by M. R. Forbes
But his mind was here, in the bowels of the Citadel, in the place the Inahri were told was an eternal paradise.
He had been right.
It wasn’t paradise at all.
Screams echoed across the open cavern where the Kuu had deposited him.
The screams were joined by a chorus of clanking chains and grinding machinery, heavy thumping and a deep rumble. There were cracks in the ground nearby, and flames spat up from them, licking at the rocky ceiling above. The heat of the fire burned at his face. He wasn’t physically here. The environment couldn’t hurt him. Could it?
He noticed that he was clothed in Space Force Marine fatigues and carrying an Mk-12 rifle. He was wearing his full gear, a knife tucked into the back of his boots, a pistol at his side.
Had Arluthu put him in the military dress, or had it come from his mind? Could he change it if he wanted?
He thought about carrying a P-90 instead. The rifle morphed in his hands, and he smiled.
He could do this.
He started forward toward the source of the screaming, a deep pit in the earth in front of him. There was no sign of Corporal Novai in the area around him, but there was an open cavern leading out of the area at the far side. If the Kuu had started them separated, Novai would likely emerge from there.
He considered switching out his armament for a sniper rifle and camping nearby until Novai made his appearance. It would be an easy headshot with the weapon. But he hadn’t chosen Arluthu’s Paradise because he wanted to hunt Novai there. He had picked it so he would learn what it was.
He kept moving until he reached the edge of the chasm and looked over the edge. He saw male and female Inahri below, all of them either naked or wearing the remains of clothing that barely covered their emaciated forms. They were old, mostly bald, filthy and bruised. All were barely able to swing their heavy picks as they slaved away on narrow walkways, cutting deeper into the rock walls.
“What the hell?” Caleb said under his breath.
The Inahri weren’t alone. Relyeh were interspersed among them, crying out in their language and driving the slaves to work harder. They used whips and knives, teeth and claws to tear at the people who were too slow or who tried to put their picks down.
It really was hell. So much so that he started to wonder if Arluthu had honored his request after all. Maybe the Relyeh leader had shown Caleb what he expected to see instead of the truth. Or maybe this was the truth, but there was no way for him to prove it.
He continued looking down into the pit, finding the bottom a hundred meters below. There were more Relyeh down there, monstrous humanoids he recognized immediately.
Trife.
Dozens of them waited in the pit, moving back and forth and watching the Inahri above. Caleb heard a distinct cry, turning his head in time to see a woman fall into their midst. They were on her in an instant, claws tearing into her until her screaming stopped.
“Shit,” Caleb said, trying to remind himself this wasn’t real.
But it was, wasn’t it? Maybe not exactly what he saw, but in some form. This was what Arluthu did to the Inahri who got too old to serve as soldiers, breeders or servants. He worked them to the bone until they finally fell, and when they fell, they died.
The only question was...why?
For as hard as they were working, their meager efforts weren’t accomplishing much of anything at all.
So why bother?
His thoughts turned back to his meeting with Arluthu. He remembered his feeling of fear and the suspicion that the Relyeh was feeding off it.
It seemed impossible. How could an entire race survive on something as intangible as someone else’s fear? It sounded ridiculous, but the proof was right in front of him.
He looked back down at the trife. They hadn’t eaten the body of the woman they had killed. They hadn’t just left her laying there either. They had picked her up and were carrying her to a machine embedded in the rock wall at one end of the pit. They placed her on a moving conveyor belt that fed her body into the bowels of the machine.
Now that was something the Relyeh could survive on.
The idea of it made him sick.
He needed to know more.
He scanned the edge of the pit, all the way around, looking for a way into it. It had been designed to keep the Inahri from trying to climb out, with five meters of slick, solid stone between him and the uppermost walkway. If he jumped in, he wouldn’t be able to get out.
Except he wasn’t really here, was he? The challenge wouldn’t end until something happened to him or to Novai, and once it did, both of them would be transported back to the Kuu.
“Sergeant Caleb!”
