Snakelike eyes flip open, and she takes a long breath. “Sam,” she whispers, smiling weakly.
“H… How?” I gasp, shaking my head.
She winces, tilting her head back, and the holes of her nose seal and then reopen. “Threvians can hold their breath much longer than humans.”
I cough. My throat feels like sandpaper dragged across broken glass. “Thank God.”
Across the room, a ragged cough, far more violent than mine. Mika spasms before turning to vomit water. I’m at her side before I realize I’ve moved, holding her up as a swimming pool of water sprays from her and she shakes uncontrollably. Finally, she collapses into me, arms around my stomach, breaths weak
But she’s alive.
“Astra, close the doorway,” Syl says, voice controlled but urgent.
“What–” Astra says, cutting off with a gasp as she sees what only Syl’s detected.
Another rift. On the other side of the door. The Shepherd, watching us. Studying the room we’re in, flaming eyes darting across us from one corner to the other.
“Fuck!” I’m up, but Astra beats me to the door. She slams the panel at its side and it coalesces, but not before the Shepherd gives me another invisible smile.
“Sooooon,” it whispers just before the door seals.
I slump against the now featureless wall, weak as a newborn lamb. “Everyone… Everyone okay?”
“No,” Mika growls. “Have I told you guys lately how much I hate this place?”
“Yes.” Syl ticks off a claw. “When we reappeared in the hallway together after we thought we had escaped.” Another claw. “During the trial you referred to as ‘are you shitting me, fucking Mario Brothers?’, just before Sam appeared to pull us out.” A third. “When we woke in Astra’s study, you stared at the ceiling for approximately three minutes before–”
“Okay, okay.” Mika struggles up, starts toward me. “Add one more to the list.”
I meet her halfway, taking her arm over my shoulders. We move back to my spot at the wall where she leans into me gratefully. I hold her tight, then look to the others. Astra’s already fiddling with a panel set into one of the otherwise featureless walls. “Please tell me this is our last stop.”
She flashes me a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. It chills me. “It is. Just one thing left to do.”
“This is the final chamber?” Syl asks, prowling and poking into each identical corner.
“Yes,” Astra laughs. “Congratulations. You’re the first Aspirants to complete the Citadel.”
Mika shakes her head. “Seriously? This is it?”
“You expected something else?”
“Well, yeah.” I feel weirdly outraged, even if we did have to get rescued and then cheat to get here. “No fireworks? No feast? Not even a little mushroom guy waiting to tell us that our princess is in another castle?”
“Well, no,” Astra says, momentarily crestfallen. “I guess they didn’t think of that.”
“Or maybe it is because they knew no one would ever complete the chambers,” Syl says. “Why bother programming a reward when no one will ever see it?”
“The cake is a lie.” Mika’s words are quiet enough that I know they’re just for me.
“I know that one.” I poke her in her bruised ribs, earning a grin and a wince. “Nerd.”
“Yeah well… Wait.” Her joke dies on her lips. “Wait, if there’s no reward because no one would ever be here to see it…” She pales. “What if there’s no exit?”
“There is,” Astra says. “Voilà!” She points to the panel she’s been messing with.
Mika and I limp up to her. The panel looks like every other on the Citadel; black with sunken handprints for us to activate. I don’t get it. “Why create an exit for Aspirants that would never see that, either?”
Astra’s hands never stop moving. “This was hardwired into the Citadel from the beginning. A beacon to send you to Homeworld. It was always the point of this place, part of its first versions. The chambers and trials came much later.”
“Okay, sweet.” I watch her, wishing I could help. “How long do we have? Can you get us out?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t know.” Astra sighs. “He knows where we are, and it won’t take him long to find us. But how long? Could be a minute, could be an hour.”
“Not very comforting,” Mika says, still leaning on me.
“As for getting us out?” A ripple of silver chases its way down Astra’s frame. Fear? Nervousness? Either way, it can’t be good. “I’m trying. Hoping. We didn’t finish the Citadel by normal means, and it knows.”
