Archaea 2: Janis

Janis

By Dain White

Other books by Dain White

Archaea

Janis

Red

© 2012 by Dain White. All Rights Reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the author.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Revised February, 2013

Preface

I think it's fair to say at this point that I am hooked, through and through, on writing. It's such a massive process, all-encompassing and so unbelievably rewarding. The story churns inside of me, endlessly tugging at the tips of my fingers, pulling me inexorably towards the keyboard, a minion to my muse.

As much as I am writing for myself, to discover the story within, I am really writing for you. You, who have taken a chance on a new book, on a new story – your eyes reading these words, ready for a new adventure, yearning for escape from our workaday world, from our shared social collective unconsciousness. This is who I am writing for.

Your kind words of support, sharing my book with your friends, family, and even (and most especially) your most bitter enemies... this is what fuels my fire. To think that I have become enthralled by the act of writing, creating a moment of imagination, that's just part of the equation. You are the other part, and the only part that matters in the end.

Without you, none of this would have any purpose, and for that, I thank you.

Chapter 1

The mid-day crowds along the waterfront of New Turiana were thick, teeming with every manner of character, perfumed courtesans walking with their hips, businessmen in office costumes clutching cliptabs and handsets, and everywhere, dock workers jeering at each other as they loaded the deep displacement scows used for trade around the inner sea of Vega 6.

New Turiana was a melting pot of modern and archaic. The glittering arcologies of downtown welded together in a solid mass of cityscape and raised towers like fingers impossibly high into the mauve sky, amidst the pink-tinged clouds scudding past – but along the waterfront, it was the same as any other port in any other planet, dirty, busy, and dangerous.

Yak and I were on a mission to meet with an insurgent, a representative from Solis, a rim-space system that is currently under indenture to Americo Ventures, a massive glom that controls nearly an entire arm of the outer rim.

Solis is a system at the very core of their sphere of influence, and apparently they have suffered deeply as a result of their indenture – they need supplies that AV can't, or won't, provide, supplies that can help stop the spread of a deadly plague.

Captain Smith and the rest of the crew, Gene and Pauli, were back on the Archaea, which was berthed on the blast-pans to the east of New Turiana, on a peninsula reaching out into the inner sea.

As I passed a shop with a glass front, I looked behind me on the angled glass of the entrance and spotted Yak, towering head and shoulders above the crowd, looking anywhere other than at me. I knew that was just his thing, he didn't want anyone else to know he was watching me. At least, I hoped that was just his thing. I was practically unarmed, as our Solaris contact was adamant that his contact with us needed to be completely passive. I would sooner leave my skin behind than go out without a gun or three, though in this case, I left a few behind.

Yak was armed to the teeth, however, though you couldn't tell it from looking at him. He's a massive mountain of muscle, a proud son of the Yakima Nation on Terra, a trained killer, a jarhead – but a really nice guy, and smarter than your average Marine.

Owing to his size and physical prowess, he was a champion wrestler as well as an all-star lineman in high school, but he was smart enough to also be captain of the debate team. After graduating, he joined the Terran Service, where they turned him into a Marine.

The perfect person to be walking rear-guard on this little stroll down the busy wharf on the bad end of a big town. I was a little apprehensive, but not too much. I am after all, a highly effective, lethal killing machine in a compact frame. My name is Jane Short, but I'm not really short, I'm just not that tall. Not like Yak.

Right about then, I wished I could see more than shoulders and backs, as a commotion started to break out somewhere ahead of me, voices called out followed by a drawn out scream, and then I dodged under the awning of the nearest building as people pushed and shoved back through the crowd.

A quick glance behind me showed Yak forging ahead, the press of the crowd parted around him like a boulder in the middle of a rushing stream. His face, grim and set, watched everyone and no one and he passed my perch in the shade of the awning without a flicker of recognition.

When he came abreast of me I darted in and took a position behind him, pushing upstream in his wake. We didn't have far to go, before we saw what had happened.

A man lay across the slats of the wharf, bleeding profusely from what looked to be a critical head injury, the kind of bleeder that you don't wake up from unless someone hits you right quick with some medifoam.

