*
A handful of hours later, nine security bots arrived to seize them and take them away. All three prisoners remained hungry and thirsty.
Their hosts made no effort to offer them anything.
They did not bother to ask. Their hands were secured in front of them.
The adjoining interrogation room lit up, looking more like a medical lab. Naero watched as Gallan and Tarim were secured on medbeds.
Naero’s three guards led her out of the chamber for another happy visit with Kattryll.
“What’s going to happen to my friends?” she said. She could smell Tarim’s fear.
“They will be interrogated,” the lead bot answered, its soothing AI voice a mockery.
“But they don’t know anything.”
“The director believes in being thorough. You may discuss the matter with him.”
The doors snapped shut behind her. She didn’t even get to say goodbye.
Her three bot escort gained clearance to a secured mover that took them somewhere else in the ship. Naero could only guess.
They stopped.
“Error. Incorrect destination,” the lead bot remarked.
The doors snapped opened.
A large blur ripped into the three bots.
Naero dropped to the floor.
Unknown force attacking security drones, Om howled. Defensive protocols still offline. Unacceptable.
She caught the flash of twin, blazing green disruptor blades that arced through armor and vital systems.
In less than a second, all three sec-bots lay all about Naero in pieces, busted up and oozing fluids.
Sparks flew from the pieces internally.
Three silver spheres rose up over the bots and sucked up the pieces and every trace of them, like bizarre null collectors disposing of junk.
The doors closed, the mover continued on its way again.
Her hands were still bound.
A blazing green blade sliced through her restraints like a scalpel through flesh.
Baeven revealed his grim face beneath his strange, shifting black cloak and hood.
He shut down his disruptor blades and smiled. “Well, hello again, Naero.”
She could have hugged him, but her mind raced.
Threat is known to us? Is this an ally?
Yes, Om. He’s trying to help us escape…for now. I don’t know what he plans once we get away.
“We have to get Gallan and Tarim,” she told Baeven. “They’re being tortured.”
“I know. We can’t do anything about that right now.”
“Those sec-bots–their central control will know someone took them out. They’re probably on the way to retake us already.”
Baeven tapped one of the floating silver spheres They purred like pets at his touch. They glowed brightly for a moment and then phazed away.
“The enemy will detect nothing, and to them I’m not even here. I do not exist.
“Temporal shifting emulators,” he said. “They’re a few seconds out of phaze with us. But they’ll imitate the signatures of the sec-bots for as long as we need. The ruse will last long enough for us to complete our business here and get you and your friends to safety. Then they’ll explode...quite spectacularly.”
“Where are we going?”
“You still have a date with a Mr. Kattryll. Shall we keep your torturer waiting?”
Naero half smiled. “Certainly not.”
“Function Sigma-Mirra-47,” he commanded the shifters.
Holos of the three sec-bots shimmered over each of the three small spheres. “Marcron emulators. They can simulate almost anything.”
“I’ll pretend my hands are still bound. Let me give nubs a little surprise.”
“Play along at first. We need to find out what form the Kexxian Data Matrix takes and how they can detect it. Why do they think you and your brother might have it? They possess key knowledge that we do not.”
“My parents weren’t transporting any kind of alien tek data.”
“We can’t be sure of that. Our foes seemed pretty determined and adamant about the matter.”
“Even if they did, if I know my parents, they dumped or destroyed it somehow before they went down. But the Corps still think Jan and I might have it.”
“Do you? That would explain a great deal. How can you be certain, one way or another?”
“So, even the great renegade Baeven’s at a loss? You don’t know anything more about this mess?”
“Nothing but rumors through several contacts. We don’t even know how the data is encrypted or transported. You or Jan may in fact be carrying it with you and not even know it.”
“Great.”
The mover stopped.
“So, what’s our plan?” Naero asked.
“Keep Mr. Kattryll distracted while I disable his security and search his files. Then we’ll have a few kind words with him.”
“What do you mean, keep him distracted? The bastard wants to rape and torture me.”
Baeven phazed away with a vanishing smile.
Naero wondered if she was going to be sick.
She marched in with the phony sec-bots just as expected.
Kattryll stood with his back to her, completely naked.
“I am going to vomit,” she muttered.
Once illuminated more, the strange room was fully revealed to be a bizarre jumble of furnishings and decorations from many worlds and time periods.
But the most striking thing was a beautiful, naked young man floating in the air off to one side, his wrists and ankles stretched painfully in grav-restraints.
He formed an obscene X in the air with his nude form, his superbly toned young body scarred with cuts, large purple welts, blisters, and burns.
His battered, chiseled face slumped down on his chest, still dripping blood beneath his long, dark blondish hair.
Then she saw the young man’s long triple braids hanging down his back.
Damn it all to hell.
And here she had felt sorry for him.
A Matayan prince of all things.
Why in the living hell did such a beautiful creature like this have to be one of her bitterest Clan enemies? A young man built like a god.
