The Great Game Trilogy

by O. J. Lowe

  Nothing good comes of great power being handed to those who’d misuse it. At least by entering in partnership with her, he could attempt to keep a check on her. It might not work, he had to try. And he might as well put into fruition his own plans from a comfortable base until he got back onto his feet. The times had not been good. Not since the Fall. He didn’t know how many Vedo were left. He might be the only one and until they helped him, he was only a half-Vedo. Not even that. All the knowledge and memories, what good did it do him?

  Now here he was, wearing one of those horrible blue gowns and awaiting them to finish prepping up their cocktail of drugs. Blue clad doctors and nurses swarmed around him, all looked busy, they were all going way too fast for a simple thing like this, only then that Wim Carson realised the drugs were kicking in. He didn’t like drugs, not normally. But this was quite a pleasant feeling, made it hard to care about things. Things that should be towards the forefront of his mind just danced away out of reach. Hard to think. But not impossible.

  Back in the day, he wouldn’t have needed this. He’d just have slipped into a calming coma, let the Kjarn accelerate the natural healing process of his body and he’d have been fine. Ever since the Fall, that had no longer been an issue.

  The most maddening thing, he had discovered since then, was being able to sense something but not touch it. Not utilise it. Not embrace it the way you had for so many years. He had once been so much and now he was so little. Even cleaned up and shaved, given fresh clothes and a room by his benefactor to sleep in, he was still a shadow of his former self. A pale reflection. Without the Kjarn that had guided him since he was a child, he was less than nothing. They’d taken it from him and he wanted it back. No matter the cost.

  They’d found the cause, of course. He’d urged them to look into his bloodwork, he’d been able to feel them there inside him for a long time, and only then had they had results.

  That strange doctor with the lisp, Hota, had come to him with a passive look on his face and Wim had been intrigued. When the men with knowledge had that expression on their face, it generally didn’t bode well. Either they were excited and trying to hide it or they were terrified and trying even harder.

  “Mithter Carthon,” he’d said primly. “I have your tetht rethulth.” He held out a data pad in front of him, slender fingers dancing across the buttons, bringing it to life. Wim locked his eyes on him as he did.

  “Is it bad or good?” He asked before realising it might not have been the right question to ask. “Can you heal me? Or not?”

  “We will heal you, Mithter Carthon,” Hota said. “There are jutht quethionth to be athked firtht. I have never failed.”

  “There is a first time for everything, you know,” Wim replied, stretching his fingers out in front of him uneasily. “And pride will always be the undoing of those who wear it as a badge of honour.”

  “There ith.” Hota didn’t sound like he was disagreeing. “Your proclamation of imminent death appearth to have been exaggerated. According to thith, you are in perfect health. Too healthy.”

  “That’s what they want you to think,” Wim said. “They’re keeping me healthy. They don’t want me to die. Not while they’re feeding on me.”

  “Ath you inthithted,” Hota continued, his face registering annoyance at being interrupted. “We examined your blood thampleth and it wath there that we found the anthwer.” A holographic image flashed up in the space between them with a red tinge, a dozen red and white disc-like objects running across it and Wim realised it was a cross section of his own blood stream. “Ath you can thee here, everything lookth normal, ath can be expected, yeth?”

  Without replying, Wim just nodded and folded his arms. “But if we look clother, then we can thee thith ith not the cathe.” He hit a button and the holo-image began to expand, zooming in on one of the platelets. “Thith ith a hundred magnification. And thith ith where the problemth come into play you thee.” Wim narrowed his eyes and stared at the image, trying to take in what he saw. More than that he found he was trying to process what he saw into something could understand.

  “How small are they are?” he asked, still not quite able to believe it. Even at a hundred magnification, they were still little more than dots on the platelet.

  “Beyond microthcopic,” Hota said. “They’re tho thmall that outthide the human body, they would ceathe to exitht. The light falling on them would cruth them. But in you, they thrive. Magnify a thouthand.”

