"You'd just be talking to the host, Commander," the balding man, who appeared to be the senior technician, said.
"Can we get the control unit online?"
"We can hook it up to an interface."
"Do it."
Grundel pulled a square console with two screens atop it to Sabre's side, gripped his head and plugged a cable into the brow band. The tech typed on the keypad and peered at a screen, whose information was mirrored in Sabre’s mind.
"Here we go. Inputting password. We have access. Status: malfunctioning, of course. Bio-status: one hundred per cent. Huh, that's pretty amazing. All cyber implants are offline, yet the seventh control light is green." He typed in a query. "It's a feedback from the cerebral cortex. Not only has the control unit lost control of its host, the host now has control of it."
The portly man grunted. "That's got to piss it off."
"Big time," Grundel agreed.
"Can it be fixed?"
Grundel typed on the keyboard again. "Probably. What I'd like to know is how it happened. I’ll access the memory circuit for audio and video playback."
Sabre fumed with helpless fury as his conversation with Tassin from two days ago played on a wall screen at his side.
The portly man chuckled after a couple of minutes. "Wow, that little sweetie sure has the hots for him."
"Hmmm, fascinating, but not what we're looking for,” Grundel said. “You can watch it some other time."
Several more scenes from Sabre’s memory were played before they found the one containing the beings of light, which they watched from beginning to end in silence. Then the commander turned to Grundel.
"I've never heard of that type of alien, have you?"
"Nope, that's a new species. And that's solved an age-old mystery; the origin of Archetype. Fascinating stuff." He leant over Sabre and shone a bright light on his chest. "Look at that. Archetype did that too."
"What causes it?"
"Light-refracting skin cells. They protect against heat, but we could never get the gene combination right to produce it. Those aliens did some amazing stuff to him."
"Why would they do that?"
Grundel shrugged. "Who knows? Sounds like they took a shine to him. Females tend to find cybers attractive. That was done to corner the market in rich, lonely old ladies."
"What's that on his wrist?"
Grundel examined the bracelet. "It's high tech, that's for sure. Looks like some sort of..." He scowled. "Bugger! It's an Overlord friendship bracelet." He glanced up at his commander. "It's the Scorpion Lord's."
"Is it active?"
Grundel shook his head. "I don't know."
"Well, find out. And deactivate it."
"I can't. No one can deactivate an Overlord bracelet, or remove it."
"Find a way. Contact HQ."
Grundel hesitated, studying the bracelet again. "I could break it, but if he activated it..."
"He might not have."
"But if he did..."
"Break it and stop the signal. At least then the Scorpion Lord won't be able to find him, or us. HQ will have to decide what to do about it."
Grundel turned to a tray of instruments beside him and picked up a pair of cutters. Clamping them around the bracelet's centre, where the tiny beacon was located, he crushed it with a crisp crunch.
"That should do it," he muttered, replacing the cutters on the tray with a clatter.
"Ask the cyber if he activated it."
Grundel turned to the keyboard and typed in the query, but Sabre ordered the cyber to be silent. "It won't respond. The host must be controlling it."
"We could wake him up and make him to tell us."
"He's awake, and torture won't work on a cyber."
"He's just the host."
"True, but I'd rather not deal with him." He turned to his commander. "The guys on Myon Two are going to be really excited about this. They won't destroy him now, even if he can't be fixed. He'll be cloned, so we can upgrade to fireproof cybers. He'll be put into stasis."
"Let's hope he didn't have time to activate the bracelet, though. See if you can find anything else interesting in his memories."
****
"No!" Tassin cried, staring at the spot where Sabre had vanished. Atrel also gaped at the empty space, and several officers swung around.
"They've taken him!" She turned to Atrel. "We've got to get him back!"
"The enemy ships have broken off their attack," an officer stated. "They're overtaking us."
"They're taking him to Myon Two," Tassin said. "Stop them!"
Atrel frowned at her. "Be quiet, or I'll have you removed. The only reason you're tolerated is because the commander allows it."
