“Beer,” said the server, as he or she—Cal couldn’t see clearly enough to tell which—set twelve cracked mugs beside the jug.
Cal couldn’t wait. Grasping the pitcher, he gulped down several cooling mouthfuls, then poured a good glug of the stuff over his face.
For a moment, all was well, but then the fire ignited again, worse than ever.
“WHAT IS THAT?!” he screamed, leaping to his feet and clawing at his skin.
“It’s mustard beer,” said Red Hat.
Cal set off at a sprint, half-blinded, like he could somehow outrun the agonizing assault on his respiratory system. Everyone watched in stunned silence as he ran in laps around the room, yelping and shrieking and making noises that, had anyone present ever heard a baboon before, they would have almost certainly have said it sounded a bit like a baboon. But not a healthy or happy baboon. A baboon with problems. A baboon, most likely, whose face was on fire.
Three Harvesters entered from two different doors. Cal couldn’t hear their barked commands to stop over the sound of his own screams, and didn’t notice them chasing him until one feinted in front of him, arms outstretched to grab him.
There was no way Cal was stopping, though. Something primal was driving him now. He ducked one pair of hands, hoofed the owner of another pair in the balls, then continued on his desperate-yet-pointless run.
He was on lap four before anyone caught him. Even then, it was only because he’d had to slow down to vomit, after his stomach had decided to go full nuclear in its response to the waves of fire creeping steadily down Cal’s throat.
Cal didn’t see where the puke went, but from the high-pitched chirps of protest, he guessed a few Nogems had found themselves plastered. He slurred out what he thought was an apology, but what was actually a series of pig-like snorts and a sob, and then a Harvester slammed into him, smashing him into a table, somersaulting him over the top of it, then depositing him onto the rough stone floor.
Elongated fingers pinned his arms down. He tried to kick, but a sudden weight on his legs made it impossible.
He heard Loren shout something, and made out a flurry of movement through his watery eyes. It ended abruptly with a short cry of pain from Loren. Cal wrestled against the hands that held him down. He blinked away his tears just in time to see a Harvester leaning over him, a finger extending toward Cal’s forehead.
“We do not appreciate this disturbance,” the Harvester hissed through his undulating teeth. He extended two more fingers. “You shall be taught a lesson.”
All three fingers pressed against Cal’s forehead, just above his eyes, and Cal knew nothing but the pain that followed.
Sixteen
Cal woke with a cold, damp compress on his head, and a body that ached so badly he suspected it would never forgive him.
“You awake?”
That was Loren’s voice, drifting into his half-awake fog from somewhere in the space beyond his eyelids.
“Not sure,” he murmured. “Let me get back to you on that one.”
Cal lay there for a while, enjoying the cooling pressure on his forehead, and observing the various parts of himself coming back online.
He felt his toes and gave them a twitch. His hands, too. He pointed his feet and stretched his legs, simultaneously worsening and easing the ache in his muscles.
His senses of taste and smell switched on with a bang, popping his eyes open.
Mustard.
He tensed, preparing to set off running again, but the taste had bedded in now, and was more like an insistent background noise than the crescendo of agony that it had been. It was still deeply unpleasant, of course, but not so bad that he couldn’t cope with it.
He’d complain about it, yes—God, how he’d complain about it—but it was manageable for the moment.
As his eyes swam into focus, he expected to see Loren kneeling over him. Instead, he saw the sludgy mud-pack that was Garunk’s face. The Slurrit’s sloppy wet hand was resting on Cal’s forehead, oozing rivulets of runny mud into his hair and pooling it in his ears.
“Hey, beefcake,” said Garunk. “Good to have you back.”
He withdrew his hand and Cal sat up. Loren stood behind Garunk, one arm wrapped around herself, the other held up to her mouth so she could chew on her thumbnail.
“You OK?” she asked.
Cal nodded gingerly. “Head kind of aches,” he said. “And, you know, every other part of me, too. But, on the plus side, my sinuses have never been clearer.”
