by Neil Davies
The Bosen holding Steve pushed him towards the open door of The Seven Deadly Sins. He staggered, his legs not wanting to fully obey him, and stopped for a moment, looking back at the body of his friend, staring in disbelief at the grinning face of this madman, Suzex. The Bosen took a step towards him and he turned and hurried for the door.
It seemed he had little choice. He was leaving.
PART TWO
THE ALLIANCE
Chapter 36
Leader Lane looked out of his office window over the rooftops of Akasian, silhouetted against a burning red sky. Fires in the suburbs.
More riots.
The city was pulling itself apart. Bloodshed, destruction, anarchy. He had never wanted any of this.
He remembered the shock of Carlton's assassination, the public mourning, the interminable funeral procession, and Suzex. Always Suzex. Advising, suggesting, pushing! Even now he was unsure how involved Suzex had been in the assassination. Nothing had ever been said and Lane did not have the courage to question him. Official reports cited ‘mercenaries working for unknown fanatics’, but Lane could not forget Suzex's words such a short time before that day on Armistice; 'It's never too late to stop something that hasn't yet happened'. And if Suzex was responsible then he, as the man who had brought Suzex into this, was also responsible. There was cause enough for worry without any possible revelations about how the Leader of Aks gained his political advancement through murder.
The Leader of Aks.
That thought almost made him smile. It had been his ultimate goal and, if he were true to his deepest emotions, he cared little for how he obtained it. Leader Lane sounded so much better than Mayor Lane.
There had been little protest against his promotion to Leader. As Mayor it was generally accepted in such situations, and at first everything had been smooth, peaceful. Plans for the continued war with Earth were drawn up. The people were persuaded that, although Earth might not have been directly involved in the assassination, their hand was to be found somewhere. Public support for the war was at its highest for many years, and striding at its front was the Larnian religion. Leader Lane was its champion, its living saint, in the battle against the heathen Earth.
And then the Bosens had arrived.
"I should never have let them come." He turned to face Suzex, who sat in the shadows of a far corner.
"An alliance with the Szuiltans is the only way to defeat Earth," said Suzex, speaking quietly, a trace of amusement in his voice.
"But the people..."
"The people," interrupted Suzex, "will do as they're told. Some will complain, but you have the forces to bring them under control. The Bosens are the ultimate enforcers when it comes to suppressing trouble."
"I know. I've seen them work." Leader Lane shuddered at the memory.
"Then you know you have no need to worry."
"I need public support, and the riots are turning even the well-off against me."
"When they see Earth heading for defeat their attitude will change."
The rumble of a distant explosion shook the office windows and Lane watched as a plume of black smoke curled into the evening sky.
"Theirs or ours?" His voice trembled. Violence, even distant violence, still scared him.
"Ours."
Lane nodded.
"I suppose we should be grateful that the rebels haven't managed to get hold of any heavy armament yet."
Rebels! How quickly I've fallen into using the popular name for these suburban terrorists. Before the Bosens came they were vandals, criminals, scum! Now they are rebels.
Suzex pushed himself to his feet.
"I have to leave. I have other interests, other jobs to do."
The Leader turned from the window, a tremor of fear in his voice.
"When will you be back?"
I hate myself for this dependency. I hate Suzex for making me dependent. But most of all I hate Earth, and in the end that's all that counts.
Suzex smiled. He almost laughed, but held it back. It would not be wise to humiliate the new Leader of Aks too much barely six months into his government. It was enough that Lane felt his need, accepted it and, however reluctantly, embraced it. They were combined, the need of the world and the need of the man. Aks needed Szuilta. Lane needed Suzex.
"I won't be long. In the meantime, you have the Bosens to protect you."
Leader Lane straightened himself, gathered all his courage. There were some things he could not let pass, not even from the fearsome Suzex.
"It is not my life that concerns me. It is the true Larnianway that is at stake."
Suzex bowed slightly. "I do apologise Leader. I was not suggesting any selfishness on your part, simply that the Bosens are at your command."
"Are they?"
"The Szuiltan President himself assured me that they would do as you asked."
As I ask? He makes them sound like my slaves, yet they serve only Szuilta.
He watched Suzex turn and leave, the churning of fear in his stomach matched in intensity only by the disgust he felt at his weakness. A wave of damp, fetid air swept over him as the door opened and closed, a reminder that there were Bosens outside the door guarding him, so he was assured, against any personal harm.
Then why do I feel like a prisoner?
He dragged a hand over his face, tired eyes staring, the harsh light scouring deep shadows into the cracks and lines of his face. This situation had kept him awake at nights, dragging him from the occasional doze. How quickly he had become little more than a puppet for the Szuiltans.
It was to have been a small, expeditionary force to initiate first direct contact between Leader Lane and the Szuiltans. It had rapidly, and deliberately, turned into an army of occupation. Thousands of Bosens, free-floating globes acting as their Generals, descending in the Szuiltans’ great ships and spreading throughout Akasian. Within two weeks they had control of all major communications and centres of government. Lane himself felt he was there only on sufferance.
