She’d work on behavior modification later, to make them more cooperative. That would come along.
Suddenly, Naero felt weak again, to the point of passing out.
She quickly reduced her sprites back to glowing pods of proto-energy, and drew their essences back into herself.
The spell of fatigue quickly passed.
That was also a good lesson. She had to remember to startap. If she expended too much of her own, primary internal energies, it would drain her and knock her out.
But her two, life-sized replicants had been formed out of a dangerous excess of energy. That meant, in theory, that when she re-joined them with herself, she would also experience an exponential excess of Cosmic power once again.
Managing all of that at once was going to be tricky.
She started with Naero II.
She paused and smiled, patting her replicant on the shoulder.
“Sorry, sweetie.” Naero sighed. “Hope you enjoyed yourself.”
Haisha, she was starting to sound like Saemar.
For some reason, she suddenly missed the rest of her family and friends horribly.
Re-absorbing Naero II went surprisingly fast. Yet within an instant, she was bloated with dangerous, near lethal levels of wild Cosmic energy.
But this time, she was ready for it.
This time, she reversed the startapping process. If she could take Cosmic energy from the universe, she could give it back, siphoning the excess power back into the nearest star, and the Cosmic flows that naturally existed around it, her, and everything else in their dimension.
That was the trick. She didn’t have to keep it all inside of herself and risk exploding. The difficult part was finding a proper outlet, and then surrender the energy with the right matching flow level, to give it back without sucking oneself dry, or blowing up.
That little triumph left her so confident, that she immediately turned to re-absorbing Om. Get the task done.
Almost immediately, Naero realized that she was horrifyingly wrong.
Ribbons, tendrils, and tentacles of incredibly complex, Kexxian infused Cosmic flows, blended biomancy, and teknomancy ripples rose up to defend him.
She warred with the KDM defensive protocols–dangerously over her head again, without a clue.
The only thing she could think to do was re-absorb Om instantly, make him a part of herself once more. Then there would be nothing to defend against.
Om awoke inside of her mind, disoriented and confused, but part of her once more–and so was the KDM.
Then she gasped, fighting against a sudden swell of tremendous Cosmic energy–a hundredfold greater than before.
Om nearly shrieked in her mind.
Naero! Imperative that we shield our current form in every way possible. A massive explosion and something even worse is imminent. We’ve unleashed it from the protocols and now it is beyond our control. Hurry!
I’m trying, Om.
Try harder. Don’t let up. Otherwise, we will not survive.
The ship, Om. We can’t destroy the ship.
That can no longer be avoided. Destruction cannot be avoided.
Everyone was about to perish, and it was entirely her fault.
Naero used all of the energy she had left, and startapped for even more, covering herself in layered waves of protective force.
Next, she attempted to transport them out into space, as far away from The Darkstar as she could.
It won’t work, Naero. Still too close.
Then the air around them went opaque and sparkling blue.
Naero tried to gasp, but could not.
The explosion detonated out from them–yet worse than the explosion, something else erupted from within her–a thing even more terrifying.
The raw energy of the blast transformed and actually came to life on its own, a ravenous uncontrollable entity of jet-black, Darkforce energy and utter malevolence.
This was her Dark Beast set free on its own, yet still linked with her mind. Chaos itself and annihilation personified, exactly like the destroying amoeba-like monster of her repeating nightmares, that absorbed and penetrated her very flesh and devoured and crushed her completely: body, will, and soul.
That’s exactly what it was.
She looked on, petrified with horror as it came to life before her staring eyes and went on a rampage.
But it struggled, flipped, and whirled in place.
It couldn’t maneuver properly, and there was nothing close by to destroy.
Where were they?
Then she heard Womi’s voice.
My, you are incredibly fascinating–especially for a weakling of your kind. Since we were preparing to explode…I thought it best to remove both us and our Cosmic energies to the Astral Plane.
Her Dark Beast whirled about suddenly, and looked straight into her.
It’s ragged maw grinned with knowing recognition.
Then, even worse. It rushed at her, faded from sight, and melded back with her–once again.
For a few brief seconds, she had nearly been free of the vile thing, and wasn’t even aware of it. The massive blast had simply let it spring free for a few moments.
Naero realized fully, therefore, that her Dark Beast wasn’t just part of her.
It was her.
And she was it, too.
Much more than Om, she and that terrible, sickening, delightfully wicked, and deliciously seductive force of total, gleeful destruction and abject evil…
Were all one and the same. Another terrifying paradox.
The very real monster lurking deep within her, was both Other, and also herself–somehow all at once.
Whatever she did, she would never be free of it.
Naero shuddered and convulsed, instantly curling up into a tight, opaque sphere of Cosmic energy. She hugged her knees at what she was and wept.
She was a monster. No way to deny it now.
Om attempted to reach her.
Naero, it’s all right. Our physical form is still waiting for us back on the ship. No one else was hurt; we survived the blast.
Had they? Had Om seen and perceived what she had just realized? Could he see it? Or had it all just been another of her mad delusions?
