Atlantia Series 1: Survivor (32 page)

‘No infections that I can detect,’ he reported. ‘Everybody’s clean.’

A tangible air of relief filled the War Room as Evelyn looked at Meyanna. ‘I’m sorry, I had to…’

‘I know,’ Meyanna replied. ‘Better to be safe than sorry, right?’

‘It’s Qayin,’ Lael announced as a beeping signal sounded out through the War Room. ‘They’re signalling us. I’ll put it on screen.’

A link was established, and Evelyn saw a screen flicker into life to gaze into the bridge far above them.

She saw Qayin immediately, sitting in the captain’s chair. Around him were Cutler and his fellow convicts, manning various bridge stations. Qayin glanced up at them as he apparently realised that he was being watched and he smiled broadly.

‘There you are,’ he greeted them. ‘Welcome to my bridge.’

‘
Your
bridge?’ Sansin uttered. ‘What’s happening up there Qayin?’

‘Ah, captain,’ Qayin raised a hand to wave idly as he spoke, ‘you’re finally out of your cage. Feels good, doesn’t it?’

‘Where is Hevel?’ Idris demanded.

‘Dead,’ Qayin replied, his smile slipping. ‘Although I think he’d been dead for a very long time.’

‘Give up the bridge,’ Sansin ordered. ‘We’re coming up.’

‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you,’ Qayin replied.

Evelyn felt a pulse of concern as she pushed off the pillar and looked at Qayin. ‘We need to take control back,’ she said. ‘This isn’t over yet.’

Qayin inclined his head.

‘Yeah,’ he agreed, ‘but y’know, I kinda like this seat and the view is great.’

‘Qayin,’ Andaim growled, ‘after all that’s happened this isn’t the time to try a coup. We’re about to be destroyed.’

Qayin shrugged, playing idly with the switches on the captain’s chair. ‘Well, you see lieutenant, I ain’t so sure about that.’

‘What the hell are you talking about?!’ Idris roared. ‘You’ll get us all killed! If we do not cooperate we will be dead before this day is out.’

‘That might not be true,’ Qayin replied. ‘I’ve been speaking to the Word and you’re right: cooperation makes a world of difference.’

A silence descended upon the War Room as the captain frowned. ‘Talking to it?’

‘Talking to it,’ Qayin confirmed. ‘It’s remarkably reasonable, you know? Calls itself Tyraeus.’

Sansin made a sign at Lael, whipping his hand across his own throat, and the transmission signal vanished as the captain turned to Andaim.

‘Commander Tyraeus Forge,’ the captain said.

‘One of the finest battleship officers we ever had,’ Andaim agreed. ‘He must have been infected early. That would explain how the command structure was so easily destroyed during the apocaplyse: Tyraeus was in constant contact with both the high command and political leaders.’

‘And Qayin’s been speaking to him,’ the captain said. ‘Why would the Word bother with him? You think he’s lying?’

‘No,’ Andaim said. ‘That’s an Avenger class cruiser sitting out there and it could have blown us to hell an hour or more ago. Something’s going on all right.’

‘What the hell would it want to
talk
to us about?’ Sansin asked. ‘It’s wiped out our entire race and we’re the last few left.’

‘Maybe it’s seen the humans on the surface,’ Evelyn suggested, ‘and it’s trying to buy time until more ships arrive and it can destroy them too.’

Sansin gestured to the screen and Qayin’s image returned as Lael re–opened the channel.

‘I don’t like being cut off,’ the convict snarled.

‘Tough,’ Sansin snapped back, ‘it already happened. What does the Word want with a traitorous bastard like you, Qayin?’

‘Well now,’ Qayin replied casually, ‘that’s the thing, ain’t it? It’s not me the Word wants.’

‘That’s no surprise,’ Andaim shot back, ‘you’re not worth anything to anybody.’

‘Sticks and stones, Andaim,’ Qayin grinned. ‘Thing is, it doesn’t want you either, or any of the Atlantia’s crew.’

Evelyn glanced at Andaim, who in turn looked quizzically at Qayin.

‘What does it want?’ the captain asked for them all.

‘It wants Eve,’ Qayin replied.

Evelyn stared at Qayin in horror, and then at the captain, at Andaim and the bridge crew.

‘What does it want with you?’ Andaim asked.

Evelyn shook her head, trying to make her jaw move to reply. ‘I don’t know.’

The captain looked at her for a long moment and then back at Qayin. ‘No can do. I don’t negotiate with people like you.’

Qayin shrugged.

‘I kinda knew that you’d say that, so here’s the deal.’

