The Agathon: Reign of Arturo (15 page)

“Well, I … eh … better get back to the engine room to oversee that last deployment, ay?” he said, standing slowly and giving Aron a nod.

“Captain,” he said, nodding a farewell as he placed his bowl in the large sink and heading out of the door leaving just the three of them.

Aron gave him a raised eyebrow and turned his attention back to his food. There was deafening silence in the room as the air from the life support system swirled in from the overhead ducts. Aron looked up at India who was playing with her spoon. Aron could feel Stanley looking intently at India. She shifted in her seat and looked as if she was beginning to feel uncomfortable by it. That was usually when she turned into attack mode, so Aron thought it best to intervene.

“So, Mr. Stanley, how are things getting on with the power conservation efforts on board the station?” he asked trying to get India’s attention to calm her down.

Stanley kept his eyes firmly on India who was now looking him straight in the eyes.

“Something I can help you with?” she asked bluntly.

Stanley smiled at her.

“You grew up in the Red Tribe, didn’t you?” he said to her.

Aron looked at India who was frowning at Stanley. The Red Tribe was considered to be the lowest class of all four tribes in the colony. It was forbidden for a member of Red to reproduce, without express written consent from Arturo Verge. Any child born without authorisation was immediately terminated. Needless to say, the population control measure was deeply resented by those in Red. There were rumours that some children had slipped through the medical nets as it were. Aron knew of course who those children were. Sitting opposite him was one of them. India’s birth implant, which had of course been replicated by an ingenious member of Red Tribe, had hidden her secret successfully her entire life. Aron didn’t like Stanley’s tone at all. There was something distinctively menacing about it.

“I did,” India replied looking back at her bowl of food.

Stanley nodded.

“Who were your parents if you don’t mind me asking?” Stanley said still focused on her.

India dropped her spoon into her bowl and looked at Aron. She had been the most fearless person he had ever met, yet there was a sign of panic in her eyes. Aron decided to answer for her.

“Surely you should know all our family histories, Stanley? Why do you ask?” Aron said turning his shoulder towards him. Stanley kept his gaze on India.

“Walder,” Stanley replied, “That’s an interesting last name. I have always liked it. Do you remember your parents? They died, didn’t they?”

Aron could see India close one of her fists.

“They did,” she replied, “I never met them. Why do you ask, Stanley?”

Stanley shrugged, “What were their names?”

Aron was unsure what this was leading to, but danger was looming. India sat up straight in her chair and stared down Stanley.

“Paul and Cynthia,” she said through tense lips.

Stanley snapped his fingers at her and laughed suddenly, as if finding out the answer to a riddle he had been unable to solve.

“That’s it,” he said triumphantly. “Paul and Cynthia, that is it. I have been trying to figure that out since I got on board, thank you.”

“Figure what out?” India replied.

Stanley looked away and began to eat his food.

“Oh nothing,” he said shovelling large mouthfuls of the food into his mouth.

There was what seemed like an eternity as he ate. India looked angrily at Aron who shook his head ever so slightly, telling her to calm herself and not do anything stupid. Stanley suddenly paused and looked up at India.

“You really are quite beautiful; you know that?” he said.

India didn’t respond. She was clearly taken aback at the comment. Aron could see she was ready to do battle.

“You know, it’s funny,” Stanley continued, “I looked up Paul and Cynthia Walder in the Colonial Guard database. Did you know that both your parents had blue eyes?” he said.

India flicked her dark brown eyes at Aron and he suddenly realised where this strange line of conversation was headed.

“And you have such beautiful dark brown eyes,” he said pointing his spoon at her and smiling.

“I mean, what are the odds of that?” he finished, suddenly losing his smile.

