Death Defying (Dark Desires) (18 page)

Chapter Fifteen

Callum paced the shuttle and tried to ignore Venna.

He couldn’t hear anything and the wait was driving him insane. He wanted to comm Tannis, but if they were in a fight, he might distract her.

“For God’s sake, relax,” Venna grumbled.

She’d sat down in the pilot’s seat and was studying him as though he was one of her specimens. “What’s with you and the captain?” she asked.

“What?”

“All that lovey stuff?” Her tone held intense distaste.

“Mind your own business.”

“Actually, it is my business. You told me you’d lost your libido years ago. You said you thought it was another side effect of the Meridian. It’s in my files. So I’d really like to know if it’s not the case.”

That sounded like Venna—her mind focused solely on the science. He thought back to the extremely uncomfortable night he had spent, with a raging hard-on that had refused to subside. Nothing wrong with his libido.

“Yuk,” Venna said. “Get that sick smile off you face. I’ll delete the entry from my records.”

“Good idea.” He peered into the monitor, but could see nothing in the docking bay. “Where the hell are they?”

“Don’t worry. She’s obviously impossible to kill. Meridian is wasted on her.” She got up and paced for a minute, then sat down again, and started gnawing on her fingernails. She was driving him nuts, but she was obviously stressed out, and he decided to take her mind off the whole thing.

The thought brought him up short. Maybe he was turning into a nice guy after all. He was actually feeling pretty good; things were on track, and while he was sure Tannis would never forgive him, she was starting to see beyond the past. He felt a grin tug at his lips.

“Let me repeat it,” Venna said. “Yuk.”

Back to Venna. The one thing that could be guaranteed to focus her mind was talk of her research. “Tell me about the planet,” he said. “What’s my best chance of finding anything?”

“We’ve been over and over this.”

“Tell me again.”

She took a deep breath, and he saw her brain click into action. “I reckon you’ll have about six hours before the sickness makes it impossible to function.”

It didn’t seem very long to discover “the truth.” Why was he so sure that he would find his answers when Venna had spent years hunting and come up with nothing? Maybe it was just a gut feeling, but he’d learned to follow those. Then he realized that wasn’t the case. The feeling wasn’t in his gut, but in his mind—in that part of his mind changed by Meridian, where he could communicate with the other members of the Collective. Could it be some sort of ancestral memory? Or was there something on the planet calling to him, drawing him there. But they had never found any living organisms on Trakis Seven or any sign that there had ever been an indigenous life form. One of their theories had been that an alien space ship could have crash-landed like they had, although they’d found no evidence.

“We’ll land close to the Meridian site,” Venna said, breaking into his thoughts. “But it’s still half an hour beneath the planet’s surface, that’s an hour there and back plus at least an hour for the treatment to take. That leaves you less than four hours.”

“Doesn’t seem long.”

“It will when you’re down there, believe me.”

He did. He could still remember the time he had spent on the planet—it had not been a pleasant occurrence.

“So we go for the Meridian first?”

“No. I suggest you leave that until last—the place messes with your brain but you don’t need much mental capacity to get to the cache.”

“So where do we start?”

“There’s a chamber close to the place where the Trakis Seven crash-landed and luckily quite close to the final cache of Meridian. It’s the center of the radiation—though it’s not really radiation—more like some sort of poison. I reckon that’s your best bet. I’ve been there a couple of times. It’s a weird place, but there’s something… I don’t know.”

“You still think it’s some sort of alien?”

It was something they had discussed many times, but Venna refused to commit to a conclusion that wasn’t firmly based in scientific fact.

“Yes.”

He’d been gazing at the monitor, but at her answer, he whirled around to face her. “Well, that’s a change.”

“I can’t see what else it could be. I’m hoping you’ll find some proof where I’ve failed. Go to the chamber, open your mind, and see what happens.”

He nodded. His comm unit flashed, and he reached across and flipped the switch.

“We’re done,” Tannis said. “Just clearing up, so you can come out now if you want to. We’re on the bridge.”

