Dream Called Time (26 page)

“What?” I had been so sure we could count on the Hsktskt to help protect Joren and oKia, the last two uninfected worlds, at least long enough to give us time to find a solution. “Why?”

“The commanders of the League fleet are not responding to any signals or League base command. They have left Sol Quadrant, and their trajectory indicates that they are en route to Varallan.”

“The Hsktskt wouldn’t run from that.”

“Long-range scans indicate that ships from other worlds have joined them.” He hesitated, and then added, “The fleet now has over ten thousand ships.”

While the Hsktskt barely had two thousand. No wonder the commanders had deserted. “Do you think the black crystal is controlling the League fleet?”

“That, or the League commanders have decided to invade Joren and oKia in order to escape it.” He stopped me from heading to the door panel. “You have been through an extraordinary ordeal, Cherijo. You have to rest sometime.”

“I can sleep when I’m dead.” I frowned as I remembered how I’d felt when I’d faced the prospect of being awake for all eternity. “Did Shon detect any crystal in my bloodstream?”

“He scanned you several times while you were in the tank. You shed all of the black crystal in your system, and he did not detect anything else.” He studied my expression. “What is it?”

“I took those blood samples when I was infected with the infinity crystal. They should have contained traces of it.” And now that the retroviral compound had altered my DNA, it should have also deposited the infinity crystal in my bloodstream, but when I performed a quick scan of myself, I found no trace of it. “Well, at least my bones won’t crystallize before the League comes and starts a new war.”

Reever and I went to Command, where my presence seemed to stun the flight officers. The captain overcame his shock soon enough; he called for security and ordered Reever away from me.

“I’m not a shifter, Xonea,” I snapped. “If you don’t believe it’s me, signal Medical. Shon has all the scans to prove it.”

Xonea did just that, but even after the oKiaf assured him of my identity, he seemed unconvinced. “I saw you abducted by the Odnallak.”

“No, you saw a nurse who was alterformed to look like me.” Given my ClanBrother’s dislike of Jarn, I decided not to elaborate further. “Have you been able to locate the Odnallak craft?”

“We will intercept them within the hour.” He lowered the pulse rifle he had trained on me. “Why did you not signal me before this?”

“In the shape I was, you wouldn’t have wanted to talk to me,” I assured him.

One of the com officers handed Xonea a datapad, which he read and passed back. “The Ruling Council has ordered me to return to Joren.”

“We can’t go back yet,” I said. “We have to stop the Odnallak from creating another rift.”

“The council has received an ultimatum from the commander of the League fleet. Our people and the refugees we are harboring must leave Joren, or they will attack.”

“It’s the black crystal. It knows it can’t invade the planet by itself or by using infected refugees,” I explained. “So now it’s trying to get the people to leave so it can attack them in space. I bet the League made the same threat to oKia.”

“They signaled them after contacting the council,” Xonea confirmed. “What will it do if we do not leave our homeworld?”

“It has ten thousand ships under its control,” I reminded him. “With that kind of firepower, they could bombard the planet from orbit. Joren wouldn’t stand a chance.”

The captain’s expression grew thoughtful. “Do you believe this Odnallak can put an end to the black crystal invasion?”

“I don’t know. But if anyone can, it would be him or Maggie.” I sighed. “If he is successful in returning to the past, he intends to destroy the Jxin. If he does that, then the black crystal won’t be created. Neither will any other species in our time.”

Xonea summoned his com officer. “Signal the homeworld. Inform the Ruling Council that at this time I respectfully decline to follow their orders.”

Seventeen

Reever and I went back to Medical and joined Shon, who had been scanning the minerals my body had shed in the tank.

“It is black crystal,” he confirmed, “but it is inert.”

“It’s just taking a nap,” I said. “I suggest we blow it out an air lock before it wakes up and attacks the crew.”

“I do not believe it will.” He handed me the scanner he’d been using on the tank. “See for yourself.”

