“I didn’t know that was going to happen.” Cenjo lifted him with ease and draped one of Kalil’s arms over his shoulder. Kalil’s terror at how little control he had vanished when fire blossomed through his wounded leg and the pins-and-needles feeling dug into every part of his other leg that was beginning to wake up.
“You look awfully young to be a Controller,” Cenjo said.
“Why does everyone care how old I am?” Kalil hissed through clenched teeth. “And I’m not a Controller, whatever that is.” They made their way up a flight of stairs, Cenjo huffing toward the top, and entered a dark and empty room.
“I suppose you call yourselves the Liberators.”
Kalil adjusted his body the best he could on the edge of a desk. “Liberators? Nope, doesn’t ring a bell.”
Cenjo crossed his arms. “Then what are you doing here? Commander Xiven said you are responsible for killing his brother, Dru.”
“I haven’t killed anyone. We just want to help Daith.”
Cenjo’s brow wrinkled. “I don’t have time to check out your story, but if you want to help Daith, maybe we are on the same side. Regardless, we have to get her away from Commander Xiven. He lied to us about his plan.
“This is my office,” Cenjo continued. “You’ll be safe here. I’ll come back to get you.”
“Wait! My companions think I’m in the shuttle bay. That’s where we are supposed to meet. Granted, they were supposed to be there hours ago.”
Cenjo uncrossed his arms, his shoulders dropping. “Torrak Spirtz is still in his holding cell. I assume your other companion was Faan Kaano.”
“What do you mean, was.”
“I’m sorry to tell you this, but they located her in the holding room. I had to leave on orders to find you and wasn’t there when it happened. She’s dead. I can’t be sure what occurred, but from the look in Daith’s eyes when I left…”
Kalil sat, stunned. He knew it was possible they wouldn’t make it out of here alive, but knowing that one of them actually died...
“I need to continue to pretend like I’m searching for you.” Cenjo continued. “I have to admit, you’ve led us on quite a chase. Commander Xiven is furious.”
Kalil felt very vulnerable. “Are you sure no one will find me in here?”
“In one standard hour, everything is going to begin. I’ll try to stop Daith before then. Afterwards, I’ll come back to get you and Torrak if I can. If he’s still alive.”
“Why don’t you just stop Commander Xiven? If he’s the problem, then once he’s stopped, Daith will be fine and my friend won’t be dead.”
“The problem is Daith because she holds the power. Commander Xiven thinks he can control her, but I don’t think he can anymore. Xiven has warped and confused her. Even if I kill him, she will still continue with the plan because she can’t see anything except her pain.”
Kalil wanted to protest, but to what end? He didn’t know Daith. He only knew his friends were in trouble and this man could help them. And stop others from dying.
Except he knew how much Daith meant to Torrak. The way he’d spoken about her…she seemed too important to lose.
“I know it won’t make sense, but give Torrak a chance to reach her first. Please. Give him the hour before everything starts. He might be able to change her mind.”
Cenjo thought it over. “I’ll wait as long as I can, but I’m not holding out much hope. He won’t have much time to talk to her before Xiven takes her to the bridge. In one standard hour, no matter what happens, I’m going to do what I must.”
Cenjo almost left when Kalil called out one last question.
Cenjo nodded toward the back of the office. “Second door.”
After Cenjo ducked out, Kalil hobbled over and entered through the second door. Standing on one leg, he clumsily undid his pants.
He, and his bladder, had never been so relieved in their entire lives.
*
Torrak had been sitting on the cold floor of the holding cell for four standard hours. Four hours since Daith and Xiven had left the room.
Four hours since Daith had killed Faan.
Torrak sobbed and yelled until his head hurt and then turned his back, unable to look at Faan’s lifeless body any longer. And in that time, several insights of truth hit him.
He knew he couldn’t save Daith.
He knew he wouldn’t survive.
