The Lost Tribe (Sentinel Series Book 2)

by Richard Flunker

  “If you cannot be ruled by him, you cannot live.”

  He swung a sword made out of fire, cutting through the woman and her two guards. The sword froze halfway through them. Kale screamed, but no sound came out. The face appeared on the woman and Kale began to cry. He tried shouting out, and could feel the sound rise from his throat, but only a dark mist came out from his mouth. The darkness began to form around him and spread out towards the woman. He knew her. He knew her well.

  The darkness began to swell up around the woman. She stood up straight as the flaming sword continued to cut her in half at a pace he couldn’t follow. The darkness enveloped her and extinguished the fire on the sword. In one swoop, the sword went through her. In that moment, she was gone, and the darkness came back drifting to him. Kale could hear his name whispered in the mist. It darkened his eyes as it came around him.

  A strong breeze blew it away, and now the demon held a small girl in front of him. He towered over her, and kept her in place with one of his claws. Kale’s sadness was replaced by vehement anger. He began to struggle with the invisible cords that kept him tied to the post.

  “This one has no right to be alive,” the demon said with a smirk on his face.

  Kale’s mind screamed no, burning through his mind. The demon opened his mouth wide and a vile liquid poured out of it, drenching the child in it. When she looked back up, wiping the filth from her face, her small blue eyes looked up pleadingly at Kale. He continued to thrash back and forth as blood and flesh began to fall off of his wrists.

  “Take me,” Kale was finally able to shout.

  The demon laughed, spitting out more of the course slime.

  “Take her from me, if you can,” it taunted him.

  The demon looked up and screamed a piercing screech. Kale’s ears began to melt and the pain that burned through his head threatened to send him into the darkness. He struggled to stay awake. From the demon’s mouth, a single ember came out, floating. Kale watched in horror as the ember began to float down towards the child.

  Kale screamed in utter violence and broke free from the invisible bonds. He began pumping his legs as fast as he could towards the child, but he kept sinking deeper and deeper into the sand. He found himself drowning in the dry sea. Every time he emerged from the sand, the ember was closer to the child, and he was not.

  The child looked one more time directly into Kale’s eyes. There was a moment of peace and Kale stopped running. The ember reached the top of the little girl’s head and the child smiled back at Kale. His heart stopped for a moment and he closed his eyes. When he opened them up again, the flames had consumed the child. In a thought, Kale was upon her, embracing her. The flames ate at his body. Flaming claws reached out and tore at his chest, turning the bloody chunks of his body into ashes.

  Kale endured. He heard the child whisper one last word before her body turned to ashes in his arms.

  “Dada.”

  The child exploded in a blue flame that spread outwards.

  The demon laughed and turned to ashes. The sand, the plaza and all the people he still couldn’t remember turned to ashes. Kale was engulfed in flames, but he no longer felt the pain of the fire licking his skin. When he looked once more, he was floating in a gulf of darkness. The only light came from the flames that burned in the darkness. His body was aflame.

  He looked out into the void and saw a small bright speck of light. It was a dark blue hue. As it floated to her, he saw a baby girl inside of the ice. He tried to reach out to her but she kept flying away from him. It kept moving away from him, staying just out of his range. A deep blue glow emanated from the ice and Kale lost sight of the baby within it. He struggled to swim through the void towards the ice crystal. He kept swimming until he ran into it. It had grown much larger, and was now a lot bigger than he was.

  Kale looked into the ice and saw Uli encased within. Her eyes were closed and there appeared to be a great wound on her stomach. The blood was frozen and sprayed out into the ice. Kale started beating on the ice with his hands, but to no avail. Each blow sent the ice crystal spinning and he soon found it floating away from him. He had left burnt marks on the crystal. He looked at his hands and they were still awash in a blue flame.

  He watched the ice crystal float away towards a large white sun. It stopped next to a man and a woman. They resembled Uli, especially in the eyes. They caught the ice crystal, and when they did it shattered. Uli was no longer there, but a child, a girl, was.

