Prisoners of Darkness

by Jason Anspach

  But she just ignored that. Machines died. People died. Everything died.

  And then she would return to moving the marble.

  With her mind.

  She could make it float now.

  She wanted to make it dance. Wanted to make it circle. She wasn’t strong enough to do that just yet. But she would be. Given time.

  And when she thought about being stronger at moving the marble, she thought about the man named Goth Sullus. And once more she would practice with the marble. It was during one of those times, when she was thinking about moving the marble after thinking about the man who’d killed her father, that she began to sense the machines that hated her. They were coming for her.

  Coming to bring her food.

  She was afraid.

  And so she thought of Ravi. She thought of his smile, and his soft yet musical way of talking to her.

  And though she didn’t know it, she had just made a discovery about the power she was beginning to wield.

  That there were two forms of it.

  One that asked the marble to move.

  And one that demanded it move.

  When she was angry, she demanded the marble bend to her will. And that’s when she saw the power that came from such a place. The marble rose more swiftly. More surely. More… aggressively. And she wondered, or felt, or even imagined, that she could send it like a rock, or a speeding bullet, or even a blaster, straight into the main processing units of the machines that came for her. And hated her.

  Maybe not now… but if she practiced in this quiet place where there was only sometimes food that tasted of potatoes and warm water and nothing else but silence… one day, she could do that.

  If she practiced… in that way. Demanding. She had to demand that it be done.

  Just like every fiber in her being demanded that Goth Sullus pay dearly. In those moments the power grew and Prisma knew…

  … knew that it was the wrong way.

  And… almost right.

  Such a place for a little girl to be in, Ravi might have said to her. In a kindly way. And he did. He did say that. In her mind. When she became afraid of the darkness that told her to sleep, or the long dreadful silences during which the galaxy reminded her how finite and frail she was. Because of course… her daddy was dead. And the galaxy is cruel and hard, especially to little girls.

  She was afraid then.

  She would make up Ravi-words when the fear came for her like an animal. Like a mean dog not to be trusted. Vicious and growling. Fangs bared.

  Such a place for a little girl to be in, Ravi would say, even though she had to make up the words he might say to her. Comfort her with.

  And then she would play with the marble. Moving it side to side in a game. Making it run and hide from her. Pulling it toward her. Making it fly.

  What she could do was growing. Slowly. But it was.

  Many smart, brave, and fine people would never learn the lesson that the power came in two different forms. They would never learn, and they would pay with their own lives and the lives of others, and ruin worlds, and even the galaxy itself. They had done so in the past. They would do so again. Such a time was once more coming upon the galaxy even though there were few who knew the ways of this power.

  One was strong.

  And one was very weak.

  Such is the way of things one touches, not knowing what they are. Thinking they can control the uncontrollable. Such is that way.

  Two paths there always are.

  And then Leenah came to her.

  Came crying.

  The seam in the wall appeared, and the gap widened into a doorway, as it did when the machines brought her potato-tasting meals. But this time the pink-skinned Endurian stepped in. Or was pushed in. And then the door was just as abruptly slicing closed with a machine-like coldness and finality.

  At first Prisma was overjoyed. Because Leenah could be trusted. Was like a kind of compass in a galaxy that had lost all direction.

  Like Daddy.

  Like Tyrus.

  Like Crash.

  Leenah wasn’t crying in the first instant when she was pushed into the cell. The look on her face was one of worry for herself and concern for Prisma. But when she saw Prisma on the floor of the bare cell, that’s when the tears came. The Endurian rushed to the little girl, fell on her knees to cover her in kisses and a hug that told the galaxy to stay away from this little girl forever.

  Some things are sacred.

  Some things cannot be violated.

  And of course, Prisma knew this was not true.

  What is sacred?

  What cannot be violated?

  Daddy… Tyrus Rechs… and Crash… all dead.

  The galaxy is a hard and cruel place. Even for little girls.

