Collision of Worlds - Chapter 19

Vivian knew they were too late to get inside without any problems: The city was locked down tight. Vivian scouted the exterior fences around the shipyard and saw that there were guards posted at every entrance and possible weak point as well as frequent patrols.

She hadn’t really expected anything different considering there was an army bearing down on Delphi, but she’d been hopeful that they might be able to easily slip inside while they were distracted. After all, the army would likely make contact on the other side of the city where it would be easier to breach.

The spaceport in particular was well defended, and she knew it would be difficult to get to her ship and slip away unnoticed. She doubted they would let her leave with their confiscated goods, and they had enough firepower to shoot her down before she made it very far.

Which meant they were trapped between an army and the gates of the city. She would need to come up with a new plan to get herself and Traq to safety.

She went back to their campsite and found Traq lying up against a tree and rubbing his legs. He was disheveled and exhausted, in need of a good bath and a few nights of restful sleep. His clothes were torn and dirty.

She doubted she looked much better right now. They hadn’t packed enough goods for an extended rush like this, hoping to have time to rest and clean their supplies. She was running on empty.

But she was also reinvigorated. After the events from the previous day, she was more determined than ever to see herself and Traq to safety. She needed to find out what he was capable of and test his limits. He didn’t seem to have much control over his powers, using them haphazardly in times of great stress.

He was something else entirely: she’d known that from the first day she saw him on Geid, and now she knew that it was her singular duty in life to keep him safe and find out what he would be capable of.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Tired,” he said. “And hungry.”

“Do you want another energy bar?” she asked. They still had plenty of those high-density protein bars that the general’s people had packed for them, but they had run out of most other rations during the trek.

She pulled one of the peanut butter-flavored bars out of her pack and offered it to him.

He shook his head. “No thanks,” he said. “I hate those.”

“Me too.”

“Do we have anything else?”

“Not right now,” she said.

“Okay.”

“We can get better food soon,” she promised. “But for now, you’ll have to eat this to keep your energy up.”

He sighed and then accepted the food. She grabbed one for herself as well, and they sat down to eat. She didn’t disagree at all with him because they were terrible. For the first few days, they had only been a nuisance, but now she couldn’t think of anything she’d rather eat less.

For a while, the only sounds were them munching on their protein bars. She could tell how tired they both were and wondered if maybe she should break into the city on her own. If she could get inside and get to the ship, maybe she could pick him up on the way out.  After all, he was only a kid, and this was a lot for him to handle.

The only problem with that plan was that the longer they stayed inside the atmosphere of the planet, the more likely it was that they would be able to shoot her down. Every second mattered in a situation like this.

Worse, she would also have to find somewhere safe for him to stay while she was gone, and that ran the risk of someone stumbling upon him and either killing him or taking him captive. He could handle himself, at least a little bit, but he didn’t know how to control his powers.

“Do you have a headache?” she asked.

He looked at her, confused. “No. I don’t think so.”

“Nothing hurts?”

“My body hurts, but my head feels fine.”

She nodded, a little surprised. He didn’t seem impacted by what he had done. When she was a child, using even a little bit of her mental power drained her and left her weary for hours, sometimes days. And that was when she did nothing compared to what he had done.

The effects were always worse on children than on adults, but on top of that Traq wasn’t normal anyway. It was crazy to think that in everything he had done on this planet, he’d never really tested the limits of his abilities.

And yet, he hadn’t complained of a headache even once, and he didn’t seem any more tired than he had before he had used his gifts.

She had wondered during the last two years if maybe manifesting his powers to throw that bully so long ago on Geid had been a fluke. Maybe it was just some sort of accident of providence or maybe a one-off incident that he would never replicate.

But now she knew it wasn’t. Traq was something else entirely, something she’d never even dreamt of existing before. No one had, not even the Ministry. It was exciting because she knew this was something new in the galaxy; this was something the Ministry had never faced before.

It was also terrifying. If Traq was this powerful at such a young age, what might he be capable of as he got older?

She needed to give him some sort of stress test. Push him to his breaking point and get a sense of what he was capable of, but she needed to do it in a more controlled situation away from this war and the marching armies.

She would train him effectively and teach him how to control his powers. The damage he could cause was immense, and he needed to better understand what was happening and how it was happening so that he might be able to control it.

