"Soon see."
He closed the channel, and turned to Dodgers.
"Is that wing healed enough for you to fly me over yonder uglies?"
"Are you kidding? I doubt I could do that with a fully healed wing."
"Damn. Ok, plan B."
"What's plan B?"
He told her, and she flinched. His grin was infectious though. He knelt down, and Dodgers pulled herself onto his back, settling her front legs between his back and backpack, letting the backpack hold her weight.
"Ready?"
"Hell no. Do it."
Jamie shifted his suit, and in an instant, it was covering both of them. Only Jamie could see now, and only with his PC using the suit sensors. The suit shifted again, and they vanished into chameleon mode. While not completely invisible, it would take a keen eye to spot them, especially in the dark.
There was nothing Jamie could do about how the undergrowth moved as he pushed against it, but he hoped it would be put down to the gusting light wind, or simply not seen in the dark. He had no idea if the valderians could see properly in the dark, and since they were using light sources further out in the forest, he doubted they had true night vision.
He walked calmly and deliberately through the outer sentries, who seemed to be worried about the likelihood of human reinforcements, and into the middle of an army. He weaved around individual troops, slowly and carefully moving closer to the entrance to the pyramid. He picked his way around an ever increasing number of bodies left to lie where they fell.
The firing had stopped now. There appeared to be a wall surrounding the entrance, with combat suited humans pointing guns outward over the top. At odd intervals were not-crocs.
Jamie continued on, now being ever so careful, as each foot forward was onto a body. The terrain led up, but he wasn't sure the rise was natural.
Close to the wall he stopped. It wasn't a wall.
The dead had been piled on top of each other to form a wall. He shook his head in wonder at the carnage, and started moving forwards again. The last dozen steps took him upwards until he stood on top of the wall, looking down at the troops behind. At least half of them were sitting, most eating and drinking something. The not-crocs were wearing actual uniforms with a belt over them, and were sporting the beginnings of bruises. The humans had stepped out of their combat suits.
He looked back at the valderian line, back under the trees a way. It looked to him as if the two forces had fought to a stalemate.
He lightly dropped down behind the wall, causing several soldiers to look up in alarm, but seeing nothing, they went back to their food and drink.
Jamie entered the pyramid. The floor was still littered with corpses. He saw Patters over by one corner, talking to a huge not-croc, and some sort of rodent perched on her shoulder. But he didn't stop to say hello.
He halted half way up the stairs, and shifted his suit back to normal. Dodgers jumped down, breathing heavily, and the two of them made their way up.
"Was that him?" asked Crocatoa, indicating the stairs.
Patters saw a flash of Jamie's suit as he vanished.
"Yes."
"Was that a duck with him?"
"Apparently so."
There was a rumble of laughter, which Jamie heard as he kept moving up.
He was taking the stairs two at a time, Dodgers running to keep up, coming into the pyramid room at the top of the pyramid, feeling more and more urgency the closer he got. He looked around for anything which would trigger the light, and the mechanism, for transporting him to where the others were. Nothing.
He stood for a moment, nonplussed. What if it wouldn't work for him? What if he needed to be with Anna?
One hand twisted Anna's ring on the little finger of his other hand, and he focused his thoughts on her.
He was just starting to doubt himself, and wondering what he would do when the valderians stormed up the stairs when they decided to attack again, when the bright light engulfed him, and he clamped his eyes shut against the glare.
The void took him.
Dodgers stood there with her mouth open. He was gone.
She waited to see if he would show up again quickly, and when he didn't, she made her way downstairs.
Patters saw her coming, and met her at the bottom step.
"I'm Patters."
"Dodgers. Jamie's told me a bit about you."
"Let me guess, he vanished on you?"
"Yes. Poof, gone."
"So far, you're the only one who's gone up, to come back down again."
"There was no-one else there."
"So all we can do is wait. Why aren't you wearing a belt suit?"
"How would I be?"
"How did you get here?"
Dodgers explain it to her.
"I might have guessed. No, I don't think I would have. That's crazy even for Jamie. Still, let's get you protected. We have a lull at the moment, but they could attack again at any time."
"Why did they stop?"
"Hard to know. It seems everything they did was to get two of theirs up those stairs. After that, nothing mattered, and we managed to push them back. For now, they're sitting out there waiting for something."
Patters started walking towards the entrance.
"Colonel?" she called when she saw Crocatoa. "Do we have a spare belt suit?"
Sixty Five
Traversing the city was difficult in places, due to the rubble of the fallen buildings, and the paving of the streets torn up by tree roots. They wondered at what had happened to the beings who'd lived here? What would have caused this decay? Had they deserted the city during a catastrophe of some kind? Had their civilisation crumbled around them? Had they died out?
It was sad to walk through the places which once would have been alive with beings going about their daily lives. Anna could almost hear them, a ghostly echo of the past. She knew she was imagining it, but the contrast of the two cities she'd seen, one thriving, and this one, deserted, was distressing.
Snark grumphed and humphed, being his usual narky self, but kept them headed in the right direction. They had tantalising glimpses of the tower, but at times it was hidden behind the ruins of other buildings.
