The Sarpeidon Chronicles

Part 5: The Way to Dusty Death

Chapter 6

Desperately Jarrod clawed at the iron-like grip that held him, fought against the blackness that almost immediately clouded his vision. Finally, just before the spreading numbness rendered his writhing limbs useless, a half-remembered lesson in physical combat took over, just as his Starfleet instructors had promised it would. Blindly he struck out with both legs, bucking off the floor with enough force to send Argus sprawling. Undeterred, Argus rolled back onto his feet and came at him again. This time, Jarrod managed to pin him against the wall. The agony in his side was almost more than he could stand as he pushed his opponent down with all his weight.

"Argus, stop! I am not your enemy. I did nothing to harm you, any of you, I swear!"

"Liar! You were there-when my sister went to Zor Khan. You were supposed to kill him. Instead, you betrayed all of us to save yourself. Now every last member of my family is dead, or condemned to something far worse than execution. It was your doing, all of it!"

"I failed to kill him, that's true. But I held him off-gave her time to escape. Believe me when I say I meant no harm to come to any of you-least of all her."

"Believe you?" Argus pale blue eyes, so much like his mother's, blazed with fury. "As Milos did, and my father? They paid for that trust with their lives. I won't make the same mistake."

"If you harm me, Argus, you will cause your sister far greater pain than even Zor Khan could. And if I tell you why, you'll think me insane...or a liar."

"I already do think you a liar of the worst sort. So go ahead-tell me why I should show you a shred more mercy than the Tyrant has shown us."

Once again, his hands twitched, and this time Jarrod found it more difficult to restrain him. The dampness inside his shirt told him that his stab wound had begun to bleed again. His fingers, even his hands, had begun to feel cold and numb. If Argus really were determined to kill him, in a few minutes there would be little he could do to prevent it.

"Because I am her son."

Just like that, the words were out, disclosing everything Octavius, not to mention his own common sense, had warned him never to reveal. Jarrod could only watch Argus shrink from him in horrified disbelief.

"Can't you see the resemblance?" he urged. "People have remarked on it my entire life."

Argus did see it; the astonishment in his eyes confirmed that. He slumped against the wall and sank slowly to the floor when Jarrod released him. "But how is this possible? You and my sister are nearly the same age!"

"You know very well that it is possible. The device Zor Khan is experimenting with-he plans to use it on both you and your sister. I am a product of that device, as surely as she will become its victim."

"No. This is absurd. You are as mad as Atoz. Or perhaps you merely take me for a fool."

"If only it were that simple. Don't you understand that I don't want you to believe me? I've revealed too much already! Forget what I have told you, if you can. And if you can't, you must never repeat a word of it to anyone. The future itself, and possibly my mother's life, depends on our silence now."

Visibly distraught, Argus crawled to his feet and paced the cell on shaky legs. "If she is to have a son...then my sister will not die."

"No. She will suffer more than I care to contemplate, but she will not die."

Suddenly Argus tensed and spun around. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes had narrowed. "Tell me you are not also the son of that bastard, Zor Khan."

"I think you can see that there is much more to this tale than I can reveal to you, or to anyone in this time." Jarrod pushed back his dark, thick hair to uncover the delicate points of his ears. "All I will tell you of my father is that he suits her well, though at times even I fail to understand why."

They stood in silence for a long moment. Their mutual anguish filled the room like a suffocating vapor.

"What you have told me seems scarcely credible," his uncle said at last. "More like something from those fanciful books my sister used to order from Atoz's collection. Still, your words have brought me too much comfort to be outright lies." Before long, his face became troubled again. "Since you know the future, may I ask you one other thing? I swear that your answer will travel no further than these walls."

"What is it?"

"Will I survive the Atavachron as well?"

Jarrod looked at the floor. "No. That is the main reason I decided to confide in you."

Without shame, Argus put his face in his hands and wept. Only when the guards came for him did he manage to suppress his tears.

