Apex

253 Pages·2013·1.13 MB·English

by  Jyr Aer-ki

1
Jalia woke with a start, sitting up in her sleep pod, sweat glistening on
her forehead. It took her a moment to realize where she was…her head was
awash with the lingering sensory numbness of the dream-state and the only
illumination in the dark chamber was the muted blue/green status lights on the
wall to her left.
She put a hand on her forehead, putting pressure on her temple and
settling herself. She’d had another nightmare. The third in the past four days.
The Junta breathed in deep, then shook away the last bit of haziness from
her vision before pulling her legs and tail out of the enclosed portion of the pod,
crunching her knees up to her bare chest to clear her feet, then swinging them
over the edge of the padded sleeping compartment and feeling for the dark floor
below.
She flinched when her feet touched cold…then realized that she was
covered in sweat, worse even than the last sleep cycle. Whatever it was about
jumpship travel, the longer the journey lasted, the more her unconscious mind
protested. Fortunately they were less than a day from arrival in the Hellis
system, and Jalia intended to stay awake for the remainder of this jump.
Flicking the sanitation cycle switch on her sleep pod, the nude Junta
stepped into the nearby cleansing chamber and closed the arced door on the
semi-clear vertical tube that lit up with green lights when she stepped inside. A
moment later warm water rained down on her petite red-skinned body that
appeared black against the mood lighting. Her species reacted to the green
spectrum of light with calming neural waves, which helped to wash away the
nightmare-induced adrenaline while the tiny streams of water rid her of her
sweaty sheen.
Her fleshy, half-meter long tail coiled up behind her back, itching and
rubbing a knot in her spine. Her sleep pod may have been padded, but she’d
never grown accustomed to the thing. It hadn’t been custom fitted, rather it was
an acquisition from another unit, repurposed to the Captain’s quarters on her
ship, along with the cleansing chamber and a few other items of Junta
technology. Her homeworld and race didn’t possess starships, thus some ad hock
customizations had to be made when she’d purchased the Zaklorn freighter some
8 cycles ago.
Jalia took her time beneath the water streams…there was little to do
during jumpship transit. Her ship sat parked inside the massive vessel, along
with dozens of others being ferried between star systems. Aside from routine
maintenance, she and her crew had an abundance of spare time on their hands.
Most of her crew had left the ship and secured temporary
accommodations in the city that was the interior of the jumpship Vernera, which
carried an onboard population upwards of 600,000…not including passengers
and crew of the docked ships. Jalia had spent most of her free time roaming the
city, while never spending too much time away from her ship. Security was
decent on the Vernera, but she didn’t feel completely at ease leaving her home
entirely in their hands.
Not that someone could steal it. It was locked behind massive bay doors
on the jumpship hull, and even if they were opened and the ship exited, they
were traveling 197 times lightspeed. Without the jumpship’s massive engines,
there was no way for her little ship’s gravity drive to bleed off that much speed.
Any hijacker would be marooned to interstellar drift…assuming they didn’t run
into a star or nebula, which would end their journey within a microsecond. It was
often debated amongst starship crews which fate would be worse. Either way,
you ended up just as dead.
When Jalia had finally recovered from her nightmare, she palmed a wide,
flat switch on the interior of the clear tube and activated the drying cycle. Air
jets replaced the water, and she spread her legs, arms, and tail wide to let it get
into all the cracks. She leaned her face upward and shook her six headtails,
flicking off water beads as the limp tendrils flopped to and fro. Unlike her proper
tail, her headtails had no muscle tissue, only a combination of cartilage, fat, and
sensory neurons. They made up for a lack of ‘ears’ that many other species
possessed, as well as adding other sensory input…which also made them rather
tender. One surefire way to piss off a Junta was grabbing her headtails…or in the
case of the males, headtail. They possessed one, with musculature, but lacked a
pelvic or ‘proper’ tail.
Few people in the galaxy knew of that distinction. Most Junta seen in
galactic society were female…slaves, sold by pirates, slavers, or the clans on her
homeworld. Many of her Kella-clan sisters had seen that fate forced upon them
when they reached puberty. Her world was so poor, and morally deficient, that
the clans sold off excess female population to the galaxy as servant or sex slaves.
Jalia, as a member of Kella’s ruling family, had been exempt from that
practice…though arranged “marriages” were common between clans, which was
one of many reasons that she’d struggled to escape her homeworld through a
combination of ingenuity, manipulation, and blackmail. As it was, she was the
only Junta starship captain, male or female, in the known galaxy.
Which meant that virtually everywhere she went she was recognized as a
slave, being barred or questioned as to her purpose when trying to enter various
establishments. She was a second-class citizen at best, as far as most races were
concerned…however, the lachar pistol that she wore in a blatant hip holster had
forestalled many such assumptions, prompting her to make it a permanent
feature of her daily wardrobe.
