In Death's Shadow

by S. F. Edwards

He sent the team what information he had and waited, doing his best to appear calm.

  Two men exited the van, masks over their faces, and led him around to the back door. Another masked man greeted him there and slapped a bag over his head. Blazer made no move to resist. It was not nearly as rough as some of his training exercises. The kidnappers bound his wrists and ankles and rummaged through his pockets.

  There was nothing there but his ID and comm link. The comm link tinked off the highway, and they shoved him in the back of the van. He crashed to the floor, the door slammed shut, and they raced away.

  “We’re going to knock you out,” one of them told him.

  Awfully nice of them to warn me. He said nothing and felt a pinch in his arm. Just play along for now. What if they take me somewhere unexpected, though? Will Gokhead be able to keep track of me? Fog filled Blazer’s mind, but before he lost consciousness, he sent one last message to Tadeh Qudas.

  Blazer only caught before passing out.

  Anul, Electrolite Compound

  Blazer had no idea where he was, or how long he’d been out, when the universe began creeping back into his senses. The waking was not of his own accord, however: someone had kicked him with both feet. Blazer opened his eyes, found the sack still over his head, and sat up. He regretted doing that instantly when the drugs in his system made his head spin.

  “About time you woke up, you freaking idiot!”

  “Nice to hear your voice, Jell.” Blazer scooted towards the source of his sister’s voice. He felt her teeth grab hold of the bag before she pulled it off and spit it out. He surveyed a darkened room before turning to Jell.

  She looked like they’d dragged her through Sheol, not injured, but dirty, grimy and wearing clothes that were not something she would ever pick out. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here to rescue you.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Nice job, you freaking moron. You got yourself captured in the process.”

  “That’s just part of the plan.”

  “Oh yeah, ‘part of the plan’ says mister big shot military guy, thinks he can do anything.”

  Blazer gave his sister a harsh look. “I know what I’m doing.”

  He attempted to access his micomm, nothing. He tried again, and the link stayed dead. He restarted the unit and the start menu indicated it was functional, but he couldn’t establish a link. “Jamming,” he let slip out.

  “What?”

  Blazer looked around, searching for listening devices.

  “They’re not listening. I shorted out all the electrics in the room after they brought me in, and they’ve not brought anything else but you.”

  “Something could have been shielded.”

  “Not from the charge I blew out.”

  Blazer looked at his sister and her haggard eyes. “How much did you blow out?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Jell if you blew out enough to get Tem’s…”

  “I’m not that stupid.”

  Blazer shook his head, twisted about, and grabbed her hands to give her a slight charge. The look of relief that washed over her face when he turned back to face her told him enough. You came damn close.

  “Thanks, I needed that.”

  “Given who our captors are, I’m surprised they didn’t do that for you already.”

  “I think they didn’t want to risk me taking more. How much of a charge have you got?”

  Blazer smiled back. “You don’t want to know. Could they have drained me on the way here without my knowing?”

  Jell shrugged.

  Blazer remained silent for a moment, feeling the electrolytic layer below his skin. The drugs made it hard for him to know how much charge he had, but he could tell they had taken a little. Good. They probably think they’ve siphoned off enough to make me harmless. “How long since I arrived, or since they called?”

  She shrugged again.

  “Come on, Jell, give me something!”

  “I haven’t exactly got a way to tell time in here you know, a few hects at least since they dumped you here, not sure beyond that.”

  Blazer accessed his micomm’s internal clock, but the clock fritzed. It jumped around between time zones and the windowless room gave no indications. “Did they do anything to me when I arrived?”

  “Not that I saw.”

  Blazer tried to reset the clock, but nothing worked. He clicked the clock over to internal stopwatch mode, cutting it off from outside influence. “This jamming is really messing with my micomm,” he whispered to himself.

  “You’ve got a micomm? I thought they didn’t work with EGs?” she whispered back to him.

  “New model, it even works with Arion.”

  “Really?”