"I am to be transported?" he asked as one soldier shoved him from the cell while the other forced Jarrod back against the wall. The fact that neither of them replied was answer enough.

He struggled against them for as long as he could, dragging his feet along the floor and twisting his shoulders and arms while they hauled him away.

"If anything you told me was the truth," he shouted just before he disappeared around the corner, "I beg you, spare my sister as much pain as you can."

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At the end of a long corridor lined with empty cells, Atoz turned to Spock in obvious bewilderment.

"I can't understand it," he lamented, looking around as if he couldn't trust his own senses. "Only yesterday there were a dozen prisoners here."

"It would explain the lack of security. Surely they could not all have been transported in the space of one afternoon."

"They all should have been here. Not just the young man you spoke of, but the others as well."

"Are there other detention areas?"

"I suppose there must be. Zor Khan has not been slow to arrest anyone who has spoken against him. And as of late, there have been many dissenters." Atoz wrung his hands nervously. "Wait here a moment. There is one more place I can investigate, but there might be guards. They wouldn't question my presence, but yours might be another matter."

"I understand."

Left alone, he walked the length of the corridor, glancing briefly into the barred cubicles. Each of them had been left in a pristine state, every sign of their former occupants expunged. If his son had in fact been imprisoned here recently, no clue remained to guide him. Nonetheless, he continued his inspection.

He had almost completed his search when he heard an indistinct rustling in the furthermost cell. Moving closer, he found the last remaining prisoner gazing at him from behind the barrier. She was so close that he could see the swollen condition of her eyelids, the half-dried tears still clinging to her lashes.

Of all the bizarre, disquieting, and even deadly situations he had expected on this journey, encountering her had not been one of them. Before he could stop himself, her name rose to his lips. "Zarabeth."

"Yes, I am Zarabeth." She offered him a wary nod, then tilted her head as if trying to see through the gap in his hood. Smoothly he turned just enough to obscure her view. "Are you to be my executioner?"

"No. Atoz told me of your circumstances. I mean you no harm."

"You must be an acolyte, then. Have you come to offer me spiritual comfort?"

"My identity is not important," he said quickly, starting forward. "I should not have disturbed you."

"No-wait. Don't go just yet. I've been alone here since the guards took my brother a few hours ago. No one has brought me any further news...though I have little hope of seeing him ever again." Her voice caught; to his consternation, Spock felt a strange clenching sensation at the back of his own throat. Hastily he shook off his discomfort.

Zarabeth, too, made an effort to collect herself. "Don't worry. I won't ask you to help me. I know I'm beyond anyone's help now."

"Is that what you believe?"

"It's what I know. I've heard about the Atavachron-most of my relatives have already been sent through it, and the rest are dead. All that's left for me is to stay alive wherever Zor Khan has decided to send me-if I can."

"You strike me as a young woman with a great deal of fortitude. I believe your chances for survival are excellent."

"I don't know if they are or not. Before he left here, my brother made me promise that I would fight for my life. Someone has to make sure we're remembered, he said. We mustn't let people forget what was done to us, or the Tyrant will never be defeated." Pausing, she leaned against the bars and closed her eyes for a moment. "Still, to tell you the truth, now that he is gone, I think that I would just as soon give up. No one knows what the other side is like, but even if it is only a void where we will never meet our loved ones again, it might be preferable to what Zor Khan has in mind for me."

"It is not uncommon for the mind to counter uncertainty with fear. Perhaps it would help you to remember that in some cases, situations that seem finite are not necessarily so."

"Like death. Can you truly understand what I mean when I say that everything I had is gone? They say that Zor Khan has a doorway to the past-yet the days I long to live through again will be forever lost to me."

"Perhaps one day, there will be other events you will care to remember."

"I wish I could believe that-but I'm afraid I cannot." She looked up at him again, her face a mask of abject despair, and he knew that his ill-advised attempts to console her had only made things worse. If he left her now, it occurred to him that there might be no present home on Amphitrite for him to return to at all.

