Drew shook his head. “Do not lay that on me. Please.”
“I knew if you found out what I know, your life would be in danger. I wasn’t happy with your father’s lifestyle. I left him because he was a fraud, a liar, and part of something black and clandestine.”
“Do you know where my dad went?”
She pointed at the rocket in the sky. “He’s in one of those.”
“What’s his name?”
She gave me a wink. “You talked with him on the news the other day.”
“I...uh…”
“Slade Isaac Roberson, Colonel and once head of the Global Safety Administration. Now flying to Callisto to be a leader there, as well. He always dreamed of living amongst the stars.”
“You have got to be shitting me.”
Laura coughed. “I shit you not.” She coughed again, this time harder. “Hand me my water.”
As Drew reached for her water, Laura pitched forward, out of her chair, and onto the ground. She spasmed and kicked, froth forming at the edges of her mouth.
“Mom!” Drew tried to scoop the mess out of her mouth, to clear her trachea. “Someone, please, help me.” He turned her on her side and tried to perform a half-assed Heimlich. “Please,” he screamed. “I need some help here.”
He looked back at the Facility. The G-men were back at their posts, guarding the doors. There was an attendant, banging on the glass, trying to get out, but there was no way around those goons.
Drew looked at his mother’s glass. Had they snuck something in there when the two of them were watching the rockets leave Earth, observing the politicians flee their sworn oaths to protect us?
His mother lay in his arms, still and quiet. He lay her head, gently, on the grass and stood, looking into the sky, tears wetting his cheeks and his chin trembling, “You may have won this fucking battle, but believe me when I tell you, you will never win this war.”
53
Date: Unknown ~ Location: Unknown
Jaxx lay on a cold table. A hazy light swayed above him, not blinding by any means. It was pleasant, calming.
He tried to lift his head, to see where he was, but the pain knocked him back. He cringed. It was going to be a hum-dinger of a migraine. He could already tell. He blinked. There were vines, hanging from the ceiling. They were green peas. He turned his head to the left, wincing. Dozens of long boxes displayed tomatoes, squash, and cucumbers. Vegetable planters lined the room’s floor.
God, I feel nauseous.
A warm hand touched his forehead. Startled, he tried to get up. Lightning pain shot through his skull, pinning him back on the table. He bit down hard, then let up, realizing he might break his teeth.
“Are you okay?” A woman leaned over, her face blocking out the light. She smiled.
“Who are you?” Jaxx’s voice was weak, barely audible.
She stroked his forehead. “I’m Francine. I’m one of the ship’s med techs.”
“Where am I?”
She averted her gaze. “Just relax. Right now, we need to get you healthy. Let’s not worry about where you are.”
Jaxx sat up, squinting at the searing pain in his head. Windows were everywhere. Stars speckled the sky.
“Please tell me where I am.” He tried to jump off the table, but the med tech held him down.
“I don’t know.” She walked over to the windows. “I only see stars. I’m not a navigator and I don’t know what quadrant we are in. From what I’ve been told, we are somewhere between Earth and Mars.”
Jaxx rubbed his eyes. “Between Earth and Mars?”
“Yes.”
He remembered Slade knocking him out. He recalled Fox placing a helmet on his head. After that, nothing.
Francine put her hand behind his head. “If you’d lift up, just a tiny bit, you can have a sip of this. It will help with pain.”
Jaxx complied. If they could take the pain away, he’d be able to think. He closed his eyes and counted backwards from three. It was right there, the memory. He’d been strapped to a chair and flung into space. He gasped. It was true. He did launch. “I’m on a ship?”
“Starship Atlantis. This is one of our grow rooms, though this one is mostly vegetables.” She extended her hand. “Let me help you to your feet.” She took Jaxx’s arm and pulled him up, then guided him over to the window. He held himself up on the window sill, feeling completely out of it. A large fan-like object, full of mirrors, surrounded the ship, spinning like a wheel. He looked all around at the stars, almost losing equilibrium.
