Post by pendell on Jul 7, 2014 17:52:52 GMT -5
The vastness of space, deep and dark. Millions and millions of points of light shine forever, illuminating the darkness.
Yet even in the light of the stars, there are shadows.
In the dark space between the stars , invisible to all save the most keen-eyed observer, a black shape sat, drifting, noticeable only by the complete lack of emission or reflection which would characterize a natural body.
Aboard this vessel -- for such it was -- sat Captain Song La, of the Steel Song Vessel Autumn Wind. They had waited thus, for many days, monitoring the passing traffic here in the dark place between the stars, somewhere on the trade routes between Javat Prime and Galantia.
"Sensors".
"Sensors, aye."
"Status report." This was as close as the Captain would come to betraying impatience before his trained crew of assassins. Aboard another ship, another time, there would be buzz and grumbling from the crew at the long enforced wait. But not from a picked crew, the least of whom came from a family which had served the Song with valor for generations.
Steel Song was noted for its patience.
The report came back quickly. "Nothing of interest. Standard merchant traffic. Not the one we're looking for."
"Very well."
The Captain allowed his glance to flick down to his datapad, to remind him why he was here: To kill a man, a man by the name of Seamus Campbell, captain of the Merry Widow , of House Thulun. Who had, quite recently during a short stay on Corelloth, become drunk and had his way with a married woman. That was bad enough, but worse for him was the fact that her name was Song Wi.
People spoke of "Steel Song Clan", he mused , but it was actually a federation of hundreds of different clans, all bound in fealty to each other, and each of them to the High Clan, the Clan of Song, named for the Founder Song Fa.
He remembered the story , told and retold in the clan bed-chambers to children -- how, during the dark ages of rule by the machines, Song Fa and some others had participated in the strictly forbidden practice of precognition, deliberately taking spice so as to induce spice fugue and the visions it induced in the susceptible. Song Fa had been one susceptible person, and his fugue had been vivid, far beyond the sights usually given to seers.
He had seen the galaxy dissolve in a cataclysm of steel and flame.
He had seen small bands of men fleeing the disaster in small metal ships.
He had seen them sprouting from this seed to rule the cosmos -- men no longer governed by machines. Instead, men would govern themselves -- themselves, aye, and everything else.
And the seed of Song Fa would govern them all.
He had foreseen it, and so with some others he had, aided by forbidden precognition, amassed weapons and funds for the day, swearing allegiance to the prophet Shalun when he appeared. For Shalun was also a visionary, and the vision he had seen was not unlike that seen by the Song ... save in a few particulars.
And thus the clan had fled and established itself among the stars. Thus the clan prospered despite the hatred of all other peoples. Even the Templars would not dare to move against the Song, for they had their own visionaries. They also had seen the future.
Steel Song would survive always, for so it was fated.
And thus only a madman, or one tired of living, would dare touch a woman of the high clan, one bearing the sacred name of Song, of the everlasting dynasty which was the hand and instrument of fate.
Perhaps he thought to hide among the stars. The fool. Song Li looked to regard Jen Wu, his concubine and the ship sorceress. For steel song was not guided merely by computers and reasoning. Rather, steps were taken to identify the susceptible among them and to teach them both the art of spice fugue, and how to make use of what they saw there. Jen Wu had done so, and during her fugue had foreseen the passage of the Merry Widow through this place -- but "time" was not something that made sense within the spice fugue. One could see past, present, and future all at once, all mixed together, all that was, is , and would be. But specific details, such as "The target you want will be at 4,23 at 10 PM sharp on Wednesday" were a little harder to come by.
But Jen Wu was among the greatest prophetesses of the clan, and so she was certain that when she had seen the Merry Widow pass through this desolate space, it was not past nor distant future but sometime soon -- whether days or weeks, though, she could not say.
She was certain, however, because she was closely related to Song Wi by blood. The closeness of her bond aided her precognition, and the anger, radiating from her as from a supernova, explained also why she was here on this mission, and would not turn aside though they wait for centuries here.
And so they waited, though they were all quite impatient after all this time of enforced activity.
It was fated that the Merry Widow should pass this way. And Steel Song was the hand of fate.
"Conn, Sens-o".
"Senso, go ahead."
