by Jason Kent
Kate felt she was missing something. But what? She looked around the engine room again, straining to see past the drifting steam and constantly churning machinery. A series of lighted windows overlooking the center of the chamber caught her attention.
"Hey!" Kate called to the others. "I think I found the control room." She looked over her shoulder when no one responded. The sound of gunfire from across the room testified to the real danger of a counterattack by the ship's crew and their mechs. Merrick was firing across the chamber, adding his precision targeting to the marines engaging a newly arrived trio of attackers.
No one gave any indication they heard Kate above the constant thrumming which filled the engine room. She looked back up at the glowing panes.
"Don't worry guys," Kate announced and pulled herself along a series of pipes toward the control room, "I'll check it out."
Kate reached a landing running under the windows. She hooked her legs around the railing and gazed into the room.
The control room was a wonder of mechwork. Brass gleamed everywhere under the flickering lights. Hundreds of gauges and levers lined the walls, more were laid out on the consoles which filled the space. Pressure lines and electrical conduits hung from the ceiling connecting the gleaming panels to the components they controlled. Although there appeared to be workstations for a dozen Tallinns, no one was in sight.
"Left the fighting to the mechs, eh?" Kate noted. She figured the engine crew, either by their own smarts or warned off by the ironclad's security forces, had obviously sought safe refuge elsewhere aboard the huge ship. Kate approached a door which also served as an airlock in case of an emergency. An optical sensor scanned her. A moment later gears turned and the round door components parted with smooth precision. The aperture sealed once Kate was inside the lock. The inner door opened and she stepped into the relative silence of the control room. The smells of polish and copper replaced the odors of oil and hot metal.
She ran her fingers along one of the panels in front of the windows overlooking the engines. Outside, she could see the marines putting the final touches on their sabotage. Rattling fire from two or three rifles stopped the latest mech threat at the far entrance. Merrick scanned the engine room with his scope, seeking new targets.
"Looking for me?" Kate spoke loudly into a funnel she determined to be a public address system. She saw the sniper start at the sound of her voice as it boomed over the pounding of the pistons and crackle of electricity. His gaze landed on her face behind the window. He shook his head and started to move her way. Satisfied someone at least knew where she was, Kate turned to study the rest of the control room and froze. There was someone in a reclining chair at the rear of the room, nearly hidden by the cables and pipes which dropped out of the ceiling. Unlike the rest of the compartment with its soft amber light, the consoles surrounding the figure were cloaked in shadow. Swallowing her fear, Kate moved closer to the figure. She felt an unexplained and overpowering urge to see this Tallinn's face.
Kate grasped the brass railings set around the consoles and inched toward the platform holding the Tallinn's raised seat. As she moved closer, she saw the couch was made of a material molded around the man's frail figure. Despite the weightlessness, he was held comfortably in place. She pulled herself slowly past the last row of consoles and pushed aside a bundle of cables drifting from the ceiling then used them to steady herself near the couch.
Kate leaned over the reclining figure. He was aged beyond measure, his hair a thin white mane pulled back from his head and gathered in a loose knot at the back of his neck in what Kate understood to be the Tallinn fashion. His mouth hung open slightly. Kate wondered if he was asleep...or dead. She placed her ear close to his cracked lips, testing for signs of respiration. Kate felt warm breath upon her cheek.
"You've come."
Kate jerked back, shocked by the raspy voice speaking in her ear. She met the old Tallinn's eyes, now open and alert. Kate was enthralled by his pupils, black pools surrounded by startling blue irises flecked with gold and shards of jade. What really caused her breath to catch was the fact the man's eyes glowed from within, gleaming with a golden light like a lost treasure, newly uncovered.
...the key to knowledge...future paths a mystery no more...
The voice inside Kate's head was as clear as if someone were speaking directly to her. She shook her head. What the tral?
