Starbearer

by Rock Forsberg

  Inside was dark and smelled of roasted meat. A small kitchen gave way to an even smaller bedroom. There was nobody there. When he stopped to listen, the only sounds were the shuffling of Efia’s dress and the wind outside.

  Then a sound at the door made him jump. The door opened, but the room became dark again as something filled the whole doorway: a giant of a man, with ragged clothes and a broad beard—and holding a gun. ‘Don’t make a move!’ he shouted.

  ‘Dad?’ said Berossus.

  The man stepped in under the doorway, and shone a torch at the pair.

  ‘Oberen,’ Efia said.

  ‘You shouldn’t have come.’ He sighed and lowered his weapon. ‘How can you even be here? Of course, she’s reining the monster.’

  ‘I have an important message for you,’ Efia said, ‘and he already knows too much to stay out.’

  Oberen took a chair and motioned for them to sit. Berossus hadn’t believed it when his mother said so, but now he was faced with the biggest Andron man he had ever seen, bigger than himself. His face was mostly covered by the full beard, and whatever was visible seemed scarred and deformed. One of his eyes was clearly an implant. His look suited his occupation.

  ‘Well,’ Oberen said, ‘what is it? What’s the message for which you and the boy had to come and disrupt my peace?’

  Berossus sneered at the word boy—he was a grown man about to get married—but he didn’t say anything.

  Efia, sitting straight in her corset dress, and making it look effortless, said, ‘I have temporarily disabled his ability—you should know I can do it—and now that he’s a grown man, he deserves to know his father. But that is a minor reason we are here. Nenetl has captured and imprisoned Shinzaburo, Warrigal, and Aalto.’

  Oberen perked up. ‘Captured Aalto?’

  Efia nodded. ‘And she’s got Grangar and a millions-strong cyborg army at her disposal.’

  ‘Grangar,’ Oberen said, in a serious voice. ‘What about Vernair?’

  ‘Was that one of the black creatures?’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Mother told me about the time you met—’

  ‘She has never seen Vernair,’ he said, emphasising the last word as if it was a curse. ‘Vereen and Vernaga also pass between realms like we walk across the yard, and strike the innocent like a horde of rabid vampire bats.’

  Efia said, ‘You were there, when Vernair, the ruler of the Ver, was consumed by Grangar a long time ago.’

  ‘I wouldn’t say consumed,’ he said. ‘And that is the problem. Grangar absorbs living beings so that they coexist within the monster, as part of the oneness, devoid of their bodies. Once, it was but a speck, but throughout its life over millions of years, it’s grown to the size of a planet. There’s a lot of life inside, but I thought it was dormant, out of energy, until recently. What happened?’

  ‘Ah, you’re right about Grangar,’ Efia said, with resignation. ‘Not knowing the risks, the navy provided the power, but in the end, she got the creature.’

  Oberen thumped his heavy arms on the table and sighed. ‘That is truly a frightening proposition.’

  Berossus found it difficult to follow their discussion. ‘What makes it so scary?’

  ‘The Vereen are multidimensional beings that can naturally cross realms of existence. They found our universe enticing and, like an ant colony, planned a mass migration from the other side. With their limitless numbers, they would eventually have tipped us out of existence, because everything we’ve got prepared, all our big guns and tech, would’ve been useless against the biting, flapping horde that could materialise anytime, anywhere.’

  ‘But your father—and a number of other brave souls—banished them from this world.’

  ‘Or so we thought,’ Oberen said. ‘If Nenetl has control over Grangar, and Grangar absorbed what Vernair, the most powerful of the Ver, was able to do, it means a free pass for Nenetl’s troops to move between the realms.’

  Berossus gulped. ‘What would she do?’

  ‘Think about it. She could bring anything through from Remola whenever she wanted.’

  Berossus thought of the black discs. ‘We have to stop her.’

  ‘That’s right, kiddo. Someone has to take a stand,’ he said, just like Inanna had said before.

  There were so many things Berossus wanted to say to his father; so many questions to ask. He was as he had expected: big and serious, but also different; it was as if he bore a dark aura. Berossus didn’t know how to feel about him. Was he glad to finally meet his father? Or was he angry that he had abandoned him when he was just a child?

