A Ragged Loop in Time
Copyright
A Ragged Loop in Time
Copyright © Tom Kane 2026
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permission requests, contact Brittle Media Ltd at https://www.brittlemedia.online
The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this production are fictitious.
No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.
Author: Tom Kane
Cover: Mack Dundee
Illustrations by Mack Dundee
Publisher: Brittle Media Ltd
Act I
"Some threats do not come from the future or the past, but from the quiet moment when humanity first decided it deserved dominion over the stars."
The Seed
Somewhere out of time, a place with no light, no dark, no sense and no sound. A voice whispers.
“You cannot see us. You don’t know we exist. But we are watching you, waiting for you, touching your past and future, gently and inexorably. It was we who planted the seed and watched it grow… and we can easily weed out that which displeases us.”
In the 25th Century Earth
“Down one,” Maxwell Bahn said, skipping through the screens as he searched for an overview of his work notes.
From his first days at the University of Mare Cognitum on Luna, Bahn had tried to record every thought he had, just in case something, anything, proved worth remembering. The result was screens of scribbles, half-formed ideas, and what he privately referred to as his nonsense period. Now he was in his last days at the university, and he had to find a vocation in life that would take him forward and make him useful.
He stopped at one entry.
Time manipulation is dangerous, not a toy. The universe punishes arrogance.
“What is this rubbish?” Bahn muttered.
He leaned back in his chair, rubbing his eyes.
I must find something I can use. Something to work on. I must create.
His thoughts drifted away as he told the computer to enter stand-by mode.
“What was the point of all that education if I can’t be useful to society?”
He tapped a finger on the desktop in his university study.
Two weeks and I’m out of here. I need to find a government-funded project…
The thought faded before it could settle.
“Computer.”
“On,” came the gruff male voice, sounding faintly irritated at being disturbed.
“Review all my notes and, at random, select a subject. Then scan all government-funded projects throughout the Terran system and match it to a project with allocated funds but no active research programme.”
It was a wild guess. A pot-shot. Probably a waste of time. But Bahn was tired of staring at the same dead ends and knew he needed help, even if it came from a machine.
The computer chimed and the screen lit up.
The heading was simple enough.
Space Exploration by Android Humans
Beneath it sat a project designation.
Project Clean Sweep
And beneath that, a location.
Hygiea
“Where is Hygiea, computer?”
“The asteroid belt.”
The computer continued.
“Hygiea is a Type-C carbonaceous planetoid with a rich subsurface of water ice. The research base processes the ice into drinking water, hydrogen fuel, and breathable oxygen. Hydroponics provide food for the facility’s five personnel, who operate on a four-month rotation cycle. Hygiea is considered a time capsule from the early solar system.”
Bahn stared at the screen.
“What are they doing there, computer?”
“Research.”
“Would you like to expand on that a little?”
There was a small time-lag, before the computer spoke again. “Research on longevity drugs, and medical compounds. Longevity seems to be the principal research. Hygiea, it seems has potential for new medical discoveries. But because of the harsh environment, they lack a key factor in their search.”
“Which is?”
“An android with the dexterity and mental capacity to be able to go out onto the surface and carry out experiments with no fear of compromise to the integrity of the unit.”
“Which is where I come in.”
“Your assumption is correct. Dexterity issues are moot. The requirement is for an android that can think. A positronic brain, as postulated by Isaac Asimov and created by you, though rudimentary, is what is required. As you have observed, it seems you are the perfect choice.”
The perfect choice.
Maxwell Bahn smiled.
Finding My Feet
“You want to go where?”
Maxwell Bahn shuffled his feet as he stood in front of the university director, P.B. Gardener.
“Hygiea… sir.”
“And where exactly is, this, Hygiea?”
“The asteroid belt… sir.” Bahn didn’t do well with authority, and he kicked himself mentally every time he forgot to say sir.
“Maxwell, you know I admire your ability. You are, to my mind, a genius. But, you are Maxwell Bahn, the young hothead, who is brilliant, idealistic and yet directionless. And now, suddenly, you want to go to Hygiea. Can I ask why?”
Bahn gritted his teeth.
I knew he would ask that! Now what do I tell him? They have the money, but no direction. He thinks I’m directionless…
“Maxwell? Maxwell Bahn.”
Bahn stopped his reverie. “Sorry, sir, I was forming an answer.”
“You haven’t thought this through, have you?” Gardener stood up and walked around his expansive desk. He stood in front of Bahn. “What has Hygiea got that you need?”
Bahn suddenly felt he was standing on firm ground, and not sinking into quicksand. “Hygiea has a project, there is already a team there, ready and waiting.”
“Ready and waiting? For what?”
Bahn shuffled his feet. “Me. I hope.”
Gardener shook his head. “Sell it to me, Maxwell. If you can do that, maybe we can get somewhere with this.”
Bahn took a breath. “Hygiea has Project Clean Sweep. They are looking for elements, chemicals anything to help humans live longer. To improve health. But they have no idea how to do a search. They have the funds, but don’t know what to spend the money on. They lack direction. They have nobody with the ideas I have. I can use their money to design an android that will do all the hard work in the most extreme environment known to man.” Bahn finished and waited for Gardener to say something.
Gardener returned to his chair and sat down.
Bahn waited, shuffling his feet a little.
Gardener sat forward and rested his elbows on his desk. “I’m impressed,” he said after a long pause. “That is rather a good idea. I’ll have a word in the right ears and we will see what we can do.”
Hygiea
Space is huge, beyond human comprehension. The asteroid belt is vast with so many planetoids, asteroids and plain big rocks, the view was breathtaking from high above the belt. And the gaps between these rocks, asteroids and planetoids is big. Taking all that into account, the jump from Earth to the asteroid belt, and then the slow ride into the outer part of the main asteroid belt meant a brief time in space for Bahn, not enough time to work on his planned introduction to the staff already present on research site, Hygiea/V2131.
Hygiea orbits the Sun between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, roughly three AU out. She’s large, in fact one of the largest objects in that region. Hygiea is a planetoid, with a spheroid shape and two known craters about 100 to 180 km in diameter. Because of the larger crater’s location, and the relatively flat plane of the interior, the research centre was located there.
From a thousand miles above Hygiea, taking in the view from his ship in a two-hour orbit, Maxwell Bahn began to appreciate the scale of Hygiea.
As the vessel slowed and began its long, spiralling descent, the view of research site, Hygiea/V2131 gave him greater clarity of where he would spend the next four months, at least, of his young life.
The research centre was a ring of connected modules, with another inner ring of modules, all connecting to the central core module. Each ring and module were connected to each other with walkway-tubes.
***
The hatchway leading from the robot lander to the connection hatchway into Hygiea/V2131 squeaked and turned as if by an invisible hand. The door opened and a middle-aged woman peeked from behind the door. “Hi, you must be Maxwell Bahn?” her English accent giving away her heritage. “Come through and we will take the short, but complicated walk to the mess hall. Called mess because none of us have managed to get a cleaning routine up and running. And it's hardly a hall, more a small canteen.”
Bahn followed as the woman set a brisk pace in the low gravity environment.
After a seemingly never ending guided tour from the woman, they reached the mess hall.
“Let me introduce all the crew,” she said to Bahn as they entered the cramped central control hub. “I’m Rosalind, lead scientist, gardener and medical technician. It’s my job to feed you, keep you alive and tell you what to do.”
“Okay, Rosalind,” Bahn said.
“Please, call me Roz. On our left is Chi Zhang, she’s our computer geek.”
Bahn nodded and Zhang nodded back, her long black ponytail making snake-like movements in the low gravity.
“Next to Zhang we have Beb Silvestri, he’s the techie who looks after our experimental section, and he cooks a mean spag bol.”
“What’s spag bol?” Bahn asked.
