She didn’t linger beside the shuttle for very long – eight-point-seven seconds, to be exact. By the time the Archimandrite’s flagship had readied its missiles for firing, the Adeona was already long gone, lost in the nebula’s myriads of tunnels.
With no pilots and three of its four primary thrusters destroyed, the shuttle was going nowhere. The Archimandrite would have no choice but to recall the shuttle back to the temple remotely. It was either that or lose the LX-14s to the storm.
Much to Jack’s disbelief, everything was going to plan.
21
The Dark Acolytes
The rear of the Archimandrite’s flagship boasted a moderate-sized hangar with space for a few two-seater vessels. The blast shields retracted and a flickering blue forcefield lit up across the open entrance. The busted transport shuttle floated through, and the blast doors rumbled shut behind it.
Sparks rained down from the decimated thrusters in golden waterfalls. Glass from the cracked cockpit windows, suddenly under the effect of the flagship’s artificial gravity, fell from the shuttle and shattered into diamond sized fragments against the hard hangar floor.
It turned around, slowly and clumsily, and reversed towards the wall directly opposite the blast doors. Given its bulky size, the shuttle required at least two of the three bays and most of the remaining hangar floorspace, too.
As soon as it started to dock, Jack and the others made their move.
After the Adeona had shot out the shuttle’s thrusters and killed its pilots, she’d come around for a second pass. Shielded from view from the Archimandrite’s flagship by the shuttle itself, it looked as if the crew had been confirming the damage. In reality, however, those eight or nine seconds spent lingering beside the shuttle were for an altogether different purpose.
Jack, Klik, Rogan and Tuner had been standing inside the Adeona’s airlock as she made that second pass. Her airlock door hissed open the second she stopped, and they all covered the short and weightless hop across to the damaged shuttle with ease. The side of its cargo hold was large and covered with handholds. Then, as the Adeona raced away to avoid the flying temple’s inevitable counter-attack, the four of them slowly pulled themselves across the shuttle’s flank and clambered into the disfigured cockpit, throwing the two corpses out into the ether to make room.
And inside the cockpit’s footwell they lay, waiting for the shuttle to be recalled into the flagship. Had anyone on board bothered to scan the incoming craft just in case, they would have detected two organic bodies – one for each pilot, as far as anyone in the flagship was concerned – and a shipload of inert automata. Until they performed a manual inspection, nobody would notice the difference.
As the shuttle moved to dock across the two empty bays, Jack poked his head above the warped rim of the cockpit’s windows and checked that the hangar in front of the ship was clear. The few hooded acolytes present had their attention focussed on making sure the rear of the shuttle – where their precious merchandise was stored – didn’t put a dent in the sole other ship parked beside it. He spotted two Scrap Rats in torn mechanic overalls deep in conversation beside a workbench but, aside from the occasional curious glance, they weren’t paying the inbound shuttle much attention. Presumably, the Archimandrite didn’t expect it to be fixed anytime soon.
“Quickly,” Jack whispered to the others. “Drop down and take cover behind the refuelling pumps over there.”
Two steel tanks of combustable fluid formed a tall barrier on the opposite side of the hangar to where the two Scrap Rats were yakking. Tuner went first, falling to the ground with a mechanical clank. They were lucky nobody heard it over the splutter and gurgle of the shuttle’s dying engine. Rogan followed, successfully lowering herself down the front of the cockpit in order to minimise the volume of her descent. Then Klik dropped down. By the time it was Jack’s turn to leave the cockpit, the shuttle was almost parked. At least he had a shorter distance to jump to compensate for the greater risk of being spotted.
He slid behind the industrial tanks just as the shuttle finally hissed to a stop. Suddenly the hangar was empty of any noise save for the stomping of acolyte boots, the swishing of acolyte cloaks, and a whole babble of panicked conversations regarding how and why the shuttle had arrived in such a state, and what the Order was supposed to do now. He let out a quiet sigh of relief. So far, so good.
Jack turned to the others.
“Everybody good?” he whispered. “Still got your rifles?”
