SWNOVELS Chapter The remnants
For a long time Kysaek, now silent, exhausted and at a loss, sat in her seat, as did Re’Lis and Thais, while Dios and Kuren flew the Bolt Dropper in the pilot seats above their heads. Almost two hours ago, the last survivors of the Disciples of Dealith had escaped from Cipi, but there was no new target and Kysaek, despite the dire events, had the urge for reconnaissance.
However, Kuren beat her to it over the loudspeakers. “Priestess ...” she began, as if she didn’t want to ask any more questions. “We’ve been flying away from Cipi for over two hours now, but you haven’t given us a new course yet, and flying haphazardly in space without a large ship is not very advisable.”
It seemed Thais had only been waiting for this question. “Set a course for Ohm II,” she said simply. It didn’t sound like a real plan, though.
That was why Kysaek frowned. “That’s it?” she asked indignantly, but restrained herself. She just couldn’t figure out how Thais could be so quiet all this time and only give orders when Kuren asked.
“It’s more than enough for now,” the Talin replied feebly. Whether the weak demeanour came from the fierce fighting or the enormous losses, however, Thais hid it very well. At all, it was not quite clear whether the events touched her, for there was no emotion in her eyes and that was a good reason for excitement.
“More than enough?“, Kysaek snapped out of her skin and stood up. “What’s the matter with you? We’ve been flying around here for hours in the void without you saying a word, and then ‘Set a course for Ohm II’ is more than enough?” Most definitely, she wasn’t looking for a confrontation with her rescuer, but it wasn’t on her mind, and Kysaek filled the tons of guilt on her shoulders.
Whether it was experience or indifference, however, Thais displayed a boisterous calm. “And what would your suggestion be?” she asked, but didn’t wait for the answer. “Should we turn around and kill a few PGI henchmen before the superior force destroys us? Or confront Skarg Peeks? Possibly even bury our fallen sisters?”
Kysaek didn’t want anything like that, of course, and she faltered. “Yes, no, I don’t mean that,” she said. There was so much anger in her, though, and it dominated her thoughts. “But still, you must have more on your mind than flying somewhere?! And what happened anyway? How could it have come to this? Why don’t we go to the next base of the disciples? Surely they won’t put up with that?!”
Thais freed herself from her seat restraint and crossed her hands in front of her lower face area so that her nose and mouth were hidden. “Yes, they will,” Talin murmured. “Because they sold us out!”
Re’Lis raised her hand. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly as I say,” Thais sighed from between her held hands before pulling those apart. “The Guardian betrayed us, as well as the rest of the disciples on Cipi. The meeting was a trap. They lured me away from the base and tried to kill me.”
As Re’Lis lowered her hand and her head, Kysaek began to pace up and down, stunned. “Can’t you rely on anyone in this fucking galaxy?” she huffed, slamming her fist into the wall, but it hurt like hell. “Ah!”
Thais couldn’t keep it in her seat either, though her steps were without haste, and she turned her attention to Re’Lis first. She put her hand on the Galig’s head, whereupon she raised her head, and Thais’ hand moved from her head to her sister’s glass face mask.
The whole thing seemed extremely familiar, even inward and intimate, like the love of two beings for each other. Still, the meaning was not clear, but Re’Lis seemed nowhere near as excited as Kysaek and gently tapped her commander’s wrist.
After the tap, Thais took her hand away and she blocked half of Kysaek’s up-and-down route. “I would have to ask myself that question much sooner than you would.”
Kysaek tried to catch up. “How? What?” she blinked and stopped when she got in front of her commander.
“Whether you can’t rely on anyone anymore,” Thais replied, minimising Kysaek’s role because of the attack. “I was quite naïve and should know better after centuries, but you were not the reason for the attack, not at first.”
“What do you mean ‘not at first’?”
“The Guardian found out you were with us after making enquiries about our cell,” Thais explained intelligibly, but she had to fight herself, for every now and then a bitter note sprouted in her words. “I made a mistake, Kysaek, but it wasn’t letting you in with us. Supporting these terrorists, however, has taken its revenge and is the reason for this disaster.”