“Spag bol, short for spaghetti bolognese… it’s a Brit thing I guess.”
“And Aussie,” a young man with long blond hair said, in an obvious Australian accent.
Beb nodded and yawned at the same time.
“Then we have the man with a big mouth, Peter Jones, our Aussie Chemical-cum-Physics expert. He’s a brain box, and as funny as hell.” The admiration in Roz’s voice very evident. “And finally, Blake Anderson, who loves to roam the surface looking for interesting stuff.”
Anderson, older than the rest by at least ten years, raised his left hand to Bahn, who simply nodded back.
Unfocussed.
Bahn didn’t know where that thought came from, but it was obvious now he concentrated on the lineup. It was a mishmash of scientists, all, save one, too young to have had much experience and none of them knew what they were doing. All except Anderson, who had an assured look on his face.
“Okay, you’ll get to have a long chat with these guys as we progress. First though, let me show you to your cell.”
“Cell,” Bahn said as he followed Roz out and into the connecting tube to the next module.
“Yeah, it’s what we call them because they are so small and can be a little cramped if two people are in one cell.”
“You live with one of these guys,” Bahn said, thumbing back at the central core they had just vacated.
“No! Good heavens, no,” Roz said, her face turning a deep crimson. “Follow me, it can take a while to get from one area to another.”
Primus
Bahn settled his backpack onto the small bunk that formed his bed. The tiny cell was well named. It felt claustrophobic already.
“What the hell am I doing here,” he said in a low voice, doing a three-sixty to take in the tiny space. His gaze met the entrance just as a white-haired older man walked past. Bahn, popped his head out and looked at the man turning the wheel on the door through to the next walk-tube.
“Excuse me,” Bahn blurted out.
The man turned and smiled. “Yes?”
“Who the hell are you?”
“Me?” the man said, tapping his chest.
“Yes, you. I’ve just been introduced to the team and you were not mentioned in the introduction.”
“Oh, that happens a lot, to me. Any inspection tours always leave out the janitor. The hired hand as it were. I’m Primus.”
Bahn, despite his concern, smiled. “Okay. Pleased to meet you,” he said, holding out his right hand.
Primus took the hand and the two men shook. Both with broad smiles.
Primus let go, turned and opened the hatchway. “See you around,” he said, another broad smile on his face. He stepped through and the hatch closed, the wheel turning until it locked.
Maxwell Bahn stood for a good minute, looking at the hatchway door, not quite understanding what had just happened.
***
An hour later and Bahn was back in the central hub, being led by Roz to the mess hall. The team were waiting for him, ready for a get-to-know-you session.
“So,” Roz said, pulling on a hot coffee ring-pull can. The tell-tale hiss and sudden warming of the can made Bahn thirsty suddenly.
“Sugar?” Roz said, handing the can to Bahn.
“No, I’m fine as it is, thanks.”
The research staff all seated, watching Bahn as he sipped the hot java.
“Hey, that’s not bad,” Bahn said.
“Well, that’s a good start,” Beb said.
Chuckles all around.
“By the way,” Bahn said, seating himself next to Zhang. “You never told me about Primus.”
A look of confusion on all the faces made Bahn wonder if he had imagined his encounter.
The opposite hatch door wheel squeaked and turned, making the group look up. The door opened and in stepped Primus. “Oh, sorry. Don’t mind me. Sorry for disturbing you,” he said as he walked through the group, smiling all the time. He opened the next hatch door and walked into the connecting tube, shutting the door behind him. All watched the wheel turn and lock.
“Primus,” Bahn said, with no idea why he had said it.
“Yes,” Roz said. “That was Primus.”
The others nodded, and nobody spoke for a few minutes.
Bahn wanted to question why there was one extra person on the staff roster but couldn’t quite form the words.
The rest of the staff looked at each other, a degree of confusion on their faces.
“Primus is the caretaker,” Roz said.
“He lives here,” Zhang said.
“He was here when we arrived,” Beb said.
“He built this place,” Anderson said.
“He’s very useful,” Peter Jones said.
“Oh, I see. Now I understand,” Bahn said.
Bahn wasn’t quite as confident as he sounded. He knew that. He also felt, from the looks on the other’s faces, they too were not so sure of their words. But nonetheless, Bahn was sure it was fine.
It was all fine.
“That’s fine,” Bahn said as much to himself as he did to the others.
Clean Sweep
Roz spoke first after the lull that followed Primus’ departure. “So, Maxwell, we need to discuss our project.”
“Please, call me Max. I’ve hated the name Maxwell since I realised it was my name.”
“Okay, Max it is,” Anderson said. “Let me tell you what we are trying to do here.”
Bahn looked at Roz, who shrugged and pointed a limp wrist at Anderson.
Anderson proceeded to baffle Bahn with scientific mumbo-jumbo that wasn’t part of Bahn’s remit.
“Of course,” Anderson said, “at the end of this we will have developed the ability to investigate remotely. And should we come up against an alien…”
“I think that’s about all for now,” Roz said.
Bahn yawned.
“That’s it, Anderson. Can’t you see your target is tired?”
“Tired! We don’t have time to be tired. Time is precious. Time is running out. The threat is with us…”
“Enough,” Zhang said.
Anderson opened his mouth, but Zhang’s determined gaze made him sit back and close his mouth.
“You must be tired,” Roz said turning to Max. “You’ve come a long way,” she added, standing up.
“Yeah, I guess you’re right, Roz. I had better get some sleep. I’ll catch you all later.”
Bahn opened the hatch door, stepped through and shut the door. The others watched the wheel spin and lock in place.
“Are you stupid?” Roz hissed at Anderson.
“He needs to be indoctrinated,” Anderson hissed back. “He’s the key. Our missing link. He has more information on Androids in his little finger than any of us put together.”
“It’s not the point,” Zhang said. “He is…”
The wheel to the opposing door clicked and then span anti-clockwise. The hatch door opened and Primus stepped through. Shutting the door behind him and spinning the wheel into the locking position. He turned and smiled. “Hello all. Don’t let me disturb you. Carry on talking,” he said, walking through the cramped space and unlocking the opposing door. He opened the hatch and paused. He turned. “Night all. Taking our new member some bedding,” he said. He stepped through and was gone.
“He’s very thoughtful,” Roz said.
“He didn’t have any bedding,” Anderson said.
“He did, under his arm,” Beb said.
“In a bag,” Peter Jones muttered.
They sat for a while, looking at each other, confusion written across their faces.
***
By the time Bahn got to his cell, he was yawning. He spun the wheel and opened the hatch and stepped inside. His bed had been made, and a neat, folded, piece of paper, sat on the crisp white pillow.
Bahn picked up the paper and opened it.
NOTHING IS WHAT IT SEEMS.
PROJECT CLEAN SWEEP IS A FRONT FOR THE MILITARY.
LOOK INTO PROJECT DOMINION.
That was it. Nothing more, just a warning in bold block letters.
Dominion
“Dominion, dominion… Project Dominion… nothing, not a thing,” Bahn muttered, as he tapped the computer screen, scrolling through countless references to projects and dominion. But nothing came up as a military project. The search engine, multiple search engines, seemed devoid of any information even obscurely referencing a project hinting at dominion.
He sat back and stretched, his fingers almost touching the rear wall of his cell. Bahn sat forward again and picked up the piece of paper for what seemed like the hundredth time.
LOOK INTO PROJECT DOMINION
The words have no meaning.
Bahn yawned. It was 03:00 local time and he needed sleep. He took the paper in both hands and screwed it up, then threw it into the mouth of the waste disposal. It would have disappeared in a flash of disintegrating laser light, had it not missed and bounced off onto the cell floor.
