DATE POINT: 5Y 2M 2D AV
ADRIAN SAUNDERS
Every day was a new opportunity. When Adrian had been a school-going teenager, his homeroom had been practically immersed with signs saying crap like that; ‘every day is an opportunity to reach your goal’, ‘every day is an opportunity to better yourself’, and most untrue of all, ‘every day is an opportunity for a happy ending’. The only happy endings he was likely to see was the self-inflicted kind, but while he was one part cynic he was also three parts pure stubbornness, and so the struggle continued.
The bed was made of a pile of fabrics he’d reclaimed from a lot of ruined chairs, and provided only barely enough comfort to allow sleep, but he still stared at the ceiling for a long time before he decided to present himself to the world; he knew that this was going to be one particularly gruelling day, and there wasn’t enough grog left in the barrel to soften what was on its way.
“Good morning,” he said as he stepped into the communal area, where most of the mercenaries were busying themselves with mundane tasks or games.
Mando, one of the older mercenaries, looked him up and down and wobbled his head in astonishment. “I have no idea how you manage to look worse every day.”
Adrian snorted. “Practice.”
Mando clicked his amusement, and shifted a gadget across his bench with a significant gesture. It was about the size of Adrian’s hand, and clearly a haphazard construction, but from the satisfied look in his eye it was more than a pile of scrap. That was only to be expected from the only other member of their group with a technical background, although Mando’s experience extended to improvising useful devices in the field, and he’d apparently spent several years fighting street-to-street when the Celzi Alliance had invaded his homeworld. “I have a toy for you.”
Adrian took a seat across from him and picked it up for examination. “I wasn’t aware it was my birthday.”
“I ripped it out of the last Hunter you dragged back here,” he said, confirming Adrian’s suspicions about certain stains. “Well… it’s the personal cloaking field generator.”
Adrian set it back down. “Won’t work against the V’Straki,” he said. “Their drones will scan the tech before I can get close enough to make use of it.”
Mando smiled, and set down another device. “And here’s the remote.”
Adrian frowned and took it, giving it a brief experimental activation, during which the table vanished from view, so that only the barest hint remained of a camouflage field. He smiled back. “I like.”
“I thought you might,” he said. “From what you’ve said, they’ll be able to detect a camouflage field, but they wouldn’t expect you to use it on a decoy. It’s just the sort of distraction you’d need to help you escape, or… you know, slaughter them all to a man. Whatever you feel like.”
Adrian took them both, and deposited them into the carry-bag he never let out of his sight. “Thanks. If everything goes to plan, I’ll be back in three days.”
He nodded. “I’ll have to check our schedule, but I think we’ll still be here. Oh… the Shipmaster wanted to remind you that you’ll be wanting another translator unit.”
“Thanks for the reminder,” said Adrian, and went to fetch a replacement from the tech-stockpile they’d assembled of whatever he’d pulled from a half-dozen wreckages. Lacking an implant, Agwarens would need the help of an external device if they wanted to talk to him, and words were a hell of a lot easier than bloodshed.
Giving Mando another nod as he exited the Shelter, Adrian carefully made his way down the corridors with only the glow of a data-tablet for light, only setting it down and turning it off when he reached the section of the ship that was exposed to the elements. Here the damage was most severe, but the vegetation had already begun to reclaim all but the deepest shadow and the floor was spongy with decomposing plant matter. Bugs the size of rats scuttled out of his way as he passed, working his way to the external remnant where he stored his travelling equipment. It was an easily sealed room that had somehow remained intact, although everything around it had been utterly destroyed, and with a door that could be opened just wide enough for a human to enter. Inside was the body armour he’d made from bits of scrap, beaten into shape with brute force and fitted with the help of reclaimed poly-fabrics. It was more of a mess than a work of art, but it had protected him when the Agwarens had made their first challenge, had saved him from a few beasts, and it’d give the Hunters something extra to think about; with his body still weakened from the nerve damage, he needed every advantage he could find.
