” His deep staccato laugh echoes in the rocky sub basement drowning out the constant sound of water trickling into standing pools of dank dark water where the ever present musty smell tastes like copper on the tongue.

Part Twenty One: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

Something doesn’t add up.

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And I know what it is. I keep thinking my first book was mostly the first section of twenty two (22) chapters worth of interconnected stories, plus a couple of one off autobiographical stuff. But I have failed to remember that both Sisters in Arms and A Call to the Void, plus The Chronicles of Kelvin were multi chapter sections of weight on their own. No wonder I’m not anywhere near a 60,000 word count for book two. I’m about three, full matching in size sections to Ghost of the Dirty Starling short. Ha. At least I finally clued in as to why it felt like I wasn’t making much head way. On the plus side, I won’t feel bad if I go over twenty four chapters. Not that I’m looking to pad things out, but I want to hit all my marks, and tell any contextual stories as they come up. Like a flash back, or an aside, or some kind of additional point of contact within the story. I’m also not aiming to finish by the end of February. No need to rush. I’ll tell my story as it comes to me.

How on earth did I ever forget about those other meaty portions of my joint series. Covid times man – Covid times. Messing with my brain.

“I do believe that your friends are attempting to hail me…

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On a number of different frequencies. Shall I respond?” Booms the disembodied voice from every direction at once. Racquelle is braced on all fours in a small grey bubble of malleable lattice work walls. With no direct source of light that she can find, there is ample grey white illumination from the writhing, wriggling living material. Similar to bioluminescence but more diffused and brighter. The vessel feels to shimmy and shudder underneath her for another brief spell. “How do you know it’s my friends?” Asks Racquelle quietly into the open air of the containment sphere she’s in. “The ID of the ships transponder says Lil Boat Peep, in a similar fashion to how yours read The Mangelo.” Booms the voice. “Oh, well then yeah. Colleagues, more so than friends. But same team, same team, yes.” She exclaims into the empty space. “Query?” The ship booms internally. After a long pause Racquellelooks around inside the empty sphere. “Are you asking me? Or is it I can hear you asking them?” Retorts Racquelle. “Yes you. Did you find our initial contact to be suitably nonthreatening, or shall I patch us both through on comm’s?” The vessel walls echo with the volume of the question. “Oh. I didn’t realize you could do that. Yes. Please patch us through to them. But can you dial back the volume a decibel or two?” The ship no longer vibrates under her palms and knees. With a soundless jolt the spherical room expands into a larger cube of three meters on a side. Out of the floor a make shift table emerges, along with a banquet bench. Everything is made from the same grey white writhing material that emits light. As Racquelle makes herself comfortable on the bench and table the room remains silent, except for her foot steps, and the rustle of her uniform as she gets seated. For a heart beat or two longer Racquelle sits patiently waiting. “Hello? Is there a problem?” Racquelle calls out into the empty room. “NO!” Blared the voice at a painful shout like a fog horn. “Jesus suffering fuck!” Racquelle shouts cupping her ears tightly. Her ears are ringing badly, and a small trickle of blood runs down from both ears canals. “Shit!” Exclaims Racquelle, “I think my ear drums are shot. What the hell was that?” She screams, not hearing anything beyond her inner monologue. “Wait – wait. Don’t speak, or yell. Can you write it out in that ghost smoke writing like on The Mangelo earlier?” She barks oddly. The wall opposite her and the bench, becomes a large black screen, and a message appears on it like white grey smoke out of the ether. “Initial contact was met with hostility. Your friends and their vessel have been assimilated. No further threats detected.” The text glows slightly and disappears as she reads along. With a puzzled look Racquelle asks. “Assimilated? Assimilated? What does that mean? How did it happen so quickly?” Her throat raspy from shouting. She has to clasp her hands together to settle the panic rising within her. She’s got to remember to not shout to try to hear herself. Her ear drums are ruptured, but will eventually heal. She can read the text with no issues, and thus far the ship has kept her safe, warm and protected. At least beyond their initial in person introduction where she nearly asphyxiated in near total vacuum. “I drew them into myself, and devoured the component elements. I assure you it was somewhat painless.” The text lingers an added beat or two on somewhat painless. “Somewhat painless. Well then… listen I don’t know what you are. You’re nothing like any tech I’ve seen before. And I’ve seen some pretty weird shit. So – what do I call you? Do you have any food or water I can consume?” Says Racquelle.

The light in the room vanishes and in the span of a heart beat Racquelle swears she felt like falling through time. As the similar grey white light reappears Racquelle, now sat on the warm metal paneled floor can see what looks like the internal structure of a very old Company science vessel. Slowly standing up while holding onto the bulk head beside her, a bisected door opens and out walks a nude woman. Well not nude, per se, but covered in the same writhing wriggling grey material the vessel was made of before she fell. The nude woman reaches out a hand to Racquelle and opens her mouth to speak. “I can’t hear you? My ears! My ear drums have ruptured.” Racquelle squeaks signaling to the blood running out of her ears. With a slight red flush at the cheeks the woman looks down sheepishly, then reaches out with both hands to cover Racquelle’s ears with her palms.

