by T J Mott
The data she had access to was overly broad however, lacking details on smaller subjects. While it did speak of major empires and important leaders and wars in their history, it did not speak about the minor powers or current events. She searched for Thaddeus, but the only mention she could find was in a minor list of known Earth-hunters.
Her heart still ached at the loss. Upon discovering her, he had marched out without hesitation to rescue her, even giving his life to do so. And the lives of the crew of his frigate. Dontun had told her she was the only survivor. When she’d awoken aboard his ship he’d already given all the bodies a burial at space, so she didn’t even get to see Thad that one last time.
For a long time she had felt numb. Finally, over the past week, the pain had faded some. But she still missed him dearly. Even though she didn’t really know him that well, the things he had done for her, the way he’d treated her…She had no doubt that she loved him. She fondly remembered their kiss, there at the end when she thought she was about to die. His surprise, and then joy at her affection, despite their grim circumstances. The things they’d talked about when they had no future and nothing to lose.
Yet, she wasn’t sure if it could have worked between them. He had changed, a lot. Older, more confident, and more mature, but also darker. She wasn’t sure what to think of some of the rumors she’d heard aboard his frigate, and it was clear to her that he had struggled deeply with alcohol and depression.
“Truth is, I’m probably drunk as often as not,” he had told her. “I know how to function like this.”
She had withdrawn from him after that. Those words had frightened her. They were not the words of the hyper-intelligent, bright-eyed, innocent young engineer she’d watched from afar on the Lunar Dawn. They were the words of someone struggling against demons. Someone who was internally fighting a long, bloody war, and slowly losing ground. Someone who deep down inside knew he was inching towards destruction, yet refused to admit it to himself or change course to avoid it.
Yet she still wasn’t sure if she should have pulled away. She’d opened back up to him, in that drifting piece of starship debris, when they’d both thought they were about to die, and she was glad for that. The way he’d held her in those final moments had shown her that despite whatever his hidden issues were, whatever it was that drove him to be an alcoholic, he still had a caring, protective spirit, and she wondered almost daily what could have been if they'd had more time together.
With all the pain and mistreatment and fear she’d been through as a slave, those last moments with Thaddeus were now her most treasured since being taken from Earth. He’d held her close, his warm arms wrapped around her to protect her from the freezing cold. They had both completely dropped their guards, believing they were about to die, and the sudden honesty between them was unique and refreshing. And when they’d kissed…
As much as she wanted to return to that moment, she pushed the memories from her mind. He was dead, and she didn’t want to start crying again. His sacrifice had bought her a temporary reprieve, a few weeks of rest from the torturous hell she’d faced as a slave, and bought it with his very life. Her few days of freedom had revived her, given her hope. If she’d been free once, perhaps it could happen again.
She did not know what her future held. Her elderly captor had already told her he would sell her. He had to, the time he’d spent picking through the wreckage and burying bodies at the red giant had cost him valuable time on several important contracts and he was behind. If he didn’t sell her, he’d explained, he’d end up in debtor’s prison somewhere, where he’d likely live out the rest of his remaining life.
He had seemed genuinely sorry. Adelia wasn’t entirely sure if she believed him. But he was still far nicer than any other captor she’d had.
She heard a knock at her cabin door, and she quickly wiped a few tears from her face. Dontun respected her privacy and had given her the largest free passenger suite in his starship. It wasn’t as luxurious as anything aboard the Dawn but was definitely roomier and far more comfortable than anything she’d seen aboard Thad’s frigate.
A moment later the door swung open and the elderly captain entered, carrying a bag of clothing slung over his arm. He wore a sharp, neatly-pressed suit, his shoes shined to a perfect polish. “Ah, lovely Adelia. We’ll be disembarking shortly. I have some clothes I’d like you to wear for the occasion.”
She gulped. “So this is it.”
He nodded. “I’m afraid so.” His expression turned sorrowful. “I hate to let you go. I’ve really enjoyed your company, Adelia, I really have. But it’s now time to move on. Such is the nature of the universe.”
Time to move on. She fought back tears as she thought of Thaddeus again.
Then she looked at the captain and briefly wondered if she could overpower him and escape. He was old and frail, but she knew she could never overpower the rest of his crew.
No, she had no chance to escape, and she knew it. Not yet. All she could hope for was to be bought by someone who wasn’t complete scum. Maybe a rich starship owner, or a lonely prince looking for his queen. Not the rabid pirate animals like before. The ones who tortured and drugged her, put her through hell, refused to feed her or treat her injuries, used her as nothing more than a plaything to satisfy their physical desires.
She felt tears continue to well up in her eyes. Dontun looked at her with pity, and offered a reassuring smile, perhaps mistakenly thinking her tears were for him. He left the bag on her bed and left the cabin. “Get dressed, Adelia,” he said as he exited. “I’ll be waiting outside.”
She complied. She had no choice. At least the dress he left her was beautiful and tasteful, not one of the tiny, revealing outfits that slave girls her age were normally forced to wear at auction. This one was fit for the Lunar Dawn’s grand ballroom.
