The Changeling Game, Chapter 96

96.
Let No Creature Put Asunder

Where is she? Riddick demanded from Lucy as he ran. He was aware of footsteps in pursuit of his; from the sound of it, Vaako wasn’t far behind. He heard Toal and Scales fall in as he passed them. The trio of would-be Firsts, insisting on following him into whatever crisis he was dealing with. Damn it.

She is near the engine room of the Tenth Crusade, but not in it, Lucy told him.

Near but not in. Practically on top of the Moribund’s lair but not inside it. Still closer than he liked.

What have you done to her? he demanded, letting both Apeiros hear him. He was nearly there…

We have done nothing. This was set in motion by someone else.

“Riddick!” Officer Lola was running towards him along the very route he planned to take. “Jack is in—”

“Trouble, yeah. Got the memo.” Sometimes he thought it ought to be the girl’s slogan. He charged past Lola; she fell in with the others behind him. Hang on, Jack! I’m coming!

“What can we do to help?” Vaako called from behind him. They were passing the Tenth Crusade plaque. Nearly there… nearly—

He saw Dame Vaako first, lying on the floor of what looked like some kind of control room, sobbing. Past her, through a steelglass panel—

“Fuck!”

Jack had her back to him. She was holding something against her chest with one arm. Her other hand was extended, palm forward, toward an open reactor core.

Riddick jumped over Dame Vaako’s prone body and started punching buttons on the control panel, calling up every shutdown procedure he could remember. And he could remember a hell of a lot of them.

“Jack!” None of the codes were working yet. He tried to keep his voice calm, reassuring. How does she get into all of these messes? “I’m gonna get you out of there!”

“This is my fault,” A female voice hiccupped behind him.

“What the fuck did you do, Dame Vaako?” He spared a glance back at her. Her husband had his arms around her and was frowning in confusion.

“It wasn’t her,” Jack rasped from the other side of the glass. The last time he’d heard her voice sound like that, he’d thought she was mourning Johns’ death when she was really preparing herself for her own.

“What happened, Chantesa?” Vaako murmured, stroking his wife’s wet cheek. Scales frowned at them and looked away, moving past them to examine the control panel. Toal moved to another of the panels and began calling up readings.

“It just started all on its own,” the Dame sobbed, leaning her head against her husband’s shoulder. “The controls have always been dead before now.”

What the fuck? What was that woman doing, skulking around in the bowels of the Basilica? She was lucky the Moribund hadn’t eaten her.

“I tried to find an emergency failsafe,” she continued, her voice still hitching but increasingly coherent, “but there’s nothing…”

She looked genuinely devastated, but she’d run—and tried to run—so many games in the last year that it was impossible for him to believe her tears were real. “Things,” he growled at her, “don’t just start all on their own.”

“I was right next to her when they did,” Lola told him, forcing open a cabinet to the side. Behind it, winking lights and meters worked quietly to destroy his universe. “She never touched anything until she started trying to turn the system back off.”

“These readings make no sense,” he heard Toal murmuring to Scales. “Only two thirds of the radiation monitors in the room are registering anything. The others aren’t dead—they seem to be working—but it’s as if there’s a wall up.”

A wall. Jack was isomorphing the radiation away from herself before it could touch her.

Clever girl, brilliant girl… No wonder she wasn’t trying to talk to them. She would need all her focus to do something like that. But how long would she be able to keep it up before she ran out of stamina…?

He had to figure out a way to get her out of there before then.

Something flickered in the corner of his eye, a familiar shape he couldn’t look at long. Lucy was inside the core chamber with Jack, almost visible, racing across the room and up the core pillar—

“What in God’s name is that?” Vaako shouted behind him.

Riddick tried to follow her movements with his eyes, tried to see what she was doing, but his visual cortex wouldn’t cooperate. Was she going to try to rescue Jack? Was there a way to reclose the core from inside the chamber?

But the Apeiros seemed to simply be perching on it.

