The Nu stood still, as if processing this information. Finally, she dipped her head in acquiescence.
“It is reasonable,” she said. “The Garra will go with you. Guide that ship above to the portal you came from.”
“But first,” said Jira, “I’m going to find Conrad.”
“You know who he is,” she said, never breaking her gaze. “The boy—the captain of the Steadfast. You knew he would be at Seo Cire. Xee said so. How? Why?”
A smile flickered across the Nu’s face and then was gone. “You ask too many questions,” she said.
“I’ve come this far. I think I deserve to know the answers.”
Apta folded her arms. “The Nu have always been aware of him, since he was born,” she said. “Conrad.” The name passed her lips with hesitation.
“Why?” Jira persisted.
“He knows why,” she said. “And if he chooses to tell others, he may. But we will not speak out of it to outsiders.”
Jira felt her frustration climbing. “I’m tired of all these Lords-damned mysteries,” she said. “You and Xee drag us into reaches so remote they may as well be unmapped, for lies and paradoxes?”
“You need not worry about him,” said Apta. “We will take care of him, if we find him. The wisest thing you can do is to take your memory, intact, to Earth.”
Jira crossed her arms, echoing Apta’s stubborn stance. “No,” she said. “I’m going to find him, and I’m going to take him back with me. I won’t leave the Empire without him.”
The Nu had a rueful look on her face. “Ah,” she said. “Love.”
Jira’s face suddenly ran hot. “I’m not in love with him. He dragged me into all this. Don’t you dare presume. You said I had a choice, and this is mine.”
Apta approached Jira, her eyes gleaming and unnaturally dark. “I know something about love. I know enough not to challenge it.”
“Before we leave,” Jira said, eager to change the subject. “The remnants of the Federation ... where could they be?”
“There are as many possibilities as there are stars in the universe. There may be refuges in places we have not yet dreamt of. If they exist, we will find them. After we rescue this boy—if we rescue him.”
“You keep saying we. Who’s we—you and Xee?”
“And us,” said a musical voice behind Jira. She spun around—they were surrounded by a crowd of women. Of Nu. They all wore the same face as Apta.
A thrill ran up her spine. “Your sisters,” Jira whispered. She hadn’t known that they looked alike. They were stranger creatures than she’d ever imagined.
“We are all Qloe Apta,” said one of them.
Before Jira could open her mouth to speak, one of the Nu reached out and touched her shoulder. “Look up.”
She tilted her head back. Her eyes adjusted to the light of the stars, and it took only a moment before she saw it—something far above them. It was unmistakable.
It was an Imperial ship. Jira’s hackles rose. She looked at the Nu, swaying slightly.
“The Lusus,” Qloe Apta said, smiling.
Chapter 22
“I hate this Lords-damned place,” he said, to no one but himself. His voice was hoarse from thirst and days of disuse. It felt good to say it aloud, even if there was nothing but miles and miles of rock and black soil beneath a smoky, red-gray sky.
Arkona was a world of extremes. He knew that the moment he glimpsed the planet from orbit—it was covered with massive volcanoes. Between the fiery mountains, immense flat plains stretched for hundreds upon thousands of miles.
He had been abandoned by the Arbiter’s shuttle on one of those plains, the base of an immense volcano not far in the distance. It had been three cycles since the shuttle had departed, leaving him with no comm device or shelter. He was beginning to run out of food and water.
The basic survival training they’d programmed into him had kicked into gear. He chewed on the leaves of plants for water and rationed out his food into smaller portions. The Arbiter left him with no instructions or guidance, nor even a map.
At the end of the third day he decided to make for the volcano. There was nothing where he had been dropped, and no reason to stay.
I’ve waited too long, he thought, in the middle of the fourth night. He was out of food, and the grasses he chewed were not enough to sustain him for long.
He pressed on. As the fifth night began he realized that he was at least another ten days away from the base of the volcano, at his current pace.
I’m not going to make it, he thought, dizzy with hunger. They sent me here to die of exposure?
He rejected the thought, suppressing a feverish laugh at the same time. It was one thing to die for the Empire ... but this was no suicide mission. Karsath was not an illogical man. He wouldn’t have wasted so much effort on rehabilitating his agent’s mind and body only to abandon him on such a wild and deadly planet.
Or at least, that’s what he hoped.
He lost track of time not long after that. Arkona’s sun rose, and then it set. Too exhausted to travel in the heat of the day now, he waited in the shade of rock outcroppings and tough, squat trees until darkness fell before he could bring himself to move.
Then he ran out of food. He gnawed on waxy tree leaves to fill his stomach but he could feel the lack of calories beginning to eat away at his strength and sanity.
It could have been the fifth day, or the seventh, or the thirtieth. He’d lost track. He lay down underneath a gnarled tree tangled into a rocky hill, its roots piercing the black-brown stones. It was night, but he was too weak to go any further.
On the horizon, he could see the volcano rising up into the sky, its summit disappearing into a hazy cloud of smoke.
Too far.
He licked his cracked lips in vain and closed his eyes.
When he woke up, a figure draped in black hovered above him like a devouring ghost.
