Adam McBroom
United States
Asheville
North Carolina
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I posted this on the FFG forums a month or so ago. Someone suggested I post it here. Just a bit of escapist fan fiction set in the TI3 universe. For avid fans of the TI3 flavor text, this takes place about 12 years before the start of the game. I hope you enjoy it.
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On the slender beaches of Uthar, the silver sands burn all they touch in fourteen hours of daylight. At night they cool rapidly and can be walked upon quite comfortably. The reflective facets of the grains twinkle with the light of the millions of other stars visible through the planet’s unsoiled atmosphere. Under the protection of the Hylar, then the Xxchaa, and now the Mentak, Uthar’s beauty is of the rarest variety. So say even the Naalu.
-Hylar Planetary Digest
All eyes aboard Lori’s Spice were fixed on instrument readout screens. Signals, both real and phantom, danced across radar. Every piece of Astronav was driven mad by mountains of false mass data. These were parlor tricks for an experienced military crew, but completely debilitating to the merchant class freighter. In the minds of the crew suspicion and anxiety took deep root. Every story of a cloaked asteroid taking out an overly curious explorer played out in vivid detail. Every third hand rumor of murder bound pirates sewing terror on the borders of civilized space was whispered openly without the slightest doubt of veracity. Without the charts furnished that morning, Mentak territory was barely navigable. For the crew, fear of treachery had not been stayed by the captain’s assurances that this Hacan vessel had been granted safe passage. If the captain himself had been present when those assurances were given to his patron trade master Sundja, then perhaps he would not share in their fear. More likely it would have
made no difference.
Sundja sat in seclusion in captain’s quarters and poured over the contract agreements his sponsors had drawn up. Hypotheticals. Scenarios. Test cases. None of it had been endorsed, and his own limited authority as a trade master of House Geisle may have afforded him escort from a second rate convoy ship without question, but Sundja couldn’t legally open negotiations with a candy shop clerk without endorsement from the Quieron. This entire operation was illegal, dangerous, and delicate, a combination of qualities that, according to an old family formula, also made it highly profitable.
Sundja stood and smoothed his robes, the musky scent of an unwashed male flowed like a river from the corridor. The Hacan are not a private people. Closed doors are a convention of secure space travel, but in no way an implication of privacy. The captain opened the door with little pause and stepped into the room. His feline grace seemed somehow caged by the tight space, but his sentiment was in no way restrained. “You’ve got my crew scraping out their whiskers here. I need to know your agenda now, or I turn this ship back towards civilized space.” Sundja took a very formal stance, standing straight and tall, holding his arms tight against his body. He looked straight into the captain’s eyes so that his sincerity could be read plainly. “That would be a breach of Mentak protocol, and a death sentence to us all.” Even for a Hacan, the low growl on the bottom of his vowels was unsettling. His rumbling voice drew its strength from deep in his chest, and had none of the high frequency resonance of a low bred “head talker.” He dropped entirely the severe tone of his voice and relaxed his stance, shifting from mere formality to rehearsed presentation as he swept his arm over an array of documents spread across the cramped surface of a small desk. The Hacan are born storytellers. Even the relentless modernists like Sundja were masters of the craft by the standards of any other race. His shift in grace and attitude did not go unnoticed. “Do you know what happened to the trade guild that secured the contracts with those reptiles on Archon Ren? Or the rogue house that found common ground for an agreement with Arc Prime?” The captain nodded. The greatest and most lucrative deals of the last three centuries were well known. Even the grunts of the Baeil Jacgdn trade guild were made nobility by the Quieron, and the rogue house had been legitimized, the Quieron’s third mate had come from their ranks in fact.
Sundja allowed these thoughts time to germinate in the slow witted captain’s mind and then continued “Such deals have made our people great, and yet they would be impossible to forge in this day, our day. We have adopted the bureaucratic habits of the Xxcha, and the corrupted sensibilities of the Mentak. It’s all boons and bribes at the highest levels. Endorsement comes from the ruling house, and their pockets must be filled till their robes cannot move. The houses, great and lesser, are growing fat and stupid. We are slaves to trades that are more tradition than profit.”
