“Is this all of you?” Abaddon asked, stopping in front of Tyra. His glowing blue eyes tracked through the crowd, as if performing a head count.
Tyra forced herself to breathe normally and keep her expression neutral. Despite her concern that Atara might still be infected with Abaddon’s consciousness, she’d instructed Brak to hide with her children in one of the Veritus’s storage rooms. So no, technically this wasn’t all of them.
Abaddon’s gaze landed on Tyra, and he cocked his head curiously. “Your entire crew is here?” he asked again.
Tyra nodded. “Yes.”
Abaddon smiled. “Then why am I detecting three life signs below decks?”
“What? What are you talking about?” Tyra struggled not to stammer as her heart jumped in her chest with a painful stab of adrenaline.
Abaddon’s gaze appeared to drift out of focus. “Two children and a... non-human,” he decided, nodding to himself. “Your children and their guardian, I presume?”
Tyra said nothing to that, but the assembled crew shuffled their feat uneasily at the mention of her children. Tyra’s mind raced to come up with a way out.
Abaddon turned and nodded to the Elemental standing to his right. “Go fetch them. If the non-human gives you trouble, kill him.”
The Elemental nodded and started toward the nearest set of doors leading out of the hangar. As he went, the Faro drew a transparent blade from a scabbard on his back. A split second later it began humming and shimmering with an energy field. Tyra imagined Brak being cut in half by that blade as he tried to defend her children, and she winced.
“Wait!” she said.
“Halt,” Abaddon called out. He smiled and raised hairless eyebrows. “Yes?”
“I’ll call them up here,” Tyra said. “No one has to die.”
“Very well, but I’m afraid you are wrong. Someone definitely needs to die.”
Tyra scowled. “If you’re trying to convince us that Etherus is the enemy and you’re the misunderstood villain, you should probably stop threatening to kill people.”
Abaddon’s eyes appeared to dance with amusement. “Who is worse: the one who does something evil, or the one who could stop it from happening, but chooses not to?”
Tyra set her jaw and shook her head. “Etherus will stop you.”
“Yes, I used to think that, too, but after committing the first few trillion murders, and taking quadrillions of slaves, one begins to doubt such things.”
“You’re doing it to yourselves,” Tyra said, hoping Etherus’s arguments for his inaction would put a dent in Abaddon’s smug exterior. “You don’t have souls. All of the beings you’ve enslaved are just empty copies of the original Faros’ minds.”
“I see you’ve been schooled in the latest dogma,” Abaddon replied, smiling. “Let’s say that’s all true. Even if souls do exist, what difference do they make? Clone yourself and your mind a dozen times, then ask each of your clones if they think they’re alive and free to make their own choices, and they’ll all say that they are. Then kill the clones that you gave life to, and when you’re done, won’t you have committed twelve counts of murder? Or is it somehow acceptable for you to kill them because you were only killing yourself?”
Tyra frowned and shook her head, unnerved by that argument.
“Won’t all twelve clones beg for their lives if they are given the chance?” Abaddon pressed. “Won’t they scream and cry if you torture them?”
“They’re like computers. Programs scripted to behave a certain way...” Tyra replied, but even as she said that, she doubted the truth of what she was saying.
“You are a scientist,” Abaddon said, nodding to her. “You believe in observable evidence. What is the observable difference between a being with a soul and one without? I know there have been experiments.”
“People’s clones behaved more predictably, in more deterministic ways than the original people. That unpredictability is attributed to souls,” Tyra said.
“Exactly,” Abaddon replied. “But if souls do exist, aren’t they subject to their own higher-order version of deterministic forces? How is that any different? What is it that supposedly makes the soulful alive and the soulless dead?”
Tyra fumbled for a response, but she couldn’t hope to answer those arguments without knowing exactly what souls were and how they gave people a free will.
“Food for thought, isn’t it? Now enough stalling,” Abaddon said, waving his hand imperiously. “Get your children up here. We have a shuttle to catch.” He gestured to the ship they’d come in on, a medium-sized, matte black vessel.
