Triptych

by S. C. Mitchell

  Chapter 17

  An almost-full moon glided toward the horizon. Stars filled the cloudless sky. Somewhere in the distance, an owl hooted.

  Paul waited, teeth clenched, at the edge of a newly cleared patch of woods a mile from the Xi Force headquarters and even further from any other habitation. El Brujo had pronounced this patch of dense forest adequate to his needs and cast something that made the trees and hilly ground turn into a flat, grassy mat in an almost perfect circle about a hundred feet across.

  Maggie stood in the exact center of the circle with El Brujo in front of her. Z-Bot, Shade, and Phaze stood with Paul at the tree line, watching.

  The rest of Xi Force was back at the headquarters in case this went horribly wrong.

  “Zandier plonbot diagnous.” El Brujo spoke the nonsense words that made his magic work.

  An orange beam of light radiated from his chest and bathed Maggie in its light.

  “Signot,” she said, and a beam of golden light shot from her up into the sky.

  Paul’s hand crept toward his Magnum and he forced it away. What good would a fucking handgun do against a god from outer space?

  “Womp.”

  He felt the sound more than he heard it. A heavy impact from the ground below pulsed up his body. Once, then again. And again. Little by little the individual thumps became a vibration.

  “Singulous blaspime.” El Brujo shouted the words up into the night sky.

  Within the beam of golden light shining from Maggie, a dark figure descended.

  Then the pulsing stopped.

  The Morrigan calls and I return.

  The clearing remained silent. Paul heard the words in his mind.

  The form stopped its descent a yard above Maggie’s head, then stepped out of the light and floated to the ground in front of her.

  Humanoid in form, its skin was golden. A shoulder-length fall of silver hair crowned its head. Androgynous, neither male nor female, yet something in between, it stood naked staring into Maggie’s eyes.

  Paul’s gut churned.

  “We beg a favor, exalted one,” El Brujo said.

  The being turned and cocked its head, staring at Carlos. Not you. I do not contend with gnirts.

  The last word was gibberish, but Paul clearly saw a bug-like creature in his mind.

  The being turned toward Maggie.

  Morrigan. At last you have summoned me. Is the debt to be paid?

  Shit, that didn’t sound good.

  ~ ~ ~

  Maggie’s stomach turned inside out. “I . . . I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she stammered.

  The creature leaned closer to her. You are melded with mac Lir. Yet, it is you, Morrigan. I see you. Is the debt to be paid?

  She had to wing this, somehow make it work. The being had dismissed Carlos with a wave of its hand. “I . . . will pay if I can. What do you ask?”

  The creature cocked its head. Its eyes, deep pools of inky darkness, widened. You will pay? No. You will not pay.

  It kept its gaze on her, walking completely around her as she stood petrified.

  She started to tremble. She needed to keep it together here. The world needed her to keep it together.

  You are, yet you are not Morrigan. You are, yet you are not Manannan mac Lir. And you are, and are not human. Yet the debt is on the Book of Eons. Payment is due. Is that not why I was summoned across the stars?

  “We needed . . . we ask for . . . your advice on a matter of great importance to us.”

  Ah, then the debt is to be paid. Ask what you will.

  Maggie dove in. “We need to know of the Sha’Xari. What are they? How can we stop them from attacking our world?”

  Sha’Xari are the province of Dun Loon, a galactic plague unleashed in the Quentillion. They do not bargain, they do not barter. They overrun a planet, stripping its resources to create more starships to inhabit, then move on leaving a dead world behind. A thousand worlds they have devastated, yet there have been planets that have successfully fought them off. They have yet to tip a cosmic balance in the galaxy, but they are coming close.

  She didn’t understand some of that, but the rest didn’t sound good. “Can you help us?”

  Sadly no, for I abhor the Sha’Xari, but I am pledged to Dun Loon and can make no move against them. Thus, the debt cannot be paid in that way.

  “What is this debt? What do I owe you?

  Ah, I see now. The human is dominant. Curious. But no matter. You do not owe me. It is I who owe you. A millennia ago Morrigan came to my aid at Festune. The debt was recorded in the Book of Eons. I would clear that debt if I could. At need, call on me.

  “How do I call you? What do I call you?”

  My name is not pronounceable in your limited intellect. Call me Javasad. Say that name, and I will come.

  “Javasad,” Maggie said, nodding.

  Now the stars call me back. Think hard on the boon I could grant to clear my debt. Almost anything but the Sha’Xari. I could take you to a safe world, hide you in the stars.

  “But what of the rest of the people on Earth?

  They are as nothing. They are gnirts. Why do you worry for them?

  The creature couldn’t understand.

  “I am one of them.”

  Ah, but you are also one of us, albeit a minor one. Consider that.

  And the creature faded away to nothing.

  El Brujo approached, his face drenched in sweat. “Well, I think you handled that well.”

  “Did I?” She wondered. Earth was no safer. But they now knew for a fact there would be no negotiating with the aliens even if they could take Guinevere out of the picture. The Sha’Xari would strip the planet of resources if they weren’t somehow stopped.