Tuner and Klik raised their weapons in confirmation. Jack subconsciously squeezed the grip of his own for comfort. Rogan was the only one of them who’d declined a gun. Although she’d been prepared to blow up the LX-14s as a last resort, she hoped to enact this stage of the plan without further bloodshed.
Speaking of which…
“Okay, great.” Jack nodded over-enthusiastically. “What now?”
“The LX-14 we captured told us that its kind is compelled to obey whomever has the activation chip,” Rogan replied. “If we can find the acolyte who brought them online back on the asteroid, we can order the LX-14s to obey us instead.”
“And more specifically, to not shoot any Qualians,” Tuner added.
“Sounds simple enough,” said Klik, struggling to flex her mandibles inside her helmet. “So who is this acolyte? Where can we find them?”
Tuner shrugged.
“I told you LX-14s aren’t smart,” he said. “And this one was literally born only yesterday. It doesn’t know the layout of this place any better than we do.”
“Well, getting on board was a start.” Jack peered around the tank. The acolytes were still fussing with the shuttle. “Plus we know that the front of the ship has to be dedicated to that weird hall we entered last time, so unless the Archimandrite is giving another sermon, it’s unlikely we’ll find anyone in charge there.”
“Upstairs, then.” Rogan turned to face the hangar ceiling; the others followed. “Seems likely we’ll find the command bridge up there. It’s as good a place as any to start looking.”
“Right,” said Jack. “Good.” More nervous nodding. “Same rules as always, guys. Let’s make this quick and quiet. No shooting unless we’re shot at first. It’s going to be hard enough finding our way around this mad ship without being spotted – we don’t need to advertise our presence, too.”
They stood up and prepared to make a dash for the nearby security door. Before they did, Rogan paused and scrutinised the acolytes inspecting the LX-14s in the back of the shuttle.
“Yes, about that,” she mused. “I may have a proposal for how we can blend in.”
Aside from the two sliding doors, the walls of the changing room were completely covered with tall, glass cabinets. Their doors, which occupied each unit’s entire front and contorted one’s reflection due to their subtly curved design, housed row upon row of cruddy, outdated spacesuits. Their nylon was torn and their protective pads were scored and scratched. One of the helmets even had a crack running down its visor.
Two acolytes entered and laid their data pads and snub-nosed pistols down on the cold, steel bench running through the centre of the room. They hurriedly pulled their cloaks up over their heads, exposing their rather banal spacer rags beneath.
“What’s got the boss in such a state?” one salamander-faced acolyte said to the other. “One second I’m leading a communal worship, the next someone’s tapping me on the shoulder and telling me I need to run downstairs and suit up.”
“Didn’t you hear? Somebody totalled the shuttle. The Archimandrite wants us on standby in case the Rats can get it operational again before we reach Queflia.”
They carefully hung up their robes in an empty cabinet alongside half a dozen spare uniforms.
“As if,” said the first acolyte. “We’re only an hour or two out, aren’t we? Not even the rodents are that good. Did he say who did it?”
“What, you think I spoke to him?” The second acolyte shook her head as she unlocked one of the o
ther cabinets. “I got my orders from Jilt, same as you. Some old mining ship, or something.”
“What’s an old mining ship doing out here?” said the first, crossing the changing room. “And what has its crew got against us, anyway? What did we ever do to them?”
“Dunno. Beats me. What I want to know is what we’ll do if the shuttle isn’t ready. What’s the Archimandrite going to do – crash down on Balua in this thing?”
“Why not?” The first acolyte pulled out a spacesuit and began slipping his slender legs inside. “All that matters is the attack takes place. If the Order gives itself away in the process, so be it. We’re too far along to be stopped now anyway.”
The salamander-faced alien carried on getting dressed, pulling on a chunky, well-worn chest piece and then reaching back inside the cabinet for the two detachable arms. She heard a dull thunk sound behind her and dismissed it as her clumsy fellow acolyte dropping his helmet. It was only when she slid the door of the cabinet shut again that she saw the warped reflection of four intruders standing around his unconscious body.
