We’d need to evacuate everyone through the portals. Mary had notified New Haven about a potential influx of displaced refugees, and New Spero was prepared for a segment of the Scaril as well. We were as ready as we could be.
I was still in my armor as I emerged on the bridge, standing behind Magnus, and Mary and I watched as the planet was set in the exact location that had been programmed into the drone. It hung there, unmoving, and I knew it was time.
“Good luck, Dean. I knew there was a reason you came along on this ride.” Magnus beamed. “We set sail on the Horizon a year ago, and look how much we’ve done. Save the Scaril, and we might have a new Alliance partner, one with some pretty amazing ideas and technology. This will open up a lot of doors.”
I couldn’t bring myself to think about it on those terms. I simply wanted to revive the race of aliens, helping them return to the waking world they were torn from by the guile of the man we now held in our brig.
I was ready to go. “It’s time.”
Slate arrived and stuck a fist out for me to bump. “Go get ‘em, Boss,” he said, grinning at me.
“I intend to,” I told him, and left the bridge with Mary at my side. I had one more stop to make.
Jules was coloring at the table, and Natalia smiled as we approached. “Can I have a moment?” I asked the ladies, and Mary picked up Hugo, bringing him to the living room.
“Hi, Papa,” Jules said. She scribbled away on her paper.
“What are you drawing?” I asked.
She didn’t glance up but kept working. “You’re helping them, right?”
“I am. I’m going now.” I stood; my armor, while thin and strong, was too bulky to sit comfortably on a wooden chair. My helmet sat on the countertop.
“Can I come?” she asked, finally peering up at me.
“Sorry, honey. Not this time,” I told her.
“How come?”
“Because this” – I pointed at the device strapped to my arm – “only works for one person. If you went with me, you’d freeze in time like the Scaril.”
“No I wouldn’t.”
This piqued my interest. “How do you know?”
“I know.”
“How?”
She shrugged and kept drawing. “I just know.”
I leaned over, seeing what she was drawing. It was a little girl with dark pigtails, holding a hand up. She’d drawn at least a hundred tiny figures on the sheet.
“Is that you?” I asked.
“Yep. I’m helping them,” she said.
“Who?”
“The Scar…Scarl...”
“The Scaril?” I asked, and she smiled.
“Yes. Them. Can I come? I think I should go.”
____________
“Dean, have you gone insane?” Mary asked. Her arms were crossed, and she was giving me the look she saved for special occasions when I really screwed up. Which was often enough, these days.
“No. You saw the drawing. I think she may be the key to helping them. How do I know I can trust Khozal’s instructions? He could be tricking us,” I said.
Mary paced the bedroom and stopped in front of me. “Dean, when this is over, we’re going home.”
I paused, letting her words wash over me. “Which home?”
She let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t know. But I can’t keep doing this anymore. We have two children to think about. It’s been great visiting with everyone and having Nick around while I was pregnant, but you aren’t able to keep your nose out of everything here. I thought you were asked to be an innocent bystander and let other people deal with the dangerous stuff.” She stopped and rubbed her temple. “Never mind. I forget who I’m talking to sometimes.”
“I know, Mary…”
“They all see you as this reverent man, a hero and a figurehead for all that we’re working towards, but I…” She stepped closer, her palm finding my cheek. “I see you as a man, my husband, and father to our children. And I don’t want anything to happen to you. If you keep going like this, one day you’re not coming home to us, and I don’t know what I’d do if that happened.”
I let it all sink in, and leaned in, resting my forehead on hers. “Then we’ll go home.”
“Good.”
We didn’t decide which planet that was going to be. I suspected she’d want to be on Haven for the time being, but I was leaning toward my childhood farm for a while. Jules and Mary could ride the horses, and Hugo and I could walk Maggie through the fields, smelling the fresh crops at harvest time.
I opened my eyes, remembering I had an important task to do. “Bring Jules,” Mary said.
“Are you sure?”
“She did find the tool under the bed. Khozal hadn’t even known it was there. It’s the only way to make sure he isn’t tricking you. How does she know these things?” Mary asked, her eyes blinking too quickly, the way they moved when she was nervous.
“I’m not sure, but I suspect she’ll be able to explain it someday. I’ll go tell her. And don’t worry, she’ll be in the armored suit the whole time. And if she does become afflicted with the time freezing, I’ll find whatever’s stopping everyone from moving, shut it off as planned anyway, and bring her home along with the Scaril, okay?”
“Okay,” Mary said.
“Jules!” I called. “Get ready. You’re coming with me.”
Twenty-Seven
Horizon’s portal room was dim when we entered, the symbols and lighting illuminating as Jules and I stepped foot inside. Jules was quiet and contemplative as we neared the portal table. The stone glowed bright green, matching my daughter’s eyes.
She stared up at me, her face a blank slate of emotion, and I forced a smile. “You ready?”
“Ready,” she said in a small voice, and I found the symbol we needed to travel to the shrunken world. Four lines at an angle, with the oval overlaid above.
