Chapter 32 Olivia and Dustin Discover Things

"Damn it, Jake! Hold up!" Olivia stopped to rest, leaning against the nearest tree. Her belly was getting huge and she was having trouble keeping up.

"Sorry, Olivia," said Jake, returning to her side. He kept looking around in excitement at all of the sights and sounds around them.

Olivia watched him, amazed at the change in his behavior since his PED had finished upgrading and syncing with him. Apparently, he had poor eyesight. The PED had corrected that as soon as he woke up. She was a little jealous that his PED was better than hers. Because it was made from nanobots, it wasn't a large hulking piece of metal attached to his arm, but could change and move throughout his body. He didn't have the genetic material she did, but that didn't mean much to him, as he hadn't had a PED before.

"Is the baby going to be born soon?" he asked, touching her belly softly.

She laid her hand on her belly and laughed. "I don't know when it will be born. I hope not. It's a lot safer in there then it would be out here."

Jake nodded, jerking his head to the side at a noise. It was only a bird, so he relaxed, but she understood. The nanobots had killed all of the robots they encountered, but the aliens were getting more persistent in trying to find and capture them. She didn't want to think about what may have happened to Dustin. Hopefully he would come back soon, from wherever he went.

"Okay, I'm ready. We can go again."

Jake nodded and started leading her through the forest again. They had left the last military base when it was completely trashed. Everything had been left when they left, but someone had gone back and torn everything that might have been useful up. She didn't believe the natives could have done some of the damage, she was leaning towards the aliens being behind the destruction.

Hopefully the next base, which was the last one, would still be intact.

As they broke through some thick brush, a landslide came into view. It looked recent, and Olivia's heart sank.

"The entrance is over here," said Jake, leading her around the landslide.

Pushing some bushes aside, she saw a door, half open and filled with a lot of dirt.

"The hill collapsed after a really bad rain a couple years ago." Explained Jake as they made their way into the darkness.

'PED, can you make the nanobots light up like Dustin had them do before?'

(THEIR BATTERIES WILL DRAIN QUICKLY, BUT I CAN HAVE THEM CYCLE OUT TO ENSURE THAT THERE IS A LIGHT FOR YOU TO SEE DURING YOUR STAY HERE.)

'Thanks.'

A small glowing orb appeared in front of them, and they made their way deeper inside. The hall became cleaner the deeper they went. The air wasn't too stale, thankfully, and soon, they found themselves in a large open hangar. Planes and ships were still sitting, waiting for someone to use them.

Sending a silent thanks to whoever might be watching over them, Olivia rushed up to the first ship, but it had no power. Checking each one out, it became obvious really quickly, that despite them being in good condition, none would work without help. Unfortunately, she didn't have a clue on how to fix them.

'PED, can the nanobots fix the ships?'

(NOT WITHOUT GUIDANCE.)

She sighed and led Jake away from them. They would have to wait for Dustin. Maybe he would get there soon.

XxxxX

Another body went flying through the air as Dustin moved through the hall. They had stopped trying to shoot him. His nanobots were too numerous for any shot to get through.

Reaching the next lab, he opened the door and stepped inside. The sight before him almost made him puke. Bodies were in different stages of dissection on tables throughout the room. He could tell right away they were his people, and a few had even had PED's.

Rage boiled up and he almost lost it, until he spied a computer. Rushing over to it, he used the nanobots to hard hack it. Pulling up information, he quickly found out why the people here had known the names of the aliens involved. They were all part of a massive slave trade hunt. These people were part of a human organization set up by the ancient human military, to discover the secrets of his people. They paid the aliens handsomely for information about them and for any they handed over to them for experimentation.

The number one thing they wanted to know about was his PED. It wouldn't work for anyone other than one of his race, and while he knew it was because his people could change without a PED, they didn't and were determined to discover why.

As he dug deeper, he saw that they were also interested in an ability that he had only seen mentioned once before, an ability they knew of, but hadn't found any specimens with the ability, chrono skimming. It allowed the user to access memories from the past, and not only from their own life, but from everyone they were related to. He scrunched his face in confusion as he read the details they had on the ability. How could they know of such a thing, if they had never encountered it before?

Finally, he found what he was looking for. There was a reference of a specimen with the ability, that had been captured prior to the Josagn War. That specimen was him.

Cursing, Dustin realized all of his people were suffering because of him. They were being hunted and killed because of his PED's and an ability he had as their king.

Skimming through the information he could find, he found a holding cell they had of his people in another area, and information of holding locations scattered throughout the galaxy where they conducted similar experiments.

Crushing the computer, he turned to leave, determined that no more of his people would be killed because of him, only to find himself facing a group of Josagn. The looks in their eyes chilled him, but he only smirked. He wasn't the same Dustin that had gone up against them as before. When they raised their guns, he saw that they were the ones that melted things. Olivia would like a few of those. They were her favorite guns. Maybe if he brought her some, she would forgive him for leaving without warning.