by A. R. Knight
“Here we have our prize,” the slug thing warbles as we draw close. “The very thing Nasiya sought to keep from us. The proof of our position, of the necessity of peace.”
6 The Captors
Bas isn’t here. It’s the first thing Sax notices, it’s what he focuses on. A pair finds his pair.
The room is a circle, and he’s not in the middle but bunched up on one of the sides. A pair of the mud-like creatures are sitting in the center, playing some sort of game on a table. They look over as Sax begins to stir.
“Wake up? Almost too late,” the one speaking gravel is a clay color, the other one a brown mud. “Boss say to kill you in an hour.”
“Oratus too rare to kill. Boss was joking.” The mud one lurches up from the seat, bits of itself sticking behind it.
Bits that will regrow.
Sax blinks a few times. Reasserts his vision. Pushes his vents to inhale and test the air; clean, but not so pure as on the ship. Space stations, even the ones with the best recyclers, have too much air and too much smell to handle to get the same quality as a small vessel. And Scrapper Station doesn’t have top-tier parts. What Sax gets is the scent of booze, of chemicals and sweat. More than a little bit of blood. Makes his claws tingle. Makes them want to add to it.
But if there’s one thing he doesn’t want to fight, it’s these two. Whatever body lies beneath that rocky exterior is going to take a lot to get to, and there’s more than a little chance of his claws breaking off as Sax tries to dig through that thick skin. So Sax sits up instead. Glances around the plain art in the room; vistas pulled from various planets and stuck around, without any unifying theme or purpose. As if someone simply grabbed what they could find and threw it against the wall. Like Scrapper Station itself.
“Where’s Bas?” Sax hisses.
There’s no headache. No lingering pain. They gave him meds, made sure the Oratus wasn’t too badly hurt. Which means they’re not thinking he’ll be a captive for long. They want to use him.
“Fine,” the clay one says. “Awake. Working.”
“Doing what?” Sax says.
“Business,” Brown says. “Your job too. Keep people honest.”
“We’re part of the Vincere,” Sax replies. “We’re not your tools. We’re not your peons, your employees, your guards. You’ll let us go, or when the rest of the Vincere arrive, you be blown to particles so small nothing in this place will get any use out of you.”
They laugh; a low rumble, like boulders falling and clashing against one another. Perhaps, Sax thinks, that’s because that’s what it is. Rock and earth grinding together. Sax is starting to believe, though, that his threats are losing power. He hasn’t managed to get a single one to work lately. Dalachite on Cobalt certainly didn’t care, neither did the Lunare on Earth, or even the Sevora on that seed ship. The Oratus aren’t what they used to be.
“Save threats for boss,” the clay one rumbles. “You, us, the same. Stuck.”
Sax can’t help but wonder if this is what they’ve been fighting for. All those Oratus that have given themselves, all the Flaum and Whelk supporting them, for these lumps of rock who can’t do anything more than spout nihilistic nonsense. Stuck. Not for much longer.
“Take me to this boss,” Sax says, not bothering to address the clay one’s remarks. “I’m guessing he’ll want to see me.”
This time it’s the brown one that takes the lead, “Us give tour, first.”
Sax waves a claw. Doesn’t object. Might as well see if there’s anything worth knowing about Scrapper Station before he tears it apart.
The two Lutos lead Sax out of the room, and instead of another long, featureless hallway, the room opens right out to a wide floor. It’s a big space, connected to others by half-closed walls with sloping doors. Mirrors drape those walls, casting back reflections of gambling tables and video displays. And those entrapped by them. The sounds of laughter and curses, cheers and jeers echo. Sax is in a place he despises, a place that thrives on chance and making odds against those who choose to partake. It is the antithesis of what the Oratus believe; that preparation can make victory certain.
