Emergency lights pulsed into action, revealing a dripping cockpit strewn with fallen ceiling panels and tangles of hanging wires. Somehow, the ship and its unusual crew had survived the miles high free fall into the hidden sea. The ship lay on the bottom, blackness erasing the murky world on the other side of the thick windscreen as warning alarms rang in the deep. Lockspur lay half slumped in the pilot's seat, eyes darting around behind closed lids as old guilts dance through long suppressed memories. A mixture of spit and blood trickled from the corners of his parted lips.
In the rising pool of salt water behind him, two non-humanoids lay sprawled out as a sea of angry amber console lights clicked to red, one by one. The scuttled ship groaned and shuddered; its compressing hull struggling to hold out the extreme pressure of an entire sea bearing down on it. After the crippled ship pierced the waves, it settled on a five kilometers thick steel plate as smooth and clean as a laboratory beaker. No sediment; no toxins; no biome. Just clean, filtered water. The purest in the galaxy.
The lower chamber's hidden ocean, the lush, fertile lands in the lower chamber and the desolate world above were nothing more than window dressing to hide a billion year old secret cloaked in the moon's core.
As Icy water forced its way through the ship's mutilated hull, long tendrils spread across the ceiling. Water flowed down the walls, pooling on the floor and rising again. Soon, where there had been air, only water would remain. Heavy droplets spread outward along the upper edge of the windscreen seam, joined and poured down the inside in a translucent curtain. Its shimmering surface gave life and movement to the blackness outside.
A rending explosion in the ship's bowels raced through the quaking structure, and Lockspur flopped in his seat, cool water dripping on his face, driving away sleep. The sound of blaring hydraulic pistons filled the ship. But how? The ship's power systems were dead. The AI was offline. Only the back-up lights and emergency systems were still functional. But something onboard had activated.
Lockspur's eyelids popped open and the eerie compartment came into focus. He looked around the compartment and vomited over the edge of the armrest. He fumbled to a semi-seated position, eyes watering, trembling hands finding the rising knob on his pounding forehead. The cockpit lights spun like hungry vultures floating over a fresh kill, and his gums ached and bled. Stomach acid coated his throat, searing his esophagus. He spat a mouthful of bile in the rising pool of water and understanding mashed his flight or flight senses. The sound of falling water filled him with an inescapable fear. He stared at the soaked pilot's console in disbelief. And a woman's voice whispered in his ear. Move. Get to the loading dock now. He looked around, eyes wide, saw no one, and said, "Lilith." No one answered; she was not there. But he was sure he had heard her. He saw his two allies laying in the water and the memory of Lilith's transfusion filled his mind. What else had she done to him?
The ship settled hard on the starboard hull, and a second rending reverberation tore through the hull. Hydraulic pistons groaned again, and the ship snapped back upright. Lockspur saw Binky's face, remembered the raptor had the codes to get through the odd device grafted to the bottom of his ship.
"Move!" the disembodied voice said.
Lockspur's head snapped sideways, sending out an explosion of stars and pain. Water poured from his eyes and if not for his still fastened harness, he would have landed on the floor in a watery puddle of floating puke. He punched half a dozen switches, and silence returned. The ship was dead; the alarms were pointless. And if they didn't move now, they would be dead, too.
"Dammit!" he screamed, punching another button. On the other side of the windscreen, the blast doors moved, but ground to a stop. Another red light flicked on and an alarm cried out. He silenced it.
The ship settled again, and inertia tossed Klar across the floor. He struck the base of the engineer's console, caving in the lower half. Vash slid towards him, rolling to a stop, splashing water everywhere. Klar lifted an unfamiliar hand, touched his bloody, bruised face and he withdrew it, staring at five meaty fingers. Clear liquid dripped from them. The newly transformed appendage fascinating him as he flexed his hand in disbelief.
Nearby, Vash flopped onto his back, head lolling around in the gloom, hazy eyes searching the compartment for answers. He blinked in confusion, shaking his head, trying to cast off the fog as he coughed up a throat full of water. It tasted strange and coppery. Staccato explosions sounded like shotgun blasts in the deep. The hull was imploding. Vash pulled himself onto a weak elbow, head swaying from side to side. The murky compartment coalesced in front of him, turning his enormous mouth into a toothy oh of surprise. He watched the little man in his seat, wondering where they were and why they were alive.
