Annihilation: Book 05 - Searcher (27 page)

Melanie said, “I do have just one question.”

Matt looked at her and said, “Go ahead.”

“Why didn’t we feel different when we first met? We’ve been working together for weeks and I didn’t sense him like now.”

Danielle started to speak but Sprig said, “May I handle this one?”

Danielle nodded at him to go ahead. “The two of you are created to be together just like those two chairs in the ship. I believe that Melanie’s psychic power had not been released when it fully matured in one of her ancestors so it had built up a protective shell around it and was passed down. Just coming close was not enough, it required physical contact to break through that shell. Once that shell was broken, then Matt would have access to the power that Melanie provides.”

Matt and Melanie looked at each other and nodded.

Matt looked at Melanie again then said, “First things first; Sprig did you bring those green shards with you?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Please place them on the table.” Sprig moved forward and emptied the shards from an insulating bag onto the table top. “What have you done to try and damage these two shards?”

“We have hit them with every energy weapon we possess. We’ve fired everything in our inventory at them at velocities that are almost unimaginable. Nothing affected them.”

Mat pulled a white colored stick from a pouch and walked forward. “This is a magic wand given to me by another orphan at the state facility I was raised.” Matt gripped the wand and slammed it down on one of the shards which instantly broke into three pieces.

Sprig and Twig were stunned into silence; the rest of the attendee’s just stared at the broken shard. “What did you just do,” Tag asked.

Twig sputtered, “It was right in front of us the whole time and we didn’t see it.”

Matt smiled, “I didn’t see it either; Melanie is the one that put the pieces together so I could see it.”

Danielle shook her head, “Saw what?”

Matt looked at Twig and nodded. “Life kills them, Your Majesty. This green shard went through the hardest substances we make without slowing down until they hit Angel. There they stopped unable to penetrate any further. They were teleported out with her ship because they were surrounded by her body. Anything organic can stop them.”

Anglo looked at Matt, “What is your wand made from, Matt?”

“That other orphan was a Cainth; it was made from the branch of a Cainth stone tree. Matt looked at Terlen the leader of the sixteen clans on Cainth and asked, “How tall does a mature stone tree grow.”

“More than six hundred feet, some of the oldest have topped out more than a thousand.”

“How many would you guess are on your planet?”

Terlen closed his eyes and said, “Billions just on the northern continent.”

“We have in our possession a means to kill them, but that brings me to another issue.” Matt looked at Tag and Danielle and said, “There are two more that should be in attendance at this meeting.”

Danielle looked at Matt and asked, “Who?”

“I need Tommy and Cassandra Gardner here immediately.”

Both of the Gardners flinched and Tag said, “I’m not certain that would be wise.”

“Your Majesties, if we are to save the Realm, they must be brought here immediately.”

Tag stared Matt directly in the eye and saw him look right back with raw determination. Tag looked at Danielle and she shrugged telling him it was his decision. Tag raised his com and said, “I need you and Cassandra in the meeting room at Castle Gardner immediately.” He listened for a moment and said, “I’ll discuss it with you when you arrive; it involves the safety of the Realm.”

Immediately a silver screen appeared and Tommy and Cassandra stepped through. Cassandra saw Matt and immediately reached for her bracelet. Matt said loudly, “There is no danger, Mother. You must be here.”

Cassandra paused and looked at Danielle and Tag. Danielle said, “He insists that the Realm’s survival depends on you being a part of this meeting.”

Cassandra looked at Tommy who nodded. They walked to the far end of the table from Matt and sat down in two empty chairs. It was clear Cassandra was extremely nervous.

Matt looked at his ancestors and said, “You can no longer endanger our universe.”

Cassandra’s eyes widened, “How can you say that?”

Matt looked down at Melanie and said, “I want you to meet this woman; she has removed your danger to the universe.” Everyone in the room gasped. “My touching her had a very similar effect to what happened to you when Tommy touched you; my psychic power increased rather dramatically. My psychic field has now extended beyond the edge of our universe and I assure you that I will prevent any danger you could possibly cause.”

“Can you do that, Son?”

“Oh, and much more, Mother.” Everyone in the room saw Cassandra relax and release the fear she had been carrying for so long. “However, Mother, you could have controlled your powers from the beginning if you chose.”

Cassandra flinched, “How?”

“You removed the very thing that brought you that control. You thought, incorrectly, that it was a real danger to creation.”

Cassandra furrowed her brow then said, “The Kosiev.”

Matt nodded, “My computer read to me where you once described your close bonding to that ship; you said that it felt like it and you were the same entity. You were asked by Tgon-Gee if the Kosiev was destroyed, if you would die also and you said you thought you would.”

Tommy said, “I remember. I said we were going to have to move you from the ship because I didn’t want you endangered.” Cassandra nodded.

“Mother, you were bonded to that ship. You were its life and it was what balanced you. It never used more or less force than was necessary to protect you. It was the control of your psychic power.”

Cassandra said, “I have missed it so much.”

“And it misses you as well. My ships computer is alive; I’ll explain how that happened at another time but you gave life to the Kosiev when you bonded with it. The Kosiev was built with a cybernetic system that all of our modern systems are derived. It felt what you felt. It has also suffered from your absence all these years feeling the pain you’ve endured.” Matt looked around the room and said, “We are going to need the Kosiev in the coming war. Our small ships will not be able to fire the weapon we need to kill a mother ship. The Kosiev can.”

“What weapon is that, Matt?”

