by Elana Brooks
“Hmm.” Sarthex teased Rabbi Sensei’s tether with the ball of energy. It sizzled as it brushed against the shining cord, vaporizing a thin layer. Keiko swallowed.
Sarthex nodded in satisfaction. “I’d let him speak if I thought he’d beg you for his life, but I know he’s too stubborn for that.” Suddenly the ball of energy whisked away from Rabbi Sensei’s tether and darted at Keiko’s, stopping barely a millimeter before touching it. “Nor would he beg for yours. He’d watch me kill you and never utter a word. You know that, and yet still if I can convince you that you truly can save him by it, you’ll sell your life and honor for his sake.”
Keiko didn’t respond.
Sarthex laughed. “I’ve found your price. All that remains is to work out a way to structure the bargain so that we’re both assured of getting what we want. I promise, as soon as you tell me what your fellow alien did before we captured him, I’ll release this one unharmed, free to return to your planet and continue to defy us in whatever pitiful way he chooses. What will it take for you to believe that?”
Keiko met his gaze. “Release him first. Then I’ll speak.”
Sarthex chuckled. “I’m afraid I don’t believe your promises, either.”
Keiko’s voice was dry. “Then we’re at an impasse.”
“Indeed.” Sarthex pulled back his lips from his teeth. Adrian wasn’t sure if it was a snarl or an imitation of a human smile. “I suppose I’ll have to fall back on the sort of techniques your fellow alien was finding so persuasive before he developed a defense against them. I doubt you’ll be able to do the same.” His eyes narrowed.
Adrian watched Keiko’s eyes go unfocused and her face pale. Her body tensed against its bonds. He wondered what torturous vision Sarthex was forcing into her mind.
Suddenly she went limp and her eyes drifted closed.
Sarthex spat a Seraphim curse and lashed his tail. Agitatedly he moved to examine Keiko from every direction. “This one, too? What—”
He stopped and whirled on Rabbi Sensei, who also hung unconscious within his sphere. “Ah,” the Seraph muttered. “Now I see. The two of you are linked in some fashion the containment field isn’t designed to block. The link amplifies pain until it overwhelms you both. Very interesting. Hannex!”
The other Ex-caste Seraph moved forward from the ring of Order Police. “Yes, Commander?”
“Can you reconfigure the containment field to disable the alien’s link?”
“I should be able to, Commander, now that you’ve discovered the source of the problem. It might take a little while.”
“Do so, as quickly as you can.”
Hannex waved his fins in acknowledgement of the order and set to work diligently poking and prodding at the gray mist.
Sarthex turned on Adrian. “I suppose you share a similar link with the ugly one. If she’s still on the ship, perhaps I can use it to make her vulnerable to capture.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment, dreaming up some new nightmare, Adrian was sure. This time he would have to clamp down on his emotion and not let it into the soul bond. He made the necessary mental adjustment, bracing himself to endure whatever awful vision assaulted him without hope of any respite.
It hit hard and fast: Beverly engulfed in flames, skin blackening, flesh splitting and peeling away from white bones…
He damped his pain with all his power. If Beverly was still on the ship, he couldn’t allow her to black out and lose her ability to defend herself.
He only knew he’d succeeded when the vision ended and he realized he was still conscious. Sarthex nodded sagely. “So she’s deserted you. You and I both know she lacks courage. I suppose she was too frightened to remain here after all her companions were captured. She must be well on her way back to your planet by now.”
“That’s right,” Adrian said. He hoped Sarthex was correct and Beverly had been too smart to hang around. She’d have no chance to rescue all of them alone. In any case, he had to do what he could to encourage Sarthex to believe she was long gone, so he’d call off the hunt for her. “She’s safe from you. So feel free to do your worst against me. I know you can’t really harm her.”
“Even so, I know what you find unbearable,” Sarthex said conversationally. “You’ve already broken once. Eventually you’ll run out of lies and confess the truth.”
Adrian wasn’t surprised when the rape scenario sprang back to life before his eyes. He couldn’t look away, of course. All he could do was repeat over and over to himself that it wasn’t real. He concentrated on sealing his pain away from the soul bond. He wasn’t sure how much might reach her if she really was on her way back to Earth, but Beverly couldn’t be allowed to feel even a shadow of this horror.
