Ava Read online

The front window was split in two by a thick support beam that ran down the middle following the curvature of the Ixion’s nose. Two seats sat in front of an ancient flight console. A complicated setup of hundreds of buttons and flickering screens adorned its surface. Banks of computers ran either side of the already cramped room and two thick cables ran from the top of each, connecting towards a central processing unit that bulged from the ceiling.

  “It’s junk,” said Ava deadpan, “how does this thing fly?”

  “By sheer will alone most of the time, you’ll be busy on board, that’s for sure, there’s a lot that needs doing after we… lost our last engineer.”

  “You lost them? What does that even mean?”

  “Ah, it doesn’t matter!” Feelo avoided the question by spinning the co-pilot’s seat around towards the frowning woman, “take a seat.”

  She slipped her small frame down, snuggling into the comfortable chair. Silently, she turned and looked out the window at the blue waves that washed over the nose and across the ship. Her eyes were wide, and her pupils dilated, both her hands held onto the armrests, digging her non-existent nails into the tattered brown leather.

  “Ava,” said Feelo, trying to draw her attention, “A-a-a-v-a,” he clicked his fingers in front of her face, “wakie, wakie, there’s still a lot more to see yet.”

  She sat back, her chest quickly rising and falling. “Yeah… Sure, come on, let’s have a look.”

  Their boots shook the stairs as they exited the bridge and went down towards the engine room. The rattling of the FTL engine was deafening. It sat exposed in the centre of the room. From the hulking machine, two large cylinders of an azure liquid extruded at each end, their chambers emptying as it funnelled the fluid down into the engine.

  “This is an…” Feelo began.

  “Arcadian type-VII injector engine fuelled with a liquid rhodium-scordium mixture,” she stepped closer to the tubes. “I’d say ten percent rhodium, maybe fifteen judging by its colour. It produces a bubble around its local space propelling the object – the Ixion in this case – across the natural tides of the universe, like a stone skipping across water.”

  “… FTL engine,” finished Feelo. “How do you know so much?”

  Ava turned on her heels excitedly, her features softening as she spoke about the machine. “I worked as an emergency engineer at a space port on Aeos, I’d service every ship that came to dock, and let me tell you, rarely do you find an engine as incredible as this.”

  Feelo smiled. “It’s just about the most advanced thing on board, apart from Meco, she’s taken us across the quadrant and complained little about doing so.”

  “These Arcadian engines are like that,” said Ava, placing her hand on the outer shell of the reaction chamber, “enormous amounts of engineering went into every one of these to ensure they didn’t fail, their backups and failsafe systems are legendary.”

  “I bet your old crew loved having you around.”

  Ava looked at Feelo, pushing her hair back behind her neck, “I’ve never left Aeos. I’ve got no clue what goes on out here. I lived in my little sheltered bubble.”

  “Oh man, really?” Feelo said with a twinge of excitement, “there’s so much for you to see and do, then.”

  “There is,” nodded Ava, “but don’t forget, I’m only a passenger, I’m not sticking around.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” replied Feelo, turning away to hide his disappointment. “Wanna see your digs?”

  “My digs?”

  “Your quarters! You know, where you’re going to sleep…”

  “Lead the way,” she waved towards the stairs. Feelo skipped away over the bulkhead, charging up the stairs with a crash. Ava, though, stood still, watching as the young man bounded away. She allowed herself a quiet smile, running a hand along the railing which surrounded the engine.

  She ran up the stairs and rounded the corner into the common area. Ellie stood in front of the television, chuckling to herself at the old cartoons that flashed across the screen. “Oh, hey, Ava,” she said, turning, “I laid out some new clothes for you in your room, it’s not much, but it’s all we have, sorry.”

  Ava silently nodded her appreciation whilst dreading what they could be. She followed Feelo through the room and out into the corridor, stopping before they headed into the medical bay. “These rooms,” Feelo pointed to the six doors around them in the tight space, “are our quarters, and this one is yours.”

