“Did I do something bad too?” Luci asked.
Tom just wanted to get this over with and return to his ship. “No, honey. You didn’t.”
“Then why am I being sent away?”
He chose not to answer any more of her queries, and directed Cleo through the falling snow. The lights were on below, a blinking beacon on top of the home prepared for Seda’s arrival. No one knew who was visiting the remote building, and bots had been dispatched to prepare it a couple days ago, rather than the warden’s people.
Cleo landed, Tom parking as close to the metal structure as he could. It looked as miserable as he felt outside. He powered the ship down, unclipped the PL-30 at his hip, and told Luci to follow him. He passed her a cloak and waited as she wrapped it over her shoulders.
“Seda, we’re here,” he said, heading to the cargo hold. She glared at him with hard eyes, and he deactivated her tethers. “Keep this cordial, and you and your daughter can be with each other a long time. Who knows when the Prime will offer you a bargain?”
“I don’t imagine that’s happening any time soon,” she said with a cutting edge. “I don’t blame you for this, Tom, but that doesn’t mean I have to be happy about it.”
“I know,” was all he said in reply.
Tom lowered the ramp and passed a crate of supplies to Seda. “Take this. Something a little extra.” It was full of games they could play together, and some old Zilph’i texts, but he didn’t tell her the contents. She finally gave him a faint smile and took the offered crate.
Luci stretched her arms out, wanting to help, but Tom only patted her head. “Off we go.”
The wind blew in snow, and soon the lower half of the ramp was covered in white fluffy cold stuff. Tom had never liked the snow. On Nolix, it was a rare sight, but he’d visited enough places with freezing seasons to develop a distaste for it. Earon had lots of regions where they frequently saw inclement weather like this, and he was glad he hadn’t grown up there.
The building they were heading to was squat; a flashing light on the top shut off as he reached the front door. Tom pressed the keypad, not needing a code for admittance, and he waited for the two captives to enter before him. He didn’t see any windows from inside, but the lights slowly rose in brightness at their arrival.
It appeared like any house. There was seating, a table on the right edge, and all the cooking equipment Seda would need to survive. Tom guessed there was a bathroom down the hall and bedrooms beyond.
He took them on a brief tour, his gun in his hand as he swept the rooms, ensuring there weren’t any Assembly surprises waiting for him. When he was confident they were alone in the remote dwelling, he moved for the doorway.
Seda was already searching through the cabinets, and Tom saw they were stocked with various food products, and there was clothing in the closets. Luci watched it all with the enthusiasm of a small child, and she’d seemed to forget that they were separated from her father.
“What am I supposed to do here, Tom?” Seda asked softly.
“Live your life,” he said.
“In here? It’s a prison.”
“Yes, it is. And you deserve worse.” Things would have ended a lot differently if Tarlen hadn’t come upon his little hostage.
“I do deserve it. I’ve done awful things for the cause, but think of the child. Take her,” Seda said calmly.
“Take her? I can’t do that.” He glanced at Luci, her big eyes staring up at him.
“Yes, you can. Bring her, Tom. She’s not evil. She’s a little girl. You can teach her to hate me, I don’t care; just give her the chance to grow up in a better place,” Seda said. “You can’t let my little girl rot away here.”
Luci was crying now, as if she understood the complexities of what her mother was begging Tom to do. Seda grabbed the girl, pulling her close. She stroked her blonde hair, telling her how much she loved her. Tom couldn’t watch.
He considered the options and hated each possible outcome.
He turned to leave and felt the tiny hand grip his.
____________
Tarlen had never been more exhilarated yet terrified in his life. Sure, he’d been scared a lot since the Tubers had lowered to Malin, destroying his home city and altering the course of his life forever, but this was a new kind of lingering fear.
Behind the thick walls and energy bars were dozens of angry prisoners, who wouldn’t think twice about ending his life. They walked down the hall, the warden stopping every few cells to discuss the occupant behind the bars.
