Eden's Revenge (Eden Paradox Book 3)

by Barry Kirwan

  “Fifteen, fourteen…”

  Holding his breath, he concentrated. The missile was probably set to fire automatically; he had to destroy the whole control centre where they stood. But how? Then it came to him: where there is thought, there is power. He felt a connection in his mind – the interface with the Hohash was still active, its craft just beneath them in subspace.

  “Eleven, ten…”

  Sister Esma had not paid the Hohash any attention – it was standing upright to her left, behind her.

  Gabriel called to the Hohash, trying to communicate directly, thinking at Genner speed. “You must have a power source. When the Q’Roth invaded your world, many of you self-destructed, shattering harmlessly. But you were commanded by the spiders to do so, not to fight back, because they feared the Q’Roth might find the spider eggs. But now, the Kalarash want this woman stopped, the planet saved –”

  Everything turned a uniform blue. Gabriel felt a floor beneath his feet, but couldn’t see it. He had no sense of distance. A Hohash appeared in front of him, undamaged compared to the one on the Crucible, but he guessed it was one and the same. Its surface was blank. Without warning it advanced on him. He blinked.

  A vast cavern opened up before him, wide enough to hold ten Crucibles like the one where he knew his real body was dying. Fire-like tongues of coloured light spun downwards, coalescing onto an anvil-shaped plinth in the centre of the cavern floor, accompanied by a roaring sound like a waterfall. He couldn’t see upwards, as the brightness obscured his sight, but he could make out giant black, tree-like legs, massive gleaming golden quadruple-jointed fingers, dark grey tentacles, and clutches of transparent filaments that curled and uncurled every few seconds. At one point something like an eye opened, a gold-rimmed ivory pupil within an iris of lapis lazuli. It stared at him a second then disappeared. He couldn’t fit the pieces together, and realised he wasn’t meant to: Kalarash.

  Columns of cascading light bathed the plinth, and he guessed it was energy and information. When the light-feeds snapped off, leaving silence underpinned by a ringing in his ears, he wasn’t surprised by what was left on the stone slab. The gleaming, freshly created Hohash lay dormant a while, then lifted off and rose upwards until Gabriel could not see it anymore.

  The scene shifted and he witnessed a hundred or more Hohash mingling with reptilian Rangers and other alien forms he didn’t recognize, in a vast amethyst city, crystal towers and tubes floating above the cloud layer at sunset, with three moons hanging in a ruby sky. So, he thought, this is how it used to be. The scene shifted rapidly, showing less positive scenes – wars, destruction of worlds, of suns and entire systems. Each time a Hohash was present. Each time they watched, but did nothing. He witnessed a torrent of these scenes, unable to turn away. Last, it showed him the culling of the spider race by the Q’Roth, many Hohash shattering into fragments and glinting shards, their golden frames melting into the ground.

  “I get it,” Gabriel said, “you’re pacifists. It’s programmed into you.”

  He found himself back in the blue space, the Hohash in front of him. Its face swirled and a youngish woman appeared; mousy-blonde hair, a ski-jump nose, and bottle-green eyes. Jennifer. But the look on her face was strange. Not Jennifer; the Hohash wanted to speak to him through this image.

  “Omnipaths listen, record,” she said.

  “Your masters the Kalarash are in danger, they need you to do this.”

  “Never kill,” the Hohash said through Jennifer’s image.

  “But this time –”

  “You are human,” the mirror interrupted, “with no concept of ‘never’. It is a very long time.”

  Gabriel almost laughed. But they had very little time back on the Crucible. “The woman whose form you take is with Kalaran, one of your masters. He needs you to do this. They asked me to kill Sister Esma and stop the missiles. Protect the planet. I have failed. You –”

  “Difficult to do that and save you as well; I may not be able to send you to his ship. That was the last order from Kalaran.”

  Gabriel shouted. “Dammit! I don’t matter! Destroy the bridge, sever the control connection to the missiles. Protect Esperia! That’s the only –”

  He was back on the bridge, struggling to breathe. Sister Esma was saying something to him.

  “It is about thinking in the long term, Gabriel,” she said. “Strategy, that’s what counts, that’s what wins.”

  “Eight, seven…”

  He glanced over to the Hohash. It looked broken, fractured, tired. It was incredibly old.

