Authors: Gillian Andrews
“Th-thanks,” he gasped, trying to wave them out of range. “They spray you with some sort of liquid as soon as you injure them. It seems to be an automatic reaction, but the mask packs protect us. It just means that it is hard to see anything.” He took a ragged breath, clearly in some pain. “But the spray lets them see us more clearly.” He took another gulp of air, nearly blocking his mask pack. “The neck. The neck is where they are most vulnerable. And … and don’t get too near them; those membranes are lethal; they can tear you into small pieces once they get close enough.”
But Bennel was looking down at the Dessite on the floor. It was still feebly trying to right itself, the fronds undulating along the floor of the facility, but unable to get a grip. As they watched, two other Dessites came smoothly up, bent slightly until their own membranes had attached to the upper part of its body, and then hoisted it to its feet.
“I rather think First Six has found the secret of the Dessites,” he said. “He put that one out of action.”
All three then ducked hastily out of sight from the intruders, wondering if, now that they were soaked with the fine mist, they would be detectable to the Dessites.
Six grinned. “I wasn’t even trying to knock it over; I think I just caught it as it was trying to finish Ledin off!” He peered along the corridor. “But you are right. It didn’t seem able to spray us when it was down, either, did it?”
The two Dessites that had rescued their fallen comrade began to move away. Ledin breathed a sigh of relief, but Tallen indicated four more Dessites, who were approaching rapidly from behind, and who seemed to know exactly where they were.
“Yes, yes,” he said testily. “Very useful. But not much help right now.”
Six looked back. The Namuri was right; the Dessites were getting far too close for comfort. “Yes; this might be a good time to get out of here.”
Tallen gave a small sigh.
Six began to laugh. “Not used to retreating, then? Well, I apologize.”
It was Tallen’s turn to glower. “I want to kill them,” he said.
“Very fine sentiment, but it seems that they might just kill us first if we hang around here for long. We have to use our heads.”
Bennel waved one hand and muttered something about some people not having much of a head to begin with.
Tallen stepped towards him. “WHAT did you say?”
“I was commenting on the size of your head. Why? Do you have a problem with that?”
“My head is a perfectly normal size.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have thought it to hear you.”
“I don’t have to take that from a sycophant like you!”
Six blew out air. “Shut up, both of you! How do you expect the Dessites not to find us if you are circling each other like catumba around a sick vaniven? Bennel, help Ledin to his feet, would you? He has to lead us to the chamber where they have been keeping Arcan.”
Bennel obliged with alacrity, and Ledin, who was still struggling for breath, pointed down the corridor.
“Right,” said Six, bustling them quickly to the other side of the pile of stores they had been using as cover. “You know what to do. Let’s move out!”
Chapter 10
DIVA AND GRACE turned in unison as the first Dessites reached them. The size of the creatures was impressive, but neither of the girls flinched as they approached.
“What part of the body should we go for?” whispered Grace.
Diva shook her head. “Don’t know. We have no idea where their vital organs are – or even if they have any. I should aim for the upper part of the torso, more or less where you would expect the heart to be.”
Arcan’s shape was expanding to meet the Dessites. He was clearly not feeling well, but even so, was an imposing sight. The first Dessite had shrunk slightly inside its membranes, but held its ground. It seemed, to Grace’s eyes, to have turned to two other Dessites who were approaching, and, as if answering an order, these two moved back, and disappeared.
For some moments, the tall Dessite and Arcan faced each other. The Dessite – one of the largest Grace had seen, was examining Arcan, seemingly surprised at his ability to expand and contract at will.
Then the two acolyte Dessites came back, and Arcan twitched. They were holding six large rods of some dark material. They handed two to the largest Dessite and kept two each, which they held extended to either side of their bodies. Then they began to circle the orthogel entity.
The girls saw that Arcan was forced to retreat from the rods; this must be more of the carbon nanographite, then. Grace gave a groan; she hated to see somebody as strong as Arcan dominated like this, trapped by these creatures that were greedy for more and more water worlds.
Both Grace and Diva took steps forwards. They looked at each other, and Diva gave a quick nod. They both launched themselves at the Dessites, aiming for the membranes holding the rods, trying to help Arcan escape from his tormentors.
Diva gave a cry as she attacked. Her eyes were shining, and it looked as if she had been waiting for years for just this opportunity. Her first strike severed a large frond of the membrane holding one of the sticks, and her opponent quivered as the dark pole dropped to the ground. It bounced up and down several times with a clanging resonance before finally becoming still.
The Dessite turned towards her, and she jerked her head at it provocatively.
“What? Didn’t like that? Well, well! Come closer, I will give you more of the same.”
Grace had swung her catana at the second Dessite. It, too, cut the membranes holding one of the sticks, and caused the creature to turn towards the Sellite girl, leaving Arcan temporarily with only one Dessite trying to contain him.
Arcan gave a bellow of ire and launched himself at the creature, but it held both nanographite sticks up in front of it immediately, and he was forced to stop. He cringed back again and turned black with anger.
Arcan looked at the two girls defending him. He knew that they were both prepared to give their lives to save his, but he could no longer see a way out. Whatever they did, there could be no possibility of escape for him, not for that part of him which was here, on this floating island. The orthogel entity clouded over. There was nothing else for it; he would have to detonate the explosives. Only by destroying himself could he ensure that the Dessites wouldn’t manage to use his quantum decoherence capacity to travel wherever they wanted around space.
“Get out!” he boomed, speaking as directly as he could to Diva and Grace, both struggling to avoid being snapped apart by the lethal membranes of the fighting Dessites. “Get out, both of you. You know why!”
Diva glanced back over her shoulder. “NO!” But she knew that Arcan had no other choice. He would have to put an end to this.
