by J. N. Chaney
Awen reached over to the holo-display and started swiping through it before noticing that it, too, was in Novia script. “Ninety-Six, can you—”
“Try that, Awen.”
“There we go. Thanks. Wouldn’t want to inadvertently send us to universe three hundred thousand nine hundred sixty-eight.”
TO-96 paused. “Is there something there you do not wish to see?”
“It was a joke, Ninety-Six.”
The bot jerked back. “Ah. I see.” Then he let out an attempt at a human laugh. “Ha, ha, ha.”
“That was terrible, ’Six,” Ezo said. “See if the Novia can help modify that.”
His eyes flickered. “They have noted it in my research archives.”
“I’ve found it.” Awen pointed to “Ki Nar Four” on the list. The amount of data listed after it was more than she could read at the moment. Suffice it to say, it seemed as if every quantifiable fact about the planet’s larger system had been logged.
“Very good. Now, Awen, you need to travel there.”
Awen blinked at the bot. “Excuse me?”
“Did my vocal transducer short again? I am incredibly sorry. I said—”
“No, I heard you, Ninety-Six, but I don’t understand what you mean.”
“That you need to travel there?”
“Yes, that.”
The bot tilted his head then looked at Ezo and Sootriman, who appeared to be just as confused as Awen was. “Why are you all looking at me the same way?” he asked.
“Uh, because you’re asking Awen to travel to another galaxy in another universe,” Ezo said. “Don’t think that’s possible, buddy.”
“Of course it is possible, sir. The Novia inform me that they did it all the time.”
Awen sniffed, shaking her head in bewilderment. “Well, as you can see, I’m clearly not a Novia Minoosh.”
“That is correct, Awen. They abandoned their bodies, and you are far too naked.”
She covered the small tear in her tattered shirt that exposed her stomach. “Naked?”
“Quite so. But that is for another day. They assure me that you possess the ability to travel to any universe in the Unity that you wish to see, providing they assist you. Yours is merely a problem of not knowing what is possible with the power that you have.”
“Well, I’m going to need a whole lot of their assistance, then, because I’ve never even conceived of this.”
“They are ready to escort you.”
“Oh, right now?” Awen asked. “Okay. What do I need to do?”
“Remain in the Unity as you are, then concentrate on Ki Nar Four. Picture it. Summon any memories of it.”
“Right now?”
“Yes, right now.”
Awen stared into the orb and felt her eyes glaze over. Her thoughts drifted back to leaving Worru and arriving at Sootriman’s planet. Charred tectonic plates were split with red lava while gas swirled between the hellish continents and the floating cities above. Awen could smell the noxious fumes and picture walking the destitute streets behind Ezo and TO-96.
“Well done,” the bot said. “Now, do not move from that memory.”
Awen suddenly felt as if someone had pointed a vectored thrust engine at her belly and pegged it to full throttle. The blast took everything from her, threatening to not only knock her out of the Unity but fling her physical body backward into the remaining workstations of the theater as well. But keeping her in place was the sense that something—or someone—was holding her hands.
“What’s happening?” Awen yelled.
“Awen!” Sootriman was beside her in an instant.
But TO-96 raised a hand to halt her. “Do not touch her, Sootriman. She will be fine. The Novia have her.”
“They’re… they’re holding me between—” Can I say it? Is it even true? “I think they’re holding me between universes!” It felt as though someone had stretched her across a giant chasm, linking her hand to one side and her feet to the other. She pictured a small life-form using her as some sort of bridge between the two realities.
“That is precisely what they are doing, Awen. Please remain still just a moment longer.”
Awen held still, feeling a torrent of motion stretch and pull and shift between her natural and ethereal selves. It wasn’t painful so much as it was alarmingly uncomfortable.
Then, all at once, it stopped.
“It is over,” TO-96 informed her as easily as someone might say a walk in a park was done or a dinner had concluded.
Awen was trembling. She pushed hair behind her ears and wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead. She was no longer in the Unity.