My world has become a fortress, occupied by a foreign, alien race.
His patriotism raged at the thought, but the necessity calmed him, gave reason to the madness, purpose to the suffering. The jihad was gathering momentum once again. Perhaps in the final analysis all this would be worth it and Aksian history will remember him well.
Together we will destroy Earth and its Larnian heresy.
Chapter 37
The Tradesman's Entrance buzzed with activity, the constant drone of conversations deafening, music played over speakers invisibly inlaid in every table lost beneath the sounds of customers talking, shouting, drinking, eating, socialising in the myriad of ways known to mankind.
Mankind.
The word settled into Steve Drake's mind.
Yes, mankind.
The bar around him was filled with the accents of a hundred worlds, the skin tones, hair colours, body shapes and minor mutations of a thousand evolutionary trails, but all of them were mankind. All of them could trace their lineage back, eventually, to the Mother Planet, Earth.
But the Szuiltans...
The thought of that alien race made him shudder and he knocked back the remainder of his drink in one gulp. His glass was immediately refilled by a nearby barman without having to ask. When Steve Drake started drinking, barmen who wanted a tip did not wait to be asked to supply more drink.
What do the Szuiltans look like?
He almost laughed, but all that escaped to the surface was a wry grin.
All that happened on that planet and I still don't know what a Szuiltan looks like in the flesh, if they have flesh. Isn't that ridiculous?
He studied the drink on the bar before him, the beginnings of a frost spiderwebbing the glass as the clear liquid’s extreme low internal temperature reacted with the warmth generated by the people around him. Mind Buggering Purgatory. The dozen or so bottles lining the back shelf of the bar were all of synthetic manufacture. No trader could afford a bottle of the now extreme
ly rare real thing, found fermenting naturally in freezing pools on the ex-colony world of Milestone. The labels on the affordable copies simply stated MBP. No one needed to know any more.
Steve took another gulp, sucking air through his teeth as it burned the back of his throat. This was a good synth year.
"Now, Bosens..." he said, his words slurring as the MBP began to loosen the control of his bodily functions. "Bosens are big, hairy, shit-stinking, mean motherfuckers, and I can vouch for that personally."
He jabbed a finger at the barman to emphasise his point. Fergus Dekker, invalided out of trading and current head-barman of The Tradesman’s Entrance, had known Steve for some years and nodded without listening. Tools of the trade.
"Sorry to hear about Jack.” A hand fell on Steve’s shoulder, a garlic-tinged breath leaning close to his ear. “Must have been terrible. Great trader in his day but, well, accidents happen. See you around."
Steve turned to see who the speaker was, but only managed a brief glimpse of a trackover moving away. A trader no doubt, and probably someone he and Jack had known for years.
Accidents happen?
He wanted to scream the truth out, tell everyone who would listen what really happened out there on Szuilta. How Jack had been murdered on an alien world by a human, or humanoid at least (was that a Szuiltan?). How he had been kicked off the planet with a message for something called the Council. How the names Suzex and Shrilor kept throbbing in his head, although he was no longer sure why. He wanted to tell the whole galaxy about the nightmares he still had of staring at the shrivelled corpse of his friend, watching the trails of smoke snaking lazily into the air, coiling about each other forming patterns that were meaningless yet filled with the violence and death that surrounded him.
He wanted to tell, but he dare not.
The flight back to Sellit was vague, most of it spent lying on his bunk, staring at the ceiling, trying not to fall asleep in case the nightmares came again.
He had accepted, without question, that The Seven Deadly Sins would have been programmed for autopilot back to Sellit. When the first message from Sellit Control crackled through the otherwise silent communicator, he glanced at the readouts and realised that he was not needed even then. The program was already adjusting the autopilot for landing procedures.
At some point during the long, tedious journey, the haze started to lift and anger burned through.
They had killed his friend. They had ordered him off the planet with the legacy of bruised ribs and broken sleep. He had no doubt that Sellit would take action. He lusted for revenge.
Four men in trackovers met him off the ship before he even passed through Sellit customs. He had been stunned when one pressed the barrel of a gun into the small of his back.
"You don't shout, I don't shoot," said the armed man, hissing his words directly into Steve's ear, making him flinch away.
He did not resist as they herded him at a casual but brisk pace away from the arrivals area, two of the men ahead of him, another with the gun still in his back and the fourth staying further behind.
Who are these people? Do they work for Szuilta? Have they sent me back just to kill me here for some perverse reason of their own?
The questions sent his mind reeling, mixing and swirling with extreme exhaustion to produce a physical dizziness. He stumbled, was caught by one of the men in front. Through the heavy fog that threatened to engulf his thoughts he heard the words "all clear" and felt a sharp pain in his left arm.
He saw, or perhaps imagined he saw, a syringe being pulled away and the thought primitive but effective came ridiculously to the forefront of his consciousness just seconds before he lost it to a rising wave of blackness.
When he woke it was dark.
For a moment he panicked (they've given me something that's made me blind!) before sensation began to return and he could feel the cloth blindfold around his eyes.
