by Conner, Jack
“Fuckin’ aye,” said Janx.
“I’m glad you’re pleased,” Layanna said. “I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say that we saved millions of lives today. Or, alternately, stopped the whole coast from converting to the Collossum faith.” She smiled. “I’m pleased, too.” Then, seeming to see Avery frowning and looking away, she said, “What is it?”
He grimaced. “I hate to dampen the mood ...”
“Tell me.”
Sucking in a breath, he said, “In Rigurd’s lair, he had a laboratory. He’d done something with the Atoshan relic Sheridan brought to him from Davic, sent out some sort of broadcast—”
“I don’t ...”
“—right before the ghost flower nectar became viable.”
Something rippled across her face. “You mean ... ?”
“Remember when we first tried the nectar, it had no effect. Then you said you felt some change in it. Well, I think that was the change. I think Rigurd did something that made the nectar effective against the Starfish, compelling us to seek out the source of it. Maybe he didn’t know that it would be us who went, I doubt he intended the nectar to boost your psychic abilities exactly, but he knew it would do something, that someone would go.”
“Someone would lead them to the Key ...”
“Yes.”
She chewed her lip. “If that’s true—and I hope it’s not—my people are up to something.”
“Something to do with that lost race of gods, it sounds like. And we have no way of knowing what.”
“Then … the Starfish were just a means to an end.”
“Yes. If only we had some spies amongst the Octunggen ...”
The wind blew cold, and Avery began to wish they were somewhere else, somewhere near a fire, with a drink in hand.
Gasps and noise erupted from the dirigible.
Hands raised over their heads, Colonel Versici and his troops made their way down the gangplank. Their weapons had been taken and were now in the hands of Sheridan and the two Navy troopers who had been arrested along with her. One of the Army troops stayed, as well. That answers that, Avery thought. He’d wondered if any more Army people had been corrupted than the ones they knew about, and it seemed as if at least one had.
At a nod from Sheridan, one of the Navy men went to the machine gun (the one that had failed to be thrown overboard) and trained it on those grouped around Layanna.
“Don’t do this, Sheridan,” Avery called, pulling away from the others.
“Oh, I don’t plan to kill anyone,” she said. “But I will if she—” she hitched her chin at Layanna “—makes any move I don’t like. Now you—” this was aimed at Janx, Hildra, and the troops she had not already disarmed—“drop your guns.” They did, and one of Sheridan’s people retrieved them, bringing them back to the dirigible.
Sweeping her gaze across the gathering, Sheridan said, “You’ve all made a terrible mistake. You think you’ve beaten them?” Almost sadly, she said, “No. No, you have not.”
The trooper who had retrieved the guns began to ready the dirigible for departure while the other kept the mounted machine gun trained on the gathering.
“Where will you go, you bitch?” Hildra said. “The skies are full of our boys.”
Sheridan smiled enigmatically. “Not completely full.” Her attention shifted to Avery, and her expression softened somewhat. “Farewell, Doctor.”
He started to say it back to her, then hesitated. His mind spun, hot and bright. “Wait,” he said.
“Yes?”
“Remember in the Crothegra, when we were leaving the Dome, you said I could come with you. That there was a place for me.”
Her brows drew in. “You’re saying you wish to come with me?”
“Yes, I think so. If that place is still open.”
She studied him with extreme skepticism. “Why, Doctor? Why would you want to do that? You could stay here and enjoy peace ... at least, for a time.”
He shook his head. “What do I have left here? My friends have their own lives. My daughter has a new family, my former girlfriend wants no part of me. I have no purpose, no use.”
“What’re you doin’, Doc?” Janx said.
Ignoring him, Avery continued: “I know myself, Jess. I’ll go back to the bottle. I’ve done it before.” He grimaced, wondering if it were true. “Let me come with you, and I’ll have purpose again, and life. Besides,” he added in a different tone, “you know it’s what I want.”