The floors were dark stone here, and Tarlen thought that he saw bloodstains all around it. Some of them were probably soaked in it years before he was born. From the outside, he’d thought it would be fun to tour, but once the doors shut on them, sealing them inside, he hadn’t been able to stop shaking.
“What do you think, Tarlen?” Brax asked him, nodding to the blob in the room they faced. The lights were on, but dim, and he could hardly make out the creature in the shadows. A pool of water separated the bars and the being, the light reflecting off the rippling surface.
“It’s interesting, I suppose,” Tarlen lied.
“Interesting? This is horrible,” the Tekol said. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve wanted to leave since I arrived. I’ve heard the stories about these prisoners. I was obsessed with saving the universe when I was bright-eyed and about your age. Can you believe I read about this guy in here?”
“No. What did he do?” Tarlen asked, his curiosity piqued.
“He’s a Wrooplan, from over near Inprinx. They’re water beings. Mostly a civil bunch. Live partly on land, mainly underwater. This sadistic one poisoned an entire village. Nothing even remotely like it had happened among the Wrooplan in their history, and here he was, killing ten thousand or so of his people.” Brax and Tarlen were trailing behind the group, the sound of the warden’s voice shrinking as they moved farther away.
Tarlen could see the outline of the Wrooplan now, and it began moving from the shadows.
“When he was asked why he did it, he told them it was to hear their spirits drowning,” Brax said, and Tarlen felt the goosebumps rise on his arms.
The creature was husky. Fat layers covered its bare torso; the arms were short and chubby, its face a pale gray. Clumpy whiskers shot from the top of his head, and his eyes were black as midnight and menacing as he stared at Tarlen before slipping into the water.
“Let’s get out of here.” Tarlen tugged Brax’s arm and led him away.
“I don’t blame you. He made my skin crawl too,” Brax said.
Tarlen stopped peering into the cells as they went, and the warden eventually guided them into the center of the prison. The ceiling was clear glass, snow melting as it hit the surface. Tarlen gawked up at the perfect view of the cliff wall of smooth ice. It was beautiful, in an ominous sort of way. He thought Belna would have appreciated it.
He missed her already, and he’d only left her side a few hours ago. Ever since Doctor Nee had managed to get her talking, Tarlen had been in a better mood. She could move around a bit, mostly on instinct, and she swore the bodily functions weren’t under her control. She communicated through a speaker, the same technology as Treena’s real body had, but Nee was confident he’d find a way to merge her neural pathways with her motor controls and return some of the real Belna to the surface.
Tarlen could only hope so, but Belna seemed in better a state of mind than he would have been if their roles were reversed. She was trapped in her own body. They’d considered whether she could control an artificial body like Treena’s, but Captain Baldwin had been told there weren’t enough resources to give a random Bacal girl such a valuable asset.
“Welcome to Cliffside’s central command,” the warden said, his small eyes glinting as he waved his arm in the air. His entire demeanor was far more theatrical than Tarlen had been expecting, and Treena appeared to be growing tired of it.
“Can you show us the plan? Where are our captives going, an
d who is staying at this facility?” Treena asked.
“We will be placing the acting Assembly captains from Remie and Persi here. The rest are being spread out among the other prisons.” Warden Minhaus walked to a long desk near the left edge of the room.
Tarlen peered around, seeing various guards and workers in the room with them. He recognized a few of the races, but there were others he’d never seen among the Tekol and humans. They were all going about their business, watching video feeds. The room was built of the same rock, the blinking and beeping computer consoles almost looking out of place in the rustic setting.
“These are very far apart,” Ven said, pointing at the screen on the desk. Tarlen’s gaze followed his finger, and saw the various glowing icons indicating the other prisons.
“That’s right. No one can make it between the prisons on foot. Some have tried, and we always let them go,” the warden said.
Ven appeared perplexed. “You let them walk away?”