And there he was.
Caleb turned his head toward Novai. He was standing near the entrance to the cavern, dressed in full battle armor. He held a heavy blaster in his hands, aimed at Caleb. He fired and Caleb threw himself to the ground, rolling sideways. The bolt hissed past him just above his head. He moved as fast as he could, Novai’s rounds digging at the ground beside him, coming too close for comfort.
“Novai, wait!” Caleb shouted, wondering if his decision not to shoot the corporal as soon as he came around the corner was the right one after all. “Hold your fire!”
Ignoring him, Novai ran recklessly toward Caleb, keeping a steady stream of bolts flashing toward him. If Caleb had wanted to cut the corporal down and end the challenge, he could have.
But that wasn’t his goal. Not yet.
He rolled to the edge of the chasm.
And then rolled off.
Chapter 30
Caleb fell the five meters to the first walkway, his momentum slowed by the Inahri he hit on the way down, knocking them both off and down into the rezzaching hands of the trife.
Caleb struggled desperately to find purchase on the walkway, his fingers ultimately slipping off the edge. If he still had his replacement hand, he could have gotten a good grip on the surface. Instead, he tumbled down into the pit, dropping toward the floor and the trife below. If the fall didn’t kill him, the demons waiting for him down there would.
He had only seconds, but he remembered to stay calm. This wasn’t reality. The rules were different here.
He conjured a parachute on his back, dropping his rifle and quickly pulling the ripcord. The chute shot out above him, spreading and catching his fall, the straps yanking hard on his arms. He couldn’t help but smile as his momentum slowed,and he began to drift downward.
The Inahri stopped what they were doing to look at him. One of the Relyeh on the platform looked too. Then it lunged, leaping out at him from the side of the pit, claws reaching for him.
Caleb swung his legs up, spinning his body and cracking the Relyeh across the face. This one was humanoid and ugly, with thick, sinewy black flesh on a heavy frame. It grumbled as it failed to reach its target, falling to its death instead.
The action got the attention of the Inahri prisoners. They stopped what they were doing, turning to look at him as he floated down the center of the pit. At first, Caleb thought they would react positively to his effort. But this was the Kuu, not reality. The Inahri here might represent the truth, but they weren’t actual people.
They started jumping at him, trying to grab hold of his legs. Most couldn’t reach him, and they fell screaming to the bottom of the chasm, their screams silenced by sickening crunches of bone. A couple managed to grab hold of his feet, but he kicked them off.
The shifts in weight made it difficult to steer the chute, and he ended up drifting toward the south side of the chasm, only to have the Inahri there turn to face him, picks at the ready.
“Shit,” Caleb said, trying to yank the parachute back the other way.
He heard a soft hum, and then a bolt of energy flashed past him, hitting a nearby Inahri. More bolts followed the first, Novai firing down at him.
“Where are you going, Caleb?” Novai said. “Are you afraid of me?”
Caleb grabbed the buckle to the chu
te, opening it and letting himself drop. He was still fifty meters above the floor. Still too high to survive the impact. He imagined himself in a Space Marine drop suit, a jetpack strapped to his back. It materialized instantly, and he fired the thrusters, slowing his momentum.
Caleb swapped the drop suit for an Intellect Skin, quickly throwing a shield above him as he was once again falling. Novai starting shooting at him from the edge of the chasm. His shots hit the shield, energy crackling along it. Caleb fired back at the corporal, sending a blast from the palm of the Skin that came within centimeters of the soldier’s helmet.
Then he looked down.
The ground was approaching in a hurry. Too quickly for him to stop the fall. But did it matter?
He hit the ground feet first, bending his knees as the earth around him splintered and cracked from the impact. He remained unbroken, standing in the middle of a group of trife. Novai jumped off the top ledge of the chasm and hit a moment later, crushing a trife beneath his boots and shaking the entire chasm.
“Novai, do you know where this is?” Caleb shouted.
