by A. R. Knight
I’m about to dive into the recording of Sapphrite’s capture when my perception shakes. The Cache goes hazy. The words blur and then disappear entirely and I’m back in our room. Only now we’re not alone.
Sapphrite is waiting for me to break out of the Cache, and it’s by itself. Staring at me. The room itself remains dark, and, so far as a glance tells me, Malo and Viera are still asleep.
“Come with me,” Sapphrite says.
There are any number of reasons I should say no to this, but the reason I agree, why I follow Sapphrite out of that room is that, to me, I’m still the Empress of the Charre. I still have a people, even if they’re far across the stars, and those people deserve an Empress who tries all she can to keep them safe.
I can’t do that by hiding in the room.
Sapphrite’s chair goes slow, which I don’t mind as it gives my eyes time to recover from the dark room. We wind through the Bunker’s corridors and back out towards the wing table. There’s nobody waiting for us, and Sapphrite keeps on going. Down into the tents.
“You have a Cache,” Sapphrite states.
As the Amigga caught me using it, there doesn’t seem to be a reason to lie, so I just nod. Sapphrite doesn’t respond and I remember the Amigga, and it’s facing forward now. Guiding us through the piles of refuse and sleeping bodies.
“Yes,” I say. “The Sevora gave it to me.”
“It is a dangerous tool,” Sapphrite says. “I’ve known many who have lost themselves in one. Knowledge can be as intoxicating as any drug, and if you forget your body while you slide through a Cache’s endless troves, they can be fatal.”
I get that the Amigga’s probably making conversation, but I’m not in the mood for pointless chatter.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“Nowhere,” Sapphrite replies. “I want you to take in this place, the species that are suffering here, waiting for hope, so that when we ask you, you’ll say yes.”
I’m not so cold that I don’t see what Sapphrite’s talking about;. For all the small cook fires, most of the species here look gaunt and tired. Sickly or old. Fur, when present, is patchy and the slug-like bodies of the Whelks bear a number of crusted, calcified patches.
“The Sevora could crush you whenever they wanted,” I say. “It’s not that they can’t find you, it’s that they don’t care.”
“Not enough,” Sapphrite agrees. “We used to be stronger. We would hit the surface often, cause chaos. Try to get off a message to the Vincere with Vimelia’s location. But we never succeeded, and now we’ve lost many, while the Sevora only get better at keeping their hosts contained.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“If the Chorus learns about Vimelia, they’ll send a force here too strong for the Sevora to survive. We need to get the location of this world out, Kaishi. You can help us do that.”
“And what do we get? Malo, Viera and I?”
“You get to go home,” Sapphrite says. “You get to forget about this world, this fight. Go back to the life you used to know.”
I laugh. It’s a cynical bark, but I can’t help it. Forget? I would never, and I wouldn’t want to.
“There’s no going back once you’ve had a voice in your head,” I reply. “Once you’ve seen and felt what we’ve seen and felt.”
Sapphrite doesn’t argue the point, but the Amigga does turn itself around. We’re at the foot of another stair, and I realize there’s no elevators in this chamber. None of the doors have ramps leading to them. The Amigga must have someone carry it, or else it’s been stuck down here for a very long time.
“Perhaps not, but you can try.” Sapphrite starts puttering back through the tents, and I have no choice but to follow.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned since Malo took me away from my tribe, it’s that charity is rare. Sapphrite’s offering us a getaway, but it has to have a reason. Dalachite didn’t care at all about anything other than itself and its experiments. I can’t expect Sapphrite to be different.
“What’s your reason?” I ask Sapphrite as we trundle by a trio of sleeping Flaum. “Why help all of these people?”
Sapphrite doesn’t stop. Its metal arms hang limp at its sides as it rolls along. “The Sevora ruined everything I worked for. Destroyed my research, prevented me from completing my life’s purpose. Bringing about their end by the force of my fellow Amigga would be the sweetest revenge.”
“That’s it? Revenge?”
