‘Now,’ Reelai instructed. ‘Will this place to yourself. Steady your mind.’
Milton used the silence to focus. He saw his town and condensed it to its place on the planet, then the planet to its place in the system, then its system among the stars and constellations. He reached through space and time and took hold of the dusty world. He dragged the planet to his location. The vast void that separated him from his home yielded. Milton opened one eye. Nothing had changed. His mental image dulled and his mind began to wander. He pondered what Reelai might be thinking as he stood close behind, observing Milton’s wishful efforts.
The chilly wind cooled his skin, destroying his image of heat. A creature squawked in the distance. No, he thought, putting his wavering mind back to the task at hand. He struggled to grasp his home, concentrating on how much he wanted to be there. He felt something. Yes, he smiled, this was it. He wanted to feel something and now he was. Then the feeling dropped a notch. Self-consciousness leaked in.
Perhaps the feeling was something of his imagination. He opened his eyes and looked around. Nothing had changed. Except his heartbeat — speeding up in excitement — something it always did when he thought of home.
He turned and saw Reelai staring intently, emotionless.
‘Nothing’s happening,’ said Milton. ‘Maybe I can’t do it.’
‘I am certain you are in capacity,’ said Reelai, raising his volume. ‘The data I collected is well indicative of this. Milton, you must be able break a rift gate.’
‘I’ll try again.’
Milton turned back, widened his stance and gritted teeth.
‘A perfect visualisation. You are more than capable,’ Reelai encouraged, leaning closer.
Milton nodded and began imagining his home again. The image snapped shut … a dead leaf rattled past, destroying his focus.
‘I’m not sure how this …’
‘You are not concentrating!’ Reelai circled the Human, staring down with tight fists, his chest level with Milton’s head. ‘If you were, you would know exactly what I am talking about. You should be able to feel this location around you. Knowing it is but a mere step away. You are not focused!’
Milton grunted and again willed with all his might for his world to come to him, not entirely sure of how.
‘That is it,’ said Reelai, moving to Milton’s side. ‘Think how much you desire home, to end all of this misery. Think of the comfort such a familiar place will bring. Think! Think of your loved ones.’
Milton conjured his home. He knew where he wanted to be. He reached out both hands, as a helpless youngling would for its mother. Having no idea whether his faith would be rewarded or not. He wanted to go home. Another empty quanut passed.
‘Can you feel it?’
‘No!’ Milton yelled in frustration, turning to Reelai. The Xoeloid bowed his head. ‘I am deeply sorry, Milton Lance. I did not mean to upset you. Perhaps you are not yet ready.’
Milton realised he was holding his breath. He filled his lungs again. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know if I’m actually feeling anything that you described or if I only think I am.’
‘All feelings are real,’ said Reelai. ‘They are as real as the electrochemical waves that trigger synaptic transmissions in your brain. You can control your feelings. It is only a matter of willpower.’
‘Then I failed.’
‘You have yet to succeed.’
Milton chuckled. ‘Okay then. I’ll work on it. You know, I really want to help you.’
‘I know you do,’ said Reelai. ‘Then we shall continue this another time. I must get back to my laboratory.’
‘I’ll go and get Tazman then,’ Milton sighed. ‘I should talk to him. He’s been acting awfully strange.’
‘Strange?’ Reelai asked. He looked like he was going to say something else then paused. This was the first time Milton had seen him hesitate. ‘Does he seem displaced?’
‘Yes … yes he does,’ said Milton, snapping back to the present and his friend’s plight. ‘You sound like you know something about this?’
‘The dampening radiation we are using to hide your signal is known to have temporary effects on some beings. Although I highly doubt your friend is affected.’
‘What? Why didn’t you tell us earlier? What effects?’
‘Affected beings are subject to a mild temporary delusion. I can guarantee no damage will occur. But again, I doubt this is the case for your friend. If you’d like we could run tests to find out for sure.’
‘No, don’t worry about it. I can find out myself,’ said Milton.