“Can I touch her?” Sootriman asked.
“Yes, you may.”
Sootriman came up behind Awen and embraced her. “You all right, love?”
Awen nodded. “I think I’m fine, yes. That was really intense.” She looked at TO-96. “I thought you alluded to the fact that they can’t use the Unity.”
“I did, though it is not as simple as that. The easiest way to explain it for now is that they used you as a conduit.”
“I was their access to the Unity, then.”
“No, you were their access to the physical reality of your universe.”
“The important thing is that she got a tunnel established beyond Ki Nar Four, right?” Ezo asked.
“She assisted, yes. But given her limitations, the Novia placed one there for her.”
Awen looked up and noticed Ki Nar Four taking up the majority of the orb’s space. “It’s beautiful.”
“Almost looks like it’s real,” Sootriman said.
“That is because it is, ladies,” the bot said. “What you are seeing is a real-time manifestation of the planet.”
“How is that even possible?” Ezo asked.
“I am afraid all these lessons must wait for another time, though the Novia insist they are eager to share what they can with you without damning you to a worse fate than any you might discover on your own.”
“Fine.” Ezo shook his head. “Can we just get out of here? What’s next?”
“Why, we must head to the ship, of course.” TO-96 offered the notion as if it was the most normal thing in the galaxy. Without another word, the bot turned and began exiting the theater.
“Of course,” Ezo echoed. “We head to the ship next. ’Cause that’s what I was going to say.” He chuckled at Sootriman and Awen then tagged along after his wonderfully strange robot. “Let’s go.”
21
With some serious cover fire provided by Rix and his unit, Dutch and Gilder raced across the courtyard to the remaining guard tower. Once inside the lower level, Gilder managed to disconnect the compact shield generator and return with it to the house.
“Without a hard-lined power supply, you only have a few minutes of battery life,” Gilder explained to Magnus and pointed to the large battery pack protruding from the bottom. “Just don’t bump it, and it should get the job done.” He passed Magnus the bulbous unit. It looked like a food replicator with four micro arrays on each side and some wires ripped out the back. Gilder had turned the arrays to face nearly the same direction—straight ahead. “Just trust the generator.”
“I trust the generator,” Magnus said. “I just don’t know if I trust your cob job.”
Haney spoke up. “No worries, Lieutenant. Gilder, here, is the best damn cob jobber in the system. Nobody cobs a job quite like him.”
“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.”
More blaster fire strafed the doorway, the holes in the wall growing larger. “If we don’t do this now,” Dutch said, “there isn’t going to be any wall left to hide behind.”
“Copy that,” Magnus replied. “Gilder, turn it on.”
“Yes, sir.” Gilder reached over and tapped on some buttons followed by a swipe in a holo-field. With a sudden jerk, the device came alive, righting itself in Magnus’s hands. “Those are just the stabilization gyros,” the engineer explained. “Keeps it posi
tioned the way you want.”
“And I want it pointing away from me, right?”
Gilder nodded. “And whatever you do, don’t put your hand or any other part of your body in the field.”
“Painful?”
“Uh, well… you’ll lose it.”
Magnus raised his eyebrows. “Copy that.”
“Man,” Rix said with a shake of his head, “Abimbola is gonna be so pissed you used his algorithmic shield generator.”
“Oh, he’ll get it.” Magnus grinned. “It just might be in several pieces.”
“So pissed,” Rix said with more shakes of his head.
* * *
When Magnus turned into the doorway, he felt as though he were facing the gates of hell without any defense. He was sure he’d be blown to smithereens. But when the first several rounds sank into the blue force field and were absorbed like water into a Translutian sponge, he relaxed. In fact, the next emotion that came over him was exultation. He was invincible!
“Take that, you Selskrit sons of bitches!” Magnus roared, advancing one step at a time. Blaster fire came harder now as the assailants realized their rounds were failing to down the Marine-turned-Marauder. The shield had no problem taking everything the Jujari wanted to dish out.
