The Imperialists: The Complete Trilogy

by H. T. Kofruk

  Rhee shifted uncomfortably. He was officially a citizen of the Pacific Federation and the Tri-Star Company, the Yinhexi’s largest conglomerate under his direction, was officially headquartered in Seoul. Although it was general knowledge that the large industrial families of the Pacific Federation did business with all the empires, if official evidence that he had supplied arms to the Chinese ever got out, not even his extensive connections with the Pacific government could save him. None of that really mattered anymore with the Pacific Federation virtually non-existent.

  “I hope that your journey was pleasant” said Rhee.

  “Yes. Jinjusung is always a quaint corner of the galaxy that I enjoy visiting.”

  Rhee had not expected the veiled threat. Jinjusung was a terraformed Pacific Federation planet with colonists from mostly Korean, Philippine and Vietnamese origin. It was where all the major decisions of the Tri-Star Company were made, the Seoul headquarters being merely a front. Government presence was very light, however, and Rhee and his family were considered the planet’s unofficial royal family. All of the Tri-Star Company’s technology had gone into making the planet and the rest of the system as secure as possible. The fact that a Shadow had come and gone without detection made him anxious. Bo was basically saying that he could come and kill him whenever he wanted.

  “So how can we help you, Mister Bo?” said Katsutoshi.

  The Shadow smiled through his thin lips. “I thought we could help each other.”

  Tang grunted a laugh, making his bulk jiggle. Rhee felt like strangling his fat, soft neck.

  “If anything is to mutual benefit, a businessman has the duty to explore” he said, attempting to neutralise any offence.

  “Really? I thought a businessman only thought about his own profit” said Bo. The assassin obviously looked down on businessmen.

  None of the three chairmen responded to this blatant insult but Rhee could hear his bodyguard shift menacingly. He was, of course, completely safe in the room; the Shadow was alone facing three highly trained bodyguards and various stunning devices were installed yet invisible. Rhee and his bodyguard had even each secretly swallowed anomine detox pills; if it came to it the deadly gas would fill the room in less than five seconds. But why did he still feel threatened? He still felt the assassin could somehow thwart all the defences with ease.

  The meeting only lasted fifteen minutes. The Shadow left the planet on his stealthy transporter. Rhee looked down at the face of Mister Kang. He had been dead for at least a few minutes but his right leg was still shaking as the hyper-vibrating blade was still lodged in his nervous system. The Celestial Guard of Chairman Tang was still breathing weakly but his eyes had already glazed over.

  Rhee let out a long breath. Tang was silently weeping while Katsutoshi was still immobile with fright. All three men had given their biometric and bacteria-code signature to the agreement proposed by the Shadow. Rhee wasn’t a patriot but he had never thought about betraying the Pacific completely. He started to gather his nerve. The fledgling United Terra movement had more military might than what was left of the Chinese government-in-exile, but since it didn’t forcefully reoccupy the lost colonies of the other dismembered empires, it didn’t have a constant flow of money. The galactic economy had collapsed after the fall of Earth to the invading aliens but the major Pacific industrial families still had enough money and resources to keep going for another couple years. The unannounced thought of all of the family heads was to keep low until either the Chinese Empire remnants or United Terra consolidated power enough to reinvade Earth and then provide a stable platform for reconstruction, commerce, consumption and trade to start again. If another intra-Renden war followed after that, so much the better for commerce.

  But each chairman had not only signed an agreement to provide arms, technology and supplies exclusively to the new Chinese Empress, but they each been forcefully injected a nano-serum containing millions of tiny mechanical cells. The Shadow had said that someone was close enough to each of them to activate the nano-bots. Rhee had no intention of testing whether he was telling the truth or not. He knew that the specific nano-bot had no means of deactivation; they had been designed and produced by his own company.

