‘They need to see direction,’ Meyanna replied, ‘but they also need to know that they’re part of the group. They feel isolated down there and regularly complain that they don’t know what’s going on. Maybe informing them of everything would help the situation?’
‘And give the people distributing this disgusting cocktail the chance to hide their supply?’ Idris challenged. ‘Not a chance. They need to be controlled. We need to stamp down on this fast.’
‘Controlled, stamp,’ Meyanna echoed his words, ‘you see how you’re bludgeoning them to conform to what you think you need? The majority of the civilians will still be clean. You need to trust that they have enough eyes and ears to find out who’s doing this for you, not lock them in their homes.’
Idris exhaled noisily.
‘I don’t have the luxury of letting them find out in their own good time who’s behind this,’ he replied. ‘If they’d been able to achieve that they’d have done it already. What if the drug makes its way into the military population? Keep this to yourself for as long as you can,’ he insisted. ‘I’ll re-task the Marines to start rooting out who’s behind this as best they can.’
‘Where the hell did it come from?’ Meyanna asked. ‘We had no drugs aboard ship before the apocalypse other than those used for medical purposes. I couldn’t have concoted Devlamine in here if I’d wanted to.’
‘I don’t know,’ Idris replied as he cast the dying man one last glance. ‘Will he make it?’
‘If he doesn’t get a hit of Devlamine in the next few hours?’ Meyanna asked. ‘No, he’ll be dead.’
Sansin thought hard for a moment, but his train of thought was interrupted as a tannoy announcement echoed through the ship.
‘All personnel, sub-luminal velocity deceleration in ten minutes.’
‘We’re coming up on a habitable system,’ Idris said. ‘There may be supplies but the Veng’en cruiser we’re following may also be waiting for us, I have to go.’
‘Get to the bottom of this man’s addiction,’ Meyanna insisted as the captain turned to leave. ‘If we have an outbreak of drug abuse aboard ship, what cohesion remains among the ship’s company will be lost forever.’
***
VI
Ishira awoke to the touch of cold air upon her skin and a feint sliver of light suspended before her in the darkness. She shifted position and immediately realised that her wrists were bound behind her back and that her shoulder hurt where it was pressed against a thin foam sheet on the cold floor.
‘Erin?’
Ishira scrambled to her feet in the darkness, her first thought for her daughter’s safety. The empty tone of her voice told her that she was in a bare cell and exposed to the open air that she could smell drifting in through the narrow gap ahead. Ishira staggered forward in the darkness, her legs weak and her head groggy as she peered through the gap in a pair of heavy doors and out into the world beyond.
The smell of sea salt and the whisper of waves crashing somewhere far away below her drifted across her senses, and she realised that she was suspended hundreds of feet in the air above the turbulent surface of an ocean. She looked down and her balance wavered as she saw that her tiny prison was swaying back and forth, giving her vertiginous glances of the precarious drop. Waves thundered against a rocky cliff-face far below, churned white and grey as a brisk gale whipped the ocean into a frenzy.
‘Erin!?’
Her voice sounded small and she realised that nobody would be able to hear her above the roar of the seas below. She cried out again anyway, calling for her daughter, and almost fell over as the tiny prison jerked upward and swayed dangerously as it began to climb. Ishira dropped onto one knee, nausea from the movement and darkness swimming in her belly as the cell rose up, the sound of some kind of mechanical winch hauling it and then swinging it away from the cliff’s edge.
Ishira groaned as the nausea intensified, but then the cell thumped down with a metallic clang onto solid ground and her senses returned to normal as a dull crunch was followed by the doors to her cell being swung open as brilliant sunlight blazed inside.
As she struggled to her feet a giant hand grabbed her upper arm and yanked her out of the cell. Ishira stumbled out into the bright sunlight, squinting as she tried to focus on her surroundings.
She was standing upon a rocky cliff-top that stretched as far as she could see in either direction across the shore of a vast ocean that sparkled like liquid gold in the sunlight. The sun in the sky was bloated, radiating immense veils of glowing gas that were visible even against the pale blue heavens above, and those skies rippled and shone with glowing aurora that flowed like gigantic rivers of light through the heavens.
