How on earth do they see through all this? he wondered.
“Have you noticed the dark visors they have on their helmets?” Zelph asked. “It’s a miracle that they’re actually able to see through those things.”
Q’s focus shifted to the second, hidden part of his mission. Are you even working on the mainframe? he asked.
“Just calm down would you? I’m working on it, but you knew this would take a while didn’t you?”
Fine, Q thought. Just give me updates. I don’t want to be in the dark about this.
“Will do,” the AI said and went silent.
Q noticed that Kai and Chris had led him into a different region of the ship. The corridor became wider, and had fewer gadgets on the walls.
“Kai?” Q called out quietly. No reaction. “Kai?” he asked a bit louder. Still nothing.
They neared a white wall with no door on it.
Wrong turn? he wondered. The wall suddenly split open, and revealed a massive circular room on the other side. Q didn’t hesitate and stepped inside.
And then immediately regretted it.
A white velvet couch stood at the opposite end of the room, facing him. Levi sat on it, a look of glee on his face.
And right next to him, sat Taylor.
She was dressed in a sleeveless gown made of flawless silk. It had a bold cut that rose up to her waist and showed off her right leg, something Taylor would never have been caught dead in. Her golden hair had been curled up more than usual, and had a silver hairpin fixed on the side. Her moon silver earrings glowed mystically in the bright light, as did her fairytale-like glass slippers. Her eyes were dulled from the serum, but everything else about her glowed radiantly.
Levi reached out and put his arm around Taylor. “Hello, Q,” he smirked.
Q resisted the urge to show any emotion. That’s what he wants you to do, he calmed himself.
The door behind him closed as Kai and Chris came in and stood guard at either side of the doorway.
“Like what I’ve done with the three?” Levi asked, provoking him yet again.
Q stood still. “I trust you have something better to talk to me about than petty comments,” he said.
Levi was taken aback for a second but immediately regained his composure. “Very well.”
A section of the floor in front of Levi’s couch flipped about, revealing a chair and a table. Levi pointed to it. “Please,” he said.
Q promptly took his seat, never taking his eyes off of Levi, and never putting them on Taylor. “So, what do you want?”
“I wish to ask you what I had asked of you before,” he said. “Join me.”
Q sighed. “Is this what you called me all this way for?” he leaned back and crossed his arms. “Man, we could have just done this over a hologram.”
Levi smiled. “You must understand your situation, sorcerer,” he said. “There is no scenario where you win. There absolutely isn’t.”
“I don’t need to win,” Q said. “I just need you to lose.”
“Oooh,” Levi grinned at him. “Now that’s a quote for the books,” he chuckled.
“You asked me a question, now let me ask you something.”
“Sure, I’m completely bored anyway,” he sighed. “Not many toys to play around with. Especially after I broke this one,” he gently brushed Taylor’s lips.
Calm down, Q thought. Just shut up this one time.
“Boss, you should probably just beat the hell out him,” Zelph said.
Just focus on your job! Q yelled, taking his frustration out on his AI instead. He breathed in deeply, calming himself down, and looked at the green-eyes devil.
“Whoa,” Levi laughed. “Just what kind of question is this? You seem to be preparing a bit too much.”
“What would you do if I told you I know how the world ends?” Q asked.
Levi’s face turned to genuine interest, and he leaned closer. “Well, I would ask you where you heard of such a tale.”
“I visited the future.”
“Ah, the future,” Levi reclined back onto his couch, as though he had immediately lost interest in Q’s story. “Such a wonderful place.”
“A massive shock wave wipes out life as we know it,” Q said. “No one survives,” he lied, adding onto the tale.
“Oooh, drama,” Levi said childishly.
“You don’t believe me?”
“Well, let’s see. Who exactly gains the most by getting me distracted? You. Who’s the one who’s telling me this tale now? You.”
“The only reason I told you this is because there’s only one person we both know who may be powerful enough to actual cause that.”
Levi turned serious for a moment. “The Masked Magician,” he whispered.
Q nodded. “Exactly,” he said. “That man may be the reason humanity ends.”
“It can’t be,” Levi said sternly. “I know the end comes from a NOVA warrior.”
“Really?” Q raised an eyebrow. “Have you visited the future?”
“And have you seen the prophecy?”
Q’s eyes shifted. “Prophecy? What?”
“It is prophesied that reality will be pushed into darkness by a NOVA warrior.”
“Are you crazy? Where did you hear that from anyway?”
“Why these are the words of your close friends, Q,” Levi smiled. “The energy beings.”
Q’s heart skipped a beat. “Don’t you dare twist stories up for your own benefit.”
“Q, who do you think knows the energy beings more? You who have met them once, or I who have a close connection to them.”
“Close connection?” Q smirked. “Don’t go off praising yourself.”
“I am not joking,” Levi said. “You see, during the Great War, the energy beings did not even exist. Unlike what most people believe, the energy beings are not some superior race. They are just a group of people who evolved greatly during the war. Now these people could have been anyone before they evolved.”
Q’s eyes widened, his mind jumping the gap to what Levi was pointing to.