  Chapter 13: Doom

  ‘The role of Renden civilization will remain paramount for centuries to come, even if we renounce the colonisation of planets already inhabited by intelligent aliens. Wars will be fought among newly independent worlds, populations will explode with the transfer of Renden technology and Renden methods of warfare will be employed by our former colonial subject worlds. If we seek to completely disengage from other intelligent aliens, a galactic anarchy will prevail using our very methods of domineering. No, Rendens must remain engaged.’ - Terry Southend, , year 2917

  The Nikruk leader came only with a security detail of four. She disliked the calculating, devious look in his yellow eyes, a stark difference to the robotic, shallow eyes of his other kin. He was somewhat smaller than the others; she attributed that to his obvious youth. His tough armoured skin was pale brown with a broad shape of a purple leaf imprinted on his chest and abdomen.

  She came with twenty-two elite guards, each of them heavily armed. Despite the superior numbers, she couldn’t help feeling insecure after having witnessed what these strange beings were capable of. It had been a long time since she had experienced fear of any sort. She, one of the most decorated warriors of Carulio, felt weak and insufficient in front of these beings.

  “Please, Commander Zaram, sit” said the young alien as he gestured to a chair opposite to him. He spoke Upper Carulion with a flawless accent. This unnerved her even more. “It is nice to sit in something designed for beings our size. Not puny chairs and tables made for Rendens.”

  “You speak my language as if you were born with it” she remarked as she took her place.

  “Just one of the many gifts endowed to me by Mother. I can speak any language with barely a few hours of exposure.”

  “Mother must be an impressive Nikruk.”

  He made a rumbling sound as if to laugh. “Mother is not a Nikruk, Zaram. She is something much greater.”

  Speaking of their leader made her uncomfortable for some reason. She had had her doubts about cooperating with this new race that was threatening the Renden hegemony in the known galaxy. After seeing them in action against the Tzak, her doubts were amplified even further if anything. She had voiced her opinion to the Council of Broulio, the Carulion governing body, but the Elders had ordered her to stand down.

  “Have our blueprints satisfied your leadership?” she said deciding to change the subject.

  “They have satisfied me. I am synthesizing the data through Mother’s neural network as we speak.”

  “And you are sure that you don’t need a sample weapon, Shran?”

  He made the annoying rumbling sound again. “My name is Shi’ran. And yes, I am sure that no sample is necessary.”

  She changed the pigment colour of her giant right claw to show amusement. “This is technology that we have taken centuries to perfect, Shi’ran. Each weapon is created painstakingly by a master craftsman. I am sure that processing the blueprints and making the weapon will be two very different challenges.”

  This was one of the assurances given by the Council of Broulio on passing on the much coveted Death Beam technology to the Nikruk after decades of refusing it to the Rendens. They were sure that the primitive Nikruk would not be able to understand much less recreate the know-how behind it.

  “That is where you are wrong” said Shi’ran. “One reason why you will never rival the Rendens, even if you had wormhole technology, is your manufacturing philosophy. Large scale manufacturing is a skill that the Rendens have perfected through centuries of trial and error. Even with your impressive technology, you depend on artisanal workers to create each machine and weapon, a phase from which the Rendens graduated more than a thousand years ago.”

  Zaram was not impressed. “O
ur weaponry masters are second to none.”

  “Yet you treat them with contempt. Only the males of your race have the dexterous hands to craft weapons. Rendens have long given the utmost respect to manufacturers.”

  “Warriors win wars, not crafters. Good strategic planning and minute tactical details win battles, not blacksmiths” she rebuked.

  He didn’t immediately answer but sat studying her. “I have studied many wars, Zaram. To put it in as simple terms as possible, let’s say there are two peoples, one with a dominant warrior class like you Carulions or the Tzak, and another with just a regular army but a strong industrial base. Assuming similar populations and technology, in nine out of ten cases, the warrior people will gain an early upper hand against their industrious enemy, but the finality will almost always be different. If one party can build three warships while the can only manage one, three arrowheads to one, the advantage will gradually go to the more industrialised people.”

  “Are you suggesting that we let males on the Council of Broulio?”

