“Much better,” Hannah said. “We are now sitting together.”
Jazz’s hand slowly rose up, and he felt the sides of his head. He thought for sure he had been shot in the head. There was dried blood on both sides of head, but no exit wound, or entrance for that matter. “The fuck?” he said.
“Hmm, your tone is still on the negative side,” Hannah said as she placed the ePistol between his eyes. “This won’t do at all!”
The trigger was pulled once again.
… … …
Jazz woke up for a second time, with a much larger migraine. Emelia stood next to the entrance with her arms folded, while Hannah remained sitting at the side of the bed like before. His hands performed another examination of his head—dried blood no wounds. He felt a hole in the pillow his head rested on, however, as well as the presence of dried blood on that.
“Can you please stop doing that?” he pleaded.
“Oh, he said ‘please,’” Hannah said, then looked toward Emelia with a smile. “His tone is much better!” Hannah patted Jazz on the head and continued. “We can now continue on in the way I wanted, you and me, resting here, nothing more, nothing less.”
“Why?” Jazz asked.
Hannah replied by waving the pistol in front of his face. “I have the power here, Jazzy! What I say goes, OK?”
“You shot me in the head twice, didn’t you?”
“I sure did! Emelia deserves all your thanks. She healed you. Just like how she healed you when Chloe stabbed you, and when Xyniea shot you.”
“So you’re saying I can’t die?”
“Oh, you can very much die, if I cut your head off.” Hannah’s finger zipped across Jazz’s neck. “You’re dead! Missile to the face? Dead! Nuclear bomb…well, you get the picture.”
Almost instantly, Jazz’s headache became less severe. It’s not every day you get news like this. Between this, his armor, and the medical systems built within, it will open up new ways for him to conduct missions. “So overkill can take me out, but not getting shot or stabbed.”
“Poisoned, falling from great heights, virus,” Hannah continued. “You will be incapacitated, but you will always make a full recovery, Emelia will take care of you until she returns to her orb, or is convinced to change her mind. These gifts are after all, a taste of what is to come.”
This would have been nice to know during the attack on the imperial palace, he thought and then was reminded of the one bullet that pierced him during that attack. He completely forgot that the wound even existed; it was fully healed by the time the ordeal was over.
Destiny came bursting in via the sliding doors and ran right through Emelia, literally. Destiny was clearly oblivious to Emelia’s presence, both mentally and physically. Of course she was, Emelia was nothing more than a voice in Jazz’s head until now. Now she’s evolved into a figment of his imagination…one that Hannah could see and talk to as well.
“I heard a gunshot. Everything OK?” Destiny asked.
“Everything is wonderful now, Destiny!” Hannah said as she waved her arms about, with the pistol still in it. Jazz could see the safety was still off. “Now leave us! We are not finished with our information exchange.”
As Destiny left, Jazz continued to rest in the bed and pondered how he would explain to Alisha that her daughter had become a psychopath and shot him in the head twice.
… … …
Jazz entered the galley where Destiny and Veloshira sat, indulging on a meal. Something Jazz hadn’t had in a while. An hour had passed since Jazz listened to Hannah ramble on about metaphysical stuff. He could only reply by smiling and nodding his head toward her. From the gist of it, he gathered that she was responsible for all those dreams he’d had long ago, though he figured that part out for himself as time went on.
Jazz took a seat and joined the two; Destiny smiled at him. “She finally let you go?”
“There are two women I fear: my mother when she’s pissed and now Hannah,” Jazz said. “And I’m pretty damn sure Mom didn’t survive the invasion.”
“That’s why she’s our leader. Nobody wants to fuck with her,” said Destiny.
“How did this happen? And what is this organization?” Jazz asked.
“Can’t really talk about it here,” Destiny said as she looked around at the other people in the galley. She then raised her hand toward her ear, activating her comm device. “Dollon hun, wanna meet us down in the galley for a bit? OK great.” Turning back to Jazz, she said, “I know a place where we could talk.”
