No More Heroes: In the Wake of the Templars Book Three (35 page)

Raena’s head pounded as if it would split, so hard and fast that she feared she would have a stroke. Sweat slicked her whole body. Mykah came over to hold her in his arms. Raena scrunched her eyes closed and clung to him. It didn’t help. She felt like she was dying.

“This is only a panic attack,” he whispered. “I know it feels like it will kill you, but it won’t.”

“This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” she said quietly. “I don’t want to be trapped again.”

“I know.”

“How will we know when it works?” Gisela asked.

“The
Veracity
’s clock will reset,” Kavanaugh said. “It’s linked to GST.”

The
Veracity
gave a horrific moan. Raena echoed it.

The ship’s power shut off abruptly. The
Veracity
started to fall out of the air. Kavanaugh fought for control as Gisela slapped blindly at switches, trying to regain some kind of spark. Suddenly, independent of anything they’d done, the ship blazed back to life. The engine reengaged. The repulsors caught them before they bottomed out.

Jimi leaned forward to check the clock. “We’ve gone back,” he said. “The War is on, but the plague hasn’t begun yet.”

*   *   *

Raena drew a shaky breath and pushed gently out of Mykah’s arms to stand on her own feet again. Her body felt wrung out. She put a hand on the bulkhead, just for stability, and asked, “Mykah, do you have Vezali’s translator?”

“It’s in my cabin.”

“Let’s listen to the Templar Master’s message before we play it for anyone else.”

As he went to retrieve the translator, Kavanaugh asked, “What do you expect it to say?”

“Kill us all,” Raena said. “The Templar Master can’t let us return to the future, knowing he has a time machine.”

“What makes you suspect it?” Gisela asked shakily.

“That we’re not supposed to play it until we get back to the planet. If this trip is straightforward and the Templar in the past would support what we’re doing, why don’t we have a message for them when we come out of the machine now—so they could help us?”

They stood around in tense silence until Mykah returned. “You know how the translator works?” Raena asked.

“Not really. I think it’s on all the time, unless you intentionally switch it off, which I don’t know how to do.” He set the translator on the
Veracity
’s console. Kavanaugh triggered the message to play.

The translator reeled off a bunch of syllables. They didn’t make any immediate sense to Raena. “Play it again,” she said.

Afterward Kavanaugh asked, “Is that Standard?”

“It’s a formula,” Jimi realized. He pulled a handheld out of his jacket, poised to take notes. “Let me hear it again.”

Kavanaugh played it a third time.

“Yeah, it’s a formula. Some of it’s chemical, some’s genetic.”

“Can you decipher it?” Mykah asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe. We all had to study genetic code, but it wasn’t what I was best at.”

“If it’s the antidote to the plague, why would the Templar want us to play it to the Templars guarding the tombs after our mission?” Gisela asked.

“It could be the plague to wipe humanity out,” Raena said. “The Templar Master probably got hold of the Thallians’ notes and made a few tweaks, since our physiologies are supposed to be so similar.”

The others stared at her in silence.

“I know how we can decipher it,” Jimi said at last. “We just need to get onto Drusingyi and access the family’s computers.”

*   *   *

As Kavanaugh eased the
Veracity
forward out of the mountain, the constant wind rocked it. He turned to look over his shoulder at Raena. “While we’re here . . .” he started.

She cut him off. “No. She would be insane by now. She would kill us. If not as soon as we opened her tomb, then as soon as she saw this ship. She would recognize it and know where it came from.”

“But she would know me,” Kavanaugh protested. “She would recognize you . . .”

“No,” Raena repeated. “Don’t tempt me. If we let her out now, who knows what that would do to the future? I could cease to exist. We could all cease to exist. All the Templar Master would know in the future was that we did not come home. We can’t risk the fate of humanity. Let her be. As long as I don’t suddenly vanish, we know that she survives her imprisonment.”

Templars crawled around in the gritty wind on the tombworld, but none of them paid any attention to the Imperial transport exiting from one of their mountains. A shudder ran through Raena as the
Veracity
headed into space.

“What are we doing then?” Mykah asked.

“Set a course for Drusingyi,” Raena suggested. “Jimi needs to access those computers.”

