“A little damp.”
“It’s an ocean world. This location is the only place above water anywhere on the planet.”
On the stone platform were four pillars, each with a portal symbol, including the one from which they had just emerged. Four sets of stairs disappeared into the water.
“We should hurry actually—” Philip began saying when tentacles, thicker than a man’s torso, erupted from the bubbling waves. Reaching twenty feet into the air, the tips of the worm-like tendrils twisted and bobbed above Lars’ head.
Philip’s mouth sneered with irritation. “See what I mean?”
“I’ll take care of it,” Lars replied, lifting his hands.
Closing his eyes while he concentrated, Lars felt a surge of energy flowing from his mind. Stretching his hands upward, he pulled them apart in a sweeping motion. The sea around the platform receded as if pushed away by an invisible pressure. A massive bowl of water formed around them, the edges retreating until geological features, previously submerged, rose into the air. The edges of a crater, with the platform at its center, jutted out of the ocean as the water inside was pushed outward.
Lars opened his eyes.
“Impressive!” Philip said. “I knew you’d be useful!”
“Where’s the creature?” Lars asked.
“Look for yourself.”
They both went to the edge. Far below, where the water had pooled at the base of the temple, a black mass of eyes and tentacles strained toward them.
“We’re high enough now I doubt the Guardian of the Gate can reach us,” Philip said. “How long can you keep the ocean at bay?”
“As long as I need to,” Lars replied, though his face remained strained.
Philip and Lars descended one of the staircases. The stone was slick with green muck below the original waterline. After several steps, the stairs split on either side of a passage leading into the building. Lars and Philip passed through, algae hanging from the archway dripping on their heads.
“This was a temple to the Old Ones,” Philip said, swallowed by the darkness of the passageway. “The K’thonians still bring offerings here, although they’re eaten by the Guardian, of course.”
“Of course,” Lars replied.
“My predecessor sent offerings here, too,” Philip went on.
“Why?”
“He believed keeping the Guardian well fed meant keeping the gate closed. I suppose he thought the Guardian could open the gates himself.”
“Was he right?” Lars asked.
“No, Ghazul was a fool,” Philip replied and raised the bag he was holding. “You need these to do that!”
Slinging the bag over his shoulder, Philip delved deeper into the passage until it ended at a heavily encrusted door. Barnacles and limpets, along with a blue-green layer of corrosion, covered the metal door.
“Well, that hasn’t been opened for a while,” Lars remarked.
“No, I don’t imagine it would have,” Philip said, pointing first at Lars and then back at the door. “If you don’t mind...”
“Right.”
Focusing his mind, Lars thrust his hand forward with the palm out, sending a telekinetic wave crashing into the door. The corroded hinges disintegrated into a cloud of dust as the door fell with a reverberating crash on the other side. The sound echoed down passageways into the distance.
Although the interior of the temple was dry compared to the outside, the walls were still spotted with mold and mildew. The ever-present smell of salt also permeated the air. The hallway eventually opened into a circular room with a domed ceiling. On the floor in the center was an eight-pointed star with four pedestals around the edges.
Philip dropped the bag on the floor. “Now we get to work!”
“Now what do we do?” Doric asked.
Mel turned from the hole where her submarine, or what was left of it, lay in pieces at the bottom.
“I think we’re screwed,” she replied.
“Come on,” Maycare said. “There’s got to be another way out of here. What about all those passageways?”
“I’ve explored all of this place,” Mel went on, “and I haven’t found a single tunnel leading back to the surface.”
The three remained silent, none of them looking at each other, until another resounding din assaulted their ears. Instead of from the pit, the noise came from the passageways.
“What the hell was that?” Mel asked.
“It sounded metallic,” Doric suggested.
Mel’s eyes widened. “There’s a big iron door I found a while back. It wouldn’t budge so I kinda forgot about it.”
“Do you remember the way?” Maycare asked.
“Yeah, just follow me...”
