Spears of the Sun (Star Sojourner Book 3) (10 page)

The mother didn't look up as she gathered her bag, her roll of thread, and returned to her boiling pot.

“How long am I supposed to keep this on?”

“Two days,” Darby said and chuckled.

“I haven't
got
two days.” I sat up. “I have friends up there who are counting on me.”

Well. Maybe.

“I've got to get back out there…to the surface. Uh, to my friends, I mean.”

“Aye, an' what would ye important mission be all about? If I could ask.” I heard the note of sarcasm in his tone.

“You've heard of General Ki Rowdinth?”

“Oh.” Shannon nodded and soft red curls brushed her bare shoulders. “We all know about General Rowdinth. The mon's a lunatic.”

“And so he is,” I agreed. “He's hired two scientists to develop a weapon that can – “

“Destroy Earth,” Darby finished.

I was too shocked to reply.

“We know about his plan,” Shannon offered. “But what can we do about it?”

“W-CIA will know what to do, if we can only locate the lab.”

Shannon glanced at Darby.

“What?” I asked.

Darby sat down beside me and stared into the distance as he rubbed his lips.

“Do you know where it is?” I ventured.

“We know,” he answered softly. “But tis impenetrable, lad. Ye mission is a suicide one.”

“Just point me to it. That's all I'm asking.”

Darby looked at Shannon and raised his brows. “I tried to keep him here, lass.” He turned to me. “If yer mind's made up, well then, I'll show ye the way.” He stood up with a grunt.

“No, Grandpa,” Shannon said firmly. “I won't have it! I can show him the way an' run back, if need be.”

I snapped the red thread and pushed off the cabbage leaves with my other foot.

“I'll get ye jacket,” Shannon said.

Darby stared at her and I saw the fear of loss in his eyes.

“I'll send her home,” I said, “as soon as she shows me the way.”

He nodded.

I went to the stream and washed off my bare foot.

Shannon handed me a towel and waited while I dried off my foot and put on my sock and shoe.

“Lead the way, lass,” I said and took my jacket from her extended hand.

Shannon led me through a side tunnel to a dead end where sand sifted into small piles around our feet. Fingers of light pierced through three pairs of tiny holes at eye level in the wall. I brushed dirt from my hair and peered through one pair.

Beyond the holes, a mirrored bubble chamber, about two meters in diameter, and clamped to a platform that had wheels, stood in the center of a lab. A red globe pulsed and spun within the bubble's transparent center, with a golden kernel within that, and surrounded by an outer blue halo that turned green, then back to blue.

I leaned against a wall. “That's it! That's the Dark Energy Project!”

“Tis what ye been lookin' fer?” She smiled.

“Sure tis. There must be a way inside!”

“No one knows where.” She shook her curls in the narrow beams of light. “We happened upon it when we were digging a new tunnel and heard the machine.”

I stared through the holes again. “I expected it to be…”

“What, lad?”

“I don't know. I mean, the damn thing's on wheels!”

“Aye.”

“Shannon, dark energy is born of space itself, you see? It defies gravity. It's pushing the universe
out
.” I gestured with my hands.

“Out where?”

“Not where. To expand faster than it should. I mean, than it would've. If they've harnessed that energy within the chamber, and they expect to destroy Earth with it, it should be…” I shook my head.

“Bigger?” she asked.

I nodded. “Bigger.”

“Well, lad, I'm sorry ye disappointed.”

“I didn't say that.” I gestured toward the wall. “I mean, it lessens one of the four forces of the universe.”

Her green eyes widened. “Aye, then I suppose it should be bigger. Unless…”

“What?”

She peered through a pair of holes again. “Unless tis concentrated, like the singularity in a black hole.”

“A dark-energy singularity? Did you read that in a scientific journal?”

She shook her curls in the narrow beams of light. “Tis just a thought, lad.” She drew in a soft breath and moved back. “Hush,” she whispered.

