Future's Edge E-Book

Gareth Powell

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 414

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

A gripping and heartfelt horror-tinged space adventure from the BSFA award-winning author of Stars and Bones and Embers of War. Readers of James S.A. Core and Becky Chambers will love this fast-paced story of space piracy, deadly alien artifacts and a race to save what is left of humanity. When archaeologist Ursula Morrow accidentally infects herself with an alien parasite, she fears she may have jeopardised her career. However, her concerns become irrelevant when Earth is destroyed, billions die, and suddenly no one needs archaeologists anymore… Two years later, she's plucked from a refugee camp on a backwater world and tasked with retrieving the artifact that infected her, as it just might hold the key to humanity's survival. With time running short, and the planet housing the weapon now situated in hostile territory, she realises she's going to have to commit an act of desperate piracy if she's going to achieve her objective before the enemy's final onslaught. A thrilling, page-turning journey into deep space where the fights are brutal, the relationships are complicated and the world ended years ago.

Leseprobe

CONTENTS

Praise for Future's Edge

Also by Gareth L. Powell and available from Titan Books

Title Page

Leave us a Review

Copyright

Dedication

PART ONE:

MASS EXTINCTION

A Tree Falls

On the Beach

Up Against the Heliopause

From the log of the Crisis Actor – I

Los Estragos

A Scattering of Undervoid Echoes

Freudian Weakness Chambers

The Spiders Wake

The Universe, She Don’t Work Like That

Let’s Stop Flirting

Weaponised Archaeologists

Nature Versus Nurture

From the log of the Crisis Actor – II

PART TWO:

THE FUNDAMENTAL THINGS APPLY

Uncertainty Principle

Fuck the Universe

The Start of a Beautiful Friendship

From the log of the Crisis Actor – III

Evolution’s Lottery

A Chandelier in the Sudden Breeze

From the log of the Crisis Actor – IV

Fuck Around and Find Out

Hypovolemic Shock

From the log of the Crisis Actor – V

Falling Away into History

PART THREE:

INTO THE DARK

And Yet, There is Light

From the log of the Crisis Actor – VI

Hold a Spear Accountable

From the log of the Crisis Actor – VII

Letting You Go

Dust Caught in a Shaft of Sunlight

From the log of the Crisis Actor – VIII

Galactic History

From the log of the Crisis Actor – IX

The Stuff of Legends

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Praise for Future's Edge

“Gareth brings his trademark blend of fierce action, ingenious SF ideas and an intriguing cast of characters. An excellent read.”

Adrian Tchaikovsky, award-winning author of Children of Time and Alien Clay

“Gareth Powell’s writing upgrades classic Science Fiction tropes with modern sensibilities and a nifty twist.”

Peter F. Hamilton, author of Exodus: The ArchimedesEngine and Salvation

“Crazy inventiveness, vivid characters and enthralling action. This is thrilling, joyous stuff.”

M.R. Carey, bestselling author of The Girl with All the Gifts and Infinity Gate

“Future’s Edge is Gareth L. Powell at his best, mixing exceptional world-building and galaxy-wide stakes with complicated relatable characters and enough heart to fuel a supernova. Horror, humour and hope in equal measures. Not to be missed.”

Cavan Scott, New York Times bestselling author and co-creator of Star Wars: The High Republic

“Gareth Powell pulls out all the stops with Future’s Edge! It’s a wild blend of alien invasion, body horror, and the power of the human spirit! Highly recommended!”

Jonathan Maberry, New York Times bestselling author of NecroTek and The Sleepers War.

Also by Gareth L. Powell and available from Titan Books

Embers of WarFleet of KnivesLight of Impossible Stars

Stars and BonesDescendant Machine

GARETH L.

POWELL

FUTURE'SEDGE

LEAVE US A REVIEW

We hope you enjoy this book – if you did we would really appreciate it if you can write a short review. Your ratings really make a difference for the authors, helping the books you love reach more people.

You can rate this book, or leave a short review here:

Amazon.com,

Amazon.co.uk,

Goodreads,

Barnes & Noble,

Waterstones,

or your preferred retailer.

Future’s EdgePrint edition ISBN: 9781803368634E-book edition ISBN: 9781803368641

Published by Titan BooksA division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UPwww.titanbooks.com

First edition: February 202510 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

© 2025 Gareth L. Powell. All Rights Reserved.

Gareth L. Powell asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

For Dianne

PART ONE

____________MASS EXTINCTION

CHAPTER ONE

A TREE FALLS

“Guv?” My barman was a mechanical, multi-limbed lifeform from a system in the vicinity of Arcturus.

“Yes, Siegfried?”

“You’d better get in here.”

I sighed. “What are we dealing with?”

Siegfried looked like a football thrown through a cutlery drawer. “Attempted shakedown.”

“Another one?” I rolled my eyes. “What’s that, like three this month?”

“Four.”

“Where are they?”

“Standing at the bar. You can’t miss them. They’re the ones that look like geckos in sweatpants.”

I pulled open my office door, to be greeted by the buzz of a dozen conversations in half a dozen languages. The place smelled of desperation and black mould. The only illumination came from a row of lights hanging above the counter. Tonight’s would-be gangsters were standing in a tight group at one end, trying to look simultaneously menacing and inconspicuous.

“For goodness’ sake,” I said. “They can’t be much older than hatchlings.”

I walked around the counter to face them. The tallest only came up to my chest, but they had pointed snouts filled with sharp teeth, and scalpel-like claws on their three-fingered hands.

