Raksamat said. His words were like a gravity bind around her. In desperation, she brought up her leverage over him.
There was a sense of defeat in Raksamat's thought.
Chapter 32
FELIK
The hum of the ship's Alcubierre drive ran steadily in Felik's head. With his nexus back online, he could choose to ride out this trip in a Meme Wars sim. Instead, he tried to let his thoughts absolve him of his uncertainties.
On the upside, he was fairly certain Oberon hadn't implanted a psionic tracker to read his thoughts. Minerva would've alerted him otherwise. So he could think freely.
According to the news indices, Oberon and the Watchers were placing a large part of the blame for the Wraith destruction on the Lumerians. Megas's supporters were skeptical, but the evidence was there. The Lumerians had yet to respond, but Felik didn't see how it could go well. Accusing another Type IV species of a New Terran war crime was asking for trouble. Because if the Lumerians were, indeed, guilty, what did Oberon expect to happen? War?
And now he'd taken his own major risk. He'd struck a deal with Oberon, even accepted a breaker. If Oberon really wanted, he could keep him as his subordinate indefinitely. At least until we determine who's to blame for our progenitor's death, his brother had said. For Felik that meant until he completed his mission for the Guardian Templar. Then he'd have his karma bits and a virus-free head. The freedom he'd craved for so long now.
Success on this mission would put him one step closer.
"Your wormhole is ready, Captain," Ilder said.
"Take us through," Felik said.
A massive hole tore the space in front of them apart, revealing a new star system. The Nassatar cruised forward and a minute later the portal closed behind them.
"That's weird," Minerva said.
"Huh?"
"We're about ten million klicks from a planetary body."
"Is this some game by Megas?" Felik wondered aloud. "Figures he'd shaft us on that."
"I wouldn't recommend making statements like that," Minerva said.
A series of blurry ovals formed as holodisplays above the command sphere.
"Sixty-one unidentified ships detected on said planetary body," Ilder snapped.
"Shit. Warp us out of here," Felik said. They'd flown directly into an ambush.
Slowly, the blurry ovals were solidifying, tiny details appearing. Mostly corvette ships.
"Wait," Minerva said. "They're emitting a distress signal."
"Doesn't make them our allies," Juliard interjected.
"No one said they had to be. That doesn't mean they don't deserve our help," Felik said, parsing their data. "Their drives are all screwed up. They can't even warp. And their godwebs aren't working."
"I've seen this trick before," Juliard warned.
They belonged to the Saganerio network, which raised some serious questions. What were they doing so badly damaged in their own territory?
"Then it must not have been too bad," Felik said. "You survived."
"And you just survived an attempt to frame you. This doesn't seem suspicious?" she said irritably.
"She's right," Minerva said. "Handling this the wrong way could cause more legal fallout for us."
His curiosity got the better of him. What he couldn't tell them was that he still planned on discovering the truth about the StarMaster's death. Something told him this fleet might carry answers. Besides, helping them was the right thing to do. Where would he have been if his uncle hadn't rescued him?
"What's the point of having this ship if I'm too scared to use it for good?" he said, eyeing Minerva, Ilder, and Juliard. "That's a rhetorical question, by the way. Ilder, warp us to the planet's orbit. Let's see if we can help them get their drives working again. Minerva, compile a diplomatically neutral message that we're going to offer aid and send it. If this is a trick to frame us, we want to look as much like heroes as possible. And make sure we follow all the rules."
Within a minute, they were orbiting the unnamed planet that was hosting the sixty-one Saganerio corvette-class vessels. Felik was mulling the response from their fleet leader, a Henshi named Solaris.
Yet Solaris refused to join Felik's construct on the basis that he could not trust him. Instead, he invited him over to his own. But the Henshi wouldn't allow Minerva to monitor it as he didn't know where she came from.
The alien sapient was paranoid. Something must've terrified him. Or he was being smart. More likely, it was a little of both.
Felik gave a long sigh. Different neural viruses spread different ways. Joining a stranger's construct was one way.
Letting Minerva check it, he messaged them again.
"It sounds like they're afraid of him," Felik said, wondering in the back of his mind how they knew what he'd come for.
"Kind of makes you wish somebody hadn't gotten us to accept this mission from Oberon, huh?" Juliard said.
Oberon had told him Megas requested a secret meeting. Felik would serve as the former's representative—he was still technically the quadrant's Envoy. Running into this damaged fleet couldn't be a coincidence. "I'm going in. Juliard, if anything goes wrong, I'll trust you know what to do."
As Minerva and Juliard voiced their concern, his mind was whisked away to Solaris's digital construct.
