CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Disperse. This was the word that Colonel Dornan had used to describe what had happened to Chase. This had to be the same kind of weapon that had been used on him and his parents.

A hoarse, stifled moan started deep in Maurus’s throat and stayed there, trapped behind tightly sealed lips. There was pure terror in his dark eyes—frozen in place by the controlling collar, Maurus had no chance to defend himself. Chase stepped forward between Maurus and Rezer Bennin.

“I won’t let you kill him,” he said.

Bennin raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

“I won’t let you do it,” Chase repeated. Behind him Maurus made frantic, unhappy noises.

Bennin’s cold eyes flickered thoughtfully over Chase. “Keep this up, and I’ll use the device on you instead.”

The shackles bit into his wrists and caused a painful tingle that Chase knew meant he was about to phase through them again. He had to focus all his concentration to keep them from sliding off. When he looked up, he saw Asa watching him with a strange, piercing gaze, but still the man made no move to help.

“I suppose you were hoping to find this?” Bennin took something small out of his pocket and held it out, pinched between his forefinger and back thumb—a tiny metal cylinder that looked like it would fit in the hole in Maurus’s collar, obviously the key. Bennin tossed it on the floor. “Go on, get it,” he said in a taunting voice.

Chase stared at the key and nearly gave in to the temptation to pull his wrists through his shackles and dive for it. But he glanced at Asa, who gave another tiny, deliberate shake of his head, with a look so menacing that Chase wasn’t sure if he was more scared of Bennin or him.

The comm panel chimed again. With an impatient sigh, Bennin stalked across the room and thumbed the panel. He tapped his many fingers across the table as a soft voice mumbled something. A sudden expression of sheer delight broke out on his face.

“Bring them up,” he purred, and turned to Asa. “What an unexpected treat! We have more guests.”

Asa nodded. Chase tried to catch his eye again, but Asa ignored him. Anger began to cloud Chase’s thoughts as he stared at Asa’s straight profile, his expression utterly calm, as though Rezer Bennin hadn’t just threatened to disperse Chase. Was this really the man they’d thought would be their savior?

The door opened, and the maroon-haired woman led a small group into the room. As each person entered, Chase’s heart plummeted.

Mina, carrying the slack form of Chase’s sister in her arms.

Parker.

And the mercenary, Fersad. Pointing a blaster rifle at all three of them.

For Fersad to capture them so quickly, he must have been tracking them since they left the medical center. Chase strained to get a look at his sister. Mina shifted her onto her hip, and one of the girl’s arms flopped down at her side, making it look like she was still unconscious—or worse.

A large, fresh bruise was forming on the side of Parker’s face. His eyes traveled from Chase’s shackles to Maurus’s bloody nose, and then widened when he noticed Asa. “How the—”

In a flash of movement, Mina clamped her hand onto Parker’s shoulder. His words cut off in a gasp as he nearly buckled to the floor. Oblivious to this, Rezer Bennin had already turned to Fersad, a smile stretching across his flat face. “Fersad, I don’t know how you do it. As a tracker, you are a true virtuoso. How ever did you find her?”

Fersad’s tattoo-marbled face bent into a frown as one of Bennin’s henchmen relieved him of his blaster. “Spotted her coming out of a Fleet medical center. She was holed up in a warehouse in Nano City with these kids.” He glanced nervously around the room and paused when his eyes reached Asa. “Hello, Jonah,” he muttered in acknowledgment.

Asa returned a thin, irritated smile, giving no sign that he recognized Fersad’s captives.

“Welcome back, my dear,” Bennin crooned to Mina. He looked down at the girl in her arms and prodded the child’s neck. “What’s this, is she dead?”

Chase’s heart jumped up in his throat.

Mina shook her head. “She needs to see a doctor immediately.”

“I see. Thank you, Fersad. I appreciate you returning my property to me.”

Fersad gave an awkward half nod and stayed where he was.

Bennin paused for a moment, and made an inauthentic noise of surprise. “What am I thinking? You’re expecting a reward.” He went to the comm panel. “Saleh, bring up a—”

Fersad coughed. “Actually, I’d like to make a trade. For him.” He raised a clawed finger toward Maurus.

