Resurrection (The Inherited War) (10 page)

“Don’t bother, I’m alive.”  The man jumped back startled by his sudden response.  “I assume you kept this information from me for a good reason.”

“Yes, I was told not to say anything or they would suffer.”

Cole slowly sat up then climbed to his feet.  His muscles groaned with the stress placed on long unused muscles.  He slowly raised his hands above his head and stretched as much of his body as he could at one time.  “God that feels good.”  He moaned as he turned a bit and flexed his lower back.  “Regardless, I am not telling the Esii shit.  You hear that!”  He yelled up at the ceiling.  “Go fuck yourselves.  My people were already dead once and ten thousand or so of them still alive doesn't change a damn thing.  Your torture has failed and you’re running out of time.  Soon my friends will be here with a larger force than you can deal with.  I may die before I am rescued, but I will die knowing that your end is also near.”

A portion of one of the walls suddenly shot out and enveloped Cole’s body from throat to feet, leaving only his head exposed.  The door opened and a single Pyndingum walked into the room.  “Our time together has only just begun.  You will tell us all your secrets before your friends arrive, if they even attempt come.  Your friends will have more pressing issues to tend to in the near future.  We wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t have the opportunity to even leave their home systems.”

“Go to hell.”  Cole shouted and began trying to thrash his way out of his bonds.  The other four Pyndingum arrived and watched his feeble struggles.

“Now, it’s time for lesson four.”  Cole fought as all five threw their combined wills at his mind.  He lasted for a few moments before being completely overwhelmed and rendered unconscious.  They used the flowing metal of the room to make a chair which they strapped him onto.  The other human in the room kept as far out of the way as possible but soon found their attention focused on him.

“You will continue as before and keep him reminded of his past and the things he has told you.  The next part of his schooling will test the bounds of his mind and he will need a constant reminder of whom and what he is when he is conscious.”   The human nodded his head yes and settled down to watch while the Esii tortured Cole in his own mind.  Early on the Esii had realized they couldn’t hurt Cole physically because of his nanites so they had bypassed them entirely and created the torture in his mind.  They all turned their attention back to Cole and started the new round of torture on the young man.

~

Standing off to the side, Split had watched everything happen.  From the Nixa Administrator to the revelation that there were human captives from Earth on the Esii homeworld.  Split had already found their location and had spent some time watching and listening to the human prisoners.  The females would almost be useless to any escape attempt because all of them were currently pregnant, but the few males that were there had been picked by the Esii for their virility and physical prowess.  They would come in handy if they could be armed.

“He almost didn’t make it that time.  We can’t wait much longer for a rescue.”  Split said to himself.

“If there is no way off the planet, what would we do if we helped him escape?”  He responded to himself.

“We could, if worse comes to worse, free the humans and set up a defensive position and attempt to hold off the Esii until Thalo gets off his ass and gets a rescue mission here.  With enough arms and armor we could outfit the human males and get them ready to fight.  We know where the nearest munitions caches are and where they store the food for the humans.  With a little effort we can smuggle the necessary equipment to a place near Cole and his people.”  Split thought for a second. 

“We should go have a look at that machine that delves into the core of the planet.  It may be something necessary for their people’s survival that we can take hostage to ensure the Esii leave us alone.”  Split contained a chuckle before it escaped his lips.

“Yes that sounds like a good plan.  We shall leave as soon as possible and finish our preparations.  Split hunkered down and waited until the Esii torturers were finished with Cole for the day.  They followed them out of the room and retraced their previous path to the giant machine they had found earlier in their explorations.  It took them almost an hour to reach it and wait for an Esii to open the door to admit them to the room.

That was going to be another problem.  So far as they could tell it took an Esii to open doors on this level.  They headed deeper into the room that housed the strange machine, than they had gone on their previous trip.  They looked at everything they could until they finally found the room they needed.  Split smiled to himself.  “Yes,” he thought to his mate, “This room is very important to the Esii, if we could take control of this room we could dictate anything we wanted to them, and they would have to agree.  Agree or lose their entire planet.

