Chapter 43 Journey Begins
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"Sir, I'm registering an energy surge the likes I've never even heard of." The sensor officer of the watch spun in his seat to face Captain Prey.
"Central? What have we got?"
"I have no idea, Captain. There seems to be a very localized energy surge taking place in hangar bay ninety-seven. We have fifteen people down, and the hangar's been destroyed completely."
"But what could be causing it? Do we have anything on board that could?"
"No, sir, but I have other news. The Commander seems to be deteriorating as we speak. He's not healing, and the more they try to stabilize him, the weaker he's becoming."
"Oh, this is just getting better and better. All right, one emergency at a time. Central, tell Joshua I want him to deal with our visitor then get back to medical, they might need him down there."
"What about our visitor, sir?"
"Let them sit in that hangar. Seal every door out of there. They can't do very much trouble if they can't leave that hanger."
"You'd be surprised, sir."
This time, it was so much worse. He was screaming for her, crying out to her. His thoughts were disjointed, Tamar couldn't make any sense of them. All she knew was that the other side of her soul was looking for her and couldn't find her. Then, even in the middle of her agony, Tamar's eyes sprang wide open.
He's looking for me. He thinks I'm in trouble and wants to help. But whatever had happened to him must have made it so he couldn't.
So whenever she touched his energy, his power, he could sense it and was trying to help her. He must be unconscious, but even asleep, his suit gave him the ability to make his wishes known to the conscious world. The problem she was facing was that he couldn't control what he was doing and the more he tried to find her the more energy he poured into each attempt, and she could feel how much it was taking out of him because the connection was a two-way street. Tamar had no idea how much of an injury he'd sustained, but if he was this desperate, it must have been bad. He could be dying on an operating table, could be bleeding out at this very instant. With her trapped god knew how many miles from him.
"Stop it!" She screamed as her spine bent near the breaking point, and as if snipped off by a pair of scissors, everything stopped.
It took Tamar several minutes before she tried to regain her feet this time. Every muscle in her body hurt, so she rolled onto her side and concentrated on her breathing. In through the nose slowly, deliberately, hold for five seconds, then out through the mouth. Control the diaphragm to move the lungs, use the mind to control the body, not the other way around. After several minutes of these focus exercises, Tamar rose to her knees, then pushed herself to her feet.
The first thing she noticed was that the man in gray was gone. She hadn't even seen him go, but that wasn't a surprise. When you're busy, just making sure you are sucking in air, noticing whether some comes or goes in secondary. The fact that her way was unobstructed was no help to her. She had no idea where she was going, or where she was, for that matter. By the way Malachi had described it, this place was huge, as in planetary huge. So how was she going to find one man in a place this big?
First off, she had to get out of this hangar. Looking around, she was horrified by what Malachi had down. The floor looked like a wave of a very angry sea. There wasn't a flat piece of floor anywhere. In the distance, Tamar watched men moving from still form to still form. She hoped they weren't dead, or at least a part of her did. The rest didn't care right now. If they hadn't come for her, they wouldn't be in the situation they were in.
Reaching the nearest door, she realized, upon closer inspection, that there was no handle. Great, how would she get out of here now? Walking up to it, she watched the tiny light above the door slide from red to green and the door begin to open, when suddenly the light flipped back to red, and the door slammed shut.
"Access denied." A voice chimed from the door.
"Access to what?" She seethed. What was on the other side of this door?
Spinning from the unmoving piece of steel, Tamar began to look around. Never in her life had she seen anything like the space she was now in. Even with the floor torn and bent, she could still see the surrounding area was massive. If this was only one of many landing bays, then this ship was truly massive.
The only problem for her was she had no idea where she was going, or the slightest clue on how to get there. Now something seemed to be doing its dead level best to keep her in this room. When the man in gray had been gone, when she'd come to Tamar, had thought it was the hand of Malachi's God. Why had she gotten her hopes up? No one cared for her except the man she was trying to find. No one. She was on her own, as always.
Each door she came to was just like the last one, locked. It would slide tantalizingly to the side, but just before enough room was given for her to slip through, it would slam closed, and the annoying voice would sound.
"Access denied." It was beginning to drive her crazy.
Maybe if she tried one more thing? Carefully, she reached for the power she'd never known she had until she'd instinctively sought it. Closing her eyes, she searched for what she'd touched before. In her mind's eye it was a crackling ball of energy, small but oh so powerful. This was another thing she now shared with her Malachi. When he had saved her life by almost killing himself, he'd left more than just a piece of his suit inside her. He had given her the ability to tap into the same power he possessed. To a much lesser degree than he could, but the amount of energy she could now call upon made her more powerful than anyone but a select few on the ship she now found herself on.
Only this power now came at a price. Malachi could feel when she called on it, and in his weakened state he would try to find her any way he could. His last attempt had left her as helpless as a newborn kitten. She couldn't afford another one of those. Now hoping that if she didn't dive headfirst into the power, just gentle touched it, Malachi wouldn't notice, and she could use the strength boost to tear this damn door out of its frames and be done with it.
In her thoughts, she reached towards the glowing orb and, with the slightest fingertip, touch it. The rush of power that shot through her had her eyes snapping open and brought a heavy gasp to the lips. Was this how Mal felt all the time? How could he hold back this much energy? Tamar felt like she could do anything, anything she'd ever wanted. She could kill her, there was no way the General could stop her now. Her greatest dream, so close yet so far away. Snapping out of her revere, Tamar snarled.
"NO!" All of that would have to wait. She had only one priority now. She had to find Mal, her Mal.
Reaching forward, she was startled to watch her fingertips sink into, then through the steel of the door. With a shriek of ripping metal, she tore the door in half and stepped through. The instant she was past the barrier, she let go of the energy and sagged against the wall. She still was not used to having that much energy in her body. Falling to her knees, she took several deep breaths, gathering herself. When she looked up, she gasped. Away in front of her was what seemed to be an endless corridor. It stretched so far out in front of her that it passed beyond her sight horizon. How was she going to find him in a place this huge?
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