Rebellion at Ailon

by T J Mott

  The pain in his left arm grew worse, and she repeated herself. “I’m afraid of you.” The room seemed to dim everywhere except around her, fading to black. And she continued to stare accusingly at him.

  He couldn’t stand the pain much longer. His breath was short and ragged, coming in gasps that he had to fight for, and each breath seemed to amplify the agony in his left arm. Beads of cool sweat accumulated on his forehead, and he began to shiver as it evaporated and chilled him. He squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his teeth together so tightly they hurt.

  And then he was somehow free from his shackle. It was gone, as was the auction room. He suddenly sat upright, still gasping for breath and grunting in pain, and grabbed his left hand with his right. He flexed his robotic hand, opening and closing his fingers over and over again, tightening them into a fist and releasing them, all while massaging his metal forearm with his other hand. The prosthetic’s sensors sent touch and proprioceptive signals to his brain, and the pain slowly began to fade as his pain centers came to grips with the sensory input and concluded that there was nothing wrong, his hand was still there, it worked, and it didn’t actually hurt after all.

  He let out a long breath of relief as the pain faded away. He opened his eyes and looked around, remembering where he was and how he’d got here. He was sitting on a cot in a prefabricated barracks—the kind of lightweight modular construction that could very easily be broken down, loaded aboard trucks, and re-assembled elsewhere. Long and narrow, the room had a row of eight cots on each of the long side and exits on the short sides. It was also completely bland, entirely devoid of decoration of any kind, and dark, lit only by the weak rays of sunlight which shined through the windows behind him.

  As he grimaced, struggling to suppress the lingering pain, Thaddeus realized he was being watched. Two men sat on two other cots, and a third stood in the center of the room with his arms crossed over his chest. All three of them were watching with concerned expressions on their faces.

  “How long ago was it?” asked the standing man. He was a bit below average height, but strong and and built like a bulldog. Thaddeus realized the man wouldn’t look that out of place among his Organization’s Marines. He had short, dark hair, and looked to be in his mid-forties.

  Thaddeus felt a surge of suspicion. “How long ago was what?” he asked defensively, narrowing his eyes.

  The man frowned, and pointed at Thad’s hand. “Since you lost your hand…”

  He felt a wave of relief flood over him as more of his grogginess and confusion lifted away. No, they hadn’t discovered who he was. They weren’t asking about the events of his nightmare. “About four months,” he answered. “It’s getting better, but I still have some pain.”

  “It can take quite some time for the body to adjust to a change like that,” the man said. He stepped forward and offered Thad his hand. “I’m Chet Savoy,” he greeted.

  Thad stood and shook his hand. “Thad M—” he coughed suddenly. “Chad Messier.”

  Chet nodded. “Sorry I didn’t have the chance to meet you yesterday when you arrived. I was away on business, just got back this morning. Welcome to Clinic 12.”

  “Thanks. I got in pretty late after a 14-hour flight from Chilon, I’m not sure I’d have been very good company anyways.”

  Chet chuckled. “Yeah, travel can sure wear you out. You still look kind of beat. I hope you slept well. Other than the nightmares, that is.”

  Thad nodded lightly, glad that he wasn’t one to talk in his sleep. If they found out who he actually was…

  “Anyway, I came to wake you, Chad. Breakfast is ready, and we usually do our daily briefing while eating. Get dressed and meet us in the mess.” Chet nodded and left the barracks, and the two other men followed shortly after.

  Thad stepped into one of the two cramped bathrooms which serviced the barracks. And as he looked in the mirror, he barely recognized his own reflection. His face looked rough and lined, appearing older than he actually was. His light brown hair was much longer than he was used to. He was surprised by the amount of gray creeping into his hair, especially at his temples. And he still wasn’t used to the goatee. The facial hair was probably an unnecessary disguise. He was one man in a galaxy of trillions, and even though he had some serious notoriety in some regions, it was not likely for anyone to recognize him. But it gave him some peace of mind.

