Bounty Hunter Academy 4, page 38
The smile in the diplomat’s eyes grew wider. “Nothing. And everything.”
“I’m afraid you’ll have to explain yourself.”
Diplomat Korthaz set the holocaster down on the supreme’s desk. Either accidentally (or, more likely) on purpose, the eyes of Governor Lyrin pointed directly at the supreme in a way that was somehow unnerving.
“Have you ever heard the name ‘Draxena Veil’?”
The supreme felt her blood temperature drop ten degrees.
Draxena Veil. The mysterious criminal mastermind rumoured to be behind every criminal organisation in the Tri-Galactic Territories. Even though she was so obviously a fabrication of conspiracy theorists everywhere, she still made the supreme want to reach for the remote that controlled the environment settings in her office and turn up the temperature.
“Draxena Veil doesn’t exist,” said the supreme, matter-of-factly, as if the matter was not open for discussion. “And even if she did, I don’t see what she could have to do with Governor Lyrin.”
“Draxena Veil wasn’t always Draxena Veil,” said Diplomat Korthaz. “Once upon a time, she had a different name.”
Diplomat Korthaz didn’t elaborate further. He seemed to be waiting for the supreme to ask the obvious question. But the supreme wasn’t going to play turboball.
“Diplomat Korthaz, if you don’t get to the point in the next ten seconds, I’ll not only have you thrown out of my office. I’ll have you escorted to your shuttle and sent on your way before you’ve even had time to pick up a cheap gift for your wife from one of the tacky souvenir shops stationed around the astropad.”
“I’m not married.”
“Well, when you do finally get hitched, please don’t invite me to the wedding. I’m afraid I don’t have time for time-wasters. Good day.”
The supreme turned her attention back to her desk terminal. It was, in retrospect, a particularly childish piece of amateur dramatics, but she had had to do something. She couldn’t just sit around letting Diplomat Korthaz toy with her emotions all day long. She had work to do - work that involved protecting the academy and the colony - from the inevitable attack that was going to come any day now.
“Before she was called Draxena Veil,” said Diplomat Korhaz, showing no hint of being offended by the supreme’s harsh treatment, “she was called Porla Destanger. That’s right. The same Porla Destanger who was once the chief strategist and closest advisor of Governor Lyrin. When Governor Lyrin was brought to justice—” Diplomat Korthaz said the word in a way that indicated he held it in complete and total contempt. “—Porla Destanger lost everything. Her home. Her job. Every last zenthar she had to her name. Porla Destanger blamed the Bounty Hunter Academy for ruining her life, and she vowed to one day get revenge on an institution that many view as little more than a brutal, repressive organisation.”
There was something in Diplomat Korthaz’s tone that indicated that he, too, thought that the academy was a brutal, repressive organisation, but he said nothing to that effect.
“After she changed her name to Draxena Veil,” Korthaz continued, “Destanger - or Veil, as she would be known from then on - sought to rise to the top of the criminal underworld. And she managed it, in only a few short years.”
“No thanks to that Vakian ultrawolf she supposedly keeps as a pet,” the supreme quipped, humouring the diplomat. Whenever she had heard mention of the name Draxena Veil in the Tri-Galactic governmental information reports her spies intercepted on behalf of the academy, the terrifying white beasts had usually been mentioned, often in concert with the words ‘maimed’, ‘mutilated’ and ‘dismembered’. The idea that someone could domesticate a Vakian ultrawolf, however, was about as laughable as the idea that a single woman lay behind every criminal organisation in the Tri-Galactic Territories.
“Draxena Veil would have ridden to the top with cute kitten just as quickly,” said Korthaz, either not picking up on the supreme’s joke or just ignoring it.
The supreme frowned. There was pride in Diplomat Korthaz’s voice. She had somehow touched a nerve. And why would that be the case? What did an insignificant diplomat from the Noruna Galaxy care how the fictitious Draxena Veil had made her name?
