by Trevor Scott
“Though,” Astrid continued, “If Ansaran men knew what pleased a woman, maybe there wouldn’t be such a shortage of females among my kind.”
Astrid had a sultry way of speaking that made almost anything she said sound sexual in nature. She had a hungry look come over her as she looked him up and down. Even with much of her face obscured by her cloth disguise, she was sensual, erotic even. Ju-Long felt hot despite the utter lack of sunlight that made its way through the sand. Astrid’s body was mostly covered in her voluminous robes, but her blue and green eyes suggested everything he needed or could ever want to know. If Nix didn’t hurry up, he and Astrid might have to take care of another item on their agenda.
Astrid pushed off from the wall and pointed down the lonely stretch of road behind Ju-Long. A single hover bike rode against the gusting wind, being blown hither and thither by the maelstrom. Ju-Long smiled and began pulling weapons from the holsters on his bike. He slid a Dinari energy weapon into the crescent-shaped holster on his thigh and slung the strap of the stolen Ansaran laser rifle around his neck and shoulder.
“Show time,” Ju-Long said.
Astrid took the remaining two Ansaran laser pistols and slipped them inside her cloak to hanging straps on each of her sides.
The hover bike stopped alongside Ju-Long’s and Nix dismounted, cloaked in a traditional Dinari robe with the hood up over his head and a piece of thick cloth drawn up to his nose. He pulled the cloth down as he approached Ju-Long and Astrid so that the beige fabric dangled loosely around his neck.
“You’re late,” Ju-Long jibed.
Nix said loudly to be heard over the wind, “Couldn’t be avoided. Are you ready?”
“Ready for what?” Astrid asked over the howling wind. “Do you actually expect to assault a spire and live?”
“There will never be a better time than now. During the storm, the Ansaran Guard will be occupied with the shutdown of the city. It should be a ghost town.”
“What’s the endgame here?”
Ju-Long could see that Nix was growing tired of explaining himself. Still, Astrid’s questions weren’t out of line.
“What’s special about this spire?” Ju-Long added, pointing off into the distance.
With the growing wind, they had to huddle closer together to hear one another.
Nix replied, “This colony is protected by a web of energy. You’ve seen it before. The Dinari can’t stand the purple light the spires project at night. It’s one of the most effective ways to keep the Dinari at bay. Though this spire looks like the others, it’s a generator of sorts. The rest only act as repeaters, magnifying the energy.”
Nix pointed to a roughly hewn bag attached to the back of his bike. “We’re going to blow it up.”
“Won’t the city be defenseless?” Ju-Long asked.
“When the fighting begins, the energy web is the first thing the Ansarans will use. While the Dinari are forced indoors, the Ansarans could go door to door rooting out the agitators. Either we destroy this spire or the Dinari uprising will be over before it begins.”
21
Saturn tapped her toe against the dark stone floor, the sound echoing throughout the rocky corridor outside the great hall. It had been nearly thirty minutes and she was beginning to grow impatient. Sestra had paced the same stretch of hallway since they’d moved the hover bike, mumbling to herself in words Saturn’s translation chip couldn’t recognize. Based on her limited knowledge of the intonation of the Dinari language, it sounded like a strange dialect that she’d never come across before. After several minutes, her translator started picking out individual words as it learned the new language. Saturn heard her say ‘running out.’
“What’s running out?” Saturn asked.
Sestra’s eyes enlarged. She stared back at Saturn in shock, her exceptionally bulbous eyes glowing under the light from the many orbs overhead. Deep lines appeared on her face that conveyed the same worry that was in her eyes.
“You speak Vasal?” Sestra asked, returning to the Dinari common language.
Saturn shrugged. “My translator.”
Sestra approached Saturn cautiously and grabbed her chin with a firm hand, forcing her head left and right and examining Saturn’s ears.
“Have you lost it? What’s wrong with you?”
