Flung Out of Space (and Time)

"Fuck!" I scream out. The case has flown forward and lands on the walkway, Markos' arm still attached to it. Jenna takes out the man who shot the Captain in the arm, again hitting her mark near the center of the head. His body hits the floor not moments after Markos' does. Fenster stands frozen in place, unmoving and looking lost. "McMannus, the case!"

As Jenna takes out the final soldier, a woman no older than twenty, McMannus rushes forward and slides down on his side towards the case. More soldiers come out of the entrance. Jenna and I start firing quickly, tearing into their line. The once silent exterior is now filled with screams of agony and the sounds of death, the air now reeking of it. I rush into the walkway and grab Fenster by the collar, pushing him towards the ship.

"Nero, you have that ship ready for dust off, now!" I cry out.

Jenna and I are walking backwards, side by side, towards the drop ship and providing cover for McMannus. He drops his head and rushes forward in a crouch. Behind me I can feel the opening for the ship and Fenster stumbles inside. Jenna and I continue to shoot while McMannus is running towards us. When he gets to about five yards from us his chest rips open, covering the two of us in blood.

"McMannus!!!!" Fenster calls out in a frenzy. He begins firing wildly as his friend's body crashes to the walkway.

In my own crouch, and with little forethought, I rush to his body and wrench the case from his still warm hands. Both it and Markos' limb fall to the walkway and I fire off a couple of rounds before crouch running back to the ship. In front of me Jenna is pushing Fenster back onto the ship. Diving in the door slams shut behind me as the drop ship rapidly takes off. Jenna rushes over to me to check for wounds while Fenster drops to his knees and wails. The depth of his pain alarms me. It is a feral and ugly sound, an out of control sound. With the drop ship successfully docked onto the Elagabalus Jenna and I rush to the bridge while Nero is helping Fenster to his feet. Immediately I jump behind the controls and turn our ship away, we need to get out of this system as fast as we can and then we can figure out our next steps.

"Fools!" A voice cries out from the monitors. Jenna and I rush over there right as Fenster and Nero walk in. A man, older and face full of scars, is looking down into the camera. One of his eyes is so badly damaged that it is fully white, a full cataract. "Do you know what you stole?"

"Fuck you, asshole," I mutter. There's no way for us to communicate with him but we are stuck listening to him rant into the helmet camera of what I think was the Major.

"Well, I'll tell you what you idiots stole, a prototype. We have developed a way to send objects back in time. We've yet to be able to test it on living tissue but you Confederation cockroaches will make for good test subjects." The camera drops, he must have been holding up the body of the Major, and then he reappears with something in his hands. "To date the device doesn't have the power to successfully come back. I know just where to send you stupid shits to eek out an existence. Happy fucking trails."

As he's saying this I can see another monitor as the soldier stumbles to her feet. She looks down to see a massive wound on her stomach but has somehow found the strength to stand. The man looks over as she does this and from her vantage point I can see that she's pulled out two grenades from her belt and popped the pins on them. She rolls them towards the man and then pops two more and with an agony filled scream she runs towards him. Right as he's pressing the button the screens light up in a bright orange and white flare before going black. I can feel as the ship and everything in it seems to rip through space and time. When it stops the four of us are thrown to the ground.

Struggling to my feet I look out the window, this is clearly not the system we were just in. In front of us is a bright blue planet. It does not strike me as a planet that I've been to before. To the left of our ship is a gigantic, bright yellow sun that covers half the planet. This light fades as it turns to darkness on the back side of the planet.

"Mother: assessment." I call out.

"Yes, Captain Ortega," the now female voice of Mother intones. "Ship has been transported. I am running algorithms to determine both the system and the year of our present location. The estimated time is over one hour."

"Thank you, Mother."

"Ohfuckohfuckohfuck! I killed him! McMannus, my McMannus is dead!" Fenster is getting out of control.

"Fenster!" I shout, walking over to him and grabbing his face with my hands and making him focus on me. "I need you to calm down, okay? We need you. Take a few breaths. I know you're grieving, we all are, but I need you to get down to the engine rooms and check to make sure everything is in order."

"No," he stares at me defiantly.