“Are you the owner?” one of them asked in the Common Tongue. Judging by the length of the spines protruding from between his shoulder blades, he was the oldest of the bunch, and probably their leader.

“How can I help?”

“We have an offer for you.”

“Let me guess.” I folded my arms. “Does this offer have something to do with me paying you a percentage of my takings in return for protection?”

Eyelids flicked back and forth across large, black reptilian eyes. “Uh, yesss.”

“Sorry, kids. Not interested.”

The leader pulled himself up to his full height. “We could make thingsss very difficult for you.”

“I don’t doubt it, but I’m still going to have to say no.”

A hush fell as the patrons smelled a confrontation. Some of the smaller reptiles in the group looked around, unnerved to suddenly find themselves the centre of attention. The tall one didn’t seem to have noticed. His attention remained fixed on me. “This is your lassst chance,” he hissed. “A place like thissss, with a lot of wood and packing materialsss. Very flammable. Anything might happen.”

I uncrossed my arms. “You boys must be new in town. I assume you’re trying to carve out a little territory for yourselves. A little notoriety?”

“What of it?”

“You think you’re the first to try something like this? I’ve been here two years, and there are always parasites about, looking to take what they haven’t earned. I’ve seen gangs come and go. You’re no different.”

Claws flexed. “Are you going to pay or not?”

I shook my head. “The thing is, kids; if I needed protection, I’d already have it. There are plenty of hoodlums to choose from, and a lot of them are tougher than you.”

The leader held my gaze for a few seconds, then he held out a three-fingered hand. One of his henchmen produced a stolen emergency flare and passed it to him. “How about we torch the place now?”

“I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“Oh, really?” The leader twisted the flare’s base, igniting it. For a moment, the only sound in the bar was the roar of the red flame.

I sighed. The flare was designed to be seen through rain and fog by search helicopters. It probably contained a mix of strontium nitrate, potassium perchlorate, and an energetic fuel such as aluminium or magnesium. Which meant it had a burn temperature of at least a thousand degrees centigrade—certainly hot enough to set fire to anything in this place. I couldn’t let that happen, so I reached out and snuffed it with my hand.

The reptiles looked at me aghast. The leader said, “How did you do that?”

I smirked and held up my hand. In the overhead light, my palm glistened with an iridescent rainbow sheen.

“Alien nano-virus,” I said. “I picked it up on an archaeological dig, a long way from here.” I slapped the extinguished flare from his hand. “It makes me very, very hard to kill.” I hauled back and punched him across his scaly face. His jaw snapped shut and he crashed back into his little entourage, who fled, leaving their fallen leader sprawled unconscious on the concrete floor. “And a lot stronger than I look.”

Scattered applause broke from the tables around the room. The locals always appreciated a show. I ignored them, turning instead to where Siegfried hovered like a rotund Swiss Army knife. “Drag that outside, would you?”

“My pleasure, guv.”

* * *

As the conversation among the drinkers turned back to the latest reports from the front line, I stepped out to the small concrete yard at the back of the ramshackle bar. Leaning there against the corrugated iron wall, nostrils filled with garbage fire smoke from the surrounding refugee encampment, I gazed up at the vast foam ships being constructed in orbit and wished I had the guts to book a berth.

Beyond the lamps and circles of firelight, the night was very dark, and a cold breeze ruffled up from the salt marshes to the southwest to flutter tent walls and fluster laundry. Like everyone else, I had come here fleeing the war; but unlike the majority in the camp, this was where I had stopped, too scared and too stubborn to cash in my chips and leave altogether.

From the campfires, I caught snatches of competing songs; the crackle of burning plastic; children crying; food cooking. From further afield, the brine stink of the marshes and the occasional echoing thunder of a shuttle lifting from the civilian port. I kicked aside a tin can. Once, a lush grass analogue had covered the ground here; now, the passage of thousands of refugees had worn it to a bare, hard-packed dirt, strewn with the detritus of their half-abandoned, makeshift lives. Beyond the sea of tents, barbed wire gates marked the camp’s entrance. The wire wasn’t there to keep the refugees from leaving; it was there to deter the local wildlife, especially the nocturnal Komodo-jackals that prowled the edges of the salt marsh and picked off the occasional incautious security guard.

Whenever a completed foam ship broke orbit, which happened about once a week, the entire encampment looked up. Some of them muttered blessings and good wishes, kissed prayer beads or raised their hands to the skies in the knowledge that another ten thousand sleeping souls had cast themselves into the abyss in the hope of finding sanctuary among the uncharted stars on the far side of the gap. Others shook their heads and cursed at the sight, lamenting a missed opportunity. They knew there would only ever be a finite number of foam ships, and never enough to take every refugee. Eventually, the Cutters would find their way here along the tramline network.

The tramlines were a web of furrows in the undervoid, which a correctly positioned ship could use to glide from one star system to the next, expending very little energy. Every known species employed them. They had been arteries for colonisation, conflict, and commerce, the roads of empire; but now the enemy were using them against us.

That was the part I didn’t want to think about.