“For the love of…” Bahn muttered. He leaned over sideways and stretched to reach the paper and fell to the floor instead. Bahn laughed at his predicament. Stuck between his chair and desk and the solid base of the bunk bed, staring at the waste disposal bin… that had words stamped on the base. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
Bahn’s eyes looked left at the base of the desk. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
The bed. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
Even the chair. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
Bahn struggled to unwind his body and stand up.
He picked up the stylus for the computer. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
He lifted the computer and turned it over. PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
Then he noticed the untouched notepad. Blazoned across the front sheet were the words - PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION and beneath that, a web address.
If it’s military, it cannot be this simple.
Bahn sat down and tapped in the web address, and a whole new world opened up for him.
It was unrestricted access, no closed pages, and even had terrestrial telephone numbers, contact names and best of all, an About Us page.
Bahn began reading. And of what he read, none of it shouted TOP SECRET. And yet, Bahn finished pouring over the data and was immediately engulfed in a feeling of falsehood.
Project Dominion was a military backed setup designed to create androids that would explore the galaxy on behalf of humans.
The technical data was sound. The methodology sound. But there was one glaring omission and one tiny snippet of unwanted openness.
There was no mention of how the androids they created would carry out any form of exploration or mention of their goals.
But what was glaringly obvious, was a program in place to teach the androids advanced weaponry training and even multiple forms of unarmed combat… for self-defence purposes. Self-defence against what? Against whom?
Maxwell Bahn felt a shiver down his spine. “Oh my god. Dominion, of course, What is the definition of dominion? The power or right of governing and controlling; sovereign authority.” Earth’s military were not preparing to explore the galaxy, they were preparing to conquer it.
What is Dominion
Bahn made his way through the complex, searching for Primus. He had an odd idea that Primus knew more than he let on. As he passed through the empty mess hall, he could hear what sounded like someone whispering. He stopped, back tracked and then he saw Anderson, leaning on the kitchen bench, obviously waiting for the steaming kettle to boil, but at the same time talking. There was nobody else in the mess area, so Bahn guessed he was using some form of hidden comms device. He looked at Anderson’s ears and saw the tell-tale bud behind his left ear.
Neural-Hyperwave? That’s pretty hi-tech.
“Hi, Anderson,” Bahn said.
Anderson almost jumped out of his skin. “What the f…” he almost shouted as he turned around. When he saw Bahn his left hand went to his left ear.
Turned it off.
“Hey, what are you doing, man. It’s a bit early for sub-etheric phone calls, don’t you think.”
Anderson’s face flushed read. “My partner,” he said in way of explanation.
You’re not married nor do you have a partner according to your personnel records.
“Okay, expensive way of keeping in contact. Sub-Egrams are a cheaper option.”
“Yeah, she insists. You know how it is.”
Bahn nodded. “Okay, whatever. I needed to talk to you anyway. I wanted to ask you about Project Dominion.” Bahn let the words drop like a lead weight.
Anderson’s flush drained from his skin as it turned pale. “Don’t know what you mean,” he said, not knowing which way to turn.
“It seems Dominion owns this place. Just look at all the fixtures and fittings.”
Anderson’s eyes trailed toward the equipment on the kitchen counter.
Toaster – PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
“Oh hell,” Anderson whispered.
“What’s going on?”
Anderson looked up from examining the toaster. “I can’t tell you. It’s a…”
“State secret?”
“Something like that,” Anderson said, walking through the doorway into the hall where Bahn stood.
Bahn put his arm across the door. “I need answers.”
Anderson shook his head. “I can’t give you any answers. Ask Roz, she’s in charge.” Anderson pushed Bahn’s arm out the way and walked through and out of the mess hall.
Okay, I’ll see Roz in the morning.
Bahn turned and made his way back to his cell, feeling he had stumbled on a dangerous secret, that wasn’t going to have a happy ending, for anyone.
The Key in Me
Bahn opened a hot coffee ring-pull can and waited for the heat to subside before he took his first sip of the day. He sat in the empty mess hall and waited. It was 07:00 and he was tired. When he got back to his cell early that morning he hadn’t been able to sleep. Too much going on, and his brain was trying to make a story of a few snippets of information he was privy to.
The port hatchway’s round door lock spun and Bahn turned, expecting the full staff to walk in and explain everything to him.
The door opened and Primus stepped in, shutting the door behind himself and turning the wheel to lock it. He turned and saw Bahn. “I’m glad I caught you. We need a chat.”
“Not sure I’m in the mood for a chat. This place gives me the creeps. The staff are evasive and there is someone among them sending me notes.”
“Not quite correct, only one note.”
Bahn looked at Primus, a quizzical look. At first he didn’t grasp what Primus the caretaker had said.
Primus stood, regarding Bahn, waiting for something.
“Is there something else,” Bahn said. “Something…”
Primus smiled as the expression on Bahn’s face went from confused to revelatory.
“You,” Bahn said.
Primus playfully grinned and pointed to himself.
“You,” Bahn said again, raising his left arm and pointing at Primus.
“Yes?” Primus said.
“You sent the note.”
Primus nodded, grinning like a Cheshire cat.
“Are you crazy or something?”
“No, no. Wrong response, Maxwell. Think about it. Think man.”
Bahn shook his head slowly back and forth. And then the spark of understanding lit his face up. “This place is all about secrecy. They not creating anything… they’re researching something… and they want me to create an android for… research?”
Primus shook his head.
“I’m missing something,” Bahn said.
The two men stood looking at each other. One saying nothing for fear of saying too much, the other saying nothing, for a lack of understanding.
“You are the key,” Bahn said.
Primus slowly shook his head, a grimace on his face.
Bahn shook his head in unison, exasperation on his face. Then he looked surprised. “I’m the key. This place needs me to create an android, because they need it for a secret project… that is… Anderson, now I remember. He mentioned aliens and a threat and… oh my god, is there a threat from space?”
“Bingo,” Primus yelled, just as the hatch opened and the rest of the staff began to file in.
“Come with me,” Primus said, dragging Bahn by the arm toward the other hatchway. “I need to show you something.”
Hercules
Primus led Bahn down under Hygiea/V2131’s lower levels where the hydroponics lab and gardens, storage facilities, energy batteries were located. And also a very large rover with the biggest wheels and tyres Bahn had ever seen.
“My little baby. I call her Hercules.” He turned to look at Bahn and gave him a winning smile, that made Bahn smile in turn.
“Those six wheels have provided me with endless days and nights of pleasure.”
“Wasn’t Hercules a man?” Bahn asked.
“Well, does it matter? It’s my name for her,” he said opening his arms wide.
“Where are we going?”
“For a little ride. And a chat. You need your eyes opening, young man.”
Bahn sighed. “For a caretaker, you have access to so many restricted areas.”
“Even Top-Secret areas need a dusting every now and then,” Primus said with a broad grin.
***
Hercules, with Primus at the controls, was barrelling along at 20 kph and bouncing round and over humps, rocks and any other imperfections Primus noticed.
“Why are we going so fast? What’s the hurry?”
Primus ignored him. “Did you read the note I left you?”
“Oh, so that was you. I’m renaming you Spy-Janitor… you’re not a spy, are you?”
Primus grinned and shook his head. “No. How can you be a spy when you already know everything there is to know.”
Bahn frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Bahn felt uncomfortable for the first time since he had arrived on Hygiea. “So, what is this Project Dominion?”
“Quite simply, it’s man’s attempt to control nature. The military’s attempt to establish dominion over nature. They want to build an artificial human. A warrior. The perfect fearless warrior that will stop at nothing to destroy it’s perceived enemy. In much the same way Anderson operates as a military agent of UNIT-32.”
Bahn took a deep breath and let the air out slowly. “UNIT-32? That sounds ominous. This is getting beyond my brief and beyond my expertise.”