"I'm sorry," Kate felt oddly at a loss for how to react as she stared into the Tallinn's luminescent eyes, "I've what?" Should she be polite to a member of the crew she, with no small help of the Marines, was trying so hard to blow up? The Tallinn before her seemed to have no interest in defending himself, even if, in his frail state, he were capable of mounting any serious resistance. She wondered if he possessed some form of mechanical augmentation which would explain the eyeshine. If this were the case, he could have strength to spare, putting her in immediate danger. Kate started to pull back but stopped when the figure spoke again.
"You've come," the Tallinn repeated. He gazed up at her, his face serene, as if he did not care about the tremendous battle raging on all about them and which his ship played such a key role. He sighed and added, "at last, you've come."
Kate looked behind her. Through the command center windows, she could see a few members of the team. They seemed to be finished with their work and now headed for the exit. When she turned back, the man met her gaze with his glowing eyes. Kate felt a wave of guilt well up within her for the destruction her team planned to unleash.
"We have to—" Kate faltered, not wanting to voice the Tallinn's death sentence.
"Yes," the man interrupted then completed Kate's statement, "...disable the interdiction device. Save your Fleet. You have your duty. As do I." He stretched out his right hand towards Kate.
Kate grabbed hold of the man's arm and held it tightly, afraid he was about to sound an alarm or activate an emergency system which would seal off the chamber, evac their atmosphere, or, well, there were just so many extremely painful ways to die in space.
"Fear not." The Tallinn made no exertion against Kate's grasp, either to move his hand closer or to pull away.
"Who are you?"
"A Watcher," the Tallinn held up his free hand to stop Kate's obvious question, "I am called Javin."
"What exactly are you doing here, Javin?" Kate nodded at the bedding molding itself around Javin. It appeared to be more than just making him comfortable. "Are you a prisoner?"
Javin gave a soft laugh and smiled. "Hardly. I foresaw this...victory. The battle plan was shown to me and carried out per my directions."
"Shown?" Kate wondered aloud.
"Allow me to share with you."
The peace emanating from Javin's luminescent gaze over-powered Kate's reluctance. She released her grip. Javin reached behind her and laid his hand at the nape of Kate's neck. She succumbed to the light pull of his aged muscles and allowed the Watcher to draw her nearer to his face.
"End this," Javin urged. "The time is very near. This I have seen!"
What did he mean? Kate was getting lost in the man's eyes again. She could not fathom what he was talking about. The intensity of his gaze increased as Javin's eyeshine grew even brighter.
"Knowl calls you", Javin whispered. "Go to him. Free him!"
"I'm sorry, Javin," Kate replied. She wanted to pull away, afraid she had encountered an unpredictable, mad Tallinn. But she also wanted to find out what he was talking about. "I don't understand. Who's...Knowl?" Kate blinked and focused on the Watcher's eyes. "Why are—"
"Free us all!" Javin gasped and grew excited. "Go to Knowl!"
Kate opened her mouth to speak and froze.
Javin's hand squeezed harder across the nape of Kate's neck, his grip surprisingly strong in stark contrast to his apparent frailty.
Intense heat and incredible pressure at the back of Kate's neck paralyzed her. One thought ran through Kate's mind, killed by an old man...great. All further thoughts were quickly driven
from her mind.
Kate wanted to scream but could not make her voice work. Fire flared down her spine from the Watchers hand and spread through her arms to each finger and down her legs until even her toes seemed to be burning. Untold thousands of images, forced their way relentlessly across her inner eye. Everything bursting into her mind was overlaid by the Watcher's eyes exploding into golden suns. The roar of millions of voices speaking, crying, laughing, and dying all at once built in her ears while the smell of a hundred worlds filled her nostrils. Kate's senses overloaded and climaxed in blue-white lightning which flashed through her mind and drowned out all else.
A sob of things found and lost escaped Kate's throat as the cascade of emotions dropped away. Javin's grip slackened. His hand fell.
Kate was frozen in place, completely unsure of what to do next.
Breathe, Kate told herself finally. Just breathe.