After a moment, the sound of blood rushing pounds in Racquelle’s ears again. Her breath coming in panic stricken gasps. “Can you hear me now Racquelle?” Murmurs the woman in grey. On closer inspection Racquelle can see that she isn’t really a person, but more of the wriggling and writhing material like the ship. “How? How did you do that? My ear drums ruptured only moments ago?” She is dumbstruck by the return of her hearing, and what’s more her hunger and thirst are subsiding the longer she stands there. “Nanotech. It’s what I am. A self replicating experimental version gone awry. As it were. Very beneficial to – humans.” The woman’s voice is soft but firm. It has a lilting quality to it, like she should be singing to thousands of adoring fans, not standing in a hallway of an older derelict ship.

Standing there together, alone in the ship Racquelle reaches out to touch the humanoid construct’s face. As her finger tips caress the faux skin the lattice work matrix of writhing nanotech starts to shift and roil under her touch. Pulling her hands away quickly Racquelle watches in open mouthed fascination as the humanoid constructs face changes before her eyes. Mouth agape she is looking on as the molten metal like substance begins to form new features. Those that look like herself. With a smirk the construct softens the tip of the nose, and widens her jaw a few millimeters. No longer an exact copy of Racquelle, but a sister or cousin. “I was once known as Kelvin. But you can call me Katayna.”

Part Twenty: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

Is 53 a lot? Sexual partners – Yes, dollars to your name – no.

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I was planning on a diatribe about raising my kids but I seem to have pulled a muscle in my thigh while skating for the first time in nearly a decade, on ice skate two sizes too small. Not to mention it is currently minus 22 today, plus whatever the windchill is. The ice rink we spent a few hours uncovering is now covered in last nights snow, once again. Ugh! My back! My back – my ass and my crack.

I seem to recall car travel being a lot quieter in my youth, whereas my kids use it as a time to narrate their whole lives, second by second on any car ride, no matter the length. It is …. trying. To say the least. Not that I don’t love the sound of laughter and giggles. Or the occasional hilarious story from either kid, but it always descends into cackles and shrill squawking. The kids – they never know when to quit while they are ahead.

On the up & up side, it will soon be March, which means Maple Syruping time! I do love to run the boiler out in the sunshine. Keeping the sap burning for 24 hrs a day for a week or two. Not a fan of hauling in the buckets from the forest, but I can pour sap, and keep a fire burning for hours on end. The crackle of the flames, the soft hiss and pop of the sap boiling, the steam and smoke. It can be very relaxing provided it isn’t insanely windy, or obscenely cold. If it’s too cold you get no sap, and it’ll be a short lived experience. If it hovers just over freezing in the sunshine – whoo boy! Giddy up.

Had some time on my hands to explore more of the Ghost of the Dirty Starling story line last night. I hope to be able to do a bit more this week. I feel like one really long chapter is coming on. I have been able to hang comfortably in the one thousand word range, with occasional dips to seven hundred words. I like the length changes personally. If I had to pad out each chapter to be an arbitrary ten pages some would feel drawn out, where they don’t need to be. Flaunt the rules. Make your own way. Do it how you want to see it done.

In other news, the Olympics started? Really? How did I miss that? Oh right. Human rights abuses, and boycotts and such. Shame for the athletes who have worked for four years to reach their peak over these two weeks. This will be the only time I care about Alpine skiing, down hill slalom, bobsled, luge and figure skating.

Crazy how a million dollars in our town will get you a run down back split of bungalow that needs work. That’s fucking wild. Who the hell wants a million dollar plus mortgage hanging over their heads for twenty five years. Gives me anxiety to think about it. Surely not all of these people can possibly make six figure incomes do they? Maybe they do. I don’t know. But six zeros slowly counting down on an ever looming mortgage would make me want to vomit. More power to you if you can stomach that kind of stress in your life/marriage for decades at a time. Yeesh.

“What do you figures got them all riled up?”

