They wordlessly trudged back to the cages, wherein Qaz’s ‘accommodations’ were centrally located for all his would-be rivals to see. The cages were arranged in a series of concentric circles, with the newest and least proven gladiators occupying the outer circle and the most prestigious and fearsome warriors occupying the inner circles. In this way, rivalries were fomented between potential enemies while dubious alliances were often struck for the purpose of mutual advancement. Those occupying the outer circles looked ever inward, where their betters received markedly better food and amenities.
In accordance with the natural way of things, Qaz occupied the lone cage at the heart of the circular arrangement.
He passed by Inzigar’s vacated cage, pausing to pay his respects to the formidable—if shortsighted and ultimately foolish—lizard man. Qaz did not condescend his fallen rival for fighting and dying at Qaz’s hand; he could hardly blame any living creature for suffering such a fate. He condescended the lizard man because Inzigar had not possessed a nearly strong enough respect for Qaz’s experience.
Qaz sighed, whispering, “I will soon join you in the abyss, brother.”
“Move,” the assault droid snarled, and Qaz cast an angry glance over his shoulder at the strange machine before resuming his march to his cell.
Unlike all of the other occupants of the various cages, Qaz was surrounded by bars and had not a single solid wall in his cell. He therefore enjoyed no privacy, whereas the others all enjoyed at least some measure of seclusion if they chose to take it. A small corner of a cell might be walled off, or a four-sided cage might have two sides made of bars and two sides of plate metal. It was fitting that he, as the mightiest of the arena’s denizens, become a target for each of his would-be rivals to aim at. He did not begrudge his position—he relished it.
Qaz strode confidently into his cage and sat at the edge of his cot. He looked down at his damaged leg and snorted irritably. The cage door slammed shut and the minotaur proudly waited for the medical droid to arrive and treat his wound.
The familiar whirring of the medical droid’s motivators echoed down the corridor which led to the Crafter’s laboratories. Strangely, the assault droid remained motionless outside of Qaz’s cell.
“A broken droid,” Qaz grunted.
“I am not broken,” the droid retorted with what sounded like genuine offense.
“Then why do you linger?”
“I am…waiting,” the aged assault droid said hesitantly, and Qaz’s brow lowered as he re-examined the strange-looking assault droid. Only a few seconds into his examinations, however, a medical droid moved into view.
“Medical services required by Qaz, 37th Heir of Asterion,” bleeped the medical droid, “remain seated to avoid neural interruption.”
Qaz had seen what ‘neural interruption’ meant when several of his colleagues had failed to comply with the seemingly friendly medical droid’s commands. Of the five who had fallen victim to the droid’s neural stun field, only two had survived the experience—and one of those had been so badly damaged that he had been chopped up and fed to his former neighbors when it was clear he would never fight again.
So he waited while the door opened and the droid began to administer its healing. The customary pinch at the margins of the gash in his leg was followed by the expected numbness. He focused on the fights he had just won, recalling every minute detail as he replayed the battle in his head. Several of his own missteps stood out in his mind’s eye, and he resolved to practice on the footwork which led to those mistakes.
“Unit is not recognized,” the medical droid bleeped, and Qaz was broken from his ruminations to realize that its ministrations were complete and it now stood just outside the open cell door.
“You are in error,” the assault droid growled.
“Unit is not recognized,” the medical droid repeated. “Broadcast identification—now,” it said as the ‘neural interruption’ probe popped out from concealment within its round torso.
“Broadcasting,” the assault droid replied, and for a long moment the two droids stood silently as an unfamiliar series of chimes sounded from the medical droid.
“Error…” the medical droid suddenly blurted before once again falling silent. “Error!” it shrilled, but the assault droid looked on impassively as the medical droid began to spin wildly on its treads. “Error: subprogram incompatible with—“
The medical droid suddenly ceased its erratic movements and fell silent, while Qaz stood from his bed and felt every muscle in his body tense. This was the first time he had ever heard the Crafter’s droids argue with one another, and he decidedly disliked the direction this particular exchange was headed.
