Chương 18: Part 18

Anja and Jesri trailed behind Eleanor as she walked down the busy corridor, the flows of grey Irri parting around them as if they were a rock in a stream. There was something vaguely alienating, Jesri thought, about being in a place where everyone was so well coordinated save for you. It didn't seem to bother Eleanor or Anja, however, and the two of them chatted loudly amid the soft rustle of the crowd.

"... centralize operations around the C-quarter of the outer ring," Eleanor said proudly, "but within a decade we should be able to refurbish much of the middle ring in this quarter as well. That will net us two new fabrication workshops around C-Mid-47 and 103, assuming we can scrounge enough to repair the power conduits." Anja was nodding, but Jesri had a suspicion that she was just as lost as Jesri.

Eleanor seemed to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the station and their efforts to repair it, rattling off room designations and corridor numbers like she was referencing a spec sheet. Then again, she had been trapped on the station for long enough that her exceedingly granular familiarity made sense. To hear her tell it, she had been directing Irri refurbishment efforts for nearly five hundred years but only reclaimed the resources to make much headway within the last fifty.

The station had fallen into disrepair during her lonely custodianship, and refurbishing it to support the needs of the Irri had been an immense undertaking. They still suffered from systems failures, Eleanor confessed. They had been forced to cannibalize parts from unused systems to wire and repair their first fabricator block, so many of the areas adjacent to the docks were stripped and powerless.

Since many of the core functions had dependencies in the central ring, a failure there meant walking kilometers through dark tunnels while lugging spare parts and tools to address the problem. Jesri remembered the warren of hallways at Harsi and shuddered. Still, the areas they had reclaimed were nearly pristine. Jesri hadn't spotted the depressingly normal sights of a transit station as of yet - dead machinery, broken lights, lichen and moss covering the walls.

The station probably didn't look this good when it was still a mining outpost, she thought ruefully. She was just about to interject and complement Eleanor on the state of things when the lights flickered and went out.

"Oh, dammit," Eleanor groused, "hold on a second." It was pitch-black in the corridor for a few heartbeats, then a swarm of lights winked into existence up and down the hallway. Each Irri pulled out a small pen light, clipping it to their uniform and proceeding down the hall as if nothing had happened. Eleanor's own light illuminated her sheepish grin as she fastened a light to one of her shoulder boards.

"Sorry, didn't think to get you two lights," she apologized.

"We've had a good couple of months, so it didn't occur to me." She shook her head.

"Dammit, dammit. There's just way too much infrastructure here for us to maintain," she griped.

"We've only got five working fab shops and they're civilian spec. The good stuff is in the maintenance areas towards the core, but we can't even turn them on with just the substation reactor from this ring segment." Eleanor sighed and seemed to deflate in on herself.

"Every time I think we're finally making progress there's another damn setback. It's like the station is working against me." Anja squeezed her shoulder reassuringly.

"You've done wonderful work so far, sister," she soothed, "maybe there is some way we could use the resources on the Grand Design to assist." She perked up at that, giving Anja a grateful look.

"That's not a bad idea, actually," she mused.

"The ship reactor-" Eleanor cut off, a blank look slipping over her face before it tightened with anger.

"We have to move," she said curtly.

"I just lost contact with Drinni." She turned and ran down the corridor, back the way they had came. Jesri and Anja exchanged a bemused glance and jogged after her, but it took several steps before Jesri remembered where she had heard the name before. She nearly tripped at the sudden realization.

"Oh shit," she swore.

"Rhuar and Qktk!" They ran faster. Qktk winced against the glare stabbing into his eyes, flaring from a half dozen handheld lights. He couldn't make out anything in the dark save that their attackers were Irri, the glow of the lights obscuring all other details. Drinni lay sprawled on the floor, a thin trickle of blue-green blood dripping from his head where one of the attackers had hit him with a battered pipe. Unless Qktk had severely misjudged Irri physiology he wasn't going to be of any use in the short term.

A low, menacing growl issued from beside him as Rhuar stalked up towards the encircling Irri. His hackles were raised and his teeth bared, making him look every inch the feral predator. The Irri hesitated, backing away from him fractionally. Qktk rattled his mandibles at them, a noise he knew most humanoids found to be incredibly disconcerting. To his immense gratification, they backed away in earnest.