Klar heaved himself into a seated position, watching a storm of water coming through the ceiling. It threatened to drown the compartment. He leaned over, squeezed Vash's upper arm, and said, "Get up, brother. We are in trouble."
"Where are we?" Vash asked, slapping Klar's hand away. Water sloshed over his muscular legs in a series of rhythmic waves, catching his attention. Neither of them had ever seen water. The hull rocked onto the port-side, groaning in pain and sending another surge of telltale shockwaves through the protesting structure. Vash watched the falling rain with an utter childlike fascination. He slapped the water like a toddler sitting in a bathtub and let out a half gasp/half burst of elation. "Is this-"
"Water," Klar said, finishing his question. "I think it is."
"How?" Vash asked, scooping up a handful and taking a drink. His eyes widened, and he spat the liquid as if it burned his mouth. "Salt!" he screamed, jumping onto the engineer's seat like an elephant trying to escape a circling mouse. Had they not been in desperate trouble, the sight would have been comical?
Klar watched him, shaking his head in amusement. He wiped the taste of saline from his own lips before it could ignite the same fear in his veins. Salt is death and there was no getting away from it. They were in a sea of it.
"We're in a sea of death." Vash said to no one, feeling himself all over, wondering why his flesh wasn't blistering off and sloughing away in sheets.
Klar shook his head, looked at Lockspur to see if he was watching, and gestured from Vash to the pool beneath his seat. "Get down. You look ridiculous."
"It's salt," Vash blared. After a few moments of pointing at the floor. He stepped down, feet tickling the surface of the water before stepping in. He extended a hand to help lift Klar out of the pool of water and saw Klar grimace at the gesture. Even in the pack, raptors were solitary creatures. Klar accepted his hand and said, "We are not raptors anymore. Salt will not hurt us."
"We're not men either," Vash replied, looking at his hands. "We may have five fingers; but they are not the same as their fingers."
"No," Klar admitted, holding up his hand and studying it. "Not yet. But only the passage of time will tell what is to become of us."
Vash put his hands down, looked at the windscreen, staring out, eyes probing the crushing depths for the answers he already knew. "Are we in the inner sanctum?"
Klar nodded.
"This is forbidden. We can't be here."
"If you have any ideas, I'm all ears." Klar said and touched his earlobe as if it didn't belong there. He pulled it hard and winced when it did not come off. Klar pointed at Lockspur. "I'm sure the little man is listening. He doesn't seem to miss much. Maybe he'll have an idea. Because I don't."
"Yes. The little man is listening," Lockspur said, turning to look at them over his shoulder. "He is always listening, amigos."
"Eavesdropping isn't healthy."
"And neither is running around with your heads up your asses. I saw you dancing on my seat like a frightened school child. Hope you wiped your feet off before you got up there. I like a clean station."
"Fuck you, little man."
Lockspur rose from his seat, walked to Vash, and looked him up and down. He didn't notice Klar moving to intervene. "Tell me something," he said, glaring up at Vash. "How is it that neither of you could talk a few hours ago, but now you think you're running the whole goddamn show? And what's with all the jumping around as if something in the water is going to get you? What's your deal, amigo? What did she do to you?"
Vash glared down, body shaking in rage, but he said nothing. He managed that much restraint.
"You don't know what Lilith did to you. Do you? And now you're afraid she's still pulling your strings," Lockspur said, smiling up at him without a care in the world. "It's not bad enough they created a race of rabid dogs to unleash on unsuspecting universe. But they had to turn you into some perverse parody of humanity."
"No one controls us, little man?"
"They control us all, big man."
"We are nothing alike, little man." Vash said, leaning down so close their noses almost touched. "We're the old monsters."
"You're right, you are not like us. But you're wrong about one thing. We are the old monsters, and now… you are just like us."
As Vash's right foot slid back imperceptibly and his weight shifted, Klar shoved a giant hand between him and Lockspur. "Calm yourself, brother. He's playing you."
"Like a mariachi player, amigo." Lockspur said, rerouting emergency power to a nearby monitor. Water dripped off the screen as a distorted picture flickered into view. The image revealed a pale-skinned woman in a black gown. "This is Lady Lilith Hemmingford. If she looks familiar, it's because you know her as your queen."