  Even now they still looked small, but definition was coming in. It was like looking at an ant on a table. You could see the outline but not quite every little detail, Wim noticed. Way too many legs.

  “Magnify a hundred thouthand,” Hota continued and Wim recoiled at the sight of the ugly little creature biting onto his platelet, a hideous microbe with a thousand hairy little legs and three sets of jaws, the body covered in milky blind eyes and as the platelet rotated, he could see it was dug in with a single spike stuck into the cells.

  “That’s disgusting,” he said.

  “I agree abtholutely,” Hota said amicably. “And you’re filled with them. What doeth that make you? Other than medically interethting.”

  “Your bedside manner is terrible,” Wim said dryly.

  “Tell it to thomeone who careth,” Hota replied. “You want curing or not? Oh actually, you want to thee thith?”

  Still focused in on the creature, Wim watched as the platelet rippled suddenly with a faint sheen of blue energy and the creature went into frenzy, he could see it sucking the stuff in, growing bigger and fatter although the effect didn’t last long. Within moments it was back to its normal size.

  “Want to explain?”

  Wim didn’t. But what he’d suspected might just have been confirmed. When they’d been doing the tests, several times he’d reached for the Kjarn and several times, just as before, he’d failed. And now he knew. The things were feeding off it, off him. Knowing it to be true didn’t make it better. The opposite, more likely.

  “They’re called tesicre,” he said. “They’re a rare type of energy parasite. They feed off the Kjarn.” The former home of the order used to crawl with them. But they were never like this. They were harmless. They had been harmless.

  “Don’t thuppothe you know how to get rid of them,” Hota said, closing the image. Wim grinned at him, looking more cheerful than he felt.

  “Not even in the slightest. They were never like this. I never heard of them doing this. They shouldn’t be able to…” Unless they were affected by the Fall. It had driven the Vedo mad. Caused them to turn on each other. Only those who had been away from the temple had been spared the worst effects. They’d come back to find the bodies. Even worse, they’d found the survivors. Something had corrupted the Kjarn if only briefly. Even unable to touch it, he’d been able to sense the film that covered it if he focused hard, like finding salt in sugar. Normally it was sweet. Every so often it would take on a different taste.

  “Fortunate for you that I have thome ideath then,” Hota grinned. “Not for nothing doeth the Mithreth rely upon my work. I will thave you, my dear Mithter Carthon. You’ll awaken a new man.”

  His entire body ached as he awoke, felt bruised and battered like an oversized crash doll. The first thing he saw was her staring down at him, a tube in his throat preventing him from speaking. Hota, still wearing his scrubs was stood behind her, arms folded.

  He could feel them both. Hota was smug, she was impassive. It was different than before. Beyond the pain, he couldn’t feel anything of his body. But if there was pain, then at least he was still wired up right. His body still worked. That was good. Nothing broken. Nothing damaged. He let out a groan and Hota came over, gently easing the tube from his mouth.

  “Thteady, thteady, Mithter Carthon,” he murmured. “It wath a routhing thucceth. How do you feel?”

  There was only the one way he could answer that question, his body on fire with agony and his mind still catching up with the waking state. Focusing
in on the tube hurt. More than that, it was an effort. More of an effort than anything he’d done since first learning how to touch it. He had plenty of practice to get back in. Just for a moment, he thought it’d failed. More than once, he thought it would continue to fail. No matter how much he focused on the tube in Hota’s hands, it failed to respond to his mental command.

  Come… Come on!

  Still he focused. The fires screaming through his body roared ever louder, he almost blacked out from the pain. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t. He needed to do this, he wasn’t going to give up until he made it happen.

  Had it twitched? He couldn’t tell. His stomach churned. Being hungry wasn’t a new experience for him. He could go longer, he just needed to feel it again. The first time of many. He needed it, then he could rest.

  It twitched. It did more than that, it hovered up out of Hota’s palm, a paltry inch into the air before it fell. Compared to what he used to be able to do, it was pathetic.

  But it was a start.

