Ascension

by Nicholas Woode-Smith

  ‘For the liberation of my people? For the independence of our worlds? For the return of our women from mutated slavery?’

  Gura-Teng nodded and whispered. ‘What will you sacrifice?’

  Leri whispered back. ‘Everything.’

  “Corporate holdings – planets owned by megacorporations – differ in their prosperity and their freedom. Titan owned worlds tend to prosper under a regime of free markets and the rule of law, while Zerian worlds are exploited under extraction-heavy industries.” – Extract from Corporations of Free Space.

  Chapter 2.

  Unwelcome

  A hum like a swarm of insects. Hmmmm. Vibrating into Yobu’s brain. Even facing away from him, the patch of light gave him a headache. He knew he should be used to it by now. As Commander of the Nexus Guard, he had sat in this room many times before. He had faced the blinding patch of light, aimed at those he was meant to be interrogating. He had heard the hum of the high-powered bulb, drilling into his head. And he had maintained his cool, always, no matter what criminal or monster he faced.

  But this was different now.

  Yobu had shared this room with Zerian insurgents, Zarxan agitators, Zonian troublemakers and war criminals from the civil war, but never had he been asked to interrogate an Imperial. He felt an acidity in his stomach. A rumbling of nerves. He hoped he could do it. Maintain the decorum and the cold rationality that James so valued in him. That was his duty, after all. His contribution to this great and important experiment called Defiant.

  The door opposite him opened and Yobu stiffened, preparing to adopt his syn-like façade. His mask of the apex interrogator.

  ‘You look like you have zot underneath your armour,’ a voice, filled with non-malicious condescension spoke from behind the recently opened door.

  Yobu relaxed, even has his face reddened.

  ‘Erryn, you aren’t meant to be in here.’

  Erryn waved away the comment and pushed the interrogation lamp away.

  ‘Lizards from Grengen got their own freight running now. All that tobacco and fish coming in don’t need me no more. Not much for me to do, even when Grag-Tec or Defiant loan me a ship.’

  ‘You have enough creds to buy a new ship.’

  Erryn waved away the comment. ‘And do what with it? Don’t need my skill to run commodities from Grengen to Nova Zarxa. I’m an intersystem pilot. My skill is wasted on planetary freight.’

  Yobu almost frowned but repressed it. ‘You could always leave Extos III. Could get a crew. Run your own freight. Maybe even run shipments for Grag-Tec.’

  ‘I could do that…’

  Yobu felt a pang.

  ‘But what would you do without me?’

  Yobu almost sighed. Erryn laughed.

  ‘You dirt-birthers…always so worried to lose something that you don’t realise it ain’t going anywhere.’ Erryn rolled her eyes and grinned.

  Before Yobu could ponder Erryn’s words, a notification came up on a tab on the table-top. The detainee was on the way. Erryn noticed.

  ‘I hope you don’t mind if I watch the proceedings.’

  ‘Would you care if I didn’t?’

  ‘Nope,’ Erryn grinned and walked past the seated Yobu, squeezing his shoulder affectionately. She took a spot by the wall behind him, leaning with her arms crossed nonchalantly.

  The doors opened. Yobu’s eyebrow was almost raised above his hairline.

  So, this is the so-called Imperial?

  Yobu noted down that he would have to discipline the guard later. But for now, he had work to do.

  ‘Welcome to Nova Zarxa, Diplomat…’

  ‘Re’lien en Xerl. Diplomatic Corps, Extos III division. Reporting for duty.’

  

  Re’lien mentally kicked herself when she realized, upon docking in Nexus, that the ships surrounding the planet were not Xank in design. Sure, they were a new design, but Re’lien should have recognized the distinctive smooth, snow-white ships of the Star Horde. By the time she had recalled the designs, it was too late. A group of shaking, pale-faced and armoured blue/black Troopers fanned around her, guns levelled. She was frog-marched away, leaving her pilot carrying her sparse belongings. Fortunately, the jittery guards didn’t seem concerned with the now gobsmacked pilot.