"I think we've got something. New contact entering the sector. Its electronics emissions are an 80% match with our target."
"Let them get a little closer, and prepare to leave surveillance mode. Let's wait until we're absolutely sure. "
"Conn, Sens-o, second contact. This one ..."
It must have been terrifying indeed for an assassin to be at a loss for words.
"The second contact's emissions match nothing in the database; it is unidentified."
"An alien", said the Captain, an icy ball materializing in his stomach. No one, even trained assassins, could face such a foe with complete dispassion.
"The two ships have encountered each other... Contact! The alien is pulling our target in!"
They watched in their display as the Merry Widow , for such it must have been, suddenly blazed with a drive plume brighter than the sun itself, obvious indication of the desperation of the Captain -- a plume that vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared, the ship adrift, it's last burn hardly serving to even slow it down as the other craft remorselessly bore down upon it.
"Senso, what can you tell me? Is that our target?" If it wasn't, they would have to wait even so. Honor was honor, after all, and they could not sacrifice their mission even for an alien.
"Yes, that last burn was bright enough to leave no doubt. That's the Merry Widow's reactor, or its identical twin. Also, I detected emissions from a tightbeam transmission from the alien craft -- perhaps our captain is an artifact smuggler as well as a rapist, and he is even now beginning to regret having them on his ship."
As they watched, bright spots appeared on the front of the alien ship -- the impacts of barrage guns, powerful rail guns fired by the Merry Widow in its last, doomed struggle -- which the alien heeded no more than bits of gravel thrown from a ground car's wheels.
The navigator turned ... "Do we ... just let them finish him?"
"No, set your course for the battle. We will assist the Merry Widow. If we allow the alien to do its work unhindered, it may detect our trail and come after us once it is done. Besides ... aren't you curious to know just why they want the good captain so badly?"
That was the reason Captain Song La of the Clan gave for his actions. But there were other reasons he could not speak, actions which the ruthless clan leaders would not accept. But unspoken in his heart was the absolute determination not to abandon the Merry Widow, or any living human, to an alien monster.
The men on that ship were his enemies, hated criminals. But they were still men.
The Autumn Wind, abandoning all pretense of stealth, powered up its engines and accelerated towards the battle.
Aboard the Merry Widow, Captain Campbell was cursing his luck, in all the languages he had learned in a century of spacefaring. This was supposed to be an easy run, carrying a box from De Valtos Prime to a deep space location near Keptyn Gammat. All had been going smoothly -- perhaps too smoothly -- when in one minute an alien trace appeared on his board. In the next minute that damnable box had begun shrieking and emitting all kinds of sounds, and in the next his ship was dead in space , all power out.
Captain Campbell surmised that this was an artifact , and he had heard too many stories of artifacts to allow one on his ship during an alien encounter. So while he smashed it into as many bits as he could with a power tool, his crew did the only thing left to them, which was to break out the plasma rifles and autocannons from the armory and prepare to sell their lives dearly.
He thought of the escape shuttle belowdecks, but knew from the eyes of his crew that they would gun him down in a second if he tried to flee. They would face whatever came next together, for bad or even worse. So he pulled out the blade he had saved for this occasion, and fingered a small phial containing a dose of spice.
It wasn't very long in coming. Although the ship's power was still out, he could hear the gurgled reports and screams as the alien vessel made contact and the boarding occurred, tracing by the sounds of pain and anguish over the intercom their progress through his ship. Then the hatch, sealed against the void, buckled. And buckled again. Then gave way, and through it a monstrosity born of nightmares came.
It was cut down almost immediately by the sun-bright bolt of a plasma flame. Then the next, and the next, piling up in the hatchway in a terrible smelly mess of liquid burning in the fire.
But it wasn't enough. With a shriek of metal a creature came tearing up through the floor.
At this , the captain swallowed the small -- so small - vial of precious spice and let it work upon him.
As the embattled bridge crew divided their attention between the hordes at the hatchway and the new threat from below. Then the ceiling gave way as well.