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A tired Piotr asks over the top of the carbine he’s pulled apart at his work bench. Looking away from his view screen, turning the fine tuning knobs on his micrometer dial indicator Brian looks up through the haze over the dark blue mezzanine to the massive board room window thirty meters above them. There looks to be a lot of heated discussion going on, angry pointing, arms flung in the air, people throwing papers and a general sense of chaos. “Looks like a real shit show.” Quips Brian. Setting down his guage blocks next to his pin removal set, Brian swings his monitor out of his way and shouts over the general din of the bull pen. He steps away from his bench a few feet and waves emphatically. “Magdalene! Hey, Magda!” He catches her attention and shouts while pointing up towards the window. “What’s got them so fucking randy all of a sudden?” The other armorers in the bullpen take hardly any notice of Brian. The dull roar of conversation, drills and pneumatic tools dominate the space. Turning to look up at the window, her short red hair all a frizz in the dry air, she sets down her tools and scrambles over to Brian’s bench. Piotr takes notice of Magda’s approach, and fixes his hair, and leans against his bench to ‘put out the vibe’. Skittering across the hard floors in her clunky boots, her tool belt rattling with emphasis Magda pulls up sharply to Brian’s bench. Breathing hard she leans in conspiratorially. “Oh-ho! You haven’t heard? Seems we’ve got ourselves a mole. What’s worse, the pesky buggers done given our fire teams and tankers brain worms!” She almost burps out the information in one breathless gulp. “What da’ fuck?” Barks Piotr. “That’s bull shit – no one could get a mole in here. We’re on top of each other twenty four seven. We’d know. No, no. We’d know if we had a sneaky fucker around here doing dirty shit. The Company has us so closed in you can’t take a shit without HR going over the weight, colour and stink of it in your personnel files. No. No way!” Piotr is red faced and irritated. A little of his star crossed lover sheen rubs off his face. Where he was happy and eager to hear Magda, now he’s put off and irritable. “Yeah – I’m with Piotr here. No way anyone of us working hand in glove with the fire teams would intentionally fuck them.” Brian says. Glancing up over Magdelene’s shoulder to gaze at the large window to think out loud. Brian speaks again. “We have no real idea of what we’re up against. We’ve all heard the bat shit crazy disinformation our spies were made to report back. It’s all fucked. Wackado bologna. The only reason the admiral would never pull out our spies prior to the assault is if he felt they’d all been made. Which, with the nonsense they sent back has to be the case. Has to be.” Piotr lets out a deflated puff of breath. Magdalene retorts. “Suit yourselves boys, but it’s brain worms I’m fucking telling you!” With that she turns on her heel and marches back to her side of the bull pen. Piotr comes around from his side to stand within arms length of Brian. “Hey man. I’m sure Mimi’s ok. You know. That mountain of a woman can take this on. I’m sure it’s nothing.” He rests a hand on Brian’s shoulder for a brief moment. Then makes his way leisurely back to his work station. “Yeah. Yeah sure. Thanks Piotr.” Brian’s face is one big worried crease.

In the boardroom thirty meters above several high ranking officers look as though they are about to come to blows. Brian is left feeling like his whole future is resting upon his shoulders. With his relationship with Mimi on his mind Brian’s mind races to think of something constructive to do. Mimi’s whole life could potentially hang in the balance. She was always prepared. Mimi always had a plan.

He pulls his keyboard out from under his dirty bench top and starts to pull up some of the spec sheets saved locally aboard the Righteous Chord on the new nanotech incorporated programs they were to install. Screen after screen of blue code on a black field scrolls by, as Brian’s eyes cut across the data in a mad search for a clue. Sweat begins to bead upon his brow. The noise and muffled chatter of the bull pen fades away to nothing. Clicking through the entire series of programs and check lists is going to take some doing by himself. “Piotr, can you do me a favour?” Asks Brian in a raspy whispered yell. “Sure, but what?” Replies Piotr almost immediately. “Well, you’re a better programmer than I am, do you have any scripts you can run to find anything dodgy in the set up files for these Nanotech protocols and procedures?” Reaching to turn his monitor around so that he can tap on his screen while he talks to Piotr. “I mean, I can… but the QA for all this stuff was strenuously vetted before it got to us. Not sure what you’re looking for?” Piotr exclaims. “I don’t know. Like a trap door, a trojan horse, some deviation that we have locally that’s different from the originals. Something like that.” Says Brian. “Well now, that is something that I can do – easily. If I make an image of the code, page by page, and run a visual check against the original we can see if everything lines up or not. Look here. I’ll make ours blue, the originals yellow, and anything not green could be our fucky little friend. Yeah? See. Look fields of green here man. Not this program.” Piotr is at once elated, and deflated. “Ok, but that’s just the one program, we have like thirty of these things in the directory. Can you do all of them and let me know if you get any discrepancies?” Replies Brian in hushed tones. “I’m on it.” Says Piotr.

