Zein: The Homecoming (15 page)

‘I still remember the death. Male, female and children dying as they poisoned the very air we breathe. I escaped but many of my people didn’t. The horror still lingers today and drives us to rid this planet of all Defilers and Malefics once and for all.’

Tyson felt her pain. Deep within him the magics stirred in empathy, which now he knew stemmed from the latent magic within these beasts.

‘Now don’t you see we can’t let them live as they will have us all killed. They can’t allow us to survive. That is why I order so many attacks on where they live. It is either them or us,’ Festilion finished and seemingly tired by the emotion of the discussion, sat down on the throne. She looked tired and less threatening to Tyson. Then a thought struck him.

‘You attack to reach the Malefics and not the Defilers, don’t you?’ he asked quietly, using the names she recognised.

Festilion fastened onto his face; this creature had insight. ‘Yes, we are not happy with the transfer of the magics but it is the threat of the Malefics that we most fear. The Defilers stand in our way and they need to be dealt with first.’

‘That’s is why I and my brother felt the fear during the attack rather than hatred,’ said Tyson turning his gaze to Dominion, ‘because you don’t know whether we will support the Malefic in their aim to kill your entire species.’

Dominion didn’t answer. He didn’t need to; the downcast look to the floor told the story. Tyson made a decision.

‘I will help you if you let me?’ he said.

Festilion’s face was scornful. ‘How can you help us? You are not really a Defiler but an alien to our planet,’ she said.

‘I am brother to Lord Blackstone, and he would help if he knew the facts?’

‘The Blackstones were the worst. They accepted deeper magics in return for a solution to kill us,’ she said, angrily standing up and squaring up to Tyson. Tyson didn’t back down.

‘I am my own man. My brother is different from the Blackstones you have experience of and we will help you,’ he said, keeping his eyes locked with hers. Festilion calmed down, it had been an exhausting day. She turned her back on Tyson and returned to her seat.

‘Dominion, take our guest away, feed and water him but do not allow him out of the cell,’ Festilion ordered.

She waved him away and when the warriors took hold of his arms he knew the audience was at an end.

No one noticed the small bird fly through the Outer Perimeter Barrier when the convoy left for Reinan. Zebulon watched the convoy enter the city village and with regret turned left towards the mountains to the north-west of Reinan. He couldn’t believe how ruined the city was and how far the conflict had gone. He thought time was a healer and a truce would have occurred. He had been wrong.

He decided he wanted to feel the grass between his feet and returned to the precious Zein land, transforming into his favoured wolf shape. The usual uneasy feeling he experienced when he transferred happened but his body grew used to it over the hundreds of years he had lived. There was nothing he could do. His father and Myolon made that choice for him, so many years ago.

Zebulon bounded across the ornamental park, with its beautiful falls cascading down the three sides of the cliff. The water crashed onto the rocks below in a spectacular display of noise and mist. He knew the way. Memories never faded and he remembered better times when this park had been full of smiling and happy Zeinonians playing and picnicking.

In truth he had missed Zein; the Earth Colony was a good alternative but when compared to this place of his ancestors
and where he was born there was no competition. He had grown fond of Kabel and the other companions, they had been through a lot but now that he was home he had unfinished business and they would have to take a back seat

He ran out of the park into the grasslands and then the mountains beyond. He hoped the entrance he had created so many years ago still remained or he would be in trouble. He didn’t need to worry. He found it. The entrance was small and at the foot of a particular high cliff face, surrounded by boulders. He transformed into a buzza fly: an animal so small it would make a mosquito look like a giant. He flew through the stone gap which widened into a steel lined tunnel he had prepared. He then returned to his wolf shape and twisted and turned through the tunnels until he came within close proximately of the main South Gate entrance.

There he waited patiently in his secret hiding place and was rewarded when a returning group of soldiers emerged from the steel tunnel. Taking advantage of the opportunity he changed into a butterfly and flew into the main tunnel where the recon party had come from. He fluttered above their heads as the steel barricade creaked and made way for the young Zeinonian in his battered red armour and his companions.

Then the weak Inner Perimeter Barrier was turned off behind the main entrance. Zebulon flew into the Aeria Cavern without anyone noticing a thing. Good. That was what he wanted.

