by Selina Brown
“I’m questioning.” The voice was brusque but Simon knew it had to be important.
“Vin and Zarti are Vakar. I’m diverting to meet with the Bellus.”
There was silence. “Don’t delay too long.”
The call ended.
Jamie knew Simon was worried about his treatment.
Aven was now talking to someone.
Jamie studied what they knew of the Vakar. Aven ended her call and looked back to where he was sitting.
“We’ve got a meeting with the Khan himself.”
One of Ara’s best friends while growing up was Tekko, the Khan’s son, placed so that Dark Matter Beings had a part in Ara’s life.
“The Bellus is on the way… Jamie?”
Jamie couldn’t respond. His body was trembling and jerking in pain. Somewhere in his muddled mind, he saw Ara stand in front of a portal. Ahead of her was Viper, smiling and holding out his hand. Viper was saying, “You’ve made the right decision.”
Jamie cried out, “No, Ara! Don’t! I’m coming!”
He blacked out.
Cardinal Unit 9
Blinking in the bright light, Jamie came to. After several moments he experienced a strange lethargy that he identified as meaning he was back to being a normal Avatara again. He’d lost all his superpowers. His head was splitting until a sharp pain in his arm was followed by all the pain floating away. Relief flooded him. He was too tired to even shoo the bot away.
Looking around he saw a rather white, clinical looking room and spotted Aven on some kind of medical bed. “Aven?”
“Aven is undergoing treatment.”
He croaked at the bot, “For what?”
“Your body emitted a spike of matter and energy; Aven absorbed it to ensure the sables were not destabilized.”
He rubbed his head. Jamie hadn’t accounted for extra degradation for his deep cover operation. He was going to be in trouble for this, disciplined. He managed to get up. “Will she be alright?”
“She is stabilizing.”
Jamie found his clothes. “Has Ara been found?”
“Negative. We had to refabricate your clothes.”
“Ah, thank you.”
“You are welcome.” The bot rolled away and began to work at a bench with several holo images floating over the surface. Jamie couldn’t make sense of what it was doing.
After an hour, Jamie was frustrated.
Simon had nothing to report. No one was talking. No one knew where Ara was. Only Aven might be able to use the CU to track her.
Jamie talked to Simon via Voice. “You have to press Vin or Zarti.”
“If I press it will tell them we know who they are. I feel it’s too early to play that out yet.”
“And at the cost of what? Ara’s life!” Jamie was furious.
“Find another way, Jamie.” Simon relented then. “If we hear nothing in twenty-four hours, I’ll press them.”
It was a compromise that Jamie had to accept.
He paced around Aven who was still lying on the medic bed. He had dimmed the light to try to make himself sleepy but it didn’t work. A soft groan and he moved to Aven.
“Aven?”
“I beg your pardon?” Her voice was croaky. He held up some water.
He almost laughed at her politeness. “Here.”
She sipped it. “Any success finding in Ara?”
“No. No one knows what is going on. Aven, is Ara connected to the Maya?”
“I would have to say yes, surely. Help me up.”
Jamie didn’t argue and helped her to sit, biting back his impatience. Aven wasn’t what she seemed. She looked at him. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
He flushed a little.
“Ah, Marc painted me as the devil?”
“Not really. I am grateful to you for helping me. But you do hate Ara.”
“That’s true but not enough to continue doing the things I have been doing to her.”
The confession relieved him. “And now?”
“Well, I don’t love her if that’s what you want to know.”
Jamie gave her a cold look but steadied her as she stood upright, holding her head.
She said slowly, slurring her words a little, “I’ve been meddling with Ara since she was placed into the baby biosuit. Trickster came when it was too late. Since then I’ve been working with the Snakes. I know you know who they are.”
It dawned on Jamie that Aven knew of the Snakes before they arrived in Iota. But his primary mission was now Ara. “I want to know what changed your mind but will you help me find Ara?”
