A Pale Dawn

by Chris Kennedy

As he opened another door, he realized he had never been this far into Nemo’s domain before. Looking at the door, he wondered if anyone knew the Wrogul was using this room.

  Prime Base was well over three kilometers on a side. Even with 70,000-plus employees and dependents, they weren’t using a tenth of the station. Nemo could have moved into a hundred additional rooms, and likely nobody would have noticed.

  “Close the door, please,” Nemo’s voice echoed slightly, his translator rendering the Wrogul’s light pulses into English.

  “Nemo, where are you?” The room was almost completely dark, and the open door cast an elongated rectangle of light onto the floor. Sato could see some of the light reflecting from huge upright cylinders in the room.

  “Further back in the chamber. The light disturbs the Bregalad; please close the door.”

  Bregalad? he thought as he returned and closed the door. He had never met a Bregalad. Sato accessed his pinplants, ran a recording feature on what he was seeing, took the recording and ran a light intensifying subroutine on it, and viewed it in a mental window. The effect was similar to night vision goggles. The delay between his eyes receiving the image and his viewing it was only five milliseconds, below his ability to notice. Now that he could see, he looked around…and stopped in his tracks.

  “Entropy!” he cursed. “Nemo, what is going on here?” He walked over to the nearest cylinder, a big glass container, with a Human floating inside.

  “It’s a project,” Nemo said. “I’m trying to finish something that was interrupted.”

  Sato looked around the room and found a total of six identical cylinders, each with a body in various conditions. He couldn’t see physical details of the body inside beyond that it was Human and appeared to be an adult male. The one he was looking at appeared to be missing part of its head.

  “Are these actual Humans?” Sato asked.

  “Of course,” Nemo replied. The Wrogul’s robot transport rolled down the lines. A tracked base with six robotic arms and a big, round, glass fish tank on its back, Nemo used the device to move around the world of Humans. He didn’t have legs and could barely move out of water, unlike the Selroth. He could exist outside of water for hours at a time, though, unlike the octopus he so resembled. Nemo stopped next to Sato and looked at him. Unlike a terrestrial octopus, he had two bright blue—almost Human—eyes.

  “Nemo,” Sato started, thinking through what he wanted to say, “are you experimenting on Winged Hussars personnel?”

  “Of course not,” Nemo said. “This person is dead.”

  “Person?” Sato looked at the five other cylinders. “I see six people.”

  “No, they are all the same.”

  “Okay,” Sato said, trying another tack. “How are they all the same?”

  “The Bregalad made them that way for me.”

  Sato narrowed his eyes. That was the second time Sato had referred to it as the Bregalad. He accessed his pinplant records and searched for the name in common spelling. Bingo. Bregalad: one of only a handful of flora species in the galaxy, they were an exotic with unexplained medical talents including being able to exactly reproduce just about any biological toxin, chemical, or cellular structure. Kuso, he cursed. Oh, Colonel Cromwell is going to be pissed. “Nemo, does the colonel know you have a Bregalad on Prime Base?”

  “No, why would she?”

  “Because SOP is that any and all sentient aliens have to go through quarantine and approval.”

  “Oh, that.” Nemo floated sideways and looked at the second cylinder. Sato could see a shadowy shape moving inside. “The Bregalad aren’t actually sentient, at least not as you would see it.”

  “They’re an exotic, Nemo,” Sato explained, “just like you. The Galactic Union classifies them as sentient.” He read a little more. According to the GalNet, supposedly the Bregalad only worked for the Veetanho. Entropy, how did he get one of these?

  “We need to report you have a Bregalad,” Sato said, finding himself in the rather strange situation of being worried about someone else breaking a rule. A part of his mind realized for the first time some of the consternation he might have caused over the years. “Maybe if you tell me where you got it?”

  “I have six of them,” Nemo said. “They have proven remarkably easy to breed. You see, they didn’t like where they were before. They are quite happy now, though.”