But he also knew Xiven wasn’t prepared for Sintaur to fight back, and Torrak only hoped Nuis, Preeaht, and Opute would be enough opposition.
Torrak felt the ship’s engines rumble beneath him.
“Here we go.”
*
Nuis and Preeaht met early in the morning, both completely exhausted after they spent the entire night arguing with government officials.
“How are plans with the ground troops?” Nuis asked.
“Everyone is in place, at least everyone who believed me,” Preeaht answered. “Several of the smaller outlying cities won’t give any support. Most of them said they didn’t want to leave their industries and businesses to fight in a war we couldn’t guarantee would take place.” Preeaht sighed and growled. “Not that I blame them. I don’t know what I would do if someone raced into my meeting room spouting about an Aleet Army resurrection and attack without any proof. I convinced four of the major cities to prepare, but only two out of the thirty-three military bases will evacuate, even though I insisted they would be targets.”
Nuis rubbed his eyes. “Trust me, I understand. I spent six standard hours arguing with Sintaur’s main planetary counsel to establish some kind of aerial counter-attack. Except without specific tactical knowledge, I couldn’t tell them to do anything more than standard procedures. We don’t have any idea what Daith will bring to the table. How can we fight against that?
“Regardless,” he continued, “the council finally conceded, but only offered twenty percent of their battle fleet. They claimed most of the military was on leave and didn’t want to recall any more soldiers than necessary. Still, they promised those on leave would be on standby, so if fighting did break out, they could be called onto the scene and would arrive no more than four standard hours into the fight. I doubt that will be soon enough, but it’s the best we can do.”
Nuis and Preeaht talked about a few more details when they heard an alarm go off, followed by an announcement. A large vessel had just entered Sintaur’s atmosphere.
Nuis looked at Preeaht.
“Here we go.”
*
Opute called out orders, rechecked statistics, and fiddled with the controls of his ship, all in an attempt to combat his impatience as he waited. All the ships in his group had been carefully instructed not to fire on the enemy vessel until he gave the order. The Aleet Army needed to believe Opute’s fleet was Exarth’s group coming to reinforce them.
Opute looked over everything for what seemed like the hundredth time and knew the other crewmembers must be feeling just as restless. Especially since they were a random group of mercenaries and smugglers thrown together with one goal—they all had been betrayed by Exarth and wanted to see her dead.
Unlike Torrak and his group who were already in on the action, Opute and his ships had nothing to do but wait the entire evening.
And night.
And most of the day.
And nothing felt worse than waiting on the edge of a fight.
He stood to ask for another weapons check, which would be his fifth since the previous night, when he heard one of the bridge members cry out that a ship called the Horizon had entered firing range of Sintaur.
“Here we go!”
Daith stood on the bridge of the Horizon, her lips slightly parted, her eyes half closed, her skin tingling.
She was everything.
Channeled fury surged through her, filling her body with fiery warmth. Energy swirled inside her, connecting with everything around her.
She was the energy of the weapons, the rumble of the engines.
&
nbsp; She could feel and sense everyone in her vicinity. She could hear every vibration in the bridge.
The ship. The crew.
Everything.
The battle consumed her. Coordinates for military installations on the planet spilled from her lips faster than the tactical team could enter them into the ship’s computer and fire. A surge of satisfaction raced through her every time the ship’s weapons warmed up and discharged their energy onto the planet below.
She hated everyone for messing with her mind, for invading her dreams, for controlling her life.
And she wanted everyone connected to the Controllers to die for Dru’s death.
His image stuck in her mind, like a vidlink display caught in a skipping loop. She could see his face, hear his voice, feel the warmth of his fingers against hers. Even though she could see the bridge of the ship, feel Trey close by her side, and sense the destruction on the surface of Sintaur, Dru’s face still hung there, superimposed between two levels of consciousness. A face she could remember with perfect clarity, but would never truly see again.
Torrak had felt her pain. Now everyone below would, too.
