‘Yes, Captain.’ Parator’s voice echoed off the concrete walls. ‘The gallu is tiring, I believe.’
The aliens’ voices were as wistful as their features, their native tongue a weird mix of the roughness of a language like Russian and a softer twang like Danish. Difficult to get a human tongue around, but with Cym and Gren’s assistance, Tamas had managed. One benefit to the aliens’ lack of irises – stark-white eyeballs with a bare smudge of colour beneath – was that Tamas could imagine himself speaking to blind people. If he deluded himself into thinking he was not being scrutinised visually, the anxiety stayed buried.
‘It is you who are tiring, Parator. And if you commanded one of the Four right now, and not this pathetic creature, then you would have already lost control. You would have failed your Lord Lahar. Now, you will continue until there is no strength remaining, in either you or the gallu.’ Nex’s ever-present annoyance deepened his pitch. ‘Continue until that mea stone burns your very flesh.’
Parator glanced down at the sand-coloured stone embedded in his forearm, as if he expected to see the skin already glowing with embers. His eyes lifted towards Bel and Gren, but his fellow soldiers offered only cool, detached stares.
‘Seder!’ the captain roared. ‘Commence attack.’
Seder raised a weapon, a sword for all intents and purposes, with three peaks running the length of the blade. His movement shifted his gleaming silver hair, gathered in a ponytail against his back, its tip sweeping against the base of his spine. Of all the aliens, Seder was the least likeable. Vain and sullen. Treating his precious hair better than he ever did Tamas.
Seder thrust the weapon at Azrael, and the gallu’s natural instinct to defend itself was, yet again, used against it. Azrael pushed to his feet, letting loose with another of his strangled, animalistic cries, and launched at Seder. The god-soldier pirouetted out of reach, and Parator stepped forward. Directly into the path of the raging, flailing gallu.
The hollow-cheeked Syranian didn’t so much as flinch as a tonne of Telteriun metal hurtled at him. He lifted his left arm every so slightly, and Azrael jerked as though he’d hit a wall. Tamas cringed at the ear-shattering sound that flew from the embattled gallu. He quickly cleared his expression. If any of the Syranians happened to glance up, they must see a Messenger who was steady, focused. One who was taking in every inch of the scene so that the goddess had a front-row seat when he took his memories to the shrine for her viewing.
Parator took a step towards Azrael, who was clawing at the air in front of him as though trying to shred the molecules themselves. The gallu did not shift from his position. He could not. Parator used the stone adeptly, exercising utter control over the hapless Azrael. Blake had been incessant with her questions about the workings of the ancient stones, but had been unhappy with Tamas’s explanation. Surgically embedded into each Syranian before they had left their homeworld, the mea stones enhanced telepathic and telekinetic ability. They were relics, like the Tier Waters, from a distant past when the Syranian universe contained multiple gods. With further pieces worked into the structure of each carapace as Blake had constructed them, the pieces of stone – innocuous as rubble – became powerful remote-control units, enabling the Syranians to exercise utter control over the metal, and in turn, the beings within.
Seder danced forward and sliced the sword across the gallu’s bare chest. This time there was impact, the tip of the blade making a great slice in the faux flesh. Tamas shuddered. Despite knowing that the skin was artificial, and the flowing blood man-made, the sight was no less disconcerting. Added to that was the knowledge that Azrael was being stripped of his ability to defend himself. Parator, through sheer, brutal will, forced the gallu’s arms wide, dragged him to his knees, and arched his back at an angle that looked fit to crack any calcium-based spine.
Parator was bullying Azrael into submission, overpowering a creature whose natural strength was ten times Parator’s own. Treating him little better than a rag doll he’d grown tired of. Tamas crossed his arms, stifling his empathy for the enraged creature and digging his fingernails through the thin fabric of his faded blue shirt.
‘I’ve seen enough today.’ Tamas strode past Nari, who fell into line alongside. They made quick progress out of the training area. He could not close the door fast enough on the scene behind him. Once in the elevator, Nari paused with her hand over the buttons.
‘Where to, sir?’
Tamas took a deep breath, finally loosening his fingers and letting his arms fall to his sides. ‘Orientation Room. I’ll do the memory transfer now.’ Get it over with, he stopped himself from saying.
‘Very well,’ Nari said, entering the code for the floor. ‘I’ll remain with you.’
It wasn’t a question; and Tamas had no intention of protesting. He raised his hand to his mouth, covering his smile with a cough.
‘Are you unwell?’ Nari’s face gave nothing away, dark eyes steely, mouth set in a hard line, as if she were daring him to be anything but perfect. But at least she’d asked.
‘I’m fine.’
That would change in about half an hour. The transfer at the shrine made him bone tired; five days straight of it would be a record. One he wasn’t keen to set, but the goddess had better things to do than be present at day after day of Syranian training. The goddess had attended the very first of these training sessions, but for the past week had been occupied with her own affairs. She was in the midst of a divine war, after all. What was going on here, on Earth, was a footnote in her battle plans. Tamas understood that. The goddess was
