The Beyond: Chapter Three

 Notes: I'm still going! This story is getting told, damn it! Have some Kyle POV--he's going to be a pretty big presence in this one.

Title: The Beyond, Chapter Three

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Chapter Three

 

Photo by the NASA Hubble Space Telescope

 

 

 

Kyle sat next to Robbie in the cockpit of their little ship, prepping everything from the emergency cut-offs for the engine to the modified trajectory calculator that he planned to run in tandem with Robbie’s approach. It wasn’t enough to really help, but it would make Kyle feel better about the whole thing.

Their crew was, unfortunately, a little infamous among people in the Beyond for this particular approach to Cloverleaf Station. The asteroid field was a decent approach as long as you kept enough distance, but given the strength of the gravity waves, you didn’t save much on fuel by skirting close to the pulsar. Most people found it easier to go long, fly a few million kilometers away and get some bigger eddies and currents in there to break up the persistent damage of the pulsar, and round on the station from the larger spaceways, usually hitching onto the most popular from Gania.

That sort of patience wasn’t to be found in Wyl and Pence, back when he was with them. As for the benefit of keeping their unique status to themselves, Robbie of all people declined to bother with hiding that there was something that allowed them to do what they did. “We need people to know that there’s something weird going on with us,” he reasoned. “We need them to want to approach us and interview us, so we can learn from them as much as they might learn from us.”

Which…he wasn’t wrong, but that wasn’t the way Kyle had been trained to go about things. Admiral Liang had taught him from a young age that the best way to get information was by being covert, by hiding your true intentions and giving people what they wanted to see. It had worked for him for a long time—worked too well in the end, when his brother decided to discard him at Redstone.

Garrett Caractacus had anticipated that and sent Isidore Cain ahead of him to save his life, and Kyle would be forever grateful for that, not just because Isidore had saved him, but because in doing so, he’d met someone who was so much like him. Isidore was clever, and knew the benefit of a pretty face and empty eyes, and was so much more dangerous than he looked. If he hadn’t fallen in love with Pence, Kyle would have done his damndest to convince Isidore to stay with them.

But he’d fallen in love after all, tempted into the start of it before Kyle ever showed up, and Kyle knew better than to fight it. That was another thing he’d grown used to—perpetually coming second in the race for a heart.

Stop it. Isidore was happy, so he was happy for him. Besides, the man was pining for civilization and Kyle couldn’t blame him. He had a chance to do more with himself, and he should take it. Kyle would be in good company with Wyl and Robbie.

Second place again. Which, again—Robbie and Wyl were married, and he was old-fashioned the way you got from Martians—he only had eyes for Wyl, and Wyl felt the same. They were the sort of devoted he’d never seen before…well, maybe with Cody and Ten, but that relationship was pure chaos, where these two were solid, two planets in perfect orbit around each other. The only hiccup there was the parasite, and that could be fixed.

It could.

It had to be.

“Ready for approach.” Robbie’s voice was steady, almost mechanical as he made minute adjustments to their pitch.

“Ready,” Kyle confirmed. “The quickest route looks like about forty thousand kilometers, with permanent shadow.” The information wasn’t perfect, but it was a lot better since the Ganian stationmaster had started sending drones out to map the field and give spacers continual updates.

“I’ll increase speed a little.” Ten thousand kilometers an hour was a brisk enough pace, but should give them time to make the adjustments needed to handle unexpected asteroid movement.

“Copy.”

“Are we good?” Wyl asked, coming up behind Robbie and laying his hands on the other man’s shoulders.

“We’re good,” Robbie said, covering one of Wyl’s hands with his own for a moment.

They were. It would be fine, they’d done this a dozen times over the past three years. They’d only ever had problems once, and that was the very first trip. Robbie was better at this now—perfect, in fact.

Because he had the parasite.

“Here.” A mug appeared in Kyle’s peripheral vision. He turned and took it from Isidore with a smile.

“Thanks.” He sipped—mm, milky and sweet, the only way he liked coffee. Kyle took his share of ribbing from Wyl about taking his coffee like a child, but the hell with it. He liked what he liked, and he liked coffee that didn’t feel like a punishment.

