by Ember Lane
A corpse lay prone on the floor. It was dressed like Faulk. I couldn’t make out the sex, every inch covered in its black armor. A photon rifle lay discarded by it. Pog picked it up, pressing just above its trigger and then discarding it.
“Soulbound,” he said, by way of explanation to the others.
“Blunt anyway,” Mezzerain pointed out.
We stepped on, more crackles from the halogens, trails of sparks arcing down from the wires.
“Is that magic?” Sutech asked.
“More trapped lightning,” Pog answered easily.
Sutech nodded, accepting his explanation.
The corridor ended at a door. I pressed my hand on a panel to its side. It illuminated a lime-green aura around my fingers and slid open with a whoosh.
“Is it cold in here, or is it me?” Sutech asked.
The steam of his breath told us which.
“Colder than a wraith’s heart.” Mezzerain duly added his opinion.
I stepped through the doorway and onto a large, mesh-metal platform with a three-foot-high safety wall around it. The edges were highlighted in garish yellow, striped black. I rested my hand on it, feeling the cold, and pulling away immediately. I equipped my gauntlets, flexing my fingers, trying to sense the Nexus Rod through them. It pulsed in my hands, reassuring me that the connection was fine, ever ready.
A shaft fell away, more mesh levels giving me a measure of its height—perhaps a hundred feet—eight or so of them. I could see the edges of huge machines nearly butting up to the mesh parapets. Large gantries crisscrossed all. It was much how you’d imagine the innards of a power station.
“Engineering,” Pog muttered.
I agreed. The others said nothing. Pog clattered down a set of steps. The others followed. I held for a second, something niggling at the edges of my mind. Then I saw it, a small pulse of khaki light, way down, down in the depths. That was my beacon. It was certainly one of the things we were supposed to see, one of the things we’d been brought here to see.
Following the others, we descended into a stench of metal and oil, of sweat and toil, lingering smells that defied years of abandonment. The machines were huge, stretching away in uniform alleys. Giant metal rings, vast turbines, blocks of rectangular batteries the likes of which would power a city through a blackout storm. I’d seen these places in virtual tours, except there they were always impossibly clean and sterile. Here, though, was the reality. These machines were our salvation, supposed to propel us light years across space, yet some looked like they’d been on their last legs. Looking along an alley, I saw Pog crouched over a body. The others milled a little distance away. I assumed they were worried about…well…just about everything.
I soon crouched by him. The body was dressed in a green uniform, rigid hands still coated in grease, with hair much longer than military regs. Uniform was an overstatement. It was worn with disdain, not pride, not smart like the corpses in the pods.
“It’s the same,” Pog said, lifting a flap of material. “See the slight check to it?”
“The Cers,” I whispered.
“So the Cers are engineering.”
A piece of the puzzle?
We swapped nods but said no more. I had some ideas, but more answers were coming—I understood that. We left him there, returning, continuing on.
“There’s more metal here than in all of Valkyrie, Mandrake, and every other land put together,” Mezzerain announced. “I shall do a deal with those pesky gnomes and get them to mine it. If we can get those portals working, we can have the whole lot out in days. Sutech, you provide security—three-way split with me and Digberts, and we’re all rich.”
“What are you going to do?” Sutech asked.
Mezzerain straightened his frame, puffing out his chest. “I’m the brains,” he announced.
“All this,” Sutech said, spreading his arms wide. “All these strange creations, and my true astonishment comes from four words that spill from your mouth.”
“I’m not stupid,” Mezzerain said, clearly affronted.
Sutech pulled out a gemstone from his pockets. “Then you’d be rich already.”
Mezzerain grunted. “Some of us were too busy looking out for others to collect glass trinkets.”
“Gemstones,” Sutech repeated.
“My gemstones,” Billy added, his interest perked.
“Not—” Sutech made to say, but Pog shut him up with a shush!
“Not what?” Billy asked. “I knew something was up.” His long thumb curled out and pointed at Pog. “Well? Are you double-crossing me?”
“You’ll get your fair share,” Pog told him.
“All! That was the agreement.”
“All that fit in our pockets,” Pog reaffirmed.
“But clearly not in your sacks of holding,” Mezzerain added, chuckling. “Clever, clever indeed.”
We all glared at him.
Billy punched the nearest machine, regretting it instantly.
“One day I will best you, young man,” he vowed.
We carried on down, dropping level after level, but seeing a similar pattern. Scattered bodies lay around, no sign of a battle, no indication of any struggles. The corpses were sparse, but then I hazarded a guess that spaces on engineering were precious—each involved in maintenance taking up another’s spot—others deemed more important, part of the master plan.
Had they even had a master plan? Or was it more a set of loose guidelines; launch a ship and hope for the best.
I was beginning to wonder.
We arrived at the bottom. It was raised slightly from the metallic skin below. That had the slightest curve to it, like it was the skin of the ship itself. The khaki light pulsed. It was somehow fainter now that we were closer.