The city wasn't completely deserted. They heard the rustling of creatures amongst the rubble and foliage, and every now and then, something they called a bird, flew out of hiding places. It remained an eerie procession though, and the two cats and the human felt strangely alone in the quiet of the place.
Finally, the team arrived at the tower, and soon saw the building, which when up close, was enormous. It was intact, with no damage or decay. They made their way around to an entrance. Enormous metal doors carved in fanciful whirls and designs stood like sentinels waiting for them.
Snark marched up to the doors and pushed. There were no obvious handles anywhere. The metal was smooth and seemed polished, glinting in the sun.
They were locked.
Anna was annoyed. They'd come so far, and a simple thing such as locked doors was keeping them from what she knew would be inside. She thought of the doors at the ark on Winter. Perhaps there was a barrier, where only certain people could pass.
She stepped up to the doors, laid her hands on the metal, and pushed. Nothing. She rested her cheek against the metal. Instead of being cold, it seemed to take the warmth from her skin, radiate it outwards, and back into her flesh.
Anna was tired. She knew she should try to See, to find out how to enter, but she was almost done. They were so close. It wasn't fair. She felt a paw on her arm, and looked down to see Sissness. She gathered her strength. She couldn't just give up now.
Anna thought about her dreams and visions. The metal standing stones had sung rather than hummed. She thought about the song, the melody and harmonies. She hummed her own tune. No, that was wrong. It was more like the lullabies her mother had sung to her before she'd lost her forever. The songs of her childhood resonated in her mind, and she found her voice.
She s
ung at first the melody of the lullaby she'd loved, and her mother had hummed, without words. She ahhed, rather than hummed, and felt suddenly the comfort of returning to a time before responsibility and worry, before striving without gain. She changed to a song her mother had told her was an ancient song, before the time of being outcast. Then she sang the song of longing, her mother had sung when she begged her, and only on special occasions. Her heart opened with the love she'd felt then, with her mother, with the connection of generations before her.
The doors opened.
Sixty Six
They stepped forward into the hall. And stopped, mesmerised.
The standing stones, or pillars of flat metal, sang with a quiet resonance in the echoing space of the hall. They reflected the light coming in through the door, and from tall windows in the opposite wall. A cathedral, Anna was thinking, as she'd learned from picture books. A church, or temple to, what?
The circles of flat metal pillars shone with the sunlight, and emitted the eerie song filling their ears, and senses. The entrance pillars, so like the ones they'd seen at Perdita, and at the dog planet, led into the centre of the circles, to a flat metal table. They wondered in awe at the shining sentinels to another race, another culture.
Snark made his way more quickly than the others to the central table. It was carved with intricate patterns, swirls and devices. He looked up towards the 'altar' stone at the far end of the room.
Anna was slower to move through the pillars. She remembered her Seeing, but the reality was a thousand times more wondrous. Sissness touched the metal of a pillar, and the song changed, swirling around her, as she felt the warmth of the metal, as it responded to the heat of her paw.
Snark was already moving towards the further end of the hall, as Anna and Sissness gained the centre table.
"Sissness, can you make anything of these designs?" Anna indicated the swirling etchings on the metal.
"No, it's nothing I've ever seen before," returned Sissness.
They made their way forward after Snark, who'd arrived at the end of the hall, breathless. He took in the curved table, and the amulet lying on its surface.
At last, they'd found it.
He put a paw out to touch it, and snatched it back at once, as the suit snapped into form around his hand to protect it from being burned, and bounded off a force-field of some kind. Whatever it was, it formed a protective barrier, and seemed to surround the amulet, protecting it from harm. Snark turned as the others joined him at the table.
"Don't touch it!" he warned, as Sissness stretched a paw towards it. "It has a barrier, a force-field, in place."
Anna gazed at the amulet. It was a work of art. A necklace or collar plate, it was of the same metal as the pillars around them. She could hear it breathing. She knew this was fanciful, but felt it was true. She looked at the hole in the centre of the plate, and knew this was where the Destiny Stone would nestle, safe at last.
Sissness and Snark were examining the table, to work out the mechanism for the force-field. They came up with nothing.
The metal was smooth, with no crevices or additions. It was one piece of beautiful curving sculpture.
They gazed at the amulet. So near, and yet so far.
"Bloody gods!" grumped Snark
They all laughed.
The laughter echoed in the hall, and came back to them in the form of a low cackle.
They turned to the doors of the hall, looking over the centre table, and through the entrance pillars. Two figures stood silhouetted in the light streaming in through the doors.
One was a hunched over, misshapen form, in a black loose-fitting coverall, with a hood shadowing its face. The other form let a cloak fall to reveal a human woman, dressed in a light-weight black suit and white blouse, with sensible but dressy shoes, and long silver hair falling over her shoulders. Their features were obscured in shadow.
Snark in reflex reached for a gun, but remembered, and let his paw fall back. His eyes scanned the scene around them, looking for anything which would do as a weapon, but he found nothing. He cursed himself for not picking up stones, or fashioning stakes out of sticks, as they'd made their way here.
