With the battlesuit’s servos whining, Maddox stalked to the tin can—the ungainly, box-shaped fold fighter with stubby wings waiting for them. Keith was inside, hopefully able to do what he did best: fly this baby in and out of combat. If ever the ace was going to need his fighter skills, this day was it.

  “Good luck, sir,” Galyan said.

  “Thank you, Galyan,” Maddox said.

  Soon, Maddox and Meta were strapped within the ugly-looking tin can. Keith seemed slow today as he readied his fold ship from the pilot seat.

  Everyone exited the hangar bay. Air was flushed out. The hangar bay hatch slowly opened to space.

  “I’m starting her up,” Keith said. He seemed even more sluggish.

  “Can you do this?” Maddox asked.

  Galyan appeared. “Follow my instructions, Keith.” Galyan began to speak with a distinct Scottish accent. The holoimage lowered his voice, speaking into Keith’s ear.

  Keith nodded and then grinned, trying to pat Galyan’s shoulder. His hand went through the holoimage. Keith jerked back his head as if astounded. Then he grinned and laughed nervously.

  “Don’t worry about me,” Keith told the others. “I know what’s going on. I do, I do.”

  Galyan continued to instruct Keith.

  Keith turned his head robotically, and the engine started. The tin can lifted off the deck. Soon, it eased out of the hangar bay into underspace.

  Maddox’s gut was tense. He could not engage the Way of the Pilgrim. His intuitive sense was down. Fortunately, the Erill spiritual energy he’d gained long ago must be sustaining him.

  Meta did not speak, even though Maddox addressed her several times. Finally, he gripped her armored sleeve. “Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” Meta said. “I feel so odd and off, though.”

  “I’m going to leave you behind then.”

  That caused Meta to straighten in her battlesuit. “No,” she said. “You will not.”

  Maddox nodded to himself. He would threaten to leave her behind every time she became sluggish. That, perhaps, would give her the boost—the mental energy she needed to fulfill whatever they were going to have to do on the enemy station.

  “All right,” Maddox said, but he realized Keith wasn’t paying him the slightest attention.

  The pilot listened to and stared at Galyan most of the time. It seemed as if Keith’s fingers were moving automatically whenever Galyan spoke. What would happen once they folded, leaving Galyan behind?

  Maybe they could have used Ludendorff and his teleport device to reach the station. Unfortunately, in underspace, none of them functioned well.

  “Do you see it?” Maddox asked.

  “Do you mean the engine of destruction?” Keith asked. “I do. We’re heading there now.” Keith stabbed the fold button.

  Everything blurred. Maddox felt foggy and then blanked out. The next thing he knew, alarms were blaring around him as he raised his armored head.

  “We might crash, sir,” Keith said.

  Galyan was no longer helping Keith. Galyan hadn’t come when they folded because he was a holoimage projected from the starship. Could Galyan project himself this far, an eighth of a light year? Up to now, the answer was no.

  “Ha! You bastards,” Keith shouted, as he manipulated his piloting board.

  Small missiles hissed from the tin can.

  Maddox watched on a screen. Explosions detonated out there. Their little ship began to maneuver violently as beams shot from the gigantic space station.

  “Are those anti-craft guns?” Maddox asked.

  “Let me fly my own ship, Captain,” Keith shouted.

  Maddox jerked this way and that in his restraints. His stomach lurched as the tin can moved up and then violently down. A burn hole appeared in a bulkhead near his feet. Air must have rushed out. Fortunately, Keith had been wearing a vacc suit and now closed the helmet’s visor.

  “Ha-ha-ha,” Maddox heard over the helmet comm. Keith almost sounded insane.

  “That won’t be enough to destroy me tin can,” Keith yelled.

  Maddox grinned in spite of himself. Keith’s fighting fury was up. Would that be enough for them to complete the mission? He sure hoped so.

  “God,” Maddox prayed, “please help us. We need Your help to succeed. Is the evil one one of your angels that you banished?”