Captain Campbell was swept away from his crew but he had forgotten. The spice had different effects on different people, and in him it induced at the last a battle frenzy, striking madly in all directions, immune to pain, oblivious to friend or foe. In such a frenzy he had fought single handed against pirate ships before, and though all his crew had died had nonetheless wreaked enough carnage to slay the pirate leader and become the pirate ship's new captain. And so he fought again, oblivious in fugue to any thoughts of defeat, of despair, of the hopelessness of his cause.
Then, after a time, his sword ceased to rise and fall. All around him was bloody ruin, of aliens and his own crewmen. Yet he stood alone on the bridge, gradually coming out of his trance.
Can it be ... could he have actually *won* his battle?
He would know soon enough. As he waited he heard the tramping of boots on the deck -- human boots! He let his sword fall from his hands as two humans in power armor came up through the whole in the deck plate, as the hatchway was still impassable. Behind them came still more.
The first regarded him calmly, and removed his faceplate. "My thanks. If it were not for your actions we could not have lived through this day. The aliens were so busy with you they were caught unawares by our own boarding operation, which killed their brain."
Campbell nodded. "Aye. So here we are, alive. Are you ... are you here to rescue me?" He let a note of hope creep into his voice.
"No", said the other. He pressed a button, and the power armor quickly fell away revealing a blue-green uniform with a blood-red pennant prominently displayed on the chest. Everyone in space knew that blood-red mark and what it meant, and Campbell gave himself up for lost. " I am Captain Song La of the Autumn Wind. Steel Song makes its own vengeance; we do not let monsters do our killing for us."
He pointed his weapon. "Pick up your sword."
Campbell hesitated.
"I said, pick up your sword! I do not slaughter unarmed men."
At this the figure to his right gasped and spoke "Captain, No! For what he has done..."
"Look around you, sorceress, and remember your place! We would not be alive today except for his bravery, and while I cannot grant his life, I CAN grant him a warrior's death."
Campbell's eyes traced over the scene as Jen Wu brought up her own faceplate to look him full in the face. As well ask a roaring tiger for mercy than a woman whose kin is wronged. Och, he thought, why so upset? I met a lady in the den and invited her to my room for drinks, and a good time was had by all -- and she had enjoyed it far more than I did , for I studied pleasure as well as astro-navigation. How was I to know she was married?
His eyes lit upon the shattered remains of the artifact, and a plan came to his mind.
"Aren't ye... aren't ye the least bit curious as to why the alien was after me?"
At this , Song's eye flickered, just for a brief second. "You think that will save you?"
"How can you know, until I have told you?"
Captain Song glanced at his concubine, who shook her head slowly. Evidently even the eyes of the sorceresses did not see all.
The Captain thought for a second, then sheathed his sword with an exasperated sigh. "Very well, but you realize you have only bought yourself a short time. Honor demands your death. "
"Come to the cargo hold, and then ye will see and decide for yourself."
And so, closely guarded by the Song elite guards, many men in power armor made their way down to the cargo deck, closely guarding their prisoner. Captain Campbell had been searched most thoroughly and had been stripped of everything of any possible value or utility. Nonetheless, he was pleased as the lights came back on, Song engineers evidently working to restore the ship for its new career as a prize. "Down here"? Asked Captain Song La. "What do you have to show me?"
"Why , ye'll find it's a verra large artifact that ... LOOK OUT ITS ALIVE!" Seventeen sets of eyes saw a great, mechanical shape begin to move slowly toward them, gun ports opened and auto shells began to blast wildly from it in every direction.
Astonished cries of fear, for there was nothing the Song clan feared more than the ancient metal-masters. Weapons were aimed and the Captain dove for the ground as the bright sunbeams of fifteen plasma rifles blazed together. For a minute everyone was blinded, for things had happened so quickly that their face shields had not polarized.
When the spots cleared, and vision returned, Captain Campbell was nowhere to be seen. "Spread out and find him!" said the Captain, who advanced on the mechanical monstrosity. Yet, when he came close, he saw it was no robotic monster but only a standard exoskeletal walker of the sort used for exploring planets , rigged with drone controls. Such a thing was of course a violation of at least fifteen Shalun edicts but it was still not the Narvidian monstrosity they had feared. As the Captain continued to gaze at the thing in wonder, one of his crewmen ran up. "Sir ... I think we've found what became of Campbell." He pointed, and Captain Song La turned .. and looked directly at an indicator panel for an escape shuttle.
