Chapter 65 - The Kraken Gate
Chapter 65
‘Arghhh!’ Bank’s face twisted with rage as the packet burst on his chin. It was a feeble throw so only a small puff of powder emerged. It wasn’t much, but it incapacitated the traitor. He stood there for a moment, eyes closed, swaying, but only for a moment. He managed to open one eye briefly and kicked the backpack away from me before I could throw anything else. He roared at the sky in his agony, heedless of the danger of attracting more Charg. I remember the effect it had had on Inigo and felt cheated as Banks quickly seemed to get over the worst of it. He wiped at his red eyes with the cuff of his sleeve and spoke to me again, tears running down his cheeks.
‘Aballas take you. The Charg may not be able to finish you off, but I will!’ He raised the crossbow and aimed it at me, then realised that the quarrel was missing. The shaft had dropped off the weapon as Banks climbed down. He reached into the quiver hanging from his belt, but came up empty.
‘Don’t go anywhere,’ he snarled. He stalked back to Benjamin’s body, retrieved some ammunition. He returned, slotting a quarrel into place behind the cocked trigger and aimed the crossbow at my forehead. I tried to move, but my leg hurt and my left arm still had no feeling in it. I lay on the ground, gasping like a landed fish. All I could think of was to repeat Benjamin’s last question.
‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why betray the Republic? What riches have the Nallians promised you?’
‘This isn’t about money,’ spat Banks. ‘It’s about law and order, and progress.’
‘What about the Republic that was so hard fought for?’
‘The Republic!’ spat Banks. ‘Old men bickering in dusty corridors? What a joke! I’d dig up the old king myself if he was the only alternative. At least he was able to make decisions.’
‘So instead, you’d invite a tyrannical regime to rule over us?’
‘Why not?’ snarled Banks. ‘At least they get things done.’
‘Such as?’
‘Did you know there’s no crime in Nallia?’
It was my turn to laugh, but it came out as a thin cough. ‘Propaganda. If there’s no crime, how come their prisons are full. You don’t dispute that do you?’ Banks wasn’t interested. He was beyond reason.
‘Political malcontents,’ he scoffed. ‘Anyway, look at their armies, their airships. What has Emberland got? An air-train with half a dozen stations. What a waste of money. Airships can go anywhere. What has the blessed revolution brought us? In spite of the ludicrous taxes the slums in Emberly as bad as they were during the time of Orwall the Third.’ Banks waved the crossbow in the general direction of the portal’s touchdown. ‘The Republic is a sham. It’s not order, it’s the exact opposite; it’s chaos. Anyone can be a someone? Draxil give me strength! And anyone who used to be a someone in the Empire, with reach and influence is a pariah now! Of all the people who should understand this, I expected it to be you. Your father is rotting in prison, his past sacrifices for the Empire all thrown on the bonfire of so-called progress.’
‘If my father was here, he’d punch you in the face himself,’ I managed. So this was Bank’s motivation. His family were well-to-do and resented the new idealogical equality. ‘He defended the king because he believes we should all be treated equally. Even the King is entitled to a fair trial, while you and your friends cling to a world where the meek are for trampling into the dirt. My father dreamed of a meritocracy, long before the revolution happened. He brought me up to believe that everyone should get a chance to succeed.’
I was too tired, injured and filthy to argue politics and revolutionary ideals. I wanted to point out that Nallia’s leverium mines were stuffed full of the poor and dispossessed, choking to death on the toxic dust. Banks didn’t care that the might of the Nallian nation came at the expense of freedom. Minorities lived in terror, and women were relegated to supporting roles, but he was neither of those. I was already bored of the sound of his voice, but there was one thing that I had to know.
‘Why work so hard to destroy the Koulomb Gate? It’s hardly a threat. It will be years before Emberland begins to reap the benefits of the new worlds. Since you’re so confident in Nallian supremacy, why not just wait until the conquest is over? You and your new best friends can just wander in and take Director Harman’s project from him.’
Banks barked a short laugh at that. ‘You don’t really believe that nonsense about the Koulomb Gate being for exploration and the benefit of all Draxilkind?’
I hesitated, testing his assertion. Director Harman was nothing if not passionate about his project, but his insistence that we return to where the portal had last touched down on Ganessa had set me thinking.
‘All the gods!’ exclaimed Banks. ‘That scrawny niece of his, Jenniver, showed him it was possible. It was her who did the maths that turned it into a weapon. That’s why Chancellor Gordon and the Council are so concerned. Why else do you think they brought the S.I.S. into this?’
I searched my memories for something to confirm what the man was saying. Banks saw my hesitation.
‘You see, you stupid bitch? Anything this powerful can be made into a weapon. With this device he can open a portal into the Nallian capital and wipe out the members of their Collective Assembly.’
‘The device can’t be pointed like that,’ I sighed, as rain began to fall. Surprised that Banks was unaware of this. ‘It needs line of sight.’
Banks waved this away. ’So he builds another one here and points it back at our world.’
