by T. R. Harris
A few moments later a group of huge Nuoreans entered, each wearing a distinctive dark grey uniform with a yellow stripe on the breast. They were serious and stern-faced and passed Adam without a second glance.
The local guard then stepped up to him.
“I still have not been able to find your assignment log,” he began, “but because you are a tech, you will not be allowed to leave. Techs are always needed.”
The door to the building opened again, yet Adam was so engrossed in his conversation with the Nuorean guard, that he almost missed Sherri as she walked by.
But she didn’t. Her eyes grew wide and her mouth fell open the instant she saw through Adam’s weak disguise. She turned her head away as fast as she could, as a hulking Nuorean in a grey uniform behind her gave a shove. He frowned and turned an eye on Adam, who quickly shifted his attention back to the guard. Riyad and Copernicus entered next, followed by another six grey-suited aliens. His friends were hassling with their escorts and didn’t notice Adam.
Adam’s Nuorean guard took him by the arm and led him to a doorway on the right. As he entered, Adam glanced back and saw the huge officer with Sherri looking back at him, the frown still pasted on the alien’s forehead.
Adam was placed in a chair in front of another Nuorean.
“You are a construction engineer?”
“Yes.”
“What is your race?”
“Belsonian.”
The alien worked on his computer. “You will be assigned to lodge six-nine. Your work duration shall be twenty-three ND-12 days.”
“What are ND-12 days?”
“Days on this planet, as designated ND-12.”
“I thought it was Qidos?”
“Not any longer.”
The Cadre escort placed the three Humans in plastic chairs while Azon stood by the closed door, wondering why he felt strange. Something had just happened, and he was disturbed.
The Nuoreans were extreme players, and one of the most important skills to master was that of awareness—awareness of surroundings, environment and even the subtle changes in an opponent. The Human Sherri Valentine had reacted strangely to the alien outside the room. There was something, a form of recognition. The blue-veined creature had reacted in kind. Yet what was most compelling…they both tried to hide their reactions.
Azon stared at the Human female; she was avoiding his eyes. Why? He continued to stare, as she took furtive glances his way. Finally their eyes locked and the Human’s mouth fell open.
Azon ran from the room.
“No!” the female cried out from behind him.
Azon flung open the door at the end of the stone bench. The alien was seated at a desk, but he jumped to his feet when Azon entered. The jaw was set, the blue eyes staring at the Cadre player with a warrior’s intensity.
Four more Cadre entered the room, having followed their leader without knowing what was happening. They had weapons drawn, now locked on the alien with the strangely shaped ears.
Azon reached forward and grasped one of the soft appendages…and then he pulled. The two-inch long finger of skin came loose in his hands yet left no blood or signs of distress from the alien.
“I am humbled…and impressed,” said Azon. “You made it here, through our entire fleet, and never detected.”
“I have skills.”
“As I have heard.” Azon removed a small kissil knife from his uniform and ran the blade lightly over the alien’s left cheek. A thin line of red blood appeared. “So, this is the real Adam Cain, and not some mutant surrogate. Very good. Now let us see how well your mortal skills serve you while under my care and custody.”
The alien grinned, producing a full array of long white teeth. “Let the games begin—asshole.”
Adam was moved into the lobby of the building as Sherri, Riyad and Coop were brought from the other room. Sherri tried to run to him but was restrained by the Cadre troops.
“I’m so sorry!” she cried. “I didn’t say anything.”
“It’s not your fault.”
The foursome was led outside and across the parched landscape to one of the barracks. They entered a building without air conditioning or anything else for that matter except for row upon row of mattresses placed on the floor and bathroom comprised on just holes in the stone floor. Nearly all the mats had an emaciated Human resting on them, watching with vacant eyes. Yet as the new prisoners moved along the open central corridor, faces began to light up with recognition. Some of the prisoners sat up, while others stood. Slowly sporadic clapping began, followed by a growing chorus of cheers. By the time Adam reached the end of the building, it was filled with raucous celebration.
The Nuorean guards at first tried to quell the outburst but then gave up. At the end of the room were a dozen empty mattresses. They nodded to Adam’s group and then turned and left.
Adam turned to face the throng, raised a hand and smiled. “Thank you, thank you,” he said, barely heard through the cheering.
“Are you here to save us?” someone shouted.
“We’re working on it,” Adam called out. “Please, let us have some time to assess the situation.”
“You’re…you’re a prisoner, just like us.” another voice pointed out.
“They captured all of you too?”
The cheering was dying down at an alarming clip as the reality of the situation sank in. Adam Cain and his famous entourage were not there to rescue them; on the contrary, they were in the same boat as the others. Depression swept through the barracks and the prisoners turned away.
Adam hated to be the object of their disappointment, but he did welcome the privacy it offered. He plopped down on one of the thin cushions. Sherri sat next to him. She tore a strip of cloth from her already tattered blouse and ran it across her wet forehead, before wiping the thin blue lines from his face. He pulled off the remaining capen, returning his look to that of the classic Human. Riyad sat on a pad across from him.
