Qin
Station :
Sol
System :
Alex was taken
deeper into the laboratory section of the station without being given the
opportunity to say goodbye to his friends. His thoughts were clouded with
outrage over Kenny’s murder, and he was barely aware of his surroundings when
they arrived at the destination.
The lab was similar to the one Klaus had set up on the
station orbiting Venus—Alex recognized it from the description Michael and
Justine had given him. There were two sections: the main lab area, and the room
where the subjects underwent Kinemetic process trials.
He took a hard look around, and it was only then that he saw
there was another person in the lab besides his guards and himself.
An oriental woman, who looked to be in her mid-thirties, her
long jet-black hair tied back in a ponytail, and wearing a white lab coat,
glared at him as he entered.
Three of the guards, having completed their escort mission,
stepped back out of the lab without a word and sealed the door behind him. One
guard remained inside the lab, standing in a relaxed but attentive position,
with his rifle cradled in his arms across his chest.
Alex, feeling decidedly uncomfortable, cleared his throat.
“My name is—”
“I know who you are,” the woman said. “And I don’t need you
here. I told him that. I can do this myself.”
“Do what?” Alex asked. “And who are you?”
She gave him an inscrutable look. “Do you know nothing? This
is a waste of my time.” Storming to a communications console in the wall, she
tapped something on the control, and a voice came through.
“Yes, Your Highness?”
“I told you, Dr. Yin will suffice. Get my father.”
Dr. Yin!
Alex reeled from shock. This young woman was
Chow Yin’s daughter?
He glanced at the guard in the room, as if he could give
Alex some kind of confirmation. The guard did not so much as react.
The monitor lit up, and Chow Yin appeared on-screen. “What
is the problem, Alice?”
“I told you I didn’t need this boy to help me. I am
perfectly capable of discovering the process on my own.”
“You’ve had four years to do so,” the Emperor said.
Alice Yin’s face flushed visibly. She protested, “Now that we
have the Mayan’s story recorded, it’s only a matter of time.”
“Time is a luxury we can no longer afford. After all, the
Americans had the story for over a decade, and they never solved the problem.
There is obviously a missing element. Alex Manez knows the secret; he has been
in close contact with the involved parties all along. He has agreed to
cooperate.”
“I can figure it out myself,” Alice said, though her words
were not as vehement as before.
“Of course you could,” Emperor Yin said, giving her a patient
smile. “I have every confidence in your abilities. We are on a timetable,
however, and so I ask you to set aside your pride and work with the Westerner.
Make me proud.” He cut the communications link before his daughter could say
anything more.
Alice Yin stared at the blank monitor for several seconds
before turning around. Alex got the impression she was trying to compose
herself.
Her efforts, apparently, were not enough. She gave Alex a
hateful glare and stormed out of the lab through a door on the opposite wall.
When Alex glanced at the solitary guard, the only reaction
the man made was a very slight relaxing of his shoulders. It seemed high drama
ran in the Yin family.
∞
Much had happened in so short a time, and Alex felt more
than a little disoriented. Kenny’s death hadn’t fully hit home yet; his initial
outrage at the killing had settled into a strange, disconnected numbness. When he’d
first met the young physicist, he and Kenny had done nothing but butt heads.
Their friction had turned to friendship. Alex didn’t want to think about it,
didn’t want to process the finality of the other’s death.
Alone with the uncommunicative guard, Alex felt helpless. As
a distraction, he took it upon himself to take a tour of the lab.
On a hunch, he tried to initialize one of the computers, and
it prompted him for a password. He tried a few others but could not get access.
The lab had a Kinemetic damper, so Alex could not use his electropathy to
circumvent the computer’s security protocols.
From his quick investigation, he concluded that they had all
the necessary equipment to perform the Kinemetic process. All they were missing
was Kinemet and a subject.
He gravitated toward the experimentation room, and his
thoughts drifted back to Klaus, who had killed several American soldiers in his
attempt to refine the process before succeeding with Justine.
The last time Alex had seen Klaus was at his uncle’s base
several hundred kilometers from Luna Station. He’d spent a few years in the
company of the young man. Though they’dd never indulged in conversation, and
had been barely polite to each other during Alex’s stay, he always felt Klaus could
have matured past his abusive childhood.
Initially angry and bitter, Klaus had become quiet and introspective
over the first few years, and had spent his time focusing his studies on
physics and chemistry, rather than on computer technology. At one point, Alex thought
he might take Klaus into his confidence, and see if either of them could understand
Alex’s condition.
That was never to be. Word reached Klaus through his uncle
that his estranged father had died from liver failure, a legacy from his
alcoholism. His mother, who had left them years before, refused to acknowledge
Klaus and rebuffed all attempts at communication. Klaus became increasingly
agitated and violent. He went on several raids with his uncle, and Alex came to
understand the young man had taken someone’s life unnecessarily.
