Crossroads of Fate (Cadicle #5): An Epic Space Opera Series

by Amy DuBoff

  I don’t want to accept my new reality, either. Tom anxiously milled around in the empty concrete hall while they waited for their backup to arrive.

  After fifteen minutes, three sets of footsteps echoed from down the hall.

  “Finally!” Sander breathed, pushing off from the wall he’d been leaning against during the wait.

  Michael, Ethan, and Saera rounded a bend in the hall and waved at the group.

  “Good to see you!” Tom called out. “Couldn’t have asked for better backup.”

  “Great timing,” Ethan replied. “It was about time I checked up on you to make sure you were actually working.” He flashed them a grin.

  “Very funny,” Tom retorted.

  Andy ignored the exchange and focused on Saera. “How are you?”

  She smiled back, but it seemed half-hearted. “Relieved to be anywhere other than Headquarters.”

  “And how’s Wil?” Rey asked.

  “About the same.” Her smiled faded. “So, the telekinetic shield…”

  “It extends about a meter out from the door,” Tom replied, gesturing toward the end of the hall.

  Saera glanced at Michael. “What’s the mystery behind Door Number 1?”

  He gave her a knowing smile. “Let’s find out.”

  The seven Agents gathered two meters from the shield, facing the end of the hall. Due to the relatively narrow width of the corridor, they had to stand shoulder-to-shoulder two rows deep, with three in the front and four in the back. Saera took front and center with Michael to her left, and Tom bumped Ethan to the back row so he could be in the front right—wanting the first possible opportunity to face whatever Bakzen waited for them on the other side of the door head-on.

  In a similar fashion to Tom’s test pulse, the Agents simultaneously directed a dispersed wave of energy at the field. With the augmented support, Tom realized that the shield was composed of several separate telekinetic signatures, though he perceived them to be more like echoes of the same voice than unique individuals.

  Saera was the first to pull back from the assessment, and the others withdrew, as well. Her brow knit. “I think it’s just some drone soldiers maintaining the shield. The question is, what are they guarding?”

  Michael tensed. “It’s something important, or they would have surrendered by now, like the others.”

  “There aren’t that many of them,” Ethan said as he eyed the door. “I counted six distinct signatures. We can easily take them.”

  “Let’s just do it, already!” Tom urged.

  “All right,” Saera agreed. “Punch through at the door, and then we should be able to collapse the shield from there.”

  Following Saera’s lead, Tom sent a steady stream of energy at the shield directly in front of the door. The shield flashed in his mind’s eye, glistening with silver sparks as it absorbed the initial blast. Soon, though, the light intensified as the shield was overwhelmed by the Agents’ assault. With a shimmering wave, the telekinetic bubble collapsed.

  “I don’t suppose it’s unlocked,” Saera said as she stepped toward the door. She pressed her palms on the smooth metal surface, but it didn’t budge. There didn’t appear to be a control panel. “Of course not. That would have been too easy.”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Tom offered.

  Saera nodded and stepped back behind him with the others.

  Tom focused on the edges of the metal door and yanked it away from the surrounding concrete structure, sending a shower of dust to the floor. He propped the door on the side of the hall, leaving enough room for two people to walk side-by-side. As the concrete dust cleared, he peered into the dim room beyond.

  Six Bakzen soldiers stepped forward to block the doorway. Their hands were at their sides, seemingly not posing a physical threat, and there were no auras of telekinetic exertion now that the shield was down.

  Tom examined their sickly orange-tinted skin and angular features. Everything about them conveyed a warlike nature, designed and bred for combat. Yet, there was no malice in their gaze. The anger that had fueled Tom’s thirst for revenge wavered as he looked his enemy in the eye. They know they’ve lost. They’re not going to fight.

  “You kill us, too,” one of the Bakzen soldiers stated in broken New Taran.

  Tom faltered. “The war is over.”

  Saera brushed past him, addressing the Bakzen soldier who’d spoken, “What are you protecting?”

