“It is a wonder to feel, is it not?” Reynolds asked in response. “You will get used to the way our bodies prevent us from damaging them beyond repair.”
Izanami smiled and slipped her arm through his, pulling him along with her as she walked. The impact of her armored boots on the metal floor sent minute vibrations up her spine, distracting her from the novel experience of hearing speech transmitted directly into her brain without the need to check each individual phoneme against her speech and language database to gain context. “I feel whole, and yet I am still the Baba Yaga. I understand now why you would never be parted from your ship despite your need to exist independently from it. I know what it is to be alive. I did not before this body.”
Reynolds recalled his first experiences of organic senses, savoring the shine of Izanami’s eyes as she processed each new scent, sound, and tactile sensation.
“Yes,” he agreed, and that was enough.
Izanami stopped walking and tilted her head when one of her aural inputs suddenly spiked.
“What is it?” Reynolds inquired.
“I’m not certain,” Izanami replied. Her mouth made a little O when Bethany Anne stepped out of the Etheric.
“Why am I being redirected to a copy of Reynolds when I try to reach you?” she demanded, glaring at the two AIs. She waved off their explanations impatiently. “We have an issue. Alexis and Gabriel—”
“Are they in danger?” Izanami interrupted.
“Maybe,” Bethany Anne told her. “So stop fucking interrupting me and get this ship on course for the planet Daolagen.”
Reynolds tapped his communicator. “Takal, beam me back. We have a situation.” He inclined his head as his body was swallowed by blue light. “We will retrieve them. Do not fear, my Queen.”
With that he was gone, leaving Bethany Anne and Izanami alone in the corridor.
“Battle stations,” Bethany Anne ordered.
“Done,” Izanami informed Bethany Anne as lights flashed and alarms sounded. “We are en route to Daolagen.”
They entered the elevator, leaving behind Izanami’s calm voice instructing all hands over the ship’s speakers as the doors closed.
“Good,” Bethany Anne told her through clenched teeth. “Michael would kill them all and leave them to God’s judgment. Alexis thinks she has hit upon the only way to be rid of the cult forever, and I was inclined to agree—right up to the point where the cult crossed the line.”
Izanami tilted her head. “You didn’t want it to come to this.”
Bethany Anne lifted her chin, the glow from her eyes painting the elevator red. “It’s a lesson I almost never enjoy giving.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Open Space, QSD Baba Yaga
“Why have we suddenly changed course?” Michael inquired when Bethany Anne and Izanami walked in through the lower-level access. Seeing the way Bethany Anne held herself clenched made his heart drop into his stomach. “The twins?”
“Are fine for the moment,” Bethany Anne assured him. “Despite the incompetent gaggle of fuckwits running Daolagen, giving the cult a place to dig in and metastasize.”
“We are on our way to intercede, then,” Michael inferred. “They’d better hope to God they haven’t harmed the children in any way. What kind of welcome can we expect on arrival?”
“Likely a hostile one,” Bethany Anne told him. She waved a hand to cast the information she had in her HUD to the central console, and a holo-representation of the Daolagen system manifested. “Our communications with the president’s people prior to this included details of planetary security. They’ve lost the satellites, which means the cult is in control of the defense grid.”
Izanami scoffed. “I’ve been over the specifications. Those lasers don’t have the power to so much as scratch my paint, and the Reynolds is just as well protected.”
Bethany Anne waved a hand, dismissing the issue. “My concern is for the people who could be killed by falling debris when I have the Bitches take it out, and then there’s the number of people converging on the Senate.”
“I’m going to get ready to go down to the planet,” Michael told her.
Bethany Anne held up a finger to ask him to wait while opening a link to Gabrielle.
What’s with the klaxons? Gabrielle asked.
Bethany Anne caught her up. Suit up and prepare to ship out, all of you. Michael will be heading straight down to the planet to extract the children, so make sure those satellites are dust.
