by J. N. Chaney
I groaned in response, trying to push myself up from the floor. The room was blurry and confused, but I could see the outline of white that made up the Celestial, and it grew closer by the second.
I didn’t have long.
“Siggy,” I managed to say. “Tell everyone to get out before—”
The wing came down and dug into my leg, burrowing through my muscle like a knife through a tomato.
I screamed.
“Captain!” I heard Freddie yell, but I couldn’t tell from where.
My visor blinked, showing the map of the facility, but the glass was so broken that half of it was gone. I could still see our section, but only barely. Only enough to tell where we were, where the core was, and the nearest drones.
The Celestial bent down to me, its empty face a meter from my own, and it stared into mine like it was searching for something. It drew nearer, coming close enough for me to see its blue eyes. I buried the pain as best as I could, and I stared right back.
Right as I thought it might open its mouth and speak, Freddie fired on its back. “Get away from him!” he raged. “Get away, you monster!”
The Celestial flicked its shoulders, pulling itself away from me, and slid its wing out from my leg. It hurt just as bad coming out as it had going in.
I caught sight of Freddie, holding his weapon near the rear, towards the door. The Celestial brought its wings around to its back, shielding it from the attack and leaving its front exposed to me.
I reached for my pistol and brought it up to meet the head, but fired prematurely, tagging its chest as I tried to steady my aim on its forehead.
I squeezed the trigger again.
Click.
My eyes widened as the sound of an empty chamber echoed through the room.
In all the fighting, I’d lost track of my shots, and I didn’t have time to reload. Not without signaling my move to the enemy. This was it.
I was fucked.
The Celestial reached out to my weapon, grasping the barrel. Its fingers were so small, almost like a child’s, but there was strength behind them. I could feel it.
It jerked the weapon free from me, tossing it to the opposite side of the room.
The Celestial leaned down again, this time reaching out for my throat. At the same time, my visor blinked, flickering with an array of different lights, each of them indicating—
Three yellow icons. What did that mean? Was it a glitch? No, not a glitch. Something else. Those were—
I looked to the ventilation tunnel to my right, then at the Celestial as it gripped my throat with its hand. “Fuck you,” I moaned.
The Celestial raised me off the floor, our eyes still locked. I tried reached for my knife and drew it free from its sleeve, then plunged the blade into the hand. It dropped me, and I pushed myself back.
“S-Siggy!” I managed to say.
“Patience, sir,” replied the Cognitive. “Here we come.”
As he said the last word, a medium-sized drone slammed into the side of the Celestial.
I felt the pressure from the impact, and the sound hurt my ears like a gunshot.
The Celestial hit the wall, along with the drone. Immediately, another drone followed, hitting the monster in its chest and burying it. A third arrived a second later, striking with the same amount of force as the previous two.
And this time, the Celestial didn’t get back up.
Freddie came running to my side before the dust had even cleared. “Captain!” he shouted, quickly spotting my torn leg. “Oh, gods!”
I motioned for him to help me to my feet. “I’m fine,” I said, obviously lying.
He grabbed my arm and wrapped it around his shoulder, hoisting me up so I could get a better view.
“Sir, this seems like the appropriate moment to inform you that the slip tunnel has been activated. A new gate will form shortly,” informed Sigmond.
I had Freddie bring me to the railing near the stairs. “I need you to disarm that core,” I said, trying to slow my breathing. Between the strain of standing and the intense pain in my leg, it was all I could do to say it.
“I’m not sure how, Captain,” said Freddie. “But I’ll try.”
“I shall walk you through it, Mr. Tabernacle,” said Sigmond.
“You heard him,” I said, motioning with my head to the reactor. “Go.”
Freddie nodded and took off, heading into the rear compartment.
I glanced around the room, finding Abigail and the others at different points, most of them conscious. The exceptions seemed to be Felix and Gustin, who weren’t moving. “Siggy, is everyone alive?” I asked, unable to check their status with my visor.
“Yes, sir,” he responded.
I breathed a sigh of relief. As long as we hadn’t lost anyone, I could turn my focus on what mattered.
“Jace?” called Abigail, her voice coming into my ear through the comm.
“Over here,” I said, raising my hand so she could see me from the broken drone resting between us.
Bolin was on his feet, too, making his way to my position, along with Nash.
I stood on my one good leg, trying to reload my pistol while holding on to the railing. It was harder than I expected.
Still, by the time Abby reached me, I had a round in the chamber and the hammer pulled. “Did we get it?” asked Bolin.
“Don’t know,” I said, taking Abigail’s arm when she came close enough.
I had her bring me close enough to have a look, and it didn’t take long to find the creature’s head. It looked exactly as it had before, with no sign of stress or fear in its eyes. Only the same, empty, unnerving features.
“I think it’s dead,” said Abigail.
As if to answer, the Celestial blinked, then darted its eyes to me. I reacted swiftly and without thinking, raising the pistol to meet its forehead.
And I pulled the godsdamn trigger.
The bullet splattered through the skull, destroying the eyes and nose and creating one hell of a hole.
