ganymede rising
by Jonathan Shepherd
EPISODE 11
Hammer on glass. Pounding on flesh. Dry eyes and mouth and skin. Shards
of way-too-bright light were performing surgery through her eyelids and
beckoning for her to awaken.
“Mmphrr…” she mumbled. The smell of her own breath assaulted her
nostrils and fought for its place amidst the smell of sweat and liquor
and stale marijuana smoke. Her left hand stretched out and hit another
warm body.
“What?!” She was startled awake. The pounding followed her brain.
She squinted down to her side and saw a big hairy body tangled in the
sheets. “Oh fuck…” she mumbled to herself.
Bits of the previous evening slipped into her consciousness and reminded
her of where she was and what she had been doing.
“Oh fucking fuck!…” Jenna mumbled to herself as she rolled out of the
bed and began scrambling for her clothes. The blood rushed up to her
forehead and tried to knock her eyes out of her skull. Her brain felt
gigantic. She started to get dressed and hopped a few steps to get her
pants on. Once in the living room of Richter’s apartment, she remembered
the data disc they had created the night before. She moved an empty wine
glass out of the way to get to it, and the rancid smell of the wine
fermenting at the bottom of the glass made her stomach flip over. She
grabbed the disc, put it in her bag, and let herself out.
“Later Richter…” she mumbled under her breath, “enjoy telling the
story asshole, I know I won’t.”
***
Jonas’ apartment had the same sterile white and chrome architecture
that pervaded this segment of the Mars colony. Since everything here was
contained, the walls and windows had all been made of plastisteel, like
a space station. He had a rare view of the rocks and valleys beyond the
colony- and from his living room window you could see the southern arm
of the colony stretching out and glistening under the mid-day sun. The
walls were about the only sterile thing in his apartment, though.
Strange posters hung everywhere, depicting ancient deities and occult
symbols. Edward recognized the large poster over the couch as something
from the Kabala, the mystery school of Judaism. That symbol was, he
believed, called the “Tree of Life” or something.
The apartment smelled like spicy Indian incense and oranges. Edward and
Alex found a place on the oversized, comfortable tan sofa and waited for
Jonas to join them.
“You want something to drink?” Jonas offered, “I’ve got fresh
orange juice from Earth, and water, or spiced tea.”
Edward and Alex both decided on water. Jonas removed his vinyl
trench coat, revealing a muscled body beneath a tight black undershirt
and a gun strapped over his shoulder. After removing the weapon and
setting it on a table, he joined them around the coffee table and looked
them one at a time squarely in the eyes.
“This is quite a place you have here.” Alex said. “And quite a
collection of art work and stuff.”
“Yeah,” said Jonas, “I’m very interested in the philosophies that
have gotten humanity this far. My interest in computer work is purely
for the money. I think there are things that we can know, or try to
know, that touch on a far deeper meaning.”
“Empirical Nothingness?” Edward said, gesturing at a periodical on the
coffee table. “I didn’t know they even made that magazine anymore.”
“You guys don’t miss anything, do you?” Jonas eased back in his
chair and took a sip of water. “That magazine has helped me to look at
things… at myself in ways I would have never thought. This is their
tenth year actually. Still an underground publication, and a lot of
people write for them under pseudonyms. There are those of us who are
skeptical and rational, but who also realize that reality doesn’t
explain itself in neat little rules the way some would have it. EN
magazine is for people like us.
“But that’s not why we’re here is it boys? Chaplain told me you
guys would be coming, and that it involved something pretty steep.
Chaplain and I go way back, and if this is to help him, then I’m ready
to get started.”
“Fair enough,” said Edward, “did Chaplain give you any details?”
“Nope. He said this needed to stay secure and that I’d have to hear
it all from the horse’s mouth.”
“Well, I was doing some work for Consulate Solutions awhile back,
and I stumbled across what looked like a secondary security network on
Ganymede 2. But the minute I started to research it, it was gone. Like a
glitch. I kept records of what I found, though, and when I asked Tanya
about it, she started having visions about something going on that was
bigger than all of us. Tanya is also a part of our group, and she’s a
certified sensitive. Her abilities are always accurate, but they’re not
always clear. They don’t always give us an entire picture. Anyway,
before I try to get back into that system, Chaplain suggested that I get
with you. Your skills cater, he says, to the more clandestine approach.”
Jonas’ face opened into a bright smile and he let out an easy
chuckle.