Knowing he now had little, if anything, to lose, he moved to a position directly in front of her cell, then reached for her through the bars.

"Zarabeth, come toward me. Do not be afraid."

She was afraid; that much was clear to him. When he pressed his fingers to her temples, the sharpness of her raging emotions raked his mind like jagged glass shards. As it would in the future, the intensity of her pain staggered him.

Somehow, slowly, he managed to work his way past all such obstacles. In turn, he gave her strength...hope...and then the ability to forget his visit utterly. A healing sleep overtook her as he slipped away and went to find Atoz, who was gesturing toward him with important news. Leaving her to her fate now, he hoped, was necessary to ensure that they would meet again later...nearly one hundred years in the future.

"It was almost by chance that I found him," Atoz jabbered as they hurried down the corridor. "A few minutes more and he would have been lost to us forever."

"Your assistance has been most valuable," Spock assured him as he tried to keep pace with the younger man's rapid strides. "If I am successful, your actions will have saved many lives."

"Really?" Startled, Atoz abruptly slowed his steps. "Forgive me...but you have no idea how strange the very idea seems to me. All my life, I have been regarded as at best a coward, at worst a madman. Even to imagine that I have done something heroic-well, it doesn't come easily to me, I can assure you."

"I have a presentiment, Atoz, that before the end of your life, you will be responsible for many extraordinary accomplishments."

Beaming with pride, Atoz motioned Spock to a bend in the corridor. Just beyond them sat a closed door that bore neither a guard nor markings of any kind. "He's being held in there," he whispered. "If you'd like, I can walk in ahead of you and distract whoever is on duty inside. Assuming you are less averse to violence than most monks, we can probably force our way past him before anyone else even notices."

Spock held up a hand to silence him. "In fact, the scenario you describe does not suit my plan at all. Given your ability to move freely within the Library, I believe it would be far more advantageous for you to maintain your position in Zor Khan's entourage. Milos and Boroc may have failed to remove him from power, but there will undoubtedly be others. You should be available to aid them."

Atoz sighed. "I suppose that makes sense. Still, I don't see how you can manage this on your own."

"You may trust that I have sufficient personal resources. And now I suggest that you leave me, Atoz. It would be wise for you to establish your whereabouts elsewhere within the next few minutes."

Reluctantly, Atoz began to back away. Then, after a final bow, he turned and ran.

Spock waited until he was alone, then applied the lock disrupter to the door and slipped inside and resealed it to ensure complete privacy.

This time, he spotted the prisoner right away. Jarrod lay on the floor in the corner cell, as alone as his mother had been. The entire left side of his shirt was soaked in fresh blood, and his skin appeared waxy and cold. Dull, heavy-lidded eyes barely registered surprise as Spock forced his way into the cell and bent to check his son's wound.

"If I weren't so sure I was hallucinating, I'd ask you what you were doing here," Jarrod murmured.

"You are not hallucinating, and it is I who have several questions for you. However, all of them will have to wait until we return to our own present-the place we should have remained all along."

"How long have you been here?" Clutching his side, Jarrod struggled to sit up.

"A few hours at most. Long enough, I hope, to undo some of the damage your presence has caused."

"It wasn't supposed to be like that. Octavius promised to pull me back after only a few minutes. Then something went wrong."

"Octavius had no intention of bringing you back. The bioequalizing device he gave you was modified to prevent your return. Fortunately, I believe I can render it sufficiently stable to return you to your point of origin."

Jarrod watched as Spock removed a handheld sensor from the pocket of his robe, pushed up his son's tattered sleeve, and began to tinker with the wristband.

"Atoz and I suspected that my problem was connected to the wristband," he said after a moment. "I'm glad we were on the right track about something, at least."

Pausing in his work, Spock looked up at him with a grim expression. "I trust I need not remind you how foolish you were to come here in the first place. Entangling yourself in the events of this time, and confiding in the people, was immeasurably worse."

