Lailani hit the brakes.
"HOBBS, grab the wheel." She hopped out of her seat.
HOBBS replaced her at the controls. He gave her a blue stare. "Godspeed, Lieutenant Lailani de la Rosa."
He saluted her. It was the first time he had called her by name.
She nodded, eyes damp, and returned the salute. She closed her helmet's visor, adjusted the straps of her jet pack, and ran into the hold. She grabbed a heavy backpack filled with a spare spacesuit, helmet, and jet pack. She slung it across her chest.
She took a deep breath, steeling herself.
Rock. And. Roll.
She raced into the airlock, opened the door, and leaped out into the storm.
* * * * *
Lailani plunged through the red storm of Indrani, wearing nothing but a spacesuit.
The rage, fury, and heat of Hell blazed around her. She screamed.
I should have worn an armored battle spacesuit, not this bullshit ninja outfit.
She grimaced. The storm whipped her. Blazing gas rose all around. Lightning crashed.
She gripped the controls of her jet pack, swerving left and right. A funnel slammed down ahead of her, casting out terrifying winds that knocked her into a tailspin. She managed to right herself, to fly onward. A geyser of sizzling hot gas burst ahead, tall as a skyscraper. Lailani swerved around it, spraying out flames. Her head rattled in her helmet. The jet pack thrummed against her back, slamming into her spine. The storm was deafening. Lightning crackled. When a splash of gas burned her leg, she couldn't even hear herself scream.
She saw him ahead. The Scum King.
By God, the size of him. Here in the open, Lailani could barely believe how large he was. He loomed ahead, the size of goddamn Godzilla. He roared, fangs the length of lamp poles. He kept lashing at the disabled Miyari, denting the mighty warship as if it were a tin can.
In just a few moments, Lailani knew, Marco would get past her younger self, would reactivate the power. The warship's cannons would tear through the great alien.
Lailani flew faster, roaring forth, charging through the storm.
The Scum King whipped his tail. The scaled appendage shrieked over Lailani's head, scattering red clouds, and slammed into the Miyari.
The mighty warship cracked and spun through the air, helpless, only for the alien to grab it again.
Lailani gritted her teeth, adjusted her jet pack, and stormed toward the warship.
She grimaced, shouting wordlessly, and slammed into the hull.
The impact knocked the breath out of her. She clung to the metal. As lightning flashed and the storm roiled, the Scum King lashed his claws. Lailani scurried across the warship's hull, dodging those claws. She crawled across the golden phoenix painted onto the Miyari, desperate to reach the airlock.
Above her rose the head of the Scum King, roaring, gullet filled with molten fire, eyes like cauldrons. Its wings spread out, black curtains of night draped with flame.
For a moment, all Lailani could do was cling to the hull, to stare.
Lailani . . .
His voice was speaking inside her! Dark, deep, a voice like thunder. No. No! Her chip was activated! It should not be able to penetrate her mind!
We know you, our daughter . . . You are one of us . . .
Clinging to the hull, she trembled. She wept.
"Father," she whispered.
Daughter of centipedes . . . Mistress of malice . . .
"Let me pass," she whispered. "Let me in. I will make them bleed!"
Enter, child. With his great claws, the creature tore open the airlock. Bring them to heel.
She leaped down the hull, gave a single spurt of fire from her jet pack, and flew into the airlock.
She landed inside the ship, banging her knees. Ahead of her loomed the airlock's second door. Behind her the storm still roared.
She paused for just a moment, taking deep breaths.
He knew me. He called me daughter. He is about to die.
She tightened her lips, rose to her feet, and drew her pistol.
"I am human," she whispered, tears in her eyes. "That is where my loyalties lie. I am a hybrid. But I fight for humanity. I fight the alien outside and the alien within me."
Leaving her backpack in the airlock, she opened the inner door. Clad in black, singed, holding her pistol before her, she entered the Miyari for the first time in a decade.
A narrow corridor stretched before her, tilted. A single fluorescent light flickered above. Bloodstains covered the floor. A dead scum twitched in the corner, its nervous system giving a few last spasms. A severed human arm still bled in its jaws.