… … …
►► Vancouver, Earth
► Sol System
Teleportation light faded, resulting in Jazz, Destiny, Veloshira, and Dollon appearing inside a posh living room apartment. Jazz could see the nighttime rain fall from the living room’s large window along with smaller buildings on the outside.
“Your place, I take it?” Jazz asked.
“Ours,” Destiny said, smiling at Dollon. “Dollon is my husband.” Another reminder of how many years went by while Jazz was in cryostasis. “Make yourself at home for now. I don’t plan to head back to base tonight, not after what has happened.”
“The one question ain’t nobody answered for me yet,” Jazz said. “What happened since I was gone?”
Veloshira laid herself out on the couch. Smart move. Before he learned how to speak her language, he found himself doing similar things when his Hashmedai friends engaged in long-winded conversations in a language he didn’t understand. Jazz sat down as well along with Destiny and Dollon.
“During the invasion, I narrowly escaped from Vegas, found myself in LA where an Aryile girl handed me Hannah,” Destiny said.
Jazz’s mouth formed into a frown as he remembered the Aryile in question. “Odelea,” he mumbled. That bitch tried to shot me.
“Yeah that was her name,” Destiny said. “The one who was on all the news when Radiance arrived.”
So Odelea lied about handing Hannah off to Alisha, Jazz thought.
“After Hannah came to, she insisted I take her to an alley, stating that Whigli was going to teleport there. And sure enough, he did. She started making all sorts of predictions, all of which came true. One by one, members of our cause came together, following the word of Hannah,” Destiny explained.
“And what cause is that?” Jazz asked.
“The HLF, Hashmedai Liberation Front,” Destiny said. “After the command ship was destroyed and the Radiance fleet showed up eight years later to mop up the last of the Hashmedai invaders, the surviving Hashmedai who didn’t flee back to the empire settled here on Earth. The Hashmedai offered themselves to the communities they ruined as slave labor, in exchange for food, shelter, and protection from Radiance who hunted them down.”
Dollon added. “As time went on, those Hashmedai started to follow in the footsteps of those who surrendered before Radiance arrived and raise children; we just wanted to be left alone at that point.”
“But you know humanity, always gotta hold a grudge,” said Destiny.
“Well they did glass almost a quarter of the planet,” Jazz said.
“We didn’t attack on purpose,” said Dollon. “People in the empire are told what lives they live from the day they are born. And if you’re a psionic like myself, then you’re sent away to brutal psionic boarding schools were the teachers make playthings of you.”
“Yeah, my friends back in the empire mentioned something about that,” Jazz said.
“So as you could imagine, nobody aboard those ships came here because they wanted to. They were in the military because the empire forced them to join, and they attacked Earth because they were ordered to.” Destiny sympathized. “The UNE is now the single governing power of the human race, but they refuse to provide any aid or rights to the Hashmedai living here, even the Hashmedai born here who did not participate in the war. Yet the Radiance races who work here and brought their families here get the same rights and freedoms as everyone else.”
Jazz crosse
d his arms and said, “I don’t side with Radiance, but they aided in the recovery of Earth, from what I see.”
“And advanced us,” Destiny added. “We’re grateful for that but…they’ve overstayed their welcome. They now control the UNE.”
“Seriously?”
“A lot of the new laws that get passed are eerily similar to those in Radiance. In addition, the number of Radiance missionaries seems to be going up every year. They relentlessly try to convert people to the Radiance religion. Meanwhile, Radiance races are offended at the sight of a bible or koran or any other Earth-based religious text. And now they want humanity to become the sixth member of the union,” Destiny said.
“Membership in the union will require everyone to be sterilized and born in a lab,” Jazz said.
“As well as everyone using Aryile names and worshiping their gods,” added Destiny.
“That won’t fly with people,” Jazz concluded.
“And it didn’t with our people when Radiance tried to force us to join thousands of years ago,” Dollon said.
“The UNE will never join the Radiance Union, if Radiance will always be pulling its strings,” Destiny said.
