Triorion Omnibus

by L. J. Hachmeister

  “But that in of itself is very dangerous,” Razar interjected. “The Alliance can’t just send an SMT, so for this mission, for the potential ramifications behind it, I’ve ordered the activation of a Sleeper Agent rather than send a full regiment. We need to go quietly on this one, and one of our Agents has a better chance among those Godforsaken Scabbers and Necros than we do.”

  “Why? What are you looking for?” Triel asked.

  Unipoesa understood his role now, why Razar hadn’t wiped his mind yet and why it was still important for him to play soldier and fight Li. He had never rid himself of the guilt over the death of his human surrogate mother, and a chance like this, to help the human race, might help him set things right.

  “Besides the answer to their identity, other important survivors from the Exodus—ones that were never accounted for. Specifically, one that might know how to save our planets, keep us from war,” Unipoesa replied. All eyes turned to him, and a silence fell upon the room. “With the twins alive and well, it could theoretically be possible.”

  “I have sent each of you a set of specific instructions on what needs to be done to monitor our Sleeper Agent, gather intelligence on Li, sweep the human colonies for other ancestral survivors, or help with the recon mission for Jetta. How is the team looking?” Razar asked Mo.

  “We’ve set up a perimeter around Fiorah,” the chief of military intelligence replied. “Our attempts at placing undercover police on the streets have been unsuccessful, but we’re still trying. No contact reports from any of our teams.”

  “Godich locals,” Razar said. “Keep at it. Secure her sister with me—I will debrief Jaeia myself about the situation. Meeting adjourned.”

  “Wait—wait,” Triel said as the other officers rose to leave. “There is something I still don’t understand. They’re not genetically telepathic?”

  DeAnders shook his head. “No. I can’t explain where their abilities come from. We’re still working on it. It might be a subatomic mutation we’ve never seen before.”

  Her eyes widened. “That could be a very big problem.”

  Those who had headed towards the exit paused. Razar ceased his private conversation with Wren and all eyes turned to her.

  “Minister Razar, you have to let me go back to Algar,” the Healer said. “There is something there that might explain where the twins come from.”

  Unipoesa crossed the room and stood by her side. She looked up at him, clear blue eyes pleading with him to advocate for her request.

  “There isn’t much left of Algar,” he said gently, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Certain groups of expatriates and defectors have set up camp on tribal grounds. It’s not safe.”

  “I didn’t think you’d let me go alone,” she said. “Have Reht escort me. He can get around anywhere, better than if you send me in with troops.”

  “We have plans for Captain Jagger and his crew,” Razar said. Unipoesa gave Triel credit for trying to help her friends, though her method wasn’t the least bit subtle. “And plans for you, Triel. We need you to help us find Jetta. You’re one of the few people she’ll talk to. Maybe you can reason with her.”

  As the others filed out of the room, Unipoesa lingered behind with the Healer.

  She looked away from him, playing with the webbing between her fingers. “What I’m about to tell you goes against everything I’ve ever been taught, everything I believe in.”

  “It must be extremely important, then.”

  “If I’m right, and the foremost tenet of the Healers is to preserve and restore life... then I have to betray my people to save yours.”

  Unipoesa softened his voice. “Triel, I’m on your side.”

  The Healer exhaled heavily. “When I was a child, there was only one tale that the elders would tell in whispers,” she said, turning around in her chair to face the window. Starlight bathed her face in azure and white light. She closed her eyes, her red lips parting slightly as she took a deep breath. “It was the story of fear and death that only the high tribesmen could know, and even they barely spoke of it. It was the Legend of the Rion, the Abomination, the poisoned one—the mortal who stole from Cudal.”

  “Cudal?” Unipoesa said.

  “It’s our name for the Otherworld, the realm of the Gods,” she explained before continuing. “Since my father was the chief of our tribe, my brothers and I sometimes followed him around town and spied on his meetings. I overheard some of the legend before I got caught. That’s why I need to go back to Algar. I’m afraid for Jetta and Jaeia, but I’m more afraid for what this will mean if they are ‘unnatural’ telepaths—they are more dangerous than Dissemblers.”