I pulled a joint from behind my ear. Smoking wasn’t one of my customary vices, but one of my regular customers had slipped the little hand-rolled cylinder to me in lieu of payment and it seemed a shame to let it go to waste. I cupped my hands and lit the end with a borrowed lighter. The first drag made my head feel light. The second brought a surge of nausea. I managed two further inhales before coughing, giving up, and flicking the butt over the fence. If I wanted to feel sick, I could huff the toxic smoke from the garbage fires. I stood for a moment, letting the wooziness subside. The bar was a familiar presence at my back, its conversational weight sensed rather than heard. It had been mine since I’d taken over from its former owner when he shipped out. He had left it a stripped-out derelict mess and I’d been the only one interested in fixing it up and reopening. It didn’t really have a name, but under my stewardship, it had become one of the few places on the planet where people said the beer came cold, and the gin didn’t taste like a reactor leak.

Sparing a final, rueful glance at the orbital construction platforms, I turned back through the door into the storeroom where, between the stacked kegs and cases of spirits, I kept a small bed made from pallets.

The one thing I had in common with every other lifeform in this stinking camp was that I’d left somebody behind. The trouble was, I didn’t know how to move on. At first, owning a bar had seemed like a good survival strategy. If I was going to be stuck in a place where everybody else was just passing through, it made sense to have something permanent. But now, after two years of waiting, the novelty of it all had worn thinner than a twice-used tissue. I sat down and regarded my palm. Closing my hand over the flare had been momentarily agonising, but now there wasn’t even so much as a scorch mark. My knuckles, which should have been torn to shreds where they’d impacted the rough hide covering the kid’s jawbone, were similarly unscathed.

I should get out of here, I thought. I should just throw my clothes into a bag without bothering to fold them and apply to be on the next foam ship out. It didn’t matter what waited on the other side of the gulf, it would be preferable to a life spent rotting here.

“Guv?” Siegfried drifted into the storeroom like a spiky balloon.

“Don’t tell me those lizards are back?”

“No, but someone’s asking for you.”

“Who is it?”

“I didn’t catch his name.” The barman moved two of his tool-tipped metal limbs in an approximation of a shrug. “But he says he’s your ex-husband.”

CHAPTER TWO

ON THE BEACH

I stepped through the connecting door and immediately clocked Jack. He was sitting at a table, leaning on one elbow and watching the front door as if expecting someone. He’d shaved the nearest side of his head, and a silver earring gleamed from the exposed lobe. His long black coat hung loosely from his shoulders. He hadn’t noticed me yet, so I picked a bottle of gin from the shelf and sidled up behind him.

“Freshen your drink, sir?”

His shoulders stiffened. “Ursula?”

“Who else were you looking for?”

He swivelled on his barstool, and I caught my breath. I’d forgotten how striking he was, in a hard, square-jawed kind of way. A dancer’s body with a sword-fighter’s poise. He said, “Charming place you have here.”

I wanted to tell him it was a shithole, but my regulars were within earshot, so I just nodded, and said, “Coldest beer in the whole camp.”

He tapped a fingernail against his glass. “And roughest gin?”

“I’m told it does the job. The first one numbs your taste buds, and after that, you’re golden.”

He laughed. “Oh, Ursula, I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you, too.”

“They told me you were still here,” he said. “But I couldn’t believe you really would be.”

“I told you I’d wait.”

“I’d hoped you wouldn’t. I wanted you safe.”

“I’m as safe as anyone here.”

He looked up at the corrugated iron ceiling and exhaled.

“What?”

“Nobody’s safe.” He leant across the bar and seized my free wrist. “Nobody here’s even remotely safe. You know that.”

I thumped the bottle down on the counter. “Keep your voice down.”

He pursed his lips. “You could try to be civil.”

“You could just tell me where the fuck you’ve been.”

Jack shook his head. “Trust me, you really don’t want to know.”

“The hell I don’t. You left me—”

“I told you.” He rubbed his forehead. “I told you why I had to go.”

“I’m not an idiot.”

“Then why are you angry?”

I leant my hands on the bar and took a long breath. “Why on earth do you think?”

“Less than a minute, and we’re back to this?”

“What do you expect? You got us berths on the last freighter out. I abandoned everything and everyone. And you never showed.”

“I had my duty.”

“I thought you had my back.”

“And I thought you understood. My comrades were counting on me. Our world was counting on me.”

“Yeah, and how did that turn out?”

He scowled. “You know what happened.”

“Everyone died. Earth fell, and you being there made no difference.”

“That’s not entirely fair. Some transports got away under covering fire from our forces.”

“How many?”

He picked up his glass and glowered into the amber centimetre of spirit at its base. “Maybe two dozen. Yours among them.”

“You should have come with me.”

“I had to stay.”

“You knew you couldn’t defeat them.”

He swigged down the dregs of his drink and managed not to cough. He pressed his lips against the back of his hand while the burn passed, then whispered, “We had to try.”

* * *

Those final hours in London had been nightmarish chaos. With the interstellar tramline network collapsing like a broken spider’s web, confirmation of attacks on other worlds arrived only hours before the routes connecting them went down completely. The damaged ships that limped through to spread the alarm were often the last to make it before those tramlines decohered altogether. And yet somehow, the Cutters still advanced.

When the shit hit the fan, I was in the process of being discharged from hospital. I’d been in there for months and knew most of the nurses by name. Since picking up the alien parasite, I’d had every scan and test you could imagine, and a few you’d probably rather not. Suffice to say, I’d been prodded and poked in places you’d usually not get anywhere near unless you’d at least bought me dinner.

“Whatever it is,” the doctor had said, “it seems to have adapted and fused with your DNA.”

I sat back in my chair. “So, you can’t get it out of me?”