“Did you bring any playing cards?” he asked. “It looks like we may be here for a while.”
Copernicus Smith wasn’t so nonchalant. “The mutants—are they with you?”
The sick grin on Adam’s face told the story. “No…they’ve left again. This time we’re on our own.”
“How about fleet command? Have you been in touch with them?”
“Negative on that too.”
Coop let the stare linger. “You came here alone, into the very heart of the Nuorean fleet. So what’s your plan?”
“I thought we’d go on the offensive…and kill every damn Nuorean we see.” He looked around at his friends. “Who’s with me?”
They didn’t see the humor in the comment, having just spent two weeks in the custody of the aliens. Hope had abandoned them long ago, and Adam wasn’t doing anything to help bring it back.
“They’re setting up some team challenge against us and the guys in the grey suits,” Sherri reported. “Now that you’re here, I’m sure it will be a really big deal.”
“Who’s the dude with the big mouth?”
“He’s called Azon,” Sherri began. “He’s in charge of a special unit of Nuoreans who analyze dangerous races—”
“Jundac?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“I heard it through the grapevine. Go on.”
“I think they’ve pretty much decided on destroying the Human race, but they want to have some fun doing it. This huge challenge match will be the start.”
Adam looked at his companions. “Are any of you hurt?”
Riyad shook his head. He had some bruises on his face, but they were healing. “We’re fine.” He looked down the length of the barracks. “Which is more than I can say about these poor souls. It looks like the Nuoreans don’t want any real competition.”
“It’s all fixed anyway,” Sherri said. There was long moment of awkward silence before she spoke again. “What are we going to do?”
This time the light-hearted humor was gone fr
om Adam’s voice, replaced instead by almost a growl. “We’re going to win…that’s what we’re going to do.”
85
“Admiral, there’s an urgent message coming in for you from Earth. It will be in the SCIF,” said the voice through the speaker in the officer’s away cabin.
Nathan Smith rose from the bunk and headed for CIC. Communications received through the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility aboard the flagship had to be important. Recently, Smith had been deluged with a flood of seemingly priority messages coming from the Juireans and the Formilians that were anything but. The aliens hadn’t yet grasped the concept of the words important and secret.
However, this message was coming from Earth.
Once settled in, a security officer opened the link.
Admiral Morton Hollingsworth, commander of Union military forces was on the screen, along with Rolf Kushner, another admiral who ran the Military Technology and Development Division.
“I hope you’re about to pull a rabbit out your hat, sir,” Nathan said. “I have a very bad feeling about our upcoming engagement.”
“The feeling’s mutual, Admiral,” said Hollingsworth. “We have some intelligence that has us worried.”
“What’s that?”
Kushner took over. “We’ve just received reports that the Nuoreans have acquired fifty thousand Formilian circuit controllers. They raided a planet where they were stored and that was all they took.”
“Controllers? What for?”
“I’ve had my people trying to figure that out. The only thing they can come up with is they’re for some kind of electronic device which they can’t get the parts in from Andromeda.”
“You think this has something to do with beam nullifiers, don’t you?”
“We can’t think of anything else they would need so quickly and so desperately.”
“So the mission’s an abort.” Smith stated without emotion.
“On the contrary,” said Hollingsworth.
Admiral Smith shook his head. “Pardon me, sir, but how can we go up against a force twice our strength knowing they may have a way of countering our so-called secret weapon?”
“Because we have something new,” said Kushner, with a thin smile. Smith let him talk. “Remember the nuclear torpedoes Captain Cain used during his campaign against the Juireans?”
“Tell me you’ve solved the energy problem,” Smith said with urgency. “The after-action report said he was able to make them work with the help of that energy ball he had.”
“We don’t have an energy ball, but we’ve been able to solve the problem—sort of.”
“Sort of?”
Now the grin grew into a full-blown smile. “We basically bypassed the problem.”
“Dammit, Rolf! Get to the point. I’m launching in nine hours—maybe.”
“Sorry, Nate. What we’ve done is build an entire starship around the torpedoes and packed it with batteries and generators. It’s not as elegant a solution as Cain came up with, but it will work—once.”
“Go on.”
The smile was gone from Kushner’s face, replaced by a serious, professional demeanor. “We still have a power problem, but in order to overcome it we had to go big. The ship is one huge power station, designed to first jump to a location—again only once—and then to power the torpedoes. But then we went a step further. Instead of launching the torpedoes individually, they will all be fanned out at once, forming one gigantic nuclear bloom. And where the most torpedoes Cain launched at a time was six, this weapon will launch forty at a time.”
Smith whistled. “And each with the same yield as Cain’s torpedoes?”
“That’s right.”
Smith locked eyes with Admiral Hollingsworth. “Where’s this ship?”
“We have it stationed on our side of the Barrier,” Hollingsworth replied. “Since the energy requirements are so enormous, it can only do a short trans-dimensional jump, not more than fifty light-years. And remember, Admiral, this is a one-time-use weapon.”
“But it could be a game-changer.”
