New Olympus Saga (Book 2): Doomsday Duet

by C. J. Carella

  Cassius’ eyes widened. “How..?”

  “Long story. I’ll get to it. How many, Cassius? Your original itinerary was going to cover a volume of four thousand cubic parsecs. How many dead worlds did you see before you turned back?”

  “I explored over four hundred star systems,” Cassius said slowly, reluctantly. Even talking about it was forcing him to relive horrors he desperately wanted to forget. “I found dozens of planets with habitable atmospheres and simple life forms. Sixteen stars had planets where intelligent life had risen. Of those, fourteen held only ruins and bones. One was inhabited by a primitive species, living in the equivalent of our Paleolithic era. The other held a single survivor.”

  “I think I know what killed all those species, Cassius,” John said. “I think I know why you wouldn’t talk about what you saw.”

  “You know nothing,” Cassius replied coldly. He didn’t want to talk about his journey, didn’t want to even think about it, but he now realized he had no choice. “But if you really want to know, I’ll tell you.”

  His expression hardened and his eyes brightened with anger. “I’ll tell you. But damn you, John, damn you for making me tell you. You won’t thank me for it.”

  Chapter Five

  Christine Dark

  Lake of the Woods, Ontario, March 15, 2013

  Is this what you want? Christine’s brain asked as Mark turned towards her, wearing his Christian Bale-y face.

  Their second kiss was different, more intense, more passionate; his tongue pushed past her lips, probing, hungry. She felt his hands gliding along her skin, the tips of his fingers running down her neck, making her shiver. His need for her was like a beacon of light; his desire, his hunger, they scared her a little. A part of her didn’t care. She felt his desire stoking hers, making her want him right back. She caressed his chest, feeling the rapid heartbeat under his shirt. He stepped back and took it off, and she had a second to enjoy the view of his athletic, solid body, before he embraced her again. She wanted him. She longed to hold him, to feel something real and alive after all the darkness and death she had seen.

  Is this what you want?

  Yes. Yes, you pestiferous mass of ganglions! She almost said that out loud, and the thought made her giggle a bit in between kisses. Mark pulled back for a second, grinning, and she sensed laughter hovering behind his grin. He was so freaking happy it was hard not to get carried away by his emotions, but there was a cold undertone there too, fear and doubt. Christine turned her empathy down before it ruined the mood. Stick to the surface stuff, which was pleasant and happy and made her feel all warm and tingly inside. She wanted, she needed something good to happen, something to turn her mind from the cosmic mess her life had become, and she wasn’t going to overanalyze and second-guess herself.

  Would you be doing this if John hadn’t left?

  Fuck you, brain.

  She lifted her arms so he could pull her t-shirt over her head. He kissed her neck as they lay in bed, sensual gentle kisses, not at all like the clumsy hickey-inducing ones her first college boyfriend had inflicted on her. His touch was light; he didn’t paw or grope, he caressed her. She ran her hands over his back, his sides, feeling his smooth skin and the hard layers of muscle beneath. His power and strength made her hot.

  For someone who usually didn’t have a mouth, he sure knew what to do with his lips, with his tongue – oh, my. His hands got her feeling all warm and breathless; he smoothly pulled the sweatpants off her, caressed her legs, kissed her inner thighs. He took his time, explored her and tasted her and… Oh, God. He worked on her steadily, in a rhythm that sent quivers of pleasure through her. She sank her fingers in his hair, held on to him as she felt things reach a crescendo allegro altissimo. Oh, yes. Her empathy thingy felt his joy in her pleasure, and the feeling combined with the orgasm in a wave of multi-spectrum sensations that made her head spin. He kept at it, his head nestled between her thighs, tongue and lips and fingers at work, gentle and steady and constant… She shuddered again, leaned back and cried out and surfed the wave of pleasure, rocking in time with his head movements, with his caressing tongue.