He suggested, “My father could get us clearance. And we have the perfect bait for him.”

Everyone stared at the boy, but Raena understood what he meant. “Me,” she said. “Jonan will come anywhere in the galaxy to get me. It’s just a matter of luring Jonan into suggesting he meet us on Drusingyi.”

“What if he thinks you’ve been captured by bounty hunters?” Mykah suggested. “Kavanaugh and I could claim we tracked you down.”

Raena looked at them: Kavanaugh with his bristling red beard, Mykah with his headful of braids. They could pose as hunters, if not for the
Veracity
. “I hate to suggest drastic changes in your appearance, gentlemen, but we’re aboard an Imperial transport. Do you think you could pass for officers? Mykah, you’d have to captain. Gisela could be your aide. Jimi, you’ll have to make certain your father doesn’t see your eyes.”

“Call me Jim, please,” he said quietly. “I don’t want to be that other person any more.”

Raena nodded. She of all people could appreciate that.

“What would we do for uniforms?” Kavanaugh asked.

“We still have the Thallian soldiers’ livery in the ship’s stores,” Raena said. “We can spin you as some kind of Special Ops.”

“What are you going to do to distract them while Jim works?” Mykah asked.

Raena gazed at him and slowly smiled.

“I’ll draw up a map of the city,” Jim said, “so you’ll know where to meet us if you bust out of detention before I can come and get you.”

*   *   *

Raena took apart Eilif’s former cabin and reconfigured it to look more like an Imperial detention cell. She removed every comfort that Eilif had added and reinstalled the restraints.

She couldn’t restore her long hair or replace the scar across her face, but she was certain Jonan would recognize her despite the superficial changes. Especially if she dressed in such a way to highlight her other scars.

Once she’d gotten the setting arranged to her satisfaction, she checked on the other actors.

Mykah and Kavanaugh had shaved off their beards. Gisela had cut their hair in passable approximations of Imperial style. Jim found uniforms for everyone, along with appropriate sidearms.

“Here’s the scenario,” Raena said. “Feel free to tweak it. I’ve escaped from the tomb. You lucky gentlemen found me. If we send the message from the vicinity of Drusingyi, Thallian should suggest that we meet him there. He won’t want the
Arbiter
’s officers to know what he’s up to. I’ll do what I can to provide distraction for the Thallians while you figure out the Templar Master’s message and what to do about it. Without that message—or something like it—we can’t get back onto the Templar world to get home, so you’ll have to figure that out, too.”

“With any luck,” Mykah said, “we can get the job done and get out of there before the
Arbiter
arrives.”

“I particularly like the part where we leave before Thallian arrives,” Kavanaugh said.

Raena turned to Jim. “Come to the galley and tell me everything you remember about your family before the plague.”

He followed her and joined her at the table over bottles of cider. Mykah and the others came, too.

Jim bit his lips before he began. “Uncle Revan used to tell us stories about the time before the planet was destroyed. The family lived in a city-sized palazzo on the edge of the Shining Lake. The lake was in the middle of a mountain range, which protected them from the monsters that crawled in and out of the ocean.”

“How many in the family?”

“Seventy, more or less. There were some left from my grandfather’s generation, then twenty or thirty of my father’s generation. The rest were Aten’s sons. Not all of them would have been at home at once. Some followed my father into Imperial service. Others would be out trading or traveling.”

“How many slaves did they keep?”

Jim looked puzzled by her bitterness. “None.”

“That’s hard to believe.”

“It’s true. The initial settlers brought slaves, but there was a revolt. After that, the family just cloned enough sons to keep the city running. Well, they used sons and machinery. They didn’t allow anyone into the city who wasn’t genetically related, other than the alpha’s wife. And she couldn’t get out without a genetic escort.”

“So,” Raena said, “Seventy Thallians at the outside.”

“You don’t think that we could just talk to them?” Mykah asked. “Explain what will happen to the family—and the galaxy—if they decide to manufacture the plague?”

Raena looked at Jim, but he didn’t answer. She said, “I don’t imagine that they had very much choice in the matter. Whether Jonan was onboard to disseminate the plague or not, the Thallians on Drusingyi were a small out-of-the-way outpost. The Empire only had to threaten. They had no way to defend themselves.”

