by Sam Coulson
I knew all the questions he must have had. I’d expected, if not dreaded, the moment when Marin came to see me.
But when the time came, I was surprised by what he had to say.
“I know what happened,” he said easily. “I’ve spoken with Loid and my sister. I know all of it. I was here those first few days after you left, I saw the change in him. The poison the Draugari used was vicious. My sister doesn’t understand, because she didn’t see him then, but he was dying already. Slowly for sure, but he was dying. A slow, painful death that would rob him of all he was would have been heartbreaking for him. For us. This is what he wanted, I know it. I can accept it.”
I nodded.
“When Chen first told me what you had done, I didn’t understand any of it. But then I talked to Loid. It’s pretty unbelievable. You survived a terraforming event. Not only that, you were reborn whole, with the ability to see into other people’s minds. Pretty miraculous.”
It wasn’t the word I would have used.
“What I want to say is that I’m grateful,” he said.
“Grateful?” I choked out the worlds, not quite believing what I heard. “After what I did?”
“As I said, I knew my father was dying, and I know what he can be like. He decided that you doing—that—was the only way. Nobody could have changed his mind. But no, that’s not what I meant. I was talking about the fight. I’m grateful for what you’ve done for the colony.”
He paused.
“You will have heard that Admiral Mjonor of the Dante has installed me as the provisional planetary governor?” he asked.
“I heard,” I answered. “Congratulations.”
“Yes, well the position has some perks,” he said as he pulled a card out from his pocket and held it out to me. “I got something for you.”
I took the little card, it was made of thick plastic with a digital interface on one end. I flipped it over in my hand. It had my picture, next to it was the name “Elicio Thar’esh.”
“An official Earthborn Protectorate Identification card,” Marin smiled. “You’re now in the system. Loid came to me yesterday and told me that you didn’t exist on any of the Protectorate or Collective records, so we put this together.”
“It says that I was born on Leir II. Never heard of it.”
“Some creative fiction,” Marin nodded. “Leir II is a colony on the border with the Collective, populated by Earthborn, Noonan, Osterian, Lasterians, there may even been a few Celestrials. It was founded by a religious fringe group that worships the Sower of Seeds. They believe that someday their God will come back to see what each branch of humanity has achieved and judge us for it.”
“Why there?”
“The colonists shun any connections to the Protectorate or the Collective, but they don’t cause any trouble and stick to their own little world, so they are more or less left alone. They don’t maintain any birth or death records, something about wanting to avoid touching the greater sins of humanity. It’s all superstitious garbage. The official story on your records goes that you were an orphan on Leir II and stowed away on a cargo ship. When they noticed you were onboard, they marooned you here. We’ve added some notes in the planetary records to match up.”
I looked down at the ID card and couldn’t help but smile at the last name: “Thar’esh.” I had little doubt that that had been Loid’s idea.
“The ID is tied to bank accounts, property transactions, everything,” Marin continued. “You really can’t do much in the Protectorate without one.”
“Thanks,” I said sincerely without looking up. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“No,” Marin answered. “I didn’t, but I wanted to. The sky is yours.”
“Thanks,” I said quietly. “Though I’m not sure what I’ll do with it.
“You know, I’ve been meeting with a lot of people from the Dante. Most of them are bureaucrats or Protectorate officers. But there are also some others who are with the Third Division.”
“Third Division?” I’d heard the word before.
“The Third Division is the covert branch of the Earthborn Protectorate Fleet. Some call them spies, some call them assassins. But what they really are is an intelligence agency working to keep the peace across the Protectorate and between us, the Domari Collective, and the Celestrial Empire,” he answered.
“Why tell me?”
“Because I think you should talk to them.”
“What did you tell them about me?”
“Oh nothing about that,” he answered. “Your secret is safe. I just told them that you were a genius with languages, and a natural pilot. Enough to pique their interest. Either way, the man’s name is Fanto Rings. Odd name, I know. Odd guy. But interesting. I just figured you would need somewhere to go and something to occupy your mind, and they are always looking for recruits, especially recruits like you who don’t have any family.”
His last words bit.
“I’ll think about it,” I answered. “Thanks Marin. I appreciate you talking to me.”
He shook my hand and turned to leave. At the door, he stopped and turned.
“You know, when they first told me what happened with my father, I was furious,” he paused. “It was Ju-lin who explained it all to me. Who you are. What you are. She cares. She just can’t handle it all, not right now. But if you give her enough time, she’ll come around.”
Before I could summon the words to manage a response, he was gone.
Chapter 38
“So what’s your bet Jitters?” The man to my left paused to take a bite of a protein bar as he leaned against the dingy, rust-covered bulkhead. “This one going to have more molded provisions? Or maybe something more interesting, maybe some rusted out power cores?”
“Toys,” Jitters said as he worked the plasma torch on the edge of the steel door. “This one will have a load of those stuffed alligator-bear things that you always see the Hoken children carrying.”
“Ha! Toys!” The first man barked a laugh. “Can you imagine what the Draugari pirating a ship, slaughtering the crew, and then going in and finding they’d stolen toys? I’d pay to see that one. What about you, McCullough, what’s your bet?”
