106: the war has already begun, part three

Issac did not have the slightest idea what preparations his rescuers had made prior to their invasion of the Ring, but apparently their return time had been predetermined. though his eyes were still adjusting to the intense luminosity of dayside, Issac could see a small group of people clustered perhaps twenty feet from the tram, out of which he followed Sorensen and Cillian.

each member of the group stiffened at the duo’s approach. one man, tall and darkly complexioned took two steps in their direction.

“ya made it,” he said, his voice a soft rasp.

Issac could hear the grin in Sorensen’s voice as he said, “yes, my friend. may i introduce you to Issac Devers of Dulvern.” he gestured in Issac’s direction.

Issac was taken aback by what happened next. the dark man snapped his arms straight down against his hips and tilted his head downward. a moment later, the rest of the group, six or seven men and two women, mimicked the gesture. having adequately adjusted to the sunlight, Issac scanned the daysiders perplexedly.

Cillian cocked his head at him and said quietly, “they’re waiting for you to say something.”

“me?” Issac said dumbly.

Cillian responded only with a nod and suggestive hand gesture.

“hi,” Issac said feebly in the direction of the minor assembly.

“greetings, outworlder,” the dark man said.

“greetings,” the group behind him mumbled. Issac noted the formality of their speech.

the dark man continued, “we welcome you to Klin, and to Gorshen. your uncle–” he paused for a moment and his eyes flicked up at Issac, as if to verify by appearance that Issac was Lathan’s kin, then looked down once more and continued, “was a great man, and his aid to us was invaluable. we regret his loss in the deepest corners of our souls. we thank you for joining us.”

Issac realized with a gasp that he had stopped breathing. he felt as if he were some sort of royalty. but why? he felt as though he should say something. he managed, “i…didn’t really know him. but i’m glad to know that he was helping you.”

there was a silent beat before Sorensen spoke. “Issac is not familiar with our customs. please raise your heads, my friends.”

with an almost palpable release, the group relaxed their tense muscles and slowly tipped their heads back into normal position. Issac scanned their faces. they were rough and hard. the men wore tan, sleeveless shirts, stained and torn. the women’s faces were hard, their lips pursed. they stared at him.

Cillian withdrew a cigarette from a hidden pocket and lit it. he leaned casually against a broken-down groundcar that sat rusting under the ever-burning sun. he offered one to Issac, who refused. a moment of silence passed before Cillian said, exhaling a cloud of smoke, “have you delivered today?”

the dark man hesitated, then said, “they ain’t took nothing from us.”

Issac shook his head involuntarily. the dark man’s voice had shifted from the very picture of formality into a rough and unfamiliar dialect almost instantly.

the man continued, his voice even harsher, “they said ain’t ten points to goal. ain’t drivable.”

Cillian spat angrily. “who? who was the station chief?”

“he given no name,” the dark man said. “he’s a stripe, sure as sun. i try’da argue, try’da tell ‘em purest dry we got, but he ain’t have none of it.”

Cillian looked at Issac. “a day in the mines. no pay.” he paused again and took a long drag from his cigarette. he did not look away from Issac. at last, he said meaningfully, “you say you gotta debt to your uncle?”

Issac did not answer, but instead gazed at the miners before him. they were a proud but broken, or nearly broken people, skins rough and darkly tanned from near-constant exposure to dayside’s eternal sun. their poverty presented itself plainly, and it looked as though they were on the brink of succumbing to the difficulties of their lives, but, as if by some measure of faint hope and desperate strength, they held on.

“outworlder–” the dark man began, but Issac interrupted him.

“call me Issac. please. and i do not know your name.”

“Issac,” the man said hesitantly, and then more confidently, “Issac. my name is C’moy Tocts. may you come to my home? i’ll try’da — well, my wife, she — please.”

Issac looked at Sorensen for guidance, but the amber-haired Klinian only smiled. Issac turned back to Tocts. he said, having nothing else to say, “i would be honored.”

the meal passed quietly. Issac gazed at the bare, gray walls as he chewed the last bit of his roasted sanddeer steak.

it was a small, humble home twenty minutes’ drive from where Issac had met the daysiders. C’moy Tocts’s establishment sat in a row of similar homes, each dug almost entirely below the surface of the ground. they had entered through a hatch that led down a steep staircase and into the only room of the house. Tocts and his wife — they had no children, Issac had found out — minimized costs by maintaining a small living space.

the five, Sorensen, Cillian, Issac, Tocts and his wife, named Furlia, crowded around a table that was obviously intended for two. like the room, the meal was simple, but sufficient.

