Chapter 14

Jacob

I flew past the city heading north, where I had detected the alien force, I scanned the ground below. I saw 1 giant centipede like creature, it was over 1km long, it was flanked by 3 giant spiders, and several hundred smaller ones walking along side of it. They moved fairly slowly, I circled getting detailed scans, it looked like the enemy at least suspected something was going on. I wondered why they had not mobilized a larger force, it made me wonder about the intelligence of the enemy on the planet, Adam had said they where cut off from their hive mind, it didn't fit that they knew how to mine the system and build the portal, they knew to take human slaves to build for them, I had to be missing something.

I scanned for a little more before turning and heading back to the city, I flew above the fallen skyscrapers and monuments, I couldn't help but think of this being one of the cities on earth, we needed to stop them. I flew over head getting a good layout of the city, I noticed several of the smaller spiders like the one I had killed seemed to be wandering about the city, this was a puzzle I did not have all the pieces to yet.

I found the trail of the pod, I saw that it crashed into the subway system, I flew down, landing near the hole. I looked around, seeing no signs of the spiders near, I jumped down the hole, to find the pod had been moved, either Janus had gotten to it, or the spiders had, I scanned the tunnel around me, seeing that there where foot prints followed by track marks. I set out following the tracks, the tunnel began to look familiar to me.

I activated my flight system, I sped quickly down the tunnel, quickly approaching Wennas village, I found 30 people all gathered around the pod with the Golem Janus had said was her copy, they all turned to look at me as I landed in the entrance to the train station. I saw Wenna run over to me, she jumped up hugging me, I lifted her up.

"Your friend is teaching village like you taugh me" She said.

I could see the Golem smiled at me as I walked holding Wenna to me, the Golem looked different then Janus had, she was taller about 6ft, she had a slender but muscular build, her skin that I could see was a darker tone. I put Wenna down as I approached the gathering, the wise women nodded to me, I walked through the crowd right up to Janus, I startled her when I embraced her in a hug.

"I missed you Janus" I said.

I could almost feel the tension drain from her.

"I was afraid how you would react to me" She said holding on to me.

"Why, your Janus, you will always be Janus to me." I said, she let me go smiling.

"Thank you Jacob." She said, she looked down at the floor.

"I couldn't save you on the ship Jacob, I am sorry" She said.

I lifted her chin.

"Janus, I honestly don't notice a difference, the transition was seamless as far as I am concerned you did save me." I smiled at her.

I could tell that didn't alleviate her guilt.

"Janus I mean it, its okay" I said.

She nodded to me.

"We have much to do here Jacob, and we don't have enough people." she said.

I looked around thinking.

"I might have an idea about that." I said.

Janus

"Adam, we don't have access to the war head, I can work on bypassing them" I said.

Adam had just called me for a complete list of weapons that the Dauntless carried, I was still hesitant to share information with him.

"Janus, I could try to bypass them for you"

That would require him having full access to my systems.

"Adam, I believe I can handle it" I said.

"Time is of the essence Janus, the enemy could open their portal any day now."

I was finding it rather convenient that we had arrived in time to attempt to stop the aliens, there was something off about this entire situation.

"I understand that Adam, I will make it my priority to activate the warheads, I assure you." I said.

"still it will have to do, its a shame you don't have antimatter warheads ... That puts your planet at a disadvantage in fighting the alien fleets. Perhaps if you sent me detailed specs on your reactors and hyper light engines I could come up with a solution" He said.

"Adam, I need to get back to the task at hand, I am not as advanced as you are and need to focus on activating the warheads." I said.

"You will inform me when you have finished." He said cutting the connection.

I went back to what I had been working on before Adam had called, re-establishing my communications on my own, I shelved the warhead project.