The Altreian Enigma (Rho Agenda Assimilation Book 2) Read online

  Through Jack’s eyes, Khal Teth watched the ceremony, which had become a nightly occurrence, and marveled. Like a house that had its foundation ripped from beneath it, the Altreian government had collapsed upon itself. The coup threatened to spawn a civil war, but since the Altreian fleet’s rank and file were mostly of the Khyre race, the would-be Dhaldric rebels found themselves vastly overmatched. Thus, most of the Dhaldric were falling all over themselves to join the Twice Bound rather than face the same fate The Ripper had doled out to Parsus.

  As much as Khal Teth needed The Ripper to consolidate his hold on the government, the power that the Twice Bound had granted him now presented a serious problem. Without Jack’s consent, Khal Teth could not regain control of his body. And unless he did something about that before Jack got too comfortable in his new role as overlord, Khal Teth’s situation might very well become permanent.

  That was why, at the end of tonight’s bonding ceremony, he would complete the bargain he had made with Jack and send his mind back to his Earthly body. Even that involved risk. For the process to work, Khal Teth would have to wholly accept the bonds to the Twice Bound in the same way that Jack had accepted them, making them his own. The only reason the ex-overlord had waited this long was his need to learn precisely how Jack was doing so, ensuring a seamless transition of minds.

  For a time, Khal Teth would have to become The Ripper. He was certain he could deceive all but one of the Twice Bound. Captain Moros would have to be killed, but he would die defending The Ripper from a rebel assassination attempt. Then the Twice Bound would build a statue of Moros inside the Parthian, and Khal Teth’s deception would be complete.

  Khal Teth felt a warm glow of anticipation fill him. Yes, it was high time to send The Ripper back to his lovely wife and young son.

  The ceremony lasted almost a quarter of the night. So many Altreians wanted to share the bond that Jack could never get to them all. His psionic range now extended throughout Quol, as if the Twice Bound formed some sort of psychic circuit, granting him more power than even Khal Teth’s brain could safely channel.

  Dismissing Captain Moros, Jack had just reentered his chambers when Khal Teth planted the vision in his mind that swept him out of this reality and into Janet’s arms. He felt her body pressed against him as her soft lips met his, felt the heat rise up to consume him.

  Then the scene shifted. He stood across from Robby on a rubber mat, both wearing loose-fitting white karate uniforms. When Jack had moved into an attack, Robby executed a perfect counter, sweeping Jack’s legs from beneath him and throwing him onto his back hard enough to pull a grunt from his lips. When Jack had rolled back to his feet, he saw a look of pure joy shining in Robby’s young face. And Jack felt that same joy spread to him.

  The vision faded, and Jack found himself standing at the transparent outer wall of his chambers, staring out into the alien night. Gone was Janet’s heat. Gone was Robby’s warmth. He was alone. He swallowed, unable to make these eyes shed a tear.

  He knew the vision’s purpose. It was time to decide. Stay here and fulfill his commitment to the Twice Bound, or reenter the chrysalis cylinder and allow Khal Teth to return Jack’s mind to his original body beneath the Kalasasaya Temple.

  Surely he had done enough. He’d given the Twice Bound a chance at freedom. Turning them over to Khal Teth wouldn’t break the bonds. And Khal Teth would find the power provided by the Twice Bound too addicting to sacrifice. That would impose limitations on Khal Teth’s abuse of power, lest the Twice Bound release their bonds. Over time, Moros would recognize the change but would probably come to believe that it was caused by The Ripper’s ascension to overlord.

  Jack repeated the thought again and again, all the way to the chamber where the chrysalis cylinder awaited.

  The nanoparticle door dissolved at his mental instruction, and he stepped into the room that had but a single chrysalis cylinder, the one into which Parsus had entered the specialized command sequence that banished Khal Teth’s mind from his body, imprisoning it in the interdimensional void where he could sense multiple futures, but feel nothing.

  Khal Teth had found partial release from that by discovering that when a human lingered on the life-death boundary, he could form a mental bond and deliver the adrenaline kick that would push him or her back to life. The feat only worked if the host agreed to the bond and only if that person wasn’t beyond the possibility of natural recovery. Jack was intimately familiar with the symbiotic relationship.

  As he stood beside the horizontally mounted chrysalis cylinder, staring down, the worry about the fate of Captain Moros and the Twice Bound who had placed their faith in him returned with a vengeance. His intuition told him . . . something felt wrong.

  And there was another problem with returning to his Earthly body. Could he trust Khal Teth not to send the planet killer should the UFNS welcome the Kasari Collective through a stable wormhole gateway?

  Jack cursed himself, gritted his teeth, and handed control of this body to Khal Teth.

  Khal Teth gazed down at the hated chrysalis cylinder that had imprisoned him for all those thousands of cycles and smiled. Finally, he had arrived at the endgame. Only one sequence of moves remained to be played, a progression that would set him free from this most disturbing of humans—the one host whom Khal Teth had been unable to break to his will.