Aven’s black eyes closed momentarily. She opened them and nodded. “Let’s go.” But she stopped at a panel inside the medical room. “I need more water.”
Jamie went over and ordered two waters. He turned and saw Aven slip into a smaller room.
“I’m not escaping,” she croaked. “Toilet.”
After she went, Jamie did too. When he came out, she had finished her water and walked painfully to the door with a small black bag in hand. Jamie stared as a cart rolled up outside the open door of the medical center.
Aven climbed in. “Come on. It’ll take thirty minutes to drive, much longer to walk, and I need a chance to recover.”
He was already sitting before she finished her sentence.
They trundled up and along ramp ways. Aven injected herself with something. “Just vitamins and minerals.”
“What happened to you?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember after you collapsed and spiked. But there was something I picked up from the Three Principals that I needed to tell you. It’s right … there. I can feel the memory but something is blocking it.”
“Something like the Maya?”
“I think so. A bit of irony there for me.” She glanced over at Jamie. “I’m not winning you over am I?”
“Not yet.” Jamie tapped his fingers on his leg and told her about what he’d learned.
She moaned. “We have more puzzles!”
Jamie stared at another strange archway etched into a white wall; everything was white in the CU that he’d seen so far. “What are those?”
“Transportals I think.”
“To inside the CU?”
“I haven’t found the files yet. But they could be to other stations. I noticed some of the coordinates are similar to our interstation terminals.”
“If only one could take me direct to Ara.” He felt silly after saying that.
She glanced at him. “Maybe it can.”
He stared at her but she kept driving. “Tell me now why you’ve changed your mind.”
“Because you love Marc, that’s why.”
Jamie looked ahead, confused by her words. “Try again and don’t say Marc loves me.”
She grimaced. “I can’t work for the other side. They aren’t the enemy though. Things are complicated.”
Jamie stared straight ahead seeing doors and panels and passages as they zipped by.
She sighed. “I need Ara to do something so I can get out. I recently discovered that without her I’m stuck in … um … Aryan Society.”
“That sounds more honest.” He looked at her. “Marc’s doing?”
Aven cursed. “Yes. But Ersen and Sacha too. They have been working with the Principals to put me on notice saying that my interference with the Cardinal Unit is affecting the Three Empire and Grands agreement with Aryans. The SHEs have a way of making Aether comply.” She shivered in some remembered horror.
“And?”
“And?”
“What does Ara have to do?”
“Remember who she is.”
Jamie shook his head. “Don’t you know?”
“It’s complicated. But no.”
“Aven, explain complicated.”
She glanced at him, and looked again. “Jamie, there’s a war on, an unconventional war, with no rules. Powerful beings are using the Lacuna to resolve it.”
“That doesn’t s
ound so complicated.” He’d heard the Snakes use the expression “Lacuna” before. In Aryan language it meant “void” but in his culture it meant “site”.
“It is when you know the Lacuna is why there’s a war in the first place, and millions of powerful beings are trapped inside and want to get out and go home and free their ruler. The nature of this conflict will be enduring, high, and universal.”
Jamie frowned. “A little more detail on the home bit and free their ruler bit.”
“Home is outside the Lacuna and the ruler is currently locked up by a Safeguard.”
The Safeguard again. He remembered the image Trickster had shown him. Nyx had made that, what had he called it? A perpetual in motion, fluid-metal wheel labyrinth that kept the Chaos Entity from emerging. Too many people knew bits and pieces and weren’t sharing. Too many thought lies were truths while others were using lies as truth. Jamie felt as if he were drowning, the lies filled his lungs until he could no longer breathe and he wasn’t even sure if he wanted to cough it out. The more he heard the more he questioned his role. This was getting way out of hand. He didn’t sign up for this, not in any capacity. But he couldn’t help himself. “And the war is between the powerful beings and who?”
“More powerful beings.”
Jamie groaned. “Do they have names?”