Furlia broke the silence. “an half o’ tea, anyone?”

Cillian shook his head in the negative, but Sorensen said, “if you’ve any to spare, please.”

“fer ya, mister Devers?”

Issac looked at her dumbly for a moment. an half? he wondered.

Sorensen interposed. “she means half a serving. half a glass.”

“oh, of course.” to Furlia, he said, “um, yes, i’d like that very much.” he forced a smile to mask his embarrassment.

Issac stared into his plate for a moment. finally, Tocts said, “mister Devers — Issac — how’dya come to be w’us?”

Issac looked up at the miner, considered his face. there were years of hard labor there, to be sure, but there was something else. something that Issac could not place, but that seemed almost…hopeful.

“i’m — it’s a long story,” he began. “i got in to some trouble back home, and my uncle, Lathan, got me out of, well, a difficult situation. i promised him that if he ever needed my help, i would join him on his ship. we were attacked, and now i’m here and he’s, well, he’s…” Issac rubbed chin. there was a day’s growth there, something that had not felt in a long, long time. “i don’t understand it, to be honest with you.”

Tocts smiled. “he tol’ me, yer uncle did, why he was bringin’ ya.”

Issac’s eyes opened widely. “he did? what did he say?”

“that he was hopin’ ya’d join ‘im. ‘see somethin’ in that one, i do,’ he’d say. ‘something different.’ yer uncle believed in us miners, in this worl’, in our freedom more than any outworlder ‘fore him. he tol’ me he thought you would ‘elp us when ya saw us.”

Issac stared at the man, his thoughts rolling tremulously. this was his life’s mission, Issac realized. the trading, the war profiteering, the smuggling. he did it all to help a people that were so thoroughly oppressed, so downtrodden, so without resource or chance of hope. this was his life’s mission, and he died without seeing it come to fruition.

he felt Sorensen’s eyes on him.

“you knew this?” Issac asked.

Sorensen nodded. “he spoke of you often, Issac. and strange, now, that you are here, just when Lathan is lost to us.”

Furlia returned with the tea. she set the glasses down with a clank. “sorry fer that,” she said quietly.

“thank you for the tea,” Sorensen said sincerely. he drank, but Issac did not touch his cup. he gazed into his cup, lost in thought.

Cillian turned to Tocts as if unaware of what had just happened. he said, “we’re going out to the ship. if what’s there is what i think is there, well, we’re going to have a lot of thinking to do.”

“can i serve ya in any way?” Tocts asked. “groundcar, fuel?”

Cillian patted him on the shoulder. “you already helped us plenty, pal.” he stood. to Furlia, he said, “as with the sun,” and bowed his head slightly.

Sorensen also stood, nudging Issac. “as with the sun,” Sorensen said to the couple, also dipping his head.

again, Sorensen nudged Issac. he gaped at him for a short moment, then, realizing that they were practicing a custom, he repeated Sorensen’s words and gesture.

“may be your life,” Furlia and Tocts said in unison. also bowing their heads. no more words were spoken as the trio exited Tocts’s establishment, nourished and refreshed.

a few hours later, Issac was debarking from Cillian’s groundcar. in the open, the transport could travel at very high rates of speed, and they covered a long distance in two hours of travel. Cillian had piloted the transport while Sorensen navigated using a combination of paper maps and a computerized mapping system Issac was unfamiliar with. it had not taken them long to find the wreckage of the Lathan Devers.

during the drive, Issac had learned that Tocts, and the others he had met after exiting the tram, worked under the supervision of Sorensen and Cillian, who apparently held the highest rank among operators at Gorshen Plant. Gorshen was the name of both the mining city Sorensen and Cillian called home, as well as the plant itself, which refined the raw minerals from the mines into dry as it was sold. Sorensen had said proudly that Gorshen was the largest of its kind on dayside. after leaving Tocts’s they had procured their transport and headed further into the deserts of dayside.

