Aurona, page 29
Without missing a beat and exhibiting true mastery of separation, they disguised their reactions. “What do you wish to know?” The shorter one made a show of scribbling a reply, studying Adam warily out of the corner of his eye.
“Very recently, have either of you noticed any suspicious-looking Bandors carrying someone … or something?”
The taller one’s eyes brightened subtly. “Yes. I pretended not to look at them, because they obviously had their mind-shields up.”
His friend agreed. “I saw them, too. They took a capsule into the center tube.”
“A capsule?”
“Yes, one of our larger shipping capsules. It is sized to fit only the center tube. Although it is slower, that tube follows a direct freight link to the other side of the planet, to the continent of Arrix. We have construction going on there as well. The right tube goes to the undersea city of Meseo and the left one connects to a speed station.”
A spark kindled. “A speed station? Can it get to Arrix faster than the freight capsule and be waiting outside when the larger center tube opens?”
The Bandors glanced at each other and shrugged. The shorter one replied. “It might be possible. I do not know the newest schedules, but let me converse with my friend Tunek 44366 in Arrix. He is the master controller and he should know.”
A powerful wave suddenly blasted underneath Adam’s body. He tensed his shoulders, his eyes widening in alarm. “Holy cow! What was that?”
“Cow? I do not understand, sir. Please excuse my friend’s small breach of mind-etiquette,” the taller Bandor apologized. “He was trying to reach Tunek quickly.”
“But in Arrix? You said the continent was on the other side of the planet!”
“Why yes, it is, but that is not so surprising! We have mining colonies on both of our moons and converse with them the same way.” The workers glanced at each other.
Adam tried hard to keep the surprise from his face. “I’m sorry, I just didn’t know the extent of your people’s telepathic abilities. Your range is phenomenal!”
The short Bandor interrupted. “Pardon, but Tunek 44366 just said your request is possible, but only if you leave immediately and make the right connections at the speed station. There is one important consideration though: the smaller speed tube can hold no more than six. You must divide your group and hurry.”
Thanking them profusely with his mind, Adam turned and sprinted back to his crew, an impromptu plan formulating. His orders spilled out as soon as he reached them.
“Listen!” he puffed. “We may be able to overtake them!”
Kron’s eyes widened in surprise. “Really, sir!”
“Yes! I’m sorry, Kron, but I’m going to need you and six men to remain here and guard this entrance until either we or they come out! I’ll ask Duron for additional Bandor reinforcements at both terminals!” As he handed the notepad to Duron, he waved the others back toward the tubes. “Okay, you four come with me!”
Shocked, Dexor and Nastix followed eagerly, sprinting to catch up to Adam. “The guns!” Dexor puffed in a loud whisper. “We got a chance! Waddaya think?”
Nastix nodded vehemently. “They might be down in the middle of the planet!”
Running side by side, they discreetly punched the air with their fists.
In moments, the five humans and a short Bandor guide squeezed into a tiny speed tube, standing uncomfortably close. As the hermetic seals hissed shut a bell chimed, and they followed the Bandor’s eyes upward. Above them, a flat panel displayed a schematic outline of the planet, with hundreds of lines passing through it in a jumbled morass. A long, slender finger reached up to touch the screen twice: first the source, then the destination. All but two lines disappeared. He nodded to the men. Immediately, they felt a slight sensation of movement. Barely thirty seconds passed before the Bandor was tugging at Adam’s sleeve and motioning toward the exit in unmistakable body language.
“What? The seals are opening?” Adam glanced over his head. “It-it can’t be!”
A red blip on the display showed them to be almost three thousand miles into the core of the planet: they’d arrived at a mammoth, supercooled underground station. The Bandor guide urged them to switch to another, larger speed-tube. With the hollow sound of running feet, they sprinted toward it and piled in, a small detachment of armed Bandor warriors crowding in after them. Duron had evidently sent the urgent mind-message ahead and things were really moving!