  ‘The thing is,’ Oberen said, ‘we have to find a way to get to Nenetl, but if we wait until something comes out from the other side, we might already be too late.’

  Efia nodded. ‘The navy would know—’

  ‘They disgust me. Besides, who would we talk to?’

  Berossus was going to say he knew people, but Efia beat him to it. ‘There is another lead, a powerful inter-dimensional energy field in Runcor.’

  Berossus and Oberen stared at her. ‘There is?’

  She nodded. ‘I would start there.’

  ’I trust you,’ Oberen said.

  ‘What are we waiting for?’ Berossus was conscious of the fact that Mianea expected him to be back sooner rather than later. But he couldn’t go back now that he was with his father and—

  ‘The boy will take the taxi back home.’

  ‘I’m not a boy.’

  ‘Yes, you are, and the best thing you can do now is get out of the way. Fighting a rogue Shade is not a place for a kid like you.’

  ‘I’m over thirty! Besides, if you want to talk to the navy, I could organise it; I have a contact in Dawn Central.’

  His father squinted. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Someone I used to work for, with FIST in Spit City; he joined the navy after the incident with Grangar. Henning Dal.’

  ‘Henning Dal? The son of Jilius Dal?’

  Berossus nodded.

  ‘Berossus knows Henning,’ Efia said, ‘because he defended Avalon when it was under attack.’

  ‘Well, I fought Vorlar Block on his ship, and because of that, I have this,’ he said, pulling up his sleeve to show his prosthetic arm.

  ‘Block’s that navy show-off. I knew he was a crook,’ Oberen said. ‘Sounds like we should talk to Henning Dal.’

  Efia beamed. ‘Splendid.’

  ‘All right, let’s get down to storage, gather what we need, and start moving.’

  Berossus found himself smiling.

  Oberen moved over to the bedroom door. ‘Come on.’

  Berossus glanced at Efia, who was already gliding towards the bedroom. He shrugged, stood up and went along.

  The bedroom had a wardrobe, against which Oberen leaned. Berossus stood by the door and said, ‘So, we should go?’

  ‘This way,’ Oberen said, as the wardrobe door slid open.

  They all crammed into the wardrobe. It wasn’t made for three people, not the size of Berossus and Oberen. Efia was like a twig between two heavy trunks.

  Oberen closed the door and it became dark. Then without a warning, Berossus’s stomach jumped with a falling sensation. As he caught his breath, he said, ‘It’s a lift.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Oberen, as the door opened again.

  Berossus gasped in amazement. In front of them opened an expanse with two spaceships on landing pods, a number of crates, and equipment on the sides. ‘This is your monster-hunting stuff?’

  ‘Yeah, monster-hunting stuff. We’ll take the Abyss. Help me equip the stuff we need.’

  Berossus nodded and followed Oberen to the crates by the black stone wall, while the black ship’s blue lights blinked on and the ramp came down. Efia glided up the ramp.

  Big metal crates were lined up against the wall, and smaller ones lay neatly stacked in front of them.

  ‘Let’s bring onboard this, this, and that, and we should be fine,’ Oberen said, pointing at a collec
tion of large wheeled crates, a few cubic metres in volume.

  ‘What’s in them?’

  ‘You said it—monster-hunting stuff,’ he said with a grin. ‘Guns, shields, recon, constrictors… You’ll see.’

  Berossus had so many questions for his father he didn’t know where to start, and without thinking too much, he blurted out the most important one, ‘Why did you leave us?’

  Oberen stepped behind a crate and glanced at him. Then he looked away and pushed the crate forward, past Berossus towards the ramp to the Abyss.

  ‘Why do you call your ship the Abyss?’

  Oberen paused at the bottom of the ramp. ‘What are you waiting for? These crates won’t load themselves.’

  Berossus sighed and pushed on the crate. His father didn’t care about anything he said, and he was beginning to think it had been a mistake to come. He could still go back to Mianea. The taxi was waiting for him outside. He stopped. ‘Hey! If you hate me so much, if you want me to go, I’ll leave you alone.’

