The Return (Alternate Dimensions Book 5)

by Blake B. Rivers

  That was the final line, apparently, because I felt my head loll back against the ground and I slipped down into darkness.

  Chapter Twelve: Head on a Silver Platter

  “Andi! Andi, where are you? Your life signs are barely picking up on my locator! Where are you, Miss Andi?”

  “…Anjali?” I said groggily, slowly opening my eyes to see that I was in the middle of what looked like a very cinematic inferno. Where was I? What had happened?

  Oh right. Genesis’ ship had crashed into the station and I had been thrown from the catwalk. Groaning, I tried to sit up only to feel a great weight on my middle, pressing me into the floor.

  I had forgotten that I had been crushed by a pipe. Well that was just fantastic.

  “Miss Andi! You are alive and lucid. Well that is a wonderful development.”

  “Are you… are you on the station?”

  “Yes. We figured if there was anyone who could help with the final front against our infected brethren, it was us, the immune. After all, we’ve heard you’ve found a cure, which means our duty to protect ourselves at all costs is no longer our driving force. We are ready and willing to fight.”

  “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. You guys have been in confinement for years.”

  “We have been waiting for this opportunity each and every moment that we spent behind those walls. The rabid ones are beginning to pour out of the ship now. We would appreciate that cure as quickly as you can.”

  “It’s… it’s not going now?”

  “Unfortunately, no. The fire suppression system seems to be offline.”

  “No…” I groaned, hand going to my head. “That’s not right…”

  Had we really fought so valiantly to get so far only to have it all amount to failure?

  I glanced to the platform Viys’k had been standing on. She was no longer there, but I did see the bright, hermetically sealed case that Jyra had been toting since our arrival. I needed to get that into the tank and figure out what was causing the stall out in the fire system.

  But first, there was the matter of the giant pipe on my middle.

  I tried to push at it, my hands blackened and bloody. It was so heavy. How was I supposed to get it off? How was anybody supposed to move it?

  I couldn’t let it end like this. I couldn’t be defeated by a simple tube of some unknown metal alloy. For the first time in a long while, I reached down into myself for the energy that used to be coiled there. I knew there would be nothing there, and yet I kept pushing. Down past the exhaustion, down past the fear, down into the very depths of myself until I felt the tiniest sliver of energy flickering within me.

  I grasped that with both hands, refusing to let go, and hauled it up into my center. I fed it, stuffing full of my refusal to die, or to lose. I infused it with my need to live to see another day. After all, unlike most of my life, I finally had something worth living for.

  And the energy responded. I felt my limbs strengthen and my lungs reflate with blessed oxygen. I pushed at the length with my hands again, rolling it to the side and off me.

  “Oh my God,” I gasped, suddenly able to breathe unimpeded again. I struggled to my feet, only to have my left leg give out from under me. Looking down, I saw a bit of bone sticking out of my shin.

  “Ow,” I stated flatly, ripping off my sleeve and quickly tying it around the wound. It hurt, but it wasn’t the absolute worst thing I had ever experienced, so I pushed on.

  There was fire everywhere, surrounding me, threatening to consume me whole, but I ignored it. I spotted my target and made myself keep going. I didn’t pay attention to the fact that my shoes were melting onto my feet, or that I didn’t know where any of my friends were. I just kept on walking. One foot. Then the other. And then the other.

  Finally, I reached the case and I pulled it up. The handle was hot, and my hand sizzled upon contact. I hissed in pain, but didn’t let go. Instead, I walked over to the top of the vat and peered in. It was filled with water, thankfully, so that wasn’t the issue. Like a woman possessed, I opened Jyra’s case and took out the pressurized container that contained our ace in the hole.

  I hit what I assumed was the release button at the top then threw it in. I saw the water began to bubble and churn, but the fire still raged around me without any deterrent.”

  “Andi?”

  I jolted at the sound and looked down to see Viys’k wedged between the silo and the scaffolding, fire licking up towards her legs and tail.