Lailani walked down the corridor, struggling for balance as the ship swayed. A roar sounded outside. The Miyari jerked and spun, and Lailani swayed and hit the wall. She ignored the pain and kept moving, faster now.
A shout rose somewhere above.
"Emery, damn it! Get the power back up!"
Lailani recognized that voice. It was Major Ben-Ari! No, she wasn't a major now, only a young ensign.
In this ship, she's only twenty, Lailani thought. She's eight years younger than I am now. She seemed so old back then, an adult, while I was just a kid.
"He's tearing us apart!" Ben-Ari shouted somewhere in a higher level. "We need that plasma, soldier!"
From deeper in the ship, she heard shouting.
"On it!" rose a voice. Marco's voice.
"There, red pipes!" answered another voice.
Lailani inhaled sharply.
"Elvis," she whispered.
She ran, following the voices. She raced along the corridor, leaped down a stairwell, and saw a round door. There, beyond it—the engine room full of pipes, turbines, and steam.
And she saw them.
Marco. Elvis. Two eighteen-year-old privates in bloody fatigues. She could only see their backs, but she knew it was them. Tears streamed down her cheeks.
Marco. The boy she loved. The boy she had made love to. Elvis. Her friend. The friend she had killed.
No. Not killed. Not yet!
"I see it," Marco said, racing with Elvis toward the plasma generator. "We're turning it back—"
A figure emerged from the shadows, blocking their way.
"No."
Marco and Elvis skidded to a halt.
Between them and the plasma generator stood a young girl, barely larger than a child. Her head was shaved down to stubble. A crooked smile played on her lips. Madness danced in her eyes.
It's me, Lailani thought. Me ten years ago. Me possessed by the scum. And in a few seconds, I'm about to rip out Elvis's heart.
She took a deep breath.
Nightwish, she thought. Her code word to deactivate the chip in her head, the chip that kept the alien at bay.
Her chip shut down. Her consciousness expanded. The alien part of her, only one percent of her DNA but so powerful, began to rise, to fill her with cruelty, with might.
Elvis breathed out in relief, still facing the younger Lailani.
"Damn it, de la Rosa," the boy said. "You scared the shit out of me. Help us turn this fucker back on."
The young Lailani didn't move. Her voice rumbled out. Low. Guttural. Demonic. "No."
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Elvis said, trying to walk around her, to reach the pipes and turn the Miyari's weapons back on.
The young Lailani smiled crookedly.
Her hand thrust forward, growing claws.
The older Lailani, twenty-eight years old, her heart pounding against her ribs, reached out with her mind and grabbed Elvis.
Like a puppeteer tugging a string, she yanked him a step backward.
The young Lailani's claws scraped across Elvis's chest, tearing open the skin, ripping the muscle . . . but missing the heart.
With her mind, the older Lailani slammed Elvis onto the floor.
Play dead! She forced the thought into Elvis's mind, keeping him down. You're dead, damn it. They must think you're dead!
The young Marco stood, frozen, eyes wide.
"God, no," he whispered. "God, no, God, no. Elvis!"
Neck creaking, the young, demonic Lailani turned her head toward him. Her smile stretched into a grin. Elvis's blood dripped from her claws.
"Hello, Marco," she said, advancing toward him.
"Who are you?" he whispered.
Lailani licked the blood off her claws. "You know us." Her voice was impossibly deep. "You slew us in the desert. You murdered our children and wives in the mine. Now you will worship us. Now you will join us. We are the Masters. We are the Ancients. We are those who rise."
"Scum," Marco whispered, staring at the young Lailani. He grabbed his gun. "Let her go! Get out of her body!" His shout was hoarse, his eyes damp. "Take me instead. Let Lailani go!"
The young Lailani laughed. A deep, rumbling laugh, a sound impossible for one so small. "Let her go? Lailani has always been one of us. We were always inside her. It was we who impregnated her whore of a mother. It was we who lurked inside her throughout her childhood, keeping her frail body alive. It was we who broke her soul. It was . . ."
The older Lailani stopped listening. She knew that Marco would be fine. She remembered this day. Remembered that he had subdued her.
Serenity, she thought, reactivating her chip.
