The Dance Eternal

ch 10 and 11

10

“Holy Mother of… have you ever seen such destruction?”

The crew of the aircraft had been mostly quiet since getting to the target area, not because the flight leader had called for radio silence, rather because of the wasteland that used to be Indianapolis, Indiana.

Where the city had been, there was now a crater, almost perfectly circular and looking as if that shape had been scooped from the earth and taken away. The ends of pipes could be seen protruding from the walls of the hole, water pouring from them. In the bottom-center of the crater, a bank of fog or smoke was building.

“Sir, I have something,” said the Navigator, “it’s big, in the center of the crater.”

“Aye. Take us a little lower. Let’s get a look at this.”

The plane banked as it passed the outer edge of the crater, and came around for a second pass, dropping to five-hundred feet. As they passed back into the air over the hole, and the cloud was in full view, it began to dissipate outward across the ground, revealing a shape that was hidden within. It resembled a massive seed but was covered with countless spikes, each easily as tall as a man. It’s outside was dark in color, with a hint of a rusty hue in the right angle of light.

“That thing must be thirty stories tall! What the hell is it?”

“Sir, there is an odd energy signature that just appeared, and it seems to be building. At first I thought it might be a communication signal, but now I’m not so sure.”

Near the peak of the thing, a little point of intense light appeared, pale white with angry little crimson motes dancing around it. Gradually, the motes snapped into the point, seeming to make it grow in both size and intensity.

“Sir, those readings are… that’s bad.”

“No bullshit, Davis. What’s going on?”

“The energy is off the scale, and I keep getting tone like we’re being targeted.”

The craft lurched, first upward, then down, settling into a shallow descent straight toward the ‘seed’. The pilot wrestled with the yoke, pulling back to regain control, while the rest of the crew held on to something to keep from toppling about the cabin.

“Get us steady, Jones. Damage?”

“Trying, Sir…”

“No real damage, Sir, but the electronics are going haywire.”

The light was so bright now that none could look out the window, casting them all in a brilliant, crimson-hued pallor.

“Sir?”

“Get us out of here,” the flight leader said, but didn’t get the usual response from Jones, the pilot. “Jones, you hear me? Let’s get the Hell outta Dodge!”

Jones was stark still, and when the Navigator, Davis, leaned over to check on the man, he saw that the pilot was staring ahead, eyes glazed, and some kind of goo was beginning to seep from his eyes.

“Sir, something is wrong with Jones.”

“Take the yoke, Davis. We got to get control and go, now! Radio, send a message with our scan data. Do it now, and keep it open.”

The intensity of the gathered light had grown to painfully blinding levels, as Davis nudged Jones from the pilot’s seat. Jones fell to the floor, and a puddle of the goo began to form at his mouth; he was dead before Davis ever touched him. The new pilot grabbed the yoke and pulled back hard.

The plane jerked its nose up and began to level off, still aimed at the thing in the crater. Davis turned the yoke to the left, the wing dipping immediately, and started the turn for an escape.

“Good work, Davis- “

The praise was cut short; the gathered energy pulsed once as the craft banked away, then streaked out toward the plane, accompanied by the shriek of that energy rending the very air through which it traveled.

The shot struck the plane on the bottom of the fuselage, and the wings comically popped off and fluttered away like a pair of steel-coated feathers. The plane seemed to hang in the air for a moment as the impact point crackled with energy that seemed to eat away at the body. The crew inside sat, looking at each other, knowing they were about to join Jones in death.

The remains of the body of the plane crashed to the ground in a hail of debris; the largest intact portion of the fuselage slammed down and rolled several times, before creaking to a halt in a slow rocking motion.

Several minutes later, Davis pushed Jones’ body off and pulled his leg free from the seat it had gotten tangled under. A noise from his right, and a familiar voice cursing, told him that the flight leader, Captain Flemming, had survived.

“Who’s there,” Flemming asked, voice strained from pain.

“Davis, Sir. You okay?”

“Aside from just being in a plane crash, not too badly,” the Captain said with a forced laugh. “I can’t see, though. That could be a problem.”

The wreckage groaned, then rolled half over, tumbling the men about, and causing the remains to come apart even more. When it again settled, both men found themselves facing upward at the sky… and the top of the thing in the crater. What really caused some panic was the gathering of… beings… that had formed around the crash site.

Several were moving toward the plane, odd amorphous appendages crackling and slurping as they carried their bulks. As the first of them arrived, it extended an appendage toward Davis, who started to scrabble backward as best he could.

