The Negator, page 12
“How interesting,” Axion said.
I glanced at the android standing on the other side of the window, raising my eyebrows at him.
“It seemed like a longshot in the beginning,” Axion said. “But I’m starting to think I might actually pull this off.”
“Not if the invaders get back to the subs,” I said.
“No, not then.” Axion sighed. “We must subject ourselves to more risk. Let us go down and see what the chief priestess orders next.”
-29-
I stood in the temple courtyard, watching the last of the Sea Peoples retreat into the forest. My right hand throbbed where the overheated blaster had burned it—a red welt across my palm that stung with every movement.
The centurion approached, pulling off his blood-soaked head bandage so a priestess could examine the wound. In the torchlight, I could see it wasn’t as bad as all the blood suggested—a long gash but not deep.
“Sky demon,” the centurion said, then paused. “That’s not right. You fought beside us. You deserve a name. I am Traz, centurion of the third coastal legion.”
“Kane,” I said, offering my left hand since my right was burned.
He clasped my forearm in a warrior’s grip. “Kane. A strange name, but you fight well for someone from the sky realm.”
He pulled a water flask from his belt and offered it to me. I drank gratefully—the water was warm but clean, with a hint of some herb I didn’t recognize.
“Your hand,” Traz said, noticing how I cradled it.
“The weapon overheats,” I said.
He nodded. “Sky weapons are powerful but temperamental. Come, we have little time before we start pursuing them.”
Soldiers were forming up in the courtyard, checking weapons, binding wounds. The worst of the walking wounded were sent back inside. Only those still capable of fighting would join the hunt.
Traz led me to where a priestess was tending wounded soldiers. It wasn’t Serena or Nira, but a younger woman with gentle hands and tired eyes.
“His hand,” Traz said simply.
She examined the burn, then produced a small jar of greenish cream. The moment she spread it on my palm, the burning eased to a cool tingling.
“Kelp extract,” she said. “It is from the deep waters.”
While she worked, more soldiers gathered. I counted about sixty, split into three groups of twenty. Traz would lead one, two other officers the others.
“The Sea Peoples are clumsy on land,” Traz said to his men. “Their suits make them slow, although their weapons are deadly. We know these forests. They do not. We will hunt them like we would hunt any dangerous beast, with patience and cunning.”
Axion appeared at my side. “Interesting tactics,” he said, “though somewhat primitive.”
“It has to work,” I said.
“It probably will. The… aliens are adapted for aquatic environments. In the forest, they’re at a disadvantage even despite their projectors.”
Nira rushed up with a healer’s satchel over her shoulder. “Kane! I heard you were hurt.”
“Just a burn,” I said, showing her my treated hand. “I’m fine.”
She touched my face. “You’re always fine until you’re not. Be careful out there.”
“I will.”
She squeezed my unburned hand, then moved away to tend other wounded.
“We move out,” Centurion Traz said.
The soldiers with Axion and me trailing behind entered the forest in three columns, spreading out to cover more ground. The purple ferns towered overhead, their massive fronds blocking most of the moonlight. But the soldiers knew these paths, moving through the darkness with what I’d call quiet confidence.
It didn’t take long to find the first group of Sea Peoples.
They’d set up in a clearing, about fifteen of them, beam projectors facing outward in a defensive circle.
Traz signaled his soldiers to spread out, surrounding the clearing. I crouched behind a massive fern trunk, my blaster in my left hand, trying not to aggravate the burn on my right.
At Traz’s signal, soldiers opened fire with their flintlocks from three directions at once. The shots mostly bounced off the alien suits, but the psychological effect was immediate.
The Sea Peoples spun, trying to target enemies they couldn’t see. Their beam weapons lit up the forest, burning through ferns, starting small fires, but hitting nothing important.
A bugle blared.
The soldiers charged from the fourth direction, the one the aliens had turned away from. I joined them, my blaster working again. I dropped two aliens before I quit firing. There was no sense in overheating it if I could help it.
The Sea Peoples tried to reform their circle, but it was too late by then. The soldiers were among them, using the aliens’ poor mobility against them.
The fight was savage and didn’t last long. When it was over, fifteen suited aliens lay dead.
We could hear fighting from other parts of the forest. The crack of flintlocks, the sizzle of beam weapons, men shouting and the aliens making their high-pitched distress calls.
As we moved deeper into the forest, tracking another group, Traz fell into step beside me.
“You could have stayed in the temple,” he said. “This isn’t your fight.”
“It kind of is,” I said.
Traz eyed me before nodding, then moving up to lead his soldiers.
We found another group of aliens trying to navigate through the dense undergrowth. Their suits had gotten tangled in vines, and they were using beam weapons to cut themselves free. That perfectly marked their position.
This time, I used my flintlock while the soldiers closed in. The pistol was useless against alien armor, but it added to the chaos and that helped keep the aliens distracted.