Stanley’s face suddenly became deathly serious as the emotion drained from his face and a knowing sinister glare replaced it. Aron was about to respond, but he was too late. India suddenly leapt across the table screaming. Grey sticky food was scattered as she tried to land a full force blow to Stanley’s face. He reacted swiftly, grabbing her arm before it could land on his face and the pair tumbled backwards onto the floor. The force of the encounter knocked Aron off the bench. A cracking sound let him know he had injured his lower back. Then the pain followed. He grimaced and tried to get to his knees as India and Stanley rolled around on the floor. Stanley had her pinned to the ground with both arms held firmly above her head. He straddled her, as he leaned both knees on either side of her torso. India let out a feral scream,
bringing her knee up and landing a crunching blow into Stanley’s lower back flipping him over her head. Stanley crashed into the food dispensary sending empty bowls and cutlery flying in all directions. Before Aron could get to his feet, Stanley had stood up from the fall and was lunging towards India with a large closed fist. He landed a blow cleanly on the side of her cheek. She managed to hold her ground and he landed another one in her mid-section causing her to splutter and bend forward. He brought his elbow down on her back and India crumpled to the floor. Stanley reached inside one of his chest pockets and pulled out what looked like a long blade attached to a thin black handle. He brought his arm back and prepared to bring the blade down onto the fallen India when Aron’s instincts kicked in. He leapt over India, who was coughing and clearly winded from the blow to her stomach. He crashed his shoulder into Stanley’s chest sending them both careening into the far wall. The blade slipped from Stanley’s hand and fell onto the floor with a clink. With Aron’s bodyweight lowered, it made it easy for Stanley to spin him on his axis and throw him off to one side. He stumbled and fell catching one of his ribs against the corner of a table. He heard a definite crack and a piercing pain as he tried to steady himself. As soon as he had brought his body upright Stanley had landed a blow to his face sending a lightning bolt of pain up to Aron’s brain. Aron knew he wasn’t a match for Stanley’s strength. He was remarkably fast and it was only a matter of time before he outmanoeuvred him. Before he had a chance to retaliate, Stanley had thrust an open hand straight into Aron’s throat. The crushing force of the impact pinned his head firmly against the back wall of the mess hall. Aron looked into Stanley’s crazed eyes and grabbed his thick wrist with both of his hands. His air supply had been completely cut off and the strength in his arms was beginning to fade. With a growl, Stanley raised his arm up lifting Aron completely off the ground. The pressure of his thumb dug deep into Aron’s larynx as he darted his eyes around looking for help. His lungs began to convulse begging for air that would not come and his vision began to blur. It would not be long now. Darkness began to take hold as he suddenly saw a change in Stanley’s eyes. He felt something
wet dripping down his face and hands. Stanley looked surprised. It was blood. Aron’s hands were covered in blood. He looked down and saw a blade protruding from the centre of Stanley’s neck. India was standing behind him and had her arm locked around Stanley’s neck. With a smooth slice she pulled the knife across his throat cutting his neck almost in two. A shower of blood covered Aron’s face. He closed his eyes as Stanley’s grip loosened and they both collapsed on the blood soaked floor. Aron coughed and inhaled deeply as his bruised airways flooded with beautiful air. He breathed in deeply, trying to climb his way back to life. He looked up at India who was looking down at him. She extended her bloody hand. Aron had to admit she looked fearsome. He took it and with her help, stood up to meet her. He had to grab her arm to stop himself from slipping on the pool of blood. He took her hand with the knife and tried to slip it from her fingers. She was shaking. He put his hand on her face and directed her eyes up to meet his.

“India, let it go,” he said, taking the murder weapon from her.

She was breathing heavily and he could see the adrenaline pumping through her veins.

“You okay?” he said.

She nodded wiping a line of blood off her lips.

They both looked down at Stanley’s body as quiet descended in the room. There was a gurgling sound coming from the edge of his severed neck as pools of blood oozed its way out and onto the floor.

“We’re fucked,” India said quietly.

Aron couldn’t help but agree.

“Yep,” he said.

The Kandinsky

“Sir, Hector Stanley hasn’t checked in this morning,” the young man said to Escat who was sitting lazily in his chair reading.

It was the only printed edition of Charles Dickens’ “Oliver Twist” in the entire colony. There had been a handful of printed books kept in the archives for preservation and he had been given it by Arturo
when he had been given command of The Kandinsky. Its pages had been preserved neatly by a resin that had prevented it from falling apart and he kept it neatly in his vacuum safe where he had collected other ancient relics from humanities past. He had left instructions to the crew not to be disturbed this morning and gruffly looked at the man standing in front of his metallic desk.

