by Matt Larkin
In normal times, never. But they had reached the End of Days. And facing extinction, he suspected even former enemies might have cause to band together. “We’ve already released Caleb Gavet. Why not your brother?”
“Ezra …” Phoebe shook her head. “I want to, but … he has implants. A cybernetic eye.”
“Fine. Give him the chance to have it removed. We don’t have much time. We need everyone we can get armed and with some basic training. Because very soon, the Adversary will come for the Milky Way. And if we lose New Eden, we lose everything.”
“Not everything,” Rachel replied softly. “If there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s that humanity will struggle on.” She looked to David, and he felt her gratitude, her strength, seep into him.
“How about you?” Knight asked. “How long can you control it, with those implants?”
David shut his eyes. As long as he had to.
He would never be a pawn again.
45
“Desperate times have brought the holy Sentinels down. The once-proud defenders of justice and righteousness have put out notice offering pardons to anyone willing to fight. This offer is specifically targeted to pirates, smugglers, and prison planet exiles. If the Sentinel fleet is victorious, will it only be for the Mizraim Empire to be ruled by outlaws?”
Levi Meir, MNN field correspondent
PHOENIX DWARF GALAXY
Caleb didn’t deserve a pardon. After all he’d done in service to Apollyon, he knew better. There was no redemption. The Adversary knew it too. It never let him forget.
Tell us where you are.
Caleb shook his head and kept walking down the corridor. Unescorted. How odd. How truly foolish of them. Of course, he would never willingly betray Rachel or MacGregor, not now. But he wasn’t certain how much longer he could control himself.
Visions of hell swarmed behind his eyes until he stumbled against the wall. They burned him, engulfed him in a freezing, fiery nebula of destruction that tore his molecules apart then forced them back together. A warning of things to come.
Give us your location.
Maybe Rachel couldn’t stop the advance of hell. But now that she had the Ark, she had gotten their attention. He supposed it counted for something. And so hell tried to use him to gather intel on the dwindling forces of the NER. Maybe it knew MacGregor was recruiting Sentinels. Maybe it wanted to learn where he was training them.
Caleb should leave the ship. Remove any chance of betraying Rachel.
Except, if the Adversary could use him to gather intel … well, it had to work both ways.
He paused outside the isolation wing of the brig. Sentinels stared him down.
“I need to see her.”
The man didn’t even look him in the eye. “The prisoner is off limits.”
“I have permission from Lt. Jordan. Call her.”
The Sentinel grimaced, then tapped his comm, making the call. A second later, he stood aside.
Despite himself, Caleb’s heart raced. The bitch had betrayed him in the worst possible way. He should feel nothing for her. He should have her spaced.
And yet …
He entered the isolation wing. Behind smart glass, Rebekah was bound, kneeling on the floor. Mag restraints held her arms out to either side. Her fiery orange hair hung over her lowered head. But she looked up at him as he entered, a coy smile on her traitorous face.
“Caleb.”
A tap opened the smart glass, and he stepped inside.
Rebekah—or Naamah, he supposed—licked her lips. Visions seeped into his mind. She lay naked on the floor of his office, legs spread, waiting for him. Her pert breasts begging him too …
God!
He slapped her, the sound ringing through the cell.
“Stay out of my head!”
Naamah groaned, then licked a trail of blood from her lip. “I’ve never been anywhere you didn’t invite me, Caleb.”
The worst of it was, it was true. And the damn telepath would know he knew that.
He was sick. This monster had indirectly murdered his mate and their children, and still Caleb felt himself harden. Void, she might well have set the bomb herself for all he knew.
And still, he had to fight the urge to rip off her clothes and take her in this very cell.
Maybe she was telepathically driving him to it—but that weakness had to be inside him in the first place. A weakness of character, a weakness of soul, poor withered thing that it was.
A shuddering breath escaped him, and Naamah smiled wider.
“Come on. No one will know. You know how I like it.”
He ran his index finger along her smooth jaw line. “You told me you were nineteen.”
“My file said that.”
Fair enough. She’d never actually claimed it out loud. “How old are you really?”
“Timeless, my love.”
“I am not your love!” He never was. He was a tool she’d used to unmake mankind. He was a pawn she’d played.
Naamah recoiled harder than when he’d actually struck her. “Of course you are.”
His mouth tasted like sawdust, and he felt his fingers curling into a fist. He wanted to hit her, blacken her eyes. He wanted to fuck her until she shuddered in his arms and whispered her love a thousand times.
“You disgust me.”
“Caleb, I …” The smile had slipped from her face. “You don’t mean that. Yo-you love me too.”
Heaven help him, could she be serious? Could a creature like her …? No. It was impossible. She was playing him again.
“Please don’t think that.”
He raised his fist toward her face. “Do not read my mind.”
“I-I can’t help it. It’s not easy to shut it out … I’m sorry. Caleb, please.”
It didn’t matter. He couldn’t have brought himself to beat her anyway. Instead, he slumped to his knees in front of her. “Tell us everything.”
