Infinity's End: Books 4-6, page 68
“Guys! We might have company!” Jann yelled from across the room. “I’m hearing something down here. And it doesn’t sound pleasant.”
“It doesn’t sound like scuttling, does it?” Cas asked.
“They’ll have sensed it,” Martial said. “We have to hurry.” He turned to Evie. “You can probably sense it as well.”
“What do you mean they? Who is they? I thought Evie killed the alien.” Cas asked.
“She did,” Laura replied, looking up. “I don’t care what kind of technology they have; no one comes back from something like that. His brain was in two pieces.”
Evie furrowed her brow, not sure what Martial was talking about, until she did. Deep in her mind she could feel something in the air had changed, something fundamental. And now that she was reaching out with her mind, she could feel other things as well. Jann was right, someone was approaching, and it was too small to be a car’nivac. But then she felt a tiny tug in her mind, like two magnets pulling toward each other and turned back to Martial. “Wait, a second. You are one of them, aren’t you?”
“What?” Cas asked, whipping around.
Evie pointed at the Tempest’s former bartender. “He’s an Athru, right down to his core.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Martial had his hands up as Cas trained his weapon on him. “We don’t have time for this.”
This entire time? They’d had a member of the species that was hunting them onboard this entire time? “What was it?” Cas asked. “Were you a spy? Was that how they knew how and where to hit us back at Omicron?”
“Guys…” Jann warned from across the room.
“No,” Martial replied. “It wasn’t like that. Remember I told you I was there to keep an eye on someone. It was her.” He nodded to indicate Evie. “I had to make sure she was okay.”
“Yeah, I’m not buying it,” Cas said. “You could have been feeding them information this entire time and none of us would have suspected.”
“That’s not what happened,” Martial protested, anger rising in his voice.
“Guys!” Cas turned to see the door Jann was guarding melt away, revealing another alien creature like the one they’d encountered back in the other antechamber. He heard the SHINK of Evie’s sword being drawn and in an instant she was beside Jann, her legs wide while she held the sword close to her chest.
“You’re not touching them,” Evie said.
“Moch lach nu das mus noah,” the creature replied and lunged for Jann. Jann fired off a series of shots while Evie used the blade to deflect the swipes from the creature’s long arms. One would have hit Jann for sure had she not parried it.
Cas double-checked his boomcannon was set to the projectile mode before turning away from Martial and firing three shots in quick succession at the creature. One clipped its torso, producing a splash of blood. But the creature didn’t stop. Instead it tried to go for Jann while Evie continued to fend it off.
“Hurry, we have to finish,” Martial said from the console. Cas assumed he and Laura would take care of the final sequences. He glanced over to Box who had readied the injection in his finger.
“Mach!” the creature yelled and jumped clear over Evie and Jann, breaking into a dead run for the control panel. Cas took aim and shot again, this one connecting in his leg, but the alien only faltered for a moment. Pulses hit his back as Jann continued to lay down suppression fire, but that seemed to do little to stop him.
“No!” Evie ran after him with her sword high in the air. Cas saw where the creature was headed: right for Laura—ignoring Martial completely. He was completely ignoring Martial. Box jumped into his path, grabbing the alien by the arm and injecting him with the drug, only for the alien to throw him off like a rag doll, and Box hit the wall with the crunch of metal on stone.
The distraction had given Evie enough time to catch up with the creature. She brought her sword down right on the alien’s shoulder, slicing right through skin, muscle and bone. The arm landed on the ground with a thump as he howled in pain, then jumped high in the air, attaching himself to the tapering ceiling that led to another skylight. He climbed faster than Cas thought possible, until his body blocked out the light for a moment and was gone.
Cas holstered his gun then looked down at the arm on the ground, blood spilling into a pool beneath it. Despite it being gray, he couldn’t help but think how much it resembled a human arm. And Evie had just sliced it right off, with one clean blow.
