Lost Valor

by Kal Spriggs

  “He’s playing the quiet game, that’s nice,” Wessek sat back, giving a slight smirk, dropping his knife and fork on his plate. He saw my eyes go to his plate and his smirk grew broad. “You’re hungry, kid, aren’t you? Been a couple weeks with no solid food... and this stuff, it’s good. Real meat, not some vat-grown stuff. Potatoes and what’s this other stuff?” He looked over at the pirate who’d brought the plate.

  “Steamed carrots and asparagus,” the pirate answered.

  “Yeah, I don’t like that crap,” Wessek waved a hand, “but the rest of it, man it hits the spot. Way better than that gruel we feed our slaves, isn’t it Vars?”

  “Much,” Vars hadn’t touched his food. He was still staring at me.

  My gaze went from Wessek to Vars and back to the plate. I lunged across the table, grabbing the knife and drawing it back to stab.

  I didn’t know what hit me. Agony ran through my body and my muscles all tensed up. I fell face first into the metal table, my forehead bouncing off the surface as my arms and legs twitched. I hurt all over, but the agony seemed to come from the back of my head.

  “I saw that coming,” Wessek laughed. “Good job, Vars.”

  I heard him get up, his plastic chair squeaking as he pushed back from the table. “Get him off the table, will you Vars?”

  Vars kicked my shoulder and I rolled off the table, my legs and arms still limp. Hitting the floor hurt and my head bounced off the deck.

  “Get him up, get him up,” Wessek commanded. A pair of pirates caught me by the shoulders and lifted me between them. Vars caught me by the back of the head, pulling at my hair to lift my face to look at his father.

  Wessek smirked at me, “You think I’m stupid, kid? Do you?” He shook his head, “You’re implanted, Will. Slave implant, right in the spinal column. You do anything I don’t like, and Vars or any one of my boys can zap you.” He snapped his fingers, “Like that.”

  “I was prepared to make this easy for you, Will, I really was. You translate the code, you make your parents’ notes readable and I give you better food, maybe better living arrangements. You could have enjoyed things a bit.” Wessek shook his head. “Now, though, kid, you got to see how bad it can be.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t know anything, dad,” Vars spoke up, “maybe we should just dump him out an airlock.” I went cold as I realized that Vars was just as happy to dump me into vacuum and kill me as to keep me alive.

  “He knows something,” Wessek shook his head, his dark eyes meeting mine. “I can see it in his eyes, Vars. He’s a smart kid, we got his records. But there’s no free rides, here, kid. You translate your parents’ notes or I let Vars have you.”

  Vars let go of my hair and, without being in control of my body, my head dropped forward. I could hear the pair of pirates laugh at me. I was going to kill them. I was going to kill all of them.

  Wessek squatted in front of me, so I could see him as he spoke. “I didn’t want this, Will. I didn’t want to kill your parents. I wanted them alive. I wanted your whole family alive. But they fought. Like you tried to fight. And they died. They died because they fought me and if you’re not careful, you will, too.” Wessek stared at me, as if trying to see if his words had the desired effect. All I could think was that I wanted to take everything away from him, just as he’d took everything away from me.

  Wessek sighed, “Take him away, Vars. Put him back in with young Ted, maybe the boy will talk some sense into him.”

  As they dragged me away, I realized that it had been a test. A trap. I’d fallen for it. Next time, though, I would have to be smarter. Faster. I was going to kill Wessek, Vars, and all the other pirates. I was going to take everything away from them, just as they’d taken everything away from me.

  ***

  Chapter 3: Just When I Was Starting To Settle In

  I soon learned the pattern of my days. Sometime in the morning, a pirate would bring a couple bowls of gruel and two cups of water. Not long after that, someone would take Ted and he’d go work for several hours, leaving me alone in our cell.