"I am the Captain now and we are in some seriously deep shit right now. We do not have time for your bullshit." He glares at me for a moment before turning on his heel and stomping off. "Jenna, go with him. Make sure he doesn't do something we'll all regret. Take the rifle."

Before she leaves I grab her by the wrist and pull her in for a hug. Her body relaxes a bit as we embrace each other. I hold her for as long as I feel I can before letting go. After watching her leave I turn around and see Nero looking at the case. He looks up to me and I nod my consent. He opens is up and it contains a simple looking electronic box. Honestly, it looks like some ancient Earth technology to me.

"Run some analysis on it but do not take it apart. We cannot risk it breaking Nero." I order. He disappears to his room, where he has a full lab set up.

I sit behind the Captains chair and let out a loud and long exhale. In my mind I have trouble not running a tape loop of the prior events over and over. The sight of Captain Markos' chest being ripped apart and flying in every direction. To distract myself from that thought I run some quick diagnostics to see where all of our systems stand. Everything is intact, no repairs are necessary and both supplies and energy reserves are all in perfect shape. We'd be great if we could just figure out where the fuck we are, and when we are. It occurs to me that the Jolanai general could have been lying about this device being a time traveling one. It could have opened up a wormhole and just placed us in a far off system, maybe one well outside of Confederation territory. One of those empty and desolate systems that offer no resources or citizens so the Confederation pays them no mind.

"Captain Ortega?" It's Jenna.

"Go ahead, Lieutenant Hwang." I reply.

"All systems are in line, the engine looks to be in optimal shape per P.O. Fenster."

"You and Sergeant Fenster report back up here."

With the Captain dead it's not only me who gets a promotion, both Jenna and Fenster get a bump up as well. When we return to Quantos and give our detailed reports, sure to be an arduous process consisting of days, if not weeks worth of sworn depositions, the company will decide if Fenster gets to keep his promotion. A petty officer can only be promoted by the company. Sergeants and above simply move up. Once you become a Sergeant you are bound to the ship and its Captain. Petty officers have a habit of washing out, getting lost in pleasure districts and failing to report or joining the Confederation Army and therefore need to be approved to get promoted. For now though he will be a Sergeant.

"Captain Ortega, collation is complete." Mother intones.

"Where are we, Mother?"

"System: Milky Way, planet: Earth, by my calculations the year is somewhere around 1750."

"What?" I cannot believe my ears. We've been sent back in time almost two thousand years to a system that has been dead for almost a thousand after its sun imploded into a black hole. The planets Mercury and Venus were sucked into the black hole and disappeared forever.

"Correct, I have collated all available info based on the size and heat of this systems sun to determine the approximate year. Without a ground excursion we will not be able to obtain an exact year. The keeping of time by years is an indistinct science as it is, born of the ancestors of the humans on that planet."

"Thank you Mother, please stand by."

I stand up and start pacing the room. If Nero is not able to get that device up and running we are d.o.n.e fucked. Even if we had the fuel to get back to the general vicinity of our own system there's no telling what year it will be when we get there. At best we will be a good five hundred years before our time, meaning we cannot interact with anyone or anything. Doing so would scramble up the timeline and may even erase us from existence. If that doesn't happen then we could end up changing the outcome of history. We are better off flying into the sun and going out that way.

"Delphine?" Jenna's voice is full of concern and I whip around to see both her and Fenster.

"Sit down, both of you." I wait for Fenster to take Jenna's old chair and Jenna takes my old chair. "I won't sugarcoat it for you, things have gone from very, very bad to catastrophic. The planet in front of us is Earth. Yes, that Earth, I'll let that sink in." Their faces go pale. "Mother believes the year to be 1750 or so."

"Are you fucking kidding me? This is a god damned joke, has to be. You lesbos are pulling my chain." Fenster stutters in disbelief. I flash in anger over the dig, something about Fenster I've long suspected but could never confirm. He doesn't like us in part because we're gay. In most corners of the Confederation it is commonly understood that both sexuality and gender are a spectrum and people fall all along those spectrums. There are still some holdouts, though extremely rare, and Fenster has revealed himself to be one of them.

"Mother, please inform Sergeant Fenster of your findings concerning the time and location of our ship."

