by Orion, W. J.
“Soon,” Dwen said. “I hope. The galaxy is too frail to survive their Empire’s casual malice.”
The three-faced Galon originated in the swamps of their world and were blessed with the ability to breathe both air and water. This gift (or curse, when it meant the Galon were asked to interface with the crabs) meant they were even better suited for service at Nexus.
Dwen cursed the Galon breathing abilities. Dwen despised interfacing with the squids. But Dwen performed its duties as it had sworn to, and would find the proper time to stand up to the crabs.
Dwen took one of the many pressurized anti-grav lifts across the moon-sized station to the aquatic quadrant where the crabs docked their massive command vessel. Dwen met its two other Galon teammates at the water lock leading into the crab habitats, and without exchanging a word they stepped into the tank and hit the switch that flooded the room.
Heavier than the water, their three feet remained firm on the hard floor, and when the interior door opened they strode forward, encased in their black, electrically resistant armor.
The interior of the crab’s section of Nexus was a massive manufactured environment designed to resemble the crab’s home world. Towers of crystalline coral stretched up into a dark ceiling a dozen stories above as hundreds of small aquatic creatures swam about, providing the swarms of flickering, glowing crab (squid) colonies both food and sport. Streams of seabed greenery danced languidly in the flow of the water, giving the entire environment a sense of motion.
A cloud of the tiny squids as wide as all three of a Galon’s arm spans swam up, swirling and hovering above Dwen like a thick field of stars swimming in the night sky. As Galon do, Dwen slowly rotated in place, allowing all three facets of its face and sensory organs to take in the scene. Its partners did the same.
Dwen triggered the visual translator on the side of its translator headset and let the computer decipher the squid’s visual light display into audible language it could hear.
“Greetings, Peace Keeper,” the squid entity illuminated. The light show of its members dazzled with hypnotic precision. Lines, orbs, and geometric patterns formed the colony’s movements.
Dwen opted to speak in the celestial common tongue. “To whom do I converse with?” Dwen asked. “It is certain that we have met before, but my species is not gifted in identifying your version of individuality.”
“I understand. My people typically do not take ‘names’ as most intelligent species do. We identify each other using different methods. However,” it replied in its dance of color and light, “I interact with many other species here on Nexus, and to facilitate those interactions, I have adopted the title, ‘Diplomat of the Core Collective.’ For short, you may refer to me as ‘The Diplomat,’ or ‘Diplomat.’ I trust that is sufficient.”
“It will serve, Diplomat. Welcome back to Nexus,” Dwen replied. Its voice rumbled from its three mouths and vibrated the water like a mournful whale’s song. “I trust a member of the Collective’s presence means all is on course with your ever-growing empire.”
“Quite. We shall be staying for twenty of your lunar cycles. Has the Nexus enough supplies for such a visit?”
A lunar cycle was the standard ‘day’ measurement on the station. Outside of the twelve wormhole portals, an outer defense moon orbited Nexus. The smaller defensive facility orbiting the larger space station made a complete circuit once every thirty Earth hours. A Nexus day, or lunar cycle. A common way to measure time with the races using the station.
“What we do not have ready can be procured by vessels traveling the portals on short notice. If you would forgive my curiosity, why such an extended stay?”
“We are offering partial escort security to a dozen of our harvester vessels returning. We will await their transit through the void of the Archelian Gulf, and when they reach the Perenall System, we will transport there and provide security for the remainder of their journey.”
“Confident that the Gulf is safe?” Dwen asked. “Twelve of your vessels filled with that quantity of fresh water is a mighty meal many pirate fleets would love to sink their teeth into.”
“Pirates understand the price they will pay if they prey upon our ships. We recently cleansed the Archelian of thirty vessels of questionable intent, so we feel our fleet is safe. Not as safe as if they were using your wormholes for transit.”
“I hope those vessels deserved their fate. The treaty you entered forbids your harvester vessels from using our network web, as you well know. We suffer your species and its predations, and we will not enable it any further than we must,” Dwen said with the Galon equivalent of a scowl.