Kattryll turned on her finally, leering.
“Ah, little Naero, come to join the fun?”
He pointed at the Matayan. “I wanted to be in good form for you. This boy was just a warm-up. I was instrumental in solving a recent Corps problem with the Matayans. In return, this lovely boy was given to me as one of my prizes, a hostage to ensure compliance to the Corporate will. Matayans can be dreadfully stubborn.”
“I’m impressed. You appear in better spirits today.”
“Professional ethics, my child. I put on my best face when I work. I’m also less morose after I’ve rested and I’ve a had a chance to whet my appetites. I trust you slept well?”
She nodded at the prince. “What do you want with me? It looks like you prefer boys.”
“Not really. I enjoy domination.” He reached out and caressed her face slowly.
“Gender in sex is irrelevant. Yet there is nothing more arousing than the subjugation of others, to break them utterly and completely.”
“You sick, corpulent turd.”
He smiled at her voraciously. “The stronger the will, the bigger the challenge. The greater the arousal.” He sat back across from her and glanced over at her dried spittle, still marring the surface of his prize desk.
He threw two pairs of grav restraints over at her feet. “I hope you won’t disappoint me.”
She narrowed her eyes to slits. “You want those on me, pus-slug? You put them on me. I’d like to see you try.”
Kattryll sighed. “Very well. Guards. Stun her briefly.” He slipped in front of his desk again, before he realized the bots weren’t responding.
Baeven appeared behind Kattryll and nodded to her.
Naero grinned, launching herself through the air right through the h
olos. She cleared the space between her and Kattryll, ramming both of her heels into his fleshy face.
The torturer’s facial bones and cartilage popped nicely.
Two hundred kilograms of stinking, sweating meat slammed into his wooden desk and shattered it.
Kattryll crashed to the floor and soiled himself.
He whimpered and screamed, clutching at his broken face.
Naero could only imagine the agony and terror this monster had inflicted on others over the years. On men, women, old people–even children.
Who knew how many?
She walked over to him and pressed her left foot down onto his throat just enough.
His dead fish eyes bulged. She let up a bit so that he could breathe and talk.
“Surprise,” she said.
Baeven dropped the same gravrestraints onto the man’s heaving chest. “Why don’t you put these on?”
“My people will be on you in seconds,” he shrieked. “They’ll cripple you and give you right back to me.”
“Let’s wait and see,” Baeven said, holding up his hands.
Several moments passed.
Baeven stuck his bottom lip up and rolled his eyes.
“Maybe they’re busy,” Naero suggested.
“Perhaps it has something to do with my disabling your security and all of your backups. Why, look: We have you to ourselves, with all the time we need.”
Kattryll sweated, stinking worse by the minute.
His own grav restraints had a little trouble hoisting his stinking bulk up into the air.
Kattryll muttered curses at them all the while.
Against her better judgment, Naero went over and released the Matayan, hoping he didn’t have enough strength to attack her.
She lowered him gently to the ground and snagged a medkit from a stand covered with medical supplies.
She cleaned and dressed the worst injuries first.
Even banged up as he was, the Matayan remained astonishingly beautiful.
Her luck, he probably had the soul of a snake, like most Matayans.
He came to suddenly, and spit bile and blood at her in defiance. “Kattryll…I will kill you, you bastard. One day I will break free and kill you slow.”
His vision blurred. He fell back, choking. Naero cleared his airway.
His eyes fluttered open again at her soft touch.
“A girl? How did...who? ...A Spacer?”
“Don’t move. You’re pretty bad off.”
“Does Kattryll think to break me by letting my enemies humiliate me?”
“Hey, look. I’m not real happy about this, either, but if you don’t try to kill me, I won’t try to kill you. ’Kay?”
“I...I don’t understand. A truce? Until we escape?”
“Sure. Why not?” Naero said.
“I must really be desperate if Spacers are helping me.”
“And thank you very much as well. You might notice that you’re not a prisoner anymore, and that I’ve tended your wounds. Our mutual fat friend is floating in the air over there, having a polite conversation with my...other associate.”
The Matayan craned his neck.
Baeven stood in front of Kattryll with his arms folded, activated disruptor blades scorching the very air in both hands.
He spoke in a low voice.
The Matayan’s eyes narrowed with hatred.
He tore himself away from Naero’s grasp and tried to get at Kattryll. But he was still too weak and fell forward onto his face.
“Kill him,” the Matayan begged. “Kill that monster. No one deserves it more than he.”
He lunged toward Kattryll again. Naero caught him as he crashed back to the floor, unconscious.
What was there about this Matayan that made her heart go out to him? By all rights she should let him die, or finish him herself.
Instead she opened the medkit again and went to work on trying to revive him.
She finished up about the same time Baeven did.
“I think I have as much as we’re going to get out of this blivet,” Baeven said at last.
“What’s a blivet?” Naero asked.
