Solfleet: The Call of Duty (74 page)

Dylan
suddenly felt very tired and it was all he could do to keep from nodding off. “I
feel sleepy,” he muttered weakly.

“Your mind
is a closed book that can be opened and read,” the professor repeated, ignoring
Dylan’s comment. “You are the author of the book. Place the book on the table. Take
hold of the cover. Open the book and allow me to read its pages.”

Dylan
stared wide-eyed at the creature as he slowly backed away.

A huge,
thick membrane like a cobra’s cowl fanned out from the sides of its long
triangular head and neck, stretching beyond the width of its massive shoulders
as the creature grew to nearly three meters in height, lifting its feet from
the floor and holding its legs tightly against the long, muscular tail on which
it balanced.

“I know what
you know,” Min’para said as though he were reciting a mantra.

“What the
hell are you?” Dylan asked. One possibility immediately came to mind. It was
the serpent—the Prince of Darkness. It was the devil itself!

“I feel what
you feel.”

It
slithered slowly toward him. He backed away.

“We are of
one mind.”

Once more...
A
huge, thick membrane like a cobra’s cowl fanned out from the sides of
its long triangular head and neck, stretching beyond the width of its massive
shoulders as the creature grew to nearly three meters in height, lifting its
feet from the floor and holding its legs tightly against the long, muscular
tail on which it balanced.

“What the
hell are you?” he asked again. One possibility immediately came to mind. It was
the serpent—the Prince of Darkness. It was the devil itself!

It
slithered slowly toward him, hissing, taunting him as though it knew what effect
its hideous appearance was having on him.

Intelligence.

He backed
farther away. He finally gathered his wits and drew his sidearm, only to have
it whipped from his grasp by the creature’s lightning quick tail before he
could aim and fire, just as his rifle had been.

He
grabbed everything he could find within his reach—medical instruments, tools,
chairs, equipment—and threw it at the creature’s head as hard as he could, but
the agile monster moved too fast and ducked out of the way every time. Then,
suddenly, it spat. Dylan threw his arms across his face barely in time to
protect it from the venom, but in so doing he left himself wide open to attack.

The
creature whirled completely around and grabbed him up in its long tail, which
it swiftly coiled around his mid-section. It lifted him off the floor, and then
slowly began squeezing the life out of him.

The air
gushed from his lungs. He opened his mouth as wide as he could, but he couldn’t
even begin to draw a breath. One by one his ribs began to crack like dry twigs
under a hiker’s boots. Tiny sparks of light began dancing like fireflies in the
darkness before his tearing eyes. He choked and coughed up what little air he
had left. He felt warm blood trickling down his cheek. This was it. This was
finally the end. His incredible luck had finally run out. He was going to die
in agony and there was nothing he could do to prevent it.

He was
sitting in a chair, staring past three flickering candles’ golden glow at Professor
Min’para as the Cirran slowly pulled his hands back and rested them on the
table in front of him.

“What do you
think, Professor?” Beth asked.

Min’para’s
forehead creased and his eyes narrowed as he seemed to search for the most
accurate response. “Interesting,” he finally said, still gazing deeply into Dylan’s
eyes.

“What’s
interesting?” Dylan asked.

The
professor leaned forward, rested his elbows on the table, and steepled his
fingers in front of him. “Earlier today, Miss DeGaetano related to me the story
of that encounter as you once explained it to her. I find that your subconscious
recollections of the experience differ from what you told her much more
significantly than I expected they would. They also seem to have more substance
to them than do your conscious memories of the experience.”

“What do you
mean?”

“The imagery
that accompanies your subconscious recollections is much more vivid and
realistic—more distinct than that of your conscious recollections. That
distinctiveness stands an indisputable indication of their authenticity.”

“Their...authenticity?”
Dylan questioned.

“Yes.”

“Are you
telling me the events in my nightmares are the real ones?”

“The events
as you experience them in your nightmares do indeed appear to be based on the
authentic memories of what actually occurred, yes.”

