Invaders: Dreadnought Ocelot (Invaders Series Book 4) Read online

  “Nervous?” he asked.

  “The GGS Ocelot seems almost insignificant compared to all this,” I said.

  “That is a mistake,” the Magistrate said. “You have traveled abroad. You have expanded your horizons. But the problems of home are always the keenest. You will never have another home planet, Logan. That should make the one you have precious to you.”

  “It sounds as if you know what you’re talking about.”

  “Ah, that’s insightful, and in this instance…” He did not finish the thought, but let it hang. Was the Magistrate a dimensional exile? It almost sounded like it.

  “Will I ever see you again?” I asked.

  He shot me a stern look, blinked and then returned to his controls. I found it ominous that he did not answer me.

  I glanced at my hands. Had I really been through these crazy dimensional journeys? Maybe I was still aboard the Antaran space station, captured by the Gigantopithecuses and undergoing hypnosis interrogation. There was something compelling about the idea. Knowing that all these other possibilities existed in the multiverse…it kind of made a man feel even smaller than when he looked up at the night sky, seeing all the stars.

  I wanted to go home. I wanted to fix my Earth’s problems and protect its people. Maybe the Magistrate had a point. A man could travel all over Earth, visiting England, Germany, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, China, maybe fly to South Africa, Nigeria and then cross to Brazil, Mexico and at last come home to the little town where you went to high school. There was no other town like that one. There, people knew you. There, you knew the old tales, the history. There, you had set down roots, often had a past.

  I loved my Earth. I knew its history, at least a little. I had parents, cousins, friends, I knew the holidays, loved Christmas most of all and admired my world’s girls with a keen eye. Yes. I wanted to go home, to my town, to my Earth, the one I knew.

  “There,” the Magistrate said, interrupting my thoughts. “I have a directional fix. Are you ready, Logan?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said.

  The Magistrate walked from his controls to another bank. He turned some on, pressed others. The sound of humming machinery grew. He studied the board and made more adjustments.

  The portal activated. The inner part churned with a swirling blue color.

  “On my signal, Logan, you must run into the portal.”

  “Run?” I asked.

  “As hard as you can,” he said.

  I licked my lips. I was about to risk everything again. I stepped back, looked at a screen, and saw my planet with its white clouds and continents. An overwhelming feeling gripped me.

  “Magistrate,” I said.

  He turned to me.

  “We have a custom on my world,” I said, approaching him, holding out my hand.

  He did not ask what the custom was. Instead, he reached out and grasped my hand, shaking hands with me, squeezing hard.

  I stared at him. He stared back, and I think he realized his mistake.

  “Good-bye, my boy,” he said heartily.

  “Good-bye, Magistrate,” I said. “I wish you luck.”

  “And I you.”

  I released his hand and walked before the portal, seeing the swirling colors. My gut was churning.

  “Now!’ he shouted. “Run hard into the portal, Logan. Once you reach your Earth—”

  “Yeah, right,” I said under my breath. I ran at the portal and twisted around backward just before I did. As I disappeared, I flipped off the Magistrate, giving him double-barreled fingers.

  I fell through the portal, but I did not smell or sense the things I had in the past. I had an idea I knew his plan. I would come out in or on my Earth and go through the motions of defeating Nerelon Brontios. All the while—

  I concentrated. As I plunged through dimensions—fakes one, it turned out—I continued to concentrate. I thought I’d done all this in two weeks, but I bet it had been an instant of time. It was like normal dreaming. Some dreams feel as if they take hours, but really occur in minutes.

  I continued concentrating, even as I slid out of a different portal. I stood up and looked at Jenna.

  “Nope,” I said. “I’m not buying it.”

  “Logan, we have to run,” Jenna said.

  I shook my head. “I’m done believing. I’m in the aquarium and this is all false, hallucinations.”

  “Logan, look at me,” Jenna said. “Am I not lovely?”