An escape shuttle which was no longer docked, and showed obvious signs of having departed very recently.
Quickly he snapped to the shipwide communication band. "Weps, Campbell is escaping on a shuttle. Can you acquire and stop him?"
"Conn, Weps. Impossible, sir. Those shuttles are rigged with every kind of stealth device known to man. He's long gone, sir."
Captain Song La took the news stoically, then took his short sword from its sheathe. "Then I have failed. Peng Ju-Wang, I will make apology to the clan aboard the ship, and I need a second."
He was stopped by a touch on his arm... the touch of Ju, his beloved concubine and sorceress of the clan.
"You have not failed."
He stared in wonder.
"Did you really thing we waited all this time in the dark for one rutting he-goat?" Ju slid her faceplate up and he was surprised to see, not a black scowl of anger, but a grim smile of satisfaction. "I did indeed foresee this ... and what I foresaw is that the ship we have taken from the alien monsters has that in it which is of far greater value than his miserable skin. And the artifact which he thought to destroy, and now lies sparkling in pieces on the bridge, is fully functional and worth ten such ships!"
"But this is insane!" Spluttered Captain Song. "What about the honor of the clan?"
At this the concubine's eyes opened a little further and there was a hint of a smile. "Honor, Captain? Steel Song is honor. But before it is honor, Steel Song is fate."
"Steel song is nothing apart from its destiny. Our destiny was to possess this ship and its prize. And it was Captain Campbell's fate to survive this encounter, using a dark age implant in his brain to activate that walker as a distraction. This I knew, but did nothing to stop, for as I said, it was fate. All of this, beloved Captain, was fate. And Steel Song is the hand of fate."
The Captain turned away,sheathing his weapon, somewhat pleased that his failure was really a success, but this was buried under the weight of horror he felt as he regarded the woman who shared his bed, now gazing beatifically at some point far in the distance. The sorceresses gave him the shivers, in their own way they sometimes seemed as alien to his mind as any tentacled monstrosity from beyond the stars. "And what else are you not telling me?"
The sorceress looked at him and laughed. "That, Captain, you shall learn when fate decrees it."
THE END.
Respectfully,
Brian P.
Yet even in the light of the stars, there are shadows.
In the dark space between the stars , invisible to all save the most keen-eyed observer, a black shape sat, drifting, noticeable only by the complete lack of emission or reflection which would characterize a natural body.
Aboard this vessel -- for such it was -- sat Captain Song La, of the Steel Song Vessel Autumn Wind. They had waited thus, for many days, monitoring the passing traffic here in the dark place between the stars, somewhere on the trade routes between Javat Prime and Galantia.
"Sensors".
"Sensors, aye."
"Status report." This was as close as the Captain would come to betraying impatience before his trained crew of assassins. Aboard another ship, another time, there would be buzz and grumbling from the crew at the long enforced wait. But not from a picked crew, the least of whom came from a family which had served the Song with valor for generations.
Steel Song was noted for its patience.
The report came back quickly. "Nothing of interest. Standard merchant traffic. Not the one we're looking for."
"Very well."
The Captain allowed his glance to flick down to his datapad, to remind him why he was here: To kill a man, a man by the name of Seamus Campbell, captain of the Merry Widow , of House Thulun. Who had, quite recently during a short stay on Corelloth, become drunk and had his way with a married woman. That was bad enough, but worse for him was the fact that her name was Song Wi.
People spoke of "Steel Song Clan", he mused , but it was actually a federation of hundreds of different clans, all bound in fealty to each other, and each of them to the High Clan, the Clan of Song, named for the Founder Song Fa.
He remembered the story , told and retold in the clan bed-chambers to children -- how, during the dark ages of rule by the machines, Song Fa and some others had participated in the strictly forbidden practice of precognition, deliberately taking spice so as to induce spice fugue and the visions it induced in the susceptible. Song Fa had been one susceptible person, and his fugue had been vivid, far beyond the sights usually given to seers.
He had seen the galaxy dissolve in a cataclysm of steel and flame.
He had seen small bands of men fleeing the disaster in small metal ships.
He had seen them sprouting from this seed to rule the cosmos -- men no longer governed by machines. Instead, men would govern themselves -- themselves, aye, and everything else.