The captain listened patiently to the practiced speech. Unmoved he shook his head and spoke a single word that would prove his personal doom just moments later, “Heresy.” Sundja returned once more to his formal stance, arms crossed and legs straight, ears tilted back and out. “Heresy against the religion of sloth that has gripped our leaders.” His tone took the cold presumption of complete authority. He hoped to subjugate the captain by force of will and avoid the bloody confrontation that had been set in motion. “We rendezvous with representatives of the Yssaril spy network and the Naalu fleet. I am negotiating a deal to provide our goods and excess weaponry in exchange for information that only the Yssaril and Naalu can provide.” The captain was not amused by this joke. “You’ve not the authority to strike such deals, and you know that our agreement with the Baron expressly prohibits resale of weapons. What do you think would happen if he found out about this?” Sundja gripped the dagger beneath his robe and held it deep in his sleeve. He stood from his chair and caressed the papers on the table with his free hand. “I will strike this deal and bring it before the Quieron myself. He will be outraged yes… but his greater wisdom will see in it what you cannot. Then his rage will turn on the sycophants that guard his chamber door like a common toll booth. As for the Baron, his vile scrutiny does not reach to Uthar, which is at last the answer to your first question.” The captain was a man of tradition, of honor. He quaked with a healthy fear of Mentak treachery, but never once considered that Sundja, a Hacan of his own House, might strike him down without challenge. He turned to leave the room and stared at that security door as the knife crept from beneath Sundja’s robe and found its way between his ribs and deep into his heart. Sundja whispered a prayer and offered his apologies, though the captain was dead before a breath left his lips. All formality and rehearsal had left his voice. It may well have been the most sincere words he ever spoke in his entire life. “This is bigger than you or our laws cousin. I will see you on the plains of Ixth.”
Sundja stepped out of the cabin and made way to the bridge. He sat in the captains chair and called up the intercom system. “All hands take note, this is trade master Sundja of House Geisle. I have overcome the captain by right of challenge and I am assuming command of this vessel. That is all.”
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Uthar’s atmosphere is its only value. No resources lie beneath its surface, no sentient native species ever found perch in its elegant but inhospitable ecosystems. None of its life forms are suitable for consumption by any but the sturdiest of the Xxcha, and the Utharian ritual feast, an event of some significance to the Xxcha during the height of the imperial age, has long since fallen from favor. Uthar’s mildly toxic atmosphere still affords comfortable short term visits with appropriate preparation. Its unique land and seascapes have consistently proved attractive to the refined and curious. Nestled deep within the treacherous corridors of Mentak controlled space, Uthar is well beyond the ears and eyes of all but the table of captains. It is widely rumored that for an allegedly modest fee the surface of Uthar is made available for clandestine meetings and obfuscated transactions.
- Internal Reference Materials, Hylar Archives Audit Committee
The Hacan do not value diamonds as the rest of the galaxy do. They do not see in them the beauty that catches the eye of a human nor appreciate the durability as do the Noir. But it is beyond even the Hacan to not be awestruck when walking upon a soft carpet of what look to be millions upon millions of tiny twinkling diamonds underfoot. Sundja had taken the requisite supplements to allow him to metabolize the air. He commanded his shuttle pilot to remain aboard ship as he walked the quarter mile down the shore to coordinates designated by his Yssaril contact. He’d spent weeks pushing buttons to remove the obstacles between him and this beach. He’d fought off oversight and taken precautions against discovery. He’d told lies and half truths and taken a superior’s mate to chambers, all in pursuit of this meeting. All the obstacles avoided or eliminated, his mind finally turned to a troubling scenario, betrayal.
Sundja didn’t slow his pace of walking, but he did quicken his pace of thought. He ran through a mental checklist of his known enemies and their capabilities. Their contacts. Their resources. Their force of will. Impossible for the best of them. He made a lifelong audit of possible unknown enemies, those that may have taken exception to his actions. He was as a matter of habit clandestine in nearly all his dealings, precisely to avoid having unknown enemies. To a listener of the silent conversation Sundja had with himself it would have seemed he was talking himself in circles. In truth he was methodical and thorough. By the time he could see the smoke and flames climbing from a small driftwood fire, he had eliminated most of the contingencies that would have suggested he was walking into an ambush.
The shadows of his companions flickered starkly, towering across the narrow beach. The two could not have been more different from each other. Tall and slender, sleek and beautiful, the Naalu cast a terrible, sensuous shadow. The other was short and gaunt. The Yssaril could never have been mistaken for anything but what he was, a viscous little goblin, a thing of nightmare.
It was this creature that spoke first as Sundja approached. “Welcome master trader. We think your journey uneventful yes.” Despite his stately tone and careful word choice, the raspy gravel voice of the creature betrayed its attempts to appear refined. This was a muddy creepy thing and Sundja exercised not only his diplomatic skills, but his considerable constitution, to treat the Yssaril as the ambassador it thought itself to be. “The journey was uneventful. Please extend my thanks to the table of captains for securing our passage.”