"Well, obviously I don't have your strength of character," Jarrod shot back. "Perhaps you could have stood by and done nothing while you watched them suffer and die-I could not. Don't you realize how close Mother is to us even now? Both of us know what she'll have to endure. We could change that."

"Your mother has come to terms with what happened. You-we-cannot change the sequence of events here without inadvertently affecting our own history. We could return to find nothing the same - assuming we can return at all once the damage is done. Perhaps you have forgotten that your mother once saved my life as well."

Slowly, Jarrod's pain-glazed eyes filled with tears. "I guess you're right. I didn't think this through very well. And I do want to return."

"We shall know in a moment if that is still possible," Spock said as he drew back. "My adjustments to your wristband are complete. You may now signal for transport as Octavius showed you. If my reconstruction was accurate, you should rematerialize in his cottage. I shall follow within the next few moments."

"Don't wait too long. They might be coming back for me at any moment."

"Understood."

A fraction of a moment later, Spock was alone in the cell. As Jarrod had predicted, footsteps had begun to converge outside the sabotaged door. A subsequent banging suggested that Zor Khan's guards were in the process of forcing it back open again.

Long before they managed to pull it back even an inch, Spock reached for his own wristband. Temporary oblivion rushed over him like a cold, inky wave. Nonetheless, he welcomed it.

The inexplicable loss of his most valuable prisoner had left Zor Khan in a foul mood for the remainder of the afternoon. Then there was the fiasco of Argus' botched transport. By the time he sent for Zarabeth, even his most trusted guards cringed when he addressed them. Atoz, fingering the bruise the Tyrant's boot had left on his cheek, watched the proceedings from the corner in total silence.

Beside the Atavachron lay a small collection of the personal effects she would be permitted to take with her. "How like a woman to choose sentimental objects over those that might preserve her life even for a day." Zor Khan sneered as he surveyed the items, even touching a few of them with his foot. "Still, it is not altogether a lamentable thing that you are guided by the gentler emotions. As you know, I am seldom swayed by them."

"Your conduct toward my cousins and my brother has made that more than clear, my lord."

"I cannot deny that I have acted harshly. That is why I offer you this single chance to save yourself. I have already explained the terms under which I will spare you. You would do well to accept them now...or you will see how truly heartless I can be."

"My lord, I would sooner face death than endure the caress of my brother's killer."

Zor Khan clenched his long, discolored teeth. "In that case, you have brought this punishment upon yourself. You have refused my touch; therefore you will never feel the touch of another human being for the rest of your days. You have refused the comforts of my palace; therefore you will live in the basest of conditions until the dust consumes your remains. And, since you have refused my company, I sentence you to dwell alone forever."

At his command, the disk was set in place. From beyond the doorway came the roar of an icy, pitiless wind.

"If you attempt to return, you will die a most hideous death. Your body will wither into nothingness, as your foolish brother so recently demonstrated." With great satisfaction, Zor Khan watched her sag against the guards with grief. "However, let no one say that I am totally without mercy. I have located a suitable shelter that passes for comfort in such an atmosphere. You will find it by walking fifty paces north and then twenty more to your left. If you are fated to meet your death there, you will summon it with your own hand, not mine."

One by one, her possessions were lifted through the barrier by the guards. Just before it was her turn, Zor Khan stepped in front of the portal.

"Daughter of Jaryd, I offer you one last respite. Will you serve me now, or would you truly prefer to die, lonely and forgotten, in a place so barren that even a beast would shun it?"

"My lord, I will not serve a tyrant." The face she raised to him was so full of defiance that Zor Khan was momentarily taken aback. "And I promise you that I will never be forgotten."

Turning slowly, she met the eyes of each man in the room. Every last one of them looked away...all except for Atoz.

Then, all at once, the doorway opened and the world itself was different. Gathering up the precious few items that represented the last link to her time, Zarabeth walked off alone into the drifts. Huge columns of ice shimmered around her, while sweeping flurries stung her face and hands.

