BETH

Her accommodation was nice, a much needed upgrade from the facility’s barren cell. Entertainment, a small food synthesizer, a shower, toilet, proper bed and the hibernation pod next to the bed. Spacious compared to the facility’s cell.

Something chimed. A hand terminal rested on the bed’s pillow and indicated a received message. Beth opened the message by clicking on the flashing icon.

“You seem nice. I like you. Let’s be friends,” the message said.

Its id was Tom, the telekinesis boy. Friends? That sounded nice. The boy had connected to her and stuck by her side right out the gate. Was it her scholarly life or her friendly face that made him trust her? Did she really have a friendly face, after what had happened to her? The wet sound and the feeling of bone breaking under her knuckles surfaced. Mom had pleaded and cried. But Beth had kept hammering. She had killed her own mom. Even if it was under Saif’s control she couldn’t shake the nightmare away. It was HER fists, HER strength that has ended mom. Her surroundings spun so she sat down on the bed. Hands trembled, tensed into fists. Pain and death. Beth licked her lips; the sweetness was close and ready. Muscles itched. She willed away the response, her body relaxed. One day. One day her hands would tighten around Saif’s neck. The Admiral had been adamant, he seemed a seasoned man and well versed to force his way on others. This ship would not turn back. If she attempted to force them, the Admiral would throw the compartment and everyone in it, including her, into space.

Beth let herself calm down for a few minutes before typing a reply to Tom. “Tom, I think we will become great friends. I will have your back if you have mine.” She sent it.

A friend would be nice in these dark times, or was it her motherly instincts kicking in? The boy was young, but not that young.

Beth’s stomach growled. She had just eaten! But she had used her powers. The powers had to draw energy from somewhere and since she always grew tired after using them, it would be safe to say that they drew from her. They burned calories. Powers needed the body’s biological energy. In the same sense, she should be able to train herself not only to become stronger but also to increase the duration of her powers. Maybe she should pick up running?

Beth started typing a message to Tom with her hand terminal. She laid out her line of logic, re-wrote it twice, it was important to get it correct and clear, and hit send.

Before she put down the hand terminal a reply arrived. “We should try it out! I like it! But we need to convince the Admiral.”

Beth could potentially appeal to Admiral Harris’ Navy background of efficiency. If a weapon of mass destruction was able to blow up an even bigger target than before why would he hinder that potential? She clicked around the icons and found the list of contacts she was allowed to communicate with. Admiral Harris was one of the few listed, among the nine other sleepers, but no chance in hell that it was his primary inbox. No chance. But still, she would get a reply eventually. She typed up the text and sent it.

The food synthesizer produced a resource efficient, but high nutrient food bar. It represented the Navy’s practical and efficient ways, she guessed. The food bar tasted strange, too salty and the texture reminded her of a day-old pizza. Ship personnel would know how to manipulate the settings, but she was not inclined to give up so easily. She navigated the synthesizer’s menus, trying to gauge the taste settings. But the machine complained of altered mineral and nutrient values as she changed things. Lacking vitamins and fibres. She frowned in frustration.

-

Beth slept better than she had done for a long time. Her body exhausted and satisfied. Muscles were a little sore, but in a good way. Like after gymnastics back at Callisto. Callisto, it felt like a distant dream. What were the other students doing now? She had lost count of her awakenings. The Admiral had said that fifteen years had passed on Earth. Fifteen years in the blink of an eye. Her fellow students would not be students anymore. A distant dream indeed.

A text waited for her. Beth tapped on the icon. Admiral Harris. “I like how you think. I will arrange something before the end of the day.”

She had thought the Admiral would need some persuasion before accepting the request. But the man showed full conviction. Was this a tell for the real reason they were put onto this starship? It felt odd that the Navy would waste resources to create super powered humans just to mine asteroids or any other mundane tasks which machines already did better. Admiral Harris enjoyed the term “weapons of mass destruction.” Navy people really, really liked their weapons, gadgets and machines. She and the other sleepers were no doubt created to be weapons. But why? The European fleets didn’t need more firepower against the Russians or the Americans. With the Asians as allies there would be no open warfare. So why risk escalation? She couldn’t put a finger on it.

Even though her hand terminal had restricted access to the network it did have full access to the starship’s library database. Beth scrolled and flicked through tabs of categories. Fiction tab was quickly discarded. Who needed made up things when the universe was compelling already? She grouped the research areas according to real life applications. Starship. That would be aligned with her present situation. A subcategory caught her attention: Self sustained and long life starships. Space City builders. Exactly the purpose of the Au-delà. She chose a topic randomly. Hydroponics.

