“I’m sorry about Pete. But Clarence, I can’t talk to you when you’re like this. Maybe call me in a few days, but stop wasting my time,” she shouted. “I need to help get the horses under shelter.”
“You don’t understand, Tegan--”
“Damn right I don’t understand you,” she said.
“Listen, I know this is going to sound insane, Tegan. But trust me--”
“I got to do nothing where you’re concerned.”
“When I say it’s too dangerous to go to the ranch, I mean it’s--”
She shook her head. “Insanity?” she said. “I should have listened to my father.”
She kicked out at the car door, sending it swinging into him. “Insane is going to war over a dead rock in space, Clarence. Insane is dying for that dead rock. Your mother needs you home, Clarence. Go.”
She put the SUV into reverse and stamped on the accelerator. The SUV jolted backwards onto the road. The open car door swiped him across his back. He felt to the roadside as she reversed the car and lined it up.
She pulled the door to her and locked it. She gunned the car at him. He yanked off his helmet and hurled it at the windshield. A crack like forked lightning seared across the glass. The helmet bounced off.
She kept on driving. He stepped aside, hammering a fist on the trunk as she sped by. The helmet rolled to his feet.
He watched her head along the empty highway until she took the turn along the dirt road to the ranch. Above her, clouds erupted with lightning.
If he took a short cut through the corn he knew he could just about make it before her. He ran like he’d never run before in his life. Keeping his eyes on the raging sky, he tore through the corn.
For five minutes he sprinted, flat out. His hammering heart felt as if it was about to burst. He was three quarters the way to the ranch house when Tegan’s car pulled up in the wide circular drive.
He could see her folks on the porch. If they ran now they’d be clear of the house in time.
“Get out,” Thor shouted. “Get out, it’s coming.”
Her folks left the porch to join her. She ran to them. They headed for the nearby paddock. They were greeted by a dozen mares and the stallion.
“Tegan,” he shouted over and over until his throat bled with the strain.
Tegan and her folks led the horses to the stables block next to the house.
No, no, no. You’re too close.
“Get out,” he shouted as the clouds parted.
He was only a quarter of a mile away now. He pointed at the sky and shouted. “Look out!”
The horses broke free. Tegan’s father hesitated. He peered in Thor’s direction and waved.
“Up, up,” Thor shouted and pointed at the sky.
Tegan joined her father and looked in the direction her father was staring.
A burning, molten meteor burst through the cloud and plummeted through the roof of the stables. Tegan and her folks stepped back from the house and looked up.
A giant shadow like a claw seemed to reach out from the erupting sky. Like a clenching fist of flaming dark steel, it thrust downward.
Thor was close enough to hear Tegan scream as the twisted, broken and burning hull of a Lupos battleship dropped from the sky and tore into the ranch.
Thor knew he was too late. The shock wave smashed into Thor and flung him backwards. As the dust settled, Thor blinked. The burning crater that was once his sweetheart’s ranch, began to dissolve into a black void.
The strangest feeling gripped his stomach. As if a whirlpool was opening up inside him. As if he were attached to an invisible chord. As if someone or something were tugging at it from a great distance.
All about him screams came from figures in power-armor, battling ant-bots. He was back on the outer shell of the Ursu ship’s hull.
He felt a hand on his shoulder. He whipped around to see Sergeant Van Cleef engulfed by a burst of light. The man somersaulted backwards into space and slowly dissolved until he vanished.
CHAPTER 25 - THE PROMISE
Van Cleef felt the burst of light engulf him. It punched through him like a meteor. The strangest feeling gripped his stomach. As if a whirlpool was opening up inside him. As if he were attached to an invisible chord. As if someone or something were tugging at it from a great distance.
Instinctively, his eyes shut tight as his visor adjusted to the blinding glare. His mag-boots lost their grip on the hull of the Ursu ship. He somersaulted backwards for what he knew would be an eternity.
He remembered his ingrained training and forced his breathing to calm. He felt his power-armor inject his body with nausea calming drugs. After a minute of stomach churning spinning, he cautiously opened his eyes.
He stared up at a spinning ceiling. A rotating ceiling fan much like the one in Martha’s bedroom. He blinked hard.
The ceiling slowly stopped spinning.
He reached out and realized he was lying flat on a bed. He felt a stirring next to him. He peered out through the cracks in the visor and recognized the slender, tanned shoulders lying next to him in the bed.
Martha.
His first thought was that he was dead. Or deep in some failing respirator induced coma. Dreaming the dream of all warriors on the journey to the eternal sleep. But his training methodology refused to accept this explanation.
He began to piece together the facts as known to him. He felt his knuckles clench tight. His stomach tied itself in knots. He arrived at one logical conclusion.
I’m a warp-ghost. I know where I am, but when am I? And how long do I have here?
From his helmet display he disengaged his power-armor. His power-armor jettisoned the last of the air from his respirator unit with a gentle sigh. He felt the nano-bot skin of the armor roll back along his legs, his chest and arms and converge in a wrist sized bracelet on one hand.
He removed the helmet and set it down on the floor. He felt Martha stir again.
He sat up and realized he was wearing his regulation combat skin suit.