What she noticed most, though, was the silence. No human voice had ever disturbed these barren gusts.

"You must tell our story," Argus had said. But tell it to whom?

Someone would come. Someday. She wasn't sure why she believed that-maybe she was already going insane, or at least delusional. Yet for reasons she couldn't fully understand, she held onto that preposterous hope as if she knew it for a fact.

And until that happened, she was determined to live.

EPILOGUE

Jarrod suspected that his mother didn't entirely believe his story about having too much to drink and spending the night with some friends in the city. Fortunately, the Embassy's medical department had reduced his stab wound to little more than a thumb-sized welt, and the journey had left him with no other physical aberrations. Unless his father decided to unveil the sordid details at some point during the evening, which Jarrod thought highly unlikely, he had little to fear beyond her general disapproval.

"I hope you don't make a habit of disappearing on Leila that way," she chided him when she brought his dinner to his room. A hangover, he had decided, was an acceptable cover for the weakness resulting from voluminous blood loss. "There are some behaviors even a mother can't excuse in a man."

"Gamma Aurelius is an agricultural research station, Mother. We don't have taverns there. If we did, I wouldn't be so tempted to indulge myself here. All the same, I don't plan to do it again."

"Then I suppose I could forget about it by the time I see her next."

"I'd appreciate that. Father already lectured me about what a catastrophic transgression I'd made." Jarrod poked at his dinner. It had been so long since he'd eaten-about a hundred years, actually-that his stomach felt unequal to the challenge.

"I wouldn't go that far. I can't promise that I wouldn't have done equally foolish things at your age if...well, if things had been different for me."

"Mother...can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"It's about Sarpeidon."

"Oh." Her face darkened. "You know I don't think it's a good idea to stir your imagination up in that direction."

"I think it's your own imagination you're worried about. And when has refusing to answer my questions ever dampened my curiosity about anything?"

Zarabeth sighed in resignation. "All right. What do you want to know?"

"Just one thing. If you had the chance to go back...to change the way things happened...to save your family, and yourself...would you?"

"If that happened, then you wouldn't exist. None of you would. How can you ask me to wish my own children out of existence?"

"But if it never happened, we wouldn't even know the difference. Besides, your father and Argus would have found you a suitable Sarpeid husband. You would probably have had other children. Please, Mother. It's important to me. Just think about it seriously for a moment."

"I don't have to think about it. The answer is no. As deeply as I'll always miss them, my place is here now. With all of you."

He nodded. "I think I always knew you'd say that. I just wanted to hear it for myself. Mother, I know this subject is painful for you. It isn't fair of me to keep bringing it up. I promise you I never will again."

She started to agree, then stopped. "Wait a moment. I'll be right back."

Puzzled, Jarrod toyed with his food and watched the door until she returned. When she did, she was carrying what looked like a carved jewelry box. The wood was discolored and chipped around the edge, the metal clasps severely tarnished. He put his dinner tray aside as she placed it on the bed in front of him and opened it.

"Since I came to this time, I've never shown these items to anyone but Spock. Maybe that wasn't the right choice."

He knew what they were even before she told him. Keepsakes from another world, her last tangible connection to the people she'd lost.

"It's time I told you everything about Sarpeidon-about that part of your family you can never know."

"But you never wanted to speak of these things before. Why now, Mother?"

"Because a very long time ago, I made a promise to my brother-one I don't think I've fully kept. It's true that I've kept our lineage alive, but what good is that if none of you really know who you are?"

"I'd like to hear about them."

"And I think in some way, I want to tell you. Most of all, I want them to live on."

Gingerly, Jarrod sorted through the items in the box. "Tell me about Argus first."

"He was hotheaded, impulsive. He tried to do what was right...but his judgment was never equal to his ethics."

"Do you think we would have been friends?"

"I don't know." Zarabeth managed to smile through the tears that had begun to fall. "At times I wonder if you might have been too much alike."