Kysaek was certainly not keen on putting all the blame on herself, but she tried to follow the reasoning. “The terrorists? But you had nothing to do with their attack.”
“Have you already forgotten who supplied them with the weapons?”
“The weapons?” asked Kysaek, still not getting through. It took her another moment to understand. “Yes, you gave them the weapons, but you didn’t .... Oh!”
“Yes, oh. I had thought that all traces about the deal had been removed, but in doing so I underestimated PGI’s vindictiveness and overestimated the disciples’ loyalty. When PGI got to know who had got the weapons for the terrorists, they immediately approached the judges and they didn’t want a confrontation with Skarg Peeks. So they issued orders to the Guardian accordingly, and when she checked everything, it came out about you. However, the order to destroy us would have fallen either way.”
It was hard not to show that, and Kysaek didn’t want to be irreverent because she was still saddened and angered by it all, but the fact that she wasn’t the direct source of the fighting gave her relief. “So the leadership sacrificed us to avoid a war with PGI?”
“Yes.”
The image settled in Kysaek’s mind. If she had been so miserable a moment ago, thinking it had been her fault, she found it hard to appreciate how Thais must feel now.
The Talin saw herself as responsible for everything, and as the commander and the one who had supported the terrorists, yes, she was. Still, Kysaek was not satisfied with the terse statement about Ohm II and wanted to know if there was more to it. “Then do you have a plan for where else we could go, or why do you choose Ohm II?”
Thais seemed taken aback and patted Kysaek on the shoulder. “For one so young, and considering the circumstances, you are quite persistent and determined.”
Was Kysaek? She found her question was one that any normal person would have asked at some point, and her ambition was more a mixture of uncertainty and annoyance than what Thais had mentioned. Kysaek, however, showed her appreciation for the words, for the Talin had plenty to worry about at the moment. “Thank you.”
The gesture made Thais smile faintly before she turned serious and explained the plan to everyone. “Dios and Kuren probably already know, but Ohm II is a small space station, in the second asteroid belt of this system.”
Dios interjected. “Doesn’t that station lie on a smuggling route?”
“It does,” confirmed Thais, who was not using the station for the first time. “I’ve been there a few times when we’ve received explosive drug shipments. Ohm II is not big, but the station will provide us with everything we will need for our immersion.”
Going into hiding - Kysaek couldn’t say she was happy that it meant just running and hiding again. That it had to be, however, was clear to her. “You want to go into hiding there?”
“No,” Thais shook her head. She expanded on the meaning of the station. “On Ohm II, many kinds of smuggler ships pass by, but also more or less official refugee transports, and we’ll get on one of them.”
Kysaek had a hunch it was going to the Maw. “Where are they going?” she asked, quite sure that she was now going to get to where she wanted to escape from being taken in by the disciples.
“In many directions,” Thais replied, not having a clear idea of which way it should be. “Where we should go, though, I’m afraid I don’t know.”
Good sounded different, but that appeased Kysaek for now and she wanted to set Talin up. “Well, I think the plan is good, and it will be a few hours before we get there, after all,” Kysaek said. Her Bolt dropper only got to a barely appreciable fraction of the speed of light at full power, but that was more than enough for a long flight within a solar system. A proper ship, designed for sustained space flight, would have been better, of course, but even with that the distances in solar systems would still be considerable and they could eat up an hour or half a day, depending on the target distance and available speed. Local space flight today was like air travel on planets then, before the time of stars. Flying in space was merely much more dangerous, but Kysaek trusted her pilots. “When you say many directions, do you mean everywhere?”
“Pretty much, yes,” Thais nodded, exhaustion beginning to show on her face.
Not being much fitter herself, Kysaek suggested, “Then everyone can figure something out until we get there.”
“I don’t mind,” Re’Lis agreed.
Thais also gave her consent. “That’s what I thought.”
