The Ship of the Unforgotten - Chapter 31

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Jun. X, 2565 A.C.E.

Cobb paced back and forth at the grated stairs of the junction room. Tundra or islands? Tundra or islands? He’d never been to the island biome, and a voice in the back of his mind warned him away from it. If he hadn’t been there, it was very possible—likely, even—that they’d booby trapped the whole place, as they’d done with the tundra earlier. Exploding coconuts, maybe. It was hard to predict how the minds of traitors and cowards worked.

He stopped by the stairs and rested his forehead on the cool metal rail. The islands were almost certainly booby trapped. The tundra though; he’d been through there. He’d already set off the booby traps they’d left. Unless they’d been back to set more. He couldn’t put that past them; they’d already proven to be far more resourceful than he’d have given them credit for. Especially the android; he shuddered to think of facing her. She’d taken down a bear bare-handed. No matter; even if she took him down, no amount of practice wrestling bears would save her from his plan.

He didn’t relish the thought of going back to the tundra. It was cold, and thoughts of bears brought the polar bear back to mind. But part of him relished the danger and discomfort. He’d show them it didn’t matter what traps they laid, or how severe the conditions were; he would still outwit them, would still overcome and persevere.

He lifted his head slowly, thoughts of overcoming the cold filling his mind. His eyes crossed over the banks of equipment that lined the room, lights twinkling on the control panels, white, yellow, blue, green, and … green and red.

The coward had showed them something, hadn’t she? A map of the ship with a sea of red lights, all over the biomes. The red lights of the fortunate ones, spared forever the knowledge of the disaster their hopes and dreams had come to. But there had been more; along with the lucky ones, there had been one large cluster of green ones. The unfortunate ones. The traitorous ones, waiting even now for the other traitors to wake them up.

That was it. That was why they’d set so many traps in his path before. They were searching for their accomplices! They’d been incredibly lucky that he hadn’t found them first. Or maybe they hadn’t been lucky enough. His lips locked in a feral grin. Maybe he still had time to find them first.

A part of his mind tried to tell him he had another quarry, that it wouldn’t matter whether they found their friends or not, that his plan would reduce them all to ashes anyway, but right then, he couldn’t care. They wanted to find their friends. He’d make sure that if they did, they would find them only in the peace of the glowing red.

He opened the door and set off into the snow once more, leaving behind the soft blink of an active video feed’s light.

The Ship of the Unforgotten - Chapter 30, Pt. 3

Rose nodded. “I do, but they’re confidential.”

“Of course,” he said. “What can you tell me? Has he said something specific that makes you think he actually means us harm?”

The android was slow to respond, expression intent but focused inward. “… Not specifically, no. There’s a pattern to the data that I don’t like, though. You couldn’t call it intuition exactly, but that’s the closest equivalent feeling I can think of to describe it to you.”

“And there’s no way we can find out what he’s up to?”

“Maybe we can, but only if he goes to a place with a video feed. There are feeds at the junction points, such as those we’ve used to cross between biomes. I can access the feeds from here, but it won’t do us any good if he moves into the maintenance passages again.”

“It’s worth a shot. Is there anything we can do if he does go another way?”

She shrugged apologetically, her artificial eyes conveying true regret. “We can search.”

Dann nodded. It had been such a good morning.

The Ship of the Unforgotten - Chapter 30, Pt. 2

“What danger, what’re you talking about?” Dann demanded. It had been such a nice morning up until then too.

“Rose Dawn picked up his location last night; he returned to the lab where we last saw him. It’s the first time there’s verifiable information on his whereabouts since then, though there is some system data from the period of the AI’s activity that suggests he was on the move in at least one of the biomes for a time. And Dann, there are three cryo-pods that now read deceased that had been potential survivors.”

“No. No way. I know the lieutenant wasn’t taking any of this all that well, but he wouldn’t have killed people, would he? He couldn’t have.”

“Unfortunately there are relatively few areas of the ship that have camera feeds that Rose Dawn and I can access, and Lt. Cobb hasn’t been giving us much opportunity to verify his identity. The new crew deaths occurred while the AI was still operational, so we can’t be certain that Cobb was responsible.”

“The AI has been in operation since long before we awoke; has Rose Dawn finished her diagnostics yet? Can you give us any more information on the crew and how many survivors there are?”

“Yes. The four of you are the only crew currently awake and wandering the ship. All other pods are accounted for; four empty, 43 operational with living crew inside, and 3953 deceased. Privates Jackson and Pixton and yourself are accounted for in this location.” She paused, artificial face betraying hesitation.

“And Lt. Cobb?” he prompted.

“Lt. Cobb was last identified in the tramway between this biome and the sub-arctic tundra biome less than half an hour ago.” Her face twisted as she said it; it looked to Dann as though it was almost physically painful for Rose to be so uncertain in her data.

“That’s awfully close to here. You’re sure it’s him?”

She nodded. “He has taken to talking to himself on occasion. It’s … disturbing. It also allows Rose Dawn to confirm his identity by his voice print.”

Dann swirled the remains of his cup of coffee in the cup as he thought. “Just to be clear, we don’t know for sure that Cobb is a threat, right? You said the data is unreliable?”