  Carlos nodded. “We need to ponder this. Let’s return to base.”

  ~ ~ ~

  In the basement of the Xi Force headquarters, the alien spacecraft hissed steam and blinked blue and green lights. This vessel had been kept secret for almost thirty years.

  Morgause wondered if the secret was kept because of some government agency, or Guinevere’s machinations. Most likely the latter. Had the Fay Queen foreseen this invasion? Had she caused it?

  This was a probe craft, sent to seek out viable worlds for the Sha’Xari to conquer and destroy. The burst of information imparted to her by Javasad had her stomach knotted.

  Entering the craft, she stared at the strange control panel, trying to make sense of the buttons, dials, and switches. Her Air Force and brief NASA training weren’t helping her much. This was like nothing she’d ever seen before.

  Morgana was sleeping and Morgan was working with El Brujo on . . . something across the chamber. When she’d asked what, Morgan had replied, “Moving rocks.”

  All three of her aspects had been kept on a vigorous training schedule, but Aaron and Shade had determined learning about this ship took precedence over any medical training Morgause needed. Her healing did make her kind of a one-trick-pony.

  “We have enough medical people on staff,” Aaron had said. “We can put them in the field if necessary. But we need to know everything we can find out from that ship. Put your efforts there.”

  The alien craft was the one solid piece of the alien’s technology in their hands. All attempts in Washington to unearth files and data from the old project failed to turn up anything useful. All of the primary personnel and scientists assigned here twenty years ago were dead, many under mysterious circumstances. Others, like Dar Ferguson, Aaron and Shade’s FBI friend, didn’t really know any of the specifics of what had gone on here during the project.

  Anything they could learn from this craft would be helpful in the coming conflict.

  And it would be a conflict. The decision had bee
n made to fight with everything the Earth could put together. The aliens had sent ships to virtually every major city on the planet, demanding surrender or death of the entire population.

  There had been those who wanted to capitulate and give in to slavery. Riots had broken out. Some countries were in chaos.

  Most recognized this was the point of no return for Earth. Old arguments between countries were set aside, armies were mobilized, and defenses set in place around the globe.

  More than likely the first blow would be struck in Megopolis, and much of the civilian population was in the process of evacuating the city. The Xi-1 was prepped and ready to fly out at a moment’s notice to any other corner of the world, if the aliens chose to strike there first. Xi force would fight wherever the war took them.

  “I’ve got nothin’,” Morgause said to Olivia who stood at her side. “We’re probably goin’ to have to sit down and start hittin’ buttons and switches to see what happens.”

  “It did fly.” Olivia slid into the seat. “I have a vague memory of the ship hovering in this chamber when I was here before as a ghost. There was an alien sitting here, and his hands, well his claws, were positioned something like this.”

  Her right hand was slightly higher than her left, hovering over a set of controls.

  The alien’s claws had three long, pointed fingers. Digits longer than any human’s. Was it even possible for an Earthling to pilot this craft?

  Morgause patted Olivia’s shoulder. “Play a bit, but be careful. There are undoubtedly some weapons on this ship, and I’d rather not trigger any of those.”

  This control station offered a view out of a broad windshield on the front of the craft, so was logically the flight controls. Three other stations had only monitors to look at, so they were most likely weapons, or engineering, or . . . God knew what.

  Ugh! “I’m going to check in with Kirk and see if he’s made any progress.” She pulled back and headed for the hatch.

  She found Kirk over in the ancient computer center of the chamber, soldering something onto a circuit board. Lights flashed on one of the old machines and the big tape spindles were turning. “That looks promisin’.”

  Kirk never looked up from his work. “Thirty year old magnetic storage. Not a lot of data survived, but what I’m finding I’ll feed into the Cray as soon as I finish wiring this interface.”

  “Theoretically this ship crashed in the nineteen-forties or fifties, right?” At least that’s when the Roswell thing happened.

  Kirk shook his head. “I’m pretty convinced that’s just their cover story. That ship didn’t crash. There’s not a scratch on it. And this base was built in the eighties. My guess is they were using the earlier story to cover up what was really happening here. Dar Ferguson said pretty much the same thing.”

  Behind her, the space craft shuttered, lights flashed on it in sequence, pulsing with a steadily faster beat. The whirl of machinery sounded, followed by a short burst of flame from one of the tube-like projections on the vehicle’s short wings.

  With a womp, womp, womp, the craft lifted a few feet above the floor. Then the vibrations lessoned, the whirling stopped, and the craft settled to the ground once again.

  “Got it,” came Olivia’s triumphant yell from the open hatch of the ship.

  “Awesome.” At least Morgause would have something positive to report to Aaron and Shade when they met with her later that morning.

  ~ ~ ~

  Morgan concentrated on the hand gesture, lifting the chunk of concrete off the floor and guiding it across the chamber before setting it down, all with the telekinesis spell Carlos had taught her.

  “Nicely done,” Carlos said.

  Earlier, to demonstrate, he’d lifted a smaller chunk and moved it.

