Ramus felt sick. He looked away, unable to stand the sight of the dead man, only to see Demona standing near the table. The whites of her eyes had gone black and, along the palms of her outstretched hands, wisps of purple energy were quickly fading.
Death Magic, Ramus thought.
With Ramus staring at her in disbelief, Demona turned silently and walked out.
In Kanet Solan’s chambers, Ramus took a moment to recognize Ta Demona after all these years. Although her robes were unchanged, she wore a respirator concealing much of her face. Her eyes, however, were uncovered, piercing through Ramus like sapphires fired from a gun.
“What the hell is she doing here?” Ramus asked, jumping to his feet.
Solan stood also. “As you said, you don’t read minds.”
“If you think I’m working with her again,” Ramus growled, “you’re as crazy as she is.”
“You’ll work with whomever I say you will,” Solan replied coldly. “It’s not like you have a choice.”
Demona came closer, waving her hand casually through the air laden with jasmine. Her nails were like long needles, painted black.
“Come now,” she said. “We were always so good together...”
Ramus straightened, shifting his attention from Solan back to the former priestess. He pointed his finger at her. “You’re a monster.”
Under the respirator, she laughed. “I’ve seen your monster, Rowan. I’ve seen it tear a man in half in fact!”
“At least it was quick,” Ramus replied. “I don’t rot people from the inside in one of your sick experiments.”
“Demona’s research has been invaluable,” Solan said, “even if her methods are not always... traditional.”
“I’d call it torture,” Ramus said.
Demona shrugged beneath her stiff robes. “I won’t quibble about semantics, but my test subjects are a necessary evil. Otherwise, we couldn’t make the strides we’ve accomplished with Dark Psi.”
Ramus scoffed and sat down heavily beside the table. His eyes narrowed below his scowl. “What’s up with the new hardware?”
“My respirator?” Demona replied, casting a sharp glance at Solan. “A failed lung implant I’m afraid. Now I wear this.”
“It covers your smile,” Ramus said, but scowled at Solan. “I guess we both owe Solan for something. For a lot of things.”
“Yes, you do!” Solan replied. “Now, if the two of you have sufficiently caught up, I’d like to go over the job at hand.”
He took his old seat beside Ramus while Demona found a pillow to rest on between them.
In Sparky Joe’s Saloon, Fugg’s head lay on its side on top of the bar, his pig-like snout partially submerged in a puddle of fungus beer and his own drool. Bubbles formed and floated away as he snored.
Gen, sitting on the adjacent barstool, finally leaned over and nudged him with her outstretched finger. “Excuse me, Master Fugg...”
With a loud snort, Fugg sat up straight, his eyes suddenly open.
“What? How dare you!” he shouted, pointing randomly around him.
“Sorry to wake you,” Gen said.
“Wake me? Hell no! I wasn’t sleeping...”
“You were snoring.”
“Just resting my eyes!” Fugg insisted.
Fugg lifted his shirt, exposing his pronounced belly just below the bar rail. He gave his dripping face a quick wipe with the shirt before letting it drop back again, almost covering his belly button.
Her eyes large and inquisitive, Gen hesitated before speaking. “Actually, I have a question.”
“Yeah?”
“I was wondering why Master Ramus is helping the Psi Lords.”
Fugg chuckled, but had to stop halfway through to clear his throat. He coughed and spat something green onto the floor.
“It’s complicated,” he said finally.
“But I thought Master Ramus didn’t like the Psi Lords,” she said.
“When the captain first ran into the Psi Lords,” Fugg explained, “he had lost everything. His family, his people, all the Dahl had turned their back on him. He was an exile with nothing but his name. The Psi Lords took him in, gave him a job, and gave him an identity. They were like a family to him I guess.”
“You said they gave him those tattoos...”
“Sure,” Fugg replied. “They gave him powers that his people never would, but that’s not why he’s helping.”
“No?”
“I said it was complicated!”
“In what way?” Gen asked.