I peered through holes again and saw two coveralled Terran men shuffle into the dark lab. I leaned against a wall. “Don't talk, Shannon,” I whispered, closed my eyes and tried for a probe. But they just shut down the chamber, ordered the lights off and were gone before I had a chance to link for an image of the entrance.

“Dammit!” I whispered. I hadn't even gotten a good look at them. Well, I could find this passage again, with Shannon's help, and notify Joe.

Black-hole type singularities of dark energy?
I thought. Was that possible? There are millions of black holes roaming the Milky Way. There's one in the vicinity of Earth's solar system, as you count space distances, but it's drifting out between the galaxy's arms, and black holes don't purposely target planets, or whole solar systems. Could dark energy do that? Ah, hell! I'm a biologist, not a particle physicist.

“C'mon, Shannon.” I took her hand. “Show me the entrance to the surface with the hatch.”

She led me down the tunnel, feeling her way along the wall. “Then ye be leaving us?”

“I've got to contact W-CIA. This lab's going to be shut down, or blown up. It's the military's call.” I paused and took her shoulders. “Shannon, if the government decides to blow it up, you and your people will have to leave. There's a good chance this whole maze of tunnels and caverns will collapse with it.”

“But this is our home, Jules! Where would we go?”

“Maybe Darby and the elders can devise some contingency plan if the cavern becomes uninhabitable.” I smiled. “Anyway, you're too pretty to spend your life underground.”

In the dusky light of glow balls, I saw tears shimmer in her eyes.

“I'm sorry,” I said and hugged her. We paused and I wiped her tears with my sleeve.

“I know, Jules. But not near as sorry as I am.”

I made a mental map of the paths as we continued toward the hatch. Maybe it was the urine cure after all, but my ankle felt a little better.

We paused at the bottom of the ladder. Chances were good we would never see each other again. I was at a loss for words.

“I…I'll keep your clan's location a secret,” I said lamely and glanced up at the hatch. “Do you know if it's day, or still night out there?”

“Day. Tis that time o' the month.” She put a hand on my chest.

“What time is that?” I studied the hatch. “You'll have to fit it back in place when I'm on the surface.” I smiled. “Goodbye, lass. Give my love to your grandpa.” I hugged her. “And that old crudgemother Holly Eve.” I tried to break away but she held me and stared into my eyes.

“Do ye not remember what grandpa said about the clan needin' new blood?” She wrapped her arms around me.

“Now, Shannon.” I pried her hands off my back and held her wrists. “This is no time for a wedding proposal.”

“Did I ask ye fer a ring now?”

“Just what are you asking for?”

She smiled. “A bit o' yer time.” She reached up and pulled off my jacket. “A bit o' ye.”

“Oh.
That
time of the month.” I grabbed back my jacket. “You figure you're ovulating.”

“I'll bet me grandpa's beard I am.”

“Forget it, Shannon. I'm not leaving behind a kid I'll never see. I'm a little more responsible than that.”

I thought of Lisa. Sure.

She pressed herself against me and I backed to the damp wall. “Would it be so terrible a thing,” she said, “to father a child who would be loved by the whole clan?” She stood on tiptoe and kissed me. Her tongue probed past my lips. I didn't know my hands had relaxed until she embraced me and pressed her breasts against my chest. She must have been wearing perfume. Or was it pheromones? Dammit! My body was responding. I tried to back further but a branch in the wall poked me in the side. I held her away by her shoulders and she smiled and unbuttoned her blouse.

“Jesus and Vishnu!” I tried to pry my eyes away from the siren call of her firm breasts with their hard nipples.

She shook off her blouse as she backed away, and unzipped her pants.

“Don't do that!” I ordered and turned toward the ladder. “You'd better get dressed before you catch a cold. I'm leaving!”

She threw her arms around me under my loose sweater and pulled it off. “Are ye certain o' that, now?”

