Star Blaze (40 page)

Johnny breathed a sigh of relief. The soldiers clearly didn't know whose ship they were on or he was sure they wouldn't have dreamed of leaving. He relaxed his grip on his sister and bent down to check on Bentley, while she rebooted Alf. The Old English sheepdog must have put up a good fight, but was suffering for it now. “Sol—can we take off?” he asked.

“Not officially,” the ship replied, “but I am capable. However, I estimate the Plican will be unable to fold for 1.618 034 days.”

“I'll get us home,” said Clara.

Johnny nodded. “Do it, Sol,” he said, “as soon as those soldiers have left.”

“More soldiers?” asked Alf, standing up and going to collect his hat.

“Gel pod, Alf,” said Johnny. “We're getting out of here.”

“Not a moment too soon, Master Johnny,” said the android, entering one of the two capsules that had risen up through the floor of the bridge.

As gently as he could, Johnny scooped Bentley in his arms and carried him to the remaining empty chamber. The pool of warm blood on the floor didn't bear thinking about, but there was no time to get to sickbay and folding without protection
would probably finish the sheepdog off. He lowered his oldest friend, as carefully as he could, onto the floor of the pod; the dog whined, but licked Johnny's fingers.

Johnny stood, stepped backward and sealed the door behind him. As he turned, the view outside was already changing from pink to black as the
Spirit of London
careered out of Melania's upper atmosphere.

Just beyond the hull, an explosion lit up the bridge before Sol darkened the windows. The ship shuddered, but carried on. “Planetary defenses include batteries of hyperspatial gravimetric charges,” she said. “Apparently, that one was a warning shot. I am informed it will be our last.”

“Clara—now's a good time,” said Johnny.

He floated away from the floor as Sol switched the gravity generators off. Nearby, globules of Bentley's bright red blood did the same, but somehow Clara remained exactly where she was, her legs apart and her hands stretched upward. It began. Johnny felt himself flying through the
Spirit of London
's hull above the familiar sight of the Imperial Palace and its giant tower. Next moment he was jerked sideways at unfathomable speed, passing close to a fiery red giant star. Then he flew upward through the blackness of space, the background stars becoming lines alongside him. He was pulled backward through an orange and green nebula. The sides of the ship flew through and past him into their right positions and he was back on the bridge. Slowly, Sol turned the gravity on and Johnny floated to the floor. For all the world he wanted to be sick, but he fought back the feeling in order to rush Bentley out of the gel pod and to sickbay.

The journey had taken nearly a day so far and Johnny had lain awake the whole time. He replayed the events in the courtroom
over again, unable to believe Valdour could really be dead. If only he hadn't let the Judge disarm him. He hoped the giant brain had suffered in destroying its own tank to kill the captain.

Afterward, facing the firing squad had been the most terrifying moment of his life, but it had brought him closer to his mum. He knew now more than ever that she'd given much to protect him and Clara—their shields were proof of that. It wasn't fair that he'd never had the chance to talk to her properly. He hated how everything important seemed to happen so quickly—even with Bram returning, but telling him and Clara to leave the capital at once. If they ever came through this and made it home, he was determined to pin the Emperor down and find out more about his mum, the Diaquant. That was if home still existed. It was all very well Bram saying Johnny and Clara could protect Earth themselves. There'd been no chance to question it at the time and it all sounded fine when the Emperor was oozing power and reassurance beside him. Lying there on his own he didn't feel at all confident about standing in the way of a few hundred Andromedan and Krun destroyers. He hoped the fleet wasn't far behind.

His thoughts drifted to Nicky and how he might breach his brother's outer shell that was Nymac. Again he cursed himself for not telling Clara about her other brother straight after the meeting in Derby—the longer he'd waited, the worse it had become. As soon as they finished folding, he promised himself he would do it. He rehearsed the words in his head. He'd step straight out of the gel pod and say, “Clara—I've got something important to tell you that I'm really sorry I've not told you before.” It wasn't going to be a good conversation, but it would be better once it was over.

He felt such a useless passenger lying in the gel pod while his sister remained on the bridge, manipulating great swathes of the fabric of space in huge folds to speed them home.
She
had
real power—if only he was as strong, they might yet stop the Andromedans.

Johnny sensed the change even before Sol announced the last fold to be over—it was something he was getting better at. It was time to face the music. He didn't want to wait any longer. Still covered in gloop as the vacuum suckers had only just begun their work, he opened the door all ready to make his announcement. A moment's relief—the yellow Sun was shining through the clear walls of the ship—but something had gone wrong. Outside, it was Saturn, not Earth, which hung majestically against the backdrop of blazing stars. The ringed planet filled the viewscreen and most of the windows while Johnny's sister was lying on the floor before him, her body filling the bridge with a silvery glow.

He ran over to Clara and bent down beside her, desperate to check she was still alive. As he touched her wrist, his fingers tingled. Her pulse was strong, but her eyes were closed and he couldn't wake her. He'd half-carried Captain Valdour in the far stronger gravity of Melania, so getting his little sister to sickbay shouldn't be a problem. He made to pick her up, but nearly dropped her in surprise—she weighed next to nothing. It was just like the time he'd had to carry their mum all the way back from the Atlantean tower to the
Spirit of London
. If she'd not made herself incredibly light, they would never have reached the ship.