“If the Nuoreans do have beam nullifiers,” said Rolf Kushner. “Let me warn you, Nate, this is a powerful weapon, more powerful than anything ever detonated before. We’re not sure what affect it will have on the Fringe. Use it only as a last resort.”
“Am I to have operational command?”
“Yes; access codes will be transmitted soon.”
Admiral Smith frowned. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
Hollingsworth looked to Kushner, both faces serious. “The impact zone, it’s unknown,” he said. “But estimates predict that with the effective range of the beam platforms, they may be at risk should the weapon have to be deployed.”
“That means so will most of my fleet. So I’ll sacrifice a large part of my force to destroy a large part of the enemies’?”
“The classic definition of a tactic tradeoff.”
That didn’t make Nathan feel any better, knowing he’d achieve a Pyrrhic victory in the end. “But the Nuoreans are still bringing in fresh units from Andromeda. Do have an answer to their buildup?”
“We have the resources of an entire galaxy behind us, Admiral,” Hollingsworth said with venom. “We better have an answer…if we expect to survive.”
86
If there was one thing Adam Cain had learned about the Nuor it was that they didn’t procrastinate. When they said they were going to have a major team challenge with the Humans, they meant it. Three hours after entering the barracks, the four prisoners were led out and taken to the completed stadium half a mile away.
They entered through underground tunnels, past holding cells and even a well-stocked armory, yet even then, they could hear the roar of the massive crowd of spectators filling the Grand Arena. Preliminary matches were taking place, and from the joyous sound of the audience, the weak Humans selected for these bouts weren’t fairing very well.
Each of the four Humans assigned to the main event were given matching white uniforms—one piece with no pockets or flaps where weapons could be hidden—and designed to show blood more easily to the distant audience. Rubber-soled, soft-sided shoes were placed on their feet and they were given shin protectors. That was the only armor they were provided.
Finally, weight-belts were locked around their waists, ostensibly to overcome the Human’s physical advantage in the light gravity of Qidos. It seemed the Nuoreans were once again one step ahead of Adam and his team.
Adam had heard the stories of Panur’s fight with the Nuorean leader, so he had some idea what to expect—the most troubling being that the alien had placed poison on his sword. If it had been Adam in the challenge instead of Panur, he would have surely died, if not from the blade, then from the toxin. The same held true for the coming conflict.
Once dressed, the Humans were paraded out into the harsh Qidos sunlight.
The blast of heat was incredible; even the breeze blowing outside was blocked by the towering walls of the stadium, providing no relief. Still, Adam felt energized, confident. When he noticed his emotions, he frowned. This was unusual, even for him. Unfortunately, his teammates weren’t feeling so confident.
This field of battle didn’t have all the blocks, walls, pits and barricades as the one he’d seen before. This was just a flat area with a small pond filled with brackish water and a few small boulders embedded in the hard ground.
Adam looked across the arena and saw an entrance that looked like a baseball bullpen. Nearly a dozen of the grey-uniformed Nuoreans were packed inside, some standing, others seated. There were a lot more than four of them, and Adam sincerely hoped this wasn’t going to be tag-team event. If it was, he had no other players to tag.
The Humans were placed at the center of the field and given three-foot-long, double-sided blades, with metal pommels and four-inch cross-guards. The grips were made of a leather-like material, providing decent tackiness for a firm hold. They were quality weapons, but it wasn�
�t the Humans’ swords Adam was worried about.
Four of the Third Cadre players marched to the center of the arena. The crowd erupted with deafening cheers. As they approached, Adam studied them. They had distinct features, but not radically so. Even then, their leader—the one known as Azon—stood out. He was six inches taller than the others, with broad shoulders and rippled muscles straining under the form-fitting uniform. The outfits they wore had only very short sleeves, revealing powerful arms, down to the point where forearm guards were strapped in place. They also had shin guards and breastplates—hardly matching the scant protection afforded the Humans.
The huge alien was smiling as he walked up to Adam.
The cut he’d made on Adam’s cheek was only a thin red line. “You heal quickly, Human, yet not fast enough.” He looked over at Sherri. “As you see, I have decided to include you in this team challenge. Your affiliation with the males is the reason. You may not be as strong, yet you may be cunning. We will find that entertaining.”
Adam stepped away suddenly and raised his sword. “Greetings spectators to this glorious event!” he cried out. His voice carried easily to all levels of the stands.
“What are you doing?” Azon asked.
“Just keeping it interesting,” Adam whispered. Then turning again to the crowd, he continued to shout. “As is the custom of people, we wish to offer our weapons in exchange for those of our challengers. In our combat contests, we ritually provide our opponents with the means to kill us, and they to us. It is a time-honored tradition we ask to be observed by the great Nuorean players.”
“There is no such tradition,” Azon growled. “Otherwise the other Humans would have evoked it.”
Adam continued to speak to the crowd. “The Humans before us were not warriors—players. They did not come with advanced skills and training. We do. And it is the legacy of the player that we bring to this contest today.”
Azon leaned in close. “I know what you are doing. There will be no trading of weapons.”