The Naalu remained motionless and silent. Had he believed there lived so talented a sculptor in the modern age, Sundja would have thought her a statue. She raised her delicate arm, spreading her silken gown across the delicate curves of her body. Her voice drifted out of her mouth as she cracked it open only slightly. It carried on it a sexual gravitas and deadly confidence. “Welcome beast of Geisle, your presence is pleasurable to me.” Sundja took an intense moment to stare at her. The secret unspoken fantasy of half the universe was to experience congress with the mysterious and sensuous Naalu. Galactic rumor held that they were more than capable of satisfying any sentient creature, and that many of them possessed a mental trait, a side effect of telepathic exhaustion, that rendered them incapable of resisting such advances. Other rumors held that they devoured interspecial suitors inside out. Sundja had no knowledge of the veracity of either claim, but he knew the subtleties of utility involved in mixing sexual polity with business. He knew when to play and when he was being played with. Mostly, he knew how the grace of a polite refusal unfolded. The low growl left his voice entirely, and he spoke without emotion, and yet could not be said to have sounded emotionless. “My presence is required for the business ahead, and that pleasure we share entire.” Few could speak such words with as little meaning as was left in them by Sundja.
Again playing diplomat pretend, the Yssaril took on the formal introductions. “Sundja of Geisle is you. She is Grace til Oua of them Naalu. Gaest of my Yssaril is me. You been contacting mine Headdie, he my subordinate, several weeks now yes. We two like you, we don’t carry no authority real kind matters for we are to discuss here.” The whole thing should have sounded hopelessly ignorant, but there was a certain confidence in the delivery, a personal ease, a sincere comfort with which Gaest was gifted. He sounded more like an eccentric than an idiot.
Sundja nodded and sat cross legged beside the fire. Gaest and Grace til Oua followed suit, the Yssaril sitting likewise cross legged, and the Naalu sitting with torso erect, one leg bent before her, the other folded underneath her. “It is only the beginnings we speak of, authority is not necessary,” Sundja began. “Now I have a number of potential agreements that…” he was interrupted by a tsk-tsk sound coming from behind the sealed lips of Grace til Oua. Gaest was the one to actually speak the objection the Naalu held. “Buisness no good for strangers, friends tell stories say you people”
In his mind Sundja rolled his eyes. Such archaic traditions certainly had their uses, but he was anxious to prowl the negotiations. He had no desire to cause insult to his companions, however, and they were trying to show respect for the ways of his people. He shoved the papers he had been pulling from his robes back into their pouch and laughed disingenuously. “Of course you are right, I have lost myself in anticipation. With what tale shall I regale you?” The choice was spectacularly limited. Sundja knew the stories of children, but had never undergone the intensive education in extended oral histories that had been available to him. He did have his favorites however. “The princess and the Sand Dragon? The Empire of open desert?” Grace til Oua moved her lips so slow and so slight as to go unnoticed, but the result was unmistakable, a smile. “The princesss and the sand dragon,” she answered. Gaest leaned forward, investing his attention fully on Sundja. “Oh yes, that one.” Sundja nodded and rolled up his sleeves. If he could tell a story without waving his arms about he would, but that was not the way he had been taught.
“Before we knew of the Imperium, before we crept off our planet’s surface, before even the First House of the Emirates brought commerce to us, the Hacan organized ourselves by pride alone. A single male and his mates roamed the desert aimlessly.
Then came the King, Daes. We had only one King, for one King was all we ever needed, so wise was he. He commanded that we form cities and learn the ways of one another, and we did. He commanded that mating be tracked, and that none shall mate with his mother’s daughters, and that was done also. He commanded that rivalries cease and that peace should reign. For that he was killed and his carcass given to the buzzards. His message was not lost completely, nor ignored entirely. The First House was formed, and the lesser houses after it, and laws were written for war and for commerce, and our people prospered.
The King’s only heir was his daughter, the princess Hana. She could not be allowed to mate, for whoever bore her son could lay claim to the throne, and the Houses had no more use for a throne. None would kill her, for she was just and beautiful, and they feared her magics. Hana was therefore commanded to wander the desert the rest of her days, and she was given fifteen Eunuchs to guard her virginity. She became something of a shaman, sought for advice and powerful magic and judgment, revered for her commitment to the peace her father dreamed but forbidden from entering even the smallest of villages. And so three centuries passed, and most considered her to be long dead.
