Andromeda Day and the Black Hole (13 page)

She didn’t, though. She smiled bravely,
rubbing her wrist, and nodded towards Lydia, who had been dropped onto the
floor of the elevator on the other side. “Is she okay?”

“She doesn’t look too well. I wonder if she
is sick.” The young Ruvalian woman’s green skin had paled to a whitish-green
hue, and sweat beaded on her forehead. She sat curled up on the floor, as if
she had a pain in her stomach.

Andi sighed. “I hope Clios is all right.”

“So do I.” Deneb touched his forehead briefly,
obviously thinking of the way she had healed his wound.

The elevator ascended slowly, the gears
creaking and clanking below them. Andi bent down once to try and make sure that
Lydia was all right, but the guard growled at her to stay where she was, and so
she retreated to the wall, scowling at him.

Eventually the elevator ground to a halt. The
doors slid open, and yet again they found themselves in the central cavern.

The guard led them out, carrying the now
unconscious Lydia, and gestured for them to go over to the far side of the
cavern. They crossed the busy floor, dodging the wagons of Indigo Quartz, which
looked like black pieces of coal in the bottom of the carts, and then followed
the guard’s instructions to enter a long corridor that consisted of a line of
closed doors. The guard slid his card through the control box to one of them,
and the door opened. He thrust Deneb inside with a hard push. Deneb turned
round angrily to complain, but the guard shut the door in his face before he
could reach him. Andi heard a loud thump from inside, presumably from Deneb
smashing his fist against the door.

A little scared now she was separated from
her father, she walked in front of the guard until he barked for her to stop. He
then opened another door and thrust her into it. The door slammed behind her.

Andi stared at it for a moment, her arms
wrapped around her body. She shook a little, and unshed tears pricked behind
her eyes. She was tired, so very tired, and disappointed to the core of her
being that her attempts to escape had failed. There was no lock on the inside
of this cell for her to pick, and anyway, she’d left the bra behind in the cell
she’d shared with Clios.

Andi turned around, seeing that the
windowless room had only a small table with two chairs in the center. She sat
heavily on one chair, thinking about her friend. Slowly, she let the piece of
Indigo Quartz slip from her sleeve until she held it in her hand. She looked at
it through blurred eyes. Clios had agreed to come with her to the Black Hole
because she had believed Andi when she said she could rescue both Deneb and
Lydia. And now look what had happened. Not only was Deneb still a prisoner, and
not only was Andi herself captured, but Clios had been taken to work in the
mines. And Sphere now knew that Lydia was the Keeper of the Golden Star. Once
he had his hands on the artifact, the Ruvalians would be finished for good.

As if he had read her thoughts—which was
entirely possible, she thought humorlessly—the door suddenly clicked open,
making her jump, and Sphere stood in the doorway, almost filling the space with
his height and huge frame. He paused for a moment as if to make a theatrical
entrance, and then came into the room. He ignored the other chair and sat
instead on the table in front of her, so that she had to look up at him.

Andi’s mouth went dry. Here, alone with
him, he suddenly looked much bigger and more frightening than she remembered. His
skin glowed with the deep green phosphorescent hue, and his plait of hair hung
thick and glossy down his back. She looked at his huge hands, thinking that he
could easily snap her neck with them. Trying to swallow, she looked up into his
bright eyes, green as emeralds.

He was watching her. His gaze, she was
relieved to see, did not appear to hold anger, but was filled with curiosity. “How
did you get out of the cell?” he asked.

Andi swallowed again. She was determined
that she wouldn’t show him how nervous she felt. She would not give him that
control over her. “Magic,” she said.

His lips twitched. “Hmm, I doubt that
somehow. I guess it probably had something more to do with the wire in the
undergarment that you left behind.”

Andi said nothing. She made herself stare
at him boldly.

He seemed pleased, if somewhat curious, by
her attempt to stand up to him. “You are very young to be so confident,” he
said, linking his hands and tilting his head at her. “There are not many
prisoners down here who have the stamina to maintain a resistance to me.”

Andi shrugged. “I believe that most people
feel that even when they are physically beaten, their minds remain their own, a
part of them that they will never have to give to another. But you take that
away from them, so that they have nothing of themselves left.”

“And yet you keep yours from me.”

Again, Andi said nothing. It was true—she
did feel some small amount of relief that at least her mind was something he
could not touch.

“I wonder what it is that makes you so
different,” he said, softly, as if to himself. “Your father is not the same, or
else I would have said that it was something to do with your race.”

“What have you done with him?” Andi asked,
hoping her voice didn’t sound too pleading.

Sphere grinned. “Given him a scar in return
for this one.” He touched the fresh line along his cheek tenderly. Then he
smiled at Andi’s alarm. “Don’t fret, little one. He is still alive—for now. Although
he might not be once I have finished with him.”

Andi’s cheeks grew hot with fear and anger.
“What right do you have to take other people’s lives?” she snapped. “Do you think
you are God?”

His smile faded. He bent closer to her. “No,
I am not a god. I am just a man who intends to right all the wrongs done to his
people over the years, to take revenge for the injustices wreaked on them.”

Andi stared at him incredulously. “How can
you say it’s just revenge after what you have done to the Ruvalian people? After
what you did to Clios’s parents?”

 Sphere said nothing for a moment. Then, to
Andi’s surprise, he stood and, hands behind his back, walked away from her. “The
Ruvalian girl told you that I murdered her parents,” he said flatly, still
facing away. “But did she explain to you why I killed them?” He turned round as
she said nothing. “She told you that there was no reason—that I am a
cold-blooded killer, a psychopath, didn’t she? Well she was wrong. That
Ruvalian village was home to a group of militants who engaged in secret
missions to attack and destroy Hoshaens. They planted a bomb in our central
government buildings that destroyed our town center. They were also responsible
for a bridge that collapsed across the Great River, killing over two hundred of
my people.” His eyes seemed to darken. “My wife and children died in that
blast. Yes, I led the attack on the village. Yes, I killed all the adults
there, including your friend’s parents. But I did it for a reason.”

