by Jaleta Clegg
“Dumb luck,” I said. “You can only have so many variations in a lock. A starship is a lot more complicated.”
“Starship.” Wex stared overhead at a display of flashing lights making complex patterns. “I can almost read it.”
“I don’t see anything here that matches the scan readings,” Lovar said. “Those were variations of force fields, strange but not completely different. Not like this control room.”
“Command mode on,” Wex said in the language the golden men used. We’d been talking Basic, the common language of the Empire.
The screen directly in front of us went blank silver then cleared to show a running list of symbols.
“I can almost read it,” Wex repeated. He squinted at the screen.
The lights in the room flashed off and back on. All the equipment began blinking faster.
“Command mode initiated,” a voice said.
“I’ll be a cheese noodle,” Wade said in a very small, very impressed whisper.
“Status report.” Wex sounded different, almost as if he were someone else. “And slow the text down.”
“Confirmed,” the sourceless voice said. The text on the screen slowed to a bare crawl.
Wex walked closer. He ran his finger down the list. His lips moved, sounding something out. He shook his head and leaned in closer. “Water. Engine power capacity, atmosphere, breeding. . . Breeding?”
“Genetic diversity maintained at forty seven point three two five percent,” the voice said. “Breeding programs established for three hundred six veirtos. Current status of breeding males: Ninety seven of breeding age, thirty eight with desirable traits, twenty seven with mutations beyond the acceptable range. Breeding females: Seventy eight within prime reproductive age, forty two with desirable traits, twenty with mutations beyond the desirable range.” The voice droned on. The list got more specific and a lot more technical.
Wex watched the symbols scroll across the screen, mumbling to himself. Wade and Lovar fingered controls, not quite ready to try moving them to new settings.
Commander Hovart watched Wex with a very strange look on his face. “This is a colony ship. Not a viable one anymore, though. Why slaves?” He looked at me, puzzled.
I shrugged. “Cheap labor?”
“And why no children in the camps? With men and women both there, human nature says it should have happened.”
“So come back and study it later.” I was tired. And hungry, my stomach reminded me.
“Wex!” Hovart called, snapping out of his puzzled study. “What about the force shield or the tractor beams?”
“They aren’t here.” Wex stepped back from the screen. The voice was still droning about specific genetic traits and percentages of something.
“Can you ask it?” Commander Hovart said, pointing at the ceiling.
“Status of force shield,” Wex called out.
The voice paused. “Term undefined.”
“Status of energy fields,” Wex tried.
The voice launched into a very long, detailed report of the nebula emissions that came nightly.
Wex tried every variant he could think of and several that Wade and Lovar suggested. None of them got the right answers.
Wex shook his head. “I don’t think the controls are here.”
“Then where are they?” Hovart planted his hands on his hips.
“They might be in the caves just north of here,” I said, remembering my encounter with the more intelligent gray-eyed man. “They have other equipment there.”
“Why didn’t you say so earlier?” Hovart snapped.
“Because I thought this was the most logical place to find them,” I snarled back.
“You’ve been here before,” Commander Hovart said. “You brought us here as part of a trap. You work for Them, don’t you? That’s why you know so much.”
“If I work for Them, why would I be leading you here and helping you break in? Why would I be helping you escape?”
“Who says you’re helping? Maybe you’re just keeping us busy while They take care of the others.”
I was so angry I saw spots in front of my eyes. I leaned in close to yell. The anger evaporated into nothing in an instant. I saw the same bewildered look in Commander Hovart’s eyes that I felt.
“What happened?” he asked.
“It must be a field like the black boxes,” I said, feeling my way through a guess. “The boxes can affect minds. They used it to drag crews off ships. They tried to use it on me.”
“Why didn’t it work?”
He was still suspicious of me, but then I’d picked locks that I couldn’t have ever seen before, I’d guessed how things worked and been right too often. It was almost as if something had planted the answers in my head. The answer stared me in the face. I hadn’t been in the cave thing like the others, where they’d had the language of the golden men rammed into their minds. It hadn’t worked on me. So they’d taken me somewhere else to a different kind of equipment. Maybe it had put more than language in my head. Whatever it had done, I couldn’t access the information. At least not when I was conscious.
“For a lot of reasons, I think.” Pieces dropped into place to form a picture I didn’t like. “First off, I score a flat zero on any psychic rating scale. So maybe the box didn’t affect me as strongly. And the buckle on the pilot’s safety strap in my ship sticks. I tore the chair apart. They used a different machine to give me their language. Maybe it gave me more than language. I think they used a similar field on us just now.”
“Why?” Hovart crossed his arms over his broad chest.
“Because we’re getting too close to the answers?” I hazarded a guess.
“Because we tripped an alarm.” Lovar had his scanner back out. “The energy readings are changing. Big fluctuations now. I think we need to leave.”
“Which way is out?” Commander Hovart asked. He had a different look to his face, more than just suspicion, as if he thought something else about me and wasn’t certain enough to accuse me to my face yet. He stepped away from me, a deliberate distance.
“Ship diagrams,” Wex ordered the ship. “Show us the nearest exit.”
