Dark Space: Avilon (2 page)

Chapter 1

—The Year 10 AE, Present Day—

E
than Ortane watched his long-dead mother embracing his son, Atton, in the sky. He had to remind himself that they weren’t actually standing on the clouds. It was an illusion. It had to be.

His mother wore a shimmering white robe, just like everyone else, and she looked far younger and more beautiful than he remembered her—but again, so did everyone else who had been resurrected. Apparently that was a part of the deal. Come back to life on Avilon and you get a brand new body, a perfected version of the one you had before.

Ethan heard his son whisper, “This is impossible.”

“No, Atton,” his grandmother replied. “It’s a miracle.”

That miracle was Avilon. Over two months ago Atton had gone looking for the lost star system, hoping to get reinforcements against the Sythians. He’d never returned. Then Ethan’s ex-wife, Destra, had asked him to go looking for their son. He hadn’t returned either, but he’d found Atton—along with
everyone
else.

A thunderous voice split the sky. It was Omnius, the artificial intelligence who had declared himself god and resurrected everyone who’d died in the Sythian invasion. Ethan suspected some technological rather than supernatural power was at work, but he hadn’t pieced it all together yet.

“You are wondering if this is real,” the voice began. “Those of you who aren’t wondering are afraid to ask, but I tell you that your eyes do not deceive you. These are the same loved ones you lost. Many of them have been waiting a long time for you. Soon you will all return to the surface to begin your new lives on Avilon.

“Some of you have asked me why I didn’t stop the Sythians when they invaded. Part of the answer, which I haven’t given until now, is that I didn’t need to stop them. I only needed to bring everyone back to life in my city, where they would be safe. I have spent the past fifty years building the city of Etheria to make room for everyone, and now that the work is done, none of you need ever die again!”

A loud cheer rose from the crowd: “Omnius grando est! Omnius grando est!”

Ethan noticed that even his mother was repeating that mantra. His eyes drifted out of focus.
Omnius, the AI who would be God
.
A god created by humans to rule them.
Ethan shook his head, trying to dispel the unease that thought caused. He supposed that in some way Omnius was
their
creator. Somehow he had copied their memories and then cloned genetically-superior versions of them to give those memories to. Ethan wondered if there was a clone waiting for him somewhere on Avilon.

Now
that
was an unsettling thought.

“Ethan? Are you all right?” his mother asked, waving a hand in front of his face.

He came back to the present and turned to his mother with a smile. “I’m just happy to see you, Mom. Besides your grandson, there’s someone else I’d like you to meet . . .”

He trailed off when he couldn’t find Alara. He frowned, wondering where his wife had gone. She had to be just as shocked by this development as him. They’d survived a harrowing battle, defending a lost world of immortal human clones from the race of ruthless aliens that had killed everyone in the former Imperium of Star Systems, only to find out that everyone who had died in that war had been resurrected here, in the world-spanning city of Avilon.

Cities
, Ethan corrected himself. There were three, each separated by an energy shield—Celesta on top, Etheria below, and the Netherworld, or
Null Zone,
at the bottom.

Omnius had named his cities well if he wanted people to think he really was god. Etherians had long spoken of the afterlife in terms of the Netherworld and Etheria, and both names were steeped in meaning for anyone who had come from the Imperium.

People in shimmering white robes crowded all around, embracing their friends, crewmates, and loved ones who had arrived aboard the
Intrepid.

Ethan admired his surroundings once more while looking for his wife. Clouds raced by underfoot; a stiff breeze blew; the rising sun shone big and red on the horizon. Despite the appearance that they were all somehow floating above the clouds, the ground under Ethan’s feet still felt solid—invisible, but solid.

It was all an illusion. The wind wasn’t strong enough to correspond to the speed with which they were moving, and the air was far too warm for the altitude. They were traveling in some type of starship. The deck and bulkheads were cloaked with holographic projections of what lay outside. Simple enough to do, but still awe-inspiring to look at. The white gauze of clouds parted briefly underfoot, and Ethan stole a glimpse of the shining city far below. His stomach did a loop-the-loop, and he looked up quickly.

“Who is it you’d like me to meet, dear?” his mother asked.

“Alara!” he called, unintentionally answering his mother’s question. His green eyes searched the crowds for her face. He cupped his hands to his mouth and tried again. “Alara!”

“I’m over here!”

He whirled around to see her walking up behind his mother. A young man and woman followed her.

Ethan’s brow furrowed. “Who are they?” he asked as Alara drew near.

She shook her head. Her face was ashen, her violet eyes shimmering with tears. Yet the grave expression on her face was broken by a faint smile.

“Hello there, grub,” the young man behind Alara said.

Ethan turned to glare at him.
Grub.
The insult burned in his brain, making him see red. He didn’t even know this man
.
Was it stamped on his forehead?

Poverty—the birthmark he could never seem to erase.

Alara forestalled the reciprocal insults poised to leap from the tip of his tongue by placing a hand on his arm. He turned to her and saw that her lower lip was trembling.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“They’re my parents, Ethan.”

“Your . . .” Turning back to the pair of strangers standing before him, he shook his head. “That’s impossible! We saw them just a few weeks ago at our wedding! They can’t have died since—”

“You didn’t tell me you got married!” Ethan’s mother interjected.

He turned to her with a strained smile. There was a look of mock outrage on her face. “You weren’t there to tell,” he explained. He skipped the part about Alara being his
second
wife.

“It’s been two months since then, Ethan,” Alara whispered, still talking about her parents. “The Sythians have been in Dark Space almost that entire time.”

“Sythians? Dreadful creatures . . .” Ethan’s mother said.

