The Empress

Twenty-Four

Ornth spent many long hours tinkering with the unfamiliar controls of the Great Machine. At first, he proceeded calmly, full of optimism. As time slipped by and fatigue grew, his mood shifted into that of panic, and eventually to despair.

Garth watched the proceedings with interest, making few comments. His hands reached out and adjusted controlling systems that were made of thick metal and apparently worked in an analog fashion-or if they were digital, they seemed analog due to the nature of the controls. Rather than tapping in numbers or symbols on screens, valves, wheels and screws were used. The entire system seemed to be built for use by larger beings than Garth, and his skinny arms strained to get enough torque to shift the massive, steaming equipment.

Finally, exhausted and frustrated, Ornth slumped himself over a knob as big as a dinner plate and gasped for air. Garth cried out in his mind, for the heated knob burnt his chest. Ornth couldn’t feel the scalding heat, and apparently didn’t care.

“You are burning us!”

What difference does it make? The systems are not functioning as they should.

Garth felt his bare chest turning red. In time, the skin would peel away. “Why damage this body thoughtlessly? It is the only hope you have.”

Finally, the Tulk reluctantly shifted his weight. He allowed Garth to slide to the floor, which consisted of a metal grate with hot vapors rushing up through the hexagonal grid. Warm gases fluffed his hair, but did nothing to dry the sweat running from his body. Still, the uncomfortable spot was an improvement, so Garth stopped his complaints.

You offer me nothing, Ornth said suddenly. No aid, no comfort. Only complaints. Are all your kind such recalcitrant mounts?

Garth was startled to be addressed in this fashion. Normally, he was the one to start up conversations inside their shared skull and was generally rebuked for doing so. If he annoyed Ornth sufficiently, he would be punished by heat or needles. He’d learned to keep quiet, and bide his time. Since they were not in immediate danger of death, he had been content with the absence of pain.

“You ask for my help?”

Are you not a technician? Do you not have experience with systems of this kind?

Garth almost told Ornth no, that these alien contrivances were utterly incomprehensible to him. But then, he had a better idea. “Of course I’m familiar with such equipment. It is my occupation.”

Then why have you offered me nothing?

“I feared discipline.”

Ornth made a choking cry with Garth’s mouth. You must help me. We must operate the Great Machine. It seems to be damaged. So many years have past-the power sources do not have the capacitance they should.

“Why must we operate this ancient device?”

You do not understand its significance? It is a weapon, a power that can reach out to the stars themselves. Weapons such as this allowed my people to defeat the Skaintz Imperium thousands of years in the past.

Garth did not answer immediately, he wanted to gain any advantage he could. Thoughtfully, he decided to feign curiosity. “Tell me more, so I may help you. I must understand what it is you wish me to repair.”

As I said, this world is not a world, it is artificial. It is vast, and this chamber controls some of the critical functions.

“But there is life on this globe, a complex ecosystem.”

Garth felt his lips burble with odd laughter. Like a sunken warship in a shallow sea, it has gathered a reef of life that clings to the dust and mud of the surface. But the bulk of it is not natural.

Garth dared to probe some of the Tulk’s defenses as he spoke. Perhaps, when he was distracted, the reins could be snatched away…

Ornth went on, unaware of the probing. Really, we need a team of thousands, a hundred or more trained technicians are required in every control chamber. I fear that by myself, I can’t do what must be done.

Garth thought about launching an assault, but the other’s defenses were frustratingly effective. He could tell the needle-like nerve endings had penetrated too deeply. It was not a simple matter of superior willpower. It was more like being numbed by a drug. No amount of yearning for freedom could force a drugged man to normalcy. The nervous system would simply not respond. But as he thought hard, he came up with another approach.

“I have watched for many hours,” Garth said, “and I do have a great deal of experience with this kind of work. What do you propose to do with the Great Machine if you manage to make it function?”

Is it not obvious? I plan to focus the projectors. I plan to sweep the great ship from the sky, and destroy it before the enemy can infect this world.

Garth was surprised. He’d not calculated that the Tulk would have such high aspirations. To win a war single-handedly? That was not the kind of activity the reclusive Tulk were known for. Perhaps this one was different, as he claimed to be. It made no difference to Garth, however, who only wanted to regain the reins of his own body.