Schematics rippled over the screen. “Do you wish a guide light?” the voice asked.
“Yes,” we all answered.
A thin dot of yellow light appeared on the floor in front of the door. The doors slid open. The dot exited into the corridor. We stared after it then scrambled at the same time for the door.
The dot moved at a steady walking pace down the corridor. We ran to catch up.
“Are we stupid for trusting this?” Wade muttered.
“You have a better idea?” Hovart asked. He shot a hard look at me, as if I had answers and wasn't sharing.
I shifted my glare to the yellow dot on the floor.
“A very large laser cutter,” Wade said.
"And blast rifles," Wex added.
"You may as well wish for a troop transport ship and full military backup," Lovar said, his nose plastered to the scanner. "I think we've got company coming."
We shut up and followed the yellow dot, hoping it wouldn’t lead us into a trap.
Chapter 27
Night fell. Angry orange and red light from the star streaked the sky. The nebula was on fire, burning green and yellow. The purple force shield flickered on and the colors faded. The night was the same dim purple it was every night in the canyon.
The camp of former prisoners spread along the base of the cliff between both paths that zigzagged up the side. At last count, two hundred and eighty two people had joined the camps. None of them belonged to the small group that had gone to turn off the generators. Dace was still missing.
Clark sat under his tree with Jasyn. He hadn’t let go of her hand since she’d found him that afternoon. She leaned against his shoulder, asleep. He was ready to sleep himself, but somehow he’d found himself in charge. People kept coming to him with tallies and questions, looking for direction. He gave what
answers he could.
The distant sounds of shouting had died down. A faint flickering yellow light danced through the trees where fires still smoldered. The air reeked of smoke.
“Are you the one in charge?”
Clark looked up to see a short man standing over him. A ragged cloth wrapped rakishly around his head as a bandage. Clark frowned, something in the posture and the set of his chin reminded him of Dace.
“They said you were the one in charge,” the man continued. He wore a pale blue shipsuit with the Exploration stars on the front.
“I guess I am, by default.” Clark didn’t want to be the one responsible. He wanted to sleep.
“Then I suggest we stage an attack,” the man said.
“Why?”
“Because we haven’t seen or heard from the team that went in to take out the generators. I think they may have been caught.” He looked worried.
“Do what you want,” Clark said.
The man flicked a look at Clark’s insignia. “I would have thought you at least would care, considering Dace is part of the group. You’re her shipmate, aren’t you? Do I also have to remind you that we can’t leave if the generators aren’t shut off? We need to do something.”
“Then do something.”
“We ought to go,” Jasyn said through a yawn.
“I don’t want to lead it,” Clark said to the short man. “I'm not a strategist or a weapons officer. I'm a pilot.”
The man grinned. He looked a lot like Dace. He stuck out his hand. “I wasn’t expecting you to lead it. Well, maybe I was. The name’s Darus Venn.”
“Trevyn Clark.” Clark took the man’s hand and used it to pull himself up. Jasyn stood with him. “How do you suggest we do this?”
“I get a group of toughs to go with me. We break in and look for the others while you stage a distraction.”
“Again? Isn’t it what we did before?”
“Seemed to work then. Let’s assemble a team.” Darus moved away through the crowds of people gathered at the base of the cliff.
“I hope he doesn’t have more energy than brains,” Jasyn muttered.
Clark squeezed her hand.
Darus came back only a few moments later with a string of people behind him. He paused near Clark. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go get them.”
“Jasyn,” Clark said, intending to ask her to stay where it was relatively safe.
“Don’t, Clark,” she said, shaking her head. “Don’t even ask.”
“Then at least stay where I can see you.”
She smiled and kissed his cheek.
She kept hold of his hand as they walked through the night-dark forest with the others.
The forest was silent except for their footfalls. Everywhere they looked, they saw signs of violence. Thorn fences had been ripped apart and burned. The fields were trampled, the cauldrons tipped and smashed. A stand of trees on a knobby hill burned like a beacon in the distance.
Darus led the group at a brisk walk towards the towering cliffs on the other side of the valley. Clark glanced behind to see that their small group had grown to a huge mob. They moved quietly, purposefully, as if they sensed the importance of the coming confrontation. Clark studied the set of their faces, the determination in their eyes. What if he’d been here for years, decades? How would he feel to finally be given a chance to escape, a chance to be free again? How would he feel to be confronting his former captors? He’d only been here a few days. He knew only a taste of what they felt.
They emerged from the trees into an open area, facing a thick wall of thorns twenty feet high. A bonfire burned in front of it, surrounded by a group of silently staring men in different colored shipsuits. All that could be seen of the golden men was an occasional head showing over the barricade of thorns.
Darus hung back under the trees with a group of about twenty people. He caught Clark’s arm. “Keep them busy. We'll find the others and make sure those generators are down. Don't wait for us, if we aren't there by dawn. Take off and go get help.”
Clark nodded.
Darus' group divided in two and took off along the paths under the trees that paralleled the cliff face.