She hesitated, and in that moment Avery’s heart almost stopped. The last thing he’d said had been all too true, Layanna was right, but there was more to it than that. He had said it himself only moments ago. He traded a look with Layanna, who, after a moment, seemed to understand.
“Fine,” she said, playing her part. “Go if you want to. I know you do.”
The horrible thing was he did. He looked at Sheridan, saw the cut on her lip from where Versici or one of his men had struck her, saw the way her lip had swollen, just slightly, making it even more bitable, and wanted to kiss it.
“Shut up, blondie,” Hildra said.
“Well?” Avery asked Sheridan.
She hesitated another moment, then held out her hand. “Come, then.”
Slowly, Avery moved toward the dirigible. Colonel Versici and his soldiers, looking baffled by this whole exchange, parted for him.
“Quickly, Doctor,” Sheridan said.
“Yes, go on,” Layanna said.
“Shut your pie-hole!” Hildra snapped. To Avery, she said, “Don’t listen to that bitch, bones. Bones?”
Avery was walking up the gangplank.
Janx grabbed his arm. “Doc, you can’t really do this.”
Haunted, Avery said, “I have to, Janx.”
“But ... Ani ...”
Forcing out the words, Avery said, “She has a new family. One better suited to her needs.”
Janx’s face turned to stone. His grip tightened. “Doc. No. You can’t.”
Making sure his face was turned from Sheridan, Avery mouthed the words, Have me followed. Trust me.
Janx’s eyes went flinty.
“Let him go,” Layanna said, in her flattest voice. If Avery hadn’t known better, he would have believed she meant it.
Slowly, Janx released his grip. Avery moved up the gangplank. He took Sheridan’s hand, feeling the deck of the airship tilt and sway beneath his feet.
“Don’t do this, bones,” Hildra said. “Ignore the bitch and come back.” She meant Layanna, Avery knew, not Sheridan.
“I’m afraid this is goodbye,” Avery said. “For now.”
“For ever,” Sheridan said, and nodded to the pilot. The dirigible began to lift off and drift away from the Starfish’s back.
Avery traded a nod with Layanna, who did not nod back. She was playing her part a little too well.
“Doc, no!” Janx shouted, and Avery was shocked to see moisture in his eyes.
What am I doing? Avery asked himself. Why am I REALLY doing this? He turned away, unable to look at Janx.
Sheridan directed the dirigible up, speaking into a radio, and minutes later another ten airships descended from the clouds. Avery gaped: were they all aligned with her? The ships turned about, escorting Sheridan, a sort of honor guard, and rose in a solid body toward the dark clouds, which broke suddenly, revealing a zeppelin. Its sides glimmered in a flash of lightning.
“A zeppelin,” Avery muttered. “And you don’t fear being pursued?”
“We have few extradimensional weapons left to us now, but we do have devices, and they can stymie your people long enough for us to be away,” Sheridan said.
Avery glanced back at the Starfish. Layanna and the others were invisible against its vastness. He realized that he was very, very alone.
The dirigibles docked with the zeppelin, and a woman—in an Octunggen uniform—greeted Sheridan on the other side of the boarding ramp. The woman had strange eyes with bifurcated pupils, like the eyes of a frog, and she
snapped her heels and saluted.
“You are most welcome, Colonel,” she said, and Avery remembered that Sheridan was only a colonel in the Octunggen military.
“Thank you, X.O.”
The woman was the Executive Officer of the zeppelin, then, come to honor Sheridan personally. An Octunggen X.O. Somehow Sheridan had snuck a whole crew of the enemy right up among the Ghenisan ships. Avery was floored.
The X.O.’s gaze took in Avery. “And this?”
“This is Doctor Francis Avery.”
The X.O.’s strange eyes widened slightly. “The doctor ... well. That is quite a victory. I’m assuming ...”
“He’s a guest,” Sheridan said.
“Good. Good! Excellent. I will give you rooms, baths, clothes. You are just in time. The officers meet for dinner in one hour. I will arrange seats for you both.”
