Epic of Aravinda 1: The Truth Beyond the Sky (21 page)

Then, just as he breathed a sigh of relief, he heard a hideous voice from within his own mind.

“Why do you steal what I have rightfully taken?”

The voice was guttural and revolting. It was so clear that Zahn looked around him in shock, but no one was there.

“You may think that you have escaped us, but there is no place we will not find you. My servants will be avenged. We consume all. We control all. We are the Vakragha.”

Zahn wondered what Oonak would do. He knew that no good could come from listening to the enemy. Perhaps Asha would know how to stop this voice.

“If you tell your friend that we are speaking to you directly, she will be the first to die.”

Zahn’s eyes widened. His heart was beating fast now.

“Yes, we can hear your thoughts, and we will find you in the darkness. We
cultivate
the darkness.”

He braced himself for more of the vile voice, but none came.

“What do you think happened to Oonak?” Asha said.

Zahn almost jumped from her words.

“What? Oonak? He ordered Navika and us to leave. What was I supposed to do?”

Asha was quiet.

She released the jagrul from its spherical shield and continued to work with Darshana, who was still unconscious.

After a few minutes, Zahn noticed that Navika was leaving the nebula at a strange trajectory.

“Navika, what are you doing?”

“To remain safe, we must remain within the moon’s shadow. Otherwise, the pulsar’s radiation will disrupt the cloaking field.”

“Oh. Thanks, Navika.”

“Of course.”

“Are you okay, Zahn?” Asha said.

“I’m good. No worries, Asha. We’ll be out of here in no time.”

“Captain, I’m detecting six Vakragha cruisers approaching us.”

“How is that possible?” Zahn said.

“How is what possible?” Asha said.

“I’m talking to Navika.”

“I didn’t hear him say anything.”

“Zahn,”
he heard Navika say.
“I am communicating with you directly through the mindcap. No one else can hear me except you. Relaying information is much faster this way. For instance, I can highlight objects behind you, such as the cruisers that are fast approaching. To respond, simply speak within your own mind.”

Images of the view behind the ship somehow appeared beside his field of vision, and within the star field he saw six shadowed shapes, thinly outlined in green, fast approaching.

“Zahn?” Asha called.

“Sorry, Asha. Navika was talking to me.”

“Navika,” Zahn said through the mindcap, “isn’t this a little intrusive? And how can they know where we are? I thought you said we were safe as long as there was something between us and that pulsar.”

“I’d hypothesize that the potent pulsar energy that we were exposed to before may have leaked into the cloaking cells. So it’s possible that the field is unstable, causing the cloak to fail periodically. I recommend we use the timespace drive.”

“Right… Wait, how do we do that?”

“You know how.”

“Sort of. So I just imagine a vortex in front of the ship?”

“Either tell me the destination or hold the picture of your destination in mind, yes. You may begin visualizing the vortex now, but we cannot jump until we reach sufficient velocity.”

Behind him, Zahn could hear the timespace drive begin to roar again.

“Wait, how do I reach that velocity, though?”

“Oonak made you captain and you don’t know?”

“Well, I’m pretty sure that—”

“Incredible. He must really believe in your abilities. All right, here’s your crash course in mindcap piloting: energy flows where attention goes. Visualize your desires and the ship will move.”

Zahn imagined the stars moving past, yet nothing happened.

“Good. We are now moving at 5% impulse. But you’ll need to do better than that Zahn.”

“What are you talking about? It doesn’t look like we’re moving at all.”

“The stars you can see around us are dozens or hundreds of light-years distant—too far to see relative motion. However, just beyond the edge of your vision, you should see a spiral shape within a circle. When the edges of the spiral touch the circle, we have reached adequate velocity to make a jump.”

Zahn looked forward and realized that, somehow, he could see the indicator just beyond his vision. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t notice it before, but he guessed it was because he’d never looked for anything outside of his field of vision before. It was quite bizarre, as if he now had an eye on the side of his head.

“Please hurry. We’ve been discussing this for nearly one second already, and the Vakragha cruisers are now within firing distance.”

Only one second? That’s right. Navika had told him that conversations went faster with the mindcap.

