Ardov and his cronies being here didn’t surprise me. It disturbed me, but it didn’t surprise me. No, what surprised me was the fact that Colonel Rage wasn’t being made to sit on his hands and behave himself. He was standing and talking to Ardov.
Zeke, it is getting increasingly difficult to keep this technology functional. I suggest you hide before we suffer a complete system shutdown.
I looked around. There was an outcropping of rocks about ten feet away that kept me out of the line of sight of Ardov and his henchmen. I slipped behind that, and I felt Smelly turn off the stealth without my telling him to. I almost felt its sigh of relief.
“How long until we can use that again?” I whispered, my voice barely audible even to me.
Hard to say. At least ten minutes.
“I’m telling you,” the colonel was saying, “he’s got the tech. He can make himself invisible.”
“I don’t believe it,” Ardov said. “Why hasn’t he used it before?”
“He didn’t know he had it. There’s some alien machine in his brain, and it’s been manipulating him, holding things back, not letting him know about all the things he could do.”
When you put it that way, it almost makes me sound like I’m not very nice.
“You think?” I whispered. “I can’t believe this, Smelly. The mole wasn’t Villainic. It was Colonel Rage. Why is he betraying us?”
He’s not, as far as he’s concerned. Zeke, you have to understand the mind of a military meat bag. He’s always been looking for an advantage. I think he would have double-crossed Junup if he could have escaped with you kids and some useful tech, but he was always willing to trade information for the same goal. All he cares about is protecting your world, and maybe you and your pointless friends as well, but he doesn’t care who runs the Confederation. Junup or Ghli Wixxix? The colonel won’t care as long as Earth gets a good deal.
Maybe that was so—I could see it from his perspective—but I didn’t like the idea of him making deals with Junup. Not only didn’t I trust any deal Junup made, but he had done things that made him unforgivable. I don’t care how good a deal he offered, it couldn’t be trusted, and even if it could be trusted, it was still tainted.
“Whatever he’s got, he doesn’t know how to use it,” Ardov was saying. “I’m not worried about him.”
“He was able to run rings around the highly trained personnel of a United States military base.”
“Your primitive soldiers are one thing. I’m another.”
The colonel grunted. “I think you’re underestimating him.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Ardov said. “As long as we have his girlfriend and these other morons as my hostages, he can’t touch me. If he tries anything, we pick off one of them. We’ll start with Villainic, since no one likes him, but it will let Zeke know I mean business.”
“That wasn’t the deal,” the colonel said. “I was promised no one gets hurt.”
“If you had seen The Empire Strikes Back,” Charles volunteered, “you would have known that making deals with the bad guys never ends well.”
“You remember that Voyager episode, ‘Scorpion’?” Alice asked. “Same deal.”
“A most satisfying two-parter,” Charles agreed, “though I find that show to be flawed.”
“The later seasons were pretty good,” Alice said.
“Shut up!” Ardov shouted. He turned to the colonel. “I don’t care about you or them. I don’t care about anything except retrieving that technology for Director Junup.”
The colonel folded his arms. “I thought you were a good soldier, son. Junup told you not to hurt any of those kids.”
Ardov shrugged. “He did. He absolutely told me to avoid hurting the kids if I could. He likes to keep his options open. But if I come back with the tech and a bunch of dead primitives, I have a feeling he’ll forgive me.”
Colonel Rage opened his mouth to say something, but he closed it again. There was nothing he could say and nothing he could do. His best bet, he had to know, was to play it cool and hope things turned out okay for us. If not, then he was probably hoping they turned out okay for the Earth’s relations with Junup.
Ardov was now looking down at the fortress. “The guardians are neutralized, and Zeke knows we’re here. He’s either invisible and hiding nearby, or he’s inside the fortress. My guess is that he’s already in there, looking for the tech or for some kind of weapon. Who knows what kind of Former artifacts are in there.”
The colonel’s eyes narrowed, like he was thinking something. He was surely aware that I wouldn’t leave my friends behind, but he didn’t want to tell a selfish jerk like Ardov what wouldn’t occur to him naturally.
“Smelly, what are my options here?” I whispered.
I can give you a short burst of power in a few minutes. I think you should use it to get into the fortress and see what’s there.
“So, basically, I should do exactly what Ardov thinks I’m already doing?”
He may suspect that you are doing it, but what options will he have? The longer you’re away from him, the more time I’ll have to recover and use the tech. Besides, he will have no reason to hurt the hostages if you are not around to see him do it.
Maybe Smelly was right, but I didn’t like the idea of leaving everyone alone with Ardov. As it turned out, Ardov didn’t like leaving things to chance either.
“If he has this technology, I don’t want him running around with it. I need to have him under control before we move into the fortress. Get Villainic up.”
So Smelly clearly got that one wrong.
A couple of his henchmen grabbed Villainic and pulled him to his feet. Ardov pointed a PPB pistol to his head.
“Zeke!” Ardov shouted. “If you don’t show yourself in sixty seconds, I’m going to kill Villainic. I know you don’t care about him, but that’s just to prove I’m serious before we move on to your friends.”
