AWOL

by Traci Harding

  ‘He saved Thurraya’s life!’ Mythric repeated, as she seemed to be ignoring that point.

  ‘And took mine!’ Satomi defended her right to feel betrayed.

  ‘Yet, here you are,’ Mythric pointed out.

  She shot a killer glare in his direction. ‘So, no harm done then, is that what you think?’ Her voice was harsh with disdain. ‘I watched from my grave as Khalid destroyed you! My son grew up with the impression his parents abandoned him, and my granddaughter is now defending the very man responsible for all of this!’

  ‘Our son is trying to prevent any more harm being done in the name of the damn curses that have destroyed all our lives!’ Mythric took a few steps towards her and felt a psychic restraining device clamp around his ankle; the event brought him to a standstill.

  ‘You gave up your amulet to come here.’ Satomi was surprised to get a restraining device on him after failing to do so on Taren. ‘Not a very smart move.’

  ‘This is no game. I came here to be with you! That’s all I ever wanted … you don’t need to restrain me.’

  ‘You are taking my side?’ She raised both brows and laughed. ‘Then bring me Khalid and my granddaughter!’

  ‘I cannot find them without my amulet,’ Mythric informed her, looking to his ankle. ‘And now I am restrained that is doubly impossible.’

  The Qusay summoned up a pretty blue glowing rock. ‘Is this what your amulet looks like?’

  Mythric looked it over. ‘No.’

  Her eyes narrowed, as the stone again vanished. ‘Then I’ll take your restraint off, you can conjure forth the true amulet, and then do as I bid.’

  ‘I cannot,’ Mythric proffered, ‘only the timekeeper can manifest a Juju stone at will.’

  ‘How convenient.’ She doubted his story. ‘If that is the case then you are of no use to me for anything but information.’

  ‘Use?’ he queried indignantly. ‘You stood by me all that time, your feelings could not have just vanished —’

  ‘You are quite wrong about that,’ she said coolly. ‘I knew you were going to try and play the love card, so I had all my feelings for you, our son and my sister, stricken from my memory. I didn’t even need a psychic to do it, just a good hypnotherapist.’

  The fact thrust an emotional blade deep into his heart, and Mythric could barely breathe for the aftershocks pulsing through his being. ‘Zeven was right, I did not have a clue what you are capable of. I never recovered from your death, but you have cast me aside in an instant.’

  ‘If my death was so devastating to you, then you should want to aid me to avenge it,’ Satomi shot back.

  ‘Yes, I want to aid you,’ Mythric insisted. ‘But killing Khalid is not the solution! Someone orchestrated his conception, his escape and his curse! That’s who we need to find … they are responsible! And I’m guessing it was whoever aided you to steal the Soul Keep from Dead Man Downs.’

  ‘Guards!’ Satomi summoned them into the room, and they entered through all doors — a swarm of red leather, metal spikes, boots, make-up and hair product. ‘Seize him!’

  ‘You know I’m right.’ Mythric didn’t resist arrest, as there was little point.

  ‘You are nothing but my prisoner,’ Satomi snapped. ‘Interrogate him, but don’t kill him. Pain enhancing drugs might aid him to divulge some information that is actually useful to our cause.’

  ‘I’m not giving up on you, Satomi,’ Mythric yelled back as he was led away. ‘It doesn’t matter how much you torture me —’

  An elbow to the face from the closest Valourean cut his confession short. His face went numb and warm blood oozed from his nose and down his throat; even without pain-enhancing drugs, it hurt like hell.

  ‘Have him thrown in psychic containment,’ he heard Satomi add, despite the ringing in his ears. ‘Someone is bound to come looking for him.’

  Mythric was not as confident of swinging his wife around to see reason if their emotional bond had been severed, and by all appearances it had. Fortunately, Zeven and the others knew of the risk he’d taken. If they didn’t get word from him, sooner or later they would assume the worst and come to fetch him — he could only hope he was still breathing by then. He wanted, more than anything, to stand by Satomi, but after her Valoureans finished with him, Mythric doubted he’d be able to stand by anyone for quite some time.

