Spacial Illusions

Chapter Eleven

NOT PROPERLY EDITED

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"Where to, Ursa? We can't go back to the village obviously and it'll start raining soon." Callisto spoke to the Tao Cat knowing he wouldn't answer or even know what she was talking about. He lightly chuffed and shuffled his body to support her more as they wandered aimlessly through the trees to find some form of shelter for the night. She spotted a clearing in the trees and moved toward it in hopes that there was something of use around it. Callisto felt her body freeze with ice and her heart stopped when she realized that they had returned to the mass grave of her Scout Regiment.

"Why must I always come back to this place? This is going to haunt me until the day I die." Callisto grumbled as they worked their way down to the grassy clearing. The grass swished around their legs, the sound like the whispers of the universe telling its secrets to the skies. The ship sat in ominous shadows over the glittering suits and grinning skeletons.

"Guess this will have to do until the morning." Ursa plopped to the metal floor with an echoing thud and Callisto was swift to follow, careful to avoid looking at the tower of vegetation by the controls that was once a Scout just like her. She got comfortable and seconds later the sweeping rain battered the ground and the ship with an ethereal fury like it wanted to wipe this place clean off the face of Praesidium.

"Look at it, Ursa, this was supposed to be our saving grace. A clean slate to make better choices. Now it's just a reminder of the failure we were as soldiers. As pioneers. We failed our planet and I failed them." The Tao Cat softly churred his comfort and shifted around to drop his wide head on her lap. Callisto buried her fingers in his silky fur and ran her hand from between his eyes to between his shoulders before starting again. It didn't take long for Ursa to fall asleep to her soft and methodical pace, but every time Callisto tried to do the same her mind would reel and speed through that massacre just a few feet from her and the death of Cordal she couldn't save.

Callisto watched as the sky brightened over the clearing, her sleepless eyes staring into the distance as she silently assessed her options left on Praesidium. She was yet to hear about other villages and she wasn't keen on looking for potentially hostile peoples. The entire planet was one huge forest of ancient trees speckled with random clearings and no standing water. Collecting water was a minor obstacle anyways, as was food. She was more concerned with how she was going to stay safe from the various predators that prowled the forest floor.

"Seems like this is the only choice we have, Ursa. Staying in the middle of this blood bathed hell hole is the most logical choice. Lovely. That doesn't sound completely idiotic and insane at all. I have lost my ever-loving mind on this damn planet." The female pushed up from the cold floor and stepped over the vegetation thriving off the Scout corpse with the golden name of Asher barely visible through the leaves and the budding carrion flowers that filled the air with the stench of rot and misery.

"These look to be like the ugly flowers at home too. Seems that death doesn't change faces no matter where you go." She stood in the empty cockpit, something that now struck her as odd since she distinctly remembers Launch Captain Rider saying he would be guiding their ship through the galaxy.

"We can risk the lives of forty-five Scouts but God forbid Director Striker lose a fucking Launch Captain. The whole world would collapse into chaos." Callisto snaps harshly at the empty seats in the room before she turns her attention to the gaping hole in the console courtesy of Callisto and her rage- along with help of a titanium spear of course.

"Okay, this doesn't look too complex. It's just a bigger version of the VR training ones we had during boot camp." Kneeling down, Callisto found the tool box under the pilot seat and found the correctly sized Phillips head screwdriver to take the front cover off to the broken console. She poked at a sheared wire and leapt backward with a shriek both at being shocked and that it even sparked in the first place. The lights flickered on the top of the console and for a split second she saw an icon reading in broken lighting 'Message(s) from Director Striker'.

"More reminders of how menial we Scouts are, huh?" Tapping the ends with caution to reconnect the wires without being shocked, she pouted when nothing happened on the console. "Damn, out of juice. Maybe I can MacGyver my way through this mess. Let's see, what can I rip apart and Frankenstein together?" She moved to the cargo hold once more and carried everything out to the grass to be assessed. Blueprints to making buildings and cities, medicines, water reclaimers, oxygenators, pressure stabilizers, and more that were considered potential needs for survival on the planet. Callisto had an epiphany and tapped her forehead with her first two fingers to silently call herself a moron.

"What an idiot! I can just use the long distance communication receivers! I might not be able to read the previous messages but those are useless with how old they are." Finding and assembling the pieces to this machine took well into the day and she had to find a way to cover and protect the receiver from rusting in the constant rains. Callisto ripped apart the inside of ship until she could construct an extremely primitive and rudimentary rooftop made from leather seat covers and wall paneling strapped as an extension of the ship with strung together seatbelts clipped to a handle just inside the door. She finally flicked the machine on as the skies faded into the cloudy night and moved into the pilot seat to listen to the white noise crackling through the speakers of the connection radio.

"How early until launch? Over."

"Launch Captain Rider estimates two weeks. Over."

"Roger. Director Striker asks if there is a way to shorten that time. Over." There was a moment of silence as the other side had a private discussion. This gave Callisto the moment to think over what they could be talking about. Launch? What were they launching? Why does Director Striker need the time shortened?

"Negative. Over." The next voice to speak she recognized as Director Striker himself and she couldn't stop the instant bristling of hackles.

"You are aware that they have been on an alien planet for more than three months now, if they aren't already dead. It's been a month since we got the signal of the code use for the doors to the Scout ship. I called for the mobilization of all troops two weeks ago and you are failing to deliver to me, Rider. Was it a mistake choosing to make that Scout ship remotely controlled? Did I make an error, Rider?" Even though Callisto was thousands of miles away and listening was through a receiver, chills still clawed down her spine at his scary calm and eerie serenity. His leadership was built on respect from fear where she had grown accustomed to the respect through admiration of Cordal before his passing.

"No sir, you did not. I can make launch ready in one week. Over."

"Don't fail me again, Rider. I will not be lenient this time. We will take Salutem and find our surviving Scout. Director Striker signing off. Over and out." Callisto sat staring at the receiver in shock and hints of terrorized surprise. Director Striker was attacking Salutem? Because she used the code to open the cargo doors all that time ago? That can't be his true motive, he considered their slaughter as a menial footnote in their monthly budget, they meant nothing to the Director so why act like he cared now?

"Because I used the code. It means that the planet is habitable. He doesn't care about saving a Scout, he cares about having Praesidium as his own."