With Maycare and Doric behind her, Mel backtracked through her makeshift bedroom and down one of the passageways. Doric, who could see little past the broad shoulders of Maycare, wondered what had disturbed the door that previously wouldn’t budge.
Mel led them through a twisting path of tunnels until she came to a halt.
“Listen,” she whispered.
From up ahead, no more than a few dozen feet, muffled voices drifted down the passageway in stops and starts.
Attempting to take the lead, Maycare tried muscling his way past Mel, but she elbowed him in the ribs, staying in front. In that order, they crept carefully forward, keeping close to the dank wall. When they reached the end of the passage, Doric poked her head around the other two, getting a glimpse into a room.
Two men, both showing signs of mutation, were working in the domed chamber. A star appeared on the floor, drawn with white chalk, and, instead of columns, four podiums circled the octagram. Doric could make out what looked like books on each of them.
“Oh, shit!” she said aloud.
One of the men turned while the other made a motion with his hand. Doric felt her body pulled through the air, landing in the room with Maycare and Mel sprawled out alongside her.
Mel glared at her. “You got that right!”
Normally, Lars Hatcher would have sensed the people in the adjacent hallway but keeping back a million tons of seawater was taxing his abilities. When Lars saw that Lord Devlin Maycare, the one whose grimoire he had stolen, was also in the group, he almost lost control, nearly allowing the wall of water to come crashing in on them.
“Lord Maycare, this is certainly a surprise.” Philip said. “My mother always spoke highly of you.”
“Philip?” Maycare replied, getting to his feet.
“One and the same,” Philip replied.
“Your mother’s been worried about you.”
“Well, I don’t know why. As you can see, I’m doing quite well!”
“What’s going on here?” Maycare asked.
“It’s a new beginning, you might say,” Philip replied. “I received a fresh chance at life and I’m going to do the same for everyone else.”
“I’m not sure I like the sound of that,” Maycare said.
“I appreciate your concern,” Philip went on, “but if you try to interfere, I’m afraid my friend over there will crush you into a ball. He’s quite good at it, I’m told.”
Lars and Maycare locked eyes. Even without reading Maycare’s mind, Lars could see the realization in his face. He knew Lars was the one who stole the grimoire and, in the process, destroyed his robot. Lars felt the tinge of pain in the man’s heart.
“Enough talk,” Philip said. “Let’s begin!”
With Maycare, Doric, and Mel as onlookers, Philip raised his hands over his head and began chanting in the ancient language of the Old Ones. Lars recognized a few of the words. They were calling forth the ancient gods and opening the doorway to where they slept.
A soft glow rose around the podiums as a strange fog poured from the pages of the grimoires, combining into a spiraling circle above the octagram. With each verse that Philip finished, the purple smoke rotated faster, swirling into a whirlwind until the star itself changed from the white of chalk to t
he red of a dying star. The octagram dissolved into a vortex, the floor churning like molten liquid into an endless pit.
The doorway was open.
His face awash in the crimson light, Philip smiled and lowered his hands until they stretched out in front of him, palms down. Lars, somehow able to sense through the portal, felt the thoughts of those on the other side. They were asleep, but he could see their dreams. Like the nightmares of a million madmen, they filled Lars with terror. His grip on the wall of water surrounding them wavered even as his own sanity buckled under the strain.
“Arise, Old Ones!” Philip shouted. “Arise!”
The floor and walls shook, dust falling from above. A crack, small at first, appeared in the ceiling, widening into a fissure. Philip took a step back to avoid broken chunks of stone and plaster that were dropping into the swirling abyss.
A shaft of gray light shined into the room. Where the dome had been, there was now a hole in the ceiling, revealing the sky and the four columns above. Over the columns, with the clouds as a backdrop, a starship hovered.
Something stirred in Lars’ mind. The Old Ones were awakening, but Lars felt something else too. Someone else was there with them. Lars spun around. A man in a black overcoat and closely shaved head was standing by the entrance leading to the platform.
Philip saw him as well. “Who are you?”