Zebulon observed the group and heard the leader call for a meeting and on the spur of the moment decided that he would follow this young man and watch the proceedings of this emergency meeting. He watched the members of the Inner Council enter and caught his breath; there she was, not changed for almost one hundred years. He heard
her speech to the Inner Council and was shocked; he had arrived home just in time.

The Inner Council meeting ended and Zebulon followed the Changelings back to their enclave. The Changelings lived in a generous, almost presidential area of the city. There were parks and impressive residential houses.

I did a good job
, he thought, impressed his work had lasted through the years.

Heathlon, walked into her quarters. She felt uneasy. Her magics were strong and they were disturbed by a presence, something she had not felt for a long time. ‘Are you going to show yourself or skulk in a corner?’ she said, removing the cloak from her shoulders.

‘I see you still have the skills,’ said Zebulon. Heathlon let out a gasp of shock. Her hand flew to her mouth as she spun round to face the newcomer.

‘Greetings, Mother, I hope I find you well?’ said Zebulon, in his newly transformed shape that mirrored the way the Changelings on Zein liked to be seen.

‘Zebulon, you are alive,’ Heathlon exclaimed.

‘Yes Mother, I came in with the task force.’

Heathlon’s surprise was total. She had thought he was lost to her and seeing him now had answered many prayers. He approached her and she reached out to him. They embraced.

‘I thought I would never see you again,’ she said, releasing the embrace and taking a seat.

‘Mother, I am glad to be back, but in the Inner Council you talked of a quest to extinguish the Pod,’ said Zebulon. ‘How can you make that mistake again?’

‘You don’t understand my son, the Pod are growing more powerful and I think they are turning to the magics.’ Heathlon dropped her head in shame, conveying that she doubted her own words.

‘And if they did, does that make them any worse than us?’ said Zebulon, ‘Do you want mass murder on our hands again?’

Heathlon shook her head. Zebulon sat next to her, seeing that her advanced years were masked by the youthful façade. He took her hands. ‘I have struggled to live with what we did,’ he said quietly, ‘I have wandered for many years waiting for this very moment. I am here to put right what was wrong.’

He lifted her chin. ‘I am so pleased to see you and be back home. I have made new friends who have accepted me as I am – no questions asked.’

‘It’s too late, Zebulon. Your brother set out two termins days ago and is on his way to the breeding grounds to launch the serum.’

He patted her hands, ‘One thing which these humans have taught me is never give up,’ he said firmly. ‘How is my dear brother?’ Heathlon’s face told the story. ‘So he is still reckless then?’ said Zebulon.

‘Yes you know your brother, he has made us isolated, where once we were integrated,’ said Heathlon, ‘He wants to rid Zein of the Pod once and for all and forced me to speak at the Inner Council, knowing no one would stand against me.’

‘Isolated?’

‘We stay in our enclaves and do not mix with the other clans. We have a sickness and he will not seek help.’ She took hold of his hand, ‘Son we are dying, we have very few children and there is an illness the magics bring. We need help.’

Zebulon shook his head. It was the reason he had taken up the request by the young Lord Chancellor Morgan Blackstone to support the Zein Expeditionary Force all those years ago. He and twenty of his personal
pack had agreed to support the quest. He had lost most of his brethren during the journey. They had landed on a planet they thought would be hospitable to the Zeinonians; however, they were attacked by monstrous beasts that required the Changelings to protect the Lord Chancellor. Many died. Others died during asteroid and mercenary attacks. The few who survived perished in Zylar’s attacks on the quadrants until he was the only one left. He had given up, voluntary becoming an attraction at the Federation Fair until he had seen Morgan’s grandson strolling across the fairground.

‘I have seen death and destruction from hatred and greed. My father and your husband recognised that when he absorbed and controlled the magics there was no return.’ Zebulon became pensive as he remembered the events that happened a long time ago.

‘We were wrong. We shouldn’t have corrupted the scriptures and remained one with Zein, like our brethren.’ He shook his head. ‘To try and wipe our own kin off the face of this planet, not just once but twice, when they were in the right all along, is a travesty.’

Zebulon slumped into one of the large chairs in the room. He placed his hand over his eyes.

