Diamond Sky (Diamond Sky Trilogy Book 1) (26 page)

The doctor opened his drawer and took out a syringe. He removed
the sterile wrapping and gestured for Jimmy to take a seat.

‘Don’t worry, lad, this won’t hurt a bit.’

‘I know,’ replied Jimmy. ‘It will hurt a lot.’

Chapter 29

Lucy was startled by a knock on her door. With nothing to
stimulate her in the stark, dormitory style room she had been assigned as her
cell, she had drifted in and out of sleep for most of the afternoon. And
without windows to offer any sort of a clue, she did not even know if it was
day or night.

‘Who is it?’ she called, knowing full well that whoever it
was would enter regardless of whether permission was given.

‘It’s
Emmy
Rayne; you and I need
to talk.’

In spite of the teary outcome of their earlier conversation,
Lucy was glad it was the female scientist and not one of the soldiers. It
seemed that this Dr Rayne was close to Lucas and if anybody was going to get
her out of this awful predicament, she was the one.

‘Come in.’

The door opened, but the scientist did not enter. Her
posture was guarded and Lucy sensed this was more from nerves than a desire to
deceive. She had a friendly face and there was a spark of chemistry between
them that drew Lucy to this girl at the bar.

‘Not here,’ said
Emmy
. ‘Let’s take
a walk outside. It’s okay, as long as you are with me those soldier creeps will
keep their distance.’

Lucy followed the scientist down the corridor and through a
door leading onto the grounds at the rear of the complex. She was glad they did
not pass by the courtyard where she witnessed the killing.

Like the front side of the building, the grounds were well
maintained and featured many brightly coloured plant species, which were
incongruous to the sparse desert location.

They passed by the flowerbeds until they came to a small
fenced off section. At first, Lucy did not recognise the headstones for what
they were, as they were hidden behind a chorus line of fresh bouquets. She did,
however, suspect that
Emmy
had brought her to this
place for reasons other than quizzing her on the killing.

‘I took this from the garage,’ said
Emmy
,
handing the photograph to Lucy. ‘I assume this is the one you alluded to
earlier.’

She looked at the picture. It was the same photograph,
except this time she saw something different in the two faces staring back at
her. When
Davo
had died, she had been staring him
directly in the eyes. For a brief moment, those eyes burned with more intensity
than she had previously seen. That intensity was visible in the eyes in the
photograph. They were the same eyes, which meant that the girl could not
possibly be
Emmy
. She looked to the scientist, but
her question was already anticipated.

‘Her name is Felicity Fox,’ said
Emmy
.
‘She was my mother.’

‘She looks so like you; she’s beautiful.’

Lucy blushed, realising what she just said and not quite
sure why she said it.

‘I don’t know for sure, but I am guessing that the picture
was taken when she was about twenty. It would not have been long before she
became pregnant with me.’

‘Forgive me if I am wrong, but today is the day that she
died, isn’t it?’

Emmy
nodded.

‘How old were you?’

‘I was just a baby. I never got to know her.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘That’s okay; I know that she is out there somewhere,
watching over me.’

Lucy briefly looked away; her thoughts turning towards her
father and how she believed that she had felt his presence around her over the
previous few days. She wanted to say something to the other woman to offer her
reassurance, but did not know how to say it without sounding a little crazy, so
instead she said nothing.

Emmy
took the photograph back from
Lucy and then walked until she was standing between the two gravestones. Both
were double plots, although one had not yet been filled.

‘My whole family is buried here,’ said
Emmy
.
‘My parents are on the left and on the right is my grandmother. She too died
young, long before I was born. I sometimes worry that the women of my family
are cursed. Suffice to say, I regard each day as a blessing.’

The headstone marked out the second plot as the final
resting place of Priscilla Fox. Beloved wife to Jackson and mother of Felicity
- she died in 1980 and had been waiting, alone, ever since. Beside was a blank
space that would soon be filled with a message of love for the man who died
that very day.