Primus shook his head. “No. No it’s not. You know more than you realise. You will be the father of a major breakthrough in your android project.”
“How? I haven’t got an android project yet. That’s why I’m here.”
“I know. But believe me, your knowledge will ultimately save humanity from the threat it faces.”
“What threat? You’re a janitor and you’re talking in riddles.”
Primus looked sideways and gave Bahn that winning smile again. “Life, is one long threat.”
Life is One Long Threat
“We are leaving our nice cosy crater and going for a crawl past the plains and to the back of the Ridge of Sighs.”
“Ridge of Sighs. Who gave it that name?”
“I did, just now,” Primus said.
Bahn sat back and tried to relax as the bumping grew in intensity.
***
Bahn was nudged awake by Primus. “We’re nearly there. Be prepared.”
“Prepared for what?”
“A shock.”
“To the body?”
“To your human superior ego and your intellect.”
“Are you trying to be funny…”
“Does that make you laugh?” Primus said, nodding forward.
Bahn followed the nod and tried to jump out of his seat. “What the f…”
“Exactly,” Primus said.
“It’s a city! A damn great…”
“Alien city. Hiding behind the Ridge of Sighs. Impressive, isn’t it?”
“I’m… I’m…”
“Lost for words? Welcome to Threnn Central. I hope you’re ready for a quick dash back to Hygiea/V2131”
“What… I… what… for fuc…”
“It’s an alien city built by an alien race.”
“Alien?”
“The Threnn.”
“Why? Why are they here.”
“They feel this is as much their back-yard as yours. They are here to tidy up. Well, sweep up actually.”
“Sweep up? Sweep up what?”
“The asteroid belt.”
“What? But it’s ours. You mean they want to wipe out our asteroid belt?”
“No, not wipe out, not at all. They’re going to do what your lot are trying to do. They have the technology to sweep up, and process the entire asteroid belt, and probably the Oort Cloud too. They will process the collected debris for new elements, chemicals, etcetera. They want life preserving and life enhancing new drugs. Just like your people.”
“But that will put the solar system off-balance… it will destroy the system.”
“And humanity with it.”
But Why?
Bahn sat in the left seat, normally reserved for the co-pilot of Hercules. He was stunned into silence. He looked through the main window, watching Hygiea/V2131 get bigger and bigger, but couldn’t quite comprehend why it seemed so small.
“It’s because Threnn Central is so big. That’s why you’re lost for words.”
Bahn turned to Primus. His mouth open, but no words forming.
“Take a breath,” Primus said.
Bahn breathed deeply and let the air out slowly.
“Better?”
Bahn nodded. Then the words came. “Aliens! Bloody aliens, in our backyard. What the hell are they doing, no, wait, yes, you said… okay, they consider this their back yard… where are they from? How can this be their back yard? So many questions!”
“Kepler-452b, in the constellation Cygnus, 1,400 light-years away from Earth. That is the home planet of the Threnn.”
Bahn turned and looked at Primus. “That’s nowhere near us. How can they consider this their back yard.”
Primus laughed. “Their empire stretches from Cygnus all the way to the asteroid belt. We have just seen their new outpost. Believe me, this, to them, is their backyard.”
Bahn held his hand up. “Okay, okay, enough. Let me just sit and let all this sink in.”
“Yes, it can be overwhelming, at first. Take you time. We will be back at base in an hour and all will be revealed.”
“Everything?”
Primus smiled again. “Well, most of it,” he said with an added grimace. "Some threats do not come from the future or the past, but from the quiet moment when humanity first decided it deserved dominion over the stars."
Act II
“The distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
Albert Einstein
It’s Our Rubble
Anderson leaned against the edge of the kitchen sink, once more in the early hours, talking to someone through his Neural-Hyperwave device. And once more, a more enlightened Bahn came upon him, Anderson unaware Bahn was stood behind him listening.
“We can’t move forward until Bahn is made aware…” Anderson said, then waited for a response.
“Yes, yes I know we have to keep this a secret but…”
Another pause, as he listened.
“Very well, I’ll do what I can. But it’s damn hard answering a question with a lie. Unless Bahn knows the truth… Okay, fine. I’ll see what I can do.”
“Can I make a suggestion?” Bahn said.
Anderson almost jumped in surprise, his shoulder clipping the cupboard door.
“Stop creeping up on me.”
“I wasn’t creeping up. I walked up. You make a really bad spy, Anderson.”
Anderson’s eyes narrowed. “How much did you hear?”
“Enough to know you’re still pretending you don’t know anything,” Bahn said. “Which is a spectacularly pointless act now.”
Anderson scoffed. “Now? And what changed ‘now’?”
Bahn stepped forward until they were almost nose to nose. “I know about the Threnn.”
Anderson blinked. “Threnn? Who or what is or are the Threnn.”
Bahn exhaled slowly, as if he were trying to stop himself from shouting. “There is an existential threat to humanity. The Threnn are an alien species threatening the core existence of humanity. It’s not a temporary setback. We are talking irreversibility. The potential consequences are permanent, not to be easily recovered from. The scope of the threat is vast, affecting our entire solar system. Nations, humanity, our ecosystems, everything is about to be wiped out and you people are thrashing about not knowing what to do.”
Anderson swallowed. “Who told you all this?”
Bahn looked confused for a moment, then almost laughed. “Nobody. I worked it out for myself. Or rather, I was shown enough to stop lying to myself.”
“Shown?” Anderson repeated, but his voice had lost its edge.
“You know there is a technology at work on this planetoid,” Bahn said, pointing at the ceiling, as if the Threnn city sat directly overhead. “But you haven’t gone out onto the surface to see what it is.”
Anderson’s jaw tightened. “I take my orders from a higher authority.”
“There,” Bahn said. “Right there. That’s the problem.”
Anderson stared blankly.
“You haven’t thought any of this through,” Bahn continued. “You have no idea what is happening, but you haven’t once tried to physically investigate. You’ve made secrecy into a religion. Meanwhile, something is building a city behind your back.”
Anderson’s nostrils flared. “It’s not easy.”
“Life isn’t easy,” Bahn said, voice low. “Life is one big threat. But we deal with it or we die.”
The kettle clicked off. Neither of them moved.
Anderson’s fingers touched the Neural-Hyperwave bud. “You shouldn’t have been told.”
“I wasn’t told,” Bahn said. “I was confronted. There’s a difference.”
“By whom?” Anderson asked, already knowing the answer and hating it.
Bahn didn’t reply. He simply held Anderson’s gaze until Anderson looked away first.
“Fine,” Anderson muttered. “What do you want from me?”
“The truth,” Bahn said. “And the moment you stop speaking in riddles, you might actually help save Earth.”
Anderson gave a brittle laugh. “Earth doesn’t know we’re here.”
“They do now,” Bahn replied. “And they’ve already decided we’re the problem.”
Anderson froze.
Bahn nodded once. “Yes. It’s started.”
Threnn
“The Threnn consider the asteroid belt excess mass. Nobody wants it. It’s there for the taking. To them it’s a resource and it should be used. But in doing so, the Threnn are going to wipe out humanity. So, humanity must see them as a threat.”
Bahn and Primus walked away from Hercules toward the lift shaft.
“Can’t we just talk to them? When they know we exist, they will stop what they are doing. Surely.”
Bahn saw Primus’ pained expression for the first time.
“No,” Primus said, shaking his head, “they already know all about human beings.”
“Surely a sentient spacefaring species is enlightened?”
Primus shook his head again. “No. Think of it this way. If a house you lived in, say a wooden house, suddenly had a termite problem, what would you do?”
“Call in the pest control people and get rid of them.” Bahn stopped. “Oh my god.”
“Exactly. To the Threnn, humanity is simply an infestation.”
Bahn swallowed hard, stopped walking and bent forward, retching.
