by Rhonda Mason
* * *
MAIN REBEL BASE, ORDOCH
Malkor ignored the nasty looks just about every rebel in the base threw their way. Even the presence of Wetham and Ygreda beside himself, and of Rigger, didn’t stop Kayla’s people from giving them the stink eye.
Same look, different part of the galaxy. Ah, the glorious life of an IDC agent.
On the bright side, he’d earned Ygreda and Aarush’s respect on the last day as they thrashed out the details of the extraction plan. It was entirely possible they’d expected him and Rigger to have the combined intelligence of a rodent. Once that preconception had been shattered, they’d all gotten along quite well. Wetham was a bit of a cold fish, but Malkor liked the other two better than he’d expected to. Ygreda was sharp and decisive. She immediately grasped the basics of any plan they came up with and started fleshing it out on her own. Aarush had a real head for tactics and a quietly sarcastic wit. If he wasn’t so injured, Malkor would have included him in their plans.
“I have great faith in you, agents,” Wetham was saying as they strode along the corridor to the lift. “Rest assured that we’ll be doing our part.”
“You’re certain your people will be able to place the charges at the prison under the cover of darkness tonight?” Malkor asked. “We only have one shot at getting Mesa out. I am hopeful we’ll breeze right in, impress them all with our transfer orders, and breeze back out, but if something goes wrong, we’re going to need a distraction. Once they know we want Mesa, they’ll make sure she’s never found.”
Wetham nodded. “Aarush assures me his team can handle it.”
“The IDs are as flawless as I’ve ever seen,” Ygreda said. She returned the credentials to Malkor, credentials that Rigger had worked up last night after tapping into the imperial infolink network, and which Base Commander Chen had signed electronically this morning. They were dated for tomorrow to give time for the rebels to get the charges in place. They had a rare opportunity to gather intel directly from officers in the occupation forces, something the Wyrd rebels could never do, so they planned to make the most of an evening in the city. The rebels had pointed out which bars the officers frequented, so it would be easy to mingle.
The four stopped outside the lift. “I’ll leave you here,” Wetham said. “I wish you speed and success with your mission.” He bowed, and was headed back the way they came as soon as he straightened.
Ygreda gestured into the lift. “Let’s get you packed. Jahnni will take you to the nearest shuttle depot,” she said as they rode the lift to the upper level. “You can take the shuttle into Vankir proper from there. The first real test of your IDs won’t come until you hit the city gates.”
“We won’t have a problem,” Malkor said. Rigger had been hacking networks and complinks since she was a baby, and forging the octet’s needed documents since she was a teenager. There was no doubt in his mind that they’d make it through the outer gates. Things would become decidedly dicey after that.
“Your IDs are loaded with a small amount of credits: all we could spare.”
At Ygreda’s words, he cut a glance to Rigger, who winked. He cleared his throat to cover a laugh. “Funds won’t be a problem.”
The Wyrd caught on, and offered a quick smile. “Perhaps when you get back, you can see to our ‘funds.’”
Rigger nodded. “I’d be happy to.”
The lift opened and Ygreda showed them to a supply room filled floor to ceiling with every item you would need in order to fit in as an imperial, including weapons. He and Rigger were already dressed in imperial army uniforms with their officer rank designated at the collar.
“Once you’ve equipped yourselves, Jahnni will meet you on the ground level. Anything you need before I leave you?”
“We have everything, thank you.” Malkor stepped forward to shake her hand, and Rigger did the same. “We’ll contact you on the agreed channel when we’re ready for extraction.”
“Good luck, agents.”
Rigger waited until Ygreda was out of earshot, then said, “We’re going to need it.”
“Let’s at least get to the city before you consider us out of the game, okay?”
She grinned. “Sure thing, boss.”
Despite her humor, it was a tense ride to the shuttle depot. Jahnni gave them terse, last-minute intel on the mood inside Vankir City. Apparently there had been a series of protests last night and now the army was on high alert. Admittance to the city had been restricted.
