Darkness Rising Read online

  Volka looked at Sixty in alarm. Sixty’s eyes were on the cold-eyed man at the center of the group. He didn’t hesitate as he stepped up to the sliding glass airlock doors, though, so Volka didn’t, either.

  Before the doors even closed behind their heels, Sixty said, “Since you didn’t ether, I’m guessing this isn’t a personal call.”

  Wiggling in her pack, Carl said, “Oh, yeah, forgot to mention he was visiting.”

  “No,” said the man, his voice as chilly as his expression.

  Scanning the military escort, Sixty said, “I’ve done nothing to warrant an arrest. Do I need to sic Lauren G3 on you?” Volka’s stomach dropped at the mention of the legal ‘bot who had helped defend Sixty from a frivolous lawsuit, and who was hopefully already working on protecting FET12 from being deactivated permanently. Was more legal trouble following Sixty?

  “You have done no wrong, 6T9,” the stranger replied, and tension left Volka’s shoulders. “Nor has your companion.” He tilted his head toward Volka. “Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

  Sixty’s eyes narrowed at the stranger. “Volka, this is James Sinclair. James, this is Volka.”

  Volka’s ears perked. “Admiral Noa Sato’s husband James?” she asked, startled. This cold man was married to Noa?

  James bowed slightly. “The same. I’ve heard a lot about you, Volka. It’s an honor to finally meet you.” His expression didn’t soften with his words, and his eyes immediately returned to Sixty. “This isn’t a personal call,” he said. “I need your help. My team needs immediate transport to System 33.”

  The tiny space between the glass airlock doors and the plastitubing gangway had an intercom mounted in the wall. It crackled, and an announcer called passengers of a flight to Mars, and then another for Proxima Centauri.

  Volka’s android partner had programming that made him inhale and exhale, even though Sixty didn’t need oxygen. Her ears flicked now. He wasn’t “breathing” at all, and his face had drained of all expression. His hand went out as though he was going to put it behind Volka’s back, but he didn’t touch her. “How immediate is immediate?” Sixty asked, voice soft.

  “Now,” said James.

  Her ears twitched at Sixty’s gulp.

  From her pack came the crackle of Carl’s ether-to-speech device. “No, no, no! Absolutely not.” A moment later, Carl poked his head around her shoulder. “Volka and I need to go back to our asteroid for some real food. We can discuss transporting you afterward.”

  “Carl Sagan,” said James, his eyes focused on the werfle with predatory-like intensity. “The One might want to consider being more helpful. What with events on Luddeccea.”

  Volka remembered the fear that had gripped her in the elevator. “Events on Luddeccea?” she blurted.

  “Relax, pet, Solomon wouldn’t let any harm come to Alaric,” Carl said.

  Solomon? Volka’s eyes went wide. “Alaric’s…werfle?” Carl’s words spun around between Volka’s ears like flies. The uneasy churn returned to her stomach.

  “Yes,” Carl replied. “James, you can tell Noa that Kenji is safe, too.”

  “That won’t reassure the Senate,” James said tightly.

  Something terrible had happened. Volka’s chest tightened. “And it doesn’t reassure me either.”

  “Events on Luddeccea have nothing to do with The Republic,” Carl said. “And they are…political…not personal.”

  Volka’s heart skipped a beat.

  Stepping closer to Volka, eyes on Carl, James said, “To assure The Republic of The One’s goodwill, it might be wise to help us out now.”

  Unable to contain herself, Volka exclaimed, “What is happening on Luddeccea?”

  7

  Luddeccea: The Enemy Within

  Sitting in a bed of startlingly clean linens, Alaric lifted the bowl to his lips and drained the contents. The ptery rice soup was room temperature and unseasoned, but it tasted as good as anything he’d ever eaten. Wild Solomon sat at his feet, purring softly and kneading the sheets.

  It was only after he’d drained the last dregs that Alaric asked a med tech, “What is happening here?”

