She smiled and patted him on the left shoulder. “I’ll be back this time.”
“Let me go.”
“You’ll be fine, Dom, I believe in you.”
During a situation like this Foster’s place was on the bridge. But who else could have gone on the mission? Only she, Pierce, Kingston, Chevallier, and McDowell had gone down the first time, and therefore they were the only people that were familiar with the labyrinth within Tiamat’s tomb.
Pierce went through enough trauma as it was, and should have been resting and speaking with a counselor. It was bad enough he insisted on remaining at his science officer’s station. Nereid didn’t have all of McDowell’s memories back, Kingston is gone, that would leave Chevallier as the sole person that knew where to go. Besides, the engram trance Foster received did give her better insights into the past and Marduk’s objectives, it might come in handy down below.
ESRS CARL SAGAN, Docking bay
SB-417 orbit, Sirius B system
May 22, 2050, 17:51 SST (Sol Standard Time)
Foster arrived in the docking bay fully geared in her EVA suit while its magnetic boots clung to the floor, planting with every step. She examined her EAD which was modified to allow a partial copy of EVE to be loaded onto it, thanks to Rivera. Damn Rivera wasn’t kidding, she thought as the screen of her EAD was blank, its contents completely wiped out in favor of storing EVE on it.
Chevallier was in her full Hammerhead combat armor, Nereid and two Poniga were suited in EVA suits armed with magnetic rifles, Nereid however kept her Voelika staff in her hands. Foster glanced at the two Poniga as they gave uneasy looks at their human-made weapons within their human-made suits. Through their helmets’ visors she saw the faces of Eisila and Mavron inside the two EVA suits.
“MC, they good to go?” Foster asked.
“Did the best I could to teach them how to use our stuff given the limited time,” Chevallier said.
“It was the actions of you and your crew that saved us,” Mavron said with EVE’s voice offering the translation. “We must repay the debt.”
“And it gives us the chance to finally strike back at the Architect. Perhaps this will be one of many retaliatory strikes that will help liberate our people,” Eisila said.
Chevallier double-checked her rifle’s settings. “Just keep your head down and remember what I told you.”
The group boarded the transport with Foster and Chevallier sitting up front in the cockpit. Foster looked behind at their unusual rag-tag team; two Poniga who never fired a rifle in combat, and a mysterious psionic girl with talents unknown to Radiance and the Hashmedai. A full Hammerhead team would have made her feel slightly safer.
The transport’s engines flared, blue spikes of thrust propelled it out of the Carl Sagan as its trajectory took them to the surface of the planet, a planet that was the start of their crazy sleigh ride since their arrival in the system. The transport dipped below the darkened clouds, beneath the clouds was the icy surface reflecting the whitish-blue light of the white dwarf. The original transport they first rode in on could be seen, encased in snow and ice. It was a sign they were nearing Tiamat’s tomb.
“We should probably come back for that once this is over,” Foster said, glaring down at the first transport.
The transport’s landing thrusters scattered fresh snow in all directions as it came to rest next to the frozen over entrance to the tomb. The five all exited as its sliding doors rose, and retraced human-made, snow-covered footprints made days earlier. Nereid’s eyes fixated on the alluring design of the structure in front.
“What’s wrong?” Foster asked her.
“This is really it. The tomb of the goddess.” Nereid continued to look around wide-eyed. Snowflakes began to fall and were illuminated by the beams of light emitting from her EVA suit’s helmet. “This world must have been paradise before it met its end.”
“Let’s move!” Chevallier shouted. “Nereid, you might not be McDowell, but you still got his marbles. What would he be doing in a situation like this?”
Nereid clenched her fists, switched her sight to the entrance of the tomb and gave Chevallier a confident nod. “Right.”
The group entered the frostbitten tombs once again as Foster and Chevallier lead the way through the eerie mazelike halls. Unlike their previous expedition, power was running, lights along the walls shined upon them and the dragon-like sculptures adorning the walls. Marduk had indeed been busy. Prior to passing through a doorway, Nereid, Mavron, and Eisila stopped and kneeled before a serpent-like figure above, its design was similar to the figure on Nereid’s Voelika staff weapon.
Chevallier stopped and rolled her eyes at the three. “Guys . . .”
“Let them do their thing,” Foster said. “This is a sacred place to them after all.”
Two minutes later they pushed on into the central chambers, where it had all begun. Hordes of Marduk’s soldiers meandered next to active wormholes. Foster used hand gestures to signal to the group to hunker down out of sight. The five observed their enemy’s movements attempting to figure out exactly what they were doing.
“They were right, Marduk is using the wormhole to travel here rather than fly to it,” Chevallier said.
“Carl Sagan, are you receiving us?” Foster transmitted. As expected there was a signal loss, creating an irritating static sound inside of her helmet. “Just like last time, at least we’re prepared.”
Several soldiers entered the tomb via a wormhole linked with Marduk’s ship. They marched over to an unopened gate inside of the tombs alongside dozens of other soldiers, and waited. It was a rally point most likely. The question was, where were they waiting to travel to?
“Something tells me there’s a reason they all rallyin’ there,” Foster said.
Chevallier replied with two words that made Foster cringe. “Uh-oh.”
“What?”
Chevallier sent her helmet’s camera footage to Foster’s EVA HUD. A tiny holographic window appeared over her visor, within it she saw what appeared to be a zoomed in view of the dormant wormhole’s interface controls. There was a preview projection that showed the expected location the wormhole was set to connect with. It was hard for Foster to clearly see what the preview projection was in the distance, though one thing did stick out. A Hammerhead helmet.
“That’s the base camp Williams and Rivera set up when they discovered that wormhole in the Lyonria hub, isn’t it?” Chevallier said.
“Maybe.” Foster sent the data to her EAD. “EVE?”
“Your assumptions are correct,” EVE said. “The hologram appears to be monitoring activity in front of the gate in the Lyonria travel hub.”
“From what I was able to gather, a small screen appears next to a gate that allows the user to interact with it,” Chevallier said. “And probably to see what’s on the other side of the world you intend to visit.”
“Makes sense, gives folks a chance to look before they leap.”
“And it looks like they’re planning on leaping right on top of our forces. Captain, this is an invasion army they’re going to attack the colony!”
Foster looked again, this time via her suit’s HUD as more soldiers marched in unison away from the wormhole connected to Marduk’s ship and toward the dormant one, now set to open and ambush the UNE forces. “They must have used EVE’s copy to bypass the lockout and connect to that planet.”
“I don’t get it; why not just use the wormhole on his ship to launch the invasion?”