by Tristan Vick
Across the battlefield, Ishtar had managed to climb onto the third ape’s back and was hacking at its thick neck with frenzied chops with the shank she had used to kill Algaia.
It wasn’t expert or precise, but Ishtar wasn’t one to play nice when it came to a chance to amplify the amount of gore. The crowd got off on the brutality of the sport and she had quickly risen through the rankings to become a fan-favorite. And although Ishtar could have easily dispatched the creature with a single, clinical swipe to its jugular, she gave it five additional lacerations before finally taking off its head.
Ishtar rode the beast to the ground and leaped off just as its body met the ground. Landing on her feet, she trotted out to the center of the arena, riding out the momentum. She posed dramatically, looking over toward the eastern wall to see Danica crouched underneath half an energy shell, the dead body of the final ape draped across her.
“A little help here?” she grumbled, noticing Ishtar just standing there watching her. She strained against the creature’s immense weight. Needless to say, she wouldn’t be able to hold the energy field much longer and was already beginning to feel rather drained.
Ishtar waited another moment before heading over to assist Danica when, halfway there, the energy bubble burst and the large ape collapse directly on top of her.
There was a loud oomph and Danica disappeared beneath her furry blue opponent. Ishtar stopped in her tracks and the crowd fell silent, waiting with bated breath to see what had become of the popular Dagon warrior.
Just as the tension grew to unbearable heights, a lavender arm shot out from beneath the dead ape. Violet fingernails dug into the sand of the arena and Danica clawed her way out from under the beast’s heavy body.
Once again, the televid drones swooped down to zoom in on Danica’s bare chest, which heaved with every deep breath she took. Rising to her feet, she clutched her bruised ribs with one arm, her other arm hanging limply at her side from exhaustion.
“Thanks for nothing,” Danica groaned, eyeing Ishtar with an icy stare.
Ishtar shrugged. “It looked as though you had things under control.”
The two women sidled up to one another and looked up toward the emperor’s booth. Without warning, a giant hologram of Emperor Dakroth’s face appeared, causing both women to tense, and his voice boomed over the speaker system. “Well done, ladies! Well done, indeed!”
The crowd roared out with applause and then quickly died down again. The image of the emperor panned out to show his upper half and he held out his fist. Jutting a thumb out, he waited till the sounds of the arena died down to a murmur, and then turned up his thumb.
“They will live to fight another day!” he announced.
After an eruption of applause, he raised his hand and gestured for them to simmer down. “Hear me, my loyal subjects! I have a very special announcement. In the next match, our valiant gladiators will face none other than the champion herself. The Empress, Jegra Alakandra, Jegra the Merciless, the reigning supreme champion!”
The arena went wild. The cheers were so loud it sounded like the rumble of an avalanche.
Danica’s face went numb at the news while Ishtar grinned excitedly next to her. If they were really to go up against Jegra, she knew it would be a death match. Last one standing gets to live.
Naturally, Danica would never deliberately harm the one woman she loved with all her heart. But even if she chose to fight, there was no way she and Ishtar, not even with their combined strength, could defeat Jegra. It was impossible. And Dakroth knew it.
Dakroth swiped away the holovid display of Danica and Ishtar standing amid the roar of the crowd and leaned forward in his seat. Placing his chin on steepled fingers, he grinned to himself, pleased by his own cunning.
Not only would he force Jegra to fight a title bout, but he’d kill two birds with one stone, as his lovely wife would be obliged to take out two royal pains in his neck. As for the empress, he’d keep her around a bit longer. After all, he still had the Nyctans to worry about and he needed her as a bargaining chip. The other two, however, were dead weight. At least he’d get some good ratings to close out the season.
26
Avocado colored breasts and olive-green nipples flashed Jegra as Onelle Agnar changed her clothes behind the glass wall of her state-of-the-art cell aboard the Shard. Jegra didn’t feign to look away but merely kept her gaze focused on the Bre’lal woman. Given their history, Jegra didn’t trust her for an instant.