For a long time after dinner, Lidia stood on the terrace and stared up at the night sky.

"I started off thinking about Adonia," she confessed when Spock came out to join her. "However, my thoughts keep turning instead to Selyk. Both of them are up there somewhere. They might even meet and never recognize each other."

"I find it highly unlikely that Selyk and your sister would travel in the same circles."

Lidia frowned. "What I still find strange is that Selyk would desert his father in the first place. What could have possessed him? He never seemed dissatisfied here."

"Perhaps he had ambitions he did not share with you."

"I suppose he must have."

"In any case, I suggest that you do not waste too much time grieving over his departure. Clearly he had no such qualms about leaving you behind."

"I don't grieve for him. Now that I look back on the time we spent together, I realize that he was a diversion, at best. In many ways, we were incompatible. Intellectually, we had almost nothing in common."

"I am gratified that you realize that."

"At times, it is quite practical to be one quarter Vulcan. Would you think me tactless if I admitted that Selyk's departure is in one sense a relief?"

"I would not. And I cannot deny that your mother and I share that sentiment."

"In that case, perhaps my attitude was genetically predetermined."

"Perhaps. However, I do not believe that Selyk's shortcomings were particularly well camouflaged."

"Mother is convinced that it would take minimal effort on my part to secure the attentions of a more suitable admirer."

"No doubt she is correct. For the present, however, your energy might be better spent on academic matters. A year from now, it will be necessary for you to choose a career. Were I in your position, I would prefer to limit all nonessential involvements."

Lidia nodded. "I will consider your advice. All that I can say for now is that I do not intend to disappear as Selyk did. When I do make a decision regarding the future direction of my life, I will inform all interested parties of the specifics."

"Very well." Spock raised a brow. "We will postpone any further discussion until that time."

"Agreed. And now I hope you will excuse me. I do in fact have one more assignment to contend with tonight."

She entered the house just as Zarabeth came out.

"Is she terribly upset about Selyk? I must say, I never thought much of his manners, but I did think he'd have the courtesy to write her a farewell letter, at the very least."

"Presumably he had his reasons."

"I'd certainly like to hear them." In vain, she waited for him to respond. Though he continued to stare at her, his attention seemed light years away. "Spock, what is it? You've been so strange all evening. Does it have anything to do with Michaela coming to visit tomorrow? Is something going on that I need to know about?"

"Nothing that could benefit you in the slightest degree."

"Then why-"

While she was still in mid-sentence, he lifted his right hand and rested it against her face. The tenderness of the gesture, and the intensity in his expression, caught Zarabeth completely off guard.

"What is that for?"

"You are my wife. May I not touch you?"

"Of course. I wish you would do it more often-but I know it isn't your nature. Unless...." She felt his forehead. "It couldn't be...?"

He shook his head. "The situation you refer to need not be addressed until Lidia is in her twenty-first year."

"I suppose there's nothing to prevent us from rehearsing a little. I do wonder, though, what's put you in this mood."

"I was thinking of the first time we met."

"Oh. I often think about that, too. Every day, in fact."

He nodded. "I suspect you remember it differently than I do. Nonetheless, it will never be far from my mind."

As she leaned against him, an oddly nebulous image flickered through her mind. A ghost-thin memory, of a dream perhaps, something to do with a sullen-mouthed priest who'd come to visit her in Zor Khan's prison. Or had he simply been another spy?

How strange, she thought, that such a memory should return to her now. She could discover no rational explanation for it, beyond the fact of discussing that tumultuous era with Jarrod.

There was just something about the way Spock's hand had felt on her cheek that had brought the image unexpectedly back.

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When she was finally alone in her bedroom, locked safely away from the prying eyes of her parents and brothers, Lidia sat down at her computer and keyed into her communications program.

Sumarr's face immediately appeared on the screen. The lines around his eyes and mouth eased a little as they looked at one another.

"I am pleased to see you, my dear," he told her. "I was just thinking about you."