It did make the outside less tolerable, though. When he’d first come to this world, this region had been covered with snow, but summer, coupled with the extreme growth of vegetation, had produced a far more tropical climate. Rain came often, and it fell heavily, slowing progress and making life miserable even if the canopy shielded him from the worst of it. Today was, fortunately, blessed with blue skies, and he hoped that it would hold, for he’d like to reach the Agwaren settlement well before darkness fell, and before returning natives could bury their dead and move on.
The jungle itself made Adrian feel as though he’d entered a world of the giants, where he was made tiny against an extreme backdrop. Youthful trees towered above him, their trunks already on the scale of the giant redwoods of North America, while groundcover flowed over the terrain like a flood of green. The air was filled with the rich scents of soil and moist vegetation, and resounded with a deep and varied cacophony of creature-calls emanating from every direction. Under these conditions it was normal to have the feeling of being watched—the small predators of yesteryear now looked at him with hungry eyes—but it was a universal rule that beasts feared flames, and those of the fusion-blade were more than enough to dissuade all but the most motivated.
Proving that every day is an opportunity for an extra helping of bullshit, Adrian slowed his pace. His skin pricked with an ancient warning, and he gave his conscious mind the time it needed to catch up. The rustle of vegetation shifting, and branches cracking under weight, were the only other cue he needed to get the hell out of the way. He sprang to the side, his hand instantly going to the hilt of the fusion blade, and turned to find the snarling, spiked mound of reptilian muscle where he had just been standing. He drew the fusion-blade without further delay; this was a scavenger, a simple beast that must be truly desperate to attack him, and desperation would make it dangerous. With the help of the weapon, however, he would make short work of—
Locking eyes with it, he saw his mistake. An animal like this didn’t look at you with calculation, nor with barely disguised hate, and yet all of that was clearly visible in its glare. There was more here than the mind of a lizard, as made evident by the uncharacteristic glow of warmth tracing lines in its scaly skull.
“I thought you motherfuckers were all dead,” he told it, raising the weapon more seriously. It tracked it with a wariness full of recognition. “Guess I was wrong.”
He almost expected it to come at him there and then, but it kept its distance, circling him carefully, with neither willing to commit to the first attack. It had understood him, he knew that much, because he’d seen the look of shock that crossed its face, but losing that element of surprise was all the more reason for it to cut and run. There was no way for it to beat a fusion-blade—it had to know that—so there was only one possible reason for it to stay: it was expecting help.
It didn’t take extensive military training to spot the impending ambush. There was only one place where it could expect to lure him into range of heavier vegetation—a massive fallen tree that had been overtaken by rot and the ground coverage. He played along, letting it draw him in, keeping his eyes on it even as his ears and body listened to the world around him. The one in front of him feinted, but Adrian was already moving when the two others launched themselves from the top of the decaying trunk. Whatever the first had thought would happen with its feint, it certainly wasn’t the solid punch to the face with a metal-clad fist, nor the follow-up stab through the upper torso.
It spasmed in a silent, involuntary scream while death overtook it, and Adrian flung himself aside as the newcomers landed. He was ready for them, grinning like the apex predator he was, while surprise played out across their reptilian features. The first didn’t even have the chance to move before the fusion-blade sliced its skull in half with a steaming hiss, but the other was quicker to react.
With a screech of anger and surprising agility, it sprang at him with a second, enormous lunge, hitting him with scrambling claws and a salivating mouth full of hideous teeth. It had caught him off-guard, and as it sank its claws into his body, it wrapped its spiked tail around him, and it was all his could do to press the hilt of the blade against that monstrous head. There was little doubt that, as they were, it had a definite strength and weight advantage; adrenaline, however, is one hell of a drug. Adrian roared in anger as the claws sank deeper, lifting its weight into forward momentum and slamming it against the jutting branches of the dead tree. He felt its bones crack and break, and the gurgle of its pain, but it kept its grip and stared back with pure, focused malice.
