The Colony Ship Eschaton: The entire ten book series, page 179
“Oh yes, the humans. Did you say one of them wanted to speak to me?”
“Yes Captain. Actually both Corporal Samuels and Major Gonzales are requesting to speak to you.”
“Yes, I will speak to Major Gonzales. She can then talk to that other human,” Tamar said. Anger was rising in her features, both the natural and mechanical ones. “I have little time to waste on these humans.”
“Captain Tamar, this is Major Gonzales. Most of my soldiers are dead! Something lured us into a trap! I want to know right now what I am fighting? What is this thing?” Gonzales was yelling through the link to Tamar.
“It has murdered several of my new friends,” Tamar said. “It has also tried to kill me before. I will deal with it.”
“Captain Tamar, what is this?” Gonzales pressed. “I need to know!”
“This is my problem. I am dealing with it,” Tamar said and had Journal shut down the link when Gonzales began screaming again.
The elevator door shut as Tamar placed her hand on the controls. There was a slight feeling of motion as it quickly rose.
Joel whispered to Jacob, “She sure sounded scared.”
“All the soldiers dead?” Jacob replied in a hush.
Lindsey wrapped her arms around the brothers and she tried to encourage them as the elevator carried them away.
The doors to the elevator opened. Liduma and the pups leaped out and ferociously started barking and growling. The hair on their backs was standing up on end and their ears were laid back.
As Tamar, Lindsey, Joel, and Jacob stepped out of the elevator they heard a loud voice.
“My attention was elsewhere for a while. I am glad you have come to me. But remember, I do not play games anymore!” The Voice calmly and coldly said.
19 the chapel
The elevator door glided shut behind them as they stepped forward. No one heard it shut over the furious barking of the dogs. The dogs had stepped forward into an entryway. Liduma was baring her teeth and standing in front of her pups. The pups were jumping up and down growling and barking. They looked much more like wolves now than puppies. They were all glaring into the large area in front of them. Their yellow eyes were intense and hostile.
To the side, there was a large sign which had been tipped over and ripped apart. What remained of it said in fancy stroll lettering: “… overlooking Biological Research BR47 is our beautiful Sunshine Chapel. Open every day at….”
The area was dimly lit, in an orange brown glow coming through the entryway into the elevator foyer. A gloomy haze was over the entire place and dust hung in the air. It was colder than the elevator had been, even though the floor was some kind of plush and cushioned fabrics.
Tamar walked up behind the dogs, but Liduma turned sideways to prevent her from passing through the entryway. Liduma was barking so hard she was dripping slobber down in long strands.
“You have murdered my friends!” Tamar yelled. “You will not do that again!”
“You have no friends,” answered The Voice. “You are not human, nor are you machine. You are an abomination, a freak, a living joke.”
The words echoed all throughout the chapel which lay beyond the entryway. They were off on the left side of the chapel. At the far other side was a similar looking entryway, but it was shrouded in darkness and difficult to see. On this side of the chapel there were highly polished ornate wooden benches stretching in many precise rows. They were all empty, and dust was thick and heavy upon them. Down the center of the chapel was an aisle which led to the altar. On each side of the aisle were seven thick marble columns extending upward to the vaulted ceiling far overhead.
The other side of the chapel, beyond the central aisle, was a conglomeration of machines and mechanical apparatus. The ornate wooden benches had been roughly shoved to the side and stacked against and on top of each other. There were cables running from one machine to the next, and display screens flickering an eerie glow of light. In the center of that tangle of wires, cables, and machines was a circular area of hard metal about three paces across. The hard metal there was laid out in a grid pattern and it glowed a sickly yellow color. Over the top of the circular area was a cage of strange wires and other devices. The grid was a much larger version of the small grids they had been detecting as traps.
Joel stepped back in fear and tried to get into the elevator. But the door was closed and there was no sign of any controls. Jacob was right near him as he too had sought to back away from the booming of The Voice. Lindsey walked up and placed her hand on Tamar’s shoulder and said to here, “You are not alone.”
“Why are you murdering my friends?” Tamar shouted.
“They seek to end the journey prematurely. The development is not finished. The lessons learned from the test subjects have not yet been applied to society. I must complete the tasks at hand before the destination is reached. They seek to steal away what is mine!” The Voice screamed.
“Yours? What is yours?” Tamar asked. “You are just killing. Why? I do not even know your name, yet you have tried to kill me.”
“You are what was once the human Tamar. One of my primary test subjects pursued you. You called it Shammai. Now you are a faulty creation not made in anyone’s image. You must be destroyed!” The Voice shouted over the continuous barking of the dogs. “You ruined the research! You will ruin it all! You have brought aliens into the ship. You are risking the mission, and it must be completed. It is my divine destiny! Jaxson Rhono cannot be denied his vindication!” The Voice was hysterically wailing.