Tyra grimaced and got on the comms to contact Brak. She told him to come to the hangar bay and warned him not to resist capture.
When she was done, Abaddon nodded and gestured to his Elementals. “Get the others on board.”
Wordlessly the two black-robed Faros moved through the crowd, ushering everyone toward the transport. A few officers shuffled forward a few steps, but they were all obviously dragging their feet.
Tyra wondered how just two Faros were going to compel compliance from her crew, but then they began gesturing to the stragglers, and invisible forces seemed to take hold of them, shoving them forward and drawing exclamations of shock from their lips.
When Tyra failed to follow the Elementals’ directions, something invisible punched her between her shoulder blades, shoving her toward the Faros’ ship. She stumbled and almost fell, but managed to avoid crying out in pain. She refused to give them the satisfaction.
They must have some kind of grav guns in their palms, she realized as she and her crew began a very literal forced march toward the Faros’ shuttle. She thought of her children receiving similarly rough treatment, and felt a burst of rage building inside of her, goading her to action. She calmed herself thinking that Brak would probably pick Theola up, and Atara was technically one of the Faros, so she probably wouldn’t mind walking on her own.
Tyra followed her crew up the shuttle’s landing ramp into a cavernous space with bench seats along the sides. The Elementals moved between them effortlessly, pushing some people down onto the benches, and leaving others to stand. Tyra was one of the ones left standing. By the time everyone was inside, there was barely room to breathe, let alone to sit. The Elementals went to guard the top of the landing ramp and wait, their glowing eyes—yellow and orange—scanning the group with cold contempt.
The minutes trickled slowly by with the crew murmuring amongst themselves, passing nervous questions back and forth: What’s going to happen now? Will Etherus save us? Who are they going to execute first?
The tension and fear in the room was palpable, radiating from person to person in hot, noxious waves. Or maybe that was just their sweat.
Tyra refused to join the speculation. Her gaze remained fixed on the exit and the landing ramp, waiting for her children to arrive with Brak. Abaddon hadn’t come in yet, so he was obviously waiting for them, too....
The thought of leaving him alone with her daughters, even with Brak to watch over them, was more than Tyra could take. Tyra pushed through the crowd, stepping on toes and elbowing her officers in the ribs to get back to the landing ramp.
“Ouch!” Lieutenant Argos said, his eyes flashing as she stepped on his foot. Then he appeared to notice that it was her, and his expression softened. “Captain? Is something wrong?”
She shook her head, her heart pounding and palms sweating. “I need to be there when my children arrive. I can’t leave them alone out there with that... thing.”
Argos nodded and stepped aside. “Make way for the captain!” he called out.
Everyone turned and Tyra offered a grim smile, hoping they couldn’t see how badly she was losing it. After a moment’s hesitation, her crew began stepping on each other’s toes to get out of her way, and Tyra pressed forward until she reached the top of the ramp. There one of the Elementals planted a palm on her chest and shoved her back a step, but Tyra barely noticed. Her gaze was fixed on the spot
where Abaddon stood with her two daughters and Brak in the hangar below. She sucked in a hurried breath, and grimaced.
She should have known to expect something like this, but seeing the evidence with her own eyes was far more visceral than any verbal warning.
Brak stood a few steps away from Abaddon, shielding Theola hiding behind his legs. Atara stood in front of them, a mere arm’s length from the Faro king, her back straight and a reverent expression on her face.
She’d had dropped the act. The five-year-old human child was gone, leaving nothing but a dutiful Faro soldier in her place.
Chapter 28
Aboard the Separatist Fleet
Lucien watched the battle play out from the bridge of the separatist sphere ship. There was no way for him to gauge who was winning, but ships in the Faros’ defense fleet were exploding left and right, and so far the separatists had only lost one of their sixty-seven sphere ships.