“Give me that!” We fought over the stretched sweater. “Now give it back!” I picked up my jacket.

She held the sweater behind her. “Come an' get it, lad.”

“Look, Shannon,” I said sternly, “you're a beautiful woman, and if things were different….” I thought of Willa and felt guilty.

“Aye, but things bein' what they are.” She stood naked before me, her red hair draped around her shoulders like a caress. “An' ye havin' to leave.” She dropped the sweater and kissed me again. I held her against me. Willa was somewhere in a new form.
Live your life,
she had sent. Well, if there was ever a time….

“Ye won't be needin' this.” She unstrapped my holster.

Maybe she wasn't ovulating, I thought as I kissed her. She helped me push off the rest of my clothes. How could she know that for sure?

I ran my hands through her hair, pulled her close to me and kissed her again.

She gasped in a breath. “Ye have kisses like wine, lad.” We slid to the cold floor. “Sweet an' intoxicating.” She pulled me down on top of her. “I'm yours.”

And I'm going to regret this in the morning
, I thought. No. It's already morning and my friends might be worried about me, if they were still alive and not captured by Rowdinth's rat pack. And I had a mission to save Earth. But it all faded as we made love.

“You're beautiful, Willa,” I whispered.

“What?”

“Just a…a pet name.”

“A dog, I hope.”

We gave ourselves to passion. It spread through me like wildfire and I didn't know where I ended and she began. And then those waves of ecstasy that come only with fully loving a woman. She cried out and we clung to each other like two drowning people.

When it was over, we lay side by side, holding hands, panting. Dammit! If that didn't make a baby, I don't know what would! I rolled my head to look at her. “I don't know whether to kiss you or kick you.”

She lifted on her elbows and lightly kissed my lips. “If I have yer child, I hope tis a boy who looks just like ye.”

“A girl who looks like you would be the princess of your clan.”

She smiled and brushed hair back off my face. Her eyes were glossy with tears.

“I'll come back,” I said, and wasn't sure I meant it. “If I can.”

'Ye remember the song, lad?” She kissed my cheek. “Tis you must go away and I must bide.”

Joe Hatch sat at the conference table in planet Alpha's W-CIA private room. His shoulders hunched, his expression grim, he surveyed the four officials gathered there and chewed the stem of his cold pipe. “The last we heard from our field operatives on Fartherland,” he said, “agent Enigma could not be found. General Rowdinth might be tracking him with the implant.” He tapped the table with his fingertips.

“Assuming he's still alive,” Director Kerry, a compact man with black, thinning hair and a focused expression, said.

Joe stared out the window, where rain dripped from an overcast sky. He'd never liked the cold, wet climate of Alpha.

“What's your input as a psychiatrist?” Kerry asked Doctor Chang.

Chang's white hair brushed her shoulders as she turned to Kerry. “Let's consider the ramifications if agent Enigma is informed that General Rowdinth can kill him with the remote push of a button.”

Joe rubbed his eyes.

“It could cause him to attempt to dislodge it himself.” Doctor Chang rolled a pen between her fingers.

Will Kaiser, head of Engineering, shrugged his bulky shoulders. “Depending on the device, of course…I'm sorry, Joe, but if he did, it would very likely explode.”

Admiral Owusu sat back and folded his long, dark arms. “Do
you
think General Rowdinth can track him?” he asked Will.

“It's possible,” Will said. “It depends on the device.”

“And whether agent Enigma is still alive,” Joe said. He lit his pipe, puffed it to life, and went to stare out the window.

“I thought you gave up smoking,” Doctor Chang remarked.

“I did.”

“Joe,” Director Kerry said, “please sit down.” He shuffled through papers on his desk, then picked up one and stared at it as Joe returned to the table.

“This lunatic,” Kerry started, then looked around the table, “as in General Ki Rowdinth, has informed us that if we locate his citadel, and attempt to invade it, he will destroy Earth now and target the off-planet colonies.” He rubbed his lower lip. “He's threatened to destroy them, one by one, until Alpha hands over the gold bullion.”

