Voidstalkers Chapter Three

Three

     In the dark, Colby’s head throbbed. His mouth was sickly and dry, tongue swollen, and the same pain radiated from his skull down through his limbs, lancing throughout his body as he struggled conscious. He couldn’t see. There was no light where he was. It took him some time to realise that it was dark because his eyes were closed tight. Groggily, he fluttered them open and looked up.
     There was a ceiling above him, low and made from some dark metal that was ribbed in wide corrugations. At first, he winced at the brightness of the light emitted from small yet powerful circular nodes lining the edges of the roof, but his eyes adjusted slowly and after a time he lifted his aching head and sat up onto his elbows where he lay. The huge black metal man was towering over him. Sitting, yet still ominously huge and encased in the hard metal planes of its body. The reflective, eyeless lens of its face seemed to glare down at him. With a start, Colby scrabbled backwards on all fours, but collided solidly with an unseen wall behind. The metal man didn’t move. Rubbing the back of his head, Colby looked around again and then back at the strange thing leaning over him, sitting on what looked like a rounded metal boxy crate.
     “W-where am I? What are you?” He stuttered weakly.
     His voice sounded high and shrill with panic, but he didn’t care. He was scared. The dull dark steel beneath his hands was cold and hard, unforgiving. Like the unblinking stare of the thing that watched him. Slowly and deliberately the machine raised up a hand to its great armoured head and gripped under its chin. There was a low whine of something mechanical. Colby watched in disbelief as it seemingly began to pull its own head free. Until rolls of long, dark hair streaked with grey fountained out from around the base of the head, and a grizzled, unshaved and salt-and-pepper bearded throat then chin was exposed beneath. The imposing figure finished removing the beetle-black shell encasing its head. It was a helmet. Revealed beneath was the head of an aged, worn man, bearded and with greying shoulder-length hair to match. His features were hard and fierce, angular and sharp like that of his armour, and lined with years. They didn’t seem like smile lines like his Aunt had.
     The stranger had a hard, straight nose crossed with a long pale scar slanting from left eye to right cheek, faded with time. His eyes were steely grey and iron-hard, boring into Colby where he lay, quaking. Around the corners of which ran minute slivers of silvery metal, as though they were apart of the skull beneath. For a few moments he sat like that, placing the helmet next to himself on the edge of the metal crate upon which he sat. Then he spoke in that terrible, deep gravelly voice, the same that had boomed from the helmet, but now plain and un-mechanical.
     “Colby Harper.” Was all he said. His voice was harsh, gruff.
     From where he lay Colby jumped. “Y-yes?” he replied nervously. It seemed like he was in trouble for something though he couldn’t imagine what. This place and the man were strange, and terrifying. The man sat back, reclining slightly as the intensity of his stare decreased slightly.
     “You are safe now, for a time. I will answer your questions, because I know doing so will make you more compliant. Make no attempt at violence. You are quite small, and I’d rather not have to subdue you again.”
     Colby raised a hand to his aching head and rubbed at it experimentally. The coolness seeped into his hand from the cold floor helped, a little.
     “Local electrical neural discharge. The effects will wear off shortly.” Said the man unapologetically, observing him.
     “I am Aurion. That is all you need know for now. You are currently aboard the cargo bay of my ship, the Obsidian.”
     Colby looked around himself, confused. Ships were made of wood not metal, and they sailed upon the ocean or rivers and lakes, if the water was big enough. He wondered if this Aurion was then the captain.
     “What were those things that attacked us? The Chupacabras?” He asked.
     “I do not know this…Chupa-cabraas.” The fierce man seemed to glower at the admission. “Thennculi, or Warpers as they’re more commonly known. Savage things, not very bright. Something in the quantum structure of their genetic makeup allows them to jump through subspace for an instant. Hard to track and dangerous in numbers. Unless you have exotic energy visualisers.” He reached down and tapped the helmet sitting next to him.
     “Don’t like using ranged weapons, but their teeth are mono-bladed. They can bite through just about anything. Except for energy shielding.”
     “Oh.” Said Colby. He didn’t understand a word the man called Aurion had just said, but he pretended like he did. Mostly out of fear.