  The door cycled back into the wall with a hiss. Inside was a sparse twelve by twelve box room. A basic bed sat propped up against the wall, its sheets and blankets folded neatly onto the chest of metal draws beside it on top of which Ava’s fresh clothes also sat. Desperate to change she pulled her shawl over her head and unlaced her boots.

  Feelo quickly turned away. “Don’t mind me,” he said. “I’m just looking over here.”

  “I’ve still got clothes on, idiot.” She unfolded her new gear, holding up the one-piece, dark blue uniform. “This is all you have?” she questioned, “you must have something else.”

  Feelo scratched the back of his head. “We don’t keep spare clothes aboard for any wantaway engineers who force their way on board. We’ll arrive at Deaua in about fifteen hours, why don’t you stick it on, just for today, and I’ll buy you a set of new stuff when we get there, deal?”

  She eyed the two-sizes too big garment up and down, sighing as she did. “Fine, I suppose it’ll have to do, close the door on the way out.”

  Feelo stood outside, leaning against the door’s bulkhead. “So, you’ve never left Aeos, then? You’ve never seen what’s out here?”

  Muffled sounds of Ava falling back into the cabinets and swearing under her breath crept from the room. “No, I’ve never left, I said that already. All I know about the sector is from what traders have told me. I didn’t have a television or access to the galactic network.”

  Feelo shot from his comfortable position, “no galactic network! How did you even get by? What did you do in your spare time?”

  “I read books, I worked, I slept, simple stuff really.”

  “You couldn’t have been happy with that life, surely?”

  Ava emerged, zipping up the last part of the uniform, pushing her hair back behind her ears. “So. How Do I Look?”

  “Ridiculous,” Feelo laughed, “I can’t believe you’re actually wearing it.”

  “Well you haven’t got anything else, have you!” she roared, pushing him back, “get out of my way, I need a drink.” Ava barged past the laughing Captain, pushing him with her shoulder as she did. She walked out into the common area to a rapturous round of laughter from Caesar and a hidden, almost compassionate smile from Ellie.

  “It looks good on ‘ya, kid,” Caesar smiled, “eat the rations aboard and you might grow to fit into it one day.”

  “Lay off her, Caesar,” Ellie said, “here, you must be starving, I’m cooking this up for us, it’s nothing special but I hope you like it. Take a seat, it’ll be ready in a few minutes.”

  “Thanks,” said Ava, sliding down into a chair.

  Meco stomped about the area, his feet rattling the grated floor. He moved towards Caesar who sat up from his slouched position to scratch either side of the ‘dog’s’ cheeks to which the mechanical beast let out a gentle, gleeful noise as it raised its head towards the ceiling in enjoyment.

  Ellie stood behind the counter in the kitchen. A thin smoke wisped up from the beaten wok as flames licked its exterior with every shake of its contents. Sweet and savoury smells soon filled the room, making everyone’s mouth water.

  There was a moment where Ava sat back, let out a deep, calming breath, and closed her eyes, taking in the tranquil yet electric atmosphere. But a loud thump snapped her back to reality.

  “Don’t doze off on us now,” said Feelo, slamming a bowl down in front of her, smiling as he knew what he had done, “Ellie is quite the chef considering the gruel we’ve got in storage.”

  Ava looked down at the
thick red sauce which swished about. A mixture of vegetables and a hard, sour fruit floated in the spicy smelling broth. Cautiously, she took a spoon, digging it into the meal and pulled out a complete mixture of everything on offer. Her eyes grew wide with surprise before she assaulted the bowl, slurping at a pace none of the crew had seen before.

  “Damn, have you not eaten this month?” Feelo chuckled, dipping a piece of stale bread down into the sauce.

  Ava looked up from the bowl she had tipped into her mouth. “It’s just how I eat, what of it?!” she said. “I can go eat in my room if it makes you feel better?”

  “You can go eat with Meco with those noises,” Caesar laughed. “It’s all good, kid,” he slapped her on the shoulder, “enjoy the meal. If you’re leaving us at Deaua, it might be the last proper meal you have for weeks.”

