115: explosion

Leah entered the cockpit quietly, observed Afnen working at the ship’s controls.  she carried a tray of food; she had found several self-warming platters in the ship’s diminutive mess-hall area, as well as a couple of bottles of water.  as she had explored the ship’s cabins while Afnen navigated the ship to a safe distance from Dulvern, she had also found an unopened bottle of spiced wine, which rounded out the tray’s presentation.  the wine was Dulvernian, from a winery in Hanben, a small but idyllic town on the opposite side of Dulvern from Leah’s home town; Hanben was well known for it’s vineyards, and she was hoping that this bottle would not be the exception to the rule.

“is everything alright?” she asked softly.

Afnen lifted his head from the controls, looked at her.  there was a look in his eyes, a feeling that she had seen develop since he had freed her from her confinement chamber at the planetarium twenty-four hours ago.  it was a potent mix of guilt, avuncular protectiveness, and affection.

he smiled a tired smile.  “yeah, i think so.  i’ve got her in a distant-Dulvern orbit for now.  even if their satellites get back up, it’s doubtful they’ll be able to detect us at this distance, and even if they could, we’d just be a tiny, distant ship: nothing to worry about.  we’re not burning any fuel, though.”  he paused, as if considering how to intone his next words.  “we could stay here for quite some time and be perfectly safe, so long as we have food.  the water recyclers on a ship even this old work at nearly one-hundred percent efficiency, and as long as we have water and electricity, the oxygen cycling system can continue almost indefinitely.”

“won’t we run out of power?” Leah asked, setting the tray down on an empty seat next to Afnen before occupying a chair for herself.

Afnen shrugged.  “supporting two people isn’t that hard.  the solar receptacles generate quite a bit of power at this distance, and we can always burn a little dry to recharge the batteries if we start getting low.  we have enough dry for probably two jumps, if we ever decided to make them.  but that’s more than enough to charge the batteries a thousand times.”  he thought for a moment, then said, “although, now that i think about it, i’m not sure if i can do that.  burning dry is, well, you know, don’t you?”

“sure,” she said as she handed Afnen a self-warming meal and a bottle of water.  he murmured his thanks.  she continued, “it’s hard to control that much energy.”

“basically,” he said, opening his meal.  the food hissed out steam as he opened it, and he waited for it to cool before eating.  “how’s the food supply?” he asked, taking his first bite.

“low in diversity, high in quantity,” she answered.

Afnen smiled, chewing.  between bites, he said, “sounds typical for this kind of ship.”

“do you know it’s name?” she asked.

“the ship?”

“yeah.  we keep on calling it ‘the ship,’ but whoever built it had to give it a name.”

“oh.  yes.  i stumbled across it when i was plugging in some numbers earlier.  they called it the Swallow. i’m not sure why.”

Leah smiled, felt somehow contented in knowing the ship’s name.  she watched Afnen take a few bites from his self-warming meal, opened hers, ate.  as was her experience on starships, the flavor of the meal was not good, but she knew that it would be filling, and that she would be well nourished having eaten it.  when she had nearly cleaned  out her tray, and saw that Afnen had polished off every last morsel  from his dish, Leah lifted the spiced wine onto the consol between her seat and his.

Afnen raised an eyebrow humorously.  “oh, my!” he chuckled scandalously.  “what have we here?  and on top of the radiation scanner, no less!”

she laughed, released the cork.  Afnen had drained his water bottle and, lacking any other containers, Leah filled the bottle with spiced wine.  her water bottle was still mostly full and so, with mock sheepishness, she drank the spiced wine from the bottle.  both Swallow crew members released satisfied sighs, and, loosened by the wine, began to laugh at their situation.

“three days ago, i wouldn’t have expected to be in deep space,” Afnen said.

“and three days ago, i wasn’t expecting to get kidnapped.”  there was an attempt at humor in Leah’s tone, but it failed.  Afnen hung his head, took another drink from the spiced wine.

“i…i can’t tell you how sorry i am.”

instantly, Leah felt terrible, realize that she had wounded Afnen.  she put a hand on his shoulder.  “no, no…i mean…you were mislead, troubled.  right?”

“yes,” he said, quietly.