He looked apologetic. “We wouldn’t know where to start. We’re not even sure where you end, and it begins.”

“I’m stuck with it?”

“If it’s any consolation, it doesn’t appear to be contagious, so we’ll be able to release you from quarantine. Nor does it seem to be doingyou any harm. On the contrary, all indications suggest it’s going to great lengths to keep you healthy.”

I looked at the back of my hand. The skin seemed smoother than I remembered, and the nails were hard and glossy, more like carbon fibre than keratin. But nothing had burst out of my chest or turned me into a terrifying blob of fleshy protoplasm, so I guessed I should be grateful.

“We will, of course, be referring you for further tests.”

“I thought you might.”

Once the paperwork had gone through and I’d been officially released, I collected my things and left. Outside, the sky and the Thames were the same shade of brutalised steel. I started walking towards the tube. I wasn’t up to raw-dogging reality, so I had my earbuds cranked to eleven, blasting out the playlist I’d been putting together in preparation for this day. Around me, dead leaves fell from the trees, car tyres hissed on the wet roads, and I watched the advertising holograms flicker and strut above the glass towers on the river’s far bank. They looked wan and insubstantial in the overcast light. The news about the parasite wasn’t what I’d hoped, but I couldn’t let it slow me down. I had to convince Doctor Vogel to select me for his next off-planet expedition. I’d been a fucking idiot last time out, taking off my glove when I did, but at least I hadn’t brought back anything infectious. That had to count for something, right? With my hands firmly wedged in my pockets, I dodged around an elderly Korean woman and her umbrella drone. If I didn’t get on another mission roster, I could effectively kiss my PhD, and perhaps my entire future career, farewell.

My phone buzzed for attention. I blinked up the call and frowned as I saw Jack’s number. He was on shore leave and had been looking after my flat while I’d been in hospital. I’d been hoping he would be here to meet me, so I was kind of annoyed he was nowhere to be seen. I tapped the side of my eye socket to answer, and saw his face overlaid on my vision.

“Ursula?”

“Jack, I thought you were coming to meet—”

“Ursula, listen to me. You need to get out, right now.”

The signal glitched, then reasserted itself.

“Out? Out where?”

“Get to Heathrow,” he said. “There’s a transport called the Mango Feedback. It’s evacuating the families of serving crew. I’ve told them you’re my wife.”

“You told them what?”

More static. I heard sirens in the streets.

Jack said, “New York’s gone. It’s just gone. And Mexico City’s under attack.” People were slowing their pace, holding their hands to their ears as they absorbed the breaking news reports. The lady with the drone umbrella let out a cry and collapsed into a sitting position on the wet pavement. When Jack came back through, he was gripping the sides of the camera and shouting into the lens. “London might be next. You must move. I’m sending you the flight details. There’s a berth waiting for you. Don’t stop to think or pick up luggage; just get to the airport. There isn’t much time.”

“You’re not coming?”

“I need to report in. My ship needs me.”

“I’ll wait for you.”

“Just get to Heathrow. Let me check with my ship, and I’ll find you. I promise. Get to the transport and I’ll find you.”

* * *

I refilled his glass.

“Do you know how hard it was to get from Chelsea to Heathrow while civilisation literally collapsed around me?”

“You made it, though.”

“A lot of people didn’t.”

Jack lowered his eyes. “I know.”

He was silent for a moment, and I looked away, trying not to remember. As the self-driving networks broke down, the cars had choked the streets. There were fights. I got caught in a few scuffles. If I hadn’t had the protection of the alien infection, I doubt I would have made it through the gridlock alive.

“It was a surprise attack,” Jack said, and I honestly couldn’t tell if he was talking to me or himself. I watched him scratch the label from the bottle, scrunch up the paper, and flick it away across the tabletop. “We didn’t have time to warn everybody. We did what we could.”

I reached over and touched the back of his hand with my fingertips. “I chose you over everybody. I didn’t go back for anyone. I fought my way through crowds of people who are all now dead, just to be with you.”

“And also, to live.”

I glanced around at our surroundings. “You call this living?”

* * *

I stood at the hatch.

“Please,” I said, “we have to wait.”

The naval crewman shook his head. “We got orders, ma’am.”

“But he’ll be here. He said he’d find me.”

The guy glanced out at the overcast sky and the other transports lifting from the tarmac. Sirens wailed in the distance. Armoured hovercraft patrolled the airport’s perimeter. “I don’t reckon he is.”

“Just a few more minutes?”

“Sorry, ma’am, we got incoming.” He touched a control and the hatch lowered into place with a heavy metallic thud.

“No, please, I—”

My phone rang. It was Jack. Judging from the noise and vibration, he seemed to be in some sort of vehicle. He said, “You made it?”

“Where are you?”

“Don’t wait for me.”

The crewman was trying to guide me towards the passenger compartment. He made an I-told-you-so face and reached for my arm, but I shook him off. “Why not?”

“Because I’m not coming.”

“What—”

“All leave’s been cancelled. I’m shipping out with the Crisis Actor.”

“No, you can’t.”

“I’m sorry. I must.”

“But I need you.”

“And if I’m going into battle, I need to know you’re safe.”

“No!”

“I love you.”

“Then don’t do this. Come with me. I need you.”

“I’m sorry.”

* * *

“Are you still with the Crisis Actor?”

We were at a corner table now, in the intersection between two corrugated iron walls, the bottle of gin between us. Jack had opened his coat, revealing the tarnished scabbard at his belt.