Will Kaiser shook his head. “What weapon, in the name of all the perditions, are his scientists developing with dark energy? It's all around us. How can they use it to destroy a planet?” He looked around, but the others were silent.

“If we knew that, Will,” Kerry said, “we might have a handle on how to stop him.”

“I could send in a special operation's team,” Admiral Owusu said. “My people would take him and his citadel out so fast he'd never hit any button, including the one to destroy Earth.” He glanced around. “The fucker would never know what hit him. What do you say, Director?”

Kerry laid down the paper and folded his hands over it. “Not until our operatives locate the lab, Admiral. If just one of Rowdinth's people escapes, he could take up the cause with the two rogue scientists and line his own pockets. He shook his head. “Or so they think. If Rowdinth only knew that there is no bullion.”

Owusu leaned forward. “Why don't we just tell him?”

“It would cause worlds-wide financial chaos,” Kerry answered. “And the lunatic might still destroy Earth and extort the colonies.

Joe slammed a fist on the table. “This is a goddamn rock and a hard place. And Agent Enigma is between them.”

“Joe,” Director Kerry said, “has agent Enigma contacted you in the recent past from Fartherland?”

“No. Our other field operatives on the planet have, though. Some Vegan who worked for Rowdinth hooked up with our team and told them about the implant.”

“The mission is not going well.” Director Kerry shook his head. “Agent Enigma has become a hindrance with Rowdinth's Elite Guards after him.”

“Is it his tel powers Rowdinth wants to tap into?” Doctor Chang asked.

“That's a fair assumption,” Kerry said. “I don't know why else Rowdinth would want him.” “I'd say,” Owusu offered and waved a graceful arm, “that if Rowdinth captured our agent, he would threaten him with death if he didn't return here and mindprobe the government, especially W-CIA, for information about our plans to counterattack.”

“Suppose,” Joe said, “we bring agent Enigma home and replace him?”

“Joe,” Will said, “if Enigma boards a ship for Alpha, the change in pressure on the implant from the shuttle to the starship would alert Rowdinth, even if he isn't tracking Enigma.” He glanced at Kerry. “If Rowdinth pushes the button, it would blow a hole in the ship.”

“I think we must assume,” Admiral Owusu said, “that whether or not Agent Enigma becomes Rowdinth's tool, in the end, Rowdinth will execute him.”

Joe put down his pipe. “And if Rowdinth manages to send Enigma here for mind probes?”

“Or possibly,” Will said, and combed back his light hair through fingers, “to activate the device when Enigma is inside the government halls.”

“Joe,” Director Kerry said, “we all know that this agent is the father of your grandchild. But considering the magnitude of the lunatic's threat….”

Joe nodded. “I want to go to Fartherland.”

“What could you accomplish on Fartherland, Joseph,” Doctor Chang asked, “except to endanger your own life? You're too close to this agent to remain objective.”

Joe tapped ashes from his pipe into his empty coffee cup. “I've found in my long career, Doctor, that even with the best laid plans, sometimes it's better to just play it by ear as events unfold. Director?”

“You're getting a little old for field work, Joe,” Kerry said.

“I intend to remain behind the scenes, and continue as Enigma's contact.”

“He hasn't contacted you,” Kerry said and lifted his brows.

“Which is good reason for me to go there and find out what the hell's happening? I have a few years of experience in field work!”

“No one is questioning your experience,” Kerry said softly. “There's just one hitch. And you're not going to like it.”

Joe felt his stomach clench.

“If Agent Enigma becomes Rowdinth's tool, with the stakes being what they are….”

Joe lowered his head. “I wasn't hired on as an assassin.”

“Then Admiral Owusu's people will have to step in.”

“Jesus and Brahma,” Joe muttered. “A rock and a hard place.”