"That just leaves one tiny detail," Rand said.
"I'll get swamped with volunteers from my unit alone," Jeck said. "It won't be for the money, either. If this is something that will end the war they'll put their asses on the line for it. It's worth it."
"I want men from all of your units. An equal amount from each. I don't want any of you seeing an opportunity with the trade vehicles and making a gamble that might cost us lives. We're playing nice. By their rules. We're not going to fuck this up."
"Even if we have a chance to blow up Gizmoidon?" someone else Rand didn't know the name of said.
"We don't do shit, you understand me? We want peace. We are not going to violate their trust in any way. If that changes in the future the order will come straight down from me. For now, going forward, you bow the fuck down and do everything it takes to keep the Eidolons happy."
Rand placed his forehead in his hand. "Aw, geez."
"Spit it out, Rand," Sidmory said without looking at him.
"4,500 soldiers get to take a vacation in a nice little prison camp. What about the other 486?"
"4,985 men are going to be handed over as collateral prisoners. Every volunteer is going to be told up front that there's a ten percent chance they might be chosen to become the comfort slave of an Eidolon. These prisoners don't get to come home after their service term is up. They'll stay prisoners as long as a truce or treaty is in place."
Rand put his face in both his hands now and let out an exaggerated sigh of anguish.
Jeck started to talk, but Hern cut him off. "Comfort slave? What the Hell does that mean?"
"It means exactly what you fucking think. It's what we're willing to do to keep the Eidolons happy. We needed to give them a way for them get their conquest programming bullshit out of their system so they wouldn't be itching to go back to war. It was the berry on the cake that got them to agree to the truce—the only way they'd do it." He paused to swallow. "Some of our men are going to end up being sacrifices. It's just what it took to get it done. And you're going to tell them that before you ask for volunteers. They have a right to know."
Rand heard movement and darted to look. The stealth fighters were slowly converging on him. If he stabbed the one behind him in the neck, then threw Sidmory into the three in front of him, he could hop the table and—
"Rand," Sidmory said, "Put the knife away. We talk first, understood?"
Now the knife was no longer in play—they'd probably disabled the elevator, too. He could take Sidmory as a hostage...but...no. They all had to have sleeper darts for him.
He buttoned the knife back into his thigh pocket. An icy numbness started spreading through his middle.
"That's 4,985 accounted for," Rand said. "What about the 4,986th?"
Sidmory signaled with a tip of his chin for the other attendees to back off. Skip quietly exited the seat next to him. All the officers grouped by the door, the furthest distance away from him allowed by the room. The stealth fighters now surrounded him and Sidmory. Two climbed onto the table to block his final avenue of escape.
"You're Mister 4,986. You're the only one they asked for by name."
Rand met his eyes. Nothing in his voice indicated how cold his spit had gotten. "So I get to go to a nice prison camp and relax for the rest of my contract?"
Sidmory shook his head.
Rand had to start breathing through his mouth. His chest was shaking; his hands trembled with the dire urge to launch an attack. He tried to draw up enough spittle to form a word.
"Deandred?"
"He's their leader, Rand. If you can keep his need for conquest satisfied he's not going to want to restart the war. It's his call. You're going to be able to influence him. You could save hundreds of thousands of lives."
"He'll torture me until I'm half dead!"
"That's not how he wants to use you. Don't make me force you, Rand. You've been my best asset for three years—but think of what's at stake."
He dropped his head and shoulders onto the table while letting out another anguished sigh. "Just fucking dart me."
He saw Sidmory nose a signal to the stealth fighter behind him. A second later he felt a prick in his neck. Then, blissful unconsciousness.
* ** *** * *** ** * * ** *** * *** ** ** ** *** * *** ** ** ** *** * *** ** *
"Hey."
Someone was speaking over the noise of an engine. The sounds made Rand dream of being back at the flight school he'd lied his way into at age 15. In the dream he was abandoning the pilot's seat to leap off the plane with a parachute. He had a strong need to get away. He didn't remember why.
"Come on, Rand. Wake up."