The tech steadied him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m in Starship Atlantis? It’s really called Atlantis?” Maybe they believed him in the first place, that those on Callisto were from Atlantis.
“Yes. Well, it’s called Space Shaq, according to Slade.”
Jaxx touch his forehead, trying to grasp what was happening. He turned, looking for a door. “We’re in space?”
“The ascent into space conked you out for a while.”
“How long?”
She looked at her watch. “17 hours.”
“Where is Rivkah?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know any Rivkah. I can check our flight sheet.”
Jaxx rubbed the back of his head. “This doesn’t seem real.”
“It’s real. Do you want me to help you to your room?”
He rose his brows. “I have a room?”
“The starship has about five hundred. They aren’t extravagant, but they have a bed, a closet, toilet, shower, and a bit of a kitchenette.”
Jaxx touched his belly. “I need to sit.”
“That’s completely understandable.” She helped him back to the table. “Rest here and I’ll be back later.”
He nodded, lying back on the table.
She left the room and an instant later, sprinklers turned on and mists of water covered Jaxx. He didn’t make any attempt to move. He was too tired, and lying down was helping his headache.
He touched his arms, making sure this was real. Why wasn’t he weightless and floating?
He stood, rubbing his temples and dragged his feet to the door.
He stepped into a hallway, which was also lined with windows. Outside, the fan, that he could only think was a solar sail, spun around the ship along with the ship’s frame. The inside of the ship, however, wasn’t spinning at all. He rested his head against the window, eyeing the length of the ship. It went on for miles.
He took a few steps down the hallway. Each step was light, almost as if he could float down the hall. He imagined the astronauts on the moon, where each step was like a bounce. It wasn’t the same on this ship, though similar.
“Kaden Jaxx, I presume?”
He turned, staring at a man he’d seen a thousand times. Once in person, the rest on TV.
The man extended his hand to help. “I hear you’re going to help us figure out how these pyramids power themselves.” He grinned long and wide. “You’re the man with the name on a Callisto pyramid. Isn’t that something?”
How did he know that? No one knows that.
Jaxx couldn’t speak. He was staring at the most famous man in the world, and that man not only knew Jaxx’s name, he knew a little more than Jaxx wanted him to know.
“Do you know who I am?”
Jaxx nodded his head. “The President of the United States. President Martelle.”
The president patted Jaxx on the shoulder. “Just call me Craig. I hate it when people call me President.”
“Pleased to meet you, Craig. It’s an honor. I need to find Colonel Slade.” Jaxx couldn’t believe he was trying to evade the President, but it was essential he get to Slade and explain what he’d worked out, before he’d been abducted. “I don’t want to sound alarmist or self-aggrandizing, but I believe we have a way to save humanity.”
“Want to walk and talk?” said Martelle.
Jaxx ran through his entire “pyramids-are-terraforming-devices-which-punch-magma-producing-vents-through-the-Earth’s-
core” presentation, just as he had with Rivkah.
“So, you’re telling me that ancient people – all over the world, all in different eras – created these pyramids, all for the same reason?”
“No. I’m saying that the Atlanteans created every major pyramid throughout the world, strategically, and with technology and sacred geometry long lost from man. Pyramids are terraforming devices to ease us into each age as best they can, to lessen the earth changes, and to sustain a liveable environment on Earth. I think they created the pyramids on Callisto for the same reason, for better mineral quality, more oxygen, and to create a gravity field humans can live in.”
“Intriguing,” said the President. “Tell me more.”
Jaxx wasn’t used to being listened to, but he had the ear of the world’s most powerful man, so he decided to go for broke. “Atlanteans left Atlantis and built structures on Callisto 12,500 years ago. It’s no coincidence that it’s at about the same time the lost city of Atlantis went under, just like the hieroglyphs are telling us.”
“The hieroglyphs?”
“Yes,” said Jaxx. “They’re all on the laptop.” He stopped. “Please tell me Slade remembered the laptop.”
Martelle smiled.
