“Chancellor,” Lee began as the image of the tall Vadne appeared in his briefing room. “I’m glad we got through to you. We’ve had—”
“Captain Pearce,” the Vadne politician snapped. “You are to return to Vadne immediately and surrender the device you stole from the Ch’Tauk.”
“Chancellor, I—”
“Captain Pearce, the Ch’Tauk are here demanding you turn over the device you stole from Perigee Station,” the chancellor said again. This time his crest seemed to waver. “They are demanding you turn yourself over to their custody to stand trial for crimes against the Alliance and the murder of Tercero Na’Tora.”
“Sir, you don’t understand. We just left Perigee and—”
“Lee,” Farthing’s voice called from one side. “Shut it off! Shut it off now! He’s being coerced.”
“Lee reached again for the podium but paused as a familiar chittering came over the comm signal. He moved back to see the chancellor again. This time a Ch’Tauk moved into view, the same he had seen in the chancellor’s office. He was still carrying the odd staff, but this time a small blade protruded from the tip and pressed against the chancellor’s throat.
“Lo’Pearce,” the voice from the creature’s vocoder crackled. “I had hoped to see Na’Tora instead of you, but you must have killed him. Now surrender yourself or I kill this one.”
“Why?” Lee demanded, looking into the projection of the tall Ch’Tauk as if he were truly standing in front of him. “Why do all this? The Gizzeen are a threat to our entire sector. Once they have the Alliance, they’ll go after the Ch’Tauk.”
“You cannot comprehend, human, the grace which has befallen my people,” the creature replied. “We are blessed with a living God in the form of our Emperor, as well as lost brothers and sisters who have come to reclaim us.”
“Lost brothers and—” The image clicked off. “What? Kama, what happened?”
“I had her close the channel, Lee,” Farthing said. “They were tracing the signal.”
“Like hell they were,” Lee said. “Kama would have scrambled that signal ten ways before they could get anywhere near us.”
“The chancellor was signaling us,” Farthing said as Lee came back around to look at the screen. “He was telling us to go. You wouldn’t have seen the movements, but I did.”
“The chancellor, my God. They’re gonna kill him if we—”
“The chancellor is already dead,” Farthing replied. “They would have killed him as soon as the transmission was cut.”
“Then why did you?” Lee said, flabbergasted at the cool admission. “You killed him.”
“Yes I did, and I saved our lives in the process,” replied the Vadne. “We need to move from our current position and get to safety. They’ll be coming for us.”
“We’ve gotta go to site Beta and get repairs made before we finish this,” Lee replied, thinking quickly of the nearest place. “We’ll go radio silent and hide out for a few hours before moving on to wherever we’re supposed to go next. I have a few stowaways I need to have a chat with anyways.”
“Agreed,” Farthing said. “It may be necessary to make several jumps to throw off pursuit. We can coordinate through our navigators. Kongo out.”
The image snapped out and Lee was left in the dark room. The events of the last few hours were racing through his mind as he tried to understand what had happened. They were on the run again without any knowledge of whether or not the rest of the fleet was after them, or even still intact. Again, they had been thrust into a position of having to trust Admiral Chang and his plans, and go forward with his scheme to close the Gizzeen portal. He felt out of sorts and lost in a sea of blackness. He quickly palmed the comm and gave orders to the bridge to take the ship away, then he sat in one of the empty chairs.
“I don’t know what to do,” Lee said aloud. “I don’t seem to have any options anymore. Everything I do just seem to get us further and further away from safety.”
“I think you’re looking at it the wrong way,” said a voice from the door. I don’t think we’re moving away from safety, Lee.”
“Lee looked up to see his fiancée, still wearing the dirty uniform she’d had on when she leapt into her fighter. She crossed the distance to Lee in a few long steps. Lee looked up at her in the dim lighting. With the door open, her golden hair seemed like a halo against the darkness around him. She reached out and put a hand on his head, pulling him closer. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. She smelled like sweat and fire and grease, and he loved her. She spent a long moment stroking the side of his head, running her fingers through his short black hair. Finally, she reached under his chin and tilted his head up to look into her eyes.
“Lee, you’ve always had choices and you’ve always made the right ones,” she said. “You have never run away from anything, and I don’t believe you are running away now. As always, you are running towards something.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of, Alice,” Lee said, standing up and holding her tight. “I don’t know if the place I’m running towards is a solution or an end.”
“No matter which,” Alice said, tilting her head down to kiss him. “I’m always here to watch your back.”
The rest of the conversation continued in their cabin with fewer words, fewer tears and clothes.
22
“D’ya mind telling me what the hell just happened?” Lee asked the diminutive alien seated across from him on a low couch. “The Ch’Tauk are supposed to be under your control.”
“We are afraid we don’t understand your question, Captain Pearce,” replied the creature, staring with his white-on-white eyes. “Which event are you speaking of?”
“I’m talking about the attack by your creatures that killed four of my men and nearly cost all of us our lives.”
“The attack apparently was in response to your discovery of the device and the subsequent signal sent by your first officer to a nearby attack fleet,” replied the creature. “That is what we know of the situation.”
