Purge of Prometheus (21 page)

“Keryn,” Yen whispered into the bridge.

The serpent leapt from his hand, elongating as it stretched beyond his reach.
 
The blue psychic snake bared its fangs and sunk their power into the base of Vangore’s spine.
 
The Wyndgaart Communications Officer jerked as the serpent’s head disappeared under the skin and reached into his subconscious mind.
 
Vangore flinched as his mind became alight with psychic fire and whispered suggestions.
 
Words flittered through his subconscious mind, filling it with thoughts not his own.
 

Merric
, the voice whispered.
 
Code.
 
Engine room.

Vangore convulsed quietly while the mental dams in his mind broke free, flooding his synapses with an overload of information.
 
Images fluttered through his mind, like triggered memories rising to the surface after being long forgotten.
 
Only Yen knew that the memories running through his mind were not his own.
 
The power coursed through Yen, pulsing down the length of the filament that ran between the two.

Stealing a glance at Tylgar sitting in the navigator’s chair, Yen debated sending a second filament in his direction.
 
Instead, he showed impressive restraint by reeling in another blue filament that began to coalesce in response to his pondering.
 
While Yen feared Tylgar turning around and seeing what he was doing, he was more concerned with the perception of the entire bridge being involved in a conspiracy against Merric.
 
People were quick to accept a single man plotting bodily harm against another.
 
But when it reached a point of multiple people working in an intricate, interwoven conspiracy, skeptics quickly arose in the ranks.
 
One person is a fluke.
 
Multiple people lends itself to a leadership failure and blatant mutiny against the established command.
 
No, he wouldn’t do this to Tylgar unless the Lithid turned around.
 

As Yen’s thoughts wandered between Tylgar and Vangore, the Wyndgaart stopped his subtle convulsions.
 
With its work done, the serpent slipped free from Vangore’s mind, coiling once again around Yen’s wrist.
 
It flicked its tongue once toward the Communications Officer before turning and plunging into Yen’s open palm, disappearing from view with a final toss of its transparent blue tail.

In front of the Captain’s chair, Vangore began typing furiously on his overhead display, alternating between inputting and erasing new data.
 
Sinking into the Captain’s chair once more, Yen let his eyes lose their focus once more as he stared out beyond the stars.

CHAPTER 17:

Keryn stumbled through the snow, the freezing wind tearing through her wet pants, biting into her skin.
 
The numbing cold had spread from her feet and legs into her fingers and hands.
 
She staggered forward, her hands tucked under her arms as a minimal protection from the stinging wind and her filth-caked hair blowing in chunks of frozen strands.
 
When she had last made the three-mile walk from the
Cair Ilmun
into Miller’s Glen, she had been fresh faced after a deep space journey.
 
The time had passed quickly for the trio as they walked and joked amongst themselves.
 
This time, however, the journey seemed to last an eternity

Without the sun as a guide and with all her jungle landmarks now decaying, the world seemed entirely foreign.
 
The cold still clouded her mind and allowed doubt to creep into her thoughts.
 
For all she knew, she had been wandering in circles for the past half hour and would, quite soon, come across her own beaten path through the snow.
 
Still, she trudged on, knowing that movement was all that kept her from collapsing into the snowdrifts, never to rise again.

She staggered for another ten minutes, certain that she was completely lost in the woods.
 
The walk to Miller’s Glen over two weeks ago had been quick, taking less time to transverse the entire distance than what she’d been walking since her escape, yet she still had seen no sign of the stream in which they had washed a few weeks earlier.
 
She was panicked and disoriented, turning back and forth, her only guide being the straight trail behind her as she broke through the deep snow.
 
Shivering now both from the cold and her own fear, Keryn drove forward hoping and praying to Gods she didn’t believe in that she would find something familiar soon before the threatening cold overtook her.

Her foot catching on a buried root of a recently deceased jungle tree, Keryn stumbled and dropped to a knee.
 
Tears streamed down her face, cutting clean tracks down her dirty face.
 
Her energy was quickly leaving her; she feared now that she didn’t even have the strength to get back to her feet.

Get up, Keryn
, the Voice called, closer now than it had been in some time.
 
You have to keep moving.

“What do you care?” she moaned through her chocking tears.

You may view me as your enemy
, it said, soothingly,
but I can’t exist without you.
 
If you die, buried out here in the snow, I die with you.
 
And I don’t want to die.

“Just go away,” Keryn replied with little conviction.
 
“Just leave me alone.”

I can’t do that either
, the Voice said, spouting a familiar rhetoric.
 
We’re stuck together forever, you and I.
 
And if we are both going to die, it won’t be today in a snow covered graveyard where we may never be found again.
 
If we’re going to die, it will be in a blaze of glory.
 
But we can’t do that unless you get back up and keep moving.
 
Now, get up.
 
Just make it a few more steps, and then you can start feeling sorry for yourself again.

Keryn pushed herself up, using a nearby tree for support.
 
Her knees cried in angry defiance as she tried to straighten her legs again.
 
The cold had settled deeply into her bones during her brief reprieve from walking and now each step sent explosions of pain through her legs.
 
Still, the Voice cried in her head, driving her forward even as her own thoughts sunk into the dark recesses of her mind.
 
The memory of her shared kiss with Adam rose to the forefront of her mind and, with the Voice taking control of her movements, she lost herself in the memory.
 
She remembered the feel of his strong arms around her back, pulling her body toward his.
 
His warm breath had danced across her lips as they leaned into one another, her body melting into his strong embrace.
 
Their lips had met and she had hungrily leaned in for more as explosions of pleasure rippled down her spine.
 
Though she knew she had to leave him soon, she had held tightly to the sides of his face as they kissed, their tongues probing on another’s mouth first playfully, then passionately.
 