  Khal Teth reached into the memories he had stolen from Parsus and retrieved the code sequence that would cancel the cylinder’s original program, the one that had separated Khal Teth’s mind from his body and cast it into an interdimensional prison. For the briefest of moments, a wave of vertigo assaulted him, but he gritted his teeth and blinked it away. Then Khal Teth climbed into the cylinder.

  He lay back and entered the command that would close and activate the cylinder. As the lid slid shut, a familiar thrum pulsed through his mind. He felt the same ripping sensation he had experienced millennia ago. He searched for the presence that was Jack Gregory and, when he failed to sense the human’s mind, experienced a thrill that he would savor until the end of time. Having his mind linked to the human had been an exciting ride, but he was happy to let go. Finally, he was free to fulfill his ultimate destiny.

  But as Khal Teth tried to lift his hand to reopen the cylinder, a sense of wrongness engulfed him. He could not feel his arms or legs. He could not feel his body at all. A wave of panic flooded his mind, and as that mind struggled to understand what was happening, he saw multiple futures stretch out before him. Along one of these blood-soaked paths, he strode Earth, once again the rider in another human’s body, hunting The Ripper’s wife and son.

  No!

  This could not be happening to him.

  Not again.

  Khal Teth tried to scream, but no sound issued forth from the mouth he could no longer feel.

  Desperately attempting to calm himself, Khal Teth searched for answers. He still had his memories. This time they had not been stripped from him before his mind was cast from his body. But how had this happened? He had entered the codes that should have canceled the chrysalis cylinder’s original imprisonment program. Had he not? He remembered reaching for the control pad. But then the wave of dizziness had taken him and he had climbed into the cylinder.

  As he examined that memory, he recalled another presence there with him in that moment, distracting him.

  The Ripper!

  A fresh wave of despair filled Khal Teth’s mind as he tried again to feel something—anything but betrayal. This was not the end. Not for him.

  Khal Teth felt his hatred coalesce into the one thing that could sustain him. As he had done before, Khal Teth would find a way back. And when he did, The Ripper would pay for this betrayal.

  EPILOGUE

  With his arms folded over his powerful chest, Jack Gregory, in Khal Teth’s black-uniformed body, stood at the transparent wall in the overlord’s chambers, an ivory blade strapped to each thigh. Far beyond that wall, the magnificent magenta orb of Altreia hung on the h
orizon, dark storms swirling across the brown dwarf star’s surface. Higher in the twilight sky, bright stars bejeweled the Krell Nebula’s orange lace. A gorgeous sky to be sure; it just wasn’t his sky. Somewhere out there, Earth hurtled around its sun, carrying the woman and child he loved. The thought filled Jack with an unbearable longing.

  He had tricked Khal Teth into activating the chrysalis cylinder without canceling its prior programming. His plan had worked, but at a hellish cost—it had sent Khal Teth back to his mind prison but had also trapped Jack here.

  Technically, Jack wasn’t stuck here. All he had to do was walk back to that room, climb into the chrysalis cylinder, and enter the code sequence that would synchronize it with the cylinder on the Altreian research vessel buried beneath the Kalasasaya Temple. Then he would wake up in his own body and return to Janet and Robby.

  But if he did that, the Twice Bound would once again find themselves at the mercy of their Dhaldric masters, and the old order would return under a new overlord. Painfully, Jack had made his choice. Now he would have to make the best of it.

  Unfortunately, another complication plagued him. Although the chrysalis cylinder had been programmed to block Khal Teth’s mind from returning to his body, the cylinder held no such power once Jack climbed out. Even now he could feel the tendrils of Khal Teth’s mind seeking a way past the mental blocks that Jack had erected to keep the Altreian from returning. If not for the power of the Twice Bound, Jack was certain those blocks would have already failed.

  Jack turned and made his way to the elaborate throne that faced away from the star field. He sat down, took a deep breath, and prepared himself for those who would soon enter this audience chamber seeking to manipulate their new overlord for personal benefit.

  He absolutely hated politics. But just maybe, if he worked at it hard enough, Jack would find a way to build a government that was stable and trustworthy enough for him to go home.

  In the meantime, he would have to live with a mental itch that he just couldn’t scratch.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank Alan Werner for the hours he spent working with me on the story. Thank you to my editor, Clarence Haynes, for his wonderful help in fine-tuning the end product, along with the outstanding editorial and production staff at 47North. I also want to thank my agent, Paul Lucas, for the work he has done to bring my novels to a wider audience. Finally, my biggest thanks go to my lovely wife, Carol, for supporting me and for being my sounding board throughout the writing of all of my novels.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Richard Phillips was born in Roswell, New Mexico, in 1956. He graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1979 and qualified as an Army Ranger, going on to serve as an officer in the U.S. Army. He earned a master’s degree in physics from the Naval Postgraduate School in 1989, completing his thesis work at Los Alamos National Laboratory. After working as a research associate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, he returned to the army to complete his tour of duty. Today he lives with his wife, Carol, in Phoenix, where he writes science-fiction thrillers—including the Rho Agenda series (The Second Ship, Immune, and Wormhole), the Rho Agenda Inception series (Once Dead, Dead Wrong, and Dead Shift), and the Rho Agenda Assimilation series (The Kasari Nexus, The Altreian Enigma, and The Meridian Ascent).