30 October, 2167. Fourth planet of the COROT-7 system.
The Tesla’s galley felt cool to Rimes’s freshly showered skin, the plastic bench of the table he sat at even cooler. After so many hours crammed into the same uniform and environmental suit, running through the desert, the scent of soap on his skin was a glorious change. He felt human again and greatly revitalized. Even the uncertainty about his decisions had started to fade a little.
He took a sip from one of the ship’s mugs—white, plastic, clean. The coffee’s aroma was sharp, and it stayed with him along with the taste—pleasantly bitter and earthy. He ran a finger across his tender lips; they were healing. Slowly.
Andrea stared at him over the rim of a perfect twin to his mug. She seemed the same as before: a predator watching her prey. Watanabe sat to Andrea’s left, Sung to Rimes’s right. They were focused on a display built into the tabletop, where the recovered security camera videos were playing.
“So those were the…pilots?” Watanabe asked. “I cannot understand why they would have come all the way to the Tesla just to take the reactor apart.”
Sung rubbed at his eyes, then he reversed the video until the pilots were visible again, standing in the cargo bay, reactor components in their hands. “I don’t think the question is why, it’s how.” Sung froze the video and framed the face of one of the pilots. The pilot’s eyes were glazed, unfocused. “See? They’re sleepwalking.”
Watanabe restarted the video, watching it closely. “Drugs, perhaps? They seem organized in some ways. They are working in that same area. They are separating the components with care.”
Andrea watched the video for a moment. Cleaned up, with most of her bruising healed, her exotic, almost alien beauty was magnetic. Her amber eyes reflected concern.
Rimes wondered what could cause her such concern, then he recalled what they’d just talked about: it had been two hours and Meyers and Kershaw hadn’t returned.
The video drew Rimes’s eyes, and he heard Sung repeat the word: sleepwalking.
I let them go out there. Am I sleepwalking and I don’t even realize it?
Sung drilled in closer on the pilots’ glazed eyes.
Are we all sleepwalking?
Sung reversed the video to the point where the pilots entered the cargo bay, slowing it when one of the pilots came into view carrying a fairly large and possibly shielded container. “What about the fuel?”
Rimes shook off the strange malaise and ran the video backward and forward. There was a gap in the recording after the container showed up. When the video resumed, the container was nowhere to be seen.
“We can organize a search.” Rimes knew they wouldn’t find the container. Images of the crater played through his mind. The fuel was in the crater, along with the Tesla’s crew and the Commandos. And the pilots. And Meyers and Kershaw. “When we searched the forward hold, we didn’t see anything but food, medicine, and spares, but we didn’t check every crate.”
Sung looked at Watanabe. “We could check the quarters. Maybe Meyers overlooked it when he checked out the reactor? We could check there too. And Sheila can help Munoz and Theroux with the cargo hold.”
Andrea’s eyes narrowed. “What about the two you sent out to the crater? You’re all acting like they don’t even exist anymore, like they didn’t go off alone.”
Watanabe stared at the video, ashamed or hypnotized; it was impossible to tell. “Maybe—”
Andrea glared at Watanabe. “You’ve seen the look in the pilots’ eyes. They weren’t like that in the earlier videos. Something changed them. And now something might be changing you.” She looked at Rimes again. “It might be affecting us. You said you were worried we were already influenced. Now you act like it was nothing?”
Sung exchanged a nervous glance with Watanabe. “How do you mean?”
Rimes chewed his bottom lip, wincing at the sharp pain when it cracked and salty blood trickled into his mouth. “She means I okayed Meyers and Kershaw going to the crater. I realized it was questionable at the time, but I approved it anyway. She’s right. It could be a sign of outside influence. Looking at the faces we’ve seen so far, we should be worried. We can’t just stay sealed up in the Tesla now. We don’t have a radio until we repair the antenna mast. How long before the genies find us? A day? Two? Let’s assume we get the radio operational. If Meyers and Kershaw don’t show up before the genies, we’ll be forced to seal them outside.”
Sung blinked nervously. “So what are you proposing, Captain?”
“We go looking for Meyers and Kershaw as a group. They’re out there, possibly down in the crater already. I told Meyers to go straight to the crater’s edge and back, but if there’s something affecting us, influencing our minds, he may not have realized he was disobeying orders.”
They quietly sat for several uncomfortable seconds, eyes darting nervously. Watanabe looked at Sung for support. He gave a subtle nod and moved his right hand a few centimeters closer to hers. Andrea watched the interplay, eyebrows raised, apparently intrigued by the fragile and complex nature of human emotional dynamics.
“Captain Rimes,” Watanabe finally managed, almost breathless. “Corporal Sung and I have noticed changes as well. In Meyers and Kershaw. After we came aboard, they both seemed distracted…undisciplined.”
Sung let out a deep, gruff sound in agreement. “Impulsive, I think. I noticed it while Kershaw searched the quarters. He simply seemed to lose his edge. He had his weapon down, you know? And, well, it was like he didn’t think there was any sort of threat. It was really odd. I didn’t think much about it at the time. You know how a soldier can get, that sense of invincibility after surviving a deadly engagement and all.”