Kavanaugh made a disgusted snort.

Raena only smiled, remembering the old political arguments with Ariel.

“Who was the alpha clone then?” Raena asked.

“Aten. He was injured during the War and had to live in a mechanized chair after that. You might have seen him on Drusingyi.”

Raena remembered seeing his corpse. “What about the one who was the head of family security when you ran away?”

“Merin. He served on the
Conciliator
during the War. He won’t be on the planet now.”

“Was Revan at home in those years?”

“Not often. He was kind of an adventurer. He made supply runs for the family.”

“Good. Then we don’t have to worry about the brothers who survived the War seeing either of us, as long as we can keep out of Aten’s way. Were there boys your age, so that you can get in and out of the palazzo?”

“Yes. Aten’s sons.”

“Maybe we can capture one and you can pass for him?” Mykah suggested.

When Jim didn’t answer immediately, Raena said, “This is where we need you, Jim. You have a better chance of understanding the Templar’s formula than any of us and a much better possibility of disrupting the Thallians’ design or manufacture of the plague. Can we trust you?”

“This is a lot to process,” Jim said slowly. “I’ve always thought that my family’s participation in the Plague was horrific. But now I wonder: were they set up to be scapegoats? Why did the Emperor ‘honor’ my family? Surely there were other scientists working in genetics that could have created this plague. Why were we chosen?”

Raena answered, “Because of your father. Because Jonan had become a threat to the stability of the Empire. He was an unrestrained serial killer in command of one of the most powerful ships in the Imperial fleet. He wanted to be in line for the throne. But while the Emperor didn’t trust Jonan, he couldn’t get rid of him either. Your father had allies across the Empire—and your family to back him up. As long as Jonan was obsessed with finding me, he wasn’t an organized danger. After I was locked up, the Emperor put Jonan in charge of the plague. It was his last chance to prove he was more useful than Marchan.”

Gisela asked quietly, “You were alive during the War?”

Mykah laughed. “I don’t know why Coni went to so much trouble for your cover story.”

Raena shrugged. “Yes,” she admitted. “There’s only one of me and I’m it.”

Working it out, the girl said, “You were my mother’s slave.”

“Yes. And Jim’s father’s girlfriend. And I was imprisoned in a Templar tomb before the plague was spread. And Kavanaugh let me out six months ago. That’s my sad and sordid life.” Raena sighed. “I just want to move forward. Why does the past insist on dragging me down?”

“Because your former boss exterminated a people who seem to have had more than one way to bend time,” Mykah pointed out.

“It needs to stop,” Raena said. “I didn’t have anything to do with killing the Templars.”

“Now you have the chance to rescue them,” Kavanaugh said. He changed the subject back. “What are we going to say to Thallian?”

“You two are errand boys who answer directly to the Emperor. That will explain why Thallian doesn’t recognize the ship. Mykah is going to be a young upstart, eager to make himself useful and get a boost up the chain of command. The key here, Mykah, is that very few people could lie to Thallian and survive.” She nodded at Jim to underscore her point. “So keep your pitch short and get the camera onto me as soon as you can. I will sell the story to him.”

*   *   *

Raena let Mykah set up the camera angles and the lights in the cell she’d made. She coached him through a couple of practice runs of his speech, until she was certain he could hold the character. Then she lay facedown on the bench in her new cell, out of camera range, and listened to him record the first message.

“Lord Thallian,” Mykah said. “I am Mykah Chen, in command of
ISS Veracity
. While on a mission on Lautan, we recaptured an Imperial deserter. I understand that you were her commander.”

Gisela moved forward with the second camera to focus in on Raena, who swooned on the bench as if under heavy stun. Raena had chosen to wear a breast band over a pair of leggings, which left the scars on her bare back visible.

In voiceover, Mykah continued, “With the rate at which we’re having to stun her to keep her docile, I am becoming concerned about the potential for permanent damage. Can you advise?”

Gisela held the shot, then Mykah said, “I’ll get that edited and sent off to him. How long do you think it will take him to reply?”

“At a guess?” Raena asked. “Don’t take off your uniform.”