  “Mark… Marco Marky Mark…”

  Eventually he moved up so they were face to face, and then he was inside her and she sighed and writhed under him. He kissed her and he rode her and she rode him and nothing else mattered. She’d never screamed in bed before; her orgasms had been tiny timid things, when she’d had them at all and not faked them just so they could get it over with and go to sleep. Mark made her scream and call his name and God’s name and just let out every pent-up feeling she’d ever had into a series of pure primal sounds. He kept on; they switched places and postures and he never stopped, he made her scream again and again. When he started approaching his own crescendo, her empathy sent his building pleasure flooding into her and brought her to the most intense climax yet. He shuddered on top of her: the silent but intense release coming from him overwhelmed her and sent her off yet again.

  Afterwards, they lay in each other’s arms and he kissed her forehead. “You’re amazing, Armageddon Girl,” he said.

  “Armageddon Girl?”

  “My little nickname for you. It sure felt like the world ended a minute ago.”

  “Hmmm,” she commented wittily.

  Mark’s face vanished; he was feeling pretty relaxed. At peace. His emotions now felt like drinking a glass of warm milk. She caressed the smooth head and kissed him where his mouth should be. “I don’t know,” she said. “Armageddon Girl kinda sounds pretentious and all doomy-and-gloomy. And ‘girl’ can be kinda disempowering-like, as a term.”

  He smiled inwardly at that, which surprised her. She’d expected some irritation at her deconstructing the nickname. “Just a suggestion,” he said lightly, a hand resting on her side; he leaned his forehead forward until it touched hers, and his feeling of contentment at the touch washed over her, as pleasant in some ways as the orgasms had been. “But that’s not important now.”

  “What’s important now?”

  “You. How beautiful you are, how your smile melts my heart, and how fucking corny I’m sounding just now.”

  Christine snorted. “Corny is okay right now.”

  “So you won’t mind if I wax poetic about your alabaster skin, fiery tresses and turquoise eyes? Because I’m about to.”

  “Wax on, wax off, turtle-wax me, I don’t care.”

  He caressed her hair and made a face again. “Then again, I just thought of something better than poetry.”

  “Oh yeah? Like what?”

  He showed her.

  * * *

  Christine woke up at the crack of dawn; she needed to go to the bathroom. She gently slid from under Mark’s arms and left the bed. He stirred and she felt him opening his notional eyes – he was a light sleeper. He sent a mental smile her way and went back to sleep. She paused at the doorway and looked at him; he was sleeping soundly once again, the most relaxed she had seen him be since she’d met him, a whole three – more like two – days ago.

  Pretty fast, her brain commented. Pretty loose, too.

  Do shut up.

  Jumped into bed with a guy you’ve known a whole forty-eight hours and had unprotected sex with him.

  Now her brain was just spouting BS. Okay, she’d had unprotected sex, but during her little foray into the Xanaweb, Christine had done her due diligence about Neos and sex. Neolympians didn’t catch STDs; their immune system pretty much killed any microorganism they encountered, from herpes to Ebola. In other words, she was in no danger of catching cooties or AIDS. That selfsame immune system also made getting pregnant nearly impossible; Neos’ immune systems treated sperm cells like another any other invader and killed them. It seemed that the only way to get pregnant was to really, really want to be pregnant, which seemed to create a form of subconscious feedback that made the Neo’s immune system stop acting as the ultimate form of birth control. So it wasn’t like she was putting herself at risk. Screw you, brain.


  She put her oversized t-shirt on and headed out to the guest restroom, did her business, and brushed her teeth to banish morning breath, just in case Mark felt amorous when he woke up. Which he probably would: Neo stamina had turned out to be a pretty amazing thing. She brushed her hair and felt like bursting into song, something like ‘Age of Aquarius.’ Yeah, that’s the ticket.

  Holy crap. Neo sex was as good as vampire sex was supposed to be, and with a lot less bloodletting. They were like little energizer bunnies that just kept going and going. If they hadn’t been exhausted from all the epic battles and near-death experiences and stuff, they wouldn’t have gotten any sleep at all. And after a whole two hours’ sleep, she felt pretty fresh and rested, and ready for Round Two, Round Six if you wanted to get technical. How did Neos get anything done? The temptation to just stay home and boink till the cows came home should be overwhelming.

