“Why replace them at all? Why not let them flourish?”
“We are the Xandra. We cannot allow it. The humans would destroy us.”
“You are probably right.” A sudden thought popped into his mind. “What about the seedpods? Won’t they be wondering about them?”
“The tree-elves will move the seedpods to an area where there are no humans. By the time the pods split open and the Xandra-humans are born all humans will have been replaced.”
Tom closed his eyes. The knowledge was inside him, he knew she spoke the truth. “When was this body created? I remember being chained to one of the mother plants by fibers inserted into my body, but somehow I don’t believe that was me, I mean, this body.”
“No, it wasn’t. That was still the original Thomas McClary.”
“What about the other one, the one who was here before me?”
“That was the first proto-type, an inferior specimen. He would not have survived. The Xandra took him back. He was just an experiment.” Sister Angela crouched in front of him. Her blue eyes sparkled. “We three were the first with individual identities, but the Xandra is still a part of us. You, brother, are the only one with a true individual identity. You were born this morning.”
She rose in front of him, kissed him on the lips, then she said. “You are not alone. We are your companions, through us your are connected to the Xandra. She loves you, and so do we. We are one.”
“Where is the human Sister Angela? Where is my wife?”
“I am your wife.” Anina said beside him with a gentle voice.
When he looked at her with a grave expression she said, “Tom McClary and the females were taken to the valley. They are happy there, they will not remember their former lives. It is the only way. The Xandra does have compassion, she will not extinguish life, unless it is necessary. Deep inside you must know this.”
Chapter Thirty
Space Station
The plant had grown. It covered almost half the pond. The naked woman standing in its center smiled at the men watching her. Her green eyes glittered in the bright light of the artificial micro-sun.
“Who are you?” Cunningham asked.
“I am The Xandra,” she said with a sultry voice.
“What are you?”
“A goddess.” She lifted a slim hand to brush long strands of red hair away from her face.
“How did you get here?”
She laughed softly. “You brought me.”
“Are you real or just a figment of my imagination?” Cunningham looked at Starfinder. “Do you see her?”
The alien man nodded. “I see her. But that doesn’t mean she is real. This is not what she really looks like.”
The woman on the plant laughed. She was still looking at Cunningham. “I can be anyone you wish me to be,” she said. There was a subtle shift in the lines of her body, her hair moved like a nest of vipers, changing from red to black.
“Jeremy, my darling,” she whispered across the pond, “come into my arms. Let me fulfill your desires.” Her eyes were not green anymore, but a beautiful hazel.
Without realizing it, Cunningham stepped into the water. Rough hands pulled him back onto dry land.
“She is not who she seems to be!” Starfinder’s voice said harshly. “She is evil! While she satisfies your bodily desires she takes away your soul, rips it to shreds.” The alien’s voice grew hoarse, high-pitched, not at all the soft baritone Cunningham was used to hearing.
The woman on the plant changed again.
Her hair was still black and long, but her eyes became overly large. Not hazel any longer, but purple. The outlines of her body seemed to blur; she became shorter, more slender.
Starfinder moaned. “Go away!” he cried out in anguish. “You are not she. I hate you!” His voice broke. “You took her away from me. I loved her so much. She was my life.”
“I am your lost love. I am Starmist, your mate.” She stepped off the plant, slid gracefully into the water.
“Do it now!” Starfinder almost screamed.
Cunningham tore his eyes away from the beautiful vision that flowed toward them. Swallowing the lump in his throat, he tried to still the beating of his heart. “Now!” he told Beringer, who stood silently beside them.
Beringer brought down his hand.
The blast from the lasers melted her lovely body. She didn’t scream. Her smiling face was the last thing they saw. Another blast destroyed the great floating plant, burnt it into a black mass that left an oily film on the water. The smell of burning vegetation was unpleasant only for a moment, then the ventilators sucked it away.
Starfinder sank to his knees and put his hands over his face. Cunningham touched his shoulder in a gesture of comfort.
Beside them, Commander Beringer cleared his throat. Cunningham looked at him, and then at the two marines, who still stood with their weapons at the ready. “Your work here is done, Commander,” Cunningham said.
Beringer nodded, saluted and signaled his men. Even though their faces showed no emotion, it was written in their eyes.
They were men, and they were young.
Killing a goddess in cold blood is no easy thing. It would haunt them for the rest of their lives.
There was a bench nearby. Cunningham walked over to it, sat down. He watched Starfinder rise to his feet. The alien man stared for a long time at the now dark water of the pond. Silence fell throughout in the park, except for the quiet noise of the ventilators. “I know it was not Starmist,” Starfinder said after awhile, “but it was like watching her die all over again.” He joined Cunningham on the bench. “I apologize for showing you my pain. I’m usually more controlled.”
“No need to apologize. We’re all human,” Cunningham said and smiled. “You know what I mean.”
Starfinder managed a small smile. “I appreciate your empathy. Seeing your own mate must have been just as painful.”