  Unipoesa leaned against the conference table and gazed out at the stars with her.

  “There aren’t many people who believe in them, Triel. I was hoping that you were one of them.”

  “I am,” she said, her eyes welling with tears. “That’s why I’m willing to go back to the one place in the entire universe to which I swore I’d never return.”

  “HEY, CHECK IT,” BOSSY said.

  Agracia had seen the fiery streak in the sky long before Bossy could have picked it up. Her eyes and ears were far better than any other Sentient she knew, especially considering she was part human. “Yeah, that’s a ship. See the way the fuel burns blue and yellow? Ain’t no meteor.”

  “Payday!” Bossy shouted.

  Agracia set down her gear and scanned the horizon. They were about five kilometers from the checkpoint, and the digital readout on her visor displayed about forty percent oxygen reserves and radiation shielding. There wouldn’t be enough time to drop off their gear at the checkpoint and then make a run for the downed ship. Most likely there were other scavenging Jocks lurking around to beat them to the payload or steal her gear if she chanced it.

  “You’re sitting on this one?” Bossy exclaimed. “All because of that lousy letter?”

  For the first time since she could remember, Agracia didn’t know what to do. Her gut pulled her to stay on the job, especially since it was sure to be lucrative. But a downed ship—especially one that left that big of a tail—would be just as big, and guaranteed. Then maybe they’d scrap together enough dough to move on, maybe hit the Mars colony for a few years, the Belt, Saturn—something other than this forgotten wasteland—without having to resort to the fighting rings, selling chits or joining up with another crew.

  “Sycha,” Agracia said, adjusting the straps on her harness. Bossy had ripped off some drunken Jocks, affording them some decent gear to get across the wasteland. Dropping it this close to a Pit would mean they’d lose it, no question.

  “Look, we can make it to the ship, right?” Bossy said. “We got enough tools on us to fix something when we get there, especially with all them fancy new parts we’ll acquire.”

  “A temporary shelter?” Agracia said, eyeing the amber sunset. It would be dark in less than an hour. “Even if we could with the scrap we have, we’d have to take shifts staying up. We ain’t shutting eye without guns lit.”

  “Fine, fine. I won’t sleep.”

  “And what if someone survives that wreck?” Agracia asked, testing her. It was hard to see her expression through the reflective visor.

  “Say what? Are you kidding? If they survive, good for them. They can walk home.”

  “God, you’re worse than a chakking dog-soldier,” Agracia laughed. “Alright, but it’s a long shot. Better hope we can put something together, or we’re toast.”

  “Well it’s a chakking good thing I’m smarter than you!” Bossy said.

  Agracia grinned and punched her in the shoulder. “Watch it, kid. That mouth of yours is gonna get you screwed up one day.”

  “Chak off, Grace.”

  They walked in silence, each of them focusing on their breathing and the radiation meter superimposed over the rolling dirt and scrap landscape.

  “Chakking Scabbers,” Agracia cursed as she stepped around and through the skeletal remains of an old building. Wh
y anyone would choose to remain in the wastelands of Earth defied all logic. The dump of a planet should have been abandoned centuries ago, especially considering how much it cost to maintain the Pits, but the Scabbers—humans that couldn’t let go of their dream of revitalizing the dead planet—were determined to stay put. Earth only existed because of the black market trade, and the few that could get by selling artifacts and giving tours of the graveyard cities. But that was it. The underground Pits that shielded the dwindling inhabitants from radiation and severe weather were crumbling along with the rest of the planet. It wouldn’t be long before the entire place had to be evacuated.

  Or the Alliance decides to use it as a weapons testing site, she thought.

  As they approached the smoldering wreckage, Agracia decided that the chance of someone surviving was slim at best. Black smoke pumped out of the engine exhaust while white fire and red sparks danced across the crushed nose of the cruiser.

  “They were hit,” Bossy said, pointing to the gigantic flaming hole in the engine lock.

  But it didn’t add up. A hit like that came from a military grade weapon. The make of the cruiser looked decent enough, so there must have been adequate shielding from a standard assault. She didn’t know of any crews flying around Earth, and no Scabber could afford machinery like that.

