ConQuest (The Quest Saga) Page 13

  “Okay,” Q smiled. This was more like the Taylor he knew.

  Suddenly the ship stopped with a lurch. Taylor and Q fell hard on the floor.

  Q rubbed his head as he got up. “Ouch! What’s wrong with the ship?”

  He looked around him. Taylor was unconscious. She seemed to have hit her head on the walls. He carried her to the bunks and laid her on her bed.

  Chris walked up to him. “Kai needs your help at the pit”.

  He looked at Taylor. Chris noticed her as well.

  “What happened?”

  “She hit her head on the walls.”

  “She’s a dark knight all right.” Chris grinned “She’ll be fine. Now C’mon.”

  Q followed her to the pit.

  “What exactly seems to be the problem? Why did the ship stop?” he asked.

  Kai pressed a button. Instantly a large screen dropped into the pit.

  That is so cool, Q thought.

  Kai pointed to the readings on the screen “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the ship. The readings are all perfect. The Orion just stopped for no reason.”

  Maybe there’s some sort of force field, Q thought.

  He focused and his mind immediately brought up the Q-maps. He searched for the section of the universe they were in.

  He was right!

  Around the planet was a huge sphere of energy.

  Chris tried to move the ship forward but it just wouldn’t budge.

  “It’s no use,” Q told them.

  She looked at him, expecting an explanation.

  “There’s an energy field around the planet. You’ll never get through like that,” he explained.

  “We’re blocked out?” she asked.

  Q didn’t reply. He was deep in thought. Nothing other than energy could pierce the field.

  “I might have a solution,” Chris said.

  “…but you’re not going to like it.”

  New Year’s Eve

  Taylor was having a dream.

  She was in a huge room. The floors were of wood and the walls were plastered with posters.

  ‘New Year’s Eve Party’ they all said.

  “Oh, no. Not this again,” she mumbled.

  There were a lot of kids dressed in tuxedos and glittering gowns. She herself was in a silver gown. A guy walked up to her. It took some time for her to see that it was Q. He was in a hoodie and jeans. The only one who stood out from the whole group.

  He had always said that he didn’t care about how he looked but Taylor felt that this was pushing it a little too much.

  “Hi,” he waved at her.

  Taylor could see a few guys glare at him.

  She felt a little bad. She was the only one he ever talked to. The others snubbed him. He was the number one enemy a guy could have. Rich, smart and played video games in class!

  “So what do you want to do?” Q asked her nervously.

  “You don’t like being here?”

  “Well, frankly, I don't know why I had to come for your New Year’s Eve Party. I’m going to have the same thing two years later anyway.”

  “What do you think they do at proms?”

  “Play cards in the corner?”

  She turned to the corner and actually saw guys playing cards.

  Wow, she thought.

  “So what’s new?” she asked.

  Q’s face turned darker. “Nothing.” He looked around. “Excuse me,” he said and ran out of the building.

  Taylor didn't understand what she’d done wrong.

  “Hello, darling!” said a voice.

  Taylor expected it to be one of the jerks who always asked her for a dance no matter how many times he got ‘no’ as an answer.

  It was Carlos. Luckily for him, Taylor decided to look before punching.

  “Whoa, whoa,” he said, backing off a little bit.

  “Just wanted to know what happened between you two,” he asked her.

  Without a second thought she started replying. “I don’t know. He just fled the moment I asked him what’s new with him,” she said furiously.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with him these days. He’s suddenly changed, keeps locking himself in his room all the time. Hardly ever comes out. Anyway…” Carlos said.

  “Sorry…” she said and ran out of the building. She searched frantically for Q. He usually hung out by the playground during a ‘boring’ event.

  “Q!!” she called out but he wasn’t there.

  She heard a low growl. She looked around her. No one was there. Now she could hear a loud howl.

  “No. It can’t be,” she said.

  Suddenly her vision went white.

  When it cleared up, she was back in the Orion, looking at the worried face of Kai.

  “Wake up!” he shook her.

  She was still in a daze. She wondered why she had seen that. It hadn't even completed the story but frankly that was one story for which she’d never want to see the ending.

  “Stop shaking me,” she murmured.

  “You’re awake,” he said happily; then a sly grin came across his face. “You were yelling Q’s name over and over again. What’s up with that?” He was trying hard not to laugh.

  Taylor felt like she was in an oven. “That.....umm......” She didn’t know how to explain.

  “You don’t have to say anything. It was bound to happen anyway.”

  “What was bound to happen?”

  “Q’s a nice guy so…” he started.

  Taylor kicked him so hard that he hit the wall and slumped to the floor.

  Maxi Blast

  “An energy field can only be pierced by energy. Nothing else gets through,” Q said.

  “How about weapons?” Chris asked.

  “Do you know how hard it is to find energized weapons? They’re really unstable and…”

  That was when he realized that Chris wasn't paying attention to him.

  “What’s wrong?” Q asked.

  Chris turned to him. She had a grin on her face.

  “I have a crazy idea.”

  “Well then let’s hear it.”

  “We could try using your Durendal to pierce through the field.”

