Headfirst into the Abyss

Phoebe stays put, silent throughout the ordeal – she listens to Arjun badmouthing her daughter and she nearly thinks that he’ll call her way to old to be scolded. He doesn’t say it, but his voice says enough instead of him.

“TIA might be afraid of you.” He says, eyes set on her. He’s not afraid. Unlike Phoebe, he’s not afraid. “But TIA has its limits too. Please think of this next time you are so dead set on killing my employees.” Arjun is seething with hate, however, and his words are poison, his face nearly red from exertion and anger. “Are we clear, Grimgrinner?”

Arianna’s face is a careful neutral, though there is something akin to disbelief in her eyes too. They’re wide, large and watery, but Phoebe cannot discern the emotion behind them.

“Are we clear, Arianna Fyodorova?” Arjun repeats. Her daughter scowls for a second, then her face falls back into the barely-clinging mask.

“Let’s say we are.” The voice is not hers; it’s male and deep, and Arianna doesn’t move her lips while speaking even though it sounds like the voice is coming from her direction. It’s also much calmer than hers would be. Just few more weeks, and Phoebe might think of getting used to it.

“Humanity has survived other miracles that were thought invincible before, Miss Fyodorova. I assure you, we are going to survive you too.” Phoebe almost smiles, because Arjun makes it sound to laid-back, so secure.

“Is that a threat?” Arianna growls, swaying slightly on a chair that’s a little bit too small for her inhuman height, and leans towards Arjun. He doesn’t seem to be too bothered with it.

He laughs, even, although it’s a chuckle more than anything. Phoebe could follow him, if the situation only wasn’t so grave.

“It’s not a threat. It’s a fair warning.” He relaxes back into his chair, and his eyes soften a little bit. Phoebe has seen him do this before. It’s not a sign he’s going to become mild. It’s a sign he’s going to point something out. “I think we’ve given you enough freedom here. Ruin an entire sector of our complex even though you of all people should be aware how expensive and hard to make it was, kill half of your own mother’s team, kill a person of your former team for no good reason other than some childish jealousy—“

“I wasn’t jealous of her!” It’s Arianna’s voice now and she’s speaking, speaking—she’s angry and she’s showing that she’s human. So she’s got her flaws too; she’s not the flawless supernatural miracle she wants them all to think she is.

The room is silent. It’s only the five of them there anyway – Phoebe and Arjun, as two people of importance within the complex, Naim as the older Captain and Sundowner, uncharacteristically silent in the background, behind Arianna. There’s a strange red line that crosses his face and then disappears and that repeats. He seems to be zoning out.

“If I say childish jealousy again, I’ll just be stooping down to that level.” Arjun shrugs.

Phoebe has had problems with her daughter. She was stubborn, she wanted—she craved the adventure, craved the flight, craved the danger and the fall. She was reckless and unsafe for both herself and people around her, has always been.

But this—this makes Phoebe think that there is more wrong to Arianna than just faulty upbringing.

“Call it what you will.” She spits out and then, without another word, gets up and leaves. The door open before her on their own and the lights flicker, but it’s something they’re more or less used to by now. She needs to crouch down to make it through the door.

Phoebe had anticipated her children being tall; they had all the predispositions for it. This, though—being entirely alien, to the point of easily being the tallest creature in the universe? If somebody told her, she would’ve been mortified at first, and then laughed it off.

She sighs, then turns to Arjun.

Now that the meeting isn’t calling for his attention, Naim is tapping away at his terminal. In the back, Sundowner is still looking at the empty nothing, but he does twitch towards the younger male every once in a while. Phoebe notices the pattern – the message pops up at Naim’s terminal and then, not a second later, Sundowner turns to look at him. The curiosity isn’t justified; it’s just a little bit strange.

“We still have work to do.” Arjun says finally, although he’s obviously more relaxed than he’s been until now. He keeps surprising Phoebe from one day to another, mainly because he’s worried about people first, as should be natural and then about his job, rather than himself. He’s not fearing for his life. “If the two of you would pay attention to the matter at hand.”

The two of you is directed at young Naim and the space tyrant. When addressed, their heads snap upwards almost simultaneously, both looking like deer caught in headlights. Phoebe doesn’t remember the last time she’s seen a live animal. She must visit the Earth as soon as this entire mess in over with.

