A Check for a Billion

by Vasily Mahanenko

  “A giant bug?! Oh, thanks! That was me, you idiot. You started from me like from a leper. And immediately reached for your blaster…”

  Eunice didn’t finish, staring at the Zatrathi helmet.

  “Brainiac? Can you connect to it?”

  “About time you asked,” said the computer impatiently and an interface plug extended from Eunice’s armor suit to the helmet. “Let’s see what we have here. The memory, the CPU, the transmission module. Narf!”

  Brainiac fell silent and at the same time the warrior’s armor suit began to melt like a wax candle under a heat gun.

  “Cap’n, we didn’t mean to…” said the snake.

  “Report! What was that?”

  “The helmet contained a controller that was very much like a remote terminal. Only with a smaller operational radius. It was constantly broadcasting a recording about how great the Zatrathi are and how the Vraxis must be annihilated. Furthermore, the helmet’s optics were set up in a very particular manner. They render all creatures who don’t have special friendly tags as Vraxis and transmit the picture and audio directly into the wearer’s brain, so there’s no need for translation. We traced the remote channel upstream and then were cut off — someone sent a self-destruct command. That’s why the armor self-destructed.”

  “To keep us from finding the man behind the curtain, running this entire show,” I made the obvious conclusion. Suddenly, I went further and added: “The Zatrathi aren’t the aggressors in this war. They are victims just like us. The victims of the one who knows how to create the brainworms. The Queen. Eunice, we have to take this warrior with us!”

  New title: Devil’s Advocate. You are the first player to figure out that the Zatrathi are an enslaved race. Find the evidence that will vindicate the Zatrathi before all of Galactogon.

  An icon in the form of ancient scales appeared above my wife’s head. Checking her avatar’s properties, I saw that she had received the same rank as me.

  “This is odd,” said our Zatrathi ‘evidence.’ “My armor has returned to our mother without me…yet I am still here.”

  “Has this happened before?” I latched onto the warrior’s confusion.

  “Yes, the higher the rank, the more often the mother returns us to her. We become stronger every time we’re reborn. Well, nothing to be done. I will request new armor from the officers. It doesn’t do to go rushing into battle naked.”

  “Maybe you had better take a nap, right now,” I said. “Brainiac, knock him out!”

  An injection of sleeping solution and the Zatrathi’s compound eyes turned dull gray.

  “No way!” Eunice objected. “How are we supposed to haul him out of here? He’ll die without armor.”

  “Let’s figure that out later. First we have to kill the brainworm. Brainiac, we’re going to head to the bridge. Help us avoid any detection along the way. If the Queen orders the fortress to self-destruct, we won’t be able to complete Mercaloun’s mission. You’ll have to block the signal somehow.”

  “Orders received. We will need a little time to figure out how to do this,” the snake replied in a serious tone. “We have some of the data from the other flying fortress. Maybe we can find the source of the self-destruct signal it received. Then perhaps we could divert it somehow.”

  “Spare me the details, I need a result.” I climbed back into my suit, picked up the pieces of the Zatrathi’s armor scattered across the floor and loaded them back onto the food cart. All I had to do was figure out what to do with the warrior, but here my wife came to the rescue:

  “We can put him in here.” Eunice unscrewed the food cart’s side panel and pulled out the motor. This cleared a large cavity into which we then stuffed the Zatrathi with some difficulty. Replacing the cover, Eunice opened the door and checked the corridor.

  “It’s clear. Move out!”

  * * *

  Our journey to the fortress’s command center could be characterized by one word: ‘lucky.’ First of all, we were lucky that the flying fortress had a very rapid moving walkway, which meant that we didn’t have to sprint at breakneck speed, attracting attention to ourselves. Second of all, we were lucky in that the majority of the enemy’s manpower was busy mopping up Mercaloun’s spawn. We were just passing by the place where the cacodemons had gnawed their way through the bulkheads between decks. Looking inside, I saw a huge melted hole. The cacodemon blood was worse than acid and had already burned a hole through several decks. The Zatrathi were busy hectically patching the ensuing leaks and had no time for a cart loaded with junk. Given the emergency situation on board the ship, their coordination was spotty at best.

  As a result, a mere thirty minutes later we found ourselves outside the brainworm’s chamber.

  “You managed to kill those without any fire support?” You could tell from Eunice’s voice that the Zatrathi Regal Guard had made an impression on her. Four barrel-shaped bodies stood at the rainbow-colored door, guarding the chamber of the brainworm. Or, now that we knew its proper name — the Regal Relay.

  “I had a good partner,” I replied, opening the dummy armor suit and unleashing Mercaloun’s starving spawn. “Lunchtime! Eat those fat ones first — then everything else.”

