Chapter Eleven

The sun was hotter and more intense than Maxim thought that it was going to be as they made their way across the desert. It was an odd feeling considering the darker characteristic of the sun here. It was as if the sun were constantly in shadow, shedding the power of the heat onto Penthos, but not giving as much light. The small group that was traveling together walked nearly in silence as if none wanted to sacrifice the energy that it would take to speak. Maxim occasionally brought his water pouch to his lips for a sip, but tried to pace himself as much as possible. The last thing he needed was to run out of water when they were still out on the planet. Mikana were strong and could withstand incredible extremes when needed, but it would be difficult, and he didn’t want to put his body through the stress when he knew that he was going to need all of the strength and energy that he could maintain to face whatever might be waiting for them on the rest of the journey and on the ship once they arrived.

He glanced over at the Meldor as they made their way further away from the compound. It walked calmly, not seeming at all agitated or uncomfortable, unlike the first time that he had seen the creature. Now that he had learned more about him and was able to see him for what he was, a captive and slave as much as any of the hybrids, the women, or even Aegeus, he commiserated with the animal far more. The brutality that the Meldor had shown to Kyven and Emerie hadn’t been out of some type of vengeance, fury, or even pleasure at the violence. Instead, it was out of fear and desperation, the drive for survival that compelled even the most tortured and miserable of creatures to do anything that it took of them to overcome what they encounter and overcome to stay alive. It wasn’t the Meldor’s fault that he had been put through the excruciating pain and severe training that Ryan had subjected him to. Even though this was an animal, Maxim could see so many parallels between the Meldor and the people he had come to know in the time since encountering the Denynso. The creature had been separated from all he had ever known and anything that he had ever loved in order to force it into violence and servitude.

“How much further?” he asked, breaking the silence that they had maintained.

The sound of his voice seemed to startle Gyyx, who turned to look at him sharply, almost as though he had forgotten that Maxim was even walking along beside him.

“I don’t know,” Pyra said. “I’m having trouble remembering how far we walked when we got out of the ship. It looks different.”

“It’s a desert,” Maxim said. “It all looks the same.”

“It does,” Pyra said. “But it doesn’t. I can’t tell where we’ve walked before. I feel like we’ve missed something.”

“The car,” Azrael said.

“The car?” Maxim asked.

“The vehicle that Jonah and Rain designed. We passed by it when we were going to the compound. We haven’t passed it yet. Either it has been moved, or we went the wrong direction.”

Ahead of them Maxim could see the slight hill that had been the grounds of their first battle.

“We haven’t gotten to it yet,” he said. “That’s where we fought. You had already passed the vehicle by the time that we got here.”

“We’ve been walking for so long,” Gyyx said. “We should have passed it by now.”

“Enough of the complaints.”

The men all looked at Pyra, surprised by the sudden depth in his voice. He had not shown his aggression since leaving the compound, remaining almost meditative as they progressed. Now, though, he seemed to have returned to the loud, forceful leader that they had known.

“The more that you complain about it, the harder that this is going to be for all of us. Ryan didn’t choose Penthos because it was going to be easy or comfortable. He chose it because it’s difficult and because he believed that he could train up an army that would be far more capable of withstanding the conditions here than we can. Don’t prove him right. Besides, this isn’t about us. Think about the people in the ship who we are going to rescue. What have they been through in the time that we’ve been away. These last few weeks we’ve spent in the compound we’ve had shelter, plenty of food, and the strength of each other. What have they had? Have they encountered the hybrids in the time that we haven’t seen them? Have they not attacked us or tried to engage in battle with us because they have found the ship and have been concentrating on the people we left behind? Once they have been rescued and are safely back in the compound, then we can think about our own needs.”

Though Maxim understood what Pyra was saying, something about what he said didn’t sit well with Maxim. He thought about the people who had stayed in the ship when Pyra and the rest of the crew left to come to the compound to reconnect with them. He wondered if they were truly struggling the way that Pyra had suggested that they must be and if they were really rescuing them at all, or if they were merely reconnecting with them in the same way that the first crew connected with them in the compound. In the time that they had been on the ship, it seemed to Maxim that they could have emerged and sought out the help of the rest if they truly needed it. Unless, of course, Maxim’s first concerns and Pyra’s worries now were correct and they had been in danger or even attacked since the rest were gone.