Again, a slight sensation of movement tugged at their bodies, feeling strangely familiar. “Of course!” he whispered to the men. “It-it all makes sense now! They have artificial gravity inside these pressurized speed tubes! The underground stations must be sealed, insulated, and the pressure adjusted to surface tolerance, or we’d have been crushed to death!” The five turned their eyes back to the ceiling to check their progress. Unbelievably, the red blip was almost to the other side! The Bandor soldiers were stirring, unobtrusively checking their weapons as they anticipated departure. His heart in his mouth, Adam activated the electrochemical charge in his Stifler, turning up the dial to full stun.
As the speed tube’s seal opened, they spilled out quickly into the early dawn and dove for cover. Suddenly, there was a great whoosh of air behind them! Startled, they slipped into the shadows to watch anxiously. Their timing was incredible! The vacuum seals were opening on the central freight tube!
After a short pause, there was a subtle movement in the entrance. Motioning behind him, a lone figure warily stepped into the open. A sinister-looking group appeared behind him, weapons drawn, an antigrav pod floating in their midst.
Adam’s fists suddenly clenched. Out of the blue, a crazy idea had flashed through his mind. He knew exactly what to do. His heart racing, he stealthily pulled the holocamera out of his backpack, tapped out a code, and sent it aloft.
“Seek ELENA!… Seek ELENA! …Seek ELENA!” An enhanced, shrill scream announced its presence. Its screen flashing imperatively, its green lasers blazing brilliantly in the morning light, the sphere hurtled toward the kidnappers at a tremendous velocity!
The kidnappers recoiled in total confusion. Ducking and covering their heads, they fired their weapons randomly into the air, not knowing which way to turn.
An odd, cold adrenaline was pouring through Adam’s veins. He snapped his head toward the crew. Why wasn’t anyone moving? He blinked in confusion. Everyone seemed to be frozen solid, their movements locked in midair! No matter, Elena was there. Shrugging his shoulders, he grabbed the initiative and stepped coolly out into the open.
Just like a shooting gallery, he picked off the captors in rapid-fire, one by one. Had time itself stopped? He gawked in disbelief. They just hung there, impossibly suspended in mid-action, frozen as they were hit! Ever so slowly, their twitching, paralyzed bodies floated to the ground, a single, smoking hole marking the exact center of each robe.
Adam glanced over his shoulder at his companions. Everyone seemed to be swiveling their heads toward him in ultraslow motion. Suddenly, the odd surging that had distended his arteries flew away as swiftly as it had arrived. He drooped, his arms falling to his sides.
“What in the…?” Tola walked over to him, astonishment written all over his face. “D-do you realize what you just did, sir? We were all just getting into position when it was over! How in blazes did you move so fast?” His finger jabbed emphatically at the stunned bodies on the ground. “Twelve! Count ‘em! You got all twelve! They dropped like flies!”
As the Bandor warriors cheered, Dexor’s jaw sagged. He yanked Nastix aside, whispering in confusion. “I-I couldn’t follow his movements! What is he, superhuman?”
“And a dead shot, too!” Nastix affirmed. “Man! We’d better watch out for him!”
Adam was sagging, leaning on Tola’s arm. They watched as the Bandor warriors picked up the paralyzed bodies and slowly, carefully, slipped them into some kind of straightjacket, locking an equally strange helmet onto their bulbous heads. The flashing holocamera was hovering steadily over the pod, recording every movement.
“Elena!” Blinking to his senses, Adam stumbled toward her. “The pod!” he shouted. “The pod! Help me get this stupid thing open, guys! We don’t know how long she’s been in there!” Dropping to his knees, he twiddled helplessly with the dials and straps. Accidentally, he touched something he shouldn’t and the pod fell heavily to the ground with a loud thud. Its antigrav function had just been disabled.
As a Bandor warrior reached out to restrain Adam’s wrists before he could do any real damage, another warrior tapped a memorized sequence on a control pad. With a sharp hiss, a seam parted along the hermetic seal on the side of the pod. It opened slowly, revealing Elena’s damp, sweat-soaked form. Pushing everyone aside, a Bandor checked her with a battery of strange instruments, then gave her a small injection.
As she began to stir, Adam scooted closer on his knees, watching the color reenter her face. Trembling, he reached out to hold her hands and wait for signs of recognition.