Kate managed a ragged breath and reached deep for the energy to move. She pushed away from Javin's couch and crashed against a line of control levers at a nearby console. Dazed, she swallowed hard to keep from throwing up. Kate stared back at the old man, her vision swam in and out of focus. He stared back at her, his eyes still glowed, with the gold-tinged phosphorescent inner light, but they dimmed more with each passing second. As Kate watched, Javin's fire flickered and was gone.
"Wait!" Kate breathed. She opened her mouth to ask what she should do now but no words came. Tears welled up in Kate's eyes as she realized the light behind Javin's eyes would never return.
The Watcher was dead.
A flash in Kate's peripheral vision caught her attention. She moved her head slowly to keep it from exploding and tried to identify the source of the light. A line of brass-framed gauges provided all the reflective surfaces she needed to identify the source of the flash.
Kate was looking at two eyes which glowed with the same intense light as Javin's just moments before
Kate's eyes...Eyes of the Watcher.
Kate inhaled sharply and screwed her eyes shut. She opened them slowly. Her eyes still gleamed and reflected off the brass and glass surfaces of the control room. Unlike Javin's golden eyes, Kate's burned with an intense blue flame. With trembling fingers, she reached around to the back of her neck. Kate felt the lingering heat of Javin's touch. She began to feel there was more to the touch of the Watcher than simply contact. Something—
...cool breeze laden with the heavy fragrance of wild flowers bursting with life...deep grass sprouting from rich moist soil...dew not quite burned off from the rising morning sun...light, more orange than Kate was used to, suffused everything, accented each blade of grass and flower petal, caught floating motes and lazy insects flying about their business...water gurgled to itself nearby and fed a clear pool...
Creaking in the distance, limbs moving with the wind, leaves rustled, whispering to Kate, calling to her...Kate looked up from the bounty of the field all around her...in the distance, a massive tree, at first Kate thought it an oak but realized no oak ever grew to the gigantic proportions displayed before her now...
A knotted trunk plunged massive roots into the soil, possibly all the way down to the bedrock of this world. The roots would need to grasp solid stone to support the utterly impressive bulk of the giant tree. From the ground, the trunk soared upward. Thick branches, twined together in places spread out and sheltered a calm, silver-faced pool of spring water. High above the lightest branches at the top of the tree waved in the breeze; brushing the sky with gentle fingers covered with fluttering, heart-shaped leaves. A sense of ancient watchfulness permeated the scene...someone...something sensed her...
'Katherine Michelle—'
Kate pulled her hand away from her neck when she heard her given name spoken in her mind. As the vision began to fade, Kate gasped for air. She screwed her eyes shut and tried to force her mind back into the memory. She sobbed as the vision dimmed. She needed to get back there. Kate wanted nothing more than to stay in the presence of the great tree...forever.
"No," Kate declared and forced her thoughts back to the others and the battle. She shook her head. Javin's duty belonged to him. Whatever Javin's touch did to transform her to fulfill his orders, Kate knew her duty must be carried out. She opened her eyes and looked at her reflection again. Unfamiliar blue eyes gleamed at her.
"Thanks a lot, Javin," Kate sighed.
'You must survive.'
Kate jerked her head up at the sound of Javin's voice. She looked back at the Watcher's still form. She looked left and right then raised herself up to see over the console she slumped against. Save for Javin's lifeless form, Kate was alone. She rubbed her temples.
"Super," Kate breathed and ran her hand through her hair. "Now I've got another voice in my head."
Chapter 4
Black Death
Delivered
The sound of tapping on glass drew Kate's attention to the control room windows. Merrick had pulled himself through the maze of pipes and supports in the engine room and was staring at her. His face was slightly distorted by the imperfections in the glass. He looked at the airlock doors then back in at Kate. He shrugged a 'What's up', questioning look at her then tapped his wrist.
When Kate did not respond, Merrick tapped experimentally on the glass again. A rattling sound caught his attention. The sniper looked back over his shoulder to the source of the gunfire.
"We're leaving!" His shout was muted by the thick panes.
