Worlds Without End: The Prophecy (Book 3)

by Shaun Messick

  He focused his attention back onto the shuttle, turned the ship around, and flew toward Celeste and the others. Once the ship arrived, he landed the shuttle softly onto the charred ground, exited, and caught Celeste, who had run to him, in midair. “I am so grateful you’re alive,” she said with dismay in her voice. “We watched the entire fight with the pilot. I used the binoculars to see in more detail. How you survived is . . . well, it’s—”

  “A miracle,” Jake responded as he lifted her chin with his fingers so he could look into her beautiful blue eyes. A small grin graced along his lips as he leaned in and kissed her. She reciprocated, pulling him in close.

  After a few seconds, Jake heard someone clear her throat as they kissed. He pulled away and met Nichelle’s eyes. She carried Calum comfortably in her arms as he slept soundly. “We need to rescue Adrian and the others. By now, the Gnols have to know we’ve taken control of their only escape back to Chast. They’ve likely called in for another to come and get them.”

  Jake nodded his agreement as he stepped toward Nichelle and gently caressed his son’s face. He kissed his cheek and said, “Okay, everyone in the shuttle. Let’s go get my dad.”

  As everyone secured themselves into the seats within the cargo bay, and as Jake walked by toward the cockpit, Kevin asked, “So, what’s the plan?”

  Jake stopped and turned, looking at the man who had been his father his entire life. With a growing confidence in his abilities and a smile of determination, he replied, “You thought how I was able to get this shuttle was a show. Wait until you see what happens next.”

  *****

  General Sapharius paced nervously back and forth. His anxiety was beginning to get the best of him. He cursed and said under his breath, “Where are they?” Turning around, he looked at his remaining men. Six were killed in the scuffle capturing the rebels, who sat on the ground helplessly with their hands bound behind their backs, encircled by the remaining twelve. The two he sent after Nichelle never returned.

  He checked to see how far out the rescue shuttle was. Fifteen minutes. Earlier in the afternoon, he witnessed Jake Palmer miraculously commandeer their attack shuttle, leaving him and his remaining men without transport back to Chast. They now had to wait. To buy time, he knew that by holding Adrian and the others prisoner, Jake wouldn’t fly in and attack. But the longer he and his men waited, the more dangerous it was becoming, especially since it was now dark.

  Before the sun had gone down, dark gray billowing clouds formed above them. And as the darkness of night progressed, droplets of rain began to fall, adding another disadvantage to an already miserable situation. The only visible lights were the lights mounted on the rifles of his men. If they were to go out, he and his men would be sitting ducks in blackness.

  After a few more nervous paces, he turned his gaze to Adrian, who stared at him intensely. This infuriated Raul even more. He charged toward the rebel leader with the fury of an angry grizzly. “You dare look at me!” he shouted just as he landed a ferocious backhand across Adrian’s face. His superior strength sliced through Adrian’s face, causing blood to spray. Adrian fell to the ground unconscious, maybe even dead.

  Lexis screamed for her father.

  “Keep her quiet, or she’ll be next!” he roared, pointing at Lexis.

  Anyta, sitting next to her daughter, did the best she could to console her youngest child. Lexis buried her head into her mother’s shoulder, heaving deep sobs of despair.

  “You coward!”

  With fire in his eyes, Raul turned and met the fiery eyes of the man who had demonstrated so much promise as a warrior for the empire. “How dare you address me in any manner whatsoever, Sage? I would rather these despicable humans speak to me than you! You are a traitor, a disgrace!” he shouted, spitting into Sage’s face.

  Now kneeling, Sage never even flinched, keeping his disdainful gaze upon his former CO. “I would rather give my life for these people than become the monsters we have become.”

  Raul laughed nervously. “Monsters? So you believe we are monsters for giving the people of Terrest their purpose?”

  Sage retorted emphatically, “Purpose? Nearly killing off an entire race and enslaving the strong is not giving them a purpose! It is tyranny in the worst way, borderline genocide!”

