D'Mok Revival 1: Awakening

by Michael J. Zummo

  Allia screamed “Ichini!” as she ran back to her companion. As she did, one of the ray-like creatures shot a barb at her from its tail. Before Mencari could warn her, Naijen blocked the quill that would have landed squarely in her back.

  “What’s happening?” Eyani called out.

  None of them had time to answer. Allia placed her hands on Ichini while Naijen dispensed the other creatures. Mencari ignored Eyani’s continued cries for attention and went to Allia, the same green and white light dancing chaotically around her fingers as the girl attempted to heal her companion.

  “I can’t get him to change back!” she yelled.

  He knelt with her as Naijen, elated with battle fever, scoured the area, hunting for more prey.

  “What’s the problem?” Eyani asked, panicked.

  Mencari waved his hand in front of communicator. “Give us a second.”

  “I see more ta play with,” Naijen called from an open doorway. “Catch up when yer ready.”

  He disappeared into a side corridor, ignoring Mencari’s calls to wait.

  Beastly shrieks echoed down the hallway while Allia continued her frantic efforts to help Ichini. Slowly, the white light began to overpower the green, allowing Ichini’s body to return to its normal form.

  “You scared me,” Allia said, hugging her companion.

  Silently Ichini nuzzled her side as if nothing had happened. Even so, Allia’s brow wrinkled in concern.

  “Let’s keep moving,” Mencari said gently. “Maybe he shouldn’t try morphing for a while.”

  She nodded, and as they moved down the corridor to catch up with Naijen, she glanced back often to make certain Ichini still followed them.

  “What is happening?”

  At Eyani’s call, Mencari kept walking but said, “Naijen’s attacking creatures that got inside.”

  “What kind of creatures?”

  “Same as the ones outside. Floating creatures, like stingrays. And they aren’t very friendly. You have any idea what they are?”

  A moment later, she said, “Nothing’s coming up in my database. See if you can get close enough to get a read—”

  At Naijen’s bellow, Allia ran into the room he’d headed into, and soon she and Mencari were engaged with the creatures. Her flower blade sliced through leathered skin, sending the beasts flailing on the ground.

  “Ah, a true warrior come to help me!” Naijen bellowed while hacking at his own adversaries.

  A steady stream of creatures started to flow in from a hole in the ceiling. When their traditional weapon couldn’t dispense with the number of beasts flooding in, Naijen resorted to his D’mok attacks. Meanwhile, Naijen was glowing with power, as his energy-imbued Skar sliced the creatures like a hot knife through butter.

  Naijen scoffed as the last one fell, “Too easy!”

  Panting, Mencari said, “Maybe for you. Let’s head to the command center before more of them show up.”

  As they continued on, a nagging feeling kept dogging Mencari. He found himself constantly looking over his shoulder, expecting something to be there. After checking the scanner and not seeing any life-form readings, he dismissed it as his own paranoia getting the best of him.

  The command center held an equally gruesome scene, with dead humanoids scattered throughout.

  “Everything points to some sort of bio or neuro attack,” Eyani said. “Check the environmental readings.”

  They scanned the station’s log entries. “The last entry’s thirty hours ago,” Mencari told her. “It just states that the environmental system was reinitialized by the automatic systems.”

  “That would have been about eighteen hours after we lost contact,” Eyani said. “Anything else? Any life readings?”

  Mencari reviewed the monitor. “Just our readings . . . wait . . . more creatures too. Many of them. They must be everywhere in the station.”

  A small plug appeared from the side of the pin on Mencari’s chest.

  “There should be a general terminal off to your right,” Eyani said. “Find an access port, and connect the communicator. That will allow me to use it remotely.”

  Seconds after he located it and plugged in, she blurted in frustration, “It’s scrambled. This isn’t just system damage, the interface has been hacked. And the data store is gone.”

  “Nukari?” Allia said.

  Mencari shrugged. “If it was, we have a lot more to worry about.”