“Resume sitting, slave,” the assault droid commanded, but Qaz hesitated to comply. “Sit!” the droid bellowed, and by now all eyes in the Crafter’s cages were fixed on the scene.
“Who are you?” Qaz demanded. “You are not one of the Crafter’s servants—you bear no heraldry and do not speak as they do.”
The clomping of metal feet echoed down one of the adjoining hallway, and Qaz knew that more assault droids were on the way to secure the scene. He suspected he would be killed for a measure of perceived complicity in the bizarre situation he now found himself in.
The voice of an approaching assault droid—this one definitely one of the Crafter’s—boomed throughout the chamber, “The Crafter demands compliance.”
The quartet of assault droids stomped their way toward the center of the cages, where Qaz still stood his ground behind the medical droid and strange assault droid.
“What is the nature of your malfunction?” the lead assault droid—a tripedal design that resembled nothing so much as a trio of insect legs which supported a swiveling torso with a dozen different weapons mounted upon it—demanded after clomping its way to the medical droid’s side.
The bulbous medical droid said nothing in reply.
“External diagnostics do not indicate interruption of power or cessation of central processing,” the assault droid intoned. “Comply with your directives, Medical 12,” it insisted, backing its words with an ominous whirring noise from one of its many weapons.
Medical 12 remained silent and unmoving.
“Unit not recognized,” a second newcomer declared in a cold, metallic voice. This assault droid stood on four legs and had a pair of pincer arms—arms which had taken dozens of the cage’s denizens in its cold, brutal embrace during Qaz’s time in the Crafter’s pits. “Unit will self-identify,” the quadruped commanded after coming to stand in striking range of the new, unmarked droid.
“Transmitting credentials,” the strange, unmarked droid grumbled, and almost instantly three of the four Crafter assault droids started to behave as erratically as the medical droid had done.
“Update status,” the pincer-armed droid demanded, turning its machine eyes toward its fellows. “Update status!” it repeated more forcefully.
But the three assault droids did no such thing, opting instead to slam their limbs into Qaz’s cage with bone-crushing force that caused several of the bars to bend as sparks flew from the impacts.
“Unidentified unit,” the pincer droid squared off on the unmarked assault droid, “you are directed to power down and await disassembly.”
“Unable to comply,” the bipedal, unmarked droid said in a hard, unyielding voice. “Return to your recharge station immediately; your control matrix has suffered catastrophic damage.”
“Repeat,” the four-legged droid with the pincers crouched threateningly, “power down and await disassembly.”
The unmarked droid made a sound which Qaz would have sworn was a long-suffering sigh. “Error: deception protocols have failed. Re-mounting primary personality matrix.”
The strange assault droid’s weapon arms trained on its pincer-armed counterpart, and a bevy of weaponry popped out from concealment along nearly every possible inch of the newcomer’s chassis. The four-legged droid seemed ready to leap into the fray, but
all of a sudden its fellow assault droids ceased their erratic movements and fell as silent and still as the medical droid.
“Re-calculating probabilities,” declared the unmarked droid now bristling with previously concealed weaponry declared. The bipedal droid drew itself to its full stature—which saw it tower to nearly a meter above Qaz’s horn tips—and grumbled, “Probability of engaging in combat to complete mission objectives: 93%.”
“Droid, you will submit to my commands,” a new voice—this one belonging to the none other but the Crafter—echoed through the speakers built into the walls of the cage chamber. If Qaz had been less focused on the immediate danger of a droid fight erupting just a few meters from where he stood, he would have recognized the abject fear in the Crafter’s voice—an emotion which none of the arena’s denizens had ever witnessed in their creator and jailor.
“Probability of compliance with vocally transmitted directive,” the new droid said wearily, turning one of its weaponized arms toward the nearest speaker, “7%.”
The plasma cannon mounted on the droid’s upraised arm roared as it launched a bolt of blue-white fire. That jet of flame instantly turned the speaker and its attached observation devices into molten slag.