  Several minutes later Thad stepped out into the dim sunlight, with only the faintest traces of pain in his arm and only the dimmest memories of the nightmare.

  Clinic 12, operated and staffed by the Ailon Relief Foundation, was a camp of prefabricated, modular and mobile buildings currently set up just outside the city. Off to the west was Orent itself, looking quite cramped and dirty, tightly-packed with tall, smoky industrial facilities and cheaply-constructed high-rise housing.

  To the east was wilderness. For as far as he could see, there were gentle, rolling hills covered in a low carpet of yellowish wildgrass that never seemed much taller than ankle-height, punctuated by the rare patch of short-statured trees or shrubs.

  Within the camp’s perimeters, much of the grass was trodden flat and hard patches of bare dirt formed paths, weaving from door-to-door around between the buildings. This camp had been here for several weeks at least.

  To the south was some kind of giant industrial complex and arrays of high-rise slave barracks, almost a kilometer away and barely visible in the dim morning. It looked like a miniature city outside of Orent proper. The entire complex was surrounded by a nasty-looking razor-wire fence overlooked by guard towers and spotlights.

  Thad shook his head and looked up. The sky was clear, but still oddly dark for the time of day. Ailon’s eerie little M-class sun hung low on the horizon, out above the wilderness, casting down its sickly, pale rays that seemed inadequate at bringing the morning out of the nighttime.

  The camp’s buildings were made of a tough, high-visibility orange plastic, well-labeled for their purpose and adorned with the livery of the Ailon Relief Foundation. He crossed the camp, feeling a chill as a dry, cool breeze blew in, and entered the building labeled MESS. The interior was about three times the size of the barracks, and looked to be the main living space for the camp during their off-hours. A number of immobile plastic tables and chairs were scattered throughout, with matching indentations in the plastic flooring hinting that they somehow folded down and secured within the floor when the building was torn down for transport. A few large two-dimensional display panels hung on the walls, and a single small holoprojection table sat off in one corner. Clear panels of flexible sheet plastic acted like windows, but very little sunlight came in. The overhead lights were on, but the bare, white-colored room still seemed too dim for Thaddeus’s tastes. Then he wondered if these people were that accustomed to the world’s relatively dim sunlight.

  As he entered, he saw a door to his left which passed into another module which appeared to be the kitchen. Chet walked through it, into the mess, and smiled at Thad. He held a tray in his hands. “Chad. Kitchen’s that way, help yourself.”

  Thad nodded and stepped into the kitchen. It was far brighter in here. The lighting spectrum was shifted towards the blue end, which relieved him. The sun’s dim, pale-reddish light was strange and unreal to him, making the world feel like some kind of gloomy, surreal dream.

  A simple buffet made of a long, plastic folding-leg table was set up in the center. Trays at one end, with bowls, cups and silverware nearby, and some kind of creamy, soupy substance in a large kettle sat in the middle on an electric burner. The room generally smelled like food, though he didn’t find anything recognizable in the scents.

  “You must be Chad,” a female voice said. Looking around for the source of the voice, he saw a short, lithe, and rather attractive woman standing on the other side of the buffet. She had a pale, freckled face with brilliant green eyes and wavy red hair that almost reached her shoulders. He figured she was probably a few years younger than he.

 
; He smiled uneasily. “Yes. I just got in yesterday.”

  “Glad to have you.” She stepped up to him and offered a small hand. “I’m Ria Parri, the administrator of this clinic.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” he said politely, with a short handshake.

  She waved towards the buffet. “Get yourself some breakfast. Sorry for the…slop, but when we’re in the field we eat the same food that the ARF provides to the Ailon people. For solidarity.”

  He nodded slightly, and grabbed a tray and a bowl. He took the ladle from the kettle and fought back a face as he saw its contents. It was thick, pasty, and gritty, looking more like wood pulp from a paper factory than edible food, but he filled his bowl to the brim anyway. He was hungry. He hadn’t had a chance to eat since leaving the nearby Chilon system.

