PARANOOBIUS part 5

Nameless Planet     It's not that the Nameless Planet has no name, but rather that it has many.    It's inhabitants are known to other worlds, each with their own words for punishment, and plague. And each with their own titles for this place, and its dwellers. It's not surprising that names for it exist even in Earths' lexicon: Naraka. Tartarus. Kur, with its cruel Scorpion Men. Whether by contact or lore, it is known. But the actual word for it does not exist in the known universe. Hades would tremble to think of  it.      The SJ migrated to this place aeons before,  having reduced their own world to pulp. Their former solar system is now an unapproachable cloud of voracious nanotech slowly dying, like everything they touch.       The indigenous beings here proved unsuitable as slaves, and were erased. Their culture, their history, their incredible ecosystem, their selves. As if they never were. In a parallel program the SJ set about growing their own servants, simple beings whelped in immense birthing complexes. Organic tools. These would be their emissaries, their agents, their assassins and thieves, and manage too their infernal processes.      In this place too they realized their ambition for immortality, shedding their corporeal selves and housing their thoughts in artificial vessels that move as though alive. They wrote a communal dreamworld free of physics' manacle, to the delight of the SJ, and much to the dismay of their prisoners. Forty thousand centuries of forced evolution followed, with ever more dire results.  But in the end, their achievement was not so much eternal life. More so eternal death.       Attempts  have been made to destroy this planet, none successful, even by those who were burgled of the Eitr.  Only their slaves came close to wiping them out, and with their own science, an act of bio terror to rival any perpetrated by the  SJ themselves.  But there is still life here, waiting. Like everything else, though, life is not really the right word for what waits on the Nameless Planet.      400 kilometers from the planets' surface the Dreadnaught seems to suck onto the Juggernaut in a lascivious embrace. The planets' topography is not visible from orbit, concealed under a storm whose size rivals half the surface area of Earths' moon.      The Dreadnaught itself is a thing to see, a surreal battering ram of mammoth proportion, at once muscular and skeletal, a shipyard organ. Appendages seem to spill forth from its veined surface and interface with the Juggernauts' hull. There is no question who is captor and who is captive.  Like everything of SJ manufacture, there is certain a nightmarish quality to it, as much a result of aesthetic as necessity. The SJ were, above all things, artists. Painters in pain. And they will be again. Fear and hopelessness are their stock in trade, even among their own.     The Dreadnaught is over 2000 years old,  progress having halted on this world after it was attacked. But like any SJ product it is virtually indestructible, the galaxy is littered with them, Gods' garbage. And it shares a womb with the Juggernaut,  both exploiting ancient science and protocols of transit that Humankind has only recently learned to wield.     Aboard,  David detaches the optical sensor from its nest of tape, twists it with an audible click, and swallows it. Shaw, struggling with her suit, does not notice this.     Shaw is in shock, her nervous system overloaded from an acute hysterical paroxysm 672 hours long. Her dexterity is compromised, vision doubled, pulse erratic. A line of drool dangles from her lower lip.     David locks his helmet, and crosses the turntable.     " Good news and bad news..."     Shaw fumbles with her helmet.  " Give...me...the  bad..."     " Our hosts. They do not share your reverence for life, Doctor.  Quite the opposite.  " He places his hands on either side of her helmet. Shaking, Shaw looks him in the eye.     " What's the good news?"     " We have something they want. And.." he clicks her helmet home.  "you have me." If a polite punch press could smile, it would be what he now offers Shaw. She looks askance.     " What do they want?"     " The location of Earth."     A deep mechanical groan echoes in from depths of the the dark passageway, the sound of a hundred monks chanting. A low rush of air follows. Whatever thin barrier stood between them and their fate has opened. They share a look, then turn to the sound, searching for movement in the dark. The rush is getting louder. The oxygen is being drawn out.     Shaw turns to David.  " The ships' memory..."     " Its was wiped when I plotted our course. Failsafe. I'm afraid there is no way back.." Shaw gives him a long look. A powerful wind is developing, becoming a howl. David raises his voice to be heard.       " [i]Cessation is still an option[/i]."      " [i]For who?[/i]" Again, that smile. " [i]The only torture for me is boredom.[/i]"     " [i]I may die here anyway, David.[/i]"     " [i]At the very least.[/i]"     The Dreadnaught takes command of the Juggernauts' OS, terminating Life Support and Gravity. The illumination dies.  The howl continues to strengthen. It's clear now that the pressure is not stabilizing, the Juggernaut is being vacuumed.      Only suit lights now. With a yelp Shaw claws at the Chair for purchase, wind velocity and weightlessness threatening to suck her into the tunnel. And there's movement, in there.      David reduces his surface mass in a tight crouch, one hand clamped to an impression in the turntable. He strains for Shaw, who is being sucked from her crablike hold on the Chair. The howl. Shaw releases her grip with one hand, reaches for David. Her feet fly from her. This tableau recalls something. They clasp wrists.     No longer shy, the dwellers of the shadows emerge. A pair of wraiths float into the chamber, large grey sacs apparently immune to the suction. Damp and ghostly, they  propel themselves like jellyfish, and hover briefly near the ceiling. Shaw does not see this. Her  grip on David's wrist slips. They lock fingers. David shouts.     "[i]Doctor Shaw, may I call you Elizabeth?[/i]"      She can only barely hear him, but she sees his attention shift somewhere past her as he speaks. She follows his gaze over her shoulder.      A sac has dropped from the ceiling and yawns wide at her feet, opened like a balloon in a wind tunnel. Within its mouth the bluish pebbled surface of its interior undulates suggestively, each node producing fluid that washes down and out it's mouth, drops carried away on the wind.The howl like a tornado spawned in Hell. Shaws' eyes go wide. She looks to David. He mouths three words carefully.      "[i]Good Luck Doctor.[/i]"     And releases his grip.      Shaw wheels through space and head first into the sac,  eyes wild and arms flailing as it sucks onto and over her helmet, a thin fluid washing out at its lips, droplets being sucked away. It continues on, enveloping her, and closes over her feet, swallowing her like a Python. It then succumbs to the suction, and disappears into the passage.      David watches the other sac, similarly opening before him. One hand still gripping the turntable, he extends his right arm, the sac elongating, touching his fingers,  seeming to kiss them. Pale  lips closing over his hand, his arm. True wonder in his eyes as it takes him.