"Sacrilege," Vash raged. "Our queen is no human. She is a god."
"I'm sure Lady Hemmingford would readily agree. But I can tell you from experience, she is no god. What she is, is a giant pain in the ass."
Vash snorted in anger, and Lockspur felt it in his chest. The non-humanoid was a barely controlled beast.
"If that little truth pisses you off, you're going to shit yourself when you hear what comes next, amigo. You look like us, because you came from us. And we act like you, because we came from you. It's all linked. We are the same people and no matter how much you protest, you will never change that."
"He mocks us, brother." Vash said, turning to Klar with barely contained rage.
"He is saying we are one people."
"No," Lockspur corrected. "He is saying we are the same people."
"Not possible," Vash said, touching his face, realizing just how much he had changed. Throughout the long, painful transformation, he had never considered what he would yet become. "I am no man."
"No. Not yet," Lockspur agreed. "But your children will use their DNA- our combined DNAs- to seed the primordial oceans of countless planets throughout the universe, creating the paradox that leads to their and our creation. And worse yet, it is they who exile you to this hellhole." The monitor erupted into sparks and smoke, then the screen went black. "So you see, we did this to ourselves. She engineered us all for this very moment, amigos. She started the hamster wheel spinning and now the question is, which one of us is going to jump off first?"
Something big slammed into the windscreen. The ship shuddered, tossing everyone around. The blast doors groaned, closed, ground to a stop again, and everyone looked to the diffused world on the other side of the poly.
Bubbles drifted up as a massive eyed tentacle, covered in giant suction cups slithered past the half closed windscreen. Klar saw the creature and took a tenuous step back. Vash's eyes followed his brother's retreat, studying the trace of fear twisting Klar's expression. He did not like it. Fear was a foreign concept for Raptors. It was an emotion that had no business on the face of his kin. Let alone the strongest of them. Vash squinted at Lockspur, thinking it was a trait torn from the little man. After all, his queen had used the little man's mind to uplift theirs. Perhaps his fears had transferred to them as well.
"What are you doing, brother?" Vash whispered, eyes following his slow retreat.
"She is here." Klar pointed at the open windscreen.
"Who?"
"The Dark Athena."
Vash turned to the open windscreen and stepped away, too. "Whatever that creature is, it is not our queen."
"Not yet, perhaps. But you can feel her. She is out there."
Lockspur punched the blast shield switch. It groaned to life again, and this time, it completed its cycle. He looked over his shoulder at his new comrades. "Hey, amigos. It looks like we're not alone down here."
"Has this been down here all along?" Vash asked, the expression of uncertainty on his face morphing into a barely contained sense of distrust. "Salvation in the dark?"
"There is no salvation here," Klar replied. "Not for us. Not for anyone."
"Do we mean so little to her?"
"Control, brother." Klar warned in a whisper. He placed a steadying hand on Vash's massive shoulder. "This is not the time for doubt. The last step in our transformation is nearing completion. If we are to win the prize, we must survive this day."
Vash gestured at Lockspur and whispered, "We must proceed with caution, brother. This Lilith character is not our queen, and the little man is an outsider."
"He is not," Klar said, unabated by his comrades' warning. "No one asked for his permission before stealing his mind. And now, he is the only father we will ever know. And you dare call him an outsider, knowing he will forever live in our minds."
"He does not look like us, speak like us or think like us. He is not us."
"And yet without him, you do not think at all. Without him, we are mindless pawns scurrying in the dark. Killing for the sake of killing."
Vash stared at Lockspur for a long moment, then turned to Klar. "Be that as it may, brother. When the Dark Athena acts, it falls to us to stop her." Vash turned to Klar and gestured to Lockspur. "We cannot allow him to stop us from completing our goal."
Sadness crossed Klar's face. He nodded and looked at Lockspur. "Perhaps none of this will matter. If we can prevent her from completing her transformation."
"And perhaps we will wake up tomorrow as men," Vash replied. "To succeed, the little man may have to die."
"She cares for him."
"She was supposed to care for us. And yet here we are. Trapped in a sea of salt, plotting the death of our parents and waiting to die."
"She is too strong for a frontal assault. So you will be an obedient dog until the right opportunity presents itself."