  Oberen kicked on the wheel brake of his crate on the ramp, and said, ‘I don’t hate you.’ He seemed to take a breath and ponder his words. ‘Come on, now, we’ll talk more on the way. I guess I owe you an explanation.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  Naido led Evie through a maze of interconnected buildings in Spit City. As they passed through dark corridors and neon lights, Evie clutched the enigmatic chip she had received from Gus. He said it was to protect the realm, obviously from Remola and the portals. Naido knew someone who could help, and now stopped on a peripheral area of a shopping centre, in front of a shop called Drool. If it even was a shop—the logo was affixed over a windowless door in the middle of a wall-sized painting depicting something that seemed like a scene from an old movie where a woman in archaic dress fell into a man’s arms.

  ‘This is it,’ he said.

  ‘A virtual massage parlour?’

  ‘Yeah, massage,’ he said with a smirk. ‘Let’s go see if Fuu’s around.’

  He pulled open the door and Evie followed him in. Inside was a counter, with a door on each side; again, everything except the floor and the window were painted in the theme of ancient love. Behind the counter sat a young woman.

  ‘Hello,’ Naido said. ‘Is Fuu around?’

  ‘I’m sorry. Would you like to book a service?’

  ’No. I want to see Fuu, the owner of this place—is he around?’

  ‘Wait,’ she said, pressing a button. The glass between them turned opaque.

  ‘What now?’ Evie said.

  ‘We wait.’

  It didn’t take long for the young woman to reappear. ‘Fuu will see you in the back room through the six.’ She pointed to the left, and the door beside them opened.

  Evie followed Naido into a corridor that had numbered doors from one by the entrance to six at the back. They entered six.

  The room was flat grey from floor to walls to ceiling, with a black matrix running through every surface. It was a presence room. As soon as they closed the door, the scenery changed.

  Sudden vertigo caused Evie to gasp and take a step back. Not again; I hate heights!

  They were on a snow-covered black mountain, with a steep ravine and a suspension bridge to the other side some forty metres across. Snow floated down gently and crunched under her feet. On the other side was a log cabin, which had a chimney puffing smoke.

  Evie clenched her jaws. ‘Yeah, I’m not gonna step on that bridge.’

  Naido shrugged.

  The scenery was beautiful, but the cold air made Evie shiver and her eyes water.

  Then the door of the cabin opened, and someone stepped out. A bear-like man, he stomped towards them and over the bridge with purpose, never minding the height of the ravine. Close by, his size became apparent: he was perhaps three metres tall, and his legs and arms were like tree trunks.

  ‘That’s Fuu?’

  ‘Nope. That’s George.’

  ‘George?’

  The giant of a man, George, stomped forth, but stopped a few metres before them. Without speaking, he pulled down his backpack, set it on the snow, and untied its strings. A bald, blue head peeked out.

  ‘That’s Fuu,’ Naido said.

  Fuu climbed out of the bag and on to the snow with bare blue feet. He looked like a chubby hairless baby and was dressed in loose golden robes. George took him up on his palm and raised him so that he was eye-to-eye with Evie. He smiled, and said, ‘Fernando de los Angeles, what brings you here?’

  ‘I’m hoping you could help us with something.’

  ‘Of course you are,’ the little blue man said, and looked at Naido with a weird smile. ‘It’s been a while since I saw you last.’

  ‘I know. Since we lost Sweeps.’

  ‘You did indeed, and now FIST has fallen. The martial law under the navy doesn’t suit the city. It’s bad for business, and bad for tourism. But some of the old Sweepsters are still around, and those guys would love to restore the city to its former glory.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘You know I love the city. There’s nothing quite like it in the universe, and business is still better than almost anywhere else.’

  ‘But you’re not here yourself?’

  ‘Hell no,’ he said and chuckled, the fat under his chin jiggling. ‘But that does not stop me from loving the city.’

  ‘Are you just a bot?’

  Evie glared at him. That’s rude, isn’t it?

  ‘You ask me every time we meet,’ Fuu said with a smile, ‘and every time, I tell you I’m not. And the answer to your second question is also the same as always: I’m here, there and everywhere.’

  ‘Someday, I’ll find the truth.’

  ‘Pointless,’ Fuu said. ‘I’ve told you the truth. But that’s not why you’re here. It’s the chip on her, right?’

