Armageddon (57 page)

Atton pulled the trigger, and Omnius’s body jerked as the pistol burned a hole in his gut. His expression contorted with pain, and his eyebrows drew together in an almost comical look of betrayal.

“Atton? I d-didn’t predict that…”

The flickering silver light went out of Omnius’s eyes as his augmented reality contacts deactivated themselves. The drone holding him stepped away, allowing Omnius to crumple to the deck.

Atton stared at Omnius’s body. “If you’re god, then god is dead,” he said.

“Atton, what have you done?” Ethan yelled, his chest heaving desperately. “We
needed
him! Trinity died! Now who’s going to bring her back?”

Atton looked up, his eyes shimmering with tears. “My wife is dead, too.”

“No one is dead,” Therius interrupted. “Least of all me.”

“What do you mean
you’re
not dead?” Atton asked.

“You said God is dead, but I’m standing right here.”

Ethan’s jaw dropped. “Who are you?”

“I am Etherus.”

Chapter 52

“W
hat do you mean, you’re
Etherus?
” Ethan asked. “You
created
us?”

Therius smiled. “I think it would be better if I showed you.” Turning to the drone who had been holding Omnius, he said, “Seven Sixty Seven, take us to Ethan’s ship, please.”

Ethan watched the drone go
clanking
across the control room to the exit. Therius went next, and everyone followed close on his heels. Ethan studied the man more carefully now, trying but failing to see through his humanity.
There’s no way he’s Etherus. He’s insane, that’s what he is.

In the corridor beyond the control room, there were dozens of drones standing frozen in mid-stride or toppled over on the deck. All of them were deactivated by the virus, just as Therius said.

Ethan tried to imagine the chaos on the surface of Avilon as millions of drone fighters rained from the sky.

“You said no one is really dead,” Ethan said, walking up beside Therius. “I guess that means you’re going to use the Trees of Life to bring them back?”

“The databanks are infected with the same virus that corrupted Omnius’s systems. All the data is unrecoverable.”

“What?”
Ethan’s heart sank.

“Have
faith,
Ethan. How did I bring
you
back on Origin? How did
I
return after Omnius killed me on Avilon?”

“I’m still waiting for the answer.”

“Then come.”

Feeling suddenly apprehensive, Ethan stopped walking. Alara came up and grabbed his hand.

“What other choice do we have?” she whispered to him.

None. That was what scared him.

They spent the next hour walking down corridors and riding down lift tubes before they finally returned to the hangar bay where Ethan had left his ship. The Icosahedron had been designed with quantum junctions as the primary form of transport, but they were all offline now that the jamming field was back.

When they reached the
Trinity
, Therius stopped at the foot of the boarding ramp and waited. “Lead the way.”

Ethan led the way to the cockpit. He grimaced once more as he was forced to walk around the Rictans’ bodies.

“So much needless bloodshed…” Therius said as he came into the cockpit behind him and Alara.

“Those nanite bombs you dropped aren’t exactly helping,” Atton said.

Ethan sat in the pilot’s chair and began spinning up the ship’s reactors, while Alara ran systems’ checks from the copilot’s station.

“The nanites will deactivate themselves soon,” Therius replied. “I built a kill switch into them.”

Ethan fired up the engines and hovered the
Trinity
off the deck, turning it to face the hazy blue wall of static shields. He still hadn’t decided whether or not to believe Therius. He had a terrible feeling the man was skriffy as a space rat, and no one who had died was ever coming back.

“Where are we going?” Ethan asked as he rocketed out of the hangar and into space.

“There.” Therius pointed to the gravidar display, to a tear in the repetitive landscape of the Icosahedron. That jagged line ran straight through the otherwise perfectly spherical shell, providing a way out.

Ethan set course. Along the way a surviving Union ship hailed him.

“Unidentified corvette transport, please identify yourself!”

Ethan keyed the comm for a reply, but before he could say anything, Therius spoke over his shoulder.

“This is Admiral Therius. Omnius has been defeated. Spread the word to the rest of the fleet. Have them cancel their quantum jumps and board the Icosahedron to take control of it; there’s no need to retreat anymore.”

“Admiral Therius? Your ship was captured. We thought—”

“You’re not the first person to accuse me of dying today,” Therius said, sending Atton a wry smile. “But I assure you, I am very much alive. Send the message, Captain.”

“Yes, sir.”

The comms went silent, and Ethan guided them out through the ragged tear in the Icosahedron. The gap was surprisingly wide, and crowded with debris. To either side of them Ethan saw the internal structure of the Icosahedron laid bare, with thousands of decks torn open and slumping on top of each other.

“What happened here?” Ethan asked.

“When I first started jamming Omnius, his Facets were still coming together around Avilon. Without him to guide them in, they began colliding with each other.”

“Where are you taking us?” Atton asked. “What could you possibly have to show us that will support any of what you’ve said?”

“I’m taking you to Origin,” Therius replied.

“That’s in the Getties,” Ethan said. “My ship doesn’t have a quantum jump drive. I can’t take us there.”

“I know, which is why I’ve brought Origin to you.”

“What?” Atton burst out. “You jumped an entire planet here? How is that possible?”