As feeling spread wider he realised he was tied to a chair, his arms pulled painfully backwards, his wrists tied to the tops of the rear chair legs. A quick experimental movement proved that his ankles were also tied to the chair.
With the realisation that he was bound and blindfolded in an unknown location by persons equally unknown, Steve began to calm himself. Perversely he felt this was a situation he could deal with, an understandable and, above all, human situation. He could not imagine the alien Szuiltans tying knots in ropes to bind him to a chair. He was in deep shit, but it wasn’t the first time and there was nothing he could do about it at that moment, so he wasn't going to worry.
"Am I alone, or is someone else enjoying the show?" he said, his tone filled with a deliberate bitter humour he did not truly feel. I won't let the bastards know how scared I really am.
"Very commendable Mr Drake. May I call you Steve? Mr Drake sounds so formal, and whatever else we are, we do not need to stand on ceremony here."
The voice came from directly in front of him, a middle aged voice, or so it seemed to Steve.
"Steve's fine." He forced his voice to be steady, confident, despite the fear trembling in the base of his stomach. "What should I call you?"
The man laughed. "There's no need to call me anything, although I dare say you've already thought of a few names."
Steve heard a slight shuffling off to his left.
So, there's at least two of them in the room with me, probably more. Who the fuck are they?
He forced his voice to be light, relaxed. Friendly even.
"I don't suppose there's any chance of being untied or allowed to see?"
"Quite correct Steve. No chance." The man cleared his throat. "Now, shall we get down to business?"
"What exactly is our business?"
Another shuffle, this time behind him.
At least three then. But what does it matter? I'm hardly in a position to try and escape.
"Tell us about Szuilta."
Steve hesitated only briefly.
"An alien planet some distance from here. Not very friendly apparently..."
"Tell us about your time there Steve," interrupted the man. "And don't try being clever. I'm not easily impressed but I am easily pissed off."
Steve sighed.
Why not? I wanted to tell someone anyway.
None of the others in the room said a word as Steve retold his story. There were no interruptions, no questions, no comments. He could have been alone as he told of Jack's murder, a telltale tremor creeping into his voice. He tried to fight back the tears that welled in his eyes.
Larn, it still hurts so much.
There was silence as he finished his tale. If anyone noticed the meandering teardrop sliding down his right cheek they were tactful enough not to mention it.
When someone finally spoke, it was the same man as before, but this time his voice was softer, less authoritative.
"So, Agent Holt is dead."
Agent. Again, someone calling Jack an agent.
"A good man. He'll be missed." This from a second voice somewhere to Steve's left.
"What do you mean Agent Holt?"
"Your friend Jack Holt was more than a trader trying to get back into space Steve, much more than you will probably ever know."
The voices dropped to whispers, sibilant sounds filling the air as they discussed something between themselves. Steve could not make out the words and did not make any great effort to try. His mind was struggling with another matter. The message. He had been given a message to deliver, and there had been names as well, names he had not included in his telling of the story because he had forgotten. Until now.
"Suzex."
The whispers stopped immediately. There was another moment of complete silence and then the man's voice.
"What of Suzex?"
Is that nervousness I can hear? Perhaps even fear?
"I was given a message by the man who killed Jack," said Steve, shivering in the sudden atmosphere of cold dread and anticipation in the room.
"Which was?"
Steve wanted to get the words exactly right. It was not difficult. He found they were etched into some far corner of his mind. He would probably never be rid of them.
"'Tell the Council that Suzex has dealt with another one of their agents.'" He paused at a sudden intake of breath behind him before continuing. "And there was something else too, something about this Council not having anyone to stop him without someone called Shrilor. Does that sound right?"
The man did not answer. Instead he leaned close. Steve could smell the faint odour of exotic herbs on his breath. This man did not eat in places like The Tradesman's Entrance, where seasoning was limited to a slight sprinkling of synthetic salt and garlic.
"The official line on Jack Holt's death will be that you were both involved in an accident while en route to Szuilta. Unfortunately Jack was killed. You escaped with minor injuries. You never reached Szuilta."
The man's voice was low, menacing, and Steve quickly realised that it was futile to argue. Whoever this man was there was a definite aura of authority about him.
"If you should start trying to tell other people the story you told us, you will be struck off the trading register."
"You can't..."
"We can, Steve. Believe me, we can. You will never trade legitimately again. Now, do you understand all that?"
Steve nodded. He found it easy to believe.
"Good. As long as you go along with our story about the accident you have nothing to worry about. We probably won't even have to talk to you again. You can forget all about us."
"That shouldn't be difficult." Steve's voice held a sharp edge of bitterness. "I never found out who you were in the first place."
He felt the sharp pain in his arm again, and then blackness.
It was hard to believe that had all happened over four months ago. The warning was still fresh in his mind, and he felt certain he was being watched, listened to. He had become edgy, looking over his shoulder, thinking carefully about what he said before he said it.
Shit! My comment about the Bosens. Will that count against me?