Barry Kirwan's Blog, page 5

I just watched a film of the same name (We come as friends), made by a Frenchman (Hubert Sauper), that won awards at both Berlin and Sundance film festivals. It's about Sudan, but it's also about colonialism, which is a common theme in science fiction. During the film there is even an excerpt from Star Trek, the original series, where James T Kirk says ' we come as friends', and adds, phaser in hand, 'but we are ready to defend ourselves.'

Probably the most recent science fiction blockbuster dealing with colonialism, and how it can ruin both natural and alien habitats, is Avatar. The film neatly goes to the essence of colonialism, and why it is usually bad for those at the receiving end. Those colonising are there for one of two reasons (often both): to plunder resources, and to 'help' (i.e. improve) indigenous cultures.

At first sight going somewhere to steal resources, usually trashing the environment in the process, seems like the worst part. But the second is more insidious. In Avatar, there is a blindness by the colonisers as to what  the existing culture has, its beauty, its alignment with nature rather than technology, and its strength of community. In Avatar, being a Hollywood production, the local culture triumphs, and we can all cheer as the baddies (us, by the way) get what they deserve, and the hero finds his true love.

Meanwhile, in our own backyard, Hollywood endings are few and far between. Lands are taken away from indigenous peoples time and time again, their cultures are destroyed, replaced by supposedly better ones. And they are given guns. The lands they lived off for countless generations are poisoned so the people have to work in the colonisers' factories or farms. Sound familiar?

So, when we venture out into the stars, are we going to be the good guys, as in Star Trek or Stargate (where peaceful explorers are even more heavily-armed), trying to help others without trying to improve (subjugate) their existing culture? Even in Star Trek, the film Insurrection (one of the best) acknowledges this dark corner of humanity's soul.

I've written a couple of short stories set a few hundred years in the future, where mankind has indeed gone out and colonised the stars. But we are not the good guys. We plunder resources from other worlds, and 'educate or exterminate' other races we encounter. Is this pessimistic? I'm not so sure.

My two favourite quotes from the film 'We come as friends' are as follows, the first by a local African, the second by a Brit who has been out there sometime in a local village:

'They came here and taught us how to need money'

'They're maybe two hundred years behind the rest of the world, we all know that. But maybe they don't want to catch up, maybe they don't want what we have. Did anyone stop to think that?'

Humanity is characterised by a capacity for love, but also blind fear of 'otherness'; racism and bigotry are easily learned or transmitted, leading to wars, tragedies, and ... inhumanities. If we can be so inhuman to each other, what chance are aliens going to have?

In my book, Eden's Trial, humanity is put on trial by vastly superior aliens, and its very right to exist is challenged. Imagine there was a mature, peaceful but strong alien presence out there, and imagine they took a long hard look at our achievements but also our wars and inhumanities. What would you decide in their place?

If there are superior alien races out there, maybe we can learn from them, and grow up fast. The danger for other species might be if we are actually the (technologically) advanced ones. As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and we come as friends could be the death-knell for civilisations we encounter. I hope I'm wrong, that it won't be that way.

But in the meantime, if one day aliens do come a-knocking to our little backwater planet, it might be safest for them if they take a leaf out of Stargate's book, and come as friends, too, but heavily-armed.



The two (free) stories referred to (Sylvian Gambit, and Executive Decision) can be found here.


    

I've been quiet for a couple of weeks since the York Writers Festival and the feedback on my diving novel Sixty-Six Metres. While I'm processing that and doing some editing, I've started a new scifi story: When the children come.

Here's the working 'blurb':
Nathan, a womanising loner, hates kids, but when children in his neighbourhood start to disappear, he realises he may be their last hope.

I had the idea back in 2011 but I was kind of busy writing the Eden Paradox series, and I thought it was never going to happen. But over the summer I kept thinking about the story, and to show myself it was a waste of time I started writing it. The writing flowed, seemed clean. Still, I wasn't convinced about it, so I took it to my writing group, assuming they would lambast me for it, ask me what I was thinking. I was wrong. They loved it.

So, it was originally going to be a short story, but I've plotted it and it should be seven chapters in total, so somewhere between a novella and a novelette. I just finished the second chapter. I hope to have it done by Xmas and released by the New Year.

It's a self-contained story, but it is also potentially the first in a series of novella-length episodes called Sphericon. On my website www.barrykirwan.com I have some free short stories, and two in particular (Executive Decision and The Sylvian Gambit) come from a future universe where humanity are dominant, but not the good guys anymore. When the children come is the beginning of our journey to becoming Sphericon.

So, we'll see how far this one goes.

You may be wondering why, if children are disappearing, the book is called 'When the children come'? That is a very good question...

I've just left the annual Festival of Writing (Friday to Sunday 4-6 September, held at York University), heading back to London then Paris, which is a shame as there are blue skies and sunshine here in York, better weather than in Paris for a change. As usual the Festival was packed with useful sessions and the chance to meet a range of agents representing a diversity of publishing genres from Literary to Crime to Scifi to Children's books. Interestingly there were several sessions on self-publishing, which I don't think were available when this popular annual event led by Writers Workshop first started.

It kicked off at 2pm on Friday afternoon with a collection of mini-workshops lasting four hours. I didn't attend these as I decided this year to have all my One-to-Ones on Friday afternoon. These are ten minute meetings with an agent of your choice and genre, where they have already read the first three thousand words / short synopsis / blurb of your novel. They give feedback on the writing and its marketability, and whether they think it is ready. If they really like it, they ask for the full manuscript and, well, who knows, maybe it ends up with a contract with the agent.

This type of feedback is priceless. Having said that, reading is a subjective experience even with agents and editors, so it is best to hear from at least two if not three agents / book doctors / editors (I did two agents and one editor). One of the things authors need is honest and industry-informed feedback, even if it not what they'd hope to hear, and this is where you get it. The feedback I got was tough, but clear, so I pondered it during the weekend and now have a good idea to fix the main issues. It just goes to show that even if you are already published, swapping genres (in my case from scifi to thriller) requires learning a new set of rules.

The first evening always features Friday Night Live, where seven hopefuls are selected to read out 500 words from their novels and are judged on their merits by a small selection of agents, and then the entire crowd gathered judge them via a 'clapometer' - as compere Craig Taylor said, well, it's not precise, but it is what it is. This year however there was a clear winner (who also won the best pitch competition), about how families deal with the return of soldiers from war zones who may be physically intact but psychologically scarred. It was strong stuff, but the other six were also compelling, my personal favourite a stream-of-consciousness piece concerning an air crash (okay, I'm biased - it's my day job).

Saturday and Sunday were then packed with workshops, panel sessions and plenaries on a whole host of writing topics, from 'how to write a sentence' to 'how to get an agent', with specialist sessions on genre science fiction (e.g. crime, scifi, etc.).

Without doubt what makes the Festival so attractive is the number of agents, editors and book doctors who are present and available if an author wishes to pitch to them. But the audience, full of authors, is also what makes the event special - it is a friendly and helpful crowd, and many people have been there before and are progressing with their novels, some of them published since they first attended the Festival. As well as catching up with friends and fellow writers, I talked to a lot of new people and asked them 'what are you writing?' and have already discovered some great future books I'll want to read as soon as they are published. Writers are not a famously outgoing breed, since writing is often a solitary and absorbing process, but it is very easy to engage with new people at this event.

In terms of the lectures my three favourites this year were James Law, who did pretty much a stand-up comedy lecture on advanced dialogue, with some very interesting and fresh ideas on how to sharpen dialogue; Julie Cohen who deconstructed Pixar story-telling and showed how it could be used to structure a novel and make it compelling; and David Gaughran who took the lid off self-publishing in a no-nonsense style, providing lots of free information on how to do it and do it better without getting ripped off.

The venue is tucked away in the countryside campus of York University, very green and studded with lakes and wildfowl, and we had brilliant sunshine on the last day. The food was generally very good, and there was endless coffee tea and biscuits.

So, what did I come away with personally? I'd taken a new novel there, a thriller I've recently finished (or thought so), but all three of my one-to-ones had issues with it, in particular the heist at the beginning that takes place in Penzance and involves robbing a police van. Feedback ranged from 'why Penzance - somewhere a little more international?' to the credibility of the heist and the fact that it wasn't that exciting by its very nature, to the fact that the strength of the novel at the moment is its underwater diving scenes, so why not start with one of those?'

I pondered the feedback for a full day, and then came up with an idea for a new version of the heist. I got quite excited by it and almost skipped the Saturday evening meal and its three competitions (best pitch, best blurb, best opening chapter) so I could work on it. But common sense prevailed and I had a great evening and got to bed at 2am (by no means the last to bed). But after I left the Festival at lunchtime today I immediately started a new version of the first chapter and its 'inciting event'. Now the heist involves using a drone to down a RAF helicopter, causing it to crash in the Thames and has the female protagonist steal the device underwater, all within spitting distance of the MI6 building... Well, it sounds a lot more exciting to me at any rate. So, a good call from my three one-to-ones.

Oh, and I sold a couple of books without really meaning to, honest...

Thanks everyone, and thanks Writers Workshop! See you next year..?







  

The twelfth episode from The Eden Paradox series, called Eden Approach. The crew of the Ulysses have finally made it to Eden's system, but a sinister surprise awaits them.

