City Without Suns (28 page)

Chapter 59

3 Days Remaining…

When Breccan returned to his quarters at the agreed time, Nova was not there.  The possible reasons for her absence were finite, especially in light of Nirav’s disappearance, and the chance that she had been taken was greater than any other.  It would not have been by a Keeper, or at least it would have been unlikely for another tier-one to go missing in that manner.  No, this was of human doing, he thought.  He looked desperately under the covers, under the bed, and behind every piece of furniture.  She was missing.  He was filled with a nervous energy as he ran for the door.

He was faced with a split-second decision to turn left toward the tier-three section or right in the direction of the conservatory.  The first encounter with his twin flashed in his memory, the one meeting in the forbidden section, so he turned right without a pause.  Running through the hall, he shouted his sister’s name repeatedly, but the shouts were returned with only echoes. 

Through the conservatory he continued, running aimlessly and frantically shouting her name.  He quickly arrived at the dark portal.  He paused and considered looking for her in the other direction.  The chances of running across Nova were low, he knew, and the act of entering the pitch black forbidden zone seemed especially desperate.  His hopes were dashed at the thought Slade could have taken her anywhere.  As he pondered, the whistling that used to be uncomfortable came as a sudden glimmer of new hope.

A number of the Chiroptera circled his head.  It was impossible to see how many while they were in motion.

You seek the other like you.

Breccan spoke the answer out loud with a yell, “Yes! Where is he?”

He followed the path you are on now.

“Follow me!” Breccan yelled aloud again, assuming it was the easiest way to project his thoughts.

He carried a girl, the one that was with you.  Hostile intentions.

“No kidding,” Breccan thought, to which there was no reply as he ran recklessly into the dark.

Within a hundred yards, he tripped over the raised edge of a ladder tube, but he recovered quickly and kept running, hitting walls and willingly taking the self-abuse in an effort to move as fast as possible.  As he ran, he sent a thought to the Chiroptera ---
where
? 

Down.

Breccan leapt into the hole without using the ladder.  He knew the approximated distance to the floor underneath, and he flexed his legs in anticipation of the impact.  He picked a direction to run, and the Chiroptera sent him instructions.

No.  Wrong way.

He turned around and had no choice but to slow his run to a walk as he could barely breathe.

“Wait, how do you know what way?  You followed him, and then you went back to the conservatory?” Breccan became skeptical and stopped.

No, young telepath, we are a dispersed swarm.  We can track him collectively because his signal is relayed between us until we all know.  Some of us are with him now.

…

“What are you going to do with me?” Nova cried.

“You will see,” replied Slade as he strapped her down with her back on a cold, hard table.

“Why would you want to hurt me?” she tried to reason with him, but there was no reason to be found, which she realized and started to yell, “Help!  Help!”

Slade did not respond to her verbally right away, but he smothered her screams with his hand pressed firmly onto her face.  He leaned over and said, “Don’t yell, or I will hit you.  Lie still, and I won’t hurt you.  Not yet.”

He released Nova’s mouth and she just closed her eyes and whimpered.  “What do you want?” She asked again to no avail.

“It would be a shame to kill her and not preserve the genetic composition,” Slade spoke about Nova in third person with nobody else apparent to her in the room, but the bats were there on top of the cabinets and in the halls.

A shame indeed.  It must be done carefully.  Retrieve a vile of blood.

How do I do that?
Slade wondered.

There are syringes with needles in the drawer.  Look.

This?
Slade questioned silently.

Yes, that is the tool.

Slade approached the girl not knowing he was being intentionally delayed.  He had a vague concept of what to do with the tool.  He had seen it done before, but he lacked the practice and skill to do it correctly.  He punctured Nova’s arm with a thoughtless jab and was unsuccessful in drawing her blood when he tried to create suction with the syringe.

“Agh,” Nova cried at the painful prick in her arm.  “What are you doing?“ and she whispered, “That’s not the right needle.”