“I can help you,” Garth said at last. “But I must be allowed to control my own hands. How else can I operate the equipment?”

The Tulk was quiet for a moment, mulling it over. Garth wished to urge him to accept the offer, but said nothing further. He did not wish to appear too anxious.

At last, the Tulk agreed. Nerve-needles were withdrawn from the centers controlling the hands and the arms. Garth now not only felt with his fingers, he could flex them. He could move! He stood happily watching his fingers stretch, curl and extend at his urging. It was a wonderful feeling. Hope blossomed within him, and his scheming grew in scope.

Are we to get on with this or not? demanded Ornth.

“Of course. Walk us over to that bank of meters, please. I need to examine them.”

Garth spent time working on the machine, adjusting things and making queries about various details. He knew he had to appear interested, if only to get Ornth to allow him to continue to have his freedom. Truthfully, he had learned a good deal about its operation, but now that he was in charge of the effort to get it working, his mind was more fully engaged. He frowned as he made adjustments, read the gauges, then made further twiddling changes.

Well?

“There is definitely something wrong,” Garth said.

Another gasp of exasperation came from Garth’s own lips. All this time wasted, and you have only this to tell me? You are the cretin I’d expected! And I’m a bigger fool for believing in you.

Garth ignored the insults. When dealing with the Tulk, one had to expect them. “Some of the controls are operable, but not all of them. There has been serious damage, particularly to the power sources. Where are these units located? Can we go there and effect repairs?”

Alas, no. They are on the far side of this station.

“You mean-the place they call Sunside?”

Yes. There are heat-driven collectors permanently aimed at the star. They gather energy to power the Great Machine.

Suddenly, Garth began to put together what might have occurred. Weren’t the natives of this world engaged in mining unusually pure metals from Sunside? Perhaps he now knew the answer to the puzzle of why such a great content of metal existed on this planetary surface. He hesitated to tell Ornth this, however. If Ornth knew the collectors were damaged, why would he continue to allow Garth his freedom? The entire endeavor was doomed.

“Perhaps it would be easier if I had control of my legs as well,” Garth said, “so I might walk where I wished.”

Grudgingly, Ornth allowed the freedom and removed more nerve-needles. As he became more secluded within Garth skull, he began to prattle on about lost opportunities, past Tulk greatness and the foolishness of his comrades. Garth ignored most of it. He had soon determined that the Great Machine would never be fully functional. It would take a thousand men a thousand years to rebuild all the damage the miners had done out in Sunside. The weaponry was magnificent and clearly could produce amazing firepower. Once it had been able to reach from one star system to another, firing intense beams of radiation that could pulverize ships a lightyear away, or sterilize the surfaces of distant worlds, even if they circled distant suns. But the Great Machine had no power source to drive it. Like a flitter without grav plates, it was going nowhere.

It was during the third hour that Garth made his move. Ornth had fallen sullen and quiet, only making a suggestion now and then as Garth adjusted the power input controls.

Garth grabbed up a sharp length of brass-like metal. It was a broken shard from a frozen valve. He’d had to snap the valve with a prying bar in order to force it to turn. Now it was a dagger of metal with a needle-sharp point. He pressed the dagger to the side of his neck, just under the skull.

“Let us discuss a new order between us,” Garth said.

Absurd! cackled Ornth. I’ve been awaiting just such a juvenile attempt. Continue your work, or I will retake the reins and punish your body. Humans are equipped with two ocular organs-one is enough to function. I will burn your left eye from your head until the socket wisps steam.

“Not before I can thrust this point into my skull.”

Again, the Tulk shook with laughter. Garth gritted his teeth with annoyance. He hated this being that had dared violate his body and mind.

I’ve examined your profile. I know of the idle boasts you made to Fryx, exactly this kind of thing. Putting a gun to your own head and the like. I’ll not be cowed in this manner, rebellious creature! You have no intention of killing yourself and exposing me. You will be ridden, and you will come to accept your place in this universe!

“You’re right,” Garth said. “I don’t intend on committing suicide or exposing you. Instead, I plan to drive this metal spike under the bottom rim of my skull. A precise jab will prod your body, and mortally wound it. You are only a pound or so of soft flesh, after all.”

You would not dare! You would never take such a risk!