She glared at him, biting her tongue to prevent hot words from spilling from it. "Please help him."
Atrel turned back to the screens. "Target the ships, aim for their engines."
"Let me use the communications console," Tassin begged. "I can call the Overlord and ask for his aid."
"Be silent. Those ships are still jamming us."
Tassin stared at the screens, where the two black ships moved past, glowing spots appearing on their hulls as Nemesis' lasers strafed them.
"Keep up with them," Atrel ordered.
"Going to one hundred per cent thrust," an officer said.
The floor vibrated, and the tension on the bridge rose, making Tassin wonder how safe it was for the old Trykon warship to use one hundred per cent thrust. In the screens, a fireball erupted from the second black ship's engines, and the officers shouted in triumph.
"A direct hit on their engines, First Lieutenant!"
Atrel smiled and nodded, then his face fell as the fireball continued to expand into the ship. Flames burst through its hull as it disintegrated, torn apart by a massive explosion. Tassin raised a hand to her mouth in horror.
"Prepare for debris wave," Atrel said, glancing at her. "He might be on the other ship."
She nodded, clinging to that hope. Her brave words to Sabre now rang hollow. She did not want to go on living if he was dead.
Chapter Two
"My Lord! My Lord, please wake up!" Commander Shrain touched the young Overlord's shoulder, giving him a gentle shake.
Fairen cursed and burrowed under the silken covers, shrugging him off. "Leave me alone!"
"My Lord, it's urgent!"
"I don't care. Piss off."
"It's the cyber."
"What about him?"
"He's activated the distress beacon."
Fairen flung off the covers and sat up in his massive, crimson quilted bed. "When?"
"A few minutes ago. I came straight away."
"Locate it." Fairen reached for his trousers.
"We're already doing that, My Lord."
"Prepare for emergency translocation." Fairen swore when he discovered that he was trying to stuff both legs into the same trouser leg. "Why does he always do this when I'm asleep?"
"The ship is fifty seconds from translocation configuration."
"Locate the beacon!"
Shrain, a grey-haired man in his mid-fifties with a bluff countenance and receding hairline, consulted his communications box. "It's stopped."
"Translocate to its last location."
"Yes, My Lord, at once."
Fairen pulled on his shirt and stood up, then bent and found his shoes. "Have you found it yet?"
"Almost."
"Hurry up!"
"Yes, My Lord." Shrain typed faster. "We've narrowed the location to an obscure planet on the rim. It's somewhere in the region of... Omega Five."
"Translocate there at once."
"What about the negotiations between -?"
"Tell them they'd better have come to an agreement before I come back, or I'll wipe them both out."
"Yes, My Lord."
Fairen headed for the door, Shrain trotting in his wake. His private apartment, like the rest of the Scorpion Ship, had a décor of black and pale grey with crimson
trimmings, such as the curtains that draped his four-poster bed and hung against the walls, back-lighted so they gave off a subtle ruddy glow that the floating light globes all but banished when they were at their brightest. Since he had been in the midst of a sleep cycle when Shrain had woken him, they had been dim at first, but now that he was awake, the ship’s AI raised the lighting to a normal daytime level. As he stepped through the portal, the freezing solidity of translocation gripped him. A blinding flash seared his eyes, and then he staggered free of the stasis and reeled down the grey-carpeted corridor, Shrain stumbling after him. In the vast black-walled control room, Fairen frowned at the peaceful blue and white planet in the four twenty-metre ovoid screens.
"No ships. Find their ion trails and follow them."
"Yes, My Lord." Shrain tapped on his com-link. "Three ships, one was the Trykon warship... the other two are unidentified."
"Well identify them!"
"Yes, My Lord, working on it. We're following the trails. They're heading for a corridor."
"Of course they are."
The stars moved across the screens as the Scorpion Ship turned to follow the trails, and Fairen seethed with impatience. Its massive size made his ship slower in normal flight, especially when manoeuvring, but without a destination he could not translocate, and the generators need time to recharge.
