The Crucible- The Complete Series

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The Crucible- The Complete Series Page 27

by Odette C. Bell


  She looked at me and nodded.

  “We need to question Alyssa,” I said.

  “Alyssa?”

  I pressed my lips together, wondering whether I should tell Williams I knew Jenks’ real name.

  I thought about it, but stopped.

  I didn’t want to share it, not yet. For some reason it seemed too powerful, too personal, too much like I’d be betraying Jenks’ confidence.

  It was like the walls holding Jenks together had shattered, and I was the only person left to protect her from the rest of the world.

  I couldn’t really form the thought, but the feeling – the feeling sank deep into my chest.

  Williams darted her gaze away from me for a few seconds. “You’re right though. F’val isn’t going to let us question her.”

  “We’re two officers trained in intelligence and combat,” I said directly.

  I didn’t say anything else. I let that statement settle.

  She looked at the carpet, then let her gaze lift second by second until she reached my eyes.

  She knew what I was implying.

  “This is one of those times,” I suddenly said, voice hoarse.

  “What times?”

  “We can make a difference,” I stated plainly.

  She said nothing. She did nothing.

  Then she took a step back and nodded. “F’val came in a light cruiser. It hasn’t got any other crew. From the little we know, it has four rooms, including a pretty spectacular brig.”

  “I’m thinking he knew he was going to take something pretty spectacular back home with him,” I said gruffly.

  Williams nodded. “It’s not going to be easy.”

  “Since when did you ever like easy?”

  She smiled. “You’re right. We’ll need a distraction though.”

  I stood there and thought. Really thought. I pushed my mind into every possibility.

  This was huge. In going against F’val, technically we were going against the resistance. But I couldn’t trust them right now. I couldn’t trust that they were brave enough to go against F’val.

  So we had to go alone.

  Still, it would be better if we had another person.

  My brow scrunched up and I thought.

  “What are you thinking?”

  “I’m wondering whether we could trust the Chief,” I said plainly.

  I watched Williams tense. Then her eyes shifted to the side as she clearly thought through my proposition. “If we had her help, this would be easy. Okay, not easy, but we’d have a much better chance. She’d be able to remotely access the controls of his ship. She’d also be able to distract him.”

  I nodded. “But if we go to her and she’s not sympathetic…” I trailed off, letting that statement speak for itself.

  Williams shivered.

  “What do you think our chances are of succeeding without the Chief?”

  Williams shrugged. Then she winced.

  “Yeah, I agree.”

  “But you’re right – if we go to the Chief and she doesn’t believe us….” She gulped.

  “I’ll take it carefully and slowly. Ask some leading questions, see what she truly thinks. The Chief likes Jenks, or at least liked her. She’d also know much more about the damage done to the life-support systems. She’d be in a unique position to judge what really happened.”

  Williams looked up sharply, a spark of hope igniting in her gaze. She nodded. “… Are we really going to do this?”

  I looked directly at her. “Yes we are.” I wanted to say that we owed it to Alyssa, but Williams didn’t know Alyssa.

  Only I did.

  “We’re doing this for the resistance. The galaxy,” I said, defaulting to a position she would have to agree with.

  She nodded. She let out another breath. “Okay. You contact the Chief, and I’ll see what I can do.”

  I smiled. I can’t say it was genuine, can’t say it indicated any level of relief. But it forced its way across my cheeks, and in doing so I remembered the glowing smile of Alyssa Nightingale.

  I nodded.

  We walked out.

  …

  Commander F’val

  I stood in the brig and stared down at her.

  She was still medicated. Though not unconscious now.

  I watched her eyes dart from left to right, tears brimming in them and trailing down her cheeks.

  She was lying on the floor of the brig, exactly where I’d dumped her.

  Alyssa. The special one.

  Professor Axis’ child.

  I was Axis’ child too. Before Alyssa had come along, I had been his hope. A willing subject. A man prepared to be turned into Axis’ vision.

  The complete battle system. Three words that had sunk deep into the core of my mind and conjured such a sharp picture it was like being drawn into a dream every time I so much as thought them.

  I’d wanted that power.

  But I hadn’t got it.

  Alyssa had it. With only two implants, she could outperform all the rest of Axis’ children.

  Including me.

  I found my hand curl naturally into a fist. My finger pressed so hard into the soft flesh between my thumb and palm, I could feel it. One of my implants.

  With just a thought, I could have activated it, let the light speed up over my arms.

  I didn’t.

  Axis had wanted me to bring Alyssa in with no injuries. His perfect child could not be damaged, after all.

  Axis wasn’t here to tell me what to do.

  It would be easy, so very easy to end Alyssa’s life. It would do her a favor, wouldn’t it? She’d never wanted this power. She had no idea how to use it, either.

  Maybe she could tell what I was thinking as she lay there, short hair half covering one wide open eye. She locked that eye on me. If she could have screamed, she would have. If she could have moved a hand, however, she would have done more.

  Despite the fact she was entirely incapacitated, I still felt the smallest knot of fear at the base of my spine.

  I’d seen what Alyssa could do. And though she didn’t know it, I’d helped train her.