"The year is approximately 1750 and our ship is located just outside the orbit of the planet Earth. Earth is located in the Milky Way Galaxy. This information was gleaned from multiple algorithms. I could go into further detail if needed."

"No, that will not be needed Mother. Thank you." I turn to Fenster. "So now you know, I need you to get a fucking grip and get it fast. We're in some serious shit here and I need all hands on deck."

"So, what do we do now?" Jenna asks.

"We wait on Nero. If he's able to get that device working again and get us back home then we will be good. If not then we'll have some hard choices to make. Let's all go to our quarters and fit in some rest, it's been a long and trying day."

"Are we not going to give some kind of eulogy to our lost crew? Our lost captain?" Fenster defiantly asks.

"McMannus, Robert J. was a fine man and a fine crew member. He will be deeply missed. I could tell that he was a great friend to you. When we get home I will make sure that the Company provides his family the full honor that he richly deserves."

"And our Captain, you bitch?"

"He betrayed us and the Company. The last four of our runs were done off of Company time. He conscripted us into a war without our consent. All four of those runs we made were done so without pay. He deserves no fucking eulogy." I icily state. "Get out of my fucking sight." For the second time in an hour Fenster angrily stomps off of the bridge. "Mother, seal the engine room and once Fenster is in his quarters seal him in as well."

"Understood, Captain Ortega." Mother responds.

"Nero," I call out.

"Yes, Captain Ortega?"

"Is there a status update?"

"It is going to take me hours, if not a day or two to complete my analysis."

"Very well. Are you aware of the situation that we face?"

"Yes, Captain, things are critical. Without this device coming back online we will face serious hardships in our attempt to return to our home system."

"Good, Jenna and I will be in the Captain's quarters."

I set the ship to coast until it hits the Earth's orbit. Once there we will rotate around the planet, saving fuel. On our walk to the Captain's quarters Mother informs me that Fenster has been successfully sealed into his room and is sleeping soundly in bed. Jenna takes my hand as we step into the roomy quarters. The room that we shared, where we first fell in love three years ago, was about the same size but held two beds and those were tiny. Here we'll get to share an actual bed, a king, with no issue. We spent many nights cramped onto a tiny twin bed and that was only because Jenna is so small. I kick my boots off and fall into bed. Jenna removes her boots and climbs in next to me. I curl into her and put my head on her chest. Her fingers are absentmindedly twisting my hair as we let the reality of our deeply fucked up situation set in. The planet below us is prehistoric; there's no electricity, technology, the people don't bathe or even have a rudimentary understanding of medicine and healing. According to the neural net they still bleed people as a cure for just about any ailment. Survival on a day to day basis is a struggle.

"Captain Ortega, I have something to show you in the lab." Nero calls out through the comms.

"We'll be there shortly." I reply.

Jenna and I walk into the pristine lab, everything a spotless white, and find Nero hunched over a work table. He looks over at us and gives the weirdest approximation of a smile. Every time he tries that it creeps me the fuck out. We look at the table and see that the device is still intact and still looks to be dead.

"Whatcha got, Nero?"

"Good news and bad news, Captain," he starts. "Good news is: I have figured out the device and will be able to get us back to our time and our system with little issue."

"Great, now what's the bad?"

"It's dead. Completely drained of power."

"Shit!" I shout. "So what can we do? Is there a way to charge it?"

"It can be charged but to do so I'll have to divert basically all ship power."

"So, how does that work?"

"The ship can function on minimal, back-up power but even then it will take anywhere from six months to a year."

"A year! We have the provisions to last about a quarter of that. If all power is diverted will the stasis chambers still be operational?"

"No, regrettably they will not. The only option will be for the three of you to spend the charge time on the surface."

"Won't we run the risk of fucking up the timeline?"

"Yes, Captain, you cannot interact with other humans in any meaningful way. I've had Mother collate information on a site where the three of you might stay where supplies will be abundant while contact with humans is likely to be minimal."

"Define meaningful," Jenna asks.

"You cannot befriend, kill or copulate with them. Killing and copulating are the worst possible outcomes and may result in the altering of all current timeline events. Befriending may or may not change it but it would be best if the three of you kept to the wilds."

"Wow, just wow." I start. "Ok, has Mother determined a location?"