Andi was startled at the pain and anger in
his eyes. Now, she understood why he wanted revenge. She felt a deep sense of
shock at the knowledge that there was more to his actions than sheer delight in
killing. But that still did not make what he had done to Clios’s parents right.
“Are you certain that her parents were part of the militant group?” Andi asked.

“We did not know their names, only their
location.”

“So you probably took the lives of many
innocent people too?”

Sphere’s impassive face showed no hint of
regret. “Civilians die in war. It is unfortunate, but it is a fact of life. They
have to realize that they cannot get away with annihilating the Hoshaen people.”

“So where will it stop?” Andi got slowly to
her feet until she stood facing him. “They kill one of yours, so you take out
ten of them. They respond with a bomb that destroys a city—do you plan to
obliterate them completely in return?”

“If that’s what it takes.”

“Then I pity you. I feel sorry for your
losses, and to some extent I understand you better now. But that doesn’t make
what you’re doing right.”

Sphere came right up to her, until she had
to crane her neck to look up at him. His eyes were hard as green glass, his
mouth set in a line. The loss of his wife and children, she thought suddenly,
had made him insane. He reached out a hand and grasped her chin firmly. His
fingers dug into her jaw so hard that she couldn’t help but let out a little
cry of pain.

“I don’t want your pity,” he snarled. “I don’t
need your blessing to do what I am doing. The Ruvalians will pay for what they
have done to my people, and I won’t stop until they are all dead!”

He looked deep into her eyes. “And as for
you… I am very interested in finding out just what is inside your head that
makes you blank to my gaze. And I will find out… even if it means cutting open
your skull myself and looking inside.”

He let go of her face abruptly and strode
out of the room. The door shut with a bang behind him.

Andi’s knees shook. She sank onto the
chair, trying to control her rapid breathing, her chest rising and falling
sharply. How stupid she was to have responded to his words. She should have
just sat and said nothing. Now she had made him angrier than ever. She had
touched the small piece of him inside that knew he had done wrong in killing
innocent Ruvalians. And for that he would not forgive her. He would probably
kill her for making him feel emotion again.

For a moment Andi wondered if the circuitry
that controlled her mechanical heart was failing, because she had a sharp pain
in the depths of her chest. It felt as if someone had reached inside her
ribcage and was squeezing the organ with both hands. Never had she felt this
defeated, this low. It was as if there was a black hole deep inside her, too,
sucking away all her energy, all her hope. It would have been better if she had
not come to the prison. Maybe Deneb would have found a way to escape. And at
least then Clios would have been free, and Lydia’s secret would have remained
intact. The tears ran freely down her cheeks.

She sat there like that for a while, too
despondent to move. Occasionally she heard the low murmur of voices from
outside the cell, but no one else came in to talk to her. So she sat there,
eyes closed, feeling the black hole inside her drain away her emotions.

It was only gradually that she become aware
that the pendant she still held in her hand was changing.

It was a smooth stone, highly polished,
about half the size of her palm. When Clios had placed it in her hand, it had
felt cool, like a pebble taken from the bottom of a stream. Now, however, it
began to grow warm.

For a moment, Andi didn’t open her eyes. She
concentrated on the Quartz, feeling its heat gradually increase against her
skin. Her heart began to beat a little faster. The crystal grew warmer and
warmer, until it almost scorched her fingers. Then, two things happened
simultaneously. She felt the touch of a hand across her forehead, so light she
thought she might have imagined it, as if someone had brushed away a stray
hair. And at the same time, she received in her mind’s eye a flash of an image.
A person.

It was her mother.

Andi’s eyes flew open and she gasped. She
looked down at the piece of crystal in her hand. Whereas before it had been a
light purple color with flecks of silver, now it glowed a deep indigo, and the
silver flashes glittered like stars in the night sky. The image of her mother
seemed burned on her brain. It was a picture that she could not recall seeing
before. Sagitta Day had been smiling gently, her hazel eyes filled with
concern, as she reached out a hand towards Andi. Her dark hair had been blowing
around her face, as if in a breeze.

Andi ran a thumb over the Quartz. The
Plions had said that it helped an individual to channel his or her power of
thought. It increased your psychic powers.

Was it possible that the crystal had
somehow enabled her to communicate with her mother?

Deneb would scoff at that. He would say she
was feeling low, feeling needy, and some part of her brain had drawn on the
images of someone it knew would bring her comfort. But why not Deneb, then? Or
Jack, or someone else on board who she loved and trusted? Why her mother, whom
she had not seen for over a year?

Andi clutched the crystal tightly. It was a
sign, she knew it. Whether or not her mother had really just visited her, or
whether it was all in her mind, Andi knew that she was being told not to give
up.

It was ridiculous to think that she should
never have come to the Black Hole. Okay, so now Sphere knew about Lydia—the
Ruvalians were pretty much finished anyway regardless of whether he recovered
the lost artifact. Yes, Clios had been taken to the mines, but she had known of
the dangers before she agreed to come and had considered the risk worth the possibility
of actually rescuing Lydia and the Golden Star. And Deneb—although her father
liked to think he could talk his way out of any situation, Andi knew that he
could not have escaped from his cell without her. No, it was a good thing that
she had come to the prison. It was a good thing that she had tried to rescue
them.

And she wasn’t going to give up now.