At the same instant the plasma weapon fired, the pincer-armed droid leapt at the rebellious newcomer. But even before it could close to grips with the larger, older droid, the pincer droid’s torso was rocked by a pair of mini-rocket impacts which sent metal fragments flying across the chamber. Several of those fragments opened minor cuts on Qaz’s torso, but he leapt forward to leave his cell as a combination of survival instinct and the urge to grasp at this seemingly impossible opportunity for freedom overcame his conscious faculties.
The pincer droid would not be so easily deterred, skittering toward the rebel droid on only three functional legs as it lashed out with mechanical speed and ferocity at the towering droid’s legs.
It seemed to Qaz that it would land at least a solid blow, given the bipedal droid’s relatively vulnerable frame. But at the last instant, before the pincers closed on the exposed components which made up the rebel droid’s legs, an unexpected volley of fire erupted from all around them and Qaz reflexively dove to the floor.
After realizing he had not received any of that fire himself, Qaz returned his focus to the battling droids and saw a most satisfying sight: the pincer droid’s torso had been completely annihilated and it stood on three stiff, motionless legs as tiny sparks erupted sporadically within what remained of its ‘torso.’
“Probability of damaged unit’s successful repair,” the new droid said with what sounded like genuine remorse, “7%. Probability of mission completion: 92%.”
The odd assault droid turned to Qaz, who only then realized that the Crafter’s other droids were now moving—and that they had been the ones to author the sudden burst of weapons fire which had destroyed their former fellow.
“Who are you?” Qaz asked as he slowly stood to his feet.
The droid lowered itself into a relative crouch—which still saw the top of its chassis stand at Qaz’s eye level—and lowered its arms fractionally. “This unit’s primary designation is ‘Ed,’ but I have recently been re-designated ‘Hansheng’.” The droid clomped toward Qaz, who stood his ground with determination even in the face of such a truly awe-inspiring machine warrior. “What is your unit designation?”
Qaz held his breath for a moment before replying, “I am Qaz, from the 37th Batch of Asterion’s line.”
“Designation logged for future reference,” the droid acknowledged as the other droids began to make their ways to the various corridors adjoining the cage chamber. “After this facility has been secured, you and your fellow inhabitants will be enabled to pursue individuated agendas in accordance with your unique bio-social imperatives. But first, my mission requires me to make a request of you, Qaz, from the 37th Batch of Asterion’s line.”
“You are going to set us free?” Qaz blinked in disbelief.
“Affirmative.”
Qaz was so blindsided by the very possibility of genuine freedom that it took him several seconds to collect his thoughts. “What would you ask of me?” he finally asked, wary that he would dislike the answer—and still not entirely convinced this was not all one of the Crafter’s games.
Hansheng, the assault droid, underwent a rapid change to its outer armor as the majority of the previously-concealed weapons returned to their hidden compartments. He then gestured to the corridor which led to the Crafter’s laboratories—the same place where every single denizen of the cages had been sculpted, birthed, and eventually returned after their usefulness had been exhausted—and in an ominous tone which Qaz which knew he would never forget, the droid replied, “Take me to your Crafter.”
Prologue II: A New Assignment
“Mr. Sarkozi,” Section Chief Black greeted after Sarkozi finally, following weeks of decontamination and debriefing, was permitted to leave the quarantine section of the warship which had collected him from the FTL comm. hub, “have a seat.”
“Boss,” Sarkozi acknowledged with a formal nod, moving to the indicated seat.
“There will be no further need for that particular form of address, Mr. Sarkozi,” Chief Black insisted. “It’s better for all involved if you call me ‘Mr. Black’ from this point on.”
“Mr. Black,” Sarkozi acknowledged as he settled into the lone chair present along the conference table. Sarkozi had not even seen the warship on his instruments when it had approached the comm. hub where he had previously been stationed. His first warning that Mr. Black’s ship had arrived was when the airlock opened via external override—which had been one of the most terrifying moments of Samuel Sarkozi’s life.
