Zero Recall

by Sara King

  That did it. Joe went to the wall pad, opened the PlanOps database, accessed his ground-team record, and changed the configuration. “There,” he said, stepping back so the Jreet could see. “You’re off the team. Officially. Now headquarters is looking for a new assignment for you. I’m sure they’ll find some two-bit Takki slave for you to push around. Hell, you’ll probably have every Prime on the planet get into a bidding war over your useless hide. In the meantime, we’ll be down plucking the scales off the Vahlin. We might sell you a couple of his scales afterwards, if it will make you feel better.”

  The Jreet stared at the five names on the screen for long moments. Then, with an enraged cry, he ripped Joe off his feet and hurled him into the wall with all the force of a wrecking ball. Joe hit the corner, then crumpled instantly because too many bones had been shattered to hold him upright.

  A Huouyt with an odd-colored eye rushed into the room at the sound of the Jreet’s scream, then paused to give Joe’s unnaturally twisted body a startled glance. Joe thankfully blacked out before his broken bones could get over their shock and make themselves known.

  #

  “What next?” Rri’jan asked, pacing the floor of Forgotten’s chamber. “I’m not seeing a clear goal from all of this, Geuji.”

  Forgotten endured the imbecile’s interruption calmly. “Now we have a war, we use it as a testing ground.”

  “A testing ground.” The Huouyt was trying to maintain his façade of control, but he clearly didn’t understand.

  “Yes,” Forgotten said. “Now that we’ve tied their hands, they’ll have to send in ground troops. They’ll try different combinations of Planetary Ops groundteams hoping they find a group that works well enough to take out the princes. With Aez destroyed, a handful of the strongest Jreet will go to Neskfaat seeking vengeance. Those will be the ones we need. Finding a team that can reach the Vahlin will only be half the battle—only a Jreet will be able to kill Mekkval in hand-to-hand combat.”

  “So we’re using this war just to pick a Jreet to fight for us?” Rri’jan sounded disbelieving.

  “There is more than one method to kill a Dhasha, Rri’jan. We’re using this war to find the combination of species that is most successful at finding those methods. Ayhi, Jahul, Ooreiki, Huouyt, Baga, Ueshi…”

  “Why don’t you just decide what the best combination is and spare us the war?”

  “I could. My personal choice would probably be a Human leader, a Huouyt assassin, a Jreet heir, an Ooreiki with the phenomenon called tunnel-instinct, a Baga scout, and a Grekkon burrower, though if I were to simply pick them out of hand, they would not have the experience working together that they will require when we send them against Mekkval.”

  Rri’jan’s face wrinkled with distaste. “The best leader would be Human? You are sure?”

  “No. That is why I will allow the war to make the selections for me. There are one hundred and thirty-four princes. Planetary Ops will assemble approximately two and a half million inter-species groundteams, all with different mixtures of killing talent. However, I believe the leader to successfully reach the Vahlin will be Human. There are several Jreet capable of taking out a large Dhasha, foremost among them are the Voran and Welu heirs. I have several Ooreiki candidates in mind, though any with the tunnel instinct will do. Same for the Grekkon. Burrowing is a straightforward process, and as long as his companions can protect him, any Grekkon will suffice. The Baga will be trickier.”

  Rri’jan gave Forgotten an irritated look. “What is a Baga? Are they even citizens?”

  “They are. They’ve colonized seven planets, though they technically own sixty-five, most of which were colonized by Huouyt or Ooreiki due to the Baga’s lack of understanding for numbers beyond six. They have only rudimentary mathematical skills, so advanced civilization is beyond them at this point.”

  “You would entrust our plans to a barbarian?”

  “Baga are pranksters and risk-takers, but they are not stupid. Despite their appearance and lack of mathematical capacities, they are one of the six most intelligent species in Congress, and like to use that advantage over others. In fact, they will need someone to keep them in line or they are quick to offend species not so well versed in their mischief. Unfortunately, their particular talents make Baga more dangerous than over ninety-two percent of all other Congressional species, so I would not be surprised if they kill groundmates in over half of the inter-species experiments. In particular, I believe the Baga will target the Ooreiki for some of their crueler jokes, due to their terraforming history. I give Baga-Ooreiki pairings a projected failure rate of eighty-nine percent, over four-fifths of which will end in the Ooreiki’s death.”

