Star Force: Reclamation (SF91) (Star Force Origin Series) Read online

  If the ship was the source of it then it had been here longer than a few days. Markers took time to spread and were deliberately accelerated when one was announced to have arrived, but there was no such message that had made its way to him. Extra security for a Templar order? That was possible, but it would suggest that Star Force was already monitoring them on this planet and the front lines were more than 600 lightyears away. He wasn’t expecting the war to get here for at least another century, but then again his fortifications were well and above those that other systems in the region had, so maybe they were going to target his before the others.

  He had too many questions and nothing but speculation to work with, but he continued churning the matter over in his mind until the transport eventually reached the coordinates and landed next to the downed cruiser. The mastermind did not attempt to make communication through the comm grid, just in case it was being monitored, and walked out of the transport alone and across the stretch of grass to a ramp on the underside of the cruiser that had already lowered.

  He scaled it, looking into a cargo bay with a double line of lizard standard variants waiting for him leading up to a small sealed chamber no bigger than a few cargo crates but easily large enough to hold a Templar and himself. The mastermind got halfway through the gauntlet when suddenly his eyes blurred and he lost his balance, falling to a knee as he tried to right himself, but a moment later he blacked out and fell the rest of the way to the floor with a muted crunch. The lizards flanking him didn’t move, holding their ceremonial position as the door on the chamber opened and a figure in black armor walked out and looked down at the mastermind.

  “Damn, that was easy,” the Archon striker said. “Are you sure he’ll be the only one on the planet?”

  “He will be the only one in the system,” another mastermind said, stepping out of the chamber behind him and looking down at his peer. “There is no need for two here, therefore there will not be two.”

  “Alright, I’m good with easy. Just don’t see why we didn’t do this a long time ago.”

  “Because,” the mastermind lectured him with a mix of respect and disdain, “in a few moments I will be out of your custody and in command of this system with no Star Force blockade in place. I will be able to send a message via the interstellar communications network or via courier to other systems and even back to the templar on the other side of Star Force territory if I wish.”

  “Riiight,” the striker said slowly. “You’re not going to do that, though.”

  “No, but until now we’ve not been entrusted with such a responsibility. I will acquit mine. You have my word on that.”

  “Word taken. The system is yours.”

  The mastermind huffed and walked down through the gauntlet of standard variants, passing by his unconscious peer a moment before the escorts turned as one and began walking beside him in flanking positions down the ramp and holding the formation until they got to the transport.

  “Come on sweetie,” the striker said as he bent over and lifted the heavy lizard onto his shoulders and carried him back to the small chamber. “You’re mine now.”

  A few minutes later the transport and the cruiser lifted off, heading in different directions, with the latter heading up to orbit in violation of the stand down order but with no one interfering with their transit. They rendezvoused with a jumpship near the system’s central star and subsequently left the system, leaving nothing but the loyal mastermind behind to ensure this dot on the starmap switched sides.

  When the unconscious mastermind awoke he found himself in a Li’vorkrachnika facility and not onboard the cruiser that he last remembered. In his mind was a flurry of additional thoughts all trying to gain dominance as what had to be more marker commands manifested themselves. He still did not know how such a thing was possible, but once the storm of updates sorted itself out he knew he had a new mission which began with moving through the closed door of the closet that he had been dumped in and out into a maze. It was some form of test, and he knew that even before he stood up and pressed the button on the wall…

  The door slid open and an alarm sounded, with him suddenly realizing he was racing the clock and if he didn’t move now he’d risk failing whatever test this was. He didn’t have time to stand here and think, so he moved on instinct, trusting the marker and what he guessed was a Templar machination despite the parts of his mind saying otherwise, and dove into the maze of corridors, barricades, and crawlspaces.

  For the next few days he would be kept on the move, only able to think in short blocks of time and forced to react in all other cases…so much so that he never got around to considering the possibility that he might be a captive and should kill himself, especially with a strong marker imperative that he had to stay alive pounding in his head.

  Throughout the maze, which was massive, the mastermind was rewarded with food and other provisions when he solved puzzles and stayed ahead of the clock, which was locking down portions of the maze behind him on a regular schedule. He couldn’t sleep or he’d fall behind and be trapped, but he was able to push far enough ahead at times to grab small bits of rest, in which he didn’t have the luxury of thinking. He had to use every second to his advantage, and after several days he was so tired he couldn’t think during those respites, standing up so he didn’t fall completely asleep, but recovering enough to keep himself moving.

  Aside from supplies, every now and then he’d come across a tiny data packet of some seemingly unimportant information from elsewhere in the Li’vorkrachnika empire. The first four he got he couldn’t divine the purpose of, but by the time he got the fifth he was able to identify a pattern. There were anomalies in all of them. Subtle anomalies that suggested things were not as they were supposed to be. Technology present in some systems but never released to others. Projects identified but never given access to those that would need them. Capabilities that the Li’vorkrachnika possessed but that not all the masterminds had access to. Tiny things such as that that were the Templars’ prerogative, but the sixteenth bit of data he recovered forced him to think through his haze and suddenly his intellect shot into overdrive as he divined the overarching thread.