She had wanted more, even then, but…

Wake up and look
, the Voice yelled, the strength of its words striking her awake better than any physical blow.

Keryn felt the memory fade into her subconscious again as the aches of her body slowly reemerged.
 
Looking ahead, her eyes grew wide.
 
After all this time, she had finally found the stream again.
 
Though the freezing winter had killed the jungle and dumped feet of snow over all surfaces, the stream still bubbled happily across her path, unfrozen from the arctic winds.
 
Glancing upstream, she watched the waterfall slowly dump its contents into the pool below.
 
The waterfall no longer roared as water rolled over its edge.
 
Instead, the water fell in swollen droplets, as though the surface of the water itself had congealed in the cold, revealing a small erosion-worn cavern behind the once proud waterfall.
 
Remembering her painful splash into the water, Keryn leaned forward and pushed on the surface of the water.
 
The tension remained buoyant and strong, if not a little more solid than she remembered.
 
The memory of her first encounter with the stream also reminded her of something else: Penchant had found a way to cross just a little ways downstream.
 
Turning to her right, she walked down the stream just a short distance until she found the large rocks jutting from the water’s surface.

Keryn walked gingerly over the impromptu bridge and climbed up the short cliff face.
 
With a higher vantage point, she was able to watch the waterfall dump its contents slowly into the gathering pool below.
 
Between the waterfall and her location, however, something else caught her eye.
 
Protruding from the snow was a dirty brown object, standing out clearly in the continual twilight against the pristine white snow.
 
She walked down the sloped ground as she approached the object, silently swearing at her stiff joints.
 
Keryn reached the object and bent down, picking up the surprisingly lightweight item in her hand.
 
Holding it up in examination, her face fell.
 
She twisted the large white feather in her hand, looking at the dried brown blood that coated its surface.

Tossing the feather to the side, Keryn dropped to her knees and started digging through the snow.
 
Though the cold bit at her fingers and burned her skin, she continued digging, exposing first an arm, then a torso.
 
She pushed the snow free in heaps, clearing away the drift on both legs and around the wings.
 
Dreading the inevitable, Keryn cleared away the snow that had collected over the golden hair and face.
 
Stumbling away from the body, Keryn collapsed in the snow and covered her mouth, suppressing the cry of anguish she wanted to let out.
 
Lying uncovered and broken on the rocks near the stream, Cerise’s body rested where it had fallen, undisturbed over the past two weeks.

One wing lay at an odd angle, the thin bone shattered from the collision with the stone surface.
 
One leg and part of Cerise’s skull had suffered a similar fate.
 
The other wing was missing, severed cleanly near the back.
 
The rest of her torso was peppered with holes of varying size; gunshot wounds that had torn through her body.
 
The dark, dried blood surrounded her body and soaked into the bag on her hip.
 
Keryn’s imagination told her the tale.
 
The Terrans fighters had gone off in search of survivors.
 
Wherever Cerise had been, she was caught unaware of the danger and had flown away, skimming the treetops in an attempt not to be seen.
 
But white against the deeply dark jungle, she had been easy to spot.
 
The fighter had opened fire on her; bullets tearing through her soft flesh and severing her wing.
 
Keryn could see her spiraling out of control, her body ripping through the tree limbs before slamming into the rocks below, her fingertips dipping into the cool waters of the stream.
 
Shot, bleeding, broken.
 
Cerise had struggled, broken on the rocks, trying to gasp for air through lungs that had been pierced by both gunfire and broken ribs.
 
Alone, scared, and in the darkness, Cerise had died on these rocks.
 
Keryn cried uncontrollably as the scene played out in her mind.

The Voice let the silence build for a while, allowing Keryn to cry herself dry, before speaking.
 
We need to go
, it said comfortingly.
 
We can’t stay here.

In her mind, Keryn could feel the Voice tugging, wanting to say more.
 
“Just say it,” she said, feeling defeated.

We need her pants and bag
, it said, devoid of the emotions that Keryn felt welling inside of her.
 
It was true that she and the Voice were two very different people.
 
Keryn wished she could stare introspectively, letting the Voice see her displeasure.

Your own pants are still soaked from the trip through the sewers
, it said, explaining.
 
Hers are treated, which means that they’re relatively waterproof and a lot warmer than your thin pants.
 
And if she has any food in her bag, you’ll need it to keep up your strength.

Keryn sat, unhappy with the advice but knowing the truth of the Voice’s words.
 
Still, she couldn’t escape a simple realization: if Cerise was dead, what hope was there that the
Cair Ilmun
was still intact?
 

Reaching forward, she unhooked the bag from Cerise’s hip.
 
She twisted the latch, which was resistant after being frozen for so long.
 
Peering inside, Keryn’s heart leapt in her chest.
 
She pulled free a grain bar and, unwrapping it, reveling in the nutty flavors as she took a bite.
 
The first bit of real food in two weeks protested in her empty stomach, but didn’t stop her from ravenously finishing the food.
 
Shifting aside the remaining grain bars, Keryn discovered the first aid kit that all members of the team traditionally carried.
 
Near the bottom of the bag, Keryn paused as her fingertips brushed against a filmy material, its thick mesh feeling too good to be true.
 
Turning the bag upside down, she dumped out the contents.
 
The food and first aid kit tumbled into the snow, followed by a flowing silver cloth, which floated to the ground.
 
Grabbing it before it could reach the snowy surface, Keryn pulled the deep space blanket to her chest in elation, her concerns and mourning temporarily forgotten as her basic need for survival overrode her worries.
 
Used for deep space travel where temperatures inside cabins would plummet while crews attempted to conserve fuel, the blankets were thin and lithe, easily packet into most any container, but capable of keeping crewmen warm in almost any temperatures.
 
To Keryn, it was her personal savior.