Nemesis: Book Six (15 page)

This thing now moving through her, it wanted to kill. It wanted to spread and anything that tried to stop that spread would die.

Helos' aura ached with the knowledge, spreading from the very end of her existence to the core of her body.

This wasn't her people. These weren't her descendants. They couldn't be. They weren't
Morena.

Helos closed her eyes and with a single thought blocked the creature from its search. She didn't move for a few minutes, only stood with her eyes closed, her mind silenced—building focus. When she finally opened them, she floated into the air, her white aura flowing around her.

It would come to her, that thing which just searched her. It would come and then it would die. Everything Morena created would die.

* * *

H
umans screamed
from deep within the hole in front of Junior. They were moving closer to him, running up from the internal mazes they lived in below. Soon they would reach him, firing their bullets and doing their best to kill him. Or maybe they would stay below, waiting for him to come down. He didn't care.

What he just felt froze him. Traese couldn't know, though he saw his leader standing still in front of steps that might soon fill with those that they came to kill.

A Var.

That's what he felt.

He couldn't be mistaken, such a thought was ludicrous. A second Var, though Junior didn't know who or how. He didn't have much time with her, and her power was far too great to stay if she didn't want him to. Indeed, when she pushed him away, it felt like being thrown at a rate that would crush mountains. He couldn't remain.

What he did gather though ….

Well, it made the screams from below seem like whispers in a hurricane.

The Var was here to stop this. Morena, Briten, and himself. She had come to stop their colonization of this planet, and in the end, when she threw him from her—she decided that she came to kill
him
as well. This Var, former or present Junior didn't know, would destroy all of this, everything they created.

Junior's aura slowly moved from its surrounding protective stance, heading toward the strip of metal opening up the ground in front of him. It wrapped around it, moving like a fog as Junior's mind twisted over and over what he just found, wanting to understand what his next move should be.

The metal strip moved down, reversing the path it took minutes before. Junior stared straight ahead as his aura did the work for him.

The ground was flat again, though looking nothing like it had before—anyone who walked by could easily see the disturbed earth, would see that something which wished to be hidden no longer was.

The decision was simple, actually. Junior could go down there into the labyrinth, destroying everyone he came in contact with. He could turn it into a hell of inescapable fire, listening to humans scream and beg for death. When he rose again, though, coming back through the metal gate he just closed, the world he fought for could be gone. He didn't know what the Var wanted to do after she wiped out her own kind, but what happened after didn't really matter, did it?

His mother would die. His brother standing next to him now would die.

All those still fighting in the west—they would all die.

Without turning around he said, "We're going to Grayson. Bring everyone."

"What?" Traese said.

"Bring them all. Everyone in the west. The war is in Grayson now."

T
he strands' growth
inside the house frightened the humans. Morena saw it on their faces. She didn't call the strands for whatever nefarious purpose they thought up inside their heads. She called them for information. Despite their shrinking reach, they still covered a sizable area, and each one communicating with the others created a wealth of knowledge.

The strands gently placed themselves at her feet, and she stepped on top, immediately becoming one with what they knew. She saw Will's face, his eyes wide but jaw firm. The other man, Wren, he didn't look as secure as Will, but she didn't think he would break anytime soon.

"What are you doing?" Will said.

Morena let the knowledge enter her, feeling both her children's pain and the major issues they saw across this planet.

"Things aren't good, Will," she said, her head slightly cocked as she spoke.

"Send them back out," he said.

"Why?" Morena's voice was a whisper. She heard what the man said, but didn't truly care. Because her children told her things that shouldn't happen. That couldn't happen. Her husband sat before her, tied and trapped, a few inches of pressure on a pistol away from dying. And now ….

"Send them the fuck back out, Morena, or I'm going to hurt him. I won't kill him, but there are parts of the human body, the male body specifically, that doesn't do well with injury." Will pressed the gun into Briten's crotch. Her husband didn't move, didn't show the slightest bit of nervousness.

Morena smiled.

