"It's the Port house alarm, Thora," Evren called.
A knock sounded at the door of the Port house.
"Don't answer it," Evren yelled as he opened up security footage.
Lena looked over Evren's shoulder at the security screen. Ras Tabor stood at the front door. Behind him were guards with the Divitian crest on their uniform.
Lena saw Aaron leap to his feet and sneak to the window beside the front door. In the background of the hologram, Aaron signaled for them to be quiet.
Thora had already stopped talking but Lena and the others went completely silent. Lena felt herself holding her breath even though they weren't in the room with Thora.
Lena saw Gideon walking down the stairs his hands still cuffed in front of him. "You didn't think you'd win, did you?" Gideon said in a tone that was not his own. He lunged at Thora.
Thora screamed, as Gideon threw her to the ground and knocked her unconscious in one move. In the next, he had Aaron pinned to the wall.
Gideon's looked at the hologram. His dark brown eyes stared straight at Lena. They looked hard and unkind. She had never seen Gideon look at her with such hatred. "I will find you, Evangeline, and I will kill you," he said.
The communication ended. Evren had turned off the hologram.
"Gideon," Lena screamed. "Get it back on, Evren. He's been activated. What's happening? Evren, why did you close the hologram?"
"We can't have them tracking the call," Evren said. "I had to turn it off."
"Gideon," she screamed again.
She felt Suki's prosthetic arm wrap around her waist and pull her backward. She was hyperventilating while trying to pull out of Suki's bionic grip. "We've got to get to him," she said.
"Evren, where is he going? Track him," Suki snapped.
Evren was already typing madly onto his computer. Images of the Port sprang to life on the holograms around them.
"There," Suki said, pointing to one of the streets just outside their Port House.
Gideon stood outside the Port house next to Ras. Four guards had Thora and Aaron between them. Both were unconscious. Gideon gave a nod of his head and the Guards lifted Aaron and Thora into an airship.
"Those are the Divitian guards," Tarek said.
"But it's Gideon giving the orders," Lena said. She felt panicked. "They're listening to Gideon.”
"Lena, that's not Gideon. You know it's not," Suki said.
"Selene is working with Divitia," Tarek said. It almost sounded more like a question than a statement. "It seems odd that Divitia would help her with anything. There is bad blood between Selene and Kaghan."
"Do you think they're being controlled? Do you think Kaghan has the device implanted inside of him?" Myri asked from the side of the room.
"Kaghan usurped Selene and Thora's father to become sole ruler of Divitia. I don't know if he's been implanted or something else, but the fact they're working together does not bode well," Tarek said. "My father will want to know about this. I'm going to contact him at the IMA."
"I should have never let him go," Lena said. "I should have stopped him. I could have stopped him from leaving. We have the plans now. We could have fixed him." She found herself rambling. All she could think of were those cold dark eyes looking at her through the hologram.
"Lena, calm down," Suki said.
Lena gasped for air as she choked on her sobs. She was crying so hard it was uncontrollable.
Suki pulled her closer and Lena turned and buried her head in Suki's shoulder. They watched the feed of the Divitain's vehicle going towards the Divitian consulate. Once it went inside their parking structure, they could no longer see what was happening.
"We've gotta help them," Birdee said.
"We're going to help them," Suki replied. "I'll have my Zoons get right on it. They'll be able to get us more information. Bates is in Arc right now. He's one of my best. Nothing gets by him. Evren, get me Bates."
Evren had been running between different computers trying to keep up with everything that was going on. Several holograms were already open in front of them. When Suki asked about Bates, Evren nodded and opened up yet another screen in the air in front of them.
Bates immediately was on a hologram. It looked like he was in the underground club, but it was daytime, so it looked empty.
Lena only half listened as Suki explained the situation.
Bates kept nodding until Suki finished. "I'm on it," he said.
Lena wrung her hands together. She needed to do something to help, but didn't know what to do. The others in the room looked at each other with heavy looks. Did anyone know what to do now?
After a few silent minutes, Myri cleared her throat. "I think we all need to take a break to clear our minds," she said. "Come on, Lena. Let's make some of Thora's biscuits."
Chapter Seven
Gideon rested his head against the window of the plane and watched as Ebon came into view. The city's streets and buildings were set up in the same circles as everything else the Priestess designed. A black circular fortress sat in the center surrounded by a half circular courtyard. The city roads and buildings rippled outward from the fortress, edged on one side by a deep crag that wound into the bare land behind the fortress. This was the same crag that Gideon, Lena and Tern had rescued Birdee from. This is where the Priestess kept all who opposed her. At least, the ones she couldn't control
The plane landed in the open ground next to the fortress. Gideon turned towards the Defense soldiers in charge of guarding him. His hands and feet had been cuffed since Selene had released her hold on him hours before, but the soldiers still eyed him warily. He looked away from them and back out the window. His head throbbed with the beat of his heart. He wanted to be anywhere but here.
The plane landed and soldiers led him outside to where his mother was waiting for him. Ruddy, the former weapons master from the Defense Training Facility, stood at her side.