Nothing came from Dios and Kuren, which was why Kysaek sat down again and closed her eyes to think quietly. The first thing that came to her mind was the maw to submerge, anew, but peace at Thais’ idea worked too well and too quickly. Indeed, before Kysaek knew it, she nodded away and fell asleep.
Later, Kysaek’s eyelids were pulled apart and she stared into the glare of a small lamp, not really realising whether this was a dream or reality.
Behind the light was emblazoned the mask of Re’Lis. “She’s fine so far,” the Galig said expertly. “No permanent damage. It was probably just the stress.”
“I don’t see anything,” Kysaek murmured, realising this wasn’t a dream and turning away from the blinding glow.
“It’ll be over in a moment,” Re’Lis replied, holding her patient’s head fixed before she took the light away. “No, she’s perfectly fit.”
Fit felt different to Kysaek, though, as her skull was humming and like a boiler under high pressure. “My head is about to burst, Doctor Askar.”
“That’s the stress,” Re’Lis said, taking her patient by the hand. She uncrossed her wrist and held an injection vial filled with a bright red liquid between her fingers. “You’re just not used to situations like this, not to this extent, and the frequency doesn’t make it any better.”
She didn’t distrust the doctor, but Kysaek pulled her wrist in a little. “What are you going to give me?”
“A harmless plasmid. It will help.”
That was enough for Kysaek, though she winced briefly as she was injected with the plasmid. “You really are a good doctor, but I have been wondering all along why you are so good with humans.”
Re’Lis remained vague. “It comes with the territory,” she said sadly. “But it’s the same reason Thais or I aren’t as finished as you are - we’ve been through worse.”
Worse? Kysaek didn’t even think to ask at first, but she at least stuck to asking what Re’Lis knew. “So what species do you know about in medical terms?”
“Besides mine? Humans, Talin, Palans, Hishek and Calans are well known to me. The rest only rudimentarily.”
“Impressive.”
“Yes, Re’Lis is good and we’ll need her,” Thais agreed, sitting opposite, herself an empty injection vial beside her. “Which brings me to you - do you even want to stay by our side?”
“What else?” retorted Kysaek in reflex to the unexpected question. “Why wouldn’t I want to?”
“After I had some sleep and woke up again, I realised that a plan alone is not enough,” Thais said. She rubbed her hands together. “I stand by my suggestion that we all stay together, but there is no longer any compulsion to do so. The disciples have betrayed us and we are everything but sisters anymore, and I don’t want anyone here to think they have to come along. That’s why I spoke to the others while you were asleep and they have already decided to come along. It stays...”
Kysaek did not let Talin finish. “No question about it!” she intervened. “I’m coming with you! You’ve already saved me once, and I’d be ungrateful if I abandoned you now ... Besides, I’m certainly lost on my own.”
“Sincerely,” Thais nodded at first. However, she gave what followed a distinct note. “If I didn’t already know you a little, though, one could say you’re shrewd and calculating, which could make one doubt your motives. You know you can’t get through on your own, but I call it prudent because I trust you and believe you want to stay above all because you want to repay a debt and are grateful.”
“And she’s entertaining,” Dios commented.
“And she brought us the special delivery. You can always use a good messenger,” Kuren added.
Even in a situation like this, Dios and Kuren made their jokes, which Kysaek found funny, but possibly it was a defensive reaction or an attempt to cope with the setback. However, it could also be that it just didn’t hit them. Kysaek didn’t question it, but wanted to talk about the Ohm II destination. “Now that that’s settled, what exactly do we do?”
Dios gave her opinion first. “Our homeworld would actually be the ideal hiding place for us.”
“Would be?” asked Kysaek, looking up at the ceiling every time she spoke to one of the twins, though she couldn’t see through the steel.
“The thing is,” Kuren murmured regretfully. “If you were all Sororanians, this wouldn’t be a problem. Our homeworld is like a vault - Sororanians very, very rarely betray their own people, no matter what you’ve done. Family and blood are sacred to our people.”