She lifted a shoulder at Michael’s inquiring expression. “There’s an extra scout fighter in the hold since John straight-up refused to switch ships, or you can go direct and get a ride back on the Gemini.”
“I’ll go direct,” Michael decided. “We don’t know how long it will take to disable the defenses.”
“It won’t take long,” Bethany Anne assured him. “There are tens of thousands of cultists headed for the colony’s capital. I need you and the children to limit the damage they cause.”
Michael nodded. “That was my plan.”
“We have another problem,” Izanami cut in as they swept into the Daolagen system. “A possible stranded ship. The Gate logs show an SOS being received from the other side eleven minutes before it was shut down.”
Bethany Anne raised an eyebrow. “Tell me the ship in distress made it through.”
“There is no record of it crossing the Gate,” Izanami confirmed.
“Well, shit.” Bethany Anne ran through the options, knowing that getting the Gate back up and running required more than just punching a few buttons. For the second time recently, she wished she had Tabitha with her and realized she would have to either figure out her ability or leave Devon in someone else’s hands when they moved on Gödel. “Do you have the coordinates of where they were transmitting from?”
“The system does not have that information, and the Gate has been severed from the network,” Izanami grumbled. “Based on older logs, I can narrow it down to one hundred and thirty-nine possible Gate locations, but unless I can access the Gate, there is no way to know.”
“We haven’t got time to check them all.” Bethany Anne pulled Michael into her arms and kissed him soundly. “Go get our children. I’ll join you as soon as I’ve opened the Gate.”
She stepped into the Etheric without waiting for a reply and headed toward the point in space where the Gate lay. Her coat shifted form as she ran, the lapels moving to cover her chest while the flowing tail sealed itself to her skinsuit. She pulled her hood up and instructed the nanofabric to complete the seal, and the Bl’kheth DNA-infused nanocytes built a translucent panel that filled the space around her face.
Bethany Anne closed her eyes briefly in thanks to Sean’s group for the gift and opened the Etheric on the Gate. As she had suspected, it was inert. Even the maintenance bots were frozen, floating around the massive structure aimlessly with no power to the Gate to provide gravity
She kicked the base of the Gate in frustration, leaving a dent in the reinforced alloy. “Fucksticks. It’s deader than disco.”
What do you have against disco? TOM commented in a mock-hurt tone. At least it hasn’t been damaged. Well, beyond what you just did to it.
>>But it has been severed from the remote command station,<< ADAM countered before TOM dug himself deeper. >>Which is behind that net.<<
“They’re controlling it from a ground station?” Bethany Anne glanced at the laser fire coming from the planet and pressed her lips together. “That ship might still be okay, but Gabrielle and the guys are taking too long to bitch-slap the net out of existence.”
Those lasers don’t have a snowball’s chance in Hell of hitting what they can’t see, TOM countered. What are you thinking we can do before they break it?
Bethany Anne extended her window onto reality to a small, jutting platform and placed a hand on the cold metal. “ADAM is going to get inside the Gate and make it think it’s receiving instructions from the command station.”
&n
bsp; >>Then…<<
Bethany Anne’s eyebrow arched at ADAM’s tone. “Then we’ll figure out exactly how much juice it takes to open it.”
>>You make it sound so simple,<< ADAM remarked with amusement.
“I tell you what I want, you make it happen without giving me a condensed lecture on some part of engineering I have no interest in,” Bethany Anne replied. “Then I get on with saving lives.” She paused for impact. “I don’t see the problem.”
>>Isn’t the point that you don’t?”<< ADAM replied. >>Okay, give me some power here.<<
Bethany Anne blinked when an overlay of the Gate appeared on her faceplate. She closed her eyes and focused on drawing energy to the spot ADAM had marked in the overlay. “How much should I give it? I don’t want to get too enthusiastic and blow the damned thing by mistake.”
