by JK Stone
The remains of the children burst into flames a moment later, but rather than consolidating into ethereal forms as the other ascensions had done, their remains incinerated and swirled in place a few feet above the Altar.
A second later the energy Terrah had been pushing their way became more like a vacuum as it was drawn from her body and arced equally between the three swirls of ash. A moment later it appeared as if energy had been being drawn from the atmosphere as well, then an explosion threw her back, and she collided with a stone pillar.
Shaking her head in pain and confusion, Terrah regained herself and peered up just in time to see three brilliant electric blue spheres of energy form and a second later, they shot into the air and vanished into the sky.
Terrah wasn’t sure what just happened, or if it really happened at all, her head was pulsing so badly as tears were freely flowing from her eyes. Shaking off the pain coursing through her body, Terrah wearily made it to her feet, took one more look at the Altar stone, then exited the Henge before falling to the ground with choking gasps and she called out to Doran, “I’m finished.”
Doran had transported Terrah to the ship, and a moment later the static zap indicated she had been sanitized. Terrah coughed a little and felt weakened and she was finding it difficult to breathe. She made it to her feet and was about to head down the corridor to the control room, but the passage to the corridor wouldn’t open for her. Terrah called out with a voice that still burnt from her unshed tears. “Doran why can’t I exit decon?”
*****
Doran heard Terrah’s crackly voice call out, and he checked her bio scan from Decon, and after letting out a curse, Doran immediately transported Terrah to medical before running down the corridor to check on her condition.
Doran had expected Terrah to have radiation contamination after being on the planet, but with the chlorophyll, along with her triple helix DNA, the radiation wouldn’t have been a problem for her. The Biological and chemical damage she had taken was another thing altogether though.
Looking at the medical display Doran let out a sigh, Terrah’s body was being purged of the toxins and she would wake soon.
Now Doran’s anger began to surge and he chastised himself for not performing active scans while Terrah was down on the planet as he had planned to do. For some reason, once Terrah had been transported to the planet, Doran lost his focus and the next thing he knew Terrah had said she was finished.
Returning his focus to what caused Terrah’s injuries; Doran realized that the consortium had poisoned the atmosphere of Earth. The toxins were of the sort that bound with almost any molecules, separating them and causing them to rise to the upper atmosphere where they could be siphoned off and reprocessed without having to waste resources raising them threw a planet’s gravity.
Doran had seen these techniques used in the past, and he realized that if Terrah had been down on the surface even a few more minutes, then the medical unit may not have been able to heal her.
Doran was seeing red and transported himself directly in front of the weapons console. He targeted all vessels within range and was about to open fire on the consortium ships, but a voice, not Inola’s, but Vellia’s by the sound of it halted him.
“NO!”
Doran’s head threatened to explode as he was forced to his knees from the intensity of her voice. He was slowly getting his bearing’s back, and could now make out what she was saying.
“Wait until Terrah wakes, she knows what to do,” Vellia stated.
Doran took a few quick breaths to clear his head, and then he remembered Terrah saying they had to dispatch the consortium anyway, so he asked, “What does it matter now or earlier?”
“Because the rift isn’t closed yet, and too many of the consortium ships are on the planet as well as in orbit, if you attack now the ensuing explosions will open the rift completely. Lantis is the only thing holding a scourge off at this location at the moment,” Vellia stated.
“What happened to me?”
Doran turned to see Terrah had entered the control room, and he stated, “You were poisoned.” He hurried to her and pulled her into a tight hug adding, “It’s my fault, I didn’t scan the surface while you were down on the planet. Your armor must’ve been down when you exited the Henge, otherwise you should’ve seen it.”
Terrah nodded and said, “Every time I would enter the Henge with remains my armor would drop. I knew the radiation wasn’t overly harmful to me so I didn’t raise it again after the third trip in. The consortium must’ve saturated the planet after that because my heads-up display didn’t show any signs of toxins when I got down to the surface, just severe radiation.”
Doran looked Terrah in the eyes and said, “What happened down there? Your eyes are back to normal now?”
Terrah began to tell Doran something, but she got a strange look on her face, and when she nodded slightly, Doran figured she was being told what not to say, and Doran realized that there must be a lot more going on here than a simple ascension.
Terrah quickly described the final ascension and how energy was drawn from her body, and then she said, “That must be why my eyes are back to normal.”
Doran saw Terrah looking down at the mission prep console and she asked, “Why haven’t we jumped to the next objective yet.”
“I knew our last jump would be time sensitive and I didn’t know when you would wake,” Doran replied.
Vellia spoke a moment later saying, “It’s alright, you still have time, but you need to get moving.”
Terrah looked at him and asked, “You heard her?”
Doran nodded, and Vellia spoke again.
“I’ve almost finished repairing this timeline, and I still have some other tasks for you a little later but for now stick to the plan. You can tell Doran everything you know after the consortium is dealt with, but you mustn’t tell anyone else. Now get your ship moving,” Vellia stated firmly.