“She’s a bit banged-up,” Jack said, “but still flying.”

“The crew?”

“We lost a few.” His thumbnail worried the scraps of label still clinging to the bottle.

“And for the last two years?”

“We’ve been fighting a guerrilla war in Sol system, trying to slow the Cutters’ spread into the network.”

“That must have been tough.”

“It wasn’t easy. We ran out of a lot of supplies and ammo. We took a lot of casualties.” His expression hardened. “For a time, we thought we might be trapped in the system for good.” He drained his glass and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Then we saw a chance. The last remaining tramline connection. We had to fight hard, but we got through just before it lost all coherence.”

“And now?”

“Now can wait.” He reached across the table and took my hand. “Will you have a drink with me?”

I pulled my hand away. “I don’t drink.”

He looked surprised. “You’re running a bar. I assumed—”

“You assumed wrong.”

“You used to.”

“I used to do a lot of things.”

“So, what happened?”

“The world ended. I lost you.”

“So, you stopped drinking?”

“No, I started. I spent the first six months here getting blackout, falling-down, puking-up drunk.” I glanced towards the bar. The place was quiet now the excitement had died down. Siegfried was more than capable of handling the drink orders by himself. “Then the guy who ran this place up and left, and I needed a project and I needed to get sober, so I took over, and I’ve barely touched a drop since.”

Jack sat back and rested an ankle on the opposite knee. Straps and buckles covered his boots. “Are you still angry?”

“I don’t know what I am.” I pushed the gin bottle aside. Its base made a harsh scraping sound on the wooden tabletop. “I think I blamed you for staying behind, because it was easier to be angry with you than deal with losing you.”

“And now?”

“I guess I’m relieved you’re not dead.”

“That makes two of us.”

“And now, you’re here. ‘Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world…’”

“Yes.” He looked away. “About that.”

I felt a stir of disquiet. “What is it?”

Jack sighed. “We have an ulterior motive for coming to find you.”

“We?”

He looked me in the eye, and the skin prickled at the back of my neck. “There’s a possibility you might hold the key to slowing the Cutters’ advance.”

* * *

Before the war—if you could really call it a war, rather than a constant, desperate rear-guard action—Void’s Edge had always been considered a dead-end at the farthest extremity of the tramline network. As such, it had never required a military presence. Not until the Cutters’ onslaught caused ships to start falling further and further back. Now, the docks at the military port were a series of twenty fresh pits dug into the tundra floor and lined with sandbags, containing vessels from half a dozen different species and civilisations. We descended a flight of metal steps into the one that held Jack’s ship. When I saw her, I stopped in my tracks.

“Holy shit.” The Crisis Actor had been ugly to start with; now, she looked like hell.

“The old girl’s been through a lot.” Jack sounded defensive.

“I don’t doubt it.”

Parts of the hull had been scorched and buckled. Antennae were missing. A whole section had been replaced using parts scavenged from a completely different class of ship. The result looked like something you’d get if you asked a blindfolded drunk to build a submarine out of boiler parts and military scrap. She was asymmetrical and sported lumps and bulges where no ship had any business sporting lumps and bulges. Her days as a stealth warship were over. Fly her into a hostile atmosphere and she’d light up the radar screens like an oil rig dropping from the heavens. God alone knew how she had made it down from orbit without shearing apart in at least half a dozen different places.

“Whose idea was it to paint her with yellow and black stripes?”

“Some creative soul at the Foss Repair Station. Apparently, they were all out of battleship grey.” Jack leant close. “Don’t mention it when you get aboard, though.”

“Why not?”

“Cris was furious about it.”

“Who’s Cris?”

“It’s what I call her for short.”

“The ship?”

“Yes.”

He led me across the blasted soil of the pit to the base of the Crisis Actor’s embarkation ramp. As we approached, ground defence gun turrets swivelled in our direction, and then swivelled away again as the onboard intelligence recognised us and deemed us friends rather than potential invaders.

“Trust me,” Jack said. “If she wanted us dead, we would have been atomised the instant we entered this pit. Probably even before that.”

His pride in the ship shone through in his voice, but there was also an uncharacteristic shyness about the way he wouldn’t meet my eye when he was talking about her.

Puzzled, I said, “I’ll try to be on my best behaviour.”

“Thank you.”

I followed him into the shadow of the misshapen vessel. Overhead, sections of the hull shimmered with the energies barely contained within. I could almost feel my skin blistering from the radioactive overspill. A ramp lowered on squealing hinges, and we ascended.

The Crisis Actor didn’t look any better from the inside. Cables, tubes, and wires hung from the ceiling, lashed together with plastic ties. Maintenance panels hung unfastened, revealing the jury-rigged electrical repairs within. Patches of steel welded to the bulkheads marked where shrapnel had scythed through the walls. Everywhere I looked, I saw evidence of the two years she had spent on the run in Sol system, waging a desperate running battle against a relentless and lethal enemy.

“It’s quieter than I remember.”

“We lost a lot of people.”

“I’m sorry.”

Hands in pockets, Jack shrugged. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Nevertheless.”

“Forget it.” His lips hardened into a tight line. “We all knew what we were signing up for.”

“Did you, though?” I couldn’t help it. The Cutters’ attacks had been as swift and brutal as they had been unexpected. Before them, the navy’s main peacetime duties had involved preserving communication links with extrasolar colonies and offering humanitarian need where required; maintaining diplomatic relations with neighbouring civilisations; and patrolling trade routes and tramline termini to deter pirates, terrorists, and traffickers. Nobody had ever seriously expected an interstellar war.