  Raul stepped forward, leaning down to within inches of Sage’s eyes. This traitor was becoming a nuisance, and it was time to silence him before their rescue shuttle arrived. He landed a devastating punch directly into Sage’s nose. He felt bone crunch beneath his knuckles. But the punch had no effect on the former Gnol soldier. Sage didn’t even blink, shriek, or flinch. With blood pouring from his broken nose, Sage’s eyes bore into Raul’s, almost as if he was staring into his very soul. The intensity of the glare induced a sense of fear and intimidation within Raul, causing him to glance away.

  Reclaiming his composure, he turned back to Sage. “Our lord and savior, Koroan Chast, freed the pitiful Terrestrians from their miserable existence.”

  This time, Sage laughed, but it wasn’t a nervous laugh. No, it was one of satisfaction. “Koroan Chast was nothing, a false idol who proclaimed himself to be a god. No, in fact, he was the exact opposite. Evil to his very core!”

  Infuriated, Raul withdrew his sidearm and slammed its barrel into Sage’s forehead. “I should kill you now!”

  The satisfying smirk on Sage’s face never disappeared. “Do what you have to do. But know this, General; killing us won’t get you what you have come for. Jake and Celeste have Calum safe and sound in your shuttle, so killing us doesn’t matter. They’ve already escaped and, soon, you will be left with nothing, only dead prisoners.”

  The temptation to pull the trigger was overwhelming for Raul, but he couldn’t help but respond, this time with his own gratification. “You fool. We have achieved our mission and retrieved the relic.”

  The smirk on Sage’s face grew larger. “Are you sure, General? You never checked the contents of the case you confiscated from us. How do you know the gold plate is even in there?”

  Raul did his best to hide his dismay. His former subordinate was right. In all of the confusion, he had forgotten to check the contents of the case that General Hendricks had secured to his wrist. After breaking the chain that secured the case, he ordered his men to secure the case with their supplies, locking it into one of their ammunition trunks. He glanced at one of his men and nodded, giving him the order to check the case.

  The soldier nodded his response and jogged to their ammunition and other supplies piled neatly nearby. Using his flashlight to see, he unlocked the ammunition trunk and pulled out the case. Not knowing the combination, he ripped the case apart with his Gnol strength. Two large stones dropped to the ground. He turned back in astonishment to Raul.

  Raul shrieked in indignation. “Where is it?” he screamed, pressing his gun harder into Sage’s forehead.

  “Killing us won’t get you what you want.”

  “No,” Raul replied as he walked over to Anyta and Lexis, clutching Lexis by the hair and dragging her to face Sage. Lexis shrieked in horror as Anyta cried out for her. “But killing one at a time, beginning with her, may get you to talk,” he said as he put his gun away, grasped Lexis by the chin, withdrew his knife, and pressed the razor-sharp blade to her carotid artery. Droplets of blood began to run down her throat.

  Anyta pleaded with tearful sorrow for Raul to release her daughter. “Please. Please. Don’t.”

  He felt the girl’s body trembling in terror. “Shut up!” he howled. The two women conceded and withheld their cries for mercy and sobs of despair to controlled whimpers.

  “Well, what’s it going to be, Sage?”

  With the courage of a lion, Sage stood to his feet. He leaned in close. Raul took a step back in fear as he tightened his grip upon Lexis.

  “I’ll repeat what I said before,” Sage uttered with intensity. “You are a coward.”

  Even though Raul’s rage was about to boil over, he held his composur
e. “Very well, then,” he said.

  Just as he was about to slice through Lexis’s throat, the lights on each of his men’s rifles exploded, surrounding them in darkness. He then felt a crushing blow to his face from Sage’s head. He fell onto his back, still holding Lexis. But she managed to wriggle free, jumped to her feet, and landed a swift kick to his ribs. Even though she was far inferior in strength, the blow stunned him.

  Plasma blasts flashed in the darkness, creating a strobe light effect. As Raul gathered to his feet, he watched as the rest of his men were mowed down by plasma blasts. He then heard the hum of engines above him. The plasma blasts created just enough light for him to see as he looked up and saw his attack shuttle hovering quietly above.

  Recognizing what had just happened, he withdrew his gun again and desperately searched for the culprit who was just about to kill his last soldier. Out of the corner of his left eye, he saw the silhouette of whom he assumed was Jake Palmer with his back to him. As the lights flashed, he raised his weapon, pointing it directly at the back of Jake’s head, and began to squeeze the trigger. Jake Palmer was about to die.