Daith, stretched in so many different directions, involved in so many different energies, didn’t notice Cenjo until he stood right beside her. Daith turned her focus onto him. The battle held its breath.
“Did you find Torrak’s associate?” Trey asked.
Cenjo ignored Trey. His gaze saw nothing but Daith. With a movement quicker than a thought, he pulled a knife from his sleeve.
“NO!” Trey screamed.
But he needn’t have screamed. Cenjo’s arm stopped centimeters from Daith’s chest. The knife trembled with effort, but Cenjo couldn’t get any closer. She had stopped him with her mind.
Daith looked at the knife and then at Cenjo. “Why?” she asked. “I thought you wanted this?”
“I knew it!” Trey snarled. “I knew you’d become weak. Security! Take the Lieutenant Commander to a holding cell.”
The security team on the bridge hesitated.
“That’s an order, soldiers. Take him, now!”
The security team pulled Cenjo back, taking the knife from his hand.
“You have to stop,” Cenjo told her, struggling against the guards. “You need to know the truth. You need to know—”
Trey hit him sharply across the face. “Get this traitor out of my sight.”
The whole bridge watched security drag Cenjo from the room, dazed from the blow. Daith turned to Trey, confused. “What just happened?”
Whatever Trey’s answer, he didn’t get to say it. An announcement of Exarth’s fleet arriving cut him off.
A sinister grin spread across Trey’s face. “Open communications to her fleet.”
“Open, Commander.”
“This is Commander Xiven. Please take care of any menial resistance they might muster up—”
A man’s voice, low and rough, interrupted Trey, ringing loudly over the speaker. “Hate to disappoint, but this isn’t Exarth.”
“Who under the stars is that?” Trey snapped at the communications officer.
The man on the intercom continued. “Even with Jaxx’s daughter, you won’t win. Give it up, Xiven.”
Jaxx’s daughter? Daith thought.
“I will give up when every star in this galaxy blinks out of existence,” Trey seethed.
“Have it your way.”
The Horizon shuddered from a shot.
“Evasive maneuvers!” Trey bellowed at the pilot. He turned back toward Daith. “Can you disable those ships? I want that captain alive.”
Daith nodded, but her thoughts felt unfocused.
Part of her searched out the engines of the incoming vessels, using her mental energy to disrupt them and shut them down. But part of her struggled with what had just occurred. Cenjo attacking her…another traitor who seemed loyal…and now this man saying she was Jaxx’s daughter….
Time seemed to slow. She watched the pilot’s eyelids take a standard minute to open and close. She heard Trey inhale for what seemed like an eternity—a bead of sweat dripped off his eyebrow and fell so leisurely Daith could have walked over and caught it.
And then a wave of displacement hit her. She felt disconnected from reality. Memories of the past few weeks raced through her mind as bits and pieces of information that had made no sense now jumped at her with perfect clarity.
I’m Jaxx’s daughter.
Trey had told her he stopped her dreams to break the connection with Torrak. But Dru said her dreams were her memories trying to resurface. And the dreams she had were of being kidnapped and strapped down to a large machine with a huge, white helmet over her head.
What if Trey had really been blocking her dreams to keep her from remembering things? Then Dru’s programs were only there to shape and measure her empathic and telepathic abilities. Trey and Dru were training her—seeing how far she could be pushed and what she could do—setting her up for this very day, so she could sense and destroy targets on the planet below.
I’m Jaxx’s daughter.
Daith remembered how nervous Dr. Ludd had been at the suggestion her abilities were genetically linked and how both he and Dru only met one other being with the same abilities as she. And the only one both the Aleet Army and the Controllers could find with this leader’s powers was her.
Maybe Dru meant to tell her the truth about her relationship to the Aleet Army’s leader. Could that have been why he’d been killed? But Torrak killing him made no sense. What would he have to gain? What would anyone have to gain? And then Dru’s face popped into her mind.
