The crowd was growing bigger by the minute, with people coming from buses, cars, trucks, and even semi trailers. It was bizarre. Bill had no clue why the Zalt were being drawn to the hub, but it was clear that was what was transpiring.
Marcus seemed nervous, but he was parting paths for them, using his smaller size to slip between people as they headed toward the hub’s barrier. From some angles, the shield was invisible, with a gentle sheen to it. At others, Bill saw the glimmering light.
Most of the people were obviously locals. They had that small-town Texas vibe to them, and Bill wasn’t picking on them when he thought that. They were hard-working folks, probably suffering since their local oilfield business had dried up. Economies came and went, but resilient people always survived.
Lot of good it had done them, though. They were each infected with a Zalt, no longer in control of themselves.
Bill guessed they were nearly a mile out, had to be, but Marcus kept moving them farther into the crowds. There were so many people pressing on each side of Bill that he felt claustrophobic. It reminded him of a concert he’d gone to when he was younger. It had been full of booze and drugs, the constant smell of marijuana and perspiration. This wasn’t so different. There was a sense of euphoria oozing from the Zalt. They were reveling in their victory.
“Not so soon,” Bill whispered.
To the right was a break in the crowd, and Marcus took them to it. Bill saw why the people had hesitated. One of the Umir sat rolled into a ball. The Zalt gave it space. Marcus didn’t. He walked up to it and tapped the tablet to its side. It rose from the sphere, stretching tall.
“How did you do that?” Evan asked.
“I figured it out on the way here. If I’m within range of the Umir, I can control them.” Marcus’ expression was grim as the Umir stepped forward on two legs, guns raised on the offensive. It started toward the hub, and they trailed after the huge robot.
“Quite the escort,” Bill told Evan.
People parted for them, making space for the Umir and, consequently, their group. A young man grabbed at Bill, trying to speak to him, but Bill shoved him off. He became painfully aware of the gun in a holster under his vest but didn’t reach for it.
“Do you hear that?” Evan asked.
Marcus cocked his ear skyward. “Sounds like engines.”
“Is Gren early?” Bill inquired.
“That’s manmade. Someone’s flying in. Jets, I’d say,” Evan told him.
Marcus stared into the sky, and Bill noticed his mouth twitch open. “Those are F-16s.”
Bill sensed danger but wasn’t quite sure why.
“We have to get to cover,” Evan exclaimed.
Marcus was running, heading for the hub barrier, and Bill hiked up his jeans, chasing after them. The Umir kept ahead, its heavy weight causing its feet to dig into the earth. Bill was careful not to trip on the torn ground.
“Hurry!” Marcus had the tablet out as they neared the barrier, and used it to give them access. Other people were pushing against it, but it held them at bay. The three of them entered the shining blue shield, and Marcus managed to close it up behind them. It cut one of the people behind them in half.
Evan shot the man in the head, doing him a favor. Bill fought to keep his stomach contents down.
The F-16s were drawing a lot of attention, and the crowd seemed to understand the purpose of the incoming vessels. Many of them were armed, and they shot into the air, trying to hit the speeding fighter jets. Bill guessed they were packed with more than just the regular Sidewinders.
They blasted the barrier and the crowd with missiles. The entire area lit up as the steady stream of fighters assaulted the region.
“This must be the surprise Tripp mentioned,” Evan told them. “Colonel Jerkins was a last resort. He gave him a timeline to abide by, and it looks like they made it.”
Bill fell to his knees as the ground rumbled. A bomber screamed through the skies. This was their final showdown. He buried his head under his arms, fully expecting the impact that was coming.
The nuclear bomb’s shock was catastrophic. Everything went silent, and Bill glanced at Marcus and Evan. They stood watching the terror, and Bill climbed to his feet, walking to them. The people outside the shield were instantly incinerated, cars and trucks were tossed aside like leaves in the wind. The giant mushroom rose so high, and their view became obstructed by the clouds of dust and debris.