  I assumed it was sometime in the afternoon, several hours later, when Vars or one of several other pirates would collect me and bring me out to sit while Wessek would enjoy a meal while asking me questions. Sometimes those questions started out mundane. What shows did I like, what classes was I good at, what my skills were... and then he would shift over to my parents’ work. It was hard to stay focused, hard to keep my mouth shut, particularly when Wessek or Vars would talk about this detail or that, especially when I knew they were wrong.

  The worst part was the food. I was hungry. The single bowl of gruel left my stomach growling by the afternoon. Every day they had something different. Pasta. Steaks. Roasts. Fish. Stuff I’d never even heard of or seen before, all of it smelling too good to imagine. Wessek would eat a little off his plate, always leaving it just out of my reach. Vars wouldn’t even touch his plate.

  When I wouldn’t say anything after a stream of questions, Wessek would have one of his pirates bring me back to my cell. Usually they brought Ted back sometime later. He and I would talk some, and then we’d lapse into sleep or at least, he or I would pretend to sleep, lying on the cold metal floor of our cells.

  I asked Ted about the meals, at one point. He just shook his head when I told him about it. “They never offered me better food,” he admitted. “I guess they really want what you know.”

  I started counting days based off meals. I started dreaming about food in ways I’d never thought possible. I woke up drooling, curled up around my empty stomach. Things began to feel foggy, a blur of the same thing, day after day after day.

  It was the chocolate cake where I slipped up. Wessek was toying with his fork, stabbing it into his cake as he talked, then leaving it there and gesturing with his hands. I wasn’t even consciously listening, I was just staring at that cake, my mouth filling with saliva. “...quicksilver material, like they had implanted in his sister.”

  “Wait,” I blinked, “Jiden had quicksilver in her?” I asked.

  Wessek smiled and his gaze went between Vars and me, “See, Vars, he does know something.”

  I realized that I should have kept my mouth shut. But Wessek didn’t push, didn’t question, he just sat back, staring at me. I clamped my lips shut, not meeting his dark eyes. Instead I looked down at the table. It didn't matter, I could still feel those eyes boring into me.

  Wessek leaned forward and slid the plate with cake a little bit towards me. Not much, maybe a couple of centimeters. “All you need to do, kid, is tell me what you know about quicksilver.”

  “I’m not going to help you,” I snapped.

  “Wrong answer, kid,” Wessek sighed. “Vars, take him back to his cell.”

  Wessek’s son rose from his chair and came around the table, grabbing me by one arm and lifting me to my feet. Wessek took the fork and took a big bite of chocolate cake. “Man, this tastes good...”

  As Vars walked me back to my cell, I sized him up. I was actually a bit taller than him, but he had more muscle and he held my arm with a grip like a metal vise. Even if he wasn’t stronger than me, there was the slave implant. I didn’t know where he had the controller, didn’t know if he controlled it with an implant of his own or if it was a physical controller. Either way, he could use that to lock me up and then it didn’t matter who was taller, bigger, or stronger. I’d be unable to fight back.

  Vars shoved me into my cell and I sat in the corner, wondering what I should do.

  Ted arrived not long later, his eyes sunken and his expression even paler than usual. He barely waited for the door to close before he hurried over to me, squatting next to me, “What did you do?” He hissed.

  “I didn’t do anything,” I protested.

  “Well, I overheard Wessek and Vars talking when they brought me back from the offices,” Ted whispered. “Vars was saying they should just kill you, that you’re not going to give them anything.”

  I grimaced, “Good thing
it’s not up to Vars, then right?”

  “But Wessek, he said that he was going to give it a couple more days, until they make orbit. He said if you didn’t agree to help, didn’t tell them what they wanted to know, then they’d dump you.” Ted whispered the last in a breathless voice.

  I understood that entirely, since I had the feeling they meant drop me in empty space rather than at a habitable planet of choice.

  The timing was a bit too convenient. It reminded me of the time my parents had got me to do my chores by having Jiden tell me that she’d overheard them talking about punishing me. I’d been eight at the time. I wasn’t a child anymore... and Wessek wasn’t my father.