Luckily for him, I carry a pretty complete kit in my bag, and with a quick look at Yak, I rushed up and gingerly rolled him over, trying to ignore the ever-spreading pool of blood.

Yak faded back into the background, and pulled overwatch while I worked on the back of the man's head. About a decimeter long gash was split open impossibly wide, and looked to be deep – to the bone.

I'm normally not a squeamish girl, you'd find me hurling a chair at a mouse rather than squealing on top of it pointing down, but this was almost more than I wanted to look at right then.

Luckily the man kept his hair short. I pinched the edges of his wound together and then sprayed dabs of medifoam. I had to hold pretty tight for a few seconds, until the medifoam expanded a bit and started to harden tight against his scalp. I worked my way up the wound, fingers drenched in blood and teeth clenched tight, my jaw ached from the tension of the moment.

His blood was hot between my fingers, and had completely soaked through my pants at the knees, but I was finally able to get the wound closed. I watched a moment more as the medifoam continued to solidify.

I took a moment to breathe, and looked around me at the ring of silent, ashen faces around us, Yak among them watching them more than me, but holding his cover well.

I caught the eye of a man who looked the leas
t green at all the blood. “You, get over here and help me move him to the shade over there” I pointed towards the deeper shadow cast by an awning behind us, as another man came over to help. It was like the tension of the moment snapped, and all sorts of people started to come out of the frozen tableau, to scurry around, to try and help the poor injured man they were all watching die at their feet a few moments ago.

“I'm a doctor”, one man said breathlessly as he rushed in and knelt by the injured man, his face looked grim as he felt for a pulse. “Has anyone called medics yet?” he asked, though no one answered.

“I will” said another man in coveralls, handset in his hand held out as if it would somehow protect him from the grisly scene.

“Did anybody see what happened?” The doctor asked. He looked at me, and added “What did you see when you got here?” as he took in the blood spattered across my chest, my legs, and up to my elbows.

“When I got here, he had to have been hit just a few moments earlier... he was just starting to bleed out. I rolled him over and used some medifoam to close the wound.” My voice sounded wooden, and thick, as the intensity of the moment started to play back in my mind.

“What did the wound look like?”

“It was deep... I could see the bone, I think.” I am not a doctor, but it sure looked like bone.

“Do you remember how the edges of the wound looked?” he asked, with an intent look.

“They looked pretty bloody... ragged, I guess. I wasn't able to get the edges to line up very well, but then I didn't try all that hard. I was really trying mostly to stop the bleeding as it looked like he was about to run out...”

“Well, I think he has a little left in him... head wounds always bleed horribly, it always looks like gallons when there are in fact only a few pints.” I nodded, mechanically. I felt a slight tremble in the back of my knees, as if I wanted to go sit down in some cool, dark place, preferably with an even colder, darker beer within easy reach.

“Well, you did a great job stabilizing him Miss...”

I stared at him for a moment and considered my answer. “Tallman.” I didn't really see any reason why he should need my real name, Captain Smith asked us to keep a low profile.

I could hear the warble of incoming sirens, the authorities inbound. I traded a brief look with Yak, and he nodded imperceptibly, and then melted off into the crowd. He was going to stay on mission, and I was going to stay behind.

*****

The winds gusted across the blast pan as a storm front moved in from the northwest and turned the sky dark with clouds piled high against the mauve sky.

I grew up on Vega 6, and knew very well what sort of storm blows towards New Turiana from the interior. Termed howlers, they are incredibly dangerous and powerful. It might be difficult now for Gene and Pauli as they worked the mobile gantry on the blastpan, but in a few moments, it would be impossible to stand up.

As much as I preferred the customary, absolute lack of physical labor that goes along with being the captain, I realize at times it is unavoidable. I poked my head out of the top hatch, and cringed at the sight.

“Gene, how much time do you have until that turret is in the socket?” I asked while the wind tried to tear the words out of my face. Gene made one of his signature faces at me, unmistakable even from the control room at the top of the gantry.

“Dak, we're getting close, but I know we're running out of time. I think we're going to get it, but Pauli may need a hand down there!”