It was then that Alex realized he could no longer depend on
Klaus or his uncle to harbor him. With his deteriorating health, Alex knew the
clock on his life was ticking, and made the plan to hijack the
Quanta
.
Though he’d tricked Captain Gruber into helping him, Alex had not thought about
what his deception would have done to Klaus. It was only years later that the
repercussions became evident, when Klaus enlisted the Cruzados to aid him in
his experiments.
Now, Klaus was dead, but his mad pursuit had been picked up
by Emperor Yin and his daughter.
Alex was, once again, right in the thick of it. He had
promised his cooperation to save his friends, and couldn’t think of any way to
back out. Even if they told him Michael and the others had been returned to
safety, there was no way for Alex to know whether it was the truth or a lie.
If he refused to cooperate now, it would only be a matter of
time before they rediscovered the formula for the Kinemetic process. Alex had
to do his best to delay their progress by any means necessary.
The Kulsat were on the hunt for Sol System. They would
eventually find it. Humanity needed Kinemats to defend themselves against the
threat; but someone like Emperor Yin would never use the technology to save Sol
System. He would use the knowledge for his own gain, and sacrifice the masses.
Alex started and let out a gasp when he realized someone had
come back into the lab. Alice Yin studied him with cold, dark eyes.
“I didn’t see you there,” Alex said, struggling to even out
his breathing.
“It seems we must work together,” Alice said. Her voice was
even, but Alex could sense the hostile undertones. She was struggling to keep
her anger in check.
“That was the arrangement.” If she was going to play it
cold, so would Alex.
“Then tell me the big secret. Tell me what I’ve been missing
all this time.”
Alex shook his head. “Not until I am satisfied my friends
have arrived on Earth alive.”
“You doubt my father’s word? He is the Emperor of Sol
System. Argh,” she said, throwing up her hands in frustration. “Do you not
understand? Once your ‘friends’ are in the custody of your government, they
will tell them the secret. We must succeed before they do.”
“That would be too bad,” Alex said, unable to keep the
sarcasm from his voice.
She pointed a finger at him. “You gave your word you would
cooperate. If you do not, then we have no reason to ensure their safety. So
long as you are helping me, your friends will safely continue their journey to
Earth. Once we have developed the Kinemetic process, it won’t matter that they
also know it,” she said. “We have amassed more Kinemet than they have. We can create
hundreds of Kinemats before they have their first one.”
“You’re mad,” Alex said, the accusation coming out before he
could stop himself.
Alice’s face turned a bright shade of red, and for a moment,
Alex thought she would attack him.
He couldn’t help himself. He asked, “Don’t you care that you’re
killing innocent people in your experiments? If you do succeed, you surely know
the Emperor will use the power to kill thousands—perhaps millions—of others.
How can you be a part of that?”
“Why should I care?” Alice said in a hiss. “Humanity turned its
back on me a long time ago. Anyone who opposes us will get what they deserve.”
She glanced at the guard, and then back at Alex.
“You will cooperate now, or I will give the guard the order
to shoot you on the spot.”
Department
of Defense HQ :
Ottawa,
Canada :
Michael had never
felt so despondent in his life.
After three days in a holding cell in the military detention
center, he thought he would never see a friendly face again. They had not even
let him contact his family to let them know he was still alive. Until they
could assess the national security risk he posed, he was kept incommunicado.
They gave him access to a computer for the purposes of
filing a statement, but he’d been supervised for the duration. Though he’d
submitted the report a day ago, no one had come back to let him know what his
status was, or whether they would simply leave him in his cell indefinitely.
From the moment Michael and the others had re-entered Sol
System, he’d been imprisoned in one form or another, and he’d had his fill of
the experience. All he wanted was to speak to someone in authority and plead
his case. Even if they decided to lock him away forever, he wanted someone to
take his warning of the Kulsat threat seriously, at the very least.
When one of the two guards outside his cell unlocked the
door, Michael first thought it was to bring him a meal, but the man who entered
the cell was not a soldier.
“Calbert!” Michael said. “You have no idea how happy I am to
see you.” He stood up and took a step forward, but Calbert Loche put up a hand,
motioning for Michael to sit down on his cot again.
“You may not be so happy once you hear what I have to say,”
he said.
“Oh?”
Calbert glanced around the holding cell quickly. There was a
small, plain desk with a chair on one wall. He pulled the chair out by the
backrest and turned it around. Slowly, he eased himself down on it.
“I’ll cut to the chase: they’re not going to drop the
charges against you,” he said, “…yet.”
“Yet?” Michael asked. “Then there’s a possibility.”
“Maybe. Your report made a lot of people unhappy.” Calbert
took a deep breath. “Billions of dollars were spent on Quantum Resources and
Alex Manez. Now, from your statement, we find out he was lying to us from the
moment he returned from Centauri—some even doubt he made the initial trip.
