The Kasari Nexus (Rho Agenda Assimilation Book 1)

by Richard Phillips

  Civilian clothing appeared to be any color other than black. Although Jennifer didn’t know if the hues held any special meaning, she suspected that overall attire represented a person’s profession and position in Koranthian society. Whatever they meant, the combinations were vibrant and beautiful.

  No Koranthian, military or civilian, wore a hat.

  For the first time in many weeks, Jennifer became aware of her own appearance. The remnants of her carbon nano-fiber clothing were tattered and filthy, her boots almost worn through. She could only imagine how her face and hair looked. She didn’t have to imagine her smell.

  Looking around, she saw no sign of other slaves beyond the freight terminal that they had just left. In a way, it made sense. The slaves were all captured enemies. They were to be guarded at all times, never trusted, never allowed to roam freely without a shock collar, much less among civilians. That Dgarra was brazenly violating these norms angered the populace.

  Dgarra entered a tower within which a winding staircase led to a high platform that serviced several monorails. And it was onto one of these monorail trains that Dgarra led her. She seated herself between the general and his captain. Then the doors slid closed and the car was whisked silently away, traveling at a much faster speed than any of the ground trains Jennifer had experienced.

  When the car entered a monstrous cavern, Jennifer gasped in wonder. The city within was like nothing she’d ever seen. From up here, suspended from the cavern roof, she felt as if she’d entered a twilight world of violet and blue. The city had been built seamlessly into its natural surroundings, buildings separated by walkways that wound among underground streams, ponds, and lakes.

  The buildings resembled giant stalagmites, rising from the floor in graceful, flowing curves and swirls, some of which had a combination of walkways, escalators, and elevators climbing their exteriors. Most of the buildings were tall and slender, although some formed lumpy or bulbous mounds. Despite her enhanced eyesight, Jennifer couldn’t determine the actual color of individual buildings since the dim lighting of the city shifted as the day progressed. Perhaps that was the Koranthian way of determining the time of day in this underground metropolis.

  Parks and open spaces were filled with beautiful natural stalagmites and stalactites, glittering crystal formations, and limestone flows. The city branched into offshoots and connecting caverns that were too numerous to count. Above it all, superhighways of crisscrossing monorails connected everything.

  Jennifer was so enthralled with the view of this twilight realm that she almost forgot her promise to remain silent. A glance at the scowling faces of the other passengers reminded her. The monorail car made several stops before Dgarra got off and led her onto a high platform with few people, and then they boarded another monorail car that was empty. The doors closed and it accelerated along a gentle curve into a narrow side passage. This led to a cavern that was more beautiful than any she’d yet seen.

  Glittering crystal stalactites hung from the ceiling to form a mosaic of icicles and delicate draperies. In the midst of the cavern, their edifices mirrored in the surface of the surrounding lake, three alabaster towers grew from the cavern floor to form a grand palace that glowed pale white. Instead of a central courtyard, this three-tower palace had an even grander version of the parks and walkways she’d observed in the city center. The view left Jennifer breathless.

  The monorail car decelerated toward a platform complete with ceremonial guards. Jennifer found herself running a hand through her hair. Yeah. Like that was going to help. Dgarra paid no heed, exiting the car and leading her between gate guards who didn’t even glance at them. Her nerveless legs carried her across a smoothly arched bridge, through the parklike grounds, and toward the main palace entrance.

  As they approached, the huge double doors swung outward and a Koranthian dressed in midnight blue stepped out to meet them. He bowed low to Dgarra and then spoke the words that pushed Jennifer even farther down the rabbit hole.

  “Welcome home, my lord.”

  After sending his captain off to get Smythe cleaned up, properly outfitted, and settled into her room, Dgarra headed for his audience with his uncle. He’d known that he was asking for trouble by freeing the human female and bringing her back with him to the imperial palace. Outsiders were forbidden in all the major cities, especially in ArvaiKheer. The people they’d encountered on the platforms had been angry.