"Captain Gideon. It's nice for you to join us." She was dressed elaborately, as she always was, in a sparkling black dress suit. Her golden jewelry caught the light and reflected into Gideon's eyes. He squinted and turned his head.
"It's not as if I had a choice," Gideon replied, looking back at her and raising his cuffed arms as far as the chains would allow him.
The Priestess' eyes turned deadly. "Follow me. If you choose not to, I'll make you." She touched a headband placed across her temples, its thin gold wire barely noticeable.
The Priestess turned and walked back towards her fortress. Ruddy pushed Gideon to follow her.
They entered the fortress through side doors that immediately put them in a gold encrusted hallway, the ceiling high and the walls carved with ornate pillars at various spacing. Selene kept leading them down the corridor until it opened into a large hall. A throne sat at the far end of it. She walked forward, her feet clicking on the floors. She sat on the throne, her hands grasping the armrests. Slowly her eyes looked Gideon up and down. Her lips formed a tight line as she did so. "You look like your father," she said with coldness in her voice.
Gideon felt the muscles in his jaws clench as he kept himself from saying something back. She didn't deserve a reply. She didn't deserve anything from him. Gideon tried to remember the last time he had had a private conversation with her. It was the night she had initiated him into her Defenses. The night he found out that she was the Priestess. And that conversation wasn't even in person, it was virtual. He couldn't remember a time he'd talked to her before that. Of course, he was young, but even being young he couldn't remember any kindness his mother had shown him. Gideon tried to remember if she'd ever laughed with him. Or smiled with sincerity for that matter.
With a sudden jolt, he remembered LillyAnne, Lena's mother. Her smile and how she cared for him when Selene had left him. The contrast made his heart ache for LillyAnne. She loved him in a way his mother never could. So did Thora. They loved him. Selene left him.
"What am I going to do with you?" she asked, strumming her finge
rs on the armrest.
Gideon refocused on his mother, hatred for her boiling inside of him.
"I should kill you," she said. "I would kill anyone else who'd done what you have."
"Why don't you then?" Gideon said, unable to keep his silence any longer.
"Call it a mother's love," Selene said.
"What you mean to say is, you still think you can use me to get what you want. You think you can use me to get to Evangeline. Not to mention the device you had placed in me would be a waste if you didn't use it," Gideon said.
The edges of Selene's eyes tightened and her lips pressed again into a hard line. He knew he had made her mad.
"I arranged your education. Assured you were in a position to lead for me after your graduation." Selene's voice began escalating. "And you repay me by hiding the very person who can destroy me," she said. "Just because I don't kill you, doesn't mean you aren't going to pay for what you've done to me. By the time I'm through with you, you're going to wish you'd never defied me. Take him to the med room," she demanded of Ruddy.
Ruddy pulled Gideon away from his mother and back down the ornate hall they had just come from, this time taking a left about halfway down the hall.
"You really made her mad," Ruddy said.
"Would you have done any different?" Gideon asked.
Ruddy took a deep breath. "It takes a lot to protect the people you love. But Captain, I'm not going to lie to you, the Priestess is not going to let you get away with what you've done. And I'm not in a place where I can help you again."
Gideon nodded his head. "I understand. The device inside me makes it impossible for anyone to help me."
The two of them stopped talking as they walked into a small, silver room. A medical examining table sat in the middle. "I'm sorry Gideon," Ruddy said. "It will be easier if you don't fight it."
Gideon felt his fear spike. He dug his feet into the ground pushing away from the examining table but he felt Ruddy grab hold of him. He twisted his torso, trying to free himself from Ruddy's grip. "No, I refuse to make anything easier for her," he screamed. Gideon felt his muscles relax as the device turned on.
Ruddy let go of him and watched as Gideon obediently climbed onto the table and laid down.
Gideon still felt all the fear he had before, but now he was trapped and there was nothing he could do to free himself.
Ras came and stood over the top of him. Just looking at his distorted face made Gideon's heart race. But he couldn't do anything to calm down. He had no control of his body.
"The Priestess has assigned me the task of testing the limits of the control device inside you," Ras said. His voice was gravely and low. The sound made Gideon want to shiver. "It's not going to feel good," he continued as an evil smile spread across his face.
Gideon could see Ruddy standing at the edge of the room from his peripheral vision. He tried to call out to him, but couldn't. He tried to beg for help, but his mouth wouldn't move.
A sharp pain started in the top of Gideon's head. It slowly moved down his body racking against every nerve until it stopped at the tip of his toes. Spots of lights danced in his vision as he tried to cry out the words would never come. He felt his body start to spasm and he felt as if he were choking.
Ras started to laugh. "Nobody defies the Priestess," he said. "Even her own son."
His laughter was the last thing Gideon heard as he slipped into unconsciousness.
***
Evangeline stood in the same place she always did when Xenia visited her in her dreams. She stood by the edge of the crag, while swirls of mist surrounded her feet.
"I see you made it to your destination," Xenia said. She stood next to Lena looking across the crag to the dry ground on the other side.
"I made it," Lena said. "But not without heartache."
"Yes, I know about Gideon," Xenia responded.
"What am I going to do? You said we needed to work together. I can't even get near him now." Lena didn't know if she could cry in a dream, or a vision or whatever this was, but she wanted to.
