“What the hell happened here?” Deacon asked, surveying the office.
“It’s Alastor,” said Thresha.
Letho sat down at the foreman’s desk and found that his workstation was in working order. Cooling fans whined and chittered as stuck bearings inside shrugged to the task at hand. Letho wiped the dust from the data pad and went to work. The foreman hadn’t bothered to lock his workstation with a password, so Letho was able to go straight into the operating system. He pulled up the news site for the station and began to read.
“Hey, Deacon, what year is it?” Letho asked.
“According to the ship logs, it’s 2350.”
“Well, according to the news site clock it’s 2361.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Yeah, but wait, there’s more.”
Letho began to read the foreman’s final email aloud. It had come from someone on Eursus whose official title was “Chancellor Elan Steigen.” The email had been sent with high importance and forwarded to officials on all active Fulcrum Stations.
ELAN STEIGEN ISSUES UNPRECEDENTED FULCRUM RECALL
May 13, 2350
ATTN: Fulcrum Station Officials
Dear Fulcrum directors,
Congratulations! Your mission has been arduous, spanning hundreds of Eursan years. No doubt your forefathers hoped to receive the message that you are now reading. Food production and clean water distribution have been brought back to acceptable levels In Hastrom City. As such, it has been declared a safe zone, and is ready to welcome all Fulcrum citizens. Upon receipt of this message all stations will be recalled via internal programming.
The journey back to Eursus is a long one, but our researchers recently discovered hidden functions within the Fulcrum stations’ computer cores. Using remote access protocols we have enabled deep-space thrust drives on each Fulcrum station. These drives are incredibly taxing on the ships’ power cores, so you may experience loss of non-critical systems, such as uCom services and news site access. These deep-space drives will reduce the return voyage from centuries to mere months.
Do not attempt to divert the course being plotted by your navigation systems. Tampering with navigation systems or attempting to deviate course will activate system subroutines that will terminate critical support systems, including atmospheric recycling and power plants.
Able-bodied citizens are needed to aid in the rebuilding process on Eursus. Current residents of Hastrom City have been working diligently to fortify the walls that surround the city, as well as partaking in dangerous reclamation missions to add abandoned portions of the city to the safe zone. All Fulcrum citizens under the age of thirty-five and possessed of sound mind and body will serve as needed in these important operations.
Please continue to live your life as usual, enjoying the comforts and leisure activities on your Fulcrum station. In the event of civic disturbance, station inspectors are authorized to use any means necessary to quell resistance. The infrastructure must be maintained! All station inspectors are required to re-read their law enforcement handbooks, specifically the section entitled “Returning Home.”
Good luck! May your return journey be a smooth one!
Chancellor Elan Steigen
“So that’s good news, right? We can go home now,” said Deacon.
Letho looked over at the discarded body of the dock foreman, and then back to Deacon. “I think it would be an understatement at this point to say something is not right,” he said.
Thresha interrupted. “Don’t you see? All of this, raiding the Fulcrum Stations, kidnapping people—it was all so that he could bring Abraxas back from his hibernation. They were going back to Eursus, to bring our race…” Thresha stammered, “…their race, back from the brink of extinction.”
“Well, we were right behind them, so shouldn’t they be here?” asked Deacon.
“Why are we trusting the enemy? Her kind killed my brothers!” shouted Maka.
Letho had nothing that even approached a valid answer to Maka’s query. He was crestfallen to see a wariness in Bayorn’s eyes that he had never seen before. He still didn’t know why he had grabbed Thresha’s hand and taken her aboard Deacon’s ship. She had been prepared to die, and he had pulled her from that fate. Why? Whenever he thought back to the moment, he could only see Sila’s face, the way she had been before. He shuddered, pushing back a vision of her slack jaw, the foul appendage slipping down from between her teeth, slathered in a foam of saliva.
Letho realized that he had blanked out for a moment, and when things came back into focus Maka and Thresha were in each other’s faces, hurling epithets and gesturing at one another. Though Maka towered at least two feet over Thresha, she didn’t back down. Letho knew that a single swat from Maka’s enormous paw would topple her head from her shoulders with the ease of a toddler knocking over a block tower. But she had a strength of her own. He had seen her rip Jim’s head from his shoulders with her bare hands.
“Stop!”
Maka and Thresha froze, turning their eyes to him.
“Listen! I know this seems crazy, but you just have to trust me! She saved my life back there! That guy with the swords had me by the short hairs and she took his head off. Ask yourself why she did that. Or why she didn’t do the same to me.”
Letho and Thresha exchanged glances, and her contemptuous sneer melted for a moment.
“Letho, will you step outside with me for a moment so that I may speak to you privately?” Bayorn asked.
Letho nodded.
