The Iron Admiral: Conspiracy

by Greta van Der Rol

  The next case occurred on the following day. Two, in fact. Miners in the same work group as Havvrox,

  showing similar symptoms. Oh, buckrats. Her heart thudded. This was it; this was why the planet was

  abandoned.

  The doctors told me Havvrox had died. I went to see the body, as a manager must. The doctors warned

  me the smell was bad but I had no idea anything could smell so awful, like festered wounds. What words can I use? It was as if Havvrox had dissolved into himself, a shrunken carcass. The room was foul with blackness. I had workers fetch out the remains and burn them. Three others have now shown signs of

  this pestilence. I don’t know what to do.

  And so it went on. Fyysor spoke to the mine administrators on Chollarc. She could almost hear the

  desperation in his words, feel his helplessness as his people succumbed.

  Prenzen says the humans cannot help. He will contact the Khophirate. I think it means that he will keep this secret from the human authorities on Chollarc. I suppose that’s sensible. There is enough panic.

  Another page of horror. A team of doctors was sent by the Khophirate, as the situation on Tisyphor

  deteriorated. Fyysor was full of hope but his optimism was short lived. The Khophiran doctors had no

  answers, no cures; they had never seen an illness like it before. They quarantined the planet, prevented any of the now panicked miners from leaving, and insisted that those who were not infected should

  remain separated from the others. Mining, of course, ceased. The ship that brought the Khophiran

  doctors left without them. And every day, more bodies were removed and burnt.

  Blinking away the moisture gathering in her eyes she turned another page.

  I have closed off the medical center so that the stink no longer penetrates the tunnels where the people live. This peaceful mine is now a place of anger and fear. Earlier today I saw a group making a sacrifice to Lhyra. I thought that superstitious nonsense had died out long ago. Do they really think a demon of the caves can cause a pestilence?

  And here at last a description of how the illness progressed.

  The first sign of the illness seems to be a cough. About five days later, the soreness begins and with it, the pain. Breathing is difficult, the patient vomits ichor. From that time, death comes quickly. They told me that when Ghooren learned he had become infected, he killed himself. I fear he will not be the last to take that option. And I must admit, it is more merciful.

  Tears trickling down her cheeks, she read the next entry.

  I have a slight cough, a soreness in my air pipes. I would like to believe it is nothing and it will go away but I am afraid. I know there is nothing the doctors can do. Already a third of my people are dead or dying and no one—not one—has contracted the disease and lived. Even the doctors are now patients in

  their own hospital. I know that I will die. I hope that we have done enough to ensure that this dreadful illness does not spread to Chollarc or the Khophirate.

  Amarina, I will not see you or Tanryn or Ghensor or Zetanar until we meet again on the other side. I

  know that you will never read these words but perhaps in some way you will hear the strains of my

  ghabra in the night. Think of me fondly, my dearest, and pray that this pestilence should finish here, where it started.

  She closed the book. Sitting on the edge of the bed she let the tears flow. What if this had been

  Shernish? Xanthor and Cartya, Ceta, Farex, Bartok, all dead. Panic in the streets; neighbor against

  neighbor. What a truly awful way to die, eaten up from inside, in terrible pain. The medical rooms must have been horrible, caked with black ichor, stinking and rotten.

  With trembling hands Allysha collected Fyysor’s treasures and laid them reverentially in the polyplast wardrobe. She would take all these things with her when she left and bring them to Xanthor. Perhaps he could find Fyysor’s family and return his belongings.

  She undressed, crawled into bed and stared up at the ceiling. Fyysor had lived here. She wondered

  where he died. Here? Had he rotted away in the medical center like the others or had he taken his own life before the end?

  Her eyes closed.