“You ready for the station?”

Kyle shrugged. “It’ll be nice to see Pence again.”

“What about your friend there? Jenette, right?”

Kyle shook his head. “She left at the end of last season.”

“And you got her com info, right?”

No, he hadn’t. Jenette had been friendly, a Drifter turned miner who didn’t know who Kyle was and wouldn’t have cared anyway, but there was no point in keeping in touch with her. He’d had to lie to her every moment they spent together; it was just easier not to dig his hole any deeper, especially since she was heading deeper into Alliance space. “It’s fine.”

“Let’s get going,” Robbie said briskly, and Kyle gratefully abandoned the conversation and focused on watching Robbie instead.

This far out, the parasite’s abilities weren’t really apparent. Robbie manipulated the ship onto the right path, the same one Kyle’s program had identified, and they set off into the asteroid field. Forty thousand kilometers…no problem, and yet…there were so many things that could go wrong so quickly. One miscalculation, one misstep, and they’d be splashed across the side of a massive space rock, a brief flare of heat that a drone might catch, if they were lucky, and if they weren’t…

Well, they’d be lost. One more missing ship in a long, long line of ships that had never returned from the Beyond. It wasn’t a place people lived, or where they attempted to make careers or build a life for themselves. The Beyond was simply beyond, a region of space that teemed with so many anomalies that regular radio contact was impossible. Space itself had been warped, like an enormous hand had reached down and twisted it, making it into something that was almost totally incompatible with life.

Almost. There were also the Ruins, hard to find and harder yet to return to, and those were what people like Kathryn Blake were interested in. They were evidence of—hell, the claims varied. Everything from more species of aliens to a portal into another universe had been floated, and Robbie read them all. They all kept up with the research, but Robbie was particularly keen to figure out as much as he could.

The parasite had come from the Beyond, after all. Stood to reason that if he was going to be able to get rid of it, that was the place to do it.

Wyl and Isidore headed back to the mess once they were underway, chatting about anything and everything, but Kyle kept his focus on the charted path. He was the second pilot, and if anything happened to Robbie he’d have to take over. Not that anything would happen to Robbie, but Kyle needed to be ready, just in case. He might not have the military level of mods he used to, not since his brother had ordered them all permanently deactivated before Redstone, but Isidore had gotten him some damn good replacements, and Kyle still had the muscle memory to use them to the highest level. His reflexes were amazing.

They still weren’t as good as Robbie’s when the parasite was driving.

Kyle watched him out of the corner of his eye. Right now it was Robbie in charge, as far as he could tell. His eyes were normal, he wasn’t sweating or shivering—he was just Robbie. He was Robbie for the first hour, and the second, and then they were halfway through the field and had to slow down a bit, which was fine, because—

“Beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbee—”

“Proximity alert,” Kyle said quickly, shutting off the alarm and pulling the affected zone up on his implant. He broadcast it to the ship so it showed on the screen. “Two asteroids had an unanticipated collision about five thousand kilometers out. There’s a new debris field.”

“How much?” Wyl demanded. “What size are we talking here?”

Size made a big difference. Big debris was better—easier to see, easier to maneuver around, easier to avoid. Small was like trying to fly through thousands of bullets at the speed they were going right now.  Their shielding just wasn’t good enough to endure it.

“It’s—shit, it’s showing up as a cloud,” Kyle said with a grimace. “No visible pieces, small enough to scatter fast. We need to backtrack.”

“No.”

They all turned to look at Robbie. His pupils had gotten large, and too shiny.

“We can’t make it through that debris,” Wyl said in something close to his normal voice.

“Backtracking will take too much fuel. We won’t be able to make Cloverleaf without bartering back in the Beyond for more, and that will take too much money.”

He wasn’t wrong, but it was the only reasonable thing to do.

“The Devas owe me,” Isidore said after a moment. “I can get fuel for less from them.”

“Pence is only allowed on Cloverleaf for another two days. He’ll have to leave to renew his pass, and that could take months. You’ll miss your window to leave with him.”