Once in sickbay, Johnny placed Clara on one of the beds, from where her silvery aura filled the room. Moments later, Alf appeared, very flustered, and promptly took over. Johnny watched as the android ran various checks and finally announced that, given time and plenty of rest, Clara would be all right. In the nearby open gel pod, Bentley was well on the
way to recovering. At least the sheepdog could keep Clara company when she woke up.

Returning to the bridge, Johnny asked Sol to scan the solar system for hostile vessels. The news was bad. Five hundred and twelve Stardestroyers had gathered in the Oort Cloud and were spreading out, encircling the Sun. Johnny considered whether to head straight out to face the Andromedans single-handed or make a last stand with the Tolimi on Pluto. Neither would save the Sun. It was all very well Bram saying he and Clara could stop the Andromedans together, but his sister was unconscious and Johnny doubted that him firing a few electric sparks in Nymac's direction would be enough to send his brother into retreat.

Clara had folded them here at incredible speed and he wondered how long it would take the Imperial ships to join them. Then he remembered the thought chamber beside the Fountain of Time, “connecting the observer to people or places that matter to him.” What mattered more than anything to Johnny was to connect to Bram—the Emperor could still tell him what to do and when the fleet would arrive. He shouted for Sol to enter orbit around Titan.

Telling Alf that he was in charge and should maintain their position, and ignoring the android's protests, Johnny descended the lifts to the shuttle bay. For a moment he wondered about flying the Starfighter to the surface, but something told him it was wrong—that it would violate the peaceful place his mum had created to take weapons into its vicinity. Instead he settled into the one remaining black London taxi, checking it was fully powered, and then flew the
Bakerloo
out of the open bay doors. There was no time to admire Saturn's rings. The
Spirit of London
was soon out of sight on the far side of the orange, cloud-covered moon. Johnny merged his thoughts with the shuttle's sensors so he could locate the landing site, but as he
probed outward his mind suddenly recoiled in horror. It had touched death and darkness. They came in the shape of long, deadly spines, protruding from a ship. Johnny didn't know how, but he knew they belonged to the
Astricida
. Desperately hoping he'd not been detected, he willed the
Bakerloo
quickly into the moon's upper atmosphere while thinking,
Shields on
. He didn't dare contact the
Spirit of London
—he hoped Sol could look after herself and he wasn't about to give her position away. With Nymac's flagship so far inside the solar system things were more desperate than ever.

The descent was bumpier than it should have been, as Johnny pressed the
Bakerloo
through the thick clouds at the absolute limit of the shuttle's tolerances. He landed on a rocky outcrop which looked out across a vast, nondescript plane. Feeling beyond the craft, everything told him the atmosphere was a poisonous cocktail of nitrogen and methane, but Johnny still thought,
Doors open
, and the
Bakerloo
responded, rematerializing around him. He stepped onto the rock and immediately through an invisible curtain.

The sweet smell of honey welcomed him, but Johnny didn't stop to enjoy it. He kicked himself for not thinking properly—he'd shown Nymac Saturn and Titan through the wristcom. His brother, or rather the Nameless One controlling him, was bound to be curious—pausing to survey the moon might even be what, until now, had spared the Sun from its supernova fate. Johnny sprinted around the edge of the golden lake, careful not to step in any of the liquid, continually spilling over the sides before being sucked back in.

Partway round he reached the crystal grotto where, at its heart, sat the domed communicator. Johnny placed his hands on the crystal plinth and peered inside, willing the Emperor to be there looking back. At first he could see only murky shapes, swirling in a thick mist like at the very center of a nebula.
Johnny thought only of Bram and, through the fog, a face appeared—but it was completely encased by a mask as black as space itself with a single white star painted on. The person's eyes were even blacker than the mask that surrounded them and, as they stared at Johnny, he knew the only time he'd felt such hatred before was on Nereid many months ago when he'd first seen this same figure. Now he understood that the explosion of white against the dark mask represented a Starmark. It was a first one looking back at him. With a single star, it could even be
the
first one—it was certainly the Nameless One. The dome above the projection began to vibrate. Rippling waves of pure hatred were being directed toward him, deforming the surface which, any second now, looked likely to break, allowing the thing inside to come through. Johnny couldn't take his eyes away but managed to slap the controls.

The ripples remained, but they were softer and formed part of a new picture. The scene had changed. The place was one Johnny recognized, even though he'd never been there in real life. Now he saw it again, it was so vivid he couldn't understand how he'd ever forgotten it. It was where he'd sat beside Zeta in his dream, on her faraway planet. She was there now, on the spongy plants that lined the seashore, with her back to him, facing the ocean. He didn't have time to speak with her—it was Bram he had to talk to. His hands stroked the crystal controls, desperate to see the Emperor. Instead he found himself staring into the
Spirit of London
's sickbay. From the look of his twitching eyes and limbs, Bentley was asleep but dreaming of chasing after cats. Clara remained motionless, her body still glowing but less silvery bright than before.