by Sam Coulson
“The Collegiate is not a gang,” a tall Celestrial with white swirls in his grey eyes spoke in thickly accented common. “We are not a crime syndicate. We are not thugs.”
“Could have fooled me,” Ju-lin spat back as she held her cheek, I could already see bruising along her jaw-line.
The Celestrial regarded her silently. He raised his hand and made a quick gesture. Four of his compatriots came forward, two held Ju-lin by the shoulders and cuffed her wrists behind her back. The other two did the same to me.
“You will answer our questions,” it was not a question. “Then we will decide what we can do with you. Perhaps your existences will prove useful. But I think not.”
The guards shoved Ju-lin forward toward the door as she strained against them, fighting to get free.
“Ju-lin, no!” I called as I lunged towards her.
My words were muffled as the guard behind me shoved the barrel of his weapon deep into my side. I doubled over in pain.
I gasped and looked up, Ju-lin turned briefly as they led her through the door, our eyes met for a breath. I think she was trying to tell me something, maybe it was an apology, or maybe it was an encouragement. I wasn’t sure. But then she was gone.
One of my captors pulled a thick black hood over my head, and everything went dark.
At first I tried to keep track of the twists and turns. Twenty paces and turn left. Ten more paces and turn right. But as the guards led me through turn after turn I lost track. I did know that the air was getting more stale, the smells of fuel and grease that I had grown accustomed to in the hold of the ship was being replaced by the sharp stink of burnt sulfur. The further we walked, the dull drone of engines was replaced by the distant clattering of machines.
Eventually, we came to a stop. One of them removed the bindings from my hands, and pulled the hood off of my head. I was just beginning to get my bearings when I was shoved from behind. By the time my eyes had readjusted to the light they were gone and the door behind me was shut. I was in a small, square room that was barely wide enough for me to lie down. The floor and walls were grey steel with black scuff marks on the wall. The only piece of furniture was a short stool with a plate of food on top. I couldn’t remember the last time I ate. My stomach gnawed, growling as soon as I got sight of the food.
The meal wasn’t much, simple bread, water, and some sort of raw green vegetable with an excellent crispness, but I couldn't think of ever having tasted anything better. After devouring every crumb, I sat down on the stool to examine my surroundings and gather my thoughts.
Ju-lin’s greatest fear was that they had taken us into the Celestrial core worlds, a series of systems that are unknown to either the Protectorate or the Collective. Only full blooded Celestrials were allowed into the interior systems that are home to countless billion Celestrials and their core shipyards, Ju-lin said it was a good bet if we were taken to the interior that there would be no hope of escape or release. However, from what little I knew about where we were being held, that seemed less and less likely.
To begin, I was held in a small storage locker rather than a formal prison. The scuff marks on the walls and dirt outlines on the floor were clear indications that I was put in a makeshift cell that was typically used for storage. Also, as I looked up, I noticed that the room was lit by a low-hanging bulb mounted from the center of the ceiling. All of the Celestrial construction that I had witnessed on Shindar and aboard the ship that had carried us involved the use of luminous surfaces rather than the lamps and bulbs.
Perhaps they didn’t take us to the interior after all. Though I doubted they had taken us to an Earthborn installation, maybe it was a Collective facility? Or a captured human ship or station that they had turned into a secret prison? Or maybe the Celestrials only used luminous surfaces to light their cities and newer ships and this was merely an older model. Was I overthinking everything?
My mind whirled through the possibilities, but every thought brought me back around to the realization that I didn’t really know anything at all. And even what I did know, was secondary in my mind to my concern over what was happening to Ju-lin. I had gotten used to the feeling of her next to me, and I missed it.
As the hours went on I paced, stretched, and eventually lay down on my back. The floor was cold, but I was tired, and somehow I slept.
I was jolted awake when the door swung open and slammed against its mountings. By the time I had scrambled to my feet the guards were next to me. One held and bound my hands while the other slipped the hood over my head, plunging me back into darkness. Once again, my silent captors led me through a series of turns, after a few moments we came to a stop in a lift. We traveled upwards for several moments before it came to a stop.