"Wait," came a voice from the darkness. One of their attackers stepped forward, turning its light to illuminate its own face. With a shock, Qktk realized it was the intruder from the hydroponics bay that he had seen not an hour earlier.

"We only have seconds," it said, its voice rough and surprisingly low for a being of its stature.

"Come with us, quickly. There isn't time." Rhuar laughed darkly.

"Yeah, no," he spat.

"I think we'll stay." The Irri turned to Qktk even as her companions murmured at Rhuar's unique method of speech.

"Whatever you are, you're not one of hers," it said insistently.

"You saw me and said nothing. You have to leave with us, now!" In the dim light Qktk could see the light sparkling in the Irri's golden eyes. It looked afraid again, just as it did the first time he saw it, only now it wasn't afraid of dying - it was afraid for him, for all of them. He began to respond, but was cut off when Rhuar snarled again, snapping at the Irri. It danced backwards, its light flickering out.

"It doesn't matter," it said sadly from somewhere in the dark.

"You aren't hers. We can't let her have you." Thin grey arms shot out from behind Qktk, pulling him into a crushing embrace. He heard Rhaur yelp from beside him - they must have snuck around behind them while they were talking. He struggled, limbs flailing, but couldn't manage to break free from the Irri's deceptively strong arms. The one who had spoken walked in front of him again, eyes pitying.

"I'm sorry, strange friend," it said.

"You're confused, it's okay. We can talk once we're safe." A bag of rough fabric swept over Qktk's head, and he was plunged back into darkness. The three sisters raced through the darkened hallways, Eleanor sprinting without hesitation or indecision while Anja and Jesri did their best to keep up. After a few minutes, there was a high-pitched whine and the lights slammed back on, forcing them to stop for a few moments and wait for their eyes to adjust.

The Irri, unperturbed, deactivated and stowed their penlights before continuing about their business. Eleanor led them to one of the fabrication workshops, the last location she had received from Drinni. Jesri's stomach contracted to a hard knot when she saw that it was empty save for a smear of blue-green blood on the floor that Eleanor grimly informed them was Irri in origin.

"They've taken Drinni and your crewmen," she said, "I'll compose a search team to recover them."

"They?", asked Anja, confusion adding to the anger in her voice.

"Who are you talking about, sister?" Eleanor paused and grimaced, seeming to roll the words around in her head.

"There were a few Irri who didn't like the group's decision to work with me and split off," she explained.

"They were no trouble at first, there's plenty of space on the station. But as we've become more prosperous they've taken to raiding us for supplies. We've even had a few incidents where we had to use force, when they were caught stealing." She frowned, staring at the blood smear.

"They always run when they're caught, though. They don't seek out fights. And the timing of the blackout… I'm afraid they're escalating their conflict with us. This was a deliberate attack, coordinated with sabotage."

"For what reason?", Jesri asked, feeling lost.

"Why would they want to abduct these three?" Eleanor hesitated, then shook her head.

"I don't know for sure," she said slowly, "they might have been alarmed at your arrival." She looked up, her eyes blazing with anger and determination.

"It's not the time for speculation, though. Every minute we talk, they move deeper into the station." Anja and Jesri nodded.

"We can help," Jesri said determinedly, "let us know where you need us." Eleanor nodded and led them out of the room at a brisk walk.

"We'll have to lead multiple teams," she said, "or they'll be able to evade us easily. I've directed a few dozen Irri to meet at a staging area near here, they know the standard escape routes." Anja frowned.

"Standard? I thought you said the other Irri had never done this before."

"We chase them away when they raid us, catch them if we can," Eleanor explained, making an irritated gesture.

"Anja, we don't have time to chat right now. The adjacent segments are dark, neglected deathtraps. If they make it out of this ring segment with your crew we'll never find them. We can predict where they'll go for the time being because of the chokepoints between the segments, but once they reach an exit they'll be impossible to track down."

"Right," said Anja, nodding her agreement, "just tell us where to go." Jesri moved quietly with a team of a dozen Irri, her companions slipping through the hallway with an efficient, loping stride. Eleanor had been able to determine the direction in which the kidnappers had fled, but after they had left the reclaimed area around the docks their trail vanished. This left seven likely exits from the ring segment, of which Eleanor had functioning remote access to close four.

