Across the Stars: Book Three of Seeds of a Fallen Empire

  Knightwood furrowed her brow. “Yes, it was,” her tone persuaded Erin to elaborate.

  “Well, ever since the first jump, I felt the mass of my body almost disappear into energy. In that state, I... was able to observe everywhere on the ship at once, but nothing moves,” she went on hurriedly. “A long time passes, and I retrace the path to my body in the same quick pattern—that is, my awareness returns to one point. Then I feel whole again—matter—and the ship returns to normal.”

  “You mean—” Knightwood stopped.

  “I think my body converts from mass to energy and back to mass again.” Erin said. If someone else had made such a statement, Knightwood would never have believed it possible.

  “Why?” Knightwood asked, her hand pressed against her cheek.

  “I’ve thought about it a lot—but I still don’t know.” Erin said.

  “Hmmm. Maybe it’s some kind of defense mechanism.” Knightwood massaged her forehead with her palm, then dropped her arms to her side and stood up decisively. “Anyway, we’ve got time to sort that out. You’ve got to prepare yourself for tonight when Kansier informs the entire ship about your origins. There will be a lot of questions. They’re going to look to you or answers, for guidance, even if you don’t know where Selesta is taking us or why we’re going there.”

  Erin nodded. She realized in avoiding acknowledging her power all those years, she had been trying to deny her own responsibility in the war. But deep down, she had always known. She had only wanted to cling to the dream on Earth, the simplicity, comfort, and privacy of a life all her own and not controlled by others, swept along by the events set into motion long before she had ever been born.

  She finally understood the meaning of power—it was far too expensive a gift because the responsibility over so many lives had come with it. Realizing that—she knew she would not be able to use it to secure her own happiness. The temptation she had fought died a quick death.

  But as she suppressed her inner demons, another voice continued to call out to her. After all that had happened, she still couldn’t understand.

  She could not feel its desperation.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Scott strode across the near-empty observation deck where Catherine Cresson lay on a lounge panel reading.

  “Catherine, I need to talk to you,” Scott interrupted in a firm voice. He had been debating with himself how to break the news to her for the past several hours; he did care for her, he knew, but not as he should have, not enough to marry her, he realized. With that realization he knew what he had to do, what he ought to do, but that did not make doing the right thing any easier.

  Catherine blinked and looked up, her fingers still clutching the small printscreen.

  “Oh, Scott—I didn’t hear you come in.” She offered pleasantly.

  “Catherine, I—there’s something I need to tell you,” Scott said; Catherine stared intently at him, her eyes revealing her confusion.

  “I have a confession to make,” Scott said resolutely, turning to face her after a moment.

  “Yes?”

  “I won’t lie to you, Catherine. You know you mean a great deal to me, but, I can’t live a lie, either. For a long time now I’ve been denying my true feelings, but I won’t any longer.”

  “What true feelings? What are you trying to say, Scott?”

  “I—don’t love you, Catherine. I’m not sure I ever really did love you—at least not the way you deserve.” He paused, breathing deeply. “I’d like to call off our engagement. It wouldn’t be fair to you, Catherine, or to me. I couldn’t make you happy, not while I’m thinking of someone else.”

  Catherine stood suddenly, then stepped back and glared at him, tears stinging her eyes. She had no intention of listening to anything else. “How can you do this to me?” She hurled furiously, launching the small printscreen at him.

  “I’m truly sorry, Catherine,” he said sincerely, making no attempt to dodge the small projectile that struck him on the arm and fell to the ground with a clattering thud. He understood her anger, had known all along that this would be her reaction, as much as he knew that in time, she would recover from her initial fury. Catherine was not usually an emotional person, but she didn’t take bad news very well.

  “Would you rather be married to me or someone who truly loves you?” Scott went on calmly. “Who loves you more than anything in the world?”

  Catherine paused. “Who says I don’t love you that way?”

  “Your eyes have said it all along.” Scott said frankly. “Come on, Catherine, you know we aren’t right for each other, and you’ll get over me because I’m not really the one for you, the right one who—makes your life complete. We never had that feeling, did we? You know I’m right, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know anything of the kind.”

