The face on my cabin's video screen was familiar, but I couldn't remember who she was. It was two o'clock in the morning, and I was still more than half asleep; pieces of a dream still floated through me---amorphous, phantom aliens drifting above me in a huge, spherical chamber while I hung onto a slippery metal ring for support; I wasn't wearing a pressure suit and I was holding my breath.
I rubbed at my eyes, switched on low light and the camera, and mumbled something that was incoherent even to me.
"I'm sorry about waking you," the woman said.
"I know you, I said, "but..."
"Abigail, Charles's sister."
It still took me a few moments, until I remembered talking to her in the ag room. I nodded. Then, realizing what time it was, I said, "Has something happened to him?"
"I don't know. I sure hope not. He asked me to contact you if he wasn't back in forty-eight hours. It's been almost that long, and he's not back."
"Back from where?" I had a sick feeling I knew what she was going to say.
"The alien ship."
I was totally awake now, though I still felt a buzzing through my limbs from being dragged out of deep sleep.
"You let him go?"
Abigail shook her head in disgust. "Come off it, Pavel. You've met Charles. When he decides to do something, who's going to stop him?"
She had a point, and I admitted as much. "So it's been two days since he went."
"Nearly. I just can't stop worrying about him. He's pretty self sufficient, but it's been a long time."
"Try not to worry too much," I told her. "Forty-eight hours isn't really that long. He doesn't know the ship, and it would take a long time for him to make his way to the end of the explored areas, which is what I'd guess he would do. He's probably just working his way back now."
"How long are we supposed to wait?"
"I'm not going to wait," I assured her. "I'll suit up right now and get over there."
"Please. Take me with you."
I shook my head. "That'd just slow me down. I know that damn ship inside and out. Or that part of it, at least."
"What if something's happened to him? What if you need help?"
"Then I'll call for help. But I'll be able to get to him a lot faster on my own."
"Okay. Call me as soon as you know anything. Promise me that."
"I promise."
She gave me her com code. Her concern for Charles surprised me; the last time I'd talked to her I didn't get the impression they were very close. I was glad for Charles that she obviously did care so much for him.
"If anything's happened to him...."
"Don't worry," I said. "It doesn't do any good." It also wouldn't do any good to tell her not to worry, but I had to say it.
"Is it true, what we've heard?"
"What?" I had no idea what she was talking about.
"That we've actually docked with the alien ship, and that we're taking it with us?"
"Yes, it's true. Or mostly true. Nothing final has been decided yet."
"You people in charge of this ship are all crazy, you know that?"
"Why?"
"You figure it out, Pavel. You're supposed to be so smart. But obviously you can't." She paused. "You're risking the lives of thousands of people. And for what? The trophy of an alien ship."
"It may be the greatest discovery the Enterprise ever makes."
"It may be the last discovery the Enterprise ever makes." She sighed heavily, resigned. "Just find my brother, Pavel. Please."
"I will."
An hour and a half later I was back at the airlock entrance to the alien starship. When the hatch slid open, i wasn't surprised to find the lamp on inside.529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4UzjOTOIUh
I pulled myself into the airlock and spoke over the open channel. "Charles? Are you in here? It's Pavel."
No response. I didn't even hear breathing, but he could've closed the channel.
I didn't move for a long time, just hung there in the airlock, unwilling to close the hatch behind me so I could open the interior door and continue. I didn't understand why, but I did not want to have to do this; I did not want to work my way through all those rooms and passages. Maybe I was just afraid of finding Charles dead in one of them. But it seemed more than that. Something like Father O'Heron's nameless dread. All of my excitement and enthusiasm for exploring the alien ship was gone, replaced by disquiet and exhaustion. I wanted nothing more than to turn around, return to the Enterprise, and go back to sleep.
But I couldn't. I finally turned the handle and watched the hatch close, cutting off the stars.
I worked my way quickly through the explored areas, following Charles's progress by the lights that were on in the rooms and corridors. Either he'd known the most directly route to the farthermost rooms, or he'd turned off the lights in the dead ends after he'd backtracked.
After a short time, I slowed a little. No, not by choice, but because the dread returned and seemed to drag on my limbs, although I was still in zero gravity. Damn him. I moved slowly but steadily from room to room, passage to passage. As I continued, I periodically called out Charles's name, but never got a response. If not for the lights, I would have believed there was no one in the ship.
I took me two hours to reach the section with Earth-normal gravity and atmosphere. I was already sweating, and it got worse; in normal gravity, I was working harder just to move.
I found Charles in the circular blue-lit room. He was sitting on the steps holding his head in his hands; his pressure suit lay on the floor halfway across the room. He heard me come through the doorway and looked up.
The blue light was dim, but I could see the haunted look in his eyes. Something was terribly wrong. I wasn't sure he knew where he was.
"Charles." Then I realized he couldn't hear me and switched on the external speakers. "Charles, it's Pavel."
He didn't respond. His expression didn't change.
"Charles, put your suit back on. We don't know what's in this air." I spoke gently, afraid to spook him.
His mouth turned up slightly and he said, "I'm still alive, aren't I?"
I started toward him. "Put it on, Charles."
