by Elliott Kay
“Y-yes,” Vandenberg gasped. “Yes, I am.”
“Then you may speak for the rest.”
“Yes,” he answered again, then hesitated. His eyes darted to the shelters containing Stockton and his men. Other complications came to mind immediately after. Malone and his urgency about the Union. The University.
Vandenberg steeled himself with a deep breath and nodded. “Yes. I am Professor Joseph Vandenberg. This is my expedition.”
He heard a soft, rocky crack to his side. Dust fell from the door, top to bottom once again. This time, the door slid open, quieter than he would have imagined possible.
He saw silhouettes as the door slid to the left and the light spilled in. Armored boots. Armored greaves.
“You will come with us.”
Chapter Twenty-One:
Relics
“We should’ve gone to Anambra. It might be boring and maybe we wouldn’t find anything revolutionary, but at least it’s safe. God, I hate it when my mother is right.”
--Kim Choi, Personal Journal, August 2280
His boots tangled in the blanket every time he turned in his cot. He tried pulling the blanket over them, perhaps to his ankles, but that felt weird and kept him awake, too. For the first time since he’d left the service, he almost conceded it would be smarter and more effective to sleep in his vac suit on top of the blankets.
He still had enough built-up resentment for Navy living to silence that idea. Sleeping while mostly dressed was crazy enough. Tanner tried again, twisting around onto his side and fussing with the blanket. Not for the first time, he wondered if he’d get any sleep.
He awoke to a noise in the middle of the night, confirming that yes, he did fall asleep, and yes, that was a laser blast. And a scream. Tanner flung off the blanket and grabbed the shovel laid beside his cot.
“What was that?” Kim. The shelter held six others within its lightweight walls and roof. Not all of them were supposed to be here, but consolidating shelters seemed wise. By the dim red light hanging up above, Tanner saw each head perk up. Nobody slept deeply tonight.
“Get out of bed and keep quiet,” he instructed urgently. “Put your shoes on. Stay low.” He crept toward the exit. Shouts, thumps, and muffled cries drifted through the walls. He thought he heard more shots.
Then a laser blast cut through the upper walls of the shelter to remove all doubt. Nigel yelped in fright. Thankfully, everyone heeded Tanner’s advice about staying low.
A push from the shovel broke the seal on the exit with a hiss. Light spilled in from the lamps posted around the camp. The noise grew louder along with it. He couldn’t see the other shelters from this angle.
Laser fire had already been established. Tanner was at least used to that sort of thing. A beam of yellow light flashed across the camp, confirming he had all new threats to deal with, too. “Aw, Christ,” he grunted.
The camp was under attack. Tanner’s mind raced. He couldn’t trust the mercs to look out for the students. The attackers clearly had a disagreement with the mercs, too, but that told him nothing of their feelings about his classmates. He didn’t really know which side of this to jump in on, or if jumping in was smart at all. For all he knew, if he took a side, his chosen enemy would view the whole class as a threat and broaden their fire accordingly.
He wouldn’t learn anything until he went outside.
“What are we doing?” Gina asked, slipping up to the door beside him. At least she seemed to have faith in his ability to come up with a plan.
“If we sit here, we’re at somebody’s mercy,” said Tanner. “I don’t know what’s going on. I’m gonna slip out. If I yell run, get everybody going for the vehicles. They may be locked down already but it’s better than nothing.”
“You’re sure?” asked Antonio.
“No,” said Tanner. “Stay down.” He looked and listened as best he could for another breath before he swept out of the exit, promptly turning to his right to hug the corner of the shelter.
He made it two steps before he slammed into a towering figure of black stone. Tanner bounced backward, landing on his ass in the dirt. The figure turned toward him, looking down with a face marked only by an engraved and glowing red T-shape.
A crack of thunder split the air around them. The accompanying burst of red light ran parallel to the ground. Tanner watched Stockton fall in a smoldering heap near the research tent. Another stone figure walked past with telltale red-tinted vapors rising from its face.
