The Gambit with Perfection (The Phantom of the Earth Book 2) (26 page)

He choked, dry heaved, and fell to his side.

Forced to use the ZPF, intrusively and aggressively, Brody felt power he’d tucked away after Antosha’s arrest, telepathic talent that he feared would destroy him the way it had his former friend.

The Gemini convulsed as Brody destroyed its DNA, cell by cell, and the Gemini’s face shifted once again into Antosha’s and then into the living liquid metal that pulled Brody here.

The colorful metal swirled, forming into a humanoid with features that Brody could only assume were designed to mimic a transhuman’s eyes, nose, mouth, and ears.

Palaestra Square disappeared, and Verena and Nero still struggled beneath rods of iron, though they, along with Brody, descended from the outer core to the inner core, filled with a ball of radioactivity that enabled life upon Vigna’s surface.

Without gravity, they dangled in the inner core.

I know you can understand me,
Brody sent.
You’ve seen me regain my full control in the ZPF, so you must know that I will not allow Antosha to harm your species, I will not let him use knowledge of your genome to—

The iron rods tightened around Verena and Nero, and Brody could feel their bones breaking as if they were his own.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have lied to the Lorum about Antosha at the outset; or maybe he should have resisted this plunge into the core at the start.

He accessed the ZPF as strongly and decisively as he ever had during his sessions with Antosha, piercing into the Lorum’s consciousness as he had with his Gemini, setting fire to the equivalent of the Lorum’s mind, burning his way to its secrets … to more knowledge Antosha withheld.

Brody heard Verena and Nero scream.

If you kill them, I’ll kill you,
Brody sent.

When they cried out louder, Brody adjusted.
I see your dilemma, much as you’ve seen mine. We are at a stalemate, and you know it.

The iron rods loosened.

You hold my strike team captive, but I hold your mind in my grasp. If I tear it apart, your species will die, but so will we. You know it’s true, and you know I have the talent in the ZPF to do it!

The iron rods disappeared.

There’s a different choice than death. We share a similar dilemma, we have no viably accessible and usable resources left within the Earth, and we’ve destroyed most of our natural energy sources as well. Yet I can help you! We heard your distress signals, but we didn’t get it. I do now. With your genome installed in our technology, I will find the extremophiles near our planet’s core, much as they once existed in abundance near Vigna’s, or die trying.

Let me and my team go home, and I will do this. Defy me and your species will disappear.

The core darkened.

When light returned, Brody stood upon mossy stone in his bodysuit across from Verena and Nero, who didn’t act or look harmed by the Lorum’s attack.

He threw himself over them.

“How do we know your planet has the extremophiles we require?”

Brody heard the artificial, organic, utterly alien voice that he’d heard earlier with the Gemini and beneath the Vignan falls.
You don’t
, he sent,
but I believe that it does. The formation of our planets likely resulted from similar processes. But to find the extremophiles, I’ll need a piece of the Lorum.
This was true, for with present Beimenian technology, Brody could never synthesize its genome or that of its extremophile prey so close to the Earth’s core.

“How do we know you’ll serve us?”

Brody dropped to his right knee, as did Nero and Verena. They put their right hands over their hearts.
We will send the extremophiles you need to obtain energy,
Brody sent,
and in return what I ask from the Lorum is your cooperation with Earth and our people in Beimeni.

The multiple cloud layers suddenly swirled and cleared the view to the tops of the mountainous jungle, where the
Cassiopeia
still hung. The vines lowered it, slowly and consistently, until it sat in a clearing not fifty meters from the Barão Strike Team.

“Hullo?” Brody cupped his hands over his mouth. “Lorum!?” He jogged farther from the shuttle. “Hullo!?”

A blue, purple, and topaz twilight crept over the jungle, the cliffs, and the mossy mountain.

“Captain,” Verena said, her hair no longer in a bun and whipping around her head in the breeze, a smile on her face. “It answered you.”

Near the shuttle, a glowing orb colored as the Lorum dangled as if weightless. Brody put his hand beneath it, and the orb, a piece of the Lorum, a part of the organic river, fell into his palm. It was smooth, warm, and aromatic, like a heated oil.

Its movements were mesmerizing.

“Something’s happening,” Nero said. He peered to the sky. “This dusk isn’t natural …”

The ground pounded and shifted as if from an earthquake. The team stumbled.