“Come on,” he said to Venna. “The place is ours. Let’s get on with this.” A sense of deep excitement rose inside him. What would he find? The truth?

…

The ship was built like
El
Cazador
but on a smaller scale, and once out of the shuttle they headed up the ramp to the upper level. She was obviously new, still gleaming, with the smell of fresh clean air. They found the bridge, and he paused in the doorway. His gaze went straight to Tannis. She stood to one side, talking to Skylar. She appeared unharmed and some of the tension inside him eased.

It was obvious a fight had gone on in here. Scorch marks from laser blasts scarred the walls, and a couple of bodies lay on the floor.

Jon pushed past him from behind, entered the bridge, and picked up the nearest body, tossing it over his shoulder with ease. He grinned at Callum as he passed, carrying the dead crewmember—presumably they were just dumping the bodies out of the airlock.

The last body lay on the floor, eyes staring. There was no obvious cause of death, but when Callum looked closer, he could see the puncture wounds in the throat. He glanced up to where Rico paced the deck at the far side of the bridge. As though sensing his gaze, he turned Callum’s way. He appeared totally wired—his eyes glowing crimson, blood staining his lips, and a shiver of primordial fear skittered down Callum’s spine.

“I’d stay away from him for a while if I were you.” Tannis came up beside him.

“That was my plan. Are the crew all dead?”

“Yeah. We did give them the chance to surrender.”

“How much of a chance?”

“Not much. It may have escaped your notice, but Rico isn’t too fond of the Church.”

“It hadn’t escaped me.”

“He was sort of blinded by the light flashing off the crosses around their necks.” She shrugged. “They chose to do this, so they must be willing to take the consequences.”

“If you live by the sword, you should expect to die by it.”

“Something like that. And look on the bright side—at least they died believing they were going to heaven. But the good news is none of the systems have been damaged—she’s fully functional and ready to go as soon as we’ve cleaned up.”

Jon came in and picked up the last body, carted it out like so much rubbish.

Tannis glanced at him. “This is really bothering you, isn’t it?”

“Maybe.”

“You sent God knows how many men and women to their deaths in the mines, you’ve probably given orders that have killed thousands without blinking an eye. But faced with a few bodies and you go all squeamish.”

She was right, in a way. He’d always killed from a distance. Even when he’d been a fighter pilot on Earth. But dead was dead, whether it was under your nose or a million miles away.

“Take responsibility, Callum.”

His anger flared. “You have no idea of the responsibility I take every day. You don’t think I know that my decisions can lead to deaths? But they also sometimes lead to life. Not every order I make gets people killed.” He’d actually done some good in his time as Leader, but he was past defending himself, because the truth was he had done things that were indefensible. He hoped the good outweighed the bad, but he was in no way sure.

“Okay,” Jon said, returning to the bridge. “We’re done, and we’re out of here.”

Callum glanced away from Tannis and saw that the others were standing by the door. Rico came forward, and he’d come down from the high a little, though he still looked twitchy.

He stalked over, wrapped his arms around Tannis, and hugged her. She stiffened in his arms—Callum reckoned she wasn’t really one for hugs—then she relaxed and returned the gesture. When she stepped back, she looked vaguely embarrassed.

“Come home,” Rico said. He turned to Callum. “You keep her safe, or we’ll be looking for you.”

He nodded. “I will.”

Skylar smiled. “Hey, when we see you again, I’ll be able to get inside your head,” she said to Tannis.

“You’ll keep out of my freaking head,” she replied.

“Good luck,” Jon said. “Call if you need us.”

Tannis nodded. “We’ll see you at the rendezvous. It should be no more than three days.”

“We’ll be there. Don’t be late!” Rico swung around and headed out the door. At the last minute, he paused, dug his silver flask out of his pocket, and tossed it to her. “To keep you company.”

Then they were gone. Leaving her alone with Callum and Venna.

Chapter Sixteen

Tannis watched them go with a vague feeling of unease. It was that old, everything-is-changing feeling that had plagued her for the last few weeks, maybe longer. Probably since Skylar had come aboard with her offer of work.