“And?” he said gruffly.

The young man looked at him nervously.

“Apologies, sir, but you did ask us to report if there was anything unusual regarding ship to ship communications,” he said, looking straight ahead.

Escat sighed. It was unusual that Stanley wouldn’t check in as he was nearly as meticulous with his routine as Escat was. He folded the book and neatly placed it on his desk. He nodded at the young man and waved him out of his office. Escat turned to his computer screen and swivelled it on its base to face him. He tapped a few commands into the interface and brought up the log of Stanley’s latest communications. They had all been time coded and had come in at precisely the same time every morning. The crewman had been quite correct. He had not checked in this morning and was in fact two hours overdue. Escat bit the side of his lip and wondered. There was nothing on board that scraggy old ship that Stanley could not handle. Maybe he was disposing of Elstone’s body and had simply forgotten about it. Unlikely, but it could happen. Bodies were heavy and he would have to do it alone. He envied him that task. He would love to have seen the look on Aron Elstone’s face as he floated out into space. He would have given him a nice little wave as his eyeballs exploded in the vacuum. He decided he would give him another hour before bringing this to the chancellor. He did not like disturbing him with irrelevant news and was beginning to feel uncomfortable in his presence these days. There was something different about him recently. A distance in his eyes that seemed dangerous. He felt nervous around the chancellor and wasn’t entirely sure that he himself wasn’t about to see the inside of an airlock.

The Unity

“Jesus, Cap, I leave you guys for two minutes and you kill a guy,” said Oliver looking at Aron.

“Shut up, Ollie, what are we going to do about this?” said India looking at him unamused.

“We need to get him off the ship before he stinks up the place, that’s for starters,” Oliver said stroking his beard.

“Agreed,” Aron replied still thinking of what he was going to say to the chancellor.

Sure, accidents happened in space and he had lost crew members on dangerous missions before, but this was different. There was physical evidence sprayed all over the walls and the Colonial Guard would certainly perform a molecular and DNA sweep of the entire ship.

“India, go get cleaned up. Ollie and I will wrap the body and jettison it out the port side airlock,” he said to her.

He could see she was afraid. She had been avoiding eye contact with him.

“I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know what came over me,” she said quietly.

He walked slowly over to her and placed his hand on her arm. She was still shaking.

“India, we both know why he was sent here. It was gonna happen sooner or later and … well … shit, you got the jump on him and maybe saved both our lives in the process. So relax. We’ll get outta this.”

He looked into her eyes and she smiled at him.

“But first, please go take a shower, yeah?” he said.

She widened her smile and nodded, moving towards the door. She looked back at him in a way he had never seen before. He wished he could have reciprocated the feeling coming from her eyes. Instead, he turned his attention back to the bloody mess on the ground. The sound of the door hissing behind him let him know that she had left. Oliver looked at him.

“You’re gonna break that girls heart you know,” he said, “and judging by what I am seeing here, that ain’t such a bright idea.”

Aron frowned at the engineer and rolled up his sleeves. The feeling of dried blood on his face was beginning to irritate his skin and he was in no mood for jokes.

“Just grab this piece of shit’s legs, will you? And be careful, she nearly cut his head clean off,” he said, stepping over Stanley’s corpse.

Oliver gave a mock salute and positioned himself at the base of Stanley’s feet grabbing his ankles.

“How you want to do this? He’s gonna leak all over the deck if we just carry him straight to the airlock,” said Oliver.

“Give me your jacket, I will wrap it around the wound,” said Aron.

“What? No way, you take off your trousers, I love this jacket,” Oliver replied, dropping Stanley’s legs back on the ground.

“Ollie, I’ll get you a new one, I promise, now take the fucking thing off and give it to me or I’ll tell Arturo you did this and request a seat right up front when he executes you,” he replied, half joking.

Oliver was not amused. He mumbled something under his breath and removed his cotton jacket handing it to Aron.