‘I wouldn’t miss it for anything,’ Taren assured him, as he let her go.
‘Don’t I know it.’ He tried not to sound bitter.
‘The life you are desiring is really only a day away,’ she reminded him.
‘Taren.’ Her mother and father came forward.
‘Please, don’t make a fuss,’ Taren implored them.
‘How can we not?’ the Qusay-Sabah Clarona rejoined. ‘With all that you have accomplished to the benefit of the entire United Systems!’
‘Oh dear.’ Taren didn’t like the sound of this; she didn’t expect any thanks and praise for trying to put right what she had had a hand in putting wrong in the first place.
‘We are fairly sure,’ Anselm cut in, ‘that no one has ever really had the opportunity to thank you, and all your colleagues, for the amazing job you have done. So, on behalf of the entire United Systems, we thank you.’ Her father kissed her forehead and everyone present broke into a round of applause. Taren lost her breath and tears of joy welled in her eyes, which she quickly brushed away.
‘It’s been the most incredible journey we’ve all taken together these last ten years and beyond.’ Taren looked around at the faces of her nearest and dearest, and their smiles warmed her soul. ‘None of you had to take this road, horrifying and wondrous, with me … but I am so grateful that you did, because there is no way I would have gotten this far without each and every one of you.’
‘Aw.’ Everyone sighed as Taren brushed away a few more tears.
‘I told you not to get all mushy!’ she joked away her emotional state, and there were hugs all round.
‘Right, if you’re quite done making me cry, we should fly.’ Taren stepped back to join Zeven, who was memorising their destination from a photograph Telmo had given him.
‘Well, then,’ Zeven put the paper down and clapped his hands together to suggest they depart. ‘Let’s —’
‘Wait.’ Kalayna stopped them. ‘This might come in handy.’ She gave Zeven a handheld psychic neutraliser.
‘Kalayna.’ Taren was annoyed and yet delighted. ‘You made another one?’
She shrugged, guilty as charged. ‘I figured Khalid would have given up on looking for it years ago, and today of all days, I thought it might come in handy.’
‘Good call.’ Zeven felt safer already.
‘Keep it hidden,’ Taren advised, and Zeven tucked it deep into a pocket.
‘If Khalid is still on board, it won’t take long for his ghostly guards to report we’re there.’ Zeven held out his hand to her, and clasping his hand, Taren cast her mind forth to Khalid’s science lab.
Upon their arrival, Taren felt completely zapped. She hadn’t even taken a step when she fell on her behind, having been tripped up by a dead body.
‘Shit,’ Zeven uttered under his breath, as he cast his eyes about the lab — there were dead scientists everywhere.
Taren drew a deep breath to regain her equilibrium and, as Zeven helped her to her feet, they both froze upon hearing Khalid’s threatening voice in the distance. ‘Type in the command to fire up the collision chamber, or I shall burst every organ in your body!’
Zeven and Taren snuck around the mounds of scientific hardware to get a closer look.
‘I won’t do it,’ the old scientist insisted, a trickle of blood running from his nose, and Taren was heartbroken to recognise the scientist being exploited. Professor Kestler! The fact sent a shock wave through her being. Although she wanted to go to Kestler’s defence, she was barely able to stand on her own two feet at present.
A pulse bullet from Kalayna’s weapon shot past Taren and toward Khalid, just as he leant forward to threaten Kestler again. The shot skimmed over his back, but he still sensed it.
‘Fuck!’ Khalid objected, knowing exactly what had happened. He looked to where the pulse bullet had come from, and reaching out he commanded the weapon into his possession. As Zeven was weaker than usual, Khalid’s will won. ‘Thank you.’ He shot back at them and they both ducked out of the way. ‘I do like to collect little trinkets to remind me of my conquests.’
‘Ah!’ They heard the old professor moan as he was cracked over the head.
‘I’ll do it myself,’ resolved Khalid.
When Zeven and Taren dared to take a peek, the old professor was laid over the desk and Khalid was nowhere to be seen.
Taren attempted to will Kalayna’s weapon back to them, but obviously Khalid was keeping a tight psychic grip on it at present.