She felt the change in vibration under her feet as the shuttle fired up. There was no turning back now.

Venna stood just inside the doorway. Tannis still couldn’t look at the other woman without a feeling of betrayal, which was crazy. While she hadn’t forgiven Callum, she could see past it. At least Callum was honest. He wouldn’t go around offering little children chocolate if he meant to do horrible things to them.

Tannis stalked toward her and stood staring down at the woman. She did bear a strong resemblance to an angel—all blond curls and big violet eyes.

“Why the fuck did you give me chocolate?”

Those enormous eyes stretched even wider. Venna tried to edge away, but came up against the curved wall of the bridge and visibly jumped. Her gaze darted to Callum, who had followed Tannis over. “Callum, get her away from me.”

“I just want to know why,” Tannis ground out.

“She gave you chocolate? When?”

“Nearly thirty years ago. She came to the research center, and she handed out chocolate to the children, and I want to know why the fuck she did that when she was responsible for us being there.” She looked from one to the other of them. “I thought she was a goddamn angel. She was the first person in that place to show any kindness, and I want to know the fuck why.”

Venna opened her mouth. “I…” She trailed off, licked her lips.

“Venna likes to be liked,” Callum said. “It’s a weakness.”

“Jesus,” Tannis snarled.

“She could come there and see you, but only if you didn’t hate her to her face. She can’t take it. She likes to think she’s a nice person, and the only way she can make believe that is if other people think she’s nice.”

“I am nice.” Venna finally found her voice.

“No, you’re not, but you’re good at your job.”

Tannis was overcome by weariness as the adrenaline from the fight drained from her system. She turned away. There was no such thing as angels anyway; she’d always known that.

Glancing over her shoulder, she spoke to Callum. “You want to fly this thing?”

“Hell, yeah.”

Callum took the pilot’s seat and rubbed his hands together. Tannis took the seat behind him and fastened the safety harness—she had no clue what Callum was like as a flier. But it was a pretty safe bet that he hadn’t done it for a while, and she didn’t want to die just now.

Venna had very wisely disappeared. She’d obviously realized her chances of being “liked” were about zero in the present company. Tannis rested her head against the back of the seat and watched Callum as he familiarized himself with the controls. After a few minutes, when she’d assured herself he was competent enough to head in the right direction, she closed her eyes and let herself drift off into sleep.

When she opened her eyes, he was sitting in the seat next to her, watching her.

“We’re on automatic,” he said.

He stretched his long legs out in front of him, folded his wings close against his shoulders, and sat back as best he could.

“You know,” he murmured, “I’m tired. I can’t remember feeling tired in a long while. Fed up, bored, but not actually tired.”

“Sleep then. Find a cabin and sleep.”

“Can’t. I’m too wound up. I’ve been waiting for you to wake up so you can talk to me.”

“About what?”

He shrugged. “Anything.”

She thought for a minute. There was something she would like to know. “How about you talk instead?”

“What about?”

“Tell me about Meridian. About how you found it, what happened when you landed on Trakis Seven.”

“We didn’t actually land as such—we crashed. Machines don’t work well on Trakis Seven.”

“So how will we get down?”

“You have to shut down the engines and let the planet pull you in, then switch them back just before landing. I’ve not done it—but I had a crash course before I left.”

“What about getting off again?”

“As long as you’re quick, there’s time to make safe distance before the engines cut out. Just no dawdling on takeoff.”

“Great,” she muttered.

“It will be fine.” He settled in his chair. “Okay—so the story of my life. Are you sitting comfortably?”

She nodded.

“When we reached the Trakis system, each ship was allocated a planet to check out for viability. We’d already lost contact with the Trakis One—we know now that she disappeared into black hole, but back then she just went dead.”

Tannis shuddered. “Holy moly. What a way to go.”

“I’d forgotten. You’ve been to Trakis One, haven’t you?”

“When we broke Jon out of the prison.”

“You were lucky to survive.”

