Starbounders (23 page)

“You're too late,” Professor Olari said. “Everything's already been set into motion. Earth will be as barren as any other lifeless planet within the hour.”

“You're wrong,” Zachary said. “We're going to override the lockdown. Once those IPDL ships are freed, all of you Clipsians are going to be sent running.”

“I highly doubt that,” Professor Olari said.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a photon pistol.

Zachary fired first, sending a lightning ball from his slingshot. But Professor Olari got off a shot of his own. A bright burst of light came at Zachary so fast he only had a millisecond to recognize this was most likely the end for him.

Yet the photon bolt didn't hit him. It was as if it didn't exist at all. Then Zachary realized that the electrical blast he had fired at Professor Olari had gone straight through him.

“Drop your weapons,” said a voice from behind Zachary.

Zachary turned to find himself face-to-face with the barrel of a photon cannon. And the individual holding it was Loren.

Zachary let the voltage slingshot fall to the floor. Kaylee released her grip on the sonic crossbow as well.

“I don't understand,” Zachary said. “Why are you helping Professor Olari?”

“That's the thing,” Loren said. “I'm not.”

Keeping his photon cannon fixed on Zachary, Ryic, Kaylee, and Quee, Loren glanced at a thumbtack-sized device with an LED light on it, positioned on a nearby shelf.

“Cancel doppelform,” Loren said.

The LED light went off and Professor Olari disappeared. Zachary's head was spinning. Then Loren kicked open an underbin at his feet, revealing Professor Olari bound and gagged inside.

“He hasn't been so cooperative,” Loren said.

“
You're
the traitor?” Zachary asked. “The one who hired Quee to create the virus that locked down Indigo 8?”

“That's not the half of it,” Loren said. “I'm the one who sabotaged the dreadnought and hired Hartwell to kill you.”

“Why us?” Kaylee asked.

“That night in the laundry room,” Zachary said. “Of course. You weren't washing those Chameleon jerseys. You were tampering with them. So they'd ignite during the game. And you were in the Qube when it malfunctioned.”

“I couldn't risk having you expose me,” Loren said.

“So you put my virus into the aux-bot to infect Cerebella,” Quee said. “To initiate the lockdown.”

“Nice work, by the way,” Loren said. “You've got a real knack for programming.”

“Your father's death,” Zachary said. “You never intended to honor his legacy, did you?”

“No, I chose to avenge it,” Loren said. “I told you. My mother said I could either get angry or be a hero. I guess now it's pretty obvious which one I picked.”

“Your father wouldn't have wanted this,” Zachary said.

“The IPDL stole him from me. Now they're going to pay for it.”

“And all the innocent people on Earth?” Ryic asked. “What about them?”

Loren shrugged.

“They'll suffer the same way I did.”

Loren pulled Professor Olari out from the underbin and removed the binding covering his mouth.

“I need you to translate something for me,” Loren said.

He gestured to a small portion of the panoramic window, and a holographic display appeared showing another Clipsian. His charcoal outer layer was more cracked than that of any Clipsian Zachary had ever seen before, and his inner ember glowed brighter.

“Nibiru, I've handled the young Starbounders,” Loren said. “There shouldn't be any more unforeseen disturbances.”

Professor Olari stood there silently. Loren shoved the photon cannon into his back. Olari proceeded to translate, relaying the message to Nibiru.

Nibiru responded in the same off-planet Clipsian tongue.

“He says that the ships heading for Earth will be there within minutes,” Professor Olari said.

“You would have been better off on that lava planet I redirected the dreadnought to crash into,” Loren said.

“Technically it's magma,” Ryic said.

“I think you just made the decision easy for me,” Loren said. “I'll kill you first.”

He pointed the photon cannon at Ryic. Just as he fired, Professor Olari lunged at him, taking the brunt of the blast and tackling Loren to the ground. Professor Olari grabbed hold of Loren's shoulders and slammed his head into the metal floor, knocking him unconscious.

Olari rolled onto his back, revealing a gaping photon wound in his chest. It went straight to his core.

“Quee,” Zachary said. “Go. Now.”

She ran over to the mainframe and began using her robotic hands to hack in. Zachary, Ryic, and Kaylee knelt around Professor Olari.

“Hang on,” Zachary said. “We're going to get you out of here.” But even as he spoke, Olari was fading.

“You must continue what I started,” Professor Olari said, grabbing Zachary just above the elbow. “Armed with the knowledge I've left you, you can save the outerverse from an unspeakable evil. But share this information with no one.”

Zachary felt Professor Olari's grip tighten and a burning sensation sear into his flesh. He pulled his arm back, wincing. Then Olari's eyes closed, and the superheated core inside his chest cooled to a lifeless gray. Any last sign of warmth was gone. It was that quick.

“What was he talking about?” Ryic asked.

“I have no idea,” Zachary said, still smarting from the singed mark on his bicep.

“Almost got it,” Quee said. Her fingers were back at work on the portion of the thin metal card sticking out of the mainframe.

Something caught Zachary's eye through the panoramic window. He watched as Skold's battle-axe flew so close to the glass that it looked as if the ship was going to crash right through it. But instead it turned and dipped out of view.

“I'm in,” Quee said.

Zachary, Ryic, and Kaylee came up behind her.

“Okay,” Quee said. “Communication lines are reopening. Lockdown is being reversed. And if you want, while I'm connected, I could make all the campus's drinking fountains dispense soda instead of water.”

“Link us to Indigo 8,” Zachary said.

Quee entered a command, and suddenly a holographic display appeared on part of the panoramic window. Dozens of IPDL officers were frantically hustling about in the command center of the Ulam, directing aux-bots to different parts of the control panels.

“Who is this?” one of the officers asked.

