by James Harris
Over the next few hours, Amonda’s life signs slowly become stable. Freshly oxygenated blood replenished the cryogenically frozen blood. Dead blood cells were flushed and replaced with vibrant ones. Her skin took on a pink hue, although that was not visible through the greencolored gel. Her organs were rejuvenated and found to be functioning perfectly. The body was ready to accept the mind transition from the crypt-orb.
The Bot was attached wirelessly to the ship’s main computer. It was programmed to observe the progress of the transition. It knew that the time for the transfer of the crypt-orb had come. It moved toward the chamber and touched the control device that housed the orb. The transition was initiated immediately. The crypt-orb began transferring its precious cargo of data back into Amonda’s brain. It would take under fifteen minutes. The Bot would monitor the brain for temperature.
Once the transition was completed, a jolt of electricity passed through the gel to awaken Amonda. Her eyes fluttered as she swam up from deep unconsciousness.
When Amonda had surrendered her live body to be cryogenically stored, her Being was freed from her physical body. For those two hundred years, her Being had felt little inclination to drift into the empty cosmos of space. It felt joyful to remain nearby, basking in the sheer joy of timeless existence.
Now, as naturally as winter turns to spring, Amonda’s consciousness returned into the plane of existence that defines this world. The euphoria of timelessness came to a sudden end as the mind was reactivated and reunited with the Being. The human being became whole again.
Consciousness and cognition. Crashing sensations! From a heavenly body to the mud of animal existence.
The chamber emptied and the door opened. She gagged on some gel that had entered her mouth. Her body fell forward awkwardly. The Bot caught her.
Welcome back to the real world. There was work to be done.
The queen mother awoke, sensing a change. Her eyes flicked open in her crypt. A cruel smile cracked her lips. She had waited eons for this moment, foretold in her meditation.
CHAPTER50
Amonda sat comfortably in Gamma III’s pilot command chair, her arm at a cranked angle on the arm pad, and examined the 240-degree monitor.
On either side of the massive view screen – thanks to the light reflection of several faraway star clusters – she could see the images of Gamma I and Gamma II. The royal barge logo of the House of Narok was visible, dark and blurry against the stark blue-white of Gamma I’s hull. The three vessels remained in tight formation. All three vessels appeared motionless.
Amonda had spent the last few days resting and meditating. For many years she had existed without her mind. There had been no brain to conjure up images or thoughts. There had been existence, and joy, and simplicity, and peacefulness, and love. Most importantly, there had been the holistic awareness of who she was. There was the simplistic awareness of Being – of existing in the universe.
She was now the human called Amonda again.
She had existed in the past; she existed right now; and she could possibly exist again in some future time and place. Amonda, and all past and future Amondas, lined up like multiple mirrors reflecting the same image. Those images, she knew, were but possible futures compared to where she was now at this precise moment in time. This place existed like an island in the vast cosmos of space, a space that allows different planes of reality and possibility to exist simultaneously. These planes overlapped, she knew, and they would contradict each other were it not for the huge molecular and subatomic spaces between each. They would never clash, because to clash would be the ultimate contradiction. A contradiction of science and space.
The most recent beacon message from Prince Stell was on a popup screen. The prince had completed his mission to find a new home. He had landed on a suitable planet. That was good news! However, the rest of the message was odd and disturbing. Gamma III was to break off from the other two ships and secretly steer toward this new planet. Amonda was not to alert the others. She was not to revive the other two wizards, Asunda and Alexia.
Stell had had claimed the new planet for the House of Abishot alone; the House of Narok was to be excluded.
The fate of the other two scout ships came as another blow. Alpha I had fatally crashed and there was no mention that Prince Kor had survived. Alpha III was missing. There was nothing to indicate that Stell and his crew weren’t the sole survivors. It was an ominous omission.
Amonda’s instructions were to spirit the cruiser Gamma III away from the small fleet and head to Earth’s coordinates. Once there and established, Amonda and Stell would oversee the assimilation of the entire contingent of the House of Abishot into the native population. There were about ten thousand Abishot crypt-orbs on board. The remainder were Narok orbs. Stell made no mention of his plans for them. The planned assimilation would guarantee that the gifted minds of the Abishot would greatly enhance the lives of their native hosts. The House of Abishot would begin a fresh new dynasty on this new Sargon.
The welfare of the other two galactic cruisers was to be left to chance. There would be no marker beacon to guide the pilotless ships. The Beings of the House of Narok, stored aboard Gamma I and II, would journey into the innermost part of the galaxy toward the predetermined coordinates of suitable Sargon-like planets. If these targets were somehow missed, the Narok travelers could be trapped onboard, possibly for eternity.
Had this been Prince Stell’s plan all along? Amonda wondered. If so, he was truly his mother’s son. It was a deceitful and selfish plan, but one with a shrewd logic to it. Stell would conquer the Narok through trickery, because he knew that he couldn’t possibly do it in a fair battle.
Amonda had no choice but to obey Stell. She was the wizard of the Realm of the House of Abishot. He was Prince of the Abishot. Even if she disagreed with him, it was her duty to obey him.