“How did you do that?” Cas asked. The amount of force she would have needed must have been immense.
Evie was breathing hard but could only stare at the arm as well. “I…I…” Before she could finish Laura launched herself into Evie’s arms, wrapping her in a hug.
“Are you okay?” Cas heard Laura whisper. Evie nodded.
“Nobody check on the robot, he’s fine,” Box said from the other side of the room. Cas stowed his weapon and ran over to him, checking his injuries.
“Did you inject him?” Cas asked.
“My syringe is empty and I don’t see any on the floor so I’m going to say yes,” Box replied as Cas helped him up. “You all owe me. Everyone saw it. Had I not slowed him down, the captain never could have sliced the arm off. I want that in the record.” Cas couldn’t see any additional damage, but from the way Box stood, there was probably internal work that needed to be repaired.
“Lateral spine connections?” Cas asked.
“Like you have to ask,” Box retorted, his eye blinking in frustration. Cas could tell he was in pain, despite the robot always insisting he didn’t have pain receptors. But Cas knew better, because it was impossible to have pleasure receptors without having the opposite, and his friend was more than willing to enjoy those. He knew the pain he couldn’t see on Box’s face was very real.
Cas turned back to Martial. “What the hell is going on here?”
Martial was still working to turn off all the equipment. “They know what we’re trying to do; they can feel the time actuator deactivate. And they’re trying to stop us. Because once our ships have power again, they won’t be able to hunt us as easily.”
“Speaking of which,” Laura said, having pulled away from Evie. “How much longer is this going to take?”
“This is it,” Martial replied. “We’re done. The field should be down, and the ships should regain power.”
Cas tapped his comm. “Robeaux to Tileah. Robeaux to Xax, anyone come in.” There was no reply.
Martial cleared his throat. “Give it a few minutes. Their systems have to reset.”
“So how do we keep them from turning it back on again?” Laura asked. “What stops that guy from coming back in here after we leave and trapping us again?”
“The solution is simple,” Jann replied. “We destroy it. And this place along with it.”
“You can’t do that,” Martial said.
“He’s wrong. You can,” Evie replied. “There’s a lot of raw energy that runs through this structure. I can feel it in my blood. All we need to do is overload all the systems, and the unit will take care of the rest.” She pushed past Martial to reach the control panels.
“No, you don’t understand. You can’t do that,” he replied. “Without the time actuator—”
“What?” Evie challenged. “What will happen if it can’t be used anymore?”
“I—I’m not sure,” Martial replied.
“This is how they manage to create those pockets in time, isn’t it? Like the archway at Omicron. And this place, where the sun is up, but on the rest of the planet it’s night.” He nodded, averting his eyes. “Tell me the truth, Martial. Have you been spying on us for them?”
He shook his head. “My mission was only to watch you. To make sure you were alright. And to alert my superiors if your…abilities began to manifest.”
“Your superiors,” Evie echoed. “The Athru.”
“Not exactly,” he replied. “But it isn’t my place to say. I’ll have to make my report first before I can give you more information.”
Cas charged him, stopping right in front of the man. “I don’t think so. You’re going to tell us everything right now. No more secrets.”
“Guys!” Laura yelled. “Let him tell us back on the ship. If those things come back—”
“How many are there, anyway?” Jann asked.
“Enough,” Evie replied. She had a strange, faraway look on her face, like she was seeing into another world. Cas didn’t like any of it. She turned to him; her eyes suddenly clear. “I need you to keep a weapon trained on me.”
“What? No, why would—”
“Because if this thing comes back out, she can’t be allowed to survive. These Athru, they’re ruthless. They’ll do anything to kill us. And they all have to be stopped.” Her gaze was intense.
“Evie, I can’t do that. The first time was…a mistake. I couldn’t live with myself if I did that again.” Cas hung his head.
She turned to Box. “Can you do it? With one of your syringes?”
