by Erik Hyrkas
They all rushed onto platform that normally zapped them over to the Silver City, but it did nothing. Whether it was disabled intentionally or due to the loss of power, there was no way to know. The distance between them and the city stretched out before them.
Brit glanced up at the small hole high above the mine entrance that she knew led to her halo and to safety.
“It looks like we’re running,” the slave in charge said. “Let’s move.”
They all started running across the hilly terrain between the mine and the city, but Brit quickly fell behind. She had been warned that they would not wait, and she didn’t complain or beg them to stay with her. She pushed herself, but the others were far faster. Within minutes, she only saw the others occasionally when they crested hills ahead of her. She pushed herself, but fatigue, hunger, and thirst brought her to a walk.
She pondered turning back. What good was it going to the city? There wouldn’t be room on the ship, and she wouldn’t be able to help fight. She shook her head in disgust at her own lack of backbone, then pushed on, walking up hills and jogging down them. The city slowly grew nearer, and her resolve to help, in whatever small way she might, steeled.
Hovering above the center of the city was a green ship shaped like a stadium-sized triangle with gold highlights running from the sharp nose to the sharp wingtips. From the front, the bottom and top bulged out, but the wings were thin. Downward-facing rotors in the wings allowed the ship to hover and turn gracefully.
On the horizon, white plumes trailed three dozen black objects that streaked in the direction of the city. She was certain that these ships were bearing the legion. Soon the city’s guard would be reinforced and all resistance crushed. In minutes they would be on top of her. Brit wasn’t sure how long it would take for them to drop soldiers, but she was sure that bad had just turned worse. She wondered if the ships themselves were armed and whether they would blow up Kauppias’s ship. Would they dare? There were laws about attacking lords, she knew, but then maybe Kauppias wasn’t on the ship—or maybe Jumala wouldn’t care about those laws.
She saw pockets of fighting at the edge of the city, but there were around fifty guards left standing, and those few guards were being overwhelmed by thousands of slaves all trying to get to the last ship out. She gripped her armilon and prepared herself for battle as she moved through the streets. She found no need to use the weapon, though. The typically pristine thoroughfares were smudged with blood and littered with the injured and dead. The smell of mingled fear and ozone wafted lazily around her, and the screams of terror and determination reached her from every direction.
She reached the tallest building where Kauppias’s ship hovered. A giant ring of thousands of slaves, only a few armed, surrounded the building. She stood on the edge of the throng facing the coming legion.
The ships passed overhead at blazing speed, raining searing hot blasts upon the crowd that burst into plums of green fog. The odor of the fog reminded Brit of the mine, and she knew that she had only moments of consciousness remaining. Those directly hit were burned badly, and those near them were already unconscious from the gas. This wasn’t going to be a battle, she realized. It was going to be a slaughter.
Above her she saw Kauppias’s massive ship rise, rotate, and spring away faster than her eyes could follow. She wobbled on her feet trying to think of some plan, some way to escape before she gave into the fumes. Brit slipped to the ground like those around her and stared for a few fuzzy moments at the blue sky.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“On your feet,” a guard said.
Brit blinked furiously. She touched her forehead, which had a new halo attached.
“I said, on your feet!” The guard nudged her with his foot.
She pushed herself up to a sitting position, and her vision went dark for a moment. She swayed, and then urged by a more insistent kick from the guard, she rose to her feet.
“You are being assigned to the mine,” the guard said.
Brit tried to speak and found that she was unable to move her jaw.
The guard saw the panic on her face and smiled. “You will find that there have been two long overdue changes, factors that have been determined to be the root cause of such an ugly rebellion. Slaves are no longer permitted to talk, and we have extended the power web to stretch into the deepest portions of the mine.”
Brit saw the platform she knew led to the mines. She was in the large manufacturing room that was not fully operational yet. There were many slaves still lying unconscious on the floor. She must have been among the first to awaken, she thought.
Groggily, she moved toward the platform, starting the cycle she expected would last for eternity. She glanced back at the guard, who had already moved on to wake the next slave.
Then she stepped onto the platform and appeared outside of the cave. Two guards stood on either side of the cave. They were wearing masks and armed with armilons and the white balls that emitted knockout gas. She glanced up at the small crevice she knew led to freedom but had no hope of reaching without the guards stopping her. Even if she made it that far, she couldn’t risk being followed. She grabbed a power chisel and an empty bin before she stepped into the shadowy passage.
