Audeo

audeo: latin

verb; present active audeō,

I dare, venture, risk; (poetic) I am eager for battle.

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The bodies fell in mute synchronization. There were two of them, black spots on a leaden sky. Miles away. From the vast distance, a single onlooker watched in horror. She could only imagine them as they might be. Perhaps silenced beforehand, their arms were loose by their sides, hands curled at their thighs. The curve of their backs improbably traced the jagged bulge of the cliff from which they had been flung. Their chins were tipped back, not quite staring toward the impending earth.

Worried lines were etched into chasms around her eyes, dark and defined like black water had slipped in to fill them. She leaned back as though frightened the grim scene would hook into her chest and drag her into its midst, sending her rocketing towards the barren surface of the planet alongside them.

Behind her, the last of a trickling stream of passengers had vanished into the interior of the shuttle, and so she was the only one to see as death hurtled downward and disappeared beneath the distant horizon to strike the earth and be obliterated.

The last wind the planet of Uataislurn had to offer spiraled up the boarding dock, gray fingers playing at the ornamented fabric that framed her dark brown face. It coaxed lost breath back into her and she could move again, if only to make it the rest of the way up into the shuttle.

Nasira let herself fall against the round wall of the booth, directly within. Her long, slender fingers went up to the beads on the crown of her head. She straightened them where they laid across their silken headscarf, tracing back to where they vanished beneath its folds. As she did, she let her eyes drift shut, willing there to be only the redness of her eyelids. No bodies. No great heights. No death.

Uataislurn was a zealot's planet. Its inhabitants subscribed to stringent religious rules and rituals, but they were not perceived as pious, nor were their traditions seen as archaic. Nasira had come to observe their practices for the duration of a seasonal holiday they called Ubrone, but she'd been recalled to a new base, with a new obligation, one that took precedence over attending the holiday of a tiny religious sect on the edge of the galaxy.

Participants of Ubrone adopted a solemn composure, retreating to places of worship alongside family. Past a certain date, movement within the planet's borders was forbidden. No emigration, no immigration. Those who wished to observe must be settled before the holiday's beginning, and those who did not wish must see themselves out.

It was on this the eve of Ubrone that the last transport away from Uataislurn found itself preparing for departure.

Something pushed past Nasira roughly, jerking her out of her contemplation before she could decide for herself whether the fuzzy splotches still reminiscent in her vision were borne of some religious suicide.

"Pardon me," she apologized, unsure of whether she'd been in the way of the door or not, though she did not recall seeing anyone else on the boarding dock. She said it verbally in Yutovian, the universal language and her best bet for being understood as polite quickly.

Yutovian consisted of three "alphabets": verbal (which worked best for those species that could articulate syllables), clicking (for those that possessed no verbal speech, such as those without mouth or tongue), and sign (for those that could be understood through general body movements, such as the manipulation of digits and appendages). Anyone who claimed to know Yutovian could understand all three.

The hunched frame stopped between her and the passenger area of the shuttle. It turned around.

It was a human male of roughly middle age. Caucasian. Long hair that stringed into dark grey eyes. He carried something under his left arm, and shifted it protectively when she met his eyes.

"Evening," he said, squinting at her in the semi-darkness. He responded in stiff English, which took her aback, and she had to hastily recalibrate her brain to receive it. She could see that he was trying to read her name on her left shoulder, so she provided it.

"Sergeant Nasira Lathan," she said, extending a gloved hand. Though it was not quite the truth. Her ranking could not be translated into human languages quite so easily, as she was the only one of her species in Adrara. The Seraph. The Guardians. The Protectors. Adrara was similar to the older human military, the Colonial Marine Corps, but without any of the supremacy, the entitlement, the misguided patriotism. Adrara aspired to be pacifistic, and was a millennium-old cooperative alliance that encompassed thirty star systems and sixty-three species.

Any of those sixty-three species could serve, but there was exactly one representative for humankind.

One human.

Just her.

