An Officer’s Duty (59 page)

That’s very strange…That’s a
machine!
How is a
machine
able to give me a psi-induced headache?

She probed warily, precognitively, dipping just far enough into the timestreams to see the fog spreading outward as an aura-overlay on the real world. Specifically, from the crown-thing on the alien’s head, not from the box, though the box and its cables did radiate a bit of mist-glow uncertainty.
So…if they’ve put this thing on her head, and I know from when we get out of this that she’s a Seer, their term for someone with psychic abilities…then the machine is generating some sort of…of psychic-ability dampening field?

That made sense. That made a horrible lot of sense. It also made sense as to why blowing up a capital ship armed with one of those things placed her so close to the dais, rather than at the back of the room for all her other crimes against the Salik nation. The generation of that much psi-nullifying energy, enough to block
her
abilities, would have indeed required the resources of a capital ship. By comparison, this little machine was a mere nuisance.

Until they brought in the second psi, and a third, and a fourth. Each machine ramped up her headache and spread another patch of fog into her mental awareness of the large underground hall. Quickly, before the fields grew too pervasive, Ia wrapped her hands around the chains holding her up and unlatched the manacles at wrists and ankles. She carefully held still, not wanting anyone to realize she was free, but unlocked herself subtly all the same.

One of the machines passed close by her eating frame. Carefully craning her head, Ia studied it. The head-thing was firmly strapped onto the crested skull of the priest-caste Tlassian. The machine had the usual sucker-controlled buttons, smooth and seamless, and very difficult to pull up on telekinetically.
By its very nature, the machine itself would no doubt block any electrokinetic attempts to interfere with it, and probably—

—Aha! It’s
plugged
in! That’s how they can fit on all the different skull caps, for different alien head configurations. The machines are the same, but the
helmets
are interchangeable, and it’s the helms that cause the radiation effect.
Biting
her lip to keep from crowing, Ia focused on her pain to clear the joy out of her nerves. Pleasure could be just as distracting as fear, and the next few minutes would be vital. Mindful of her loosened manacles, she looked around the chamber, identifying the exact placement of each of the anti-psi machines and the sockets for their suppression helmets.

This would not be that much different from playing the wall harp back home. A little harder thanks to the fog, but not by too much. Confident she knew of each plug’s placement, Ia relaxed. Instead of wrapping her mind around a dozen or so picks, she wrapped them instead around the base of each wire. The strain of holding on to them in spite of the fields’ dampening qualities was about as bad as the strain of holding herself up by her chains without moving. Bearable, but not something she’d care to do forever. She closed her eyes and rested as much as she could, given the two problems at hand, balancing tension with what would look to her captors like resignation.

An extra-long speech in Sallhash warned her that the parade of prisoner-meals was coming to an end. Opening her eyes, she watched the Salik guards carry in yet another pole-bound prisoner. This one was their last prisoner, the greatest enemy the frogtopusses had managed to get their slimy tentacles around.

The naked, struggling, grey-haired and grim-faced woman was none other than the long-missing Admiral Jenka Viega, former Fleet Commander of the Blockade. Viega had been presumed killed while traveling on an OTL courier over four months ago. Despite her long captivity, she looked as if she had kept her middle-aged body fit and her spirit strong, judging by the curses she flung in Spanish and the flexing of her muscles against her bonds.

Her fighting spirit seemed to rouse some of the other captives. Several strained against their bonds, craning their necks to look at the woman. Breathing deep, readying herself, Ia watched as the admiral was set on the platform and her ankles were unbound. Ia knew the older woman was just waiting for her wrists to be freed before she intended to lash out, and hopefully take down the Grand High General before she died. Ia didn’t intend to give the older woman that chance.

“Excuse me, meioas!” she called out, tightening her gut to project her voice over the hubbub in the hall.

Ia let go of the chains, freeing her hands from their restraints,
kicking her legs to shake off the ankle cuffs binding her feet to the floor. The Salik around her hissed in surprise, too stunned by her sudden escape to move. Without hesitation, Ia turned her drop into a bound, striding quickly straight for the main platform. Hisses followed her progress, with some of the aliens rising from their cushion-seats.