Now the Amigga stops, rotates the chair so that it stares at me fully with its single eye. “I am going to die, Kaishi. On this planet, I cannot access the therapies that allow Amigga to continue on indefinitely. Riddles we solved ages ago are now coming back to tear apart my body. An Amigga may be killed, but dying? Of natural causes?”
It’s expecting me to share in its bafflement, its head-shaking denial of a process that’s taken every Solare and Charre for as long as humanity’s existed.
“Amigga don’t die?” I finally manage to ask.
“Not that way. Not unless you’re cut off,” Sapphrite hisses out a sigh through its speaker. “Which I have been, for far too long.”
When we get back to the wing, Malo and Viera, along with Rackt and several others, are waiting for us. My friends don’t look particularly thrilled as I approach with the Amigga, and I can guess why.
“Nice job keeping watch, Empress,” Viera says to me as we walk up. “There’s nothing I like better after a long sleep than waking up with this thing in my face.”
She nods towards a purplish Whelk. The slug-like thing, for its part, does what I think is a shrug by quivering its body and rolling its eyes.
“It’s my fault,” Sapphrite takes over. “I asked her to come with me, so that she could learn, so that she can help you to understand why you’ll be going back up to the surface.”
“I know why we’ll be heading back up,” Viera replies, her spitfire returning with her energy. “To get off this place and head home. Right, Kaishi?”
Malo doesn’t say anything, but by his straight look, I know he’s wishing the same thing. Sapphrite, apparently done for the moment, only stares at me and waits.
“They want our help, Viera,” I start. “And they’re going to give us a chance to go home, yes.”
“The way you’re saying that makes it seem like there’s a catch.”
I didn’t serve long as Empress - not before being removed by a pair of angry Oratus, anyway. In that time, though, I learned to recognize an audience. To understand I’m not really delivering a speech to one person when I answer a question, but to everyone.
“Clarity’s Dawn needs help,” I say. “They’re going to lose this fight, and soon, unless we help them turn Vimelia into a target for the Vincere. Sapphrite has a plan, and part of that has us ending up with a ship and heading home, but we can’t just leave on our own.” Now I quirk a small smile at Viera. “Not least because none of us knows how to fly one of those ships.”
There’s a beat, then Viera throws a theatrical sigh out into the air. “Fine. What’s this plan?”
“It’s going to take some courage,” Sapphrite says. “But I think you’re the perfect trio to pull it off.”
14 One Deal After Another
One violet, the color of approaching twilight, and the other a bluish white, like a new dawn. The Sisters emerge from their house like a pair of particularly smooth liquids, minus their eye stalks, which orient on the Oratus without surprise.
They both form up, standing, or rather, sitting at half a meter in height. Sax and Bas stare down at them, and Sax prepares to tell his story.
“Brother,” the blue sister starts. “You’ve once again caused a problem. We’ve already removed you from this level, stripped you of administrative rights.”
“What else can we do?” says the violet one.
“I have an idea, Sister,” the blue one replies.
“What’s that, sister?”
“These two, they are looking for our favor, yes?”
Four eyestalks rotate towards Sax and Bas, and the Oratus nod.
“Then here’s my plan,” the blue one says. “Kill our brother, and we will listen to your proposal.”
“What?” D’Arscale flaps. “Kill me?”
“You’ve become a liability,” the violet one says. “I agree with your plan. Oratus, do you agree as well?”
Sax looks at Bas, who bares her teeth. D’Arscale has done nothing to deserve their mercy, done nothing but deserve its own demise.
“We agree,” Sax hisses.
D’Arscale tries to run, its liquid body squirming back while its eyestalks turn into that hard Ooblot cement.
Sax catches him with his tail, wraps it tight around D’Arscale. Looms over the Ooblot, then turns back to the Sisters. “How?”
“However you wish,” the blue one says. “We’re not monsters.”
So Sax does it the kind way - asks for the nearest airlock. There’s one on this level, ready for rapid escapes - so together the six of them cross the garden to it. Eneks places a feathered hand on the center of the circular door, which chimes an affirmative as it opens.
