Amish Vampires in Space (75 page)

"Well, at least they got you patched up all right. I would hate to have you go and die from just a little scratch."

"You know it would take more than a deinon's kick to get rid of me," Rathe said. "Throw me the tathnak and hang up the rest."

Rakjear hung the battle gear on its rack and tossed him the flexible armor piece. Rathe spread the tathnak across his resting bench and surveyed the damage. A large gouge marred the chest area where Votak's claw had struck during the fight.

Rakjear's eyes widened. "That's a mean kick for such a little saurn."

"You don't have to tell me that," Rathe said, nodding at his shoulder. He pulled his repair kit from under the bench and took out a small tube of paste then uncovered a small lightglobe set in the wall just over the head of the bench.

"But you did it," Rakjear said, settling onto the stool next to Rathe's equipment rack. "You fought your way out of your hatch status and made it into the light infantry! That's more than most saurn can say. I can still hardly believe it. Have they revealed your assignment yet?"

"Yeah, though it seems strange that the judges scored me so high after all they did to hold me back in the earlier rounds." Rathe squeezed the tube's contents into the gash in his armor. "But they brought the results in while the medics were fixing me up." He placed a textured adhesive patch over the paste and smoothed it out with his claw.

"So hatch the news already."

Rathe struck a dignified pose. "You are now looking at the newest member of Grakin Spur, under Drakier Talos. That's the second Spur in the third Klaw. It was the highest Spur with an opening in the entire army."

Rakjear broke into a toothy grin. "Who would have thought it? A fivefive making second Spur in the third Klaw of a first Fist!"

"It's a start," Rathe replied, as he tossed the tathnak back to Rakjear.

"It's more than a start." Rakjear flipped the piece of armor onto its rack. "Most five-fives never even make it off the continent. Look at me, I'm a three-three and had to settle for a third Spur, fourth Klaw, in the assault infantry."

Rathe nodded. As the last to hatch in his sire's final clutch, Rathe should have spent his life in the lower castes of the Karn Empire, with only the spika below him. That was a fate Rathe had never been willing to accept. Yet, even now, despite all that he had overcome and all he had proven, he felt like it was all a dream. Maybe because part of him still said that he didn't deserve it.

Rakjear tossed Rathe a small bundle wrapped in old packing material.

Rathe snatched it out of the air. "What's this?"

"Why do people always ask that? Just unwrap the thing and find out."

Rathe clumsily tried to tear at the wrapping with his free hand, then bit at the material with his teeth.

"Give me that." Rakjear snatched the object from Rathe and pulled the paper free, then handed the gift back. "I figured that since you're a real soldier now you should have a real sarkae."

Rathe ran his claw along the contour of the emblem. Two silver rods had been curved into a fourteen-inch tall oval, with a single pointed curve extending three inches from the top and two curving away from each other at the bottom, forming the first letter of Rathe's name. The metal had been affixed to a supple band of leather and slightly curved so that Rathe could strap it onto his left arm. A silver ring hung in the center of the oval, suspended by two fine chains.

The silver sarkae completely outclassed the wrapped leather one Rathe had used throughout his time in the mines. As his identifying mark, Rathe had been ashamed of the low quality of his old sarkae. Now, thanks to Rakjear, he had a symbol he could be proud of. He ran a claw over the five bronze pips that marked each of the lower curves, designating his hatch status.

"Those pips are a mark of honor now, Rathe," Rakjear said. "The fact that you fought through the Sokojae and won, even though you are a low-hatch, is proof of your skill. You truly have made your own way."

"Thanks, Rak." A surge of emotion welled within Rathe. "You know I couldn't have made it this far without you."

"That's right. If it wasn't for me, you'd still be stuck in that sludge pit, moaning about how cruel life is."

"At least I wouldn't have you reminding me of it every ten minutes." Rathe tapped at the ring in the center of the sarkae with a claw. "What's this ring for?"

"That tail slap Votak gave you must have done some brain damage. It's for your jerkrenak fang."

"The fang . . . " Rathe glanced at his pack. "I'm not sure I want all the attention that would bring."

"Are you cracked? I can't think of any other saurn who would pass up the chance of putting a trophy like a jerkrenak fang on their sarkae. Especially after you killed the beast singlehandedly."

"You know the jerkrenak was mostly dead when I found it. I barely had to fight the beast."

Rakjear threw his arms wide. "Everyone knows how dangerous even a mostly dead jerkrenak is. Even the Grakil respect them, however grudgingly. Whatever happened in that cave, you still saved a hatchling, and that in itself is enough to warrant wearing the jerkrenak's fang."

Rathe smiled and shook his head. "All right, Rak, I promise to think about it. I won't be able to sleep at all tonight anyway."

"All the more reason to celebrate while we have the time. I've got a whole pouch of seetha juice globes and only tonight to drink them." Rakjear reached into a hip pouch and pulled out two emerald globes, popped one in his mouth, and tossed the other to his friend.

Rathe bit the globe out of the air. Sweet juice burst from the container and filled his mouth.

The night passed far too quickly, filled with memories and twenty-eight globes of seetha juice. As Rakjear finally staggered out the door to return to his quarters, the ship's comm system announced they would be docking in thirty minutes.

Rathe splashed water on his face and started to stow in his pack what few possessions he had. Uncertainty gnawed at his gut. He had spent all his life looking forward to this day, and now he wasn't sure he was ready.

All too soon Rathe found himself with everything packed except his new sarkae. As his fingers slid over the silver metal, the full force of his parting with Rakjear took hold. Nearly three years of being side by side, and now it was all over. Rathe knew he would see his friend again—they were in the same Fist, after all—but military assignments could keep them apart for weeks or months at a time.