“Oh good,” Rigger said, “I love a challenge.”
Malkor was less than thrilled to hear about the whole thing. Still, their cover should hold up. What was one more log on the fire?
“Holograms,” Jahnni reminded them, and then he set the hovercar down in the shuttle station’s lot.
While it was highly unlikely that anyone would recognize Malkor or Rigger if they used their own faces for the IDs, facial recognition programs at the gate would flag them as among the empire’s most wanted fugitives.
“You have a head like a bowling ball,” Rigger told him as they left Jahnni behind and sauntered to the shuttle station platform.
“For which I have you to thank.” Malkor gave her a once over. “I see you’ve managed to make yourself look a boar.”
“You don’t remember Ubeca Minstin?” She turned so that he could get a better look.
“Was Ubeca that Madame from Falanar’s Pleasure District?” He laughed. “You nailed it.”
The shuttle arrived then. He and Rigger surreptitiously checked their ion pistols in their holsters, grabbed their rucksacks, and boarded. They made it to Vankir City proper without incident. Most of the other passengers were Wyrds, and none made eye contact with him or Rigger.
They followed the flow of foot traffic leaving the station. Up ahead, huge flak towers rose out of the dirt, giant sentinels on either side of the gate. The towers were multiple stories tall and had armed sentries. The gate itself was closed. Cross-woven quadtanium panels made for an impressive structure that would be difficult to breach. The panels continued past the guard towers and formed a daunting wall that was interrupted regularly by more well-armed flak towers.
Malkor joined the queue of people wending their way up the hill. Apparently a different gate was used for vehicle traffic. Here, people were being checked one by one for security threats at a station in the base of the flak tower on the right. Judging by the length of the line outside, they had a long wait ahead of them. Thankfully they were inside the massive environmental dome that covered much of this continent’s northern plain, so at least the weather outside was pleasant. They waited their turn, moving one slow meter at a time. An hour had passed before they finally entered the tower.
Each handed over their ID to the surly-looking soldier stationed behind a complink terminal, then laid their weapons and packs on the belt to be scanned and waited, albeit anxiously, for the go-ahead. The soldier at the complink certainly seemed to be giving the IDs a triple looking-over.
“Where have you come from?” he asked.
“Senfranco Base.”
The soldier arched a brow. “And you arrived this morning? That must have been a rough trip.”
“Nothing like flying in the middle of the night, am I right?” Malkor joked. “Our commander has a love affair with missions that need to be done ‘yesterday!’ I swear, he has ASAP tattooed on his ass.”
The guard didn’t join in the joke. “What’s your business in Vankir?”
“Prisoner transport,” Rigger said in her best “quit wasting my time” tone.
Tapping came from behind the desk as the guard’s fingers flew over the projected keyboard. “You don’t have a barracks designation. Every soldier from another command coming into the city needs to be stationed at a barracks.”
“It’s just one night: we figured we’d just take rooms wherever we found them.”
The guard gave him a flat stare.
This was not going as smoothly as Malkor would like. Then ag
ain, most administrators seemed to get off on being officious assholes, so maybe things were par for the course.
“If you’re coming into the city overnight,” the guard finally said, “you need to be logged at a barracks.”
“Fine.” Malkor gave Rigger a look to keep her from saying anything else. “Then give us a barrack designation and we’ll stay there overnight.”
“Can’t do that.”
Would it hurt their chances of gaining entry to the city if Malkor reached over the desk, grabbed the guard by his lapels and shook the shit out of him?
“Who can?” he forced himself to ask calmly.
“I’ll have to make a call. Whose command did you say you were from, again?”
It was practically lunchtime when they finally cleared the gate. But at least they had cleared the gate. One hurdle down, who knew how many left to go.
