Vigilant Veritas: Black Saber Novels, #3

Chapter 1

Killian’s eyes barely opened. All he could see was a gray blur around him and a tiny bright light overhead. Pain radiated from the length of his body on his posterior side. He had to be lying down. His skull ached on the hard surface.

He closed his eyes.

***

An unknown time later, he opened his eyes. Still a gray blur. Pain up and down his spine. His mouth and throat felt like sand. His head throbbed. He lifted his left arm a bit, then brought it up in front of his face. His arm was heavy. He moved his feet. He wasn’t paralyzed. Good news.

He twisted his torso using his legs. The movement gave instant relief where it left the surface. He rolled onto his side and stretched. He twisted the other way and stretched. The more he did, the better he felt.

He was naked.

He curled on his left side and got up on one elbow. Nausea swept through him, and his gut wrenched, but nothing came out. His head still ached like he’d been kicked. An image of cracks in his skull flashed in his mind. He reached his right hand up to touch the back of his head. No cracks or bumps, nothing wet. He looked at his hand. No blood. He rubbed his eyes to help clear the fog. He felt whiskers sprouting on his face.

He sat up. He was on the floor of a small cubicle. On the side by his feet was a door with a slot on the bottom and a small window about four feet up. In the corner was a round object with thick, perfectly vertical sides. He suspected it was a bucket to use as a toilet. The walls were dark gray and perfectly smooth. He looked up. A tiny light the size of a pinhole cast an amber light. He twisted and stretched, then rolled onto his knees. His head swam, and his pulse throbbed in his head. He thought he might fall over, but the feeling passed. He got on all fours and then stood. The top of the cubicle was low, and he couldn’t quite stand upright.

He spread his arms. One way he could touch both walls with his palms. The other way was a bit wider than his fingertips. He examined the wall. It was perfectly smooth, like stainless steel with no seams. The cubicle appeared very clean, but the lack of anything comfortable indicated it was not a medical facility. It was a prison cell. All that training he had gone through, and this was it. He’d rot in a prison cell and never have a chance to utilize his skills. It was over before it had really begun.

He looked in the bucket. Empty. Might as well use it. He turned his attention to sensing his bowels and bladder. He decided to piss. He stood before the bucket and concentrated, feeling the sensation in his bladder and pushing. Urine leaked out. He pushed. It continued to trickle. It looked dark. In the amber light, it had the faint color of blood. When no more would come, he went to the window and crouched to look out the metal mesh. Across a wide hall were other doors with small windows. He smelled the animal stench of incarcerated people. Faint moans and cries came from down the corridor.

Killian decided to stretch. The more he moved, the better he felt. All he could do at that point was wait and see.

***

He woke and sat up slowly. More lucid now, he didn’t feel nearly as bad as when he woke previously. He noticed a tray had been shoved through the slat at the bottom of the door while he slept. He crawled over to it and found a bowl of soupy mush and a hunk of something that looked like a potato. He went for the mush first, as his thirst was dire. It tasted like dirt. He devoured it, but it didn’t come close to quenching his thirst. He wiped errant slop from his chin with his forearm. His whiskers scraped his skin. He rubbed the back of his hand on his chin to scratch an itch.

He picked up the potato-like object and bit into it. His teeth ached in his gums. More dirt. It had a slightly sweet taste and probably tasted much better than it actually was, because he was so hungry. He put the bowl onto the tray and pushed it out through the slat. He stood, stooped, and looked out through the metal mesh. No one.

He sat against the wall. It was neither warm nor cool. Strange. The air, too, was neither warm nor cool. He looked at his hands and arms, then his legs. Slight bruising but no blood and no dirt. He was clean. Again, strange.

He bit into the barely sweet potato. The last thing he recalled was the sensation of getting kicked from below when they landed. He wondered if Captain Alan and Perez were dead or in another cell nearby.

He rolled across his knees and got up, going to the metal mesh window.

Captain Alan! Corporal Perez! Are you there?

Nothing.

He called several more times but got no response. Not even from prisoners in other cells.

He kept at it.

In a moment, he heard heavy footsteps approaching. The corridor had similar pin lights in the high ceiling. The stomping came closer, and Killian saw movement to his right.

A crunk slammed a flattened hand against his window. Killian jumped back. The crunk peered through the metal mesh, then went away.

He sat and continued eating the potato.