  “Took three implants, but it took.”

  “So now what?”

  “Now we wait.”

  A few pulses later, the door to the room opened. Blazer recognized the old man who had led the charge to kidnap Jell at the Overlook Inn, from the surveillance video, but not the two younger men with him. “Gared Corva.”

  The man’s eyebrows raised and he nodded to Blazer. “You do know me then.”

  Blazer recognized the voice from the comm link and nodded. “I know you were in Kamden’s inner circle, one of the few who escaped. You’ve also been on the Confed’s most wanted list since Kamden died. It’s nice to meet you. I’ll get a medal for your capture.”

  Gared returned a crooked smile. “You are overconfident.”

  Blazer shook his head. “Overconfidence kills.”

  Gared nodded as three more men entered the room. One brought a chair for the old man to sit in as the other two went behind Blazer and Jell and hoisted them to their feet.

  Blazer looked down at the man once he was on his feet. “Curious position you put us in. I’m standing above you now.”

  Gared nodded. “But of course. You are Kamden’s ultimate success, albeit not the way she planned.”

  Blazer had heard of Kamden’s plan when she’d possessed Marda. He looked at his sister before turning back to Gared, betraying no emotion. “I’m not going to screw my sister.”

  Jell looked at the two of them, horror on her face. “Oh, you’re disgusting.”

  Gared smiled back at them. “There’s no need for the two of you to exchange fluids in such a crude manner. Though if you did so willingly, it would make things far easier. Artificial wombs are so hard to maintain after all, and of course we might not gain the benefits of your sister’s multiplier womb.”

  Jell stood there slack jawed. “You want us to breed? That is the most twisted thing ever.”

  Gared looked up at her with the eyes of a kind old grandfather about to school a child on the wrongness of its misconceptions. “Jell. Imagine how powerful your child would be if your brother fathered it. You two are the most powerful Energy Gatherers I have ever seen. Combine that with your multiplier’s womb, and just imagine the power it would have.”

  Jell stood silent and turned to Blazer. He remained stoic while she addressed Gared again. “I’ve not had any children. I may not have inherited my mother’s gift.”

  “Oh, we already know you have her gift. We’ve mapped your genes, pulled your file from the Confed database, and we know you are a Multiplier. Young Schan is also a carrier.”

  Blazer and Jell exchanged a look. “That database is locked. How’d you gain access?!”

  “We have an Electrolite there. They pulled your files annura ago.”

  These idiots, if people find out that they accessed the genome database without authorization it could cause a panic. It would affect not only Energy Gatherers but others with genetic specialties as well. “So, what then, collect my sperm and artificially inseminate her?”

  Gared smiled that crooked smile back at them and nodded his head at an odd angle. “It is a thought we had. We’ve also considered keeping her drugged to keep her from doing anything that might terminat
e the pregnancy, though we would prefer your cooperation.”

  An orb that Blazer didn’t recognize flitted into the room. The way Jell flinched told Blazer that she did. He regarded it as a curiosity when it zipped into his face. It felt a touch familiar, but at the same time a complete stranger. “Well, this obviously isn’t Kamden. Who is it?”

  In response, the same memories that had filled Jell’s mind during her kidnapping flooded his own. Along with the remembrances, it unlocked hidden pockets of knowledge Kamden had implanted in him over the annura.

  Blazer staggered back into the man behind him as the last memories took root. He panted from the exertion, unable to believe what had just happened. He couldn’t process it all, but then the tools Kamden implanted came to life, and he snapped back up. His brow furrowed, he looked about the room, and turned to Jell. “He showed you the same vision?”

  She nodded, visibly shaken by the memory.

  He turned toward Gared, then up at the orb. “You showed me more than you did her.”

  The orb twittered back at him.

  Blazer twisted his neck, popping it, and sighed before looking back at his sister. “I see now why Kamden joined them.”

  Jell stared back at him in horror. “You what?!”