She consulted her sky chart and superimposed Stell’s coordinates onto the screen to determine their relative position. It wasn’t far, about twenty light years away. Amonda plotted the course and reprogrammed the giant ship’s navigation system. Included in the beacon message had been a warning from Stell about Earth’s unusually strong magnetic core, which caused a tremendous gravitational pull on incoming spacecraft. As a safety precaution, the galactic cruiser was to enter an orbit that matched the orbit of the Earth’s single moon, no closer. Landing craft could transport the cargo of crypt-orbs from the safety of outer space to the planet surface.
Once the coordinates were locked into place, Amonda prepared to initiate the thrusters and activate the change in course. Only one thing remained to be done. A very secret thing. Something close to diabolical. She felt shame and remorse, but she had no choice. She was admittedly weak that way. She had to do it.
Amonda left the control room in a ready state. She was going to temporarily vacate the ship. Upon her return, she merely had to activate the mechanism to engage the ship’s new trajectory.
The launch area of Gamma III was cavernous – sixty feet long, sixty feet wide, and twenty feet high. The lighting consisted of hundreds of pinprick-sized spotlights of incredible brightness. The net effect wasn’t overly bright by any stretch, but each parked craft was clearly visible under its own dedicated spotlights.
Amonda selected a nimble six-seater transporter craft and maneuvered it skillfully across the launch deck’s rugged gray synthetic rubber floor. She idled the craft as she focused on an intent to open the iris-style launch door. The ship’s computer understood her command. The transporter passed cautiously through the opening. There was the expected honking of an alarm warning of an air breach.
The door eased shut as soon as her craft had left, and the launch area was repressurized in seconds.
The craft had few manual controls, and those that did exist were mainly for backup in the event of audio or mental communication failure. Amonda’s mind was connected to the ship via the bio-implant inserted under her skin. Upon mind-pattern recognition, the ship’s compute
r would acknowledge her as the operator. It would send and receive commands from her on a unique frequency reserved for her.
The craft propelled itself away from the cruiser using its two tiny, highly efficient, high-energy ion pulse thrusters. The small craft traveled the fifty thousand feet between Gamma III and Gamma I in a matter of a few minutes. Its on-board brain hailed Gamma I and was granted immediate access to the launch port. The portal winked open. Amonda’s small craft entered and docked with Gamma I’s systems before shutting down its thrusters. The space door had already closed behind her, and the aircraft hangar cavity was stabilizing pressure to normal.
Amonda was given the OK, and the transporter door flew open with a soft hiss as the atmosphere of the two ships mingled. She stepped gingerly out onto the tarmac. She had always been wary of space stations and galactic cruisers right after repressurization. These systems were all automated and, after long trips in space, they were subject to error. When it came to requisite air pressure and oxygen, machines were not human; they didn’t have to breathe. She did. She was ready to hop back into the transporter if the air wasn’t right.
The air had a faint odor of plastic and machine oil, but it was breathable. Her step was light as she strode across the tarmac. She entered the flight deck elevator and was whisked immediately to the control room.
Her Signature had not been command-approved for this vessel. She couldn’t navigate or otherwise control the craft. However, her security clearance did allow her to access the ship’s data on a read-only basis. She decided on vocal dialogue.
“Gamma I, greetings.”
“Greetings, Master Amonda.”
“Produce visual activity log, Signature Asunda, dating backward from last known activity to one year prior. Group by day. No subgroup.”
The main screen began to scroll through dozens of images per second. It ended. No luck.
“Produce similar log, dating backward from launch date to one year prior.”
Again the screen flashed with a multitude of images.
“Stop! Produce subgroup image for each day. Stop! Continue at realtime speed.”
There it was. On the screen she saw Asunda, standing on the lower cargo deck in the bowels of the galactic cruiser, supervising the uncrating of what appeared to be black obelisk crypts. Each crypt was eight feet in height, with a highly polished ebony-colored surface. They shone as if made of marble. There were twelve crypts in all, each standing upright, aligned in a perfect row.
The setup crew left the scene. Asunda appeared alone on deck. The image showed him with his hand on the surface of the nearest statue. His lips were moving, but the audio didn’t pick up what he had said. He talked for a few minutes before leaving. Amonda did catch one phrase by reading his lips – the words were easy to decipher. They were: Ancient Ones.
“Exact location of surveillance video?”
“Deck D. Room IV. Restricted access.”
“Restricted how?”
“Digital retinal recognition.”
“Retinal owner?”
“Master Asunda.”
“End help. Go off-line until I recall you.”
“Sorry. Request denied. Only Master Asunda can issue that command.”
“Then remain on-line.”
“I have always been on-line. Your activities are being logged.”
“My presence has been recorded?”
“All activities.”
Amonda was not pleased about Asunda’s auto-order for the ship to stay on-line. It seemed like a strange practice for a long space voyage. Asunda was not one to squander energy; he must have had his reasons for keeping the ship on this level of alert.