And the seed of Song Fa would govern them all.
He had foreseen it, and so with some others he had, aided by forbidden precognition, amassed weapons and funds for the day, swearing allegiance to the prophet Shalun when he appeared. For Shalun was also a visionary, and the vision he had seen was not unlike that seen by the Song ... save in a few particulars.
And thus the clan had fled and established itself among the stars. Thus the clan prospered despite the hatred of all other peoples. Even the Templars would not dare to move against the Song, for they had their own visionaries. They also had seen the future.
Steel Song would survive always, for so it was fated.
And thus only a madman, or one tired of living, would dare touch a woman of the high clan, one bearing the sacred name of Song, of the everlasting dynasty which was the hand and instrument of fate.
Perhaps he thought to hide among the stars. The fool. Song Li looked to regard Jen Wu, his concubine and the ship sorceress. For steel song was not guided merely by computers and reasoning. Rather, steps were taken to identify the susceptible among them and to teach them both the art of spice fugue, and how to make use of what they saw there. Jen Wu had done so, and during her fugue had foreseen the passage of the Merry Widow through this place -- but "time" was not something that made sense within the spice fugue. One could see past, present, and future all at once, all mixed together, all that was, is , and would be. But specific details, such as "The target you want will be at 4,23 at 10 PM sharp on Wednesday" were a little harder to come by.
But Jen Wu was among the greatest prophetesses of the clan, and so she was certain that when she had seen the Merry Widow pass through this desolate space, it was not past nor distant future but sometime soon -- whether days or weeks, though, she could not say.
She was certain, however, because she was closely related to Song Wi by blood. The closeness of her bond aided her precognition, and the anger, radiating from her as from a supernova, explained also why she was here on this mission, and would not turn aside though they wait for centuries here.
And so they waited, though they were all quite impatient after all this time of enforced activity.
It was fated that the Merry Widow should pass this way. And Steel Song was the hand of fate.
"Conn, Sens-o".
"Senso, go ahead."
"I think we've got something. New contact entering the sector. Its electronics emissions are an 80% match with our target."
"Let them get a little closer, and prepare to leave surveillance mode. Let's wait until we're absolutely sure. "
"Conn, Sens-o, second contact. This one ..."
It must have been terrifying indeed for an assassin to be at a loss for words.
"The second contact's emissions match nothing in the database; it is unidentified."
"An alien", said the Captain, an icy ball materializing in his stomach. No one, even trained assassins, could face such a foe with complete dispassion.
"The two ships have encountered each other... Contact! The alien is pulling our target in!"
They watched in their display as the Merry Widow , for such it must have been, suddenly blazed with a drive plume brighter than the sun itself, obvious indication of the desperation of the Captain -- a plume that vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared, the ship adrift, it's last burn hardly serving to even slow it down as the other craft remorselessly bore down upon it.
"Senso, what can you tell me? Is that our target?" If it wasn't, they would have to wait even so. Honor was honor, after all, and they could not sacrifice their mission even for an alien.
"Yes, that last burn was bright enough to leave no doubt. That's the Merry Widow's reactor, or its identical twin. Also, I detected emissions from a tightbeam transmission from the alien craft -- perhaps our captain is an artifact smuggler as well as a rapist, and he is even now beginning to regret having them on his ship."
As they watched, bright spots appeared on the front of the alien ship -- the impacts of barrage guns, powerful rail guns fired by the Merry Widow in its last, doomed struggle -- which the alien heeded no more than bits of gravel thrown from a ground car's wheels.
The navigator turned ... "Do we ... just let them finish him?"
"No, set your course for the battle. We will assist the Merry Widow. If we allow the alien to do its work unhindered, it may detect our trail and come after us once it is done. Besides ... aren't you curious to know just why they want the good captain so badly?"
That was the reason Captain Song La of the Clan gave for his actions. But there were other reasons he could not speak, actions which the ruthless clan leaders would not accept. But unspoken in his heart was the absolute determination not to abandon the Merry Widow, or any living human, to an alien monster.
The men on that ship were his enemies, hated criminals. But they were still men.
The Autumn Wind, abandoning all pretense of stealth, powered up its engines and accelerated towards the battle.