“What? How do you know?” Slade asked, distracted and annoyed that she might be right.  The notion that the Chiroptera would lie to him was not possible.  Their thoughts were involuntary, unlike words that were spoken deliberately to deceive.  He did not know how to project false thoughts and assumed it was impossible, so he continued with the exercise of stabbing Nova’s arm several times.  Drops of blood were left behind the removal of the needle on top of each wound.  She was not speaking anymore.  She sobbed at the thought the pain was only a small beginning for what was in store.

This isn’t working. 
Slade observed.

Wrong syringe.

Nova was right.  Slade rummaged again through the drawer of old medical tools. He pulled the drawer completely off is tracks and slammed it to the ground.  He had lost patience.  It did not matter to him if her DNA was preserved, so he was no longer going to listen to the voices in his head.  The Chiroptera would not matter to him anymore in only three days.

He had pondered how to kill Nova. Blunt force, perhaps.  But even in his cruelty, he was tired and derived no pleasure from any means to the desired end.  The result itself was his goal.  He scanned the floor and spotted a scalpel.  That would do the trick efficiently.  As he was bending to pick it up, an unexpected intrusion entered his mind.

Kill the lights.

…

Without explanation, the lights were off.  Nova could see the image of her brother in the doorway with his hands in front of him. The darkness was as opaque as that of the deepest, darkest section of the ship.  There was no light to see, except for the heat radiated by the warm bodies and the irregular streams of invisible warmth created by the bats flying in the room.

Slade looked cautious and said nothing.  He turned in the direction of the door and put his left hand in front of him.  To Nova’s horror, he held a scalpel in his right.

“Knife,” she tersely warned.

Neither of the identical clones said a word.  Breccan crept into the room to get away from the door, circling to his left in a wide arc toward the place where he heard his sister’s voice.  Nova, thinking quickly, gave him directions that only he would understand using notation from the ancient clock in their room. 

“Two o’clock at two fathoms,” Nova said, speaking an ancient unit of measure that only Breccan was likely to know.

Breccan tiptoed blindly to his left all the way to the other side of the table and he reached his arm out to touch it.

Nova yelled as if he was not in her proximity, “ Twelve o’clock two fathoms!” 

Slade had a worried look on his face.  In the time that had elapsed since the lights went out, Slade assumed Breccan was near the door, because prompted by the false inflection in Nova’s voice, he swung the blade wildly in all directions around him.  Slade’s breath could be heard as he exhaled.  With some urgency, but without making a sound, Breccan slid around to the other side of the table to get in between the other two.  He held his back to Nova.

“Twelve o’clock,” she spoke in a subdued tone.

Breccan took decisive action.  He guessed correctly the lack of a distance qualifier meant that Slade was right in front of him. He guessed that the figure held the knife in his right hand, just as he would do in the same situation, slightly crouched.  He bent and thrust his fist with all his might straight ahead.  It met Slade in the midsection and momentarily knocked the wind out of him.

“Right hand!” Nova yelled.

Breccan, with his left hand, quickly found the left shoulder of his opponent and pulled violently.  Before Slade could do more damage with the blade than some deep but nonthreatening cuts, Breccan had oriented himself behind the other and wrapped his right arm around the neck of his twin.  He locked his hand in the crease of his other arm and slapped his left forearm behind Slade’s head. 

Slade reacted swiftly, trying to twist away to his left, but the result was a tighter choke.  Breccan jumped onto his back and wrapped his legs around, locking his feet around Slade’s thighs.  They fell backwards onto the floor full of objects spilled from the broken drawer.  Breccan’s back was cut, his wind was gone, and the pain of a bruised spine must have sent intense jolts through his body, but his grip was unwavering.  He leaned back and squeezed with his head next to Slade’s ear.  He squeezed as hard as he could until Slade’s flailing arms lay at his side, and then he squeezed some more for good measure.  He did not let go for at least two minutes.

“Hit the lights,” Breccan said, and the bats responded as the lights came on once again.  Blood dripped from the gashes in Breccan’s arms as he pushed the dead body off of himself and lay still on his back.

“Breccan, undo these straps,” Nova commanded.