  High Protector Winston had been wrong. Nova Zarxa was not a world tolerant of edal. If anything, Re’lien had walked onto a world more dangerous than Mars. Ganymede was a fading, if traumatic, memory on Mars. The Imperial wreckages still floating in orbit around this planet revealed a much darker fact. Nova Zarxa had just had its own Ganymede, and its people were not going to be so tolerant of the blue girl, even if she wore a Trooper uniform.

  Fortunately, the guards didn’t manhandle her. They only marched her at gunpoint to an indoor tram. The dejected pink-haired inhabitants were ushered off and Re’lien, with her retinue of captors, sped towards void knows where.

  None of her captors responded to her questions, but some did seem genuinely shocked to hear her speak Standard Terran. It seemed that Winston had been right about one thing – these were a people not used to her kind. Unfortunately, it seemed their only experience with edal had been hostile. She hoped she would be given the time to address that. She hoped she would be given any time at all.

  They finally arrived at the docking-bay of a citadel. It bustled with activity. Blue banners adorned smooth, shining geradite walls. Signs dubbed the facility: Fort Nexus.

  Inside, she heard the blare of alarms. She felt a tad flattered that they had made such a ruckus over her. Inside, she was put in a holding cell. Before she was able to sit down on one of the seats, a welcome addition compared to the Martian cells, she was called out and brought down a long hallway of shocked and terrified humans, grays and exanoids. At the end of this hallway, a door opened, and she entered.

  White light almost blinded her, but she had trained herself to blot out and resist such rudimentary interrogation techniques. The bright light was meant to unnerve her. To hide the identity of her captors. To act as a searchlight upon her soul. But she was a trained Order diplomat, and an edal. This was child’s play.

  ‘Welcome to Nova Zarxa, Diplomat…’ a voice, filled with confusion, spoke. The man wore a Trooper commander combat uniform, but with blue instead of crimson. His face-plate and helmet were placed on the table-top. His features were Asiatic. His face stern, but his eyes and eyebrows revealed a genuine befuddlement. He didn’t expect this. Behind him, a woman with olive skin, wearing a tank-top and fingerless work-gloves was leaning against the wall. She looked amused.

  Well, here it goes…

  Re’lien locked her legs together and brought her hand to her head in a salute. ‘Re’lien en Xerl. Diplomatic Corps, Extos III division. Reporting for duty.’

  The Trooper commander nodded and indicated for Re’lien to sit. She noticed that the interrogation light seemed to dim. The room, now more easily viewable, was small. Clinical. The walls were plain geradite silver, with a single metal table dominating the middle. Re’lien sat down on the hard-metal stool at the table, sitting with a decorum learnt from many years training for this position.

  ‘You come at an unfortunate time, Diplomat Re’lien en Xerl. In the past, Nexus would have been a welcome parish for a Diplomatic Corps representative of your…persuasion…’

  ‘But you have just faced Imperial Council invasion, I presume,’ Re’lien finished his thought.

  The commander nodded, gloomily.

  ‘It has only been a few months since the Imperial Council attempted to take Nova Zarxa. It was a hard-fight. Many died and many here are not so calculating as to see the individual past the collective. Your skin-tone and your ears will brand you a monster in the eyes of many on this planet.’

  ‘Why didn’t you attempt to contact Mars for reinforcements, Commander…?’

  ‘Yobu. Teraka Yobu. The Trooper Governor, until a few months ago, was working with the Imperial Council in a plot to take the planet. He destroyed the system’
s Network port. We couldn’t get any pilots past the Xank blockade to send a message.’

  ‘Where is this Trooper governor?’

  ‘We’re the ones asking the questions, missy,’ the lady at the back announced, a mock-harsh tone. Yobu waved the comment aside.

  ‘Dedelux is dead. Defiant Forces summarily executed him when he attempted to re-take the city.’

  Despite not being the one asking the questions, Re’lien asked another. ‘Defiant?’

  ‘This is no longer a Trooper world, Diplomat Re’lien. The people here, including myself, lost all faith in the Order when we faced total annihilation and the red and black did nothing. I was a Trooper, but now I am a Defiant. We don’t have any ill-will against the Troopers. Most of the leadership of the Defiant are ex-Troopers, after all. You are welcome here as a representative of the Diplomatic Corps, even if not as an edal.’

  Re’lien raised her eyebrow. ‘Why do you so quickly think that I am who I say I am? I could be an Imperial ruse. As an Imperial defector myself, I can say that the Council do have spies. Not all edal speaking your tongue are friends.’