“Who’s winning?” Addy asked from where she was sitting on the deck, near the back of the bridge with Garek and Brak. Her voice held a note of apprehension, but her expression had lost most of its urgency. It had been almost three hours since they’d arrived at the Forge, and the battle had still barely begun. When Abaddon didn’t immediately reply, Addy glanced behind her, to the exit and the crab-creatures guarding it. Turning back to the fore, she went on, “I hate to interrupt your concentration with mundane concerns, but we could use a break.”
Lucien nodded at that. His stomach was aching with hunger, and his mouth was dry. This battle looked like it could be raging for days, and as much as he wanted to stick around to track every laser beam and missile, they weren’t actually doing anything useful on the bridge.
“Abaddon?” Lucien prompted.
The alien’s gaze was fixed on the holoscreen in front of him. His glowing blue eyes were unblinking, his hands swiping furiously through the air to manipulate the display.
“Guards—take these four to the mess hall,” he finally said.
One of the crab creatures replied in its bag-of-marbles voice: “Yes, master.”
The bridge doors rumbled open and both creatures scuttled aside. Lucien walked up to them and the others joined him from the back of the bridge. One of the guards led the way, while the other waited until they were all through the doors before scuttling after them.
As soon as the doors rumbled shut behind them, Garek spoke up: “He never answered the question—about who’s winning.”
“Do you think it’s because we’re losing?” Addy asked.
Lucien frowned and shook his head. “I’m not sure we need to worry about that. Separatist or not, Abaddon isn’t capable of sacrificing himself for a higher purpose. He’ll retreat long before it comes to that.”
“Leaving us back where we started, with all of humanity in danger,” Garek pointed out.
“True,” Lucien said. “But my point was, if we were losing, I think Abaddon would already be withdrawing from the fight. The fact that we’re still fighting means there’s at least a chance we’ll win.”
Garek nodded, and Addy let out a tremulous sigh. She glanced at him and bit her lip. “I don’t know what to hope for. If we win, you die, if we lose... everyone else dies.”
“Maybe not. The Faros wouldn’t wipe out an entire species just because they can. They’d probably make slaves out of most of us.”
“Doesn’t sound any better to me,” Garek replied.
“Slavery isss death,” Brak agreed, hissing loudly. “Better to die free than to live a ssslave.”
Lucien frowned, unable to agree. Better that humanity live to find some other way to defeat the Faros.
They followed the guard scuttling in front of them into an elevator. The one behind them squeezed in, stepping on Lucien’s foot with a surprisingly heavy leg. He winced, and withdrew to the corner of the elevator as it dropped through the ship. Lights from passing decks strobed rapidly through the windows in the doors of the elevator. They must have passed at least a hundred floors before the elevator slowed to a stop and the doors parted once more.
They walked out into a giant room, filled with food stands and various kinds of adaptable seating scattered in-between. Every kind of alien imaginable crowded the space, from lumbering four-legged beasts of burden to two-legged humanoids, flying avian species, and hopping amphibians—even some kind of floating balloon-like creatures.
“Wow...” Addy breathed, her eyes skipping around the room.
Lucien nodded slowly. It reminded him of the mess hall on Freedom Station, where they’d met the Marauders, all runaway Faro slaves. Back then, in a mess hall not unlike this one, Oorgurak, the green-skinned Faro had first explained to them about the significance of The Holy City, the Forge, and the other side of the universe—although apparently not even he had known that the other side of the universe was made of antimatter.
Garek glanced down at the nearest of the crab-like guards who’d brought them here. “How do we know what’s safe for us to eat?”
“If you do not know, how am I supposed to know?” the creature replied, membranes nictating over its upper two eyes, and then over its bottom two.
“Never mind. We’ll risk it,” Garek muttered, and started toward the nearest food stand. Lucien followed him there, with Addy walking along beside him. The aromas and odors wafting through the mess hall were overwhelming and confusing—some appetizing, others nauseating.
Lucien walked around the food stand Garek had chosen, sniffing at the colorful, steaming platters of food behind the serving counter. It was impossible to know what to order from sight and smell alone, but Lucien was determined not to make a mistake with what might be his last meal.
