by Cheree Alsop
Chapter 13
Liora charged blindly through the cavern full of the bodies of slain warriors and the piles of ash left by the beasts. She ran up the hallway and to the cave of stalagmites and stalactites. The carcasses of the smaller, hinge-jawed creatures lay along the bloody path. Liora flew through the cave without looking down.
In her mind, she saw the moss fragments growing, drawing on Tariq’s energy as he readied the bomb. She had to stop the others from entering the ship and get back to him in time. If her warriors were slain and their bodies infected with the moss, there would be no stopping the plague’s reach across the universe. There was no doubt in her mind that Tariq would sacrifice himself to keep the leech-like beings from leaving the planet. She had to keep that from happening.
Liora burst out into the daylight. She could see those who had survived of her army in the distance. They were almost to the ship. She shouted, but nobody turned. The sky was glaringly empty of Ketulans. She knew they all waited inside the craft. She had to stop them before they opened the doors.
Liora closed her eyes and pushed. It was further than she had ever attempted mind contact with anyone. The warriors didn’t slow. She could see men and women carrying each other, hoping to find safety within the ship’s massive hull. The thought of the death that waited for them sent a surge of adrenaline through Liora.
She pushed beyond her limits, straining every fiber of her being. She felt something familiar, something that resonated with her thoughts and connected to the push.
Brandis! she shouted in her mind.
She saw him pause near the rocks just before the ship.
Brandis, the Ketulans are waiting inside. You can’t let anyone in there. They’ll kill everyone!
In the distance, she saw him gesture. The warriors scattered, seeking shelter among the rocks.
They will pay for your insolence, the voices within the dome said.
Anger fueled their words and Liora could feel them growing stronger. There was only one place they could gain strength within that chamber.
Ketulans burst from the doors of the huge spacecraft. They looked like a swarm of swarthans bearing down on the warriors beneath. Liora was afraid the beings inside the dome were right; she was about to see her army be torn apart no matter what she did.
The hum of engines screamed through the air. The Nines shot above her, their guns blazing. Ketulans exploded right and left. The army beneath fought those that flew low enough to attack. The machines swarmed one of the Nines. Liora could imagine the terror of the pilot inside as their claws tore through the metal of the ship. Smoke rose and the craft spun through the air.
Liora dove to the side when the Nine crashed into the entrance of the dome. The caves collapsed beneath the dark starship and dust rose into the air. Liora ran forward, but the entrance to the dome was blocked.
She rushed around the wreckage to the dome and stopped short at the image that met her eyes.
Tariq leaned against the glass as if he had known she would come. Moss swarmed him, covering his flesh and his uniform so that it looked as though he wore the energy-sucking matter as his clothes. The moss throbbed blue and green as it took what it wanted from his strength. Blood streamed down his leg to be consumed by the moss and his face was pale.
No one can save you, Damaclan, the voices said. The words were twisted with taunting menace. You will never leave this planet. We will feed on your flesh and devour your soul.
Images flooded Liora’s mind; they were the planets she had been to, the water planet of Gliese, Verdan with its green lightning and felis roaming the forests, Corian where her father lived, Titus, Saturn’s largest moon where she had fought in the Gladarian, and the red planet where she had saved Tariq’s life and battled giant, flesh-eating worms to rescue the crew of the S.S. Kratos.
Each planet in the vision was wrapped in the devouring moss and the planets died along with their inhabitants. Liora felt their losses as she had when she learned that the Gaulded with Zran’s mother had been destroyed by Obruo. If it wasn’t for her, the inhabitants of the manmade ship resupply planet would still be alive, and if the other planets were devoured by the moss, the same guilt would be on her shoulders.
The moss couldn’t be allowed to spread. It would consume galaxy after galaxy. It was truly a plague, and one the Macrocosm couldn’t fight. Once the moss left the planet, it would be unstoppable. The spread would be so fast and definite that everything Liora had fought for would be annihilated. Countless lives depending on them stopping the unstoppable.