She shook her head and sobbed.
I’m not so sure about anything anymore, Om.
Womi tried to cut in. Are you speaking to someone else telepathically? I keep hearing this buzzing sound and these echoes when I try to link with you. The explosion is past. Should I take us back, now?
30
Naero actually struggled to rest, after her intense ordeal, tossing and turning–experiencing further nightmares, fears, and many, very unpleasant visions.
Jia, Alala, and Om woke her, four hours later, calling to her in her quarters.
Om, what is it, now?
They think they’ve found where Baeven might be.
Naero reported to The Darkstar bridge minutes later.
“Looks like another secret enemy base of some kind,” Alala informed them. The Star Fox was still docked and linked with them. Both ships took up orbit around a strange new planet.
Jia jumped right in. “Now that we’re this close, I have a good feeling that Baeven is in fact down there, somewhere. And whatever has happened to him–I was right. He is definitely in trouble. We must find him and extract him, as soon as possible.”
Om cautioned her. Naero, the enemy has gone to much greater lengths to mask and cloak this facility than any of the others we have found, thus afar. It has advanced tek that my scans can not penetrate. You will need to be extremely careful.
My middle-name, Om.
No. It most definitely is not. I’m serious about this, Naero. This place shrieks trouble, and we’ll be walking right into it. There is tek here that we’ve never encountered before.
Then let’s learn what we can, before we go in.
Together, Naero and her comrades performed a quick survey of the new planet, and especially the secret ba
se. Jia provided them with a full report.
“We think it is some kind of weapon’s lab or R&D development base; it must be important. Our enemies have invested a lot into this one location. The facilities are extensive, much of them underground, armored, well-shielded, and even cloaked. We barely stumbled upon it because of the G’lothc ship signatures out this way. It must have stopped here, and more than once, according to the traces. We remain very lucky that the enemy still thinks that it can pop around with impunity. They don’t believe that we can track them in any way.”
“Where’s Baeven?” Naero asked. “What kind of tek and defenses are we up against?”
“I was getting to all that,” Jia added. “Be patient. We have a lot of ground to cover. The defenses are high tek and layered. Here are the specs. Use your teknomancy to absorb them.”
Naero connected fluidly with Alala and did so.
Haisha! These were incredibly intricate defenses.
“There are also full battle groups of active Ejjai, hidden in mountain bases, backed up by hunter-killer teams of Dakkur–led by Dakkur champions.”
Naero envisioned her battle royal with Oth, back on Janosha. Where she had taken her revenge on the creature that slew her best friend, Gallan.
“The enemy also has dozens of fleets, just waiting to swoop out from hidden planetary bases scattered throughout the system and attack, if the planet should ever come under siege. We don’t want to kick over this hornet’s nest. With any luck, we can sneak in, get Baeven, and get out without attracting any attention. That’s the plan.”
“Do we know where Baeven is?” Naero asked directly.
“That’s the problem,” Jia said. “We don’t. We can’t actually see into the base, either. Some kind of shielding or tek defense is keeping our penetration scans from getting through. It is heavily defended in every way. On the outer layers we can detect various hi-tek sensor arrays and robotic gun emplacements. This installation could withstand multiple heavy attacks, and defend itself very well against attackers, and most likely, careful infiltrators as well.”
Naero let out a sigh. “Copy that. That’s where I come in. I’ll slip in all stealth mode and locate Baeven. I just wish we knew what to look for or where.”
She did feel somewhat better having The Shadow Fox along with them for the ride. They could get into deep trouble very quickly this time.
Naero hadn’t even thought of a way to tell them that she was both slowly dying from a growing Cosmic infection she couldn’t stop, and that she might also explode and kill them all at any moment.
There was not good way to spin all that.
Nor did they have any back up.
All flags stood against them. No friends any longer, ever since she killed High Master Vane. Anywhere they turned, everyone who had been their greatest allies–would now be on the hunt to take them down.
It hurt Naero deeply that her own people–her own beloved Clans would view her as an enemy, now. She was a wanted, heinous criminal–a murderer.
The Spacer authorities would have to formally capture her and bring her to trial before they could ostracize her, making her an outcast liker her uncle.
Only then could they strip her of her name and all she was.
Time to check out the planet surface in stealth mode.
Immediately, something wasn’t right. Naero’s small cloud of spyfixers started sounding warnings.
For starters, the region all around the enemy base was highly toxic–unnaturally so. Good thing she was already buttoned up in her stealth armor.
She had her spy fixers scatter and perform a toxicological survey.
Naero carefully gathered some samples from the poisoned streams and pools, now a real life contaminated dead zone. Nothing lived there. Not even bugs. The trees and plants–even the grass–were either all dead or carefully replicated fakes–all camouflage.
Once they shunted those samples back to Zhen for analysis, they might have a better idea about what kind of bio-weapons program the enemy was operating. The research base maintained a disciplined, very low profile operation–within striking distance of their foes.
At least thus far, anyway.
