The Mantis Continuum - Book Four - 15. Chapter 15 - Saved?

Ogomo’s ship was capsizing. It leaned in the water dangerously, and the bow was quickly sinking below the waves. The life rafts were lowered, and several small boats were spotted racing from the mainland toward the sinking ship.

The weight of the water filling the hull caused a major portion of it to suddenly dislodge, and the section still above the waves lurched. Many people were thrown into the churning surf, and the rest of the ship began to be swiftly sucked beneath the roiling surface. Anyone left onboard dove from the destroyed vessel.

Kosephaji found himself surrounded by debris, and he was not even sure how he got into the water.

“Relliduna!” he cried out. “Where are you, Duna?!” Seawater filled his mouth and the surging waves made it nearly impossible for him to see anything as he bobbed at the surface. “Duna!”

Kosephaji could hear other voices shouting nearby, and he kept catching glimpses of a boat heading straight toward him. He reached one arm above the waves as high as he could, and a moment later, powerful hands were pulling him onto the deck of a small boat.

A brutal club connected with the side of Kosephaji’s head, and he was swallowed in darkness.

*

“Relliduna!” Kosephaji shouted, sitting upright with a start. He was on a hard cot in a cold, tiny, gray room.

“I’m right here,” came Relliduna’s weak voice.

“Duna!” Kosephaji said a little quieter, looking over at his companion. “Are you okay? Where are we? Where’s Pelipi?” He brought his hands to his throbbing head.

“I’m fine,” Relliduna replied in a hollow voice. “I don’t know what happened to Pelipi. I don’t know what happened to him. I made it onto one of the lifeboats, but all of us in it were immediately arrested when we got to shore.” He sighed and added, “These cells are some sort of old Oselian construction that prevents Shifts from using our powers.”

Kosephaji looked surprised. “You can’t do the thing?”

Relliduna raised his hand between them, but nothing happened. “Some sort of power-dampening stuff must be built into the walls or something.”

Kosephaji rubbed his head where he had been hit. “Do you know what happened to Ogomo or Nahli?”

Relliduna shrugged. “Either they drowned in the shipwreck, or somehow they escaped, but I couldn’t see them from where I was in the lifeboat, not even huge Ogomo.”

Kosephaji looked hopeful. “Maybe Pelipi is with them and they’re all safe.”

Relliduna did not reply.

“How long was I unconscious?”

“You’ve been asleep for hours. I wasn’t sure if I should wake you up or not. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do, but I’m glad they locked us up together.”

Kosephaji understood; he did not like the thought of waking up in the cell alone.

“I requested we be put together,” Relliduna added, “and for some reason, they did.”

“Any idea who they are?” Kosephaji asked.

“I guess we made it to Teshon City,” Relliduna answered, “but I don’t have a clue who runs this place.”

Kosephaji squinted at a flash of pain in his head, and he took a deep breath. After a moment, he asked, “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

Relliduna looked up at the cell’s tiny window and then back at Kosephaji. “The ship wrecked in the afternoon, and the sun set hours ago. It’s still the night of the crash, but I don’t know, maybe it’s close to dawn?”

“Duna, do you know why…”

“No,” he interrupted, “I don’t know why they arrested us. No one’s told me anything and no one has come in here since we’ve been locked up.”

Kosephaji turned to look up at the window and asked, “What’s that light?”

Relliduna’s eyes moved back to the room’s tiny exposure to the outside world. “That’s not the sunrise?”

Kosephaji got to his unsteady feet and stepped up to the wall, but the window was too high for him to see anything except the sky. “No,” he said, “that’s not the sunrise. Duna, come here and let me lift you up.” He interlaced his fingers together and bent his knees.

Relliduna stepped up to the wall and onto Kosephaji’s hands. He was lifted and managed to get ahold of the window’s ledge. He pulled himself up, peeked outside, and was very surprised by what he saw.

“Hello,” boomed Ogomo.

“Ogomo?!” Kosephaji hollered from below Relliduna.

Nahli called back, “Let’s get you two out of there! You boys better step away from the wall. Do you have anything that you can use to shield yourselves?”

“This wall is not long for the world,” Ogomo added with a rumbling chuckle.

“Flip the cot up on its side,” Relliduna recommended as Kosephaji lowered him back down to the floor of the cell. “Let’s get behind it. I don’t know what they’re going to do out there, but Ogomo is holding the biggest hammer I’ve ever seen!”