Which meant he needed an implant. They were used to harness and control the power as much as anything, and with it she could begin teaching him techniques to regulate and focus his energy.

She had no clue how she might go about getting him such an implant, though, considering they were strictly regulated and managed by the Ministry. Argus might be willing to help, but this would be a much bigger ask than anything she’d sought before.

Still, once she explained what had happened here on Eldun, she had no doubt that Argus would be on board with her plans, if for no other reason than that he might selfishly believe he could control and use him. She would never let Argus do such a thing, but if making him believe it was a possibility got her what she wanted, she wasn’t above insinuating.

But, to be honest, that was a problem for another day. Right now she had to focus on getting into the spaceport and getting off of Eldun.

2

Vivian gently kicked Traq on the side when he started snoring. He was a small child, but she couldn’t believe how loudly he slept. It was like listening to a lumberjack sawing logs.

She was confident in the place she’d picked for their camp, hidden in a ravine surrounded by dense foliage, but not confident enough to let her guard down. They couldn’t afford for anyone to overhear in case there were any scouts or soldiers patrolling nearby.

He coughed and sputtered but barely woke up. Groggy, he rolled over onto his side and was breathing deeply and asleep in only seconds.

She almost laughed at the absurdity of it: There was an army marching down on them only a few kilometers away to the north, and here he was fast asleep and oblivious to it all. She considered herself to be a fairly stoic person, able to keep her cool in the toughest of situations, but even her nerves were starting to act up with the intensity of it all. And yet, here he was sleeping through their precarious situation.

She’d been in a lot of fights, even to the point of full-scale battles against enemies of the Republic. She’d been a part of crushing a rebellion in Sector Seven years ago and killed her fair share of civilians and soldiers. But she had never been in the middle of a warzone alone like this, completely and wholly unprepared, and she didn’t know what to expect.

She had watched their defenses and resolved herself to the reality that they wouldn’t be able to sneak into the city while it was on high alert. Their defenses were solid, and they would need to wait until there was a sizable distraction before breaking in.

As soon as the battle commenced between the two armies, she was going to wake Traq, break into the spaceport, and get onto Junker, and then fly off world. Her hope was that the heat of the battle would be enough to distract the patrolling soldiers enough to let her get past.

But for now, it was the waiting that was getting to her. They’d already been here for several hours, and her adrenaline was wearing off. She’d scouted the advancing army earlier, and she knew they would attack sometime during the night.

Delphi knew it as well. The city was lit up with enormous searchlights and she could see soldiers walking around the fences, staring out into the woods and on edge. It was near dusk, and they knew it wouldn’t be long before the shooting started.

And still Traq slept through it all.

When the attack finally started, it caught her completely off guard. It began with scattered tapping sounds in the distance, followed by shouts inside the city. All of this was followed by the war sirens. They were loud, waking up the entire city and preparing them for action.

This happened over the course of a few minutes, and then all at once the city erupted into chaos. The pattering was replaced with the roar of cannons and heavier guns, and these were much closer than the initial skirmish.

She heard people screaming and barking orders from farther in the shipyard, organizing some sort of a response to the attack, and through it all the sirens continued to blare.

She shook Traq awake, clamping a hand over his mouth to make sure he didn’t cry out. He blinked up at her blearily, trying to orient himself. He looked so young and fragile, and she wondered yet again how and why she’d gotten him stuck in the middle of this warzone.

Poor life choices, she knew.

But there was no time to worry about that now. She helped him to his feet, grabbed the remainder of their meager supplies, and pointed toward the fence.

“We need to hurry. You good?”

Traq nodded and ducked low, running across the ground toward the edge of the city. Inside the fenced in spaceport they saw soldiers running around and shouting, trying to get organized. Most of them were leaving, heading to the northern side of the city where the army was attacking from. The soldiers ran around in various states of disarray, trying to put on their uniforms and carrying rifles and other supplies for the battle.

Not all were leaving to join the battle, though; some were sticking around in case another attack came to this area, but so far no one seemed to notice the two approaching from the south. Vivian hunched over and ran behind Traq, eyes peeled for any sort of threat she might have to deal with across the open field. The sirens intensified as they grew closer.

They reached the fence without anyone noticing them or calling out a warning. The fence was ten meters tall and angled outward with barbed wire. Too difficult to climb. She would have to improvise.