“Chaos and Vitalian.”
He tried to keep his body relaxed. “Why are you telling me, you’re scared of more than the SHE I take it?”
‘It’s the level of corruption, Jamie. What happens when powerful beings are corrupted? There are millions of them.” Her voice was faint with dread. It was her whimper that convinced him.
“I need to think.”
In twenty minutes she was looking much better.
“Vitamins my arse.” He shook his head at her, wishing he had whatever it was that perked her up. “Do you have more of that?” Aven flashed him a grin that reminded him painfully of Marc.
“Sorry.” She turned off into a large, apparently empty room. She stopped the cart and climbed out but popped out into the wide passage for the moment. Grinning, she ran back into the room. She pulled Jamie onto a spot on the floor and activated some kind of podium that rose from the floor. “Stand closer.”
He stepped in close to her and almost fell off as it rose quickly into the air. The whole room dimmed and doors swished closed, blocking off the passage light.
“Put your hand on the GELpad and think about Ara. Did she make an exergon link with you?”
“Yes, but as a baby. I rarely used it.” He couldn’t if he was to keep his relationship professional and distant.
“Pity.”
“Korbet uses his connection to her extensively, what if we call him here?”
“Let’s try you first. Maybe she accessed you more than you knew.”
Jamie rested a hand on the pad and, sure enough, a jagged blue line formed in front of him, it shot out from his hand and crept out as star systems that formed before them.
“Wow. That answers that question. It’s blue indicating she’s accessed you more than you her. Not only has she connected to you, but it’s strong. Really strong. She’s not in this station.” Aven zoomed out. The line kept creeping and then stopped. Aven waved her hands around, zooming in. Further and further in. “Well, your connection is uber-strong.”
She gave Jamie a sidelong look and he felt the flush, knowing his face must be turning pink.
“What’s that?” he asked, trying to deflect her interest.
“A … space station thing. I’ll see if I can get a set of coordinates.”
Jamie unclenched his hands again, it was a tell—and a bad one. He was losing control and falling into obvious mannerisms. He blew air out from his lungs thinking of Ara and what might be her last moments. Blowing air out was another tell. What an idiot! Depending on Aven’s answer, and if Ara died, it would result in a matching level of pain he decided to inflict on her regardless of his feelings for her brother. “What was the last thing you did to Ara?”
Aven looked at him askance but nodded, not seeing the trap, but he wasn’t so enraged that he didn’t hear her shame and internal anguish.
“I reconnected some of Ara’s neural pathways to remember that her connection with Maya could have allowed her to access the Cardinal Unit and stop the Genocide Vote. In fact, Ara as the Mobile Unit could have taken control of the Cardinal Unit, with Maya’s access, and reduced Iota’s matter levels.”
Jamie’s body and mind froze in shock and hatred. “So, Ara will know what she could have done but is now impotent to do anything? Can’t you fix that?”
“No,” she said shakily. “Once the process begins for the Chaos Unit to disengage, there’s no way to stop it. Once the Cardinal Unit ejects the Chaos Unit only the release of antimatter and measured reduced levels in matter that were allocated during the court case will stop the genocide.”
This time Aven heard and understood the trap. “Jamie, it wasn’t until I did—”
“Stop speaking.”
She turned back, shaking and pale.
Suddenly, the podium fell, the room illuminated, and the door opened. Aven grabbed hold of him. “Hate me later. This is it; you want to go direct to her?”
“Yes.” She was right about those two things.
Aven ran out. “What about backup?”
He ran into her just a few moments later and stared at the now glowing arch.
“Over time I’d noticed different numbers assigned to each. I simply shunted the coordinates to this portal arch.”
He pulled out his Voice, holding it out to her. “Contact Diane and tell her where I’ve gone.”
“I want to come but I have to stay here and keep the portal open.” She took the Voice reluctantly.
