David Kernot

The Sentinel was first published by AlienSkin Magazine in their December 2006 Issue. It is a 1000 word Science Fiction story.

P25 lay on his solitary bunk listening to the slow ebb of the ion generators as they gently pushed the ship forward through the vacuum of space towards Beta 513974; a small planet in the distant spiral arm of the Andromeda Galaxy.

The crew were never kind to the Sentinels, the blind pale-skinned race of telepaths from Zirgon; followers of the prophet Jan. Sentinels believed that everything in the cosmos was connected and that the elixir of life was knowledge through passive intervention. P25 believed that they had been molded through the eye of Jan, although some whispered that they were cloned and accused them of being less than human.

The crew distrusted Sentinels, but he was important to their ship and they couldn’t do without him. They would come for him soon – carelessly strap him into the navigation chair – force the plug of the ship’s inertial drive system into his cortex – then demand the next series of maneuvers for landing. It was always the same and he could always feel their hatred of him.

Why does it have to be Beta 513974? He radiated his telepathic thoughts forcefully into the ether of space for any of the other Sentinels to hear. What would you do if you knew when you were going to die? He agonized over the thought. If you knew the year, the day, down to the exact minute and how. It would be today on Beta 513974! From an embedded computer programming error in the ships navigation system. I have dreamed about it; already felt the shock and pain of my last gasps, clawed uselessly at the shreds of life! What if you realized it was too late to do the things you wanted? Could you change your life? He became silent over the futility of his plea.

Don’t use that maneuver then, demanded P16, the closest Sentinel within range of his telepathic plea.

It is the only one that will land us, suggested P25.

Then make them see reason. Tell them! Don’t land!

P25 sighed. They had used the pain of torture far too many times to get results from him and neither believed him any more or cared what he thought. P25 knew, knew all those things and yet he could do nothing but ignore the dream.

The door to his small room swung open. ‘Sentinel, it’s time to land! Get your lazy body up to the flight deck now,’ demanded one of the crew as he kicked the bunk.

P25 recognized Storn’s voice. ‘I think that we should reconsider a landing. There is a problem with the…’

‘Stow it mutant!’ growled Storn. ‘I don’t want to hear it, I don’t want to know about it and I don’t care what you think. Get to the flight deck now!’

‘It’s a matter of life and death! It concerns us all,’ pleaded P25. ‘I think that you should mention my request to the captain.’

‘Get out of bed,’ demanded Storn as he grabbed P25. ‘We don’t have any time. We’re landing shortly.’ He dragged P25 out the room and down the corridor. ‘Not another word,’ hissed Storn when they reached the door of the flight deck. P25 could feel Storn’s hot foul smelling breath on his face as the man grabbed him painfully by the neck in a vice-like grip. He was marched into the navigation seat. The grip was relaxed as the cortex collar was forced around his neck and the probe of the navigation system plunged into the nape of his neck.

P25 sat up painfully as the probe connected to his cortex. The computer took control of P25’s functions; accessing the stellar charts he had memorized for all of known space and used the sub-light processing ability of his incredible brain to plot an intricate path to the landing site. Now there was no hope for him; he was wired up to the ship and escape was impossible. P25 could do nothing more than hope his dream was a lie. He prayed to the prophet Jan that the man would forgive him and he would not let P25 die so far from his home soil. He still had things he wanted to do and he had not yet lived the full life he desired. P25 closed the lids over his sightless pale blue eyes and waited as tragedy approached. The inertial dampeners started to waver and the complex inertial algorithm failed during a critical roll. Agony flooded his paralyzed body as his ribs snapped and his body got crushed in the wreckage as the ship impacted on the wrong planets surface. He sat there broken, gasping hopelessly at the failing air; nobody could hear his screams.

P25 lived that moment, hung on to every millisecond of time, and clung to the core of who he was before he slept the dreamless endless sleep of death. In a flash of realization during his last living moments, he realized the truth of what and who he was – he sent out a final cry to the Sentinels. And somehow P25 made it back to Zirgon.

Where am I? asked P25 from the void.

Zirgon. Welcome home, replied a stranger’s thought.

What are you?

I am the Sentinel! replied the stranger. The last on Zirgon. I live in a body blinded since birth, yet I am connected to every ship that travels the far reaches of space. We are all connected.

What have I become? wondered P25.

You are but a passing collection of thought’s; barely a presence finally returning home; something of my creation.

Who are you? … P25 faded from existence.

The man’s body shook as he absorbed all of P25’s thoughts, dreams, conversations, and experiences; everything that was P25 was now inside him. He maneuvered his wheelchair over to the window until he could feel the sun’s warmth on his face.

‘I am Jan,’ said the prophet. ‘Let the dreams come!’