Between Darkness and Light (42 page)

“But Captain, as Priest, you represent both Vartra the Consort, and the son of Ghyakulla and Vartra. You should be the one to decide,” objected the young male.

“You decide,” he said, pushing his chair back and getting to his feet. “I have the service to write, and deliver, since it won't be the usual traditional festival with dancing and hunting.” Damn Jayza for reminding him he represented the fertility aspect of the God at this festival—instead of meditating on this responsibility, he'd been pairing with the Prime doctor.

 

“I thought you'd written the service already,” said Banner quietly when he caught up with him as he headed along the corridor to the temple.

“I made a start,” he said, “but I didn't anticipate getting injured before finishing it.”

Banner looked sideways at him from under lowered brows. “I made some notes, too. Perhaps I can help you while the other three finish weaving the rest of the greenery we brought from the hunt into garlands. Jayza brought some clay back from the hunt and has made it into pretty good little statuettes of Vartra and Ghyakulla so at least we can represent Them properly tomorrow.”

“That's good,” he said, nodding briefly, unable to speak any further.

They'd no sooner got settled into the Priest's office when one of M'zynal's young security officers arrived to remind him that he had an appointment with Giyarishis.

“Can't it wait?” asked Banner. “We've only just started working on the sermon for tomorrow.”

“I'd better go,” he said, pushing his notes over to his Second. He'd completely forgotten about his meeting with the TeLaxaudin the night before. It would be extremely embarrassing if Giyarishis came down to get him and mentioned they'd met up on the hydroponics level late the night before. “Check this over for me.”

 

Giyarishis was waiting for Kusac in his office.

“I hope this won't take long,” he said. “We're finishing our preparations for tomorrow's festival. Why do you want to see me?”

“Not take long. I do for Kzizysus. We go next door to medical room.”

Marshaling his thoughts, he followed Giyarishis into the room next door. He had a few questions of his own he'd like answered.

A slim, bronze hand pointed to the low examination couch. “Sit. Torc works well?”

“I have some questions I'd like to ask first,” he began.

“Answers you have later,” said the TeLaxaudin. “This first.”

 

The scent Giyarishis had emitted had quickly rendered the Hunter unconscious. He'd then been able to administer the drug needed to keep him like that for two hours. That achieved, he placed a sleep tape headset over his eyes, connected his Camarilla-made scanner to it and began to monitor the Hunter's brain while running him through a series of virtual scenarios to test his psychic abilities.

What happened concerned him. The Hunter had initially tried to resist the dream scenarios—his willpower now was stronger than they'd anticipated, given his state of mind when Kzizysus had conducted the operation on him. But even that didn't account for the periods when he was effectively invisible to the monitoring devices he'd placed throughout the outpost. He couldn't put it down to a malfunction of the torc because it was performing as expected.

As they'd hoped, the Hunter's abilities were spreading to enhance all his senses—not just his sense of smell. A body scan had shown several tiny anomalous nodules—too small to cause concern, and certainly benign in nature, they would cause no danger to his well-being. As for the cuts and grazes on his body which the sand-dweller female had left, and those where he'd washed himself too vigorously, they could be ignored.

Reaching for the final recording, one prepared by medics within the Camarilla itself, he inserted it in the headset with many misgivings. His colleagues wanted the Hunter's training completed now, giving him access to the portions locked away by Naacha because he'd been too unstable at the time to control his expanding abilities. They had all hoped he would come to realize by himself how to unlock the memories, but that had not happened. Now it was time to give him the final clues and stimuli so he remembered everything.

While the tape was playing, he took the time to dress the Hunter's injured arm. It was healing nicely, and as fast as they'd expected. It might be a good idea to fetch some of the pool water before restoring the power to the elevators and doors because then he could genuinely claim the chemicals in the Primes' Holy Pool had aided the healing process.

As he made his way there, he was still troubled by the whole procedure, afraid that in awakening the Hunter fully, they'd unleashed a wild element, one they couldn't control, that could cause the end of civilization as they knew it rather than making him the savior they hoped he would be.

“What do you mean there's been a power failure on the hydroponics level?” Zayshul demanded of M'zynal when he finally arrived at his security office by the Command Level's main elevator. “I want to talk to Giyarishis now!” She banged her hand on the counter between herself and M'zynal as he edged round behind it.

