Cursed: Brides of the Kindred 13 (56 page)

“What’s going to happen to Earth my dear?” Two smirked at them, showing his gleaming metal teeth. “Why, it’s going to get eaten up,
every…last…crumb.”
He smacked his thin, liver colored lips together in apparent delight.

“Two!” Six surged forward but four guards every bit as big and imposing as he was had suddenly appeared on all sides of him, holding him fast.

“You never should have returned, old friend,” Two said, smiling at him nastily. “Though I
am
glad you’re here. It will be good for you to witness the complete and utter
failure
of your plan and the eventual destruction of your paramour’s planet.” He motioned at the guards which were holding all of them now. “Bring them all to the Hall of the Collective.” Then he swept off down the long metal corridor, his black leather coat flapping behind him.

Without emotion, the huge warriors began to march after him, dragging their prisoners as they went. Charlie struggled and cursed but the two Dark Kindred warriors on either side of her were much too strong to fight. They each wore some kind of bulky battle armor and had an iron grip on her arms. Beside her, she could see Mei-Li struggling as well. After a while, though, she gave up and let herself be dragged along. Looking to the side, she caught Charlie’s eye and shrugged.

“It’ll be all right,” she said, raising her voice to be heard over the tramp and clank of the many booted feet against the metal floor. “Save your strength—we’ll think of
something.”

What the hell they were going to think of, Charlie had no idea. She only knew she was scared to death and not for herself—for Stavros. What had Two meant when he said he wanted them to witness the failure of their plans? How did he know they had any plan at all? Then again, how had he known they had followed him?

Before she could even begin to guess at the answers, the whole company turned a wide corner and found themselves in front of a vast set of black iron double doors. To Charlie, they looked completely out of place in the plain blank metal halls. They were huge—twenty feet tall at least and half again as wide—with some elaborate scrolling scrip carved all over them. They looked more like the gateway to an ancient medieval stronghold than the entrance to a high tech computer room.

They stopped in front of the doors and Two turned to see her staring at them.

“Ah, I see you are admiring our entryway,” he said, smiling. “Yes, it is a leftover from those who came before—before the Collective took over as the rulers of Zeaga Four, that is. It amused the ancient ones to build this most sacred room as a kind of shrine to the beings housed within.” He looked back at the elaborately carved doors admiringly. “They did it ironically, I believe but as it so often does, the truth swallowed their lie whole. The Collective took over and now they guard and rule this planet as sternly as any deity that ever was—nor do they tolerate unbelievers.”

At a motion from him, the heavy doors were heaved open by four guards on each side, revealing a room bigger than a football stadium. Two’s voice rang out shrilly, echoing in the vast space.

“Behold…the sanctuary of the only Gods I have ever known or shall ever know. Behold, the Hall of the Collective!”

Charlie caught her breath at the enormity of the vast space. It didn’t seem like such a huge area could be captured indoors and yet it was there, right in front of her.

The room seemed to spread out forever, an illusion doubtless helped along by the dim bluish lighting which didn’t seem to illuminate much. Charlie had been picturing the rows and rows of old-fashioned computer banks for some reason, though she knew beings as advanced as the Collective probably wouldn’t look like an image from an old Earth film. So she wasn’t very surprised when she didn’t see anything that matched the metal image in her head. What
did
surprise her, though, was that she didn’t see anything at all—at least, not at first.

When she did, she took in a deep breath. Suspended from the high ceiling were clusters of dark globe-like lights winking and twinkling with quiet malevolence in the dim room. They hung in clusters like poisoned grapes, connected with slender black cables that seemed to be shooting sparks of light back and forth between them. Once she saw them, she noticed that the entire room was full of them, cluster upon cluster of dark lights, like black globes lit from within, crowding the vast space like some kind of malevolent growth that was taking over the entire huge room.

Below the clusters was another network, this one harder to see because it had no lights in it. It was a net of fine white gossamer-like threads that stretched up to every globule of light and down to the metal floor thousands of feet below.

For Charlie now saw that they were standing on the metal lip of a vast chasm. The huge room wasn’t only wide, it was deep as well. Indeed, when she dared to peer over the edge she saw that the space was so much more immense than she had first supposed, the sight made her dizzy.
You could probably empty the Great Lakes in here and still have room for a river or two,
she thought, drawing back hastily.

There was a thin tongue of metal—a kind of walkway that led out into the middle of the enormous room. It extended out like a narrow bridge over a chasm and ended at the very center where all the thin white gossamer threads which glimmered in the light of the dark globes seemed to converge in a single point before branching out again towards the floor.

Those white threads must be the net Six as talking about,
Charlie thought, staring at its many glimmering strands.
The one that powers this whole place. And that’s the Apex Point in the center—if what Six said is right, the power’s all gathered there.

There was something else—someone crouching in the center of the round platform at the very end of the metal tongue. Charlie couldn’t tell who or what it was in the dim light but then it raised its head and she saw a faint glimmer of reddish auburn gold.

“Stav?” she breathed uncertainly. “But if he’s out there, shouldn’t the Collective—”

“Shouldn’t the Collective be overloaded by all the emotion he somehow managed to bring with him?” Two finished her half whispered question for her. “Why yes, you would
think
so, wouldn’t you? But you see, you made the mistake of bringing the only one kind of emotion—
positive
emotion. The Collective’s power net is well grounded against such gentle feelings. To excite the kind of explosion you were no doubt hoping for, it would take a much more volatile mixture. Something with hate and loathing and spite—all the really
intense
emotions as well as the sweet, mild, gentle ones your Stavros was able to carry in his Mark.”