His mind drifted through feelings of regret for his journey ending so suddenly. He was proud of the fighting skills he had acquired. Now, like countless times over the past several months, he imagined plying his new skills in Bangkok. He replayed his encounters with the Global Alliance conscripts. Those idiots. They could barely shoot a rifle, let alone shoot straight in a firefight. He envisioned how such firefights would go with his new skills. He imagined new scenarios, how he’d plan ambushes, train other refugees to fight more aggressively, more decisively. The more he thought about it, the more impressed he was that such a ragtag group of rebels had created so much terror among the Global Alliance troops.

But all of that was lost. He looked at the last piece of potato and was sorry he couldn’t go back and kick some serious ass.

A scraping sound caught his attention. Another tray was shoved into his cell.

He jumped up to look out the window. He barely caught a glimpse of a smallish creature, the size of a young teenager, taking his old tray away. It wasn’t a crunk, but it wasn’t nearly as tall as the Carthenogens. He wondered if the young ones would be given this kind of prison duty.

Hey! Hey!

The creature was gone.

Hey! Am I a prisoner? Hey! Come back!

***

Killian pushed the tray with the empty bowl back out and sat against the wall to eat another dirt potato. He stroked his chin, the whiskers softer now. His neck itched from them, but stroking his chin gave him some small comfort.

He thought of the attack on the Blue Orchid and how it made him feel. Terrified yet energized. The adrenaline seemed to put him into an altered state of being. Time moved slowly, and he didn’t feel as afraid as he should have in such a situation.

Sowell’s face flashed in his mind, from the time when he was trying to psychoanalyze him, asking Killian what he was fighting for. The only answer he could think of was the rush he felt during battle. The rush that made him do extremely dangerous things, like run out into the ladder well as it ran low on air pressure to blast those fucking crunks. He felt the adrenaline surge through his veins. Was that all he was fighting for, the rush of battle? The more he thought about it, the more he realized that the ideas of freedom from tyranny and vengeance were things he contemplated and told others when he was sedentary. Nothing seemed to match that rush of tempting death and coming out of it alive.

The image of Seski came into his mind—the freckled skin on her tits, her brown nipples. Damn it! He had wasted his opportunity to indulge in pleasures of the flesh. Even then, he had wasted the moment by waiting too long to penetrate her. Fuck! He became angry at the thought of Tyla interrupting him before he could satisfy himself properly.

He thought more about Tyla. She was certainly sweet and attractive. Yet, he didn’t feel magnetically drawn to her girl-next-door looks. He wouldn’t quite call it loving her like a sister. There was definitely more to his feelings for her than that. But it wasn’t the surging lust he felt for Seski. He could see having an ongoing sexual relationship with Tyla but not with Seski. The one time he had sex with Tyla was pretty good, to be sure. But he felt inhibited from going beyond the one time. She knew his goal was to get in the field and fight, and he didn’t want to hurt her by leaving and potentially dying. As it was, he had wound up in a prison cell on Carthogena. So close. He made it all the way to their home planet, only to be locked up with no memory of how he had gotten there and no idea of how to escape.

No. He really couldn’t see himself engaging in a long-term relationship with Tyla. He always felt like he was on the verge of disappointing her, breaking her heart, and disappearing. He loved her, he realized, but he didn’t want to do what he had wound up doing. Disappearing.

Besides, she was too damn intelligent for anything long term. It bugged him that she always knew ten times as much as he did—not that he felt stupid around her. He knew where his skill-set was, that he was quick to see opportunities and take action. He couldn’t take her expressed intentions at face value, and he suspected she always had a hidden agenda, like she was always scheming. She often told him how she would say something to someone else with the intention of getting a desired behavior out of them. If she did that to others, why wouldn’t she do it to him?

The day after the last ground op, he had the first clear inkling that she was not only keeping things from him but that she was only telling him things that would force him to decide things one way—her way. Gesturing to her stomach like she might be pregnant, then repeatedly denying that she was. Why do that? He didn’t like the feeling of being manipulated. No, he really couldn’t have a relationship like that.

