by Allynn Riggs
“Perhaps.” Renloret couldn’t lie but he was not certain how much he should say.
They had added the items from Mroz’s list to their supplies and then, at Kela’s telepathic suggestion to Ani, they had taken the tunnel from the lake house to the research center. This allowed them to escape notice and possible questions from the eve staff at the research center.
As for Mroz, he accepted Renloret’s simplified explanations of how the alien Lrakiran technology had created the underground passages between the residence and the research center with its ship storage and launch areas. Renloret kept hoping the decision to include the tavern owner in this escapade would not endanger the future of Teramar in some way. Until this moment, Mroz seemed to have no hesitation about fraternizing with aliens. Now, at Mroz’s question, Renloret guessed the reality of an alien presence on Teramar had finally made its impact.
“Do you want to continue?” Ani’s voice was tight, as if she was afraid Mroz would answer negatively. Evidently, she’d been thinking the same thing.
Renloret didn’t blame her. He waited for a response as Mroz walked around the ship, sliding his hand across the metallic shell. His behavior reminded Renloret of watching Taryn doing the exact same thing barely two moon-cycles ago when Renloret had to take the then comatose Ani back to Lrakira. Would Mroz continue to react as positively as the sheriff had to this glaring announcement of alien technology?
The ramp slid out as Mroz’s hand crossed the touch pad, and he stood calmly until it had settled. Then he strode up into the ship. Mroz hadn’t yet responded to Ani’s question. Renloret and Ani shared concerned glances and Renloret started for the ramp. There were things inside that shouldn’t be touched.
“You said you can make this thing invisible?” Mroz asked, his voice drifting down the hall from the bridge area.
“It has a type of camouflage screen or field. You’ll only see it if you know what to look for,” Renloret replied as he headed for the front of the ship. “Trust me, we won’t be seen and since we will be executing this in the dark, after the city’s usual work hours, there should be an even smaller chance of discovery.”
Mroz stepped out of the control bridge to stand in front of Renloret, his face serious and adrenaline lighting his eyes. Two large hands gripped Renloret’s shoulders. “Then let’s hone this blade. We’re wasting time.”
As they hovered over the roof of the building, Ani watched the screen for the structural scan to complete. This whole escapade would be worthless if the weight of the star runner collapsed the building. Renloret had expressed relief that the buildings were crowded up next to one another and that their frames were of metal. She now understood his explanation of how the ship’s magnetics would assist the physical braces and allow the star runner to settle without shaking a single building. When everything was ready, he nodded to Ani and Mroz and they gathered equipment, a folding stretcher, which Mroz had suggested, and their weapons.
Once on the roof, they ran to the service stairs. Mroz turned around to stare at the hidden ship.
“Glad we’re doing this in the mid-eve and no one is looking up. As you said, Renloret, if I didn’t know where it was, I’d never know. Just like those hand-sized holograph units Reslo designed but on a larger scale. I always wondered what good those things would be other than just for entertainment. Now I wonder what Reslo was trying to keep us from seeing.” He glanced at Ani.
She shrugged and gave him an innocent smile. “They’re perfect for playing hide-and-find. Didn’t you ever wonder how I always won? I knew where Uncle Reslo stashed them and I always got one before we played.”
Mroz laughed softly. “Didn’t your mother ever explain about cheating, girl? One or more of those small units would be handy for this game.”
She winked at Mroz. “Sorry. I didn’t think about the advantage they might have given us. There really wasn’t time.”
Ani pulled the fitted hood over her face and opened the roof maintenance door. “Let’s grab the sheriff. I expect more guards have been posted since we were chased away.”
Renloret put his black assassin hood in place and pulled out his boot blade. “Blades ready?”
Mroz jerked his chin down in answer as he slid a hand to the inside of his jacket and revealed a forearm-length, narrow double-edged blade. “Always.”
Ani paused on the fourth floor landing to roll up her shirtsleeves, baring the set of wrist blades. Then she drew a short blade from her thigh scabbard. Renloret helped Mroz tighten the straps holding the folding stretcher to his back while Ani eased open the door. “Ready?” Both men nodded in response.
