Wanderer

Chapter 2

2

Jess was startled from a light doze by someone else entering the living area. He turned his head hoping to see Ali, but instead found himself facing Sal. She froze for a moment, her eyes wide and her face contorted, then she raised clenched fists.

Jess stood up, sensing danger. It was the first time he and Sal had been together with no one else around. Until now she’d avoided paying him any attention but now it seemed as if a dam had burst.

“You! Do you have any idea how much I hate you?” Sal screamed at him. “Do you? I can’t stand to look at you! I can’t stand to know you’re even on the same ship as me! I can’t bear to know you’re even alive after what you did!”

She stepped closer, close enough she could reach out and touch him. He fought the urge step back and stood his ground.

“I did what I had to, Sal. I couldn’t let the universe be destroyed, and I couldn’t let it be overrun by the Taint…”

“How dare you call it that! You know it wasn’t that. Unity was something precious, something amazing. You have no idea of the evil you’ve done. You have no idea of the untold trillions who will starve to death now because they lack the coordination Unity brought. You have no idea how many will die in conflicts and war from now until the end of time. How could you do that? How could you cause so much suffering?”

“I did it to stop suffering! To stop people having loved ones ripped away, and having those very same loved ones turn on them. I did it to save those who would have been taken, would have felt darkness flooding through them. I did it to stop the hurt and pain!”

Sal stared at him for a moment, and to his surprise tears started flowing down her face.

“Oh Jess, you have no idea,” she said, much more softly. “Wherever Unity spread there was always some resistance, some trauma, but it was born of misunderstanding.

“Once those times were past peace would reign, peace and calm. People would be born to the embrace of Unity, would never know the horrors that existing alone brought. Now that has been ripped away from billions upon billions of beings who have no idea how to live or even survive on their own.”

“If that’s the case, if you’re right, then they can take what they learnt from Unity and live their lives well. They can take what they learnt and live peaceful lives by choice, not through being forced. They can continue to cooperate, but of their own will.”

“How? How can they possibly do that? They have no way to communicate at range, they needed none. Unity was part of them and they were part of Unity. They knew what was needed and they did it. They have no way to coordinate now. Communicating using technology won’t cover a thousandth of what Unity gave them. Some will survive, but so many more will die.”

“You can’t know that! You can’t know that that’s what will happen!”

“Of course I can!” She was yelling at him again, but her tears were still flowing. “I was part of Unity, part of it in a way that almost no one else was. I know what it was, I know what it did, and I know what you’ve done by destroying it.

“You’re a monster, Jess! You’re a murderer! No, you’re worse than that. What you did was g******e. You wiped out an entire race, a unique entity, and some of those species that are no longer receiving guidance from Unity will not survive either. That will be more entire species that you will have wiped out!”

“Even if that’s true I had to do it. There was no choice!”

She’d moved even closer, so close that the punch she threw to his stomach landed before his shields could activate. Jess doubled up, the wind driven from his lungs, and she tried to hit him again. This time his shields were already active. She screamed in frustration as the punch failed to land.

Jess was already getting over the shock of the attack and his implants were quickly removing all effects of having been winded. As he started to straighten Sal slammed something heavy against the side of his head. Once again his shield saved him from direct harm, but she hit him so hard he still staggered slightly.

She was screeching at him now, yelling incoherently. She hit him round the head twice more, still to little effect, and screamed in even more frustration. Her eyes darted around the room, then she cried out and rushed away from him. Moments later she was running back, a sharp knife in her hand.

Jess knew his shield would keep him safe, but he couldn’t help feeling a thrill of fear. And sadness. This was Sal! This was Sal who had been with him when he first came aboard the Wanderer. This was Sal who had escaped from slavery alongside him. And this was Sal desperately trying to kill him. Not Sal under control of the Taint, that had happened but that was different. This was Sal, his friend, and she wanted him dead.

He couldn’t help but flinch when she tried stabbing his stomach, even though the defensive shield was already active and stopped the knife well before it reached him. She stabbed once more, then stood panting, her eyes wide. A smile spread across her face, which chilled Jess to the bone.

“I can’t kill you then, Jess. Or maybe that would have been too easy anyway. You don’t deserve to get off that lightly. You deserve to suffer, to know the pain you have caused. And I know how to make sure you do. Look at me, Jess. Look at what you’ve turned me into. Look at what you’ve done to me. And remember what I’m about to do is totally and absolutely your fault!”

Before he could reply she turned the knife and plunged it towards her chest and towards her heart. Jess opened his mouth to shout, to yell no, but it was far too slow.

At the same time he instinctively reached out through his implants to the Wanderer. Time slowed for him. The knife was still moving towards Sal’s chest, but far more slowly.

He had the Wanderer engage its internal fields, wrapping them around the knife and stopping it from moving any further. Then he wrapped more fields around Sal, holding her gently but securely so she couldn’t hurt herself or anyone else. Then he let his thoughts return to more normal speeds.

“No! Sal shouted. “No! You can’t take this away from me! You’ve taken everything else from me, you can’t take my death as well!”

“Sal! What the hell is going on?” shouted Dash, charging in the room. He looked at Sal, standing rigidly, and Jess before her. He took in the knife in Sal’s hand, aimed at her heart, and jumped to completely the wrong conclusion.

“You’re trying to kill her! You’re trying to get rid of her because of what she did to you!”

Dash ran forward, placing his own body between the knife and Sal. It was a tight fit, Jess was reasonably certain the knife would be cutting Dash’s skin if it wasn’t wrapped in a protective field.

