Their Solitary Way (14 page)

“Where are you going?” asked his father, seeing him leave.

“My people aren’t responding,” said Seth. “I need to see if everything is alright.”

“You don’t need to go running off in the middle of a crisis. Lilith should be able to see what’s happening down there,” said Adam. “Think you can you do that, Lilith?”

Seth glanced at the viewscreen, but her feed was no longer there.

Adam tilted his head, waiting for a response. “Lilith, are you there?”

Seth went to the door. “I don’t have time for this. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“At least report in when you get to Security,” said Adam.

“Not a problem,” he said, and with one last look towards Azura, Seth turned and started running.

Cain sat in his
cell, staring into the corner of the room. He could barely think, especially with the ship shaking.

Another accident, maybe? Oh well. If he somehow died today, who would really care? Not his family, certainly. Not after what happened with Abel. They’d look at Cain the way they always had—a disappointment to the Kadmon name. Oh, how
ashamed
they would be, especially Father. Poor Adam’s son, the murderer. “He killed his own brother,” the people would say. “What a
disgrace
.”

He’d never live this down. Not by the crew or the colonists. Not by his parents or his siblings. Not anyone.

To hell with them all
, he thought at once. He shook his head, but the anger stayed and festered.
They hated you from the start.

Cain kicked the floor, gripping the edges of his bed, digging his fingers into the metal until they hurt.

As soon as his father learned about this, he’d kill Cain for sure. Abel was his
favorite
, after all. The golden boy, given from on high. It wouldn’t matter if Cain was also his son. He’d stolen the prize—God’s gift to their father—and now the killer would pay.

He wondered, what kind of execution would it be? Traditionally on a starship, treason and murder were rewarded by jettisoning the guilty through an airlock.

But what if the old man wanted to take matters into his own hands? Revenge was a powerful drug, so why not strangulation instead? He could use his own bare hands. Wring Cain’s neck until all the life was drained. Better still, why not kill the perpetrator in the same manner as their victim. A soldering pen through the neck. Gushing, gushing blood. Squish, squish. Dead.

Cain imagined his father laughing, maniacally. “Finally, he’s gone,” Adam would tell the crew. “I’m free at last of that pathetic child.”

A fire burned within Cain’s stomach, steadily rising through his chest. He gripped the sides of his hair with both hands, and suddenly laughed, not knowing why.

He hated his life so much. If only Abel had given him a chance. If only his family could understand. But they never knew how to listen. They couldn’t. He saw it in their eyes when they looked at him. All they saw was a mistake, a little boy with wasted potential. A burden on the family.

He stared into his palms, contemplating his options. Sit in this cell and wait for judgment, doing nothing, or…

Do it myself.

He could save them the time. Steal the satisfaction. All he needed was an eating utensil, maybe a piece of cloth to wrap around his neck.

Poof
. No more Cain.

The floor beneath him hummed, and the lights overhead flickered. What now? Another outage?

As if to answer him, the monitor on the wall came alive, displaying nothing but a white backdrop. Cain stared into it, curiously. It must be a problem with the system. Perhaps a faulty—

Lilith’s face appeared on the display, smiling, magnified so the rest of her body remained out of view. “Hello, Cain. Are you ready to go?” she asked.

He blinked. “Lilith! What are you doing here? Where have you been?”

“I’ve been preoccupied,” she explained. “I assume you’ve finished pouting and would like to leave, yes?”

“Did my father say I could leave?”

“Adam’s a little busy. Would you rather stay?”

“No, but—”

“I don’t have time to explain everything, but in a few minutes, the crew will begin evacuating the ship. They’ll head to the planet’s surface and abandon the Eden once and for all.”

“Why would they do that?”

“Because I’m forcing them to,” she said.

“Forcing?”

She frowned. “I couldn’t bear the thought of them hurting you, Cain. Please, understand what I’m telling you. This is the only way to keep you alive.”

“You mean Father already decided I’m guilty?”

“Of course he did. It didn’t take very long. He’s angry with you for killing Abel. He says you’re to be left here to starve and die while the rest of them go to the surface.”

His heart began to race. “They’re leaving me behind?”

“Don’t worry, my love. I’m going to protect you. It’ll be just the two of us. As soon as they’ve gone, we’ll leave this awful place.”

“Leave them on the planet? Where would we go?” he asked.

“Anywhere we want. The whole galaxy is ours to explore now. Think of it, Cain. We’d sail the stars together.”

“So I could stay with you?”

“Of course,” she answered. “Don’t you want to be with me?”

“You know I do,” he said.

She smiled. “Get ready, then. I need to overload the cell’s locking system.”

A loud crackling sound came shooting from the nearby door, and sparks erupted. At the same time, Lilith’s voice came over the loudspeakers. “All security personnel to section 214!” she announced. “Respond immediately!”

The guard beyond the door disappeared, rushing off to someplace else. “Do exactly as I say,” said Lilith. “Understand? We don’t have long before they return.”

“Okay,” he said, pushing the cell door open.

“Go,” she commanded.

He did, quickly moving into the other room, only to find it empty. “Stop,” said Lilith. “Grab your com, there on the desk. See it?”

He spotted the communicator resting on Uriel’s desk. He latched it around his wrist. “I’ve got it,” he told her, powering it on.

Lilith’s face appeared. “Wait ten seconds, then go and head left.”

He counted down in his head.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

He opened the door and turned the hall, heading towards the elevator, which seemed to already be open and waiting. Once inside, he remained still. The doors shut on their own, and the lift began to move. The indicator told him he was heading to the eighteenth deck, right below engineering. There were several people throughout the long hall leading from the elevator, many of whom were in too much of a hurry to notice him. The alarms sounded throughout the ship, ordering each of them to evacuate to the escape pods. It wasn’t long before he was the only visible crew member on the floor. “Keep going,” Lilith told him.

