by M. R. Forbes
He dropped below them, bending backward until his shoulder blades nearly brushed the floor. The three speartips swept past his face. He snapped his hands up, grabbing two of them, using them to pull himself back up. Shooting into the air, he kicked out in each direction, sending a foot into two of the squid-faces. The force threw the Relyeh back, leaving only the one in front. Caleb came down on that one, planting his feet on its chest and grabbing its head. Momentum carried him forward, and he became heavy as a stone, bringing the Relyeh to the ground and crushing its chest beneath his boots.
A pair of blasters appeared in his hands, and he spun and fired, a bolt piercing each of the remaining Relyeh before they could get back up.
Too easy.
He walked toward the machine and held out his hand. It groaned and whined ahead of him, splitting in two, crumbling and compressing against the walls of the cavern. The activity scared the trife. They hissed and scattered, rushing toward the back of the pit and leaving Corporal Novai in the open.
“Caleb?” Novai said, voice tight with fear. He raised his rifle and fired.
Caleb smiled. The rounds curved before they reached him, wrapping around his body and spinning in a tight circle.
“You lose, Novai,” Caleb said, releasing the bolts back at the corporal. They slammed into him, a dozen blasts of energy cutting through him and out the other side.
Corporal Novai fell to his knees, the armor vanishing. “How?”
Caleb had a guess, based on everything he had just seen. Maybe he was wrong, but all the pieces seemed to fit, at least in his mind.
The Kuu was a trap. A snare. But not one intended for human or Inahri. It was built to imprison one of the most powerful entities in the universe. It used emotion as fuel—not as an intangible idea, but in its physical output. The chemicals secreted when the body was stressed, in pain, afraid. It seemed almost magical.
Emotion could be a help or a hindrance. So could logic. Caleb had learned that a long time ago. He had been trained to harness both efficiently. Some were better at it than others, and he had a feeling that ability made all of the difference in the Kuu.
In some ways, he had spent his entire military career training to be the best there had ever been.
He could sweep the entire field in the Kuu. He was sure of that. If winning challenges here was the way to rise to the rank of General, he could do it in a day. But Arluthu didn’t want that, and certainly his captors, whoever or whatever they were, didn’t want that either. The Relyeh leader needed not only the physical fuel of the Inahri bodies to survive. It needed the chemicals the Kuu provided. The same chemicals that helped power its bonds.
Like the gravity in the Citadel, it was an odd paradox Caleb couldn’t begin to resolve. But he didn’t need to. He only needed to understand at the most basic level. Somehow, Arluthu had turned the tables on his captors. He had gained control of his prison, and while he couldn’t set himself free just yet, that didn’t mean he wasn’t working on the problem.
What would happen to Essex if he got free?
The arena began to fade then, taking the dead Corporal Novai with it. Caleb found himself back in the darkness of his subconscious. He sensed Arluthu there before he made himself known.
Did you like what you saw?
“I’d like to keep you that way.”
A rumble echoed around him.
I will be free. It is inevitable. The means are close at hand.
“And then what?”
And then I will devour. I hunger. An eternal hunger that cannot be satiated.
“Why did you let me see all this? Why give your enemy your secret?”
You call yourself my enemy because you do not understand. We aren’t enemies. I don’t regard you enough to consider you opposition. You are no threat to me, only a curiosity and a tool. Your strength makes you useful. Enjoy your victory, Sergeant Caleb Card. To the victor go the spoils.
Caleb opened his mouth to speak, but the darkness faded back to light. The pain returned to the area where the branch of the Dabboth was stabbing him, and a colored haze hung in front of him, casting Corporal Novai in silhouette.
“Welcome back from the Kuu, Sergeant Caleb, head of Dojo Shing,” Lieutenant Harai said, pulling Caleb from the Tree. The motion hurt like hell, and he groaned and slumped in Harai’s grip, suddenly exhausted. “We’ll get you to the sanctorium and then back to your quarters to rest up. I don’t know what you did in there, Earther, but I’ve never seen anything like it. You set a record for the longest challenge, as well as the quickest kill. I don’t even know how that’s possible, but you did it.”
Caleb glanced up at Harai. Before he had entered the Kuu, he was angry at the Inahri. After seeing the truth of Arluthu, he only felt pity.
Arluthu said he didn’t understand. Arluthu said he wasn’t a threat.
Maybe Ishek had read his mind, and maybe that data had been passed into the shared Relyeh knowledge. And maybe Arluthu knew all about his time on Earth, his parents, his sister, Sho and the rest.
He was still underestimating what a Space Force Marine could do.
Chapter 32
Jackson guided his chair over to the window, squeezing it in beside the small table to get a better view. He had a good angle to take in all of the action in South Park from his apartment in Block One, and he gazed down at the field with a sense of satisfaction.
Almost ten-thousand people were scattered across the park, so many that they trailed off the brown dirt and into the strands, winding down the main street, through the first two cross-streets and out of sight. It was the most impressive collection of people he had ever seen. Even his mandatory speeches had never drawn such a crowd.