“This is what you want?” Bas asks as Sax grips the Ooblot with all four claws.
“Our brother has caused far too much annoyance to be left alive,’ the blue one says.
“It continues to forget our birthdays,” the violet one adds. “Among many other insults. D’Arscale is simply not worthy of the Ooblot name.”
“You’re evil!” D’Arscale thaws itself long enough to patter out a series of harsher invectives, none of which seem to phase the Sisters in the slightest.
“Do you see?” says the blue one when D’Arscale at last falls quiet. “No use keeping such a thing around.”
“Do it,” the violet one says.
With that debate settled, Sax throws the struggling, helpless D’Arscale inside the airlock. Eneks shuts the door, and with a second press opens the portal to the cold void of space.
Sax is certain D’Arscale is screaming, but they hear no sound as the Ooblot is sucked away into the infinite nothing.
With that taken care of, Sax turns to face the Sisters and, at their prompting, tells them about Twillo, about needing Plake’s cargo purchased so that Sax and Bas can secure a ride off the station.
“You don’t like it here?” asks the blue one, who introduces itself as L’Reneo. “Scrapper Station isn’t paradise to a pair of Oratus?”
“It’s not built for us,” Bas throws in a much more diplomatic answer than Sax would have managed.
“Like most of civilization, it would seem,” the violet sister, N’Ollene says. “Yet we must continue anyway, even if our efforts displease the mighty Oratus.”
“Your sarcasm isn’t necessary,” Sax hisses.
“Oh, but it is. We can’t hurt you physically, so words must be our only weapons,” N’Ollene replies.
“Why hurt us at all?” Bas says. “We want to leave, you can facilitate that. Do so, and you’ll be thanked.”
“By who?” L’Reneo says.
“The Vincere,” Sax says. “They’re looking for us.”
The Sisters swivel their eye stalks towards each other. Hold the stare for a second, then swivel back towards the two Oratus. For his part, Eneks seems to be enjoying staring out that airlock after the disappearing bit of light that is D’Arscale’s vacuum-frozen body.
“Then we can make a deal.” L’Reneo quivers as it says this.
“I don’t want any more deals,” Sax hisses. “I’m tired of deals. Tired of wandering around this station and talking to people who are, somehow, connected to everyone else.”
“Oh, but you’ll like this deal,” N’Ollene says. “It’s right in your department. Your expertise, if you will.”
“What?” Bas says.
“You want a way out, and we want a particular person removed.” L’Reneo shifts its eye stalks towards Eneks. “Our friend’s brother was recently killed in a horrible attack on this very station, by a Whelk. A red one.”
“Kill the Whelk, and we’ll let Twillo purchase your provisions.” N’Ollene adds.
“But the Whelk works for Plake - if we kill him, she’ll never give us her ship.” Sax shakes his head.
“Then perhaps you’ll just have to kill all of them and take her ship for yourself.” L’Reneo says. “Scrapper Station demands justice for our slain resident, Oratus. Deliver it, and you’ll get what you want.”
15 Playing the Game
I’m exploring the tents with Malo as a way to relax, to see and explore among the colored lights, sights, and sounds of species abuzz. I don’t think the details of Sapphrite’s plan have made it out to the public, but anyone could tell there’s major movements going on - for one, the Bunker is flooding with people going in and out. The various airlocks leading away from the settlement open and shut constantly, as Clarity’s Dawn agents, engineers, and runners send messages and materials to where they need to be.
Viera’s off with Rackt, who’s promised to find her some miners and make sure she knows how to shoot them. Malo’s happier with the jagged blades they have scattered around - most seemingly broken off from scrap - so he takes on the role of my protector as we wander.
“In a lot of ways, this feels like my home,” I say as we shift past a quartet of Teven huddled around a cook fire. “Everyone living, working together to survive.”
“There was no existential threat back home,” Malo replies. “All of these species know they could be dead in a moment if the Sevora above decided they were worth the effort.”