“You’d give up so easily?” it said. “You’re not the man I thought you were.”
It took all his strength to merely raise his eyelids. “Who are you?” he rasped.
The figure was coming into focus. It had a face. He squeezed his eyes closed and then open again. It had eyes—brilliant blue ones. Its skin was lined, as if from years out on Arkona’s plains.
The figure sat back as he struggled to lift himself off the ground. It watched him struggle in silence.
“You some friend of Admiral Karsath’s?” he asked. “Here to tell me what’s going on?”
“Karsath,” the man said. He could see that it was a man now, its face covered with a wiry white beard. “Ah, yes. I’d forgotten.”
“What’s your name?” he tried again. “You tell me yours and I’ll tell you mine.”
“I already know your name,” the man said. “Southwark.”
“Commander Southwark,” he said. “Seems like everyone knows who I am but me,” he muttered to himself.
“That is true,” the man said. “But that is why I am here, after all. To teach you who you are. To remind you of what you can do. To prepare you for what lies ahead, old friend.”
“I’m not doing anything until I have your name,” he said. It seemed to be an entirely pointless battle, but he couldn’t stop himself. He was stubborn.
“Kazu,” the man said.
The name meant first, his artificial memory helpfully supplied. An old name from an ancient language.
“You already know my name,” he said to Kazu. “You knew I was coming?”
The man grunted and nodded. “Come with me,” he said. “It begins now.”
“Is this some kind of training mission?” he asked, after swallowing the last of the filthy brown water Kazu had offered him as if it was the best thing he’d ever tasted. He swirled the murky liquid on his tongue. “Some ... extreme survival situation?”
Kazu didn’t respond. He merely walked on, a staff in his right hand, his stride surprisingly strong and quick considering his age.
He f
ollowed, but he was growing frustrated. “Old man,” he called out. “Where are we going? Have you got some shelter out here?”
“Yes,” the man said.
He picked up his pace and reached for him, reaching for his cloak. “Then maybe you can tell me—”
Kazu stopped at his touch. He spun around and brought his staff down on his shoulder with shocking speed and force.
He crumpled but grabbed the staff, intent on defending himself. Kazu yanked it out of his grasp and slammed the rod into his chest, knocking him onto the ground. Already weakened, he couldn’t move fast enough to resist the attack. Kazu held the staff against his throat now, his knee pinning him down.
As he struggled to breathe, he looked up into the man’s icy gaze.
“Good,” said Kazu. “You have some fight in you after all. You are not an empty shell, as I’d thought.”
He wheezed, but grabbed the man’s knee and forced it off his body. This man, he realized, was not his friend.
“It is good to see you again,” said Kazu, seeming to soften just slightly.
His eyes widened. “You knew me—before?”
“Yes,” replied Kazu. “I’ve known you for a long time, Southwark.”
“Have I been here before?” he asked Kazu’s retreating back. “You call me an old friend. Have we met before?”
“Yes and no,” Kazu grunted. “I knew your father. Tadao Southwark.”
That name …
He knew the name. It was part of the memory they’d programmed into him.
“How is it possible that Tadao Southwark is my father?” he demanded. “The man lived and died centuries ago.”
“I’ve seen stranger things in this galaxy than you, boy. And however you may have come into this universe—there’s no doubt who sired you.”
They approached a crumbling edifice at the base of the volcano. It was built of rock, and led underground, inside the body of the mountain. He came to realize that it went deep into the earth.
For some time, there was nothing but the flickering light held by Kazu, and damp loamy soil under his feet. He wondered how far they’d gone below.
Kazu stopped, his robes swaying. He raised the light.
He heard himself make a sound of surprise. They were underground and yet there was a silver door ahead of them, made of some ancient metal, now weathered and discolored.
“It’s a ship,” he said with wonder.
“So it is,” said Kazu, turning his head to look at him. “This ship is a legend. To me, to the Empire, and to the galaxy. It’s been here for two thousand years. You and I will live inside this ship. Perhaps it will trigger something in your mind. Your father lived on this ship. He came into his power on board it.”
“What’s its name?” he asked.
“This ship is called the Satori.” Kazu said the name with reverence.
He approached the old man cautiously, drawn by the mystery of the ship but wary of the man’s volatile temperament. Kazu entered the ship and beckoned him to follow. They wove through two layers of shield doors, penetrating into the interior of the ship.
The scale of the ship quickly dawned on him. Once past the shield doors, they walked through a corridor and through a pair of doors that slid open unevenly, suggestive of the ship’s age. He took a sharp breath when he saw what was on the other side.
They stood at the edge of a ledge that revealed dozens of levels below them, all surrounding a center atrium that stretched ten levels above. It was no sleekly designed vessel of war or swift small yacht; this ship was designed to hold people—thousands of them.
“This thing’s huge,” he said with awe. “How did a ship this massive get buried here?”
Kazu kept walking. He followed but trailed behind the old man, captivated by the ship’s enormous scale and design. There were echoes of its design in the Imperial ships that he was accustomed to, he realized.
“It was buried here intentionally,” he said. “Over the centuries, soot and dirt covered all traces of its existence.”