“When the war ended, you said you were going back to Ch’Tauk to guide the species you created into a better understanding of peace and harmony,” Lee pressed, pacing the floor in front of the couch. “They don’t appear to be very harmonious to me.”
“Indeed,” replied the creature. “We tried to teach them harmony; however, their vocal range is unable to form a perfect chorus.”
Lee’s instinct was to raise a hand towards the small creature, but a steadier hand on his shoulder held his anger in check. Alice was waiting patiently while Lee attempted to interrogate the Engineer. The little creature had proven evasive and found ways to frustrate Lee at every turn. She stepped past her fiancé and knelt down in front of the couch.
“Do you have a name?” Alice asked the creature. “I’ve always wondered about that. We call you Engineers, but I’ve never heard you called by name.”
“Since we do not live the sort of linear existence your people perceive, and our existence flows between us in the Convocation, any name I’d give would have no meaning in any context you would understand,” the creature replied. “It is only due to our reduced faculties that I am able to hold this form as long as I have.”
“It must be difficult for you to be a solitary form for so long,” Alice said, reaching out to hold the small white hand. “Does it hurt?”
“No more or less than the alterations which have been performed on you. This form is a part of our existence. We will endure.”
Alice was stunned. It was the first mention of her engineering abilities she had heard from anyone not intimately familiar with her capture. Lee had managed to keep her mental state secret from anyone not on board the ship. To hear the creature state the facts so baldly was startling. The Engineers, she understood, perceived time and space in such a different manner. They must have known about what the Ch’Tauk were doing to her during her captivity.
“What do you know about my … alterations?” Alice asked quietly
as Lee placed a hand on her shoulder.
“The Conduit race draws forth mental energy and converts the information into usable, trainable knowledge,” the creature said, tilting its head up to look into Alice’s face. “The conduit works both ways, though they are not always aware of this.”
“Why would these Conduit creatures want Alice to have knowledge of multi-dimensional physics and engineering?” Lee asked, fearing the answer. “They were subjects of the Ch’Tauk and we didn’t even know about the Gizzeen back then.”
“Indeed, you did not,” the Engineer replied. “However, it was not the Conduit who imparted the knowledge.”
“It was you,” Alice said, stepping closer to the small alien. “You put this in my head. I was being tortured and you just let it happen!”
“Miss Bennett, it was our intention to assist you in your escape,” the Engineer replied, not backing down from the tall woman. “It was our intention to save the knowledge in the most expedient container we had access to. The conduit process allowed us to access the storage centers of your brain and deposit the information needed to unlock the secret of the device. We were never sure the Ch’Tauk could be trusted and had to—”
“Is that all I am to you?” Alice said, charging at the creature in rage, her face a mask of pain and fear. “I’m just some canister you can fill up with your damn blueprints and equations? How dare you! Do you know what they did to me?”
“Calm yourself,” the creature said, this time watching Lee place a restraining hand on Alice. “Your anger is understandable but misplaced. The process killed four of the Conduits during the procedure, and more knowledge was taken from you than we intended, but we are also responsible for your return.”
“I escaped because that bastard Ch’Tauk had no more use for me and ordered me killed,” Alice said, throwing off Lee’s hand to stare down the Engineer. “If it hadn’t been for the priest on that station, I … wait. I don’t understand. I forgot about that female Ch’Tauk and … what the hell … is…”
Alice wobbled on her feet. Lee reached out as she fainted into Lee’s arms. Lee eased her back into his shoulder and looked at the Engineer. Alice was still conscious but her eyes were fluttering. She had never told him the full story of her escape and he had never pressed. He knew there were gaps in her own knowledge, but hadn’t truly realized the extent of the damage.
“What’s happening to her?” Lee asked, staring into the white-on-white eyes. “What did you do?”
“We locked her mind,” the creature replied, stepping closer and extending a short white hand. “To protect her from what she carried. We can unlock her now and release the information.”
“What will that do to her?” Lee asked, pulling Alice closer to his body. “She’s already been through too much.”
“The process will free her, Captain Lee Pearce,” the creature said, tilting its head up to look at him. “She has been struggling with containing the matrix we implanted. We thought if we locked her mind she would be better able to handle the data. We underestimated the frailty of the human mind. For that, we have regrets.”
“Regrets?” Lee said, wanting to lash out at the creature but holding Alice closer. “Is that all? Do you have any idea what she has endured? She’s been going crazy trying to figure out what you did to her. The stuff she’s been spewing out has driven her up the wall. She can’t function around an M-space engine without babbling and grabbing a wrench. What gives you the right to do anything to her?”
“We believed we would be saving your race from destruction,” the creature replied, its small hand retreating into the folds of the white robes it wore. “We arranged for the Ch’Tauk to release her and we guided others to send her back to her own kind.”
“You sent her back, but what did you send with her?” Lee asked. “Why was this so important you had to do … this to her?”
“The Gizzeen are a threat to you and your people,” the creature replied. “It was decided your people should survive, and this was our solution.”
“Solution to what?” Lee asked. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Captain Lee Pearce,” the Engineer said, easing back to the low couch. “What do you know of the origin of the Ch’Tauk?”
