Nano Bytes - A Collection of Short SciFi Stories

Silent Garden, by TyborTigadoro

"No ma'am," Cosgrove says, likewise strained. "They're staying silent."

The unyielding pressure from my seatback is suddenly gone, replaced with the gnawing bite of my harness.

"We slowing down?"

"That's right, Captain," Martinez says. "Shuttle has reached terminal velocity. We're on deceleration until we reach the Silent—eh, the unknown artificial structure."

"Cosgrove, start hailing on all frequencies," I say. "It has been a long ride to get here, and the least they could give us is a little hospitality."

"Roger that, Captain."

The harness gradually releases its hold on me as the structure becomes ever larger in our field of view. From this distance, the illusion of smoothness is gone. I can make out ducts and vents, strange outlines runic in appearance, and even minor scorching. There has clearly been some activity here throughout the eons.

"Any response, Cosgrove?" I ask.

Cosgrove is silent for a moment, assessing the numbers flashing across my visor.

"No ma'am, dead silence. No sign of Terra-1's mystery signal."

"Hey, that looks like a response to me," Martinez says.

I look out the bay window, and the system has already honed in on the source of Martinez's interest. An impossibly small piece of the face of the structure is peeling back.

"Is that—"

"A hangar," I say.

A pair of shuttles launch from the opening, cutting through the open vacuum at an impossible clip.

"How they hell are they moving that fast from a standstill?" Martinez asks.

The cabin remains silent for a moment.

"Is that— is that rust on them?" Sipes asks.

The system cameras zoom in on the vessels. And sure enough, the ships—apparently utilizing engines that would put to shame any tech in Centauri—are speckled with orange.

"We're getting hailed now," Cosgrove yelps.

"Anything we can understand?"

"Yes, strangely," Cosgrove responds. "It's— it's Centauri."

"Now, how the hell is that possible?" I ask.

"Captain, they're telling us to fly into the hangar. They've given us coordinates to plug into the system."

I let out a long breath. "Well, that's why we're here. Are we transmitting all of this back to Terra-2?"

"Negative, Captain," Cosgrove says. "They're jamming outbound coms."

"Shit," I say. "Well, it's not like we have much choice other than to play ball."

I fidget with my headset as the second moon—the Silent Garden—transitions from a distant body to an impenetrable wall of matter. I struggle to comprehend the idea of Terra-1 stumbling across this structure a century earlier.

So many questions. How long has it been here? Did my species create it? But most of all—why? What purpose could it possibly serve?

"They want us down there," Cosgrove says, placing a nav point on our visors in the back corner of the hangar.

"Roger," Martinez says.

The shuttle lurches toward our designated corner. I grip my chair tightly as we decelerate, though the discomfort is nothing compared to the Gs from the trip from Terra-2. We cruise slowly through the dimly lit hangar, only a few meters above row after row of rust-covered vessels.