Calseso: A Soq Ladwin Adventure

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.

But the baby screamed. And screamed. And screamed.

And she heard every nuance, every tone, every second of terror. Every piercing wail of pain.

She couldn’t, of course, not really. Their suits weren’t connected with the standard audio link because she simply hadn’t had time to activate it as she crammed Ja’hos into his miniature space gear. As the monster tore through the thick metal of the capsule they were in and exposed them to space.

Impossible, she thought as she watched it happen. But it was possible. They were living proof.

Or, rather, they were living proof for the moment.

She couldn’t hear Ja’hos cry but she watched her precious little boy as horror and fear filled his face and his mouth spread wide to bellow his final protest against this, whatever ‘this’ was. As the beast she’d been assured was no more than myth tore him from her determined arms. As she sprang forward to grab his legs and try to wrestle him back.

As pain replaced fear on his treasured features. As the … the whatever it was ripped his protective suit away.

As it devoured him.

It took less than half a minute from their initial encounter to their last. Probably less than half that time.

Her only solace as her heart shattered in her chest and air refused to find its place in her lungs was that the void of space killed her child before… Before… Her mind couldn’t wrap itself around the thought. There were no words in her language or that of any other mother, she knew, to express that thought.

But she could still hear his screams.

She screamed, too. She screamed in loss and agony. She screamed in the anguish of losing a child.

And then, like Ja’hos, she screamed in pain.

Soq Ladwin leaned against the desk he normally occupied and studied the images being projected in the arena. A frown so deeply creased his face that one would think he’d never smiled. Perhaps that he was incapable of such expression.

“Again,” he ordered the device and bit his lip in concentration as the scene replayed. A mother and child aboard a Destination Capsule, so close to their home that it made his heart beat faster. And then, suddenly, an animal of immense size and bulk, as large as the DC itself. He watched as the animal – could a creature who lived in space be called an animal, he wondered - wrapped itself around the tiny ship, destroyed it and… He swallowed. “Duration?” he asked, his voice only a micron thicker than normal.

“Eighteen seconds.”

“Identify.”

“Loquasan Andelli and her child, Jo’ho--”

“The creature.” Soq interrupted sharply. He didn’t want to know anything about the victims. He didn’t want to know their names. He didn’t want to know if she was a scientist or an engineer or teacher or caregiver. He didn’t want to hear about the grieving husband or family members or frightened community. Of course they were grieving. Of course they were frightened.

He didn’t want to know. He didn’t need to know.

It didn’t help. This he knew as a fact from long years of experience. Emotional connection of any kind would only make his job more difficult.

And his job was difficult enough without emotional connections. To anything. To anyone.

“No identifiers.”

Soq narrowed his eyes as the scene replayed itself on the hologram pad in his office. “An unknown?” They hadn't come across an unknown species in decades. Or, Soq thought, something like that.

A taut, dispassionate voice responded. “There are planetary lore of a beast that descends from the sky to feast on residents who have not paid proper homage to their god. The description in these legends matches what you are viewing now within a variable of 17 percent. The indigenous people groups there call the creature ‘Calseso’.”

“Calseso…” Soq murmured to himself. “Interesting.” He stood and walked around the pad several times, replaying the carnage, reversing, pausing the event at various points, getting nearer and then stepping back to get a more accurate mental picture of the monster.

Face-to-face with the image of the beast, he felt what his grandfather had called ‘goose-flesh’ creep down his back and across his arms. Slowly. Taking a light year to make the trip from left to right. He cleared his throat and straightened.

He tried not to look at the mother but his eyes were drawn to her, locking onto her determined features. The woman fought this horror to save her son. A futile attempt, to be sure but still… She’d faced it, faced certain death, if only for the few seconds her heart had left to beat. She’d faced it with apparent fearlessness.

“Time?” He directed his question to Dr. Ocmani Katcas, never taking his eyes from the haunting image before him.

No answer.

Again, with more volume and irritation, he asked, “How long ago did this happen, Dr. Katcas?”

If Soq didn’t know better, he’d think Katcas didn’t want to respond. “Katcas?” Soq put all his weight behind that name, all his force, and raised his always-sad, ebony eyes to the screen that framed his boss’s flat face.

The man’s face was always flat, Soq thought as he waited for a reply. The monitor wasn’t distorting Dr. Karcas appearance, wasn’t doing him an injustice.

Katcas looked at him, expressionless. Had Soq ever seen even a flicker of feelings cross that flat face or through the lipid eyes? No, he decided. Nothing. Katcas was as flat inside as out.

“Sixteen hours.”

“And I’m just now in the loop? What the hell, Katcas?"

"You are just now in the loop because you were not our first choice of Investigators""

Flat. Emotionless. No apologies, no explanations. Exactly what Soq had come to expect and, to some degree, to rely on from this man. He raised an eyebrow but didn’t feel slighted. “Second choice?”

Katcas didn’t shift, didn’t blink. “This is off-world. You’ve made it clear how you feel about off-world investigation. The Committee has given you time. Until now."

And Soq could do nothing but nod.

In the past decade, he’d been off-world only twice. For his part, that was twice too many. But other Investigators had carried his load long enough, Katcas warned a month ago. Space Crime Investigators, of which Soq was one of dozens, were actually expected to be… well, able to travel to space. To investigate. Crimes.

Against his will, against his better judgement, his mind traveled back through the years. Back to Theshi Krfi. Back to the nightmare that was no nightmare. Back to the day his life changed so drastically that he hardly recognized himself when he looked in the mirror.

But, he thought with the blackest of hearts, at least he could still look in a mirror. At least he had that. Theshi had been denied ever having that small pleasure again. She’d forfeited it in the blast of light and --

Katcas’s two-dimensional voice cut into his dark introspection. “You will not be going alone.”

Soq’s frown deepened, if such a thing was possible, and his head began to shake with no intention from him. “No.”

“You will have a second on this, Soq. This is not a request.”

“No.” Soq went to his chair, deposited his body into its support and tried to make it look casual. His knees were shaking and, as sudden as a Neptunian storm, sweat glistened on his face. He resisted the urge to wipe it away and repeated, “No.”

Katcas shifted in the frame of the monitor and Soq knew he was preparing to end the vidchat, his bony finger probably already poised over the button. ‘As I said, Soq, it is not a request. You will meet her now.”

Soq shot to his feet, shaking knees or not. “A woman? No! Hell, no! I won’t do this again, Katcas. I’ll walk, first.”

But the image of Katcas faded and he knew his last objections had faded, too.

As his office door slid open, Soq whirled to glare at his new partner.

The world darkened around him. He felt as if he were aboard a ship on the Ocean of Niam, pitching and rolling as waves slapped the side of the sailing vessel. His legs, suddenly noodles, gave way beneath him.  He crumpled back into his chair, this time unable to make it appear casual or planned. This time, had it not been there to catch him, he’d have ended up on the floor. Flat on his back.

He shot a glance to the hologram again. To the fearless woman facing the monster. To her face through the protective screen of the helmet she’d donned as danger tore through the ship to take her life.

Then back to the woman standing in his doorway attired in full SCI regalia.

The victim of the attack … The woman in his doorway.

They were the same.