Absence of Blade

by Caitlin Demaris McKenna

  “You wouldn’t be alone here,” said Pal. “There are other Osk on Skraal.”

  “Fugitives fleeing a failed war,” he scoffed. “If I wanted that I’d have rejoined the Fleet limping back to Oskaran.” Gau rose from his seat, depositing his water bowl on the counter by the food console without looking at it. “I’ve been a fugitive my entire life,” said Gau. “I’m done running away.”

  The door to the suite whispered open at his touch. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have something to do.”

  “Where are you going?” Pal asked.

  Gau looked back at him levelly. “To look for a seph named Mose Attarish. We worked together in Za. Someone in Skraal-Teklan may have heard something. As long as there’s a chance he’s alive, I won’t turn my back on him.”

  Pal’s mouth twitched once, as though he’d been about to speak and checked himself. Gau bowed and turned out of the darkening guest suite, leaving Pal to contemplate the rain.

  Hyperstream gates were ring-shaped exotic-matter generators a kilometer across, each one a dark staring eye framed in a complex of bronze metal machinery.

  The gate outside the curved observation bay of the Baskar ship was a circle barely larger than a game piece. Even that was an illusion, projected onto the bay’s holofoil screens: the real hyperstream gate was a light-minute away, one of two that led from Skraal directly to Olios 3.

  A green dot intruded into the screen—a graphic superimposed over the filtered view of space. It headed rapidly toward the bright circle of the gate. Gau felt the change in air pressure as the Baskar in the bay around him held their breaths.

  Gau gripped the railing fronting the observation bay, nervous despite his better instincts as he watched the green dot indicating the probe intersect with the tiny coin of the gate. His heart slammed in his ears, waiting for the explosion of light as the gate collapsed, taking the freedom he needed with it. Even though he knew it was absurd, impossible.

  Seconds crawled by. The probe was programmed to exit at the other end of the hyperstream and then return, in order to verify its code’s compatibility with the mines rigged at each end of the stream.

  The bay’s screens showed darkness.

  Then light.

  Red light, the red blip of the returning probe as it rocketed out of the stream gate. All around him, Baskar let loose with gurgling barks that must have been equivalent to cheers of celebration, bodies bobbing up and down in their excitement. Gau let a tiny smile of satisfaction find its way onto his face as he watched the red dot track its way back to their ship.

  His smile disappeared as Pal rolled up beside him and hooked his claws over the railing.

  “Well, it seems your codes were a success,” the Baskar said. “You’ll have what you need and be leaving soon enough.”

  Gau jabbed his snout forward in an Osk nod, keeping his gaze on the screen.

  “I had some of my contacts look into the matter you mentioned.” With a tendril, Pal slipped a data sliver out of his skirt pocket. “Mose Attarish is not on the official lists of war dead the Fleet uploaded during their passage through Skraal space. They had many combatants unaccounted for, but still . . .” His voice grew soft. “It offers some hope he survived.”

  Gau pocketed the data sliver. “I appreciate it.”

  “I could tell it was important to you.” Pal’s eyes met his. “It doesn’t seem as though you have many friends.”

  Gau curled his hands around the railing, wishing it were the feel of the Carnivore’s controls under his fingers. The ship sat cold and asleep in the hangar of this Baskar transport, but not for long. Soon he would power it up and be away from here, away from Pal’s prying questions and false concern. He had spoken truly earlier: the Baskar didn’t really know him at all. But . . .

  But Pal still knew who Gau had been; where he’d come from; what he’d had to do to survive, day after day. The Baskar might not know the game, but he at least sensed a shade of the past Gau dragged behind him. Even so, Gau didn’t know he was going to speak until he cleared his throat.

  “I thought about what you said.” Yellow eyes fixed on him; the Baskar waited in silence.

  “I’m going back to Diego Two.”

  Pal closed his eyes.

  “But not before I have a plan.” Gau gazed past the gate, at the myriad of stars scattered across the vacuum. Aival’s star was out there somewhere, but for once he wasn’t looking for it.

  “And not alone.”

