Into the Fire Part I: Requiem of Souls (Universe in Flames Book 9)

by Christian Kallias

  “Why did you risk so many lives to save only three?”

  “Life is not a number’s game, Ryonna, each and every one of them is precious. It should be nurtured, loved and protected. I’m not about to start weighing numbers against one another, every life counts. I realize that there are situations where making that choice of sacrificing a few to save many will be more difficult and perhaps even unavoidable. But anyone under my command knows, or at least I hope they do, that we’re going to risk our lives to save others. That’s the legacy I want to leave to my people before I die. To be empathic and try to do the right thing, not to conquer and rule territories by force.”

  The words struck a chord with Ryonna. But, she still was baffled that they were coming from the leader of the Obsidian Empire. And, unofficially, the second in command of the Earth Alliance.

  “That’s very noble, and it seems like you did a lot of introspection and thinking, I—I’m having a hard time reconciling the person I’m talking with right now with the image I had of you, even before I met you.”

  “Then it seems my thinking has been beneficial. While I appreciate you apologizing and us having a personal discussion, I believe we should get back to the subject at hand.”

  “Indeed,” said Ryonna with a smile. “My gut tells me that whatever this drug Argos created to give the Gorgar more long-term memory abilities has had an unforeseen side effect.”

  “Such as?”

  “I can only speculate at this point, but what I can tell you is that from our last visit, the Gorgar have turned from slaves to being pretty strict on rules, with a new political structure which seems a radical change from the old one, where one queen is ruling the entire planet as opposed to a cluster of queens. And they seem trigger-happy if you’ll pardon me saying so.”

  “And they don’t seem happy with just letting us run; they’re building ships to defend themselves, or worse, to go on the offensive with a preemptive strike.

  “That’s what I think as well, and it’s why we can’t leave just yet.”

  “I agree. I’ve already ordered reinforcements, but I want to avoid a full-scale assault; these people probably don’t realize what they’re doing. Somehow Argos’ tech has triggered something in their brains that made them more aggressive. We need to correct that. Any idea how to proceed to limit the casualties on both sides?”

  “I’m no scientist, so I don’t know if that can be achieved, but if we could beam a larger scale pulse of the mind device we have from Argos, we could implant a new directive to the entire planet in seconds, hence stopping a war before it even starts.”

  “I like that idea even though I was against using the tech when we first started this. Right now, it seems it could be the best, if not only way, to stop a conflict none of us need right now. We just have to hope whatever the other tech did to the Gorgar is not gonna interfere with the mind-suggestive device.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “Right now it’s the best, and in fact, the only option on the table. So, I’ll have my engineers work on a way to send a planet-wide pulse so we can order the Gorgar to stand down. If that fails, then maybe we’ll need to try and talk with their mother queen to gauge her intentions. Thank you for coming Ryonna; I now have a better grasp on our situation thanks to your helpful insight.”

  “You’re welcome, Emperor.”

  “You can call me Altair.”

  “I may in the future; you’ll excuse me if I don’t just yet.”

  “Absolutely. Was there anything else you wanted to discuss with me?”

  “No, not at the moment.”

  Ryonna got up, and Altair did the same, accompanying her to the door. Something she did not expect.

  “And, Ryonna, if you ever need anything, know that my door is always open.”

  Ryonna now understood the newfound respect Saroudis had for the Emperor before his untimely passing. As well as Chase’s apparent trust in the man that once was the Star Alliance’s enemy for generations.

  “I appreciate that, thank you.”

  AMUSED, Arakan clapped his hands and laughed.

  “Such a cute family moment. Discussing my demise and bonding all at the same time. If I still had a heart, I might even be moved. But not to worry, whether you’re two or ten fighting me, you’ll all end up turned to dust.”

  Arakan’s eyes shone bright red and his aura almost instantly tripled in size. “I’m done playing. I have Ultra Furies to kill; you insects need to go away now!”