Doran wondered what Vellia meant by telling him everything and repairing this timeline, but he figured Terrah would tell him soon enough, and he watched as Terrah input the temporal coordinates and time jumped the ship.
Chapter Thirty-five
TDS 4 completed the time jump and almost immediately a signal pulsed from Earth, through their location and out to the approaching Consortium scavenger fleet who were just arriving, and she was a little startled when a hail sounded over the communications.
“You’re trespassing; the consortium has claimed this planet under our interstellar salvage laws. Now release my father to me and leave here, and we may let you live.”
Terrah had almost open fire on the approaching fleet, but something about the man’s voice and his order struck her as odd, so she replied, “And just who might your father be?” she asked as she began scanning the hailing vessel, and got a lock on the man’s location.
The moment he replied, “My father is Anubisis the Greatest and most powerful—
The man’s voice had been cut off because Terrah had transported the idiot directly to her medical unit and placed him into stasis, then without another moment’s hesitation, she opened fire on the approaching vessels.
Half way through the battle Doran called out, “Several small ships are launching from the planet’s surface, and I can’t get a lock on any of them.”
Terrah told Doran, “Move our ship to provide cover fire, attach tracking probes to each of those ships and destroy any vessel that comes within weapons range of them.” Doran didn’t even ask why he just repositioned TDS 4 so they were leading the ships and launched the probes.
A moment later Doran said, “The lead ship was hit, but it only took minor damage before I placed us between them and the four other ships that launched.”
Terrah peered down at her console and found that four of the vessels had been attempting to destroy the fifth ship, but the lead ship passed the moon and disappeared as it engaged its drive engine, then a moment later the last of the ships passed the moon, one of the ships ju
st vanished from her display, and the other three took off at high speed out of the solar system as well.
“They’re gone,” Doran called out.
Terrah asked, “Could one of those ships have been the Prometheus?” hoping Krysali and Braydon made it off the planet.
“No, they were all too small, two of those ships launched from the same general location as you found this ship at, one launched from the ocean on the western coast, another from further inland, it looks like it launched from beneath a large lake. The fifth ship was launched nearby where the Prometheus crashed, but it was too small to be the Prometheus,” Doran stated.
Terrah thought about that a moment, she knew the Area 51 base had three other sections of the base where top secret aircraft hangars were located, and now she wondered why Vellia wanted her to protect those ships as they fled the planet.
Terrah sighed and figured she would ask the next time she saw or spoke with the future Vellia to find out what was with that. She performed a slingshot maneuver around the moon, and after targeting and freezing a small ship within a quantum bubble, Terrah with the assistance of Doran, proceeded to destroy the remaining consortium vessels.
Once the battle was over, Terrah repositioned TDS 4 directly in front of the last consortium vessel, and then she released her hold on it. A second later the commander of that vessel began making threats.
Terrah had enough of the idiot’s rant and her body began to resonate as she shouted over the communications, “SILENCE!” a second later Terrah passed on the very real and dire threat that if the consortium didn’t disband immediately they and all of their people and planets would cease to exist by the month’s end. Then she told them to vacate the solar system and never return.
The Consortium vessel didn’t even respond to Terrah’s command, they just hightailed it out of the solar system, then a moment later Terrah noticed the debris vanishing from all around them, and she phase jumped TDS 4 and set a course directly for Daregon.
Doran stood and pulled Terrah into a hug, kissed her soundly, then said, “It’s done.”
Terrah chuckled and said, “Not quite, but we’re close, follow me,” and she led Doran down the corridor to medical.
*****
“How did he get here?” Doran asked.
Peering down at the man Terrah was amazed at how much he resembled his father, usually genetic variants would change children’s features a little, but Anubisis’s son looked and sounded like he could’ve been his twin brother.
Terrah had an odd notion about what she’d seen in Bias, Horuisis, and Sethis’s memories, and upon seeing this guy she said, “When he said Anubisis was his father he sealed his fate. Not that it was going to be much different if he had died on his ship with all of the others. I just want to make sure we aren’t missing any other family members that deserve the same fate,” Terrah said as she placed her hand on the man’s forehead and began sifting through his memories to see if her supposition was correct.
A few minutes later Terrah suspicions were confirmed, so she pulled out of the man’s head with revulsion and shivered a bit, then she said, “He still has a lot of cloned Aunt-Uncle-Sister-Brother-Cousins. There are a few who concern me, but I doubt if most of them will be an issue at the moment, but at least I know who and where those ones are now.”
Terrah shook her head a moment wondering if or when she should tell the others what she just saw regarding the ship at Cheyenne Mountain, or Anubisis and the rest of his family. She was tempted to call over to Jason but she knew he wouldn’t take it well to hear that there were more than likely more versions of each of them out there than she even saw in this guy’s head. Then she remembered Vellia telling her to wait until they had reached Daregon before contacting him anyway, so deciding to wait on informing the others she asked Doran, “Do you know why their family resorted to cloning their children?”
Doran nodded and said, “I didn’t know they had, but I do know why they would have resorted to cloning.