“Wrong again,” Garth said, curling his lip in pain as he jabbed the needle-like tip into his own neck. Blood ran down his back and mixed with his sweat in a slurry. “I have little to lose under the current circumstances. I do not have high hopes for my own survival, but I can at least finish my life alone in my thoughts.”

The Tulk raged and complained bitterly, but at last he relinquished the reins of Garth’s mind. He would not shut up, however. As Garth climbed up the long shaft toward the surface, he considered jabbing himself in the back of the head anyway, if only to silence the annoying creature.

Aldo and Nina brought their army at last to the southern end of Lavender City. They hid in a dispersed pattern under the spreading domes of a thousand suntrees. Overhead, the great ship could be seen hanging in the sky. From the ground, it resembled an oblong moon wreathed by tiny artificial lights. Nina wondered if it tracked them and if it possessed weaponry capable of annihilating their army.

“We must press the attack without delay,” Aldo said. “We must rush into their ranks and prevent them from bombarding us from above.”

“Order the mechs in first,” Nina urged, not for the first time. “They are our shock-troops. Once they are engaged I will take my knights over the canyon rim. We will flank them and break them.”

“Can your riding machines handle such a fall?”

“If it is no greater than a few hundred feet, these mounts will fall, but catch themselves. The repellers will keep us from dashing our brains out on the streets below.”

Aldo reluctantly ordered the mechs to charge. Nina watched with glittering eyes. This, she hoped, would be her moment of vengeance. It would have been much better if she could have slain Sixty-Two personally, but having engineered his death was enough for now. She had an entire world to save, after all.

She watched the battle unfold in detail on a computer scroll. Vid pickups followed the mechs, and many of them broadcast live streams of the action.

Things did not go as planned from the start. Almost as soon as they broke free of the suntrees, the Gladius flared with bright pinpoints.

“They are firing on us,” Aldo said.

“They are firing on the mechs,” Nina corrected.

Aldo gave her a sidelong glance that was less than trusting. Did he suspect her plans? No matter, she thought. The die was cast. The mechs were already sprinting across open swards, their feet sparking on the Queen’s Highway as they ran. There was no point in recalling them now.

The snap and whine of descending missiles turned into blossoming explosions. Two initial impacts sent up mushroom clouds. Mech limbs twirled over the landscape. Blooming clouds of dust obscured the battlefield. There were a dozen more strikes all around the landscape, all hitting one clump of running individuals or another. Still, even under harsh bombardment, the mech charge continued undaunted.

Nina strained to see a flapping cloak-a lone figure different from the rest that wore a hat like a man. But there were only clanking, uniform individuals. Perrupters, altered laborers and a few rare construction mechs with massive bodies twenty feet high charged together. They all ran and ran. They died, but kept going. Nina felt a momentary pang of sympathy for them. She’d narrowed her hate to one individual, and no longer wished the rest harm. They were only slaves, as Sixty-Two had taken great pains to point out.

Her eyes roved over the mechs hungrily. Had Sixty-Two already been blown to fragments? She hoped not, she didn’t want to miss such a moment of triumph.

“So many losses,” said a voice beside them. “We can’t win the battle if it goes on like this.”

Nina craned her neck around in shock. It could not be! There stood Sixty-Two, unmistakable in his tattered cloak, scarf and hat.

“You!” she shouted, pointing out into the charging mass of mechs on the field. “Why aren’t you out there with your troops, leading them?”

Sixty-Two tilted his head to one side, a gesture not unlike that of a shrug. “You two are commanders, as am I. Why didn’t you lead the charge you ordered?”

Nina turned away in a fury.

“They’ve reached the alien lines,” Aldo said. “It is time, Baroness.”

Thousands of knights surged out of the suntrees. Nina realized, to her rage and horror, that it was Sixty-Two who was now going to watch her make a suicidal attack from a position of safety and comfort. Seething, Nina Droad screamed for her troops to charge. She might have refused Aldo’s order, but for her own code of honor. She’d sworn to follow a reasonable command from him, and this attack had been her own plan. To disobey now would be to dishonor herself and Droad House. Nor was it possible to sit out the action as Sixty-Two had done. On Ignis Glace, able-bodied nobles led their troops personally.