Aboard the Merry Widow, Captain Campbell was cursing his luck, in all the languages he had learned in a century of spacefaring. This was supposed to be an easy run, carrying a box from De Valtos Prime to a deep space location near Keptyn Gammat. All had been going smoothly -- perhaps too smoothly -- when in one minute an alien trace appeared on his board. In the next minute that damnable box had begun shrieking and emitting all kinds of sounds, and in the next his ship was dead in space , all power out.
Captain Campbell surmised that this was an artifact , and he had heard too many stories of artifacts to allow one on his ship during an alien encounter. So while he smashed it into as many bits as he could with a power tool, his crew did the only thing left to them, which was to break out the plasma rifles and autocannons from the armory and prepare to sell their lives dearly.
He thought of the escape shuttle belowdecks, but knew from the eyes of his crew that they would gun him down in a second if he tried to flee. They would face whatever came next together, for bad or even worse. So he pulled out the blade he had saved for this occasion, and fingered a small phial containing a dose of spice.
It wasn't very long in coming. Although the ship's power was still out, he could hear the gurgled reports and screams as the alien vessel made contact and the boarding occurred, tracing by the sounds of pain and anguish over the intercom their progress through his ship. Then the hatch, sealed against the void, buckled. And buckled again. Then gave way, and through it a monstrosity born of nightmares came.
It was cut down almost immediately by the sun-bright bolt of a plasma flame. Then the next, and the next, piling up in the hatchway in a terrible smelly mess of liquid burning in the fire.
But it wasn't enough. With a shriek of metal a creature came tearing up through the floor.
At this , the captain swallowed the small -- so small - vial of precious spice and let it work upon him.
As the embattled bridge crew divided their attention between the hordes at the hatchway and the new threat from below. Then the ceiling gave way as well.
Captain Campbell was swept away from his crew but he had forgotten. The spice had different effects on different people, and in him it induced at the last a battle frenzy, striking madly in all directions, immune to pain, oblivious to friend or foe. In such a frenzy he had fought single handed against pirate ships before, and though all his crew had died had nonetheless wreaked enough carnage to slay the pirate leader and become the pirate ship's new captain. And so he fought again, oblivious in fugue to any thoughts of defeat, of despair, of the hopelessness of his cause.
Then, after a time, his sword ceased to rise and fall. All around him was bloody ruin, of aliens and his own crewmen. Yet he stood alone on the bridge, gradually coming out of his trance.
Can it be ... could he have actually *won* his battle?
He would know soon enough. As he waited he heard the tramping of boots on the deck -- human boots! He let his sword fall from his hands as two humans in power armor came up through the whole in the deck plate, as the hatchway was still impassable. Behind them came still more.
The first regarded him calmly, and removed his faceplate. "My thanks. If it were not for your actions we could not have lived through this day. The aliens were so busy with you they were caught unawares by our own boarding operation, which killed their brain."
Campbell nodded. "Aye. So here we are, alive. Are you ... are you here to rescue me?" He let a note of hope creep into his voice.
"No", said the other. He pressed a button, and the power armor quickly fell away revealing a blue-green uniform with a blood-red pennant prominently displayed on the chest. Everyone in space knew that blood-red mark and what it meant, and Campbell gave himself up for lost. " I am Captain Song La of the Autumn Wind. Steel Song makes its own vengeance; we do not let monsters do our killing for us."
He pointed his weapon. "Pick up your sword."
Campbell hesitated.
"I said, pick up your sword! I do not slaughter unarmed men."
At this the figure to his right gasped and spoke "Captain, No! For what he has done..."
"Look around you, sorceress, and remember your place! We would not be alive today except for his bravery, and while I cannot grant his life, I CAN grant him a warrior's death."
Campbell's eyes traced over the scene as Jen Wu brought up her own faceplate to look him full in the face. As well ask a roaring tiger for mercy than a woman whose kin is wronged. Och, he thought, why so upset? I met a lady in the den and invited her to my room for drinks, and a good time was had by all -- and she had enjoyed it far more than I did , for I studied pleasure as well as astro-navigation. How was I to know she was married?
His eyes lit upon the shattered remains of the artifact, and a plan came to his mind.
