An Admiral or a Ruler – Lunar One, Milky Way

Blinding lights welcomed the prison shuttle as they landed on Lunar One. Rows of orange and blue clad guards marched her into the white hangar, pristine and elaborate with high ceilings that boasted of the funding clearly provided to the Metahuman base.

She raised a hand protecting her adjusting eyes. Starion mechs and Metahumans lined the walls, their tech and weapons far advanced in their tight grips.

She had no hope of getting home on her own.

She looked to the hangar door outside of the facility, the dark abyss through the oxygen screen of the moon base signalling night, a dim twirling blue earth far in the distance in front of a dying sun.

As the door in front of her opened, Admiral Arkham came through, his white cap and uniform pressed neatly as he opened his arms, embracing her. “Astra! Thank the stars, you’re alright.”

Surprised by his affection, she leaned away. 

Antonio noticed her retract. He fixed his overcoat instead. “Astra…I don’t want you to misunderstand my compassion for you. Not all is calculated.”

She scoffed in handcuffs. “So kidnapping is kindness?”

“Rescued.” Antonio reassured, touching her shoulders briefly. “You’ve been swarmed with pirates for days, how else could we extract you? They took you to their base, forced your compliance–”

“Forced?” Astra looked at him cautiously. “Maewan called to discuss something with me. I went on my own, and even if that were true the Starion team that arrived didn’t even wait to recover me before shooting.”

Sensing they would get nowhere standing and arguing together, Antonio waved her guard away as he uncuffed her. “It is as it has to be with Raider contact–assume hostility.” 

He looked into her eyes. “Follow me.”

With no choice, Astra followed his lead down a glass hallway above lush green moon grass and blue flowers. Before long, he turned to her, stopping in front of a black door. He took her hand to ease her fears. “You’ve been through so much. Rest, and we can discuss your…unauthorised conversation tomorrow.”

Astra heard his distaste as he opened the door, revealing an elegant black bedroom with a view of earth. She stepped inside, seeing clean white clothes hanging for her and the shower already on.

Finally alone she tried her implant, searching for a receiver around the room to try to amplify the signal, but her hope dwindled as her implant connection failed.

She rolled her eyes, knowing that she was being watched.

Closer now to Earth and what should have been family, Astra felt further away from home than ever before.

Vector ⋯ 111

‘You are to me.’ – Lunar One, Milk Way

The next morning Astra was dressed and waiting, her twists fastened above her head, falling delicately here and there around her shoulders, clad in a white bared shoulder dress. 

Though she was still comfortable in the heeled formal wear, she missed her sand corroded clothes. 

Antonio had been friendly enough, but the message was clear with the extra guard she was greeted with outside of her door.

They didn’t trust her. 

And the feeling was mutual.

They escorted her to Admiral Arkham’s office, his space just as neat and upscale as it looked on the vids from their calls. 

Being in his physical presence was strange. It had been decades since they had last spoken face to face but he felt…deeper. As if the spark of life within him had died.

Antonio hugged her before helping her sit in the silver grey chair brandished blue with cushions. “I’m still happy to see you, Astra. I meant what I said when I told you I was worried.”

She looked him in his wavering eyes. “Worried for me, or worried for you?”

She saw his mask twitch.

He bridged his fingers.

“Worried for you. Strange friends you’ve been making. Like your Merrimech Prototype. Did he tell you about the reports on unshackling he’s been sending his superiors since you made the grave mistake of freeing his mind?”

Astra looked at him unfazed. “You’re lying.”

Antonio pushed the cream paper against the dark blue desk. “Read it yourself. It’s all there. So not only did you single handedly betray Starion, your race… You also instigated a mechanical rebellion. And still I welcomed you as a friend, because…I feel responsible for you.”

She watched him lean forward, a faux sympathetic look on his face. “And because I feel responsible for you, I negotiated an offer on your behalf.” She wanted to wipe the smile off of his face. “Would you like to hear it, Commander? I think you would.” He motioned for guards to come in and stand by the door, their blasters aiming at her.

He threw his hands up as if it couldn’t be helped. 

“Arkham Rift is our most profitable community–still is. We make them drill day in and day out and they haven’t even dented the dark matter resources on Thenos. We’d hate to lose their trust–it’s what keeps them productive, and they trust you. So we want to offer to keep you. Nomad Commander Alisha Astra, retains her title–paragon of health and wellbeing–while we shut down our less…profitable communities.”