“Smoke,” Verena said. “Look at all the
smoke!
” She pointed toward the mossy mountain.

“An eruption,” Brody said.

The tremors increased, and the
Cassiopeia
shook. Deep crevasses opened in the ground. There was a blast of smoke and fire, and bright red lava shot high above. The team fell on their backs. The jungle darkened with ash and dust. The ground beneath them cracked, crumbled, and slid, while
Cassiopeia
moved like a tortoise on its landing legs. Brody sprang to his feet and cradled the Lorum orb. He fell forward. Flashes of violet, green, and gold lightning through the smoky clouds showed glimpses of Verena and Nero, their faces visible, then obscured.

Brody tightened his grip on the warm orb. He waited out another tremor, and at the next reprieve dashed to the shuttle’s entry ladder and climbed, Nero ahead of him.

“Where’s Verena?” Brody said.

“Preparing for takeoff.” She emerged from behind the center column in the hull and closed the hatch.

The ground shifted.

The shuttle shook and dipped.

Nero fell and crashed into Brody. The Lorum orb fell to the ground and rolled to the back of the ship.

The shuttle slid deeper. Brody and Nero activated the Granville panels upon the
Cassiopeia
’s walls. The landing gear lifted, and the landslide around them sparkled, as did the jungle and mountain. Images of dust, fire, and lightning surrounded them.

Cassiopeia, begin takeoff sequence
, Brody transmitted.

The shuttle activated lateral and lower thrusters. The
Cassiopeia
pushed off and darted away from the darkness until the stars of Vigna, its sky, and its colorful ocean overtook the views in the shuttle. Brody twisted around his column to get a glimpse of the Lorum orb.

Behind the shuttle, the volcano, the cliffs, cloud layers, jungle, lava, and steam moved farther away.

“
Cassiopeia
reports all systems operational,” Nero said. “We can achieve escape velocity.”

“And I’ve located the spare synsuits,” Verena said.

“Where were they?” Brody said. He hadn’t been able to find them prior to the descent into Vigna’s jungle.

“The supply area.”

“I looked there. Multiple times. I saw nothing. You were with me when—”

“No,” Nero said, “you saw what the Lorum wanted you to see.”

“The Lorum—” Verena began.

“Knew they’d draw us to the center of the exoplanet through the mantle plume beneath the volcano,” Nero said, “and to do so they’d have to remove our synsuits—”

Brody nodded, not believing his words as they tumbled out of him. “—and they knew we’d need the spares to return to the Earth.”

“To fulfill the treaty,” Nero said.

Brody again looked at the Lorum orb. Could he trust the Lorum? Would they allow him to leave when next he returned with the extremophiles? Or might they deceive him once again?

The team unlatched and suited up. Brody stowed the Lorum orb. Then the team reattached to their columns, bracing for high g’s. The
Cassiopeia
left Vigna’s atmosphere and soared toward the Lagrange point between it and its blue star.

“How’re we looking?” Brody said.

“The wavefunction calculations are sound,” Verena said.

“Ready to release the exotic matter on your command,” Nero said.

Damy
, Brody thought,
I’m coming home
. He nodded to Nero.

The striker shot the missile, the exotic portal opened, Brody collapsed the wavefunction, and the shuttle disappeared.

Blackeye Cavern

300 meters deep

A new world
, Connor thought.
An
impossible
world.

The stalactites reflected shades of orange and green bioluminescence above the bazaar. There were women in work boots, children in shorts and sandals, scientists in lab coats, engineers in bodysuits, traders, entertainers, bakers, and growers in overalls. It reminded him of all places in the commonwealth Connor had explored from the West to the East—the hum of Portage during rush hour, the scents of Vivo’s farms, the sweetness of peaches and strawberries and blueberries, the beauty of Natura at dusk with its never-ending sky and lagoons. But it was none of these places. They had left the commonwealth. The people here were free.

“How do you maintain all of this?” Connor said.

“By the will and the work of the people, under your father’s leadership, my boy,” Pirro said.

“Why didn’t Father let me live here?” Connor asked.

