I drifted further until they blended with the scenery. A lightning bolt, absent of thunder, licked the sky. I was moving near the center of an electrical storm that swirled ahead. It began to open, the center black, swallowing the bands of lightning like it was hungry for our world, growing larger and wider. I felt like plankton being inhaled by a whale. I gripped the table, cold and smooth and solid. Maybe that’s why it was there, to keep me from falling over.
The black opening suddenly ripped open, exposing a blue throat. I was swallowed with no time to brace for impact. No time to scream. It was like being sucked through a straw. But just as sudden as my body felt steamrolled, there was no sense of motion. There was no sight or smell. For a long moment, I was bodiless. There was no pressure. No pain. There was nothing.
Getting past the first part was nothing short of being blown to bits. After that, it was the greatest peace I’d ever known. No body, no thoughts. No sense of going anywhere. Maybe this was what death felt like.
But I was moving. Towards destiny.
There was no stopping that. We all arrive where we’re going. And as my body began to exit the other end of the wormhole, preceded by the siren scream of my nervous system reminding me that it was working again, I had the nagging thought my destiny was near.
Showtime.
VIII
Serving life is not always beautiful.
Pivot
A perfect trap is one the prey readily accepts,
even when he already knows the outcome.
Pike
Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32
L E G E N D
Outpost
The exit was as quick as the entrance. For a second, I sensed my body had already arrived at the destination before I did. But I was catching up, arriving in time to feel the wormhole shit me out the other end of that intergalactic straw.
My extremities were cold and my fingers tingling. I blinked several times to focus the blurry details of men, more than one, somewhere in front of me. There was a hollow pain burning inside my chest. I wasn’t breathing.
I pulled in my first breath like I was drowning, gasping for air. I bent over and, with my hands on my knees, was ready to puke. It passed, but when I stood up my mouth was filling with spit. I blinked away the tears. Now I could see three men. Maybe they were smiling.
I walked toward them, each step tentative. I couldn’t feel the ship’s walls anymore, but then again I couldn’t feel much of anything. Five feet away from them, I passed through the ship’s cold doorway and was bombarded with an earthy smell and the sound of the ship’s hissing. And that’s when my stomach revolted.
I blew chunks all over. It was mostly green liquid, but I was hands on my knees again, wrenching until it was all over my shoes, the floor and whatever else was below.
Someone slapped my shoulder. “That first trip’s a bitch, ain’t it?” The others chimed in with laughter.
The man in the middle was the commanding officer. His name was Samuel. He handed me a bottle of water to rinse out my mouth.
“Spit it on the floor,” he said, when I looked around with a mouthful. Evidently not their first time greeting a first-timer.
I was expecting the inside of the Outpost to look industrial. Where the ship had landed, that was exactly what it was: all gray walls and concrete floor. The translucent ceiling of the dome was far above, letting pale light through.
The other two guys with the commanding officer introduced themselves as Pepper and Fadden. They showed me the rest of the Outpost. It was a small city, complete with streets lined with elms and maples and houses and warehouses. Mosquitoes buzzed and squirrels chirped. They farmed crops, raised animals while they researched the planet outside the dome.
We walked for hours and never reached the perimeter of the dome. We stopped at the central cafeteria, a gathering place for the settlers. They ate. I didn’t.
We sat around for a good hour. People dropped into the conversation until there was a couple dozen. They asked the questions, mostly about life back home. Most of the residents were on extended stay in the Outpost, some had been there half their life. Some even born there. While most of them said they didn’t miss it, they were still curious. No one forgets home.
My celebrity status among Paladins was missing a planet millions of miles away. Some had heard of me – the Paladin that defeated the duplicates, The One Who Sees Clearly, as the grimmets once named me – but it hardly seemed to matter. That was another planet. This was the Outpost.
The sun was a gray disk as seen through the dome when I was escorted outside Samuel’s office, a set of steel doors tightly closed. A few minutes later, they slid open. I ascended a short flight of stairs to an enormous room at the edge of the dome. A large desk was alone in the middle of the empty floor, and beyond that was a panoramic view of the vast plain.
Samuel was at the desk, looking busy and more officer-like than he did when he was laughing at my pukefest. Military tension set my body rigid, waiting to approach. This was the president of the Grimmet Outpost.
“Have a look,” he finally said. “I’ll be done in a moment.”
I relaxed and let my gaze wander. My footsteps echoed in the silence, but the outside world was a dry, whirling windstorm. Dust-devils dropped to the ground, picking up debris and sending it airborne before disappearing as quickly as they formed. There were ancient, leafless trees sparely populating the flat, baked ground, like the ones I saw in my office, and red mountains in the distance. I went up to the dome, put my fingers on the surface. It was warm.
There were no signs of life. A beaten planet. Only a clear barrier that separated life on the inside from death on the outside.
“Quite a view, isn’t it?” Samuel stepped next to me.
I nodded, but not convincingly. Captivating, yes. But I failed to see the beauty in a lifeless landscape.
“This is where the grimmets live?” I asked. He nodded. “Up in the mountains?”
