In the Quiet Night

A Midnight Vault II Story

In the Midnight Vault, one can find stories spanning space and time. In the far reaches of the solar system, on a future date, a lonely man aboard an old space station confronts the results of evil leaving whispers in the quiet night.

Alex went down the dim corridor, floating from handhold to handhold. An orb with fans in its body and a spindly arm followed him. A telltale blinked red on the wall, an angry disturbance to the twilight accompanied by an insistent buzzing marring the quiet.

“OK, Computer, I’m at the panel.”

“Please remove the cover, Alex,” said a disembodied feminine voice next to his right ear. He suppressed a shudder. The intonation reminded him of his ex-wife.

Alex reached into the tool pouch around his waist and with swift motions, removed the screws holding the panel. He lifted it out of its brackets. The orb moved close, a glowing tip on the end of the actuator. It moved the arm about inside the wall.

“Try now,” said the voice.

Alex flipped a switch next to the red LED. The light went off.

“The fault appears to have been reset, Alex.”

He rubbed the stubble on his chin. They can’t get here fast enough. I need help. “That’s the fourth one since everyone else left. The damn station is falling apart. Computer, when does the next crew arrive?”

“Six days, seventeen hours and twenty-three minutes until they dock.”

Alex nodded. He had pulled longer stints before, playing skeleton crew between changes, but this time, it was getting to him. Even at triple pay, this place wasn’t worth the hassle.

A whisper of a musical note came from down the hall, toward the receiving terminals.

“Computer, did you hear that?”

“I did not hear anything, Alex.”

“I, I thought I heard something.”

“Several systems are now cycling since you cleared the fault.”

“Yeah, that’s it. Probably something else needs maintenance.”

Alex closed the panel and headed back the way he came, toes barely tapping on the floor grates, propelling him forward.

* * *

The meal in front of him wasn’t the right temp. No matter how careful he followed the instructions, the ‘wave just didn’t want to function correctly. The tray’s compartments each had a built-in code for the hood elements along with printed instructions. These were standard food trays for God’s sake. You would think just based on random chance, one of these shitholes would function right and cook the food proper.

He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. One more thing wrong with this crappy station. A gig a couple of stations ago, there was another with him on the skeleton crew. That man could cook. Alex’s mouth watered at the memory. A rare occasion indeed. He was usually alone on the stations as he made his way around the solar system. It paid good money, something he needed to support the two kids he’d left with his parents.

He scooped some too cold mashed potatoes and gelid gravy. In mid lift to his mouth, the lights went out in the mess hall.

“Fuck. Computer, what the hell happened to the lights?”

“I am sorry, Alex. I don’t know. I am resetting the breakers.” Alex’s spork hovered in the air. “It was not the breakers. I am thinking it is a mechanical interrupt.”

“The hell does that mean?”

“A switch probably broke.”

Emergency lighting came on, bathing the couple of tables and dozen chairs in a red glow.

“The darkness appears to be localized in your area.”

“Fine, I’ll get my tools, see if I can find the problem.”

He looked at the food tray in the red light. It made the food look covered in blood. Disgusted, he deposited the tray into the recycler and headed out.

Normal light caused him to squint outside in the corridor. At the far end, past the crew quarters, he saw the door to the server room half open. He went to it and grabbed the handhold by the door. A rustling sound issued from the opening, the sound of fans.

Stupid maintenance orbs. They’re all stuck in there.

He shook his head at the noise and pushed the open button on the hand-sized alcove next to the doorframe. The door started to open, shuddered, and stopped. He sighed and made note to attend to it later.

He turned and launched himself the length of the hall toward engineering.

* * *

His daughter held his son’s hand but they were walking away from him. Their mother’s voice, damn her, sang to them, luring them away.

“Come back! Come back!” He grasped at them, ran after them but their casual walk got them further and further away.

Alex woke drenched. His arms tangled in the sleep cocoon. Awareness of his surroundings filtered past the disquieting images of his dream. He unzipped the side and floated out.

A little exercise would help clear his mind and combat the effects of zero-g.