  The human med tech, just finishing administering intravenous fluids to another patient, gave a worried look in Solomon’s direction. “I…I don’t think I can explain that to you, sir.” The man had dark circles under his eyes and deep hollows under his cheekbones. Ducking his head, he hurried off. Alaric sat on the bed, bewildered. He gazed at his fellow patients. Some were awake, but sweat beaded their brows, and they lay in bed with empty eyes. Others muttered to themselves. Many had bandages wrapped around their lymph nodes. Alaric lay back and tried to be patient.

  The medic came back, perhaps half an hour later, a pair of electric clippers, a towel, soap, and Luddeccean Guard dress greens neatly folded in his arms. “A messenger just brought the uniform. You’re to have an audience in an hour.” Casting an uneasy eye at Solomon, he gave the items to Alaric and then pointed to the rear of the ward. “There are showers back there.”

  “I need access to counsel—” Alaric began to say.

  “A demon!” shrieked a man several beds down, ripping out his IV fluids. “Let me go!”

  Rushing to the fevered man, the medic fumbled with the IV, murmuring, “Without fluids and antibiotics, you’ll die. You must be calm.”

  Another patient ripped out his line. “I can’t stay here with it!”

  “Can I help you?” Alaric asked, approaching the struggling medic.

  Looking over his shoulder, the medic hissed, “If you want to help me, take the werfle with you.”

  Other patients began thrashing in their beds. Someone cried out, “Devils. Devils!”

  “Go!” shouted the medic.

  Alaric turned to the bed, wondering if he could catch the wild, venomous Solomon in the sheets, but the creature was already at his heels, blinking up at him, seemingly unperturbed by the commotion. The werfle had followed him this far. Alaric grabbed his bundle and went to the showers. Wild Solomon followed him into the long, empty room, crawled up a stone wall, settled into a sunbeam on the ledge of the single barred window, and closed his eyes.

  Alaric showered, dressed, and set to work with the safety clippers. Venomous or not, Alaric was used to the creature’s company, and even though the room’s only mirror was right next to the window, Alaric didn’t think twice about standing under the werfle as he shaved. He was just dusting off his uniform when he heard boot steps in the med ward, too regimented to be anything but the Luddeccean Guard. He turned on his heel just in time for Commander Ran, his second in command, to walk in, flanked by eight Guardsmen, all armed. Alaric recognized none of them.

  Alaric clasped his hands behind his back. He’d lost weight and his uniform no longer fit. The safety clippers hadn’t been sharp and had a permanent guard, and his hair and beard were still rough and uneven. But he’d learned long ago that being imposing was all in attitude. He leveled his eyes at Ran—his back straight, his chin high—and then the werfle jumped onto his shoulders. Alaric doubted the prison infirmary had anti-venom, and a werfle bite was enough to kill a grown man, but he froze not in fear, but frustration. Jaw going hard, his gaze went to the ceiling. So much for projecting authority. Wild Solomon twined around the front of Alaric’s neck, settled with its snout facing Ran and his retinue, kneaded its ten sets of claws, and purred. Loudly. Alaric exhaled slowly through his teeth, unable to look at the Guardsmen.

  “Are you trying to threaten me?” Ran demanded.

  Completely caught off guard, Alaric blurted, “What?”

  “Get that thing off your shoulder!” Ran ordered.

  Alaric almost reached up to pull the creature off its perch. The first Solomon had liked to sit in exactly the same way and had kneaded his back just so. With his first Solomon, whenever it had gotten to be too much, Alaric had merely reached up and pulled his werfle off. But it wasn’t Solomon, and he stilled his hands. Standing before Ran and the Guardsmen, looking like
the werfle-draped farm boy he once was and not the man he’d become, he said, “I can’t. It’s not tame. It’s just…” His eyes slid to the creature. “...taken a liking to me.” It was comical, really. His lips twisted into a crooked half-smile and the werfle butted its head against his cheek, forcing him to look back at the Guard. To his surprise, instead of the bemusement and disdain he expected, Ran’s men looked tense. Their knuckles were white on their stun rifles, and they shifted on their feet. Alaric heard a few gulps, and he swore they’d all become paler. The men looked terrified…as everyone had seemed to be of Solomon. Werfles’ venom was deadly, but they were hardly ever aggressive if unprovoked, and in any event, the most likely target of a bite was Alaric himself.

