Star Force: Temple Wars

  1

  August 30, 158392

  Ikrobar Kingdom

  Mid-Jump

  “Anticipate where it is going, and squeeze your talons there,” Davis said, tossing the ball into the air again. “You lose sight of it just before it’s in range. Stop trying to move your body to keep your eyes on it.”

  The Ren’mak twisted its torso down again, with it flying almost back straight perpendicular to the ground as it reached out its talons and grabbed the silver ball, squishing it slightly under the pressure, then flapping its wings hard to level itself out again.

  “I will miss.”

  “It takes practice, but many avians have learned this technique.”

  “I cannot turn my talons up,” it said, switching the binary grasp to one foot only then flying a couple of meters forward and flicking it back towards the Director.

  “You don’t have to. You simply push downward on top of the target like this,” the Human said, lightly tossing the ball in the air in front of him, then cupping his hand over top of it and pushing down towards the floor faster than the ball fell. When he brought his hand back up the ball was clenched in his outstretched fingers as if he had talons himself. “Tuck your legs then try.”

  The Ren’mak continued to hover, pulling his scaly legs up underneath his light body, then Davis tossed the ball directly under him.

  Both talons shot down, hitting the ball, but they didn’t clench right and instead deflected it sideways as one talon hooked in and ended up pushing it aside.

  “Better,” Davis said, telekinetically pulled the ball back to him. “It takes a lot of failures to adjust your movements into success.”

  “We know that well,” another voice said from the side of the chamber as the Neofan walked in.

  “You never played catch with him?” Davis asked sarcastically.

  “We worked on more important things,” Plausious said dismissively. “And we had no ball.”

  Davis threw the ball again, with the Ren’mak smacking it down to the ground, failing to clench in time, but the Human just telekinetically picked it up and set to go again. “How much did you do before you went underground?”

  “Little things,” Plausious said, walking up behind Davis. “Staying undetected was our primary concern. They would always come for us, and I only had so much Essence to use.”

  “Is your head any better today?”

  “It is not. I need answers, not rest.”

  Davis threw the ball again, and this time the Ren’mak barely got his talons on the ball, with it slipping out of his first grasp, but it managed to quickly get it in a second before it could hit the floor.

  “There,” he said, accepting the ball back as the Ren’mak flew it over to him then tossed it into his hands. “You can do it.”

  “Not well.”

  “Success is success. Better success comes with practice,” he said, throwing it again…but it curled through the air into Plausious’s hand.

  The Reignor telepathically ordered the Ren’mak as he threw the ball high into the air in an arc, with the avian letting it reach the peak and start to come back down before it moved towards it and attacked…but it didn’t touch it. Rather it got close and then disintegrated it in a cloud of smoke and ash that billowed over the area of the room where they stood.

  The air processors quickly started to remove the thick haze, leaving Davis standing there unable to see much aside from his Pefbar, though Plausious could still read his stunned expression.

  “We practiced more practical things,” the Reignor said calmly.

  “That was my ball,” Davis said deadpan, then looked towards the coughing Ren’mak that was flying up higher to get out of the ash. “How did he get Essence abilities?”

  “The Neofan know how to trigger such things in others, and my absorption of the Hadarak command ability came with unforeseen revelations. I needed him to be able to defend himself, so I taught him.”

  “I thought you already had safety from the Hadarak at that point.”

  “I’m referring to future threats. Until we came here, he wouldn’t leave my side for a moment. But what I must do will be suicide for him if he cannot assist me, and I also would rather not be parted, so I made him into an asset.”

  “The technology you asked for?” Davis guessed.

  “He cannot use his own Essence sufficiently, nor do we have a million years to wait, so he must use mine.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want help?”

  Plausious shook his head. “The Neofan do not deserve to be part of your Star Force. They have not earned it, and while you could obviously make something of them, we have a greater responsibility. You have accomplished great things, Director, but there are some things you have barely scratched the surface of. The Neofan’s place is at your side, not under your command. It is time they lived up to their responsibilities, and I am going to make sure they do.”

  “And why can’t that happen within Star Force?”

  “You are beginning to see it with your Furyans. They cannot coexist with the rest of your society, thus you keep them isolated. It is the same with any advanced race, and the more advanced they become the more alien they are to the others and do not mesh well. You are having to rewrite your maturia system for the Furyans. Do you know why yet?”

  “They needed challenges similar to what their parents had.”

  “Then you have not seen it yet. Or perhaps you have and are mislabeling it. Superior races have additional requirements of them, and if they are not met, the weight of their superiority will crush the young and your civilization will implode. It is a common theme among the more advanced, and once you are on that level you cannot live at the slower pace of the lesser races…without consequences.”

  “And yet the Neofan seem to live very slow lives.”