So much focus that it was undone; fixated as it was, it missed his fingers snaking forth until they were already knuckle deep into an eyeball and crunching into the creature that had taken the place of its brain. It recoiled immediately, flailing in shock and releasing Adrian in one movement, giving him the space to strike out with one final stab of the fusion blade. It screeched as he skewered it through the chest, but fell silent as he shifted his stance and sliced upwards through its skull. Nervous system still twitching, it fell forward into a shuddering heap, no longer a threat to anything.
Wounded, but knowing better than to leave this job half-done, he returned to the first. It was still, but he knew that meant nothing, and he spiked the blade through the skull to be sure. The jungle was returned to its former ambience, but he gave all directions a long and intense stare before taking stock of his injuries.
“Lucky when it counts,” he murmured as he assessed them. They were mostly shallow, and already beginning to clot, but would have hurt a lot more if his nerves were still doing their normal job. An optimist would tell you that every cloud has its silver lining, even the nerve damage that would have killed a human less saturated with Cruezzir. He was also lucky that the Corti Frontline implant still appeared to be working, or these few cuts might have preceded a very nasty way to go.
He sat as the adrenaline passed, regarding the dead creatures and considering how much of a problem they represented. A very bad one, he decided, if they were infecting deathworlder wildlife, because that meant there was no end to how far they might spread. The Cruezzir infestation was bad, the V’Straki and Hunter threats were worse, but this was on another level entirely. The others might, eventually, be controlled, but there was no fix for this; it was probably a sign that the whole planet was beyond saving. “Well, fuck.”
He could only assume that the same fate had not yet befallen the Agwarens—if it had, he doubted there could have been peace between them after their initial misunderstanding—but it was probably only a matter of time. Something else to warn them about, on top of the everything. It’d already been a long list: telling them to make sure everything was cooked in the hope it’d minimise their Cruezzir consumption; giving them the heads-up on the still-living Hunters; and of course alerting them about the aggressive alien soldiers and their ‘skyship’.
The sooner he could get a ‘skyship’ of his own, the better. Until then he was stuck, trying to survive, on what had become a mildly radioactive jungle planet. At least that seemed to wreak havoc with sensors as well, or the V’Straki would probably have found them all by now.
Rest over, he rose to his feet with a grunt, and pressed onward, more alert than ever to the dangers of the forest.
++++
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DATE POINT: 5Y 2M 3D AV
Dawsan Village, Sector Six, Agwaren Crash Zone
Aladyn
The hunting party had known something was wrong in the village long before they actually arrived. They would normally be met by the smells of smoke—that of cooking fires and of the basic industries they’d transplanted from the city—and the distant sound of work being done, but the heavy, warm air smelled only of jungle, and carried only its sounds. For this reason they had approached, not with the triumph of the hunt, but quietly, and with spears and crossbows at the ready.
Even then he’d known it was far too late.
Kalen was the first to see it. “Over there,” he pointed out in a low voice. “Bodies.”
He looked sick, and Aladyn could not blame him; he felt the same way. This was what they all feared when leaving for the hunt. Dalon was, as always, straight to the heart of the matter. “Any sign of those responsible?”
The village was still, but they studied it intently for some time before making a decision. “Seems not,” Aladyn replied. “Let’s go and take a look.”
There was a cold weight upon them as they entered the village, and a flutter of wings as carrion feeders lifted into the air at their approach. Angered by their desecration, Kalen let out a roaring shout to send them on their way, while Dalon took a greater interesting in the bodies themselves.
“They’re all in one place,” Aladyn observed. “Unarmed. This was an execution… or a purge.”
Dalon nodded. “This is nearly everyone… they were thorough, whoever they were. We shall have to check the homes of those missing.”
“In case they survived?” Aladyn asked doubtfully.
“To confirm that they’re dead,” Dalon replied.