  It had been more than just sex, though. Mark had been… intense but sweet, which probably made her the only person who’d used the word ‘sweet’ to describe Face-Off, stone cold killer and vigilante. No, she decided. Cassandra would have used that word too. The psychic knew the guy behind the no-face, and now so did Christine. The way he felt about her when they made love was like basking in the sun. Empathy-enhanced sex had to be felt to be believed.

  So lovey-dovey; you do remember he’s a murderous psychopath, don’t you? Kinda like Dad, come to think of it. She glared at herself in the mirror, at her freaking self-doubting second-guessing brain. She’d had the first good night since she’d hopped on the crazy train to La La Land, the first good night in a long time even before that, and now she was trying to deconstruct it. Why couldn’t she just enjoy the moment?

  Well, she had a couple of good reasons why. Things had happened way too fast. She’d met Mark on Wednesday and ended up in bed with him on Thursday night, early Friday if you wanted to get all technical. Sure, it had been a pretty intense couple of days, but that still was way fast. Her roommate and sort-of-BFF Sophie would be all proud of her for jumping a guy’s bones on short acquaintance, but that wasn’t how Christine rolled. She wanted to get to know a guy, really feel like there was a connection, before going to the next level. Of course, the two times she’d thought she had a connection with a guy, she’d ended up with an a-hole and a d-bag, so her modus operandi had a lousy track record.

  And she did know Mark. Thanks to her super-empathy, she knew a lot about him. On the other hand, thanks to her super-empathy, she wasn’t sure how much of what she was feeling came from her and how much had been Mark’s emotions sweeping her off her feet. His feelings for her were pretty darn intense, but she didn’t know exactly what she felt for him. She liked him, definitely. Liked him a lot, even. But did she feel like he felt? Reply hazy, ask again later. She could feel his happiness as he slept, radiating from the bedroom like pulses of light, and it made her happy to feel it. The whole thing was confusing the heck out of her.

  Told ya, her brain said.

  Go away.

  She stepped out into the hallway and ran into Kestrel. The super-slut was wearing a black Victoria’s Secret little number, something made of black satin, dental floss and fishnets, along with stiletto heels she had probably worn in bed.

  “Had a good night?” Kestrel asked, stepping closer, right into Christine’s personal space. “It sure sounded like you did. I never figured you for a screamer.”

  Christine felt herself blush with embarrassment – and anger. “Do you ever turn off your little performance routine, Kestrel? It’s just us right now, no guys to impress.”

  “You really don’t want to ever see me being myself,” Kestrel replied; the sultry tone was underlain with something far darker and more threatening. It scared Christine, but it angered her even more.

  “And maybe you won’t like me when I’m pissed off,” Christine said through clenched teeth. She gestured with one hand, and Kestrel flew against the nearest wall; she remained stuck there, held immobile by a steady stream of telekinetic force. Christine stepped right up to the immobilized super-skank. Kestrel struggled, but however strong she was, it turned out Christine’s power was stronger. “You are going to cut it out, Kestrel. The bullying crap stops right now.”

  Kestrel struggled for a few more seconds before giving up. She smiled. “I guess you got more than a good fucking from Face-Off. His attitude’s rubbing off on you.”

  “I don’t need a guy to teach me to stand up for myself,” Christine said. “And I’m sick of your attitude. You don’t get to push me around just because I’m not a total bitch. So stop it.”

  “You have grown up. Okay, Christine, I’ll play nice. You know, now that you have me all helpless, maybe you’d like to have your way with me.” She thrust her hips towards Christine, as much as the telekinesis allowed, which turned out to be quite a bit. “Play with me while I can’t move. Bite my…”

  “Unbelievable.” Christine let Kestrel go with an exasperated sigh.

  “Sorry.” For a second Kestrel looked contrite for real. “Can’t help myself sometimes. Okay, let’s be friends.” She extended her hand, and Christine warily shook it. “Call me Melanie. I’ll lay off you and Face, a little bit at least.”

  That was probably the best deal Christine was going to get. “Okay, Melanie.”