"Yes, it is on what was called the North American Continent. Mother has found a shack that it is certain is abandoned a few days ride southeast of the burgeoning city of Quebec. Mother has prepared downloads for the three of you."

"Are they individualized?"

"Correct. All three of you will learn period appropriate French. Jenna Hwang will also learn Mi'qmaq, the language named after a local Native American tribe. She will have to pass as one of them if met by the French. She will look similar to them, and very unlike the French, which will put her in a precarious position based on appearance alone. She will get a download on tracking, hunting and living in the wild. Fenster will learn manual labor skills like woodcutting in case you need him to work for a time to cover expenses. You will get skills on keeping a period home."

"What do you mean on her appearance alone? And keep a period home?"

"They will not accept your lesbianism. If caught the two of you will be killed. Fenster will have to pose as your husband and she will pose as a half Indian helper. The men of this society will expect you to stay indoors and do the cooking and cleaning. You must keep up this illusion if any locals visit. Inside the home you will be able to do as you wish but the downloads are needed. Jenna will be responsible for obtaining meat for the three of you and you to cook it. Fenster will obtain fuel and accompany Jenna on her hunts as we know he cannot shoot."

"Ok," I take a deep breath in and let it out. "We all complete the downloads tonight and you will fly us in the drop ship tomorrow. Will we still be able to contact you via the neural net comms?"

"Yes, Captain, you will. I will also be fabricating period appropriate clothing for the three of you as well as some traps and weapons to use."

"Got it, Mother, please open the locks to Fenster's door."

"Doors unlocked, Captain."

Jenna and I walk in to find Fenster on his bed staring away from us, towards McMannus' bed. We share a quick look before I call out his name. He doesn't move, doesn't respond in any way. He lies there motionless, unspeaking. This is not exact the idea circumstance to start off my tenure as Captain. We're lost and have a slim window in which to operate and succeed and if we fail we either die or we alter the time space continuum in such a way that we could erase ourselves and the future with it. To top it off I have an emotionally unstable crew member who has made it clear that he won't respect me as Captain. Yes, the events on that moon hit him harder than the rest of us, watching his best friend die and knowing he accidentally killed his Captain in a friendly fire mishap.

"Sergeant!" I shout. This time he sits up, slowly, and then turns and looks at me petulantly. "Nero has found that he can operate the device but to do so he needs to charge it. The charging process will take anywhere from six months to a year and the three of us will have to spend that time on Earth."

"And?"

"And it means you will have to pose as my husband for the public. Mother will download information about what you need to do and other pertinent info overnight. In the morning we prep the drop ship and descend to the location Mother has chosen for us. Once we land you and Jenna will have to get right to work collecting firewood and setting traps for food."

"And what will our illustrious Captain be doing while the two of us toil?" His petulance makes me want to strangle him.

"Prepping the cabin for us to live in, getting a fire started and collecting water to get to a boil. On this planet I will be in charge of keeping the cabin, Jenna will be responsible for getting food though you will accompany her and you will be responsible for collecting fuel. Our fuel will be fire and therefore you will spend a good bit of your daylight hours chopping wood. Should we need money you will join what Mother informs me were called Logging Camps, doing what the bosses tell you, ok? While on the planet we are not to: make friends with the populace, kill anybody or fuck anyone."

"So you and Jenna won't be fucking?"

"I didn't say that. I said no fucking of the people of this planet."

"We're technically of this planet as we descended from them." God, I hate this fucker.

"Jenna and I having sex will not mess with any timeline, and this is the last we speak of the relationship between Jenna and myself. Get some rest Fenster, we're all gonna need it."

Jenna and I walk away and I have Mother lock his doors after we leave. I know it seriously damages the trust between us but I cannot risk him sabotaging the ship or the device. Neither one of us sleeps all that well during the night. Jenna falls asleep pretty quickly but it is a light sleep and she wakes frequently. I stay up worrying about what we need to do and the sheer weight of task in front of us. When I do slip into sleep I dream uneasily about the events on the moon. So much loss of life and for what? A device that should have been destroyed and not stolen. Instead the Confederation got greedy and thought that they could take this device and weaponize it, use it against their much smaller enemy. I wake a few hours later, tired but ready to get this moving.