“What would you recommend for us?” Lucien asked the tan-colored reptilian behind this particular stand. Three bright pink eyes turned to them. The creature cocked its head, as if considering the question. Abruptly, a long pink tongue darted out of the creature’s mouth, licking Lucien’s lips.
Lucien jumped back a step, wiping his mouth on his sleeve with a wrinkled nose. He was about to give the lizard creature a piece of his mind when he noticed it was smacking its lips, sampling the flavor of something—of me, Lucien thought.
The creature spoke in a gravelly voice: “G’hartan root and roast dekku.”
Lucien nodded slowly. “One order of that, please...”
Addy walked up beside him. “Make that two orders,” she said.
The tan-colored reptile nodded and fetched two empty platters in its upper two arms. Using its lower two, it scooped out pink chunks of what must be the g’hartan root before turning aside to retrieve two skewers of blackened meat from a sizzling grill. He passed both platters over the counter and then asked, “For drinking?”
“Water,” Lucien said, not willing to take a risk on exotic food and beverages.
Addy nodded. “For me, too, please.”
The lizard passed two metal cups of water over the counter and then Lucien and Addy went to take their seats on a nearby bench under a red-flowering green-leafed tree.
They weren’t given any utensils, but Lucien was too hungry to care. He ate with his hands, stuffing the g’hartan root into his mouth in greedy handfuls, and biting off chunks of dekku from his skewer. The food was surprisingly delicious.
“Not bad for a last meal,” Lucien said, washing it down with a swig of water.
Addy glared at him. “How can you be so blasé about your own death?”
Lucien snorted and shook his head. “I’m not, but if I don’t make light of it, I’m afraid I’ll lose my nerve.”
Addy abruptly stood. “I need to use the restroom.” And with that, she left.
“Me, too...” Lucien replied, but she was already striding away. He cast about for a place to deposit his leftover food, but before he could identify a waste-receptacle or locate a kitchen patrol bot (assuming these Separatists even had such a thing), a giant bird swooped down and landed in front of him. Standing on the deck, it was at least four fe
et tall, and its wingspan must have been twelve feet or more. It had short black fur all over its body, as opposed to feathers. The furry black bird spent a moment cocking its head at them. It had a sharp-looking beak, but also a mouth full of needle-sharp teeth sitting below that.
Glittering green eyes blinked at Lucien, and two long, spindly arms unfolded from its wings, reaching tentatively for Lucien’s plate. “May I?” it asked in a fluty voice.
Lucien blinked, surprised that it could speak Faro. His brow furrowed with bemusement as he tracked its gaze to the leftovers on his and Addy’s platters. “If you want, sure, but why don’t you—”
The bird creature snatched his platter and began shoveling food into the mouth below its beak.
Lucien watched the alien eat, wondering why it didn’t just get its own food. They hadn’t been charged for anything they’d ordered, but maybe this creature’s job was to help with clean-up? And the way it does that is to eat the leftovers.
Lucien looked away and spent a moment scanning the far walls of the mess hall for doors or markings to suggest where the restrooms were. He spied some glowing signs with suggestive symbols on them and headed that way. Once he arrived at those doors, he could see that he’d guessed right. As further confirmation, he ran into Addy on her way out of the door labeled Female Humanoids. She walked right by him as if she hadn’t seen him. Lucien stopped and turned to watch her go, wondering if he should go after her.
They shouldn’t split up on a ship this big with so many different aliens milling about—who knew what kind of trouble they could accidentally get themselves into?
But Lucien’s bladder gave a painful stab, reminding him of more urgent matters. He winced and turned to enter the restroom marked Male Humanoids. The door swished open as he stepped up to it—
And a noxious cloud of fumes gushed out. He turned aside and sucked in a desperate breath before entering the restroom. Hurrying through the open door, he found a likely-looking row of dish-shaped urinals and emptied his bladder as fast as he could. Unfortunately, he ran out of air before he was done. A series of violent explosions issued from one of the stalls behind him just as he was forced to suck in another breath. His stomach heaved with the smell and his head spun.
Dark Space Universe (Book 3): The Last Stand Page 19