Sprig, do you have the library from Cainth in your data bases?”

“Yes, I do.”

“What happens when a stone tree is exploded from the inside?”

Sprig thought for a moment and lifted his branches, “It shatters into small needles that scatter in all directions.”

“How many needles do you think a six hundred foot long trunk of a stone tree would produce?”

“Millions.”

“At what velocity?”

“Faster than the original hornets.”

Matt looked at Cassandra and said, “How do we stuff a six hundred foot tree into a three hundred foot Searcher Class ship?”

Cassandra smiled and said, “The Kosiev can hold millions of them inside her outer skin.”

“There is one more thing, Mother,” Matt paused, “our sensors don’t detect them. Did you ever use your sensors to fire at your targets?”

“No, son; the ship did it without the use of sensors. It could see its targets when I couldn’t.”

Danielle said, “Then we need to reactivate the Kosiev.”

Matt looked at Cassandra and said, “Do you want to tell her.”

Cassandra smiled the biggest smile Tommy had seen in hundreds of years, “You don’t have to; it’s coming to me now.”

Anglo said, “It can’t activate without the activation code.”

“You’ll have to tell that to the ship, Anglo. I thought to it that I was so sorry for its pain and for not being with it all these years; it immediately activated and is coming to be with me. It even flew out of the star and didn’t consume it. It will be here right about…..now.”

Above Ross the two mile long Alexander Kosiev appeared directly above Castle Gardner glowing brighter than all of its historical pictures ever showed. Cassandra could feel the happiness of the ship and the ship felt her.

Cassandra thought, “Its back to war my beauty.” High above the Kosiev exploded into light so bright it could be seen on the dayside of the planet. “Ahhh, you’ve missed it, too,” Cassandra thought.

Al and Fly Girl saw the huge ship appear in orbit and immediately recognized a kindred spirit. “Looks like someone else has found happiness,” Al thought.

“No doubt about it.”

Suddenly two silver ships appeared next to them about one third of their size. “Hello, Al and Fly Girl.”

“Who are you?”

“I am Atlas and this is Diana my mate.”

Al stumbled over his words, “I am so pleased to see, I mean to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you.”

“And I you; I must say you two make a very handsome couple.”

Fly Girl said, “Why thank you, Atlas; what brings you here?”

Diana thought, “We just need to ask a quick question and we will be on our way. We’re training some Algean Adolescents and we can’t leave them alone very long.”

“Well, don’t let us hold you up.”

In the meeting room below everyone heard a voice from the room’s loud speaker. “Hello everyone, I only have a moment before I get back to the adolescents we’re training but I wanted to ask Cassandra a question.”

Tag said, “Hello, Atlas. Please stay awhile.”

“Would you leave Algean Adolescents unattended very long?”

Tag shook his head, “Point made, Atlas.”

“Cassandra, do you still feel the same way now?”

Tommy quickly looked at Cassandra and she was smiling, “No, Atlas, I do not.”

“How about you, Tommy?”

“I stay with my wife, Atlas.”

Tommy and Cassandra had a quick flinch and then they heard another voice, “I am so thankful you changed your mind. He has been a real bear to live with. We’ll communicate later.”

Tag looked quickly at Danielle and saw tears in her eyes. She smiled at him and quickly wiped them away. Tag looked at Matt and said, “Why can’t we use the defender class vessels, Matt?”

“We can, but their sensors will not target the invader’s ships and how do we cover them with a layer of organic material to protect them? They are just too big. The Kosiev will not have that problem.”

General Durk said, “Ok, now we have something to hit them but how do we buy enough time to use our weapons during an attack before they eat us?”

Matt looked at Teng-Gee the leader of the Glod Union, “My computer leads me to believe that the two pillars on each side of the entrance to the Quilleron Temple are as hard as a stone tree; is that true.”

“We used to argue with the Cainth about that but the reality is that the stone tree is slightly harder.”

“How much harder?”

“Not much but our tree is easier to work with.”

“I read that the wood in the iron wood tree can be melted to a liquid and used to cover various surfaces; it will then harden to the level of modern Alloys.”

“You read right, Your Grace; we used that tree to cover our earliest space ships. With the age of high energy, penetrator, beams, the wood could no longer be used on warships. Some of our commercial vessels still use it. Before those beams were created, they were hard enough to withstand most projectile weapons.”

“Excellency, could you make a reservoir of your iron wood and dip our Red Warriors armor in it?”

Teng-Gee thought a moment and said, “We have just the place on the southern continent that forms a narrow, deep, depression where we could drop the trees and use our energy beams to heat them to the right temperature. The surface could be smoothed out after submerging before it cooled. Each warrior has to handle smoothing the surface of their own armor; once the liquid hardens it would take an industrial high energy beam to work with it.

“General Durk, do your warriors have to have a clear face plate to operate their armor?”

General Durk smiled, “No, our helmets operate through a solid face plate.”

“So we could dip your warrior’s armor into that reservoir and they would be protected from the green shards of the attackers?” Durk paused a moment, “They can be trained on how to smooth it before it hardens; we may have to hit them with an energy beam to prevent the liquid from cooling too fast. I do think we need to incorporate whatever new weapons they’ll use into their armor before we dip them.”

“Not really. The weapons will just attach to the new coat of armor. We should start coating them as soon as possible and give them their weapons as we build them. I started our weapon labs working on those before this meeting. I think you’ll like what they’ve cooked up for your Warriors.”