Chapter Fourteen

The Iliad crashed into something very hard.

My head was throbbing as I tried to lift my face out of the soft floor below me. I looked up, a bright light instantly caused my pupils to retract as I looked down at the scattered debris around

Looking over my shoulder, I saw scattered debris that was once the Iliad. Theo was laying several feet away from me.

"Theo? Luther? Can you guys hear me?" I moaned.

Theo let out a gasp as he picked his head off of the ground. "Where are we?"

"I don't know."

"Luther?" I looked frantically around at the metal wreckage, trying to steady my breathing.

"I'm over here," he coughed, lifting up a piece of wreckage so that my eyes could identify the general area of where he had landed. "My body feels like it just fell off a large skyscraper."

"Anything broken?"

"I don't think so, but I'm not going to lie...everything hurts in a massive way."

There were several seconds of silence before Theo finally said. "Look at the Iliad. It's destroyed. How did we survive?"

"I don't know," I responded as my eyes scanned the area around us. It seemed as if we had landed in a dessert. There was sand all around us. My head whipped back around. Sand was everywhere, except for a dark spot on the horizon.

"Guys, we may have a problem."

"Yeah, we can see that," Luther responded. "There's nothing but sand all around us. Are you sure we're still on Merak? What happened to all of the ice?"

"I don't know, but we should probably get moving to find some sort of cover," I pulled my body up into a sitting position to try and get a better view.

"I agree," Theo slowly stood up and began to wipe the sand off of his white suite. "Let's see if there is anything salvageable inside of the wreckage and then let's move."

It seemed almost impossible anything would be intact. The wreckage had charred the sand underneath where the Iliad had landed. Large chucks of the ship were scattered everywhere.

"Let's take some water and any of our weapons," Theo said beginning to throw pieces of metal to the side.

We each found several guns and strapped them to our bodies. "Let's go."

"Any idea of where we are going?"

"No. I just think we should probably head towards that dark spot on the horizon. It's the only thing that looks different."

"Alright Captain. We'll follow you," Luther said. "Hopefully, your royal blood will save us all."

"That's not funny." I turned to take the lead. We had walked several feet when the sky began to turn dark and suddenly snow was falling all around us.

"Guys, what's happening?"

"I don't know," Theo's eyes narrowed. "Let's just keep walking forward."

My teeth began to chatter as we slowly made our way through the snow. The wind began to pick up and then it began to rain. Large drops feel from the sky stinging the exposed skin on my hands.

Then the rain stopped and suddenly we were standing at what appeared to be the edge of a very large lake. "This must have been the dark spot. Water."

"Great. What do we do now?"

The water began to bubble and then suddenly large spouts shot towards the sky. We all watched with eyes wide open as the water changed colors, almost as if we were at some sort of water show and then almost instantly a large hole appeared in the middle of the water and it looked as if it was draining. The ground began to shake as large white pillars appeared before us. They were rough like wood and almost glowed at the top. Large trees formed out of the white pillars. The trees were also white and appeared to glow at the top.

The Part of the Napoleon became visible between the trees.

"Samuel!" I began to run towards the ship. "Audrina! Gave!" Steam let out around the edge of the mammoth ship almost as if it had also done a hard landing, similar to what had happened to the Iliad. The front portion was gone and now it was just the middle section that was rectangular.

There were no responses.

An odd breeze blew though the area. Strands of hair slapped me in the face. A face began to take shape in front of me. It was one I hadn't seen in a while.

"Mary!"

Her image instantly disappeared.

"Mary? Are you here?" My heart began to race. Maybe Mary was also being used.

The wind began to pick up even more as everything turned dark and water began to pour in all around us. We would drown if we couldn't find a way out of here.

"Theo, can you open the Jump Line?"

He tapped on his medallion. Nothing happened.

The wind was making it hard to hear, but I could read his lips. "No."

"Hold on guys!" My hand grabbed ahold of Theo's and reached out to find Luther's hand. Just as the water reached our lips, it began to recede.

My heart continued to race unsure of what would happen next, but it didn't take long to figure it out. Off in the distance, we could see the black dot come closer to us.

"What is it?!" I tried to calm my voice, but it was no use.