"I needed air," he said.
"You've got air in the suit," I said.
"I needed air," he repeated.
I sat beside him. "What happened, Charles?"
He turned to me, his expression still haunted. "What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you. Your sister called me."
"Oh. It's been that long?"
"It has. Charles, what happened?"
He buried his hand in his hands again. He mumbled something I couldn't understand.
"What did you say?"
He raised his head and without looking at me said, "Go see for yourself."
"Where?"
"Past the place you people got stuck. One of the doors just opened when I tried it. A couple more empty rooms, then an airlock." He breathed in deeply, then slowly exhaled. "Be careful. You lose air and heat and gravity all over again."
"I was afraid to leave him al one, but I had to go see. Besides, I told myself, he'd been alone here for hours, and he was still alive.
"I'll be right back," I told him.
I stood waiting in the airlock, weightless and unsure, reluctant to work the bar in the wall which would open the door. What had Charles seen? I was afraid to find out.529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1ZsarUE4cX
I had a single lantern with me. After breathing deeply once, then again, I reached forward and grabbed the bar. I pulled and turned it, and the door slid open.
A short empty passage that angled to the right. I pulled myself into it, drifted along until I reached the angle. Ten meters father on, the passage ended, opening up into darkness. I moved slowly forward and stopped in the opening.
I held up the lantern, but its dim light did not penetrate deeply into the darkness beyond. I had the sense of an immense room, but that was all. I maximized the lantern's brightness, and the light radiated somewhat farther, but only revealed that the room was even larger than I'd thought. Something like a strange, frozen mist seemed to swallow the light from the lantern.
I held the lantern out past the opening to confirm there was no gravity. The lantern remained weightless in my hand, but as an extra precaution I released it. It hung in the air before me, turning slightly. No gravity. I put my head into the room, looked around the opening, and saw only walls that extended beyond the reach of the lantern light; no floor or ceiling was yet visible. I took hold of the doorway and pulled myself into the room.
I hung there in front of the opening, searching the emptiness before and above and below me. Nothing happened, nothing changed. But I knew there was something out there. I breathed very deeply once, set my boot against the wall behind me, and kicked off into the gloom.
As I moved forward, a deep blue luminescence slowly bloomed, filling the open space as if my entrance had triggered it. The strange mist itself seemed to glow with the blue light, revealing this place at last. The room was enormous, a vast arificial cavern whose dimensions were still unclear. The light continued to grow, then stabilized, slightly brighter than the blue-lit room where Helsing had killed himself, and where Charles now waited for me. Like the Enterprise corridors at night. As my eyes adjusted to the light, and as I continued to drift steadily across that huge cavern, I finally saw on the distant wall what Charles had seen.
Bodies. Human bodies. Men and women and children naked, blue and gray and dusted with ice crystals twinkling in the faint light, the bodies impaled on hooks like the skeletons of the dead infants back on Antioch.
Rows of them on the far wall, row after row both rising and descending until I could no longer see them in either direction. Thousands of mutilated corpses preserved in this cold dark chamber for who knew how many years, how many decades. Preserved for what purpose? Why woild they let us discover this? Why now?
I drifted closer, paralyzed, unable to think, unable to stop myself, unable to look away. The bodies stared back at me with open, frozen eyes glittering with a false life. Drawing me to them.
Vicious metal spikes protruded from broken ribs and ragged flesh. Other wounds decorated their bodies, their faces: bloodless gashes, deep holes rimmed with scorched and blackened skin, blossoms of deep blue-black and purple, broken limbs and broken fingers with jagged bone visible in the open wounds, torn and shadowed sockets that had once held eyes.
Still closer, still paralyzed. I felt pulled to them by my own horror.
At last, when I was no more than a few meters from the nearest body, I found I could move again. But it was too late; I couldn't stop my momentum. I fumbled for the suit microthrusters, but couldn't locate the controls and drifted toward the corpse of a man with flesh more bruised than not and a broken jaw twisted unnaturally to the side.
I panicked. I kicked out, I flailed with my arms, desperate to get away. The corpse's hand seemed to reach for me and I kicked again, making contact with its leg and sending myself at last back across the metal cavern.
Terrified and disoriented, I tumbled slowly across the deep blue abyss, the endless wall of tortured bodies flipping in and out of my vision. I may not have believed in God, but in those interminable moments I believed in Hell!
I made contact, stopped tumbling, and scrabbled for purchase on the wall just above the opening through which I'd entered. Trembling, I managed to hold myself against it, facing the smooth dark metal. I closed my eyes and didn't move for a long time. I was sick and dizzy.
And then, against my will, I slowly turned around to face the horror of those innumerable mutilated bodies. I stared, and did not turn away for a long, lont time. It was as if I felt an obligation, to them and to myself, to witness this, and to sear their images into my mind so I would never forget.
I dragged myself back into the airlock, shaking violently, barely able to control my own hands. Somehow I managed to work the wheel and the door sealed shut. My breathing was way too fast and irregular and I tried to slow it, concentrate on each breath, control it---control it----529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEoWMvwYXeV
I needed gravity. I pushed myself across the airlock, worked the other door, then pulled myself into the short corridor and back into normal gravity. I sealed the airlock door, then lay down on the corridor floor and stared up at the ceiling.
