Gage saw Leviticus get on board the helocarrier taking Iona away. Gage had guns pointed at him from inside the carrier until it lifted off and that moved to Leviticus once they were in the air.
Back in the room, Gage had been less than surprised when Leviticus had said he was happy to go with them. Benediction said they had disabled the Danger Zone and it was obvious Leviticus did not want to be stuck with Gage at Sleeping Beauty Inc. headquarters on Io. The Voynich choir boys were happy to have Leviticus, but they did warn him that he would have guns trained on his head in case he tried to rescue Iona.
Gage watched the helocarrier fly away and reflected on how little Leviticus’ defection hurt him. He knew he could never trust anyone who looked like him.
Not only that, but Gage was optimistic when he saw the parts of the Danger Zone that were sitting in the sand. Benedict’s choir boys had opened the hood and ripped out whatever came out easily. The piles would have discouraged someone with less know-how than Gage. He was not bothered. He cracked his neck, went to the boot of the helocarrier, and retrieved the toolbox.
He put Iona out of his mind and rebuilt the engine and the cooling systems. He replaced the rupter with a fresh one from the back and stowed the one they’d pulled out. Maybe it had a little juice left in it, but Gage wasn’t interested in testing it and was happy to put in a new one.
When he was finished, he got in the pilot’s seat and programmed his watch to alert him if there was any seismic activity surrounding Loki. Then he triangulated the best route and then the route from the volcano to the Tranquility Mansion Voynich’s followers would retire to after they had finished with Iona. If he was lucky, they wouldn’t see him approach as they would be moving in a different direction through the mountains and dunes. Of all the things he needed, he did not need them shooting at him. His helocarrier wasn’t armed and even if theirs wasn’t either, the men inside were armed to the teeth.
Out over the sand, he saw Jupiter glowing. It was a magnificent sight, so beautiful and so enormous. The gas giant always reminded him of how small he was. What did it matter what he did with his life if he was so insignificant?
He slapped himself.
He wasn’t insignificant if he saved Iona.
His systems were silent as he sped along the yellow sands. He had almost circled Loki before he saw her. She was tiny, a little figure stretched over the seam between two tectonic plates. He rushed to her, hovered above her, and dropped down near her.
“How are you doing?” he asked as the helocarrier blades above him stilled.
“I’m good!” she shouted.
He slid down a dune and arrived at her side.
Aside from the sand, she kept spitting, she actually did seem fine. She smiled at him. “Could you scratch my nose and if you have something I could swish my mouth out with, that would be beauteous.”
“Uh, yeah. Sorry for blowing all that sand in your face when I landed. I even buried one of your stakes. You’re really okay?”
“I’m great,” she said with a yawn. “The water, Gage?”
“Yeah.” He hurried up the dune and retrieved a water bottle that had come with the carrier. He slid back to her, unscrewed the top, and held it for her while she swished.
“It’s so nice of you to come and sit with me,” she said with a dreamy smile.
“Come to sit with you?” Gage asked in confusion. “I came to dig you out. There’s a shovel in the back. I’m going to dig out your stakes.”
“Ah. You don’t need to do that,” she said in a huff. “I want to see where this goes.”
“You’re interested to see if Jupiter’s gravity tears you in half along with the moon under you?” he asked incredulously.
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“Yes. I want to know if I deserve a second chance,” she explained.
“Forget that. You want to know if Jupiter can rip you in half? Yes, Jupiter can rip you in half. You see that red spot on the surface? There’s a storm raging there where winds are going four hundred and fifty kilometers per hour. Nothing about Jupiter is safe. You can’t land there. It is a death zone. Why does a hostile planet get to judge you?”
“I want to know If I deserve a second chance!’ she hollered at him, but her voice trembled a bit at the end of her statement.
Gage stared at her. What was going on inside her head that this trial by gravity made sense?
He got his shovel and started digging next to the stake that held her right hand.
“Stop it, Gage. I don’t want to be saved. There are probably satellites watching us and I don’t want The Church of Voynich to think I was cheating during their trial.
“Is that because you saw Benediction and you suddenly decided he’s better than me? Scratch that. You always thought he was better than me,” Gage said through set teeth. “That’s what this whole trip was about. Getting you a husband? Do you think he’ll be interested in marrying you if you can survive this test? You’ll be purified and he’ll want to crown you with the cross of the church? Is that what you think?” Gage was getting hysterical. The tone of his voice was belying his panic.
“This has nothing to do with Benediction!” Iona defended. “It’s just that I feel… unworthy.”
“Unworthy?” he repeated, digging harder. “You think there’s something that can happen to you that corrupts your innate worth? You wanna tell me about the abuse you’ve suffered? You think I will look down on you because you feel broken? Your feelings are not facts, they’re squirts of chemicals in your head. You don’t have to listen to them! That’s why I always liked you more than the other girls!”
“What?”
“You didn’t complain! You didn’t whine or cry. I thought you’d overcome whatever snot your brain was producing and overcome the part of your brain that makes you panic. I admired you, but that wasn’t true, was it? Instead, you just didn’t feel like fighting for yourself. Well, Iona, I feel like fighting for you.”
“You have to stop!” she cried.
“Yeah, I’m not freaking listening to you anymore,” he said, suddenly kicking the spike that had staked her to the stand. It fell. “Our contract is over. You’re not my boss any more.” Gage pulled the massive spike and rolled it over to her right foot. “If the fissure tears, you’ll be torn in half in the middle, is that right?”
“Yeah, but… you…”
“Stop talking,” he said firmly. “I have work to do.”
The ground started to heave under him. Tiny motions, but enough to make Gage hurry to her left arm and start digging.
“You have twenty hours left according to this clock in this spike. Do you have any idea what twenty hours of exposed sand against the skin on your face will do? It isn’t like the sand on Earth or the sand on Mars. Prolonged exposure to this sand will burn you, like acid. This isn’t just about whether or not you live through the ordeal. It’s also about torturing you as you wait for your death sentence or your release.”
“I don’t… care… probably.”
“I care,” he said crankily as he dug up her second pole.
She was crying by the time he pulled the second pole free and allowed it to roll to her left foot.
Having finished the most urgent work, he stopped and had a water break by the Danger Zone. If the crack opened, it was unlikely to kill anyone, unless the cut in the moon’s surface was large enough to swallow her, him, and the helocarrier.
He mopped his forehead with the front of his shirt and got to work on the foot spikes. Gage hadn’t been working on the third one for very long before he stopped. He dropped his shovel, took a few steps back, and kicked the stake.
“What’s the matter?” Iona asked.
“It’s in rock. They drove it into the rock!”
The ground under them heaved harder. There were three huge rocking movements before what had merely been a line on the ground under her was now a gap where the rocks had been ripped asunder. The side that had originally had her arms staked to it was lifted two meters in the air. The half with Gage and Iona on it heaved and the ground tilted.
Gage rushed to Iona, but he wasn’t fast enough to stop both the spikes he had released from rolling toward the gap and pulling Iona’s arms with them.
Iona screamed.
He watched in horror as the spikes fell together inside the crack. He rushed to the edge. She was on her back and lacked the leverage she needed to pull them up. He grabbed the chain connected to her right arm and pulled hard. The spike weighed too much. It was intended to be handled by two men, but Gage lifted it feeling tiny tears in his arms and chest as he did so.
The ground kept bucking, but Gage got to Iona’s other side and pulled the second spike up. He pushed it toward the spikes that still secured her feet.
The rock under him heaved one last time and on the slick sand, Gage fell.
Iona called after him, but he fell between the rocks and, without a sound, he slid out of sight.