Standing in front of them with his hands up was a young man in a hat and glasses. Not the God-King. This man wore the attire of a Dominion officer, though he had about as much courage and tenacity as a kitten. Shaking, tears streaming from the corners of his eyes, he said, “P-please don’t shoot me.”
“Where’s the girl?” Ryze said, his voice firm and loud.
“I-I don’t know. He told me to go,” the pilot said. “Just get in the transport and fly home.”
Jade stepped forward and pressed her blaster against the man’s chest. “If you’re lying, you’re really gonna regret it.”
“Relax, Jade,” Ryze said. He leaned in, saw nothing. “Spex, can you do a scan now that we’re not in the middle of a firefight?”
“Yes, sir. Scanning…there are no other life forms aboard,” the AI said.
Ryze squeezed his flayzer’s handle viciously and looked at the officer. “This sad sack ain’t lying.”
She growled, which made the pilot trip over his own feet and fall. His ass would be sporting a fresh bruise come tomorrow…but at least he would get to see tomorrow.
“So you left the God-King there?” Ryze asked.
“Y-yes.”
“All right, back to the ship, Jade. We might still be able to head him off before he makes it to the Behemoth.”
It made sense that the Battler hadn’t followed them out here. They should’ve realized it earlier.
Shoulda, woulda, coulda, Ryze thought.
“What about him?” Jade pointed at the pilot with her blasgun. The man cringed at the sight of it.
Ryze turned and headed for the ship. “Leave him.”
For a moment, he was sure he would hear the sound of Jade’s gun going off, killing the pilot out of anger, but that didn’t happen.
Instead, she fell in next to him, and they boarded the Starblazer.
Five
Another Battler appeared on the radar. The God-King saw it come out of a QJ on the viewscreen of the Behemoth. It would break through the atmosphere in less than a minute. So far, his little ruse had worked, not that he’d ever doubted it would in the first place. The bounty hunter took the shuttle transport bait, and now the Behemoth could destroy that little Rogue ship. After I get my crystal, that is…
“Calamity here for backup, sir,” the bridge commander communicated, voice crackling.
The God-King sensed all the crew’s eyes on him. He shook with anger and rage. The queen had gotten away, and all he’d gotten in return was a useless queensguard aboard his ship. How to use her? he wondered now. As a bargaining chip…or shall I just mutilate her for associating herself with such scum? Teach her a lesson she can carry to the afterlife?
“All clear, Calamity,” the God-King said. He kept his voice steady, but he gripped his staff hard enough to make his knuckles crack.
The Calamity is Ace’s ship. And where is Ace? Nowhere to be found. The imbecile has gotten himself killed or captured, no doubt. He’s failed me. I knew it would happen; he’s been slipping for years…
“Scanning now, sir,” the commander on the Calamity said.
“Not necessary. And why weren’t you here sooner?” the God-King asked. He felt the calm in his voice slipping. The men and women on the Behemoth’s bridge took as many steps from him as the command center allowed.
Smart, smart move.
“I—uh, sir, we just got the beacon. We were coming out of the Zenith System. As soon as we got it, I assure you we wasted no time in responding.”
The God-King bared his teeth. “Where is Ace Silver?”
“Sir, I’m n-not sure. We lost him on Zed.” Obvious fear.
“And you left him behind?”
“No, I—we got the beacon and came straight here. There’s a grounds crew searching for him as we speak.”
“Sure,” the God-King said. He closed his eyes and reached out with the Essence. The man was lying.
“I don’t appreciate liars,” the God-King replied. “What’s your name?”
“Williams, sir.”
“Are you lying, Williams?”
“No, I—”
“Not only were you lying to me then, but you are lying to me now. And for that, your whole crew will suffer the consequences.”
The speakers picked up the mass confusion on the Calamity’s bridge: People asking what was going on, gasps, shuffling feet. But they knew. This wouldn’t be the first time one of the God-King’s ships were punished for their ineptitude. This, though…this was different. Since the battle in the hangar on Cryton IV’s surface, the God-King had been harboring immense power. Such built-up power needed release.