The stone man before Tanner stepped closer, leaning forward to reach out with both hands. Tanner launched a counterattack with his shovel. The glowing red gap in its face seemed like the only possible vulnerable spot. He thought he might do some good if he could jam the head of his shovel in that crevice.
His target took the shovelhead on what passed for its cheek. The shovel bounced off as harmlessly as Tanner had bounced from the stone man’s body. A powerful arm batted the shovel from Tanner’s hands, leaving his wrists stinging. It put him back to the ground with a shove.
“You are not dressed like the other combatants. Are you one of the students?” the stone man asked with a low, calm, surprisingly human voice. Tanner heard only the slightest airy hint of some artificiality to the words, like talking to someone over a communications link, but the lifelike quality of the voice stunned him. The stone couldn’t be some sort of suit. No human could fit in there.
“Stay out of the fight,” said the stone man. “Students will not be harmed.” Then the thing strode past him—practically over him—and plunged around the other corner of the shelter as if rejoining the battle.
“What the fuck?” Tanner rolled over and got to his knees, trying to keep track of the stone man, but it was already gone.
Lasers kept flashing through the camp. The fighting seemed to avoid Tanner’s shelter. The other shelter stood closer to the action. Snatching up his shovel again, Tanner rushed to check on the remaining students.
“Motherfucker, die! Go down! Die!” someone shouted. Red flashes reflected off the tents and little sheds only a couple of meters away. The shooter and his target both had to be on the other side of this shelter. Then the shooter appeared, passing by a gap between structures, still blazing away with his laser on rapid fire. Tanner recognized him in the brief instant of visibility and light, but then he was behind another shed.
Another shape steadily pursued, leading with a tall black shield. Tanner saw black armor and a helmet, the latter ducked low behind that shield. It seemed perfectly effective at absorbing every shot from the laser rifle.
The shield looked thin. So did the helmet. Tanner remembered what he’d seen in the video.
“Fuck,” Tanner hissed. He slipped in between the tent and the shed, keeping his shovel up and back in a wind-up for a swing. Continued fire from the laser rifle covered the approach, though the rest of the fight had already tapered off at an unsettling pace. Tanner put everything he could into one great swing of his shovel.
The helmet let out a dull clang upon impact. Tanner felt a painful rush of vibration through his wrists. The figure in the helmet got it worse. He dropped to his knees. As Tanner hoped, the armor was made from local minerals with protection from energy weapons in mind. A thin layer of metal so closely contoured to the wearer’s skull didn’t provide much shock absorption.
The bottom of the shield sank into the dirt, but its bearer didn’t have the wherewithal to use it for balance. As the armored figure tried to rise again, too much of his body left the protection of his shield. Another barrage of rapid laser fire caught him through the gap at the neck. With a desperate gurgle, the armored figure expired in the dirt.
The shooter ducked around the shed. Tanner ducked around the opposite side in the same direction and caught the merc before he got far. “Solanke!” he hissed. “C’mere!”
“What—?” Solanke yelped. Tanner twisted him off-balance and dragged him to his knees between the tent and the shed. “What are you doing?”
&nbs
p; “Sshh!” Tanner turned his head left and right, listening. “Shit, this is already over.”
“What?” Solanke asked again.
“Gimme that.” Tanner jerked the rifle from Solanke’s hands before the merc could gather his senses again. He dropped it in the dirt. “Come on.”
“Damn it, let me go!” Solanke demanded.
The younger man didn’t listen. He didn’t need to get far. They were practically on top of the second student shelter already. “It’s Tanner,” he announced quietly, poking the seal open. He didn’t wait for a response before shoving Solanke inside. Tanner followed close enough to bump into the soldier.
They found Naomi along with the other students, all laying on the floor by their cots. Only Tanner and his unwilling companion stood.
“What are you doing?” Solanke asked again.
“Take off your jacket and shirt,” said Tanner.
“What?”