  Again the rumbling. “I am making no suggestion at all. All I am saying is that though you like to think that your weaker position against the Rendens is purely due to your lack of wormhole technology and fewer numbers, it is in fact the enormous industrial gap that will probably never be filled.”

  “And what about you? You have access to Renden weapons, Renden technology and now some of our technology. But how do you intend to implement this supposed knowledge in manufacturing?”

  He leaned closer as if to tell a secret. “That’s where Mother comes in. The Rendens may be very technologically advanced but the way they treat data is…primitive. Mother has found the ability to scoop up their data and convert it into useful knowledge in a way that Rendens could only dream of. In all honesty, even I can’t really explain how she does it. Perhaps we can attribute this to the fact that she and I actually come from two different species.”

  Zaram was intrigued by what the alien was saying. Was this Mother a completely separate, almost god-like entity?

  "What will happen to the Tzak?" she asked. For some reason, she felt the world would be empty without their ancient enemy, like removing a tumour that one learns to love.

  "Do you feel anxious about their extermination?" he answered with a touch of irony in his voice.

  "I rejoice the extermination of such a vile race."

  The alien continued his ironic tone. "But the extermination of a race that you have failed to defeat for a thousand years also makes you wonder about your own fate. How will your proud people fare in a universe without them? Your rivalry has become your identity, a part of your innate culture. Without them, the universe is full of uncertainty. You rejoice but yet a part of you wishes that you could go back to the predictable fighting."

  Zaram's giant right claw started to glow blue with anger without her even realizing. She suddenly got an urge to kill the young alien. "We are afraid of nothing" she said somewhat unconvincingly.

  "And you shouldn't be. You have aligned yourselves with the most powerful race in the known galaxy. The future masters of the stars if you will."

  "Align? Only for momentary convenience."

  "Mother will remember those who swear allegiance early on. And a people with such obvious technological and martial abilities as yours will certainly be of use."

  She could feel her temperature rising. Her salty blood started to bubble. "Carulio will forever be independent. We will never swear allegiance to your godling, or to the Rendens."

  He opened his palm to show a small device. The Carulion warriors in the room all pointed their plasma staffs at him. He remained calm and made an expression that she translated as amused. She was surprised that no one fired when a bright holograph lit up the room.

  "You probably know what is happening on Tzakbhat. I just wanted to remind you" he said.

  The device capturing the holograph looked as if it was mounted on the shoulder of one of the Nikruk monsters. It moved through bands of Tzak warrior-priests as if they were children, decapitating one here, piercing a torso there. Splashes of pink Tzak blood covered the golden sands. The monster seemed to be attracted to a distressed mewling. The culprit was a tiny Tzak pup, confused and disoriented by the carnage. The child had probably arrived only days earlier to the malhatabhat, a collective school run by the priests to nurture warriors. The monster's giant hands lifted the small pup who instinctively attempted to bite with its already sharp teeth.

  The giant hands enclosed the tiny biting head and squashed it as if it was a soft fruit.

  When the holograph ended, Zaram looked at the young alien in front of her with all the pigments on her claw and her face bright blue with anger. "Are you threatening us?"

  "I am trying to convince you. Carrots and sticks, as the old Renden expression goes."

  "You are boring me, young one. I don't know how many moons you have seen but it seems too few. Do you see all these plasma staffs aimed at you? One of the principles behind negotiation is to never engage from a position of weakness."

  "I think I know that principle better than you expect. And we are not really negotiating. I am giving you a choice."

  The movement of the four Nikruk warriors was too fast for her. All she felt was a violent gust of wind and a split-second shade from the light. She turned her head around only after the first plasma staff went off creating a large crater in the reinforced ceiling.

  The four killers were almost invisible as they ripped heads, throats and limbs from the two dozen blue-armoured guards.