  “Admit it to yourself if not to me, because I know now it was never there, and I’m not afraid to face up to that fact anymore. Besides that, you know we’ve been drifting for a long time, even before I left for Charon, and things haven’t gotten better even confined aboard ship. It would be wrong for us to marry under the circumstances.”

  “Nonsense,” Catherine protested. “Who ever knows who ‘the right one’ is as you put it? I still loved you and waited all that time that you were away at the front.” She said, shaking her head. “No—you’re doing this because of her, aren’t you?” Catherine accused, her eyes widening, then laughed in a clipped manner. “She’s not even human, Scott!” She hurled in disgust. Scott recoiled slightly; as with most slight gestures, it passed unnoticed. “She’s—a damned alien!”

  Catherine did not know that nothing could prevent him from doing the right thing.

  Scott had been lying to himself for years, thinking it for the best. Yet all the time he had felt like a man who had stood in fear over the edge of a great falls, gazing down upon the water far below.

  When he thought Erin was dying, Scott’s soul had at last taken a plunge headlong into his own fear.

  “I don’t care anymore, if she’s an alien or not.” Scott said, responding to the insult Catherine had thrown. He began to ramble, exploring his own soul, almost oblivious to Catherine’s presence. “She is as close to my heart and mind as any one has ever been—perhaps a being of another time and place, but certainly no stranger.” He shook his head. “I simply love her. She understands me.”

  “Understands you?”

  “I want to quit the struggle of pretending I don’t love her.” Scott explained. “I tried not to surrender. I was denying my true feelings, my buried, secret thoughts. The secret feelings were eating away at my peace of mind.”

  “Why didn’t I see that, then?”

  “Because I wouldn’t let anyone see it. But my feelings had almost worn through that superficial composure we all show. You might even say I was smothering under it, Catherine. So you see, it doesn’t matter to me if her body is alien; we are of the same mind and soul.”

  “Her people killed your family, Scott.” Catherine reminded him, ignoring all he had said.

  “Oh, no, I don’t believe that anymore. But it doesn’t matter, even if it is true. If I held a grudge against her people, I now relinquish it. My hatred for the aliens has dwindled these past few years, and even the discovery of her true self means nothing to me by way of impediment, Kate. I only hope to God that she still loves me after how I treated her—”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I was a fool. I loved her for her mind and who she was on the inside, and I treated her terribly.”

  “Don’t blame me for whatever you did.” Catherine interjected, understanding that he must have said something to Erin once to put her off; Scott laughed.

  “No, I’m not.” He agreed. “I think I did it because I feared that Erin would eventually tire of me and forsake me if I began to love her. And because I was afraid to harm her with my vengeful obsessions, those obsessions you never understood.”

  “Oh yes, your
obsessions.” Catherine said dryly. “Obsessions aren’t constructive, I always told you that. I always said they’d destroy you, if you let them. I always said they were wrong.”

  “Perhaps you were right.” He admitted. “But I am no longer the same man.”

  “Well, I’m glad to hear that you’re over them, even if I don’t necessarily agree with you. When did you suddenly realize all this?”

  “Not suddenly. I thought about it when we left the Earth behind. And when my obsessions against the aliens died, I realized my love for her was still there.”

  “You did?” Catherine said acerbically.

  “Yes, the more so because I began to believe in her loyalty—she stayed true to me.”

  “I don’t understand you when you talk romantically.”

  “No,” he agreed, puzzled by her statement. He—romantic? He had never been accused of that before. “But maybe when you understand what it is to love someone and not be able to live without that person, you’ll see that you and I—”

  “Stop,” Catherine cut him off, shaking her head. “Don’t say anything else.” She looked away, then sighed bitterly. “Consider our engagement broken. I suppose you must really love her, if you still want her, knowing what she is,” she added, with a hint of incredulity. “You haven’t hurt me,” she went on, lifting her chin, masking her pain. It was her pain, and she would not show it to him. Perhaps that had been her mistake all along, never sharing her life with him, she thought. “I hope she rejects you,” she said softly. “Or that she is so unlike us, you can never be with her in any meaningful way physically.”