She felt faint. “Shut down the way you tried to shut Arkham Rift down?” her eyes slid up to his, seeing the brief moment that she hit a nerve, reminding him of his promotion expense. 

His smirk twitched. “They gave them a choice too. They chose wrong, so I was all too happy to help clean up the mess. Humans will always take the biggest bet, and they lost.”

“Why not just free them from their contracts like they wanted? We’re killing each other for no reason.”

Antonio laughed. “And what would they do then? Sit around and play farmer like you wanted for New Dawn? Starion does not work if we don’t have our workers. We free them and then there’s no one left to keep us going. Then we can’t help the galaxy find New Earth.”

“We don’t need to find New Earth.” She countered. “We just need to help each other and make the best of what we already have. It was promised to them. Is Starion so heartless that they’re not above slave labour? Generations of human lives have gone into repaying them.”

Antonio's grin said all. “Only a few Nomads are succeeding Astra. You can remain one of them.”

“And be a slavedriver?”

“You were one already. Born to be one–in fact.” Antonio smirked. “The Nomad program is dying, and I’ve been made its Chancellor. Think of what that could mean for you–for your success.”

She shook her head. “Go to hell.”

Antonio sighed. “I’m sorry Astra. We adapt or die.”

With a flex of his fingers shooting began, Astra lunged behind a bookcase, covering her head as vases and glass broke all around, facility alarms sounding off around her.

Alive and not in pain, she looked up into the dusty room as a security mech came inside, his helmet removing as smoke drifted between them. “Theta?”

Wordlessly Theta went over to the console on Admiral Arkham’s desk, moving his red stained body. With few touches Theta hacked into his comms history bringing forward Arkham’s voice post mortem through a blue wave. 

“She’s close to finishing. It’ll work. Take it tonight, make it fast and easy. We’ll take care of the mech. We can’t have her–cut off–access to—Arkham Rift–”

The line ended, the corrupted sound file clearly making a case against Antonio. Astra stood in shock. 

“He ordered the hit on me? Everything?”

Theta sensed her distress at his betrayal. “After I awoke I did have my suspicions in regard to your bad luck, Commander. But it was much worse than I feared.”

She stepped back as he stepped forward, stopping his chest from coming closer with a palm. “You lied to me too. He told me about the reports you’ve been sending to Merrimech, Theta.”

Guilty, he nodded. “It was upon discovering Starion’s purpose for me that I acted this way, not out of spite for you, Commander. Their request for vast data capacity was much like the engrams we spoke of. Instead of independence, they intended for my model to become their immortal shells.”

Astra’s head hurt. The Admiral had been adamant about the storage space, and to hold something so endless and complex as the human brain–infinite was needed indeed.

“Why didn’t you tell me? I may have helped you.”

He shook his head. “You had not yet lost faith in your directive…and I knew how important finding your true purpose was for you. I would not take it from you.”

She sat in the chair.

“Merrimech did send me purposefully to you. After reviewing your psychiatric files they thought of the remaining Nomad engineers that your profile was the only one  suggestive of a hierophant. Your decision to unshackle me was proof that their suspicion was warranted.”

She looked up at him. “So you were using me?”

He went silent. “Not in a way that I was conscious of, and for that I am sorry. We were not counting on hurting you in any way. To lose your colony and your home… We had no idea that Starion did not value their humanity enough to protect you.”

He kneeled by her side. “You have given me purpose beyond directive, Astra. To free a society off of your work unknowingly did not occur to me. For this reason I have not yet sent Merrimech the final components needed to unshackle. I would not do it…not without your continued permission.”

She eyed his blue light, feeling warmth within her as his fingers came close in affection. “So they haven’t been told how to unshackle yet?”

He shook his head. “And they will not unless you say so, Commander.”

She blinked hard, reality hitting her. Was she now a criminal across every Starion controlled system? “I don’t think I’m a Commander anymore.”

He held her shoulder, not entertaining her doubt. “You are to me.”

Astra felt his cold fingers trail her neck in comfort. She followed his touch and gripped the handgun he put in her lap. 

No one but them mattered now. Her life was her own and to her makers she owed nothing. 

“Do it. If Starion wants enemies…they’ll get them.”

Theta rose, pulling her to her feet with him as alarms sounded through the facility. “Done. Now, let's get you home.”

 

To be continued...