Given that Sallha’s gravity was barely.71Gs Standard, Ia reached the platform in mere moments. The Grand High General hissed and gurgled at her approach, no doubt something about personally eating the guards who hadn’t secured her chains. She spoke again as he started to raise one set of tentacles in her direction.

“I hope you don’t mind, General, but I went to a
lot
of trouble and expense to attend this little party. I am here to try to save your lives,” Ia told him firmly, letting her volume echo her statement off the ceiling and walls.

Her words arrested him in mid-command. Curling his digits, he licked his lips. “Hhheww…wish to sssave
our
livvesss?”

Silence fell. Those Salik who had risen sank back onto their seats. Once again, alien psychology was now on her side, playing into her hands. With such a bold, bold statement, Ia had proven herself worthy in their eyes to face up to their leader…though perhaps not yet worthy of being eaten by him.

Chin up, shoulders level, Ia returned the taller alien’s gaze calmly. “Yes. I do wish to save you. I am here to give you Deep Warnings, as your people put it. If you insist on going to war with us in the next few years, your
entire
race will perish. Generals, workers, males, females, tadpole-children and kraken-crones,
all
of them will vanish from the future of this galaxy. Knowing that will happen, I could not in good conscience remain silent, thus I arranged to be captured and brought here.

“You will perish to the last scrap of your species’ existence,” Ia stated, holding his swivel-eyed gaze. “Your rivers will run dry, your lakes will lie still, your waterworks will cease to drip, and the roar of your oceans will be silenced forever,
if
you go to war in the next few years. You have my Prophetic Stamp on that.”

The Grand High General snorted. He wheezed through his nostril-flaps, eyes flicking this way and that before refocusing on Ia’s face. “Hhheww are misstakenn, Hhhuman. We go to war in the nexst fffew
hoursss
!”

Ia ignored the alien version of laughter gusting through the hall. Instead, she yanked on the plugs of every machine within her grasp. If their headaches were anything like hers, the sudden cessation of pain in the other psychics’ brains would force them to take a few moments to recover. Prepared for it, Ia ignored the backlashing ache in her own head. Focusing while the Salik around her mocked her words in babbles and hisses, she shifted her mind to target every single weapon being carried by the ten guards on the platform, followed by every manacle within range. It would strain her abilities, and she would have to unlock the whole room in a series of waves, but it was the best she could do.

She knew the Grand High General was permitting her to speak as a show of power over such insolent prey. She needed that arrogance, because she had to
try
to warn them, to salve the burning of her own conscience before taking up the burdens of her coming duties. When the laughter-wheezing finally died down, Ia spoke again.

“…So. You will not change your mind? Even knowing that it
guarantees
the destruction of all of your people, and all your worlds, leaving you nothing more than a fading, pitied memory?”

He uncurled a tentacle at her, wiggling the tip in admonition. “There isss
nothing
hhew can do to usss.
We
are mighty! And hhhyouuu are
prey
.”

Holding up one finger upright toward him—the Human gesture was ironically similar to the Salik version of
please wait
—Ia looked over her shoulder at Admiral Viega. “For the record, sir, I
did
try to warn them. I honestly tried. Please stand witness to this, in the coming years?”

Viega frowned in puzzlement. She opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted. Not by the scornful whistle-laugh of the head of the Salik military and his fellows, but by another set of sounds. The clanking and locking of every door around them, sealing them into this room. Hard on the heels of that came other sound.

Stunner pistols flew out of holsters and
pop-popped
out of suckered grips. They flew into suddenly freed fingers as manacles snapped and clattered. Solaricans roared, K’kattas chattered, and Gatsugi keened, some flushing rage-violet, others staying a sickly yellow-fear. Salik leaped up high and slammed down
on their freed meals from overhead—only to find themselves batted off-target by Ia’s mind, and more, aided by the other psis in the room. All of this took energy, some of which she siphoned from the crystal still encircling her leg, softening it so it could flow up her shin.

