The Glorious Becoming (14 page)

“I need to know this, Petrov.”

“
Want
and
need
are different things.”

“Petrov...”

The scientist faced him. “Remington! Can you not see that I have a job to do now?”

“I’m looking for two Ceratopians. I need to know where they went. It’s very important.”

Once again, the scientist engaged in another conversation.

“This could change the war, too!” Scott said.

Stopping his conversation, Petrov glared at Scott. “How could it change the war?” he asked, folding his arms across his chest.

Scott had no idea how to answer. “I don’t know.” Petrov rolled his eyes. “I don’t know
yet
, but it might. I need you to trust me.”

“Trust you. Right.”

“Sixty seconds. I just need
sixty
seconds!”

Cursing loudly, Petrov slammed down his clipboard. The room flinched, then quickly got back to work. Eyeing Scott coldly, the chief scientist picked his clipboard from the floor and walked to a terminal. “Date?” Petrov asked.

Date? Oh, crap.

“Date?” the scientist repeated, voice rising.

“I’m thinking! I’m thinking!”

Petrov roared.

“It was November, late November,” Scott said. He grabbed his comm. “This’ll just take a second.” Petrov walked away just as Scott queued up Max. “Wait, don’t walk off—”

Max’s voice emerged. “Yep.”

“Max,” Scott said, trying to block out the loudness of the room. “Are you in the hangar yet?”

“Yeah, we just got here.”

“I need to know the date of that battle.”

“All right, just give me a minute.”

Scott shook his head. “I don’t have a minute.”

“Well, veck!”

The seconds that passed felt like minutes themselves. Maybe a full minute actually did pass. Maybe two. All Scott knew was that Petrov was storming about the room like a man on a mission, and fulfilling Scott’s wishes was the last thing on his agenda.

“November 25th.”

Scott snapped back to the comm amid the chaos. “What?”

“I said November 25th,” Max repeated. “Where the hell are you, at a rave?”

“No. Thanks!”

“No problem—”

Scott closed the channel. “November 25th!” he shouted at Petrov, giving chase. “It was November 25th.”

Petrov didn’t say a word; he just tromped back to the terminal, his fingers pecking away furiously at the touch-screen buttons. After a halfminute, he walked away again. “Cairo.”

“Cairo?”

“Yes, Cairo!”

“So it specifically said that
Ceratopians
went to Cairo—” Scott cut himself off when he saw the murderous glare in Petrov’s eyes. “No, no, it’s fine. You told me all I needed to know, thank you so much.” Not wanting to be any more of a disturbance, Scott turned to leave.

Petrov shouted after him. “Remington, wait!” The scientist’s voice was different, more purposeful than annoyed. When Scott turned around, Petrov went on. “I gave you what you wanted. Now I want you to do something for me.”

Scott didn’t hesitate. He was happy to repay the favor. “Absolutely. Just name it.”

“Go talk to Thoor.”

His face falling, Scott stared from the doorway. That favor, he hadn’t expected.

“Go from here to his chamber. Before you can find all of the answers, you first must receive some of them. You want to know what this war is about? What has changed today? Find the general. But be warned, you will never feel the same.”

Thoor had answers. Scott had always known that, always believed it. Now he was confronted with it. He had sworn long ago never to speak to the general, never to become a part of the Hall of the Fulcrums. Nicole deserved better. Scott did, too.

I would rather never know the truth.

The Alien War had been a mystery since day one. Why Earth? Why humanity? What was it about their small blue dot that attracted the wrath of two entirely different species? That had taken so many lives? That had tormented their world?

Thoor. Scott’s blood chilled at the mere thought of his name. Talk to Thoor. Were answers worth that much? As Scott stood in the still-open doorway of Confinement, his glazed expression found Tauthin. The Bakma was still being interrogated, but his opaque eyes weren’t on his interrogator. They were staring back at Scott.

Why are you here, Tauthin?
The two remained locked.
Why are you on our planet?

He knew in that moment what he needed to do. He needed to break a promise—to himself, to Nicole. He needed to know. Numbness set into Scott’s body as he slowly backed out of Confinement, his stare-down with Tauthin never breaking until Confinement’s metal door slid shut in front of him. Closing his eyes, he inhaled a breath.

