Mospeada Fan Fiction / Macross Fan Fiction ❯ Invid Lullaby ❯ Unraveling ( Chapter 14 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

By: gppr

Disclaimer: I do not own Robotech or its characters. This fan fiction was written for entertainment purposes only. No infringement is intended.

Chapter 14

Unraveling

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The amount of security personnel deployed within the diplomatic area required Ambassador Lraon and his escort to move discreetly.

Forcing an isolated street-level access open, the Karbarran group slipped unnoticed into the base's underground: a maze of dark swirling tunnels. Lraon knew the way very well. He had funded the construction of the facility, studied its tentative blueprints and carefully concealed its existence from the Council.

The deployment of such a security force contingent can only mean one thing: they are onto the lab's location, he thought. Stupid Baraka! Your dangerous game can cost us much. I will finish it, at once! The diplomat headed briskly toward the place where the scientist was hiding along that problematic hybrid egg.

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With each slow burning blast, the protector grew numb to the pain. It absorbed energy and it swelled like a bubble of black gel. Inside, the baby cried for his mother. His immature fears traveled around his protector like electric current through a wire, prompting it to shield him at all costs. But the being's barrier wouldn't endure much longer.

Incapable of textual thought, the protector sent a faint distress message. Recollections of burning pain and the baby's piercing cries flowed into a plane where Invid psyches could pick them up.

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The platform where Scott's group had found the hidden tunnel was busy like an ant hill. Lancer and his units had arrived and proceeded to seal off the area from civilians. Scott was all over the place, barking orders hastily while security personnel scrambled to carry them out.

"It's solid metal and concrete, sir..." one man informed, looking at the screen of his scanner. Scott turned to the explosives' expert.

"Can we break through?" The expert scratched his head and looked at the crystalline dome above them.

"If we use too much, we could damage it," he said pointing up.

"Can we or not?" Scott's face didn't leave the Tirollian many options. The expert carefully adjusted sensors on his equipment and took a new batch of measurements. After a while he turned to Scott.

"A set of low powered blasts," he said. "And If we use a barrier to contain the shock wave... we can manage to crack an opening without risking the dome."

"Do it."

The mother waited anxiously trying to stay out of the way as explosives and a barrier were being set up. Something told her she was getting closer to her baby, but strangely, every second that passed found her feeling more desperate. She perceived subtle cries in the back of her mind, flashes of anguish from a familiar source...

Sera could sense her sister's emotional state and felt compelled to comfort her. But the pain Marlene was experiencing, the princess couldn't fully understand. She witnessed sadly and silently, examining Marlene's mental anguish in involuntary detachment. It was the pain of a mother; something no Invid - perhaps the Regiss - had ever felt before.

When all was ready and everyone had been hauled away to a safe distance from the hazardous charges, Lancer came to his wife and Scott to Marlene.

"Explosion in 5 seconds..." announced an artificial voice, "4..."

Quietly, Marlene endured the swirl of sensations invading her mind, but the growing intensity of the feeling was starting to overwhelm her. Somehow sensing this, Scott held her. In the blue irises which shot icy cold looks to everyone but her, Marlene found relief. The Invid realized that sometimes, a human mind's inability to sense what other minds around it felt was a blessing. His determination to find their son was blind and strong. If she could shelter her mind there, she would withstand the distressing flow engulfing her. And so she reached out for him.

"3... 2..."

And somewhere in another plane, she felt he held on to her as well. And in a whisper he told her: all is going to be all right.

"1... "

Concrete and metal blew open.

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A set of guttural booms echoed far and deep through the diplomatic quarter. Without stopping to explain a thing to his perplexed crew, the Ambassador urged them, "move faster!" Following his lead, the posse sped up its stride.A few steps ahead, the lab entrance loomed, concealed behind false panels and thick tubular appendages.

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"What was that?" a startled technician let out, as the faint aftershocks of the explosions on Moon Base's surface reached the depths of Baraka's lab.

"Probably a construction crew," calmed her another.

"I need more power!" yelled Baraka, unaware of the developments brewing above.

"The system can't take any more, sir," ventured a scared technician. The angry bear-like creature moved toward the console.

"Out of my way," he grunted. The technician jumped away at once and watched as the maddened head scientist subverted the auxiliary power to complete his probe.

“Just a few more seconds...” he mumbled to no one in particular.

As the lab's main lights started to flicker, alarms erupted in warning beeps.