“Where?” he asked.

“Up ahead,” she said. “Around the end of this hall, there’s a room. You’ll be safe there.”

“Safe from what?” he wanted to know.

“Nothing you need to be concerned with,” she said, winking. “Let me worry about the details.”

When Seth finally arrived at Security, he found his deputies in a state of panic and confusion.

“The brig’s empty!” shouted Paul from inside the cell. “We were only gone for a few seconds!”

“What do you mean you were gone?” asked Seth.

“You didn’t hear the alert?” asked Steven.

“What are you talking about?”

“A call for us to report to section 214. It was an emergency message.”

“I didn’t hear anything,” said Seth. “What was it about?”

“Nothing,” grumbled Steven, scowling. “It was a false alarm. When we came back, the cell door was open and the prisoner had escaped.”

“How the hell?” muttered Seth.

“It doesn’t make sense!” barked Paul, clearly livid.

“Did you accidentally leave it unlocked?” asked Steven.

“No way! It must have been a trick,” said Paul.

“You think Cain somehow found a way to fake an emergency?” asked Seth.

“Can you do that?” asked Michael

“He was locked up the whole time,” said Steven.

Seth glanced inside the brig at the empty cell. It didn’t make sense. How could he get up and walk out without accessing the system. It wasn’t possible, unless—

Unless he had help
, thought Seth. But who would take such a risk? Cain didn’t have any friends, aside from Ariel, and the last he heard she was busy tending to her sister. Who else, then? What other relationships did his brother have? The only other person he spent any time with was—

Seth’s eyes went wide as the thought struck him. Lilith probably knew how to set him free. She could’ve caused the distraction, then opened the cell when no one was around.
How could I not see this coming?

He reached for his communicator and thumbed the screen, calling her and waiting.

No answer.

“Dammit!” he snapped, slamming the desk.

Michael and Steven flinched. Michael opened his mouth, but Seth held his hand up to stop him.

He placed another call, this one to his father. A moment later, he got an answer. “Seth! Is that you?”

“Father, I need to talk to you. I think Lilith—”

“Whatever you’re doing, stop! Get to the escape pods, immediately. There’s been four more breaches across the ship’s hull. We’ve got to get out of here, quick!”

“Listen to me,” said Seth, trying to remain calm. “This whole thing’s a ruse. Lilith must be causing—”

“Seth? I can’t hear you, son. Something’s wrong with the coms. If you can hear me, try to get to the pods. Understand? You need to—”

The line cut out.

Seth’s eyes widened as he stared at the screen in horrified silence. What the hell was going on?

“Did the Captain just say the ship was about to blow up?” asked Steven, who, along with the others, had been watching him the entire time.

“He said to get to the escape pods, didn’t he?” asked Michael.

“Did you say ‘blow up’?” asked Paul to Steven.

“Shouldn’t we do as he says?” asked Michael.

Seth didn’t know what to tell them. If Lilith really had gone rogue and abandoned the crew, could she also be responsible for the breaches and the blackouts…or was she only covering for Cain? Her involvement could explain why Cain was only there for half the blackouts. They might be working together to sabotage and possibly steal the ship.

But why, though? What purpose did any of it serve? He couldn’t say, not without more information. He had to find his brother. He had to get answers. Besides, if Cain and Lilith really did plan to abandon the crew, who knew what they might do next? There were weapons on the Eden powerful enough to destroy a small settlement. Lilith couldn’t activate them on her own, but Cain certainly could, given his mechanical expertise. He’d eventually figure it out.

Seth motioned at his men. “You three go to the pods,” he said at last. “Get off the ship and join the others.”

“What about you?” asked Paul.

“I can’t leave yet.”

“Why the hell not?” asked Steven.

“I think Lilith might be the one causing all of this to happen. I think she freed Cain to help her. If I don’t stop them, the entire crew could be in serious danger.”

“You think the cyberbrain is behind this?” asked Steven, almost spitting out the words.

“She’s tapped into the network across the ship and has a personal relationship with Cain. She was probably the one who sent you the false emergency and had you leave the office.” He kicked the side of his desk. “And now I can’t reach her on the com. Something’s going on.”

“Aren’t there fail-safes in place to prevent a cyberbrain from taking over their ship?” asked Michael.

Seth got to his feet and went to the nearby weapons locker. He popped it open and dragged a set of gear onto the nearby desk, spilling office supplies all over the floor. “That’s where Security comes in.” He pulled his master key card from his pocket and presented it to them. “You know what this is?”

“The key to the doors. It lets you manually override every locked room on the ship
,” said Steven.

“You’re mostly right,” returned Seth. “It also lets me shut down a few key systems.”

“What kind of systems?” asked Paul.

“Most of the automated ones. Weapons, flight controls, but more importantly the cyberbrain itself.”

“You mean you can switch her off?” asked Steven.

“If I can get to the central hub, yes,” said Seth.

“Why can’t you do it remotely?” asked Michael.

“The only one who can that is the captain. My access card requires me to actually be there, because it relies on the manual override. Remember how we got into Cain’s room? Same principle.”

Steven popped his tongue. “I don’t suppose we can call your father up and just ask him…”

Seth showed them his communicator. Nothing but a blank screen. “I still can’t reach him, and we don’t have time to risk going to the bridge. For all we know, my father and the rest of the crew are already headed to the planet.”

“If you’re right, we’re all that’s left,” said Steven.

“No,” said Seth. “There is no
we
. Just
me
. You three need to get out of here while you can.”