“Yes, I see. We shall rejoin our harvesters when they are in the region of the more dangerous Perenall System. Your concern over our transports is noted, Peace Keeper, and your criticism dismissed. You are a friend of our species.”
“I am not your friend. I despise your species and your way,” Dwen said without passion. “Those ships are filled with the lifeblood of a planet that needed it. Your species wastes what it was given by the cosmos, and you disrupt the natural order of other worlds to fill the gaps you’ve created in your own. Your empire took that water by force, no doubt. Tell me, was this world habited by an intelligent species? Have you broken your agreement?”
“Barely intelligent bipedal mammals. Perhaps it is best that we are giving their water a better future than the one they would’ve given it,” the tiny squids said in their languages made of light. “Though they were tough little critters. Tenacious.”
“The remainder of the galaxy does not believe that you have the right to ruin a planet, regardless of how you justify it. Your time will come. Soon enough your species will try to steal from a planet, and that planet’s inhabitants will teach you the lesson you deserve.”
“Perhaps,” the colony said. “But until such a time comes, we shall do as we must to further our kind’s prosperity.”
“What else can the Nexus do for the Collective?” Dwen asked, trying to dismiss its rage and disappointment.
“Are there any disputes on the docket? The crew of my vessel has need for live entertainment.”
“The Interstellar Court does not exist solely for the entertainment of the galaxy,” Dwen counseled. “The service we offer with the adversarial arenas is a somber one. It has saved countless lives and prevented incalculable damage and suffering to the galaxy.”
“And we find its events entertaining, like millions of others do. Do you not have seats for us all to watch? Are your disputes not broadcasted live to all of the Nexus? Justice and resolved disputes are not mutually exclusive to being entertaining.”
Dwen closed its eyes and tried hard to remain without passion. It couldn’t react to the Collective member’s lack of empathy or understanding. Worse yet, the colony wasn’t wrong either. The courts were entertainment for billions. Even Dwen often enjoyed the battles and games held there. But Dwen had to do its duty. For the Nexus, and for the races of the galaxy that respected order and peace.
“The docket is full, as always,” Dwen informed. Dwen told the truth; each hour of time on the Nexus saw the massive central court arena allocated to two or more parties seeking a contained, fair, and moderated dispute. Sometimes that dispute was resolved by something simple, like two master players playing a game of skill and chance at a table while drinking tea. Sometimes the disputes were decided over thousand-strong tank battles, overseen by Galon judges in a neutral battlefield in the center of the area, built in the arena by the court’s overseers. All parties in the court agreed to both the terms of the adversarial court and to the outcome. Failure to comply outside of the court would result in the Nexus shutting off wormhole service to the offending party’s ships, or worse yet, their entire planetary system.
The courts had prevented interplanetary war a thousand times or more, though they had done nothing to stop the tyranny of the crabs. The race of powerful cephalopods denied the court’s ability to govern them; they were above the law.<
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“Anything… colorful?” the squid colony asked.
“Same old, same old, Diplomat,” Dwen answered. “More mecha fighting each other, as is the rage right now.”
“Ah, there is little better than watching noble pilots inside giant robotic constructs do battle. It is much the way my people go to war.”
“I cannot disagree with you about the nobility piece,” Dwen said. “Notify staff if you need service beyond what is available in your habitat. Enjoy your stay.”
Dwen and the two other armored Galon spun their way slowly back to the air lock leading into the rest of the Station. They waited until the water drained away, then entered the station’s dry, air-filled hallway.
“I hate them,” Dwen said. “And one day, the galaxy will be rid of the Collective and their fecal Empire and their poisonous influence on the worlds.”
“Would help if the Triumvirate were whole again,” one of the Galon guards muttered.
