The Survivors Box Set

by Nathan Hystad

  “I don’t. I sent some encrypted messages out to the other Keepers, but no one knows. Lom is a ghost. Always has been. When Garo Alnod tried to have him killed in the mines years ago, everyone thought he was dead, but clearly, that isn’t the case.” Sarlun scratched his head; his snout twitched lightly. “We don’t even know what he looks like.”

  “Rivo will be able to get that for us,” I said it, hoping it was true. “Mary, who do we still trust on New Spero?” We’d been through this, but my exhausted brain wanted to have someone else help me with something.

  She listed the few names off. “Clare. Nick. Denise. Leonard.”

  “That’s not many, is it?” I asked.

  “Oh, and your sister and James, of course. We all have some distant family out there. I have some cousins in Terran Four.”

  “Where’s the Kalentrek?” I asked, referring to the large Shield used by the Deltra to prevent the Kraski from coming to Earth for a few hundred years. It was the same device Magnus and I had carried into the center of the Kraski mother ship, killing them all before dealing with the Deltra’s betrayal. I hadn’t seen it in a long time, but with an impending war against the Kraski, I wanted to have it handy, just in case.

  Slate shrugged. “I have no idea. Magnus would know.”

  Mary chimed in. “Magnus has to know. Patty would have stored it somewhere safe.”

  I pulled the communicator out of my pocket, the one that would allow me to speak to Magnus live, no matter how far away he was. Clare was still having trouble copying the technology. I tapped it, and the device came to life. “Magnus, come in, over,” I said into it, repeating the phrase a few times before getting a response.

  “Magnus here,” he said, sounding tired. “Is everything okay?”

  “We’re fine. Karo’s been taken by the Kraski.” I cringed as I told him. “They beamed him off New Spero.”

  “Are you kidding me? I’ll have their asses!” Magnus yelled into the communicator, and I could picture his hair a mess, neck cords straining in anger.

  “We need to know where you stored the Shield, the Kalentrek.” I waited for a response.

  “Dean, are we safe to talk about this in present company?” he asked quietly.

  “Suma, Sarlun, Slate, and Mary are in the room with me. We’re on Shimmal. Go for it.”

  “It’s underground in a bunker, east of Terran Two by seven miles,” he continued, giving me the coordinates. “We didn’t want it to fall into anyone’s hands, so we tucked it away where no one could find it.”

  “We might need it,” I said. “Magnus, do you have direct access to Lord Crul?”

  Magnus took a second to reply. “I do.”

  “Can you send him a message for me?”

  “Sure. Let me get my tablet.”

  “No need,” I said. “Just tell him I’m coming to see him. I don’t know when, but soon.”

  “Anything else?” Magnus asked.

  “No, that’s it.”

  “What are you planning?” he asked, a nervous twinge cutting through his usually confident voice.

  “Something big.”

  “Be careful,” Magnus said. “Stay safe, brother.”

  “You too. Thanks. Over.”

  The call ended.

  “We need to leave,” I said. “Suma, can you go to New Spero and work with Leonard to track down the Shield? Bring it back here.”

  Sarlun looked like he was ready to deny me the right to bring the weapon onto his world, but he sighed and nodded.

  “You got it, Dean,” Suma said with a smile.

  ____________

  “Take care of yourself here, Mary. Sarlun’s vacation home is the safest spot for you two right now.” I hugged Mary tight. We’d spent last night in each other’s arms, and I could still feel her pressed against me when I closed my eyes.

  “We’ll be fine here. It’s you we have to worry about,” she said.

  I smiled widely at her. “I’m Dean Parker. Accountant extraordinaire.”

  “You’re something, but finding a flaw in Lom of Pleva’s bookkeeping isn’t going to win us a war.”

  I separated from our hug and picked up a happy Jules. She smiled at me as I made a face, and I nuzzled in close, feeling warmth emanate from her soft cheeks as I stood there holding her. She’d changed everything. I had to be more careful now. I had to protect her above everything else. I had to make it home to be a father to this tiny girl. “I’ll be back. Then we can stop worrying about everything. Once and for all,” I said.