  The creatures with the circular jaws blinked their eyes obediently and surged towards their meal. The guards immediately opened fire — but what can four mortals accomplish against an immortal hunger? The cacodemons did not even notice their attempts at resistance, almost instantly tearing the Regal Guards into their constituent components. Swelling up to enormous sizes, the cacodemons settled down to digest their meals. Our time had come. Pushing the cart ahead of me, I blasted the rainbow door without worrying about my stealth. A nasty general alarm resounded throughout the flying fortress. There was no doubt that the brainworm knew about our arrival. The Relay even tried to resist, trying to jump on top of us while brandishing his blaster like a club. But Eunice zapped him in mid-leap, turning him into a loot crate. Undistracted by all this, I pulled out the remote terminal and connected it to the ship. Brainiac won’t be able to protect us through the armor suit’s interface — he needs a bit more bandwidth. We had a minute to save ourselves. This was how much I figured it would take for ‘mom’ to react to her relay complaining about the arrogant humans who were invading his chamber.

  “Got it!” It took Brainiac thirty seconds to cope with the greatest threat. “Self-destruct has been disabled. There’s no longer any danger of you exploding!”

  “Welcome news. Now start the engines and fly this tub straight into that planet. We’re going to ram ‘er!”

  “Captain, there’s one problem. I lack the system resources to manage a network this large. I can do the little stuff, but flying the entire flying fortress…”

  This news was so unpleasant that I even grew upset. Our entire plan was based on my assumption that Brainiac would be able to pilot the flying fortress. I had miscalculated.

  “Thirty minutes!” Eunice reminded me. One of the screens displayed the silhouettes of Zatrathi warriors fighting our cacodemons. Finally I got a chance to see the method they found of killing them. Or rather, the method of just letting them die. The reckless monsters never stopped eating until they simply burst to pieces. Their stomach acid flooded the floor, reached the neighboring cacodemon and I received another notification about a fallen party member. Sigh. Victims of their own gluttony.

  “Is there anything you can do?” I asked hopefully, but Brainiac was implacable.

  “With this ship no. There is so much data onboard that my cores are starting to overheat.”

  “What do you mean ‘with this ship?’” Eunice took exception to the Brainiac’s wording.

  “Well…I could connect to the orbital station that the flying fortress is docked to. Ninety percent of its functionality is disabled from the Anorxian attack, which means there should be enough resources.”

  “We won’t have time to get over there,” my wife objected, but here Brainiac had a solution:

>   “You don’t have to go anywhere. The vessels are currently linked, I can pilot it from here.”

  Here was a chance! We could hope to triumph again!

  “What’s still functional on the orbital station?”

  “Some maneuvering thrusters and a few cannons. The functionality is extremely limited.”

  “Rotate the damaged station around so that the fortress is between it and the planet! Hurry!” I ordered, unable to hide my excitement. An NPC would never think of this — it was time to show the advantage of the human mind over the programmer’s creation.

  “Eunice, cover the entrance! Our support’s about to run out! Don’t let anyone in here! It should work!” I ordered, receiving a notification about another dead glutton. Eunice silently rushed for the door, activating her shoulder blasters.

  “Done.” Brainiac broadcast an external image to one of the screens. The orbital station and flying fortress orbited the planet in tandem, linked like a dancing couple.

  “Fire the station’s thrusters. Set its throttle to full!”

  “Cap’n — what you’re doing — it isn’t very safe.” The snake didn’t like my idea, but I snapped:

  “Execute! Push the fortress with the orbital station!”

  “Roger that. You’re the one in charge,” the engineer sighed and added: “Hold on. Three seconds to contact. Two. One. Contact!”

  The connective passages between the two vessels collapsed as the orbital station slammed into the fortress. The ensuing crash sent me flying across the room — with the rail I had been holding onto still in my hand. The flying fortress began to vibrate, shake and, judging by my screens slowly slip out of its orbit. Meter by painful meter.

  “Thrust to full, I said!”

  “Cap’n these vessels won’t be able to withstand reentry.”

  “They won’t burn up entirely! There’s too much metal here. Full throttle!”

  “Roger full throttle, Cap’n, sir!”

  Jets of light erupted from the myriad thrusters that dotted the orbital station. A terrible shaking from the acceleration joined the shaking from the collision. At the same time, the force of gravity began to grow, pulling us tighter to the floor and making us fight for every step.

  “We have entered the atmosphere. Altitude is fifty kilometers. I am picking up hull damage. Attention, the power cables have melted. We have lost contact with the orbital station!”

  I barely lifted my head off the floor, looking for the cart. It was lying on its side, on the opposite side of the bridge. Turning on my thrusters, I pushed myself along the floor to the objective.

  “Altitude is twenty kilometers. Estimated time to contact is twenty seconds. I strongly recommend abandoning ship.”

  “Eunice, take off your armor suit!” I yelled, crashing into the cart and grabbing it like a prized possession. The force of gravity had reached 3Gs. A little more and I would be at my limit, so I needed to hurry. I yanked the poor warrior out of the cart. The acceleration had almost flattened him into a cake, but the Zatrathi was still alive.

  “Altitude is five kilometers. Time to contact is six seconds.”

  I ejected out of my armor suit and groaned. Without the assistance of my suit’s servomotors, I could barely move a finger.