“but once you realized what you were doing, you changed.”  she clapped him on the shoulder.  “so cheer up, kiddo.  i didn’t want to be on that planet, anyway!”  she did her best to forget the terrible memories of the Rockhewn Planetarium.

they laughed for a moment, drank.  after a long silence, Afnen said, “so what’s the plan?”

“the plan?  well, you saw that message from Issac.”

Afnen pursed his lips, looked down.  “yes.”

“so you know what i have to do.”

Afnen looked at her, puzzled.  “no.  i don’t know.”

she gaped back at him, dumbfounded.  “i have to go to him,” she said, as if were the most obvious statement that had ever been made.

“on…Klin?” Afnen asked with trepidation.

“of course on Klin!” Leah blurted, incredulously.  “you have to have known that!”

Afnen inhaled deeply.  “oh, shit.”

“well?”

“well, what?”

“well, what are we going to do?”

Afnen considered for a moment, then said, “i can’t take you there.”

“‘can’t,’ or ‘won’t’?” she asked.

Afnen shrugged.  “i can’t.  listen, i’m surprised, frankly, that i was able to get us into space in the first place, much less get us into a stable orbit.  i took one course in ribbon-drive jumping, and i did it once in a simulator.  but i’ve never even co-piloted a wormhole before.  i don’t know the physics, the math, shit, even the controls of this ship!  a planet that far away?  we’d end up in the middle of a star or in uncharted deep space — and that, if we’re lucky!”

Leah was crestfallen.  “but…” she stammered.  after another gulp of spiced wine she said, “but, Issac…”

for a moment, she was silent.  Afnen tapped at the controls of the Swallow, brought up starcharts on the ship’s viewscreen.  manipulating the controls a bit clumsily, he focused the map first on Dulvern, then their ship, then a nearby star system.  “how about this?” he asked.  “how many interstellar trips have you been on?”

“five or six.”

“alright.  then you know that the further away a planet or star is, the more gravitational distortion there is between us and our destination.  that’s what i’m talking about when i say that i can’t compute for that kind of travel.  but this system, here–” he thrust a finger at the viewscreen “–there’s not much between the Dulvern system and theirs, just one nebula and this asteroid belt,” he said, gesturing to a fuzzy ring on the screen.  “this world here–” there was energy in his voice now “–is a major shipping hub for Klin’s sector — it’s on the edge of the shipping lanes, obviously, but you could think of it as an artery to the rest of the galaxy.”

“okay…” Leah said, waiting.

“okay?  so there are lots of ships going from there to Klin!  i can’t take you to Klin, but i can take you there…i think, anyway.”

“what’s the name of that planet?”

“Poridan.  it’s a merchant world, fairly wealthy.  not a lot of mineral resources, but, let’s see…” he was scrolling through a report on the ship’s mainframe– “good atmosphere, good weather for crop growing, but poor soil.  okay, so there’s very little official government, it looks like Poridan is mainly run by co-op.  import/export companies buy dry from Klin, as well as many other mineral resources from other nearby worlds.  looks like they use the credits from re-selling those to buy fertilizer and import — wow, looks like they import fifty-thousand cubic tons of soil per standard year.”  Afnen continued to page through the report, skimming the text for items of interest.  “once they plow the fields with the new soil, they can grow a wide variety of crops because of the rich atmosphere — lots of rain, it looks like, lots of fresh water on the planet — and, boy, it seems like they’re just content to subsist.  they trade to get a little boost, then just sort of hang back and try to stay out of the way.”

“but there are lots of ships going to and leaving from this world?”

“sure.  from what is says here, StarEx likes to sell dry to Poridan because, like i said, it’s mostly co-ops — there’s no government collecting huge tariffs on dry imports, like on Dulvern.”

Leah scoffed.  “most global governments put huge tariffs on dry.”

“i know,” Afnen agreed heartily.

“so what’s your point, other than that Poridan has a good business model?”

Afnen wrinkled his forehead, peeled his eyes away from the viewscreen and looked at Leah.  she was distressed, perspiring.  she was almost indignant, and he was caught by the energy of her gaze.  her furrowed brow folded into an inverted vee that somehow emphasized the lines of her face.  she seemed more beautiful then than at any time since Afnen had met her at Elttaes.  “the point is,” Afnen began.

