Hellhole Inferno (58 page)

As they orbited Hellhole, Adolphus saw the large bull's-eye scar on the terminator line. The slanted light of dawn cast deep shadows of concentric circles from the old crater. He understood what the first impact had been like five centuries ago, for this planet and the Xayan race, but the new strike would be immeasurably worse.

Up here in orbit he could do nothing to stop it. In all his life, after so many battles, this was his darkest hour.

 

78

From the dubious shelter of Walfor's ship, Sophie had watched the slickwater storm as Keana and Encix engaged in their telemancy battle. Even though she was no shadow-Xayan herself, Sophie had still felt the titanic waves of mental energy building, the converts emanating barely controlled forces. It seemed to her that telemancy had turned each one of them into a volatile powder keg.

In the sudden, crackling stillness following the death of Encix, Sophie rushed to the hatch. Tanja called after her, cautioning, “Careful, there's still slickwater!”

“I don't think it matters anymore.” Sophie stepped out onto the ground and hurried over to the shaky-looking Keana. The pretty woman seemed to be boiling with static electricity, every cell in her body ready to go supernova. Her face was in a grimace, showing the effort inside of her. Wrestling with the writhing, uncontrollable telemancy she barely contained, Keana seized control of the many thousands of shadow-Xayans who filled the valley. The air thrummed in the last instant of a chain reaction.

In a strained voice Keana said, “I'm holding them back … just barely. I won't let them unleash
ala'ru
—I won't!—but they are ready to explode. The Xayan race has never held so much power, and I can only make them suppress it for a short while longer. Too late? I feel the danger approaching!”

The enormous asteroids were already having long-range gravitational effects. Hellhole's unpredictable weather churned; growler storms appeared in a flash, rippling across the greenish skies.

Sweating, Walfor shouted back at Sophie. “The impact is imminent. We've stopped
ala'ru
, and now we have to get out of here. My ship will still be in the atmosphere for some of the turbulence when the asteroids hit, but there's a chance we'll get away. My ship can fly fast enough to beat the asteroids—but we
have to leave
!”

Sophie was distraught. “We can take a few people with us, maybe a dozen. Keana, get aboard!”

Now that
ala'ru
had been prevented, they could flee after all. She could make it back to Tiber Adolphus—and together, they could watch and mourn the destruction of the world.

Keana refused, forcing her words through the strain. “I cannot leave this planet now. I can barely hold back all this power.”

Sophie clung to an idea. “Then use it to deflect the asteroids!”

Keana turned to her, and her strange eyes looked as if they contained small grinding wheels, emitting sparks. “Twenty large asteroids, accelerated for weeks and still driven by the full force of Xayan telemancy … it would be an impossible task. The asteroids are too close. Even though I have prevented
ala'ru
, Zhaday and his faction are intent on annihilating themselves and all of us.”

Walfor shouted from the cockpit. “Come on, Sophie! We have to
go
!”

She held her ground. “Keana, you stopped
ala'ru
and killed Encix. Communicate with Zhaday! Tell him there's no longer a threat—they don't need to destroy the planet now.” Her voice hitched. “At least ask him to give us time to evacuate the innocents here.”

But Keana shook her head. “Even if Zhaday listened, the Ro-Xayan telemancy isn't enough to halt the asteroids now. And neither is mine. The mass and energy involved … even with all the enormous power of our telemancy—even if I could somehow coordinate my efforts with Zhaday and use all our combined telemancy, it's not physically possible to divert them. And the Ro-Xayans have made up their minds. They won't take the risk.” She looked up, glanced at the ship. “But Ian Walfor is right—you can get away. Go! It's the smallest of victories, but it's all I can offer.”

The air thrummed as thousands of shadow-Xayans waited. Turbulent clouds masked the sky.

Keana let out a long, disappointed sigh. “So much energy, just waiting to be released…” Her shimmering eyes suddenly brightened. “We can't move the asteroids or fight the Ro-Xayan telemancy that drives them—but I have another idea.”