“No, not lucky—Rico’s a brilliant pilot. Even so, it was a little hairy.”

“Anyway, the crew was already on edge. And the planet was far from inviting—as you’ll soon see.”

“How many of you were there on board?”

“Awake? Twenty, plus ten thousand or so in cryo. We orbited the planet for a while, then, when I couldn’t put it off any longer, we went in. I lost control almost immediately. I remember thinking
this is it
. And what a way to end after five hundred years in space.”

“What happened? Obviously you all survived the crash.”

“Something slowed us down, some force field before we hit the ground. We still sustained a lot of damage, but the main systems were repairable. So we set about doing the repairs and exploring the planet.”

He stared into space for a few minutes obviously remembering the past, and if his expression was anything to go by, the memories were not happy.

“We’d heard from the other ships by then. The Trakis Four and Five had found habitable planets. We knew we had a safe place to go if we could get the ship fixed. So I made the decision to wake some of the Chosen Ones. There were scientists, including an environmentalist. While I was sure Trakis Seven wasn’t suitable for colonization, I wanted to find out if there was anything we could use in the future. It was a mistake.”

“You couldn’t have known.”

“Maybe not. It seemed fine at first, the planet actually has a breathable atmosphere though it’s a little thin, tiring for doing anything physical. But it was good to be off ship even on that hellhole.”

“How long had you been captain?”

“Ten years. It wasn’t too bad. There was space on the ship. Books to read, plenty of entertainment, which was just as well as the ship ran itself. I was redundant except for in an emergency. And when we did have one, I very nearly failed.”

“But you didn’t.” Why the hell was she trying to comfort him? What was it about Callum Meridian that touched her as no man had before?

“Well there are relative stages of failure. People died because of decisions I made, and back then I wasn’t nearly so comfortable with that idea as you believe me to be now.”

“So what happened? How did you find Meridian?”

“It was more like it found us. The planet’s a strange place, as you’ll see when we land. I never returned after that first time, but even after five hundred years, I can remember it clearly. I took a team out to explore.” He closed his eyes as if he was remembering. “It was as though something was calling to us. I found myself in a sort of cave. No light but the place glowed violet. Eerie.” He opened his eyes and stared at her. Violet. Inhuman.

“There were these growths, like tentacles, hundreds of them, emerging from out of the walls. I touched one, and it reacted almost as if it was alive, wrapped itself around my arm and needles cut into my skin. I’ve never felt such pain, like fire through my blood. I blacked out. When I came to, the rest of my team was unconscious on the ground around the chamber. The thing that had attacked me had shriveled to nothing. And there were others the same next to each of the crew members.” Callum jumped to his feet and started pacing the confines of the bridge. “They awoke shortly after me, and it was immediately obvious that we were changed. We could read each other’s thoughts.”

“And the rest,” Tannis said.

“Well, we didn’t know about the immortality then or the fact that we could repair just about any damage to our bodies. Though the damage thing we found out early. One of the six, Tyler, was injured in a fall. We thought he was dead, it should have killed him but it didn’t, and he recovered quickly—far too quickly to be normal—but we’d already left the planet by then.”

“Why did you leave? Didn’t you want to stay and explore?”

“No. You’ll understand when we reach Trakis Seven. The place has an unfriendly feel. But it was more than that. The rest of the crew, and the Chosen Ones we’d woken from cryo, began to get sick. Then the first one died, and we knew we had to leave.”

“I thought it took two years to die from the radiation poisoning.”

“The planet can kill you quick, or it can kill you slow but it always kills you unless you undergo the treatment. But we didn’t realize we were immune at first. Not until we got clear of the planet, and then it took a long time for us to understand. While the six of us felt immediately better as soon as we were away, the others only got worse. We took the ship to Trakis Five and settled there. Within two years, all those who’d been on the planet’s surface were dead. Worse than that, even the ones who had been in cryo became sick and eventually died.”

“And you were all fine?”