Of course it hadn’t been hard for Fersad to track him down. The whole population of the Shank probably knew Maurus had come here, just like they knew that Bennin was looking for his missing android. Chase glanced at Asa, who watched the exchange dispassionately. It took all his self-restraint to keep from screaming at Asa to step up and tell Bennin that he was Mina’s true owner.

“Ah. The Lyolian.” Rezer Bennin stood for a moment with his head inclined, and then whirled around, his long coat flaring out around his knees. He opened one of the containers along the wall and removed a long cylinder of black metal, dotted with a few levers and fitted with a strap. “Do you know what this is, Fersad?”

“I can’t say that I recognize it,” said Fersad nervously.

“No, you probably wouldn’t. It’s a particle disperser.”

Chase stared at the device. This was the creation that had, if he could believe what Dornan said, supposedly blasted him into nothingness. It didn’t look like much more than a metal tube, but the simplicity of the device somehow made it more ominous. He couldn’t take his eyes from it.

“Fersad, do you know what this device does?” Bennin asked.

Fersad hesitated, and nodded quickly. “Vaporizes.”

“Well, yes, that’s the fool’s answer. ‘Disperses’ is the technical term, but more precisely, it blasts a stream of evanescent energy at its target—for the sake of this explanation, let’s say it’s you.” He paused to flash a vicious smile. “This energy dissolves your body down to the very molecular level and flings those molecules out across the galaxy. A slight trace of you will remain, a biological smudge to show your final standing point, but that’s all. Isn’t that fascinating? I’m just aching to try it out.”

Fersad’s eyes darted nervously at the weapon. Chase felt as tense as a drawn wire, waiting to see if Bennin would pull the trigger. Hovering at the edge of his subconscious was a small, morbid curiosity to see the device in action. Would Fersad just vanish? Would he explode? With a start, Chase realized that the shackles were slipping off again and pushed his wrists closer together.

When Bennin spoke again, his tone was silky. “Now, Fersad, I have only one question for you. How high is the bounty?”

“The what?”

“For the Lyolian, Fersad. I’m no simpleton. To me, he is simply the man who wronged me. But, I realize, to the rest of the universe he is a destroyer of worlds, the most-wanted man in existence. So what’s the going rate?”

Fersad narrowed his feral eyes. “I brought you the android,” he growled.

Bennin leveled the particle disperser at Fersad’s chest. “And your reward will be your life. I think it’s an excellent bargain. Anyone else I would have killed without asking, but you’re an outstanding tracker and I may need your services again. My offer will expire shortly. I suggest you take it.”

Fersad reached for Mina’s arm, and Bennin pulled a lever on the back of the particle disperser. The weapon responded with a surging hum and a crackling film of orange sparks danced along the black cylinder. Two of the henchmen stepped on either side of Fersad.

“Get out.” Bennin’s voice was as flat and hard as his eyes.

With a snarl of frustration, Fersad turned on his heel and stalked out of the chamber, followed by the two Ambessitari henchmen.

Bennin smiled as the door closed behind Fersad and turned to Mina, staring with an intensity that would have made any human uncomfortable. Mina stared blandly back.

“That’s quite a high-caliber android you’ve got,” Asa commented.

Rezer Bennin turned slowly to face him. “We can stop the charade now.” His voice had gone low and dangerous.

Asa said nothing, a hint of a smile playing around his mouth.

“You’ve been supplying me with your goods for, what, twelve years?” Bennin said. “But I’ll admit I know next to nothing about you, other than the fact that you appeared out of nowhere—despite my efforts, I haven’t been able to find a shred of information about you prior to our first transaction.”

“You mean when I outfitted your men to help you overthrow the previous Rezer?” Asa asked, arching an eyebrow.

Bennin smiled. “Correct. You’re an enigma, Jonah. But it’s never really mattered, since you produce the most advanced weapons available on the black market.”

Twelve years? Black market weapons? This sounded to Chase like someone very different from the owner of a tech corporation.

Asa inclined his head. “I appreciate the compliment, Bennin—Rezer Bennin—but I don’t quite see what this has to do with—”

“Stop,” Bennin interrupted in a derisive tone. “Rumors have been circulating for years that you have any number of other high-tech endeavors outside the weapons field. You think I didn’t immediately suspect that she might be one of yours? That I didn’t check for your mark before I had her reanimated?”

