C. J. Barry - Unearthed 01, page 18
“I do not understand,” Pitz came back after a brief pause.
Cohl sighed. “We will be in total communications blackout once we get close to Demisie. At that point, you are on your own. It should not take us more than four days to find the amulet and contact you. If you don’t hear from me after that time, then get my father out of Trakas any way you can.”
Static filled the line. “Are you sure, sir?”
“Positive. I will send you one last message outside Demisie’s solar system. Start counting from then.”
“Understood.”
“Out.”
Cohl cut communications and rubbed his forehead. He already knew that the odds of a successful rescue attempt were slim. Pitz’s formidable firepower was no match for the sheer number of Rommol’s loyal guards. Even if Pitz managed to find Montral Trae Salle, getting him out alive would be practically impossible.
The door to the office slid open. Tess walked in with a warm smile.
“Hey, handsome. Anything new to report?”
He watched her graceful walk, caught her scent as she stopped in front of him and looked him over with those bewitching green eyes.
“Come closer and I’ll tell you all about it,” Cohl said in a lazy voice.
She shifted her weight to one hip and cocked her head. “You know, you’re easily distracted.”
“On the contrary, I have very linear, very focused thought processes.” He flexed his hands.
With that, Tess took a small step back to what she probably thought was a safe distance. Her chin went up. “Stop changing the subject, Cohl, and tell me what you were so worried about when I walked in here.”
He took a deep breath. “Nothing is wrong. Pitz arrived at Trakas and is attempting to locate my father’s exact position.”
Tess frowned. “Why?”
“In case Pitz needs to launch a rescue.”
She watched him for a long time. “You don’t think we are going to make it, do you?”
Cohl scanned her troubled face. “I don’t know. Every acquisition is different and this one sounds more difficult than most. Alone, I’d be all right. Having you along increases the risk considerably. I warned you that this would be dangerous.”
Tess stared at the floor in thought and then fixed her gaze on him. “Would more training help? Sahto said you used that Virtu-whatever to practice. Maybe you could take me through a real acquisition?”
Cohl’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “We can do that. Are you sure you are up to it?”
Challenge flashed in her eyes. “You have to ask? I’m ready for anything.”
He grinned slow and wide. “I’m glad to hear it. Come to think of it, we haven’t finished combat training yet either.”
Tess’s eyes widened. “There’s more? Like what?”
“Did I mention reach?” Cohl lunged forward and pulled her down on the chair to straddle his thighs. Her hair tumbled around her face. He glimpsed the fight in her eyes. Damn, who knew combat training could be so stimulating?
“The power of reach is deceptive,” he said smugly.
Her hands spread warm against his chest. Her sensual gaze heated the rest of him. She asked, “Did you actually study all these rules or are you just making them up as you go along?”
He chuckled low and deep. His hands began a long slow slide down her back and around her buttocks. “I learned from Zain. He’s military trained. For obvious reasons, his training technique differs considerably from mine.”
Her gaze sharpened. “So how many women have you trained?”
Cohl’s hands stopped and he looked directly into her eyes. “Just you.”
She scanned his face as if searching for the truth. Finally she slid her arms around his neck and began nipping at his jaw. Her soft voice set him ablaze. “Since you are obviously well trained, I really have only one choice. I surrender.”
Cohl’s hands skimmed over the front of her black shirt, across her breasts, and down the rib cage, one rib at a time. He murmured thickly, “Not that I’m complaining but that was pretty easy. I expected more of a fight from my best student.”
Slowly, she wriggled the length of her body against him until he hissed through his teeth. Her hands slid down his stomach, her fingers slipping beneath the waistband of his pants.
“Who said I was going to go easy on you?” she whispered.
* * *
Chapter Fourteen
Tess stared down at her feet planted dead center in the blue, shimmering circle of the VirtuWav. Her gaze traveled straight up to the matching circle above her head.
“Are you sure this is safe?”
Cohl glanced up from the VirtuWav control panel, the insidious blue light giving his smiling face a ghostly cast. “I do it all the time. It is safe. Trust me.”
She gave a short laugh. “Do you have any idea how many women have gotten in trouble believing that line?”
“Would I lie to you, Tess?” There was an amused undertone in his statement.
“No. You would just leave out the part where my brain explodes.” She smiled sweetly at him.
Cohl tapped the controls. “Only if I thought it would scare you.”
“Not funny, Cohl. I told you I want to know everything. That includes any minor details that may affect my ability to walk with the living.”
She heard his soft chuckle. “How could I forget? You nearly carved it across my forehead. Believe me, you are perfectly safe.”
The door to the VirtuWav room slid open and Sahto walked in. He greeted Tess, then took over the control of the VirtuWav panel from Cohl. Tess swallowed hard.
“So explain to me exactly what happens here,” she said. “And don’t leave anything out.”
Cohl stepped into the circle next to her. “The tubes will rise and fill with a buoyant gas. You will still be able to breathe. Then the computer interface will engage. Feels like fingers touching you. It doesn’t hurt. Just relax. And don’t fight the interface.”
He grinned at her, his gold eyes gleaming. “I know that goes against your natural instinct.”
