Star Force: Lost Destiny (Wayward Trilogy Book 1) Page 13

  “It’s a risk either way, but if they’re not actively tracking us then they can’t be sure if we’re hiding here or have moved on. If they assume moved on, they could go right past us.”

  “Meaning they have to search every bit of cave?”

  “It causes them to have to make choices, and the further ahead we can get the more choices there are between us and them.”

  “How long of a delayed signal can you send?”

  “I can’t do it with the equipment up ahead. We’ll have to move on and gather what I need. If and when we do, I can set the timer for as much of a delay as we want.”

  “So, like a month to make sure we get good and lost again?”

  “Something like that.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The Viks aren’t just going to sit and wait for us to show ourselves. They’re going to be up to something, and that message confirms they’re after us, one way or another.”

  “And you said we can’t fight them?”

  “No. We can’t. It’s an automatic loss, but surrender isn’t an option either. They’ll kill us both on the spot unless they think we can supply them with information.”

  “And if they do?”

  “They get the information, then kill us.”

  “If Star Force is here and they can get us off this planet, that’s the only way we’re going to be truly safe…right?”

  “If…” Rammak emphasized. “But if it’s a trap, the only way to avoid it is by staying away.”

  “As much as I want to live, I don’t want to live like this forever unless it’s the last option. And don’t mistake that as ingratitude. When Teren died I didn’t want to live at all. You got me this far, and thank you very much for that, but if there’s a way out of this mess we need to try to find it. Cautiously, but we can’t pass this up, can we?”

  “The Viks are the better hunters,” Rammak sadly said.

  “Meaning we can’t hope that Star Force will find us before them?”

  “We could hope, but it would be a foolish one. We have to tip the scales in our favor and I agree that a message sent is the only way to cautiously do that. Come, we can discuss this more in the light,” he said, unceremoniously turning around and jogging again.

  “How close are we?”

  “A few minutes.”

  “No guide lights?” Esna asked just as the first glowing orb appeared ahead of them. “Oh, there.”

  “This cave is a fractured slab that has eroded. There are many places to get lost and I do not usually wear armor with a battlemap in it.”

  “How do you get through the canyons then?”

  “Small trail markings and memory.”

  “And you get lost a lot?” she guessed.

  “On occasion, but time is something I’ve had an abundance of on this planet.”

  “So you usually walk?” she asked darkly.

  “No, I usually run faster than this for workout purposes,” he said as they came to a flattened part of cave that had obviously had work done on it. Rammak hit a switch and a beam of light burst out from a framed doorway. “We’re here.”

  “Figured that,” she said, noting his rare use of humor. “Safe to strip?”

  “Yes. Thermal sensors will do no good here unless they’re in the caves…at which point we’re already dead.”

  “Armor. Disassemble,” she said, beginning to pull off various pieces to reveal damp, but not too horribly sweaty clothing. The armor had some form of internal air circulation that she didn’t understand beyond the fact that Esna never got drenched like she used to in her old armor.

  “There is a full shower tube here,” Rammak said. “Indulge yourself while I attend to supplies.”

  “If you insist,” she said sarcastically, wandering around the few rooms that were a mix of carved rock and artificial structural supports. It didn’t take her long to find the chamber that held a big vertical cylinder with a platform on top. Unfortunately it was empty, but she quickly found the topside controls and a small waterfall spilled out of three ports and began to slowly fill the big pond that the Calavari used. She could make it rain inside instead, but right now she preferred total immersion.

  While it filled she looked around for replacement clothes but found none that would fit her, so she dug into her pack and pulled out her spares. All of them were dirty, so she looked for and found a clothing refreshing unit and stuck them in, then stripped down and threw her current clothes inside. She walked naked back to the shower tube to find it filled halfway up.

  She walked up top and slid over the edge, dropping down into the water and blissfully soaking in the warm liquid up to her armpits. The tube would continue to fill up above her head, but she found the internal controls and stopped it just short of her chin before dunking her head and twirling her dirty hair around underneath the water and coming back up to the surface feeling thoroughly renewed.

  Rammak walked in and looked at her through the clear side of the tube, but at this point she no longer cared. She’d lived in her old armor so long that just wearing clothing alone had left her feeling naked, and she knew her protector would be the last person to ever harm her so she didn’t fear for her safety here, nor did she have any sense of embarrassment when Rammak stared at her. He seemed to worship Humans a bit, and she didn’t mind him looking when her body was fully there to see. Yammar and Innit had always suppressed their curiosity with her and her brother’s bodies, but she saw no need for it.

  Vanity was one of those things that her isolation on this planet had shielded her from, and her only concerns about ‘exposure’ revolved around having armor between her skin and a lachar bolt.

  “Did you need something?” she asked after a minute, running her fingers through her hair.

  “We’re missing some supplies.”

  Esna’s eyes widened and her sense of exposure spiked with the implied danger. “What?”