She coughed. “A-Adam?” Her eyes blinked, trying to focus.
A dark tunnel closed in. The sense of urgency gone, a viselike grip invaded, grabbing Adam at the base of his skull and choking off his windpipe. Vainly, he tried to swallow. The Rasheen! With great effort, he staggered to his feet. “Oh, no, not again!” he gasped. “I-I’m gonna….” He blacked out, collapsing backwards into the arms of his men.
Chapter 16: PLANET OF LIGHTS
Out in the rim of the great starship, the long, curving hospital bay was humming with activity far into the night. Even the most sensitive Bitron diagnostic equipment couldn’t identify Adam’s odd condition. With great reluctance, the last of the baffled Bandor attendants gave up and left around three in the morning. Kron and Tola remained at Adam’s bedside, their bleary eyes glued to his monitors. Suddenly, at precisely five-thirty, every gauge unexplainably leveled out to normal. His brain had relaxed out of neural spasm. They watched the gauges a few more minutes, let out a breath of relief, then gave each other silent high fives and quietly slipped out the door.
Adam began to dream. Deeply troubled, he became soaked in a pool of sweat, stirring and groaning in his sleep. All the day’s events were jumbled together: somehow, he found himself back in the jungle carrying Elena, who was hanging limply over his shoulder. As he slashed frantically through the dense, steamy undergrowth with a laser cutter and battled endless waves of thundering winged creatures, Solumbras suddenly swelled up out of the ground and popped open all around him. Packed together like sardines, armies of large-headed humanoids began to swarm out. He was exhausted, his arms felt like they were falling off, vines were twining around his feet and ranging searchlights kept spotting him as he ran. There was nowhere left to hide.
Suddenly, there was and odd twist in the jungle path. Slashing through one last thicket, he broke free and stumbled into the open! Elena stirred, woke up, and jumped off his shoulder. Somehow, as dreams go, there just happened to be two antigrav belts lying on the ground. They strapped them on quickly and jumped into the air. Flying side by side, they skimmed over sand, ocean, and clouds, gaining altitude and getting stronger. He felt like screaming for joy; at the mere snap of a finger their circumstances had been totally reversed! They glanced over their shoulders: far behind them, a roiling, flashing, black cloud receded into the distance.
Reveling in his new powers, he took a long, deep breath, smiling in his sleep. His mind was transforming rapidly, becoming sharper and extraordinarily different, his body was becoming more taut and keenly alive than he could ever remember. As they accelerated into the blue, he actually began to feel a cool wind on his face.
Out of nowhere, there was a gentle pressure on his shoulder and a soft hand caressing his forehead. An even softer voice whispered into his ear.
“Um, are you okay, Adam?”
The curtains of sleep parted. “Whazzat?” He opened his eyes a slit. The clammy hospital sheets were wringing wet under his back and his eyes were aching from an impossibly bright fiber optic diffuser over his head. Somehow, the same cool, lavishly perfumed breeze in his dream had woven its way through a hidden ventilation shaft. As his wandering eyes came to rest on Elena’s face, he drew in a sharp breath. He reached up impulsively, pulling her close. The nightmare was over.
She sighed, trembling in his arms. “Bad dream?”
“A-and how,” he muttered. “H-how long was I, um, z-zonked?”
“You couldn’t have gotten much quality time,” she muttered. “Kron said he couldn’t sleep and came back. In fact, he’s still sitting outside the door. He told me you were thrashing around half the morning, and, ah, you just made a loud whoop.”
“I whooped?” He grinned. “Yeah, that’s right. I-I was in sort of a race.”
“Did you win?”
“You bet,” he chuckled. “I got the jackpot!”
She snuggled closer. “I really shouldn’t be here, Adam.” She looked around furtively. “But I grabbed the chance and sneaked in. You can’t imagine how many times I wanted to check on you, but I figured it was best to leave you alone. I left my room real early and wandered down to the dining hall with Joelle. We’ve been talking for hours! She told me all about how you went down into that city after me and knocked out those Bandor outlaws. I’m so proud! You-you really must….”