Kalen was crouched over a pair of corpses, those of his wife and child, shaking with sorrow. Aladyn looked to Dalon and silently suggested he should go make that check now, on his own, while Aladyn saw to their grieving comrade.
“We will burn them,” Aladyn promised from a respectful distance.
Kalen turned and snarled. “We will avenge them!”
Aladyn nodded. “Yes, but first we will burn them. The carrion feeders have had their feast, we shall not tolerate any further gluttony.”
“Someone comes,” Dalon hissed, hurrying back from his brief departure. He planted his spear in the ground in front of him and once more readying the crossbow. “Hear how the squawkers grow quiet.”
Aladyn nodded; it was obvious from the way the jungle noise grew quiet that something was approaching, and he followed Dalon’s lead.
“They’re back,” growled Kalen, gripping his spear tightly. “This time they will not—”
He was interrupted by the familiar, alien shout of the strange, pale creature from the stars, although the alien words were accompanied by the same speech in their own language. “Good day!? Is there anybody still here?”
Aladyn exhaled and shared a glance with Kalen and Dalon that confirmed they were of one mind: this wasn’t the enemy they were looking for.
“Adrian Saunders,” Aladyn replied, lowering his crossbow only enough to indicate he wasn’t quite ready to start shooting. “Why are you here? As you can see, there is nobody left with whom to trade.”
The village had initially identified the small creature as a threat, given how similar it was to the supposed ‘Chosen One’, whose arrival had brought only further horrors to the world, and they had therefore attacked him immediately. It should have been easy—judging by appearance, the pale creature had been small and weak—but there’d been plenty of brave males injured before peace had been called. Adrian Saunders, or ‘Adrian’ as he more frequently called himself, was fast, nimble, and hit harder than Aladyn would have imagined, and the jungle loved him.
“I can see that, yes,” Adrian confirmed. “I thought you might want to know who did it.”
“The reptile men?” Dalon guessed. That had been Aladyn’s assessment as well, given the efficiency of the killing, but it was always good to have confirmation.
Adrian nodded. “I’ve been around a bit, and it looks as though they’re doing a lot of scouting, and this isn’t the first time they’ve done something like this. Nor is this their first time in our neck of the woods.”
Aladyn nodded, though he’d been told nothing he didn’t already know. Adrian Saunders had already explained that he, the reptile men, and the Crawlers were all originally from the stars, but had made it very clear that he was not aligned with any of them. His knowledge of their origin, and self-claimed relationship with the long-absent Lord Groddi, was what had enticed the elders into accepting his offers of a trading relationship; they had reckoned it would make them all safer in the long run, but once again it seemed that age did not necessarily produce wisdom. “That is not the only reason you’re here.”
He smiled broadly as though caught out in a lie and feeling no shame whatsoever. “It’s bad for all of us if they’re running around here, and I’ve got a real problem with people who think this kind of thing is business as usual.”
“They are our families to avenge,” Kalen said in a low voice.
Aladyn considered the star-born creature carefully, and finally lowered his crossbow the rest of the way. If nothing else, Adrian Saunders would prove useful in helping them achieve their revenge. “If I see any sign of betrayal, I will not fail in killing you a second time.”
“I’m not in the habit of betraying allies,” he replied simply, and although there’d been no sign of fear, there was a subtle reduction in tension as the others lowered their own crossbows.
“Help us here,” Aladyn instructed, knowing what the magic fire-sword could manage. “It will save us much time.”
Adrian nodded and got to work. It was then that they noticed the wounds on his sides, still glistening with that thick red blood. It looked very much as though an overgrown skirrin had nearly gotten the better of him, but given the subject that seemed highly unlikely. He saw them looking, and grimaced. “There’s something else we’ll need to talk about when we’re done here. A new problem I’m not sure we can fix.”
“One thing at a time,” said Dalon bluntly, “and our dead come first.”