‘Please forgive me, Milton Lance. The range of beings that are usually affected is extremely small. Less than—’
‘Don’t worry about it, Reelai,’ Milton snapped. ‘I understand other things must be on your mind right now. I think he just needs some fresh air.’
All of a sudden Milton felt ashamed. He’d been dwelling on his own problems and neglected his simian friend. Tazman was trapped, with nothing to do. He needed to socialise. But where in the galaxy could he go? Where could either of them go? ‘I’ll talk to him.’
The Xoeloid bowed. ‘Then I shall wait here.’
Annoyed, Milton turned and strode into the scrub. He could feel Reelai’s gaze follow him the entire way.
The leafless branches of the mud trees reached out and hooked their claws together. Their thick roots looked as though they did the same, burrowing into the damp ground and merging into one organism. Milton stepped on the root clusters, to avoid the puddles of mud. He called Tazman’s name and listened intently for a response. Insects chattered from unseen hiding places. A flock of the squawking flying things thumped their wings overhead. Milton spotted them through a gap. Their featherless wings were of reptilian skin and their flexing tails had a small bony rudder on the end. They flew overhead in an arrow formation.
In that instant, the washed-out clouds drifted away from the sun. Its rays filtered through the canopy, reflecting off wet ground and brightening the area. Milton called again.
‘I’m over here!’ the Freegu shouted, his voice muffled.
Milton changed direction towards the noise.
‘Where?’ he yelled.
‘Just keep going. You’ll find an opening,’ Tazman shouted.
Milton continued. A six-legged fish thing, as big as his boot, plopped onto his path. It oinked, spraying droplets of mud with its flittering fins. The animal tensed then suddenly leapt away. Its long body flipped through the air and landed on the trunk of a tree where it crawled into a hole.
Milton found a wide breach in the growth and went through the gap, stepping into a breezy open space. He found himself on the bank of a slow flowing, muddy creek lined with slimy rocks.
Tazman was down to the right, standing on a wide, flat rock facing the water. He had a large stick cocked over his shoulder. His tail was curled and steady, a slow wave flexed through its length, then it whipped skyward, flicking a stone in an arc over Tazman’s head. When the stone tumbled in front of him Tazman swung the stick. It made perfect contact sending the rock into the water.
‘Whoo hoo,’ Tazman howled.
‘Hey, buddy.’ Milton clambered over a rocky mass.
Tazman turned to him with a huge smile on his face. ‘Did you see that?’
‘Yeah, that was cool.’
Tazman swung at another rock and missed. ‘Drat!’ His tail plucked it from the mud and he tried again, this time sending the stone on a horizontal trajectory into the sludge. Milton stepped along the rocks and took a seat on a boulder, letting the moment linger as he watched Tazman play his game.
‘How’ve you been?’ asked Milton.
‘Me?’ Tazman snickered. ‘Fine, why do you ask?’ His tail dipped onto the ground again and retrieved another slimy stone.
‘I don’t know, just making conversation,’ Milton replied.
Tazman tried again, loudly swishing the air. ‘Have you opened a gate thingy yet, so we can go som
ewhere cool?’
‘No. Not yet.’ Milton looked at a line of tiny crustaceans that passed under his boots. The colour of the mud, they had two narrow pincers, one noticeably larger than the other. They worked together, hauling small pieces of carrion, and disappeared one by one down a hole. ‘I’m not even sure what Reelai’s on about.’
‘Bah, you’ll get it soon.’ Tazman swung again and the stone spun off the stick and landed in the mud by his feet. ‘You better because I’m dying of boredom.’
Milton tossed a rock into the water and leaned back on his hands. The sun warmed his skin. He hadn’t felt sunlight in ages.
Tazman had been suffering, but radiation had nothing to do with it. He was an active being; he needed stimuli. Give him a rock and a stick and he was happy. Nevertheless, Milton would be keeping a close eye on him from now on.
‘I’m working on it,’ said Milton. ‘I’m not even sure it’s gunna happen.’