I made sure the device on my forearm was working and pressed the icon. White light filled my vision, and for a split second, I expected a pause in the transition. Maybe another not-Dean from the future would visit me, but the ambiance faded as always, revealing an alien Shandra room.
Instantly, I noticed the two Gatekeepers we’d sent there a few months ago to investigate. They were frozen in time, and I pulled Jules close at the sight. An invisible bubble extended from the device strapped to my arm, and since Jules was so small, she was easily able to stay within the effervescence.
Jules reached for the huge Keppe Gatekeeper beside her, and I pulled her arm back. “Honey, don’t touch anything and stay with me, like we discussed before we left. Okay?”
“Yes, Papa,” she replied.
There were a few others in the room, each frozen in their footsteps. I walked over to an alien of a type I’d never seen. It was furry, striped like a tiger; thick claw-edged paws ended powerful arms. Its face was paused in a roar.
“Papa, who are they?”
“I think they came here through the portal, maybe at random, and were frozen, never to return home,” I said quietly. My voice sounded too loud in the room, and I finally beheld the space, seeing the structure, not just the paused people inside. The walls were high, heavy with dark wood design elements. The floor was made of hardwood; the entire place had a sort of eighteen hundreds colonial feeling to it.
I wanted to talk to the Gatekeepers, to let them know we were here and they’d be okay, but when I stepped in front of them, there was no indication they’d have any idea we existed. Their eyes were blank, a blue film glazing over their entire bodies. Even inside my bubble, they stayed frozen, so this protective device I was armed with didn’t have the power to reverse their predicament after all. I’d been hoping to recover these two and send them home to the Horizon.
Khozal had admitted there was an instrument causing the time freezing and gave us the approximate location, which should only be a few kilometers from the portal. I really wasn’t expecting too much of a hassle reaching it, since all biological life on the tiny w
orld was paused in time.
“Are we shrunken?” Jules asked while stretching her arms forward and staring at her hands.
I’d been trying not to think about the fact that we were on the planet now hovering in space just outside the Horizon, two tiny specks on the world. It was too much to consider.
“Let’s not worry about that, honey,” I told Jules, and she shrugged it off like only a small child could do. She wasn’t familiar with the existential dread that came with being an adult yet, and for that, I was grateful.
The Shandra room was only a hundred feet deep, and I led Jules to the exit: two double doors that opened as I pressed through them, swinging with a squeak on long-unused hinges.
I was surprised to find us entering into an open courtyard, instead of an underground corridor like most portal rooms led to. There were a few of the Scaril nearby, with long limbs, squat torsos, and elongated heads. There had to be two hundred of them under the vast blue sky, each appearing angered and distraught.
“Were they running for the portal?” Jules asked.
“I think so.”
“But they didn’t make it,” she said.
“No. They didn’t make it.”
“How long have they been here?” she asked.
“We’re not sure. A long time.”
“Which way?” She spun around, searching the courtyard.
It was cool out, the few trees gathered in the center of the stone courtyard were bereft of leaves, and I guessed they were perpetually frozen in late autumn. Did the seasons still transpire here, or was the entire planet on pause? I tried to listen for movement, wind, clouds, and when I noticed nothing of the sort, I established that the device had paused the entire planet: weather, plants, animals, and all.
“According to Khozal, it’s…” I pointed to the end of the courtyard, past a huddle of trapped Scaril, and toward the horizon. “That way.”
Jules scrunched up her face and pursed her lips in thought. “Papa, I think he’s lying to you.”
“Do you?” I asked, not shocked by her revelation. This was the reason I’d brought her with me. If I’d suspected Khozal was being straightforward with us, I’d have left Jules safely at home with her mother.
“Yes. He’s a bad man, a big fat liar.”
“Okay, so what do you think we need to do?” I asked her.
Jules paused before tugging on my EVA sleeve. She looked so small and helpless in her armored suit, only coming up to my hips. “I can feel the power.”
“What power?”
“The thing that’s making all these people stuck,” she told me.
“Where is it?” I asked.
“It’s in the water,” she told me.
“The water? Like an ocean?” I asked.
She nodded. “It’s far away, Papa.”
“Great…” I didn’t know what far away was to my daughter. “How far? Can we walk there?”
“We don’t have to,” Jules said.
“Why?”
She didn’t finish. I was whisked off the ground, shrouded in a basking green light. The glow originated from Jules, extending in a sphere ten feet wide. We both lifted away from the courtyard, higher and higher, until we were well above the treeline.
“How are you doing this?” I asked, my voice louder than it needed to be.
Jules hovered in front of me, the green light brighter directly over her armored EVA suit. “I wanted to.”
It reminded me too much of her mother as the Iskios had possessed her. I’d fought with Not-Mary in an epic battle that I thought might kill me, but Jules was clearly still herself, with no sign that any of the evil race were left lingering in her. She’d gained their powers from being carried by her mother inside their cocoon of energy, and now she was utilizing the skills. I couldn’t blame her or be upset with her, but I was still afraid for her.
“You know where to go?” I asked as we began moving forward, heading toward a distant body of water. It glimmered far away, and Jules took us faster and faster until the ground streaked below us.
