She looked to the left of the bench seat. The interior walls of the craft were of a dull gray unfinished bare metal. It seemed to resemble Earthen steel on a Naval vessel her family had visited during a family vacation. Unable to fight her curiosity, she reached over and touched the wall with the tip of the telenium. A fist-sized ark of white light flashed before her and a dense plume of smoke filled the air. The flash was brilliant and temporarily blinding. She recoiled, pulling the telenium away.
Sonia fanned the air in an attempt to get the lingering smoke to dissipate. The vessel was ringing with a loud ear-piercing alarm that went off as lights started to strobe. The tip of the telenium was still in its original condition, but the metal wall was now scarred and had a hole in it. The surface melted as if cut by a torch. Sonia felt stupid for ceding to the temptation to satisfy her curiosity and was glad that she had not been foolish enough to do it to the exterior walls.
She could hear Ann shuffling and leaving the bridge heading her way. The quirky robot stomped down the hallway and into the open room where Sonia was sleeping. “Happened…what? Happened…what?”
As Ann entered the room the alarm went off and the lights returned to normal. Sonia slid over to the wall to cover up the small, yet smoldering hole as if she were still a child hiding her actions from the judgment of a parent. She didn’t fear repercussions from Ann but was embarrassed by her foolishness. This was hardly the place for such experiments. “You mean ‘what happened’ not the other way around. Nothing, everything is fine.”
The mechanical blue eyes never seemed to look at her even when directly communicating. The left eye went down and seemed to settle on the telenium that was in her hand. The right eye followed a fraction of a second later. The mechanical pupils focused on the metal as if attempting to sort out its origin. Sonia slipped it back into the pouch on her side. Ann returned the gaze toward Sonia, but as the robot always seemed to do, it looked just off to the right of her face and not directly into her eyes as it spoke, “Arriving…landing soon.”
Unable to fight her curiosity, Sonia followed Ann as the android stomped back to the bridge. As they passed a pair of sliding doors, Sonia nearly fell to her knees as she looked beyond the glass wall. Instantly her stomach knotted up as a numbness worked its way across her body. She recognized the planet where they were heading. It was Isfahan.
The dark golden color of the planet was unmistakable to her even after only seeing it on several occasions while traveling with Tilhar and during her escape. Seeing it again triggered a barrage of memories that took her mind hostage and made her weak in the knees. Often there were thoughts of returning and destroying the ginn and the Erim of Tilhar. During her fantasies of catastrophic revenge, returning had been no big deal. Now that Isfahan was floating before her, all vestige of courage dissipated. The boy is here? That would explain the references to Tilhar and how he had helped me kill him, she thought. Or, was all this some neatly orchestrated deception that she had fallen for? What have I done? She asked herself. Sonia began to wish that her concern about wandering aimlessly through space had come to fruition. Anything but returning to the horrid planet.
“I don’t care who that boy is, he can be the chosen one…I’m not going back there. Just turn this thing around!” Sonia ordered.
“Boy of Earth. About Earth boy, what?” Ann forced out.
“What about the Earth boy?” Then she focused on him. Memories of fear and trepidation of her captivity and remembering the sounds of the screaming women settled her mind for a second. What if someone hadn’t come for her. She would have died in the hanger. Despite the all-encompassing fear, she knew that going after him was the right thing to do despite the consequences. There was a child in need and she was going to help.
The large vessel stopped, and Ann locked its controls down, “Move to smaller transport for approach.”
Within minutes the transport entered the atmosphere and was descending toward Onsan. Despite only being allowed to see it a few times, Sonia recognized the skyline of the city in spite of the blinding glare of the bright orange-red star as it descended on the horizon. Night would soon fall across the city, but it did not give her any comfort or boost in confidence. This was not a place that required the cover of darkness to hide vile and evil deeds, but the wickedness ramped up nonetheless.