There was some more talking after that, but it was in Octunggen, and Avery was too tired to process it. His knees sagged, and it was all he could do not to simply curl up on the floor. He was spent. Utterly. What have I done?
When Sheridan was done with the others, she led Avery to a gilded stairwell and up two flights, then down a richly carpeted hallway.
“You act like you’ve been here before,” he said.
She glanced sideways at him, just briefly, the first time she had looked at him since leaving the Starfish. “I have arranged for us to have ... adjoining rooms. Is that suitable?”
He straightened, though he knew he must look a mess. “It is.”
“Good.”
She arrived at a cabin door, unlocked it and pushed it open, handing him the key. “This will be yours,” she said, stepping in and indicating the richly appointed cabin. A door to the left presumably led to her cabin.
Cautiously, he stepped inside—
Sheridan spun to him, slamming him up against the door—closing it in the process—and shoving her face in his. Her eyes were livid, her lips drawn back.
“What are you up to, Doctor?”
“I—I—”
She slammed him against the door again. “I know you didn’t come here just to be with me. How stupid do you think I am? What’s the real reason?”
“I assure you, I—”
She growled and released him. Rubbing his throat, he watched her as she stalked back and forth before him, a tiger winding itself up to strike. At last she wheeled to face him.
“Well?” she demanded.
There was nothing for it. It was either tell her or be thrown out the nearest hatch, parachute optional.
“What do you think?” he said, quietly.
She studied him for a moment, then smiled, just briefly. “Good. I hoped you hadn’t gone soft on me.”
He smiled, just as briefly. “Never.”
“You knew the only way you could find out what I was up to and stop me was to join me, so you and your ...”
“Layanna,” he supplied.
“You and your alien whore decided to trick me into thinking you would willingly betray them and go with me.”
“Really, Jessryl, if you already knew, why did you ask?”
With that, her eyes blazed, but not with fury. She threw herself at him, finding his lips waiting, and they tore at each other’s clothes. And, despite the fact that they were both utterly exhausted, they launched themselves on the luxurious bed and did not stop until they were done.
* * *
Someone knocked on Sheridan’s cabin door—Avery heard it through the bulkhead—waited a tactful moment, then knocked on Avery’s door.
“Yes?” said Sheridan, raising her head from his chest.
“The Captain, ma’am,” came a voice. “He wants a word before dinner.”
“Very well. We’re coming.”
The footsteps moved on.
Avery and Sheridan dressed quickly, she using a new uniform from her cabin, he using some quickly gathered civilian clothes that had been tossed into his, likely moments before his arrival, and together they made their way through the halls to a doorway flanked by two guards. After checking with someone within, the guards admitted them, and Sheridan and Avery stepped through into a dark conference room facing a bank of windows.
A man stood there, silhouetted against the windows, staring out at the gathering darkness. Clouds rushed past him, ghostly bulks in the twilight.
He didn’t turn, and Sheridan and Avery were obliged to move toward him. Avery could see that, like every other soldier aboard the zeppelin, save Sheridan, the Captain had accepted the Sacrament, and though he was a handsome if stern man in his middle to late fifties, there was something gray about his face, something just slightly fishy, and one of his hands was webbed.
Wearing a troubled expression, he turned to them, nodding at Sheridan, then Avery.
“Doctor, meet Captain Marculin,” Sheridan said. “Captain, Doctor.”
“Thank you for coming, both of you,” the Captain said, in a rich, gravelly voice. He spoke Ghenisan, which Avery appreciated. To Avery, he said, “So, you are the Doctor of Doom, eh? I have heard so much about you.”
“I am hardly a doctor of—”
“You have halted our attempt at world conquest, forced our gods to retaliate by killing tens of millions. You are the greatest butcher of our time.”
Avery blinked. “I did not force them. They chose—”
“Gods do not submit, Doctor. They do not surrender. No, you forced them to act, and so they have, and now it is up to us to stop them.”
“You ... want to stop them? The R’loth? But I thought ...”
“Not all is as it seems, Doctor,” Sheridan said.