"Aren't ye... aren't ye the least bit curious as to why the alien was after me?"
At this , Song's eye flickered, just for a brief second. "You think that will save you?"
"How can you know, until I have told you?"
Captain Song glanced at his concubine, who shook her head slowly. Evidently even the eyes of the sorceresses did not see all.
The Captain thought for a second, then sheathed his sword with an exasperated sigh. "Very well, but you realize you have only bought yourself a short time. Honor demands your death. "
"Come to the cargo hold, and then ye will see and decide for yourself."
And so, closely guarded by the Song elite guards, many men in power armor made their way down to the cargo deck, closely guarding their prisoner. Captain Campbell had been searched most thoroughly and had been stripped of everything of any possible value or utility. Nonetheless, he was pleased as the lights came back on, Song engineers evidently working to restore the ship for its new career as a prize. "Down here"? Asked Captain Song La. "What do you have to show me?"
"Why , ye'll find it's a verra large artifact that ... LOOK OUT ITS ALIVE!" Seventeen sets of eyes saw a great, mechanical shape begin to move slowly toward them, gun ports opened and auto shells began to blast wildly from it in every direction.
Astonished cries of fear, for there was nothing the Song clan feared more than the ancient metal-masters. Weapons were aimed and the Captain dove for the ground as the bright sunbeams of fifteen plasma rifles blazed together. For a minute everyone was blinded, for things had happened so quickly that their face shields had not polarized.
When the spots cleared, and vision returned, Captain Campbell was nowhere to be seen. "Spread out and find him!" said the Captain, who advanced on the mechanical monstrosity. Yet, when he came close, he saw it was no robotic monster but only a standard exoskeletal walker of the sort used for exploring planets , rigged with drone controls. Such a thing was of course a violation of at least fifteen Shalun edicts but it was still not the Narvidian monstrosity they had feared. As the Captain continued to gaze at the thing in wonder, one of his crewmen ran up. "Sir ... I think we've found what became of Campbell." He pointed, and Captain Song La turned .. and looked directly at an indicator panel for an escape shuttle.
An escape shuttle which was no longer docked, and showed obvious signs of having departed very recently.
Quickly he snapped to the shipwide communication band. "Weps, Campbell is escaping on a shuttle. Can you acquire and stop him?"
"Conn, Weps. Impossible, sir. Those shuttles are rigged with every kind of stealth device known to man. He's long gone, sir."
Captain Song La took the news stoically, then took his short sword from its sheathe. "Then I have failed. Peng Ju-Wang, I will make apology to the clan aboard the ship, and I need a second."
He was stopped by a touch on his arm... the touch of Ju, his beloved concubine and sorceress of the clan.
"You have not failed."
He stared in wonder.
"Did you really thing we waited all this time in the dark for one rutting he-goat?" Ju slid her faceplate up and he was surprised to see, not a black scowl of anger, but a grim smile of satisfaction. "I did indeed foresee this ... and what I foresaw is that the ship we have taken from the alien monsters has that in it which is of far greater value than his miserable skin. And the artifact which he thought to destroy, and now lies sparkling in pieces on the bridge, is fully functional and worth ten such ships!"
"But this is insane!" Spluttered Captain Song. "What about the honor of the clan?"
At this the concubine's eyes opened a little further and there was a hint of a smile. "Honor, Captain? Steel Song is honor. But before it is honor, Steel Song is fate."
"Steel song is nothing apart from its destiny. Our destiny was to possess this ship and its prize. And it was Captain Campbell's fate to survive this encounter, using a dark age implant in his brain to activate that walker as a distraction. This I knew, but did nothing to stop, for as I said, it was fate. All of this, beloved Captain, was fate. And Steel Song is the hand of fate."
The Captain turned away,sheathing his weapon, somewhat pleased that his failure was really a success, but this was buried under the weight of horror he felt as he regarded the woman who shared his bed, now gazing beatifically at some point far in the distance. The sorceresses gave him the shivers, in their own way they sometimes seemed as alien to his mind as any tentacled monstrosity from beyond the stars. "And what else are you not telling me?"
The sorceress looked at him and laughed. "That, Captain, you shall learn when fate decrees it."
THE END.
Respectfully,
Brian P.