Outside of the prison, Nahli stepped up to the wall and smeared a thick paste on the rough surface.

Ogomo spoke into the opening of the little window. “Nahli has put some brittle butter on the outside of the wall and it’s about to shatter. Stay back!” The giant hoisted his massive warhammer over one shoulder, and he roared as he swung it with brutal force at the wall.

It connected.

Nothing happened.

“Well, that was anti-climactic,” Nahli said, looking at the outside of the prison wall, and then at her brother’s hammer.

“Why didn’t it work?” Ogomo asked her.

She stepped up and examined the wall more closely. “Huh… this isn’t normal concrete. Look at the space where your hammer connected. The brittle butter made that very specific spot brittle, but the effect was supposed to spread out.”

Ogomo stepped up to the window and said to Relliduna and Kosephaji, “Sorry, boys, we’re going to need to figure something else out. That didn’t work at all.”

Alarm bells pierced the air.

“I think they’re onto us, baby brother,” Nahli said. “Let’s go!”

The window above Relliduna and Kosephaji lit up with the glow of a flickering light; then it faded.

“Hoist me up again!” Relliduna shouted over the shrill ringing. He peaked outside and gave Kosephaji a very loud play by play. “Ogomo and Nahli just climbed into some sort of weird boat at the water’s edge. The thing’s hatch is closing…” Relliduna paused. “By the great river, it submerged!”

Kosephaji helped him down and declared, “I can’t believe they tried to break us out.”

“I can,” Relliduna retorted over the blaring alarm. “Way back at the beginning of our journey when Ogomo wanted to talk to me alone, he made it clear how much he supports other Shifts and Bio-Shifts. I was surprised that he was outside the cell, but I shouldn’t have been. I wish that he had succeeded and we were leaving with them right now.”

The screaming alarm died and the harsh silence returned, only to be filled with a sudden rattling at the cell door of keys being forced into locks and locks being released. The door swung open and a group of armed guards entered the tiny room, shouting at Kosephaji and Relliduna. The two of them could not make out what the men were saying, and they were dragged into a larger grey room and forced before a panel of severe-looking officials seated behind a wooden table.

“We had nothing to do with that escape attempt!” Kosephaji blurted out.

A woman stepped in front of him and Relliduna, and she snapped at the officials, “Why haven’t these young men been released?! You already know their story. They’ve done nothing wrong and you are holding them without reason or just cause. You should have let them go last night with the others! As an advocate of the people, I demand their immediate release.”

One of the men behind the table responded in a tone that sounded exhausted. “Milady Troonbien, we know your stance. We are also advocates and are just trying to keep the citizens of the city safe.”

“By locking up young men for nearly drowning in our harbor?!”

Her fellow leader sighed. “No, we just wanted to make sure they are not a threat.”

“These two boys?” she asked incredulously. “You were worried these boys might be a danger to our great city?”

The leader looked past her. “What brings you young men to Teshon City?”

Kosephaji and Relliduna turned to each other.

“We’re from Xin,” Kosephaji replied, “and we just wanted to find someplace that was more accepting.”

“Look, boys,” the man said, “we’re not trying to treat you like criminals, and we’re sorry you spent the night in a cell.”

His apology surprised Kosephaji and Relliduna.

“Madame Troonbien, there,” and he nodded to the woman in front of them, “insisted that we speak with you lads at first light. We questioned everyone else who we pulled from the harbor until the wee hours, and again, sorry we didn’t get to you two last night. It just got too late. Everyone else has already been released.”

Madame Troonbien turned to face Kosephaji and Relliduna. “You were the final two detainees. The rest of your crew are free.” She looked at Kosephaji. “We know you got hit by one of the harbor officers, and we apologize for that too.”

“We just want to make sure the city is kept safe,” the leader at the table added.

“That’s what we’re looking for,” Relliduna replied, “someplace safe and better to live than where we grew up.”

The woman turned back to the panel of officials. “Are they free to go?”

Several of the leaders nodded and made dismissive gestures, and a woman seated at one end of the table answered, “Yes, they can go.”

A man entered the room and quickly escorted Kosephaji and Relliduna down a long hallway and up a flight of stairs. They were ushered through a very plain door and suddenly found themselves standing in the rising sunshine. The door to the prison slammed behind them.

Relliduna let out a relieved sigh. “I’m glad that’s over.”

“They didn’t even ask us our names,” Kosephaji said.