“I don’t bet,” I answered solemnly as I looked from left to right down the long, dank corridors. The air was thick with mist and mold.
“‘I don’t bet’,” he repeated in a mocking tone. “Always so serious Lee. Relax, what are you afraid of? This old derelict is abandoned. The engines are stripped, most of the electronics, weapons systems. Judging from the rust on this hulk the Draugari abandoned it at least ten years ago. There’s nothing to worry about. Waste of time even searching it.”
“We’re nine fluxes from Centauri,” I answered. “I’ll relax when we’re back on the Cypher and back in Protectorate space instead of floating out here in the middle of the Draugari’s back yard.”
“I second that,” Jitters muttered. “This is the last hatch. Once I’m done cutting we can poke our heads in, report that there’s nothing but a bunch of toys or moldy piles of whatever the hell that stuff was in the last two, and get off this cursed ship.”
“I guess that’s why they call you Jitters,” the other man laughed a bit harder than the moment deserved.
Jitters ignored him as he moved his plasma torch to the last hinge.
“Getting all worked up over nothing,” he continued.
“Nothing?” I repeated. “You don’t think it’s strange that the Draugari stripped this ship but left the cargo bays and backup power systems intact? That they swapped out the power couplings to lower the voltage, added dozens of new cable conduits that track back and forth across the ship, and upgraded the heating and life support units?”
“Who’s to say when those systems were upgraded and modified,” Darl scoffed. “This bucket was registered to a group of Olsterian traders, those hairy bastards tinker with everything.”
“Or how do you explain that we set out and have made a straight line fr
om flux point to flux point through supposedly unexplored and uncharted space, and happen to go directly to this wreck?” I continued. “This isn’t just some exploration mission. Command sent us here for a reason. To this ship. Some ten year old tanker wreck. That doesn’t strike you as odd?”
There was a loud clang as the steel door dropped from the hinges. I let my rifle sling back over my shoulder as I stepped forward to help Jitters move the door to the side to clear the passage. As Jitters and I eased the steel door down, leaning it against the bulkhead I heard Darl gasp.
“What in the name of the Sower is that?” Darl’s voice shook. His weapon hung loosely in his hand.
I pulled my rifle to the ready and stepped around the corner, ready for a fight.
“Dra-” the words choked back in my throat as I peered into the storage bay. Instead of the deep, dense, misty darkness I had expected, there was a soft green light and soft hum emanating from something in the center of the room. The cargo hold was as spotless as an operating room.
I took a step over the threshold, but Jitter’s caught my shoulder.
“Those tanks,” he said softly. “There on that-thing, in the middle. What is in those tanks?”
“Call it in,” I said as I raised my light, peering through the mist. The light was coming from tanks laying end to end on top of each other. Each three feet wide, two feet high, and nine feet long. They looked like caskets. Through narrow windows on each I could see shapes. Bodies. Each body was floating gently in the tank.
“Is that the crew of the ship?” Darl whispered. “In some kind of stasis?”
“There are dozens of them,” Jitters whispered. “Stacked one on another. There’s at least fifty in here. This thing’s crew was only eight.”
“Slaves then?” Darl asked. “Were they transporting slaves?”
I stepped into the room, Darl and Jitters didn’t follow. Minutes passed as I walked from tank to another, peering in. The faces were gaunt, the skin was pale, but they were unmistakably Draugari. Human, but not entirely. Something different. Something bestial. But these were not like any Draugari I’d ever seen. Their faces were gaunt. Their eyes less sunken.
“Draugari,” I said slowly as I stepped into the room. “And they are alive. All of them.”
“Those don’t look like any Draugari I’ve ever seen,” Jitters said as he crept up next to me. “Look, they are broader than usual, shorter by a foot. But, Lee you may be right. Those faces. They look like Draugari. Just not like one I’ve ever seen.”
“Commander on deck!” Darl barked.
I spun around and snapped to attention to see Admiral Lakota walk through the door, followed closely by a man in a black uniform with the symbol of the Third Division on his lapel.
“Well done gentleman,” Lakota’s said in a sharp staccato as he walked past me and approached the tanks. “We’ve been after this for a long time. You’re right, of course. Those are Draugari, but they aren’t like any we’ve ever seen before. We’ve only ever seen the males.”
“The males?” Jitters echoed. “You mean, those are the females? Kept here in stasis tanks? Why?”
“We believe it’s the only way to keep them alive.” The Admiral responded. “Take scans and bring one of them back to the Cypher. The only way we’ll stop these beasts is by cutting them off at the source. Set charges and blow the rest.”
“Look who’s out and about!” Loid called as he caught up behind me. “You look like hell.”
“Nightmares,” I answered. “Or memories. I haven’t figured out which.”
Loid narrowed his eyes, “You alright?”
“I think so,” I said as I continued down along the road. “Lee had been through a lot. I don’t quite understand it all.”
“Need to talk about it?”
“Naw, I’m alright.”
It was still morning, the air was crisp. Most of the Dante’s temporary landing crew had returned to their ships the night before. The colony already seemed to be returning to its old quiet bustle.
“Were you able to find out anything about Growd’s ship?” I asked the question had been gnawing at me.