What the fuck is going on? Lucy? Moribund? You said Jack wouldn’t die!

She won’t. We are busy right now.

Did that fucking thing just shush him?

I have just about had enough of your shit—

“You and me both,” Jack said on the other side of the glass. For a moment he thought she was agreeing with him. She took several long, deep breaths while around him everyone entered random commands on various panels to try to rescue her. “Better be right about this…”

He watched in horror as she dropped the hand that she’d been holding up.

“Jack, no!” he heard himself—and Lola, and Dame Vaako—shouting.

“Hell,” Toal said beside him. “Those sensors that weren’t picking up radiation all just spiked. Whatever wall was up just—”

On the other side of the glass, Jack, her hair blowing back as if a gust of wind had struck her, reached forward toward the pillar, and toward Lucy. One dark, glittering leg stretched out from the mind-breaking form above the unshielded core, touching Jack’s fingertip and making Riddick think, for a second, of a fucked-up version of a famous painting on the ceiling of Old Earth’s Sistine Chapel, and then—

“Fuck!” Riddick slammed his hands against the glass, not understanding what he was seeing.

Aside from the unshielded core, the inner chamber was empty.

Jack and Lucy had vanished.

“How is this possible?” Scales gasped beside him.

How the fuck in­deed…? Riddick turned around, fists clenched, and stared down at Dame Vaako. “Why… the fuck… were you down here with Jack?”

The normally imperious woman wiped at her eyes, leaning against her husband. “She… she was looking for a book. Written by, uh… Minnie something? One of a set of three, and she had the other two. I…” She sniffled, closing her eyes for a moment. New tears spilled out when she opened them back up. “I used to use this place as a retreat, when I was first brought here.”

She rose unsteadily to her feet and walked over to the glass, pointing.

“I would go in there to commune with our god. Sometimes I brought books with me, too…”

In one corner of the room, where she was pointing, a small lamp glowed beside several pillows, a blanket, and a scattered pile of books.

Not as empty as I thought…

“The book she wanted was one I’d brought here. So we came down here to get it.” She closed her eyes again, leaning her forehead against the steelglass. “I don’t understand what happened, how it happened, but… I think it is my fault, Riddick… Tokoloshe said I’d made a mistake and been be­trayed…”

“Tokoloshe?”

“Our god,” she half-whimpered.

The Moribund was talking to a human? Riddick could have sworn the fucker hated all of humanity. Aside from maybe the Quasi-Dead. And he had let her give him a name? A delimiter?

Not important right now. “So what mistake did you make?”

Dame Vaako swallowed before turning to look at him. “I visited the Elemental witch today. She was struggling to do even simple things with those chains on and I… I…”

Fuckin’ hell. “You thought you’d ask her guards to unchain her.”

She nodded.

“Because what trouble could a sweet little old lady who walks through fuckin’ walls like they’re not even there get up to?” He didn’t even realize he was moving until his hand was wrapped around the Dame’s neck and he slammed her back against the wall. “I had those chains on her for a reason!”

“For God’s sake, Riddick—” Lola started.

“Lord Vaako,” he growled, cutting her off, “give me one good reason why I shouldn’t snap Chantesa’s neck right now.”

“Because,” Vaako said quietly, “I love her.”

Well, fuck.

“Sounds like a damn good reason to me,” Jack said from somewhere behind him. “Please let go of my friend, Riddick.”

The hand that had been gripping Dame Vaako’s throat suddenly felt numb and weightless. The woman, no longer pinned to the wall, crumpled to the floor, gasping and coughing. Vaako dropped to her side, gathering her into his arms, even before Riddick could make himself turn around. The others, he was aware, were staring, dumbfounded, at—

Jack. Standing in the outer doorway as if she’d never been trapped in a reactor, looking perfectly normal. She was still holding a large book in one hand.

“How are you here?” Toal asked her while he was still struggling to find words. “How are you alive? We all saw you trapped inside the core chamber.”