“Indeed,” said the Captain. “We are trying to stop them. Of course. We are humans, are we not? We want to preserve humanity.”
“But they’re your gods,” Avery said, honestly puzzled.
“Yes, and we quail in fear of them, and love them for the blessings they’ve given us and the promise of still more blessings to come. But their wrath is a terrible thing, and must be tempered, or all is lost. Civilization will fall.”
“The Starfish have been destroyed,” Avery said quietly, with conviction.
“And what now?” the Captain said. “The assault of the Starfish was our gods’ idea of a surgical retaliation, striking only the countries that had wronged them. The Starfish could only have survived a few days outside of the sea. They could have only leveled the coastal powers, those that had risen against us. Now that the Starfish are defeated, the gods will have no choice but to unleash even more unholy terrors, things, plagues, the warping of reality to the point where anything native to this dimension will perish.”
Sweat trickled down Avery’s back. “What ... what ...?”
“You begin to see,” Sheridan said.
“But Layanna said the R’loth had no further resources—”
“Layanna has been away for centuries,” the Captain said. “Even then, the Great Elders held things back from the rest, waiting to unleash them. That time is now.” He let that sink in, and Avery felt cold all over. Then, slowly, the Captain said, “There is hope, though.”
“Hope?” Avery said, his mind racing.
“Of course. It’s why we are here, is it not? The gods do not want to destroy the world, or civilization, merely transform it. It is why they have not done so yet.”
“What are you saying?”
“They built a flaw into the Starfish,” Sheridan said. “A weakness.”
“A weakness?” he repeated, then understood. “The ghost flower.”
“Yes,” said the Captain. “Not specifically the flower, of course. Once the relic on the Atoshan Islands was found, the Starfish were reconfigured to be susceptible to poisons or technologies from certain ruins, the ruins of a once-great race of gods that used to dwell here, gods that even the Collossum revere.”
“The Ygrith.”
“Even so.”
“Layanna spoke of gods her people were trying to reach ...” He stopped himself wh
en he saw the others looking at him, but he need not have bothered hiding what he knew.
“It’s why the Great Ones came to this world,” the Captain said, nodding. “The R’loth. To find these greater gods. The Ygrith. When the Collossum couldn’t find them immediately, they found another way. Part of their plan was to establish themselves as lords of the surface and use their subjects to hunt for sign of the Ygrith, explore ruins, research ancient mythology ... all of which Octung has done, and was continuing to do until ... well.”
“The relic,” Avery said, starting to understand. “The artifact taken from the Atoshan monastery ...”
“Exactly,” Sheridan said. “During the war Octung occupied numerous countries that held the ruins of races that worshipped the Ygrith, and from deciphering their texts we found one such ruin with an unopened chamber believed to hold an actual item of the Ygrith. Davic gave me the relic and told me to bring it to Rigurd, who, through his association with Admiral Haggarty and his control of the Ghenisan Navy, had been working to decipher yet more texts recovered by Haggarty. Rigurd confirmed the relic was indeed Ygrithan and was able to use its extradimensional signature to create the specific weakness in the Starfish using machinery he had manufactured.”
“That’s why the ghost flower nectar only began working after he activated it,” Avery said.
“He didn’t activate the relic. He broadcast its signature to all of the Starfish, creating the weakness to similar signatures—specifically signatures related to certain items thought to be helpful—and it was after that broadcast that the nectar became effective.”
“And now?” Avery said.
“The reason the Collossum engineered the weakness in the Starfish was so that only by finding a specific trace of the Ygrith could the Starfish be driven back. In the Crothegra we found that trace.”
“The Key ...” Avery suddenly felt cold. “Only by finding the Key could the Starfish be stopped. All those millions of people died just so you could get your hands on it ...”
“It’s what Octung was looking for during the war,” Sheridan said. “It and the thing it’s the key to. It’s why they conquered and occupied so many places. In a sense, finding the Key, and what it is used for, is what the war was all about.”
