Warlord 2: The Nobility

by CJ Williams

  “Go ahead,” she said. “I’ll just wait.”

  He rolled his eyes and grunted again. “Come on.”

  She followed him to the table and waited until he sat before sitting down herself. “Sorry,” she mumbled.

  “Not your fault. I’m Pang Guan.”

  “Carrie Faulkner.”

  They ate silently. His meal was gone in about ten seconds; she ate more slowly. The food was good, much better than the prison.

  Pang Guan watched her silently and she snuck quick glances between bites. He was a big man, barrel chested with thick arms and huge hands, the sort of man she imagined as a dock worker. And he was afraid of her; she could sense it easily. But his curiosity got the better of him.

  “So why are you wearing an Angqua collar?” he asked.

  “I honestly don’t know.” Carrie sighed. “I tried to confess but I keep getting it wrong and they won’t tell me what to say.”

  “Sorry,” he muttered.

  “That’s okay. I’m grateful for your kindness.”

  He mumbled about being somewhere else and left the hall. Carrie finished her meal and took both of their trays with the dirty dishes to a waste receptacle.

  Afterwards, she returned straight to her room. Joh-eun was gone, so she went into her bedroom. She considered locking the door but decided against it. He didn’t seem interested and she didn’t want to offend him. The shower in the bathroom was heaven. She ran the water on hot for an hour trying to get the prison smell off of her body. She washed her gray dress and hung it up to dry. There were no other clothes in the room.

  * * * *

  The following morning there was still no sign of Joh-eun. She waited, uncertain of what to do. He came in at noon looking exhausted, and he was surprised to see her.

  “If I’m not here in the morning,” he said absently, “you can go out for your meals. You don’t need to wait around.”

  “Thank you,” she said and scampered from the apartment, hurrying to the mess hall, but it had closed before she arrived. She wandered away and tried to ignore the rumblings in her stomach.

  With nothing to do, she explored the ship, carefully staying below the forbidden tenth level. On level twenty-three she came across an arboretum. She followed the paths, enjoying the flowers and shrubs. At the far end, she was astonished to discover several young men playing basketball. It wasn’t regulation NBA, just a bunch of guys trying to toss an inflated ball through a rim bolted high on a non-descript bulkhead. Two teams were taking turns trying to block each other from shooting the ball through the hoop; close enough for her to consider it basketball in this corner of the galaxy.

  They were loud and clumsy but having a great time. An errant shot rebounded off the rim and the ball bounced almost into her arms. She dribbled twice and took a shot…nothing but net.

  “Three points,” she shouted with a grin, pumping her fist.

  The men stared at her, open mouthed.

  “Mizzou Tigers,” she said in explanation. “Junior Varsity.”

  It didn’t register on their astonished faces.

  “Never mind,” she mumbled and turned to walk away.

  Her attempted departure galvanized them into action. With a loud hurrah, they dragged her onto the court. In short order, she became a team member and played until she was exhausted. Their stamina far exceeded her own so after an hour she begged off.

  Tired and sweaty, she went back to her room for another shower and again washed her only dress. She slipped it over her head still wet and hoped it would dry before the dinner bell. Joh-eun was not present, so she went out quietly.

  At six bells, she returned to the mess hall. The day’s activities had left her in a good mood. Quite different from the day before when she was afraid of her own shadow. She pointed to the spicy dish that Pang Guan had warned her of yesterday.

  When she emerged from the serving line, a man at one of the tables waved his arms. It was one of her erstwhile teammates. His youthful enthusiasm was welcome and she joined him willingly. He either didn’t know what her collar signified or didn’t care. Other teammates showed up and joined in, inspiring a lively conversation about basketball and other topics.

  The spicy food was hot but not inedible and she said so. Her comment started a lively discussion about the benefits and drawbacks of ship’s food. Her comrades shared bite-sized portions in exchange for some of hers. She enjoyed the meal immensely and was sorry to leave when she heard eight bells. On the way out of the mess hall, she saw Pang Guan and gave him a big grin with a wave of greeting.