Marco and the younger Lailani began to grapple. The older Lailani inched forward. She grabbed Elvis and tugged him back into the shadows. He moaned, chest lacerated, blood seeping over his uniform. He blinked up at her.
"De la Rosa?" Elvis whispered, struggling to cling to consciousness.
"Hush!" she whispered, dragging him. "Keep playing dead!"
By the plasma pipes, only a few meters away, the younger Lailani was squeezing Marco's throat, laughing maniacally, her eyes filled with the madness of the scum.
You'll be fine, girl, the older Lailani thought, tears in her eyes, looking at the monster she had been. You'll get a chip installed. You'll be cured. I promise you. Hang in there.
She pulled Elvis to his feet behind a network of pipes. She stared up into his eyes.
My God, it's really him, she thought. The same face from her memory. The nose sharp. The sideburns long. Her friend. Benny "Elvis" Ray.
He frowned down at her, clutching his bleeding chest. "Lailani? How?" He peered around the pipes to where the younger Lailani was still strangling Marco. "But—"
"Shush! I need your blood." She grabbed his wounded chest.
When he began to scream, she covered his mouth with her other hand.
She worked quickly. Using his blood, she painted a trail toward a pit full of pistons. She ripped off Elvis's shirt and tossed it over the guardrail. Once power was restored to the ship, those pistons would begin to pump out an inferno of fire. Marco would think that Elvis, wounded, had fallen inside, had been incinerated.
She grabbed Elvis's hand. "Now come with me." She pulled him toward the door and shoved him into the corridor. "Marco will be fine. Move!"
As Elvis stumbled forward, Lailani stepped through the doorway too.
She paused.
I shouldn't. Oh God, I shouldn't. Paradoxes and destroying the universe and everything. But . . . Oh, dammit.
She peeked back into the engine room, her helmet still covering her head. She lifted the visor. She shouted, "Don't let Sofia fall!"
Kneeling over Marco, her claws wrapped around his throat, the younger Lailani looked up.
Marco kicked the girl off.
The older Lailani grabbed Elvis and dragged him away.
The ship swayed as the Scum King bellowed outside. She could see his claws and scales through the portholes. Elvis and she kept running, heading back toward the airlock. The ship thrummed as, back in the engine room, Marco managed to reactivate the plasma cannons.
"We're back in business!" rose a voice from above—young Addy's voice. "Eat fire!"
Lailani and Elvis leaped into the airlock. The Miyari shook. Plasma was blasting out from her cannons, slamming into the Scum King. The creature bellowed.
Lailani ripped open her backpack and shoved the extra spacesuit, jet pack, and helmet at Elvis.
"Get dressed. Now!"
Plasma roared out again.
Lailani and Elvis leaped out into the storm.
They soared through the crimson clouds as behind them the Miyari fired her cannons, blasting the massive alien king. They flew around funnels of gas and sparkling electricity. They flew as lightning crackled around them, as thunder boomed, as the winds whipped them.
"What the fuck is going on, de la Rosa?" Elvis shouted, voice muffled behind his helmet. "And why the fuck are there two of you?"
"Shut up and fly!"
Behind them, the Scum King let out a final bellow. When Lailani glanced over her shoulder, she saw the Miyari's cannons tear through the creature, cracking its ribs, filling its innards with flame.
Strangely, she felt pity for him.
Is he my father?
She pushed the thought away. She looked ahead. She kept flying.
Soon the Miyari vanished behind her and Elvis. All was the storm, orange and deep and burnished gold and blinding white. Endless. No ground below. No sky above. Nothing but these hellish fumes.
And there ahead, a beacon—a flash of light. They flew toward it. It emerged from the storm before them. A small starship, far smaller than the Miyari. A ship with a dragon and rainbow painted on its hull. The Ryujin.
Its airlock opened, and HOBBS stood there, gesturing for them. His voice rang through the storm.
"Hurry, mistress! We must go back!"
Lailani grabbed Elvis's hand. They flew together, jet packs leaving trails of fire, and all but crashed into the airlock.
HOBBS slammed the door shut, and Lailani raced into the cockpit. She grabbed the controls, spun the Ryujin upward, and shoved down the throttle. They soared upon a jet of fire, rising from the storm. They breached the atmosphere with a shower of spurting, crackling, burning gasses.