“How do you
know
all this?” Charlotte blurted. “How could you possible know about our plans or that we were at the J’lorgan’s Mind resort looking for the Heart of Love in the first place?”

“How do I know? I have eyes
everywhere
—observe.”

Suddenly a small creature about the size of a large rat came scuttling between the booted feet of the Dark Kindred up to Two’s side. It moved in a jerky fashion that made her think of a remote controlled toy but it had black and purple fur and glowing red eyes.

Those eyes…where have I seen those eyes before?

Then it came back to her—the red eyes she’d seen peeking out at her in the kitchen area of the Kindred shuttle she had Stav had taken to the J’lorgan’s Mind resort in the first place.

“A furskin,” she heard Six growl.

“A spybot now—and a very useful one,” the Dark Kindred Commander sneered. He looked at Charlie. “My little furry friend here has been keeping me informed of your whereabouts and intentions the entire time you were at the resort and you never even noticed it.”

“So you’re up to your old tricks, Two.” Six sounded disgusted. “Modifying creatures to suite your own purposes—just like the sniffers.”

“Yes, my lovely sniffers.” Two smiled malevolently. “They are
so
going to enjoy tearing the lot of you apart after I’ve made my point. Regrettably I cannot bring them to the Hall of the Collective. Though they’re not supposed to have emotions I have found it actually
helps
to give them some. Their animosity and rage would be far too much for the power net to handle, especially mixed with the positive emotions Stavros has so thoughtfully brought us.”

“Is he—is Stav all right?” Charlie couldn’t help asking. “Why isn’t he moving much? Why did you put him out there by the center of the net?”

“Why to prove a point, my dear. To show you definitively that your sad little plans cannot defeat the greatest minds the universe has ever known or will ever know. Observe!”

Two strode out onto the narrow metal walkway suspended in space in the center of the vast room. His boots clanked, echoing in the emptiness but he seemed not the least distressed by the thousand foot drop on either side. When he got to the round platform in the center, he stood perfectly still a moment.

“Lights.” He spoke softly in that high, unpleasant voice but the clusters of black grape globes which must be the Collective suddenly began to glow brighter. “Thank you.” Two nodded respectfully around him, acknowledging his sentient machine masters.

Looking closely, Charlie saw that Stavros was indeed crouched on the metal platform, his head bowed. She couldn’t be sure but it seemed he was chained down in some way—maybe by his hands which would explain the awkward position he was in. Her heart clenched.

The bastards are too afraid to let him up!
She felt a surge of anger followed by a surge of fear and regret.
Stavros, oh God, I wish I could have talked to you…wish I could have told you…
But told him what? She still didn’t quite know. She only knew she wished with all her heart that she had just a little more time.

But it seemed her time was up—what was Two going to do?

* * * * *

Crouched on the metal platform balanced precariously above the void, Stavros was wondering the same thing. He already knew that their plan had failed. Obviously the mixture of emotions he had managed to collect with his Mark wasn’t volatile enough to affect the power net of the Collective.

He had even managed to reach out one hand and wind one of the silky white strands around his finger when Two had first manacled his wrists to the platform. He’d been hoping that direct contact with net would do the trick. And indeed, for a brief moment he’d thought he felt a tremor run through the line he held and the clusters of black globe lights that represented the Collective’s many processing systems had flickered briefly. But that was all. Clearly the emotion he had brought wasn’t enough or wasn’t the right kind or mixture of feelings.

Now he watched as the Dark Kindred Commander stood beside him, putting on a show for his own amusement.

“Behold!” he shouted and reached down to hook his long, skeletal fingers in the back of the black shirt Stav still wore. Though the fabric was thick, Two’s slender frame was deceptively strong. With a jerk, he tore the shirt away and cast it down into the yawning pit below.

At once the darkness was pierced with light as the glowing Mark was revealed, shining like stripes made of pure golden sunlight in the dim room. The gossamer-fine white line still wrapped around his little finger began to tremble and vibrate.

This is it!
Stav thought hopefully.
Surely it will happen now! Surely the emotion flooding out of my Mark will overcome the power net and blow the Collective to bits, just as we hoped it would!

He held his breath and closed his eyes, trying to be ready for the blast.

But instead of an explosion, he heard only the high, maniacal laughter of the Dark Kindred Commander.

“Do you see? Do you
see?”
he demanded, shouting at Six and Mei-Li and Charlotte who were still all gathered on the edge of the pit, staring. “Do you see what effect your pitiful little positive emotions have on my masters? Nothing! Noth—”

Two’s words were cut off by another voice, one much louder and deeper and unnaturally harsh—and it was coming from his own mouth.

“
He is mine and I shall have him! You shall not keep me prisoner any longer, Two!”

Two’s bony left hand suddenly jerked towards Stav and landed flat on his back, covering the place where the Mark shone brightest.

Stav jerked in agony—it was like a sword piercing his flesh—but couldn’t shake off the hand. For a moment he felt something dark flowing into him—some black sludge from the pits of hell that had somehow gained sentience. It crawled inside him, clawing at his mind, seeking a way to own…to control…

Then he felt something else—a surge of light from under his skin. It was the positive emotion his Mark had soaked up in the Heart of Love, he was certain. It met the darkness head-on and repelled it, fighting it fiercely, denying it entrance to his soul.

It was like fire meeting water—lava meeting ice.