  Poseidon spun his Trident to the side with expert skill and then pressed the weapon’s handle against his belt. Extending his bionic arm forward, red lights began traveling along the prosthetic weapon all the way into his palm. Poseidon unleashed a flurry of small fireballs at Arakan.

  Oryn added to the mix her own freezing energy-based fireballs, trying to overwhelm the supreme commander. But Arakan simply erected a strong, dark-purple shield around him that deflected the attack. Multiple explosions occurred in the throne room when the attacks impacted with various parts of the room.

  “Pathetic,” said Arakan. “Let me show you how a real fighter does things.”

  Arakan took a power stance and clenched his teeth. Two massive black fireballs with sizzling purple lightning dancing along them were created around Arakan’s fist. Both Oryn and Poseidon took defensive stances in anticipation of his attack.

  Arakan threw his fists upward for a brief moment before slamming them both on the ground in front of him. A split second later, a huge column of black energy pierced from the ground below both Oryn and Poseidon with highly destructive force, and a shock wave sent both of them spinning in the air. Before Oryn could recover, Arakan had planted his right knee deep into her back. The pain from the blow almost made her lose consciousness. He then grabbed her arm and smashed her into Poseidon who was flying to her rescue. They both crashed to the ground, leaving two long trails of broken stone behind them.

  Poseidon was the first to get back up but Arakan was already upon him, before he could move out of the way, the supreme commander, using his lightning-fast momentum, smashed Poseidon’s head downward with such force that the Olympian first crashed into the stone floor, and immediately bounced up and hit the ceiling. He lost consciousness, and a second later, gravity took hold of the Olympian and smashed him down, head first, onto the floor.

  25

  Spiros saw at least three men by the ramp.

  “I wonder where Jackson is; he should have been here guarding the ship,” said the tallest of the men.

  “Maybe he went for a leak,” proposed a man with red hair.

  “Or he’s doing synthetic Kyrian snake venom; he’s kinda hooked on the stuff,” offered the smallest, yet most crazy looking of them.

  Spiros had to let Gaia know about them, though he wondered if he shouldn’t try to stun them and be done with it. He wasn’t a marksman though, and there was a better chance that he would get himself killed than firing three bull’s eye shots before any of the crewmen had time to retaliate.

  He couldn’t whisper either, so he accessed his brain implant and encoded a text-to-speech message that he wirelessly sent to Gaia, but not before making sure he muted his comms device first.

  “Well, if the boss learns of that, he’ll be fired on the spot, at best.”

  “What do you mean at best?”

  “The boss has been known to execute members of his crew when they do something stupid or dangerous for the operation, and well, doing drugs will do exactly that.”

  “I thought those were just rumors.”

  “I’ve seen him execute at least one crewman in cold blood, so no, they aren’t.”

  “Speaking of the boss, he should return within the hour, so we may want to make sure we’re ready for our weapon’s drop if we don’t want to put him in a bad mood.”

  Crap, these are weapon’s smugglers.

  The worst and the most dangerous kind. Spiros didn’t like this one bit, and having them board the ship no
w would be too risky. He had to act fast. He rerouted his comm’s speakers directly into his brain implant and sent another message to Gaia.

  “Gaia, time for Plan B; dump the sleeping gas into the sleeping quarters as soon as you can, and then locate the two crewmen that aren’t in the cockpit, I’ll take care of the rest. Then join me in the cargo bay so we can take care of the remainder together.”

  “What’s going on, Spiros? I don’t remember us discussing an alternate plan.”

  “Just do what I say, or we’ll be dead soon.”

  “Understood; rerouting to the sleeping quarters. ETA twelve seconds.”

  Heavy footsteps on the metallic ramp told Spiros that he couldn’t give five seconds to Gaia, let alone twelve. He took control of the ship’s systems with his brain implant, silently locked the cockpit’s door, and deactivated flying controls from both the pilot and co-pilot consoles. He then jump-started the ship’s engine and fired them up immediately, just before the men were near the top of the ramp.