  She walked through a marketplace, bright and cheerful, awnings and pennants snapping in a breeze from the sea. She recognized it instantly; Shernish portside where boats bounced next to the wharf and

  fishermen heaved baskets of wriggling silver fish to the porters to carry to the trestle tables. Blue-furred ptorix farmers trumpeted their wares, waving fruits and vegetables in the tentacles at the end of each of four muscular arms. ptorix shoppers, seeming to float in their conical robes, passed up and down

  between the stalls. And then suddenly the wind changed. Dark clouds gathered and thunder rumbled. A

  howl went up, voices raised in agony as their blue fur blackened. They seemed to melt, all of them,

  dissolving into their clothing while the roadway ran with stinking black sludge.

  A cry of anguish echoed in her skull as she jerked upright. Her own voice.

  Shernish. The thought of that virus going through her home town… Xanthor, Ceta, Bartok, Farex; all

  dead. The students at the university, their teachers.

  A nightmare. Her chest heaving, she fought for breath.

  Chapter Five

  Jarrad sat at one of the tables in the square outside the tavern, already armed with a bottle of white wine and a couple of glasses.

  He stood as she approached. “Hi. Lovely to see you,” he said.

  She snorted and looked down at her black pants and grey shirt. “I didn’t bring any nice clothes. It’s the best I can do.”

  “It’s very nice. You’re very nice.” He smiled. “I thought outside would be better.”

  That was true. Sounds of laughter and loud conversation drifted through the open doors of the ‘Miner’s Refuge’, occasionally drowning out the music. Several other people also sat at the outside tables,

  probably for the same reason. Soft lights floated in mid-air, providing gentle illumination. In the warm darkness, the planet’s sweet, earthy background smell was even more evident.

  He poured the wine. It was delicious, cold and crisp with a hint of spritz.

  “How’s your work going?” he asked.

  “Work? Oh, yes, not too bad.” The story of the diary lay like a lead weight in her brain, clamoring to be shared. She wouldn’t tell Sean or any of the other people here, but Jarrad was a scientist. Besides, the horror of it all was too much to bear on her own.

  “You know what you said about the thranx venom? How it kills cells?”

  He stared at her, his hand holding his glass suspended in mid-air. “Yes?”

  He must think I’m crazy. “It’s just that… It sounds like something I read about. In my room.” She

  swallowed a shudder. Just talking about it sent worms of revulsion creeping in her abdomen.

  “What?” he said, eyes alive with curiosity.

  “You know this planet was abandoned by the ptorix?”

  “Yes.”

  “A virus killed them. All the ptorix here. It must have been terrible.” She told him what Fyysor had

  written, describing the progress of the disease.

  He frowned, his wine forgotten. “It sure sounds like a necrotoxin. Were they sure it was a virus?”

  “I don’t know. But Fyysor mentions a cough.”

  “True.” He had a cute habit of putting his head to one side when he was deep in thought. He turned the glass in his hand, round and around. “The cough suggests it’s airborne. The necrotoxins get into the nasal passages, throat, lungs. And the time period is significant. You said a few days before it developed past a cough?”

  She nodded.

  “So the cough spreads the virus, the victim breathes it in but doesn’t know he’s sick until the virus has spread sufficiently. Then,” he spread his hands like a
flower opening, “it explodes.” He stared at the table top. “That would explain how it could spread easily, by people who didn’t know they were sick.”

  Allysha shuddered. Imagine the havoc that would cause on planets like Carnessa or Chollarc? “Just as

  well it didn’t get any further.”

  “Did you say the first death was somebody who’d recovered from a thranx attack?”

  “That’s right.”

  He frowned, gazing into his glass. “It sounds almost as if something crossed and combined,” he

  muttered. “It’s intriguing.” He shook his head as if to flick the thought away. “I’d love to see the diary.

  And the musical instrument you mentioned.” He gave her a tentative smile. “Could you show me?”

  She wavered for a moment. But why not? She wanted to share what she’d found. “Okay. Come on.”

  She took him up to her room, feeling a little like a student sneaking a man into the dormitory after hours.

