The Chaos Sutra

by Gregg Vann

  Maxal did just that, and then they both scrambled across the broken glass and into the corridor beyond, climbing over the pile of wreckage left behind from Tien’s battle with Miso to join the others waiting near the center of the ship. The vessel’s defensive array, such as it was, managed to fire twice more before finally being silenced by the Udek guns outside.

  “Well, that’s it,” Maxal said. “We’re done.”

  “Move to the cross-corridor connecting the two hulls,” Tien directed. “It’s structurally reinforced, so it should provide us better protection.”

  “Temporarily,” Eraz grumbled.

  “Go!” Tien snapped.

  They had only taken two steps when a large explosion went off beneath the ship, throwing them up against the wall as the vessel teetered to one side. Without warning, the fuselage suddenly dropped to the tarmac below, and the vicious impact sent them all flying off in different directions. The Udek had obliterated the landing gear holding up the primary hull, and the ship crashed to the ground when it lost the underlying support.

  The collapse was so powerful that it bent the junction where the main fuselage connected to the cross-corridor, leaving the group trapped in an area between the now impassable intersection and the cockpit. As they staggered back to their feet, flames shot out from a doorway directly behind Tien. He turned to look inside the room and saw Brother Ryll picking himself up off the floor. Then the monk grabbed a portable fire extinguisher from the wall and began dousing the flames. Like most of the ship’s other important equipment, the automated fire suppression system was now offline.

  “No!” Tien heard someone scream.

  He looked to his side and saw Eraz standing above Maxal. The Blenej pilot was on his knees in the wreckage, cradling Ayel in two of his arms. Maxal’s third hand was pressed up against Ayel’s head, trying to stem the flow of blood from a serious wound. Tien scanned the area and quickly deduced what happened.

  When the ship dropped, Ayel had been struck by a metal beam that tore free from the overhead framework, leaving more than half of her skull exposed by a wide piece of avulsed scalp. The bloody flap sagged down almost to her shoulder, revealing multiple fractures in the bone beneath. But that wasn’t Ayel’s only injury. Tien also saw a thick piece of charred metal protruding from her abdomen. No blood had wicked into the clothing surrounding it, so he assumed the searing piece of metal cauterized the wound as it passed through Ayel’s body. One thing was certain, though: either of the injuries was fatal, especially given their present circumstances.

  Ayel tried to speak, but couldn’t. Her neck had been partially crushed in the collapse, and her artificial voicebox was damaged. She then tried using her fingers to say something to Maxal, struggling to twist a few of the broken ones into proper shapes. The slow and deliberate movements made it plain to everyone that Ayel was fading fast.

  “No, no, no… No!” Maxal yelled. “I won’t let you die. No!”

  Brother Ryll had finished extinguishing the fire and he joined the others in the corridor. Maxal’s eyes locked on him instantly; his voice was desperate. “You! Monk. Save her! Preserve Ayel’s consciousness, I’m begging you. Forget about your promises to me. All of them. Everything. Just save her!”

  “I… I can’t,” Ryll replied, his expression pained. “I’m sorry. I want to, I really do. But I don’t have the necessary equipment.”

  {Yes, Brother Ryll. You do} Dyson’s voice boomed out into the corridor, startling them all. {Leave me where I am. I alone can withstand it. Transfer the young woman’s mind into Miso’s empty chamber. You must save her life, Brother. We have a duty to preserve her}

  “I can’t,” Brother Ryll said, shaking his head emphatically. “I won’t. The torture you’re going through, master…it’s too much. And that device is failing. You could die. You need Miso’s chamber, Brother.”

  {She needs it more. You know that in your heart. Keep me alive where I am, if you’re able. But that girl deserves a chance at life. Miso’s soul chamber is equipped with a built-in scanner, so use it to transfer her mind. Go, now, and do what you must}

  “But—”

  {You have made enough hard choices for today, Brother Ryll. This one is mine. Now move, quickly}

  Ryll heard the finality in Dyson’s statement, and knew he had no choice but to obey. “Yes, Brother,” he said. Another explosion sent him stumbling for a few steps, but then Ryll rushed back into the room to retrieve Miso’s chamber.

