by F. E. Arliss
Gradually Jullian was able to relax and began to try to make sense of the load of information floating by her mind. It was everything she needed to know, she realized finally. Stopping her wandering mind, she began to concentrate first on the mechanisms of the helmet she wore. Slowly its full function became clear. She could monitor every system in the ship from this head set. It held the language, history, and the entire database of all Idolum history, nests, languages, and business provinces. It was thousands of years worth of information. No wonder she felt like she was going to drown from it.
It would take her months to learn everything. Even though the information seemed to stream directly into her brain. She wondered if she disengaged from the helmet if she’d still have access to everything she’d seen. Slowly, mentally, she commanded the helmet to disengage. Lifting the contraption with a breath of relief, she sat up. Yep, sure enough. She still had command of the detailed information the helmet had held. With a grin to Dent, she lay back down.
It would take several months, maybe years to learn all the helmet had to ‘download’. That is what it was like, it was like a ‘download’ directly into her brain. She might as well get started. Focusing, she dwelt on the thing she most wanted to know about...Queen Altum Vis.
Chapter Eleven
Information Osmosis
It had taken her six months to learn the provenance of the slimy pool of glowing green scum in her quarters. When she did, it freaked her out for two days and she slept on the bridge for a night. Even the comfort of the ‘queen nest’ couldn’t call her back.
Turns out the pond scum was actually the dessicated knowledge/soul remains of the actual Queen Altum Vis. When Queens died, they had to be lowered as soon as possible into the ‘Queen nectar,’ as it was known. The nectar was actually a type of living being that recorded energy signatures. The primordial broth was how the helmet described it. The ultimate dishonoring of a Queen was to ‘not’ put her in the broth. Someone, at least, had respected Queen Altum Vis.
When a Queen died, the new queen was then interred next to her in the nectar and all the old Queen’s knowledge and ‘gifts’ were passed through the nectar to the new Queen. She was not a true Queen until the detritus on the surface of the pond was absorbed into her body in its entirety.
In other words, that scum floating in the pond was Queen Altum Vis. She’d never received her new queen, so she was still there. Freaky and disconcerting. Though all this Idolum stuff was getting less freaky with time. Every day as she used the helmet, the new information seemed more and more natural and less and less freaky. Still this gave the meaning of ‘pond scum’ a whole new meaning. Jullian shivered, then burst out laughing.
Back on Earth there’d been this over-priced line of cosmetics called Broth de Mer, which supposedly was made from some type of sea algae. The founder had called it the ‘primordial broth’ and charged a fortune for it. Jullian, ever frugal, had never purchased it. The thought of the sea algae con and the primordial broth of an alien species being so different just made Jullian laugh at the gullibility of humans. Unless, of course, we were interested in absorbing the knowledge of single cell sea algae.
The real cause of the unsettling feelings the news gave her, was that she then had to consider whether or not she should submerge herself in the broth. Would Queen Altum Vis kill her in the broth? How sentient was this stuff anyway? Was she an imposter that Vis would drown, dissolve, or perpetrate other types of horrible endings on? It was mind-boggling.
She ignored the pond for another three months, learning each and every day more of the Idolum culture and history. Interestingly, she was actually getting current information, too. Almost by accident she wondered about the nest and General Montav. Instantaneously, an image of the nest came to mind. They were well hidden behind the moon of a small planet. The planet itself teemed with plants and wildlife. It was a good choice for sustaining them. It was also far, far out from any other established nest. Good, they were safe, Jullian thought with satisfaction. She was glad to be able to view the ‘home’ planet even though she’d never been there.
When she cast her thoughts to Shale --she refused to call him a general now -- she was not surprised to find that he’d rejoined his original nest, though at a significant demotion. He was probably currently plotting his way back to the top, thought Jullian with disgust. Ass hat! The helmet had given her a huge amount of information about Shale. She knew his birth, his long climb to power, and his close association with Queen Altum Vis. What shocked her the most was that he’d been Queen Altum Vis’ general clear up until her death. Jullian wondered if he was Vis’ murderer. Probably, slimy snake, Jullian thought.