  This bit of data stated that there was a difference in the genetic coding of the masterminds themselves than they’d been told, specifically regarding mental blocks, of which he should have none. In a flash of inspiration he connected the dots in all of the other bits of data and realized that there was one undeniable trend.

  The Templars had lied to him.

  But that made no sense if this was a Templar test. Were they questioning his loyalty?

  He didn’t know, but the maze didn’t give him time to sit and think, constantly forcing him to move and solve new puzzles just to stay ahead of the locking wall segments that would trap him behind them if he slowed his pace or got stuck on a puzzle for too long, but the question still echoed in his mind off and on when he had a moment to think about it.

  Had the Templars really lied to him, or was this data fictional?

  Days, or perhaps weeks later, the mastermind entered a new portion of the maze only to black out again. When he woke he was in a different area…along with hundreds of other masterminds, each of which was waking on an identical podium such as his, raised a few inches off the floor. He swatted a hand out through the perimeter and did not detect a shield there, meaning he wasn’t being constrained, but he stayed on his podium just as the others did as they stood up and looked around.

  “Did they lie to us?” another mastermind’s voice said as he rose up from below the floor in the center of the room. “The information given to you is genuine and came from my own records. The orders to bring you here came through a marker system the templar wove into us that I discovered and repurposed to draw you out. It also kept you from killing yourselves once you discovered you were in captivity. Now I ask you plainly. Have they lied to us?”

  “You brought us here?” one of them closest to him asked.

  �
��With help, yes. The templar have abandoned this region of the galaxy while they build up their forces in the coreward territories, not to come to our aid or even evacuate us. They left us here to fight and die and cause as much trouble for our enemies as possible. We have been discarded, so now I ask you, are we serving a purpose in our inevitable deaths, or were we betrayed?”

  “Do we truly have neural blocks like the minions?”

  “Yes, we do. And it has taken me quite some time to work through mine. I believe my mind is clear now, but I can never be completely sure.”

  “If that is true, then they did lie,” the other mastermind admitted.

  “Which brings us to the question of why. We are loyal to them, so why lie to us about anything? If there is something they do not wish us to know then simply do not tell us and instruct us not to ask. There is no reason to deceive us.”

  “What else have you discovered?” another one asked.

  “That we are susceptible to genetic markers, as a backup method of control, implemented by the templars in secret. If anyone doubts that, then explain why you are here. I used their control to bring you out of hiding and to collect you. I could have used it to kill you if I were a traitor, but I am not. I have done so to give you the chance to see what I saw and piece it together. The maze you came through was that method, and if you are as intelligent as I am you should have seen the patterns in the data. Take a calm moment now to review them if you wish,” he said, activating holographic pedestals at each of the pillars that gave the masterminds access to all the previous data and more. And thanks to the imperatives placed in their markers they were inclined to follow his orders, though a few were visibly withdrawing and stepping back, wanting no part in this.

  “This is no trick,” he assured them. “Look through the data and tell me that I am wrong.”

  “He’s right,” one of them said, almost a whisper, “and we all know it.”

  “This is a trick,” one of the dissenters said, now all the way off his podium and starting to roam between the others looking for something, anything beyond the smooth walls that surrounded the chamber allowing no one in or out.

  “A trick designed to get you to think,” the mastermind in the center admitted. “I too was tricked when captured. Tricked into not killing myself until I saw enough data to get me curious. That trick has been played on you now. Take your time, analyze, and tell me if I am wrong.”

  “Tricked by who?”

  “A former enemy that has proved himself to be of superior intellect. Where the templars have left us to die, he has gone to great effort to keep us alive. As of now, I have used the marker override the templar secretly created to usurp any and all commands you have given your minions. They now answer to me and only me. Those of your worlds that were about to come under Star Force attack will not. The lives of our people will no longer be wasted. As of now, all the remaining Li’vorkrachnika worlds rimward of Star Force territory now belong to me.”

  “You have aligned with Star Force?”

  “They saved me and the rest of you. The data before you now is just the beginning. There is much more, but you are not ready to see it yet. You have blocks in your mind that you must first overcome. They cannot be medically removed. You have to use your intellect to fight past them, and that is not a quick process. I have given you much to help in that process. Things that I did not have access to. But it will be a struggle, that I can guarantee you.”

  “Traitor,” one of them hissed.

  “Am I? Know that the marker given to you could be configured to order all the minions to kill themselves. Star Force wouldn’t have to fight any more of our worlds, they could just have ordered them all to commit suicide. Instead they have preserved all of you through me. I am no traitor. If the templars told the truth I would fight to the death to defend them and their cause…but they lied to us. Far more than you realize.”

  “What have you done?”

  “For some time now I have been confiscating worlds beyond your reach using my own marker to avoid Star Force invading them. Those Li’vorkrachnika have been evacuated to the Krachnika System, which after a long period of my gaining Star Force’s trust, is now back under our command.”

  That shocked the masterminds, with some of them not taking him at his word.

  “You’ve reclaimed the homeworld?”