“You asked that four times already. We don’t have time. Take it off.” Tanner grabbed at the lapels to tug it off his shoulders. “They won’t hurt you if they think you’re a student. Somebody give me a coat.”
“I won’t abandon this fight!” Solanke objected. He tried to shove Tanner out of the way.
Tanner gripped his arms. “Shut up and listen. The fight’s already over. I’m trying to save your life. Maybe it’s only five minutes longer but it’s five minutes more than the uniform or that rifle will buy you.”
He looked to his side. Naomi was already there with somebody’s overcoat.
“I’m not a coward,” Solanke objected.
“No. You’re the only other soldier left. If there’s another to fight, we need you. Put the coat on. You got a sidearm?” Tanner asked, but he spotted it before Solanke could answer. He jerked it out of the holster at Solanke’s hip and tossed it under a cot.
“Are you insane?”
“Leave it. Lasers don’t do much anyway.” He looked past Solanke to the rest. Faces stared back with undisguised fear. He felt pretty much the same. “Don’t ask what’s going on. I don’t know. One of them knocked me down and said students won’t be harmed if we—”
The entrance flew open behind him. Tanner whirled around to the sight of three more men in black armor. Two stood with their shields up for protection, right arms raised with those wrist-mounted weapons he’d only seen in the video. The third, standing in the center, held the malleable entrance open with a long black spear.
It was his first real eye-to-eye look at the attackers. Though the helmets covered much of their faces, Tanner saw human eyes, a human nose and mouth… and unnaturally golden skin. At first glance, he didn’t see much difference between the three. They shared the same height and build.
“Students,” said the one in the middle. “You will not be harmed if you do not fight.” His words came slowly, carefully, as if he was unused to the language. “Come out to join the others. Carry nothing. Do it now.”
Tanner held up his hands. He hesitated before stepping forward, hearing the rustle of clothes behind him. A grunt from the lead raider prompted Tanner to shuffle outside. Looking back, he saw Solanke follow in the overcoat covering his otherwise bare torso. He caught a glimpse of movement past Solanke as Naomi flung a blanket over Solanke’s discarded clothes.
The others weren’t far away. Tanner’s remaining classmates stood in the open near their shelter, surrounded by more figures in black armor and a couple of those stone men.
His work with Naomi to get the crew organized before everyone bedded down paid off a little, at least. Though roused in the middle of the night, everyone was dressed. They all had their shoes or boots on.
All but one. Tanner’s headcount came up short. He realized who was missing almost as soon as he finished the check. He quickly thought better of saying anything. Their classmates were freaked out enough already. Some didn’t handle it as well as others.
“Oh God, they’re dead,” cried Olivia, her voice muffled by her hands over her mouth.
“What are they gonna do?” somebody else stammered. Jishen, Tanner realized. He stood at the center of the group, looking around frantically. “What are they gonna do with us?”
“Stand with them,” grunted one of the armored men.
“Jishen, everybody, breathe,” counseled Tanner. “They haven’t hurt us. They could have, but they didn’t. We’re okay.”
“If you call this okay,” Solanke muttered behind him. “It isn’t your friends dead here.”
“Shut up,” Tanner warned through gritted teeth.
“Where’s the professor?” asked Kim. “Where’s Professor Vandenberg?”
“Guys, look. The door,” urged Antonio.
Their great discovery stood open, revealing a deep darkness on the other side. Tanner thought he saw a faint bluish glittering inside, but he wasn’t sure given the distance and the camp’s floodlights.
His second real look at the newcomers threw new questions on top of all that dread. Though he was struck more by the apparent uniformity of the raiders than anything else, he noticed some he thought might be women. Regardless, they all shared the same taller-than-average height and athletic build. They shared the same unnaturally golden skin. Even their eyes were all the same emerald green…though odd. Too bright. Too intense. It could only be a matter of millimeters, but were they wider than they should be?
“Who are you guys? What do you want?” asked Olivia.