“Ah, I see you’ve got it,” Levi smiled. “The energy beings are all former White Knights.”
***
He’s got to be lying to me, Q thought. I can’t be swayed in by this.
“Don’t believe me if you don’t want to,” Levi smiled. “But reality won’t change just because you do so.”
But the energy beings were helping me, he told himself. Why are they helping him too? Are they just playing a game with both of us?
“Boss, Infinity Canon is down,” Zelph said.
I thought I asked you to give me periodic updates, Q said, annoyed.
“The hacking part got me a little too preoccupied. Sorry.”
An alarm screeched through the air, and the ship tremored gently. Q immediately panicked and jumped out of his seat.
Levi smiled at him, calm and peaceful. “I believe you’ve broken the ‘peace’ part of this meeting, Sorcerer,” he said.
Q dashed for the closed door, getting ready to crash through it, but a burst of wind knocked him flat onto the floor.
“You see,” Levi’s face popped into his vision. “Right now it’s you against a Druid, a Sorceress, and two NOVA warriors. You’re never going to win.”
Q rolled onto his side and jumped away from Levi. His life energy immediately surged into his body, strengthening his muscles. He pushed the energy into his arms and flames of fire curled around his hands, from shoulder to wrist.
“That’s cute,” Levi smiled and stepped aside, revealing Taylor, who was now covered in a dark flame. “Get him,” he said.
Taylor shot a massive blast of darkness right at Q, and it struck him hard. He crashed through the door, and still had enough force to crash through the next three walls.
He lay on the floor, breathless, surrounded by rubble. A thick layer of white shone around him. His energy suit. It was the only reason he hadn’t died from Taylor’s assault.
She�
�s too strong, he realized.
“I hit him too hard,” Levi’s voice came from far off.
Q’s senses reacted. I need to get away. Now.
He looked around him and saw that the corridor he had crashed into was completely empty, which felt a little too lucky to be true.
He stood up and the floor immediately gave away. The light disappeared and everything was swallowed by darkness. He summoned a bit of his Elementa of Light to create a light orb and see where he was.
Dull metal walls surrounded him in the shape of a tube.
Some sort of vent, he realized. He felt a cool breeze go through, and took a whiff to see what it was. Just normal air.
“That’s insanely lucky, to fall into an air vent of all things,” Zelph said.
All the air vent did was circulate air around the ship. It was the best way to get around the place. But now it also the first place Levi would look for him.
Zelph, can you access the ship from here? he asked.
“You mean our ship?” Zelph asked.
Of course I mean our ship, he said.
“Okay okay, no need to get fussy about it. What do you want me to do?”
Send it back to Drakon.
“I’m sorry. I thought you just asked me to-”
DO IT NOW, Q yelled, his mind impatient.
Zelph remained silent for a few seconds. “Done,” he finally said. “Now we have no way of leaving this ship. Unless you plan to use your energy suit to fly all the way back.”
I don’t think I’m in any condition to do that, he said, still breathless from Taylor’s attack.
Her increased power was the result of the Tenebrae EcQuest. It was a parasite that accelerated the use of one’s life energy. That made the parasite’s host use much more life energy than possible with every attack, but in turn it meant their life spans would be reduced to a fraction of the actual thing. Taylor had probably lost a few years just with that attack of hers.
“What’s our plan of action now?” Zelph asked, distracting Q from his thoughts.
We wait, he said. If I’m correct, our ship doesn’t have biosensors, and that means these people can’t confirm if we’re in it or not. If everything goes according to plan, they’ll think we’ve left the ship.
“So we fooled them into thinking we left their ship even though we’re still stuck on it,” Zelph said. “I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t feel even a bit like a good thing.”
“It’s fine. Now we can explore the place as much as we want.”
He sat still for a while, thinking about what Levi had said. The energy beings didn’t sound even a bit evil. But then why were they helping Levi? It just didn’t make sense. There were too many questions that were confusing him.
Q’s vision suddenly distorted, the walls turning to liquefied waves, and he hit the floor hard, his body exhausted. His mind crumbled from the immense stress and fell into the darkness.
***
“Helllooooo?” a voice said. “Time for wakey wakey, boss.”
Q slowly opened his eyes. He immediately felt disoriented, waking up to an unnerving darkness.
“Good morning,” Zelph said. “You finally woke up.”
Q sat up, his back against the vent’s wall. How long was I out? he asked.
“About twenty hours?”
WHAT?! Q’s eyes shot open. And you didn’t wake me all this while?!
“Of course I tried,” Zelph complained. “You were knocked out cold. How long has it been since you went to sleep?”
About three days now? he said.
“No wonder,” Zelph sighed. “Well, the good news is, I checked the mainframe and no one has searched the vents. I think they actually believe we slipped away.”
That’s good, he said. What about this ship? Is it still in orbit around Drakon?
“Nope,” Zelph said. “I’m not sure where we’re even headed. The coordinates don’t match any map that I’m aware off.”
We’re in hyperspace? he asked.
“Yeah. You actually slept through the jump.”
Wow, Q chuckled. I must have been really tired.
He stood up, his feet trembling a bit before they steadied. “I think I’m okay,” he mumbled.