  I’d been the first guinea pig. Axis had perfected his methods on me.

  I curled my other hand into a fist. “You didn’t honestly think it would take long for us to find you, did you?” I taunted her.

  I enjoyed the look of terror as her eyes widen more.

  “Alyssa,” I said as I got down on my haunches, just in front of the meter-thick force field. To be honest, the force field did little. If Alyssa were functioning, it would be nothing more than a slight annoyance.

  She wasn’t functioning. My only power over her was the incapacitating drug Axis had provided me with. As long as I kept her dosed up on it, there was theoretically nothing she could do.

  Still, that tiny tinge of nerves, it was there. Still sparking at the base of my spine.

  I clenched my teeth and watched her. I enjoyed her fear. It confirmed something I’d always known – Alyssa was not built for her own power. While she could physically manifest great strength, mentally, she was weak.

  Too weak.

  Soon she would crack. And when she did, I would be there once again to take the mantle as the strongest telekinetic warrior in the galaxy.

  Before she cracked, we needed her to open that wall. Perhaps it would be her last act.

  I found myself smiling. “You know that we knew about your whereabouts ever since you left us? We have always known where you were, Alyssa. We were simply waiting for an opportune time to bring you back to the family.” It was a lie, but it served its intended purpose.

  More tears swelled in her eyes.

  In truth, we had not detected Alyssa until the incident on the Argus Service Cluster when the Godspeed had been attacked. Even then, we hadn’t been able to confirm that Ensign Jenks was Alyssa Nightingale.

  That only happened when I’d seen her take out those two enforcement officers.

  No one el
se could conduct an entire room full of crates like that. Nor would they be able to pull the very implant out of a telekinetic warrior’s arm.

  Then I’d known.

  And for a few minutes, I’d hesitated before contacting the Enforcement Unit and Professor Axis.

  Not to hide her identity. But rather to provide me with an opportunity to end it all for her.

  That’s what she wanted. I could tell it from her desperate gaze.

  And I was more than willing to give her that wish.

  Just not yet.

  I’d contacted Axis. And strangely, rather than celebrating the possibility of getting his special one back, he’d agreed along with the Ruling Command that it would be just as valuable to leave her with the resistance for now.

  Though she did not know this, there were several failsafes built into her implants. They could be activated at a sufficiently close range, and in doing so, we could use her as a weapon.

  In one fell sweep, we could have destroyed the resistance.

  Now we needed her for another task.

  Before leaving the Ra’xon, I had infected Alyssa with a carefully engineered retrograde virus that increased her dependency on 78, making it far easier to capture her when the time came.

  Now I leant there, one arm propped against a knee as I tilted my head to stare at her wide open, fear-filled eyes.

  “We always knew where you were, Alyssa,” I lied again, letting an almost singsong quality filter through my tone. “Every step of the way, we were there with you. Watching. Waiting,” my tone bottomed out.

  If she could have, she would have probably trembled.

  “Nothing you ever did, and nothing you will ever do, will let you escape us. You will be part of this family forever.”

  More tears streaked down her cheeks until abruptly they stopped.

  Surrender. There it was. After all, there was nothing more she could do.

  …

  Lieutenant Commander Nathan Shepherd

  I had no time.

  I felt this wad of terror pushing through my gut. It pushed me on, told me I couldn’t wait. It was far more effective than some drill sergeant shouting over my shoulder or some irate commander snapping orders.

  I found the Chief.

  We were in her office, the door was closed, and there were barely any other engineers out in the main room.

  I stood there for a moment, sweating, visibly shaking.

  The Chief scrunched up her brow and looked at me. “You look like hell, Shepherd. But I can’t fix you – you have to go to the Doc for that.”

  “I don’t need to be fixed,” I said with a disbelieving shake to my tone. “I need to…” I trailed off.

  The Chief stopped what she was doing to swivel her head my way. A frown punched down her chin. “What’s going on? I may not know you very well, but I’ve seen enough to realize you’re on edge.”

  She didn’t know me very well. Christ, she was right. I’d only been on the Ra’xon for a handful of weeks.

  … She wasn’t going to trust me, was she?

  Maybe my desperation punched through my gaze, because the Chief locked two of her hands on the edge of her desk and rose. She walked over to me and stopped, staring up into my eyes. “What?” she challenged.

  This was it.

  Stop and turn away, or trust in a chance.

  The only chance I had.

  I winced. “Something isn’t right.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t tell me…” I trailed off.

  “I can’t tell you what? Shepherd, just spit it out.”

  “Would you tell me something? In your professional engineering opinion,” I got control of myself and spoke my words through clenched teeth, “how did somebody open the door to the life-support systems? And what did they do when they were in there?”

  She looked confused for a moment. “Why are you asking this?”

  This was it. “Because Commander F’val is lying,” I said.

  That statement, it sat there. Sat around the room, like it was some kind of giant rope that was ready to bind me in place.

  She didn’t say anything.

  I swallowed. “It doesn’t make sense, Chief. He sat there and told the Captain that Jenks is a telekinetic warrior. He sat there and told us that she had the devices and knowledge to get in and mess with the life-support system. That she went after the Omega weapons because her own supply of compound 78 dried up or something. Tell me that makes sense,” my voice shook.