“No. NO! Get away,” he yelled, flailing, but it seemed unaffected. As the appendage reached his leg, its surface seemed to melt over his form, and he suddenly let out a wail of agony to wake the dead.

Flemming, vainly blinking his ruined eyes and calling out for his crewman, reached out to try to help, but found nothing as Davis was devoured – dissolved – by the thing. Poor Davis was whimpering, no strength remaining to scream, when the thing reached his head and silenced him for good.

The Captain, determined to go out like a warrior, pulled his pistol and began firing in a generally frontal arc; many went harmlessly past, a couple struck other beings behind, but he did manage to get two shots into the nearest creature’s ‘head’ area – to no effect. Its reaching appendage began to cover his leg, and intense pain shot upward through him. He could understand now why Davis wailed; it felt like his leg was covered in acid and on fire.

With every last ounce of strength he had left, Captain Gregory Flemming of the United States Air Force, decided that was not going to give this bastard-alien the satisfaction of torturing him, and put the last round of his pistol in his own head.

11

The scene of the massive cavern from near the top of the cylinder was impressive. He’d had no idea as to what time it was, but he could see through the gaps in the top of the cavern that it was getting close to dawn.

As John silently mulled over their discussion so far, Steve stepped onto a walkway that led up to the side of the central structure, and tapped a few buttons on a keypad. After a moment, a hollow metallic pop sounded, like a wooden bat hitting a metal sheet. The section of the structure in front of Steve swung inward, and he saw another platform within. Steve stepped through the doorway, motioning for John to follow.

“This, my friend, is my project, what this place was built for. I spent years, and most of my savings, putting this together.”

John stepped through the doorway, and onto another steel-mesh platform. A lift sat ready to the left, past where Steve stood, while a set of stairs wound along the outer wall of the cylinder, all the way to the ground.

When he saw what the structure hid, his breath caught. Standing vertically was a craft unlike any he’d never seen. The nose, tapered and wide as the ship, nearly touched the top of the metal shroud, and he could see a pair of shallow, fin-like wings that almost touched the sides. She was sleek, with few right angles anywhere on her surface, and was painted stone grey, polished to a nice shine. The window of the bridge sat back a bit from the nose, and a little light could be seen from inside.

“We have taken to calling her ‘Celeste’. What do you think?”

John stared, amazed, yet trying to discern why that thing in his mind was suddenly excited. The look on his face must have been priceless, because when Steve looked at him awaiting a response, he grinned and gave a light chuckle.

“That’s about the same look I had when we finished her body, and again when the first test-flight was a success.”

John smiled himself, “In a word; breathtaking. And you’ve had her up already? How’d you get her back into the cylinder?”

“Just that good,” Steve laughed, then, “joking aside, the propulsion is literally out of this world. Anti-gravity technology, reverse engineered from an old military facility that was closed down.”

“What, it was just laying around, waiting to be found?”

Steve shook his head, and stepped onto the nearby lift. Once John was on, he pushed the button to start the decent. “Well, yes and no. One of my best researchers used to work at that facility. It took some talking, but he agreed to take us, and show us what was there.

“The stories you probably heard about alien crashes and recovered tech are not entirely false. In fact, they had a ship, but it was unserviceable – too much damage to attempt repairs, especially with different materials.”

“So, you scavenged what you could?”

“It was collecting dust in a facility that hadn’t seen human presence in ten years, at least,” Steve shrugged, “The place wasn’t even guarded. According to Yates, the government was counting on the urban stigma to keep people away… that, and the fact it’s general public knowledge that a good number of those who used to work there were killed.”

“Pfft, that works,” John said sarcastically. He remembered a time that he, Tommy, Lacy, and several others, went to an old place outside of the city that they’d heard about; an old hospital that was supposedly haunted, and had a nasty reputation for disappearances. The gang had determined that they were going to be the ones to sniff out the ghosts, but found none.

Steve pressed the button again, stopping the lift about half of the way down, and stepped off, John following suit. Haverstad went directly to the side of the ship and pressed his hand against the button on the nearest console. The section of hull in front of him popped with a depressurizing hiss, then swung inward, revealing a small room with another door opposite.

“This is a decompression chamber, for spacewalks, incompatible atmospheres, etcetera. Hell, you’ve probably seen enough sci-fi programs to know this,” he mused as the outer door closed. “Oh, and you might want to plant your foot like this.” He leaned back and planted one foot against the wall to his left, looking like he was about to walk up the wall.

John, immediately catching on, turned himself and got his foot against the wall just as the outer door sealed, and the cabin pressure shifted. “Step” Steve said, as the pressure change forced his center of gravity to the left.

