Vontaura

by James C. Dunn

  ‘You’re right, Shree,’ he said. ‘We can’t get ourselves in a state. We need to be calm. We need a plan. Now, we know where we’re going. We know who’s going to be waiting. We have to help the Captain. And we need to save Raj.’

  ‘Yes,’ Aíron said.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Thinking calmly. Thinking smart. I don’t know. How can we help? Really?’

  ‘Maybe the three of us can’t make a difference,’ she said. ‘But I know where we can go for help. We don’t have a choice now.’

  In minutes they had crossed the glimmering city heights. Shree and Noah guided the craft into a landing space as close to the north quarter of Avaris City as they could. Out and into the street, Aíron guided them along the dark, sodden lanes. Passersby stared dismayed at Shree. Their giant companion was going to prove useful now.

  The same ramshackle region Aíron remembered from her first venture here loomed. The same smell. The same darkness. The same back alley Justus had brought her.

  ‘This way,’ she said. ‘You remember the plan?’

  ‘Which plan?’ Noah asked.

  ‘The one we’re about to make up.’

  ‘That one? Yes, we’re ready. Right, Shree?’

  Shree nodded twice.

  At the end of the alley, the same deafening music blared from the club beneath them. Jules Ditton’s club. Four men stood outside. Was it a mistake? Should they have stayed away?

  ‘And where do you think you lot are goin’?’ asked the largest man as they approached. The other three men looked up at Shree in disbelief.

  ‘We’re here,’ Aíron said, ‘to see Adra Dimal. She here?’

  ‘Well, you three ain’t gonna’ find out, miss.’

  ‘Wrong answer!’ Noah said. He produced his blaster and shot himself in the foot.

  Aíron recoiled and screamed. Noah screamed louder.

  The closest security guard laughed and reached for Aíron. But before he had chance, Shree’s muscular arm had knocked him onto his back like a plank of wood. Noah recovered, more or less, and fired at the three. They each threw themselves in different directions. Three more appeared out of the dark entrance.

  Shree bounded forwards and raised her arm, knocking all of them back.

  Another pulled out a handgun—

  Aíron raised her foot and kicked him between the legs. He fell to his knees.

  ‘Go on! Go in!’ Noah shouted, hobbling for the door.

  Shree went first. Aíron followed next. Smoke filled her vision. She could just about see Shree in front of her and so stuck close.

  ‘Stop!’ somebody cried. More men stood at the bottom of the steps, including the great, gold-toothed almuit from her last visit.

  ‘Shree!’

  A flash filled her vision. Noah pulled her back and out of the way. Both of them fell forward. Before their eyes, Shree looked like a wild animal. She took out every last man in sight, security or not. She then reached down, raised her two companions under her arms, and forced her way through the crowd.

  ‘That way!’ She pointed in the direction of the second set of steps. Shree kicked two more muscular men out of the way. Aíron couldn’t help but let slip a smile.

  At the bottom of the steps, however, Shree stopped. Less noisy, they could hear the command to halt. This Jules Ditton really did have an army. More armed men stood before them. Shree dropped the two back to their feet.

  ‘Drop your weapons,’ a bald-headed man said from one side. ‘Now, here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to tell me what in hell’s name you three freaks are doing in my establishment.’

  ‘Jules Ditton?’ Aíron said.

  ‘You know who I am?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And? I’ve shot plenty people who knew my name, princess. I’ll very happily shoot you too!’

  That was it. Shree threw herself forwards, knocking the line of men over like dominos. Without waiting, Aíron pushed her way through. Voices cried out around her. She ignored them and shoved her way into the room at the end. Hands seized her as she entered. Weapons triggered.

  ‘ADRA DIMAL!’ she cried.

  A hand clutched her neck.

  ‘Stop! Just stop!’ came a reply. ‘Put those weapons down!’

  Aíron looked up. Dimal stood in front of her, barely clothed and carrying a glass of orange liquid. She looked unsteady on her feet and thinner than before.

  ‘Adra . . .’

  ‘What are you doing here, Aíron?’

  ‘We need your help. Justus needs your help!’

  Behind her, Ditton and his men dragged Noah and Shree through. Dimal shook her head. ‘What are you doing here?!’