"I am no more a dog than I am a man."
Lockspur had returned to his seat. He fixated on the pilot's console. He jabbed a dozen switches, trying to lengthen how long they had to live before the hull imploded. Ear piercing alarms blared, and the ship groaned in protest. He reached overhead, yanked down hard on a large amber handle, and a deep rumbling resonated through the aft compartment. The ship lurched again, tossing the in-humanoids forward as the knee-deep water receded.
Vash slammed into the back of Lockspur's seat, air exploding from his lungs, causing Lockspur to jump in surprise. His hand flew out and struck a switch on the console, and a geyser of water shot up in the center of the cockpit. He slammed the switch again, and the geyser subsided. "Chinga tu madre. Would you please be more careful?"
"Where are we?" Vash demanded, pulling himself to his knees by using the arm of the pilot's seat for support. The arm creaked and bent beneath his considerable weight. Lockspur glared at him as if he had just killed his cat.
"Sorry," Vash said, forcing an unnatural smile that made Lockspur shy away.
"Dulce niño Jesús," Lockspur said, grimacing. "Whatever you're trying to do there. Stop it. You look like a deranged serial killer on a 3 system killing spree."
Klar shrugged and shook his head in frustration. There was no way they were going to hide what they were up to if Vash couldn't control his animalistic tendencies. Lockspur, preoccupied with his frantic button pushing, didn't notice Vash.
"Where are we?" Vash asked again, only this time his dark expression suggested he wasn't just pretending to be a serial killer. Lockspur let it go.
"We're 1,300-feet beneath the surface," Lockspur said, gesturing towards the windscreen. "On the bottom." He gestured at the water coming in around the windscreen and flicked a toggle switch up. Hydraulic pistons whined, the blast shield moaned and this time the interlocks clicked shut, stifling the water flow. The sheets of pouring water coming through the windscreen slowed to a dripping trickle. "We need to get rid of the incoming water or no one is getting out of this wreck alive."
"So do it," Klar said.
"Not so easy. This tub isn't equipped with a bilge pumps. It built to operate in a vacuum."
"Figure it out."
Lockspur scanned the console in thought, flipped up a red switch cover marked warning do not toggle on and toggled the switch beneath to the on position. The upper and lower air vents blared to life, filling the compartment with a blast of shrill air that churned the water into a storm. Everyone covered their ears as the sound intensified. After the water level went down, the blast of air subsided. Emergency pumps routed the remaining water into a series of empty O2 tanks.
"You did it," Klar said, pulling himself off the floor. "You stopped the water."
"For now," he said. "But we're still in trouble. The ship can't take much more of this pressure. If we don't get out of here before the hull buckles, we're-"
"Get out," Vash cut in, gesturing around the watery tomb. "And just where do you suggest we go?"
But Lockspur didn't seem to hear him. He looked as if he were floating in the pilot's seat, mouth open, staring forward with a vacant expression as a strange light flickered behind his eyes.
Klar and Vash stared in confusion. Vash waved a giant hand in front of Lockspur's face and asked, "Do you have a plan to get us out of here or not?" Vash pushed his shoulder. Lockspur toppled over, only to bob back up a split second later. Vash's head cocked to one side in confusion and he poked Lockspur's shoulder again. And again, same result. Topple over, bob back up. As Vash made to push him again, Klar scowled and gestured for him to leave Lockspur alone before he broke the little man. Vash looked disappointed.
But then, as if coming out of a seizure, Lockspur blinked repeatedly, shook his head a few times and looked around. He turned to Vash with a vacant stare that morphed into realization. "I have a plan. Not mine. But there is a plan."
"If not yours, then whose plan is it?"
"Hers," he answered. "The plan she embedded in your minds when she created you." Lockspur explained, standing up and walking towards the hatch. He gestured for them to follow.
Klar and Vash turned to one another and Klar said, "Brother. He knows."
"Impossible."
Lockspur opened the hatch, stepped through it, leaving his dumbfounded comrades in an empty compartment staring at one another. His voice drifted back, "Coming?"
The hull let out a tremendous crunch and a long, jagged crack raced across the polycarbonate windscreen. Vash and Klar flinched. Lockspur poked his head through the open hatch. "Now would be a good time."