Which was why her uniforms - her combat uniform, her service dress, and her current ceremonial regalia (as was easiest for her to be recognized as a member when it was necessary) -were all specially tailored for her human stature. Black boots and pants, a snugly cut blue coat that hit her mid-thigh. Her epaulets were golden, as was the chord that looped its way around her left arm. She was allowed to wear her hijab with no lengthy appealing process, as had been the case when she was in Earth's custody. Her name and rank were embroidered in both Arabic and Yutovian. Even if it hadn't been dim where they stood, this man would have struggled with reading it.

"Right," he said. "You're, uh, A-dray-rah."

"I'm a cadet officer of Adrara, yes," she said, smiling tolerantly. "And you are?"

He seemed to debate. "Marcus."

"May I help you with something?"

He looked her up and down, his lip twisting in a way of which she was long accustomed. The way she held herself to Adrara's standards of articulation and composure, her age, her posture, her headscarf, her monolid eyes - all that was there for his cruel gaze to scrutinize.

He said, "Not now, thanks. Maybe once we're up."

Once the shuttle launched, they'd land on the orbiting spaceport and transfer to their flight vessel.

She nodded. He readjusted whatever he held in his left arm again before turning away.

Nasira watched the sky curve into darkness and tried to imagine that breaking the atmosphere was smooth. She'd been the last to seat herself and the first to rise, assisting the shuttle crew in unloading its passengers, as was courtesy for someone of her position. The man, Marcus, brushed past her again with no comment as he left the shuttle. Behind him was a boy, older than her by a year or two, with the same pale skin tone as Marcus. The only other human on the shuttle, and apparently too young to be traveling on his own. Father and son, then. She smiled at him, but he had as much to say as Marcus, his eyes flickering up to hers before wrenching forward again.

Their vessel's name translated to 'Cavalier'. It was massive ship, made for much more than ferrying mere handfuls of passengers across the small sea of space between Uataislurn and the more populated world of Thouopra. Their current port was at the end of its route, and once they arrived at Thouopro, the Cavalier would orbit for one local day before setting off into the swollen cluster of systems in the heart of the alliance. Before then, Nasira would transfer from public transport to a closed Adraran flight.

Flight, she thought wryly. Ships like the Cavalier didn't need to be aerodynamic, because they weren't designed to operate anywhere other but a vacuum. And there was no flying in vacuums.

It was shaped like an egg with multiple ovular protrusions - habitation levels, storage bays, and engine rooms - at random intervals, like the gnarled burls on a tree's trunk. The Cavalier doubled as a commercial freight vehicle and galactic cruise ship. The accommodations within the vessel - within all commercial passenger vessels - were meant to suit as many species as possible at once. The atmosphere was stable and breathable for most species, though masks were offered to those who felt it was too different from their natural composition. On such a short flight, temporary habitation would not be necessary. They were to stay within the body of the ship, the fuselage, that made up the largest part, with an ocean of seating spanning the entire floor.

Nasira helped a nimod (a lifeform twice her height with eight long legs, enormous glassy eyes, and ant-like pinchers) lift its possessions into a locker, smiling when it clacked at her appreciatively. She laid her hand across her heart and gave a low bow. The nimod flailed several tiny vestigial arms at her before going to its seat. Around her, several other passengers inclined their heads or bowed their bodies at her before going about their business.

Nasira loaded her own baggage into her designated locker, closing its door to reveal Marcus arguing with the sole security guard on the ship. The guard was a large Oxio with sloping shoulders, a species whose homeworld was the craggy desert planet of Troturn.

She made her way over to them. Marcus's face was scarlet and he was gesticulating hard enough to be a threat to anyone taller than his thigh. Some of this was the sloppy, inexperienced way he was signing Yutovian, but for the most part he kept breaking off and pointing a finger into the Oxio's noseless face whenever he got too worked up.

On the ground beside him was a canister about a foot and a half tall.

She interjected, positioning herself just off from between them, but planting her foot there and leaning her hip in, blocking the Oxio from Marcus' view.