“Ten kilos of shit in a five kilo bag,” he said with a smile. “If your parents were indeed smuggling what he claims, the Corps will stop at nothing to acquire it.”
“Do you know what form the Kexxian Matrix takes or how to detect it?”
“We’re on the right track, but it’s worse than we feared. This treasure holds a vast amount of information, much more advanced than what we thought. It will be centuries, perhaps millennia ahead of anything out there–Spacers, Corps, every known culture.”
“How could Mom and Dad get ahold of something like that?”
“No one knows exactly; not even the Corps. But everyone’s scrambling to find out more and to locate it. We’re still not sure what form the Kexxian Matrix takes, but from Kattryll’s top secret files, at least now I have some insights on how we might detect and perhaps decode it. But the Corps are still ahead of us somehow. We need to catch up.”
“Good. If we’re done here, let’s grab Gallan and Tarim and get the hell out of here. Where in the hell is here, anyway?”
“The Triaxian battleship Napoleon. We’re in a secured area of the ship used only by Triaxian Intel. I’ll impersonate Kattryll and we’ll spring your friends. Let’s go.”
She looked down at her patient. “I want to take the Matayan.”
“He’s an enemy. Leave him.”
“He’s a hostage. I won’t give Kattryll the satisfaction.”
“Good point; take his toys. I think Kattryll’s superiors will do a much better job on him than we ever could–once they learn of our escape.”
“You’re probably right. The Corps take care of their own. Hey, Matayan, can you walk? I know you’re listening.”
The Matayan snapped his head up like a wounded Hoshen lion and glared at her suddenly. “I can run and fight, Spacer. If we survive, rest assured that my family will pay whatever large ransom you set for my release.”
“If we make it,” Naero said, “you’re free to go once we’re clear. But think about that. They gave you up to the Corps once. What’s to keep them from doing so again?”
“Hah. I’ll believe that when I–”
“Suit yourself. Get dressed and come with us, or stay here. Find a weapon or two if you can. What do we call you, anyway?”
“Ellis.”
Simple enough.
“I’m Naero.”
The Matayan turned away, rummaging through the strange room.
Baeven chuckled. “You always pick the grateful ones?”
“Just lucky that way.” She watched the Matayan get dressed, silently chiding herself the whole time.
Baeven put neutralized control collars on both Ellis and Naero to give the proper illusion to anyone who might see them.
He adjusted his cloaker to imitate Kattryll.
“You won’t make it out of here,” the fat man said.
“We’ll do more than that,” the false-Kattryll said, in an exact duplication of the man’s vocal pattern.
Naero walked up to the real one and glanced once under his rolls of flab. She clucked her tongue and smacked him on his huge belly.
“Like I thought, just a nub. It wasn’t meant to be, blivet-boy.” She waved a hand in front of her nose–“Whew, you’re getting ripe. Try not to soil yourself again while you’re hanging around for the next day or so.”
Ellis came over and taped Kattryll’s mouth shut. “I don’t have the time, so I won’t be able to kill you slow. But I want you to remember me.”
He clamped a pain bug to Kattryll’s left nipple. The fat man’s eyes bulged. Two hundred kilograms of pale, bloated flesh bucked and shuddered in the grav restraints.
“Let’s go,” Ellis said. “I can’t believe this. Now I’m allied with Spacer Intel. My family will probably hang me.”
“If it’s any consolation,” Baeven said with Kattryll’s voice, “we
’re not Spacer Intel. Follow my lead or I’ll kill you.”
With the phony sec-bots around them, Baeven led them back to the holding area.
When they walked in on Gallan and Tarim’s questioning session, the Triaxians snapped to attention. Gallan and Tarim looked beaten up, but she guessed that they could still walk.
“Release the prisoners to me and prepare my shuttle immediately,” the false-Kattryll said.
“This is highly irregular,” the duty officer said. “I had no such orders.”
“These orders come from the top through me,” Baeven told him. “The prisoners are wanted for further questioning at another facility, on a need-to-know basis.”
Baeven’s glance was withering. Dead on. “Or would you like to disappear along with them? Is that clear enough?”
The duty officer swallowed hard. “Very clear, sir.”
“Then shut your traps and follow my orders. Prepare my transport and forget you ever saw me or these people, understood? We don’t need any leaks now, of all times.”
“Understood, sir.”
Within minutes, Baeven and Naero piloted the Triaxian luxury shuttle away from The Napoleon. Naero watched as Baeven plotted a course, but he did it so fast and with such precision that she couldn’t figure out where they were headed.
By the time the Triaxians knew what was up and scrambled their interceptors, three massive explosions crippled the big ship. The battleship’s big guns never even got a shot at them.
“Wah-hoo!” Naero screamed. Their ship lurched into jump. “What a ride. Eat shit, Triax!”
Tarim and Gallan stared at her wide-eyed, and then over at the Matayan, completely confused.
What value would there be in consuming excrement?
All of them knew how close they’d been to death.
“Who are you people?” the Matayan prince demanded.
25