The Phoenix War (11 page)

“I don’t know why the Polarians would attack
them,” said Celeste. “They were supposed to protect them. But that
is the information that we have and I can vouch that it’s
credible.”

“It could have been for many reasons,” said
Guillermo. “The money wasn’t good enough, or someone else paid them
more. For all we know the Polarians at Titan Three planned to
betray our people the whole time.”

“Speaking of money… it’s fast disappearing,”
said Celeste.

Guillermo knew that was true. Zane had been
the primary source of income for the Phoenix Ring. He’d greased all
the wheels and made certain the right money, barely imaginable
sums, was always in the right hands at the right time, gluing
everything together. But now he was dead. His incomes belonged to
Caerwyn Martel now, and to some extent Brinton, his father, and
neither of them were members of the Phoenix Ring, nor was either
likely to keep funding them. Zane had money in place, a lot of
money, he’d set aside certain funds, but those were swiftly
depleting. It was probably only a matter of days, if not hours,
before the last remaining q that held their associates together
dried up. And then the Phoenix Ring truly would have no more
friends left in the galaxy…

“I take it by your silence that Zane didn’t
leave you in charge of another even more secret emergency fund or
something? Something that could keep certain
interests
happy?” asked Celeste.

“I’m sad to say no. When the funds you know
of are gone, then everything is gone. There won’t ever be any
more.”

“That’s too bad,” said Celeste. “I was hoping
you’d say something else.”

“I wish I could.”

“You know what this means, don’t you?”

“That we’ll have to start cutting people
off,” said Guillermo. “Although someone has been doing a good job
helping us with that.”

“The biggest expense left is the Compound,”
said Celeste.

Yes that is true
, thought Guillermo.
Something will have to be done about that. And before the money
dries up. Because, once it does, the guards will no longer obey us.
And who knows what they will do with the prisoners, possibly
they’ll ransom them to the Empire or let them go or something else
unfortunate.

“Celeste,” said Guillermo. “I’m starting to
think it’s past time we eliminate the evidence. We’d better do it
now, while there’s still time.”

“You mean while the guards are still under
our control?”

“Precisely.”

“Do you think that’s wise? Surely Zane kept
the prisoners alive for a reason.”

“I know exactly why he did,” said Guillermo.
“He wanted to keep the replicants in line, so he kept the originals
as leverage. But there’s no point anymore. The replicants are
probably already working for the Rahajiim, or the Enclave, or god
knows who, or else have gone rogue. If we continue keeping the
prisoners alive, that will only serve to incriminate us. We must
eliminate the evidence. All of it. And soon.”

“All right, I’ll send the word. But it’ll
take time. There are loyal people who will need to be removed
before things get ugly down there, people and information too,” she
said. “Only then can we do a full sweep.”

“Do what you have to do. Just see that it
gets done.”

“I’ll see to it personally,” said Celeste.
“In the meantime, I don’t think it’s safe for you to remain in
Capital System.”

“I quite agree,” said Guillermo.

“I take it that means you’re jumping
system?”

He considered not telling her, the fewer the
people who knew his plans, the safer he was. But Celeste was one of
the only people still alive who he trusted completely. So he didn’t
mind letting her know that he planned to escape Capital System, but
he decided not to tell her to where exactly, in case someone was
listening.

“Yes, I am jumping system,” he said. “But I
can’t tell you where I’m going, not yet. But I’ll let you know once
I get there.”

“I understand.”

***

It was lonely in his quarters. Like most
Polarians, Rez’nac was unused to privacy as he slept. It wasn’t his
first night back on the Nighthawk; this black, metal, soulless
human object hurtling through space, but sleep came no easier than
it had the previous night, and the night before that, and so
on.

By human standards it had been a kindness,
Rez’nac knew, that Captain Pellew had granted him his own living
space apart from the barracks that housed the human soldiers. But
with no fellow Polarians to share it with, no brothers of the
Essences, no son, no one but himself, it felt cold and empty and
lifeless.

We are not meant to be alone. We draw
strength from one another, that is our way, alone we cannot
flourish. Alone we must certainly perish
.