‘But our magics helped us defeat the Xonians,’ said his mother, defending history.

‘Maybe, maybe or we may have bonded with the Defilers and defeated the Xonians, who knows.’ Zebulon was tired. He had lived for over three hundred years, seen many things, and fought many battles.

‘I think my father knew this when I volunteered for the expedition. He knew that I needed to escape Zein and seek out a new world were this sickness does not invade the body.’

‘Did you find it on this Earth?’

Zebulon, bit his lip in concentration ‘Not fully. They have their own share of misery, evil and greed but conversely I see something in them which exudes hope and peace.’

‘So what do we do now, my son?’

‘I am not sure, but Mother, I have returned to put right what I feel is wrong. Things will change, I promise you that,’ said Zebulon with an evangelical look on his face. For the first time in many years Heathlon felt there was a future for them.

Slowly the companions woke up as the daily activities on the ship began. Kabel untangled himself from the still sleeping Gemma. He swung his legs out of the bed and placed his head into his hands. His dream last night had switched from an angry Tyson sat in a cell, to an underground lake. He knew it was on this planet due to seeing Pod all around him. But they weren’t attacking, they were dying. Fear all across their faces as both child and adult died by the thousand. The dream ended with a strange human like person with a spiteful look upon his face. The eyes, the eyes reminded him of someone.

There was a groan behind him as Gemma stretched. She sensed his pain. Her hand touched his heavily muscled shoulder and brushed along the ridges.

‘Another dream?’ she said quietly. He gestured that it was. ‘Was it about Tyson again?’ she asked.

‘Not all of it,’ said Kabel, ‘though I do think he is still alive.’ Gemma felt relieved, worrying most of the night on whether Tyson had survived or not.

Kabel stood up and moved athletically to the table where a jug of water rested. Gemma stared at the curve of his back and the magnificence of his nakedness.

‘Tell me about the dream,’ Gemma coaxed, as she patted the side of the bed. He sat down and told her everything. Gemma was a good listener and he wanted to share as much of his dream with her as he could remember.

‘That sounds awful,’ said a horrified Gemma, after he described the mountain of bodies littering the underground caverns, ‘how did they die?’

‘Well, not all my dreams come true.’ He hesitated, not sure how to put it. ‘They are flashes of what could be or will be and I have a chance to alter them.’

‘Those creatures are frightening; maybe it is good that they are destroyed?’ said Gemma, shuddering with the memory of the attack yesterday. Kabel reached across and lightly touched her face with his fingertips. She kissed the end of his fingers when they touched her lips.

‘It was strange yesterday, I know they were attacking but it wasn’t out of hate but fear,’ said Kabel, telling her about the swirl of feelings that came from the seven foot creatures, which was also felt by Belina and Tyson.

Much to her disappointment he stood back up. ‘I am going for a shower,’ he said purposely, ‘we need to find out what’s the plan for today.’ He saw the disappointment on her face and realised that after the shock of yesterday, she was seeking comfort. ‘Of course, there is room for two in the shower,’ he said over his shoulder as he strutted towards the shower cubicle. Gemma wasn’t far behind him.

Later, suitably refreshed, they went to the Command and Control Centre. Another heated argument between General Corder and Admiral Koshkov was underway.

‘We should have had air support faster yesterday,’ said Admiral Koshkov, furious with the hesitancy he had witnessed yesterday and not satisfied by the explanations given. His shock at what he thought was a dereliction
of duty, further underlined that the commander of the Expeditionary Force had ulterior motives.

‘The convoy had sufficient firepower, Admiral,’ General Corder replied calmly. His second-in-command was just going to retort when Walter Moore interrupted.

‘I think our focus should be on what we do next and not on what went wrong,’ he reasoned.

It was Kabel who stepped forward. He was tired and filled with the horror of the battle the day before. On the way to see General Corder, Kabel had sought out Bailey and the others to tell them details of his dream, minus the element concerning the Pod, and that he thought Tyson was still alive. Both Amelia and Bailey, especially, were relieved but all their concern did not evaporate and wouldn’t until they saw Tyson alive and kicking.