His mind cascaded straight from that to the memory of Goreman when he was tied up on Veritas. The way she regarded him with a certain knowledge of something indiscernible, like he was just a player in a game, and she, too, knew how it was going to end. He didn’t feel manipulated by her at that moment. It was as if she had paused the game, took him aside, and said I believe in you when the others on the mission doubted his sanity. Then she went away without another word, like all the others who washed out of Mission Veritas. She seemed too smart to be included in that bunch of dipshits. She was wiser than the rest of them, although she pretended to be a ditz in need of help. The more he thought of her, the more he was certain that she had her shit together and was just playing dumb to gain Stiles’s favor. He thought of her amazing blue eyes, gorgeous face, and incredible body. She had manipulated the situation, he supposed, to make Stiles jealous. But it wasn’t the same kind of manipulation as Tyla. He didn’t know who was slyer. Goreman seemed like an all-knowing, gorgeous operator who applied herself at just the right time. Tyla? He wasn’t sure what her motivation or end game was. It was as if she manipulated him just because she could.

If he had to choose between the two, he’d choose Goreman. Manipulate away, magnificent woman! I am your servant. I will throw myself to the wolves, fight off an endless army of crunks, run into space for your love.

Sowell flashed in his mind like snot in a punch bowl. Sowell was a great guy, but damn his psychobabble. Always lecturing him on diplomacy and using a soft touch with the tyros. From his mother’s experience with diplomacy, all she got was dead, and she took his father with her. In Killian’s mind, diplomacy was a way for the enemy to regroup and attack from a different angle. That’s why he was so adamant about being harsh on the Proelium tyros, so they’d finish the job without hesitation, taking diplomacy out of the equation that could ultimately cause them to lose.

Why did Sowell always have to fuck with his head? What are you fighting for? Sowell’s words haunted him like a scar.

Goreman! That was some serious motivation. He’d give his life for her. She probably hadn’t given him another thought after she left the Blue Orchid.

He found himself getting aroused as Goreman swiveled her hips through his mind.

Damn it!

The idea of masturbating in the prison cell was pathetic. He was already riddled with guilt and humiliated enough. He didn’t want to die even more pathetically.

To distract himself, he reenacted the crunks he had killed. Better to focus on his successes than tear himself up over his fuckups.

***

The sound of a parade of footsteps woke him.

He scrambled to the metal mesh window. A line of humans, tethered to each other by a silver wire between their necks. They looked Asian.

Where are you from? he called to them.

They were only a few feet away. If he could have gotten his hand out the window, he could have touched them.

Where are you from?

Definitely Asian.

He switched to Thai. Where are you from?

No response.

He tried Latin. Still no response. He switched back to English.

Finally, a young man turned to him with hopeful eyes. Filipino.

The Philippines! How did you get here?

A bic sheep.

A big ship? Killian had suspected he was one of the first humans on Carthogena. How many more were here?

The man winced with pain and brought his bound hands to his neck. The person behind him tugged on the wire. "Tahimik!"

The chain of prisoners continued.

Was this where all the people from Bangkok went? It had to be. He wasn’t in a prison camp. Maybe a slaver’s camp. But why?

How did you get here? Killian asked another.

A large paw smacked the metal mesh. Killian flinched backward, and a crunk face stooped to snarl at him.

He went back to the window and counted. He reached close to three hundred by the time the last slave passed his cell.

Of course he wasn’t a prisoner of war. Humans weren’t at war with the Carthenogens. They were taking millions of people as slaves. They must have come across the crash site and found him, Alan, and Perez, then didn’t know what the human slaves in orange suits were doing there. They tossed them in with the slave population. But why this cell? Maybe some kind of processing regimen. Figure out who was healthy and who was not.

The good news, he concluded, was that he wouldn’t be in there indefinitely.

Chapter 2

Thursday, July 25 – 03:28 p.m.

22 Days to Coronation

Guy sat on the park bench thirty feet away and facing Amelia’s direction. She held up a piece of paper torn from an advertisement. It showed the number 999, the three-digit channel code to which he had to tune his earpiece. He fingered his ear for some time.

You there? he said across the comm.

Yes. I’ve got something for you, she said tersely.

Before we get into that, can I say something?

She nodded. She wasn’t looking at him, but she was sure he was looking at her.

I was thinking about what you said the other night and—

You’ve decided that you still want to fuck me?

Well, you don’t have to be so blunt about it, but, yeah, I’d like to explore a relationship with you.

You were right. My job—my life—thwarts the possibility of a relationship. I cannot afford emotional ties, and neither can you. She paused. You’re getting reassigned.

