Flinx Transcendent_ A Pip & Flinx Adventure - Alan Dean Foster [197]
His awareness that something was amiss having been stimulated by the arrival and subsequent actions of his half sister, Flinx had little by little grown dimly aware of the confrontation that had now given way to out-and-out combat onboard his ship. While a small part of him continued to agonize over the conflict that was physically out of his reach, the bulk of his concentration remained focused on sustaining the bonds that were beginning to stir the incomprehensibly vast forces swirling around him.
With Flinx and Pip at its core, the triangle of concentration held firm and continued to function.
On board the Teacher, an enraged Mahnahmi let loose the full fury that was herself. The uncontrolled ferocity picked up Tse-Mallory and tossed him aside as if he had been flicked away by a giant invisible hand. Reaching out with her misshapen mind, she came down hard on Sylzenzuzex with the mental equivalent of a blow from a hammer. Dropping her weapons, the padre fell to the deck unconscious. A force akin to that which had pitched first Truzenzuzex and then Tse-Mallory into the far wall slammed Scrap straight up into the ceiling. When it drew back, the minidrag fell to the floor insensible.
Surrounded by the dead and injured, Mahnahmi stepped over moaning or motionless bodies as she advanced on the entrance to the control room. Seeing her coming, Clarity swung the muzzle of her weapon around to fire at the malevolent, commanding figure. Before she could depress the trigger, something set fire to her optic nerves. Crying out, she dropped the thranx pistol and fell backward, clutching at her burning eyes. As she lay on the floor, sobbing and moaning from the pain, Mahnahmi halted between her and the comatose Sylzenzuzex.
“Two females.” Flinx's half sister sniffed contemptuously. “Two different species. Two fools. The only question remaining is, do I kill you slowly for the damage you've inflicted on my pitiful but still occasionally useful associates, or do I not waste the time and dispatch you with alacrity?” Kneeling, she picked up the weapon the now helpless Clarity had dropped. Handling it as if it were a jewel-encrusted necklace, she turned it slowly in her fingers as she admired the typically fine thranx workmanship.
“A toy from Evoria. I like toys. Let's see what this one does.” Straightening, she aimed it at the back of Clarity's skull as her forefinger felt for the trigger.
Within the increasingly active sphere whose periphery was now blowing off scarlet sparks like a miniature red sun, Flinx found that he was gradually able to recognize more clearly what was happening on board the Teacher. He perceived Clarity's terror, fended off Mahnahmi's hatred, touched upon the pain of friend and foe alike whose bodies were scattered throughout the control chamber. They all needed his help, but Clarity's immediate situation took precedence over everything else.
Everything—except what he was doing. Everything except what he had come for. The future of civilization and the fate of the galaxy was at stake.
So—was—his—future.
STAY WITH YOURSELF, the cetacea of Cachalot counseled him uneasily.
BE WHAT YOU ARE, the Krang on Booster ordered him.
insisted the green pervasiveness of Midworld.
Clarity! He felt himself drowning in anguish. What good to save everything and everyone else if he lost the only thing in the cosmos that really mattered to him?
STAY—BE—!!!^ the tripartite power resounded inside his head.
Something was on the verge of igniting. Not igniting, he told himself restlessly. It was on the cusp of exploding. No, it would not be an explosion either, he realized. Something magnificent, something unprecedented, something on a scale so vast it could only be even faintly comprehended within the realm of mathematics humanxkind had yet to discover.
HOLD ON, the cetacea exhorted him as they embraced him tighter in the depths of their warmth.
HOLD ON, the Krang commanded with the cold authority