  The contortions of the fold ship became so violent that Maddox couldn’t hold on to the thought and merely clung to his restraints. Too much more of this, and he would vomit.

  There was horrible screeching all around them.

  Moments later, Keith said, “I’ve landed.”

  “What? How?”

  “I blew out a hole in the station. It’s up to you two now. You’ll have to go quick. I don’t know how long I’ll be able to stay here.”

  Maddox unlatched the restraints and stood, his servos working perfectly. “Meta, can you hear me?”

  Her faceplate stared up at him.

  “That’s okay,” Maddox said over the suit comm. “I’ll leave you behind then.”

  There was a faint snarl on his comm.

  “No, you will not.” Meta tore off her restraints using the exo-power of her armor. Then she stood. “Go, I will follow.”

  Shaking his head, Maddox clanked for the exit hatch. This was it. Keith had brought them to the enemy station. Now they needed to find the warp in here. Galyan had given him a small detector for that. Maddox looked at it on his armored wrist. The warp showed on the tracker as deep within the giant structure. A multi-dimensional coil fluctuation caused the warp. That was the place to put the Prism Drive Bomb. Would he have to detonate it himself?

  “No,” Maddox said. His little girl was not going to grow up without a father and a mother.

  “Come on, Meta, let’s get her done.”

  -68-

  Maddox and Meta clanked through the Great Station, which was five times the size of Victory. Fortunately, gravity was present. Whether it was pseudo-gravity or that of the planet, Maddox didn’t know. It likely wasn’t gravity from the planet, though. He realized he wasn’t thinking straight. The answer should have been obvious to him.

  “To your left,” Meta said.

  Maddox turned and fired a few shells.

  Titanic explosions blasted part of the far bulkhead and took down whoever had stood in their way. They continued to move through the station corridors.

  “Maybe we can blow the station apart and save ourselves the journey,” Meta said.

  Maddox didn’t think they had the ordnance to do that. Maybe they should have taken an antimatter bomb along. Why use the special device that would ruin their single Prism Drive? Maddox shook his head. It didn’t matter now. What mattered was getting to the warp point.

  Perhaps there were other energies and things taking place here. Perhaps the whole station could shift from an antimatter blast. He imagined that Omegan would detect such a thing and have fail-safes in place.

  Maddox kept marching and firing explosive shells. Meta followed him, not providing any firepower, but providing him solace because another person was with him in this bizarre realm. He needed to know that, especially with the Inkari waiting on the water world below for him to make a mistake.

  Maddox coughed several times and used a battlesuit beam to destroy a squad of Inkari in tentacled armor. He laughed as they tumbled to the deck, their suits smoking.

  Maddox was reverting, he realized. He was reverting to the wolf that had thrust his dueling sword through Artaxerxes Par’s chest. A great and vicious bellicosity filled him. He was going to do this. Why he should feel this now and in this way didn’t matter.

  What was he thinking of? Oh yeah. How did Omegan and Leviathan—what was the connection between them? Maddox didn’t know. Was it a Yon Soth? He hadn’t seen any indications to show that. All he knew was he had to get to the warp location.

  These corridors were huge. Machinery pulsed upon the bulkheads all around them. What were their purposes?

  Fury was building inside him. He wanted to destroy everything. Was that because he knew this evil one was coming to their universe to devour everything as it had in its own? Was he the warrior who was supposed to defend their universe from all comers? Maybe that was too grandiose of a thought.

  “I am the di-far!” Maddox roared that as he clanked down the hall.

  He raised a battlesuited arm, ejecting more shells, destroying stuff.

  “Maddox, Maddox,” Meta shouted over the comm link. “What are you doing? Save your ordnance for our enemies. You’re just destroying stuff to no purpose.”

  “Right, right,” Maddox said.

  He strained to get it together. He strained to keep his consciousness, his logical thought in one piece. Underspace was horrific. The mental and spiritual pressures seemed to be building. Even though this was a so-called stable or soft place in underspace, maybe some vile eddies were working through from the horrific places.