"Please," she said to him, signing for emphasis, a little finger making circles on her sternum. "Calm down. What is the problem?" She said this to both of them, turning slightly without moving from blocking Marcus.

The Oxio rumbled, "I told the human that I needed to search his possessions, as it did not have a checking tag from the space port. He refused me."

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Prono."

Nasira translated for Marcus so that she could be sure there was no misunderstanding, but Marcus' eyebrows remained with a irritable line between them.

"He can't look through this! It's company property, and it's confidential. I told him I submitted a copy of the work order and my permit to carry the cannister on my person."

"The cannister? What does it contain?" she asked.

"I told you, it's confidential. You're not an employee."

Nasira said to Prono, "Did you check his permit?"

"I did. The permit is sound, but the serials of the cannister and the work order did not correspond."

Again, she relayed this to Marcus.

"It's not my fault they fucked up their labeling. I can't consent to a search or I'll be penalized."

Nasira frowned. "If it's alright for the work order to be read, why is it not alright for the contents of the cannister to be searched? Is it dangerous? It ought to have been carefully shipped rather than carried on your person."

Marcus' mouth worked.

"The work order…"

"Can't he search it in private? He's an employee of the company, and he already has access to the work order. He just needs to confirm the contents as the same as the way they're stated on the forms."

Marcus scowled. His face looked like a smile had never beaten a sneer in a foot race.

"Fine. Whatever you want, man."

Nasira's eyes thinned as she smiled at him. "Thank you for your cooperation. Prono, is that alright with you?"

Prono nodded, and Marcus handed over the cannister with what looked like great reluctance.

On her way to her seat, she spotted Marcus' supposed son sitting in an empty seating bay. Beside him was a seat saved for Marcus. The bays were separated only by aisles, but the isolation of the two humans from the rest of the passengers was plain. Nasira nodded at him as she passed, but the boy did not look at her. She wondered if Marcus would have pitched such a fit with his son nearby, but then decided that he probably would have. He didn't seem the type to show regard for even those closest to him.

Despite the argument, when Nasira sat, she allowed the warmth in her chest to burgeon. As the sole human in Adrara, she was a representative for her planet and her species. It was through her that all future relations with Earth would be determined. For now, humans were only tolerated, as they had not proven themselves worthy of all the stars had to offer. Every civilization that made up the current alliance had already achieved majority peace among its own, and soon after came the technological value to establish a place for themselves.

For the first four hundred years of space ventures, humans were ignorant about the life, other than their own, that surrounded them. Even as human territory had expanded into colonized planets, they'd had no idea of the species systematically avoiding them. But then something had changed, and the alliance chose to present itself, and a tentative treaty formed, and the entire human population was screened, and a single ambassador was selected to test the waters.

That had been Nasira.

She'd spent eight years in Earth's custody before being released and allowed to join Adrara. To learn an upwards of five alien languages. To attend cultural festivities, to advocate in support of her species. To spend the rest of her life proving humans able and willing to share the universe.

From where she sat, she looked up into the enormous glass dome that made up the ceiling. Impractical for a spacecraft, maybe. But it kept the dangers of space out, and offered passengers an unobstructed view of everything the galaxy had to offer as they passed beneath it.

A nebula she could see. A split in the black, a seam in the primordial darkness of oblivion. Purples like majesties - golds and silvers like riches. Young stars burned blue, raring to send their brilliance into the expanse. Others were old, molten hearts settling down for a quiet rest. A cat's eye winked from a dense pocket of ruddy star gas. Intricate spirals of magma, of napalm light, flared their prominence.

Nasira hugged herself, letting her eyes drift shut. It was not long until she felt the thrum of the engines beneath her feet. She opened her eyes and turned to see the spaceport shrinking away. Within seconds, it was small enough to be blotted out by her thumb if she held it out.

It was to be an eight hour journey. No stops. No obstructions, no navigation.

Three hours in, she jolted awake, disoriented. A slice of light narrowed into a sliver and then into black as a door on the far side of the room shut. The security guard stationed there was nowhere to be seen, but it was possible that he'd gone to check on another part of the ship.

