The Gardens of Nibiru (The Ember War Saga Book 5) (18 page)

“They say how long until they can neutralize Mentiq or get the shields down?” Commander Ericson asked.

“Kill him, XO. We’re here to kill him. Let’s not mince words,” Valdar said.

“Nothing follows from the initial message,” Erdahl said. “But they promise regular updates.”

“The ball’s rolling, but we’ve still got the same problems.” Valdar went to the tactical holo tank behind his command chair and waved Utrecht and Ericson over. A slice of Nibiru with the Toth fleet anchorage, the prowling dreadnoughts and a distant
Breitenfeld
appeared in the tank.

“How do we cover Hale’s extraction? And evacuate the human settlement. And the Karigole. And jump back to Earth without being blown to bits,” Valdar said. He ran a hand through his thinning hair and drummed fingers against the side of the table.

“This isn’t a rescue mission,” Utrecht said, earning a dirty look from Valdar. “I know you don’t like hearing that, sir. But we came here for one purpose. The people in the village, the Karigole,
maybe
we can get them out. I don’t think we should risk this ship for them.”

“I agree with Guns, sir,” Ericson said.

“Do you know what the Toth will do to them if we leave them behind?” Valdar asked.

“No, but neither do you, sir,” Utrecht said. “They’ve been down there for a long damn time. They’re too valuable to just destroy out of spite. The Toth are vicious drug addicts, but even they know better than to mess with their supply chain.”

“We find a way or we make one,” Valdar said. “Don’t shrug off this problem. Pretend rescuing those civilians is the mission.”

Ericson let out a deep breath. She put a finger on the tip of her nose, then furrowed her brows.

“You know,” she said, “the Toth sure don’t trust each other. Look what they’ve done.” She reached into the tank and zoomed in on the many ships crammed into the anchorage. “See how close they all are? My guess is they’re packed in like sardines to block lines of fire on the city and on the dreadnoughts. The way the dread orbit, they always have their guns trained on the anchorage, never on each other.”

“The dreadnoughts must all belong to Mentiq,” Utrecht said, stroking his chin. “Fits with the data the salvage crews pulled out of the
Naga
. The rest of the Toth fleet we blew to hell belong to some Tellani Corporation, but not the
Naga
.”

“So pretend you’re the lizard running one of these dreadnoughts,” Valdar said. “What would you do if one of those ships in the anchorage fired on you?”

“Mass punishment,” Ericson said, “hit everything in the anchorage.”

“That would keep everyone in line,” Utrecht said. “Makes the Toth police themselves before the big boys open up on them.”

“We need to pick a fight,” Valdar said. “Guns, XO, I’m authorizing a nuclear weapons release. I’m going to the cemetery to talk to the Iron Hearts.”

****

Hale stepped around the hulking mass of an alien covered in a filthy piece of cloth so large it looked like it had once been a drape for a grand room. The alien had wrapped packages and barrels strapped to its back. He looked over his shoulder and saw a bull-headed creature with a single eye trudging forward through the crowded street.

“OK, that one was definitely weirder than the bird-person,” Standish said.

Hale, flanked by Cortaro and Standish, cleared a path for Lilith who followed close behind. The city was alive with Toth menials and several alien races Hale had never heard of or even imagined. They’d come across a few humans, all of whom fled once they saw Hale and the Marines’ misappropriated uniforms.

“A Felnara,” Lilith said, “barely sentient, used as beasts of burden on some worlds. They have an excellent sense of direction and never question orders. Plus, they’ll defend their portage to the death.”

“So don’t steal anything, Standish,” Cortaro said.

“I don’t steal, Gunney. I liberate. On occasion, I forage,” Standish said.

“Snipers, status,” Hale said.

“We’re about two blocks ahead of you,”
Rohen said.
“You’re almost to the square.”

Hale looked up and saw a puff of dust on a roof ledge as one of the snipers landed on it. Rohen and Bailey were cloaked, opting to leapfrog from building to building than try to dodge through the crowd. Hale hadn’t seen an obvious weapon on anyone in the city, and the two armored Marines with their sniper rifles wouldn’t have made it very far without their cloaks.

“We’ve got to take the long way around,”
Bailey said.
“We’ll be out of IR contact for a bit, which means you’ll lose the connection to Egan back at the ship.”

“Copy. Move out and get set up. The festivities are about to start and Mentiq seems to be a stickler for timetables,” Hale said. He heard a double-click on the IR as Bailey acknowledged his instructions.

A pack of Toth menials hissed and snarled at passersby from the front of a two-story building with overly tall doors. Hale stopped and felt for his missing rifle as the doors swung open and a Toth overlord ambled from building, fine gold filigree encrusted against the tank. The overlord moved toward the square as the pack of menials formed a protective cordon around it.

A red-skinned alien with thick arms and a triangular-shaped head stood in the doorway. It held a gold bar up to its mouth and bit thick molars into the corner. Behind the alien were pictures of overlord tanks, each with a different mosaic of inlaid gold and platinum along their tanks.

“Overlord tattoo parlor,” Cortaro said. “I’ve officially seen everything.”

Hale slowed as they came to the end of the road where it spilled out onto the square. A pair of guards stood between the rest of the city and the square. Both were almost seven feet tall and almost twice as wide as Hale. A canine head hung between stooped shoulders; scraggly black fur hung from long snouts and matted what little of the alien wasn’t covered in earth-colored armor plates. Both aliens carried long pole arms, the blades crackling with electricity. Bright white eyes flicked from person to person as they scanned the crowd.

