Summoning Light (32 page)

She kissed him on the cheek and walked out of the bar, leaving Londo, with his drooping lock of hair, looking stunned.

Galen stood in the dim stone tunnel, looking through the open doorway into the brilliant white room. Within, on the far side of the table, stood Elizar, with his long maroon velvet coat, his dark goatee in the shape of the rune for magic, his angular, arrogant face. Hatred sent a blaze of new heat through Galen's burning body.

It had been a month and a half since they'd last faced each other, but it felt, at this moment, as if no time at all had passed. From Elizar's cupped hands had emerged the long, deadly spike, from his lips the breath of air that had shot it toward them. The spike had snaked up her spinal cord, severing nerve roots and artery branches, killing her inch by excruciating inch. Now it was time for him to die.

"Galen," he said. His skin seemed paler than it used to be, his shoulders slightly curved. For some reason Galen was reminded of Elric and the other mages who had destroyed their places of power. But Elizar had no place of power. Though Galen had destroyed the small piece of chrysalis on his ship, that shouldn't have had any significant effect.

"What a lovely nonsurprise," Tilar said. He was crouched on the floor to one side, Blaylock's body propped against him. His bloody hand pressed a gun into Blaylock's cheek. "Come in, Galen. A pleasure to see you again." Blaylock's hands lay, palms up, against the floor. They were two masses of purplish red, blood pooled around them on the white floor. "I'm betting I can fire this gun faster than you can kill me. Want to take that bet?"

Galen was surging with energy, incandescent. Rabelna stood to the left of the door, and Bunny sat behind her, head bent to the side, regarding him with mild interest.

He stepped into the room.

The relentless, racing energy vanished. The burning incandescence died. The gravity – or something – within the room seemed strange. He stumbled, disoriented, caught a glimpse of the door closing behind him. G'Leel jammed the gurney in the doorway. Galen couldn't recover his equilibrium. Part of his mind, part of his body, seemed out of reach, as if he'd suffered a stroke. His sense of balance failed and he dropped to the floor,

"Galen!" It was G'Leel's voice.

With inordinate effort, he lifted his head, struggling to get his bearings. There was a high-pitched screech – metal on metal – and the gurney burst through the doorway, G'Leel behind it. Momentum carried her past Galen, the gurney ramming into the table, knocking it over.

Elizar had stepped back, and now he nodded to someone.

Galen's head turned in a loose roll. Beside the door, which was sliding closed, Rabelna brought a weapon out from behind her back, aiming it at G'Leel.

With a fierce drive for clarity, Galen focused on Rabelna, visualized the spell of destruction. But there was no echo from the tech, no gathering of energy. There was no response at all.

Rabelna fired.

G'Leel's arms flew out as the blast threw her into the upended table. In the center of her back a black hole blossomed, plasma instantly vaporizing leather, skin, tissue. G'Leel fell away from the table, legs failing, buckling. She thumped to the floor a few feet from Galen, her golden arms splayed.

His hand flailed as he tried to get up. He couldn't make his body work. Limbs no longer seemed to be where they should. They no longer seemed to move as they should. His thoughts felt fuzzy, disjointed. His heart sped ahead. He gagged on saliva.

He'd felt something like this before, he remembered. Though it had been much milder. When he'd trained with Elric. When Elric overrode his chrysalis.

But no one could override a mage's tech. It was controlled only by him. It was part of him.

Galen pressed both his hands against the floor, straining to push himself up. His palms felt numb, yet his leg was throbbing worse than before. He couldn't find his balance.

To one side G'Leel lay, probably dead; he did not have the sensors to tell. On the other was Blaylock, with his ruined hands and dead mind.

"It's a horrible sensation," Elizar said. "But one can get used to it in time."

It was not possible for Elizar to do what he had done. "What– What have you–"

"I've turned off your tech, of course. And I can do it any time I want."

C
HAPTER 14

In his quarters, Londo negotiated with Refa via a secure channel on the comm system. Refa was in the royal palace on Centauri Prime, and he was reluctant to admit he even owned the Ondavi, which made convincing him to turn it over quite a challenge.