Any day that starts with cleaning up the genocide of your home community is going to be a rough one, but Adrian Saunders proved as useful as Aladyn had hoped he’d be. Without his surprising agility, strength, and magic sword, the task would have taken three further days, but they finished halfway through the second.
They stood at the pyre, watching the dead burn, nursing the hollow feeling that came with losing the last of what you held dear. Aladyn might have wept, as Kalen did, but the whole thing was far too big, so overwhelming that he could only experience it with a certain sense of detachment. That might have been for the best, though; he could grieve once he’d made justice, or simply find his rest in the last sleep.
Silence was observed throughout the rites, as it needed to be, and to Aladyn’s surprise, Dalon did an excellent job for leading the observation. Finally, when each of the dead had been quietly set to flame, they retreated to the communal hall that was normally full of activity. Finding the best of what was available, Dalon poured them all cups of arosia, carved up the salted meats, and set it out alongside thick, heavy chunks of bread.
“Eat, drink, and remember what we have lost,” he said as he took his own seat, although it was mainly directed towards Kalen, who remained too filled with his grief to do anything but remember what he’d lost.
Aladyn didn’t suffer from the same malady—if anything he’d gladly stuff himself so he’d have something to feel, even if it was just physical discomfort—and heaped his plate with generous portions.
“My mind moves to matters of vengeance,” Dalon said as he took his own serving.
“Justice,” Aladyn corrected. “This crime demands justice, not bloodthirsty revenge.”
“In this they are one and the same,” Dalon replied.
They shared a sidelong glance at the small creature sitting beside them, perhaps whether there might be some interjection of space-borne wisdom, but it seemed that Adrian was more focused on his own meal. He’d said little since his arrival, which was a notable and welcome change from his previous visits; he had been respectful, and that had not gone unnoticed.
“I recall another matter being mentioned,” Aladyn noted, his mind returning to the conversation of the previous day. “Is that not correct?”
Adrian finished chewing a mouthful of meat, swallowed, and nodded firmly; even from this, it was clear that it was a matter of importance. “Probably the worst thing so far.”
“I find that difficult to believe,” Aladyn replied darkly.
“Fair enough,” Adrian conceded. “I assume you know what a parasite is, though?”
Once upon a time, that would have been an absurd question—gutworms and leg-biters had been so commonplace that even someone from the stars would have learned about them sooner rather than later—but Aladyn hadn’t seen them since the Change, and Adrian had arrived some time after.
“We do,” Aladyn confirmed.
“This will sound crazy,” Adrian prefaced, although Aladyn could hardly imagine a situation that was any crazier than what he was already living, “but this type will eat your mind, and use your body for a puppet.”
Like the others, Aladyn laughed. “A body-stealer? Those are just stories made up by parents wanting their children to do as they are told!”
Adrian Saunders did not laugh. “Not anymore. They’re in the animals, and given time they’ll be in the people, too.”
Aladyn stopped laughing, as did the others; it was clear that he was deadly serious. “How are they stopped?”
“Killing them individually isn’t the problem here, it’s the fact they can spread to damned near everything,” Adrian replied. “A big fuck-off explosion nearly did the trick once, but I’m running a bit short on those right now.”
“I don’t see how this changes anything,” said Kalen. “We already know who our enemy is. We already know our mission. If you expect us to stop this—”
“There is no stopping this,” Adrian interrupted. “The animals will go first, then it’ll be the people. I don’t have a plan to stop it… not a good plan, anyway, but maybe I can save a few lives if I can find a way off-world.”
Aladyn shared a glance with his fellow hunters. Dalon took a long drink of his arosia, staring at the star-creature with that intense gaze of his. “Our vengeance ties us here.”
“Our families are here,” Kalen added.
Were here, Aladyn thought, though he at least refrained from correcting Kalen out loud. Either way, the very concept of abandoning his entire world to some monster was not something that sat well with him.
