NULL SPACE - Part 18

Zolurious was waiting outside the cave for General Solvar to finish dealing with the ships when a holographic dialog popped up in front of him. He stared at it, it was detailing an energy signature that his sensors were detecting. It must be something that the criminal was doing but it was strange. The woman that had been so good at avoiding his detecting was now giving him a clear indication of where she was.

It must be some kind of trick. She probably planned to use the reading to get him to go in and then escape while he was distracted. She must not think very highly of him is she thought such a simple trick would distract him. So he ignored the reading and continued to wait for Solvar to come back.

However when his display started to beep in warning he looked back at it. It seemed that the energy signature was getting quite large, much larger then it would need to be to get his attention. Just what was she planning to do? He studied the energy signature for a little while, had she made it bigger to make sure he noticed it or was there some other plan that she had. There was a lot of built up energy down there and it was continuing to grow. With that much energy she could…

He paused for a second. She couldn’t really be planning to do something like that… could she. He looked back over his shoulder and the city of glass behind him. No, she was more then capable of doing something like that. Was it just wishful thinking on his part that she wouldn’t descend to such depths. If she did something like that, then… who knows how many casualties and injuries there would be.

He needed to stop her, and soon. He had already given her too much time as it was by ignoring the reading for so long. He ran inside the cave not longer worried if this was a distraction. Even if it was he couldn’t take that risk, not with so many lives at stake. It was easy to track the energy source through the mines, it was location fairly deep so it took him a few minutes to reach the source.

As he entered the large cavern it was illuminated by the light he had created and which shone behind him. He stared in awe at the thing in front of him. This woman was crazy, much more so then he had though. She was really planning to go through with it.

Null turned around as he entered, turning away from the large object that was now in the center of the room. “Hello Zolurious, it is good to see you again. I’m glad you have joined me for my little party. I do hope that you will enjoy yourself.” In the light cast by Zolurious, Null’s hair sparkled like a rainbow behind her and against the darkness her eyes were glowing.

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“It has been five minutes,” Said Jeran to Silvia. “I’m going to go out there first and I want you to follow me.” Once Silvia nodded in agreement he moved up to the corner, around which the entrance and the guards waited. He took one last deep breath and ran around the corner. He brought up his gun to a shooting position.

Before the guards had even realized he was there he shot one in the arm and another in the leg. He wanted to avoid killing them if he had too. Silvia wasn’t good enough of a shot to avoid killing but he was so he wanted to take them out before Silvia got a shot at them.

The two men he shot collapsed onto the ground and he heard the shouting of a couple more guards. He was suprised that so many were guarding this entrance. He had shot the shoulder of the third guard then he heard the a shot from Silvia’s gun go off. He spun to fire a shot at the last guard only to find him writhing on the ground in pain.

The man had been shot in the chest on the left side. He was still alive but Jeran didn’t know for how much longer. Jeran glanced around to make sure that there were no more guards before disarming the guards that he had shot and moving them all to one side. They would probably survive but for now they wouldn’t be dangerous to him.

He then returned to the guard Silvia had shot. Silvia was empting her stomach on the ground a few feet away. He wanted to go and pat her on the back and tell her that it would be alright but this was something that she had to deal with herself. Instead he too the gun that man hand and disabled it before picking up the gun Silvia had dropped and turning on the safety. He knew what she must be going through was hard and when he was younger he had to go through it himself. It was tough to be a soldiers and he hoped that this discouraged her from wanting to do anything else.

He gripped Silvia on the shoulder and began to help her walk. “I’m going to bring you back to the meeting place before dealing with the other two entrances.” Said Jeran as they entered the mines again.

Silvia shook her head, “No, I’m coming with you. I can see be of some help.” She was still quivering a little bit, she had definitely not recovered.

This time is Jeran who shook his head, “No, your in no state to help anybody right now. I need you to stay at the meeting place while I deal with the other entrances and this time I am going to insist. Soldiers who aren’t calm are soldiers who die. You did good this time and you have learned a difficult lesson. You will recover but it will take a while.” He lead her back to the meeting place despite her protests before he headed off again to deal with another entrance.

