Out of This World Read online

  Ilara examined her fingernails. “Is this going to take much longer?”

  “You could help, you know,” said Boston.

  “But you’re all handling it so well,” she purred sarcastically.

  Boston exchanged a glance with Mazzy. “See why it was so easy to kick her off a cliff?”

  “Yes, and don’t think I didn’t notice that when I read your mind,” she said. “You were awfully eager to—”

  They flinched as a blaster bolt hit a pipe nearby with a scream of energy. When Jack’s shoulders had un-hunched and he opened his eyes again, he saw that there was a line of blood across Ilara’s elegant cheek: a scratch caused by flying shrapnel.

  “Uh, Ilara—your cheek …”

  Ilara put her fingers to the scratch. They came away bloody. She stared at the red on her fingertips, and her cat eyes narrowed.

  “Right, then,” she snarled, and she stormed out past them into the passageway.

  The Mechanics were so surprised at the sight of her walking boldly into their line of fire that at first they didn’t think to actually shoot her. That hesitation proved to be decisive. With an angry cry, she threw out her hand and a shock wave blasted up the corridor, denting metal and cracking pipes. When it hit the Mechanics, it blasted them flat against the walls and the ceiling as if they had been swatted by a giant hand. After the shock wave passed, nobody was firing anymore. There was a long sucking noise as one of the Mechanics unpeeled from the ceiling and landed in a heap on the floor.

  Jack and the others surveyed the devastation. Jack swallowed and made a mental note never to give her reason to get angry at him.

  “The bridge is this way,” she said curtly, and strode off up the passageway, past the bodies of the fallen guards.

  The door to the bridge hissed open. Mazzy retracted her data cable from the keypad, and Gradius led them inside, aiming his blaster this way and that. They were relieved and a little surprised to find that nobody was here.

  “I guess the whole thing’s automatic,” said Boston, looking about. “You don’t really need a pilot if all you’re doing is flying a great big bomb through a rift gate.”

  “Do you think those guards knew they were on a one-way mission?” Thomas wondered.

  “Probably,” said Mazzy. “But they didn’t care. They’re not individuals anymore; they’re part of the Kernel.”

  Boston headed to the controls. A huge viewing window showed a bruise-colored sky. There in the distance, getting larger, was the rift gate, a shimmering hole in the sky sucking in clouds. Boston hit a few buttons but came up with nothing.

  “I’m shut out. It’s on autopilot.”

  “I’m on it,” said Mazzy, plugging herself into the captain’s console. Immediately her eyes began to scroll with data.

  Jack’s eyes drifted to a screen that showed Earth turning slowly in space, beneath a single word: Destination. Nearby, a timer was counting down the minutes to zero.

  “Wait … it’s going to Earth?” he cried. “They’re going to blow up Earth?”

  “Sure looks like it,” said Mazzy.

  “No!” Thomas cried.

  Jack just stared, dumbstruck by the unbearable tragedy of seeing his home planet destroyed. All those billions of lives, gone in an instant. All that beauty. Earth hadn’t treated him all that well, if he was honest, and nobody else seemed to think much of it; but seeing it there, a cloudy marble in the darkness, it seemed utterly precious.

  “The course to the gate is locked in,” Mazzy said. “There are firewalls a mile high around everything. By the time I got through, it’d be way too late. And there’s a countdown on the bombs in the cargo hold; they’re going to detonate a few seconds after the Firehawk passes through the rift gate.” She cursed. “They really made sure. I can’t stop it.”

  “But we have to do something!” Thomas cried, pointing at the screen. “Who’s going to make all the reality shows otherwise?”

  “Hey!” called Boston. “We’ve got company!”

  Jack and Gradius hurried back to the door. Striding through the smoke in the corridor, stepping over the fallen Mechanics, was a figure dressed all in black, his face a mirror. He was carrying a sword in one hand that smoked with strange colors, and a blaster in the other.

  “Vardis,” said Gradius darkly. He drew his own sword from the sheath on his back. It seethed with the same weird energy. “Stand aside. I’ll deal with thi—”

  He was cut short as the door to the bridge slammed shut in front of him. Jack had his blaster pointed at the keypad mechanism and had blown it to pieces.