“He got mixed up with a woman,” Fugg went on. “Demona was her name.”
“Was she nice?”
Fugg stared at the robot. “No!”
Gen’s eyes widened as she nodded.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Fugg went on. “Neither of them were gentle souls. They were both nasty in their own way, but she was on a whole ‘nother level! She was into some stuff that would make your toes curl.”
Gen’s mouth rounded into a circle. “Really?”
“They had a thing together.”
“Love?”
“Maybe — I don’t know about that — but they definitely had something. Anyway, if he’s helping them, I’d bet my last beer it’s because of her.”
The robot stared at the floor, avoiding the glob Fugg had spat there earlier.
“Poor Master Ramus,” she said.
Fugg gave a disinterested shrug. “Yeah, poor dumb bastard...”
The diplomatic residence for the Erudite Concordant was in the West End of Regalis, along a main boulevard called Embassy Row. A few blocks down from the consulate for the Talion Republic and the black monolith that was the Magna embassy, white marble walls surrounded the Erudite envoy’s home and diplomatic offices. As a famously xenophobic race, the Erudites usually kept the gates of their compound securely closed to outsiders. On a few occasions, the doors to the sanctum would open just wide enough to allow a few, select visitors to enter and meet Ambassador Abaru himself.
Abaru did not relish these encounters.
From a planet called Erudun, the ambassador was the product of a highly selective and rigorously followed set of protocols related to breeding. The Erudite government, based on computer programs that tracked his parents’ genetic profile, allowed them to procreate with the sole purpose of having a child that was as close to a perfect specimen as possible. Once the baby was born, government officials would compare the child to a set of criteria including physical proportions, internal measurements, and genetic markers for future diseases, and if the results matched the ideal specimen, within limited tolerances, the birth would be considered a success. If not, the paired parents would never mate again, at least not with each other.
Children matching the ideal were henceforth known as Omegas. Those who did not were called Omicrons.
Ambassador Abaru was an Omega, while all of his janitorial staff were Omicrons.
In the embassy courtyard, a single tree rose from a circle of white gravel surrounded by alabaster tiles. The slender branches were graced with reddish leaves and buds of pink flowers. As perfectly symmetrical as possible, the tree appeared almost artificial, but Abaru stood beneath it with a pair of pruning shears, clipping off branches to maintain its aesthetic balance.
One of his staff, wearing a stiff tunic with a high collar, approached. Both Erudites had blue skin, a narrow mouth and no ears or nose. Dressed nearly the same and almost identical physically, they could have been twins.
“The guests will be arriving shortly,” the staff member said.
Abaru surveyed the branch he was about to trim, his head cocked to one side.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“It looks perfect.”
“Hmmm,” Abaru murmured and then clipped the branch. He handed the scissors to his staff member. “There’s always room for improvement...”
The Abbot of the Dharmesh Monastery arrived by gravcar at the Erudite embassy, accompanied by the monastery
Prior and two acolytes. The Abbot, an elderly Dahl with gray hair twisted around his pointy ears, rarely visited Regalis, preferring the clean air of the Palatine Mountains to the smog and congestion of the capital city. He found the ride in the gravcar especially unnerving, but did his best not to lose face, or his dinner, in front of the two younger monks.
All four, dressed in orange robes, walked the path up to the main gate where an Erudite official greeted them and asked for their invitation. The Erudite flag, a simple blue line in the shape of a circle against a white background, flapped in the evening breeze above him. The Prior produced the invitation from his clothing and handed it to the official who bowed and led them to the courtyard inside. Other guests, not more than twenty in total, had already arrived and were circulating through the open space around the central tree. The Abbot stopped for a moment to take in the foliage, noting it had been meticulously pruned, perhaps excessively so. On the Dahl home planet, Gwlad Ard’un, they had genetically altered their trees to be in perpetual bloom like an endless Spring. The Abbot favored that over whatever torturous grooming they were doing to this poor specimen.
“They’ve invited the Sarkan,” the Prior whispered into the Abbot’s ear.
