Infinity's End: Books 4-6, page 31
“What the hell?”
One arm reached out and on the end Cas could see it split into two dangerously sharp blades, opening and snapping closed like a crab’s claws. One of the claws reached up to where the cuffs had been affixed to the bar above him and snapped the air beside them, but then retracted again, folding back through the tears in Vrij’s jacket and disappearing from view.
“Did you know about those?” Cas asked Laura, his hand still on his weapon.
“They weren’t in the log.”
“Do you mean to tell me you could have broken out of those restraints at any time?” Cas asked. Vrij pulled up and slapped his chest twice with his forearms. Cas took that as his culture’s gesture of a yes. “Then why didn’t you?”
“P-prisoners aren’t supposed to escape,” he said.
“What are those things?”
Vrij concentrated. “M-my people are b-born with t-their own mandibles. T-they grow from our b-backs and h-help us complete tasks or are f-for defense. I…I lost m-mine when I was young.”
“What does that have to do with Diamant?” Laura demanded.
“When Diamant f-found out—banishment.” Vrij turned away again in what Cas easily recognized as shame.
“But you got them replaced. Aren’t yours as good as anyone else’s?” Cas asked.
“No. Mandibles are a p-part of a Bulaq’s nature. To l-lose them is a g-great dishonor.”
Cas released the butt of his gun. He was pretty sure if Vrij had wanted he could have killed every one of the spacewing pilots that brought him aboard, as well as anyone else within a one-meter radius during any time of his incarceration. He also could have removed his restraints at any time, or kept the mandibles secret. But instead he just laid there, staring at the ceiling of his bunk and chained up when he didn’t have to be.
Laura leaned over. “So, if they’re not on good terms, how is he supposed to get us to see Diamant?” she whispered.
Chapter Eleven
“Sir, wake up.”
Cas was jostled from a dreamless sleep back into the reality of the shuttle’s crew quarters. It took him a moment to gather his bearings and for a second he thought he was back on the Reasonable Excuse. He glanced over to see Laura standing beside the high bunk, her head barely visible over the top where he lay. He drew a deep breath. “You don’t have to call me sir.”
“Fine,” she replied. “I think we’re almost there. Jann told me to come get you.” She turned and left the crew bunks. Cas oriented himself and dropped his legs over the edge and hunched out of the cramped bed. The bunks were really horizontal alcoves that could be shut if the occupant wanted, but they didn’t leave a lot of room for comfort. They weren’t more than a meter in height in order to maximize the number of spaces in one shuttle which made getting in and out of them a challenge. Especially the top ones.
Cas hopped down and bent to check on Vrij on the bottom bunk, still in the same position he’d left him in. He didn’t expect the alien to go anywhere, or to even break his restraints. If Vrij was planning something, he wouldn’t act until they had disembarked. Though Cas couldn’t help but think he still hadn’t gotten over his shame from admitting to them his “disability”, if you could call it that. If Cas had two-meter-long bladed scythes tucked into the folds of his back he certainly wouldn’t consider them a disadvantage.
He made his way to the front of the shuttle where Jann and Laura sat in the pilot and co-pilot’s seats, respectively. Without turning to acknowledge him Jann nodded toward the structure ahead of them. “That’s it. Right where he said it would be.”
“Seems kinda…plain.” It looked like nothing other than a massive rectangle floating in space. Though the outside had markings and other indications it was more like a massive cargo container. “I don’t see any ports or any access areas. How are we supposed to get in?”
“It’s like Takar,” Jann said.
“What’s Takar?”
“Training mission,” she replied. “A couple years back we had a training exercise in the Argolis system. Takar is the asteroid belt which makes up most of the system; it’s huge. But our training involved dogfighting in an area with a lot of obstacles. Dorsey, Grippen and I, we’d hidden out behind one of the larger rocks, waiting for the autoprobes to come find us when Grippen gets this insane idea we needed a window.”
