Luna, S. Aitken Basin, Shackleton, Hyperion, The Grace, Pygmalion Chamber
They made it down the stairs to the long curved promenade of the Solarium. Alberto was heavy in the Captain’s arms, even on Luna, but Zephyr helped.
“Where to? What do we have to do?”
Alberto, who could not hold his head up, was coughing blood but he wheezed, “Father, you have to get him.”
The Captain looked at Zephyr, who answered, “Necker.”
“God.”
Alberto lifted his head a fraction, and nodded.
“God. How the hell are we…? I’m looking for the bastard…”
“…the ship…”
“Okay, Zephyr, let’s get him to this place … I have to find Necker.”
“You have to remind him why…” said Alberto before passing out.
“Damn it, he really is human or close enough…”
“The room, the place we woke up in, it’s in there. I remember.” Said the girl.
“Okay.”
They made their way forward.
The lights flickered on.
“Solar backups…”
“Cap…” Tomassina pinged him on his earbud. “Yes, lights coming on, I know…”
“At least we have power for this… we’re taking this?”
“Yes, the same one we just used… into the forest.”
“Forest?? Two, Three, tell the medics to meet us at the Solarium Level, in the tram.”
The captain and Zephyr carried Alberto into a tram.
Alberto thought he was awake, he wasn’t bleeding, everything hurt. He wasn’t awake.
Alberto remembered his father and mother from before he died, when he was a boy.
It was all out of order, like a shuffled deck that kept reshuffling.
The one thing that kept the deck from flying apart, after being broken apart and hidden in the Verse and found again and stacked together on the Moon, was the feeling.
The things people do out of love, what happens when it's taken, when they lose it, when they become capable of anything to get it back, and what things they have done for love.
He was back in the studio in Miami-Marseilles or was he?
Zephyr was standing in front of him, shifting hair colors, wearing dark prisms of slate blue and charcoal black camouflage.
Zephyr asked him, “It’s not fair, no, not just molded from a carbon model, born too? And me? who was my carbon model?”
“Reclaimed from the Conservancy. My mom’s recipe. She cooked up a reliquary, a storehouse of whoever passed, memories reclaimed from a warehouse.
Early on, easy bake Verse, my mom the baker, everybody’s maker. Functionality. Every world needs beauty. She insisted.”
Then someone spoke, “You were carbon modeled after an artist, chosen by the Conservancy’s mysterious contract. It generated you from a human, who passed on, but you are so much more. As are you, son.”
We all must have a why, you know.”
Necker looked up at the ceiling of the studio, which changed into a great dome held up by an eight-walled ring of matte black rock with inlays of moonrock and alloy. Its ceiling was a montage of stars, ships, and worlds.
Necker, who looked like a young man, looked at them, smiled and said, “Grace, Forever.”
“We’ve got him stabilized Captain.”
“Good. Stay with him, I’m going after Necker.”
“Tommy?”
“Cap?”
“Necker is headed to the hanger. We got solar, can you give me intercom?”
“We can move in before he takes the ship.”
“Put me on the intercom, I got a reason for him to come back.”
“Copy that.” “You’re on intercom.”
“Necker? Necker, if you can hear me, listen, your son’s here. He’s not coming with you. He needs you, he’s been hurt. Do you hear me? You son needs you.”
“Captain?!,” shouted the medic, “her bandage wasn’t enough. I don’t understand.”
“They’re not ordinary. Go, I’ll meet you there.”
The Tram begins its trip into Shackleton.
“Tommy, coming to the hanger. Lock it down.”
“Copy that.”
Luna, S. Aitken Basin, Shackleton, Hyperion, The Landing Fields, Main Hanger
“Suits. I know we took out of most of them but I also thought I had him in the tower.”
“Copy that. Suit and seals everyone. What happened up there, Cap?”
The Captain shook his head, “Necker’s got a kid bleeding out, a girl too.”
“I remember something about something that happened down the well, his family.”
“Well, let’s just say Necker’s myths are closer to the truth.” The Captain didn’t bother getting into the details about Alberto and Zephyr.
Tomassina shrugged and went down the line and checked the team was ready for vacuum.
“We cleared the ground crews and specialists. But he’s got muscle on the deck.”
“In formation, take them out.”
“Why don’t we set charges and be done with it?”
“No, I need him.”
“The kid?”
“Yeah. But no matter what, can’t let him use that ship, this place, again. Three??”
“Three standing by.”
“If we don’t make it back in time, set off the charges. Overload.”
“… Copy that.”
“All teams ready, Cap.”
“Move in.”
Necker’s last men were better than expected. But not as good as the Captain’s team.
“That was the last of them.”
“Set charges, breach that hatch.”
Before they could set the charges on the “Harvest”, a rear loading hatch opened.
Everyone looked at each other.
“I guess, he’s giving up or…”
“Tommy, hang back, in case…”
“No Cap, can’t let you go in there alone. Besides, we got a man with a rocket launcher in case Necker gets ideas.”
They walked into “the Harvest”.
Inside “The Harvest”, Hyperion Research Vessel, Systemwide Transformation
They made it into the anteroom, the hatch sealed, the chamber pressurized.
Their suits blinked green. Air.
Then a voice:
“I’m almost flattered you all came, up the well to see me.
I can see it all over you, You’re “Langley”. And you, you’re “Quantico”. “You’re Special Forces.”
In the end, you’re all “The Cooperative”, pawns in its service.
For thousands of years, we bathed in moonlight at night, reached for what was untouchable. Our karma was bondage to one world.
One day, we harnessed new powers. Chariots made for the dark were flown to our object of desire. Our desire made a bonfire of our karma. What did it profit us? The first landing, the first footsteps, the first outpost.
The Cooperative began on Luna.
The first and richest province of the Space Cooperative. They deny it but that’s what this place is, in the eyes of an entity that saw the future like a State. Burning karma for an empire.
I’ve been under exile, house arrest.
They don’t call it that. I don’t have the beach view like the former head of Wellington HQ, for his clever defiance, or avoid being put to pasture like the head of Houston HQ, who, despite his gamesmanship, is a lost boy.
It was always here, answers to all your questions.
Long before Earth and Mars were lit up by the worst solar storm in eons, before a hurricane washed away Heavyville, Texas, and a sentient ledger disappeared and robbed the world of its financial memory.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“I’m just a moral man seeking relief.”
A portal opened, dim light grew brighter. They walked through it.
AI Lexica Art Prompt
symmetry!! portrait of a astronaut, midsommar style, intricate, elegant, highly detailed, digital painting, artstation, concept art, smooth, sharp focus, illustration, art by artgerm and greg rutkowski and alphonse mucha, 8 k