Qayin raised one arm and gestured lazily to his side. Cutler and another convict walked into view, each gripping the arm of Officer C’rairn, one of them with a pistol to the officer’s head.

‘You two–faced bastard, let him go!’ Andaim shouted.

‘Now now, lieutenant,’ Qayin sneered. ‘No sense in getting all worked up about it. I’m a criminal, right? What did you expect?’

Andaim cursed under his breath and turned away from the screen as though he could not bear to look at Qayin any longer.

‘Give us Eve and we’ll give up C’rairn,’ Qayin said. ‘That’s our leverage over the Word. If we don’t give her up we’ll be blown apart and this really will all be over.’

Andaim looked over his shoulder at the convict.

‘After all she’s done, you still turn your back on her as quickly as you draw a breath.’

‘We don’t know what she’s done,’ Qayin said. ‘Maybe that’s the thing, and Hevel and his friends probably knew something about that. Hand her over to the Word and we get to go free.’

‘You don’t seriously believe that?’ the captain challenged him. ‘The Word will take what it wants and blow us all into oblivion a split–second later.’

‘Maybe,’ Qayin shrugged, ‘but then again it might not, and if we don’t do what it asks it’ll definitely blow us away, so I figure it’s the better end of a bad deal.’

From behind Qayin, Cutler looked at Evelyn and spoke.

‘It’s just like in the desert, right Evelyn? We all gotta do what we gotta do. It’s Golyath and Thutmose all over again.’

Evelyn stared at Cutler for a moment and she caught a glance from Andaim. The desert. She had watched as Qayin and Andaim fled the Egyptian army, and Andaim had gone back for Cutler, and she had fought Golyath to protect them both.

Evelyn turned to the captain.

‘I will go,’ she said.

‘Like hell,’ Sansin shot back. ‘I’m not giving up a single person to that murderous bastard and…’

‘I must go,’ she interrupted without force.

The captain stared down at her. ‘The Word will kill you if Qayin doesn’t first.’

Evelyn nodded once. ‘Better me on my own than all of us.’

Andaim shot to her side and grabbed her arm. ‘No.’

Evelyn hesitated, saw the concern etched into Andaim’s features and for the first time she thought that she saw a glimpse of something else. She reached up and gently rested her hand on his for a moment before pushing it away.

‘I have to go,’ she repeated, and then looked at the captain. ‘Any chance of avoiding conflict is worth the effort.’

The captain’s voice was a harsh whisper.

‘It’ll kill you,’ he growled. ‘The Word does not do anything without good reason and it has no good reason to let any of us live.’

Evelyn smiled briefly but she shook her head.

‘Logic doesn’t matter, captain,’ she replied. ‘It’s a risk worth taking, agreed?’

The captain bit his lip, but she knew that he could not argue with her. She glanced at Qayin’s image up on the display screen. ‘I’ll take a shuttle and be over shortly,’ she said.

‘I’ll await your arrival,’ Qayin confirmed. ‘I’m cutting off all communications until you arrive.’ The channel cut off and the screen went blank.

‘This is a mistake,’ Andaim snapped. ‘You’re being sacrificed on Qayin’s say so.’

‘No,’ Evelyn said. ‘He’s got a plan.’

‘What plan?’ Idris asked. ‘He’s holding C’rairn hostage! It’s the damned prison ship situation all over again.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘If Hevel was infected then he could have placed bugs and monitoring devices all over the bridge when he mutinied. We have to assume Qayin’s compromised, and he said Hevel and
his friends
– that could mean there are more infected people aboard the Atlantia.’

The captain rubbed his forehead with his hand. ‘We don’t have time to scan the civilians in the sanctuary.’

‘Which is why I need to do what Qayin is asking,’ Evelyn pressed. ‘We need the Word to think that we’re playing along.’

‘You’re sure Qayin’s bluffing?’ Andaim asked.

‘Of coursed he is,’ she replied. ‘He hates the Word as much as any of us, especially if it killed his brother. He knows we can’t win and that it cannot be trusted. If Qayin really was in control of the bridge he’d have fired the engines and blasted us out of here as fast as he could and given us time to plan something.’

‘Cutler said something to you about the desert?’ Captain Sansin asked.

‘We were being hunted by an army,’ Andaim explained, ‘trapped between two kings, Golyath and Thutmose.’

The captain’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. ‘So they’re trapped on the bridge somehow?’

‘Qayin must fear that he’s under observation from the Word. He can’t say what he wants to, but I’m thinking he wants me to travel over there,’ Evelyn explained, ‘and take the fusion core with me. Hevel could not have informed the Word about the fusion core until it was within communication range, which wasn’t until very recently and he’s .’