Nasira glanced around the dim seating area and unbelted herself from her seat. As she walked through the aisles, the nimod awoke, lifting one bony eyelid. It swiveled in the socket before focusing on her. Nasira hurriedly signed reassurance, and the nimod didn't sit up any further. It didn't close its eye, either, though.

She walked to the door through which Prono had vanished, peeking through at first and then going in. The hallway was lit only by blue lights embedded near the floor, but no overheads. From inside its close quarters, she could feel the atmospheric conditioning working - her toes in her boots hummed.

It was then that she nearly turned around to return to her seat, but then she heard a few deep, booming coughs further down the hallway. Nasira followed the coughing until it could be heard through a door marked for crew usage only.

She knocked but couldn't hear it over the sounds, now punctuated by retching.

She raised her voice and said, "Are you alright? Let me call the infirmary for you."

There was no response, just more retching.

A crash shuddered out.

"I'm coming in," Nasira announced, tugging the door open. She almost tripped as she entered. Prono had collapsed in front of the door, flipping a desk with him. He was prone now, and she thought maybe he'd recovered, but then his chest and shoulders gave a great jerk, spasming his broad features.

She dropped to her knees, hands fluttering like panicked birds over him. She had no idea what to do. She had experience with emergency medical aid, but not for a seizure-like coughing fit, and not for alien anatomy. Trying to hold him down and pry his clenched jaw open at the same time proved difficult, so his body thrashed and rolled, striking her as she struggled. She jammed the first thing she could find - some kind of office utensil that had fallen to the floor - between his teeth so he couldn't bite her at least, then shoved her hand back into his face. She swabbed his now-slavering mouth with a finger, checking for a lodged object. Nothing.

She abandoned her efforts there and scanned the rest of his body, over his chest, then his abdomen, looking to his legs, and then back up.

Her face was poised seven inches from his chest when she heard a crack like breaking ribs. Something wet and meaty slapped her face, spattering her with moisture. Dumbstruck, she blinked crimson beads from her eyes.

There was a cavity in his chest, a bombshell gone off in his heart. Red muscle, red bone, red tubing that made him up, red everything.

And something squirming within it.

A skeleton, a snake. Some grotesque perversion of both. It uncoiled a thin tail. A low hiss escaped from its bony, parted jaw.

Nasira froze, hyperaware of the dripping gore on her face. A chunk of something slid from her nose and dropped wetly to the floor. The skeleton creature followed it with a jerk of its body, still making that sort of cautionary hiss.

It sprung from the cavity.

Nasira fell backwards, a strangled cry escaping her. The coiled snake skittered across the room, fleeing. Nasira felt around, grabbed something, and launched it after the retreating creature. Her aim was true, but in an instant it had wormed through a low vent and vanished. Her projectile slammed into the grating, rattling it, startling her again so that her arms almost gave out.

For a moment she just sat, lost, fingertips trailing the bloody floor, legs bent on either side of her - looking utterly woebegone despite the multitude of shiny buttons that signified her esteemed rank lined up on her breast.

She wrenched herself away from the curdling insides of the corpse and vomited, heaving until her vision swam.

When she could stop herself, it surprised her to hear the silence of the office, to realize that the universe had continued to expand, that life was still happening even though she'd forgotten how to breathe and how to stand.

Eventually she did stand, and the first thing after that was to rummage through Prono's pocket to find his ship access card.

The next step, she thought, tottering on unsteady legs down the same hallway from which she'd come, would be to get to the bridge.

She turned the corner and came to an abrupt stop. At the next junction, there was nothing but a smooth expanse of metal wall.

But she had seen movement.

She understood what she'd just been through. She understood that.

But she'd seen it.

She knew.

Some distortion of light, a warp in the air. It was still there. She could see the air move around it, even though there was no air to move. She was in a tin can in space. There was nothing.

There was something.

But just before she could focus on it, the ship gave a great shudder. And then she was knocked off her feet, colliding with the wall, falling to the floor.

Something had happened.

Something.