  “What the hell!?” exclaimed one of them, almost tumbling down.

  It was now or never. Spiros grabbed one of the magnetically attached crates before pushing the vertical thrusters to their maximum. He then brutally rocked the ship from side to side, effectively bringing all three mercenaries crashing onto the ramp. To make sure he wouldn’t have to deal with them in an unpleasant and most likely life-threatening way, he put the ship in an instant ascension, quickly soaring upward. All three men lost their balance and struggled to stay attached to the ramp, grasping at anything in the vicinity. They rolled and fell off the departing ship.

  Spiros closed the ramp and exhaled deeply.

  “Gaia, are you alright? I’m sorry, I had to act earlier than I wanted to.”

  There was no response. “Gaia?” insisted Spiros.

  He realized something had gone wrong, and his heartbeat went into overdrive.

  WHEN CHASE RETURNED, Argos stood next to him with one question permeating in his eyes.

  “How is she?”

  “She was still alive when we put her in suspended animation.”

  Chase could feel the sorrow and guilt inside his brother’s heart. He wanted to tell him that it didn’t matter that he was the one who put her in the machine in the first place. That for this future to unfold the way it did, this needed to happen. But, he could tell that it wouldn’t appease his brother’s pain, at least not right now. Perhaps later, when the mission was over, he could try to help Argos rid himself of the intense guilt he was feeling right now.

  “We’ll bring her back; we’ll find a way, together,” said Chase instead.

  Argos nodded absently.

  Chase could feel distant energies being deployed.

  “Where is Poseidon?” he asked.

  “He left a while back,” said Menelas. “I didn’t think anything of it. Should I have tried to stop him?”

  Chase exhaled in frustration. Both Oryn and Poseidon had been wild cards, and he questioned his decision to take them with him in the first place. Their thirst for revenge could get them killed, and Chase didn’t want anyone else to die. No matter how annoyingly stubborn those two had been, Chase understood and shared their grief regarding Zeus. But, he also knew that trying to take Arakan alone could have catastrophic consequences.

  “Kvasir,” inquired Chase. “Are you done with the machine?”

  Kvasir’s tattoos blinked madly. “Done? You’re kidding, right? I’ve barely scratched the surface of what needs to be done. I haven’t seen this machine in almost ten thousand years, and if I make even the slightest mistake, it won’t work as we intend it to. We could even tear a hole in our space-time, and that could destroy our universe.”

  Chase’s frustration grew.

  “A simple no would have sufficed,” said Chase coldly and almost immediately regretted it. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

  “No need to apologize. I understand we are on the clock, but rest assured I’m working as fast as I can.”

  “How much time do you think you’ll need?”

  “It’s hard to say.”

  “Please, Kvasir, take a guess.”

  “Half an hour; perhaps less, perhaps more.”

  That’s not what Chase wanted to hear. Now that they had freed Menelas and that Arakan was back on Erevos, they needed to go. The more they stayed here, the more chances things could go wrong. Though, part of him longed to join Oryn and Poseidon and try to finish the supreme commander once and for all.

  Would they get another shot with that much firepower in one place in the future, though? Then again, once they recovered the soul ships they wouldn’t need to. They could send Arakan to his death with the rest of his planet.

  ORYN WAS THOROUGHLY PISSED that Arakan injured Poseidon the way he did, but part of her thought this gave her the opportunity to take him out without any hindrance. When it looked like Arakan was about to finish off Poseidon she made her move.

  She flew toward Arakan at max speed and extended both her palms forward, ready to send a cold-based attack. But then she heard the voice of Zeus in her head.

  Use your dormant powers, my dear Oryn.

  Without any action on her part, two large blue lightning bolts shot from her hands and impacted Arakan on the torso, preventing him from killing Poseidon.

  When she landed on the ground, Arakan had tumbled to the other side of the throne room and lay on his back; smoke rising from his scorched armor chest plate. Oryn looked at her hands in awe. She didn’t understand what had happened, but she felt a new power course inside her in addition to her frost. Lightning bolts started sizzling throughout her cold aura.

