“You’re not really the Curator, are you? He died a long time ago. He—”
The Curator raised a hand, with his fingertips glowing.
My throat locked up so I couldn’t speak. I clutched at it, finding it difficult to breathe. I waved to him, nodding.
The fingertips glowed again.
I gurgled with noise, enjoying the ability to breathe once more.
“Are you convinced that I am who I say I am, Commander?” he asked.
“You have the power. I was merely…” I cleared my throat. “Curator, may I be frank with you?”
Those blue eyes regarded me for a time. Finally, he nodded.
“You remind me of what I think God would look like. I don’t mean the way our theologians would envision God. I’m talking about ordinary people like me, what’s in our minds. That seems unusual. In other words, it doesn’t seem like a coincidence that you look like this. I suspect you have taken this aspect for a reason.”
“I see,” he said. “You wish to prove to me that you’re higher in cognitive ability than I first gave you credit for. I freely grant you that. I have come to believe you are the little killers of legend.”
A cold feeling worked its way through me. I had heard humans called the little killers before. Were we? And, if we were the little killers, what in the heck did that mean?
“The identity troubles you, I see,” the Curator said.
“Who are or were the little killers?”
“Commander, do you not yet realize that I refuse to let you interrogate me?”
“I’m not trying to prove anything. It’s our innate curiosity at work. Ever since Abaddon—”
I stopped talking because the Curator stiffened as his eyes bulged outward. He took a step back and raised his fingertips like weapons.
We remained like that for a few pregnant seconds. Finally, the Curator lowered his hands. I found that my stomach had clenched even as I felt sweat on the back of my neck.
“Maybe we have something to trade after all,” I said.
“It will be a simple matter stripping your mind of everything it knows. Unfortunately, you will become an imbecile in the process.”
“Or I could just tell you what you want to know,” I said.
“I would prefer that myself, Commander. You gave me a moment’s sport back on the Survey Vessel. I have kept the Ve-Ky at an arm’s length for so long that I had forgotten the joy of watching a true combat species at war.”
“The Ve-Ky are not a combat species?”
“They have the will, of course, but against the little killers they found themselves badly out of their league. While their civilizational score is high, their military prowess leaves something to be desired. It is one of the reasons…”
The Curator plucked at his beard as he examined me. “Let me see if I understand you correctly. When you said Abaddon, what did you mean?”
I glanced at N7. The android wasn’t any help. He was clearly terrified and in awe of the Curator. I had been at first, too. I told myself this wasn’t what he really looked like. The being had taken this guise to trick us, or to awe us. It had worked. But there were things going on about which I knew little to nothing. In some manner, Holgotha was involved in all this. So was Abaddon.
“I’m waiting, Commander,” the Curator said.
“Abaddon is a First One who found himself exiled in a different space-time continuum,” I said. “He was there with the Kargs—”
I stopped talking because the image of the Curator began to shift, almost melt. At first, the Curator didn’t seem aware of that. When he did, he turned around sharply. I don’t know what he did, but he remained in that position for about a minute. Finally, he faced us again.
I didn’t gawk, but I saw that his eyes were brown now. Otherwise—no, there were a few other subtle differences in his appearance. I decided to go with it.
“Is that the Abaddon you wanted to hear about?” I asked him.
“It is,” he said.
I worked to keep my features as bland as possible. It must not have worked.
“What has excited you, Commander?”
There was menace in his tone. I wasn’t sure about the correct response. Whatever the Curator really was, I didn’t think he was an artificial intelligence. Therefore, winging it at this point didn’t seem wise. Thus, I decided on the truth.
“I’m excited because I slipped in Abaddon being a First One. I didn’t know that was true until now. I’ve wondered about it, though.”
“You are cleverer than I realized,” the Curator said slowly. “This is fascinating. Yet, that is what is said about the little killers. One cannot give them an inch. Know, human, that I would not have let you know about Abaddon being a First One.”
“Are you a First One?” I asked.
The brown eyes glowed with more menace than ever. “Commander, I am afraid I must punish you this time. I have warned you several times about interrogating me. I have let a few incidences pass. I will no longer.”
I smiled.
That made him frown. “What do you find amusing about that?”
“You still seem to feel that you have to prove yourself to me. Even after I did you a solid.”
“A what?” he asked.
“A solid,” I said, “a good turn. I take it you wanted your Survey Vessel back. I’m the one who brought it to you.”
“Turn around, N7,” the Curator said.
The android did so with speed.
The Curator reached out, grabbing one of my arms. At the same time, the fingertips glowed. His grip felt like fire. I found myself paralyzed, unable to move, shout or roar with pain. The punishment swept through me with growing agony. I felt as if I might start melting.
Abruptly, he let go, stepping back.
I gasped, rubbing the spot where he’d touched me. There were sucker marks on my skin that pulsated with color. That freaked me out. Was he really some kind of octopus creature?
Finally, the pain subsided as the marks began to disappear. I found myself wheezing.
“I hope I do not need to do that again,” he said.
I decided the less I said, the fewer times he’d do that to me.
“Walk with me, Commander,” he said.