****
A technical officer looked up at Atrel. "We're going to run out of fuel in two hours, burning it at this rate, First Lieutenant."
"How far to the corridor?"
"Twenty-seven minutes."
"That gives us an hour and a half of fuel for deceleration and manoeuvring. It should be enough."
Another officer looked around. "They're not heading for this corridor. They're turning away."
"What's their heading?"
"They're still turning." The officer studied his instruments for a couple of minutes. "They're on course for a distant corridor, 675-842. It's three hours away."
Atrel cursed, bringing his fist down on the console beside him with a bang. "We can't follow them. We have to find fuel. Enter the corridor ahead. We know where they're going."
"That will give them time to torture, or kill him," Tassin said.
Atrel turned to frown at her. "If they wanted to kill him, they would have done so already. As for torture, a warrior can withstand much pain, non-com. There's nothing we can do without fuel."
"Then let me use your communications device. I'll call Overlord Fairen and ask for his help."
"They're still jamming us."
Tassin wanted to shout at him to follow them, to fight, do something, but she knew it was futile. He was right. Swinging away, she left the bridge.
****
"My Lord, we've detected debris ahead,” Shrain said. “One ship, and not a very large one. It's not the Trykon vessel."
"Scan it for cyber remains."
"Detecting traces of barrinium, enough for two or three cybers."
"So they had cybers aboard, that doesn't mean he was one of them."
"No, My Lord." Shrain consulted his com-link. "The trails split up ahead. One enters the corridor close to us, the other continues on to a farther corridor."
Fairen swung around. "Then they must have defeated the second ship, and it fled. Follow the Trykon ship."
"Yes, My Lord. Entering corridor momentarily."
The young Overlord mounted the shallow dais and sat on his high-backed onyx throne, pondering the situation. The remains of two cybers in the debris could mean that the ships that had attacked Sabre were Myon Two enforcers, but was not conclusive. Many ships carried cybers, although two was unusual. If they were enforcers, Myon Two had disobeyed him, and the fact that they had found Omega Five seemed to indicate that they had had help, possibly from Overlord Ramadaus, which did not please Fairen.
****
Commander Barrin entered the examination room, which had been especially prepared and equipped in case they captured the rogue cyber. The walls were reinforced duronium, and movement sensors constantly monitored the occupants. Although the loss of his escort soured his triumph somewhat, it was still a great achievement. Seventeen enforcer ships had followed rumours and clues in search of the rogue cyber since Overlord Ravian had taken him, and he had thought the boring vigil at Omega Five would be a waste of time. The mission was top secret, since two Overlords had forbidden Myon Two to hunt the cyber. He wondered why Myon Two thought it was so important to capture the rogue, even going against the Overlords to do it.
Walking over to the table, he gazed down at the rogue. The senior technician, Grundel, looked up, cocking one side of his unibrow. "Can I help you, Commander?"
"How long before the paralysing agent wears off?"
"He'll metabolise it in five hours, since he's not in stasis, but we'll give him more."
"I want to talk to him."
"It won't do you any good, sir, he's just the host."
Barrin nodded. "A host who managed to free himself from his control unit and live like a human for many months. I think we could learn from him."
"I disagree. The host brain was not designed for independent thought."
"Yet, from watching his memory recordings, we've all seen that he's fully capable of it."
"Even so, what do you hope to learn from him?" Grundel asked.
"How he got free, for one thing."
"We know that. The control unit was damaged in a high velocity impact."
"The first time,” Barrin agreed. “What about the second time?"
"Under the direction of his owner, he kidnapped a Myon Two director and forced him to remove the software patch that reinstated the cyber's control."
"How did his owner know to do that?"
Grundel shrugged. "Not a hard thing to work out. The only way to hack a cyber is to get a technician who has the codes."
"I still want to talk to him."
"Sir, releasing him from the paralysis would be extremely dangerous, even with restraints. I won't authorise it."
