“I know
“We’re going to find out,” Amy says as her feet hit something solid. “We’re here.”
We all jump down beside her. There’s another hatch — we spin it open, and a smaller ladder automatically drops down, stopping at the floor beneath. Amy goes down first, and I follow her.
This is a bridge.
It mirrors the one on the Shipper Level in miniature. The window is smaller, but it still faces the planet. Victria turns her back to the planet, but the rest of us all stand, still stunned speechless by the sight of the massive blue and green orb. It seems so achingly close. The control panel angles under the window, rows of desks behind it. I think about what Shelby told me, how — if all goes well, and if these controls work like the ones on the main Bridge — you can just hit the autopilot button on the front of the control panel, and the ship will land itself.
Propped up on top of the autopilot button is a floppy, already loaded with a mem card.
“The last vid,” Amy says.
“What is it?” Bartie asks, picking up the floppy.
I snatch it from his hands. My eyes question Amy — should we show them?
“All in,” she whispers, and even though I’m not sure what that phrase is about, the meaning is clear.
Everyone crowds around me as I swipe my fingers across the screen. I glance up once at the honeycombed glass window showing the planet, and the video begins.
<<begin video feed>>
“What is this?” Bartie asks, drawing closer.
Victria gasps. Amy puts her arm around her shoulders and squeezes as Orion’s face fills the screen.
He sits on a chair in front of the bridge. I glance up, looking at the real chair, the one in the middle. That’s where Orion sat as he filmed this, the planet cresting over his left shoulder, so bright that it cast Orion in silhouette.
ORION: Oh, Amy. I wish I didn’t have to show you this. I really do. Because… now that you’ve seen the planet, how can I ask that you turn away?
Orion glances behind him at the planet and sighs. Victria sighs too.
ORION: Because that’s what I have to ask you to do. If at all possible — I need you to turn away, lock this door, and never come back.
Amy’s mouth drops open, but no sound comes out.
ORION: Did you think the big secret was that we were here? That the planet is just on the other side of that window?
Orion shakes his head. I notice that Victria, her eyes glued to Orion’s face, shakes her head just barely too, the movement hardly noticeable.
ORION: That’s not the secret.
Orion reaches behind him and pulls out a sheaf of papers.
“This is what he has,” Bartie says, picking up a sheaf of papers from where they were resting on the control panel. The edges are curled and the pages are dusty, but these are the same papers Orion holds on the screen.
Orion clears his throat, then reads, holding the papers up so the camera can show the report.
We all lean over the sheaf of papers Bartie holds, reading along with Orion’s gravelly voice.
Date: 328460
Ship Status: Arrival
Ship Record: Godspeed has arrived at Centauri-Earth 248 days prior to expected planet-landing. Preliminary scans indicate that the planet is life-supporting, with appropriate gravity, air quality with sufficient oxygen levels, and liquid water. However, additional scans have proven that the planet is already inhabited. Not by any creatures we can tell are sentient, but the life-forms seem… aggressive.
Date: 328464
Ship Status: Orbital
Ship Record: We have continued to scan the planet. The life-forms on the surface have been confirmed. Visual probes indicate that the planet is habitable but inhospitable. Our current weapons do not seem a sufficient enough defense against the creatures on the surface.
Date: 328467
Ship Status: Orbital
Ship Record: Crew is restless. It is the opinion of our top statisticians and scientists that we should not fulfill our mission for planet-landing at this point. The surface is too dangerous. Communication with Earth has been severed. We cannot expect aid from other sources, and we cannot defend ourselves outside the ship. We will conduct a vote with the crew, explaining the situation. It is my recommendation that the crew remains on board the ship where it is safe. Our needs are provided for, and the ship’s external engines can be redirected to internal maintenance.
Date: 328518
Ship Status: Orbital
Ship Record: Mutiny. The ship’s crew did not see the logic of staying aboard, despite my protests. There has been significant loss of life. My scientists, however, have developed a method of influencing them to obedience.
Amy and I look up at each other. “This is the Plague, isn’t it?” she asks. “This is where Phydus came from. This — this ‘captain’—he’s the first Eldest.”
I nod.
“Shh,” Bartie snaps.
Date: 328603
Ship Status: Orbital
Ship Record: A way of life has resumed with increasing stability. The crew is once more submissive. We will work on rebuilding our numbers. In the event that communication can be resumed with Earth or aid otherwise received, we can still commence with planet-landing. Until that point, with conservation and careful production, the internal functions of the ship should subsist for countless generations.
Orion sets the papers down on the control panel at the front of the bridge in the exact same spot Bartie found them.
ORION: So, that’s why we can’t land. I’m not a frexing chutz; I get what’s going on here. The Plague Eldest was right to keep us on board the ship. I’ve seen the armory — you’ve seen it too. There are weapons there…
Orion shakes his head in disbelief. My eyes are on Victria.
ORION: Amy, surely you know that those weapons aren’t normal… If the Plague Eldest says that there are monsters on Centauri-Earth that those weapons can’t kill…
He shakes his head again.
ORION: And besides, think about it. Think about those weapons.
Orion leans forward, closer to the camera. All four of us lean in closer too.
ORION: You think those frozens in the cryo chambers are going to use ’em? Frex, no. That’s what we’re here for.
Orion stands up, walks to the window, stares a minute, comes back.
ORION: See this?
Orion picks up the camera and angles it to show ten empty circles on the floor. As one, all four of us look up, over to the far wall and the ten hollow depressions in the floor.
ORION: That’s where the probes were. After all the ones the Plague Eldest sent, every Eldest after that sent down another probe. They’ve all come back with warnings, that we can’t live on Centauri-Earth without a fight. A fight we’ll probably lose. A fight the frozens will make us fight.
“That’s when he decided to kill them,” Amy says. “All the frozens, after I woke up — that’s why he unplugged them. You were getting close to the truth, even if you didn’t realize it, and he was afraid of what they’d do.”
I meet her eyes. “That’s what he told us. That’s what he told us all along. He wasn’t lying.”
Amy scowls. “He was lying about some of it. I don’t care what he says, my father wouldn’t—”
ORION: We ran out of probes a couple of gens ago. I don’t know how long the engines will last now, how