  The soldier shook his head. “They not ready yet. We failed.”

  A guttural cry sounded from within the room.

  Tom instinctively raised a telekinetic shield around himself and felt the other Agents do the same.

  “What’s in there?” Saera demanded.

  The Bakzen soldier cocked his head as though the answer were obvious. “The future.”

  “Pin them,” Saera commanded telepathically to the other Agents.

  Tom instantly grappled the Bakzen soldier closest to him, throwing the broad figure onto his back. The other Agents each secured one of the other Bakzen soldiers, leaving Saera free to investigate.

  She approached the doorway and peered inside. “I don’t detect any telekinetic traps, but there’s definitely someone else with abilities nearby.”

  “So close,” the Bakzen soldier Tom was pinning murmured.

  “What’s close?” Saera demanded.

  Another cry of anguish reverberated down the hall.

  “Hold them. Stay together,” Saera instructed as she entered the room with a telekinetic shield raised.

  Still maintaining his hold on the Bakzen soldier, Tom followed her inside.

  The limits of the room were in shadow, with only a row of lights leading inward from the door. To either side of a central walkway, person-sized tanks filled with a translucent reddish liquid were arranged at one meter intervals. Tom exchanged a worried glance with Saera before they stepped further into the room.

  Several meters from the door, Tom caught sight of a figure huddled behind one of the tanks. “Over here!” he alerted Saera.

  Cautiously, she approached the tank. She recoiled with a gasp.

  “What is it?” Michael asked, rushing over.

  Tom ran to see for himself while he kept the Bakzen soldier pinned. Behind the tank, the crouching figure had patchy, dark hair and her skin was coarse and peeling. “Stars!” he breathed, trying to wrap his mind around what he was seeing.

  “You’re Taran, aren’t you?” Saera said, crouching down near the disfigured woman.

  The woman nodded. “They won’t let us die,” she stammered. “Please, kill me!”

  Saera took a slow breath. “What did they do to you?”

  “Experiments,” the woman, replied, her hands shaking. “They took us from Kaldern—started injecting us with something. They… They said that they were going to make us better. Like them.”

  “Changing Tarans into Bakzen…” Michael murmured.

  Saera stood back up. “Just like Haersen. Except, it looks like it took years for him to change… It’s only been a few months since Kaldern was captured.”

  Tom studied the woman, sensing a faint aura around her. “She has abilities,” he said to the other Agents.

  “Have you always had telekinetic skill?” Saera asked the woman.

  Her eyes widened. “What? Never! I…” She trailed off, staring at her peeling hands.

  Saera backed away. “The mind control neurotoxin was just the first step. The Bakzen must have been trying to transform the population—and they figured out a new, accelerated process.”

  “Can we reverse it?” Michael asked.

  “I have no idea.” Saera turned back to the woman. “You said ‘us’. Where are the others?”

  The woman pointed with a shaking hand toward the back of the room.

  “It’s okay!” Saera called out. “We’re here to help.”

  Slowly, a dozen people edged out of the shadows, some even more twisted than the first woman.

  “You can’
t help us,” a man said in a gruff voice, his head completely bald and eyes with a sorrel tint. “The pain… it won’t stop! Don’t make us live like this…”

  “Please, let me die!” another cried.

  Soon every one of the mutilated Tarans had joined the pleas for death.

  In shock, the other Agents standing guard over the Bakzen soldiers watched the unfolding scene.

  “No, we’ll take you to the nearest medical facility, and—” Saera cut off as the throng of Tarans lunged for the Bakzen soldiers pinned to the ground by the Agents.

  They began clawing and kicking at the immobilized soldiers like wild animals, teeth bared and eyes wide.

  Tom dodged the crazed mass as he dashed for the door. “What do we do?” he asked no one in particular.

  “This isn’t our outcome to decide,” Saera replied as she, too, ran for the door. “We let it play out.”

  As soon as they were out of the room, the Agents released their hold on the Bakzen soldiers.