“Half the senators on the oversight committee think you were
operating in collusion with Chow Yin—after all, how did he manage to figure out
how to weaponize Kinemet?”
“That’s ridiculous,” Michael said. “Why would he ship us
back here if we were working with him?”
“I don’t know.” Calbert shrugged. “Maybe he needs more
information, and thinks you can get it for him.”
Grimacing, Michael said, “Ludicrous.”
Calbert continued. “The rest believe you’re not a traitor,
but simply guilty of gross incompetence.”
“What?” He couldn’t keep the shock from his face.
“From the beginning, Quantum Resources faced failure after
failure; it was only after your retirement that the company turned itself
around. Once you were brought back into the fold, things went sour in a hurry.”
“They want a scapegoat? Pin everything that went wrong on
me?”
“It wouldn’t be the first time something like this happened.”
“So either I’m a traitor or an idiot,” Michael said.
“Don’t forget ‘a liar’,” Calbert said. “All of them think
your report of some super alien species massing an invasion is pure fiction, a
legerdemain designed to distract us from your other activities.”
“Are you serious? I wouldn’t make something like that up.”
Michael felt the figurative noose tightening around his neck. He looked Calbert
in the eye. “What does Alliras think?”
“Alliras is no longer the Minister of Energy, Mines and
Resources. He recommended me for the minister’s ballot before he left the
position. I’ve been in the seat for a year now.”
“You got political?” Michael gaped. “What about Quantum
Resources?”
“Dissolved. Since Chow Yin has put an embargo on space
operations for all earthbound nations, we lost our mandate. Space Mining
Division has been gutted. The country has more important needs, such as
fighting the war.”
“The war?” He gasped, feeling completely out of touch.
“I have to say, it was a brilliant move on Chow Yin’s part.
He corrupted a good portion of the PRC government, got them to start trouble in
Asia. Within months, everyone was picking sides, and I mean everyone. The rub
of it is that World War III is nothing more than a distraction. While we’re all
busy fighting each other, Chow Yin’s been taking advantage and securing control
of the rest of Sol System.”
“Murderous bastard,” Michael said, grinding his teeth.
“Yes, I’m sorry about Kenny Harriman.” Calbert bowed his
head a moment before continuing. “A month ago, the PRC government regained
control of China. They’re in the process of rooting out the imperialist
sympathizers, and they’ve initiated a ceasefire. Everyone is in a holding
pattern at the moment.”
“That’s good news,” Michael said. “We can turn our attention
back to Chow Yin and the Kulsat.”
Calbert clicked his tongue. “That might take a bit of time,
and might be more problematic than realistic. There were a lot of shots fired
by both sides. It’ll take years to smooth out ruffled feathers. Worldwide
resources are already taxed. We need those space-based production stations
controlled by Chow Yin. There’s been talk that it would be easier to negotiate
a deal rather than commit resources to another fight, especially when the Solan
Empire has the high ground.”
“I can’t believe my ears.” Michael’s eyes were wide. “They’re
going to give in?”
Lifting his shoulders in a sign of helplessness, Calbert
said, “The economy was tenuous when you left; now, it’s reaching a critical
point. The war exhausted everyone’s reserves. People are tired of fighting.”
“Well,” Michael said, his voice upset, “people better get
un-tired. The Kulsat are going to find us, and when they do, we’ll be wiped
out.”
With a half-smile, Calbert said, “It would be easier to
convince the government to swallow the Moon, than to swallow that story.”
“And you?” He looked at Calbert through the corner of his
eye. “What do you believe?”
Taking a long time to answer, he finally said, “I believe
that if your story is true, then we’re all in very serious trouble.”
“That wasn’t what I was asking.” Michael held his breath.
Finally, Calbert nodded, “We are all in very serious
trouble.”
Though Michael felt a surge of relief when he heard that—at
least someone in the entire world didn’t think he was either a complete moron
or a traitor—he knew his situation was far from optimistic.
“To break it down,” he said, pulling at his lip, “we’ve got
two problems: Emperor Chow Yin, and the Kulsat Consortium. I hate to say it,
but Yin is the lesser of the two evils. He wants to rule Sol System; the Kulsat
want to decimate it.”
“What do you suggest?”
Michael scratched an eyebrow. “Do we have the technology to
weaponize Kinemet?”
“Before Quantum Resources was shut down, we bandied a few
theories about. The first problem is, we don’t have any Kinemet stockpile to
test the theories. Second, even if we did, those theories can’t be tested
planet-side. Unfortunately, Chow Yin has all the marbles, and he’s not
sharing.”
“It sounds like you’re trying to convince me that making a
deal with Chow Yin is the sensible option.” He gave Calbert a sharp look.
