Nyxia Unleashed_The Nyxia Triad

by Scott Reintgen

  Our group flinches as the sound of a whip cracks overhead. A static discharge sounds, followed by a thundering boom. The sky clears completely. The protective dome falls away. We all shield our eyes as the extra brightness floods down, reflecting harshly over the surface of the water. “We’re still protected,” Jacquelyn says. “I designed a secondary system to activate above the Sanctum. We felt it was important to witness this. For us and for you. Know your enemy.”

  A long minute passes. Jacquelyn eventually points south.

  “We’ve shown you who we are,” she says. “Now we’ll show you who Babel is.”

  It takes thirty seconds for the bombs to start falling.

  Great booms color the horizon with light. We watch as the First Ring goes up in flames. In every direction, explosions rake into the blue. Babel leaves nothing to chance. Sharper whines sound overhead. We all flinch, but Jacquelyn’s secondary system wards the dangers away. We watch the translucent layers catch a first and then a second and then a third missile. The explosions tongue skyward, ineffective.

  “Genocide. That was their plan in the end.” Jacquelyn’s whisper carries. “Do you see why the Imago kept them at a distance? They always feared this.”

  Jaime’s muttering darkly, his fists clenched. All that rage that’s boiling inside him is threatening to surface again. I can see him pounding the frozen marine with the nyxian crowbar. Parvin stands beside Omar. He sets a heavy hand on her shoulder as she covers her mouth in horror. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen his size look gentle.

  Isadora grips the edge of the railing, a familiar desperation written across her features. Every fear we’ve had about Babel since day one has built to this moment.

  Hundreds of thousands of deaths. It would have happened that way if not for the Imago’s plans. Babel has nowhere left to hide now. The truth is an ugly thing.

  “Time to go,” Jacquelyn says. “The trap’s been set.”

  They lead us back through the sanctuaries. Our equipment is already packed neatly aboard our ship. We move with purpose through the halls. We’re not afraid as bombs drop on distant buildings, but confident. I can feel Babel’s end hanging in the air like a promise.

  Servants rush through the halls, running twenty ways, hands full of last-minute supplies. By every other measure, practice has resulted in perfection for the Imago.

  As we enter the gardens, we find the chosen Remnant arranged in columned lines according to rank and station. They wait in their patient formation by the loading docks as the pressurized escape route opens up. The first boat drops, and there’s not even a second of hesitation as the first crew of Imago file on board. Guards take up the defensive stations as the chosen passengers march belowdecks. Captains are barking orders from every direction.

  After the first ship vanishes, there’s a noticeable staggering. One military boat followed by a passenger ship followed by more soldiers. Jacquelyn shouts orders, pulling my attention to the nearest techie. “Make sure you disable every security measure and flush our radiation signatures. I want green lights for all ships all the way out to the coast. Last time we wasted oxygen and time—let’s not repeat that mistake, okay?”

  I watch as he wheels back to the control panel. Our Genesis crew waits impatiently. Only Isadora and Ida aren’t with us. The Daughters invited them, as a matter of custom, into their boat. They framed it as a tradition for more honored guests, but I’m guessing it was their way of defusing whatever situations might come up. We need Morning fully focused.

  A ship splashes into the water tank as another rotates through the hangar, waiting to be dropped. Jacquelyn continues sounding commands.

  “Double-check your pressurized suits,” she shouts. “No radio contact when we reach the ocean floor. Preserve your oxygen at all costs. Keep the ascent slow; follow the models in the readouts. We’ll move to Cadence Point for our surface location, off the northern coast. We have four separate breakaway packs. Remnant and Genesis ships will prioritize reaching the coast. Military boats will patrol the surrounding waters. Understand?”

  We give an answering shout of affirmation.

  “Next ship is Genesis crew,” Jacquelyn calls out. “Let’s load it up.”

  Pressurized suits are passed back through our ranks as the boat splashes into place. We only practiced putting them on once, so it’s still a slight struggle to pull the bulky suits over clothes and boots. The suit hangs loose until I find the button on the shoulder that compresses the lining. A second button pops helmets up from shoulders. There are a few buddy checks before everyone begins the boarding process.