This is it.

Thoor would accept him. He’d been the Terror’s favorite toy since the day he became a Nightman, an exception to some of the very rules that made The Machine what it was. He could defy a direct order to save trapped EDEN operatives. He could kick one of Thoor’s highest fulcrums out of his transport. What other man could get away with any of that? And even with those luxuries, the Terror owed him one. More than that. He owed him a life. Was hearing the truth an acceptable compromise?

Today, yes it was.

As Scott marched toward the Citadel of The Machine, his blood slowly boiled. It was part adrenaline and part anger, with enough uncertainty mixed in to make the feeling memorable in every horrible way. He wanted to walk fast, to move quickly. He didn’t want to give himself time to change his mind.

Nicole. Lieutenant Novikov. Galina. Joe Janson. Sergei Steklov. Whether directly or indirectly, Thoor had cost each of them their lives. And now Scott was seeking him out.

Don’t think. Just do it.

The Hall of the Fulcrums passed quickly. Soon Scott stood before the massive wooden doors of the Throne Room and the pair of sentries who guarded them. He knew of the room, but he’d never been to it before. There was a first time for everything.

The body language of the sentries revealed their surprise. “Remington,” one of them said, a bit apprehensively. “Does the general expect you?”

“No.” The firmness in Scott’s voice was enough to let them know he meant business. And that frankly, he didn’t care whether Thoor expected him or not.

Exchanging an indicatively long look, the sentries stepped aside to clear the path. Only the doors stood between Scott and the instigator of Nicole’s death.

You can still turn around.

You can still never know the truth.

Scott shoved the doors open with all the purpose of a murderer on a mission. They swung widely as the Throne Room became visible. It was done. There was no turning back now.

Clustered in the middle of the room around a table that looked strikingly out of place, a group of about a half dozen men suddenly went silent, turning their attention to the door. General Thoor’s frame was distinguishable among them. Behind him and the table, a massive stairway led to a throne.

There’s really a throne in here. I thought it was figurative. This man is insane.

The room was as antiquated as any Scott had been in. He could smell the mustiness of the limestone walls. He could feel the cold dampness of the air. It was like walking into someone’s sick fantasy. Nonetheless, Scott’s feet took him forward, and the men around the table came into view. Three of them, he’d never seen before. But two of them—in addition to Thoor—he couldn’t forget.

The first was Oleg Strakhov. The dark-haired fulcrum, his black beard trimmed precisely, glared as he recognized the intruder.

The second, whose reaction was worse, was Colonel Saretok—the very man Scott had kicked out of the
Pariah
on their mission in Verkhoyanskiy. The mohawked fulcrum bared his teeth, his lips curling over his canines. But none of the men said a word, their invisible chains restrained by their master.

“Captain Remington,” General Thoor said. His voice, though still autocratic as always, droned less than normal. It took Scott a second to realize why. Thoor didn’t need to be theatrical now. He was talking with his counsel.

Behind Scott, the wooden doors slammed shut. He was alone with them. There was no way to escape. He was standing before the Terror. It was a moment he never thought he’d experience—one he’d both feared and vowed never to put himself in. He was face-to-face with the root of his fiancée’s murder, the man who’d turned her beautiful face the pale shade of death. The man who’d put her in a coffin. This was the moment. The confrontation. The climax of every emotional impulse in his heart.

“General,” he said, nodding subserviently.

Oh my God.
Scott’s stomach turned as he heard himself say the word. Was that it? The moment he’d been dreading? His reaction to the man who’d murdered who would have been his wife? Just
general
?

Thoor motioned to the table. “Come. Join us.”

More than Scott hated Thoor, more than Scott hated whoever it’d been who’d actually poisoned Nicole...he hated himself. It didn’t take Scott long to analyze his reaction—his lone word in the face of the Terror. It hadn’t been said out of fear or subservience. It had been said out of acceptance. These men, these murderers around the table, they were his kinsmen. In the battle for his soul, Scott hadn’t been defeated by Thoor. He’d been defeated by himself.

Thoor made no attempt to question Scott on his arrival. He simply began his introductions. “To my right is Captain Antipov, chief of all eidola.”