“The Beru’dawn withdrew to their clouds in space to protect the Nexus and the known worlds. They were too large a threat to the squids, and knew the little monsters would destroy the Nexus and much more if it meant they could eradicate them. I respect the Beru’dawn for wanting to prevent bloodshed on a scale the universe has possibly never seen. The Nexus Peace Accordance they entered into with Collective has saved the Nexus from destruction and prevented the deaths of… untold numbers, though their absence has opened the galaxy up to the Collective’s hidden predations.”
“The Beru’dawn could be considered cowards.”
“And those carrying that consideration would be very wrong.”
Chapter Nine
Fifty Gallons for Free
“Keep your eyes peeled,” her uncle said to her as he drove his big red pickup down the beaten and dead street at a rate that felt profoundly dangerous to Yasmine. Maybe it was the way the truck shook them like they were beads in a baby’s rattle.
“What am I looking for?” she said, her grip on the pistol her uncle had given her growing tighter and tighter with every yard driven. Getting hard to breathe. I’m so nervous.
“Bad guys. We’re in the last wild miles of Route Irish. We’ll start seeing Station towers and heavy artillery. The bandits who hit this road won’t mess with us once we’re in the range of that but right now, we’re as far from home as we can get before we reach safety, and this is where we’ve been hit the most. Look at the burnt-out cars. The bullet marks in the buildings and guardrails.”
She looked at those things, but her attention couldn’t be taken away from the skeletons and more fresh remains littering the fringe of the road in the city ruins. The handheld radio sitting in the cup holder between them crackled with voices as the drivers and gunners in the other vehicles exchanged info about the environment around them. They were all nervous, on edge. Maybe it was the corpses.
“Are those the bodies of bandits?” she asked.
“Bandits, their victims, and those who’ve tried to make this place safer from the former for the latter.”
“Are there Monolith bodies out there?”
“Look for the tower patch.”
She did. Within a quarter mile she saw three fallen Monoliths, and her guts spoiled. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, me too. Many good people don’t make it back from this trip. That’s greed right there. Simple greed taking lives from people. Ali Baba and way-more-than-forty-thieves shit. Keep an eye on the windows of these buildings,” he said, pointing at a four-story office building several streets back with most of the windows shot out.
Man, that building has been through hell, she thought as she looked at the blackened char marks, busted concrete, and exposed iron beams. She watched the windows and the roof, the remains of the low walls surrounding the sidewalks at its foot. Yasmine saw no movement.
“Thank you,” Caleb said as he stared forward, observing all that they approached.
His hands are so tight on the wheel. He’s as sweaty as I am. Just as scared. That’s good. We’re all scared. That makes me feel normal. She looked over her shoulder through the sliding window into the back of the truck into the bed. There, just a few feet away sat Trey in his white armored vehicle. He filled the bed and remained at a half crouch, staying just high enough up off the bottom so his face-mounted mining laser could be put to battle almost instantly.
I can feel the power inside it, ready to release. Not as much sizzle in the air as when that crab tried to kill me in the school, but still. Scary feeling. “You okay back there?”
“I’m fine,” he replied, using his voice box. “This is near where your uncle attacked my friends and me. That memory makes me… well, unhappy.”
“I’m sorry, man,” her uncle said over his shoulder out the window. “If I had known your people had good amongst them, then… it would’ve gone different.”
“I hope that’s the case,” Trey said. “Watch out ahead. I see four humans armed with large automatic weapons at the bases of those two wooden structures.”
“The outer guards of the Station,” Caleb said, and slowed the truck’s precarious speed.
“What do we do?” Yasmine asked.
“Watch and learn. First stop is ahead, team,” he said into the walkie. “Watch the perimeter for cherry-pickers.” He turned back to Trey. “Play dead.”
Trey nodded his suit’s facial section and powered down his sensor array.
Caleb brought the truck’s speed down to a crawl as he sat his walkie back in the cup holder. He unholstered his pistol and readied it at his thigh. Several shallow breaths later, he stopped the truck and leaned out the window to look down at the pair of heavily armed, dust-covered guards. One stood further back with their weapon aimed at the engine block while the other approached to talk.