Kyle’s heart lurched downward for a moment. That would be bad, Isidore having to stay would be bad, and yet…

“I can get us there,” Robbie said, blinking hard. When he looked at thema gain, his eyes were their normal blue. “Trust me.”

Wyl bit his lip. “Robbie.”

“I can.”

“All right.” That was Isidore, nodding firmly. “Let’s do it.”

Robbie smiled at them. “I’ve got this.” He turned back to the viewscreen and began to modify their course, taking over manually.

Kyle startled badly when Robbie looked over at him and, with a wry smile on his face, winked. His eyes had gone completely black. “Follow my lead and reprogram as we go,” he said, then turned to face forward again, and his face sort of…blanked.

This, at least, Kyle had seen before, when the parasite was extending its—shit, he didn’t know what to call it. Aura? Cosmic range? Whatever it was, Robbie’s passenger had the ability to sense the space around him better than anything Kyle had ever heard of before. He could do it from inside a ship, from standing on the surface of a vantablack planet with no light except what they brought with them, he could do it underground and under water. And clearly he could do it for thousands of kilometers, which begged so many questions that Kyle wasn’t prepared to even ask.

Robbie kept them on course for another fifteen minutes. The first deviation came in the shadow of an enormous asteroid, one several miles across. Instead of skirting around the side of it, he took them under, keeping them in the protective shadow and curling up tight on the other side as they emerged—

Right next to a second asteroid, holy shit, the radar showed it was almost close enough to touch. Kyle inhaled sharply, and from right behind him Wyl cursed, then put the viewfinder on visible. He knew it didn’t matter to Robbie, after all.

Their lights illuminated the pitted, gray rock of the asteroid they’d nearly kissed a moment ago, smaller than the one they’d darted under but spinning slightly, more mobile. Kyle’s breath stilled in his lungs, his heart starting to race as he realized his program was completely useless now. If anything happened to Robbie, he wouldn’t be able to pick up the slack. He’d get them all killed. Useless, worthless, dragging other people down…

“Focus,” Robbie whispered, and Kyle knew it was for him. He forced himself to look away from the screen and at what his own implant was broadcasting, willing the calculations to catch up even though he knew it was impossible.

They had three more close calls over the next forty minutes, including actually watching an impact take place less than a thousand yards away. The asteroids involved were tiny, only about the size of their ship, and broke into a dozen pieces that Robbie was able to weave around without a problem. Still, it was humbling and terrifying in equal measure knowing that the field was always, always in motion. The pulsar’s gravitational waves left the asteroids unstable, moving them around, while at the same time its gravity well pulled the smaller pieces in over time to be consumed by the broken star. It was the only reason the field was passable at all, instead of a solid cloud of dust.

Two more hours and they were finally within range of Cloverleaf Station. Robbie was soaked with sweat and Kyle didn’t feel much better, but as soon as they emerged from the field he reversed their forward propulsion and shut the engines down, then sent their docking code off so a drone could come get them.

“Holy shit,” Isidore murmured.

Kyle looked over his shoulder at them, and one glance was enough to make him get up and give his chair to Wyl. They needed space, and he needed some water. He went back to the mess, head pounding from residual tension, and poured himself a drink. It was tepid and metallic, but it still tasted amazing to him.

Isidore’s hand clasped his shoulder. Kyle shuddered at the clammy feel of his shirt pressing down on his skin. “Are you okay?”

Kyle resisted the wild urge to giggle. What a question. “I’m fine. I didn’t even have to do anything.”

“You had to watch.”

And watching was hard, was what he was getting at, but the truth was Kyle had been grateful to watch. Happy to do so, even. He’d known he couldn’t do what Robbie did in those moments, knew he was nothing but a liability.

In the end, he just shook his head. Isidore squeezed him one more time, then let go. “Come on. Let’s get you kitted out for the station.”

Ah right, his disguise. Couldn’t show up looking like himself, not even on the edge of the known universe. Kyle drained his cup and set it in the sink. He’d clear it later. “Yeah, okay.”