He inhaled deeply through his nose to demonstrate his point, but the smell of mustard and burning flesh made his stomach flip, so he quickly stopped.
Propping himself on his elbows, Cal took in the cell around them. “We’re back here? Why are we back here?”
“They figured you couldn’t work when you were unconscious,” Loren said.
“Ha! Shows what they know,” Cal snorted. He shook his head. “Actually, they’re right. I can’t work when I’m unconscious. I don’t know why I said that.”
With some difficulty, Cal got back to his feet. The room spun around him, forcing him to lean against the wall for support.
“Still, nice of them to give me time off,” Cal said. “For evil, people-trafficking slave masters, they’re actually not too bad. Wait, what am I saying? They’re truly terrible people.”
“Can’t argue there. Although, they did let us check in on you every so often to make sure you were still alive. Took some persuasion, though” said Loren. “Your friend said he’d work a double shift to cover your quota until you got back.”
Cal frowned. “My friend?”
“With the red hat.”
“Oh, Red Hat!” said Cal. “Seriously? He’s covering for me? What a guy.”
He yawned and stretched, then smacked his lips together several times in the vain hope of tasting anything that wasn’t mustard.
“How long was I out for?”
“About six hours,” Loren said.
“They fingered you really violently,” said Garunk. Cal wasn’t sure if this was a deliberate innuendo by the Slurrit, or a perfectly innocent remark. He chose not to investigate further.
“Wow, that’s… Wait,” Cal said. “So, Red Hat has been covering for me for six hours?”
“Pretty much,” said Loren. “Why?”
“Jesus. The poor guy was already exhausted,” Cal said. He tried the cell door, but found it locked.
“You have to knock and wait,” Loren explained.
Cal thudded his fist on the heavy wood. “Hey! Open up. I’m ready to get back to work,” he called. “Mech? You out there? Let’s get me back in action.”
There was a clunk and the door swung inward. A Harvester stood in the doorway, fingers raised as if expecting some sort of trick.
“Where’s Mech?” Cal asked.
“That is not your concern,” the Harvester said, the words whistling through his teeth. “Come. You will return to digging at once.”
“Well, yeah,” Cal agreed. “That’s why I was knocking on the door and shouting, ‘I’m ready to get back to work.’”
He stepped past the Harvester and into the corridor. “There’s no need to be an asshole about it, is my point. Hell, I’m practically volunteering.”
“You literally are volunteering,” Garunk pointed out.
“Right? Exactly.” Cal swept a fleck of dust off the Harvester’s shoulder. “I’m just saying you should relax. I’m going back to work. You don’t need to put on your Bossy pants for my benefit.”
He wheeled around, pointed along the corridor, and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Now… this way?”
“Walk,” the Harvester continued. He prodded Cal in the back and a brief shudder of pain radiated through the muscles of Cal’s back.
“OK, then!” said Cal through a grimace. “This way it is.”
They eventually reached the cavern, where everything seemed noisier and more active than ever. The Nogems hammered at the walls much faster than they
had been earlier. The flying boxes swarmed through the place, carrying whatever cargo they contained.
The reason for the Nogems’ increased productivity became evident when one of the patrolling Harvesters produced something that was a cross between a whip and a lightsaber, and cracked the air behind one of the little bearded figures.
The Nogem let out a yelp of panic, then redoubled his digging efforts. Sweat poured down his face as he struck at the wall again, and again, and again, the little bell on his hat dinging dementedly in time with each swing.
“What’s the big rush?” Cal asked. He looked back over his shoulder to his escort. “Or is that none of my concern.”
“The great Manacle approaches,” the Harvester said. His voice was a mix of emotions—pride, mostly, but with a generous serving of fear on the side. “We will impress him with our increased productivity.”
“Manacle is coming here?” said Cal. “The Manacle? Oh, wow! I can’t wait to meet him.”
“We will not defile the great Manacle’s gaze with your presence,” the Harvester said. “He gave Cal a shove down the slope leading into the cavern. “You will return to your zone. You will dig. And you will never know his greatness was ever here.”