Sadness filled her as the strands retreated, moving to their place outside the house.

"They're coming, Will," she said.

"Who?"

"Everyone."

His eyes narrowed and Morena understood that he knew at least some of those that were coming, or had arrived. Two people from the government, that entity that plagued her since the beginning. She couldn't tell for sure because of the suits they wore, but she imagined one of them was Kenneth Marks. Bringing his demands and ultimatums.

"Who is everyone?" Will said, his voice ice personified.

Morena's smiled widened, just as the sadness deepened inside her.

"I think almost anyone involved with this. Your superiors, and apparently, mine too."

"What are you talking about?"

"I don't know how it's possible, to be honest. How she could return. But she's here and she's coming to see me."

Will ground the gun into Briten's groin. "Stop with the bullshit. Who is she? What the fuck are you talking about? We don't have time for this, Morena.
He's
coming. Did your strands tell you that? Kenneth Marks. And things are going to get a lot crazier when he arrives. So before he does, right now, we need to end this."

"End this?" Morena stepped forward, her knee nearly touching the coffee table that separated her from her husband. "I'm beginning to think the end is coming. I thought when I arrived here that we might have a chance, my kind, but I'm not sure that's possible anymore. She's here and she shouldn't be. I can't see her purpose, but …." Morena trailed off, not completely sure how to finish the sentence. The 'but' hung in the air like a pregnant bubble, full of endless possibilities but almost assuredly only holding one single thing. Morena just didn't know what that thing was.

"Shoot him," Will said, not taking his eyes from Morena, but clearly talking to the man next to him.

"Me?" Wren said.

"Yes. Shoot him in the knee. We're going to keep shooting him until this bitch decides to start making sense."

* * *

S
he
.

That one word told Michael all he really needed to know. Morena held the
she
in some kind of reverence, though Michael thought he sensed fear in her voice too. The
she
was the same creature Michael saw in Bryan's mind. He knew she was here, had known for quite some time, and now Morena knew too.

Why is she scared?

Michael looked out Bryan's eyes, seeing the smile on Morena's face, the calm outward appearance, but knowing more lay beneath.

Michael moved back inside Bryan's head, into his mind's desert. There she was, the creature Morena spoke about, though she had no idea Michael saw her too. She stood above him in her white glory, he sitting on the sand. She looked down on him, and when Michael looked up, he saw kind eyes.

Kind eyes set in a deep determination.

And back to Bryan's eyes, out into reality. Morena was looking at Will, going back and forth about what she knew. Will didn't understand a bit of it.

Michael understood more than the mercenary. This creature was real and coming here, coming for Morena. Could she save them? Was that the fear inside Morena? Was she telling the truth, about it all being over?

Panic rose in him, the endless questions creating a sense of urgency that he could do nothing about. Except ask more questions.

Calm down
, he said.
Think about what you've been through already. Think about the room with Julie; think about what you had to do to get out of there
.

He turned around from reality and went back into the desert. She still stood above him. Her white aura wrapped halfway around him, not quite touching, but mere inches away.

Michael swallowed, not completely sure what he was doing.

But have you been since this started? Have you been since you saw Bryan walking towards that white orb, unable to stop?

It went deeper, though. His insecurity about the world around him started long before Bryan walked through those fateful woods.

Mom
, he thought, still staring up at the alien.

Because that's when the world stopped making sense, when she died. Everything stood solid before that, a mountain that faced all weather without any problems. Her death shook the mountain, cracked it deep. And then the rocks began tumbling, slow at first, picking up speed as the years passed—until nothing but rubble lay where something strong once dominated. Small rocks. Large rocks. Dust. When Bryan walked out into those woods, that's all that was left of Michael's life. Perhaps the biggest rock was Thera, but still, not the mountain that once cast shadows on the land.

He lived his whole life scared. Of his father. Of his future. Of life.

And how did you deal with it?

He acted like none of it mattered. Not his father. Not his mother. Not the trailer and the fact that he would flip chicken at the local shop until his pops died and he inherited the trailer. All of it was fine and dandy.