“My name is Zachary Night. Nibiru is leading an attack on Indigo 8. You need to get as many pitchforks out here as possible.”

“The starship hangar is malfunctioning,” the officer replied. “We've been trying to override the virus infecting Indigo 8 for the last couple hours.”

“Well, you won't need to anymore,” Zachary said. “We hard-lined into the mainframe from Callisto. Cerebella has been debugged.”

“Then we'll initiate—”

Just then, the transmission cut off and all of the power inside Callisto started to flicker and hum.

“We must have been hit,” Ryic said.

One by one, the bigger equipment panels began to shut down. Larger overhead lights flickered off around them.

Zachary looked out the window and spotted Skold's battle-axe as it flew past. Attached to its rear cargo hold was a trio of giant cylinders.

“What is Skold doing now?” Ryic asked.

Zachary fixed his lensicon's crosshairs on the device the battle-axe was hauling behind it. He blinked twice.

THIS RARE AND HIGHLY VALUABLE ENGINE COMBINES FUSION, FISSION, AND VACUUM ENERGY TO ALLOW A CONTINUOUS FLOW OF POWER WITHOUT ANY EXTERNAL FUEL ADDED.

THE SECRET OF ITS MECHANICS IS TIGHTLY GUARDED BY A SHADOW ORGANIZATION OF SCIENTISTS KNOWN AS THE BLACK ATOM SOCIETY.

“He didn't come back here to save us,” Zachary said. “He came to steal the perpetual energy generator!”

“Unbelievable,” Kaylee said. “He knew Callisto would be unguarded. He used us again.”

The display on the window started flashing the words
All-system failure
.

“We need to get out of here,” Quee said. “Once the power goes down completely, every life-support system in the station will stop functioning.”

“What about Professor Olari?” Ryic asked.

“He's gone,” Zachary said.

The four started for the double doors. As the gravity in the space station faded, Zachary's strides became longer and lighter. Quee reached the hallway first. Ryic and Kaylee followed. But before Zachary could get through, the doors slammed shut. His nose smacked into a thick, circular glass window. Kaylee looked at him from the other side, confused. Then her eyes went wide, as if she saw something over his shoulder.

Zachary turned around just as a warp-glove-encased hand grabbed him by the hair and threw him across the room. He went tumbling. When he came up on his knees, he saw that Loren was pulling his own arm back through a warp hole. Loren's other hand was on a lever that must have manually shut down the doors.

“You're not going anywhere,” Loren said. “Not without me, that is.”

Loren bounced over to Zachary, the gravity getting so weak that his feet barely needed to touch the ground. Loren kneed Zachary in the chin, sending him flying backward. Zachary felt a shock of pain shoot straight through his teeth right up into his head. Loren used his warp glove to scoop up his fallen photon cannon, then aimed it at Zachary.

“I'm going to pilot my pitchfork out of here,” Loren said. “And you're coming with me until I'm safely out of the galaxy.”

Although they were standing ten feet from each other, distance didn't matter when you were wielding a warp glove. Zachary lashed out his own gloved hand, shooting it through a hole and grabbing the weapon Loren was brandishing. He tried to wrestle it free, but Loren struck back with his warp glove, reaching through a different hole and clutching Zachary's throat. Zachary spun out of the choke hold but had to pull his hand away from the photon cannon.

Even in the midst of the fight, he saw a hopeful sight through the panoramic window. The space fold from Indigo 8 had opened, and dozens of pitchforks and battle-axes were pouring out of it. He had no doubt they would fend off Nibiru's attack on Earth, even though it would be of little help to him now.

Callisto was beginning to feel the effects of the loss of power. The air had already grown stale, and the fans had stopped blowing. It seemed that there must have been something electric stabilizing the entire space station, because the structure was starting to crumble.

Kaylee, Ryic, and Quee remained locked outside the doors, watching through the glass window as Loren pounced again. He delivered a series of blows to Zachary's face and body before lifting him up and spinning him around. A coppery taste filled Zachary's mouth, and he knew it was from the blood pooling behind his teeth. Zachary felt the barrel of the gun jam into the small of his back.

“I'm going to open those doors and walk us out into that hallway,” Loren said. “If you do everything I ask of you, maybe I'll let one of your friends live.”

Zachary knew that once they walked through those doors, his friends would become casualties just like Professor Olari.

“I'll do whatever you want,” Zachary said. “Just don't hurt them.”

Loren pushed Zachary across the room toward the command center's control deck. As Loren reached out for the lever that would manually reopen the doors, Zachary seized the moment. He shifted his weight and grabbed hold of the photon cannon that had been pressed up to his back. He tried to rip it away, but Loren's fingers tightened. The two struggled to gain the upper hand on the weapon. They were at a stalemate.

“Did you think I'd really let you turn this gun on me?” Loren asked.

“No,” Zachary said. “That was never part of the plan.”

Zachary used all his muscle to aim the photon cannon down at the lever. Then his finger pulled the trigger. A beam of superheated light obliterated the entire lever and the control deck around it, leaving nothing but a gaping hole.

Loren put a hand to his head.

“What did you do?” he asked. “There's no other way out of this room.”

The command center's walls were shaking vigorously now, and the panoramic windows were beginning to crack. Gravity was gone. Loren floated just above the smoking panel, shock turning to anger.

“You've killed us both,” he said.

Yet Zachary looked remarkably calm.

He turned to the glass windows on the double doors and called out to Kaylee and Ryic.

“Pull me through!”

With that, Zachary created a warp hole and stuck his arm in. His gloved hand emerged from a hole on the other side of the doors. Zachary could immediately feel fingers wrapping around his. Loren realized what Zachary was doing and squeezed the trigger on the photon cannon. The flash of light from the muzzle of the gun was the last thing Zachary saw before he was tugged into the warp hole itself.