  A small plasma weapon protruded from her large right claw and she pointed it at the young one in front of her. But as soon as she aimed it at his grinning face, he disappeared in a flash only to appear on top of her. Her heavy chair fell back from the sudden weight and she found herself looking up at his yellow eyes. She tried to move her right arm but it seemed that he was restraining it with incredible strength. A sickening snapping sound and a sharp, agonizing sensation let her know that he had broken it. She didn't make a sound, however, and instead lifted her other arm as a poisoned blade slid out of her armoured sleeve. He caught the arm only when the blade was a mere inches away from his eye.

  "Well, from a position of strength. How about a new round of negotiations? Will you and your pitiful race swear allegiance to Mother and agree to a far smaller army and arsenal of weapons, or will you meet the same fate as your less treacherous rivals?"

  The pain in her right arm made her gasp for breath as she spoke. "Go to hell, you freak of the devil."

  The poisoned blade still attached to her forearm slid slowly into her eye. With every millimetre, she screamed louder.

  Chapter 14: Misguidance

  ‘My endeavors to save and, ultimately, change humanity through philosophical thought, and my subsequent choice to put down my arms…deep down I know these were all choice I made for her memory.’ – Terry Southend, personal memoir, year 2915

  Sweat poured down her body as she used her own weight to strengthen her sinewy shoulder muscles. A small pool had already accumulated on the ground below her elevated forehead and droplets continued to make the shiny patch ever larger. Exercising was practically the only way to pass the time permitted to her after having been thrown into the jail cell.

  For Heera, being separated from Bin'ja was much more painful than she had ever thought possible. She had learnt of the dire situation of Earth by listening to snippets of conversation between prison guards; dozens of formerly Chinese and Orthodox warships, now under Nikruk control, prevented United Terra from attempting to rescue Renden survivors. Not only that, powerful remnants of the Chinese Empire had taken refuge on Diqiu Two, the capital of their outer-space territory. It seemed that Princess Han Wei, cousin of the deceased Emperor Han and General Han Fann of United Terra, had taken control of the Imperial Family.

  In these unsure times, a captured Nikruk seemed to be an important breakthrough despite her explanations about how he differed from his bio-engin
eered brothers. Bin'ja had remained inexplicably silent and docile as they led him away at gunpoint. She was convinced that he was the key to defeating the corrupted 'Mother' but they would not listen. It was impossible to get any information about how he was being treated even though she never neglected to pose the question whenever and to whomever she could.

  She sat exhausted on a bio-plastic chair, the only piece of furniture in her cell apart from the hard bed. Half a dozen other cells were visible through the fibre-crystal glass wall, four of them occupied. The man in the cell opposite from hers had been a petty smuggler with a history of violence and sexual assault and he reminded her each day about it. She had learned to ignore his stares when she exercised, even when he went as far as to touch himself repeatedly. The prison guard, a huge Maori with a face full of wavy tattoos, only threatened him if he started to expose himself.

  She stared back at him with a bemused expression when he stuck out his tongue obscenely at her while his hands made suggestive movements in his prison trousers. Given her experiences of the past four years, she considered the pathetic man nothing to get anxious about. She had pictured herself over and over again kicking him in the crotch and then breaking his arm before smashing his teeth into dust.

  “Doctor Kim?” said a woman who had materialized in front of her cell at some point.

  “Who’s asking?” said Heera.

  “Major Geraldine Schmitt, ma’am.”

  The woman had a pale face with light brown hair tied tightly into a bun. Her expression was cold and professional.

  “What do you want?” she asked bluntly.

  “I’ve been ordered to escort you to the Jibaru wormhole station.”

  Heera smirked. “A major to escort me? Should I be flattered?”

  “My team is responsible for both you and your friend.”

  Two other soldiers in full battle armour accompanied the two women before meeting up with four more who were leading Bin’ja. On seeing her friend and the way he was bound in improvised titanium and graphoid strips, Heera almost rushed to release him. Thick bars of metal were tied to his legs, presumably to stop him from running or jumping but they made his walking painstakingly awkward. She was so outraged at how he was being treated that she clenched her fist and only just managed to keep herself from punching the woman in her revealed face.