Evolutionary Liberator - Chapter 61 It Is Done

“Dustin! We have incoming!” cried Olivia.

“I know, we have time,” he said, watching the jump gate come online and stop in space. It was awesome to watch from the surface of the planet.

He had returned to his body, and had the front screen showing them what was visible in the night sky. The ring gate glowed in so many different colors, they looked like they were pulsing as the planet approached it.

“Is everything going alright?” asked Kitteral, looking up from his game as everyone went quiet.

The scene on the screen was going to get too big to show, so Dustin jumped up and headed for the airlock. He wanted to see this from the outside, even if the scout ships found them. It was far too late to stop anything at this point.

Granny and Olivia rushed to follow him, as Kitteral gazed at the screen in silence.

They stood, leaning against the ship, as the gate got closer and closer. Only moments remained, before they would fly through and be in the next system. Dustin was ecstatic. He was almost done. Kit could handle whatever drama that came, and he could finally take that nap, knowing that there wasn’t anything more for him to do.

“Dustin! Quick! Get back on the ship!” cried Kitteral, looking crazed.

A whine in the air was the only warning they had of the blast that came next.

*KABOOM*

XxxxX

Dustin opened his eyes to darkness. The first thing he did was heal himself, before he even checked to see what damage he had taken.

The room was dark, so he hadn’t been blind. Outside he could hear children laughing as they played some game. The smell of vegetable soup, his son’s favorite, wafted in the air.

Sitting up, Dustin looked around, and saw that he was in his old room, on Haven. What had happened? Climbing out of bed, he moved to the door and listened as he heard voices. It sounded like Granny was talking softly to Kit at the dinner table.

“What happened again?” asked Kit, as the sounds of bowls being set down reached his ears.

“Kitteral jumped at us, blocking most of the blast, and Olivia was just able to move in front of Dustin, taking the rest. I think the missile must have hit the ground right in front of us, because the damage to the ship was pretty severe. The nanobots were barely able to patch it up enough for us to escape the rest of the incoming missiles.”

“But I don’t understand how mom and grandpa didn’t make it,” whispered Kit.

Dustin froze. He hadn’t been moving, but suddenly the world froze around him. Did he need to breathe? Did his heart really need to beat? How could they both be gone? The old man wasn’t much of a father, but he had been his dad. And Olivia? Maybe he had misheard…

“I was barely able to scrape enough of your dad together to drag onto the ship. There wasn’t enough of the others to grab anything… I’m sorry…” Granny’s voice trailed away and there was silence. Not even the sound of spoons moving in the imitation of eating.

Dustin sat on the bed. The world was a haze. Nothing seemed to make sense.

He looked around the room, not recognizing any of it as his. Had Kit reorganized? No, there was the desk the nanobot hivemind had made for him from wood bits pieced together. Over there were the pictures that Kit had drawn when he was very small, organized in no particular order. Next to his closet was the hamper he only sometimes used.

“The tranquilizer I gave your dad should be wearing off soon. I think I’m going to go, before he wakes,” said Granny, as the sound of a chair gently scraping across the floor echoed in the silent apartment.

“Thank you for bringing back my dad,” choked Kit, who was obviously crying.

Tears were no where for Dustin. Hearing his boy cry meant nothing to him. He was too numb to even register the outer door softly opening and shutting. Granny had known he was awake, and left anyway. She had told him what had happened, and left. Even that wouldn’t register with any emotions.

Laying back down on the bed, Dustin looked up at the ceiling, trying to find the tears that should have been falling, and was reminded of all the times he had stared at that ceiling, thinking of where Olivia might be, and why she wasn’t with him.

A nap. He had accomplished everything he had sought out to do. He had brought back all of the Uz’En from around the galaxy. They had a home that was safe, whether they wanted it or not. The hivemind was there to study the galaxy and to keep them safe. And as far as he knew, there wasn’t any aliens out there who wanted to hunt them down and kill them. A nap sounded just fine. That was what he had told Olivia he would do when he was done, so why not?

Closing his eyes, Dustin willed himself to fall asleep, and the sounds of the children playing outside drifted away.

XxxxX

“Prisoner 313564, has completed his sentencing of one year on the virtual planet 3.54365. Commencing waking sequence.”

The mechanical voice echoed in his ears as the sounds of rustling filled the silence.

“His stats look good, he should be fully awake in thirty minutes,” said a deep male voice.

“Holy crap, did you see the time dilation?” exclaimed a raspy male voice.

“Shit! How the hell did this guy survive twenty years?! We have to do something!”

“What? Why?”

“This guy was sent to the Death World for a year! If this is true, he spent twenty years there instead! He’s going to be a fucking psychopath! We’ll lose our jobs over this!”

“But it’s not our fault he reacted this way! How can they blame us?”

“We were supposed to keep an eye on him over the past year. This should have been caught on day two! They’ll know we’ve been skipping out, and not doing everything!”

“Shit! You’re right!” cursed the raspy guy.