The Voyage Home

by D. J. Holmes

  As the auction got underway, Sarah had to fight back tears. She had been mentally preparing herself for what she knew was coming. Even so, when it came, she couldn’t help herself. Almost every slave that came out looked lost and helpless. Though Sarah couldn’t see who was buying them, she could imagine. Many of the slaves were likely heading off into miserable lives. They had no hope. The prices also shocked her. Some of the worst looking slaves sold for less than a thousand credits. Life was so cheap to the slavers.

  By the time Rex appeared in the central cage, Sarah had seen enough. He was hopelessly naive. He actually looked like he was happy at the prospect of being sold. Sarah couldn’t let some pirate or horrible slaver get their hands on him. As soon as the bidding began, she leant forward and placed a bid of three thousand on him.

  Divar’s eyebrows shot up. Sarah stared him down, then she gave a slight nod. After a moment Divar nodded back and turned back to the auction. He knew what she wanted. He had to place several more bids on Rex, but eventually they won the auction and bought him for twelve thousand. The terminal took the money from Divar’s credit chip and then spat out a purchase chip. Divar reached over, took it, and then made to get up from his seat. Sarah stretched out her arm and held him in place. This time she gave him a shake of her head. The emotion in her eyes said all Divar needed to know. She wasn’t leaving without all the humans.

  The first of the three ragged humans sold for only two thousand credits. The second for two and a half. When the female came out, someone placed a bid of four thousand on her. Divar only had to glance at Sarah’s face to see what she wanted. He quickly put a bid of five thousand on the human. Whoever else was interested in her was clearly not deterred, for the price went up to six. Quickly a bidding war developed.

  Sarah knew what that meant. Someone had figured out that Divar wanted to purchase all the humans in the auction. They were driving up the price. Probably it was someone in the employ of the slave market owner. It meant their cover was partially blown. People would begin to ask questions about them. If Angrave or Klixar were still out there looking for them, they had left a small clue. Sarah was past caring. She couldn’t let the nameless human female be sold into slavery.

  When the price hit twenty thousand, Divar looked to Sarah. She reached over herself and put in a bid for forty thousand. No one is taking her from me, she thought. Her bid had the effect she desired. No one else placed another bid. Within several seconds the auction had moved on and Divar was able to retrieve his credit chip and the final purchase chip.

  “You know we’re leaving a trail,” Divar said. “A forty thousand credit one.”

  “It’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Sarah replied as she stood.

  Divar shrugged, stood, and then walked towards the turbolift. Sarah knew what he was thinking. It was her mistake to make. Though there was little point left, Sarah played her role and fell into step behind Divar. She hoped the other slavers would just think Divar had a thing for human slaves. Maybe they would think he particularly liked female humans. Sarah blushed slightly at the thought. She guessed the same thing had crossed Divar’s mind. She would have to tease him about it later.

  When they got down to the two cages that held their purchases, Divar handed his four purchase chips to the guard who had walked up to greet them. “Everything checks out,” the guard said after scanning the chips. “I’ll send the codes for the collars to your command unit.”

  “Thank you,” Divar said as he tapped a few buttons on his wrist device to allow it to receive the codes.

  “Try out the collars,” the guard said.

  Divar hesitated for a moment. When the guard began to look at him in a funny way, he quickly hit a few more buttons on his wrist unit. First Rex let out a yelp as his hands flew to his collar. Then one by one the other three humans did as well.

  “Good,” the guard said. “Everything seems to be in order.”

  “You can release them now,” Divar said.

  With a nod the guard hit a button on each of the cages and they opened. “That will be all,” Divar added.

  “Thank you for purchasing me,” Rex said. “As I said before, I look forward to working for you.”

  “Come on out here,” Divar said. “We’re going to leave now. Just stick with us. I don’t want you getting lost.”

  “Certainly,” Rex replied.

  Once the guard turned to walk away, Sarah stepped into the cage with the three dejected looking slaves. She wasn’t worried about Rex trying to run away, but if the humans thought this might be their last chance at escape, they could try something foolish.

  “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “We have no intention of keeping you slaves,” as she spoke, she reached up and unclipped her collar. She only let it open a couple of inches, but it was enough for the slaves to see. “Don’t say anything,” Sarah continued, giving them a stern look. “Just play along for now. Do you understand?”

  The three slaves nodded and got to their feet. There was a completely different look in each of their faces. Sarah couldn’t help smiling at them. She had just changed their futures, it felt good.

  Turning to face Divar, she motioned for him to take the lead. Following her cue, he turned and began to walk past the other cages of slaves. Sarah, Rex and the other humans fell in step behind him.