The scene continued past the point where it had stopped before, playing out in gruesome, explicit detail. He tried desperately to think of some lie that would keep Sarthex busy for a while checking, all the time trying not to see the specter of Beverly’s brutalized body, trying not to hear her screams, her voice begging him to save her. But he couldn’t think, couldn’t block the images as the first man finished and another took his place.
“Stop!”
Had he spoken? No. As the vision dissolved and he blinked hard, trying to clear the fuzz from his vision, he saw Beverly confronting Sarthex. Her astral form blazed so bright the glare nearly blinded him. “Leave him alone!” she cried, and hurled a ball of energy at the Seraph’s tether.
Sarthex blocked it. He laughed, but there was surprise beneath the contempt. “So you didn’t run after all.” He shielded easily against a flurry of attacks. “Brave, I admit, but stupid. You can’t hope to defeat me. Not when you’re alone and I have thousands at my command.”
Order Police burst into the bridge from every side. Beverly fought them in a whirling blur of flashing astral energy, but they quickly overwhelmed her. Gray mist swirled out and enveloped her. Adrian wrenched against his bonds, but they held as firm as always. In moments Beverly, too, hung paralyzed, helpless to do anything but glare furiously at Sarthex.
He waved his fins lazily and laughed at Adrian. “Now, you see, your one consolation is gone. No longer is her pain an illusion. I can harm her as I wish, and it will be all too real.” He turned to the other Ex-caste. “Hannex, have you discovered how to counteract their link?”
Hannex looked up from his work. “I believe I have, sir.”
“Make the same adjustments to the containment fields on these two.”
Adrian watched, despairing, as the Seraph did incomprehensible things to the gray mist. It swirled before his eyes, making the whole scene shimmer and blur.
Eventually his vision cleared, though a trace of filmy haze remained. Hannex moved back and dipped his head to Sarthex. “It’s done, Commander.”
“Very good.” Sarthex looked speculatively at Beverly. “Let’s test your work.”
Beverly’s eyes went blank and she yelped. “Get away from Adrian, you—” She gasped, then struggled helplessly. “Stop it! You’re hurting him!”
Adrian flung his mind wide open, all defenses dropped, but nothing came to him down the soul bond, not even a faint echo of Beverly’s pain. He sent his own rage at seeing her suffer into it, but nothing resonated back.
“Excellent,” Sarthex said.
Abruptly Beverly fell silent, panting. “What was that?”
“Just an illusion,” Adrian told her. He blinked hard, trying to clear the tears that were making his view of her shimmer and tremble. “He can’t really hurt us. Only force imaginary pictures into our minds.”
Sarthex curled his lips back from his teeth. “I can’t? Will it hurt her, do you think, if I make her see that last vision I showed you?”
Cold horror flooded Adrian’s gut. “No,” he whispered. “Don’t you dare!” He threw all the power of his mind against Sarthex, but the containment field absorbed it effortlessly.
Beverly stared at him, confused and afraid. “What vision? Adrian, what—”
Her e
yes went unfocused and her lips parted. Slowly her face blanched. She writhed, her whole body fighting to escape. With a blaze of helpless hatred, Adrian realized Sarthex was allowing her just enough freedom of movement for Adrian to understand exactly what she was experiencing.
Beverly clawed at her invisible attacker, without effect. Her eyes grew huge and round and she started to scream, raw, frantic sounds that sliced into Adrian’s heart.
“I sabotaged the sleep tanks,” he blurted. “Soon they’re going to start malfunctioning, one by one. There won’t be enough of you left to finish decelerating.”
“Wrong answer,” Sarthex drawled. Beverly’s screams trailed off. Broken, hopeless sobs wracked her body.
Adrian shook. His stomach twisted with nausea and his head swam. Everything took on an unreal edge that made him afraid he was about to pass out. “I… I released a virus… a deadly… we bioengineered it…” Sarthex’s smug expression didn’t change.