  A loud, high-pitched whine pierced the air, followed by the sounds of metal being cut and then bent away. The commotion was coming from the other side of the collapsed passageway—at the twisted junction with the cross-corridor, just a few meters away.

  “They’re coming through,” Eraz said. “Though for the life of me, I don’t understand why.” She looked toward the cockpit but found no escape there. The damage from the fall had blocked off that end of the passageway as well. “I would just blow up the entire ship to avoid any danger, but it looks like they may want prisoners.”

  “Or,” Tien countered, “they’re trying to get through to make sure we’re all dead. And if not, to finish the job—up close and personal.”

  “Or that,” Eraz admitted. “But either way, we’re fucked.”

  {Tien?} Dyson called out.

  “I’m here.” He noted that the old monk’s voice was slightly warbled. Ryll’s concerns about the decaying soul chamber appeared to be genuine.

  {How bad is the situation?}

  “Imagine the worst. And then double it.”

  {I may be able to help}

  “How?” Tien felt strange speaking to empty air so stepped inside the room. Brother Ryll rushed past him to help Ayel. Tien spotted Dyson’s battered soul chamber immediately. It was secured to an undersized base, sitting on top of a half-tilted workbench.

  {There is something I have to tell you, Tien. The Bodhi have access to certain privileged information}

  “So I’ve heard.”

  Dyson paused for a moment. {You are aware of the afterimages?}

  “I am. I know about everything, Dyson. Including the fact that you kept one of my memories to program your androids, using it to develop a new threat discrimination protocol—without my knowledge, or consent.”

  {I see. Then please accept my sincere apologies, Tien. And table any anger you’re feeling about that unfortunate necessity until later. I’m actually glad you know the truth, because now you won’t be surprised to learn that we also possess secrets from Udek governmental elites, at the highest levels of power. As you are no doubt aware, many of them choose to be cloned and resurrected on Bodhi Prime. And at times, the afterimages they leave behind are quite revealing}

  “You’re saying that you have memories from sitting senators in the Presidium? From the Council of Ministers?” The gravity of Dyson’s statement began to dawn on Tien, as did the possibilities presented by it. “Eraz!” he yelled. “Get your ass in here!”

  {But I want your word, Tien. Promise me that the Udek will not move against Bodhi Prime. I heard snippets of conversations suggesting they were going to attack the monastery. Whatever calamitous wheels Miso’s sick mind set into motion must grind to a halt. That is my only condition}

  “You want my word?” Tien said. “That’s the only assurance you need?”

  {I believe I have the full measure of you, Kiro Tien. Your word is enough}

  “Then you have it. I suspect Miso was working directly with Awi Stenth, so their plans for Bodhi Prime probably died with them. But if we do get out of this, I’ll make certain of it.”

  {Thank you}

  Eraz ran into the room, almost falling as the ship’s broken hull shuddered under a renewed Udek assault. It appeared the commandos outside weren’t content to wait for news from the cutting crew about who might still be hiding in this section of the ship. And judging by the ferocity of the current weapons barrage, Eraz decided that maybe the Udek weren’t so keen on taking prisoners after all.

 
; Thin white smoke began drifting through the already hazy air, coming from an unseen fire elsewhere in the vessel. Eraz knew the poor ship couldn’t take much more punishment, nor would it have to. Soon enough, the commandos would breach, and then they would swarm through the wreckage to capture or kill every last one of them. Eraz was somewhat amazed that they hadn’t done so already.

  {Set up a secure channel to Bodhi Prime} Brother Dyson instructed.

  Eraz glanced at Tien with a confused expression on her face. “What the hell?”

  “Just do it,” he said.

  “All right. All right. Relax.”