  In the lounge of President Anselm’s private high-rise apartment on Sermetica, Taren was in the midst of explaining the whole sordid truth behind the silent coup Satomi had orchestrated on Phemoria. She had made her father vow to say nothing until she’d finished her brief, which began with Zeven calling her to the pod bay control room about a little over a week back and ended with her confronting Satomi in the throne room of Phemoria only hours ago. She couldn’t remember the last time she had seen her father truly furious, and for a moment he couldn’t even speak.

  ‘It was Zeven who broke Khalid out of prison,’ he stated through gritted teeth.

  Taren understood her father had spent money and resources trying to discover the truth about that escape, so his anger was not entirely unexpected. ‘Unlike the rest of us, Zeven separated the man from the curse, to realise Khalid has been wronged more than any of us, his true father also … have you not been listening?’

  Anselm had to stand and pace out his frustration. ‘We can kiss the psychic bill of rights goodbye, and prepare for war instead.’

  ‘Satomi is just begging for an excuse to pit her psychic army against your new task force …’ Taren stood also. ‘Please don’t give her one.’

  ‘I only just won your mother back!’ The true source of his anger surfaced. ‘Am I to just allow her to spend the rest of her days in a coma state?’

  ‘You know I will not let that happen,’ Taren approached to reason with him more intimately. ‘We have to find the Soul Keep Satomi is hiding and bring it together with the canister containing Chironjivi’s evil spirit, and the crown of the Phemoray. Then the curses can be reversed, and all the women of the celestial city will return to consciousness safely.’

  ‘And if we just shut the complex down?’

  ‘We kill them all.’

  Clearly, Anselm just wanted to kill something, but headed to his bar to pour a drink instead. ‘Before we’ve even had the chance to announce Sermetica’s reconciliation with Phemoria, it’s been bloody destroyed, by Khalid, surprise, surprise! Even defunct he’s a pain in the arse!’ Anselm drank down his shot.

  ‘What has happened is no person’s fault —’

  ‘Bullshit!’ Anselm strongly disagreed. ‘It’s Zeven’s fault for messing with timelines without your consent! I have a good mind to issue a warrant for his —’

  ‘Please don’t. I happen to believe he is doing the right thing.’ Taren wasn’t appreciating the dramatics. ‘What do you know of General Prochazka?’

  Anselm calmed as he considered the query that seemed to come right out of left field. ‘As she is the head of the queen’s guard, rather than the armies of Phemoria, no one on Sermetica has had much to do with her; she is renowned for her hatred of Sermetic men.’

  ‘Have you met her?’ Taren felt he was holding something back.

  ‘Just once.’ He seemed distracted, perhaps by a pleasant memory. ‘The night your mother and I —’ He snapped out of his daze, and forced a grin.

  ‘Gotcha,’ Taren confirmed, to avoid the awkward moment.

  ‘Prochazka briefed me before that liaison, led me to the would-be-Qusay’s chamber and guarded the door until I emerged again.’ Anselm poured another shot.

  ‘Interesting.’ Taren considered. ‘I wonder if she has performed this service for all the queens of Phemoria.’

  ‘I would think so,’ Anselm concurred. ‘She wouldn’t entrust that responsibility to anyone else after what happened with the previous queen.’

  ‘That puts her on door duty the night Khalid was conceived.’ That only confirmed what Taren already suspected.

  ‘You think she let that curse lo
ose on her queen?’ Anselm scoffed. ‘No Valourean would betray her queen, least of all her general!’

  That part didn’t make sense, it was true. ‘But she must know what happened that night.’ Taren knew what the general looked like, and could teleport to her at any time. Still, her instinct told her to be cautious when dealing with this woman. For if she was the one Zeven was looking for, she had been dealing with the curse at Dead Man Downs for some time, which made her incredibly resourceful and dangerous.

  ‘Do not go after Prochazka,’ her father warned.

  Taren shook her head to assure him. ‘Not at this point. If I am not mistaken she has left Phemoria on a mission to reach the AMIE craft, which is going to take her at least three years in transit from the Maladaan system, since the inter-system gateway in the Oceane system is still out of order, and all the people with PK are on our team. So we have a little time to get our hands on those curses.’

  ‘And what am I to do in the meantime?’ Anselm queried, completely baffled.

  ‘Carry on drafting the bill of rights, and don’t give Phemoria any reason to go to war,’ Taren advised.