  “They must have been mid-jump,” Agracia surmised.

  Bossy cocked her head and sucked noisily on her lollipop underneath her helmet. “Yeah, you’re right. Where you from?” the kid said, jumping on the wing and looking for the emergency hatch release.

  One of the fuel cells blew, rocking the ship and knocking Bossy off the wing. Agracia caught her, and the two stumbled backwards.

  “Sycha!” Bossy exclaimed. The windshield of the cruiser cracked open, and two hands appeared, struggling to lift it over the damaged hinges.

  Agracia grabbed her gun off her thigh belt and took aim. Bossy, already tossing a ball of 20-20 in her hands, readied for the fight.

  “Chak,” Agracia mumbled. The pilot, bloodied and burnt, slumped over the rim of the cockpit, unable to squeeze through the narrow window.

  “Grace!” Bossy shouted as Agracia lunged for the pilot’s arm. Usually she didn’t give two chaks about someone else’s fate, but she hated crashes, herself having almost baked alive in one, and she couldn’t watch even a sucker like this one go down like that.

  “You trying to get us canned?” Bossy screamed, but she nonetheless helped Agracia drag the pilot to a safe distance from the wreckage. “Give it up—not like he’ll make it that banged up and out here without any protection. He’s gonna die anyway!”

  Agracia dropped the pilot in a pile of rubbish about twenty meters from the wrecked cruiser. His chest still rose and fell, but he sustained a deep gash in his stomach and burns on his right shoulder and arm that would need treatment.

  “We’re not that far from the Pits. We could backtrack.”

  “What?!” Bossy exclaimed. “You can’t be serious. They have Dogs after us now! ‘Sides that, you think they’ll let us back in with all this gear? We’ll have to trade off with the patrol, and then we’ll have nothing—right back where we were. I thought you wanted this job!”

  Agracia knelt down and took the pilot’s helmet in her hands. Maybe if he’s cute, Bossy will reconsider. She gave the helmet a tug, and to her surprise, a head full of auburn-brown hair tumbled out.

  “Holy sycha...” Bossy recognized her, too. “How did you know?”

  Agracia shook her head. She didn’t—but this was going to pay off bigger than any job she’d ever had. “Exposure will kill her before these injuries do. We have to make that shelter.”

  Bossy scanned the wreckage. “We have some D-fuser 226 that could put out that fire. Not much, though. If the cruiser’s shields aren’t blown, I can rig our generator and cross it with the biofield. Should last us the night.”

  Agracia dug through her gear, but couldn’t find a single medical kit or supply of any kind she could use to patch up the battered pilot. Not that it surprised her. Jocks usually discounted that kind of thing, even in the wasteland. It was lazy. Stupid. Just like most Jocks. She just hoped the rumors about the Slaythe’s hyped up biology was true, because there was nothing Agracia could do to keep her alive.

  Frustrated, Agracia grabbed an extra oxygen mask and cinched it over the pilot’s mouth. The woman’s head rolled to the side, and the shallow rise and fall of her chest became sporadic.

  “Hey,” Agracia said, poking her in the ribs. “Don’t you die on me. You’re my paycheck.”

  The last rays of sunshine faded into the deathly browns and rusted yellows that pervaded the planet. She took a deep breath, the stale smell of oxygen and body odor reaching deep into her lungs. Somewhere in the distance she could hear the Necros howling.

  It would be a long night.

  GUNFIRE. SHOUTING. Pain streaking up her arms, chest and neck. A distant rumbling in her ears. Her own heartbeat, shattering her concentration, pummeled away at the insides of her skull.

  Please, oh Gods—

  The blackness of night swirled together with the stars. Above her head she saw a solitary beam of a headlamp swaying back and forth while a red beacon winked in the distance.

  Am I running? No, she couldn’t move. Her neck arched back impossibly, and her arms, pinned to her sides, froze in pain. Someone else was running, dragging her along like a rag doll.

  “Stop,” she groaned through split lips.

