Orion Colony Complete Series Boxed Set J.N. Chaney (books for new readers .txt) 📖

The three fingers on each of his hands were racing across a holographic control panel. Each button on the control panel was etched in a symbol I did not understand. A wide screen appeared floating in space above us, showing an image of a Remboshi with metal pieces attached to its body.

“Rung,” Tong said, pointing to the image. “Our enemies.”

I took a closer look. The Rung were Remboshi that looked as though they had been genetically altered with technology that made them a bit larger than Tong. These guys had to be a foot taller and had used some kind of genetic enhancing.

It also seemed as though they weren’t afraid to experiment on themselves. The Rung in the picture had a left metal eye, and its right arm was completely mechanical.

Tong motioned to my ear and then again to my hand. It was something we had done in the past. He wanted to communicate with Iris.

“We can do one better for you,” I said, bringing Iris up on the smart pad I still held in my hand opposite the blaster. “Iris, Tong would like a word.”

“Certainly,” Iris said.

Tong rattled off in his language to Iris. It sounded like a series of hard clicks and hisses in my ears.

Iris answered him in his own language. She ended with, “Tong, if you want to learn English, speaking it is the fastest way to learn.”

Tong nodded then cleared his throat, or maybe he coughed; I couldn’t tell.

“Rung once part of my people,” Tong said, pointing to the picture. “Rung obsessed with enhancing body. Break off from main Remboshi clan and begin a war with my people. The Rung create the Zyg, or Iris tell me English name is Legion. Legion become self-aware, try to kill us all, Rung and my people. We hide underground and wait for Great Dawn to save us.”

Tong said this last part pointing at me with proud smile.

“What is Great Dawn?” I asked. “Why do you keep calling me that?”

“A prophecy foretold by our seer,” Tong said. “The Dawn would come once more to our planet.” He pointed to me again with a fat finger. “Humans are the Dawn. You are Great Dawn.”

“Listen, buddy, I wasn’t even supposed to come on this trip. We crash-landed here by accident,” I said, hoping he was understanding everything I was saying. “I’m not sure what this seer of yours told you, but maybe they have it wrong,” I said, shaking my head. “They had too much to drink one night and started spouting nonsense, that’s all.”

“No, you are Great Dawn,” Tong insisted, never losing that smile. “You are Great Dawn.”

“Maybe there’s a better way to go about this,” Stacy stepped in. “Tong, why do you think Dean is this Great Dawn?”

“You all Children of the Dawn,” Tong said with a sharp click of his teeth. “Dean is Great Dawn.”

“Yes, but how do you know Dean is the Great Dawn?” Stacy asked again.

Something must have clicked because Tong’s eyes widened and he went back to his control panel, bringing up another image on the screen above us.

“No freaking way,” I muttered, my voice barely a whisper. “How is that even possible?”

Stacy almost dropped her rifle.

It was a symbol. The same symbol I wore on the medallion hanging from my necklace.

2

I paced up and down the tent erected for Arun to use as an office. It was stationed against the open side of the Orion, the greatest scientific feat of engineering, which had come crashing down, thanks to the hate of a few extremists calling themselves the Disciples.

Now the Orion was nothing more than a massive ball that had been cut down the center. It rested on its side, exposed for the alien world to see. A wall had been erected around the open back half of the Orion.

The wall itself was two stories tall with a catwalk ringing the inside. A pair of watch towers were now under construction on either side of the massive gate that allowed survivors access.

Inside the wall was a city of tents. Those who didn’t want to have to live their lives in the sideways Orion made a home for themselves here. They used the pop-up shelters and tents the ship had carried here.

Each seed ship held enough shelter, food stocks, and supplies for a colony of one hundred thousand. Although half the vessel and many of its supplies had been lost in the crash, we had more than enough. There were only a few thousand of us now.

“Will you stop walking around like that? You’re making me nervous,” Arun told me without looking up from her smart pad. “It’s not going to help.”

“How is that even possible?” I asked, stopping myself from turning in her tent, only to walk down the short diameter of her office again. “I mean, that’s not a coincidence. That symbol is exactly like mine.”

Arun Drake massaged her temples. As an Eternal, her white skin and hair clearly set her apart. The grey uniform she wore was almost laughable under the circumstances, but I got that she still wanted to give the survivors a sense of order. They needed that much right now. It was the uniform the officers aboard the Orion were required to wear, a symbol of order.

“I wish I had more answers for you, Dean,” Arun said with a weary sigh. She exhaled slowly. “The fact is, I don’t. If everything Tong is telling us is true, we have a much larger problem. Legion nearly wiped his people out the first time. What do you think he’s going to do to us?”

“Yeah, and that’s why you have got to tell the people out there what we’re dealing with,” I argued. I didn’t realize how strongly I felt about the subject until now. “You have to tell them everything. How this was no accident, about Legion and about the freaking lizard man we found.”

Anger flashed in Arun’s eyes. She stared at me with those cold blue irises