For reasons unclear to Jegra, Onelle blamed her for Abethca Agnar’s death. Somewhere along the line, in her quest to track Jegra down and avenge her sister, she’d ended up marooned on the same alien world that Jegra crash-landed on months later. It was a bit much, and, though she couldn’t put all the pieces together, Jegra didn’t think it was all simply a coincidence.
Although there was no way to have known the squid entity would transport her there, it still seemed like all the dominoes fell into perfect formation, as if someone had orchestrated it all.
But who could arrange so many seemingly random events in such a way as to ensure two people were destined to meet in no other way but the way they did? That’s when Jegra remember the Nyctan oracle.
Surely, if anyone, Sanakar must know. She was the only person Jegra had met who could see glimpses into the future. Even if she hadn’t planned it herself, chances are, she would know who had.
“I know I’m the last person you want to see right now,” Jegra said, watching Onelle change out of her clothes and into an orange prison-issue jumpsuit, “but, I need you to hear the truth. Whether you accept it or not, whether you can find it in your heart to forgive me or not, that’s up to you. But, here it is. The truth is I tried to save her. I couldn’t. That regret will forever be in the back of my mind, nagging at me. Reminding me of my greatest failure.”
Onelle slowly looked up at Jegra and gently touched the welt on her head from where Jegra had headbutted her. There was a long silence before she chose to answer.
“I suppose I owe you an apology. After all, you’ve watched over my youngest sister, Raphine, for several months now. Kept her safe. And for that I’m grateful.”
Jegra nodded. “It’s the least I could do for Abby’s little sister. Please, if there’s anything you need, do not hesitate to ask.”
Onelle brushed down her bright orange prison-issue jumpsuit and grinned devilishly. “I could use better clothes.”
Jegra laughed and stepped closer to the glass, her eyes meeting Onelle’s. Her teal eyes were like the ocean, and she still couldn’t believe how much Onelle resembled Abethca. If it wasn’t for Onelle’s more chiseled form, thanks in no small part to the harsh conditions of that terrible planet, Jegra was certain the two sisters would look virtually identical.
And she couldn’t help but sense old feelings stirring. She had to remind herself that this was a different woman. That the woman she’d loved and known was gone now.
“I’ll see what I can do, but I’m not making any promises. Captain Blackstar runs a tight ship and she’s not likely willing to budge on regulation or protocol.”
Onelle ran her finger down the edge of her jumpsuit’s V-neck and tugged at it and fanned herself. Beads of sweat ran down her forehead and she wiped them away. “Does it feel hot in here or is it just me?”
“Now that’s something I can help you with. What temperature would you like?”
Onelle shrugged. She wasn’t sure. In fact, she was having trouble thinking clearly. Her head was spinning and she felt as though a fever were coming on. But she didn’t feel sick; that was the weird part.
“Well, if you make up your mind, just tell the guard. I’ll personally instruct them to assist you and change the temperature if need be.” Jegra slowly turned to leave and began to move toward the door when Onelle called out to her.
“Wait! I need to tell you something.”
Jegra turned to hear what Onelle had to say.
“I just wanted you to know that�
��” she paused briefly, her dizziness abruptly spiking into a migraine. She cringed and pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to push back against the searing pain in her head. Then, without provocation, her face went blank and a cruel smile incrementally formed on her Brunswick green lips. “When I get out of here, I will hunt you down and gut you like an Angorian king fish.”
Jegra took a step back, raised an eyebrow, then shook her head disappointedly. She had given Onelle a second chance, but she was as two-faced as ever. It seemed like someone had literally flicked a switch in her mind and caused her to go from pleasant to psychotic in a split-second.
“For crying out loud! And to think that I was trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. But, apparently, you’re bat-shit insane. So, enjoy your stay in the brig, sweetheart.” Jegra turned, her arms at her sides, fists balled up in aggravation, and began to march toward the exit.