He hated this, hooking up to the treadmill. He needed his running shoes, large rubber bands over his shoulders, padding that always slipped. All this procedure and rigamarole. He tried to do it as fast as possible. Pressing the start button, the mill sped up. Sweat beaded and his bouncing flung them off.

The blower!

He mashed the stop button. Slick hands unhooked the rubber bands and caught the padding. Freed from the contraption, he floated to the control panel.

Stupid switch should be next to the treadmill. He reached out to flip it on.

His hand froze on the lever. He heard faint, musical tones.

“Computer, do you hear that?” he whispered.

“What are you asking if I can hear?”

The tones faded.

“There was something, I don’t know, singing, like music?”

“I am very sorry, but I did not pick up any auditory vibrations corresponding to music.”

“Dammit, I just heard it. It was coming from outside the room.” He furrowed his forehead. “Has someone been hiding on the station these last couple of weeks?”

“Alex, I have completed a scan of the entire station. I also examined the resource usage trends. All parameters are nominally consistent for a single occupant,” the computer’s familiar timbre informed him.

He mashed his lips tight, flipped on the blower and went back to his torture device.

I’ll be happy to be off this hunk of junk, he thought in the needle shower. Hell, I can’t wait to have a decent shower. There was always something going wrong, weird noises, terrible food, the smell of oil and metal everywhere.

He scrubbed. The hot water pulsed, stinging before getting sucked away. There had to be a better way to make a decent living. He wanted to see his kids more instead of being out on the ass end of the solar system. Going from derelict orbital station to derelict orbital station sounded like a good way to make money. This one was supposed to be gravy, attending to the mostly automated Helium-3 mining station, a little service on the robotic miners when they came in to unload. Easy peasy.

Then he found out Jupiter wasn’t so easy on the harvesters. There was always something wrong. The Computer offered inane advice on how to fix the gaseous extractors. The icing on the cake was the whole station was rundown and in need of constant repairs.

He toweled himself dry. An automated miner had come in while he was exercising, and it needed to be checked on. Dressed, he went to the cavernous receiving terminal control room. Red and yellow graphics played on the screen attached to the control console. Alex tethered himself to it and studied the read out. Numbers and alerts scrolled on the display. 3He was flowing into the storage tanks at the correct rate. Good for now. He ran a diagnostic on the probe.

He ran his hand over stubble on his head. The miner’s computer reported less than optimal extraction from one of the intake manifolds. The display helpfully noted the most likely cause was a damaged vane.

Probably got hit by ice crystals or something to that effect. He’d suit up and take a look. All sorts of crap floated on the harsh winds of the King of Planets but usually the equipment was spared due to the altitude they operated at.

He looked up the repair logs of this miner. The information on the screen indicated this one always seemed to operate at the edge of recoverability. It was a candidate for being lost to the maelstrom that swirled below. He gave a half-hearted shrug. He couldn’t summon any concern. It only meant a welcomed bonus for going outside.

There was a note attached to the log, a wait order on the unit. The company insisted it had to grant permission for any repairs on the miner. This was a standing order.

He would send an email. As long as he got it back out before the next miner arrived, everything should be hunky-dory.

“Computer, when is the next miner supposed to arrive?”

“Approximately fourteen hours from now.”

The schedule was tight to get a response and effect repairs. He hurried to the comm room to send the message to Luna.

* * *

Who the fuck did they think they were?

Alex fumed as he launched himself across the empty space of the terminal receiving room.

“Fucking corporate bean counters with their pencils stuck up their asses!”

“Alex, you appear agitated. Is something wrong? I can dispense some Calmcion for you.”

“Fuck off, Computer.”

He snagged a handhold and feet slammed into the wall. The impact almost made him lose his grip on the helmet. He took a deep breath to keep from yelling at inanimate objects. Idly, he wondered if he did need a tab of Calm.

“I am sorry, but I cannot do that. I do not have...”

“Fine, nevermind. Look, check the tug. Make sure it’s all gassed up and ready for me. Is the auxiliary bay working? I need to move the miner over.” Alex fitted his helmet on the suit collar.

The Computer’s oily voice came over the suit intercom. “Checking systems. Auxiliary receiver is offline. It will take a few minutes to fill the tug’s tanks with propellant. Be sure to double check the seals on your...”