Ahead of her, she saw the ragged line of knights reach the canyon rim and fly out into space. They plummeted, and those that lost their nerve or who were less than masters of their mounts inverted and plunged to their deaths.

Nina soon came to the rim herself and felt her guts squeeze up tightly within her. She went over the edge and began a wild fall to the dark streets below. Wind rushed up, buffeting her and threatening to knock her from her saddle. Her mount bucked and twisted under her rump, and she fought the controls with every ounce of skill she had. Bright flashes showed enemy fire coming up at her, twice scoring the steel flanks of her mount.

She noticed her mount’s vid pickup was glowing red. Someone was using her cameras to watch the battle remotely. Perhaps it was Sixty-Two himself.

Life was anything but fair.

The watchtower of Lavender City, which had been converted to a hotel and back again to a fortification, was among the last places in the city to succumb to the alien assault. The Duchess Embrak had prepared for this moment, and possessed a slim laser pistol that was custom-shaped to fit her small pale fist. She drew it from the dressing table drawer and checked the energy pack, making sure it was fully charged. Soon, the aliens were hammering on the door. They struck the metal with such alarming strength and rapidity that it shook the walls. The Duchess trembled in shock. How many were out there? Was this the end?

She drew herself up and placed the tip of her weapon under her chin. Four pounds of pressure on the trigger, that was all that was required. She began to squeeze-relented-then began squeezing again. Her eyes shut tight and she bared her fine teeth.

The door buckled. An upper corner of the metal surface curled inward, as if it were folding paper. Her last two bodyguards glanced at her. She nodded to them in salute. One’s face streamed with tears, the other man’s face was locked in an animal snarl. She reflected how differently each person faced a horrific finish to their own lives. She was glad the bodyguards were here. If they had not been present, she doubted she could have maintained a calm exterior. Since there were witnesses, she did not want them to see her collapse over the velvet furniture and bawl like a jilted schoolgirl.

The door came down. Still, the Duchess didn’t fire her weapon and end her own existence. Partly, she was curious about what these aliens looked like in the flesh. There had only been flickering hints from the battlefield pickups. Since it was her final moment, she had decided to indulge that curiosity.

Gray creatures, vaguely man-like, rushed into the room. They moved with unnatural speed, like a vid that was played at high speeds. The two bodyguards fired and the first alien that entered the room went down, flailing. It bounded back up, but was blasted down again. Such vitality. The Duchess was impressed and fascinated.

Two more followed it. The bodyguards were expert marksmen and veterans of many conflicts-reasons for their employment. But they did not concentrate their fire this time, and the killbeasts reached them before they could be slain. One man was decapitated-the one that had been crying. The second grappled with the killbeast for a moment. But it was an uneven contest. The man had a barrel chest and a savage snarl, but he could not face the power of alien musculature. He was bent back double and gargling within seconds. His spine snapped audibly. The Duchess winced. Helpless, he lay on the floor, panting and raving, still alive.

The Duchess took her gun from her throat and fired at the killbeast that had broken her last bodyguard’s back. She held the button down, and the sleek weapon lanced a hole through its tough exterior. The carapace smoked and grey steaming liquids gushed out. The beam came through the far side and the thing staggered. Aiming carefully, she burned three more holes into its carapace and it sagged down.

It was the next killbeast that changed matters. It bound close and swept the weapon away-taking her hand off at the wrist. The gun clunked on the floor, her small bejeweled fingers still gripping it. The Duchess stared at her lost hand in shock.

She passed out then, and when she awakened, she found herself on the back of a table-like creature with a heavy claw holding her down. Her wrist stump had been clamped with some kind of organic blob-it resembled a leech made of gray glue. It had obviously been applied to prevent her from bleeding to death. The thing on her stump pulsed and appeared to be alive. She suspected it was feeding upon her pumping blood, even as it staunched its flow. She could not remove the thing on her wrist, in fact, she could barely move at all.

The Duchess watched from this position on her back, being carried to an alien nest as ants might carry home squirming, living prey. She was at the north end of the valley, where things were relatively quiet. As they climbed the cobbled streets toward the valley exit and the assault ships that waited there to shuttle her to Gladius, she saw a battle erupt at the distant southern end of the valley, miles distant. It had to be Aldo. Why had he attacked the opposite end of the city?

There were no witnesses, so the Duchess allowed herself to cry.