Eve of Destruction

Back to Diana's Space Cases Fanfic

Click here to e-mail me!

The Christa, 2261, 19:00

“Bova!”

At the sound of his name, the young Uranusian stopped in his tracks and turned to see Suzee walking toward him, looking exasperated. “Are they at it again?”

Bova rolled his eyes. “What are you complaining about? At least your bunkroom’s quiet after lights-out. I’ve barely slept for three nights because of the two of them.” He threw up his hands, seemingly disgusted with Suzee, his bunkmates, and life in general.

“What are they fighting about this time?”

“I think Harlan’s telling Radu that it’s his fault they got sent back to the command post after dinner. The commander said they needed to do some more work to ‘improve their chemistry.’ But seriously, tell me something - would it really matter what they were fighting about?”

Command post

“What are you talking about?” Harlan said, sounding utterly disgusted. “Look, something’s definitely screwed up over there, either in your console or in your head! There’s no way those coordinates could be right - you gave the same set to me when I asked you for them the last time! Look, if we’re gonna have to spend the rest of the night in here, the least you can do is . . . ”

The human hadn’t stopped talking. Radu had just finally tuned him out. He’d heard Bova and Suzee in the corridor, and he knew what they were saying was true; these arguments had been going on for days. Unfortunately, he also knew that there was nothing he could do to correct his friend’s foul mood. He’d overheard the adults talking earlier that week, and had learned that Harlan’s father would have been celebrating his fiftieth birthday in a few days. No wonder he’s been so touchy lately, the young Andromedan thought. I wish there was some way I could just get out of his way for a while . . . But with the positions the two held in the command post, it was impossible for them to avoid contact for long.

“Well?”

Radu suddenly realized that he was supposed to come up with a response. “Huh?”

“Exactly what I’m talking about! I’m trying to have an intelligent discussion with you and you can’t even bother to come down off your throne and listen to me!” Radu forced himself to swallow the comment that sprang into the back of his mind. Unfortunately, he only realized once the other boy continued on that his silence might have given Harlan more ammunition. “Look, I’ve just about had it with this Mr. Nice Guy business, all right? You didn’t even try to fight back! I mean, this act of yours is so see-through - all you’re trying to do is get me to forget that you’re Andromedan. And I’ll tell you something; no matter what you do, no matter how wonderful you act, you’re not going to change what you are. You get it? Nothing is gonna change that!”

Do we have to go through this again? Radu wondered, trying not to let his thoughts show on his face. He knew that he should be more sympathetic to the way Harlan must be feeling, but the fact was that he simply couldn’t relate very well. He had an idea of how his friends felt toward their parents, but he couldn’t even begin to imagine how it would be to lose one. Doesn’t Harlan realize that getting mad at me isn’t going to bring his dad back? I mean, how many times are we going to have this same argument?

He hadn’t even realized he’d spoken out loud until Harlan continued. “How many times are we gonna have this same argument? Until I can get you to admit that all you’re doing is trying to get me to like you by becoming my faithful doormat! Well, let me tell you, buddy; I don’t need a doormat, okay? This act is getting old!”

Radu was reaching his limits. He knew that if Harlan harassed him much more, he’d start to lose control himself - and then things would get ugly. As a way to focus his attention on something other than his crewmate’s outburst, he began something he often did to fill time when he was bored. Almost unconsciously, he let his concentration slip and began “listening in” on some of the different conversations going on throughout the ship. But one quickly caught his attention; a discussion between a pair whose chats he always found fascinating.

“Yes, you are correct - they are arguing again,” Thelma was saying in that peculiar way of hers. “I agree, they do seem to be disagreeing more frequently lately . . . but what do you suggest we do?” The android was talking to someone whose input, at times, would be infinitely more valuable if it could be given to the crew directly rather than having to go through Thelma. The silent partner in this conversation was the Christa itself.

Radu frowned as he realized that he’d inadvertently lost the conversation again. Following a distant discussion was more difficult than the other crew members usually gave him credit for, especially when only half of it was audible! He would have given up, but his curiosity had been piqued - and he’d managed to grasp enough to realize that this particular conversation involved him.

“That is a novel idea,” Thelma was saying now. “I believe that it would solve most of their problems - if they were allowed to see the way things truly happened, it would eliminate many of the causes of their fights. You always do come up with the best ideas, Christa! I will begin the transportation process now.”