  As the glass visor closes, a robotic voice runs through calibrations inside my helmet.

  “Vitals: normal. Depth: sea level. Pressure: normal. Establishing link to communications network.”

  Jacquelyn’s voice pipes through the comm. A few others sound, affirming they’re linked up. I echo the confirmation as Morning takes her place at the center of the ship.

  Back on the platform, we see Isadora and Ida huddling beside the Daughters. Feoria and Ashling stand as regally as a pair of queens ever have. I remember that—at least for Feoria—this is a death march.

  She will stay behind as her people reach across the universe.

  “Morning.” Jacquelyn’s voice. “Assign stations. Let’s get moving.”

  Morning nods in answer. She sends Omar to the back of the ship, with Longwei in reserve. It takes two seconds to fire up the massive engines. Katsu and Alex are placed on the hips for steering. I can feel the tremble of nyxia as they establish their link.

  “Parvin up front,” Morning commands. “Jazzy, be a second set of eyes, please. I want Jaime, Holly, Jacquelyn, and Noor on the defensive stations. Let’s drop in.”

  Morning takes her captain’s chair, and for a second all I can do is stare. Is she really benching me? The others are snapping into action, obeying her directives.

  A long stride brings me to her side. “What about me? You know I can help.”

  She locks eyes with me. “If I get hurt, who captains the ship?”

  I swallow my anger. “Me.”

  “You,” she says firmly. “So sit back and trust me.”

  I reach down and squeeze her shoulder, lowering my voice. “You’ve got this.”

  I cross to the back of the ship and take a seat between Omar’s and Holly’s stations. Jacquelyn roams the deck, inspecting our arrangement. There’s chatter across the nyxian link as the familiar dome stretches up, knitting overhead, sealing us in. One look is enough to see that these walls are thicker than normal, meant for deep-sea diving.

  Parvin throws a thumbs-up to confirm we’re fully cocooned.

  “Genesis, how do we stand?” Morning shouts.

  The answer bellows out of us, all instinct. “Shoulder to shoulder!”

  Morning releases the supports and we drop in.

  “All right,” Jacquelyn says through the comm. “Quarter power. Let us drift. I’ll direct you to the tunnels we take for our evac route. Nice and steady for now.”

  Morning echoes her command. Everyone’s quiet as the windows go dark and the natural overhead light is replaced by occasional ticks of red or green. The emergency lights mark our descent until the tunnel ends and we’re left in the black.

  “Take this right tunnel for another five hundred meters,” Jacquelyn orders.

  I watch our progress patiently, feeling helpless. Morning’s the right person for the commander’s chair, but I still wish I could do something. Parvin relays the radar reading as Katsu and Alex guide us down a maintenance shaft. It’s tight, so the going is slow and steady. When the tunnel finally widens out, Jacquelyn orders us to dive.

  “Parvin, check your third screen. You can double down with an exo layer on our outer shell. It will keep us from feeling like we’re being stomped by ironhides.”

  Metal groans as we dive deeper and deeper.

  “Everyone,” Jacquelyn calls. “If you haven’t popped helmets, do it now.”


  The boat plunges into deeper dark. Our helmet readouts tick from one atmosphere to two. Morning notices the indicator. “What’s that mean?” she asks.

  “It means we’re really deep and we’re in trouble if anything goes wrong,” Jacquelyn answers.

  Our course straightens out, though, and the numbers hover in equilibrium. When we’ve found the final evacuation tunnel, Jacquelyn has us lock onto the ships ahead and behind us.

  “No radio communication between ships,” she explains. “We don’t want signatures being logged as we head to the surface. I’m going to walk you back through this, okay? There are four queens and four guards. We’re one of the queens. It’s our job to get to shore. Understand? No matter what happens, the rendezvous point is where we’re going.

  “This ship is my invention. Dual-engine, with sound-speed capability when she peaks. She’s the fastest thing on this planet, and nothing even comes close. So as long as we can get up to full speed, we’re going to be where we want to be before Babel’s radar even picks up our signal.”