Steve stepped somewhat smoothly, but stumbled a bit at the end, and flattened out against the now opposite wall.

John started tipping back as soon as the pressure shifted laterally, and, as if a fully practiced motion, rolled smoothly with the gravity shift, earning a considering look from Steve.

“Have you done this before, John,” he asked, collecting himself from the wall as the inside door popped and swung open.

Within, John could see a corridor that went to the left and right. Recessed lights lit the way from the ceiling, casting the walls of the hall – metal paneling painted white, with a deep blue trim near the floor – in a soft white ambience. Across the corridor from the decompression chamber, a glass door revealed the inside of a compartment that held four space suits that looked way too thin to be of any protection, and presumably enough room to change.

“Are those space suits?” John felt stupid for asking what he felt was obvious, but the suits’ appearance was throwing him.

“Yes. Look flimsy, don’t they? One of NASA’s last projects was a new space suit that was a lot more compact – an ultrathin material that could withstand the cold of space, or the heat of open flame. Their problem was oxygen. We fixed that.”

“Open flame? You’ve tested these, right?” John didn’t want to sound incredulous, but he just couldn’t see how those flimsy looking things could withstand getting poked with a toothpick, much less open flame.

“A hundred times if once, over the last ten years. Both open flame – tested that one myself – and the frozen cold of space. NASA tested both extensively before us, but we wanted to be sure. The suit is also fitted with plates of a Kevlar-type weave that is both flexible and durable. Yes, it will stop a bullet or three, but don’t stand in front of a minigun and expect to walk away.”

John was understanding a bit more now. “And the oxygen issue,” he questioned for all the world as if he had been on Steve’s team the whole time.

“Another NASA project, with a good deal of our own improvements. They had a very successful nanotech program, and the research was quite easy to obtain. We’ve placed nanotech scrubbers in the filters of the helmet; they convert our exhaled carbon dioxide into oxygen, and the process itself produces energy that the nanos use to function... it’s a perpetually functioning system, as the rest of the suit is powered with bioenergy, using the electrical current in the wearers body as a power source.”

“That doesn’t harm the wearer of the suit, does it?”

“Not at all. It’s more like the body is completing a circuit; the charge cycles through the suit and is merely refreshed as it passes through the body – combined with the nanotech, it’s actually quite a marvelous little system.”

John nodded, pretty sure he understood, as Steve turned left, toward the front of the ship. He started the tour in the bridge, pointing first at the captain’s seat near the back of the room. He then pointed to each of the five other seats and briefly explained each station’s function; from the captain’s chair, the closest left was communications, with navigation ahead of them. On the right was the science station, and the ship’s defenses were handled at the seat ahead. The front wall of the chamber was dominated by a large screen; Steve explained that this could be used to show various information, zoom on scenery, and so on. It could also be raised, giving the bridge the “true view” outside.

The little ball in his head seemed to snicker, as John got a mental image of the bridge from above, noting that the five seats were arranged in a star pattern. He did find that interesting, both the seating arrangement, and the amusement in his head around it, but put it aside for now, trying to follow what Steve was telling him.

They left the bridge, past the airlock and deeper into the ship, until they came into the main common area. A seating area, with two sofas and a pair of overstuffed chairs set around a low table, could be seen to the right, while the left side held an ample kitchen space and a table large enough to seat eight comfortably.

“The larger pieces of furniture – the sofas, shelving, and the larger chairs – are all secured to the floor,” Steve was saying, rounding the table and entering the kitchen. “These chairs have magnetic feet, so they can be moved, but shouldn’t slide much when empty.”

“What about food,” John asked, scanning the kitchen’s closed cabinets as if he could see the contents.

“That, my friend, is one of our crowning achievements,” Steve announced, “You see that the kitchen is fully equipped for regular cooking, and there are some supplies.

“However, this,” he said, laying is hand on the side of a large appliance that looked to John to be an oven, “is the replicator. Celeste has over three hundred recipes in memory, with plenty of space for more.” Steve chuckled, adding, “If you go hungry, it’s your own fault.”

“Wait,” John said, unable to keep his amazement from his voice, “so, this thing makes food… from nothing?”

“Well, not nothing, per se, but the processes are pretty complex, even for me,” Steve replied with another chuckle.

The crew quarters, eight rooms in total (four to a side), were on an upper level accessible via one of two short ladders on either end of the main room, with an open walkway facing the room below on both sides. The way the whole was arranged made him felt like nearly any of the ships he’d remembered from film and the Net; it gave him a comfortable sense of nostalgia and hominess.