  Sato moved closer to the cylinder next to him and let his light gathering program work. Sure enough, it wasn’t just a body. He could see it was wrapped in vines, wrapped around the body, slowly prodding it in places. Where it prodded, new bits would be attached. It’s making a body, Sato thought. Fascinating!

  “Nemo, why did you do this?”

  “Breed the Bregalad?”

  “That too, but no, I meant make these bodies? What use is having six corpses?”

  “They’re not corpses,” Nemo explained. “They are quite alive. You see, it began when I was helping a crew member attempt to repair damage to his brain. It was a quite fascinating case, and I was enjoying myself greatly. Then he went and got himself killed. They didn’t bring the body back for me to work on, and I wasn’t content with computer models. I had one Bregalad which I’d been studying, and I had an idea.

  “I gave the Bregalad some samples of the Human and it began to rebuild him for me. As it worked, it became easier to communicate. You see, if a Bregalad doesn’t have things to do, it kind of goes to sleep. Well, it eventually bred, and I needed to keep that one busy, too. So you see, that’s why I have six copies now.”

  “They’re clones?” Sato asked.

  “Not specifically, no. They’re exact copies.”

  Brain damage, Sato thought. He moved down the line of tubes, each one holding a Human body, which was further along in its reconstruction process than the one before it. When he reached the last one, it was complete in every way Sato could see. Complete enough that he recognized the face.

  How am I going to explain to Colonel Cromwell that Nemo made six copies of Corporal Rick Culper? Sato asked himself. The body inside the tube opened its eyes and looked at him, and Sato screamed like a little girl.

  * * * * *

  Chapter Eight

  Manaus, Main Continent, Chislaa

  Sansar snuck up to the edge of the forest, keeping behind large trees as much as she could. While the interior of the jungle was relatively open, the edge was less so, as the flora competed for the additional sunlight and water available there.

  Eventually, she worked her way up to the tree next to the one Mun was sheltered behind and eased out to look at the city wall. After a second, she gasped and dialed her magnification up to maximum. In addition to the wide-open killing ground they’d have to cross, the automated sentry guns, and the roving patrols of HecSha which could be seen, there was something new.

  “Son of a bitch!” Sansar exclaimed. “Those are Humans on top of the wall!”

  “Yeah. I had one of the snipers take a look. He said there are at least two Humans chained to every single one of the sentry guns he could see. He didn’t go all the way around the city, but I suspect if they’re in one place, the damn lizards have people chained to all of them.”

  “That’s going to complicate things,” Sansar noted. “We can’t just go in there, guns blazing, nor can we pre-emptively take out the turrets, or we’re going to kill a lot of innocents.”

  “And pretty much do Peepo’s work for her,” Mun noted. “Just like I’m sure she wants us to.”

  “I swear to Blue Sky Above, that rat is going to have me hating aliens more than damn Nigel Shirazi!”

  Mun chuckled. “Easy, Boss. One bad rat doesn’t a bad pack make.”

  “This time, I think it does. Once we kick those damn rats’ asses, there’s going to have to be some changes made in the Merc Guild.”

  “Shoot, ma’am, I kind of expected that would happen all along. I never figured you or Colonel Cromwell—or especially Colonel Shirazi—would take what they’ve done to us and
not make some…adjustments…once we’re through with them.”

  “But first we’re going to have to figure out how to get into that city.”

  “Got any ideas on how we’re going to do that, Colonel?”

  Sansar sighed. “No, not yet. Let’s go back and see what we can figure out.” She took a last look at the city, trying to etch the defensive positions into her mind. Mun turned to leave but then froze.

  “Move very slowly,” Mun cautioned.

  Sansar turned slowly to see three of the “Baby MinSha,” as her troops had taken to calling them. All three were armed with sharpened sticks whose points looked like they’d been hardened in fire. One was a little closer, with the other two a little farther back, making a V formation. They all brandished their spears at the CASPers.

  “Well, hello there,” Sansar said.

  The creatures all waved their spears again, before dropping back into a defensive stance.