“Yes, not easy to swallow is it?” Primus said. “The truth about life kind of hurts if you’re a caring sort of creature.”
Bahn wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s so unfair.”
“They have the technology and ability to sweep the entire asteroid belt clean. The Sol solar system will be off-balance. The inner planets will be swept into the Sun, causing a catastrophic explosion. The outer planets will be pushed out of orbit and hurtle away from the ever-expanding explosion of the Sun. Humanity and every living thing will be gone, forever. Nothing left but cosmic dust and a pretty afterglow someone, somewhere, will see through a telescope.”
Bahn pressed a fist to his forehead. “I think I’m gonna…”
Primus grimaced and turned away. “You’re born, life is a bitch and then you die.”
Bahn looked up sharply. “That’s meant to help?”
“It’s meant to resonate truth,” Primus said. “Truth rarely comforts on first contact.”
Survival of the Fittest
“How are you feeling?”
Bahn sat on the edge of his bed in his tiny cell and felt smaller than he had ever felt before. He looked at Primus who was sat at Bahn’s desk, doodling on Bahn’s computer.
“I feel terrible. We are about to become cosmic dust and all you can do is doodle.”
Primus placed the stylus on the desk and sat back. “There’s not a lot I can do about all this. I’m more a writer than a fighter.”
“Oh, that’s easy for you to say,” Bahn snapped. “It’s the likes of me that have to join the military and fight or be killed. And be killed.”
“You’re panicking.”
“Too damn right I’m panicking, man. This stuff is scary. Crazy. This happens in books, not to real people.”
Primus’s expression softened. “Maybe you need to calm yourself.”
“Calm down? Is that what you were about to say?” Bahn’s laugh was edged with hysteria. “Son of a bitch, I’ll be wetting myself next. I’m scared. Aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Primus said. “Terrified.”
Bahn blinked. “You don’t look it.”
“That’s because fear can either steer you, or eat you,” Primus replied. “I’ve had practice.”
Bahn stared. “How old are you, exactly?”
Primus smiled faintly. “Old enough to have seen clever men mistake certainty for safety.”
Bahn’s hands flexed, as if he wanted to grab hold of something solid. “What are they like?”
“The Threnn?”
Bahn nodded.
“I was hoping you would ask.” Primus tapped the screen, turning it towards Bahn. A simple sketch filled the display: humanoid, upright, lean, almost graceful, with subtle differences that made the familiarity unsettling.
“They’re human,” Bahn said.
“They are not human,” Primus replied, “but your brain will insist they are, because it needs handles. Yes, that is a male.”
“So, they have women. Families.”
Primus nodded.
“Same lifespan?”
“Hmmm. Almost. Hence the need to harvest.”
“Superior technology?”
“Very much so.”
“Warlike?”
“No,” Primus said. “Not really.”
Bahn’s brow furrowed. “But humans are warlike.”
Primus’s eyes glinted. “That’s your first advantage.”
Bahn’s fear shifted, just slightly, into something else. “So, were we to go in for the kill, they would retreat?”
Primus said nothing, only nodded.
Bahn’s voice lowered. “We have to stop them here. Without Earth’s help.”
“You have help,” Primus said.
“You mean you.”
Primus tilted his head. “I mean your mind.”
Bahn exhaled and forced himself to look at the drawing again. “We have no weapons. No means to fight them.”
“You do not need to fight them head on,” Primus said. “You need to make them misstep.”
Bahn’s eyes sharpened. “Stealth.”
“Now you’re talking,” Primus said. “As I said, they are not warlike. Survival does not require malice, only indifference. But even the powerful can be toppled. You only have to look at Earth’s past to realise that.”
Bahn stared at him. “How do you know all this?”
Primus’s smile returned, light and irritating. “I know a lot of stuff. I know a lot about cleaning too. Did you know if you pour equal measures of lime juice and lemon juice down a toilet bowl you will…”
“Stop,” Bahn said. “Enough with the banter. Who are you?”
“I’m Primus,” Primus said. “We were introduced.”
A tap on the cell door stopped the conversation dead.
“Yes,” Bahn called, too loudly.
The cell door opened revealing a gaggle of staff, Roz at the head. “We have a problem.”
“What sort of problem?” Bahn asked.
“ECC, Earth Central Command, are reporting all Earth defences are down,” Roz said. “The defence grid has been neutralised. They’re expecting an attack.”
Bahn didn’t need to ask, but he did anyway. “From whom?”
“Not who,” Roz said, and her voice trembled. “Where.”
“Where?”
“Us,” Roz said. “They have named this research base as the enemy within.”
The words hung in the air like a verdict.
Anderson stepped forward, pale. “They know about Hygiea?”
“They know about Dominion,” Zhang said quietly. “Or rather, they know enough to panic.”
“Panic gets people killed,” Bahn muttered.
Primus leaned close to Bahn’s ear. “Panic also gets the truth spoken.”
Roz looked at Bahn. “Max, we need you in the hub. Now.”
Bahn stood, legs slightly unsteady, and met Primus’s gaze.
Primus nodded once. “Eyes open. Ego off.”
Arrival
The central hub felt smaller than ever, full of bodies and too much breathing. Screens were lit. Alarms were not sounding, but the silence carried the same threat.
Zhang tapped at her console. “ECC are broadcasting on open loop. They’re demanding we identify ourselves.”
“And if we do not?” Roz asked.
“They will treat Hygiea/V2131 as a hostile installation,” Zhang said. “They have already moved assets to intercept.”
Beb swallowed. “Assets like what?”
“Like ships,” Peter Jones said, voice thin. “Ships that have weapons.”
Anderson shook his head. “Earth cannot fire on this base. There are civilians.”
Roz gave him a look. “Earth does not see civilians. They see contamination.”
Bahn stepped closer to the main display. The map of Hygiea orbit glowed, with vectors like thin knives.
“Where did the defence grid go?” Bahn asked.
“Not destroyed,” Zhang said, fingers flying. “Neutralised. Like someone reached in and switched it off.”
Bahn’s skin prickled. “The Threnn.”
Anderson’s eyes widened. “That’s impossible.”
“Nothing is impossible,” Primus said, stepping into the hub as if he had been there all along. “Only inconvenient.”
Zhang’s voice rose. “We have an incoming signal. Not ECC. Not Dominion. Not any Terran registry.”
Roz’s face drained. “From where?”
Zhang pointed at the screen. “From the surface. Behind the ridge.”
Silvestri’s hands trembled. “They are calling us?”
“No,” Primus said. “They are announcing themselves.”
The main display flickered. For a heartbeat, nothing. Then a pattern of light, geometric and calm, resolved into a shape that felt like language without words.
Bahn heard it, not in his ears, but somewhere behind his eyes. A presence. A pressure. An assessment.
Not hatred.
Indifference.
Roz whispered, “This is it.”
Bahn swallowed. “They are not asking permission.”
This Is Not An Invasion
There were no explosions. No dramatic descent of ships into the crater. No thunderous voice proclaiming conquest.
Instead, systems failed.
One by one.
Hygiea/V2131’s external sensor arrays blinked out, then returned with a slight lag, as if reality itself had developed a stutter. A communications relay flashed, then went silent. Power levels dipped, recovered, dipped again.
Zhang watched the readouts with horror. “They are testing us.”
“Testing what?” Beb asked.
“Testing how quickly we notice,” Zhang said.
Anderson slammed a fist against the bulkhead. “This is a reconnaissance operation.”
Primus’s tone was calm. “No. Reconnaissance implies uncertainty. They are not uncertain.”
Roz turned to Bahn. “Max, do you understand any of this? You’re the one who found Dominion, the one who spotted what we missed.”
Bahn stared at the display, eyes unfocused. “They have already decided we do not matter.”