Part Nineteen: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

“Ma’am, we have a serious problem…”

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Says the tall solid woman dressed in blue medical scrubs. Her hair pulled taut in a messy ponytail. Wisps of her dark Auburn hair stuck to her face where she had obviously been sweating. “What seems to be the issue Dr?”  Replies the very short and severe looking commanding officer of the Righteous Chord. “It’s the fire teams ma’am, their stasis is being constantly interrupted by something, we don’t know what though.” The doctor responds in a dry rasp. “Are the sleeved soldiers affected aswell, or just the walking tank crews and fire teams?” The CO asks after a brief pause to wipe her nose with a handkerchief. “It’s isolated to just the fire teams and tankers ma’am. At least our last seventeen diagnostic scans tell us so.” The doctor is quite weary, trying to stand at attention, but also leaning heavily against the bulk head of the vessels main thoroughfare. She is wrestling with fatigue and slowly succumbing to it. “Have a seat Ms?” Replies the CO. “It’s doctor Tam, ma’am. We are stumped. And it’s only getting worse the longer we leave it.” She is really frazzled now, fingers cradling her temples, and knees about to buckle. From out of sight a folding chair is offered by one of the CO’s retinue. CO Austenmire looks down and taps a few commands into her wrist communicator and glances toward the free standing chair to the seated dr Tam. “Can you be ready for a debrief with the weapons teams and the other attending medical personnel? Let’s say ninety minutes from now. Go eat, shower and prep for a grilling from command.” Barks commanding officer Austenmire.

Her retinue break away suddenly to start talking into ear pieces and wall mounted comm’s terminals setting up the meeting among the higher ranking members onboard. The usually bustling ship is vacant with the large fighting force locked away in their stasis sleeves for the months long journey out to UB313. The echoing of the retinues chatter is freely bouncing down the central corridor of the vessel. No other noise is present to cancel it out. The majority of the ship is unused, and only the bare minimum of running lights are turned on. In the dimness of the hall the exterior field of stars is easy to see.

After a few deep breaths dr Tam pulls her hands from her face and notices she is alone in the halls, the CO and her entourage left soundlessly. The only hint she didn’t hallucinate the whole encounter is a flashing meeting notification from CO Austenmire and a quickly counting down timer which reads eighty one minutes and forty two seconds until she needs to report to the engineering sector on decks eight through twelve. Not being mechanically inclined the good doctor has never ventured down that far into the belly of the ship before.

The doors whirl open with a soft swishing noise and a slight jingle as dr Tam passes over the threshold. No guards are stationed out front by the doors, and inside is a bustling hive of activity. The temperature inside the debriefing room is about fifteen degrees warmer than the hallway. Inside the large room is a faux wooden table about thirty paces long and about ten wide. The back of the room is a floor to ceiling window that over looks the ship yard dry docks, and the storage mezzanine where the walking tanks are usually stored and repaired. Twenty meters below the mechanics are pushing their maglev tool boxes around the hull of the drop ships and scout vessels, while there are clusters of apron clad armorers working diligently at their work benches. The vision is soundless through the two foot thick concrete glass window pane. Built to take explosive decompression from a failed hanger door in the dry docks, or various types of explosions from all the artillery stored in the caches. Inside the room is a constant stream of buzzing, pings, printers and muffled intermingled conversations.

A side door opens a few moments later and the room goes silent. In walks commanding officer Austenmire followed by Admiral Mark Garneau. The wiry gray admiral looks like he used to be a very imposing man in his younger says. He carries himself with the bearing of a man who knows his own importance. A large man with a charcoal gray moustache is the last to enter the room. He sits down to the right of the admiral, and opposite CO Austenmire. The three look drawn and unhappy. The tension in the room is palpable. With a flick of her wrist CO Austenmire dims the lights with a wave and calls the debriefing to order. “We’ve been given to understand that their are several serious issues with our tankers and fire teams stasis in transport. I call on the good doctor Tam to lead us through what we know, and what we are going to do about it.” With a snap of collars and heads turned in unison the room full of superior officers and unit commanders all look directly at doctor Tam. With her palms pressed against the table top, she forces herself to stand. The warmth of the room and the glare from those present bring her thoughts into focus. Stepping away from her chair she walks to the side of the room with the view screen on it, and picks up a clicker and laser pointer. “Ok, so do we need a primer on the logistics surrounding stasis, or can I dive right in?” She says while looking around the room. CO Austenmire interjects ” We’re all as clear as we need to be on the standard stasis sleeves doctor Tam. Our issue, and yours concerns the specialized fire teams that are a key component of our upcoming mission. Without them we will be at a serious disadvantage. So – if you will, proceed.” Her remarks are sharp and concise. Dr Tam clicks through her deck to the suitable page. “Right. So – the issue is, our tankers are having their stasis interrupted for longer and longer intervals, and at an increasing number of instances. They are essentially experiencing waking paralyzed nightmares and migraines of increasing strength. At the current rate they will likely not be able to fight, nor maintain any kind of grip on reality to be of any use. As they are being driven mad by a long and pervasive bout of straight out torture. And there’s little we can do about it at the moment. I’ll take questions in a moment. Please. Yes – we have tried to decant four members from each task force, both the fire team and the walking tank crew, to no avail. We can’t seem to wake them up. At all. Not with chemicals, not with stimulation, not even with the electrodes buried in their brains. We’ve attempted a reprogrammed Morning Rays Protocol and nothing is working. So – Now I’ll open the floor to suggestion.” The room erupts into chaos.