"The hull is failing. Where do you think we can go?" Klar asked, gesturing around. "We're trapped."
"Where are you going?" Vash shouted as Lockspur walked down the corridor.
"Stay here and die, or come with me. Either way, I'm getting the fuck out."
"There's nowhere to go." Klar repeated. "We're trapped in a coffin at the bottom of the sea."
"Maybe not." Lockspur said, gesturing them forward. "The windscreen is about to implode. So, I strongly suggest you come out here. Now."
"How can you know that?"
Lockspur turned away, continuing his journey towards the hatch on the other end of the corridor. "I'm leaving, and I'm taking the rest of your co-conspirators with me. Either way, I suggest you close and lock that hatch before it does."
"He knows our plan," Vash said, taking a step towards the open hatch.
Klar grabbed Vash, preventing him from attacking. "NO! We follow. Nothing more. We will not let him out of our sight. What is in his head is dangerous."
"So am I."
"You are foolhardy. That makes you dangerous to everyone around you. Besides, the little man is far more crafty than you give him credit for."
"I do not fear his kind."
"Like I said, brother. Foolhardy."
A billion miles above the vent opening, the celestial convergence shifted out of position. As the beam of light drilling into the chamber vanished, a massive shockwave rocked the moon, ejecting a million tons of debris from the lower vent opening. It punched through the waves, sinking into the depths, burying Lockspur and his companions beneath a mountain of crushing rubble. The windscreen became a billion shards of sand, mixing with a muddy slurry of salt water and the brutal blast lifted Klar and Vash into the air and threw them through the open hatch, slamming it behind them. Water pressure ballooned the thick steel outward as if made of rubber. Klar and Vash cartwheeled down the corridor, bounding off the far hatch. Behind them, a spray of mucky water forced its way through the hatch's bent collar. The hatch wouldn't hold for long.
Lockspur reached down, grabbed Vash's hand, and yanked him to his feet as if he weighed that of a rag doll. He spun him around, shoved him through the second hatch, and extended a hand to Klar. As Lockspur pulled him up, the hatch at the other end of the corridor quaked as if someone was battering it with a giant sledgehammer. "We need to go." Lockspur said, gesturing at the open hatch. "Now."
As Lockspur stepped through the open hatch, Vash lunged forward. But Klar pushed Lockspur to the side and slammed the open hatch closed. Vash slammed headlong into the steel, bouncing back and landing on his backside 15 feet away. Klar rushed forward, leaping on his brother, and snarled in anger. "Perhaps if I tore one of these flappy things off the side of your head, it might help you hear better. You don't seem to use them anyhow."
Lockspur leaned around Klar and said, "Lilith thought it would be a good idea to implant a message in the shard she gave me. I'm supposed to help you. And for the record, don't tear his ear off. It won't help his hearing. For that, you will need to put a boot up his ass."
"Brother, the little man knows our plan." Vash shouted, kicking and struggling to get at Lockspur.
"She knew what we were planning?" Klar asked.
Lockspur laughed and shrugged. "Lilith knows everything; especially the things you think she doesn't. But in this case, the plan was always hers."
"What does she want?"
"Her last effort to save the obelisk failed. So, she went back and included a little surprise scenario. An alternate plan, if you will. A plan none of the other Liliths knew about. The one where you seize control of the Moon's reactor and there by control of this moon and the obelisk."
Vash squinted through a mask of suspicion.
But Lockspur only smiled and said, "Don't let it get to you down, amigo. Sometimes you can feel the puppeteer's strings; sometimes you can't."
______________________________
"Goddammit," Commander Krone yelled, arms outstretched towards the heavens. He flailed around in a childish act of outrage. He tore off his heavy steel helmet and hurled it into jungle undergrowth. It clanged half a dozen times before rolling to a stop. All the men fighting in the distance stopped to watch the display. None of them returned to the fight.
Krone laughed and shook his head. "Really?"
"He fucking left us again." The Commander continued, reeling towards the empty spot where the Purifier had vanished. He kicked a clod of dirt at the emptiness and a flock of frightened birds screeched and flew away.
"You were expecting something else?"
The commander squinted and sneered, but said nothing.
"You should take care of what you say. The Lord Marshal would not approve of such candor." Krone gestured to the thick scars furrowing the commander's face. "We have fallen prey to his ire before. Perhaps it is better not to speak words in darkness if one would not let them slip in the light of day."