Ethan nodded along with that.
He and Alara had spent an uneasy month on their honeymoon watching on the news nets as the Sythians invaded all over again. This time, instead of killing everyone, they had begun making slaves of them to replace their previous army of slave soldiers—the Gors. Alara’s parents must have died resisting the occupation.

The young couple standing with his wife looked vaguely familiar now that Ethan knew what to look for. The young man was just as tall and skinny as old Kurlin Vastra had been, and he wore the same sneering smile that Ethan had come to expect from his father-in-law. The young woman was an even closer fit for Alara’s mother with her rare violet eyes and flowing dark hair, both the same color as Alara’s own. He absorbed the doubly-shocking news that his in-laws had died only to be resurrected on Avilon. A numb feeling of unreality set in.
Maybe I’m asleep?
He hadn’t decided yet if this was a dream or a nightmare.

“I’m . . . sorry to hear that you died?” Ethan tried. He wasn’t sure what sort of response was called for. His wife was obviously distraught, but his in-laws, the very ones whom she was upset about, were alive and smiling from ear to ear.

“Don’t be,” Kurlin replied. “We weren’t bound to live much longer anyway. Now, thanks to Omnius, none of us will ever have to worry about dying again.”

“Yea, so it would seem,” Ethan replied, nodding slowly.

“This must be the special lady,” Ethan’s mother said, ignoring them and turning to Alara. “Come here girl,” she said, reaching out to enfold her daughter-in-law in a hug.

Alara fell into her mother-in-law’s embrace. Her violet eyes still brimmed with tears, and now a few of them spilled to her cheeks. A genuine smile grew between the trickling tears. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Ortane,” Alara said as she withdrew from the hug.

“It’s just Miss, actually. Ethan’s father and I divorced before he was born. My name’s Lara, but you can just call me Mom—if that would be all right with you, Darla?” she asked, craning her neck to catch Mrs. Vastra’s eye.

“Of course.”

Ethan looked on with a frown, feeling like he was missing something important—perhaps a few somethings that were important.

“You two have already been introduced?” Alara asked, connecting a few of the missing pieces for Ethan.

“Not formally, no,” Lara explained, “but everyone on Avilon knows each other—at least by name.”

“That’s a lot of names to remember . . .” Atton put in.

“It does seem that way, doesn’t it? But don’t worry, you won’t have to remember them, not really. You’ll find out what I mean soon enough.”

“I can’t wait,” Alara said. “I’m sorry to hear that your marriage didn’t work . . . Mom.” The endearment sounded awkward to Ethan’s ears, but he supposed that was to be expected given that Alara’s real mother was standing just behind her. “Where is Ethan’s father? I’d like to meet him, too.”

Lara’s smile faltered, and she looked away. “Oh, I’m afraid he couldn’t make it.”

That set off an alarm bell in Ethan’s head. “What do you mean he couldn’t
make
it?” Ethan and his father had never been very close, but he’d seen the old man on more than one occasion whilst growing up, and as an adult they’d even smuggled a few shipments of stims together before Ethan had been caught and sentenced to Dark Space for his crimes. Preston Ortane wasn’t an easy man to get along with, but Ethan was sure that his father wouldn’t miss something like this.

“It’s not that he didn’t want to come, dear. It’s just that . . .”

“Just that what?”

“Well, it’s not really my place to say.”

“Not your place to say! What the frek?”

“Ethan, dear, calm down. That language has no place here.”

“So now I’m being censored?”

“No, just calm down please. I understand this must all come as quite a surprise, but I’d like to think that it’s a good surprise. I haven’t seen you in so long. . . .”

“Well, where is he?”

“Who?”

Ethan’s eyes narrowed sharply. “Dad.”

“Why don’t we rather talk about your wonderful bride? It will be night soon, and we’ll all have to go to . . . sleep.”

“Night? The sun is still rising! And even if it weren’t, why can’t we just stay up and talk? I’m not tired. I’ll make you some caf. Unless you don’t have caf in Avilon . . .”

“
On Avilon,
dear. It’s a planet, not a star system. Yes, of course we have all kinds of stimulating beverages, but I’m afraid the night here falls with or without the sun and we are not permitted to stay up.”

“With or without the sun? That doesn’t make any sense!”

“Omnius will explain everything to you soon,” his mother soothed, rubbing his arm.

“Well someone better!” Ethan turned to Atton. “You believe this krak?”

“Dad.”

“What?”

Atton nodded his head sideways, indicating his grandmother. “Language.”

Ethan noticed that his mother looked distraught—or fearful. He couldn’t decide which. But despite the fact that she’d mysteriously come back from the grave, Ethan didn’t care. He wasn’t even sure that young woman really was his mother.

He was about to swear again just to emphasize his freedom to do so when Alara took his hand, squeezing it just tightly enough to convey a warning. Somehow the cool touch of her hand was enough to cool his head. She was right. Now wasn’t the time to start poking holes in the clouds they were standing on. For better or worse, they’d found Avilon, and they wouldn’t be leaving any time soon. For now at least, they were at the mercy of its people and its ruler, and they needed to tread lightly until they learned what that meant.

The thunderous voice rumbled around them once more. “Now that you’ve all had a chance to be reunited, the time has come for you to say goodbye. Those of you who have not yet decided to join the Ascendancy will be taken to temporary quarters where you will tour the three cities of Avilon to help you decide where you want to live. Welcome, my children! Welcome home!”

At that, the crowds began cheering once more, “Omnius grando est! Omnius grando est!”

Ethan remained silent and traded a glance with his wife. As soon as the cheering stopped, he saw a pair of shining portals open in the sky, one to either side of the rising sun. He placed a hand to his forehead to shield his eyes from the glare. He tried to see what lay beyond those portals, but the light was too bright.