  “We have to do it,” the man said. The woman looked up. Tears fell from her cheeks.

  Behind the sun, thousands of black spheres began coming into view. They were headed towards the couple and the child. When Kale focused on the child again, he saw a large bowl made out of the same blue ice underneath her. The woman held the child over the bowl while the man poured a dark liquid into the bowl. Steam hissed off the liquid as it poured into the bowl. The woman cried out as she let the child go. She floated down slowly until she sank into the dark liquid. A bright blue light erupted from the bowl. The man and woman disintegrated as the light expanded. When it reached the sun and the black spheres, it wiped them out too. The light reached its apex, then began contracting into itself. As it emptied back into the bowl, all that was left was a giant black hole.

  Kale swam over to the bowl and looked inside. He saw Uli, but she was made of the blue ice this time. She still had the gaping wound in her stomach. Blue sparks floated up and out of the wound and formed a glittering trail that was sucked down into the black hole. Kale looked down and the bowl was gone. He spun around and Uli was standing a distance away. The wound was still there, but nothing more came out of it. She was still made of the blue ice. She pointed behind Kale to the black hole.

  “That,” she said, “is my purpose.”

  She reached down to her stomach and covered it up with her hands. Kale could somehow feel the coldest of the ice seeping out from within the wound. Whatever they had done to her had destroyed the life inside of her. It had left her a frozen husk.

  He looked down at his hands again. The blue flame continued to roll over his skin. He could feel the heat within, seeping through the skin. He closed his eyes and could see the fire broiling within him, deep inside his heart. When he opened his eyes, he could see crystal tears floating away from Uli’s eyes.

  “I have no life in me,” she cried out.

  Kale felt himself floating over to her. He stopped just outside of arm’s length.

  “Have mine,” he offered.

  They watched as her frozen tears melted under his flames. Kale reached out his hand and took hers. The ice shattered when he touched her hand and she screamed out in pain. Her hand was a bright blue. He pulled her into him, embracing her deeply. As they met, their lips touched and the rest of the ice exploded off of her. As they lost themselves in each other, she began to pass through him as a mist. Kale turned around and saw that a blue fog rolled off of her bare skin. He looked down at his own body and saw his own skin. His chest bore no scars.

  He reached out to her again. She was just beyond his reach, but as she reached out to him, bright white threads of light weaved out between their hands. Kale looked down and saw that the threads of light were sprouting all over his body and quickly growing. Many sped off and intertwined with Uli, who vanished into the threads. He turned around and gasped at the sight of all the stars, planets and galaxies he could see. The threads continued to flow out from his skin. He looked under him and saw Gadoni far below him, with its bright green and purple colors mixed in with the blue oceans. Ahead of him he saw the threads started to concentrate into a funnel and then vanish down a hole in space.

  Kale reached out and tugged at one of the threads that flew off towards the hole. When he touched it, he felt it vibrate and he could feel everything along its entire length. He closed his eyes and saw the hole. A giant black sphere with hundreds of long feet squeezed through the hole. Behind it, hundreds of smaller spheres came pouring through.

&nb
sp; Kale sensed a deep rumble from the sphere. He could swear that it was looking at him, or better yet, through him. He looked back and saw the bright planet off in the distance. The three suns were spinning around behind it. In one dark cloud, the spheres began speeding past him. Kale turned to look at the largest sphere as it hovered directly in front of him.

  “Kale,” he heard it whispering.

  Kale started falling. He looked down and saw the ground on Gadoni rushing up to meet him.

  He closed his eyes and waited for the impact.

  ***

  Kale opened his eyes and everything was normal. He felt warm and safe and was covered in a soft fur blanket. He moved a bit, buried as he was in the furs, and touched someone’s arm. He sat up, uncovering himself. He quickly lifted up his shirt and checked his scars, but they were all still there. He lowered the shirt as he felt the cool chill of the night air. There were no moons in the sky, and if they were, they’d be hard pressed to shine through the clouds. He tried to look off into the east, towards the ocean, but the clouds blocked most of that view as well.