  “Ooreiki breed like vermin,” Rri’jan said dismissively. “They can afford to lose a few.”

  “But we can’t,” Forgotten informed him. “The death of any member of the team will result in death for all of them.”

  “Really? Why is that?”

  “Because I’ve engineered it that way. This is a testing ground. We don’t want failure before we can use them.”

  “Then why put an Ooreiki and a Baga together, if you already know the result?”

  “Because their separate skills will both be necessary to our team’s final success. It will be up to the team’s leader to keep the Baga under control.”

  “And the Huouyt?” Rri’jan demanded. “I can give you my best assassins.”

  “Do not concern yourself with the Huouyt.”

  Rri’jan’s electric-blue eyes sharpened with displeasure. “I want this to succeed, Forgotten. If the Huouyt must take part in this experiment, I have the influence to do so.”

  “You have your personal assassins, but you do not have access to the one I want.”

  “Who?” Rri’jan snapped. “If he is Va’gan, I can hire him.”

  “You can’t hire this one. No one can.”

  “Why not?”

  “He works for the Peacemakers,” Forgotten explained. “And, unlike the overwhelming majority of his kind, he cannot be bought. He works for Congress or not at all.”

  Rri’jan gave him a long look, the look of a creature that did not believe him. “Anyone can be bought, Forgotten.”

  “Don’t concern yourself with the Huouyt. I’ve already stacked our odds, so to speak.”

  Rri’jan watched him, finding his words carefully. “You hand-picked your own team? Already? How could you possibly—” He trailed off, apparently realizing that he was showing his own ignorance, and that Forgotten was enjoying it.

  “I chose two teams,” Forgotten said. “Each with equal chances of survival.”

  “How?”

  “I have contacts and money and the power of suggestion.”

  “And what will you need from me for your plan to work?”

  “Not to question my decisions.”

  The former assassin peered at him, unblinking. “Are you thinking of one decision in particular?”

  “I arranged it so that Jer’ait will be on one of the groundteams going to Neskfaat.”

  Rri’jan stiffened. “Jer’ait is a cur. I have better assassins.”

  “Better than the top Va’ga?” Forgotten asked. “Better than your own blood?”

  “Never suggest that infectious pustule shares my blood!” Rri’jan trilled, his musical voice going high in rage. The Representative looked dangerously close to doing something stupid.

  “We both know he does,” Forgotten said. “I also know that the only reason he is not here devising a way to acquire his Tribunal seat instead of you is his birth defect. He surpasses you in every other way.”

  Rri’jan’s voice was calm with fury, now. “For the sake of our plan, I will allow you to choose whatever filth you wish. But if you fail, Forgotten, I will destroy you. I swear it.”

  “I will not fail.”

  CHAPTER 8: Daviin, Meet Joe

  “Interesting, Jreet. It seems our Human had a spine, before you shattered it.”

  Jer’ai
t’s eyes followed the Human’s mangled body as the medics took it away, a smugness seeping from under his Va’ga-trained, expressionless features. The doctors had cursed and complained, but had accepted the Human out of the shuttle stasis with few questions, saying that the multi-species groundteams had been the biggest Takkiscrew they had seen since first giving the Dhasha Congressional technologies. Apparently, every room in the hospital was full, and not one injury had been from the enemy.

  “Beda’s bones. Let it rest already,” Daviin growled.

  “You know the Human won’t take you back, don’t you?” Jer’ait continued, without pause. “If there was any question before, it fled the moment you drove his sternum through his shoulder blade.” Jer’ait watched him intently. Only the Huouyt’s purple eye was out of place, like the mask that was a normal Huouyt had been torn away to reveal a trickle of his thoughts through this one odd-colored window.

  Daviin was still furious with himself that he had allowed the Human to get under his skin, even more furious that the Human had actually followed through with his threat. To have the Huouyt rub it in, however, was too much. He turned on Jer’ait with a snarl.