  If Smythe had been escorted by someone of lesser rank and lineage, she would have been attacked and killed on the spot. But as first in line to the throne, no one would dare challenge Dgarra. Not openly. But his rivals wouldn’t hesitate to use this against him.

  So why had he done it? Yes, she’d saved his life at the risk of her own. But that alone wouldn’t have been enough. Dgarra was convinced that Smythe was telling the truth about where she was from and how she’d gotten here. She spoke of understanding technologies that had been gleaned from two starships, one Kasari and another built by a competing race, the Altreians. He intended to put these claims to the test. And if Smythe could recall the Kasari world ship that her human partner had fled the planet aboard, it might just give him the means to put a stop to the Kasari’s assimilation of Scion.

  Ahead of him, the double doors swung open, allowing Dgarra into the emperor’s meeting chamber. When the general stepped forward and bowed, Emperor Goltat, wearing his royal black robes, rose to greet him.

  “Ahh. The rumors of your return appear to be true.”

  “Apparently so.”

  His uncle motioned Dgarra toward a pair of ornate but comfortable chairs set at a shallow angle to each other. He seated himself to the emperor’s right.

  The emperor’s face darkened.

  “When you said that you were going to retrieve the slave, you made no mention of freeing her or bringing her to my palace.”

  “That is true.”

  “Several of the nobles went out of their way to make sure they informed me of what you were doing before you could do it in person.”

  “I am not surprised.”

  “Then why did you do it?”

  “If I left her alone in the city, her life would be in jeopardy.”

  The emperor snorted. “And you think it is not while she is in this palace?”

  “I think that when you hear me out, you will give the order that places her under your protection, as a ward of the empire.”

  Dgarra watched as his uncle’s eyes widened. “That has not been done in generations.”

  “But it is not without precedent.”

  The emperor laughed. “That outsider saved the emperor himself, not his nephew.”

  “I believe this one can save the empire.”

  This statement took the emperor by surprise, as evidenced by the seconds of silence that preceded his response.

  “Thank the dark gods you did not make this claim within the hearing of others. We will win this war without any outsider help.”

  “Others may tell you that, Uncle. But we are fortunate to have defended our outer gates until the winter could shut them for a season. I know. I was there. When the monsoon reverses, the Eadric and their Kasari masters will return in force, and when that happens, the empire will fall.”

  Dgarra watched as his uncle leaned forward, his eyes flashing with anger.

  “You dare speak treason in my presence. Do not mistake my love for weakness.”

  “I dare speak the truth because of my love for you and for the empire.”

  Dgarra’s eyes locked with those of his emperor and he did not lower them. When the emperor spoke, his voice had gone cold.

  “We will speak of this no more. Tomorrow, you will walk the city promenade at the head of a military honor guard, as our people shower you with gratitude for your great victory. It is a victory you will have the chance to repeat when the winds shift.”

  Dgarra felt his jaws clench as he bit off the angry response that rose to his lips. Instead he made a vow he would likely regr
et.

  “If you will not make her a ward of the empire, then she shall become a ward of my house. Anyone who strikes at her will be striking at me.”

  The emperor stood and Dgarra rose with him. “So be it. Have a care that your rash decision does not enable the dogs who nip at your heels to destroy you.”

  Dgarra bowed stiffly. Then he turned and strode from the chamber. If he was to lead a parade on the morrow, he would make this official. In the morning, he would lead an honor guard of ten thousand warriors along the great promenade of ArvaiKheer. And Smythe would be at his side wearing the distinctive uniform that marked her as his ward and aide-de-camp.

  A mirthless grin split Dgarra’s lips. If his rivals thought they could intimidate him, they were about to learn otherwise.

  Jennifer hadn’t felt this clean since before she’d left Earth. She’d been stripped, bathed, and scrubbed by two of the Koranthian servants who served General Dgarra when he was at his home in the imperial palace complex. And she’d been assigned a suite that rivaled the one she’d stayed at inside the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas, back when she was a fresh runaway and so full of herself that she thought she was ready for the real world. Little had she known the cascade of events her foolish actions had triggered.