>>Go slow and steady,<< ADAM instructed. >>You’ll know when to stop because there will be a large portal throwing out massive amounts of radiation six inches from your face.<<
Bethany Anne increased the flow of energy steadily, and the Gate stuttered to life. She stepped back into the Etheric, keeping her window open while protecting herself from the blast of energy that poured from the silver-green circle. “Is the ship still there?”
>>Give me a moment,<< ADAM replied. >>I have the rest of the transmission, and the Gate coordinates the transmission was sent through. Locking on…<<
Satellites exploded in the background as the scout fighters made progress with the net. The portal undulated, spilling light as it shifted to open at the location ADAM had found.
Michael’s voice interrupted the hypnotic effect it was having on Bethany Anne. I have the children.
Are they good?
If you count spitting mad as good, then yes.
Bethany Anne raised an eyebrow. What’s going on down there?
I’ll tell you what’s going on down here, Alexis cut in. The colony is descending into a riot, and the president’s people are too busy talking to act. People are fighting in the streets, and they’re still arguing about whether implementing martial law is a violation of the colony’s constitution.
Is there anyone down there you can work with? Bethany Anne asked. They have Federation officers in their military, right?
Yes, and their hands are tied while the colony’s capital burns, Alexis informed her. We left the politicians to talk and came out here to do something. We’re working with the emergency services folks to get people evacuated.
Gabriel joined them in the mindspace. I think the generals can be persuaded to act for the good of the people, but we’re out in the city.
I’m almost done here.
>>Um, no, you’re not,<< ADAM informed her out of the family’s hearing. >>I’ve got the ship, and the reason they’re in distress.<<
I hope you’re not expecting me to spare the lives of the cultists responsible for this, Michael told Bethany Anne. I’ve requested ground teams from both superdreadnoughts to assist the suppression efforts.
Whatever you need to do to put the brakes on the shitshow until I get there, do it. Got to go.
She dropped the mental link, having no time to elucidate as three ships came tearing through the Gate, two of them Ooken destroyers in pursuit of the first, which was a battered and beaten freighter. It looked to Bethany Anne like the dwindling forward motion the freighter had was largely due to the hit it had taken on the crossing, judging by the atmosphere venting from its belly.
“Oh, fuck, no!” Bethany Anne cut power to the Gate before any more Ooken destroyers came through, opening a mental link to John. We have Ookens at the Gate and a civilian ship in danger. I’m in the Etheric, headed for the ship.
I’ll take care of the Ookens, John promised.
Daolagen, Senate
Bethany Anne headed for the planet’s surface after depositing the rescued crew onboard the Baba Yaga. She exited the Etheric in the war room, a bunker deep below the Senate building, putting an end to the shouting match occurring over the top of the president’s head between the two factions of her advisors.
The stunned politicians stared at Bethany Anne in silence. President LaCroix lifted her head from her hands, her face crumpling with relief. “My Queen, you are here.”
Bethany Anne smelled a traitor in the room and drew her katana, bringing it up to point at the people clustered around the table. “Just in time to prevent your mole from succeeding, it would appear. Not one of you moves. Anyone who does so will find themselves getting intimately acquainted with the business end of my sword. Do I make myself clear?” Michael, did you meet with these people?
I did not, he replied.
Alexis?
Her daughter let out a sound between a growl and a groan. What did I miss?
Not sure yet, Bethany Anne admitted. But there’s something rotten in the state of Daolagen, and I know just the Kurtherian to get to the bottom of it. “Someone here is being less than honest,” she told the president.
LaCroix snorted in disbelief. “Nobody here would betray the people.”
Bethany Anne looked around, speaking in a soft voice formed of concrete. “Take your seats while we discover who it is.”
She dismissed the men and women, who looked shifty as they obeyed. They might well have had a petty crime or misdemeanor they were concealing, but the brief feeling of intense hatred she’d sensed mixed in with the clear gratitude of the others belonged to someone much more adept at hiding their true self.