“Then why show themselves now?” Peter Jones asked.
Bahn answered without looking away. “Because the moment an infestation realises it is being exterminated, it behaves unpredictably.”
Silence followed.
Roz whispered, “So they are trying to remove our ability to be unpredictable.”
Primus nodded. “Surgical vulnerability. A neat trick.”
Bahn forced himself to breathe. “If they can neutralise Earth’s grid, they can neutralise us.”
“And yet,” Primus said, “here you are. Still alive. Still thinking. Which means they have not yet pressed the final button.”
Bahn looked at him. “Why not?”
Primus’s smile was thin. “Because even indifference likes efficiency. They prefer the path of least resistance.”
Bahn’s fear sharpened into clarity. “Then we become resistance.”
All's Fair in Love, War and Space
They gathered in the mess hall because it was the only place that felt remotely human.
Roz pushed coffee cans into hands that did not really want them.
Bahn stared at the steaming ring-pull can as if it were proof of a world that might not exist tomorrow.
“Space is empty,” Beb said, almost pleading. “That’s what we grew up being told.”
Bahn shook his head. “Space is not empty. It is simply not built for us.”
Peter Jones gave a humourless laugh. “And it is not fair either.”
“No,” Bahn said. “Fair is something humans invented so we could sleep at night.”
Anderson leaned forward. “What do we do?”
Bahn looked around the table. “We stop treating this like a lab problem.”
Zhang frowned. “What does that mean?”
“It means we stop asking what is ethical and start asking what is necessary,” Bahn said, then immediately regretted how Dominion it sounded.
Primus raised a finger. “Careful. Dominion starts with ‘necessary’ and ends with ‘permitted’.”
Bahn nodded once. “You’re right. Let me say it properly. We do what we must, and we do it with eyes open. Not pretending we are heroes.”
Roz’s voice cracked. “Do we even have a chance?”
Bahn’s answer was quiet. “We only need one chance. We only need them to make one mistake.”
Anderson stared. “And how do we make an advanced alien species make a mistake?”
Bahn looked at Primus.
Primus didn’t speak. He simply waited.
Bahn’s mind reached for history the way it always did when science failed. Not because history was comforting, but because it was instructive.
“How do you sink a battleship?” Bahn asked.
“What’s a battleship?” Roz asked.
“Okay, you’re British. Do you know any history? Elizabeth I?”
“Oh, yes, fireboats, against the Spanish Armada.”
“Fireboats? I’m none the wiser," Anderson said.
"Small wooden ships the English set fire to, then rammed the Spanish Galleons which were much bigger and much slower,” Roz said.
“Exactly,” Bahn said. “But only, if you do it correctly.”
All It Takes Is One Little Push
After the meeting broke, Bahn found Primus alone in the corridor, standing as if he belonged to the metal.
“Was that your plan?” Bahn asked.
Primus didn’t turn. “Was what my plan?”
“Getting me here. Getting me to see. Getting me to speak.”
Primus glanced at him. “Do you feel pushed?”
Bahn hesitated. “Yes.”
“Good,” Primus said. “A man rarely moves until something stops being comfortable.”
Bahn’s jaw tightened. “You enjoy this.”
“I enjoy survival,” Primus replied. “And I enjoy watching a clever man become useful.”
Bahn bristled. “I was useful before.”
Primus finally turned, eyes suddenly hard. “No. Before, you were brilliant and directionless. Now you are brilliant and frightened. Fear is direction.”
Bahn’s anger faltered.
Primus’s voice softened. “All it takes is one little push. Not heroics. Not speeches. A push.”
Bahn swallowed. “And the push is?”
Primus’s smile returned. “A plan.”
In The Belt
They took Hercules out again, not because the rover mattered, but because moving helped thinking.
The Ridge of Sighs rose like a scar against the star-thick sky. Hygiea’s low gravity made everything feel unreal, as if they were walking inside a dream that could end abruptly.
From the ridge, Threnn Central sat exposed, vast and silent. Its structures were not crude metal domes or bolted scaffolding. They looked grown, not built, like architecture that had been persuaded into shape.
Bahn whispered, “How long have they been here?”
Primus shrugged. “Long enough to be confident they will always be here.”
“And nobody noticed.”
Primus glanced at him. “People notice what they expect to see.”
Bahn stared at the city, then at the sky beyond it. “Where are their ships?”
Primus lifted a hand and pointed, not at the horizon, but into the void. “There.”
Bahn squinted.
Nothing.
Then, a shimmer, barely perceptible, like heat haze.
And then another.
Bahn felt his stomach drop. “That’s not a ship.”
“It is,” Primus said. “It is simply not trying to be visible.”
“How many?” Bahn asked.
Primus’s voice was flat. “Enough.”
Bahn’s mind raced. “If they can cloak in plain sight, we cannot fight them.”
Primus nodded. “Correct.”
Bahn’s eyes hardened. “So we do not fight them. We sabotage them.”
Primus smiled. “Now you are learning the difference.”
An Armada
Back in the hub, Bahn drew circles on the screen with a stylus, crude shapes representing large Threnn vessels.
“They’re too big,” Beb said, watching. “Too armoured. Too advanced.”
“Exactly,” Bahn replied. “So we do not try to pierce them.”
“And what do we do?” Roz asked.
Bahn’s gaze went distant. “We do what England did when the Spanish Armada came.”
Peter Jones blinked. “You’re quoting naval history at an alien armada.”
“Yes,” Bahn said. “Because people forget that size is not the same as invulnerability.”
Zhang leaned forward. “Fire ships.”
Bahn nodded. “Small ships. Just like the Spanish and French Armada against England, we use small ships as fire ships, to disable or destroy the bigger ships.”
“And what do we use for fire?” Anderson asked. “A fireship has to have fire.”
“The engines,” Bahn said. “We let the atomic pile go critical.”
The room went silent.
Roz’s eyes widened. “That would kill whoever pilots it.”
Bahn nodded once. “Which is why we do not use people.”
Primus’s smile was faint. “Ah. There it is.”
Roz looked at Bahn. “Your androids.”
“Not explorers,” Bahn said, voice steady. “Not conquerors. Protectors. Disposable, if they must be, but not human.”
Anderson’s mouth tightened. “Dominion will love this.”
Bahn snapped his head towards Anderson. “Dominion will hate it, because it is not dominion. It is defence.”
Primus nodded. “A small but meaningful difference.”
Zhang breathed out. “We still have no androids.”
Bahn’s eyes flicked to Primus. “Yes, we do.”
Primus’s expression didn’t change, but something in his eyes said, careful.
Bahn continued, “Project Dominion has stock. Prototypes. Training programmes. Combat routines. If we can access their storage, we can repurpose what exists.”
Roz nodded slowly. “We have Dominion property everywhere. That means supply chains.”
“Which means,” Bahn said, “somewhere, in this base, there is a sealed module. And in that module, there is exactly what we need.”
Anderson’s voice was tight. “And the moment we touch it, ECC will treat us as hostile.”
Bahn answered evenly. “ECC already does.”
Fuel Leak
They found the sealed Dominion bay behind a bulkhead that had no reason to exist.
Primus opened it like a man opening a cupboard.
Bahn stared. “How did you…”
“Dusting,” Primus said.
Inside sat three crate-like pods, each marked in clean block lettering: PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION.
Zhang ran a hand over the casing. “These are android frames.”
Bahn’s heart thudded. “Not full units,” he said, already thinking faster than he could speak. “Frames. Skeleton and musculature. No cognition core.”
Beb cursed. “So, we cannot pilot them.”
“We can,” Bahn said, eyes scanning the room. “We can remote-run them. Dumb guidance. Simple tasks. Aiming, propulsion, collision.”
“And if their comms are jammed?” Anderson asked.
Bahn smiled without humour. “Then we do not use comms.”