“And that’s why you fight them?” Jazz asked.
“We fight for the Hashmedai to be free, for the UNE to be free of Radiance influence and for people to wake up and stop treating Radiance like their friends. All we did was exchange one alien invader for another,” Destiny said and then proceeded to change the topic. “But enough about us—what brings you back to Earth?”
“I’m an assassin with the empire now,” Jazz said.
“I can see that,” Destiny said.
“I didn’t know the guild recruited nonpsionics,” Dollon said.
“Like here, things changed, too many assassins killed or deployed deep into Radiance space,” Jazz explained. “My mission is to kill Chris Boyd, the person responsible for killing Prince Akeia and triggering the war.” Jazz knew very well that the Celestial Order was behind Akeia’s death, but a paycheck is a paycheck. “And to kill the president of the UNE.”
Destiny raised an eyebrow. “So Hannah was right about you coming for him,” she said. “Though you just missed him, that virus cut power to our base and resulted in him and another escaping.”
“You sound shocked,” Jazz said to Destiny.
“Hannah’s predictions as of late haven’t been correct. She’s been making mistakes. We’ve been losing a lot of good men and women because of it,” she said. “But so far, she’s been spot-on about you.”
“Wait,” Dollon jumped in. “You said Boyd killed Akeia. I thought both Akeia and Kroshka were killed? That’s why we were ordered to attack.”
“No, Kroshka’s alive. She was targeted to get wacked, but the recon team survivors and I managed to save her and bring her back to the empire,” Jazz explained. “And even then…I ain’t gonna lie; Chris Boyd didn’t really kill him. Akeia was targeted by the Assassins’ Guild, and then framed Chris. Some members of the guild are working for the Celestial Order.” Damn it, Jake, why you gotta tell ’em about that? What if this place is bugged?
“The fuck is that?” Destiny asked.
Jazz released a sigh and reluctantly explained. “Think of ’em as the illuminati of the galaxy. They were behind the invasion of Earth. I’m surprised Whigli didn’t tell y’all this. He was helping me briefly before we lost contact with him. Hell, he even worked for them for a short while.”
Jazz could tell that there was some deep processing going on inside the heads of Destiny and Dollon. Finally, after a brief pause, she said. “Jazz, you need to tell me everything you know about them.”
“Shit, I shouldn’t even be talking about it,” Jazz said, and then he pointed at Veloshira, who remained resting on the couch as the English-speaking trio rambled on. “She doesn’t even know, kept it a secret ’cause, like I said, they got people in the guild working for them, people within the empire, and people within the union. Hell, they even had cells hidden here on Earth long before the invasion. The sooner I finish my mission here, the sooner I can get back to helping my friends track down these sons of bitches. Though, I ain’t gonna lie, should I find major leads on them here, my mission will take a backseat.”
“All the more reason to tell us,” Destiny pleaded. “Like you just said, they had people here on Earth. Perhaps some of their operatives are still here. If the invasion was planned, then Radiance being here could very well be planned as well.”
Jazz sighed, then reached inside his trench coat to find his data pad with all his notes and discoveries about the order. There was just one problem; his fingers felt nothing but the air and the inside of the large pocket. Where the fuck is my pad? he thought, trying to hold back a panicked look. Both his hands began a quick pat down. There was nothing, and he knew for a fact it wasn’t on the Silver Raven, as he and Veloshira double-checked their items before heading out.
The pad was left behind on Morutrin Prime. It had to be. When last did I have it? He thought, but nothing came to mind. Destiny and Dollon both looked at him, waiting for his intel to be shared. Fuck it, I’ll have to tell them what I remember.
… … …
►► Port Shala, Morutrin Prime
► Morutrin System
Kalis entered the apartment suite she shared with her father, Telan, head chef at the Vuanel Gi Talsyk, from time to time. It was one of three places where she stayed in Port Shala, though she never revealed two of those places to anyone. Telan sat in front of a computer, his hands moving quickly, typing out a message. Out from Kalis’s handbag was a data pad; she placed it directly in front of her father on his desk. His typing paused as he looked down at the pad, and his tail began to wag in a grateful manner.