  “Four seconds!”

  Straining my tendons as hard as I could, I just barely reached the Zatrathi. A system dialog appeared asking me to confirm that I wanted to put my armor suit on the alien.

  “Two!”

  The suit initialized and its medunit began automatic resuscitation procedures. Circles appeared before my eyes. I felt like I was swimming in an invisible liquid, but I was still holding on. I didn’t have the time to pass out!

  “Contact!”

  I had only one nanosecond for my one attempt. The armor suit with the Zatrathi disappeared into my inventory as everything around me vanished in a fiery whirlwind. There was a short pang of pain and then darkness. I was free to pass out.

  Chapter Eleven

  When the darkness cleared, returning me to Galactogon, the first thing I saw was a rebuke from the system:

  You cannot store a living creature with a developed intellect in your inventory. Zatrathi Officer ?!?!?!?! has been removed from your inventory.

  A drawn-out groan sounded beside me. Respawning in Galactogon came with its own special discomfort and this was Eunice’s first death as far as I recalled. My head was spinning, yet when I sat up, I couldn’t help but whoop triumphantly: The Zatrathi warrior had been ejected from my inventory and now lay beside me whole and unharmed. The only thing he had lost was his name, but this was a mere trifle compared to the alternative. How critical can a single nanosecond be sometimes!

  “What are you whooping about?” Eunice grumbled, rubbing her temples.

  “Put on your armor suit. It will remove your debuffs,” I advised and donned my own golden spacesuit. The medunit immediately set to work, eliminating the warning icons dancing around my status screen. Placing my hand on the motionless Zatrathi, I ordered Brainiac to reanimate him. A few dozen injections and the pale gray body regained its customary colors. The Zatrathi’s breathing evened out, his eyelids stopped twitching, and his body regained the tranquil repose of sleep.

  The next thing I heard were a myriad tiny hammers and our respawn point filled with cacodemons. They flashed their fangs menacingly, but did not attack us. Just in case, I pulled the Zatrathi a little closer to me. What if they decide to eat him? Having verified that we weren’t aggressive, the vermin began to transform, turning into a transport rhino once again. I had to give them their due — this time the weird monster rhino had seats for three. I guess they had examined my Zatrathi and deemed him worthy of meeting Mercaloun.

  Five minutes later we appeared before the snake, who was busy eating without a second’s pause. An endless conveyor of food in the form of blackish gruel was being delivered straight into the mouth of the Great Uldan. Once her mouth was full, Mercaloun rolled the contents over her tongue, savoring and enjoying each drop with evident pleasure. Three of the snake’s four eyes were closed, while the last one kept a close watch on us, albeit without any sign of menace.

  “You made it in time. The flying fortress and orbital station will last me a long time. You have earned your lives and you have earned a reward as well. Order your ship to fly over here, I would like to make some modifications to it.”

  The snake never actually stopped eating as she spoke, communicating with us through the walls’ vibrations.

  Mission accomplished: A Meal Fit for a Lady. Reward: +4 orbship upgrades; comm link to Lady Mercaloun; access to Planet Shurtan; +5 Mercaloun spawn integrated into the orbship.

  Your rapport with Lady Mercaloun has grown. Current Rapport: 10,0000

  “I’m already en route, Captain.” Brainiac had anticipated my orders. “Send me the coordinates of the landing zone. There is such a mess taking place in the system right now that no one should notice me.”

  “Fly here, Orbship. My spawn will meet you. Surgeon, I want to hear the story of Warlock and the reason why you came to this planet.”

  It took me half an hour to satisfy Mercaloun’s curiosity. The snake was interested in everything, starting from where I met Brainiac and ending with how I recruited my crew members. After that I was forced to tell her about the pirates and my missions to find the video and the warehouse on the pirate base. By this time, Brainiac had reached the planet and fallen into the short paws of Mercaloun’s spawn. I didn’t know what they were doing to my ship — but the periodic exclamations of joy from my crew indicated that everything was going well. All of Eunice’s attempts to discover what was going on were met with a polite request not to disturb the work and assurances that the surprise would be a pleasant one. I finished my story and looked expectantly at Mercaloun, hoping that she would grant me full access to the base. And yet, the Uldan’s response were disappointing to say the least:

  “You are too late. A week ago, I transformed everything
that was here into energy. Objects, walls, living and nonliving creatures. There is nothing left.”

  How can I describe the utter disappointment that I felt? I don’t think I could. We can only describe what fills us. Hate or love, for example. My disappointment, however, was a complete emptiness. A spiritual vacuum that bred apathy and sapped my will to go on. There is little that can resist such emptiness.

  My hands dropped, a heaviness settled on my chest, and I just looked at Mercaloun mindlessly, not understanding what to do next. Was it worth going on a suicide mission just to find out that everything was in vain? The snake did not look away and suddenly declared:

  “I can help with the video, however. I absorbed the recording and it has remained in my memory. I am able to recover a small excerpt. Do you know the date and camera ID you need?”