  Eraz produced a dataslate she’d liberated from their escape vehicle and got to work. She ignored the repeated demands from Special Corp flashing across the top of the device, ordering them to surrender, and used codes provided by Brother Dyson to establish an encrypted connection to the monastery. The monk then gave Eraz a specific set of files to retrieve, and it only took a moment for information to start streaming into the dataslate—direct from the repository on Prime. Eraz began to smile, and Tien glanced down at the screen to find out why. He couldn’t manifest a grin of his own on the android face, but it was there, just the same.

  {Will that be helpful?} Brother Dyson asked them, already knowing the answer.

  “Yes,” Tien replied, continuing to read through the host of information running down the display. The words rolled out in a steady stream as they cleared a sophisticated collection of high-security protocols, meant to keep them from prying eyes. “This will do nicely.” Tien gently tapped Eraz on the shoulder with his shattered arm, drawing her attention away from the screen. “Contact Ambassador O’linth,” he said.

  “On it,” she replied, without question. Eraz was smart enough to realize what Tien was up to.

  After establishing a connection, Eraz gave the dataslate to Tien, wedging it tightly between two stiff wires jutting out from the tangled stump of his right arm. As she backed away again, the ambassador’s image appeared in a small frame at the top of the device. The confusion on his face sat in stark contrast to the revelations flowing down the rest of the screen.

  “What the hell are you?” O’linth demanded. “And how did you get this channel? This is my private line.”

  Tien suddenly remembered his appearance. “Kiro Tien, Ambassador. Surely you remember me. The Bodhi furnished this android body. But I assure you, the Special Corp operative you know is the person controlling it.”

  Ambassador O’linth’s expression shifted from annoyance to curiosity. And then Tien saw another emotion creeping across the Udek's face…amusement.

  “Kiro Tien? Remarkable. I have to say, I never envisioned you foolish enough to return to Ko’ln. I thought you were smarter than that. It seems I was mistaken.”

  Something slammed into the top of the ship, and the explosion that followed sent a lighting block from the ceiling crashing to the ground, narrowly missing Eraz’s head.

  “I saw the alert,” Ambassador O’linth continued, acknowledging the destruction in the background. “And I can see that you’re quite busy at the moment. So why have you contacted me?”

  “I need a favor, Ambassador,” Tien said. “It’s a simple one, really. I want you to call off this attack.”

  O’linth laughed. “Awi Stenth never told me you had a sense of humor, Tien. I never saw any trace of it, that’s for sure. But you’re no fool. You know damn well that I don’t control the military—and certainly not Special Corp forces. I’m afraid that you’re wasting your time appealing to me.”

  Tien ignored O’linth’s transparent lies. “You’re right, Ambassador. I’m not a fool. So why are you trying to treat me like one? You understand what’s going on here, and that I don’t have time for games. I know the real extent of your influence—with both the military, and the Presidium. Tell me, O’linth, are you still leading the opposition to Udek expansion?”

  “I am. But what of it? This doesn’t seem a very opportune time to discuss politics, Tien. Don’t you have more pressing matters to attend to?”

  “I do, which brings us back to why I need your assistance, Ambassador. But I don’t expect you to help me without some reward in it for yourself—I certainly wouldn’t. So I’m sending you files on a few of your staunchest opponents in the Presidium. Have a look; I think you’ll find what’s in them extremely useful.”

  Tien linked his HUD to the dataslate, and began sifting through the information provided by Brother Dyson. When he found what he was looking for, he transferred some carefully selected secrets to the ambassador. Tien watched O’linth’s eyes narrow as he read over the incoming material. Then he saw the man’s jaw drop wide open.

  “This… This could change everything. I can gut my opponents with these revelations. They would never want this information to get out—they couldn’t allow it—and would do everything in their power to stop it from happening. At the very least, I can use these secrets to drive my enemies away from their current policies, and maybe even force them to support mine.”