Kate started to get up to answer but a wave of nausea overwhelmed her. She watched as Merrick braced his legs against the railing and struck the window with the butt of his rifle. The window cracked but did not break. Kate pulled herself lower behind the console as Merrick smashed rifle against the pane again. The second hit proved to be all the window could handle. Shards of glass flew through the air and clattered against the brass consoles and gauges. When the debris stopped sailing past her, Kate edged up to find Merrick knocking out the remaining pieces of glass from the frame. Merrick rolled through the broken window and made his way carefully to Kate's side.
"You okay?" Merrick shouted. With the window broken, the high decibel racket of the engine room spilled in and displaced the relative quiet of the command center. His eyes roved the room and locked on Javin. He leveled his rifle at the Tallinn's still form.
"Friend of yours?"
"No," Kate responded and shook her head. "He...well he's some sort, was, some sort of advisor. Someone called a Watcher—"
'Come to me.'
Kate closed her eyes. Tried to place the voice, it was different than the one she heard just a moment ago. She knew it was not Javin...at least in bodily form. She frowned. Was the Watcher speaking to her from...from where? As if in answer to her question, the image of the great tree filled her mind again. Whereas before she felt as if she could have walked forward and touch the tree's rough bark, now she seemed to be seeing the massive tree standing alone in its green field from even further away. Kate's heart swelled with the overwhelming desire to find the tree. She needed to be under the spreading branches again, lay in the cool grass in the dappled shade—
Merrick's hand laid gently across on her shoulder brought Kate back to the reality of the ironclad's control room.
"Are you injured?" The sniper began. He leaned in close and studied first her left eye and then the right. "You're eyes..."
Kate brushed a stray strand of hair out of her face. "Nice look, right?"
Merrick glanced around the control room quickly then settled his intense gaze back on Kate. He leaned forward and raised her face with his hand. As he gazed into her eyes, he asked, "Radiation?"
"More like memory dump," Kate shrugged, "I think." She grimaced at the pain in her shoulders. God, she thought, everything hurt.
'Survive. Go to Knowl. Free us all!'
Kate ran a hand over her glowing eyes at the sound of Javin's voice. Two voices in my head, she thought. When she looked up, she found Merrick's worried gaze studying her. She took a deep bre
ath.
"Look," Kate sighed and leaned close to the sniper. "I have no idea what just happened. All I know is I have some dead guy's voice in my head and he keeps telling me to get out of here. I also have the overwhelming urge to find something I believe is sacred to the Tallinn."
"But, your eyes—" Merrick began.
"Forget them," Kate stated as a new insight sprang into her conscious. Her eyes went wide and she shared it with Merrick. "We can end the war!"
Merrick raised his eyebrows but said nothing.
'Free us all,' Javin's voice filled Kate's mind.
"I got it," Kate declared aloud to the voice only she could hear. She looked at Merrick, tapped her temple, and explained, "Sorry. There are two conversations going on at once in here."
Merrick rubbed his jaw and came to some silent conclusion. He nodded, reached out to Kate, and pulled her close. Through her foggy mind she saw her gun nearby. Kate snagged the weapon from where it still floated after she let it go during her encounter with Javin. Merrick pushed off. Even with one arm holding his rifle at the ready and one wrapped around Kate, Merrick was able to smoothly maneuver both of them through the improvised entryway.
Kate took one last look back at the center of the room. She caught a glimpse of Javin's face through the hanging conduits and brass consoles.
"Rest well," Kate breathed. She felt this was not near enough to say over the Watcher. She felt she knew Javin all too well due the memory dumps and at the same time barely knew him at all. Merrick kicked off from the command center window frame and Javin was gone forever.
Out in the engine room again, Kate realized she was able to comprehend every gear, piston, steam release, and pulse of energy through the electrical system. She grabbed her head and screwed her eyes shut. Slowly Kate discovered she could block out some of the input into her overloaded senses if she focused on something else. She thought of Merrick and could instantly hear the steady beat of his heart and deep, even breathing. Even amidst the chaos all around them, the sniper remained calm. Kate picked up a new sound; approaching mechs. Kate knew she should not have been able to pick out the noises in the distant corridors. But, with voices in her head and her new inner vision, she was willing to roll with it.