Leah cut him off.  “they’ll have lax regulations on ship’s passengers,” she said with realization.

“right,” Afnen affirmed somberly.

Leah’s excitement was growing.  “so you can take me there, and i should be able to get onto a supply ship, or a passenger ship, or some kind of ship to Klin!”

“dozens of ships leave for Klin from Poridan every day,” Afnen said flatly.

“yes, yes!”  Leah stood.  “oh, thank you, Afnen!”  she crossed the cockpit, threw her arms around him.  because he was still sitting, her torso leaned heavily into his.  he felt her arms around his neck, clutching opposite shoulders.  her cheek brushed against his, and for a split second, he felt her breath on his left ear, on the curve of his neck.  her breasts pressed against his chest as she hugged him, but before he could even raise his arms, she had pulled away.  “set a course!” she said.  “i’m off to find another bottle of spiced wine!”  she grinned at him, exited the cockpit.  Afnen took a moment to gather himself, acknowledged that she would never understand what an effect she had just had on him, set a course for Poridan.

**

they had been flying over the sands of dayside for over an hour now, and Issac was becoming restless.  he sat against a cold bulkhead, and he was reminded of his voyage to Klin on the Lathan Devers.  if it was possible, he knew even less about his future now than he did then.

a door hissed open, and Sorensen walked into the passengers’ bay.  Issac glanced at him, but Sorensen did not make eye contact.  instead, he sat down across from Cillian, who was busy sketching details into a paper notebook.  Issac wondered fleetingly what he was writing and, indeed, where the notebook had come from.  Sorensen did not seem to take notice, however, and Issac turned his eyes away.

“hey,” Sorensen said.

“hey,” Cillian said, not looking up.

there was a pause, and Sorensen sat upright for a moment.  he clapped Cillian on the outside of his chin-high folded leg.  “i’m glad you made it.”

Cillian slipped his leg down to the floor, dropped his notepad to his lap, smiled subtly.  “i’m glad you made it, too,” he said.

Sorensen smiled, stood.  “i think we deserve some more information, don’t you?”

“damn straight,” Cillian responded, raising his notebook up once again.

Sorensen departed, on a mission.  the door hissed shut, and once again Issac was alone with Cillian, though he still wasn’t sure that Cillian knew he was there.

“so, um, where are we landing?” Issac asked delicately.

Cillian glanced at him, raised an eyebrow.  he grinned.  “hey, Issac.  what’cha doin in here?”

Issac shrugged.  “this is where i ended up.  as usual, i have no fucking idea what’s going on.”  there was more than a hint of bitterness in his voice.

Cillian reacted to his tone.  “easy there, spaceboy.  just calm down a little bit.”

“i am calm,” Issac said, losing any serenity that he had.  he stood, approached Cillian.  “i just watched C’moy give himself up for us.  you don’t seem all that concerned.”

Cillian replied with a scoff.  he folded his arms and looked away from Issac.

Issac said, “so, that’s it?  you’re just going to ignore me?”

Cillian turned his head, looked Issac straight in the eye.  the young Dulvernian did not back down.  Cillian said, “are you sad that we lost Tocts?”

Issac was baffled.  “of course!  aren’t you?”

Cillian shrugged.  “one less miner.”

Issac lunged at him, gripped Cillian by the collar of his shirt.  “that’s how you treat him?  that’s how you respect your dead friends?”

Cillian stood abruptly, shoved Issac against the wall.  “how many have you lost?”  he barked the words as Issac.  “how many friends have you buried?”

“only one,” Issac responded unwaveringly.

“oh, yeah?  and who was that?”

“my mother.  i watched her die; i watched her go into the ground.”

“good for you,” Cillian said harshly.  “then you have a hint of what we go through.  Tocts is either dead or nearing death.  if you can’t forget about your best friend in the blink of an eye, then you ain’t ready to do what we do, Issac.  C’moy was a necessary loss.”

“are you fucking kidding me?” Issac blurted angrily.  “you’re just going to let him rot in a StarEx prison?”

Cillian shrugged.  “we don’t have any other choice.  and the sooner you get that through your thick skull, the better off you’ll be.”