“Deacon, get on the computer and see what you can find. Logs of ship arrivals and departures, anything.”
“Already there,” Deacon replied.
◊ ◊ ◊ ◊
Letho and Bayorn stepped outside the dock foreman’s office and closed the door behind them. Bayorn’s face was dark, his expression contorted. His irises darted back and forth rapidly, a signal to Letho that his old friend was lost in thought. Choosing his words carefully. His lips pursed and he moved to engage Letho in conversation, almost taking a full step toward him, then immediately dropped his head and continued with the brooding routine.
“Bayorn, the suspense is killing me. Can you spit it out please?”
Bayorn snorted and his eyes flickered like gold coins immersed in water. He had only seen Bayorn’s eyes do that when he was very angry; suddenly Letho was back on the shuttle so long ago, simultaneously meeting Bayorn for the first time and stepping on to the path to his supposed destiny.
No. You are not that person any more. Stand your ground. He is trying to bully you.
“Letho, I have been thinking about what happened on Alastor’s ship. With Sila. With the Mendraga you have brought into our company.”
Letho felt his forehead become heavy. It sloped down like a creased shroud, and his eyebrows met in a hard line that transformed his eyes into shadowed pits. His mouth drew into a bloodless line, and he fought back the urge to sob. He wouldn’t give Bayorn the satisfaction.
“Bayorn, look. Don’t bring her up.”
Letho’s words came forth in hesitant blats, like he was struggling to breathe. He dragged his hand through his grease-blue hair, chuckling a little under his breath. The laughter wasn’t mirthful, but rather an expression of anger, frustration. He felt his vision begin to sharpen, and his hands clenched into involuntary fists. An immediate twinge of pain brought him back from the brink; he had bitten his lip hard enough to draw blood, the coppery taste coating his tongue.
“We must talk about the Mendraga then. I cannot understand your choice to save her. She is a child of Abraxas, the one who destroyed our world and forced us into exile! Did you not hear any of the Elder’s words?”
“I don’t know why I did it. All right? Are you happy now?”
The shout echoed and dwindled to nothing in the cavernous belly of the Fulcrum station. Reproach filled Bayorn’s eyes, and Letho felt embarrassment creeping up his neck and blossoming in his cheeks.
“You were there. You hear
d what Fintran said.”
Letho, you must do what is right. Even now the Elder what is right. ntran . Bayorn smiled, and his eyes took on a glossy sheen and began to water at the edges.
“I can’t explain it. She saved my life, so I saved hers. It seemed like the right thing to do. Besides, she wants to help us. She has helped us. And according to my records so far, she hasn’t eaten anyone.”
“That is my point, Letho. At some point she will need to feed. What then, Letho? Will we sacrifice one of our own so that she might live?”
Bayorn crossed his arms across his chest, and stared with blank eyes into the middling distance.
“Maybe we can do it like in the movies. Feed her bad guys, you know?”
Bayorn scoffed. Letho considered the distinct possibility that Bayorn had never seen a Eursan movie and was wholly unfamiliar with this film trope.
“Mendraga cannot be trusted. If she turns on us it will be on your shoulders. If I see even the smallest hint of such a thing coming, I will kill her myself. Do we understand one another?”
“Yeah, I understand. You aren’t exactly dropping subtle hints here,” Letho answered.
“Oh, and I would not leave her alone with Maka. He wants to kill her even more than I do. As you know, Maka’s anger is deep and burns bright. He will not be able to hold it in much longer. I am afraid if she angers him that it will only end in death.”
“Well let’s hope that none of these horrible scenarios happen. I think she might be our only hope of getting to Alastor. And Abraxas.”
“Remember my words. Mendraga value honor less than the dirt beneath their boots.”
“Well, dirt under your boots can be pretty important, like if you’re on a cliff, or…”
Bayorn said nothing. His visage was etched in stone.
“Right, I’ll just stop right there.”
The door swished open, and Thresha sauntered into their company. Bayorn made no effort to conceal his contempt and shouldered past her. Thresha leaned against the office’s window-wall, arms crossed, head cocked in a gesture that somehow communicated both interest and disinterest at once.
“Hey. How’s it going?” Letho asked.
“Let’s cut the idle conversation. Why did you save me?”
“Well, you saved me. I was just returning the favor.”
“I wasn’t saving you, you idiot. I was killing the bastard that murdered a friend of mine.”
The way she said friend drew Letho’s attention. He studied her face, an alabaster mask that betrayed no emotion. But Thresha’s eyes told him what he needed to know. Even though they rested in the visage of one of Vigner’s legendary warrior maidens, Letho saw a glimmer of vulnerability there. Then it was gone, lost in the depths of her emerald eyes.
“I lost someone very special to me as well,” he offered.