“Your revenge will get you killed,” Adrian said flatly, “but I’ve had a while to think this over, and I reckon you’ll be able to help my plan, if you’re interested.”
“We would have to hear it first,” Aladyn allowed. Unlike Kalen he was not so blinded by grief that he could not see the value in an ally like Adrian Saunders.
“In brief, we take down some V’Straki soldiers, so that I can get enough time to convince one that he should take me to his leader,” Adrian explained. “If I can get myself aboard their ship, I can try to figure out the rest from there.”
“That is not a plan,” Dalon replied icily. “It is a very good example of a complicated suicide attempt.”
“It could come to that,” Adrian admitted, “but I can’t think of any other way to get aboard that ship. This whole area is filled with trashed technology, and even the Hunters—the Crawlers as you call them—are showing up more often without their usual replacement parts.”
Adrian had once discussed the Crawlers with the Elders, and Aladyn had been privileged enough to listen in. They had come from the stars, much as he had, but were monsters even there. They had replaced many of their body parts with machines so amazing that they might have been magic, just as his own sword was, but the same cause of the Change was also forcing their natural bodies to restore themselves. This, he claimed, was better for everyone, but Aladyn had his doubts. He had seen the creatures only once, and from a distance, but even then he’d noted how they moved as though they were of a single mind, and that alone made them a threat to be taken seriously. Maybe there were only a few of them, but they were a danger to any less coordinated force.
“Why is the sky-ship so important to you?” Aladyn asked. To him it was the home of their enemy, and therefore something to be destroyed, but it did not move from its position and it was far easier to strike the lizards as they came to the ground. “Just because you could leave on it?”
“Because it can save you, me, and a shitload of other people,” he replied. “It’s my last option, and if you want anything more than a big fuck-you to the V’Straki, then it’s your last option too.”
“The big fuck-you does sound good,” Dalon mused, glancing towards Kalen, “but… we were both soldiers, once, Aladyn, and we had the same teacher. What do you think?”
It took a shared history, but Aladyn knew what his comrade was getting at. Neither of them were common rabble like Kalen, but had been trained in strategy as well as combat, and he could hear the old man’s wisdom: ‘choose your battles wisely’. In this sense it meant that the price of a single battle could be the victory in a war they hadn’t known they were involved in. “What do you intend to do with the lizards if your plan succeeds?”
“No fucking idea,” Adrian replied, “but I can promise you they won’t love it.”
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DATE POINT: 5Y 2M 4D AV
STARPORT THREE OF GAMLIS HOMEWORLD
ASKIT
“It’s cold out here,” Askit complained as they stepped out of their stolen, illicitly re-registered starship and into the third largest starport on the planet. The Gamlis Homeworld was the last remnant of a civilisation that had spanned thirty-seven worlds—albeit many in a very minor capacity—and was still heavily populated in comparison to other declining civilisations. It even retained its impressive architecture, which favoured hued crystals more than most contemporary species could enjoy, but it was supposedly maintained entirely by a fleet of maintenance robots originally deployed before they entered their final phase. Part of this maintenance should have included keeping the starport at the settings recommended for minimal discomfort, but evidently that was one guideline they’d abandoned for some time.
The cold did not bother the humans, and naturally they were just as concerned about his comfort as one might have expected. “You’re the one who decided to forgo trousers,” said Darragh. “Even though we keep asking you to wear them.”
“There are so many things wrong with that idea I don’t even know where to begin,” Askit replied, rubbing his arms to generate some extra body heat. “And in any case, Kefani is hardly wearing anything by human standards.”
“Shorts and a t-shirt are not ‘hardly anything’,” Darragh replied after a brief visual study of Keffa. “If you want to swing your junk around in starports, you’re going to be wearing the consequences.”
“Nice pun,” Keffa replied, having ignored their conversation thus far. “You know, this place is just amazing! So many crystals!”
“If you like that sort of thing,” said Askit.