‘It is sad that they were parted for so long,’ said Lucy.
‘There is nothing more heartbreaking than seeing so tragic a separation marked
out in granite.’

‘Tragic?’ asked
Emmy
, genuinely
surprised. ‘It is not tragic; it is heart warming. I often come here when I am
feeling low. Seeing that message gives me hope.’

‘But she died alone; how can that not be tragic.’

Emmy
smiled. Lucy could not
believe how well this girl coped with grief. When her father died, she had been
a mess and that was after being given months to prepare for it. She did not
know how
Emmy
did it.

‘Don’t you see?’ asked
Emmy
. ‘She
did not die alone. She went first, which means that he was with her when it
happened. In turn, when he died she will have been waiting for him. Neither of
them was ever alone. You may not see it, but graveyards are the most inspiring
and beautiful places on Earth. Nowhere else will you find so much love and
goodwill.
’

A solitary tear ran down the side of
Emmy’s
cheek, but Lucy could see no trace of sadness or fear in the scientist’s face.

‘You must have strong faith,’ she said. ‘I never thought
that scientists believed in an afterlife; in God.’

Emmy
straightened her posture to a
more rigid, uneasy stance as if the magic of the moment had been torn away like
a blanket, letting the cold penetrate.

‘I don’t believe in God,’ she said, defensively. ‘Religion
is for the faithless. I say that my grandparents have been reunited in death
because I know it to be true. There is life after death.’

‘You’re confusing me,’ said Lucy. ‘How is what you are
saying not faith and what is faith without religion?’

‘I never said I did not have faith, but to think that faith
is tied to religion is complete nonsense. We have to have faith, because
sometimes we have to trust in something when we are uncertain of the outcome.
That is faith; believing in what you can never know. All scientists have faith.
The religious, on the other hand, are not willing to trust the unknown. They
demand answers and choose to believe what they are told in scripture for the
simple reason that they lack faith in the unknown.’

‘That still does not explain how you can be so certain of an
afterlife.’

Emmy
shrugged.

‘Maybe you need to have a little faith.’

Her evasiveness was driving Lucy crazy.

‘Why can you never give a straight answer?’ she asked.
‘You’re worse than my kids.’

‘You have kids?’

‘Well – sort of. When I say “my kids” I just mean that I
look after them. I’m a nursery teacher. At least, I was until I had to take
time off to care for my dad.’

‘Did you like it?’

‘Yeah, I guess so. Having been through all that pain
watching dad’s life slowly ebb away, I really miss the innocence the children
have. Eventually, life forces us to stop believing in fairy tales, but that is
not to say that pleasure can’t be gained from being around those that do.’

‘Maybe they’re the smart ones.’

‘Who?’

‘The children.
Who’s to say that
some fairy tales aren’t real?’

‘You’re doing it again.’

Emmy
smiled, mischievously.

‘Can you keep a secret?’ she asked.

‘What sort of secret?’ Lucy replied.

‘Well, now that I know you had nothing to do with what
happened here, it is only a matter of time before the captain has to let you
go. Before you do, there is something I would really like to show you.’

‘Does it have anything to do with fairy tales?’

‘Just answer the question.’

‘Okay, I can keep a secret.’

‘In that case; follow me.’

***

Mike complained of feeling unwell and retired to his
quarters, so it was Bradley who took the call coming through on the professor’s
old line. The way his superior officer was acting, he was beginning to worry
that he would have to relieve him of his duty. If there was anything he could
do to avoid that scenario, he would gladly do it.

‘Lieutenant
Schwarzmann
speaking.’

‘This is Lucas Black. Can you put me through to Captain
Peters?’

‘Mike’s a little busy right now, Lucas; is it something I
can help you with?’

‘Maybe, we’ve run into some trouble down here in the town.
There appears to have been some sort of mass poisoning. It’s already driven one
man to kill and I think it could be linked to the professor’s death too. For
that reason, I want to take possession of the bodies you have up there. If you
won’t hand them over willingly, I’m prepared to take this to the courts.’