How to grow plants without soil. Instead you used water and mixtures of nutrients and minerals to keep the plants healthy. In space frozen water existed in abundant quantities. You could of course transport soil from Earth but it was expensive. Not just that, the soil would need maintenance since it degraded over time, which accumulated the cost even more. With the abundance of water, you threw in the new ice cubes into the system and pressed go. Simple and effective. She skipped over all the tabs concerning different types of frozen water experimented with, among them were ice from asteroids and planets. Also, how to add the correct minerals and nutrients to the water. During her hibernation sleep fifteen years had passed on Earth, it was natural that some progress would have been made. A research paper stated that they had managed to grow a plant which could filter away 99.99% of waste from used water. The old, proven methods could reach a purity of 99.9%. People engaged in numerous discussions in public forums because of it. She knew why. That exceptional small number yielded enormous returns. With this new process starships could devote more space to other things and also spend less time farming ice, which meant greater profits.

The door slid open, Admiral Harris and two guards stepped inside. None inside combat suits.

She put away the hand terminal. “What’s up, Admiral?”

“It is your time for evaluation,” Admiral Harris said. “We can also talk about the training plan I will initiate. Your idea, of course.”

She was escorted through a few corridors and junctions, the two guards always keeping behind her and Admiral Harris on her side. He must have emptied these specific corridors from crew since they encountered no one.

“Hopefully you will show better control than the others. Your friends have potential but they lack proper discipline,” Admiral Harris.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Only one is my friend. The others I have no clue. I don’t know them,” Beth said, they made another junction and went left.

Admiral Harris frowned. “I guessed as much. The treatment and procedures you went through are too close to torture. I don’t like the methods used on you, but that doesn’t mean I won’t take advantage of what you have become. Or what you will become.”

“But you won't care about what we want?” Beth said.

Admiral Harris laughed. “I have ownership of you.”

“So we are slaves?” Beth asked.

The Admiral’s arrogance would be his downfall. Atmosphere venting and armed soldiers would not stop them from causing harm. And he agreed to train them. The man was insane.

“I cannot just release you. You might hurt people. Better for everyone to keep you under control,” the Admiral said. “Then you could achieve something good in this world.”

Admiral Harris was just like Saif. These people with their screwed up ideas about control and higher agendas. Screw ‘em.

“This will not end well for you,” Beth said.

They entered a larger chamber: a shuttle bay. Shuttles and other smaller starships were lined up. Nimble crafts, but fully armed and equipped for deep space. She had little knowledge of space warfare, but even she could recognise a mounted railgun. Could she steal one of the shuttles?

A piece of oblong asteroid stood in the center of the room. The setting was a little too reminiscent of the past.

“This beauty is stronger and tougher than the iron you played with before. I have seen the videos of you punching stuff. But can you lift heavy objects as well?” Admiral Harris asked.

The sweetness flooded before she even reached for it. Lift with her legs and back. Rocky asteroid surface felt rough under her finger as she placed her hands under it. She tested a light shove. The asteroid made a heavy thud when it rolled back.

“Sorry,” Beth said.

Okay. Let’s try again. But lift straight up. She tried to pinch a grip-like feature of the rock, but it crumbled under the force of her fingers. Lift with stretched and separated fingers would spread the force better. With bent knees she reached longer underneath the asteroid than before and kept her fingers wide. Come on. Muscles longed for strain, for challenge. Sweetness focused. She held her breath and heaved. In a single motion she lifted the asteroid straight up and put it on her shoulders. To balance it was easy. The heave had been the hard part.

Admiral Harris stared in disbelief. “To actually witness it. Not quite like anything I have seen before. That piece of rock weighs more than our shuttles. Impressive, Elizabeth. Very impressive.”

“Do not call me Elizabeth. I am Beth,” Beth said and let the asteroid fall forward, towards the Admiral.

The Admiral winched when the asteroid halted just in front of him.

“No one in the science teams can understand how your powers work. Take your strength. Why don’t your bones break underneath all that leverage? How come your skin doesn’t tear open when you punch something hard in the case without your skin turned metal?” Admiral Harris said.

Beth grinned. “Magic?”

“Enough. No. I am not going to spend man hours trying to understand how you can do this,” Admiral Harris said and gestured at the asteroid. “But I will try to make you stronger. All of you. You especially, Beth, displays an uncanny instinct to summon and focus your strength. You simply will it into use and out again. Impressive.”