She turned and saw large, rusting cranes mounted upon the cliff’s edge, and below them ranks of metal cells like the one she had been incarcerated inside, dangling from hooks that were attached to precariously thin metal wires stretched taut between bracing towers erected at key points along the cliff.
‘My daughter, Erin,’ she gasped as she turned to the man who had liberated her.
A huge, muscular creature leered down at her with wide dim-witted eyes, a drooling mouth spilling copious volumes of saliva down a threadbare vest. An Ogrin, a feeble-minded race often enslaved by unscrupulous traders and brigands.
The back of the Ogrin’s enormous hand smashed into her chest and propelled her backwards into the ground. Ishira cried out as she slammed onto the rocky earth, and immediately other hands lifted her up again. Ishira realised that she was one of dozens of captives being picked out of their hanging cells along the cliff by dozens of Ogrin who shoved and cajoled them into lines.
‘Don’t aggravate them,’ an electronically-translated voice cautioned her. ‘They’re ordered to throw into the sea anybody who disobeys them more than once.’
Ishira looked into the eyes of a Caneerian miner, human but his skin touched with the faint blue tint that all Caneerians had evolved, the legacy of generations of evolution causing blood to flow more thinly near the skin on Caneeron’s icy veld. Far away from his cold, distant homeworld, like many who had never left before he spoke only his native tongue rather than Etherean. Bulky and muscular but also appearing tired and lethargic, his gravelly voice whispered to her.
‘Face the front, stay in line. You’ll survive longer that way.’
‘My daughter, Erin,’ Ishira whispered. ‘Have you seen her?’
The Caneerian shook his head and said nothing as the Ogrin lined them up and linked their manacles together with strong wire cord before their leader, a creature even bigger than the rest, yanked the front of the cord and the prisoners were hauled into motion behind him.
Ishira tried to quell the fear for Erin poisoning her guts as she made an effort to start thinking. She took in the ocean again and noticed for the first time the immense thunderheads far out across the horizon, flickering with distant storms of unimaginable ferocity. A brief glance at the dying star dominating the sky and she realised that the planet itself was also in its death throes.
‘The oceans are starting to evaporate,’ the Caneerian said, noticing her gaze. ‘The heat and vapour cause giant storms, and the aurora up there are visible day and night.’
Ishira glanced up at the glowing auroral veils, the result of energetic particles from the dying star hammering into Chiron’s magnetic field.
‘How long?’ she asked.
‘A few weeks at best,’ the miner replied. ‘The magnetic field won’t last much longer, and once it’s gone those cosmic rays will hit the surface and all life will be extinguished. Including us.’
Caneerians were not known for their inate optimism, probably a result of living on a cold and lonely planet of ice that endured storms that could last for weeks. Caneerian miners were even less jovial, due to spending most of their working lives beneath the surface of Caneeron and thus not even enjoying the modest sunshine the world had to offer.
‘I don’t intend to be here to find out,’ she replied.
<
br /> The miner gave a snort.
‘You won’t be with that attitude,’ he informed her. ‘You won’t survive the night.’
‘Who owns this place? Who’s in charge?’
‘You’ll see soon enough,’ the Caneerian replied.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Who cares? We’re all doomed anyway and…’
‘Then I’d like to know who I’m doomed with, okay?’
The Caneerian peered over his shoulder at her and then shrugged his big shoulders. ‘Dantin.’
‘Ishira, pleased to meet you.’
‘Sorry it’s not under better circumstances.’
‘Me too.’
The Ogrin led them between two peaks on the headland, following a meandering path between barren expanses of hardy grass and gnarled, twisted trees long dead. As they crested a rise that descended on the other side of the headland between the two peaks, a vast valley revealed itself. Watercourses flowed down from distant highlands toward a river system that swept in from the mainland and wound its way toward the ocean somewhere far to Ishira’s right. Huge sprawling plains of vividly coloured foliage swept into the distance, nature’s elegant touch colouring the wilderness even as mankind’s rough caress destroyed it.
