Author: Autumn

Carol jolted awake at the sound of urgent pounding on her door. Dizzily, she stumbled to the door and opened it to find Lambert, who grabbed her arm and pulled her roughly into the corridor. She had to trot to keep up with him as they sped through the base, avoiding the faces of the soldiers that peered at them, self-conscious of still wearing her pajamas. Lambert looked intently through every window they passed, but was otherwise too distracted to notice anything else.

When they reached the doors to the outside, Lambert barged through then took Carol by the shoulders and pushed her forward out from under the eaves. She saw it immediately.

A giant spaceship.

Hovering right above them.

When she realized her connection with its appearance her heart sunk, then suddenly leaped in ecstasy. After having spent so much time lovingly polishing it, she recognized that the ship was made from the same metal and paint as the Suit. The beacon had reached home after all.

Lambert was livid. “Did you have anything to do with this?” he snarled.

“No!” Carol blurted, then immediately felt like a small child for telling the lie. “I mean… it might have been me… on accident.”

“Do you…!” Lambert couldn’t finish. He was glaring at her, hard.

Carol couldn’t resist the urge to stare at the spaceship. She liked the way the light glinted off of it, and the angles in the design were beautiful in a way that nothing on Earth had ever appealed to her. It held as much sway for her as the Suit, and she itched to fly up and see what the interior was like. Unconsciously, she stepped forward and reached up to feel closer.

“Solitary confinement, commander!” Lambert barked, yanking her back.

“What?! No!” Carol pulled against him, but was physically no match. If she was in the Suit where she belonged, she could do what she wanted whether he allowed it or not. But as a human, she was powerless. She fought Lambert as he dragged her back through the base, resorting to tactics used by toddlers and letting her whole body go limp as a dead weight. He picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, where all she could do was pound on his muscular back that didn’t even give her the dignity of bending under her weight.

She wanted the spaceship, more than she had ever wanted anything. Everything inside of her was screaming that she needed to get on board, and all she could do was put up a futile fight.

Lambert tossed her onto her bed and threatened to tie her down if she didn’t behave, then exited her room and locked the door behind him. “Make sure she doesn’t get out,” he ordered Holmes, who was dumbfounded by what he had witnessed.

“What is going on… captain?” Holmes could barely remember protocol.

“That goddamn spaceship is making her crazy! No more questions, soldier!” Lambert stomped off, taking a moment to kick the wall and leave a dent with his steel-toed boot along the way.

While there was no doubt that the spaceship was of the same origin as the Suit, Lambert didn’t know if it had been inadvertently summoned by Carol accessing full command, or if she lied and had deliberately called out to it. He missed the old Carol who had skipped around as a permanent civilian; she had died during her first mission, and returned a different person. Another unrecognized casualty.

The military had hailed the spaceship but received no response. Because there was no sign of any activity onboard, they were waiting to decide what to do next, the tension palpable. The entire world had already turned its eyes on them, watching. Judging.

For captain Lambert, the event was personal.

The General arrived within the hour, and Lambert was part of the ensuing conference. He was not remotely surprised when the General announced, “Let’s send in the Suit.”

“General,” he began, his speech already rehearsed, “I would advise against it. The spaceship is undoubtedly here because of the Suit, and there will be unexpected consequences if we send it up to them. Furthermore, it is demonstrably provable that the Suit influences the mental state of those who pilot it, so we cannot trust that our pilot will remain loyal to us once up there. We should wait to see what the aliens do first.”

The General raised his eyebrows. “Wasn’t your last mission a resounding success?”

“Yes, sir. But…”

“We need to show the world that we are fearless.” The General pounded his fist for emphasis. “If the extraterrestrials wanted us dead, they could have done it in an instant. We aren’t going up there to fight, but to make first contact. It is possible that they are unable to receive our transmission, and have no idea of our desire to communicate.”

“I have a bad feeling about doing that, sir,” Lambert muttered.

The General paused thoughtfully. “Are there any other ideas?” When no one answered, he continued. “We need to take action, and that’s the best we’ve got. We’re sending up the Suit. I trust that your training with that woman has gone well?”

Lambert thought for a moment, then stood and saluted. “I must stand against this decision.”

“Are you defying orders, captain?” the General asked quietly.

“Yes, General. I will not send the Suit under any circumstance.” The words were hard to say, but Lambert strongly felt that he would much rather face the consequences of speaking them than the guilt that would follow if he didn’t. His inner voice insisted he talk about Carol, to tell them about the changes in her personality and the obvious allure that the spaceship held for her, but in that regard he held his tongue to protect her.

Their eyes met, and the General spoke, “In that case, you are relieved. Thank you for your service.”