  ‘How did you—?’ Evie said.

  George moved Fuu closer to Evie on his palm. ‘You are in my world now. I’m right about the chip, am I not?’

  Evie pulled the chip out of her pocket, but hesitated. The fact that Gus had slipped it to her was a strong indication of its power.

  ‘Place it here.’ Fuu pointed at the ground before them.

  From beneath the snow, rose a small pedestal of metal on a leg about a metre tall. Evie placed the chip on it.

  ‘All right, let’s look inside,’ Fuu said, and a large virtual screen appeared before them. On the screen, an image of a fancy personal spacecraft appeared.

  ‘What is it?’ Evie asked.

  Fuu said, ‘It’s a Petals Interceptor S.’

  ‘And…?’

  ‘Maintenance guide?’ Naido said.

  ‘So it seems.’

  ‘Why would he give me the maintenance guide of a ship?’ Evie said. ‘Are you sure there’s nothing else there?’

  ‘That seems to be everything,’ Fuu said, and froze for a few seconds—he was running a taxing algorithm. ‘No, there is something more: a garbled-bit encrypted avatar file.’

  ‘Show us,’ Naido said.

  Fuu nodded, and between them appeared a dapper-looking young man. He had a clean-shaven face, square jaw, sharp haircut, and he wore a white shirt with rolled up sleeves, black vest, and two gun belts hanging loosely over well-fitting khaki-coloured pants. The sight made Evie grin.

  ‘You know him?’ Naido said.

  ‘Yep,’ she said. ‘It’s Gus.’

  ‘Doesn’t look like him.’

  ‘It’s his avatar in Momentum 6, Santa5k.’

  Naido raised his brows.

  ‘Yeah, I know. Wait—’

  Gus’s avatar spoke, ‘Evie. I’m sure you will get this message somehow, somewhere, and I hope it is not too late. This is important, but very difficult to communicate. The people I’m with are engaged in a dangerous game which, as much as I would like to think otherwise, will be disastrous for our existence.

  ‘Their leader, Marc Puissance, is working for a force of evil and a league of creatures of darkness, form
ed for the sole purpose of upending the universe as we know it. The black portals are but a beginning. Their end goal is to override our whole universe with theirs.’

  Evie gulped as she connected the dots. Nenetl. Remola. Portals.

  Gus’s avatar continued, ‘They must be stopped. The chip you have is the Starbearer: a small manifestation of the code of the universe.’

  ‘What—’

  ‘We will use it to create a perfect foil so that when the dark side comes over, they are directed to the foil,’ he said, and grinned. ‘I know you’re going to ask, so, the thing in your hands is forged of unobtanium from the core of a star, and produces an almost infinite container in a temporary dimension.’

  Evie had a hard time understanding Gus, and wanted to ask him to explain, but the avatar continued.

  ‘This, Evie, is your number one priority, and the beginning of your final assignment as my protégée.’ He stared at her with the serious gaze of a space-faring male model.

  ‘What should I do?’ Evie said.

  ‘We must prepare the foil. Enter Momentum 6 through a secure connection from a safe location, and get Bibi, Ivano, Arcelia, and Zender with you to the sea floor, exactly under the water covered pole of Jibisi-6245.’

  She understood what he was asking, and it wasn’t going to be too difficult; the crowd was always in the game, and even if each one of them didn’t owe her too many favours, they’d still come on a mission with her. But the reason for doing it made her wonder—if he was to make Momentum 6 a foil to prevent their universe from destruction, what would happen to the universe of Momentum 6?

  ‘We don’t have much time; you should move fast,’ Santa5k said, and raised a finger. ‘Don’t worry about me, and don’t come after me. Get those folks and get to Jibisi-6245.’

  ‘But—’ Evie said, as the avatar of Santa5k flashed out of view.

  ‘That was interesting,’ said Fuu.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Naido said.

  ‘I have a bot running in Momentum 6 as we speak. I can ask them to check it out.’

  ‘No,’ Evie said, ‘it’s fine, I’ll go—’

  George grunted, then leaned forward. He seemed suddenly exhausted, apparently out of the vigour he had originally presented.