  “I had a minute to skim your file. You’re from Arica?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied carefully. Arica was the capital planet of a confederation of several star systems about a hundred light-years away from his organization’s Headquarters. Commodore Cooper had suggested it for his cover story. Thad had had some dealings with them, and so he was reasonably aware of its geography and politics if anyone asked him about it. “I’m a shuttle technician for a university there.”

  “Oh good, we could use someone who knows his way around tools,” she said. “You look strong, too. That’ll come in handy the next time we pack up the camp.”

  “I suppose so.”

  She smiled at him and left into the mess. He added a glass of water to his tray and followed. Chet waved him over and Thad took a seat next to the burly man.

  After a round of introductions with everyone at the table, they made small talk while Thad worked on his very bland breakfast. Soon Ria stood from the other table and addressed the room. “Okay, everyone,” she said loud enough to silence the room. “Let’s get going on the briefing. Today will be pretty straightforward. There’s been a pneumococcal outbreak at two of Orent’s mines, and the Army is busing over infected workers. We’re going to do checkups, administer antibiotics, and then the Army will take them back this evening.”

  Chet raised a hand. “How many will we be treating?” he asked.

  “They told us to expect two or three hundred, so it will be a very busy day and we’ll need all hands on deck. Chad, I know you probably don’t have much medical background but I want you to watch closely and learn. There’s plenty of routine medical work that doesn’t need a certified nurse or doctor.”

  Murmurs arose from the other men in the room, and Thad suddenly realized that the fifteen or so people in the mess were the entirety of Clinic 12. Ria waved her hands to shush them. “I know, that’s a lot of patients, but the Foundation is sending us a van of reinforcements. They’ll be here within the hour. The Army buses will be here in ninety minutes. Any questions?”

  Thaddeus had many questions, about many things, but he remained silent. And nobody else spoke up.

  “Good. Then, just so you’re all aware of what’s coming, we’ll spend tomorrow packing up the camp. We’ll be relocating to Zhale the day after tomorrow to replace Clinic 8 which is being recalled to Orent for training. Finish your breakfast and get ready for the rush!”

  ***

  The rush happened sooner than Thad—or anyone at the clinic—expected. The Avennian Army buses and troop carriers of course arrived early, and the van of ARF reinforcements of course arrived late. The clinic was still preparing when brown-and-tan-uniformed soldiers began disembarking manacled Ailon slaves in their thin cyan-colored jumpsuits and lining them up within the cordons the clinic had set up outside earlier.

  Four of the camp’s trailers, still hitched up to ARF box trucks, served as storage units. The crew quickly removed a side wall from each trailer, exposing the tightly-packed shelves of common medical equipment arrayed within.

  The clinic did have one modular building for treating long-term patients or performing surgeries in a sterile environment, but it wasn’t designed to quickly handle a high volume of short-term patients. But this part of Ailon generally had a fair climate, if a bit chilly. So the crew set everything up outside, placing examination tables and lights and sinks and all sorts of medical equipment whose purpose Thad could only guess at, right on the hard-packed grass as Ailon’s weak, reddish star continued its climb into the sky and a convoy of Avennian buses packed with ill Ailonian slaves waited nearby.

  Coughing was rampant among the cyan-clad slaves. Rather than standing, most of them sat around in groups on the grass. A minority were clearly feverish, sweating profusely and lying down in the sun. Many shivered in place as a cool, dry breeze blew in, and the weak sun provided very little warmth. Meanwhile, the well-equipped soldiers from the Avennain Army took turns standing watch, looking intimidating with their blank expressions and laser carbines slung across their chests. A few of them escorted slaves back to the buses after examination and treatment, a few others kept a patrol outside the camp, and the rest simply posted guard around the clinic grounds and looked bored.

  Thad was assigned to a middle-aged doctor named Giles, who quickly taught him how to measure and record basic vitals signs. After a crash course in triaging and prioritizing the patients, Thad spent the morning taking temperatures and pulses and blood pressure readings, moving those with abnormal stats to the front of the line, and also dispensing oral antibiotics to every patient who came through his line. And with each slave he treated—many of them weak with sickness and yet shackled and guarded by armed soldiers as if they were somehow a danger—he felt an increasing sense of guilt. He knew these people were enslaved because of him.