"I don't know, but it's moving pretty fast."

"There's nowhere for us to run or hide."

"I don't think it would matter. Whatever it is knows we're here and it's quickly heading our way."

We continued to watch as three large metallic looking vessels approached the wreckage. They came to a stop in front of us.

We never saw a door open, but what appeared to be three humans appeared in front of us. They were wearing similar white suits as us.

"Welcome to Merak. We have been instructed to bring you to headquarters!" One of the figures said.

"Who are you?" I asked, not intending to follow a stranger on a weird planet. One that had, so far, not been very welcoming.

"I am T-3108. Please follow me," she turned and disappeared.

"Um, how are we supposed to follow you?" I looked up

"Just walk forward."

Almost instantly we were transported to the inside of one of the ships. T-3108 didn't say another world. The ship began to move upwards, just as it appeared as if all of the walls disappeared.

"That's amazing," I looked down at the surface below passing by us at a high speed. "So, this is Merak."

"Yes."

"What happened to the ice?"

"It's part of our defense mechanism. It is all an optical illusion."

"Is this an optical illusion?"

"You will soon see," T-3108 responded.

As we came over a ridge, an entire city gleamed in front of us. All of the buildings had glass ceilings that glowed from the internal lights on the inside. It appeared as if they were all sitting on top of water.

"What is this place?"

"Welcome home to Merak."

"Is this just a city on Merak?"

"No. This is Merak."

As we sped past some of the buildings, my head turned just in time to see the Napoleon set down in the middle of the entire place.

"Is Dr. Marie James here?"

"Yes. Marie is waiting for you."

A side door began to slide up as the small little craft maneuvered its way inside.

Instantly, we were all standing on the outside of the small object staring at her.

"Welcome," she said coolly.

"Is Samuel here?"

"Yes, Samuel, Gave and Audrina are all here. I wanted Samuel to see first-hand all of the new technology that has been created over the past few decades."

Just then Samuel and the rest of the team emerged through a door and walked over to us. He put up a hand. "I know what you're thinking Esadore. It was not a trick. I really was going to go over and fly the Napoleon, but once again Dr. Marie James was a few steps ahead of me."

"Could you see us?"

"Yes. I tried to talk to you, and couldn't."

"The ice and the ship heating up were all a part of an illusion?"

Dr. Marie James cleared her throat. "Yes, we call it our Emperor system. It's designed to mess with your eyesight. We can make you believe whatever we want. Welcome home." She let out a deep breath.

"Home?"

"Yes, it's been several Earth years, but we are finally back to the one place where we are safe."

We relunctantly followed her down a hallway towards a wall. It disappeared in front of us. There was what looked like small white steps that were moving upwards. "Climb on," Dr. Marie said as we all followed what she was doing. My back was flat against the wall behind me as I watched the floor become further and further away.

We all finally got off at one of the top decks. "There are five rooms in this pod. Choose one. There is a conference room down on deck 2. It overlooks the control center. Please meet me there in one hour. Samuel, follow me."

"I'll stay with the rest of the team," he shook his head.

"No. You will follow me."

I walked in front of him. "We want him to stay with us."

"Very well. He means little to me," she turned and disappeared leaving the six of us alone.

"What do you guys think?" I looked around at the team I had grown close to over the past few weeks.

"I'm definitely curious," Gave said. "Did you guys notice that T-3108 looks just like us?"

"Yes," we all responded in unison.

"Except her skin is not as pale," Gave shook his head.

"Yeah, I thought that same thing."

We all stood out in the common area. "Should we go look at the rooms?"

"I don't care about my room," Theo folded his arms over his chest. "I really don't plan on being on this weird place that long."

"How exactly do you plan on getting back?"

"Jump Line. Samuel, you can open it... right?"

"Yes, but we still need to find a way to transport the other normals and Ciphers back to Earth," he said.

"Fine. I can see both sides to the argument. Samuel, we need you help understanding the makeup of Merak and how we might be able to leave this place."

"We all have RaCo in our systems. It's flowing through your veins and your medallions are made from the substance. That's why you could never take them off."

"Of course. Why didn't I think about our medallions," I held the smooth disk in between my fingers. It had always brought me comfort, but now I feared what it might mean.