Like a magnet for his eyes, Sax feels his gaze slide to the right, to a cluster of rollerball tables - where the contestants all take turns pitching colored orbs against a vast target board. The scores change depending on where the balls lands, and whomever happens to find themselves with the highest one wins while the others lose and, of course, the house takes a cut. A little bit of skill, a lot of luck, and Bas looks like she’s had about enough of it. Sax’s pair looms over the bundle of Whelk playing at the tables. Their liquid-like bodies fling the balls one after another, and Sax is compelled to go over there, but the the rock monsters grab his arms and lead him on.
“Later,” the clay one rumbles. “You both stay, anyway.”
Bas gives Sax a slight nod, and that’s all Sax needs to know. She’s safe, bored but okay. Which means he can focus on his two escorts, and where they’re leading him.
It turns out the gambling hall isn’t all that big. One more small room and they’re out, back into the basic interior of the dilapidated station. Sax can still see all the marks where different plates were welded together, pieces scrapped from various wrecks forced into place. A habitat made with the ghosts of others. The core of Scrapper Station is a large open space dotted with tables, benches, people hawking goods and an endless swarm of species in transition from hopeful to hopeless and back again.
Gravity here comes from the spinning, and Sax can feel it in his talons as they grip the metal. A slight shifting, as if his stomach were in a wind tunnel. In here, outside the gambling hall, they’re in the center, where the gravity’s the strongest. Spokes shoot away from this core in all directions.
“How many live here?” Sax asks to gets them talking, revealing something, maybe, he can use.
“Thousand,” Clay says. “More free here, than working for Amigga.”
“Hah,” Brown replies. “Your idea to come here. Now we’re stuck. Watching baby Oratus.”
“Baby?” Sax hisses.
The Lutos don’t answer and the conversation’s over.
They take a walk around the core, with the rock monsters pointing out the way to residential spokes, bars, restaurants, docking bays and the cluster of other services. Medical, waste, manufacturing are all bundled together in their own spokes. Scrapper Station seems a little too well ordered for a place way out here, without an Amigga to run it.
“Ooblots manage things,” the clay one says. “Bosses’ sisters.”
That explains it then. Ooblots are always organized, dedicated. Weak and cowardly. Sax has never met one himself, not counting just a few hours ago. Never wanted to.
Now the Lutos are telling him it’s time. Back to the gambling hall, through a door on the far end. Sax tries to catch another sight of Bas, but she’s not looking; busy with some dispute. Her claws ready. Sax wants to watch, both in case he needs to help, and because there’s something about watching his pair work that’s entrancing. But he doesn’t get the chance. He’s ushered through and this time there is a short hallway. To the right and left Sax can see the rooms where security is monitoring everything. In the back is what he’s expecting; the lush luxury that Ooblots are known for.
There’s a couple of eye stalks standing from the creature as it sits on a velvet red couch. Like a Whelk with an added helping of liquidity, the Ooblot puddles himself around the surface. The skin that Sax thought was yellow is, on closer inspection, closer to gray with plenty of golden blotches from radiation - too much time on Scrapper Station and its poorly shielded hull.
“Sax, right? I am D’Rascale, what do you think of my little enterprise?” The Ooblot says, and its voice is a slap-smack of liquid thwacks as the Ooblot hardens and softens its body, throwing parts of it against itself to make the words.
“It’s a pile of garbage,” Sax replies and bares his teeth, just a little.
“Honesty. I can appreciate t
hat. We all can, especially in a place like this, where lies often travel farther than the truth,” D’Rascale doesn’t get up, doesn’t wave for Sax to move anywhere.
Just stares at him with those two large round eyes set in those stalks.
A long breath of silence. The two Lutos still have hold of Sax’s arms, and the grip is tighter now than it was outside. They think he’s going to attack. That he’s going to fly into some sort of rage. Sax wants to, but his pair is out there. He wouldn’t be doing Bas any favors by getting himself killed here.
“They tell you?” D’Rascale asks.
“I don’t have time for games,” Sax says. “I don’t have time to work for you. An Oratus is not security guard, a janitor, or whatever else you have in mind. We are warriors, we belong at the front. You will hail the Vincere, and you will let us go until they arrive. In exchange, you will be rewarded.”