  Now, wearing a robe with the distinctive black and purple colors of House Dgarra, she stood in front of a full-length mirror, marveling at the changes in herself. Her brown hair hung to her shoulders, tipped by dyed blonde ends and crying out for a good trim. Her body was lean and hard. Even her face held the look of a warrior, a far cry from the pampered teen she remembered.

  Now she awaited a new set of clothes to be delivered. The Koranthian equivalent of a tailor had taken her measurements with a device that looked something like an airport security wand. She imagined that it was some sort of 3-D scanner that automatically collected her measurements, although the thought occurred to her that it could just as well be a video capture that was now posted to the interstellar equivalent of YouTube.

  In the hours she’d been here, Jennifer had learned much, most of it from Dgarra’s assistant on the general’s orders. Jennifer’s presence here had apparently increased the long-existing rift between Dgarra and a number of other high-ranking nobles aligned with House Magtal, with General Magtal being second in line for the throne behind Dgarra. Apparently Dgarra disdained court politics and suffered for his indifference to it. This was evidenced by the central front being designated as the main fight despite the fiercer fighting in the north.

  Jennifer understood what that meant. The priority for troops, equipment, and supplies always went to support the main effort, explaining why Dgarra’s warriors were stretched so thin. Now he had brought an outsider, a probable Kasari spy, into the capital city and imperial palace itself. Worse, he had announced to the emperor that he planned to make Jennifer his ward and then have her walk by his side in tomorrow’s celebration of Dgarra’s great victory. And he planned on naming her his aide-de-camp, an honored position marked with a unique, purple-braided rope worn on her left shoulder. Gasoline poured on a flame.

  Dgarra might suck at politics, but when it came to confrontation, he was spectacular. Jennifer had seen into his mind. She had earned his respect, and with that had come belief in her story and a sense that the technology she could offer in the fight against the Kasari might give the empire a fighting chance. To gain that, he would engage all who challenged him, unto the very gates of hell.

  There was no knock. The tailor just barged into the room. That didn’t surprise her. She may be Dgarra’s ward designate, but she wasn’t his ward yet, and everyone seemed intent on letting her know it. The tailor carried over his shoulder a clutch of bags that he gently laid atop the bed. Then, taking the topmost bag, he moved it to a separate spot and ran a finger along the edge. Although there was no visible clasp, the bag opened like the petals of a rose.

  The uniform within was stunning. Or maybe her impressions were just screwed up from the way she’d been whipsawed through wildly contrasting circumstances. How did the old saying go? When you’re starving, even swill tastes like manna from heaven.

  The tailor motioned at her and she let the robe fall from her shoulders and stepped forward without a trace of self-consciousness. For the next several minutes she stood there, moving to allow him to dress her, memorizing exactly how it was done.

  When he was finished, he motioned her toward a full-sized mirror on the wall next to the door that led out of the apartment. When Jennifer stepped up to it, she froze. This wasn’t your mother’s uniform. This was a silk-thin and incredibly revealing second skin of swirling black and purple over soft black boots with springy soles that made her feel as if she could leap tall buildings in a single bound.

  Jesus! Dgarra was intentionally magnifying her humanity . . . enhancing her differences. If this was a game of Texas hold ’em, the general had just gone all in.

  Space sucked. Raul had arrived at this conclusion some time ago, but it had just been reinforced. The subspace inertial damping had worked just fine. In fact it had worked so well that the exit from the wormhole felt no rougher than several roller coaster rides he’d taken when he was a boy. But this trip, in addition to all those weeks experimenting with subspace field manipulation, had used up most of the Rho Ship’s remaining fuel. It meant that he’d have to delay his trip to one of Scion’s moons until after he landed on one of the moons orbiting a closer world to refuel. Plus he was hungry, which meant that he’d have to force down another of the Scion eels, probably while having to endure VJ’s helpful suggestions about the joys of positive thinking.

  As if on cue, he heard her voice. “I’ve completed the sensor scan for the closest body where we can ingest fuel. It’s a dwarf planet less than a million miles from our current position.”