     He looked around at the metal hull of the ship again.
     “Are we still at port? I can’t feel the ocean.”
     This time the large man actually managed to look somewhat puzzled at the same time as fierce.
    “The ocean? No, we’re not at sea. Not on one of yours, by any means. We’re in the void.”
     It was Colby’s turn to look confused. The boys face furrowed. “What’s the void?” He asked.
      Aurion’s face darkened in annoyance, as if he were asking why water was wet or why birds swam the sky instead of the ocean. There was a minute flash of disbelief in the older man’s grey eyes. “Perhaps your people aren’t… there yet.” He muttered before continuing on.
     “The void goes by many names. The endless night. The abyss. Some call it Space, the empty area between things. It is the nothing, the distance between, the lack of matter amidst where worlds, star systems, and galaxies themselves reside. There is no air, no heat, seemingly not very much light though it is constantly bathed in radiation. It is like an ocean, you could say. But in all directions, and between the stars.”
     Colbys eyes were wide with wonder, fear and apprehension temporarily forgotten. “Between the stars? You mean we’re in Heaven?”
     “I have not heard of this ‘Haven’ before. Perhaps another name to add to the list, but you understand all the same.”
     “Heaven.” Corrected Colby. “You know, in the sky where God lives. Where people go when they die, if they’ve been good… and if they go to Sunday school.”
     Aurion raised an eyebrow. “In the sky, perhaps. But you and I are very much alive. As for Gods, that is not for me to say. There are many queer things in the Universe, many who claim to be such. In the end, it makes no difference. We’ll all meet our own, after we’re done.”
     With a slight mechanical whine the large imposing man clad in the angular black Armor rose from his seat, collecting the discarded helmet in one hand.
     “We have talked enough. We have nearly arrived. Come, you do not seem particularly dangerous. And if you do not attempt escape…” The hit of unvoiced threat hung in the air.
     Without waiting for the boy still sprawled on the floor to reply, Aurion strode to the rear of the room opposite, where a large section of the wall seemed to slide right with a hiss, disappearing, opening a large portal through to the rest of the ship. Colby hurriedly scrambled up to follow. What had he said about escaping?
     Ahead of him the armoured man ducked through the doorway and with heavy thudding steps strode on through, presumably deeper into the rest of the strange vessel. Colby followed suit, pausing briefly to examine the recess in the wall where the door panel had mysteriously vanished into, perplexed.
     The adjoining room was a slightly wider chamber with the same ribbed metal ceiling and flat floor, cold and hard. There was much more to it than the bare cargo hold, however, as the entire right-hand wall was given over to long shelving and closed cabinets of the same dark alloy the rest of the ship seemed made from. There was a low, grey padded bed with a tilted headrest jutting unsupported from the wall directly near the door Colby exited. Above the bed long shiny metal arms on hinged joints hovered, the ends of each all a different blade, circular saw, pincer, or other such instrument. He shivered, though it was detectably warm inside the new room. The contraption looked like a torture device. Not that he’d ever seen one.
     Upon the far wall, opposite the bed was a large cylinder wider than even the man called Aurion was broad in the shoulder. It was a different metal to the rest of the ship, a solid gunmetal grey with a high sheen than he could see his distorted refection in as he drew nearer. There was a square flat panel set in it, with a multitude of glowing yellow squares on them in a grid. As he watched, one of them blinked red.
     The left wall was almost entirely given over to another large aperture, which remained closed as the two passed. As if sensing the boys gaze behind him, Aurion suddenly barked: “Primary airlock. Don’t bother. Biometric.” And kept walking, as if that were that.
     The next room was a lot shorter, and a lot narrower. It was more of a glorified hallway though along the right wall at calf height there was a wide bed recessed into the wall, covered in tousled soft grey linens and a singular long lump at one end for a pillow. The other wall was entirely given over to more panels with deep grooves in-between which made Colby think they were more cabinets, though there were no handles. Midway between down the hall on the same side was a rectangular space sunk into the wall, half of which held an oval basin-like protuberance and the other which was floored with an inset rectangle and a grilled drain at the bottom. It took him a moment and finding the sieve-like showerhead above to realise that it was an extremely compact bathroom. Was this where the metal man lived? Like the Captain’s Quarters?
