Jelena saw it all happening at the same time as the images kept playing in her mind. Now, their ship was flying through the tunnels again, and piles of boulders fell atop it, burying it. The same thing that had happened to the old Kirian ship.
She tried to shove the images away, knowing she had pirates to worry about, but it was like a vid that she couldn’t stop. What were they? Warnings? Predictions of the future? And who was sending them? The artifact? Had the Starseers created some kind of warning buoy to play telepathic messages over the centuries?
The pirates were still firing. They reached Thor’s barrier twenty feet away, and one pounded it with an armored fist while another fired at it point blank.
Thor hoisted Jelena over his shoulder, turned, and jumped. She hadn’t seen him get the elevator door open, and she sucked in an alarmed breath as they plummeted into a dark shaft. They dropped three or four levels before landing at the bottom. No, not the bottom. They were on the top of a lift car.
Stay here. Thor set her down and yanked out his sword, flicking his wrist to extend the curving blue blade. And get yourself together, he added.
She flushed, irritated at having to be rescued and at not having control over her body. He crouched low and sprang back up the shaft, back to the open door they’d come through. Jelena could just make it out, thanks to the pirates’ headlamps.
Sword in hand, he landed on the ledge, then disappeared, running toward those pirates.
“Get yourself together,” she muttered, echoing his order. She clenched her eyes shut, angry at having to be told and angry at this strange intrusion.
Was it not bothering him at all? Maybe because he was stronger than she, he could simply brush it aside.
“If he can do it, I can do it.” Jelena slowly but deliberately walled off her mind, imagining herself a bricklayer placing each and every brick around her thoughts. She spattered mortar between and all over them, then turned a high-powered fan on the wall so it would dry quickly.
The exercise worked, and the images faded and finally disappeared. She regained control of her body and drove away the sensation of ants crawling, but she trembled in the aftermath, as if she’d exerted some Herculean physical effort.
“Wimp,” she grumbled and rose to her feet.
She spotted Thor’s pistol on the floor next to her boot and picked it up. Her staff had fallen from her hands too. She gripped both while focusing on keeping her mental barriers up. She could still feel the warning, or whatever it was, wanting to push its way into her mind.
Lights wavered and wobbled up above, and then it got a shade darker. Jelena could sense Thor battling the two pirates, pitting his enhanced sword against their rifles and armored bodies. He ought to beat them if more didn’t show up, but she had better get the door down here open in case he needed a quick retreat.
The car below seemed to be parked—or stranded—mostly on one level. From her spot on the roof of it, she would have to jump to reach the doors on the level above. But did Thor want to go out there? Or did they need to go down through the car and out on the next level?
Warily, she stretched out with her senses again. That was how she’d ended up with vids playing in her mind, so she was afraid to open herself up, but she needed to pinpoint the location of that artifact. Yes, it did still seem to be lower than her current position.
She patted around the top of the car and found a trapdoor. There wasn’t a latch, and it didn’t open when she shoved against it. She stepped to the side and fired the blazer at the seam, using it like a laser cutter. Bits of material flew up, and she pressed her back farther into the corner, not wanting to risk damaging her suit. It was a long walk back to the Snapper, and it wasn’t as if she had a spare along.
After cutting along the seam, she stomped down with her foot. The trapdoor gave way, falling into the car below. She didn’t expect to encounter any enemies down there, but she pointed her headlamp into the car to check it before jumping down. There was something down there. Something on the floor. A black robe and—
She gasped, reeling back when the light played over a skull. A human skull.
“Relax,” she told her hammering heart, taking several quick breaths to steady herself and staring at the conduits on the shaft wall instead of down into the car. “Whoever that was has been dead a long time.”
Of course there would be the remains of human bodies here. She should have anticipated that on a five-hundred-year-old wreck.
But the skeleton was odd. Surely, bodies would have been frozen as soon as the ship’s life support gave way and the icy fingers of space crept through the hull. And on a spaceship, there wouldn’t have been any of the organisms that decomposed the dead on planets, right? Just whatever bacteria and such that a person normally hosted in his body. But they wouldn’t eat a body from the inside out once the person died. She didn’t think.
“Erick?” Jelena tried the comm this time, remembering that it had worked a few minutes earlier.
“Yes?” he replied.
“Good, you’re there.”
“I’m in the same spot I’ve been for an hour. I’m not the one exploring ships and battling pirates.”
Goodness, he wasn’t bitter, was he?
“I’d gladly trade places with you.” Jelena glanced up. Speaking of battling pirates, she hoped Thor was all right. She would check on him next. “Can you get Kiyoko on the comm? Or Zhou? I need advice on…” She stared down at the skull—at the entire skeleton nestled in the confines of the old Starseer robe. Why was the robe perfectly preserved when the body was gone? “Death,” she finished.
“Advice on death?” Erick asked. “Maybe you should talk to a priest about that.”
“In this case, I’ll take a doctor. Or a microbiologist.”
Movement from above startled her, and she jerked the pistol upward.
Thor landed in a crouch right in front of her, the glittered chest of his spacesuit facing her. She managed a weak smile at the random splash of vibrant color in the dark old ship, a ship she was realizing doubled as a tomb.