  Tom turned for one last look before he rounded the bend in the hallway, seeing that the Bakzen had formed a telekinetic chain. Energy was swirling around them. “They’re going to blow the facility!” he warned the others.

  With renewed urgency, the Agents sprinted for the surface.

  “Evacuate!” Michael called out to the Militia soldiers standing guard at the port.

  “What?” the Militia captain started to question, but he jumped to attention as soon as he saw the Agents running at full speed.

  The eight Militia soldiers joined the Agents in their sprint for the concourse.

  “Our engine is still warm,” Saera shouted as they ran. “Everyone follow us.”

  Michael and Ethan surged ahead with her toward their ship. It would be a tight fit for everyone on the vessel, but there wouldn’t be time to get another ship prepped from a cold start.

  The group ran up the gangway, with Ethan darting ahead to the controls to start up the ship.

  Tom checked that all the Militia soldiers had made it on, then sealed the door. “Clear!”

  Moments later, Ethan had the ship in the air. At only a kilometer elevation, a telekinetic shockwave blasted out from the port, rocking the craft as it continued to gain altitude.

  “Shite! It took out the whole port,” Sander observed out the window.

  Tom peered over his shoulder, taking in the destruction for himself. The location of the former port was now a round crater, perfectly scooped out from the rock. No one could have survived the telekinetic detonation.

  Saera took a shaky breath. “When I agreed to come into the field today, I wasn’t expecting this.”

  Michael’s face was drawn. “None of us were.”

  “What happened?” the Militia captain asked.

  “We encountered Bakzen hostiles,” Saera replied. She gazed out at the crater in the side of the moon and swallowed, then focused just on the Agents. “I’ll file an official report, but I think it’s best if we don’t talk about what we saw here. In the future, if anyone comes across a telekinetic shield like that, I’ll make sure there’s a standing order for the entire facility to be destroyed without entry.”

  “Agreed,” Michael said, his face still pale.

  Tom and the others nodded their understanding. There are fates worse than a swift death. Knowing that, I can put my family to rest now.

  * * *

  H2 was barely recognizable from the place where Laecy had spent the majority of her TSS career. Though the facility’s blast shields had been raised and she could once again look out the windows, the surrounding sight bore no resemblance to the concentrated hub of TSS power that had always been her reality.

  Most of the spacedock had been destroyed in the Bakzen ambush outside H2, leaving charred stubs of mangled concourses fanning out from the core space station like branches on a lightning-struck tree. The fleet was distributed throughout the rift as Agents began the tedious process of repairing the rift the Bakzen had created. It would be years before the rift was fully healed—possibly decades—but at least the recovery had begun.

  Laecy returned her attention to inside her engineering lab. The space was now only a relic from a war-torn past. She could move on.

  Nolan and Becca were in the process of reviewing the final fleet manifest to decide which ships to decommission and which the TSS should keep in service for future peacekeeping missions.

  “How goes it?” Laecy asked them.

  Nolan glanced up from his work. “I think we’re just about done with the recommendations.”

  “It’s strange,” Becca added, “talking about decommissioning these warships. Up until a week ago, we would have been brainstorming every possible way to keep them flying.”

  “I know, I’m not sure I can make that mental shift,” Laecy admitted.

  “What’s next, after we’re done with this inventory?” Nolan asked.

  Laecy shrugged. “I guess you find other assignments, if you want.”

  “What are you doing?” inquired Becca, likely looking for a chance to keep the team together.

  “You’d both be at the top of my list for my next leadership post,” Laecy replied to the underlying question. “But, I’m retiring. I said I’d see the war through, and I have.” Now I have to live the future that Jack will never get the chance to share with me, in his memory.

  Nolan scrunched up his nose. “I can’t picture you retired. You like solving problems too much.”

  Laecy smiled. “I’m sure I can find something to keep me occupied. Maybe learning to relax will be my first challenge to overcome.”