What? Wait, you’re not doing this because—

I’m not doing it; I’m simply the messenger. We aren’t here to play lovebirds. I’ve got my job, and you have a new one. This one’s right up your alley.

Where am I going?

Lucerne. Your job is to charm, shall we say, a particular young woman. Get whatever intel you can. Details are in here. She held out a magazine, turning it side to side, then put it on the bench beside her.

Charm her? You mean . . . sleep with her?

She got up and walked away, throwing the magazine in the trash.

Bingo. It’s why they hired you. It’s why they hired me. She’s not very appealing, but you’ll get used to that, too.

She passed by a couple embracing and kissing. She frowned and gave them a wide berth.

Guy watched her in stunned silence, then went and fished the magazine out of the trash.

Chapter 3

While Killian mentally thrashed himself over the botched plan, he finished a set of pushups and then began lunges to get his legs back in shape. He noticed he felt lighter, as he could do more pushups with ease. He suspected the gravity might be less than a full G if Carthogena was smaller than Earth.

The gruel and dirt potatoes were awful, but they gave him the energy to exercise and recover. It would only be a matter of time before they let him out to work somewhere.

The planet had seemed filthy and densely populated as they flew in. It was such a contrast to what the Carthenogens projected—correct that, what the humans who were in love with the Carthenogens hoped the home planet was like. They talked of a clean, utopian world, where inhabitants were free and equal. From his brief exposure, Carthogena seemed nothing of the sort. After all, they were taking humans as slaves.

Another set of pushups, then windmills. Then he practiced some of the close-quarters combat moves. It was a little tight in the cell for that, but he did the best he could to limber up.

He took a break from his guilt trip and reflected on how glad he was that he had instituted the secret Proelium fighting regimen. It was a stark contrast to the anemic, authorized training and sparring they did in PT. He found the other tyros adapted well to the 2:00 a.m. training. They quickly transitioned from sleep to full-on combat readiness. Only a few of the midnight crew and sentries had known he was up to something. When they’d pop into the PT rooms, the tyros pretended to practice normal training. When the crew went away, the tyros resumed slugging each other.

He managed to get one of the late crew to let him have a five-foot length of plastic piping, and he used it with his Proelium tyros to practice evasion. If they didn’t move fast enough, they’d get hit with the tube without causing serious harm. After he got a second plastic pipe, the tyros got creative and practiced sword fighting. Killian had learned a great deal from Takata, who had been a black belt in martial arts and was good with a tachi sword. Takata was seven generations removed from Japan but was an expert on anything related and a wealth of knowledge on martial arts history. Takata taught the Proelium tyros grappling, several Judo moves, how to take a fall, and tumbling. At first, the tumbling seemed odd, but then they learned how to do handsprings and back flips. He wasn’t sure how that might come into play, but the tyros liked doing them and worked at it.

Large footsteps in the hall. A crunk guard was approaching.

The door buzzed and opened. The crunk peered in, then stepped back. A small figure in a burlap-looking tunic appeared.

Killian stood.

The small figure waved his hand downward. Chet, chet.

Killian recognized the word but didn’t have a translation for it. In context, it probably meant to sit or be calm. He sat down.

The figure looked like a miniature Carthenogen. His arms and hands looked like bone with skin stretched over them. No meat, somewhat like thin branches with twigs for hands. It had the same large eyes and disproportionately large head. Its fleshy neck was withered. It was not likely a Carthenogen child but a member of another race used to tend slaves.

The twig creature stepped in and stopped, put a box with a handle onto the floor, and waited. It was likely testing whether Killian would make an aggressive move.

Killian kept still. The twig came closer. Killian didn’t move.

Chet, chet, the twig said.

Killian spoke in Pluraa. Am I a slave or a prisoner?

The twig froze, its wide eyes growing wider. A look of shock.

Am I a slave or a prisoner?

The twig stepped backward, grabbed the box, turned, and ran.

***

Killian couldn’t tell day or night, but he had slept, ate, and defecated since the encounter with the twig man. He ran through scenarios in his mind. The twig posed no threat, but the crunk guard would be too much to deal with. If or when the twig returned, he wouldn’t have much luck making it past the crunk. He recounted the pressure points that could disable the crunk. But then what? He had no idea where he was. He decided to play it docile.

Another parade of human slaves passed by. Three hundred and twenty. He added that to the tally, over fifteen hundred had passed since he had seen the first group. They looked Filipino as well.