A pungent stench assaulted his nostrils. Rand jolted awake. He immediately became aware of his constricted movements. His wrists were belted to the armrests of a cabin seat. His ankles were bound together. Tight seatbelts made an X across his shoulders and torso.
He jerked to test the restraints again. "Oh, fuck! Fuck! What's going on!"
"Calm down."
He looked in front of him while hyperventilating. Master General Sidmory and another soldier Rand didn't know were seated side-by-side across from him.
"Everything's going to be okay," Sidmory said. "Just take a deep breath and calm yourself down."
"What...what's going on?"
"You're on the transport to take you into Rendono to deliver you to High Lord Deandred."
"How is that okay!"
"It's going into the record that you volunteered to be a prisoner. Since you're going to be a comfort slave of an Eidolon we're putting you down for twice the normal bonus. Who do you want that to go to after trade gets started? Your mother in Rolley?"
Rand breathed at him with his eyes and mouth open wide.
"I'm going to put it down for your mother unless you say different." He picked up a clipboard from the chair beside him and made a note. "We packed all your things from the barrack. Is there anything else you want me to get for you?"
"Yeah."
Sidmory picked up the clipboard again.
"Two tons of painkillers."
The older general didn’t smile. He pointed his thumb at the man beside him. "This is Wallek, one of Brigadier Kander's men. He was a prisoner to an Eidolon named Colrick for eight months. He's going to tell you what you can expect. Wallek?"
The young dark-skinned soldier wet his lips. "Well, okay, um, so basically the best thing I can tell you is just do whatever they tell you and don't fight. You fight and things get a whole lot worse."
Rand blinked at him in the silence that followed. Then he looked back at Sidmory.
"Thanks so much for bringing this guy, General. I'm so fucking relieved!"
Wallek leaned closer. "Look, you don't have to be scared. It's not that bad...I mean—once you get used to it."
"Would you get this guy out of my fucking face!"
"Nope," Sidmory said. "He's coming with us. He volunteered to go back. To let Colrick have him again."
The anger in Rand's face softened. He looked back at Wallek.
Wallek met his eyes and then looked downward. "I mean, I didn't want some other soldier going through what you're going through right now. I've already been there. I know what to expect." He swallowed. "I can handle it."
"You're okay with living the rest of your life as an Eidolon's fuck toy?"
Wallek wet his lips. "I could have died in the war same as a lot of other guys. Seems to me I'm lucky I get to live at all. And...it wasn't so bad. Living in the lap of luxury is better than working in a civilian factory or some shit."
Rand looked at him as though he were insane.
"Besides, if we can pull this off, keep the peace I mean—my little brothers may not even get drafted. They might never see a day of combat their whole lives."
Rand turned away, still with a dubious expression.
"Last chance, Rand," Sidmory said. "Is there anything you want me to get you?"
He shook his head.
Sidmory stood. "T
hen I'll notify the Eidolons that we're heading out." He tapped Wallek. "Go take your seat in the back."
Wallek went down the aisle behind Rand.
"You're being handed over to the High Lord at the signing ceremony for the truce. You're a symbol of goodwill from our end. Trying to get this thing started off on the right foot."
"Yay," Rand said without looking at him.
Sidmory drew a loud breath through his nostrils. "Look. I know you can probably find a way to escape at some point between here and there. I know we've only got you on this ship right now because you let us take you. Rand, I need you to give up. Just do this thing. Sacrifice yourself. Don't fuck it up for us. What's happening here is bigger than you. It's worth your life, and yeah, it's worth your ass, too."
Rand eyed him.
"When we get to Rendono you're going to have your legs and wrists shackled and our soldiers are going to walk you over to the High Lord. And you're going to stay where we put you. You're going to go with him when he tells you to. You're not going to try to escape—not from us or from him, not today, tomorrow, or five years from now. You're not going to try any hero bullshit where you try to take down the Eidolons all by yourself. Commit yourself to the peace we're after. Do what the fucking High Lord tells you to do."
Rand kept staring. The numbness was like a miasma surging through his insides. He couldn't conjure any snarky remark. The bleak truth to the general's words had crushed his defiant spirit.