‘That’s a very risky assumption,’ Andaim pointed out. ‘He could have signalled the Avenger when we left the surface with Bra’hiv, and warned it of our plan.’

‘We won’t know for sure,’ Evelyn agreed. ‘But we don’t have much choice, do we? The only way to win this is to travel across to the Avenger.’

Captain Sansin’s features collapsed. ‘You’re going to go
in
there?’

‘There is no other option,’ Evelyn said. ‘We have to utterly destroy that vessel and then flee, and the only way we can properly do that is from the inside.’

‘I thought that we would mount the fusion core externally and open fire on the Avenger,’ Andaim said.

‘And have the Avenger blast it and take the Atlantia down with a single salvo?’ Evelyn challenged him. ‘It has to be aboard the Avenger and we don’t have much time. I go now or the Word gets suspicious and we’re vaporised anyway. What’s it going to be, captain?’

Idris stared up at the blank screen and then he sighed mightily.

‘Very well,’ he said, ‘but I’m not going to just sit here and let you go without getting ready for a fight.’

‘I wouldn’t expect anything less,’ Evelyn said. ‘I don’t know if the Word intends to double cross us, but I sure as hell don’t have a problem with trying to blow it to hell while we’re in the process.’

Idris thought for a moment. ‘How many Raython fighters does an Avenger class cruiser carry?’

Andaim smiled. ‘Eighteen,’ he replied. ‘And Tyraeus hasn’t launched them into a defensive screen either.’

‘Something that a commander of his standing would never have neglected to do,’ the captain replied. ‘Maybe the Word’s confidence in itself might also be a weakness. Do you think that you could go aboard with Evelyn and launch them?’

‘If we can reach them, we can fly them, captain.’

‘Then do it,’ Idris ordered.

‘How will you get away?’ Andaim asked Evelyn. ‘If we’re busy trying to steal the fighters, how will you get the core to Tyraeus?’

‘I won’t,’ Evelyn said. ‘Leave the core on the shuttle when we land. It’ll shield your men from the Avenger’s scanners, and once you’ve got the fighters blow the core to hell.’

Andaim’s features tightened. ‘But if you’re still aboard…’

‘The Word will still be destroyed,’ Evelyn cut him off. ‘Agreed?’

Andaim swallowed thickly but nodded once. The captain looked at Evelyn.

‘You don’t know what’s in there,’ he warned her. ‘We saw things, back during the war, before we were forced to leave Ethera. Terrible things, Evelyn.’

She hesitated at the War Room door, and then opened it and hurried out.

***

Evelyn boarded the shuttle and sealed the ramp behind her as Andaim made his way into the cockpit. He began surveying the instruments as she walked past the fusion core in its magnetic containment unit and moved to sit alongside him.

‘Will it hold up? The shuttle, I mean?’ she asked.

‘It’s only a short hop between the ships,’ Andaim replied. ‘She’s good for that, but the hull’s very weak. If Tyraeus decides to hit us we’ll be vaporised.’

‘Comforting.’

Andaim looked at her as he ignited the engines, the whine from them humming through the hull.

‘You don’t have to do this,’ he said.

Evelyn sighed, looking out of the viewing screen at the cargo deck still littered with the corpses of marines infected with the madness that was the Word.

‘I don’t know who I am,’ she replied. ‘I don’t know anything but my own name, but that thing over there, Tyraeus, knows about me. I can’t just walk away.’

Andaim gripped the controls as the shuttle lifted off the deck of the landing bay, tilting awkwardly under the uneven thrust from its remaining engines. Ahead, they saw a rush of air billow out into space in clouds of vapour as the bay’s shield doors opened onto the yawning abyss of deep space, exposing the cavity where Bra’hiv had blasted through exterior doors. The shuttle drifted forward as Andaim guided it out of the bay and turned alongside the Atlantia.

The old frigate’s big hull gleamed in the sunlight, and not for the first time Evelyn marvelled at the sight of the planet beneath them, vast expanses of blue and green, of sandy deserts and billowing clouds.

‘We’ll never be able to come back here, will we?’ she said.

‘No,’ Andaim said. ‘Not as long as the Word exists anyway.’

Andaim guided the shuttle beneath the frigates’s massive hull, turning away from the planet as they passed beneath the Atlantia and out toward deep space.

There, opposite them, was the Avenger. Evelyn scanned the battleship’s enormous lines, the sleek hull bristling with plasma cannons that speckled its surface, the ghost–grey metal hull blackened in large areas as the Word slowly converted it into something entirely new, consumed by the powerful machines swarming through it.