“Mostly, yes. They occasionally visit the plains and flock to the Outpost out of curiosity, but we don’t see them much. Mostly when we venture out.”
The planet didn’t look diverse, but it was rich in elements valuable to Earth. Why else be here? The Outpost was just one of many settlements on the planet. Mines were set up all over. They weren’t here just to live on another planet. There was profit involved.
“This planet wasn’t always dead,” Samuel said, gazing out. “There is some water and the atmosphere can support life, but when we discovered it there was none to be found. There is evidence that beings once lived here, the remnants of houses and roads, cities and farming. Signs of advanced civilization. One can only imagine what it looked like when it was still vital.”
He was looking at a plume of smoke in the distant mountains.
“I’m sure you’re well aware of our mining industry, but our primary objective for being here is research. This is an expensive operation and the mining of energy-rich minerals helps fund our exploration. Those trees you see are some of our first successes. Instead of leaves, the bark is photosynthetic, tolerating the harsh conditions. This is one of the first links in planet-building. Our goal is that one day this planet will be habitable, once again. That many generations from now, the human population can call it a home.”
“I don’t understand. How could the entire planet be void of life if the atmosphere is habitable? I mean, asteroids or pestilence or war couldn’t wipe out all life.”
“We’re not sure.” He was still curiously eyeing the mountains. The cloud was dispersing, growing larger and nearer. It didn’t appear to be smoke. “All our research indicates that life just vanished. As if a heart just stopped beating. What could do something like that is, currently, beyond our understanding. And that’s another reason we’re here.” He flicked a glance toward me before resuming his watch on the cloud. “If it can happen here, can it happen on Earth?”
I wondered if he w
as holding back information. We knew so much, how could there be so much mystery about a dead planet?
“What made the grimmets immune?” I asked.
“Tenacious beings. Unlike anything in the universe. They’re similar to cold-blooded organisms, going extended periods of time without food. They seem to have some ability to photosynthesize as well as utilize minerals and nutrients from soil, rocks and trees. Somehow, they resisted whatever wiped everything else out. Of course, I don’t need to tell you about their psychic ability.”
All right, so he was aware of my connection with them. Of course he would know I shared a special bond with grimmets back on Earth.
“But even as tough as they are, their populations are dwindling. We tried to incorporate them into our environment,” Samuel said, “inside the Outpost, but it just didn’t work. They weren’t acclimated to the friendly climate and didn’t care to be separated from the flock.”
He stared to the distant plume, let his thoughts drift for a moment.
“One day,” he said, “this planet will be revitalized. The grimmets will reclaim its wonder. And, hopefully, we’ll be able to share that with them.”
Long ago, I accused the Paladin Nation of kidnapping grimmets, bringing them back to Earth for selfish reasons, convinced they intended to make a weapon of them or simply display them like zoo animals. Even when the grimmets defeated the duplicates, I assumed that to be a fluke. But now it seemed like an act of compassion, an attempt to preserve their kind until their home was saved.
Perhaps my trip was not just for the wormhole, but to see some of the truly humane aspects of the Paladin Nation.
Samuel dismissed me to return to my escorts with a firm handshake and a warm smile. “You’re welcome to return any time you wish. Trust me, the wormhole ride gets easier.”
I thanked him and left, but not before noticing that he was still watching the growing cloud. I could feel a slight tug in my gut, like something familiar was coming.
My goodbyes were short. Everyone waved in passing, but life resumed in the Outpost. We walked through the large docking doors into the hangar, the gray room that housed the black wormhole ship where it was cold and sterile.
“In case you’re wondering, the trip back is even worse,” Pepper said, patting my shoulder. Fadden laughed, mentioned the room still smelled like puke.
I knew what he meant. Now that I knew what to expect, my thoughts were making the anticipation of the trip worse. Even so, there was a pleasant sensation tugging inside my belly and it was getting stronger. I was sure someone would be waiting for me at the ship. Someone I knew.
My backpack was sitting on the floor in front of the doorway glowing on the ship. It was a little fuller than when I arrived, filled with items from the Outpost to take back.
“Come back if you’re bored.” Pepper extended his hand as the sky seemed to dim. “You don’t get a waiting party on your next visit so you’ll have to clean up your own barf.”
“Thanks,” I said, shaking his hand. “You’re an excellent host,” I said, sarcastically.
“What can I say? By the way, you know when you get back everyone will be about two weeks older. Time’s going a little faster for them.”
I sensed a bit of sadness. Did he leave anyone behind? No one was immune to homesickness.
“Well, I better get back before they forget me,” I said.
Fadden slapped Pepper with the back of his hand. He was looking up, mouth open. The top of the dome was a couple hundred yards above us. Dark lumps could be seen squirming on the opaque surface.
Fadden and Pepper shaded their eyes like that could somehow clarify what they were seeing, but it was just getting darker as more things dropped out of the sky, scratching and clawing along the surface. The dome was too thick and far away to hear anything, but the commotion was frenzied.
“Yeah?” Pepper touched his ear, listening to a nojakk call. “Seriously? No, no. We see it over here, too.”