  Leenah wept into her. Telling Prisma that everything would be all right. Telling the little girl that they would be rescued in time. “Trust me,” she said over and over again and again.

  Except, thought Prisma as she allowed herself to be enveloped and caressed and smoothed, except she had not sensed Leenah. Only the machines and their menace coming for her before Leenah was pushed through the door.

  Their hatred.

  Their hatred for her.

  She had sensed only that.

  13

  Synth Mines

  Herbeer

  Owens walked with Crux and Rowdy, striding purposefully toward a concentrated gathering of Gomarii.

  “I’m not a hundred percent with this,” Rowdy said, his voice low as they approached. He looked behind him at the drusic, Orpe, who followed at Owens’s request.

  “For this to work… it’s gotta be me,” said Owens. “And the Gomarii have to know the influence you three have down here.”

  One of the guards noticed the coming approach, and notified his blue-skinned peers, who squared themselves, ready hands resting on their energy whips.

  “Okay,” Owens said. “Orpe… as we planned.”

  “And no hard feelings?” rumbled the drusic.

  “Just make it convincing.”

  Owens wasn’t afforded the opportunity to change his mind. The big drusic gave a shout and drove its palm forcefully into Owens’s back, sending the air from his lungs and knocking him face-first onto the ground. The drusic packed a nasty punch.

  The Gomarii laughed at the sight of the assault.

  Crux gave a wheezing laugh of his own, sending an elbow into Rowdy’s side as though sharing a joke with the man. The legionnaire gave a confident, self-satisfied smile.

  Owens struggled onto his hands and knees. As soon as he regained his footing, Rowdy sent a sharp kick into his hamstring, sending him stumbling forward. That brought him face-to-face with the nearest Gomarii guard.

  Although the guard’s mouth was hidden somewhere behind his independently writhing tendrils, which sat on his face like a long, blue beard spanning from chin to chest, Owens got the distinct feeling a sinister smile lurked beneath that mass. With a hiss, the guard forced Owens to his knees, holding the legionnaire’s clavicle in a painful grip.

  Under normal circumstances, Owens would never have let on that he was being hurt. “Get tough” was a standard expression in the Legion. Never let the other guy know he’s made a dent. But if what was said about the Gomarii was true, and they could somehow read the truth of a man through some sort of extrasensory perception, Owens felt that for his plan to work, he’d best emit some false flags.

  He cried out at the pain, making it sound like this was an unwelcome inconvenience in addition to the hurt. It was a noise he’d heard countless times before, every time the kill team got authorization to bring down some bloated politician or technocrat whose stink had finally grown too large to ignore.

  This caused laughter among the other guards, who formed a loose semicircle around Owens and his captors.

  “Does this hurt, little one?” the Gomarii tormentor asked. His species was at least head and shoulders taller than humans.

  �
�Yes,” Owens said, holding back the anger he felt at sounding so helpless and broken. “Please… stop it.”

  Loud belly laughs and slaps on the back were shared among the guards.

  “So polite…” The guard’s tendrils caressed Owens about the head and neck.

  Owens projected every worldly concern he could imagine into his heart and mind. He thought of the guards as though they were his Legion drill instructor. He let frightening images of his wife and family, dead from some random accident or murderous home invasion, seep like floodwaters into his mind. He imagined himself old… alone. Waiting for death.

  The Gomarii made a wet slurping noise, sucking tendrils into its mouth and then slathering Owens’s face with the saliva-ridden things. “Yes… so polite. So… fearful. So compliant.”

  The tendrils were lifted away from Owens’s face, leaving a warm, viscous mucus to dry on his head and hair. His skin was rapidly cooling, like he had stepped out of a warm pool and into unheated air. He panted, looking down at his knees. He wondered if this, too, was for show. Or if the alien’s touch had left him feeling truly drained.

  The slaver looked sharply at the drusic. “Why do you bring this one to us, Orpe?”

  “He was stealing synth to make his quota,” grumbled the massive ape.