     Colby stepped through the next sliding portal-door and expected the rest of the ship to open up before him, long galleys and decks underway with others aboard, maybe encased in the same strange outfit as the man who’d saved him. He was puzzled then when they came out into a short space fronted by two metal-backed curving armchairs, each held aloft by a thick arm of yet the same substance reaching from each wall to support the bowl-like frame. In front of the two chairs was a blank, sloping wall, sheer and unblemished, darkly matte in colour in that way the rest of the ships structure was. Aurion strode up to the rightmost chair and laid a hand on its shoulder, looking back at the bewildered Colby. Where was the rest of the ship? The crew?
     “We’re in subspace.” He growled.
     “In a moment, we’ll drop out in-system to Centauri Gate, where we’ll make a larger jump. When we do, the ship’s visual sensors will come on-line, and then you’ll see it.”
     Colby was tired of all the riddles, all the made-up words his host seemed to be using. “Subspace? A what-gate?” he asked exasperatedly.
     Aurion frowned.
     “Subspace is the plane next to realspace where the space-time manifold is contracted. The Obsidian is equipped with a decent subspace drive, allowing it to tunnel into this plane and traverse it, achieving greater distances over less time than possible in realspace. Faster-than-light travel, as no such thing is possible in realspace, especially not for a ship. But Its speed and distance is limited by power.”
     Aurion turned back to the front of the ship to survey the sheer blank wall again, almost expectantly if his gruff exterior could allow such.
    “To get somewhere faster through the sub-plane you need a lot of energy to force the spatiotemporal contraction tighter. Hence the gates. There are many throughout the galaxy, some owned by local inter-solar governments, some by galactic corporations or privateers who charge tariff for their use. Massive constructs capable of producing a large amount of energy for bigger jumps between two fixed points �" further than a single ship by itself could manage. Centauri Gate is the closest to your home system, Sol, and will take us on to our next destination. From there we will travel to the other gates, and so-on.”
     Colby took a hesitant step back. Through the garble of nonsense, the man was speaking, something had rung through true and clear. Had he said travel onwards to their next destination?
     Quite suddenly, the blank metal of the wall to the front of the ship blinked and was covered by a sheet of blackness that appeared from thin air.
     “We are here.” Said Aurion.
     It was pitch-black still for a few moments, until in an explosion of light a trillion points of luminescence coated the screen in a wide arc of brilliant colour dominated by a huge, swirling ball of what looked like liquid fire confined to a sphere. The surface of the thing rippled and flared in bright cirrus tails of fire and light, spasming out weakly into the great blackness around, tainted with the sporadic pinpricks of blue-white. Just below the great fireball was a brightly illuminated ring, the inward edge of which flared blue with a deeper black centre than even the gaps between the stars all around. That’s what they were, Colby realised with a start. Stars. Just like in the night sky on a clear day, but many, many more than he’d ever seen before.
     Trillions upon trillions of them back-lit the scene of the swirling golden ball of light and heat.
     “W-what is that?” He asked, pointing at the thing. Steadily, slowly, the glowing ring was growing larger. So too was the raging sphere ahead. His perception changed, and with a sense of dread he realised that it was because they were getting closer.
     “That is the star of the Centauri system. The gate is just there.” He pointed a black steel gauntleted finger at the growing ring.
     “It’s powered by quantum tethers latched into the cornea of the sun itself, which is one of the more powerful �" and therefore efficient �" methods to run a jump gate. It should cut down our journey time.”
     Colby’s face was stricken. He had no desire to get nearer to that monstrous-looking thing, yet they drifted closer still.
    “Mister Aurion, Sir, I really appreciate all you did for me with those Chupacabra-warper things, but um. I need to be getting back now.” Colby took another step backwards.
    From where he stood Aurion’s head pivoted and he fixed Colby with an iron-hard stare. He tried to take another step back, this time involuntarily. His back met the hard plane of the door behind him, though he hadn’t heard it close. He began to get scared again.