  Kale drew the edges of the furs up close to him, then reached to his right and uncovered a bit of the blankets. Uli lay sleeping, snuggled deep inside the warmth of the soft fur. He covered her up again. It was then that he remembered what had happened. He looked down at his wrists but had a hard time seeing anything. He felt at them with his hands, and could feel the bump where she had stuck him with the spikes.

  He remembered the vision.

  “Kale,” he heard.

  It was a very faint sound. Kale twisted and turned to try to find out where the sound was coming from. He heard it again and this time, it was coming from within the fur blankets. He went digging down in them and found his ear piece. It must have fallen out at some point. He quickly stuck it into his ear. In the commotion, Uli stirred and sat straight up. Kale could see that she was wide awake.

  “You saw?” she asked.

  Kale tapped the earpiece. “I'm here.”

  “Kale.” It was the feminine voice of Cove.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “The Galaxy is back in orbit and Ayia is with them. They detected the black spheres.”

  Kale stood up quickly.

  “You saw them?” Uli said.

  Kale looked back down at her.

  “What?” he asked. He shook his head. “The large spaceship. They detected the black spheres.”

  “Cove, have Sentinel lock in on me and fly up here. I don’t have time to walk off this mountain,” Kale ordered.

  Uli stood up, wrapping herself in the blankets. “You saw them in your vision?”

  Kale was trying to listen to both Cove and Uli at the same time.

  “Sentinel isn’t here. But I can fly and get you,” Cove replied into his ear.

  “Ok, wait. What? Where is…hold on Cove,” Kale said, stammering. “What do you mean I saw them?” he directed that question at Uli.

  “I was there. You saw something beyond my vision,” she said.

  “You saw all of that?” he asked. “I was there, with you. We….” He started to say, trying to remember.

  “I saw your pain. It burns within you,” she said.

  Kale looked down at her stomach. She raised her shirt and showed him. There were no wounds and certainly no scars.

  “What did I see?” he asked.

  “You saw that I am dead inside,” she said. “But you gave me life.”

  The images continued to float through his mind. He saw them together. It was all very confusing. Then he saw the black spheres.

  “Oh shit, did I really see them?” he wondered out loud. He tapped the earpiece again. “Cove, where is Sentinel? Where is everyone?”

  “Ayia is on board the Galaxy. Gheno, Karai and Sentinel are somewhere else.”

  “Uhm,” Kale tried to think through the mental fog. “Sentinel isn’t on board?”

  “Who is Sentinel?” Uli asked.

  “He is not. He has left the ship. All source code is gone. He has uploaded somewhere else,” Cove responded.

  “What the hell happened while I was high?” he asked.

  “Who is Sentinel?” Uli asked again.

  “That’s a very long story. I think I saw the black spheres in my vision dream thing,” Kale said. “Is that possible?”

  “You saw the evil spirits? Your threads led you to them?” she asked.

  “I think so. I'm not sure really. But they were flying here. I think.”

  Uli’s eyes grew wide. She dropped the blankets and ran to her pack.

  “Kale, Gheno is asking me to come fly to him. He says they have lost Sentinel,” Cove’s voice chirped into his ear.

  “LOST HIM!?” Kale shouted. “What is going on?”

  “Kale, what should I do?” Cove asked.

  “Do you have a lock on my location?” Kale asked. Cove said she did. “Then go get Gheno and Karai and then come get me. We have to get into the air.”

  Cove acknowledged and his earpiece went silent. Kale turned around and Uli was speaking into a small rock. He turned his head slightly to the side.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “I am talking to the hive at the city. I am warning them,” she said.

  “You're talking to them with that?” he asked, pointing at the rock.

  “I am. This being can carry our voices from itself to others of its kind.”

  Kale covered his mouth. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. You have found everything you need on this planet.”