"And what of your recent infractions?" The commander countered, gesturing at his unmarked face. "Would you stand in his presence so clean? Scars gone; skin pink with life, professing his downfall. He would end all our variants for such insolence. Do not counsel me when I should and should not sow discontent. I am a loyal subject."
"Loyal," Krone repeated and laughed. "Who do you think you're speaking with? You are as devoid of loyalty as deep space is devoid of oxygen. And yet you still think there is a place for you at his side? He sent you here full well, knowing you would never return. He cares nothing for you. You are a cog in a machine you cannot even see." Krone held out his very normal-looking hands, turned them over and inspected them. "As for my recent changes, inspect yourself before considering a return to the armada. It appears neither of us are the Necromongers we once were."
"That doesn't mean we can't find our way home."
"HOME!" Krone blared, as if wanting to put a large crack in his doppelgänger forehead. "What gives you the fucking idea I would ever go home? There is no going home. Our world was destroyed. They murdered our family while we hid like cowards in the dark. There is no going back."
"We couldn't stop it."
"We didn't try."
Guilt stole the commander's voice, and he turned away. There it was. A truth even he couldn't hide from.
An ear piercing howl, maybe wind, maybe beast, forced its way through the jungle, bending massive trunks, tearing off limbs, stripping away leaves and the sky turned to a canopy of ash. The air temperature plummeted by fifty degrees and everyone in the clearing turned towards a blast of trumpeting sirens. Mountain sized chunks of bedrock fell into the sea and a tidal wave pushed the shore inland.
"What the hell is this shit?" The Commander screamed, falling on his knees, fingertips dissolving into a cloud of ash that circled his upper body in a growing tornado. He watched in wide-eyed horror as his arms dissolved to the elbows.
"The black-hearted bitch did it," Krone said as his arms went up in smoke. He stared in amazement as the cloud joined with the commander. "She figured out how to combine the streams and we're getting caught in the wake of whatever she did. We're becoming one."
"One," the commander repeated, going bug-eyed as his arms disappeared.
The oncoming rush of water faded, withdrew, and the chamber fell silent. The sky above the island turned to sackcloth, and a creeping fear moved through the undergrowth as an ancient evil coalesced on the opposite side of the island. In the growing gloom of the clearing, the doppelgangers became one. One dark soul; one loyal subject. But loyal to whom?
Dahl and Carolyn raced across the clearing, followed by a blast of hot air that tossed them on their faces. They rolled to a stop at Krone's feet as the jungle behind them bent and wailed under the immense force of the wind. The merged Krone reeled on them, holding up his hands. Not in defense, but studying them as if seeing them for the first time.
As Eve ran towards Dahl, a massive creature crashed through the dense undergrowth. It skidded to a stop, towering over her. She leapt at it and the creature snatched her out of the air as if plucking an apple from a tree. He tossed her away with a casual gesture, not intended to harm. Eve landed on her backside, rolled onto her knees, and jumped upright, crouching for a second attack.
"Wait," Dahl yelled, waving off the incoming attack. "He's with us."
To Dahl's shock, in the hectic run from the beach, Boron had transformed again. Now, his skin had faded to a light cream. And she saw great similarities to another.
"Prince Belial," Eve said, shocked by his presence. "Where did you come from?"
"She is coming," Boron blared in horror. The sight of the giant in obvious distress made Eve's black skin crawl with an icy chill. "We need to reach the entrance before she does. It is our only hope."
"Who is coming?" Eve demanded.
"The Dark Athena," Carolyn answered.
"There is no such thing." Dahl blurted in a harsh voice.
"Lilith is the Dark Athena," Carolyn bellowed, gesturing in the opposite direction.
"You're insane."
"She is not," Boron said. "Lilith is both our creator, our mother, our queen, and our destroyer. She is the Dark Athena. The bringer of death. Conqueror of worlds, voice in the void, and she is eternal damnation made manifest. We must go, now."
In the distance, the sound of massive trees snapping like twigs reverberated off the lofty chamber roof and a penetrating scream drilled into everyone's minds.
"Move!" Boron shouted, diving into the jungle, leaving them to decide if they follow or stay and die.