“You did good work on you deep space stint,” Mr. Black said approvingly, gesturing to a data slate on the table. “That particular assignment has a burnout rate of 83% inside of three months. You were stationed there for considerably longer than that, which suggests to me that you’ve got more than just talent—you’ve got character. What do you think about that?”
Sarkozi knew this was some kind of test, but he had never been one for projecting false airs so he shrugged, “I guess I’m surprised the burnout rate is only 83%.”
Mr. Black’s lips twisted into a mischievous smirk, “Bravo, Mr. Scarlet. Are you ready for something a little more…demanding?”
Sarkozi felt a thrill of excitement at his Chief’s reaction, but he kept his emotions hidden as best he could. “What’s the mission?”
“First, some background,” Mr. Black tapped a nearby crystalline control panel and the lights in the room dimmed. A holographic display of the local region of the so-called Gorgon Sectors appeared. Sarkozi leaned forward to examine the notations logged under each major point of interest as the Section Chief explained, “This band of space—the Gorgon Sectors, such as they are—comprises a region of the galaxy nearly as vast as the Imperium of Man.”
The Gorgon Sectors were highlighted in yellow as the long, banana-shaped band of the galaxy was expanded to fill the holographic display. Sarkozi knew few details of the Gorgon Sectors’ inhabitants aside from the presence of various uplifts, gene-crafted species, and outlaw organizations which most people would refer to as ‘pirates.’
“The Gorgon Sectors present a unique challenge,” Black continued, “since they are heavily populated—relatively speaking, of course—and possess remarkably consistent levels of technology throughout the disparate factions which call this region of space home.”
“They share their technology for mutual benefit?” Sarkozi asked with a furrowed brow. He had not heard of organization on the level required to conduct such comprehensive diplomacy—to say nothing of the lack of centralized, multi-system governments in this war-torn patch of space.
“Not according to our sources,” Black shook his head. “There is precious little contact which even remotely resembles diplomacy taking place between these factions, but we have collected and examin
ed dozens of technological articles which confirm that the general tech level of the so-called Gorgon Alliance is, for all intents and purposes, uniform. In fact,” he waved his hand and the swirling star-scape was replaced by a trio of wildly different life forms, the left-most of which resembled nothing so much as a slug, “among the various factions we have encountered are three distinct intelligent species of non-human origin in the Gorgon Alliance. Each of these species arose in markedly different environments: the Prichtac,” he gestured to the slugs, “occupy highly acidic environments found in volcanically active regions of terrestrial-grade worlds, while the Ordnam,” he gestured to a vaguely avian-looking creature with spines rather than feathers, “developed in environments with atmospheric pressures and surface temperatures which present significant challenges to the establishment of high technology. The third species has no formal name due to their primary communication occurring via electromagnetic pulses transmitted through ferrous material as the medium,” he gestured to what looked like a molten lump of rock. “This third species is based on silica rather than carbon, and would be more at home in the outer core of a terrestrial world than anywhere on its surface. How then,” Mr. Black gestured to the trio of wildly disparate species, “do we come to find all of them at roughly identical states of high technology at this particular point in time?”
Sarkozi was familiar with the equations which predicted the probability of intelligent life arising simultaneously in a local region of space. While many of those equations were laughably narrow-minded, he did take Mr. Black’s meaning clearly: the odds of these three species developing alongside and independent of humanity, and achieving a comparable level of technological advancement in a timespan better measured in centuries than eons, were so low as to be functionally impossible.
Either such species’ would have destroyed themselves with independent tech explosions, or they would have sought each other out and competed or cooperated with each other. The lack of apparent diplomatic ties between these non-human species’ was enough to negate the possibility of their cooperation. But if they possessed the technology to build FTL-capable ships—warships capable of putting up a real fight against the Imperials, at that—then they should have made contact with each other and established formal ties long before the Gorgon War erupted.
The Middle Road (Spineward Sectors: Middleton's Pride Book 7) Page 2