Stepping through the door, she began checking the other entrances where guards might be stationed. But before she could finish her assessment, the well-lit image in the center of the room immobilized her.
Taryn was no longer lying on a gurney with a sheet covering him. Years of training drained away leaving her near empty except for the blood-chilling need to destroy whoever was responsible for what hung in front of her. All she could think of was killing the doctor, then the senator. She shuddered and enough of her training trickled back to suppress the instinct to scream.
Curses in two or more languages erupted from the men behind her. A hand gripped her shoulder preventing her from bolting blindly to the body hanging from a four-cornered frame in the middle of the room. She was shocked to find herself unsure if she wanted Taryn to be alive or dead. She couldn’t close her eyes.
“Wait.” Renloret’s voice was tight with the kind of control Ani didn’t feel.
She tried to shrug out of his hold.
“Think, Ani.”
She shook her head. How could she think? Her shoulder hurt as he applied more pressure.
“Breathe. You’re in the ring. Where’s your opponent? Breathe.” The whispered instructions — demands really — reminded her of Uncle Reslo. She straightened up, inhaled for five counts, and forced her mind to see the scene before her as one of the special situation blade rings used to train the recruits at the university. She perused her surroundings. They were similar to one or more of the many holographic blade games Reslo had invented to keep her sharp. A predatory visual search of the room verified opponents had not yet set foot inside the ring, but her goal hung in the center, spotlights showing every bruise and cut. Wires trailed from patches strategically placed on his chest, extremities, and shaved skull. Each line was connected to a machine.
“Mroz? You okay?” Her raptor gaze had come full circle. She’d never seen that expression on his face. They were all going to have nightmares.
“Barely.” There was anger and horror in the word. “Let’s get him down before they figure out we came in the back way.”
Taryn’s abdomen rose and fell in an irregular rhythm. Blood oozed from crisscross cuts on his chest and all five fingers of his right hand appeared to be broken. His left knee was swollen and cockeyed while his foot hung at an odd angle, the ankle also broken. Saliva dripped from slack lips. Ani and Mroz vomited on opposite sides of the spot-lit centerpiece of Dr. Isul Treyder’s experiment.
“I will kill him,” Ani hissed as she wiped her mouth.
“Then I get to,” Mroz growled.
Renloret stood in front of the bank of machinery staring at the screens. “I don’t think he can feel any of it.”
“What?” Both Ani and Mroz chorused.
“He’s been implanted with the device, Ani,” Renloret said.
“Then why torture him if he can’t feel anything?”
“The doctor’s notes say he wants to find out how much the body can take before it dies, and if the patient can’t react, then the ones executing the work won’t get squeamish before Treyder gets the results he’s looking for.”
“I guess I should thank the doctor,” she whispered, wiping tears off her cheeks. “At least we found him quickly.”
Mroz unstrapped the portable stretcher. “Let’s cut him down.”
While Ani helped Mroz set up the stretc
her, Renloret pecked at a keyboard. “According to this first report, there is no sign his brain is registering any discomfort, only his heart, lungs, and other organs. The meticulous doctor notes that he is delighted with how long the process may take and will continue to experiment — until the body gives out. He plans to wait until some of this initial damage has healed before renewing his efforts. He states that the device works better, and yet differently, than originally planned. There’s more here. Should I read it all?”
Ani shook her head. “No. We have to get Taryn to the star ship so the medics there can begin to fix things and then get to Lrakira to have that hells-cursed thing removed.”
She could not take her eyes off her brother. His stretched and mangled body brought to mind the back room of the butcher shop she had mistakenly wandered into when the Star Valley school had taken the then ten-year-olds to Saedi City to see how farm produce was processed and packaged. It had been a hot day and Ani had wandered off in search of a cooler place — arriving at the overlook to one of the slaughtering rooms. She remembered watching in shocked fascination as carcass after carcass of ovlines swung on hooks around metal tables where men gutted, skinned, and carved off quarters.