  Feelo looked at the newcomer. “Born and raised on Aeos,” he said, noting her olive skin and intense, large green eyes, “but you look nothing like the locals, their skins darker, their eyes, too.”

  “I never said I was born on Aeos,” she said, her voice sharp with frustration, “I said family brought me there, originally I’m from elsewhere.”

  “But where, then?” Feelo asked, “you said you’ve never left the planet.”

  Her brow furrowed as she grew impatient. “Why all the questions?”

  Feelo shrugged, “I want to get to know my new crew member better.”

  “I’m not…”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” he held his hands up, “I’m only a passenger, nothing more,” he repeated.

  Again, there was silence. Ellie took the bowls away as everyone finished their meal. Ava leant back on the two back legs of the chair, swinging back and forth, deep in thought. Feelo watched her with a curious eye, who is she? He wondered, knowing the whole truth, or even the partial truth, had yet to come out.

  Ava felt the unwanted attention and crashed the two front feet down into the ground, making everyone jump. “Right, I’m going to get some rest before we land, it’s been a hectic day. Ellie, thanks for the meal, Feelo, well… Yeah, I’ll catch you all later.”

  “Good night,” Ellie smiled.

  Feelo stayed quiet, watching her as she went. He bit at his nails, racking his brain with an odd feeling he had towards her, he knew something was off but couldn’t quite place it.

  * * *

  Feelo leant back in the pilot’s seat, his feet up on the centre console. Tablet in hand, he read through the latest reports coming out of Deaua. Pirate attacks, muggings, and murder were all common place on the unaligned world. He scoffed at the reports of police corruption, as if that’s news he thought, they’re the same on every backwater planet.

  A gentle double beep came from the computer. With a huff, he reached above him and grabbed the microphone. “This is your Captain speaking. We are nearing our destination so would all passengers please remain seated with harnesses secured as we exit slip space, thank you.”

  “Shut up, Fee,” Caesar’s voice echoed from the common area, “you idiot.”

  Smiling, he strapped the belts across his body as Ava moved onto the bridge and took a seat beside him. “We both know how it went last time when I tried to strap myself in down in engineering…” she said.

  “Yeah, good point,” Feelo laughed. “Strap yourself in, things can get… bumpy, let’s put it that way.”

  “Bumpy!” Caesar protested, his voice distant as it echoed throughout the ship, “that’s an understatement.”

  “Such a great guy,” Feelo nodded to himself.

  “Yeah…” Ava raised an eyebrow, “great…”

  “Anyway, we’ll be there in two shakes of a Tark’s tail, so hang tight.”

  Feelo took hold of the flight stick between his legs with both hands and put both feet on the pedals within the well. Within moments a screeching erupted from the terminal. As the timer reached three the ship begun to shake violently. It threw Feelo and Ava about in their seats to which she grabbed onto the armrests; her eyes wide with fear. Loud creaks and bangs rang out all around them, piercing through the vicious screeching of the vessel’s hull. Then, with a crack that deafened everyone onboard for a moment, they were spat out from slip space and slid back into normal space spiralling out of control.

  “Feelo…” Ava said, her voice tinged with fear, “is this normal?”

  The stars outside were a mere blur, the planet came and went every few seconds as he wrestled for control. Thrusters on the outside erupted, spewing out high pressure gasses to stabilise their tumbling ship. Slowly, the stars aligned as their stomachs settled.

  “Well, that went better than expected,” Feelo let out a sigh of relief.

  “Better than expected!” Ava complained, “are you mad!? I nearly tore my head off and the meal I had before coming here, well, I’m pretty sure I’ve eaten it twice now.”

  Feelo unbuckled his restraints. “That’s disgusting… Was it better the first or the second time?”

  “Gross,” she winced.

  “What?! You started it.”

  They sat five-hundred-thousand kilometres away from the planet. Three large industrialised moons orbited the world. Feelo pushed power towards the chemical engines and brought them about on a course to slingshot around the nearest moon. It didn’t take long to clear the planetary bodies’ gravitational well and come out around the other side.

