Battlefield: “Future Tense” (continued)

Raynes waited, trying not to pace, as he waited for his officers to report. The adrenaline began to wash away, bringing with it the familiar sense of weary post-battle fatigue. It was not, he had recognized some time ago, not all that different from the pleasant lethargy that came after sexual climax. This was not nearly as pleasant, but he could see why people became addicted to its preceding high.

“Captain,” Chautran called softly from behind him.

Raynes blinked, refocusing his thoughts on the present moment.

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

He turned to find her staring at him from across her station. Her complexion, usually a warm hue like cappuccino, was pale.

“What is it?” He asked her, trying to sound both gentle and urgent.

“I’ve . . .” she swallowed and started again. “I’ve completed a preliminary scan of the surrounding space.” Her lips trembled noticeably.

Raynes nodded. “And?”

Her eyes remained on his. She straightened, regaining some measure of self-assurance.

“There’s nothing unusual in the immediate area.”

Raynes nodded slowly, silently prompting her to continue. His stomach tightened with a new knot at her continued hesitation.

“Lieutentant?” he prompted her when she remained silent.

“Sir,” she admitted, looking both panicked and disappointed in herself. “I don’t know where we are.”

The knot in Raynes’ stomach turned to stone. For an instant, he felt a flare of anger, wondering whether Chautran was truly qualified enough to hold her post. He squelched, recognizing the flash of fury for what it was, and took a step toward the helm station.

“Laureen?” he asked, hoping she had overheard.

A flicker of annoyance passed across her features. She was still fighting to regain control of the vessel—without much success, Raynes noted.

She did not directly acknowledge him, but her hands shifted their positions above her console as she worked different controls now. A display shimmered into view above her station showing the plot from the navigation systems. It showed the landmarks from their last position before transitioning into slipstream, color-coded and labelled at key locations.

The image shifted, stretching and twisting, deforming itself in the familiar it did as it depicted their transition, and then passage, into slipstream. Hudson tapped a control and the motion of the image sped up, froze, and then abruptly shattered. The display went blank, empty except for the faint sparkle of dust particles in the air that revealed its continued existence.

The air before the helm console flickered. Bright shapes appeared, shifted, and then vanished. A few, displayed as circles clearly meant to designate planets, remained for moment. Short lines of text appeared below these, but they changed too rapidly for Raynes to read them. Then, these too disappeared, along with the planetary circle.

Raynes, Chautran, and Hudson stared at the rapidly shifting and flickering display in silence. Confusion, along with growing concern, was evident on all of their faces. Chautran bit at her lower lip nervously.

Finally, the image stabilized into what was clearly meant to be a star chart. From experience, Raynes knew which symbols represented planets, suns, asteroids, and other spatial objects. However, labels were absent from all of them.

Damage to the astrogation data banks?

As if hearing his unspoken question, Hudson replied, “The integrity of the navigation and astronomical data is confirmed.” As she turned to face him, her voice flat, she said, “The computer just doesn’t know where we are.”

Raynes stared at her for several moments while the weight in his stomach turned to lead. He looked toward the main bridge display, reassured to the see stars shown there. He did not recognize any of them, nor their arrangement, but that was not unusual, unless they were passing through a very familiar region of space.

“No reference points at all?” His question came out unbidden. He was relieved, at least, that his voice did not quaver.

Hudson’s hands worked her console. She shook her head.

“The computers are still working on it,” she reported. “But nothing definitive yet.”

Raynes turned back to Chautran. “Not even a guess?”

She shook her head, her dark tresses framing her face. Her eyes turned toward her console displays and then back up toward his. They seemed even brighter with fear than before.

“Based on the data so far,” she told him. Her voice was soft and almost trembling. “We’re at least forty thousand light years from known space.”

Raynes played back her statement in his mind several times to make sure that he had heard it correctly.

Forty thousand lights years?

That was further out from Earth than any known vessel had ever gone. While the distance was startling, it was not without hope. Slipstream travel being what it was, if they could find the right transition points, even if it took several jumps, they could return to known regions of space within a reasonable period of time—well before their supplies ran out.

The danger was, of course, that this far out, the systems were uncharted and the dangers unknown.