bag.”
Faragar grabbed the Cyon’s head and lifted him up. Wires that hung from below the abdomen scraped the floor. Faragar’s large fingers enclosed the head like it was a tiny ball. Vicious smile stretched his lips while two sharp teeth glinted beyond the visor. For a moment, Ailios thought Faragar’s hand would squash the ball.
Behind them Luthis kept arguing. “You’re not serious, are you? Faragar, you’ll be carrying a Cyon in that bag. You’ll be carrying him. That’s an insult to any human being.”
“Whatever team leader says, I obey,” Faragar said, and put the body in the bag. He flung it over his shoulder.
“That’s ridiculous! If he says jump into space, would you do it?”
“I already did.”
“But … but it’s a bloody Cyon we’re talking about here!”
Faragar turned to face him. He leaned closer. “Do I smell fear, rat?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, that thing is close to being dead.”
“Then shut your mouth.” Faragar turned to follow Ailios.
“Are you blind? Even if we take it with us there’s no way we can fix it. We would need a Cyon doctor for the job, and I, for one, do not know of any Cyon doctors.”
Ailios turned this time. “Unless you find a better clue, I suggest you do what Faragar said. What we have is still better than nothing.” Now the trapdoor, he thought. I have to find the trapdoor.
Ailios got back behind the computers and kneeled again. His hand trailed the floor, moving the dust away, hoping to find a chiseled line. It should be right here somewhere.
Another chamber was below which connected with the secret exit he used to escape in the last temple. Ailios remembered that there was this huge wall with the screen and the ancient symbols when he accidentally touched the red square that spat the piece of glass, now hanging on his neck. His hand moved to touch it, but he couldn’t reach through the visor. He forgot he was wearing the suit. It has to be something important, and most certainly valuable. But he never got to talk to a buyer, he was captured as soon as he left the temple, all smeared with ancient dust. Maybe there was another piece of glass under the floor.
“Luthis,” he called, “I need you to move the floor. There is another chamber beneath us.”
Luthis stepped closer. “You mean you don’t want me to sing this time?”
“The prayer thing was a jest, Luthis, now help me get this thing opened.”
“How do I know it’s not a jest again?”
“You can’t unless you try to open the trapdoor first.”
Luthis crossed his arms. “In that case, I’ll pass.”
“Faragar,” said Ailios, but Luthis extended his arm toward him.
“Not a step closer, Faragar,” he said. “I’ll send you on the wall if you try to punch me again.”
“Actually, it was a slap,” said Ailios.
Faragar growled, accepting the challenge. Ailios brought his hand up to stop him from going further–
And then Olivia’s voice startled him in his head – Team leader, we’re in trouble! Imperial ships are closing in on our position. They are asking for some code.
“What sort of code?” asked Ailios.
Luthis blinked a puzzled look. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m not talking to you.”
“Then who are you talking to?”
Would you shut up and listen! – Olivia screamed in his head. Ailios raised a finger to Luthis. I don’t know what sort of code – she went on. My contact never said a thing about a code. Listen, you need to get back to the surface. I’m coming back to pick you up right now.
“Bloody soul-burning rivers,” mumbled Ailios. “Imperial ships have caught on our little dolphin. We need to get out of here.”
Luthis crossed his arms again. “I’m not buying that.”
“Luthis, I’m serious! Get this thing opened!”
Ailios could tell that Luthis was considering it, but he wasn’t sure if Ailios was serious this time or not. Olivia – Ailios thought, focusing his words toward her as if to push them in her head – Please talk to Luthis and make him open the door.
What? – she said.
Just tell him that, he’ll know what it means.
After a second, Luthis looked at Ailios, confusion in those green eyes behind the visor, and then he turned at the floor and raised his hand. The floor started to shake and vibrate and probably even squeal, if they could hear it. The metal below their feet started to deform as Luthis tightened his face and gritted his teeth. His hand became a fist.
“C’mon, c’mon…” whispered Ailios. The metal started to crease and move up. Luthis turned his fist up and swiped aside. The metal crumpled and flew the same way his hand went and hit the wall with a blast of sand. And then there it was – a dark hole gaping from the floor. Ailios jumped in first. He caught himself on his feet. A sudden bright beam lit the chamber from above. Both the light and Faragar came down. Ailios let them go first through the next door while he approached the computer on the wall. He wanted to see if there was a piece of glass left inside. Ailios’s fingers touched the spot. The slot where the glass came from in the other temple was empty here. Someone must’ve taken it already. At least we have the Cyon, Ailios thought to console himself. Maybe he knows what happened here and where to go next. And he broke into the fastest run his legs could give.
Right before he reached the exit Luthis’s beams flashed into his eyes. Then they turned toward the walls in the dead end they found themselves in. This time Luthis couldn’t open the door as he didn’t know which wall to force out. He obviously didn’t want to spend more of his energy for nothing. Ailios pushed him aside and moved a metal plate on the right wall. His fingers danced into another combination of squares and the ceiling started to open. Steps appeared from the darkness.