Dylan hadn’t
known what to expect going in, but the possibility of what the professor had
just told him certainly hadn’t been it. He hadn’t anticipated hearing anything
like that at all, and he suddenly felt as if God Himself had pulled a prank of biblical
proportions on him. His whole world had just been turned upside down.

“Then...what
about my
conscious
memories?” he asked. “If they’re not real...then
where the hell did they come from?”

Min’para seemed
to consider that for a moment, then explained, “If you had no conscious memories
of the incident in question, the most logical theory would be that the incident
was so traumatizing that your mind simply suppressed it—blacked the whole incident
out, so to speak. However, you
do
have conscious memories of the
incident. Those memories differ significantly from what I believe to be your
authentic memories of events as they occurred, but their presence cannot simply
be ignored. They do mean something.”

Dylan leaned
forward on his elbows, unconsciously mirroring the professor’s posture, and
asked, “Did you
not
just answer my question, or did I miss something?”

“If he
missed something, I missed it, too, Professor,” Beth chimed in.

“You are
correct, Lieutenant. I did not answer your question. I merely stated that the presence
of conscious memories that differ so significantly from your subconscious
memories is of some importance. Those memories mean something. They are there
for a reason.”

“Oh,” Dylan
responded. A theory as to what that reason might be began forming in his mind.
He didn’t like what that theory suggested and he hoped the professor could help
him to determine the truth. “Professor, if it ever came out that I told you
what I’m about to tell you, I’d probably get into a whole lot of trouble.”

“Then
perhaps you should not tell me, Lieutenant.”

“I have to.
I have a theory as to what might be going on and I’d like your thoughts on it.”

Beth looked
at her fiancé and smiled, pleased that he’d decided to trust the professor and
open up to him.

“Then I give
you my word as a Cirran citizen that I will not repeat it.”

“Thank you, Professor.
I appreciate that. Needless to say, I don’t know you very well, but Beth tells
me you’re not only a professor and a mentalist but also a high priest, and I
do
know what the word of a Cirran high priest means to the one who gives it. So here
it is.

“My
commanding officers recently sat me down and briefed me on a classified mission
they wanted to assign to me. They told me that if I turned down the mission,
which I was given the option of doing, I would be taken directly to the medical
facility, where I would be subjected to a memory-edit so that my memory of the
entire briefing could be erased.”

“Indeed? If
I am not mistaken, such an act would not have been in keeping with Terran law
concerning the use of the memory editing procedure.”

“Somehow, sir,
I don’t think that would have mattered. At any rate, in the end I did in fact
decline the mission. Then, right out of the blue, Commander Royer asked me if I
was still having the nightmares. Judging by how Admiral Hansen reacted to that,
I’m guessing he didn’t know anything about my nightmares until that moment.
Anyway, he told me that an episode of post-traumatic stress disorder in my
medical history precluded the possibility of subjecting me to the edit.
Considering what you just told me, do you think it’s possible I’ve already been
subjected to one—that my memories of the battle were intentionally altered in
some way and that for whatever reason the edit might be failing?”

“My god,
Dylan,” Beth said, “that’s awfully paranoid. What did they do to you at that
academy?”

“Not
necessarily, Miss DeGaetano,” Min’para opined before Dylan could respond to
her. “If true, that could very well explain your fiancé’s condition. That said,
I have studied your world’s use of such techniques quite extensively and I have
never heard of a memory-edit failing before. I am also not aware of any
instance when one was carried out for reasons other than protecting the mental
health of the individual patient. And yet,” He turned to Dylan again, “your
mind is quite healthy, Lieutenant. And extremely sharp, I might add.”

“Thank you,”
Dylan said automatically, his thoughts light-years away.

“Your thanks
is unnecessary,” Min’para said, brushing it aside. “I simply state facts based
on observation. But to answer your question, I believe it is not only possible
that you have already been subjected to a memory-edit, but also quite likely.
There are certain aspects of that creature that appears in your nightmares that
are not totally unfamiliar to me, and its presence compels me to contemplate
some quite disturbing theories of my own.”