Saturn broke free of Sestra’s grip and felt the small lump at the back of her neck. Every time she felt her translator chip, she remembered the shooting pain which ran down to her toes when the Ansarans had forcefully inserted it at the base of her skull. The chip was the size of a grain of rice and fused to one of her nerves. Sestra continued to stare her down with incredulity. She must have known the chip was in her neck, so why was she acting so strangely?
Sestra’s eyelids flicked and she backed away, returning to her restless pacing, her bare feet sending high-pitched clicks and clacks every time her claws scraped against the stone.
“Apologies,” Sestra mumbled almost to herself, “It’s been ages since another has spoken my native tongue.”
“You’re not from Surya?”
“I was born on Vasalis,” Sestra said as she meandered to the far side of the cavern, dragging a finger along the stone wall and creating a thin white line. “A faraway moon. One of the first to be colonized, millennia before the war.”
“How did you end up here?”
The Dinari’s eyes shifted as she considered the question. It seemed like an easy question to Saturn, but then again, her journey to the Ansara System wasn’t exactly a simple one.
“It is said that Vasalis was once a beautiful place. A moon of the Mother World, it was a sanctuary for diplomats and the wealthy. I never knew that place. When I was born it had already been a wasteland for centuries.”
“What happened to it?”
“Vasalis was the only planetary body in this system that was never terraformed by the three races of Ansara. It was already a perfect cradle for life, only life as we knew it had not yet come to exist there. Its natural resources were bountiful. That is, until The Long War. The War of a Thousand Years required more resources than Ansara and the other colonies could provide. The Ansarans plundered Vasalis for every bit of metal and precious mineral they could get their claws on. The landscape became a series of holes and caverns that burrowed deeper than the eye could see. The entire moon was irreparably scarred.”
“What happened to the people?”
“The Ansarans left the world to die, along with the Dinari inhabitants. Thousands of Dinari fell ill for lack of food and water, but the hardiest found a way to live. A network of caves was created beneath the pockmarked land from countless excavations. Within, life remained. In a sense, at least.”
Sestra’s hand pressed gently against the bone-dry wall of the tunnel, her gaze traveling up to the orbs hovering near the ceiling.
“Water rose up from the depths of the moon forming pools. Sometimes it would run down walls such as this one. A rare sight, indeed. There were about fifty Dinari left on Vasalis when I came of age. The Ansarans likely thought us all long dead. Maybe it was fate that brought a Dinari ship from the Mother World. It was a scavenger ship, searching for scrap and resources left over from the war, or anything that could be easily extracted and sold. Instead, they found us.”
“Lucky.”
Sestra’s face contorted into a look of disgust.
“Lucky?” she spat. “They imprisoned us and sold us as slaves to the highest bidder. Their own kind, no less.”
“Slaves?” Saturn asked, stunned.
Sestra’s head ticked to her left toward the Great Hall. Her raspy voice shook with a rage from deep within. “A story for another time, perhaps.”
Saturn followed Sestra’s eyes down the hallway to the approaching Dinari Elder. He carried a glowing orb out in front of him and kept his eyes focused on the ground below. His bare feet shuffled along slowly until he was within ten feet of them. Saturn pushed off from the wall and regarded the aged Dinari expectantly.
&nb
sp; “If you’ll follow me,” the Dinari muttered before turning around and starting his long shamble back to the Great Hall.
Saturn and Sestra’s eyes met and they nodded to one another. Her Dinari counterpart’s reasoning for the way she’d acted before was beginning to make more sense to Saturn. Sestra had faced true hardship at the hands of both the Ansarans and the Dinari. It would make sense that Sestra would be so outspoken against oppression in any form, even if that meant giving Zega more power as the lesser of the available evils.
The Dinari Elder waddled onto a small stone platform, which lit up with a flash of purple light. The stone square lifted off the ground and floated silently around the back of the councilmembers’ table. Saturn eyed the many steps and found herself wishing she could avoid another lengthy climb.