He imagined the spiral shape expanding more and more within the small circle and felt the feeling of acceleration as he did so, even though Navika nullified all changes of inertia in the cabin. Somehow, he felt acceleration as a concept now.

“Good work. Vortex in ten seconds. Wait—incoming fire!”

Behind him, Zahn didn’t like what he saw. Six dark, menacing shapes fired toward them, and as they fired, a small point on one of the distant moons glowed a bright orange.

CHAPTER
30

AS PHANTOMS OF LIGHT

As Navika counted down, Zahn held the image of a vortex in his mind and recalled the music they’d heard on Aarava to help him relax. Asha looked back toward him, her eyes wide with fear. “4…” He focused on the Aaravan music and what it felt like the first time they’d used the timespace drive. “3…” Complete calm and focus, just like Oonak had taught him. “2…” It’ll be like going underwater for one second. It’s easy.

“1…”

The roar reached a fever pitch, and behind them dozens of green plasma bolts raced toward them.

“Engage!”
Navika said.

Zahn imagined a vortex appearing in front of the ship, and just a fraction of a second later, one appeared. It looked like a sphere of swirling stars, and when they dove in, a vision of perfect light filled his mind.

There was a brief flash, and they were back in the Ocean of Space once more. Zahn looked around, but could only see stars and the faint glow of the galactic core in the distance.

“Excellent work, Zahn,” Navika said.

“Yeah, good job getting us out of there!” Asha said.

“One moment,” Navika said. “I am detecting traces of Vakragha radiation. It’s possible—Wait. That’s odd. The radiation traces have vanished. I am now detecting only natural galactic background radiation. Perhaps I am in error. I will begin running diagnostics on my sensors now.”

“Don’t worry, Navika. Everyone makes mistakes sometimes, and you’ve been through a lot. We all have.”

Asha looked around at the stars now surrounding them. “So, where are we?”

In the excitement of the moment, Zahn had completely forgotten to imagine his destination. He had no idea where they were, so he discreetly asked Navika. Within a few seconds, Navika displayed a hologram of the galaxy to his left. This was the first time Zahn was able to study a complete hologram of the galaxy, and he was surprised to see that one of the galactic arms was partially covered by a murky shape.

“What’s that darker area?” Zahn said.

“I am once again speaking to you via the mindcap. The darker area is the current known extent of the Vakragha Dominion. We are 1,027 light-years from the Nirananda Nebula which borders a part of this shadowy region.”

“Hmm. So why did we go so far even though I forgot to picture a destination? I didn’t even tell you one.”

“I made a judgement and went for minimum safe distance.”

“One thousand light-years is minimum safe distance?”

“With the Vakragha Dominion, yes.”

Then again, a thousand light-years was a mere hop relative to the size of the galaxy. Navika was right. It was enough space that Zahn wasn’t going to be watching for every little sensor reading.

“We’re in the middle of nowhere, aren’t we?” Asha said.

“More or less,” Zahn said. “But we’re safe. Well, at least once we fix the cloaking cells. Navika told me that the pulsar radiation may have slowly contaminated them. How’s my mom doing?”

Zahn stepped up from the command chair and walked down to them. Asha had placed his mother on the long bench. She had even found a pillow and blanket for her.

“I can’t wake her up, Zahn. I think she may be comatose.”

“Didn’t you learn anything on Amithya about comas?”

“She’d been there for years, Zahn. These things can take time. I’ve stabilized her, but I’m not sure what else I can do for her right now.”

Zahn knelt down, held his mother’s hand, and looked down to her face. He thought of Amithya, and closed his eyes.

Please help her,
he thought.
You said you would be with us, helping us in hidden ways. Were you telling the truth?

Zahn kept his eyes closed for some time as he meditated on this thought.

When he opened them again, he saw strange orbs of light in the cabin, moving over them. For a moment, they were both completely speechless. The orbs seemed divine and otherworldly.

“What are they?” Zahn said. “They’re like phantoms of light.”

The orbs cast strange lights all around them.

“Do you feel that?” Asha said.

“No. What is it?”

“It’s like a presence. A warmth. I think I’m supposed to try healing your mother again.”

