Nexus by Robert Boyczuk (best large ebook reader txt) 📕

“Are you sure the dropship is going to be safe?” Hebuiza had asked when the whole group reassembled in the bay. They had spread out along the wall, hanging on to drag bars. All four were dressed in pale blue undersuits, the ends of half a dozen recycling tubes poking out from several junctures in the insulating material.

“It wasn’t designed for atmospheric work,” Sav said. “Except in emergencies. But it should hold up well enough. I wouldn’t want to rely on it for an extended period, or in rough weather, but it’ll get us there and back.”

The Facilitator mumbled inaudibly.

“Let’s get going,” Josua said curtly, pushing away from the wall and drifting over to where Sav and Hebuiza had clipped the EVA suits to the floor.

The suits belonging to Josua, Liis and Sav were standard-issue zinc white, divided at the waist into bulky pants and torsos. Helmets with large oval visors had been clipped to each chest. The fourth suit, Hebuiza’s, was set apart from the others; it was longer and thinner, its material black. It was in one piece, split vertically along its side. A wider, oval helmet, permanently hinged to its neck, bore an intricate cross-thatching of wires, sockets and tiny antennae, extensions, Liis guessed, for the ones atop the Facilitator’s skull. On its chest, nearly invisible against the dark material, was a black, featureless box that the Facilitator had refused to detach despite its kilos of extra mass. Thin cables radiated from it like veins, running along the exterior of the suit to its extremities. Several disappeared into gusseted ports on the base of the helmet.

Hooking her feet under a drag bar on the deck, Liis reached down and unclipped the lower half of Josua’s suit; she held it out for him. “Come on, I’ll give you a hand.”

He nodded and pushed away from the wall, sailing across the bay. He caught himself awkwardly on the nose of the dropship his legs swinging beneath him and almost knocking the suit from Liis’ hands. He righted himself.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Liis said.

It took a few minutes for her to help him struggle into the trunk of his suit. Liis began connecting his waste tubes, but he waved her away and did it himself. She turned to retrieve the upper part of his suit, then guided it over his head and secured it. She unclipped his helmet and handed it to him.

Josua smiled weakly at her. “Thanks.” Lifting his helmet, he placed it over his head and, after a couple of tries, slipped it onto its metal threads. He turned it slightly so the faceplate was centred, then pressed the compression snaps on the collar.

Liis drifted over next to Sav who’d already climbed into his suit; in the far corner the Facilitator had donned his suit and clipped himself to a drag bar. He was playing with the cables that converged on the box fixed to his chest. Though he was only a few meters away, Liis could no longer see the vertical seam that had split the side of the dark suit.

“When we were working on the EVA suits, he wouldn’t let me touch his,” Liis said quietly to Sav. “I don’t know what that thing on his chest is. When I asked him, he told me to mind my own business.”

Sav shrugged; he looked like other things were on his mind.

The Facilitator, who had finished with the box, had now turned his attention to his oddly-shaped helmet, wider that the rest. His dark fingers adjusted the antennae there as his head bobbed. Liis realised the helmet had been designed to accommodate the strange swinging motion of the Facilitator’s head.

She turned her back on him and suited up. A moment later she had pulled herself around the side of the dropship to the open hatch where the other were waiting. Inside the ship the space was dominated by a console and two seats anchored to the deck. Above the console was the windscreen, a thick band of polarised plastic wrapped around the nose of the ship.

Sav pulled himself in first, squeezing his bulk into the pilot’s seat. With a gentle shove, Liis propelled Josua towards the co-pilot’s seat. She figured that since he’d had only minimal training in the bulky suit, he’d be safest there. Josua went without protest. Liis followed and helped him fasten his harness. Then she wedged herself between the back of his seat and the bulwark, clipping himself to two recessed rings in the wall. Hebuiza came last, the top of his odd helmet scraping along the low ceiling; inside his head swung from side to side in its agitated motion. He spread his long arms in the narrow aisle between the hatch and a bank of storage lockers, but didn’t bother clipping himself to any of the safety rings.

Sav punched in the sequence to seal the hatch. A few seconds later, Liis felt the hum of the Ea’s airlock compressor sing through the floorplates of the dropship. In less than two minutes, the atmosphere had been sucked out of the dropship bay. The broad outer doors rolled back and Liis blinked at the bright light of the sun reflecting off the apparition of Bh’Haret.

Day 0

“We should be coming up to the stasis facility soon,” Sav said. He reduced the altitude of the dropship to a kilometer before they made another pass. Liis leaned as much of the weight of her own suit as she could against the back of Josua’s chair. She was hot and uncomfortable already; her visor was misting up. Weight had returned with a vengeance. Every movement now required an effort. Her breath was an uneven rasping sound trapped in her helmet. And the tiny craft seemed to bounce her around vindictively, just to exacerbate her discomfort. Unlike the solid, heavy shuttles normally used for planet fall, the dropship seemed a flimsy and capricious thing to her. The slightest bit of air turbulence made the craft shudder like it had been dealt a death blow.