***
Adelia reluctantly followed Captain Dontun and his men to her destiny. They were at some kind of casino space station. The décor was expensive and extravagant, with thick, lush carpet lining the decks. Gold-trimmed velvet curtains hung at all the windows. They passed through a colonnade carved from giant amethysts, rubies, and emeralds, illuminated from within the columns by pulsating fiber optics. It reminded her of Las Vegas, but richer, more ornate, and more extravagant than the famous gambling city on Earth.
She looked around, hoping for a chance to dash to freedom as they walked through the station, but she knew it was in vain. There was no way she could outrun her captors. Her wrists and ankles were shackled and chained, and she was unable to slip out of them. She’d been testing them the entire way.
They passed through a huge, open lobby, part of which was within a giant crystal dome that jutted out from the station. She gasped at the view. “Lovely, isn’t it?” said Dontun. “Here, let’s take a closer look. I’ve never been here before, either.” He led them through the lobby, and his men forced their way through the crowd of tourists and brought them right up to the crystal. She brought her shackled hands up and placed them against the window and peered out at the sight.
There was one brilliant point of white light in the distance. As she squinted, she thought it looked like a comet, but it was way too bright. And it had two tails, not one, leaving from opposite ends of the object. “That’s Cadria Minor A,” Dontun explained. “It’s a white dwarf, the corpse of an ancient star that died and collapsed eons ago. There are not many of them around.”
Then she looked at the closer, much dimmer object that she hadn’t noticed at first, since her attention had been captured first by the intense light from the white dwarf. This object seemed far larger because of its closeness. Bands of color encircled it, some beige, some purple, some red. It reminded her of Jupiter, but it seemed to actually glow, as if it emitted some of its own light. And around the object was an impressive system of rings, like Saturn. “And that,” Dontun said, “is Cadria Minor B. It’s a Y-class brown dwarf, a category reserved for things that are too big to really be called plan
ets but too small to be called stars. The casino orbits it. Right now we’re far away, near apoapsis, but the station follows an extremely eccentric orbit that brings it just a few hundred kilometers above the cloud tops at periapsis. I’ve heard it’s an amazing sight, but sadly we’ll be done here before the next approach. Reservations during periapsis are far too expensive for me.”
He allowed Adelia to marvel at the sight for several more minutes, and for a while she actually forgot that she was his prisoner. She had seen Jupiter a couple times, never had the chance to visit Saturn or its rings, but she knew this was more impressive than either. Especially with that—what did he call it?—white dwarf in the distance.
Sights like this were what originally drew her to space. Paris had been too busy for her, and overcrowded. But the first time she saw the rocky, cratered surface of the Moon from low lunar orbit while on a family vacation, she knew she wanted to leave. She had applied for a position on the Lunar Dawn, and had spent several years there. It had been a high-class luxury cruise liner, one that visited several of the space stations in orbit around the Earth and Moon, and regularly made low orbits around the Moon to give its passengers a good look at its surface. And sometimes it had made very low passes above the domed city of New Washington, the administrative capital of the Moon, although it never landed there. The Dawn had not been equipped for that.
Dontun’s men finally pulled her away from the dome. They continued on their march through the station, passing all kinds of game machines, card tables, arcades, restaurants, holo salons, and shops. The air smelled of alcohol and a hundred different types of spicy smoke which, based on the antics and moods of those smoking, clearly contained a number of mind-altering drugs. The station was absolutely huge, bigger than anything she’d ever seen in Earth space, and the majority of the patrons appeared fairly upper-class.
“Here we are,” Dontun announced as they stopped at a large, ornate, wooden double door, finished with a clear lacquer that exposed the most unusual grain pattern she’d ever seen. Each door proudly displayed the ruby-encrusted gold-leaf seal of the Cadrian Casino in the middle. One of his men opened them, held them open for the rest of the group, and they entered the room on the other side.
The room was a large oval, with a ring of high-class desks built from another rare, exotic wood with spectacular and unusual grain patterns. The layout reminded her of a government council’s boardroom.
In the middle of the ring was a pillar of gold-fringed red velvet curtains extending from the floor all the way up into recesses in the ceiling. The curtains were arranged in a cylinder a couple meters in diameter, obviously concealing something within them, and the fabric seemed to glow slightly.
A multitude of people sat all around the ring of desks, facing inward towards the curtains. They clearly came from all over the galaxy. Many were dressed in business suits common to wealthy businessmen and diplomats. Others wore various military-style dress uniforms with rows and rows of merit ribbons. A few wore pompous, ornate, frankly ridiculous outfits suggesting they were royalty, complete with crowns, capes, large rings on every finger, and jewel-studded staffs.
Many people appeared rather normal by comparison to those who were obviously filthy rich, dressed in the upper-class garments that seemed common among the tourists aboard the station.
Behind all these people were more people, unseated, lining the walls around the room. Most of them looked like bored casino patrons, mere commoners who had stepped in to see what the auction was about.
Adelia figured there were at least three hundred people in the room. They all stood to their feet as Dontun and his group entered. The old starship captain led them to a separate pair of tables just inside the ring, obviously set up for the meeting’s president and his aides. He motioned for Adelia and his officers to take a seat, then took a small wireless microphone from one table, pinned it to his lapel, and stepped into the middle of the room.
