We stand there awkwardly for a few moments, caught in the harsh blue glare.
“Tell me of Project 616,” says the Accuser.
We shuffle a little.
“Speak!”
“Was…was that a direct question again?” Rocket asks.
Glowering, Sharnor activates a touch control on the arm of her throne. The blue light around us shivers and intensifies. We all feel a jolt of neural discomfort—even me. As organics, Rocket and Groot suffer it more greatly.
“Ow!” gasps Rocket.
The intensity dims, and the discomfort recedes.
“Every time you evade, withhold, dissemble, attempt to play verbal games, or simply refuse to answer,” says Sharnor, “I will deliver a burst from the Psyche-Agonizertron.”
She demonstrates its effect again. The blue light intensifies. The discomfort this time is greater.
“Yeeoouch!” cries Rocket.
“Every time,” continues Sharnor as the pain ebbs, “I will increase the Psyche-Agonizertron’s setting. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” says Rocket immediately.
“Good. Tell me of Project 616.”
“I don’t know what that is,” says Rocket plaintively.
Pain again, worse than before.
“I really don’t!” squeaks Rocket.
“What about you?” Sharnor asks Groot.
• CHAPTER SIXTEEN •
MEANWHILE
[TWENTY MINUTES EARLIER ON ALPHA CENTAURl…]
“I am Groot.”
The pain is even worse this time. It is almost unbearable.
“I am losing patience,” says Sharnor as we pick ourselves up, trembling. “I will ask again. Tell me of Project 616.”
This time, she is directing the question at me.
I would, at this juncture, swallow nervously if I possessed an Adam’s apple. I can see what is going to happen, and there is nothing I can do about it.
“I’m afraid I have no idea what that is,” I reply.
FEW people ever entered the outer office of Senior Vice Executive President (Special Projects) Odus Hanxchamp without a prior appointment, and even if they had a prior appointment, entry was generally through the door.
Not on this occasion.
Behind her desk, Mrs. Mantlestreek, Hanxchamp’s glacial P.A., looked up through her horn-rimmed spectacles and watched with some distaste as reality unfolded like reverse origami and the matte-black Spaceknight dropped through. He landed on one knee, hands flat on the floor, his head bowed. Smoke and vapor fumed off his armor, which was scratched and dented. He had singed the carpet beneath him.
Slowly, he raised his head until the venomous glow of his visor met her withering gaze. She did not blink.
“Hanxchamp,” he said.
Patiently, Mrs. Mantlestreek made a show of scrolling through the daybook.
“I don’t believe you have an appointment, Mr. Roamer,” she replied. “Senior Vice Executive President (Special Projects) Odus Hanxchamp is in a meeting just now.”
He rose to his feet.
“Hanxchamp,” he growled.
She arched one eyebrow.
“Sir, he is in a meeting.”
The door behind the Spaceknight flew open, and two Timely Inc. Corporate Security guards entered the outer office in the more traditional manner. Their Timely Inc. Subduematic phase pistols were drawn and aimed in highly professional two-handed stances. Xorb Xorbux, the Z’Noxian head of Corporate Security (Special Projects), rushed in a few seconds later.
“Flark!” he cried in dismay. He looked at the security guards. “Put those away, boys,” he instructed. “Everything’s optimate. I’m sure I can redactify this problemistic situation right away.”
The guards withdrew. Xorbux approached the smoldering Spaceknight.
“Roamer,” he said. “What the flark’s going on? You can’t just burst in here—”
“Hanxchamp,” the Spaceknight replied. “Now.”
Xorbux looked at Mrs. Mantlestreek anxiously. Though perfectly unruffled, she was already dialing.
She exchanged a few quiet words, put the handset down and looked at Roamer.
“You can go in,” she said.
The door to the inner office slid open, and Roamer entered with Xorbux on his heels.
Senior Vice Executive President (Special Projects) Odus Hanxchamp’s inner office was opulent and stylish. Situated on the eight thousand and first floor of the Timely Inc. Headquarters building, it enjoyed precipitous views across downtown Alpha Centauri—though today the window showed instead rainbow streams of annihilated planetary material circling the event horizon of the Procyon black hole in majestic candy-cane spirals.