“I suppose I could mix Exerodine and Afaridol, it should make a fairly deadly combination,” he replied.
“Then that’s what you are to do, and that’s an order.” She winced, stretching her neck out. “She’s still there. Faint, but there. And she’s mad.” She turned her attention to the control panel, her hands moving over it in sharp, precise movements. Cas glanced at Laura, who was staring back at him, her eyes pleading with him. While Evie worked, he motioned for Box to follow him out of her hearing range.
“Don’t do it,” Cas whispered.
“I’m not,” he replied. “You need to have a little more faith in your favorite doctor. Just because I’ve been in the wilderness for a season doesn’t mean I’ve gone stupid. But I can give her something that should knock her out.”
Cas gave him a knowing look. “Just so long as we’re all on the same page.”
“That’s it,” Evie said. “At least I think that’s it. It should feedback on itself, destroying the entire system.”
“Please,” Martial replied. “You do this, and it could have unintended consequences.”
Laura stepped forward. “Yeah? How about you cut it with the cynical warnings and tell us why we shouldn’t just leave you here?”
“We’re not leaving anyone,” Evie replied. “Especially not when he seems to know so much. Now, we need to go. We don’t have long before this system overloads itself.”
“I know the way!” Box said, approaching the wall where the door had appeared. “As long as there isn’t an army of Athru on the other side.”
“There’s not,” Evie replied, stepping forward and placing her hand on the wall. It glowed blue and the door melted away. “There aren’t a lot of them left. Most departed with the armada. Isn’t that right, Martial?”
“It’s what I assume,” he replied. “But I don’t know it for sure.”
“Come on,” Jann said, motioning with the rifle. “You’re walking ahead of me.”
“I’ll lead the way!” Box said.
Evie stared up at him. “I’ll lead the way; you stay behind me in case we run into any more problems. Let’s move.” She trotted out into the dark passageway beyond, her light the only source of illumination in the dark tunnel. Box followed, as did Laura and Cas, with Martial and Jann bringing up the rear.
They wound through the corridors, and within minutes Cas was lost again, but Evie seemed to know exactly which way to go. It was just like back at Omicron; she had said she’d seen a map in her mind, and he could only assume that’s what she was seeing here. So what if she was part alien? Normally Cas wouldn’t have even blinked an eye. There were individuals all over the Coalition and the Sargan Commonwealth who were the product of two different species. Usually it required some inventive genetic engineering to be possible, but it had become quite common in the last two to three hundred years. The difference with Evie was she was part of them. And Cas had seen the fury in her eyes when she’d been attacking him and Box. He didn’t want to question her judgment, but he was also more on edge than he should have been. What if she was right? What if that thing inside her came back and Box had to knock her out? How would they handle that going forward?
He shook his head. He couldn’t afford to dwell on it. He needed to focus on the task at hand; getting out of this place, and returning to camp. Once they had the shuttles and spacewings back up and running, they could worry about everything else.
Chapter Thirty-Six
“Something’s wrong,” Evie said as they exited the pyramid. She couldn’t describe it, but there was an unease within her, and something didn’t feel quite right. “How far back to camp?”
“According to the information I downloaded from the device you gave to Ensign River, about six kilometers,” Box replied.
Cas tapped his comm again. “Does anyone copy? Base camp two, do you respond?”
“This won’t end well,” Martial muttered behind them. “You’ve disrupted their plan. They won’t hesitate now.”
Evie spun on him. “What was the plan? What were you going to do down here?”
“You need to understand; you were never supposed to find this planet,” Martial said, his voice gruff. “Never in a thousand years did I ever think we’d ever come here. But here you are, and it was my job to protect you. Before you snuck away, I was planning on bringing a few of the security personnel with me here to shut off the dampener. I figured it had to be here.”
“And then what?” Evie asked. “We just go on our merry way?”
“My hope was to do it without disturbing the native population. But once I realized the time dilation was in effect and wave one had been here for weeks already—”
“More like a quarter of a year,” Laura said.