  “I do not think it was scavengers because they did not take everything, but I do think some indigenous critter found its way in here.”

  “Do we have enough to get to our next camp?”

  “Yes, but not by a wide margin. I had hoped to stay here for a week or so, but we need to leave tomorrow.”

  “Ahh…” she said, emotionally clinging to her bath water as she said the word. “Is that critter still around?”

  “If it is, I’ll make sure it doesn’t get in here. Enjoy the water while you have it. I’ll bring you your clothes when they’re ready.”

  “Thank you, Rammak,” she said as he left, then Esna hit a button on the curved wall that closed the cap on the tube and caused it to rain inside, but pulled out enough water simultaneously so the level wouldn’t increase.

  Esna felt it hit her hair and run through it, as well as little droplets hitting her face and seeming to wall her in from the harsh, cruel exterior world.

  “One day,” she said with disgust. “And I bet he says we have to run the whole way.”

  14

  ‘The whole way’ turned out to be 9 days through pitch black caves, but fortunately these weren’t burrow made and therefore more or less straight with annoying wiggles. The worst of it was the footing, for there was very little flat space to step down on. Esna was always turning her ankles on the angled rocks, but her armor kept her from getting injured for the most part. A couple of times she managed to really tweak her left despite the protection, but Rammak just told her to look at it as training and learn to how move over the rocks…meaning they weren’t going to slow down and walk.

  When they got to the end of this segment of their journey the broken floors disappeared into chunks of debris laying down on flat, artificial ones. They’d broken through into another set of ruins, though at this point she wasn’t sure where on the planet they were. Far beyond anywhere she had ever traveled with Yammar, and her armor’s map didn’t extend beyond where she or Rammak had traveled. Apparently the set he was wearing now hadn’t gone anywhere she hadn’t yet, for the
ruins weren’t mapped on her HUD and he’d told her that the two sets shared data regularly over short range hidden signals.

  Esna wasn’t sure what a ‘hidden’ signal was, but he’d told her it was meant to be useful without giving away their position. Apparently their comm signals to one another could give them away if they were more powerful, but were set to a very short range to avoid that. The hidden signals were somehow even more…hidden?

  She didn’t understand most of the technology he’d salvaged, but she was learning how to use it. Every stop they made he’d show her whatever was new and she tried to learn as much as she could. When they got into these ruins and followed a line of lights into a cleaned up area she spotted the power switch before he did, then the darkness disappeared and the clean, artificial light snapped on from strips that ran along the edges of the ceiling and floor.

  “Is there comm gear here to use?”

  “Possibly. There’s equipment here that can be salvaged. If I don’t get enough parts we’ll have to take what we have with us and combine them later.”

  “How big?”

  “I need a transmitter bigger than a suit of armor, or we’ll have to go to the surface to make sure it gets the range we need.”

  “How can I help?”

  “Restock your pack with foodstuffs and see if there’s any Human clothing here that fits you.”

  “Alright,” she said, a little disappointed not to be helping with the salvage work…which was as close to an area of expertise that she had. “How many Humans were on this planet before it got…blasted?” she asked, realizing that it was personal to him and she might want to pick her words better. To her it was stories, but he’d been here and known these people.

  “I don’t know for sure, but there would have been some that lived here to assist the Calavari and then some that came in to fight and help with the evacuation, as did many others.”

  “How many different races were in Star Force?”

  “Hundreds…thousands if you count individuals in Axius.”

  “Axius means what again?”

  “Alliance Xeno Interstellar Unified Sanctuary.”

  “So it was a refugee area?”

  “No, but it’s where a lot ended up after they passed through indoctrination…which was a process to teach them what they needed to know in order to join Star Force.”

  “A test?”

  “Training,” the Calavari said, taking the moment for another lesson. Rather than telling her things on his own, he usually waited for her to ask questions. She’d asked him about that too, and he said that curiosity was an essential part of being an individual. Those who didn’t think and wonder never got very far and had a hard time achieving self-sufficiency because it required a lot of adjustments made off internal biofeedback that no one else could access.

  Basically, no one could make you live forever. You had to earn it…then get lucky enough to avoid accidents and assassins.

  “How long did that take?”

  “For some it took years.”

  “And me? If the message is real and they’re coming for us?”

  “Your indoctrination has already begun. The more you learn from me, the faster the transition.”

  “What do I have to end up doing?”

  “Become one of us. Nothing more than that.”

  “How?”

  “Learn what it means to be Star Force.”

  “And everyone in Axius had to do the same?”

  “Most people in Axius were born there, but when someone came from the outside that was probably where they would end up. If they were Calavari they could go to Axius or our faction, and if you earned enough marks you could live and work about wherever you liked. That’s why some Humans were living here.”

  “Did you let anyone in?”

  “Pretty much, but we also had contacts with races and individuals that weren’t part of Star Force. They were free to travel and visit a lot of places, but to live with us you had to be one of us.”

  “What were their names? The other…powers besides the Viks?”