She spun around as quickly as her cumbersome outfit would allow, let out a loud, warbling, wide-mouthed scream in surprise, and promptly followed her colleague into dreamland when Rogan thumped her on the top of her head.
“Hopefully nobody heard that,” Tuner said, peering up and down the corridor outside.
“Here we go,” said Jack, flinging open the cabinet full of spare robes. “Plenty to go around. Perfect. Try this one on for size, Klik.”
He handed her the first of the robes. She pulled it down over her head and flipped up the hood.
“Reminds me of old times,” she said, her face semi-concealed in shadow.
Jack and Rogan followed suit. Jack’s robe was a little short in the arms yet somehow managed to trail behind him on the floor. Still, the hood was plenty big enough to hide his face. Rogan’s, too.
They all turned to look at Tuner, who’d hopped up and grabbed a cloak of his own. Jack cleared his throat.
“Erm, Tuner? Buddy? I don’t think that’s going to fit.”
Tuner had been swallowed by his robe. The sleeves draped across the floor like cotton skis. He resembled a young child wearing his father’s business suit.
“It could do with being turned up a bit,” Tuner admitted from somewhere inside the black folds. “But it’s not like I can stay here and wait for you. What else am I supposed to do?”
Rogan checked inside her own robe. It was quite loose.
“I suppose I’ll have to smuggle you,” she said reluctantly. “You’ll need to hold on tight, though. I can’t carry you and stick my arms through these silly clothes.”
Tuner studied Rogan.
“Front or back?” he asked.
“Back,” Rogan instantly replied. “For a convincing disguise, of course. It’s statistically more likely for an organic creature to sport a shell or fin than a pouch.”
Tuner crawled under the hem of Rogan’s cloak and clambered up her back. When he was comfortably in position, he locked his arms around her.
“This is so weird,” Klik whispered to Jack.
“Is it?” Jack sighed. “I honestly can’t tell anymore.”
“I can’t see anything,” said Tuner, his voice muffled.
“I’ll transmit everything I see to you if you promise to keep quiet,” Rogan replied testily. She shook her head, embarrassed. “Right. Is everybody else ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Jack said, rearranging his cloak to better fit around his shoulders. “Let’s go find us an activation chip.”
Rogan opened the door and checked that the coast was clear. Klik glanced nervously at Jack before they followed her out.
“Do you really think these disguises are going to work?”
“Oh, absolutely not,” said Jack. “But hopefully they’ll get us far enough.”
22
The Fire Cleanses
The Archimandrite’s temple flagship lacked the personnel required to operate a full-sized warship. Almost everybody on board was a follower, not a soldier. That’s not to say there weren’t plenty of acolytes wandering about with stubby, standard-issue pistols tucked away in their robes, of course, but none who were actively guarding anything.
Not downstairs, anyway.
Jack, Klik, and the lumpy cloak that was Rogan and Tuner combined followed the corridors around the edge of the ship in search of a staircase or elevator that might lead up to the bridge. The lofty walls were built from the same cold, black stone as the ship’s exterior, all the floors were carpeted a dark red, the flames of torches flickered in their iron brackets, and it was impossible to instinctively tell their way around.
They kept their hooded heads down and their pace to a brisk walk. So far, nobody had paid them much attention. But it would only be so long before someone asked to see their faces.
“What if there is no upstairs?” Klik whispered. “What if everything above the ground floor is just for show? Like, ‘Don’t mess with me, look how big my ship is,’ or something. You saw how distorted the space was down in that worship chamber.”
“Then we’ll have even fewer places to search,” Jack replied. “Be quiet. Somebody’s coming.”
A pair of cloaked acolytes were hurrying down the corridor towards them, panicked expressions on their husky, horned faces. Jack guessed the Archimandrite was rethinking his security options. Either that, or somebody had found the two bodies in the changing room and raised the alarm.
He knew they should have hidden them inside the spare spacesuits.