I shook my head at the absurdity of it and, for a moment, my predicament was forgotten. ‘Who’s ridiculous idea is that? Yours? The Nallians’? You really haven’t been paying much attention have you?’ I was making Banks even more angry. I couldn’t see any way to escape. Perhaps I was going to die, but there was grim satisfaction in really upsetting the man. Encouraged, I pressed on. ‘Have you seen all the materials that go into making one of these devices? The generators, the observatory, the leagues of cabling, the hundred ton steam engines made of iron. We can’t bring the tiniest shred of the metal we need through with us, so what are you proposing? We build settlements here, then a mining town, assuming the raw materials even exist on this planet. Next we build factories and foundries. Just how many years do you think all that will take?’
‘I don’t know. I’m not the scientist.’ Bank’s voice was flat and cold, beyond anger. ‘It’s that whore of yours, Jenniver that you need to be questioning. Oh yes, I know what happened between you two,’ he sneered. ‘I followed her the night she visited you. It’s disgusting, but it ends here!’
‘Draxil be praised!’ I spat, drily. ‘At least I won’t have listen to any more of your drivel.’
‘Let’s see if you find this funny.’ Banks lifted the weapon again and sighted along it, through the pouring rain. ‘Time to die.’
I knew I couldn’t twist out of the way of a crossbow bolt fast enough, but I would try. I had to try. There was a blur of motion to my right just as the crossbow trigger clicked. Something slammed into my chest and knocked me on my back. I gasped, winded. Might have taken my last breath, Connie. Where’s the quarrel? I managed to drag in some air, then another. Surprised, I felt with one hand and worked out that I was weighed down by a crude wooden shield. Sticking out of it, just over my heart, was the solid shaft of the crossbow bolt. Not dead yet!
I grimaced and glanced over the top of the shield. Banks was looking down at his hands in shock. He was holding the shaft of a spear sticking out of his chest. He made a small, choking gasp. I turned my head to the side and glimpsed the outline of a man standing in the rain. Light was fading fast as day was giving way to dusk, but there was just enough light to see the crumpled clothes, the fighter’s stance and a battered hat.
Did the head of the crossbow bolt go clean through the shield? I must be dead, because it looks as though I’ve joined Ty Rendish in the afterlife.
Somehow, I managed to push the shield aside. Obviously the quarrel went with it, so it wasn’t embedded in me. It took every last ounce of my strength. Unable to sit up, I squirmed sideways and turned my head.
Captain Banks had dropped to his knees, his head drooped forward. Rainwater dripped from his long forelock onto his hands and mingled with the blood running down the spear. Slowly, he toppled to one side, much like the Charg a few moments earlier. I immediately lost interest though, because a couple of paces away stood Ty. Ty, who we’d all written off for dead. Ty, whose memorial service we had attended. The man we had abandoned on Ganessa as he tried to buy time so that others could escape back through the portal. It was too dark to see his expression, but I saw him walk over to Banks. He put a boot on the traitor’s head and rolled it experimentally.
I blinked again, trying to clear the rain from my eyes. It must have been a long blink, because the next thing I knew was a voice beside me.
‘Draxil’s fucking beard! Who was that?’ growled Tyrone. ‘He was a boring shite!’
‘Typical!’ I croaked, ‘You Caddrian’s are always too quick to judge people.’ Ty smiled down at me and then glanced around, anxious again.
‘We can’t stay ‘ere, chief. It’s not safe.’ Gravelly, but sure and steady, as though he was discussing a game of skittles back home. Comforting as a hot bath in the winterxil or a pair of dry boots on a waterlogged reconnaissance mission. Just the sound of it broke me.
All this time, the sorrow I had felt at losing Ty had been held in check by my determination to be professional, especially in front of the others. I hadn’t really appreciated the strength of the bond that we had developed. He’d been the first person to join Lockhouse Security; the first person to place his trust in me, and I didn’t recall showing him the gratitude he deserved. I had held my composure while I spoke of him in the little chapel in Lannerville, but lying in the cold mud on an alien world, the floodgates burst. I sobbed. My chest hurt as I shuddered, trying to gulp down air, and the more the pain built, the more I figured I deserved it. All the joy I felt because Ty was still alive was shot through with guilt and shame. It should have occurred to me that he could survive Ganessa, but I had dismissed the possibility and done nothing.
And every time it seemed like I might surface from my misery, I remembered Ankush, and Benjamin, whom I’d lost for the second time. Ankush, the most loyal of all my team. Benjamin, who’d been beside me during the early years in the marines, when I was the freak. He’d witnessed the abuse that had been meted out to me; the first woman to join the elites, and had gradually moved to stand beside me. He’d never been much of a talker, and he certainly hadn’t been the world’s best listener, but he had known how to make me laugh, even during my darkest times.
As I lay there, wracked with emotion, Ty Rendish gathered me up.
‘I’m sorry.’ I rasped. I tried to say more but the effort of those two words overwhelmed me again. Ty said nothing. He was breathing hard, concentrating on getting us someplace. The warmth of him against me was like a tonic. My ankle hurt. Pain spiked through my arm with every step Ty took and there was a deep ache beneath my left breast. In truth, my whole body felt mashed, but lying in Ty’s arms I began to feel some hope.
Comments
Post a Comment