  “There were large ones and small. The biggest near us was the independent Protovic. The Critel, some of which are on this planet, had numerous worlds of their own spread out amongst Star Force territory. They were mostly businessmen and interacted with Star Force on that level, though few actually joined Star Force if there wasn’t profit to be made from it.”

  “Wait. I thought you said there was no currency?”

  “For people like me there was none, but if you were a civilian you could earn credits doing a variety of things. You didn’t have to in order to survive. Credits were for luxuries, but many people ran businesses within Star Force and acquired a great deal of semi-independent power. I’m guessing that you might have been descended from them.”

  “Me? Why?”

  “I wonder why your ancestors survived as long as they did. You said you came here on your father’s ship. Do you know where he got it?”

  “From his father.”

  “Perhaps you are descended from traders who weren’t on a planet when it was attacked. Those that were would either end up dead or evacuated. I doubt your lineage was accidental. I have been able to survive here amongst the other Calavari because the Viks don’t care about them. They’re not Star Force anymore. But for Humans it doesn’t matter. You all have to die. So how did you get here?”

  “I’ve been wondering that most of my life.”

  “I’m sorry I don’t have more to offer, but I am Star Force, and as long as you’re with me then so are you.”

  “Thank you. For everything…which is quite a lot compared to what I had before.”

  “It’s very little to me.”

  “I suppose it would be if you lived here before all this got trashed.”

  “Not all of it. Go find some intact pieces. You can keep whatever is here that fits you or in your pack.”

  “Does that mean we’re running out of here again?”

  “One more segment, yes. Then we’ll get to another underground transit with a speeder.”

  “How far?”

  “We’ll stay here a few days, then it’ll take at least 3 weeks.”

  “Ugh,” Esna said, “but I’ll take the few days.”

  “During which we’ll work on your fighting skills.”

  “Better than running,” she said, turning and heading off to explore the new camp.

  “Faster,” Rammak prodded as he watched her punching a variety of targets space around an otherwise empty room, “but never go as fast as you can. Always leave your mind a little bit of a head start over your body or you’ll end up making mistakes and that will slow you down far more.”

  Esna didn’t say anything, punching one floating bin with the side of her fist then running three hasty steps to the left and hitting another one with her elbow. Rammak had a circuit set up for her but she could barely move the targets. She didn’t know what was holding them in place, but had it been anti-grav like in her old speeder than even a little tap should have moved it.

  Whatever he had rigged up here, it had been meant for his strength level…which was why she couldn’t even budge them.

  “Let yourself fall into a rhythm and flow from one to another. Accept inefficiency as the price you must pay now to develop that rhythm, but always be looking for it. Strike, move, strike, move. Live it. Breathe it. Become it. When a Commando acts he does not think or plan. That is for times of calm. A Commando pulls on previous planning and thinking so that he can act and react. In the future you will be able to think when you have even a gap of 2 seconds to spare, but for now don’t try. You have targets and you are to hit them. Let that soak into you then disconnect the analysis part of your mind and put everything into the physicality.”

  Esna hit one up high then had to turn and duck down low to hit another. She wasn’t allowed to kick them yet, everything had to be arm strikes. When she went for it somehow she ended up in a skid without realizing it, fee
ling her arm come within range and exploiting the opportunity. She straight punched it, not having any other good options, then she moved up with her mind to the next target…with her legs somehow figuring out how to get her there on their own.

  She swung her elbow at it from the side, getting very close to the target in order to do it and feeling a personal connection with the target. Even though it was just a stationary target she had felt uneasy about getting so close before, but apparently that was starting to wear off. If this had been a person that probably wouldn’t have been the case, but right now she wasn’t thinking about that and taking Rammak at his word…just going with the flow and seeing where it led.

  “Enough,” he said, startling her.

  She half hit one, ending with a tiny little tap as she turned and looked at him, breathing hard.

  “Why?”

  “You’re finished.”

  “What? I can’t be. I just got started.”

  “That’s 1000 strikes.”

  “No way.”

  “I counted and have the visual replay if you want to confirm that.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yes.”

  “I could have sworn I was only at 400.”

  “When you get in a rhythm, losing count is normal. That’s why you have someone or something else counting for you so you can disconnect and pour your full focus into what you’re doing.”

  “Our armor makes recordings?”

  “Whenever it is on, yes.”

  Esna was shocked. “You mean everything I’ve done and said since I put this on is stored inside it somewhere?”

  “Not what you said unless you were on the comm. It records exterior sounds though.”

  “Why?”

  “So when we fight a battle analysts can study our enemy after the fact, or even during. With the battlemap signals being transmitted constantly we can have an analyst in a safe place…say a ship in orbit…and they can be studying what is happening from as many vantage points as there are suits of armor, either live or on as short a delay as they need.”

  “Can I turn it off?”

  “Yours is off, along with most of the rest of the functionality. Mine is recording though, so we can review your training or anything else we need.”