  “Let me deal with the Human,” he growled at his annoying companion.

  While the Huouyt’s blue-white eye remained expressionless, the Huouyt’s purple eye oozed amusement. “Considering whether your vengeance is worth more than your pride, my friend?”

  “I am not your friend.”

  “On that I agree,” Jer’ait said. “It was a figure of speech.”

  Daviin peered at Jer’ait, wondering if the Huouyt’s mismatched eyes contained a key to the Huouyt nature heretofore undiscovered by the rest of Congress. The right one seemed completely aloof, eerie, unnerving, like all normal Huouyt. The malformed left one, however, had none of the unnaturalness of a Huouyt’s normal gaze. Instead, it felt almost harmless, like an Ooreiki’s, seeming to betray Jer’ait’s thoughts like a leak within a canteen. A slow leak, but a leak nonetheless.

  “Is that why those with defects are not allowed to sit in the Regency?”

  Daviin had murmured it, almost to himself, but Jer’ait stiffened immediately. His violet left eye betrayed anger, frustration. His right betrayed nothing.

  “That’s it,” Daviin whispered. “Your eyes. They’re like a shield from your thoughts. Except your left is broken.”

  Jer’ait stepped closer, until he was only a foot from Daviin’s coiled torso. “And what am I thinking right now, Jreet?”

  Daviin ignored the threat. “Why are you here, Jer’ait? I recognize you from Sentinel training. They made us memorize your voice.”

  The assassin flinched, obviously taken aback. “How long have you known?”

  “Since I saw you,” Daviin replied, looking him over. “Who are you here to kill? Me?” He doubted as much, because Jer’ait was well-known as a Peacemaker’s tool, refusing even the highest bids for his service, which, for a Huouyt, was enough to create a smudge of respect within Daviin. In a species of lying, backstabbing betrayers, Jer’ait was almost…

  …honorable. Almost.

  “I have better things to do than dabble in Jreet clan warfare.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Daviin said. “But the Twelfth Hjai wouldn’t send you unless it was someone special.”

  Jer’ait gave him a long look before saying, “I am here to make sure the Vahlin dies.”

  Daviin felt his body stiffen reflexively, feeling his vengeance on the Vahlin sliding through his fingers. “You’re next in line to the Twelfth Hjai. Don’t the Peacemakers have underlings to do this?” An underling would fail. Jer’ait would not.

  “Don’t fret, Jreet,” the Huouyt said. “I’m not the Human. I won’t stand between you and your revenge if I can avoid it. All that matters to me is that he dies.”

  Daviin scanned the Huouyt’s odd violet eye, watching his thoughts leak from him in a slow but steady stream. “The truth is there for anyone who would see it. A Huouyt’s eyes…they act as a distraction. They bar natural communication, natural reading. It’s why Huouyt with the defect are not allowed off your planets. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  It was impossible to miss the tightening of Jer’ait’s paddle-like fists. “It is unwise to antagonize me, Jreet.”

  Daviin had a brief moment of nervousness, realizing what he was dealing with. It was creatures like Jer’ait that were sent to assassinate creatures like him.

  Jer’ait’s vertical slit of a mouth puckered. “Since you are to be my groundmate, Jreet, I’ll spare you the mental anguish and I’ll tell you another secret. My disability does not keep me from reading your eyes as well as any Huouyt.”

  Daviin flinched as Jer’ait strode away. This was a mistake. He should have gone straight back to Vora, gathered up a party of warriors, and come back here to do battle. Instead, he was going to have to rely upon five strangers, creatures infinitely weaker than himself.

  Weaker…but possibly more useful.

  Daviin understood his limitations. He glanced down at his long, ungainly bulk and squeezed his claws together. His kind relied upon ambush or distraction to kill. Once located, he could not move away fast enough to avoid a Dhasha’s claws. He was not agile. He was not quick.

  The Ooreiki and the Human were.

  Further, due to the Dhasha’s ability to hear his echolocation, Daviin could not penetrate a Dhasha den undetected. Jer’ait could.