“This freedom comes at high cost, Connor,” Murray said. When Connor twisted his face, Murray added, “Lady Isabelle might invade from below, or Reassortment might seep from above—”

“Hey, Pirro!” a woman said, waving. Her cheeks were covered with freckles, her hair was frizzed, and her tunic was pocked by dirt. She strolled along the walkway, her baby wrapped around her body in a sheet. Pirro politely nodded. She disappeared into the bazaar, swallowed by the crowd.

“Come,” Murray said, interrupting Connor’s next query, “we must continue.”

They entered a pentagonal room rimmed with graphene and garnet. The men sat around a table. “How do you know my father?” Connor said to Pirro.

Pirro turned to him and placed his wrinkled hand on Connor’s arm. “I met Jeremiah in the year 302. We united the factions that operated in Underground South and Underground East.”

“How did you get involved?”

“Traitorous impulses,” Pirro began. He chortled, swiped his beard, then continued, “Oh so very, very treasonous—I had the gall to use my own mind, you see!” Pirro stood now and ambled closer to a workstation ahead of the table. He turned. “Marstone and Isabelle overheard me, and Chief Justice Carmen sentenced me to the Lower Level.”

Connor gasped. “You’ve been to the Lower Level?”

Pirro swiped his salt-and-pepper beard. “No, no, I fled to Navita. Security wasn’t as onerous back then as it is now. Once there I heard about someone known on the street as the Liberator, uniting the unregistered of the underground. The Liberator sounded like my kind of person.” Pirro glanced around the room and was met with smiles. He leaned forward, his hands resting upon his cane. “Jeremiah the Liberator united us all and provided security for us to live free of the commonwealth in the underground.”

The pride Connor felt melted away when he recalled an argument in his secret room in Piscator City’s Third Ward. His father told him he couldn’t leave and that if the Janzers ever found him, they’d send him away.
Why do you hold me prisoner here?
Connor had screamed in his father’s face.
You don’t now understand
, Jeremiah had replied,
but one day you’ll be able to work on the Block. And you’ll thank me.

Connor turned to Arturo. “When did you meet Father?”

“My unit in the Fifth Ward of Vivo City was used by the BP—”

“On the Underground Passage.”

Arty nodded. “I helped when and where I was able. It’s not that I hated the commonwealth in those days, but I didn’t love it, not after what I’d seen on some of the farms, the demotions, the Lower Level sentences for violation of the Second Precept and others. Years later, when Perla underperformed in the Harpoons, Jeremiah stepped in. He sent in his commandos to pull Perla from Harpoon Hamlet and she and Martha settled in the Polemon stronghold beneath Haurachesa, but … they …”

Connor felt his eyes well up. Arty had always sounded sad when he talked about his family, but he’d never let on why. “The gods will punish those responsible,” Connor said, “and so will we.” He put his hand on Arty’s shoulder. “It was after my father helped you with Perla that you offered to take in Hans and Zorian.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“They were babies when the BP built the enclave beneath Hautervian City, and it wasn’t clear the BP had the resources to raise children proper. Your mother insisted the boys would stay with her in Piscator. But your father feared for their safety in the territory the commonwealth knew he and Solstice had moved to following the demotion.” Arty laughed sadly. “Your mother would’ve hurt me very badly had I let anything happen to her sons, she assured me in not-so-kind terms. She soon came to like the idea of her boys being raised as growers.” Arty’s smile disappeared, leaving his face a mask of emptiness. “The arrangement worked out for a while for your family—”

“Until the Janzers killed my mother in Piscator City, and invaded Vivo City.”

Arty patted Connor’s hand. “So you see, you’ve been eluding the Janzers since before you could walk.”

“My days of running are over.” To Murray, Connor said, “You mentioned Captain Barão betrayed you and my father. What was your role in this?”

“I worked in the RDD on Reassortment. After Captain Barão demoted me, I met up with Jeremiah in Piscator and offered him my expertise in transhuman development.” Murray’s eyes seemed distant as he looked in the corner of the room, then back to Connor. “Captain Barão was supposed to unite the teams and the commonwealth, not take over Jeremiah’s role and banish his team from the Northeast.”

Connor didn’t want to talk about Captain Barão again. “I’m sorry for you, Murray,” he said. “You’ve been good to my family, and I’ll make sure your honor is restored.” He removed Hans’s z-disk from his leather satchel and handed it to Murray, who inserted it into a workstation and activated it—