Ani now realized that Doctor Isul Treyder was treating Taryn as less than an animal raised to feed people. At least those ovlines had not suffered injury before being compassionately euthanized for butchering. What she saw hanging before her was a product of a deranged mind. Now, even though her stomach was empty, bile rose up from the depths of her intestines, burning the back of her throat. She swallowed against the gag reflex as she allowed anger to replace the horror her eyes and mind had difficulty processing.
Mroz placed the gurney beneath Taryn’s tortured body and was studying the straps that held him upright. “We can cut these and then disengage the lines.”
Ani kept surveying the edges of the room. She’d expected a certain number of guards, especially after being chased away from this location just hours earlier. Why were there none? Perhaps they were just waiting. Or even better, she supposed they were expecting a more obvious entrance through the main street-level doors. Appreciation for Renloret’s idea to use the star runner and enter the building from above eased some of her tension.
Renloret turned from the screens that continued to record the information fed to them by the sensors on Taryn’s body. “I think we ought to take all of this, not just Taryn.”
“Why?” Ani asked.
“Our researchers on Lrakira could use this. Maybe they can figure out a way to deactivate the device remotely. According to these notes, Treyder was going to offer thousands of devices like this to the military for use in a war against Southern, and he was developing a method to deliver over a hundred of them at a time at distance — without endangering the soldier firing the machine. According to Treyder’s notes, Taryn was the first to be shot by this machine. Seems it would only take a nick to embed it and then it would travel to the brain and shut everything off. What would happen if every Southern soldier was the recipient of this?”
Ani shivered as the question hung in the air. “I wish I could remember more of what happened when I encountered Treyder in the tunnel and he inserted the coma device in me,” Ani admitted. “I remember the beginning, when he nicked me with the poison on the blade. But everything after that is gone.”
Ani felt Mroz’s stare but ignored it as she sliced the restraint above Taryn’s left knee. “All right, Renloret, but we get Taryn out first. Then we can come back for the rest.”
Eardrum piercing whoops shattered the air and flashing lights rotated about the room making it difficult to see.
Mroz leapt on the folding gurney and whacked at the bindings of both arms. Taryn sagged across his shoulder as Ani swung her blade through the remaining leg strap. Without regard for possible further damage to his body, she pulled on both legs to stretch him lengthwise on the gurney. Mroz dropped to his knees and eased Taryn’s chest and head into place.
Shouts could be heard from the corridors. Obviously, they had been waiting for a frontal attack. Soldiers spilled into the room, blades and swords unsheathed. Ani grinned at Mroz across Taryn’s body, then turned away to face multiple opponents. Yes, just like some of Uncle Reslo’s scenarios.
She didn’t bother yelling as she dodged the first swing of a sword. The overeager soldier staggered three steps past her as her short blade caught the back of his neck. One down. Two more advanced, a bit more wary. The blaring sirens ceased. Ani heard the ring of blades sliding against each other behind her and to her right, but she did not look to see who engaged with whom. Renloret and Mroz were qualified.
Instead of coming at her singly, the pair in front of her separated and rushed her in a coordinated formation. Recognition of the tactic brought her blade perpendicular to the floor and out of the way as she snapped both wrists backwards releasing the flick-blades towards the assailants. They didn’t have a chance to react. They were not wearing vests. Three down. She chanced a glance behind her.
Mroz grappled with an opponent as large as he, though Ani thought the tavern owner was in control. Renloret appeared to be sparring against a well-handled long blade, retreating and advancing the length of the machines. All the sensor wires hung limp, having been blade severed rather than unplugged. One sparked every time Renloret’s opponent brushed it, causing him to flinch. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t last long, though his technique was more than good — almost familiar. She wondered if she’d seen him compete.
A whistling sound brought her attention back to one of the corridors. She turned her head to see the slingshot release a projectile. She raised her left arm in front of her face, and the solid metal ball smacked the back of her wrist blade sheath. At least one bone broke with the impact. A curse slipped past her lips. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to use her hand. The man in the corridor loaded a second time. She grimaced. It was his turn to pay for Taryn.