That sounded pretty social to Kysaek, a trait that didn’t apply to most species, and that included humans. “Yes, if we were Sororanians, that would be good.”
“Told you,” Dios sighed.
Actually, Kysaek wanted to bring up her maw idea next, but Thais beat her to it. The Talin was nostalgic and pretended to be melancholy “You know ... because of the attack, I had to think about the war again and I dreamed about it too. A cruel time.” Thais’ memories, however, were not for comparison to the recent battle with PGI, but were the basis for her suggestion. “But that also made me think of a place where we could hide.”
A place that came to Thais’ mind because of the war? Kysaek immediately thought of any bombed out ruins, abandoned cities, and again, the maw. Yes the maw made sense - it had always been the dark corner to crawl into, and always would be.
The mention of Thais, however, was the complete opposite of Kysaek’s reasoning, a dare and an unforeseen surprise that really had it all. “There are many ships flying to Central from Ohm II.”
Kysaek, Re’Lis, Dios and Kuren asked simultaneously, “Central?!”
Thais remained serious. “Yes, Central. That Central,” she said, and there was only one thing she could mean by Central - the city, the moon, the centre of the galaxy. At most, small children didn’t know what Central was, but otherwise in this modern society there was no getting around it and even the most illiterate slave had at least heard of it.
Kysaek couldn’t believe it and assured herself, “Do you really think it’s wise for us to go to Central? Right under the noses of the leading species, the biggest governments and whoever else has something to say there?”
Even Re’Lis expressed misgivings. “Kysaek has a point there. Why do you think that would be a good idea?”
Although she was most certainly still burdened by the grave mistake and the destruction of her sisters, Thais stood behind her idea. “It was just a spur-of-the-moment idea at first, because I couldn’t help thinking of the conditions during the war and how countless living beings flocked to Central thinking they would be safe there. But it wasn’t countless, it was endless streams of refugees and at that time a lot of problems came with them to the city. Enormous overpopulation, extreme scarcity of resources, and crime took on frightening proportions in the lower regions. That is why there is little order in the lower regions to this day. I’ve been thinking about all this all the time now, and that’s why I think Central is a wise choice.”
How that could be the best option didn’t enter Kysaek’s skull and she drilled on, “And you don’t think we could give it some more thought and pick one of the millions of other places in the galaxy?”
“Well, I’m not saying that’s not true,” Thais replied, leaving room for another suggestion. “So what place did you have in mind?”
Kysaek recapped the entire plan, questioning Central repeatedly. “Sneaking into Ohm II as refugees is fine, but .... Central? Why Central? Why not the Maw, for example?”
Re’Lis again found the suggestion bad. “That’s what any fool in serious trouble does - run off to the Maw,” she opined, but the Galig was conflicted. “Central, however, continues to elude me as well. It’s too bad you’re not amphibians, because I know some planets with good underwater hideouts.” In the end, Re’Lis was convinced. “No one would suspect that; no one will find us there, not so fast.”
Thais followed up on Re’Lis’ last words. “And so is my thought in relation to Central - who would suspect that?” she asked, but she didn’t build solely on the fact that it was so unlikely, but reinforced her other argument. “Central is a great place to go underground if you have the means for a flight, fake IDs and other necessities. The city may not be the maw with its many worlds and nooks and crannies and the ability to buy anything, but that kind of stands out too. My idea is based on the drastic mass of Central, which is a good place to disappear into, and in case you’re worried, the surveillance in the lower regions is quite different from the government districts far above, where the rich, elites, politicians and guards have other things to do. They ignore the suffering among themselves anyway, as best they can, otherwise the problems would have been solved long ago and wouldn’t have existed for decades.”
At first Kysaek started to speak, but she swallowed the necessary air again. Curiously, her thoughts lingered on the statement. “That ... makes sense,” she admitted, recognising the clever absurdity, especially while thinking of the lower regions of the city. “Going to Central is really even more reckless than the obvious choice of the Maw, but then again, many do, and again, who would be stupid enough to go to the centre of the galaxy if they were wanted?”