  I shot a glance at Ted, wondering for a moment if he was in on this, as Jiden had been with my parents. What better angle to play than to have him pretend to be my friend, to learn every secret he could from me? They might even offer him a bit better treatment or more food and he might go for it. At this point, I figured it didn’t matter, either way. Either Ted was being honest with me or he was working for our captors. Regardless, it didn’t matter right now.

  At the same time, I realized they had given me some more information. We were making orbit, soon, probably at Wessek’s base of operations. Wessek had some kind of time crunch, some deadline that he needed me for... or at least, needed me cooperating by that point. That meant either he answered to someone or else he wanted to sell the information from my parents’ research within a relatively short period of time.

  I had to assume my value to him went to near zero after that. He wouldn’t want any witnesses to the things he’d done. He might sell me into slavery or kill me. Both results were far from ideal. Translating my parents’ notes wouldn’t change that. If he had the information, again, I would be dangerous to him alive and free.

  Maybe if I piecemeal information to him... I didn’t want him to have my parents’ research. In fact, it gave me quite a bit of satisfaction that my dad and mom continued to spite the pirate who’d killed them from beyond the grave. But if I gave him scraps of information, if I played him along...

  That might give me time. Time to plan an escape. Time to take my revenge. I needed one chance, one opportunity, and maybe giving Wessek some of what he wanted would give me that opportunity.

  The hard part was guessing how much he knew and what information he was after. He’d already mentioned quicksilver. I knew my parents were working on an alien smart material, a substance they’d called Armstrong-Nadami Quicksilver. It looked like metal and they’d found remnants of it in their excavations, but when subjected to current, it could flow like liquid and it could even form conductors and semiconductors, acting like a circuit. I had no idea why anyone would have implanted that into Jiden, whether it was my parents or something with the Academy. Either way, it didn’t matter. My sister was dead and so was my parents... and if it was a choice between their knowledge dying with them and the pirate who’d killed them getting it, I knew which option that I would prefer.

  But I needed to know everything, myself. For one thing, that might give me some advantage, some knowledge that could help me escape. For another, if I knew everything about my parents’ research, I could figure out what Wessek was after and prevent him from getting that... or maybe even feed him fake information. I wasn’t sure whether that would work or not, but it was an idea to keep in mind.

  I looked at Ted, “I’m going to need your help.”

  “Me?” Ted asked in surprise. “I’m just an accountant... I don’t even have a degree or anything, just training.”

  “You know numbers. Some of what my parents did was based off number puzzles,” I said. Whether or not Ted had some kind of deal with Wessek, I had to assume anything I told him would get back to the pirate. Even if he isn’t, the room could be bugged. “You know how to organize stuff, you’re smart, you can help me.”

  “What happened to escape?” Ted whispered.

  I closed my eyes. “I promised you I’d get you out of here, Ted. Maybe this is the way to do that.” I hoped, really hoped, that Ted was honest with me. More than anything, I needed someone I could trust right now.

  “I’ll do what I can,” Ted inched away and leaned against the wall next to me. He gave me a fragile smile, “This will be okay, won’t it, Will?”

  “Yeah,” I answered, feeling like a liar, “yeah, everything is going to work out, just fine.”

  ***

  “I’ll do it,” I said as I sat down at the table across from Wessek, “but I need some things.”

  Wessek smirked at Vars, “He needs some things. He’s making demands now... how cute.”

  Vars just glared at me.

  “I need a datapad, probably a computer, too,” I went on. “Better food, better conditions.” I gestured over my shoulder at the cells. “I need to be able to sleep, to eat, to focus. I’ll need Ted’s help, too.”

  “What do you want the squint for?” Vars demanded. I think it was the first time he’d spoken to me, instead of just responding to his father.

  “I’m going to need someone smart to help me,” I answered. I swallowed, then, as I gave them the first bit of real information, “My parents used a complex code to protect their research. They used inside jokes, family references, and math puzzles to hide their handwritten notes and they kept their research notes encrypted. My dad liked puzzles and they had a couple of their research papers stolen, so they kept everything as secret as possible.”