Clark silently wished him luck. He turned his attention back to the barricade. The mob that followed walked into the light of the bonfire. Clark stood near the front, holding Jasyn’s hand, and wondered what he was supposed to do now.
They stood in a loose group, just watching. Clark’s nose itched. He scratched it. The silence continued. The number of heads showing over the thorn wall increased. Clark shuffled his feet in the sand.
A section of the thorn barrier shifted and pulled back. Five of the men, these with honey colored hair and gray eyes, stepped out with wands held high. Clark took a step back. Someone nudged him. He glanced over his shoulder.
“We’ve got that covered,” a man said. He held a com unit, wired clumsily to one of the wands. “Whatever frequency they use, we can block it.”
“Good,” Clark said. The collars that most of the prisoners wore, including Jasyn, still bothered him. She’d explained them to him that evening. He put his hand to his own throat, glad he wasn’t wearing one.
The golden men strode out from behind the thorns. They waved the wands, their frowns deepening as nothing happened. Jasyn scratched under her collar.
“It makes it itch,” she whispered to Clark.
The men waved the wands a moment longer and then retreated in a huddle, whispering fiercely. The bushes were pulled back into place. The heads all disappeared from the wall of thorns.
Someone threw more wood on the bonfire. The stream that flowed from the side canyon trickled under the thorn barricade, barely murmuring over the stones. Time passed. Clark shifted from foot to foot. He was tempted to find a spot to sleep.
“We ought to burn them all out,” someone muttered, beyond the firelight.
“How dare they keep us as slaves,” someone else added.
The sound of complaining increased. The mutters carried an undercurrent of anger. Another load of wood dropped on the bonfire, and another, and another. The flames leapt up, spitting and crackling. The air seethed with impending violence.
The thorns moved again. Another group ventured out. They set a black box on the ground, then crouched near it. Antenna unfurled from its side. A rock spiraled in from the darkness, thrown in anger and vengeance. It struck the box, sending sparks showering into the night. The men squealed, holding their heads as they backed away.
“They’re like children,” Jasyn murmured in Clark’s ear.
“Then how did they keep us all working as slaves?” Clark kept his voice low.
“They separated us. They caught us unprepared. And used these.” Jasyn tugged her collar.
“We can remove them,” the man with the com unit said. “It hurts a bit. Tucker is doing it, back at the camp.”
“Then—” Jasyn started.
She was interrupted by shouting. Rocks pelted the men gathered near the black box. A rock struck one golden head. The man crumpled to the sand, blood gleaming darkly through his hair. The other aliens looked stunned. None of them made a move to help the fallen man.
“They aren’t the ones doing the thinking,” Jasyn said.
The shouting of the mob almost drowned her out. Years of pent up anger poured out. The golden men stared stupidly at the shouting mob eddying closer. The one on the ground lay still, blood soaking into the sand around his head.
“You can’t let them kill them,” Jasyn said grabbing at Clark’s arm. “There has to be another way. Do something, Clark.”
Her dark eyes pled with him. He looked at the mob gathered at the edge of the raging bonfire. The golden men shuffled uncertainly in front of the thorn barrier. They reached their hands to the ruined box, then pulled them back. They milled across the sandy ground, indecision plain on their faces.
“Stop it!” Clark took three long steps forward to the edge of the thorns and turned to face the mob. The go
lden man on the sand at his feet stared sightlessly at nothing. Clark watched a trickle of blood move over his cheek. His stomach twisted with revulsion.
“They should pay,” someone shouted.
“They’re like children,” Clark answered, quoting Jasyn. “They aren’t the ones responsible.”
“Yes, they are,” the man shouted back. He stepped forward to face Clark, giving the mob a spokesman. “Thirty years I’ve been here, held prisoner by them.”
“Why didn’t you leave thirty years ago?” Clark asked. “Do you really think they could have stopped you if you tried?” He pointed at the milling group of golden men.
“Not them,” the man conceded. “But the others.”
“What others?” Clark asked.
“The dark haired ones. They told the others what to do.”
“What dark haired ones? These are the only ones I’ve ever seen.”
“Those ones aren't too bright,” the man said. “But the others, they’re the ones to watch for.”
“They haven’t been seen for twenty years, Vince,” another man said. He limped forward. “He’s right, you know. All it took was a bit of planning. And a few com units.”
“They should still pay,” Vince grumbled.
"We're better than this. We don't need more violence," the second man said, placing his hand on Vince's shoulder.
The mob stilled, staring behind Clark. He turned to look. An old man stood in the hole in the thorns. His hair was dark though it was heavily streaked with silver. He wore a long white robe. He stared at the mob, his head tilted at an arrogant angle.
“You will return to your stations,” he said.
“Or what?” Vince said.
“Make us,” someone else shouted.
The mob surged forward.
“You will obey,” the man shouted.
“No,” Clark said simply.
“But you must,” the man insisted. He looked ready to cry. “You must make the food. You must grow the plants. You must.”
“No, we won’t,” Clark said. The mob behind him was quiet now, the anger being replaced by a mix of pity and guilt. The robed man’s lack of intelligence was obvious.