“Love you?” he interjected quietly, finishing her sentence. “Yes I do, more than anything in this world, or any other.”
She drew in a quick breath. Her whispered words were lost, muffled against his cheek. After an eternal moment she leaned back, pulling her damp hair off his face. “So what happened? They said you got a horrible pain, right about here!” She reached behind him and rubbed a spot on the back of his head. “After you made sure I was okay, you collapsed and blacked out!”
“I know,” he shrugged. “It was embarrassing. Ah, how’d we get back?”
She ran her fingers through his sleep-matted hair. “Tola and Peter carried you out. Those Bandor people were so kind to us, Adam, so polite and civilized. They escorted our group back through the speed tubes into the city, then up out of the hole.”
Her cheery countenance darkened. “Speaking of nightmares,” she whispered, “it really got scary when Duron turned off that gold shield. Those horrible, gigantic bees with the lights on their heads attacked us!”
“Are you sure I was unconscious? I swear I saw….”
She laid a finger across his lips. “You were out cold, Adam. First you, and then the bees. The men killed them all, but not before Peter got a horrible bite on his arm. He didn’t get stung, thank God. We flew out of the rainforest in total darkness with our shields up.” Suddenly she gripped his arm tightly, her blue eyes wide. “And, ooh, ooh! Adam!”
He raised a brow. “What? What ooh?”
“This ooh!” She giggled. “It was beautiful! The trees were all shimmering with this-this phosphorescent glow!” Her eyes had a misty, faraway look. “Just the growing tips of the branches were lit up like stars, millions of them! And then….” Her eyes popped. “We spotted this huge light through the treetops, kind of a tall, vertical beacon. When we broke through into our Motherlode’s clearing….” She slid off the bed and threw her arms far apart to form a big tubular shape. “Our tree was bathed in this-this intense column of light, coming straight down from somewhere above!” She pointed upward, wonder in her eyes. “The-the whole clearing was lit up! It was really spectacular!”
He struggled to sit up. “Was it just our Motherlode we’re, ah, parked in?”
“No, Adam, all of them. Every last one of them.”
He drew back, studying her eyes. “How’d you find that out?”
“Well,” she hedged, “while the doctors were trying to resuscitate you, a bunch of us flew up to the top again…”
“No! To the top? In the dark? But the hornets, the animals!”
“Don’t worry,” she assured quickly. “We had our shields up. But listen, it was so intense.” She stared into the distance as if in a trance. “As far as we could see, hundreds of Motherlodes were lit up, marching toward the horizon as if they’d stepped into brilliant columns of light! Even though it was late, their flowers were still active. They were sending out these long, spangly washes of gold confetti, streaming up inside the columns!”
He was struggling to piece it together. “Columns of light, huh?”
“Hundreds!” she breathed. “Huge! Miles and miles high!”
A memory suddenly jolted his consciousness. “Hey, wow!!” He sat bolt upright. “Just before the shields closed, I remember seeing those columns of light from space! They were all along the day/night boundary, making the horizon look like a pincushion of full of needles from that angle. I’ve got a few holo-photos of them! He leaned back, reflecting. “But it figures. Listen. I think the Bandors have given the Motherlodes a few extra hours of daylight to keep up the production.”
Her head tilted questioningly. “Production? You’re moving too fast for me. Of, what, the mind-fruit?”
“Rasheen,” he corrected, gently. “Bandors call their mind-fruit Rasheen. No, believe it or not, it’s electricity, made through photosynthesis!”
“No way!” she exclaimed. “You’ve gone too far with that one, you screwball!”
“But it’s true!” He shrugged. “The Bandors told me. Every leaf, every vine, every tree on Aurona manufactures it, and it’s all routed into the Motherlodes! Ah, and there’s something else, hon.” He looked deeply into her eyes. “Something big. Huge. I-I don’t know how to say this….”
She found her voice. “What is it?”
“Um, the Bandors told me all this incredible stuff by, um, telepathy.” He turned away quickly, checking her reaction out of the corner of his eye. “We-we had a whole a mind-conversation going on in their runic language.”
Her mouth flew open. “You speak in runes now?”