  “There’s more where that came from, Ambassador O’linth, much more. Including a few things you may not want widely disseminated.” Tien glanced down at the still-running data stream and used his HUD to sort through it again. He froze a couple of entries on the screen. “Like the incident on Volas, thirty years ago. Or that nasty business during negotiations with the Blenej, right after the Brenin War. Nice work on that, by the way. I imagine Awi Stenth was involved at some point; it certainly looks like some of his handiwork. You see, Ambassador O’linth, there are many, many secrets here. And it would be a shame if they all became public knowledge—especially if your interstellar counterparts found out what you’ve really been up to over the years. I’m confident that I can transmit an unencrypted data burst across this entire planet before we end up dead here today—one that will be picked up by every terminal on Ko’ln, including those at the foreign embassies you so often frequent. But maybe you can help me avoid doing something so rash.”

  “Incident on Volas?” Ambassador O’linth repeated. The Udek’s expression first went slack, and then his eyes widened in shock.

  Tien could almost see the fear racing through O’linth’s mind. It’s a terrible thing to have your sins laid bare before you—being forced to confront the worst parts of your own nature. But it’s even more frightening to realize that the whole galaxy might see you as you truly are. Tien read through more of the material as O’linth struggled to find his voice. Some of the things he already knew, but much of it came as a surprise. When you stripped away the trappings of high office and personal station, and removed the thick veils of privacy afforded by privileged birth and family prestige, Ambassador O’linth’s secret life was one worthy of a Special Corp operative.

  “But…but how?” O’linth stuttered. “How could you possibly know about Volas? I was the only one in the room.”

  “The only one left alive, you mean,” Tien replied. “The information you stole was valuable, to be sure, but can you imagine if the Volasi ever found out the truth about what happened to their courier? I should think that would create quite an incident.”

  As both a consummate politician, and a practical one, O’linth grasped the situation before him perfectly. Without an intervention of some sort, Kiro Tien was going to die. And he seemed determined, and very capable, of taking the ambassador down with him. But Tien was offering inducements as well as threats, signaling a willingness to be reasonable. So Ambassador O’linth made up his mind; it was time to deal. The decision was an easy one though, because he had no choice in the matter. Kiro Tien was holding secrets that would cost O’linth his freedom—at best. But more than likely…his life.

  “What do you want?” he asked wearily.

  “I already told you,” Tien said. “Call off the attack.”

  “And? I’m not a stupid man, Tien. That can’t be it. Not with the club you’re holding over my head.”

  “No, it isn’t. You were always very smart, Ambas
sador. That’s one of the reasons I’ve decided to ally myself with you. I think we’ll work well together, especially after reviewing your clandestine activities. So I’m taking the position.”

  “Position? What position?”

  “The promotion Awi Stenth told me about. The one you and Minister Tekiol already sanctioned. So unless you want your secrets flashing across every screen on Ko’ln, and beyond, the time has come for you to follow through with the chancellor’s recommendation.”

  “You can’t possibly mean—”

  “I can. And I do. Stenth is dead. I killed him myself.”

  Kiro Tien lowered his blank face closer to the screen—to emphasize the fact that his next statement was a directive, not a request.

  “Now, Ambassador O’linth, please inform the troops outside to cease their assault immediately. Before they end up killing the new Chancellor of the Udek Special Corp.”

  O’linth’s image disappeared from the dataslate as he switched to another channel, and then seconds later…

  The attack stopped.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Tien and Eraz stood together on the tarmac, roughly a dozen meters away from the still-burning Bodhi ship. The pungent smells of leaking fuel and spent ammunition saturated the scene, assailing the senses, and grayish-black smoke billowed out from the smoldering wreckage of spacecraft and assault vehicle alike, rising up through the cool night air in swelling, broken columns—their intensities slowly fading as efforts to douse the flames finally bore fruit.

  The sounds of dozens of soldiers and support vehicles, racing around to fight the fires and secure the area, added to an already sizable commotion—caused by frequent secondary explosions, and ongoing field triage for the Udek wounded. It was borderline pandemonium at the spaceport, and certainly the most significant event the facility had seen since the last civil war. But despite the devastation, and all of the frenetic activity underway meant to bring things under control, Kiro Tien and Commander Eraz were quite satisfied with how things had turned out.