  This was it. This was my moment to convince the Chief, and yet I couldn’t marshal my thoughts, couldn’t get them to make sense. Couldn’t formulate an argument convincing enough.

  I swore my heart would pull free of my chest and slam to the ground.

  I watched her.

  She could have thumped one of her many hands onto her command PIP and called for security.

  She pushed away from the desk and started walking around it, a thoughtful if somewhat lost expression on her face. “I’ll admit, I’m not used to these telekinetic warriors. But I’ve been looking into them. Looking into what they can do.”

  “… And?”

  “The Star Forces don’t make mistakes,” she suddenly said.

  “Sorry?”

  “Did I ever tell you why I am a member of the resistance?” she suddenly asked.

  I said nothing. Just watched her. Confused at the sudden change in topic.

  She swallowed. “I saw it. Saw so many talented ensigns and officers be taken away. I come from a very long-lived race, Captain. You may not know this, but I’ve been in the services of the Star Forces for over 200 years. That’s a long time. And I’ve seen it. Time and time again. People being taken away. Oh, the Star Forces make the right excuses. Make it seem reasonable. Make it seem like they were spies, or they were sick, or they just left for a new life. But it was never that way,” her tone dropped.

  “Chief, we don’t have much time. I think… I think F’val is the spy. I think he’s here to recapture Jenks.” There it was. I’d said my piece. The truth had spluttered from my lips like blood from an open wound.

  Slowly the Chief met my gaze.

  “Is there anyway,” I said through clenched teeth, “in your professional opinion, that Jenks could have damaged the life-support system?”

  She dropped my gaze. “If you’d asked me a day ago, I would have said no. That was extremely sophisticated sabotage. The more I look into it, the more I realize it wasn’t intended to take out the base, just permanently incapacitate the Ra’xon. It was like the Star Forces were happy enough for us to take the ship, but just not be able to use it.”

  I nodded, throat as dry as a desert, breath as short and sharp as a shout. “Could Jenks have done it?”

  One lip pulled to the side as she breathed through her teeth. “I don’t know. She would have to be an extremely capable engineer. We’re talking years of training. But if she is a telekinetic spy, then maybe. I have no idea what kind of power they have.”

  “Commander F’val insists that she is not that powerful. That she would have used some kind of device to make it through the chamber door. Is that possible?”

  Now the Chief’s expression stiffened. She seemed to be surer of herself as her brow crumpled. “Like I said, I’m just starting to wrap my head around the powers of these telekinetic warriors. But if I had to answer… I’d say… someone just pulled that door wide open.”

  “Sorry?”

  She sighed. “Lieutenant Commander, I’m trying to tell you that I believe you. I think F’val is lying. Somebody opened the door, and they didn’t use any standard device. I have analyzed it more now, and the pressure patterns throughout the metal… I think they match telekinetic power.”

  “So he’s lying,” I said, relief spreading through me so fast it was a surprise I didn’t explode.

  She nodded. “He’s lying. Either Jenks is extremely powerful and he doesn’t want us to know…” she trailed off.

  “O
r?”

  She shivered. “I don’t know. The bottom line is, he’s lying. He’s keeping something from us.”

  I nodded. I wasn’t ashamed to say a tear or two touched my eyes. I wasn’t about to cry or anything; it was just the relief of the situation. The pressure that had been building to this point. The Chief believed me.

  But would she trust me enough to follow me?

  I swallowed.

  She watched me intently. “You want to confront him, don’t you?”

  I shook my head.

  All six of her arms dropped, and she tipped her head to the side as she stared at me. “What do you want?”

  “I want to question Alyssa.”

  “Who?”

  “Jenks,” I said in a soft voice.

  “… I see. And if we are both wrong, and she’s a spy?”

  I let her question sit there. I closed my eyes. I breathed. “F’val is lying. We know that.”

  “Yes, we do. But is this a gamble we are willing to throw the resistance away on?”

  I shook my head. “Williams will be there. We will take the proper precautions. We just can’t… we can’t let this happen.” My eyes snapped open and I stared at her pleadingly.

  She caught my gaze. A second passed, then another, and another. She nodded.

  That was all she did. She nodded.

  She walked forward and stretched out a hand.

  I took it.

  She shook it.

  All the time staring into my eyes. “Right you are, Lieutenant Commander. I refuse to let another soul disappear into the night. I joined the resistance to do the right thing, knowing full well that sometimes the right thing is the hardest thing you can imagine.”

  I found myself smiling.

  “Now, didn’t you say we didn’t have any time to waste?” she questioned.

  I nodded.

  “I need you to distract F’val and help us get onto his ship.”

  “Leave it with me. Give me 10 minutes to prep, and I’ll be good to go.” She brought all six of her hands together and cracked all of her knuckles. It was like listening to the percussion section of an orchestra.

  I found myself grinning.

  “We haven’t won yet,” she cautioned.

  “Just wait and see, we will,” I promised.

  I walked from the room.

  …

  Alyssa Nightingale

  Oh god. I was going back.

 

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