The Sand Dragon was a warrior of endless skill, unbreakable flesh, and insatiable thirst for blood. His father had disowned him when he was a cub, and while still a cub he had returned to challenge his father and feasted on his heart. He would enter a city and destroy all its greatest warriors, then move on to the next, laying waste to any who stood in his way, unstoppable by all accounts. The people of Febigda, a small trading town, saw clearly that they lay in the path of the Sand Dragon and they sought out the princess, for only she would be wise enough to know what must be done.
When she was found, most believed it was not truly her, for she had not aged as she should have. Those that did believe her begged her for the secret to her youth, for all are vein. Hana showed to these people her paw, and commanded them not to look upon her with envy, for it would befoul her destiny. Envy she explained was the source of all misery, even that wrought by the Sand Dragon. It was his envy for their families and their love, and their envy for his prowess and his freedom. Should they turn her hand upon him and release their envy, he would lose his powers and none again would walk among them who was so endowed. She then removed her paw as one would remove a ring, and had it cast in bronze and wandered away, never to return.
The paw was mounted in a shrine and pointed south, into the path of the Sand Dragon. The people then put him and his powers from their mind and thought of their daily tasks and sought nothing that was not theirs. The Sand Dragon never arrived and indeed by all accounts vanished entirely. Likewise the princess was never again seen. And never again did anyone of such devastating power as the Sand Dragon or such enduring youth as the princess emerge.”
Sundja reached into his robes and pulled out a small bronze amulet. “Today we carry Hana’s paw as a ward against all envy.” He caressed it between thumb and forefinger, reflecting on all the things he had coveted over the years and wondered if he wasn’t thoroughly doomed.
Grace til Oua clapped her hands against her thighs, evoking an undulating and pleasant rhythm of appreciation. Gaest slapped his small clawed hands together in a crude celebration. “Good story you tell it, Sundja. I wonder what were charms long time. Never I meet one of you people not got one yes.” He pointed his finger at the amulet and started clapping again. “Yes.”
Grace til Oua put her hands to rest on her knees and called up the story she had planned to tell. Naalu are the worst of all story tellers. Their thought patterns are not in the least bit linear, and they have no respect for the distinguishing characteristics of individual stories. They tend to combine their favorite parts of various stories into one amalgam of random words so far out of context as to be incoherent. The stories are however, mercifully short.
Grace til Oua again held her mouth in that slightly open position and allowed her voice to carry up from wherever it originated, soft and crammed full with undercurrents of tone and inflection. “This is a story of Sol origin, it is the story of Christ. His powers rendered the Christ god dangerous. Herod plagued his people but Christ walked on water with glass slippers at night. Finally Herod killed Christ, but he had become a great white whale, and swallowed him. Inside Herod struck bargain with the great beast, enemy of the Christ. Then midnight struck and they all died for they were each firstborn, and such are the ways of mankind.”
That was it. To another Naalu, laden with a catalogue of human thought, it would have been an epic retelling, well delivered, but a little bit too wordy. She let fly a deep maniacal belly laugh, though still her body could not be seen to shake, nor her lips to move. It was a thoroughly disturbing display, and the look shared by Gaest and Sundja told each that the other was as stiffened by it as he. Again Gaest slapped his hands together to make celebratory noise. Sundja showed his appreciation by bringing his paws together once, bringing the back of one paw into the palm of his other paw and shaking the two in unison in three brief thrusts. Unfortunately, it was now Gaest’s turn to spin a tale.
The stories of the Yssaril are filthy, rambling, bawdy tales of incest and tribalism, and they are without number. Relief coursed through Sundja’s body as he realized that Gaest was not telling a story of his own people, but one of the Hacan. It was a word for word memorization apparently, for the retelling lacked the Yssarils peculiar speech pattern (which truth be told, Sundja was beginning to appreciate). Sundja’s lack of interest in traditionalism was a liability of course, as he had no idea who the principal characters were as Gaest shot off tongue mangled versions of their guttural names. Nonetheless Sundja smiled and nodded as if this were one of his favorite tales. Halfway through the story he heard a name he did recognize. His old surname, Chebra, famed house of the old age. His ears perked, his attention had been won.