N7 looked up as if he wanted to ask what he should do. He didn’t, but stayed where he was.
Soon, the Curator and I moved past the area where the force field had blocked me. The sky, clouds and sun all vanished as if they had been smoke. I looked back into a forest scene.
“Hurry, Commander,” he said.
I faced forward and saw the bearded man sitting in what looked like a roller coaster car. In a few strides, I joined him, sitting down beside him.
He manipulated the controls and the car slid forward. Soon, we moved down a long corridor with stars all around us. I saw the supermassive black hole in the distance along with the accretion disk around it.
“I had to punish you in the exhibit,” he said. “I have to follow the rules as laid down long ago.”
I thought about that. He said he had to punish me in the exhibit. Did that mean outside the exhibit I could ask questions?
“May I ask a question?” I said.
“Soon,” he said. “For now, enjoy the ride. It might teach you something.”
I shrugged inwardly, wondering what he meant. If I’d known, I would have buckled up. I might even have asked to stay in the exhibit or receive another punishment shock.
The car sped up even though the stellar scene remained the same. Then, we shot out of the corridor into what looked like the exhibit of a star. We plunged toward the nuclear furnace as the heat became intolerable.
-22-
The less said about my experience, the better. We went through the heart of a star exhibit. The heat caused my skin to bubble and melt, or so it felt. The light burned out my sight. The roaring noises left me deaf.
These aren’t metaphorical expressions. I felt real agony and suffered for it. The mild pain
I’d experienced earlier when he’d grabbed my arm didn’t compare to the torture of the ride.
It also lasted far too long.
Finally, though, the agonies ended, and I endured like a lump of flesh. I was alone and weak. I hated it. Then, by small degrees at first, I began to feel, see and hear again. I became aware that I still sat in the car with the Curator. We sped along as before, the stellar sights the same for all I knew.
I didn’t say a thing. I hardly thought. I endured hunched over as time lengthened. As my strength returned, I considered attacking him, trying to rip out his throat if I could. I finally began to tremble with the anticipation of doing it.
“That was necessary,” he said in his deep voice, sounding as if he was perhaps sorrowful for what he’d put me through.
I might have given him a glance, but if I had just then, I would have attacked like a maniac. Claath had caused me pain in the past, but nothing like that. I planned to hunt down the red-skinned Rumpelstiltskin for what he’d done. Could I do any less to the Curator?
“It was necessary so you could understand,” he added.
I didn’t want to ask. “Understand what?” So I continued to keep my mouth shut and envision his death. That was more pleasant at the moment.
“The eternity of my existence has almost become as unbearable to me as your ordeal was to you,” he said.
My trembling, my desire to attack increased. Then I uncoiled like a viper, a roar on my lips. I would rip out his eyes, I would—
He touched me as I lunged at him, and it seemed as if he sucked the berserker-like desire from my brain and body. A sensation like cold water poured over my brain. It left me gasping.
“We do not have time to indulge your rage,” he said. “I need the cunning Commander Creed, not the emotive warrior full of hatred.”
I glanced at him, wondering if he had screwed with my mind in some underhanded fashion I couldn’t detect. The thought of that almost started the rage process all over again. I decided to wait to strike. I would test myself and my thoughts by asking questions.
The Curator sat erectly beside me, his beard stirring in the wind created by our passage. He appeared self-absorbed, troubled and sad.
“I am the Curator,” he said slowly. “I am the Watchman at the center of the galaxy. I have seen so much, so very much. But now I am tired. I have grown weary of my task. I want to set down my responsibilities, but I cannot.”
What was the right way to proceed? Had the agony of the star exhibit been an initiation into his sorrow? Did he think he could confide in me now? If that was true…I should try to understand, right? Maybe if I understood what he was saying, I could comprehend… I didn’t know his end game. It was time to study, to think before striking. And if that was the case, I should try to lull him, put him off his guard.
“May I ask why you cannot set down your responsibilities?” I said.
“Because I do not have free will in this one area.”
“And the reason for this is…?”
“Being the Watchman is my function, my reason for existence.”
My brow furrowed in concentration. I thought about his various comments along the way, especially his dislike of N7.
“I take it you’re a construct then.”
He sighed. “You’re asking if I’m a machine, but you’re trying to be delicate about it. I am no more a machine than you are, Commander?”
“Do you have a soul?” I asked.
“If I do, I haven’t seen it.”
“Have you ever seen the Creator?”
“You have spoken to Holgotha,” he said, in lieu of an answer. “I know, because I played back Key’s memories. Perhaps you don’t realize that Holgotha is chief among the Forerunner artifacts. They have chosen exile in the fringe zones for their own peculiar reasons. I suspect they thought themselves safe out there. They left me to contend with the clever center races by myself. I could have used their help, but they remained in the fringes to play with the weak races, never suspecting that the little killers would someday escape from their prison planet.”
“Earth was a prison?” I asked.
“The entire Solar System was,” the Curator said. “Think of yourselves as a tool kept in a glass cage to use only in case of an emergency.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” I said. “What was the great emergency anyway?”