I holstered my pistol. “There,” I muttered, twisting around so I didn’t have to look at it anymore. “Now, it’s dead.”
Seventeen
Freddie got the power off before things got out of hand, which was good. No impending invasion from a race of divine superbeings. One less thing to worry about, I supposed.
In the meantime, we had wounds to stitch and bones to mend. Petra had a broken leg, but that had been the least of it. Felix’s spine had shattered in three places, causing its own share of problems.
Octavia had to place him in a coma until we could get him home and into a medical pod, but she said he’d recover just fine. We all would, including me with my torn-to-hell leg.
“I have to say, you’re fortunate, Captain,” remarked Octavia.
“How do you figure that?” I asked.
“The size of this cut,” she said, motioning at my thigh. “It missed most of the bone, but had the angle been different, you might not have a leg.”
“Well, I guess things could always be worse, couldn’t they?” I asked.
She nodded. “I suppose they could.”
We were in a temporary structure right outside the Gamma Dome. “How long do you figure this’ll take to heal?” I asked.
“Six hours, based on what I see,” she explained. “But I can’t make any promises.”
I looked around the room at the other pods. Aside from Felix and Petra, there was also Bolin, Gustin, and Nash. They were fine, but still had to get themselves checked out.
Abigail and Freddie were already cleared, so I’d sent them outside to help with the arriving crew. There was far too much to do right now, and I didn’t have the patience to wait, even with the injury to my leg.
“If I have to stay in this pod for the next six hours, I expect you to relay my orders to the rest of the crew,” I told Octavia.
“You can tell them yourself,” she said, giving me a look. “Those ships are at least a few hours away. Take a
nap and let your body heal.”
“Fine,” I said. “But I’m walking out of here as soon as the engineers arrive.”
“Do what you want,” she returned, giving me a shrug, followed by a slight smile as she walked to the next pod, leaving me alone.
“Typical,” I muttered, and then closed my eyes.
* * *
“I hope you’re not planning to sleep all day,” said a familiar voice.
I opened my eyes to see Abigail standing beside me, a relaxed smile on her face. I blinked a few times as my eyes adjusted to the light. “How long was I out?” I asked, licking my chapped lips and stretching my arms. I immediately noticed the pain in my leg was gone.
“All night,” she said.
I sat up. “What?”
“You were clearly exhausted,” remarked Dressler, who was standing a few meters away on the other side of the room. She walked over to the end of my pod. “You should listen to your body.”
“Tell me what I missed,” I said, twisting around and easing my feet to the floor beside me. Abigail offered a hand to me, and I took it, steadying myself as I got up.
“Things are complicated,” said the doctor.
“Complicated?” I asked, glaring at her. “I don’t like complicated, Doc.”
“In a good way,” assured Abigail.
Dressler nodded. “I have six teams working at the moment, each with a different assignment. You’ll be happy to know that the Celestial’s corpse has been relocated and an analysis has already begun. I suspect it has quite the story to tell us.”
I chuckled. “You suspect?” I asked, walking to the door. “That abomination had better be worth the cost, Doc.”
“It will be,” she assured.
I grunted and turned the handle, cracking the door and letting in the outside light. The sight of the rising sun forced me to cringe before my eyes adjusted. It was a bright day.
A good day.
Walking out into the field, I noticed several children playing with a ball, most of them familiar.
“Mr. Hughes!” shouted Lex, waving with a bright smile on her face.
Elise was with her, along with Tiler, Dixon, Fumi, and three others. Their laughter carried so loudly that I wondered why I hadn’t heard it in my pod.
Lex ran to greet me at the same moment that Abigail and Dressler left the building. “They said you were asleep,” said the girl.
“I was,” I said, giving her a nod. “Long time.”
“You’re better now?” she asked, eying my leg.
“He’ll be fine,” said Abigail. “Our Jace is a tough one.”
I looked at her, spying the knowing smile. “Yeah,” I said, turning back to Lex. “And I ain’t going anywhere, kid. Best get used to me.”
Lex smiled, but then glanced at Abigail. “Did you tell him about the animals?”
“Animals?” I echoed, cocking my brow.
Dressler cleared her throat. “Something happened while you were asleep. I was planning a briefing on the matter, but I suppose I can tell you now.”
“I suppose you’d better,” I said.
“Shortly after we arrived here, and not long after you fell asleep, the birthing chambers inside the dome activated on their own.”
“On their own?” I asked. “What exactly happened?”
Abigail sighed. “It might be better to show it to you.”
The two women led me through the field, past five temporary shelters, and to the front of the Gamma Dome. The doors opened as we neared, and we stepped into the laboratory.
It was laid out very much like the others, filled with birthing chambers and seed distribution hubs. We’d never been able to figure out how to activate any of them, and Dressler had been too cautious to try, but now it was all happening on its own. In fact, the entire facility seemed to have come alive. Every last machine was lit up and active. The dome had filled with noises, loud and quiet, hums and beeps, and all of it with purpose.
Two figures stood near the center of the dome, glowing in their own auras—gold and blue. Sigmond and Gaia.
“Good morning, sir,” greeted Sigmond. “I’m happy to see you walking around again.”