“The core isn’t lethal,” she said with a ready smile, as if the soldier had asked her how she’d trained for one of her half-marathons. “I guess I needed its energy boost to be able to hatch into my—hey! Easy there, big guy!”

Riddick had his arms wrapped around her, holding her to him in an embrace that was almost rib-crackingly tight. In that moment, he didn’t know if he’d ever manage to let go again, but he had just enough self-control left to keep from squeezing too hard. He was shaking and wasn’t sure if he could find a way to make that stop.

“Don’t ever scare me like that again,” he whispered, wishing he had her alone in his room. He needed to explore every inch of her to be sure she was—

“No promises,” she murmured.

Fuck! He pulled back, staring down into her face.

Her smile was wry and apologetic. “I know what’s going on now. What’s really going on. This is a war, and I’m gonna have to do some scary shit to help us win it.”

“What war do you speak of?” Vaako asked, still kneeling beside his wife.

Jack shrugged. “The war against the Demons—”

“—of the Darkness,” Dame Vaako gasped. “I remember them from my dreams. Dreams Tokoloshe would send me.”

Toal, Scales, Vaako, and Lola all had looks on their faces as though they were trying to recall similar dreams of their own, struggling with a kind of déjà vu.

“Yeah,” Jack continued, seemingly unsurprised by their reactions. “It’s almost time to take them on. Speaking of which, someone should really order a security lockdown of the shuttles in the starboard bay in the next few minutes. All of them, really, but probably those first. There’s just no telling who might start crawling around in one of them.”

Scales gave Riddick a confused and inquiring look.

“Hell if I know what she means,” he growled, every bit as confused, “but go see to it.”

“My Lord,” Scales said with a nod, and hurried out of the room.

“Been meaning to ask why nobody around here uses comms,” he found himself growling. “Somethin’ against them?”

“The Quasi-Dead are our comms,” Toal said after giving him a quizzical look. “Instantaneous across the light years, unlike the delayed systems used by this upstart Federacy. And the closer we are to the Basilica, the more clearly we can feel our god’s will. What else is needed?”

“Oh, I dunno…” Exasperation flooded through Riddick. I’m supposed to turn a zombie horde into an actual army? “Tactical updates. Warnings about enemy movements. Fuckin’ small talk with friends. You really don’t do any of that shit?”

“If it’s important to us, we pray.” Toal’s voice had taken on a patient tone Riddick remembered from his grade school days. “And if it’s important to Him, He answers.”

Lord and Dame Vaako nodded in solemn agreement. Lola, he was glad to see, was on Team What The Fuck right along with him, concealing her bafflement behind a mostly-convincing deadpan. It was getting tempting to introduce the lot of them to their god right that moment.

“To be fair,” Jack said, “it is a communication method almost nobody outside of the Armada can eavesdrop on. Or steal.”

She slipped out of the loosened circle of his arms and walked over to the control panel, entering commands on its main console. On the other side of the window, the pillar containing the core began to close and lower itself down toward the floor.

“You know how to work the panel?” he asked, surprised.

“I do now, yeah.” She pressed several more controls as the pillar vanished into the floor, and Riddick heard a series of heavy bolts draw back in the metal shield door. It swung slowly open.

“Is that safe?” Lola asked behind him. “That room was just irradi­ated—”

“With ‘Kirshbaum rays,’” Jack said, turning around and smiling. “Totally harmless to baseline humans, might even make some of you hatch into your five-shapes, if you hang out in them long enough.”

“I thought this was a nuclear reactor,” Dame Vaako said in a soft voice.

“Oh, it’s designed like one, sure.” Jack grinned. “Kirshbaum barely understood what he had here or what it was doing. He just figured out how to make it do what he wanted, filed a patent, and slapped his name on it. Riddick, where are the apeirochorons the Moribund’s been collecting?”

“How did you—?” He hadn’t told her about that part of the deal; he’d remember if he had.

Figure it out later, he told himself.

“There’s a storage room near here. They’re inside.” What did she want with them?