“You don’t think we felt the same way about the Charre? The Lunare? Either of you could have crushed us if you’d chose to.”
Malo shakes his head. “We never had an interest in conquest. Plenty of land to the West for us. Raiding your tribes was more about keeping our soldiers ready, confident. About gathering honorable sacrifices.”
“Well now I feel better.”
We pass by a ramshackle shop that’s glowing with blue light. I look inside and see racks and racks of small cubes against the walls, most of them pulsing. They’re hypnotizing, and I step in, reach for one to see how it feels, when something long and furry grabs my arm.
“Unless you’re pure energy, better not touch those,” it’s a rasping voice, quiet and harsh. “They’ll burn right through your skin, melt your bones and turn you into a smoking puddle.”
I follow the arm and see it’s linked to a three-limbed, monstrous thing with what looks like a half-mouth sticking up and out of a wide torso. As if a Flaum and Amigga had been smashed together, without much care for how things fit.
“Keep your hands off her,” Malo says, stepping between us.
“Meant no harm,” the creature’s mouth twists and snaps as it talks. “Just trying to keep your friend from killing herself.”
“Thank you,” I speak quickly. “For the warning.”
I don’t see any eyes on the creature, yet it clearly knows where we stand, as it’s oriented towards us, and its central arm - the one that grabbed me - hangs ready to reach out again. The other two limbs, its legs, end in what appear to be massive, but thin feet.
“What are you?” Malo asks the question, which I’m thankful for, even if it comes off as rude.
“An accident.” The creature doesn’t seem the slightest bit embarrassed about this. “A Sevora mistake. An old one, too. Tried coupling different species in one of their vats, and when it didn’t work out, they tried to have me killed.”
“You escaped?”
“Freed,” the creature scrapes a laugh. “The Sevora scientist that grew me thought it’d be cruel to burn me down. So it let me go in the sewers instead, like that’s some kind of mercy. Fell my way down here and look, a useless split-breed keeping watch on batteries. What an achievement.”
“So these go in the miners?” I nod towards the cubes.
“Everything else too,” the creature replies. “We siphon off what power we can from up above. It�
�s not much, but it keeps this place warm, the filters running and our weapons with enough juice to cause some damage.”
“You don’t seem that excited?”
“What’s there to be excited about? That attack Sapphrite’s planning?” Again the creature falls into its hacking laugh, which is starting to annoy me. “We’ve done hundreds of those. They cause some chaos, but the Sevora always drive us away. Then they come for revenge, but their factions keep anyone from committing too much, so we nurse our wounds and wait to try again.”
“You can’t win a war that way.” Malo glances at me, his eyes moving towards the exit. “There has to be drive, a willingness to keep fighting until the enemy is gone.”
“Or you’ve made peace,” I add, taking my own step away from the creature.
“Peace. There’s a funny idea. You think I’m down here because I declared war on the Sevora?” The creature follows us as we step away from the glowing cubes. “No. They wanted me gone because I reminded them of their own failures. I’m a stain to be wiped away, not something to be bargained with.”
We reach the edge of the shop and keep going, both of us making half-hearted goodbyes.
“To them, we’re nothing!” the creature calls as we head away. “Nothing!”
We make it to a quiet spot with a few scattered boxes between a pair of larger tents. A string of glowing green lights gives the clearing a calming ambiance, which is what I’m looking for after the encounter with the strange battery keeper.
“Looks like the jungle, doesn’t it?” I say to Malo as I head for the box.
It’s not exactly a comfortable chair, but just sitting for a moment gives my mind a chance to reset. To breath in the smells and wind them around thoughts. So many of them on the edge of familiarity, so many entirely new.
“I don’t know what jungle you lived in, Kaishi, but the one I remember didn’t have lights like these,” Malo sits down near me. I notice he’s picked up a broken bar of metal from somewhere and holds it like he used to hold his spear.
“It hasn’t been all that long,” I say. “But it feels like forever since we’ve left home.”