Each sister was leading a team towards the remaining exits. With luck, the three captives would slow the kidnappers down enough for one team to intercept them. It was a shitty plan. The station was huge, and the kidnappers had enough of a head start that they weren't assured of catching up in time even at their brisk pace. Unfortunately, there wasn't much else to be done about it. The lifts were broken, the doors were stuck open, and if they didn't catch up then that was it - the three captives were in the wind.

Her group broke into the midline orthogonal hallway, the large central arc that ran through the outer ring segments. The hallway curved off into the distance, high-ceilinged and pocked with lichens that clung to the walls and floor. If they were going to escape towards the next outer segment, the door at the end of this hallway would be their chokepoint - and they would likely be following this route to get there.

Anja and Eleanor were moving towards two exits to the middle ring segment in the same quarter, relatively close together compared to Jesri's target on the far end of the ring. They had less distance to cover - if they didn't catch their quarry soon, then odds were they had already escaped. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work! Or, perhaps, they were leaving through Jesri's exit.

Around the farthest curve of the hallway she caught a flicker of motion, and when she redoubled her pace she saw them clearly. Ten Irri, with three figures in brown sacks being awkwardly carried between them. One of the fleeing kidnappers looked back and gave a shrill yell when it saw Jesri approaching. The others looked back and the whole group sped up fractionally. Jesri grinned. They outnumbered the fleeing Irri, and they were still a good ways from the door.

"Come on, guys!", she yelled back at her team.

"Push, we've got them!" The grim-faced crew following her didn't reply, but matched her pace. They didn't seem to be made for sprinting, but if they were feeling the exertion they didn't complain. Jesri steadily gained on their quarry, her feet pounding against the deck. The trailing kidnapper looked back again, its big golden eyes darting to Jesri. She was close enough now to read the fear on its face. She grinned wider, flashing her teeth at it. That's right, she thought viciously, actions have consequences.

The little Irri put on a desperate burst of speed to pull away from her, but she could see its endurance was flagging. It looked back at her again, seeing her almost on top of it, and the fear in its face faded into a grim resolution. Jesri registered it a second too late to dodge when it flung itself at her knees, tripping her and sending the two of them sprawling to the floor. She kicked at the dazed kidnapper, pushing it off her legs as the rest of her squad pounced.

"Leave him!", Jesri shouted, rising to her feet and pointing to her crew who were restraining the struggling fugitive.

"He's a distraction. You two, stay with him. The rest of you, on me!" She raced after the group, who had managed to put some distance between them while she was down. She growled and sprinted after the receding figures, her feet kicking up flakes of lichen as she ran. She was gaining on them fast, but her breath snagged as she saw a broad arch come into view several hundred meters out. They had reached the door. She ran as fast as she could, vision narrowing to only the fleeing Irri and their captives.

It wasn't going to be enough, she realized. Ahead of her, the first kidnapper passed under the door and into the dim hallway beyond. The lights were off on the left side of the hall in the next segment, and his dark shadow raced larger than life across the far wall as he ran. The rest followed, but were forced to stop as one of their captives began to thrash violently in their sack. Jesri grinned. Probably Rhuar, giving them hell.

She nearly shouted encouragement, but she was pouring everything she had into her sprint to close the distance rapidly. They finally hoisted the twitching sack between two of them and scrambled down the hall. She made it through the door mere seconds behind them, but slid to a stop when she glanced back to check on her team. They had kept pace with her admirably, but when they approached the huge inter-segment door they had stopped in their tracks.

They milled around in front of the archway, staring at Jesri wordlessly.

"Come on!" she yelled angrily.

"We've got them!"

"They crossed into the next segment," one of them called back matter-of-factly.

"We have to cut pursuit."

"Bullshit!", Jesri shouted.

"They're right here, let's go!"

"We have orders!", objected a different crewman. She didn't have time for this. With a frustrated grunt she turned and raced after the kidnappers, who had increased their lead again while she was talking. Her team stared wordlessly after her as she ran. She was going to have words with Ellie about fostering initiative in her crew, she decided. She came within sight of the fleeing group again, but didn't try to close distance as she had been, hanging just within visual distance against the inner curve of the hall.