Tariq put a hand on the glass.
Tears filled Liora’s eyes. She lifted her hand to his.
“No!” she protested.
Tariq’s lips moved as he said something to her, but she couldn’t hear him through the thick dome.
She could see the resolve in his eyes. He had already made up his mind what he was going to do.
Liora shook her head. She hit the glass with her palm.
“Don’t you dare!” she said and pushed toward him.
Tariq smiled; it was the special smile he saved just for her.
“I love you,” he mouthed.
“No!” she yelled.
Tariq threw the backpack over his shoulder. If the movement hurt his leg, he didn’t show it. He turned back to meet her gaze, his body covered in moss and his smile holding her, promising love and so many things that could never be.
In the next instant, everything inside the dome turned dark. Liora felt the percussion of the explosion beneath her hand. The thousand voices of the moss vanished, leaving her thoughts empty of their overwhelming presence. She shook her head, refusing to come to terms with what had happened.
Tariq was still there, standing in the darkness, smiling at her. He just had to be.
She slammed her fist into the glass. It refused to give. Liora beat her hands against the thick panes again and again until her knuckles were bruised and bloody. Her knees gave way and she fell sobbing against the outside of the dome.
“No,” she growled.
Liora put her hand to the rocky red ground. She pulled, drawing from deep inside the planet. She felt the wrongness of what she did. It was the same method the moss used, sucking energy from the planet to use it the way she wanted to, but she didn’t stop. She gathered the strength she found and pooled it into a knot in her chest. With an outlet of angry breath, Liora shoved the energy up her arms.
The glass shattered and time slowed.
Liora ran into the dome. She heard the tiny tinkling sound of the shards of glass hitting the ground. Nothing else was audible within the dome. Liora walked through the darkness.
Deep down, she knew there was nothing to find. The spongy sensation of the mossy floor was gone, replaced by the red rock that had covered the rest of the caverns. There was an acrid scent in the air as if someone had lit a fire and then snuffed it out. There was no life within the dome. She could feel its absence to her core. Nothing had survived the blast.
Her steps were muffled by a strange screaming sound that rebounded off the pillars back to her. It took Liora a moment to realize the screaming was coming from her. She closed her mouth and felt as much as heard the sound die away.
In her mind, she saw Tariq’s hand pressed against the glass. She knew the lines and scars as much as she knew her own fingers. They were so vivid in her memory as if she could reach out and pull him through her thoughts into the present. Her hand lifted. It fell back empty to her side.
New explosions sounded outside the dome. Liora turned, her movements automatic. She saw ships shaped like stars cutting through the atmosphere. The ships opened and closed as they honed in on Ketulans, shooting down those that attacked the Nines.
The Ketulans threatened people she cared about. They were enemies. They were dangerous.
Liora walked out of the dome. She felt numb, surrounded by water, by the depths of Gliese’s ocean, by the crackling void left by Verdan’s lightning, by the frayed nerve endings an
d emptiness that remained of Colonel Lefkin’s torture. She felt as though she was everything and nothing, floating and yet so heavy it seemed as though it was the planet that moved and she stood still.
“Liora, get down!”
She recognized Brandis’ voice through the haze in her mind, but she couldn’t find the will to respond. She kept walking. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her warriors hiding behind the massive red rocks. They were being destroyed by the Ketulans, shredded and torn limb from limb by the merciless creatures still intent on their directive from the moss. Liora didn’t slow; the torn metal of the massive Cherum ship marked her destination.
Though her instincts buzzed at the sound of the Ketulans closing in, Liora didn’t flinch. She knew what kind of a target she made and she embraced it. She would draw them away from her army, from her brother, and from the other ships landing in the distance.
The grating, humming sound closed in and the first blade stabbed into her shoulder; another sliced her knee and her legs collapsed. The metal bodies buried her beneath their stabbing forms. The whir of their engines shut out everything else.