Elric watched through the probe on Vir, who stood silently to Londo's side. Elric remained still in the captain's office, awaiting his return. But the endless wrangling of the two Centauri failed to hold his attention.

Through the growing throbbing in his head, he found himself worrying again about Galen, wondering if he still lived, if Alwyn would reach him in time to help. It would be so simple to do an electron incantation. In less than a minute he could have Galen beside him, talking to him, putting his fears to rest. It would be such a joy to see Galen one last time, to learn that Galen would be all right.

But he must not.

"I can't believe you convinced him," Vir said.

The communication had been concluded. Apparently Londo had been successful.

"What choice did I have? If I failed, I would be tormented for the rest of my life by foul-tempered holodemons and even more foul-tempered techno-mages. The smell in here, by the way – you still haven't gotten rid of it." His face wrinkling in revulsion, Londo began to scout around the cluttered, ostentatious room for the source of the odor.

"I'm working on it." Vir followed. "But I can't understand why you went back to gamble with her. I told you she was a techno-mage."

Londo turned to him. "I was– talked into it. I thought I couldn't lose."

"Londo, how many times–"

Londo held up his hands. "Don't say it, Vir. Don't say it. I was a fool, I was used, and now I'm trapped in a situation that is beginning to look very bad. It's beginning to look very bad indeed."

"What do you mean?"

Londo shook his head. "I have no time to explain it all to you. But these techno-mages have powerful enemies. I am afraid: I am afraid this may not end well."

As much as Londo might wish it, he could not blind himself entirely to the truth. Morden would not have confided the Shadows' intentions, yet Londo could easily deduce them. Nevertheless, he would do nothing to stop the Shadows' plan.

Londo reached with irritation to the back of his head, pulled out a hair clip. The drooping lock of hair fell free. "If you can stop badgering me with questions for a few moments, Vir, perhaps you can make yourself useful and do something about this embarrassment."

In Elric's mind's eye, he saw John Sheridan coming down the hall toward his office. The Drazi had been taken to the brig, and the Zekhite sealed off until further notice. John had met with Susan Ivanova, then headed tiredly back.

Elric straightened, acutely aware of how little time was left. He believed John would not detain them, yet he could not be certain. In any case, he needed more than that. Again he must ask for a favor. And he could not tell John the whole truth of it, or the captain would surely refuse.

John hesitated in the doorway as he saw Elric, then continued to his desk. "Elric. I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. I would have understood if you'd left."

Elric stood. "I have no time to reschedule with you, Captain. We will leave this place shortly. Unless you intend to stop us."

John took a breath, and his lips rose slightly. "Please sit," he said, and they both did.

John continued. "I have no intention of detaining your group. I'm afraid some people won't be satisfied with the answers you've given me, but that's going to be their problem. I believe you've dealt with me honestly, and as you said, you are free to go where you want."

"I will not thank you for allowing us to do what it is our right to do. But I will thank you for the friendship you've extended me." Elric paused, noting John's smile. "Unfortunately, Captain, there are others who would stop us from leaving. They seek to use our power for their own ends."

"Do you mean Ambassador Mollari? I think you scared him off."

"He is but one of many. I'm afraid I must ask for your help, Captain. Or we will not leave here safely."

John's face hardened. "Who's threatening you? I'll call in security, you can swear out a complaint, and we'll have them arrested."

He knew so little of what the mages faced, of what he himself would soon face. "A confrontation would be too dangerous," Elric said. "You don't want this station to become a battlefield, nor do I." That possibility would seem very real to John after the Drazi episode. "We have a plan that will allow us to leave safely and peacefully, but we require the assistance of you and your security team. I assure you that no laws will be broken. We plan a simple misdirection, a sleight of hand, so that our enemies cannot stop us."

John picked up the orange blossom on his desk and twirled it between his fingers. "Like this."

"Yes."

"You realize that not only am I not supposed to help you, I'm supposed to stop you."

Elric gave a single nod.

"How do you know you can trust me?"

"Because you believe in good, as do we. And because you still dream."

John laid the orange blossom on the desk. "Tell me your plan. Don't leave anything out. If it breaks no laws, as you say, I'll give you everything you need."