It wasn’t until danger pressed in on General Montav and the nest that Jullian finally took the ‘plunge,’ so to speak. And even then, it wasn’t a plunge so much as a tiny tiny dip of one finger. Sitting in her quarters, worried sick about the closing presence of human explorers into the nest’s galaxy, Jullian took a deep breath and slipped one finger slowly into the pool. Dent and Axel stood at the ready. Her orders had been to pull her out if she showed any distress at all.
At first, she felt nothing. Slowly, she saw some of the ‘pond scum’ start to cling a bit to her finger. A strange tingling sensation started on her scalp. Her hair began to twist and writhe in the same manner it had back on the frontier colony when she’d been so enraged with Shale.
Oh boy, I hope this doesn’t mean she’s enraged with me, Jullian thought with sudden panic. Yanking her finger out of the pool, she stared down into the green depths. A vague shape glimmered at the bottom of the pond, then disintegrated. Holy shit!, Jullian thought. That was her! Making sure that every bit of scum was dripped back into the pond. Jullian flopped onto the nest bed and closed her eyes.
Did she feel any differently? A small burning knot of anger simmered in her belly. That hadn’t been there before, had it? Well, actually yes. She’d been worried about the Khyberian nest. Underneath that, she’d been angry that they were being threatened. So maybe, yeah, she’d been angry, just not too in touch with it. Instead, she’d been concentrating on knowledge. Knowledge she was obtaining from the helmet, the ship, and now from the primordial broth. Maybe it was time to let go of the past and take a grim grip on the future.
Chapter Twelve
The Crew Wakes
Telling Dent to let the shuttle they came in go was an enormous decision. It was taking energy from the other systems, and she needed Talio running smoothly and fully as soon as possible. Slowly, function by function, they brought Talio to life. They did each section slowly, not wanting to have to concentrate on several sections at once. Jullian felt that she had a full understanding of the ship, but only fools rush in. She was certain that saying was true now. She’d been a fool. Still probably was, but wasn’t going to rush into anything again.
The hardest part had been waking the small crew that had been in hibernation stasis. Dressing with care in one of the more worn of the Queen Altum Vis’ outfits, Jullian was hoping that upon waking, the crewmen would recognize the outfit, if not the woman wearing it.
Ordering Dent and Axel to open the first pod had been a moment of pure terror. This was the test. Would they accept her as their Queen, or would it be a mutiny? Nodding to Dent, she requested he proceed with the pod’s opening. Gas hissed as the stasis pod was disengaged, lights turned from pink to green, then the hood slid back into the bulwark as if it had never existed. A groggy, but recovering Idolum warrior spilled out onto the moist deck. Heaving with deep breaths, the warrior was helped to his feet and gently restrained by Dent and Axel.
Raising his head, the warrior stared at her. According to the information Jullian had from the Talio, this was Kor, the prime warrior of Queen Altum Vis, and the right hand of General Shale. Talio had even given her a command that Queen Altum Vis had used to signal that any communication that followed was to be solely between the two of them and not shared with General Shale. That tidbit had Jullian raising her eyebrow
s. Maybe Vis hadn’t really trusted Shale at the end.
The groggy warrior pulled his black-clad arm away from Dent and Axel’s restraining grips and straightened to face her. Looking him in the eyes, Jullian saw that he was taking in her outfit, then he dropped to his knees, “My Queen!” He breathed. “I thought you lost to me!”
“Rise, warrior Kor. I am not Queen Altum Vis. She is indeed lost to you. Rise and help me find her persecutor.” Jullian said this, a little awed at the strength of her own voice. Geez, I sound like some Roman orator at the coliseum, she thought sheepishly.
The shoulders of the warrior before her hunched for a minute. Then, raising his eyes to hers he started violently. “What blasphemy is this?” He thundered. “How dare you besmirch the belongings of my Queen!” He raged, gesturing wildly at her outfit.