  “The amount you can move is directly proportional to the power you have available for the casting,” he’d said. “You have much more magical energy available in this sphere of the craft.”

  There were different spheres and levels of magic, but Morgan found it hard to believe she’d be more powerful than El Brujo in any aspect of the craft. He seemed so powerful, so knowledgeable.

  He’d been startled and dropped his chunk to the floor when the alien spacecraft fired up and lifted off the floor to hover.

  “Olivia.” His full attention turned toward the ship.

  His sister seemed to be the only thing that could get the unflappable sorcerer . . . flapped?

  “How in the world does she know how to fly that ship?” Morgan asked.

  Carlos held his breath until the craft landed once again, then he huffed. “She was here, she says, a long time ago, as a ghost. But she remembers only snatches of what she saw.”

  “Could a spell, perhaps, revive those lost memories.”

  “Hmm.” Carlos cocked his head. “Maybe. Would you be willing to help in an experiment?”

  She followed at his side as he strode toward the ship. “Of course.”

  The hatch door opened, and the exit ramp extended, then Olivia bounded toward him. “Did you see? I flew it. I remembered seeing that creature flying it and copied what it had done.”

  Carlos smiled as she ran up and hugged him. “Anything else you recall about being here before?”

  Yes, maybe Olivia could help clear up some of the mystery of this place.

  Morgan put a hand on Olivia’s shoulder. “Were you here long?”

  Olivia shook her head. “Not long, and it’s all so fuzzy. I think I’m losing memories from my ghost years because I’m real again. Maybe because the memories aren’t native to this brain.”

  She tapped the side of her head with her finger.

  Sometimes Olivia pulled out some pretty far-fetched theories. Then again, it wasn’t like there was any way to know for sure. Certainly no way to confirm someone’s memories.

  Carlos chucked her under the chin with brotherly affection. “Would you allow me to pick around in your mind a little before those memories disappear completely?”

  Okay, unless El Brujo had something magic up his sleeve.

  Olivia shrugged. “Knock your socks off.”

  Carlos turned to Morgan. “This casting relies on a magic source in a school I don’t possess. I’ve read about it and know how to cast it, but haven’t been able to before. I’d like to link to you, and use some of your energy. Your power appears to be more universal than any I have ever encountered.”

  Was this like when Guinevere stole power from the Morrigan all those centuries ago? No. he wasn’t asking to take a part of her powers. He wanted to use her energy, something that would return to her over time. In any case, she trusted him.

  “Okay.”

  As Carlos began his casting, Morgan switched to eyes that see as Carlos had taught her. He sent a strand of energy toward her that connected to her aura. A conduit that would allow him to tap into her magical energy. She simply had to grant him access to her reserves.

  She felt the flow within her, only a slight drain on her vast resources. The energy flowed into Carlos, then out again as he directed a spell toward Olivia.

  Olivia giggled. “That tickles.”

  But the magical conduit seemed to flow both ways. As Carlos entered Olivia’s mind, images flowed to Morgan over the connection. She saw shadows that solidified into images overlaying the real world around her.

  “I think I’m seeing it too, Olivia. Are you okay with that?”

  “Sure, I’ve got nothing to hide from you.” A mischievous twinkle lit her eyes. “I gotta warn you, though; I used to spend a lot of time as a ghost in movies and male strip clubs.”

  The warning came too late.

  Morgan pushed through a hodgepodge of erotic images. Intimate scenes from Olivia’s favorite movies, male strippers dancing on stage, men in various sta
tes of undress.

  Someone had a very active imagination.

  “Olivia.” Carlos visibly paled.

  Olivia rolled her eyes. “Sorry, but it’s not like you didn’t know, bro. Let me see if I can locate something from here that spurs another memory.” She walked toward the computer banks where Kirk was working. Her eyes locked on to his ass and again began to peal clothing from the image. She had the poor guy in his underwear, not really, but in her mind.

  “Um.” Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. But then the scene shifted, as it sparked a memory from Olivia’s past. Two people confronting each other at this very same location. The image crystallized to show Guinevere and her husband at the time, Senator Stacey.

  “You’re going to bring aliens to invade the Earth?” the Senator asked, his voice raised and tense.

  Guinevere shook her head. “This is the backup plan. I’m putting them into suspended animation for now. If you win the election, we don’t need them.”

  Senator Stacey almost growled at her. “I want this place sealed up in concrete. All the records expunged. This never happened.”

  Guinevere folded her arms and narrowed her gaze. “First I need something from you. I need that family eliminated.”

  The Senator huffed. “I already have a man on it. Now, close down this place.”

  The image wavered and began to fade. Olivia must have moved on at that point.

  Morgan clenched her fist. She had no problem putting those pieces together. Guinevere had ordered the execution of her parents, and her as well. And, as Gran had said, Senator Stacey had hired the killer and orchestrated the execution. And it appeared he’d done it to keep Guinevere from unleashing the aliens back then.

  Now, without the restraint of the Senator, it appeared Guinevere was putting her backup plan into action.