Jack sighed. “We did our duty.”

I couldn’t argue with that. I could see the rusty bloodstains on the walls; holes like stab marks in the bulkheads; the dirty yellow smears where shrapnel had depressurised a corridor and been hurriedly patched with sealant foam.

The Crisis Actor’s bridge and power plant lay close to the core of the vessel, where they were safest, shielded from projectiles and blast effects by the rest of the ship. But even down here, there were signs of damage.

Jack noticed me looking. “They don’t fire bullets,” he said. “More like shards. And those shards slice clean through armour, deck plates, and human bodies alike. They don’t care what’s in the way; they just don’t stop.”

“Shards of what?”

“I have no idea. Bits of themselves, maybe. They look like coloured glass, but they go through ships and people like hot knives through snow.”

“Shit.” I didn’t want to picture that. “How do you defend against them?”

“You don’t.” He scrubbed a hand across his brow. “You just have to try to get out of the way.”

We entered the bridge. It was a dome-shaped room ringed with workstations. The captain’s seat occupied a rotating platform in the centre, kind of like a Lazy Susan, or one of those revolving serving trays you sometimes see in Chinese restaurants. It could be turned to view any of the other stations.

“Where’s Captain Avion?”

“She’s dead.”

“So, who’s in charge now?”

Jack turned and placed a hand on my shoulder. “I am.”

“You?”

He released me and shrugged. “Well, me and my wife.”

I heard the words but my brain wouldn’t parse them. “I’m sorry, your what?”

“My wife?”

“Your wife?” I glanced around the almost-deserted flight deck. “And which one of these assholes is that?”

Jack looked up at the dome and spread his hands. “You’re standing in her.”

* * *

The Crisis Actor used a synth body to communicate with her crew. She chose that moment to slouch over and greet me.

“Oh look,” she said. “It’s the archaeologist. Long time, no see. I’m so glad you could join us again.” She resembled a woman in her late twenties, with shaggy hair, an askew tie, and tight-fitting blue business suit. “I trust our journey hasn’t been in vain?”

I crossed my arms. “You tell me.”

She smiled. “Do you remember when you were careless enough to contract that alien virus?”

I felt my cheeks grow hot. “As if I could forget.”

“Well, I hacked your medical records and we’ve been studying the results of all the analysis you’ve had done.”

“And?”

“And we think the device you touched is a weapon.”

“A weapon?” I looked around at Jack. “You mean, this shit’s going to kill me?”

He crossed his arms. “Probably not.”

“Probably?”

“We don’t think your infection constitutes an attack by the weapon. Rather, we think it might have been an attempt at an upgrade.”

My heart was beating like it was auditioning for a jazz band. I rubbed my forehead with my fingertips. “Will somebody please start making sense?”

The Crisis Actor moved into my eyeline. “Weapons need operators,” she said. “When you touched it, we think it downloaded its operating system into your mind.”

I glanced down at my grey fingernails. “And the fast healing?”

“An ideal trait in a combatant.”

“But I’m not a combatant. I don’t know the first thing about combat.”

“I’m afraid you no longer have much of a choice,” Jack said. “The weapon turned you into what it needed. For want of a better term, you’re a gunner now.”

“I’m no soldier.”

“We’ll see,” the Crisis Actor said.

“What do you mean by that?”

“She means,” Jack said, his eyes lingering on her, “that we want to take you back to the dig site and plug you into the weapon.”

“I can’t believe what I’m hearing. After all the trouble I got into last time I touched that thing, now you want to take me back and purposefully re-expose me?”

“Yes,” the Crisis Actor said seriously. “We want to see what happens.”

“But why me? Can’t you just try exposing someone else. Someone who knows what they’re doing?”

“We already tried that,” Jack said.

“And?”

“And they died. That’s why we came looking for you. You’re the only one who survived.”

* * *

Siegfried was wiping down the bar with a rag. One of his lenses swivelled up as I entered. “Hey, guv.”

“Pour me a drink.”

“Are you sure?”

The customers were gone for the night. Only the lights above the counter were still on, casting a row of soft yellow cones.

“Do I look unsure?”

“You look angry.”

“Then pour me a fucking drink. You know how this works.”

He pulled a dusty bottle from beneath the counter and filled a shot glass. The liquid glowed amber. This wasn’t the battery acid we served to the locals; this was the good stuff— the last resort, emergency hooch. Genuine Mexican blue agave tequila, all the way from Earth. It was smoother than an oiled ballerina, and harder to find than an honest politician.

“Things didn’t go well with the husband?”

“They did not.” I tossed back the shot and clinked the glass back onto the counter. “And he’s not my husband. He’s married to someone else.”

“Oh, who?”

“His fucking ship, if you can believe that?”

Siegfried had been in the process of re-corking the bottle. He stopped and poured another measure instead. “I’m sorry, guv.”

“I mean, marrying a ship. How is that possible?”

Siegfried resumed wiping the bar with his rag. “I guess it takes all sorts.”

“And you should see her synth. Small, scrawny, and ten years younger than him.”

“Aren’t you ten years younger than him?”

“Shut up.”

I knocked back the second measure and tapped the glass with my fingernail until he topped it up again.

“Do you really think they’re engaging in sexual activity?” he asked.