  Sister Esma stared out at the viewscreen and beamed, her eyes widening. She looked happy. “Six, five –”

  The Hohash flared a violent red, the heat scalding Gabriel’s cheeks, and he knew it had decided to do as he’d asked. Sorry Jennifer, it would have been nice to get to know you. He thought of Gabriel, the true father he’d never known, and his stepfather Ramires, who had taught him how to live and how to die. This is for both of you, for all of us. Let the dead, all those Sentinels and others murdered by her hand, watch and savour this moment.

  Sister Esma’s head swung in the direction of the Hohash, a look of indignation on her face morphing into a grimace of rage as she realized her time had come, and that her plan had failed. “NO!” She whirled around to Gabriel. “Not like this!” Her hand dove into her pocket, as if clutching something. “Aless–”

  The Hohash’s surface went nova-bright. Gabriel watched her flesh ignite, phosphorous-white, a human flare, her Q’Roth claw flailing, the roar of fire enveloping her scream.

  Gabriel smiled. Micah, we’re finally a team. I’ve done my part. The rest is up to you. He scrunched his eyes closed, as the Crucible’s bridge exploded.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Under Fire

  Micah had always secretly feared dying in space. It was worse than drowning, where at least something filled the lungs, rather than having them explode outwards. His hands were shaky and he felt his heart hammering in his chest as he sped silently through the expanse of space between the dying Pyramid ship and the Crucible. He was painfully aware that at any moment a random micro-chunk of fast-travelling space-rock could tear his suit’s membrane and introduce him to the true meaning of hard vacuum. He and the rest of the Ossyrian attack party relied on their stealth tech to prevent the Crucible’s scanners from targeting them. The one bit of good news was that Kilaney’s Mannekhi Spiker had caused a major distraction, and had finally brought down the shields of the Q’Roth warship.

  Micah stayed in tight formation behind Chahat-Me’s delta wing of Ossyrian commandos, using the auto-thrusters in his suit. His resident, normally in the background unless called for, was fully activated, showing him read-outs of distance and closing speed, plus his own biometric data. Micah tried to ignore his heart rate. He glanced across to Petra on the other side of the wing, but her helmet pointed resolutely toward the Crucible battleship growing large in front of them.

  The vessel made him think of a monstrous dragonfly: the tail-end comprising four grey-gold bulbs he knew to be the engines. Next was the spindly octagonal fuselage occupying most of the ship’s length, which normally housed the planet-cutting cables currently engaged in carving up the larger of Esperia’s two moons. Sporadic flashes of purple reflected on the metallic sheen of the Crucible’s boxy fore-section, signalling yet another lunar explosion spewing a shower of rock destined for Esperia.

  Petra had calculated that the first barrage of moonrock would break atmosphere in just under an hour, categorizing the projected impact on the planet’s biosphere as ‘catastrophic’. Micah had been searching for a more Biblical adjective.

  Just as he was feeling that anything they did now would be too late, an explosion of white light in the Crucible’s front end made him squint. When it faded, he saw a small area of the ship ripped apart, as if a giant claw had torn open the hull, exposing it to space. From its location and ruptured dome, Micah reckoned he was staring at what was left of the s
hip’s control centre. Kilaney and those Mannekhi are damned good! He wished he could see their Spiker ship pricking the Crucible’s hull, but it was on the other side, only three of the Spiker’s black and purple spines visible.

  It felt like forever getting there, but as the Crucible loomed up ahead, Micah began to wonder when they were going to slow down. He felt a stab of panic as he realised he no longer had manual control over his suit thrusters, and that the entire Ossyrian attack wing seemed to be accelerating; he envisioned them all swatting themselves against an impenetrable metal hull like suicidal mosquitoes. His suit thrusters aligned him behind an Ossyrian who held one of the disk-shaped ‘corers’. A cylinder of light struck out from it towards the hull, ribbons of yellow and red proto-plasma spinning faster and faster until the colours meshed. Abruptly he decelerated so fast he felt his organs shoving upwards, squeezing his throat so he could barely breathe.

  Unable to see ahead properly, he gazed across to the lead Ossyrian in front of Petra. Where the tunnel of light struck the hull, the ultra-tough metal caved in like a collapsing cake. He glanced back. At the end of Petra’s line of Ossyrians was one holding a similar cone attached to her feet – a plug, he guessed. Without warning Micah found himself inside a glowing red channel of metal with smooth, steaming sides he knew better than to touch. A second later he entered the ship, his thrusters braking and manoeuvring him upright, resisting the rush of air sucking back out into space. He counted – 1 – 2 – 3 – and the last Ossyrian entered, a reassuring clunk sealing the hull breach. His suit thrusters adjusted to local gravity then shut off. A green light on the inside of his visor lit up, as all the Ossyrians removed their helmets.