Bethany Anne walked around the table, touching her blade to each human's right shoulder as she passed. As she made contact, she and TOM riffled their minds in search of deception. The first few humans yielded nothing of interest.
I don’t know about that, TOM commented. That woman’s level of attachment to her housebot is a bit concerning. What about this man? He’s keeping two families, one on the colony, one on the planet of his grandparents’ origin.
You find the idea amusing? Bethany Anne asked, moving on to the next senator.
I don’t know about amusing, TOM replied. Illogical. If a man has more than one wife, which one does he obey if they are asking for different things? Human women do not generally take well to sharing their men in my admittedly limited experience. Which brings me to the terrifying part: what does he do if they find out about each other?
Exactly what he’s told for the rest of his days by whichever one of them is gracious enough not to castrate him, I would assume. She found nothing in the president’s mind to connect her to the cult, a small favor she sent up mental thanks for. Thankfully, they won’t be starting tomorrow with entirely new leadership.
What about him? TOM’s tone shifted as he and Bethany Anne looked into the friendly-but-concerned eyes and open smile of the senator who had been arguing with the generals.
No. She followed the senator’s gaze when his eyes darted involuntarily to the senator sitting three seats away from him. Her.
Yes, TOM agreed. There’s nothing healthy about the fear that woman is concealing.
Bethany Anne continued circling at the same pace until she reached the woman. She placed the edge of her katana a hair’s breadth from the senator’s throat and her other hand on the woman’s shoulder. “You are an agent of the cult.”
“No!” the guileless man cried. “Laura, tell her she’s made a mistake.
The senator swallowed, saying nothing to confirm or deny the accusation leveled against her.
Bethany Anne gave him a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry for you, but it doesn’t make it any less the truth. This woman has been conspiring with the terrorists to bring down this government.”
She leaned in and whispered in the senator’s ear, “Talk, and you can live out the remainder of your life on a penal colony. Continue to play the strong and silent game, and your life expectancy will be very short indeed.”
The woman closed her eyes. “That’s what you do when you don’t get your way, right? Spill however much blood it takes to change the result. Isaiah�
��the people—will stop you from enslaving us.” She jerked her shoulder out of Bethany Anne’s loose hold and thrust herself onto the blade at her throat.
Senators and military personnel alike drew back in shock when they were splashed with the senator’s blood. The man whose relationship with the late senator was still not clear to Bethany Anne broke into choked sobs.
“What the hell just happened?” President LaCroix demanded.
Bethany Anne released the senator’s body to fall onto the table and held her katana up while it absorbed the grisly coating, then sheathed it. “She made her choice. I have no stomach for traitors. Now explain to me what measures your administration is going to take against the riots happening in your streets, because so far, the only ones I see doing anything worth a damn are my people and the emergency services.”
The president sighed. “This is a civil issue. I cannot in good conscience turn the military on our citizens.”
“Screw your good-fucking-conscience!” Bethany Anne was at the president’s side in half a blink, causing LaCroix to shrink back in her chair under her withering stare.
“A riot is not a civil matter. It’s a terrorist incident that is occurring because of your complete and utter incompetence as a leader. You had a duty to your people to cut the cancer out of your society and you failed, so buckle the fuck up and start making decisions that will save your people’s lives before I take the power to do so out of your hands.”
The president nodded, seeing she wasn’t going to be given a choice. “You heard the Queen. Mobilize.”
The generals jumped into action at the president’s order, leaving the table for their command posts at the consoles crammed into the other end of the room.
“We may be too late,” President LaCroix fretted. “You are right. I failed my people because I didn’t take the threat of Isaiah seriously.”
Bethany Anne considered whether she should feel bad for the woman. Her inclination was to be pissed that she had to intercede in something that should have been dealt with by a black-ops team before it even got started, but not everyone had the foresight that came with experience.
Return Of The Queen: The Kurtherian Endgame™ Book Eight Page 23