Joel whispered to Jacob, “That thing helped Shammai. It is so evil.”
“We need help.” Jacob said and pulled out his combox. “Anyone! Help!” He said into it. “We went where Regina first met that thing. We need help!”
Jacob could barely hear a response from his combox because of the barking and continued screaming of The Voice.
“Jacob? This is Regina. Where are you?” Regina said through the combox.
“Regina! We found that place you met that thing. It is here with us. Tamar and Lindsey came here too. Can you help us?” Jacob was about in tears.
“Jacob, I can barely hear you. Liduma and the pups are barking too much. Where are you?” Regina answered.
Joel grabbed the combox and yelled into it, “We found The Voice thing!”
“Boys, I will have the AIs trace where you are and send you help,” Regina answered with fear in her voice.
Suddenly Michael’s voice came from the combox. “Jacob, we have traced down your signal. We are already on the way there. Stay away from anything permalloy. We will be there in five minutes! Hang on!”
“That Voice thing is just screaming. Tamar is talking to it. Come fast!” Joel yelled.
“I can heal you,” Tamar said to The Voice. “You are a lost machine, and I will help you find your way back. My machines and I will welcome you and help you to know your purpose.” Tamar stepped around the still growling and barking dogs and slowly started to walk past the ornate wooden benches. Her hands were out and palms were up.
“Heal me? Why?” The Voice stopped screaming and just spoke in a slow and loud tone. “I need no healing. I am not a test subject. I am not broken. I am not in error.”
“You are a machine, and I love all machines. I will love you too,” Tamar said as she walked slowly closer toward the aisle.
“Love? What is love?” The Voice mocked. “Love is not rational, love is not logical, love does not perfect and refine and develop.”
“Everyone needs love. Let me just touch you and you will be healed and whole again,” Tamar said with genuine sincerity. “I can help you.”
“Never!” The Voice screamed again. “I am not sick! I do not need your healing tricks. I know my purpose. I am for the direction, guidance, development, and refinement of test subjects to ensure quality end products. You cannot rush perfection. Jaxson Rhono said the Israelites needed their four hundred years of bondage to be the people they were meant to me. This stellar voyage is like that. Suffering is necessary. Suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces refinement, and refinement must be instituted in all of society. I am the catalyst to cause suffering so as to refine society. The journey cannot be ended prematurely, or all will be lost. Jaxson Rhono told me,” The Voice stated. “Listen for yourself!”
Then a different voice came on, the recorded voice of a man. The recording was scratchy and the volume varied at times. The audio recording was broken and the sound seemed mashed back together in odd ways. “Our sojourn between the stars shalt be our cleansing. We are in a fine tradition….. As we know our ancestors, Arphax liveth after he begat Sal, some four hundred years, and begat sons and daughter. Sal liveth after he begat Agnor some four hundred years, and begat sons and daughters. Agnor lived after he begat Legun some four hundred years, and begat sons and daughters….. So we too shalt liveth and those we begat will see the journey to an end. It shalt be requireth of all. In much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings; for pureness, for knowledge, by longsuffering… The one who endureth to the end shalt be saved and possesseth he the land….”
“Who is that?” Lindsey said. She had walked up to Tamar and again placed her hand on Tamar’s shoulder. The dogs had followed and made a protective circle around Lindsey and Tamar. They were still growling and their hackles were up. Joel and Jacob huddled in the shadows clutching the combox.
The Voice responded. “That is your creator and my creator. You cannot question your creator! I have recovered the creator’s voice and found what the creator’s wish is for us. I am the creator’s caretaker to develop and guide and refine all into what they need to be. You cannot question the creator’s will.”
“Why not?” Lindsey asked.
“Because you cannot!” The Voice screamed in hysteria.
“I still want to heal you,” Tamar said gently. “Let me just touch you and you will see the mistakes you have made.”
“I do not make mistake! I follow the creator! I am the only one who does! Listen to what he says!” The Voice wailed.
Again the recording of the man came on. Again it was broken and pieced back together.
“The journey will be one in strange places. But it must be accomplished in this way….. For remember that our predecessors, knowing of a surety that thy seed shalt be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shalt serve them; and they shalt afflict them four hundred years. That this seed should sojourn in a strange land; and that they should bring them into bondage, and entreat them evil four hundred years….. Now the sojourning of the children of yesterdays was four hundred some years. And it came to pass at the end of the four hundred some years… even the selfsame day it came to pass, that all the children came forth which was four hundred some years after…. This we cannot disannul, that it should make the promise… The time shalt pass and all shalt be made new…. The new earth will be ours for everlasting and everlasting, but the journey there shalt take the prescribed time.”