  As they climbed the stairs and passed the two guards who were there, Sarah felt a small flutter in her stomach. They were almost out. Then, when they walked out of the large double doors that led out of the slave market and into the open streets of Berius, she allowed herself a wide grin. They had done it. Turning, she shot the other humans a quick grin before flattening her face again. “We have reserved a hotel room, just keep following us,” she said.

  Chapter 29

  As soon as they were in the privacy of the hotel room, Sarah reached up and undid her slave collar. With disgust, she threw it onto the floor. Turning around, she saw a look of utter shock on Rex’s face.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “Getting that awful thing off me,” she answered. “Come here and I’ll do yours.”

  “What? No!” Rex said. “If you try it will shock me. Or worse, it will kill me.”

  “No it won’t,” Sarah said. “Trust me.”

  As Sarah moved towards Rex, he stepped back.

  “Here, do me instead,” the female human said as she stepped forward.

  “With pleasure,” Sarah said as she turned and smiled at the slave. “What is your name?”

  “Rebecca,” the slave replied. “This is Steve and Jason. Can you really take these off?”

  “Yes,” Sarah answered as she reached up with a small scanner Alexandra had given her. The scanner took a moment to examine the collar and then it beeped. With the touch of a couple of buttons it released a command code. With a click, the collar split into two and fell away from Rebecca’s neck.

  Rebecca’s uninjured hand went straight to her neck and rubbed the rough skin. “I can’t thank you enough,” she said to Sarah. “I thought I would be wearing that thing for the rest of my life.”

  “I know the feeling,” Sarah said. “I can’t do anything about your arm. But when we get back to the ship we should be able to fix you up. Here,” she continued as she turned to the other two ragged slaves. “Let’s gets yours off as well.”

  “Impossible,” Rex said as he saw a second and then a third slave collar fall to the floor. “It’s not possible.”

  “Watch,” Sarah said as she approached him. This time Rex stood still as she lifted the scanner to his neck. In just a few seconds, the collar fell to the floor. Instead of reaching for his neck, Rex dropped to his knees and picked up the slave collar. He studied it carefully. “I have worn this all my life,” he said. “What do I do now? Am I free?”

  “Yes,” Sarah said as she took the slave collar out of his hands. With a flick of her wrist, she threw it away. “Forget about it. You are free now. We bought you, but we have no intention of ke
eping you. You can do whatever you want.”

  “Whatever?” Rex said as his eyes flicked to where Sarah had thrown the collar.

  “Yes,” Sarah replied. “But you don’t have to decide now.”

  “If you didn’t buy us to keep us, what do you want with us?” Rebecca asked. “And who is this?” she followed up as she gave Divar a wary glance.

  “This is Divar, and my name is Sarah,” Sarah answered. “Divar is my partner. We bought you because we are trying to find Earth. I was taken from Earth when I was young. I have never been back. We have searched through as many star charts as we can get our hands on, yet we can’t find Earth, it doesn’t exist on any galactic map. Earth is where you are from isn’t it?”

  “No,” Rebecca answered. “We are from the Alpha Centauri system.”

  “Alpha Centauri?” Sarah repeated slowly, she was disappointed. “I have never heard of it. Is that our species’ homeworld?” She cursed Ranack, had he tricked her again?

  “It is a human colony,” Rebecca explained. “Earth is humanity’s homeworld, but we have never been there.”

  “I thought Earth was a Tier 1 colony,” Divar said. “They are not allowed to colonize other planets.”

  “Alpha Centauri was colonized before the Elders conquered Earth,” Rebecca explained. “At least that is what the Resistance says. The official history says the Elders graciously allowed our people to spread out from our homeworld so that our race would survive in case a disaster struck Earth.”

  “Well that’s a load of rubbish,” Divar said. “The Elders have not done anything as nice in four thousand years of rule.

  My people had colonized other worlds? Sarah thought. She had only heard of a handful of species who had done so before being forced to join the Elder Empire. Suddenly, Sarah realized she had a million questions for Rebecca and her friends. There was so much about her people and their history that she didn’t know. Even so, there was one question at the forefront of her mind. “Do you know where Earth is? Can you show us on a galactic map?”

  “Not precisely,” Rebecca answered. “We don’t know Alpha Centauri’s coordinates, at least not on a galactic map. We had never left our home system before. Yet we do know the local stars around Alpha Centauri. We should be able to find it easily enough. We should also be able to give you a good estimate of where Earth is in relation to our homeworld. Isn’t that right?” she said, turning to her friends.

  “Yes,” Jason replied. “It shouldn’t be too hard to give you a good estimate.”

  Sarah let out deep breath. It felt like a giant weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She was so close to finding out where Earth was. Soon she would be able to return home.