Tess glared at him.
Cohl laughed aloud and nodded to Sahto, who tapped the panel.
An instant later, everything changed. The blue tube rose up around her and locked on to the circle above. Warm, heavy air filled her little world and lifted her off her feet. Weightless and lighter than air, she floated like a cloud; her hair flowed around her much as it would underwater.
When she steadied herself with a hand on each side ot the tube, Cohl’s voice came to her as if he were inside her mind. “Don’t fight it, Tess. Relax.”
She turned to look at him, but his floating image was fading away into a sleepy dream despite her fervent effort to control it. Electrical charges surged around her, tickling at her skin. Tess stiffened as they probed and attached to her, gently holding her flailing body in place. Once she was immobile, Tess felt the delicate invasion into her brain as her real world succumbed. After a few long terrifying seconds, her mind relinquished its struggle and the image sharpened.
She found herself standing in a strange world with Cohl nearby, frowning at her.
“I told you not to fight it. You’re going to have one hell of a headache when we get back.”
She knew he was talking but whatever he said was lost on her. The dirt beneath her feet, the distant mountains, the smell of foliage, the warm sun beating downall so real. Cohl had told her what the VirtuWav was capable of but this was unbelievable.
They were standing in a clearing between a sheer rock face and an odd-looking forest of column-shaped trees in various hues of green. Mossy tendrils hung in large clumps from rocks and crept along the ground. Humid air with its heavy, pungent smell was so real that her nose itched. She glanced up as a flock of birds screeched their way across a blue, cloudless sky.
“I can’t believe this is only in my mind,” she whispered.
“It is amazing,” Cohl agreed. “Sometimes I take it for granted.” He reached out and squeezed her hand. It felt just like it should, warm and strong.
Tess stared at her hand in his, then down at herselfall there, same body, same clothes. She took a tentative step forward. The ground felt solid and real beneath her. She turned to examine Cohl from head to toe. He looked magnificent as usual.
“You want anything changed?” He crossed his arms over his chest.
Tess met his gaze, confused. “What?”
A wide smile crossed his face. “The program can change my appearance. I can be taller, broader, bigger if you want.”
Tess blinked at him. “Bigger?”
Both his eyebrows rose. It was then she realized exactly what he was talking about.
She shook her head emphatically. “Oh, heavens no. No, thanks. Don’t change a thing.”
Cohl chuckled softly. “You had me worried for a minute.”
“What about me?” she asked, half joking, half serious, mostly curious. “Anything you would alter?”
His golden eyes shimmered as he regarded her intently, lightly stroking his chin. “I’d prefer you naked.” Then he smiled wide. “But that would put an end to this little expedition pretty quick.”
She laughed and surveyed the strange new world inside her head. “So where are we?”
“Fa Lipele,” Cohl replied from behind her. She turned to find him running his hand along a rectangle depression in the rock face.
Tess frowned. “You’ve been here before?”
“You wanted to see what a real acquisition is like. I tackled this one about a year ago.”
She licked her lips. “So you know what to expect, right?”
He gazed up at her sincerely. “Whatever happens, I’ll be with you, Tess. You won’t be alone.”
His hands roamed over the rock, finally settled into an almost invisible line. “Besides, I want to see how well you take orders.”
“Wasn’t I a good student in combat training?” Tess folded her arms across her chest and raised a single eyebrow in quiet challenge.
Cohl’s fingers froze on the stone. His eyes slowly met hers. “The best student I’ve ever had.”
Tess’s heart took a powerful leap. “I have an excellent teacher,” she said in a husky voice.
“However perfect it was, we don’t need any distractions along the way,” Cohl replied. “You can get hurt here just like you would in reality.” He returned to the rock, his fingertips following a fine crack.
“You said it was safe.”
He nodded, not looking up. “I did. You can’t die in here but pain is pain. Unless you specifically cancel it out, it’s going to hurt just like the real thing.”
His fingers slipped inside a narrow fissure. “Got it.”
A deep rumble emanated from the towering stone cliff and an entry door opened before them.
Tess peered inside. “It looks awfully dark.”
Cohl reached into the backpack at his feet, produced two baseball-sized balls, and tossed them in the air. Tess watched in fascination as they floated to midair and started glowing. One shimmied to Cohl; the other one flew to Tess. Hers stopped about two feet away and blinked at her.
“What are they?” Tess asked.
“Lightballs,” he answered. “They are programmed to stick close to you and provide no-hands lighting.”
“They are so cute. Can I name mine?.”
Cohl shook his head and chuckled. “Whatever makes you happy.”
Tess reached out and gently touched her lightball. “Hello, Tink.”
Cohl swung the pack over his shoulder. “Follow me. And do exactly what I tell you.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I know, I know. Horrible death, dismemberment, and all that. Don’t worry, I’ll be a good girl.”
He gave her a skeptical look to which she batted her eyelashes. Then he entered the cavern with his lightball zipping along ahead of him. Tess stayed close behind as the brilliant day outside disappeared around the first turn. The lightballs shone a path through the terminal darkness.