“Here?” he replied, casting a glance around. In one corner, a group of three stood away from the others. Like the Dahl, they had pointed ears, but their skin was a bright red and their eyes were like amber. A branch of the same race, they spoke the same native language, but their political views could not have been more different. Whereas the Dahl had allied themselves with the humans of the Imperium, the Sarkan viewed humans with distrust, saving an equal disdain for their ancient brethren who befriended them. The Sarkan also viewed the Dahls’ unwavering obsession with gathering knowledge as a distraction from far loftier goals like conquering the galaxy. The Sarkans’ own alliance with the Magna Supremacy, the sworn enemy of the Imperium, made their presence even more curious, the Abbot thought.
“I suppose the Erudites have their reasons,” he told the Prior.
The party of Dharmesh monks wound their way to where the Erudite ambassador was standing.
“So nice of you to come,” Ambassador Abaru said.
“I was pleasantly surprised to receive your invitation,” the Abbot replied. “This is certainly a singular and, I must say, rare honor.”
Erudites lacked much in the way of a mouth to smile, but the Abbot thought the envoy was at least making an effort to.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m aware my people are not well known for having gatherings such as this. At least not for outsiders — I mean, non-Erudites.”
A wry smile wrinkled the Abbot’s face.
“Indeed,” he said and then frowned. “However, I am also surprised, unpleasantly I might add, that a Sarkan delegation appears to be here as well.”
“No offense was intended,” Abaru replied, “but I have invited several parties tonight.”
“Which brings me to my next question,” the Abbot said. “Why are we here?”
When Ta Demona and Rowan Ramus arrived at the Erudite embassy, they were not wearing the same fashionable dress and tuxedo as at the Fat Cat Casino. They were dressed more conservatively, Demona in a simple black gown with a veil covering her respirator and Ramus in a traditional long tunic of red and black. Ramus even removed his earrings, although it almost killed him to do it.
Reaching the gate, Ramus presented the invitation to the Erudite official. The blue face of the omicron betrayed no emotion but Ramus was still nervous, not sure if he could trust the forged documentation.
“Mister Gambhir and guest from Gwlad Ard’un,” the Erudite said. “Most of the other guests have already arrived.”
Ramus motioned toward Demona. “Sorry, this one took forever to get dressed...”
Demona’s blue eyes became slits while she dug her nails into Ramus’ arm. The Erudite again showed no emotion, ushering them through the gate.
“Was that really necessary?” Demona asked once they were inside.
“No, but I enjoyed it,” Ramus replied.
In the courtyard, the Wanderer‘s captain admired the central tree while Demona scanned the guests with her mind.
“Curious,” she said. “Nobody seems sure why they’re here.”
“What about the ambassador?”
“Also curious,” she went on, “he seems to be shielding his thoughts. I can’t read them.”
“Isn’t that going to make our job a little difficult?” Ramus grumbled.
“I just need to get closer. Come on.”
Wading through the guests, Demona and Ramus rounded the tree in a counter-clockwise circuit, maneuvering ever nearer to the Erudite ambassador on the other side. They passed faces, most of them Dahl, but also a few Sarkan and even a Sylva or two. None seemed terribly interested in either of them.
“Do you recognize any of these people?” Demona asked, nodding at strangers.
“Nope,” Ramus remarked.
“Any of them likely to recognize you?”
“One of the advantages of being an exile,” Ramus explained, “is becoming a Forgotten. Any memories of me have been erased from their minds.”
“Even the Sarkan?”
“No, but they’re a bunch of dicks and I don’t fraternize with dicks.”
Demona grinned. “Perhaps I should feel flattered.”
“Don’t be,” Ramus said. “You’re awful in your own special way.”
A group of Dharmesh monks were crowded in front of the Erudite ambassador. One of the monks, the Abbot, was speaking to the ambassador, blocking the way. Demona could still not read the Erudite’s mind, although she felt a unified sense of annoyance from those around him. If she could get just a little closer...