“Good. Once your guest of honor is tucked away again, we need to bring them here and get them into the chamber. Their occupants are going torpid.”

“Sorry,” Lola cut in. “What are you two talking about?”

“It’s a long story,” Jack said even as Riddick drew a breath. “I’m still piecing it all together. Got a whole lot of new stuff in my head.”

She’d only been gone a minute or two. What the fuck…? “Where did you go, Jack? When you vanished from the core containment chamber. Where were you?”

“At first it wasn’t a where,” she told him. “It was a when. About four hundred-twenty years ago in this very room. I got to see how everything began. Went a few other places after that.”

“Time travel?” Lola asked. “You’re talking about time travel here.”

Jack shrugged. “I can move in six dimensions now, and time’s the fourth. Just gotta be careful with that one. It’s where most of the bifurcations happen. When they can, anymore.”

There was a weird, ominous note in her words. He opened his mouth to ask—

“My Lord.” A Necromonger soldier had appeared in the doorway. “Commander Scales reports that the Elemental, Aereon, has been captured while attempting to steal and launch one of the shuttles in the starboard bay. He is returning her to her assigned quarters and wanted me to tell you that he’s having the chains put back on her.”

Jack knew. Huh. He spared her a quizzical glance before answering the soldier. “Tell him thank you, and good work.”

“Yes, My Lord.” The man bowed and departed.

“Comms. I’m tellin’ you.” He looked around at the others. “That could have been a comm call, not some soldier walkin’ across the whole ship to talk to me.”

“If you accepted our god into your heart,” Dame Vaako said with pious solemnity, “He would be your ‘comms.’”

That how it works, Moribund? You carryin’ messages for your Armada?

He could feel the creature’s offended outrage. They are my servants. I inform them of how to serve me. I am no courier they can whistle for at will.

Seems like you have a more personal connection to Dame Vaako here.

Apparently, it was possible to growl telepathically. Jack looked like she was suppressing laughter.

“I suddenly feel as though,” Toal said, “anointed by our god or not, He finds you quite—”

“—annoying,” the Vaakos joined him in saying.

Now that was just spooky. But he guessed it proved their point. Might also explain a little why Dame Vaako could pull some of the stunts she has, if the Moribund’s made a favorite pet of her… heh. Creature’s Pet.

Fortunately, the Moribund apparently hadn’t heard that last bit.

“We should probably get back to the newer parts of the Basilica,” Jack said, audibly still struggling not to laugh. “Chantesa, would you like any of your old things from inside the chamber? It’s going to start being closed up most of the time soon.”

“I would.” Dame Vaako climbed to her feet. The expression she turned on Jack seemed genuinely warm. “Thank you.”

Vaako glanced between the two women, looking as surprised as Riddick felt. Whatever had happened, it seemed like the Dame and Jack genuinely considered each other friends.

Shouldn’t be so surprised, I guess. Jack’ll make friends with anything that’ll let her. Even eldritch horrors and Lady Mac­Beth…

Lord Vaako ended up carrying the small lamp and a pile of books, while Dame Vaako carried pillows and blankets as they left the bowels of the Tenth Crusade for the rest of the Basilica.

“You never told me about your retreat,” Vaako murmured to his wife as they brought up the group’s rear.

“I didn’t need a retreat,” Dame Vaako answered, “after you saved me from Lord Vath.”

“So you did need saving, but not from a heretic.”

“Not a heretic, no,” Dame Vaako told him, her voice dropping. “Just a monster.”

“Ah.” Vaako was silent for a moment as they walked. “Had you told me that, at the time, I might have fought twice as hard for your sake.”

“I didn’t know that about you back then, or I would have.”

Beside Riddick, Jack had a pleased smile on her face.

The Vaakos turned off at the hallway to their quarters, Toal formally excusing himself a moment later. Riddick found himself surprised—and then wondering why he was at all surprised—when he saw the tables of discards set up outside his suite, the Ennead Kids picking through their contents while discussing dance moves and rehearsing snatches of song.