“Knows?” Mika shivers.
“Yes. Like a videogame that requires you collect certain items to proceed, this Citadel marks finished trials. The bitch of this is that the Citadel automatically activates this beacon when an Aspirant finishes the ninth trial. You didn’t.”
The bitch of this? I mouth to Mika. She smirks.
“But I’m trying. If I can get us out…”
“Anything I can do to help?” I ask, knowing there isn’t.
“Just be near me.” Another ripple, slower than the first. “You give me courage.”
“I think you’ve got more than you realize.” I rest my hand at her back. “But sure. I can do that, too.”
“Just stand there and be handsome.” Mika winks and pokes me back.
I grimace. Damn, are all my ribs bruised? “I can do that.”
“When I arrived on planet Earth, I thought humans were repulsive. The opposite of handsome, or beautiful.” Syl talks almost absently as she stands at our backs and watches everything. “And the men were the worst. Pink and soft. Covered in coarse hair. Their bizarrely large genitals hanging free, unprotected and vulnerable.”
“If this is some kind of complement, I’m not quite getting it…”
She turns, eyeing me sideways. Her tongue flicks out, brushing my cheek like a soft whip, leaving a little burn. “I have since found… Some appeal.”
“There’s the ego boost,” Mika laughs. “Try not to let it go to your head.”
Syl gives her a toothy smile. “Do not worry. You are both delicious.”
I shiver as blood rushes low. “I don’t know how you make me feel this way after… Every goddamned thing we just went through,” I say. “But I love it.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” Mika says, cheeks pink.
We fall silent as Astra works. She doesn’t respond or even show that she heard our banter, but she wears a tiny smile and the silver bands of fear don’t travel her length anymore.
But after a moment she slumps, all lightness falling away. “Shit,” she whispers.
“Definitely don’t like the sound of that.” I peer over her shoulder, but there’s nothing but the handprint with its invisible keys.
“I can’t get us out.”
This time, the silence is crushing.
“That… That can’t be,” Mika finally whispers.
“I’m so sorry,” Astra says, turning to us. Her hands clasp at her stomach as she looks down. “I… I gambled. That I could beat the system. But without my access, I can’t. By not defeating the Citadel we locked ourselves out.” Her shoulders hitch with a swallowed sob. “I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you. I… I knew we couldn’t survive. That this our only option. But I was wrong.”
Mika and I don’t respond. Can’t. I want to comfort Astra, to tell her that it’s not her fault, but I can’t make my voice work.
We’ve all failed.
“Astra,” Syl barks. Three heads snap up at her tone. “Blame is useless. Self-incrimination is useless. Do not lose your strength, now. Think.”
“About what?” She casts a hand back, smacking the panel. “All we can do is go back to the beginning. Again. The beacon’s open, but we can’t connect to Homeworld.” She stalks off, turning back, angry now. “Useless? The only useless things here are me and this damned beacon!”
“No,” Syl says, marching up to her, one
claw poking out. It stops a millimeter from Astra’s chest. The AI doesn’t flinch, just stares back, breathing deep. “There is always another option. Always another way to fight back. Swallow your anger and think.” Her claw retracts, and she lays her hand on Astra’s shoulder. “We are counting on you.”
Rage drains and Astra deflates. “Sorry. You’re right. Just… I hoped I was right. Hoped I could get us out and save us.” She lays her hand over Syl’s. “To fail is…”
“Human,” I say, smiling.
Astra smiles back and a single tear threads its way down her cheek. “Thank you, Sam. Syl. Mika.” A deep breath. “So, what now?”
Mika’s chewing her lip, eyes distant like she hasn’t heard the conversation. I give her another poke. “You okay?”
Instead of answering, she pulls away from me and stops at the beacon. “You said this was open?”
Astra’s mouth quirks. “Yes.”
“And it won’t connect to Homeworld.”
“No.”
Mika turns to us. “Can we go somewhere else?”