  She fetched the books first. He admired them and commented as she had done on the quality of the

  paper. Theghabra riveted his attention. He turned the instrument over with gentle hands. “This is

  incredible. How is it played?”

  Allysha grinned. “They use their top mouth to blow into here and then block the holes with their

  tentacles. It’s quite astonishing to watch a really good player; their tentacles are a blur.”

  “What does it sound like?”

  “Like half a dozen cats fighting.” She laughed. “But that’s just us ignorant humans.”

  Jarrad had his head on one side. “Maybe you should get this sterilized before you take it anywhere.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “I guess as a precaution, really. If the mine manager played this while he was ill, there might still be traces of the virus.”

  “After thirty years? Surely not.”

  “Viruses are tough and this environment is ideal for them. Moist and warm. You’re probably right but is it worth the risk?”

  Allysha stared at him. The very idea that Xanthor and his family might contract this horrible disease was too ghastly to contemplate.

  “Let me take this. I’ll sterilize it for you and bring it back.”

  She nodded. “Take care of it. And keep it secret, yeah? You’ve seen what these… these vandals do to

  ptorix artifacts.”

  “Of course.”

  She let him kiss her goodnight, not tongues and passion, but she put her arms around his neck.

  “You’re very beautiful, Allysha,” he whispered. “I love your eyes.”

  She smiled. “Thanks for the evening, Jarrad. It was fun.” She had enjoyed herself. He was nice,

  enthusiastic, interested in her and where she came from, and in the ptorix and their culture. Yes, he was nice.

  “See you tomorrow?”

  “Fine. Same place, same time?”

  “For sure.” She walked to the mine entrance with him and watched him walk away, wondering why her

  body wasn’t thrumming with anticipation.

  Chapter Six

  Chaka Saahren, currently using the identity Brad Stone, alighted from the shuttle on the Tisyphor landing platform along with the other new arrivals, three men and a slatternly-looking young woman who’d tried to attract his attention on the day-long flight. The heat hit him like a wall. This would certainly try his fitness. He hadn’t spent much time planetside anywhere for years, let alone a steamy, jungle location.

  “Take the lift down to the ground,” somebody shouted.

  He crammed into the waiting car with his fellow travelers, jammed tight next to the girl. She pressed her breast against his arm and simpered at him. The smell of cheap perfume competed with body odor.

  He stepped out of the lift with the others and breathed a sigh of relief when an ugly woman with hair scraped back from her face gathered up the girl. A big, florid man welcomed the three men while a

  thickset fellow with the look of a bully stepped toward him, arms folded.

  “Brad Stone, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  The fellow gazed up at him, chin jutting. “I’m Seth Ludovic. You can call me ‘boss’.”

  Saahren nodded. “Understood. Boss.”

  “Come on. I’ll show you the barracks and get you a uniform, then I’ll show you around.”

  He jumped into a ground car, flicked his fingers at the passenger seat and waited while Saahren swung inside.

  The car rose and drifted along a road overhung by jungle, almost like a tunnel through thick, red-green foliage.

  Ludovic stopped at the barracks, a line of prefab rooms, sparse, clean and adequate, two men to each

  room with shifts organized so that the two were on opposite rosters. Saahren pulled on the uniform, dark grey with a light grey undershirt. The trousers were tucked into short boots. The fit wasn’t bad, not that it mattered.

  He presented himself to Ludovic, who waited outside, leaning on the verandah rail. “You know, you

  look a bit like Admiral Saahren,” he said.

  Saahren snorted. “If I had a credit for every time somebody said that, I’d be pretty well off.”

  He wondered how his body double was faring, on a hunting trip in the mountains. Fleet Intelligence

  would trot him out occasionally to say some orchestrated words to the media to keep the illusion going.

  But the truth of it was that hardly anybody had given him a second glance, out of uniform in an

  improbable location.

  “Huh. True enough. They say everybody has a double somewhere. Handled one of them before?”

  Ludovic nodded at the Emson beam pistol in the holster on Saahren’s belt.