If they were in danger, this small group was to rescue them. If they were as strong as the first group that came to the compound and had the same drive and determination to be a part of the rebellion as they were, though, this was not a rescue. This was a military maneuver. Maxim tried to think of it that way, not wanting to worry about them but rather to focus on them as their equals, as the other half of their forces who were joining with them to stand up against their common enemy. He knew that some of the people still on the ship were injured or the pregnant women, but they could be protected. Having them close would help to ensure that they were all kept safe while those who were capable joined in the fight so that one day they could all return to the lives that they deserved to live.

****

“Jacob, please. You need to stop.”

Jacob walked around Phaedra to the side of the room where he had tossed his bag after they found Frederick digging through it. He scooped it up off of the floor and put the items that had fallen out back in.

“I have to, Phaedra.”

“No, you don’t. You can stay here like you said that you were going to. You had the choice to leave when Pyra and the rest of the crew left here weeks ago. You didn’t. You decided to stay here with the rest of us and wait it out.”

“I know,” Jacob said, “but I told you that I regret that decision. I should have gone with them when I had the chance. I have a responsibility toward all of this. Especially now with what Frederick is doing. We can’t just ignore that. We can’t pretend that he isn’t doing something incredibly suspicious and that might be putting all of us in serious danger. I have to go out there. I need to find the rest of the crew and see what can be done.”

“They said that they would be back,” Phaedra continued to argue. “They said that they would return when they could and that we would make our next moves then.”

“I can’t keep waiting around for Pyra and Maxim to decide that it’s time for some action to be taken. I’ve said it before and I’m going to say it again --- they are not in control of me. I might be a part of this now and I might be willing to offer my services and my loyalty to them, but I am still my own entity. I remained behind here to take care of you and make sure that you and the baby stay safe. Not because I was told to or because I was trying to behave.”

“So, stay with me,” Phaedra said, reaching out to grab onto Jacob as he started out of the room. “Stay here with me and take care of me. Make sure that I stay safe.”

Jacob turned toward her and tucked his hand around her face, stroking her cheek with his thumb.

“You are safe,” he said. “You are far stronger that I could ever have imagined that you would be. I’m not leaving you alone. Samira, Jane, Valerie, Leia, and the rest are still going to be here with you. I shouldn’t be gone long. They said that the compound should be easy to find from here, that we should be able to just walk and find it. I will go there and find them, let them know what’s going on, and we’ll be back. I promise.”

Phaedra looked at him like her heart was breaking, but that she knew that there was nothing she could say that would stop him. He was determined to do what he felt that he needed to in order to protect the entire mission. None of them knew who Frederick actually was. They had chosen him purely out of need and convenience, his piloting skills necessary to get them off of Earth and to Penthos and his presence in the transportation bay when they got there making it possible for them to leave quickly rather than looking for someone else. They had asked him to bring them to the desolate planet without asking questions, and now it seemed that they were facing serious consequences, harboring a man whose intentions they didn’t know and whose connections could prove catastrophic. It was enough that he had stormed into the observation hall and demanded their obedience. Now he was invading their private pods and going through their belongings, trying to tell them that there was someone on the ship that was threatening them, though he knew that that was not a possibility.

They had exhaustively reviewed the ship. They had walked through the rooms, scoured the corridors, dug through even the closets and storage cabinets for any sign that this ship might have been inhabited like the one that had brought the first crew to Penthos. They had used technology aboard to scan the entire space, checking for the life forces of each being that inhabited the ship. There had been nothing but the people they already knew were there, and Jacob could see no threat in any of them. It was only Frederick who was threatening them, putting any of them in any danger.

“Bring weapons with you,” Phaedra said.

Jacob nodded.

“I will,” he said. “I won’t need them, but I will bring them.”

“And if you do need them?”

“I won’t.”

Jacob kissed Phaedra, allowing his lips to linger on hers for a few soothing, delectable moments before stepping back and looking at her for a last time. She stared at him nervously, her hands running over the swell of her belly. It was becoming more noticeable by the day and he wondered when the time would come that he would deliver the child she carried within her and they would meet the unexpected, miraculous child that they would share and would build their family. That thought only fueled him more and Jacob stalked across the pod to pick up his weapon before heading toward the door to the ship.

“Be careful,” she said.