  “We could stun it,” Ran said.

  Alaric’s embarrassment turned to fury in a heartbeat. Stunning a werfle, even at the lowest power, would kill it. Trying to stun the werfle, missing and hitting Alaric’s head, might kill him.

  “I’m sure that isn’t necessary,” Alaric said, taking a step toward Ran. “Let the creature live. God knows, we could use the pest control around here.”

  All but one of Ran’s guard took a step back, rifles sagging in their arms, their eyes sliding to one another. Alaric did his best to keep his expression neutral, but he was becoming alarmed by their fear.

  “Commander, sir,” said the one man holding his ground, a Corporal. “We have orders from Archbishop Sato that werfles and cats are to be left alone.”

  Alaric tilted his head at the archbishop’s name. Archbishop Sato was a hero of Revelation. Over one hundred years ago, he’d been the first to discover that the time gates had become sentient. He’d placed a bomb aboard Luddeccea’s gate, delaying the gate’s eventual attack, and enabling a crack team of Guardsmen to slip aboard and disable the gate’s remaining defenses in a dramatic suicide mission. That, in turn, had allowed the Guard ships to strike before any more fission bombs could be dropped. The archbishop was undeniably a genius, and was in charge of monitoring Luddeccea’s supercomputer, making sure that it never developed its own sentience. He was also over 122 years old. Religious Luddecceans like Volka believed Sato survived because he was a saint. Alaric suspected it was Republic technology combined with the sense to be apolitical. The only controversial stance the old man had taken was to allow exceptionally talented weere into the priesthood.

  At mention of the archbishop’s name, Ran’s frame sagged slightly. To Alaric, he said, “You can keep it.” His eyes narrowed on the werfle. “Or it can keep you. Come with me.”

  The guard divided into two neat lines and Ran led Alaric between them. A few minutes later, they were marching across the gravel that surrounded the prison to two armored vans. Ran hesitated a moment and then said, “Darmadi rides alone with me.” A few moments later, they were alone in the back of the first vehicle. Sitting across from Alaric, Ran gripped his pistol tight, his gaze occasionally going to Wild Solomon, still on Alaric’s shoulder. Through the phaser-proof glass to the front seat, Alaric could see two of Ran’s escorts. He heard another man hop onto the wide, back bumper, and knew that exit was guarded, too. Not that he was thinking of escape.

  As soon as the engine started, something in Ran appeared to snap. His lip curled up and he turned to Alaric. “I didn’t turn you in.”

  Alaric raised a brow, curious at the confession of innocence juxtaposed with the anger.

  “You had everything!” Ran continued. “A beautiful colonel’s daughter, two healthy sons, a career most would envy…and then you do this.”

  Alaric’s skin heated. “I did not collaborate with the Libertian rebels, Ran, and I had no part in the attack at the inn.”

  “You think I don’t know that!” Ran said. “I would have turned you in if I’d thought you had. But it looks bad, Darmadi. Why didn’t you tell command you were the weere bitch’s patron?”

  Oddly, it took a moment for Alaric to tie Volka to the slur “weere bitch.” When he pieced it together, he wasn’t angry. Instead, a wry smile crept across his lips. “I was not her patron.”

  Ran hissed, “Don’t lie. We know you were involved.”

  “We were involved, but I was never her patron,” Alaric responded, leaving out that Volka had refused his patronage. No need to expose that old wound.

  “She and the android saved you from the rubble after the attack!” Ran protested.

  So she had. Alaric almost smiled. “I believe she is still fond of me.”

  Ran stared at him a beat too long and then looked away. He huffed. “Of course, you weren’t her patron. You didn’t have to offer her money; she did it all for love.” He shook his head again. “You had everything.”