“What
theories?” Dylan asked. “What do you think that thing is?”

“I believe
it is a creature known as a Vul-Veshtonn, a very rare and extremely dangerous
creature that researchers on my world believe the other Veshtonn worship as
gods. There are a number of curious differences between what I know of them and
what you are seeing in your nightmares, however.”

“What kinds
of differences?” Dylan asked.

“The
exoskeleton, for example. I have never heard of a Vul-Veshtonn with such
resilient skin before. Tough, yes, but not so tough as to be skeletal. And the
eyes. Red instead of the pale yellow that those who have seen them always
comment on.”

“What do you
think it all means?” Dylan asked, genuinely fascinated now. “Was mine a
different race of Vul than the ones your people have encountered? Was it a
whole different sub-species maybe? Or some kind of mutant?”

“Any answer
I might give you now would be based solely on speculation. I would prefer to
investigate further so I can be more certain. When I am ready I will contact
you.”

Recognizing
that he’d just been dismissed, Dylan stood up from the table and took Beth’s
hand, helping her to stand up as well, then started to back away. “Please, try
not to take too long, Professor,” he requested as he retrieved his jacket. “I’m
not sure how much longer I’ll be on the station.”

The
professor stood up but kept his place by the table. “I will have to conduct
some quite extensive research, but I will start immediately and will complete
it as quickly as I can.”

“Thank you,
sir. And thank you for your time this evening.”

“Yes, thank
you, Professor,” Beth added.

“Please
understand that under normal circumstances I would not spend any more time on
this issue. I am extremely busy and this has nothing directly to do with me or
my usual pursuits. However, I will be here for a few more days and I do enjoy a
good mystery.”

“Then we appreciate
your help that much more, Professor,” Beth told him.

The Cirran
nodded silently, and the couple left his quarters.

Three Days Later

Monday, 6 December 2190

The door
buzzer sounded, but before Admiral Hansen could so much as draw a breath to ask
who was there—as if anyone besides Liz would come by his office first thing on
a Monday morning—the door slid open and the usually much less predictable
commander walked in. “Good morning, Admiral,” she mumbled, apparently having
left her usual enthusiasm at home. Her uniform looked something less than
immaculate, which was unusual for her, and her hair had already fallen loose, assuming
she had bothered to pin it up in the first place. In short she looked exhausted.
Understandable considering the long hours she’d put in over the weekend. “Sorry
to just walk in on you like this, sir,” she continued, “but Vicky isn’t in yet.”
Her voice sounded a little scratchy.

“Don’t worry
about it, Commander,” the admiral said. Then he looked back down at whichever
hardcopy report happened to be in his hands at the moment. There were at least
a dozen of them scattered across his desk. “Anything yet?” he asked.

She locked
the door and then approached his desk. “The professor has been making real good
use of the station’s library computer,” she answered as she turned one of his
visitors’ chairs on an angle and unceremoniously collapsed into it. She crossed
one leg over the other, rested an elbow on the edge of the admiral’s desk, and
propped her throbbing head up in her hand. As far as she was concerned the time
for military protocol between them had long since passed. The two of them were
once again acting as co-conspirators, superior and subordinate by rank but
equals in a necessary game of crime and cover-up. A position they’d had several
years to get used to. “He’s been eye-deep in research day and night, all
weekend. Beats the hell out of me how anyone can read so much without getting a
migraine.”

Hansen
noticed the deskward lean in her usually straight-backed posture and wondered
if she might actually have fallen over if his desk weren’t holding her up. Then
he looked more closely at her face and saw the dark circles under her glassy,
blood-shot eyes as they slowly closed. She’d obviously put in a long and
arduous night—a long and arduous
weekend
more likely—and was clearly
exhausted, so he decided that as soon as she finished bringing him up to speed
he’d give her the rest of the day off. And the sooner she started...