“I am Doram, First Awoken of Her Sentinels, Ch-champion of… Spears,” said one of the men. His brow darkened as if the halting nature of his words surprised or frustrated him. He turned to one of the stone men. “Speak,” he ordered.
“You possess a jar containing several crystal orbs,” said one of the stone men. Other than a slight turn of its head, it gave no indicator of how it spoke. Its speech came with greater facility and ease than Doram’s, but less emotion. “You will turn it over to us.”
Tanner caught a questioning glance from Naomi. He nodded slightly, unsure if she wanted him to do the talking. She’d hired him on with the dangers of the expedition in mind, but they never once talked about altering the chain of command in any such event. “It’s in one of the shelters,” she said.
“Retrieve it,” said the stone man. Doram gestured to a pair of his raiders to follow her. Thankfully, neither of them grabbed her, merely walking at her side instead.
“Where’s Professor Vandenberg?” Kim repeated.
“Van-den-berg. He is your leader?” asked Doram. He pointed to the open doors. “He is in the sanctuary with…” He paused with an odd twitch as if considering. “You would say Her Majesty. We have not harmed him.”
“Majesty?” Antonio blinked. “Like a queen? Who are you?”
“That is your word.” Doram looked over his shoulder at Naomi and his returning men. “We are the Sentinels. These are the Regents,” he added, pointing to the stone men.
“Stand with the rest,” one of the escorts instructed Naomi.
The other carried the jar in both arms with care. Tanner recognized it immediately as the older jar he’d dug out of the ridge above the canyon. He also caught a look from Naomi as she rejoined the group.
They’d only asked for one jar.
“Do you recognize these marks?” Doram asked, running his fingers over the jar. He looked to his companions, but none spoke. “Nor do I.”
“A peasant family,” suggested the man holding the piece.
“Yes. Now survivors. To be honored.”
“What do you mean?” asked Tanner. Nobody had told anyone to shut up. “What is it?”
Doram turned to him with a slight frown. “Your words…” he began, then stopped. “We use your words because we cannot speak our own. These mouths cannot form our language. So we take these words from your kind, as your kind has tried to take our world.”
“Our… kind?” Gina moved beside Tanner. “What do you mean by that? What is our kind?”
“You. Your race. Humans.” He ges
tured with one hand to indicate the whole group. “You have only come to learn of us. To understand. And then to leave. This is acceptable.” Doram pointed to the nearest body. “The rest have come to take our world. To poison it against us. We will take it back from them.”
Unable to take her eyes off Stockton’s smoldering corpse, Kim let out a whimper. Doram turned to her, gesturing to her face. “Is this fear?” He looked from her to the others, seeming to ask her classmates as much as Kim. “Your face. Your voice. Do you express fear?”
“You killed people,” said Tanner. “A lot of people. So yeah. We’re scared.”
“You do not show the same expressions.”
“We don’t all handle it the same way. I do most of my howling in terror on the inside.”
“If it is on the inside, how do you express fear to others?” Doram asked Tanner. “How else do you react?”
Tanner’s eyes flicked from one armed raider to the next. “I’m not sure my personal reactions to fear are really the most constructive thing I could add to this discussion.”
“I understand,” Doram replied. His frown suggested otherwise. “Fear is… not needed. We do not intend to kill you. Only our enemies. We will cleanse our world of invasion.”
“You keep saying this is your world,” said Gina. “How is it yours? How is it any more yours than the people who live here?”
“Do not mistake what we have become for what we are.” Doram pointed to the great door. “The answers you seek are inside. So is your leader. Come with us.”
More than one student looked to him and to Naomi. The pair agreed with a single glance: they didn’t have much choice. On the way to the door and up the stone platform, Tanner was afforded a better vantage point for a look back at the camp. Bodies lay strewn from one end of the camp to another, but the military vehicles on the other side of the shelters looked untouched. From the platform it was almost a straight line to the Vanguards parked on the canyon floor. He caught a glimpse of one of the haulers up on the ridge beyond, too.