Chapter 4
Dana
Six hours after boarding Mothership the VR pod had filled my head with language like someone downloading software directly into my brain, and now I understood every word Er'dox was saying. I wished I didn't.
"Shorstar Galaxy." I said it out loud, tasting the alien syllables. Behind me, the other women waited, their faces tight with hope that was about to curdle into something much worse. "We've never heard of Shorstar Galaxy."
Er'dox's amber eyes tracked my face with an intensity that made my skin prickle. He was reading me, I realized. Watching for the exact moment when understanding crystallized into despair.
"The wormhole," I said. "It didn't just split our ship apart. It threw us across—" I couldn't even finish the sentence. Across what? How did you measure the distance between galaxies? What unit of measurement could possibly contain that kind of cosmic fuck-you?
"We have no records of your galaxy in any database," Er'dox confirmed, his deep voice carrying an edge of something that might have been regret.
"The wormhole you described, that kind of spatial anomaly could theoretically bridge vast distances.
But without navigational data, without a reference point. .."
"We can't get back." The words came out flat. Dead. "You're telling me we can't get back."
"I'm telling you we don't know where back is."
I closed my eyes. Breathed in. Breathed out. Felt fifteen other lives pressing against my shoulders.
When I opened my eyes again, Er'dox was still watching me with that uncomfortable intensity. Waiting to see if I'd break.
I didn't break. I'd broken plenty of things in my life with equipment, relationships, my own stupid idealism, but I'd learned a long time ago that breaking down in front of people who depended on you was a luxury you couldn't afford.
"The VR pod," I said, my voice steady even though my hands wanted to shake. "The others need to go through it. We need to be able to communicate."
"It will take several hours to process everyone." Er'dox gestured to the medical bay, where Zorn, the green-skinned medical officer, was already preparing the equipment. "And we'll need to conduct medical evaluations. Some of your people are in serious condition."
"I know exactly what condition my people are in.
I've been keeping them alive for three weeks with a medkit and prayer.
" I turned to face the others, switching back to English even though it felt foreign on my tongue now, like the Zandovian language had shouldered its way into my brain and rearranged the furniture.
"Okay. Listen up. The good news is we've been rescued.
The bad news is we're in a completely different galaxy. A galaxy no one's ever heard of."
The silence that followed wasn't really silence. It was the sound of hope dying in real-time.
"Different galaxy?" Jalina's voice cracked on the words. "Dana, that's not possible."
"Wormhole physics say otherwise. We're here. In the Shorstar Galaxy. With no way home and no one who knows where home is."
"But surely they have records—" Bea started.
"They don't. They've never heard of the Milky Way. Which means we're not just lost. We're cosmically, fundamentally, impossibly lost."
Someone started crying. I didn't turn to see who. Couldn't afford to let their grief become mine, not when I needed to stay functional.
"Everyone's going through the VR pod," I continued, bulldozing through the breakdown happening behind me.
"It uploads their language directly into your brain.
Feels like someone's rewiring your neural pathways with a socket wrench, but you'll come out speaking Zandovian.
Then medical evaluation. Then we figure out what the hell happens next. "
"And what happens next?" Elena asked, her voice sharp with something between anger and terror. "We're stranded in a galaxy we've never heard of, on a ship full of aliens eight feet tall, and you're talking about medical evaluations like that's going to solve anything."
"It's going to solve the immediate problem of keeping you alive," I shot back. "Long-term planning comes after we make sure there is a long-term. Now who's volunteering for the VR pod, or do I have to make that decision for you too?"
Jalina stepped forward, because of course she did. She'd been backing my plays since the Liberty disaster, and she wasn't going to stop now just because the universe had gotten exponentially more complicated.
I watched Er'dox guide her to the pod, his massive hands surprisingly gentle as he helped her climb in. The contrast was almost absurd with her petite frame dwarfed by Zandovian technology, by Zandovian scale, by the sheer overwhelming alienness of everything we'd stumbled into.
The pod sealed around her with a hiss that made my teeth ache.