“I’ll be whatever I need to be.” He gave her one more swift kiss. “Secure the locks behind me. Make sure that they are all locked and that the shields go into place. Do not let me back in.”

“What?” Phaedra gasped.

Jacob took her wrist and stared into her eyes.

“You have to be strong,” he said. “Protect the ship. I will be back. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Her voice was shaking and still held questions, but she said the words as if she was afraid that if she didn’t, he would leave, and she would never have the opportunity to say them again. Jacob input the code that operated the door locks and turned the handle to disengage them completely and open the door. The heat from the desert outside hit him, but he pushed through it and stepped out onto the steps that led down off of the ship. He wanted to turn back and look at Phaedra again, but he didn’t. The longer that the ship’s locks were disengaged, the longer that the steps would be down, making the ship more vulnerable. He needed to get off of the steps as quickly as possible so that Phaedra could engage the locks and withdraw the steps to fully seal the ship’s shields again.

His feet sank into the hot sand and he had taken only a few steps when Jacob heard the sound of the steps drawing back up into the ship and the shields sliding into place. He braced himself and started across the desert sand.

Jacob felt like he had only been walking for a few minutes when he heard voices ahead of him. He stopped and tightened his grip on the weapon he held. The sun had started to slide away, leaving his eyes aching for light, and he stared into the shadowy space ahead of him to see who might be approaching. The voices had stopped, but now he could hear crunching like footsteps on the sand. He started toward it, resisting the urge to reach into his bag for a lightstick. He wanted to keep himself as hidden as possible and he knew that the glow would be more and more visible the deeper the evening became.

As he drew closer to the sound Jacob saw a massive silhouette coming toward him, a group of smaller figures clustered around it. He squared himself toward it and started to run. He had only gone a few yards when they noticed him. Rather than coming toward him, however, they paused. He stopped as well, watching as they individual silhouettes separated from the larger one.

“Who is that?” a voice yelled into the rapidly deepening shadows.

He immediately recognized it.

“Pyra?” he said.

“Who is it?” Pyra shouted again.

“Jacob,” he called back, starting to run toward them again.

“Jacob,” Pyra said when he was drawing close to them. “What are you doing out here? Why aren’t you on the ship? Has something happened?”

“Everyone is fine,” Jacob told him, “but something has happened. I came to find you.”

He recounted the situation with Frederick as fast as he could while being sure that he was giving them all of the details. When he finished, he looked between Pyra and the man he would soon learn was Maxim, watching as they exchanged glances.

“And you scanned the ship?” Pyra asked. “After the scan that we performed before leaving?”

“Yes,” Jacob said. “I personally watched the scans. There was nothing different from the first scans other than the crew you brought with you missing.”

“And he said that there was someone on the ship who wasn’t there for the right reasons?”

Jacob was frustrated by the question, angered that Pyra was forcing him to recount what he had just said rather than responding.

“Yes,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm. “But he wouldn’t elaborate. He didn’t tell us who he was talking about or what they might be doing that would possibly be putting all of us in danger.”

Pyra nodded.

“We need to get to the ship,” Maxim said. “Even if what he’s saying wasn’t true, he was still going through Jacob’s bag. There had to be a reason for that. We need to get him and the rest of the crew back to the compound where they can be watched better.”

It seemed to take far less time to get back to the ship and soon they were standing at its base again. Jacob walked up to the pre-determined spot beneath the ship and performed the knock that they had planned to announce their presence to the people inside. He waited a few seconds and then repeated the knock before returning to where the rest were standing so that whoever came to the door would be able to see him along with them. Phaedra looked out on him and her face brightened, but then her eyes moved to the huge creature that the men had brought with them and she took a step back.

“It’s alright,” Pyra shouted up to her. “This is the Meldor. He’s no threat to you.”

“How are we going to get him inside?”

“There should be a vehicle hatch in the back like on the ship that brought the rest here,” Pyra said. “Go to the control room and look at the ship map. When you’ve found it, go to the door. We’ll be waiting outside.”

Phaedra jumped into his arms as soon as the door to the hatch opened and Jacob held her close.

“How did you get back so quickly?” she asked.

“They were already coming,” Jacob told her. “They were planning on coming to get us and bring us back to the compound.”

“Have you told them about Frederick?”

“Yes,” Jacob told her. “They want to see him.”