“Shut up, Computer.” The helmet latched on. Alex couldn’t stand when the Computer started mothering him. It reminded him of her.

He cycled the airlock and went outside onto what he called the porch. The porch ran thirty meters and was wide enough to hold an antique rocking chair, if that were a thing in zero-g. Its actual designated name was Docking Platform 1. It deserved a better name. Alex knew what he would be doing if he had the time. He would be tethered to the rail watching the cloud tops of Jupiter. He could spend hours there, looking at the poetry of the swirls.

No siree, not today.

He had work to do. He hauled himself along the railing to the end where the tug waited for him. Strapping himself into the tug’s open cockpit, he waited. A minute went by. Then another.

No readiness notification came.

Belatedly, he remembered he told the Computer to shut up. He keyed the mic.

“Computer, is the tug ready to deploy?”

“Certainly, Alex. It has been ready for some time now.”

Alex stifled a response. He activated the tug and tapped the gauges in front of him. They now registered full. Maglocks off, he applied a little thrust and approached the enormous angular hull of the gas miner. He searched for an attachment point. Yellow painted arrows, scarred by the winds of the gas giant, pointed at one. He eased the tug to it and latched on.

“Computer, release the miner.”

“Affirmative, releasing the miner. Docking clamps disengaged.”

Alex opened the throttle full. Long seconds passed. The gas miner eased away from the docking cradle. Motion achieved, Alex shut the engines down.

He always found waiting to be the hardest part. In space, not having a big engine just means things take longer. As soon as the hull cleared the dock, he would vector the whole kit over to the other bay. A little finessing on the receiving end and he could head inside. He started the push over.

A quick peek at the electronics told him it would take a couple of hours.

‘Experts in the arriving crew!’ How incompetent did those fucking corporate loonies think I am? He ground his teeth.

He plotted in the silence. He would have to put the tug on the other side of the miner to stop it. It would be a shame if he accidentally went by the damage and saw it.

He came off the attachment point and edged back.

“Computer, where is the blocked intake located on the collector?”

“Alex, the email clearly said you were not to inspect the ship or attempt repairs.”

“Not going to. I just want to know what to avoid.”

“Of course. Please avoid the forward area of frame fourteen along the top of the ship.”

“Thank you. I’ll do my best.” He headed along the side toward frame fourteen.

Frame fourteen came into view. Alex followed it to the top. The smooth, sloping expanse of metal lead to a rectangular cave, the bright red paint of the plate a marked contrast to the rest of the rusted, pitted ship. Correction, almost pristine paint. Two tracks of missing paint exposed bright metal underneath the red expanse. He moored the tug to the miner.

Alex got out and activated his mag boots. He came down with a clunk. There should be a grating in the back of the funnel. Even from out here, he could see there was an issue along the bottom of the vent. The vanes looked bent.

The sound of boot magnets making contact and his labored breathing interrupted the quiet. There were crystals along the floor, long crystals, brown from whatever was in the soup they were scooped out of. He got closer. There were additional bare metal tracks now, radiating around the damaged vanes, short ones.

Inside the funnel, his eyes adjusted. The brown stuff was wrapped around the vanes. Past them, on the inside, was a long strand of it, on the floor. It looked glued to the floor. He pressed his helmet against the grate to get a better look.

Sudden horror overtook him. Eyes wide, he turned and surveyed the whole scene.

“Oh shit.”

* * *

Inside at the control console, Alex tried to access the onboard camera footage but the probe required a password.

“Computer, engage the maintenance mode of the miner and tie me into the video recordings.”

“The miner says it needs a password to access the filesystem.”

“Can’t you copy the files to somewhere you don’t need the password?”

“I am sorry, Alex, the miner is being recalcitrant. It is telling me the files themselves are also encrypted. Any copy of them would still need the password.”

Alex smacked his forehead repeatedly with his open palm. “Fuck. Who would know the password?”

“Probably nobody currently on the station. Perhaps on the arriving crew.”

He brought his fist down on the auxiliary console. Deep breaths and a count to ten followed. His hand reached for the attached thumbdrive and stopped short. There were only a couple of days left before the new staff arrived and then everything would get swept under the rug. He didn’t doubt someone in the arriving crew would have the password and then the evidence would get deleted.