  Before the plasma energy erupted from his gun, he was a hit with a bone-crushing blow to his right side. The bolt shot just past Jake’s left ear as Raul fell sideways. He jumped back to his feet and managed to get a shot off in the direction from which he was hit. At the same time, Jake whirled around, and the floodlights on the attack shuttle flashed on, flooding the entire area in brightness.

  Raul squinted to adjust his eyes. Quickly surveying the scene before him, he saw that his remaining troops were dead. Then he looked at the man he had shot. The human he knew as Skyler Green stood with his eyes wide open and two holes through his chest, extending clear through his back. Skyler dropped to his knees and then plopped face down into the dirt below. He was dead.

  “Skyler! No!” Jake shrieked.

  Just as Raul turned to face Jake, he saw two white flashes and then nothing.

  *****

  Jake lowered his smoking gun. He cut Sage loose from his bonds and gave Sage the knife. “Help the rest,” he said, turning his attention to the last remaining member of the original Mars I mission besides his father and Donald Garrett. He turned Skyler’s body over. Skyler’s eyes were wide open, staring blankly back at Jake. Jake closed them and said, “He saved my life.”

  He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up. Anyta stood above him, smiling warmly. “No. He saved all of us.”

  After standing and hugging Anyta, Lexis rushed to him and buried her head into his chest. “Thank you, Jake.”

  A small smile curved along his lips as he embraced his baby sister. Ever since Jake and Celeste’s return from the dead, his stepmother, as well as his brother and sisters were leery of him. They kept their distance. He understood their hesitation, however. After all, he and Celeste had risen from the dead, and their bodies were different. It was obvious that they were a little bit intimidated with his newfound abilities and strength.

  Still holding Lexis in a protective embrace, he noticed his father lying on the ground. “Dad.” He let go of his sister and rushed to his father, skidding to a halt on his knees.

  “He’s still alive,” Anyta said. “We need to get him in the shuttle for immediate medical attention.”

  Jake nodded, stood back up, and spoke into his comlink. “Kevin, land the shuttle. Dad’s hurt.” He then looked at Sage and Skip, who had gathered the Gnol weapons and retrieved the gold plate, which Skip had hidden nearby before they were captured. “We’re taking Skyler’s body with us to Earth.”

  After Kevin landed the shuttle, everyone boarded. Sage placed Skyler’s body in a body bag and secured it onto one of the three medical bunks that were built into one of the sidewalls on the ship. Jake helped Anyta secure Adrian onto another bunk. Anyta then dug through the medical supplies and began administering a saline IV solution to rehydrate him.

  “How bad is it?” Jake asked.

  “The Gnol officer’s blow knocked him out instantly. There’s no doubt he received a severe concussion.” Anya then looked up and smiled, placing her hand on the side of her stepson’s cheek. “Don’t worry. He’ll be okay. I’ll take care of him. That’s my specialty. Your job is to get us to Earth as fast as you can.”

  Jake returned her warm smile. He was grateful his father had found love on Terrest. Anyta was resilient and, with relatively little medical training, had become one of the best practitioners of medicine within what was left of the Terrestrian civilization. In a lot of ways, she reminded Jake of his birth mother, Melissa, at least from the little memories he had of her.

  “Jake, we have an incoming ship,” Kevin said from the cockpit.

  “Everyone buckle in,” Jake ordered. “Sage, you’re with me.”

  Kevin made his way to the back and buckled himself in next to Lexis, who now held Calum in her arms. Celeste sat on the other side, watching her son as a new, overprotective mother would.

  Once Jake and Sage were settled, Jake checked the fuel gauges. Every Gnol shuttle was equipped with four fuel tanks. The reason was because of the vast distances they needed to travel, especially if a shuttle crew made a run through the wormhole to monitor activities on Earth. With the attack and subsequent action, the shuttle had burned through one tank and had nearly exhausted the second tank. Concerned, he calculated how much fuel they would need to get to Earth. If they were careful and didn’t expend too much, they would have barely enough.

  “We have incoming,” Sage said, pointing to his right.