Issac exhaled, disgusted.  he once again found a seat against the bulkhead, away from Cillian.  he had just assumed his position in time to feel the ship shift its orientation.  Issac felt the craft slow, then drop in elevation.

ten minutes later, he had filed out of the ship along with Cillian, Sorensen, Dewn, Ash, and Lareth, and Issac was once again on the hot, brilliant sands of dayside.  he saw Ash lean back into the ship.  “let us know as soon as you can land.”

Issac heard a voice from within, but could not make out its words.  it could only be Joyn, the pilot, the one whose skills made this mission possible.  for a moment, the group of six stood on the sands, waiting for the ship to take off.  then, it did.  it began as a quiet rumble, then turned into an outright roar.  the ship took off vertically, just as it had done in the StarEx hangar, and was soon gone into the shimmering atmosphere.

Issac suddenly panicked.  “wait,” he said, looking from Cillian to Ash to Sorensen.  “the agreement was that i would get off this planet!  where’s he going!?”

Ash approached Issac, looked him in the eye.  “you have done well, young Issac,” he said.  “the miners look up to you.  i hear you; i hear your desires.  but this is not the time.  Joyn is taking the ship far away from Klin so that we might all avoid capture and condemnation.  soon, we will begin to run missions to distant words.  soon, you will have your chance to escape.”

Issac walked away in a huff.  “i sure hope so,” he growled.

**

the interrogation had gone on for over an hour, but Tocts had withstood it without much trouble.  in fact, he’d been surprised by how light the questioning had been.  Sefrin had only been in the sealed, windowless room once, and then for only a few minutes.  he had made a few comments, and asked no questions himself.  the comments were, of course, extremely demeaning and insulting, but they had little effect on Tocts.

as he sat alone, now, only two things occupied his mind: his family, and his rebellion.  he weighed them carefully as he awaited the next round of questioning.  there was present to be measured against future, and personal future to contrasted with the future of the miners.  there was the ever-present question one must ask himself: does the good of the many outweigh the need of the individual, even if that individual is you?  and, in fact, there were three things, not two, in Tocts’s mind.  the third was  much smaller and much more immediate — though perhaps even more important — than the his other considerations: the blade still hidden in his right shoe.  in the hangar, the StarEx troopers had removed the retractable blades from the miners’ left shoes.  the presence of these blades was common knowledge: they were standard issue for dayside miners, and Tocts had actually used his blade twice in emergency situations, once to cut free a trouser leg that had been caught underneath a rock during a cave in, and once to sever a section of electrical wire that had shorted out and was spraying sparks deep inside a mineshaft.  the troopers had had the foresight to check the miners’ right boots as well, but, finding no blades in any of the other shoes, had given Tocts’s right boot only a cursory glance.  what they had not known was that C’moy Tocts was the only miner among the group of eight daysiders who carried a blade in each sole.

as he deliberated, the door slid open once more.  once again, Sefrin himself entered.  he motioned to someone out of Tocts’s sight, and the door slid closed behind him.  Sefrin turned to Tocts, grinning.  “hello again,” Sefrin said.  Tocts said nothing, but returned his gaze with fortitude.  “i want to ask you a question.  do you mind?”  again, Tocts said nothing.  “i’ll take that as a no.”  Sefrin slid a metal chair out from underneath he table at which Tocts sat.  the interrogator rotated the chair one-hundred and eighty degrees, sat straddling the chair’s back.  he rested his hands casually on the top of the chair’s back, smiled humorlessly at the daysider.  “what town are you and your friends from?”  Tocts was surprised by the directness of the question, especially since it had not been accompanied by physical violence.  he assumed the violence would come eventually, though.  he did not respond.  Sefrin waited for a moment, tapped his fingertips on the chair.  “are you from a town close to the tram station?”

“yes,” Tocts said immediately, not making eye contact.

Sefrin pondered for a moment, regarded Tocts.  the StarEx man rubbed at the hint of beard on his chin, then said, “you could be saying that for a lot of reasons.  it might not be true, and you’re hoping that i’ll think you’re confessing and go after a city near the wall instead of yours.  you might think that i will, by default, not believe you, and that by saying ‘yes,’ you think i’ll assume that you’re lying and avoid nearby cities.”  Sefrin stopped again, considered.  “or, you might just blurt out anything you think i want to hear in hopes that i will spare you.  well, let me put that notion to rest — you will not be spared. you are a traitor to Klin; a terrorist; a menace to civilized society.”