  “It feels like we’ll never be able to relax,” Mary countered.

  I didn’t reply. Slate was waiting for me in the portal room, and I left Mary after a final kiss goodbye. It stung to leave her there, but we had no choice.

  I entered the large white portal room, passing two guards who stood still as I walked to the stone where Slate stood, pulse rifle strapped to his large back. He was ready for action.

  I clapped him on the back. “Glad you’re on my side, Zeke Campbell.”

  He grinned at me. “No other side I’d rather be at, boss.”

  I keyed in the icon for Bazarn, took one last look around the room, and tapped the screen.

  TWENTY-ONE

  We arrived, and the massive guards at Bazarn Five raised guns to us. They had sleepy looks in their eyes, as if no one had come through the portals in a long time.

  I raised my hands in the air. “Dean Parker. Here to see Garo Alnod.”

  The lead guard stepped toward me. “I remember you,” he said and motioned to the missing table along the wall. “You broke our furniture last time you were here.”

  “Sorry about that. I was having a bad day.” I didn’t want to spend time explaining the Theos icon that was disappearing from my mind as I thought of it. I’d had to break the table apart to draw the shape so I could remember it and find the right place to travel to. It had worked, because shortly afterward, I’d met Karo.

  “Right. A bad day. We’ve had a few of those since you were here last. There’s no chance you had anything to do with our planet being attacked last time you were here, is there?” The second guard held his large gun up, a snarl on his oversized face.

  “That had nothing to do with me. Ask Alnod,” I pleaded.

  “Fine. I’ll see if we can track him down for you,” Guard One said. He turned and tapped at a small console on his wrist. He stepped away so we couldn’t hear what he was saying. The other guard stood somberly, watching us under hooded lids.

  “Not much for small talk, hey, boss?” Slate muttered to me.

  “Hands where I can see them,” Guard Two said gruffly.

  The lead guard turned and motioned us forward. “Garo Alnod will make himself available for you. He’s sending a ship now. Meet it at the northwest corner of the promenade.”

  They walked us through the ornately gilded room. I ignored the luster this time, not caring about Bazarn’s opulence any longer. I had bigger fish to fry. We exited the portal room and walked the familiar distance to the steps that would transport us up to the promenade. We were alone in the room, the steps clear of other beings like we’d seen last time. A pair of guards walked the perimeter, glaring at us as we crossed over to the stairs and up through the energy field.

  We found ourselves in the promenade. Last time we’d come, it had been packed, scents of food trucks and sweat thick in the air. Now it was quiet. Empty. Dark outside. It was night, and we traversed the open space in utter silence, save for the sound of our footsteps across the stone ground.

  “What happened here?” Slate asked, his voice loud in the quiet night.

  “I guess an attack on Bazarn was enough to keep tourists away for a while,” I answered.

  A ship lowered to the ground right where we were told it would be, and the doors opened as we approached. A Molariun pilot sat up front in the small transport vessel, and she lifted a hand in greeting. She was small and blue, wearing a bright yellow vest.

  Without a word, she lifted th
e ship, and we rose into the sky. We couldn’t see much, other than the odd lights from the empty resorts below.

  Slate and I sat in silence for the trip, and eventually, we lowered onto the floating island Garo Alnod called home when he was on Bazarn Five.

  The doors hissed open, and we exited. I went to say thank you to the pilot, but the doors were already closing, the ship lifting away. No one was there to greet us. The large bright moon hung overhead; thousands of pinpricks of light were painted in the expanse of space. I took a moment to look at the beauty that was our universe before blinking and jogging to catch up to Slate, who’d walked ahead.

  “Quite the house,” he mumbled, looking at the nearby palace.

  Someone was coming toward us, and I saw Slate reaching for his rifle. “Don’t. It’s Rivo,” I said.

  “Dean!” She wrapped her arms around my waist, and I gave her an awkward hug back. She’d filled out a little since her captivity by Lom’s robo-pirates, and I was happy to see she was looking healthy. “I was not expecting you.” She said the words in English, and I was surprised.