What? Radu wondered, narrowing his eyes in confusion. What was she talking about?

Harlan’s alarmed voice abruptly brought the young Andromedan’s attention back to the command post. By the time he was fully focused on the room again, they had become surrounded by a low hum, a sound that resembled some kind of strange machinery starting up. And as the crewmates watched with a mixture of awe and fear, the walls surrounding them began to glow. Brighter, brighter, until both boys were forced to shield their eyes against the brilliant light. Then suddenly, with a flash, the command post was glowing as bright as a star - and when the glare finally faded, the room was empty . . .

????????????

“Harlan, get off of me!”

Another mysterious flash had temporarily blinded the boys as they’d materialized, in a tangle of arms and legs, on the floor of a strange corridor. But once they were able to disengage themselves and get a better look at the place they had landed in, their eyes widened in surprise.

To the casual observer, their new surroundings were quite unspectacular. But to these two, accustomed to the purple veined walls of their own ship, the simple metallic sides of this corridor made it seem as though they had landed on some strange alien world.

“Where are we?” Harlan whispered.

“I - I don’t know,” Radu muttered distractedly, only half paying attention to his friend’s nervous comments.

“This doesn’t look like any place on the Christa . . . N-not that I’m scared or anything.”

Oh, no, you’re not scared. Don’t try to pull that until you can slow your heart down so it doesn’t sound about ready to jump out of your chest, Radu thought, shaking his head at the unbelievable deafness of humans as he worked to screen out Harlan’s pounding heartbeat and rapid breathing.

“L-look,” he said hesitantly, “I know this is going to sound totally crazy - ”

“Oh, wonderful,” Harlan muttered.

“But I think . . . I think I might know what happened to us. Right before we got pulled out of the command post and sent - wherever it is that we got sent, I heard Thelma talking to the Christa. I couldn’t get every word she said, but it was something about showing us the true pattern of events, that if we knew what really happened we wouldn’t have anything to fight about any more. Then she said something about beginning the transportation process - and right after that, everything just got . . . strange. It’s almost as if - as if the Christa itself decided to send us somewhere.”

He could almost see the wheels turning in Harlan’s head as the human racked his brain, trying to think of a snide comment. But his friend’s expression was suddenly forgotten as a sound which had been lingering at the back of his mind leapt to the forefront of his consciousness. A sound that he’d heard a thousand times - in his nightmares.

Long reptilian toenails clacking on the metallic floor as their owner headed toward the boys.

Without warning, Harlan found himself shoved through a nearby door. “What are you doing?” he whispered. “You’re lucky we didn’t just find ourselves on the wrong side of an airlock, or - ” With surprising speed, a hand was clapped over his mouth.

“Sssshhh!” Radu hissed. “Someone’s coming!”

His hand still tight over Harlan’s mouth, Radu peered through the crack in the door and saw, as he’d feared, a Spung heading his way. As the lizard-creature passed them, his breath caught in his throat - but as he continued on down the corridor, Radu felt his heart stop. A few paces behind the Spung, following him meekly with feet shuffling and head down, was a young Andromedan. The boy paused for a moment, looking suspiciously at the door that hid the two terrified crewmates from view, and then, with a shrug, continued walking.

One of us? Here? Radu could feel himself beginning to shake. That can’t be possible! We - we were freed over eleven years ago! But no matter how hard he tried to convince himself that he must have been mistaken, he knew what he’d seen was real. And as his gaze went around the room that they were hiding in - the room behind the door which he’d thought led to an empty storage closet - he noticed something that made a chill run down his spine.

Sensing that whatever danger Radu had been trying to protect him against was past, Harlan turned to his friend. “Now can you tell me what that little panic attack was all about?” He looked curiously at their new quarters. “Okay, and what is this, a closet? What do these people expect to keep in their closets - herds of elephants? I mean, the place is spacious, it’s got great lighting . . . this is nicer than some people get for their first apartment!”

“There was a Spung out there,” Radu broke in, cutting off the human’s nervous rambling.

When he noticed his friend’s worried expression, Harlan grinned affectionately. “Buddy, you can do a lot of stuff, but you couldn’t keep information from someone if your life depended on it! Come on, there is definitely something you’re not telling me. What is it?”