At the very back of the ship, squeezed between the hatch and a row of narrow storage lockers, Hebuiza sat, his knees pulled up into his chest, in a glum silence. It would have been impossible for him to stand in the craft without stooping, so, shortly after they had felt the first tug of gravity, he had lowered himself to the floor, knees and elbows jammed against the walls.

The dropship bobbed and weaved as the landscape slid beneath them, an endless puzzle of broken, rolling terrain dotted with pockets of ragged trees. It was early fall and this far north leaves had already begun turning. Directly below, the river Lyst was a dull, glinting ribbon in the morning sun, switching back and forth as it twisted its way through canyons and gorges. Josua bent over in the co-pilot’s seat, a thin cable running from the instrument panel to his helmet. He fiddled with the crude optics of the craft, trying to magnify the image, but to no avail; blurred images drifted onto the screen, came into focus for a split second, then slipped away. Instead, Liis stared through the windscreen, searching the ground from her awkward position, but one hill looked pretty much like the next.

The craft yawed sharply and pitched to the left as it was buffeted by a headwind. Liis had to grab the back of Josua’s seat to keep from being thrown into the bulkhead. The craft bucked one more time, then settled into a rhythmic rising and falling, as if it were riding gentle ocean swells.

“There!” Josua’s voice sounded in Liis’ earpiece. He tapped the co-pilot’s screen excitedly.

Liis couldn’t see what he was on about. She looked through the windscreen at a broad valley bordered by a ring of low, rounded hills. In its centre was the mirrored surface of an oval lake, its edges ragged with the shadows of thick, stunted trees. A lake no different than a hundred others they had already seen.

“Where?”

“I think that’s it.” Josua pointed at the far edge of the lake, now in the middle of his screen. “Along the south shore. See how the trees run in an even line. And how they’re all about the same height.”

Then Liis saw it. While the forest everywhere pressed in on the boundaries of the lake, in one place they stood back in a neat row, two hundred meters from shore. The ground here was darker than the lake, a matte black. And unnaturally flat.

“Okay,” Sav said. “Let’s take a closer look.” He swung the dropship toward the ring of hills.

“It’s got to be the solar array,” Josua said.

Liis scanned the hills, but at this distance could find no sign of buildings, no storage sheds, no fences. Nothing that might indicate the facility was nearby. “Why can’t we see anything else?”

“Underground.” Sav spoke as he eased the craft into a gradual descent. “For stasis facilities they usually pick a site as far away from fault lines as possible, and dig deep into the rock. I’ll bet the entrance is the only thing that’s on the surface. And from up here it would be next to impossible to spot.” The ring of hills drew nearer. The dropship decided to veer abruptly to the east and away from the lake; Sav fought it back on course. “If that is the array,” he said as soon as he had regained control, “we should be able to find the site.” They bumped over the nearest ridge and suddenly were directly above the thin tail of the lake, skimming a hundred meters above its surface. The water looked brackish. Near the edge of the lake, the grey spikes of dead trees thrust upwards.

“It is the array,” Josua said. On the screen an enhanced image of the dark plain grew as they sped over the lake, a grid of interlocked solar panels, a network of supporting struts pale lines beneath its edges. Already it was easy to see numerous panels were cracked and pitted. Those nearest the lake were covered with a creeping, green algae. In one spot, a small sapling grew where two partitions had collapsed inwards.

“Are you sure that’s it?” Sav banked the craft towards the point where the array met the lake. “That’s gotta be too small. How could something that size provide enough power?”

“Look down,” Liis said.

Sav bent forward to look out the window on his left. Josua leaned over to his right. Directly below, the murky waters of the lake sped by; visible beneath the surface was a uniform plain of black.

“The array’s plenty big, if you figure it runs the length of the valley,” Liis said quietly. “At least it did before the lake was here.”

“Bah,” Hebuiza said. His visor was darkened, making it impossible to see his face. “So much for your back up power! We may as well turn around.”

“Turn around?” Josua said. “We don’t know anything yet.”

“We know the array is disabled,” Hebuiza shot back. “And that there won’t be anything of use for us here. I told you it would be a waste of time.”

“We’re not turning around!” Liis was shocked by the vehemence of Josua’s response. He turned in his seat to face Hebuiza. Through his visor Liis could see his hardened expression. “We’re not leaving until we find the cryo facility!”

“You are not in charge here,” Hebuiza said calmly.

Josua’s face twisted up in rage; he fumbled with his harness. Only his inexperience with the thick, awkward fingers