No. I can’t see him right now.
And the image shifted to his death
No. Please. I CAN’T…
—the scorched stomach, the burning pain—
DEAL WITH THIS…
and then the vision continued.
RIGHT NOW!
Dru looked up. He saw who shot him.
It wasn’t Torrak. It was Trey.
Trey killed Dru.
Because I’m Jacin Jaxx’s daughter.
Trey’s mind opened to her. His barriers crumbled like dry sand. She now knew the truth. Jaxx had been the leader of this army and after he died, Trey looked for his daughter to replace him. He needed her to be unstable so he could get as much power out of her as possible in a short period of time. And he did what he had to do to keep her from finding out.
He’d killed his own brother.
Daith stopped.
She stopped blinking. She stopped breathing. Her heart stopped beating.
She was dead.
But somehow she was more alive than ever.
She began to see things—the crew members, mere masses of energy radiating light and heat from their bodies, the panels of the ship were pieces of metal and she knew where they’d been forged, the oxygen in the room shimmered and she could see every atom as tiny pinpoints sparkling amongst the emptiness.
She looked out of the viewscreen. She could feel the energy from Sintaur’s sun as it warmed the planet, she could hear the sound of a waterfall in a forest below, each drop of liquid hitting with the forceful sound of a drum, she could see the make-up of every being on the planet—from the hair follicles on their bodies to the crystals of salt in their tears. She felt the entire universe stretch before her, pressing on her with its power. It connected her to everything and everyone, drawing her energy into itself and exhaling its life back into her. The past and the future were at her fingertips.
She thought she could sense everything before, but this moment opened her up to ideas and shapes she had never thought possible. She saw and heard everyone’s mind at once. The voices thrust down on her in a garbled accumulation of pain and joy, nonsensical yet linear, with a sound like a static hum in her head. The sound grew. It drowned out her own thoughts, consuming her mind. She melted into a puddle of feelings and emotions.
She heard everyone in her head except herself. One with them, she swayed in a musi
cal swirl of energy beyond anything she could ever dream.
She didn’t have to care anymore. She didn’t have to think.
Nothing mattered.
Nothing mattered.
Nothing….
Daith…
A voice pierced the blended clutter of energy.
Daith’s mind trembled with exhaustion. She was falling, being pulled under. She was….
Let it go…
Daith focused on the voice, familiar. Nearby.
Torrak.
I don’t know how…
Let it all go…
A tremor rippled across her skin. She took all the energy that filled her, all the thoughts and emotions that ripped her apart, all the broken dreams, shattered souls, and moments of ecstasy that filled her and…
…she screamed.
The sound welled up inside her and coursed through her, erupting from her body. The noise made everyone on the bridge cover their ears and cower in pain. Panels exploded, doors burst open. She felt everything in her head spew through her mouth as if expelling a poison from her body. She shook, swayed, nearly fell over, but still the sound came, until the last of the universe’s energy had been forced from her. The scream died slowly. Her vocal chords were raw and torn.
Daith’s mind returned to the present. Only a few moments passed, but it seemed like a lifetime. She wiped her hand across her face and it came away covered with sweat and blood. She looked over at Trey, his eyes wide with concern, his lips pressed together tightly.
“Are you okay?” he asked. He watched her carefully. She knew how terrible she must look. Her hair clung to her face with static electricity, her face red and wet. “Do you want to sit for a moment?”
She trembled with fatigue and her vision blurred, but she knew she couldn’t sit. Though Trey had been able to block his mind before, his thoughts were now laid open and free for her to peruse.
She felt his pain when he found Jacin’s body, lifeless.
She saw the deal he made with a beautiful and terrifying woman, Exarth, skin pale as snow, eyes black like space.
She watched contempt contort his face when he fired the electro-volt weapon, killing his brother.
Killing Dru.
Eomix Galaxy Books: Identity (Book 2 of 2) Page 20