He turned to his second-in-command. “Bring up the Calamity on the viewscreen.”
“Sir—please,” Williams begged. “I am sorry. Don’t punish my crew. Allow me to take the blame and the consequences.”
The God-King’s right hand rose and touched the broken stone atop his staff. It burned his fingers. A sick and twisted smile appeared on his face. The expression did the opposite of what a smile usually did, which was to make one appear younger. In this moment, the God-King looked more like a living corpse than a human being.
“I’m sorry, White. It doesn’t work that way.”
“Williams, sir. It’s Williams, sir.”
It doesn’t matter what your name is, idiot. You are dead. Enjoy these last few moments of your life while you can.
“Sir,” the woman at the radar screen to his right said, “the Calamity is preparing a QJ.”
He almost said Let them but held his tongue. No, he wanted this, needed this. He closed his eyes and let the Essence take over.
The stone on his staff pulsed a sickly green. The God-King cupped it, feeling the heat, grimacing against the pain. And then—
He let go.
Below the hovering ships, the surface of Cryton IV cracked open, and immense green pulses of light escaped from the planet’s core. Fire shot up and through the atmosphere. It hit the Calamity in the middle with the force of a hundred thousand beamblasts, fracturing the Battler.
Screams sounded over the comm speakers. An alarm blared, muffled.
All of it was music to the God-King’s ears.
Then, slowly, the Calamity split, its engines no longer active, and it fell into Cryton IV’s surface, burning as it descended at an indiscernible velocity.
The God-King watched with electric blood surging through his veins. The smile twisted into something even more unnatural as the commlink broadcasted dead static. Blessed silence filled the Behemoth’s bridge, nearly as loud as the screams from before. This, too, was like music to the God-King’s ears.
A few minutes later, the woman sitting at the main radar said in a firm voice devoid of all fear that the broken Battler would impact Cryton IV’s capital city. “Expected casualty numbers are around fifty thousand, my king.”
He didn’t answer; he just spun on the bridge, his robes flowing behind him, staff in hand, skin a neon green beneath its normal pale hue, and headed toward his quarters.
Cryton IV, like those on the broken Battler that fell, was dead.
In the corridor, a guard approached him. He was short and fat, but with a hard face the God-King found respectful, oddly enough.
“Sir, what of the prisoner in cell block K2? Shall we exterminate her?”
The God-King, in all the madness, had almost forgotten about the queensguard. Wylow. Wylow’s her name, he thought, and what a stupid name it is.
“No,” he answered.
“She’s not talking, sir. In my opinion, she’s worthless.”
Another sickening smile. The man wasn’t exactly wrong. In the God-King’s opinion, all those of Xovia were worthless. He had thought that before Queen Jade escaped him and had thought the same after. If anything, this whole debacle only served to reinforce his ideals.
“If she won’t talk to us, perhaps she will to the torturers of Sker. Not that she has much of anything interesting to say… Xovians never do.”
/>
The jailer returned the smile. “And then, sir, can we kill her?”
Ah, another with a taste for blood. I love it! he thought. Perhaps I’ve found a new right-hand man. Though his looks deceive him, I sense greatness in this one. Greatness and loyalty. Who needed Ace Silver, anyway?
“What is your name?”
“Danning, my king. Ricz Danning.”
“Well, Ricz Danning, we will cross that bridge when we get to it. For now, I have a proposition for you…”
“Yes, my king, anything.”
Six
Ryze took the Starblazer up toward the hanging Battler. As he did, Spex said, “Sir, another Battler is breaking through a QJ.”
“Shit.”
“The same one from Xovia, sir. Call sign Calamity.”
“Well, we scared him so good,” Ryze said, nodding toward Jade on his back right, “that he called in reinforcements.”
“Sir, forgive me,” Spex added, “but I don’t believe your ship can take on a lone Battler, let alone two. I suggest we break away and get off this planet while we still can. The shields are in good-standing condition, and the ship’s just been fixed. We mustn’t waste this chance while we have it.”