They outnumbered her now, so she was going to have to be more careful. She could tail them and try to nail down their base of operations. Then she could… She didn't know. She just ran, cursing the Irri and discarding options in her head, the hall growing dimmer around her as she traveled. Qktk slammed heavily to the ground, bouncing and rolling as he was dropped unceremoniously by his exhausted Irri bearer. He came to a stop in an awkward position with his bound legs throbbing where the bindings pulled tight.

Another thump and muffled yelp heralded Rhuar's arrival on the ground. He couldn't see past the bag covering his head, but he heard the Irri slumping to the deck around him as they rested.

"Who was that?", one of them gasped.

"She had Colonel Tam's face!"

"Did we lose her?", another asked tremulously.

"Hush," rasped a lower voice.

"No noise. We rest only for a few seconds." Just as promised, Qktk found himself hoisted up onto another bony Irri shoulder before his legs went fully numb. For the next hour they plodded through the hallways at a careful, halting pace, his captor's shoulder finding new and unpleasant ways to grind into his body. Finally the light outside seemed to brighten and their pace picked up just before he was dropped to the floor again. He groaned quietly, new shocks of pain shooting through him.

Some whispered conversation took place too quietly for him to make out before more hands seized him and hauled him upright. The Irri stripped his bonds away, sliding the bag down and causing Qktk to blink rapidly at the sudden light. He was in a large room that had once been some sort of storage hold, if he had to guess. It was currently filled from wall to wall with makeshift tents, improvised shelters and shabby fences.

Tangled masses of wire fed into light fixtures bound to the ceiling with braids of rope and fabric. In the far corner a section of wall had been torn away to reveal a tangle of piping and conduits, around which a small cluster of plants crowded close to a thin stream of dripping water. The Irri from the hydroponics bay squatted next to Qktk as he pulled himself upright. It stared at him as if waiting for something, watching him carefully while he massaged feeling back into his joints. After a short while it spoke.

"So you are truly not touched," it said, seeming to relax.

"I thought so, even if…" It trailed off and did not elaborate.

"I apologize for any harm we caused you, but we could not delay once we began," it said. Qktk glared in response, flicking a few of his minor eyes to further scan their surroundings. After the bustle of the docks this ramshackle hold seemed sparsely populated, but there were actually quite a few of the lithe grey aliens here. Unlike the uniformed Irri from the docks, they seemed… normal.

They wandered around, carrying crude baskets or chasing naked children that screamed and dashed giggling through gently waving curtains of tattered cloth. Many of them were draped in cloaks of the same flat grey that blended into the station walls, but others were wearing bright swatches of fabric woven into intricate patterns. His captor was still staring at him expectantly. It… No, she? Qktk didn't even know if Irri had genders, but her face was distinctly different from Drinni's blocky features.

The injured ensign was nowhere to be seen - only one sack remained, and he doubted Drinni was the source of the yowling and inventive profanity coming from within.

"We would like to release him as well," she said with a grimace, following his gaze surprisingly well for a humanoid.

"Can you calm him down so we can undo the bindings?" Qktk suppressed the urge to be mutinous for Rhuar's sake and scuttled over to his side with a stiff gait. He poked the bag with a leg and whispered quietly for a few moments, after which the Irri gingerly loosed his bonds and removed the sack to reveal Rhuar's ruffled, angry face. His lips curled into another snarl, but Qktk tapped him admonishingly on the nose.

"Listen. Observe," he hissed.

"Unless you enjoy the sack." Rhuar shot a glance at the rumpled bag next to him and settled onto his hindquarters, peering suspiciously around the room. A gaggle of curious Irri children stared at him from behind a pile of crates, fleeing with a chorus of gleeful shrieks when he bared his teeth at them menacingly. Their captor regarded them with an amused look before lowering herself to the floor beside them.

"I am Se Dasi, the Watcher for this area," she said, inclining her head respectfully to them.

"I would like to again extend my apologies for the rough treatment you have endured."

"Pleased to meet you," Qktk replied, keeping his tone neutral.

"I am Qktk, and this is Rhuar." He saw Rhuar flick an ear at the Irri, who nodded in return. Qktk fixed Se Dasi with a look and she returned her attention to him.