He stood with Rigger in the street on the other side, thoroughly saddened by the view in front of him. Trash littered the street from one end to the other, something that never would have happened before the occupation. A broken sanitation bot lay in a puddle of filth. Another spun in a crazy, ever-widening circle until a passing soldier kicked it back to the gutter. Squat buildings of dull organoplastic made up a shanty town of bars and prostitution and hid the Ordochian architecture behind.
“Let’s get away from here,” he said. The change his people had brought to the once great city angered him.
Away from the busy gate, the place looked more like he remembered—a confection of swirls and arches, loops and graceful turns. It was as if the buildings were having conversations with each other, one informed the other, and so on and so on down the street; as if the entire city had been built somewhere else and set in place exactly as it was now. It was amazing what architects and engineers could do when they didn’t have to build the machinery to build the buildings. Amazing what the power of the mind could accomplish.
“Will we ever have a city such as this?” Rigger breathed, her voice softened with awe. “It’s like riding through a cloud.”
“We’d probably have to stop warring with each other, first.” Which seemed unlikely. The blemishes on the city, the stains and dark spots existed anywhere an imperial installation had been built. That was less a commentary on imperial architecture, though, and more on necessity. Occupying armies only had time for one consideration: function.
And that explained why every imperial installation looked like a short stack of toddler blocks. No wonder they had commandeered so many of the original Wyrd buildings for their own use.
Both the prison and their barracks were located in the city center, not too far from the entrance to the massive Complex of Oligarchs. All the major ruling families on Ordoch had huge ancestral homes here, along with markets, restaurants, entertainment centers… The noble class—for lack of a better term—could live almost entirely within the Complex if it was so inclined, and this made the Complex more of a city within a city. The Reinumon palace, the home seat of Kayla’s family and now center of the occupation government, was there as well. When he’d come to Ordoch as part of the IDC contingent five years ago, he’d spent most of his time within the massive area. Their barracks had an excellent view of brilliant towers in all shapes and sizes rising over the verdant forest that formed the “wall” between the Complex and the rest of the city.
“Let’s go check in,” Malkor said. “I have a feeling it’s going to be a long night of bar hopping before we get to the loose talk and valuable intel.”
15
THE YARI
It was midday before Kayla woke up. She hadn’t gotten to sleep until “sunrise” ship time. Now that she was awake and the events of last night came back to her, it seemed like she might still be dreaming.
Rooks? Seriously? And not just one, either. Once the first adult was happily settled, a second had blinked into place above it, looming like an enemy spacecraft. It hadn’t made a threatening move, though. Instead, it gently—for a rook— rested its gargantuan body on the Yari’s hull beside the first, knocking the ship out of position once again and sending the crew into fits in Kayla’s comm. Luckily Ariel had been at the helm, and had been able to reestablish their position. The last thing they needed was for the Yari to crash into the Lorius, or worse yet, pass through the Tear, leaving a second of the engine in a cave on Ordoch.
The two “parent” rooks then seemed to curl up together, the lights on their bodies making a gentle counterpoint to the vibrations of the ship caused by the stress test.
From their size alone, it was hard to imagine that they were living creatures. But to see how they had acted last night, and especially the “babies,” they were so animal-like that it seemed unlikely another intelligence was using them as a mere vessel.
What did she know about xenobiology, though? The only wildlife she was familiar with was on Ordoch or in the Fengar Swamp. The only humanoid races she knew of were from the Wyrd Worlds or the empire, and that physiology was so similar that they had to have come from a single ancestor some time in their shared history.
One good thing about the rooks: her close encounter—and the fear of her demise—had broken the ice between her and Vayne. He’d rushed to see her as soon as she returned, berating her for her recklessness even while feelings of gratefulness that she was safe flowed into her mind.
On the downside, he’d reported that his search with Tia’tan for Zimmerman had turned up nothing.
Kayla levered herself out of her bunk and got to her feet. She changed into a tunic and leggings, then pulled on her boots and fastened her kris daggers to her thighs. The familiar weight of the knives was comforting. She’d spent so much time in her EMU lately that she hardly ever had them on.
