“I’m done,” he said, putting a boot in the kid’s armored ribs. “I’m not killing him. The fight’s over.”
This time, the bullet didn’t miss. His back exploded, and the world went away.
Twenty-Seven
“This … is exactly what I wanted,” Rhundi said to herself. She’d managed to squeeze through the cleaner ‘bot tunnels to get into the storage room, and it was everything she’d hoped for in life.
K’Shorr brought a lot of hardware with him when he went on vacation. The room was crammed with weapons and explosives–hanging on the walls, sitting on shelves, and in cases and crates stacked in the corners. Unfortunately, most of it was ogre-sized, meaning that even the smallest guns were still massively oversized for her. She found a dagger that would pass for a sword in a pinch, but it wouldn’t do her any good against more than one enemy or at a distance. She grabbed an assortment of grenades, loading them onto a belt that she was able to wear as a bandolier.
There has to be something around here, she thought. Something he took as a trophy, if nothing else. Eventually she settled on an energy pistol that was just a bit too big. Conveniently, the thing was fully loaded and used fairly common ammunition packs. She attached several of them to the bandolier.
Okay. Armed. Now what? She contemplated the room for a few minutes and then started using her control unit to retask one of the cleaning ‘bots to the storage room.
She got her answer a moment later. That was definitely the sound of boots outside. Large, heavy boots. She briefly considered making for the ‘bot tunnel and rejected the idea just as quickly. She was carrying a lot of kit with her now and the tunnels were already tight enough. She put the control unit away and slid behind a stack of crates just as the door opened.
She couldn’t see around the crates, but from the swearing and the stomping it had to be K’Shorr in the room, and he sounded like he’d brought a couple of minions with him as well. She heard a few different pairs of feet. The minions were staying quiet, and K’Shorr was mumbling and swearing to himself in a dangerously low tone. She heard a few guns clatter to the ground from one of the shelves. A moment later, the stack of crates in front of her rocked a bit as the ogre kicked whatever it was out of his way.
“Here, take these,” the ogre said, finally speaking at a volume Rhundi could hear. “And I don’t give a fuck what the elf says. You find her, you shoot her first and then you find us. If I find her with you and she’s alive I’ll kill the whole lot of you. I catch you without a weapon on the ship again and you’re getting tossed out an airlock. We clear?”
Sounds of movement from the men. They’re saluting, she thought.
“Go, goddammit,” he said. “Every meter of the ship until you find her.”
She heard footsteps as the men left. Then one of them stopped.
“Uh, sir?” a male voice said.
“Was I not fucking clear enough?” K’Shorr said.
“Well, uh, you, uh … you said every meter,” the man said. “There’s room in there for a gnome to hide.”
“Oh, you son of a bitch,” Rhundi said under her breath.
“So you’re saying she got into my gun closet? My locked gun closet?”
“You said she was clever,” the man said. “Maybe … maybe there’s another way in.”
“There’s not another way in,” K’Shorr said. “Quit stalling.”
At exactly that moment, the cleaning ‘bot noisily moved the grate out of the way and rolled into the room.
Rhundi risked a peek around the side of the box. K’Shorr and the mercenary were both staring at the little ‘bot. K’Shorr looked enraged. The look on the merc’s face was an odd combination of self-satisfaction and pure terror that Rhundi wasn’t sure she’d ever seen before.
“The grates. The fucking service tunnels,” the ogre said. “God damn it. The bitch could be anywhere.” He stomped the little ‘bot flat, causing the mercenary to flinch. “Fine, genius, check out the rest of the room, and after that go see if we have any little pointy-eared elf shits on this ship that are small enough to crawl through those things. It’s sure as hell not gonna be you or me.” He stomped off, and the mercenary moved into the closet. Rhundi heard him pawing through some of the crates.
