46. Aru

Aru watched as Negal and Julian rappelled toward him, their flashlights casting light on the chasm"s walls. They were both carrying backpacks, which were no doubt filled with emergency medical equipment or maybe just diagnostic devices, and hopefully more portable lights.

The truth was that Aru was ill-equipped to deal with a situation like this, which made him wonder about the motives behind sending his team to find the missing pods and not providing them with proper medical training. If they had been expected to find the Kra-ell alive, they should have been instructed on basic things about the Kra-ell anatomy and physiology and what to do if something went wrong, but they hadn"t even been told what a god"s blood could do.

He had a sinking feeling about that. It was possible that his team was supposed to confirm that everyone in the pods was dead, and if they found any survivors still alive, they would be commanded to eliminate them.

Finding Kra-ell, who had already woken up from stasis, must have been a nasty surprise to the Eternal King and his cronies.

Or was it the queen?

She was the one who had pulled strings to have Aru arrive on Earth, but her motives were different. She wanted him to find out if the exiled gods had survived. His team"s official mission was finding the Kra-ell, and that was on the king"s orders or those below him who were loyal to him.

Aru would probably never find out.

The fact was that if not for Aria"s training as a healer, he wouldn"t have known what a god"s blood could do. Therefore, he couldn"t help save Kra-ell crash survivors unless their chambers had remained intact and kept them alive and well until they were found.

Following that thought, perhaps he didn"t need Julian to revive the twins. He could probably do it with his, Negal"s, or Dagor"s blood. Then again, no one knew how the hybrid creatures would react to it, and he didn"t want to take responsibility for messing things up and accidentally killing them.

Perhaps he was wrong, and the command to eliminate them wouldn"t come.

In any case, it was better to leave it to the clan"s doctor. If Kian had asked him explicitly to assist with a transfusion, he wouldn"t have said no, but he wouldn"t have volunteered for it either.

As Julian and Negal reached the bottom and unclipped themselves from the ropes, Aru could see the hesitation in their eyes as they debated where to stand.

With the pod dome open, there was no place for their feet other than stepping over the stasis chambers.

"That"s okay," Aru said. "They are not going to break, and since their inhabitants are most likely dead, they can"t complain about it either."

"Morbid humor?" Julian asked as he carefully maneuvered over the curved tops of the chambers, pulled out a portable work lamp, turned it on, and placed it at an angle that allowed the light to spread over the entire pod interior. "You didn"t ask me to come here just to confirm that everyone is dead."

"I"m not known for my sense of humor," Aru said. "It"s just the way things are. The way the pod is designed doesn"t leave space between the stasis chambers. They are like peas in a pod."

The doctor regarded the pod"s interior with curiosity. "I guess no walk paths are needed since everyone inside is in stasis, and the pod is supposed to navigate itself."

"Precisely," Dagor said. "This is a very old model, but the new ones operate on the same principle. The stasis chambers are always inside escape pods to be automatically ejected in an emergency."

While standing together, Aru pulled his earpieces out of his pocket. "Before opening the stasis chambers, I want to remind everyone to put their earpieces in. I know it"s most likely unnecessary given their state, but Kian asked us to follow the protocol, and I won"t argue with that." He smiled. "His paranoia must be rubbing off on me."

Julian didn"t smile as he looked at him. "I do not doubt that Kian"s so-called paranoia has saved the clan from annihilation on more than one occasion." He let out a breath. "It"s human nature, or rather I should say it"s the gods" nature since we are all your descendants, to project our values and beliefs onto others. That"s why good people are such easy victims of evil. They don"t expect it, they don"t prepare for it, and many don"t believe it even exists." He paused, his gaze sweeping over them. "But we all know that it does. I"m a young immortal, and the massacre of the villagers in Acapulco wasn"t my first encounter with evil, but it was the worst. Kian has seen countless examples during his long life, so his so-called paranoia is well justified."

Aru nodded. "You are right. It"s better to expect the worst and be pleasantly surprised when it doesn"t come to pass than to be caught off guard by something we didn"t anticipate and be too late to do anything about it." He waited until every one of them had their earpieces in. "Let"s start opening the pods one at a time. Dagor needs to take pictures and record the lack of vitals to prove what we found, so please stay quiet and out of his camera view while he does that."

Julian nodded. "It doesn"t matter to the dead when I jump in, but if we find any alive, I suggest that Dagor does it quickly because I won"t wait longer than a couple of seconds."

Aru paused with the earpiece in hand. "On second thought, perhaps we can wait to film until after we verify whether the person inside is dead or alive."

It didn"t matter if all of them were gone, but if any had survived, perhaps it was better not to record it just yet.