  Noah almost choked. ‘What’re you doing here? That’s very revealing, Adra.’

  ‘We need your help,’ Aíron said. ‘Please.’

  ‘Look, I can’t help you,’ Dimal said. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Raj is still alive.’

  ‘What?!’

  ‘Malizar has him. Justus has gone to confront him.’

  ‘He came back?’

  ‘He was always going to, Adra. He needs you, more than you or he could ever know. And you need him.’

  Dimal turned her back on them. She threw the glass at the wall, watched it shatter. She craned her neck back and turned. ‘Where are they?’

  SEVENTY-NINE

  ‘WHY ARE WE here, Anna?’

  Gordian entered the vessel’s captaincy quarters with Avéne Ketrass in tow. Ferranti and Callista were already sat at his clear glass table. The baby Berenguer lay asleep in a portable incubator beside the old woman. The four looked anxious, worried even. But Anna’s mind was clear. She stood before them in silence.

  ‘I asked you to come,’ she said, ‘because I trust you all. Nobody else. We’re the only survivors of Erebus. We are the only ones that know what we’re dealing with.’

  ‘We don’t, though,’ Ketrass said.

  ‘We know enough.’

  Callista looked angry. ‘What is it, Anna? Tell us.’

  Anna breathed out. ‘I . . . received a message.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘It was the night we returned to Titan. It was hidden in my uncle’s vault. Directed to me. It warned me of a coming darkness.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘Because the message said only I could do something about it. It told me not to say a word to anyone, even if I absolutely had to. I wish I’d told you. Really, I do.’

  ‘Who was the message from?’ Ferranti asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Yet again she kept the name of the Accentaurian to herself, though she was not sure why. ‘But he said that the messengers would come.’

  ‘Those creatures,’ he said. ‘The Sonii?’

  Anna nodded and addressed the others. ‘Ferranti and I spoke with the Sonii this morning, at length. It has a way. But that’s not the hard part.’

  ‘Then what is?’ Ketrass asked. ‘Why us? How can we help?’

  ‘The message said that I would eventually have to leave you all. But also that I have to take some things with me.’ She looked to the old woman. ‘The silver diary. That was one. You said it was taken from you. I know there’s no way we could get it, but if I could find the other items then maybe that’s all right.’

  ‘I could try and remember some of its contents,’ Callista said. ‘I doubt it would be very much, though.’

  ‘What were the other items?’ Ferranti asked, stroking his chin.

  Anna pulled a small, black sphere no larger than her thumbnail from her pocket and placed onto the table. ‘The message I received was one of the four items. The original message was lost along with the vault. But I’d listened to it so many times that I was able to record another earlier. Word for word. I manipulated the voice. You can’t tell it’s me.’

  ‘So you have that,’ Callista said. Anna could tell she was only humouring her at this point. ‘What else do you need?’

  ‘The research. The research gathered on
Erebus.’

  ‘You’re asking me,’ Ketrass said.

  ‘Well . . . yes. I asked Kramer, but he wouldn’t tell me.’

  The woman smiled. ‘He wouldn’t tell anyone.’

  ‘But it exists?’

  She nodded. ‘Wait here. I’ll do what I can.’

  ‘I will come with you,’ Gordian said. They both hurried from the room, seemingly inseparable all of a sudden.

  Anna smiled at Callista, but the old women turned away towards Ferranti and spoke in whispers. Anna sat in the chair beside her and looked into the portable incubator. Little baby Berenguer. So small. So vulnerable. If she had to leave, then this is what she would be abandoning. Could she really do it? The answer was effortless.

  ‘All I want to do is hold him,’ Callista said. ‘Hold him like I did you and your sister.’

  Anna attempted to make eye contact with her. The old woman looked away.

  ‘What do you think we should name him?’ Anna asked.

  ‘I would have thought that is quite obvious,’ Ferranti said. ‘Ruben is a strong name. If he’s anything like your uncle, your sister, or you, he’ll grow to be a powerful person.’

  ‘As long as he has you to guide him,’ Callista said. She stared her in the eye now, and it was Anna who was forced to look away. ‘What is it, Anna?’

  ‘The message,’ she said. ‘It asked for something more.’