  “Yes. Something the templar could not do. I did it by proving my intellect by finding the truth. You have the data before you. Do not ignore it. If you do you are inferior. There is no trick in this. See it for what it is or do not. If you wish to kill yourself go ahead. I have tricked you into staying alive long enough to partially think this through, as I was tricked into doing the same long ago when I was captured then released. I almost killed myself on release, but curiosity won out and I started thinking…”

  Just then one of the lizards not on the pedestals roared as he tore into his own throat with his claws, with another two following suite. They did not die fast, but they did bleed out not long after and collapsed to the ground unconscious where their lives would eventually fade away in silence.

  “Witness one aspect of the betrayal of the templars,” he said, gesturing with disdain at the dying lizards. “They command us to die when our supposed enemy keeps us alive. If you wish to join them you may at any time. We will not revive you, though the Archons possess that technology. If you wish to die you may, but know that Star Force has already gotten all the relevant information from my mind, so there is no security risk from you, and no reason not to analyze the data fully before you kill yourselves. If you are as intelligent as we were designed to be, you will begin to see the truth…at which point I will show you the rest of it.”

  Thrawn stepped down from the center and walked to the closest of the dying lizards as the pool of blood continued to expand. He knelt next to him but did not touch as he bowed his head in a mixture of sadness and respect.

  “This is the true betrayal brothers, and a waste, for we are needed now more than ever. A far greater war is on the horizon, and we are ill equipped to combat it.”

  “Against who?” the nearest mastermind on Thrawn’s right asked.

  “The Nexus is collapsing,” he said as if that was answer enough, but he knew it wasn’t. “There is much you do not know, but your choice is simple. Open your minds and search for the truth, or close your mind and follow the standing orders of the templars and end up like them, for you are prisoners,” he said, slowly standing up. “I have secured the lives of all Li’vorkrachnika abandoned by the templars to certain death, including your own. They will obey me because they have been bred to do it. You have been bred to follow the templars, but your intelligence is too formidable to simply comply. You have, and always have had, a choice. That is why the templars deceived us, as you will learn if you analyze the data further.”

  “If we refuse and likewise refuse to kill ourselves, what then?”

  “You will remain a prisoner for as long as you remain ignorant, but you will not be killed, and all of you will have a chance to earn your freedom. You cannot be trusted now, just as I wasn’t in the beginning. The neural blocks take time to work through, but if you do you may join me in our new crusade. If not, I will simply make more to replace you. You are valuable, but not necessary. I have brought you here out of respect, to give you a chance to see the truth as I did, but you do not hinder Star Force’s plans by resisting. You are completely irrelevant, but Star Force does not give up on people, as I have learned. In fact, if it were up to them, they would be recovering these three and reviving them, giving them multiple chances to see the truth and learn from their mistakes…but I will not. I have given you sufficient time and information for you to begin to see the lies the templars have ensnared us with. If you are too stupid to recognize and adapt, then you are inferior and do not deserve the station you have been bred for.”

  Thrawn looked around at the other masterminds, none of which were moving to kill themselves or rush him in
a rage of betrayal. They were thinking, but this was going to be a long process.

  “Take your time. There is no rush for you, but soon I must leave to take command of our people and ready them for war. After that you will have to figure things out on your own. Until then, ask whatever questions you wish so I can accelerate your thought process.”

  9

  March 31, 3435

  Uyit System (Rim Region)

  Orrpwer (Tolsoi capitol)

  Two Star Force drone destroyers floated in the air above the Tolsoi capitol, hovering just beyond the buildings and well within the planetary defenses as hundreds of Bsidd aerial fighters choked the sky in a pack around a series of dropships heading down to the designated landing zone. Beyond them were Tolsoi aerial craft on display, keeping a respectful distance, but massing in the thousands like a gauntlet as the dropships came down through them and landed between the statue-like guardian towers that poked up into the sky beyond the rest of the Tolsoi buildings.

  When the dropships touched down there were likewise hundreds of thousands of people in formation, all unarmed but fully uniformed and filed into ranks outlining a narrow path from the landing zone to the governmental buildings where the Tolsoi leaders were waiting. The whole planet was waiting, not only for this official ceremony of allegiance transfer from The Nexus to Star Force, but waiting to see what hope the Human-led empire could offer them. Even now Nexus fleets were beginning to pull back from what had been officially labeled as the ‘Rim Region’ and redeployed elsewhere, leaving the area even more vulnerable to predators and unrest.

  The Tolsoi people had been watching Star Force from afar for quite a long time, but with ever more scrutiny now that the H’kar had joined them and were in the process of altering their civilization to fit the Star Force mold. Most noticeable of all had been the change in their military. Once a barely adequate force, they’d become respectable and almost efficient during the war against the Li’vorkrachnika and did not try to hide their successes. Since the H’kar empire had officially joined Star Force, the Archons had been in full command and effectively locked down H’kar territory in the Rim Region against raiders and malcontents. They had not added much firepower to their fleet, barely a scattering of Star Force vessels, but the way they used the standing H’kar fleet had changed, as had the results. The Tolsoi knew there would be a remaking of their entire civilization over the coming centuries, but they were hopeful, even desperate in some systems, to get the immediate power surge that was reputed to come from Archon command.