  Her routine became set. Each day she roamed through the ship, making friends and enjoying life. She met Joh-eun’s girlfriend, Chaerleon, who turned out to be quite a sweet person. Chaerleon supplied Carrie with two other outfits so she finally had a change of clothes.

  At the end of the third week, a ship-wide announcement informed her they were entering the Bonbu system. It was just after nine bells and Carrie was standing in Joh-eun’s apartment. She was staring out of the window when the ship slowly flew past a planetoid that had been converted into a station similar to the Isaac Newton Gateway orbiting Earth.

  What was disturbing, however, were the warships that were docking at the station. Their thick, rounded hulls were an obvious copy of Alliance Ambrosia-class warships. They were almost exact duplicates of the early models; they even included the shoulder mounted cannons and notched front end for crew quarters. The implications removed all previous speculation from her mind. King Kkoli was definitely working with the Bakkui. Otherwise, he could not have that design.

  Before she could consider it further, the passenger transport glided by a massive graveyard of assorted spacecraft. It was a stunning sight; the derelict hulks were haloed by bright sunlight, and floated in a tangled clump, relics of forgotten battles.

  “What is that?” she uncharacteristically asked Joh-eun.

  He followed her gaze. “Defeated enemies of King Kkoli,” he said. “Or do you mean that big one?”

  “It’s huge,” Carrie said, amazed at the mammoth vessel.

  “I agree. But it doesn’t matter how big they are. All of them fall before the might of our great king.”

  “I can believe that,” Carrie whispered. She traced the lines of the mile-long ship through the ruined hulks. It was big and ungainly but at the same time had a certain elegance of line. Near the tip of the old fuselage its name was painted in an alien script. The symbols were each at least thirty feet tall. But from Carrie’s close vantage point at the window, she didn’t need her implant to translate the writing. It was already in English.

  The name was Lulubelle.

  Chapter 12 – Bonbu Two

  Seeing Lulubelle floating amongst the other derelicts made it absolutely clear. This was the world Carrie had been searching for. The virus that Sadie and Carrie had allowed to infect the giant ship brought it here. The question now was exactly who was calling the shots in the relationship between the Second Family and the Bakkui? But then again, what could she do with the information?

  Joh-eun drew her attention when he dug into his satchel and held up the familiar chain.

  “We can do this the easy way, or we can do it hard,” he said.

  It was nice while it lasted, Carrie thought. She gathered her hair into a topknot and presented her back to the man. She tried to hold still while he attached the chain to her collar.

  “I’ll be handing you off to the local prosecutors as soon as we dock,” he explained, fastening the other end to the grab bar by the window.

  “May I ask one question?”

  “Go ahead,” he replied. His voice had gone cold. In the space of a few seconds, he had once again become a ruthless member of the Angqua.

  “When they ask me to confess, what should I say? I honestly don’t know what they want.”

  “It doesn’t matter what you say,” he admitted. “The goal is to weaken your mind for the administrator. That interrogation will come later.”

&nb
sp; “How much later?” Carrie persisted.

  “When your mind is broken.”

  He wouldn’t answer any further questions and Carrie subsided, not wishing to provoke him.

  Their ship entered the atmosphere above the daylight side of the planet. It was a fairly typical world for those with human habitation. She counted three vast continents set in relatively narrow oceans. By the time they reached their intended destination the ship had crossed over the solar terminator to the nighttime side and then back again to daylight.

  When they touched down, the spaceport was brilliantly illuminated by the midday sun. Next to their pad was a colossal building, a passenger terminal on a large-scale. Around the edges of the spaceport other buildings reminded Carrie of the elegant spires she’d seen on the moon, but these were larger by far. She wondered how long it had been since the Second Family had started rebuilding after the Bakkui’s initial destruction of the planet’s civilization.

  Before they landed, Joh-eun snapped her chain to his wrist and set out for the lower levels, as though he wanted to rid himself of her presence as soon as possible.