“You should get some sleep,” he said to her.
She nodded and stepped toward her room, while Telan picked up the data pad, and browsed through its contents. She looked back at him just before crossing the threshold into her bedroom; he began to stroke his chin.
… … …
►► HLF Headquarters, Northern Canada
► Sol System
Destiny and Jazz stood above Whigli as he rested on his infirmary bed. The computer screen next to him kept a close eye on his vital signs while the doctor at the far end of the infirmary tended to the wounds of dozens of other HLF operatives that were injured on other missions. With Whigli lying here recovering, it meant that Dollon was the last remaining combat-ready psionic the HLF had in the base. The thought of Dollon ending up like Whigli…or worse as a result made her wince. Oh god, no. Destiny did what she could to flush out those thoughts.
Whigli groaned as he tried to sit up to face Destiny. She reacted by forcing his shoulders back down. “You need to stop moving,” she said. “Those bullets not only ripped through your gut, but damaged some of your cybernetics.”
“Doctors said I’m good to go,” Whigli said.
“And they said for you to take it easy and rest for another day,” she said.
“Long time no see,” Jazz said.
“And you,” Whigli said to Jazz. “I must ask, Chidorli, did she make it?”
“Uh, yeah,” Jazz said, looking away from him. Destiny grimaced; she knew a lie when she heard it.
“You have no idea how many years I waited to hear about her fate. I never had my doubts, however. She was young and strong. The doctors shouldn’t have had any issues removing the brainjack device,” Whigli positioned his body into a more comfortable spot. “I have so much more to ask you.”
“And I have shitload of questions to ask you,” Destiny sternly said. “Like why didn’t you tell us about the Celestial Order? Or that you knew they were the real reason Earth was attacked?”
There was a moment of silence between the two; her question caught him completely off guard. “Just…ugh, I just wanted to blend in with the rest of the Hashmedai here,” Whigli said.
“That intel could have allowed us to look into their existence here! We cou
ld have used it to prove to the UNE that Radiance can’t be trusted!”
“Hannah knew,” he whispered. “Don’t blame me exclusively. She knew as well.”
“Whigli.”
“Destiny,” Eupiar’s voice interrupted Destiny midspeech via her ear comm. “Please report to CIC. I got something you might want to take a look at.”
“On my way,” Destiny replied to her. She then refocused her vision back down toward Whigli. “We’ll talk later. Rest up for now.”
… … …
Eupiar sat in her usual chair and computer terminal, surrounded by her usual holographic windows as Destiny approached her from behind and asked, “What’s up?”
“My elite hacking skills have uncovered something interesting,” Eupiar said. A holographic projection of an expensive condo appeared next to her, the mountains in the background and the ocean off to the side suggested it was in Vancouver. “It’s an EISS safe house, the source of Justin’s betrayal.” Eupiar’s fingers tapped a few keys on her keyboard. A new window loaded displaying images of an advanced computer network and security protocols, way too advanced for a residential place like that. “A stash of intel in regard to our person of interest, Danyal Aksoy.”
“The trail for Aksoy went cold last summer shortly after we beheaded those missionaries,” said Destiny.
Danyal Aksoy was one of Hannah’s first predictions, back when she was right about everything. Twenty-two years later, they have yet to make contact with this mysterious Hashmedai-human hybrid, only learning of his name, age, and now that he was arrested and tossed in prison.
“Well, if the info I have here is correct,” Eupiar explained, “they got the location of the prison he’s being held in. I just can’t hack into it to get the data—too well protected—we’ll have to break in and physically grab the data crystals.”
“Contact, Tetsuya, and Vuyin,” Destiny said with a conceited look on her face. “We’re going to spill some EISS blood.”
Uprising of the Exiled (Splintered Galaxy Book 2) Page 22