  Suddenly very tired of talking to Ran, Alaric’s eyes drifted to the front window, past the guards, and out to the street. In front of their vehicle was a truck with an open back. The cargo made his chest tighten. Corpses of men, women, and children were stacked like wood, many of them not even shrouded. “What has happened here?” he whispered.

  “A lot,” Ran said, his own voice tired. “When you were arrested, there was already tension in No Weere. Some weere were murdered by the Guard under orders of Counselor Abraham. Among them were Counselor Abraham’s own weere and her whelp.”

  Alaric remembered Volka’s assertion that the reason there was a warrant for her arrest was because she knew about Abraham’s “weere whelp.”

  Ran continued, his voice tired, “The weere believed it was his miracle child.”

  On Luddeccea, it was believed that weere and humans couldn’t conceive. Alaric had that misconception destroyed during his time with Volka, but he hadn’t thought that weere could carry a human-weere fetus to term. On Libertas, the system’s other self-sufficient colony, where Luddeccea central control was weaker, weere-human hybrids were relatively common. Travel was so restricted between the two planets that the truth hadn’t filtered to Luddeccea—but Ran knew.

  Ran scowled and ran a hand through his hair. “I guess it could have been his. Anyway, his crackdown caused riots. And then, maybe to deflect from the chaos that his personal life had caused, Abraham released intel from the Galactic Republic that the werfles are sentient and capable of rudimentary mind control.”

  Alaric went rigid, remembering Volka saying her werfle had spoken to her.

  Ran’s eyes narrowed on Solomon, and the creature slithered from Alaric’s shoulder to the seat beside him. Smiling tightly at Alaric, Ran added, “Abraham framed it as demon possession, of course.”

  “It’s madness either way,” Alaric said.

  The tight smile melted. “Some of the weere started claiming they could hear the werfles talking,” Ran said, and Alaric felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. Ran continued, “Abraham declared a bounty on all werfles and cats, too, for good measure.”

  “The rats…” Alaric murmured.

  Ran nodded. “Their population exploded, but even before that, people started getting sick. Abraham blamed demons and the unfaithful. He condemned the premier for not eradicating critters like yours and claimed that was the reason for the plague.”

  Alaric felt himself go cold. He’d read of Europeans killing cats during the Black Death back on old Earth. His people rejected the excesses of the Republic, but they were educated; they had radios, cars, antibiotics—he hadn’t realized they could slide so quickly into dangerous superstitions.

  Shaking his head, Ran said, “The premier, the counselors, and the high-ranking clergy were busy trying to enforce a quarantine of New Prime, while getting themselves out, of course. Abraham tried to stage a coup during their relocation, but most of us in the Guard, we resisted. Things were tense. We didn’t know if we’d be labeled traitors later.”

  “You prevailed,” Alaric said.

  Ran met his eyes. “Not really. The plague killed Abraham, the premier, and half of those who fled. They spread the disease to the Northwest Province. Might take care of the rebel groups known to hide out in the caves there.” He shrugged. “Or may
be not. Seems to have run its course.”

  “Who is Premier now?” Alaric asked.

  Ran sighed. “No one, yet.”

  “Then who is in charge?”

  Ran looked out the window. “During the worst of the plague, Archbishop Sato refused to be evacuated. He went on television and came out into public, a werfle in his arms, and urged the people to let them do their jobs and kill the rats.” His eyes returned to Alaric, and he said earnestly, “Archbishop Sato was why I didn’t join Abraham’s coup. Abraham, his fellow counselors, the premier, the clergy, they abandoned the people of New Prime behind a quarantine I was ordered to enforce while my men died around me. His Holiness stayed with us to face the demon-spawned plague.” His eyes fell on Solomon and became hard.

  “Werfles aren’t demons,” Alaric said.

  Lifting his chin, Ran said, “The intelligence from the Galactic Republic is that they are sentient and capable of some very demonic things.”

  “You can’t believe that,” Alaric protested.