“Well… we will know,” said Cal. “You just told us.”
The Harvester hesitated. “Well, yes. But, you shall not see him with your own eyes.”
Cal flashed a grin over his shoulder. “How much do you want to bet?”
Another prod to the back made him leap into the air. “Ow! Watch where you’re sticking that thing,” he said.
Two other Harvesters approached. Loren and Garunk were peeled away from the group and led off in different directions. Cal and Loren exchanged a look that managed to say a whole lot in a very short time, and then Cal was shoved on through the cavern in the direction of his zone.
“Hey, Red Hat, look who’s back?” Cal called, as another painful poke from the Harvester sent him stumbling into the smaller side chamber where he had struck mustard earlier.
The pumping equipment he’d seen being brought in had been removed, and the only sign of the geyser Cal had unleashed was a crusting of dry mustard around the hole in the wall.
Red Hat didn’t turn at the sound of Cal’s voice, but just sort of sagged for a moment as if in relief. The heavy head of his pickaxe thunked against the ground and he leaned on the handle for a moment, his frail body heaving as he gulped in air.
“You OK there, little buddy?” Cal asked, bending to address the Nogem.
The Harvester wrenched Cal upright before Red Hat could respond, then thrust a pickaxe into Cal’s hand. “Don’t talk. Dig,” the Harvester instructed. He lashed out with a foot, knocking Red Hat’s pick away. “You, too,” he snarled, as the sudden lack of support sent the Nogem crashing to the floor.
“Wow, you people are harsh,” Cal said. He reached to help Red Hat up, but another prod from the Harvester sent spasms of pain jolting through him, forcing him to stagger clear.
“I’m alright,” Red Hat wheezed. His little arms shook as he pushed himself up onto his knees. “I’m alright.”
“No thanks to you,” Cal said, shooting the Harvester an accusatory glare. “I’m going to give you some advice. As a starship captain, I occupy a position of authority. I find that treating my subordinates fairly, respecting their boundaries, and not jabbing them with magical pain fingers really helps to get the best out of them.”
“I heard that,” called Loren’s voice from the next chamber over. “We’re not your subordinates.”
“Haha. Obviously, I wasn’t talking about you!” Cal called back. He lowered his voice to a whisper and nodded at the Harvester. “I was totally talking about her.”
“I heard that, too.”
“Jesus, the acoustics in here are insane,” Cal muttered. “Anyway.” He puffed out his cheeks. “What was my point?”
“I am not sure you even have one,” sneered the Harvester. He looked Cal up and down then spat a wad of black sputum onto the floor at his feet. “Now dig. You do not wish to displease the great Manacle.”
“Wow, you don’t know me at all, do you?” said Cal, but he hefted his pickaxe above his head, and thunked it against the wall. “There. Digging. Happy now?”
The Harvester sneered at him, then glided backward, his long black robe skimming across the uneven floor until he vanished back into the main chamber.
“Hey. Red Hat. You OK?” Cal asked, lowering his pick.
“Keep digging,” Red Hat warned. His voice was like a crackle of old paper. His little face twisted into a grimace as he swung with his own pick and knocked a respectably sized chunk of stone from the wall. “Don’t let them catch you stopping.”
Cal spat on his hands, which were now merely below-average in size, and swung with his pick again. Despite Red Hat’s exhaustion, the Nogem dug at more than twice the speed that Cal did.
“Hey, take it easy,” Cal warned. “You’re exhausted.”
“I’m fine,” Red Hat grunted, swinging twice in rapid succession.
“OK, well… thanks,” Cal said. “For stepping in for me. You shouldn’t have done that.”
“I know,” Red Hat grunted.
THUNK.
“But they’d have killed you, otherwise.”
THUNK.
“And I was just getting used to you.”
THUNK.
“Right. Well, like I said, thanks.” Cal watched the little man warily. “Seriously, you’re going to give yourself a hernia. Take a break.”
“Cannot,” Red Hat grunted. “Manacle is unhappy with our progress. We must redouble our efforts.”
