The Gardens of Nibiru (The Ember War Saga Book 5) (20 page)

****

Mentiq’s throne room filled with overlords. Ranik rushed through the doors and looked for a spot against the wall far from the throne, but every other overlord that beat her to the room had the same idea. No one wanted to be near Mentiq when his ire was up.

“All overlords will report to the throne room immediately or their life support will be unilaterally terminated!” Fellerin’s voice came through the speakers of her and every other overlord’s tank.

The assembled overlords remained quiet. Whoever was behind the attack on Mentiq would be discovered soon enough as the city’s guards hunted down the assailants.

What idiot did this?
Ranik thought.
Killing Mentiq is a death sentence without access to the extension codes.
None of the overlords had armed warriors within the city and she’d glimpsed the brawl happening in the skies above before the city’s blast shields went up. Mentiq’s policy of indiscriminate justice and widespread retribution had kept the overlords in check since the first days of their arrangement with him. The thought of ever upsetting the balance was too much for her to even consider.

More overlords raced into the throne room. All had abandoned their business to answer the consigliere’s call without hesitation. An old rival pressed his tank to hers, his tentacles curled into knots in fear.

“Who?” Mentiq’s voice boomed through the throne room. The overlords sank to the ground instantly as the master of all the Toth descended from the ceiling.

“Who…dared!” Mentiq’s voice was phlegmy. “Which of you menial shits thought you could take my crown!”

The palanquin lowered, revealing Mentiq with one leg was missing. Torn flesh seeped white fluid out of the wound, and drops spilled onto the floor and hissed as they hit the carpet. Mentiq coughed and spat a wad of mucus onto the nearest cowering overlord.

So his body is artificial,
Ranik thought. Mentiq had returned from his grand expedition that discovered the tank technology at an advanced age. He never opted to transition as the overlords had, and no one had ever dared ask how his body managed to regress to a state of vitality.
He’s had the means to create an eternal body…but forced us into these tanks.

She wasn’t sure if she should hate Mentiq or admire him for keeping the rest of the overlords well below his station.

“Which of you was it? Which of you knew about this assault?” Mentiq lashed out and struck an overlord, cracking the tank.

“None would every challenge you, Lord!” came from behind Ranik.

“And yet…” Mentiq beat the stump of his severed limb against his disk. “I will find out. No one will leave my presence until I know which of you it was, and which knew, and which should have known and all will be punished!”

“My lord,” Fellerin spoke up, “we have found a recording of the assault.”

“Show me.” Mentiq turned to watch as a holo screen appeared above the throne.

Video segments from across the city played out in tiny segments across the screen, then one piece of the puzzle grew to encompass the entire picture. An armored figure carrying a sniper rifle jumped from the kadanu’s stepped pyramid.

“Order the guards to kill every human on sight,” Mentiq said.

“Yes, my lord.” Fellerin bent his head to a bracelet and spoke softly.

Ranik watched the replay, then felt a chill go up her spine. The human’s armor, she’d seen it before. She looked to the doors, now bolted shut and guarded by armed warriors, and realized she had a very slim chance of surviving the rest of this day.

“My lord,” Ranik said, rising off the floor. “I have information that may prove valuable.”

Mentiq’s disc spun around, sloshing white fluid across the room.

“Speak.”

“That human is not of the kadanu. It wears armor of Earth’s warrior caste, their Marines,” Ranik said. “I recognize it from recordings from our expedition to Anthalas.”

Mentiq dove on Ranik and ripped the armored top of her tank open. He thrust his gloved hand into the tank and Ranik felt the chill touch of feeder lines against her nervous system.

“Did you bring them here? Did you think what you found on Earth would be enough to wrest my throne away?” Mentiq hissed.

“Never! Never, my lord. The humans must have infiltrated the planet. I would never betray you!” Ranik wanted to pull away from the deadly touch, but doing so might antagonize Mentiq further. Staying within his grasp was akin to baring one’s throat to a stronger Toth, the classic gesture of submission.

“Your honor guard has the human in custody, my lord,” Fellerin said.

“Alive?” Mentiq’s withdrew his grip on Ranik.

“Injured, but alive,” Fellerin said.

“Bring it to me. Now,” Mentiq snarled at Ranik, “we’ll see just what your involvement in this coup is, Ranik.”

****

The streets were a riot of panic and confusion as Toth, humans and a myriad of other aliens rushed around in the darkness.

As Hale and his team pressed against a wall, he kept an eye on the lowest tier of the pyramid from around a corner. Streetlights had come on, but were flickering on and off as entire sections of the city went dark around them.

A black box appeared from thin air and attached to the pyramid wall. Thick cord came out of the box and pressed into a circular shape wide enough for a Marine to walk through with ease.

Yarrow, still cloaked, knocked a menial into a puddle of mud as he ran across the street to Hale.

“Charges set,” Yarrow said.

Hale leaned back and covered his ears. “Blow it.”

The explosion shattered glass for blocks around and the wave of overpressure felt like a brief earthquake. Not for the first time, Hale really wished he had his armor.

“Follow me!” Hale ran around the corner and made straight for the smoking hole in the wall.

“No offense, sir, but stay behind me.” Yarrow uncloaked, ran ahead of Hale, and barged through the breach.

