Slavers of Antar
By
DocPaul
***************************************************************
Chapter
Six: Correspondence
“As
Above, So below; As below, So Above.”
“You want to talk about this?”
Isabel slammed the dishes around. Clearing the
table, she walked around the living area picking up the twins’ discarded toys.
“What’s to talk about? What?”
“Iz…”
She gave him a hard cold stare. Going into their
bedroom, she slammed the door behind her. Max rubbed his face. So she was angry.
He expected that. He was used to it. Serena used to spend half her time angry
with him. Max sighed. Isabel wasn’t Serena.
He couldn’t let it end like that. Following her
into the bedroom, he shut the door and stood leaning against it. She was lying
on the bed on her side, facing away from him.
“I should’ve known that it was only a matter of
time.” Isabel said softly. Accusing. Resigned.
“That what was a matter of time?” Max asked as
he slowly advanced into the room to join her on the bed.
“That you would find a way to leave me and the
boys behind. Sooner or later, you would decide that we were a problem, and your
solution would be this one.”
“That isn’t true, Iz. I swear. This isn’t
forever. I need you and the boys to be safe, and this is bothering me.”
“Would you’ve dumped Serena?”
Max sighed. No. Isabel knew that. “You’re not
Serena.”
“And Maria? Would Michael leave Maria behind?”
“No.” That wasn’t a fair comparison. Michael
would be more afraid of what trouble Maria would find away from him, than with
him.
“I see. So I’m this weak, need to be protected
woman, basically more a hindrance than a help.”
Max forced her to roll over and look at him, and he
wasn’t gentle about it. She wanted to fight? Fine. He was game.
“I don’t think you weak. I rarely think you need
protecting. That doesn’t mean that I don’t want to protect you.” Max’s
face darkened. “You aren’t Serena. True. I never protected Serena. And
she’s dead. I prefer not to bury another wife. Actually, I never got to bury
Serena. Her body was lost to me.”
“I’m not going to die.”
“And my sons? Three years old. I would stay here
with you, with them, if I could. I can’t.”
“Because you’re the Captain.” Isabel said. She
knew what he was, who he was long before she married him. He never denied it.
Never hid it. He never lied.
“Because it’s my duty, Iz.” Max stopped her
from turning away from him. “You’re not a hindrance to me. Never. Not once.
I’ve sat at your bedside in the Medical bay a few times now. In three years,
since the twins’ births, and two years married, not once have I ever suggested
moving you and the twins off the Shiva. She’s the safest ship in the
known Universe. Of that I’m sure.”
“Then why now?”
Max closed his eyes. “I heard the door open too.
It wasn’t just Maria, Iz. I heard it too. I see Alex. I’ve been dreaming of
the serpents. Cut off the head, and it grows another. The same head.” Max took
her hand with her wedding ring in place. “I’m sure Michael dreams the same
dream, but he won’t say. He’s distracted by other things right now. That
much I can feel.”
“When did you start dreaming?”
“The day after you went to the surface. I held the
staff of the serpents in my hand, and it was more than a little familiar to me.
Not the same as Maria, but still, it was something I felt I knew.”
Isabel sat up, her hand moved on his face, stroking
the ragged line of his scar. “You didn’t tell me.”
“I didn’t tell anyone. How can you give a name
to fright? How can you explain it isn’t a real discernible fear, but rather a
welling nausea?” Max took her hand and pressed his mouth to the center of her
palm. “I can’t lose you, Isabel. I can’t. Serena was hard. The bond made
it that way. The bond I share with you is different. Stronger. It was forged in
love. If you were to die…”
“If you
were to die…” answered Isabel softly.
Max groaned. She was such a gentle creature.
Deceiving. You looked at her, and thought her elegant, dignified, and lady-like.
It was a ruse. Beneath it all was an iron resolve, hard, and crystalline. She
did not bend. She did not break. His wife. His partner. His best friend.