“Check this out.” Fadden was squatting on his haunches in front of a thin silver sheet spread out on the floor projecting a three-dimensional image.
It was an aerial image of the Outpost from far up. Thousands of brightly colored things were crawling over it. Grimmets. And more were coming. Floating lights kicked on. I looked up at the thick layer of grimmets obscuring every bit of sunlight.
Pepper and Fadden looked at me. They’d never seen anything like it. No one had. Every grimmet within range of the Outpost was coming. They can feel me. And I could feel them tugging at my insides, connecting with their energy, their unlimited essence, bonding to me like the grimmets back on Earth.
Strangely, though, I felt they were connecting with something else, like I carried something inside me, something dense. Maybe they came because of that.
What’s inside me?
The ship welcomed me with its impatient hum. I could see through its invisible walls, once again. Pepper and Fadden waited far away from the ship. They didn’t bother waving. Didn’t seem concerned about the white-blue light that crackled behind me, illuminating their faces. They’d seen the wormhole open inside the Outpost too many times to be amazed. I stayed still, not wanting to see it swallow me. Braced for impact.
My teeth snapped together, just missed clipping my tongue. I was pulled into oblivion, once again, with my mind focused on home, guiding the ship back to the warm life that waited with familiar surroundings and loving friends and family.
The black nothingness of the moment was peaceful. It didn’t feel like I was moving, but I sensed home was near. My destination began to pull me back into existence, like my body had been evaporated and was being reconstructed inside Earth’s atmosphere somewhere over the Preserve. I sensed oncoming pain.
I was jerked in another direction like a fish snagged with a treble hook.
I went back into the black peaceful oblivion, but home felt like it was far behind. But then I felt my body again, reassembling somewhere near the planet. And then there was the excruciating agony as my awareness squeezing back into it.
My eyes were clenched as tightly as my jaw. I was mostly numb, again, but felt water slosh around me.
I moved my arms in a swimming motion, unaware if I was below water or not. My lungs burned. I opened my eyes, the salty water stinging. Panic propelled me upward but I was too heavy. My arms were like useless poles. I desperately kicked and barely broke the surface, inhaling just enough air to relieve the fire in my chest. But I sank again.
There was no chance of getting back up, but fortunately I hit the sandy bottom. I pushed upward, this time clearing my entire chest above the water. One deep gulp of air and I let myself sink again. I pushed off at an angle but found the water getting deeper, so I turned around, jumping again and again.
Finally, I stood on my toes and gulped air. My heart was slamming. I took feeble steps and slowly walked into shallower water.
A sandy beach was ahead. The full moon was bright in a clear night sky. I missed my landing. But I had no idea by how much.
L E G E N D
Silent forest
Something flushed out of my body, like a plug had been pulled and drained molten metal weighing in my veins. I was light as driftwood. The water around me turned cloudy. I rubbed my eyes and looked again. The milky cloud drifted deeper and spread out like an oil slick.
When I reached dry sand, I dropped to my knees. Exhausted. I was catching my breath, the air cool and humid. Seawater dripped off my nose, over my lips. It tasted odd. It was salty, but there was something else, something familiar. Something that usually wasn’t associated with ocean water, but I couldn’t place it.
There was no sign of civilization. Just endless water, sand and tropical trees. This was bad. It could’ve been worse. The north pole. Or the sun.
I tapped my cheek, got no response from my nojakk. Not even a tick, tick, tick. I dug through my backpack, activated a handheld phone but it was non-responsive, too. The same with a homing beacon. Everything, dead.
Maybe an electromagnetic pulse killed everything upon entry. Something went wrong right before I got home, I felt it jerk me around. Maybe the ship malfunctioned and dumped me in the ocean. At least it didn’t drop another twenty feet out to sea or I’d be stuck to the bottom like an anchor.
My suit had already dried. I sat down in the sand, leaned back against a tree. What now? Surely, the Paladins knew I was coming back. They would eventually search for me. But if I didn’t have power to signal them, how would they find me?
The waves were small, sloshing onto the beach in a steady rhythm. I closed my eyes, listening to the ocean go in and out. In and out.
It lulled me to relax, but something was missing. Everything felt so… so empty. Like an environment in my office where nothing was real. But I couldn’t sense any walls. I considered, for a second, that I was in my office. But I could always sense the confines of a moldable environment, sense the walls of a room even though it looked endless. The beach had no such limitation. It just felt empty.
Maybe I imagined it. I was tired.
The waves greeted me gently. I imagined I was floating in the water, warm and cozy. But then I opened my eyes and stared at coconuts. My survival suit was warm but the cool air was nipping at my ears and the tip of my nose. I sat up and rubbed my face. My eyes were heavy with sleep. I couldn’t remember laying down. The moon hung just above the horizon. It felt like I’d been asleep for hours, but everything looked the same. And not a single bug bite.
It was quiet in the trees. Too quiet. The only thing that broke the silence was the ocean, but everything else was as still as a museum. No breeze from above, no drifting leaves or scuttle of a crab. Absolute stillness.
Socket 1-3 - The Socket Greeny Saga Page 48