“Hey, Spaceknight pal!” said Hanxchamp, not getting up. “A little unscheduled, but what the heck? We were just having a Senior Special Projects meeting here, so I guess you fit right in.”
There were others in the room: Senior Vice Development Executive Arnok Gruntgrill; the M’Ndavian head of Legal, Blint Wivvers; Sledly Rarnak, the Skrull in charge of Corporate Pamphlets; Pama Harnon, the Kree Chief Finance Officer of Special Projects; and Al-landra Meramati, the Shi’ar head of the Executive Executization Department. All of them regarded the Spaceknight cautiously.
Hanxchamp clicked his intercom.
“Clandestine fields on, please, Mrs. Mantlestreek,” said Hanxchamp.
“Yes, sir,” crackled the reply.
Hanxchamp turned sunnily to the Spaceknight.
“So, pal, are you about to make my diurnal period?” he asked. “Come on, have you solutionized this for me? Have you resolution-ated my needage? Tell me you have!”
“Have I…what?” asked Roamer.
“Have you found the Rigellian Recorder doodad thingy?” Hanxchamp asked impatiently. He clicked his tentacle-tip repeatedly. “Get with the program, pal!”
He rapped his bunched tentacle on the Spaceknight’s matteblack armor as though he were knocking on a door.
“You in there? Boy, you look like you’ve been through the wars!”
“There have been altercations,” replied Roamer. “Some unavoidable conflicts.”
“Oh, I don’t like the sound of that,” said Wivvers. “Conflicts? Traceable to us? I’m asking, are we talking about corporate liability here? Class actions?”
“The last thing we need is blowback,” said Rarnak.
“I literally hear that,” said Pama Harnon.
“There will be no ‘blowback,’ as you put it,” replied Roamer. “No ‘corporate liability.’ There were incidents, some of violent magnitude, but nothing that can be traced back to this corporation.”
“Phew!” said Hanxchamp. Everyone made a show of laughing with relief.
“Good news,” said Wivvers. “I had the loss adjustors on speed-dial for a moment there.”
“So…the Recorder?” asked Allandra Meramati quietly.
“Not yet recovered,” replied Roamer. “My efforts are ongoing. Other parties keep getting in my way. Other interested parties.”
“Interested parties?” asked Hanxchamp.
“I am not the only agency hunting for your Recorder,” said Roamer.
“No one should even know about this!” exclaimed Rarnak.
“Literally no one,” agreed Pama Harnon.
“Tell that to the Badoon War Brotherhood,” replied Roamer.
“The-tik!-Badoon?” Gruntgrill cringed. “That’s extremiatedly problemistic!”
“Also, possibly the Nova Corps,” said Roamer.
“The cops? The space cops are sniffing around, too?” said Hanxchamp, aghast.
“I suspect others, as well,” said Roamer. “I cannot confirm.”
“How the flark did this get out?” demanded Hanxchamp. “I mean, how the flark does anyone get wind of a Senior Special Project like this?”
Everyone looked at Xorb Xorbux.
“I’m afraid, sir,” said the head of Corporate Security (Special Projects), “that we may have a leak.”
br />
“A leak?”
“A corporate spy, on the inside. Maybe in this very room.”
There was an uncomfortable silence. The executives glanced nervously at each other. Meramati’s feathered crest stiffened. Gruntgrill swallowed hard and tried not to tik! Wivvers tutted and shook his head. Pama Harnon reached nervously into her purse, retrieved her expensive black lipgloss, and refreshed her makeup. Sledly Rarnak looked like he wanted to hit someone with a box of pamphlets.
Hanxchamp just simmered.
“Don’t worry, sir,” said Xorbux. “I’m on it. Total security review and clampdown. If there’s a spy, I’ll have him or her found, questioned, and then ejected into the nearest supernova. And I’ll take away their parking space and retirement portfolio.”
“Get to it,” said Hanxchamp. He looked at the Spaceknight.
“So where is it?” Hanxchamp asked. “The Recorder?”