The Ooblot swings a tendril out wide and, as if by magic, a small servo robot putters over and hands D’Rascale a small drink. The Ooblot places its newly-formed appendage over the lip, and from the center of its “hand”, a pipe-link tube emerges and descends into the liquid, sucking it up with a slurping noise.
Sax eyes the beverage. The last thing he’s had to eat or drink was back on Cobalt. He was too distracted on Plake’s ship, and now his body, sensing a chance to feed itself, awakens.
“It seems you do need something,” D’Rascale says, its left eye rotating on its stalk to focus on Sax’s face. No, beneath his lips, where, Sax realizes, a bit of saliva has snaked itself out and is making its final escape towards the floor.
Sax catches the drop in his right mid-claw. He’s not an animal.
“Your Vincere, if you are so necessary as you claim, will no doubt come for you,” D’Rascale continues. “Until they arrive, we can strike a deal. You work for me, I feed you.” A dwindling pause. “Your pair agreed to it.”
“Liar.” Bas would never agree to something like this. Would never accept servitude, no matter the price.
“She mentioned you might react this way. But here’s the truth, Oratus. You’re stuck here and you have two choices: either you work for me, do as I say and reap the benefits or I have these two throw you out an airlock so you can have the death you so obviously wish for.”
“Is it me that wishes for death?” Sax hisses and then hurls forward, jabbing with his foreclaws and slipping their sharp edges beneath the Ooblot’s slippery body. With his tail batting back the two rock monsters, Sax lifts the creature above his head, then tilts his mouth up and opens wide, so D’Rascale can see just how many teeth will be cutting into him.
But the Ooblot seems unfazed. D’Rascale takes another drink from the glass, still held in its sucking hand.
“This is why you’d be such a good fit here,” the Ooblot says. If being an inch away from death has any effect on the creature, Sax doesn’t see it now. “In fact—”
There’s a shout, then another and a crash from outside the room. Back towards the casino floor. Back towards Bas
Sax doesn’t hesitate; he drops D’Rascale block back on the couch, turns and barges his way up through the door. Down the short hallway and onto a casino floor that’s broken into chaos. Tables are overturned, species are running wildly, and Bas in the middle of it all, her pink-gold tail thrashing what looks like one of the Whelks away from her and sending it flying. Two more slug creatures try to pile her to the ground while another tears the end off of a bar chair and begins to bring it over.
Begins. Sax provides the end.
He takes two long steps and then presses his talons to the ground and launches himself over the large bar in the middle of the floor. He clips some bottles, sends a few glasses tumbling, but the Oratus makes it across in time to catch the advancing Whelk in mid-swing. His claws dive into the gel-like surface of the slug-creature’s skin, digging and scooping and gripping and then he’s throwing the Whelk away.
What should have been a mortal wound for most species hardly fazes the Whelk, and it catches itself on the floor, rolls, and then it wriggles its way upright. You want to kill a Whelk, you have to pierce an organ or cut them all the way in half.
This one, though, with its yellow green skin and wild eyes, doesn’t come charging back. It hesitates, and in that moment Bas turns the odds even further against the slugs. She throws the two things off her - both slamming against the wall next to the rollerball tables - and rises up behind Sax. Now faced with two ready, angry Oratus, the four Whelk decide they’ve already lost enough and run from the room.
“I want them banned,” D’Rascale says, its voice slapping as it slides into the room. “This is the third time those four have decided to end their night damaging my floor. Look how much business I’ve lost. If it weren’t for the two of you, it might’ve been even worse.”
Sax is about to reply that he was just protecting his pair when D’Rascale holds up a flat hand. “I’m not asking for a commitment right this moment. Take a breath, have some dinner. Then tell me if you’d prefer to die, or work.” The Ooblot gestures back to the room he just came from; apparently that’s the Oratus’ temporary refuge.
As much as Sax wishes he could tear D’Rascale apart, he realizes a good choice when he sees one. If he’s hungry and tired, then Bas probably is as well. A chance to talk in private, a chance to be away for a moment from people that want them in servitude, would be nice.