Alex shuddered.

The thing in the intake duct would be cleaned up, the metal straightened, some more paint would get slapped on the hull covering the frantic claw marks. He pulled up the repair logs for the miner in question. The screen filled. Cross referencing locations, he found an area particularly rich in 3He that the miner kept going back to. He dumped the information to the thumbdrive for later.

Bastards.

A little Speedy Delivery man was waving at him from the corner of the screen. He stared at it for a moment.

He remembered he was supposed to write to his kids today.

Gathering the spacesuit components, he headed to his room to compose a reassuring email for them. It was probably too late for them to read his reply but time had slipped away from him. He needed to be a better parent.

In his room, his fingers slowly picked through his emotions and the words took shape. He told his kids how much he missed them and how he would rather be home than out in space. He ended it with an assurance that it wouldn’t be long now and that he loved them very much. This would be his last space tour he decided. An extra paragraph was added to the bottom, telling his mom and dad he was done out here. He asked them not to tell the kids so he could surprise them.

A stretch, carefully in zero-g, and he sent the email. He passed his hand over the fuzz on top of his head and yawned.

Grimy. He felt grimy. And tired, tired from dealing with everything. He needed a long, comfortable shower but the needle shower would have to do. He stripped out of his clothes, grabbed a towel and headed to the bathroom. This was the only quasi-luxury afforded to him, not having to meter his water usage.

The pins were scalding at first. He let them take the tension away, muscles relaxed. Maybe Computer was right and he should take a Calm. He’d get a good night’s sleep to tackle the problems tomorrow morning, rested. Last chance before the others showed up.

Behind his closed eyes, he saw the body of the alien stretched out, brown, desiccated by vacuum. It was large, stretching almost the length of the chamber. One appendage ended in a hard claw, the other was truncated halfway, missing. It had a large, deflated bag with something that looked like a mouth where the appendages joined. Above it were two slits. They snapped open, the eyes staring at him.

Alex yelped, heart pounding, the water from the shower cold against his skin. He looked around. The hot water had run out. Fumbling at the controls, he shut the water and the blowers off and quiet descended.

Almost.

Faint notes reached his ears. Quaking, he wrapped a towel around his waist and pushed off.

Outside, the not-quite music came from down the hall, with an echo-y quality to it as though its notes were being played in a large space.

Alex snapped down the corridor, away from the sounds, toes scrambling for purchase, arms grabbing at any hold. He hit the bulkhead next to his door hard.

“Yow!”

He pulled himself in and sealed the door. He almost launched into the ceiling when the Computer spoke to him.

“Alex, are you alright? I am detecting a very high heart rate. Your motions are erratic. Have you injured yourself?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine. Strike that, I am not fine. Do you hear that?”

There was silence for a second.

“Hear what?”

“The music, the singing...”

“Please calm down. I do not hear any music. My audio sensors are only picking up this conversation. You need to administer three tablets of Calmcion for your body weight.”

“I will do no such thing! There’s goddamn singing going on, coming from the receiving terminal.”

“I will patch the feed from my receptors here.”

“NO!” Alex covered his ears.

There was nothing. Only quiet, broken by Alex’s ragged breathing. He experimentally removed his hands.

“Fuck me.”

“As you can hear, there are no extraneous sounds. If you are feeling fine, the next miner will be docking within the hour.”

* * *

A few hours of sleep were all that separated him from company. Freedom arrived in the morning. Only the thought of getting back to his children mattered. Anything that could delayed that was pushed aside, crammed down into the nooks and crannies to be forgotten, to be overlooked. He had to get off the blasted station and not give anyone any excuse to keep him longer. He tended to the new miner. This one was fine, no blockages, no scratched paint. The other one and its unwitting cargo was stashed in the other bay, ignored for the moment as he changed out of his work clothes.

He tried to stifle a yawn. He couldn’t get the video on the extractor and he hadn’t thought of getting a sample at the time. Too late now.

Fuck it. It was someone else’s problem, had been for a while according to the records. Unzipping the sleep sac, he crawled in. In moments, unconsciousness claimed him.