“Stop, Kor!” Jullian commanded him impatiently. “I wish to find Queen Altum Vis’ killer! I need you to help me do that!,” she snapped at him. “We have work to do! Get a grip on yourself!”
Struggling to control him, Dent and Axel finally succeeded in controlling the warrior’s physical protestations. Raising his eyes to hers, he stated coldly, “I already know who killed her. What does it matter to you, human?”
Nodding to Dent and Axel to release him, Jullian looked into his yellow eyes and said, “It means everything to me.”
Narrowing his already small eyes at her, the large warrior looked down his long nose at her, his black hair was dull and his skin thin as paper. He looked like a dehydrated vanilla bean. Jullian could tell he was hungry. Perhaps this was the chance to gain his trust and loyalty.
“First you must gain strength.” Raising her palm towards him, Jullian sent a strong pulsing wave of energy through him. Before her eyes he began to unshrivel. His hair became luxuriant and his skin filled out. She hadn’t had to use that type of energy since Shale and it felt good to help restore health to a living being. Hopefully, he wouldn’t try to kill her now.
Kor gasped, “What are you?”
“For all intents and purposes, I am your Queen now. Do you feel well enough to hear a story?” she asked him calmly.
Eying her with uncertainty, Kor glanced at her mites, then back to her. “A human with imprinted mites. That’s new,” he said seriously.
“There are many things new,” Jullian said quietly. “Beginning with the fact that you’ve been in stasis for almost a thousand years. It will be a lot to take in,” she added.
“It isn’t the first time I’ve been in stasis for a long time,” Kor stated dryly. “If you add a thousand years to the last time I was awake, I believe I’m twelve thousand years old.”
Jullian gasped! “You’re older than Shale!” she exclaimed.
At hearing the name Shale fall from Jullian’s lips, Kor began to struggle once more. “Killer of Queens! Dishonor is his name!” Kor yelled at her, fury distorting his face.
“Control yourself, Kor. We are not in league with Shale. Quite the opposite in fact,” Jullian stated calmly. “We would very much like to end his manipulations once and for all.”
That statement brought a respite to Dent and Axel’s attempts to hold the big warrior still, as he managed to get himself straightened and contained once more. “Good!” he spit out vehemently. “He should die!“
“Am I correct in believing that General Shale poisoned Queen Altum Vis?” Jullian asked him.
“Yes! She didn’t trust him anymore, but she never thought he’d kill her. They had been very close. She was considering mating with him for the strength of the nest,” he added with a snarl that showed all of his horribly gnarled yellow teeth.
“Will you help me? Come sit, let me tell you all that has transpired and you may decide what your allegiances are after that,” Jullian said. She almost laughed at her strangely antiquated turn of phrases lately. It seemed she was picking up some vocabulary from the dead queen after all. No one would recognize her now!
Chapter Thirteen
Shale’s Evil Unveiling
It had taken several cycles of the planet the knotted abyss revolved around in order to tell Kor all of the details leading up to the opening of his stasis pod. He was able to access the database inside the birdcage helmet and confirm all she told him. Each day she sent him healing energy and after a few days he seemed amenable to her leadership. He only agreed to serve her unconditionally once she’d shown him the primordial broth with its scum of Queen Altum Vis’ unabsorbed being floating on top.
His reaction had been one of extreme pain. Kor had fallen to his knees before the pool and keened like a wild animal. The sound broke Jullian’s heart. “Will you take her essence?” he’d asked, the uncertainty showing on his face.
“I have only attempted to touch the pool once,” Jullian said. “I did feel that I got some of her essence through that one touch. I am waiting until I feel that I have sufficient command of the history and culture of the Idolum to do her justice. If I can ever do that,” she stated simply.
Kor nodded. “It is a formidable undertaking. She was…” he blew out a gust of grass scented air, “she was magnificent!”
Once Jullian was assured of Kor’s acceptance, the task of bringing the rest of the crew of engineers and warriors out of stasis began. It took several more months of slow awakenings and assimilation of the new regime for Jullian to feel comfortable with the crew. Each day she learned more from her interactions with the ‘birdcage’ and each day she meditated, reached out through her mind and surveyed the thoughts of her crew.