She took the mine lift, stopping it when she reached the level that she knew reached the cave, and she stepped off. She checked her pocket and found that the light globes she had pried from the wall were gone, but Jax’s notebook remained. The small pencil stub that she had found with it had fallen from her pocket during her unconsciousness. She thought of how they must have dragged her from the street to the manufacturing room like a bag of laundry. She felt fine now, better than one might expect, and she knew that the halo had repaired whatever damage she had taken from the rough-handling the guards would have used.
Using her power chisel, she pried one of the half-globe lights from the wall and set out for the cave. The way was as familiar to her as any she had ever traveled, and she quickly found her way to the river room where the stone slab tables still sat. There were no slaves remaining here. She wondered what had become of them. Had they found their way out of the cave? Maybe they were hiding in some deeper passage.
She found a spot near the river, flipped the bin upside down, and sat down on top of the bin with Jax’s journal on her lap. She began to read. When she was sure that her light should have given out from lack of power, it continued on, and so she remained there, reading. The journal wasn’t long. It was a pocket notebook with twenty pages, but each of those pages was crammed with small notes. Many were scribbled, ineffective, inspirational phrases like “darkness is driven back by hope” and “determination and action are living.” She read them without much thought, but the one line that she read over and over were these smudged words: “I will find Brit and we will be happy.”
These were the words that rooted her to the cave. If Jax found a way to return, he would return to this spot. She was sure of it. With light and the sustenance of the halo, she was determined that this would be where she lived out eternity waiting for him. If he didn’t come, at least she would have the small satisfaction of knowing that she had defied her captors.
Hours passed and she sat, then stood and paced, then sat again. How long had Jax been on Earth? Was he looking for a way to recharge the ilo? Certainly, Peter must know of a way to do so. Then she wondered what was happening on Earth. What if they had returned in the middle of the ocean or in the middle of a war? How did they know the portal led to someplace safe? Or what if it didn’t take them to Earth at all? Certainly, Peter wanted to escape here, but Earth wasn’t his first choice. What if he tricked them into going someplace else?
As these thoughts and more went through Brit's head, she alternated between sitting near the gurgling river and pacing the now empty cavern. She occasionally flipped through Jax’s notebook and eventually found that even the ineffectual inspirational phrases were becoming endearing.
She couldn’t be sure how much time had passed
now, as time in the cavern was impossible to judge. And with the aid of the halo, she never needed to sleep, eat, or relieve herself, so even those mundane markers of time were denied her. Eventually, she began to wonder if her self-imposed solitary confinement might be worse than actually doing the cycle. She realized now that Jax wasn’t coming back and sitting here wouldn’t help.
She thought of underground city and the small home she had been offered there. There was no way that she could get to the small crevice she had taken above the mine, but maybe there was another way. Despite being a hundred feet underground with many, many tons of rock between her and the city, she formulated a plan. It might take her centuries of digging, but she had centuries.
She grabbed her power chisel and stepped into the flowing water. With measured strikes, she chiseled away at the stone above the river, in the direction that the river was flowing, so that she might make the ceiling higher and follow it to an outlet.
“What are you doing?” a male voice behind her asked.
She turned and saw Jax standing there. His t-shirt was torn and he was bleeding from his lip. He smiled at her. Behind him was a glowing portal, and in his hand was the ilo.
Brit ran into his waiting arms and hugged him fiercely. She began to cry but couldn’t make a sound with her mouth forcibly held closed.
Jax touched his lips to her lips softly. “Are you ready to go?”
She nodded.
He squinted. “You seem rather speechless.”
She growled and gestured to her mouth.
“Then I’m going to say this while I know you can’t interrupt or argue,” he said. He brushed a strand of hair from her face. “You’ve only had to endure this place because I was stupid enough to let Peter kidnap me. I’m sorry.”
She hit his chest in frustration.
“I know you blame yourself for finding the ilo,” he said. “But if I hadn’t been an idiot, it’s possible that none of this would have happened.”
She pulled him toward the portal. He smiled and let her lead the way to the first step.
“This doesn’t go back to Earth,” Jax said. “I don’t want you to be too shocked.”
Brit paused and looked into his eyes, searching for answers.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s a better place.”
He squeezed her hand and, together, they stepped into the portal.