“Once she had asserted her power,” Diplomat Korthaz continued, and now the supreme realised the smile that had been present in his eyes earlier was now gone, “Draxena Veil sought to unite the enemies of the Bounty Hunter Academy under one banner. She called it The Hunterfall Faction.”
This time the supreme’s blood temperature didn’t drop a single degree. Despite the obvious danger that such an organisation could represent, the supreme didn’t believe for a single second that all those egotistical criminals could cooperate cohesively enough to mount a serious threat to the academy. If that was what her vision of the future was referring to, the supreme felt comfortable she could rest at ease, for there would be no difficulty repelling an attack from that idiotic assortment of tortheads.
“I see,” said the supreme, masking her inner thoughts with practiced ease. “And you believe this Hunterfall Faction is about to launch an attack on the academy?”
Diplomat Korthaz nodded gravely. “An imminent attack.”
“How imminent?”
Diplomat Korthaz shrugged. “It’s hard to say.”
The supreme sighed and leaned back in her chair. “How much?”
Diplomat Korthaz frowned. “I’m sorry?”
“How many zenthars do you want for the information? One thousand? Ten thousand? Fifty thousand? What’s your price, Diplomat Korthaz?”
Diplomat Korthaz contrived to look offended. “My price?”
“That’s usually the way these things work. Someone comes to me with information. We negotiate a price. If the price is fair and the information is valuable, then both parties will be satisfied. My predecessor insisted that I handle such matters with discretion, but I’ve never found much use for it and instead prefer getting straight to the point. So, how many zenthars do you want to reveal what you know about the timing of the attack?”
Diplomat Korthaz’s face was contorted with confusion. “I think there’s been some kind of misunderstanding. I’m not here to arrange an information trade. I’m merely here to inform you of an imminent attack on the academy.”
“An imminent attack that could happen at some point in the future. Yes, that’s very useful information, Diplomat Korthaz. I shall see that it gets my full attention.” The supreme got to her feet and gestured towards the door. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to install an update on my desk terminal.”
The supreme winced. Perhaps she had laid the sarcasm on a bit too strong. Clearly Diplomat Korthaz was just trying to be of service - perhaps even, as he claimed, without the desire for any kind of reward. That was the kind of selfless behaviour the people in the Tri-Galactic government were often found to be lacking. But if she took every ‘imminent threat’ to the academy seriously, the academy would be on a permanent state of red alert - a situation that was not exactly conducive to effective learning. When the real attacks came, she usually got wind of them a few days in advance. Not long, but long enough to snuff out most of the plots before they could even get started. That business with the Konrosh her father had sent to abduct her back to Zaltreya was the only notable exception in years of dealing with ‘imminent threats’ to the academy. The supreme had no doubt that if this Hunterfall Faction were to put together a serious attack on the academy, she would know about it well in advance, if not from the use of futuresight then from the many, many spies she had planted throughout the Tri-Galactic Territories (including inside every major criminal network).
“You don’t believe me, do you?” asked Diplomat Korthaz, his expression crestfallen.
“I believe you,” the supreme said in a more even tone. “It’s just that we get a lot of threats to the academy and most of them never come to anything. And those that do, well, I usually find out about them in my own way.”
“And yet this attack has slipped right through your notice.”
The supreme frowned. Was Diplomat Korthaz mocking her now?
“As I said,” the supreme continued, suddenly a little unsure of herself, “without a clear timeframe, it’s impossible for me to make any realistic preparations, and seeing as how you can’t even tell me the day—”
“Oh, I can tell you the day,” said Diplomat Korthaz.
“You can?”
“Yes.” Diplomat Korthaz’s eyes started smiling again. “It’s today.”
The supreme blinked. “Today?”
“That’s right. I’m just not sure about the time exactly. It could be in the next hour or it could be in two hours from now. It all depends on when she drops out of the spacegate.”
“When who drops out of the spacegate?”
“Why, Draxena Veil, of course. The leader of the Hunterfall Faction. Have you not been listening?”