The warden smiled widely, his yellowed teeth flashing as he spoke. “Sure. We send a drone to escort them. They usually don’t even realize it. They think they’re safe, and they probably are… for a few hours. But after a while, they freeze up, their blood too cold to pump any longer. It’s a horrible death. On a night like today, a big man like you would only make it twenty minutes or so.” He tapped a finger at Brax’s chest.
“Good to know.”
Treena glanced around the room. “Thank you for the tour, and your time, Warden. We’d be happy for you to unload the prisoners and take over their charge.”
“Glad to hear it. Not that I presumed anything different. Most aren’t equipped to manage the hateful and murderous.” The warden stood up taller, fixing his crooked glasses.
“I suppose you’re right. Then it’s a good thing we have people like you to do it for us,” Treena told the man, who beamed at the comment.
Tarlen was anxious to leave, and he could tell the others were too. They left the command center, Tarlen taking one last glance at the enormous wall of ice directly behind the prison.
____________
“Ma’am, you’re going to want to see this,” Lieutenant Darl said, waking Reeve as she dozed off. Her eyes remained open, but using her brother’s famous meditating trick, she’d managed to catch a few minutes of rest while sitting up.
Reeve snapped to, turning her attention to the viewer. “The third probe shows something interesting,” Darl said.
Reeve stood, walking toward the image. “How interesting?”
“I think there’s a ship behind it,” Darl said.
Her heart raced at his words. “What?” She’d only had him use the probes because she’d been bored, and she’d wanted him to stop his annoying whistling. “Are you sure? You said it yourself, that’s an old chunk of a vessel. Maybe there’s still some active power source altering your readings.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. See…” Data streamed over the right side of the viewer. “They did a decent job of hiding it, but I’ll be sent to the Vastness if that isn’t a corvette of some kind. See the way the…”
Reeve hardly heard him as he droned on. She could see it now too. The energy waves: the first three bars were maintaining life support, the next four keeping the impulse engines primed, while only giving off enough of a read to make others think it was residual power from the section of damaged ship they hid behind.
“Damn it.” She rubbed her palms together. “Bridge to Commander Starling.”
Nothing.
“Bridge to Lieutenant Commander Daak,” she said, registering silence. “What’s the issue?” she asked.
The JOT in the seat beside Darl was using the console to check, and she gulped and tapped the screen. “Ma’am, it appears as though the storm below is blocking our communications.”
“All the technology in the Concord, and we can’t talk because of some snowflakes? You have to be kidding me,” she said. Reeve added it to her list of things to research more. If they were going to be running around Concord space, doing on-planet missions every month, they’d have to ensure errors like this weren’t overlooked any longer.
“Constantine, where are we with the prisoner transport?” she asked.
His handsome AI projection appeared beside her. “They just picked up the last load. All ships are now devoid of our Assembly captives.”
The image on the viewer changed to show the huge, bulky transport vessel provided by the Bolux prisons. She watched as it moved away from Constantine and toward the blue ice planet. What in the Vastness is that ship doing hiding out there?
“Darl, send a communication. Tell them we’re aware of their position, and they are in no way allowed to interfere with our delivery,” Reeve said.
“Yes, ma’am.” His fingers flew across the keypad, and he smiled back at her, indicating it was done. They waited a few moments, the prisoner transport shrinking in the viewer as it neared Bolux.
Darl paled, and Reeve leaned over him. “What is it?”
“It’s a Lobrelion. They claim they want nothing to do with our business. They suggest we don’t interfere, as they’re acting in accordance with their own bylaws,” Darl said.
“And what does that mean?” Reeve scanned her internal filing system, trying to recall anything about the Lobrelion.
Darl was already on it, accessing a file about the Concord partner. “Lobrelions are from the planet Tesserus and joined the Concord three hundred and seventeen years ago…” He made a clicking sound with his tongue as he ran a finger over the screen, searching for pertinent details. “Here we go: ‘The Lobrelions brought with them a medical technology previously unheard of. They were able to cure the Duonucleiton disease that plagued over ten partner worlds for decades’.”