  Blazer regarded his sister again. “They just gave you the chapter summaries. I got the whole story.”

  “Oh you have to be the biggest fool…”

  “No, you don’t understand, Jell. Kamden’s plan was wrong. She shouldn’t have been so quick to dismiss our mother. She should have checked her gene map before rejecting her as our father’s mate.” He looked back at Gared. “You have most of our followers gathered here, correct?”

  He nodded. “We have been without a real leader for some time now. The bloodline of Kamden Krain. That is the bloodline we should maintain.”

  “My sister will birth us true princes and princesses. We will have to monitor the development of our children in utero to ensure that our kinship does not bring complications.”

  “We have a geneticist ready to work with us, to prevent any unfortunate side effects of your breeding.”

  Jell made to step towards him, but the man behind her held her fast. “What did that orb do to you?”

  Blazer regarded her with a pitying kindness. “It showed me the truth, dear sister. It showed me just what place our kind holds in the galaxy. The Energy Gatherers, Electrolites in particular, are the most powerful genetic specialty there is. We could even manipulate the psionics, disrupting their telepathy and telekinesis with proper training and focus.”

  Jell stared back at Blazer in disbelief. Gared continued to smile. “Good, what would be your first order as our king?”

  “Obviously, to impregnate my sister here. Before that, however, I would have you bring the Medium to me as well.”

  Gared regarded him with a raised eyebrow.

  “Jell here is my sister, and I would gain no pleasure from coupling with her. I would keep the Medium as my concubine. She should prove able to breed other powerful Energy Gatherer children as well. As for Jell, we will simply impregnate her via artificial means for the most part.”

  Gared gave Jell a cruel smile, looking her up and down.

  Jell tried to twist out the grip of the man holding her, but he was too strong. “This is insane!”

  “I would also have you bring the Medium, so that she might free Kamden.”

  Gared jumped out of his chair. “What, how?”

  “She is the Medium who sealed her. She is the only one who knows how she did that, and therefore the only one who can free her. The sealing may have given her a link to Kamden’s orb and let her know where it is. I could use Kamden’s counsel.”

  The other orb twittered back at Blazer, protesting.

  “It is rare, but sealed orbs can be unsealed.”

  The orb flared at him in anger.

  “The Medium told me that she has seen it done before. She would not lie to the man she loves.”

  The orb continued to twitter back at him with a new fury.

  “Contain yourself. While I value your counsel as well, I have questions about my family that only the Medium can answer. Your memories of her are, shall we say, incomplete.”

  The orb continued to rage at him.

  “I’m sorry, Jell, but this is way it has to be.”

  He turned back to Gared.

  “You never answered my earlier question. How many of our followers are here?”

  “The whole of the Council and their attendants.”

  The memories the orb had imparted to Blazer had told him that five senior Electrolites made up the Council. They in turn disseminated the rule of the king or queen to the rest of their cells. Kamden had used Gared as her go-between with the Counsel, in life and even more so in death. She had even left him in charge while she molded and indoctrinated Blazer and Jell.

  “Is there unrest, since Kamden’s fate was revealed?”

  “Some, but now that you are here, you can bring them back in line.”

  “So, am I to rule from here?” he asked, looking about in disgust.

  “No, my king, but we must begin here. Soon you may rule from any throne you call upon.”

  Blazer continued to look about, making his irritation known through his posture and expression.

  Gared waved one of the men out. “While we do not have a throne for you, we do have your scepter.”

  Blazer just stood there regarding them all with a dispassionate eye.

  Jell continued to stare at him, a stare that screamed hatred at her brother.

  “Don’t worry, dear sister. You’ll be taken care of.”

  She glared back at him as the other man returned and handed a bundle to Gared. Blazer gave the bundle a curious look as his kidnaper unwrapped it. His eyes went wide when he recognized it—unmistakable thanks to the knowledge the orb had imparted to him.

  Jell looked at it with disdain. “It’s a gun, what kind of scepter is that?”