  Maddox was stunned they’d made it this far. Likely, he’d needed the combination of Ludendorff, Galyan, Andros, Keith, and maybe even himself and Meta in order to have made it this far.

  “We’re going to do it,” Maddox shouted at Meta.

  “Not so loud. What’s happening to you? What’s wrong with you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Maddox followed the indicator on his wrist sensor. He was close to the special warp. Maybe in this warp, there could be no shifting and maneuvering from one phase to the next. The engine would have to accept the full blast of the Prism Drive Bomb. Or maybe the Prism Drive could fluctuate with it, maintaining its location wherever he set it. Surely there was more to the bomb that Ludendorff, Andros and Galyan had constructed. They hadn’t had time to tell him all the ins and outs of how it worked.

  “I am the warrior. I am the tip of the spear.” Maddox disliked that he was bragging. “I’m only bragging to me, though.”

  “No,” Meta said, “I’m hearing it, too. I didn’t know this side of you.”

  That struck him as a snide comment. Maddox was ready to turn and tell her off.

  Maybe Meta sensed that, for she said, “Listen, husband, you must do it. Jewel is back there. We must succeed. Think of Jewel.”

  “Yes,” Maddox said.

  He would think of Jewel. He would think of his sweet daughter who was growing up on the starship. Was that the proper place for a young girl? He didn’t know. But he would protect her. Any who tried to kill her, any who tried to shift her thoughts to wicked ways or to make her act in bizarre ways, any teacher that tried that, he would kill her. He would hang the teacher from a lamppost if she dared to meddle with his child. It was his child from his blood. How dare anybody else think that they had a say in how he raised his girl. By the Lord God Almighty, he was going to stop that. And if that meant he was going to stop this evil one—

  Maddox fired shells down the corridor. Aliens blew up. Maddox laughed like a wolf seeing his prey stagger and ready to go down. Maddox rushed forward, leaving Meta behind.

  This was the warp point.

  “Help me, help me,” Maddox said.

  He began to unlatch the locks that held the bomb on his back. Then Meta was there, helping him ease it down while using her servo-powered strength. Maddox twisted around and helped her, and they set it with magnetic clamps to the bulkhead. Here was the warp fluctuation. This was it. It was a mystic coil that twirled and twirled.

  “Yes!” Maddox snarled.

  “Control yourself, husband. You’re becoming berserk.”

  “Berserk?” he said. Yeah, that had happened last mission. Was he succumbing to this berserker rage? Had this become easier for him to slip into? Was he becoming angry too often and too easily?

  People seem to follow whatever patterns they set. Maddox decided he needed to control the rage, even though it had been of use to him in other situations.

  “There,” he said. Maddox pressed the detonation timer switch. “Now, my love, we must get back to Keith before this thing detonates and stops everything.”

  -69-

  Maddox and Meta clanked down the corridors, using infrared sensors to see the heat of their former boot prints on the deck.

  “Keith, Keith, are you there?” Maddox said over the suit comm.

  Some of the elation, wildness and berserker rage that he had felt faded the farther he left the Prism Drive Bomb behind. He still had to battle the debilitating effects against his mind. He almost seemed foolish to himself. The effect still hurt Meta’s thinking as well.

  Here was the thing, though. Would the bomb succeed? If it didn’t, they would have to conceive of a Plan B. ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.’ That was Maddox’s motto, and he would follow it to the end.

  “And if that fails, I’ll be dead,” he said.

  “What was that? Why would you die?” Meta asked.

  “Concentrate,” he told her.

  “I’m trying. You keep muttering, mumbling and shouting. It’s disconcerting. Is this how you always act?”

  “Not now,” Maddox said. “Keep your mind in the game.”

  “Is that what this is to you, a game?” Meta asked. “No! This is about life and death. Don’t you realize you’re staking your life in places others should be doing this?”

  “Enough,” Maddox said. “Quit haranguing me, woman.”