But it was the gigantic object set in the heart of the valley that took Ishira’s breath away.
A vast space cruiser lay in dock alongside the river, supported by immense beams and cradles and tended by hundreds of men and machines. To Ishira’s practiced eye the ship looked Colonial, of an older model, her slab-sided fuselage and stubby engine nacelles reminiscent of the golden age of space travel when just being functional was enough, architectural aesthetics left to artists and dreamers. The vessel towered high above the swarm of slaves labouring around her, her upper hull partially obscured by low cloud drifting through the turbulent sky and the tiny specks of Chiron’s birdlife wheeling and turning as though flocking to the side of giant cliffs, their hawkish cries distant and muted by height.
Around the cruiser was arrayed a flotilla of docked spacecraft. Ishira counted at least fifty of them, of varying types and origins and ages. She felt her heart leap as she recognised Valiant docked alongside a boarding platform.
‘That’s my ship!’
The Ogrin glared at her as they lumbered alongside the prisoners, and Dantin shook his head.
‘It was your ship,’ he replied. ‘Now, it’s theirs.’
The Caneerian nodded toward a towering scaffold set against one of the peaks, banners flying from its heights as though it were some kind of palatial residence. The odd contrast of makeshift metal and colourful exuberance bothered Ishira immensely as they were led by the Ogrin beneath the massive nose of the grounded Colonial frigate, showers of sparks raining down around them from high above as slaves worked on repairing huge hull panels and giant power conduits.
Ishira saw sitting among the colourful scaffolds ranks of men, all of them watching the arriving prisoners with satisfied grins on their faces and large tankards in their hands. Clouds of smoke drifted from pipes and root tobaccos, the men variously lounging on casually arranged beds or leaning against pillars and surveying the miserable horde as it approached.
The lead Ogrin stopped at the foot of the scaffolds, the seemingly tiny wire cord held in one giant fist, and looked up at the watching men.
‘Your subjects, my lords,’ he intoned in a voice so deep it sounded as though the earth had moved beneath them.
One of the men, a tall and wiry man with deeply tanned features and long black hair tied behind his head, stepped forward. A colourful trench coat billowed in the wind as he tossed something down that wriggled and screeched as it tumbled toward the giant Ogrin below him, and the creature caught it in mid-air and hungrily gobbled whatever it was to the sound of a wet crunch.
‘Chironian spice rat,’ Dantin explained. ‘They’ve got the Ogrin well and truly addicted to them.’
‘That thing was a drug?’ Ishira asked.
‘Kind of, it’s full of sweet juice from the trees that it lives on here. It eats the fruits like a parasite, more than enough to go around. They’re lethal to humans, but these Ogrin can’t get enough of them.’
Ishira narrowed her eyes as she stared at the men gathered above them. ‘How come the Ogrin don’t just get it themselves?’
‘Because access to it is tightly controlled,’ Dantin smiled tightly, ‘and the Ogrin were never very good at handling plasma rifles. They’re totally at the mercy of these men.’
Ishira looked up at the men and as she did so they parted and another joined them from within the scaffolds. He was squat, his long, thick black hair pulled back from oily olive-coloured skin and pinned in braids down his back. Oddly effeminate make-up adorned his eyes, contrasting sharply with his thick and hairy forearms as he strode out to survey the new arrivals. A cold gleam in his eye told Ishira everything that she needed to know even before his voice broke out over the captives.
‘Welcome to Chiron!’ he boomed jovially. ‘You may thank us later for liberating you from the grasp of the Legion and bringing you here to our lair. Your lives are now saved, and they belong to us.’
Ishira couldn’t help herself. She strode out of line and glared up at the squat man.
‘Who are you, where is my family what the hell are you doing with my ship?’
A few captives working nearby drew a sharp intake of breath and for a moment it seemed as though the wind stopped blowing as the squat man stared down at Ishira. Then, a ripple of chuckles fluttered among the men behind him and a grim smile curled from his lips like a snake basking in the sun.