None of them spoke. It was impossible to find their voice. Bill’s breath lingered in his chest somewhere, and his instincts took over, letting him exhale. The barrier held. They were alive.
Marcus dropped the tablet and quickly picked it up. He glanced at Bill, then Evan. “The battery’s dead.”
Fire burned all around the perimeter of the hub’s shield.
____________
“Jessica. I’m here to cut a deal,” I told her. I struggled to remember that she used to be my boss. It was almost laughable, and I would have chuckled if I wasn’t staring at my sister’s face.
“The time for deals is over.” Jessica waved at a group of soldiers. These weren’t the black-clad Believers; they were men in army fatigues, with assault rifles and years of combat training behind them. Even if they had Zalt inside them, the instincts were there.
“You might want to hear me out,” I said.
“You’re too late, Rexford,” Bev told me. “We’re beginning our descent. Your people will soon be a thing of the past. Don’t worry; humanity will continue, until we consume them. But this is our Exodus. Our final stop.”
I studied her, trying to gain a hint of Beverly in those narrow eyes. “I have the Bridge.”
Jessica walked closer, staring at the bag in my grip. “We should secure it.”
Beverly looked irritated. “None of that matters, Jessica. When the Zalt enter them, we’ll have it, or we can shoot them this instant. But this one…” She pointed at me. “He’s strong.”
We were still armed, which came as a bit of a surprise. But not even Tripp Davis would open fire with all these soldiers aiming high-caliber weapons at us.
I glanced at him, but he didn’t return the attention. He was grimacing, watching the soldiers like a hawk. I stayed between my friends and the pair of women.
“Where’s Alan Black?” I asked, knowing full well he was dead.
“Black was weak.” Beverly motioned to the nearest soldier. “Take them inside.”
I almost expected them to search me, but they only took the gun from my holster. Tripp held his tight but eventually gave in. This was part of our plan, but I knew full well this went against everything in his training.
The soldier shoved Veronica toward the house, and she spun around, clocking the man in the jaw. He lifted his head, blood welling from his lips, and grinned.
“I think we located a vessel for my second in command.” Beverly chuckled, and Jessica flinched.
Jessica slowed before we entered the house, grabbing my arm. We stayed just out of earshot from my sister. “Rex, I think I’ve made a terrible mistake.”
I waited, not wanting to speak. She was probably messing with me. I couldn’t trust a word this woman said.
“They’re going to kill so many of us. There’s only a few hundred thousand of the aliens left, not billions. Rex… in the next two hours, we’ll almost lose our entire population.” I studied her eyes. This was Jessica.
“Help me stop them,” I whispered.
She glanced into the house, and Beverly was staring at us, her face devoid of emotion, her eyes black.
Jessica slapped me, hard. “Don’t speak to me like that, Rexford. You have no idea who you’re dealing with.” Her expression told a different story than her words. She wiped a tear away and entered the house.
“Let me see it,” Bev said.
“What?” I asked.
“The Bridge you’ve been talking about.” My sister walked over, her feet bare. They padded across the cool white tiles.
I held
up the bag, and when she stopped and reached for it, I dropped it to the floor. “Sorry,” I muttered.
Bev didn’t let it bother her. She stooped low and opened it, pulling the Case out. She rose, grinning as she spun it in her hands. “Very good. The Rodax are up to their old tricks, I see.”
“You’re familiar with them?” I inquired.
“We’ve met along the way. They keep giving us places to adjourn to. It’s a good relationship,” she said.
“You work together?” I asked, not believing her.
“In a manner. Come. I have something to show you.” She clutched the Case and walked to the doorway. Veronica started to follow, but the soldiers stepped to block her.
“It’s okay,” I assured Veronica, and went to the staircase with Beverly.
Jessica was there, and Bev shook her head. “This is just for siblings.” She shut the door and led me into the basement.
“You don’t have to do this, Beverly,” I told her, searching for a shred of my sister remaining in that mind.
“Call me Yeral.” Her tone was harsh and deliberate.