She reached out through her implant, touching the part of her mind that interacted with the world, and focused on the fence. It was likely electrified, which meant touching would be dangerous. She grasped the metal mentally and began unraveling it.

It was a difficult task, tapping into the molecules and separating them. If she actually stopped to think about what she was doing, separating the bonds that held the atoms together and pulling at all apart, she would have been awestruck by what was happening.

But she had learned how to do things like this at an early age, and it just sort of happened. She thought about the task at a high level, and her mind and the implant helped her actually handle the low-level task.

She pulled the fence apart in a section and lifted it out of the way, gesturing for Traq to go through. She’d worried that some sort of alarm might sound if the fence was breached, but it looked like she’d lucked out.

Traq slid in first, ducking under the broken fence and climbing onto the spaceport. Vivian moved in after him, releasing her hold on the fence and letting it hang loose. The electrical connection was still flowing through it, so it was still dangerous, but this section now had a huge gap in it.

Searchlights were sweeping the area of the shipyard between them and where Junker was resting, and she knew it would be nearly impossible to get across the open yard without being seen. Now, she knew, it was all or nothing in getting aboard their ship and escaping. No turning back.

3

They were committed, so waiting around wasn’t an option. She grabbed Traq by the wrists and moved forward toward the enormous structure housing her ship. She timed the movement of the lights to try and weave across the yard without getting spotted. Her ship was docked in Bay Four, which was about two hundred meters away.

They moved, stopping occasionally to retime their movements or avoid a patrol. They stayed low to the ground, doing their best to stay out of sight, but it was all a matter of luck now considering they were in the open.

Her luck ran out when they were only forty meters away from Bay Four. A pair of vehicles came roaring out from behind one of the buildings up ahead of them, heading toward the battle lines to the north.

She tried to grab Traq and move out of the way before the convoy came into sight, but one of the drivers noticed her and slammed on the breaks.

The vehicle was about ten meters away from them and the driver was staring right at her. She heard shouting and one of the doors opened.

“Intruders!”

She released Traq and sprang forward, pulling a rock out of her pocket that she’d grabbed outside the city. A man started climbing out, raising his gun up to aim at her.

She threw the rock at his face, still moving forward. He ducked and it missed, but gave her enough time to close the distance. She kicked him in the stomach, knocking him back into the door frame and then slammed his head against the corner of the door.

He tried to pull his gun up again, dazed, but she didn’t give him the opportunity. She slammed him again, then let him fall limply to the ground. She noticed a vibro-blade strapped to his hip and grabbed it as he fell, drawing it loose.

She flicked her wrist, setting it into motion, and felt the comfortable thrum of the blade. It wasn’t as long as her personal weapon, but it was nice having something she’d trained with her entire life.

Vivian continued forward, ducking behind the vehicle and out of sight of the other vehicle. Shots rang out from inside that second car, missing her by a wide margin, and she hoped missing Traq as well. With any luck, he was cowering low and out of sight and they wouldn’t even notice him.

In either case, she needed to hurry. They knew she was here now and were doubtless calling in backup, and that made it all much more dangerous.

She stepped forward around the other side of the vehicle. The door was open and a passenger was stepping out. He was wearing a uniform and facing away from her. He had a pistol in his hand and started barking orders, trying to get his soldiers into position.

She stabbed in, hitting him in the lower back from behind. Her blade tore through his body, ripping it to shreds on the way through.

He tensed up and tried to turn, and she instantly recognized him. General Coley. He met her eyes, a look of confusion and fear on his face.

“You…” he muttered.

She didn’t answer except to stare at him.

“What have you done?”

He slid forward, dead before he hit the ground. Vivian ducked down and grabbed the gun off of the ground next to him. She raised it up and fired into the car twice. The shots hit the driver, once in the shoulder and the other in his head.  Then she aimed forward at the other vehicle farther away and fired at it as well, forcing the soldiers to duck back out of sight to avoid being hit.

“Come on!” Vivian shouted back at Traq.

She saw him climb up from the ground and start running toward her.

He moved around the back of the vehicle and she pointed for him to keep going. They were close to their destination and had to get inside the loading bay.

The other vehicles in the convoy had stopped and seemed to be coming back as well, probably to protect their general. She knew they had to hurry.

She waited until Traq was a good distance ahead of her and then ran to catch up. She fired off a couple of shots at the approaching vehicles and other soldiers, and then they were at the bay where her ship was being stored.