A cry from Mroz swung her around in time to catch a descending blade against hers. She kicked at this new opponent’s knee. With a cry of his own, he dropped his blade and crumpled around the ruined joint. Ani kicked the weapon away and struck the butt of her blade on the man’s temple, silencing him. Four down.
The high-pitched whirling of the sling signaled that another ball was on its way. She flattened her body on the floor. The ball passed over her and ricocheted off several pieces of equipment, pinging almost musically until it rolled to a resting point on the room’s central drain. Ani noticed that the drain was stained red with Taryn’s blood and anger boiled up, renewing her adrenaline. She rose from the floor, refusing to be pinned down by a rock thrower. Wasn’t he man enough to meet her one-on-one?
Another metal ball thunked into her side, making her grateful they had all worn vests. The strike was sure to cause a bruise, but it did not break a rib.
The sling wielder stepped out of the shadowed corridor with a sword. Ha! He was out of throwing ammunition. With her left wrist disabled, she didn’t waste time. Instead of meeting him blade-to-blade, she ducked, rolling into his body to bring the short blade up into his chest as he tried to leap over her. She was jerked backward along with his fall. Twisting to her side, she wrenched the blade free and jumped to her feet.
Movement on the other side of the room caught her attention. Renloret was withdrawing his blade from his opponent’s gut. Turning in her direction, a grimace on his lips, he pointed his blade at the gurney. Mroz was buckling a strap across Taryn’s chest. Blood dripped from Mroz’s mask. Ani ran to him and pulled up the edge above his eyes. The skin had been split in a powerful glancing blow, possibly from an elbow. It would bleed a lot at first, but the mask would act as a bandage until they could get to the ship. She released the mask and patted him on the shoulder. He gave her a bruised and bloody-lipped smile and reached for a second strap.
Ani listened for additional soldiers. How many had entered the room? Had any left to get reinforcements? They couldn’t wait. They had to get Tary
n to the ship.
“Renloret?” Ani glanced over to the machines he had been looking at when the soldiers arrived. He was stacking whatever papers were on the work surfaces into a box.
“I’m unscathed. You?” he asked.
She tried to move her wrist. Up and down was not too painful but twisting it caused her to suck in a breath through clinched teeth. “Possible broken wrist. Mroz?”
“A nick or two. I think he bit my arm too.” The bartender wiped his blood off Taryn’s stomach, then looked at Renloret. “I’m assuming Ani will provide rear protection as we transport the sheriff to the roof.” He cocked his head toward the emergency exit.
“I’ll return for the research,” Renloret said, stuffing a handful of notebooks into the box and then taking up the grips on the gurney.
After depositing the gurney with Taryn’s body in one of the sleeper alcoves in the star runner, the three rescuers returned to the lab. Bodies lay where they’d fallen. Mroz gathered all the loose computers and tablets into a second box and ran back up to the ship. While Ani stayed at the door checking for signs of reinforcements, Renloret crawled under the long console counter and tried, without success, to figure out how to remove the entire assemblage of hardware from its floor bolts.
“We’ve got everything we can, Renloret. Let’s go. You’ll have to carry the box.” A groan from the soldier Ani had knocked unconscious added urgency to her order.
Renloret crawled from under the desk and kicked the almost conscious man in the head. “We have more time now.” He started to duck back, but Ani grabbed at his shoulder.
“No. Get the box. We’re leaving now.” She jerked her head toward the stairwell door and grabbed one of the swords abandoned by a fallen soldier. It might be useful.
Renloret straightened with a sigh, embraced the box of files, and followed her. The sound of boots and raised voices echoed through the corridors. Ani shoved Renloret up the stairwell and jammed the extra blade in the stairwell door before running down one flight and pulling the door open a crack. Let them think the intruders had escaped by going down to the third floor rather than up. Taking the steps two at a time, she reached the roof with minimal sound. Once out the roof door she made sure it was firmly closed, then dashed for the ship.