Liora’s mind drifted and she saw Tariq standing beyond the dome once more. Instead of glass between them, there were curved metal bars and he held onto the top of the dome while she knelt and stared down at him. The backpack with the bomb was on his back and he held onto the bars with the moss writhing below.
“Live together or die together, remember?” Liora shouted over the sounds of battle that filled the air.
“Forget that,” Tariq replied. At the look of loss in Liora’s gaze, his voice softened. “Liora, live for both of us. Promise me.”
“I won’t,” she told him, shaking her head.
His expression became desperate. “You have to!”
She shook her head again. Her words came out as a strangled whisper. “I can’t.”
Tears filled Tariq’s eyes. He grabbed her hand through the bars.
“Liora, you must. One of us has to make it through this. You have to make it home! Promise me.”
“But Tariq…” she began, her voice cracking.
He shook his head. “Promise me, Liora. Please.”
She couldn’t deny the pleading in his gaze. Her heart ached when she finally nodded.
Tariq pressed his forehead against the bars, pulling her gently down until their foreheads touched.
“You always were too good for this Macrocosm,” he said, his voice thick.
“No, you were,” Liora replied.
Tariq’s lips brushed hers, then he leaned back and let go of the bars.
“Tariq, no!” she shouted.
He fell and she was helpless to stop him.
She watched him plummet toward the floor. His gaze stayed locked on hers. There was a gentle smile on his lips, the one he reserved only for her.
“Tariq,” she whispered.
He hit the moss-covered floor and the pack exploded. Liora was flung backwards off the structure. She closed her eyes as she fell through the air. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t feel, couldn’t fear the impact that was coming. Tariq was dead. She had watched him die. She would give in to the Ketulans and die with him. Live together or die together.
Liora embraced the pain, the distraction, the impending death from the Ketulans’ merciless blades. She was willing to give up. She was ready to die. She didn’t want to live in a Macrocosm where there was no Tariq. She had given him her heart and she felt the massive hole caused by his death. She wanted to let the Ketulans end her so that she could be wherever he was, and if he was nowhere, at least she wouldn’t have to exist with the pain in her heart that hurt even worse than the metal cutting her skin.
Unfortunately, she was Damaclan, and the Damaclan were unable accept death without a fight.
A growl tore from Liora’s lips. As much as she wanted to give in and let them shred her to pieces, she couldn’t deny her Damaclan heritage. All of the beatings, the punishments, and the hissed threats Obruo had whispered into her ears echoed in her mind.
“Give up and die,” the only father-figure in her life told her. “Lay down your useless life and prove me right. A half-blood mongrel doesn’t deserve the name Damaclan.”
Only she wasn’t just a Damaclan; she was their Queen, and the half-blood mongrel had a weapon the Ketulans weren’t prepared for. If she was going to go down, she would take as many of them with her as she could.
Liora put her hand to the ground and pulled with what remained of her strength. She let the energy from the planet fill her until she felt like she would burst. She lifted her other hand into the air amid the Ketulans who fought to reach her through the writhing metal mass. With the image of Tariq’s hand pressed against the glass foremost in her mind, she released the energy.
The Ketulans above her exploded in a halo of shrapnel. The pieces of metal fell, but the energy acted as a shield, burning the scraps before they could hit her or the ground within five feet of where she stood. More Ketulans attacked and were destroyed by the energy. By the time the last Ketulan burst outward in a violent explosion of parts, the ground around Liora burned with a circle of red fire that sparked where metal pieces lay.
Liora looked through the fire to the warriors beyond. Her gaze met Brandis’. His eyes were wide and his irises reflected the flames. She had done what she meant to do. She had promised her father and herself that she would find Brandis and rescue him from the unknown danger that held him hostage.
The price had been dear. The pain in Liora’s heart that made it hard to breathe told how very much the journey to the other end of the Macrocosm had cost her.