They stared at him.
Bahn pointed upwards. “Solar wind. Charged particles. A constant stream. You can ride it if you build correctly.”
Peter Jones frowned. “That’s… theoretical.”
“So is dying,” Bahn replied. “If I can build a sail skin for these frames, and if we leak a trace ion signature, we can let the solar wind do the pushing.”
Roz blinked. “A fuel leak.”
Bahn nodded. “Not enough to alert them. Enough to move us. We drift into their blind spot and let momentum do the rest.”
Primus looked pleased. “A shove. Not a punch.”
Bahn met his eyes. “All it takes is one little push.”
Risk Analysis
They argued for an hour.
They argued about ethics, probability, failure rates, collateral debris, domino effects, political ramifications, and whether any of it mattered if Earth’s defences were already down.
Finally, Bahn slammed his palm on the table. “Stop over-analysing. You do not have the time.”
Roz opened her mouth.
Bahn cut her off gently. “Roz, I understand. You are the one who keeps people alive. That makes you cautious. But caution is not always intelligence.”
Zhang nodded slowly. “Risk is unavoidable.”
Bahn’s voice steadied. “Life is a constant risk. We only pretend otherwise until something reminds us.”
Anderson’s shoulders sagged. “ECC will fire on us if they see anything unusual.”
Bahn shrugged. “Then we do not let them see.”
“And the Threnn?” Beb asked. “They can see everything.”
Primus spoke softly. “No. They see what they consider relevant.”
Bahn leaned forward. “Which is the point. We become irrelevant until we are not.”
It’s Like Playing Pool
Hercules sat in the bay while Bahn mapped trajectories across the display.
“It’s like playing pool,” Bahn said. “You do not aim for where the ball is. You aim for where it will be.”
Peter Jones stared at the plotted lines. “Except the table is full of rocks.”
Bahn nodded. “The belt is not empty. It is a minefield and a motorway at the same time.”
Beb rubbed his face. “There are no safe angles.”
“Exactly,” Bahn said. “That is why you cannot seek safety. You seek timing.”
Zhang pointed at a cluster. “If we clip that, we become debris.”
“And debris is a language the Threnn understand,” Primus said quietly.
Bahn looked up. “Meaning?”
“Meaning,” Primus replied, “they will notice debris. They will not notice a whisper.”
Bahn swallowed. “So we drift. We graze nothing. We become a whisper.”
“And then?” Anderson asked.
Bahn’s eyes were cold. “And then we become a match and we light the fuse.”
Under Pressure
They built fast.
Not elegantly. Not perfectly.
Bahn stripped his own equipment, cannibalised anything stamped Dominion, and repurposed it into guidance, sail-skins, and a crude proximity trigger that did not require a signal.
Roz watched him work and whispered, “You are not sleeping.”
“I’ll sleep when Earth is not about to be exterminated,” Bahn muttered.
“You’ll make mistakes,” Roz warned.
Bahn’s hands shook. “I know.”
Primus stood beside him. “Your intellect is not the thing under pressure,” Primus said. “Your ego is.”
Bahn snapped, “My ego is not the problem.”
Primus’s voice stayed calm. “Then stop trying to prove you can do this alone.”
Bahn froze.
Roz stepped in and handed him a coffee can. “Drink.”
He did, grimacing at the taste.
Zhang pushed a console towards him. “Trajectory input. I can do the maths. You do the logic.”
Beb held up a sealed unit. “Framework ready.”
For the first time, Bahn felt something close to relief.
Not safety.
But shared weight.
Calm Under Fire
The first Threnn ship moved.
Not closer, not overtly. It simply shifted position in a way that made Bahn’s skin crawl, like a predator adjusting to wind direction.
Zhang’s voice tightened. “They are changing orbit.”
“And Earth?” Roz asked.
Anderson looked up from his console. “ECC assets are moving into strike range.”
Bahn’s pulse hammered. “So we are between two threats.”
Primus shrugged, as if discussing weather. “Life is one long threat.”
Bahn wanted to punch him, but he knew Primus was right.
Roz whispered, “If ECC fires, the Threnn will interpret it as aggression.”
“And if the Threnn interpret aggression,” Peter Jones said, “they will stop being surgical.”
Bahn’s voice steadied. “Then we cannot give either side a reason to escalate.”
“How?” Zhang demanded.
Bahn pointed at the trajectory lines. “We launch on a window. One. If we miss it, we die.”
Beb swallowed. “That’s comforting.”
Primus smiled. “Comfort is overrated.”
Time Is Irrelevant
They were minutes from launch when Bahn caught Primus standing by a wall that had no utility, head tilted as if listening to something unheard.
“What are you doing?” Bahn asked.
Primus didn’t look at him. “Listening.”
“To what?”
“To the moment,” Primus said. “It has a texture.”
Bahn frowned. “That’s nonsense.”
Primus finally turned. “Is it? You are about to throw a handful of manufactured ghosts into the void, to collide with something that should not be here. If you call that nonsense, you have not understood your own life.”
Bahn’s stomach tightened. “Why do you speak like you are not afraid of time?”
Primus’s gaze held his. “Because time is irrelevant when you are already living out of sequence.”
Bahn stared. “What does that mean?”
Primus’s smile was faint. “It means you should stop asking questions that require answers you are not ready to carry.”
Before Bahn could respond, the alarm light blinked once, silent but urgent.
Zhang called out, “Launch window. Now.”
Bahn’s breath caught.
Primus placed a hand on Bahn’s shoulder, light as a whisper. “Push,” he said.
Bahn nodded once and stepped towards the console.
Act III
You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.
Abraham Lincoln
Victory With a Cost
The launch was silent.
No roar. No vibration. Just a subtle shift as the first of the android frames detached from the bay and slid into the dark like a held breath finally released.
Zhang’s fingers hovered above the console. “They’re drifting.”
Bahn nodded. “They’re supposed to.”
On the main display, the faint outlines of the android frames were barely visible, riding the solar wind exactly as planned. Not thrusting. Not accelerating. Simply existing in the same careless way as everything else in the belt.
Beb whispered, “They look so small.”
“They are,” Bahn said. “That’s the point.”
The Threnn ships did not react.
Minutes stretched.
Earth Central Command pinged again, a sharp, impatient pulse.
“They’re asking why our emissions have changed,” Anderson said.
Bahn didn’t look away from the screen. “Tell them maintenance.”
“That won’t hold.”
“It doesn’t have to,” Bahn replied. “Just long enough.”
Primus stood at the back of the hub, hands folded, watching not the screens but the people. Bahn felt his gaze like a weight and, strangely, like an anchor.
Then Zhang inhaled sharply. “They’ve noticed.”
One of the Threnn ships shifted. Not abruptly. Just enough to acknowledge a deviation.
“They’re tracking the debris,” Peter Jones said. “They think it’s accidental.”
“Good,” Bahn said. “Let them think that.”
The first android frame clipped the outer boundary of the Threnn vessel’s influence field.
Nothing happened.
The second frame drifted closer.
Still nothing.
Bahn’s jaw tightened. “Come on.”
The third frame made contact.
For a heartbeat, the universe hesitated.
Then the Threnn ship convulsed, not violently, but wrongly. Its surface rippled as the contained reaction inside the android frame went critical, energy bleeding into systems that had never been designed to absorb chaos.
Zhang gasped. “They didn’t shield for internal disruption.”
“Why would they?” Primus said quietly. “Nothing this primitive should be dangerous.”
The Threnn ship began to shed fragments, not exploding, but unravelling, like a machine discovering too late that it had been assembled incorrectly.
A second android frame followed, then a third.
“Chain reaction,” Beb whispered.
Bahn’s hands trembled. “We didn’t plan for—”
“No,” Primus said. “But they did not plan for you.”