“When the Lantin’s discovered the Chlorophyll solution, it had been decided before anyone had the procedure done that only a limited few would be allowed to use it so they would not over populate the city or planet, and if they did have the procedure, then they were only allowed one child.
“Khepri-Atum-Ra was one of the Ennead who passed that edict, and when he violated that law by giving all of his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren the Chlorophyllic Transmugentic nanites, the family was given two punishments to choose from to set an example for their people.
“The options were sterilization or execution. It wasn’t much of a choice really with their desire to live. All but one chose the sterilization.”
“How is it that Khepri remained on the Ennead if he violated their law?” Terrah asked.
“The Ennead was formed by the nine families who assisted in the funding to build Lantis, and the only ways to be removed from the Lantin Ennead was by death, choice, or a unanimous vote by the remaining members of the Ennead, the vote was split on his removal.
“According to Gallos, there were whispers of a payoff, threats, or promises made, but because the Ennead couldn’t come to a consensus, Khepri could not be removed from power, but even if he had been removed, one of his children or grandchildren would’ve replaced him.
“I think what happened following the sterilizations may have been the catalyst driving that family’s insanity though,” Doran stated with a smirk.
“What happened?” Terrah asked.
“Immediately following the sterilization procedures, the execution of the youngest great-granddaughter Marisis had been scheduled. She was only about eighty or ninety years old at the time when she was given the nannites against her will, and she chose death because she knew about the plot and failed to inform anyone of it.”
“Only eighty or ninety? How long would Lantin’s live?” Terrah asked.
“The average lifespan of a Lantin would range between four to five hundred years, but if they were healthy and took care of themselves a rare few saw six hundred.”
Doran seemed to be thinking something over a moment then he added, “In Earth year equivalents, Marisis was between one hundred and fifty to a hundred and sixty-nine years old.”
“Anyway, Marisis stood before the Lantin people and begged their forgiveness for not coming forward when she heard of the plot, but she didn’t ask for a pardon in the moments before she was to be executed. Marisis had intended her death to teach her family a lesson, and that proceeding definitely did that.
“Moments before Marisis was to be executed, The High Chancellor Arbitratrix opened a sealed writ from Atlas absolving any of the family members who chose death yet showed true remorse.”
Terrah chuckled a little, and then she said, “From what I saw while sifting through Bias U’san, Nephthys, Sethis, and Horuisis’s minds I don’t think they would’ve begged or shown remorse; I don’t think they were capable of that emotion.”
Doran nodded and said, “You’re probably right, and I couldn’t locate the memories while I was sifting through Nephthys, Sethis, or Horuisis’s heads, but I would bet one or all of them were responsible for Marisis’s death soon after that pardon. And Baelac always suspected their family of the deaths of the High Chancellor’s first two children as well.”
“Why do you say that, and I thought you said they could only have one child. The High chancellor would have had to of used the chlorophyll, didn’t she?” Terrah asked.
Doran chuckled and said, “My, you are full of questions today, aren’t you? Well, I can answer all of those by saying, Yes, she had the procedure, but her first child Arcotum had been murdered, and thousands of years later her following daughter Arcasem had been murdered as well. All three of them, Arcotum, Arcasem, and Marisis had been killed in the exact same fashion thousands of years apart, so Baelac believed one of Marisis’s family members had been responsible for their deaths.
Terrah now realized what was bothering her about Seth
is, Horuisis, and Bias U’san’s memories, apparently, they were all clones with the memories of the previous versions of themselves embedded in their minds. And now she knew that the unemotional memories she witnessed before were in fact imprinted memories, and that was why there were no emotions attached to them.
Apparently, emotions couldn’t be transferred to a clone, and that could account for the lack of empathy and the downright evil within that family.
Terrah looked over at Doran a moment and wondered how it was that despite him having a cloned body, he and the other AI’s were so compassionate and caring, where as Khepri’s cloned family were so evil. Brushing off that anomaly she peered down at Anubisis’s clone-son then asked, “How close to a star are we?”
“We could be within transport range of the closest star in a couple of minutes,” Doran said.
Terrah nodded, thought over what she was going to say, then placing her hand back on the man’s head she pulled him out of Stasis, and recited, “Ra’tek-Atum-Anubisis, you and your family have been found guilty of the following offenses:”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Terrah had explained in detail to Doran exactly what she knew from speaking with her ethereal form, and what Vellia had done to alter the events in their current timeline.
Doran had sat through the explanation, and at the end, he had told her that it made sense to him, but though he and his prior commanders had done the same thing for other civilizations in the past, he felt it was odd to hear of another timeline in which he no longer existed.
Terrah felt sorrow for her Ethereal form, she’d never had a chance to bond with and really get to know ‘her’ Doran, which was something ‘this’ Terrah was not going to take for granted. Over the following days of travel to Daregon, they had talked, then made love, then talked some more before eventually becoming extremely familiar with each other’s bodies and minds in every room and on almost every surface of TDS 4.