Re’Lis was puzzled by the reason for choosing Central. “So you want to go there because it would be so simple-minded? So obvious? Doesn’t it work the same way with the maws?”
“Yes, but more people dive in the maw than on Central,” Thais said, but she wasn’t finished comparing hiding places. “In the maw you might get everything, but as I said it leaves a mark and pretty much everyone sells you there too. And the lawlessness only makes it easier to hunt us down. As fugitives to Central again, and maybe bribing an official in the process - that’s a very different set of circumstances because the official advertises his corruption less than a crook in the maw would.”
“I’m not sure it’s just that it sounds funny,” Re’Lis admitted, but she saw that the huge range of options was also the lack of same. “However, nothing is certain. PGI certainly won’t give up when they realise a few disciples have escaped and Kysaek is still alive. So it won’t be easy either way, but maybe, yes maybe, Central’s surroundings actually offer us more advantages. You may think what you like of the lower regions, but PGI will certainly not march there with an army. At least not without attracting attention. Public interest in Central is weakness and strength for us.”
That yes, there were still clandestine assassins, Kysaek swallowed, though she figured that didn’t need mentioning, and so she went along with the tendency towards Central. “So it’s decided?”
Thais nodded and Re’Lis said, “Yes.”
Kuren also agreed. “We are definitely in, but there is one more thing,” she said, bringing up an important point which was unresolved and yet important to the plan. “What do you have in your pockets and on your vortex cuffs? Because that’s not going to be cheap on Ohm II.”
“Uh...“, Kysaek brought out. Her cuff was loaded with a few foreign currencies and she patted herself down. “I have, I think, five hundred.”
Re’Lis had no digital currency at all. “Nothing on the cuff,” she commented, reaching into her pockets. She ended up with two empty vials and a currency badge in her hands. “I can add that.“”A badge, after all,” Kysaek said.
“Yes, but there are only two hundred saved and the residual value is only in the silver of the badge.”
Kysaek sighed. “Which is not enough for our needs.” She looked at Thais, but she had already raised her hands. There was nothing there except her pistol and Kysaek said, “So unless Dios and Kuren have a small fortune with them now, we have a problem.”
“My sister spent our last foreign exchange on the package,” Kuren regretted.
To which Dios added, “And Kuren dropped that in the hangar too when the fighting started.”
Thais, however, once again created calm as she had come up with a solution to this problem as well. “We have plenty of foreign currency,” she claimed, subconsciously begging her pilots to forgive her. “The Bolt Dropper is worth plenty.”
“You really want to sell our machine?” asked Dios, sounding as if she had already considered the option but kept quiet about it. “We’ve been building her for so long and she has some extras.”
“And because of that, she will earn us enough. We all have to make sacrifices so we can live.”
Kuren grumbled. “Yes, only our sacrifice is not empty pockets, ampoules or meagre foreign currency stores.”
“I know and we will be very grateful to you.”
Like her sister, Dios was anything but happy. “Us without a ship, it will be like a bird without wings - completely useless.”
Kysaek noticed that the twins were nevertheless behind the proposal and cheered them up. “Don’t worry, I’ll get you a new ship as soon as possible.”
Bright-eyed, Kuren replied. “A ship? So not a fighter or small transporter, but a ship?”
“Well, I wasn’t talking about a ship in the sense of big ships,” replied Kysaek, to whom everything was a ship, from small fighters to pompous battleships, but she meant a new bolt-dropper rather than a normal ship.
“Too late,” Dios agreed. “You promised us a ship and we’ll take you at your word.”
Thais kept up the unintentionally comical mood. “It looks like that’s settled, and Kysaek’s mouth has helped us a lot. I hope it stays that way in the future.”
“Yes, I’m always happy to help ...” gritted Kysaek’s lips pressed together. She didn’t take it so seriously now, of course, and yet she imagined in her head.Getting a ship - I couldn’t even afford a hoverwheel until now.