The Face of Earth (28 page)

“Yes, Mayla,” Nanot answered.

In just under an hour they reached their destination, and they all stared at the green and blue globe below them.

“What happened?” Lantor asked, confused.

“Captain, the planet’s atmosphere is breathable,” Mayla informed Nanot.

Kevin gleefully rubbed his hands together. “Good. That will make it easier to revive my men.”

“Take us down, Mayla,” Nanot ordered.

“Yes, sir.”

Mayla steered them down through the atmosphere, heading for the coordinates of the metal building. The glacier was gone, so she set them down just behind the terminal moraine it had created. Lantor, Nanot, and Kevin disembarked, breathing in the fresh air and feeling the warmth of the sun on their skin. They took a skiff and headed into the city.

Kevin squinted at the sun as they drove. “Hmmm. The sun is slightly larger than it was, which means this orbit is closer to the sun than the original orbit.” When they arrived and parked next to the building, Kevin jumped out and led the way into it, excited to awaken his son along with the rest of his men. They entered the building and went down to the cryonic room. Kevin stopped suddenly as he entered, causing Lantor and Nanot to bump into him.

“No! My son!” Kevin cried, and rushed across the room to his son’s open pod. His son lay dead and rotting in the warmth of the room. Kevin rested his head on the edge of the pod and sobbed.

Lantor and Nanot entered the room slowly, repulsed by the scent of decaying flesh. All of the pods stood open, all of their occupants dead.

“What happened here?” Nanot questioned.

Lantor wrinkled up his nose. “I don’t know, but there’s nothing we can do about it now.” He went over to Kevin and sympathetically put his hand on the Earthling’s shoulder. “We should go.”

Kevin looked up, his face stained with tears. “I must bury my son,” he insisted, roughly pulling away from Lantor.

“What about the rest of the men?” Nanot questioned.

“I don’t care about the rest of the men,” Kevin snapped.

Lantor held up his hands and stepped back. “Alright. We’ll help you bury him.”

“No, I can do it myself,” Kevin growled.

“No, you can’t,” Nanot said. “Whoever opened these pods could come back. If we’re going to bury him, we must do it quickly.”

“You think someone did this on purpose?” Lantor asked. “It could have been a malfunction,” he suggested.

“No, it couldn’t have. The Bitowans designed the cryonic system too well. The redundant optical circuits would reroute the power in case of damage to the main grid, and their cubic boron nitride nanorods are practically indestructible.” Nanot gestured around the room at the pods. “This was done deliberately.”

“But who would do something like this?” Lantor couldn’t understand the wasteful destruction of the aliens. He didn’t care that they were dead, but he cared that they had been left to rot. Now he couldn’t even salvage their bodies for scientific research.

“Probably the same someone who moved Earth,” Nanot replied.

“Only the Stelairians have that kind of technology,” Lantor said.

Nanot looked worriedly at Kevin, who was still staring at his son’s corpse, tears running down his face. “If the Stelairians are behind killing these Earthlings, then we don’t want to let them know we have one in our possession. It could be dangerous for us all.”

Lantor looked up at the ceiling, suddenly nervous. “I think we should leave as soon as possible.”

“I agree,” Nanot said. He turned to Kevin. “Kevin, we have to go.”

Kevin glared at him. “Not until I bury my son,” he stated with finality.

Lantor exhaled loudly in frustration. “Fine. Bring him outside. I’ll go dig the hole.” He turned to Nanot. “There are shovels in the skiff, right?”

“Of course. They’re in the survival case.”

Lantor turned and left, disappearing up the dark hallway. Nanot turned back to Kevin. “Let me help you move his body,” he offered compassionately.

Kevin nodded silently and kicked the skeleton that rested at the foot of his son’s pod out of the way. There was a hole in its sternum, indicating a violent death. Kevin wondered if there had been a fight over the last pod. It seemed pointless now that neither man had survived. He gently maneuvered his son’s body out of the pod so he could get his hands under Daniel’s armpits. Then he pulled his body away from the pod. As he did, he noticed his old gun tucked under Daniel’s belt. He surreptitiously removed it, transferring it to one of the large pockets in the leg of his jumpsuit.

Nanot grabbed the corpse’s ankles and they lifted and carried him out of the room. Nanot almost gagged at the stench of decay from being this close to the body, but he steeled himself against it as he had many times before. This wasn’t the first time he had been on burial detail, and he was certain it wouldn’t be his last. He was relieved when they finally exited the building and most of the smell was carried off by the breeze. They brought the body over to Lantor and set it down next to the hole he was digging.

Lantor had been busy. The hole was almost deep enough to qualify as a shallow grave. Nanot and Kevin pitched in, and soon they had it deep and long enough to hold Kevin’s son. Nanot helped Kevin place the body in the grave, and then he and Lantor stepped back to allow Kevin a moment with his son. They could hear him mumbling something and choking back sobs. When he began filling the grave with dirt, they rejoined him to help.

“We have to go now, and quickly,” Nanot said, as they piled the last shovelful of dirt onto the grave.

Lantor scanned the sky worriedly. “Yes,” he said, “we’ve already stayed too long.”