They were supposed to be a surprise, though. He glanced over at Jack.

“They did try to be discreet,” she told him, still looking amused and not at all like someone who had almost been killed just a short while before. “But I think you forgot I’d hear their thoughts even if I couldn’t hear them singing. Thank you, though. It’s really good to see them again. And get to know them better, the way I always wanted to.”

“Gonna need a moment alone with Jack,” he grumbled to Lola as they reached the doors to his—well, his and Jack’s—suite.

“Yes, Sir. I’ll be near if you need me.”

Sir. I’m a fuckin’ Sir… As if “my Lord” and “my Liege” hadn’t already been bad enough…

Things had changed inside the suite, too, he saw. Someone—undoubtedly Jack—had set up the outer room as a lounge. His desk was unmolested, his armor still piled on its top, but it was surrounded by groupings of chairs, tables, lamps, and sofas, different areas for conversation and even dining. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, it looked fuckin’ cozy. Especially with the torture statue and the gruesome wall hangings long gone.

He could already see the spot that Jack had begun to nest in: one of the fancy teapots he’d seen in her memories of New Marrakesh sat on a low table beside an ornate, matching glass. The chaise next to it had a throw blanket draped across its bottom and two books leaning against its side. It was positioned to give its occupant a clear view of the room and everyone in it.

“So,” he made himself say in a calm voice, “what have you been up to since I went off, aside from… hatching?”

Jack walked over to the chaise and put her new book down with the other two. “And aside from the mess outside? Reading, mostly. Minnie Sulis’s autobiographies. I knew something was up with them, but I kept forgetting that she wasn’t just a Kirshbaum, but Joren Kirshbaum’s first cousin. I think—and maybe her diary will confirm it—I think she was the one who figured out how to access other ’verses. She had a lot of power.”

“And now your big mystery’s solved?” The whole time, he thought, the Apeiros had been suppressing her ability to put the clues together, but not his when he watched her memories. Aside from the blank spaces in those memories that he hadn’t been able to see into, either.

“Yeah. Got a plan, too, of a kind… it’s gonna take a lot of work, and more time than I’d like, but I can see a way through it.” She turned to him, a wry smile on her face. “They were right, though. Before my hatching, when I couldn’t understand what’s really needed, much less do it yet… there was no way I would have been able to be patient. Now, though—”

“This plan,” he found himself growling. “You gonna live through it?”

“All the way to the end,” she told him. “I have to.”

“And after?”

She shrugged.

God damn it… “You don’t have plans for after?”

“I can’t see that far,” she told him. “All the alternate pathways collapse to that point. On the other side, everything opens back out again. I don’t know where we’ll end up after that.”

Why did he suddenly feel like he was losing her? Like he’d already lost her, somehow? She was right in front of him, and yet—

“So,” she broke in on his thoughts, “Is the position of ‘Dame Riddick’ still one you want me to fill? ’Cause I’m in.”

An even mixture of confusion and relief flowed over him. He crossed the remaining distance between them and pulled her into his arms for a devouring kiss. Maybe he shouldn’t have tried talking about this at all.

They’d have to talk eventually, he silently admitted as he carried her into the bedroom to begin the inch-by-inch exploration of her body he’d wanted to conduct since she’d first reappeared. These ’verse-shaking matters were things that couldn’t be left unarticulated. But for the moment, he needed to forget that words existed, that worlds existed… that anything existed except her, the taste of her mouth and skin and most sensitive flesh… the exquisite feeling of being buried deep inside her… the way her body clutched at his as he brought her to her re­lease… and the pure trust in her face, eyes, and mind as he lost himself in her.

He’d already had too much taken from him, almost everything. He couldn’t lose her, too.

As much as he’d managed to be a lone wolf for years, he realized as he shuddered against her and emptied himself within her depths, he couldn’t be that anymore. He’d let every ’verse in creation fall before he allowed anything to take her away from him again.