Asa’s features hardened, and in a threatening tone he said, “Then I’m sure you’re pleased that I’m giving you the opportunity to return my property to me.”

At last Asa had finally claimed what was his, but instead of satisfaction, all Chase felt was more anger. Was this just about his property—about getting Mina back? He hadn’t even looked at Parker since he entered the room. Chase wrestled with disappointment as he watched Asa. This cold-blooded weapons dealer, whatever his name was, wasn’t anything close to the hero he’d hoped for.

Bennin arched an eyebrow and looked down at the weapon in his hands, running his fingers over the levers, adjusting one of them by a few notches. “What’s your relation to the children?”

Asa shrugged noncommittally. “No relation.”

Bennin tilted his head with a smirk. “No? Then you won’t mind if I just—” He pointed the particle disperser at the girl in Mina’s arms.

“No!” Chase’s hands flew up automatically, reaching for his sister. The shackles clattered to the floor.

Rezer Bennin turned, swinging the crackling weapon toward him. Staring down the barrel of the disperser, Chase froze down to the very last hair on his head. Bennin looked down at the empty shackles lying on the floor, and his eyes narrowed.

“What remarkable children. Or should I say, experiments?”

Asa’s cool expression broke, and anger flooded into his face. “They’re not experiments. I’m their guardian. Let them be.”

“I’m not sure I believe you. Maybe if you have to start from scratch—” Bennin hoisted the disperser into firing position, still pointing at Chase.

Chase sucked in a gasp. It was all he had time to do.

In the corner of his eye, he saw Mina shove his sister into Parker’s arms and throw herself at the henchman guarding the door. Asa dove across the room, tackling Bennin at the waist. A brief blast of the orange disperser beam skimmed just over Chase’s head and hit the ceiling, sending down a rain of concrete chunks.

The disperser flew free and skidded across the floor.

“How dare you!” cried Rezer Bennin, who lay on his back with a look of stunned fury.

Asa crouched at Bennin’s ankles. “Don’t make me hurt you, Bennin. Just let us walk out.”

“So the children do matter,” Bennin spat, teeth bared.

“If you hurt any one of them, I’ll kill you,” Asa promised.

Chase took a step toward the fallen disperser. Bennin yanked a handblaster from his coat and pointed it at Parker, who stood wide-eyed, clutching Chase’s sister to his chest.

“No!” Asa’s voice rose in panic, and he leapt at Bennin as he fired. The red blast hit Asa square in the chest, and sent him flying backward. He rolled across the floor and lay still.

Holding the handblaster out in front of himself, Rezer Bennin got to his feet. His flat features were disfigured with rage. He walked over to pick up the disperser, looping it around his shoulder, and pressed the comm panel.

“Saleh, send up the men!” Bennin paused and, when no answer came, slapped at the panel again. “Saleh! Where are you?”

He primed the disperser using the hand that was still holding the small blaster. The weapon crackled and spooled up as he brandished it at everyone. “I’ve had enough of this.” He pointed it at Asa’s body. Then he cocked his head, frowning.

A rumbling noise sounded outside the room and deepened, joined by a sound like grating steel. Rezer Bennin reached for the comm panel again.

And then the door exploded off its hinges.

A tall, imposing figure stepped through a cloud of smoke into the chamber, blaster raised. Behind the helmet visor were familiar craggy features and pale wolf eyes.

Despair struck through Chase like a deep chord. It had taken Captain Lennard less time than he had expected to catch up. He’d almost forgotten that the captain was pursuing them. But with Bennin on one side, Lennard on the other, and Asa possibly dead, they’d never be able to escape.

Five more armed soldiers slipped through the door behind the captain. “Rezer Bennin, on behalf of the Federation of Allied Planets and the Federal Fleet, I order you to surrender!” Lennard shouted.

“I don’t think so!” Bennin brandished the disperser. “Do you know what this is, officer?”

“That is illegal contraband,” said Lennard. “Under section 427 of the Fleet charter, I order you to surrender your weapon and come peacefully.”

“Fool! This weapon? You don’t stand a chance—I can disperse this entire room before anyone takes their next breath. Do you want everyone here to die?”

An orange beam burst from the end of Bennin’s particle disperser, and Lennard dodged, narrowly missing the shot. The beam hit the wall behind him, leaving a gaping hole. “Rezer Bennin, put down your weapon!” he thundered.