“I just need a minute to check the cryonic room,” Kevin said.

“What for?” Lantor asked incredulously.

“In case there’s something left to salvage,” Kevin replied.

“No,” Nanot said. “We already have the cryonic technology, and the Earthlings are dead. There’s nothing down there we need.”

“I just want to check,” Kevin insisted. What he actually wanted was to get into his hidden office so he could retrieve the League’s jewels and more ammunition for his gun, but he couldn’t tell that to the Yalsans.

“No,” Nanot reiterated, “we leave now.” He stared Kevin down, and Kevin climbed into the skiff without another word.

On the drive back to the ship, Kevin silently plotted how he could get back to the building alone. He needed those jewels; without money, he couldn’t regain his former power. He also needed more bullets, if he wanted to keep the gun from becoming a paperweight. Back in the cryonic room he had noticed the empty alcove where Karina’s pod had sat. He had also noticed that its footprint was clean, signifying that it was recently moved. Which meant that Karina might be alive, and should they run into each other again, he wanted the protection of a weapon. The Yalsans wouldn’t allow him to carry any of theirs, so his gun was the only thing that stood between him and that murderous woman. He was sure that once she discovered he was alive, she’d want revenge.

They boarded the starship and Nanot escorted Kevin to his room. “Stay here. If the Stelairians exterminated the Earthlings, they won’t stop until every last one is gone.”

Kevin stood in the doorway, undaunted. “How could they find out about me? I speak your language, and I can pass as Yalsan.”

Nanot frowned. “Everyone on this ship knows you’re an Earthling, and giving you up to the Stelairians could be very lucrative for someone. Staying in your room is the only way Lantor and I can keep you safe. When you aren’t with one of us, you stay here, understand?”

Kevin nodded. “As you wish.” He turned and went into his room. The door closed behind him.

Nanot’s cheek twitched as he attempted to suppress a smile. He could be that someone who turned Kevin over to the Stelairians. He wondered how much the Earthling was worth. He hoped it was a lot. He was tired of being a lackey for his government. In this current job he was no more than a glorified chauffeur, and he was sick of it. He wanted enough money to buy his way out of the military and back into civilian life.

Kevin looked around his room as the door closed behind him. He had to find some way to keep this ship here until he could get back to the building and retrieve the jewels. He may have lost the men of the Lazarus League, but as long as he was alive, he intended to recreate it. There were always his type of man around; men who knew they were better than everyone else. He could rebuild his League with them. But he needed money for that, and his money was sitting in a safe on this planet. He had to get to it before they left.

He sat down at the desk and pressed the keypad to initiate the alien computer. The desk opened to reveal the screen and Kevin got to work. He would find a way into the main computer and stall the ship before Nanot could start the engines and head back to Yalsa. He only needed an hour to retrieve his goods from the League’s building, and the ship’s crew should be distracted by the malfunction for at least that long.

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As the ship orbited Earth, Salgon kept a constant watch on the data readouts. Life was still in its infant stage, but it was evolving a thousand times faster than it would naturally. One day as they passed over one of the northern continents, a blip appeared on the readout. Concerned, Salgon scrolled back the page and scrutinized the data. He steered the ship out of orbit and scanned the area where the anomalous readout originated. His eyes widened as he recognized the life readings.

“Megg!” he called into the comm. “We have a problem!”

“On my way,” Megg’s voice replied.

While he waited for Megg to come to the bridge, Salgon steered the ship down to the planet, toward the coordinates where they had killed the remaining Earthlings a month before.

Megg stepped through the bridge doors. “What is it?” she asked.

“Yalsans,” Salgon replied. He pointed to the screen and the ship below them. He hovered over the Yalsan barge, preventing it from leaving, as it was apparently trying to do, engines at full and the ship inches off the ground.

Megg sighed in exasperation. “Connect with them,” she ordered.

Salgon tapped the comm pad and connected with the Yalsan ship. A man answered the call, his face filling the screen.

“I’m Captain Niella, on a scientific mission from Yalsa. How may I help you?” Nanot asked Megg deferentially.

“This planet is off limits to all outside species. It is an experimental site of the Stelairian government and trespassing will not be tolerated.” Megg’s voice exuded authority.

Nanot deferred to the Stelairian, not for her claim of the planet, but for her status as a member of an immortal and powerful species. “I apologize. I wasn’t aware that this planet belonged to the Stelairians. We will leave immediately.” As he spoke, a rumbling rolled through the Yalsan ship and the engines died. Nanot’s face disappeared as he fell to the deck when the ship dropped the few inches to the ground, shaking as it hit. His off-screen voice went up a notch in shock at the accident. “What happened?” Nanot demanded of his crew.

“The engines cut out, sir,” a woman’s voice answered.

“Why?” Nanot asked.

“I don’t know, sir,” she answered.

“Captain Niella,” Megg said impatiently.

Nanot’s face reappeared on the screen. “Yes, ma’am?” he asked.

“What is going on?” she demanded.

“The engines don’t seem to be working anymore,” Nanot replied.

“Really,” Megg said sarcastically, not believing him.