Liora put her forehead to the coarse red rocks that made up the ground. When she closed her eyes, she felt Tariq’s forehead against hers. She knew he would have the smile on his face he saved for her; she wished beyond all desire that she could smile in return.
“You are under arrest for violation of the Interplanetary Protection Treaty.”
The voice was stern and directed at her. Liora let out a slow breath and opened her eyes.
Chapter 14
“That’s ridiculous. You can’t arrest her!” Brandis protested.
“She used the planet’s energy to save herself,” a man with dark purple skin and glowing orange eyes replied.
“She saved all of us,” Korgutan pointed out. “The Ketulans would still be tearing your ships apart if it wasn’t for her.”
Liora could see several of the star-shaped ships behind the man. Holes in the sides were being swiftly repaired by men and women in silver suits.
“Regardless of the situation, the unlawful use of planetary energy for personal gain is against the Interplanetary Protection Treaty,” the orange-eyed woman at the man’s side said.
More of the men and women in silver advanced on Liora. They had laser blasters raised and there were skeptical expressions on their faces as though they expected her to attack at any moment.
“Lower your weapons,” one of the women shouted.
Liora didn’t know when she had drawn her knives, yet they were in her hands. She let go of the knife from the S.S. Kratos and heard the thud when it fell to the ground at her feet, but she couldn’t open the hand that held the knife with the purple gem Tariq had given her. The thought that it was the last thing she would ever have from him remained foremost in her mind. She straightened slowly and met the woman’s gaze.
“Drop…the…blade,” the woman said, her words carefully spaced as if she thought Liora’s comprehension of them questionable.
Liora lifted her chin and met the woman’s glare. “No.”
The woman’s slit eyes narrowed. “Shoot her.”
“No!” Brandis shouted.
Three bullets hit Liora. The thought crossed her mind that the sound of the bullets leaving the guns was wrong, and also laser blasters shouldn’t have bullets anyway. She looked down to see the tufted ends of darts protruding from her chest.
Liora’s knees gave out, whether b
ecause of the loss of blood from her wounds or from the darts, she didn’t know. Her palms hit the ground and she stared from them to the red rocks beneath her fingers. It felt wrong that such a harsh landscape was the last thing Tariq saw. The thought that her face had actually been the final thing Tariq looked at lingered in her mind when she collapsed to the ground and surrendered to darkness.
***
“Are you awake?”
The voice was the first she had heard since finding herself in the small room. There was a sensation in the air that told her they were back in space. She couldn’t explain what it was, but there was the knowledge that the ship she was in didn’t sit within the gravity field of a planet.
Liora sat up on the small pallet covered with the black sterile sheet. Every movement made her breath catch in her throat. She rose gingerly and crossed her arms in front of her chest. The motion pulled at the tattered pieces of her Ventican uniform that stuck to her back.
At the lack of answer, the door slid open. A man with pale skin and dark blue scales around his eyes and along his cheekbones entered. His hair was the same dark blue color as his scales. He looked as though he belonged to the same race as Malie, the young woman Brandis had been so adamant that they rescue.
He stopped on seeing her up. The man held a small red box in his webbed fingers. His dark eyes showed his wariness.
“I’m Rist. I was sent to tend to your wounds.”
Liora eyed him up and down. She debated whether she could take him out in her condition, but she didn’t know enough of where she was to make that work to her advantage. The strength it took just to stand was enough to warn her not to push herself.
Tariq would tell her to take it easy.
The thought of his concern brought a pang to her heart so sharp she bit her lip. The taste of blood centered her.
“You’re to meet with the Council tomorrow morning,” Rist told her. “My job is to ensure that you are healthy enough to attend the hearing.”
Liora watched him without speaking. She didn’t care about a council or a hearing. Vague memories of a man with glowing orange eyes preaching about a violation of some treaty were countered by the thought of Ketulans in the air above, a starship crashing down, blocking the door to the dome.