Maybe there was still a chance. Taking advantage of the distraction, Chase dropped to the floor and scrambled over to where Bennin had tossed the collar’s key. Someone from the Fleet took a shot at Bennin, who ducked and fired off another blast of the disperser. Keeping close to the floor, Chase dashed back to Maurus and with fumbling fingers stuck the key in the tiny hole. The collar broke apart and tumbled away.

Maurus dropped to his knees, hands limp at his side. His dark hair fell across his face.

Bennin grabbed Chase by the arm, and for a second he resisted, letting the man’s hand start to slide through his arm. But Maurus looked like he could barely lift his head, let alone run away. He would need the extra time that a diversion could provide.

“Get them out of here,” Chase hissed at him, climbing to his feet.

Rezer Bennin wrapped his arm around Chase’s neck, still gripping the disperser with his other arm. “If you want this boy to live, you’ll let us go.” He took a step toward the back of the room, wrenching Chase along with him.

As he stumbled backward in Bennin’s grip, Chase kept his eyes on Lennard. “Take the shot!” he yelled, not sure if he meant Bennin or Lennard, half hoping they would both fire on each other at the same time. The captain’s snarl deepened, but he didn’t fire.

Movement on the right—somehow Parker had slipped across the room to Maurus’s side, still balancing Chase’s sister on one hip. He was trying to help Maurus stand, but the Lyolian fell back down, his muscles too exhausted from the strain of the collar. Chase’s heart sank. There was no way Maurus would be able to escape. By the defeated look in his eyes, it was clear that Maurus knew this too.

“Run, Chase,” he said hoarsely.

And in a microsecond, it happened. Chase could feel the tension running through Rezer Bennin’s body and down his right arm as he turned the weapon, and he knew Bennin was going to fire the disperser at them all, Maurus and Parker and Lilli Garrety. He had to stop him.

If he was really Chase Garrety, he’d already survived the disperser once, and he could do it again.

If he was Chase Garrety.

Chase phased through the arm wrapped around his neck and spun around, grabbing the nozzle of the disperser with both hands. He pressed it against his own chest.

“Chase, no!” screamed Parker.

There was an explosion of orange light and, in the background, more screams. Chase’s vision narrowed to a pinpoint as his body was overtaken with violent, uncontrollable trembling. For a moment, he was filled with a strange feeling of thinness. The room began to fade away.

Barely there, he could feel himself jittering away to nothing but a shadow. He screamed, but he couldn’t tell if he was actually making the noise or if it was only in his mind. In waves he slipped away, dissolving and retracting in a painful tug-of-war. His hands on the weapon were almost transparent, melting outward.

A piercing sound caught his attention, a high-pitched, keening wail. Chase tried to see who it was and in that moment had the strange sensation that his eyes were everywhere, that he could see the entire room through the orange haze.

The girl, his sister, was finally awake. She was pushing away from Parker, who struggled to hold her, and her mouth was torn wide with a continuous scream. She slithered free and sank to the floor, her eyes huge and terrified, filled with the nightmare she had awoken to.

It’s okay, Chase wanted to tell her. I can do this. But he couldn’t speak. He wasn’t even sure his mouth was there anymore.

Shapes moved around the room, activity that he couldn’t distinguish. Chase focused on Rezer Bennin as he stopped to prime the weapon again. A burst of light fanned out behind Bennin like a halo, and the furious expression on his face melted into a blank stare. He fell forward, into and through Chase, landing on top of the disperser.

“Move! Move! Move!” screamed a voice.

With a colossal snap! like a hard bolt of electricity running down his spine, Chase came flying back to himself—his whole, present, focused self. He stumbled backward, his vision blurry and indistinct. He needed to find his sister, but he could barely see. A pair of wiry arms caught him, helping him stay upright.

“Hold on there, buddy,” came Parker’s voice. “I’ve got you.”

“Is he alright? Don’t touch him—he might be unstable,” said Lennard’s voice.

“Shut up,” snapped Parker. “He’s fine. Chase, do you need to sit down?”

“No. Maybe.” Chase wasn’t even sure if the words were making it out of his mouth, but with Parker’s help he sank to the floor, breathing deeply and trying to focus.