The supreme sunk back into her chair. She thought for a moment, then her eyes locked onto Diplomat Korthaz, holding him firmly in her interrogative gaze. Futuresight might have been all burned out for now, but she had plenty of other analytical abilities. When she trained them on the bland, unceremonious man on the other side of her desk, however, they all returned empty. Diplomat Korthaz was as hard to read as Destron himself. All the same, there was something unnerving about Korthaz’s warning. And it couldn’t hurt to be careful. A quick call to the spacegate controller to check the interspace tunnel for any incoming vessels that weren’t registered on the daily landing schedule would determine whether Diplomat Korthaz’s claim had any validity.
The supreme reached for her comm board.
And then the strangest thing happened.
The supreme’s finger stopped just short of the comm board.
“What in the name of Destron…?”
The supreme tried to move her finger, but it remained exactly where it was, frozen in the air like it had been struck by an ice ray. Her hand, too, and even her entire forearm seemed to be suffering from the same strange muscle spasm. And then, with a weight of sudden dread in her belly, the bounty hunter supreme realised that she could not move her body at all. Every part of her was paralysed, from the head to the toe.
“It’s the Veyta Orb,” said Diplomat Korthaz, his tone suddenly bored and disinterested. “You do know about the Veyta Orb, don’t you? Yes, of course you do. He must have told you. Destron, that is. Before he fled.”
The invisible paralysing force was slowly making its way up the supreme’s neck, but it hadn’t reached her tongue yet.
“He didn’t flee,” she said.
“Sure, he didn’t. He just went for a walk fourteen years ago and hasn’t come back yet.”
Diplomat Korthaz sneered, and a light of triumph lit up in his eyes.
“You’re doing this,” said the supreme. It wasn’t a question.
“The mysterious, mystifying Veyta Orbs,” Diplomat Korthaz continued, springing to his feet with an energy that hadn’t been there before. He turned his attention to the decor (or rather than lack of it) on the walls of the supreme’s office. “The great prize of the ancient Veytans, who once ruled the universe, before they were wiped out by the greedy, treacherous Umumata. The Umumata killed the Veytans and took the orbs, and they hid them somewhere they thought no outsider would ever be able to find them.” Diplomat Korthaz smiled and shook his head to himself. “Only they didn’t figure an insignificant human bounty hunter into their plans.”
The supreme broke off her stare with Korthaz and shut her eyes. Focusing her attention inwardly, she forced her body chemistry to shift, just like how she had been trained at the academy. Whatever was stopping her from moving, it had to be chemical. Somehow, Diplomat Korthaz had slipped something into her drink or poisoned her some other way. That was the only explanation for her paralysis, and if the supreme could just alter her body chemistry significantly enough, she might be able to break the chemical hold on her muscles.
“You’re wasting your time,” said Diplomat Korthaz. “And you’re not listening to me. Here I am talking about Veyta Orbs, and you’re off trying to treat your paralysis like it has a biological cause. I’ve got to tell you, it’s a little bit disappointing, especially after everything she said about you.”
“Everything w-w-who said about me?” said the supreme, just about forcing the words out as the paralysing agent claimed her tongue.
“Draxena Veil, of course.”
Diplomat Korthaz came to a stop before the white mask mounted on the wall. The supreme’s infamous teardrop-shaped mask glowered over the room: fearless and deadly in a way that the supreme only felt when she wore the mask over her scar-worn face. It was that mask that the supreme had worn all those years ago when she had first taken down that band of rebels at the tender age of eight. The mask had been a little too big then, but she had grown into it over the years, and now it fit perfectly. How she wished she could be wearing it right now. Then she might instinctively know the right course of action.
“It was Veil who exposed me to the Veyta Orb,” said Diplomat Korthaz, his eyes tracking over the supple curves of the mask. “The other Veyta Orb, that is - the one she borrowed from the Unumata. I didn’t know what it was at first, and the effect it had upon me - I was a young boy at the time - well, it was quite severe. Still, it was better than spending the rest of my life on the streets - an eventuality that would come to fruition after my parents were taken by bounty hunters for a trivial crime. Draxena Veil took care of me, and she raised me to become the force that would one day be the harbinger of retribution for the Bounty Hunter Academy.”
