“What are you say …?”
She couldn’t finish. Michael tapped a finger over her lips. He zeroed in on one boy who punched open a large holocube and appeared to be sorting through graphics that pulsated at varying wavelengths. He grabbed one of the pulses and pushed forward, as if pressing a launch button. The machine hummed then rattled, as if the speaker’s bass was turned up full.
Yet the sound was going the wrong way. The machine appeared to be absorbing the bass like a vacuum. As soon as it came alive, the DR29 responded with lively analysis. Michael’s jaw fell.
“Oh, hell.”
“What?”
“The readings. I can’t believe it. They built a graviton weapon.”
“Which is?”
“Something else that shouldn’t be possible. They must have got this design from the J’Hai, just like the mobile wormhole and all their other goodies. The Chancellors never built a workable model of this machine. I read about it in Tier III Quantum Engineering. It alters gravity and air pressure inside a stasis field. It’s designed to hit you like a bomb and rip you apart from the inside.”
“That’s horrifying. How big is the field?”
“I got no intention of finding out. But why is it so far away? Wait …”
He reset the DR29 parameters to scan up to ten kilometers for similar configurations. In seconds, the first matches arrived. Soon, he saw a stunning pattern.
“It’s a network, but it’s not like those towers. There’s at least fifty of these positioned in zigzags around the perimeter. Some are close as five hundred meters from the settlement, and the farthest are … well, like this one. It’s another defense system. They don’t have the numbers to fight an enemy on multiple fronts, so they’re using these like a minefield against a ground assault.”
“They’re not exactly hidden like mines.”
“No. But I get the feeling they don’t have to be. Like I said, we’re dealing with some hardcore shit. I can’t wait anymore. Sun’s about to come up, and I need to make my move. When I give you the signal, haul ass.”
She asked what signal, but Michael wasn’t paying attention. He locked his blast rifles over his forearms. Inside, he manipulated his fingers into prime aiming and firing positions. The weapons became him. Symbiosis. Michael loved when that happened.
He commanded the DR29 to lock on to all possible targets.
Wait for it. The one on the right. He’s moving. Anticipate position. Behind the machine. One more. She’s about to appear. Good. Now. Three steps, leap, flat landing. Move your arms like a fucking squid. Do NOT hit the machine!
The targets were not hapless Mongol rogues, but Michael wasn’t giving them a chance to prove any more effective.
He made his move, lightning-fast, and unleashed a precision barrage of flash pegs toward the only vulnerable part of their bodies.
One by one, they jerked and fell, holes opening in their heads, red splashes of liquid expelling from the far side. Blood splattered against the machine, which otherwise appeared unharmed.
Michael pivoted toward the rifters and waved Maya to follow.
She was furious – more than he ever saw – when she caught up.
“Don’t even say it,” he told her. “What did you think I was going to do? Have a chat with them? Look. They’re immortals. They’ll get over it. I did. Now let’s go.”
“This is reckless, Michael. They have stream amps. It won’t take long before someone realizes there’s a problem.”
“That’s what I’m hoping.”
She tried to hop on a rifter with Michael, but he pushed her back.
“No. You take that one. We’ve got a better chance on separate rifters. Look, I’m gonna amp you a guide path. Throw open a cube. You can toss the data straight into the guidance web. I’m familiar with this model rifter. We had one on Sam’s estate.”
She jumped on the other before realizing what Michael was up to.
“Are you separating us?”
“Yeah, and we don’t have time to argue. There’s something I gotta do, and it’s a little nuts. You can’t be there. These coordinates will give you a visual on the settlement, but you’ll be out of the line of fire.”
“Michael, I …”
“Trust me,” he said, tapping his amp. “You have the coordinates. Go. I don’t know how quick these kids regenerate.”
Maya’s peaceful, stoic exterior rarely betrayed her emotions, but Michael saw something unprecedented: A stare of utter disdain.
She’ll get over it. If she doesn’t, at least she’ll be alive.
He tossed his DR29 flight path into the rifter’s guidance web and grabbed hold of the steering arms. Michael didn’t stick around to see if Maya followed instructions. The quicker he departed, the sooner she’d come to her senses.
He flew east, toward the sun that peeked its head over the high plateau. Then he turned sharply south over the Bengalese River and headed toward a waterfall.
56
S AM NEVER TALKED SO FAST; she expected to lose Valentin at any second. Reminding him of the schism with his brother was one thing, but convincing him of a deadly threat posed by both the hybrids and the Jewels was another. At first, he seemed less concerned about what Sam learned through the J’Hai than about the man who entered her dome.
“Describe him again,” Valentin insisted.
“Old,” she said. “Very old. Not a hybrid or an immortal. If I had to guess? A native.”
“What? A Hiebim? And he conveniently gave you no name.”
“Valentin, there’s no other explanation. How else could he be here? He said he’d been spying on the city since it was settled. That’s how he got to me undetected.”
“And this Hiebim who shouldn’t exist gave you a white cube that dissolved on your tongue and took you back in time a million years.”
She saw where this was headed.
“Valentin, do you believe I’d tell you a story like that if it wasn’t true? What do I have to gain?”