Anna thought quickly. How could she release the amulet? Think! Her dream had shown the 'god' setting the force field, but not how to remove it.
The two figures moved slowly towards them, and passing out of the doorway, the team could make out more features. The hunched figure's face was still obscured by the hood, while the woman's features became clearer. She was old, with wrinkles lining her face and features. But she was carefully made up, sophisticated, and wore a confident expression. She looked familiar.
The misshapen figure cackled again, as they came closer. It was intended to inspire fear, and it succeeded.
The two groups came close enough for conversation, and for a fight, if that was what it would come to. Snark's fuzz was standing up under his suit, making it look like he had a ridge down his whole back, which was now curved, and his ears were flat back on his head. His eyes were wide, his claws extended through the suit, and his tail lashed back and forth. Sissness was also prepared for a fight, but she was trembling from an all-encompassing feeling of fear the form in black inspired, even as she couldn't rationalise it.
Anna stood forward, and confronted them.
"Who are you?"
"We could ask the same thing," sneered the woman, through red-painted lips, turning the sneer into a laugh. "Except I know who you are, you and your pets."
"How could you know that?"
She laughed her sneering laugh again.
"Such celebrities!" she jeered. "Such well-known heroes, lauded from one end of sector ten to the other end of sector eight, sailing the Seasprite, and having adventures, searching for the Destiny Stone." She chuckled, but not in a friendly way. "Such children's-book antics. Really, if it wasn't true, I wouldn't believe it."
Anna could feel her face and throat flushing with heat. She put a hand out to hold back Snark, who she knew would be getting ready to attack.
"And you are?"
"Don't you know?"
Anna swallowed and looked closely at the woman. Still in shadow, she studied her features. Could it be…?
The woman saw her expression, and laughed again.
"You must be asking yourselves, how is it possible there is another human this close to the rim of the galaxy in sector eight? One you've not come across before. Definitely not part of Hunter's Run, or the Human Federation. So, who could she be?"
Anna knew this woman was teasing her, and spinning this conversation out. Why not just get to the point? She thought about her visions. How could she get to the amulet? With the amulet, they might have a chance.
Anna looked at the hunched figure next to the woman. The black coverall hid something evil, she knew. Something which had haunted her dreams for some time. The woman was dangerous, and angry, hateful even. But this being was the incarnation of malevolence, she could feel it.
As if she'd willed it, the being in black stood forward, and moved to the side, around the three friends standing in front of the table as if guarding it. The woman moved the other way, and closer, threatening.
"So, you've found the amulet," the woman mocked them. "But there's a force field, isn't there? Don't know how to turn it off?"
Anna's chin went up defiantly.
"If you know, why don't you try it?"
The woman's eyes narrowed.
"Well this is nice," she said instead. "Family reunions are such bores usually, but this is fun."
"Family reunion?" Anna almost whispered.
Snark was tracking the movements of the figure in black, and keeping himself between it and the table, but he was so much smaller. Sissness was unconsciously doing the same thing on the other side. Snark was half listening to the conversation, and trying to plan ahead. He caught Anna's words, and looked startled, but kept his eyes on the figure in black.
The woman laughed again.
&
nbsp; "You are so naïve, Anastasia Romanova, so-called last of the Romanovs." She moved even closer, and Anna had to steel herself not to step backwards. "So sure of yourself and your heritage. So pampered and spoiled. Last of the Romanovs! Please, such misguided certainty doesn't become you."
Anna blushed again, and braced herself for a fight.
The woman suddenly flashed her arm out, and grabbed Anna's wrist. Snark almost leapt at her, but Anna wrestled the woman's hand off, and they glared at each other.
"Last of the Romanovs!" the woman repeated, spitting with hate. "I am the true Romanov here, and the amulet will know it. Think yourself the heir to the Romanov heritage? I am the heir. Me. I am the direct descendent of the oldest child of the house of the Romanovs, Anastasia Romanova, and the heir to their house. You are just a nobody."
Anna flinched back as the woman's spittle caught her full in the face. She wiped it away, and thought quickly. If the Anastasia she'd met at Scylla, the one of her visions, married to the cruel Vasily, had survived the trial of the Hall of Righteousness, and had children, and the party they travelled with had also had children, perhaps a pocket of human society had survived in this galaxy. They had certainly never returned to human space.
"Look closely, Anna." The woman was still spitting her vile words. "I am you, or rather you are me. I may be old now, but I once looked like you, but far more beautiful." She laughed again. "And I have the sight. I've been patiently watching you in your adventures as you crossed the sector. I've been waiting for you. You've been very clever, or so you thought. But I've been cleverer. All I had to do was let you do the hard work, and follow along. You led us here to the amulet. You've brought us to it."
Anna didn't know what to say. She looked in shock at the woman in front of her, full of bile, and saw it was true. She looked what Anna might look like when she was older, however she hoped her features wouldn't be twisted in hate and regret, as this woman's were.
"How did you survive in this galaxy?" asked Snark from behind Anna.
He'd been following the woman's words, and wanted to keep her talking.
A.I. Destiny 5 Talisman of Tomorrow Page 25