I checked the display, and saw the usual readings for the mineral’s atomic structure, element content, and energy levels. “Unknown, unknown, and what the hell is this?” I glanced up. “It’s turned into rock?”

“As I indicated—the crystal does not contain any energy, and it is no longer generating it.”

“It’s dead.”

He shrugged. “For want of a better word.”

“It’s a trick.” I saw Reever by the tank. “Duncan, don’t you even think about it.”

He placed a hand on the side of the tank. “I feel nothing.” Before Shon and I could stop him, he thrust his hand through the infuser port. Hunks of black crystal fell to the bottom of the tank as he pulled one of the formations free and drew it out.

“Do you have a death wish? Shon, seal the room.” I looked around frantically for a specimen container.

“It is harmless now.” Reever brought it over and offered it to me.

Without thinking, I swiped it from him. “It eats planets, Reever, so I hardly . . . think . . .” I looked down at the eight-sided crystal shaft, which sat in my hand like a pretty, harmless bauble. “Shon.”

“It is as he says.” The oKiaf took the crystal from me and held it up to the light. “It refracts the light as any prism would. I can feel nothing from it.” He gave me a direct look. “You neutralized it.”

“Wait a minute, I didn’t do anything,” I argued.

“The shifter placed the black crystal in your body because he must have known you would survive being infected with it,” Reever said. “Just as you survived carrying the infinity crystal.”

“My immune system is great, but it’s not
that
great.” I turned to Shon. “The blood samples you used to alterform me had to contain infinity crystal; I took them when I was infected with it. That’s what must have happened.”

He shook his head. “I found traces of three-sided crystal embedded among the black formations. Also in an inert, harmless state.”

I refused to believe I had anything to do with this. “Maybe they neutralized each other.”

“Or your body did. There is something else I discovered from the readings I took during the alterformation process,” Shon said. “Something the shifter brought out of dormancy when he separated you into two beings. I confirmed it when I compared your sequences to Maggie’s.”

“I know I have Odnallak DNA,” I told him. “Don’t remind me.”

“You were created with Odnallak DNA, and bioengineered with Terran DNA to appear human,” he agreed. “But you also have chromosomes that are identical to the Jxin’s. Approximately twenty-three.”

“What does that mean?” Reever asked.

“It means that Joseph cloned me from his cells,” I said slowly. “But Maggie added some of her DNA.” I met his gaze. “It means Maggie
is
my mother.”

A warning signal came over the com, and I went over to answer it. “Medical Bay.”

“Cherijo, we have intercepted the Odnallak craft,” Xonea said. “The shifter is not responding to our signals. Readings indicate that the craft is on a direct course for an unidentified, newly formed anomaly.”

“He has also created a new rift,” Shon said.

“Cherijo, we can pursue the Odnallak, but not before he reaches the anomaly,” Xonea told me.

I knew what he was saying. The crew of the
Sunlace
had barely survived the first passage we had made through the derelict’s rift, and our ship was still in desperate need of repairs. But if the shifter escaped into the past and destroyed the Jxin, we would wink out of existence, and none of this would matter.

I exchanged a long look with my friend and my husband. “Under the circumstances, ClanBrother, the only thing I can advise is that we follow them in”

“Agreed,” he said. “Prepare for time transition.”

We barely had enough time to alert the medical staff before the
Sunlace
reached the rift. As Xonea issued orders for the crew to brace for impact, Reever and Shon and I left the immersion room and joined my staff. I didn’t mind Reever pulling me into his arms as the first of the rift’s lights appeared around us.

If we didn’t make it this time, there was no place I would rather have been.

The passage was just as cold and frightening as it had been the first time, but it didn’t seem to last as long. When we emerged from the blinding light, we were on the deck but uninjured. This time everyone regained consciousness almost immediately.

“Something’s already changed,” I said, spreading my hand over an odd lightness in my abdomen. “Do you feel that?”

Shon touched his chest. “Yes.” He opened the front of his tunic, and revealed the touch- healer marks in his fur. Now there were three: one golden, one black, and a new silver mark between them. “What does it mean, Cherijo?”