Behind his eyelids, eyeballs twitched back and forth. A desert filled his sight, painted in wild colors flowing from the rocks into the sky. All around were round huts. Families gathered in knots, singing greetings. A fire without flame burned in the middle. Alex felt calm.

There was a discordant screech, echoing through the hills. The families turned. Something was coming. A group of the bigger inhabitants went toward the danger. Screaming notes followed, a screech of metal, borne on the winds. The monster appeared, hard, angular. It crashed through a hut, then another. The families ran, trying to flee but they were drawn into the metal maw.

The beings sang to him, chanted a refrain, over and over.

It was over in a flash. The keening wind wound through the desolation.

Alex woke with a start, his heart racing, slick with sweat. He knew the password.

He crawled out and propelled himself down the hall toward the auxiliary terminal, the soft sounds of life support, mechanical parts doing their jobs, whispering in the quiet.

Trembling fingers typed in the passphrase.

“What are you doing, Alex?”

“Checking out a hunch.”

“You’re not authorized to do that, Alex.”

“Shut up, Computer.”

He was in. He could see them on the display, floating, inflated bags, eyes shining in the light of the harvester. There were nests. He could make out their songs against the background of the wind. They grew large in the video frame, then disappeared.

Alex felt sick. He downloaded the videos to the thumbdrive, yanked it out.

“You shouldn’t be doing that, Alex.”

Alex froze. “What did you just say?”

“I said you shouldn’t do that. Please put the drive back if you want to see your children again.”

The singing grew louder from the speakers. A maintenance orb floated toward him, actuator arm claw clicking open and close.

“Fuck you!” Alex grabbed the arm and flung it aside, the reaction sending him in the opposite direction.

He aligned himself and took off down the hall toward his room. The music grew louder.

Ahead, another drone menaced him. This one had a glowing tip on the end of its effector.

Alex shot up to the ceiling and kicked it. It clattered against the wall panel. He reached his cabin. He’d get his suit on and wait outside. It wouldn’t be long until the replacement crew arrived.

Images of the village went through his head, the loud music giving it solidarity. He could see their forms being torn apart in the intake.

The door to his cabin wouldn’t open. He pounded on the button.

“Open the damn door!” he shouted. Nothing. In the shadows, he saw a gathering of orbs, more drones under the control of the Computer. Glints hinted at sharp edges. The server room lay behind them.

Gritting his teeth, he jumped toward them as hard as he could, drawing his legs up, curling into a ball. He bowled through them while they lashed out. Blood trailed from his cuts, floating in the space. He bounced hard against the server room door. His fingers closed on the handle.

“Alex, you need to stop. Please turn over the drive.”

“No fucking way.” He furiously pumped the emergency handle next to the buttons. The door inched open. Behind him, fans whirred as the robots righted themselves and approached.

He exhaled and squeezed through. A blade sliced at him through the opening. Alex looked at the racks and started pulling wires. He yanked hard, disconnecting them. He undid latches and got the servers out. They powered down as electricity was lost, floated in the room.

Panting, he looked back at the door. It had opened wide enough for the drones to come in. They floated silently now, inert.

He could hear the music so clearly now, almost understand it. It was haunting. He didn’t even have to close his eyes anymore to see the village. It spread out in front of him. The others stood by the huts, motioning to him, inviting him in. His own kids were there, holding hands. They smiled and waved at him.

He took them by the hands and went into the village.

* * *

“Still no acknowledgement?” The captain of the vessel looked at the mining station on the screen.

“None, sir.” The first mate checked his screens again.

“This is most irregular. Bring us to the docking platform and we’ll send someone through the airlock.”

“Sir, I’m picking something up. Near one of the miners.”

“Put it on screen.” The captain leaned forward. There was a small figure floating by the miner in the auxiliary bay, near a vent.

“What the hell is he doing there? Magnify.”

The image grew. The man came into focus.

“Dear God!” The figure didn’t have a suit on. He was floating in the vacuum of space. He held something in an outstretched hand. A smile curled his lips, his eyes were closed.

The captain grew grim. There would have to be a full investigation. He turned to talk to the first mate and stopped. “Wait, did you hear something?”