Sefrin stood, circled Tocts, stood behind his back.  Tocts tensed as he felt the interrogator move closer to his exposed neck.  he heard Sefrin’s voice, felt his breath.  Sefrin said quietly, intensely, “do you realize what a waste this is?  generations.  generations of miners have tried to ‘stand up for their rights,’ Tocts.  surely you know that — you probably even worship some of them.  but let me tell you something, boy.”  he annunciated each word with staccato punctuation.  “we always win.”  Sefrin took a step back, continued to pace.  his voice was almost conversational.  “do you think it would be impossible for the rest of the galaxy to save the miners, Tocts?  i don’t think it would be.  StarEx is powerful, but not more powerful than the rest of the galaxy combined.  we’re rich, but we don’t have the wealth of all inhabited worlds combined.  not quite, anyway.”  he grinned, continued, “but you see, Tocts, no one wants to save you.  there are four billion miners on Klin.  if you were actually paid for the value of your work, well, surely you have at least some grasp of economics, boy.  people don’t want to pay any more for dry than they have to.  so, you’re left to your own devices.  you are billions, yes, but you are uneducated, poorly organized, and spineless billions.”

“do y’have a point, mister?” Tocts asked.  “or am i ta sit here an’ listen ya yer lessons?”

“you have spirit, Tocts,” Sefrin said sharply.  “but you would do well do learn a lesson or two.  i’ll let you think it over for a while.”  Sefrin hit a control on the wall, spoke into a speaker.  “put him in solitary.”

the door opened immediately, and two StarEx troopers walked hastily through door, grasped Tocts by his arms, lifted him, escorted him forcibly out of the room.  Sefrin sneered at him as Tocts helplessly followed the guards out of the interrogation room.

**

Cillian had spent most of the day in Gorshen’s refinery section. the workers were getting sloppy, and it was his responsibility to get things straightened out.  he’d bitched a few guys out, then shaken hands with them.  they knew what they had to do; they just needed someone to remind them of it.  he felt relatively confident about what he’d accomplished at the refinery level, and so Cillian headed down to the reactor.  he had noticed some unusual numbers on the reactor reports earlier in the day, and thought it worth checking out.

“what the hell’s goin’ on down here?” he barked at Lenont Uhriah.

“hey, jack, what’cha mean?” Uhriah called back as he tightened a bolt on a relief valve he had been fixing.

“what?” Cillian responded, unable to hear Uhriah over the roar of the reactor.

“i just said, no problems down here, jack!” he smiled, gave Cillian a thumbs up.

Cillian thought he heard the sound of a voice over the loudspeaker.  he craned his neck to listen, but only heard a mumble.  well, it can’t be that important, he thought.

just then, a steam vent in front of Uhriah ruptured.  the blast of hot gas knocked the miner backwards, crashing his skull against the opposite bulkhead.  Cillian watched Uhriah crumple to the ground, rushed towards him.

“Lenont!” he yelled, picking the man’s head up from the grated floor.  there was no response: the man was dead.  before Cillian had a chance to react, three more ventilation pipes burst on the far end of the corridor. immediately, Cillian knew that there were more lives at risk than just Uhriah’s.

“oh, no,” he said, rising to his feet and darting down the corridor to the reactor chamber.

**

orange twilight danced across scattered clouds as Hermialis brought the chalice of Reddolian wine to his lips.  a gentle breeze swept across the patio, rustling the brothers’ garments.  Hermialis’s eyes moved from the clouds, flecked with silver around the edges, to the sky’s apogee, where the pale-blue and orange backdrop faded into a saturated cobalt.  the first of the stars were visible just past the sky’s apex, as they usually were at the evenstrip, and Hermialis traced their path deeper towards the night horizon.  the sky melded into a deep sapphire, but never became black.  Hermialis considered the night horizon for a moment, feeling as the though permanent winter of nightside was reaching out for him, groping at his mind with her icy fingers.  the thought made him shudder, and he looked away, regarded the faces of his brothers.  he took another sip of wine.  the mild inebriant was bitter, made him pucker ever so slightly with each drink.  he set the chalice back on the stone table, breathed in deeply through his nose.