“I am about to reacquire its location,” said Roamer. “The Recorder seems to have allied itself with a pair of low-life troublemakers. I suspect they may also have developed a keen interest in its fiscal worth.”
“Who is this pair?” asked Xorbux.
“A genetically engineered Raccoonoid from Halfworld called Rocket and a specimen of flora colossus from Planet X called Groot.”
“Never heard of either of them,” said Hanxchamp.
“They are small fry. I will deal with them,” said Roamer.
“Then why aren’t you out there doing that right now?” asked Hanxchamp.
The Spaceknight indicated the Interpolation Inserter unit clamped to his armor.
“I came back because of this,” he said. “It has taken me directly to them twice, but each time it seems…it seems to have chosen the most inconvenient moments. When they are in combat, for example. It is harder to effect an extraction under combat circumstances.”
“I told you that thing was -tik!- dangerous!” Gruntgrill exclaimed. “It should never have come out of R&D!”
“Can it be adjusted?” asked Roamer. “Can it be…fine-tuned?”
“Gruntgrill?” Hanxchamp asked. “You seem to know more about the device than anyone else.”
“I…doubt it can, sir,” said the Kaliklaki anxiously. “I mean, by its very nature it is supposed to take the user to the most dramatically appropriate moment in the Universal Narrative. Simple logic demands that at such dramatically appropriate moments, there is likely to be, well, drama. And jeopardy. And other things I really don’t like to think about.”
He looked at the intimidating Spaceknight.
“The Inserter isn’t just supposed to take you to your -tik!- target,” he said. “It’s supposed to take you to your target at the most dramatically satisfying moment. It’s what it does.”
“Satisfying to whom?” asked Roamer. “In both instances, my arrival actually seemed to alter the circumstances radically. In both instances, the Recorder and its companions were under direct threat. My arrival, though indirectly, actually assisted their eventual escape.”
“Shame you couldn’t have grabbed them before they did,” sulked Hanxchamp.
“If your appearance altered the causal flow of events,” mused Gruntgrill, “I guess…well, that’s the very definition of a dramatically significant moment. You became a sudden, surprise plot twist.”
“Then it cannot be adjusted?” asked Roamer.
“I don’t -tik!- believe it can.”
“Very well,” said Roamer. “I will become a sudden, surprise plot twist again. And this time, I will twist the plot my way. I do not believe in fate or destiny, and I do not believe in any ‘causal narrative.’ I simply believe in cold steel and energy weapons. I will—”
“Whoa, whoa!” cried Hanxchamp. “Waaaay too much macho in here suddenly! I’m starting to have serious second thoughts about the optimized viability of this solutionoid. Third thoughts, probably.”
“I am literally on board with your doubts, sir,” agreed Pama Harnon.
“Is this really the best way to go?” asked Rarnak.
“Exactly,” said Hanxchamp. “Is this the best way to go? In fact, do we have to go any way at all? Meramati? How’s the datacore looking today? Any upswing? Tell me there’s an upswing. Tell me we can go with what we’ve got and forget about this flarking Recorder business altogether.”
“I’m afraid the percentile remains at eighty-seven, sir,” replied Meramati with regret. “The datamap is stuck at eighty-seven percent complete. We simply do not have quite enough of the truth yet.”
“I warned you about that word, lady,” snapped Hanxchamp “I simply will not have anyone in this company talking like one of those Universal Church nutzookies.”
“Then, again, my apologies, sir,” Meramati replied, crestfallen.
“So…eighty-seven just isn’t enough?” asked Hanxchamp morosely.
Meramati shook her head.
“The lowest percentile threshold at which we can go live with any hope of success is ninety-six percent-plus,” she replied.
“Project 616 remains a pipe dream unless we hit that threshold,” said Gruntgrill.
“What you’re telling me is that we simply have no choice?” asked Hanxchamp. “That the Recorder remains our fundamental needage? That we need this Recorder, we absolutely need this Recorder, or our number-one priority project is finished before it’s even left the drawing board?”
Nobody wanted to confirm this. Finally, because someone had to, Gruntgrill uttered a very small “yes.”
“Some days…” rumbled Hanxchamp.
“I will continue with my mission,” said Roamer.