Galen's thoughts still felt fuzzy, disjointed. Hunched over on the floor, he panted in short, shallow breaths, each one stabbing sharply into his side. His sense of balance remained uncertain. He needed both hands braced on the floor to keep from falling over. Carefully he pushed himself back until his good leg was folded beneath him. His bad leg remained splayed out to the side. When he tried to bend it, an incredible pain shot through him.

"Another one bites the dust," Bunny said. "You guys are getting a bit boring at this point. There's no challenge."

"Leave us," Elizar said. "Galen and I must speak privately."

Galen struggled to focus, to understand.

This was how they'd subdued Kell, he realized. And he'd walked right into the trap.

They must have done the same to Blaylock. But for some reason Blaylock's higher brain functions had been shut down along with the tech. Why? He remembered Gowen saying something – something about Blaylock's health.
In his quest to become one with the tech, he has encouraged his systems to intertwine with it more intimately than most of ours do.
Perhaps Blaylock's brain had become so linked to the implants that only its most basic processes could function without them. In that case, if the tech was turned back on, Blaylock might recover.

Being without it was an awful, sickening sensation. Galen might have imagined a simple loss of power, a return to the way his body had felt before receiving his implants. But he now recognized the radical change his body had undergone since initiation. The tech had spread itself through all of his systems, had become a part of him. Without it, he was no longer complete.

Galen had thought at first that Elizar had cast a spell to deactivate his tech. But he realized that Elizar's tech was turned off too. That was why Elizar appeared weakened. That was why Elizar had not used his powers to attempt to revive Blaylock or to torture him. That was why Tilar had forgone his chrysalis. Without it, he would not feel the disorienting effects.

Some external device had deactivated the tech in all of them. But how could that be so? How could there be such a device?

Tilar shoved Blaylock over onto his side and stood. Galen vaguely realized Elizar and the others had been bickering, but he didn't know what had been said. He'd been concentrating so hard, he'd lost track of them. He had to regain his bearings.

"I'm getting tired of being treated like an inferior," Tilar said. "I bet I could get more out of him than you."

"You've certainly proven that with Blaylock," Elizar said.

"At least I tried something." Tilar stepped over Blaylock's body and came toward Galen and the door. As he passed by, something thin and wet fell on Galen's cheek. "A souvenir," Tilar said, "and token of things to come."

Galen shook his head and it fell to the floor, a golden filament of tech coated in tissue and blood.

Tilar left with Bunny and Rabelna. The door slid closed behind them.

Whatever device overrode their tech, it seemed to operate only within this room. If he could get himself and Blaylock out of here, perhaps their power would return.

Fighting disorientation, he crawled toward Blaylock, his leg dragging behind him. Thick streaks of red were smeared over the floor around Blaylock. He'd lost a lot of blood. In the wetness, one of Galen's hands slipped out from under him. He regained his balance, turned Blaylock onto his back. Blaylock's face was ashen, his lips a greyish blue. The rise and fall of his chest was barely visible, his pulse beneath Galen's fingers rapid and weak. Thin streams of blood continued to run from his hands out onto the floor. Galen had to stop the bleeding.

Blaylock had a handkerchief in his jacket. Galen took hold of Blaylock's cold wrist. He pushed up the jacket sleeve, tied the handkerchief tightly about the forearm as a tourniquet. To slow the bleeding from the other hand, Galen pulled her scarf from his pocket. He leaned unsteadily across Blaylock's body, yanked the scarf tight, leaving bloody fingerprints. Then he pushed himself out of his coat, laid it over Blaylock. If Blaylock's tech wasn't restored soon, so that his organelles could operate, Galen didn't know if he would survive.

Galen believed G'Leel had to be dead, but he made his way over to her, hoping that Elizar merely thought him concerned. She'd been holding her gun the last time he'd noticed. Her guncase was open, but her hands were empty, the weapon was nowhere to be seen. For show, he checked G'Leel's pulse and was amazed to find her still alive. She had a chance to survive. He rolled her onto her side to check the plasma burn. The wound was deep, the yellow of bone visible at its center. She couldn't last long. He had to find her gun.