“it is beautiful up here, is it not, brothers?”

Arestian grunted.  “it is the rooftop of a palace.  it ought to be.”

“i agree,” Hermialis said, smiling.

Aphrodam looked morose.  “i don’t see how anything could be beautiful while our father is downstairs dying.  and…and…” the dark haired brother rubbed his hands together anxiously, looked at the patio’s dark granite floor.

“and while he prefers Terras?” Arestian snapped icily.

Aphrodam looked at Arestian as if pleading against an unfair judgment that had been placed on him.  “when has Terras been here?  what has he done for our father — for the family?  what has he done to deserve father’s favor?  for how long has he been gone?”

Arestian stared back unfeelingly.  Hermialis said, gently, “Terras left eleven years ago.  you ought to remember, Aphrodam — you had just come of age.”

“he stole it away from me!” Aphrodam moaned, remembering.  “it was my eighteenth birthday — i was becoming a man, a man like you, Hermialis!  and that…child!  only sixteen, he ran away, disappeared.  and, oh, was father concerned!  his poor, sweet child!” Aphrodam’s voice dripped with disdain, and it seemed as though he might burst in to tears at any moment.  Arestian folded his arms, rolled his eyes.  Aphrodam continued, “not a word, in eleven long years!  and now father wishes to see him again, while i am by his side!”

“we are all by his side,” Hermialis said amicably.  “and we ought be by each others’ side as well.”  the eldest son paused, looked back and forth between Arestian and Aphrodam.  Arestian appeared calm, but Hermialis could detect the subtleties of his anger.  yes, he has gotten better at hiding it, Hermialis thought.  but not good enough to fool his brother. still, Hermialis was not sure what exactly it was that fueled the rage.  did Arestian, like Aphrodam, feel slighted at his father’s preference?  or was he simply disgusted by Aphrodam’s histrionic display, as had often been the case in their adolescent years.

“you have a proposal?” Arestian asked coolly.

“yes.  i believe we can work together for our collective benefit.  clearly, father wants to see Terras before he dies.  if we love our father, ought we not do all we can to grant his final wishes?”

“but…” Aphrodam said, unable to voice his protest.

“i believe i have anticipated your concern, Aphrodam.  you believe that if Terras is brought back to the Ring, father will declare him as the heir.  rightly, that should be a concern for all of us.  but have you considered this: father may declare Terras the heir even if he is not brought back to the palace. can you imagine the implications, Aphrodam?  think of the empty throne.  surely that would be worse than you or i as individuals being left out.”

“i agree,” Arestian said.  “even one day without a living Patriarch, and StarEx would dissolve the civil authority instantly.  every charter that has been signed for the last two centuries explicitly states that the Patriarchy must remain continuous, except in cases of assassination or accidental death.”

Hermialis smiled.  “i see your mind has not been idle, brother.  you are entirely correct.  thus, our predicament is far more urgent than it may seem.”  he turned to Aphrodam and continued.  “and have you considered that Terras may not want the throne?  after all, he left without a word, had not made contact in over a decade.  by all accounts, he wants nothing to do with the us, the Patriarchy, or even his own father.  even a Patriarch cannot force another man to become something he will not be.”

Aphrodam straightened, struck by the thought.  “by sun, you’re right, brother!  of course!  Terras will not want the throne!”

“more than likely, that is correct,” Hermialis said calmly.  “however, think of father’s gratitude when we find the prodigal son.”

“we?” Arestian intoned, raising an eyebrow.

“yes,” Hermialis said.  “Klin is a large world, with three distinct areas where Terras could be: dayside, nightside, and the Ring.  as it happens, there are three of us.”

“one person for an entire third of the planet,” Arestian scoffed.

Hermialis shrugged. “you are one man, Arestian, but i know you do not travel alone.  there are many who wish to impress a potential heir to the throne of Mason, weak though that throne may be.  and i would suppose that we might have more access than most, and more willing to do us favors.”

“but if you find him, how do i know you won’t bring him back by yourself and take all the credit?” Aphrodam accused.