“I'm afraid you can't, Doctor,” said M'zynal apologetically. “The engineers are working on it, but for now, we have no contact with that level at all. It's effectively sealed off.”

“Who's up there, and how long have they been trapped?” she demanded in frustration.

“Apart from the regular staff there, the TeLaxaudin and Captain Aldatan, and they've only been cut off for an hour. They're in absolutely no danger, of course,” he reassured her. “Nor are we. It's a temporary, localized fault.”

She stared at him openmouthed for a moment, then looked from him to M'kou. “What about the stairs? Aren't those doors on a different circuit so this can't happen?”

“They are, but their power is down, too. We aren't operating under normal circumstances, Doctor,” said M'kou patiently.

“We've had a crew working on sublevel five engineering deck all night rerouting the last of the main relays to the bridge and our new substations on this and the Officers' level. Obviously something was either faulty or damaged after so long in disuse. They'll locate the problem shortly and all will be back to normal, Doctor. We still have access between this level, the Officers', and the main flight deck,” M'zynal explained.

“But none to hydroponics!”

“Not at the moment,” said M'kou soothingly.

“Actually, there is a way in,” said M'zynal, leaning forward to punch some keys on his console. “Look at the screen behind you.”

Zayshul turned round to see a cutaway plan of the asteroid exterior and the interior for the hydroponics level.

“Surrounding that deck on the outer surface of the asteroid, there are twenty concealed laser bays—all connected by maintenance tunnels. At least eight of them correspond to ground level for that deck.”

“There's no need to go cutting through rock fused when they hollowed out the asteroid,” said M'kou firmly when Zayshul looked at him. “At worst, we can dismantle the locks on one of the stairwells—if we can't get them out in the next two hours. There's air, water, and food in there, Doctor, enough for them to survive for far longer than we can. They are in no danger. Now, if you'll excuse us, we can get back to monitoring the engineers. I have informed Lieutenant Banner of the situation.”

Exasperated, Zayshul stalked back to her lab. This had wasted the time she'd set aside to confront Giyarishis and demand to know how her scent could have been imposed on N'koshoh, and how her DNA had become part of Shaidan's. She was absolutely convinced Kzizysus had had something to do with it.

She had a patient due in ten minutes, and as it was the first of the females willing to carry her egg to full term, it was vital that she saw her in person to allay any fears she might have.

The sound of a commotion outside woke Kusac. Pushing himself up groggily on one elbow, he could see the TeLaxaudin at the door talking to M'zynal, one of Kezule's commandos.

“Captain wakes,” he heard the TeLaxaudin's translator intone in its flat, mechanical voice. “Arm heals well—used pool water on it to aid healing.”

“What's happening?” Kusac asked, smothering a yawn as he sat up. He frowned, looking at the TeLaxaudin standing dwarfed between the two Prime guards who were glancing concernedly in his direction. “Have I been asleep?”

“Fall asleep during examination,” confirmed Giyarishis. “Sleep through power failure. Long wait till now.”

He looked back at M'zynal for confirmation.

“No one was in any danger, Captain. It was only the power for the doors and elevator to this level,” said the Security chief reassuringly.

With a grunt, he pushed himself off the low couch and got to his feet. Feeling the dressing on his arm binding slightly, he looked down at it, surprised to see that it had been replaced.

“I change dressing while you sleep,” confirmed the TeLaxaudin, shooing him out the door. “Used special mineral water to help healing. Now go, too much delay this cause. Things I have to do.”

“Your people were informed of the power failure, Captain. They're still in the temple with your Second,” said M'zynal as they left the office and headed for the elevator.

Automatically mumbling his thanks, he got into the elevator with the two Primes. When it halted, he headed for the Sholan temple, glad to be away from the TeLaxaudin. For some reason he couldn't pinpoint, the alien made him uneasy. The fact he'd fallen asleep in the examination room confused the hell out of him. He couldn't remember why the TeLaxaudin had needed to see him, but then a lot of things had become blurred since the hunt—probably because of a residue of poison still in his system.

As he pushed open the temple door, he tried to clear everything from his mind except for thoughts of the following day's festival. His actions the night before may have let himself and the God down, but he could ensure that he gave Him all He was due from now on.