  “That ought to keep him out for a bit,” said Jack.

  “Good work, kid,” said Boston. “He can’t open it if the keypad’s ruined.”

  Gradius gaped at them, aghast. “But … I was going to duel him!”

  “Duel him later; we’re trying to save Earth here,” said Jack. “Mazzy? Any ideas?”

  “Wait. I think I have one,” she said. She pulled out her data cable from the console and began typing frantically. She hit a key to enter the command, and the picture of Earth changed to show a huge white rocky planet instead. She whooped and clapped her hands.

  “Arcturus Prime, everybody! The Firehawk’s new destination! Where the most it’ll destroy is a bunch of dusty old temples.”

  “And that cute snuffly rabbit hologram we talked to,” Thomas pointed out.

  “And the Fangbeast, if it’s still alive,” Jack added.

  Mazzy rolled her eyes. “Still, better than seven billion people on Earth, though, right?”

  “Totally!” said Jack. “You rock! How did you do it?”

  “Well, I couldn’t do anything to the Firehawk itself, but I can affect the rift gate. So I set it to beam a different destination to the gate, which will send it to … er …” She trailed off as she saw the picture had switched to Earth again. “Wait, that’s not right.”

  “It’s going to Earth again? Change it back!” Thomas urged, jigging anxiously. The rift was looming large in the viewscreen now. The Firehawk was getting close.

  “Will do,” said Mazzy. She typed in the coordinates for Arcturus Prime once more, and the picture switched back to the tomb world. “There!”

  The point of Vardis’s sword plunged through the bridge door. As they watched, he began to drag it horizontally, slicing through the metal as if it were fudge.

  “He’s making himself a door!” Thomas cried.

  “That is one sharp sword,” Boston said admiringly.

  “A vorpal blade,” said Gradius. “It will cut through anything.”

  “The screen has changed back again!” Jack cried, his voice touched with panic. And it had, back to Earth.

  Mazzy cursed. “Wait, let me figure it out.”

  “We don’t have time to wait! There’s a psycho ninja with some kind of ultimate sword slicing through the door!”

  “Hey, it’s not that ultimate,” Gradius said. “I’ve got one, too!”

  “Whatever. Is there a way out of here?”

  Dunk harrumphed. “Well, when we were building these things, I seem to remember we put service ducts all over the bridge so we could get to the machinery behind the walls.” He lumbered over to a console, tore it from the wall, and tossed it aside. Behind it was a panel, which he tore off as well, revealing a crawlspace. “There you go,” he said. “One escape route.”

  “Wait,” said Mazzy. Her face was pale. “We can’t escape. Not yet.”

  “Gonna need a pretty good reason to stop me,” Boston said, already heading for the crawlspace.

  “Someone has to stay,” she said. “Someone has to stay on board till this thing explodes.”

  They all stared at her. “Explain,” Ilara said.

  “The Firehawk sends a signal to the rift gate every thirty seconds, updating its destination. That destination is set to Earth. If we switch it to something else, it’ll only change back thirty seconds later, the next time the Firehawk talks to the gate. So that means …”<
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  “That means that someone has to change the destination less than thirty seconds before the Firehawk enters the rift gate,” said Gradius.

  “Exactly. And that person is not going to be able to get off.”

  They were silent as they considered what she had just said. The only sound was the rumble of the Firehawk’s engines and the steady fizz of Vardis’s vorpal blade as it carved a path through the door.

  Gradius scanned the room. “So,” he said, “any volunteers?” He looked at Dunk.

  “You must be joking,” said Dunk.

  He looked at Ilara. She just laughed.

  “Boston?” he said.

  “Nah,” said Boston.

  “Mazzy?”

  “It’s not my planet,” said Mazzy, still working at the console. “I’m sending a signal to the Epsilon right now. I’ve got the release codes for the dock where they impounded her. She’ll be airborne and here in minutes.”

  “Thomas!” said Gradius, appealing. “You have family on Earth!”