So what if he was unsure what to do right now? Seeing this creature he couldn't grasp and, frankly, didn't understand how he
could
even see her.

Michael stood up, slowly, with the only legs he had anymore. The legs in this mind.

They looked at one another, those kind eyes seeing his, her white aura still almost touching him.

"What are you?" he said.

"Go," she said.

"Where?" He didn't understand the directive outside of its base meaning in the English language. Was she not seeing the same place as him, an endless desert lit by a single moon that never fell below the horizon?

She raised an arm and extended her finger, pointing behind Michael.

He knew what she wanted from him, for him to turn around and see what she pointed at. Yet a part of him didn't want to turn his back on this creature, leaving himself vulnerable to whatever she may do.

His mind—
his
mind, not the shared one—showed him again the dust filled cavern that once held a mountain. What was there to fear any longer? What was there to run from? The mountain was gone, had been gone since before Michael hit puberty.

He turned around, her hand still in his vision as it remained pointed over his shoulder.

A door.

He hadn't seen a single door in any of the places he'd been. A door was choice, an ability to either stay or look elsewhere. There had been no doors, not since he breathed in that orange aura and ended up walking in a gray world.

"Go," she said.

Michael looked back over his shoulder, but she no longer watched him. Her eyes were on the door.

He walked forward, a total of about ten steps, and then he was there. The door sat in the open space the same as it would have in a house. Michael knew that if he were to circle around to the back of it, there would be no door. It would simply disappear.

He reached forward and put his hand on the knob.

* * *

S
weat beaded
on Bryan's face. It sprang from his hair, too, dripping down his forehead. He didn't wipe any of it away, mainly because he was too scared to move.

For the first time since he watched Thera die, he felt something other than apathy and the need to die himself.

Because things in this room were fucking
heated.

Morena didn't seem to understand what was happening here, as if she couldn't see the pressure mounting on Will's shoulders, forcing him to either be crushed beneath the weight or throw it off in some Herculean effort. She stood there smiling, looking at Will with her head slightly cocked. Thinking.

And Will held the goddamn gun into the alien's crotch. Into
Michael's
crotch.

More though, something was happening inside him. Something with Michael. Bryan didn't know what it was, couldn't hear exactly what was being said, but Michael spoke with someone in there. Someone else was inside Byran with Michael, but he didn't know what the hell was happening.

A bead of sweat dripped down, falling over his eyebrow and into his eye.

He reached up, finally, rubbing the salt away.

"Yes. Shoot him in the knee. We're going to keep shooting him until this bitch decides to start making sense."

Bryan heard the words, saw Will's mouth moving as he spoke, but barely believed them. That wasn't just an alien, that was Michael's body they all looked at. Overgrown and disgusting, but his body nonetheless.

Bryan flashed to Wren. The drunk, but still Michael's father.

His eyes were wide too, staring at Will, unable to believe him either. Both witnessed and participated in Will’s unfolding plan, subduing and holding the alien kidnapped. They saw it all and not for a second believed anything would happen to the person they both grew up with, even if Michael's soul now lived with Bryan. They somehow thought this was all for show.

Will curled his lips, looking more like an enraged animal than a human.

"Listen to me, Wren," Will said, his voice calm despite the anger twisting on his face. "If you don't shoot that thing right now, you'll never get your son back. It's not your son. It hasn't been your son since it woke up with red fucking eyes. Do you hear me?"

Wren nodded, but no other part of his body moved. His lips remained slightly open as if he expected to stick a straw in his mouth at any second.

"Then do it."

The words slid from Will's mouth like ice, so cold that no one wanted anything to do with them.

Wren swallowed and he looked down at his son, his hand gripping the gun tighter.

Bryan looked to Morena, still standing there smiling. Her head turned slowly to him as if she was a doll brought to life.

He barely had time to notice as her aura snatched out and grabbed his body whole. Morena never stopped smiling.