  ‘What?’

  She took a deep breath. ‘The Gilaxiad.’

  Callista’s face fell, hand came up to her face. ‘Did they say what it is?’

  Anna nodded.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Me.’

  ‘You? That’s ridiculous.’

  ‘What’s ridiculous? They said that they’d come for the Gilaxiad. That they’d been sent for the Gilaxiad. I went to see them earlier. They said they had found it – found me – and that they’re ready.’

  ‘Ready for what?’

  ‘Ready to take me.’

  Ketrass led Gordian through the halls of the Stellarstream and down to their quarters. The vessel was once again inhabited, but they did not meet any Titanese along the way. It was for the best, Gordian knew. Tensions were as high as ever.

  Once or twice he caught her looking back at him, a glimmer in her sharp eyes. Their quarters were adjacent to each other. Ketrass slipped into her room and Gordian entered his. He was in and out in thirty seconds, a small package hidden in his pocket.

  When Ketrass appeared he nodded, turned. But she took his arm and spun him back around. They were alone. All was quiet. She moved towards him and he gazed into her bright green eyes, caught the soft scent of her skin. She was beautiful. He desired her. Needed her.

  ‘Avéne, he said, ‘I—’

  She placed her finger over his lips, stroked the scar beneath his nose and the notch across his top and bottom lips. ‘Xerin was right all along,’ she said. ‘I didn’t believe him. Now I do. You’re not all alike. I think, I see something else. I see. You’re different from all of them.’

  Then she kissed him passionately. Intimately. He closed his eyes. No. He pushed her back.

  ‘Avéne, I can’t.’

  ‘Oh, it’s too late for that,’ she said. ‘I always get what I want.’

  ‘And what is it you want?’

  She smiled, then kissed him again.

  Anna placed the sphere containing her rendering of the Accentaurian’s message onto the table, beside Xerin Kramer’s face covering. Concealed within the metal half-mask sat a dozen tiny spheres containing nearly all the data collected within the black moon Erebus.

  ‘Kramer denied it to the very last,’ Ketrass said. ‘But this was the reason he hid it, and would tell no one of its existence. The information inside there is so important. Everything we learned.’

  ‘Maybe the way to stop them is on here,’ Anna said. ‘That’s why they need to take me.’

  Gordian stepped forward. He placed a small item, wrapped in dark fabric, onto the table beside the covering. Anna unwrapped it to reveal a silver book. The silver book.

  ‘Mokrikov’s diary,’ Callista said. ‘How did you—?’

  ‘I took it from you the day we arrived upon Titan. You said it was important. So I kept it safe. Now it’s yours, Anna, to take to this man that will save us.’

  Ferranti placed a heavy military-style rucksack onto the table. ‘Everything you’ll need is in here,’ he said. ‘My influence within the Committee is the only reason this is happening.’

  ‘The only reason what is happening?’ Callista said.

  ‘I’m going with the Sonii,’ Anna answered. She looked to Ferranti.

  ‘I hope it was right about what you’re going to do,’ he said.

  ‘Wait.’ Callista circled the table and stood between Anna and the others. ‘You’re not going.’

  ‘I have to.’

  ‘You can’t trust that thing. You need to trust us.’

  ‘I’m trusting myself, Callista.’

  ‘Callista has a point,’ Ferranti said. ‘According to our specialists, what you are going to do may well destroy the moon.’

  ‘Which moon?’ Callista asked him. ‘Can that happen?’

  ‘The creature has provided some kind of plan in which itself and Anna, inside a reinforced pod, will travel to the centre of the moon Io. From the centre, and through some sort of wormhole.’

  ‘You’re joking!’ she said. ‘Anna?’

  Ferranti spoke first. ‘We’ve double and triple checked and confirmed that, theoretically, what it is suggesting could work. But it’s unlikely and dangerous.’

  ‘Are you doing this to punish me, child? Or to punish yourself?’

  ‘I’m doing this to save you, Callista.’

  She answered with silence. Anna could see the pain in her eyes. She wanted to hold her, but couldn’t.