“What? Tell me, what’s the compromise I am to
make?” Max searched his wife’s beautiful face, his hand unconsciously
threading through the long silky blonde length of her hair. He loved her hair.
Loved its feel. Loved to have it move across him as they slept or made love.
“The boys stay with Lonnie. She has agreed. I go
with you.” Isabel said.
Max sat back. His wife. He should’ve learned to
beat her long ago. “I take it you’re already packed?”
Isabel smiled, lifting herself to fit her body along
her husband’s, smiling she rubbed her face in his neck. “Of course.” It
would be hard. The first time she would ever be parted from her children, and
they from their parents. It was her part of the compromise. This involved her
too. She couldn’t afford to be left behind.
Max could feel her move over him like a whisper.
Something sacred. Something breathtaking. All this time, this love thing, it
grew stronger. He didn’t want to be away from her. His bed was used to her
presence, as was his heart. But he was the Captain, and that part of him had the
ability to block out all things, except what was needed to do his duty. She knew
that. Hated it, but respected that it was who he was.
Max kissed her, holding her tight to his body, as
his hand easily removed her clothing. She was his mate. As she accepted him, he
had to learn to accept her for who she was. Isabel would not leave his side,
leave him alone to fate. It was beyond her nature. They were two opposites
defining the other. Her beauty to his beast. The perfection of her skin to the
disfigurement of his. The cold hardness of his heart opened to the warmth of
hers.
“I would die for you,” he murmured against her
skin.
Isabel held his head, her fingers feathered along
his scar. “Yes, you will.”
~~~
“Son?”
Kyle looked up from his work. “Dad. I thought you
and mother were resting.” He glanced at the chronogram. They were in a sleep
cycle. “Morning isn’t for another three periods.”
“I felt you.”
Kyle startled at that. “I’m sorry. My shields
took a bad hit recently, perhaps I am telegraphing too much. I can isolate
myself into…”
Jim put a reassuring arm around his son’s
shoulders. “No. It doesn’t disturb. I could feel you, but that was all. No
real emotions. I just knew it was you.” Jim looked at all the tests and
results Kyle was working through. “What are you doing?”
Kyle shrugged. “Monitoring my progress, getting
all the scans I ran on myself in order for the specialists.”
Jim took a seat across from the desk Kyle was
working on. He had taken over the medical lab on their ship. The Seer was
not as large, nor as powerful as the Shiva, but then again, nothing was.
She was an exploratory ship used to transport officials and scientist
from Agape. Kyle had commandeered all her available labs.
“Is the lab space adequate?” Jim asked, hiding a
smile.
“Barely. Their systems are in need of updating.
Some of them are entire cycles too old. Science progresses, so must we.”
Jim didn’t hide his smile enough, Kyle caught it
out of the corner of his eye. “Okay, what is with the smirk?”
Jim shook his head, but his eyes became very
serious. “Agape doesn’t progress, because she has no reason. Things in
stability become static, as you know.” Jim looked at the work table. “You
progress, Kyle, because you chose to live in a highly fluctuating world where
you were forced to think innovatively, to go to extremes to find solutions.
What, my son, do you expect even the experts of our world to understand, that
you cannot?”
Kyle sat back, his hands steepled in front of him.
“Nothing. I am going home to die.”
Jim breathed at deeply. His son. His special son
with two hearts. So easily broken. The damage that his own family and wife had
done him so long ago was a scar he still carried. He never had willingly come
home, and wouldn’t now if not for his children.
“For the children?” Kyle nodded. Not for anyone
else. Not even his parents, no matter how much he loved them. For his children,
especially Liam. “Not for Meghan?”
“No.” Kyle stood. “She is sex. Nothing more. I
can still feel the emotions I once had for her, but they are so far away.
Something else had come forward. A possibility. A dream. It is as if a door has
been opened to my hearts, and I can feel what has been in there all along.”