CHAPTER 9

Approximately 20,000 years ago

Jarrod watched as the Kin volunteers said goodbye to their loved ones and boarded his ship.  Both male and female Kin had answered his call for aid.  Jarrod marveled as he watched the supremely graceful and beautiful Kin kiss and hug their spouses and children.  They walked single file past him and up into his ships.  He etched each of their faces into his memory.  He would never forget their faces or names.

There were a total of one hundred Kin who had volunteered for service in the heavily outnumbered army Jarrod was in command of.  One hundred may not be many by other races standards, but it was a monumental sacrifice for the Kin.  One hundred Kin, who may likely never return home. One percent of their total population.

The Kin had never been numerous to begin with, and that hadn’t changed with their alteration to a sentient race.  They were extremely long lived, even by pure human standards.  They had been hidden away for so long there had been no recent records of life span or any other medical histories.  When the last human ship had left this world thousands of years ago the population had been ten thousand, the same as it was now.

Jarrod had tried to delve into this odd phenomenon but had been rebuked.  The Kin leaders he had spoken to would not answer any questions with respect to Kin biology or history, and were seemingly prepared to send the one hundred with him.  As if they were waiting for him to come, and they knew what he would want.

Jarrod watched as the last one boarded his transport and he turned to wave goodbye to the friends and families that were staying behind.  They had vanished, gone without a trace.  Jarrod stared for a brief moment at the now empty field, he shrugged his shoulders and trudged wearily up the ramp and back into the war.

~

Sky shivered as the odd feeling of faster than light warp travel coursed through her body.  Cole had always said it made him want to take a shower.  For her it was like electricity dancing up her spine.  She reconnected to the Justice and watched as the other members of the crew did likewise.  They came out of warped space exactly where they should have, as close to the Twin Worlds planets as possible.  She looked down to the virtual captains’ chair and saw Jeth issuing orders, while Thalo rested on his elbows on the back of the chair.

“Is this your homeworld or Jeth’s?” she asked Thalo.

“Outsiders, they each have their own name you know.  The system is called the Twin Worlds, not the planets.”  Thalo shot back with a grin.

“No I was unaware that they had their own names.  Please do enlighten me.”

“I am from Vivos, Jeth and his people are from Magna.  We are currently inbound to Vivos.”  Thalo never took his eyes off the bright blue and green ball rapidly filling the forward view screen.  “It has been a long time.”  The last was said under his breath.

“How long?”  Sky asked him.

“Each of the lookout stations did fifty year tours, mine and Jeth’s was just about over when you guys showed up.  I am looking forward to seeing my wife and children, though the latter will have grown since I last saw them.  Most of us left family behind when we were chosen.”  For the first time Thalo actually sounded a bit sad to Sky.

“Such a sacrifice,” Sky murmured, “why did they choose married Worlders to do the mission, why not single Worlders?”

Both Thalo and Jeth chuckled as they listened to Sky.  “There are no single Worlders.  We marry young and reproduce as early as possible.  We were nearly wiped out by the Esii once before because of a low population, that will never happen again.  Now that the general populace knows about our groups existence and what we have been doing for the last twenty thousand years, our spouses and children will be hailed as the real hero’s for suffering in silence.”  Thalo returned his attention to the forward screen.

Sky had no idea, no clue really, that so many Worlders had sacrificed and suffered in silence for millennia waiting for humanity to return.  If Cole hadn’t shown up when he did, they would still be waiting now.  For all of Thalo’s boasting and flippant remarks, he was a hero to his people and deserved of their praise. 

As they got closer to the planet, Sky took notice of the massive amount of ships currently in orbit.  “Is that normal?” she asked Thalo.

“What, the ship traffic?  No, not normal but to be expected.  Our people know about us now and have heard of Cole’s victory against the Esii.  They are here to celebrate our return and more than likely volunteer to join our cause.” Even Thalo had a look of amazement on his face.  “That is a lot of ships, though.”

It took their sensor techs a few moments to sort out all of the signals and pinpoint the location of the rest of their fleet.  All four of the ships were clustered close together in a high orbit around the planet.  Jeth changed course and sent the Justice on a course to join her sister ships.