Novai was ten meters away and walking in his direction. “Don’t know, don’t care,” he replied. “You know what I do care about, Caleb? Dojo Shing. There’s no chance some Earther who doesn’t even believe in Arluthu’s Might is going to be in charge.”
Calab stayed in the Intellect Skin, quickly scanning one of the trife and projecting it. He moved slowly, blending in with the demons.
Novai started shooting at the trife, killing the four demons closest to him. Caleb circled with the creatures, trying to mimic their movements.
“Arluthu let me decide where we would face off,” Caleb said. “He let me pick the arena. Have you ever chosen before?”
“I thought you would get to choose. We all get to pick, Caleb. It doesn’t make you special.” Novai spun and fired, hitting the trife next to Caleb.
Caleb slowed, staying with the group. Novai was tracking the sound of his voice. “I decided on the Inahri paradise,” he said. “This is where we wound up. Does this look like paradise to you?”
Novai stopped moving, pivoting to look around as if it were the first time he had noticed their surroundings.
“Arluthu is lying to you, Corporal,” Caleb said. “He isn’t taking your people somewhere better. He’s using them as food for the Relyeh.”
“No. You’re lying. This is a trick. Your trick to confuse me and win the challenge. I don’t know how you did it, Earther. I don’t know how you learned to manipulate the Kuu so quickly and so completely.” Novai pivoted, aiming his rifle directly at Caleb. “But you aren’t going to win.”
Caleb swung his hand up, hitting the muzzle of the rifle and knocking it aside as Novai fired, the bolt going wide. Then he shoved himself into the soldier, latching onto what Novai had just said. The Kuu could be manipulated. He punched Novai in the chest and smiled in satisfaction when he went airborne, flying back and slamming into the wall.
“Screw physics,” Caleb said. He ducked low, still projecting himself as a trife and moving through their ranks toward the machine at the end of the pit.
He looked over his shoulder when he reached it. Corporal Novai was getting back up, pulling himself out of the rock and leaving an impression of his battle armor behind. A new rifle materialized in his hands, and he scanned the field of trife, shooting a pair that got too close while trying to guess which one was Caleb.
The corporal still didn’t get that he was overmatched in here. Whatever experience Novai had in the Kuu, it seemed as though being thrown into it without ever having observed a challenge or knowing even the smallest details about it made it easier to overcome its limitations. Except it didn’t seem to have any limitations. They were all self-imposed, decided by how the soldier in the Kuu believed it should work, instead of how it did work.
Advantage...Earther.
Caleb reached the machine. The belt fed through a tight squeeze out of the chasm and into a room behind it. The only way through was to go onto the belt, so he morphed himself into the visage of one of the Inahri he had seen fall and hopped onto it. Novai obviously didn’t see him make the move, because he started shooting trife again.
The belt went through the machine. Lights burned down on Caleb from above, and for a moment he wondered if he had made a mistake. Did the Relyeh cook their meat before consuming it? It was uncomfortable, but he passed through the other side intact.
A Relyeh was waiting to collect him. A large, bipedal squid-face like General Ogg. It was one of a few in the room, dressed in rich black robes. They handled the bodies with care, carrying them toward the back of the room and vanishing into the shadows.
Caleb let the Relyeh pick him up and take him like the others, cradling him gently in its arms. It didn’t seem to notice his eyes were open, or that he was still alive. It moved with singular purpose, its steps perfectly synchronized and spaced, as though it were performing an important ritual.
The shadows parted as they neared the back of the room, revealing a rough-hewn tunnel into a deeper part of the cavern. The Relyeh ducked to enter, climbing across uneven terrain to get through the short tunnel and into an adjoining chamber. Another of the Relyeh was already there, and Caleb watched it heave one of the Inahri corpses over the edge of another chasm. Then he heard a grunting sound and the cracking of shattering bones.
What the hell were they doing?
The first Relyeh turned around and started back, eyes down and walking with the same purposed stride. Caleb’s Relyeh approached the chasm.