  Kale helped Uli pack everything back up. It was difficult in the dark, but they managed to get everything wrapped up. Kale explained that his ship would fly up to get them and then they could go back to the city. From there he needed to find out what was going on with Sentinel.

  “I have to ask again,” Uli began. Kale stopped her.

  “Sentinel is...”Kale thought, “he is a being that lives in my ship. He is, in a way, a part of the ship, but he is not the ship.”

  “He is a spirit?” Uli asked.

  “Yes, I think. Something like that.”

  “I did not see him in my threads when I first saw you.”

  “It’s because, I think, he’s not alive in any sense you may know,” Kale tried to explain.

  Uli’s face suddenly grew dark. “Like the evil spirits in the dark web?”

  “Well. Maybe. We are not sure yet,” Kale said sheepishly.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.

  “He, Sentinel, he is a secret. Even back on Earth, his kind aren’t allowed to exist.”

  “But he is not evil?”

  “No. No, he is not.”

  “But the dark spirits out there…”she began.

  Kale interrupted. “Some men are evil, some are not. They are all still men.”

  Uli was lost in thought. Kale walked over to the edge of the clearing, trying to see through the clouds and darkness, but he couldn’t see anything at all. Uli walked up behind him.

  “Maybe, a spirit is the best defense against another spirit.”

  Kale turned around. “I'm not sure. I think we will certainly need him.”

  He reached out and put his hand on her shoulder then drew her in to him. Her warm body felt good against his.

  “You saw my vision?” he asked.

  “I did.”

  Kale was about to speak when he heard a very loud swooshing noise. They both spun around and tried to peer into the darkness. The clouds were swirling. From within the darkness, a very large form flew at them hovering just above them. They both fell over in shock and from the gust of wind. Kale scrambled back to his feet, helping Uli up. They ran back away from the shape. Whatever it was, it was large, and had wings and a head.

  “It’s…” Kale gasped. “It’s an eagle?”

  “No, it’s a Vahe,” Uli said, “but, this one is different. The threads, they go through it like a living beast.”

  Three legs lowered from the Vahe. Two
grabbed on to the side of the mountain and the third, just under the head, lowered down to the ground. There was a strange humming sound and a faint familiar vibration. The shape of the Vahe seemed familiar to Kale. Just in front of the third leg, a plank lowered and a glow emanated from within.

  “You sure it’s a Vahe?” Kale asked. “One of yours?”

  “It is a Vahe,” she said, “but it isn’t like any I’ve seen.”

  “I'm going to regret this,” he said.

  Kale took Uli by the hand and rushed off towards the Vahe. He ran up the lowered plank and into the Vahe. He instantly recognized the inner layout.

  “I know this ship!” he exclaimed.

  He looked down a narrow hallway into the ship, then looked back into the head. It was the pilot’s cabin. It was the same layout, down to the Captain’s chair.

  “I don’t believe it,” he said. “It’s the Midnight Oil….or a damn good copy.”

  “Believe it.” The voice echoed through the hull of the Vahe, coming from deep within the walls themselves. It was the same voice he had gotten used to over the past four years, but it was more organic now.

  “Sentinel?”

  3127 – Gadoni, Fields under The Shadow

  “Uhm, Cove. I think I need you to come get us,” Gheno said, standing there stupefied.

  It had been the greatest day in his life. For the past five years, Gheno had worked relentlessly on his research into biological hardware. His ultimate goal had initially been to create a working and living computer, with the ability to grow and expand without the installation of additional hardware. He dreamed of a computer system that could expand to meet its or its user’s needs. What Gheno had never foreseen when he first started his research at the age of thirteen, was that his purpose would change.

  He had always had an interest in AI technology. He had studied the matter as thoroughly as he could, given the limited resources humanity had. He had read everything he could find on the self-aware computer beings that mankind had created as powerful servants nearly eight-hundred years ago. He had also read up on every detail about the mysterious rebel AIs and the consequent war Earth had fought against their artificial servants. The result of that war had been the extermination of all self-aware AIs and the creation of strict laws and guidelines for any new AI.