He obliged, leaving a trail of blood on the floor as he stepped to release her restraints.

Nova dug through the supplies in the room.  She improvised some bandages, which they held in place on two deep wounds before conceding that something else needed to be done.  She found a needle and sutures, and convinced her brother that repair was needed.  She sewed him up as he grimaced and gritted his teeth, then led him back through the dark.  Despite the trauma, there was more work her brother needed to do, work that had been anticipated for several lifetimes.

Chapter 60

Arrival Imminent…

The clocks that were displaying countdowns were now off. Breccan’s focus was completely on the task at hand, the moments he had anticipated for a lifetime.  He was nervous as the planet grew in size until it spanned almost half of the interior display.  Breccan, Ace, and Orr all watched together with Ultima and the Pilots as the glowing planet became real.  They were entering the atmosphere.  With light from nowhere, it loomed larger and larger until it stretched from one end of the bridge to the other.

The planet surface was obscured with cloud cover.  The opaque vapor was brighter on one side than the other, as if there was a star shining from one direction to give the planet a day and a night.  They were approaching the landing site blindly, pieced together from fragmented images collected over the preceding weeks.  They would have to wait until they were under the clouds and hope there would be enough visibility to see anything at all before they hit the ground.

“What is this?” an anonymous Pilot exclaimed at the view of the rotating planet.  It spun slowly to reveal the brighter side.  The vapors had cleared.  Bright light shined from the planet interior.  The planet, or whatever it was, appeared to the onlookers to be porous, spotted with light emitted through giant funnels leading to the core.  They stared at the phenomenon unable to explain what they were seeing.

“It looks like craters or holes in the surface,” Breccan offered, but he had to focus on the goal.  They were not landing anywhere near those parts.

The matter of exactly where to land had not been fully disclosed to Breccan.  He knew only an approximate location.  The odds that the Pilots had not decided exactly where to land seemed low, and the fact they had not discussed it seemed odd.  Something was wrong, he thought.  Then he realized what he had seen for his whole life, the shape of the ship with an engine that passed well through each side of the center of a toroid.  The Pilots had not mentioned it because they intended to set Neptune down in deep water, and even if not, how could it rest on solid ground?  Would it be too heavy with the gravity shield deactivated to stand on the bottom of its engine?  Would it balance?  Questions that he had never thought to ask entered his mind.  Questions that may have been obvious to someone who had set foot on the solid ground of a planet had never occurred to him.

A panic overcame him.  A deep-water landing would only mean imprisonment for all time thereafter, for him, for Nova, and for everyone.  The time for their landing could be measured in minutes, and he didn’t know where Neptune would be set down. 

Options.  Must think of options.
  Breccan thought to himself.  He could turn off the fabric.  Yes. Turn off the gravity shield.  It would not deactivate right away, and they would float down softly, but he didn’t know how soft, and the small amount of fuel left in the engine was still enough to obliterate them all.

“Ace,” he whispered.

“Yeah.”

“Where is this thing going down?”

“Don’t know but are you thinking what I am?” 

“Deep water.”

“Yup.  That’s where they have it going.”

Neptune dipped into the clouds.  The gravity shield that had been dormant for their time in space was fully powered, and the ship floated through the atmosphere like a soap bubble.  Responsive to every little thrust of the guiding rockets, it wobbled its way toward the surface.  The
ocean
surface.

There was no recourse.  The Pilots had the ship, and soon they were submerged and at rest on an alien seafloor.

“Guys, I think we need to leave the bridge,” Orr whispered.  “I know what we need to do, but I think we may need to hurry. You really think humans would have designed an underwater ship without a submarine lock?  Come on.  Nirav found it and told me.”

For once, Breccan believed Orr was making an admirable suggestion.  A quick exit was in order, lest they become potential livestock held in captivity for all time.  They left the bridge quietly and deliberately.  Ultima uttered something as they were leaving, but the departure of the tier-one humans could not have been a major concern for the Pilots while they were in full control of Neptune.

