“I’ve been afraid of this the whole time, but ignored it,” said Tsir, shaking his head resignedly. “It was a vain thought to believe that the Olegians would be leaving us in peace. As long as we are alive, we comprise a potential danger for them, which they cannot avoid. When do you think they’ll be arriving?”
“I would guess in about four to five hours.”
“Order the armada to depart immediately!”
Within half-an-hour all units had lifted off, only to become entangled in violent battles as soon as they made contact with the Olegians. Eventually, however, Orril was forced to report that there were no longer any radar indications from their own ships, and that the enemy force was approaching once more.
“If the armada has been lost, then all hope is gone,” said Tsir, with a stiff expression on his face.
“Shall I give the order to evacuate immediately?” asked Orril.
“No, this time we can no longer flee.”
“But you can’t be entirely serious?” said Orril, gasping for breath in shock. “You must try to remove yourself to safety!”
“Are you questioning my order?” asked Tsir, staring at him with narrowed eyes.
“No, my emperor.”
“Alright, then. We should never have come here in the first place, but should have remained in Oboe and defended ourselves to the last drop of blood. Activate plan F, without delay, and report to me when everything is ready. Is that clear?”
“Yes,” answered Orril, bowing, before he rushed away.
The decision he had received hit him like a blow to his heart, since the plan meant that Urduk’s inhabitants would meet a glorious end rather than the disgrace of being captured. Only two hours remained until the Olegian’s arrival, so the first thing that must be done was to position guards at all exits to prevent anyone’s trying to escape. Once back at his office, he assembled his officers and informed them, with a heavy heart, of the emperor’s orders.
CHAPTER 8
Before their departure for Urduk, a dozen or so Straal agents were in Oboe to infiltrate the city’s defences; one of them, in the role of a colonel, had managed to follow along in one of the armada’s ships. When Hug, who was at work, heard that the Olegians were approaching, and when running breathlessly to warn the others, it was his fate, in an empty and lonely corridor on the way out through the air terminal building, to meet this colonel. A wolf in the right disguise can of course fool the sheep, but if it meets one of its own, it is unavoidably revealed.
“Which of my colleagues do I have the honour of speaking with?” asked the colonel, formally, and peering at him enquiringly.
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Hug, while his thoughts ran amok trying to find a way out of the dilemma he had landed in.
“I’m sure you do, and its high time to get going. We have far too much to do, before the air force arrives, to play charades.”
Hug judged that the man possessed about the same combat abilities as he himself did, and that his only chance to survive, therefore, was to take advantage of the element of surprise. Long and persevering training proved fruitful, when his hand flashed with lightning speed to his waistband to grab the knife that pierced his opponent’s throat a split-second before he would have himself met the same fate. When he had recovered, heaving, he dragged the stiffening body into an adjoining storage room and hid it under some sacks. Then he wiped the blood from the floor, as good as possible, and hurried on to sound the alarm and meet the others before it was too late.
To avoid panic, it was vital that the population was kept uninformed, as long as possible, about what was to happen, so it was with amazement that Orril, at six o’clock in the morning, heard the wailing sirens of the alarm system that he thought had been deactivated. That it was because Hug had bypassed the circuits of the main computer was something he would never find out.
Jolted out of sleep, Shay ran out into the street with Esai, confused, half-awake, and tired; they squeezed their way through a terrified crowd, received the message that the emperor had ordered that all exits were to be closed, and that no one any longer had access to any of the ships. Surprised, they turned back, but were met by an agitated Gus, who told them that Hug had said that the battle armada had been destroyed and that soon they were going to be attacked by the Olegians.
“Then we have to leave immediately,” said Shay. “Do you know if there’s any alternative route to the ship, Gus?”
“Unfortunately, I don’t have the authority to provide you with that information,” he answered.
“Listen, now, Gus; it’s often good to be dutiful, but not this time, unless, that is, you want us all to be killed.”
After a second of doubt, he finally agreed, and told them there was a blocked emergency exit, behind the north transformer building, that they might be able to force.
“Good, then we’ll try to get out that way! Do you know if there’ll be any guards posted around our ship when we arrive?”
“No, I don’t know about that.”
“Oh, well, one problem at a time, and we’ll deal with that if it comes up. Now we have other things to think about.”
They were shortly back in the house, to which Anderika and Baria had also arrived, so he jumped up onto the stairs, everybody crowding around worriedly.
“Listen, everybody!” he shouted, after getting their full attention. “An emergency situation has arisen that requires that we act quickly and decisively. We have heard from secure sources that the colony’s armada has been defeated and that the Olegians will soon be here, so we must immediately leave Urduk. Unfortunately, all the exits have been blocked, but Gus says he knows of a tunnel that leads to the ship, and we can try to use it.”
Then he checked whether everybody was present, and when he was told that Gail was missing, he told Ixter to immediately go and find her.
“That’s probably not going to be so easy,” said Gus, “Since no one is allowed in or out of the palace. Plan F, which has now been started, means that any hope of a victory has disappeared, and that the imperial family has now assembled in the great council room, with all their servants, to commit mass suicide.”