“Apologies, Commander Royce.” Naim mutters, the shuts his terminal away. “Osborn is a little bit preoccupied with the conversation between me and my crew to be of any help.”

“Oh give yourself a break.” Sundowner waves him off, almost dismissive. “Like I would care either way.” Realistically looking, he has no reason to care.

Naim glares at him, but says no more. In a second, he is poised, all formal and ready to continue with business.

A lifetime ago – or rather, what it feels like a lifetime – Phoebe had a crew of her own, a ship that she served and that sailed through the galaxies like Scylla and Charybdis do. Before she was one of the head researchers here, on the complex, she was a medic on a spaceship that was just like their two most valuable assets – small, five-man crew used for quick missions and emergency situations. They fell apart years ago, when Phoebe had been younger than Naim himself.

Still, that lifetime ago, she worked with Isabelle Naim, young Captain’s adoptive mother. Back then, she was still Isabelle Bradford, although she was remarkable as ever, all loud laughing and silent confidence. She could boast without saying a word and make others humble with only a few of those, too. It seems like she’s taught her son few of those tricks too.

“Apparently our ally here—“ Arjun’s not even looking at Sundowner when he says that; instead, he’s fixing up a small hologram. “—didn’t do a really good job at Betsalel Conglomeration. Because, something apparently managed to survive.”

The picture is grainy and doesn’t seem to be high-quality, but it’s getting better with each second. It might never be clear enough, but they’ll be able to see what’s going it.

Most of it is hot, molten mass moving through space, some of it hardened into rocks already. Now that Phoebe looks more carefully, most of it is actually dust moving in uneven intervals, somewhat dampened by the lack of quality.

“What’s that dark thing in the background?” It’s Naim that speaks then, dark eyes fixed on something Phoebe didn’t notice at first – a shape moving, twisting. It coils like an overgrown snake around the debris.

“We don’t know.” It’s a confession. “So we need to send out a team that way. Five people cannot be enough, but we cannot send both of our ships out there, lest they be—“ Lest they be destroyed. He doesn’t say it. “They’re too valuable, but they’re also the only ones with enough experience.”

No one else has seen the aliens up close and personal like the ten of them did.

Sundowner raises his hand up, and only speaks after Arjun’s rather surprised “Yes?”

“I could accompany them. That’s what you want, right?” That’s exactly what they want. Phoebe almost breathes a sigh of relief – not because she would feel better if her child was with the tyrant, but because she thought that Arianna might come with Viktor. They didn’t appear to be on the best terms, not after he’s reported that she broke into his sleeping quarters despite the arrangement she had with TIA.

Sundowner and Grimgrinner were not to enter any of the TIA’s facilities without explicit permission. It didn’t look like they were abiding by the rules so far.

“That would be perfect. You will travel with Charybdis. The ship’s Captain is Viktor Fyodorov. You should probably arrange things with him before you take off.” Phoebe knows why; she’s flown in enough ships to understand that one person can put everything off-balance, especially in smaller ships.

The hair on the back of Arjun’s neck stands up. Sundowner has the red stripe across his face again. Naim seems tense. She’s not sure what’s got them all in a twist, but she doesn’t feel nearly as uncomfortable now that Arianna’s left.

“If that is it, then, I should get going.” Sundowner gets up and stretches his hand to the side. It hovers above Naim’s terminal for a second before it flickers back to life.

“This, too, will be reported.” Naim says without a hitch. Phoebe appreciates how calm he has stayed, but she’s worried too; he seems almost detached as he looks into device flipping through contacts until it comes to a sudden stop.

“Do what you will. There is no point of getting angry, Captain Naim. I will not react like Arianna did.” He leans over the device, looks closely at the black numbers printed on it – the address from Scylla’s private network, Phoebe recognizes – and then there are thin red lines rewriting them on his forearm. “I will not react at all.”

With that, he follows after Arianna, leaves without a trace and there’s just the three of them here.

“For you, Captain Naim...” Arjun continues, even though Phoebe can see that his shoulders are slumped now. “I have a far more boring task...”