Twice she was assaulted and an assassination attempted. Both times she crushed her opponent easily. She’d taken to allowing the attempts when in full sight of the rest of the crew. Those that had doubts about her strength soon lost them. Those who had thought her weak, re-evaluated. Confidence in her grew. Three times more, she found traitors among the ranks. She let them go until a meeting of the entire crew.
Kor had gathered the crew to give them an entire overview of what was happening in the universes around them. They were in one of the cargo bays, the only place big enough for all of them to assemble. Trusting Kor sufficiently now, Jullian had placed Dent and Axel on the bridge in charge of the ship’s security.
As Kor summed up the state of the Idolum empire and then moved on to the workings of other species within the closest galaxies, Jullian felt an enormous surge of malevolent energy. Lifting a hand against its flood, she managed to halt the progress of three small but lethal dirks that floated through the air towards her. Halting them in mid-flight, she also followed their trajectory in her mind and found their originating sources.
She was not surprised to find each of the three crewmen, whose thoughts she’d identified as unfavorable, behind each knife. The dirks were a clan tradition, and those frozen in midair had the markings of Queen Altum Vis’ reign. Holding the knives in the air, she then drew each of the blade’s owners into the center of the room. It was as though they were dragged on their toes towards their own weapons.
“I feel very sad to see the weapons of a Queen that I respect and admire being used against the very person who may allow her knowledge and legacy to continue. I will bring her killer to justice, but these three would halt my progress. Why? That is what I want to know. Why would you not want the Queen’s killer brought to justice? Are these three in league with her betrayer?” Jullian asked this huskily.
She was surprised by how let down she felt by the betrayal. Though, honestly, she’d known it was coming. It was probably the way they’d tried it. Right out in the open and in front of everyone. Like they’d expected the whole crew to cheer and then go on about their duties like nothing had happened.
“Speak, traitors!” thundered Kor.
He really was an admirable leader, Jullian thought; I need to promote him to General.
The air in the cargo bay was charged with tension. Releasing the hold she had on each of the traitors sufficiently for them to talk, she waited.
“She is human! She is not pure!”
one of the traitors raged.
“She is a false hope. She is a fraud!” another gasped, his face going a strange pale grey color.
“Shale rejected her! I know it through the learner!” gasped the last one.
Kor roared with rage. “Shale is the one who killed our Queen!” he raged. “You would follow the murderer of our Queen, rather than the one who might give her rise again?” he thundered. “You are indeed a traitor,” he roared again, and raising his own dirk, slid it neatly into the warrior’s heart.
Jullian dropped the warrior as though he was a hot potato. His dirk clattered to the floor. She hadn’t meant for Kor to execute him, but now she thought about it, what was she going to do with them. They could not remain onboard. The rest of the crew were now muttering about Shale’s roll in Altum Vis’ death.
Allowing Kor to take the other two into custody, she raised her hands and allowed her energy to calm the small crowd. “They are traitors to the cause of finding Queen Altum Vis’ murderer. We know that it was General Shale. He poisoned her. We know where he is. Now, we must bring him to justice. When we have done that, you may follow me to the nest of the Khyberians where I am already Queen, or you are free to pledge yourselves to another nest. That is my promise to you. Let us bring Shale to justice and then you may decide which nest you feel you belong to. I am not pure. I am, instead, strong. Which do you desire? A strong queen or a pure queen. You decide. You may deliver your choice to Kor, now my General Kor, when you know your decision.”
Jullian stated this with all the regal dignity she could muster. She infused her speech with all the scorn she felt for a crew that once again, was not glad to simply be alive. She hoped at the end of this, the wheat would be sorted from the chaff, as her mother used to say. Julian remembered Shale telling her once that scorn was a balm to a male Idolum’s heart. A true Queen was scornful of all beneath her. Well, she’d laid that out there today. They’d see what the result was. Then Jullian swept from the room, her white hair writhing and snapping in anger.