My breath was still ragged and loud, and I was feeling hot again. A clammy sweat broke out all over my body in places that didn't normally perspire---forearms, thighs, knees, every inch of skin, it seemed. I understood why Charles had taken off his suit.
There was something wrong here, horribly wrong. I thought about what the old woman had implied, that this ship, the aliens on this ship, had rescued her and others from Antioch where they were being slaughtered. They may have rescued them, and they may have kept her alive, but the aliens had surely killed all these others.
What had happened here?
I had to get out. We had to get out.
I pushed myself to my feet and staggered back to the blue-lit room. Charles was where I'd left him. He looked at me as I came through the doorway.
"You saw?"
"I saw. Get your suit on. We're going back."
"Was it this bad on Antioch?"
"No," I said.
And that's when my stomach tightened and turned on itself. Antioch. Antioch. The old woman had said she'd been rescued from Antioch. How had she known that's what we had called their world? I knew then that this ship was no longer dead, if it ever had been.
"Get your suit on, Charles. Now!"
He nodded. He stood and walked across the room and started to work himself into his suit. All of his movements were slow and deliberate, like an awakening somnambulist; too slow for me, but I was afraid to rush him, afraid to sound afraid. I was sure that we were being watched, and I didn't want to let whatever was watching think there was any panic, any rush to get away. It was crazy, but that's what I was thinking: show no fear, and we might get out alive.
I opened the command channel-link to the Enterprise, tried calling Communications. Nothing. I wondered if all the translators Uhura had set up were still working. Was something blocking the transmission?
My heart was pounding, I felt my pulse thumping in my throat. Breathe slowly, I told myself, slowly---I couldn't afford to lose control here.
Charles had his suit on, but held his helmet at his side, looking at me.
"C'mon!" I said.
"They did it, didn't they?" he said.
Don't say any more, I wanted to tell him. But my throat was stuck. I couldn't speak, I couldn't swallow.
"These aliens. They did this, they killed all those people in there, and they killed all those people on Antioch."
"Yes," I finally managed to say. "Get your helmet on now. We've got to go."
"We can't take this ship with us," he went on. "They'll kill us."
I grabbed the helmet from him and put it on over his head. Finally he reached up and worked the neck seals. I turned off the external speakers. "Is the open channel activated, Charles?"
"Yeah."
"Let's go. Quickly now. But don't run. Don't act like your scared."
"I won't," he replied. "I'm not scared."
He really wasn't, I could tell, but I didn't know if that was a good thing. Maybe in the short run. I nodded, and off we went.
We didn't talk. We moved at a steady pace, turning lamps off as we went, as if we needed to conserve their batteries for our next excursion. Light ahead of us, darkness behind.
Every ten minutes I tried to contact the Enterprise, but always without success. I was on edge, expecting at any moment---something. I didn't know what. A horde of aliens pouring out of a hatchway. Barriers sliding across our path, cutting us off. Sharp, vicious hooks springing from the walls.
Nothing happened and I couldn't understand why. We continued unimpeded, the alien ship still empty, silent, and dead.
Finally, when we were only fifteen minutes and a few rooms from the outer airlock, I got through to the Enterprise. I had them patch me through to Gardner at the sickbay. He wasn't there. I finally got him in his quarters, as sleepy as I had been when Abigail called me.
"Pavel, why are....?"
"Listen to me, Gardner, this is important. The old woman from the ship."
"Susan? Yeah."
"Susan, nothing. You've got to get up there right now and secure her room. Do not let her out of that room, do you understand?"
"Dr. J.'s probably in there with her. She's set up a cot and sleeps in there. Wants to make her feel safe."
"The old woman is plenty safe, Gardner. She's dangerous. Get Dr. J. out of there, I don't care what you have to do, get her out of there and get that damn room secure."529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiBlEQLaSc8
"Where the hell are you, Pavel?"
"I'm on my way back to the Enterprise. I'm inside the alien ship."
"Did you find something....?"
"And get her sedated."
"I'll secure the room, but I won't sedate her without authorization from the captain of the Executive Council."
"Fine, damn it, but at least secure that room!"
"I will," he said, and he broke the connection. Then I had Communications patch me through to Jean-luc.
"Crash session of the Executive Council, Jean-Luc. Now!"
"Where are you, Pavel? Why isn't there any video?"
I patched through the suit camera transmission to him. "How's that for video?"529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxyKmrPT4W2
"You're in the alien ship? Who's that with you?"
"Never mind who. I'm on my way out. Just get the damn session called!"
"What is it, Pavel?"
"I've got no time. But we're in trouble, Jean-Luc. Just call it. And call Gardner, authorize him to sedate the old woman. "I'll be there as soon as I can get in."
"The old woman?" What...?"529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSDGIO3tqch
"Just do it!"
I broke the connection. Ten minutes later, we emerged from the hull of the alien ship and drifted away from it. We fired our suit jets, and headed back to the Enterprise. Nothing tried to stoop us.529Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5jqo105js6