“Siggy,” I returned before eying Gaia beside him. “I see you managed to get her transferred.”
“We did, indeed, sir,” he replied.
“Hello, Captain Hughes,” said Gaia with a smile.
“She’s been assisting my team,” explained Dressler.
“That’s good,” I said.
“If you call ignorance helpful, I suppose,” she remarked.
Gaia frowned. “I’m afraid I don’t know much about many of the extended protocols and processes outside of my domain, so my assistance has been somewhat lacking, admittedly.”
“That’s not true,” said Abigail. “She tapped into the local network and now has access to all of the domes across the planet. Thanks to her, we know exactly what’s happening inside all eight hundred of them.”
“Eight hundred and seventy-two,” corrected Sigmond.
“Whatever,” said Abigail. “My point is, she’s hardly useless.”
“I never said useless. I said ignorant,” inserted Dressler.
I walked to the nearest birthing chamber, looking through the gold-tinted glass on the hatch. Before, these had been completely empty, but now I could see something inside, floating in a thick liquid. “Is that—” I paused. “What the hell is going on right now?”
“Another phase in the process,” answered Gaia.
“But what is it?” I asked.
The door opened behind us, and I instantly reached for my pistol, but didn’t find it. They must have taken it from me when I was in the pod.
I relaxed, however, when I saw who it was. Lex came running into the dome with her friends, the ball under her arm. “Mr. Hughes!” she exclaimed. “Mr. Hughes, you have to come see!”
I took a step towards her, my heart beginning to quicken. After everything we’d just been through, I couldn’t afford another fight right now. “What’s going on?” I asked, quickly.
She ran up and grabbed my hand, yanking me towards the door. “Come on! You have to see!”
I ran with her, not knowing what we’d find when we reached the field.
The door swung open and the two of us continued ahead, our friends coming behind us. As my eyes drifted through the yard, I saw no sign of danger. No clue as to what had the girl so riled up. She still had that smile on her face, brimming with excitement and purpose. This wasn’t fear or concern, I realized, but an eager kind of joy. Whatever she had seen, she wanted to share it with me.
We came to a dead stop near where the children had been playing, and Lex released my hand. “Here!” she said as she turned away from me, pointing at the ground in front of us.
I stepped closer to her, trying to see what she saw.
She got on her knees, looking at the dirt with a concentrated stare, still with the same bright smile as before. I crouched beside her, finally seeing what had caught her eye and stirred her soul.
A single blade of green grass poked through the mound of dirt, glistening in the morning light.
My jaw fell when I saw it, and for a brief moment, I held my breath. “It’s—”
“Is that what I think it is?” asked Alphonse, his voice coming from several meters away, towards one of the other temporary shelters.
I refused to look away from the little thing in front of me. “I think it is,” I said, wanting to touch it, but knowing I shouldn’t.
Dressler crouched down beside me, easing closer to examine it. “Fascinating,” she muttered.
“Look!” shouted Tiler, who was standing with his brother a few meters to my right. They were both pointing at the ground near their feet. “We found another one!”
I got to my feet, only to have my attention pulled away by Lex again. “And here!” she exclaimed. “Two more!”
In a matter of minutes, we’d found over fifteen blades of grass, all
in the same little area. “This is incredible,” muttered Abigail, looking around at each of the blades. “I just don’t—there was nothing here before. Where’s it coming from?”
“Seed spores,” said Sigmond, speaking through the comm in my ear. “Laced with a growth accelerant. The system indicates a wide delivery across the entire valley, beginning nearly an hour ago.”
“Was it only here?” I asked.
“No, sir,” he replied. “Everywhere.”
We sat and watched as more blades of grass continued to stretch out of the ground, right before our very eyes. It was like watching a holo in quick time, only right now.
“Sir, I beg your pardon, but Gaia has informed me of an alert inside the building,” said Sigmond.
“I’m on my way,” I said, turning around and breaking into a light jog.
“Wait up!” called Abigail.
When I opened the door, I heard a kind of alarm sounding in the rear corner, a bright orange light flashing on one of the chambers.
“What’s going on, Siggy?” I asked, running to the front of the machine and trying my best to spy the creature inside.
“Unknown, sir, but I have a theory,” he remarked.
Before I could ask what that was, the animal inside the hatch disappeared, sucked through the back and into the floor to some unknown location. “Where did it just—”
“This one’s doing it, too!” said Lex, pointing to another chamber.
Like the first, the creature inside disappeared, moving through the tube to some unknown place.
“Siggy, if you’ve got a theory, now’s the time to share it,” I told him.
He flickered momentarily, the same way every Cognitive did when they were processing something complex, finally regaining his composure. “Ah,” he said with a sly grin. “Orbital scans show the emergence of another structure, not far from this location.”
“What kind of structure?” asked Abigail.
“Another dome, but much smaller,” he explained.
“There are many,” said Gaia, causing all of us to turn to her. “One for every facility, according to the system. Most of these facilities are tasked with the production of a unique lifeform.”
“Unique?” asked Abigail. “Are you saying each dome creates different animals?”
