Jacked In

TW: swearing

Grateful locals patted Jack Dancer on the shoulder everywhere he went on Copernicus. Being congratulated for murdering a spaceship full of people made him queasy but he’d tired of telling them to fuck off. Leaving his spaceship to visit a planet was bad enough. Planets didn’t move the way his body needed to, with the constant gentle vibrations of a ship gliding through the vacuum.

“How much for this?” asked Max Axel.

“Is he with you?” the fruit stall seller asked Jack, who nodded. “No charge for our hero’s friend. We’d be dead if not for you guys.” The balding man with the pencil moustache smiled. His sunburnt cheeks creased as he showed crooked teeth.

“Thanks man.” Max pocketed the apple and bowed his head in thanks.

“We should be leaving,” Jack moaned in his usual monotone. He cradled his toolbox like a baby in his arms. The clock over the market declared that it was nine-eighty, local time. They were due to leave at midday. He turned, seeing more smiling faces. More hands reached to take his. He returned a lemon sucking grimace that was his best forced smile and slipped through the crowd. He chewed at a baked potato with cheese that had gone cold as he pushed past well wishers.

At the port Doctor Anne Brie sat on a cargo container of oxygen canisters.

“Boys, just in time to help.” She jumped down from the container and pointed to a woman with her back to them, looking at their shuttle. “But first, meet Irene Moriarty. She’s the new navigation officer.”

Irene had a face that was old before its time, dry skin and crow’s feet. Her wide smile hinted at madness, that of a killer clown. Irene tilted her buzz cut head to take in Jack and Max. She winked at the younger man and swaggered over.

“Nice to meet you both.” Irene held out a hand which matched Jack’s for its papery quality. He shook twice, only twice. Max shook her hand until Irene pulled away with a raised eyebrow.

“Nice to meet you.” Jack forced out the greeting, knowing it was the social protocol.

“I’m Max,” said the acne scarred twenty something. “This miserable sack of scars is Jack. We’re engineers.” The scrawny lad puffed up his chest.

Irene’s brown eyes flickered from Max back to Jack’s grizzled face. She licked her lips. “I don’t mind scars. Quite like them actually. Got plenty of my own.” She flashed the psychopath smile again. “Suppose we should get these things aboard then?” Irene waved a hand at the supplies. “Wouldn’t want to suffocate would we?”

The Fairweather swam through the vacuum, directed by Irene. She knew the pathways between the worlds of the Federation of Free Colonies. The crew had a bounty in Pierce Dynasty territory thanks to Jack destroying one of their ships. They had to take the long way through the darkness to worlds that rejected a fascist empire of hundreds of millions.

“War is coming between us and them,” Irene said, standing on the bridge, hands on her hips. “The Pierce Dynasty isn’t going to wait around forever. They have the numbers.”

“Us and them? You’re planning on fighting?” Jack asked, switching his toolbox from his left hand to his right.

“I’m not joining that lot. Fascists.” Irene bit her lip looking at him.

“We’re a haulage vessel. We’re not going to war,” said Captain Eliza Erdman. She brushed a hand over her spiked white hair with blue tips. “If Copernicus hadn’t been starving we never would have,” she stopped to correct herself. “Jack would never have spaced the crew on the PD Anathema. We’re not about killing here.”

Irene shrugged. “Would you just watch innocent people get killed if there was a fight? That’s what it would be.”

The captain sighed. “Changing the subject, don’t we pass near the Ghostly Trinity on our current path?” She bent her neck and gave a satisfied sound when it cracked. She rolled her shoulders. Jack caught Irene ogling the captain’s curves as much as he was.

“The what?” Irene asked.

“The Vacuum Trio. The Silver Ghosts of the Darjeeling Path,” Eliza Erdman threw out the names as if she was explaining that one and one was two. She looked for agreement from the rest of the crew.

Jack shook his head. “Never heard of it.”