“Oh, good. I was worried there for a second.” The two men continued their walk around Starship Atlantis. “Where was I? Oh, right. The Atlanteans left Earth to continue their way of life. Like us, I suppose. The ones who didn’t leave, dispersed throughout the world. Some made their new home in Egypt, where they built the Great Pyramid of Giza. Again, 12,500 years ago.”
Martelle laced his hands behind his back. “So what you’re telling me is, we’re repeating the same scenario as the Atlanteans?”
“Yes, yes, yes,” said Jaxx.
The President leaned on the railing that went the entire way down the long glass wall. “We have a long ways to Callisto. Care to join me for a drink? There’s a nice bar on the third level.”
Slade appeared at their side, almost as if he knew they’d been talking.
“It’s fine,” said Martelle. “He still doesn’t have a clue. The smartest man on Earth and he doesn’t know he’s the key to our future. You’d think they’d teach them common sense, but no. He’s all angles, vectors, and theory.”
Slade laughed.
Jaxx stared at one man, then the other, trying, as always, to fit the pieces together.
“I even threw him a bone,” said Martelle. “Mentioned his name was etched on the pyramid on Callisto.” He slapped Jaxx on the back. “Why didn’t you ask how I know that? You’re incredible.”
Jaxx’s mouth hung open. The possibilities raged through his head. They were going to a resource-rich moon, possibly inhabited, with the Government, a gaggle of scientists, and the military. Not good, not good at all.
“We’re just headed for a drink, Slade. Care to join us?” President Craig Martelle flung his arm around Jaxx’s shoulder and steered him towards the bar.
Destination Atlantis
Ascendant Chronicles Book 2
1
June 13th, 2018 ~ Star Warden – Second Class Star Carrier – Secret Space Program ~ J-Quadrant, Solar System (Near Jupiter, Callisto Moon Orbit)
Star Warden’s reverse thrusters slowed the large ship, its engines easing into neutral as she entered Callisto’s orbit. The Second-Class Star Carrier was on a first-class mission: to land on Jupiter’s moon, Callisto, and claim it for the United States of America, before any other bozo got there. Admiral Gentry Race slid his hand over his freshly-shaved chin, a reminder to himself to calm the fuck down and behave like an admiral. Even though Callisto was shaping up to be the find of the damned century, and he was going to be first to have boots on the ground, he could not to let his excitement show.
“Captain Bogle…” He turned to face his captain, though she was more of an XO. “Have we detected any human life down there? Correction, human or ‘other?’”
Bogle stood to attention. “The starfighters on Callisto are almost brand new, Admiral. They have either just been built or have been kept in near-mint condition.”
Callisto’s pyramids, landing pads, and forested, biospheric translucent dome filled the screen in front of Gentry. They were so close, it was as if Star Warden was sitting directly on top of the pyramids. If that wasn’t freaky enough, there were squads of starfighters lined up alongside these marvels of ancient engineering. How pyramids or starfighters came to be on Callisto was a question for another day. Today, Gentry simply wanted to land and plant the flag.
“According to our scans, Sir, the moon is a treasure of ores, minerals, and gems; along with crude oil, a subsurface ocean, and underground rivers and lakes.”
The surface was covered in gray, brown, and white rocks, which glinted and glittered, their electrotonic signatures registered crystal and gold. The surface didn’t matter much. The moon was teeming with underground assets.
“You didn’t answer my question, Captain. Have we detected life forms?”
Captain Katherine Bogle withdrew from the holographic display console on her captain’s chair and eyed Gentry. “Negative, Sir.”
“Then whoever assembled this fleet has left?”
“That is one interpretation, Admiral.”
“Good,” said Gentry. They could mine Callisto’s resources without resistance. He pointed at an officer near the back of the bridge. “Send a communication to Colonel Slade Roberson…” He grinned. He’d beaten Slade to the punch. Again. Sweet. “Open communication: ‘Callisto secured.’ Close communication.”