“Then keep going.”

Asha placed both of her hands on Darshana’s heart and pushed once. To her surprise, Darshana coughed, took a deep breath, and for a brief instant, she blinked.

“Did you see that? She blinked!”

“Yes. But that doesn’t mean she’s recovered yet.”

Asha kept working as the floating lights indicated other spots that needed attention. At times, Zahn could have sworn that light itself was coming out of Asha’s fingertips, and they worked like this for over an hour, Darshana occasionally opening her eyes for a few moments only to close them once more. Even after all of the wonders they’d seen, seeing his mother’s dark green eyes again was the best sight he’d seen in years.

Finally, after three hours of intense work and a few short breaks to eat some of the food they’d found earlier, Darshana opened her eyes.

And she kept them open.

At first, Darshana had no idea what had happened. She coughed violently and took a deep breath. Then her eyes locked with Zahn’s.

“What happened to you?” she said slowly.

“It’s me, Mom. I’m here. We saved you. You’re safe now.”

Zahn tried to stay strong and not to cry.

“Where?”

“It doesn’t matter. You’re safe. You’re safe.”

Darshana’s eyes closed again.

“So tired…”

“Here. Have her drink this. It will accelerate her healing.”

Asha had brought over a small vial that contained a familiar golden liquid.

“Is that amrita? You saved some?”

“I thought it would come in handy, so I didn’t drink it all. Here, Darshana. Drink it slowly.”

Asha pressed the translucent vial to Darshana’s lips, and she sat up a bit and sipped it. When she finished the last drop, Zahn could easily see the difference. Color was returning to her face, and the light behind her eyes was brighter. Darshana closed her eyes and fell asleep once more. But this was a truer sleep, a deeper sleep.

“Thank you so much, Asha,” Zahn whispered. “I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you.”

“What are friends for?” Asha smiled.

Patiently, Asha and Zahn waited. While Zahn stayed by her side and used the ship to track her pulse and temperature, Asha went to work on diagnosing the problem with the cloaking cells. As Navika had hypothesized, the pulsar’s radiation had leaked into some of the cells, and Asha set to work on retuning them and resetting the field.

During this time, Zahn hardly left his mother’s side. By the time Asha finished her work on the cloaking field, she noticed that Zahn had fallen asleep beside his mother as she slept on the long bench.

Asha walked over and watched Zahn in his slumber. He moved his head slightly every few seconds, as if he were in the midst of a dream, and mumbled something she didn’t understand. After a few seconds he mumbled again, and Asha walked closer to try and understand what he was saying.

“Oon says, we’re going to make it,” he mumbled.

Asha knelt down and whispered into his ear.

“Yes,” she said. “Oonak has faith in us.”

The thought that Zahn was talking to Oonak in his dream was oddly comforting to Asha, but she frowned at the thought of Zahn waking up and remembering what had happened. She missed Oonak very much, but there was nothing she or anyone else could do about it now.

“But Dad,” Zahn mumbled. “She is still alive.”

Asha wondered where Zahn could be now. His eyes were darting back and forth behind his closed eyelids.

“Why did you let her go?” Zahn whispered. “Didn’t you love her? Didn’t you?”

A wave of sadness swept over Asha. When she thought of Zahn struggling even in his dreams, she felt pity. She wasn’t proud of the feeling, but hearing his dreams had changed her somehow. She felt she now knew Zahn in a way she hadn’t known anyone in a long time.

“Zahn,” Asha whispered into his ear. “You’re dreaming.”

Zahn inhaled slightly but remained asleep.

“But you don’t have to dream about that,” she continued. “You can dream about whatever you want. Dream about seeing her well again.”

Zahn’s breathing slowed.

“I wasn’t sure before, Zahn, but now I can feel it. With the help of the amrita and the phantoms of light, your mother will recover. I can feel it. Dream of her now. Dream of your home. Dream of walking with her along the silvery sands just like you told me about. Can you see it?”

Zahn mumbled something, but she couldn’t understand it. She performed a blessing on both of them that the Amithyans had taught her and sat down beside him as she waited patiently for one of them to awaken.

Then, Darshana did something remarkable: she sat up.