I'd been through it. I knew what was coming.
The disorientation, the sensation of thoughts that weren't yours flooding your consciousness, the weird moment when you realized you could suddenly understand words that had been meaningless five minutes ago.
Jalina emerged gasping, her dark eyes wide. "That was—"
"Deeply unpleasant," I finished. "Welcome to multilingual consciousness. Bea, you're next."
One by one, they went through the pod. One by one, they came out able to understand the Zandovian language that was about to become our lifeline. And one by one, I watched their faces as they processed the same devastating truth I'd already absorbed: we were never going home.
By the time the last woman, Harriet, had been processed. Zorn was ready to begin medical evaluations. He moved through our group with methodical efficiency, scanning us with devices that made my engineer brain itch with curiosity even through the exhaustion.
"Remarkable," he muttered, more to himself than to us. "Bilateral symmetry, carbon-based biochemistry, but the cellular structure is unlike anything I've documented. The resilience required to survive Class Seven conditions with your level of technology is—"
"Is us being too stubborn to die," I interrupted. "How bad is it? Medical assessment."
Zorn's golden-brown eyes settled on me, and I saw the calculation happening behind them. How much truth could we handle? How much should he sugar-coat?
"Five of your people need immediate intervention," he said finally.
"Burns, fractures, internal injuries that have been slowly deteriorating.
Another six are showing severe malnutrition and dehydration.
The rest are functional but compromised.
If you'd lasted another week on that planet, I estimate seventy percent mortality rate. "
The numbers hit me. Seventy percent. We'd been that close to complete collapse.
"Can you fix them?" I asked. "The critical cases?"
"Yes. Our medical technology is significantly advanced compared to what you've described. But there's a complication."
Of course there was. Because the universe wouldn't be satisfied with just stranding us in the wrong galaxy. It needed to add complications.
"What kind of complication?"
"Treatment costs resources. Medical supplies, surgical time, pharmaceutical compounds designed for your unique biochemistry." Zorn glanced at Er'dox, who had remained at the edge of the medical bay, observing. "Mothership is a rescue vessel, but we're not a charity operation. We have protocols."
"Protocols," I repeated slowly. "You're telling me we have to pay for medical care? We just got rescued from a death planet, and now there's a bill?"
"Not exactly." Er'dox stepped forward, his deep voice cutting through my rising anger. "Captain Tor'van will want to speak with you. With all of you. But first, let Zorn treat your critical cases. We're not going to let anyone die over administrative complications."
"How generous," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm that probably didn't translate well across species barriers.
Er'dox's expression didn't change, but I saw something flicker in those amber eyes. Amusement? Respect? I couldn't read alien microexpressions worth a damn.
"You've been through significant trauma," he said. "You're exhausted, displaced, and processing information that would break most beings. Hostility is an understandable response."
"I'm not hostile. I'm realistic. We don't have money.
We don't have resources. We don't even have clothes that aren't falling apart.
" I gestured at my salvaged outfit, singed and torn and held together with improvised repairs.
"So when you say 'protocols,' what I hear is 'you're about to become indentured servants,' and I'd really like to know if that translation is accurate. "
Silence fell across the medical bay. Even Zorn had stopped his scanning, watching the exchange with obvious interest.
Er'dox studied me for a long moment, and I forced myself to hold his gaze even though every instinct screamed to look away.
Some primal part of my brain recognized predator when it saw one, and these Zandovians were definitely predators.
Eight feet of muscle and controlled power, bred for a gravity well that probably made Earth look like a playground.
"You're correct," Er'dox said finally. "You have no currency, no resources, no collateral that would be recognized in Shorstar economy. Captain Tor'van will offer you positions aboard Mothership. You'll work off your rescue costs, your medical treatment, your room and board."
"For how long?"
"That depends on your skills, your positions, and how efficiently you work. Years, probably. Maybe decades if your debts are significant."
I wanted to laugh. Wanted to scream. Wanted to punch something, preferably the universe itself for its cosmic sense of humor.
Instead, I just nodded. "Okay. What are our options?"