“Why is it a secret?” He remembered what Karsath had warned—all of Arkona was a secret, and this ship was undoubtedly the heart of the mystery.
“Because it is sacred. The origin of the Empire rests with this ship.”
He stretched out a hand and skimmed his fingers over the metal bulkhead.
He took a ragged, shaky breath and stopped dead in his tracks.
Kazu stopped. He turned to look at the commander.
“Southwark,” he said, as if testing for something.
“It’s nothing,” he replied. There was something about Kazu that made him wary.
I can’t trust this man. Not yet, anyway.
“Keep going,” the man said, a look of disappointment passing over his face and quickly disappearing.
They continued to walk, slowly ascending towards the top of the ship. Lights above them turned on as they passed and flickered off as they moved away, giving him the uncanny sensation of being followed by ghosts. Otherwise, everything was dark except for the light that Kazu carried.
They came to a battered, ancient door.
“Come,” said Kazu, beckoning to him. “Your blood.”
He obeyed, stretching out a hand towards the panel on the door. It pierced his skin. It was more painful than the standard bloodprint readers he was used to; this was a more primitive version. He wiped away a bead of crimson blood before it could heal him. The door opened.
In the middle of the room stood the strangest, most beautiful structure that he could remember seeing. It was composed of arched metal blades that curved up to form a near-perfect sphere. Nothing in his artificial memory hinted at what this object was.
As he gazed at the sphere, he felt Kazu step behind him.
“Inside,” he ordered. “Enter the cage, Southwark.”
Chapter 23
“Lady Jira Tai,” he said. “Welcome aboard the Lusus.”
Jira scrutinized the Imperial captain before her. At first glance, he looked no different than the thousands of officers who’d passed through the palace during her concubinage. Tall, trim, clad in the standard uniform.
Yet this man was clearly unlike any of the others. The first hint was a certain humor in his eyes; the second was, well, that he associated with the traitorous, alien Nu.
“I’m no Lady,” she corrected. “I never did complete my concubinage, at least by Imperial standards.” Which was to say, she never lay with a single man in the palace, and she certainly never conceived a Satori scion.
“My sincerest congratulations,” he said dryly, leaning back in his chair.
She relaxed just slightly. “Thank you,” she said. “Now,” she said briskly, “moving on to more important things. Where are we going?”
He tented his fingers as he regarded her behind his desk. “My dear Qloe tells me that you intend to rescue a certain Conrad Redeker,” he said.
Her pulse quickened. He already knew Conrad’s name. “Yes. You’ll help me?”
He glanced at her, quickly taking her measure. “Perhaps. But I imagine you have questions for me, as I do for you.”
“Ask. I’ve spent three days with that Nu of yours. I’m ready to talk to a human being again.”
He smiled. “Qloe can be cryptic, when she chooses. Tell me: are you a Federation agent?”
Her lips pressed into a thin line. Surely, at this point, there’s nothing to risk. “I am,” she said, lifting her chin. “Are you?”
“No,” he said as her heart dropped into her stomach. “But I’m no friend of the Empire, either.”
“You seem to be an Imperial captain,” she pointed out.
“I am,” he said with a crooked smile. “But my allegiance lies with the Empire’s people. Not its overlords. It has been so for years.”
“Now answer this question,” she said. “How do you know Conrad’s name?”
He rocked back in his chair. “That’s a very long story,” he said. At her nod, he continued. “Ql
oe is a Nu. That’s where it begins, I suppose. She serves the Lords of the Dark—the Locc. She told me to wait in the Seo system for a young man who was destined to cross my path there.”
“Destined?” Jira’s voice was skeptical. The last thing in the universe I’ll believe in is destiny. After everything I’ve seen. What kind of god or goddess would subject us to all this ...
“Her words, not mine. The Locc—and therefore the Nu—have certain qualities that take them out of time and space. A kind of prescience, you could call it. It’s what makes her so difficult to understand, when she’s in one of her less lucid moods.” He smiled fondly as if humoring a quirk of a long-loved spouse.
“I’ve never seen one of these Locc,” said Jira.
“Few people have,” he said. “I have. A Locc touched my mind, once. It gave me a gift, Qloe said. Even so, I don’t claim to understand them; I don’t even know what that gift is.” He smiled again.
“Not much of a gift, then.”
“Mysteries upon mysteries. Maybe no one but the Nu really understand what they say or do, which is why the more connected a Nu is to a Locc, the less sense she makes to we human mortals.” He paused, thinking. “Qloe Apta’s Locc is dead,” he added.
“Can they be killed?”
Trillion ignored the question. “It left her with knowledge and directives. One concerned a young man who had met with the Locc as I did. I didn’t know how or when I’d meet him. He was to be delivered to the protection of the Nu, away from the Empire. But he fought the Vehn in Cirish space ... and when he was brought onboard the Lusus, we took his bloodprint. It triggered a chain of alerts that went immediately to the Lord High Admiral himself. There’s been a warrant out for his capture for quite some time—and it was set by Karsath. The moment his bloodprint made contact with an Imperial AI, he was alerted to the boy’s presence.”
Sanctuary's Gambit: The Darkspace Saga Book 2 Page 14