“QUARANTINE MEASURES ENACTED,” said a computer voice.
“Medical, what's going on?” Wesley snapped. “We have radiation in here, I've got to get the First Consul out.”
The Chief Medical Officer’s voice came back, sounding very nervous. “Captain,” she said. “I don't think it's safe to do that right now.”
“It's not safe for us to remain in here, Doctor,” Wesley responded. “Give us an override.”
“Sir…” she said. “We've detected nano-pathogens on the bridge level. Their exact nature is unknown. I'm trying to do an analysis. But the profiles match as those of common bio- weapons.”
“Bio-weapons from where?” Wesley asked, incredulous.
But he heard the First Consul laughing bitterly behind him.
“From the Colonial ship do you think, Captain?” Wells said. “Was that wretched little vessel toxic, and now we're locked in here for—” He coughed, then struggling to clear his throat. “For the greater good,” he finished. “I suppose I should find that ironic.”
“Get medical staff up here!” Wesley told the medical officer over the comm. “Override the lockdown. I don't care.”
Wells began coughing again, violently this time. A black oily substance was leaking from his nose and the corners of his mouth.
His eyes went wide… and he fell to his knees, his arms flailing.
Wesley bent down to support him. He cradled the First Consul in his arms as the elder man suffered what seemed to be a seizure. There was a dark foaming substance running from his eyes now, like dirty tears.
“Poisoned…” Wells choked. “I always thought that would be the most likely means of my demise, yes? So… many enemies.”
“I'm going to get med techs up here, Sir,” Wesley told him. “Just hang on.”
Wesley tried to ignore the tingling that was running all over his own skin, swiftly turning to an itching, burning sensation. His vision as he looked down on Wells was blurring. Pinprick sensations filled his ears, his mouth, and nasal cavities—growing sharper as the pricks turned to true pain, like a thousand red-hot needles.
Now, Wells coughed again, spewing oily fluid onto the front of his tunic. His arms and legs spasmed brutally, and there were loud cracking noises, like bones breaking themselves.
“First Consul!” Wesley exclaimed, alarmed.
Behind him, crew members were hammering and prying at the doors that led from the bridge. Some were sobbing now. Some pleading, some screaming…
“Everything I did…” Wells gasped “For the… Republic. They never understood how… How could…”
Wells had another violent seizure. His body bent backwards, and Wesley thought that he could hear vertebrae cracking. Wells mouth stretched out in a grotesque expression. And then there was another crack—as if his jaw was breaking.
Now, the flesh around the mouth tore. Teeth, muscle, and bone were revealed in a horrid grin stretching from ears to mouth. One of the First Consul’s eyeballs seemed to implode, white and black fluid spurting out.
Wesley's own hands were burning as if stung by a million insects. He looked down to see that the skin was a boiled red color, with pus leaking from the joints of his knuckles.
There was an unholy pressure behind his own eyes, his vision growing dark… And burning needles now ran down his throat, in his stomach, into his gut…
He started to spasm now, dropped Wells body and fell onto his own side. There were cracking noises and unbelievable jolts of pain as his body contorted itself.
Not like this, Wesley thought.
I am… All eyes on me, always.
Bright boy, bright future. They always told me…
Worth more than… this…
Screams of agony filled the air around him as the bridge crew went through their own dying spasms.
And then—the merciful darkness claimed Captain Wesley Fitzgerald.
50
“Sivarek!” Seutter ordered over the comm. “Start moving my pod up slowly towards the ends of the booms. Bridge, get those booms as close as you can to the sphere. I'm going to have a little talk with Enoch.”
“Graham, no… Don’t go alone,” came another voice. It was Xon.
“I don't need you,” Seutter spat back. “I didn't need you to get in before.”
“Maybe not, but you do need me now. Please.”
“This is a one-man pod,” Seutter advised. “And the door is sealed.”
“Yes,” Xon said. “I'm aware of that, Graham. Look behind you.”
Seutter turned; there was a small window through which he could see out the back of the Psionicist’s pod.