“Nick is coming by for breakfast,” she said and sat up.
She doesn’t know her son’s dead. And it’s all my fault. How can I tell her?
She kissed his shoulder.
He felt his shoulders stiffen.
If I tell her, she’ll hate me forever.
He climbed out of bed and walked into the closet. He found a shirt and pants and quickly pulled them on.
Knowing he couldn’t face her, he picked up a pair of shoes. He picked up his helmet and walked to the kitchen. The TV news screen flickered to life.
If Martha can stomach my grotesque cyborg implants, why can’t I honor her by giving her the truth about her son?
I’m a coward.
“Ernst, promise me you’ll protect Nick.”
He spun around and knew he’d blurt it out with all the insensitivity of a blind halo-jump on a comet.
“Martha, there’s something I need to tell you.”
Her complexion drained.
“You’re scaring me, Ernst.”
“Martha, I’m sorry, but Nick is--”
Something about the news grabbed his attention. He hesitated as it relayed a story about a Lupos battleship crashing onto a ranch in Kentucky.
In the corner of the screen the date flashed at him: July 4th 2177.
Two years before Nick dies. Is that why I’m here? To somehow stop him from dying? Talk him out of enlisting?
“You’re scaring me, Ernst,” Martha said. “Look, I’m not blind.”
“What do you mean, Martha?”
“I see how you and Nick are with each other...” She took a deep breath and let out a heavy sigh. “I think it’s best for his last breakfast before Boot Camp if you’re not here.”
“Martha, I really need to speak with Nick,” he said.
“My mind’s made up.”
He knew better than to argue with her when she was like this. He slid on his shoes as a car pulled up into the driveway.
> “Slip out the back door,” she said.
They kissed and it felt like the last time he’d taste her lips. Unless I’m somehow damned to come back here and repeat this scene over and over for eternity...
As he pushed through the back door, she called out.
“Promise me you’ll look out for him.”
“I’ll pull some strings. See if I can get Nick on my squad,” he said and instantly regretted his words.
“I can’t lose him the way I lost his father,” she said. “I need you to promise you’ll keep him safe.”
“And if I can’t do that?”
“If Nick dies, promise me you’ll find his killer for me.”
“I’ll try.”
“Promise me, Ernst, or never come back.”
“I promise,” he heard himself say and slipped out the back door as the front door opened.
From the shade of the orchard by the side of the house he watched Martha on the front porch. She threw her arms around her son and hugged him tight.
Van Cleef couldn’t leave it like this. He had to try to talk Nick out of enlisting. He screwed up his courage and stepped out. As he marched up to the porch, Nick turned sharply around to face him. Van Cleef felt himself stop dead in his tracks.
Nick was wearing a full dress suit: Marine issue.
Damn it, he already enlisted!
Maybe I can get him to strike a senior officer. Get him kicked out of the marines.
He thought of the shame of it and swallowed hard.
Martha shot him a dark look over Nick’s shoulder.
“Nick, can I speak with you a moment?” Van Cleef asked.
He saw Nick’s hands ball into fists. “You have nothing to say I want to hear,” Nick said.
“Just listen, a minute, son,” Van Cleef said.
“I’m not your son,” Nick said and stepped toward Van Cleef.
That’s it, Nick, just two more steps and you can take a good swing at me. Live a long, happy life as a civilian.
Nick took another step. “You’re not wanted here, Van Cleef,” shouted Nick.
The round house punch telegraphed its arrival from a mile away. Van Cleef knew he could deflect it with his eyes closed. But he stood his ground and kept his arms by his side. Just one more second and we’re all home free--
Van Cleef felt the strangest sensation engulf him. The strangest feeling gripped his stomach. As if a whirlpool was opening up inside him. As if he were attached to an invisible chord. As if someone or something were tugging at it from a great distance.
Suddenly, he was somersaulting backwards. He felt his nanobot ring burst into life and rapidly spread out over his arms, down his chest and over his legs. He was rolling across the hull of the Ursu ship. Without his helmet secured and no air to breathe, Van Cleef felt his lungs freeze in the vacuum.
His power-armor pumped his blood stream with emergency nano-molecules capable of sustaining him for a few more vital seconds. But he knew in less than a minute he’d be dead.
He barreled into Captain Valkyrie. She grabbed hold of Van Cleef’s ankle and hauled him down to the hull. She swiftly fitted an emergency nano-hood onto his shoulders and connected his own respirator-unit to Van Cleef’s.
Stale, recycled air pumped into his helmet and felt like a summer breeze.
“Captain...” he croaked. “Private Olsen, is he alive?”
Rainbow light coiled around Valkyrie’s body like a snake. She dissolved into a thousand tiny stars and vanished.
CHAPTER 26 - HER FATHER’S LOVE
The strangest feeling gripped Argyle’s stomach. As if a whirlpool was opening up inside her. As if she were attached to an invisible chord. As if someone or something were tugging at it from a great distance.
Argyle jolted. She blinked and realized she was sitting in darkness alone in an old rocking chair. She recognized the wood paneled room. She hadn’t been here since her father’s funeral.
I’m home? How’s this possible?