*   *   *

With two objects on a collision course, one could be moved, or the other, yielding the same result. It all depended on the frame of reference.

Keana reached out with her expanded mind, and Uroa assisted her, tapping into the Xayan presences all around them. Through her burgeoning mental bond, Keana reminded them of who they were, made them remember how the Xayan people had taken a last desperate chance by dissolving themselves in the slickwater when there was no hope of escape from the first asteroid strike.

With all the power that Keana-Uroa now channeled, she also tapped into the stored and still-unawakened Xayan lives that were pooled in the slickwater, which generated energy beyond even what Encix had summoned when she tried to push them over the brink of
ala'ru
.

But Keana directed that energy not to an evolutionary transformation, but elsewhere.

She connected with and pulled together every one of the shadow-Xayans, including Bolton Crais and Escobar Hallholme at the camp, Cristoph de Carre at faraway Ankor, and thousands more in Michella Town. The pool of available telemancy grew deeper, wider, and more restless. She was strong enough to sense Zhaday and the Ro-Xayans huddling inside their hollowed asteroid colony, grimly prepared to eradicate their race forever.

Keana would not let that happen. Instead, she absorbed all the telemancy from all the shadow-Xayans. It would be so easy to do, so tempting to trigger
ala'ru
and ascend. But she used that power in a different way.

Instead of expending the energy to push toward their evolutionary leap, she called on all Xayans to release their enormous reservoirs of power.

And move the entire planet.

 

79

Moments before …

From the bridge deck of his flagship, Commodore Hallholme was speechless.

He had always thought the expression was mere hyperbole, but he found himself completely unable to form words as he watched. The awe and inevitability of the cosmic shooting gallery left him unable to do anything but stare.

Huge, cratered rocks hurtled toward the planet like a broadside of cannonballs aimed at a sailing ship. There could be no doubt that these asteroids were driven by a hostile and supremely powerful force.

And Escobar was down there, where he could not be saved.

Frustrated and helpless, Percival had already withdrawn his ships to well beyond the stringline hub. He felt a deep sense of dismay. Not only had they lost the planet but most of its population as well. All so unnecessary, so malicious.

In moments, everything on Hellhole would be smashed to rubble and burned to cinders.
Everything.
The totality of the impending destruction was still incomprehensible to him.

He felt a sick anger to realize that Diadem Riomini would actually be pleased by this result. He would probably even congratulate the Commodore for completing his mission so thoroughly.

But Percival had already burned that bridge. He'd publicly defied orders and broken with the corrupt Constellation, declaring to his crew that he could not in good conscience follow barbaric commands. Most of his crew were appalled by the ruthless punitive measure and they supported him … but not everyone. Even after the asteroids struck, he would still have a great fight on his hands, a mutiny.

The biggest blow, though, was that his son remained trapped down there—by choice, apparently. Someday, Percival was going to have to return to Qiorfu and tell his two grandsons about their father, although he would alter the stories somewhat. Percival had always enhanced the reminiscences of his own war exploits.…

Feeling fatalistic as the asteroids hurtled in, he opened a comm channel to the
Jacob
. Percival's battles with this man had been legendary. “General Adolphus, I've had too much time to assess how we've come to this juncture. I know what you blame me for and, for what it's worth, I apologize for my actions.”

Percival didn't think the apology was worth much, especially now, but the General accepted it with grace. “Thank you, Commodore. If you and I had been on the same side all along, think of how we could have changed human history. But it's too late now.”

The General signed off, and the Commodore sat back. Duff Adkins stood at his side, silent and tense. Everyone on the bridge seemed to be holding their breath as the asteroids moved inexorably forward. When Percival swallowed, his throat was dry. He knew he was about to watch the end of a world.

And then the planet below—the entire gigantic sphere that filled much of the viewscreen—simply
vanished
, as if it had winked out of existence.