“We never got sick. As the years passed, we didn’t age.” He shrugged. “The rest is history. That’s enough storytelling. Why don’t you go get some rest? It’s a big day tomorrow.”

“What about you?”

“I’m fine. Another side effect—we don’t need much sleep.”

“Okay. I’ll go find somewhere to lie down—enjoy sleeping while I still can.”

He grabbed her hand as she went past and tugged her toward him. She didn’t try to pull away, just looked down into his eyes.

“Are you absolutely sure this is what you want?” he asked.

Tannis frowned at the question, unsure why he was asking her at this point.

“Once we’re on the planet,” he continued, “there is no more choice. You take the Meridian, or you die.”

“I know. And I want it. I’ve always wanted it. Why ask now?”

He shook his head. “Telling how it happened has brought it all back. And I suppose Aiden’s suicide affected me more than I thought. Then the way the Council members are behaving…I just want you to be sure.”

“I’m sure.”

“Good. Go sleep.” He raised her hand to his lips, kissed her palm, and then released her. Tannis closed her fist around the kiss and stepped back. For a minute, she hovered, not sure whether she wanted to go or stay. In the end, she whirled around and left the bridge.

…

Tannis stumbled as she stepped off the ramp and onto the planet’s surface. Callum reached for her, but she shook her head.

“I’m fine.” Breathing in deeply, she blinked a couple of times. “I think.” She swayed and then righted herself.

“You can stay in the ship,” Callum said. “I’ll come back for you after we’ve been to the chamber.”

“No, I want to come.”

He studied her for a moment, then nodded. The planet affected people differently. Some were almost incapable of functioning without antinausea drugs. Strangely, and unhappily for them if they had been brought here to work the “mines,” they were the ones who lasted the longest. The people who reacted the least to the planet, tended to die the quickest. Venna had done a detailed study of the subject. He remembered reading her report, but it had meant nothing to him—merely numbers. Now, he couldn’t help but think of the vast amounts of suffering reflected in those statistics. When had he become this person who didn’t care? He shook his head. Now was not the time to contemplate his past inadequacies as a human being.

Tannis had gone pale and a fine sheen of sweat coated her face, but she appeared perfectly capable of functioning. It was just as well she was getting the treatment, because she wouldn’t last long.

“Let’s get going, then. You’ll only get worse.

Callum felt the old, familiar fog in his brain, the nausea in his stomach, but this time, he didn’t fight it. He allowed it to wash through him, and a sense of peace stole over him. Something whispered through his mind, not a voice—there were no words—but the need to move filled him, and a deep sense of excitement stirred in his gut.

He didn’t know why he was sure he would find his answers here when Venna had searched for years and come up with nothing. But he had always been the strongest of their kind, even among the inner Council who had all been changed with him on that day. He was the first to get the wings. And his telepathic powers were the strongest, though he still got nothing from Tannis.

She appeared strangely subdued. He’d expected her to be fizzing with excitement, even taking into account the sickness. Maybe he shouldn’t have told her about the pain, but it was better to be prepared. Besides, he didn’t think the thought of pain would dampen her spirits.

He’d asked her yesterday if she wanted to back out. He hadn’t wanted to ask, and he’d silently prayed she wouldn’t say yes. Whatever journey lay ahead, he wanted Tannis to share with him.

Maybe he was a little scared of what he might find after all. Maybe he wanted someone to hold his hand through whatever eternity would bring. He’d never believed in love, wasn’t sure he did now, but something drew him to her. And he knew she felt the same, otherwise he had a notion he would have been dead days ago.

Behind her, Venna appeared composed, if a little green. She was coming with them to the chamber, in case she could cast any insights into what he found there, but then she would return to the ship—no need for her to accompany them to where Tannis would get the treatment.

“Can we get on with this?” she snapped. “I hate this place.”

Callum realized that he didn’t. This time felt different. His head was clearing and his stomach settling. It was around midday and the light was bright, showing the harsh, hostile landscape. No vegetation grew on the planet, or at least nothing they recognized as vegetation. The rock that formed most of the landscape was a dull, gray green.