“More to the point, what do you have to lose?”
“Valentin, despite everything you did with James before you came here, I know you’re a decent man. I’ve seen it. You protected me when I arrived. I know you hated what Rayna did to me. And I know you love those children. They look to you like a father. I’ve gotten to know some of them. If you don’t deal with this now, they’re all going to die. The hybrids will kill you all. And if they don’t, the weapons in those towers will. The Jewels won’t protect you if they believe you fight for the hybrids. When the Guard arrives, they’ll have the easiest invasion in history because nobody will be left to resist.”
If that didn’t convince him, she was sunk. Sam had no more passionate card to play. The vast catalog of data and memories from the J’Hai continued to materialize, but she wasn’t built to process so much so fast. And none could be reproduced as physical proof. At the very least, Valentin hesitated before he replied.
“Why you?” He asked. “If the Jewels are behind this, why anoint you as the messenger? You and an old man who shouldn’t exist.”
An easy one. “Who else would you believe? Valentin, you told me I was being sent down here instead of vented into space, because James said I was ‘essential to the future,’ whatever that means. I think about it every day. He’s your conduit to the Jewels. Yes?”
“He is.”
“What if he allowed me down here because the Jewels planted the idea in his mind? What if they knew this was coming? What if they decided to make me a conduit to the younger brother? Maybe all this was a chance to test you and the immortals to see where you stood when given the choice. This cannot be a coincidence.”
Valentin held his hands to his hips, a sign that gave Sam hope. At least he was contemplating the possibility.
“My brother is arrogant and at times, irrational. But he led us here, and he knows his empire will not happen without me and the immortal army. He would never do what you suggest.”
Now she understood.
The poor J’Hai who led her into the skyscraper and tried to negotiate with a Berserker wasn’t pleading with just anyone. They spoke of their mother and father.
“It happened before, Valentin. A million years ago. The same betrayal. The J’Hai people sent him to negotiate with the leader of the Berserkers – his own brother.”
“And what happened?”
“His brother didn’t listen. Didn’t even care anymore. Slaughtered him then turned his army on the rest of the immortal J’Hai. Every time I see it, I want to cry and scream. They’ve been seeking vengeance all this time. They brought us here to create a type of crucible, and they’re giving us a chance to choose.”
Valentin’s jaw stiffened. “My heart wants to believe you. After all I’ve experienced the past three years, nothing seems beyond the pale. But I have a brain, and it asks too many questions I can’t answer. Are you suggesting I kill my brother before he kills me?”
“Like I said, we have to choose. I’m not sure that’s your path, Valentin. Someone else will be here soon.”
“Who?”
“The old man said, ‘He is coming. Wait for him.’” She held off the tears. “I can’t say his name because I don’t see how it’s possible. I want it to be true more than my life, but I can’t …”
“No. Samantha, if you’re thinking of Michael Cooper, no.”
“But why not?”
“James was obsessed with finding him. We recently discovered Michael Cooper’s location. A base on Tamarind. But Samantha, I’m sorry to say the base was destroyed. There were no survivors.”
A cold knife, long and jagged, ripped into her gut and twisted.
“You’re wrong.”
The words dropped with ease. The news should have destroyed her. Yet Sam refused to bear it.
“I wish I were,” Valentin said. “We lost fifty of our best.”
“But not Michael. Either way, nothing changes if you …”
Col. Joosten, who Valentin left in charge, burst into the room.
“Admiral, we have a breach.”
“Wait, what? By whom?”
Joosten paused to glance at Sam. “Unknown, sir. It just now happened at the NR7 installation. Six streams died simultaneously. I picked up an image from a drone vid.”
Valentin crowded beside Joosten and looked inside the officer’s holocube. The response was immediate.
“Who could do this? Have we detected the enemy?”
“No, Admiral. But look here. We are monitoring two rifters leaving the scene in different directions. This one is on a northwest heading, away from us. But here … south over the river.”
“How long?”
“Assuming current path and velocity, seven minutes to the falls, eight to JaRa. Your orders?”
Valentin stepped aside and grabbed Sam’s arm. He brought her close and showed the carnage at the installation site.
“Who did this? The old man couldn’t have ambushed all these soldiers. Who did this?”
His tone changed from near-acceptance of her story to blood-soaked rage. Sam didn’t blame him, but she dared not answer his question. Valentin was trembling when he leaned in.
“Your orders?” Joosten asked again.
Valentin hesitated, shifting between them both. Finally, he addressed Joosten.
“You’re Slope skilled?”
“I am, sir.”
“Prepare the reserve Scramjet. It seems our war has begun.”
57
T HE SUN PIERCED THE HORIZON AS a fiery hemisphere, opening Michael’s eyes to the wonder of a beautiful world. It felt new with possibilities, as he imagined Eden might have long ago. Yet he pushed forward with pounding heart and nerves on edge, the rifter skimming a few feet above the rapid rush of the Bengalese River. He was half a kilometer from the waterfall, time about to slip away, his thousand-to-one shot almost lost. Did he follow the signs correctly?