"You can't keep him paralysed for three months, and that's how long it's going to take us to reach Myon Two," Barrin said.
"I plan to put him into cold sleep."
"How will you do that without the cyber to control his metabolism?"
Grundel frowned. "I'm working on that."
"And if you can't?"
"Then we'll have to let the paralysing agent wear off."
Barrin nodded. "I can wait. I don't think you're going to be able to fix him on your own."
Grundel turned back to his equipment, scrutinising the spiky lines on a screen.
Barrin leant closer. "What are you doing now?"
"Studying his brain waves."
"Looks pretty active."
"Yeah, he's wide awake, and listening to us. This is so abnormal, it's freaky. His brain waves should be almost non-existent, less than a sleeping person's."
"Are these like a normal person's?"
"Yeah."
The commander straightened. "Let me know when you plan to release him."
"I don't."
****
"We've entered the corridor, My Lord," Shrain informed Fairen. "Do you wish to hail the Trykon ship?"
Fairen turned from his perusal of the light-filled screens. "Yes. Tell them to take their solar wings offline so we can capture them, then bring them to a docking port. Tell them I wish to speak to Sabre."
Shrain spoke into his com-link and waited for the reply, then looked up at Fairen. "They say Commander Sabre is not on board, My Lord. He was captured by two Myon Two enforcer ships, one of which the Trykons destroyed. They don't know if he was aboard it."
"Well that was bloody clever of them,” Fairen muttered. “When they're docked, have Tassin Alrade and the technician Tarl brought aboard, and then release the Trykons."
"Yes, My Lord." Shrain spoke into the com-link again.
Fairen gazed out of the screens, frowning. The only way the enforcers could have captured
Sabre without defeating and boarding the Trykon warship was if they had transferred him, and that technology belonged exclusively to the Overlords. If the enforcers had it, an Overlord had given it to them, and he knew of only one Overlord who would do that. The one who wanted Sabre dead at any price, it seemed. He pondered the ramifications of Ramadaus helping the enforcers now, since he had discovered the folly of trying to kill Sabre himself. Giving away Overlord technology was also forbidden and Ramadaus knew it. Fairen would have to forbid the enforcers to ever use it again, but so far Myon Two had proven rebellious. If they continued to use it, there would be a vote amongst all the Overlords to lay down a unanimous decree, which, if broken, would result in the destruction of Myon Two. They would not dare to disobey. At least then they would not be able to use it to snatch Sabre again.
The Scorpion Ship sailed the photon corridor on mammoth solar wings, its size such that it spanned the entire corridor. Fairen hardly ever used photon travel, since he could translocate, and a ship this size, home to over one hundred and fifty-five thousand people, caused some spacial distortions as it outstripped light speed several hundred times over. In fact, the Scorpion Ship was not really designed as a light ship, since it was too large, and it had solar wings primarily as a backup system, in case his translocation generators and the tunnel drive failed. In order to capture a ship in a photon corridor, however, he had to enter it and match its speed. The solar wings, vast webs of negatively charged electromagnetic power confined in a stasis field, propelled the ship by capturing the speeding photons and reversing them, which provided basically unlimited forward thrust, since the faster the ship went, the more the streaming photons were overtaken and the inverted particles moved backwards quicker.
****
Tassin stared at the worn metal floor in Tarl’s cabin and blinked back the tears that stung her eyes, determined not to cry. She sat on a bunk, which was a little more comfortable than the cold metal chairs. The cabin’s dull greyness and cramped confines were depressing, but a relief after the tension of the bridge and the Trykons’ ill-concealed scorn and hostility. Without Sabre’s protection, only his former status with the warriors kept them safe, and she wondered how long that would last. If he had died on the enforcer ship, she did not give much for their continued freedom or good health. The possibility that he was gone did not bear thinking about, however, and she refused to believe it. Tarl sat on the bunk opposite, looking stunned and forlorn. She raised her head and glanced at the door.
The Cyber Chronicles 07: Sabre Page 2