When Ixter, in despair, said that in that case they could leave without him, Shay took Gus aside for a few words in private. When he returned a moment later, he said that Gus had told him that at the beginning of the tunnel there was also a connecting tunnel to the palace that they could use to try to find Gail.
As soon as they were ready they left the house in great haste, following Shay’s admonition to only take what was absolutely necessary. In addition to clothes, blankets and personal effects, they also took cleaning and toilet articles, as well as food and drink, that had been sorely missing during their escape to Urduk. Anderika’s baggage also included a medical bag, containing among other things an active substance against Cyatrin, which she believed was the toxic they had ingested in the council room. A distant alarm meant that most people had departed for the ship locks, so that they luckily only met a few individuals, who also seemed to be too preoccupied with their own problems to pay them any notice. Once they arrived at the emergency exit, they checked the area thoroughly before shooting off the lock of the heavy iron door; when they’d all passed through it, they carefully blocked it so that nobody would be able to follow them. Fortunately, the backup lighting still functioned, and a few minutes later they came to the tunnel that according to Gus connected to the palace.
Shay, with Ixter, Gus, Allur, Anderika, and Esai, went into the tunnel in search of Gail, while the others stayed and waited in the dimness of the tunnel. After only a few hundred metres, they found the tunnel blocked by a door with a monogram cast into it.
“This is the entrance to the palace’s cellar, but unfortunately my keys don’t fit, so we’ll have to use the hard method,” said Gus, aiming his weapon at the locking mechanism.
When the electrical viburnum field had been broken, the door opened, with a clicking sound, so they climbed a s
teep stairway to the palace’s top floor. Several hallways later, they found the decorated council room. What fixed their attention, however, wasn’t the intricate interior design, but the unreal scene of dead people lying everywhere, their eyes wide open, in twisted positions.
“Oh, God, why?” gasped Esai.
“Because Plan F didn’t allow them any other choice, I’m sorry to say,” answered Gus.
Ixter, standing silently with pursed lips, uttered some swear words and rushed into the chamber to search for Gail. The others immediately followed him and, in their search, were forced again and again to turn over bodies lying face-down, to see who they were. They were about to give up all hope when Ixter suddenly shouted with joy that he’d found her and that she was alive. While Anderika gave her an injection to block the poison, their attention was drawn to a light figure in a cage next to her, panting and wheezing and, a moment later, three other women still alive. After that, the miracle seemed to have come to an end, for it seemed that in some strange way it was as if the only ones who still had any life in them were those in the light figure’s immediate proximity.
“No, this won’t do!” said Shay. “Now we have to carry the survivors and leave, before the Olegians make their entrance!”
Without meeting any obstacles, they reached the stairs they’d climbed earlier and, when they came to the cellar, continued onwards back through the tunnel, knees buckling under their burdens. It was during one of their brief pauses that Gus, gasping, exclaimed that now that he’d had a chance to look more closely at the women, he was sure that two of them must be princesses.
“Why do you think so?” asked Shay.
“Because they’re wearing necklaces with the imperial seal, which only they have the right to wear.”
“I see. Well, I thought they were elegantly clad, but right now it doesn’t matter, since we have no time to lose. The Olegians don’t give a damn who they kill. For them, we’re all the same vermin.”
When they finally returned to the main tunnel, those who’d been waiting for them to re-emerge from the side tunnel were astonished to see who they had with them. Exhausted, all they could think of was resting, but after a hasty recap, they were nevertheless forced to move on. After some hundred meters, Gus said that they should turn off into a smaller tunnel that was barely high enough to walk upright in, but soon widened, luckily. Before long, they emerged into a concrete chamber lit by a yellowish cold glow, in which they were surprised to find a girl, tears streaming down her cheeks, sitting on a stone frieze. She looked about thirteen, in a simple dress of the kind that the palace servants usually wore, and had blonde braided hair, brown eyes, and thin, tightly-drawn lips.
“What’s your name, my friend?” asked Shay.
“Selis Krancia,” she sobbed, her eyes red from strain.
“But what in the world are you doing here? Why aren’t you with your family? They must be deeply worried about you!”
“No, not at all, because they died in the war with the Olegians.”
“Then how did you get to Urduk?”
“I was working in one of the palaces in the imperial city, so I got to follow along here, as a nursemaid, when we were evacuated.”
“Ah-hah, I see. OK, well you can’t keep sitting here, anyway, so if you want you can come along with us,” he said, in a sudden burst of tenderness.
“Yes, thank you. I’d really like that,” she answered, and dried her tears. “I have nowhere else to go.”
Esai muttered under his breath that they were now too many, but was instantly silenced by Shay’s dark look.
Another few hundred metres up the weakly-lit tunnel, they were stopped by a green steel door that, to their relief, opened with a long squeak. After climbing up a steep stairway, followed by a long culvert, the Olina suddenly appeared before them, like a shining mirage. They started across the last few metres, but an armed imperial soldier darted out, pointing his laser carbine at them, shouting in a pompous voice that no one had the right to approach the ship. His voice radiated strength and self-confidence, and he seemed to take his mission with great seriousness.