Radu sighed. “You were right. This place isn’t a storage closet - a storage closet wouldn’t have sleeping mats rolled up in the corner.” He shook his head, trying to rid himself of the frightening realization that was still coming to him, reinforced by tiny details in every corner of the room. “Just now, I saw . . . I saw an Andromedan. Following the Spung down the corridor. And - and Harlan, the way he was walking, the way he was dressed . . . that wasn’t our typical uniform, even on the space arks. But I’ve seen outfits like that before. I know I have.”

“So what exactly are you telling me?” Harlan asked, trying to make some sense out of his friend’s panicky monologue. “Do you think that this guy heard us? Do you think he’s some kind of traitor who’s going to report us to that Spung he was with and that we’re both in some major trouble?”

“Yeah . . . well, no. Yeah, we’re in big trouble, but no, I don’t think he’s going to report us.” Radu knew the perplexed look that was forming in his friend’s eyes without even having to look. “If he was going to report us, he’d have done it when they first passed. If he did it now, we’d be captured, but all he would be getting himself was punishment for withholding information.”

“What? Look, Radu, your explanation is just getting me more confused. In, like, twenty-five words or less, where are we?”

“You mean when are we.”

“Uhh, okay,” Harlan said in a mystified voice. “I’ll bite. When are we?”

“We’re in the slave quarters of a Spung base. In the middle of the Spung-Andromedan war.”

Spung base, 2250, 19:15

“Okay, are you ready to do this?”

Radu almost had to laugh at his friend’s expression. Although Harlan’s question expressed concern that the Andromedan wasn’t sure about the plan they’d worked out, the look on his face clearly stated that he would much rather have stayed in the slave quarters. Both crewmates knew that wasn’t an option, though - the room’s inhabitants could return at any time.

“Remember,” Harlan continued, “you’re just making a routine prisoner transfer. All we’re trying to do is find a place where we can plan without having to worry about someone eavesdropping. Don’t talk to anyone unless you have to, all right? We want to be very low-profile here.”

Radu nodded distractedly, forcing himself to forget his thoughts about the absurdity of a human trying to find a place in a building full of Andromedans where he could speak without being overheard. “Yeah, I think I know what to do. Are you ready?”

Harlan nodded, shut his eyes, and stuck out his wrists. Taking them in a firm grip - and mentally brushing away his surprise at the fact that some of the useless war details he’d been taught in school were actually proving to be useful - Radu opened the door and stepped out into the hallway.

Okay, remember, stay calm, he told himself. You’re just a guard, taking a prisoner from one part of the prison block to another. He breathed a silent sigh of relief that he already had one point in his favor; the fact that the Spung relied on their soldiers’ strength rather than handcuffs to control prisoners during transfers. Restraining gear wasn’t exactly a standard item in Starcademy cadet survival packs.

As they began walking down the corridor, Radu suddenly realized that he had no idea which direction the prison block was! If anyone asked where he was going, he’d just have to stick with the plan, hope he was heading in the right direction - and be ready for the consequences if he wasn’t.

No sooner had he forced that train of thought out of his mind than he heard an authoritative voice say, “Hold it right there!”

He came to a halt - not a moment too soon, it seemed, as he was approached by a tall, menacing-looking Andromedan female. Closer inspection of her uniform revealed a red band on her arm - and when he noticed it, Radu had to fight to keep down the contents of his stomach.

The Andromedan word for them was Narya, but each language had its own, just as each conflict was invariably filled with these creatures. They were collaborators. Double-dealers. Willing to turn in their own people if it would get them a bit of favor and the promise that they could live a few more weeks in safety. In Radu’s culture, based on the principles of unity and brotherhood, these people were despised to the extent of exile. Their quarters were separate from the regular servants - they had to be kept separate, or they would have been murdered in their sleep. After the war, although some had elected to stay with the Spung, the majority had tried - unsuccessfully - to be accepted back into their old communities. They had become outcasts of the worst variety, the ones that were deemed no longer acceptable for community life. Eventually, many had ended up killing themselves. But none of that has happened yet, he reminded himself. Remember, she still has the power. Ignoring her could have the same consequences as ignoring a direct order from Warlord Shank himself. Steeling himself, he turned to face her.

“Y-yes?” he asked. “What is it?”

“Where are you taking this human?” she said briskly.

“Uh . . . prisoner transfer,” Radu stammered, trying desperately to piece together the proper phrasing of such a statement. “From - from block 1138.”

