Brian Evenson - Dead Space - Martyr

When he hit the porthole, he didn’t stop, just wrote right over it. Anything that got in the way he wrote on. After a while, he was running out of space and started writing smaller so that there’d be enough room. When he ran out of room on the walls, he wrote on and under the instrument panels. When he ran low on blood, he stomped on what was left of Dantec’s chest, trying to force more out. But only a little came out. So he stomped on a limb hard and blood began to leach out. Before too long, Dantec’s body had been torn to pieces, looking even less human than when he’d started.

The com unit crackled, sending out an angry hiss of static. “—in, co — F/Seven — othersh—” it said.

“Not now, Tanner,” he said back.

“—ome in, come — o you read?” it said.

“Not now!” he shouted. The ceiling was already covered, the walls were already covered; all that was left was the floor. He piled the pieces of Dantec’s body in the command chair. He tried to strap them in, but quickly realized it was useless. That was all right, he told himself. The vessel wasn’t moving. They weren’t going anywhere.

There was hardly any blood left, and what was left on the floor was beginning to clot. He dipped his fingers in it, kept writing in light, wispy strokes, conserving the blood. But very quickly, he ran out of floor.

He wished Shane were there to tell him what to do next. Had he done the right thing? Had he betrayed his brother? He stayed there on his knees, staring.

It was hot, almost too hot to bear. How could it be so hot? He stood up and took off his shirt, threw it on the other chair. It helped a little, but not enough. He was still hot. He took off his shoes, piled them on top of the shirt, then took off his pants, his underwear. Naked, he stared down at his body. Pale, he thought. White as a sheet. No, not a sheet, he corrected. White as paper. And then he knew where he would write next.

Only there wasn’t any more blood. He’d used all of Dantec up; he hadn’t saved enough to write the ending.

He looked around. Surely there was more blood here somewhere. Didn’t they travel with bags of blood? What if they needed to do an onboard transfusion? How could they go anywhere without blood?

His eyes were scanning over the room, searching, when they passed over his arm, saw the pulse of a vein. “Ah,” he said, breaking into a smile, “that’s where you’re hiding. There you are.”

· · ·

It wasn’t easy to get the blood to come out, but in the end he managed, tearing the arm open with the sharp corner of the same strut he had used to discipline Dantec. At first, the blood came readily and he could simply rub the finger against his arm and then inscribe a symbol on his body. But quickly the wound slowed and began to clot. He had to tear it open again, and then a third time.

By the time he was done, it was as if he himself had become a representation of the Marker. He was beautiful, covered with a swarm of symbols, all the knowledge of the universe expressed on the surface of his skin. He stood straight, arms to his sides, and held still. He was the Marker. He could feel its power flowing through him.

How long he was like that, he couldn’t say. He was snapped out of it by a sharp noise and an intense pain in his head. He swayed and fell down, clutching his temples. When the noise finally stopped, he stood and stumbled up. He had more to do, he remembered, confusedly. He had to tell them; he had to warn them.

He turned on the vidscreen and stood in front of it, set it to simultaneously record and to broadcast on all frequencies. The message was for everyone —Shane had been clear about that. He needed to tell everyone, if the message could get through the rock and muck at all.

“Hello,” he said to the vidscreen. “Officer James Hennessy here, acting commander of the SS Marker . I’ve been informed by my brother, Shane, that there’s something we all need to know.”

There was a stabbing pain in his head, as if someone were prodding his optic nerve with the tip of a dull knife. He clutched his head and leaned on the counter. After the pain had passed, he stood there for a moment, unsure of where he was. He opened his eyes and looked around him, unable to take it all in. And then suddenly he remembered: He was on TV!

He gave the camera his most winning smile. What was he doing again? Oh, yes, that’s right: He was saving humanity.

”We’ve heard the wrong whispers,” he started. “There’s little time, and we’re listening to what they say, but Shane says we should not obey. We are not following the right answers. We have to resist the past before it is too late. Too late for Convergence.”

He gave his winning smile again, looking straight and intensely into the camera. Anyone watching would realize he was talking directly to them. They had to understand how important this was.

“I’ve drawn a map,” he said, gesturing to his body. “I don’t know if that’s what Shane wants, but I looked at the Marker and looked at it and then I had to draw. We need to change our ways and learn to understand it,” he said. He shook his head, confused. Had he gotten off track somewhere? “Or else not understand it,” he said. It was like there were two forces inside him, fighting to claim him, and he was no longer sure which was which, and which he should listen to.

The Marker caught his eye through the porthole. He watched it pulse a long moment. He looked at his left hand, then looked at his right hand and slowly brought them together, in front of him. “Convergence,” he said. He gestured at the Marker through the porthole, then gestured at the symbols on his own body. “We need to understand it,” he said, even though a part of him was screaming at him to stop. “That’s the only thing that’s important right now, to learn from it. It is the way. We need to understand it, not destroy it.”

He backed away and turned the vid off. He was so tired now. His head hurt. He needed to rest. He would rest for just a minute and then head for home.

He lay down on the floor. He felt both hot and cold. His bare body felt unnatural against the smooth floor. Slowly he folded in on himself, until he was curled into a ball, and started to shiver.

At the end he had a brief moment of lucidity, when he realized that he was tired because the oxygen was running out, when he realized that something else had controlled everything he had done, everything he had said. But by the time he realized this, it was far too late to do anything about it. I’ll get up in a moment, he thought. I’ll get up and drill my way back up to the surface. And then I’ll sort this mess out.

A moment later he lapsed into unconsciousness.

Not long after, he was dead.

“How long has it been?” asked the Colonel.

“Too long,” said Tanner, his face drawn, his voice hoarse. “Nearly forty-eight hours now.” He’d been awake almost two and a half full days. Most of that time he’d spent trying to get in touch with the F/7. There’d been a few scattered bits, moments when somehow everything aligned to let the signal through, and so he assumed there had been moments they’d seen him as well. But it never lasted long enough for them to communicate. And then, just when he was ready to give up hope, there had come a signal, broadcasting on all bands. They had gotten only bits of that, too, but others had picked up other bits of it on other channels. Tanner’s team had gathered as much as they could and were working to sequence it all together to form something. He’d thought they’d have something by now, which was why he’d contacted the Colonel, but they were still working.