A whirling vortex of rain and mist formed around him. Below him, under several feet of water, brown meter-long worms with razor-edged teeth slithered through sand, hunting for a meal. His nexus told him the entire planet suffered an eternal storm. Some local days were worse than others. Among the haze, his sensors picked up the giant roaming forms of elephant-like beasts. The planet's primitive, albeit huge organic life.
The giant oval form of a Henshi appeared hovering a foot above the water's surface.
"Thank you for taking my request," Solaris said with a heavy accent. At his words, the torrent of rain grew almost silent. This being only a psionic reconstruction of the planet, the normal rules of physics didn't apply.
Felik hadn't configured the construct to automate translations. Meaning he should've required a nexus translator to understand Solaris. Oddly, his nexus translator hadn't kicked in. "You speak Basic?"
"Within the Saganerio network, there are many incentives to learn it." Solaris's voice was deep and sounded like every word was a battle to make. More than likely that was due to the constraints of his frame's vocal cords, not some emotional issue.
"Then listen closely, no lies, no tricks. I want the truth when I ask you questions or else your fleet is on its own."
"We are in agreement. I'm not worried about our safety. I only want to share the truth."
"Yeah everyone wants to spread their truth. I'll decide what I want you to tell me." Most likely Solaris had an understanding that Felik indulged scholar realm rumors more than most. He wasn't about to get taken advantage of, sucked in by some lies. "How did you know I would be here?"
"That shouldn't be hard to figure out—"
"Just answer."
"We heard it from Megas. He doesn't know how to filter what he says." Yeah, that made sense. It also worried Felik because this was supposed to be a secret operation. If this fleet knew, who else in the Saganerio network kne
w? And how would they react?
"What order are you in the network?"
"Seventh order." Significant, but not critical to the network's operation. Felik glanced at two fifty-foot tall beasts locking horns within the maelstrom, their deep groans echoing for miles around.
"What happened to your ships?"
"Other members of our network attacked us."
"Just out of the blue?" A creeping sense of apprehension rose up Felik's back.
"We were running. Not all members believed in Megas's immutability when it comes to criticism. My fleet was among the more skeptical. We were determined to ensure that he was not involved in Arteyos's death in any way as the Watchers network indicates." He was referring to media streams that suggested Megas had murdered his father. Of course, Oberon's consort owned most of these streams. "Instead, we discovered that he isn't what we thought. Megas Ullon is—"
Solaris's body flickered for a nanosecond before his body disintegrated into nothing.
At the same time, the construct ended, and a notification from Ilder popped up.
As he registered that information back on the Nassatar's command sphere, the horrifying afterimage of Solaris disintegrating remained.
"What happened to their ships?" he asked, still in shock.
"Megas finished what he started," Juliard said. He checked. Sure enough, the nameless planet had been cleansed of the damaged vessels.
A chat invite rested in Felik's feed from Megas. "Let me join you on this one," Minerva said.
"Yeah, I think so."
Seconds later, Felik was standing on cracked, yellow crust, among giant webbed mushrooms and jagged rock arches that spanned thousands of feet. A massive, dark shape formed behind the swirl of purple clouds overhead.
"Sorry you had to see that. But I wanted to show you that I can present myself neutrally," Megas said, looming over him and extending a plated hand. Except for his head, a neon green and gold adamantine battle armor accentuated his form, his arms, shoulders, chest, and legs all four or five times more massive than on a standard living frame. Probably a variation of the juggernaut-class combat frame.
Felik let him engulf his hand. For a split second he felt like a black hole was tugging at him. And then Megas freed him and looked up. "That's an enormous one."
Out of the clouds, an asteroid plowed directly toward the surface of the moon. It would've crashed already, but gravity disruptors were slowing it down just enough. Electricity burst spontaneously from Megas's armor, his face hardened in focus. Felik stepped back, a hint of trepidation gnawing at him. Ilder was ready to warp him away if anything went wrong, and his godweb was running, but still.
Then a furious plasma beam exploded from Megas's hand to meet the asteroid dead-on. Rock and debris flew in all directions as antimatter particles riding in the plasma energy eroded the asteroid. For miles all around them the fragments battered the surface, throwing up dust and ash.
A tag appeared in the sky, updating Megas's score. A new record.
Felik swallowed. "Excuse me. I'm not sure what you mean, presenting yourself neutrally?"
"It's true that Solaris's fleet discovered one of my dirty little secrets. And I took their lives for it. Legally, of course."
"Legally?"