"You don't need to be together to work together," Xenia said.
"What do you mean?"
"You'll figure it out," Xenia said.
"If you're not going to tell me, why are you here?" Lena found herself getting very mad.
"One with the power to save, the other to destroy," Xenia answered. "You have the power, Evangeline. You need to use it."
Xenia beckoned for Lena to look around.
Lena looked down. People were crying out for her to save them, their voices echoing up the steep walls.
"Your job is not done, Lena, and neither is Gideon's. You need to keep fighting."
"Right now, I don't want to defeat Selene," Lena answered. "I want to save Gideon.
"They are the same thing."
Lena turned away and stared into the distance. "I can't do it alone and everyone who tries to help me gets hurt."
"Your parents can help you," Xenia said.
"My parents?" Lena answered. "My parents were murdered."
"Yes, but just because they are dead, doesn't mean they didn't leave information that will help."
"What do you mean?" Lena asked.
"They have the information you need. Now find it." Xenia stretched out a hand toward her.
Lena jolted awake just before Xenia's hand made contact. She clutched her mother's diary. A plate of biscuits sat on the couch next to her, their crumbs having strayed from the plate to the couch around it. She had fallen asleep while reading her mother's journal.
Dessa and Remiah spoke quietly to Myri and Driunn.
Tarek and Suki were in the middle of playing some type of game that wasn't cheering either of them up.
Evren was nowhere to be seen and neither was Birdee or Tern.
Everyone's face bore the signs of everything Lena felt inside. Sadness, guilt, despair.
Lena opened up her mother's book. The letter's scrawled haphazardly across the pages. Lena read the first thing that caught her eye.
"Put communications in the records' room.”
Lena gasped and reread the passage.
Suki and Tarek stopped their game and stared at her.
"What's wrong?" Myri asked.
"Remiah, where's the records room?" Lena asked.
Remiah frowned. "We don't have a records room."
"Get Tern," Lena said. "I think I know what we need to do."
Chapter Eight
"I had another dream," Lena said as Druinn left to get Tern.
"What was it about?" Suki said as she looked back at her game and laid a card on the table.
"You once told me that Xenia was giving me the next step to take," Lena said excitedly.
"So?" said Suki.
"Well, she said I needed to keep fighting and that my parents had the answer," Lena said as if it explained everything.
"What does that even mean?" Remiah said.
"I don't know, but she basically said if I worked to defeat Selene, I'd also be saving Gideon. And look at this." She pointed at her mother's note.
"Put communications in the records' room," Tarek read.
"Everleigh doesn't have a records room," Lena explained.
Everyone was giving her blank stares.
"Everything was electronically stored. And I'm pretty sure if there was a whole room full of records, Gideon and I would have found it as kids.”
Tarek's eyes lit up. "Well, then the records room is somewhere else. Here perhaps," Tarek said. "You also didn't know this place existed. So it could be deduced that your father kept a records' room in these caverns."
"Yes!" Lena said. "That's exactly what I'm saying."
Suki switched seats so she could lean over Tarek and read the journal.
Tarek blushed slightly as her shoulder pressed into his.
"What does it matter if there is a records' room?" Suki asked.
"Maybe the answer is there," Lena said.
"It makes sense," Tarek sa
id. "Your father was a great military leader. He led the resistance and would have put information in a safe place where no one else would know about it."
"I think we should find the room your mother is talking about," Dessa said.
"Find wha' room?" Tern said walking up behind them with Druinn.
Lena showed him the journal entry.
"I already have some idea's where it migh' be," Tern said. "I explored a little bit. Birdee will be asleep fer a while and won't need me. Let's find it.”
Lena closed the journal and stood up. Suki and Tarek did the same.
"While you're looking for that, I'm going to check the security," Remiah said. "Dessa and I have been talking. Since our father was captured we feel like we need to implement more."
"Do you think he'll be forced to give up our location?" Myri asked.
"I don't know," Remiah answered. "But it's best we're secure if it does happen.”
Everyone went silent once more, no one wanting to say anything or be the first to move. It was finally Myri that broke the silence.
"Well, Lena, Tarek, Suki, and Tern, while you're finding the records' room and Dessa and Remiah are checking security, Druinn and I will go check on our prisoner.”
"Wouldn't want to miss his bathroom schedule," Druinn grumbled.
Remiah nodded in agreement. He and Dessa left through the same tunnel that led to Evren's workshop.
The rest crossed the main cavern into the tunnel leading to their rooms.
"Good luck with the bathroom," Suki said with a smirk. "Hope everything comes out all right."
Druinn gave her a playful shove as they left.
Tern led them into the same tunnel Lena had taken to get to Everleigh. When they were almost to the exit Lena had taken, Tern made a left. This tunnel looked natural, the walls rough and uneven.
"Tern, it's a dead end," Suki said.
"Ta look at it ya'd think so. But I think this passage has been used. The ground has been worn more than the other tunnels that are natural.”
They stopped at the dead end. Tern studied the rough walls. His head moved slowly from side to side as he walked the width of the tunnel.
The Mir Chronicles- The Complete Series Page 51