Eden Approach
Kat sprinted at breakneck speed but it was closing fast. She saw the hatch door open. Someone was shouting, egging her on. With a shock she realised it was her elder sister. In an instant she knew that was wrong – her sister had been dead for years – she must be in the dream again. Abruptly, her viewpoint shifted and she saw herself from above, running across Eden’s landscape towards the Lander. Eden was no longer green as she’d seen from the Prometheus vids – instead it was a sickly rust colour. For the first time she saw the creature chasing her. It was hard to make out. It ran in a strange way, in spurts, like it was jumping, or hopping even. It was long, longer than a horse. She tried to count the legs, when it jerked suddenly, left the ground, and flew upwards towards her. Its head had small mandibles, but it also had a human-like face. She recognised it, wild with anger, the face screaming at her. She shrank back as it seized her shoulders and opened its blood-red gaping maw wide.            "Wake up! Kat, wake up, dammit!" Zack shook her hard. Kat woke, drenched in sweat. Pierre stood behind Zack, looking at small holo-readouts emanating from her monitor. "She’s not supposed to dream in stasis," he said. Zack huffed. "Well, she sure as hell was. Seemed like a real shitter, too. You okay, girl?"She could see and hear them but she felt drugged, as if a transparent pillow was over her head. She didn’t know how to respond, her mouth not yet connected to her brain. "She’s still pretty groggy," Zack said. Although she couldn’t feel her tongue, she decided to try to speak anyway. She lifted her head.            "Kreechhhur; Froo..." she rolled his eyes and flopped her head back down to the cushion.            Zack squinted at her, while talking to Pierre. "You sure she ain’t brain damaged?" He winked at her.            "Well, she just made a lot more sense than you did in the first five minutes of your revival phase yesterday." Pierre collapsed the holodata and turned to leave. "Give her a few minutes. I’ll be in the cockpit. The captain wants to give us all a briefing as soon as Kat’s capable."            Zack grinned at Kat, ran a stubby finger down the right side of her face, and made to go, holding the end of a makeshift walking stick. "See you soon, kid." Kat managed to find the muscle co-ordination to grip his wrist. She needed to tell him. She tried to speak, but just gurgled.            "Hey, okay, take it easy. I’ll stay a while. Must’ve been some nightmare, eh? Deep breaths now. Try to move your tongue and jaw – loosen them up."            Kat tried. Her throat felt baked. She was desperate to tell someone what she’d seen – the creature, the desert. It was already slipping from her mind, like sand falling through floorboards. Finally she found some words.            "Saw it – big – fasht – aily-in... alien." Kat caught her own reflection in the stasis lid: hair matted with sweat, and the four days of stasis had brought out freckles on her cheeks.            "Wait – you mean after all these nightmares you finally saw the thing chasing you?"            "Yessh." Her tongue felt swollen. She coughed. Zack reached somewhere out of her line of sight, and produced a chrome mug of warm liquid, and brought it to her lips. Half of it didn’t stay in her mouth, but it was strawberry sweet, a hint of menthol, and soothed her throat. She gulped it down, then gasped for breath.            Zack’s features sharpened, as the fuzz lifted from her brain. White noise she hadn’t even noticed phased out. Her shoulders relaxed.            "Thanks, Zack," she sputtered, coughing. "S’nothing. Took me fifteen minutes to come round properly." He leaned closer, a heavy hand on her shoulder. She’d never minded before that he was physical with her – he never meant anything by it, and she could tell the difference – but this time... He must have seen a small reaction, because he transferred his hand to the edge of the cot."So, tell me. What’d it look like?            She’d been struggling to remember what it reminded her of most. Her first thought was of an insect – a praying mantis – but that wasn’t quite right. A grasshopper wasn’t right either. It didn’t look like anything she’d ever seen. She imagined how Pierre might describe it – objectively, matter of fact. She closed her eyes, placing her mind in free recall mode.            "A three metre long insect; can bend in the middle; six legs, trapezoidal head like a hammerhead; black body; six wet-looking slit-eyes, dripping red, no iris or pupil; no wings… muscular, armoured like… like a rhino." She opened her eye-lids wide and stared at Zack. She shuddered. She was relieved she’d been able to remember it, but now the terror of it was more real. It was fixed in her mind, and from now on it would haunt her when awake.Zack pursed his lips and blew out a long breath. "No wonder you were running, kid." He frowned. "And Eden? Did you see Eden this time?"             She squeezed his eyes shut again to help remember, then opened them.            "Yes! But it was reddish-brown, dry. Not green anymore. Withered trees scattered around. It was a desert."             Zack snorted triumphantly. "Well, there it is then, Eden’s greener than Earth – than Earth used to be, that is. So, just a nightmare, kid. Case closed." He made a mock salute. "I’ll inform the skipper we can land there after all! That’ll teach you to eat too much cheese before going into stasis."             Kat offered one of her crooked smiles.            "Now, you get up in a few minutes, and take a shower, because, I’ll let you in on a little secret of my own – after stasis, you stink! Then join us up front, okay?" He turned, grinning, and shuffled off, his metallic cane clunking on the floor.            She knew he must be right. This past month she’d been having premonitions of Eden – that some terrible alien was there, waiting to kill them all. And the fact that it was in a desert, and her dead sister – what was that all about anyway? And of course the face. She hadn’t told Zack that part, it would have upset him. In the last few seconds before the monster reached him, its face had changed into a human face: Zack’s. Shaking her head, she attempted to sit up, but her arms were jelly, and she collapsed back down. She tried again, slower this time, and realised how sweaty she was. Definitely time for a shower. She crawled out of the cot. Her legs quivered, weakened from stasis. All that running, she thought, and laughed.             Setting the shower-head to "Rain", she let the hot water cascade over her head and body. As she relaxed, she remembered a detail she’d forgotten – it hadn’t seemed important at the time. But she’d studied dream psych at college, and you almost never saw yourself from above – except in near-death experiences – not in dreams or even nightmares. And that top-down viewpoint – whose view was it? The creature had attacked it, no longer chasing the Kat figure on the ground. She didn’t know what that meant, but somehow the thought chilled her. She shivered. But she didn’t believe in anything metaphysical. Zack was right. Just a dream, nothing more. Dreams don’t have to make sense, and don’t have to mean anything. She set the water to very hot, adjusted the nozzle to "Needle", and turned around, leaning her head against the misted cubicle door, hoping the pinpricks of steaming water would melt the shivers from her spine.

The cockpit was more cramped than usual: they’d had to adapt Zack’s pilot chair due to his leg being in a cast. Kat’s area, directly behind Zack’s, was now squeezed. She envied Blake’s position, and Pierre’s science station looked positively spacious. Real estate was a prime commodity on a space-ship, she thought to herself, and laughed inwardly – space ship – now there was an oxymoron!            She watched Zack rig up for decel. He operated a compound joystick and neural interface connected to an oculometer, a small device that fit like glasses, which shone an infrared beam onto his right eye. It allowed him to make rapid course changes if necessary, simply by looking in a direction he wanted to go and uttering a sub-vocal command through his throat-mike. Kat envied his pilot skills – not many people could use this kit at all, let alone with his precision and response speed. She knew it came from his battle experience: dodging heat-seekers and blister-mines that took out half of all aircraft in the War.            They were nearing visual sighting of Eden. Zack, his leg propped up on a non-functioning part of the console, had been making minor course adjustments for the past two hours to get them there in the fastest possible time. All the calculations and contingency plans had been prepared and triple-checked manually. She noticed more instrument lights were on than when the virus had first hit; Blake and Pierre had been busy while she’d been in stasis. They’d managed to restore thirty per cent of the software, so they’d have good sensors, and alarms would sound if they were too steep or shallow on orbit intercept. But for the rest, they were in Zack’s hands.             It was quiet, the only sounds occasional thruster burns, Zack’s wincing noises, and the "beep" that occurred very two minutes confirming they were still on target and lined up for Eden.             Kat felt a subdued excitement. After all they’d been through, they were finally about to reach Eden, the salvation of humanity. And they had oxygen to breathe, at least enough to get them down to the planet’s surface, where they could replenish supplies for the trip home.             As astronauts, it was the ultimate dream: to reach a new, habitable planet. The first major step had been that of Neil Armstrong, onto the moon’s surface. Then there had been Yanni Sorensen, the first man to set foot on Mars, and Carlita Fernandes, the first woman to place a foot, or a fin as it had turned out to be, into the icy quagmire of Europa, floating around the awesome spectacle of Jupiter. But none of these worlds had been remotely habitable. They could build stations there, but the resource requirements meant they were unsustainable, and all such stations except a couple of so-called strategic bases on the Moon had long since been abandoned Post-War, due to the sheer cost, with almost nothing in return except abstract scientific data.             Their mission was different. Everything had fed forward to this point. Over a century of space exploration had been building to this moment. The whole crew sensed it, and despite being cut off from Earth, those back home would be aware that they were nearing Eden. Better still, they were out of harm’s way, the Alicians couldn’t touch them. Despite ghosters and viruses, they were going to make it.            She studied Blake, his eyes fixed outside the spaceship hunting for Eden, seeking it out in amongst the millions of points of light, a look of resolve welded onto his face. He’s willing us to Eden. They picked the right man for the job.             Zack interrupted the silence and her train of thought. "Okay, folks, this is it. Time for decel. Buckle up!"            They all fixed their harnesses including forehead straps. Kat didn’t have to be told to do it properly. The first experiments on deceleration from dark matter drives had been wildly successful and simultaneously catastrophic for the crew, who had ended up splattered all over the cockpit, their internal organs shredded by the decelerative forces before they had escaped the body’s fickle confines. The harnesses in fact were a minor part of their survival kit. Most of the work was done by the Schultz-Piccione inertial dampening system inside the ship. She was relieved when its tell-tale thrumkicked in. Her body started to tingle, then vibrate, as its pitch rose. Pierre had told them once, over dinner, that if the sound rose to roughly high C, it meant that it was failing, and they were about to explode, but that they would probably lose consciousness. Pierre wasn’t one to take along to dinner parties, she’d decided a long time ago.            Kat shook so much she finally realized how a cocktail must feel: she felt her abdominal organs moving around, though she couldn’t tell which. Speech, and even yelling were impossible. It was advisable to keep her mouth clamped shut – the nearest dentist was a long way away. But soon enough it began to die down. Her relief was blanketed by nausea. She hit the harness release buckle, eager to see out of the cockpit, and stood up, leaning on Zack’s burly shoulders, staring forwards.            "Welcome to Eden," Blake said, as they all gaped at the main viewscreen. It was still some way off, a medium-sized disk, a silhouette in front of its own sun, some hundred and forty million kilometers away on the other side. They were still travelling relatively fast, but decelerating at a speed that could now be handled by the inertial field. She felt a thrill run through her, even though they couldn’t see much yet. It had been so long just seeing stars, dots of white light, that she’d forgotten what it was like to see a whole planet again. The last one they had seen had been Saturn, before the slingshot out of the Solar System. She felt a lump in her throat, and apparently Pierre also was moved, because he placed a hand briefly on her shoulder – at least she hoped that was the reason.            Zack chimed in. "She sure is a sight for sore eyes! Hang on to something, this’ll be worth it!" He moved the joystick forward, and the ship gave a spurt of acceleration – catching Kat off-balance, so that Pierre caught her. The ship veered outward in an arc, placing the sun initially behind Eden, creating an eclipse, and then showing the sun burst out from behind, forcing them all to shade their eyes until the screen polarized. Kat regained her balance. For the first time they could see colour on Eden. The lush forest green and Mediterranean blue, after so much black, silver and white made Kat gasp. The continents were very different to Earth’s, and two small polar caps blazed like icing on a spherical cake.            "My God, it really is Eden!" She wanted to whoop. Blake nodded to Zack. "Well, my friend, you’ve got us this far, take us into orbit. Kat, Pierre, take your stations."            She felt a cautious happiness, like a small animal daring to come out of its hole into the sunshine. So much of her personal life had gone badly wrong.Pierre jarred the mood. "That’s unusual." She turned back round to catch what the other three were now staring at. At first she didn’t see it. But as they headed further to the sunward side of Eden, it was unmistakable. A circular orange-brown patch decorated one of Eden’s continents.            "Looks like a desert," Pierre said, "but it wasn’t there when the Prometheus came two years ago."              Kat glanced at Zack’s face reflected in the screen, but he didn’t return the look. She gazed again towards Eden. It was a desert alright. No question.Blake broke the silence. "Okay, we’ll figure it out later. First things first. We get into orbit and then prepare for descent. Stations, please."            They all sat down and busied themselves. It proved trickier than they had thought, but they achieved a stable orbit on the first attempt. Kat glued her eyes to the console, not wanting to face Eden right now, nor Zack. She wondered if she should tell the Captain or Pierre. But it would seem ridiculous, and wouldn’t help anything. For the first time in a while, she thought of her faraway lover back in Eden Mission Control.            A red light on her console flashed, her earpiece automatically activating. Pierre swung out of his chair and leant over her shoulder – he had obviously picked it up on the science console, too. Blake turned around. Zack was using the neural interface and oculometer, so couldn’t even deviate his eyes to see what was going on.            "Report," Blake said.            Kat’s stomach turned to ice when she heard the com-message.Pierre waited for her to answer, but when she didn’t, he offered what he knew. "It’s a com signal, Sir." She turned her right palm towards her and stared at it, in case she was in the nightmare again.            "From Earth?" Blake asked.            Her breath sounded raspish in her ears. She listened again, praying she’d misheard. She regained control. "It’s… from Eden." The ship veered slightly, then recovered. Blake stood up, faced Kat, and placed a steadying hand on Zack’s shoulder, leaving it there.            "What does it say?" His voice was quiet.            Kat removed the earpiece and handed it to Pierre.            Pierre cleared his throat. "It says, Captain, that is, it keeps repeating…" he looked out toward the planet below, which was now occupying most of the screen, then back at the Captain. Blake didn’t say anything, just waited for him to compose himself. None of them had ever known Pierre hesitate before. He cleared his throat again. "It says, 'Do not land here. Eden is not safe. Eden is a trap.’ Then it repeats."             Everyone held their breath. Kat gazed up at Blake. His face locked itself down, serious. "Where is it coming from exactly, on the planet’s surface?" Pierre returned to his station and ran a triangulation algorithm to fix it. Kat slumped in her chair. Pierre was getting an answer from his console. But Kat already knew, and spoke, her voice uneven. "It’s from the desert, isn’t it?"             Pierre gave her a sideways look. "How did you know?"
            She didn’t answer, just stared at her console, wanting to punch it. She remembered her dream, the running, running to save her life, running to save everything. It was all going to come true, somewhere down on the planet’s surface. And when it did, she knew this time she wasn’t going to wake up.