I’m not in there, she thought. Was the idiot stealing? She was willing to bet that K’Shorr had a good idea of the exact inventory in the room. This was not a good idea. She listened to the human continuing to rummage around in the room. Just be patient. Sooner or later he’d either find her or get bored and leave, and there was no point in making any sudden moves until then. She found an angle that would let her watch the man, who took an ornate-looking gun case down from a higher shelf, opening it to reveal a matched set of antique projectile pistols. He took one out, admiring it for a moment, and then dropped it back into the case and continued his search.
She stiffened as he bumped the crates she was hiding behind. He pulled one down and put it on the floor, trying unsuccessfully to open it. “Locked,” she heard him mumble. “Figures.”
The man stood up and went for another crate. This time he made eye contact with Rhundi.
“Hi,” she said, and stabbed him in the neck.
He collapsed, pulling the blade from her hand and knocking over a few of the crates. She climbed over the pile and yanked the blade from his neck, dodging the gout of blood that fountained out of the wound after the blade. She considered trying to hide the body, then rejected the idea. There was already too much blood in the room, and it was immediately visible from the door.
Time to find a new place to hide. She quickly cleaned the blood off of her blade, then tapped the door console and left the room, letting the door slide shut behind her. She briefly considered putting a shot into the palm lock on the outside, then thought better of it and slammed an elbow into it instead. The panel shattered.
Good luck getting back in there again. There was probably some sort of override for precisely this sort of situation, but it would slow K’Shorr down if he wanted to go back to reload. And piss him off, too, she thought, smiling at the idea.
Something hot and bright flew past her face, singeing her fur. She heard it impact the wall behind her. Shit. She turned and opened fire down the hallway, diving out of the way. If they’d been smart enough to use a volley instead of trying for a headshot, I’d be dead.
There were two of them, about ten meters away. She didn’t think she’d hit anything either, though.
A few moments later, two more mercenaries emerged from the other direction. She took a few shots at them too, forcing them to take cover, then fled into K’Shorr’s quarters, looking around for anything large enough to hide behind. She considered the wardrobe and going back under the bed, then rejected both ideas as too obvious.
Damn it. She needed at least a few more minutes for all of her ‘bots to get into position. She needed to find a way to buy those minutes. K’Shorr hadn’t had that much time to get out of earshot. She had to find somewhere to hide, and fast.
She looked around the room again, and smiled.
Twenty-Eight
“Did you already know about this?” Grond demanded. Remember had had them brought directly back to the bridge. Several members of the crew turned around and stared at the halfogre, shocked by his tone.
“About Barren and K’Shorr? Yes,” Remember said. “And if we had discussed it before now nothing would have changed from how things currently stand. I said I had interests on Khkk. Your former owner and his associate have been trying to work from the shadows on Khkk for months now.”
“Are these the people who screwed with my head?” Haakoro asked.
“I think I said something about him staying behind with the rest of the children,” Brazel said. Remember waved him off.
“Haakoro is as much my guest as you are, gnome. Save your violence for those who deserve it. There will be plenty of opportunities in the very near future.” Remember spotted Lorryn in the crowd, pointing at her. “Perh
aps your security chief should fill you in on what happened.”
Lorryn, startled at being singled out by Remember, stammered through a description of the events at the resort.
“I … I think she’s fine, Dad,” Darsi said. “I can’t imagine–”
“She’s fine,” Brazel snapped. “Those two idiots couldn’t keep Rhundi locked up if their lives depended on it.”
“Their lives do depend on it,” Grond added. His eyes were still glowing a muted red.
“But that doesn’t mean that we don’t need to find her,” Brazel finished.
“And you will,” Remember said. “In fact, I intend to lead you directly to her. But it is better for all of us if you are properly prepared for that encounter, and not acting rashly. There are, if you recall, other lives and other interests involved here.”
“None that I care about,” Brazel said.
Remember nodded. “Nonetheless,” she said. “The Benevolence are preparing to descend upon Khkk in force, and the forces that are already warring there are causing much carnage. The Noble Opposition are on their way, and will join the fray soon.”