  Neat. Now I’m certain I can kill that monster.

  She crouched near Poseidon and shook him by the shoulders. He still appeared out cold, so she gently shocked him with small lightning bolts from her fingers, prompting Poseidon’s eye to open wide.

  “What happened?”

  “You were unconscious; I had to wake you up.”

  “Is Arakan dead?”

  Intense laughter could be heard around them.

  “Give me a break,” said Arakan. “Impressive little surprise you’ve displayed, Oryn, but it will take way more than that to damage me; not that I’m ever going to give you that chance again,” barked Arakan.

  His left eye was bloodshot and gave him an even madder look than usual. Something Oryn didn’t think was possible. Arakan put both his hands atop his head, and a sizeable crimson-red fireball with black lightning bolts started growing and growing. It was soon as large as Arakan himself.

  Poseidon jumped back to his feet, extended an open palm, and his Trident flew into his hand. His ocean-colored aura came back to life, and his eyes shone blue with a tinge of green.

  Oryn could feel the intense amount of energy building inside Arakan’s attack, and while she would normally not have waited for him to complete this build-up before the offensive, she was more than happy to let him waste colossal energy on an attack she would soon disperse.

  “How many more times can you shoot that freeze cannon of yours?” she inquired.

  “At normal power, two, maybe three times until my prosthetic power node runs out of juice. Or I can do a single highly powered shot instead.”

  “I like that latter idea better; be ready to fire on Arakan’s attack.”

  “I’m not sure that will completely stop it.”

  “It doesn’t have to. But concentrate your freeze-ray on it for as long as you can.”

  “Understood.”

  Arakan’s massive fireball cast red hues over him and in most of the throne room.

  “This has been a fun distraction,” said Arakan. “But now, it’s time for the two of you to die.”

  The supreme commander threw his fireball at an impossible speed, but Poseidon was ready and unleashed his freeze-ray shot toward the incoming attack. When they collided, it blocked and slowed down the crackling ball of energy, but it kept advancing.

&nbs
p; “I’m running out of juice,” said Poseidon between clenched teeth. “If you’re going to do something, you’d better do it fast.”

  Oryn flew in the air, and with her left hand, she unleashed a column of freezing energy that hit Arakan’s fireball, adding to Poseidon’s counterattack, stopping the fireball cold. She roared as her aura and attack power intensified. Inches of ice rapidly grew on top of the crimson fireball. Oryn swapped hands and shot a lightning bolt with her right palm. Upon impact, Arakan’s attack exploded. The resulting focused shock wave knocked the supreme commander off his feet and sent him flying against the wall. Blood shot from his mouth.

  GAIA WAS a couple of yards away from the quarter’s door when the ship’s engines roared to life. She activated the gas canister on a five-second timer, giving her a margin of three seconds to throw it in the sleeping quarters.

  But the moment her finger went to open the quarter’s doors, the ship rocked intensely and smashed her on the right side then the left side of the corridor. She hit the left wall with her head and saw stars for a few seconds.

  She took a deep breath and held the air inside her lungs while punching the door’s control. She threw the canister inside at the exact moment the gas released. There was a commotion in the room, and the crewmen began shouting. When she went to punch the door controls a second time, the ship took off with such force that it propelled her inside, and she landed in the middle of the room.

  She reached for her blaster on her belt, but it wasn’t there. Quickly, she jumped back up on her feet and ran for the already closing door, but a hand grabbed her wrist.

  “Who are you?” shouted the man. The canister rolled and hit his foot, bringing his gaze down. “What is this?”

  Then all hell broke loose.

  Gaia released herself with a swift wrist twist and, with a powerful kick to the face, sent the man’s head impacting with the metallic frame of the bunk bed. She heard the click of an automatic knife’s blade lock into position, and she spun to catch her assailant’s arm by the wrist.