Then there was a loud metallic crunching sound as the collision chamber was heard to activate.
‘That can’t be good,’ Zeven said.
‘Fortunately for us, it will take about half an hour to get up to speed.’ Taren ventured over to check on the professor. ‘He’s still alive.’ She attempted to bring him around, but no luck. ‘Come on, professor, we could really use you right now.’
‘Just letting you know I’ll be off now,’ Khalid’s voice came over the loudspeakers in the laboratory. ‘But I shall be watching the fireworks from not too far away. See you all in oblivion.’
Zeven served Khalid the finger, but didn’t waste his breath cursing him. ‘We need Ringbalin.’ Zeven shook his head — the thought of teleporting again was just too exhausting to consider. ‘I don’t know if I’d make it.’
‘Me neither,’ Taren was sorry to admit — they were running out of time and options. ‘Maybe there’s some manual override to reverse the flow of the bio-containment tank?’
She dragged her body into action. The area was huge, as was each tank in the deadly array — and in all seriousness, she didn’t feel she had a hope of figuring out the technology, with no Powers to aid her past security codes. A whistle brought her laboured sprint to a halt, and she turned to find Mythric and Ringbalin waving at her! ‘Aurora,’ Taren murmured, guessing who their saviour had been. ‘I’m so thrilled to see you guys.’ She ran back faster.
‘Not so thrilled to be here.’ Mythric appeared completely stuffed.
‘How are you doing, Ringbalin?’ Taren asked as he looked over their patient.
‘I think I still have a little of the good stuff in me.’ His grin was reassuring and, placing his hands on Kestler’s wound, he channelled all the energy he had left into healing the scientist.
‘Well done,’ Taren commended Ringbalin, as Kestler began to stir, but Ringbalin was so light-headed following the energy transference that he fainted.
‘Ringbalin?’ Taren dropped beside him to check his head, which he had cracked pretty hard upon falling.
‘Never mind about him.’ Zeven diverted Taren’s attention to the waking scientist.
‘Professor Kestler?’ Taren addressed him. ‘We need you to reverse the flow on the bio-containment chamber, or this whole place is going to blow.’
The professor’s ears pricked up when he noted the sound of the collision chamber winding up. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what we need to do.’
He began typing into his work station, but all access had been blocked. ‘I knew this would happen.’ Kestler was furious. ‘Khalid is insane!’
‘Yes, we realise,’ Taren said. ‘Is there any other way to reverse the flow.’
‘Of course there is.’ Kestler gave a cheeky grin, as he typed, install backup program. ‘I do my best not to comply to the will of madmen.’
The wait for the program to upload seemed endless, although Kestler’s work station assured them it was only taking ten minutes.
‘How did you good people find us, or rather …’ Kestler looked at all his dead companions. ‘Me.’
‘We suspected Khalid was up to something. He did all this to get back at us.’ Taren eyed over the huge setup. ‘But believe me, professor, what is in that bio-containment cell is far more than just a gas. It is a light-being beyond anything Khalid or any of us can possibly understand. It has been our life mission to ensure something like this would never happen.’
‘Well, then.’ The professor looked back to his screen
as the system booted up. ‘Let’s see if I can’t save my saviours then.’
Taren gave him an encouraging nod, but what she really wanted was to lay down next to Ringbalin and sleep through the entire thing.
‘How much longer is this going to take?’ Zeven yawned.
‘Not long.’ The scientist continued typing madly, as Zeven turned about and took a seat on the floor next to his father. ‘That’s good, ’cause —’ He yawned again, but a very loud metallic clang followed by a loud whooshing sound made him pause mid-yawn.
Taren’s head shot up. ‘What was that?’
‘That’s the sound of your success.’ Kestler smiled. ‘All the substance in bio-containment has been released.’
Taren caught her breath; it was too good to be true. ‘What about the collision cylinder?’ It was still running.
‘Once the antimatter is released into there and encounters nothing, it will dissipate. Fortunately antimatter is very fragile,’ Kestler stated with a broad smile, as Taren kissed his cheek.
‘You truly are a genius.’