  14

  I need something sharp,” the cloaked figure hissed. Tek’s visitor hung back beside the metal door of the weapons and equipment shop, scanning the display behind the counter. A window slit behind the figure’s hooded head revealed a sky plastered with heavy clouds, fat raindrops splashing against the thickened glass.

  Unlike most of the city’s residents, Tek relished Skraal’s constant rain. In the planet’s slang-heavy language, their species was called FlatWorms, annelids that preferred a moist environment and didn’t mind a little industrial waste in the mix. The dealer uncurled their flat body from a nest of native swamp grass and foam padding thrown into a corner of the room and sidled forward on a bed of cilia. Leaning their upper body against the counter, Tek burbled,

  “Good to see you again, S.” Tek watched their customer with real interest; they might make a sale today after all. “Would please greatly if one would specify beyond . . . sharp.”

  “Naturally.” Tek’s customer stepped farther into the dim space and pulled back the hood on her waterproof cloak. “The problem is, even I’m not sure what I’ll walk out of here with. But you’ve done well by me before, and I know my requests are rarely standard.” Freed from the hood, the female Osk shook out a spiky mane of white hair which caught the light of the overhead fluorescents in scintillating sparks. A tight-lipped smile crossed her face. “Well, Tek, what have you got for me?”

  Tek sprang into action with what constituted FlatWorm alacrity, using a keyboard under the counter to rotate the wall-mounted display. Racks of communication and navigation equipment flipped up out of sight, followed by a couple racks stacked with diverse projectile weapons. The next shelf of wares bore a light coat of dust, and the one after that was dustier still. No one ever came into the shop looking for an antique Terran broadsword or an Urd halberd. Yet it seemed to Tek that their customer was showing a more than fleeting interest in these obsolete weapons.

  “Getting closer.” The Osk stood with head cocked, one hand propped under her jaw, the other arm folded across her torso. “But these weapons are all too bulky. I just need a blade . . . that’s all.”

  “A blade . . .” Tek echoed. They steepled their hand bristles in thought. “There is perfect thing,” they concluded. “Here.” The dealer rotated the display again.

  A perfectly straight line stretching to infinity flashed silver before her eyes, entrancing Shomoro in a heartbeat. Her breath caught at the sight, the old familiar pain twisting its way up the empty sheaths on her arms. She hardly noticed it anymore.

  After the initial flash under the fluorescents, the weapon’s shape resolved into a little less than a meter of honed metal. It was a sword—ancient, she felt sure—of a design both simpler and more sophisticated than any of Tek’s other bladed weapons.

  One end sported a simple leather-wrapped grip. In a second display niche lay its scabbard, an elegant thing of red-lacquered wood. The weapon itself was indeed a simple blade, the silver edges deepening to a lustrous leaden hue in the blade’s core where the metal had been folded over hundreds of times. Its maker had imparted the smallest of arcs to the metal shaft, so that the tip curved slightly up. Such a weapon would be sharp-edged and incredibly flexible. There was nothing in the world that could replace her stolen blades . . . but this weapon might come close. As she gazed at it, Shomoro felt a little of the hardness she carried in her heart melt away.

  “T
his is it,” she pronounced to Tek. “This is what I came for.”

  The FlatWorm raised pseudohands to their mouthparts and began to clean them in pleasure. “Most excellent, S,” they chirruped. “And will be wanting the small one as well, one hopes?”

  Shomoro blinked. “What small one?”

  “One should explain. Displayed sword is old Terran. Where it from, was custom to always have two, the larger and the smaller. But one has not displayed the smaller due to damages.” Tek spread their pseudohands apologetically.

  “Show it to me.” As the FlatWorm slithered off to the storeroom in back, she thought it over: two swords—partner swords—and a Terran tradition, at that. If fate was trying to make some kind of amends, it was a poor joke. Still . . .

  Tek scuttled back into the room with a smaller sheathed object balanced in their pseudohands. The FlatWorm deposited it reverently onto the countertop, then turned to the larger sword and took it down.