“My mother is big into ‘healing crystals’,” Darragh replied. “It’s actually a touch ridiculous, but she had a whole lot of them around the house when I was growing up. Salt-lamps as well, to combat all the ‘positive ions’ and promote general well-being.”
Askit stared at him. “You’re saying that humans can heal in proximity to crystal structures?”
“No, she’s just off her tree,” Darragh replied. “Did my dad’s nut in, I tell you.”
Sometimes humans liked to have conversations for no other reason than to hear themselves talk; this seemed to be one of those times.
“This place is a lot quieter than I thought it would be,” Keffa noted as they passed through the check in. “I mean… it’s so big, you expect activity.”
“It was active,” Askit replied, “before the Gamel fell into decline. Now nobody comes here.”
“I suppose that means there’ll be no lines,” Darragh joked, “so it should be a quick check-in.”
“There won’t be a check-in,” Askit replied. “You don’t understand… they’re in their final phase, so they don’t care about things like that. They primarily care about whatever satisfies them in the moment.”
“Must be nice,” Darragh returned.
“If their machines didn’t look after them, they would all be dead by now,” Askit snapped back. “Nobody comes here because, to the rest of the galaxy, they are already dead.”
They crossed a bridge at that moment, where a massive window revealed a sweeping city-scape. It was clean, powered, and in good order, but there were few signs of the inhabitants who supposedly lived there. “Case in point.”
“Lights are on, but nobody’s home,” Keffa intoned in hushed tones. It sounded rhetorical, so Askit didn’t bother answering; she was definitely close to the mark, though.
“There’s somebody home,” Darragh replied, clearly not understanding rhetoric. “We just need to find them.”
“Easier done than said,” said Askit, taking the lead. “They’re all fitted with bio-trackers for the medi-rescue systems. Our first step needs to be the nearest hospital.”
“They just let the government track them wherever they go?” Darragh asked, aghast. This once more proved he became horrified at all the wrong things.
“There is no government,” Askit replied, weary of belabouring the point. “They install a suite of implants without even considering what they actually need. Given what we know, the Guvnuragnaguvendrugun are nearing the same fate, and with our ridiculous reliance on technology, the Corti are soon to follow.”
“Oh,” said Darragh, as understanding finally dawned. “How… do you feel about that?”
Askit raised an eyebrow and stared at Darragh. “How do I feel about the prospective extinction of my species?”
He at least had the sense to know when he’d asked something very stupid. Surely even the worst criminal wouldn’t want to see the complete destruction of their own species. “Yeah… maybe forget I asked that.”
A maintenance bot cruised past them, following the path indicated for its use—an indicator intended for people, rather than the machines that used them.
“That’s a ship maintenance bot,” Keffa noted as it passed. “I recall rejecting the offer.”
“System glitch?” Darragh asked, looking to Askit. “Or maybe someone else just got here.”
“I think it’s more likely that we’ve just been subtly inspected,” Askit replied, staring after the robot. “I think we should go to the nearest security room. Darragh, carry me while I work.”
He pulled out his data-pad and started working, connecting to the starport’s local network and nearly instantly brute-forced his way through its rather pathetic security systems. Darragh, grumbling, picked him up and cradled him awkwardly as they hurriedly walked towards their objective.
“Can’t you walk while you do that?” he complained.
Askit ignored him, consumed with checking the logs of the robot administrative system. It was, unfortunately, exactly as he had suspected—something had ordered the ship maintenance bot to take that route, and it wasn’t an automated process—and now the long-dormant security force was coming back online. This response was the kind of thing you might expect when an actual invasion was going on, not when three criminals paraded themselves through the empty halls of a derelict starport.
“Less talking, more running,” he advised. “There’s an army of security drones on their way.”
“What did you do?!” Keffa demanded, even as she picked up the pace. “We were just—”
“Identified by our enemy, most likely,” Askit finished for her. “These aren’t automated processes, something is definitely giving the orders here.”