  “Viys’k! Let me get you!”

  “No! The fire suppressant system can’t pressurize unless you close the top! It’s the blue bottom at the top of the display! Press that.”

  I looked to the control panel she had been standing at and slammed the button as she described. Slowly, metal triangles slid out of the edge of the vat, steadily moving towards each other until they sealed off the pool of water.

  “Now hit the green! The green!”

  I did that too, my breath coming out of my chest in wheezing pants. There was a split second where nothing happened, and I was sure I had somehow botched our last chance at life. But a few moments later, there was a hissing sound and water began to rain from the ceiling.

  It didn’t put the fire out completely, but it certainly beat the flames back.

  “You did it!” Viys’k cried, holding her tiny hand up to me from the gap. “Now help me up so I can refill the vat with coolant once the cure empties. Water alone isn’t going to be enough to fight this fire. I’m sure the civilian levels are much worse.”

  “Andi! Andi I can’t see!”

  My head jerked in the direction of the sound.

  “That sounded like Jyra,” Viys’k observed as I finished pulling her onto the platform.

  I didn’t have an answer, but that was because I was already clambering down to the ground. “Jyra!” I called. “Jyra, where are you?!”

  “I-I don’t know. I can’t see. I… I think I might have damaged my eyes. Or taken a hard fall to the head. Or, oh, you found me!”

  “I haven’t foun-”

  Before I could finish my sentence, a large piece of metal scrap moved beside me and Janix emerged from a pile of rubble, Jyra slung over his back. “Did someone call for a hero?”

  “No,” I answered with a happy laugh. “But I’m certainly appreciating the delivery.”

  He opened his mouth to say something in response, but a pillar of black came barreling down through the ceiling and struck through me.

  I gasped and stumbled backward, my mind deluged by the screaming whirlwind. But before I could scream, or even figure out what happened, the gnashing darkness narrowed, forcing its way into my chest and disappearing.

  I stumbled back a moment, my body trying to figure out what to do with the burning energy coiled inside me. However, this wasn’t its first time at the rodeo and it quickly absorbed what was churning in my gut.

  “What the hell was that?” Janix asked.

  “I think…” There was a click, and the dull rush of my pain from my leg stopped. And then my back straightened. And then I felt like I had just woken up from the best night’s sleep in ages. “I think the kodadt are being cured.”

  “And that was manifested in a pillar of black energy that just bore down into you?”

  “It’s the light, isn’t it?” Jyra asked, turning her head towards me. I winced at the sight of a severe burn across her face. That’s why she couldn’t see. “It’s snatching up bits of Genesis as it’s released.”

  “That’s what I’m guessing,” I said. “Can you feel it at all?”

  “Um, slightly, perhaps? It’s… slippery.”

  “Here, let me see if I can help.” I slipped my hand into hers and willed the roiling wellspring of power within me into her.

  The effect was almost instantaneous, and I felt much of the energy within me surge into her.

  “Oh… oh my gods,” She gasped.

  I watched in awe as her face healed itself, new skin and eyes formi
ng in real time. Less than a few seconds later, she was jumping down to the ground and regarding me with a manic grin.

  “Is this how you feel like all the time?”

  “Well, before the whole dying thing, yeah.”

  “It’s… it’s amazing.”

  “Yeah, it kinda is, isn’t it?”

  VERDANDI!!!!

  I knew that voice, that haunting tenor of hatred, but instead of being afraid, Jyra and I could only smile that much wider.

  “Find Bajol,” I said to Janix before taking Jyra’s hand.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To finish this.” I answered before closing my eyes and focusing on the call. “Do you feel it?” I asked Jyra.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Focus on that and yank it to you as hard as you can.”

  She nodded and I felt her comply. One moment we were standing in the wrecked remains of the sanitation departments, the next we were in the middle of what I could best describe as a battle field.