“Meghan wants you back, Kyle.”
Kyle rubbed the back of his sore neck. “I know. I
feel her reaching to connect to me, and so easy would it be to be part of that
again, to be a part of my family.” Kyle stood to look out at the stars.
“Tess broke my heart. Her death—I felt her leave, as if she was pulled from
my body. The void. A loneliness—persisted. A loneliness I never felt in all
those years of exile. Perhaps because the anger filled the void? I don’t
know.” Kyle looked at his dad. “I don’t feel that void any longer. Tess
was never meant for me, but somehow, she mended me enough to leave open a
possibility—a hope.”
“What is there?” Jim asked, curious. His son. A
stranger in so many ways, but still the small child he remembered.
“Warmth. More. I can feel my new heart beating
hard, making me breathless. My hands sweat, and I feel sick, but giddy at the
same time. Nervous. Impatient. Butterflies in my stomach, and an emptiness like
I have never eaten in my life.” Kyle clenched his hands. There was power
there—so much power. More than he could admit to anyone, especially anyone
from his world.
Jim stood up and shook his head. “This sounds
wrong, Kyle. Love? A love for an unknown? A dream?”
Kyle sighed. “I need to find her. I need to feel
her physical touch, but it doesn’t matter now. I am dying. She is a dream I am
having—a desire.”
“Are you sure?”
Kyle licked his lips, and nodded. “I give my two
native hearts only a month to survive being overwhelmed by my new one. Maybe
less.” Kyle grimaced in pain as his words made his heart speed up. “My chest
cavity was never meant to hold more than one heart. Two was an anomaly, pushing
it to the limit. Three—three is a death march cadenced to the beat of my
hearts.”
Amy listened in the shadows, Kyle and Jim unaware of
her presence. She lowered her head into her hands and wept. It couldn’t be
true. It couldn’t. She dreamed of her son, often. He was alive. Healthy.
Happy. And he was older.
She felt a small hand touching her leg. Looking down
through tears, she saw a small child. A boy. Eoin. Kneeling down, she opened her
arms as her surrogate son wound his small arms around her neck in comfort.
~~~
“Maybe you would like to go work on your ship?”
Maria suggested.
Michael frowned. “I thought we were going to
search the historical archives.”
“I am. You don’t have to be there.” Maria felt
sick.
Michael moved his hand along her neck. “Your skin
is clammy.” He felt her skin. It was cool to touch, which wasn’t unusual,
but she was pale. “How sick are you feeling?”
Maria shrugged.
Michael stopped her. “How sick, Maria?”
“Sick.” Maria tried to smile, but couldn’t.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Uh-huh.” Michael’s eyes narrowed in thought.
“What’s making you sick? I eat everything that you eat. I feel great.”
“I’m tired. You’ve been keeping me up and busy
lately, and I think the fatigue is starting to push on me.”
Michael hated that. She was right. Sexually, he was
insatiable. Beyond reason. Still, she always seemed to be with him regardless of
how late or long. The need to reproduce was sticking him in places he rather
ignore, but not if it meant her health.
“This is my fault. I should leave you here in the
now, and I should return to the future.”
Maria grabbed his hand. Laughing self consciously,
she shook her head. “It’s not your fault.” Michael closed his eyes. Sure
it was. He wasn’t telling her everything, and she was working off half
knowledge.
“Maria, I have to tell you…”
“It’s the histories.” Maria said.
“What?”
“The histories of the Ancients. Why I don’t want
you to come with me.” Maria gulped and sighed. “I never studied them for a
reason. A good reason. There is so much in there, so much life, and so much
death. They are us. My people. Gone. And…”
Oh crap. He had never thought. Never. It didn’t
occur to him how hard it would be for her to revisit a history of people who
were no longer alive, of whom she remained the last survivor. Alone.
“You’re afraid.”