  Eyani directed them with urgency to the research lab area. As they went, Naijen brandished his Skar and scouted for prey like a child hunting for hidden candy. Once there, they found the door marked “Aken I” and entered.

  The lab was trashed, with vials and equipment thrown against the walls and smashed to pieces, and test-suited scientists piled into a heap in one corner.

  “Someone else was inside,” Mencari muttered. “Looks like whoever was here knew what they were looking for.”

  “Whoever did this had inside help,” came her reply.

  “Could whoever did this still be here?” Allia asked, looking about. Mencari double-checked the scanner and shook his head.

  “There’s more of those creatures, but nothing else shows up,” he said. “They must be long gone.”

  “I need you to check one more place,” Eyani’s voice insisted.

  Following the new marker, they made their way to the end of the corridor and stopped, confused. Mencari said, “It’s a dead end.”

  “Look for a latch.”

  Allia spotted a concealed latch first and pulled it. A panel of the wall glowed, then folded into the wall, revealing a long corridor that led to a vault-like room.

  “The data-core backup area,” Eyani said. “It’s still on board, so the commander didn’t have time to eject it. Do you see a panel with a number of slots just ahead of you?”

  Mencari and Allia searched and found what she described. Naijen walked back into the main corridor, calling, “If ya need me, holla. I’m goin’ huntin’.”

  Mencari called after him. “No, hang on—”

  “Let him go,” Eyani said. “He’s a distraction.”

  “He’s also our best warrior,” Mencari replied through gritted teeth.

  She shook her head and said, “In that slot should be some crystal cubes. I just need one.”

  At Eyani’s direction, Allia grabbed a cube and handed it to Mencari. He placed it into one of the slots. The cube sparked briefly with light, then faded. “There, I downloaded a copy of the data,” Eyani said. “Now—”

  Naijen’s enraged bellow made them turn around and run back into the main corridor.

  “Look what I found!” he cried happily.

  At Naijen’s feet, a soldier dressed in a black uniform lay crumpled on the ground.

  The silvery-blue Nukari emblem decorated the shoulder. Mencari quickly checked the bio-scanner.

  Nothing.

  It showed nothing! Even though he had proof lying before him of more than what was being shown.

  “Must have thought he was safe slinking around like he was,” the warrior chortled.

  “Is that—?” Eyani blurted.

  “Yes, emblem and all,” Mencari said grievously.

  “They’re still there?” Eyani yelled.

  Before Mencari could respond, hastily-fired laser blasts whizzed by, striking the walls next to them. Gasping, Mencari instinctively shoved Allia into an alcove along the wall before diving into his own on the opposite side. To his relief, Naijen also quickly took cover near Allia and Ichini. In moments they were trapped, however, with Nukari covering both ends of the corridor.

  “Get your team out of there!” Eyani cried.

  “Not time to run—it’s time to FIGHT!” Naijen bellowed, bearing the Skar.

  Mencari watched across the way as Naijen looked for a way to move between the blasts. The warrior was great in melee, but didn’t have a prayer in a firefight. Even if Naijen wanted to use his distance attacks, he needed to power them up and step into the line of
fire to unleash it.

  Worse yet, Allia and Ichiini had the same disadvantage. Why didn’t he think about this before?

  He powered up their only conventional distance weapon, his hand phaser. Recalling the enhanced power crystal from Liren, he cranked up the setting, hoping for a powerful blast.

  Aiming down one side of the corridor, he listened for the high-pitched squeal from his wrist indicating a full charge. Among the soldiers, an average looking cat-man in a white trench coat stood oddly out, hunkered down, cowering against the wall.

  “Wait! The man in the trench coat—can you get a better view?” Eyani said.

  Laser blasts continued to whiz past. Mencari had enough to deal with, getting off his shot, much less a better view for Eyani.

  “No,” he said begrudgingly.

  The charging tone of his weapon went higher than usual, and felt very warm against the top of his hand. Odd. But not odd enough for him to delay further. His hand gripped, triggering the device.