“I don’t know.” I looked at Reever, who was studying his hands. “What is it?”

“My scars.” He showed me the smooth backs of his hands. “They have disappeared.”

“Our coming here may have already altered our timeline.” I didn’t feel changed in any way, however, and my memories were still intact. So were Reever’s and Shon’s, or they wouldn’t have noticed the subtle changes. I went to the nearest console and signaled Command. “Xonea, where are we?”

“We are in orbit above Jxinok,” he said. “The Odnallak has just entered the upper atmosphere and is preparing to land.”

I looked at the men. “Notify launch bay. We’re going after them.”

The jaunt from the ship to the surface gave me time to think, although I still didn’t know what we could do to stop the shifter. Nor did I know what power he would have with the infinity crystal in his possession. The only hope I had was what my body had done to the crystal in the immersion tank. Maggie had told me over and over that both crystals couldn’t be destroyed. I knew from my encounters with the black crystal that it was impervious to everything. How had I managed to neutralize them?

The Jxin use the infinity crystal to create life. The Odnallak created the black crystal, which destroys it. What am I missing?

We landed a few minutes after the Odnallak touched down, near a small Jxin settlement. We found the shifter’s craft, but it was empty.

“They have gone to the village,” Shon said, pointing to two sets of footprints in the dirt, and a third set of elongated marks between them.

Reever knelt and touched the soil. “She must be unconscious. They dragged her.”

I hadn’t thought of how this must be for him. “We’ll get her back, Duncan.” And then I’d be gracious and let him go to her. Somehow.

The settlement appeared to be much more primitive, with dwellings built close to the ground out of crafted wood and quarried stone. The people we saw as we walked into the settlement were also different—dressed in handmade garments, and using hand-tooled implements. I saw the faces of children, young adults, and elderly people among the settlers, and caught a glimpse of a cleared field beyond the tree line, and planted crops.

“Just how far back did we come?” I murmured to Reever as the Jxin settlers noticed us and began walking toward us.

“It appears we are in the time before their first industrial age.” Reever stepped forward and held out his hands in a peaceful gesture. After some hesitancy, one of the older men came and took his hands.

My husband closed his eyes as he absorbed the Jxin’s language. Then he spoke to him and the settler replied at length.

“They saw them pass through the settlement,” Duncan told us. “They were headed for the quarry.” He exchanged a few more words with the settler, who nodded. To us he said, “This male will guide us there.”

Another man called out something in a loud, unpleasant voice. Most of the other settlers gave him some placid looks but didn’t respond. After a few moments he stalked off in disgust, followed by three other scowling settlers.

“Let me guess,” I said, watching them go. “Those are the undesirables.”

The friendly settler gestured for us to follow him, and led us along a winding trail with deep ruts into the forest. We emerged from the trees onto a rocky plain, the center of which had been dug out in tiers that descended out of view. I noticed the sunlight glittering on some of the stones, and bent to pick up a small pebble near the edge of the pit. It was studded with tiny golden crystals.

Shon scanned it. “Dormant infinity crystal.” He moved his scanner around in a slow sweep. “The soil here is saturated with it.”

“Something is happening down in the pit,” Reever said, and then the ground shook, throwing us all off-balance.

A transparent bubble rose out of the pit, enlarging as it grew and attaching itself to the sides of the quarry. Wherever it touched stone, it crystallized into clear, three-sided formations.

The settler paled and babbled something at Reever before he ran off.

“What did he say?” Shon asked.

“The translation is difficult,” my husband said. “It was something like, ‘The stars have awakened.’ ”

“Not the stars.” I watched the upper vault of the bubble solidify into a shining dome. “The crystal has.” Something jabbed into my back, and I whirled around to face the unfriendly settler and a small group of his pals. He held a curved blade fastened to the end of a shaft made from a root that curled around his hand and forearm.

Reever offered his hands again, palms up, and spoke to him gently. The settler snapped back at him and gestured toward the pit.