  “And I only hope in time you’ll forgive me, Catherine. And though it might be hard, I could be celibate for the sake of being with her, Catherine.”

  “For a man like you, you must really love her, or else you’re being dishonest to yourself.”

  * * * * *

  “Is the message from Zhdanov, Knightwood, Dimitriev—or Mathieson?” Colonel Kansier asked, watching his bridge navigator, Lieutenant Erik Ross.

  “Knightwood’s transmitter, sir,” Hans Rheinhardt said quickly, after a moderate silence. Kansier focused his attention on the image forming in the holo-monitor.

  It had been seven weeks since he had made the announcement regarding Erin’s alien ancestry, and there were still some who had not adjusted to the idea and would not speak to her and a rare few who despised her for it, though they made their feelings so well known that Erin had gone to speak to them and had succeeded in abating their hostility towards her. For the most part, the crew had accepted her transformation as openly as the many strange realities they had traversed since leaving their home world behind. Though Erin had learned her true name, Selerael, she insisted upon keeping the same name and rank she had always owned.

  “Where are you, Knightwood?” Kansier wondered, at the same time wondering why Ross hadn’t responded. Though recently Kansier had had reason to doubt his ability to perform his duty. Ross’ concentration had diminished in the last two months, and Kansier, who knew his crew exceedingly well after such a prolonged study, suspected the discovery of Erin’s true identity was the cause.

  Selesta had come to another yellow-white star system surrounded by seven planets, two of them small and rocky, the outer five gas giants. Kansier had hoped that the surface of the second planet, around which the ship now orbited, might be the final destination of their journey. The bioscanners already reported that the planet teemed with life. But the absence of any appreciable land mass raised some doubt as to whether any intelligent life could have emerged there.

  The strange greenish seas surrounded three small islands, one unconnected, and the others joined by a sheet of ice at the planet’s northern pole. Kansier had watched the holomonitor for hours while the scout team shuttle departed for the surface. Waiting for the news was the most difficult part of the mission, as far as he was concerned. In moments of weakness when he allowed the anticipation to get to him, Kansier usually wished he was down there with them.

  Erik Ross had been performing his duties mechanically until, hours after the initial launch of the exploration team shuttles, they had at last received a signal from the surface. Nevertheless, Erik’s ears suddenly perked up to listen.

  “Knightwood reporting in, sir.” The scientist in the image said, standing inside one of the Earth shuttles.

  “Proceed.” Kansier responded.

  “We’ve discovered an under-’water’ city.” Knightwood began frenetically. “Only those green seas are more than we thought. I’ll explain—but first, we’ve got some incredible news to report. The city is inhabited by humanoid creatures! They met our shuttle when it touched down in the water. Erin ‘spoke’ to them to ask where they lived. The planet’s called Nepheria, and the city Quei-lor. She’s been translating for us—seems they think she’s from this ancient Empire, from a planet called Seynorynael. And what’s more, they’re treating her like she’s one of them.” Knightwood laughed at the image in her wrist communicator of Kansier’s confused expression.

  “Now this next part explains the green seas,” she swallowed. “They are from Seynorynael!” she shouted triumphantly. “They were sent here by the intergalactic Council when it was a Federation that met on the planet of Seynorynael. The seas here supported a variety of aquatic life in a way unknown on any other world—the water is actually a kind of oxygenated nutrient fluid. Over the last thirty-three thousand years since the Seynorynaelians first came here, they’ve rapidly evolved beyond needing the breathing apparatus their ancestors wore.”

  “How is that possible?” Kansier demanded.

  “Well, as far as I can tell, their skin has become nearly porous, and certain organs have faded or diminished.” Knightwood replied. “They don’t need to breathe, since their cells are oxygenated by diffusion, and they don’t speak.”