Reeve remembered it now. “It was rumored they were the ones who’d released the pathogens onto the planets, using trader ships.”
Darl nodded. “There’s nothing about that in the database, but I believe you’re correct.”
“So what? Why do they think they can order us to stand down and not interfere?” Reeve asked, reading over his shoulder.
His finger tapped the screen. “Because of the cure, they were granted some liberties. They’re allowed to practice their customs outside of Tesserus.”
“Meaning?” the JOT beside Darl asked.
Reeve answered, “Meaning they’re about to do something that falls within the legal parameters on their home world.”
“We can’t stop them?” Darl asked.
“Not if they aren’t harming our crew members,” Reeve said. “I need to reach Starling and the captain.”
She tried again, but the communications failed once more. The prisoner transport was too far to see from the viewer now, leaving nothing but Constantine and the hidden Lobrelion spacecraft.
Four
The storm was brutal, and Tom slipped on the ice, nearly dropping the bundle in his arms. He was foolish for buying into it all. What was he thinking? He peered down at the tiny face, Luci’s head wrapped in blankets. He was basically leaving Seda to die out here, and he knew it, but she’d brought this on herself. He had no choice with the Concord law, and everyone knew the appeal process was lengthy, and a pit darker than a black hole.
The child, on the other hand, hadn’t been given a choice. She was only four or five years old, and Tom was confident she’d thrive in the care of another family. It was the only thing he could do in this situation, but he would never be able to tell Admiral Benitor about his indiscretion.
Cleo was close, but he could hardly see her through the heavy snowfall, and he got turned around twice on the short trip. By the time he found her, his toes were numb, his fingers aching. The ramp opened, sending warm air over them, and he hurried up the metal incline, setting Luci down.
He could almost make out the lights of Seda’s new home in the distance, and wished her the best, despite all she’d done to him and with the Assembly. He imagined her decisions were more
based on her father’s brainwashing than her own aspirations, but it was too late for her. Her fate was sealed.
“When can I see Mommy again?” Luci asked. Standing there bundled in blankets, she looked like an alien to him. Come to think of it, any child was alien to Tom. He’d spent his entire adult life on cruise ships, where children were rarely found.
“I can’t promise anything, but I’ll make sure to let her know how you’re doing,” Tom said, positive the little girl had some idea what was happening. She took it all with resignation, and Tom left her behind as he kicked the snow off his boots and moved for the pilot’s seat.
The ship powered up with ease, and he attempted to communicate with the bridge. It failed. “Starling, come in.”
“Captain Baldwin, is it done?” Treena’s voice was strong and professional.
Tom glanced at Luci, who was climbing up onto the seat beside him. She fumbled with the strapping, and he took a deep breath before replying. “It’s done. I’m heading to Constantine.”
“The transports are finished with their tasks. The prisoners have been brought to the central prison for processing, where they’ll be sent off to various bases in the morning,” Treena informed him.
“Very well. See you up there,” Tom told her.
“Yes, sir.” The communication ended, and Tom pressed the thrusters, lifting from the ground.
____________
Ven sensed the shift in mood around him and waved Commander Starling over.
“What is it?” she asked.
“It’s… I don’t know, exactly, but the staff is in a panic.” Since Ven’s heart had stopped, and Fayle had brought him from the brink of the Vastness, his senses had adapted, grown.
“How do you mean? They look fine to me,” Starling told him. She was right. On the surface, the white-uniformed staff members were calm, but Ven took a closer look and saw Warden Minhaus’ right eye twitch as he leaned over a guard’s console.
Ven strode across the room, anxious to be leaving. Their duty was complete, and that meant Constantine waited for their return. “What’s the matter, Warden?”
Baldwin's Legacy: The Complete Series Page 62