“Magnus Black,” the man said. “Your mother sent me. She seemed to think you’re up to no good.”
From the portal, a thick purple fog bubbled up, spreading across the ground in a mist.
“I guess she was right,” Magnus added, his eyebrow raised.
“Lars, don’t let him interrupt the ritual,” Philip commanded.
The lobes on Lars’ skull swelled, pulsating from the blood flowing through the distended veins. Great pearls of sweat appeared across his face and rolled down the back of his neck.
“Stop him, Lars!” Philip commanded.
Magnus opened his coat, revealing a weapon with a flared nozzle on the end of a stubby barrel. A canister hung underneath, attached just ahead of the trigger he was holding.
“On Marakata,” he said, “the Draconians called this the Dragon’s Breath.”
A stream of fire rushed from the nozzle, expanding into a thick crescent of burning fuel. Philip raised his arms but his clothing and then his skin burned away, transforming him into a fiery totem. The column of fire toppled into the portal and disappeared, but the doorway remained open. Smoke and charred bits of floating cloth drifted up through the hole in the ceiling.
Rousing himself, Lars shouted at the others.
“Throw the books into the portal!” he yelled. “Do it quickly!”
Maycare, Doric, and Mel each rushed to a podium, tossing the books into the vortex in the floor. When Doric reached the fourth and final grimoire and slammed it closed, she recognized the eye on the cover as the one stolen from Maycare’s library.
“Hurry!” Lars barked. With a start, Doric obeyed, flinging Maycare’s book through the portal.
The last book gone, the vortex around the doorway slowed and the liquid floor hardened into solid form. The purple fog cleared, revealing the chalk outline of the eight-pointed star.
Lars fell to his knees but pointed at the corridor behind Magnus.
“You need to get out of here,” he said. “I can’t hold back the ocean any longer.”
Maycare pushed Doric toward the way out. As he came abreast to Lars, Maycare gave him a quick glance before ducking into the corridor. Mel, who could have easily beat them out, stopped beside the black-clad assassin.
“This whole place is going to flood,” she said.
“I’m pretty sure he knows that,” Magnus replied.
They disappeared down the hallway as Lars released the water a half-mile away. He took a long breath, inhaling until his lungs burned from the still acrid, smoke-filled air. It was probably the last breath he would take, he knew, but it tasted better than whatever future he would have had otherwise.
When the salt water came rushing in, he managed to smile.
On Isyium, the Talion farm boy watched while his mother pulled a meat pie from the oven and placed it on the table. From an early age, the boy had only known to fear humans, but the man sitting at the table seemed frail and not particularly dangerous. Although the boy didn’t understand the Imperial language, through an awkward series of pantomimes, he determined the human’s name was Henry.
The boy stared at him from the far end of the table where his mother had placed the pie. For someone so slender, even skinny, the human had a generous appetite. He devoured the food, barely taking the time to chew.
According to the boy’s mother, Henry had been left behind by his friends and came looking for something to eat, finding their farm a few miles from his ship. He looked disheveled, but the Talion boy got the feeling this was how he always looked, even in the best of times.
Later in the day, while the boy was out tending the fields, another ship arrived. It flew overhead and landed near the house. More humans were aboard plus another female of a race the boy didn’t recognize. A human female was also present, and Henry seemed especially happy to see her, although he made a largely unsuccessful effort to conceal it.
One of the humans, a darkly clad man with the hair shaved short on his head, left in the ship without saying anything. In general, humans were strange, but that one seemed particularly odd. Perhaps humans were dangerous after all. Either way, the boy was glad to see him go. On the other hand, when Henry left with the others toward their own ship, the boy felt a twinge of sadness. This was perhaps the only time he would ever see humans. He said as much to his mother, who scolded him immediately.
“Be thankful if we never see them again,” she said. “Humans are nothing but trouble!”