  ‘This is a very dangerous game you’re playing, my little timekeeper.’ Anselm seemed to be losing his faith in her.

  ‘It always was.’ She reminded him of all the successes they’d had in the past. ‘This is just a minor delay in the proceedings.’

  ‘Fix it,’ the president sternly advised. ‘Maladaan has already imposed sanctions on us for instigating this bill, and if I lose the support of Phemoria, Frujia will waver — and without that export trade Sermetica will plummet into a food crisis! Then I am not going to be very popular with anyone.’

  ‘I am on it,’ Taren gave him her heartfelt assurance as she gripped his forearm that was rested on the bar. ‘And thank you, for the trust.’ She squeezed his arm and turned to leave.

  ‘What? Not even a kiss for my patience?’

  Taren turned back, and happily obliged him with a kiss on the cheek. ‘I wasn’t sure I dared.’

  ‘Be careful out there.’ He was solemn and disenchanted, and Taren couldn’t blame him, she was feeling a little like that herself.

  ‘Ditto,’ she forced a grin.

  ‘Keep me informed,’ he added as she backed away.

  ‘Roger that.’ She vanished back to AMIE.

  As AMIE’s pilot was AWOL, Lucian and their co-pilot Leal Polson were doing a routine systems check, whilst awaiting Taren’s return from her meeting with Anselm.

  ‘Oxygen tanks?’ Lucian ran down the check list.

  Leal ran the system analysis. ‘Eighty per cent.’

  ‘Fuel?’

  ‘Five out of six cells remaining,’ Leal reported, and Lucian nodded, pleased.

  ‘Water?’

  ‘Look, Captain,’ Leal diverted. ‘I know it’s none of my business, but the crew are getting a little uneasy about what is going on between Zeven and his parents. There’s even a rumour going around that he might have had something to do with Khalid Mansur’s escape from prison?’

  ‘Who started that rumour?’ Lucian faked a cynical stance.

  ‘Mythric,’ Leal replied and the captain rolled his eyes.

  ‘Well, Mythric has joined Zeven’s quest now, so I guess he is no longer opposed.’

  There was a bleep from a monitoring desk behind Lucian.

  ‘The radar?’ Leal recognised the sound; he’d not heard anything from that desk since they’d parked in the Oceane system.

  They both moved to take a look.

  ‘Holy shit!’ Leal was astonished by the readout. ‘There is a Phemorian ship right on our arse. They are lining up to dock with Module D.’

  There was a crashing sound and the ship shook as it made contact with the other.

  ‘Steady on!’ Leal grumbled. ‘I could dock better than that with my eyes closed! They are overriding the lock codes.’ His anger turned to panic. ‘How is that even possible?’

  ‘It reeks of PK.’ Lucian got on the intercom. ‘Captain to all crew, AMIE is being breached by a Phemorian vessel. I suspect Valoureans, so do not engage, hide yourselves, or escape by any means necessary! This is not a drill!’

  ‘They’re in.’ Leal threw his hands up, bewildered.

  As the ship’s deafening alert alarm began sounding, Lucian’s communicator chimed. He pulled out the palm device to find a voice message from Swithin.

  ‘It’s fucking Valoureans —’ That was it, the message ended with a thump.

  ‘Shit!’ Leal jumped from his seat to follow the captain, who was already sprinting towards the launch bay.

  ‘They are after Thurraya,’ Lucian advised as they ran.

  Neither of them had PK, but he needed to get word to Zeven on Oceane.

  ‘Where is she?’ Leal panicked.

  ‘With Zeven.’

  ‘Send Zeven a message?’ Leal suggested, having no idea where Zeven was.

  ‘No communicator will work where he is.’ They entered into the launch bay and Lucian locked off the doors through from the main flight deck. ‘Quick, lock the stairwell door in maintenance.’

  As Leal ran across the launch bay crammed full of exploration craft to fulfil the request, Lucian climbed the stairs to the control deck to start priming a pod for launch and to set its co-ordinates.

  ‘What’s the plan?’ Leal scaled the stairs to join him in the control tower.

  Lucian would have preferred to launch Leal down to Oceane, and stay put here to defend his crew. But Leal didn’t know the planet at all, and there was no time to explain. Right now AMIE’s prime objective was to prevent Thurraya and Khalid from falling into the hands of Phemoria. ‘We launch me in a pod down onto Oceane,’ Lucian advised, and Leal was baffled.