  A radiant ball of silver energy formed at the tip of the phaser, before extending out and streaking down the hall. In the same instant, the force of the tremendous kick-back threw him against the alcove wall. A chorus of screams was cut short by a powerful blast that blew smoke and debris down the corridor towards him.

  Stunned, he looked down for the phaser, only to realize the safety system had ejected it off his wrist. Quickly scanning the ground, he saw it lying in the corner, charred black and still sizzling. The light from Liren’s crystal glowing through the breaches in melted housing. Perhaps all the recent action had pushed it too far?

  “Are you okay?” Allia yelled over.

  While his one shot has been equally impressive and scary, it occurred to Mencari that their one distance weapon was now destroyed. A constant barrage of laser fire continued from the remaining Nukari forces.

  “I’m fine, just stay covered!” he yelled back. But they’d have to do more than cower. At some point the Nukari would figure out they were defenseless and close in.

  But they weren’t defenseless, were they? Mencari recalled the training back at Osuto’s asteroid base, specifically when the two of them fought that giant creature.

  Then, the battle against the Renzr beasts played back in his mind.

  He wasn’t defenseless at all. He, himself, was a living weapon. It’s what the Coalition wanted—no needed—him to master. It was the whole point of being with Osuto.

  This is where he needed to prove what he’d learned, to show himself what he was capable of. Osuto wasn’t here to bail him out. Mencari needed to come through on his own.

  Taking a deep breath, he focused. Clearing his mind, the zipping sound of laser fire and booms of explosions faded away. A warmth spread slowly across his body, as a golden aura began to radiate around him.

  He looked at his hand, and made a fist. The glow appeared to coalesce into a swarming mass of white energy around it. Breaking his gaze with the beautiful light, he backed up, trying to get a better perspective farther down the corridor. The Nukari weren’t advancing yet. To get a good shot at them, he’d have to momentarily expose himself.

  I’ll just have to make this quick, he thought. Remembering the kickback from the hand phaser, his other hand grabbed his wrist to brace it. After a quick breath, he mentally counted coordinating his strike.

  One.

  The light around his wrist stayed strong and steady.

  Two.

  He gazed down the corridor, then summoned more power for the blast.

  Three!

  In a break in the laser fire, he leaned into the hallway, and mentally envisioned projecting the energy from around his fist down the corridor at his attackers. Enacting his vision, the blast pulsed with brilliance as it shot from his fist. The polished walls reflected the glow from the attack as it streaked towards the Nukari.

  A similar chorus of yells was cut short by an awe-inspiring explosion. Then, there was silence, except for the echo of the blast throbbing in Mencari’s ears.

  “Oh yeah!” Naijen cried, lunging from his hiding spot for a quick follow-up kill.

  Mencari looked at his still-glowing hand. The power had yet to diminish and, in fact, looked ready for more blasts. He had succeeded! However it had happened, he had managed to get the energy to persist!

  “I’m detecting a small ship in-bound!” Eyani yelled through the communicator.

  They’re running, Mencari thought.

  “It’s probably the extraction ship!” Eyani added. “They may have the stolen lab-tech with them yet!”

  “I’m on it!” he yelled, following Naijen, hearing the pattern of Allia and Ichini close behind him.

  Small teams of soldiers broke from the retreating pack, momentarily slowing Naijen’s pursuit of the main group. As they closed on another cluster of Nukari, they noticed the cat-man in the white trench coat among the stragglers.

  “We need the man in the white trench,” Eyani blurted.

  With Naijen and Mencari nearly upon them, one of the Nukari charged his weapon, and shot the man in the trench coat, moments before being cut down himself by Naijen’s Skar.

  Eyani cried out, as Mencari watched the cat-man fall, a massive hole in his back still sizzling.

  * * * * *

  “They’re getting away!” Allia yelled as the Nukari ship’s hatch closed and the vessel began to pull away from the dock.

  “Rhysus, if they get away with any research…” Eyani started, but Mencari tuned her out.