though Issac still wore his Dulvernian clothes, he had added a layer beneath them. before their departure from Gorshen, Sorensen had given him what he called a sunsuit. it was a marvel of technology, or at least Issac thought so: he had stripped naked and stretched it over his skin. oddly, after putting it on, he felt as if he were still nude — the sunsuit was nearly invisible and covered his skin with only a hint of sensation. the most conspicuous part of the sunsuit was the small battery back that sat on his left hip. the pack, as he learned, chilled the millimeter-thin suit with an extremely efficient cooling system. it also protected the wearer’s exposed skin from the heat of the air and the sand, or whatever object the wearer came into contact with. after a second thought, the suits seemed almost a given to Issac: surely no one could long survive, without aid, the conditions of deeper dayside: his experience after exiting the escape pod had taught him that, and he knew that much of the mining occurred at comparable or greater temperatures.

when they arrived at the Lathan Devers, Issac was surprised at how intact the ship was. he remembered seeing, from his vantage point in the escape pod, a portion of the hull separate during its descent, and as they approached he saw that the ship was otherwise mostly unbroken. and it was through that absent chunk of hull that they entered the ship.

once they were inside, it became clear that the ship had caught fire once it had landed. the bulkheads were scorched and the floors and panels were blackened. they trio made their way through the ship’s corridors, and Sorensen produced a flashlight to guide their way once the blazing sunlight from outside failed to illuminate the craft’s interior. Issac wondered whether the ship had by chance landed right-side-up, or whether Lathan had managed by some miracle to set it down in an upright position.

“the bridge is just ahead,” Issac said, gesturing to the left at one intersection.

the gloom of the ship suppressed conversation, and the group made their way silently down the final corridor. when they reached the entrance to the bridge, they found the door sealed; it had been the first that was closed since they had entered. of course, the automatic opening response of the door was useless in a powerless vessel. Cillian tore off a long, thin piece of loose bulkhead and, after an effort, used it to pry the door open. they entered the bridge.

Issac was not prepared for what he saw.

the crew had, evidently, managed to find their way back to the bridge during the ship’s rapid descent, and their charred remains lay grouped near the captain’s chair. Issac guessed that they had supposed that any chance they had of survival lay within the ship’s most protected cabin. but had they all made it, at least this far? without realizing it, Issac counted the bodies. the first was probably Pert, slumped over in the pilot’s chair. a second body, which from its length was probably Syry. the third, the central figure, charred bones clinging to the captain’s chair, was Lathan. and then a fourth. it could only be Gamne. Issac’s heart skipped a beat.

Issac’s thoughts were interrupted by Cillian. “i’m sorry, Lathan,” he said darkly.

“he was a good friend,” Sorensen agreed plaintively. “few outworlders cared for us as he did. we owe him and his crew a great debt.”

the three stood in silence for a moment, pondering the end of these four lives. Issac was for a moment overwhelmed by the tragedy of it all: a ship’s crew who had paid for their care for an oppressed people with their lives. and among them, his uncle, who, despite his infrequence in Issac’s life, had always been kind, and had indeed given to Issac the greatest favor he had ever received, the attempts of repayment for which had brought him to this world. Issac felt rage brewing deep within him, a quiet boil of anger.

after a long, mournful moment, Cillian said, “let’s hope his death meant something.” with that, the three men exited the bridge, leaving the sacrificed crew behind.

it did not take them long to find Lathan’s secret storage compartment. whether they discovered it by prior knowledge or by rebel’s instinct, Issac did not know, but Sorensen and Cillian were soon prying up floorboards by the light of the flashlight Issac now held. removal of the floorboards revealed a compartment, small enough that one man could barely turn around in it. off of this compartment lay yet another sealed door. Cillian could not pry open this second door, despite five minutes’ effort to that end. next to the sealed door there was a palmscanner, but it was of course without power.

Cillian, breathing heavily from his exertion, swore loudly. “Sor,” he said between gulps of air, “ain’t there any way you can power this up?”