Just then, Captain Lianica Blackstar and a security team burst into the brig, almost crashing into Jegra. Whatever business it was about, it seemed urgent.
“Apologies, your grace,” Lianica said, “but we just picked up a strange transmission coming from this room.”
“Transmission?” Jegra asked. “What sort of transmission? Onelle and I have been talking for the past five minutes, uninterrupted.”
Onelle stood behind the glass staring at both women with a blank face. It was as if she was in a trance of some kind. Meanwhile, one of the security officers pulled out a device and began scanning the entire room, searching for the mysterious signal.
“Captain, the signal…it’s coming from…her.”
Everyone turned their gazes toward Onelle, who was now grinning at them. But her smile was too big, too forced, to be genuine. To their surprise, her smile disappeared from her face leaving only the deadpan glare once again.
Onelle opened her mouth and a voice not her own came out. “Feed me,” it said, gurgling. “Feed me!”
“Shit!” Lianica shouted. “It’s a mind-control worm!”
She raced over to a security panel on the wall, opened a cubby, and pulled out a handheld device roughly the size of an electric razor. Without hesitating, she unlocked Onelle’s cell and entered.
“What’s that?” Jegra asked, eyeing the device in the commander’s hands.
“It’s a multi-purpose medical wand.”
Rushing up to Onelle, who seemed to be frozen in a trance, she began running the wand up and down Onelle’s neck and ears, scanning for any signs of the mind-control device. When the device in Lianica’s hands chimed, its LED lights blinking wildly, she sighed. “Found it.”
Lianica pulled out what looked like a small pitch fork and jammed it into Onelle’s left ear. Jegra cringed at the sight. But what came next was far worse.
The captain twisted the fork and carefully drew it back out of Onelle’s head. Skewered on the end of it was a translucent slug with pulsating internals that glowed dimly then faded again. It looked part organic and part mechanical, a mesh of bioengineered technology. A personally tailored parasite.
“These things can take over a person’s entire nervous system, giving the hacker access to one’s brain, muscles, and body functions. You basically become a living puppet.”
Lianica flicked the fork and threw the slug on to the floor. Raising her boot, she promptly stamped it out of existence. There was a grotesque sounding squish and then the commander turned to her men, “Get this woman to sickbay. Have the doctor run a full neuro-scan to see how bad the damage is.”
Onelle, who looked comatose, was ushered out of the room by the two guards, leaving only Jegra and the commander to stare at each other in silence.
“If that thing was controlling her,” Jegra finally said, nodding down at the remains of the worm on the prison floor, “then her actions weren’t her own.”
“She was a sleeper assassin. It seems that whoever infected her with the parasite wanted to use her to get to you.”
“I’ll give you one guess who it likely was.”
Lianica nodded then stroked her chin in contemplation. “Your assumption may be true, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. As bold a move as this was, it’s not the emperor’s style. He likes a certain amount of theatrics. Big space battles. Half-naked assassins. A no holds barred match in the arena. That sort of thing. Using biologically engineered parasites doesn’t fit his modus operandi.”
“In that case, I’m going to need you to find out who implanted her with the parasite and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Lianica crossed her right fist over her heart and bowed deeply. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“I’m thankful you found it in time. But how did you know she was infected? Aren’t those things designed to be undetectable?”
“Under normal circumstances, yes. Unless you know what it is you’re supposed to be looking for, they don’t show up on any scans. However, because these holding cells scramble all communication frequencies, it needed to amplify its signal to maximum, putting too much strain on its host. Whoever is controlling it wanted very badly to cut through the interference. I suppose they had hoped to get to you before getting found out. Luckily we were running a ship-wide scan at just the right time and caught it.”
Jegra and Lianica entered the corridor together and slowly made their way to the bridge. “I appreciate the catch. Keep me updated on her condition. I want to know the moment she’s able to answer questions.”
“As you wish, Your Maj—”
Jegra raised her hand and stopped Lianica in the middle of her sentence. “Please, just call me Jegra. That’s an order.”