The destruction of the J’Hai capital city replayed on a loop, each time with additional, granular details. The family that landed its organic ship at the base of the wide avenue came into clearer focus. They weren’t present at the apocalyptic moment by accident. This time, he felt the terror that brought them to the city. He heard their prayers for a peaceful resolution. They chose to be here; they refused to let him die alone.
Father. Wife. Grandchildren.
He had protected them for years; hid them away from someone who long ago slipped from their grasp and chose a different path: The first son.
These J’Hai could not bear for their beloved to sacrifice himself alone. Yet the city was huge; they did not know how to find him. So, they waited and hoped. Michael felt their desperation, their sense of inevitability.
When the thousands of J’Hai who filled the avenues and windows decayed and died under transparent chemical clouds, the family knew their mission was a failure. Only when they saw the Berserkers high above in the mountains prepare to decimate the city, did the family decide to leave. What use were they to bear witness but die before sharing their story?
In the instant before the tornadic clouds consumed them, the family reached out to the only one who knew their plight and transferred all their grief, fury, and love. The memories of happier times flooded Michael’s conscious mind. Visions of J’Hai children playing, of families bonded for hundreds of years celebrating long-held traditions.
And then, separation. New ambitions fraught with division.
The first brother, the gem of his parents’ eyes, consumed by reckless obsession for unbridled power. The second brother, loyal to his parents and passionately in love, unable to stop the inevitable.
The poison of betrayal flowed cold through Michael’s blood when the first son became the enemy of the J’Hai people. When all others failed, they turned to the second brother for help. If anyone might find goodness within the enemy of the people, it will be you, they said.
He failed. The city lay in ruins.
Michael stood in a green field where poppies were about to bloom, but he was not alone. The nine-foot-tall humanoid who tried to avert the apocalypse stood beside Michael and cried. He extended a long, slender arm toward Michael. He turned up his palm.
J’Hai’Nyon.
He laid a poppy in Michael’s hand and gave permission to speak.
Michael replied: “J’Hai no more.”
Amid these feelings of both the victors and the vanquished, Michael now understood why he heard the creature’s words and was able to translate: The younger brother was dead. This poppy field lay beyond reality. The next place on the journey of the J’Hai.
“Save me,” the second brother asked. “Give me the strength to choose life and joy. Will you save me from my brother, now and forever?”
“Yes,” Michael said after deep contemplation. “I’ll try.”
“Thank you for your courage.”
Is that what it is? Michael wondered. Courage or insanity?
Two hundred meters from the end of the Bengalese River, he was out of options. The plan was always nuts, always facing brutal odds. Yet it wasn’t a coincidence. Their message was loud and clear.
If the Jewels wanted Michael to change the equation and avoid a wholesale slaughter of every living being on this planet, he had no choice: Buy a lottery ticket and hope it held the winning combination. The odds were no worse than dying three times and resurrecting. No worse than stepping through a doorway, crossing four hundred sixty-five light-years, and landing within forty kilometers of the woman he loved.
The river was a torrent. The sheer drop was visible in the early-morning light.
And then it came.
Dead ahead, meters from the waterfall.
A flash like the midday sun followed by thunder.
A Scramjet hovered on Michael’s heading. He pulled back on the steering arms and slowed the rifter. He grabbed a blast rifle and locked it over his forearm.
“There is seriously something wrong with me,” Michael said.
The Scramjet’s bulkhead pixe
lated. A giant figure in black and bronze body armor, head to toe, stood front and center. He raised his weapon and aimed.
The sunlight reflecting off the Scramjet shifted from fiery orange to milder yellow. Michael couldn’t help it.
He looked east. The sun cleared the horizon.
That’s it. Why didn’t I see it before?
The second brother gave Michael a poppy, but Michael was too focused on the hand. He almost missed the other detail.
The sun was rising behind the dead J’Hai.
Michael saw something wondrous, felt an aura of hope amid the insanity of the past few days. He understood why he fought so hard to be here at this moment.
“Please be the right brother,” he whispered.
Michael lowered his weapon and retracted his helmet.
The rifter hovered thirty feet from the Scramjet. The beast onboard did not move.
“It’s me,” Michael muttered. “I know you remember.”
The other helmet retracted.
Valentin stood slack-jawed. He did not lower his blast rifle.
Michael waited. The silence rivaled his first experience with the J’Hai. The torrent below and the thunderous waterfall provided a soundtrack for the moment.
Michael took a chance. He pressed the steering arms gently forward and summoned the courage of his long-dead J’Hai friend.
“Hi, guy,” he shouted. “So, uh, invite me in?”
58
M ICHAEL TOOK NO RESPONSE TO MEAN ‘WELCOME.’ The resulting standoff inside the Scramjet made awkward seem like a gross understatement. After Valentin stepped aside, still aiming the rifle high, Michael steered the rifter inside the cargo hold and hopped off. He holstered his blast rifle and held his hands high. The bulkhead remained open, giving Valentin the option to shoot Michael and toss the body overboard. Michael didn’t have time for such nonsense, so he made the first move.
“Sorry about what happened back there at the graviton weapon,” he said. “I blew their brains out to get your attention. They’ll be right as rain before long. Yes?”
The Impossible Future: Complete set Page 140