“Take him up on it,” Bas hisses quietly. “For once, put your pride aside and give us a moment.”
Bas settles it. Sax isn’t going to go against his pair. He’s far too tired for that.
The Lutos don’t say a word as the two Oratus retreat to the refuge of the room. The servo robot brings them water and food. Nutrient packs, but also some fresh grown vegetables. Sax stares at the leafy green, likely produced from hydroponics here on the station. It’s such a rarity that Sax overlooks his usual distaste for things that aren’t bleeding and instead delights in the crisp crunchy flavor.
Only after they’ve consumed several pounds of food apiece do the two Oratus settle back on the red couch and look at each other. There’s no more avoiding it.
“We can’t stay,” Sax says. “I won’t work for him. I won’t work for anybody.”
“We’ve been taking orders our entire lives Sax,” Bas replies. “What does it matter if we’re taking orders from an Ooblot instead of Evva?”
“You just said it yourself. It’s not Evva. It’s not the Vincere. This isn’t who we are.”
Bas turns her rose-gold head away, stares at the mirrored walls. Clicks her claws. “We’re weapons, Sax. And weapons are wielded. We’ve just changed hands, is all.”
Sax is about to reply. To snarl and suggest they break their way out right now. Clearly, what Bas needs, is a real fight, not the dusting they had a moment ago. Something to remind her of who she is.
A crackling from an intercom breaks his momentum.
“Sorry for disturbing you, but I feel there is something you should know. It’s coming in off the broad waves.” The Ooblot doesn’t say anything more as a screen descends from the room ceiling. It turns on to reveal a familiar face.
Evva. Reddish-black scales. Next to her, a long list of apparent crimes.
It takes a while for the sound to arrive, for the broadcast to begin to play, and as with anything transmitted over the relays, it’s a grainy, simple sound. But Sax doesn’t need fancy audio to discern the words.
Evva, traitor to the Oratus, to the Chorus, plotter of dangerous crimes and spreader of false rumors, is declared a danger to the galaxy. Any who see her should take all precautions and contact the nearest authorities to ensure this stain on our society is dealt with.
7 Factions and Wars
The Whelk calls itself Jel, and it escorts us out of the chamber when the cheering dies away to fast conversation. Jel, however, brings its own conversation with us, warbling away as we wind through yet another nest of halls. I should feel claustrophobic - most of the building
s of my childhood were open constructs without these narrow corridors - but I’m struck by the art on display.
The Solare, my tribe and kin, use paints from flowers, fruits, and crushed rock to illustrate our history on our towering Tiers, tattoos on our skin, and dyes on the furs and mossweaves that make up our clothes. A form of expression we’ve refined over many generations. One I find beautiful.
And yet.
These hallways ripple. That’s the only word I can think of for how the streams of color dart and dance with one another as we walk. They aren’t images, really, but abstract bursts in constant motion, twirling and mixing and splashing their bright reds, yellows, and blues all across the space. I’ve seen screens now, both on the shuttle here and the space station Cobalt, and these appear more natural, not the product of glowing light.
“Each and every one represents a race in this galaxy,” Jel shifts its speech suddenly, its big, bulbous head shifting towards me. “Their dance is the same one we perform even now, coming together and apart again.”
“It’s beautiful,” I say, and know the words are inadequate.
“Notice how they never break one another?”
I’m about to answer when Viera does for me. “That’s what you’re all about, right? No war? Everyone plays nice?”
Jel nods, or maybe bows; it’s difficult to tell when the Whelk’s head essentially molds right onto its body. Jel slithers on and we follow. This time, when the Whelk resumes its speech, I try to listen.
Nasiya’s faction, Jel says, are called the Hasir. They run Vimelia, and their constant agitation for Sevora independence, war and pride is the source of their power and the Sevora’s overall decline. The Wem, of whom Jel is the elected leader, would see treaties. Would see reconnecting with the galaxy at large.