  “That would be kind of cute,” Mun said, “if I didn’t think they were really trying to threaten us with those things.” She chuckled and then added, “Not that there’s anything they can do with those sticks except stick them between our legs as we walk and trip us. Want me to take care of them?”

  “No,” Sansar said. “I have a feeling if they wanted to attack us, they would have done so while our backs were turned.”

  “Maybe they have some code against stabbing people in the back. If so, maybe we could get them to explain it to certain guild leaders I know…”

  Sansar laughed once. “If I thought she’d listen, I’d try it.” She knelt on one knee and held out both hands to show they were empty. “Hello, little guys,” she said to the creatures. “You don’t really want to try to stick us with those things now, do you?”

  The one in front gestured toward the city with its spear and said something. A notice popped up in Sansar’s mind. “Language not recognized. Closest linguistic variant is MinSha. Use this?” Sansar mentally clicked on Yes, and the suit translated.

  “Evil. Expiry,” the alien said.

  “An evil expiration?” Mun asked. “Is that what that thing just said?”

  “My suit had it as two words,” Sansar said. “Evil. Expiry. Did your suit think it was MinSha, too?”

  “Yeah, but those little things are hardly MinSha. They aren’t even half the size of a MinSha.”

  “I don’t know,” Sansar replied. In MinSha, she said slowly, “I don’t understand you. What do you mean, ‘Evil Expiry’?”

  “Are you messengers of the gods?” the alien asked. “Bad beings come, carrying death.”

  “Oh!” Sansar said. “He’s talking about the HecSha coming and killing them. Maybe they’ll help us.”

  “What are they going to do? They can’t throw those sticks any great distance; they’ll all be dead before they cross half the killing zone.”

  “I don’t know, but they live here. Maybe they know something we don’t.”

  “Well, can we at least take them back to camp, rather than stand here almost within sight of the HecSha? I’d hate to start our discussion with them by having us all get killed.”

  Sansar felt her cheeks redden inside her suit. I should have thought of that! “Yes, let’s take them back to camp.”

  She turned to leave, but the creatures got agitated and shook their spears. “Come, Messengers!” the leader said. “Home!” He pointed in a different direction.

  “Yes. We’re going to take you to our home,” Sansar said. She continued walking, although she watched them out of her rear camera.

  They continued to brandish their spears and shout, “Home!”

  “I’m going to have a hard time not shooting them if they throw those spears,” Mun said.

  “Oh, don’t be a baby. The spears can’t hurt us.”

  Sansar and Mun were almost out of sight of the three creatures when they huddled up, shaking their spears at each other as they discussed something at a high volume. Sansar hoped it wasn’t loud enough that the HecSha came to investigate. After about twenty seconds, though, the group apparently came to an agreement and raced to catch up with the two CASPers, following about ten meters behind.

  “We’re coming in,” Sansar transmitted on the company net as they approached the area they were using as their base. They had found another one of the metal lids, and Mun had delegated a squad to clean it off so they could set up a portable Tri-V projector to use for planning.

  “We have three of the bugs with us,” she added. “They appear to be sentient, but unsophisticated. Be careful not to scare them.”

  Sansar and Mun, along with the aliens, approached the metal lid where the man they’d found, along with the Horde platoon leaders, were waiting, all still wearing their CASPers.

  “Holy shit!” the city man yelled when he saw the creatures following Sansar. “Quick! Shoot them! Shoot the bugs!”

  For their part, the aliens started shouting something that sounded very much like the word they’d used for “Evil Beings,” while they brandished their spears. The man pulled out the laser pistol he’d been given, aimed, and fired at one of the creatures, but Sansar stepped in front of it and deployed her laser shield. The bolt deflected away harmlessly.

  “Ow!” the man yelled as one of the platoon leaders stepped forward and swatted his arm. Although he didn’t use the full force of the CASPer, it was obvious the man’s arm was broken. Still, he bent over to pick up the pistol with his other hand.