‘Good … leave it and go.’ Mythric was up on his feet and feeling stronger. ‘Lucian and Telmo are in the recon vessel.’
Zeven nodded, realising this was it. ‘I’ll see you this morning?’ Zeven held out his hand to shake his father’s in leaving, and Mythric clutched his wrist and pulled him into a hug.
‘Take care, son.’ He pulled away. ‘Take care of the boss.’ He grabbed hold of Kestler and then leant down to take hold of Ringbalin, who stirred and looked around. All the metal, cement and machinery was the botanist’s worst nightmare and the look of horror on his face said it all, really.
‘It’s okay.’ Taren helped Ringbalin to his feet. ‘Mythric is taking you back to Module C.’
‘Thank the universe.’ He grinned. ‘’Cause this place is awful.’
‘Go!’ Mythric interrupted to prompt Zeven and Taren to get on with it. ‘Are you just going to wait around for Khalid to come back? Move!’
‘Okay, already.’ Taren joined Zeven, and he gave her a reassuring grin. ‘Here we go, ready or not.’ Inside she was thrilled to be heading into the final leg of a journey that had been somewhat longer than expected. She was glad now that Lucian had insisted on accompanying her, and as her thoughts turned to him she was spirited away to his side.
Professor Kestler was rather shocked when two of his saviours disappeared. ‘I hope we’re not travelling that way?’
‘We most certainly are,’ Mythric informed, when a pulse hit him from behind, closely followed by a blade in the back, which brought Mythric to his knees. ‘Son of a bitch.’
Ringbalin still had hold of Mythric’s arm and he dropped to his knees beside his only ride home, attempting to focus on loving healing thoughts to prevent his friend dying.
‘Reverse the stream on bio-containment.’ Khalid moved in on Kestler.
‘There is no getting it back.’ Ringbalin spoke up in the hope of distracting the villain from beating up on the old man. ‘It’s all gone!’
‘Wrong!’ Khalid taunted, as he whipped out a small sample of the colourful gas that he had contained in a transparent prism.
‘Oh shit.’ Ringbalin was unnerved when he saw it. ‘My advice to you would be to get rid of that real quick.’
‘Why would I?’ Khalid scoffed.
‘Because that gas is very volatile when it changes its physical form, and it’s changing its physical form.’ He directed Khalid to check it out.
The rainbow light the gas had exuded for years before today had changed to a brilliant blue. The gas had formed a sphere whose core was alive with electrical activity that was building, pulse by pulse. When the energy began to spark beyond the confines of its prism, Khalid put the prism down on the work bench, whereupon the current latched onto the work station and began engulfing it. Kestler joined Ringbalin further afield.
‘We should release it,’ Ringbalin advised.
‘You release it.’ Khalid looked really ill, and although he tried to teleport himself elsewhere, the pulsing light from the prism was debilitating.
‘It’s going to take the ship,’ Ringbalin said.
‘But we’re not going to be on it.’ Jazmay grabbed hold of Ringbalin, who still had hold of Mythric. The old professor was pretty eager to take the Phemorian’s hand too, regardless of who she was or where she was taking them.
The current began spreading rapidly over the ship, like a wild vine claiming an old temple ruin.
‘Hurry, Jaz!’ Ringbalin urged and as they dissolved into the light field of the transpersonal teleportation experience, a huge blue light-flare from behind propelled them forth.
‘Well,’ Telmo said, with a serve of discomfort. ‘This is a lovely surprise.’
Taren manifested in the co-pilot’s seat and found herself on Telmo’s lap. ‘Teleportation is not an exact science,’ she explained her embarrassing predicament.
‘Taren.’ Lucian, thrilled to see her, switched on the autopilot and vacated the hot seat. He moved into the rear cabin and Taren climbed off Telmo to join him there.
‘Want me to take over?’ Zeven motioned to the pilot’s seat.
‘It’s all yours,’ Lucian granted, taking Taren in hand to kiss her. ‘You freak me out,’ he declared, so pleased to see her.
‘I freak me out too.’ Taren understood completely.
‘Me too,’ Zeven called from the pilot’s seat.