“It’s working!” Magnus said over comms. “Get in here!”
With that, Dutch, Rix, and the others filed in and took up positions behind Magnus. Then they looked for cover around the open square. The entire second and third stories had interior balconies supported by large columns. The upright structures made for perfect cover, and Dutch and the others wasted no time running for them.
Blaster fire came from above, pelting down on Magnus as he continued to move toward the room’s center. Gilder had anticipated this and made sure two of the arrays were pointed up enough to cover Magnus’s head.
“Right on!” Magnus yelled then accidentally knocked the battery off the bottom of the unit and watched it clatter along the ground. “Aw, splick!” The shield generator sputtered, the blue wall flickering, and then—as if someone had turned off a light switch—it was gone.
Magnus dropped the device and dove for cover. Blaster bolts tore up the ground around him, sending the small marble tiles into the air like Euperkquian dominoes. But the members of his platoon were far from abandoning him and tore into the emplacements with flanking fire. Dutch downed one Jujari, catching the hyena-like warrior by surprise. The second tried to swivel a large turret weapon toward her, but Magnus seized the opportunity to blast the hound in the muzzle, snapping his head sideways.
On his side, Rix fired a grenade from his MC90 and took cover. The explosive round streaked to the far corner, detonated, and turned the two enemy operators into pulp. A dust cloud billowed out from the corner like the burp of some fire-breathing beast.
Hidden behind the ground-floor columns, the fire teams focused on the next threat: those Selskrit attacking from the balconies overhead. The Jujari had easy cover under the half-walled railings, but they hadn’t been expecting a Recon Marine—well, a former one, anyway—to be wielding an MAR30. For the first time since awakening with his new eyes, Magnus actually lamented the fact that they’d take the weapon away from him.
He shook the thought from his head and selected Distortion Mode. The mag plates sprang from the MAR30’s side, and the weapon charged. Magnus aimed at the ceiling overhead and pulled the trigger. The invisible energy wave went to work, disrupting any biological matter on the floor directly above him. He heard the Jujari let out wails as their bodies decomposed.
Combatants on the surrounding balconies made the fatal mistake of popping their heads up to see what was the matter. The rest of the fire-team members seized the opportunity and sent blaster bolts crisscrossing up to the next levels. At least two Jujari slammed into railings and pitched over the side, landing on the tiled floor with a smack.
“We need to keep clearing rooms,” Magnus yelled over comms. “And I need actionable intel on where our hostages are.”
“My guess is we’re going up,” Rix replied.
“I need to be sure of that, Marauder.”
“Copy.”
“So until then, we clear each room.”
“You go, LT.” Dutch fired another round at a Jujari who’d dared move his head around a column on the second floor. “Gilder and I will keep ’em busy. Take Haney in case you need a medic.”
“Roger that, Corporal. Make sure one of you gets to the other side. I want counter fields of fire.”
“Can do.”
Magnus and Rix peeled away and led the remaining fire-team members under the shadow of the balcony. They started methodically clearing each room on the floor, making their way around the square’s perimeter.
“Got our stairs going up,” Rix yelled. He pointed his MC90 up a narrow circular staircase in the far right-side corner, directly behind one of the turret emplacements they’d cleared moments before.
“After you.” Magnus looked over his shoulder to see Dutch and Gilder keeping the Selskrit on the upper levels pinned down. “Keep it up, Corporal. We’re heading up.”
Dutch nodded to him from across the way. Rix started up the stairs, leading with his weapon’s front sight, with Magnus right behind him. The Marauder’s boots beat slowly up the steps, shoulders and hips twisting to account for the tight radius. “Contact!”
Sparks glinted off the curved sandstone walls as Rix knelt and returned fire. Magnus wanted to join him, but the space was too small. It’s a wonder that any Jujari can negotiate this stairwell.
“How many?” Magnus asked.