Killian spent time doing exercises, waiting for the twig to come back. He hoped to learn more about his status. If he could get out, he’d be able to figure out an escape plan.

Heavy footsteps. He stopped doing pushups and went to the mesh window. The guard opened a door across the hall and down a few cells. He had another human, not Filipino, and pushed him into the cell.

I demand to speak to your superiors!

That voice! Kerrington . . . Stiles Kerrington! What was he doing here?

I demand to speak to your superiors! I am on a diplomatic mission! Let me talk to your superiors right now!

The crunk closed the cell door and left.

Stiles? Killian said.

What? Who is that? Who are you?

It’s me, Killian.

Killian? You must get me out of here. I shouldn’t be locked up like this.

Rage burned in Killian’s veins. Stiles was the worst kind of sellout.

Help you? If I could get my hands on you, I’d strangle the shit out of you!

No! This is wrong! This is so wrong! Help! Heeeelp! he screamed into the corridor. I don’t belong here! I’m on a diplomatic mission for my father, Chancellor Barrett Kerrington! You’re making a serious mistake! Get me out of here.

Killian slammed his palms against the door. Shut the fuck up, you traitorous bastard! I’m gonna kill you as soon as I can!

You’re wrong, Killian. When I get out of here, I’m going to tell them you’re the traitor. You’re a terrorist fighting against the Carthenogens. You need to be put to death.

The odds were in Stiles’s favor, if, in fact, he had any sway through his father.

You fucking bastard!

I’m not a bastard! I . . . am not . . . a bastard! This is all such a huge mistake. I didn’t kill that girl. She was drunk. I didn’t do it. I demand a fair trial. I’m innocent!

Killian realized that Stiles was being punished for a crime, the murder of a young woman, no less. It figured that he would screw up and believe his father would bail him out.

We’re on Carthogena, you stupid fuck. There’s no trial system for humans here.

Then it occurred to him that this could very well be a prisoner’s section, and that’s why he wasn’t being put in with the other slaves. Blood rushed from his head. He was, it appeared, a prisoner and not a slave.

He might never be let out.

***

The dread of this new wrinkle left him sapped of energy. He sat against the wall and recalled all the morose thoughts of loss if, in fact, he would never leave that cell. The idea that Stiles might get out and he’d be left there enraged him further.

Stiles had screamed himself hoarse and resorted to long jags of crying and mumbling.

The jailor crunk returned and stopped in front of his cell. Stiles issued raspy demands and cries for help.

Killian scrambled to the back of his cell and sat.

The crunk face appeared in the window. The door buzzed, the crunk looked in, then the twig man entered. He looked wary of Killian as he placed his box with the handle.

Chet, chet, he said.

Killian nodded slightly.

The twig stepped in farther, pulled out a device, and placed it on the floor. The device was gray, six inches by four by two. The twig wanted Killian to see it and not be afraid. Probably an instrument to get a health reading on him. The twig stood there while Killian looked at the device, then at the twig.

Chet, chet, the twig repeated.

Killian held his hands out, palms up. The twig flinched in response, ready to run out if necessary.

Killian put his hands on the floor and stretched his legs in front of him. He couldn’t come up with a more passive pose.

The twig came in and picked up the device, then stepped nearer, at Killian’s feet. He held the device toward him. Chet, chet.

Killian didn’t react.

The twig shook the device, as if Killian should take it. He did so and examined it. Yes, it looked like a medical screening device, without power and probably broken. The twig apparently wanted him to not be afraid. It reached back into the box and pulled out a second device, identical to the first, except with power. The twig held it up to Killian and moved it slowly, scanning him.

The twig spoke in Pluraa. Do you . . . speak?

Killian responded as softly as he could. I speak— He was going to say Carthenogen, but that was the human name for them. I speak your language.

The twig froze, eyes wide, an expression looking like fear.

Killian patted his own chest. Chet, chet . . . Friend.

The twig calmed a bit, then stopped scanning him.

How did you learn to speak? Its voice was almost a whisper.

I was taught to speak your language.

The twig stared at him in disbelief.

Killian put his palm to his chest. I am Killian.

The twig tried three times to mimic the pronunciation.

Killian repeated the motion and phrase, then pointed to the twig. It caught on and said, Greebles, while pressing his twiggy fingers to his chest.

Am I a prisoner or a slave?

Greebles looked