  A crowd was already gathering in the debarkation area. Like before, Joh-eun paid no attention to those around him, and he strode to the front of the line. And also like before, people shrank away from his presence.

  Based on their obvious fear, Carrie knew that with Joh-eun, she had experienced the least harmful aspect of the Angqua. He, at least, had not been cruel for the sake of cruelty. She wondered how bad it would become during the coming days.

  A subtle change in gravity signaled the ship had set down. A buzz of anticipation ran through the crowd. Carrie examined her shipmates. There were few women. Almost all the passengers were uniformed men. She wondered if her basketball mates were stationed on Bonbu permanently or just passing through.

  A warning horn sounded and the gates at the edge of the debarkation area began to rise. Joh-eun moved forward briskly and Carrie hurried to stay by his side.

  They exited the ship into a cavernous terminal concourse. Signs pointed in a dozen directions. Joh-eun didn’t follow any of them. Instead, he made a sharp right and walked through a nondescript exit. Stairs led down to another door which opened to the outside. Two men waited beside a black vehicle. Joh-eun unclasped the chain from his wrist and handed it to one of the men. Without a word or backward glance, he disappeared back inside the terminal.

  Her new keeper fastened the chain to his own arm. He shoved her roughly into the backseat and followed immediately behind. Another man got in on the other side and sandwiched Carrie between the two.

  “Administrator’s lockup,” the first man said and the car zoomed out of the terminal area.

  The men sat silently and Carrie wasn’t inclined to engage them in conversation. A fifteen-minute drive ended in an underground parking garage. They were at the lockup building.

  More men waited by a heavily guarded entrance. Carrie was handed off to new keepers and marched into the facility. The destination was not a prison cell. Her escorts opened the doors of a courtroom, much like the ones she’d been in on Jontu Four.

  Inside, a panel of three judges were seated and ready. They were casting fearful glances at a clock on the wall. They looked impatient as if they’d been suffering through an excessive delay.

  Carrie was caught off guard. She had assumed she’d be put in a cell or holding block, but they weren’t wasting any time. Their hurried demeanor made it clear they had a deadline.

  The senior judge waved impatiently at her escorts to bring her in and she was summarily chained to the witness stand. In a way, it was a relief that there were no pole men jerking her by the neck. Before she could collect her thoughts, the judge banged his gavel and leaned forward eagerly.

  “Confess, quickly!” he demanded.

  The prosecutor jumped to his feet, declaring an objection that the judge had usurped the prosecutor’s prerogative to question the witness. Carrie looked around, but there was no one whom she would have labeled as a defense attorney.

  It didn’t matter. One of the other magistrates leaned across the bench and smashed a button in front of the senior judge. It sent a thousand volts through Carrie’s collar into her body.

  The senior judge batted away his colleague’s hands and nervously adjusted the voltage. It had been set at maximum.

  His remonstrations against his junior stopped short when a uniformed guard ran over to Carrie. She had collapsed and was dangling from the elevated witness stand by her neck collar, slowly strangling to death.

  The guard called for a medical technician while the prosecutor complained bitterly about the judge’s interference. “Your Honor, the question periods take time to get accurate information.”

  “We don’t have time, you idiot!” the judge bellowed. “The administrator’s people are on the way here. Will you explain to them why the prisoner has not provided the information they seek?”

  The medical tech arrived and after one look at Carrie shouted into his radio for a resuscitation unit. He ordered the guard to remove the collar instantly or be left to deal with a dead witness.

  Complaining desperately, the guard applied a special key to the back of Carrie’s collar. Other guards ran up and drew hand weapons, leveling them at the medical tech, the guard and Carrie.

  The collar fell to the floor revealing a ring of terrible burns and blisters around Carrie’s neck. The medic grunted and gave her several injections and then pulled out an intubation kit to try to get air into her lungs. He ordered the guard to begin CPR while he tilted Carrie’s neck backwards.