When we exited the lift the sounds and smells changed. I had grown accustomed to stale air and the drone of distant machining echoing through the halls. Here there was the soft, dampening quiet of insulated walls. The air held a light floral scent and seemed fresher, cleaner. I inhaled the clean air deeply as we walked.
After another dozen paces, a deep voice spoke melodiously, and I was led forward and pushed roughly into a softly padded chair. My hands were left bound in front of me as they pulled the hood off from over my head.
I was seated in the middle of a large room, sitting opposite an L-shaped desk with an antique lamp on the corner. An older Celestrial with greying skin sat at the desk, not looking up, his eyes focused on the tablet in front of him. I decided it would be best to wait for him to speak first, and began looking around the room.
Three of the walls were interior to the station, and decorated with all kinds of objects. Most were foreign to me, but I recognized a display with at least a dozen Draugari blades in cases on the wall. I remembered my own, still stashed back on Tons-o-Fun where I had left it. Elsewhere there were scale models of ships, including one that looked like the Protectorate Dreadnaught that we had seen while traveling through Alecto. There were colorful masks, sculptures that fluidly shifted their shape, flags, helmets and armor. The place reminded me of the Draugari trophy rooms that I had seen in my memories. Though notably less gruesome, I was pretty sure that it seemed to serve the same purpose. This was a memorial to enemies and triumphs.
When I finally got around to the fourth wall my mouth dropped open. Though I was sure that there was glass, it looked as if it were open into space. In the distance I saw a swirling hazel world surrounded by a translucent white ring. Looking downward I saw a ridge of blue-grey rugged stone outcroppings beneath us. So we were on an orbital asteroid station, maybe a mine.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” the Celestrial’s voice was low and his Common crisp and clear. “The world is called Kalaedia, the only planet in the system. The rings are a wonder, they contain flecks of a rare crystalline composite that some in the primitives within Domari Collective prize for its beauty and clarity, but serves no technological or industrial purpose.”
“Who are you?” I asked.
“We are on what is left of Kalaedia’s moon,” he continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Eons ago, this small moon collided with a comet. The moon was cracked, and the pieces were sent into a wide orbit. The remains of the comet shattered and the eons turned them into dust while Kalaedia’s gravity shepherded them into rings. The Collective built this place, and ended up surrendering it to us some years ago in a border dispute. Travel six jumps in any direction and you will not find a sight as beautiful. The Collective was sorry to lose it. But, such is the price of peace: sometimes we must surrender the things we admire to save the things we cherish.”
At last he looked up at me, the skin on his forehead was flakey and dry. Unlike most of the Celestrials I had met, his eyes were grey and dull with the exception of a few slivers of silver that seemed to explode from the deep black of his irises like the flares of a sun behind an eclipse. My silence didn’t seem to bother him.
He leaned forward, regarding me intently.
“Eli, you are called,” he continued.
“Or Elicio, but nothing more. No family name. Curious. Serana, that is to say, the Matron, says she does not know who you are, and that her pilot friend said only that he picked you up on the colony with Ju-lin. And ah, yes. Ju-lin. I had a, how shall I say, spirited conversation with her earlier.”
He paused as he studied my reaction, I tried to bury my surge of anger.
“The funny thing about the spirited ones: those whose passions burn hottest are also the most brittle and easy to crack.”
“What do you want?” I asked.
“But you, you’re not on fire,” he reached up and peeled off a flaked piece of skin from his forehead and gently set the remains on the table. “You are reserved. Well, more reserved than the girl. That makes you interesting to me. There is such variety in humans. I find it fascinating. Take the natives of Olster for instance. Did you know that all native Olsterians cannot discern the color green from blue? Two hundred and six years ago when Olster was first discovered by the Domari Collective the penultimate technological achievement was a two-masted sailing ship. And today? Nearly all of the best freighters in the Collective are designed and built by Olsterians. Though they still can’t tell green from blue.”