  Yobu tapped his eye-ball. It blinked blue and white.

  ‘I worked most of my career in customs. My cybernetic eye scans digital signatures. Your Corps badge is an unforgeable crypto-signature, signed by the High Protector himself. If we can’t trust the top-level security system that humanity has developed, then we might as well surrender to the Council now.’

  Re’lien sighed with relief. Yobu smiled.

  ‘Besides,’ the woman at the back said, ‘not all edal are bad. The only decent lecturer at Academy was an edal. Eri…’

  ‘Kara’zar? You know Eri Kara’zar?’

  The woman nodded, a broad smile breaking out from her mock sternness.

  ‘Sure do. She trained me in Academy. You know her?’

  ‘She’s my friend. And she’s not just a lecturer anymore. She’s now Lieutenant-Colonel of the Order-Armada.’

  The woman whistled, impressed. ‘She must hate that. Be sure to tell me more about it after Yobu here is done with you.’

  Re’lien nodded, smiling.

  Yobu continued. ‘We’ll prepare quarters for your stay in Fort Nexus. You’ll understand that you cannot leave the Fort, for your own safety. I hope this won’t be too inconvenient for your assignment, or the fact that this is no longer a Trooper world. We bear no ill will to Mars, but we won’t abandon our freedom again.’

  He stood and Re’lien did as well. He offered his hand and Re’lien accepted it.

  ‘I hope you enjoy your stay on the Free World of Nova Zarxa, good-edal.’

  Re’lien was then escorted by the woman, who was named Erryn Kolheim, to her quarters. Without the stress of an impending execution by xenophobes, Re’lien was able to relax. But she still faced trouble.

  This was no longer a Trooper world. Black and blue banners adorned the walls. Guards wore equipment comparable to Trooper infantry but bearing different insignia and colours.

  But Winston hadn’t sent her as just an emissary to a friendly world. She was to remain safe, until the cryptic time that she would apparently be needed. And above that, she was to find allies for the Order. The Defiant may have seceded from the Troopers, but they didn’t seem hostile. Their loyalty to the free races would need to be ensured, so to secure the core-world’s frontier. If a war with the Imperial Council was coming, as Grexus suggested in her dreams and Winston was predicting, then the Defiant would align with the free races. Re’lien guessed that much. But aligning at the last minute was not good enough. They needed to be actively loyal to the cause. And Re’lien was going to be the one to ensure that.

  Re’lien spoke to Erryn as she was led up the citadel to her room. They crossed paths with a figure clad in black metal armour, but Erryn didn’t pay it any mind, so Re’lien ignored it. But she couldn’t help the feeling that it was considering her. Not just looking at her, but into her very soul.

  

  ‘Boymancer,’ Krag-Zot called, catching James off-guard as he walked back to his quarters.

  ‘Still calling me that?’ James sighed.

  ‘Until you’re older than me, I’ll always call you boymancer,’ Krag-Zot explained.

  ‘You’ll always be older than me.’

  ‘Then I’ll always call you boymancer,’ the areq grinned with a toothy underbite. ‘I’m here about the edal.’

  ‘I trust Yobu, Krag-Zot. She is a diplomat from Mars. It is unfortunate about her race. She won’t be able to be much use to the homeworld on this edal hating planet.’

  ‘She does not need to appeal to the planet for her goals. Only the leadership. Her success is up to you.’

  ‘Hmmm…I thought you were going to caution me of something. Tell me to throw her onto the crystal fields for what her people did to Resh.’

  ‘Maybe you’re rubbing off on me, but I don’t have a blind-hate for her. She’s an Imperial defector. She’s turned her back on Imperia.’

  ‘Wouldn’t that make her a traitor?’

  ‘Maybe that’s why I don’t hate her. I’m a traitor. I forsook the Avenger, the Xank and our plan for vengeance against Imperia. But don’t get me wrong. I am here to caution you.’

  James raised his eye-brow and opened the door to his room with his crypto-wrist key. They both entered.

  ‘Caution that I don’t bow to Trooper control? That I don’t show the populace that I am friendly to an edal?’