  Deaua sat in the distance unaffected by the constant stream of traffic that chaotically flowed through her atmosphere. Sunlight reflected off a vast sapphire ocean that surrounded deep green continents. Ava sat forwards and voiced a silent ‘wow.’

  “Pretty, isn’t it?” said Feelo watching her reaction.

  “Yeah,” she seemed transfixed by the bountiful world, “it’s nothing like Aeos.”

  “There are desert regions on Deaua, too,” noted Feelo, “not anywhere near where we’re going, though, they’re on the other side of the planet, a region that ONE never terraformed.”

  Ava broke her gaze and turned towards him. “ONE?” she asked, “you say that like it means something.”

  “You don’t know who ONE are?” he was taken aback. “You can’t be that out of the loop, can you?”

  “Pretend like I am,” she frowned.

  “Wow, okay,” he thought for a moment. “There are the three main empires who control the small colonised sector of the galaxy, there are more, but there’s only three big players. There’s ONE, the Old Nations of Earth who control the largest region of space. They broke away from Earth after the colonisation of Alpha Centauri hundreds of years ago. Since then One quickly spread claiming other worlds before forming their own government as they feel Earth no longer represented their collective vision.”

  “Interesting…” said Ava.

  “Then there’s the Resojin Federation who are small but powerful, Orion and Arcadia are based there, two companies I’m sure you’re familiar with.”

  “Yep. I’ve worked with their weapons and engines a lot back on Aeos.”

  “Exactly, they produce everything that’s worth having, engines and ships produced elsewhere are cheap knockoffs. They command the largest navy of anyone but are pacifists by nature, often giving away resources and striking unfavourable trade deals to help smaller colonies.”

  “Why the navy if they’re pacifist?”

  Feelo shrugged, “better to have it and not need it rather than need it and not have it, I guess? But finally, there is The United Planets of Sol, or TUPOS, and they’re… a difficult bunch, let’s put it that way.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “They want to stick to the traditional way of doing things. It’s all proper and not for me. They’ve been locked in a cold war with ONE for going on fifty years now, but apart from sporadic skirmishes neither has dared attack the other outright, it would be the downfall of them both.”

  Ava nodded her acknowledgment, allowing the information to sink in. There was more Feelo could have explained, such as how ONE had set up a sen
sor net around their territory following their suspicious nature or how The United Planets treated their citizens, often forcing them into hard labour with little to no pay. He didn’t want to ruin her new starry-eyed image of the galaxy, not yet at least, a single peek under the hood would ruin it all.

  They soon slammed into Deaua’s outer atmosphere. Plasma lashed against the front window as they pierced through the thick layer nose first. Sporadic booms rattled the entire frame of the ship but Feelo kept a tight grip on the flight stick. The pots and pans in the common area rattled and clanged about violently creating an unbearable cacophony of noise that echoed through the Ixion.

  But, after an arduous sixty seconds, they punched through the planet’s protective shield and Feelo brought them to a gentle glide above the white blanket of clouds that bustled about thousands of feet below them.

  The first signs of settled life soon broke through the clouds. The city in the distance, Rohedia, snaked away from a towering central spire that sat high above the white blanket above the settlement. Buildings had been built low, avoiding the violent winds which often ripped across the grassy knolls of the continent. The spaceport sat near the centre of the city which had built around it. Vessels from larger gunships to smaller, singular shuttles competed for airspace above the dilapidated city.

  “This is what I’m used to,” said Ava.

  “What’s that?”

  “Traffic. Constant traffic. On Aeos you had to wait thirty, sometimes even forty minutes before being granted permission to take off, it was hell.”

  Feelo turned to her, watching as she stared at the ships that flew past them by in the opposite direction. “If you had a ship why didn’t you leave the planet?”

  She shrugged. “I was poor, I couldn’t afford the fuel to go anywhere. Plus, it was a junker, just about enough to get me from point A to B without falling apart.”

  “No troubles like that here,” Feelo said, “I just pick a spot and land, anyone wants to get in my way I’ll just shoot ‘em out the sky.”

  She turned to him; an eyebrow raised. “You’d really do that over a parking spot?”