  “Then how—”

  “How can they tell us anything? Well it seems they’re completely telepathic, though Erin says they can only understand intentionally projected thoughts. They can’t ‘read minds’ so to speak; they can only read thoughts. Or actually, they hear each other’s thoughts, almost as though they can actually talk. And, they think in a dialect of Seynorynaelian.”

  “Seynorynaelian?”

  “Yes, sir. Now we know why the aliens we’ve encountered thought we were from the Federation and the Empire. Remember how we couldn’t decide which side Selesta had come from? It turns out those two cultures were one and the same! But the Nepherians have never heard of any place called Orian. They only know that they haven’t heard from the Empire in many generations, and they can no longer create a means of space travel. They were completely dependent upon the Empire ships to take them to other worlds. But that was long ago, and the Nepherians seem happy where they are.”

  “Where are you?” Kansier wondered; Knightwood was in the shuttle, but that could have been taken anywhere. “Is Mathieson still with you?”

  “I’m speaking to you from their city—we can’t survive in their environment without our uniforms, but Erin can.” Knightwood replied.

  “How do you know?”

  “Don’t worry, Colonel, she’s all right, but she insisted on seeing if she could.” Knightwood reassured. “You see, she can’t visit the remnants of the Seynorynaelian fleet that brought them here without removing her uniform—it won’t allow her to submerge deep enough, and there’s no other way of getting to the wreckage. Our shuttle can’t make it. I was afraid for her at first myself, but it seems she can withstand the nutrient fluid, and the tremendous pressure down here—my uniform measured about fifteen atmospheres. If she can survive that, she might be able to withstand—”

  “The vacuum of space,” Kansier perceived, astounded. No human being could withstand space.

  “Of course, only if she doesn’t need to breathe to maintain her life systems.” Knightwood amended. As to the possibility of that, no one yet knew. And all of this meant that Erin was different, more indestructible, tha
n the Orians.

  “And if as you maintained, her skin deflects all forms of violent radiation—gamma, ultraviolet, and so on,” Kansier added. Space was dangerous not only because of the vacuum, but because it contained many lethal cosmic rays. However, Kansier realized it would no longer surprise him to discover that Erin could survive even exposure to those deadly rays. Erin’s people seemed to have been perfectly suited to space exploration, to adapt to any environment. “Well, how long do you think you’ll be down there?” he finally asked.

  “Not much longer.” Knightwood said, unable to calm the excitement in her voice. “The aliens seem to understand we’re in some kind of hurry, and they don’t really want to leave anymore. They’re just disappointed that we don’t know more about what happened to the Empire. Strange—” she tilted her head to the side, pondering. “None of the aliens we’ve met so far know what happened to it. It’s as if all contact from it and evidence that it existed just vanished. Anyway, with any luck Erin will learn more about it. We’ll get back as soon as we can, in case our old friends are still on our tail.”

  “All right then, thanks for the message, Knightwood.” Kansier laughed at Knightwood’s tireless zeal.

  “Signing off.” Knightwood smiled, her eyes narrowed to tiny slits. The communication line broke, leaving him once again staring at the slow rotation of a greenish planet.

  * * * * *

  Erik found Nathalie and Erin in the Great Bay shortly after they returned from the planet Nepheria. The pair stopped abruptly as he approached.

  Erin felt Nathalie stiffen at her side and watched as her face pulled into an expression of disinterest.

  “Nathalie, do you mind giving us a moment alone?” Erik asked, and Nathalie shrugged.

  “I’ll see you later, Erin,” she called, walking calmly to the far corridor. She was not one for showing her feelings to anyone, especially not Erik.

  “Erin, I just want to tell you—it’s taken me a while to realize that I don’t care who you are. You know how I feel, how I’ve always felt about you.” Erik swallowed, his face studiously blank. “I said it once before, back at the UESRC, but I can’t keep holding on. Everyone knows about Cresson and Dimitriev breaking off their engagement. I’ve seen it coming for more than a year—Cresson spent all of her time with Dr. Ponterat in her laboratory and Dimitriev lives on the bridge—it was bound to happen sooner or later.