“i will try,” Sorensen said calmly. he disappeared into the bowels of the ship for what was probably ten minutes. he returned with an armful of components that Issac did not recognize. “Issac,” he said, “will you go to the transport and remove its battery, please?”

Issac stuttered for a moment. “i’m not sure if i–”

“it’s easy,” Cillian interrupted, rubbing sweat from his brow. “just pop the hood and unhook a few wires. you know what a battery looks like, right?”

“sure,” Issac said. he left the ship hesitantly, and approached the transport. it took him a minute or two to discover the secret of hood popping, but once he did, he was surprised at how easily and obviously the battery was removed. he returned to the two daysiders within a matter of minutes.

“thank you,” Sorensen said, relieving Issac of the energy cell. in Issac’s absence, he had removed a portion of the palmscanner’s paneling and attached several wires. there was another wire, not yet connected to anything, running to the side of the door to which the palmscanner was a affixed.

in one swift motion, Sorensen planted the battery on a ledge and connected the various loose wires to various contacts on the battery. as if by magic, the palmscanner whirred to life, illuminating its hand-sized reader. Issac’s eyes opened wide, and Sorensen smiled in reserved satisfaction.

“he might talk like a poet,” Cillian said, “but he’s got a way with wires i ain’t never seen.” there was more than a touch of pride in his voice.

“your palm please,” Sorensen said to Issac.

“why not?” Issac said, placing his hand on the scanner. without delay, the door slid open. “there you go,” Issac said with admiration.

“i told ya,” Cillian said, grinning, as he entered Lathan’s secret hold.

Issac shone the flashlight around the compartment’s walls. there were crates stacked throughout the entire breadth and width of the hold. Sorensen pealed the top off of one that was nearby. the contents were antiquated, as was to be expected. they were not the lightcloud guns or the c-rays of modern armies, but they were old style powder-and-bullet projectile weapons.

the crates were full of guns.

Sorensen had returned the battery to the transport himself, at Issac’s request. while he was prepping the car for travel, Issac and Cillian had carted most of the crates of weapons into the transport’s cargo area. it was not large, but it was sufficient, so long as they stacked the crates carefully.

as Issac carried the last box from this ship, he felt something unusual under his foot. it was hard, and just blow the surface of the sand. he felt it twitch, as if it were alive, and then he felt the ground begin to shake.

he dropped the crate next to the transport and steadied himself on the car’s hull. he rolled his eyes. oh, what now? he asked himself. he looked down, but could not detect whatever it was that he had trodden upon. the tremors grew louder.

Sorensen, still working on the reinstallation of the battery, stood erect and looked about frantically. Cillian emerged from the ship in a full sprint. he was screaming, but the vibration of the earth had already gained so much volume that Issac could not hear him.

as Issac was trying to decipher Cillian’s commands, he noticed a particularly violent tremble in the sand a dozen or so meters from the Lathan Devers. and then, all at once, it exploded upwards, as if a bomb had detonated just below the surface. but instead of flame and smoke, a living thing emerged from Klin’s scorched dayside sand.

what Issac saw was, if nothing else, enormous. it appeared to Issac more plant than animal: a large central stalk, red and glistening, shot through the sand and gained the height of probably twelve feet. the stalk then seemed to call upon unseen roots, which stretched from itself out dozens of yards in every direction. these roots too ripped through the sand and into the air, flailing about madly. what Issac had stepped on must have been one of these roots: it tore from the sand a foot in front of the terrified Issac. one of the roots’ small tendrils caught Issac on its way up and cut his cheek.

“it’s a Glanthor!” Issac heard Cillian shout. “go, go, go!”

the roots began to strike the ground randomly and violently, stirring up a great amount of sand and dust. the central stalk bent over and smashed vacant tracts of sand violently. one root landed on one of the few shrubs in the area, and half a dozen other roots immediately gathered upon it, wrapped themselves around it, and twitched spastically, as if they were sucking the very life out of the scant piece of desert plant life.