He couldn’t let himself get tossed in.Whatever was down there didn’t exactly sound friendly.
He morphed himself back into the Intellect Skin, causing the Relyeh to cry out in a high-pitched squeal of surprise. Caleb drove his hand up beneath the tendrils of its face, finding its chin and hitting it with impossible force. Its head snapped back, neck broken, and it fell to the ground.
Caleb rolled away from it, to his feet. The second Relyeh was responding to the alarm and coming back. Caleb set himself, waiting for it.
The squid-face lunged at him with tree trunk arms. Caleb grabbed them in his hands, stopping them effortlessly. He pivoted, swinging the Relyeh past him and releasing, and sending the creature over the edge of the chasm and into the pit.
Then he ran to the edge, looking down in time to see a massive hand grab the falling body, catching it and bringing it toward an equally large mouth. The monster looked very similar to the squid-faced Relyeh, only scaled up fifty times or more. It held the other Relyeh near its mouth, pausing suddenly when it noticed Caleb.
Its other hand shot toward the top of the chasm, catching Caleb by surprise. He tried to jump back, his feet slipping on loose stones and causing him to fall. The huge palm closed in on him.
A loud noise echoed through the chamber, and the hand came to a sudden stop. A vibration rippled through the earth, dislodging more loose stone. The creature cried out in anger.
Caleb got back to his feet. An impossibly thick chain was connected to the monster’s wrist, leading back into the darkness below. It had energy coursing through it, not relying on tensile strength alone to keep the beast contained. Caleb saw the matching chain on its other wrist, and a closer look at its head showed him there was another around its neck, covered in ancient moss, slime,and filth.
It continued holding the Relyeh in one hand, its head shifting to stare back at Caleb. It didn’t speak, but there was something in its eyes that sent a sudden wave of fear and panic through Caleb. It was the kind of fear he had only felt once before, and not all that long ago.
“Arluthu?”
Chapter 31
Caleb stared down at the creature. It had calmed from its initial anger and was staring back at him.
So this was Arluthu. Caleb didn’t know how he knew it, but he knew it. Whatever entity they had met in the chamber was a stand-in. A false god, so to speak. Maybe Arluthu was able to control it somehow. Maybe it knew how to speak for hi
m. But it wasn’t the real deal.
This was.
The revelation could change everything. The Inahri weren’t worshipping a god. They were worshipping a prisoner, an entity chained into place so deep in the Citadel that the Inahri had no idea it was there, as trapped in its situation as Caleb was in his. Once he told them what he had discovered—once he gave them the truth—he could set them free. He could convince them not to attack the Deliverance or send the Seeker after the Axon.
Couldn’t he?
Of course, it wouldn’t be that simple. He needed proof, and he doubted a Kuu hallucination counted. But for whatever reason, Arluthu had let him choose this place as his arena. Arluthu had allowed him to see itself imprisoned. It didn’t care that he knew.
Like before, the idea continued sending waves of fear through him. What if he told the Inahri what he had seen? What if they believed him?
What if they didn’t care?
They credited Arluthu with setting them free. That he did so as a prisoner in his own right could be seen as martyrdom. It might only make them love him more. The soldiers maybe. But not everyone. Lia and Oni had already proven there was a foundation of resistance among the Inahri. Not all of them believed in Arluthu as their god and savior.
Would it be enough? Would Arluthu even give him the chance to talk about this, let alone act on it? It had let him see this without hesitation and without a hint of worry. It knew it had total control over him. So what if he knew the truth? Who could he tell?
“We’ll see who makes the last move,” Caleb said, looking down at the massive Relyeh. He had been afraid, but now that fear was changing into something else.
Resolve. Determination. Power.
He was still in the Kuu, but what would happen when the match was over? He had to end it to find out.
He turned his back on Arluthu and walked away to the crunching of the Relyeh’s bones behind him.
Caleb went back through the passage. The other black-robed Relyeh were still there, waiting to ambush him when he came out. They lunged at him from three directions, coming at him with spears.