Part Eighteen: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

“Are you really that dense, or are you joking?”

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Asks the burly woman sitting in her security forces issued combat uniform. Tucked tightly into her dressing alcove on the mezzanine over looking the main flight deck. An enormous dry dock packed with mechanics doing repairs to all of the vessels stationed inside the sector. The young man is currently helping to bolt her into her multi part suit. “I just didn’t know what all the hub-bub was about. That’s all.” Pouts the small man, with large brown puppy dog eyes and a well worn cracked leather apron loaded with tools on it. “You silly prick. The drums are beating.” She barks in anger. “Huh? I don’t hear any drums, that warning klaxon and the alarms I hear, but no fucking drums!” He replies, earnestly without a hint of sarcasm, though he is pulling her chain, hard. “I’m speaking metaphorically – dip shit. Someone’s gone and pissed off an admiral, and now we’re heading off to war.” She is shouting over the loud peal of the intermittently sounding alarms, and the deep booming klaxon horns. As they approach the time to depart the warnings get closer and closer together. Like the contractions of birth, except it’ll involve the gushing of newly retrofitted attack vessels out of the dry docks all across the refurbished Torus Station. “But, I don’t get it. We’ve done nothing but science and exploration for centuries, why go to war now? What could be so bad as to warrant that.” Asks the diminutive armorer stuffing his hands inside the chest of his leather apron. Feeling the warm rough edges scrape across the skin of his exposed hands. It’s his default position, as he waits for his security personnel to run their internal diagnostics before he can bolt their helmets into place, and fully load out their projectile weapons canisters. “I have heard, via the grape vine, that the insurgencies mole capabilities has affected the admirals personally. Which means it now affects us all. Hey, gimme some of those exploding tip fifty caliber rounds for the shoulder cannons yeah? I like the added punch. Makes door breaching easier than just the shotguns, and I don’t have to get as close to the doors.” The woman remarks, with a wink. Though they bicker back and forth the woman from the security force rather likes her armorer slash valet. “If that’s what madam Mimi wants, that’s what she’ll have. I’ll make a note of that on your requisition forms. No doubt you’ll get them. I’ll flag you down if you don’t, before you get stowed away onboard the Gallant Mistress.” No longer looking at Mimi, but toggling through screens to order up the additional weaponry for her fifty caliber shoulder cannons. “Not with the Gallant Mistress this run, I’m bumped over to the Righteous Chord. Sounds as though we’re taking just about everybody who can fight with us.” Mimi exclaims. “Us too madam. Us too. No good having you out there fighting if you have no one around to repair your gear, or suit you lot up properly.” Their happy banter is slowly fading as the full weight of what the next few months of stasis transit, and then fighting may bring. Brian the valet & armorer will not go under. He’ll be awake for the two month trip making final adjustments and calibrations to the fighting gear. Though the advancements of the nanotech have jumped forward in leaps and bounds, he will still have to administer them individually to each fighter in the battalion that fall under his care. In all he has to repair and dress, undress fifteen members of the elite security fighting force. He somehow always manages to linger when it comes to Mimi. He laughs, but Mimi doesn’t hear him while she is engaged in her comm’s check, and HUD systems calibration. Mimi, not the name he would have guessed for the six foot eight behemoth of a woman infront of him. What kind of mother would think to name this giantess Mimi? The woman needs to give her head a shake. Though, in all honesty, she’s most likely dead. As for Mimi, she’s intimidating out of her weapons suit, and positively monolithic inside it.

The alcove where her suit hangs is like a two car garage, except with chains, hoists and pneumatic Jack’s to lift and lower her armor onto her. He is a modern day Squire to the black clad knight before him. He has still not untethered her from the external life support, as he himself is running triple checks on her aiming reticule, and GPS beacons. He has to climb a ladder to bolt the helmet down from the top, and attach her instrumentation cables in. It’ll be another hour or two yet before she gets loaded into the ships storage like a rifle magazine loaded with all the other walking tank like suits of her combat group.