  “You know not of what you speak, sister.” Blazer turned back to the weapon. He had known that weapon his whole life, but had never seen one in person. An EGP-13 Energy Gatherer’s Pulse Pistol. Not just any Pulse Pistol, it’s Grandfather Aiden’s. I assumed it was lost or destroyed after his death.

  “You know what this is?” Gared asked. These pulse pistols were long out of production and even the newest was now centuries old.

  “I do. I have seen images of them, and thanks to the orb, I know exactly what this one is.”

  Gared handled it with loving care. “If we had queen Kamden’s, we would give you that. But the weapon of her husband will have to be enough.”

  Blazer stared at the weapon with unabashed longing. It looked far more utilitarian than Kamden’s, simpler in design, without the carved decorations and filigree save for the Vaughnt family crest on its side. Even Jell seemed to recognize it.

  Jell looked back at Blazer and then Gared. “What are you planning, old man?”

  Blazer looked back at her and then to the man behind her. “Gag her.”

  Jell’s eyes filled with rage as the man stuffed a gag in her mouth, tying it off behind her head.

  “I will hear no more of your protests this cycle, Jell.”

  Jell screamed at him through the gag, but nothing intelligible came out.

  Blazer turned back to Gared. “I would take my scepter,” he said and held up his hands to the man behind him. “Unbind me.”

  Gared exchanged a look with the orb, and it twittered back at him. It assured him that Blazer was theirs now. He could only recognize this weapon if the memories implanted had taken hold, and if the seeds of indoctrination Kamden had planted now controlled him.

  “You’re sure?” Gared asked it.

  It twittered again, and he turned to the man behind Blazer.

  “You heard your king. Unbind him!”

  Blazer stood still as he felt the knife first cut the ties around his ankles, then slip between his wrists to slice
through the plastic cuffs there.

  Blazer pulled his hands forward, massaged his wrists for a moment, and adjusted his stance before turning back to his sister. “Unbind her ankles as well. I would not see my queen fall on her face. Now!”

  The man behind Jell complied and unbound her ankles.

  “Leave her wrists bound.”

  Blazer turned back to Gared and the old man took a knee before him, holding up the weapon. “We are humbled to have the grandson of Kamden Krain to lead us now, to have him know our ways, and to lead us to our true future.

  “Thank you,” Blazer replied and picked up the weapon. He looked it over with a collector’s eye, examining every detail. He caressed the intake vents that pulled in surrounding air, air the weapon would compress, charge, and expel as a lethal round. They were simple and robust. The charging ports in the grip, into which he would discharge to activate the weapon, were humble in their simple elegance and design. It made them more efficient than the ones on Kamden’s pistol. Blazer could see ways to modify and improve it. There was no traditional trigger, just a discharge port, so that only an Energy Gatherer like him could use it.

  This was the preferred weapon of Energy Gatherer assassins in times of old. When tuned in the proper manner, it could tear through flesh or shatter the bones and internal organs of the target without leaving a mark on the skin. Their power was never enough to pierce a ship’s hull, though, which helped to make them practical in the early age of space warfare

  Blazer flipped it over in his hand and examined the other side. The Vaughnt name and crest stood out there, scribed into the side centuries before. He took the pistol by the grip and raised it, easing a slow discharge into it as the orb had instructed him, priming the weapon. The pistol whined in response. This was the first time it had held a charge in decades.

  Would this have been my father’s, if he hadn’t betrayed Kamden?

  Gared smiled. Blazer’s ability to use the weapon seemed proof that the indoctrination had taken hold. The usage of these weapons was a secret only the Electrolites maintained.

  Blazer twisted the weapon about and fired it at the wall. The blast was not at full power, but it was enough to crack the old wooden boards. Several men beyond yelped in surprise. He charged it again and fired at the opposite wall, boring a hole through the wood that allowed light from outside to seep in. He then turned back to Gared, who had a smile across his face.