Second thoughts crept in and Sonia once again wondered what she was doing in this place. I’m no one's hero. If Joseph, she mockingly repeated his name in her mind, was the one to save me and help kill Tilhar, then why not save himself? The telenium instilled a small measure of security that slightly pushed back against the nearly overwhelming fear. The rebirth of atrocities that occurred while a slave in the wicked place pushed her onto the precipice of a complete regression. Sonia needed to find a way to regain her courage. The Tilhar was dead with or without the boy’s help and she was not a helpless victim anymore. Her mind was far sharper than before. She was stronger than ever before. With no weapon other than the telenium, how was she going to take on the Redum soldiers that guarded the place? The building was sure to be overrun with them since Tilhar’s death. Did they expect to fly in, find the boy waiting in the hanger, simply sweep him up, and be on their way? It would not be that easy.
The flash of an image caught her eye as they merged into the sky traffic several hundred feet above the surface. A hovering billboard that was too bright and too large to miss flashed a most curious image. From afar it seemed to display the video of a human. Is that an ad for slaves? She wondered. Her eyes were fixed on the billboard as they drew near. She gasped at the realization that the image was of her. Beneath, a message scrolled in the language of the Tisht.
“What does it say?” she asked Ann.
The android’s head snapped to the right. “Translation…translation…a…reward…ten-thousand kudu for…return…slave shown.” Ann turned to face her, and the mechanical pupils opened wide and then closed a few times but continued to look off to the right of her face, “look like Sonia.”
“Yes, it looks like me.” Just as they were about to pass the levitating sign, a second image appeared. She recognized the Econian as the man who risked his life to get her out of the hanger. Having her image posted, possibly all over the city, didn’t make matters any easier. Either they were seeking bounty hunters to find them, or with a degree of certainty, they expected them to return and wanted the citizenry to be on the lookout.
She focused on the task at hand and considered Joseph’s location, which didn’t have to be in the Erim. In a city as large as Onsan, the boy could’ve been anywhere. Perhaps he had escaped and was in hiding which would mean that they did not need to return to the Erim. Her instincts instantly rebuked that notion as far too easy and unrealistic especially when the craft took a direct path toward the place that she had known all too well.
Three octagon shaped towers rose hundreds of feet into the sky over the city. The building was constructed of metals mined on Isfahan and was given no finish or paint appearing black with an iridescent blue sheen that reminded her of the barrel of her dad’s shotgun. Each octagon tower was the size of a city block on Earth at the base and was separated by a hundred yards where smaller buildings had been constructed. Each of the towers were crowned with the likeness of three fingers, similar to those on the hands of the Tisht, appearing to reach for the clouds. The upper levels were connected to one another by suspended multi-level breezeways that made up Tilhar’s private quarters offering three hundred and sixty degrees of visibility over the city.
The Erim of Tilhar was unequivocally the tallest and the outer perimeter of the towers made it the widest structure in the city dwarfing the other buildings. Even without prior knowledge or experiences behind the walls, the appearance was haunting and uninviting. It was especially disturbing to see that smoke continued to bellow out of a stack that ran through the rear tower. She was told by Calder that the incinerator was used to burn the bodies of the deceased slaves and deformed children born in th
e ginn. This made up the bulk of the smoke that rose above the city. It made her sick to think of all the dead and that they were continuing to experiment with the other women of Earth as they had done with her.
As they approached the structure, she looked down and recognized the landing bay where she was rescued by the stranger. There were no visible transports and she assumed that all had been destroyed that night during her escape. Holes and dented metal were still visible on the exterior wall as repairs seemed to be ongoing and far from completion. Several armed Redum soldiers were standing outside of the building watching as a team of male and female slaves of her kind worked to repair the structure.
“I guess we aren’t landing there?” she noted in relief.
The transport circled around and toward a bay on the rear tower that housed the smokestack. Sonia became suspicious when they were not approached by any security personnel, “How can we just fly up to the building like this? Where are the Redum…security?” This is far too easy. How can this be anything other than a setup? she wondered. “Don’t land, I want to return. I want to leave this place!” she demanded. “This is clearly a trap. Joseph is not real.”
