Your cat won't attack the mailman or eat the drapes, although he may climb the drapes to see how the room looks from the ceiling.
- Helen Powers
Try as I might, keeping up with those two shadows was a task, and though I was healing far more quickly than normal, I was still weak. My jogging was starting to sap what little strength I had accumulated.
By the time Leena and Darwin had slowed down, I had managed to figure out that we were still in the shipping and receiving section of the Station, and had left my 'recovery room' close to the original loading bay to head further back.
We came to a door down a deserted hall. Reaching into a pocket, Leena pulled out a small black device. It emitted a purple light as she passed it over the keypad. The door slid silently open. I made a mental note to pick up one of those.
Leena and Darwin had already conducted a thorough investigation of the room before I stumbled in, panting. It looked like it had once been an office for a small shipping company. This room had likely been forgotten in one of the many mergers that were frequent in the business. It had chairs and other things. Sorry if I am being vague, at this point I only cared about the chairs.
I collapsed into one of them and let my limbs flop down. I experimented with my left arm a little, twisting it back and forth. It was fine. I was unsure what the introduction of alien blood would do to my system, but for now I was just happy that it had kept me alive.
I wondered when I had made the transition of thinking of Leena as a missing human to believing her to be alien. Petersen, for all of his faults, was not an idiot. There was ample evidence to the eye, and if the phage was an example, at the biological level as well. The chances of twin evolution that matched two species this closely were astronomical. I started to go through some of the ancient theories that were popular during the colonization period.
Some of the colonists had prepared themselves to meet our alien neighbors, if we had any. While there was no evidence, until now, that any other life existed in our galaxy, they had packed aboard sounds and images and samples from earth in all of its variety. One of the popular theories at the time was that they had met their neighbors, and that is why they were never heard from again. The aliens did not want us in space, some of the stories went. Perhaps a lost ship, derelict and drifting, had been found by Leena's race, and she had traced its origin here.
Meanwhile, Leena had been occupied with far more mundane tasks. She had reached around a stack of boxes in a corner and pulled out a bag. She had been preparing this location as a hideout for some time. She pulled out three pouches of water and three food bars.
She peeled open a bar and passed it to Darwin, who devoured it with glee. Vegetarian food bar, no doubt. Leena opened one for herself, then brought me over one.
"Eat this. The phage has not yet completed its work, and it will require energy to do so."
"Forget the phage," I said. "I am starving!" Even so, I smelled the bar experimentally. It was actually not too bad. I wondered why I had been avoiding them. I started tearing large chunks off the bar and chewing happily. Really not bad at all. Actually quite tasty.
"You and the phage are one and the same now. As you and I are."
I finished my mouthful and washed it down with a mouthful of water.
"About that," I said. "What did you mean by 'I am your daughter?' I am pretty sure that I have no children."
She blinked for a moment. "I am your daughter? I am your female child. I am..." She was obviously struggling with the translation. I waited. "You are human. I am a child of humans. I am a female...." She spread her hands in a gesture of helplessness.
The thunder had returned, the pounding waves, the lighting flashing, flashing, flashing light, a steady blinking light, the blinking of numbers counting down. The flash of fire, resolving itself into the flame in an engine and the roar of departure.
"You are a daughter of humanity." I said, finally understanding what she was trying to say. Then other pieces fell into place. The strange shuttle program, the language differences, the pink tongue, the skin. Different, but the same. "Your sun. You said 'Your sun.' Because it is my sun, but it isn't yours. You..." I could hardly believe I was saying this. "You aren't an alien at all are you? You are human. But you aren't from here. Therefore...You are a colonist."
She smiled. "Hello, father."
I sat there, silent for several minutes as my entire worldview expanded, beyond the belt, beyond the giants, beyond the stars.
"I have so many questions." I said, not sure where to start. "How many have survived? Where did you go?"
"I alone survive." she said sadly. "There were once three, but now I am alone. The woman... was curious." She seemed very sad at this. Understandably. But I was enraged.
"You are the ONLY SURVIVOR? Of the hundreds of thousands that were sent out, only you survived?"
She looked at me, confused. Then that black smile again. "I understand. I am the only survivor here. My people await my return. We number in the twenty billions, at the last census over the six systems."
I was silent once again as the weight of the numbers crushed what remained of my comfortable little world.
"Twenty billion humans?" This emotional roller-coaster was taking me all over the place. "We are only about three or four in this system! Six systems! This is incredible! I can't imagine how the worlds will react. This news changes everything!"
She place her hand gently on mine. "It must not, Joshua. Look into your mind and see. Do you sense the hole there, the deep darkness that draws you to oblivion?"
How could she know? There was no way she could know!
"It is there in the mind of each of you, this yearning for the end. My mission here is nearly complete, and I must begin my return soon, but I have collected sufficient data to know this. Humanity is not ready to hear that there is a more numerous, more powerful force out beyond the Giants. Your isolation leads you to despair. This news would lead you to destruction. You must keep this secret. The others who know this would not be believed, but you would."
"The children have outgrown the parents...." I realized that my initial excitement would be the only celebration that the success of the Colonial missions would ever get. At least in my lifetime.
"When do you think we will be ready? To hear the truth, I mean."
"It is up to you."
A vague answer, but I had no time to pursue it, because the door to our little hideaway exploded, showering us both with shards of broken metal.
Shots rang out above our heads as four faceplated soldiers in armor poured in through the smoke of the explosion, guns drawn. These were professionals, trained guards with the power and will to suppress resistance.
"Please stay where you are," one of them said. "We have instructions to bring you in, unharmed if we can." His voice sounded familiar.
Darwin, of course, was not going to sit still for this. He had managed to climb unseen up some boxes. Then he went into action, leaping for one of the guards.
With barely a glance, the lead guard pulled the intended victim out of the way. Darwin landed on his feet, then crouched and hissed.
The lead guard calmly looked down. "Darwin, don't make this harder than it has to be."
The voice sounded VERY familiar.
"Aren't you a little far from home?" I said.
The captain nodded briefly in my direction. "Hello again, Finder. Care to call off your cat?"
"He's not my cat." I said reflexively. But Darwin had plans of his own. He made a jump for the captain, who calmly stepped back and twisting his hand, caught Darwin on the head with the butt of his gun. Stepping aside again, he let Darwin sail by to crash into a stack of chairs at the end of his jump.
I leapt up, heading towards Darwin, but four guns turned my way. "Don't worry, Finder. I have instructions to bring in your cat as well. Alive, like the rest of you."
He turned and shot twice at a metal crate, piercing it through. He gave instructions for the box to be emptied and Darwin to be placed inside.
"Alright, Finder, on your feet." He indicated to another guard to search me. "Yes, captain," she said. Another familiar voice. She came over and searched through my shirt and pants.
Even though she was visored, I could sense that she was a little surprised at the state of my clothes. "Looks like you've been in a hell of a fight," Private Mendoza said quietly. "Glad to see you made it through ok." This was starting to feel like a reunion.
The captain nodded the private over to Leena. She whispered something to Leena, who got down on her knees. She was smiling. Apparently she knew the guard as well. She was thoroughly searched from head to waist. Then Leena stood and the search from waist down was completed. The guard pulled out the small black object Leena had used to enter the room, then she whispered to her again. Leena smiled and nodded.
Mendoza brought the object to the Captain, who looked it over and tossed into a small box, along with Marcus Alexi's card from Small Moon Transport and a few other odds and ends I had in my pockets.
"Sir, we have them," the captain said into his com. "Very good sir, we are on our way."
The captain waved his gun. "Let's be on our way then, shall we? You know as well as I do that she doesn't like to be kept waiting."