“Before I say more, I would like to hear your story. I believe everything will make more sense once I hear the full tale.”
“What full tale?” I asked.
“Begin with whatever race first visited you. I suspect I’ll see a pattern soon enough.”
I stared at the stars, at the accretion disk. I was at the center of the galaxy, sitting with the Curator in a roller coaster car. I had just endured the worst torments of my life. Had there been a lesson in that? If so, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the nature of the lessons. Humans had been in a glass cage, on a prison planet? What did that make the Jelk who had nabbed humans throughout the centuries?
“It started when my Dad, Mad Jack Creed, went up to greet the alien visitors…” I said.
I told him my story from start to finish. He never interrupted. Whenever I glanced at him, his brown eyes burned with intensity. Several times, he grunted as if I’d given him a telling point. Finally, with my mouth dry and my back sore, I said, “And that led us here to Sagittarius A*.”
Without a word, he manipulated the controls. The car swerved sharply, swooped down as if into a tunnel—the stellar scene vanished—and came to a stop several seconds later.
He climbed onto a platform I couldn’t see. “You’d better come out on my side,” he said.
I did.
He led me into an invisible passageway, one I saw only after entering. It was like a cave deep under the earth, with a roar like a waterfall through thick rocks. I noticed the ceiling was slick with moisture.
We walked for five minutes until we reached a heavy stone door. He took out a key, rattled it in a lock and pushed. The hinges squealed and a musty odor roiled out.
“Stay close to me,” he said.
He hadn’t put the key away, but held it up. It was like a big old skeleton key, and it glowed with light. The light didn’t shine far, just enough to show us the floor where we put our feet. Unseen chains rattled in the gloom. A smell like sulfur tickled my nose now and again. I heard a terrible groan and then silence. It made my nape hairs stand on end. I didn’t like this place.
He put the key into another lock. Everything went pitch-black around us. This stone door didn’t want to move. Then it slid against the floor, throwing harsh light through the crack between the door and jam. The Curator had his shoulder against the door and was pushing. With a grunt, he shoved harder still. The door finally opened enough to admit us.
The chamber was brightly lit. A glowing outline wall showed a star with a big gas giant nearby. The gas giant had swirling clouds like Jupiter, but was bright orange with a giant green spot. Masses of starships passed the gas giant.
I moved closer to the outlined wall, with my eyes narrowed. I recognized Jelk battlejumpers, hundreds, no, thousands of them. They led the way, followed by giant Karg ships, the ones carrying several moth-ships apiece. The fleet headed toward a jump gate.
I turned to the Curator. “Is this Abaddon’s Super Fleet?”
“It is.”
“This is real time?” I asked.
The Curator bowed his head as if concentrating. I felt the disoriented feeling in my head again. Did that mean he was reading my mind?
“Oh, I see what you mean,” he said. “Yes, this is real time.”
My head no longer hurt. I wanted to tell him to stay out of it from now on, but I figured we could get into an argument about that later. Abaddon’s fleet was more important.
“Okay,” I said, “this is interesting. Can you blast the fleet from here?”
The Curator laughed, shaking his head. “I most certainly cannot. I wish it were that ea
sy.”
I studied the fleet a little longer. Then, I looked at the room. It had this screen, but nothing else. There were several doors leading out of here, however.
“What is this room?” I asked. “How can we see the Super Fleet in real time from the galactic core? I mean, I take it the fleet is still headed for Earth, right?”
I glanced at the old man when he failed to answer. He was plucking at his beard, contemplating the fleet. He didn’t seem to realize I’d been asking him questions, interrogating him.
“I had to punish you before,” he said. “While we’re in the viewing chamber, I won’t do so.”
So, he had noticed the questions.
I nodded.
“This seems like an old room,” I said.
“No older than the rest of the Fortress of Light,” he said.
“No one has been in this room for a while then, right?”
“That is true.”
“For ten thousand years maybe,” I said.
“Maybe even a little longer than that,” he said.
I studied the scene for a time. The Super Fleet was smaller than our Grand Armada, but I’d already known that. Seeing it for myself made me feel better, though. At least Holgotha had been accurate about that. Now, if only I could figure out a way so the Grand Armada could block the Super Fleet from Earth. Yet…maybe the technologically superior enemy would slice and dice our armada. No. I was beginning to think that wasn’t the answer. If the Watchman at the galactic core was worried about the Super Fleet…
“You’re afraid of Abaddon,” I said.
“That is accurate to a point.”
I scratched my head. “I’m not sure I understand why you’re afraid, at least, the extent to which you are. Abaddon is way out there in the Orion Arm, a long way from the center—unless he has more transfer vessels.”
“I doubt he has any more yet. But, I suspect his plan includes convincing Holgotha and his brothers to join the rebellion. Then, Abaddon will have plenty of transfer vehicles, superior craft to my Survey Vessel.”
“Did you know that Abaddon used to be exiled in a different space-time continuum than ours?” I asked.
“Of course I knew. It’s one of the reasons I’m here.”
Fortress Earth (Extinction Wars Book 4) Page 13