  Someone repositioned a mask over her face that blew foul-smelling air into her lungs.

  “Keep quiet!”

  Stay calm. Remember.

  “Skucheka,” Jetta whispered, recalling the attack on her cruiser. Where am I? Not Fiorah—it was never dark there. Someplace else.

  “Jaeia...” she whispered.

  SUITED UP IN HAZARD gear, Jaeia surveyed the remains of the planet Neeis with one of the science crews. The land, once fertile and green, had been reduced to a charred wasteland, destroyed by the Deadwalkers’ nuclear weapons. Entire cities turned into ash and rubble, she mused, putting her hand to her visor and looking up. A line from a poem, perhaps part of a memory she had stolen, came to mind: Dreams laid to rest under a poisoned silver sky.

  Still, this fate proved kinder than what had befallen other worlds. In most cases, the Motti infected a planet with their bioweapon first, abducted its inhabitants, then destroyed the planet afterwards, leaving it completely poisoned, uninhabitable and impossible for hazard teams to assess.

  The people of Neeis must have put up a formidable resistance, Jaeia thought as she read the reports on a datapad. From the pattern of destruction and death toll, she deduced that the Motti opted not to waste their resources and nuked the planet.

  “I never got to see La Raja,” she heard one of the soldiers lament as she re-boarded the Alliance survey craft, Palamo. Jaeia found herself smiling as she thought of Reht and his elaborate stories about the infamous escort hotels of Neeis.

  “Sir, I have a call on a secured channel holding in your quarters,” the ship’s captain announced as she exited the decontamination chamber.

  Jetta.

  Not that she didn’t already know who it was about, or that something was gravely wrong. The bad feelings first started when she was out with the teams collecting radiation data, and had only gotten worse as the day progressed. She’s hurt—is she dead?—oh Gods.

  (Did she hurt someone again?)

  No, she stopped herself. Breathe. Just wait and see.

  Despite her attempts to control her anxieties, her stomach contracted into a tight ball of acid the second she signed onto her terminal in her assigned quarters.

  The Military Minister appeared behind his desk, his beetle brows knitted, nose flared, and his lips pressed together in a tight frown. “Commander Kyron, I have some unfortunate news to share with you about your sister.”

  Jaeia barely heard the Minister as she read the perimeter guard’s report racing across the bottom
of Razar’s image:

  “Phantom fighters green-lit for missile strike against an unregistered Yamazuki cruiser in pre-cycle.”

  Oh no—they fired on Jetta’s starcraft in mid-jump!

  But as she read down the report, she couldn’t find notation of found wreckage or any indication that Jetta made it to Fiorah.

  Breathe. Reach back, Jaeia told herself, falling into their shared bond and searching for her sister’s familiar tune. Find her.

  “She’s alive, don’t worry,” Jaeia said, her voice just above a whisper as she minimized the report on the viewscreen. “What I can sense of her is disorganized, jumbled—perhaps because she’s hurt. But she’s alive.”

  “Good,” Razar said, slapping his hand down on his desk. “She will answer for this. That perimeter guard was only doing his duty. Your sister wiped out an entire construction zone where she jumped, injuring a dozen workers and putting the construction manager’s son in intensive care.”

  “Is he okay?” she asked, face flushing with guilt and embarrassment.

  “Yes, but your sister had better thank her lucky stars there’s a Healer left in this universe. Modern medicine would not have saved him.”

  Jaeia shook her head. Jetta’s only getting worse. A few months ago she would never jeopardize and innocent life for her own needs, but now nothing seems to stop her.

  “You understand why she’s in the Fleet, don’t you?” Jaeia said, sensing that the Minister’s thoughts of punishment for her twin. “It’s because of me. She wants to protect me. And she thought by joining the Alliance that meant she would have the resources to save the other people she loves too, like our aunt and uncle.”

  “Jaeia,” the Minister said, leaning forward, his belly squishing over the lip of the desk, “your sister has made herself a liability. If there was a chance that your aunt and uncle were alive we would have sent a full team, but you know as well as I do that the only things left on Fiorah are bad memories.”