  “I don’t see myself leaving the TSS for a long time,” Nolan said. “I’d like to be a part of the rebuilding.”

  “Me too,” Becca agreed.

  “There’ll be plenty of work to go around,” Laecy told them. “You’ll each get a glowing recommendation from me.”

  “Can we just stay here?” asked Becca.

  “I think the plan is to decommission H2,” responded Laecy. “Not sure when, but if they’re closing the rift, then this structure will eventually have to be dismantled and moved piece-by-piece into normal space.”

  The young engineers exchanged glances.

  “I hadn’t thought about that,” Nolan said. “It makes sense, but…”

  “This headquarters was always such a fixture in the war. It’s hard to imagine it not being here anymore,” Becca murmured.

  “Talk about a huge undertaking to move it.” Nolan shook his head, letting out a slow breath.

  “Looks like you’ve figured out a new challenge of your own.” Laecy beamed at them.

  Nolan chuckled. “Suddenly, I understand why you’re getting out while you can. They’d never let you go once that project is underway.”

  Becca’s eyes widened with feigned distress. “They’d be forced to promote us. We’ll have our whole careers mapped out on a road to everlasting glory.”

  “Receiving endless praise for how amazing we are,” Nolan added with a grin.

  “I think you two will be just fine without me.” I’ll miss them all the same. It was tough, but we also had some good times. Laecy took in her lab, remembering what it was like at the height of her time as the Lead Engineer for a fleet fighting an impossible war. “The future of H2 is in your hands now. My time here is done.”

  CHAPTER 28

  Wil blinked in the sudden light shining through the open doorway. What do they want now? He set down his tablet next to him on the bed in his quarters on the Conquest.

  His father and wife stepped into the room. They closed the door.

  “Wil, it’s been a week since you last left this room. It’s time to go home,” Saera said.

  I can’t just continue on with my life like nothing happened. Wil laid back down and rolled away from the unwelcome visitors.

  “Wil…” Saera sat down on the edge of the bed behind him. She reached out to rub his back.

  He flinched under her touch. How can she still want to
be near me after everything I’ve done?

  “The rift repairs are underway, and we’re needed back at Headquarters. We have a lot of people that need new assignments,” Cris said.

  “Have fun with that,” Wil muttered.

  “You’re coming with us,” his father continued. “Maybe some familiar surroundings will break you out of this funk.”

  Wil shot up in bed. “A ‘funk’. You really think that’s what this is?” He rolled to his feet off the far side of the bed. “You don’t have a clue.”

  “If you’d talk to us—” Saera began.

  “I have nothing to say,” Wil shot back. He dropped to a crouch against the wall in the corner.

  “If you don’t want to talk, then you’ll just have to listen,” Cris said as he squatted across from Wil. “I recognize that you’ve been through a lot—more than the rest of us. You were placed in an impossible position and had to make decisions that would leave anyone with regrets. The Bakzen were created and used by the Priesthood just like we were, and it’s hard not to feel a little sympathetic to their plight. Despite all that, you can’t let your role in the war define the rest of your life. You made it through. Now, you have lots of friends and a wife who can’t wait to start living life with you outside of the war and all this awfulness we’ve been wrapped up in for the last decade. Push past it and let’s start over.”

  Wil shook his head. “I can’t let it go so effortlessly. The power I felt while destroying the Bakzen’s world… It was exhilarating, but I also realized what I can do and it terrifies me. There’s already been so much destruction, so many deaths. I feel responsible for all of it.”

  “We’ve done things, too, Wil,” Saera said. “Now that I’ve seen the Bakzen’s twisted methods up close, I feel confident that ending the war the way we did needed to be done.”

  Cris nodded. “We all gave kill orders as commanders. We share that burden.”

  “That was a handful of individuals compared to me. I killed billions.” Cambion, the Bakzen homeworld… It’s too many to count.

  “It’ll be difficult to come to terms with everything we’ve been through, but dwelling on it here isn’t helping,” Saera said.