The machines were sparser here too. Instead, rank upon rank of shelves filed away like soldiers on parade. They held odd-shaped parts, lubricants, manuals, and clear drawers full of screws, bolts, washers, and more. Of all my concepts about spaceships, one limping through space while some engineer greases a cog or wonders where the last screw was supposed to go, didn’t quite fit. We walked past them all, around another corpse, and toward the khaki light.
It came from an open door, just a file of light from its edge. Pog paused by it, his hand reaching out, ready to nudge it open.
“Okay?” he asked, nerves coloring his voice for the first time I could remember.
I told him yes, stuttering over that single word myself.
We entered.
The place was a little more sterile. It had a solid floor and walls and was about the size of a gymnasium. There were workbenches, all with parts piled on in varying states of disrepair.
“Pod maintenance? Just maintenance?” Pog asked all, but no one in particular. The question only made sense to me. The others were following like schoolchildren now, clearly bemused by the whole dream. Pog pointed to a bank of lifts in the corner. A strip of lights above one had a faint glimmer to it. “I think I see our path out.”
It made sense. I had come to the conclusion we were being led like dogs.
We ventured farther in, headed for a small office opposite the lifts. The pulsing light came from it, but it was muffled now as though it wanted us to follow it but was in two minds about what we should see. Pog asked me to cast a glowsphere, but as I was about to, a thumping sound rang out and the banks' strip lights burst into life like a marching army, showering us in yellow light.
Sutech flinched. Mezzerain growled something about demons. It was clear the ship’s AI was watching us, monitoring us. I didn’t know why I was so surprised. The ship’s AI was Belved.
They were one and the same.
The office turned out to be a mess room. It had a kitchen, a table, plastic chairs, and an old sofa stuck in the corner. There was nothing out of place, nothing remarkable at all. It was dirty, grease smeared, exactly what you’d expect from such a place.
Pog had been drawn to its end. I saw the light blink again then
fade, like it had done its job and led us to it, and now it was up to us to locate its source. Pog began to tear at a wall. Mezzerain stepped in, poking his sword into a gap and levering a panel off. Sutech joined in as if they were all relieved of the distraction. Faulk called for his tool bag, Pog duly obliging.
They stripped the wall back, tossing its cladding aside.
I gasped as it revealed a pod: all coated in dust. A soft illumination emanated from it, the familiar khaki green, but an aura, a gentle shading.
“It’s still working,” Pog whispered.
“They hid him. They kept him alive.”
“Who?” Sutech asked.
Pog cuffed away the dust, and we both peered in.
Chapter Thirty-One
The Tower
I looked down at the boy, Zender. He tore at my heart. I guessed at ten or eleven years old. His eyes were closed. His mousy hair splayed out from his skull, the fluid’s suspension giving it free buoyancy and lending him peace, like he was sleeping.
He was a street kid all right. Old diseases haunted him, ringworm and telltale signs of lice, purulent spots that had never healed. His shoulders were striped with welts from the sun’s radiation. Yet he was pure in my mind. I’d learned to look beyond their suffering. I glanced at Pog, knowing these two boys' early lives weren’t ever too distant: one had been lucky, one not, but now their fates had collided. He’d share my empathy; I was sure of that.
“Why are they doing this to me?” I asked.
Pog’s hand crept into mine. “He is our enemy.”
My heart stopped: Pog’s words like an assassin’s blade. I felt its cold steel slowly drive through my heaving chest.
Zender, how could he be our foe now?
“No, no, he’s not.”
Pog squeezed my hand harder. “In this he is. Alexa, he’s our enemy. Not the body in front of you, the boy in-game. This scene has been fed to you to weaken you.”
“But what if it’s all true?”
He polished the pod’s top a little more, leaning closer. “Oh, it’s true all right, but that isn’t why the AI shows it. He shows it to preserve. This is beyond his control.”
Whatever the reason, it had worked. All my resolve had dribbled away.
“How can I see them apart?” That was my problem. How could I fight this?
Pog let his hand brush over Zender’s face. “Simple. This one’s Zender. The other is ShadowDancer. You fight ShadowDancer—”
“And protect Zender,” I added, and inside my heart I made a vow to myself. Somehow I would vanquish ShadowDancer, but I would make sure the boy, Zender, survived.
“That paradox might kill you.” Pog wasn’t mincing his words.
I reached out, holding Pog’s trailing hand, bringing it over the pod, and settling it on its cover. “Is he your enemy?”
Pog reached up, turning my chin and bringing my focus on his upturned face. “No, no he isn’t, but I wanted to make sure you understood that.”
“I do.”
“Then the AI has his wish, and we protect his charge if we can, but you know what that means in real terms, don’t you?”
“Ensuring they don’t blow up Ruse.”
“And in doing so, preserving all its dread cargo.”
As ever, he had a point. Pog, what would I have done without him? I let myself linger for a while, soaking in every aspect of Zender. I imprinted his street credentials in my memory, promising to return. These kids were the ones they should have taken to Celeron. They’d survive on any planet, hostile or not.
In the end, Pog tore me away.
“Come on, let’s go see what his AI has in store for us.”
I was reluctant to go, reluctant to leave the boy alone. I scoffed at that. How alone could you be? He was the only soul on a dead ship orbiting a planet so distant from a home that it no longer existed. But Pog did pull me away, my hand trailing behind.