  This caused more laughter from the guards, who seemed to find everything in this joyless pit of hell to be funny.

  “What’s good for the flush is not good for the clutch?” asked the Gomarii slaver, clearly aware of Orpe’s own reputation for stealing to make his own quotas. “There is more to this. I see the fallen legionnaires with you. Why?”

  No one spoke, though Rowdy and Crux both shot the drusic glares of warning. Keep quiet.

  Another of the guards approached the drusic, reaching out toward the being with its tendrils. The wormy appendages crawled all over Orpe’s face. The drusic resisted only for a moment, and only with an involuntary pulling away of his head. He soon held still. He’d been trained by the whip to know better than to resist. The tendrils found their way up the drusic’s two large nostrils before returning into the Gomarii’s mouth with a slurp.

  The guard pulled away and announced, “He feels anger at the legionnaires.” The Gomarii looked back at the drusic with contempt in his eyes. “And fear.”

  “Don’t think about touching me or Crux,” Rowdy warned. “Unless you don’t mind losing whichever ones you slither our way.”

  “Maybe we just talk,” suggested the guard still holding on to Owens. Evidently, the Gomarii were none too keen on the idea of getting into an altercation with the Legion. “Explain.”

  Rowdy shifted from side to side, not in an agitated manner, but like a fighter, ready for action. “Found Orpe here and that one,” he pointed to Owens, “getting heated. About ready to fight. The guy you’re holding tries to say he’s Legion. Bull twarg. He ain’t Legion, and we don’t take kindly to anyone claiming otherwise. Crux and I wanted to teach him a lesson, but in the interest of fairness to Orpe, we agreed to bring him to you first to let you know that the kelhorn spilled all of Orpe’s synth when he tried to snatch it. So after he takes his beating, he needs to harvest a double.”

  It was not a request. Rowdy was telling the guards how it was going to be, and they made no attempt to challenge him on it. Owens marveled at the way the prisoners, at least the legionnaire prisoners, ran this place. Just so long as the blaster turrets weren’t put to use. That served as a pretty effective balance.

  He shook the thoughts from his head. He had a part to play.

  “No!” he protested. “I am Legion.”

  Everyone laughed again, but Owens persisted. “I was appointed to the Legion by Senator Umri Yaval. My name is Herron Knight.”

  The laughter stopped.

  “I’ve been trying to tell anyone who would listen, but no one would. I don’t belong down here.” He stood up, as if emboldened. “I’m rich. Spectacularly rich. I can make it worth your while—any of you—to get me out of this forsaken place.”

  The Gomarii hissed at one another in their native tongue.

  “Look it up. Look me up. Herron Knight from Crewster System.”

  One of the guards produced a datapad, and Owens knew at that point that he’d done it. Herron Knight was an all-purpose alias used by Dark Ops. He wouldn’t show up on any search of the holonet unless you went looking specifically for him. And then… false stories of a fabulously wealthy erudite bachelor who went off to play war hero through a Senate appointment would fill the screen. He was a man of means and power, and most Dark Ops leejes could use almost any angle with the alias should the mission require it.

  The guard showed the datapad to his peers. They began to jabber and hiss.

  “What’s it say?” demanded Rowdy.

  The Gomarii ignored him. Their attention was on Owens. “What might your freedom be worth?”

  “Anything,” a hopeful, desperate Owens answered. “A million credits. Each. And then permanent work as my personal bodyguards. Another quarter million annually for that. You don’t even have to show up to do the job.”

  Rowdy shouted to get the guard’s attention. “So he’s Legion? He’s a damned point?”

  “Deal!” hissed the lead slaver, who then turned his attention on Rowdy. “You will not be beating this prisoner any longer.”

  Looking down, Rowdy balled his fists. “You’re right about that. I’m gonna kill the point bastard!”

  And with that, he leaped forward into the guards like a madman. The drusic joined in, and the fight was on. Crux’s maniacal laughter seemed to weave through the fray.