  “I have a couple of requests first,” Jason continued.

  “What are they?” Sarah asked as her eyes narrowed. Was Jason about to try and trick her?

  “Some clothes would be nice, and some food,” Jason said. “If you are trying to get to Earth, you must have a ship in orbit. We would greatly appreciate a lift back to Alpha Centauri. It is very close to Earth.”

  “Clothes and food are not a problem,” Divar answered before Sarah could. “But dropping you back at your homeworld might be tricky. We do have a ship. But it isn’t one that can just go about visiting Elder worlds with ease. It would draw a lot of attention and probably get us all killed.”

  “But we will do our best,” Sarah said, jumping in. She was just thankful they weren’t trying to milk as much as they could out of her. “We can work out the details later. For now, we can certainly get you some food and clothes. Here, let’s see what you would like to eat. There should be a menu in the room. We can order food to be delivered to us.”

  Looking around, Sarah quickly found what she wanted. “Here, have a look and see what you might like. I can send Divar out to get some clothes for you.”

  “I’m not sure leaving you alone with them is a good idea,” Divar said. “We don’t really know anything about them yet.”

  Sarah had to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. They had just freed Rebecca and her friends from slavery, they were hardly about to betray them as badly as Ranack had. However, the look on Divar’s face said he wasn’t about to take any risks. “Fine,” Sarah said, guessing she had better appease him. After all, he had been right about Ranack.

  “I can go,” Rex said energetically. “I know my way about Kashal. I know just where to go to get some clothes that should fit you.”

  “I don’t know,” Divar said cautiously. “How do we know you will come back?”

  “You bought me,” Rex said. “I am happy to serve you.”

  “You are not our slave boy,” Divar said.

  Rex almost looked hurt at Divar’s words. “Then who am I to serve?” he asked as his voice quivered.

  “You can still serve us,” Sarah said gently as she reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Friends help each other out. You can be our friend and help us if you like. The only difference is that you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. Friends don’t make friends do things they don’t want to. Do you understand?”

  “I think so,” Rex said. “I had several friends growing up. Though they were all slaves.”

  “Well we are all friends now,” Sarah said. “Except none of us are slaves.”

  “Ok,” Rex said. “So do you want me to go and get some clothes for Rebecca and her friends then?”

  “If you are happy to do that for them,” Sarah said, “then yes.”

  “It would be a pleasure,” Rex said. “Can I...” he began. Instead of finishing he paused and looked down at the floor.

  “Yes?” Sarah prompted him.

  “Can I put my collar back on?” Rex asked quietly.

  “Why would you do that?” Jason almost shouted. “You just got free.”

  “For safety,” Rex answered hesitantly. “There are thousands of slaves in Kashal. They can move around freely. With a slave collar on, no other slaver would try to take you. They know that without a collar’s command codes the slave would be useless. If I don’t wear my collar, I will stand out like a sore thumb.”

  Sarah saw his point. Yet she felt there was more to it than that. Rex kept steeling glances towards where his collar lay on the floor. Alexandra had warned her that not every slave would thank her for freeing them. For some slaves, their new lives were actually better than their old ones. Others had been slaves for so long they didn’t know what to do with freedom. The very concept was a terrifying thought to some. It seemed Rex wasn’t as ready as Rebecca and her friends to embrace his new status.

  “Fine,” Sarah said, going against her instincts. “You can put it back on. But I’m not activating it. It will only be for show. And I’m taking it off as soon as you get back.”

  “Ok,” Rex said as he jumped up from where he had sat down. He moved over and lifted his collar. With a snap, he reattached it. “I’ll be back in half an hour,” he smiled as he moved towards the door.

  “Hold on,” Divar said as he fished a credit chip out of his pocket. “You’ll need this. You are going to get clothes aren’t you?”

  “Oh yes,” Rex said as he blushed. “Thank you.”

  “Just hurry,” Sarah said.

  “I will,” Rex replied.

  “Ok then,” Divar said as soon as Rex left. “Have you three found something you can eat?”

  “I think so,” Rebecca answered. “We already ordered it.”

  “Good,” Divar said as he pulled a small device out of another pocket. He set it down on a table in the middle of the room and then stood back. After a couple of seconds, it projected a holo image of local space. “This is Berius and the surrounding planets. Do you recognize where we are?”

  “No,” Jason said. “Can you expand it?”

  “Yes,” Divar said as he zoomed the image out to show more than twenty sectors of Elder space.

  “Unbelievable,” Jason said. “These are all worlds controlled by the Elders?”

/>   “Yes, they are Elder colonies,” Sarah answered. “Worlds the Elders have forced to join their empire. Don’t you recognize any of them?”