“By the way,” Zelph said. “Empress Andrea has sent a ship after us.”
“What?” he asked, softening his voice. “Why? And how?”
“Well, I was able to get into the mainframe to see our destination’s coordinates,” he said. “She managed to open a connection to me, and I fed her the info. She said she’ll send a stealth fighter to us.”
“That’s a bit unnecessary,” he said. “We don’t even know where we’re going.”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “The fighter is remotely controllable. The Command center in Drakon is controlling it at the moment. Once it’s close enough, I’ll take over.”
“You’ve been really busy while I was asleep haven’t you?” he chuckled.
“Well, I really can’t go to sleep, so I need to keep myself busy.”
“Thank you,” Q smiled.
“Don’t get all mushy with me now,” Zelph laughed.
“So is there anything else interesting that you found?”
“Well, I did find a classified file in the data,”
“And?”
“No good, I couldn’t get into it,” he said. “That thing’s encryption is crazy. I could do it but it’ll take me days, and I didn’t think we had that long a time frame to work with.”
“Which computer is the file on?” he asked.
“Well, the file is shared by the whole ship’s network, but it seems to be hosted on the computer in…Area 47.”
“Great, and where is that?” Q asked. A tinge of orange appeared in his vision as Zelph gave him night vision, and an orange line appeared as well, showing him his path.
“There’s an exit out of this vent a few yards up ahead,” he said. “I’d be very careful though. There aren’t many cameras on this ship for me to use to monitor things and tell you which paths are dangerous.”
“By the way,” Q said as he made his way across the vent. “How on earth did you do all this without being traced? The moment you deactivated the Infinity Canon you set off a hundred alarms but now you do all this and don’t get caught even once.”
“The first time was because I had no clue how the systems worked,” he said. “But now that I know how the alarms detect a cyber-attack, I’d be surprised if they ever catch me again.”
Q smiled. “That’s good to hear,” he said as he found a ladder at the side of the wall. He grasped onto it and pulled himself up. He met the hatch above him, and slowly pushed it open, peering out first to see if anyone was around.
He noticed he was in a wide corridor. He saw two men a few yards away from him but that was about it. A sudden thought struck him.
“Hey, Zelph,” he asked. “Do you have access to the alarm systems?”
“Ooh, I like where this is going,” he said. “All you need to do is say the word and it’ll be done.”
“Yeah, like I need to ask,” he chuckled.
“Alarms in three...two...one...now!”
Red light bathed the corridors and loud alarms rang through the air. The two White Knights panicked and ran into another corridor. Q waited a few more seconds as a mini-army of Knights ran through the corridors.
And then there was silence.
The orange line drew itself into his vision. “Take this path,” Zelph said. “It leads you away from all the cameras that could catch you red handed.”
Q nodded and chased after the line, rushing down the now-empty corridors.
“I should tell you,” Zelph said. “The place we’re headed to appears to be highly classified.”
“What?”
“There’s no record of any Area 47 in the ship,” he said. “I found it only because it was mentioned in the one deleted file I was able to recover.”
Q felt a chill as he ran along. “Wh
at does that mean?”
“I’m as clueless as you are.”
Q stopped short when the line ran straight into a wall. “Are you joking with me?” he asked.
“Just go with it.”
Q closed his eyes and charged.
And kept charging.
His eyes opened wide and saw that he was now in a dark room. He froze. “What just happened?” he whispered.
“That wall was an illusion,” Zelph said. “Like I said, this Area 47 place seems to be top secret.”
“Oh and by the way, wouldn’t the ship’s crew find out they have a cyber-intruder if the alarms trip themselves off?”
“First of all, you shouldn’t be worrying about it this long after actually doing it, and second of all, they’ve already tried to build a wall around their mainframe.”
“And?”
“It’s like I’m playing against a five-year old.”
Q grinned. “Good,” he said. “Now let’s get some lights in here.”
“On it, boss,” he said and the room flooded with a dull green light. Q blinked hard as the haunting shade brought a few things into view.
The grin fell off his face immediately.
In front of him lay hundreds of rows of glass tubes filled with red glowing liquid. And inside each one was a human, male or female, with dark tubes running out of their body and into the floor.
Oh my god, Q’s hands clasped his mouth to keep him from gasping. He felt his body quiver, with fear and with horror. He knew exactly what the red liquid was - the serum Levi had used on Taylor, the serum that combined F.E.A.R and the Tenebrae EcQuest, the serum that let Levi turn anyone into his ultimate weapon.
Q walked through the rows of glass tubes, each step slow and forced. His mind knew exactly what was going on, but his rationality was afraid to accept it, afraid to acknowledge what was before him.
Levi was cloning an army of superhumans, an army of empty shells that were created solely to serve his every command.
It was insane.
It was inhumane.
It was something only Levi would do.
***
4-1
Q’s mind froze in panic, and his body froze in fear. The soft sound of haunting bubbling entered his ears as air was fed into all the glass tubes at once. Not even for a second could Q believe what he was seeing. This was far too insane for his mind to register in one shot.
The Quest Saga Collection: Books 1 - 5 Page 92