But it was better than that. Each of the ten-thousand colonists was armed, and nearly half of them were training in combat armor, dressed like Space Force Marines instead of tailors or janitors, housekeepers or clerks. So what if it had taken a draft to get this many citizens involved with the defense effort.
They were out there, involved, and it was all because of him.
The rest of the combat armor was in production, printed by the replicators in the armory beneath Law as quickly as the machines could make them. Within two days, every conscript down there would be fully outfitted, just like the initial rounds of volunteers.
Two days earlier, it had been obvious just from looking down at the field who was a volunteer and who had been drafted. The volunteers worked harder, tried harder, and looked better doing it. The conscripts lagged behind, were ragged in their organization and were more often subject to Sergeant Tsi’s translated shouts. But that had changed. The sense of purpose, the sense of unity, had brought the entire colony together. Even the women, children, and infirm were contributing however they could, whether it was cooking meals, handing out uniforms or running errands. In the span of forty-eight hours, Metro had gone from a city full of frightened colonists to a city of real soldiers.
He smiled at the thought, finding Sergeant Tsi down below. She was moving from group to group, from platoon to platoon, stopping to check on both the colonists and their commanding officers. The officers had been pulled from Law whenever possible, but there hadn’t been enough to go around. Flash evaluations from Sergeant Tsi had led to quick selections, and most of them were working out better than he expected. Tsi had an eye for leadership qualities. She also had an eye for detail he couldn’t help but respect. If a single soldier was out of step, if their posture was wrong, if their responses weren’t sharp enough—she was on them in a hurry, as if she could spot the flaw from a kilometer away. It was more impressive to Jackson because the Inahri woman hadn’t always been a soldier. It was incredible to think she had already given birth to nine children.
The bell to his cube chimed. Jackson guided the chair away from the window, out of his office and around to the foyer, blowing a kiss to his picture of Beth as he passed. He had spent every free moment of his time at her bedside, but so far there hadn’t been any change, and ev
ery passing hour left him clinging harder to the hope that the damage wasn’t permanent.
“Governor Stone,” Sheriff Zane said as Jackson opened the door.
The sheriff was wearing combat armor without a helmet, an MK-12 rifle over his shoulder. He had changed remarkably in the last two days, his entire demeanor focused on atonement for accidentally shooting Carol King.
“Sheriff, what do you have?” Jackson asked.
Zane had come to him an hour earlier asking about Joe King. Everyone had been so busy, they hadn’t sent a team out to find his body. Zane volunteered for the task, using the short break Tsi had allowed his platoon to retrace the scene of the fighting between Card, Valentine, Harai and Law. It wasn’t a particularly large area, and it wasn’t dangerous, but it did require somebody to sacrifice time away from something else.
And for as callous as it sounded, it wasn’t like Joe was going anywhere.
“I haven’t found Joe yet, Governor. But I was poking around behind the armory, and I discovered the door to the city’s mainframe is locked tight.”
“Locked?”
“Yes, Governor. I tried my access code. It didn’t take. Access denied.”
Jackson raised an eyebrow. “Law should have access to everything down there.”
“Yes, sir. That’s what I thought.”
“Call into Engineering. Tell Faith to meet us in the armory.”
“Yes, Governor,” Zane replied. He tapped on his badge. “Engineering.”
“This is Paulina,” a voice replied.
“Paulina, it’s Sheriff Zane. Is Faith nearby?”
“No, Sheriff. She’s back in the thrust unit, repairing one of the feeds. Is there something I can do for you?”
“There is. Governor Stone needs Faith in the armory ASAP. Can you send someone to inform her?”
“Does it have to be Faith, Sheriff? She asked not to be disturbed.”
Zane looked at Jackson, who nodded.
“Yes, I’m afraid so.”
“Okay. I’ll go find her myself.”
“Thank you.”
Zane tapped his badge to disconnect. “You don’t think your code will open it, sir?”
“It might, but I don’t want to wait around for Faith after the fact if I don’t have to. I still need to collect reports from the flight trainers.”
“I heard we’ve got more pilots now than we do ships. Is that right, Governor?”
Jackson nodded. “Deputy Klahanie’s even stopped whining about being pulled off systems control. It’s not my fault he turned out to be the best natural pilot and teacher we have.”
“Don’t let him fool you, sir. Marcus loves working with the simulators.”
“I’ll tell him you said that the next time I see him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let’s go,” Jackson said, rolling out of the apartment and into the waiting lift with Sheriff Zane following. They took it down to the street, exiting out into the middle of the training. The strand had been reconfigured to accommodate a makeshift firing range, where twenty soldiers were currently practicing with their Mk-12s. Judging by the movement of the targets at the far end of the range, the recruits were fast becoming serviceable shots.
Of course, the rifles were nearly useless against Inahri battle armor. Jackson lowered his head for a moment, glowering about the Free Inahri’s decision to abandon them for the hundredth time. They would be stronger together than separate. Why couldn’t they see it?
“Governor, are you okay?” Zane asked.
“Yes,” Stone replied, lifting his head. “I’m fine.”
They crossed behind the firing range and then walked along it until they reached Law. There was nobody in the front of the station when they arrived, but the action increased as they went around to the garage to the lift into the armory below. There were dozens of people in the area, most of them occupied with the two replicators. One of them was producing the more complex combat armor. The other was making rounds for the Mk-12s, to replace the ones they were using to train.
