Shrugging, Gabriel slid down the ladder like he’d seen done in movies. He’d
always wanted to do that. Following suit Marius dropped down behind him, drawing both of his pistols.
“You need some of this box of shells,” he asked.
“I’m good,” Gabriel nodded. “Shout out if you see her.”
“Will do,” Marius nodded as he pushed past Gabriel and dodged toward the
central ring, looking much like a wildcat on the prowl. He made absolutely no sound as he moved.
“Can you link up with the computer in here,” Gabriel asked. “You said it was a separate system, right?”
“I already have,” Allie replied.
“Is the Apostle here?”
Floating down to sit on the railing beside him, Allie crossed her legs in the
feminine fashion and arranged her skirt.
“I am still unable to locate her,” she sighed, glancing to the black hole. “I am trying my best, but that thing plays havoc with sensors and cameras. Some of the radiation and spatial distortion leaks through containment field.”
“Keep an eye out. We need to get to that console before she does anything
explosive.”
Giving him a bright-eyed smile and a nod, Allie hopped down off the railing and made an after you gesture.
Dashing toward the ring, Gabriel winced at how loud his footfalls were. Trying to quiet them did little good at all. He couldn’t understand how Marius moved so quietly.
It seemed as though even the slightest vibration grew to a cacophonous roar as they traveled along the metal.
Trying to move as silently as possible, Gabriel kept his eyes constantly moving, watching for the Apostle, but he saw no sign. Though he knew the importance of searching for his enemy, he could not stop his gaze from returning to the black hole. It dominated the cavern, and it was hard to make himself ignore it. It dragged at him, pulling both physically and mentally. He could almost feel a consciousness beckoning to him, wanting him to throw himself through the silvery surface. It was alive and it knew he was there.
“Where is she,” Gabriel whispered as he reached the catwalk that branched in
toward the black hole.
A horrible thought occurred to him as he hurried toward the computer console.
What if the Apostle had some way of bringing down the facility without ever entering the containment area at all? He’d never see it coming, just like the last time he’d died. And he would never fight the Apostle to see whose side justice was on either. He realized that it was silly to think defeating her meant absolution, but he couldn’t get the idea out of his head.
The catwalk swung very close to the black hole. The spatial distortion around the silvery sphere made movement hard, as the catwalk and railing both seemed to be wavering and stretching toward it. Even his own body seemed to distort. Staring into the surface, Gabriel was tempted to reach out and touch it, but before he could, he realized something very strange.
“Wait. It’s reflecting you, but it’s not reflecting me. How can it reflect you?
You’re not even there. You’re just in my head.”
“Reality is very thin here,” Allie shrugged. “Do not trust your eyes too much. It can mess with your head, and has been known to drive some people insane. Most people say that they can almost see something inside, staring back at them.”
“Well that’s lovely,” Gabriel muttered as he examined the silvery surface that refused to reflect him.
Something dark and malevolent did seem to be staring back at him from just
below the surface. Unease hung heavy in the air as he continued on his way. He kept catching movement out of the corner of his eye, but when he looked not even his own reflection looked back.
Reaching the console, Gabriel holstered one of his pistols. The other he set above the keyboard for easy access. Draping the gunbelt Marius had handed him earlier over the railing of the catwalk, he hit the enter key and the screen flashed on. Text scrolled for a few seconds and then a completely undecipherable menu popped up.
“How do I even start to work this thing? Who would have ever thought I’d
actually miss Vista?”
“I need to borrow your hands again. What must be done is far too complicated to talk you through. I need to manually input a Gate Jump, as well as delete all of the security protocols that make it impossible to lower the containment field. In short, you are not smart enough, and way too slow.”
Gabriel snorted a laugh. “Go for it. Halo.”
He felt something flow into his hands and they flexed a few times before reaching toward the keyboard. It felt like his hands were gloves and someone had just put them on. His fingers began flying over the keys and the menus flashed across the screen.
*****
As the Apostle fastened an explosive to the support beam and armed it, she
glanced over her shoulder. The strange sphere in the center of the cavern was so much like the Eye of Perdition that just knowing it was there filled her with intense fear. She could feel Cain’s horrible, unseen eyes, or the eyes of something equally as dark, drilling into her from it as she worked. Though the Eye had been black, this sphere was silver.
However, she could still feel something watching her through it, and the pull upon her body and mind was identical.
The last time she’d stared into a sphere like that, she’d ended up a puppet on a string, spreading Cain’s slavery throughout the universe. If the Eye of Perdition had been a portal to wherever Cain was, then where would the silver sphere lead? Who was behind this one, and why did Cain want to destroy it so badly that he’d gone to the trouble of revealing how deeply he’d trapped her to ensure that she did it?
As she finished, Cain’s impatience threatened to smother her. That was when she noticed the big man prowling toward her along the inner ring of the catwalk with twin pistols in his hands. Dressed like the man that had broken her mask earlier, he was bigger, and obviously more skilled by the way he moved. He took aim and fired at her.
Acting on deeply ingrained instinct, the Apostle drew her sword and slashed at the bullet as it flew toward her. The man’s primitive weapon seemed to have a lot of power, but the projectiles dragged far too much in the air, slowing enough for her to follow them with her eyes. The more advanced, high-powered rifles that the soldiers carried were another story. Despite how weak humans were, the Apostle could tell by the way that he moved that this man was going to put up a real fight. She delighted in the idea of a worthy opponent. She’d not fought a worthy adversary since her duels in the bloody sands of the arena, on the World Closest to Perdition.
Leaping from the support beam back to the catwalk, the Apostle ran toward the
gunman, hunched low to the ground to present a smaller target. She dodged several more bullets, her cloak flapping like a banner in a strong wind. One bullet glanced off of her breastplate, leaving a leaden streak across it, but the armor held.
With a flying leap, the Apostle tackled the man. They rolled across the catwalk and she came up on her feet. Surprisingly, he did too. Rounding on her, the gunman unloaded both of his pistols into her breastplate. The force of so many close range impacts pushed her back against the railing and she toppled over the edge, barely able to catch herself with one hand. She swung hard and caught the edge of the catwalk with her foot, using it to propel her back over the rail.
“Figures you’d be wearing body armor,” the gunman grated emotionlessly.
“Should have aimed for my face,” the Apostle replied in kind as she readied
herself to kill.
With a flourish of her sword, she threw herself at the gunman. Tossing one pistol aside, he drew a heavy-bladed knife from his belt, reloading his other pistol with one hand as he parried her thrust.