“They only know we need twenty thousand or so troops right?”  Sky said as she tried unsuccessfully to count all the ships in front of them.  The computer targeting system was over a thousand and going up as more ships came into view.  They ranged anywhere from small in system transports to freighters all the way up to Heavy Worlder Cruisers.  The Worlders appeared ready and impatient to join the war effort.  This was a better reception than her people gave the fleet.

Jeth expertly piloted the ship into the middle of the fleet formation.  “Set minimum watch and rotate shore leave.  Dismissed.”  And with that the crew was free to leave the ship and enjoy some shore leave on a completely friendly planet.

~

Sky accompanied the command crew down to the planet’s surface.  They had taken the Captain’s shuttle down to the capital city of the Vivos planet.

“I know your people want to celebrate your triumphant return, but we have to have a quick turnaround.  We can’t spend a lot of time here.  I need to get a small core of medical professionals trained on the genetic alteration process so they can train the rest.  We cannot waste any training time on parties and celebrations.”  Sky said to Thalo.

“I understand Doctor, but my people will be excited to meet the heroes of the Battle of Nixa.  There will be some celebrating and parties that we will be expected to attend.”  Thalo looked unhappy with Sky for suggesting otherwise.

“Remember one thing,” Sky leaned in close to Thalo as she spoke, “every day we delay leaving for the Esii homeworld is one more day they do who knows what to Cole.  So think about that as you’re being toasted, feted, and treated like a celebrity.”  A storm of emotions clouded his normally serene face.  “Also remember we need to get to wherever it is we are going to find information on the Kin.”

“Okay, all right.  We stay long enough to get the ball rolling here
, and then myself, you and Storm leave to find my informant.”  Thalo bowed his head in Sky’s direction by way of an apology.

The shuttle touched down without sound or bump.  The ramp opened up and the command crew of the Justice filed out onto the landing field.  Sky let the Worlders disembark first.  She and Snow were the last ones off.  She hadn’t noticed it when they had landed, but the field was full of thousands of Worlders. 
Hundreds of thousands of Worlders.  And they were all cheering and shouting.  Sky and her sister followed the command party across the tarmac and to the dais that had been erected for their return.  It was currently full of Worlder dignitaries and had three empty seats.   Sky, Thalo, and Jeth were shown to the empty seats on the dais, the rest of the crew and Snow were given seats down below and in front of the stage.

A Worlder wearing a sash that proclaimed him President, strode to the microphone.  “Ladies and gentlemen, The Heroes of Nixa.”  He turned and held his arm out to Thalo, Jeth, and Sky.  They stood to thunderous applause.

“You must change the mood of this spectacle,” Thalo had to almost yell to be heard by Sky, “they will want to celebrate for days, you must refocus their attention.”

Sky glanced at Thalo as he shooed her forward to talk.  Sky stepped up to the Microphone as a confused silence settled over the crowd.  They had come here to hear the Worlder hero’s speak and retell the tale of their great victory over the hated Esii, not listen to a Nixa.

“Gentle beings of the Twin World System, I am Commander Sky and I am the one responsible for humanities return to the galaxy.”  Hearing this, the crowd roared with applause once again.  Sky held up her hands and asked for silence.  She briefly told the crowd about what had happened to her and how she had been used to force the evolution of Cole so he could be used to capture the human technology for the Kidnappers.  She also told of the Earths destruction.  “Now there is only one human left in the whole of the galaxy.  He was captured during the Battle of Nixa.”  A gasp ran through the audience.  “He is, at this very moment, being held by the Esii on their homeworld.  Too much time was wasted on my planet in political wrangling, there will be no help coming from my people.”  This time it was a low murmur of disbelief that ran through the crowd.  “You are my last hope.  We need to push the Esii now that we have superior weapons and ships.  We need to strike their homeworld and strike it soon.  I understand that you want to celebrate your returning heroes, but our time will be better spent preparing for the greatest rescue attempt in the history of the galaxy.”