“A window? Cas asked.
“Yeah. So, she starts blasting away at the rock, burrowing a tunnel straight through it with the weapons. Ryant and I joined in and a few minutes later, we had a two-meter square tunnel we could stare down the barrel. As the autoprobes approached, Grippen shot straight through that tunnel, taking them out easy.”
Cas screwed up his face. “You want to blow a hole in the side to get through, is that what I’m hearing?”
“Maybe we should just ask the resident alien. I’m sure he knows,” Laura said.
Cas nodded and returned to the crew compartment. Vrij looked up when he entered and Cas reached over, unlocking his restraints from the bar holding them to the ceiling. “We’re here,” he said. “I figure you could have done that at any time, and you didn’t, so I want to thank you for that. But no sudden movements.”
Vrij touched his palms to his chest, tapping twice and moved to stand up. When he was up Cas could clearly see the holes in the back of his jacket where the mandibles had punched through.
“Were you ever going to tell us about those?” he asked.
“N-no. I thought I m-might need them to escape,” he replied. “I didn’t e-expect…trust.”
“You mean you didn’t expect us to take you up on your offer to come here,” Cas replied. Vrij touched his forehead with two fingers. “I don’t know what that means.”
“I didn’t expect it.”
Cas surveyed the small room. “Neither did I. But both our people need help. And maybe we can help each other. Head up to the front, I think we’re here.”
Vrij made his way past Cas, careful not to touch him and Cas followed, trying to see the outline of the folded mandibles on his back, but the jacket hid them well. Rafnkell was going to have a fit when she found out he’d been harboring dangerous weapons and her people hadn’t searched him.
“It this it?” Laura asked as Vrij stared out the main window of the shuttle. He tapped his chest twice. “What is that? Does he mean yes?”
“Yes,” Vrij said, his gaze locked on the rectangle.
“This is all that is left of your people?” Cas asked.
“T-this is where m-most of us are,” he replied. “Others, still s-scattered.” He pointed to the large rectangle. “We u-used our l-largest cargo holds—s-stitched them together. Built w-what we could.”
“Your people, you excel at engineering, don’t you?” Cas asked. Vrij tapped his chest twice again. “Pulling those power converters off the side of Tempest was delicate work. I’m not even sure we could have done it from that side. And certainly not as fast.”
“Experience,” Vrij replied.
“It’s something I can appreciate. How do we dock? I don’t see any ports.”
“You d-don’t dock. No ports. Land.”
“Did he say land?” Jann asked.
Vrij pointed to the port side of the rectangle. “Over t-there.”
“Bring us around, see what he’s talking about.”
Jann swung the shuttle around to the side where Vrij had pointed and his reason became clear. This side of the rectangle was open to the inside, which was nothing short of breathtaking. The Bulaq may have repurposed old shipping containers, but the inside was a fully functioning city. Cas could tell where other, smaller ships had been repurposed and retooled into buildings that now peppered the “floor” of the cargo containers. Some were stacked on top of each other and some had been disassembled and reengineered to create brand-new structures. The far side of the container was closed, and scaffolding climbed all over that end of the structure while the entire “ground” of the massive container was covered, with the exception of maybe a dozen different landing sites. The walls had been reinforced with skeleton structures and some of the “buildings” had begun to climb up the sides, acting as additional supports. Cas also noticed large pipes running through the “streets” between the buildings from one end of the structure to the other. He took note of the high number of spired buildings inside. Could those be shrines of some kind?
“Vrij, this is the Hub?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“And how long did it take your people to create this?”
He seemed to be doing a calculation in his head. “Ninety-four Vrij stays.”
Cas furrowed his brow. “Vrij stays?”
“I think he means the length of his stay on Tempest,” Jann offered. Vrij tapped his chest twice.