“Can’t you do something?” Darragh asked. The whine of an approaching army of drones had become audible, produced by the mix of hover-drones and wheeled-drones that normally augmented a flesh-and-blood security force.
“I am doing something!” Askit snapped back, and opened the doors to the security room ahead of them. “Those are normally opened from the inside! You’re welcome.”
The doors slid closed a moment after opening as something else issued its own commands, but by that time they were already inside.
“Cook the door controls!” Askit ordered Keffa. “I haven’t got sole ownership of it just yet.”
“Won’t that trap us in the room?” Darragh asked as Keffa did as she was told. Her Irbzrk stun-gun was set to Deathworlder, and was more than a match for the sensitive electronics that governed an automated security door.
“I’ll figure something out!” Askit promised him, and indicated that he could be returned to his own feet. “I mean… they’re not exactly using the smartest tactics available.”
The pounding on the door indicated that the bots had arrived, and that they were combining their firepower to try to blast their way through. It was deafening, like an endless roll of thunder, but it could have been worse; the door could have been wide open. Humans were resilient against standard firearms, and could even survive the anti-tank kinetic weapons, but security bots carried a heavier grade of weapon.
“I’ve got more bad news,” he told them as he expanded his hold on the computer systems. “I think we’re going to need a new ship.”
“We just got that ship!” Keffa returned.
“Well, that ship is currently being ‘unmaintained’ by a small fleet of maintenance bots,” Askit replied, and brought up a visual feed of the pad on which they’d landed. The damage they’d produced in such a short time was extraordinary, and there was no doubt that the ship was far from spaceworthy.
“We’re going to need a new ship,” Keffa agreed. “We’ll have to get out of here, first, though.”
Askit finally managed to get control of the security room’s local systems, temporarily locking down the hidden files that housed who-knew how many insurgent identities. Until now he’d thought that this would be a reasonably straightforward task—one that demanded relatively little of his expertise—but now he was wondering if the whole plan had been a terrible mistake. “This is bad. Every system is infested with the same Hierarchy digital forms that populate the implants. Extrapolating from that, I think it’s fair to say they have total control over this planet and everything on it.”
They stared at him in plain horror.
“Can…” Keffa started, “can you do anything?”
Askit scrolled to the most heavily encrypted section of the data-tab, a place that the standard software was incapable of registering without the help of a custom module he’d personally designed. There was a file there, a digital weapon, but the consequences of actually using were unthinkable. Dying in this shit-hole, however, was even more-so. “I can,” he told her. And he did.
“Done,” he said, turning to them. “We’re about to lose the use of our translators. Fortunately my English is only mostly terrible.”
“How does that help?” Darragh asked, baffled.
They all startled as the door made a metallic breaking sound, revealing that the damage was far more extensive than they’d thought. It continued for longer than Askit would have liked, but eventually fell silent.
The lights went out.
“How does all this help?!” Darragh reiterated.
Askit must have been better equipped for understanding English than he’d thought. “I talked to Jen at Ark Station,” he told them in laboured English. “She gave me ideas… computer security ideas. Do you know what a ‘worm virus’ is?”
“Not really,” Darragh replied. “I wasn’t really into computers that much… and you’re speaking English!”
“Well… I have just destroyed this planet,” Askit replied, tossing aside the now useless data-pad. It was a scrambled mess, now that the worm had been unleashed, and with the incredibly interwoven, unprotected, and outmoded security arrangements present on the planet, it should already be making the leap to the other major cyber-junctions. It would destroy everything it touched; automated systems would be stopping planet-wide, potentially killing the less resilient Gamel when their implants started failing. After millennia of progress, peace, and prosperity, civilisation on the Gamlis homeworld had finally come to its end.
“Oh…” said Darragh.
“What does that mean for us?” Keffa asked, easily the more pragmatic of the human pair.
“It means we’re stuck here,” Askit replied. “Indefinitely.”
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End of Chapter