“I will give you time to get to the exit tubes, but you are going to have to make haste,” he hissed, his voice reverberating around inside their skulls. “Stop trying to help me.”
Grace lifted her eyes. “I can’t leave you,” she said, her head high. “I won’t!”
“Grace, you have Temar to think about now,” Arcan told her gently. “And the rest of me is still safe on Valhai, protected by the canths. Please, be sensible!”
Grace’s sword hand wavered. “But we can’t be sure of that! Look how much of you is here. You may not recover from such a loss.” She looked across at Diva, silently asking for support.
But Diva was standing irresolute, obviously struggling with many conflicting emotions. At last she straightened up and gave a deep sigh. “Arcan is right, Grace. He can’t risk it. How could he let the Dessites utilize him for their space travel? He has no choice.”
Grace’s face looked suddenly wretched. She pursed her mouth. “Very well. We will go. I think you are right. But … but I am sorry, Arcan. I would have liked to rescue you from these … creatures.”
Arcan flashed a grateful white light at them both. “I know. And I thank you all for coming. At least they will not be able to use these cells to travel across the galaxy. At least the Dessites will still be contained here on Dessia – for the time being. But they have to be stopped.”
“We know.” Diva nodded slowly. “Good … goodbye then, Arcan. At least, to this part of you.” Her voice sounded higher than usual, strained.
Grace was almost crying. “Goodbye, Arcan. I hope the rest of you can survive, on Valhai.”
“Goodbye Grace. Have a good life, for the few years you transients consider to be a normal life span.”
She bit her lip. “I will try.”
“And say my goodbyes to Six and the others, will you?”
Diva thought for a moment, and then she slipped the namura necklace from around her neck, and held it out to the orthogel mass in front of her.
“I want you to have this,” she said. “It was given to me by the sibyla – the wise woman of the Namuri clan. She said that you would take it back to her one day, that she foresaw your returning it. She said that the voice in the wind would bring it back to her. It seems that she was wrong, but I feel you should have it.”
The small stone shimmered blue in front of all of them, and then disappeared, engulfed by the orthogel. Arcan seemed about to speak. Then, where the namura stone had disappeared, there was a strange fizzing, like ionisation tracks in a bubble chamber. Around the slim effervescent trails they could see a brilliant light, which seemed to shimmer and then grow stronger and stronger. The girls stared, amazed.
But their inattention had given their opponents time to regroup, and a tiny frisson as something touched her forced Diva to turn her attention back to the large shapes behind them. The creatures had crept closer, their membranes feeling out, and one had touched Diva’s arm, instantly wrapping itself around her and beginning to drag her towards the rest of its body.
Diva gave a shriek of outrage and struggled helplessly against the unbreakable suction of the membrane. She hacked all around her, but the creature was holding her out, away from the rest of its body, and its head was well-averted.
“Grace!” Diva cried.
Grace swiveled and raised both hands to hack down at the membranes clutching her friend, perilously close to Diva’s whitening arm. The creature recoiled, and part of the membrane dropped off, falling onto the floor, where it gave a few desultory twists and turns on its own before becoming still.
“YES! One more and it will HAVE to let me go!” screamed Diva, encouraged. “Come on, Grace!”
The Sellite girl raised her sword for the next blow, but the shape behind her own body was already too close, and, next moment, she herself had been caught up by the insidious membranes, and her sword had dropped, useless, to the ground.
She squirmed against the force of the membrane, but it seemed that the tighter she struggled, the harder she was caught. Her glance met that of Diva, who was in the same position, and they stared helplessly at each other. Neither of them saw what had happened to the orthogel; neither of them was even facing in that direction.
They pushed against the restraining membranes with all their strength, but it was no good; there was simply nothing to be done. After some moments of futile wriggling, they both fell still. The membranes began to tug their limbs apart, and the twisting movement caused both of the girls to forget everything except the extreme pain they each felt as they began to be, quite literally, pulled apart.
SIX AND TALLEN burst into the chamber, followed closely by Bennel and Ledin himself, who was still having some difficulty making his strangely weak muscles obey him. They took in the situation immediately and fell onto the Dessites, one to each.
Six threw himself at the Dessite clutching Diva, seeing that the membranes were already rippling in opposite directions, already applying the traction which had so nearly crippled Ledin. He gave a roar of anger and propelled himself straight for the neck of the offending alien.
The alien caught sight of the flash of movement and twisted away at the last moment, which probably saved its life, for the blade went lower than Six had wanted, causing much less damage than he could have wished. He growled, pulled his sword out of the large body, only to bury it again in its flesh, this time much closer to the neck area.
The Dessite dropped Diva, who struggled to get her legs to obey her, to let her stand. Six concentrated on the Dessite in front of him, hastily stepping back to avoid the cloud of liquid which was propagating in his direction.
“You all right?” he shouted.
“Just about. About time you showed up!”
“Yeah. Took the scenic route.”
“Stopped off for hot chocolate, did you?”
They managed a grin in each other’s direction, and then Diva waved a hand behind him. “Don’t make the same mistake I did, Six! Watch what you are doing.”
He turned back to the alien. His eyes widened. Although the creature which had been holding Diva was doubled over, and clearly not going to be any threat in the immediate future, it was now being reinforced by others, who had finally found where all the fuss was coming from.
He gulped. The odds had just taken a fierce downwards turn.
“Err … Diva!” he muttered out of the corner of his mouth.
“Need help, Kwaidian?”
“When you’re ready. No hurry.”
He could hear his wife teeter to her feet. “Always got your back. You know that.”
“Backswampers in sight.”
“Yes. I see them. Not looking good.” He was aware of her stepping up alongside him and raising her Coriolan dagger in front of her. “But I am ready.” A bodywrapped hand slipped into his, just for a tantalising moment, and squeezed it. “We are ready.”