“Why do you keep calling it an AI? Why not Belved?” I asked out of curiosity, wondering if he were insulating himself in some way.
“Because the god will present himself to you as a human. It will try and trick you. I want you to remember you’re dealing with an entirely logical being.”
“Being? You think they’re alive? AIs live?”
“They survive. Just remember, it has no emotions—none. Every word and action will have a direct effect on increasing ShadowDancer’s chance of winning the game, and in doing so, Zender’s survival.”
“So…”
“So you have to choose if his will suits our course or not. It may be he isn’t the enemy. It may be that he’s worse than we ever thought.”
“How?”
Pog paused as if unsure whether to continue. In the end, he did.
“What if Zender’s survival is his only goal? What if he thinks that our destruction is the only way to achieve that?”
“Us?”
“Everyone—everyone that’s left.”
Sickness filled my stomach, the level of my burden becoming too much now. Who was I to decide the fate of all? I wanted to hide in Greman’s hut. I wanted to run to the Vale of Lamerell. I just wanted to run, like an Apachalant, but never stop, ever.
We left the office, left Zender bare to the world, and we crossed the workshop to face the elevator. I placed my palm against its panel, calling for it, and we waited like it was the most normal thing in the world. The elevator came. Its door slid open, and we all piled in.
I stripped off my gauntlets and equipped my Nexus Rod. The elevator rose. Checking its menu, I began cycling my manas as fast as I could.
Nexus Rod
Charging in progress
Shadowmana 67.4% charged
Light mana 33.7% charged
Rod Harmony – Level 5
Magnification equates to 5 times current charge.
It was not quite where I wanted it to be. On seeing me equip my rod, the others started checking out their weapons. The sound of drawn steel comforted me. We were a group now, a solid fighting force. We would face what we had to.
In real terms, I just had one more soul to protect.
It complicated things but not as much as the rest.
I had to forget that.
I began to jump up and down then swayed back and forth on the balls of my feet, flexing my shoulders like I was about to enter an arena and fight some gladiator to the death. It came as a shock to me that I now found solace in slaughter, that I found release through using my power. It was counter to all I’d ever been.
The truth of it was, I was here to face a god. Sakina had seen to that. My task was to destroy him. I reread the veil.
Darkness hides in the shadows and nowhere more than where the shadows prevail over the light. One thing, and one thing alone, rules those shadows, and it is the force behind that you must destroy. Destroy the first, kill the immortal, and you will bring hope to the world.
Darkness hides in the shadows.
One thing rules those shadows.
Destroy the first.
Sakina had left me no better clues than these, and my conclusions were faultless. I had to kill the force behind ShadowDancer, and that was the first god, the master of the first ship, and that was Belved. A soulless AI, according to Pog, and one bent on delivering its twisted version of its prime directive.
My mana was going crazy. My heart was pumping hard. I was ready.
The elevator stopped. Its doors slid open, and we walked out to a familiar scene.
Faulk breathed the first sigh of relief. “This is more like it.”
A hexagonal floor spread away, tiled black with marble or granite. Its clean sheen contrasted with the derelict spaceship we’d just traveled through. A spiral staircase rose up across the floor, hugging the hexagonal walls. We stepped into its center, looking up, appreciating the scale compared to the other towers.
This was Slaughtower.
This was the master tower.
Faulk raced across the floor, approaching a wall unde
r the rising stairs and testing it, calling Pog across. They both searched out any hidden panels, running along it with practiced efficiency, but coming up short. It appeared there were no shortcuts here.
Sutech broke out his water bottle, taking a huge swig and then calling Faulk back. “Any food?”
“Dried fish, nothing much more.”
“Biscuits, Pog?”
“Some.” Pog was ever mindful of his supplies. It was like he stored stuff for a future that never came.
Sutech appeared to have the measure of the situation. “Then we eat, prepare ourselves, and we go up. I assume up is the way?”
“Up,” I confirmed.
“And what should we expect?”
I remembered back to my first tower. I was with the flamboyant Zybandian in the bowels of his fantastical castle. The priests attacked me there as the Forbane riders taunted me. They all circled their cauldron, and they focused their will before directing it at me. This was different. I was here. It was like others in Valkyrie, the one we’d met Faulk in, in Douglas, but here they knew we were coming.
And they had a god backing them up.
So far we’d defeated all, but this was going to be our biggest test.
“Priests,” I told him. “There will be priests. What else, I don’t know. Perhaps you’ll get an honest fight.”
Sutech pursed his lips. “Let’s hope.” He mulled the stairs. “Pog and Faulk go first? Or Charlotte and Billy? What triggers what?”
“Me and Billy,” Charlotte announced. “We go first. If there’s ghosts to be woken, wraiths to be roused, then we’ll take them on.”
Billy inched away from her, but her words roused something in the deep recesses of my mind. What, I couldn’t recall.
Sutech agreed. “So, Billy and Charlotte, Pog and Faulk, Mezzerain and me—”
“And then me on my lonesome…” I added, though I understood why.