     “I cannot allow you to leave. Not until the contract is completed.”
     There was a terrible cast to his eyes, a shadow crossing his face though the room remained brightly lit.
     Panic started to rise in Colby’s chest. He didn’t know where in the world he was, if he was still in the world he knew. He didn’t know how to get back to the farm. To his Aunt Gracie. He was scared, as much of the idea of being so horribly lost as he was becoming of the stranger who’d taken him aboard the queer ship.
    “Why not? You have to! I want to go home! I’ve had enough now. Thank you for saving me from the monsters mister, but I really, really have to get home. Aunt Gracie will be missing me...” The last came out as a squeak, barely audible as he shrunk inwards on himself before the imposing man.
     Aurion just stood there, watching as he babbled.
     “I will explain. You are a contract, Colby Harper. A very, very important one. My task is to collect you safely and deliver you to a place across the galaxy, unharmed. Un-harmed. Let me be very clear that I will not, nor let anyone-or thing-else harm you, if I can.”
     He removed his hand from the metal back of the chair and strode the few steps over to the boy, who pressed up back against the sealed portal behind. With a quiet whirr of mechanical noise, Aurion sank down to one knee before Colby, though he still towered head and shoulders above the cowering boy. He put his right metal hand behind his waist and from there drew forth a strange medallion-like object.
     It was a black, thickly encircled metal letter V, round and shiny. It reminded Colby of the Lawman’s star he’d seen just yesterday at the train station on the chest of the Deputy, but this one was sleek and seamless. He stared at it.
     “This is what I am.” Said Aurion in a low voice. “There are many like me, though some would consider us few. We complete Contracts. Courier. Assassin. Bounty hunter. Saboteur. Once taken, a contract is absolute. Unending, until we yield it to another, or we die. By this code we are known. There are many organisations like it, though is simply one of the more… exclusive. We are called Voidstalkers.”
     Carefully, he replaced the small metal disk back from where he’d extracted it, and stared into Colby’s eyes with twin emotionless pools of grey.
     “Earth, is what you’d call a backwater. Just another seeded world, protected by Sanctuary law until it matures. Centauri Gate, however, is a majour junction for this sector. I would prefer to leave you aboard, but I cannot risk you unattended in such a place. So. You will come with me, you will keep in my sight. And you will. Not. Run. Or you will spend the rest of this journey unconscious, in a very small box. Is that what you want?”

     Colby was silent and trembling for a long time. He wanted to cry, but he held it back, barely. Finally, in silence he nodded.
     “No.” He whispered.
     The great metal man loomed there for a time, face mere inches from Colbys, eyes boring a hole through his skull. Finally, he reclined back and stood again.
     “We understand each other. Now, we need to make our approach to the station. There will be a registry and a toll to pay. We’ll be exposed so I want to get it over and done with as soon as possible.”
     With that he turned and strode to place himself in the rightmost seat suspended from the wall on its thick metal appendage. Slowly, Colby plodded over to take a seat at the other, hauling himself up onto its padded grey cushioning and worming around for a look at the magic screen pouring imagery through to them from what he assumed was outside. His mind was fraught with turmoil, but he kept silent.
     A bright arc of liquid metal jetted out in front of Aurion as he raised his hands before him, solidifying just as his strange axe had when fighting the Warpers. This coalesced into a wide panel grooved with many concentric circles and long lines that reminded Colby of the pressure gauges he’d seen once lining the cabin of a steam engine his Uncle had showed him the inside of when visiting town.
     The huge ball of contained inferno had gotten even closer, filling the screen in a brilliant hemisphere as the ring below too grew in size. It was now massive, and as they drew ever nearer details began to spring out in sharp shadowy contrast in the searing white light of the nearby star. The ring of the circle was perfectly round, but from its edges extended long parallel petals, each split by a gap of empty space �" the surfaces of which glowed intermittently with dots and squares of light, some green and some white. Upon closer inspection tiny dots of many different shapes and sizes where swirling around the great central circle and the petals themselves, whizzing to and fro like insects atop a pond in summer.
     “Colby Harper. Welcome to Centauri Gate.” Growled the man from his right.