Rathe set the sarkae down and took his old emblem and a long metal box from his pack. The two crystal claws set in an obsidian circle—denoting him as a Sokojae champion— seemed out of place on the twisted leather of his old sarkae. Rathe unsnapped the medal from the dirty leather and transferred it to his new sarkae, securing it across the silver joint at the bottom of the silver oval, just above the bronze hatch-pips.

With a flip of a claw, Rathe unlatched the metal box and lifted it open. Inside lay the few awards and commendations he had managed to secure during his last two years of training in the mines. On top of those lay the ebony jerkrenak fang.

Over two years had passed since Rathe had pulled this foot-long fang from the ruined corpse of a grakil, and yet its inner edge remained razor sharp. The fang and its twin had sliced the grakil's spinal column cleanly before being torn from the murderous jerkrenak's mouth.

Rathe shuddered at the memory. The grakil had died defending a young hatchling that the jerkrenak had maimed. Rathe had only stumbled upon the scene of the battle and found the hatchling through sheer chance. Nobody knew that he had acquired the fang by pulling it from the grakil's dead body. They all thought he had saved the hatchling and slain the jerkrenak. Thanks to that belief, Rathe had gained his chance to prove himself among the warrior castes.

Yet he did not remember the day with joy. He had spoken to the jerkrenak before its death. The beast's words haunted Rathe even now, three years later, no matter how hard he strove to forget them.

Yet he still clung to the fang. It was proof of the event that had broken him out of the mold. If he wore the fang so prominently displayed on his new sarkae, it would give him more status, but it would also invite unwanted questions. Rathe shook his head. Then again, there were no witnesses to what had happened in the cave, and the official records backed his story. Besides, who cared what had given him his chance? His prowess in combat was no hoax.

"Kersheth's Ring!" Rathe scowled at the fang. "My life will not be ruled by the fear of a fang and old memories." He slid the fang into the silver ring that held it in place between the metal sides of the oval. He admired how his emblem looked now, then shoved the sarkae into his pack.

Still, even as he shouldered his gear and stormed out of his compartment, the jerkrenak's words burned in his mind.

"Let my fang, that yi hold, bear testimony that I have warned
yi. Seek the guide! Follow his way, lest yi bring the fire of the stars
down upon us all. Do that and yir path to doom will be certain."

To purchase
Starfire
, go
here
.

They called me Nebuchadnezzar, and the name suited me fine.

A good name has a way of weaving itself through and around a man until it’s part of him. It merges with his soul, for better or for worse, and it augments it somehow. It amplifies it, or maybe what I’m trying to say is it helps reveal it. All I know is that there’s a lot in a name. That instant right when someone calls your name? That’s what I’m talking about.

These were my first words to my accusers and to my judges after they asked me if I had anything to say in my defense. I sat on one side of a polished oak table in wrist and leg irons, whiskers grizzly, hair matted and gray down the sides of my head, the ebbing remains of a crew-cut on top. The crew-cut had receded from my German forehead, which accentuated my ancient Aryan features, especially the nose.
Ancient
in terms of the purity of my Germanic blood—and the plain fact that I’m now a very old man.

Across the table sat three of my accusers. The ten others lined the cobbled rock walls of my interrogation room, half in and half out of a feeble light emanating from the ceiling. Beside one of them, I saw the remains of splattered blood on the wall, barely perceptible after all these years. I noticed it because I was looking for it. Sometimes we vex ourselves with our memories like insects that can’t resist the pink swells of a Venus flytrap.

The interrogation room ran about forty feet square and was dungeonesque in its austerity. Rock all around, dark, damp, cool. I remembered this room. We used it for storage, mainly for fuel: fifty-five gallon drums full of fuel for the furnace.

My primary interrogator, apparently receiving orders from someone lining the wall by the way he continually looked over his shoulder, was a beady-eyed man with thick glasses and a widow’s peak. He was so slightly built I felt I could break him in half by snapping my fingers. Flanking him were two women who appeared to be of Eastern European descent. They never spoke, but I could see their souls nonetheless. Heartless. During the interrogation, anyway. Could have been different on the outside of the Nachthaus.

Everything seemed heartless inside the rock walls of the Nachthaus. When they caught me after seventy years in America and secreted me back to Romania, I was too old to care much. But coming back to the Nachthaus was another story. This place is as heartless as its walls. I shivered an old man’s shiver for what might await me. They had no idea how evil this place is.

“Mr. König,” my interrogator said, “we’re not interested in philosophy. We’re interested in your crimes. Names, dates, historical data. If you cooperate, things will be much easier for you.” He adjusted his glasses with hands so small they could be a third grader’s.

Easier. I knew what he meant. The death chamber was right down the passageway.

“Call me Sascha,” I said. “I haven’t been called that in a long time.”

“Mr. König—”

“Your organization has been hunting me for seventy years. You got lucky. I should already be dead. But I’m going to make this worth your efforts. I will spill the whole load, ja?” Only two days back with these people and already I was sinking back into German-English. I guess that skill had helped me blend in with Americans for so long. “But you’ve got to let me tell it. And if you do, I’ll tell the whole thing. Otherwise, just get it over with. Do we have an agreement?”

One of the heartless women reached over and massaged my interrogator’s hand. After looking over his shoulder, he nodded at me. “Continue.”

I leaned as far across the table as I could, staring at the diminutive man and his female escorts with my Aryan blue eyes, trying to let them see my features. My eyes are a faded, old man’s eyes. But they’ve seen a lot. More than they should have. And I wanted them to maybe see a bit of what these eyes held right around the sockets where the crow’s feet have dug entrenched battle lines.

“They called me Nebuchadnezzar, you see, because I could get that oven hotter than anyone at the Nachthaus. Seven times hotter, if you believed the accounts of my prowess with fire.”