  And for the first time in years, Wim Carson felt settled as he lapsed back into unconsciousness. The hardest thing he’d ever done and the most peaceful he’d ever felt merged in one fleeting moment as the blackness rushed to claim him.

  Chapter Thirteen. Threats Abound.

  “Yeah, I remember Phillipe Mazoud. Ruthless bastard in every sense of the word. Whatever you do, don’t underestimate him. He might not look like much, but he’s a man who will put you in the ground given reason. You won’t see it coming either. Always be reasonable with him, never turn your back and never let him see you bleed. He’ll find a way to use it against you. I can’t imagine a more dangerous man in charge of the Vazaran Suns.”

  Terrence Arnholt to Premier Leonard Nwakili upon Mazoud becoming head of the Vazaran Suns.

  The fifteenth day of Summerpeak.

  The image flickered in front of them, it wasn’t a high-quality transmission but there was no mistaking the identity of the man. Phillipe Mazoud looked predominantly Vazaran but according to his file, he had some Serranian blood in him too. Stood watching in the background, Terrence Arnholt found himself wondering which side of him would be more reasonable. Vazarans were known to be hot headed and reckless. Serranians had a reputation for being wild and hot blooded. It wasn’t a good combination in the slightest but Mazoud had to have some savvy. He wouldn’t be the leader of the Vazaran Suns if he wasn’t. Mercenaries with honour didn’t follow just anyone. They’d kill anyone for credits, but they weren’t suicidal.

  It was an interesting model, one that worked for them. If you wanted them, they were the best, Mazoud had cultivated a not undeserved reputation for being reasonable just as much as being capable of wanton brutality. It was a lethal combination. Small wonder he held the sway he did in Vazara with more than twelve hundred highly trained mercenaries at his immediate disposal. And those were just the ones that they knew about. Arnholt had often wondered about the unaccounted ones. At what point do mercenaries become a militia?

  He wanted to remain unseen for the moment yet still observe the discussion Allison Crumley was holding with Mazoud. As communications director for Unisco, it was her job to be with him in situations like this. Crumley was a matronly woman in her forties, her hair neat and equal parts ash blonde and grey, but the days of sitting behind a desk were slowly starting to catch her up. She’d flown in a few days earlier, along with Inquisitor Stelwyn Mallinson and Arnholt felt confident there would be a positive outcome to this conversation.

  “Anything for Unisco,” Mazoud said. “What can I do for you?”

  “Mister Mazoud,” Crumley said, her voice strong and authoritative in the silence of the room. “We would like words regarding certain actions your organisation recently found themselves engaged in.”

  He held out his hands and smirked. He had a turned down mouth like a slit, his eyes menacingly hooded. Long black hair hung down his face in oily ringlets. “Ms Crumley, I assure you everything we do is entirely within the legal limits of the operation zone. It may not be ethical, it may be immoral but believe me, I can say it is certainly not illegal.”

  Crumley didn’t blink. Arnholt nodded to himself in approval. Being unfazed by bullshit was always a prime commodity not enough people appreciated. His old superior had described it as a key leadership quality. “I am afraid I may have to dispute that with you. Have the Dark Wind been out on patrol recently?”

  “Perhaps. We recently lost quite a few of our ships on a training exercise.” If he was bothered, Mazoud didn’t show it. “There are always more of them.”

  “This training exercise wouldn’t have taken place above the Elkan Ocean, would it, by any chance?” Crumley asked. The Elkan Ocean split Vazara and Premesoir, the area in which six HAX gunships had either been shot down or gone missing in a recent engagement, along with a prisoner transport and the staff crewing it. Not to mention the prisoner. Arnholt had a desire to see that it was found before that individual was back walking the streets unchecked.

  Mazoud shrugged. “I don’t have the details in front of me. That exercise you refer to was set out by someone else. Why do you ask?”

  Crumley said nothing, just stared at him with a smug smile for a moment. “Because if this exercise consisted of what we believe it did, then not only did you break the rules of the five kingdoms, you broke your own code of honour. Six of our HAX’s were shot down. They were escorting a prisoner transport.”