  Fire was still dotting the landscape, and people were screaming. There were bodies, unfortunately, but not as many as there could have been.

  And perhaps most captivating at all were the prostrate rabid kodadt on the ground, writhing and keening as their shapes began to melt and sink into the ground.

  “It’s working.” Jyra breathed. “They’re de-mutating!”

  I rushed over to the closest one, my hand sinking into its rotting flesh as I tried to turn it over. I yelped, but as the diseased flesh fell away, and emaciated and very wet, uninfected kodadt lurched up from the pile.

  Their mouth opened in a ragged mewl. They were sick, but alive. Definitely alive!

  I jumped up to celebrate, only to have another spike of darkness exit the pile of sloughed off flesh and enter both Jyra and I.

  “Genesis!” I called, concentrating on the task at hand. “Why don’t you come out and face what’s coming to you?”

  What’s coming to me?!

  A red, craggy line cut through the ground, encircling us and sending us hurtling upwards. The force of the momentum nearly forced Jyra and I to the ground as we rocked up through several levels, until we finally came face to face with a roiling, burning, scarlet cloud.

  “Genesis, you changed your color.” I remarked, tensing myself for this final face off.

  “Andi and Jyra. I should have known that you two would find a way to make yourselves a pain in my side until the end. Well this ends now. His dimension is mine!”

  “Really?” Jyra asked. “Then perhaps you should come and take it then.”

  So eager to go to return your beloved to their death? Fine. I will oblige. And this time, you will not be returning.

  A pulsating tentacle of red emerged from the mass, lashing down to crash down on the two of us. I could tell that Genesis was reveling in the moment it would finally squash its enemies like the bugs it thought we were.

  Too bad for it, the situation wasn’t going to end that way.

  Jyra and I reached up, catching the blow in our grips. The cloud recoiled, trying to tear itself away from our hold, but we didn’t let go.

  “Hey, remember about that whole creature of light thing that you’re trying not to catch the attention of?”

  What? No. Impossible!

  “That’s right, Mr. Genesis, the Light’s here and it’s finally come to collect. I hope you’re ready for this.”

  No! NO! You’re Strangers.

  “Not. Quite.”

  With that I dropped all the walls and barrier that kept me separated from the rest of the world. Nodding to Jyra, I pulled Genesis down into me.

  No! No! NO!

  But we pulled. And pulled. And pulled.

  Bit by bit we drew the miasmic creature towards us, absorbing as we did. I was like the time that I had eaten it during its strangling attempt all over again, but to the power of two. And as we absorbed him, we only grew more ravenous for the delicious energy pumping through the strange being.

  Its screams continued as it grew smaller, then smaller still, until finally there was no cloud left. No roiling bits of darkness. Instead the same chittering, insectoid like creature that I had seen in its dreams cowered before us.

  You think this is the end? You think you can really defeat me? Lock me out of this dimension if you will, but I my reach is beyond your grasp.

  This is but a fraction of my being! Defeating me here mean nothing!

  “On an intergalactic scale, sure. But it means everything to the people who live here.”

  With that I gripped its head with my hands and pulled with all my might. My old strength returned to me in waves, the creature screaming and writing in my grasp, its arms pummeling at my sides.

  Somehow, through the cacophony of the chaos all around us, I could hear plating crack, then give, and I was stumbling backwards with a head between my hands.

  An unearthly shriek deafened me, emitting from the head in my grip. For a moment time seemed to suspend itself, then a rush of wind buffeted us before being sucked out of existence as if it was air in a vacuum.

  It was like being in the center of a tornado as all of the discarded flash and remains of Genesis’ power were swept up and then vanished. It couldn’t have lasted more than a minute, and yet it seemed like hours as Jyra and I clutched each other in the tumultuous maelstrom.

  And then, the quiet came. There was no more fire. No more rabid kodadt. Just quiet cries and the sound of recue as workers began to flood the civilian halls.

  “We…we did it,” I breathed. “Like actually did it. All of it. It’s over.”