“The devil you know…”
Shaking his head, Michael sighed. “I can’t believe that
option is on the table.”
Then he noticed Calbert looking at him oddly.
“What?”
A smile crept into Calbert’s lips. “You realize that, not
once in this conversation did you ask about what’s going to happen to you?”
Tilting his head, Michael let out a hollow laugh. “I thought
it was a foregone conclusion. I figure I’m the administration’s worst
nightmare. If they reveal I’m back, the newsvids will investigate. The moment
they find out about an alien invasion, there’d be mass panic. If they prosecute
me, they’ll have to disclose certain facts to the public, and hide others.
Anything they hide will come back to bite them later; a cover-up is a
sensational scandal.”
With a bittersweet smile, he said, “If I were them, I’d keep
pushing the paperwork from office to office indefinitely, or just bury it. Put
me in a hole somewhere and forget where they hid the key.”
Calbert gave him a hard look. “You’re not wrong about that.
It’s taken a lot of fast-talking to keep knowledge of your return limited to
the oversight committee. At this point, there are only about twenty people in
the world who know you’re still alive.”
“Well,” Michael said, trying to keep the defeat out of his
voice, “no matter what happens, I appreciate you taking the time to come down
here in person.”
“I wanted to come down here,” he said, “but not just because
I consider you a friend.”
“Oh?”
“I wanted to ask you about Yaxche.”
“He’s a good man.” Michael leaned forward. “I hope you
realize that he had nothing to do with anything. He just came along to help
save Alex.”
Calbert put up his hands. “There are no worries on that
part. We’ve actually contacted the Honduran Departmental and arranged for his
return to his village.”
Letting out a sigh of relief, Michael said, “That’s good.”
Slowly, Calbert said, “I’m glad you vouched for him.”
Michael narrowed his eyes. “I never knew you for someone to
beat around the bush.”
Calbert laughed. “Normally, I’m not. I guess this last year
of glad-handing politicians and captains of industry has made me more
circumspect.”
“Just you and I here,” Michael said. “Spit it out.”
“All right.” The minister took a moment, as if to sort out
what he was going to say. “I spoke with Yaxche in private yesterday. He
remembers me from when we met at Quantum Resources—just a few weeks ago from
his perspective, but over four years ago for me.” He held Michael’s eye. “At
first, he didn’t want to talk to me, but when I reassured him I only wanted the
best for you, and I believed your story about what happened in Centauri, he
relented and said something I wasn’t sure how to take.
“He said the Kulsat were once the favored of the Grace, and
that they’re trying to find the legacy of the Grace.”
Nodding, Michael said, “That’s what the Gliesans told Alex.
I have no idea what it really means. We didn’t really have a lot of time to
talk about it before the Kulsat blew up our ship.”
“Right.” Calbert scratched his jaw. “Yaxche said he believes
the Grace could be the gods in the Mayan pantheon.”
Michael frowned. “He never mentioned that to anyone.”
“And he said he might know how to find the old gods’
legacy.”
“How to find—?” Michael gaped. “You mean it might actually
be here, on Earth?”
Calbert made an uncertain face. “He says it might be
somewhere near his village.”
“No wonder he didn’t want to say anything. Chow Yin’s agents
could have been listening the whole time.” He stood up. “You need to send
someone with Yaxche. If you can find this legacy, it might just be the thing we
need to deal with the Kulsat.”
“It might be a long shot—no, it’s definitely a long shot—but
I agree it’s worth exploring,” Calbert said. “But, since we don’t want to leak
anything to the public about this, we need to send someone with Yaxche who we
can trust, and who can get the job done.”
Michael searched his memory for someone who would fit the
bill. Then he noticed Calbert looking at him oddly again, but this time with a
playful smile on his face.
“What?”
“How’d you like to go back to Honduras?”
Stunned, Michael opened and closed his mouth without saying
anything. When he finally recovered his senses, he asked, “Me? How?”
“First of all,” Calbert said, pulling a folded letter out
from inside the breast of his jacket, “I need you to sign this affidavit
stating that you have been operating undercover as an agent of the Canadian
government for the past four years under direct authority of the Prime
Minister.”
Signing that would immediately exonerate Michael of any
charges the Department of Defense had on him.
“As long as you agree to a full retraction of your earlier
statement, we’ve prepared a replacement statement detailing how you’ve spent
the last four years infiltrating Chow Yin’s empire.”
Michael couldn’t believe it. “How did you get Prime Minister
Dolbeau to agree to that?”
Calbert’s smile widened. “I didn’t. I got Prime Minister
Rainier to agree to it.”
“Alliras? But I thought you said—?”
“I just said he was no longer the Minister of Energy, Mines
and Resources.”
Michael pointed a finger at him. “You damned trickster.”
Laughing out loud, Calbert said, “Just sign the affidavit so
we can get you on a skybus to Honduras.”