He lurched to his feet, unable to believe what he had just seen. The bridge was filled with an uproar as technicians and bridge officers called up readings on their stations, trying to find out what had happened.

The flagship suddenly plunged out of control, and the view from the main screen spun wildly. Emergency indicators flashed on all stations, and alarms echoed through the ship. The deck tilted, throwing Percival against his chair.

Adkins shouted, “The planet is
gone
, Commodore!”

Outside their ship, numerous other vessels were thrown into chaos, their courses altered and unstable. The stringline hub was a massive structure in space, the nexus of travel lines just hanging there, but with no planet beneath it.

Percival realized that if Hellhole had indeed disappeared—he didn't even try to explain that!—then it meant that the orbiting ships no longer had gravity to bind them, no center of mass to stabilize them. While their engines continued to apply thrust, they were hurled off in a chaotic scramble. To his dismay, two Consellation vessels crashed into each other, splitting one ship open. Bodies fell out. The other ship remained intact, but badly damaged and tumbling.

“Helm, get control back!” Percival ordered.

“I can't lock on to anything, sir! All of our systems have gone insane!”

“It's open space,” Percival said. “Evasive action. Keep clear of other ships.”

The asteroids continued to hurtle in, twenty unstoppable projectiles … but now without a target. They shot directly through the gap where planet Hallholme had been. There was no impact. They simply kept moving.

Percival shouted on the open channel, and heard General Adolphus issuing similar orders to his DZDF fleet. “Withdraw! Avoid those asteroids—and avoid each other!”

Hundreds of ships spread out, pulling away from what had been the planetary orbit. With amazing, unnatural speed, the cluster of asteroids began to spread out as well, altering their course, but they could not decelerate fast enough. He didn't see any other collisions take place, although there were a few near misses.

His navigator spoke up in a small voice, husky with disbelief, but somehow Percival heard him over the turmoil. “Commodore—this is impossible, but … I think I found it.”

“What's impossible?” He knew that his very definition of
impossible
would have to change after today. “What did you find?”

“The
planet
, sir—farther along in its orbit.” The navigator displayed an image on the main bridge screen. Long-distance sensors showed a blur, then a ripple. The entire planet, complete with its old impact scar, crystallized into focus, as if reappearing out of nowhere, winking back into existence.

“They moved the whole planet out of the way!” Percival exclaimed. “They
moved a planet
!” He couldn't even imagine the power that such an action would require. He hit the comm and shouted, “General, do you see it?”

Adolphus responded, equally astonished. The General turned to his own helmsman. “Adjust course, maximum acceleration. Get us back to Hellhole.”

 

80

Just when she'd given up hope, Sophie felt as if reality had passed through a slingshot.

With the asteroids hurtling toward Hellhole and the shadow-Xayans pooling all their energies, her body and mind felt suddenly twisted, turned inside out, and then folded back to what she'd been moments ago, along with the air around her, the ground beneath her feet … existence itself.

Reality snapped back into place with a resounding ricochet that disoriented her. Sophie's vision doubled, vibrated, and sharpened again. She was left with a feeling of dread and uncertainty, convinced that something fundamental had changed—but she didn't know what.

All around her, thousands of shadow-Xayans stood frozen, poised without breathing … and then in unison they dropped to the ground like stalks of wheat struck down by a sickle. Their bodies lay on the ground, motionless, like the aftermath of a massacre. Including Keana.

“What the hell just happened?” Tanja cried, scrambling out of the ship.

Walfor blinked. “You're asking me?”

Sophie stared upward, and the sky overhead seemed different. The fistlike clouds were dissipating. “Why aren't the asteroids coming? We should have been bombarded by now.”

The sky remained clear. The three of them, the only conscious people within sight, stood hoping for some kind of an answer. Sophie had an eerie feeling that they might be the only ones left alive on the whole planet.

Then she heard a sound like a stirring wind, a shuddering breath drawn by thousands of people awakening at the same time. When Sophie saw the shadow-Xayans stir, her heart pounded with relief.