“That doesn’t pertain to us, since we have the mission of conveying the princesses to safety,” said Shay, thinking of the old saying that with fresh and daring initiative, the battle is often already half-won.
“Is that so?” asked the soldier, perplexed.
“Of course!” roared Gus. “Dare you question Orril’s order?”
“No, naturally not. Feel free to proceed.”
“Hurry up!” screamed Shay, as numerous explosions were heard in the distance, but strong enough to be felt through the ground beneath their feet. “We have no time to lose!”
As they boarded, the soldier stood watching them with a sad look in his eyes, knowing that, once they had lifted off, he would die at his post. He wore an elegant dark-blue uniform, with badges on the epaulettes that showed that he was a vaber, which corresponded to the lowest rank of officer. He was young, twenty-three at most, with brown eyes and dark curly hair that stuck out from under his cap, with a black visor that sat at a jaunty angle. When Caver, who was last up the stairs, heard him ask, in a piteous voice, if he could come with them, he didn’t have the heart to deny him, so that once they were all in the ship, he threw the switch on the magnetic lock and reported that they were ready for departure.
“But what’s he doing here, the ship is already overloaded?” asked Shay, when he saw the soldier.
“That may be,” said Caver, “But I also have a conscience to consider.”
“That sounds like something I myself might have said,” replied Shay, with a crooked smile. “We’ll just have to cross our fingers and hope that it all goes well.”
As soon as the drives were started, all the warning lights flashed that they were overloaded, but the Olina roared and lifted, anyway, and responded readily as they headed north, at low altitude, under the cover of the mountain range. When they’d flown far enough, they accelerated in a steep climb out into Urduk’s upper ionosphere and were beginning to feel an iota of hope that they had managed to escape unnoticed, when suddenly the screens lit up and a monotone computer voice informed them that they were being chased. The Olegian ships, three of them, neared them mercilessly and would soon be within firing range if they didn’t do something drastic. Given the few alternatives at his disposal, Shay decided to push the drives to full power, which created so much acceleration that they were pushed heavily back into their seats.
“She’s not holding; you have to reduce speed, if you don’t want her to fall apart,” gasped Esai, as the warning lights blinked ever more frenziedly.
“No, not until the distance has increased,” said Shay, determined.
The velocimeter crept slowly upwards as the ship vibrated and shook like a taut string that had been plucked. Several minutes later the computers indicated that the Olegian ships had ceased advancing on them, and after another five minutes, which felt like an eternity, Esai finally admitted that they were out in parsec space and could conduct a star leap.
“Prepare ship!” shouted Shay; when the photon-flash generator, roaring, slung them out thousands of distance-kilometres into the endless emptiness of space, they all breathed a deep sigh of relief.
“We are probably out of danger now,” said Esai, drying the sweat from his brow. No pursuers have been seen on the screens since we left the stratosphere.”
“Wonderful!” said Shay, and stretched himself out, trying to ease the stiffness in his joints.
“I didn’t think we were going to make it when you selected full power.”
“Sometimes, to win, you have to put everything on one card,” Shay said, elated.
“Right, but what are we going to do now?” asked Caver, once they had turned off the ship’s radiation shields and connected the large fusion drives. “In our vicinity, the only possible planet with any kind of life on it that we have any chance of reaching is Zodiac.”
“Then that’s whe
re we’ll go.”
“Excuse me for being a bit doubtful,” said Esai, “But the name, Zodiac, comes from Trekish, and means abyss. None of the countless expeditions that have been sent there have ever returned, and all the scientific data indicates that there’s some kind of energy field that obstructs passage.”
“I know about all that, but we have no other alternative, and if we don’t try to do anything then it’s guaranteed that we’re finished.”
“OK, then it’s best we proceed with your plan, then.”
“Yes, it’s unavoidable. Bring up the coordinates and let me know when we’re ready to move up into ultraspeed.”
They had already travelled two billion distance kilometres from Urduk, the Olina shooting forward like a silver arrow through dark cold space, surrounded by the glittering sparkle of the Milky Way. When Esai had reported that they were on course, Shay was pleased to shift them into warp mode, then felt he could afford to relax. After asking Caver to unlock the cargo room, he began to check the various data coming in; as he leaned back in his seat after making a few course adjustments, he heard the rustling sound of someone coming up the stairs. The flight control room was dimly lit from the green fluorescent glow of the instrument panel, which was why it took him a few moments to be able to distinguish one of the elegantly-dressed women whom they had carried from the council room, now standing and watching him with an inquisitive look.
“From what I can understand of all this, it is you who we must thank for having escaped a certain death,” she said, and curtsied deeply, which made her embroidered gown spread itself out across the floor. “May I ask why, who you are, and where we’re going?” Her speech was mellifluously beautiful, and was evidence of an upbringing in the most elevated realms of society.
“My answer to your first question,” he answered, “Is humanity, and that life is to be lived. The answer to your second question is that I am Captain Shay, and that you are safely on board the battleship Olina and, regarding the third question, the objective of our trip is Zodiac, which is the only planet that is possible for us to reach with the amount of fuel we have available.”
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