Figures moved around him, disjointed voices swimming around and between the movement.

“Tie Bennin up, get him to the brig.”

“You got her? Get her out.”

“Where’s Kaplan?”

“How soon until Dietz gets here?”

“Looks like an escape passage.”

“Get your hands off me!”

The last one was Maurus, and Chase blinked until he could make out the shape of the Lyolian, kneeling at the center of a circle of soldiers.

“Lieutenant, on your feet. You’re coming back to the ship with us,” said Lennard, stepping into the circle.

Maurus spat at his feet. “I’m not going anywhere with you. Kill me now if that’s your plan. The truth will come out in the end.”

Lennard exhaled loudly. “Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. We can—”

Shouting by the door drowned out the rest of the captain’s words. Fersad entered the room, trailed closely by two soldiers.

“I need to leave,” growled the Kekilly mercenary. “I played my part, so pay up.”

“Sorry, Captain, we couldn’t stop him—” said one of the soldiers.

“Fersad, step outside and wait,” interrupted Lennard. “I’ll be finished here in a moment.” There was a tense stare down for several seconds, and finally the rangy mercenary turned and stalked out of the room.

“He’s been working for you all this time!” said Maurus, his voice rising hysterically. “You sent him after me on Trucon—”

He staggered to his feet, swinging his fists at the soldiers surrounding him. With a frustrated roar, Captain Lennard whipped around and shot Maurus in the chest.

This Chase saw clearly: The Lyolian’s eyes turned sightless as he fell backward, shock still written across his face. He hit the floor hard.

“No!” screamed Chase. He staggered to his feet and charged the captain.

Lennard raised his hands, but Chase swung right through them. The captain tried to outmaneuver him, to grab his arms, but Chase was a blur of motion and rage. He couldn’t be restrained, and his fists connected where he wanted to connect, landing punches on Lennard’s ribs and chest. For a moment, he felt himself reaching a level of control over his ability that he didn’t know he had.

Lennard tried to push Chase away and stumbled backward, holding a hand protectively in front of himself. He looked shaken. “Take him to the ship,” he told his soldiers.

“I’m not getting on your ship!”

“Yes, you are. If you want to stay with your sister, you’ll get on the ship.”

Chase whipped around. The spot where the girl had been was empty. Parker had vanished too—even Asa and Mina were gone. Rage boiled up inside him. “Where did you take them?”

“Chase, will you please cooperate?” A cautious tone crept into Lennard’s voice, as though he were talking to a wild animal. “I can explain more later, but for now I need you to do as I tell you.”

Chase looked at the back of the room, where a team of soldiers was loading Maurus’s body onto a stretcher. A sob started to build in the back of his throat.

“You killed him.” His voice broke on the words.

Lennard glanced at the door and made a signal to one of his soldiers. “No, Chase, I stunned him. He’ll be fine. It was the only way I could get him to come easily, but you know I can’t do that to you.”

Something loosened in Chase’s chest. Maurus was alive. But confusion bloomed and swelled, taking the place of his anger. “You’re helping him now?”

Lennard took a step toward Chase, his hands still lifted in a defensive way. “I made a mistake,” he said in a low voice. “About him, and about you. Maurus said something that made me take a second look at everything that happened. And then the brig officer told me how you jumped through doors, and I realized that by some miracle, somehow, it was really you. I’ve been trying to find you ever since. And now I need to get you both away from here as quickly as possible.”

The soldiers carried Maurus out, leaving only Chase and Lennard in the empty room. Parker, Mina, Maurus, his sister, Asa—everyone was gone. His choice had been made for him, but still Chase couldn’t bring himself to trust Captain Lennard. “Why? What’s going to happen?”

A soldier leaned in the door. “ETA two minutes, Captain.”

Lennard nodded in acknowledgment, but he kept his eyes on Chase. “Because others from the Fleet are coming and this is the only way I can keep you all safe from them. Please, Chase, come back to the Kuyddestor with me.”

Kuyddestor. Hearing the word spoken in Lennard’s drawl, a distant connection formed in Chase’s mind. He frowned. Kuyd-de-stor. Could that be the answer?

He spoke hesitantly. “Guide … guide the star?”

Relief broke out on the captain’s weathered face. “Yes, Chase. Guide the star. Thank the heavens—it’s really you.”