Olivia, we’re out – thought Ailios as he made his final step out of the temple – where are you? He looked up, waiting for her response. Floating debris and scavenger ships towing chunks away from Timor was all he could see and not a sign of his robotic yellow dolphin. In the background, Palatine stood ominous. Lightning flashed across the orange-grayish globe. Blinking red dots hovered in orbit. Millions of Cyons preparing to slaughter my people, Ailios thought in sudden anger.
“Gods,” he heard Luthis mutter. “We are going to lose, aren’t we?”
Faragar slapped his fist on his chest, bared his teeth. “Let them come.”
Ailios for once agreed with Luthis. The odds were definitely not in their favor. Maybe if they could get out of here, make the injured Cyon talk; if they can use the sect’s reproduction secrets against the Cyons…
Olivia where are you? – Ailios thought again. And then he noticed one dot moving away from five others. Lights extended from the five toward the running one. Beam weapons. The realization made his stomach churn. He knew that the running dot was his ship.
Imperial ships are attacking us, team leader – came the response – we can’t get to you. I will draw them away from Timor and come back for you. I … I am sorry.
Ailios stared at the dot. It was faint, getting fainter, and then disappeared.
“Where’s our ship?” asked Luthis. “Why isn’t she coming?”
Ailios looked at him. He felt the grimness of the words when he uttered them. “It’s gone.”
LUCIUS
The emperor stared through the glass wall, his eyes focused on a monitor that sat on a rusty table. Its black display had a white, jagged line stretching from one end to another, its pattern the same – small peak up, small peak down, straight line. Repeat. The peaks coincided with the sound of a weak heartbeat pulsing from a set of speakers above the monitor.
Lucius had seen hundreds of Bion hearts in his lifetime, all beating strong even after he pulled them out from a savage. But this one was slow, too weak for anyone to live with it. Yet there it was – a live patient on the operating table. Now its life rested completely in Doctor Modius’s hands.
; “Increase oxygen levels,” said the doctor without lifting as much as an eyebrow from the table. His hands moved over the body with swift and precise motions of a man who knew what he was doing.
Clodius turned a knob on a machine next to the heart rate monitor. “Oxygen levels increased,” he said. He rejoined Modius whose metal hands gleamed under the operating lights.
“Hold here,” said Modius. One metal hand grabbed a wire sprouting from the abdomen. “And here.” Another hand moved over Modius’s and held where Clodius was told. “Gently. Be careful with the tissue.” Lucius heard a clap and the patient twitched. “Watch it!” said Modius. “I said gently.”
“Is he going to live?” Valeria took a step closer to the glass wall. Her palm touched its smooth surface.
Lucius didn’t care if it was going to live or not, he was concerned by what it was. Something similar had already tried to kill him on Timor. It was their fault he was a rusty cripple instead of the golden emperor he was meant to be. For a moment Lucius looked at the creature and wondered. How could anyone do such thing? It was covered in skin, and not the synthetic one that humans used to cover their metal frame underneath, but a true organic skin, just like those Bion savages had. It can’t be Dillius, he thought, the man never worked with Bion DNA before. But this thing had cybernetic skeleton made out of titanium where that loathsome skin had covered most of the bones. Maybe Dillius had something to do with that.
The creature’s legs weren’t developed properly, Lucius realized as Modius moved aside to take a scalpel from a steel table. The legs had titanium bones, but the skin never reached below the thigh. Maybe that’s why they left it here on Burnum – to die.
Lucius recalled his history lessons about the ancients trying to combine both cybernetics and organics, to improve their kind, but they never actually succeeded. It was one of their major failures. Eventually they chose cybernetics as they were far superior to their organic counterpart. Apparently someone did succeed in combining the two.
“It’s not he, but it,” said Arrius, standing tall above the emperor. “And I say we kill it. I don’t want this thing lurking around.”
Valeria’s eyebrows on her reflection turned down, her hand still on the glass. “But he’s just a boy,” she said. “He’s dying, captain, he’s hardly any treat to us.”
In front of the emperor’s eyes came the boy from his dream, Oliver, and he remembered that he was a boy himself. He didn’t have metal bones like the one on the table, but his skin was much the same. Did I look so frail in my dream as well?
“Abomination is what it is,” Arrius declared. “Not a boy. And we would do well if we leave it to die.”
Clodius’s feet clanked on the floor as he circled around the table. He held wires and tools, and helped Modius keep the thing alive. Nasty sound, thought Lucius. But it was still better than wheels; which reminded him…
Squad leader – sent Lucius – did you find any legs?
We have just finished searching the battleship, Your Highness. They striped clean both the ship and the outpost. There are no prosthetics. I am sorry, Your Highness.
Lucius clenched his fist. I need legs.
“Do you think the Bions did this?” Valeria asked.
“I would bet my life on it,” answered the captain.
“Then I would have to take it,” said Lucius. He uncurled his fingers and turned to meet Arrius’s eyes, glowing bright blue.
Arrius lowered his head, metal circles on his skull glinting faintly. “If it please you, Your Highness.”
“It does not please me, captain. You are a good man, and you should know that this cannot be a Bion doing. They consider cybernetic enhancements as blasphemy.” Lucius remembered the story that Olybrius once told him. Bions were pure, not defiled by technological implants, as Olybrius had put it. “Loathing is what they feel for cybernetics,” said the emperor. “They hate us as much as we hate