Jacob stepped out of the way while the men led the Meldor into the vehicle hatch and Maxim lowered a bag to the floor. He watched as Maxim pulled out a wrapped package and opened it, tossing its contents toward the animal, which ate it in a matter of moments. When he was finished, Maxim stood, and they made their way through the hatch and into the main ship. He guided them toward the elevator that brought them up to the second floor and then to the room where he had left Frederick.

The pilot was pacing in the room when they released the locks and opened the door. He rushed toward the door, but the group stepped inside, positioning their bodies across the opening so that he wasn’t able through them.

“Jacob has told us what happened,” Pyra said.

“And did he tell you that I had an explanation?” the obvious infuriated pilot asked.

“He did,” Pyra said, “but I want to hear it from you.”

Frederick stepped up closer to them, but Maxim held up a hand, forcing the man back with the gesture.

“Who is this?” Frederick asked, looking at Maxim as if he hadn’t noticed that he was there until that moment.

“It doesn’t matter who I am,” Maxim said. “Answer Pyra.”

“This ship and everyone on it is in danger,” Frederick said.

“And how do you know this?” Pyra asked.

“I can’t explain that now,” he said. “It would be too risky. You are just going to have to believe me.”

“And why should we?” Azrael demanded. “None of us know anything about you and you aren’t giving us any kind of explanation that is worth anything. Why should we simply believe what you have to say rather than trusting our suspicions?”

“You are just going to have to,” Frederick said. “I know that you think that you found me in the transportation bay and asked me to be your pilot out of coincidence, but that’s not the case. I know much more about this ship and what is happening on it than you think I do. For now, I can’t tell you what I know. It is safer that way. But I will. When the time comes, when it is safe for all of us, I will tell you. But for now, you are just going to have to believe me.”

The pilot looked pleadingly at Pyra, the anger and frustration now gone from his expression. The Denynso warrior remained quiet for far longer than was comfortable. Jacob wanted him to respond, to say something, anything. He wanted Maxim to step forward and say something. These were the men who were supposed to be the leaders, who were supposed to be in charge of what was happening and guiding all of them. Yet they seemed not to know what they should do.

“Pyra?” Maxim finally said.

The warrior looked to Maxim and the two men exchanged a meaningful look that he didn’t understand. It carried in it moments that they had experienced well before Jacob encountered them, dark moments that obviously impacted both of them in serious ways.

“I don’t want to do it again,” Pyra said. “I can’t do that again.”

“This isn’t the same thing,” Maxim said. “You know that. You aren’t doing anything that isn’t justified.”

“And if he’s right?”

“Then we’ll find out. But for now, we can’t just trust that what he’s saying is true. He was right. We don’t all know each other. We’ve accepted that as part of what we’re facing, but there is still an element of risk that we can’t just ignore.”

Pyra nodded and looked back at Frederick.

“You’ll stay here,” he said. Frederick started to protest, but Pyra held up a hand to silence him. “We’ve had a long day and are tired. We need to eat and to rest. In the morning, we’ll do exactly what you think we should and get off of the ship. We’ll decide then what we’re going to do with you. Until then, you’ll stay here in this pod. We’ll bring you supplies for the night.”

Frederick looked tense, but resigned. He took a few steps back from the men and gave a single nod. He said nothing, and the men left the room, securing the locks back into place.

“He can’t get out of there?” Maxim asked.

Jacob shook his head.

“No. According to Frederick himself, this ship was created with isolation pods. They have no way of opening from the inside. There is nothing that he can do. We’ll pass the supplies to him through a hatch so that he can’t try to overpower anyone who comes. Until we open the door, he’s there.”

“Good,” Pyra said. “That will give us time to eat, rest, and check the injured. We need to make sure they will be ready to leave tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” Jacob asked. “We’re leaving the ship that quickly?”

“Yes,” Maxim said. “We need to leave first thing in the morning and get back to the compound. We’re safer all together. The faster we get back to the compound, the faster that all of us are more secure and we can decide on our next actions.”

They went back to the main floor of the ship and headed directly for the kitchen. Samira and Jane were sitting there and both women jumped up, scrambling to make food for the men as quickly as they could. Jacob stepped to the side of the room and held his arms out to Phaedra. She curled into them, sighing as her head came to rest on his chest. He kissed the top of her head and held her close, thankful that he was back in the ship with her, though he had been willing to travel as far as he would need to go to find the men.