That's the last free episode I'm afraid, otherwise I'll get into trouble with my publisher... Hope you enjoyed it!

Episode 11 from The Eden Paradox - where we discover Blake's dark secret...



Kurana Bay
Ten years earlier…
Zack heard the shouting voices, including his own, screaming at Blake.
"Pull the trigger; take him out for Christ’s sake!" Zack saw the ghoster leaping from man to man, ripping out their throats like they were paper soldiers on a daisy chain. Only Blake had a clear shot. But he wouldn’t take it. The screeching of the ghoster was mind-numbing, but Zack fought against it. Ted and Abe fell as the ghoster smashed their skulls together, ignoring the two commando knives they had both buried half-way into its thorax. 
            "Blake! Shoot! For fuck’s sake shoot!" Zack knew why he didn’t. Sons of bitches! He limped, blood pissing from a gaping wound in his left leg, his left arm already broken, a machete in his right hand. Shots rang out but only Blake had the Slow Gun, the ghoster killer that embedded a delayed pulse charge inside the body, exploding it from the inside. Archie and Kalim were grappling with it but it was triple jointed and soon it had them, snapping both their necks with a dual, sickening crunch. Only three of them remained. Charlie pinned himself against the wall, terrified.
            "Charlie, high and low, you high!" Charlie glared, knowing it meant his death, but he bit his lip and screamed like a madman, flinging himself high in the air, two razor sharp machetes raised to strike it, while a fraction of a second later, Zack dropped onto his back, pushed off from the wall with his good leg, and slid in the blood-soaked floor. The ghoster caught both Charlie’s wrists and was about to bite through his jugular when beneath him Zack slashed six inches through the ghoster’s groin. It couldn’t raise a foot to crush Zack’s skull because Charlie’s weight was still on him. It spun Charlie’s left wrist, breaking it, and drove one of the machetes through Charlie’s neck, decapitating him. Blood sprayed the walls. Zack chopped the left leg of the ghoster clean off at the calf. It somehow kept its balance, threw Charlie’s slack body away, and hopped to face Zack, Charlie’s machete in its claw. Zack gazed into those hooded eyes he had once known so well. There was a dull popping sound and a flash of light. The ghoster looked down at the hole in its stomach, then it exploded, flinging parcels of flesh and clay-coloured blood over the entire room. Blake had fired the weapon.
            Zack crawled over towards Blake, past the open-mouthed head of the ghoster, finally silent. Blake sagged against a wall, bleeding from a chest wound caused in the first seconds when they’d encountered the ghoster, only a minute ago, after having destroyed most of the ghoster complex and set free a dozen captives, and killed four more ghosters already transformed but not activated. Once transformed, there was no way back.
Zack leaned against the wall too, next to Blake, surveying the carnage. They both looked inevitably towards the ghoster’s head: the trace of curly black hair still apparent if you knew where to look; a scar on the cheek from a farming accident two years ago; the mottled Caucasian skin. Zack noticed Blake’s right hand trembling. It had never done so before, not in nearly three years of battle. But Zack knew why it did now. It was the hand that had pulled the trigger.
They’d come to Kurana Bay, deep behind enemy lines, because they’d captured and interrogated a ghoster scientist to find out the location of the processing centre. They’d heard a rumour they were using POWs as ghosters. After the questioning, they were going to send the man back to base for further interrogation. The scientist had known he would be tortured by Chorazin there, so he’d taunted Blake with terrible information, and it had worked. Blake had slit the man’s throat from ear to ear and watched him bleed to death, convulsing for a full minute. It seemed too lenient now, as Zack gazed at the head of the boy he’d been godfather to.
Zack studied Blake’s ashen face, as he stared at the ghoster’s – the boy’s – head. And when he spoke, it was not the voice of his captain Zack heard, but of a man distraught, chopped up inside, who would never be whole again. He turned to Zack, tears streaming down his face, mixing with the bloodstains of his offspring.
            "They took my son, Zack! They took Robert and they stole his soul!"     
            There was nothing Zack could say. He gathered up the dog tags of their dead platoon members, got the released captives – young boys Robert’s age – and Blake, outside, then torched everything. A heli-jet picked them up minutes before the enemy’s reinforcements arrived. They had to leave the burning bodies of their men behind, to give room for the half-drugged captives they’d saved. Zack gave Blake a heavy dose trimorph shot. It seemed the best thing to do. Robert was listed as Missing in Action. No one ever found out he’d been at Kurana Bay. Blake and Zack made sure no one ever would.

Episode 10 from The Eden Paradox. Time to step back, look things in the face...