“You do that,” replied Hanxchamp.
“I will not fail to deliver a third time.”
“You can take that to the flarking bank!” growled Hanxchamp. “Do it. Get it done. Get it done now!”
“I will,” the Spaceknight said.
“And Xorbux? Find this flarking spy for me stat!” barked Hanxchamp.
“Yes, sir,” said Xorbux.
“Meeting over, people,” Hanxchamp declared grumpily and sat down in his chair with his tentacles folded.
“Mrs. Mantlestreek? I need a beverage,” he whined.
Everyone quickly left the room. Roamer was the only one who did not do so via the traditional method of the door. There was a lingering aftersmell of unexpected change in fortunes.
EXITING through the outer office, the executives were downcast and worried.
“I did not experience good meeting just then,” said Rarnak. “Not good at all.”
“I literally hear that,” Pama Harnon agreed.
“I don’t know why he keeps getting at me,” complained Meramati. “We’ve done an extraordinary job so far.”
“You know the -tik!- boss!” laughed Gruntgrill, but he could not hide his stress.
“I just hope we can keep the lid on this, liability-wise,” said Wivvers.
“Don’t worry,” said Xorbux. “I’ll dig out the mole. I’m afraid that means I’ll have to interview each of you, and your department heads. I may have to search your offices, too.”
“You do what’s necessary, Xorb,” said Rarnak. “I’ve got nothing to hide!”
“Here, here!” agreed Wivvers. “Transparency is what I’m all about. I am completely loyalized to the Timely Inc. philosophy, and devoted to the ongoing prosperitization and market-growth of this corporation!”
“You said it,” Gruntgrill put in. “Cut me in half, and you’ll see the Timely trademark symbol running right through me!”
“Don’t tempt me,” said Xorb darkly.
“-tik!-”
“Oh, dear,” said Pama Harnon.
“What’s the matter?” Meramati asked her.
Pama Harnon was toying with her chic and expensive lipgloss. “You know, I literally reapply this every time I feel stress. I guess it’s a nervous habit. I’ve literally been doing it so much in the last few days I’m completely out of Autocron Noir.”
“Shame,
that shade looks so good on you,” said Meramati.
“Thank you, Allandra,” Pama Harnon smiled. She turned. “Mrs. Mantlestreek? Would you literally be a dear and toss this in the disposal for me?” she asked.
Mrs. Mantlestreek fought back the urge to explain the difference between her role as a personal assistant and the role of a robot subjanitor. Instead, she merely smiled charmlessly, took the expensive lipgloss, and dropped it into the waste disposal unit beside her desk.
“Thank you!” Pama Harnon smiled breezily and followed the other executives out of the door.
• CHAPTER SEVENTEEN •
MEANWHILE, MEANWHILE
[FIVE DAYS EARLIER ON CARNASSIA…]
INSIDE the compact Timely Inc. Waste-Away model disposal unit, the small antimatter reservoir engulfed the lipgloss and annihilated it forever.
Both the lipgloss, in fact, and the miniature Kree-tech Omni-Wave communicator and listening device concealed inside it.
THE order of the Divine Oracolites was not so much an actual order anymore. There was only one of them left.
Blue-skinned and ancient, with fringed, pointed ears, the sole surviving member of the order was typical of his race, the Interdites.
The Interdites had once been a powerful and technologically advanced civilization, until they had been crushed and scattered by the Badoon. In an effort to make sure that nothing like that ever happened to them again, the surviving, far-flung members of the Interdite race lived like hermits and outcasts, developed their latent psionics, turned to mysticism, and eventually became highly gifted in the arcane craft of precognition.
This particular Interdite, who had chosen to maintain the notion of the Divine order single-handedly since the last of his half-dozen Oracolite brethren died eight decades previously, lived a lonely, hermitic existence in the high peaks of a windswept and ragged mountain range that ran like a spine across the main landmass of the planet Carnassia. Individuals from other worlds came to visit him, making the hard, demanding trek through the peaks to his lonely cave. They came to find him because they craved access to the psionic insight into the given future that only he possessed. Or rather, only the Divine Oracolites possessed.