  ‘Not that, but both are good advice, that I know you will probably ignore. You are very loyal to the Troopers for an ex-criminal.’

  James grunted. Krag-Zot continued.

  ‘I examined her closely while she was on her way to her quarters with that freight pilot.’

  ‘Erryn.’

  Krag-Zot ignored the interruption. ‘I detected latent warp energy within her.’

  ‘Edal are natural warpmancers. You taught me that yourself.’

  ‘Not just some warp energy. Not just a predisposition for the talent. I felt an ocean. And it scared me. The only time I have felt that much energy was when you defeated me.’

  James froze.

  ‘She is powerful, boymancer. Maybe even more powerful than you. I don’t know if she knows this herself, but that changes little. You must make a decision. Declare her friend or foe. For when giants meet, they cannot pass one another. And you are both giants.’

  “The people of Zona Nox were not used to living in the confines of an artificial atmosphere. They wanted real air. Real sky. Real freedom. Even without Dedelux’s oppression, Zonians felt stifled in the confines of Nexus’ halls.” – R. Rebeck, Historian.

  Chapter 3.

  A New Zona Nox

  ‘I miss the sky, Defiant,’ the man said. His hands were black with grease. Months before, they had been covered in blood. He tightened a bolt and pulled back, wiping his hands down with a cloth as black as the grease. ‘It was different then. We didn’t have time to miss anything. Can’t cry for Zona Nox when you bleeding all over the metal. But it’s a peaceful-like now. Should be happy for it.’

  ‘A peace we fought and died for. Now we can work,’ James replied. His bodyguards were on edge, glancing at any passer-by. Zerian insurgents and the arrival of Re’lien had spooked everyone. They didn’t like that James went on these walks. If they had their way, he wouldn’t leave the central floors of Fort Nexus. James paid them no mind. He didn’t need them. He could handle himself – even before he became a warpmancer. He had the agility and strength to fight-off any attacker and the hyper-awareness to spot any assassin. No, the guards weren’t for his sake – but for the sake of public relations. He had been told, all those months ago, that you bred loyalty through giving people purpose. It was the same with his bodyguards. He gave them meaning and ensured their loyalty. A lasting society found ways of including people.

  But just because the bodyguards were needed for James’ political machinations didn’t mean he had to listen to them. He knew how important it was to sh
ow his face around Nexus. To speak to the Zonians, to negotiate with the Zarxan elites. To remind people that the Defiant wasn’t a god – but a man worth following.

  He was in one of the many hangars of Nexus. It was a maintenance dock for freighters. Greasy. Raw. Off-world ships clashed with the immaculate and plastic looking Zarxan aesthetic. James liked it. Many Zonians had found work as mechanics in the many trade ports of Nexus. James spoke to many of them, asking about their issues. Allaying their fears and dejection. As much as he was able.

  ‘Right, Defiant. Should be happy. Got peace now. Got a job now. Creds in the tab. But I’m not…’

  The mechanic turned away and continued his work, still speaking.

  ‘In Galis, we bled every day, right?’

  James nodded.

  ‘But it never got to us. Not for most of us, at least. We had the fighting and we had the panics, and all, but we understood it. But this…’

  The mechanic indicated the hangar. Its smooth, shining ceilings and fake-metal walls.

  ‘All this…fakeness. This peacefulness. It doesn’t feel right. How is it that when we finally get peace, we can’t help but remember the war?’

  James did not respond. And he could not respond. To this mechanic, or the others after him. To the Zonians who begged for real air. For blue skies. For wide-open spaces. For freedom again.

  James could give them purpose. He could give them jobs. A flag. A raison d'être. But he couldn’t give them what they really needed.

  Zona Nox.

  His people needed a home, and Nova Zarxa wasn’t going to be that home.

  In the months after the Battle for Nova Zarxa, Zonians had begun integrating into Zarxan society. Zonians were criminals. Thugs. Gangsters. Opportunists. But also, entrepreneurs, craftsmen, hard-workers. When the Zarxan elites realised that, they begun to willingly recruit the many Zonian refugees who needed jobs. Zonians unwilling to be employed, took loans from banks and creditors and began their own enterprises. Many failed, but some succeeded. Don Marzio would have been proud, if he wasn’t so busy with his Aegis work.