Brad was a soldier, not a bureaucrat. As far as he was
concerned, his mission was over and he could not wait to get reassigned. The
sooner the bodies were taken away, he figured the sooner he could leave.

‘There’s no need to involve a judge. I’ll sign off on any
paperwork you need. To tell the truth, I’ll be glad to get this thing over
with.’

‘Is everything okay up there? I mean, nobody has been acting
out of character or anything, have they?’

Brad thought of how his normally laid back friend had shot
an unarmed man in cold blood and then effectively locked down the observatory
without any clear plan of what to do. If that was not uncharacteristic, he did
not know what was.

‘No,’ he lied. ‘Everybody here is fine.’

‘Well, in that case you’ve probably got nothing to worry about.
Whatever has affected people so far must have originated in town. I’ll escort
the doc up soon and we’ll collect the bodies.’

‘I’ll be waiting.’

He ended the call. As he turned to leave, he found a figure
standing in the doorway.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said. ‘I thought you had already finished
up today.’

The other man did not answer. He just stood there; half
hidden by the shadows. Bradley tried to get past him to reach the corridor, but
he never made it. He neither saw nor felt the blade that pierced his heart.
Having not taken an astral journey, there was nothing to prepare him for what
followed.

***

‘Are you going to tell me what this is all about?’

‘It’ll be easier if I just show you. Trust me; you are going
to be impressed.’

Charlie was working alone in the lab when
Emmy
arrived to show Lucy the fruits of her work. He
casually glanced up when they entered the room and his eyes were immediately
drawn to the girl from out of town.

‘What is she doing here?’

‘Now, now, Charlie, that is no way to speak in front of a
guest.’

His eyes moved from
Emmy
to Lucy
and then back to
Emmy
.

‘I was not aware that we had
guests
. Have I missed
something?’

‘Lucy is a friend. The whole thing with Mr
Armareth
was all a misunderstanding. She had no part in
what he did.’

‘That may well be, but I’m not sure that you should be
bringing her here. I’m worried you are not as focused as you should be. Grief
affects people in different ways. You don’t have to bottle it up.’

She could not believe that after everything they had seen
over the previous weeks, he still harboured such old fashioned notions of life
and death.

‘I am not grieving. Sure, what happened came as a shock, but
it could also turn out to be the best thing for us. Don’t you see? Now we have
somebody on the other side. It tore Pops up that he could not take an active
role in his own project, but now he will be able to finally unlock its full
potential.’

‘Can we talk in private?’ Charlie asked.

Emmy
offered Lucy an apologetic
sigh and then walked with Charlie to a far corner of the lab.

‘I really am fine,’ she said, pre-empting his concern.

‘It’s not just that,’ he replied. ‘I understand why you are
trying to be positive about what happened and it does you credit. I am just
worried there is an ulterior motive driving you. Your moods have been up and
down ever since...’

He offered a subtle nod of his head in the direction of the
girl over the other side of the room.

‘You think I’m trying to impress Lucy?’

‘When a hole opens, it is natural to look for something to
fill it with.’

‘That’s a cheap shot, Charlie. The reason I brought her here
is because she can play a pivotal role in our research. It was her father I had
the encounter with in the field. She is the key to finding a way to contact
Pops.’

He paused for a moment to think over what he had just been
told.
Emmy
knew that ultimately his scientific
curiosity would always outweigh his natural reservations.

‘You are planning on using her father as some kind of spirit
guide?’

‘I’m not sure what I’m planning. I just know I’m not ready
to lose Pops just yet. Is the machine ready for another trip?’

‘That’s what I really wanted to talk to you about. When the
override switch jammed and Mike got stuck, I do not think that it actually did
get jammed.’

‘What do you mean? Of course it jammed; we saw that
ourselves. If not for the fact that Mike witnessed what happened to Pops, he
may still be out there now.’

‘That’s just the thing; I ran a diagnostic check on the
equipment and there was no malfunction. The abort did not jam, it had been
overridden. Someone reprogrammed the computer to completely bypass it.’