Antipov, whose scruffy salt-and-pepper beard was matched by an equally scruffy ponytail, nodded quietly. Were it not for his EDEN uniform, he would have looked like a homeless man.

“Lieutenant Krylov, sniper with the First.”

Despite the oddity of having a lieutenant among Thoor’s counsel, that wasn’t what immediately struck Scott about Krylov. What struck him was that Krylov looked like an alien hybrid. His gray eyes were slanted at abnormally high angles. His skin was pale, almost white, and his body was frail to a sickly degree. His hair, an almost colorless shade of blond, was pulled back into a ponytail. No...Krylov wasn’t some sort of hybrid. He was just a frightening looking human being.

Thoor motioned to the next man. “Commander Marusich, also of the First.”

Marusich was younger than the rest, and by leaps and bounds was the easiest on the eyes. He was the only man besides Oleg who didn’t look like a freak.

“And I believe you already know Colonel Saretok and Captain Strakhov.”

He knew them all too well. It suddenly made sense why a lieutenant and commander were in Thoor’s counsel. Both men were members of the First, which was now Oleg’s unit—for a lack of any other place to put the fallen eidolon. Much like the men of Vector Squad were regarded above their rank, so were the men of the First. There was no doubt in Scott’s mind: these were
Novosibirsk
’s overseers. And he was at their table.

“Is there something we can do for you?” Thoor asked.

Don’t just fall in line, Scott. Man up to this murderer. This is the man who had Nicole killed.
“Confinement is in chaos. They said it had something to do with you.”

Oleg eyed several of his counterparts, then looked at Thoor. The Terror’s gaze never wavered from Scott’s.

“Have you come here looking for answers?” the general asked.

Scott was in the middle of a chess match. Thoor was choosing his words carefully—speaking with intent. Scott would have to do the same. “Yes.” Brazen. Pawn forward.

Thoor tilted his head subtly. A small grin crept up from the corner of his mouth, then disappeared. “I will give you one answer.”

It took all of one second for Scott to recognize Thoor’s game. He would give Scott one answer, of his choosing. What else, other than why Confinement was in chaos, would Scott want to know? It was as obvious as the sun.

Who murdered Nicole? Thoor was giving Scott a chance to find out, straight from the tyrant’s mouth. That, or to inquire about Confinement—a matter that Scott knew ultimately mattered more. He was giving Scott the chance to choose between a question of the heart or a question of the mind.

Scott took door number three. “No.”

The Terror raised an eyebrow.

“If
you
want answers,” said Scott, “you’ll have to supply me with more than just one.”

“If
I
want answers?” Thoor asked. A palpable tension rose around the table. “What could I possibly want to know from you?”

“What I never told you about the incident in Verkhoyanskiy.” Scott’s pieces were in place. Time to check the king.

Saretok looked immediately taken aback. Oleg’s eyes narrowed, studying Scott’s face as if he were watching Scott take a lie detector test. Everyone in the room showed an outward reaction.

Except for Thoor. The Terror showed no reaction at all—except for the tone of his voice. He was no longer amused. “You have nothing to tell me about Verkhoyanskiy.” He was calling Scott’s bluff. But Scott wasn’t bluffing.

“Judge Archer might disagree,” Scott said. He’d laid down four aces, even if Archer’s involvement was pure speculation. Name-dropping an EDEN judge out of nowhere was going to spark immediate interest.

The wheels were turning in the general’s head. Scott could see them. Thoor was putting pieces together, in particular, the fact that EDEN Command had dispatched a general to keep
Novosibirsk
out of Verkhoyanskiy. Scott was sure that Thoor had tried to figure out that one already. Now he might have had an answer in Scott.

Marusich spoke. “One does not march into this room and start making demands. If you have information, you will tell us.”

“Quiet,” said Thoor, raising a hand toward Marusich. “What information do you have concerning Benjamin Archer?”

Scott countered. “What happened in Confinement today?”

“You play a dangerous game, Remington.”

“You played a dangerous game when you had Nicole murdered. I know something you don’t—something that could implicate EDEN Command at the highest level. It’s time you paid me back for all I’ve done for
you
.” Chernobyl. The functional Noboat. Ruthless efficiency. All were things that benefited
Novosibirsk
, directly from Scott.