How stupid could he get? There was no air in the ship. And astral forms wouldn’t breathe it if there were, or be susceptible to any sickness from it. “I mean, I injected it. Into the life support… um, tanks, hoses, that carry air, or, you know, nutrients, to the sleep tanks…”
“I can keep this up as long as it takes,” Sarthex told him. “How long before her minds is damaged so badly she’ll never recover? Are you too late already, or can you still save her from the worst of what I have in mind? Only the truth will do it.”
Beverly’s heartbroken whimpers escalated into horrified new shrieks. “No!” she cried. “Not—Adrian, please, help me!” Her hands groped blindly toward him, pleading. “Don’t just stand there watching! Make them stop!”
Please, God, let us die. If Adrian could have broken his tether and Beverly’s in that moment, he would have done it without a qualm. But he was as powerless to end their lives as he was to end their suffering by any means other than the one Sarthex demanded.
Desperately he sought to feel her agony, to reflect it back at her. But the soul bond remained unresponsive. It wasn’t as blank as before—he felt a faint echo of his own pain, as if Beverly were heavily damping what he poured down their link. He redoubled his efforts, throwing every scrap of his misery into the bond. If only he could grant them both the blessed release of unconsciousness! But the containment field held firm.
Beverly pressed her fists to her mouth. “No,” she whispered. “Not you, too. Adrian, stop. I don’t want—” Her hands flew out and batted at the air. She screamed again, even louder, but laced with despair. Wretchedly, Adrian knew exactly what Sarthex must be imagining for her.
How could he not be feeling even a tiny echo of her pain? Was the containment field really that good? She must be battering it just as hard from her side as he was from his, but it didn’t leak even a trace.
Despairing, Adrian knew he was beaten. He couldn’t let Beverly go on suffering this way, even if he must sacrifice Earth to save her.
“Stop,” he said dully. “You win, Sarthex. I made con—”
The world shimmered and blurred around him. Disorientation wrenched Adrian’s gut. Beverly and her containment field vanished.
A different Beverly stood in front of Sarthex, sharp and clear and vividly real. She held the broken end of the Seraph’s tether in one hand and a brilliant ball of energy in the other.
“Fuck you,” she said, and blew his head off.
Chapter 34
The fight wasn’t over, of course. Not by a long shot. Beverly blasted back the circle of Order Police closing in on her during the instant it took Sarthex to transform his remaining astral flesh into a smaller version of himself.
Clever trick, that. It neatly circumvented the time it would take for his astral flesh to regenerate. Beverly filed the idea away for future use. Assuming her future lasted longer than a few more seconds.
Sarthex snarled and lunged for the broken end of his tether. She summoned an enormous ball of energy and flung it at him. The Seraph blocked most of it, but a chunk of his tail sizzled away. He ignored the injury and kept coming at her.
She waved his tether tauntingly in his face and fired another shot. He was slower to block it this time, giving her time to fall back a little further out of his reach. Not too far, though. She wanted to keep him trying to reach his tether. If he gave up on that and fled back to his body, she’d have a hard time stopping him before he reached it.
“Let them go,” she said, as he flung energy at her and she reflected it back at him. “As soon as they’re clear of the ship you can have your tether back.”
He laughed. She felt his mind assault hers, as malicious as ever. “I will give you nothing, ugly weakling. I will take my tether back.”
A part of her quailed before his attack as she had before, but the rest of her was riding a wave of fury and elation and surging power. “Bring it on.” She launched a triple attack, left, right and center. He blocked all three, but barely.
God, she would make him pay for what he’d done to Adrian. She hadn’t been able to tell exactly what illusions he’d been forcing into Adrian’s head, but they must have been doozies. Agony had beat against her through the soul bond. She’d longed to stop damping and grant him oblivion, but she didn’t dare gamble that this time she’d be able to stay conscious herself. And with no one to protect her astral form while she was out of action, she couldn’t risk blacking out. So she’d determinedly used her superior strength to resist every attempt he made to break through her shielding.