“House Chebra had failed in their attempts to win favor from house Salia, and thus had no mates for their princes. House Salia had been blessed by the Quieron as the most favored for breeding. He had taken his own mate from their stock, and thus to take a mate from any other house would come with a small cost of prestige. House Chebra, filthy with pride, would not abide such a cost.
A smaller house, Filgra, disgraced some generations past for disloyalty to the Quieron had managed to garner 3 mates from house Salia, having proved their amity in a daring rescue of Salia’s Matron from a fiendish plot.
Chebra, much stronger and far superior, would not openly and honorably declare claim on the holdings of Filgra, but sought them out in a shadow war first. Everywhere Filgra found its ships vanishing, its servants murdered, and its valuables stolen. It was only when Filgra’s home was stormed by peasants likely bribed by Chebra to revolt, that Chebra claimed umbrage, and slew the remnants of house Filgra, claiming the Salia mates as spoils of war.
Make no mistake, all the houses knew precisely what had happened. But as a matter of law, interpreted through the judiciary in common pay of all the houses, nothing could, or even should be done about Chebra’s contravention of honorable accord.
Two of Chebra’s newly won mates were pregnant. They were kept hidden and when their prides were born, they were released into the vacuum of space. Thus were the new brides of Chebra made virgin and the last of the Filgra heirs slain.”
Sundja was mortified. That the traditions of his people were so brutal was sickening enough. His own recent violence aside, Sundja despised such lawless corruption as a matter of standard fare. House Chebra had received its own disfavor in the time of his father. By then eradication had been deemed too barbaric and ham-fisted. Such self destruction could not be endured in the modern age, and those of skill and humility could easily find new homes when their own house was outlawed. Less than a generation later Sundja had garnered a position as a trade master of house Geisle, and should this deal prove fruitful he may very well become Consult. His own pride would be seen as “born cousins,” and the following generation would be “blooded” Geisle.
These thoughts were interrupted as the long pause of the Yssaril proved not to be the end of the story, bat an amateur attempt at dramatic convention.
“Before the theft of Filgra’s mates, one of the Salia females had already given birth to a single male cub. This cub was sent to live in safety, far beyond the reach of any Hacan house, with old allies that had taken refuge in the service of the Captains Table on Moll Primus. He grew strong and learned the code of his hosts. Learning of his sad history the cub embraced completely the life he had been given, and foreswore vengeance against his enemies. He took a bride whom he loved and lived his days in peace. As did his son, and his grandson.”
“A strangely comforting end to such a story” remarked Sundja as Gaest paused again, stirring the embers of the fire. Gaest did not respond to Sundja’s comment, nor did he continue in his story. Gaest and Grace til Oua just stared at Sundja with dead, emotionless eyes. Piercing him.
Staring through him.
No! Behind him! They were staring behind him!
Sundja whirled a half turn before the blade set on its journey, piercing his flesh and shattering one of his ribs and coming to rest just below the heart, severing his aorta.
A voice of practiced cruelty and heavy breath, bearing a growl of menace, and carrying in its low rumble an unfathomable malice, whispered a hateful treachery in his ear. “The great grandson found no peace, and sought vengeance with all the muster of his cold black heart.”
Sundja collapsed to the sand and bled out all his hopes and dreams. Felled for the crimes of his forgotten ancestors, there was not a single Hacan male that would have found less solace in such a poetically traditional end. Had the blade struck true he would have no time to contemplate his end, but the minutes of helpless observance he was so granted were not comforting.
Gaest took a tone far less friendly than the farcical diplomacy he’d been pretender to moments before. “Madja agreement satisfied yes. You madness quest open business, we three alliance sealed?” The snaggle toothed pirate stood a foot taller than Sundja had, a trait of the ancestors they had not shared. His tight black vest allowed his well toned arms to be gloriously displayed in a way that Hacan robes never could. His face was scared generously from his youthful rise to power and below the patch on his right eye, the worst of it could be seen to never have healed right. He wiped his blade with a ceremonial cloth and stuffed the cloth beneath his vest. He sheathed the blade likewise, and breathed deep. “Aye, It’s agreed. The slaves of the last age will not be slaves again.” Grace til Oua spoke with an ill ease on her lips. “I think you have paid the higher price Madja Filgra, this hatred you nurture has cost you claim to the Mentak throne.”
Madja looked at the fire and smiled. He tried to rub the blood from his fur with huge scoops of sand. The lucidity of this rare moment of peace had granted him a degree of insight. “You can’t read such a hate filled mind can you? You don’t know what else is in here. Do you?” He tapped his head just above the bridge of his nose and snorted, the last of his adrenaline rush calming into a small spasm in his face. Grace til Oua dropped her shoulders and tilted her head and eased her voice into a very pleasing lilt. “Tell me.” Either she knew already and wished to encourage Madja in his false intuitive leap, or she was hoping he would think that was the case.