I glanced at my watch, the one from my father, and tried to see how much time we had remaining. An hour and ten minutes. This was too close.
I considered shoving her down the stairs, trying to kill her, but I couldn’t. Not with Yeral in Beverly’s body. Plus, it wasn’t going to help our plight if I ruined my chance to access the Objects.
“Where are we going?” We’d landed in a basement, unfinished and rough. It smelled moldy, and the ceilings were short. I ducked to keep from scraping my hair on the beams.
“You’ll see.” Beverly sauntered across the uneven floor and rested her fingers on another door handle. “Did you think the only Bridge access was in Porto?”
The hair on my arms stood up. “What are you talking about?”
She turned the knob and pushed the door in. We descended five steps, and a groan escaped my lips. Torches lit the walls, just like they had in Portugal. The room was an exact replica of the cave.
____________
A nuke. Someone had dropped a damned nuclear bomb on the hub. And it hadn’t even scratched the thing.
Marcus thought about how close they’d been to being obliterated with the rest of these people. Thousands of lives had been snuffed out in a flash. Fire burned all around the region, and Marcus couldn’t even begin to contemplate how much radiation was emanating after the blast.
Another jet flew by at a distance, but no more missiles came. No more bombers arrived to attempt another explosion.
Marcus figured that was for the best. The shield continued to shimmer, and the light emitting from the hub, shooting skyward, grew in intensity. It was too bright to gawk directly at, but he did regardless, trying to see where it was aiming. If he was to guess, the Objects were its target.
“Kid, get it together!” Bill shouted, and shook Marcus by the shoulders.
“I…” Marcus didn’t have words. This was way over his head. Up until now, he’d been running on adrenaline and desperation; his reserve had dwindled. He was an empty vessel waiting for a Zalt to come and inhabit him, because that was his fate.
“Marcus, Bill has a point. We can’t give up!” It was the FBI agent’s turn to talk sense into him. Marcus shrugged them off.
“It’s done. We’re screwed.” He sat on the dirt, letting go of the tablet. With the battery dead, it was useless. He couldn’t turn the Umir hub off, not without…
Marcus smiled and rushed to his feet. “Wait.” He picked up the tablet. “There might be a chance.” He ran for the hub. The ground vibrated, and the closer they got, the more it shook. When he was twenty feet away, he saw pebbles lifted off the dirt, floating in place.
Evan bent down, raking his fingers through some hovering debris. “This is insane.”
“We were just shielded from a nuke,” Bill reminded him. “I think this is par for the course.”
Marcus tried to ignore them as he ran to the hub. An Umir rolled between them but remained in ball form. Marcus had seen them do serious damage in that form, but it stayed peaceful. It must have read something from the tablet, despite it being powered down. That was a positive sign.
He’d seen a perch on the hub, a flat spot that had similar attributes to a charging port. At the time, he’d been so distracted with trying to survive, he hadn’t given it a second thought. Now he figured it might be what they needed.
The Umir hub had unrolled, reaching twenty feet in height. It stood motionless and was spiked into the earth. Light barreled from its top antenna, shooting far into the sky.
“What are you doing?” Bill asked.
Marcus pointed to the top half of the thing. “I think that’s a charging port.”
Evan looked up from his crouched position. “How can you reach it?”
“Climb.” Marcus slid the tablet into his jacket and searched for footholds. Initially, when he’d realized the battery might die, he tried thinking about whether or not he could manually shut the hub down on the robot itself. But there were no external controls, and he didn’t know the first thing about its physical mechanics. He only understood the programming behind it.
Luckily for him, there were enough pieces jutting out for his boots to gain purchase. He grabbed one of the appendages and stepped onto its leg, using his arm strength to lift himself, and began to ascend the hub.
5
Minutes had passed for Dirk inside the strange underground bunker. Opor remained here, frozen in her hovering state. He’d gained no understanding on how to operate this portal. That was what it appeared to be. Rewa had exited his vessel, Opor, transporting himself to the Object.