He disliked the loneliness that came with
being the sole Polarian aboard the ship, now that Grimka and the
others of the X’jinn Detachment had moved on, but he knew it was
his duty to remain and offer whatever aid he could. Even though his
dark thoughts shifted in the night, haunting him with the memory of
the Arahn-Fi he’d fought against his son. How by sparing his son’s
life, a decision he’d make again in a heartbeat, he’d stripped
himself of honor and deprived himself of his sacred place among the
Essences forever.

I was of Khalahar
, he reflected.
One of the noblest and mightiest of the Essences
. But now,
Rez’nac knew, he was devoid of Essence. He was a wandering soul. A
Lost One. A Fallen One. Forever. No matter how honorably or
dishonorably he lived the rest of his life, it would not matter.
His soul would never join the honored dead once he passed away. His
place had been given up in that moment, that instant when he’d
withheld the knife from Grimka. And now it could never be
restored.

And yet it was worth it
, he thought.
If it meant he’d given Grimka more time to live, to mature, to see
the error of his ways and become an honorable person.
If it
means my son can join the Essences when he dies; I gladly offer him
my place.

It was a strange thing being a Fallen One.
Before, when he’d still been in the good graces of Khalahar, he’d
looked upon the Fallen Ones with pity and confusion. Wondering why
they had allowed themselves to fall. He’d always imagined that they
must not care, that they were empty inside. That they lacked the
Rhiq’ir
—the thirst for duty. And yet, now that he himself
was Fallen, he did not feel empty inside. Not truly. He still
thirsted to do good and have honor, even if such honor was not
attainable, he thirsted for it all the same. He still had the
Rhiq’ir burning inside him. An appetite he could never satisfy, now
that he had no honor. A curious thing indeed.

Eventually sleep came. His dreams were empty
and fleeting and when he woke six hours later he remembered nothing
of them. Nor did he care to try. Once the Essences—the collective
souls of the many ancestors stretching back to the beginning of
time—might have divined wisdom upon him through his dreams, but no
longer. Now his dreams belonged to the domain of darkness, whose
fabric was emptiness and threads despair. He would be wise to
ignore them.

He checked the time and saw it was still an
hour before he needed to report to Captain Pellew and ask for his
duties for the day. The human captain had been averse about letting
Rez’nac serve guard duty alongside any of the other human soldiers,
in fact Pellew had even gone so far as to arrange quarters for
Rez’nac on deck three, with the human crew, almost as far away from
the special forces barracks as possible.

He fears me
, Rez’nac thought.
Fears
that I will do violence to his people as my son did—slaying one of
their own called Patterson. Pellew is wise to think so, if one has
murderous blood he surely was given it by his father, and his
father’s father. But Pellew’s fears are nothing. I shall harm no
human aboard this ship. It would serve nothing to do so. And I am
less than nothing.

Rez’nac changed into fresh clothes and then
headed to the mess hall. It was a small, usually quiet room that
rarely had more than one or two people using it at a time, since
the master of this ship had allowed those who belonged to him to
take their meals at their leisure rather than scheduled times.

He picked up a plate and arranged it with
dried fruit from Gemini and reheated K’qurion steak. When the
Nighthawk had been at Gemini, it had taken aboard a lot of Polarian
food, enough to feed the small army of Polarians that’d come
aboard. Now all of those Polarians were gone, either slain at Remus
Nine or else belonging to Grimka and now far away, and all that
remained was Rez’nac. One sole Polarian and nearly half the
Polarian food that had come aboard.

He ate in silence. Listening to the sounds of
the ship, trying to hear their voices. The air vent purred and the
food storage units hummed. Even one of the lights above seemed to
buzz ever so slightly. But there was nothing but chaos in these
voices. No song, no soul, no harmony.

The humans sail the stars upon lifeless
stones
…

And then a new sound. A click and a slide as
the door opened.