  “How dare you say that to me,” Meta said after a few moments. “I’m your wife. I’m—”

  Maddox stopped and turned around. Even if this realm made it hard to think, Meta was still his beloved, his rare prize. He used both powered-armored gloves to hold her by her power-armored shoulders. “Listen to me, Meta. You are my life and my love. I’d have no other. We have our daughter, but I want more children.”

  “Stay at home then and help me make some,” Meta said.

  “I love you more than anything.”

  “You love your work as much or more than me.”

  “No,” Maddox said. “Don’t you understand? A man works. That’s what he is. That’s how he defines himself.”

  “That’s stupid,” Meta said.

  “It isn’t stupid.” Maddox tightened his fingers, feeling her battle armor sink under the pressure. “Sorry,” he said, as he let go. What was wrong with him? Oh yeah, it was this place making them stupid. What caused that?

  “What are you sorry for?” Meta said.

  “Listen, this place is messing with our minds. We must concentrate, and we must escape from the coming blast or Jewel will be alone.”

  “No, not my baby girl, not Jewel.”

  Maddox squeezed his eyelids closed. He needed to take his own advice. He needed to concentrate, and keep Meta’s morale high. He opened his eyes.

  “Hey, you’re the most dangerous woman I know. Few can stand against you. You have done incredible things. Now you must use all that power, all that ferocity and emotion, to control your thoughts until we get out of here, until we’re safely aboard the fold ship, and until we’re back on Victory.”

  “I understand, and I’m sorry. You’re the di-far, and I do support you. I get frightened thinking you might not come back. Don’t you understand how much I love you? The idea of having to wake up every day without you—I thought that had happened. The loneliness I felt… I want you by my side all of my days.”

  “And I want you by my side.”

  “More than you want to go on these missions?”

  “That’s right,” he said. “Now, are we good?”

  “Yes, Captain.” Meta threw herself into his battlesuited arms as they hugged.

  “Let’s get out of here, eh?” he said.

  They continued down the corridors, clanking, following the faint heat trail. It was odd, but there was no enemy opposition. Perhaps now that they had reached their destination and were leaving, it wasn’t as crucial to the enemy to stop them.

  Maddox’s proximity alarm went off. He thought this too soon. There was a vast shape ahead of him. He saw a multi-tentacled thing, a great monstrosity. It was a giant platform with tentacles. Aha! He’d seen smaller ones on the scooper on the Ruby Planet.

  Maddox opened channels. His gut told him who this was. “Are you Omegan by any chance?”

  “You foul rat of a being. Yes, I’m Omegan. I knew you were vicious and different, but I will destroy you. Then the Seekers and the Anointed One himself will come into your galaxy and take it all.”

  Maddox aimed and fired shell after shell at Omegan.

  Crystalline patterns appeared, absorbing every blast and beam.

  “Ha-ha!” Omegan said, “I can block everything you can throw at me, Captain. Do you understand what that means? If you want to live, you must dislocate the bomb for me.”

  “What?” Maddox said. “Dislocate?”

  “That may not be the right word. It does not matter. My translator device—”

  Maddox lost it, possibly due to the mind-numbing effect of this place. He felt the blood pounding in his brain. This computer virus from Dimension X, a servant of an evil one, perhaps an angel or a demon cast from this universe. How was he to know how these things worked? Was Omegan less than a Yon Soth? It didn’t matter. Omegan was trying to keep him from Jewel.

  Maddox found that he was clanking down the corridor, hammering the robot monster with every shell he had. The crystalline defense before it cracked. Maddox closed and beamed. He had more than his regular monofilament blade with him today. He had a monofilament sword in his gauntleted right hand. Perhaps the robot took on the identity of Artaxerxes Par to him.

  “Die!” Maddox roared.

  Maddox faintly realized that Meta was behind him, shooting past him as he literally launched off his feet in his battle armor and thrust the sword. The sword with its monofilament abilities pierced through the crystalline defense. He stabbed the robot and then the weight of Maddox’s exoskeleton battle armor crushed upon the tentacled platform with Omegan’s small cube in its center.

  Maddox started hacking and slashing as he roared with fury. The joy of battle filled his being. This was what it meant to be the di-far.