  The overwhelmed camp couldn’t officially break for lunch. Around early afternoon, a couple of younger men from the ARF reinforcement crew broke away from their duties to prepare food, assembling and distributing a stockpile of sandwiches made of cheap bread of dubious nutritional value slathered with some kind of salty artificial-meat paste. They also contained slices of either an odd type of vegetable Thad had never seen before, or discs of colored styrene foam. Taking a bite, he decided they were lab-grown vegetables. Foam would have had more taste.

  After finishing his lunch during a thirty-second break, Thad was examining his next patient, a teenaged boy who, though moderately feverish, was tolerating his illness very well. Giles took over and Thad moved on to the next as a fireteam of soldiers stood guard nearby. Thad was just preparing another dose of antibiotics when he heard Giles ask the soldiers to unbind his patient.

  “He has a sore ankle,” Giles explained. “I can’t examine his range of motion with the shackles there.”

  The soldiers flashed unreadable expressions at each other, but one stepped forward with a key and removed the shackles. He stepped back a few meters, taking position with his fireteam as Giles worked.

  The bustling monotony ended suddenly. The young patient bolted, sprinting away from the clinic at astonishing speed and running towards the open plains east of the camp.

  The soldiers shouted something. All around the camp, the troops came to full alertness. A fireteam briefly pursued the slave, but they were far slower than their quarry and their chase was only half-hearted. One of them shouted an order that Thad didn’t quite understand over the intervening distance and they came to a sudden stop.

  At first, Thad thought they were going to let the slave go. But then they squared up and raised their laser carbines, and he felt his blood turn cold from horror.

  The crack of discharging supercapacitors echoed from the surrounding hills, making it difficult to discern a round count. The soldiers pumped a multitude of laser bursts into him even after it was obvious he’d fallen. A few long heartbeats later, the last echoes of weapons fire dissipated, and the clinic became deathly quiet as all activity ceased. Everyone silently stared at the motionless body which lay in the grass some thirty yards away. Smoke rose from the corpse, quickly fading in the light breeze.

  Thad’s heart pounded angrily within his chest, the only sou
nd he could hear through the solemn silence that filled the camp. He stood perfectly still, gripped by a sense of horror and a rare sense of fear, not wanting to move a muscle lest the soldiers turn their attention to him. His eyes darted around the camp as he wondered what was next. He saw Ria Parri and Chet Savoy approach the soldiers. The expression on Ria’s face was sad but surprisingly mild, and as he looked around he saw it mirrored on all the clinic staff’s faces. He felt his jaw drop slightly. They don’t look shocked, not even a little bit. Bile rose in his throat. How many times have they seen this before?

  Two ARF workers ventured out from the camp to retrieve the body. Upon their return, the soldiers stopped them just long enough to scan the slave’s RFID implant. Afterwards, the workers bagged the body and deposited it at the camp’s morgue, which was nothing more than a small tow-behind trailer with rows of corpse-sized drawers accessible from its right side.

  And then everyone quickly returned to work as if nothing had happened, although conversation was sparse. Eight hours later, the last of the patients were loaded aboard the buses and the Army convoy finally departed. After assisting with cleanup, the extras from the ARF headquarters piled into their orange van and left shortly thereafter.

  Thad took a quick shower, donned a warm Foundation-issued jacket, and stepped outside just beyond the camp. He sat down cross-legged in the cool grass, facing west towards the city of Orent. As he watched, several transports descended from space and landed at the starport, looking like slow-moving shooting stars as the setting sun reflected off the bottom of their hulls.

  Throughout the day, his emotions had slid through a wide spectrum of anger, pity, and guilt. But now, he just felt numb. And something in the sunset and its dim light just felt oddly unreal to him, and he briefly wondered if he was just dreaming all of this and where he’d be when he awoke. You aren’t dreaming, he told himself. You’re just extraordinarily tired.