He stopped again, and adjusted the collar of his shirt.
“You have learned what the Collegiate stands for? Serana described us as historians I believe? That is a simple and, I will say, inelegant description. We are so much more than that. You see, Earthborn historians record and preserve records of the past. You work to rediscover what you have lost, found, and lost again. It is a perpetual cycle, you find a coin, you forget where you left it, you stumble back over it years later and say ‘Oh my! Look at this coin!’ You’re like children. It happens over and over again. An endless cycle of rediscovery. It’s really quite absurd when you look at it.”
He picked another flake of skin off his head, he set it neatly next to the last.
“An acolyte of the Collegiate does not gather history,” he continued. “We are Celestrial. History is not some distant ephemeral thing. We have lived it. It is the Collegiate’s duty to discern which books should be written, which books should be forgotten, and which books should be burned.”
“Why am I here?” my hand was starting to shake, I took a breath to calm myself.
“Yes, well, impatience is one of the most base of all human traits. I shall answer your questions. I am called Alume. Like the Matron, it is a title, not a name. I have a position of trust within the Collegiate, a position of power. And I will use that power to do what must be done. You are here because you know things that I must know. I want you to answer my questions fully and completely.”
“Or?”
“Or?” he sighed. “I will not lower myself to base and simple threats. I’m sure the famed Earthborn imagination can fill in the blanks of what I may do with you or your pretty young friend if you prove to be unresponsive or uncooperative. But really, details aside, this all comes down to a simple thing: you will tell me what I want to know.”
“What do you want to know?” I asked without hesitation. I felt the burning fear and uncertainty in my stomach dissipate, replaced by simple resolve. Alume knew about the drone, he had been responsible for sending the fighters to attack the colony. I was confident he knew more than I did. Maybe I could learn something from him.
Alume paused, blinked, and reasserted his gaze.
“Rational thought? How unusual for an Earthborn,” he tapped his fingertips against the table. “I want to know what happened to the ships I sent to the colony.”
“The Draugari destroyed them,” I answered briskly, seeing no harm in telling him the truth. “Two Draugari Slires and a pirated Carrack came in behind your ships as they were making a bombing run over an innocent and unarmed colony.”
“You saw this?”
“Ju-lin and I saw the first one of your ships destroyed,” I answered. “After that I saw them exchanging fire with the Slires. I didn’t see the second of your ships destroyed, but I heard the Draugari celebrate when they destroyed the third.”
“You heard them?”
“Yes, we were taken prisoner aboard the Carrack,” I replied.
“And then you escaped?”
“They underestimated us,” I said as nonchalantly as I could. “We took over the ship ourselves, but it was too damaged. So we crashed it on the surface.”
He stopped a moment, pondering what I’d said.
“Ju-lin didn’t tell you anything.” I said slowly.
“No,” he scratched his chin. “No, as I said, the high spirited burn brightly but flame out quickly. Her flame is still bright.”
“So that is what happened to your ships,” I said. “The Draugari destroyed them.”
“And it leads me to only more questions.” My statement had roused him. “How did the Draugari defeat my pilots? What were the Draugari doing there?”
“Your pilots were too distracted with the mission you sent them on,” I answered confidently. “They were busy firing the plasma drone into the cave and bombing an undefended colony. Maybe they forgot to check their scans?”
Alume’s forehead wrinkled as he stopped to study my eyes. “Plasma drone,” Alume leaned forward.
I stopped, studying him in return. I couldn’t tell if it was a question or a statement. His eyes widened slightly.
“Go on,” he pressed.