  ‘I have accepted a position with the Alignment leaders,’ Ferranti said, breaching the cold quiet. ‘And I’ve persuaded them to remain below Europa for now. I will take you up myself on board the Stellarstream and into Jupiter’s orbit. We’ll keep our distance. We will fire upon the moon, creating a shaft. It will go as far to the core as possible. You’ll have seconds to get as deep as you can.’

  ‘And the pod?’ she asked.

  ‘The pod you require has been specially fitted, as per the Sonii’s instructions. You will have no windows or display, so you’ll only know it has happened on the other side. It will last seconds. No more. If you build up enough speed and get to point you need . . .’

  ‘Then she’ll be reduced to atoms before she’s even aware of it!’ The old woman glared at her. ‘You think you’ll travel across space? Leap across four-hundred-million miles IN SECONDS?!’

  Ferranti wavered, unsure how to approach Callista. ‘You do understand the danger, Anna, the likelihood of this failing?’

  ‘I understand the danger perfectly,’ she answered, eyes never leaving her old mentor’s. ‘But I need to do this. I have to get to Earth before Erebus. I trust the Sonii. I have to. It’s the only way I’ll get to Earth in time to help.’

  EIGHTY

  ANNA WAITED FOR Callista in her room. She did not wait long.

  Callista would not stop. But Anna was resolved. She was going. Their relationship was at its limit. She didn’t want to leave things like this.

  When she entered, she sat on the bed beside her. Her shaking hand reached over and held the silver-black bracelet. ‘I was wrong, Anna.’

  ‘We—’

  ‘No, let me speak. Please.’ She bowed her head. ‘I was wrong. Wrong when I said this wasn’t all about you. Because it is. I always wished it wasn’t. I wished you could just live, without loss and pain. We have had more than anyone deserves. You ought to have no more.’ Then she clasped both hands around hers. ‘Stay with me.’

  ‘Callista. I love you.’

  The old woman smiled sadly. ‘You know, Anna, I was thinking today about the day you were born. Your uncle Ruben was late. He missed the b
irth. But your parents were so proud. I remember holding you for the first time. I’d never seen a more beautiful baby. You looked up at me like an angel. I knew you were special, even then. And I promised myself I would protect you forever. I failed.’

  ‘No. No. Nothing is forever.’

  ‘Don’t go. I can’t say goodbye again.’

  Anna leaned in and embraced her. She could feel the elderly woman shaking. ‘You have to be brave now, Callista. We all do. For Ruben. You have to protect him. I will go to Earth and help Justus. After tonight comes the dawn. Change comes eventually. I promise you.’

  ‘I don’t want to let you go.’

  ‘You don’t have to let me go. We’ll see each other again. Before this is over. I will find the Accentaurian and solve this, once and for all.’

  Callista sat back. ‘Who?’

  Anna paused. She had spoken the name now.

  ‘Who, Anna?’

  ‘The Accentaurian.’

  ‘Where did you hear that?’

  ‘The message. That’s who it was from. He swore I couldn’t tell anyone. I didn’t mean to . . .’

  Callista placed her fingers over Anna’s lips. ‘Say nothing more. If I cannot change your mind, I can at least give you something.’ From within her pocket she produced a small silver necklace, a miniature dark orb at the bottom of the chain. ‘This is Ruben’s necklace. He was wearing it when he died. It was once mine before his, and Peter Marx’s before mine. It belongs to you now.’

  ‘Uncle Ruben tried to give it to me before. But I didn’t deserve it then.’

  ‘It protects the true bearer in uncertain odds. It holds part of Peter’s gift. Take it, Anna, and stay safe. Stay safe, child, and be brave.’

  * * *

  The pod floated away from the Stellarstream. In orbit now above Europa, men, women, and children from every last Alignment world lined the viewing blocks and visual portals to see the pod take off, to catch just a glimpse of the one that would save them. It seemed like the pod moved away with no speed at all. But its velocity soon showed, and in no time at all Anna Berenguer was gone.

  For Anna, however, it had only just begun. Her head throbbed painfully as the minute shell in which she and her companion sat hurtled towards the Jovian moon Io. She wished she could see the stars around her. But nothing. Only a small light from the console.

  She gripped the necklace around her neck. If she and the olive-coloured little being between her legs were to die right here and now, Anna did not think she would care. There was not much left to care about anymore.