The walls were giant slabs of rock, wedged together in a crude fashion. Cohl stooped slightly under the low ceilings but she could still see the bounce in his step. He was in his element.
Tess could feel the humidity, smell the fungi that grew along the rough, stone walls. A low, steady roar emanated from the darkness in front of them, increasing to a deafening level as they moved forward. Cohl led her into an open cave filled with spectacular stalagmites and jagged walls ringed with color.
A five-story waterfall plummeted into a deep pool to their right, swirled and churned into a forty-foot-wide river that cut through the center of the massive cave, and disappeared under a stone wall on the other side. Tess covered her ears. The view might be magnificent but the damn noise could kill you.
Thick, sweet mist hung over the entire cave. Through the mist, Tess could just make out the opposite shore and outlines of hundreds of stalagmite formations. It looked like something out of Dungeons and Dragons.
Cohl walked to the edge of the raging river. Tess followed, feeling the kinetic energy of the falls vibrate the ground beneath her feet. She watched Cohl studying the far shore and wondered if he even realized he was smiling. She imagined she looked much the same way when she sang.
“How do we cross it?” she shouted to Cohl, who was already stooping to retrieve another goodie from the bag. He stood up, holding a cannonlike device sporting a grapple hook on each end.
“Watch out,” he ordered. Tess stepped out of the way as he held the device out horizontally in front of him and pulled the trigger. Two grapple hooks shot out simultaneously. The first wedged tightly in the rock face behind them with a puff of dust. The other smacked into a giant stalagmite on the other side of the river.
It all happened in a split second and suddenly they had a bridge across the river. The cable snapped taut and Cohl slid the barrel slider back and forth along it.
Then he reached into the bag and pulled out two harnesses. The first one, he secured around his own torso and legs. The second, he helped Tess into and tightened the harness webbing snuggly.
He hitched his head toward the far side. “I’ll go first, then send the unit back to you. Just do what I do.”
She frowned at the setup. “I’m not a star athlete here.”
Cohl attached his harness to the slider. Gripping it, he swung underneath and wrapped his legs around the slider. “All you have to do is hold on.”
He showed her the control trigger and immediately shot across the pounding river, dropping safely on the other side. His lightball followed, blinking through the mist. He detached and shoved the slider back toward her. It glided across the cable and into her hands. She caught it. Looked like such a flimsy little thing to trust your virtual life to.
Tess gritted her teeth. She was the one who had offered to do this. She wasn’t going to chicken out now.
She clipped her harness to the unit just as Cohl had and let her weight drop beneath the cable.
Her lightball hovered around her head. Tess whispered, “Okay, Tink. Here goes nothing.”
With her legs wrapped tight around the slider, she activated the motor. It launched her, screaming like a banshee, over the water at breakneck speed.
About halfway across, she realized that she didn’t know how to stop the damn thing. Luckily Cohl did. He grabbed her just before she smacked into the stalagmite on the other side. Tink zipped to her side.
Tess laughed a bit hysterically as Cohl set her on her feet. “Wow, that was almost fun.”
Cohl chuckled as he disconnected her from the slider and helped her out of the harness. “Want to do it again?”
“No. I’ll pass.” She waved him off. “Oh, and by the way, thanks for telling me how to stop.”
He grinned. “I realized that little omission when you hit the halfway point.”
“I knew it. I knew you’d leave out something. Trap number one down, right?”
He was already slinging the pack over his back. “Right.”
She trailed behind him, climbing between the massive stalagmites, fresh adrenaline pumping through her veins. She was beginning to see why Cohl was so hooked on this.
“What’s next?”
He cast a glance over his shoulder. “I don’t think you are going to like the next one as well.”
Tess skirted a particularly large pillar. “Spill it, Cohl.”
A cool breeze hit her in the face as they turned a tight corner. He abruptly caught her arm and pulled her tight against his chest. Face-to-face, with their shoulders wedged against a stone wall, she looked up at him in confusion.
He grinned. “Whatever you do don’t look down.”
All the blood drained from her face and only her eyes moved as she cast a worried look around. They were standing on a narrow ledge over a bottomless chasm. At least twenty feet of thin air separated them from the opposite sheer rock face.
“Oh God,” she gasped and squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m going to kill you when we get out of here.”
She pressed herself back against the rock, trying desperately to become one with the wall.
“Breathe, Tess.”
“I can’t. You breathe for me.”
She felt his warm lips against hers and she moaned softly.
“Trust me,” he whispered in her ear.
“I do. I don’t trust myself.”
His lips skimmed hers again. His fingers caressed the nape of her neck. “Believe in yourself. You are far stronger than you know.”
She let out an uneven breath. “It’s just a simulation, right?”
“Right.”
“What happens if I fall?”
He gave her a reassuring smile. “Program,” he said aloud, “terminate exercise if Tess falls.”
She looked at him sadly. “Will we have that option on Demisie?”
“No,” he answered simply. Then he glanced down the length of the narrow ledge. “And if we don’t get moving, we’ll be here all day.”
He slid over and flattened against the wall next to her. “Go first, Tess. It’s only twenty meters. Just keep moving. You can choose your next step, but try not to look directly down at your feet.”