His face stoic, Lambert finished his salute and marched out of the conference room. It wasn’t until he was in his office that he let his mask drop, kicking his desk repeatedly as he cursed, “Goddamn you, Carol!” She would never appreciate what he had tried to do for her.

Oddly, the one thing that he regretted the most was knowing that he would never see her again, or give her a proper goodbye.

Next

When Carol reported to the bunker the next morning, Lambert wasn’t there – to make it worse, the two armed guards turned her away. She spent the day bumming around base, jittery at the thought of the Suit sitting all alone without her.

The day after was a replay of the same scene, and annoyed that she couldn’t properly sulk in front of an audience, Carol snapped at Holmes to get off her back and leave her alone. He repeated that he was assigned to escort her, which made her even more irritable. She spent the day hiding in her room.

By the end of the third day, her nerves boiled over; she couldn’t take it anymore. She stormed to Lambert’s office, half expecting to discover that he was vacationing in the Bahamas without giving her any notification, so it surprised her when she flung open the door and saw him sitting behind his desk.

“What’s going on?” she demanded, venting her pent-up frustration. “You said that I was fine, but we haven’t done any training in the Suit since I went on that mission. What the hell?”

“Sit down, commander,” he growled indistinctly, not bothering to look at her as he poured himself a glass out of a blue-tinted bottle. Carol gaped as she pulled out a chair.

“Are you drinking, captain?” she asked.

“Correction: I am getting drunk,” he replied.

“I don’t see how that could possibly be constructive. I’ve been reporting to the bunker every morning for days, and you’ve been letting me down. I thought that our training would go much more smoothly from now on, and that I would finally make you proud, and yet you just suddenly drop out like it doesn’t matter. So, seriously, what the hell?”

“That,” Lambert pointed at her. “It’s because of that. Irritability and aggression. We already lost MSG Hartmann because no one paid attention, and now you’re exhibiting personality changes as well. If I had the authority, I would decommission the Suit altogether.”

“My personality is not changing; you’ve just never seen me angry before,” Carol spat, then shied at sound of her own voice. She was jonesing for certain, but being inside the Suit made her feel like she was more herself. If she was changing, it was to her true nature.

“Commander…” Lambert took a moment to nurse his glass. When he spoke again, his voice sounded even less articulate than it had before, “Do you know how long we’ve had the Suit? The military found it when you were… still in diapers, I’d bet. Do you know why we didn’t start piloting it until the last few years?”

“No, sir,” she replied, crossing her arms and leaning back. She didn’t want to waste time on chitchat, but Lambert was too inebriated to notice or care.

“We had to study it. We had to reverse engineer ammo for it. Bullets don’t form out of thin air, you know.” He chuckled to himself. “The first man to climb inside was terrified that he was going to die, but his bravery was inspiring. You have any idea how often I think about him and wish I was more like that?”

“No, sir,” Carol grumbled.

“MSG Hartmann paid a price for using the Suit. I think that it’s too fundamentally alien to work with human brains, and we should lock it away for good. But you see, the General-” Lambert pointed up at the ceiling “-doesn’t want to do that. The fact is, commander, we’re losing. It’s a closely guarded secret, but our situation is a clusterfuck right now, and everyone is hoping that the Suit will carry us singlehandedly to victory.”

“Is that why you’re getting drunk?” Carol tried to keep her voice sharp, but she wasn’t feeling it anymore. Lambert seemed too pensive and pathetic to berate.

“Yes, ma’am, it is. It worries me that your psychological profile has changed so drastically. The Carol I started with couldn’t have killed a mouse without mourning it, but now look at you: I’ve seen grown men cry after their first kill, but your reaction was to have dinner. You were a completely different person.”

“Captain, I just…” Carol struggled to figure out what she wanted to say. “I need to pilot the Suit. I don’t think you understand what it’s like for me.”

“Maybe I understand too much.”

Lambert poured himself another glass, and Carol watched him drink in silence for a moment. A thought came to her out of nowhere, and compelled by curiosity, she asked, “Did anyone figure out those numbers I read to you on the first day?”

“They’re dates, commander,” Lambert snorted.

“Obviously. I just wondered if we learned anything about them.” Carol couldn’t explain why she felt an urgent need to know, other than it was somehow personally significant to her in some way.

“They’re interstellar dates. Now, get outta here, you’re interrupting my meditation time.” Whatever mood had possessed him before, was gone now. “Enjoy your vacation, ’cause eventually I’ll be forced to reunite you with your real body, whether I like it or not.”

Carol stood slowly, studying Lambert closely. “You remember that?” she asked quietly.

“I sure as hell do. Now, git!” He grabbed a book and threw it at her, missing by a wide margin but his point was made. Carol scampered out the door.

She wished she had kept her mouth shut.

Next