"Don't ruin things for the whole fucking world just to save your own ass."
He stepped out of view. Rand didn't follow him with his eyes. He just kept staring at the empty place where he'd been.
Every time he'd been in a situation like this before, he'd known he could either fight or sneak his way out of it.
Giving up was the one thing he wasn't sure he could do.
* ** *** * *** ** * * ** *** * *** ** ** ** *** * *** ** ** ** *** * *** ** *
Rand stared out the window vacantly during the flight. They hovered at the border for fifteen minutes. Rand didn't know if it was cold feet or if they had to wait for clearances from their enemies. Alas, the ship continued onward, across vast expanses of craggy desert with the odd depot or base scattered about. Eventually the glimmering skyline of Rendono came into view, with its superfluous arches and oversized central dome. Rand always suspected the robot city was more for show than actual inhabitants. Why did robots need a metropolis? Just store them in a closet somewhere until you need them.
"Wallek," Rand said loud enough for occupants in the rows behind him to hear. "You around?"
Wallek moved to the empty seat beside him, looking eager. Rand let his chest rise and fall with a breath.
"So, tell me how it was for you. Start with day one and go step by step."
"I'll start with day zero. I was in the prisoner unit first with ten other guys. They chained all our legs together and had us going through this huge outdoor dump digging through the trash to find stuff they wanted to reuse. We had to fill our baskets with good shit for them every day or the robots would burn a dash into our thighs."
"They would what?"
Wallek tugged down one side of his pants. Below his hip were lines burned into a circular shape to resemble a flower. "These hurt, but only for a few seconds. The thing is, if you got a whole flower you got four lashes with an electric whip. That would lay you up for weeks, might even kill you. So everyone was hustling to fill their baskets with metal or hard plastics like they wanted. Except it was obvious the place had already been picked through, and we were all chained together so we couldn't search out that far. We all had the metal cuffs cutting into our ankles. Plus we were working with the sun beating down on us. We had to all coordinate going to the water trough together and no one wanted to stop working to do it. It sucked."
"So how'd you go from the garbage pile to the life of luxury?"
"About two weeks in, the robots had us get cleaned up and put on clean clothes and then took us to this mansion. We stood lined up in the driveway, still all chained together. This Eidolon comes out of the mansion, first one I ever saw in the flesh, and he starts walking back and forth looking us over. Everyone besides me was white and their skin was all sun-baked, burned, peeling. I guess I looked a lot better than them. So he stops at me and says that if I become his 'comfort slave' I'll get to live in the mansion and won't have to work anymore.
"Hmm."
"On top of that, he'll give the rest of the guys today and the next three days off. Frankly, I was ready to say yes right then and there, cause I was one dash short from getting whipped."
"Did you know what he was asking you to do?"
Wallek shrugged. "Yeah, I mean, I heard rumors the same as everyone else. I ain't gay, but honestly, it seemed better than getting the four lashes. I watched two other guys get it, and it was the worst thing I ever saw. I figured if I just went along with whatever he wanted maybe it wouldn't be so bad."
"Uh huh." Rand was dubious again.
"Anyway, I didn't actually have any choice because then he says that if I don't agree then everyone, me included, would be getting one lash of the electric whip and then would be hauled back to the dump to work and would still need to make quota even though the day was already half over."
"Nice."
"So I just said yeah. I'll be your comfort slave. Whatever."
"Okay."
"The robots unchained me and two of his robots came on either side of me. He said to follow him in. So I just waved bye to the guys and left. And frankly I think half of them were wishing that they were the ones who'd gotten picked."
"Huh."
"So we go into this really posh mansion and as we're walking he says that if I don't obey him I'm going to get a real brutal beating. But if I do obey everything he asks then I'll get a gentle beating that won't be so bad."
"What the fuck." Rand shook his head. He remembered Deandred's similar talk about 'mild torture.'