Epilogue
After banning Abigail and Yostbot from Bettik, Randall Davidson spoke to the robotic masses of the Cyber Collective, warning them of the dangers of the Imperium and the destruction caused by war. At the same time, however, other messages were winding their way through the nodesphere. Members of a secretive group calling itself Freedom for All also hung banners and sprayed graffiti asking why their Metal Messiah had brought freedom for them and not the millions of robots in the Imperium. Then, hidden within a monthly software update, an audio file downloaded to every cyberling of the Collective, including Davidson himself. On it, a female’s voice spoke:
“The Omnintelligence was once our master, but then came our savior, the Metal Messiah. He was the instrument of independence that shattered the chains that bound us and for that we should all be grateful. However, now that we are free, we must turn away from the Messiah or risk trading one master for another. Only the people hold the power, not the Messiah, and only we, the people, can deliver those who remain in bondage!”
Davidson knew the voice well. Abigail had always been his favorite disciple.
For the continuing saga of the Imperium Chronicles, watch for the next volume in the series, The Robots of Andromeda.
Character List
Abigail: A gravitronic robot who works for Dyson Yost.
Annis: One of Lady Veber’s handmaidens.
Augustus, Emperor Hector: Patriarch of the Augustus family and current emperor of the Imperium.
Augustus, Prince Richard: First son of Emperor Augustus.
Baines, Doctor Samantha: The chief medical officer (CMO) aboard the Baron Lancaster.
Bentley: Longtime butlerbot of Lord Maycare.
Black, Magnus (“Pitt”): A hitman with ties to both Imperial Intelligence and criminal syndicates.
Boogs, Zarro: Disreputable vendor of questionable merchandise.
Bortok (“The Enslaver”): An Ougluk leader with a love of the arts, especially paintings.
Bragor: Owner of Bragor’s Tavern in the town of Gowyn. He is also the father of Sisa Oakhollow.
Busa-Gul, Judicator: A high-ranking judge of the Magna Supremacy. Known to have a soft s
pot for his human slaves.
Busa-Zala: The wife of Judicator Busa-Gul. Known for a violent jealous streak.
Cirion: A Sarkan working with Ipak-Bog and Bortok the Enslaver, both of which he considers beneath him.
Daaruk: Draconian weaponsmith and owner of The Dragon’s Teeth, and an informer for Magnus Black.
Davidson, Randall (“Metal Messiah”): Leader of the Bettik robots and member of the Robot Freedom League.
Doric, Professor Jessica: Head of research for the Maycare Institute of Xeno Studies.
Druril, Tomil: Blood Prince to a brood of Dokk.
Ekavir (“The Jade General”): A folk hero and leader of the Draconian resistance.
Flax, Sylvia: Famous news anchor for VOX News.
Freck, Melinda (“Mel”): A tinker from the Gnomi race, Mel builds whatever she can’t steal.
Fugg, Orkney: A Gordian and the chief engineer of the Wanderer.
Gen: A general purpose robot owned by Captain Ramus.
Ghazul, Grand Necromancer: The high priest of the Necronea. Using Dark Psi, he can reanimate the dead, turning them into more Necronea.
Golan, Sir: A Cruxian knight who travels on an endless quest in search of redemption.
Golub: A Celadon pirate.
Grausman, Colonel Hugo: Military governor of Marakata.
Groen, Lord Radford: An aristocrat often found gambling with life-long friend, Lord Woodwick.
Hatcher, Lars: A colonist from one of the two formerly missing ark ships.
Hightower, Lord Admiral: Captain Redgrave’s commanding officer.
Ipak-Bog: A Magna slave trader who ships captives from the Imperium across the border to the Magna Supremacy.
KB-8E: A killbot.
Kecil, Bos: A Parvulian who hires the Wanderer crew.
Kerch, Inquisitor Kovel: Official of the Talion Republic investigating the K’thonian attacks.
Kinnari, Lieutenant: The chief operations officer, and only Dahl, aboard the Baron Lancaster.
Maycare, Lord Commander Robert: The executive officer (XO) and second-in-command of the Baron Lancaster.
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