“This is one reason I’ve avoided working in the spires,” Sestra said, much calmer than before.
Saturn took the first few steps with purpose.
“At least the spires had the decency to lend visitors a lift. The Council can’t do the same?”
“Careful, the stingy Council would probably consider it for a favor. Your wish might have a hefty price.”
Sestra followed her up the steps, taking each stone stair one at a time, slowly but resolutely. At the top of the stairs, Saturn could see some of the faces of the elders in the distance, watching their struggle with blank looks across their leathery forms. Hundreds of stairs still stood between them and the platform at the top and each step began to feel more asinine than the last. Saturn began to sense a burn in her quads that wasn’t present on her initial ascent.
“In the future let’s agree to pawn this job off on the boys.”
Sestra snickered. “Ju-Long would probably look at this as a warmup. He might even do sets.”
“Ju-Long is also dating an Ansaran. What’s that say about his judgment?”
Saturn caught Sestra smiling to herself. The perpetually serious Dinari was finally starting to crack and show her personality. Despite Sestra’s strange shift in behavior since they’d first met, she was starting to see some of the old Sestra. The one who was loyal and kind despite her rough exterior.
Near the top of the stairs, Saturn’s legs wobbled up the last steps until she was standing before the Council of Elders. Sestra made it up the final couple of steps and stood panting at her side. Saturn’s heart was thumping but she managed to minimize her heaving for the sake of saving face. The last thing she wanted was to appear weak to the council.
The Council’s spokesman stood gingerly and berated them, “For being in such a hurry before, you’ve managed to take your time in returning. Our time is precious too.”
Saturn shot forward. “You pompous piece of—”
Sestra grabbed her arm and forcibly held her back. She whispered, “Don’t waste your time on such filth.”
Before Saturn could protest further, the Council’s spokesman continued, “The Council has reached a unanimous decision. There are hard times ahead and soon we must all do things we aren’t proud of to survive. The Council does not take your warnings lightly.”
Saturn’s heart pumped and she felt blood rushing to her extremities. This was it. They were going to give Zega the keys to the colony.
“Though the return of the phage is worrying, we find that there is no evidence of a Dinari uprising. These scuffles with the Ansaran Guard are merely troubled youths lashing out. We will not give them a voice. This Council will not elect a Supreme Consul. As twenty-four we reign.”
The rest of the council echoed the Spokesman’s statement.
Saturn couldn’t believe it. After Sestra’s vigorous plea the Council still voted against Zega. A part of her couldn’t wait to give him the news, but the rest of her felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. Ultimately, this meant trouble for the Dinari.
Sestra released Saturn’s arm. She seemed calm, collected. The Dinari stepped in front of Saturn and addressed the Council.
“Today you have bared your naivety for all to see. You have exposed your ignorance and condemned your own people to suffer. You will not know health, nor purity, nor peace. You will not lead the Dinari. You’re incapable of doing so. You will not speak for us. Your voices are feeble and weak. If you will not stand for your people, then someone must.”
The members of the Council stared back, slack-jawed and horrified. Saturn couldn’t believe her ears. Sestra turned and brushed heatedly past Saturn. Her raspy voice called out, “Come on Saturn, if we want justice, we’ll have to make our own.”
22
Atop the tallest spire in the Colony, Toras, Caretaker of Akaru Colony, surveyed the approaching torrent. The wall of sand had finally breached the city limits. His Ansaran Guard was scrambling to protect the more sensitive areas of the colony. The spires would hold their own as they always had. There were, however, dozens of Ansaran assets that would not fare so well if left unattended. They might survive the sand, but not the looters. For Toras, there was no worse part to being Caretaker. With so much that could go wrong, these were the times that tested his resolve.
