He closed his eyes and hoped that the water might have been cold enough to numb him even a little bit to the pain.
It hadn’t been, and it didn’t.
His back hit the wall. A few ribs on his right side cracked. Every ounce of air immediately exploded out of his lungs, which refused to reinflate. Stabbing pain flared across his lower right side as gravity once again took hold of him and Theriault. This wall had no groove to slip into, just a thin, steady cascade of rainwater across its slope, which Pennington was grateful to see shallowed quickly beneath them.
As they were funneled into another curve-bottomed trench, every twisting turn wrenched his back and pummeled his fractured ribs. Pained howls left his mouth filled with dirty water, which he spluttered out between curses. Then a final whip-turn sent them hurtling toward an intersection of several drainage channels, all of which flooded into a tunnel that plunged swiftly into underground darkness. “Bloody hell,” Pennington grumbled.
“It’s okay.” Theriault gasped. “Take a deep breath, and keep your head down!” She filled her lungs and pressed her face against his chest. He gulped as much of a breath as his protesting lungs would allow, closed his eyes, and rode the turgid current into the darkness.
It was surprisingly peaceful. Completely submerged, he was barely aware of being in motion. Alone with the beating of his heart, he focused on slowing its tempo. On letting go of fear and expectation. On the warmth of the body entangled with his. On the ambience of moving fluid…
Light and air, rushing and roaring as they dropped into free fall. He opened his eyes. Sixty-five meters below, in a stag-geringly huge cavern, a broad pool of azure water awaited them. Dozens of plumes of water cascaded from the roof and walls of the cavern into the pool.
Theriault pushed away from Pennington so that they could each control their own splashdown. They straightened and pointed their feet at the water. He watched her pinch her nose shut, and he did likewise. Then they plunged together into the water, and their frantic forward motion at last came to a halt.
Pennington savored the inertia for a few moments. Then he used his left arm and left leg to propel himself back to the surface. As he wiped the water from his eyes, he saw the familiar shape of the Rocinante making a slow vertical descent from a broad opening in the cavern’s ceiling. Rain poured in alongside it.
Within moments the tramp freighter was hovering above him and Theriault. The cargo doors on its underbelly opened, and a rescue harness at the end of a winch cable dropped in a rapid spiral. From inside the hold, Quinn smiled down at the pair in the water. “Hell of a time for a swim, newsboy.”
Pennington laughed with relief. “I’m so happy to see you, I can’t think of a comeback.”
“First time for everything,” Quinn said. He offered a small salute to Theriault. “Cervantes Quinn, miss. At your service.”
She swam over to Pennington, helped him into the harness, and took hold of it beside him. With a double tug on the safety line, she signaled Quinn to hoist them up. As the winch lifted them from the water, she favored Pennington with a quirky, irresistibly cute smile. “I guess sending a reporter to save me wasn’t such a bad idea after all,” she said.
He smiled back. “Can I quote you on that?” “Absolutely,” she said with a single, exaggerated nod and a crooked grin. “Consider my thank-you officially on the record.”
The Wanderer committed herself again and again, sharpening her fury into a cutting edge, a singularity of hatred, but it was not enough to halt the Apostate’s slow dismantling of the glory of the Shedai.
One by one he had freed the Kollotaan from the First Conduit, diminishing its power, sapping the Shedai of strength. Only one of the Kollotaan remained in thrall, twitching and flailing weakly in the machine’s dark fires.
The Wanderer hurled herself into another attack. All her strength, all her anger, she made into a thrust of pure will, hoping to inflict enough damage to merit the Apostate’s notice.
He deflected her with a thought. His will was unstoppable, diabolical in its mastery, and freighted with the weight of ancient grudges beyond her ken.
Be still, whelp, he taunted. The great work will not be disrupted by one such as you.
Though her essence lay crushed and broken before him, she could not relent. You have betrayed us. Betrayed our Second Age.
She jabbed at him with the very core of her being.
He rebuffed her casually. A noncorporeal avatar of his deepest, most primitive aggressive energies thrashed her into meek submission. Unlike her own dwindling reserves of power, his seemed limitless.
Why? she pleaded, unable to comprehend his actions. The Telinaruul cannot wield our power wisely. Why do you thwart our efforts to defend what is ours?
As his attention turned fully upon her, she felt the truly awesome nature of his power, which for the first time in aeons was unsuppressed by the Maker. Paralyzed before him, all she could do was listen.
I counseled a clean end to our reign. Destroy the Conduits, I implored you all—unmake the First World, extinguish all our fires and go quietly into the final night. None of you listened. So obsessed with retaining power, none of you asked if you still had the right to wield it. You couldn’t see that power is just like matter—an illusion.
Hues of regret and mourning colored his thought-line. Even we cannot lay claim to eternity…. Everything dies. Even time.
Sickly greenish contempt radiated between her words. Perhaps you are ready to die, ancient one. I am not. Will you condemn me to oblivion at your side?
He drew her attention to the First Conduit by making it glow with a gentle throb of power. One path remains open, he explained. In a moment I will release this creature back to his own kind, and the road will be closed. You must choose: Stay and continue your futile attempts at retribution…or flee and live.
She did not trust him. The Maker had warned all the Shedai for aeons that the Apostate was a deceiver. If he closed the Conduit channel while her essence was in transit, she would be lost, cast into an outer darkness from which there would be no salvation. Why should I believe your pledge of safe conduct?
Now it was his turn to reply with utter contempt and disdain. I was ancient before you had essence. I was Serrataal before you had form. You are unworthy of my wrath.
The First Conduit hummed with the muted Song of the Shedai. Trapped within, its lone Voice cried out for death or freedom.
Choose, he adjured her.
She shed the last vestiges of her corporeal avatar and prepared her essence for the transit. At the threshold of departure, she dared to ask him one final time, Why?
He answered in placid hues and without malice. In the beginning we governed wisely. In the end we became tyrants. Our legacy and the galaxy will both be served best by our downfall. Above them, the great dome that shielded the First Conduit fissured and began to break apart. When this place is gone, those Shedai who remain will still be powerful…but they will never again be almighty. Massive slabs of the ceiling collapsed inward. Fly, youngling. The end approaches.
With bitter resignation, the Wanderer projected herself through the First Conduit and tripped across a wrinkle in space-time to safety—and exile.
The Rocinante climbed back into orbit under the guidance of its guest copilot, Clark Terrell of the Sagittarius. Quinn stepped back into the cockpit and was glad to see that Terrell had an intuitive feel for the ship’s sometimes temperamental controls.
“How are Tim and Vanessa?” asked Terrell.
Quinn shrugged. “Fine, I s’pose. We patched up his ribs, and now they’re in the back, dryin’ off and makin’ googly eyes at each other.” Terrell chuckled quietly. Quinn collapsed into his seat and glanced at the main sensor display. Its readout was blank. “Piece o’ crap,” he muttered, and gave it a broad slap on its side. The display flickered and rolled but didn’t change. “All the interference down there must’ve fried it.”