  He looked at the sleek lines of the ship. Familiar and haunting images from his daily nightmare pushed to the forefront of his mind. But never in his dreams did the Nukari ever run. Here they were, in the flesh, before him—a genuine Nukari ship.

  “I’m going to try to contain them!” Eyani said as the doors of the bay began to close. Mencari saw his badge glow with the same green energy as before. The massive bay doors of the station began to close. Undeterred, the ship sped towards the shrinking way out.

  “It’s not closing fast enough!” Allia cried.

  Something inside him went cold as an icy hatred filled him. They had struck again—another entire station slaughtered at Nukari hands, and possibly experimental research stolen too. The Nukari seemed to so easily come and go, embed where ever they pleased, and do whatever they wanted.

  But not today, he thought.

  He gripped both fists, commanding his power. Reaching forward, a blinding energy blazed from his outstretched arms. Two flashing arcs of raw power lashed out and surrounded the ship in a blazing, vengeful embrace.

  A panel on the side of the ship exploded, causing the vessel to list heavily to the side. But it struggled defiantly forward.

  He tried to summon another blast, but couldn’t. Instead, Mencari sank to his knees exhausted.

  “No!” Allia yelled.

  Silently he watched the vessel slip beyond the docking station into open space, moments before the bay doors closed tight.

  It was gone.

  Bowing his head, Mencari’s eyes stared down at the metallic, smooth floor, sightless, drained to his core. His heart pounded, his ears rang, and his chest heaved with every labored breath. How much further could he push?

  Maybe they could follow the Nukari ship? Perhaps Eyani could track them and send help? Every fiber in his body resisted the thought.

  Then, a thunderous explosion echoed off the hull of the station.

  Allia screamed, drawing his glance. “You got them!” she cried, pointing.

  Mencari looked with disbelief towards the small portals along the outer hull, and saw wreckage drifting by. Still catching his breath, he forced an exhausted smile to his team.

  Eyani happily chimed in. “Whatever you did, the ship just broke up outside the station!”

  So the Nukari wouldn’t get away today after all, Mencari thought triumphantly. But there was still more to understand.

  “What about the guy in the trench coat?” Mencari panted.

  “Yeah, why
did the soldier kill him?” Allia said confused. “Wasn’t he one of them?”

  “The scared kitty wasn’t one of them—at least not a soldier,” Naijen spat.

  “Go back to the body,” Eyani said. “Maybe there’s something on him to explain all this?”

  The group back tracked and found the cat-man still lying face down. Mencari knelt and turned him over. Eyani gasped.

  “Do you know him?” Mencari said.

  “I thought so. He’s one of ours,” Eyani said, exasperated. “Professor Xabier. He went missing a while back.”

  Xabier? The name shot through Mencari. That was the name of Toriko’s professor friend who had been taken by the Nukari. What was going on here?

  “What do you mean, ‘one of ours’?” Mencari said suspiciously.

  “I’ll reopen the bay doors,” she said. “Please, bring his body back with you, and come back as fast as you can.”

  * * * * *

  “You knew about the Nukari,” Mencari said to Eyani, who they found waiting inside the landing bay of the trading post. Bob the bot stood dutifully at her side. Others wearing the uniforms with a thick black stripe across the chest approached, respectfully collecting Xabier’s body and carting him away. Eyani looked on with great sorrow.

  “It’s time to explain some things to you,” she said flatly. “But not here. Please follow me.”

  She quickly led them through the same passages as before, moving them from the densly populated areas, into the all-but-abandoned industrial areas. Bob closely followed, his antenna raised alert, as if constantly scanning as they continued.

  Passing through the same metal gateway, they entered the same cavernous areas as before. Countless aliens still worked tirelessly at their stations, though it seemed there were even more projections of charts and scrolling data than before.

  A furry hulk approached, towering over even Naijen. His short, white-and-black snout, and long gangly limbs made it look almost sloth-like.

  “I’m Commander Tenrl,” the man-beast said warmly. “Eyani has told me much about you. I’d like to personally thank you for your help. Especially today.”

  “What is this place?” Mencari replied.