“Yes, Your Majes–I mean–yes, Jegra.”
Jegra smiled and reached over to Lianica and gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze. Lianica smiled back.
“Now, where are we on locating Danica?”
Lianica tilted her head ever so slightly and gave the empress a puzzled look. “I thought you knew.”
Jegra shook her head slightly, confirming she wasn’t clear about what Lianica was referring to.
Lianica walked over to a wall display and brought up a holovid. She tapped a few buttons and tuned it to the gladiatorial games on Arena City. In the picture, Danica and Ishtar stood back-to-back as they fended off three enormous apes with ice-blue fur. Jegra recognized the creatures. They were Korgons from the ice world Riverion. Although no more intelligent than a silverback gorilla back on Earth, they were extremely brutal in the arena and liked to tear the arms and legs off their opponents.
“That bastard,” Jegra said under her breath. “He sold her into the games.”
“It’s the seventh match in the humiliation bout. She’s being forced to fight alongside her interrogator, the one they call the red-skinned assassin. Rumors are the tenth game will end with a Bull and Swan bout.”
Jegra knew that a “bull and swan bout” was merely slang for an anything goes styled match, where the token warrior must go up against a gang of combatants, all with the single-minded goal of humiliating the defender by any means necessary. This included lewd acts of sexual assault, unthinkable violence, defecation, and even defilement after death–should it come to that.
It was a match reserved for the worst offenders of the law, as well as anyone the Emperor deemed particularly worthy for the role of the swan. Jegra had had to fight her bout after her escape attempt. “No bad deed goes unpunished,” Dakroth had informed her the night before her match. Needless to say, she won the competition, but it wasn’t something she’d wish on anyone.
Very few ever survived the ordeal. But if they did, they were rewarded with a temporary reprieve. Two months furlough to visit any loved ones, travel destinations, or just recuperate. Of course, many tried to escape during their furlough, but IGS always sent their bounty hunters to collect their prized gladiators. Something which Jegra had found out the hard way.
Even though Jegra knew the awful direness of Danica’s situation, she couldn’t help but smile to herself as the memory of her own humil
iation bout entered her head. She may have been the only gladiator in the entire history of the games to have successfully defended off every attacker in her Bull and Swan bout. At the end of her match, she remembered the sands being so saturated with the blood of her enemies that it was like wading through sticky mud after a rainstorm.
That was the match in which she had inadvertently caught Emperor Dakroth’s eye and in which he had taken a fond interest in her. That very same night, he met her in her personal chambers, underneath the arena, for a moonlight tryst.
He continued to meet with her every night for two weeks before being distracted by the political concerns of an empire embroiled in a trade war with the Nyctans. She didn’t see him again until his battlecruiser jumped into orbit above Thessalonica, the very same day she had met Abethca.
The rest, as they say, is history.
“What are your orders, Mistress Jegra?” Captain Blackstar shifted uncomfortably on her feet as she tried to get accustomed to using the empress’s actual name rather than any formal designation. Still, she applied the honorary title of mistress before it just to be safe.
“First, I want you to track down that signal and find whoever it is that’s controlling Onelle. They obviously want me dead, and I want to know who and why. After that, we’ll figure out how to break Danica out of Arena City.”
Lianica bowed reverently. After straightening up again, she enthusiastically clicked her heels together, crossed her right fist over her heart, and then turned and headed up the corridor, leaving Jegra to be alone with her thoughts.
Jegra turned and stared out of a nearby portal and watched the stars. They were in Galliforn space and she had been out of commission for several months. As she began hatching a plan, there was a flash of light off the starboard bow and the Skywend suddenly appeared.
Without even realizing it, Jegra smiled faintly. Raven Nightguard wasn’t only her greatest ally in the fight against Dakroth’s corruption, but she was the most morally grounded person Jegra had ever met. And Jegra knew that she was in desperate need of Raven’s expert counsel. If anyone knew what the next step should be, it would be her.