  “Yes, I do,” said Thomas. “But I’m also a big fat coward, so …” He shrugged.

  Lastly Gradius turned to Jack and slapped him manfully on the arm. “Jack, Jack, Jack. This is your chance to be a hero, Jack. Your chance to show the world you can amount to something, that you’re better than just a spare.”

  Jack took Gradius’s hand and peeled it off him. “You know what?” he said. “I learned something, hanging out with these guys. I worked out why I was so bad at all those tests Mom and Dad set me. It’s because I don’t need to be the best. Who’d want all that pressure, all that expectation? There’s only space for one up there, and that’s a pretty lonely place to be. Sometimes, it’s enough just to be on the team.” He thought about that for a moment, then added: “Actually, that’s where I’d rather be.”

  Gradius gaped at him. “You mean … you want to be a loser? That’s the worst philosophy I ever heard!”

  “Maybe,” said Jack. “But I’m not the one who’s about to sacrifice their life for the greater good.”

  Gradius sagged. “It pretty much has to be me, doesn’t it? I mean, otherwise I wouldn’t be much of a hero.”

  “Sorry,” said Jack.

  “I was sort of hoping some expendable sidekick would step up and take the hit out of loyalty. That’s how it usually works.”

  “Yeah, well. Not today.”

  “Are we going, or what?” Mazzy called, crouching by the service duct. Vardis had almost carved a perfect rectangle out of the door and was about to break through.

  Jack studied his more handsome and accomplished double, and for the first time, he felt sorry for him. Being the best was a heavy responsibility. He was glad it didn’t lie on his shoulders.

  “Good luck,” he said.

  “Be safe,” Gradius replied. “When I’m gone, it might be you who has to carry the flame, you who will be the new Gradius Clench.”

  “No offense, but I’d rather not,” said Jack. And he hurried off to join the others, leaving Gradius standing there alone, his sword and his blaster in hand.

  He really did look like a hero, Jack thought.

  The heart of the Firehawk was a dark, clanking maze of metal walkways and stairs. Huge vats seething with strange energies boiled in the gloom, massive pistons flexed and pumped, vents hissed stinking gases, and electricity crackled in the heights.

  They came clambering out of a hatch near the floor, Dunk in the lead, and stood there rolling their shoulders to stretch out stiff muscles. It had been a tight crawl through the service ducts from the bridge. Now that they were finally able to stand up again, they didn’t much like the look of their surroundings.

  “Are you sure this is the way?” asked Thomas doubtfully.

  “’Course I’m sure,” said Dunk huffily. “Up past the engine takes us to the roof. That’s where we want to go, isn’t it?”

  Mazzy looked like she was listening to something that nobody else could hear. “The Epsilon’s close enough that I can pick up her broadcasts now. She’s coming in fast. If we can get to the roof, she’ll get us off.”

  “What about the battleships?” Jack asked, remembering the enormous Mechanic aircraft they had seen near the rift gate.

  “She can handle those, even with one of her engines out. She’ll use the Firehawk as cover. They won’t take the risk of hitting it; not with all that antimatter in the cargo hold.”

  “You think Gradius will be all right?” Thomas wondered, looking back at the hatch they had emerged from.

  Jack gave him a look. “You mean, do you think he’ll survive being on board the Firehawk when a giant bomb goes off that’s big enough to destroy a planet?”

  “Oh yeah,” said Thomas. “His chances are a bit slim when you put it like that.”

  “Time’s ticking, everyone,” said Boston. “Let’s get going.”

  It had taken Vardis only a few minutes to cut a long rectangular line through the metal of the bridge door. When the rectangle was complete, the slab of metal tipped forward and crashed to the ground, smoking at the edges. Vardis stepped through the gap, and Gradius opened fire.

  Three blaster shots, aimed with perfect accuracy. Vardis’s vorpal sword blurred, and the shots deflected away.

  “Let’s not waste our time with that, shall we?” he said.

  Gradius holstered his blaster and readied his sword. Vardis moved closer, ready with his own. Gradius saw himself reflected in that mirror mask. He was calm, cool, composed. Or at least, that was how it looked from the outside.