They flew through space.
Lailani sighed in relief and removed her helmet. For a moment, she just breathed.
From the hold, Lailani heard Elvis's voice.
"Will somebody tell me what in tarnation is going on here? Who the fuck are these creepy-ass dolls?" He burst into the cockpit. "Dammit, de la Rosa! What the hell is going on? And—" He frowned and stared at her. "De la Rosa?" He leaned closer. "Is that really you? You look . . . different. Your hair. It's longer. And your face. It's different somehow, it's . . ."
The face of a woman, no longer a girl, she thought.
"HOBBS!" Lailani said, ignoring Elvis. For now, she had to focus. "HOBBS, can you open a portal back home?"
The robot stood behind her, manipulating the hourglass. "All ready, mistress. Shall I rock?"
She nodded. "And/or roll."
The robot tilted the hourglass.
The portal opened.
They flew through time and space and a thousand visions of what might have been.
They reemerged.
They shuddered, the dreams fading.
They floated through silent space.
"Mistress, we are back," HOBBS said. "Once more, it is the year 2153."
Elvis was pale. His hands trembled.
"I saw myself," the boy whispered, voice choking. "When we flew through that tunnel of light. I saw myself dying." He looked at Lailani. "I saw you rip out my heart. I saw . . . I saw a decade of lost life. I . . ."
He fell to his knees in the cockpit, clutching his bleeding chest.
Lailani set the ship on autopilot.
"Come, Elvis, into the back room." She placed a hand on his shoulder. "Let's get that nasty scratch patched up."
She took him into the hold, and the other robots moved aside. Lailani spent a moment tending to his wounds—wounds she had given him ten years ago, wounds still fresh and bleeding.
"Lailani." Elvis gulped, looking queasy. "I'm scared. What the hell is going on? Where are we? What did that rob
ot mean about 2153? He meant 2143, right? Right?"
She placed a final bandage on his chest. She kissed his cheek.
"Elvis, it's a long story. And it begins with me ripping out your heart."
For long moments, she spoke. He listened silently. She told him about how she was one percent alien, a hybrid designed in a scum lab, placed as an embryo into a human woman to be born on Earth, to be raised human, to become a drone waiting to be activated during the war. She told him how she had sabotaged the Miyari, how she had crashed the ship, and how she had killed him. How the HDF had placed a chip in her skull, keeping her evil at bay. And how, for ten years, the guilt had filled her.
"I had to make it right," she said, tears flowing. "I had to save you. To bring you back to me. Because I couldn't live with myself as a murderer. I had to save you and redeem myself."
Finally she finished her tale. Elvis looked at her, pale, and his fingers shook. He exhaled slowly.
"Wow," he finally said.
Lailani nodded, eyes damp. "Wow."
And suddenly she was sobbing. She embraced her friend. He was still just a kid. Scrawny. So young. By God, just a boy. She wept against his shoulder.
I found some redemption. You are alive. You are alive. Finally, you're here. Finally, a part of me is healed.
"Lailani." Elvis spoke softly. "So . . . you have a time machine."
Lailani nodded. "Yes."
Elvis was silent for a moment, looking at his lap. When he raised his eyes again, they were damp. "It was almost a year ago. Well, eleven years ago now. My girlfriend. She died in a car crash, and maybe we can go back, and—"
"No." HOBBS stepped forward. "We have already ruptured spacetime. Perhaps beyond repair. Look." He pointed out a porthole. "Look!"
They crowded around the porthole and stared.
It looked like a crack in the universe. A black rift where no starlight shone.
"A rent in spacetime," Lailani whispered. She looked at HOBBS. "Fuck. Is this it? The whole destroying-the-cosmos event?"
HOBBS's eyes were dark. He kept staring.
"The rent is still small," the robot said carefully. "It does not seem to be spreading. But we must not time travel again. It is too dangerous. We have damaged the universe itself." The towering robot shook his head. "Your friend was not meant to live, mistress. Yet here he is, ten years after he was meant to die. The cosmos is unhappy. And the cosmos tore open."
Earth Honor (Earthrise Book 8) Page 24