The Bleak Path, Part 1

[Archie Phoenix 0]

The Bleak Path

Part 1 - Crossing

Tan Simox had flown almost two hundred space missions for the Exalted Pentad -- Renazia’s governing body -- but these trips into the Bleak Zone were the worst. Granted, it was the safest region (relatively speaking) of the Stigius Nebula. No spacecraft could survive the volatile gas and particle emissions prevalent throughout the rest of the nebula. Safer conditions existed in the Bleak Zone because of the absence of stars for hundreds of light years in any direction. That absence of stars was the source of the problem, however. All that existed in the Bleak Zone was blindness -- clouds of sensor-dampening dust and gas with no reflected starlight to provide navigational reference. There was only one entrance, half a light year wide, at the boundary of the nebula, and the rest of the Bleak Zone was surrounded by the nebula’s volatile regions; if you got lost in here, you were lost for good.

 

The Renazians had charts of many of the safe paths through the Bleak Zone. Following these paths required great care; a craft’s navigational computer could be automated to follow a course indicated by the charts, but the pilot had to ensure that the craft not be diverted off course. There was nothing natural inside the Bleak Zone to bring about a forced course alteration -- no asteroids, no combustible gas pockets, no concentrations of dust heavy enough to bump a craft. But there were things in the Bleak Zone that were not natural. Things that made the Bleak Zone far more hazardous than the blind flying. The very things that brought the Renazian Star Agency here on so many missions.

 

The Serberites.

 

They were the creatures native to the Bleak Zone. Whether they originated here or moved here from other locales was not certain, but it was clear why the region would appeal to them -- their ships could navigate the omnipresent clouds of particles far more efficiently than Renazian warp cruisers. Formidable, those ships! Tan had crossed paths with one on two separate occasions. The second time, he did not stick around long enough to fight it -- the first time had taught him better.

 

The remarkable thing about Tan Simox’ current mission was that the Serberites were not what brought him here this time. It was another Renazian that brought him here. This Renazian was, like the Serberites, taking advantage of the Bleak Zone’s greatest asset -- its potential as an effective hiding place. For indeed, this Renazian did not want to be found. This Renazian had been exiled many years ago, but had recently begun violating the terms of his exile. And when the Pentad dispatched agents to bring this Renazian back to the homeworld for renewed trial, he promptly fled … into the Bleak Zone.

 

Fortunately for Tan, this particular Renazian was both smart enough to realize the imprudence of flying blindly into the Bleak Zone and resourceful enough to have gained possession of the Renazian fleet’s charts of the region. There was no doubt that, if he valued his life, he would be on one of the safe paths. Several Renazian vessels were stationed outside the nebula monitoring the entrance to the Bleak Zone, just in case the fugitive doubled back. Meanwhile, Tan and the other agents given this assignment were patrolling every one of the safe paths the fleet had charted to date, hoping they would catch up to the fugitive before the Serberites spotted either him or them.

 

Where the mission would go from there was something that was causing Tan some fear, more fear than he‘d felt since his earliest assignments with the Star Agency. For once, the Serberites were not the greatest danger in the Bleak Zone; the fugitive that Tan and his fellow agents hunted was none other than the infamous serial killer Lars Man, who could harm a Renazian in ways that the Serberites could not.

 

to be continued