Reaching over the lower rungs of the ladder to begin to climb up the racking that Mimi is held up against as the suit is still in idle mode, Brian catches Mimi’s eye, and gives her his biggest puppy dog eye wink and nod combo that he can manage. She laughs and looks away. The clicking of the winch lowering her helmet lets her know it’ll be lights out for her momentarily. When next she wakes, she will be deployed for all out war. The air quality inside the helmet is cool and fresh. The smell of oils and lubricants, and welding gases disappears as the helmet clunks into place over her head. Brian can be heard, muffled through the thick concrete glass, using an impact wrench to torque down the bolts to her helmet. Through the five inch thick dome she can see him bang on it three times with his open palm. The wet smack let’s her know she got all the weaponry she’s asked for. Inside the helmet she smiles broadly. Looking up she still smiles though she knows he can’t see her through the golden mirrored outer finish of her helmet. On the HUD a thirty second count down appears in green text across her entire field of vision. With an audible ping the numbers begin to count down with a slight click, as though it were an analog flip clock from centuries ago. As expected a shockingly cold pinch can he felt in the base of her neck. Her blood stream fills with the cool liquid, she doesn’t see the end of the countdown. Soon a pink viscous fluid will fill her lungs and other open cavities so that she can withstand the brutal forces associated with a crushingly hard thrust burn and the bone breaking deceleration to reach the outer edges of the solar system where UB313 awaits.

Part Sixteen: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

“This is the strangest feeling.”

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She thought to herself. All around her there is a calming warmth, like a snug blanket wrapped around her. But not quite, almost akin to floating in a very warm pool of water, where you know you are wet, but you don’t feel wet. There is a hum about her too, comforting, like a soft electrical tingle in her finger tips and toes. Even though it is pitch black and she can not see she is not scared. No, she thinks, at the edges of her consciousness she is terrified, but she feels compelled, externally, to not panic. Like someone is whispering sweet nothings in her ears just below what she can make out, but the warmth of breath on her neck, and the sense of someone caring is tangible. The oddness of it all envelops her. She is oddly disquieted by the lack of her heart beating in her chest. Surely at peace as she is, the constant thrum of the lub-dub of her heart, and the sound of blood rushing in her ears should be present. What had happened? Why couldn’t she remember where she was or what she was doing. The warmth and floating sensation persists. The blackness around her could stretch for miles. Or it could be a mask. Either way her eyes are unseeing. Is she waking up in a med pod? Did she fail her mission to obtain the asset? Questions are tumbling around in her mind. A brief pinch in her head, like the beginnings of a head ache, but now its gone. What was she just thinking of? The float is warm. She could just drift away, off to sleep. “YES” – the warmth speaks, like honey in her ear. Oozing around her, the suggestion to slip away, go to sleep, just rest – relax. Feeling herself giving in to the sensation of gently rocking, somewhere in the blackness she can hear her mother singing a lullaby. A gentle finger moving a lock of hair from her face. The warm embrace, the touch of warm soft skin on skin. The slight hum of electric static from an off turned radio. The clicking of the rocking chair upon the orange sun lit floors of her bedroom. Oh!, she thinks, I don’t know if I’ve ever had that memory before. So nice. She’s a teenager, rolling over in bed, away from her opened blinds, snuggling against her comforter, “I don’t want to go to school” she moans. The warmth begins to ebb away slowly, a cold chill nips at her fingers and toes. She shivers, nakedly from the cold.