The Threnn ship broke apart, its pieces drifting, inert, no longer purposeful. Around it, the other Threnn vessels moved, not in attack, but retreat.
“They’re pulling back,” Anderson said, disbelief in his voice.
“They’re recalculating,” Primus replied. “Loss was not in their equation.”
Another Threnn ship faltered as debris struck it at the wrong angle, the wrong moment. Not destroyed but wounded.
“Stop,” Roz said suddenly. “Max, stop the launch.”
Bahn froze. “What?”
“We’ve proven the point,” she said. “Any more and we risk destabilising the belt ourselves.”
Bahn stared at the console. His finger hovered over the abort command.
He saw the calculations in his mind, the cascading probabilities. He saw victory sliding, almost imperceptibly, into domination.
Primus’s voice was calm. “This is the moment that defines you.”
Bahn swallowed hard and cut the launch.
The remaining android frames stayed docked.
On the screen, the Threnn ships withdrew further, their formations breaking, not in panic, but in decision.
“They’re leaving the belt,” Zhang said.
Bahn sagged into his chair. “We did it.”
Roz didn’t smile. “No. We survived.”
The Defeated
Silence returned to Hygiea/V2131, but it was a different silence now.
Anderson watched the Threnn fleet diminish into nothingness. “They’ll come back.”
“Yes,” Primus said. “Eventually.”
“And next time?” Anderson asked.
Primus’s gaze drifted to Bahn. “Next time, they will be more cautious.”
Bahn closed his eyes. “So will we.”
No cheers followed. No relief. Just the heavy knowledge that something vast had been nudged, not solved.
Peter Jones broke the silence. “How many… died?”
Bahn didn’t answer immediately. “Too many,” he said finally.
Primus inclined his head. “Victory always comes at a cost, but payment usually comes later, when you least expect it.”
In a Safe Place
Earth Central Command stood down within the hour.
The defence grid came back online in hesitant stages, like a system waking from a bad dream.
ECC’s final transmission was clipped and impersonal.
Misidentification acknowledged. Further review pending.
Roz snorted. “Pending. Of course.”
“They’ll bury this,” Anderson said. “Classify it, deny it, rewrite it.”
Bahn nodded. “Good.”
Zhang frowned. “Good?”
“If they believe they were wrong,” Bahn said, “they won’t go looking for the right explanation.”
Primus smiled faintly. “Hiding in plain sight.”
Earth was safe.
For now.
Character Building on a Grand Scale
Bahn sat alone in his cell later, staring at the wall where the words PROPERTY OF PROJECT DOMINION had once felt accusatory.
Now they felt hollow.
Roz knocked softly and stepped inside. “You should rest.”
“I can’t,” Bahn said. “Every time I close my eyes, I see the ships breaking apart.”
Roz hesitated. “You saved billions.”
“At a cost I didn’t calculate properly,” Bahn replied.
She sat beside him. “That’s called being human.”
Bahn looked at her. “Dominion wanted conquerors. Explorers with guns. That path ends the same way every time.”
Roz nodded. “And the path you chose?”
“Is narrower,” Bahn said. “Harder. And it doesn’t let you pretend you’re a hero.”
She smiled sadly. “Good.”
Protector
The proposal Bahn submitted was short.
No grand language. No promises of supremacy.
Just one line, repeated like a mantra.
Android systems will be designed for protection, not expansion.
Dominion rejected it within minutes.
Earth Central Command flagged it for review.
Then, quietly, a third authority intervened.
Funding was reinstated.
Under a new designation.
Sentinel Programme.
Bahn read the confirmation twice and felt no triumph.
Only responsibility.
Hiding in Plain View
Primus did not attend the briefing.
Bahn searched the complex, corridors echoing with absence.
The caretaker’s tools were gone. The rover bay empty. Hercules silent.
In the mess hall, a single folded note sat on the table.
NOT BAD, MAXWELL. YOU PUSHED WHEN IT MATTERED.
That was all.
Bahn laughed once, quietly. “You could have stayed.”
The note, of course, did not reply.
Sentinel
In the 25th Century, if you were aboard a spacecraft in high orbit above Earth, you might occasionally glimpse a shimmer, too brief to register, too subtle to alarm.
A mistake of the eye, perhaps?
But that’s not to say it wasn’t there.
***
Primus sat in the command bridge of his scout ship, Sentinel. She was not a ship any human in any century in the known existence of humanity, would recognise. Sentinel was one of a kind. Fast, invulnerable, manoeuvrable, invisible and best of all, timeless.
Primus sat in his command chair and mused on the last few weeks. He was neither happy nor unhappy. But he was slightly agitated. His time with Maxwell Bahn had taught him more about humanity and what being human meant than any amount of tuition could have done.
“Could I have done better?” he asked himself.
“Maybe, maybe not,” a disembodied female voice said.
“It was a rhetorical question, Sam,” Primus said, running his fingers through his white hair. "As my ship's AI you need to know…"
“I am not, your AI, Gideon. I never have been. But I guess you were talking to yourself again,” the female voice said.
Behind Primus a door whooshed open and a woman walked in, followed by a small boy, maybe eight-years old, and a girl, almost twelve, she would tell you.
All wore blue dungarees, combat shirts and short leather jackets. All had high-leg brown US army boots, boots made in a bygone age. Boots you couldn’t buy on earth in the 25th century, for love nor money.
“Can I take a picture?” the woman asked, waving her antique camera at Primus.
Primus looked at the woman and smiled.
She smiled back, wiggled the camera, and ran her free hand through her short brown hair. “Pretty please?”
The girl folded her arms and stared at Primus. “C’mon, dad. Just one picture isn’t gonna hurt.”
“Going to hurt,” Primus corrected.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake. Take a picture, Callie,” Sam said. “Ignore the old man.”
The girl and boy giggled.
“And another thing,” Callie said. “Can I stop calling you Primus now?”
Primus squirmed slightly in his command chair. “I never asked you to call me, Primus. All the time I was on Earth and on the asteroid…”
“You, did, too,” Sam said. “Any form of communication was to be in code. Primus is your code name, chosen by you.”
“Yes but…”
“No yes, buts,” Callie said. “You’re forgetting who is in charge here.”
“I am.” Primus, Sam and Callie all said as one.
Laughter exploded from all and the kids just shook their heads.
Adults! We know who is in charge.
The children’s telepathic link was as strong as ever, and both knew who was in charge.
“Okay, the mission is over and a success.”
Callie smiled.
“Thank goodness,” Sam said. “So, Gideon. Where to next?”
Gideon Prime looked at Callie and smiled. “You choose Callie.”
Callie nodded and grinned. “Okay husband. Back to the future, or into the past? How about we watch and wait. If you remember correctly, we haven’t actually met in this time-frame…”
“And I don’t exist for another, oh, forty years.”
The shimmer in space glowed briefly and a bubble formed around the Sentinel… and then she was gone.
In The Beginning
Two years had gone by and Maxwell Bahn was head of artificial intelligence research at Project Sentinel situated at Olympus Mons on Mars. It had been an eventful two years on a personal level. The team on Hygiea had split up and gone their own way. Bahn received the job offer from Project Sentinel, only to find Chi Zhang, the computer geek from Hygiea was head of IT. To make his life more interesting, after a year of working together, Bahn found he had fallen in love with Zhang. Luckily for him, the feeling was mutual.
And it came as no surprise when just over a year after they were married, Zhang was expecting a baby.
On the day the baby was born, a boy, they decided on a name. Gideon. That day was the second happiest day in Maxwell Bahn's young life.
And when war came once more to Earth, Maxwell Bahn held that day close to his heart, even after both Gideon and Zhang were killed by an implacable alien enemy.
### THE END ###
Continue the story with The Ragged Edge of Time