“I know what you’ve told us,” Lee replied, stroking Alice’s hair as she began to regain consciousness. “I know you created them from a more primitive species and then stayed to watch your handiwork. I also know they got away from you and forced you into hiding.”
“Essentially correct, although lacking in details,” the creature replied. “We found the Ch’Tauk to be a primitive species, it is true, but we saw their potential.”
“Potential for what?” Lee asked. “Potential to destroy everything in their path?”
“It was a potential for greatness, Captain Lee Pearce. The Ch’Tauk could have been a noble race. They had a potential for survival we had not found in all our travels, and they were so young. This galaxy is so young,” the creature said, its bearing one of reflection. “We saw in the Ch’Tauk the ability to survive almost anything in comparison to most species in this reality. It was a facet we had seen before and wanted to spark into this galaxy.”
“They survived alright,” Lee replied, as Alice looked back at him. “They survived like any other roach survives.”
“An apt analogy, but totally inaccurate. The Ch’Tauk are closer to one of your sea creatures than an insect from Earth,” the alien replied. “A crab, we think they are called. In any case, their potential for survival made them a candidate for our experiment.”
“Did the experiment succeed?” Alice said, regaining her composure as Lee helped her sit upright. “Did the subjects exceed your hypothesis?”
“Unfortunately they did not,” the creature replied with something like a sigh. “Their evolutionary pattern ceased at their present level. They were not able to match the template.”
“Template? What template?” Lee asked. “You did this before?”
“No. This was our first experiment of this type,” the Engineer replied. “The experiment did not reach the target desired form. The Ch’Tauk have stalled genetically and will never match their template forms. They were magnificent creatures once. The form they have evolved into fills us with sadness. It seemed we did not understand the genetic predisposition of this species towards violence.”
“You modeled the Ch’Tauk after another race you had seen in one of the other dimensions, didn’t you?” Alice asked. “You found their genetic forebears in our universe and started forcing the evolution that would bring them into creation, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“What are you saying?” Lee said, looking from Alice to the Engineer and back. “What race are you talking about?”
“The Ch’Tauk, Lee. It’s the Ch’Tauk,” Alice began. “They’re not what they were supposed to be. They were created in the image of another species.”
“Oh no, please no,” Lee said, looking straight at the little alien. “Please tell me you didn’t model them after—”
“The Ch’Tauk were alterations meant to create a perfect creature we examined in our travels,” the alien replied with a strange tone. “The templates were such beautiful creatures when we interacted.”
“Get me the Kongo,” Lee said, tapping a control on the nearby wall. “Stop the jump and ready for docking.”
“Captain?” the voice of Kama Yu returned over the speaker. “Kongo reports ready for translation to M-space. Should we wait?”
“The templates loved art and music and had the most beautiful tonal quality of speech,” the Engineer said, ignoring Lee and Alice as they stared in horror at it. “When we asked about conflict, they had not even developed a word until we taught it to them…”
“Affirmative, Kama,” Lee said. “Stop the jump and maneuver for docking. Open communications to the Alliance and find out who’s still out there and what condition they’re in.”
“Aye, sir,” Kama replied.
“What’s the message?”
“We thought they would continue to evolve into something beautiful like our own forms, but…”
“The message is…” Lee started, taking a deep breath before continuing. “The Ch’Tauk have family and they’ve decided to join them for dinner.”
The Engineer lowered its head to stare at the floor. “The Ch’Tauk were always meant to emulate the templates. They were meant to evolve into the Gizzeen.”
23
The seal on the docking ring hissed and Resolute became one with Kongo. Lee paced outside the airlock while waiting for the door to cycle. He could see the other ship had sustained damage to its hull during the escape from the Ch’Tauk at Perigee. Roy Booth had filled him in on the damage Resolute had taken in his usual gruff manner before telling him the ship was basically undamaged. The refit the ship had undergone seemed to have included enough backup systems repair there was little the engineer needed to do on the exterior and only marginal repairs on the inside.
The light turned green on the airlock and Lee straightened his duty uniform. As the door slid open, he was both happy to see his former first officer and anxious to begin the hastily arranged meeting. Farthing had brought his own XO, Telexo, to the meeting while Lee had his own senior staff waiting in the briefing room. Telexo was carrying a sealed container under one arm, which looked to contain a familiar golden fluid. The information he needed to share was too sensitive to risk sending over the comm, even this far out from Alliance space.
“Captain,” Farthing said, not slowing as Lee began to walk away from the airlock. “Permission to come aboard?”
“Whatever,” Lee replied, dispensing with the formalities he hated anyway. “Has Kongo been able to reach anyone in Alliance space?”
“Not yet,” Telexo said, his shorter legs straining to keep up with the captains. “The relays are functional and we are getting pings from outposts, but that’s about it.”
“I have a viral comm-check worming its way through the military networks, but so far it hasn’t sent anything back but static,” Farthing replied. “We may be alerting the Ch’Tauk to our presence every second we stand still, Lee. Why aren’t we going to Theta site?”
Resolute Strike (The War for Terra Book 7) Page 19