“I was not notified,” the female said imperiously. “And at any rate, a child like you should not be making prisoner transfers. Give me the human - I will see that it reaches its proper destination!” Before Radu could react, she’d snatched Harlan away from him. She was about to turn and walk away, but suddenly gave him a second look as something seemed to catch her eye. “May I ask a question?” she said with a suspicious look.

Trying not to let his internal turmoil show on his face, he cautiously nodded.

“Why are you dressed in the uniform of the United Populated Planet scum we are fighting?”

Radu looked down at himself and felt his heart sink into his stomach as he realized that he was indeed in his Starcademy jumpsuit - an exact replica of the uniform the STARDOGS wore on the battlefield. “Uhh . . . well . . . ” he stuttered, groping for a response, “w-when I was out in the fighting earlier today, my own uniform was . . . was . . . torn. I needed a suitable outfit to replace it, and this one was all that was available.”

Although she still looked suspicious, the female stepped aside to let Radu pass, pulling Harlan roughly to the side of the corridor alongside her. “You should not be wearing that filth inside our territory. Go to your quarters and change.” When he didn’t move, she glared at him. “Immediately!”

Spung prison block, 2250, 19:30

“Yeah, same to you, pal!” Harlan yelled as the cell door clanged shut behind him. When he turned, he saw that his new home already had an occupant - a delicate-looking Saturnian who was staring at him with wide eyes. “What’s the big deal?” Harlan asked, looking perplexed.

“I can’t believe you just did that,” the other boy said, gazing at him as though he were some kind of hero. “I would never be able to stand up to them that way!” Abruptly, he stopped and began clearing his throat, as though the noise would cover the fact that he’d just been acting like some kind of pathetic fan club president. “Uhh . . . could we start over?”

“Yeah, let’s.”

“Okay - I’m Robian. What’s your name?”

“Harlan. Harlan Band. Hey, is there some kind of reason you’re still staring at me?”

Robian looked embarrassed. “Well, uh, don’t take this the wrong way, but . . . you enlisted right from Starcademy too, didn’t you?” At the human’s perplexed expression, he added quickly, “I’m just asking because you look awfully young to have graduated and have gotten all the way here without getting caught. I thought sure I was the only one out here - most of the students that drop out never make it past the trap the Spung set up in Jupiter’s atmosphere.”

What is this kid talking about? Harlan wondered. In a flash, it came to him. He remembered his dad talking about this back when the war had first started. Since the Starcademy had been running short on teachers due to the fighting, the students had a choice of two options; they could either complete the required courses to graduate, or, for equal credit, they could enlist in one of the platoons. Everyone who returned after the war was finished was given a rank equal to the new officers who had just graduated.

“Uh . . . yeah. Yeah, I got out of Starcademy to enlist,” Harlan said quickly. “My mom . . . uh, that is, my parents, didn’t want me to, but I figure, hey, I’m eighteen. By my planet’s laws, I’m an adult. I’m old enough to make my own decisions.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” the Saturnian said. “But my dad was determined that I was not going. His father had been involved in the colonization of the Sol system - Dad grew up on those stories about how war had destroyed our home planet in Rigel. But I didn’t believe him. And the night of my sixteenth birthday, I snuck out to enlist.” As though it was too much to handle, his face suddenly began to crumble. “I haven’t even been in here for a month yet, and I can already tell you that he was right. Fighting’s definitely not as glamorous as it looks in the holotapes.”

“Hey, Robian! Have you heard the latest news?” Both heads turned to look at an older Saturnian, a young female who looked about equal to a human in her mid-twenties. “You know that there’s supposed to be a temp STARDOG camp rigged up a few miles away, right?”

“Yeah . . . ” Robian said cautiously.

“Well, I just heard that they’re planning a prison break - they’re going to be busting us out of here! Tonight!”

“Yeah, right.”

After the older girl turned away, disappointed that the boys hadn’t received her news with more enthusiasm, Harlan turned to his cell-mate. “What do you mean, yeah, right?”

“Look. I’ve been here a lot longer than you, okay? Trust me on this one. There’s always some rumor around here. Either someone’s got a rebellion plan and they’re going to bust us all out, or the Spung have been defeated, they’re on their way out of the system and the base will be deserted within a week. The details change all the time. This time around, the story’s that the STARDOGS are coming in to bust us out. But I’ll tell you something, Harlan Band: Unless you hear it from the Spung warlord himself, there a chance of maybe one in a million that ‘the latest news’ has an ounce of truth in it.”

Click here for Part 2 of Eve of Destruction