Amonda faced the fact that the ship would be able to archive what was about to transpire. Records were not a good thing if what you were doing wasn’t legitimate. Amonda knew that the penalty for what she was going to do was severe.
Since all three Gamma ships were constructed identically, Amonda knew the location of the storage area. She hailed an elevator and was whisked along and down until she was below on D-deck. She walked up the hallway to Room IV.
She stopped in front of the retinal image scanner console. Since the console was connected to the mainframe of the ship’s computer, it recognized her immediately.
“This is a restricted area. Access denied, Master Amonda.”
Amonda didn’t move. She remained in front of the scanner.
“Repeat. This is a restricted area. Access denied.”
A swirling breeze began to seep out from under the door. It carried a fragrance of citrus. Amonda could feel a presence coil itself around her legs and slowly wind its way up her body. She became completely immersed in this invisible presence. The fragrance was so pleasant, so soothing – like something from long ago. She smiled knowingly, swaying slightly from side to side as she succumbed to the unseen power that enveloped her. Her quiet feelings were jarred awake by the voice of the console.
“Access granted. Alternative retina accepted.”
Some unseen power had overridden the command left by Asunda.
The door clicked, and the security bolts were released with a soft hiss. Amonda reached out and opened the composite-fiber door. As she entered, a bank of soft lights slowly brightened overhead, acknowledging her presence. The contents of the room focused into stark clarity within a few seconds. Straight ahead, to the right, a row of upright lifesized crypts gleamed against the wall, each directly under a bright spotlight. Her heart skipped a beat. She could feel her blood pounding in her ears.
“It is I, Majesty. Which one of these crypts are you in?”
There was a mute cackle of laughter.
In the middle of the pack of obelisks, a door blew off a black crypt and went skittering across the room. It bounced off the far wall and waddled before flopping onto the floor of the room. Amonda’s eyes went from the wall back to the open crypt. A bony hand appeared from inside the crypt and crept over the edge. Then the other appeared, grasping the opposite side of the box. Together, the hands helped propel the Queen Mother of Abishot from the barren box. A faint fog followed her body like a shadow before its wispy entrails dissipated into the air.
The queen smiled the smile of the eternally damned. There was no mirth, only unchecked power driven by smoldering hatred. The tinkering of mankind’s technology had made her virtually immortal. Her powers had increased since Amonda had seen her last. She must have been meditating, consolidating her strengths. She was a frightful creature to behold, bitter after her last humiliation at the hands of the Narok.
What power will I unleash on the new world? Amonda wondered.
“Amonda, child,” the queen mother said. She sounded as if she had bronchial problems. Her voice was dull, raspy, and deep. “You have news?”
“I have.”
“Well, get on with it.”
“Don’t you need to rest after having been in hibernation for so long?”
“Child, all I have done for the past two hundred years is rest. Now is the time to get going. Now is the time to set things straight.”
Amonda handed the queen mother a flask of water and then relayed Stell’s message. The queen mother was delighted at the news.
“It’s more than I could have hoped for.” She looked around at the row of statue-like crypts. “Let’s leave this place. They have ears, these Ancient Ones.”
The queen mother settled into the seat beside Amonda. She wasn’t sitting in the seat, exactly, but somehow occupying a space in close proximity above the seat. She was there, but she wasn’t. She stared out the window of the transporter as the mammoth cruiser fell away from view. She looked directly at the center of the ship, its core, and smiled with satisfaction. It was there that she had planted the anti-matter bomb. It was timed to detonate six months from now, giving Amonda and her enough time to navigate toward Earth and put plenty of space between Gamma III and Gamma I.
She had had to plant the bomb secretly because of Amonda’s vows never to participate in taking a human life. She knew that Amonda would have tried to stop her. She would have tried to convince her that a ship that was asleep posed no threat to them. It would simply move deeper and deeper toward inner space. Why kill when it wasn’t necessary?
It was entirely necessary, the queen mother thought. The Narok must be exterminated for all time.
“I see great things in store for the Royal House of Abishot, daughter.”
Amonda smiled weakly. “Yes, Mother. As I am your daughter, I am bound to you. Your greatness is our greatness. The House of Abishot will rule a thousand generations from now.”
PARTTHREE
BROTHERHOOD OF THE TWO EARTHS
IT IS SAID THAT CHAOS OFTEN BREEDS LIFE, WHILE ORDER BREEDS HABIT.
CHAPTER51
MICHIGAN, MAY 1983
A crisp light morning fog had lifted, promising a warm day. The day was so new that the air hadn’t been warmed enough to give off any fragrance. The twins were on a farm, or ranch if you are from the Southwest. It was the family estate of the late senator, George R. Grayer, Frank Grayer’s father.
“I never knew we came from money,” Joe said as he walked with his father and brother along the white fence line through the new spring grass. They were headed to the trout stream that traversed the property.
“This isn’t money, son.”
“To most people it would be!”
He chuckled. “Maybe. To me this is simply home.”
“You grew up with all this?”
“The fact is, one part of me did and one part of me didn’t. You gotta wonder about the scheme of things sometimes.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right. The alien part of you never knew this place.”