  “Give it to me.” Shomoro’s voice was quiet, but there was hunger in it, too. Tek hesitated, then carefully held the blade out to her. As she took hold of the hilt and lifted, for a moment the sword seemed to weigh less than air; then its true heaviness settled into her muscles. She executed a few experimental flourishes, slicing the air with a thin whistle, then laid the blade back down.

  “Let’s see the smaller one.” Tek unsheathed the shorter sword. It came crookedly out of its scabbard, and as the FlatWorm slid the blade free, she saw that its point had been snapped off. From the length of its sheath, Shomoro guessed the sword had been about half a meter long; now it ended in a jagged edge about fifteen centimeters from the end.

  “As one warned, there is damage,” said Tek, cowling their upper body humbly. “There is no pressure to buy this one, S. But one thought one would show . . .”

  She held up a hand. “I appreciate that, Tek. But I never judge a weapon’s effectiveness based on its appearance.” She hefted the shorter sword, repeated the motions she’d made with the first, then set it down.

  Shomoro looked down at the twin swords, contemplating, then looked Tek in their many eyes. “I’ll take them.” She laid her packet of credits firmly on the counter.

  “Both? Even broken one . . . ?” Tek moved toward the credit packet.

  She jabbed a yes. “The broken one too. I like it.” She spoke with a lightness she didn’t feel.

  Bowing their upper body in gratitude, Tek scooped up the credit packet. They wrapped Shomoro’s purchases in opaque fabric and placed the parcels in a vacuum-sealed bag to ward away Skraal’s insidious moisture. Drawing up her hood, she shouldered her new acquisitions.

  “Thank you, Tek. I think these will become very useful to me.”

  The FlatWorm clicked mandibles in satisfaction. “So, will be seeing you . . . ?”

  “I’m afraid not.” She cut the air with the side of her palm. “Your shop has been quite a resource to me this past year, but it’s time for me to leave Skraal.” She found the door and unlatched it one-handed. “If all goes as planned, you won’t be seeing me again.”

  There was a brief incursion of wind and rain into the shop, cut off as the heavy door thudded behind Shomoro for the last time. With disappointment, Tek watched her go.

  Daikar Shurinezz blew into the lounge on a breath of chill air. Inside, it was mercifully warm and dry, the lighting a dim blue. Little droplets of moisture slid off his hood as he glanced across the lounge. Bar empty. Four, no, five other patrons scattered around tables, hunching over drinks. One bartender, unleashing a spray of something violently antiseptic onto the counter.

  Movement to his left. As the drapery over an alcove flicked back, he caught an earthy, pungent scent and knew he’d found her. Daikar crept to the alcove and curled his lower body onto its bench.

  Surprise made his cold and wetness recede. The female Osk opposite him was gaunt under her cloak; she looked like she’d been starved. Her mane, a shocking white against dark skin. Hand curled around a small ceramic cup. Beside her, two long poles or shafts leaned against the wall.

  “Who are you?” Daikar asked. He felt the beginnings of uncertainty; she barely looked capable of surviving, let alone having the resources to leave Skraal.

  “I’m not surprised you don’t remember.” Her voice was soft. “I am . . . a little surprised you responded to my message. We met only once, in Za.” She paused, glanced at the shafts beside her.

  “You were a seph?” He took down his hood; freedom of movement might very soon be important.

  “A scientist, too,” she amended. “I am Shomoro Lacharoksa. I worked on Za’s nanotech research program.”

  “And now?” He let a small smile twist his snout. “A refugee, or something more?”

  “More.” Shomoro leaned forward, placing her other hand on the table where Daikar could see it. She still saw him stiffen. “An ally, if you want. Don’t tell me you wouldn’t love to strike a blow against the Expansion after what they did to us.”

  The older Osk leaned back. A scar she didn’t remember traced across his right cheek from eye to mouth; it stretched pale as his eyes narrowed. “I would enjoy that chance very much, if it were real.” His scent turned chilly as he pulled away. “But I still don’t know who you are. Or how you escaped the attack that killed so many others.”