Stakes
Four months earlier…
Blake stood on the threshold of the antique wood-panelled office. The smell of leather upholstery, mingled with the residue of a Havana cigar, drifted out into the corridor. The mid-afternoon blinds created a lattice of orange shafts of light which sliced diagonally across the office. The rays framed the slim, seated figure surrounded by a nebula of drifting dust motes. It gave Blake the overall impression of a miniature galaxy, this one man as its epicentre.
From his silhouette, Blake recognised someone who used to be a fit soldier. But age and battle had exacted their toll, lending a hollowed-out leanness to the body. Still, the alertness, obvious in the angle of the neck and head, spoke of someone who was no stranger to command. The seated man with five polished stars on his shirt collar looked up from a holo-pad and punched a desk control, snapping the blinds shut, restoring the lighting to a more tolerable sunset level. Blake had seen what was on the holo-pad before it had cleared – photos of the four assassinated astronauts who were to have led the Ulysses mission to Eden. Blake had wanted this mission like hell, but not at this price.
 "Come in, Blake," he said, his voice raspish but firm. "And don’t salute me. I sit behind a desk too much these days to respect myself, so I don’t want it from you of all people."
            Blake saluted anyway, and waited, standing to attention.
            "At ease, soldier," General Kilaney sighed.
Blake nodded and sat down in the chair indicated. He remained straight-backed, refusing to surrender to the inviting black leather. He noticed how much weight his old mentor had lost.
            "I see you haven’t lost the tricks of the trade." The General passed Blake a glass of iced water. Blake took it and clinked glasses with him. A single splash of bourbon escaped from the General’s tumbler, as he met Blake with defiant eyes. "To absent friends."
Blake held his glass high. "To absent friends." He savoured the cool water. It was thirty-five Celsius outside, even in the depth of winter high in the Rockies. Somewhere he could hear soldiers marching, being drilled. Some things never change.
            He sipped gingerly and watched the General – his erstwhile mentor – wondering whether he would indeed end up like him, stuck behind a desk these past ten years, shuffling papers instead of soldiers, riding a holo-rig instead of a real fighter, wasting away in endless meetings. Still, he respected the General. The NWA, the shaky Post-War coalition of some fifty-three aligned nations, needed people like him near the top. He waited while the General scrutinised him over the rim of his glass. His eyes hadn’t lost their edge.
            "How’s Glenda doing?" the General asked.
            Blake’s grip on the glass became iron. "Fine, Sir. She’s doing fine," he replied. "Thanks for asking."
            The General slammed his glass down on the edge of his desk, grabbed the sides of the chair and hauled himself up. "Stay put, Captain! And don’t give me any more bull. This is me you’re talking to. I said how the hell is she?"
            He took another sip, not meeting the General’s gaze. He felt the soothing water travel down his throat, but a moment later it felt as dry as the Potamac river bed.
"First cancer successfully treated.’ He took another sip. "With the ambient rad-levels, it’s almost certain to return within a year." He paused, feeling the pressure rise in his chest, pushing up against his throat. He didn’t want to say it. He hadn’t said it to Glenda, though she knew well enough. He took a breath. "Then she’ll have a few months at most – second timers don’t usually…" He willed his fingers to ease off the glass.
            The General perched on the desk. "Damned sorry. You tell her that, Blake."
He wanted to change the subject. "Sir, why – "
"You pretty much have command of the mission, there’s just the final psy check tomorrow, then it’s yours."
            He nodded once. He’d worked so hard for this, even if others would assume he only got it because of his so-called "hero" status.
            "Thank you, Sir."
            "Well, I don’t mind telling you and no one else – I always had you as first choice. Kacheng was a good man, sure, but his assassination put you back in front."
            He flinched at the memory of Alpha Team’s shuttle exploding in a shroud of white-hot flame seconds after take-off to Zeus. He stared down at his glass. The last shards of misty ice surrendered to the afternoon heat. "Who’s my team, Sir?"
            The General slumped back down into his chair. "Zack will be your first officer and Chief Pilot."
            Blake allowed himself a sigh of relief.
            "The other two – well, one thing about the Forces is I don’t have to argue with you about it. You’ll have Pierre Bertrand as Science Officer and our Katrina Beornwulf, on Comms."
            He stiffened. "Bertrand – you can’t mean Professor Bertrand’s son? After his father blocked all our gen-defence research during the War? And Beornwulf – you want me to baby-sit?" He stood up and walked around to the back of the chair. "Permission to speak freely, Sir?"
            The General’s eyes glinted as he raised his glass in a mock toast. "Denied. I know neither one is your choice, but Pierre’s a genius, and smart too, and you and I understand both the difference and the rarity of the combination. Don’t blame him for the sins of his father. Beornwulf – well, she passed all the exams. Practically a comms genius, and the last thing we need is a third loss of communications. Anyway, her uncle and all that… You can’t always avoid politics. God knows we owe both France and England enough."
He noticed how weary the General seemed, the hollowing around the eyes, that haunted look. He instinctively glanced to the General"s right wrist, under the shirt-sleeve cuff. He could just make out the tell-tale small triangular holes of a micro-transfusion implant. He met the General"s gaze again – the look on his face confirmed it, but the General continued unabated.
"Blake, there’s more. And it’s Black level. You don’t tell anyone – not Zack, not Glenda, not even your mistress if you damned well had one. Nobody outside this room."
            Blake leaned forward.
"Why do we need Eden?"
He sharpened his eyes on the General. He couldn’t be joking. "We need its resources. In the longer term, a sister planet for Earth – we can colonize it, though it will take around – "
            "Fifty years." The General finished the sentence for him. "We have ten, that’s all."
            Blake’s mouth opened involuntarily. He thought of all the things he could say, but there would be no point. He studied the deep lines on the General’s face that spoke of heavy responsibilities and things nobody would want to know, but somebody had to.
"Sir?"
            "The biosphere isn’t going to recover. Not for around fifty thousand years. We have maybe ten years like this, hiding from the sun, waking and sleeping in our sweat unless we’re fortunate enough to live underground. You know the only remaining productive food farms lie in the Polar grain-belts, but a couple of years after the last sub sea permafrost is gone, the average temperature outside will shoot up from forty-five to sixty-five degrees Celsius. In one year. Unsustainable."
            Blake needed to be sure. "But the research – I’m no scientist, but I took a good look. The re-forestation; the Arctic re-freeze project…"
            The General waved a hand. "Statistics and lies – garnished with some truth, of course, but the climate cascade we instigated with our little nuclear catharsis is locked in. We’ll actually have a drop in temperature of a couple of degrees in the next five years, but then it will rise and keep on rising, linear at first, and then after a decade, a step change."
            "What about the lunar projects? Mars reclamation?"
            "Won’t work on the moon without Earth’s resources. And Mars – well, Mars is probably what we’re going to look like a million years from now; after we’ve cooled down again."
            He trusted this man’s judgement – he was high enough in the machinery to have quality information. He sank back into the chair, draining his glass.
            "Now you see, Blake. You see why we need Eden. Survival. Plain and simple. We have a decade to start colonizing it, and start building as many ships as possible."
            "We’ll only move a fraction of the population, even if things go well. The Alcubierre Drive won’t handle transport-sized ships."
            "I know, it’ll be tough. But we’ve had some luck recently with this new dark matter tech. Maybe with another research break… If we can get Earth organised... But only if there’s the dream – if Eden fails, all humanity will see is the abyss – we’ll tear ourselves apart before the end. So, Eden’s the only game plan, our last chance. Someone needs to set foot on it, come back, talk about it – shout about it."
            Blake nodded slowly, but in so doing, he knew he was transferring the tremendous weight from the Old Man’s shoulders onto his own.
"You can handle it, Blake. Frankly, I don’t know another who could – except maybe me, fifteen years ago." He heaved himself up out of his chair. "Two more things," he said, as he picked up the bourbon bottle and held it out. This time Blake nodded, and watched the cedar-coloured alcohol sluice into his empty tumbler.
"You have to return with good news. Eden is like propaganda during a war, but this time everyone needs it – they need the dream, or God help us all. Whatever it takes – that’s why I wanted you in the first place. You get the mission done, even if you have to leave people behind."
            Blake winced inside.
            "Oh, I know you lost a lot of men in Kurana Bay. But you completed your orders. You understood what I taught you all those years ago. Mission first, men second. It sucks. Most soldiers can’t handle it. You can. It’ll be rule number one on this mission."
            Blake gazed into the bourbon. He’d been having the old nightmares again, seeing faces of the dead, their unseeing eyes wide, as if they still had something to say. "Second thing, Sir?"
            "Heracles didn’t suffer an accident. It was sabotage – we don’t know how yet, but there’s no question about it. Explosion. Tore the ship apart. They never stood a chance."
            Blake felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle, but he wasn’t surprised. He’d known that crew well, too. "Alicians?"
"Seems crazy, but the more society unravels and despair sets in, the more people turn to those bastard Fundies, and the more support bleeds into their terrorist wing. They’re a virus, and they’re making us weak just when it’s our last chance to be strong and survive. It almost makes me long for the days of the Chinese Dragon Hegemony before WWIII tore that abomination apart – at least they thought long term."
            Blake narrowed his eyes as he remembered something. "You know what Professor Bertrand said? He said that the rise of a global religion, with easy-to-follow rules and a multi-cultural God was inevitable after a global war." But then Blake remembered more – he’d said the rise of fundamentalism had been engineered. No one had paid much attention to him by then – he’d moved too far beyond his comfortable scientific domain to the treacherous landscape of politics. He’d also developed a habit of ranting in public. And after he’d been assassinated, gigaquads of his data disappeared in the infamous web-net crash. "I never quite grasp why they fear Eden, Sir."
            The General swirled the remaining bourbon in his glass. "Well, my father told me a long time ago the last thing a priest wants to see is a genuine miracle – it reminds ordinary people that priests are servants – representatives – not the real thing. Alicians don’t like it. But Eden’s a miracle alright, and we damn well need it. And we’ll fight for it all the way." He raised his glass.
            Blake remembered how different the General had been at his and Glenda’s wedding twenty-three years ago, bursting with life and energy. Everyone had told Blake he was marrying too young, but this man, a captain then, had told Blake to listen to everyone, then do what his heart commanded, and never second-guess himself afterwards. It had been his way of life ever since. He owed this man a great deal. "You can count on me, Sir."
            The General eased backwards and closed his eyes, a hint of a smile emerging.
            Blake stared again at the General’s wrist, wrapped in frail skin like waxed paper. Glenda had the same microporous chemo transfer system. He sensed the formalities were over, and cleared his throat. "What stage are you, Bill?"
            The General’s smile faltered, but his eyes stayed shut. For the first time in Blake’s presence, he spoke softly, his voice no longer in uniform. "I should be around to hear you arrived on Eden, but I’ll miss your homecoming. Now, go home to Glenda, leave an old man in peace."
            Blake knew better than to push the issue – dignity, the last vestige of this man’s identity, was all that was keeping him going. He got up quietly, and parked his half-full glass on the desk. At the doorway he took one last look, saluted and held it for a long moment, then closed the door behind him with a soft click, as if closing the coffin lid on a dear friend.

Episode 9 from The Eden Paradox. This episode features Gabriel, not seen since chapter one. It has a religious-terrorist cell context, because that's the way things are headed I'm afraid. This is the chapter where we start to wonder whose side Gabriel is really on...