“What?”
“You have a connection to the Adversary.”
“Caleb, I …”
He grabbed her chin. “Show me your love, angel. You know what I have sacrificed. What will you give?”
“I’ll be punished.”
He leaned close to her face so he could whisper in her ear. “You deserve it.”
A tear leaked from her eye. His face was so close to hers, the hot dampness dripped onto his own cheek. Maybe she was the finest actor in the universe. Or maybe, despite a billion years of life, she was still human underneath all that metal in her body.
“Please,” she said, voice breaking. “Don’t hate me.”
“Tell us. Tell us where the Adversary is massing, where their ships are. How many they have. Tell us everything, Naamah.”
She drew a deep breath, then blew it out. “All right, Caleb.” She closed her eyes. “Kiss me.”
He rose and kissed her forehead. That was all she would ever get from him. He had to be strong enough to give her nothing else.
He stepped outside the cell and tapped his comm. “Gavet to Jordan. You should come down here.”
46
“David’s call has rung through the Mazzaroth. People see him as their resurrected hero, back from the void. And they have flocked to his banner by the billions.”
Dr. Rachel Jordan, personal message to Degana O’Malley
PHOENIX DWARF GALAXY
Knight leaned against the wall in the war room, arms folded over his chest, listening to Rachel explain the details of the Adversary force. According to Caleb’s pet angel, the Adversary thus far had only brought an advance strike fleet in—some five thousand ships. But if pressed, they could muster tens of thousands more.
As usual, Rachel paced while she lectured. “The Great Attractor is the original gateway the angels created to give hell access to our universe. The Adversary has to bring its ship out from there, and right now, those ships are spread through thousands of other universes; they’re doing the same thing they’ve been doing here. So the
y’re relying on the Asherans as their mortal armies.”
Phoebe sat at the table, but she kept glancing back at Knight. He winked at her. She was scared, but she wouldn’t want to show it. No matter what, he’d never let anything happen to her.
David, Leah, and Caleb all sat around the table as well. Caleb stared at a tablet, Knight suspected to avoid looking any of the others in the eye. The intel the man provided—assuming it was true—made it worth sparing the bastard’s life.
Barely.
“Now we know they’ve already moved in on the Sculptor Dwarf. Based on the size of their forces, we might—might—be able to halt their advance. However, Rebekah Norris promises us it would only mean more ships coming out of the Attractor. It’s a reality we’ll have to deal with. As long as the door to hell remains open, we cannot win this.”
“According to her,” Knight said. “And she’s the servant of our enemy.”
“I’ve been played so many times by her,” Caleb said, “I don’t know what to think. But I guess we have to assume she’s telling the truth and they have many, many reinforcements.”
“Fine,” Leah said. “But you can’t destroy a black hole. So how do you propose to stop them?”
Rachel raised a finger. “Are you certain we can’t?”
Phoebe snorted. “Yup. It’s got more mass than every galaxy in the Local Group combined. What would we even shoot at it?”
Rachel waved that away, then pulled up a display on the screen. “Fine. Fine, we cannot do anything to the hole itself.” She pointed the screen. “So five billion years ago, angels created seven seals to lock this universe away from any other. Our best chance may be to do the same.”
“We don’t have that kind of tech,” Phoebe said. “I mean, maybe if I had twenty years to work on it.”
Knight pushed off the wall to stand beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ve spoken to the Lotan. They held one of the angel stations since the Vanishing. They studied it for centuries. They think they can recreate the seals.”
“Uh, then why haven’t they?” Phoebe asked. “I mean, saving the universe sounds like a good thing, you know?”
Knight looked to Rachel, who cleared her throat. “The Lotan told him they’d have to build the seals near the Attractor itself. They don’t have the ability to create them anywhere, the way angels did. It would take time, and the moment the enemy realized what we were doing—”
“They’ll come en masse,” David said. “Against their combined armada, we’ve no chance. Even if they don’t bring in reinforcements from hell.”
“I have the Ark,” Rachel said. “With the Sephirot—”
“It won’t work,” Caleb said. “The Azazel, their flagship, I’ve seen it. Not even the Ark can stop it. It is the most massive engine of destruction in the universe. With the Azazel, they can obliterate entire galaxies by causing mass expansion of galactic cores. You can’t fight something like that.”
Knight shook his head. “Anything can be fought. Anything that lives can die.”
“Rebuilding the seals is the only plan we’ve got left,” Rachel said.
Caleb sighed. “A desperate gambit.”
“Aye,” David said. “It is. But they’ll never expect it. They’ll think their position secure.”
“Always do the unexpected,” Knight said.
“Because that worked out so well last time,” Caleb mumbled.
Maybe Caleb was right … but then, releasing the Adversary had let them overthrow the angels. Because the angels never saw it coming. And the Adversary wouldn’t see this coming either.
David held up a hand. “Say your prayers, lads and lasses. Tomorrow we’re off to hell.”