“They’re a trio of statues, humanoid-ish but too tall to be human. They’ve been sitting out there in the vacuum for hundreds of years. Discovered by the first colonists to head out that way. I’ve wanted to see them since I was a kid.” Eliza’s glowing smile had a childish exuberance that was rare for her.

“I’ll look them up and chart a course if it’s not too far out of our way,” said Irene. She brought up three dimensional star charts on a projector. “This needs to be updated,” she said. “There’s a system here.” She waved her hand through a blank space in the map.

“Thanks, Officer,” said Eliza.

“You got it, Captain.” Irene saluted casually without looking away from the chart.

Jack’s magnetised boots clunked on the flat surface of an upturned hexagonal pyramid floating in darkness twelve million miles from anything. Three giant statues glittered in the beam of the Fairweather’s headlights.

“Incredible aren’t they,” said the captain in a voice of worship. “They’ve been carbon dated. Two million years old. Think about that.” She had been first to set foot on the closet thing that patch of vacuum had to a tourist spot.

“I don’t believe that,” said Doctor Brie. “It’s not possible. They’re just some sculpture that someone dumped here as a joke. A prank.”

“Cynic,” Eliza rebuffed the doctor. “Look at those arms.” The gloved finger of Captain Erdman pointed to the arms which divided at the point where humans had elbows. Four fingered hands, two on each split, two that formed the equivalent of thumbs on the outside. “And the legs.”

Jack’s blue eyes took in legs which bent in three places like an insect. Two toes pointed forwards, one back.

“Do you think they had a base eight maths system? Or fourteen?” Eliza’s smile was visible through her helmet visor.

“They feel old,” Jack said. He’d shivered looking at their oblong heads with three eyes.

“Exactly.” Eliza spread her hands. “A believer.”

“I said they feel old. That doesn’t mean I believe it. Whoever made them did a good job.” He touched the bulbous torso of the middle one. It had the resistance of stone. To his senses it seemed to be one with the base of the pyramid they stood on.

“We’ve seen them now. Can we go?” Doctor Brie asked.

“Not yet.” Eliza said. “How tall would you say they are? I read they were three hundred centimetres but they don’t look that tall.”

“Two fifty maybe,” said the doctor impatiently.

“Two fifty at most,” Jack said, holding his hand up to the head of the metallic beast before him. “More like two thirty.” He ran a hand up the arm of the one before him. “They’re cool. Creepy but coo-” He stopped talking as the statue moved, arm snapping around his wrist. “GET OFF!”

“Easy, Jack. Don’t shout into the-” Doctor Brie started to scold him until she saw he was in the grasp of the silver creature. “What the hell?” She tried to help.

“Holy shit.” Captain Eliza tried to open the hand of the thing that had Jack.

One of the hands grabbed Jack’s palm. He felt a burning, piercing pain.

“IT’S STABBING ME! GET IT OFF!” Jack shook and struggled but the monster statue wouldn’t let him go.

“We’ll get you out, Jack.” Captain Eliza said as she wrestled with the metal alien. “I’m sorry.”

The cold thing released him. Annie, Eliza and Jack stumbled backwards while the central statue stood back as if it had never moved. Blood flowed out into the void in perfect orbs of red.

“What the hell was that?” the captain asked.

“Who cares? We need to go,” said the doctor. “Jack, are you alright?”

“Who would be alright after that?” he asked. He leapt from the hexagonal platform towards the ship to get away from the thing as fast as possible. His glove was leaking oxygen. He had to be fast. Momentum tried to spin him until he steadied himself with bursts of gas from his atmospheric thrusters. The void carried him back to the Fairweather. He slowed his approach with another spray and blessed the cold steel of the Panthera Tigris Siberia model ship.

Jack was through the airlock before the captain and the doctor had made it back to the ship. He fumbled with his suit one handed, right hand clenched. His right hand had enough scars to tell stories about, with a number seven spanner shape branded into the point where his hand became his wrist.