And even if someone did look for enemy activity, the searchers would have to stumble upon the Intel base in the middle of nowhere to even have a clue. They wouldn’t have access to Baeven or his sensor drones and passive and active probes. And even then, nothing around or on the surface of the planet gave off any sign that serious tek was at work there, unless you got right up close to it.
The level of security and secrecy began to scare Naero.
Even Intel did not operate on any kind of a level like this.
What in the hell were their foes up to? They were definitely planning something, and as usual, it was going to be both big and nasty once they unleashed it.
And that begged even more questions. What had happened to Baeven? Baeven never got stuck like this. What had he run afoul of that he couldn’t handle?
Maybe there was a first time for everything. But every second on this bioweapons world raised more troubling questions.
Word from Jia on their secure channel.
Still no sign of any signal from Baeven.
Naero and the two ships sent specially coded signals out on all of their special frequencies and channels. Calls and signals that only Baeven would recognize.
No response.
He was either separated from his own formidable tek–again–rare if not impossible. Or he was captured, or hurt badly enough that he could not respond…or worse.
Naero had a very real sudden fear.
What if the enemy had somehow captured Baeven…and had him prisoner in one of those nightmarish, Darkforce generators? That would certainly explain a lot.
“Jia, we’ve searched all day. Other than attempting to infiltrate the base itself, I don’t see how we’re going to find him. I’ve got to make an attempt at getting inside.”
Silence.
“There is another way,” Jia said. “Something difficult that we haven’t tried yet. A special kind of telepathy that only I can perform.”
“Then let’s do it. What are we waiting for?”
“It’s…problematic.”
“How so?”
“To make it work, Naero–I need a host body to place my mind and essence in, temporarily.”
“Huh? Your mind runs the ship? You don’t have a body, Jia?”
Welcome to my existence.
Quiet, Om.
“No,” Jia said. “I do in fact have a physical body…but for many good reasons, it isn’t really here with us right now. I kind of had to leave it behind.”
Naero wasn’t going to ask, for now at least, just how Jia had her mind and soul separated from her physical body–or what that physical body happened to look like.
Her head was already spinning.
Jia went on. “For my special type of telepathy to work–I must have a physical body.”
Naero did not hesitate.
“If it will find Baeven, then use mine.”
“Be warned, Naero. It’s not as easy as it sounds, taking someone’s mind and soul inside of you. Being a host to another sentient’s consciousness…even for a short time, can be difficult, dangerous, and incredibly painful.”
“Yeah, yeah. Bring on the pain, then. What else you got?”
“Alright. Let’s rendezvous at the Delta-3 landing zone and take it from there. I’ll instruct you what to do.”
“Jia. I just naturally assumed you were a person–of some kind. Am I correct?”
She laughed. “I am a person, Naero. I just don’t have my body right now. It’s …a little complicated.”
Everything with Baeven and his weird crew usually was. Where did any of them come from? They were all individual members of their species. Where were their homeworlds?
“Sooo…if you don’t have your body with you, Jia–what exactly are you?”
“For now–I am The Shadow Fox–Baev
en’s sentient, self-aware ship, a living ship, much like Alala and The Darkstar. I function as a large part of its mind–its intellect. I bolster its raw computing power. But the ship can also function very well without me, when necessary.”
“Okay. Question answered. See you soon. Tell S’krin and Danjen to keep their togs on.”
“I don’t understand, Naero. Neither of them wear togs.”
“Just an expression.”
What in the hell was she getting herself into now? Becoming a host body for yet another personality?
Om couldn’t help commenting. Could be fun. A self-aware intellect working in conjunction with a complex machine? With Jia and Alala around, I could be in love, Naero…again.
Haisha, not Om in love again. Please, anything but that.
Whatever there was between Jia and Baeven, Naero was pretty sure it was love–and not the platonic kind either. Naero would bet the fleet that if they ever did see Jia’s body, it would be a definite eye-opener.
Keep your togs on too, this time, Om. I can’t speak for Alala, but I got a serious hunch that Jia is already taken.
Dang. They say the good ones usually are.
Who are they? You don’t even know any ‘theys,’ so don’t get cocky, Om. Sheesh, I should have never let you develop a sense of humor.
“Ah, but I have. Too late now.”
Naero sighed, continuing to worry about whether they could slip into that enemy facility or not, without being detected or captured themselves.
If Baeven couldn’t find a way out, how would she?
31
They made it to the rendezvous point, and Naero crossed over to The Shadow Fox. Both of their ships remained docked together and cloaked.
Naero used the special sensors of her spyfixers to locate the vessel and place both of her hands on the hull.
Weird. With her teknomancer abilities she could sense the living ship’s energies, and even Jia’s superior intellect, just a part of this amazing craft.
She linked with Jia again.
“I’m here, Jia. How do we do this? Through our teknomancing, or our mindlink?”
“I’m afraid it’s a little more complex than that, Naero. I will need to split my soul off from the ship, and join it with you directly. You must take my soul inside of your existence, and provide it both a safe place, and access to your bodily functions.”
Spacer Clans Adventure 3: Naero's Fury Page 27