Asper reacted to this, raising an eyebrow and crossing xir arms.
“This war must be ended. The Benevolence must not be allowed to take Khkk,” Remember continued. “We must stop them here.”
“Why?” Brazel asked. “The Benevolence control half the galaxy. Khkk is in the middle of nowhere. Why is one little desert moon so important? So they’ve got some weapons manufacturers. They can’t be moved somewhere else? The Benevolence are going to have a hell of a time moving against the ogres. This rock’s in ogre territory and they haven’t bothered to colonize it yet. What’s the problem?”
Remember fixed Brazel with a stare. “That is not for you to know at this time.”
“Oh, bullshit,” Brazel said, not backing down. “That worked when you were paying us. You’re not paying us right now. We’re in until we’ve got Rhundi back and we can get clear. That’s it.”
Remember stared at Brazel for a long moment.
“Fine,” she said. “The part of the conflict on Khkk that we are concerned about is here.” As she spoke, a large holomap of Khkk appeared above their heads. The map quickly zoomed in to a specific location, a walled compound surrounding an immense, three-sided pyramid.
“That is where the Noble Opposition forces on Khkk are based,” Asper said.
“It is. This place is called the Sanctum of the Sphere. It is very, very old, nearly as ancient as civilization on Khkk itself. And it has been abandoned by the Khkks for generations. It is considered taboo. They do not go there or even go near it.”
“Which is why we found it to be a good location for our operations,” Asper added. “It was considered highly unlikely that anyone would find us there.”
Remember continued. “Something is happening on Khkk, something that I myself do not understand. Nearly the entire surface is in conflict at this time. Nearly everyone is at war with someone. Old conflicts thought suppressed or forgotten for generations have flared back into hot wars. Borders settled for hundreds of years are suddenly in dispute again. Khkk has been relatively peaceful, especially for a system in ogrespace, for as long as almost anyone in this room has been alive. Even the Benevolence presence on the moon has been minimal. They have never expressed any more than the most cursory interest in Khkk until very recently. All of this starting with the two of you stealing a box.”
Remember looked at Grond and Brazel again.
“Do you have any idea why the train, why that exact train at that exact time, was attacked?”
“Not a clue,” Brazel said. “We figured it was a coincidence.”
“It must have been. And yet it cannot have been,” Remember said. “We know now that Barren and K’Shorr were ultimately behind the … extra items that were found, and many events since. But it does not follow to me that they were involved in the attack on the train, or the carnage that has followed. Something else is at work here. I know not what. And that … concerns me deeply.”
“What does that have to do with us?” Brazel asked.
“Perhaps nothing. Perhaps everything,” Remember said, and Brazel scoffed loudly. “Yet your enemies orbit Khkk over this very spot. It may be that there is something at the Sanctum that has been causing this disruption. A taboo powerful enough to keep a culture away from a place for generations is not something that should be taken lightly. There is something about the Sanctum of the Sphere that made generations of Khkks treat it as a holy place, and later generations treat it as anathema. Even now, there is no battle around the Sanctum. The Khkks have surrounded it. The Noble Opposition forces are simply being besieged.”
“You guys don’t have ships? How come they can’t just make a break for it?” Grond asked.
“Much of the travel to the Sanctum was overland, by design,” Asper said. “It was thought that that would be less noticeable than a sudden increase in out-of-system ships landing in what was supposed to be the middle of nowhere. Like much of Khkk, the Sanctum is surrounded by desert, rock, and scrub. It is easy to get lost in.”
“A few have managed to escape,” Remember said. “Others have been blown from the sky as soon as they reached a safe distance from the Sanctum. The Khkks have the capability to reduce the entire compound to molten glass in short order, should they wish to do so, and I doubt the Opposition forces would be able to hold out long in the face of a concerted assault on their position. That such an assault has not happened suggests that the Khkks have chosen not to.”