  “It’s over.” Jyra repeated breathlessly. “It’s finally over.”

  She looked to me and then we were both crying and clutching at each other. Despite all the odds, despite everything that we had gone through, despite dying and being blinded, finding each other and being separated again, we had done it. We had won.

  We sank to our knees, clutching at each other. Finally, we were free.

  Epilogue: Happily Ever After For the Time Being

  “Are you sure you have to go?”

  Anjali looked to me, a soft smile on her thickly furred face. “My people are recovering from years of devastation. They will need as much help as can be provided, and what better help than one of their own kind.”

  “You’re right.” I pouted, crossing my arms as I watched our feline-esque friends load up onto one of Arq’s carriers. “But I just wished we could get to know each other.”

  “Do not worry, Miss Andi. I am sure that there will be other instances in the future that will bring us together once more. But for now, enjoy your peace. You have people who love you and I’m sure they will cherish moments where some omnipotent creature is hunting you.”

  “Only seemingly omnipotent.” I corrected. “But not quite.”

  “What you did was amazing, Miss Andi. But I think you will find down time can be just as spectacular. I wish you well.”

  “You too.”

  I watched her go with the rest of the immune.

  The clamor after the cure had been released had been almost as insane as finding the cure itself. We had managed to escape the Quadric Station in the crazed hubbub of the clean up effort, and had spent the past week watching the massive amount of media from the fallout.

  It had taken just under a day for the rescuers to formulate their own copy of the cure and soon it was being distributed everywhere. Since no one knew who had created the original strain, no one race could take the credit. Genesis’ plan was defeated in every way possible.

  “Hey, have you eaten today?”

  I looked to the doorway to see both Janix and Jyra waiting for me, dressed in casualwear that had been provided by Arq.

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Well come on. Don’t you know that saving the galaxy comes with a lifetimes supply of free breakfast?”

  “Really? I didn’t see that in the contract I signed.”

  “Well then you need
a better agent.”

  We shared a laugh and I walked forward, grasping one of their hands in each of mine. “How about we go get some food and worry about all that later.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  And so, we headed towards the communal cafeteria. I knew that, statistically speaking, this peace could only last for so long -especially considering I had the ability to hop dimensions right into everybody else’s great choices- but I didn’t mind. I was going to relish each and every moment I had with my loves.

  It was a great, big, terrifying future out there where we had the ability to absorb an ancient evil. But whatever that strange and oddly specific destiny brought, I could rest assured that we would make it through it.

  Together.

  ***THE END***

  The Plague (Alternate Dimensions 1) Preview

  Chapter 1

  “Thank you for calling Medelis Health Insurance. My name is Andi. May I have the spelling of your first and last name?”

  “Hayden Pfluke.”

  “Thank you. May I have the spelling of your first and last name?”

  “Hayden Pfluke.”

  I gritted my teeth and forced myself to use my most customer friendly voice. “May I have the spelling of your first and last name?”

  “Oh! Yeah.” The consumer continued on actually answering the question, and I did my best not to slam my head onto my desk. My doctor had told me that I had enough skull trauma to last a lifetime, and since he had a degree and I didn’t, I was more inclined to believe his medical opinion.

  Thankfully, the rest of the call went more smoothly. The consumer listened as I explained what their vision benefits were and what doctors were in their network. It wasn’t even a five on the calls-from-hell scale and when it was over, I logged out of my phone and headed out.

  “Another day, another dollar,” one of my coworkers said as she passed me in the hall.

  “Ah yes, dollars. I love selling hours of my life for monetary gain. It’s fantastic.”

  She laughed and kept on, but I couldn’t help but sigh. I mean, I knew I was lucky to have a fairly cushy job where I earned twelve dollars an hour, but call center life wasn’t exactly fulfilling. I was eternally grateful that I was gainfully employed, but I couldn’t help but stare out the windows beside my drab, gray cubicle, wishing for something more.