Aliens and Toth menials moved freely between the square and the city without any reaction from the hulking guards, and Hale decided it would be better to keep moving than risk attracting attention for standing around with no obvious purpose.

“Act natural,” Hale said. “We need to get to the data center.”

Hale stepped over a puddle of something black and bubbling and made for the square. He got one step beyond the guard when a furry paw grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around.

The lupine face pressed toward Hale’s with a snarl.

“The human Primus wants your kind in the city.” Breath that stank of rotting meat assaulted Hale’s nose. “The bazaar is Kroar territory,” it said. Hale heard the undercurrent of Akkadian language from the guard as his voice box translated into English. 

“My Primus just reassigned us to the hangars on the far side of the city,” Hale said. “Of course we have to be there before Lord Mentiq honors us with his presence. If I cut around the bazaar, we’ll be late. You mind?”

The Kroar sniffed the air.

“I don’t know your scent,” it said.

“And all of you look the same to me.” Hale pulled his shoulder away from the guard’s paw and squared off.

A scream rose from the bazaar behind the guard. It lumbered around and reared up to its full height. It clicked two claw tips together and the two guards trotted away.

“Move,” Hale said, “before they come back.”

They pressed into the crowd and came to one of the large white stages they’d seen on the city map. The stage was a white slab of marble embedded in the ground, reaching four feet high. A menial crouched on each side, each wearing a skintight suit covered in bright-orange frills.

On the stage was a cluster of neon-blue-skinned aliens, all bound together by chains connected to hand and ankle cuffs. Tiny horns pocked along the aliens’ jawlines and over their scalps. The aliens looked around in wonder, none seeming to notice the crowd at their feet.

“Is it me,” Standish asked, “or do those aliens look familiar?”

“They’re…Shanishol,” Hale said. “From Anthalas, remember?”

“I’d rather forget about that place, if that’s all right with everyone,” Yarrow’s disembodied voice said.

“I thought the Xaros wiped out their home world. Certainly weren’t any left after that sphere finished with them,” Cortaro said.

“They’re a consignment for Mentiq,” Lilith said. “These are for display only. The Tellani claim access to several million more and can deliver any number of units on request.” She swallowed hard. “Their taste is considered shallow, but in sufficient numbers can induce a state of euphoria lasting almost an hour.”

“How do you know that?” Hale asked.

“There,” she said, pointing to electronic Toth script running across the top of the stage like a ticker on a news broadcast.

“Not for you, meat.” A menial scampered over and snapped its jaws in the air. “Not your meat. Move for paying customers.”

Hale moved away. He found the stepped pyramid and walked toward it. Each stage held a different alien species, some with a single individual, others with dozens and dozens packed together. Toth overlords meandered among the stages, conferring with the oddly dressed menials attending to the edges.

“The bazaar doesn’t sell things,” Cortaro said. “The overlords are selling people to each other. Like a slave auction.”

“It’s not slaves they’re selling,” Hale said.

“And Mentiq’s in the middle of all of this,” Standish said. “Could you imagine what would’ve happened if the Toth got ahold of the proccie tech? There would be stages full of humans, marketing us like sides of beef.”

“Sir, I ever thank you for
not
giving us all up to the Toth?” Yarrow asked.

“It was never an option,” Hale said.
Never for me, at least,
he thought. He’d been humanity’s negotiator with the Toth overlord on Europa, and before the final cordial meeting, Captain Valdar instructed him to sign a treaty handing over all the proccies and the technology used in their creation. The order came straight from Earth high command, which baffled Hale. After the battle, and the sacrifice of so many proccies who died serving in Eighth Fleet, Ibarra’s and Admiral Garrett’s support of the program was adamant.

Hale knew politics was a factor once officers reached flag rank, but he couldn’t believe that Garrett could have been willing to throw the proccies to the wolves one minute, then become their biggest defender the next. The discontinuity had bugged him for weeks, like a pebble stuck in a boot that never seemed to go away.

“Those other cities,” Cortaro said, “the ones we saw from orbit, they’re just like Lilith’s village. They’re all…Mentiq’s gardens.”

“We’re going to put an end to this,” Hale said. “I don’t care if we have to burn it all down.” They stepped around an overlord haggling with a menial next to a stage full of furry aliens with bulbous eyes, none more than three feet tall. Their offspring, little more than puffs of fur with glistening eyes, reached into the air.

“There’s something weird around the stages,” Yarrow said. “My visor’s picking up some kind of distortion.”

“Force fields,” Lilith said, “and one-way holos. A friend of mine had the calling to recreate alien worlds, tranquil scenes. I wonder if he was out here, standing in the middle of his own creation, oblivious to the monsters salivating over him.”

“Stay focused. Almost there,” Hale said.

“Sir, you read me?”
Bailey said through Hale’s earpiece.

“Go.”

“We’re about to start up. There’s some activity brewing at the main gate. We weapons free if we have a shot?”

“Give us two minutes to get to the objective building. Then you’re clear,” Hale said. They stepped past another pair of Kroar without being noticed and Hale saw the main entrance to the stepped pyramid, barred doors guarded by kadanu armed with shock sticks.