Star CouncilGabriel knelt in the gothic church, hands clasped in prayer he didn’t believe in. He tried again to still his mind – he’d gotten further than any Sentinel before him, close to finding the leader of the Alician Order. A slim chance to overturn their endgame was at hand. But the bitterness of remorse threatened to overwhelm him: he’d just killed his best friend.             Samuel, like him, had been in deep cover working inside the Alician cell-structure, living, breathing, and sleeping in the enemy’s ranks. His mission had been to uncover the facts about the loss of the Prometheus and the Heracles. In doing so he’d unearthed the ghoster plot on the Ulysses. Samuel had been about to release it on the nets: the Alicians made a pretence of being anti-tech for their Fundie supporters, whereas ghosters were tech-weapons, reviled by every soldier who had survived the War. An Alician section led by Brother Marcus had surprised Samuel and Gabriel during a meeting. Samuel had immediately acted as if Gabriel had found him first, and had reached for his pistol, knowing Gabriel would have to react. There had been a brief glimmer of forgiveness in Samuel’s eyes just before Gabriel shot him. The worst part was that Gabriel had not been able to close Samuel’s eyes, with Marcus and his men present, and had to leave his corpse in the rotting apartment for the rats to plunder. For four hours Gabriel had incanted the Tellurathonicat, the long-lost song for the dead. Although he didn’t believe in God, he believed in his best friend. He closed with "Amen".              The emotional gale that had threatened to undo him from his own mission died down, and a hollow semblance of calm finally arrived. He would need it to honour Samuel’s sacrifice. He scanned the rows of wooden benches around him. Since the War, churches were rarely empty – there were so many lost loved ones that people used the churches to commune with the dead. Cemeteries had become a thing of the past, every last scrap of decent soil used for crops. Funerals culminated in cremation and vitrification of the deceased’s ashes into a dusky glass teardrop that fitted into the palm of a hand. Four people knelt, heads bowed down on the bench’s ledge, arms outstretched, holding the "pearls" as they were called, as if offering them to God, or perhaps, in the silence and impunity of prayer, asking "why?"In order to concentrate, he parked everything about Samuel. He pressed his left palm to his right, his right palm to his left, with equal force. He was about to penetrate an Alician Inner cell. He needed to get into the role again, immerse himself in the thinking patterns of the enemy: believe like one of them, react like one of them. He recalled the scripture: structure, discipline, equanimity – the three principles of Neo-Fundamentalism. Even the posture for praying was critical. If the base was strong, all else would flow correctly, and all action emanating from such a structure would be right.He checked his wristcom. Two small green lights on its side, linked to micro-sensors on his jacket collar, told him there was no one behind him. Reaching into his pocket he snapped open a mini-phial with his thumb, bowed as if in prayer, and smeared a trace of clear liquid onto his lips. It evaporated in moments. He rose silently, and trod softly as if still in prayer towards an alcove and a bolted iron door. He didn’t touch the handle. Placing his eye to the peep-hole, he circled his eyeball once to let the ret-scan do its job. The door, bolt and all, heaved upwards like a mute portcullis. It descended behind him as soon as his rear foot had passed the threshold, encasing him in total darkness. He remained perfectly still."A boy kills his sister with a gun. Who is guilty?" The tone invited feelings of unworthiness, the voice of a man who commanded people to serve in a Holy war. Gabriel answered immediately – reflex not reflection – as he’d been taught."The father, for letting it fall into the hands of the son." He spoke louder than intended; he instructed his body to relax."Who else?" The voice was aggressive."The mother, for not admonishing the father." Gabriel heard the speaker pace. Still not enough. "The government, for allowing weapons in the population." Continued silence and pacing. Was the speaker carrying something? Gabriel detected unevenness in his step, favouring one side. As an assassin, he’d been trained to hear the nuances in every movement. He would not be allowed too many more attempts. "The manufacturer, for not equipping the gun with a child-sensor-block." As soon as he’d said it he knew it was wrong – too tech. The pacing stopped, a sleeve rustled, something being lifted. He didn’t panic. Then he realised what was expected."Scientists, for making the weapon possible." Gabriel relaxed. He knew it was right. He felt balanced again. A whisper somewhere in the chamber; something metallic put down, a drawer closed. He heard another speaker, female. "Welcome, Brother Matthias," she said, an accent he couldn’t place, her voice guttural yet fluid. "Change and join us in the Inner Chamber." She left, followed by the other man, the coldness from her voice lingering in her wake. Bright light deluged the room, stinging his eyes. He found a simple grey robe neatly folded on a stool. He didn’t look for the weapon the first man must have been carrying: he knew he was being watched, one always was. He undressed, removing the wristcom that otherwise never left him, and put on the robe, naked underneath, as the Structure required. In the nearby mirror he performed the mental self-examination ritual. Regard truthfully that which the Creator has fashioned. A gaunt face, fringed with black hair, jet-black eyes. Know thyself, the Structure taught. Killer’s eyes, he said to himself, the last things my victims see, eyes of a Cleanser, one who releases souls to God. The ritual satisfied, he opened the door, and walked through the ultraviolet-tinged archway that scanned for any hidden devices or bio-implants. Anti-tech when it suits them. He flushed away the thought – he had to play the role, be the zealous assassin they believed him to be.The inner chamber was cave-like; myriad candles scattered shadows onto whitewashed brick walls. Five figures awaited him, draped in white robes, hoods covering all but their chins and mouths, hands concealed inside billowing sleeves. Each stood on the point of the blue chalk pentagram drawn on the smooth granite floor. The points were connected with gold lines, creating a star inside the pentagram. Gabriel stood in the star’s centre, hands open by his side where the others could see them. He bowed deeply."Welcome, Brother Matthias. You may report." It was the voice of the man who had questioned him in the Outer Chamber; the leader of this Alician Star Council, the Cultivator.He stood at the pentagram’s vertex, facing Gabriel. Gabriel was concise, in accordance with what he knew about Star Council etiquette. "From the Devil’s craft, all contact has been lost. An analyst in the Project suspected something, told the Project Manager. Both have been cleansed." There was no reaction from any of the five until the Cultivator spoke. "All is not as you say." Gabriel’s breath closed in, his sinewy muscles tensing. To lie in the Star Council meant death. He waited. In theory he could kill all of them in less than two seconds, but he’d heard that lasers targeted the centre of the star, primed to activate in case of sudden moves – he was fast, but not that fast."The Eden Manager is indeed cleansed. The analyst, Micah Sanderson, lives on." Gabriel didn’t see how that was possible, he had made the hit himself, as ordered – but the Cultivator would not lie. "In addition," the female voice cut in, "a woman is missing –" Gabriel preferred the man’s voice: his was like bracing seawater; hers was like a wave of rotting seaweed, concealing broken glass. "– we do not know where. The Project Manager’s assistant, Sandy Mindel." Gabriel had seen her file. The Cultivator cut in. "She must be brought to God, Brother Matthias, as quickly as possible, by whatever means." Gabriel knew the "by whatever means" included doing it in public, in which case he would be discovered. Before he could voice his question, the woman spoke again."You must find her, Brother Matthias, and eliminate her. She may have seen our brother in the Eden Mission. He cannot be unmasked; his work is not yet done." He raised his left hand in front of his shoulder, palm facing the leader. "You may speak, Brother Matthias," the Cultivator said."I will do this. But if I am caught?" The woman lashed out, "Then you will kill yourself as you have been trained, and go to meet your maker!" Gabriel’s tongue involuntarily flicked back to his false left molar. Painless, so they said, but he didn’t believe it – he’d seen a comrade’s contorted face after one had been accidentally broken during a training bout. Besides, he’d seen too much death to believe it was ever painless. He bowed his head in silence. Inside the Star, respect for the Council was paramount, even if the interviewee had been misunderstood. The Cultivator rescued him."I believe, Sister Esma that Brother Matthias is referring to the ramifications after his body is found." Gabriel knew now why this man was the leader of this Council. Sister Esma was the most righteous, but sending people on suicide missions was not just about orders from God, it required careful handling. However, the fact that the Cultivator had used her name was not good news for Gabriel."If you die while executing your mission, the Chorazin will realise they had an Alician within their midst. Even though you left them ten years ago, this will be damaging to them. A Chorazin agent becoming an Alician Cleanser is unheard of. If you are caught performing this act, it will focus attention on you, drawing it away from another Alician agent." So, another Alician was still in the Chorazin. The Cultivator continued, "Such a finding will cause fear and increased self-monitoring in the Chorazin; it will slow them down at a time when we are moving forward at a greater pace."Gabriel knew they were telling him far more than they should. They firmly believed – presumed – he would be dead in the next twenty-four hours. "Then my sacrifice will be all the more beneficial," he replied, and bowed deeply. Although the disciplined group remained motionless, he nonetheless heard their collective breathing ease, reflecting their satisfaction with his answer, with the exception of Sister Esma, whose outbreath was a derisive snort. He also perceived that the session was over, that he was about to be dismissed. He pressed his luck, raising his left hand again. Sister Esma inhaled sharply, but the Cultivator got there first."Brother Matthias, you have a further question?" His tone was a potent cocktail of surprise and menace."I have a question, but am not sure I am permitted to ask it." This time Sister Esma did not wait. It had been what he had hoped for. He knew the leader would be annoyed by the question, but would be even more vexed by Sister Esma’s abrogation of his authority."You know very well the Dictates of Structure, Matthias!" she shouted.He noted she had dropped his earned title of "Brother". The Cultivator broke in. "To ask any question is your right, Brother Matthias, but you must take responsibility for what the answer brings." He foresaw a power struggle between these two – it would be ended by the assassination of one or the other, as was the usual course of Alician internal politics."Brother Matthias, what is your question?"He thought of Samuel: this is for you. "I understand, Your Eminence, that a ghoster may have been installed on the Devil’s craft." There, he had said it. He heard the two behind him gasp. Sister Esma said nothing, but her hooded head moved momentarily towards the direction of the leader, before she checked herself. She hadn’t known. The Cultivator drew himself up to his full height. Clearly, he had. "Where did you hear this?" His voice was a drawn blade, seeking blood.Gabriel knew he had to answer this question, or forfeit his own life here and now. "In the Fourth Chapel.""WHO?" Gabriel bowed his head lower. "Brother Marcus," he said quietly. He saw the Cultivator make a quick hand movement, and the one behind Gabriel’s left side immediately left the Chamber.The leader’s voice softened. "You have done well to bring this to our attention, Brother Matthias." In Gabriel’s mind he closed Samuel’s eyes. "And why does this concern you, Brother Matthias?" Sister Esma was no doubt enraged that she had not known, another reminder that she was not the leader; not yet, at least. Gabriel did not hesitate this time, but answered directly."Ghosters are an abomination. They are derived from science, and…" he paused, "even though they start as humans, they have no souls."He waited for the answer. This time the Cultivator placed his hand on Sister Esma’s robed arm, and spoke as if delivering a sermon."Brother Matthias, ghosters are a tool. In this war – and we are in a war – we must use whatever weapons we have to secure victory. If we must use the devil’s own tricks against him, then that is what we will do. The ghosters these days, few as they are, volunteer for the procedure." Gabriel found the idea of anyone volunteering to be changed into a ghoster an unlikely prospect. Alicians outwardly eschewed technology, to lure a blind following from gullible and angry masses, but he knew they were more advanced in some ways than most military governments. "Go now," the Cultivator said, "release this woman Sandy’s soul. Do not fail."            Gabriel dropped to one knee, lowering his head. The Cultivator proffered his hand so that Gabriel could kiss it. With head still bowed, Gabriel stood and backed away to the entrance. It was done. As soon as he was back in the chamber he picked up his wristcom and wiped his lips on it, downloading the Cultivator’s pheromone signature.