Watanabe relaxed slightly. “Sergeant Meyers, when he was checking the systems out, he completely ignored several things. I had to remind him to contact the Valdez. When the call failed, he thought nothing of it. I had to run the diagnostics when I heard him talking with you. It did not seem like him at all. Before, he was thorough.”
Rimes clenched his hands into tight fists. “They’re in serious trouble. I know it. And it’s my fault. I think we’re all probably in trouble. Whatever it is that’s influencing us, it’s probably affecting each of us in different ways.”
“But that means your decision to go looking for them…is that truly your decision?” Watanabe’s voice was subdued, but she locked eyes with Rimes. “How can we know it is you?”
“I’m asking myself that same question.” Rimes opened his fists and relaxed his hands. “It would be my inclination to protect my team, so that seems consistent. I wouldn’t want us trapped in here with no way to contact the Valdez. That seems consistent too. But I’m having a hard time with how I got us to this point in the first place. So your concerns are well-founded.”
Sung and Watanabe seemed satisfied. Their hands crept closer together. They leaned nearer to each other.
Rimes pointed at the two of them. “I think I should point out, though, that you should be asking yourselves the same questions.”
Andrea’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t believe I’ve been affected.”
Sung and Watanabe, hands now clasped, nodded in enthusiastic support. “She’s right, Captain.” Sung spoke so quickly his words jumbled together. “I think some of us have been unaffected so far.”
Rimes snorted, a soft sound that echoed in the galley. Sung was a small man, especially compared to the Commandos, and he wasn’t particularly good-looking: soft-featured, small-eyed, narrow-mouthed. He wasn’t good enough for Watanabe. He couldn’t protect her. He—
Rimes shook his head until the thoughts that weren’t his were gone. “I guess it’s possible you haven’t been affected, but I want you to keep your minds open to the possibility you have been.” He pointed at Sung and Watanabe’s hands. “Would you normally be holding the lieutenant’s hand, Corporal? Lieutenant, would you normally be willing to make such an open display even if you had no concern for the implications of fraternization?”
Watanabe looked down at her hand, suddenly surprised. She pulled it away from Sung’s hand and examined it with detached curiosity. For his part, Sung closed his own hand. His eyes filled with pain at Watanabe’s rejection.
“What makes you think I’ve changed?” Andrea demanded. “I was the one who saw the changes in you first.”
“You were. And you turned those changes—or the belief in those changes—into a weapon.” And I’m not even going to mention the forward hold. What were your creators thinking when they crafted you? Hunter? Some sort of pleasure provider? Maybe both? “You never spoke to the others before we came to this ship. Now you’ve taken the opportunity to plant the seeds of doubt not just in my mind but in theirs.”
Andrea leaned forward, her lips pulled back slightly. “It isn’t planting the seeds of doubt. You’ve made questionable decisions. You’re in command. Everything you do impacts everyone else, even me. You have a responsibility.”
“No denying that. And every time someone has a reason to question my decisions, you wear down our effectiveness as a unit. Maybe I did the wrong thing letting Meyers and Kershaw go, maybe I didn’t. I can’t honestly say right now. But you have to admit, getting the others to doubt my ability to command has advantages for you. When the genies arrive—and we know they will—if we’re riddled with doubt and at odds with each other, isn’t it obvious who benefits?”
Fury leapt into Andrea’s eyes, then was gone. She leaned back in her chair. “You certainly haven’t lost your ability to strategize.”
“Okay, I think we can agree this is affecting us all to some degree.” Rimes saw the acceptance on their faces. “So, we’re up against time. We need to find Meyers and Kershaw and either get them back to the ship or figure a way to escape the genies and this…” He rubbed at his forehead, frustrated. “Influence.” Whatever it is, it’s not doing just one thing. It’s wearing down inhibitions, clouding judgment, and weakening confidence. Mental acuity, discipline.
Andrea bit her lip. “You have a plan?”
I just told her. Or did I? “We head for the crater. If we find Meyers and Kershaw, we collect them and circle the crater to the opposite side and go until we’re out of this dead zone. Let’s assume the crater is the center. We should be out of the worst of it in a day. Once we’re able to use our BASes again, we circle back to 332 and wait for the Valdez.”
“What if the crater is not the center?” Watanabe blinked uncertainly.
“We’re fully replenished and fairly well-rested. We can go a long time if we don’t have to push ourselves too hard. If I’m wrong, and this dead zone stretches on for hundreds of kilometers…“ Rimes winced. “Well, I’ll be spared a court martial, at least.”
Sung, looked up from his hand. “Why do you think the crater is the center, Captain?”
“A hunch, I guess.” The way everything ripples out from there, the sense of desolation radiating. Radiating. “It looks like some sort of weapons impact, doesn’t it? The crater, the ripples in the ground, the way systems have become more unreliable the closer we’ve gotten to it. The only way we’ll actually know, though, is to get beyond it.”
Sung wiped his hand on his chest. It didn’t take the pain from his eyes. “What about the genies? You think they will pursue us?”
“Yes. So we have to be quick about it.” Rimes only wished he could quiet the nagging sense that the genies weren't the real threat.