Diplomat Korthaz turned from the mask, and the supreme now saw that his eyes were alight with fire and fury.
Could it really be true? the supreme thought. Could Draxena Veil really exist? And if so, could she have acquired the other Veyta Orb from the Unumata and used it for her own terrible purposes? If it was true, then the paralysing power that held the supreme in a rigid position of helplessness wasn’t being caused by a chemical agent but rather by something more akin to a dazzle. Only this time, it wasn’t a bounty hunter using a magical ability.
It was the prodigy of a hither-to-unknown enemy.
“I have to say, at first, I was a little bit disappointed,” said Diplomat Korthaz. “After extensively studying the plethora of fascinating dazzles listed in the Jool League of Bounty Hunter holocards collection, I had hoped I would get some cool, impressive dazzle, like the ability to conjure fire or bring asteroids down from the sky or shoot lasers out of my fingers. When I discovered that all I could do was trap people in a state of total immobility, I couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed. But actually, I’ve got to say that it’s really grown on me. I don’t know if that’s because it’s actually a better dazzle than I original thought or whether it’s just because I learned to like it. In any case, I’m quite fond of it now. And I believe that I might even develop a secondary level of ability over time, is that right? It’s been hard to get any clear information, what with the hunterNET having a level of security that’s about as unbreakable as a galvanium hull.”
The supreme felt the bottom of her stomach drop out. This was a dire situation indeed. She was about to be captured, and that could mean only one thing.
They wanted to get information out of her.
And the supreme had a lot of information - information that could bring a lot of good people to very bad ends.
She couldn’t allow that information to fall into the hands of the enemy. She was tough - as tough as they came - but the hard, unarguable truth was that the quality of torture tech had long ago risen to the point where it had a 100% success rate.
That meant the supreme had to do the unthinkable.
She had to take her own life.
Teasing out the last of the strength in her mouth, she readied herself to bite down on her tongue. If she was lucky, she might be able to choke on her tongue before help came, or she might die from blood loss. In any case, it was her only chance, and she had to act fast. If she had been wearing her mask, it would have been a lot easier, what with that built-in, thought-activated explosive charge.
The supreme gasped.
Of course! The built-in explosive charge! The one that had been installed for use in the event of capture by the enemy! The thought-activated explosive was meant to blow off the head of the person wearing it, but it could just as well be used against an aggressor who just happened to be standing with his back to the mask. The blast might not kill Diplomat Korthaz, but it would surely break his hold on her, and she would be able to deal with him with any one of the thousand methods she had for dealing with people.
The supreme focused her thoughts on the mask, reeling off the activation code for the explosive charge number by number.
Six… One… Eight… Two… Four… Three… Ni—
“It’s no use, I’m afraid,” said Diplomat Korthaz. He turned around, pulled the mask from the wall and held it over his face. The automatic bone-sensitive magnets locked the mask firmly in place, and the young man’s intense eyes shone through the eyeholes. “I can paralyse not only your body but also your mind. Here. Watch.”
Diplomat Korthaz cocked his head slightly, and the supreme felt the strangest of sensations. It was as if someone had thrown a blanket over her mind, consigning every last one of her thoughts to darkness.
She thought…
Nothing.
No fears. No hopes. No observations. No plans for escape or suicide.
Nothing.
“Don’t worry,” said Diplomat Korthaz, glowering triumphantly from behind the teardrop-shaped mask. “This won’t last much longer. We’ll put you in an SCU soon, and then you can watch as your precious academy is brought to its knees.”
The supreme’s eyes flared. She really was helpless, and all she could do now was hope that the bounty hunters stationed on the colony - including those that were amongst the teaching staff - would be able to put a stop to whatever terrible event was about to unfold.