“As the crow flies,” I mumbled, but Jules didn’t react to my random observation.
Even from our position a hundred yards above the ground, I could see more of the Scaril people. There were residences here. It must have been someone’s planet before Khozal tricked them into moving from Mion V9, but I didn’t see anyone but the transplanted race below.
The cityscape was far less advanced than most of the planets I’d laid eyes on. The layout had a haphazard, crude appearance to it, with long single-story buildings scattered about, rough paths through grassy fields connecting them.
I stayed quiet as Jules led us in her elevating energy bubble, ever closer to the ocean. The entire trip took only twenty minutes, and it was obvious Jules was concentrating hard the entire time. She slowed us as we neared the water, and held up a hand.
“Papa, the thing that’s hurting the Scary-eel people is there,” she told me, and I had to laugh at her mispronunciation of the alien name.
We were directly above the water, and she lowered us slowly, until we hovered above the frozen waves. The water didn’t move; a cresting wave emerged from the dark depths, locked eternally in time along with the rest of the planet.
“Does your bubble work under water?” I asked Jules.
She turned to me with saucer-plate eyes. “I think so.”
“Do you want to try?” I asked her. We’d come this far, and if the device was below, we didn’t have much of a choice. I’d rather go with her inside the Iskios-fueled bubble than attempt to swim in this heavy EVA suit.
“I’m scared.”
“Why, honey?”
“I don’t like the water,” she admitted.
I glanced to the ocean, and then to the coast, which was about half a kilometer back the way we’d come. “I know you don’t.” We kept meaning to take her for swimming lessons and had tried when she was about three years old, but after spending a full year at my old farmhouse on Earth, then the last year on the Horizon, we’d let it slip from our minds.
“I don’t need to try,” she told me.
I set my gloved hands on her small shoulders. “Jules, we’re in a suit that’s safe for traveling through space. Even if your bubble fails, we’ll be okay. And I’m here with you.”
She frowned and gave me a quick nod of her head. “Okay. We can do it. What will happen to the Scary-eel?”
“The Scaril will unfreeze, and we’ll bring them home to Mion V9,” I told her.
This made her smile. “That’s good. I think they want to go home. I want to go home too.”
This took me aback. “What do you mean? To see Mom and Hugo?”
“No. I want to go home to Haven,” Jules said.
“To Haven? To the apartment?” I asked.
“Yes. I miss it there,” she said.
“I didn’t know. How come you never told us?” I asked her, realizing this wasn’t the ideal time to be discussing our future living arrangements.
“I don’t know. You and Mom seem happy on Horizon.”
“But what about Patty… and your school?” I asked.
“Patty and Dean want to go to the Academy too.”
It was a strange conversation to be having while we floated on the time-frozen planet, directly above the ocean. “You want to go to the Gatekeepers’ Academy?” This wasn’t news to me. Of course we’d always thought she might want to be part of the school, but not at such a young age. The others were starting at around ten years old, but that varied with the race. Some races developed sooner than others, with one having fully-matured people within two years. The conditions were skewed because of the variety of students we had coming to Haven.
“I do. I want to be a Gatekeeper. I want to be like you,” Jules said proudly. I saw a glimmer of happiness and excitement in her eyes, and it worried me, as did the glowing orb surrounding us. How could I let me baby girl go to a school where she was so different from everyone? Would she be used fo
r her abilities, or perhaps ostracized by the other students?
“Then we’ll talk to Mom about it when we see her.” I pointed below us. “But first, we need to save the Scaril people. Can we do that?”
Jules eyed the water suspiciously and lifted us up higher. She started to wave her thin arm in the air, me behind her in our floating orb, watching with interest. I thought I heard her mumbling something as the water began to move. She was creating a whirlpool, breaking the still water from its lock in time as she did so. Her power emanated from her fingers and through the orb, toward the surface, where the ocean spun in circles over and over, growing stronger and wider with each passing rotation.
“You’re not going under?” I asked her loudly over the increasing noise below.
“I don’t like water,” she said, as if this explained her actions.
Instead of going below to locate the device hidden in the depths of the ocean, she was pulling it up to her. I had to give her credit for such a brilliant idea. I wouldn’t have thought that way.
Jules stiffened, her arm moving faster and faster, the water frothing now from the expended energy. The whirlpool was a hundred feet across, then two hundred, and growing exponentially.
This kept on for another five minutes, and by this time, the rotating water was a mile wide, and I noticed the bottom of the ocean floor peeking through the center of the maw. Jules turned to me, her eyes dim now, but she smiled eagerly.
“There it is, Papa!” she exclaimed, and began to lower us toward the water. We breached where the surface had been a few minutes ago, now finding nothing but open air as we traveled into the middle of the whirlpool.
Jules’ body began to go slack, and I caught her. She was heavy in the armor suit, but I leveled her off. “Jules, are you okay?”
“I don’t know. I feel weird.”
“Maybe we should go up,” I suggested. We were so close; the device was a metal box the size of a plumber’s toolbox, and it was only twenty feet below us.
New Horizon (The Survivors Book Nine) Page 23