"Sometimes sapients learn shocking news and they go berserk. They have to be dealt with. That's what everyone hears, anyway." Megas winked, and Felik knew that Solaris had never really attacked him. Like his brother, Megas was willing to frame innocents to get his way.
"In the spirit of objectivity, I wanted to show you that I can be just as dangerous as I'm accused of."
"Well, you've accomplished that," Felik said, the image of Solaris's death once more in his mind's eye. Was this what the megalomaniac had requested to speak with him for? No, that couldn't be the only reason.
"I hope that we can accomplish more together," Megas said. "We are family, after all. Oh, hold on."
Megas blasted another asteroid out of the sky. Felik had never understood people's obsession with master blaster. Starkeepers and those who could afford this game all seemed to love it, though. It was the thrill, he figured. How close were you willing to let the asteroid come? Even though no one ever lost a living frame—the asteroids were programmed to phase out at the last minute if the plasma beams weren't enough—blowing up an incoming asteroid still felt deeply satisfying. Even if that, too, was something artificially launched in.
"Do you know why you got the Nassatar?"
That piqued his interest. He might finally learn something tangible about his father's death. "Enlighten me."
"Our father thought very highly of you. And I always work with the best."
Felik didn't agree with that last part, but he wanted to believe the first was true. He couldn't disprove the possibility.
"The efficiency of your ships is well known," he said, feeling like he was mocking him. Because it was well known that Megas skimped on expensive features in his fleet. He used low-grade utility fog, low-grade fuel cells, and ran few quality tests. Yet they got the job done.
"It is," Megas laughed, relishing the compliment. "You ever hear what happened with Zurvek? That idiot thought he had a hope of becoming the next StarMaster. Challenged me to a fleet battle. I accepted and he surrendered immediately."
Felik frowned. He'd heard it a little differently. He shoved the discrepancy out of his mind. "Slower than light, you called him."
"That's right," Megas winked. "You know what the sapients of my network call me?"
Talking with his brother put him strangely at ease. He was practically asking to be manipulated.
"I've heard a few terms thrown around," Felik said.
"Yeah, what's your favorite?"
"Unfortunately, they're not my titles, so I can't say they're my favorites. But I know they call you a fourth dimensional being."
"Right you are. There's another that I prefer. The Cosmic Emperor has a nice ring to it. Our brother might not think so, but he's always been a snake. The Anunnaki evolved from a snake creature actually." Megas unfurled one of his oversized fists, revealing a data node. At least, Felik thought that's what it was. But his nexus didn't recognize it.
Shoulders rising slightly, he asked, "What is it?"
"I understand that Oberon has you linked to a breaker. There are ways to de-link without dying."
"Who says I want to de-link?"
"You've heard the rumors. Doesn't it make you wonder?"
"Wondering doesn't mean I'd betray him."
"Do yourself a favor. Ask that XO of yours about Arteyos. Then we'll see if you stay loyal to Oberon."
"And if I don't, I'm supposed to use this?" Felik asked skeptically. "You're giving it to me?"
"The media loves to put words in my mouth. You're not the media. The Saganerio network is running its own investigation on our father's death. We'd love to have your help."
"What would you like me to tell our brother?"
"Oh, don't worry about that. We have a little bet going, that's all."
"A bet?"
"About whether you'll stick with him or join me."
Chapter 33
KAI
Hundreds of feet below, the waves of a vast ocean washed against the rocky shore. In the teal gray light of Burkos's dusk, the sea looked serene enough to dive into. Sometimes nature made you wish for a perspective booster. Sometimes it was beautiful.
Kai broke into laughter as she turned away from the sea and strode into the curly yellow and brown grass that blanketed most of the plateau.
Raksamat did
not seem to notice.
In front of them, dozens and dozens of white, reflective cubes made up Station 98-A(*E5-]^3L. There was no easy way to say the name, but the species that designed the station didn't speak in words. Each cube was perfectly smooth on the flat sides and rounded along the edges. They ranged in size from barely larger than a Terran to several dozen meters across. Most floated at least ten feet above a metallic grid running over the surface of the plateau. A few cubes rested directly upon it.
The "station," the only one here in Zone 2080, gave off a sterile vibe. Kai wondered if they would be welcome. No one was protesting, so she assumed the three of them were safe walking here.
There were no signs of Station 98-A(*E5-]^3L's inhabitants, but a few of the cubes slid around randomly or gradually shifted their vertical positions over the plateau. And they each hummed. That was to be expected. According to Sarvill, they spent their entire lives within their respective cubes. They found no joy in exposure to the planet's natural elements, and they communicated digitally.
Raksamat gave her a long stare.
She planted her hands on her hips.
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