  ‘Why? There’s nothing there,’ Leal stressed.

  ‘That’s exactly right. But Taren will find me there, never fear,’ Lucian assured him, relinquishing the control chair and pushing Leal into it. ‘I need you to make it look like a misfire. Can you do that?’

  Leal nodded to confirm that he could, and Lucian slapped his shoulder. ‘What shall I tell the Valoureans?’

  ‘Tell them I am with Taren.’ The captain headed from the room. ‘I’m strapping in.’

  ‘What about your suit?’ Leal reminded him.

  ‘I won’t be in space long enough to need it,’ Lucian said on his way out. ‘And the misfire tale will be easier to sell if all the suits can be accounted for.’

  Lucian fastened himself into the primed pod, and switched on his com-link. ‘I’m good to go.’

  ‘Initiating launch sequence,’ Leal advised via Lucian’s headset, as the pod’s cradle aligned with the launch tube. ‘In five, four, three, two —’

  The power died, and the pod went completely dark. Even out through the small window, all Lucian could see was darkness. Even if the ship had lost power, this pod was independent of it and should have still been functioning.

  ‘Shit! Leal?’ There was no response, and without power his pod would not open.

  It was only when the backup generator kicked in and minimal light was restored to the hangar beyond, that Lucian realised he was holding his breath, and sucked air into his lungs. The pod was still completely defunct, however.

  ‘Captain?’

  ‘Leal!’ He gave a huge exhale of relief. ‘Get me out of here. Nothing is working including my oxygen.’

  ‘I don’t understand why you don’t have power —’

  A huge blast was followed by the sound of metal crashing.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘That was the door to the flight deck getting blown out of the wall.’

  Lucian clenched his fists to control his urge to punch something.

  ‘You! Get away from there.’

  It was a female voice. Leal must have left the intercom open his end, which meant Lucian’s transmission was blocked. ‘Shit, Leal!’

  ‘What were you doing?’ she demanded to know.

  ‘Running a system check,’ Leal rep
lied, ‘we’ve had trouble with pods misfiring —’

  A crack brought his explanation to an end.

  ‘Is there anyone in there?’ ‘No.’ Leal spat — blood Lucian imagined, and resentment churned in his gut.

  Another crack, this time followed by a moan.

  ‘Damn it!’ Lucian began thumping the ceiling of the pod to give himself away — if he wasn’t going to be able to warn Zeven, then he wanted to stand by his crew. He had no hope of getting this pod — built to endure the rigours of space and the toughest landing — to open with his own brute strength.

  ‘Where is the heir of Phemoria?’

  ‘Not here,’ Leal mumbled. ‘Then where?’ She demanded an answer — conjuring in Lucian’s mind an image of his co-pilot’s tormentor, weapon raised in threat and ready to serve Leal another blow if his answer was not to her liking.

  ‘Stop!’ Lucian thumped harder — his exerted effort doing nothing for his air supply situation.

  ‘General,’ another Valourean interrupted the interrogation.

  ‘There is someone in the pod.’

  ‘Liar!’

  One final crack and Lucian heard Leal hit the floor with a thud.

  ‘Son-of-a-bitch!’ Lucian thumped his dashboard so hard his fist bled, and he cussed under his breath as the pod was lowered back onto the launch bay floor, and released from its cradle.

  A purple-clad Valourean came to stand over the pod and looking in at him, she laughed with delight — from Taren’s description, this had to be Prochazka. ‘Well, Captain, it seems you are stuck in there.’

  ‘How inconvenient for you,’ Lucian replied, ‘as I am the only one on board who knows anything pertaining to your quest.’

  ‘My quest is to do the AMIE project as much damage as possible.’ She forced a grin that was full of disdain. ‘All I need do is check where this pod was headed and I warrant that I shall find what I am looking for. It is fitting really, a captain should go down with his ship, or in this case up.’

  Lucian’s first impulse was to be angry, but then he noted that the general had some very dark spirits hanging around her. ‘You have been cursed.’ He was shocked to a passive state as he watched a flash of dismay cross her face. ‘You won’t escape it, you know. Not on your own.’