“I don’t even want to know.” I heard the crackling roar of a shuttle leaving the civilian port. It could have been a supply run, or it might have been carrying another hundred passengers for the next scheduled foam ship. Either way, I suddenly wanted desperately to be on it.

I said, “I should never have waited.”

“I was never sure why you did. The romantic in me likes to think it was for him.”

I slugged back the shot. “Of course, it was for him.”

“And now?”

I pushed my glass across the counter. “Stop talking and keep pouring.”

Siegfried’s arms folded into his body. “Oh, come on, please indulge me. You know I like to talk.”

“That doesn’t mean I have to listen.”

“If I don’t communicate my thoughts and opinions, how will anyone ever know what I think? If a tree falls in a forest and nobody hears…”

I frowned at him. “Are you seriously telling me that if no one hears your thoughts, you might cease to exist?”

“Who am I to judge?”

“You’re looking at it the wrong way.” I waited for him to refill the glass. “What you should be asking is what happens if a tree falls in a forest and makes a lot of noise doing it, but nobody gives a shit about trees falling in forests?”

All his various appendages drew in tightly against his shell. “Is that your way of telling me to shut up?”

I leaned forward and tapped a fingernail against his metal casing. “Now you’re getting it.”

“Harumph.” He left the bottle on the counter and floated away. I let him go. I felt a bit guilty for being a bitch. He was my best friend in the camp. He’d sulk, but he’d never held a grudge in his life. I knew he’d get over it and be back here in the morning, as if nothing had happened.

In the meantime, I had to figure out my next move.

Through a telescope, the foam ships that had already launched formed a string of pearls receding into the darkness between the spiral arms. I could have been on any one of them, but I’d decided to squander two years wiping tables and serving drinks. If the Cutters turned up tomorrow and slaughtered me, I’d only have myself to blame.

Leaving Jack behind had ripped a hole in my heart. I hadn’t been strong enough to move forward alone. I had held onto the hope he might still be alive—and once I had convinced myself he was alive, how could I possibly have left without him?

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I said. It was unfair. If you wait for someone long enough, you tend to build up your eventual meeting in your mind. You idealise and over-hype it, and when it eventually happens, when they reveal themselves to be the weird, fucked-up human beings they always were, you can’t help but feel somehow betrayed.

Especially if they’ve married their starship.

I took another drink, and suddenly, I loathed everything. I hated this crappy bar and this festering camp; I detested this ball of rock and slime we were standing on; and most of all, I hated the air in here, all clammy from the salt marsh and smelling like week-old socks. It would have been January back on Earth, and the days there would be as cold and sharp as pins right now. There might even be snow falling over the ruins of London. God, I missed snow. I missed the sound the car tyres made as they hissed through dirty grey slush; missed the little pinprick kisses of flakes falling against my upturned face, and the cold tickle of them on my outstretched tongue.

And then I thought of my sister, Chloe. We had shared a womb, but not a childhood. Her lungs hadn’t fully developed. She was born first, but already dead by the time I took my first breath. I hadn’t known about her until my parents broke the news when they thought I was old enough to understand, but some part of me had always felt incomplete without her. At some level, I had always known there was a hole in my life.

I raised a glass to her.

If our situations had been reversed, I liked to think she’d have made better choices than I had.

* * *

I woke with my forehead resting on the cool metal of the counter and a long ribbon of drool hanging from my mouth. Tentative fingers of daylight had begun to explore the gaps between the window shutters. Only a couple of centimetres of liquid remained in the tequila bottle, and my temples throbbed like an industrial heating unit.

I sat up. My forehead made a sucking sound as it peeled from the sticky copper. My mouth tasted as if I’d been gargling guacamole, pencil shavings, and hand sanitiser.

Fucking tequila.

There was a reason I didn’t drink anymore. I liked it too much, but it didn’t like me. But then, what else was I going to do when the love of my fucking life turned up and announced he’d gotten himself hitched to a war machine?

I went around to the sink behind the counter and splashed cold water on my face. My thoughts were as heavy and ungainly as icebergs on a rough swell; but while asleep, I seemed to have reached a decision. I was getting off this rock, and to do that, I was going to have to pay a visit to Polhaus.

I pushed open the bar’s main door and raised a hand to shade my aching eyes from the sunlight. The morning business of the camp was well underway. Every species had its own rituals and habits, but certain activities seemed to be universal constants. Fires that had been tamped to embers for the night were now being poked and bullied into life to heat ration packs and (in the case of the humans at least) water for coffee. Groups of hunters were slouching out to check their traps for edible night fauna. Babies were crying and mewling for food and attention. Prayers were being offered. Those who had died in the night were being brought out and loaded onto carts. A few of the early risers nodded to me as I passed. I was well known in this area of the camp. I’d been here longer than most people, and the bar was a local landmark.

There were many cafes and food stalls on the site, as well as scatterings of ramshackle kiosks housing gambling dens, tattoo parlours, brothels, fortune tellers, masseurs, pawn brokers, and every other opportunistic trade you could imagine, all arranged into a crude, muddy high street that meandered from the camp’s front entrance to its rear gates. Anyone with a trade could set up a counter made from two barrels and a plank and sell their skills to passers-by in return for ration chits or services in kind. My bar was set a little back from this main drag, among the tents and shacks. It didn’t really have a name; most people just called it ‘Ursula’s Place’.