You seem to have recovered your senses. He frowned at the pistol, and she turned it in her hand, offering him the butt.
Yes, sorry about that. How did you so easily push aside the warning images? They’re so intrusive, and my brain still aches from that probe or whatever it was.
His forehead crinkled behind his faceplate. Probe? Warning?
You… didn’t feel anything?
No.
But you must sense that there’s something here, something besides the artifact, right?
Thor shook his head slowly. I feel the power of the artifact. That’s it. The Starseer crew is long dead.
He looked through the hole she’d cut, unfazed by the skeleton.
Could the artifact be what she sensed? Could it have been the source of that warning? That threat.
She remembered her mother saying once that she’d been able to interact with Alcyone’s Staff of Lore when Abelardus hadn’t been able to, and it had been because of her genes, because she was a descendant of Alcyone. That would make Jelena one too. But Thor was also supposed to have come from that line, wasn’t he? Or maybe he was descended from one of the other powerful Starseer lines. She couldn’t remember. It was hard to imagine some artifact talking to her and not to him. Of course, this artifact predated Alcyone. Who knew what genes it liked? Maybe it simply preferred chatting with girls.
I don’t think the artifact is sentient, Thor said slowly, peering into her eyes, probably trying to follow her jumbled thoughts. Honestly, it feels like any other teylenese object to me. Like my sword or your staff. Something made by a Starseer toolmaker once upon a time. It’s powerful, yes, but this weirdness you sense seems odd.
“Tell me about it,” she said aloud.
“Captain?” Kiyoko asked over the comm.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“So am I. Zhou is here too. As is Erick. He’s looking over the footage you sent and muttering to hims
elf.”
“My question is for you two,” Jelena said. “If people died in a ship buried in an asteroid with no atmosphere, could their bodies have decomposed? Would there eventually be just a skeleton? Or should there have been a frozen corpse more or less perfectly preserved?”
Thor glanced up, then jumped into the elevator car, landing beside the skeleton. We shouldn’t linger. Abelardus and Brody and all those pirates are in here, trying to beat us to the artifact.
I don’t think the artifact is the only thing we have to worry about. Jelena jumped down beside him as he pushed open the old sliding doors.
“The state of decomposition would depend on how long they had atmosphere after they died,” Kiyoko said thoughtfully over the comm. “Spaceships aren’t necessarily sterile and devoid of microscopic life, including decomposers.”
“So a skeleton is to be expected after all this time?” Jelena asked. “It doesn’t necessarily indicate that the Starseers weren’t alone when they died?” She shivered, imagining something feeding on the dead. Not that she could picture corridors full of wolves or ghorettins gnawing on people’s limbs. It wasn’t as if that person’s clothing had been disturbed at all.
“Not alone?” Kiyoko asked. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. I just have this nagging feeling that the Kirians weren’t alone in this asteroid, that the rockfall that buried their ship wasn’t accidental, and that maybe they were dealing with something, and that’s why they couldn’t simply use their powers to unbury themselves.” Jelena didn’t know whether she should mention the strange sensations and threats she’d experienced, the thought she was having that maybe they weren’t alone now, either.
Thor gave her a long look over his shoulder, then walked into what looked like the mess hall, his light flowing over tables. A couple had board games stretched out on them, pieces in the middle of play. Jelena started when his light revealed more dead Starseers who had fallen to the deck between two of the tables, their robes once again identifying them. And once again, only skeletons remained under those robes.
“Maybe whoever built that tower was here,” Erick said.
“I’d love a sample of that crystalline structure,” Zhou said. “Can we fly there for samples?”
“If you fly here, it’ll be to attack that pirate ship,” Jelena said. “Because it landed right on top of that tower.”
Zhou paused. “Can we get samples after we attack it?”
“What do you mean whoever, Erick?” Jelena asked, trailing Thor as he headed for an exit on the far side of the mess hall. There were gym mats and exercise equipment on the far side of the tables, everything looking like it had been abandoned a few months ago, not a few centuries ago. The cobwebs that had dangled in the corridors above hadn’t made it down here.
“I’m not sure, but that doesn’t look like Starseer technology.”
“How familiar are you with what their technology looked like five hundred years ago?”
“Well, judging by the footage you’re sending along, that’s a shryfar-class ship with ion engines. Even though fusion is preferred these days, a lot of the components in that type of ship were the basis for spacecraft the Starseers are flying today. The colonists settled different planets and developed some different techniques and technologies along the way, but we all came from Old Earth and redeveloped similarly.”
“Erick, are you saying that humans didn’t build that tower?” Jelena followed Thor into a corridor lined with metal hatches, but he halted before he’d gone more than a couple of steps. “Who else could have?”
Trouble coming from ahead, Thor spoke into her mind. Get ready.
“A good question,” Erick said. “I’d like to see Zhou’s samples of the structure before I say for sure that people didn’t do it, though. It’s possible some humans visited here at one point and deliberately made it weird looking for some reason.”
“But if the tower was here when the Starseers came… and they were the first people to regain spaceflight and make it out into the system, who else could have built it?”