“Greetings, gentlemen, captains, generals, princes, dukes, and kings,” his amplified voice announced to the crowded room. “I am Captain Lex Dontun of the Nebula and I thank you all for attending this weekend’s auction. I also want to thank the Cadrian Casino for graciously hosting us this week, and the Xionne Star Kingdom for supplying security.” Polite applause broke out among the crowd.
“Now, we’ve sold a lot of great, precious, and marvelous items so far, but as usual I’ve saved the very best for very last. Today, I present to you for sale the one and only Thaddeus Marcell!”
Chapter 23
Adelia gasped in surprise. Dontun gestured and the lights in the room dimmed to near blackness. Suddenly a ring of spotlights in the ceiling lit up, brightly highlighting the pillar of curtains at the center of the room. The curtains slowly ascended, dramatically rising and disappearing into an alcove in the ceiling. And as they rose, they revealed a man shackled by his wrists and chained to an iron pillar.
The room erupted into chaotic applause. Men cheered, jeered, whistled, clapped, screamed, and shouted obscenities at the man in the middle.
She stared in horror, not even aware of the deafening cacophony around her. Her eyes were fixated on the sight in the middle of the room. Thaddeus hung by the shackles on his wrists, too weak and too tired to stand anymore. He was completely naked, his body pale, beaten, bruised, and scarred, his feet in a pile of his own excrement now mashed into the lush carpet beneath him. His head hung low, his chin rested on his chest, and his eyes were only slightly open. He didn’t move, didn’t react at all to being exposed by the withdrawing curtains, and made no indication that he was even aware of the environment around him.
An intravenous drip bag hung above him on the support he was shackled to, its hose snaking down to a catheter inserted into the back of his right hand.
And right then it dawned on her that everything the charming old man had told her was a lie.
Dontun stepped back to his desk and picked up a gavel. He allowed the crowd to roar for a few more seconds before banging it on the desk, demanding for order and silence so he could continue.
“As promised, I have a bonus item which the winner of this auction will receive. And I guarantee that whoever buys Marcell will appreciate this bonus! This item is something he values dearly, and with this your options for vengeance multiply infinitely!”
He slowly walked up to the table Adelia sat behind, with a disturbing, predatory smile stretched across his thin, aged lips. “This bonus item is the lovely young woman seated here, named Adelia, who is none other than Marcell’s woman!” he said as he pointed to her.
The room erupted again, even louder than before. Adelia stared coldly at the aging captain as he took in the noise and enjoyed the revelry for a few moments before again banging his gavel to silence the crowd.
She looked back at Thaddeus. He had found enough strength to raise his head and was looking right at her. His expression showed surprise, but it quickly gave way to grief. His mouth moved, silently forming the words “I’m so sorry.”
“Now, as the schedule says, this auction will be tomorrow. Today is reserved for us to learn more about this notorious man who now stands helplessly chained in front of us. We are going to spend today listening to statements! Look at the display in front of you, and you should see the option to purchase some speaking time. Enter your account information and you’ll have the opportunity to tell us all who this man is to you. What is your history with him? Why do you hate him so? What are your intentions should you win the sale? I’m sure the answers to that last question will be greatly entertaining!”
He paused. All around the room, people began tapping hidden displays embedded in the surface of their desks. She saw every emotion possible. Some of them appeared angry and bitter, some seemed gleefully amused. All of it was sickening to her.
“Now, the starting bid is awfully high, so I know many of you are just observers with no intention to bid. And that is perfectly fine, and you will still get a chance to speak. I know many of you hav
e traveled many light-years just to be here, knowing you can never win, yet still desiring to be present to see some form of vengeance brought down on this man. Actually, though, I believe most of you intend to go far and beyond simple vengeance.” He laughed, producing a hideous cackling noise which some in the crowd joined him in.
“We’ll begin here, on my right. General Corseer.” Dontun stepped up to a middle-aged man wearing a military dress uniform. He passed him a handheld microphone he’d kept concealed in his jacket pocket. “General, you have the floor.” Dontun returned to his desk and sat down with a very wide smile on his face.
The general stood to address the crowd. “I’m General Corseer of the Getainne Defense Force. Four years ago this man took a contract from our enemies and assassinated our system’s President. He bombed the Capitol Building from orbit, killing dozens of our leadership and hundreds of innocent bystanders. I have been authorized by the Getainne High Council to bid on their behalf and bring this murderer back for trial and public execution.”
“What!?” Adelia’s jaw dropped in shock. That can’t be true!
The general was done speaking already, and he handed the microphone back to Dontun and returned to his seat. Dontun turned and briefly smiled at Adelia. “Interesting,” he quipped while handing the microphone to a well-dressed businessman seated to the general’s left.
The man stood. “I am Wyn Clerk, Senior Vice President at StarFreight Shipping Incorporated. SSI used to be the premier shipping firm for the galaxy’s most sensitive packages. We safely moved high-tech prototype equipment, highly classified documents, powerful and sensitive military-grade weapons, and the like for many of the galaxy’s top governments.”