Ryze chewed on his lip, his eyes focused on the radar. The AI was right, like he normally was, and though Ryze often didn’t take Spex’s advice, he found himself doing it now.
Jade leaned forward. “You can't honestly be thinking about—”
Ryze let off the flight sticks and rolled the Starblazer to the left. “He’s right, Jade. I’m sorry. One Battler, maybe, but two… No way.”
“What about Wylow? We can’t let her go!”
“I know, I know. We’ll get her back. But we need help.”
“Help? There’s no one in this galaxy mad enough to take on the God-King and his Dominion. You’ve seen what happens firsthand.”
Ryze nodded. “I have. Which is another reason we need to stay alive as long as we can. You’ve got a mission to complete.” Stars, I sound like her father, don’t I? She’s an adult. She doesn’t have to listen to me. And, c’mon, let’s be real here, who would really take my advice? You’d have to be insane to do that. “The sooner you destroy whatever the hell that thing is around your neck, the sooner we can stop looking over our shoulders.”
“I don’t care about that now, I care about Wylow!”
Ryze had no answer for her, not one he was satisfied with. The truth was simple: Wylow’s fate was out of their hands for now. Ryze had once grown up as a dreamer, but the First War had shattered that way of thinking and took away his innocence. He had thought the galaxy was an endless, vast space where the possibilities were endless, too, but it didn’t take long to realize how wrong that belief was.
He cleared his throat. “Jade, you knew when you took this task that people could and would die. You can’t save everybody. If you do what you’re supposed to do, and what you’ve told me about the crystal is true, then you will save countless others.”
He expected an argument and got none. Jade only nodded her head.
“I don’t think he’ll have her killed, anyway,” Ryze continued. “I think he’ll keep her alive long enough to get to you. She knows things—like where you’re supposed to take the artifact, what you’re supposed to do with it—and he knows that.”
A heavy blanket of silence fell on them, the only sound the hum of the Starblazer’s thrusters carrying them away from the Battlers.
Spex interrupted the quiet; he was good at that. “Sir! I am picking up high levels of heatsig below us.”
“What?” Ryze scanned the radar. There were no other ships around them, and the two Battlers were long behind, just darker shadows in a dark sky. “What is it?”
Jade started. Without a word, she reached for the flight sticks and spun one to the left.
“Hey, never touch a man’s stick, you—” but the ship plummeted before he could get the rest out. He nudged her hand away and took control again, leveling the Starblazer. His stomach roiled queasily from the sudden drop in altitude. “What the hell was that?” he demanded, turning and looking at Jade. Her face was pale beneath the glow of the crystal around her neck. Ryze understood—well, not really, but he understood it was something that had to do with the power the young queen possessed. The one that saved my face from becoming a lot uglier on Xovia, he added mentally.
She opened her mouth to answer him, and the words were drowned out by an explosion so loud, one of the instrument screens cracked in an intricate spider-web pattern, the sound nearly bursting both Jade and Ryze’s eardrums.
A flash of green light blinded them. Ryze fell out of his chair, bringing a hand over his visor. It didn’t help. The light seem to pierce his armor all the way to his flesh.
As fast as the energy came, it was gone, its massive uproar rolling over the entire planet.
“What was that?” Ryze said, but he couldn’t hear himself. His voice was muffled.
“What?”
“What the hell was that!?”
“THE GOD-KING!” Jade answered. “HE USED HIS POWER!”
Ryze’s hearing was slowly coming back. “Okay, okay, you don’t have to yell!” He shook his head, took off his helmet and shoved a finger into his right ear and wiggled it. After that, he pointed at Jade’s necklace. “Why can’t you do something like that?”
“This is just a part of the whole. That’s why he needs it. Without this piece, he can’t do what he wants to do.”
“Which is opening the very fabric of space into another dimension…or some weird crap like that,” Ryze said, still barely believing it.
“Exactly.”
“What the hell was that energy blast for? Spex, what did he hit?”