“there is no way to guarantee this,” Hermialis admitted.  “but there are two things we can do to make it all the more likely.  firstly, we swear to each other, as brothers, as men, as citizens of Klin and servants of the Patriarch.  secondly, we can tell father that we will bring back Terras as one.  thus, if one son brings him back alone, it will be known that he has betrayed his brothers.  surely father would not approve of such behavior.”

Aphrodam nodded somberly; Arestian smiled.  his brother was clever.  perhaps not clever enough, however.

“so, before we inform father of our new plan, shall we toast, brothers?  shall we swear as heirs of the Patriarch of Klin that we will bring Terras back to our father, and we will do it as one.”  Hermialis raised his chalice into the air.

Aphrodam raised his glass eagerly.  “i swear it, brother!”

Arestian paused, grinned.  “yes, brother.” he said smoothly, clinking his chalice against those of the others.  “i swear it.”

**

Issac drank deeply from the glass of water that Sorensen had given him.  Issac had been to the mines once before since arriving on Klin, but then only for a short time.  they had just returned from a ten hour stint in a hot, claustrophobic dry shaft, and Issac was exhausted.  the time in the mine had been beneficial, though.  after watching their captured ship — which he found out was called Miyoto, presumably after the designer’s wife or mistress — fade into a single point before disappearing completely, Issac was frustrated with his dayside companions and more desirous than ever to leave Klin.  now, he regretted lashing out at Cillian the way he had, though he had not seen him to apologize.  it would be an awkward interaction, to be sure: Issac was not one to say “sorry,” and graciousness was not one of Cillian’s more obvious traits.  nevertheless, a full day of rubbing elbows with the impoverished miners of Klin had once more readjusted his perspective and reminded him of why he was doing what he was doing.

Sorensen, much more acclimated to long hours of hard labor, seemed much less taxed than Issac, and had instantly gone back to work once arriving at Gorshen plant.  they were in Sorensen’s office now, and Issac reclined in a disappointingly uncomfortable chair.  he had scrounged up a bag of Klinian-grown tobacco and was rolling a cigarette from some scrap papers on Sorensen’s desk.  the daysider, though, was hunched over a computer console, tapping away rapidly at the keypad.

“what’s wrong?” Issac asked casually as he lit his freshly rolled smoke.

“getting weird readouts on the reactor.”

“the reactor?”

“the — it drives the refinery, basically,” Sorensen said distractedly.  “a huge engine at the center of the plant.”

Issac stood, crossed the room to Sorensen.  he took a long drag from his cigarette, looked over Sorensen’s shoulder at the screen.  it was a duo-chrome readout with several columns of constantly-shifting numbers.  there was one bar graph in the lower right corner of the screen — three bars were white; four were red, and stretched themselves far beyond the other three.  “i don’t understand.”

“it’s — the pressure’s too high.  but it doesn’t make any sense.  the pressure could only build up if the relief valves were malfunctioning, but my power and mobility reports on the valves say they’re working normally.”

“what happens if the pressure gets too high?”

Sorensen responded by turning a worried glance at Issac.  “the whole thing could go.”

“where’s Cillian?” Issac asked hesitantly.

Sorensen turned back to the screen, tapped a few more controls, then said, “he’s in the reactor room.”

as if on cue, the office shuddered as a tremor passed through the plant.  instantly, several figures that had been white flashed to red; the remaining white bars on the graph shot upwards, turned crimson.

“shit,” Sorensen breathed.  he grabbed a large microphone that sat next to the consol.  he tapped a large red button, brought the microphone to his lips.  “attention, all Gorshen employees.”  his voice boomed through the plant’s loudspeakers, and Issac heard it echoing through the halls.  “this is operator Sorensen.  there is a reactor malfunction.  all personnel are directed to exit the plant immediately.  repeat, exit the plant immediately! this is not a test.”  he slammed the microphone back down and went back to tapping furiously on the keypad.

“what do we do?” Issac asked, eyes wide.

“get out of here,” Sorensen said.  “i’m going to try to keep it under control, but if it blows, you don’t want to be in here.”

“what about Cillian?”