“Saif described it as a hook constructed from an emotion or several. I pull and once the sweetness slides in the power blooms,” Beth said, giving a nearby shuttle a light shove, it rocked but the tilt was not dangerous enough. Rage. Rage boiled when she focused on the suffering she and her family had gone through. Against Saif and against everything that perverted man had done. She licked the sweetness.

“Too bad it is only strength and metal skin,” Admiral Harris said, the folds in his face wrinkling. “Why could you not have manifested telekinesis instead? Or just something more powerful? It is actually too bad. Depressing, really.”

“You would be surprised what a bit of raw strength can do,” Beth said.

Had she said too much? The Admiral wanted to know and which implied that he lacked the information in the first place. She should not share more than necessary. The reason that she had just these two powers? She had no clue, but Saif might. Was it in her DNA? Maybe it had laid dormant in her ever since birth and the experiments had triggered it. There were many questions and no one to answer them for her. She could make Saif talk before she killed him.

Admiral Harris ended the silence. “Do not hang yourself on it. I will show you your new toys. But I wonder how you will ever be able to train your body? You are too strong for any conventional tools.”

“Like you said. I can turn these on and off,” Beth said and flexed her thin biceps.

-

Beth was escorted back to her room and found Tom standing in the midst of a treadmill, loadable dumbbells and an assortment of weight plates. The room had been modified. One wall had been moved back to create more space, this allowed for an additional bed and a new hibernation pod to be added.

“You will share. As a way to start accepting you into the crew and starship you must first get to know each other. To kickstart your social skills,” Admiral Harris said, gesturing wide. “Use these with your ordinary strength and we will see if you grow stronger.”

“Thank you,” Beth said.

The hypothesis; training her unpowered strength would improve her powered strength. Possible predictions; yes and no. She leaned on yes, the logic was sound. After testing it would be clear if the training would have an effect. She really hoped it would work, because that would ground the powers in science and let her begin to understand them.

“Good luck,” Admiral Harris said and left her with Tom.

Tom’s facial shapes were a little too well defined, he had to be malnourished. Their situation was strange and straining. His stay in the facility had probably looked a lot like her’s. How much damage could all this have caused his young brain? Her stomach growled, her body craved more food as she used her powers. How should she help him? He needed to eat as much as her. How to go about that? How to help him see hope where there was none? Make him feel needed. Give him purpose.

“Tom. You look like a clever kid. Would you help me with the food synthesizer?” Beth asked.

Tom smiled wide. “I thought you were the scientist?”

Beth sighed. “You know. Well, we, scientists don’t have time for such things. We do science stuff.”

“But you are supposed to be smart,” Tom said, still a wide smile. “I dreamt of being a scientist. To make the world a better place.”

“Then the world snagged you and all this happened. I know the feeling,” Beth said and looked down.

The synthesizer looked like a metal box where it stood on an elevated plate. Tom whipped out his hand terminal, swept and clicked before showing her its interface.

“This screen. This synthesizer is small and the options are limited. Also, its pre-set menu looks funny. Someone has customized it,” Tom explained. “Someone who really, really has an issue with salt.”

“Maybe the last occupant?” Beth asked.

“So, I will make a new menu with normal human food. Then you just click on the shortcuts and boom your snack is ready,” Tom said.

The synthesizer made its cycle of sounds, Tom handed her the result. A brownish food bar, it smelled of cooked meat and chili.

Beth took a large bite and devoured it. Delicious! “Thank you so much, Tom! This tastes nice.”

“My pleasure,” Tom said and bowed.

She leaned back, on the room’s wall. “Where are you from, Tom? Before all this, what did you do?”

Tom printed a food bar for himself, leaned back on the opposite wall. “Earth. New York. Maybe this bar needs less vegetables and more meat.”

“Not many are Earth born this time and age. Humanity is spreading. So you dreamt of being a scientist?” Beth asked.

A tear trickled down the kid’s face. “Mom once took me to work. She did some cool stuff in her lab and explained how science had saved dad’s life when the cure for cancer was discovered. I didn’t know what cancer was at the time. I just thought dad was very sick,” Tom said with a hoarse voice. “Mom is my hero. Was, I guess,” Tom said and looked down.

Beth hugged him. “It is alright. We two will take care of each other. Your mom can still be your hero, she will always be with you.” Beth pressed lightly a finger on Tom’s chest, left side. “In here. All the people we love will be inside here. Always.”

“Thank you,” Tom said and hugged her.