Colonel Slade and Admiral Gentry had served in the Secret Space Program together for 18 years, until Slade left to head the so-called “Global Security Administration” which, in his own words, was tasked with “securing humanity’s survival.” If the ocean’s rose, as Slade believed they would, and Earth was subjected to yet another Great Inundation, what better than a habitable moon? Though Slade and Gentry were ostensibly on the same side, Gentry was beyond thrilled that he was going to be first to set foot on Callisto. It would serve Slade right for leaving the SSP for civvy-street. Civilians weren’t suited to space exploration. Best leave that to the professionals.
“Take us down, Captain.”
Bogle’s eyes were glued to the view screen. “Whoa.” Her heart ratcheted up a notch and, on instinct rather than training, she put her hand up — not appropriate when addressing a senior officer — then dropped it. “Uh...Sir.” She motioned toward the view screen. “We detect movement. Something is emerging from the ground. Whatever it is, is huge. I mean, massive. If I am not mistaken, they are turrets. Massive fucking, no-shit turrets. Pardon my French. Scans report forty-four in total.”
Gentry glared into the view screen. “Our shields?”
An intelligence officer stood. “We’re at one-hundred percent, Sir.”
“Good. Are they targeting us?”
“Yes, Sir.”
That caught Gentry by surprise. No contact. No disagreement. No declaration of combat or war. He slapped his console, frustrated. “God dammit! Ready cannons!”
“Cannons ready.”
“Do not fire unless they fire at us,” ordered Gentry.
Bogle scanned her chair’s holographic display for energy anomalies. She didn’t have to look far. There were short pulses of energy, grouped in bursts of eight, emanating from the “Lady of Atlantis,” a statue the size of the Statue of Liberty, also known as “Princess Leia” to the Secret Space Program. “We are detecting strong energetic activity from the Princess. Her heat signature is rising.”
“Zoom in,” said Gentry.
Bogle brought the statue on the view screen. As she racked focus, Princess Leia changed up her transmission, pulsing blues and oranges. Bogle’s fingers raced across her screen, activating audio, visual, binary, every frakking decoder she could think of, but her screen kept blinking the same useless result: “code source unknown. message unreadable.”
“The Princess is transmitting something
, but she is not targeting the turrets. But, it’s not to us, either. Maybe she’s communicating with beings who are sub-surface, Sir.”
Bolts of photons shot from the turrets, quickly exiting Callisto’s atmosphere. The photons slammed into Star Warden. The starship buckled under the direct hit, setting off alarms and throwing Gentry on his side. Star Warden automatically reset herself in orbit, groaning like a whale as her port side ion drives activated to reposition her.
The overhead light switched from daylight yellow-white to ombre red, battle light, changing the personality of the bridge and alerting the crew to their “battle ready” status. Like they needed the reminder after photons had smacked them upside their proverbial heads.
“Shields?” Gentry was on his feet, faster than any of his crew, ready to do battle.
“We’re at eighty-two percent,” Bogle replied.
Another shudder brought Gentry to his knees. “Let’s make rain.”
“RGSS-2’s online, Sir.” His weapons’ chief was all over making it rain on Callisto. At the touch of a button, RGSS-2 — Rail Gun Space-to-Surface Second Generations — popped lead slugs the size of missiles, from Star Warden’s starboard side. They’d prepped for hostile alien encounters and knew how to pound those snot-nose, tentacle-waving, one-eyed monstrosities back into whatever steaming pile of sludge they’d crawled out of. When RGSS-2’s hit, they hit twice as hard as anything else Star Warden, or any Earth-made space craft, had in their arsenal.
Star Warden rattled as slug after slug ejected out of her barreled cannons, sending a constant vrum vrum vrum through the battery walls to the remainder of the ship. The vibration always caught Gentry off guard. He gripped the Lecturn, knuckles white.
Bogle brought up the targeted turrets on the view screen.
The rail gun could shoot thousands of slugs a minute, but once they were spent the chambers would be empty until the ship made it to a space armory to load up again. It was a one-time bombardment and always did the trick.
Atlantis Quadrilogy - Box Set Page 27