‘I need to be debriefed,’ he said to the warring officers. He had their attention. Admiral Koshkov pursed his lips to prevent his anger spiralling out of control but that didn’t mean this argument was over, just postponed. ‘In private,’ Kabel said pointedly.

They all funnelled into the main conference room for that deck. The only one of the companions not there, apart from Tyson, was the Changeling. Kabel could not find Zebulon anywhere and even though he asked for a broadcast over the ships intercom for him to meet in the Command and Control Centre, he still did not appear. In truth no one had seen him since they had left for their ill-fated trip into Reinan.

Walter Moore and the latter’s personal assistant, a woman called Grace Connor, whose job was to record the session, made up the remaining members of the meeting.

Kabel brought the others up-to-date on his dream involving Tyson. Both Walter and Admiral Koshkov where pleased, General Corder less so. Koshkov, glared
triumphantly at the American guessing this was not part of his plan. Kabel ignored their reactions and pressed on to cover the sequence of events once they had left the Outer Perimeter. Walter Moore outlined what he and his companions had learned from the hologram programmes in the library. It was Hechkle who began to explain the retreat and the attack of the Pod, when Kabel held up his hand to stop proceedings. Hechkle stopped his report and waited.

‘Tyson saw someone before the attack and conveyed that image to me,’ said Kabel, looking across at the team.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ said Gemma, hurt that he hadn’t mentioned that this morning. Kabel ignored the question and pressed on. Gemma threw a filthy look at him.

‘He was youngish and had red armour on which had seen better days,’ he described.

‘Malacca clan?’ said Bronstorm.

‘Yes, I think so.’

‘Did he say anything or do anything?’ General Corder asked, intrigued.

‘No, he looked surprised and then they disappeared into a hole in the ground,’ Kabel explained, ‘Tyson was going to follow but then the Pod attacked.’

‘So there are Zeinonians alive,’ said Hechkle, ‘we must find them.’

‘Agreed Hechkle, but we need to make sure we do not place the expedition at risk,’ said Admiral Koshkov, carefully. Kabel and General Corder agreed.

Kabel sought Gemma’s attention, not sure whether he should share the rest of his dream with the committee. Gemma initial petulance at Kabel for not telling her about what Tyson had seen had evaporated, intrigued by the discussion and she nodded her head encouragingly.

‘I have something else I need to share with you,’ said Kabel, and then outlined key details of his dream. The rest listened in horror when he described the gut wrenching death of thousands of the creatures.

‘I have not had this dream,’ Belina challenged. Her dreams had started back on Earth as the magics built up inside her. She saw in Kabel’s shared memory what he had seen but was not sure what the vision meant.

Kabel lifted his hands in resignation, ‘Sorry, dear sister, but I did as you now know, and I found it disturbing.’

Bronstorm had been quiet in the exchange and then brought up what they had all felt during the attack. ‘We all felt that the Pod were attacking out of fear and not hatred.’ He waited for Kabel and Belina to support his view.’ They did. ‘Why would they risk such a loss of life out of fear is the question we should be trying to answer.’ Bronstorm stated. ‘Maybe it is this vision which Kabel had. They fear death from an illness?’

‘Fair question Bronstorm, but I don’t tend to dwell on why someone or something is trying to kill me when I am protecting my life,’ Hechkle’s gruff voice spoke up. It was reinforced by similar views from both Gemma and Amelia, both of whom had felt immensely frightened yesterday.

‘So what are we going to do?’ Walter asked, having listened quietly to the views around the table.

It was Kabel who suggested a recon party, firstly to search for Tyson, just in case his dream was misleading and then to seek the hole the men, who Tyson had seen, disappear into. They agreed the size and participants of the party required and then ended the meeting.

As they exited the conference room, the warning klaxon sounded. As one they all rushed into the Command and Control Centre.

Lieutenant Lavelle, the Communications Officer on the
Elanda
, had a picture up on the forward screen. It focused on a position near the Outer Perimeter Barrier. Standing there, silently, were a group of people, numbering between forty and fifty. In front of the group was a Zeinonian clad in battered red armour.

‘Ladies and Gentlemen,’ said General Corder, drawing in his cheeks as he bit on his inside cheek, ‘looks like we don’t need to go looking for them.