“You think Omnius is the only one who can create a planet? Why do you think Origin was never found? Because it kept moving.”

“Why would you need to create an entire planet?” Alara asked.

“To guard a secret that’s been hidden since the day we created humans in our image.”

“
We
?” Ethan echoed. “We, who?”

“We, the Immortals.”

* * *

Ethan was still reeling in shock by the time he saw Origin on sensors.

“How did you jump an entire planet into orbit around Avilon’s sun without Omnius noticing?” Atton asked.

“Most of the time he was being jammed, and when the jamming field wasn’t active, the planet’s cloaking shield was. It would have taken an active scan for Omnius to find Origin, and his attention was elsewhere.”

Ethan still didn’t believe Therius. There was plenty of evidence to suggest that humans had evolved naturally, just like any other species. The best Therius could do would be to help them fill in the gaps in their evolution. He couldn’t prove that he’d created them—whoever
he
really was.

Ethan clung to those rationalizations as he guided them down through Origin’s atmosphere. Seeing clouds streak by the cockpit, he frowned. If Origin was an artificial planet, then why did it look so natural?

“Head for the fortress,” Therius said.

Ethan set course for the only man-made structure on the surface besides the obelisk-shaped ruins. He remembered Atta had called those obelisks tombstones. He’d never had a chance to take a look at them, but he was far more curious about their destination. Therius wanted them to go to the fortress, and Ethan could think of only one reason for that. He thought back to the underground chamber he and the Rictans had stumbled into … the locked doors, one of them leading into a medical supply locker inside the fortress, the other one leading to who knew where.

What’s behind door number two?

The ground peeked through the cloud cover in bright green scraps. Then the clouds parted altogether revealing a sprawling carpet of jungle and a distant ridge of mountains. In the distance lay the towering fortress where Therius had raised his army to fight Omnius. That fortress had come complete with cloning facilities, which Therius had used to bring him and thousands of others back to life after they’d died on Avilon. Ethan’s brow furrowed as he thought about that. Those facilities could easily be used to do exactly what Therius claimed—to create humanity.

No,
Ethan shook his head. That didn’t make any sense. If they’d been created, then where had all of the fossils of early humans come from? The progression from one pre-human species to another was too clear to be refuted by a purely extra-terrestrial origin of the species.

“I’ve been here before…” Alara whispered.

“So have I,” Atton said.

“Of course you have,” Therius replied. “In many ways, you never left.” Ethan shot him a look, and Therius just smiled. “Land on the rooftop,” he said.

Ethan did as he was told, and then he and the others followed Therius through the echoing, now-empty halls of the fortress. They traveled down lift tubes and stair cases, all the while trading worried looks with one another.

Finally, they came to a familiar-looking medical storage room. The hole the Rictans had blown in the door had been repaired, but the welds were thick and lumpy.

Ethan watched Therius walk up to it and open it with a wave of his hand. Beyond was the empty castcrete chamber Ethan remembered, and at the end of that, the mysterious second door.

Therius led them straight up to that door and waved his hand at the lifeless sensor. The door came to life and
swished
open, revealing a long, well-lit corridor beyond. The walls gleamed with a strange, metallic glow.

Therius walked inside, and Ethan hurried after him with Alara and Atton close behind. The air on the other side of the door hit him like a bucket of ice water. It was freezing. Ethan ran his hands along the glowing walls. They were smooth and neither cold nor hot to the touch.

The door slid shut behind them with a muffled
boom,
and Ethan turned to look, his suspicions intensifying.

“I don’t like this,” Alara whispered beside his ear.

He grabbed her hand and squeezed. “Come on,” he whispered back. “It’s too late to go back now.”

Up ahead Therius walked out onto a catwalk and stopped to lean on the railing. They joined him there, looking out into a vast chamber. The catwalk where they stood was just one of many, with subsequent levels visible through the metal grating under their feet and overhead. The catwalks ran between row upon row of glowing, transparent tubes, each of them frosted and marked with a glowing control panel.

“What is this place?” Ethan asked, afraid that he already knew the answer—the cold air, the transparent tubes and control panels, level upon level of walkways to access them… it was some kind of vast stasis room.

“This,” Therius declared, “is a prison.”

Chapter 53

“A
prison?” Ethan’s eyes widened. “Who are the prisoners?”

“You are.”

A sharp stab of adrenaline went cascading through Ethan’s body. “Are you trying to tell me you lured us down here to put us in one of those tanks?”

Therius shook his head. “No, I’m telling you that you are
already
in one of those tanks.”

“Prove it.”

“Very well.”

Therius walked down the catwalk, turned, and started down an intersecting one. As they went, Ethan became aware of Alara’s fingernails digging into his skin.

“Ethan…” she whispered. “We need to get out of here.”

“Yeah, I’m starting to think that might be a good idea…” he whispered back.

“There’s no need to be afraid,” Therius said, proving that there was also no need to whisper. “I’ll explain everything to you in just a minute.” He led them past hundreds of tanks until they came to one in particular. Then he placed a hand against the glass and suddenly the frosted texture became clear. Ethan’s heart pounded, and he wondered what they’d see inside that tank.