“Four!” Rix opened up his MC90 to full auto, the stairwell filling with strobing light.
Magnus wanted in. “Advance, Rix! Come on!”
Rix took the cue and moved forward. But no sooner had he taken a step than he grunted and dropped to a knee.
“You hit?”
“I’m good,” Rix said, firing with one hand.
Magnus couldn’t see if Rix had been hit, and he still couldn’t see around the corner toward the enemy.
“Prone, prone!” Magnus said, tapping Rix on the lower back. The Marauder slid forward onto his chest, continuing to fire, as Magnus selected Wide Displacement. He pulled the trigger, cleared the top step in the time it took for the weapon to charge, then pointed a perfectly timed blast at whatever awaited them in the balcony corridor.
Magnus’s shot swept between the open-faced columns and the left-side wall, filling the hallway with bright blue light. Three Jujari were flung backwards, feet over head, and collided with one another. They landed in a heap, rolling in death throes.
“Can you move?” Magnus asked.
“I can shoot,” Rix said—which meant he was hurt badly enough that he wasn’t getting up.
Dammit! Magnus thought. “Well, fire on those bastards now! My thirty’s recharging!”
Rix aimed his MC90 and drilled the mass of Jujari bodies with several rounds. Legs twitched as the Marauder dispensed a blaster enema the Selskrit would never walk away from.
As soon as his MAR30 was ready, Magnus echoed the shots, making sure the beasties were done. Then he advanced, sweeping his sight target over the far side, across open air, and to his current side of the level. Haney bent to look at Rix while the remaining members went along the back wall and progressed down the right side of the square.
Jujari, Marines, and Marauders exchanged fire across and between levels. Sparks sprinkled down like electric rain in an afternoon thunderstorm. Magnus noted two rooms on his left and another at the end of the corridor. He chanced a look inside the first room. Empty. He quickstepped to the second. Also empty. There was no way he was getting lucky on the third. He hugged the left wall, careful to stay in the balcony’s shadow to avoid enemy fire overhead from across the square.
Deep breath. Adrenaline high.
Magnus spun into the room at a crouch, MAR30 muzzle dead center. The Jujari at the window looked much smaller than any he’d encountered
so far. Maybe a female or an adolescent. But the Selskrit was busy firing a subcompact through the bars, hammering one of Abimbola’s skiffs. Magnus didn’t waste another second. He fired one round at the base of the Selskrit’s skull. The beast crumpled, weapon clattering out between the bars.
“Left side clear,” Magnus said.
“Right side clear,” Nolan added.
“We’ll make a Marine out of you yet, navy boy.”
“Lieutenant!” It was Haney on comms. “Need you at Rix’s position.”
Damn. That’s not good. Still, Magnus had learned long ago not to make assumptions until all the intel was in. Hasty decisions could be as dangerous as late ones.
He ran to Haney. “What’ve you got for me?”
“Punctured lung and a gut shot.”
Splick. He’d seen more than one Marine die from a gut wound—it was a bad way to go. Magnus looked at Rix’s pale face. “How you doing, Marauder?”
“Pissed.”
“Copy that.” Magnus looked back at Haney. “Talk to me, medic.”
“Medivac. Stat.”
“Can you manage him?”
“Can do,” Haney said.
“Okay, Rix. Listen. You fought good.”
“No, no,” Rix said in a weak voice. “I’ve still got fight in me.”
“You do, I know. But not today.”
“Marine-Boss, you can’t—”
“I can, and I’m going to.” Magnus touched his earpiece to connect with Abimbola. “Bimby, you’ve got Rix coming out hot. Cover requested. Needs medical attention.”
“Understood,” Abimbola said, his voice betraying neither concern nor surprise. “We will be ready.”
“Ground floor is clear,” Magnus told Haney, “but don’t assume splick. Copy?”
“Roger that, Lieutenant.”
Magnus helped Haney sling Rix over his shoulder and then led them to the narrow stairwell. He turned as Nolan hailed him over comms.