The two acolytes slowed down as they passed him and cast a curious glance in Rogan’s direction. Jack’s heart skipped a beat, and he got ready to grab the rifle strapped to his back underneath his cloak. It didn’t matter which one of them the acolytes got a good look at. Rogan might have a metal face and a fellow automata piggybacking on her, but he and Klik were wearing bloody space helmets under their hoods.
“The fire cleanses,” the acolytes murmured in unison, nodding respectfully.
“The fire cleanses,” Jack hurriedly repeated back to them, lowering his head even further than it already was. He could feel the barrel of his rifle starting to poke up through the back of his robe.
Apparently satisfied, the worshippers carried on down the corridor in the direction of the hangar. Jack shivered with relief.
“Bolts alive,” said Rogan. “I hope we don’t have to say that mantra to every cultist we run across.”
“Not every cultist,” Klik whispered. “Those ones look plenty busy to me.”
A small room branched off from the corridor, though it wasn’t immediately obvious given the skulking darkness which seemed to permeate every inch of the cursed ship. Seven acolytes were knelt in a circle inside. Six had their hands and foreheads pressed hard against the stone floor, whilst the remaining believer had his hands raised into the air in religious fervour. All were muttering in a language Jack’s chip wouldn’t translate. In the middle of their group was an ancient rock of some kind held on a small plinth – possibly a meteorite fragment, though standing in the corridor with his hood down, Jack couldn’t get a proper look at it.
“Well, let’s not disturb them,” said Jack. “Though I am getting tempted to stop and ask someone for directions. If I start off with a slightly deranged motto, maybe they won’t notice.”
“Or perhaps we could just try that,” Rogan suggested, tapping him on the shoulder.
There was a recess a dozen or so metres further along the corridor wall, reaching from floor to ceiling and continuing still further into the ship’s rafters. A clockwork puzzle of chunky iron gears turned within the inside of the open elevator shaft, grinding and grunting as one by one they interlocked and pushed against one another, slowly bringing the platform down to the ground floor. It arrived with a clumsy, jangling rattle.
“Oh, yeah.” Jack shrugged. “That’ll probably do.”
They shuffled to the side as two more ac
olytes disembarked the platform – exchanging a quick “the fire cleanses” in the process, of course – then quickly stepped on board after them.
“This tech is old,” said Klik, dragging the last syllable out as if it were lying on a torture rack. “Like, really old. Mansa prison tower old, you know?”
“Yes, we get the picture,” said Jack, inspecting the elevator. “At least that means I won’t need an instruction manual on how to use it.”
An iron grate shielded riders from the gears at the back and sides of the shaft. The only part of the elevator apparatus with which anyone could interact was a single black rectangle attached to its front pillar. It possessed no buttons for individual floors, only two shaped like arrowheads – one for up, and one for down. Presuming there was nowhere lower they could go inside the flagship, Jack reached across and tapped the topmost button. The gears around them began to turn.
Before the elevator could move, however, a black-clad Oortilian stomped his foot down on the platform. Some kind of weight-based safety feature killed the gears and stopped it from rising. Jack quickly drew his gloved hand back inside the floppy sleeve of his robe.
“Room for a couple more,” said the Oortilian, smiling cruelly. It wasn’t a question. Another acolyte appeared beside him.
“Of course,” Jack replied, bowing. “The fire cleanses.”
“Yes,” said the Oortilian, furrowing his brow in bemused curiosity as he reached across and pressed the up arrow again. “Yes, it does.”
The two acolytes stood with their back to Jack, Klik and Rogan as the elevator began its slow, juddering journey upwards. Nobody said a word, but Jack came very close to calling out in surprise when he saw what hung from the belt tied around the Oortilian’s middle.
He could have sworn it was the activation chip nestled amongst all of the rusted jewellery and bleached bone fragments. Jack guessed this acolyte was one of the Archimandrite’s most trusted followers, the same one he’d seen bringing the LX-14s online back on the asteroid. He must have been on his way back up to the bridge from inspecting the damaged shuttle.
The Tin Soldiers (Final Dawn, Book 5) Page 19