Astra’s eyes widen. “I don’t… I don’t know.”
“You should find out. Quick like.”
“You have an idea.” Syl’s words aren’t a question.
“She always does,” I say.
“Hush, you two.” Mika stands behind Astra as the AI taps at the panel, bouncing with excitement a woman who almost drowned five minutes ago shouldn’t be able to muster.
Her mood is infectious. I grin at Syl. “She definitely has an idea.”
Something rumbles behind us. Syl and I spin in place, searching the walls. “What is that?”
“Shepherd,” Astra says absently. “He’s coming.”
“Oh. Good.”
“Hurry,” Syl says.
Thirty seconds that feel like thirty years pass. The only sounds are Astra’s fingers at the panel and the distant thunder of the Shepherd. I don’t know what it’s doing, but it sounds like a train smashing through the walls of a building.
A building we’re inside.
“Okay,” Astra crows, so sudden I startle. “Uplink possible! The code won’t let us connect to Homeworld, but it has no safeguards against linking with somewhere else.” Her shoulders fall. “But… Where?”
“Anywhere,” Mika says. “Any where is better than here.”
“Yes,” I agree fervently. “But we have to think. Ending up in some dude’s porn folder isn’t helpful to us or Earth.”
“It’s not that simple,” Mika manages to laugh. “But that might be intriguing.”
“You’re filthy.” I wink. “But seriously, where do we go?”
“It has to be somewhere that will eventually lead us to Homeworld.” Astra paces. “Somewhere we can use as a jumping point to get us there.” She frowns. “I don’t know anywhere like that.”
“Me, neither,” Mika says.
I don’t respond. Everyone here knows this isn’t my forte.
“I know a place,” Syl says, voice hushed. “Lifestream Online.”
Mika gapes. “Lifestream? That’s… That’s an MMO.”
“What, like World of Warcraft?” I ask.
“Exactly like that, but also, not.” Mika blinks. “Sorry, not helpful. It’s an online game, the most complex and realistic ever made. Fantasy setting, very few rules or GM’s, just about anything goes. It’s supposed to be amazing. I’ve heard of immersion devices that take people fully into the game to experience it in VR, but they’re rare. They live and run shops and get married and fight and… And fuck,” she says, swallowing.
“Sounds like you know a lot about it,” I tease.
“I tried to get into the beta. Like, five times.” She turns to Syl. “But why would we go there?”
Something crashes, muted by what sounds like only a few walls. Syl ignores it. “When my people arrived and crushed most of the resistance,” she says, glancing toward me apologetically, “we discovered the Lifestream program. I do not know much about it, as that was not my function, but I do know that we took control of the program. Improved it with our technology and distributed thousands of the immersion units you speak of. Tens of thousands if I recall correctly.”
“But why?” Astra looks baffled. “Why invade the Earth and then… Give people videogames?”
“Pacification,” Mika and I say together.
“Just so.” Syl turns, eyes on the far wall. “Humans are desperate for escape. For entertainment.” She sneers. “Even as their planet fell around them, they clamored for the immersion units. Fought for them, cheated each other out of them. Much of the remaining population spends their time in Lifestream, fighting and bickering and killing each other.”
“Sounds like nothing’s changed,” Mika says sadly.
“So, if it’s run by the Threvians,” I say, turning to Syl as a seed of hope grows in my chest, “it’s connected to them.”
“Yes.” Syl smiles. “I knew you would understand. You are unlike most humans. I hope my contempt for much of your people does not offend you.”
“Nah, I’m right there with you,” I laugh. “Never had many friends.”
“Can you do it?” Mika’s hand tightens in mine. “Astra, can you connect us to Lifestream?”
“I can try.” She taps at the panel for only a moment, then gasps. “Yes. Yes, I can. God, the program is… It’s huge.”
“The network that houses the program is spread over much of the planet.” Syl rolls her shoulders. “I protected our scientists as they installed servers in a place you call Germany.”