The next room they entered was the stasis chamber; eight pods, looking like white, cylindrical coffins with glass panels on the front, stood against the outer wall of the room. Each had a panel on the front with a keypad, and a neat bundle of wires and hoses leading into the wall from the top of each unit. In the center of the room was a console, looking like a small round end table with a glass top. A glass panel stood from the top of the table, and as they neared, it lit up, becoming the screen for the console.

‘This is the stasis area, where the crew will sleep for most of the journey,” Steve said, tapping a key on the console, and causing the pod nearest to John to open. He looked inside, running his hand over the ‘bedding’ and thinking that at least it would be comfortable.

“How long,” John asked.

“What?”

John turned to Steve and the console, “The ‘journey’. How long?”

“We’re looking at a trip of at least seventy years.”

“To where?”

“There is a small system near Alpha Centari. We’ve been looking at it for years, since it has one of the closest M-type planets we’ve found. Deep space scans have detected both water and atmosphere. The last probe sent back pictures of vegetation, as well as atmospheric scans that read an oxygen content slightly higher than our own.” Steve tapped the console, causing the pod to close, and moved toward the doorway. “What’s more, there are three planets in that system, and all are closely matched to ours.”

After a few moments to take it in, John went to follow. They went deeper still into the ship, entering on the upper level of an impressive cargo hold (“Big enough for a pair of old Sherman tanks, and a transport to boot”, Steve had mused, his voice echoing in the empty space). They climbed down the narrow steps and crossed the space into another passage with several storage and equipment access points along the way, eventually ending in the engine room.

A mellow purr filled the dim chamber, while the scent of metal and ozone filled John’s nose. Lights marked where various panels and gages could be found, some blinking at regular intervals. The center of the room was dominated by a low, large metal box with dozens of cables and hoses leading out with seemingly random placement. A metal tube, about six inches in diameter, was affixed to the wall above their heads in the shape of a ring, with offshoots curving into and out of the central box, their paths crisscrossing.

The whole made John think of the supercollider used by CERN, and when he said as much, Steve seemed impressed.

“Good eye. This actually is a collider, albeit on an obviously much smaller scale. The smashing this little baby does is a big part of the ship’s propulsion and energy production. And, if she ever needs a jump start, there are external solar panels that will be charging backup power storage whenever they can catch some solar rays.”

John’s head spun. Much of the technology he’d seen in this ship was stuff he’d only seen in science fiction films, yet here it was. When they left the Celeste and made their way back through the cavern to the lift, it was in silence.

On the way up, John turned to Steve, “So, why the grand tour?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

John shook his head, and Steve chuckled, “I want you on board when she leaves.”

John reeled, “Me? Why? I told you before; I’m no scientist. I mean, I would hate to turn down such an awesome offer, but I don’t see what I could add to the crew.”

Steve shook his head, “You will understand, soon.”

In the lab, working on their second joint, they talked about mundane things that often seemed to make sense only to the stoned. During a lull in the conversation, Johnathan noticed that Steve seemed to be fighting a decision; his brow was drawn low, eyes fixed on some distant position, fingers working as if ticking off a series of points.

John set the remaining roach, barely smoldering, on a nearby ash tray, then leaned back, enjoying the physical and mental relaxation induced by the weed. He looked around the lab, occasionally checking to see if Steve had finished his ‘trance’, and noticed on the third glance that the other was staring at him, slightly smirking.

John lifted an eyebrow, and Steve busted out in almost hysterical, pot-induced laughter. As he howled and pointed, John just grinned and shook his head. Affecting an accent that he’d heard somewhere, he joked, “Some dudes jus’ cain’t hold they smoke.”

Steve, subsided now to giggles, waved his hands. “You looked like Spock! It was fantastic,” he managed between huffs, catching his breath. They fell silent again, and Steve idly began fiddling with the carburetor; at one point, he picked up a rag and started rubbing at a spot, muttering to himself.

“Steve,” John said quietly. The other slowly looked up, pushing his glasses up his nose. Apprehensively, he continued, “this is going to sound weird, but have you noticed anything… odd… since this started?”

“Odd, how,” came Steve’s reply. His eyes we somewhat narrowed, and John obviously had his attention, now.

“How to put this without sounding insane,” John trailed off.

“Let’s hear it.”

“Any… presences, or voices. Occurrences of things… moving?” John’s eyebrow slowly slid upward, again.

Steve could easily see that the other man was struggling. “I am glad you asked that, John,” he said, and stood. He wavered, planting his hand on the table for support. “Good smoke,” he muttered loud enough that John heard and grunted an assent.

“Come, John. It’s time you met my Nephew, Craig.”