As if not hearing or ignoring her, Ann continued to guide the ship toward a small private hanger about two-thirds of the way up the building. She considered knocking the android over the head and taking control of the craft but looked around and found nothing. “Turn this thing around! NOW!” she demanded. Without ceasing, the craft seemed to glide effortlessly into the hanger and in a nice fluid motion, touched down with a subtle thud.
Sonia leaned over toward Ann, “Get us out of here!” she demanded again. Ann sat in the chair and did nothing. Sonia turned to the controls and looked over the flat acrylic control panel. It was no longer illuminated. Sonia realized that she should have been paying attention to how Ann controlled the craft instead of sleeping. Controlling it didn’t seem like it was that hard. Sonia tapped on the transparent panel in areas where she remembered Ann doing so, then placed her hand over what looked like a touchpad that was used to guide the craft. It didn’t respond. The panel did not illuminate. It seemed as if the controls had shut down. A password…something! she thought. “If I survive this, I will turn you into a pile of scrap metal!” she threatened. But Ann was no more responsive or alive than the control panel. Sonia retrieved the telenium and placed it in front of the android’s face and thought about driving it into one of its quirky eyes.
“We will need her if we are to escape,” the voice of Joseph invaded her mind again.
Sonia pulled away and placed the telenium back into the leather sheath. “So, we really mean to escape? This seems like nonsense to me. Where are you?” As soon as she asked the question, she saw in her mind the way that she needed to go. From the bridge, she looked through the glass wall and for the first time realized that no one waited for them in the hanger. There were no armed Redum soldiers or the merciless Sagusaka. She was alone. How is this possible? They have me. All Ningal needs to do is come and get me. She waited, but no doors opened, no one stepped out from some hidden nook. No one surrounded and disabled the craft.
“No one will stop you,” Joseph stated.
“How do you know that?” she asked.
As Sonia stepped off the ramp, three doors faced her. Inexplicably she knew that the center door would take her to where Joseph was. As she approached the door, while appearing to be solid, it was no more than a hologram. She walked right through it and into a long hallway. Her entire chest cavity moved with each pounding heartbeat. She could hear the blood squishing from valve to valve in her heart as it was forced through her body.
The hallway was dark and dank. Beads of moisture ran down the walls and formed little streams that disappeared through a grill where the floor and wall met. After a hundred feet, Sonia came upon a second door and cautiously approached it. In a quick, but soundless motion, the door automatically disappeared into the ceiling. The opening revealed to her more than simply a new area to investigate.
Disturbing screams were audible now. A chorus of agony peaked her ears and she instantly recognized the horrific sound and realized where the boy had led her. She was in the ginn. The fear that consumed her seemed to fall off her back just as the beads of moisture from the dense humidity was sliding down the metal walls of the hallway. Her fear converted to anger. Though her heart continued to pound, it was now due to the anticipation of what she might do to help the anguished. Tilhar was the only living thing she had ever hurt or killed and that was mostly by accident. She wondered if it was possible do it again purposefully. Could she kill in cold blood?
The creatures that ran the ginn were monsters and deserved to be treated as such. They weren’t civil or just. They were barbarians at best. They had shown no mercy to her, the other women of Earth, or the newly born. Why would they deserve compassion? Why shouldn’t they be slaughtered? But she was not as brutal as they were and she hoped that if the opportunity revealed itself, that she would do it without any reservation.
Sonia peered into the open room. The ceilings were five or six stories high. Just as she remembered. Several round columns with elevators the size of an individual Tish citizen led up two stories to a cylindrical multi-level room that she assumed was housing for those charged with overseeing the ginn. Seven of them were in the large open area. Across the open facility as far as her eye could see were rows of walls. On each side of the walls were steel partitions that were lined up and equally spaced. Each had been secured with barred doors, which made the area more suitable for a prison. The horrors this place is responsible for, Sonia thought.