47
“As I sit here, cut off from my brethren, I have to wonder what they will think of me. By my actions here, they would judge me khapiru. Were I in their place, I could hardly blame them. But I know more than they. I have spoken with Raziel, the most forthright of the angels. His book ought to be added to the Codex, but to even suggest that would be heresy. How am I to argue against ignorance when all I have to offer is firsthand knowledge? They won’t listen. I wouldn’t have listened. Is this how Rachel has felt her whole life?”
From the personal journal of Jeremiah Jordan
MAY 29, 3097 EY — THE CONDUIT
Where are you?
Caleb pulled the pillow over his head. It wouldn’t help, of course. Especially not out here in the Conduit. There was no escape. There was no release. His waking moments were filled with the voice of the Adversary.
Open your mind to us. Show us their plans.
His dreams were haunted by the constant torments hell had planned for him. No respite.
He could feel the walls of his mind begin to crumble under the pressure. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block visions that had nothing to do with sight. A million angel ships, all covered with eyes, descending on universe after universe. Galaxies were swallowed by black holes the size of the Great Attractor. All the multiverse fell.
There is no escape.
How many are you?
Caleb drove thoughts of the NER armada from his mind. He forced himself to think of anything else. But the horrors of the Great Attractor—of a thousand of them—would not flee. Holes in creation that could swallow reality. Suck it into the bowels of torment.
It spiraled endlessly before him, on a scale beyond human comprehension.
No matter how tightly he clenched his eyes, there was no way not to see it. Because the vision wasn’t from his eyes.
His eyes.
His first implants. Like a blind man stumbling in the dark, he had allowed Apollyon to make him khapiru. To implant cybernetic eyes in his head for the chance to get a leg up on his enemies. For the chance to look at girls naked. For nothing.
Because he’d never considered the cost. Not really.
Just like the chip in his head.
And the closer they flew to the Great Attractor, the worse it would get. From the moment he’d first spied that abomination, he’d known no peace. And his heart knew the truth now. It would consume him. The threat was a promise. The end of his life. The fate he deserved for his sins.
You are coming to us.
Oh, void! It was breaking through his mental barriers.
Lotan …
Caleb shot bolt upright. They knew. Hell would bring the Azazel to destroy the Lotan.
The visions of it ran again and again through his mind. Through the blasted eyes he never should have taken. Not bothering with a shirt, he ran from his quarters.
Where was she? He knew her quarters were on the deck below. He stumbled into the lift, tapped it, then slumped against the wall. Call her? No. He’d left his comm in his room.
Fire and ice shot through his veins. A torment from hell. It knew what he planned.
“Fuck you!” he screamed as he stumbled from the lift.
Sentinels in the hall stared at him. Didn’t matter. He ran to Leah’s room and buzzed the door.
When she finally opened it, clad in only a night shirt, he fell forward, and she caught him.
“Please! Please help me. Take them out. Take it all out.”
She clutched his shoulders and forced him upright. Her hair was disheveled, and she blinked in the light of the hall. “Caleb? What happened?”
“Take out my eyes, the chip, everything.”
“That’s—you’d be blind.”
He nodded, swallowing hard. To see nothing would be better than to see everything. He’d seen too much in his life already. “Do it, please. I beg you, Leah. I’m sorry for anything I ever said to you. Please, help me.”
All this time, he’d been helping her study implants. She had to know enough now to safely remove the chip from his brain. And the eyes—those should be nothing to her. Just a quick nanobot-programming job.
She bit her lip, then nodded. “All right, Caleb. If that’s what you want. Let me just get dressed. I’ll meet you in the med bay.”
“Fine. Just wait outside while I put on my uniform.”
And miss his last chance to see a beautiful naked woman. Shame. But she probably wouldn’t see it that way. He stepped outside and braced himself against the wall.
You cannot do this.
Oh, he would.
Minutes later, he lay on an operating table. Leah stood over him, hair tied in a bun, mask over her mouth. He studied her face. It was, after all, the last thing he’d ever see. “You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
She pressed a tab to his neck, and everything went dark.
The next thing he knew, warm hands shook him awake. He just wanted more sleep. Peaceful sleep, deep and dreamless.
“Caleb, come on,” Leah said. “I’ll get you back to your quarters.”
He tried to open his eyes. There was nothing. No feeling. Just darkness.
No voices. No visions.
Leah’s hand on his back pulled him to a sitting position.
“It-it’s done?” He didn’t need an answer. He knew it was. Hell was gone.
He was free.
He threw his arms around her, falling off the table from his movement. His weight carried them both crashing to the ground.
“Ow.”
Caleb laughed.
He was free.
48
“The Quantum Electro-Magnetic Pulse bomb does not fit the profile of any weapon system specification requested by either the Sentinels or Shiza Security. It performs only marginally better than a standard EMP grenade and costs fifteen hundred times as much to produce. No one is going to buy it. It is my opinion that rather than launch a production run, we should be archiving the research findings for later applications and directing our resources to more profitable weapons systems.”
Quasar Industries Research & Development report on the QEMP, filed as “REJECTED” per Galizur Blake