She wished she’d had longer after she arrived back at her hiding place in the wall of the bridge to watch and come up with some sort of plan. Ideally she would have figured out a way to free the others before launching an open attack. She had no illusions that her chances of defeating Sarthex and the Order Police single-handedly were much better than nil. But whatever Sarthex had shown Adrian had forced him to his breaking point, and she’d had no choice but to act. At least surprise had given her one unblocked shot. She’d made the most of it with a direct hit to the Commander’s tether.
The telepathy block she was holding around the bridge should keep other Seraphim from joining the ones already here, at least until someone realized it was there and broke through it. But she was still ridiculously outnumbered. She kept getting distracted from Sarthex by the need to block shots from the ring of Order Police and fire off enough energy at them to keep them back. To have any hope of defeating the Seraphim Commander, she’d have to give him her complete attention.
There had to be some way to free the others from that damn gray mist. She was sure Sarthex must know how. Could she grab the information from his mind? He’d been able to invade their minds and pull out thoughts and memories, at least when they weren’t actively blocking him. Surprise could be her ally again, if she was fast.
She sent a wave of energy surging at the Order Police to keep them occupied while she was busy. Then she locked eyes with Sarthex and opened her mind to his thoughts.
Overwhelming power, profound confidence, arrogant certainty—no surprise there. Beverly delved ruthlessly into his memories, zeroing in on the detail she needed.
There. A young Sarthex imprisoned in a sphere of gray mist, an older Seraph laughing scornfully. He would be trapped here, humiliated, until he tore the key to freedom from his captor/teacher’s mind. Misery and rage fueled his telepathy, stronger than ever before, until after a long struggle he at last broke through the other’s shielding and seized the prize he sought—
Wordless knowledge flooded Beverly’s mind, just as it had flooded Sarthex’s in his memory. With a cry of triumph she reached for the releases she now knew how to find. Adrian’s containment field collapsed.
Deadly rage blazed in Adrian’s eyes as he drove toward Sarthex, firing globes of white-hot energy in a relentless stream. Beverly tossed him the end of the Seraph’s tether; he caught it without looking. She gratefully let him take over occupying Sarthex’s attention while she attended to the rest of the containment fields. O
ne by one the others joined them in battle.
As soon as she was sure they could handle the Order Police, Beverly shot to Adrian’s aid. God, it was such a joy to fight side by side again, the soul bond granting them effortless coordination, unthinking unity. He dipped right and down, she soared left and up, and Sarthex was forced to writhe and twist to dodge both their attacks. Bit by bit they nibbled away his astral flesh, faster than he could regenerate. But his skill at reforming himself allowed him to fight back effectively, even when Adrian scored a hit that burned both eyes away. New ones coalesced and Sarthex launched a return attack without even an instant of disorientation.
Pain lanced Beverly’s side as one of Sarthex’s balls of energy burned through her shield and a swath of her astral flesh. Damn, that was too close to her tether. How long could he keep this up? Surely he must start to fade soon, or at least be forced to flee back to his body. “Damn it, die already!” she yelled at him.
His lip lifted in a sneer as he lobbed an energy ball behind him, nearly clipping Adrian’s shoulder. “Do you think I’m an Eek-caste, to be gasping for air after a few minutes? Ex-castes can dive to the bottom of the deepest ocean trenches. My body can survive without breath for more than an hour. Ample time to defeat you.”
His taunts didn’t slow down his disciplined defense and counterattacks. Beverly and Adrian were holding their own, but now she was worried. If they had to keep fighting so long before his broken tether killed him, too many things could go wrong. They had to figure out some way to end this quickly. Had Sarthex betrayed any weakness, any vulnerability they might exploit?
She put the question to Adrian in a flash of shared thought. Together they searched their memories.
Adrian zeroed in on the instant when she’d invaded Sarthex’s memories. Find his fears. Use them against him, as he did to us. Anger burned his thoughts into her brain. Weakness, mockery, humiliation—force him to experience them.
As soon as they agreed on the strategy, they put it into action. Beverly passed control of the telepathy block to Adrian. Adrian flashed a warning to the others to keep the Order Police from interfering. He launched a showy attack against Sarthex while Beverly fell back, composed herself for a moment, gathered all her strength, and plunged back into Sarthex’s mind.