Xon was running up the right boom, clad in his hard-shelled spacesuit. His magnetized boots allowed him to awkwardly jog his way along towards Seutter’s pod. He held something in his hand—some kind of weapon or gun, squat and bulky-looking.
Soon, he caught up with Seutter’s pod and climbed on top, clinging to the external hand-holds on top that were normally meant for maintenance.
“Why are you here?” Seutter asked again, annoyed.
“You can't have rage and serenity at once, Graham,” Xon explained. “Enoch can't burn minds and make wormholes at the same time. Listen to me, Graham. I deactivated my neural blocking device, and I took an anti-suppressant. I'm open to him now, exposed. I know I'm not as strong as you are. I'm no psionicist, I’ll burn. But while the fire spreads… I’ll buy you time. Get in.”
“He must know exactly what you're going to do,” Seutter scoffed. “What's the point?”
“The point is that I can provoke him, Graham. I know just how… But you must remember your training, everything from the Psionicist’s Guild. Your brother was poisoned with rage and hatred and raw emotion. That's what poisons Enoch as well. You must find peace, serenity, focus—become one with the universe, as you were taught. Use that against him, not emotion. Do you understand?”
As they talked, the psionicist’s pod kept moving up between the booms.
Now, the mass of the sphere-like Valorian vessel was ahead. Its oily, shiny surface reflected their pod with Xon perched on top—and the shining, silvery, yet battered hull of Musashi behind them.
Seutter watched in the reflection as Xon raised his weapon and fired. Even from inside the pod, he felt the slight concussive force.
The weapon’s projectile impacted the front of the Valorian vessel. Silvery webbing spread there, turning to foam and the hull began to melt away.
A gap forming…
“It's not going to be that easy,” Seutter said.
“No,” Xon said. “But that grenade will give us a door in. It means I don't have to plead for entry.”
Seutter saw that Xon was correct, as the front of the Valorian vessel dissolved, revealing the dark interior. The contagion seemed to simply fade out; the foaming stopped once it had reached a certain point.
But the front of the sphere was open now.
“Musashi, get me just inside that thing,” Seutter requested over the comm.
“Just giving her a nudge for you, Sir,” came an unfamiliar voice on the comm.
But the ship seemed to respond. The pod, now at the end of its track between the booms, glided slowly into the opening of the Valorian vessel as the ship moved forward with the barest of carefully-controlled thrust.
Once inside, it stopped. All was dark inside; a deep blackness that the lights on the psionicist’s pod could not penetrate.
Suddenly, Xon announced himself. He spoke aloud, so that Seutter could hear him over the comm.
But Seutter knew that he was really speaking to Enoch.
“It is I, Abijah. Betrayer, Abandoner. I’m here, Father. Proof that the blood of the Faithful is impure, that it has failed. Your Templars Lamech, Milcah, and Seth knew me immediately when they touched my thoughts. Why? Where they looking for me? How obsessed have you become with finding me… Your humble child, and spy?”
Meanwhile, Seutter placed his Valorian headband back on his head. It
seemed hot to his touch. The burning wasn’t in his brain quite yet… but he could sense Enoch’s rage.
“YOU MEAN NOTHING.” Enoch’s voice boomed from the darkness. “A FAILURE OF FAITH, YOUR OWN SMALL WEAKNESS.”
Xon responded: “I'm not doing this out of faith, or tradition, or patriotism… But for love of my friends and comrades. I got them into this. And I will open the way to get them out. The prodigal child returns, Father. But I will not repent or relent. Judge me as you will, Enoch.”
“WELL IT IS THAT YOU SHOULD BURN. THERE IS NO WAY BACK FOR YOU. YOU MUST BE PURGED BEFORE THESE INFIDELS TO WHOM YOU HAVE GIVEN SUCCOR.”
“I feel your rage, Father,” Xon said “Your disapproval. I feel the heat in my mind. I know you can destroy me. Did you do so to Rebekah, Nehemiah, and the others who went out… The other spies? Or have you never found them? Freed from the Unity, they also ran, did they not? I know that— Uhh!” Xon moaned.