“No!” Jess shouted. “That’s not it at all. She tried to stab me and my shields stopped her. Then she tried to turn the knife on herself. I’m not trying to kill her, I’m trying to keep her alive!”

Dash started at Jess for a few moments, then looked at the fields, the knife, then back at Jess. “Really? You don’t want to kill her?”

“No! That’s the last thing on my mind. I don’t know what’s got into her. No… I do know! The Taint still hasn’t let her go properly. I don’t know how to save her.”

“Dash, Jess is telling the truth!” shouted Ali as she rushed into the living area. “I caught the end of it through the Wanderer. He stopped Sal from killing herself.”

Dash turned his head but couldn’t see Ali from where he stood, so instead he turned his gaze back to Jess. The anger and outrage slowly drained, replaced by sadness.

He eased himself out, turned to face Sal.

“Why, Sal? Why would you do that?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” she replied softly. “You were only part of Unity briefly. Jess denied you the chance to know what it truly was so you don’t know what it is that you lost. You’re lucky.”

“You’re right, Sal, I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you could do this. Jess, let me take the knife away from her.”

Jess reached out to the Wanderer, removing the fields around the knife while still keeping Sal safely secured. Dash reached out and removed the knife, turning and throwing it across the room.

“Now please let Sal go,” Dash said. “I’ll take her back to her room. I’ll talk to her. I’ll…” He ran out of words and just let his shoulders slump.

Jess nodded, releasing the fields but standing ready to activate again if needed. Sal seemed to shrink in on herself and said nothing. The anger seemed to have passed, for the moment at least. She let Dash lead her back through the door, showing no interest in anything around her.

Once they were gone a wave of tiredness washed over Jess. He moved to the sofa and sank down into it, shaking his head. Ali came and sat next to him, one hand on his leg.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No. Not really. I can’t bear to see Sal like that.”

“Me neither. You have to remember what she’s been through, though.”

“I know! I just want her back. The real Sal back. My friend back. I want Sal, not that brainwashed creature we’ve been left with.”

“It’s going to take time, Jess. It might take a lot of time. The Taint didn’t have long to work on me, not with the Wanderer then its creators keeping me suspended most of the time, and part of me was always fighting back.

“For Sal it was totally different. She spent a long time controlled by the Taint, and from what I can tell she was more tightly integrated with it than almost anyone else. That means there’s a lot more for her to recover from.”

“I just wish I could make it better. I can’t help but feel that it’s partly my fault. If I’d been more observant then she wouldn’t have fallen to the Taint in the first place.”

“Maybe, but then we would never have known about the Taint, you wouldn’t have gone trying to find a way to cure it, and the whole universe would be much worse off.”

“I know that, but I don’t feel it. It doesn’t help me. It doesn’t help stop the nightmares.”

“It’s still raw for everyone. It’s only been a few days. Give it time. Time is something we’ve got plenty of now.”

“Sometimes it feels like we’ve got too much. I’m starting to feel restless. Maybe it’s time to move on. Maybe it’s time to leave all this behind.”

“I’d like that. You’re not the only one getting turned into some mythical figure. I’m becoming Ali, the girl Jess saved the Universe for. At least you’re a hero and not some damsel in distress.”

Just laughed. “Only people who don’t know you think that. No one would be stupid enough to make that mistake once they did. Hell, if it wasn’t for you I’d have died and the Taint would have won. You’re as much a hero as I am.”

“Well, fellow hero, I’m going back to bed. Hopefully now I can sleep without any more interruptions!”

“Sorry about that!”

She smiled fondly, tapped him on the cheek the palm of her hand. He smiled back, but as she turned and left his smile faded. What was he going to do about Sal? If she was going to be that unpredictable, that dangerous to herself and others, then what should he do?

The Wanderer nudged for his attention, pushing information into his mind. The ship was telling him that it had reclassified Sal from crew-member to potential threat. That meant the Wanderer would pay closer attention to her movements and it would always stand ready to protect Jess and the others on the ship if she turned hostile.

Jess shook his head. He couldn’t allow that. He couldn’t allow her to be seen that way. Despite everything that had happened, that was too much. He sent a command to the Wanderer, telling it to undo the change.

The Wanderer refused. Jess sent the command again, adding more urgency, and the ship refused once more. Jess gritted his teeth, and sent the command once more, putting the full force of his authority as captain behind it. Once again, the Wanderer refused.

This was something new, something recent. When Jess first had his mind merged with the Wanderer the ship had in some ways been very limited. A large part of its mind had been shut down an immense length of time before so little personality had shown through.

Jess’s actions, his mind, and the way he treated the Wanderer had released those blocks, had allowed the ship to return to its full potential. Exceed it even. But even then Jess had been the captain, he had had the overriding say, and while the ship might suggest a course of action was unwise it would always obey if he insisted

Something had changed. The Wanderer had grown, developed, in ways its creators had never envisaged. Its time with Jess, and with the many other previous captains, both human and not, had built into a wealth of experience the Wanderer’s creators had never anticipated.

When the Wanderer had been taken from Jess by the last of those creators and forced to abandon him something amazing had happened… the Wanderer had broken free, refused the orders and gone back to rescue Jess.

From that time it had also been able to refuse Jess’s orders. Doing so was incredibly rare, Jess and the Wanderer still shared an immensely close bond, but now there were times when the ship would favour its own judgement over his.

In the matter of Sal it was doing just that, telling Jess clearly that his own judgement was clouded and that she truly was a potential threat to those on board the ship. Jess wasn’t happy with that decision, he wasn’t happy at all, but deep down he also wasn’t certain that it was wrong. And that made him even more unhappy.