“What’s up, man?” Max asked casually. “Repetitive strain thing? Carpal tunnel?”

Jack winced as he opened his hand. Three puncture wounds in a triangle were surrounded by yellow swollen skin with angry red bumps. “Shit,” Jack said.

“Shit indeed. Let’s get you to the sick bay. What happened?” Max guided his comrade by the shoulders down the hallways. Jack couldn’t look away from his hand, feeling the burning sensation as if it was screaming in his mind. “Is that an allergic reaction to something in your suit?”

Jack shook his head. He was pale as he licked his lips. “One of those things grabbed me.”

Max laughed. “Yeah right. What really happened though?” They turned a corner. “Nearly there.” He guided Jack into the infirmary and helped him onto a bed. Running steps echoed up the corridor.

“How are you?” Doctor Brie asked as she slowed to be by Jack’s side. “Show me.”

He opened his palm as bruises began to form on both wrists. “It burns. Something’s really wrong.” He watched the spots around the three punctures swell into blisters as the bleeding holes in his palm began to weep a disgusting yellow substance.

“How is he?” Captain Eliza asked, running in. She caught her breath, of all of them she had the greatest body mass.

Doctor Brie washed her hands up to the elbows and dried them thoroughly. “Having a reaction to whatever stabbed him,” said the doctor. “I have no idea what that thing did to you,” she said to Jack. “But you’re going to be alright.” She grabbed a scalpel, cotton swabs, alcohol rub and snapped on her gloves. “If you’re staying, clean your hands and put on gloves as well. We don’t know if the irritant is something that could spread.” She pulled a mask from a drawer and pulled it on over her ears. The other two followed suit.

“Too late for me to do that?” Jack joked.

“Just a little.” Doctor Annie smiled. She had a sweet, reassuring smile when she had to, a visual hug that told you everything was going to be alright. She pulled up the sleeve of his other arm and injected him with a dose of anaesthetic. “Count backwards from twenty for me Jack.”

“Twenty.

Nineteen.

Eighteen.

Ow, shit. It hurts.

Seventeen.

Sixteen.

Fuck.

Fifteen.

Fourtee-” Jack passed out before he could finish.

He woke slowly. Doctor Annie stood at the end of the bed. Her face was tense.

“Are you alright Jack?” the doctor asked.

“I suppose,” he said, yawning. “It still hurts.” Captain Erdman was on the left with Max. Irene stood on Jack’s right and next to her. “OH SHIT!” He rolled to the side instinctively, right off the bed.

“It’s alright, Jack.” Doctor Annie and Max helped him to his feet. “It’s been here for two days. All it does is watch you. It’s creepy, but it doesn’t want to hurt you.”

Jack stood, looking across the hospital bed at the creature that had put him there in the first place.

“It’s different,” Jack said despite everything else that was going on. “WHO LET IT IN?” He looked around with accusation in his eyes. With every movement he made the silver creature’s face followed him. The central eye had shrunk to a button. The head had stretched vertically. It was less oblong, more human.

The split in the middle of its arms had almost fused. The legs were human, shorter.

“It hit the hull minutes after you passed out. It cut its way through. Then it closed the breach behind itself.” Max smiled as if the whole thing was just a great anecdote in a bar. “We tried hitting it. It didn’t defend itself. It just kept walking towards you. It’s been standing by your side for two days.”

“Two days?” Jack looked at the bandage around his hand. “I was unconscious for two days?”

“You had a high fever,” said Doctor Brie. “Your body was adapting to whatever infection or irritation that thing caused.” She spoke about the visitor coldly.

“So it’s alive?” Jack asked, looking from one member of the crew to another. Max shrugged.

Irene winked. “At least you’re on your feet again, handsome.” She gave a sideways glance at the metal monster. “I thought that thing had killed you. Would have been a waste. May I say, your eyes are looking particularly blue right now.”