  Mazoud shifted on the spot, shrugging his shoulders again. His hangdog expression took on a pursed look that didn’t fool Arnholt for a moment. “Sounds like you need to train your pilots better. I can recommend someone if you like.”

  “We know the Dark Wind was there,” Crumley said. “What we want to know is why? Who sent you after that prisoner transport?”

  “If you seem to know that we were there, regardless of whether we may or may not have been,” Mazoud said smoothly. “Then you should also know it is largely beyond our abilities to hijack one of your prisoner transports. I’m not saying we couldn’t do it. I’m saying it wouldn’t be worth it. We never touched it. I can assure you that much.”

  There was something he wasn’t saying, Arnholt knew. But as to what he was hiding, he couldn’t say.

  “But you know who did?” Crumley asked, raising an eyebrow. Mazoud tutted angrily and waved a finger playfully at her.

  “Ms Crumley, this is not our first dance. You know I can’t divulge that sort of sensitive information. It goes entirely against our organisations principles. We can’t share it with you of all people.”

  “It goes against the principles of your organisation to start fights with Unisco,” Crumley said angrily. “Remember, for all the people of Vazara might see you that way, you are not the law. You’re not even close. You’re just thugs for hire.”

  “Thugs for hire who have you outgunned five to one,” Mazoud replied, his voice as oily as his hair. “Ms Crumley don’t make threats you aren’t capable of carrying out. Don’t insult my intelligence by thinking I make my decisions lightly.”

  “Mister Mazoud, you don’t have to be against us on this. We look after our own. You look after your own. Surely we can come to some understanding.”

  “I’m sorry, Ms Crumley but I’m sure it would be highly inappropriate for an organisation of our status to associate with you. Some of our clients are the unsavoury type. A conscience is nice, but business is business. I do not want to war with you. It would be bad for both of us.”

  “All we want is a name,” Crumley said. “Just point us in the right direction.”

  Mazoud shook his head. “I will not give up our clients. You assume too much I respect your organisation. How long do you think you can continue to go on when your leader won’t even come out and face me? Your days number far fewer than ours.”

  That settled it, Arnholt thought, striding into view. Time to make an executive decision, especially given something was bothering him about this whole thing. “Okay, Mazoud, I’m here.” He saw M
azoud’s face light up with delight and carried on speaking before he could come out with some sarcastic comment. “Answer me one question and we’ll let you get back to your day. All this time you’ve overseen the Suns, you’ve never hassled us before. For that, I respect you. It makes both our jobs easier. We don’t want to go to war with you, just as you don’t with us.”

  “I am not giving up my client,” Mazoud repeated. “Director Arnholt. So nice of you to make an appearance.”

  “I’m not asking you to give them up,” Arnholt said. “I respect your integrity. I find it infuriating but I respect it. I’m going to give you it in a different way. For as long as I can remember, you’ve not hassled us. But you had to have known what you were getting into here. HAX gunships are easily recognisable. Someone had to have radioed it in, if it was a surprise. But I’m curious. How many credits did it cost to make you attack us?”

  For a moment, he thought Mazoud might disconnect the line in disgust before the thin lips broke apart revealing yellowed teeth and he heard the bark of laughter across the line.

  “A good question,” he said, folding his arms. “Director, I want to correct you on something. Our order was never to attack. Only to delay. The order was given to only fire in self-defence. It wasn’t the case, but in these situations, you can never plan everything. To answer your question, five million credits. The single biggest job in our history. I’d have been crucified if I’d turned it down. We have our honour, but business is business and there’s no changing that. I am sorry for the loss of your pilots, I truly am.”

  “And I for yours,” Arnholt replied. “If you’d turned it down, we’d all be better off. You know who the prisoner was who they took back?” Once again, he didn’t wait for Mazoud to reply. “It was Harvey Rocastle. Only a few hours earlier, he tried to kidnap my daughter. When did it become Sun policy to aid pieces of scum like him?”