Seutter could feel the shadow of that pain now, conducted through his own headband. It was as if Enoch was trying to poke a hot knife through Xon's very soul.
Still, Xon fought it…
“Your Creed has no power, Father,” Xon continued. “Your Faith is false. The Unity follows your dominant mind with no will of their own. Constantly judged and steered by you—utterly enslaved. There can be no true faith without free will. Therefore, they are all damned by you, their wretched slave master.”
“THE INFIDELS ARE SLAVE TO FLESH. THE FAITHFUL ARE FREE IN THE SIGHT OF GOD.”
“Carl Jung,” Xon continued. “A great thinker of Earth… He spoke of the father complex, the yearning for a protector and a leader. But you wouldn’t know about that, would you? Do you yearn to know God—or only believe in your own authority, your own rage, your own desire? Whatever the Valorians started as, you've poisoned them. Whatever they added to the technology they received, you turned it to a disease. You know I speak Truth, you know I believe this. I—Ahh!”
The burning in Xon’s mind became more generalized now, his whole brain on fire…
And Seutter could feel it.
“I shall not suffer the BLASPHEMER to live,” said Enoch. “And he WHO conspires with YOU—ThIS infideL SHALL ALSO BURN.”
Xon gasped. “Graham… No…”
But it was too late.
Seutter’s own head was inflamed. It was no longer just an echo of Xon’s pain; the fire was in his own mind as well. His headband felt heated to an almost molten state, searing his flesh. While his brain boiled, his every little thought became agony.
“It is nothing to burn two minds at once,” Enoch announced. “Both so weak in the eyes of judgement.”
“You have what… what I don't, Graham,” Xon managed to choke out. “Training… the place. Find it.”
“All time is one heartbeat,” Seutter rasped, the pain overwhelming. He spoke aloud, the effort of moving of his lips helping him to focus.
“I exist in every moment,” he continued. “All life is one life. All minds are one. Ahh!.. The pain!” he gasped. “Theta waves… I need the burst!”
Sivarek’s voice came back over the comm. “With this sensor sail damage, I'm not sure if I can focus the burst, Graham. I—”
“Just do it!” Seutter screamed.
A moment later, it happened.
Seutter thought that he could actually hear the theta wave burst go off, like a shriek in his mind.
But it seemed to wash away the pain… at least momentarily.
Carrying him out of himself… Too far out.
No, no need to get grounded, focused, back to myself.
Find the center—the Valorian Unity.
He searched for their minds—the network of minds that they used to do impossible things with wormholes. Opening them instantaneously where they shouldn't be, mastering the quantum nature of the universe…
He could hear them again, the Valorians of the Unity… Chattering, praying, calculating.
“We have forewarning, Infidel,” came a voice. “Enoch has barred the gates.”
Their minds pulled away.
It's not going to work, Seutter thought.
I was wrong. I can't get into their telepathic network this time.
The bastards locked me out…
Thanks to the theta wave burst, his telepathy felt magnified a thousand-fold, reaching out for other minds… But the Valorians had erected a wall to stop him, and he knew that he couldn't pierce it.
The power of Enoch in front of him, blocking the way, and behind him…
Human minds racing, fearful, seeking to fight, seeking to survive. The minds of his people, the Musashi crew. Not psionicists themselves— yet each of them had a different perspective on the universe.
I can use them.
I can, yes, while the energy of the theta burst lasts.
He reached out with his mind…
51
Brattain watched on the main viewscreen—watched and waited.
As Seutter had instructed, Hawking had carefully maneuvered the Musashi so that the booms on the front of the ship were poking through the sundered hull of the Valorian sphere.
Seutter and Xon were now inside the sphere, and out of view.
Whatever's happening, Brattain thought, our fates are in their hands now.
The Mars was now just sitting there in space, like some great noble creature with a crippling injury. The bridge section above the prow looked blackened and burnt, though energy readings showed that the ship was still functional.
When Spartacus hit, it must've taken out their bridge, she thought.