Upside! At least you get rid of your rival, Smelly said.
“I’m not going to let him kill Villainic,” I whispered. “Just because I find the guy kind of irritating, and he plans on marrying the girl I like, doesn’t mean I want him dead.”
Wow, you are tenderhearted, aren’t you? What do you plan to do, then? I can’t bring the tech online for another eight minutes.
I sighed. “I guess I’ll have to buy you some time.”
Which is why I stood up from behind the rock outcropping, my hands in the air. “I know I’m going to regret saying this,” I told Ardov, “but please don’t kill Villainic.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
* * *
Ardov’s goons grabbed me, but they didn’t put me with the others. Villainic was shoved back to his seat.
“Thank you, Zeke,” he said. “I knew you wouldn’t abandon me.”
I didn’t want to mention that I would have done the same for a total stranger, and probably with less hesitation. Maybe I wasn’t being fair. The biggest strike against Villainic was that I had been convinced he was a traitor, but now I knew it wasn’t true. Could I really blame him for wanting to look after Tamret and for living by the codes of his own culture? I thought about it for a second, and I decided that I could blame him. Yeah, I had no problem with that. Plus, he’d just gotten me captured. I was in full blaming mode.
Colonel Rage was now standing in front of me, shaking his head. “I know you must be confused, son,” he said.
“Don’t call me that,” I snapped. “You sold us out.”
“I am trying to get everyone home safe,” he said, “and to protect our planet. If the Confederation doesn’t stand with us, then those Phands you hate so much will be setting up shop on our world. You want that?”
“That’s not the choice,” I said. “It was never the choice.”
“It’s the one I made,” he said. “It was the best option.”
“When?” I demanded. “When did you go over to the other side?”
The colonel sighed. He then held up his bracelet.
“I’ve been trading messages with Junup since we snuck off from the reptile house. I was worried that we might die out in the desert, or that the search for the Hidden Fortress would be a dead end. Since Confederation citizens couldn’t enter the Forbidden Zone, I figured talking to him didn’t put us at risk, and it didn’t hurt to keep options open.”
“I guess you were wrong,” I said, not bothering to hide my disgust. A guy like Junup would always find a way to get what he wanted. The colonel should have known.
“Looks like I did get it wrong,” he admitted. “But then, I didn’t have all the facts, did I?” He tapped his head, but I knew he was referring to mine.
“Did you also tell Junup about our plan to escape in a different ship? Is that how he found out about it?”
“I did not,” he said, indignant. “I would never have compromised the mission. I only turned to Junup when I thought our survival was in jeopardy.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Actually, he’s telling the truth, Smelly said. He’s not evil, just desperate.
“Then how did he find out about our plan?” I asked. “Dr. Roop said we’d been found out.”
Yeah, I’m not sure you need to sweat that right now.
I turned away from the colonel in disgust. I hated Ardov, but at least I knew what he was. He didn’t pretend to be anything but a bad guy. He didn’t take the convenient way out and then claim he was doing the right thing.
“What do you want from me?” I asked him. “How does this end without anyone getting hurt?”
“I want the tech,” Ardov said.
“Then let’s go look for it,” I told him. “This never had to be a contest, Ardov. I’m on this station because Ghli Wixxix wanted me to find that technology for the Confederation. Junup didn’t want me to. Now he does, which kind of puts us on the same side. So let’s go get the tech and hand it over. Everyone wins.”
“Except now I’m thinking that we don’t even need to look for it,” Ardov said. “There could be all sorts of Former traps and security measures in there. Going inside could be taking a foolish risk. Meanwhile, the colonel tells me you have it inside your head. I could just deliver that to the director instead.”
“Yeah, I kind of want to hang on to my head for a while.”
Ardov shrugged. “Not my problem. We can get the technology and get rid of you at the same time. It’s not such a bad deal.” He turned to the others. “Let’s move out of here.”
“What about them?” one of the Vaaklir asked, gesturing toward the others, still sitting on their hands.
“Take their rations but leave them. If they live, they live. If not, then no loss.”
“Hold on,” the colonel said.
Ardov glared at him. “Silence, primitive! I give the orders here, not you. You can come with us if you like. You’ve earned that much with your loyalty to Junup. But if you prefer, you can stay here with your thirsty friends.”
The colonel glared at Ardov. “I’ll go with you, but I don’t like this.”
“Boo-hoo,” Ardov said.
I really don’t like that guy, Smelly said. He’s way worse than Tamret’s sweetheart.
Ardov walked over to me. He pushed me in the chest. It felt a lot like someone playfully slapping me in the torso with a refrigerator. I staggered backward and barely kept on my feet. “The colonel swears you have access to this tech. I haven’t seen any sign of it, but I’d love to test what it can do. Your new tech versus my old tech? Sounds like fun, right?” He shoved me again, this time not so gently. I fell backward. My chest felt bruised, and I thought I might have cracked a rib.