  “What’s crazy about that?”

  “You’d have to technically destroy it.”

  “WHAT?”

  “No no. It isn’t what you think. You’d have to turn it into energy for it to be effective and that’s where the ‘destroy it’ part comes.”

  “I will get my weapon back, right?”

  “Yeah….. Maybe.”

  Q sighed. He didn't like the idea of putting his weapon on the line but if it was the only way to save the universe he didn't have any other choice.

  “Fine. I’ll get onto the ship and fix it.”

  Chris nodded.

  Q walked to the hangar. He put on his suit and picked up the Durendal. The air pressure system was activated. Q opened the hangar door and jumped into space… again.

  His suit changed shape until it had a jetpack on the back. He propelled himself to the front of the ship.

  Chris waved at him through the windshield. She looked pretty tensed though.

  Q closed his eyes and focused on the Durendal. His hands started to feel hot. His head was beaded with sweat.

  When he opened his eyes, his discs had disappeared. Instead there was a metal hilt and a blade of pure green energy.

  “I did it!” Q yelled.

  “Good job,” Chris said through the intercom “All you have to do now is fix it to the ship.”

  Q attached the saber to the ship easily. He got back into the ship and ran to the pit.

  “Full speed ahead!” he told Chris as he entered the pit.

  Chris pulled it into top gear. The engine hummed at a high pitch.

  Q’s saber helped pierce the field but that wasn't enough. The ship didn't have enough horsepower to move forward. The force field seemed to be pushing them back.

  He lifted his hand.

&n
bsp; “Ha-di,” he said and hieroglyphics started to appear around his body. He didn’t even know what he was doing. A word just appeared in his mind and he said it.

  The hieroglyphics sunk to the floor of the ship. The engine hummed even faster and the ship sunk in more and more into the field. The ship was going into overdrive. Chris opened a small box on the panel and pressed a red button inside.

  The engine stopped. They heard a blast and everyone fell down. The next thing they knew they were on the other side of the energy field.

  Q looked out. His weapon was still intact.

  Thank God, Q thought.

  “How did you do that?” Chris asked him.

  “I have no idea. It just came to me,” Q said. “So what was that button you pressed?”

  “It activates the Maxi Blast,” Chris said.

  “The what?”

  “Maxi Blast. Uses up all energy in one surge of speed and power,” she explained.

  “Wow… that’s so cool!”

  Then he realized the hidden message.

  “So we’re out of fuel?” he asked, hoping the answer would be ‘no’.

  She just nodded. “We’re riding on reserves,” she said and flew to the huge green planet.

  The planet that held one of the most dangerous temples of all.

  They had reached the Temple of Giants.

  A ‘giant’ task ahead of them.

  Suspicion

  Taylor came up to the pit after experiencing the sudden burst of speed. She had no idea what had taken place in the last few minutes.

  When she reached the pit all the others were already there, with the exception of Elizabeth.

  “So we’re splitting up into groups again?” Kai asked Q.

  “No splitting up!” Taylor barged in. “We all saw how that worked out the last time.”

  They all nodded in agreement.

  “Let’s get that map!” Q said and they all geared up.

  Although Q had said that, ironically he was the only one who didn't suit up. He had something more important to do.

  Taylor looked at him suspiciously as he left the pit. She wondered what he was up to.

  What was he hiding?

  Temple of Giants

  Q was on his way to the infirmary.

  “It’s like everyone just forgot about Elizabeth,” he muttered.

  Q walked to her bed. She was still the same. Her face showed no expression. She lay motionless in a coma.

  Q saw something beside her and picked it up. It looked like a feather.

  It had a feather-like structure but it looked like diamonds and pearls were woven together. He figured that it was Elizabeth’s and put it down next to her.

  He brushed a strand of hair from her face.

  “Get better soon,” he whispered.

  He walked back up to the pit when he felt a sudden jolt. He realized that they’d landed.

  He hastened his pace. When he reached the pit the others were all ready to leave the ship.

  Taylor pulled Q aside.

  “Where were you?” she demanded.

  “I was um...” He never felt comfortable talking to Taylor about Elizabeth. He felt like he was combining fire and ice. It just didn’t seem right.

  “I was checking on the nuclear engine,” he said nervously.

  “Oh, okay,” she said and left. Q hoped she had bought it but it wasn't exactly easy to find out. Taylor was known to not show things like that on her face.

  Kai interrupted his train of thought. “So, Elizabeth, huh?”

  “Can we do this later?” Q asked him.

  “Ethosien,” Q yelled.

  Instantly, white light surrounded him. When it died down he was in his familiar armor.

  They walked down the stairwell to this new planet.

  It was huge! They looked like ants before it. What they had first thought to be trees turned out to be grass!

  To find the Temple of Giants in such a place would take weeks and they had only one week without taking into account the two days that they had already spent.

  Q closed his eyes. He could see the temple but he couldn’t make out how far away it was but at least he knew how to get there. That’s much better than getting lost on a planet that looked like Godzilla’s home.

  Q led them. “That way.” He took them due east.