The pattern repeated through the night. Small groups of Sea Peoples lost and then became increasingly desperate, trying to reach the safety of their submarines. The soldiers knew every path, every shortcut. They’d appear like ghosts, striking and vanishing.
By the time the sky started to lighten, we reached the beach. Alien bodies in astronaut suits littered the purple sand. The three submarines waited at the water’s edge, abandoned.
I stood with Traz, looking at the alien vessels. Around us, maybe thirty soldiers remained. The others were either wounded or still hunting the last stragglers in the forest.
“It is done,” Traz said. “They won’t try this again soon.”
Axion examined one of the submarines with interest. “Excellent. The vessel appears intact.”
Traz looked at me. “You need one of these?”
“To go after something important,” I said.
Traz grunted, and then from his belt, he pulled a flintlock pistol. It wasn’t his regular sidearm but something finer. The wooden grip was carved with intricate patterns, the metal well-maintained and oiled.
“This was my father’s,” Traz said, offering it to me. “He carried it through three wars. It shoots true and has never misfired.”
After a moment, I took the weapon. It was heavier than my flintlock, and better balanced. “Traz, I can’t—”
“You fought beside us. You bled with us. You’re not a sky demon. You’re a warrior. Take it.”
We clasped forearms again.
“May your aim be true,” he said.
“And yours,” I replied.
Nira approached from where she’d been helping with the wounded. She looked at the submarines with worry.
“I need to use one,” I told her.
She squeezed my hand, the burned one, gently. “I want to come with you.”
I looked at the submarine, then at the alien ocean stretching toward the horizon. The weapon that could kill a proto-god was somewhere beneath those waves. This seemed like a steep price, taking Nira into danger, using alien technology I didn’t understand, trusting Axion not to betray me.
But I’d come too far to turn back now. Besides, I might need an ally down there against Axion.
“All right,” I said. “You want to come, let’s go.”
-30-
We boarded the submarine through the open front, and Axion flipped a switch so the front section of the hatch lowered, sealing us in. It was an eerie feeling.
Nira must have felt it, too, as she pressed against me. I put an arm around her, and she smiled up into my face.
The interior was like stepping into an underwater cave. Everything was curved and flowing, covered in scale-like plating. Panels provided soft blue-green lighting, and the air had an odd tang.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “The air. There’s actual air in here.”
Axion paused, looking at me.
“I thought these guys breathed water,” I said. “How are we supposed to operate in their environment? And how come this sub isn’t flooded?”
“The Kitharas are amphibious,” Axion said, using a name I’d never heard before. “They are not true aquatic beings, as you no doubt assumed.”
“Kitharas?” I said.
“It is their proper designation. They can breathe both air and water, though they prefer aquatic environments. They require air periodically, as their physiology demands it.”
I thought back to the battle, remembering the fish-headed aliens in their bubble helmets filled with sloshing water.
“So why were the suits filled with water?” I asked. “If they can breathe air, why not just use air in the helmets or forgo helmets completely?”
“Combat effectiveness,” Axion said. “The water provides additional protection against weapons, and maintains optimal humidity for their gill structures during extended surface operations. It also serves as emergency life support if their air supply is compromised.”
That made sense, sorta, kind of, I thought. Axion seemed to know everything, which made sense for a computer entity trying to mimic a High Polarion.
“What about their cities?” I asked.
“They are designed with both air and water zones. The Kitharas enjoy atmospheric environments for certain activities: rest, meditation, and some forms of manufacturing. Their deep vaults will be air-filled to preserve the ancient technologies we’re after.”
Relief flooded through me. We might actually be able to pull this off.
“The control chamber should be back from here,” Axion said.
We made our way past equipment I couldn’t identify. Everything was designed for beings who could use it in either air or water: control surfaces that could be operated with webbed hands, and displays that used patterns of light rather than text. Axion told me that.
We found two more Kitharas crew members in what looked like an engine room. These weren’t wearing environmental suits, and I got my first good look at the aliens in their natural state.
They were even more fishlike than I’d imagined. Scaled skin, large eyes positioned on the sides of their heads, gill slits that fluttered as they breathed the ship’s air. They moved with the fluid grace of creatures born to swim, but they appeared comfortable enough in the atmospheric environment.
Axion rushed forward and killed them with swift blows to their heads.
I watched them flop around.
“Are you troubled by my actions?” Axion said, noticing my reaction.
“Not at all,” I said, lying through my teeth. This was a good refresher for me. Axion was ruthless and bloodthirsty, and could act on the instant. When we got the weapon, he probably planned to do that to me. I’d have to do it to him first.
Nira couldn’t take her eyes off the dead but moving amphibians.
“The control chamber is there,” Axion said, indicating a sealed hatch ahead of us.
“So open it,” I said.
After a moment of staring at me, Axion did.
The control chamber had about two feet of water on the floor, clearly by design, so the Kitharas could operate the controls while partially submerged if they chose to.
“Can you work in that?” I asked.
“My systems are sealed against environmental hazards,” Axion said, wading into the chamber. “This should not be a problem.”