He whipped his ragged, sandy cape around as he turned away from the window. The patchy piece of cloth had served as a reminder of where he’d come from, but lately it seemed no more than a nuisance. Toras removed the armor at his shoulders as he made his way to his oversized stone desk, clinking them down on the solid surface and plopping down onto his stone chair. He loosened the leather buckle at his side and pulled off his tan chest plate, letting it fall to the marble floor beside him. He would be holed up in the spire for hours so he might as well get comfortable. Toras let out a huff of exasperation.
Where had he gone wrong? He’d kept his promise to that rake Liam Kidd. The Human’s ward was protected as promised, but was Liam holding up his end? His assurances of quelling the rising anger amongst the Dinari may have been more talk than action. Any reduction in animosity was short-lived. Now there were reports that he’d been running around with Vidu, his own head of security. Toras had never forgotten that it was the Ansaran High Council’s idea to install Vidu in his regime, probably to spy on him. But what choice did he have? Refusing the High Council’s orders would be suicide.
Toras heard a door creaking and turned to see one of his household guards approaching, the three diagonal lines of House Zumora emblazoned on the chest plate over his heart. His oblong helmet was cradled in his arm, a glinting object held tightly in his other hand. The guard’s gaunt face was not lean from lack of nutrition, but rather from the genetics that pervaded all within the Zumora clan. His high cheekbones cast deep shadows below them such that in the dimming light of the Caretaker’s chamber, his face appeared even grimmer.
The Ansaran’s armor was modeled after Toras’ own. Sharp edges and deep grooves separated each plate, allowing maximum freedom of movement without degrading the menacing appeal of the serrated bits. Unfortunately, the sand on Surya found its way more easily into their armor than with the standard issue Ansaran armor. Toras could smell the sediment and salt coming off the man’s garb. The sandstorms always brought a distinctive sulfuric smell along with them.
“What is it, Ryle?” Toras asked, not unkindly.
“Sorry to disturb you, Caretaker. The High Council has requested your presence.”
Not now, Toras thought. They’d been badgering him for weeks about the unrest on the colony. However, his placement as Caretaker had been a temporary one until a more suitable replacement for Ragnar could be found. Someone from House Ansara, to be sure.
“Are they waiting?”
“Yes, Cousin.”
Ryle frowned. He was never as shrewd as Toras when they were young. From early on it was clear the order of prestige that would be bestowed upon them both. Unlike the other clans, House Zumora was more concerned with performance than station. In any other House, Ryle might have been destined to lead the family because of the extra year he had on Toras. But Ryle was never much of a fighter. He wore the armor and he played the part, bu
t he was soft inside. Despite that, Ryle was a good man. Loyal and trustworthy. Toras always found himself growing calm when his cousin was around.
“Best not keep them waiting.”
Ryle placed the shiny object in a slot at the end of the long stone desk. It was absorbed into the surface and lit up with purple light, which traveled down through a channel along the floor into a large circle several feet away, stopping every so often to light up individual circles a few feet each in diameter. The light continued to pulse along its trail until twelve circles were lit in all.
Toras stood up from his chair and ambled around his desk to the center of the twelve circles, taking his time so he could rehearse what he was about to tell them. The unrest was hardly his fault, but he had everything under control. No matter what the Dinari thought, their trivial rebellion was a dream. Toras still had cards to play.
He stood at the center of the ring of purple light and signaled Ryle. His cousin placed a finger on the center of the disc and light projected up from the channels of light, forming bright cylinders of energy. Full body holograms of all twelve members of the Ansaran High Council surrounded him. Toras hardened himself to face the inevitable.
23
“Pass me that charge.”
Nix pointed to the bag in Astrid’s hands. She handed him the small rectangular explosive and the Dinari placed it at the base of a support pillar. They’d been ascending the servant’s staircase of the Sector Eight spire for nearly twenty minutes and were beginning to run out of charges. So far, the tower had been deserted. Astrid had never been in a spire before, but she’d imagined them to be bustling with Ansarans and Dinari alike. Instead, it was abandoned.
“Where is everyone?” Astrid asked.