Gabriel stood on the barely-lit street outside the Church, dressed in his original clothes. A light drizzle fell undisturbed by any breeze except the steam rising from hot-ground level. He walked over to the sleeping tramp on the otherwise deserted sidewalk – the rad-level was high even up here – and bent over to pick up what looked like a discarded plastic food carton. He snatched it up and glided over to a nearby disposal chute, retrieving something before discarding the box, and placed both his hands in his pockets. It was an antique silver locket, a four leaf clover carved on its front, his only connection with the past. He was relieved it was still there, where he had left it five hours ago. Luckily nobody picked up rubbish anymore, least of all that which lay next to a stinking, radioactive tramp. Gabriel had drugged the man just in case – Cleansers who left things to chance did not survive long.            He stared up into the rain, not bothering to shade his eyes from its acidic sting. Somewhere up there the dart-drone waited, primed with the Cultivator’s pheromone signature. As soon as the man left the building, the drone’s sensor would pick up the scent. Then it was just a matter of time. Samuel’s sacrifice had not been in vain, though he wished he could have taken out Sister Esma as well.He took an elevator to the mid-levels and walked towards his squalid apartment in the ruins above the orange level rad-zone, passing the Virtual Sex boutiques. He lingered outside one. A flabby sleazeball with waxed moustache called out to him, vaunting lurid promises Gabriel did not even hear, but he approached the man. Gabriel knew he was being captured on some vid system. They’ll think I know I am about to die, and wish one last carnal act before the end. He held his wristcom to the man’s reader, confirmed the credit transaction, and stepped inside. No real women there, of course; that made the charade easier. He found an empty booth smelling of cheap deodorant, entered, and sealed the door. Inside were the usual plastic-sheeted padded table, an immerser headpiece, and a data crystal port.               He ignored the table and sat cross-legged on the floor. Pulling out the locket, he flicked it open and gazed at the holopic of the young girl inside, noting the family resemblance. He touched the picture, pulled out a sliver of quartz the width and depth of a fingernail, then snapped the locket shut with a click.            He got up, removed the sex menu crystal and jacked his own data shard into the port, donned the headpiece, and lay back on the table. It took only a few seconds to adjust. He was in a white room, so uniformly bright it was hard to see where walls, floor and ceilings began and ended. He heard stiletto heels, and turned around.            "Good evening, nice to see you are still alive," she said, a stunning redhead with green, feral eyes. She wore a vermillion tycra mini-dress. Gabriel and his Master always played along like this, just in case anyone hacked in. Of course in reality she could be fat and forty, or, in this case, a seventy year old pony-tailed male. What you see is all you get, he remembered, echoing the ambivalent ad of the Virtual Sex industry. But he wasn’t here for games. He switched to an undocumented Tibetan dialect, just in case any porn-hackers bypassed the audio jamming code built into his crystal.             "The Cultivator is taken care of. Samuel is gone, as I’m sure you know, but he is avenged: Brother Marcus tonight. Sandy Mindel, Kane’s assistant tomorrow."            "We’ve paid a high price for this. Nonetheless, Samuel would be proud of you," she replied, her dialect more polished than Gabriel’s. "There is a slim chance this Miss Mindel may know the password – if not, it died with Kane. We’ve already searched the city for her, but there is no trace. Not an easy trick with all the micro-surveillance these days." She smiled coyly, all part of the show.Gabriel knew her words were a challenge to him to find Sandy, but he said nothing. She seemed about to turn, and then cocked her head at him. "You know where she is, don’t you?"            Gabriel nodded. Her smile vanished. "The battle we have anticipated for a millennium is almost upon us.""How close?""Maybe a week. We must find the password to open the ships. Then we can destroy them." Her face was grave, the charade suspended. She nodded once and turned, just as another woman entered. For the sake of the show, the two women embraced, languorously. Gabriel, embarrassed, wanted to look away, but that wasn’t possible inside a V-Sex scene. A low shanga beat started up as the platinum blonde let the redhead depart, and slinked over to Gabriel, stripping before him. His crystal had tactile sensory effects disabled – just as well, as she promptly sat on his lap and began to grind to the music, breasts brushing his chest, lascivious lips pouting centimeters from his own. He mentally disconnected from the scene, though it had been a very long time. He voided the thought and decided to end this – it was an illusion after all, like life. Letting his breathing rate increase, he began to moan, and within a minute faked an orgasm. It wasn’t so hard to counterfeit a climax – virtual sex booths enabled mental orgasm without its usual physical messiness – allowing the sex industry to escape certain laws, and sidestep health regulations. The too-perfect blonde stood up and sauntered off into the background. The entire scene faded to black static.   Gabriel slipped off the headpiece, removed the crystal, and put the locket back in his pocket. A week till they arrived; till the end of the world. So his own days, maybe his hours, were numbered. But he would play it out. Hundreds before him had died in the silent war that had endured nine centuries. In the fifteenth century Sentinels had gained the upper hand, but not for long. And now, trained Sentinels were few and far between, living on the run.             He smoked a cheroot he bought from a street trader in a darkened alleyway, watching the few people who dared the mildly acid shower scurry past. He leaned over a railing, his eyes following the cascade of rain plunging to ground level two hundred meters below. He remembered his real, non-Alician Master teaching him that life was like a drop of water in a waterfall. Each drop felt alone, confused, tumbling in chaos. But when it hit the water below, it rejoined the river and was at peace again. Gabriel let go of the cheroot, and watched its red ember blaze as it fell amongst the drops of rain.

Back in his apartment, he waited until midnight, then opened a psy-locked suitcase – letting the locking mechanism scan his EID signature. He thought of his dead sister, his emotional password. The carbo-titanium composite lock buzzed, then cracked open. He fished out his favoured S&W plasma-bullet pistol, night lenses, navcon, and a pulse grenade. He fixed the locket around his neck, tucking it under a tight-fitting Chorazin vest.
Descending from his apartment, he took a service elevator down to ground level, entered a disused building, and forced open the rusted door. Broken glass crunched under his boots, sending several dinner-sized rodents scampering away.  He continued down a metal spiral staircase until he reached a lead-lined storm door in the basement. Prying it open, he entered the stinking sewer that ran between the still-radioactive ruins of old Los Angeles, and the rad-free cave cities deeper below ground. He headed for the Eden Mission complex in New LA, five kilometers away. He knew why they couldn’t find Sandy anywhere in the city – she’d never left the Eden Mission building.

Episode 8 from The Eden Paradox. Still inside the Ulysses, Blake and the others take on the Ghoster.
Code Red (continued)Inside the compartment, Pierre spoke, his voice unsteady. "Zack, why doesn’t it have eyes?" Zack lodged his flashlight on the floor, not taking his eyes off the grey-skinned scaly head and neck. He grimaced as he met the dark sockets where its eyes should have been. His mouth felt dry as sandpaper, but he tried to reassure Pierre. "It has eyes; they’re permanently open underneath a protective membrane. They have no weak spots. Makes people hesitate, too, because it looks blind – got many a soldier killed in the War – not to mention the scream when they attack. If – when it moves, just aim for its trunk – don’t look at the face."            "What’s it waiting for?"             He felt sorry for Pierre – his first real battle experience, and encountering a ghoster was a supernova of a baptism. He knew Pierre’s instincts would be playing push-me-pull-you between fight and flight; waiting wasn’t instinctive at all. But if they moved now, they’d have little chance. He tried to appeal to Pierre’s intellectual side, to help him keep his nerve. "Its higher cortical functions are suppressed; you can’t negotiate with it, and it’ll never question its instructions. A ghoster’s reptile-brain fighting instincts have been heightened. But it still has basic tactical abilities. It has a mission, a goal, and is fucking adaptable. Its goal is to destroy the Ulysses, probably by activating the ND. But it knows if it tries now, it might fail, because we’ll have clear line of fire. But if we move first, it’ll strike in fast random attacks. We’ve got weapons trained on it, so it’s waiting for an advantage."            "Waiting for us to blink?"            "Yeah, you could say that." But a chill ran down hid spine as he recalled what he’d said earlier – a ghoster’s eyes were always open behind the membrane – they never, ever blinked.
*          *          *
Blake primed the mine. Him and the ghoster. That’s how it was always going to be. Now he’d accepted it he felt calmer, the tremors had vanished.Kat defied protocol. "Not exactly regulation issue."              He glanced toward the camera and offered a bare smile. He picked up two pulse rifles and shook them into readiness. "You’re in charge of the ship now, Kat. Auto-lock the hatch when I’ve gone through. If I fail…"            "Don’t you worry about me, I have my pistol." She tried to laugh.For a moment he wished he’d gotten to know his crew better. Like all captains, he’d been trained to keep a distance."Okay, Zack, Pierre, get ready. I’m coming in. When the inner hatch opens on your side, the ghoster will see it as an advantage or a threat. Either way it will attack. Each of you break to your respective sides and open fire. Leave a pathway open between it and me. No discussion. I have a little surprise for our guest." He spun the wheel.
*          *          *
Through the comms system, Kat heard the hiss of air as the outer hatch opened. Sitting alone in the cockpit, she pulled up her knees and locked her wrists around them, the pistol resting on her console. They’d all probably be dead in the next few minutes, and no one would even know what happened to them. Silently, she saluted Blake. But even as she did so, the Minotaur virus reached environmental system control. Lights all over the ship started to fade.