  Vardis leaped, and their swords met. Metal crashed together in a flurry of blows, now high, now low. Puffs of vorpal energy burst free each time their swords came together, and trailed through the air behind their blades.

  They dodged, rolled, and backflipped, stabbed and swung in a deadly dance. Immediately it was clear that Vardis was an expert swordsman, at least as good as Gradius, if not better. Whenever Gradius thought he’d found an opening, Vardis saw it coming and knocked his sword away; whenever Vardis found a gap, Gradius spotted it and parried. At last they broke apart, panting. Neither had scored a hit on the other.

  The Firehawk had almost reached the rift gate now. The viewscreen was filling with swirling colors and flashing lightning as they neared. The Mechanic battleships that guarded it had moved away and hung in the air at a distance, making space for the Firehawk to go through. Gradius was aware that time was short, that he had to deal with Vardis quickly, but there was something about his opponent that bothered him. Something familiar.

  “Who are you?” he demanded. “Take off your mask.”

  Vardis, his sword still held ready, reached up with one hand and undid the clips holding his mask on. It dropped to the floor at his feet.

  For one absurd moment, it seemed as if the mirror was still covering his face. Gradius stared at an exact reflection of himself. Then Vardis smirked, and the illusion was broken. He was a clone, just like Jack was. One of the ten.

  “So that’s how Kara knew what I looked like,” said Gradius. “That’s why the first Gradius Clench walked into an ambush and the other clones have been dropping like flies. That’s how the Mechanics decoded Jack’s distress signal and sent the Hunters to Earth. I should have guessed.”

  “Yes, you should have,” said Vardis. “But you didn’t.”

  “Why did you do it? Why sell us out to the Mechanics?”

  “I saw the list,” Vardis said.

  “The list?”

  “We were ranked in order of who was most suitable to be the next Gradius Clench. But I bet you knew that.”

  “I suspected.”

  “Well, I saw it,” said Vardis, circling closer with his blade ready. “They had us graded. Guess where I was. Sixth! Sixth! I was the best fighter of all of us, but they had … questions about my attitude! Can you believe that? They didn’t think I was hero material!”

  “You did betray us all and endanger the entire universe,” Gradius pointed out.

 
“That was afterward!” he snapped. “You should understand! You were a substitute like me! An understudy! A spare part! If not for me, you’d never even have been Gradius Clench at all!”

  “That’s true,” said Gradius. “But I was happy to wait for my chance. To do my part. We can’t all be number one.” A faint smile touched his lips. “Sometimes, it’s enough just to be on the team.”

  “Well, you got one thing right,” said Vardis. “We can’t all be number one. And I’ve killed every other clone between me and the top. So that just leaves you.”

  He lunged, and their swords crashed together again.

  Jack and the others hurried onward through the gloom, ears battered by the grinding din of the Firehawk’s engines. Dunk led them steadily upward through clouds of steam and thin smoke. Great bolts of electricity snapped and sparked as they jumped between towers, making Jack duck his head instinctively.

  “The Epsilon’s in place,” Mazzy told them. “Waiting for us right above. She says the rift gate’s getting awfully close.”

  “Nearly there,” said Dunk, stumping along ahead of her. They were high up, crossing a walkway that passed between two huge tanks. At the other end was a junction where more stairs led to the top of the chamber and out. “It’s just over the—”

  “Beware!” shouted Ilara, pointing upward.

  Her warning was the only thing that saved them. They threw themselves aside as a great jet of flames rolled out of the darkness and licked across the walkway. Thomas tottered away from the fire, shielding his face, and bumped up against the railing. Jack watched with horror as the railing gave way, rusted screws snapping beneath his weight. Thomas tipped backward, flailing, and fell. Jack dived toward him, threw out a hand, and caught him by the wrist, almost wrenching his own arm out of the socket as he did so. Thomas clutched on to him, whimpering in fright, legs kicking empty air. Jack looked desperately for help, but there was none to be found. The others had retreated back up the walkway, Boston clutching a burned hand.

  “Jack!” Mazzy cried. “Jack, move it! He’s coming!”