I am so not cut out for life in space.
As she was getting dressed she commed the control room. “Are the rooks still out there?”
One of the rebels replied: “The stress test finished an hour ago, and they departed after that. Seems it really was the vibrations that had drawn them.”
She didn’t need to be told that. Fifteen minutes with the rooks had made it clear they loved the ship’s vibrations. Or at least enjoyed them. The adult rooks undulated a sleepy light show with the pulses, the babies being a little more exuberant.
On her way out the door she checked with Hekkar via mobile comm to see if he’d heard anything from Ordoch. Nothing. Hopefully no news of Malkor was good news, at this point.
::Good, you’re awake:: Vayne said in her mind. ::I’m meeting with Tia’tan and Toble in the commissary for lunch if you’re up for it.::
Damn lack of psi powers. In answer, she kicked her steps into a jog and reached the commissary in double time.
When the commissary doors slid open she heard Hekkar’s voice: “Well, if it isn’t the rook charmer.”
“I thought we were going with rook babysitter?” Tia’tan called back.
Kayla rolled her eyes. “Very funny.”
“Ooo! How ’bout, ‘Kayla, queen of the rooks?’” That last one was from Toble.
“I’m glad you’re all having so much fun at my expense.” Kayla made her way to the food synthesizer in search of a hot, caffeinated beverage of any variety. Vayne met her there. “What, no snappy nickname for me?”
He smiled, but it seemed to have a shadow behind it. “I’ll come up with something.” In a lower, more serious voice he said, “I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Me too.” She grabbed her steaming cup and followed Vayne back to the table where the others sat. She, Vayne, Tia’tan, Toble, and Hekkar had the commissary to themselves for a moment. Better get down to business before that changed. “What have I missed?”
Hekkar spoke up first. “As I said earlier, no word from the boss, but that’s to be expected. Corinth is still sleeping. He was beside himself with worry for you, and finally crashed right before you did. Vid’s keeping an eye on him.”
“Good. He needs to sleep more, anyway.”
Hekk
ar grimaced. “He thought you’d say something like that. You might want to dial back the overprotectiveness. Trust me when I say, young men hate that kind of thing.”
Kayla blinked, her mug of tea suspended midair as she froze in the act of lifting it. The whole table paused, waiting for her reply. She fought the urge to snap back that she’d parent Corinth however she liked, and how dare he tell her how to handle her il’haar’s welfare.
Right away, she realized it for a knee-jerk reaction, her instant outrage fueled by her own fears that she was a poor substitute for a parent or his own ro’haar.
::Easy:: Vayne said. ::He’s not wrong.:: He brushed against her mental shields and she lowered them without thinking, letting him in.
I know that, she practically snapped. She forced herself to take a sip of the red tea she’d synthed up. Conversation at the table returned to normal.
Images of Corinth came to the surface, how young he had been, how frail. How undernourished they’d both been for five years.
::Kayla… This is how he is now.:: Vayne sent an entirely different set of images of Corinth. He looked healthy and well fed. Taller. He wasn’t so hesitant, and he actually smiled. :: This is Corinth. You need to let those outdated images of Corinth go.::
As if it were that easy. It wasn’t something she was prepared to face at the moment. Focusing on the immediate tasks in front of her was much more appealing than self-examination.
When she didn’t answer Vayne, he let the matter drop.
“Larsa said the stress test was a success,” Hekkar continued. “She and Noar are also still sleeping, but Larsa said she plans to get back to work on drive construction as soon as she’s up.”
“Here’s hoping Malkor and the rebels can get those three engineers Larsa needs,” Tia’tan said. “Wetham said he’s holding off on sending more parts for the drive until we know for sure that we’ll be able to complete it.”
Kayla could only imagine her sister’s response. “That must have gone down well with Natali.”