  “Get him to safety!” shouted a Gomarii. “Keep him secure until he can be transported off-planet.”

  Two Gomarii took Owens by his arms and ran with him—directly toward the command center. More guards, some human but most Gomarii, streamed past them to join the melee. Owens knew that other legionnaires, hidden and in waiting, would be there to keep things even.

  An alarm sounded, echoing hauntingly through the caverns.

  In fifteen minutes, according to the plan, there would be a full-scale riot, and the legionnaires would have acquired blaster rifles to use against their captors. It was up to Owens to make sure the auto-turrets wouldn’t be turned on to put a stop to it all.

  ***

  The kill team almost instantly regretted patching Lao Pak’s comm into their own L-comms. It wasn’t a true link; Victory Squad could, at their leisure, turn off the signal and leave Lao Pak unable to communicate. Chhun remembered well the trouble that came from giving anyone but a leej full, unhindered access to the comm system. But right now, they needed to hear the pirate in order to assess when the best time for them to move would be.

  Chhun and his team were positioned in what Fish had taken to calling the “chattel room”—the hold designed to transport slaves. If all went according to plan, they would be using the smuggling hatch to get off the galaxy-class freighter undetected.

  By Chhun’s chrono, it had been three minutes since they’d come to a rest at the bottom of the synth mines’ massive docking elevator. The ship was near the end of its ponderously long cool-down landing cycle, and when it was complete, loading and unloading could begin.

  “Okay,” Lao Pak said over the comm. “I still walking from bridge. Now I in hall.”

  Chhun imagined the slim pirate talking into his comm, his chin pressed against his neck as if it would make his voice clearer. Like someone wearing a covert listening device in a classic holofilm.

  “Now I in other hall.”

  “Lao Pak,” Chhun said, “just tell us when you’re ready to lower the ramp.”

  “Now I outside boy general’s cell… I mean room,” said Lao Pak.

  Chhun, along with the rest of his team, heard the exchange that followed over L-comm.

  The cell door whooshed open, and an unfamiliar voice said, “Lao Pak! I can still help—you don’t have to do this!”

  “Do what?” Lao Pak answered, sound
ing innocent.

  “Don’t sell me to the Gomarii!” pleaded the voice.

  “What? I not do things like that, Boy General. This all for show.” He raised his voice. “You hear me? This all for show. I just kidding.” His voice returned to its normal level. “Besides, Boy General, even though you bad at everything, I not sell you into slavery. You trust Lao Pak.”

  “But you said—”

  “I say you trust Lao Pak!”

  There was a pause.

  “You’re going to let me out?”

  “Yes, but I shoot you if you be stupid.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “You’re going to be quiet. Do what I say. You got that?”

  Another pause.

  “Okay,” said Lao Pak, apparently responding to some non-verbal assent. “We go meet Gomarii. Get cargo and leave. It take long time.”

  Chhun motioned for Bear to open the smuggling hatch, which the mammoth legionnaire quickly did. Though they were positioned at the lowest deck, the belly of the ship, the thick impervisteel hull was quite a buffer between them and the outside of the ship. The hatch led into an unlit tube lined with ladder rungs.

  “Start climbing?” Pike asked his captain.

  Chhun nodded, and the team made their way down. Chhun called this in to Lao Pak, more out habit than a desire to let the pirate know what was happening.

  “I almost to exit door,” Lao Pak replied.

  “What?” asked his MCR companion.

  “I say shut up, Boy General.” There was a series of clicks and clanks. “I open door.”

  “Copy,” answered Chhun.

  “I can see that,” said the boy general.

  At the bottom of the shaft, the legionnaires found another access hatch. They pulled up, and it swung to the side, neatly nesting into a compartment built into the shaft itself. The deck of the docking bay deck was visible below, with only a three-foot drop. Galaxy-class freighters, when landed, look like four-legged animals with massive, drooping tummies, and the kill team would be exiting from the ship’s lowest point—a welcome design, given that the drop from other spots could be as far as fifteen feet.