  Last, he had neither the capabilities of flight, nor a faculty for digging. They had discovered the nature of their last two teammates upon landing on Jeelsiht, and though Daviin had been curious as to why they needed a Baga underground, he was not going to question Phoenix’s choices. With its burrowing skills, the Grekkon had been an obvious advantage. Galek had gone to meet them in the barracks while Daviin and Jer’ait had stayed to admit the Human to the Congie medical system.

  Daviin decided to wait for Joe. Though he dreaded the moment, he needed to offer his ground leader an apology for losing control. Honor would allow him nothing less. He went looking for his commander’s regen chamber.

  After a long, frustrating search through the hospital corridors, many terrified Ueshi doctors giving directions that made no sense, and many dead ends, Daviin finally found the regeneration rooms deep in the hospital core. In full view of the Ooreiki guards in combat gear patrolling the hospital, Daviin passed repeated written warnings of Sensitive Area, Authorized Personnel, Staff Only, Escort Required, and other, more dire warnings to trespassers. The guards watched him, but none tried to approach him. If anything, they went in the other direction.

  Annoyed at their cowardice, Daviin stopped outside the door that reeked of Human. There, he folded his body into a coil to the left of the door. The medics of the hospital eyed him askance as they passed, but none tried to tell him to leave.

  Daviin felt irritated the way they left him unchallenged. It was a sensitive area, highly classified. What if he had been an assassin? What if he was here to spy or steal technology?

  Beda’s bones. No wonder the Vahlin managed to steal an ekhta, Daviin thought, brooding at doctors and staff from over his coils. Congress is filled with fools. A Ueshi doctor saw him from the far end of the hall, where it was just a blue-green blob to Daviin, and let out a high-pitched squeal and quickly departed the way it had come.

  Fools and cowards, Daviin amended, his irritation building.

  Several hours later, with still not a soul willing to come and demand his purpose in the restricted area, two heavy-limbed Ooreiki in gleaming, ebony Congressional biosuits stalked up to him, each toting a complex array of weaponry. Looking at their chests, he saw they were both four-point Battlemasters. Daviin perked up, looking forward to an incident after stewing for hours in his irritation.

  Instead, the Ooreiki gave him nervous glances, and, without a word, went to the other side of Joe’s door and waited. The Human’s escort. Daviin could feel their eyes shift to him warily, but they said nothing as they waited for Prime Commander Zero
to waken.

  Irritation began to change into anger. Do none of these Takki have the courage to say something to me?

  The tics continued to pass, with no one saying a word to him. Finally, Daviin could stand it no longer.

  To the two Ooreiki, he casually said, “If this were a Jreet planet, every soldier in this hospital would be killed. Then we would research who trained them and their instructors would all be killed. Then we would find their families and they would all be killed.”

  The two Ooreiki’s huge ovoid pupils dilated with obvious terror. One of them whispered, “Why?”

  Daviin motioned at the uniforms of passersby. “I don’t belong here. I wear no black. I carry no gun. Why has no one said anything to me?”

  “You’re a Jreet,” the other one said.

  “So?!” Daviin demanded.

  “Jreet aren’t traitors,” the Ooreiki babbled. “Everyone knows this.”

  “Not until our ward turns traitor,” Daviin reminded them.

  “But…” The nearest Ooreiki stared up at Daviin, his hahkta and sudah trembling. “Are you a traitor?”

  “Just shut up.” The conversation had only made him want to drive his tek through their spineless bodies.

  And they did. As they waited outside the door together in silence, Daviin seethed.

  His disgust had reached a fever-pitch when the door to the regeneration room opened and the Human stepped out.

  Joe’s gaze was automatically drawn to Daviin, whose mountain of bright scarlet scales stood out in the black Congie hallways like a green Takki on a food farm. Then, as if he had simply been glancing Daviin’s way, he turned back to the Ooreiki, ignoring him.

  “So. Can one of you jerkwads tell me why one of you didn’t escort this Janja pile back to the waiting area?”

  Under the Human’s stare, the Ooreiki’s sudah began to quiver. Their big, sticky brown eyes flickered to Daviin, then to the Human, then back. “He didn’t appear to be hurting anything, sir.”