Rez’nac looked up to see three humans enter.
They wore the camouflage fatigues of human soldiers and the patches
on their shoulders bore the symbol of Imperial Special Forces. As
Rez’nac studied their faces carefully, he saw familiarity in them.
These were not some of the new soldiers who’d come aboard with him,
when he’d returned to the ship, these were seasoned killers that
had belonged to the Nighthawk longer than he had. These were men
who’d known Patterson, and probably bore fury over his unrighteous
killing.
Let them
, thought Rez’nac,
it is their
right
.

He returned his attention to his meal and was
peacefully chewing away at his second piece of K’qurion steak when
he noticed the sound of boots approaching. He tried to ignore them,
even though his heart quickened and his hunter’s instinct told him
he was in danger.

“
You
,” said one of the humans once
they were near.

Rez’nac looked up to see; the one who
addressed him had curly dark hair and brown eyes and looked even
more familiar than the other two, though truthfully all humans
seemed to look rather alike—making them hard to tell apart one from
another.

“Do you know who I am?” asked the
curly-headed man. His eyes seemed to stare into Rez’nac like
daggers while the other two humans moved behind, surrounding
Rez’nac.

Then something clicked, and Rez’nac
remembered who the curly-headed man was. This human, he’d been one
of two that’d invaded the observation deck during the Essential
Rite of Xi’Yorn-Ra and interrupted the ritual. He and the one
called Patterson. And since then, Patterson had been slain for such
sacrilege. This one, with the curly hair, had somehow escaped
Grimka’s wrath—Grimka’s poor understanding of justice—and now here
the curly-haired man stood, perhaps seeking a kind of justice of
his own.

“Yes, human. I remember you,” said
Rez’nac.

“Do you hear that?” asked the curly-haired
human, now looking at his compatriots. “He remembers me. Maybe the
blue-skinned asshole remembers my friend.
Gary Patterson
,
that name mean anything to you?” Rez’nac felt a hand suddenly grip
his right shoulder from behind. He ignored it.

“Yes, I remember,” said Rez’nac. “What
happened to Patterson was unjust and cruel—”

“
Unjust
and
cruel
,” the
curly-haired human interrupted him. “Can you believe this guy?”

“I deeply regret what happened to Patterson,”
said Rez’nac. “I wish I—”

Again he was interrupted. The curly-haired
man’s face turned bright red and his eyes narrowed into slits. “As
if
you
give a damn!”

Rez’nac felt a new hand grip his left
shoulder and before he realized what was happening he was thrown
onto his back. His head struck the hard ground but he ignored the
pain. Above him loomed the three humans. One of them sent a swift
kick into his side, the soldier’s hard boot connected with his
ribs. He gritted his teeth and ignored the pain. Managing to
suppress the warrior’s instinct that raged inside him, wanting to
fight back.

I am nothing
, he reminded himself.
These men suffered an injustice. Their friend was murdered by my
own blood. If they can find a way to take their justice at the cost
of my blood, that is their right
.

They kicked him again. And again. Rez’nac
closed his eyes and forced himself to endure the pain. There was
something warm with each new bruise, something comforting in each
creak and crack of bones.

“
Look
at him,” said the curly-haired
man. “Look how he cowers on the floor, like the slime he is.”

Rez’nac ignored him.

“
Get up
, slime,” said the curly-haired
man.

“Yeah get up,
asshole
!” one of the
others chimed in.

Slowly and methodically, Rez’nac rose to his
feet. Great pain shot through his body as he stood. At least two of
his ribs were cracked, he knew, but he did not wince. Nor did he
submit to the pain.
I may be master of none else now, but I
remain master of my own body.

When he stood to his full height, he towered
over the humans. The tallest one didn’t even reach his chin. He was
mightier than any of them, stronger, and far more deadly. The
warrior within him burned, begging to be released. And, as Rez’nac
looked them over, he was sorely tempted. The men standing before
him, it was hard not to think of their throats and how easily he
could wrap his hands around them, one by one, and crush them, with
no effort whatsoever. He could kill these men, it would take him
mere seconds. He could slice them to ribbons with his ceremonial
dagger, or he could rip them apart, limb from limb with his bare
hands. These humans, although deadly with their guns and bombs and
instruments of killing, were absolutely nothing to him barehanded.
Frailer than children.
I could kill them easily
.