  They stood in an olive-coloured chamber intersected by a corridor. Within seconds Chahat-Me appeared with a small group of Ossyrians, followed by Petra. She looked as relieved to see him as he was her. Chahat-Me produced a black bag and ripped it open. Immediately, small glassy darts took flight and headed in both directions down the corridor. Another Ossyrian laid a disc on the floor, and a holo rose from it. Micah watched it unfold, stretching outwards from a central green point indicating their current position, sketching the levels, corridors and rooms of the vast ship. When one of the darts came upon something moving, it paused. Chahat-Me touched the corresponding point on the holo, and a close-up grew for a few seconds, until she touched it again and the dart continued on its way. There were heavily-armed Alicians onboard.

  One of the images transmitted by the darts showed a man leaning heavily against a wall. “Kilaney,” Micah whispered, a smile forming then vanishing as he took in the state of the man. “He looks injured. We must –” But Chahat-Me had already signalled two of her team to go to him. Micah also saw Mannekhi, seven of them, in a standoff against a dozen or so Q’Roth.

  Petra spoke softly to Micah. “Dumb question time: aren’t the Q’Roth supposed to be on our side?”

  “Good point,” Micah noted. “Either this band is renegade or they’ve been misled into this fight, otherwise it’s bad news.”

  Chahat-Me’s quicksilver eyes gazed into a floating metal orb, an Ossyrian comms device Micah had seen once before on Esperia, no doubt dispatching other teams to that area. One of the darts picked up a cluster of life-signs. When Chahat-Me enlarged the image, both Micah and Petra gasped. It was a dome, like a giant soap bubble, Inside, fifty or sixty humans stood immobilised in some kind of stasis, frozen, hands by their sides. Many of them wore terrified expressions, their faces taut and lined, others downcast, imprisoned refugees accepting their fate. The one at the front, her chin high and eyes fixed forward, was instantly recognisable.

  “They have my mother!” Petra unholstered her pistol, her hand shaking as she checked the charge.

  They were about to leave when Chahat-Me expanded one last image. Micah’s fists squeezed white. In the frame, a blonde-haired woman spun around just as the holo unfolded. There was a blur of light from her rifle, and then the image blanked.

  “Nice shot,” Petra said. She looked at Micah. “That’s Louise, right?”

  He nodded. They could see from the map that Louise was headed for Antonia and the other prisoners. Amongst their raiding party, only Micah knew how truly deadly she was, both individually and for the whole of surviving humanity. Whatever it took, he knew he mustn’t let her escape this time. His fear from the space-trip dissolved, and he felt purpose calm his perspiring and shaky hands. He made up his mind in an instant, met Chahat-Me’s eyes, grabbed her paw and pressed it to his temple. While Chahat-Me accessed his resident, learning his plan, he heard Petra demanding to know what was going on. He broke the connection, unslung his assault rifle, checked the holo-map once more and bolted down the corridor, joined by two Ossyrians at the second intersection. Petra shouted after him while Chahat-Me and the others held her back.

  In his mind were three priorities, in order of importance: kill Louise, free the prisoners, and protect Petra. He would intercept Louise and take her down.

  Micah and the two Ossyrians rounded a bend and came across an armed Alician male. Micah dodged sideways, a pulse shot missing him by millimetres, and returned fire. Micah sped past the man’s collapsing body even before it hit the ground. One of the Ossyrians had gone down behind him, caught by the man’s second shot, but neither Micah nor the other Ossyrian slowed.

  His resident had recorded the internal layout of the Crucible based on the Ossyrian darts’ intel, and indicated which way to turn at each junction, but as he approached a right-angled bend he heard the familiar pounding of six metal-hard legs galloping his way. Slowing down he hefted his assault rifle, knowing that it might do little good, when the Ossyrian, running dog-like behind him, flicked a paw at Micah’s rear ankle, tripping his legs. Micah flew headlong across the intersection, hearing the Ossyrian’s war-scream behind him as she slid to a halt to face the approaching Q’Roth warrior. There was a sickening crunch as Micah turned around to see a flurry of black serrated legs slash and chop at the Ossyrian’s body in a frenzied attack, almost cleaving her in two, but one of the Ossyrian’s paws morphed into a syringe, spearing into the Q’Roth’s short neck. The Q’Roth sliced her limb off at the elbow, then crushed her skull, while Micah fired repeatedly at the warrior’s trapezoidal head, to no avail.