“But you’ve only been on the ship two days. You mean to tell me your people did all this in a hundred and eighty days?” Cas gawked at the structure. Had he not known better he would have said it had been there for centuries, not barely more than two seasons. What had their home planet been like? “You really do have an abundance of building materials.”
“The b-best,” Vrij replied.
“Jann, patch into the auto-vox and send them a message requesting to land.” Cas understood why they needed food and medicine now. They could literally build whatever they wanted but without a constant supply of food their people would all die out, great structures or not. The destruction of Laq had probably destroyed what food-producing facilities they had.
“This is the shuttle Hymettus, requesting permission to land on the Bulaq structure Hub,” Jann said into the system. The comm was silent for a moment as they waited on the response.
“Sometimes—t-takes a minute,” Vrij said, tapping the small device on his neck.
“Approved, please follow the appended coordinates,” a voice very unlike Vrij’s said on the other end. Cas was surprised but tried not to show it. He thought Vrij’s stutter might be a natural affliction of the auto-vox not being able to properly translate his words. But that might not be the case after all.
Jann brought the shuttle down and as they passed the terminus into the “city” there was a slight bit of turbulence. “P-pressurization,” Vrij said when Cas glanced at him.
“Are we—holy shit!” Ryant said, emerging from the back. “This place is huge! The way he was talking I thought it was just going to be a bunch of ships tethered together floating out in space. This thing is probably as big as Starbase Eight! If not bigger!”
“They’re builders,” Cas replied. He noticed as they were setting down on one of the pads a number of smaller ships coming and going through the space. Many were headed off toward the back of the container. “Vrij, what are those?”
“S-supplies. To b-build the t-temple.”
“Is that what all the scaffolding at the back of the structure is for?” It seemed like whatever this “temple” was it would be massive when it was finished.
“Yes. It w-would have been—already f-finished but slow since…”
“Since you’re having trouble feeding your people,” Cas finished. Vrij tapped his chest twice.
“Contact,” Jann said as the shuttle set down on the pad. “Keep it hot or shutdown?” She turned to Cas.
“Keep it hot. We don’t know what we’re walking into here. In fact, I think you should stay with the ship, just in case.”
Jann eyed him. “You’re sure? I came along to be your backup.”
“I know. Just keep an eye out and let us know if there’s anything funny going on while we’re meeting this Diamant. We do have valuable supplies on board after all.” She nodded and drew a pistol from a hiding spot Cas hadn’t even seen, placing it on the console where she could reach it quick. Cas turned to Ryant and Laura. “You two, equip force barriers and light weapons. I don’t want to go in guns blazing but I also don’t want to get jumped. Use your best discretion.”
“Y-you don’t n-need weapons,” Vrij said after them.
“Look, if all your people have these ‘mandibles’ on their backs which can kill us in an instant, we’re not going in there without some protection, I don’t care how peaceful your people are. Not to mention every encounter we’ve had with them so far have been hostile.”
“Outliers,” Vrij replied. “N-not like the rest.”
“We’ll see.”
Ten minutes later the four exited the shuttle, leaving Jann inside by herself. Cas gave her a reassuring wave as they approached the two Bulaq standing on the edge of the landing pad, their hands crossed in front of them. One of them spoke to Vrij as they approached and he spoke back, though Cas couldn’t understand either of them. He didn’t like being in the dark especially in a situation like this.
“T-they want to know our p-purpose here,” Vrij said.
“Tell them trade. And to see Diamant,” Cas replied. Before stepping off the Hymettus he’d taken stock of himself. He hadn’t been out of the Coalition in seasons, the last time being when he was on Zenfor’s ship. But before that, the last place had been Devil’s Gate. And this place felt more like there than anywhere else he’d been lately. It was dirty, crowded, noisy and Cas got the distinct impression everyone was out for themselves here.
“He won’t want to see you,” one of the Bulaq said in perfect standard after Vrij had relayed the message. Cas caught sight of small translators on their necks as well. Either they had synced up with Vrij’s, or the few words he spoke had been enough for them to translate.