It was reasonable to assume that most of the cells were going to have a living person of her kind locked away suffering through experimentation or forced impregnation. The echoes of haunting moans and groans were too difficult to distinguish. Sonia had no idea how many people were imprisoned there. For a reason she was unable to discern, somewhere in the aisle in front of her one did stand out among the rest. A clearly distinguishable sound of someone in the laboring cycle of childbirth haunted her. She could never wrench the screams from her mind, especially those from her own ordeal. Reliving it never seemed to get any easier and being in the midst of so many who were suffering made her memories even more authentic.
She could no longer bear to hear the struggling woman. Her pain and anguish called out to Sonia. Fighting a rush of anxiety, she panned the room for a third time to make sure that no one had followed. The seven towers ignited a nearly crippling cause for concern. She did not come to get caught or tortured by Ningal. Why was this boy worth the risk? Why was she here? The odds of being spotted were far greater once she was in the open. There was no way to know where the Tisht were. She could already feel their black eyes staring at her.
Across the first level, none moved, and nothing stirred. To the right, she noted several hooded cloaks hanging on a rack and recalled creatures who regularly visited the ginn wearing them. She slid out of the doorway and surveyed the grey cloaks in search of the shortest one to cover herself with. In a fluid series of movements, she flung it over and pulled the hood over her head. While it was no magical or invisible garment, she felt a bit more secure while moving toward the hallway.
Sonia was eager to get past the line of beds and stirrups and into the aisle where the sounds of the woman in need were emanating. The narrow walls would provide her with cover and leave her less vulnerable to surveying eyes and whatever security systems may have been employed in the ginn. She moved as fast as nervous legs could carry her without failing. The long cloak was dragging the floor and threatened to trip her up as she stepped on and kicked at it. Twice she had nearly gone down face first and contemplated discarding the garment in frustration. A second more compelling cause for her to ditch her covering was that it reeked of the putrid odor of rotting fish and was turning her stomach. The cloak was mildly damp, which she assumed meant that whatever creature had worn it probably left the ginn within the last few hours.
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Several of the beds were saturated with old and new blood. What she assumed were sheets seemed more akin to wax paper and were in tatters. She passed a pile of soiled and bloody bed coverings then noticed that blood pooled beneath one bed near the end of the aisle and slowly flowed downward toward a drain along the contoured lines of the flooring. Sonia paused and looked at it in horror. It seemed to be far too much for anyone to have survived. It was certain that the poor woman was no longer among the living.
A ghostly scene slowly materialized before her. Where there had simply been blood-stained sheets, she could now see a faintly transparent image of a woman tied down to the table, screaming and begging for help. Three Tisht stood around her in surgical garb. One by her head was pressing down on her shoulders, the second was applying pressure to the belly and the third was between her legs pulling on the life that was in her. Sonia could see the blood as it ran freely and splattered on the floor. The Tish showed no concern for her condition. The woman screamed and snapped her head up and down, back and forth as the relentless Tisht simply ignored her pain and carried out the task of taking the infant.
Sonia realized that she had stopped in the open and was clearly visible to anyone in the towers. But it was impossible to turn away as the horrific event played out. Did the Tisht, who were certain to know she was there, project the holographic image onto the bed for some odd reason? Was it to taunt her? If not, how was she able to see this?
As if winning the tug-of-war, the Tish that was between her legs jerked backward. With its three fingers wrapped around the thin leg of the child, it held it up, then drained the embryonic fluid from its lungs. The baby cried and looked as normal to Sonia as any child that she could recall seeing. It made her wonder what had happened to the child that was taken from her. The Tisht took the child and walked right toward her, then passed through as if she wasn’t there. The one was on the woman’s belly moved between the legs, then used an instrument to fuse the torn flesh back together. The woman stopped bleeding but moaned as sweat ran from her brow. She stopped moving, either slipping into a catatonic state or passing into the life beyond this one.
Universal Code Page 28