“Chaplain knows his stuff, my friend. If you can get back into the system
where you think you saw this ‘glitch’ I’ll see what I can find out. I
have a system in the other room that ought to do the trick. Alex, you
can make yourself at home out here while we work if you want. I have
shelves full of books and a game system; it’s a HoloWorks 60. Not the
latest, but still pretty fun.”
“It’s cool. I’ll make myself busy.”
The two older men left the room and Alex leafed through the issue
of Empirical Nothingness. He was reading an article about the illusion
of environmental safety propagated by the central Terran government
through media channels that were all but free when his wristwatch chimed
that a communication was trying to come through.
“Damn,” he muttered. They were supposed to have turned all their
communications devices off while they were here with Jonas.
“Edward?! Should I take this call? It says it’s on a secure
network!”
Hearing his call from the other room, Edward came running to join
him.
“Okay. Take it. It might be Tanya or Jenna.”
“Accept Call.” Alex spoke into the device, and the view screen
flickered and became the blank white of a secure-network call.
It was scratchy with static, but they recognized Jenna’s voice.
“Guys? I’m sorry for calling like this… can you hear me?”
“We can hear you Jenna,” said Alex, “Go ahead, is something wrong?”
“It’s Tanya. I think she’s missing.”
“What?!” Edward was leaning in over the communicator with Alex so
he could hear too.
“I ended up spending the night out, looking for that… information…
and when I got back she was gone. She didn’t take her purse, or clean
anything up in the apartment. It’s like she thought she’d be right back,
but she’s not here. Her wrist phone isn’t answering and I don’t know
what to do you guys… I’m sorry… I’m scared… this is all my fault….”
Jenna’s voice was shaking and it was obvious she was in tears.
Edward grabbed Alex’s wrist and spoke clearly into it.
“Just stay calm. Go and get a room somewhere. Well be back in about
fourty-eight hours. I’ll contact you on the secure network when we get
there. We need to regroup. She may have found something, and just didn’t
want to involve anybody else yet. Tanya’s a big girl, and if something
were going to hurt her, she’d sure see it coming. Don’t worry, we’ll be
back soon.”
“All right Eddie. I’ll wait for you. Sorry for all this…”
The screen went blank as the communication ended. They all looked
at each other in silence for a few moments.
“I want to go back to earth with you,” said Jonas. “It sounds like
you may need more help. From the looks of that network we’re tapping
into, you guys are scratching the surface of something really
dangerous.”
***
Tanya’s consciousness fought to return to her. Her arms and legs
were bound outstretched and her back was against a cold stone wall. The
room smelled like earth and charcoal with a coppery taint of blood
underneath. Her eyelids flickered and she saw candlelight and robed
figures beneath her. She began to slip away again into the darkness of
sleep.
“Not so fast,” a female voice said into her ear, close enough to
make the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. The voice lilted,
like bells ringing or children singing. “We want you to be awake for all
of this…”
Her eyes snapped open as the smell of ammonia stabbed into her
nostrils. The woman standing beside her dropped the smelling salts
capsule to the floor and walked with cat-like grace around to her other
side.
“We’ve been beating you for six hours now.” The voice chimed.
“And that was merely the beginning. The human body can endure so
much suffering when it is administered… properly.”
Tanya didn’t know who this woman was, or where she was, or how she
got here. She remembered walking down the street with that man named
Flout, and then she woke up here. She remembered being beaten. By
leather and by metal and by flesh. She had never felt pain like this
before. Her naked body shivered against the stone, and the warm feeling
of tiny drops of her own blood rolled down her abdomen.
The woman doing the talking was at least six foot two and sinewy.
She had a smooth bald head, fair soft skin and almond shaped eyes. She
was clothed up to the neck in tight black leather and buckles and she
was wearing gloves with long sharp points at the ends of the fingers.
She would have been beautiful but for the fact that Tanya could feel her
aura. It was cold and deep and swirling chaos. She could see it in the
woman’s eyes. The irises and pupils seemed to merge in blackness, and
Tanya couldn’t stare into them for fear she would go mad.
Tanya and her tormenter were on a dais at the far end of a large
hall full of people wearing dark red hooded cloaks. There were candles
everywhere and the light glittered off of something she saw to her left.
There was a small table filled with implements. Tanya craned her neck to
get a better look and saw blades and needles and files of all shapes and
sizes. Her breathing quickened and she pulled at the shackles around her
wrists to no avail.
“I see you’ve figured out what’s next my sweet.” Said the woman. “Your
fear is like perfume. Feeling the suffering of a sensitive is like no
other delicacy you can imagine. I want this to last a long time and I
want you to scream as loud as you can. We hunger for your pain…”