The last crustacean disappeared into the hole, sealing the entrance behind with a clump of mud.
‘And if I can’t, then there’s no reason for us to be here and we’ll just leave,’ assured Milton.
‘Ahh, well,’ said Tazman. He twisted his torso back and hurled the stick with both hands. It swished through the air like a rotor blade and hit the water. ‘Who would have thought that bending the fabric of space and time would be so complicated?’
‘Yeah,’ Milton chuckled. ‘Who would?’
Thirteen
Luylla’s heart woke her with a rapid beat. She jolted and whipped out her sidearm. The hyperspace tube whirled before her. Still on the ship. She sat back and inflated her lungs. The flight console had smudged with her breath. She holstered her weapon and rubbed the skin on her left collarbone, from where her artificial limb extended. The metal got bitterly cold on space voyages.
The destination indicator cut her moment short. She switched to manual and grabbed the controls. The Inhibitan slowed at a crushing rate, ejecting from the tube.
The sphere of Greatek appeared. Its eerie night-life twinkled across its continents. The world was the capital of the Yezmoi sector where five of its six major trade routes intersected. Greatek was also beyond the reach of Composite jurisdiction. Whoever had summoned her was well aware of her situation. Of course they would be; the Tyde knew everything.
She eased her steering and angled past the trade depot. The rectangular structure was compartmented by long walls and had several cargo freighters stacked in their allocated docks, loading and unloading who knows what. Smaller delivery carriers deployed to and from the planet. Luylla did not opt to receive any transmission, but her contact somehow beamed specific instructions across the forward pane: the direction to follow, what speed to fly and even how to manoeuvre. She made the necessary adjustments to her flight path.
Luylla wasn’t a real hunter by professional standards. With only two successful bounties she was an amateur at best. Given her location, she was going to have to fake her qualifications from here on in. A meeting with the Tyde was the biggest opportunity she had for networking to the underworld. But the excitement was short-lived. Crushing memories of why she began her journey and the anxiety that came with them took over momentarily. But as usual, she harnessed that same anxiety and turned it into something she could use to push on, releasing the anger that focused her.
Weapons would have to be held especially close for this one. She was entering a territory full of gun-toting mercenaries who would do anything to cash in on her price tag.
The clearance message came in and prompted her to change transmission frequency. The new coded channel transmitted the exact coordinates of her destination. She locked a path into the navi computer and spub into the atmosphere of what was unofficially regarded as the Tyde capital.
The section of the city was closed to the public, so traffic was mild. Her wing lights beamed through the fog. The area was one of the many corporate owned sections of land and airspace on Greatek.
As she flew she kept an eye on the holographic map. It zoomed through the buildings and halted in a slow pan of a large, domed complex surrounded by five landing towers. Luylla was beginning to think she was lost until two of the landing towers materialised from the mist.
Following the delegated routine, Luylla eased the controls to the tower on the right and lowered her ship to the platform.
The Inhibitan’s engines softened into a discomforting silence. The fog outside clouded the pulsing red pad lights. Luylla checked her side arms, ammo levels full, and safeties off. She tightened her holster an extra notch on her way to the hatch. Chilled mist wafted inside as the door folded open. She descended with eyes wide open. The heel and ball of her boots clicked distinctly on the ramp.
The fog barely revealed anything of her surroundings. The Inhibitan’s lights, close behind, blurred in the cloud. She hit the roof surface and did her best to scope for danger. Between her ship lights and the pulsing red glow that marked the edge of the platform she could make out vague shadows on the roof; some looked to be statues, evenly spaced around a path that led to the entrance.
Luylla touched a control on her arm computer. The cargo ramp retracted with a drawn-out squeal of hydraulics. The light from the cargo hold reduced to a fine rectangular beam before shrinking to vanish with the hollow click of the lock.
‘What now?’ she whispered.
Something shuffled along the roof with a clicking of metal. Luylla whirled. She blinked. The statues had changed position. Keeping her eye on the figures, she slowly lifted her hand and touched the butt of her pistol.
