Philip Palmer - Hell Ship

I wondered how he had time to run his ship, so many hours did he spend with me!

It was clear that Minos relished my company. He depended on me. He loved to tease me and joke with me, and he savoured my mockery in return. He came to regard me-yes, I’m not afraid to say it-as his friend.

I suspected that Minos had experienced precious little companionship and no love since the Hell Ship began its long terrible journey through the universes. His fellow Ka’un were desiccated-literally withered with age, hence the black skins-and empty of soul. They rarely spoke to him. They had no fondness for him, or for each other. Friendship was an emotion most of them had forgotten.

And so, for many aeons, Minos’s life had been barren and entirely empty of joy.

Perhaps, then, my role was to fill that void?

I learned too that Minos hated with all his being the pursuing alien ship that so nearly destroyed us. He called it the Nemesis; and, he told me, it nearly wrecked the Hell Ship once before, in a battle that took place in Nemesis’s own universe.

But the Nemesis was gone now; the Hell Ship had successfully eluded it for the second time. And Minos was resolved never to fall into the same trap again. He will if necessary, he has told me, remain in this current universe for ever, once we have formed an alliance with and befriended the native sentients.

I could be happy in this universe, I have decided. Space was not black here-it shone with a rainbow coloured radiance from the light of trillions of closely packed suns. The planets were plentiful and many were wondrous beautiful, for most had rings that shimmered in the sunslight. And the entire universe was straddled by an asteroid trail that stretched between a hundred thousand stellar systems, like a river between the stars.

Are you ready for this?

I am ready.

I am so proud of you, Sai-ias. Today, everything will change!

This was indeed a major turning point in my relationship with Minos; and indeed, in the history of the Hell Ship. For my role on this next mission was to be not a warrior, but an ambassador on behalf of the Ka’un!

As Minos had explained to me, instead of waging war, this time he and his fellow Ka’un were going to negotiate a fair and lasting peace with the peoples of this universe. Here, they will make their home. And in time, so he pledged, the captives on the ship would be liberated. All this Minos had promised me.

My joy knew no bounds!

Our first port of call was a planet populated by one of the three most successful spacefaring sentients in this sector of the universe we were inhabiting. These creatures were airborne flat-creatures-sessiles who had discovered the power of flight, and had then become sentient. And now their entire civilisation hovered above the ground, in the clouds and above mountain peaks.

The Ka’un’s miniature cameras flew down to the planet and showed me images of floating towers of a soft soapy substance moulded into flying palaces-a sublime creation from these rare and strange beings.

I called the creatures ShiBo, because they reminded me of the flying plants of my own home planets. I yearned to befriend them. I have faith in you, Minos said, inspiringly. Go and speak to these creatures, and tell them we want to be their friends.

I shall do so, Minos; and I shall make you proud of me. I could hardly believe how much had changed in the last few months! For the first time in many centuries, I was no longer sad. I felt my life had a purpose.

And that purpose was to make peace with the ShiBo.

The Hell Ship itself was rendered invisible, by means I did not fathom; and I arrived in the ShiBo stellar system in an illusory vessel at the forefront of an imaginary fleet.

It was important, Minos told me, to create the illusion of massive force, in order to pre-empt aggression. Imagine, Minos had whispered softly, that you are visited by a single alien spaceship from a place of which you knew nothing. Wouldn’t you be tempted to lash out with a pre-emptive strike?

No, I had replied.

Perhaps not, Minos had conceded. But many would be so tempted. Fear of the unknown is the commonest emotion among all the sentient species we have encountered. And a single ship-that’s both to be feared, and easily defeated. Too great a temptation. So our mock fleet will help us in our road to peace.

The mock fleet was flanked with battle cruisers the size of gas giants. It would indeed be a crazed species that launched an attack on forces so entirely overwhelming.

We arrived and broadcast a message of peace in the language of the ShiBo, which our advance party robot spies had already recorded, and the Ka’un had somehow translated.

The response was immediate. All the lights on the planet of ShiBo went out, for ten seconds; this was their signal for “Let us negotiate.”

It was a phenomenal accomplishment; there was no artificial light on the ShiBo planet, but the plants were bioluminescent. The ShiBo had the power to switch their planet’s vegetation off at will.

In the game of power, that was a point to them.

I was accompanied by an escort of myself-a dozen illusory versions of me, subtly distinguished to make us seem like different beings. This one had a blacker hide; that version was larger; another version had blue eyes not scarlet, and so forth. We also wore body armour partially covering our segments, and a breathing apparatus was attached to our bodies.

I was alone on this mission, with no Kindred, and no other giant sentients in the landing party. And I was-still-free. I could move my own limbs, I could speak; I was not subject to any coercion. I was doing all this of my own free will.

Our landing craft departed from the mother ship, and we slowly cruised down out of orbit. As we-I and the other Sai-iases-entered their atmosphere in our landing craft, ShiBo jet planes provided us with an escort; these were robot controlled, ovoid in shape, with no visible weaponry. However, apparently-according to Minos’s research, which was thorough-each plane could dispatch a thousand bombs, each of which was powerful enough to make a sun spit and flare.

I looked at my screens and saw the ShiBo world below and I marvelled. It was so very beautiful. The land was scarlet and blue-rich in red-leaved plant life and criss-crossed with rivers and patched with lakes and seas. It reminded me of my own world.

We landed in a field of red, and my sensors recorded the death screams of a million living vegetal beings, and I regretted the need to kill so many. But they were, after all, merely blades of grass, and we had nowhere else to land: there were no rocky plains or deserts on this fertile planet. But each patch of ground was alive with plants which sang at night.

The doors of my landing craft opened and I slid out on my lower segment. My illusory escorts accompanied me, and we made our way down to the plain of grass. And above the grass hovered the representatives of the ShiBo leadership.

Be persuasive, Sai-ias.

I shall.

The ShiBo flapped like sails in the air, but I fancied I could read expression in the contours and ridges of their flat bodies.

“Do not be afraid,” I trilled, because my translator was turning my natural tones into a high pitched treble trill.

And the trills of the ShiBo that greeted me in return were rich and beauteous and I felt as if I had fallen into a lake of music. My translator failed miserably to render any of it into intelligible speech, and I deduced that for the ShiBos language was, first and foremost, an act of beauty. Meaning to them was secondary.

And so I trilled back, as beautifully as I was able; I sang the low rumbling song of the Day Dawning, and heard it transformed into bird song so delicate and sweet it felt as if my heart would burst from joy.