Brazel rubbed his eyes, suddenly looking very tired. “So what’s so important about all of this, then? Why even hide the stuff in the first place? What was the point of this entire mess?”
“I may have … some light to shed on this,” Irtuus-bon said, entering the conversation for the first time. The troll was at his full height, holding a portable datapad in one hand.
Remember, for once, looked faintly startled. “Explain,” she said.
Irtuus-bon tapped a couple of icons on his screen. “You have holographic capacity on this bridge, yes? I need access to it,” he said. Remember nodded at a crew member, who fiddled with a console for a moment and then nodded at the troll. Irtuus-bon did something else with his tablet, and a large map was projected in front of them.
“Here we are,” Irtuus-bon said, and a spot on the map began glowing. “We are … technically in ogrespace, although not a well-patrolled or influential part of ogrespace. He manipulated his tablet again, and a region of space began glowing.
“This is the heart of Benevolence territory, in what was once elfspace,” he continued. Another gesture, and the map zoomed sickeningly until a hologram of an enormous, icicle-shaped capital ship manifested above their heads.
“This is the Testament,” Irtuus-bon said.
“We’ve seen holos of the Testament before,” Brazel said. “I’m sure Remember has been on the thing before.”
“You do not understand,” Irtuus-bon said. “These are complete plans of the Testament. Every deck. Every room. Every weld and every wire. Every weapon. There are notes on troop complements, on weapons batteries, on the range of the ship. This is everything you could possibly want to know about the Testament. I could not have asked for a more complete set of plans. It even includes information on the composition of the outer armor. And of the shields.”
A complicated waveform appeared in place of the Testament plans. Everyone within sight who had ever flown a ship in combat recognized a shield composition diagram when they saw one.
There was a moment of perfect, shocked silence on the deck, and then everyone began shouting at once.
Irtuus-bon was taken aback by the reaction. He stepped away from everyone, trembling a bit and slightly shrinking in size.
Asper lifted a hand and whispered something, and the din was instantly cut off. “My apologies,” xe said. “Do I understand what you are suggesting here? That we have found a way to nullify the shielding
on the Testament? That the Benevolence’s flagship is actually vulnerable?”
“The calculations could be completed by a novice at any engineering academy, given some time,” Irtuus-bon said, returning to his previous dimensions. “They took me ten minutes.”
Brazel started trying to talk, but no sound came out. He gestured angrily at Asper, who made a motion with xir hand, dispelling the silence.
“Do the plans have any information about the spiderships? There’s no point in attacking the flagship if it vomits a thousand of those things at you when you’re half a parsec away.”
“It does,” Irtuus-bon said. “The shields are a common design throughout the Benevolence fleet. They are simply much more powerful on the Testament. Even at the proper frequencies you would only be able to remove a small portion of the shielding at once. It would have to be a precise, targeted strike. Still, with the plans, I have already determined what the most effective place to attack would be. I believe that if these plans are accurate, we should be able to cripple the Testament, or perhaps destroy it entirely, with an attack force of sufficient size.”
“What are we waiting for?” Haakoro said. “Put me in a ship! I want in on this.”
“The plans are a hoax,” the troll said, and this time Asper let the shouting go on for a few minutes. Remember finally halted the shouting herself, clapping her hands for quiet in an oddly effective fashion.
“Explain,” was all she said.
The troll took a deep breath, staring at the ground as he spoke. “I have … studied the Benevolence for a very long time. And trolls are … a long-lived species, as a rule. I am already aware of a number of particular details about the Testament and its capabilities. And in many ways, the details on these plans match what I have already learned. But in many other ways, they do not. And that is why I am concerned. The encryption on this data pad was difficult to crack, but I cracked it. By myself. And, if the truth be told, I do not feel that it was challenging enough. And the opportunities that these data present are … too perfect, especially for files whose provenance is suspect. We know that … someone … inserted false memories into this young man’s head–”
The Sanctum of the Sphere: The Benevolence Archives, Vol. 2 Page 19