  The walk was long and tiring. Having to cut every specimen of huge vegetation that lay in their path didn't exactly help. It wasn't a surprise that after a while everyone started to get impatient.

  “Are we there yet?” Kai asked.

  “No,” Q said.

  Five minutes later,

  “Are we there yet?” Taylor asked.

  “No.”

  20 minutes later,

  “Are we there yet?” Chris asked.

  “Yes,” Q said.

  “Really?” she asked excitedly.

  “No.”

  Three hours later,

  “Are we there yet?!” They all asked in unison (yelled would probably make a better description)

  At that point any answer other than ‘yes’ would’ve probably resulted in them killing him.

  Luckily for him they had almost reached. He just smiled and pointed to the huge metal tower that rose over the trees that were actually grass.

  The whole group received a burst of energy after that, but sadly that didn't even last ten minutes and they went back to the same routine.

  “Are we there yet?” Kai asked again.

  Q realized that the only way to stop this nonsense was to ignore them. They walked for another hour but the tower didn’t look any closer.

  “I’m hungry,” Chris said.

  Kai kneeled down and opened a backpack that the others hadn't noticed. He fished around but his hands came up empty.

  “You didn’t pack food?” Chris asked, sounding murderous.

  Kai looked at her with a broad smile. “Apparently not.”

  “What do you have in there?” Taylor asked him.

  “Weaponry, sensors and a poster of Michael Jackson.”

  Taylor just gaped at him. “I’m not going to even ask,” she said and turned away.

  “What? What?” Kai was clueless to what had ticked her off.

  Q wondered how they could reach the temple without any provisions. Who knew how many days it would take them?

  He shook the feeling off. He only had four days left. He had to find the map today. He had no other option.

  Speaking of the temple, he had lost sight of the tower behind the grass-trees, so he might be taking them in the wrong direction for all he knew. He tried using his Q-maps but the temple energy beacon was distorted.

  “There must be some huge energy flowing around it,” he theorized.

  Suddenly there was a rustling inside the bushes, which were human- sized, by the way.

  The others heard it too. Q pulled out his discs, Kai stood in a classic Jackie Chan fighting stance, Chris pulled out her daggers and Taylor took out her sword as well.

  Suddenly they heard a shrieking sound. Something jumped out of the bush and charged at Q. It was so fast that Q didn’t have time to move.

  She was a really fair girl. She had coffee brown hair that fell to her shoulders. Her eyes were like flames of fire. She wore silver earrings and a silver chain. She wore a white shirt and blue jeans. She reminded Q of someone he knew but he just couldn’t place her.

  He snapped back to reality just in time to see the girl tackle him into the bushes.

  Apparently there was a cliff on the other side so they fell right off it. One way of looking at it was that they were flying.

  Another was they were sky-diving to death.

  Q closed his eyes and willed the air around them to lift them up.

  Nothing happened.

  They were about 50 metres from the hard ground. He closed his eyes. He tried to make his suit grow wings like before, but it didn’t work.

  He waited for the impact but there was none. He opene
d his eyes to see what was going on.

  He was flying! Actually flying, not the falling-flying thing. He turned his head.

  He realized that he wasn't the one doing the flying. It was the girl. She had wings!

  They were peculiar wings at that. Her feathers weren’t fluffy, instead they shone like gems.

  A feather fell on Q’s face. He picked it up. It shone like it was made out of diamonds and pearls. It seemed strikingly familiar. The one he found next to Elizabeth!

  He instantly recognized the girl.

  “Elizabeth?” he asked.

  “So you finally realize,” she said, smiling.

  “But.... how?” he asked.

  “It’s a long story,” she put Q back on top of the cliff.

  They walked to the others. Taylor ran over and hugged him.

  “I was so worried!” she said.

  “Is that.....Elizabeth?” Chris asked.

  Elizabeth nodded.

  “You actually activated your Nova form!” Chris exclaimed.

  Q and Kai looked confused. Taylor explained it to them after looking at their faces.

  “Every zyxian is like a cocoon. Remember how Carlos used his powers only when he had a certain emotional build-up? The Nova is the same. Only difference is that it’s permanent and requires a great deal of emotional build-up. Once a person achieves such a level of emotions, he forms a cocoon. After a while he will emerge from the cocoon as a Nova. An advanced zyxian being. Cool part is, this happens to only us earthlings. No other species.”

  Q turned to Elizabeth “So your coma was…”

  “My cocoon, yes.”

  “Well.....it’s nice to have you back, I guess,” Taylor told her.

  Elizabeth completely ignored Taylor, leaving her fuming with anger. Though in Elizabeth’s defense, Taylor’s statement wasn't exactly friendly.

  “So, what exactly happened to you?” Kai asked Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth didn't say a word. Instead she opened her wings out and flapped them. A huge gust of wind hit them and blurred their vision. Their vision cleared up almost instantly.

  Q looked around him. All of his friends were there as well.

  “What’s going on?” Q asked them.

  Taylor shushed him. “Elizabeth’s showing us her memories and…”

  She let out a small yelp. Q looked at the scene unfolding before them.