  “Good. Believe it or no, I’m happy that Face is hooking up with someone who isn’t a stripper or a skank.” Pot, kettle, Christine thought but diplomatically kept to herself. “Just be careful with him; he’s a romantic under all the bullshit.” Her expression and emotions changed again, became a little sad. “I know I hurt him, even if he’ll never admit it, even to himself. And he just lost Cassandra. If you hurt him, it’s going to be bad for him.” Her expression changed, became cold and threatening. “And I’ll stop playing nice with you.”

  Holy crap, I just got the whole ‘Hurt my ex and I’ll hurt you’ bit from a super-powered uber-slut. “Okay, got the message.”

  “Good.” Kestrel – Melanie – headed downstairs, probably to whip up something for breakfast, pun definitely intended. Christine looked after her for a second, and shook her head. Well, at least she had stood up for herself, instead of just freezing up and withdrawing like she normally did. She was either growing up as a human being or getting ornery in her old age.

  She went back to the bedroom. Mark was sitting up. “There you are,” he said. Either he hadn’t heard her and Kestrel going at it or was pretending he hadn’t. Either possibility suited Christine just fine. She didn’t want to discuss Kestrel with Mark.

  “Missed me already?” she said lightly as she got in bed with him.

  “Missed this,” he said, making a face and kissing her. No morning breath from him, either, since the face was all nice and new.

  Her doubting second-guessing bitchy brain went away for a while.

  Janus

  Star System 9183, Milky Way Galaxy, Year Fifteen (Personal Frame of Reference)

  Cassius hovered over the desolate ruins and despaired.

  The second planet of Star System 9183 was a gas giant in close proximity to a red dwarf star. It had a large moon only slightly smaller than Cassius’ home planet, and it was there that life had arisen, evolved and given birth to a sentient species. That species had learned and built and grown in power, until an unimaginable disaster had rendered it extinct.

  The sight below was enough to reawaken the hopelessness he had temporarily banished after his stay with the people of SS-9182. For a while, he had dared to nurse the hope that death was not everywhere, that oblivion was not the inevitable fate of sapient life. After exploring a dozen dead worlds, he’d finally found a green-and-blue planet teeming with life, and encountered intelligent, tool-using being. The natives had been utterly alien in shape and thought, but after several false starts, Cassius found a group that had greeted him with cautious hospitality. He had spent several months in their company, learned to communicate with them to some degree, and departed feeling better about his quest than
he’d had in a decade and a half.

  And yet, once again, he found himself confronted with the ruins of an advanced civilization. So far, every species that had progressed beyond the Iron Age had died out. Was the development of technology a death sentence?

  Technology, or something else. In seven of the dead worlds, he’d found signs of battle between super-powerful individuals. He didn’t want to contemplate what that meant, not yet.

  A few thousand feet below him lay what had been an enormous city, a megalopolis that ran uninterrupted over an area greater than the continental US. A crater the size of Rhode Island, long since filled with water, was the first obvious sign that something terrible had happened. The lack of any active power sources merely confirmed that nothing lived there. He had seen all too similar scenes in thirteen worlds.

  One thing was different, however. The disaster that had befallen the inhabitants of SS-9183 had happened in the recent past. The other ruins he had observed had lain undisturbed for millennia or more. In many cases it had taken a great deal of scrutiny to determine those worlds had once held intelligent life in the first place, as their buildings and monuments had withered away until only a hint of regular outlines here or there indicated where they once had stood. Here, artificial satellites still floated above the planet, their orbits not having decayed into oblivion. Huge clouds of space debris indicated many other installations had been destroyed, the skies about the planet had been busy before its downfall. Cassius had explored it a large space station, discovering found hundreds of freeze-dried corpses and even some powered-up systems. Whatever had happened here had occurred a few decades ago or less. He might be able to learn something new here.

  Cassius descended towards the dead city, using his far slower and less efficient flight power in order to examine the ruins as he approached them. Away from the edge of the crater, buildings still stood; they were tall and spindly things, their delicate architecture made possible by this world’s lighter gravity; some of them were thousands of feet in height. Even the structures that remained upright had been wrecked: their exterior walls, or at least the ones facing the crater, had been stripped away. The explosion that had struck the megalopolis had been devastating.