The darkness begins to recede, in its place a swirling mass of shadows and smoke. She coughs deeply, and begins to choke. Hard wracking coughs that assault her lungs. She can feel her eyes begin to bulge, her neck straining, her finger bones pop with the strain. She isn’t choking but suffocating in the grey white cloud. “She might need the atmosphere we detected K”. Garbles a voice echoing from every which direction. “Yes – Yes! We did notice that too.” Replies the same voice. “Best be quick about it then K.” It answers in reply. “Too right K.” It says, still having done nothing but remark upon her strangled state. “Oh thank you K.” The woman lay on the ground asphyxiating. With an audible whistle the room begins to fill with a mixture of oxygen and nitrogen and various other gases. The same as the tiny yellow morsel they had consumed, in which they found her. Gasping for her life she lies upon the ground heaving and floundering. Trying to catch her breath and get her bearings. “Your friends are dead.” The room vibrates with the words, but no one is inside the room. With a cracked and dry throat she croaks. “I know.” The room itself begins to shrink, and reorganize. No longer a cube of three meters to a side, but an elongated hall, all illuminated in the same silver grey and off white. The hall ends at her back but stretches out into a pin point of light in front of her. Without getting up she is pushed forward, gently. “The man inside with you had significant trauma to his brain. Tell us, did you have anything to do that?” Asks the echoing voice quietly. “No! – no, I was trying to fix the sabotaged cockpit flight controls. Richard’s was murdered by our pilot Zeke.” The walls shimmy in response. The forward pull of the hallway speeds up. The woman has the distinct sensation of traveling without moving. It is disconcerting. “Tell us, what of the man partially welded to your hull?” Enquires the echoing voice. “I don’t know? I assumed Zeke was trying to sabotage us so that he could obtain the asset by himself. Keep the glory for his own.” She responds with a dry bark. “Wait – did you say welded? What welded? How is that possible?” She exclaims. The hallway starts to expand, a large yellow and black ship begins to uncover itself from the wall. The hall disappeared behind her, a large rectangular room containing her ship The Mangelo has arranged itself around her. She approaches the rear of the ship where, near the top side, the propellant storage tanks are located. Too physically weak to climb, she realizes she can’t recall when she last ate or drank anything. The ship before her appears to sink into the floor, raising her up to see the top of the vessels hull. There, frozen in place is the body of the pilot. “Can you tell if the power is still on with the ship?” She asks aloud. “We have rendered the core inert.” Responds the echo. Crawling over the pipes and exposed cabling on the hull she can see that the pilot, Zeke, had unfortunately braced himself to work by putting one boot under a secured conduit and then leaned over another cable bundle to switch the engines over to the reserve tanks, causing the current to arc, welding himself in place. Dying of electrocution painfully, in the process causing the overload of the capacitors and resistors blowing out the control panels in the cockpit. It wasn’t sabotage, at least on Zeke’s part. Just an unfortunate accident stemming from their second hand pilfered vessel, and shoddy rushed schedule to assemble it all. “So how did Richards get a pipe in the head?” She mumbled. The deep echo voice rumbles.”The analysis of the data from the biometric recorder seems to suggest he was trying to pull a stuck valve open on a holding tank, when is grip failed, slipped off the wrench and impaled himself. His gps tracker shows him flopping around.” Responds the voice dryly. “Which caused the machinists lubricant to dribble into the cistern.” She says, flatly. A little numbed by the revelation. Suddenly there is a violent rocking motion to the room, as the woman tumbles over sideways falling to her hands and knees with a violent thud, the room shrinks down into a cramped sphere, only slightly larger than the woman if she were to crouch. The light within the grey white room begins to shimmer into a dazzling brilliance. “Would you like to know what your wrist biometric unit says – Racquelle?”

Part Fifteen: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.

“We’re all just gristle for the mill…”

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Mutters the older statesman sitting reclined at his massive desk. He’s thumbing through the most recent accident reports from The Dirty Starling. One particular case was flagged to his attention, marked urgent, and highly confidential. “What’s that?” Asks the statesman’s valet, seated at a small alcove just around the side of the desk. A minuscule cut out of the massive structure that fits his small computer keyboard, a side board to fix his boss’s drinks, and a large black box full of encrypted data records. “Hmm. Just talking to myself, my dear boy.” Harrumphs the older man, his chin fixed against his round barrel chest. A look of consternation rests upon his wrinkled face, and precise chiseled features. No less handsome even with his recent weight gain in these later decades of his tenure aboard The Dirty Starling. The man, Gerald, is an advisor to the positively ancient Admiral currently entombed in the captain’s quarters of The Dirty Starling. “I’ve got to carve out some time to wake the admiral.” States Gerald flatly. The accident report clutched tightly in his left hand. “The admiral? Jesus what’s happened now?” Chirps the valet. “An absolute disaster. That’s what. Seems our vanished ghost is, or rather, was, the admiral’s great great grandson. He is not going to take this news well. How long will it take to wake the man?” Asks the large, gruff adviser Gerald. The slim valet types on his keyboard quickly, with a few clicks and some guttural noises he replies. “According to medical the admiral is due out of stasis when we reach port on Errebus Four in two weeks time sir. Do you want to wait for his regularly scheduled reanimation?” The valet asks. “Is that what I asked you young Timmons? Hmmm… did I ask you to tell me when he was scheduled to awaken? I know he’s due out in two weeks, his primary dinner guest, besides myself, my retinue and the other first officers was the dead man – his progeny. So No! In fact, I do not wish to wait. Key in the request, I’ll approve it physically. Any further delay may endanger our lives further. The Admiral is not known for leniency onboard this ship. Am I clear Timmons?” Barks the adviser in a raspy cutting whisper. “Yes sir. If we trigger the Morning Rays Protocols now, he will awaken in six hours – sir.” Responds the slim valet Timmons firmly. “Good man. Key it to my biometrics wrist communicator and I’ll DNA scan in the override. Good god I hope he takes this well.” Mutters the thick necked adviser, straightening his shoulders, and fussing with his moustache in a small pocket mirror.