Hale stepped over a mess of pulverized rock and waved dust away from his eyes.

“Yarrow! Weapons!” Hale shouted. Yarrow appeared through the dust and handed Hale a gauss rifle. The medic reached onto his back where three more weapons were attached and passed weapons to Standish and Cortaro.

Hale stepped over a dead kadanu and moved through the smoke and dust until he bumped into a wall of iron bars.

“What the…?” Smoke cleared and Hale found himself surrounded by cells containing a few humans who wore nothing but rags and tried to hide beneath threadbare blankets or under wooden benches. 

“New guy, did you break us
into
a jail?” Standish asked. He grabbed one of the bars and shook it.

“How was I supposed to know what was on the other side of the rock wall?” Yarrow asked.

“Marine, you are in combat armor.” Cortaro pointed a knife hand at Yarrow. “Why are you standing still?”

“Roger, Gunney.” Yarrow grabbed a cell wall and yanked downward. The pseudo-muscle layer beneath his armor plates twisted to augment his strength and the bars came loose in a shower of bricks and dust. Yarrow tossed the cell wall to the side.

“If this is the detention hall, then the access way to the computer core is a few doors…” Lilith said, pointing to a door on the far side of the room, “that way.”

Yarrow took the last rail rifle off his back and ran for the door.

A team of kadanu got through the door before Yarrow could reach it, each armed with a shock baton. Yarrow set his rifle to
SHOT
and hit all three with a single blast.

Lilith screamed in fright and the prisoners erupted in a babble of pleas and prayers directed toward Mentiq.

Yarrow swept the bodies aside with his foot then kicked the door off the hinges. He glanced beyond the wrecked wooden frame.

“Clear!”

The medic continued on, Hale and Cortaro right behind him.

Standish put a hand on the small of Lilith’s back and guided her onward.

“You know, I can do everything Yarrow can. Thing is, I’m not wearing my armor so I figured I’d let him have all the glory,” Standish said.

“You talk a great deal. Has anyone mentioned this to you?”

“You’re going to fit in with us just fine.” Standish raised his weapon and stepped through the door, sweeping the barrel across the antechamber beyond. A low wooden wall with decorated posts separated the inner courtyard from the many doors and offices along the perimeter.

The center of the floor was filled with open-air cubicles and dozens of administrative personnel gawking at Yarrow.

“I have come for your souls!” Yarrow shouted and fired his gauss rifle into the air. The kadanu scattered for the exits.

Lilith pointed at an unmarked door. “There!”

Yarrow ran over and slammed his shoulder into the door. It bent against the blow, then fell off the hinges after a kick.

“There’s nothing in here,” Yarrow said as he looked inside.

“Check the floor,” Lilith said.

“Oh…” Yarrow reached down and tore a lock away from a trap door. He lifted it up and waved the rest of his team over.

“‘I’m here for your soul?’” Hale asked.

“Thought that might be easier than shooting everyone,” Yarrow said. “Plus, if they jam up the exits, it’d be harder for anyone armed with more than a pigsticker to get at us.”

“Good thinking, Marine.” Hale grabbed onto the ladder leading down from the trap door and climbed down, one hand still clutching his rifle. Beneath the first floor was nothing but an abyss. The sound of Hale’s feet against the ladder echoed off distant walls.

He felt a metal floor beneath his feet and stepped away from the ladder. He hit a switch and activated the flashlight built into his rifle. A circle of light appeared on the floor, illuminating power and data cables running beneath corrugated metal. He ran the light along the power lines to where they converged into a small black stone dais surrounded by control panels.

“Sir,” Yarrow called down, “Lilith said that’s the only way in and out. You want me to stay up here?”

“Stay. Don’t let anyone follow us,” Hale yelled back.

Cortaro helped Lilith off the ladder and the four of them went to the dais.

“OK, I’ve seen something like this before,” Hale said. “Under Euskal Tower, Ibarra’s probe was waiting for us…”

“What did you do to get it out?” Cortaro asked.

“We just…Stacey…well, we didn’t do anything.” Hale frowned.

Lilith huffed and turned on a workstation. She took a hacker spike from her robes and plugged it into a data port, her fingers tapping against a keyboard with the fury of a hailstorm against a tin roof.

“Where’s the probe, Lilith?” Hale asked.

“It went into emergency standby mode after the city went into lockdown.” Light from the screens projected Toth script across her face. “Which I can override if you stop distracting me.”

A light rose from the plinth, a jagged disjointed mess of white light, not like the simple teardrop Hale encountered on Earth when he rescued the probe from behind Xaros lines.

“What happened to it?” Cortaro asked. “It looks like hell.”

“We’ve been hacking into it for generations,” Lilith said. “Rewriting its code and patching pieces together to bend it to whatever purpose Mentiq desired.” A tear ran down the side of her face. “It’s so beautiful and my life’s work was to torture it.”

“I recognize your code,” came from the probe. The words were out of pitch and full of static. “Why are you here in person? Only Fellerin comes down here.”

“We need you to lower the blast shields and drop the energy barrier,” Hale said.

“Purpose?”

“To destroy this city and kill Mentiq,” Hale said.

“Your language is filtered. Base language unrecognized. Anomalous.”