  Fleet issue, no doubt obtained illegally. “Yes.”

  “It’ll be enough for most things. Unless you have to go outside the perimeter fence. Then you’ll need one of these.” Ludovic lifted an AR70 assault rifle, also standard Fleet issue. “You’d have handled these?”

  “Yes. What’s out there to need an AR70?”

  “Ah.” Ludovic turned to a screen. “These.” A large, bipedal beast with long, strong forearms sporting three wicked-looking claws appeared. “They’re smart, they hunt in packs and we encourage them

  around the perimeter. Helps convince the workers they should stay inside the fence, know what I mean?”

  He chuckled. “Your main job here is to make sure there’s no pilfering and that the perimeter stays

  secure. Van Tongeren’s very particular about who goes where. Here’s the tunnel layout for patrols.”

  Ludovic handed him a tablet. “Come on and I’ll give you the tour.”

  Saahren attached the tablet to his belt. They walked through the settlement’s main square and up a road through the jungle to the mine’s entrance.

  The well-lit main access tunnel looked newly cut; or at least, newly shaved. Saahren had noticed ptorix carvings, flowing and evocative, around the door surrounds but none of their characteristic decoration was visible here. Signs on the walls gave destinations and distances; canteen three, control room point five.

  “This here’s the medical center,” Ludovic said, ushering Saahren through swinging doors. A man

  dressed in loose blue pants and shirt raised his head from a console.

  “Just showing the new man around,” Ludovic said.

  The fellow nodded and returned to his work.

  Saahren glanced around at an examination couch, sterilizing units for instruments, shelves stacked with bottles and packets. All perfectly ordinary, except for the sign on the door behind the counter that read

  ‘Authorized Personnel Only. Strictly No Admission’. “What’s in there?”

  “Pharmaceutical experiments. Technical types doing some tests on the wildlife here. Seeing if they can make some useful drugs.” Ludovic shrugged. “Though what you could get out of karteks and thranxes is

  beyond
me. Anyway, you don’t have to worry about this place unless somebody tries to get in there

  without permission. The sick rooms are down there.” He gestured at a short passage.

  Back in the main drive, Ludovic showed Saahren the tunnels leading to the external exit, the hangar, the equipment bays where the excavators were kept and the entrance to the deep mine where all miners

  were routinely searched. They moved on to the store room.

  “The biggest risk is in here,” Ludovic said as they walked between shelves holding lights, diggers,

  clothing, boots, ropes, clamps. “We don’t want pilfering.”

  Ludovic stopped in front of a locker. “This is the explosives cupboard. You need authorization to open it. If anybody tries to break in, an alarm goes off in the control room and on your tablet and the store room locks itself down so the person can’t get away. That alarm comes on, you come running, got it?”

  “Got it.”

  They returned to the main drive, following the signs back to the control room. His guide stopped outside.

  “You’ll spend quite some time in this room. We conduct surveillance from here in between periodic

  patrols.”

  He opened the door and his demeanor changed. He sucked in his stomach, straightened his shoulders.

  “Oh. Miss Marten, isn’t it? Pleased to meet you at last. I’m Seth Ludovic, in charge of security.” He thrust out a hand, an oily smile on his face.

  Saahren looked past him, at the woman. He’d never seen eyes like that. The bright green of new leaves shaded to a dark green pupil. It was almost as though the colors blended together, instead of that stark definition between pupil and iris. Her skin was the color of cream and the dark, slightly wavy hair that hung around her shoulders held a hint of red. No slatternly serving girl, this one. Slim and lovely, dressed in simple pants and a shirt. The expression on her face was unreadable.

  “Mister Ludovic. Don’t let me hold you up.”

  Ignoring the hand she stepped past him, flashed a glance up at Saahren that sent his heart hammering and slipped out the door.

  “Phew. Haughty piece.” Ludovic turned to stare after her. “Quite the ice maiden.” His voice oozed