Chapter 1: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-1/
Chapter 2: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-2/
Chapter 3: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-3/
Chapter 4: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-4/
Chapter 5: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-5/
Chapter 6: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-6/
Chapter 7: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-7/
Chapter 8: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-8/
Chapter 9: https://markcheverton.com/the-algae-voices-of-azule-chapter-9/
The Algae Voices of Azule
Chapter 10
“You kids strap yourselves in back there,” Charles said with a nervous voice. “I’m going to try to lose this guy.”
Billy and Ali each reached to a door and activated the crash webs. Green iridescent force fields emerged from the seat and wrapped their sparkling emerald tendrils around the twins, pulling them tightly to the seat like a glowing spider’s web. The crash web lit the backseat with a sparkling green light that, in other circumstances, might have been pretty, but mixed with the flashing red light from the pursuing Hearse, painted the back of the speeder with a sickly pale yellow that reminded Billy of their pet tiger-fish that had gotten sick and died a year ago. He wanted to share this revelation with Ali, but she looked far too scared to care.
The car suddenly lurched to the left, making their crash webs glow brighter as they absorbed the force of the turn, the speeder now rocketing down a side street. Billy noticed that the interior of the car turned green for a moment as the crash webs flared, but then went back to the sickly, tiger-fish yellow; the Inquisitor was back on their tail. Charles took the next hard right, then a sudden left and accelerated, but the interior stayed pale yellow, the Inquisitor anticipating what Charles going to do.
‘Can you feel it?’ Ali thought.
‘Feel what?’
‘The Inquisitor,’ Ali explained. ‘He’s using his Gift, probably reading dad’s mind. He knows what he’s gonna do. That’s why Dad can’t shake him.’
‘We have to do something. Try to hold onto me, I’m gonna use my Gift, see if I can slow him down,’ Billy explained.
‘No, you hold on to me. I’m lighter and you’re stronger,’ Ali explained. ‘Besides, I have an idea of what to try.’
Just then, a bright red beam of light lanced across the front of their ground speeder, missing its target and hitting the front door of a book store, making the plas-steel door burst into razor sharp shards, slicing into innocent pedestrians.
“He’s shooting at us,” Charles yelled. “Keep your heads down.”
Billy looked to the rear view mirror to check on their father. He wasn’t looking at them, his eyes glued to the road ahead.
‘OK, release your web, I’ll hold on to you,’ Billy thought.
Slowly, he pushed his arm through the crash web, the force field compliant to slow motions, glowing slightly. Bill could feel his skin tingle at the touch of the force field, the hairs on his arm all standing straight up. He pushed through Ali’s web just as she turned it off. Grabbing a hold of her belt, he held on tight as she moved to her knees and faced the back of the speeder. The vehicle lurched to the right, as they took another corner, the Inquisitor following close behind.
Closing her eyes, Ali reached out for her Gift, but this time it felt different, deeper and somehow stronger. It felt as if a million eyes were on her, watching her Gift. Gathering as much of her psychic power as she dared, she formed a hardened ball of air that sat on the back of their ground speeder. Drawing as much air as she could hold, she let it get bigger then compressed it so that it was hard as rock. She released it. The ball of air just stopped in place, their speeder rocketing away, the Inquisitor’s Hearse smashing right into it. The windshield nearly shattered, as the ball of hardened air struck, a spider web of cracks spreading across the glass, making it hard for the Inquisitor to see.
‘Turn!’ Ali shouted with her mind. ‘NOW!’
Charles’ mind heard the psychic suggestion and turned hard to the left, shooting down a narrow alleyway, the plas-steel walls of the buildings almost scraping the sides of the speeder, occasionally showering the outside of the speeder with sparks as the mirrors met walls. Ali looked back and saw the Inquisitor make the turn, but scrape one of the walls hard, tearing a door off its hinges. The Inquisitor then gathered his own Gift and pushed the shattered windshield off his ground speeder, allowing it to flip over the top and crash behind to the ground. Ali could now see the Inquisitor clearly. He had long, white hair that looked like it hadn’t been brushed or washed in a decade and a dark, brown complexion, likely from planet Skia. His eyes had an angry look, like they loathed and hated everything innocent and good, like her. Around his neck was a blood-red collar that shined bright under the light of Pateras and Gios, their two suns. All Gifted that get captured were tested for their strength, and then collared, the color of the collar signifying their strength; black the highest, white the lowest. This one pursuing them had a red color with black stripes. The stripes were signifying that he worked for Macab, instead of being one of his victims. At least they had this victory, a red instead of a black. She gave out a sigh of relief.