“I did not come out here to get all warm and fuzzy with you. This is not a get to know each other conversation. This is a make sure we both understand exactly what is going on kind of conversation.”
“Uh, okay. I was just trying to—”
She cut him off with a scoff. “God, are all the people from your Fulcrum station this dense?”
“You should know. You and your Mendraga buddies ate them all,” Letho replied.
He took a step toward her and tried to make himself larger and more menacing like the male of a proud species.
“Please,” she said through a laugh, “if you think for a moment I am scared of you…”
“Wonderful, a laughing psychopathic murderer. Maybe Bayorn was right. Maybe I should just kill you right now and be done with it.”
His hand went to Saladin, who hung between his shoulder blades, cool and heavy. Reassuring. Letho felt the anger surging up like a jet of molten rock from the sea floor. She really didn’t seem scared it all. It made him crazy. He could see her pores, tiny holes that pitted unusually smooth skin. He became acutely aware of the fact that her chest did not rise or fall, unlike his, which pumped like a bellows. She placed a hand on his shoulder and smiled. Letho felt the anger reside, replaced by confusion.
“Boys. Hands always going straight to their swords. You may attempt to kill me if you like. I care not,” she began.
“Sir? Probability of success in eliminating target is quite low, with serious injury to your person a statistical certitude. Would you like to proceed?”
“Thanks, Saladin. Great timing, by the way.”
She dropped her hand from his shoulder, and turned to show him her slender back.
“Your previous assumption was correct: I lost the one who was most important to me on Alastor’s ship. I have betrayed my Master, and thanks to you, my lot has been cast in with a group of Tarsi who want to tear me limb from limb. Maybe it would be better if you ended it right now.”
“I just need to know if I can trust you,” he began, smiling, taking a genial approach.
He was unprepared for the verbal fusillade that Thresha was about to launch into.
“You have no idea what you are doing, do you? You’re just some Fulcrum kid who got a gun and a sword and now you’re going to save the world, huh? Well, I have news for you: you have no idea what you are up against! You are going to get all of your friends killed.”
“Well, that isn’t exactly what I expected you to say… I was hoping you would say something like: ‘Why yes, Letho, thank you for saving me, and I would love to join forces with you to help rid the universe of the evil Abraxas!’”
“You don’t see it, do you? Alastor has already won. He has his army, and controls one of Eursus’s greatest cities.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Think about it. That message on the computer is over ten years old! Whatever happened on this Fulcrum station happened a long time ago. What do you think Alastor and Abraxas have been up to for a decade? Building convenience stores and fine art museums? Why don’t you just get back in your ship with your friends and go somewhere else?”
“Because I can’t.”
“Why not? There would be no shame in it. Even if you could somehow raise an army that matched Alastor’s man for man, there would be no hope. An army of Mendraga would cut you to pieces.”
“It’s hard to explain. I spent my whole life doing nothing, and then everything changed. I have…”
Letho searched for the right words. How could he possibly describe the changes he had undergone?
I died and came back from the dead.
I am the only Eursan who can communicate with the Tarsi in their own language.
I have super strength and speed.
Wounds that would kill a normal man heal up in seconds.
I am a superman.
“I have been given a gift. I don’t know what made me this way. But I think it happened for a reason. I am not going to sit on my ass and let other people do it for me. If I’m going to die, I want it to be with Saladin in my hand and my gun blazing. I want to see Alastor’s face again. I want to put my boot on his neck and push.”
“Excellent monologue, sir. Vivid imagery.”
“Quiet, talking sword.”
Saladin’s LEDs faded, and he obeyed the will of his master.
“Well, I won’t be party to this. As soon as we get planetside, I am gone. You think you can keep your friends from killing me until then?”
“I’ll do my best,” Letho said.
Thank you to Paul Meiller for glasses of scotch, advice, inspiration, and your ability to red-line.
Thank you Travis Walker for your discernment and encouragement.
Thank you to Matt Strepka for being a good friend and inspiration.
Thank you Phillip Hintze for being one of the first to read and say it was “pretty cool.”
Thanks to Ron Rozelle for taking an inexperienced writer under your wing. Also, I think we can all agree the foreword is pretty awesome.
Thank you Paul Meiller, Matt Strepka, Travis Walker, Jim Webb, Jason Nitsch, and Rhonda Bowles for helping me pr
oofread this thing.
Special thanks to editor David Gatewood for your editing. You helped create the best version possible of this book.
And thank you, dear reader, for riding along with me on the first leg of Letho’s journey. It has been great fun spending time in Letho’s world and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed discovering it. If you feel so inclined, please leave me a review on Amazon and/or goodreads. Every review helps!
Sincerely,
Doug Rickaway
@dougrickaway
http://www.dougrickaway.com
http://www.facebook.com/DougRickaway
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