"Where is Drinni?", he inquired. Se Dasi grimaced.

"The other one we took? We had to restrain him, he was touched. In time, once he stops calling for the voice, we may be able to help him." She shook her head, either missing or ignoring their confused looks.

"We can discuss his fate later. Right now, we need to talk about you two."

"Yes, please," Rhuar shot back irritatedly.

"What the fuck is going on? Why did you kidnap us? Why did you bring us to your weird trash village-" Qktk poked him hard in the side, cutting off the stream of annoyed questions.

"I think we would both appreciate an explanation for your actions," he interjected. It was Se Dasi's turn to look confused.

"When you saw me gathering food you risked defying her and hid my presence. I thought to repay the debt, so we came back to help you escape before she claimed you for your offense. Why did you fight us?" A shadow of anger crossed her face.

"One of our best was lost to the Sleepers, for you."

"Escape? Her? Sleepers?", asked Qktk, feeling lost and exasperated.

"Se Dasi, we just arrived on the station today. We have no idea what you're talking about, Eleanor was just having Drinni take us on a tour of the station when I saw you. I didn't say anything when I saw you because you looked frightened and I didn't want to get you in trouble." She frowned.

"I wasn't… Did you say Eleanor?" Qktk stared at her.

"Eleanor? The woman who runs the station? Well, apparently not the whole station," he amended wryly, his attempt at humor faltering when he saw the look on Se Dasi's face. She stared at them with cold, unfriendly eyes.

"You are willing servants of Colonel Tam?", she asked ominously, the Irri around them shifting into wary readiness.

"What?", Qktk asked, looking around in alarm.

"I told you, we just arrived on the station today! We had no idea she was here, we didn't even know the station was inhabited until we arrived. Her own sisters thought she had died five thousand years ago!" Se Dasi didn't relax, but the steel in her glare was replaced by a troubled unease.

"How do you know of her sisters?", she asked, a hint of fear in her voice. Rhuar didn't give either of them a chance to continue, cutting into the conversation with his voice amplified to painful levels.

"Okay, everyone shut the fuck up!", he yelled.

"No, Captain, don't fucking- Stop poking me with your jabby fucking legs, I'm talking now." He glared at both Qktk and Se Dasi in turn, fur bristling.

"It's obvious that neither of you has any fucking idea what the other one is talking about. Have either of you been listening to this conversation? At all?" He looked around the room, taking in the stunned Irri faces and one mortified Htt.

"Since you're both too polite to ask the right questions," he said, "we're going to sit down and I'll ask them." He maintained his focused glare until both Qktk and Se Dasi had settled back to the ground, then nodded and sat down imperiously across from them.

"Okay," said Rhuar, a satisfied smile on his face.

"First things first, we're going to lay out some basics from our side." He looked pointedly at Se Dasi.

"Most importantly - I have no fucking clue who any of you people are. We met Eleanor, or Colonel Tam, for about five minutes today. During that five minutes she neglected to mention that you folks existed or to inform us about any issues of station politics - which now seems like a big fucking oversight, considering," he snarled.

"This means that we were not enlisted in any nefarious plots against you," he continued.

"We have no intention of doing anything unpleasant and we generally don't know what the fuck we're doing here. So if we say something that makes you think we're your enemy, I would take it as a personal fucking favor if you asked for clarification before you pull the sacks and rope back out. Deal?" Se Dasi gaped at him, looking slightly dazed. Qktk sighed.

"Mr. Rhuar," he said wearily, "perhaps you should just ask your questions."

"Right," he nodded.

"Se Dasi. Please explain - in summary - the nature of your conflict with Colonel Tam." She goggled at him.

"You don't-" She blinked, and a flicker of realization touched her face.

"Ah, I see," she said, looking at Qktk and Rhuar with a serious expression.

"Colonel Tam has used her foul magics to enslave and oppress my people for generations," she explained.

"She is a thief of souls, a nightmare made flesh, an undying evil beyond evil." Qktk stared, speechless. Rhuar hovered between horror and lingering self-satisfaction.

"I'm sorry, but what?", Jesri said incredulously, emerging like a wraith from the shadowy corner where she had been listening. There was at this point a brief and perfectly reasonable moment of chaos.