After making sure she was thoroughly dry, Jalia left the cleansing
chamber, which immediately powered down as soon as her feet left the pedestal.
Her captain’s quarters reverted back to darkness, but her eyes adjusted quickly
and the faint status lights were enough for her to move about and toggle the main
illumination strips to three quarters intensity.
Four rows of ‘bars’ on the ceiling lit with white light, along with two
lateral ones ringing the walls just below the low ceiling. Jalia blinked away the
excess light and opened a compartment next to her sleep pod, which had already
finished its cleaning cycle. She pulled out knee-length pants, with tail hole, and
slipped the flexible garment on, wriggling her tail through the tight opening. To
the dark blue pants she added a matching, loose, sleeveless shirt and black strap
jacket. She retrieved her gunbelt and strap sandals from the small table opposite
her sleep pod, slipping on and snugging up the footwear first.
The straps came all the way up to her knees, with bits of skin visible all
the way down to her toes. The sandals matched her jacket, equally black and just
as gaudy. With practiced ease, her slipped her gunbelt on and fastened it below
her naval, then grabbed an assortment of currency chips, access cards, and
identification slips from the tabletop where she’d dumped them last night. They
quickly disappeared into discrete pockets.
Lastly, Jalia grabbed a thin, blue, flexible ribbon and tied her headtails
together so that they hung behind her head rather than resting on her shoulders.
She checked her image in the reflective comm panel then left her quarters,
thumbing the exterior lock as she left.
Her ship, the Resolute, was small but still over 4 keets in length, which
was just over two kilometers by the old Human standards. A few races used the
ancient measurements, others used their own, but most held to the commerce
standards, in which “keets” were the designated units of ‘local’ measurement.
‘Distant’ measurements, used for space travel, were measured in “wesks” and
“weskits,” the later being one 1/1000th of the former.
Most of the ship’s bulk was comprised of engines, fuel cells, and cargo
holds. The actual living sections of the ship were sparse, accommodating a crew
of 8. Jalia operated with 6, including herself. Two were Uria, two Presca, and
one Fret. All her crew were bipedal, double arms, and vocal-equipped within her
hearing range, as per her choice. No Junta crewers were available offworld, and
she didn’t want to have to train one from scratch, so she chose those most similar
in biology from the available recruitment pools. Still, she had little in common
with the other species.
One of the Presca was still onboard when she left the ship, going over
manifests. She trusted him enough to lock up on his own and headed out the
short docking umbilical and into the jumpship’s bay ring, which possessed all
types of maintenance services for the docked ships, ranging from spare parts to
fuel stations. Jalia bypassed the ring via a nearby stairwell, jogged up five levels,
and ended up on the observation promenade.
Some hundred plus people could be seen wandering to and fro in front of
enormous windows spanning the length of a road-like chamber stretching off
into the distance. To her right she could see the twin set of windows on the far
side, which allowed view of the starboard docking bay and the vessels berthed
inside. The Resolute was parked in the port bay, nestled up just below the
windows and mostly out of sight.
Several restaurants and lounges dotted the open air promenade…for
some reason the denizens and passengers liked looking out at the motionless
starships. Various designs could be seen, from different species and
manufacturers, but beyond that Jalia didn’t really see the point. The view hadn’t
changed for the past 8 days, but nonetheless a fair number of people frequented
this section of the ship.
Jalia walked down the promenade until she arrived at a primary lift hub,
hopped in a transit cube, and jetted off through the jumpship’s interior toward
the city proper. She emerged at the intersection of two of the city’s urban
passenger streets, with her cube popping up from ‘underground’ next to niches
for three others, presently unoccupied.
She left the cube and two Herrans took her place. The quadrupeds barely
fit in the compartment together, but they managed and quickly rose up into the
‘ceiling,’ moving to one of over 150 levels within the city.
Jalia wandered the streets, passing by a number of entertainment districts
before she arrived at the center of the city…a vast open air park that sported
rolling hills and a large central lake. The ceiling of the chamber was some 50
levels up, with high priced apartments situated above, able to look down at the
park through their transparent floors.
The Junta walked out through the grassy knolls, avoiding the clusters of
people gathered for all manner of recreational activities, and ended up at the
edge of the lake where a small cluster of thick trunked trees rose up and shaded
the ground from the warm overhead lights. She sat down and leaned back against
one, pressing her headtail bundle against the rough bark. She tolerated the mild
discomfort and let the organic sounds and smells wash over her senses.
She relaxed for a long while, having nothing else to really do and not
favoring the crowded kiosks that reminded her of her overpopulated homeworld.