The android nodded unhappily. “I wish I could be more specific, but yes. And, there’s more.”

He really didn’t like her tone of voice on that part. “Okay … what is it?”

“Several things, all conjecture, but worth considering. First, the cryo-bay where the survivors were … terminated.” She looked around the space; Jackson and Pixton were elsewhere. “It was very near the bay in which Pvt. Jackson’s daughter lies.” Dann’s eyes opened wide at that, and he found himself looking around as well. Rose continued, “Further, Lt. Cobb appears to be trying to avoid interacting with Rose Dawn. He doesn’t know the extent of the audio pickups spaced around the ship, or we feel it likely he wouldn’t be talking out loud to himself—unless his mental state has deteriorated further than we think it has.”

“What is wrong with him? Why has he cracked up so bad? He was just a bit irritable when we saw him last, and it wasn’t that long ago!”

“There are some … unique … circumstances in the lieutenant’s past that may be contributing to his current state.”

“What circumstances? Don’t you have access to all of our files?”

The Ship of the Unforgotten - Chapter 30

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Jun. X, 2565 A.C.E.

The mattress and pillow were pretty thin, but after the last few days, not to mention the last few centuries, Dann didn’t care one whit. He slept deeply and instantly, and when morning finally did draw him slowly back from sleep’s embrace, he stayed curled within his blanket shelter, clinging to every scrap of comfort it offered.

Finally his brain returned to such a state of wakefulness that he couldn’t stay cocooned any longer, and he pulled back the blanket and stretched. He was stiff and sore—oh was he ever stiff and sore. After a luxuriously long rest in a real bed though, it still somehow felt good and right.

They’d returned to the islands by unspoken consent the night before and moved into the habitation they’d camped outside of the previous night. They were intended for several dozen people, each with a private bedroom that adjoined on communal living spaces and facilities for groups of a half dozen inhabitants.

Dann rose and left his bedroom—it wasn’t much more than a narrow space for his bed, really—and stiffly entered the communal space outside. Rose had food ready; he was the last to rise. Jenny and Jackson—Lydia, he reminded himself—had already eaten.

He sat down and helped himself to toast and powdered scrambled eggs. They weren’t bad for centuries-old relics, really. The real fruit they still had left over from crossing the rain forest biome helped too; it went nicely on the toast. There was even coffee. It wasn’t exactly a barista’s best brew, but it tasted like heaven right then and right there.

There wasn’t much talk just then; everyone still had that slightly groggy sense to them that told him they felt much as he did, if maybe not quite as sore.

When he’d finished, Rose entered the room from the corridor down to the central area by the exit to the island. “Good morning, Dann,” she greeted him with a smile. “You look … better, though still a little the worse for wear.”

“’Morning Rose. Yeah, I think I’ll grab a shower in a few,” he replied.

“Good idea, but you should wait. Before you do that, I have a concern to put before you all.”

They shared a concerned glance of their own. “W-what is it?” Jenny spoke up.

“I’m deeply troubled by Lt. Cobb’s behavior.”

“You know where the lieutenant is?” Dann asked. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Rose Dawn only regained awareness of him in the late hours of the morning, and he wasn’t particularly near us so she didn’t feel it was a high enough priority to wake you. I agreed.”

“You left him out there?”

“He’s in no danger. I am afraid though that he may be a danger, both to you and the unawakened survivors still in their cryo-pods.”

The Ship of the Unforgotten - Chapter 29

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Jun. X, 2565 A.C.E.

Lieutenant Frederick Cobb ground his teeth in frustration. Where were they?

He’d been searching for what felt like hours. He’d had to fight his way past maintenance bots of all shapes and sizes, and not all of the fights had gone his way. He’d been forced to use up some of his ammunition, but he’d managed to save some of it. It had cost him though. One of the bots, something with a damned needle on it, had jabbed him and injected him with something. It hadn’t been a clean strike though, nor a full injection. That’d been the last one he had to shoot.

After that he’d wandered in delirium, fighting dizziness and the strong urge to pass out. He was pretty sure he had passed out, maybe more than once. From the state of his clothes, he’d awakened in a pool of his own vomit at least once.

He slammed a fist into a console, forgetting to brace. It took him several minutes to get himself back down to the decks; by that point he was seething in rage. He’d been blind to fall into an obvious trap like that; they’d pay for their crimes when he found them. They clearly weren’t here anymore; he was almost certain this was where he’d seen them last, the main computer lab that the cowardly one had been working on.

The traitorous computer—he knew the story they’d fed him about an AI hijacking it was a crock—babbled something to him, but he ignored it, leaving the offices behind. He drifted for a time within arms’ reach of the hatch in the main corridor.

Would they have gone the way he’d gone earlier? He knew they’d been there before; after all, they’d had everything set up to sabotage him so perfectly in the tundra biome. So no, they’d have gone somewhere else by now, he was sure. What was in the biome next to that one? He didn’t know, he realized. And that made it the perfect place to try and hide from him. Not that it’d do them any good. He could end them any time he wanted with his remote.

Once again the temptation came over him to tap the control, but he fought it down. Not yet. He had to confront them with their crimes first. He couldn’t let them off so easily.

The matter settled, he set off down the biome access tunnel.