‘This lightshow is freaking me out,’ Telmo commented on the changes in the gaseous matter they were headed toward. ‘Are we all very sure this is a good idea?’
‘Wow.’ Taren gripped her arm — the buzz coming off her Juju stone was getting really intense, and both she and Lucian decided to sit down.
‘Are you all right, Zeven?’ Taren worried about their designated driver.
‘Look at the size of this thing.’ He sat back and stared in awe at the brilliant blue sphere forming before them. ‘I don’t think I could miss that if I tried … so relax, will you? O-oh —’
‘Don’t tell me to relax and then say o-oh.’ Taren and Lucian came forward to see what the concern was.
‘Why is Khalid’s ship as blue as our friend up-front?’ Zeven posed the question, and Taren couldn’t understand it.
‘Kestler said all the substance in bio-containment had been ejected?’ No sooner had she started to panic about that, when Telmo suddenly let out a yell and startled everyone.
‘My arm’s blue?’ He held it out to show them, and gasped again when he noticed they were all turning blue.
‘Feels kind of tingly, don’t it?’ Zeven smiled, euphoric.
Taren looked to Lucian. ‘Here we go again.’ She smiled, and his kiss was the last thing she felt before the exhilarating buzz overwhelmed all her senses and swallowed her in etheric light.
PART 4
THE MISSION
16
JAHAN — THE LAST OF
THE CHOSEN
As consciousness dawned, instinct told her that she should not have been asleep. Teleportation did not involve losing consciousness, only a brief light-filled sensation of travelling without moving — something had gone horribly wrong.
The light was harsh. It was a struggle for Jazmay to get her eyelids to part and her watering eyes to focus on her surroundings. It appeared to be a regular United Systems restraining cell — it was nowhere near enclosed enough to be a psychic containment unit. How did I get here? She raised herself to a seated position, and had to laugh at the sad attempt to restrain her. Someone has no idea who I am, why even bother locking me in?
Her humour waned as she realised she was not alone in the cell. A couple of her crewmates were laid out around her, along with an old man. One of them was dead, that much was certain, as the odour of decomposition attacked her sense of smell with a vengeance.
Her first guess was that it was the old man causing the stink, but he was still pink, warm and breathing.
‘Ringbalin?’ Jazmay moved onto the yo
ung botanist, who also appeared to be resting peacefully. ‘Oh no,’ she whispered, as she turned her attention to the last of her comrades. She didn’t have to check to know that he was the one she’d failed. ‘Mythric …’
There was a large wound that went right through his back to his gullet — she’d not even realised he was wounded! The events of her mission had unfolded too fast for her to notice!
I was supposed to be teleporting us back to AMIE, she noted. What happened?
Fortunately, Ringbalin had begun to stir — she needed to know what had transpired prior to her arrival on Khalid’s ship. All she’d been told by Aurora before she’d departed was that their team was in trouble and needed assistance to teleport back to AMIE.
‘What happened?’ The botanist moaned, as he brushed his fine blond hair from his face. He raised his glasses from where they had come to rest around his neck, and he appeared discomforted by the predicament in which he found himself.
‘That’s what I need to know.’ Jazmay assisted him to a seated position, whereupon the smell registered and he noticed the dead body lying alongside his.
‘No.’ Ringbalin protested, upon realising who it was. ‘I did not heal him in time —’
‘And I did not get us to our destination either.’ Jazmay felt now was no time for regrets; she needed to figure out where they were. ‘What happened before I arrived to collect you?’
Ringbalin was clearly rattled by the death of his crewmate, who had become something of a father figure to him over the years. He reined in his surging emotions but the feat caused him to visibly tremble. ‘After Taren and Zeven left to rendezvous with the captain and Telmo, Khalid returned,’ he recalled, his eyes opening wide in horror with just the memory of the event. ‘He stabbed Mythric from behind, but I maintained contact with him, hoping to heal him before death came …’
Ringbalin crossed his arms over his chest with hands tightly tucked under his armpits, well aware of the present danger that his dark mood posed to others.
‘Then what?’ Jazmay’s tone demanded he focus on her and not his loss.