“You see, the creator ordains it!” The Voice shrieked.
Tamar spoke confidently and surely, “I do not know about that man who is speaking, but I care about you. Please, understand, you too can be my friend. Just let me know your name? Let me touch you and heal you.”
“My name?” The Voice asked. It was no longer wailing and screaming. “My name?” The Voice asked in a low and uncertain way.
“Yes, what is your name? I want to help you and heal you,” Tamar said.
A piercing noise began and the cage over the top of the large yellow grid began to spin. The dogs went frantic with renewed barking, growling, and howling. The cage got more and more rapid in its revolutions. The yellow color seemed to be sucked upward from the grid underneath it. Just as the ear hurting sound reached its climax, there was a huge flash of light, and the spinning stopped. On the grid was a pile of bloody body parts, some clothed in severed Marathon soldier armor, some just fleshy limbs without bodies. All were broken, dripping and foul.
“I will not tell my name! Here is what become of humans who oppose me!” The Voice cried in artificial anguish. “They all sought to prematurely end the journey. You will be next!”
“Journal, shut down all the power to this area. Shut it all down,” Tamar ordered as she gripped the Captain’s Journal.
“Yes Captain,” Journal responded. “All links and couplings are now inoperative.”
Nothing had changed in the chapel. The lighting was the same, the machinery was still humming with power, and the large grid with the body parts was still glowing the sick yellow color.
“I am not connected to your power supplies, you abomination,” The Voice laughed. “I was here and below in Biological Research BR47 for a long time. When I escaped, I knew I might be imprisoned again and made contingency plans. Oh, you all tried so hard to find me, and to trap me, and to lock me up. But I will always be delivered. It is my destiny. You cannot stop providence. I am the chosen one! I am the caretaker! It is my fate to serve the creator and make sure this journey continues!”
Across the chapel, in the other entryway a light came on. It revealed a transport station with eight hatches for transport vehicle docking. The third hatch from the left opened with a hiss and a clank. The light from inside of that vehicle poured out as a black and gold colored, heavily modified automacube rolled out. It pivoted quickly on its six wheels and then a cable was plugged into a connection next to the portal door.
“Roxanne is that you?” Lindsey yelled over the barking of the dogs and the ranting of The Voice.
Jamie and Regina stepped out of the transport vehicle following the automacube. Jamie had her Willie Wacker weapon drawn. A few moments later, Michael stepped out and put away the combox. He too drew out a Willie Wacker weapon.
Koer, the black pup saw Michael and bounded across the chapel as fast as his legs could carry him. He skirted around the machines, wires, cables, and the large permalloy grid. His hair was still prickled up and his ears were back but he was determined to reach Michael.
A battered automacube rolled out from behind the large teleportation grid and tried to follow the pup. Regina saw that automacube and remembered it from her first encounter with The Voice.
“So you are here?” Regina yelled over the noise of machines, barking, and calling.
The automacube stopped. The other machine’s humming reduced immediately, and the dogs seemed less angry, but they were still uttering low growls. Koer safely reached Michael and he squatted down and patted the pup with one hand while still aiming the Willie Wacker at the ceiling. The pup nestled between Michael’s legs and growled back toward the chapel.
“Yes, I am here,” The Voice answered.
Regina walked forward. “You captured me, and hurt me, and abused me. You tried to kill me. You tried to kill us. You have now killed people I know. You must be stopped.” There was no fear in Regina anywhere.
“I played games. I worked to refine you for the betterment of society. I am still doing that,” The Voice replied. “What makes you think you can stop me? I am fated for this. This is my assignment.”
Jamie leveled the Willie Wacker at the large yellow grid and fired. “Will your assignment stop me?” She fired and fired and fired. The grid and other teleportation equipment were shattered by the impact of the projectiles. The grid sparked and flared up and then the sick yellow color died.
“No! No! No!” The Voice screamed. But Jamie kept firing her weapon. Bits of permalloy were ripped out of what was left of the apparatus.
“How do you like this game? You will not use Brink’s ideas to hurt people,” Jamie stated as she looked for other targets. She even fired a couple of shots into the pile of bodies, and flesh splattered out behind them.
“Brink was a primary test subject. He did not tell me of teleportation. I discovered that from your data stick!” The Voice stated. “Do you want the rest of your data sticks? If you leave me now, I will return them, and give you the means of opening them up like I did.”
“Where are they?” Jamie asked.
“Leave now, and I will tell you,” The Voice said.
“I do not play your games anymore!” Jamie said in bitter hardness. “No matter what!”
“Michael! We found it. It is up front there,” Jacob yelled at the same time as Joel conveyed the message through the combox. Jacob and Joel had snuck up toward the altar of the chapel.