There’s some bone damage there, Smelly said. Fortunately, I’ve been holding out on some healing tricks I can use on you, so give me a minute to get you fixed up.
“Well?” Ardov demanded.
“I can only use it in short bursts,” I said, “because I don’t have the regular skill tree.”
“Interesting,” Ardov said. “Think of what I’ll be able to do with both trees maxed out.”
“I’d rather think of you rotting in prison,” I said.
Ardov turned back to the colonel. “Do we need his whole body, or just his head?”
“I’m not signing off on you killing him,” the colonel said.
“Let me put it this way,” Ardov said. “If I bring back Zeke’s head and the tech doesn’t work, then I’ll make sure Junup hands your planet over to the Phands. So, do I cut off your head or his?”
The colonel looked away. “His,” he said softly. Then he turned to me. “I’m sorry, son, but I can help our planet a lot more alive than dead.”
This guy really has an inflated sense of his own importance, Smelly said. Oh, and get up. I’ve got about fifteen seconds of full power for you, so whatever you do, you’re going to have to do it in speed mode. You ready?
I pushed myself to my feet. My chest was already feeling a whole lot better. “Yeah,” I said aloud.
Go! Smelly said.
With a thought I was stealthed. The main thing I had to worry about was keeping my friends out of harm’s way, so I willed on the speed function and there I was, the Flash, zipping from one of Ardov’s henchmen to the next, knocking their PPB pistols from their hands. That ate up about a quarter of a second. I then took two of the PPB pistols, set them to stun, and fired off shots. In speed mode the slowness of the pistols was excruciating, and I had to keep running so Ardov’s buddies couldn’t get a fix on my location. It was impossible to get off more than three shots per pistol each second, so it took a good two seconds—which felt like hours in speed mode—to knock all the henchmen out.
I had at least ten seconds left by my estimate, so I turned off stealth and faced Ardov. “Once again,” I said, “you underestimate me.”
“You think you can stop me?” he asked. “I am greater than you can ever—”
That was as far as he got, because I started firing both pistols at him. I’d seen him taken down by a PPB stunner before, so I knew one blast would do it, but I figured four couldn’t hurt. Okay, six. After eight I started to feel bad. You can only fire a ray gun at an unconscious guy for so long, no matter how evil he is, before you start to think that it might be overkill. I stopped at ten shots. I stopped again at fourteen.
“I think you got him, son,” the colonel said.
I turned to face him, both guns up.
Tech is offline again, Smelly said. You’re on your own.
“I think I’m good,” I told Smelly. To the colonel I said, “You’re only still conscious because I want to know why you did it.”
“You know why,” he said. “I was trying to protect our world. That was all I ever wanted to do.”
“That’s exactly what Ms. Price said.”
“Nora Price sided with the wrong team,” he said. “But in any conflict there are going to be civilian casualties. You knew there were risks when you signed on, and I have always been ready to pay the ultimate price for my country.”
The colonel was probably about to say more, but instead he collapsed in a heap. Someone had stunned him.
I turned and saw Tamret holding a pistol. “I hope you don’t mind, but I couldn’t stand to listen to any more of that. And what is it with the adults from your planet, anyway? Are they all traitors or something?”
“I did not give you permission to fire a weapon at anyone!” Villainic shouted.
She turned on him, her pistol still raised, and for a moment I thought she was going to shoot him, too, but instead she lowered the gun. “I didn’t ask.”
“But the use of violence, except in self-defense, is forbidden under caste rules unless specifically sanctioned by me.”
Tamret shook her head. “I’m getting kind of tired of these rules.”
“How can that be? Our rules define us.”
Villainic turned to me, a look of pleading on his face, but I wasn’t about to offer him any advice. Tamret seemed to have decided that survival was more important than her vows to
Villainic, and I saw no reason to try to put that particular genie back in the bottle.
“Listen to me, Tamret,” Villainic said. “I demand, demand very strongly, that you put that weapon down.”
Tamret turned to me. “What’s the plan?”
To the fortress! Smelly shouted.
As it happened, I concurred. “I’d like to get a copy of the software that doesn’t need to be violently yanked from my brain. Let’s go see if we can find one.”
“Works for me,” Steve said.
“Ahhhhhhghggh!” Villainic said.
I knew he was frustrated, but even so, I thought it was an odd thing to say. I looked over, and he was running at me, his mouth open, his eyes bulging, and his arms raised in the air. I also thought this was an odd thing to do.
I turned around and there was Ardov, rising up behind me, prepared to bring his fists down on my head. Villainic leaped through the air and tackled him. They fell together in a heap, but in an instant Ardov was on top, raising a fist to bring it down on Villainic. I knew that Villainic couldn’t withstand more than one of those enhanced blows. If I let Ardov punch him, then one of my major problems would be gone forever, but I didn’t hesitate, not for a second. I feel sure it was not for more than a quarter second. I fired my pistol. Then I fired again, and again. Ardov looked up at me, like the PPB blasts were nothing more than a vague distraction. More blasts came from my sides, and I saw that Tamret and Steve were firing as well. Finally, Ardov toppled over.