Decompression
The outer airlock door hissed closed and clunked into its locked position. Blake peered through the porthole into the fourth compartment. In the dimming light he could just make out the helmeted outlines of Zack and Pierre. Even in the near darkness, he could tell both men were stressed, shoulders tensed inside their suits. They were immobile, like statues from the New Smithsonian. He secured his lanyard to the airlock eyebolt, and strained to see the ghoster."Pierre, very slowly, lower your flashlight to the floor, point it to the ceiling like an uplighter – it has good night vision, we don’t."As Pierre obeyed, Blake caught his first glimpse of the creature – still basically human in shape. It crouched behind the neutralino detonator. The last time he had seen one… he skipped over the memory. He glanced down through his visor to check the self-rigged short-range land-mine lashed onto his chest. The push-button actuator protruded two centimeters. It would kill him and the ghoster, but the others should survive. He circled his tongue inside his mouth a few times to generate some saliva, and then swallowed, angling his two pulse rifles forwards at rib height. "Okay, everyone listen up. This is what’ll happen. I’ll count down in one second intervals from five to one. On 'Two', Zack go short to the left, Pierre, go three meters to the right, so you don’t shoot each other in crossfire. On 'One' I’ll open the door, and that creature will do one of two things – it’ll either come straight at me, or go for you, Pierre. I know you have the pulse rifle, but at close quarters Zack is a better shot. Reel out your lanyards so they don’t auto-stop when you jump. Kat – stay sharp and speak only if urgent. Any questions?""Just one, Skip," Zack said. "What’s the surprise you have in store?""Then it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?" He couldn’t tell Zack, or else he’d try to save him, and they’d all end up dead.Blake took the silence that followed as assent. He drew in a breath.
"Five."Pierre reeled out several meters of lanyard, not taking his eyes off the ghoster, nor lowering his weapon. He couldn’t help but wonder if he was being used as bait because of the friendship between Blake and Zack. But there was logic in the plan. Even though he had the rifle, he’d never been in a real battle, and might freeze up. Zack wouldn’t.
"Four."A trickle of cold sweat rolled down Zack’s spine. He’d been in too many battles to worry anymore about whether he would survive. He just wanted to get as many shots into the ghoster as possible. He wasn’t too sure of the "surprise" – especially after Blake’s once-only hesitation to kill the last one in Kurana Bay. He flexed his knees, shifting his weight onto his thighs, ready to spring.
"Three."Thirty meters away, Kat sat in the cockpit, wondering how long it would take after the others were dead for the ghoster to make it to her, if it bothered at all. The landmine was a noble gesture, but she’d heard how indestructible these genetically re-engineered soldiers were, having been morphed with reptile genomes to make them fast and very, very tough. She chewed on a knuckle as she watched the screens, oblivious of how hard she bit down.
"Two." Blake watched Zack and Pierre dive to left and right, and open fire. The ghoster leapt faster and higher than seemed possible, ricocheting off the ceiling, heading straight towards Pierre. Its head bobbed lizard-like to left and right, making it a tempting but elusive target.    "One!" He rammed the "open" button with the rifle muzzle. The airlock door stayed closed. Christ! Not now! "Kat! Power!" He smashed a glass panel with the butt of his rifle to gain access to the manual lever, knowing it could take thirty seconds to open the hatch by hand. He cursed again, as he had to put both weapons down to try and get the door open.He watched helplessly as Pierre got five rounds off into its chest before the creature smashed the firearm out of his arms, almost dislocating Pierre’s shoulder, and lunged forward with a claw-like hand to break his neck. Zack fired successive shots into the creature’s knee, causing it to lose its balance. Pierre kicked hard at its left side, trying to knock it over, as he dived out of range. A swipe from the ghoster’s claw-like hand hammered onto the floor where Pierre’s head had been a split second earlier, denting the metal deck.  The ghoster sprang backward off its good leg and spun in mid-air, hit the front of the neutralino detonator, and then rebounded off, colliding with Zack, knocking his pistol out of his gloved hand. Zack dodged the ghoster’s gnarled fist just in time as it pistoned into the hull, sending a deafening echo around the room. "Got it!" shouted Kat, re-energizing the relays. "Captain, it’s armed the detonator! Fifty-seven seconds!"The hatch slid open. Blake snatched up both rifles in one fluid motion and began firing, just as it stamped its good leg down on Zack’s knee. Zack yelled with pain, while Pierre got to his feet and loosened his lanyard, his shattered pulse rifle lying next to him. Six shots from Blake pounded into the ghoster’s right side, enough to make it turn. Zack, his faceplate close to the ghoster’s eyeless head, rammed his knife into its stomach, between ribs that criss-crossed its torso, twisting the serrated blade between the scales. The ghoster’s scream intensified as it leapt off Zack towards Blake. He fired both weapons at the ghoster in synchrony. Each double-pulse shot shoved it back, but still it closed on him. The ghoster’s mottled scales glowed red where the pulse charges hit. It leapt forward and swept Blake’s arms aside, spinning his pulse rifles against the walls. Then it saw the landmine on his chest and recoiled. For a fraction of a second, Blake could discern the features of the human face that had once been there, and almost faltered, but then he seized the ghoster’s wrists and tugged it towards him, pushing his own chest outward. With a strangled shriek, the ghoster was yanked backwards, breaking Blake’s grip. Pierre’s lanyard was taut around the ghoster’s neck, like a lasso. After a moment of disbelief that he wasn’t dead, Blake dived for one of his rifles, rolled and came up firing again, this time aiming at its head. It was losing strength, but it yanked Zack’s knife out from its ribs. With its double-jointed shoulders it slashed the lanyard behind its neck and once again went for Blake, raising the knife high.            Zack, his voice choked in agony, shouted. "Pierre, hang on to something fast!" Zack fired his pistol at the escape hatch panel. Pierre threw himself towards two large crate straps and locked his arms around them. The ghoster saw where Zack was aiming and moved to grab a harness. At that moment, a shrill ghoster-like wailing erupted from the comms system, causing the ghoster to spin around to see where it was coming from. Blake fired twice hitting it straight in the face, knocking it off-balance. At Zack’s third shot, the hatch flew open. The roomdepressurisedwith a thunderclap and a howling wind. Zack had already anchored himself. Pierre clung on for his life as his legs lifted off the ground. Blake was whisked off his feet, suspended in mid-air by the decompression, tethered by his waist lanyard, but he kept firing at the creature. The ghoster hit the man-sized hole and almost passed through it, but clung on to the edges with its claws digging into the metal, trying to pull its body back inside the ship.             Blake knew that if it hung on for a few seconds longer, the room would fully depressurise, and then it would enter the room and once again attack. Kat shouted "No!" as he retrieved his own knife and in one smooth cut slashed through his lanyard. The suction propelled him head-first into the ghoster. He spread his arms wide and smashed into the ghoster full-on, head-butting its chest like a human cannonball. With one last gurgling scream, the creature lost its grip and reeled into space. Blake’s shoulders tore at him as he fought to prevent himself being dragged out too. With his head poking through the hull, he watched the ghoster flail wildly, spinning away from the ship. When it reached the invisible warp shell, it blazed bright as a meteorite for a second, then was gone. The depressurization ceased, and the artificial gravity pulled Blake back inside.            Kat came on-line, desperate. "Pierre, the detonator!"             Pierre sprang over to the ND console. For a moment he stared at it. He hit several keys, his left hand steadying his right wrist. The counter stopped at two seconds. He slumped down with his back to the ND, raised his knees, and rested his helmeted head on his knees.            Blake had landed hard on the floor, where he crouched, panting, sweat streaming past his ears inside his helmet. He lifted his wrist console and checked the heart rate indicator: 192, descending. Zack spoke first. "Sweet Jesus! I just aged … ten years. Nothin’ to do … with relativity. Kat. Trimorph. Please… Leg ..." The rest was mumbled expletives.Blake helped Pierre upright while he flicked a few more ND switches. The counter reset to zero and three green lights glowed.             "It’ll take 30 minutes to shutdown fully, Sir, but it’s safe now. I’ll come back later. I can seal the escape hole, but to save on air, I suggest we transfer the three remaining oxygen cylinders out of here and leave this roomdepressurised."            Blake was still catching his own breath. "Agreed. And thanks Pierre, that was a pretty unorthodox move back there."Pierre was visibly shaken, but a smile cracked across his face. "Just came to me. My mother once sent me to a ranch in the Pyrenees, to get me away from equations. I spent the summer working with wild horses. They usually broke me rather than the other way round, but I learned a few rope tricks."Blake nodded, and then looked to one of the internal cameras. "I assume that was you, Kat, distracting the ghoster."She laughed nervously. "Felt pretty helpless up here – had to do something. I figured the one thing it wouldn’t expect to hear was another ghoster. I recorded one of its screams and played it back over the speaker.""Good work, Kat."            Blake moved over to Zack, squatting next to him. "How are you, buddy?" He stared down at his mutilated leg. The word "ugly" didn’t cover it.            "Shattered. Cracked rib, too. You gonna… take off… your surprise?"             Blake tilted his head downward. The actuator had been pushed half-way in. Gingerly, he eased it back out, then twisted it clockwise, locking it into safe mode. He unhooked it and set it down on the floor.             Zack tried to laugh, grimacing. "That was… your whole… fucking plan?"             He shrugged. "Kat, meet us outside the hatch with the trimorph. He watched Zack’s face contort with pain. "Double-dose."  

I grew up watching Star Trek (yes, the Original series). It got me into Scifi, created an addiction that turned me to reading Asimov's Foundation and then I never looked back. I couldn't watch it now, of course, without cringing or laughing. It was a product of its time. After a big gap, we got the Next Generation, which I initially hated, but thanks to Picard, grew to like, then Voyager and Deep Space Nine. DS9 is the only one I could watch again (and again), the best of the ST series. Then there was Enterprise. How did it even get to four seasons?

I like the recent movies. But they are not enough. Why not?

All the ST series allowed the writers to explore new concepts (okay, to be fair, most of it was derivative), and present viewers with ideas. One of the hallmarks of the scifi reader or viewer's experience is a sense of wonder. Books can be great at this, but so can TV series. For example, both Peter Hamilton and Iain Banks have great concepts of ships, organic ships born in the shallows of gas giants, and mindships. But then think of Farscape's Talyn, and you have a fabulous creation that lingers in the mind.

Of course there have been other notable Scifi series: Babylon 5, Farscape, and most importantly, Battlestar Galactica, which had the same kind of impact for Scifi that Game of Thrones is having for Fantasy.

But where are the great SF series now? Quite simply, there aren't any. Most are low budget, either set in today's timeline with a few teasers thrown in (like Continuum) or post-apocalyptic shot mostly at night to save on money and CGI (Falling Skies) or near-horror scifi soaps (Helix). They all feel like fillers, while we're waiting for the real deal to come online. And most SF movies, even those with a decent premise and a stellar cast, tragically descend into popcorn-fodder fist-fights (e.g. Elysium). Where is the Blade-Runner of yesteryear?

So, the point about a series, is to allow the writers to explore. Unfortunately, there's a focus on the dollar and writing SF thriller series that keep ramping up the tension with character-bending plot-twists, and frankly often stretch the plot as if the creators had never thought beyond Season 2 (that's the make-or-break point, by the way), or the writers got too immersed in character politics to the detriment of scifi plotting (Stargate Universe, a real lost opportunity), or they built up to an impossible-to-get-out-of cliff-hanger that was ridiculously resolved in the next season (Falling Skies end of Season 3, for example). And do we get a sense of wonder from these series (SGU yes, at least initially)? Or is it just the equivalent of Jack Bauer (24) running around, a thriller whose plot you can't remember a week later. Does it inspire the next generation (pun unintended) to read scifi?

Ok, what's the solution?

It needs a Network and a few producers with some backing to take a risk, to break out of this NCIS/Game-of-Thrones business model, and go back to basics. What do SF viewers want? What hasn't been done before? And why Star Trek?

Last question first. Because Gene Roddenberry was a visionary. Visionaries imagine, and create the future, by sheer force of will. And because there is a loyal and patient audience who will give it a chance. SF viewers want new worlds, new cultures (not humans with funny foreheads), and spaceships we want to buy models of. Get David Brin (brilliant on aliens) to write a few episodes, or Alistair Reynolds (world building), or Peter Hamilton (fantastic spaceships and deep, enduring plots), or Jack Campbell (realistic space-battles). And then there's characters. Jack McDevit writes real characters, those you remember and would really like to meet (and quite a few you'd want to knock flat).

But what about the concept? Star Trek Enterprise was a failure partly because it went backwards. That's not what SF people want. A new series needs to go forwards in time. A new galactic treat, Earth destroyed or plundered, the Federation in tatters, humanity on the back foot, maybe one Starship escapes, tries to make its way in a hostile galaxy where aliens are smarter, and empathy is in short supply...

A new Star Trek would need to be gritty, dealing with tough choices, and no conveniently happy endings as in the original series (and more like DS9, when Sisko did some very questionable things in order to win the war). It doesn't have to go for shock value like Game of Thrones, rather, it can go for the wonder factor that the SF literature constantly delivers.

And as with all good science fiction, it would deal with issues that are relevant to us today, but disguised and distanced in a way that allows us to look at them in a new light, and maybe, just maybe, consider alternative solutions.

Ok, so what would this new ST series be called?

Star Trek Renegade.

  


 

More from the Eden Paradox. Back to the Ulysses, where Blake and the others need to find out what or who is hiding in the aft of the ship bleeding away oxygen... It's their worst nightmare...