Ambassador Abaru raised his hand abruptly, drawing the attention of the other guests and, perhaps not coincidentally, quieting the Abbot who had been speaking.
“Now that we’re all here,” Abaru said, “let’s adjourn to the library. There’s much to discuss.”
He turned and strolled toward a doorway leading deeper into the embassy proper. The guests murmured in a general buzz of excitement and followed, carrying Demona and Ramus along with them like leaves on a river.
Against his better judgment, the Abbot of the Dharmesh Monastery had not left yet. Although reading minds was against the laws and traditions of his people, the Abbot was skeptical of whatever the Erudite ambassador was proposing. People without pointed ears, or any ears for that matter, couldn’t be trusted.
The embassy library had a high ceiling with bookcases reaching all the way to the top. The Abbot admired the sheer number of books, each made from real paper, but he assumed the Erudites also had the contents backed up electronically somewhere. The Dharmesh Monastery used a liquid computer called the Pool of Memory, a bucket of which could hold more information than all of the books in this library combined. The old monk felt pity for the Erudites, seeking knowledge but lacking the storage capacity to hold it.
Sad, really, he thought.
The rest of the library was taken up by uncomfortable-looking chairs and couches with a few tables on which books were laying unattended. It was surprisingly open, the Abbot concluded, with the bookcases set into the walls instead of free-standing in the center. The guests had ample room to mingle about while the ambassador and his staff assembled on one end.
When he was ready, Ambassador Abaru again raised his three-fingered hands and the others quieted out of respect.
“Thank you again for coming,” he said. “I apologize for keeping you waiting.”
Get on with it then, the Abbot thought.
“My people are a contrast,” the ambassador began. “We seek knowledge about the worlds around us, but keep the people of those worlds at arm’s length. The Erudites have a long history of perfection, starting with our children and continuing with our society. We have often viewed other cultures with distrust, as if their impurity could somehow sully ours...”
The Pri
or whispered in the Abbot’s ear. “Is he trying to insult us?”
“Shush,” the elder monk replied.
“But I believe this was wrong,” Abaru continued. “Our suspicions have hampered our studies, preventing us from expanding our knowledge and our abilities.”
“What kind of abilities?” the Abbot asked, drawing stares from the other guests.
“I’m glad you asked,” Abaru said, nodding. “Everyone here shares a common characteristic. We are all blessed with the psionic arts.”
The Abbot gave a sideways glance at the Sarkan delegation. “Some of us more than others...”
“Shut up, collaborator!” one of the Sarkan shouted back.
“If you can’t beat them, join them,” the Abbot replied calmly. “We have better things to do than fighting.”
“Please,” Abaru said. “I realize there are conflicts among you, but there are many things in common as well. Together you are strong, are you not?”
The guests grumbled in low tones without consensus. Several crossed their arms and frowned or shook their heads.
“What I propose,” the ambassador said, “is an alliance of sorts. As species with psi powers, we should combine our knowledge and our skills so that we can all benefit from them...”
“He’s lying,” Demona hissed at Ramus, her blue eyes blazing with cold fire.
“What?” Ramus replied, turning his head toward her while keeping one eye on the Erudite ambassador a few feet away. “He sounds reasonable enough.”
The Abbot, ignoring scowls from the Sarkan, spoke up, “What do you intend to do with this knowledge, Ambassador?”
“To improve my people,” Abaru said. “The Dahl have studied psionics for thousands of years. The Erudites could only benefit from such learning. In return, we could share our knowledge as well.”
The Abbot gave a dry chuckle, shaking his head.
“My people, and my Monastery in particular,” he replied, “do not share our knowledge so easily. The arts we teach are for the Dahl, not ones like yourself.”
This time a Sarkan laughed with scorn. “You seem perfectly willing to share with the humans!”
“It’s true that we have shared our wisdom,” the Abbot retorted, “but never our psionics. Such abilities are too destructive for humanity, considering their proclivities...”
The Imperium Chronicles Collection, 2nd Edition - Stories Page 18