“Scanning, sir. Scanning… Ah, it seems the blast didn’t hit anything on the planet’s surface.”
“What do you mean?” Ryze said, squinting at the viewscreen. It was too dark to see, even with the afterglow of the energy blast. “I just saw it. We all saw it. Look at the radar. The friggin’ screen is cracked.” Right after I got it fixed, too, damn it!
Jade leaned then looked up. Pointing, she said, “I think I know what he hit.”
Ryze’s jaw dropped. “Holy—”
One of the Battlers was aflame, burning brightly and lighting up the night sky. In this pocket of the planet, it almost seemed like day. They didn’t have time to enjoy the show, either. A piece of scorching metal, the ship’s comm tower by the look of it, clipped the Starblazer’s wing, causing the craft to shake.
“Yeah…we better go,” Ryze said. He shifted the flight sticks forward and climbed the sky, passing through a hailstorm of debris.
As the ship climbed, the other Battler, the Behemoth, vanished into a QJ, taking Wylow.
Seven
“Move faster.”
Those seemed to be the two magic words. Move. Faster.
The stick smacked Ace Silver in the back of the knees. He expected the blow, yet he couldn’t stop himself from falling face-first in the sand. This had been going on for the better part of six miles now. The Thrathan wench would tell him to speed up, and he would try, and then the stick would crash into his legs and he’d fall. Hard. Akyra always laughed after, like she was laughing right now.
“We only have an hour before night. And that’s when it gets below freezing. So cold, your blood turns to slush and your organs ice over. So you better hurry, Silver!”
Godsforsaken planet, Ace thought as he scrambled up out of the sand. Bits of it had gotten everywhere—in his shoes, his clothes, crunching between his teeth, even his underwear. When I get out of here, I will have this entire planet destroyed.
“Don’t want to feel that cold, war-master. You’ll die as soon as the first gust of wind hits your delicate human skin. I don’t have anything to treat you with for hypothermia, either. I can take it, but I’d rather not,” Akyra said. “Let me help you.”
Her strong hands grabbed the binds around his wrist and jerked him from th
e ground. Ace cried out. The serum she had given to him in the cave was all but worn off now. Though his body had healed slightly in that time from the wounds he sustained when Akyra’s ship blew up, he was still practically on the cusp of death. Back then, he’d bit down his screams. Not anymore. Pride was important to a man like him, but he was older now, and not as stupid, and the screaming helped ease some of the pain he felt—if not physically, then psychologically. So he had screamed a lot throughout their trek. The passing time was eons, not minutes and hours.
Suddenly, the hands that had picked him up, dropped him before he was on his feet. He landed in the sand on his side, grains crackling in his ears, pain exploding in his ribs. The grit rubbed against his burn wounds, like razor-sharp nails raking his insides.
Akyra laughed again.
Ace Silver had made up his mind: he was not getting up one more time. He lay there, his body throbbing and burning, his lungs heavy with sand, mouth bone-dry.
He was doing something for the first time in his life: waving the white flag.
“You look parched, Silver.” A canteen sweating with moisture, drops of water beaded around its opening, appeared in front of his face. He was parched—beyond parched. His tongue felt like the desert itself.
“P-please,” he wheezed and smacked his lips. He looked like an infant going for the teat.
“Fine. Since you asked so nicely.” She pressed the canteen to his mouth and tipped it back. The water was cold, painfully cold, but to Ace it was nectar. He slurped and slurped and slurped, and would’ve kept slurping had the mercenary not pulled the canteen away. “Too much and you’ll vomit.” She stood, a towering monolith before him, and downed her own share of the cold water, smacking her lips and saying, “Ah.”
Fury rose within, but he knew that if his hands weren’t tied behind his back, he wouldn’t try to kill her. No, he would reach out toward the canteen and beg for more. Just this small bit had renewed him; it was almost as good as when the Thrathan stuck him with the medpack syringe. In fact, he felt so good, he squirmed up on his knees by himself, ignoring the fiery pain of the grit grating against his burn wounds.
A Galaxy Divided Page 3