  Parvin pipes in. “But we’re not expecting contact, are we?”

  “No,” Jacquelyn says simply. “Right now there are thousands of people going through hundreds of underground tunnels. Babel’s about to come down and start sifting through the wreckage. As soon as they figure out there aren’t any bodies, they’ll run their scans again and see that we’ve already moved all over the map. Good luck targeting us before we launch.”

  There’s another groan followed by another pop. Our crew’s attention flickers to the radar, but nothing is flashing red. Darkness dominates the windows. The readouts look clean. A ship ahead, a ship behind. “How do you know the lotteries will work?” Morning asks.

  Jacquelyn is quiet for a second. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “Sixty people survive,” Morning says. “Out of what? Fifty thousand on each ring?”

  “We know the odds,” Jacquelyn replies stiffly.

  “I just mean … the slings. They chose their own way. What if others do the same?”

  Jacquelyn’s voice is quiet but steady. “Feoria chose to believe the best about their people. Every generation that’s ever existed has understood: the fate of the society comes before personal interests. Ultimately, that’s why I chose to become one of them. When Feoria decided this was the best way forward, it became the best way forward for all of us. That’s how things in our world work. Those we leave behind? They’ll make the sacrifice for the good of all. It helps to have a queen willing to do the same.”

  I glance over. Her suit mask frames the determined look on her face. I haven’t given the other stations much thought. If it was humanity, there’s no way their plan would work. People would be eating each other alive outside the stations the second they didn’t win a ticket out.

  “We should conserve oxygen and resources,” Jacquelyn announces. “Let’s keep things quiet until we’re through the tunnel, at least.”

  Her words leave us in the quiet, in the dark, to our thoughts. Hours of silence stretch out. Morning glances back a few times, winking once or twice. I have to remind myself to breathe.

  I try to imagine the surface. The rings that the Imago have called home for generations, all destroyed. Babel ships sweeping out of the sky. The marines from the bases activating. I can picture Kit thinking it’s the coolest thing he’s ever seen. I have to swallow back the guilt that tries to edge up my throat then. Kit and his dad and his mom.

  Did they cross the universe just to die?

  It helps to imagine Defoe instead. The conqueror coming down to a world that will be his long enough to see it go up in flames. Pops would tell me to never wish the worst on someone. I feel like maybe he’d make an exception for a man who masterminded a failed genocide.

  Eventually we reach the end of the buried ocean-floor tunnel.

  It dumps us out into a wider, emptier darkness. The boats detach and start their ascents. The front ship marks our destination on the radar, and we all watch the progress, the frightening inevitability of light. I’m trying to imagine us crossing the rest of the ocean, landing on another foreign shore, heading for the launch station.

  How many Imago will make it? What happens if we succeed?

  I haven’t forgotten that both sides gambled on us. The Imago put on an act for years to bring us here and lure Babel in. We’re supposed to be their emissaries in a new world. I think of the show Speaker and Thesis acted out for us. It was convincing. It was supposed to be.

  Babel’s guilty of the same. Like magicians, they were always brilliant at drawing our eyes to the bright ribbon in their left hand as they fumbled through our pockets with their right.

  I’m starting to realize that our training was plan B. The nyxian mining, the Rabbit Room, all of it. Babel needed us on planet. They needed us to reach Sevenset. They trained us to be survivors and then used those final duels to push us toward the Imago. It was one more reason to distrust them, and it guaranteed we would move where they wanted us on the game board.

  “First boat preparing to surface,” Parvin says. “Radar looks empty.”

  “How long until we breach?” Morning asks.

  “Five hundred meters.”

  “Let’s get the nyxian link orbiting,” she says. “Just like we did on the river.”

  The entire crew sits up straighter. Jacquelyn gives us an appraising look as the familiar nyxian rhythm establishes itself, rotating and circling. Myan and Speaker described it as the substance returning to its natural state. The power builds as we rise to the surface. I grip the arms of my chair and feel my stomach doing backflips. My eyes are pinned to Parvin’s radar. We all watch the first beacon ping as it breaches. Then it vanishes.