Sorensen worked at the battery frenetically. after a few seconds, he shouted above the din, “something’s wrong! get in the car!”

without thinking, Issac picked up his crate of guns. Cillian had by now reached the transport. “leave ‘em!” he shouted. obediently, Issac dropped the crate. Cillian dove into the driver’s seat and began punching the ignition switch. “what the hell’s going on?” he shouted.

the Glanthor was, as Issac would learn later, a rare but not undocumented carnivorous plant that had evolved in dayside’s harsh conditions. it lived beneath the surface, but when a passerby disturbed it, the Glanthor unleashed its non-sentient fury on its surroundings in hope of gathering scarce vitamins and minerals. at the moment, Issac did not know these details, but he was no less aware that the thrashing root system was moving almost systematically toward the transport.

“i can’t get the battery back in!” Sorensen shouted from the front of the car. Cillian extracted himself from the driver’s seat and joined Sorensen under the hood of the car. the earth was now shaking almost unbearably and the sound was deafening. the two of them wrestled against the engine with all their might.

but it was too late.

Issac watched a group of twisted roots moving toward the transport inexorably. they crashed against the sand violently before pulling back into the sky reactively, as if each touch of the sand was agonizing to the plant.

finally, the cluster of roots rose in the air above the trio. they hovered there for a moment, quavering sickeningly in the air. then, the main stalk began to heave, as if it had found its desired food source. the stalk protruded itself from the ground in a massive arc, fed by more and more subterranean trunk. the gargantuan beast lunged at the group, and, for a moment, Klin’s eternal sun was blotted out of the sky.

Sorensen and Cillian held their arms above their head in a futile demonstration of defense. their faces twisted with the horror of their impending doom.

as Issac saw the massive plant streaking towards him, he witnessed something that seemed like a pausing of time. the stalk slowed almost to a halt, and he felt a strange energy welling up within his body. it was not totally foreign to him: he had felt the same power two other times in his short life. but this expression superseded by far the other instances. his courage was infinite, and his confidence unbound. his anger began to brew. he lifted his eyes to meet his impending doom. he lifted his arms, his fists clenched in defiance.

time found itself again, and the stalk, which seemed to be shrieking as if it had vocal chords bore down on Issac and his rescuers. but it stopped two feet away, and not of its own volition.

Issac’s rage burned as it have never burned before. he thought of Lathan and his honorable but completely unrespected death, of his father and his close-minded ideology, of his mother, and her utterly pointless death.

and then, it was as if the plant had smashed into an invisible but impenetrable glass dome. the roots groped for the party as well, but each arm of the plant hit the invisible half sphere that now covered the trio, bouncing off of it with painful retractions.

Issac’s face was an irate grimace that twisted further with each impact. he kept his hands raised and his violent gaze focused: the energy that flowed from him somehow prevented the advances of this nefarious life form, though Issac knew not what power in him created such a shield.

after a few painful reactions, the Glanthor retreated back beneath the sand as quickly as it had arrived, roots first, and finally, the gruesome and predatory stalk disappeared below the surface.

the group was alone again, and the world was quiet. Issac trembled, still holding his hands defensively above his head.

“so it is true,” Cillian gasped in disbelief.

Issac did not awaken until the transport had reached Gorshen. he stirred in the back seat, and Sorensen turned to him from the passenger’s side of the car.

“you’re awake,” he said.

“i guess so,” Issac muttered painfully. “what happened?” he shuddered at the fact that he was once again regaining consciousness unaware of his location or predicament.

“you saved us,” Sorensen quietly. “get some rest.”

Issac closed his eyes again and drifted back into the embracing darkness of sleep.

an hour later, Issac was sitting at a table in Sorensen’s establishment eating a local soup, the contents of which were unfamiliar to him. like Yandrake’s and Tocts’s dwellings specifically, and most dayside structures generally, Sorensen’s establishment was almost entirely below ground: it was the simplest way to control temperature and light in a land that had an excess of both.

“with these weapons,” Cillian was saying, “we can get a ship. with a ship, and weapons, the other cells will take us seriously. all we need is one operation, one really good operation, and once they know that we too have power, things will change here, Issac. you’ll see.”

“why do you need a ship?” Issac asked.

“the only spaceports are in the Ring,” Sorensen said. “even if we can get in to the Ring, miners are prohibited from boarding ships, excepting official permission from StarEx. and, since we’re not allowed into the Ring in any case, again, excepting official StarEx approval, we have no way of moving anything on or off of Klin. your uncle was our only avenue to the rest of the galaxy. the Lathan Devers was our lifeline. and now…” he trailed off.

