Father Soren hadn’t convinced Miles to live. Not yet anyway. But Miles had to hand it to the old priest. The man made a compelling argument more often than not. Death was the end. It didn’t matter if there was an afterlife or not. Once he died, everything Miles was would be set in stone. As long as he was alive, he still had some freedom left to him. And that was more valuable than anything. And who knows? Maybe I’ll get the chance to stick my thumb in the Free Exchange’s eye one more time. That was reason enough for him to stick around a little while longer.

Miles strolled down the hallway and entered the briefing room. The large room felt even bigger with all the empty chairs. The Captain sat at the head of the table, lost in thought. His head perked up as he heard the pilot enter.

“Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

“Anytime, Captain.” Miles slumped in the chair that had once been Lt. Commander Klyker’s. “I can’t help but notice we’re the only two here.”

“More are coming. This will be… a relatively private meeting.”

Miles nodded and relaxed back into the chair. “And I assume most of the senior staff aren’t in attendance?”

Samir rapped his fingers on the table. “No.”

He shrugged his shoulders. They waited a moment in silence before Miles began again. “I heard you talked with the alien—whatever it was.”

“I did.”

“If you don’t mind me asking, what was it like? What did it say?”

Captain Singh put his arms on the table. He stared straight forward to the other side of the room, never once looking at Miles. “I always believed that... humanity couldn’t change. That we were what we were.” The Captain’s eyes were distant.

“You say that as if it’s a bad thing,” Miles noted.

Captain Singh seemed to snap out of his trance for a moment. “Not all progress is good. We lose parts of ourselves—pieces of us that shouldn’t be tossed aside. And I find it’s rarely the good that remains. What I saw in that lab… I can’t think of a fate worse than being trapped in a metal prison.”

“But was it human?” Miles asked. “That’s a popular theory going around. That it’s some sort of transhuman entity.”

The Captain blew a long breath. “Who’s to say? It spoke our words. Our language. It seemed like I was talking with someone. But I wonder if we could call it a person, even if it was once human. I wonder if you can toss that aside as well.”

“Maybe things would be better that way.” Miles couldn’t help but whisper, especially given his recent experience.

Perhaps that was the solution to the Free Exchange, the one he wanted anyway. The Free Exchange was a society made by humans and for humans. It stood to reason maybe the freedom he wanted was in something inhuman. Become something the Free Exchange couldn’t control. It was an entertaining thought, at least. If only I was something different than what I was. He found himself wishing that more and more these days.

Captain Singh gave a sideways glance. “That’s the question, isn’t it? Commander Terese, she’s already made her choice on the matter. I can see it in her eyes, the way she looked at the thing, that’s when I knew for sure. Onwards and upwards towards the future. I gave her an order to kill the entity two hours from now. I’m worried what she would do given the chance to learn from it.”

The Captain turned to face Miles squarely. “I don’t think she understands the wager. So few people do.” His eyes fell to the table, and he rubbed his thumb on the polished metal. “We don’t get to take back what we’ve done. There’s no returning to the garden. The scars always remain. Once the line is crossed, there’s no going back across the divide.”

He looked up at Miles again. “I’ve known people like her. She’ll push humanity towards utopia. They all do. And they’ll strip away everything human for paradise. And if we don’t find ourselves there, they’ll strip away something else. It’ll continue until we arrive at the promised land or at the black gates of hell. And by that point, we won’t be able to take it back. That’s the question. So Miles Keith, what’s your answer? Is it better to be human, or is it not?”

Miles’ mouth twisted into a half-smile at the question. “I gotta say, I’m fifty-fifty on that, sir.”

The Captain shrugged his shoulders indifferently. “You best make your choice now. I suspect the decision is going to be made soon.”

The door opened again and this time it was Sergeant Barnes who entered the room with Father Soren shortly behind. A few seconds later and Dr. Philips also entered. They took their seats at the table and the Captain took a moment to survey them all before addressing them.

“I have no intention of bringing the Andromedan derelict back to the Free Exchange. I will not hand a civilization to be dissected by those men. As it stands, once the Andromedan FTL systems are repaired, we shall reactivate the drive and send the ship on its way.”

Playing the hero then. Miles rested a hand on his cheek. Not a move he expected from the Butcher of Three Systems, but he could understand it. He even admired it. What always mattered most was action. Tannis played ideology games all day long, but he left nothing but death and destruction in his wake. This was a practical plan he could put some faith in.

“What if it’s captured? Even if it evades the vessels that attacked us, who’s to say it won’t lay dormant once it reaches its destination?” Father Soren asked. “We might be condemning that ship to rot until the end of the universe.”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Dr. Philips cleared his throat to address the priest. “There are a number of automatic systems aboard the derelict. Some of them have activation protocols linked to the sphere. While we haven’t been able to identify them, it’s reasonable to assume that contingencies are in place if the crew were otherwise incapacitated. The contents are too important otherwise.”

“As for the first question,” Singh added, “that’s just going to be a risk we have to take. It’s no worse than a twenty percent chance of obliteration.”

“I think there’s a third option that we haven’t considered.” The priest crossed his arms. “Put the ship back in the gas giant where we found it.”

Miles did a double take at that. “Just leave it?”

Father Soren remained steadfast. “We set the Hyperion on course back to the Exchange. Once more of their vessels arrive and see that we’re gone, they’ll assume we took the derelict and left. The ship will be safe and the Hyperion will have the best chance of retreating to the Free Exchange.”

Captain Singh looked mildly bewildered at the priest. “If we go back to the Exchange, there’s a good chance we’re not coming back.”