“Actually I have,” Loid answered as he pulled his slate out of his pocket. “I was having a few drinks last night with some of the Protectorate flyboys, and they said that they encountered some wreckage floating in high orbit near the southern poles. The wreckage looked earthborn, and it was nowhere near the fight, so they thought it was strange.”
“Did they know if it was his ship?” I asked, mind whirling. “It could have been a Draugari ship that limped away from the battle, or-”
“No, they didn’t,” Loid cut in as he flipped through his Slate. “That’s why I took Tons up this morning to take a look. Here, I took some high res pics of it. There, you can see what’s left of the fuselage, and there one of the engines. If you enhance it and go in tight you can see half of the MineWorks logo from the port fuel tank. It’s his ship.”
I stopped and took the Slate, peering intently into each of the pictures. Aside from a few larger pieces of the ship, most of it was dust. Whatever had hit it, had hit it hard.
“I don’t see any signs of bodies,” I said. “Or the Charons, though they were small, maybe ten centimeters high, hard to spot in the black.”
“Must have been some kind of armor piercing round,” Loid added. “The wreckage looked like it blew up from the inside out.”
“From the inside out,” I snapped. “They could have been boarded. Or they could have met up with another ship to escape.”
“Naw kid, don’t look at me like that, that shuttle was lightly armored. There are a half-dozen warheads that I know of offhand that would make an explosion like that. Draugari or Celestial.” Loid said with an air of finality. “Besides, some of the guys I was drinking with were sitting out covering the rear-guard monitoring the flux points. Nobody came or left after the Dante arrived. That’s Growd’s ship, no doubt about it. They are gone.”
I took one last look through the images on Loid’s slate before handing it back and beginning to walk again. I wanted to believe that they were destroyed, but I still felt a shadow of doubt in the back of my mind.
“Did you talk to Marin’s guy?” Loid asked, breaking the silence.
“Fanto?” I asked. “Yeah, I met with him this morning.”
“And?” he pressed.
“I’m deciding,” I answered.
“What would he have you doing?”
“I can’t say,” I said with a grin.
“Bah,” he threw up his hand. “You have one fifteen minute meeting, and now you’re all cloak and dagger.”
“I already have the dagger, why not the cloak too?” I joked as I looked him over. “You’re leaving.”
“Yeah,” Loid answered. “The Dante lifted the lock-down this morning, traffic is free to come and go. The stars are open for business.”
“Ju-lin?”
“She’s already back in the Tons,” he answered as he stopped. “Itching to go. Speaking of which, I shouldn’t wait too long, she may lift off without me.”
I smiled.
“Loid, thanks.”
“Hey, no problem kid,” he answered. “Take care of yourself.”
“You too,” I said. “And take care of her.”
“As best as I can,” Loid answered as he turned. “Oh wait, I almost forgot.”
He pulled out his Slate and keyed in a few commands.
“There we go,” he said, slipping the tablet in his pocket. “I just gave you your share.”
“My share of what?”
“The bounty that the Matron paid me when she handed you and Twiggy over to the Collegiate,” Loid answered. “I figured you needed some running cash, and besides, it was yours anyway.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem at all kid.”
I leaned forward to shake his hand, but he bypassed it, giving me an awkward hug.
“Um,” he said, straightening himself back up. “
Yeah that was uncomfortable. Won’t do that again. Until next time.”
“Keep her safe,” I said.
He nodded solemnly, and without another word he turned back toward the starport.
I kept walking through the Downs aimlessly the rest of the morning. Thinking of Ju-lin, of Loid, of Growd and the memories that he had stolen. I didn’t set out in any direction in particular, but I found myself on the edge of town at the base of a hill. I looked up toward the outcrop of stones that marked the entrance to the cave I had woken up in. I knew that it was more or less inevitable. If I was going to leave the Downs, there was one more answer I needed to find.
I pulled a flashlight out from my belt as I entered the cave and began to carefully climb down. My exit from the cave seemed like a lifetime ago. I recalled Lor’ten and Lee’s faces. Two lifetimes ago to be exact. I kept climbing down, hand over hand. My body was rested again, agile, quick.
The cave was deeper than I remembered, and darker. I flipped off my light. I was left in nearly complete darkness. I turned it back on and I continued climbing down. Further and further, until I came to the spot. I dropped down the last cleft and landed easily and shined my light down on the stone below me.
Below me the stone was smooth, pure, and white. Tevarite. Bladestone. I knelt down and slid my hand over the surface. I should have known. I recalled what Ju-lin had said: “Tevarite puts off a low level, but inconsistent electromagnetic field.” Her words echoed against the memory from Taro’s words as he handed his blade and whetstone to the Draugari chieftain: “this is the whetstone made of the stone that my people use to forge our knives and keep them honed to kill.”
The stone. I reached down and absently touched the hilt of my knife. The Draugari had listened closely to Taro, all those years ago. They had found bladestones and used them to forge and hone their blades just as the Thar’esh had. The energy field in the Tevarite was part of the process of capturing a Charon. It had been the stone itself that had somehow saved me and preserved my mind so that it could reenter my body after the terraforming was complete.