“Hhhheewww!” the Grand High General hissed, crouching in preparation to spring onto Ia. “Hhheww did thissss!”

Humans screamed, in rage and in pain—and the shadows in the room danced abruptly under the billowing pillars of bright yellow red fire that erupted. The other psis were rousing and fighting back. Chaos now ruled the hall. “
Hhhew
willll die!”

He leaped at her. Liquid crystal darted up from her leg to her fist, hardening just in time for her to punch him in the mouth. Not in time to stop the force of his pounce, but enough to break his sharpened teeth and thrust him, mouth and body, off to the side. Landing hard on her back, Ia grunted and rolled, using the momentum of her fall to haul her heels over her head.

Shoving back to her feet, she reshaped the blob cupping her fingers. She knew this banquet was being recorded and broadcast, and spat out one of the few words she knew she could pronounce in Sallhash.
“Pthaachsz!”

Toothless.

Pupils dilating wide at the insult, the Grand High General spat blood from his mouth and reared up to leap at her again. Ia swung back her sword in preparation for a coup de grace.

“Lieutenant!”

The warning came too late. Weight struck her from behind. Teeth clamped into her left shoulder in aching, piercing, concentration-shaking pain. Clenching her jaw, Ia swung anyway, beheading the leader of the Salik forces. His body, caught midleap, knocked into hers, staggering her back into the Salik general literally trying to chew off her arm.

Stunnerfire washed over both of them. Ia squeaked as his jaws locked tighter, body sagging in electrostatic-induced slumber. Gasping against the pain, she slashed awkwardly over her right shoulder, hooking her wrist as hard as she could to make sure the monofractal edge cut through his skull without cutting into her own flesh. Scuffling forward as his body sagged, she aimed a second, even more awkward strike. It swept from behind her head, severing most of his body from his face. A third twist let her
cut off the last bit of flesh holding his body to his jaws. That freed her just in time to turn and slash, gutting the next Salik.

Whirling to face the rest, she found them slumped unconscious on the dais. The Fleet Admiral spun around as well, facing into the bloodied crowd. A frustrated growl escaped her. “I can’t
hit
them without…
Gaaah!
Why can’t this be a
laser
?”

There wasn’t time for subtlety. What Ia needed was a hundred small shards, and the nearest source was the great globe of the light-fixture overhead. It was a magnificent piece, stained and shaped to replicate the many islands and seas of Sallha. Ignoring the pain in her shoulder but wincing in regret for the chandelier’s loss, Ia flung her telekinetic might at the great globe from two sides, like two giant, invisible hands bashing together.

Glass
crashed
and fell. She caught most of it, the larger, sharper chunks, and sent them flying through the air like oversized harp picks. Instead of plucking strings, however, she plucked out throats. It was a sickening symphony of spattering, splattering red. Bodies fell, and the sounds of combat faded. Drawing in a deep breath, she shouted to catch the attention of the survivors.

“Listen up!”
Heads turned her way. “We have
two minutes
to grab all the survivors and get the hell out of here before the Salik send in their reinforcements! Search for survivors—you
know
what’ll happen if they get left behind! Find people, and move toward
that
door!”

She pointed with her sword, and seared a line of electricity across the upper edge of its metal frame. Those who were still on their feet scrambled to look for survivors. Fire still crackled and seared, spouting up from the bodies of the fallen Salik off to one side of the huge hall. Ia stabbed for the pyrokinetic’s mind with her own; now was not the time to let him go rogue. As it was, he was perilously close to self-combustion, with the very air around his naked frame showing wisps of smoke.

(Control
yourself, Michaels! Lock down your gifts; we don’t have
time
for you to burn down their world just yet!
) Out loud, Ia added more orders to the rest. “Tllaanva, Ssthikit, grab one of those damn anti-psi boxes, and keep your helmets with you,” she ordered a pair of priest-caste Tlassians. They flattened their spiked crests in dismay, but moved as she asked. Ia addressed the other psis. “Everyone, keep your helmets! We need to know
what those things are and how they’re made—
move
it, people!
One
minute.”