“I never said anything about us leaving. We take a portion of the Hyperion’s crew—or all of them. It doesn’t matter which. But we stay on the derelict. Life support will need to be kept at a bare minimum, and it’ll be uncomfortable, but it’s doable. We’ll submerge it further in the gas clouds and wait it out. It’ll give us time to understand the vessel. To safely use the sphere. And it provides the best chance of survival for the Andromedans.”

“That is, if the entities that attacked us don’t detect the vessel on a closer look.” Singh argued back.

Father Soren continued, “That’s one risk compared to the multitude of sending it into unknown territory. It’s the best chance we have to save those lives.”

Miles blinked as he thought it over. It’s not the most impossible scheme. If the entities didn’t check twice, they could lie in wait. The quickest response the Free Exchange could muster would be in sixteen years. It was just a question of whether the crew aboard the derelict could survive undefended.

“I would have to ask members of the crew to stay aboard. To risk their lives in enemy territory with no hope of rescue. To leave them at the mercy of…” Singh trailed off. “Demons.”

The man looked more than upset at the proposition. “And that is besides the point that the Free Exchange likely still has agents aboard. I believe Commander Terese to be one, but there could be others as well. If we accidentally put one on the derelict…”

The Captain’s voice made it clear that the matter was resolved. Though Miles could tell that the priest still had his reservations. Sergeant Barnes looked around, looking for the opportunity to speak up. He hesitantly leaned forward.

“I’ve talked with the men. We’re ready when you are.”

Miles now noticed that the young man now had his assault rifle next to him. He must have brought it in with him. He didn’t doubt that all the marines were now carrying their rifles, despite it being protocol to keep them in lockers. They could pass it off as being ready for another attack.

He understood the basic idea. It was one he’d seen carried out on several vessels under threat of mutiny. Functionally, each door of a spaceship could be sealed in case of an emergency. With control of the bridge, Singh could effectively cordon sections of the ship to be used as makeshift brigs. Arresting the entire crew at once wasn’t a possibility, but they could certainly shut down all communications and secure the ship one deck at a time.

Captain Singh took an uneasy breath. “Once we act, we’ll be splintering the crew. I want that to happen at the last possible moment. Once we tip our hand to the Free Exchange, they’ll be no turning back. Dr. Philips, when do you think the FTL systems will be repaired?”

Dr. Philips rubbed his hands together in thought. “It’s at least a day’s work. We already have the materials aboard the vessel. It’s more a matter of properly fixing the drive itself that’s giving us issue.”

“Work as fast as you can.”

“There is one more issue.” This time, Miles found himself speaking. “You have the bridge, but what about engineering?”

Captain Singh looked at him, surprised, as if he hadn’t expected him to speak. Miles was a bit surprised himself. The more he thought about this plan, the more he wanted to be a part of it. This wasn’t just about sticking it to the Free Exchange. Maybe there was some genuine good to come out of this expedition.

“I am planning on talking to Chief Engineer Amos and having him secure the section.”

“And can you trust him?” Miles spoke again. “Because I can’t help but notice that he’s not at this meeting.”

Miles had liked Amos more than enough when he had met him. It was a shame that they never found the time to catch up after being awoken from stasis. But from what time Miles had spent with the Chief Engineer, he also knew that the man had his reservations about Captain Singh. Trust could make or break this plan.

Captain Singh nodded. “I trust him to do the right thing. It’s more a matter of who he might accidentally inform. I know Commander Terese has been talking to him.”

Miles stared at him hard. “If he fails…”

“He won’t,” Captain Singh said with complete confidence.

Miles accepted the answer, though he wasn’t happy about it. If this was to go through, they could leave nothing to chance. That the second most important person in the operation wasn’t here was a risk. Perhaps the Captain had confidence, but Miles didn’t. However, maybe Singh knew something that he didn’t.

“I do feel there is something else that needs to be brought up.” Captain Singh’s face took a graver expression. “This needs to be made clear. The Free Exchange isn’t going to let this go unpunished. If we succeed, our lives will be forfeit.”

Miles couldn’t help but gape at the man. He, of course, knew this from the start. Glen Tannis was never one to allow disobedience. Neither was the Free Exchange. But to say those words out loud was a different thing altogether. For some reason, Captain Singh had a propensity to bring up hard truths.

“If we succeed, they’ll kill us as soon as we get back to civilization.” Captain Singh looked for the response in their faces. “We are staking our lives on saving the Andromedans from extermination. We are sacrificing ourselves to save a people. I need to know that everyone is ready to commit to that.”

For himself, Miles knew he was a dead man already. However, he knew Sergeant Barnes and Dr. Philips must’ve had their own lives. Their own dreams and ambitions—not to mention families and loved ones. To bring this up now was nothing less than inspiring doubt, but for some reason, it didn’t.

Captain Singh, perhaps for all his sins as a man, seemed to always speak the truth. Miles knew liars—he was one himself—but so far Captain Singh had been a man never to shy away from this, even when it meant repercussions. Perhaps that was an admirable quality. Siding with Singh may have meant suicide, but maybe that was at least a death that one could believe in. Singh spoke plainly, something that the Free Exchange never did.

Miles saw the men nodding along. There were others not in the room who would be a part of this, but somehow he knew they would agree as well. He may have had his severe disagreements with the Captain, especially on religion, but this was a cause that Miles could believe in. Playing the hero. Miles laughed at himself for that. He never could resist that. Maybe they were fools; he didn’t doubt that the Free Exchange would win in the end, anyway. But he could believe in this, at least for now.

The ship shook for a moment. Miles barely had time to register the impact of the explosion before the alarm sounded over the system. The room remained still in abject horror. Miles shot to his feet first. They’re here!