  “You’re speaking my language,” I said, tapping my Adam’s apple.

  “Father made me get the implant. Said if I was going to take on more responsibility, I needed to do it. I’m happy with it. Makes my life a lot easier,” she said.

  The wealthy had a way to implant a language modifier into their brains. I wondered if I’d consider doing the surgery, or if it even worked on a human.

  “We’re here on some serious business. Can we come inside?” I asked. Slate was glancing around like a cat hunting in a field of birds.

  “Come in. Father is waiting.”

  “I hope we didn’t wake you,” I said, trying to be courteous.

  “Father doesn’t sleep much. He was up,” Rivo said.

  We followed them through the entrance of the palatial home, and up the same stairs, then down the familiar hallway until we were at Garo’s office. Slate looked around with wide eyes.

  The door opened, and Garo was in the same spot he’d been last time. “Dean Parker. Come to return my suit?”

  “Uhm, I think it’s beyond repair. But it did save my life out there,” I said. Garo had loaned me his spacesuit, which had built-in thrusters. I’d needed those after being blasted away, after using the Shifter to send the Unwinding to another dimension. It had only been six months, but it felt like a lifetime ago.

  “I have more. What can I do for you?” Garo asked, straight to business.

  “I see Bazarn isn’t the same place. How’s recovery?” I asked, diverting his question for a moment.

  “We fought off the invasion. Clearly sent by Lom of Pleva. We’ve been rebuilding since then. We thought it best to close the world from tourists until it was back to normal,” Garo said.

  Slate and I took offered seats in the chairs across from Garo. Rivo stood at her father’s side.

  “How do you know it was Lom? Was he here?” I asked.

  “No. It was a mixture of five different ships. We took some prisoners, but none of them would fess up what they were doing here. The closest we got was from a Luppo. Said they were paid to show up, and followed orders,” Garo said.

  My throat was drying up, and I looked around for something to drink. “Were there any Kraski here?”

  Garo’s eyes narrowed. “Yes. There were Kraski. What are you doing here, Dean?”

  “I need your help.”

  “Then ask for it,” Garo replied.

  “I need to know where Lom of Pleva is,” I said.

  The room stayed silent for a few moments before Garo began to speak. “We don’t know exactly where he is, but we’ve been trying to track his movements.”

  “How do you do that?” I asked.

  “Spies. I have them in every corner out there, and I pay some high-level informants within his organization,” Garo said.

  “Then you shouldn’t have any problem getting the information you need.” It sounded simple enough to me.

  “If only it was that easy.” Garo looked tired. The last few months of rebuilding had taken a toll on him, and even Rivo looked stressed. “He’s gone dark.”

  “What do you mean? Even his own people don’t know where he is?” I asked.

  Garo nodded in reply.

  “He has to be somewhere,” Slate said. “Are we one hundred percent sure that he’s still alive?”

  “He’s alive. He left me a private message when we were attacked. Before our defenses obliterated the invasion, my personal communication matrix was hacked. When I got back to this office, a message awaited me.” Garo tapped a screen on his desk, and a message started to play. “I’ll have it translate to English for you.”

  I raised my eyebrows at Slate, and we both leaned forward as a voice began to talk. “Garo Alnod. Your attempt on my life took guts. You took quite the risk, attempting to end me at my own mine. Your actions mutilated forty miners and their families. So next time you look at your reflection, and you think you see an honorable face staring back at you, think about those people and their children.

  “We’ve come for your dimensional shifter. Give it to me… personally, and your people will not be killed.”

  Garo paused it now. “We don’t know if he meant those of us on Bazarn or our homeworld.” He pressed play, and the translated message continued.

  “Your life is now forfeit. Regardless, you will not live to see your daughter’s next birthing day. Tell her I’m sorry her betrothed had to die. I’m told he went down without much fight.”

  I glanced over at Rivo from the corner of my eye and saw her clench her jaw in anger. She had a firm resolve in her posture that I’d only seen hinted at. She looked like someone I didn’t want to mess with, even if she was only four feet tall.