“The system is going to collapse!” he heard a Garudan warning. Giving in to the unmistakable signs, Baraka turned all power off. The reddish tones of backup lamps surrounded them. In the middle of the room, the egg's surface cooled down like a dying charcoal. On the consoles indicator lights throbbed, tale-telling the thwarted catastrophe or perhaps, foretelling one.

The egg shook in one last agonizing spasm, its shimmer had faded.

"It's done!" Baraka's yellowish eyes were glued on it, coated with foreboding.

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The recess had come and gone. Inside the Council's chambers, impatient delegates waited. Quiet whispering had blossomed and was now frenzied buzzing. Lraon Burrek, Ambassador for Karbarra was nowhere to be found.

The situation had no precedent. No one dare say it up front, but the Karbarran had orchestrated the whole thing and now against logic, had disappeared half way through the questioning process. If Burrek had a shot at nailing Hunter, this had been it. Where was he? most delegates wondered, and among them Hunter himself waited befuddled.

“Admiral Hunter,” an aide spoke into his ear all at once, “we have gotten word from captain Bernard.”

“What is it?”

“A secret tunnel has been discovered and opened underneath the diplomatic quarter, sir. The captain has requested your urgent authorization to proceed to follow it.”

Rick's expression darkened. A secret tunnel... Lraon gone...

“Give him my go ahead.”

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Security personnel invaded the hidden tunnel, among them, Sera, Lancer, Marlene and Scott. They hadn't gotten far into it when suddenly, the sisters stopped cold, their faces ashen. "I can hear him, Scott! Our baby... I know where he is!" Marlene cried lowly.

“Where!?” He was ecstatic.

“This way,” she said and ran, leading the group. Both Invid could hear the baby clearly now. He was terrified. The sisters' minds closed on his location while his mother tried to comfort him. The Invid felt danger hanging over the little one. That other consciousness that seemed so protective earlier was fading rapidly, it was dying.

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Lraon entered unannounced. The scene came into full view and spoke for itself. Amidst the chaotic lab, the creature rested between robotic arms: a scorched, fuming black mass, most likely lifeless.Not much else to do here, after all, the diplomat thought

"Ambassador... I thought you were... at the Council,” babbled Baraka taken by surprise.

"Is it... dead?" was all Lraon said, approaching the observation window.

"No, of course not," replied Baraka.

The Ambassador turned unbelieving. "Destroy it then! At once!" he ordered coldly.

"What? You... you don't understand! The shell is on the brink of cracking, now we can..."

"Destroy it, I said!"

"We can't destroy it now. It is ready to give us the secrets that we seek!"

"Silence, Baraka! The creature will be destroyed, as it should have, all along!"

"No... NO! I wont allow it!"

"I don't need your permission, Baraka." Lraon turned. "You!" he said singling Moira Blune, "Get rid of it!" Without hesitation, the Garudan proceeded to prepare the lab's equipment for a blast of lethal force.

"No!"Baraka shrieked, torn between stopping Moira or attacking Lraon. He went for the latter, but before his paws could reach the Ambassador's neck, body guards rendered him helpless, pressed face-down to the ground.

"Dispose of him," ordered Lraon.

Not without a fight, Baraka was pushed towards the exit while Lraon readied himself to witness the egg's disintegration. It is time to right this wrong!

"Idiotic fossil! You don't know what you're doing!" Baraka screamed madly. An escort silenced him with a blow on the ursine jaw.

"Blast that thing out of my sight!" Lraon ordered eying the egg, while Baraka was gagged. From the shadows, slick and fast, Baraka's assassin was quick to join his master's captors, helping them drag the fiery scientist outside.

Traitor! Baraka judged angrily.

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Marlene and Sera guided security forces down the tunnels. Time was running out. The Invid sensed pain and a source of energy, growing out of control.

We have to move faster! The mother told Sera. We must transfigure!

We can't risk being seen, sister... Marlene nodded.

“Scott, we wont make it this way. Sera and I can go faster... alone,” she whispered. “You must buy us some time, we shouldn't be seen... transforming.” She could sense his worry, but she was desperate to the point of considering using her Invid abilities, witnesses or not.

“It's dangerous, we don't know who could be waiting there. I can't let you do that!” he replied.

“I must.” She looked at him with pleading eyes. “Our son is in grave danger!”

Loathing to let her go away unprotected, Scott had to cave in. Marlene explained where she and Sera had felt the baby to be. Enabled by the advantages of an energy state, the Invid would use a shortcut.

“I'll be right behind you. Marlene... please be careful,” he told her softly; she nodded.

While Scott continued through the tunnel, the sisters remained behind, setting their plan in motion as soon as the group was out of sight.

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