  In the blaze of pulse-fire, the Q’Roth’s head turned to look at him, casting aside the shredded Ossyrian corpse. The three metre tall warrior staggered a pace forward, then collapsed onto two of its knees, its other four legs slamming onto the floor. Micah edged backwards and kept firing, but realised it was the Ossyrian who had killed it. The Q’Roth’s head began to disintegrate, mustard-coloured acid bubbling on its face, exuding a smell of rotting eggs.

  Micah got up, skirted the two carcasses and raced down the passageway. His resident, tuned to Micah’s hearing and able to resolve it into sonar-like projections, detected two female humans in the corridor branching off to the left, moving away from him, about fifty metres distant. Micah accelerated, rifle ready. He knew he’d get one shot – but which would be Louise? The one in front because she always led, or the one behind because this was not her ship? He opted for the latter. They were almost at the end of the next corridor.

  Taking two long strides as silently as he could, he sprung upwards and twisted, rolling in the air so as to present the smallest target, and fired at the one behind. As soon as he’d pulled the trigger he knew simultaneously that he’d hit home, and that he’d chosen the wrong Alician. Inwardly he cursed, unsure he’d get such an advantage again. Before he reached safety on the other side of his corridor, Louise had spun and fired a weapon he’d never seen before, a multi-nozzled rifle. The corridor lit up and his hand burned. Landing with a thump he searched through blotchy vision for the assault rifle he’d dropped. It sat a metre away, smoking, fused by the energy bolt Louise had fired. Adrenaline pumped through him; he was up against his worst enemy, without a weapon.

  “Your shooting is getting better, Micah.” She didn’t shout, the tunnel-lik
e corridor channelling her speech perfectly.

  He heard her footsteps walking towards him, unhurried, still some thirty metres away. He got to his feet and ran the short distance to the end of his corridor. A blast door stood in his way. In frustration he thumped it, the heavy metal not even registering the blow with anything but a soft thud.

  “I sealed it a minute ago,” Louise added, sauntering towards him.

  Micah’s mind raced. He looked around, but there was nothing, not even a metal bar to strike her with. In hand-to-hand combat he wouldn’t stand a chance, and she had a rifle. If he dived to the other side of the corridor, he’d be dead before he got halfway. Next to the door was a panel with a Q’Roth keypad. He needed the password. lf she’d used a random one he was dead. Think! Micah knew she was warped by hatred, and this was personal to her – she would have used something relevant to both of them.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Micah,” she said. “It’s good to tie up loose ends.”

  His resident showed him the translated alphabet, overlaying it on the Q’Roth keypad. It also indicated that Louise was halfway down the corridor. Trying to think straight while fighting off panic, he entered ‘Louise’. Nothing happened. ‘Micah’. Still nothing. Stupid! I have to do better than this!

  “Over the years I’ve thought time and time again of how to kill you, Micah. Mostly it comes down to ‘slowly’, but I don’t have much time.”

  Micah tried ‘Vince’, her former partner and lover. No dice.

  “So it came down to strangling you, like I…” She paused. “But of course, shooting you will do. I just need to see the light go out of your eyes once and for all.”

  Micah paused. What had she been about to say? Who had she strangled? He heard her pace increase. Damn it! Who had she strangled, hated almost as much as him? She was almost there. He had seconds.

  Micah thought of their last encounter at the trial, the Alician who had betrayed Louise, then tapped in H-A-N-N-A-H. There was a hiss followed by a clunk. Micah heard Louise burst into a sprint, just as the door began to move. Come on! It slid to the right and Micah curled around it, trying to get the Q’Roth metal between him and Louise. He grabbed the inner side of the door with his left hand, then a burning sensation exploded in his right shoulder, whipping him into the wall on the safe side of the door. Ignoring the pain he slammed his hand down on several keys in fast succession, letting his resident record the code. The door slid back, almost slicing off Louise’s fingers as she tried to prevent it from closing. A satisfying clunk confirmed his safety.