“It was. She seemed so real.” Cunningham sighed. “I haven’t seen my wife for forty years, but I still miss her.”
“Mine was taken from me only a few short weeks ago.” Starfinder said. “Even though it has been over a thousand years for the entity who calls herself The Xandra, she still remembers my mate and me. What are we dealing with?”
“A goddess, as she claimed,” Cunningham said. “Tell me how your mate Starmist died.” When Starfinder hesitated, he added, “Unless it is too painful to talk about it.”
“It is, but maybe talking about it will help me to deal with it.” The alien sighed. “We were on the surface of the planet, studying the plants. Starmist always loved flowers. When we came upon this mass of purple flowers growing along the shores of one of the many ponds, Starmist shed her clothes and lay down among the flowers. There was something about these flowers. Suddenly, both of us were sexually turned on, and before we realized what was happening we were locked together like two animals in heat. Afterwards my mate walked into the water, headed for the huge purple plant that was floating in its middle. She climbed onto it. I heard her scream, and then she seemed to disappear into the plant.”
“Disappear?”
“She was gone only for short time. Before I could jump into the water, she appeared again and waved. I lay back into the flowers. My mind was not clear, the fragrance of those purple flowers proved overpowering. It did something to my brain and body. Even though we just had sex, I was still immensely turned on. When Starmist straddled me, I closed my eyes and let it happen. We copulated for what seemed like hours.” He paused, looked at Cunningham and smiled sadly. “It is not that unusual, because our females are easily aroused and can keep a male occupied for a long time. As for my own stamina? I thought it was just the fragrance of the flowers.”
“So, what was wrong and when did you find out?” Cunningham asked, a little uneasy about the intimate details the alien was going into. After all, they were strangers. Cunningham was not used to talking about his sexual experiences with other people, especially not with a to
tal stranger.
“Starmist tried to talk me out of going back to the station. When I told her it was out of the question, she reluctantly agreed to go back with me. I should have known something was amiss, when she refused to eat meat products. She told me swimming in the water changed her. I had no idea how true that was. She stopped eating altogether, and it wasn’t long before she became ill. Her body deteriorated fast. She begged me to take her down to the surface again. I did, but it was too late. I stayed with her for a few days, and then she just died. Hers was the first body we performed an autopsy on.”
“Exactly what did happen to your mate?”
“That plant devoured her and replicated her body. The woman who came back to the station with me was not Starmist, but a clone.” The agony the alien experienced talking about it was evident in his voice. “I copulated with a plant,” he said.
A shiver ran down Cunningham’s back. “If it makes you feel any better, so have I,” he said, his voice a hoarse whisper.
Both men sat silent for a while.
“You know, we may have eliminated the threat here on the station,” Cunningham said after a long pause of silence, “but how can we deal with it on Nu-Eden. I have one thousand colonists down there. Who knows how many of them are still human? I’m afraid to send down a team of scientists. How can we protect them? We can’t destroy every plant on that planet. What are we going to do with the people who have been replaced?”
Starfinder nodded. “I see your dilemma. We don’t even know which species of plant is suspect. Is it only one? Are there many different kinds? Should we worry about animals that may also be part of the threat?”
“You told me it was in the water,” Cunningham said.
“Again, we’re not sure.” The alien man shrugged. “We believe the water is part of the cycle.”
“I’ll have the water in our tanks sterilized.” Cunningham rose to his feet. “We have a small company of soldiers stationed near Alpha Colony, under the command of Sergeant Vicks. He and his men don’t have much contact with the colonists, so there is a good chance none of them are affected. I must warn them.” He heaved a deep sigh. “It seems they are of little use against an enemy you can’t see.”
“I advise caution,” Starfinder said. “Take nothing for granted.”
The elevator was empty when they stepped into it. Cunningham got off on the seventh floor and headed for his quarters. He didn’t have to ask for Starfinder’s destination. The alien was going to board a pod and float to the floor of the docking bay, then he would take an elevator down to the fifth level, where his people were living.
The aliens powered up the station, or at least part of it. Cunningham wasn’t sure. He had not been given a tour. Most of the station was inaccessible to the humans. He knew that the Genaar didn’t trust their uninvited guests, and Cunningham didn’t blame them for it.
He didn’t trust the Genaar either.
When Cunningham entered his quarters, he found a message on his computer from a Tom McClary. He was one of the bio-engineers living on Nu-Eden.
“Captain Cunningham,” the message said, “please, send down a shuttle and pick up my wife and me. There are several important issues we need to discuss. We need the facilities of the Station to do some tests, which can’t be done here on Nu-Eden…”
Cunningham didn’t listen to the whole message. McClary never said what exactly he wanted to discuss, except that it was urgent. The Captain decided to pick up the man and his wife. She was a doctor, and maybe she had information that could be important.
He put a call through to Commander Beringer. “I’d like to talk to you, Les. Come up to my quarters, please.”