  “Stolen research papers,” Wessek chuckled. “I’m sure that was a big thing for them...”

  “They had grants worth millions of Century Dollars,” I snapped. “Other archeologists were trying to get access to the site and to push my parents out.” I wasn't really sure about that, but my dad and mom had both been super secretive after having some of their research stolen by a guest professor.

  Vars grinned, “I bet you wish they had, now, eh?”

  I clenched my hands into fists under the table. It was all I could do not to leap over it and attack him. I knew it wouldn’t help. He’d trigger my implant and I’d go back to my cell. Maybe Wessek would have Vars beat me, like he’d had him beat Ted, before.

  “Okay, kid, that makes sense,” Wessek ignored my glare at his son, sitting back and staring at me. “I can’t do much about the conditions of your cell, not right now. I can give you better food, though. But I need something, something to show me you’re not making things up, spinning a story.”

  “Quicksilver was a smart material my parents discovered at the dig site,” I closed my eyes as I spoke, hoping I wasn’t going to give up too much. “They found samples of material and they recreated it under lab conditions. It’s a nanofluidic material,” I stumbled over the word a bit, I’d never used it, but I’d heard it often enough around my parents’ house, especially over the past two years. “It responds to electrical impulses and can harden or soften and can be programmed to react to specific impulses. It can form a circuit, too.”

  “So you do know some things,” Wessek nodded. He clapped his hands, “All right. Have some food, kid, you earned it.” He shoved the plate in my direction, but I waited.

  “What?” He demanded, “You don’t like the food?”

  “I want a guarantee,” I swallowed again. “When this is over, when you have what you want, that you’ll let me go.”

  Wessek chuckled. He slapped his son on the shoulder, “I like this kid, Vars. You did good bringing him back.” Wessek looked at me, smiling, “Sure, kid. You give me what I want and I’ll cut you loose. I’ll even drop you off on a nice planet, one much nicer than that dustball you call home.”

  Now I know he can be a very convincing liar. I’d have to work on that myself. It seemed wrong to lie, but I knew that my life depended on it.

  “Now, kid, eat up, you need to focus on this, we’re running down the clock,” Wessek grinned. I just hoped I’d get to see his face when I took everything from him.

  ***

  We made orbit two days later. Wes
sek was good to his word on food, at least. Ted and I got real food, three times a day. In return, he gave me copies of my parent’s hand-written notes and had Ted and I trying to make sense of them. It wasn’t easy work, especially since whoever had grabbed them had it all out of order. Also, there were pages that were damaged, several by what looked like bullet holes and dozens splattered with what looked like blood. The pages were just copies, but it twisted my stomach as I stared at them, wondering if it had been my father or grandmother who’d bled all over those pages.

  Maybe it was one of the pirates, I told myself. But that didn’t make me feel all that much better. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw my mother stumbling through the door, bleeding from a wound on her leg. I saw the look of desperation in her eyes, the knowledge that her husband, my father, was dead.

  She’d died, there, in the stone house she and my father had built. She’d died trying to buy my sister and I time to escape... and here I was, helping the pirates who’d killed her. Only so that I can escape, I told myself, only to stall them until I can get my revenge and get away.

  Putting those papers in some semblance of order took the entirety of those two days. They weren’t numbered and the only sign of where one set of notes left off and the next started was some of the project numbers in the top corners. My parents had both been copious note-takers. They liked pen and paper, probably because they were archaeologists. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of pages.

  Vars was the one who would come and check on our progress. He rarely said anything. But he was there, watching. I spent time studying him in turn. I memorized the details of how he walked, how he talked. When he spoke to the guards, I listened. He talked to them like they were servants, and they all seemed afraid of him. He had a harsh accent that came out when he was angry or in a rush, though I didn't recognize it.

  With real food, I spent some time each day working out, doing some of the exercises that Jiden had suggested to help strengthen me and build my endurance. Ted watched dully, the first time I did it. He joined in the next day, probably more from boredom than anything else.