The controls were weird. Flowing surfaces covered in displays, operated by touch and gesture rather than switches and buttons. Axion studied them for a moment, then began manipulating the alien interfaces.
The submarine’s engines came to life with a low, thrumming sound. On a screen, I saw the water flowing past the hull as we backed away from the beach. In the background on shore, soldiers and a few priestesses watched the sub.
“Where are we going exactly?” I asked.
I was beat and starting to worry. How was I supposed to defeat Axion? He had all the advantages. I did remember that my ring would cause a blast of sorts. If I used that down here, though, would I short out the sub’s controls? Would the blaster work if I tried to fire it again? It should burn Axion, but maybe not fast enough. He might kill me before I finished destroying him.
“We’re heading for deep water,” Axion said.
That wasn’t really an answer, but I didn’t push it.
The submarine submerged. We were committed, heading into the depths to find an underwater place full of hostile amphibians, accompanied by an android who would certainly betray me the moment he got the weapon and the drop on me.
But I had my ring and biker cunning. Would that be enough? I guess we were going to find out.
-31-
The submarine descended through layers of alien ocean that changed color. First the familiar blue-green of surface waters, then deeper blues that reminded me of Earth’s Caribbean, and finally into purples and blacks that had probably never seen sunlight.
I pressed my face to one of the viewing ports, watching the depth gauge climb—or rather, fall. We were already three thousand feet down and still descending. The pressure outside would crush a human body in seconds, but the submarine’s hull held steady, its scale-like plating likely designed for depths that would challenge even Earth’s most advanced submersibles.
“This is incredible,” I said, my breath fogging the transparent aluminum of the viewport.
Schools of creatures drifted past. Some looked almost familiar: jellyfish-like beings that pulsed with internal light. Others were completely alien.
Then something massive moved in the darkness beyond our lights. It was easily the size of a blue whale, but had a sinuous, serpentine motion.
“A Deep Singer,” Axion said.
The creature’s hide was covered in patterns of light that shifted like living circuit boards. For a moment, it paced our submarine, and I swear I could hear something through the hull, not sound exactly, but a vibration that seemed to resonate in my bones.
Then it was gone, vanishing into the abyss with a grace that something so massive shouldn’t have possessed.
“Four thousand feet,” Axion said from the control chamber.
The submarine’s sensors painted pictures of the ocean floor below us. It wasn’t the flat, featureless plain I’d expected, but a landscape of underwater mountains and valleys, ridges and trenches that looked like they’d been carved by geological forces.
“There,” Axion said, pointing to a cluster of sonar returns ahead.
I moved to the forward viewing port and caught my breath.
The underwater city rose from the ocean floor like something out of a dream. Organic spires twisted upward from the seabed, their surfaces covered in the same lights we’d seen on the Deep Singer. The structures pulsed, creating a constellation of blue-green stars in the abyssal darkness.
The city was maybe a half-mile across, with a dozen major spires connected by flowing bridges that seemed grown rather than built. Smaller structures clustered around the bases of the main towers like coral polyps, and I could see movement: vehicles or creatures swimming between the buildings.
“It’s beautiful,” Nira said.
She was right. It was also completely alien, reminding me that we were intruders in a world as foreign as any other.
“I see several patrol vessels,” Axion said. “Three of them are approaching.”
Through the viewing port, I could see lights moving toward us through the water. They were sleek shapes, smaller than our stolen submarine.
“Can we outrun them?” I asked.
“That is unnecessary,” Axion said. “I’m transmitting Kithara identification codes.”
The patrol vessels slowed their approach but didn’t withdraw. One moved closer, its hull bristling with what looked like harpoon launchers and beam projectors.
“They’re hailing us,” Axion said.
The communication system crackled to life, filling the control chamber with the alien speech. The submarine had a translation system, converting it to something I could understand. Surely, Axion had caused that.
“Assault vessel Depth Hunter, identify your mission status,” the patrol boat said. “You were not scheduled to return for another rotation.”
Axion responded in what I was sure was fluent Kithara, his android vocal systems mimicking their aquatic speech patterns. The translation system rendered his words as: “This is an emergency return. The surface engagement has been compromised. I am carrying priority intelligence regarding the Sky Demon for the Deep Council.”
There was a pause. Then: “Acknowledged, Depth Hunter. Proceed to diplomatic dock four. The Trade Commissioner will want to debrief you immediately.”
I wondered if I’d heard that right. Why would a trade commissioner care about that? Maybe it was a mistranslation.
In any case, the patrol vessels shifted, taking up escort positions around our submarine. I watched them through the viewing ports as they guided us toward the city.
“We’re heading for a diplomatic dock,” I said. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Not to you, perhaps,” Axion said. “The Kitharas maintain extensive trade relations with other surface areas on the planet. They exchange technology and resources for goods from the surface. The diplomatic quarter is maintained at surface pressure for visiting dignitaries.”