He nodded, hoping she wouldn’t betray him. But if he saw Ara and went to her, that’s all he cared about. Once there he could call Trickster. “Then keep it open.”
“Put your hand on the GELpad.”
He did that and the archway swirled, forming a tunnel. He saw a room on the other side; Ara was lying on a bed. She hadn’t left with Viper! He wasn’t sure his vision had been real though.
“Wait.”
Jamie paused. Aven touched his arm and closed her eyes. He felt a vibration and a glow build at the joining of her hand to his arm. “It’s the best I can do to connect us; in case something goes wrong.”
He stepped through and ran to her. “Ara … Ara?”
She was unconscious but otherwise looked alright. He turned back and saw Aven waiting. Picking Ara up, he heard a noise behind him. At first, he thought it was Aven but it was a large male coming through the now open door. Jamie just saw a fist and saw another male head for Aven. She started yelling out. “I’ve got—”
A. —a link to you!
J. Good
The portal closed. The male swore and turned.
Jamie kicked out and broke the shorter male’s kneecap. The crack and subsequent screaming was loud. He ducked and swung into the larger male’s stomach. A swoosh of air and the male was on the ground. Jamie jumped on him and layered punches until blood was spurting from mouth and nose. The male groaned and lost consciousness.
Jamie staggered up and shook Ara but she was insensible.
He heard more voices in the passage so he slung her over his shoulder—she was lighter than he expected for a Pure-Gen, remembering Caleb struggling to piggyback her—and ran down the long room. Maybe Ara had learned to offset her matter levels with her energy as Caleb had suggested when they were kids. He studied the palm lock but, as he stepped closer, the door opened. The males must have released all doors to the room to retrieve her.
They had to find a quiet place where, hopefully, Aven could connect to them. Jamie ran down so many dull, grey corridors he was hopelessly lost. The grill beneath his feet felt soft. It was weirdly quiet. But it looked like a space station of some kind. There were no portholes or monitors to the outside. He tried various rooms and
found one that looked like a storage room. There were none of the usual panels with information about the room and whether they held oxygen, but then, he reasoned, the place had doors and not hatches. Just as he closed the door, excited voices drew closer.
He ran to some crates and carefully lowered Ara to the ground. He was panting heavily now, not really recovered from his treatment. Studying his knuckles, he saw the flesh had broken where he punched the male. It stung but was only a minor distraction. He turned once the voices had moved past and looked at Ara.
“Ara?”
Her eyelids fluttered.
“Ara, it’s—” Why did he pause? He wasn’t supposed to reveal himself. It was a part of his vows and oaths. To be seen by the one you protected meant the end of the job. He wanted to remain in her life. He gently touched her cheek, and brushed away a strand of honey-colored hair. “Honeybee, hold on.” Where were the Shadow Warriors when you needed them?
“Right behind you.”
Jamie jumped and cursed. Xavier laughed. Saffron stood behind. “You should know we couldn’t abandon you both.”
Jamie shook his head. “I think you mean Ara. But I guess I benefit this time.”
The two were long-time lovers, long dark hair, dark eyes, and pale skins of their kind. Xavier glanced back at his wife.
“Check the door will you?”
She threw him a look but moved stealthily to comply. The way they moved still creeped Jamie out, and he was ever jealous.
Xavier turned back to him. “How’s Ara?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think she’s physically hurt. I think I connected to her and Viper was with her.”
“Ara’s contingent report she wasn’t injured but fell into a deep torpor after Viper left. At the last moment, Ara turned as if hearing something and backed away from the portal. They are trying to find a way out but we don’t want them going too far.”
Jamie smiled, grateful for the news. Ara had heard him. She had stayed and now he had to stay. He couldn’t very well run out now after making her remain to face the issue. He tried to connect to Aven and for a moment he thought he felt a vibration but it died off. “Damn, I think we’re being blocked.” He pulled out his ISVoice and tried to call Trickster.