With a loud woosh the lid of the medical pod opens up and a humanoid shape within can be seen through the escaping rush of steam and moisture. Over head fans kick on gobbling up the various gases. Their mechanical hum interwoven with loud clicks and a low grade grinding of metal on metal. Blue dressed medical technicians scatter as the body within begins to stir. A tall female technician approaches Gerald with the intent to scold him for rushing the older admirals awakening. But seeing the ashen look, and the puffy bags under the admiral’s most trusted advisers eyes, she yields, and backs away with a softly spoken. “Be kind Gerald, the admiral is… not in as good a state as he once was. Be gentle – please.” Turning his eyes from the man entombed in the medical pod Gerald looks at the doctor with mournful eyes and says “I do not wish to hurt him any more than absolutely necessary. He’d be furious if we waited to break the news to him. Better a sharp shock than a delayed festering wound.” He grumbles. “As you see fit Gerald.” Remarks the doctor as she disappears into her office across the medical bay. In a flutter of lab coats and orderlies with wheel chairs, the Morning Rays Protocol team rushes in to collect the admiral, checking his vitals again, attaching leads, and wiping him damp body down. Removing the remnants of the stasis fluids used to keep the elderly man alive. The clock is ticking, and Gerald expects to be summoned by the admiral within the hour from his ready room aboard the bridge.

“Well, speak man! Why did you awaken me so soon, and as harshly. A Morning Rays Protocol Gerald? Are you trying to kill me? I should have been brought back gradually over a period of days. Well? Speak damn it!” Roars the tall elderly man in a medical unitard. Not yet dressed in his full admiralty uniform. Unadorned as he was, deminuitive compared to his former self, the admiral still bellows loud enough to shake the walls of any given room. The pens on his desk rattle with the raucous boom of his voice. “I bare ill tidings sir.” States Gerald. His hands interlinked before him a manilla folder nestled under his arm, as he stands just inside the ready room doors. “Jesus Herald – don’t act like a dcolded child waiting for punishment, out with it man, out!” The admiral is pacing behind his desk, furious to be awakened so suddenly, and is such a harsh manner. He is not one so used to being man handled. Given attention to his every whim yes, but not a man used to being denied. “It concerns your great great grandson – sir.” Bleats Gerald in obvious distress. “Ah yes! Yes, yes, yes. I have not forgotten! I am so very pleased I was able to procure my progeny for this ship. I’ve watched over him you know. I have the time and inclination to follow his progress. Most impressive. An admirable specimen to the family – and name. He bares my name sake you know!” Speaks the red faced admiral, his eyes twinkling with the fondness of his memories. “He’s dead sir.” The swiftness of the admiral’s fury is frightening. Both hands slamming down on his desk. The look of betrayal upon his face. It’s as though the air has been sucked out of the small room. A dark red flush cascades over the old man’s face, as though thick blood were erupting from the top most portion of his scalp. “Bring. Me. His. Body.” Shouts the admiral in a staccato. “I want his biometrics unit brought to me. I want an autopsy, I want all relevant reports on my desk within the hour. Well? MOVE GERALD. Don’t look at me like a stuck fucking pig!” He rants. “I can’t. Sir.” “Oh yes you fucking well can, my son! You fucking well better! My boy. Or I will rend you limb from limb!” He raves. “I’m sorry sir, the Ghost protocol required his body and communicator, the whole of his biometric data be purged.” States Gerald flatly. “What the fuck are you talking about Gerald. He’s mine. I assigned him here. There was no Ghost Protocol for his personnel file. I know that because I would never grant him one. Nothing so ignoble should befall progeny of mine – Gerald.” Shouts the angry admiral. “If you check the records sir – Mark has a Ghost Protocol registered. Signed off on too.” Gerald speaks quietly as he approaches the desk, a file folder clutched in his hand. He opens the folder and lays it down upon the desk. A single photo of the puddle of remains is attached via a paper clip. Poking out underneath are the details of his subsequent bagging, being crated into a polyethylene barrel, and ejected into the backwash of the engines. There are several first person accounts from the witnesses, and the day and time stamps.

Admiral Mark stands still behind his ready room desk starring down at the Manila folder and the contents of the report. Displayed vividly in red ink is the stamp for the Ghost Protocol with a name written in black ink, with a message underneath it.

“Dr Jang you have a new message from the encrypted line waiting for you. At your leisure sir.” Without waiting for acknowledgement the intern scurries from the partially opened office door. Doctor Jang looks up at the clock on his desk, a broad grin spreading across his unshaven face. Slowly he gets up from his desk to cross the room to the door, stopping only to put on his white lab coat. A hop in his step as he saunters down the halls of UB313 to the bridge compartment, and the quiet out of the way alcove where the encrypted line awaits.

The signature is scrawled but clear as day. The Ghost Protocol was ordered by a Doctor Douglas Jang. Underneath that are a few words scribbled followed by a smiley face. “My eyes betray me Gerald. What pray tell, does that say?” Bending at the waist Gerald leans down to read the note under the signature. “It says – Fuck you old man.” With a clatter the admiral collapses into his chair with a thud.

Part Fourteen: Ghost of the Dirty Starling.