I leaned back in my chair as my mind raced. Ju-lin and I had assumed that the plasma drone that had incinerated the cavern had come from the Celestrial ships, but we hadn’t seen it launched. I had assumed Alume had given the order. Was it possible that it wasn’t launched by the Celestrials? If not, could it have been the Draugari? I delved into Lor’ten’s memories. I saw that night through the eyes of the Draugari: I saw the deck of the Carrack as it and the Slires used the clouds to mask their approach, closing in on the unsuspecting Celestrial fighters. I felt the rush of the chase, the thrill of first blood as the first fighter disintegrated into fire. No, I was certain that the Draugari hadn’t launch the drone. If the Celestrials hadn’t either—
“Please continue” his voice changed. “This, plasma drone I ordered destroyed the cave successfully then?”
“Yes,” I said quietly.
He tapped his fingertips rapidly against the table. “You don’t think the Draugari raiders fired it? I can see that in your eyes. How intriguing. And the cavern and the symbols were destroyed then?”
He knows. My mind raced. He knows what the symbols meant, or at least, he would know how to read them. I thought back to the memory card stashed away back on Tons-o-Fun. Part of me wished I had it with me now to show him so that then, maybe, he could tell me what they meant.
“Do you know what was in the cave?” Though I was fighting back my anticipation, my voice faltered.
He blinked slowly and stretched out his fingers flat on the table and then curled his left hand into a fist and studied it for a moment.
“Know?” He said finally. “No, I can’t say I know what it was. But my people have our suspicions, and our suspicions lead us to our beliefs.”
“And what part of these suspicions led you to ordering your pilots to attack a defenseless human colony in the dead of night?”
“Suspicions are powerful,” he snapped back. “Suspicions led your colonists to send the messenger drone, and to keep the symbols on the wall a secret. Suspicions brought the Draugari out of the darkness.”
“So what do you suspect?” I asked.
“That your little planet holds secrets and stories,” he stood up sharply. “That that is a book that should not be written, or even forgotten. The planet holds a book that should be burned.”
His serene demeanor had slipped, and for a moment, I saw that the Celestrial’s cool and even calm covered a deep seated rage. Loid was right, though they may seem stoic, the Celestrial were a people full of passion, and Alume in particular, was full of fear and hate.
He walked over to the window and looked out at Kalaed
ia and her rings. He was shorter than the other Celestrials I had met, and he was bent over with age. After a long moment, he turned back toward me.
“The symbols,” he said. “You saw them.”
“Yes,” I answered. “Only briefly, we were only there a few moments before the drone flew into the cavern and we had to leave.”
“Can you describe them?” Alume asked. “Were they lines like letters? Mathematical formulas? Pictographs?”
“I do not know,” I answered.
“No, no, now that is a lie.” he shook his head slightly. “Now is the time where you need to decide what it is you admire, and what it is you cherish. The things we admire are things that we enjoy, but can live without. The things we cherish are the shining few things that give us the strength and purpose to exist. Your friend, the girl. An Earthborn would say she is pretty I think. Yes? And young, surely she is young.”
I shifted in my seat.
“You will tell me what you know, or she will find pain. She will not die, but she will live with agony. You are not simple, I can see that clearly enough. Even though you are nothing but a child, I think that, perhaps, you may have already experienced the darker side of life. Yes? Do you want her to experience it as well? And, more profoundly, do you want to be the cause of her misery?”
I felt rage within me, a rage I didn’t know existed. My fists clenched as my mind went back to the Draugari blades in the display case on the wall. I pictured myself taking them and cutting Alume apart, limb from limb. I fought down the urge, trying to remain calm, remain quiet and think clearly.
“Take my lamp there on the desk. The lamp is one of my favorite pieces. It’s an original Earth artifact that I purchased from a Domari trader some years ago. The story goes that it once belonged to the Earthborn queen of some long dissolved country, if you will believe it. I know, sometimes it’s difficult to believe what a Domari trader tells you, but the experts I consulted say that it could be true. Whether it’s true or not, the fact is that I like it. I like the look of it, slender neck and ornate, yet elegant design. But what is it to me? It is an object of beauty, and an object of use. But it is not an object of necessity. Though I may never find another lamp quite like this one, I can always find another lamp. I admire it, yes. But cherish? No.”