  I stared at Jenna. That did not sound like her at all. She would have likely berated me instead. As I studied her, everything seemed to dissolve around me. The chamber, the portal, all vanished. Instead—I found myself floating in the aquarium, with the helmet-mask around my face. The water vibrated as the mind-screwing machine worked my brain over. In front of me—on the other side of the glass—stood the Magistrate and dear Ailuros.

  I gaped then, for Ailuros no longer had a cat’s head, but the face of the beauty I’d seen on the throne at the top of the golden ziggurat.

  I nodded, as I floated. “Nerelon Brontios, I presume.”

  The big black-bearded guy scowled at Ailuros. She seemed meeker than I remembered, turning to him. She spoke to him. I couldn’t hear the words.

  He stared at me again, finally nodding. He clicked on a switch. I heard that in the earphones of my helmet-mask.

  “I tried to be nice, Logan,” the bald, black-bearded man said. “Now, we’re going to do this the hard way.”

  -45-

  Before that happened, I suppose they tried one last expedient. I didn’t mind, as I was not looking forward to Nerelon Brontios’ hard way.

  Gigantopithecuses entered the large chamber, removed the top and fished me out of the aquarium. I was glad to get out of it, even if their fur stank like wet dog.

  They toweled me off. I was still stark naked, and they threw regular clothes at me, a tee shirt, jeans, some shocks and sneakers. One gave me an electric shaver, while a different one held up a small mirror for me.

  I glanced at Ailuros. Nerelon Brontios had stormed off, frustrated, I’m guessing, with my superlative stubbornness.

  Now, most people, I’d found in life, had rotten things to say about stubborn people. That makes sense, as stubbornness was a tool like anything else. You could misuse it. And stubborn people can be real pains in the ass and often misuse their gift. Stubbornness was another way to say that a person knew their mind. If one’s mind was made up, and he was a man of character, he wasn’t going to change it at the drop of a hat. I’m saying that I could be a stubborn mule of a man and liked that fact about myself. Heck yeah, I’m stubborn. The trick was to not be a stubborn jackass at the wrong time.

  Nerelon Brontios hated it that I was stubborn. Maybe Ailuros was going to try one more time to convince me to help them. I thought all that as I shaved away the hairy growth around my face. I’d been in the aquarium longer than I’d realized.

  “You don’t look half bad,” Ailuros said.

  The great apes accepted the shaver, took away the mirror and departed. Well, one big bruiser of a mother remained, standing behind Ailuros.

  “Let’s go to a different chamber,” she suggested.

  I was actually a little unsteady on my feet. Floating for over a week had given my muscles a break, but seemed to have begun the deterioration process. An hour in use again should solve that.

  I accepted one of Ailuros’s arms. She had silky smooth skin. With the guardian Gigantopithecus behind us, we exited the Aquarium Chamber, walked down a long steel corridor and entered a bigger chamber. It had screens everywhere, showing various places on Earth. I saw evergreens, a city, an ocean liner cruising alone, penguins waddling across ice to dive into a cold sea, people crossing a busy city street—

  It reminded me of the Peppermill Casino in Reno with all the big screens showing awesome scenes from all around Earth. I would have liked to go to the Peppermill and play Texas Hold ’em for a few hours, anything for a break from all this world-shattering action, debat
es and decisions.

  Ailuros guided me to a couch with a low glass table before it. On the table were various bowls with pretzels, chips, cheese and other snack foods.

  “Help yourself,” she said as we sat down.

  I grabbed a handful of M&Ms, popping them into my mouth. They had peanuts inside just the way I liked them.

  I stopped chewing.

  “What’s wrong?” Ailuros asked, as if concerned.

  I continued chewing and popped the last few M&Ms into my mouth, reminded that they knew me, or thought they did. They had stocked the table with all the goodies l liked to eat, no doubt doing that for a reason.

  The Gigantopithecus was at the entrance, leaning against a wall. He was scratching himself like I’d seen chimps do in a zoo.

  “So, what happened to Sand?” I asked.

  “Must we go into all that now?” Ailuros asked, putting an arm on the top of the couch and leaning back. She wore a low-cut blouse, super-tight slacks and sandals. She’d painted her toenails red and had long blonde hair and features—she was a beauty, all right, a real Venus.