“Maybe it was built after the ship was lost. Or, I don’t know, maybe the colony ships stopped on the way here for some reason.”
“To randomly build a tower inside an asteroid?” Jelena backed up, following Thor’s gestures—he was waving for her to return to the mess hall.
“I don’t know. We need a closer look.”
“Well, I’ve invited you. Just don’t forget to bomb some pirates on the way.” Jelena gripped her staff, expecting men in combat armor to come charging down the corridor at any moment.
“You’re being oddly encouraging of violence today,” Erick said.
“It’s been a rough day.”
“We’re on our way.”
“Good.”
Thor jumped back, pushing her around the corner as he took up a position on the other side of the corridor. Jelena glimpsed several metal constructs rolling in their direction on treads. Early Starseer robots?
Before she could ask Thor, he fired into the corridor. His blazer bolts bounced off the constructs. Return fire came immediately.
White laser beams skimmed past, just inches from his ears. He jerked his head back around the corner.
I think we found ship’s security, he told Jelena, meeting her eyes.
Chapter 16
I’ll create a barrier, Jelena said, forming one across the corridor. She peeked around the corner. There were four of them, the broad metal robots filling the corridor as they rolled toward them on treads. You find a way to power them down.
Working on it. Thor also peered around the corner.
The lead robot fired again, a skinny beam of white energy, some predecessor to blazer technology, Jelena assumed. The beam hit her barrier, and she could feel its power bashing against hers. She could keep her shield up against that for several minutes, so long as she didn’t lose her concentration. So long as the earlier intrusion didn’t try to get into her head again.
Thor’s eyes narrowed, and an invisible wave of power crashed into the lead robot. Into all of them. They were hurled back down the corridor, banging against the bulkheads, as if a tornado had plowed into them. Pieces flew from their metal frames. The robots smashed into each other, gouging the floor and leaving dents as a maelstrom flung them every which way.
I said power them down, not obliterate them, Jelena told Thor dryly.
His face locked in concentration, he did not answer.
Something plucked at Jelena’s senses. At first, she thought the presence from earlier would try to assert itself again, but movement at the corner of her eye made her spin about. Two armored pirates strode out of the elevator, rifles in their arms.
Jelena cursed. Company, Thor.
She lowered her barrier for a second, long enough to throw her own wave of telekinetic energy at the pirates. The display wasn’t nearly as impressive as Thor’s, but the armored men tumbled back, as if caught in a stiff wind. She tried to shut the elevator door to trap them inside, but there was no electricity running to it, so it would take more than pushing a button with her mind.
Something struck her arm from behind, and Jelena gasped and stumbled forward. An alarm flashed on her helmet’s Glastica display. The pirates aimed their rifles at her, so she couldn’t pay attention to it.
Jelena slammed her barrier back into place, wrapping the bubble around her and Thor on all sides. The pirates’ blazer bolts zipped into it, ricocheted off, and bounced around the mess hall. A piece of gym equipment exploded when it was struck.
Thor spun back toward their human attackers, and the elevator doors Jelena hadn’t known how to budge slammed shut.
You’re hit. Thor stared at her arm.
Jelena twisted her shoulder and turned her helmet as far as it would go. A piece of metal shrapnel from the destroyed robots stuck out of her triceps. She finally had time to read her helmet’s warning, though as soon as she saw the shard, she knew what it was about. Her suit had
been compromised. She was leaking air.
She pulled out the shard, hissing at the pain, but far more worried about the leak.
You have a patch kit? Thor glanced at the elevator—the pirates would surely find a way through the doors any second—and dove into his own bag. Here, I’ve got one.
Good. Jelena could feel blood trickling down her arm inside her suit, and she could also feel the bite of icy cold space slipping through the hole.
Thor pulled out a tube of patch-tar and smeared her sleeve, then stuck one of the patches from his kit over it.
Secure? he asked.
The display still indicated that the suit was compromised, but for the moment, she wasn’t leaking air. Just blood. Damn, that smarted.
Yeah, and I’ve got some work for Kiyoko when we get back.
She’ll appreciate it. Thor put away the kit and turned toward the corridor again. This way. We’ll deal with those pirates after we get the artifact. He sounded like he relished the idea. Maybe he had more of an idea as to what the artifact’s capabilities would be than Jelena did.
Brody is down here too, Thor added, jogging into the corridor. Keep your barrier up.
Aye aye, Captain.
Jelena glanced back as she ran after him. A gauntleted hand had already slipped between the elevator doors, fingers curling around the edge. The pirates would escape in seconds.
Keeping a bubble barrier around them, Jelena followed Thor across the bolts, smashed circuit boards, and shards of metal that were all that remained of the robots. At the first intersection, he turned left, then left again and stopped in front of one of several hatches that were along the wall in that corridor. It looked like crew quarters.
He glanced down the corridor—nothing but darkness lay in that direction—then waved his hand, and the hatch jerked aside, stuck, then jerked again until it was halfway open. He turned sideways and stepped into a large cabin.
Jelena ducked in behind him, sensing the pirates had left the mess hall and were racing into the corridor. She hoped the lack of cobwebs marking their way would slow them down, but their combat armor might include instruments that could detect life.