Jeran was able to disable the guards at the other two entrances efficiently, though returning Silvia to the meeting place had delayed the plan. After he had dealt with the entrances he returned to Silvia. She seemed to have composed herself and was looking better then she had when he had left her there. Null wasn’t there yet but it was still a little while until the time they were supposed to leave.

“How are you holding up?” Jeran asked Silvia. She looked up at him and said, “It was dark, you should have at least left me a light.” Jeran decided with a comment like that she must be feeling a little better, though he didn’t know if she would become a soldier or not.

The two of the waited for Null in the darkness. Time slowly passed and Null continued to not be there. Eventually Jeran looked at his mini-terminal and stood up. “It is time, Null told us to leave if she didn’t arrive here in time.”

“But, that means,” Said Silvia with a look of horror on her face, “But that can’t happen, she will be here. We need to wait longer. She will be here.”

Jeran grimaced, he didn’t like it either but they had to leave. He tried to convince Silvia, “Since she is late we have to leave, if she is alright then she will expect us to leave and try and meet up with us at the entrance. Even if we wait here we won’t meet up with her. We have to go because that is what she want.” Said Jeran, it was basically a lie and he knew it. While what he said about meeting them at the entrance if she was alright was true, it was more then likely that Null wasn’t alright.

“Alright, but if she isn’t at the entrance then we will wait for her there.” Said Silvia in defiance. She didn’t want to leave Null behind any more the Jeran did but Jeran knew that that they probably didn’t have a choice in the matter.

“Agreed,” Said Jeran, however that was a lie. He knew that waiting at the enterence wouldn’t do anything. If Null wasn’t there then something horrible must have happened to her and waiting more wouldn’t help her and would bring the enemy to them.

They arrived at the entrance fairly quickly. Jeran glanced outside to ensure that there was nobody there. It was empty so he assumed that Null’s plan must have worked. She had forced Zolurious into the mines, but at what cost. As they left the caves they looked around for Null but she was nowhere to be found. Jeran knew she must still be in he caves… he didn’t want to think about what must have happened down there.

Jeran took a deep breath, he needed to harden himself for what he was about to do. “Silvia, Null isn’t here. She probably isn’t going to be here. Something must have happened in the cavern. We need to leave before anybody else arrives here.”

Silvia shook her head and yelled, “No, I’m not leaving Null behind, how can you want to. You have been together with her longer then I have but you want to just abandon her.”

“If there was a probable Null can’t deal with there would be nothing I could do to help. We need to find a ship and escape before it is too late. Here, take your gun back, you might need it.” He handed Silvia he gun he had taken from where after she had collapsed.

Silvia took is and then looked away, she was really angry at her dad. She couldn’t believe he would just abandon Null.

Jeran continued, “Once you find a ship, make sure to get out of the system as quickly as possible. It will be dangerous for you to stay here. I need you to obey me just this once. I want you to make it out of this alive. Good Luck” Silvia continued to ignore him while he spoke. Then suddenly she realized that he had been saying ‘you’ for the last few sentences. She looked back at her dad but he wasn’t there anymore.

She looked into the cave mouth, had he gone back in there after Null. She collapsed onto her knees, she had said those things to her dad about not caring about what happened to Null but she had been wrong. She wanted to go in there after them, but she didn’t have a light and so there was nothing that she could do.

Instead she was going to follow he dad’s last orders and escape. That was what he wanted her to do so she would do it. She stood up and was about to turn around when she heard a voice from behind her. “Lookie here, what have I found. A poor lost girl without her father. Now I wonder where he would have gone leaving you all alone.”

Silvia turned around slowly to see General Solvar standing a few feet away from her. He had just returned from dealing with the ships and was delited to find some so interesting outside the cave instead of Zolurious. He was also pointing a gun at Silvia.

“Not drop the gun little girl, we don’t want anyone to get hurt. It would be awful if the poor little hostage died.” Silvia dropped the gun onto the ground and slowly raised her hands. “Now little girl, I need you to tell me exactly where you father is because we are going to plan a special surprise party for him when he gets back.”

Silvia just glared at him in anger but she wasn’t able to do anything. She no longer had a gun and there was no way she could overpower Solvar. She felt so helpless again.