“Tell him we didn’t do this,” I suggested.

“He knows we did not,” Reever said. “He is ordering us to go into the dome.”

I saw the hair around Shon’s neck rising. “I think that would probably be a good idea.”

As the settlers marched us down into the pit, I noticed some of the scars on their hands: slashes that looked exactly like the ones that had disappeared from Reever’s skin. “Duncan.”

“I know. I see them.” He said something to one of the men, who responded with a snarl. “Jxin children of this time are taught to control their emotions and desires from an early age. These men could not learn those disciplines.”

“That is why they’re forced to live on the fringes of society,” Joseph said as he met us outside the dome. “They are used for the manual labor that the other settlers do not wish to perform themselves, and they are not permitted to breed outside their caste. But they are not called undesirables in this time. That won’t happen for another thousand years.” He smiled at me. “I had expected to see my son, not my daughter.”

“I’m your clone, not your kid. Where are the women?”

“Inside, waiting for you.” He gestured toward the dome, and an archway formed. “Come. Let me show you what you have made possible.”

We followed Joseph inside the dome, which was still forming on the inside. I saw enormous shafts of infinity crystal shooting up from the rocky ground to serve as supports for the upper dome, and others growing into complex shapes that weren’t as easily identified.

“What is all this?” I demanded.

“You must have a name for everything. It is as annoying a habit now as it was when you were a child.” He gazed around, almost beaming with pride. “This is a place of transformation, where the future will shortly be decided. Call it whatever you like.”

Maggie appeared, dragging a struggling Jarn behind her. Her black eyes told me she was still being controlled by the shifter. At the same time, the settlers seized Reever and Shon from behind and held their sharp blades to their throats.

“Duncan.” Jarn looked at him and then me. *“Cherijo?”

I forced a smile. “I’m sorry we had to meet under such unpleasant circumstances, Jarn.” I turned to Joseph. “Why bring her here?”

“Balance, which now must be restored.” He gestured toward Maggie, who dragged Jarn over to one of the crystal archways. As soon as she thrust her inside, dazzling lights enveloped her, and she vanished.

I felt sick. “What did you do to her?”

“She has been sent back to your time. Now that I have you, I have no more use for her.”

None of it made sense to me, but the shifter was insane, so it probably never would. “Now you’re going to do what? Destroy the Jxin, and the future, and take over the universe?”

“As much as I wish to, I cannot.” He grabbed my arm. “That is for you to do.”

“You’re out of luck, then.” I didn’t fight him; there was no need to. “I’m not doing a damn thing for you.”

“You wish to stop the black crystal, and save your timeline. It’s time you faced the truth about who created it.” He pushed me into the center formation, which was formed from a series of clear crystal panels. “Observe the Jxin, several thousand years after you met young Maggie. They have left their homeworld and have spread out among the stars.” He sneered. “To pass along their precious legacy.”

I watched the images. They displayed the Jxin being taken from slaver ships and left on hundreds of different worlds. “They weren’t passing anything. They were enslaved.”

“No, as I’m certain Maggie has told you, they merely needed transportation,” he chided. “Now watch.”

The enslaved Jxin seemed remarkably unconcerned about their pathetic situations. As they were abused and worked, they began to falter and then fell in their tracks. Their bodies were tossed into pits and off the sides of ships and into enormous fires. Each time a body was destroyed, a faint glow rose from it and twinkled out of sight.

“They ascended,” Joseph explained, “but the bodies they left behind were riddled with pathogens. They rotted into the ground and infected the plant life, and dissolved into the waters, polluting the aquatics. They tainted the scavengers who devoured their corpses. Even the wind that blew the ashes of their burned remains spread their disease over the face of those worlds.”

The crystal panels displayed new life emerging on the slaver planets, humanoid life. It crawled down from the trees and out of the swamps and emerged from the woods. The humanoids joined together in tribes and occupied caves, and then began making and using tools to kill game and build crude shelters.