Chapter Thirty-one
Space Station
After leaving the Captain’s office, Beringer decided he needed to talk to the alien man he knew as Starfinder. The vision of the beautiful woman in the park and the way he and his men killed her, wouldn’t leave him. They had followed the Captain’s orders.
Even though the Captain and Starfinder briefed him, Beringer kept on wondering. What exactly did they kill there? He still couldn’t see how a plant and a mere woman could be a threat to the humans on this station. He saw the reaction of Starfinder when they destroyed the woman.
She called herself The Xandra, claimed to be a goddess.
Whoever she had been, she obviously had been delusional. You cannot kill a goddess.
Or can you?
When he arrived on the lowest level of the tower, he entered a room that had been hidden behind a door in the wall at the far end. It was one of the doors the humans had not been able to open. Since the Genaar started up their power grid, many of the doors were operational. Inside the room were a number of pods, which were used to cross the airless docking bay to get down to the next level.
Beringer stepped through the oval opening into the pod. It wasn’t very large, just big enough to hold possibly five people. He put his hand on a small blue screen, the door closed and a light in the ceiling lit up the interior of the pod. A slight vibration told Beringer that the pod was starting to move. A few moments later the door slid open and Beringer found himself in another room. A door in one wall led him into another elevator, which took him down to the living quarters of the aliens.
One of the alien men greeted him with a friendly smile. Even though he never saw any weapons, somehow he couldn’t believe that their newfound friends were unarmed. On the other hand, Beringer never brought a weapon. He felt safe in the presence of these gentle people. “I would like to speak with Starfinder,” he told the alien, who nodded politely and said, “I will take you to him.”
Beringer was amazed at the ease and speed that the Genaar learned the language of the humans. They were truly an advanced species.
Starfinder looked up from the metal desk he had been sitting at when Beringer entered. He smiled and got up to greet the Commander. Shaking Beringer’s hand, he said, “What brings you here, Commander Beringer?”
“Concerns,” Beringer replied and gave the alien a little smile. Looking at their joined hands, he said, “You adapt well to human customs.”
Starfinder pulled his hand away. “Association with many different species has taught us many things. Assuming the behavior of the people you’re dealing with helps to build trust and friendship.” He chuckled. “Besides, our two species are not that much different from each other. The custom of shaking hands is not unique to humans.” He indicated a bench at one wall, “Take a seat.”
Beringer looked around the room. “It seems you and I have much in common. My room is similar to yours. Some people may find it uncomfortable. But I’m a military man, used to little comfort.” He looked at the alien. “Do you have a military background?”
Starfinder shook his head, went back to his desk, and seated himself. “I’m a scientist. I’ve always been. Most of my life I’ve spent in space, searching for other planets, studying different civilizations, their customs and their way of life. Once, I was a pilot, but that was only part of my training.” He smiled. “Never a military man.”
“But you do have soldiers?” Beringer asked.
“We do.” Starfinder nodded. “However, we are pacifists. We do not condone violence.”
“Never?”
“We are not strangers to it. A race as old as ours has not always been peaceful.” His large purple eyes studied the Commander. “That is the reason we entered the relative safety of cryogenic sleep, instead of obliterating all life on a planet that attacked and killed hundreds of our people. Maybe it was the coward’s way out.” He shrugged. “Your Captain Cunningham does not agree with our decision. He wants to find out more about the threat you are facing. We are facing, because we are still involved. It seems a thousand years was not long enough to eliminate the enemy.”
Beringer was silent for a moment. “I don’t necessarily share my captain’s decision,” he said slowly. “That is the reason I am here. I just spoke to him. He informed me that he is sending a
shuttle down to Nu-Eden to pick up a couple of colonists. I advised against it, but it is his decision, not mine.”
“I was not aware of this,” Starfinder said. “He didn’t tell me when we spoke. Why are you telling me this?”
Beringer hesitated. “I’ve always had good instincts and I have learned to follow them. Somehow I feel uneasy, I have this queasy sensation in my stomach, this… this feeling of doom. If it were my decision, nobody on that planet would be allowed back on the station, not until we have identified the enemy. Something is wrong. I want to know if there is anything we can do?”
“Like what?”
Beringer stood up, approached the desk. “You and your advanced technology. You must have some way of identifying a person who has been infected by this, whatever it is we are facing.” Beringer gave Starfinder a hopeful look.
“We have.” The alien smiled ruefully. “But the person has to be dead before we can determine that.”
“What other options do we have?”
“Not many. I advised your captain to be cautious. I suggest the same thing to you.” Starfinder rose again. He stepped around his desk, faced Beringer. “Now, let’s talk about something else. I saw that large vessel in our docking bay and I’ve seen you take it into space a couple of times. I assume it is a warship. Am I correct?”
“You are. My job here is to protect the colonists and the research scientists against any attacks from space or from hostile planets. Assuming we run into any hostiles. It seems we have, but what good is a warship if you don’t even know you’re under attack?”
“Not much, I agree.” Starfinder nodded. “Can you land this vessel on the surface of a planet?”
The Xandra (Book 1): Daughter of the Dark Page 20