‘Is he gone?’ Billy asked with his Gift.
‘No, but he’s a red, not a black,’ Ali explained. She could feel a little bit of satisfaction and hope from her brother; maybe they had a chance.
Another red beam of light shot out toward their speeder, this time hitting their rear bumper, making it fall off. Ali looked back and could see the Inquisitor had a lase-gun in his hand and was shooting at them again; he’d caught up. She had to do something. Their ground speeder was just too slow compared to the Hearse. Thinking quickly, she formed a plan and then thought the plan to her brother, needing his help in this.
They lurched to the right, as Charles took another turn and accelerated; prey hoping to distance themselves from predator. The Inquisitor stayed close behind, following each turn as if the two speeders were linked.
Billy and Ali both reached for their Gifts and started to form hardened balls of air on the back of their speeder. Ali gathered more and more air, compressing it into a super hard ball of oxygen and nitrogen, but pulled in dust from the road as well, so that the Inquisitor would easily see it. Billy gathered air as well, forming his ball into a rock hard, transparent sphere. They lurched to the left, as Charles turned back onto a main road. They could see the edge of the City on the horizon, the spider line and the Outlands beyond—and somewhere out there, Haven. Charles floored it and squeezed every ounce of speed out of the tired ground speeder, the Inquisitor matching their pace.
Another red beam lanced toward them, this time hitting the roof of the speeder and slicing a jagged gash into the vehicle. Sunlight now streamed into the backseat, the golden rays lighting the dust the floated through the interior and making it almost look magically beautiful.
Billy could feel the edge of the city getting closer, as the houses and shops that sped by started looking more dilapidated and deserted. The edge of the city was a dangerous place to live because of the piranha spiders that roamed about the wild. They were the rulers of the Outlands. To keep them out, the Spider Line had been installed long ago, a high power, lethal laser beam that would incinerate any creature walking past it. Billy could now just barely see it, the Spider Line. It was only a faint glowing red line from this distance, but it was closing fast.
‘Ready,’ Ali thought.
Billy nodded.
‘NOW!’
At that instant, Billy released his ball of air, as his sister released hers. Ali sent hers straight toward the Inquisitor, the scene clear within his mind. Billy, however, sent his ball of air under the Inquisitor’s Hearse and stuck it underneath, attaching it to the anti-gravity generators. When he felt the Inquisitor reach for his Gift and deflect Ali’s ball, Billy released his, not just letting it go, but releasing all of the compressed air within the ball. Hundreds of cubic feet of air suddenly expanded at the speed of sound under the Inquisitor’s ground speeder. Billy’s ball of air changed from a hardened, compressed gas, to a bomb. It exploded and shattered the anti-gravity generators, making the blue glow beneath the Hearse suddenly flicker and wink out. The ground speeder dropped two feet to the ground in an instant and groaned to a halt in a cloud of street rubble and dust. They could hear the Inquisitor yell in frustration, and Ali smiled to her brother. She looked back at their pursuer and could see him getting out of the wreckage with something in his hands.
‘Billy, what does he have?’ Ali asked.
Billy closed his eyes and reached out with his Gift. He had always been better at using his Gift to see things far away, and now he was finally putting that skill to use. Focusing on the crashed ground speeder, he found the Inquisitor standing next to it with something long and sinister looking in his hands. It was a rifle of some kind, oh no, it was a phase rifle. These weapons fired a bolt of distorted space-time that seemed to go through nearly everything.
Just as he was sharing this image with his sister, the Inquisitor fired.
The beam of distorted space-time leapt from the rifle, looking like a shimmering line of black light, its edges sparkling blue and red as it streaked through the air. Their ground speeder suddenly shuddered, as the beam hit, piercing through stabilizers and field generators, damning their vehicle to the same fate as their pursuer. In an instant, they smashed to the ground and slid to a stop in a cloud of dust and smoke. As the air cleared, Billy could see that they had stopped on the outskirts of the city, in a small calliope grove. Soft fluted musical tones filled the air as the breeze blew across the tops of the calliope trees, their hollow trunks resonating, like blowing over the opening of a bottle. Their purple-gray leaves rustled in the breeze, adding to the beautiful music, yet none of the three noticed.
