LITMIR.BIZ

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expression of permanent worry, Bry was second in command at the Cerberus ops center, and was also Lakesh’s closest confidant. Many hours of experience had taught him to pick up on the signs when Lakesh was worrying, and seeing the man absentmindedly tapping at his teeth with a pen was one sure giveaway.

      “Something I can help you with, Lakesh?” he asked cheerily.

      Lakesh looked up from his calculations and smiled. Bry had been overseeing much of the reconstruction work for the redoubt over the past four days, which meant that the two of them had spent little time in each other’s company. “Donald, how are things progressing?”

      “Slowly. Ever so slowly. But we’re getting there.”

      Lakesh nodded. “I’ll be glad when I can see my old map properly again.”

      “Ullikummis did a real number on this place,” Bry said. “We’ve found things that look like carcasses up in the canteen area, round and as big as a dog but all withered up and dead now. The disturbing part is, they’re made of rock.”

      “That sounds hideous,” Lakesh said solemnly. “I fear what other surprises we might yet find.”

      Bry took a steadying breath, placing his hands on Lakesh’s desk. “We made it back here, and that monster won’t be coming again,” he said. “We survived everything he did, and we’ll make it through this, too. Whatever we find.”

      “I know,” Lakesh agreed. “I’ll just be glad when things are finally back to normal. I’ve spent too much of the past few months living out of a suitcase, not knowing what new horror the next day will bring.”

      “Life goes on,” Bry conceded, as he glanced at Lakesh’s screen. “But you look like you’re puzzling over something there.”

      “Brigid,” Lakesh said, ignoring the screen. “I fear that something has broken inside her, her spirit, if you will. What Ullikummis did took so much from her, and one can ill imagine what the effects of that are with her incredible memory. If she won’t let us help her, I fear we could lose her forever.

      “Am I an old fool to worry so, Donald?”

      Bry chuckled. “If you are, then I am, too,” he said. “Brigid’s not herself....”

      “She’s more herself than she’s been in months,” Lakesh corrected. “That’s the problem. She’s grown—experience has shaped her. She almost bit my head off when I proposed she talk things over with Reba.”

      “Maybe therapy isn’t the answer,” Donald said after a moment’s consideration. “One time when I was eight, my cat—Tiger—died. I really loved that cat, and my mom fussed and worried herself silly at what his passing would do to me. She asked if I would like a new cat, but I didn’t want one. Eventually, she tried to get me to see a child psychiatrist.”

      “For a cat?” Lakesh asked.

      “For a cat,” Bry confirmed. “So, I saw her—a nice enough woman, though I’ll be damned if I can recall her name after all these years. And we talked some, life and sorrow and all that. And it just made me realize that—you know, all I wanted was for people to stop asking me how I felt, to stop going on about it. I knew Tiger wasn’t coming back, and it wasn’t that I wanted a new cat. I just wanted to put that behind me and do new stuff.”

      “What happened?” Lakesh asked.

      “Eventually the therapy sessions stopped,” Bry said. “I probably only went for about four weeks, but that’s a long time when you’re eight. I think the shrink gave up when all I would talk about was some movie that I’d seen a trailer for. I can’t remember what the movie was now, either. Go figure.”

      Lakesh laughed. “It was always something when you were a child, wasn’t it?”

      Bry nodded. “You’ve tried to help, Lakesh, but maybe Brigid can just figure this out in her own way. No matter how much people care, probably all the questions aren’t helping her right now. Nor is being here, with reminders of what Ullikummis did to us there to see on every surface.”

      “Perhaps not,” Lakesh said, his eyes flicking back to the image on his computer terminal.

      Bry watched as a smile crept across Lakesh’s face. “I know that look,” he said. “What is it?”

      “You may have provided the solution to two problems,” Lakesh said. “Rosalia requires the interphaser to travel to her next destination, but I am reluctant to leave it with her. However, if I were to send Brigid along for the trip, she could retrieve the interphaser and take a little time away from everything that’s happening here.”

      Bry smiled. “Happy to help. Shall we say ‘eureka’?” he asked.

      “Oh, why not?” Lakesh laughed, and the two men punched their fists in the air.

      “Eureka!”

      Chapter 5

      Those old stones were a-rattling.

      In the darkened area beneath the stage in the old aircraft hangar, Domi pulled her hand back from the box. Her eyes widened as a sound came from it like the clip-clopping of hoofbeats. But already she was too late. A rush of stones came with her, racing over her hand and up her arm like insects, moving under their own power.

      “No!” Domi cried out, scampering backward with her eyes fixed on the dark shapes running up her flesh. Before her, the box continued to tremble just slightly, as though it had been knocked, its contents rattling like cooking kernels of popcorn.

      * * *

      ON THE STAGE ABOVE, the Stone Widow was speaking of salvation. “The future will need strength,” she proclaimed.

      From his position in the jostling crowd, Kane watched as one of the three robed figures who were acting as the woman’s assistants brought a wooden box over to her from its place at the edge of the stage. The box was roughly one foot square, and though Kane couldn’t know it, it was an identical match to the one that Domi had just discovered beneath the raised stage.

      “You all shall be that strength,” the woman on stage continued joyously.

      The crowd cheered in agreement, pushing ever closer to the orator. On stage, the robed man nudged the lid of the box aside, opening it so that the Stone Widow could reach within. From where he stood, Kane could not see what was in the box but he could tell it was heavy.

      * * *

      JUST FEET BELOW, Domi gasped as the strange stones ran across her skin. She brushed at them as their dark shapes moved along her right arm, watching in horror as they clung to her hand, ringing her wrist with a caking of stones. She grunted as she tried once again to pluck them from her flesh.

      Several of the stones were sinking into the flesh of her right arm where they had first touched her, digging in with their sharp edges, forming the beginnings of a shell across Domi’s skin. And all Domi could do was grit her teeth against the pain.

      * * *

      CLOSE TO THE FRONT of the stage, Edwards felt the pull of the box as the Stone Widow reached within. It seemed to be tugging at his mind, magnet to magnet.

      “We are all grieving,” the woman on stage proclaimed. “Ullikummis ascended, and we are left to grieve the passing. But the future is right here, within me. Within us all.”

      With the crowd transfixed, the Stone Widow plucked a handful of stones from the box, each one no bigger than her thumb joint. Kane balked as he realized that they were shards of Ullikummis. He searched the crowd for Edwards, saw the man reach a hand to his forehead and wince as if in pain.

      The Stone Widow held her arm outstretched and, before Kane could do anything, opened her hand, palm down, above Edwards’s head. A single stone—just a pebble really—dropped from her hand, falling onto Edwards’s shoulders and the back of his neck. Edwards fell back, sweeping at the stone and brushing it away over the heads

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