“Let’s try and find Ogomo.”

“What about Pelipi?”

Relliduna’s face fell. “I don’t know how we’re supposed to find his glass box, lost at sea.”

Kosephaji looked down a few of the streets outside the prison. “I don’t like this neighborhood. Let’s see if we can find some part of town that’s nicer than this.”

“Should we head toward the water first and see if we can find Ogomo and Nahli?”

“You said they went underwater. How are we supposed to find them? It’s morning and I’m hungry,” Kosephaji added. “Let’s get something to eat first and then decide what our next course of action should be.”

Relliduna conceded and the two headed through the narrow streets. Before long, they came to an enormous pile of rubble at the city’s center, and they needed to find a way around it. Many of the surrounding blocks were nothing more than warehouses and abandoned storage facilities, but eventually they came to a long straight street, and quite a ways down it they could see a bright sign leading into a neighborhood.

GATE TOWN

Kosephaji and Relliduna stopped at the first open pub they came across, and quite a few other folks were already inside, enjoying their breakfasts. The two took a seat at an empty booth and a mustachioed man strutted up to their table.

“Morning, gents! What’ll it be for you?” He pulled out a tiny notepad and an even tinier nub of a pencil.

“Coffee,” Kosephaji said.

“Please,” Relliduna added, rolling his eyes at Kosephaji, and he asked, “what’s good here?”

“Have a slab of the chef’s brekkie casserole. It’s got veg and sausage and chili and fluffy eggs; it’ll fill you gents right up.”

“We’ll take two, please,” Relliduna replied, flashing their waiter a smile.

The man made a quick note and said, “Coming right up.” He turned and entered the kitchen.

“He’s not bad to look at.”

“That mustache, though?”

“I think it’s sexy.”

The two boys giggled together.

Less than a minute later, steaming mugs of black coffee were in front of them.

“Cream and sugar’ll be right out,” the waiter quickly said, and he zipped off to other customers.

Kosephaji and Relliduna watched him hurry away.

“He’s got a cute…”

“Oi, lads!” barked a gruff voice that Kosephaji and Relliduna did not know, but they recognized the man who approached them from Ogomo’s ship.

“You’re Z’Mantri, right?” Kosephaji asked.

“Z’Matri,” the man corrected. He had spent almost none of the voyage outside of his own cabin, and neither of the boys had ever spoken to him. “I felt you,” he said, nodding to Relliduna, “as soon as they let you both out.”

“Oh,” Kosephaji said, perking up at the information, “you’re the Shift who can sense other Shifts, right?”

Z’Matri nodded.

“Do you know where Ogomo and Nahli are? They tried to break us out.”

“They’re in Shifton,” Z’Matri answered. “The narrow streets and alleys of Teshon City ain’t made for someone his size, but there’s a region inland near the city gates where he fits in better. When them prison guards didn’t let you two go last night with the rest, Ogomo made the plan to bust you out.”

“Wait, wait!” Relliduna interrupted urgently. “You’re the one who knew Pelipi was with us before we joined the crew. What about him?! Can you sense Pelipi?”

Z’Matri furrowed his brow. “I’m sorry, lads. Ogomo asked me to try and find him, but I haven’t been able to feel him.” He concentrated, but then he looked from Kosephaji to Relliduna. “Nothing, sorry, can’t feel your friend,” he stated.

“No,” Kosephaji breathed.

Relliduna frowned. “Can you feel other Shifts no matter how far away they are? Maybe Pelipi is beyond your range. Maybe he’s…”

“I can feel Shifts on the other side of the planet,” Z’Matri stated. “I can feel a child’s photonova gland activating right now, and I can feel that the child is on the opposite hemisphere.”

Kosephaji and Relliduna’s food arrived, and Z’Matri handed the mustachioed barman some local money.

“Eat,” Z’Matri commanded the boys, and the three did not speak until their breakfast and coffee were gone.

“This way,” Z’Matri said, and he rose without another word.

Relliduna and Kosephaji followed him out into the Gate Town streets.

Kosephaji grabbed Relliduna’s hand. “Pelipi can’t be dead,” he whispered. “He just can’t be.” He could not stop the tears that welled in his eyes, and he brought his free hand to his mouth as a sob wracked his body. Kosephaji had managed to care for Pelipi and keep him protected for the five years since his photonova gland activated and he changed.

Now he was gone, unceremoniously and without warning; Pelipi was just gone★