‘My my,’ he intoned, ‘where are your manners, my dear?’
‘Give me a plasma pistol and I’ll show you where I’ll shove my manners.’
The men behind the squat man burst out laughing. Their leader continued to smile but his voice crackled with restraint.
‘My name is Salim Phaeon,’ he replied. ‘Your daughter is safe, as is your father. As for your ship, well, we promise to take good care of it now that it’s ours.’
Ishira strained against her manacles as she tried to walk closer to Salim.
‘Like hell it is,’ she spat.
An Ogrin’s massive hand clamped onto her shoulder and drove her to her knees with such force that she thought she would be buried up to her neck, pinning her down. She kept glaring at Salim as he stepped down from his platform and strode to stand before her.
‘Then welcome to hell,’ he smiled without warmth.
In the distance Ishira could see Valiant, her hull gleaming in the brilliant sunshine as cloud shadows drifted across the landscape around them.
‘A fine craft,’ Salim observed. ‘Perfect for what we have in mind.’
‘She’s mine,’ Ishira hissed.
Salim stepped to her and tutted as he rolled his eyes in a parody of concern. ‘You really must understand, my young friend, that you do not own anything. You, all of you, are now mine and any resistance will result in consequences, you understand?’
Ishira strained against the Ogrin’s grasp.
‘Drop dead,’ she spat.
Salim lifted one podgy hand and clicked his fingers.
Up on the scaffolds the lounging men parted as two women in garish, revealing clothes that showed more flesh than they covered walked out, swaying their hips in a seductive manner with a smaller, similarly dressed woman pinned between them. Ishira gasped as she saw Erin, her hair brushed out and her soft skin covered in make-up as though she were some kind of living doll, her expression confused and apprehensive.
‘For our entertainment,’ Salim said by way of an explanation.
Ishira yanked her head to one side and sank her teeth into the Orgi’s hand on her shoulder as though she hadn’t eaten for a month. The giant gaoler screamed and tore his hand away and Ishira leaped up like a coiled spring at Salim. Her body rocketed toward his as she jerked her head back and smashed her forehead against the pirate’s nose.<
br />
Salim’s nasal cartilage collapsed with a dull crunch as the wire restraint brought Ishira up short in time to see Salim stumble backwards and collapse onto the ground, his face a bloodied mess. A rush of gasps and whispers fluttered across the prisoners as the pirates up on the scaffolds whipped pistols and rifles up to point at Ishira, plasma magazines humming into life.
The Ogrin’s giant, bloodied hand smashed across Ishira’s chest and hurled her to the ground as Salim, his eyes blackened with rage, hauled himself to his feet and drew a long, curved blade from his belt as he glared down at her.
‘You will learn your place,’ he sneered, ‘or others will suffer!’
Salim turned and the curved blade flickered in the sunlight as he threw it. The blade flashed through the air and thumped into the chest of a skinny looking man with thin, grey hair and a pallid expression. The blade buried itself to the hilt in the man’s scrawny chest and he stared down at it with an expression of bewilderment.
‘No!’
Ishira’s cry rang out as she watched the man’s legs crumple beneath him as he collapsed, his eyes rolling up in their sockets as his heart bled out inside his chest.
‘This is what will happen,’ Salim roared, wiping blood from his face, ‘upon every act of insubordination. This is how we punish those who oppose us! Those closest to you will take the punishment, and that punishment shall be death! Get them to work!’
Salim’s last was directed at the Ogrin, who jerked the prisoners into line and forced them to march toward the towering bulk of the cruiser nearby.
Dantin hauled Ishira up to her feet, his features stormy with anger as nearby the dead man was cut from the line.
‘Now do you understand?!’ he hissed. ‘Stay quiet, before you get anybody else killed!’
Ishira turned as she saw an Ogrin drag the dead man’s body away by the ankle and hurl him over the edge of the cliffs. High on the scaffold she saw Erin led out of sight by the pirate’s consorts, her features twisted with despair.
Atlantia Series 3: Aggressor Page 5