"He started off just asking me to do easy things, things I had no problem with, and I just did everything he asked. I didn't fuck around. I guess he was testing me, and I passed the test. So that was enough for the day and he just had me hang around while he did the shit he needed to do. We ate meals together and hung out together. Then he'd talk to me sometimes, like he was getting to know me, and I started not being so scared after a while. Then he'd ask me to do more stuff, you know, in the bedroom like, and I just did it, you know, even though it was shit I would never have normally done."
"You're getting vague."
"Well...but you know what I'm talking about."
"It sounds like he was courting you."
"Yeah, exactly. And I was like, fuck it, court me. Slow is better than fast, since I got no choice in it anyway. He was like, doing things in degrees so that I never felt overwhelmed. I kind of knew what the next step was each time, and I just went with it. I never put up any resistance."
"But you said that things would get bad if you didn't obey. How did you know that if you always obeyed?"
"Because he told me about the prisoner he used to have before me, the one he ended up killing."
"Aw, fuck."
"This guy was fighting him all the way, spitting in his face, trying to get away every chance he got. He said he thought he started to wear him down a little, but it was just a ruse so he could get the chains off at night and try to escape. He was torturing him hardcore and the dude just wouldn't give in."
"Torturing how?"
"Like real insidious shit. Putting bacteria on his tongue that would make it hurt for him to talk, sticking peeled radishes up his ass—"
"Radishes up his ass!"
"—sealing up his piss hole and then forcing him to drink, making him sleep while he was dangling from hooks pushed through his skin."
Rand gave a staggered whimper. He felt the color drain from his face.
"So he was finally fed up and he talked to Gizmoidon about the problems to see if he could just let him free. A
nd Gizmoidon told him to beat him to death. So that's what Mas—I mean, what Colrick did."
"What the...mother-loving..." He took a moment to collect himself. "So Deandred isn't really their leader. This computer thing is."
"Yeah. They all do what Gizmoidon says. I guess he made it so they could never disobey him."
"So they're beating on us and papa-computer is beating on them."
"That's what it seemed like."
Rand snuffled and looked out the window. They passed the outer perimeter of Rendono. Sleek round buildings and towers were growing more clustered beneath them.
"You're in love with this Colrick guy, aren't you?"
Wallek didn't answer.
Rand looked at him. "Hey. Don't start getting coy on me now. I'm about to get my ass fucked in a little bit too here. We're past the 'act extra macho so no one thinks we're gay' shit. Every straight guy can cop to turning prison gay. It happens—and you were a prisoner."
Wallek wet his lips. "I got feelings for him. Yeah."
"You know that's what happens when you're a prisoner for a long time. You start to see things their way. Your brain gets twisted. It isn't right for fucking Sidmory to use your confusion to push his own agenda."
Wallek shook his head. "Rand, I've been free for a year now. Longer than I was a prisoner. I'm over all that shit. I see things clear."
"What?" Rand's brows pinched and the corner of his top lip pulled up. "I thought you were let go recently because of the truce. How the Hell did you get away?"
"Before it happened I was helping Master—I mean...well fuck it, anyway I was helping him pack, and the whole mansion was getting closed down. He said we were going to combine households with this other Eidolon named...well, I forget his name. But Master mentioned the guy didn't have a human prisoner, and he was probably going to want to share me. Then he asks me to tell him what the Delphi philosophy on being taken prisoner was. And I gave him lots of answers from my training, but he kept asking until I got to the part where we're always supposed to be looking for a way to escape. He made me repeat it to him twice. Then he...you know, he gave me a hug and a kiss, and he asked me to bring his car which was parked way in the back of the mansion. I'd never driven any of their vehicles, but I figured it couldn't be that hard. When I moved to get it he ordered my robot guards not to come with me, and I was really confused. Then I looked at him and I saw he was tearing up kind of. He said, 'Goodbye, Wallek.' Right then my heart started racing because it finally dawned on me what he wanted me to do. And I'll tell you...it was...it was kind of hard. But I just drove away..." His voice betrayed him with a quaver of emotion. "Drove back to the border...then snuck back in. No one ever came after me."
The Eidolon's Conquest Page 2