A red beam stabbed the shroud and placed a dot at the centre of her chest. Another appeared from the left, putting the target between her eyes. Two more appeared from different directions, aimed directly at the top of her thighs, the thin parts of her body armour. She froze, pinned in her spot and having lost the option to whip out her pistol in a quick draw. She moved her hand away. The laser sights lacked the slightest hint of divergence.
One of the statues stepped forward. It uttered one word in a croaky electronic voice. ‘Disarm.’
Luylla unbuckled her gun belt. It dangled from her hand as she slowly snapped closed the buttons, securing her pistols in their holsters. She then swung the belt forward and the shadow snatched it from the air.
A low-flying craft swooped from overhead. A bright blaze momentarily lit the platform and the sharp updraft of wind sliced the fog.
The guard was a machine. Its flat face was covered in circular lenses of different sizes. The red beam came from its right arm, above the tri-barrel of a plasma weapon. Its body was relatively thin compared to its hulking forearms and legs.
As darkness once again swallowed the platform, the sentinel’s beam disappeared. Its weapon clicked and the tri-barrel rotated half a circle and disappeared into its arm. A scanning device sprang from the underside of the wrist and a horizontal sheet of green light burst forth and shone over Luylla. Detecting nothing, the device finished with a positive sounding chirp. With that, every laser sight disappeared and the sentinels stepped aside with clicking mechanical joints. They formed a path between them.
Luylla reluctantly advanced. She kept her head straight but glanced at them from the corners of her eyes. The machines’ neck joints whined in unison as they tracked her. Ahead, a door slid open, spilling light onto the ground. She stepped into a glass-walled pneumatic elevator. Three of the sentinels followed and surrounded her in the tight space. The door sealed quickly and they dropped.
A bead of sweat crawled down her face but she made no effort to wipe it away. Her thoughts raced and her heart pounded but her expression was blank. She turned her back to them and faced the opposite door, feeling even more vulnerable with them out of her sight. A chime sounded and the elevator door opened, unveiling the sound of a soft orchestra melody. A cold hand jabbed her back and pushed her forward onto plush maroon carpet.
‘Easy now gentlemen, that’s no way to treat a lady,’ sang a lively voice.
The lady sat in a high-backed chair on the opposite side of a long, polished, horizontally positioned, corporate looking table.
‘I hope they weren’t too rough on you, Ms Warride,’ she added.
The machines stepped in behind Luylla. Two positioned themselves evenly behind her. The third remained blocking the elevator.
‘You’re a Krusian?’ exclaimed Luylla, noting the lady’s characteristic emerald eyes.
‘Just like you,’ said the lady with a smile. She swirled a glass of orange liquid. On first glance Luylla could tell she was artificially enhanced. She was close to the middle of her life cycle but seemed to have perfect skin. Her shiny red hair was tied in a meticulous bun. Her outfit looked expensive. The off-the-shoulder dress, made of intricately woven golden scales, tightly hugged her upgrades. Her matching earrings were golden twisted leaf shapes with a strip of black that ended with a swirl. She glistened under the hovering chandelier.
The room had three walls. Behind the lady lay a gaping sphere-shaped void. The pressure of the room however made it feel small, an indication of a transparent force field. A colourful and elegant body shot past the gap. The dancer flexed her body as she floated down to the centre of the void where other costumed figures swirled. They leapt and twirled, moving majestically among what was clearly a customised array of gravity planes. A heavier figure appeared between them, armoured with sharp brown wings. The others scattered in a coordinated swirl at an equal and precise distance apart.
The private box was complete with a sunken lounge area. Down the step a red and yellow plant seemed to twist and sway to the music, mimicking a burning flame.
‘I apologise in advance for the show,’ she said, waving her hand in dismissal at the window. ‘It’s quite … average tonight.’ She sipped her drink and turned back. ‘Welcome,’ she chimed. She waved at the empty chair opposite. ‘Take a seat.’
Rift Breaker Page 10