…

The people filed through the narrow halls in the lower levels.  Breccan had to let Orr in front.  He knew the way.  They traversed far below the conservatory toward the forbidden zone and through a maze of passages to a pool similar to the one Breccan had stumbled upon with Nova a month before.  The kid had his uses, Breccan thought, but his momentary good will was overcome by rage when he found himself standing shoulder to shoulder with the uneducated masses selfishly pushing themselves forward without even knowing the goal.  There were no thanks exchanged, no signs of gratitude to the human pilots that subjected themselves to danger and hardship for their benefit.

The person rubbing against Breccan flashed him a look of disrespect, more than he could take.  He grabbed a handful of the man’s hair and yanked him to floor, pushing the others out of the way as he fell.  He planted a knee down onto his victim’s abdomen to pin him down.  Anger seared through his veins.  He was sick and tired of those people. To him, they were unworthy of the potential new home.  He did not stop to realize the magnitude of his accomplishment, but rather focused on his anger, feeling the need to assert dominance over anyone that crossed him.

Breccan raised his hand to pummel his helpless opponent.  The man cowered and cried as he closed his eyes.  From behind, Nova came barreling toward him with as much speed as she could generate and met him with the full force that her weight would allow.  She knocked him over and tumbled to the floor.  His fury reached a new level as he rolled over to hit her before he realized who had taken him down. 

Their eyes met.  He was paralyzed at the sight of his sister and suddenly ashamed.  She neither cried nor flinched. He lowered his arm as the crowd around him watched.  He was reduced to tears by the thought that he could have struck Nova, that he wanted to hit whatever person tackled him, and that he had become a man deserving of nothing but disgrace.

He crouched and lay on his elbows, clenching his teeth.  He let out a yell to vent his anger, but it was more of a shout of self-loathing.  He did not know what to do and just sat there too ashamed to look up and see any of the faces that were staring at him.  They were not the unworthy ones.  He was defeated.  The side of his brain that he did not understand, the one that forced him into unspeakable thoughts, had won.  He could not forgive himself for raising a hand to the one he loved.

He proved himself to be a different person than he always thought.  Now he realized he was not a leader, but a bully.  His status among the Keepers was fitting, not elevated, but reserved for the one most like them.

Nova placed a hand on his back and lowered her lips to his ear.  She said, “You know I’m not really your sister, right?”

Breccan whispered, “I’m sorry.”

She replied, “Don’t be sorry.  Take my hand, but if you take it, never do what you just did again.  Never raise your hand to me or anyone else.  I can’t be with you if you do.”

The woman he loved, the one he had always loved, had just offered herself to him.  He could not control whom he loved.  His sister, bred from genes having no linkage to his own, was the object of an affection he could never reveal.  The most beautiful and innocent person he knew still wanted him, even after what he had done.  By some chance his admiration was reciprocated, and the realization made him sob.  He raised his right hand for Nova to hold, and he raised his left to express remorse to the others.  He sat on his knees with his head hanging and would not face them.

Nova put her other hand under his chin and lifted it to expose the tears streaming down his cheeks.  She planted a kiss on his mouth, and then she pulled on his hand and arm beckoning him to rise.  She rested her head on his chest and hugged him tightly while he cried. 

The crowd gathered, and as Breccan stood to look around, there it was, a pod built for underwater travel.  As he stood in amazement, the demeanor seemed to shift.  Many of them addressed him by name as they patted him on the back on their way by, filing into the pod one after the other, until they were all there in a vessel that Orr had taught himself to guide.

They emerged through a lock out from under Neptune.  The band of humans looked out upon their surroundings.  The blanket of clouds over their heads gave off a dim light revealing the surrounding landmass.  A light rain drizzled from the starless sky and ran down the windows of the pod.  It was bright like daytime, but there was no sun.  They gathered in the tight quarters and looked out onto their imperfect yet adequate world in which Neptune was their underwater city, one that did not need a sun or moon to shine on it.  It was a city that would be contested, but it would serve as a resource while they rebuilt their civilization on the alien world.