Pauli was hunkered down along the port turret, trying vainly to get the turret base at the right angle to socket into the hull. I took a look to the northeast, and saw nothing I liked, a dark cloud thundering higher and higher, and solid as a wall completely down to the ground. Wicked tendrils and streamers of dust and debris reached out towards us through the blast pans.

I secured a retractor from my harness to the belay point near the top hatch, and made my way along the Archaea's spine towards the turrets and Pauli's wide eyes.

“Hang in there son, it hasn't even started to blow yet!” I yelled into the gale, though his face showed me he didn't hear anything except the increasing shriek of the wind.

I smiled my best confidence-inspiring toothy grin, and took a stance with the down haul at an angle, holding a lateral pull from the winch he was cranking to lever the base of the turret. The wind whipped the turret back and forth, and it was all I could do to steady it. We both breathed a sigh of relief as the turret started to slide into the socket. I looked up at Gene and waved to lower the turret.

As he slowly lowered the turret into place, a strong gust howled past nearly flinging us off the hull. Even hunkered down as we were in the lee of the starboard turret, it was all we could do to hang on.

“Pauli, we need to get off this deck, son” I yelled at his face, pointing back up towards to the top hatch just in case he couldn't hear me. He nodded, and we started crawling back along our retractors, staying as low as possible. I risked another look back at the storm front, and watched as it enveloped the world.

The wind was still building, getting stronger and stronger, pushing at me with invisible hands, shoving against me, forcing me to crab sideways across the top of the Archaea. We were getting closer, but I didn't think we were going to make it. I looked back at the gantry and noted that Gene was no longer in the control room. He was probably tumbling along towards New Turiana right about now.

It was close, but I made it to the hatch opening right as a massive shove of wind hauled me bodily off the deck, hanging like a flag from my right arm. I pulled with all my might and got my head and shoulders inside the opening, and wormed my way into the compartment.

Pauli wasn't so lucky.

The full force of the howler was on us now, shrieking wind, solid as a wall thrashed across the Archaea, and scoured Pauli off the deck, where he dangled from the end of his retractor like a kite. His eyes looked completely full of panic, so I sent him my most reassuring look, and engaged the retractor to reel him in.

Once he was in reach, I hauled him in and we both made our way back down to the bottom of the lock chamber, which had started to howl like a steamship whistle. As I irised the outer lock shut, the pressure difference as the hatch closed made me want to scream, and when it finally closed, the silence was deafening.

“Thank you Captain!” Pauli's voice, pitched against the scream of the wind neither of us were hearing, deafeningly loud in the silent interior of the Archaea.

“Steady on son, no need to shout!” I yelled back at him with a smile. As I headed aft to the cargo hold I added, “Let's go collect Gene, he's probably halfway to New Turiana by now!”

The Archaea is a panther-class long haul frigate, lighter than a standard frigate, but laid out along the same lines. She has a bridge deck forward, with a central companionway leading aft towards the stern. Three rings containing staterooms, galley, machine shops and the like are located amidships, accessible from the gun deck in the center of the hull. The Archaea was built originally as a ship-killer, with a nova-class beam cannon occupying most of the core of the ship. Aft of the gun deck, an inner lock opened to the cargo hold, and aft of that, accessible via a catwalk, the engineering spaces.

When I found her abandoned on Luna Farside, she was a scum-crusted mess. We have worked pretty hard since then getting her into shape, and she's pretty tricked-out now.

We met Gene in the cargo hold, he was grinding the loading ramp closed against a veritable nightmare of swirling dust and shrieking wind. He looked at me with one of his faces, hard to tell if it was a frustration face, or an elation face, they all look the same to me. I ignored it as usual, a skill I have cultivated over many years aboard vessels with Gene. He's the type of guy I couldn't live without, the kind of engineer that firmly believes in fixing what hasn't yet broken.

“Some wind, Gene?”

“No thanks Dak, I've had plenty” he said with a smile.

“Jokes? I race down here at significant risk of a slip or trip, and that's all you have for me?” I fixed him like a jacklighted deer in the high beams of my steely gaze.

“That's a howler, alright... I can't imagine what the waterfront looks like. Shorty's probably flying for the skyline right about now.”