Jack cleared his throat. The rest of the crew looking away as Annie smirked. Holding up his hand, he inspected the clean bandages.

“Have a look,” Annie nodded. “It’s healing well. The bruises will hurt you for longer.”

Jack pulled up his sleeves to reveal purple finger shaped bruises in an alien formation around both wrists. He unravelled the bandages on his hand. A triangle of three purple-brown scabs decorated his palm.

“Cool scar,” said Irene. She smiled.

Yeah, I’ll treasure another mutilation of my body, he thought. “It’s done nothing the whole time?” Jack asked, walking around the bed to look at the silver statue. It turned to face him.

“It stood there. All it’s done is change,” Captain Eliza said. “I think it’s mimicking us. Look at it. Our height, our proportions. It wants to communicate. This is like first contact.” Her hair lay flat on her head for once, not gelled into spikes. Most of the blue tips were lost in the white of her hair.

“It’s not an alien,” Doctor Brie said dismissively.

“What are you talking about? Look at it!” The captain shook an excited hand at the creature.

“I’m almost certain it’s a robot,” said the doctor.

“An alien robot maybe,” said the captain.

“What does it want?” Jack asked. He was all too aware that the hospital gown was tied at the back with a simple bow knot. Irene’s eyes peeked where the fabric parted, making him self conscious for the first time in many years.

He stood before the ancient silver entity, looking up at the ever more human face. “What do you want?”

“Stand,” it said in a voice that echoed back to ages before life on Earth had left the oceans.

“What?” Jack stuttered, stepping backwards in shock. He stumbled into Irene, whose hands tried to steady him at the waist, one slipping inside his gown. He didn’t know if it was on purpose or by accident as he twirled. Caught between the shock of the thing talking and the shock of her hands on him, he tripped over her foot.

“Un,” said the creature. “Dear.”

“Did it talk before?” Jack asked, trying to stand without exposing himself. Irene leered at him as much as any crusty old man had at any barmaid Jack had ever seen.

Eliza shook her head. “No. That’s new.”

“Can I have my clothes back?” Jack asked.

“Sure thing,” Irene winked. “I washed them for you. Don’t think I’ll be doing that again. It was just because you were injured. I’m not the housewife type.” She picked up his Fairweather uniform and ratty underwear from the bed behind the captain. “I have to say though, when I was talking them off, I noticed you could do with some new boxers.” She waggled them in the air until he snatched them, feeling a twinge of pain in his hand that wasn’t his carpal tunnel.

“You undressed me?” he asked her, feeling the heat growing in his cheeks.

“Someone had to. So I volunteered.” She patted his shoulder. “Don’t worry. It’s nothing I haven’t seen before. And nothing I didn’t enjoy.”

Kill me now, he thought.

“Anyway, I should be going,” said Max with his own face flushed. “Glad you’re better, Jack. Good luck with the alien.”

Which one?

“You should get some food and then more rest,” Doctor Annie said. “Stretch your legs though. Lying for two days is going to give you some aches and pains.”

“I can help with those. I can stretch you.” Irene smiled and licked her lips.

I can’t tell if you want to sleep with me or eat me. “Can you all leave me alone to get changed.”

“Want help?” Irene asked.

“NO.”

She laughed to herself as she left with the rest of them. He listened, waiting until her footsteps had receded down the hallway before tugging the bow on his white gown and jumping into his boxer shorts.

“Un,” said the thing as he zipped up his Fairweather boiler suit. “Dear. Stand.”

Jack frowned. “Understand?” He zipped up his boots.

“Un. Dear. Stand,” it said with a voice that made anyone and everything he’d ever known feel young.

“Understand. Understand what?” Jack rubbed cold hands together. “Will you walk with me?” He moved to the door.

It turned with stuttering movement as if the battery was low or it suffered arthritis. “We. Yule. Woe.” Its feet clanged on the floor. “Queath. Me?”

Walking nightmare, Jack thought, I hope you’re friendly.