Issac frowned. Leah, he thought. how was he going to return to her? trapped on a strange world, he thought bitterly.

Sorensen pursed his lips, thinking. “Cillian and i have no way of leaving. none of the miners have.” he paused, then said, “Cillian and i operate the Gorshen plant. people respect us. a few people, like Tocts, trust us enough to join a movement against StarEx, and against the system that we were born in to. you must understand, Issac, what a difficult position we’re in. you must understand the fragility of what we have here. hope is scarce on dayside. terribly scarce. a few of us have hope that there is something better for the future. but as much respect as Cillian and i have, you are an outworlder. you are the nephew of Lathan Devers, a beloved man and hero to daysiders. and you have,” he slowed, choosing his words carefully, “an ability. you are special in a way that i do not understand, and that you yourself do not understand. that is also a source of hope.”

Issac stood suddenly. “this is not my fight,” he said angrily. “i’m sorry for what’s happened to you, i really am. but i’ve got my own life, my own future to think about. maybe once i’m home, i can do something for you guys. i know people. believe it or not–”

Cillian cut him off abruptly. “goddam it, Issac. how can you say that? how can you tell us that you’ll do something about it? once you’re away from here, you’ll go back to flying around the stars, burning dry without any thought of who mines it or how it gets to you. the lives of generations are at stake here. no one in the galaxy gives a shit about the filthy miners on Klin. no one. and now you want to walk away from us, too?”

Cillian spat. Issac slumped back into his chair, staring at the floor. Sorensen raised a calming hand to Cillian, then said, “in any case, we have no way of getting you off Klin at present. please, help us. help us lead those who are willing to fight. if we can get a ship, then, perhaps, we can send you home on our first journey from Klin. but if you want to see your fiancée again, you must help us.”

bitterly, recalcitrantly, Issac said, “i don’t want to be around when your war starts.”

gently, Sorensen said, “Issac, the war has already begun.”

Issac looked at him sharply. “what did you say?”

“there are wheels turning,” Sorensen said, “events are in motion that must reach their conclusion. in a galaxy of freedom, we deserve it, too. we will have it.”

“what were your exact words?” Issac asked, as if he had not heard the rest of Sorensen’s statement.

in response, Sorensen only looked at him quizzically. the war has already begun, Issac thought, and he remembered the woman on the train. the woman who had known his destination, who had instructed him on how to survive on dayside. the woman on the train.

he sighed deeply, and looked from Sorensen to Cillian, still stewing in his anger. Issac rubbed his fingers against his eyes and sighed deeply.

“the war has already begun,” he repeated. then, a trace of resolution in his voice, “i will do what i can. i will help you get your ship. i will aid your rebellion.” and then, with a smile, “and then, you will get me the hell of this planet.”

Cillian’s frown slowly bent into a smile. he stood, clapped Issac on the shoulder, and strode out of the room.

Sorensen gazed at Issac, his eyes glistening. “you do not know, young Devers, what this will mean.”

**

Kantor Sefrin stood silently, hands at his sides, eyes on the floor. the large, cavernous room in which he stood ringed with quiescence. Sefrin’s lip trembled  as he awaited the next question. it came too soon.

“you let them go,” the voice said. it boomed through the hollows of the room, echoing off vault and ceiling. it was not a question.

“sir, they attacked,”

“you let them go!” the voice repeated. the malice in the voice made Sefrin quake.

“yes,” he said, his voice a whisper.

there was a pause. then, the voice continued. “i had thought of destroying you. but you may still be of some use to me. go, now, and, without fail, determine how they got into and out of the Ring, and where they took him. the ship is almost assuredly lost now, thanks to you. let us hope, for your sake, that it held little value to them.”

“yes, General Sentuel. thank you, sir.”

“leave me,” Sentuel barked. Sefrin obeyed, scurrying out through the arched door at the end of Sentuel’s cavern.

StarEx’s security general leaned back in his large, throne-like chair and pressed the tips of his fingers together. “so,” he said aloud to himself, “the rebellion is still alive.” he smiled. “the rebellion is still alive.”