There were few people in this section of the park and Jalia appreciated the
seclusion. Eventually her growling stomach prompted her to stand up and
consider whether to head for one of the smaller restaurants on the jumpship or to
hit the foodstuff stores for a snack.
Before she decided, she noticed a ripple on the lake. Frowning, she
slipped her second eyelids in place, enhancing her distance vision by a factor of
5. There was no aquatic animal life in the pond…or so the Gorovan information
network said. The interstellar corporation’s jumpship brochure stated that it
would be both logistically improper and potentially hazardous to keep unsapient
lifeforms in a public access body of water, not to mention potential allergic and
viral medical complications.
The database cited an incident by their primary rival in the jumpship
industry, Yiori, in which a male Teeri died from ‘petting’ an ilkori saber fish in a
decorative pool. It had been a freak allergic reaction to a chemical in the fish’s
scales, but Gorovan pressed the point for all its worth, noting that they valued
the wellbeing of their passengers too much to take the risk of a similar
incident…no matter what aesthetic value was lost.
Jalia had been to the lake every day this week and had yet to see so much
as a crease in the reflective surface. With no wind, the lake’s surface was a
perfect flat mirror…which made this moving ripple all the more curious.
Whatever was causing it, it was moving towards the shore, a bit down the
sandy edge from Jalia’s position. She leaned back against the tree, arms crossed
over her supple chest, and watched closely. A few steps out from the shore the
ripple slowed and a mass of brilliant green hair broke the surface, followed by a
smooth skinned, blue female’s face.
Jalia blanched, blinking several times, not immediately trusting her eyes.
The figure walked calmly out of the water, her tight fit, black bodysuit
shaking off the water and appearing to dry almost instantly. Her blue arms were
bare, and immediately rose up to her head and wrung the water out of her long
ponytail. After finishing she retrieved a thin grey robe left on the shore’s edge
and wrapped herself in it. Her blue skin disappeared, her face hidden deep within
the robe’s folds, and the Cres quietly walked up off the sandy shore and headed
across the dark green grass, ostensibly back into the crowded city streets.
The Junta followed from a distance, cursing herself as she did so.
Stalking someone was immensely rude, but she couldn’t help herself. Cres had
always fascinated her, and were rarely seen outside their own territory. They
even had their own fleet of jumpships…so what was this one doing here? Jalia
felt compelled to follow her, though she didn’t really know why.
Normally, drifting into the packed streets would deter pursuit, but Junta
were used to living in crowds, so Jalia had little trouble tailing the Cres from a
discrete distance. Their race was the most reclusive in this part of the galaxy, and
not a lot was known about them…except that they were highly intelligent,
militant, and worshiped the long extinct Human race. It was rumored that they
went to great pains to recover even the simplest of Human artifacts…though
they weren’t alone in that endeavor.
Very little remained from the mysterious race’s empire. The Great Purge
that wiped them from the face of the galaxy had apparently been a thorough one,
and given that their technological prowess far surpassed everyone else’s…or so
the story went…many races and individuals fell over themselves to track down
any hint of a Human archeological discovery.
All Jalia knew was that the Humans were gone, and that many revered
them. Some races even claimed to possess Human genetics, though those claims
were never confirmed, given that no intact Human genetic profiles existed for
comparison. Not surprising, given that their demise was supposed to have
occurred some 20,000 cycles ago, before many of the more prominent races had
even attained space travel.
Nowadays, the Cres were the revered race. Respected by all, feared by
many, they were elusive and uninterested in most galactic affairs, as far as the
news feeds reported. Nearly all diplomatic invites sent out to the Cres came back
with a negative response, though Jalia didn’t blame them. Interracial accords,
conferences, and exchanges were a waste of time in her opinion…one more
reason why Jalia liked them.
They were the no nonsense race…but a moral one. Their hatred of
slavers was one aspect of their psyche that wasn’t a mystery, as evidenced by the
few holos of their combat engagements available to the galaxy. Several million
slaves owed their freedom to the Cres…and the prominent slaver shipping lines
had adjusted to keep well clear of Cres territory, though it was rumored that the
blue skinned aliens would still occasionally hit one of them at random, giving all
illicit shippers pause for concern.
Jalia didn’t fear them. Her cargo was legit. Spare parts, food, a few
novelties, and a load of prefab shelters in this shipment. Still, their presence gave
other species pause…and even as the Junta tracked the Cres, she felt the need to
keep her distance.
Two trinket kiosks and a jot through an art gallery later, the Cres
suddenly disappeared from Jalia’s awareness. The Junta approached the point
she’d last spotted her slowly, blending in with the crowds then standing against a
wall, waiting on a water fountain to clear. She scanned the area with her keen
eyesight and ample hearing, but the Cres had been so silent that the later did
little good…and the grey hood had equally disappeared from sight.
