part0055

“You have such a limited imagination,” Brennen said. “You think a mind must be trapped in some fixed location, like your brain and body. The collective offers so much more. This power, this essence that can permeate bodies and intelligent machines alike, allows our consciousness to transfer from one entity and location to another. Most of us retain a body. But it’s unnecessary. This is quantum logic, John.”

“Are you saying you’re in the computer?”

“We’ve been in the computer, in my body, in those murdered beings’ bodies. We don’t simply abide in the computer; we are the computer. We merged when I came back from the probe. We tried to stop you on the outpost, John. Even when you destroyed my body, I gave you another chance.”

“What are you talking about? You wouldn’t let me leave until I shot you.”

“No John—the shuttle. Don’t you think that if we control the Constance’s computer, we also control the shuttle’s? It was exposed the whole time. We could have stopped you from leaving the outpost. But we wanted to give you another chance.”

“I doubt it,” Alvarez said.

“You don’t understand your position. Our essence is all over you. You brought it back with you. The only thing stopping us from changing you is your spacesuit. And John—let me tell you—your time is running out. How much more air and water do you have?”

Alvarez looked on his wrist console. Brennen was right. He had plenty of water, but less than thirty minutes of oxygen.

“I can just change them out,” Alvarez said. “We did it at the outpost. When Sarge’s tank wasn’t filled properly, we changed it. The vacuum seal keeps whatever contagion you call yourself from getting inside. Sarge kept his mind until the very end.”

“That may be true, but you’re forgetting; I took the remaining tanks with me to the probe. They are still tethered out there.”

“There’s gotta be an extra spacesuit with tanks around here somewhere,” Alvarez said.

“I don’t think so. But even if I’m wrong—what good will that do you? A couple more hours before you’re right back where you started.”

“So what,” Alvarez said. “At best this is a stalemate. What are you going to do? The engines are off-line. You can’t do anything about it, because you’re stuck in the machine. If I run out of air and asphyxiate, you’re no better off. Your consciousness is nothing but a bunch of ones and zeros at this point.”

Brennen laughed. His digitized voice briefly blipped in error. “You’re not the only body on board. We still have eight servicemen in their barracks.”

“Yeah, and they’re stuck there too,” Alvarez said. “Those doors only open manually, and they’re locked from the corridor side. The computer can’t do a thing about it.”

“Wrong again,” Brennen said. “You saw Parker and York. Our members are able to channel energy from their environment, to feed on what you life-forms waste. As we speak, I’m diverting ventilation, sending as much heat to those barracks as possible. They will channel this energy into mass, muscle, and power until they’re able to break through those doors. It’s only a matter of time, John.”

“It seems like you have three choices now,” Brennen continued. “One – take off your helmet and transform into something so much better than your pitiful existence. Two – wait around until those grunts bust through those doors and suffer the consequences—that shotgun won’t work as well on them as it did on me. Or three—and I’m betting on three—take the coward’s way out. Put the barrel in your mouth and pull the trigger.”

Alvarez moved towards the door.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Brennen said. Alvarez didn’t answer.

Lights and consoles started going out, room by room. Brennen must be channeling all of the energy into heating the barracks, he thought.

Alvarez flicked on his light. Apparently, this simple circuitry was out of Brennen’s reach. In the corridor, he passed the two barracks. The thumping had stopped. He imagined the grunts standing in the barracks absorbing energy like he saw York and Parker do.

He headed towards the cargo bay. As he stepped over what remained of York’s body, his light attached to his gun barrel flickered. It was spotty. He was amazed it still worked after having banged it against York’s head. He couldn’t help but visualize York’s nearly decapitated body rising up and chasing him. Fortunately, he thought, even this nightmare has limitations.

He reached the docking bay and entered the shuttle. “It’s a long shot,” he said. He ordered the shuttle’s computer to open the bay doors. No bleep. No response.

“John, do you think I’m an idiot?” Brennen said over the comm. “You getting here on the shuttle was no accident. You’re not leaving.”

Alvarez smashed the shuttle console with the butt of his shotgun and walked out in disgust. The bay doors were controlled by the computer, and there was no manual over-ride.

He walked back into the corridor. He was stuck, and he knew it. There in the darkness, he heard the return of loud metallic clangs . He shined his light at the barracks door. It was starting to dimple. With each punch, the bulge grew larger.

As usual, Brennen was right. Alvarez needed to make a choice. He reloaded his magazine. Six in the tube. More than twenty still in the bandolier.

Brennen had said there were eight grunts locked up. Alvarez figured Thomson was in there, too. Alvarez pulled the Mossberg tightly to his chest. He didn’t have enough shells or reload-time to get them all. I’ll take as many with me as I can, he thought.

He considered defensive positions, ways to slow them down, ways to give himself time to reload. There wasn’t much to work with. He thought about barricading a door, but with what? Something that could punch through steel wouldn’t be stopped by a few cargo boxes.

The pounding grew louder. He saw the hinges start to give way.

Alvarez checked his wrist console. Brennen had pumped so much heat into those barracks, it caused the atmospheric mix in the rest of the ship to be even more untenable. Alvarez didn’t know how long it took to transform into one of those monsters, but if it was more than mere seconds, he would asphyxiate before changing. Now he couldn’t take off his helmet if he wanted to.

Besides, some things were worse than death. Life at any cost, was no life at all. Alvarez wasn’t even sure the collective was alive. Joining them meant the worst kind of death.

Option three was off the table. He wouldn’t kill himself unless it meant saving someone else. He’d take a bullet for his family, even his crew. But not just to avoid pain. No way. Suicide was total defeat. He would consider it only if he thought they would use his body to get to Nadia and Adam. Maybe he should save the last shell, just in case.

That left option two. He would fight. He said a quick prayer. Then he began to focus his mind on the task at hand. He didn’t think about his odds. He didn’t think about those monsters or what they could do to him. His job, he knew, was to extinguish his fear.

Something broke his concentration. It wasn’t fear or self-doubt. Something legitimate ate at him, begged for his attention. He yielded to the thought: there’s another option .

At his feet was the small hatch to the service shaft.

“That’s it,” he said.

Brennen had missed Parker’s post-design addition. It was off the computer’s schematics.

Alvarez got on his hands and knees. He removed his shotgun, bandolier, and propulsion pack and slid them forward into the narrow passageway.

As he entered the hatch, Brennen said, “What do you think you’re doing?”

Alvarez continued sliding feet-first. He closed the hatch door, sealing it from within and said, “I never liked multiple choice tests.”