  Jake looked. He could see the lights of another Gnol attack shuttle approaching fast. “Hold on!” he said, veering the ship to the left. Just as he pulled back on his flight controls, he heard the tone of an incoming missile. The Gnols obviously knew that the rebels were now in control of this shuttle. The ship launched itself upward at a tremendous velocity. But that wasn’t enough to throw the heat-seeking missile off course. The missile followed, closing the gap. Behind that, the enemy ship followed the same path. They were now in hot pursuit as both ships soared toward space.

  The incoming missile tone grew louder with shortened intervals between sounds as the missile narrowed the gap. Jake zigzagged the shuttle left and right, trying to veer the missile off of its intended path. It was useless. Moreover, the enemy ship narrowed its gap as well. The only solution Jake could think of was to escape the atmosphere in the hopes that the missile would either freeze or fizzle out of fuel as it climbed higher and higher. He pushed the ship to full speed, knowing that it would expend precious fuel.

  “One hundred meters,” Sage proclaimed.

  The g-forces within the ship were too much. He heard his newborn son wail and others screamed. He heard Celeste in his comlink. Ariauna had passed out, and Anyta was doing everything in her power to keep Adrian stable.

  “Fifty meters. . . . Forty meters. . . . Thirty meters. . . Jake, we need to do something or—”

  With a scream of his own, Jake pulled back further on his controls. The shuttle was now vertical in the air, the missile matching its every move.

  “Ten meters!”

  With one more strenuous tug, Jake looped the ship around, causing the missile to shoot past, just missing the bottom of the fuselage. Jake leveled the ship out just as they exited the atmosphere. The starry blackness of space enveloped the shuttle with the wormhole and the two space stations holding it open directly ahead. Jake quickly switched the ship to space mode.

  With the maneuver, the missile was now the hunted. Jake fired four blasts, hitting the missile. The missile exploded into a brilliant fireball. Jake veered the ship to the right to avoid any exploding shrapnel. But in his haste to avoid and destroy the missile, he failed to notice his pursuer, who now had them in his cross hairs. The enemy fired. The first blast missed, but the second blast was a direct hit on his third fuel tank just under his left rear thruster. The tank exploded, flinging the shuttle into a violent spin.

  Using all of his strength, Jake leve
led the ship out. He cursed and yelled for Skip. “Skip! Get to the rear cannon and take care of them!”

  With the weightlessness of space, Skip unbuckled himself from his seat in the cargo hold and floated up to the defense cannon at the top of the fuselage. He pulled himself up and secured himself in. “Ready!”

  “We have incoming!” Sage said, pointing directly ahead.

  Enemy fighters swarmed from the two space stations. The ship’s computer counted ten in all. Clenching his teeth, Jake pushed his ship to full speed, directly toward one of the stations. The ten enemy ships sped past him firing, but none of the blasts hit their mark. Skip began firing as well from his position, taking out three fighters.

  “What are you doing?” Sage asked with trepidation.

  Jake ignored him, focusing his attention on the wheel-like station ahead. He then heard what he was hoping for, the tone of a missile fire. One missile wasn’t fired, however. Instead, there were now four missiles on his tail, two fired from the first ship in pursuit and two from another fighter that had maneuvered itself behind Jake as well. A grin of hope spread along Jake’s lips.

  With panic in his voice, Sage relayed the missile’s distance. “Twenty meters . . .Fifteen. . . Ten. . . Jake!”

  Skip fired, taking out the second fighter, but by this time, the rest had joined in the chase. In all, there were six fighters with the original attack shuttle in hot pursuit.

  With the missiles about to send Jake and the others into oblivion, he was now about fifty meters from the space station. Red-hot blasts of energy spewed from its defense cannons. Jake discovered with his newfound senses that he was better able to anticipate when and where the blasts would be fired. He dodged the energy bursts, rolling the shuttle side to side.

  More tones erupted from the shuttle’s computer. The other enemy ships fired a missile as well, hoping to destroy Jake before the commandeered shuttle exploded into the space station. With a shriek of sheer determination, Jake pressed down on the guns, expelling out plasma blasts of his own. The bolts landed directly into the spherical bridge of the station nestled snugly in the middle of the wheel. He then pulled hard on his controls and looped out of the wheel, through the fiery explosion. The missiles in pursuit locked on to their new heat signature and impacted with the station.