She doubted that she’d ditched the cloak, her hair alone would have
stood out, not to mention the stir her presence would probably have made.
Deflated, Jalia shook her head and knelt over the now open water
fountain. She sucked in a quick pair of icy cold gulps and decided to let the
mysterious alien go.
Then a flicker of thought caused her to glance to her right, catching the
fleeing glimpse of that grey cloak disappearing down a side street. Suppressing a
smile, Jalia merged back into the meandering pedestrian traffic and rejoined the
‘hunt.’
Three more times she lost contact with the Cres, and three more times
she reacquired her trail, which led her into the residential district…more
specifically, the temporary quarters for passengers, where her crew were
probably billeted. She hadn’t inquired…their time away was their own, so long
as they were back at the ship in time for their shifts.
The streets had narrowed and the crowds thinned, which made tracking
the Cres easier, but also made it harder to disguise her pursuit, so Jalia laid back
further, meandering to and fro, trying to blend in as much as possible. The Cres
quietly ducked into a stairwell and proceeded to walk down to the next level.
Jalia followed a bit later, but lost track of her quarry yet again. She
sighed, and glanced around, hoping to pick up the trail again. Intuition led her to
head off to the right, and she quickly found herself in a small courtyard outside
an apartment complex.
The Cres was nowhere to be seen.
Cursing her luck, Jalia walked over and sat down on a public bench and
waited a spell. No use in chasing down empty roads. She wondered how far off
the Cres’s quarters were…or if she was meeting someone. No way to tell, now
that she’d lost her.
Oh well, she thought. It had been an adventure while it lasted.
She stood up and walked over to a different exit to the courtyard,
wondering where she should go next. Maybe catch one of the Elos in the
entertainment district.
Suddenly Jalia felt her pistol slip from her holster. She reflexively
grabbed for it, but found herself knocked to the side and her back smashed up
against the stone wall, then forcefully held there, staring into the hooded face of
the Cres she’d been following.
The enigmatic alien didn’t say anything, but her eyes locked with Jalia’s.
She felt paralyzed and entranced at the same time, but also afraid. The intensity
behind the eyes was hard with warning, but they softened after a moment and the
arm across her chest relaxed and her pistol was returned to her hip holster with a
subtle grace.
“You track well, Junta” the Cres said with smooth, eloquent resonance,
then walked away, quietly disappearing around a corner.
Jalia didn’t move, still stunned by being jumped…then let off that easy.
Not to mention being spoken to, and complimented by the Cres. And how did
she get behind her anyway?
Knowing better than to continue to follow, Jalia walked away the
opposite direction, pondering what had just happened.
A long while later she ended up back on the observation promenade,
seated along one of the long windows in a cushy chair, staring out at the docked
ships, lost in thought.
Then one of the ships in the back row, partially obscured by an Uria
military frigate…exploded.
2
Jalia froze. For a moment she didn’t know how to interpret what she was
seeing, then her mind went directly to the status of her ship, mentally plotting the
debris trajectory.
No, her ship should be fine. Plenty of other ships in the way.
Then her thoughts raced to the outer hull, and the egress doors. Had they
been punctured?
The debris cloud had lost its fire, but it was too thick to see through.
Behind her the noise level began to rise and her neck stiffened against the
building tension in the air. She stayed in her seat, watching, wondering what her
next move should be.
Not a lot of options. Stay here, head into the city, or back to her ship…
which was stuck inside the jumpship, unable to go anywhere or do anything.
More importantly, what had caused that ship to explode? And was it any danger
to her ship?
Jalia’s magnification eyelids slid into place and she took a closer look at
the spreading debris and smoke cloud. The docking area was unpressurized and
had no artificial gravity, so the unchecked matter was spreading rapidly in all
directions, thinning out as it progressed. Not too long after a hazy image of the
ship’s hull appeared, listing down…and up, severed into two large pieces along
the midsection.
Internal explosion, Jalia guessed. Her stomach clenched with anxiety.
Somebody’s ship had just broken in half. No idea how many crew had been
aboard. Thoughts of the same thing happening to the Resolute came to mind, and
a surge of helplessness rushed through her.
Which was quickly forgotten as the glass in front of her cracked from an
unseen debris impact.
The Junta leapt out of her seat on reflex, literally jumping up and over
the back of it, landing deftly on her feet. Her acute hearing detected no
atmospheric hiss, but she was still thoroughly rattled.
Suddenly a large, heavy panel dropped down from the ceiling, quickly
covering the glass and cutting off all view of the docking area. Fear of
decompression gone, Jalia glanced around as the promenade quickly emptied,
with streams of panicked people rushing for the exits.
“Kitja,” she swore. She needed to get back to her ship.