Fiction Fragment Friday
This draft is as rough as it comes. I had a story concept, but I really struggled to get the story out in a short format. I’m having this happen more often lately and it makes me think I really need to put time towards some longer form fiction. I think there is a gem in this story, but it needs a lot more polishing.
I’ve never been more nervous to initiate an interstellar jump than I was jumping into the Altair system. It wasn’t the jump itself or dangers in the system that had my anxiety on edge, but the distress signal broadcasting from Altair Station. The problem is that the station doesn’t exist anymore and hasn’t for a decade. An experiment at the research station had a catastrophic chain reaction that left only debris orbiting the star. I know this for a fact because I was there and barely escaped with my life. I had nightmares for years after.
Upon arrival, I did a full scan of the system. My mind was racing with memories, but I couldn’t let anyone else take this job. It was too personal. I’m not sure what I was expecting to find, but it certainly wasn’t an intact Altair Station hailing me. I could feel a panic attack forming, but my suit injected a sedative to counteract the effects. Even so, I focused on my breathing for a moment until I regained control. Only when I was sure it had subsided did I hit the button to answer the hail.
On the screen was a face I could never forget. Zora Crate looked exactly like I remembered her. I had such a crush on her when I was a fresh cargo vessel pilot, and she was the low-ranking communication officer at the station. She didn’t make it off the station, but there she was on the screen looking like she had not aged a day. “Unknown vessel, your transponder code is broadcasting, but there seems to be a protocol issue. Please identify yourself and state your purpose for coming to Altair.”
She didn’t seem to recognize me, but I wouldn’t expect her to after all this time. Unlike her, I had changed a lot. “Hello Altair Station, this is Longstrider. I’m switching to the older protocols now.” I opened the archive subsystem and loaded the communication protocols that I updated five years prior. “Transmitting now.”
“Acknowledged Longstrider we are receiving now. What brings you all the way out here?”
“I’m here in response to your distress signal. Hoping you can explain what’s going on here.” I wanted to ask how the station even existed, but something deep in the back of my brain was telling me not to ask. Maybe it was just seeing Zora again.
“I don’t know what you mean, Longstrider. We have broadcasted no distress signals. If we had, trust me, I would know.” She looked down to read her screen for a moment and I could see her face go stern. “Please proceed to docking port 7 and we can get this all sorted out.”
I didn’t like the look on her face but set course for docking port 7 anyway because the only place that might hold answers was onboard the station. Upon docking, I was once again surprised when station security met me at the airlock with weapons raised. Zora was standing behind them. “I don’t know who you are, but you picked the wrong identity to impersonate. I know Jacob and you aren’t him. Now you can do yourself a favor and come quietly, or you can do me a favor and resist.”
I held up my hands slowly, trying to avoid startling anyone. “This is just a big misunderstanding.”
That was when the worst headache I had ever experienced smashed into my skull. I was on the floor curled up in a ball screaming in pain with no idea how I had gotten there. Some distant part of my mind registered that I wasn’t the only one screaming. There inside the door, my younger self was going through the same pain I was. Our eyes locked on each other and in that moment, we could hear each other’s thoughts. I pushed my memories of the station’s destruction and my failure to get Zora off. “Do better than I did,” I thought to him.
Zora and the security team rushed to my younger self’s side. I pushed through the pain and stumbled back through the airlock onto my ship. Once my younger self and I couldn’t see each other anymore, the pain subsided. “Computer, disengage lock and prepare for departure.” I slid into my chair and set course for the outer system, spinning up the jump drive. As I pulled back from the station power onboard, my scout flickered. I checked the sensors, only to find that the station was no longer there. Where it was just moments before was only the expected debris field.
My com system was flashing with one missed message, so I hit play. There on the screen, my wife Zora and our daughter Gina smiled back at me. “Hey hon, hope everything is going ok out there. I just wanted to remind you of dinner with your folks tomorrow. If you can’t make it back in time, please don’t wait until the last minute to tell me again.” The image cut off. I ran one last sensor scan of the system for my report. Nothing out of the ordinary and no sign of anything that could have sent the distress signal. It chalked it up to just another unsolved mystery and set course back home.
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