Washington, you crazy Colonial. You saved us. Or, at least, you gave us a few more minutes to try and save ourselves. Provided Mars doesn’t start firing again—they do have a secondary bridge and auxiliary controls.
Are they waiting to see what the Valorians are going to do?
But we're here. Stuck sitting still in space—until Seutter and Xon finish whatever they're working on.
Reynard was sobbing softly at his console. Brattain had locked out all his controls; she'd asked him to leave the bridge and go to the wardroom, but he hadn't responded. But she saw no point in pressing that order at the current time.
He worked hard, followed orders all his life, she thought. Utterly professional, I admired him for that.
I can’t blame him for feeling lost or betrayed. I—
Suddenly, Brattain felt lightheaded for a moment. Her right eye twitched, and she wondered if there was a problem with the cloned organ. But then, there was a warm tingling in her scalp…
No, she thought. Enoch, the Valorian bastard… Is this when our minds start to burn?
But the tingling turned to a soothing buzz, penetrating into her brain. There were whispers like the rushing air of an ocean breeze…
And she felt calmed. Her racing heart instantly slowed, the adrenalin in her system neutralized. She felt lightheaded. A floating sensation—but not unpleasant.
Reynard was the first to speak.
“All life is one life,” he recited. “All minds are one.” He commented: “I'm not alone… I can feel it… So big, all of us linked… So peaceful.”
Brattain could see it now: the universe stretching out, an infinity of points. All connected, all related. Always steady, yet ever-changing.
She was viewing it through a haze, as if in a dream. Only half-understood, she knew. But it was there… Out there, all around her.
And so were the bright points of consciousness surrounding her.
These were her crew.
All connected now by another very bright point out there, inside of the Valorian sphere…
“Seutter… It's his psionic meditation,” she said aloud. “He's bringing us into it. The Valorians have their Unity, but Seutter… We’re his network.”
Hawking stroked his moustache wistfully and laughed. Dreamily he said, “It's like the glowing dawn on a calm sea with lapping waves. The sea stretching out beyond the horizon to a billion beaches, a
billion other watchers… And I'm connected to them as I drink from my mug of milky tea and enjoy the sunrise.”
“Mister Hawking, that's…” Brattain drew in a deep, warm, energizing breath. “That's beautiful. The universe is alive always, persistence, continuity. One place everywhere, one moment stretching forever. Infinite possibilities. Yet in the moment, it's not hard to find the right action, the truth. This is the true Void.”
Seutter, she thought. Troubled, angry Seutter.
Through his psionicist training, he had access to the Void all along. How ironic…
On some level, she knew that he was co-opting their minds, using them as if they were slave systems on a computer network.
But that was all right. Seutter was one of them. He was human, part of their Unity: a union of unique individuals, joined willingly in the moment.
And Enoch—she almost felt sorry for him now.
“Get him, Graham Seutter,” she said aloud. “Stop him—so that we can all go home.”
52
It's the wrong scale, Seutter thought.
An infinity stretched in front of him. But the glowing, spinning things he saw were galaxies, not particles.
No… Too wide.
Pull in, pull back.
His consciousness was rushing back. The Musashi was behind him, with all of its occupants linked in the gestalt network that he had created.
In front of him, the darkness of Enoch sphere’s obscured almost everything, the lights of the pod feeble in the inky blackness.
On top of the psionicist’s pod, Xon was screaming, thrashing.
Then, he could no longer hold on. Xon let go, tumbling forward, thrashing in pain inside of his spacesuit.
And Enoch came forward.
Now, the lights of the psionicist’s pod illuminated the Valorian leader. He was clad in the Templars’ bony armor; but he wore no psionic gauntlet on his arm, as if he didn't need it. His black faceplate seemed to ooze scorn, even though his actual facial features were obscured.
Seutter coolly thought: One cannot create wormholes within solid matter. There are prohibitions on density. He had been taught this—but now he knew in this particular moment, high on theta waves and linked to his ersatz network—that those teachings were wrong.
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