  The resuscitation team arrived and shouldered the guard aside. One of them continued with chest compressions while the other pulled Carrie’s gray dress apart and attached defibrillation pads to her upper and lower chest. Another tech connected oxygen to the intubation tube.

  “Clear!”

  They leaned away and Carrie’s body jerked convulsively when the defibrillator triggered. While the medics attempted to save her life, the prosecutor set upon the judges in a vehement disagreement that escalated into an exchange of blows.

  The courtroom doors burst open and a tall hulking man walked in wearing the uniform of an Angqua Inquisitor. His bellow for silence smothered all other disagreements. The robed barristers and rumpled justices alike cowered before his anger. Only the medics continued what they were doing.

  “Clear!”

  Carrie’s body jerked once more and this time the welcome beeping of a cardiac rhythm filled the silent courtroom.

  The giant walked over and looked down on Carrie’s unconscious body. “I am Inquisitor Bokeol. Is this the prisoner?” he asked in a gravelly voice.

  Everyone in the room nodded.

  “Continue,” he told the medical team.

  *.*.*.*

  Carrie woke slowly to the sound of men arguing. She ignored the harsh buzzing of their voices and concentrated on her aches and pains. Her neck felt like it was covered with poison ivy. She touched the skin lightly and felt puffy blisters. How had that happened?

  A man was looking down at her. He had a doctor-like appearance. She opened her mouth but nothing came out.

  “Can you hear me?”

  Carrie nodded.

  “Your vocal cords were damaged,” the doctor said. “We can repair them in time, but the administrator wishes to question you at this time. I will give you a sedative to ease the pain. Do you understand?”

  Carrie nodded and then stopped as her mind focused. She was on Bonbu Two, home of King Kkoli. She didn’t want the administrator digging around in her mind if she wasn’t fully awake. She held up her index finger and concentrated on her wounds. Her neck and vocal cords; she had to heal those injuries.

  She concentrated on repairing the damage, while her swirling memories stabilized into a coherent picture. It wasn’t poison ivy, it had been that impatient judge…that had hurt a lot. And it was scary—one stupid man, and all of her work had almost gone down the tubes.
>
  She croaked painfully at the doctor, “May I have a sip of water?”

  The physician looked surprised but motioned hurriedly to an assistant. A carafe was retrieved and the woman helped Carrie sit up. She realized she was not in a hospital room at all. She was still in the courtroom!

  They had her laid out on the prosecutor’s bench like a slab of meat. They really want to question me. That was okay. If the administrator was here, and more importantly, if it was going to take part in the inquiry, information could be shared both ways. Carrie wondered who would be the most surprised.

  “I’m fine now,” she whispered hoarsely. “I can talk.”

  The doctor tried to dispute her statement. “Inquisitor Bokeol,” he argued, “her vocal cords are severely burned. I’m amazed she can even speak. Forcing her to continue could cause irreversible damage to her voice.”

  Bokeol nodded at two guards and they forcibly evicted the doctor. He then faced Carrie. “We will proceed with your trial.”

  Carrie nodded and scooted off the table. She was still wobbly and steadied herself by putting a hand on Bokeol’s arm. “Help me up,” she said, her voice slightly clearer.

  It was an incongruous scene. Normally prosecutors had to drag their prisoners to the dock with neck chains. Carrie, however, tugged on the prosecutor, forcing him to assist her as she mounted the single step and approached the witness stand. She leaned against the podium and nodded at the three judges facing her from the bench. They didn’t look nearly so formidable as they had just moments before. The Angqua Inquisitor’s presence had turned them into three scared old men.

  While on the transport, Carrie had learned that the Angqua was the personal law enforcement arm of King Kkoli. In front of an Angqua prosecutor, there was no appeal, no matter how minor the offense nor how harsh the punishment.

  Carrie glanced at Bokeol, who had taken his place at the bench from which she had just risen. It was located on the side of the courtroom, between the judges and the witness stand.