She sliced with the stolen vibro-blade and the lock crumbled to the floor. She kicked the door open and rushed inside. It was dark inside, but she didn’t know where lights might be located.

She could see enough to find the way to her ship. The vehicles were parking outside, but they were too far away to get a clear sight on them.

She punched in the key code and the loading door slid open. She didn’t have time to wait for the ramp, so she grabbed Traq and tossed him inside.

The vehicles were parked outside the open bay door now. She heard gunshots and shouts as the soldiers approached, but they weren’t close enough to be accurate. Bullets thudded into the area around her, some hitting the ship’s metal exterior.

She fired off a few suppressing shots of her own, spending the last of the ammunition, and then climbed up onto the ship behind Traq.

She slammed the button to close the ramp and ran to the cockpit and cycled the power. As soon as the ship powered on, it began pinging her with messages. They were all labeled and had been sent by Traq’s uncle or Argus.

She ignored them for now, checking through the flight systems and making sure they were clear for takeoff. She was worried they might have installed a grounding system to keep them from flying, but it seemed that with the war, they hadn’t had time. Doubtless they had never expected her to return.

As soon as she was certain the ship was flight ready, she took control of the ships guns and aimed for the roof. More contact requests were pinging in from the nearby flight towers, warning her that if she tried to leave, they would shoot her down, but she ignored those as well.

Two quick shots blasted a hole in the roof and she took off, heading straight up. They breached the building, then headed for the outer atmosphere.

She didn’t know if anyone down on the planet was firing at her, but she doubted they would be able to manage a response like that given the battle already raging outside their city.

After a few seconds, they were out of range of any ground attacks. She allowed herself to relax and looked back down at the city below. It was lit up beneath her by the flood lights and searchlights, and those were punctuated by the occasional rocket blast and explosion.

The fence had been breached in multiple locations, and it looked chaotic. The battle looked like it would go on for a long while, but she was just glad to be clear of it. She had no idea which side would win, and she didn’t particularly care either.

Of course, knowing that she had accidentally killed the main General for Delphi, she had to assume she wasn’t helping their chances any.

Nothing she could do about that now. Her priority was keeping Traq safe and getting him as far away from Eldun as she could.

4

She scrolled through the messages once they were at a high enough altitude to start planning a warp lane jump. Worried messages from Jack and Argus. They knew about the war raging on Eldun and wanted to make sure she and Traq had made it off world all right.

She decided to call Argus later, once she’d had time to relax and get some rest. For now, though, she called Jack.

He answered immediately, ashen faced and worried. It looked like he hadn’t slept in days.

“Vivian, are you all right? Is Traq all right?”

“We’re fine,” Vivian said. “You were right. I should have listened to you and steered clear of Eldun.”

“What happened?”

“The war reached Delphi. Our ship was impounded, and we had to make a run for it. We got out, though, and everything is fine.”

“How was Traq? Did he get in the way?”

Vivian glanced behind her. She didn’t see Traq and assumed he had already gone to his quarters. No doubt he was sleeping and recovering.

“No,” she said. “He was perfect. I’m not sure I would have made it off Eldun without him.”

“Can I talk to him?”

“He’s sleeping.”

“Are you heading back to Jaril now?”

“Yes,” Vivian said. “We’ll be there in a few days.”

“Okay,” he said. “See you then.”

She ended the connection and then plotted the course. Her little robot, TM, would actually handle the math for her. She clicked angrily at Vivian, berating her for taking so long and letting them impound the ship, but Vivian was too tired to deal with her just now.

Once they were safely in flight, she headed back to her chambers and rested. She had never been so exhausted in her entire life and felt like she could sleep for weeks. She also had never felt so conflicted.

She had undertaken this experiment to try and separate Traq from his uncle, but she realized now that had been a poor and selfish decision. What would happen to Traq if she was lost?

But she couldn’t keep Jack around without filling him in about everything: the Ministry, the Order, everything. He would need to understand why she was pushing Traq so hard and what he represented.

Could she trust him with that? A misstep from Jack would likely get them both killed. But she didn’t see any alternatives except for severing ties and never looking back.

A concern for another day. Right now, she had a much more pressing matter to attend to. Once she rested, she decided, she would call Argus. Maybe a couple of hours of sleep, though.

She was out as soon as her head hit the pillow.