Dirk needed to do the same. Not only to regain Opor, but to help his family on Earth. He was slumped to the floor, staring at the woman from Rimia, when it struck him.
Opor had left when they’d consumed the last of the liquid. He’d used his up, but perhaps she’d managed to make it to this room before hers wore off. She’d drunk more than him. If he could find more, and…
He stopped, recognizing how little time was left. His gaze moved from Opor to the bag at her feet.
“Hard to see the forest through the trees,” he mumbled.
Dirk rushed to it, unclasping the top. He searched it. Someone like Rewa would bring more than enough of anything. Hunter Madison had always been meticulous, sometimes to the point of obsessive. He dumped the contents, finding more food and a canteen, which he unscrewed and sniffed. Water. He took a long drink and dropped it.
Something else caught his eye, and it stood out like a sore thumb. The dark green leaves were folded, and he unwrapped them. Inside were five smaller leaves. They looked like herbs, something to enhance your meal, but Dirk knew better.
He rubbed one between his fingers, and caught the scent of the ancestral dream-walking elixir. This was the plant they used to make the beverage.
Instead of bothering to mix it with water, since he had no means of making a hot tea or steeping it properly, he shoved it onto his tongue. It was bitter.
He chewed it and swallowed. Nothing happened.
Dirk got to his feet and reached for Opor’s hand. It was cold, her fingertips blue.
“I’m sorry. I failed.” Dirk’s mind began to melt as his eyelids drooped. The doorframe glowed brightly, and he felt his body go rigid. For a second, he saw himself frozen beside Opor; he reached for her but was pulled away.
____________
“Why did you have this built?” I asked. For a second, it seemed like I was back in Portugal. The damp basement even reminded me of its scent.
“It existed before Jessica’s reign. For a time, we didn’t understand why, but we presume one of the Believers had it created.”
This confused me, since we didn’t think the Believers had access to the Bridge. Unless… “Does Rewa sound familiar?”
Beverly froze in her footsteps. “Where did you learn that name?”
I realized that the real Beverly did
n’t know about Rewa or Mezpa, since we’d discovered the truth behind Hunter Madison while on Rimia. That little detail was hidden from the Zalt inside her, and I had to use it to my benefit. “We’re acquaintances.”
“How is that possible?” Beverly stared at me with her hands resting on the stone podium.
“He was here. He infiltrated the Believers and built this duplicate Bridge cavern.” I assumed most of this was true, but I didn’t need to share that I was filling in the blanks.
“Rewa did this?” She ran a finger over the podium and smiled. “He listened well.”
My heart almost exploded. Blood thrummed into my eardrums, and white specks appeared in my vision. Hunter had been lying to us the entire time. But what were his motivations?
“Why?” I asked, barely hearing my own voice.
“We needed a second option. I knew that accessing the Bridge would lead to our ultimate destination, should Earth fail.” Beverly set the Case on the stand and spun it around, noticing the single empty slot.
She didn’t need to finish. “Kabos,” I whispered.
“Very astute. I assume you’ve visited? Judging by the old Rodax ships I saw earlier.”
I nodded, trying to think of a way out of this. We’d been deceived by Hunter, and now my sister was inhabited by the Zalt leader. They wanted Earth and possibly even Kabos. This was going to be more difficult than I’d thought, and I’d already been expecting to fail.
This estate was a hive of Zalt. If I stood a chance, I needed some form of advantage. “Does this room work?” I asked.
“That remains to be seen. Rewa was supposed to ensure it did.” Beverly walked over, her hair a knotted mess. Her t-shirt was too big and had a cartoon cow on it. I wanted to hug her, my real sister, and tell her we could finally go home.
“Bev, your kids are fine. I saw them today. They’re somewhere safe. Carson and Edith wanted me to say hi,” I told her, and saw a slight flicker in her eyes. Then it was gone.
Lost Hope (The Bridge Sequence Book Three) Page 24