“—then I knew it was too late. After that it was about containing the damage.”
“I still can’t raise anyone,” Cas said, walking over. “Are you sure the dampener is off?”
Evie stared up. The planet’s star was high in the sky. It had been the star she’d seen inside the pyramid’s chamber. “Wait, how long were we in there?” Maybe Rockron had her unconscious longer than she’d realized.
“Don’t worry,” Cas replied. “This is inside another one of those bubbles. Outside, it’s still twilight. Or, it was when we went in. I don’t think we’ve been in there for more than an hour or two.”
“Two-point-three-five,” Box replied.
“Then let’s get outside this field,” Evie replied. “Maybe it’s still blocking comms.” Her stomach turned again. Something was wrong.
“Look.” Laura pointed to the archway when it finally came into view. It seemed like it was a kilometer away, but that might have just been the star beating down on them. “The arch.”
Evie glanced up and saw a splash of red on the right side of the archway. It was smeared, but fresh. “Is that—?”
“The blood of the one you mutilated,” Martial replied. “He’s out there. And there may be others.”
“Quickly, through the arch,” Evie ordered. They all crossed through, but when she came out on the other side in the jungle, her fears manifested. For one, it was still daylight. And two, the star seemed to be moving across the sky at a rapid rate, though it wasn’t setting. For some reason they were stuck in perpetual daylight now.
“Oh, that’s not good,” Martial said.
“Robeaux to base camp. Someone respond.” His comm unit crackled.
“Commander?”
“Xax?” Cas drew his hand closer to his face. “Can you hear me? What’s the situation there?”
“We’ve been holed up since we were attacked by this…bear-like thing. Then suddenly it was light outside,” she said.
Evie motioned for all of them to begin jogging in the direction of camp. Cas could run and talk at the same time. “Anything else?” he said, trotting behind the others. Evie pulled back so she could hear.
“Zaal doesn’t have much time left. We’re still holed up in the shuttles now, should we leave and try to restart the engines?”
“Yes,” Cas replied, glancing at Evie. “If you have to go out, only send a few people at a time. Those bear-things may not be the only things out there. We’re at least thirty minutes from your position.”
“Understood, we’ll do what we can until you arrive.” Cas cut the comm.
“The alien computer should have self-destructed by now,” Evie said, glancing back to the arch they could no longer see due to the underbrush.
“I’m sure you took care of it. What were you expecting, an explosion?” He had a grin plastered on his face.
She returned the gesture; it felt good to smile again. “I guess not.” She was relieved Xax and the others were still alive; she’d been afraid the car’nivacs would come and try to destroy the camp, but fortunately that hadn’t happened. So then why did she still feel that pit in the bottom of her stomach?
“Hey, keep up,” Jann yelled behind them, forcing Martial forward. He was lagging behind. He ran up beside Evie as Box hopped over a fallen log, prompting everyone else to crawl under it or go around it.
“I know this isn’t what you want to hear,” Martial said. “But there was no way you could have ever known about me. They altered my genetic code and they made me appear human enough to fool anything the Coalition had. The funny thing was, I didn’t start keeping an eye on you until you’d left Sissk.”
“You know about Sissk?” Evie asked.
“I know a lot. I got lucky on Tempest, they needed me to fill a role. But when you were on the Saragosa, I had to rely on comms back and forth from a contact of mine. And when you were in the academy I couldn’t get too close. “
“You were there too?” Evie asked as Box slowed ahead of them to push through some thick brush.
He nodded. “I did my best to blend into the background.”
“You’re right, I don’t want to hear it.” The fact he was part of the Athru in whatever way was secondary. She was more upset she’d had someone tailing her most of her life and she’d never realized. She’d never suspected. Greene had never suspected. Hadn’t there been background checks? Records? All of which was stored in the Coalition’s database. Those files couldn’t be altered. Unless…
