Read Online Dominion by John Connolly - Free Book Online Page B

said.
    â€œAn entire world?”
    â€œYes. We irradiated it. On my orders.” Paul spoke defiantly, but he was annoyed to feel a blush of shame coming to his cheeks.
    Fara smiled at him, but it was not triumphant, or gloating, merely sad.
    â€œIt’s okay,” she said. “Nothing on it could have been saved from them.”
    â€œYou seem very certain of that,” said Meia.
    Meia had not been present when Paul was forced to act so ruthlessly to halt the breeding program. She had heard something of it from Alis, but had kept her opinions to herself. Privately, though, she was appalled at the probable eradication of all life on the planet, and alarmed at the capacities of the young human lieutenant. But she also recognized a kind of muted admiration for him. No one so young should have been forced to make that decision—nobody of any age, if it came to that—yet he had acted as he thought best, and was now living with the consequences. Still, Meia did not want him to get a taste for such actions.
    â€œI am,” said Fara, “because we were forced to do the same.”
    â€œWe tried to halt their spread,” said Kal. “We failed.”
    â€œAnd then you fled here,” said Meia.
    â€œWe were vulnerable to them in ways that conventional species were not,” said Fara.
    â€œBecause you’re a collective consciousness,” said Syl.
    â€œIf one was infected, all would fall,” said Kal. “Like the Others, we knew of the existence of wormholes, although their knowledge far exceeded our own. This wormhole—the one the Illyri call Derith—is unusual. It is the most remote of those mapped, and the systems beyond it are bordered, at their farthest reaches, by a ring of neutron stars and decaying magnetars.”
    â€œAgain?” said Rizzo.
    â€œNatural defenses,” said Meia. “Neutron stars have magnetic fields more than a trillion times stronger than Earth’s, and incredibly powerful gravitational forces. A magnetar is a rapidly spinning neutron star, again with a colossal magnetic field. They’re not perfect fortifications, and magnetars don’t live long—maybe ten thousand years—but they’re a start.”
    â€œBeyond them we have capture fields, like the one that trapped you and the pursuing vessel,” said Cayth. “Nothing gets through. Here, we are safe.”
    â€œOr prisoners,” said Syl.
    â€œIt is necessary,” said Fara. “From here, we can watch. We created the ancient transmitters that are our sentinels aeons ago, when we still had form, when your kind were just a whisper. Through them, as your conquests grew, we learned more of the Illyri.”
    â€œAnd what about humanity?” asked Paul.
    â€œNot until we glimpsed you on Torma. You are the reason that your crew are here, and not out there.”
    He gestured to the Corps ship.
    â€œWhat are you going to do with it?” asked Syl.
    â€œIt’s contaminated.”
    â€œWhat does that mean?”
    New images appeared before them: the crew of the Illyri pursuit vessel moving about their cabin, or resting in their bunks, but presented like the pictures from an MRI scan, with their internal organs visible: lungs, spinal cord, heart.
    Brain.
    â€œMy god,” said Paul.
    The creatures were clearly visible, wrapped around the brain stems of some of the crew, minute tendrils snaking into their hosts’ brains. Paul counted twelve figures on the ship, and more than half of them were carrying one of the Others.
    â€œYou asked them their mission,” said Fara. “They told you that it was your destruction. Now we must ask you yours.”
    â€œThe Illyri are planning to give Earth to the Others,” said Paul. “We have to stop them. Already, ships bearing spores are no doubt on their way to my home planet.”
    â€œYou can’t stop them,” said Fara.
    â€œI have to.”
    â€œYou