Polhaus owned a tented casino up near the front entrance. That was some prime real estate, and I knew he’d paid well for it—using other people’s money. At this time of the morning, there were no punters at the tables, just a guy in an apron sweeping the plastic floorboards.

“Polhaus about?”

The guy looked up, recognised me, and nodded towards the back room. “Go on through.”

Polhaus’s office was a shipping container at the rear of the tent. Inside, he’d furnished it with the rugs and art he’d fleeced from his customers. It felt like stepping into a harem. God alone knew what his sleeping quarters were like. He sat at the far end like a mantis, his tall frame folded into a padded chair behind a metal desk salvaged from a wrecked warship. As I entered, he looked up from beneath thick white eyebrows.

“Ah, Ursula. How agreeable to see you this morning. And to what do I owe this not inconsiderable pleasure?”

An ugly, puckered scar ran from his hairline to his chin, pulling down the corner of his left eye and twisting that side of his mouth into perpetual disappointment.

“I want out.”

His torn eyebrow twitched. Once, maybe, he’d been able to raise it. “I see you’re not in the mood to beat around the bush.”

“I’m serious. I want a berth on the next foam ship.”

“After all this time?” His eyes narrowed. “Do you know something I don’t?”

There were always rumours of coming attacks. I shook my head. “No, I’m just done. I’ve had enough.”

“I see.” He steepled his thin, surgeon’s fingers. “And would this sudden change of heart have something to do with the recent arrival of a certain naval officer?”

“That’s none of your damn business.”

He chuckled. “I mean no disrespect, of course. You know how rife this place can be with gossip.”

“Can you get me a berth or not?”

That wounded brow twitched again. “Of course, I can, but you know these things don’t come cheap.”

“What do you want?”

“Moi?” He placed a splayed hand against his chest. “I wish only to return to the personal and economic freedoms of the Before Times.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I was there. We all were. You’re only talking about a couple of years ago.”

“And yet,” he sighed dramatically, “in those days people were free to make their fortunes and determine their own fates.”

I stifled a cynical laugh. I’d heard him give this speech before. “How were they free? They had to work almost every day of their adult lives to make a handful of billionaires richer. And if they didn’t, they ran the risk of losing their homes and pensions, and starving to death in retirement. And all the while, the Internet told them they could be one of the happy elites if only they worked a little harder, believed a little harder, and prioritised their employers’ success over the happiness of their families and the state of their own mental and physical health.”

Polhaus frowned. “I didn’t realise you were an anarchist.”

“I’m no such thing.” I crossed my arms. “I just get irritable when people needlessly romanticise the past. I’m guessing you were one of the privileged few. In which case, you must remember that none of that garbage mattered a damn when the Cutters came. All the money in the world couldn’t save you from that.”

Polhaus scowled. “We are getting off topic.”

“You started it.”

“Nevertheless, I do not care to reminisce about such frightful things. What you ask of me now, well, that comes with a price.”

There it was. I steepled my fingers. “What’s it going to cost me?”

“Your bar.”

I waved a hand. “Take it.”

“That will cover my handling fee.”

I sighed. “And the price of the berth?”

“That will cost considerably more.”

“I don’t have anything else.”

Polhaus moistened his lower lip. “Don’t sell yourself short.”

My heart sunk. “What are you suggesting?”

“I have use for a woman of your talents.”

“I won’t sleep with you.”

His head jerked back as if I’d spat at him. “Good Lord, I should hope not!”

“Just so we’re clear.”

“Please,” he said, adjusting his cuffs, “don’t flatter yourself.” He had a tight rein on his composure, but I couldn’t help noticing the twisted scar on his cheek had darkened to a livid pink.

“Then what is it you want me to do?”

“I need you to recover something of mine.”

“What sort of something?”

“An object of some value. It was used as collateral for a wager.”

“And now the sucker won’t pay up?”

“Precisely.”

“Debt recovery? I’m a little disappointed. Why can’t you send one of your usual heavies?”

“If I take possession of the object in question, there will be repercussions.”

“But if I do it?”

“You will be leaving on the next foam ship.” He waved his thin fingers airily. “People will assume you took it with you.”

“But all the while, you’ll have it here.”

“Precisely.”

“Do I even dare ask what it is?”

Polhaus’s smile grew wider, until it made him look like a shark.

* * *

I picked my way between the tents and shacks. Overhead, the nearest half-constructed foam ship hung white in the blue morning sky like a cloud of shattered bone fragments. Would that be the one to carry me to safety, across the dour void between this spiral arm and the next? The thought of crossing through such emptiness filled me with equal parts dismay and relief. Humanity had barely started spreading to its neighbouring stars, and now we were setting out across a vast chasm towards an unknown future. We were teenagers leaving home for the first time, exchanging the embarrassments and nostalgia of our childish years for the cold uncertainties of adulthood. To survive, we were fleeing the enemy’s fearful odds and abandoning the ashes of our fathers and the temples of our gods.

Yes, that’s a quote from Macaulay’s Lays of Ancient Rome. And yes, I’d studied the classics. I was an archaeologist, remember?

Nearby, someone was frying something that almost smelled like bacon. There was a rank undertone that suggested it was probably only one of the local water rats, but the scent kicked off some griping in my empty and hungover gut. How long had it been since I last tasted real bacon? I’d been living on beansprouts and tofu for so long now, my mouth watered at the thought of hot grease soaking into fresh, sliced bread. But such delicacies had disappeared with the destruction of Earth.