Spider Star by Brotherton Mike

Author:Brotherton, Mike [Brotherton, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: hard science fiction, spaceships, far future, space, space exploration, aliens, robots, science fiction, stars, astronomy, artificial intelligence
Publisher: Mike Brotherton
Published: 2012-02-05T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 24

First, Bloody Contact

Onboard the Spider Star

Seconds after the elevator doors opened, Frank had to admit to himself that he wasn’t in control of the situation. Seconds after that, Frank had to admit to himself that he was in fear for his life.

He had only been in a few honest-to-goodness, out-of-control, in-fear-for-his-life situations. Once had been approaching the alien scout ship, and then with the alien confronting him, not knowing for certain how it would end. Another time, on Earth, he’d been flying his car in a storm despite weather advisories and had clipped another vehicle despite the automatic failsafe. It didn’t happen often, but it did happen. The thing that unified those moments in his mind was how the time had stretched, in some relativistic law of crisis, for him to think a multitude of thoughts that he still recalled clearly for years afterward.

While his car had been spiraling out of control, falling toward the ground, he remembered thinking something like, No, this can’t be happening. Then he’d thought,I have too many things to do. He had, too‌—‌this was just shortly before he was supposed to go into deep space. A few seconds later he landed headfirst, his nanofoam had deployed, and cushioned his impact, and he’d walked away unharmed. Physically. He’d spent a few weeks thinking through those terrible moments of spinning and falling, with their memory hitting him at odd and inopportune times, and he’d feared they’d take away his scouting mission. He’d wanted to do important things and be famous, and since he was a smart, talented guy that seemed like one of the more certain ways of reaching his goals. Life was funny.

Like now, he started to think to himself, again: No, this can’t be happening. Apparently it was his natural reaction. He’d thought it again with his first alien encounter, but the duration of the experience had diluted the thought’s impact in a way it hadn’t with the car accident.

Again, Frank was falling and spinning, hit in passing by some sort of creature flying out from the elevator car.

The aliens shot out, fast, dark, furry, all limbs. Legs, arms, he didn’t know. He was falling and spinning, and so was everyone else.

How could this be happening? Weren’t the aliens supposed to be at least two million years more advanced? The seemed to be attacking Frank and his people, of all things. This didn’t make sense, and the spinning didn’t help.

Frank reached out, trying to grab something, anything.

Something flashed, and he pulled back his hand in pain. As he continued to spin out, he looked down at his hand to see the blood popping out in a series of small globules, floating in the microgravity. This can’t be happening.

He hadn’t really been listening yet. Somehow, in all the excitement, he’d stopped hearing anything, or at least being aware of sounds. Now, with his hand throbbing, he listened to the screaming. It didn’t seem to be all human screaming. No, there were alien sounds, sounds he’d never heard before, but felt safe in characterizing as “screaming”.

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