Maria nodded. “I’m afraid. Afraid that so much
of what they knew and were, is lost for all time. That I’m it, Michael. All that remains, and when I die, no one will
remember.” Maria laughed a self deprecating sound. “I never bothered to
remember them. It hurts too much to see all that they were pass away for all
time.”
“I’ll go with you.” Michael said.
“You don’t have to, really. I can do this
alone.”
Michael shook his head. “Yes, I do.” He framed
her face, kissing her on the forehead. “You go to Attila with me, deal with my
mother. The least I could do is finally meet your people—your past.”
“In-laws?”
“Hmm. In-laws. Never thought about it that way.”
Michael took her hand. “No time like the present, or the past. Let’s go on a
journey. Guess, the OJ man is waiting?”
“He is.” Maria paused. She should warn him.
“Michael, learning in the Halls is different from learning anywhere else. The
knowledge has been scripted into crystals that hold all information. There is
this interface, and…”
“I’ll deal. Come on.”
O’Jah was waiting. He stood in the Hall of
Learning. A large library of knowledge was preserved there. Michael frowned at
the crystals. They weren’t like the crystals of the Granilith as he had
expected. rather they were large sheets of colored glass that fit into slots,
easily moved from one to another.
“They found long ago that the ordering of
crystalline forms and glass could hold endless facets of light and energy in
almost a captured memory. It was easier to store all knowledge along the bending
prisms of light captured in pure crystal. It mirrors and echoes, into
infinity.” Maria picked up a sheet of thick glass, green in color. “This is
all the science I needed to know as the guardian of the Granilith. “It took me
over ten years to amass and understand it all, and even then, I was a child in
knowledge.”
Michael stared at the library. There were hundreds, millions
of glass tablets. If Maria had only learned one or a few, it was
inconceivable how much information was truly contained in these Halls.
“Princess, the journey awaits.”
Maria nodded. She took a seat in a place that was
well known to her. For over ten years. Michael took the seat across from her; a
low table was in front of them. Above his head and hers was what looked like
helmets, but not small enough to fit their heads. Rather, it was like an
artificial roof above them.
Maria rested her hands on the armrests, and she
stared into Michael’s eyes. He followed her lead. He saw her body react before
he felt it in his own. Her eyes seemed to roll to the back of her head as her
body flexed, and then he saw nothing as the same thing happened to him. And then
he saw everything.
~~~
We are the guides along this journey. Accessing
these libraries means that we that are here have long since gone. You are of the
Terra, the first Earth, and if not, you are a seed from that branch that reached
out so long ago.
The information here is not to teach, but to inform.
Every generation in its time must learn to evolve into the knowledge kept in
these Sacred Halls. The capacity of the brain is infinite. Knowledge is the food
of life.
I am the King—Zan, of Earth. Rath, my
brother-in-arms, second in command at my side, will take you on the beginning of
the journey. It is within us that the first moment of existence in your journey
begins. We are the Ancients, cast upon foreign soils, caught in a drift of time
that plays over and over again. We are the builders and the creators of the
Granilith, a machine that not only brought about our own existence, but saved
the very world we stand upon, and safeguarded the seeds of humanity.
Behind, in the shadows, you will see all that stand
with us. Together we are united, in blood and fire. We are the Princes of our
Universe. We stand firm on a shining planet of blue in a cluster of stars, in a
system of one sun, and nine planets. This was our home, and where our hearts
reside. This was our Good Earth. We could never leave her behind, for she was
the mother of our very souls—our home. Here our fathers stood strong, fighting
for a cause, for the right of life, and after us, our children and our
children’s children will go on.
The story starts with our fathers, and our
father’s fathers. Joined to another world in another galaxy, our world was
entwined in a Destiny that could not be broken. Destiny. It is our curse, our
burden, and it is the very thing of our creation. If you have found the way to
these, the Annals of Time, then it is your Destiny as well. Look into the
shadows and we will be your guides.