  “And?” Raul asked, waiting for the qualifier that usually accompanied any good news that VJ delivered.

  “And we should be able to get there with fuel to spare.”

  “Fantastic.”

  “Unfortunately,” VJ continued, “we’ll have to use the gravity distortion engines instead of our subspace drive, and we won’t have enough fuel to also generate a cloaking field during the maneuvers.”

  “Crap!” He’d known it.

  “No use getting upset. It’s extremely unlikely that the Kasari will be able to detect that kind of distortion signal at this range. Even if they do, it will take the signal more than five hours to reach Scion. Plenty of time to refuel, shift into subspace, and make it to the Scion moon of your choice.”

  That news lifted his spirits. These were all calculations he could have easily performed without her, but this ability to delegate certain jobs to VJ had spoiled him. She was almost like his own science officer, leaving him free for deeper thought.

  “Okay, then, VJ. Lay in a course for the dwarf planet.”

  “Already done.”

  Raul issued the mental command that engaged the gravity distortion engines as a five-hour mental countdown started in his head. If nothing went wrong, they should beat the electromagnetic signature of these maneuvers to Scion by more than an hour.

  The if in that thought made him uneasy. Lately Murphy’s Law had been kicking his ass on a regular basis.

  Jennifer could never have imagined such a spectacle. She strode at General Dgarra’s side on the Grand Promenade of ArvaiKheer as a thousand drummers marched behind them, tapping out a low but steady marching beat for the ten thousand warriors who followed, all clad in the black and purple uniforms of House Dgarra. Impressive as this was, the numbers were dwarfed by the throngs of Koranthian citizens who lined the winding promenade on both sides all the way to the central amphitheater where an even larger crowd awaited their arrival.

  The way her own uniform’s shimmering pattern shifted with every muscle movement made her feel like she wore nothing more than magical body paint.

  The hisses of disapproval started slowly at first, but grew steadily in volume as they progressed
. The sound began to spread, threatening to reach the amphitheater ahead of the procession, where it would have its preplanned effect, giving Dgarra a carefully choreographed and unpleasant welcome.

  Unperturbed, Dgarra raised a hand in a signal to the drum leaders.

  The change that followed was immediate and stunning, almost causing Jennifer to stumble in her surprise. Gone was the gentle tapping of hands on the sides of the bongolike instruments. Now those same skilled hands hammered the heads of the drums, sending up a staccato beat that shook the cavern, causing many in the audience to stagger back and cover their ears with their hands.

  The alien beat was aggressively tribal and triggered such emotion in Jennifer that she had to fight the urge to chant along. Indeed, Dgarra’s ten thousand picked up a guttural chant that rose above even the sound of the drums. There were no words, just a booming rhythm intended to instill fear in a waiting enemy. The chanting came from the throats of modern warriors but was of a different age, when warriors called upon their gods to grant them honor and victory in battle.

  Jennifer knew this without even having to look into these warriors’ minds. The crowd felt a sense of awe that bordered on fear.

  They reached the amphitheater and the volume rose as the drums and the chanting warriors entered. Then, as the last ranks marched into position, Dgarra gave another signal and two dozen flag bearers lifted the long staffs of their black and purple guidons, raising flags high in one swift motion. Instantaneous silence followed.

  Immediately, Jennifer stepped forward, just as Dgarra had rehearsed with her. She projected her clear voice to the tens of thousands of onlookers.

  “Citizens of ArvaiKheer. I give you the punisher of the Eadric host, the killer of their Kasari masters, the commander of the northern front . . . General Dgarra.”

  As her voice echoed through the amphitheater, it seemed that the entire throng held its collective breath for one beat, and then two. Unwilling to leave this to chance, Jennifer picked a dozen targets at key locations in the crowd and amplified the sense of awe this display had invoked. The wild cheer that began with these few spread to their immediate neighbors and then rippled through the crowd in a great wave that even swept up Dgarra’s enemies in its irresistible tide.