“Hi, Governor,” one of the helpers said. A young colonist, no more than twelve years old.
“Hello,” Jackson replied, waving to her. He didn’t enjoy exposing the children to the war effort, but he didn’t have much of a choice. There weren’t always enough hands for everything that needed to be done.
Jackson looked around the room. It felt surprisingly smaller now that most of the equipment had been removed. The APCS were all out in the main hangar, slowly being dropped to the ground using the loader cranes, the massive lift still inoperable. The guns, ammunition, and armor were depleted, and what was left had mostly been transported to Block Two near the park. Some of it was also in the main hangar, reserved for the moment the drones captured incoming activity.
They might not have noticed Harai’s small squad coming at them, but Jackson didn’t expect the Relyeh to be so subtle the next time.
“Do you think we’ll have a chance?” Zane asked. “When the enemy comes?”
“Yes,” Jackson replied. “We have a chance. That’s all we can ask for.”
“Sergeant Tsi has been a godsend.”
“She has.”
“Do you think she likes slightly overweight former sheriffs?”
Jackson laughed. “I think she’s a little too busy to give much consideration to romance.”
“Do you think it would be weird?”
“What?”
“For a modern Earther to be with an Inahri? I mean, they’re human, right? But they evolved on a different planet.”
“I think normalcy went out the window the moment the Guardians broke the seal. If not then, definitely when we landed.”
Zane nodded. “True. Here comes Faith.”
Jackson rolled the chair around. Faith was coming into the armory via the ladder instead of the lift, her speed belying her size. She hurried over to where Jackson was sitting.
“Governor. I’m assuming since you insisted I meet you here you have something important for me to do?”
“I might need your help unlocking the mainframe storage area.”
“What? Might? I hustled my ass from the thrust unit to help you open a door?”
“Which will only take you a minute, and then you can hustle your ass back to the thrust unit,” Jackson said. “Or Zane and I can spend the next three hours trying to get it open.”
“It didn’t take your access code?”
“Not mine,” Zane said.
“And I haven’t tried yet,” the governor added. “But if Zane’s access code didn’t work, I doubt mine will either.”
Faith laughed and rolled her eyes. “Men. I swear. Lead on.”
Jackson followed Zane out of the armory to the corridor at the rear of the space. There were small blood stains scattered around the door frame, and he shivered at the sight of them, remembering the carnage Sergeant Harai had caused. It was in those moments he best understood why Beth had fallen apart. A part of him wanted to run and hide too.
The server room wasn’t far, around the corner and down a long corridor. They reached it inside of a minute. It seemed ridiculous they hadn’t tried to get into the room until now, but considering how little sleep any of them had gotten maybe it wasn’t so unbelievable after all.
“Do you think Joe locked himself in there after Valentine took the energy unit from him?” Jackson asked.
“Maybe, but why hasn’t he come out yet? It’s been four days. He has to eat.”
“He could live in there for four days,” Faith said. “The servers are most likely water-cooled. If he has tools, he can open the floor to get to the tubing.”
“So there’s a chance he’s alive in there?” Jackson said.
“There’s always a chance,” she replied. “I’m hopeful.”
“Me too.”
“So scan your chip and see what happens.”
Jackson rolled to the door, swiping his identification chip across the control panel. It flashed a red m
essage across the display.
ACCESS DENIED.
“Well, at least I didn’t come down here for nothing,” Faith said. “Excuse me, Governor.”
Jackson rolled out of the way. Faith began tapping on the controls, quickly entering a service menu. “I’ll check the log and see if we can find out who changed it and to what.” She opened the log and scrolled through it, whistling. “There’s your problem. Doctor Riley Valentine. Special security clearance. Special permissions. This door is locked harder than the outer seals.”
“Can you open it?” Jackson asked.
“We have to burn the seals. It’s not as thick as the outer hatches at least, but it’s going to take a little time.”
“How long?”
“Three hours. Maybe four. I can get one of my Junior Engineers on it. No offense, Governor, but this job is beneath me right now.”
“None taken,” Jackson said. “I’ll leave you in charge. Make sure someone contacts me before opening it up. I want to be here.”
“Yes, Governor,” Faith said.
“Thank you.” Jackson rolled his chair the other way, heading back down the passage with Zane in tow.
Why had Valentine locked them out of the room? It couldn’t be because she didn’t want them to find Joe, alive or dead. So what was she trying to hide?
Chapter 33
“Good. Next.”
Sergeant Tsi watched the two Earther colonists as they rushed from the starting point, hurrying to the first corridor in Block Thirty-two. They took a defensive position against the wall, aiming their Mk-12s around the corner and firing at an already well-beaten target twenty meters away. Their shots were too high despite the ATCS targeting system, leaving fresh marks in the wall of the building.
“Stay in position,” Tsi said. The two colonists didn’t move while she walked over to them. “You need to work with the combat armor. The powered musculature works to cancel out the rifle’s recoil and keep the reticle on the target, but if you fight it then the system breaks down and your shots go high like they just did.”