In the beginning there was
~~~
Michael started from the chair that held him
enthralled. His mind exploded in starfields of worlds upon worlds. Galaxies and
futures. The histories ran through his head with the taste of the knowledge
preserved within the crystal.
“Ahhhh!” Michael bent over in pain. Backing
away, he panted, his hands on his knees, taking gulping breaths as he tried to
stop the flood of images moving through his brain. The voice. The voice in his
head, his guide, the one called Rath was his voice. His face. He knew him. Knew
of him. All of them. It was as if a thousand lifetimes had been downloaded into
his brain in a moment.
“Maria?”
She was asleep in the chair.
“Maria?”
“She will sleep.” O’Jah said. “It is her
way. She does best to rest after a learning session.”
“There is more?”
O’Jah nodded. “There is always more.” His
ghostly hand seemed to stroke the head of Michael’s sleeping wife with a
tenderness that shocked Michael. Like a father to a child. “Time passes, but
it remains the same. They are all gone now. Memories, as am I. She is the only
direct link to a once great and noble line.”
Michael couldn’t clear his thoughts. If O’Jah
began to speak in his partial speech, it would drive him insane. His head was
swimming with the knowledge of the Ancients. They spoke a tongue he understood,
but how? Some words were common to his people, and universal communicators made
all languages the same, but the language of the guide, the Ancients, was nothing
he had ever heard, and yet, he understood every word.
“I looked in the shadows—at those, the
Masters—Princes.”
O’Jah’s head lifted as if he was called away.
“You should rest, my Prince. It has been many periods that you were bound in
the chair. You need to rest. It will make the remembering easier.”
“How long?”
“Three full days.” Michael could feel the
fatigue. His body felt boneless.
Michael voice rose, “I said, I looked in the
shadows! I saw them. All of them! I know them like I know my own face. Like I
know yours.”
“All is given reference by correspondence alone.
Without a point of origin or reference, nothing has relevance.”
O’Jah started to walk away.
“You were there. I saw your face. You stood in the
shadows at their side.”
O’Jah stopped, but he did not turn. The chiming of
bells in the distance from the distance reached Michael’s ears. It was the
sanctum of the
“I saw you there!”
“I have been gone for many centuries upon
centuries, child.” O’Jah turned to bow to Michael. “I am but a specter
caught in time. My life expectancy was far beyond those I once stood beside,
those that I once loved. That world passed long ago, and there is nothing but
the sweet bitter memory.”
“Why did you stay? Why did you Ascend? Maria says
that all things endure in continuity; they recycle onward. Why did you not go on
with them, those you loved?”
Michael wasn’t sure, but he thought the holy man
had a smile about his mouth, his dark eyes eerily impenetrable. His hand moved
along Maria, to stroke the tattoo that matched the same one on Michael’s arm.
“Time flows to and fro. The doorway between the
future and the past is but a stepping movement through a shadow. They were never
the beginning. You and she were. The joining of that which could not be bound,
the reaching across the very fabric of life—genetics. The two of you created a
bond that could not be broken. Not in death. Not in life. Not in time. Your love
created the looping Destiny.”
“When I married Maria—the ceremony?”
“Yes, your union moved through time like a ripple,
back and fro, from past to future. You together in a flash of a moment lived
together through a thousand lifetimes. Always together, to be found. Nature
finds a way to balance the flow of energies. She, the focusing stream of
powerful energies soaring as the eagle in the skies, and you, a generator,
raging and powerful, your roar as a lion of the vast savannahs of life.”
Michael frowned. He couldn’t understand. It made no sense that they could
influence the past that was long gone. “Nature is balance. Steady. Fluid. Ever
moving.”
“And you?”
O’Jah raised his head again to the chiming tones.
He looked at Michael once more before leaving. “I named myself after those
that I loved had moved on, their lives more limited than mine. I chose to guard
the knowledge, and all that they were. I was named O’Jah, meaning ‘once
Jonathan’.”