  “First ship surfaced,” Parvin says. “And their signature’s gone.”

  “It happens sometimes,” Jacquelyn says. “If they’re converting from deep-sea mode to open sailing, the signature changes.”

  Morning doesn’t buy it. “Fist stations get your shields up. Omar, triple the power.”

  A deep hum shakes and rattles the ship. I hold on tighter as Holly forms a nyxian shield against the already-thick walls of our submarine covering. Longwei sits on the other side of Omar, waiting to add his strength if necessary.

  “One hundred meters,” Parvin announces. “Four ships up and out.”

  I catch a glimpse of the dots starting to spread. One edges to the west.

  There’s a burst of white light against the porthole windows, then a loud plunk, and Morning retracts the walls. Air rushes in through the overhead and the sky plunges like a bright knife. We blink, and blink, and take in the scene.

  To the west, one of the Remnant ships bleeds into the horizon. I spy a smaller ship trailing behind it and realize it’s not one of ours. An unwelcome guest.

  There’s a breath of a second as we take in the strange debris floating all around us. The details start to solidify. Imago bodies. Snapped boards. Enemy ships.

  A Babel ambush.

  Chapter 43

  The Ambush

  Emmett Atwater

  It’s all chaos.

  A circle of Babel boats converges around us, but the Imago military vessels are already moving through their formations, causing trouble. On the distant shore, we see a flash of bright blue light curling to life.

  “Cut left!” Morning shouts. “Let’s get outside their formation. All power to engines and shields. Right flank, get ’em up!”

  Katsu and Alex jerk the ship that way, but too sharply. Our speed cuts, and Omar struggles to get us back into a higher gear. The waiting Babel ships respond better than we do. Pulse cannons flash to life aboard the middle one. We watch the bolts cross the distance. Some miss overhead, but a few deflect off Jacquelyn’s summoned shield.

  The nyxia shivers and cracks, barely holding.

  An Imago ship engages the first one to blast us, but we have other concerns. There’s a vessel running diagonally to our left. It’s arching out, reading our mo
vements. The angle they’re taking sets up a flawless intercept. I whip my head back as more of our boats surface from below. Two military vessels will follow, and the Daughters will surface last.

  The world lurches with blinding light.

  Our entire right side gets lit up. Jacquelyn’s shield suffers the blow before going up in smoke, but Noor’s not nearly as strong as she is. Her shield shatters, and fire lashes over that side of the ship. Instinct kicks in. I lunge forward as the tongues of flame spread, a manipulation thundering out from my fingertips and into the nyxia. A thought, a breath: smother. I catch Noor, wrapping her inside the nyxian blanket. Smoke gushes out as we roll to the ground.

  “What the hell was that?” Morning shouts.

  Longwei’s at my side. I leave Noor with him and barely get my hands on her station as a new round of volleys comes flying from a flanking ship. The Babel vessel nearest to shore has engaged with Imago reinforcements. Another is still moving to outflank us. The air brightens as a third particle blast scorches out. I get my shield up just as it makes contact.

  Our ship almost capsizes, but Morning’s commands keep us floating, moving.

  “They’re in position,” she announces. “We have to get outside the circle they’re forming. Full power to shields on the front and right. Omar, we’ll take it into a dive and go beneath them.”

  A glance shows the massive tower on the shore reloading, gathering and harnessing energy for a fourth blast. Thankfully, one of the Imago boats has veered away from the action and toward the glowing tower. The ship enclosing our group from behind gives chase as the others fire, closing more cautiously. Each second tightens the noose around our necks. Our boat leaps forward as Morning adds her strength to Omar’s.

  We hurtle through the water, course set for the nearest ship.

  “Let’s dive beneath them,” Morning commands. “You know what to do, Parvin.”

  The Babel captain tries to adjust as we keep our nose aimed at the side of their ship, looking like we’re ready to T-bone them. One hundred meters away we can make out the faces on board. Babel marines man every station. In between the nyxian consoles, a handful of soldiers raise their weapons and take aim. Morning calls it out and our shields barely survive the first thundering spray of bullets. We’re fifty meters away, knifing right at them.