  Shomoro lifted her cup and took a long swallow; the tea was stone cold and bitter, but it eased her nervousness.

  “My lab was outside Za. I escaped by pure accident.”

  She saw him reach into a cloak pocket. Her own hand was clutching the hilt of her sword when he pulled out a pair of bone dice. He tumbled the game pieces around his palm, pocketed them.

  “I want to see resources,” he said. “That you have a ship and a plan. Then I’ll consider it.”

  Daikar let Shomoro lead him to her ship, in a port at the city’s edge. Beyond the rows of ships nestled in their sunken launch cradles, Skraal’s swampland spread brush and glistening water to the gray horizon. He paused as she opened the belly of her sleek craft and tapped up its ramp, one hand on the shafts shoved into her belt. The ship was of Za design, a courier. Daikar wondered how she’d got hold of it.

  Craning his head, he sniffed at the ship’s insides. Air stale, empty except for a hint of earthy scent. Shomoro had flown here alone. That much was true. He ascended the ramp in small steps. It folded itself up behind him.

  Daikar felt his limbs go taut; he listened, but didn’t hear the lock engage. Glances took in the door pad to his left, cockpit to his right. Directly ahead, an onyx hump of matter rose above his head, twinkling with bluish chromatophores.

  “The berths are this way.” He followed her voice around the curve of the neural hub. Passed through a living area: rounded couches; sketches of animals, or maybe plants, affixed to the fleshy walls in places. A partial sketch lay on a table, charcoal lines half formed.

  “You can see the neural hub is fully operational.” Shomoro touched the mound, and readouts coalesced under her fingers. “The berths as well.”

  Daikar kept a body length between them. He saw three berths, their opaque bubbles winking with status lights.

  “You have a fine ship,” he said. Familiar, too: he had ridden in one just like it when he’d made the orbital drop to Za.

  She moved toward the kitchen area. “Thank you,” Shomoro said a beat later. She lifted her hood from that white hair, loosened her cloak. He watched her move cuts of meat from a cool compartment in the ship’s hide onto the counter.

  “Why?” He stepped toward her.

  She glanced at him. “Why what?”

  “Why do you have it? This is a Za courier ship. I thought your lab was outside the city.”

  “Yes. I had to walk into Za and find it.” Her hand entered a drawer, came up holding something. Daikar caught her around the wrist.

  “No,” he said. “Someo
ne told you where to find it.” He turned her hand, saw a small metal blade held in her palm. “How long have you been working for the Terrans, Shomoro?”

  Her scent went white with anger, and something else. She jerked her wrist out of his grasp—and turned back to the cutlets. He watched, fascinated, as she used the small blade to slice them into strips.

  “I’m not who you think I am.” She divided the meat onto two plates and tromped past him into the living area.

  He followed, took the couch across from her. “Who are you, then?” That uncertainty was stirring in his gut again.

  Shomoro passed him a plate and set her own on the table beside her. “I was a prisoner. Of the White Arrows.” He looked up. The shock must have shown on his face; he could tell from the grim smile that curled her lip.

  “Yes.” She fumbled at her white mane, crossed her hands over her sunken chest. “You aren’t the only one who’s lost things.”

  Daikar put the plate aside. He wasn’t quite ready to accept her food, but he was listening. If Shomoro was telling the truth, it could change things.

  “Tell me more,” he said.

  She rested the sheathed swords beside her; the metal blades made a comforting weight against her side. There were still sharp notes of suspicion in Daikar’s scent, but they were fading, overlaid by curiosity.

  “It was days after the war’s end when they took me. They had a base hidden in the Dursh-Kren. I didn’t even know yet that we’d lost.” She plucked a strip of meat from her plate and placed it in her mouth. She chewed, but suddenly found herself unable to swallow; the salty rawness tasted too much like her own blood, flooding her mouth as the White Arrow soldiers beat her.

  He frowned, the short scar across his right eye wrinkling. “What were the White Arrows doing out there?”

  Searching for hapless Osk like her, she thought. Subjects on which to conduct experiments that made no sense.