Code RedBlake stopped two meters from the darkened hatchway, fingers flexing near his holstered pulse pistol. He couldn’t believe it was happening again. He’d lost eighteen men last time, all about Pierre’s age. Nineteen men, he corrected himself. At the end it had come down to him and the ghoster, and his intuition told him history wanted a re-run. The tremors re-surfaced in his right hand, shakes he’d not had since Kurana Bay. He squeezed his fist hard to stop them."The lights are off inside," Pierre said, inspecting a small panel adjacent to the airlock connecting them to the fourth compartment. "Since zero-two-hundred, though the cockpit systems said they were on – I checked an hour ago." Zack sighed. "And the night goggles would be – let me guess…" He gesticulated towards the pitch-black porthole in the airlock hatchway. Pierre confirmed with a nod. "Figures," Zack said. Pierre closed the panel. "As we suspected, whoever planned this did a good job. The air circulation sensors were looped so we wouldn’t detect where the oxygen loss was coming from, and the emergency vents to the fourth compartment were wired open. I’ve sealed them now."  "Good. Both of you, suit up," Blake ordered. "Arm yourselves as you think fit." Pierre hesitated. "Sir, reports state that it can take four days for a ghoster to regenerate after extended hibernation, and the oxygen depletion started just two days ago. Maybe it’s still comatose, buried inside one of the food crates?""Pierre, forget theory right now," Blake said, "or you’ll die in there." Pierre held his ground for a moment then gave in, following Zack to the weapons locker. Blake peered through the airlock porthole, but only saw his reflection. His breathing slowed of its own accord, the way it always did just before battle. When they returned, he saw that Zack had retrieved an item from his personal area. He ignored it. But minutes later, as Zack and Pierre were donning their standard space-suits and oxygen backpacks, Pierre spotted it.            "Zack, you can’t be serious taking a commando knife in there? We’ll be in spacesuits and in a vacuum if we have to go to Plan B." Zack grinned, and slipped it into its sheath under his backpack, hilt pointing downwards. "You never dress commando style?" He leered at Pierre. "This knife has saved me more times than I care to remember. Think of it as a good luck charm. You asked how we killed it last time; well, my knife played its part." But Blake knew how they had taken out the ghoster in Kurana Bay – the slow gun. They didn’t have one aboard; why would they? He switched on Zack’s backpack, three telltale green lights and a single beep indicating it was fully functional. "Each man takes in what he feels appropriate." Pierre bristled. "But plasma pulse rifles, right – according to procedure?"            Blake finished with Zack’s suit, and moved to check Pierre’s.             "Actually, Pierre," Zack said, as he picked up his helmet, "I’m taking a pulse pistol. It’s not that big a compartment, and if there’s a need to use something, it’ll be close quarters."             "But the rifle charge is more powerful."            Blake snapped on the switch to activate Pierre’s backpack – three greens and a single beep. "Pierre, how many of the people who wrote those standard procedures actually went into space, or dealt with ghoster combat situations?"            Pierre frowned. "You haven’t told us what you’re taking in there, Sir, if it comes to that."            Zack laughed, wiry eyebrows stretching into grey mesh. "Man’s got a point, boss. Care to share?"            He eyed them both. "No."Pierre hefted his rifle, and shook it in pump action mode to arm it. It hummed softly. "Sir," he said, swallowing, "this is my first real combat situation."Zack spoke as he donned his helmet, muffling his words. "You’re shitting me, right?" Zack shook his head, settling his "fishbowl", as he called it. His voice came through clear on the speakers. "Just try not to shoot me in there, okay? Boss, maybe I should go in alone – seriously."Blake picked up Pierre’s helmet. "Keep your head, Pierre, or you’ll lose it." Pierre donned it, and with a click and a sound like a gulp, it sealed. He noticed how stiffly Pierre stood, how he held the rifle like… like so many men he’d sent into battle who’d never returned. He wanted to go in there first with Zack, but this was about strategy. Most likely scenario was that the first two who entered died. The third one had to be able to react fast, see what they were up against, and finish the job. Best credible scenario was that Kat alone survived, and they stopped the ghoster before it sabotaged the engines – if they lost the FTL drive, they’d all die in any case, drifting in space until everything ran out. He picked up two lanyards and handed them to Zack and Pierre.             "For Plan B, if it’s mobile. Remember, this ship wasn’t built for a man overboard scenario. Either of you go out the window, you’re history, so stay clamped at all times."  Kat cut in from the cockpit; Blake had almost forgotten she’d been monitoring them via intra-vid, listening to everything.            "Captain, telemetry’s set up, just get some light going in there as soon as possible, I can’t see much from up here." "We’ll do what we can. Kat – I want an open four-way com-line during the entire operation. No unnecessary comms."There was a pause. "Understood. Open four-way comms as of now." He pressurised the inner airlock, then spun the wheel to open the hatch. "Good luck." Only Zack nodded acknowledgement. Pierre stepped first into the airlock chamber. As Zack followed, Blake patted him once on the shoulder, and sealed the door behind them. There was a sucking sound, a clunk, then silence. His hand hung onto the airlock wheel. He tried not to think about last time. He didn’t have to. The pit of his stomach felt like it was in a vice. He started thinking instead about Plan C.
*          *          *
Shoulder-to-shoulder inside the airlock chamber, Zack heard Pierre’s ragged breathing across the intercom. Pierre checked the dials. "Fully pressurised inside the compartment." Zack chewed his lip, peering through the small porthole into the darkness beyond. "Time to check on our guest." He opened the inner door to the fourth compartment. As it swung open, the light spilled in from behind them, revealing the outlines of a room ten meters deep crammed with cylinders, boxes, and crates, all strapped down. It looked just like it had done twelve hours ago when he’d checked it over. The lattice of harnesses resembled a giant spider web laid over the contents of the compartment. He stared towards the far wall, behind which the dark matter engines lay, adding to his unease. They each took one pace into the compartment and clipped their lanyard karabiners onto hull eyeholes. Zack’s gaze swept the room, but he didn’t use the flashlight attached to his left wrist. If there was anything in here, he didn’t feel like lighting himself up. Pierre’s rifle sighting beam flashed upward to the escape hatch which was their Plan B – the ghoster-overboard plan, as Kat had christened it. "Zack, I don’t see anything." Pierre took a step forward."Wait." Zack squinted through the semi-darkness towards the crate at the far end of the chamber housing the neutralino detonator. It was one of two, the other used to start the dark matter ignition after Saturn, enabling them to get up enough speed to engage the warp shell. This one was for the return journey. Something was behind the crate. His eyes tracked to the left, knowing from theory and experience that unaided night vision worked best if you looked slightly off target. He saw it. His head recoiled inside his helmet. "Kat," he said, voice taut. "Tell me what you see through the internal cameras" He still hadn’t aimed his flashlight, instead straining his eyes towards the location of the detonator. Her reply came through, rendered grainier than usual by the voice-com transmitter."Not much. I need more light."When Pierre went to shine his flashlight on the crate, Zack gripped his forearm.             "Don’t." He was sure now, though he had a hard time accepting it.Blake’s voice cut in from outside. "Report."Zack let Pierre reply, while he began to think of tactics to outmanoeuvre what he believed was crouching just behind the detonator. He still had his hand on Pierre’s arm, and felt Pierre’s body jerk.            "Sir, it… mon dieu." Pierre’s breathing accelerated, bordering on hyper-ventilation. Then he exhaled deeply. Zack removed his arm. Good – remember your training, because if you don’t we’ll be dead a lot faster.            Pierre’s voice was edgy. "I can see a human head, but… it has no eyes."     Blake didn’t respond. Zack could only imagine how he was reacting; it was Kurana Bay all over again. He couldn’t remember unholstering his pulse pistol, but it was in his hand. He ramped it up to maximum. He spoke in a steady tone. "Don’t move, Pierre. Get ready to fire." He took a deep breath, as he did before any close-quarter battle. His palms sweated inside his gloves. He gripped the pistol harder.
            "Skipper," he said, "it’s a ghoster alright, fully awake. Lock us down, seal us in. We’re going to Plan B."
*         *        *
Kat couldn’t see Blake on her screens. "Captain? Where are you?"Blake re-appeared, suiting up. "Kat, get on the comms. Issue Code Red to Earth – at least they’ll know it was sabotage and not an accident. Fast as you can, then confirm."            Kat cursed as she realised her own rifle was two compartments away. Not that it would help. She took one last look at the silhouetted figures of Zack and Pierre, then shifted position and began typing fast.            She paused, looking at the letters on the screen. Then she hit the button.             flashed up on the screen. Her brow furrowed. Nowwhat? She typed it again, and got the same message.            "Captain, the message; it won’t transmit."            "Slow down, try again."            Pierre cut in. "Kat, wait – don’t try more than twice. Do you hear me?" But she’d just hit Transmita third time. Large bright red letters on the screen said . The screen blanked.She stared at the lifeless screen. She leant back in her chair, allowing her foot to rise up and then stomp down hard on the dead console. "Alician mother-fuckers!"            "Kat, what’s happening?" Blake shouted.            She suddenly felt how small and defenceless they were, hurtling through a pitiless vacuum, light years from help. She bit her lip hard."It’s dead. It said 'Goodbye,’ then shut down. It’s the virus." Please God, tell me this is just another nightmare.             "Kat, listen to me – Zack hotwired an emergency protocol to disengage navigation, propulsion and life support to a secondary sub-processor – press the red plunger on Zack’s console – do it now!"She sprang out of her chair, spotted the plunger, and slammed her hand down on it. "Done!" She knew without that switch, the virus would spread to propulsion and navigation within minutes, and they would disintegrate under obscene torsional forces as soon as they slipped out of their flight envelope."Kat," Blake said. "Salvage as many secondary systems as you can, but keep an eye on the screens, in case the ghoster moves." At first, she didn’t understand – Zack and Pierre would see it if it did anything – but then she remembered the tales of how quickly ghosters could move – and kill. "Understood."                                                                           *          *          *
Blake sealed his helmet, the familiar muffling sound lending him confidence, shutting out extraneous noises, allowing him to concentrate. He peered through the porthole. "Zack. Do you have line of sight?"            Zack’s voice was low but steady. "It’s right behind the detonator, in front of the reserve oxygen cylinders. One miss and we’re all dead."            "The detonator – activated?"            Zack sighed. "Was afraid you’d ask that. I see two red lights, one green. Pierre?"            "There’s only one safeguard left. A final control command to arm it, then a one-minute countdown. The arming control is in front of us. If it goes for it we’ll get a clear shot. We caught it just in time."            Blake leant his gloved hands against the door. He took three measured breaths. He’d trade their remaining oxygen for the slow gun. "Options?"            Zack replied with a snort. "Not many. Plan A, we circle the perimeter. It’ll come out screaming, moving like a bat, and we’ll probably shoot each other in the crossfire, but maybe we’ll hit it enough to stop it. Plan B…" he paused. "Pierre?"            "We blow the hatch. The problem is, ghosters can function for several minutes in a vacuum. If it manages to anchor itself inside the compartment, it will arm the detonator before we can react, and defend it until it blows. We need a Plan C, Sir."             "Skipper, he’s right. All we’ll do is slow this thing down a few seconds. You know they’re practically unkillable without explosives or industrial lasers. We’re in serious danger of becoming another fucking Eden Mission mystery."             Blake was only half-listening. Abruptly he went back to the weapons locker to pick up his Plan C. He secured the bagel-sized explosive charge with pushbutton actuator – a hand-made land-mine – to his chest.