  “Must feel a whole lot better having your old head back,” I said.

  Ailuros stared at me, and I could feel the fury building up behind her green eyes.

  “I mean, you’re a freaking babe,” I said.

  She smiled at the compliment, some of the fury dissipating.

  “Maybe you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” I added.

  “Do you really think so?” she asked, tossing a curl.

  “I sure do. If you weren’t married to Argon—”

  “But I am,” she snapped.

  “I know.”

  She eyed me. “Would it bother you if we slept together?”

  “Not at all,” I said, “just if we had relations before sleeping.”

  “Logan,” she said, reaching out to me with the hand on the top of the couch. “You can practically name your price for helping us. If you me want to lie with you, you can. I will freely give myself to you.”

  “Don’t think it isn’t a tempting offer,” I said.

  “All you must do is tell us what happened to Rax.”

  “That’s it? Okay. He shattered on the doom world.”

  “Logan,” she chided gently. “We know that isn’t what happened—”

  “Listen, babe,” I said in a low voice, leaning toward her, letting a hand drop onto one of her knees. “Let’s you and me take over. Why does Nerelon Brontios need to be in the picture?”

  She smiled as if pitying me. “How could we destroy him?”

  “The…”

  “Yes?” she asked.

  I squeezed her knee. “How come you’re not as tough as the other Polarions?”

  She frowned at me.

  “Argon once squeezed some ordinary bullets, turning them into Starcore-killing projectiles,” I said. “Nerelon Brontios is supposed to be unkillable unless one assembles all the parts we’ve been collecting, putting them into the Ultimate Annihilator.”

  “So…you know its name.”

  “You’re avoiding the question, babe.”

  Ailuros frowned as she jumped up, leaping over the glass table, pacing on the other side of it.

  I’d angered her, and she seemed more dangerous than before. I sat back on the couch, watching her. Man, but the lady knew how to move. I truly wanted to strip off her clothes and have a go with her.

  She faced me, recognized my lust—smiling at that—and then swept her hands to either side of her. “You don’t understand. I was a Polarion, became a cult goddess with diminished power, and have become a Polarion once again. I could squeeze bullets, turning them into dangerous projectiles. I could lift you over my head and hurl you across the chamber. I could destroy the great ape by the door.”

  “Now you can do that?”

  She stared at me.

  “But not when you had a—”

  “Be very careful what you say next,” she threatened.

  I blinked several times, trying to put it together. I think she was saying that the cat’s head changed her abilities. A Polarion had to be all Polarion to do Polarion things. Grafting a cat’s head onto her body had somehow diminished her former powers, but now they were back again because so was her former head.

  “I don’t understand how a moron like you can continue to thwart Nerelon,” Ailuros said. “Your confederates—” She stopped abruptly.

  I grinned, faintly recalling being a super-genius while connected to the CCC. Had I made a super plan then? That would have been the thing to do, and that plan must have been frustrating old Nerelon.

  “No, Logan,” she said. “You think you’ve thwarted us. Instead, you’ve merely made Nerelon angry and assured the destruction of your planet.”

  “You’ve lost me there, babe. I’m not tracking you.”

  “Do you see my face?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “I am whole again, of one unit.”

  “And that makes you powerful like a Polarion?”

  “Yes!” she said, her eyes swirling with power.

  “So before, you lacked some of your power because…?”

  “You’re too stupid to understand. Rax could tell you, but he’s disappeared.”

  “To get your beauty back, you went through the Synthesizer on the Asteroid station, didn’t you?”

  “No. I went through the Synthesizer presently aboard the Ocelot. If you persist on your stubbornness, Nerelon is going to return to the dreadnought and begin dropping hell-burners on your planet. He will wipe it out, Logan.”

  “Why?”

  “In order to destroy his enemies and the pieces of the Ultimate Annihilator hidden on Earth.”

  “Uh, if the people and pieces are so deadly, why not do that anyway? Why did he wait?”