“Okay. This will only take a minute,” Astra says, touching some final combination of keys. The panel lights green and seems to float off the surface of the wall. It expands, zipping open to the size of a door before hovering motionless.
“Are we sure this is the right choice?” I ask. “I mean, this place sucks, but we’re together again. Maybe we can actually do this right.”
Mika turns to me slowly, eyebrow raising. “Beat the Citadel?”
“Yeah. I know it sounds crazy. But Lifestream is an unknown. We have no idea what we’re facing there. Or what to do when we get there. Here, at least we know what we’re up against.”
Syl’s brow furrows. “From what we have seen so far, I would prefer the unknown.”
“Agreed,” Mika nods. “This place is terrifying, and it’s harder now. We barely survived half of our first run… Even with Astra, restarting on new game plus sounds like a terrible idea.”
“New game plus?” Astra blinks. “Never mind. I agree. By design or by accident, the Citadel can’t be beaten.”
The room shakes, almost throwing us to our knees. “Stay here or go with the wild card.” I glance to the exit panel. “Fuck it. Let’s get out of here.”
“Connecting,” Astra says.
The rumble is so close, now. “It’d be nice if we could have one escape from this asshole that wasn’t of the ‘cut the red wire with one second left’ variety.”
Mika chuckles. “Green wire. Always cut the green wire.”
“Okay, didn’t know you were an expert on movie bombs.” My joke is lame, nervous, but it keeps me from panicking. “Next you’ll tell us how to fight off terrorists when they invade Nakatomi–”
The wall across from us explodes. A shower of rock and plastic peppers us as we flinch back, shielding our eyes with forearms. The thunder of it claps my ears, dizzying as the smell of chemical heat washes over us.
He’s here.
Opposite the wall he’s just torn through, the doorway chimes. Sudden light, brilliant and blinding, fills the room. I can’t see what’s on the other side of the doorway, but it’s like we’re about to step into the middle of a star.
The Shepherd takes a long step forward. The room is barely fifteen feet across.
We have to go.
Syl dives through first, claws bared. I know it’s because she trusts me to take the rear and keep the others safe, and it’s impossible not to feel pretty badass.
Mika follows on her heels, but not before turning to me. “If you don’t follow me this time and I die in some shitty MMO, I’ll haunt you forever.”
“Not gonna happen,” I say, ushering her into the light.
The Shepherd takes another long pace forward, not hurrying. Why? The space is tiny, and if he’d rushed us, I don’t think all of us would survive. Instead, he’s taking his time, flaming eyes not even on Astra and me.
Instead, he watches the portal.
“Uh, will this close after we pass through?”
Astra pauses at the threshold. “I… Don’t know. I think so.”
“Can you make sure of it?”
“No. No control panel. I don’t have access.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.” I push her on as she takes a long last look at the Shepherd. Probably relieved that she’ll never see her tormenter again.
I hope that’s true.
Astra disappears, and I’m not far behind. But before passing through, I reach out with my power, feeling the shape and texture of the portal.
It almost breaks me. The link to Lifestream is all I sense; it’s enormous, overwhelming. It’s like staring into infinity and completely understanding its vastness and your place in the universe all at once.
It’s too much. My mind shies away as I step toward the light.
But no. I have to make sure. I reach out again, narrow my focus to the room around me. He’s almost on top of me, and I have barely a second to do something. Anything.
Desperation grips my heart like a fist. I reach up, wrap my mind around the ceiling, praying that it’s not like the walls in the previous chambers.
It’s not. This is just a room, much like Astra’s study. Another sign that no one expected us to get this far.
As I step into the light, I tear the fucking ceiling apart, barely escaping the tons of rock that fill the room almost instantly.
I don’t have time to wonder if I’ve stopped him. Don’t have time to hope that my desperation paid off. The moment I step through the portal, my body shreds to a trillion particles. I’m thrown into the nether, and my last thought as everything goes dark is that this must be what it feels like to die.
Aspirant 2: A Sci-Fi Harem Adventure Page 13
