A half whisper, light, almost musical.
You know what to do, Jannigan Beck.
I knew that voice.
I had heard it before.
When I was captured by the Mayir aboard the Baeder, I was strapped to a chair about to have my brain scooped out by that psychotic doctor. Then I heard a musical voice in my head—this same voice—telling me something—
Push!
Telling me how to escape—
Push!
All I had to do was—
Use your mind!
Use my mind and—
Push!
The porthole began to vibrate, making a loud rattling sound that filled the tunnel.
TenSix swiveled his sensors around, towards the sound. Probably trying to understand it.
Good luck. I didn’t understand it either.
All I knew was that—in a blink of an eye—the hyaline window was gone. It hadn’t exploded or been blasted away. It was just like the seal had broken and the porthole tipped outwards, splashing into the flood control channel below. And leaving me a way out.
“This is remarkable—” TenSix started to say.
But I scooped him up and vaulted through the window. It wasn’t graceful. I lost hold of the little bot and banged myself up pretty good, but a second later the two of us crashed in a few meters of water. At least I hoped it was water.
As my head broke the surface I looked up to see the green mist wafting through the open portal—right over our heads.
I took a deep breath and jackknifed down under the water kicking hard. The water was dark and murky and probably full of all kinds of disgusting things, but I knew that I had to keep it between me and the NECRO-7.
For the next half hour, I swam with the current underwater—as fast as I could—only surfacing to take a quick breath and check that TenSix was still with me. And with every breath I took, I expected my lungs to catch on fire with NECRO-7.
But they didn’t.
As I swam I thought about the voice in my head. Memories came flooding back—beyond what had happened on board the Baeder. For the first time I remembered what I had encountered in the underground ruins of the Coliseum on Yueld. Images of an immense mound of ancient bones flashed through my mind. I remembered what was inside that mound of bones: an alien behemoth with wet fleshy polyps and tentacles. It had shot out a dripping appendage, a tendril with a horrible eye. I saw it, clear as day, in my mind. The eye had three pupils and it regarded me with an eerie intelligence that chilled my blood.
I almost forgot I was underwater, holding my breath. The memories were so vivid. But the burning in my lungs and the pounding at my temples brought me back to reality long enough so that I could suck in deep breath of air before kicking back under the water.
There in the cold, tomblike depths I remembered that I had not escaped unscathed from my encounter with the tentacled alien.
It had done something to me.
Something that changed me.
Push.
Something that had given me—I don’t know what—a power…an ability…a—
A gift.
That’s what the creature had called it. A gift.
Whatever was going on in my mind, I didn’t like it. I needed to be fully evaluated—medically, psychologically, whatever necessary to figure out what had happened to me.
I continued swimming, falling into a rhythm. Finally, I saw stars when I surfaced and felt the cold snap of fresh air.
We had made it out of the underground complex and were now at the edge of Vortis.
And there were more than stars in the sky. Dozens of small ships dotted the night. Not good. The Mayir were out in force—looking for us.
“We need to get away from the channel,” TenSix said. “The toxin could linger.”
He was right. I staggered away, exhausted and half-dead. My muscles felt like they were made of stone and my lungs ached from the ordeal.
“Which way to our rendezvous point?” I remembered that I was supposed to meet the others at the entrance to the underground complex. I just hoped they made it.
“Follow me,” TenSix said.
We didn’t get more than a few dozen meters before I noticed something strange going on above us. The ships were attacking each other. The lineal glow of ion lances lit up the night sky and kinetic torpedoes blazed trails through the air.
“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” I asked TenSix.
He didn’t have time to answer, because at that moment a squad of six heavily-armed commandos appeared around a corner and faced off with us.
I had lost my rifle and blaster somewhere in the channel, so I was completely unarmed.
“Jannigan Beck?” one of the men barked.
I couldn’t believe it. After all I had gone through. To be captured just when we were on the brink of—
Then I noticed the soldiers’ uniforms.
They didn’t wear the Mayir crimson. These commandos wore the blue of the Imperial Marines.
“Are you Jannigan Beck?” the soldier repeated.
“Yes, I am.”
“I’m Lieutenant John Marrick, C.O. of Alpha Company with the Fifty-Seventh Reconnaissance Battalion. We’re going to get you out of here, son.”
He nodded to another soldier who then barked some commands into his comm. “We found them. Evac now.”
“What about my team?” I asked.
“We’ve already recovered three scientists from Marlington University and a private citizen who was part of their rescue,” Marrick said. “They’re the ones who sent us looking for you. Are you injured?”
“No.”
“Good. This way, then.”
The squad formed up around me.
“What about the bot?” one of the soldiers asked.
“He’s with me,” I said.
We wound our way farther out towards the edge of Vortis where a jumpship was preparing to take off. I recognized the distinctive design of an Imperial MJX-46E Centaur: a central core with two pontoon-like nacelles. Another squad of Marines secured the landing area and I was quickly ushered on board the jumpship.
“Topaz 6 airborne!” the pilot reported as we lifted off.
“You okay, TenSix?”
“That humming you are hearing is my internal drying system, so in an hour or so I should be back to normal.”
I wished it were that easy for me. Flip
