Monster Planet(110)

Sarah watched in mute horror as her father's face peeled off in long dry strips of skin. The skull underneath glowed with dark energy. The skull flexed and shook and a network of fine cracks appeared over its surface. Shafts of dark energy leaked through the fissures. Darkness burst from empty eyesockets and Dekalb's skull cracked open in a hundred pieces.

Ayaan let the headless body fall forward. She was done. Down on the battlefield Gary must have felt it right away. He must have realized instantly that he was no longer immune to the attacks of the Tsarevich's army. He made a quick slash at all the ghouls and cultists nearby and then ran for the hills.

'Daddy,' Sarah said. The last thing she'd said to him was that he was a bad parent. He had begged her not to get herself into this mess.

'Daddy,' she said again. The brain in the jar had enough tact to keep silent.





Monster Planet





Chapter Sixteen


'If,' the Tsarevich said, his voice loud enough to roll around the rocks and bones and echo in the still, cold air, 'if there are to be no more of interruptions. Then perhaps it is possible to do this thing.'

Some of the cultists had still been screaming. All of them had been shouting for help or for succor. They fell silent at their lord's command. Those who had been busy before with assembling the machinery around the scaffold and those who had been erecting the two sharp metal spikes at its top got back to work. There were a lot of bodies to be removed from the battlefield, many of them already struggling to get back up, to begin the new and glorious phase of their existence.

No one touched Dekalb's headless body. It was just so much dead meat to them. Sarah wanted to go to it, to hold her father's hands once last time, but she knew if she tried to do so the Tsarevich's troops would simply shoot her. There would be no warnings, no second chances. They would kill her. Without her father to protect and heal her she would just die. And then come back.

A sort of convulsion went through her, wracking her body. Her muscles spasmed and her eyes ached. A sob came up out of her throat and threatened to turn into a wail. She was surprised by the emotional reaction. She didn't understand it. It was grief, and she had known she would feel grief, but this just wasn't the time. It wasn't yet time for her to process everything that had happened.

It shook her and shook her until she dropped to her knees and bowed her head and hot tears fell into the dust. It made no sense. She was tougher than this. She shoved her hands in her pockets to try to keep them from trembling. She found the noose and ran it between and around her fingers as if she were making a cat's cradle.

Lass, I feel for you, I do. But I'm the last fellow you should be coming to for comfort. You failed me. You failed all of us.

Sarah shook her head, uncomprehending. 'What is so important,' she asked, staring into the brain's jar, wanting to reach into the liquid there and shred the grey matter inside. 'What is so important that it had to bring me to my father, and then tear him away from me like this? What is so important that Ayaan had to be turned into a monster? Please, Mael Mag Och, help me. Help me understand.'

The end of the world,he told her.What could be more important than the end of the world?

She stood up, straining her legs to get up off her knees. The mummy holding the jar stood as still as the dead thing she'd once been. A perfect statue, a thing to prop up the jar and nothing more. The mummy didn't react at all when Sarah stumbled forward and grabbed at the jar with her bound hands. She had trouble grasping it so she put her chin down on its top and supported it from beneath with spread fingers. The mummy didn't try to stop her. It didn't even relax its arms'it just stood there, elbows bent, hands extended, waiting for her to put the jar back.

Instead she turned around and started walking. Toward the Source.

What should have been won by strength of arms can still be won by guile,he told her. She ignored him, though she didn't let go of the noose either. She stepped on a jagged piece of pelvis and nearly fell over but managed to recover her balance.

She took another step and felt the jar grow warm in her hands. The brain inside had no muscles and couldn't spasm but she could feel its consciousness bashing against the walls of the jar, trying to break free.

Lass! Don't quit on me now. I took a chance with your Ayaan and she quit on me too soon. That's why so many had to die. I'm telling you full truth, now. Don't make the same mistake she did, not if you value the things I've given you.