“Are both of you OK?” Charles asked, turning to check on his children.
“Yeah, we’re OK, father,” Billy answered.
“Any idea what happened?” their father asked, as he climbed out of the speeder.
“The Inquisitor shot at us,” Billy explained.
“Get down! He’s firing again!” Ali yelled.
She was still looking out the back window and could see the Inquisitor taking aim again.
Another beam of distorted space-time lanced through the speeder, putting a hole through the back seat between the twins, through the front seat and into the engine. If Charles hadn’t gotten out of the speeder when he did, he’d be dead by now.
“Come on!” Charles yelled. “It’ll take him a little time to recharge his rifle. We’re going to make a run for it, leave your bags.”
The twins climbed out of the speeder and moved around to the front. Ahead of them stretched the Outlands; the untamed wilderness that surrounded Azule City; kingdom of the piranha spider. As big as a medium-sized dog, the spiders were violent, aggressive, and had razor sharp teeth. People called them smilies because of their teeth, always showing; piranha spiders had no lips, their evil toothy grins always on display. These indigenous creatures were ravenous scavengers which hunted across the Outlands in packs of hundreds, or even thousands. The Spider Line was the only thing that kept these creatures from invading Azule City and destroying everything. If a piranha spider crossed the blowing red line, and then ratchet up its power a thousand fold when the spider was detected, vaporizing it in an instant. It had proven highly effective in keeping the citizens of Azule City safe from these meandering hordes; but now, Charles, Ali, and Billy had to go into the spider’s back yard, the Outlands. They were a source of nightmares for all people on Azule, something to be always feared, but they weren’t nearly as terrifying as an Inquisitor.
“Follow me,” Charles said as he checked the coordinates on his wrist computer. “Haven is this way.” He pointed.
Charles pointed past three large boulders who sat outside the spider line; the Guardians as they were called; granite protectors who were put there by the gods to look after the citizens of Azule, as the legend claimed. Other than a few trees and the Guardians, there was nothing else to be seen, no spiders, no rock hoppers, no strangler birds, no flash lizards; the Outlands seemed empty and waiting. Charles ran for the Guardians, pulling Ali and Billy with him. Another beam of distorted space-time streaked over their heads and struck a nearby calliope tree, splitting open the trunk and setting the leaves aflame. Not stopping to look back, the three continued running, until they reached the Guardians, using the mighty granite protectors as a shield from the phase rifle.
“We’ll be safe here for a moment,” Charles explained. “A phase rifle can’t shoot through granite, it’s too dense.”
Billy peeked between two of the Guardians. He could see the Inquisitor standing at the edge of the spider line with frustration painted on his face.
“I don’t think the Inquisitor wants to cross the spider line,” Billy said.
Charles pulled his son back behind the Guardian and took his place, peeking around their stone shield. He could see the Inquisitor talking into his wrist communicator, issuing angry commands to whoever was unfortunate enough to be on the other end. He then lowered his wrist and yelled as loud as he could, his voice amplified by his Gift.
“Enjoy your time out there. You and your brats won’t be lonely for very long. I’m sure you’ll find some smiling little pets to play with soon enough.”
The Inquisitor then gave a maniacal, knowing laugh that chilled all of them to the bone. Adjusting his phase rifle to a wide beam, the Inquisitor fired it into the ground, slamming the flesh of Azule with the might of a giant’s hammer. Billy could feel the ground shake.
“That should wake up our friends!” the Inquisitor yelled, and laughed again. “Enjoy!”
Billy and Ali looked up at their father, fear covering their pale faces.
“What’s gonna happen?” Ali asked.
“Nothing, just follow me,” Charles explained, trying to sound confident, but a glimpse of fear peeked through his mask of confidence. “Be as quiet as possible; don’t step on any sticks or leaves, stay to open ground.”
“Why?” Billy asked, but was silenced by an angry glare.
Billy recalled that Mr. Dirac had said something about the Outlands, but he couldn’t quite remember. He looked at Ali and could see concern painted on her brow. He gave her a questioning look, but she only shrugged and followed their father, a tickling of fear in the back of Billy’s mind.