Cas stepped forward. “We are here to make a deal. We were told he needed assistance.”
The Bulaq stared at Vrij before turning his attention back to Cas. “What kind of deal?”
“That’s for us and him to work out.” Cas’s eyes widened as from behind the Bulaq two large mandibles extended, their ends snapping and clicking. They were greyish-green in tint, much different from Vrij’s mechanical ones. And by Kor they looked sharp. Cas instinctively reached for his gun. “We didn’t come here to hurt anyone. We may have supplies you need. But if Diamant doesn’t want to talk, we’ll be on our way.” He made a motion for Laura and Ryant to step back, which they did while all three kept their eyes on the guards.
The mandible retracted behind the man and he glanced at his counterpart. They both tapped their chests twice. “Follow me,” he replied.
Chapter Twelve
As the guards led them through the narrow streets between what were once shuttles, repair craft, pleasure vessels, and several other kinds of ships Cas didn’t recognize. He felt an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Many of the buildings they passed had no windows or doors, and the ones he could see into were filthy inside. Cas could only assume this was residue from all the construction, though cleaning was probably on the bottom of your priority list if you were just trying to eat and feed your family. Small Bulaq children without shirts skirted around their feet, playing games and oblivious to the dire nature of their world. Though Cas did get a good look at how their mandibles folded up on their backs. They were like another set of thin, compound arms which scissored in and locked behind the Bulaq shoulder blades. They blended in so well they were almost invisible unless you looked hard. Cas could only imagine it had been a contributing factor as to why the Bulaq evolved as the dominant species of their planet.
Almost every corner they turned they were confronted with another unique smell. While most were tinged with sulfur, a few he didn’t recognize, and were completely foreign to his palate. He was glad he’d ordered everyone to wear the force barriers. There was no telling what kind of diseases these people might be unintentionally carrying. He glanced over at Ryant. “You ever heard of Grum?”
Ryant furrowed his brow. “Border world? On the far side of Sargan space. Past Tau Hydrae?”
“That’s it. I went there once on a courier job. I was one of the last non-Grum ships to leave the planet. The Sargans had cut them off, forced them to become self-sufficient. This place reminds me of what little I saw. Cut off from the trade routes and influx of goods and exports off the planet, the people were starving.”
“Why were you there?”
“To pick up some last-minute diplomats from Cassiopeia,” Cas said, stepping over a man slumped down on the wall, his head hung between his knees. “They were delivering the final edicts to the Grum. A hundred years of banishment. Then, if anyone was still alive after a century, they’d be admitted back into the Sargan way of life with a clean slate.”
“Seems kinda harsh,” Ryant said.
“It was designed to act as a message. The Grum had rejected the Sargan edicts, and in a move of sheer lunacy, had tried to emulate the Coalition. I heard about it from one of my courier buddies. The Sargans weren’t pleased.”
“So, they cut them off entirely?”
Cas nodded. “To show everyone else in the Commonwealth what would happen if they didn’t maintain loyalty. I can tell you not many people in the Commonwealth are what we would call happy, but they sure won’t be rejecting the edicts anytime soon.”
“Sounds like a shitty place,” Ryant replied, tenderness in his voice. “I’m surprised you could stay there.”
“It wasn’t like I had a lot of choices. And it has its positives. But yeah, the Grum didn’t deserve that. Just like I suspect most of these people don’t deserve this. Can you imagine, having your entire system destroyed? Think about what that would do to the Coalition.”
He screwed up his face. “Earth and Claxia Prime would be gone immediately. Valus too. The defense grid. Outposts Alpha, Beta. Maybe even Gamma. That’s a lot right there.”
Cas nodded. “Enough to cripple us. This could very well be us if those aliens reach home. We have to do everything we can to stop that from happening.”
“How long ago were you on Grum?” Ryant asked.
“Three years.”