  “That should be obvious. If you help him acquire the shell of the launcher, the Prometheus Stone and the Celestial Cybernetic Circuit, he will refrain from hell-burning Earth. He will let you live, as he will have no further need of you or your planet.”

  “What do you get out of all that?”

  “Why do you care?” she shouted. “What I get means nothing to you.”

  “Where’s Argon? He’s the one you really want, isn’t it?”

  “Damn you, Logan! Stop questioning me. Stop trying to use me. I’m the easy way. Do you want to do this the hard way?”

  I sat up. The Gigantopithecus was no longer leaning against the wall, but watching me alertly.

  “Ailuros, you’re second fiddle,” I said. “Yes. I want to do this the hard way, but only after I’ve spoken with Nerelon Brontios.”

  She shook two fists at me. “You will rue the day you said that.”

  The giant ape hooted with fear, stumbling away from the door, which opened.

  Nerelon Brontios entered. He was big. He had a big black beard and long black hair. Was that a wig? It seemed wrong to think that the most powerful Polarion of all was worried about being bald. Maybe the baldness before had been a disguise.

  The Polarion radiated majesty and authority. A veritable aura surrounded him, a glowing nimbus. He strode into the chamber as if he owned the universe. Argon had possessed some of the majesty, but not the way Nerelon did.

  The pit of my gut turned. I feared this guy. I didn’t want to piss him off, and I was afraid that I already had.

  “I tried, Lord,” Ailuros said in a pleading tone.

  Nerelon nodded as if he didn’t care one whit. He gestured slightly toward the door.

  Ailuros looked as if she wanted to argue with him. Instead, with a lowered head, she strode quickly, soon leaving the chamber.

  Nerelon flicked his fingers.

  The Gigantopithecus hurried out, softly closing the door behind him.

  Nerelon Brontios turned to me and his eyes became darker as a terrible power filled him. “Logan,” he intoned. “It is time to begin.”

  -46-

  I began to shake with fear. Through an act of wi
ll, I forced myself to sit as still as I could. If he killed me, he killed me. If he tormented me, he tormented me. I would not cower like a dog, though. I simply refused. What helped, what made the final difference for me, was that this bastard and his vast plans had killed Debby.

  “Interesting,” he said in his vibrating voice.

  Abruptly, the glowing nimbus sank into him. The feeling of majestic godhood lessened. He seemed powerful and graceful, but no longer something from Heaven.

  “We will talk,” he said in a normal voice. “Afterward, I will make my decision.”

  In the past, I might have searched for a witty zinger. I wasn’t going to try to piss this guy off, though. I had a feeling I might be dealing with the survival of everyone on the planet.

  He made a shooing motion.

  I slid to the end of the couch.

  He moved to the other end, sitting down and crossing a thickly muscular leg by putting an ankle on the other knee.

  “You desire to be my enemy?” he asked.

  I frowned, finally nodding. “You killed Debby.”

  “Naturally, you mean my creatures did. I accept your verdict. You wish to kill me in return?”

  “Yes.”

  He smiled. “I like good honest hate and an honest answer. I’m not inclined to kill you yet, but I’m fast reaching that point. If I decide you must die, I will also destroy the Earth.”

  I said nothing.

  “The reason should be obvious,” he said. “You have thwarted several of my endeavors. I lack the Prometheus Stone, the Celestial Cybernetic Circuit and the shell of the Ultimate Annihilator.”

  “Plus, Argon escaped,” I said.

  He nodded. “Yes. Argon escaped. I can’t help but think that you planned that. Obviously, you used the CCC to augment your intellect. That was a clever move, making your former self a formidable opponent. I imagine you had a reason for releasing it, and you’re hoping that your plan made while under the influence of brilliance will succeed.”

  I said nothing.

  He exhaled and looked up, as if looking into an ethereal realm. “My attempt at breaking you down succeeded in part. I finally realized, in broad scope, what you did. I don’t know the exact parts. I suspect that if I kill you here and now, you, at least, will enjoy no further successes from your brilliant plan.”