  “Appearances can be deceiving. Internally we are always active, and we need to match the physicality to that pace. That is something I will change in our Construction, along with many other things, but we cannot be mundane. What is a challenge for your little Irondel is stagnation for a Neofan.”

  “That I can understand,” Davis said as the breeze in the room finally cleared it enough to hazily see to the other side. “But we’ve had a lot more experience remaking civilizations than you’ve had. Wouldn’t an adviser be of help?”

  “You have already advised me much, but no. This is something that has to be done Neofan to Neofan. Just as if you had a problem with your Archons, you would need to deal with it personally and not bring me along to overpower them.”

  “Could you?” Davis asked skeptically.

  “I could now. Not before. I have upgraded considerably since I was last here. I have trouble remembering my former status.”

  “Advancement or amnesia?”

  “Perhaps both.”

  “Are the headaches getting worse?”

  “They remain steady, as does the fog. I feel conflict that I cannot articulate. There is an impediment…I am nearly certain of it. Once removed, the pain will dismiss.”

  “Has that happened before?”

  “Many times, in other forms. If Neofan are not calibrated properly, there are many internal malfunctions. Our minds hold a greater influence over our bodies than yours. A sick mind will manifest in the flesh, and insanity is said to be contagious if left to run its course. Or so we were told. Now, I am unsure.”

  “For a race as old as yours, it seems you have a lot left to fix.”

  “The burden of superiority can be carried in many ways, not all of which are completely beneficial. The pressure must be met, or we die. I suspect it will be the same for your Furyans, and if it is, I warn you, the danger does not go away with experience. They must be supe
rior, always, or their fall will be more catastrophic than the lesser races.”

  “They have higher to fall from,” Davis said wistfully as his mind darted elsewhere for a moment.

  “Indeed,” Plausious agreed as the Ren’mak flew back down through the now cleaner air and landed on his right shoulder. “We all have our challenges, and superiority does not mean what I used to think it did. It is a greater burden, rather than greater privilege, and with it comes a mandate. As the Hadarak have their current, we have our destiny, and we will never be whole if we do not pursue it.”

  “I take it practice is done for today?” Davis asked them both.

  “We have other practice to attend to,” Plausious said darkly. “For when I return, it will not be a peaceful one.”

  “Drones?”

  Plausious shook his massive head again. “If you conquered them, your methods would work. But what I must do is something far harder, and it must be done in a very specific way or I will lose them all. If that happens, it would be best to take the young and give them to you to train. But we don’t have time for that. The Endgame is upon us, and the Neofan must do their part in guaranteeing its success.”

  “I hope you’re wrong…about the time, anyway. We’re rather busy right now, as it is.”

  “They will not give you time. They will snuff you out before you can manifest. That is their way, and it is what the Hadarak have been designed to do. They are an early warning system so they can see the next Endgame attempt coming with time to disrupt it. You must have the power of the Neofan shielding you, or you will not last. I can see this plainly.”

  “Then why are you conflicted?”

  “I am pursuing an Endgame without knowing what it is. I need to see my challenges so I can tackle them.”

  “The universe doesn’t make it that easy,” Davis warned. “Sometimes you have to get comfortable with the ground under your feet while everything else is obscured.”

  “That is a lesson already learned.”

  “Your head obviously says otherwise. I hope the Gahana can help.”

  “I felt the relief when I witnessed them in your records. They hold answers. Perhaps not all. But it is where I must go next. That much of the future is certain.”

  “And if it doesn’t help?”

  “We have other reasons for coming,” he reminded the Director.

  “Will you go into battle while the confliction remains?”

  “If I must. But I will not rush it. We have come too far to surrender to impatience now.”

  “Alright, go do your other training. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Plausious nodded, then walked off with his Ren’mak, leaving Davis in the Archon sanctum onboard the Command Ship, knowing they were a little more than 18 hours out from their destination.

  And one way or another, they were going to get some answers.

  He just hoped he liked them.

  Plausious, Davis, and the Ren’mak rode the dropship through the nebula between where the Command Ship had parked on the outskirts of the purple/orange frozen maelstrom of gas that encompassed more space than the star system did. The hidden station was just inside the edge, but far enough in that it could not be detected from the outside.

  The massive wall of gas dwarfed the star system, with several gas giants in the outer orbits around the single star growing in size each time they passed near it and pulled more gas towards them. Given enough time they’d grow in mass to become stars of their own, but they were far from that now…and even those gas giants were now obscured by the outer edge of the nebula that left the dropship in total darkness within the thickening haze.

  Little ripples flowed outward as the dropship traveled, following no beacon or path other than that of memory from where they had hidden the Maty long ago. Any ship entering the nebula would become lost as drift would deny accurate course measurements without the stars to navigate by. It was one place that was even more desolate than the interior of stars, for they always had the center of gravity to navigate by…but out here, there was no center. Just a dark sea to get lost in, and one that could not be jumped through, forcing all entry to the star system to come from the far side.