Cal swung a couple of half-hearted strikes against the wall. “Right,” he said. “So, this Manacle guy. What do you know about him?”
“He is the Enslaver of Worlds,” Red Hat said.
“Right. We got that part,” Cal replied. “Anything else?”
THUNK.
THUNK.
THUNK.
“Rumors, mostly,” Red Hat said. “You shouldn’t trouble yourself with them.”
“Come on, it’s not like we’ve got a whole lot of other ways to pass the time,” Cal told him. He chinked another chip out of the wall, then smiled down at the Nogem. “Trouble me.”
And so, between puffs and pants, Red Hat told Cal what he knew of Manacle, Enslaver of Worlds.
He had come from somewhere in the Western arm of the galaxy, leading a fearsome warrior race—the Edi—in thousands of bloody conquests across hundreds of systems.
Rumors were, he’d been flesh and bone once, but an endless thirst for power had gradually seen parts of him replaced and enhanced by technology.
“He’s more machine now, than man,” Cal said in his best Alec Guinness voice, but Red Hat failed to pick up on the reference, and just nodded solemnly. This made his little bell jingle, but it didn’t really do much to lift the mood.
For a handful of years, the Edi and Zertex were at war, with both sides vying for control of the galaxy. The war eventually drew to a close when Manacle and Sinclair reached an agreement that saw them pool their resources.
The rest of the galaxy didn’t stand a chance. Symmorium space was now reduced to a handful of planets, of which, only two were even remotely habitable. The Greyx withdrew from galactic politics, and the Xandrie—once considered a fearsome gang of lawless pirates—
“Space pirates,” Cal corrected.
—had been deputized by the Edi-Zertex alliance, and tasked with controlling the outer edges of the galaxy through whatever means necessary. Or, as was more often the case, through whatever means they enjoyed most.
There were other rumors, of course, but while Red Hat had seemed confident of everything he’d said until that point, he seemed less so about most of what followed.
Manacle had been known to eat babies for their protein. He had single-handedly collapsed a sun, eradicating all life on the planets orbiting it. He could urinate through three of his fingers and
one of his eyes.
Some of the rumors were contradictory. He was either immortal or he depended on his technology to stay alive. He had been a great warrior back on his homeworld or a humble farm boy. He was six foot three or six foot four.
That sort of thing.
Whether some of the specifics were correct or not, the general picture painted of the guy was that he was a complete shizznod who had murdered his way across half the galaxy, assimilated the knowledge and technologies of any races he encountered, plundered their resources, then fonked off elsewhere to start the whole process again.
“Interesting,” said Cal. “He sounds like a keeper. But all this leaves me with one question.”
Red Hat paused to wipe sweat from his brow, then swung his pick again. “What’s that?”
“Why the fonk does he want mustard?”
Red Hat hesitated, pre-swing. “We don’t know,” he admitted, dropping his voice to a whisper. “There are rumors about that, too. He believes the Mines of Moktar are home to a great weapon.”
Cal thought back to the pain he had experienced when he’d shoveled the mustard into his mouth. If someone could successfully weaponize the stuff, their enemies wouldn’t stand a chance.
“Mustard gas,” Cal said. “I mean, I guess that makes sense, but it seems kind of low-tech, don’t you think? For space, I mean? I’m not expert, but I’d have thought giant spaceships with lasers would be more effective. Certainly cooler to watch.”
Red Hat shook his head, jangling his bell. “Not the mustard. Some other weapon. Buried deep. Some believe that’s why we’re actually digging. The mustard is just a cover.”
“Less talking, more digging,” hissed a passing Harvester. A glowing whip crackled in the air between them, and Red Hat started swinging more quickly than ever.
Tha-THUNK.
Tha-THUNK.
Tha-THUNK.
“We’re going as fast as we can,” Cal protested, which wasn’t strictly true in his case. He gestured to Red Hat. “Could we get some water for my friend here? He needs a rest.”
The whip cracked again. Red Hat let out a little sob of fright and somehow found the strength to pick up his pace. “No rest. Work. Dig.”
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