“Sup, Baron?” the male guard who approached greeted.
“Quan, Right?” he greeted back. Yaz watched as his clench on the pistol softened.
“Yeah, yeah. Welcome back. No fuel truck? This a social visit?” the guard named Quan asked. “Or you just hauling a weird looking dead crab around for show?” he pointed at Trey’s bulky chassis in the back of the truck.
“Not really a trophy tour, no. Passing through on an important trip and needed to fill up for it. The dead crab we need for its interior tech. We’re trying to get our hands on a new kind of weapon. Long story, but we’re here for that high-test y’all make.”
“Yeah, yeah,” the guard replied. “Things have been weird since that crab ship tried to fry your tower. Sorry that happened. How come that one in the back of your truck didn’t blow up?”
“Got lucky, we think. Took out the self-destruct system is our best guess. Now we’re using it to try and learn more about their armor and maybe get some payback.”
“That’d be nice. Hey, I’ll radio ahead and let them all know to roll out the red carpet. Behave, big boss man, like you always do. Who’s your co-pilot there? She don’t look familiar. Little young to be your girlfriend.”
“This is my niece, ya perv. You can call her Baroness,” Caleb said with relish.
“Pleasure then, Baroness,” Quan said smiling, then blushing a fair bit.
“Nice to meet you,” Yaz said, and added an awkward smile.
“Okay Romeo and Juliet, we gotta bust this pop stand,” her uncle said, also with relish. “Be safe out here.”
“We will. Safe as we can. Good luck on your journey.”
“Thank you,” Yaz and her uncle said in unison. A few seconds later, they were driving down the road.
“Now what?”
“We can ease up a little. We’re gonna drive over this little bridge up there, and once we’re over it, we’re inside the Station’s sphere of safety. Won’t be anything to worry about. Then we park, barter for fuel, rest up for the night, and head north to save the world.”
“You forgot to mention, ‘use the restroom,’ Baron,” Trey added from the rear of the pickup.
“It’s implied.”
&nbs
p; The Station might not have been as tall as Monolith tower, but it had a deadly grandeur all its own.
“Where did they get all these guns on the walls?” she asked. “They’re massive.”
“Those are turrets from naval vessels, from back when the lakes were filled with water. The Navy floated up a carrier battle group or something to protect the lakes from the crab ships. They did some damage, but eventually the crabs won out in a big battle off the coast right near here. Took ‘em fifteen minutes to wipe out the whole fleet. The people who run the Station salvaged the weapons off the shipwrecks in the lakes desert a year or so later. Took some herculean work but now their little island in the dust is protected by the equivalent military armament of four or five destroyers.”
“And those big… barrels, in the back? They’re as big as buildings.” Yasmine pointed at the gigantic cylindrical storage vats as tall as hills sitting well behind the gun-covered concrete walls.
“Old gasoline storage tanks. Empty now. Some of them are repurposed into apartments, believe it or not. Cut ‘em right open and built homes inside,” he said as he guided the truck between two twelve-foot-tall concrete walls topped with steel spikes and more armed guards. They waved and he waved back. Several of the guards stood near the two nearest steel gun turrets mounted on massive concrete platforms. One of the gigantic, cyclopean guns followed the movement of the red truck and its passengers with a smooth pivot.
Reminds me so much of crab guns… just watching you. Uncaring… destructive.
“Don’t worry,” Trey said from a collapsed position in the bed of the truck. “They don’t usually shoot anyone at this point. Those guns are for crab ships and chassis, not friendly pickups.”
“You know that how?” Caleb asked under his breath as he led their four-vehicle convoy through the giant central parking lot of the sprawling fuel depot.
“The crab Empire observes a great deal. The resistance steals a lot of that intelligence,” Trey answered as if he were pointing out the obvious. “We knew where was dangerous, and what areas were downright lethal to operate in.”