  And it was in such a place that the Maty would be safely lost to the galaxy, though that was the polar opposite of its original intended purpose.

  Plausious watched the darkness on sensors as the density of gas altered in small ways. He was watching for any sign of the Maty’s presence as his anticipation grew, but nothing was visible. Everything was endless nothingness…until one moment later it all disappeared as they passed through the cloaking field that surrounded the boundary shield that kept the nebula off the Maty station and the several starships already docked at it.

  They weren’t large ones, though far bigger than the Star Force dropship the Reignor rode in. The Maty itself was not the same shape as he had been shown, but he’d been told that it could alter for a variety of reasons, and internally there was much work going on. Mostly research, but also experiments by Star Force to created their own toxin blocking shields for the Gahana, which so far had not resulted in success.

  The short trip into one of the open hangar bays on the Maty had Plausious’s chest tightening up, and it was more than emotions. Something was affecting him, and it was coming from the Maty.

  “Reignor?” Davis asked, noticing a change in him.

  “Do you feel that?”

  “I don’t sense anything. Is it telepathic?”

  “No. Not in the normal sense. But I can feel it. It’s like it’s shining a light on me and my body is responding to it.”

  Davis linked in to his people onboard via his armor, which he wore in thin gauntlets under his Star Lord’s uniform, though no one knew that was the name of it yet. They responded quickly, assuring him everything was the same as before and no new manifestations had come from the unpredictable machine that was the Maty…or the many others within it. Nor were any of the Gahana active above their normal, limited interface with the station from their protective slumber.

  “This is the same as it has been. Do we need to go back?”

  “No,” Plausious said firmly. “I need to see this through.”

  “Alright,” the Director said, with all three of them staying quiet for the rest of the landing approach, though the Ren’mak was massaging the Neofan’s shoulder with his talons nervously, meaning he was either telepathically linked with Plausious, or he could sense something as well.

  He didn’t ask for further explanation until they landed and walked down the ramp out of the dropship and the Neofan fell to a knee with the Ren’mak taking to the air and hovering over his head protectively.

  Davis took a step towards him, but got a telepathic warning to stay back, soon followed by one of the Gahana’s machines peeling out of a nearby wall and transforming into a biped that nearly matched the Neofan’s body shape, though it was full of hard angles and geometric shapes.

  “Declare your intentions,” it said in Neofan as Plausious was knelt before it in obvious distress…and Davis noticed the walls were also transforming into weapon nodes.

  “I seek…knowledge,” The Reignor answered, gasping for breath.

  “Many have come with the identical purpose, but your aura is not symbiosis as theirs was. You require something else. State it.”

  “I am questing,” Plausious said simply, with his squeezing his hands open and shut as if he was fighting off some internal attack.

  “You do not know what you are questing for,” the machine said, and Davis didn’t know if this was automated or being remotely controlled by the Gahana…nor did his people on the other end of his telepathic comm link.

  “I do not.”

  “You are questing for a quest, as a rare few who come to us have. Most have turned back, unable to accept the burden such a quest requires. If you have the strength, step forward. If not, turn back and the pain will disappear.”

  “I…choose…forward,” the Neofan said,
struggling to stand as he took a single step, then another, and another as he walked towards the machine that was transforming more and more with his proximity to it, taking on a closer shape to his own body until he was standing before it and looking into his own mirror image.

  It raised its right hand and held it before him, with Plausious forcing his left to raise and match it, feeling like he was fighting the force of a black hole to stay standing, and every inch he got closer to it the resistance became worse, but there was another fight going on inside his mind as the Maty was invading his memories and conscious thoughts by some means that he could not resist. It was inside him, measuring and categorizing him, and putting forth a test of worth in this moment that he would not shy away from…though every fiber in his body demanded he turn away and end the torment.

  But his will, sculpted through the survival challenges he had enduring on that nameless Hadarak world, had cut away any hesitancy long ago. And only with his full focus could he press forward into the wall of pain and stress that made his body feel like it was about to explode…but when his hand touched the machine’s it all evaporated in a moment, and a cool sensation flowed into him.

  Except it wasn’t just a sensation. It was nanites entering his body and spreading throughout.

  “Enter, Plausious,” the machine said as it stepped back and broke down into numerous parts that retreated into the wall as the weapon nodes likewise disappeared.

  The Reignor breathed deeply as Davis walked around in front of him to get his attention.

  “What just happened?” he demanded.

  “They know what we did here,” he said meekly. “And I have been absolved of it…”

  2

  Plausious walked through the interior of the Maty along with Davis as the Ren’mak rode on his shoulder, but he was not stable. The station around him seemed to exude a pulse that rattled him to his core…but not in a menacing way. He felt as if he was basking in pure superiority, as if a child stepping into the audience chamber of an elder far wiser and more skilled than him without being able to gage the depth of his inadequacy.