  “Stop!” yelled Sansar, her speakers set to maximum. The man froze, and the creatures ran to hide behind Mun’s suit. “Sergeant Wyatt!”

  “Yes, ma’am!” said the medic, hastening over to the group.

  “Take him somewhere else,” Sansar said, pointing to the city man, “and tend to his arm. Make sure he doesn’t interrupt us again.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the sergeant replied and led the man away.

  “Now,” Sansar said in MinSha, turning to the aliens. “What was that all about?”

  * * *

  Tunnels, Underdeep, Paradise

  The world jumped, throwing Walker’s CASPer into the side of the tunnel and then the ceiling, before finally depositing him on his side on the floor. Additional aftershocks bounced him off the walls but weren’t strong enough to bounce him off the ceiling again.

  “That fucking sucked,” someone muttered, but Walker was too stunned to tell who.

  “What the hell was that?” someone else asked.

  Walker shook his head to clear it as he climbed back to his feet. “Hurray,” he said darkly. “I think we finally pissed them off enough to get them to start bombing us.”

  “Wha-what?” several of the troopers asked.

  “If you ever wondered what it felt like to have a nuke go off above your head while you were underground, you don’t have to wonder anymore,” Walker said, “because you just experienced it.”

  Several more blasts shook the tunnels, although they were farther away, and the shaking was markedly less. They were followed by something Walker found far more ominous—quiet.

  “What the hell?” asked one of the troopers. “Now what are they doing?”

  “Probably assessing the damage from the first round,” Walker replied, “and looking to see if they need to hit us again…or maybe use bigger bombs on the second go-round.”

  “You think there’ll be another round?” the same trooper asked.

  “We’re still here, aren’t we?” Walker replied. “I don’t think—”

  “Colonel Walker!” a high-pitched voice interrupted. “Colonel Walker! Where are you?!”

  Walker turned to see a boy of about ten years old running between the CASPers assembled at the cave-in. While they could hear the Merc Guild forces on the other side of the tunnel collapse working to clear the rubble, they were still going to be a while.

  He opened his canopy and yelled at the boy. “I’m Walker,” he said, once he had the boy’s attention. “What do you want?”

  “They just…
sent me…to find you,” the boy said, his chest heaving. “The bugs…have broken through…the tunnel…to Dixia Cheng!”

  “Broken through?” Walker asked. He waved toward the collapse. “They didn’t break through. We stopped them.”

  “No, not those…tunnels,” the boy said, trying to catch his breath.

  “Wait. There are more tunnels?” He turned to Ferguson’s second-in-command, Rachel DuBois. “You didn’t tell me there were more tunnels.”

  “There aren’t!” she replied. “This is the only one.”

  “No!” The boy exclaimed. “They’re coming through the air vent.”

  “What?” DuBois asked. “There’s no way! The air shafts aren’t big enough for them to go through there.”

  “They’re fucking roaches,” Walker replied. “Going through air vents is what they do.” He closed his canopy and transmitted on the squadnet, “Saddle up everyone! We’ve got a break-through!”

  He got down on one knee, so the boy would know he was talking to him. “Take us there,” he said. “Right now.”

  * * *

  Winged Hussars Prime Base, New Warsaw Star System

  The last thing Sato wanted was for anyone to see him screaming like a child in a horror movie. Luckily, the only one who saw him act that way was an alien who didn’t understand Human reactions in the least. After Sato got over the shock, he looked at Nemo in his mobile tank. The Wrogul was just looking back with his two, big, lidless, almost Human, blue eyes.

  “Entropy,” Sato said, trying to swallow his heart again, “is he conscious?”

  “No, of course not!” Nemo said. “I haven’t uploaded a consciousness yet. I was thinking about just—”

  “Wait,” Sato said, holding up both hands. “Did you say upload a consciousness?”

  “Yes.”

  “You can do that?”

  “Of course.”

  Sato had calmed from the shock of seeing a copy of Rick Culper open his eyes, and now he was excited by what he’d heard. “How do you do that?”