“Is that you, Argyle?” a fragile voice asked. Fragments of familiarity tormented her. But she couldn’t piece them together in the darkness.
Are you one of my father’s farm hands?
A circle of electronic medical equipment hummed quietly around a bed. On the bed lay a man wheezing into an oxygen mask. Her eyes flitted across his silhouette to the slow, cautious rhythm of a pulsing heart monitor. She felt she ought to recognize him. But there was so little in the darkness to prompt her.
She adjusted the window blinds. Fracking fires danced like frenzied demons on the horizon.
One day I’ll make enough to buy them all out. Return this land the way God intended… or die trying.
The fires were her father’s betrayal. The reason she’d left.
Her travels amongst the stars failed to bring her peace. Of all the planets she visited, she realized now, in all this time she’d simply been orbiting this place.
She felt like a traitor letting the fires illuminate this peaceful room. Firelight seemed to dance around the man’s body like flames of a funeral pyre. The fires of hell...
She followed the silhouettes of smoke until she met familiar eyes of hatred.
This is impossible. Dad, you’re dead.
“Is that you, Argyle?” his fragile voice asked again and this time provoked a whirlwind of fear and loathing from deep inside her.
“Dad?” she cried out.
“Speak up, Argyle, you sound strange,” he said and this time the fragile voice echoed with the authority she knew and hated.
She disengaged her power-armor and removed her helmet.
She reached out and touched his trembling hand. “Dad, are you OK?”
“Your mother said you were on Mars.”
She cast her mind back a year. She had been on patrol on Mars when her mother sent word of his sudden illness and rapid decline. He hadn’t much time left. Colonel Rage had granted her a seven day leave on compassionate grounds, but she had arrived at the family ranch too late. One year ago, her father had died.
I’ve been given a second chance to say all the things I meant to say in his lifetime.
For the past year she’d tortured herself with all the things she should have said to her father. But now, as he lay dying in the half light of the dawn fires, she looked at his frailty and realized she didn’t know where to begin.
She felt cheated. She wanted to confront the strong, viral man who relentlessly tore her down with his ferocious disappointment. Not stand here at his deathbed as his once firm grip on life slipped and he teetered the edge of a dark abyss. Where is the justice to be found in pummeling a weak, feeble and decrepit shell of a man to find the truth?
But even now, she knew he had the power to destroy in her that which he’d failed in the past. Those fragments of herself that despite him, had grown stronger, he could still in his final bitter moments destroy with his silence.
“I made it.” She almost said, ‘in time’. She swallowed hard.
She had taken to the stars in part because she wanted to follow in his footsteps. To be her father’s daughter. She bit her lip and continued to hope.
“I knew you couldn’t resist a chance to be weak,” he said in a whisper that cut through her soul like a knife.
He glanced at the closed door and then gripped her hand with sudden ferocity. With his other hand he removed his mask and beckoned her close.
She leaned forward. “What is it, Dad?”
“Don’t be weak like me, Argyle,” he said with a rasping urgency as if he knew he was falling into that abyss.
“You’re not weak, Dad, you’re the strongest man I know.”
“Don’t lie to a dying man,” he said. “It dishonors us both.”
She knew he was right. “Yes, father.”
“There are two kinds of people, Argyle. The takers and the taken. Choose right.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Go to my study,” he said and began coughing. He bolted upright. “In
my desk you’ll find your truth.”
He slumped back against his pillows. As his hand slipped from hers she realized what she wanted from this moment. A final chance to hear him say the one thing that had never graced his lips. The first and final time he might say he loved her.
His eye lids fluttered and sealed shut.
As his last breath wheezed out of his body, she shook him and gasped, “I know you wanted a son, but did you ever love me?”
His eyes remained closed.
“Speak to me, damn you,” she said and shook him harder. “Say it...”
His vice-like grip slowly subsided. A knot in her stomach twist tight and squeezed until she vomited into her mouth. She swallowed hard and began the agonizing wait for the pulsing blip of the heart monitor.
It came at last like a distant tolling bell.
“When you were born, Argyle, it was like the first time I witnessed dawn breaking over the dead, red planet of war,” he whispered. “You revealed to me how barren and empty, but for the ashes of life, my heart really was. I cursed you for it, then. I spent your life trying to forget. I curse you now for reminding me.”
“What did I do to make you hate your own flesh and blood?”
“You’re not mine.”
She stepped away as if falling backwards into the endless, pitiless void of a vacuum. She reached out to steady herself and her shaking hand grabbed her helmet. The knot in her stomach twist so tight, it snapped.
Exploding with rage, she smashed the helmet into the medical equipment and hurled each item against the walls.
The door flew open and a woman in a gray nurse uniform ran in. She went to the old man. She glanced at his heart monitor droning with the solemn, eternal tone of death. She flicked it off. The full depth of compassion in the nurse’s heart seemed to pour out of her, but only her eyes spoke.
From the doorway her mother stared at the bed. Her cold gray eyes dry as the poison river bed running through their land. The dancing fire seemed to warm her mother’s eyes. They drifted over his shriveled body like a circling vulture until they met Argyle’s gaze.
Valiant (Jurassic War Universe Book 1) Page 15