  “I’ve left traceable contact details in this transmission. Respond to them if you weren’t killed in this attack. You’ve made a poor choice once again, Garo. We could have been partners, but instead you chose to betray me.”

  The message ended.

  “Did he expect you to show up and give him the Shifter while Bazarn was under attack?” I asked.

  “I think so,” Garo answered.

  “And the contact details he supposedly left you?” Slate pitched in.

  “Didn’t lead anywhere. Maybe he had a timer on it. Either way, we haven’t been attacked again, and Lom of Pleva’s own people don’t know where he is.”

  I had an idea. “I don’t think the contact is gone. I think he’s getting the messages but coding it to make you think he isn’t. He wants information and doesn’t want you to think he got it. Can you tell me how to reach him?”

  Garo looked uncertain. Rivo nodded from beside us, and I saw her father taking her advice. “Sure.” I unclipped a tablet attached to my forearm, and he tapped something onto it. “There. It’s in your contact list under LOP.”

  “Thanks.” I took the tablet back and reattached it. “I have a feeling he’ll reply if I send him a personal message.”

  Garo looked around nervously. “You didn’t bring the Shifter with you?”

  “It’s gone,” I said.

  “Gone? How do you mean gone? Hidden away?” Garo asked, seeming relieved it wasn’t back in his office.

  “Gone as in, I used it, and it’s gone.”

  He stood up quickly, his back rigid. “You used it? On what?”

  “The Unwinding. A vortex made from the energy of the long-dead Iskios. They were destroying whole systems, one at a time. I had to flip them into another dimension to stop it.”

  “Did you find your wife?” Rivo asked, her small blue hand suddenly on my wrist.

  “I did.” I smiled at her, and she returned it warmly.

  “Good,” she said softly.

  “Then you don’t have anything to worry about. The Shifter is gone.” I hoped Garo would be pleased. Instead, he looked at me blankly.

  “Then I have no bartering tool left. He will kill me.” Garo slumped in his seat.


  “You fended off his attack once,” Slate said. “Who’s to say you don’t again?”

  Garo’s four eyes narrowed as he looked at us. “You don’t understand. Lom of Pleva doesn’t let things go. He’ll do anything to see me dead now.”

  “I’ll tell him I took the device. I’ll send him a message and take the heat off you,” I said, a bit too quickly. Did I want a bigger target on my back than the one I had already? I thought about the Kraski taking Karo and formed an idea. “Garo, we’re going to war. The Kraski are back, and we need to end this once and for all. I’m working with the Bhlat and the Keppe, and we’re going to bring the fight to them. They’ve taken over a small world, where they battled the Motrill and Keppe twenty years ago.”

  “I know of that battle. Many lives were lost on both sides,” Garo said.

  “Then help us, because the Kraski are working for Lom, and it would be one step closer to taking him down at the knees,” I said.

  “I don’t think you understand. The Kraski are but a tool of his. He won’t care if you destroy them. He’ll use another.” Garo sat back and thought about what he was going to say next. I could see his mind racing. “Did you say the Bhlat? They’re going to work with you?”

  “They offered us sanctuary, at least. The Empress told me that Lom of Pleva is angry with her as well. It seems he has a lot of enemies. While I don’t fully trust the Bhlat, they have a lot of firepower, and if they want to side with me, I’ll take it in a fistfight,” I said.

  “What will you do if you find Lom?” Garo asked.

  “I’ll reason with him.” I had nothing else.

  “Not good enough. We need a plan,” Garo said, and I liked that he’d said we. I needed power and resources on my side. With the Keppe, the Bhlat, and the Alnods, there was no way we could lose. I needed to get Karo back.

  “The Kraski just took someone from New Spero I need to get back. What do you suggest?” I asked.

  “Gather your forces. Utilize your relationships. Take it to their colony world and demand your friend back.”

  “How do I get them to give him to me?” I asked, eager for advice.

  Garo looked at me with a smile on his face. “Trick them. It’s rarely failed me yet.”