Madja laughed heartily, plunging his hands into the sand. The relentless circular logic of merely being in the presence of the Naalu was daunting. He decided that directness was the only refuge. “Aye, I’ll tell you. It’s not complicated. That’s no throne I give up, it’s a bloodbath. The Mentak can ill afford a Civil War, and Bolivar wouldn’t roll over on her stomach for me to run roughshod over all her reforms and galactic posturing. It was a staring contest, and I blinked. Now it’s compromised and settled. Bolivar becomes Erwin’s hand, we all gain our alliance good and secret like, but official, and I get resources, information, and latitude to settle old accounts and bring those sniveling Emirates to their knees. Aside that, I’ll outlive Bolivar by a century at least.”
Gaest nodded approvingly. The Yssaril spent centuries trading blood for time against the occupational forces of the Lazax. It was an equation they nearly held sacred. Blood for Time. To watch the unfolding of its counter solution, Time for Blood, would be pleasing. An eruption of three short beeps from the small transmitter dangling inconspicuously as an earring in Madja’s ear interrupted the conversation. A quavering voice with a faint echo crackled over the receiver mounted in his jacket pocket.
“Lori’s Spice has been boarded sir, we have command.” Madja bit his lip and spit out his orders. “Stick to the list, put anyone on it in Brig 1, they’re mine. Put the rest in Brig 2, we’ll sort out the ransoms later and divvy up for tributes and payroll. Are the engines damaged?” The voice returned, the crackling had been cleared up, but the echo remained, almost elegant. “Yes sir, inoperable.” Madja scratched his chin “And the hull, compromised?” “No sir.” Madja ran his fingers through his mane, and fiddled with the strap that held his patch over his eye. “Then call in a crew from Bolivar’s fleet and either fly it or haul it to Ship Yard Geida for refit. Madja out.” “Aye sir, see you at Geida. Arsonesuei out.”
Grace til Oua’s ears perked, recognition ran through her like a slow train. “Arsonesuei, that’s a Hylar name.” Gaest ran the name through his brain briefly. Hylar had no surnames and no ancestral homage. Every single one of them had an individual name going back through all of their recorded history. There were super complex mathematical patterns in the sylabical assemblage to denote family and age, region of origin and even destiny (to the extremely limited degree in which the Hylar believed in such intangible superstition), but only the Hylar were capable of utilizing the formulas. “Arsonesuei, he big Fish. Admiral. Treason he did to them Hylar. Two decades now he dead.”
Madja took an even tone at first, speaking slow and deliberate. “The Mentak cast a wide net for the skillful refugees of other societies. The heart of our survival is a belief in second chances.” His manners turned unabashedly threatening at this point. “Never seek out the refugees of your own laws within our ranks. Never seek deals with our captains for the surrender of such refugees. Never seek even their names, or their number. We have only a few laws, but that is our oldest.”
Grace til Oua bowed her head in acknowledgement, and Geast nodded, there was no need to shatter their fragile alliance over so trivial a matter. The spy guild could easily find out if any of its number had taken second lives with the Mentak.
Madja conceded that his point made, there were more important issues at hand. “Gaest, in your last transmission you hinted that you had strange news from your fleet that you wished to relay.” Gaest nodded. “Them Naalu I been told, they make special task force, bring news soon maybe. We find distress from the Zollar, them Hacan vessel. Zollar vanished one year now. We network took note, analysts say Mentak pirates most get ‘em probably 82%, so we no concern no. Distress call tells different true story.”
Madja let his concern wash over his face openly. “Please Gaest, I can smell your fear, it hangs in the air. Unburden yourself.” A concerned Yssaril is only a pleasantry for his most dire enemies. Even a casual enemy will be unnerved at the sight of an Yssaril that has fear in his eyes. Madja didn’t even notice the last stirrings of his poorly slain victim. A leg kicked, a silent cough, it wasn’t very noticeable.
Sundja had at last come to the end of his long death. The words began to mix and fall from his understanding. “Warship,” “ruthless,” “new big power,” they hung before him like books in a foreign language and then were gone. His consciousness drifted deeper and deeper into a darkness without end. He heard a whisper in his mind, but could not begin to know what it was saying.
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