“if he doesn’t know what’s going on by now, and i can’t stop it, then it’s probably too late.”

Issac tossed his cigarette on the floor and ran out of the room.  Sorensen did not take his eyes of the screen to watch him go.

**

C’moy’s pitch-black cell was not as long nor as wide as he was tall.  he could stand erect, but could not lay flat and so, for the last twelve hours, or what he estimated to be twelve hours, he had shifted sitting positions uncomfortably, often leaning against the toilet, the only fixture in the otherwise empty room.  since putting him in here, Sefrin and his men had made no contact of any kind: he had not been given food, asked any questions, given any ultimatums.  instead, he had been left to his own thoughts in an entirely dark, cramped prison cell.

and he had done a lot of thinking.  the image of his wife had been at the forefront of his mind, and he wondered what she must be thinking now, what she had been told, and what she would be expecting.  Furlia, he thought, anguishing in the memory of his beloved.  i’m so sorry. but he was only sorry in a way. he regretted terribly that she would be without him, and he regretted this only because he had full confidence that she loved him with all her heart.  it struck him then, what a rare thing that was.  and he regretted it because his son would grow up without a father; or, if Furlia found a new husband, that the father would not be him.  for himself, he regretted that he would never see her again, that he would never see his son.  he regretted that he would not see the rebellion come to fruition.  for all of these things he ached more keenly than any pain he had ever felt in his entire life.

but he would not have chosen otherwise.

though he was no interrogator, he could guess at Sefrin’s plans.  Sefrin would assume, and rightly so, that Tocts would have expected a full onslaught, complete with physical torture, threats of death, emotional degradation and psychological berating.  when these did not come, Tocts would be, and was, confronting an unexpected situation.  then, a day or two in a tiny cell, alone with increasingly ominous thoughts, and the beatings would be all the more damaging once they arrived.  this was Tocts’s guess, and if it was correct, it was working.  each hour had made, in Tocts’s mind, Sefrin’s fist more damaging and his mind more destructive.

Tocts made himself fully aware of his weakness.  though he had not been specifically trained for such an encounter — he was, after all, a miner, not a soldier — he intuitively understood the combat between the miners and StarEx, exemplified by men like Kantor Sefrin.

Tocts knew that it would not be long before his mind betrayed him, and he divulged information that would give Sefrin and his men the tools they needed to incite a calamity that would ripple through generations.  Cillian would become the next Torgaminus, a leader never forgotten but ultimately ineffectual.

he scratched at his right boot.  the answer was there, and he knew it.  at any moment, Sefrin or one of his stooges could open the door and take him to an isolated torture chamber, the gruesomeness of which Tocts did not care to contemplate.

but that very thought made him consider another aspect of his trial.  was his chosen course of action a cowardly way out?  ought he not be expected to withstand the most brutal treatments of nefarious men and yet stand strong?  was he abandoning his wife and unborn child simply because he could not remain stoic through the torment?

perhaps.  but he did not have faith that he could withstand the torment itself.  for the good of the rebellion, he had to err on the side of caution, even if it meant abandoning his family, even if it meant taking the cowardly way out.  he brought his right hand to the sole of his right boot.  it took him only a second to find the release point; he pressed, twisted.  with a small click, the blade extended outward from its hidden compartment.  with a tug, he extracted the blade from its sheath.

he began breathing heavily, almost uncontrollably.  the gravity of the moment sunk deeply into his flesh; the finality, into his mind.  tears streamed down his cheeks.  “Furlia,” he said aloud. “i’m so, so sorry.”  Cillian. Sorensen.  Issac, the outworlder. my unborn son. the images of their faces flashed through his mind as he raised the blade to his left wrist.  he was hyperventilating now.  splotches of blue began to invade his otherwise blank vision in the lightless cell.  he felt as though he was about to pass out.  he could not allow that — he must not allow himself to be questioned.  he must not give up his friends, his son’s future, chance at a better life.

now sobbing, C’moy Tocts pressed the edge of the blade into his skin just below the palm of his left hand, felt it cut his flesh.  the initial puncture missed his ulnar artery by a fraction of an inch, and he pulled the blade through his wrist to reach it.  he knew he had done so when he felt his own blood, warm, lethal, run in torrents down his forearm.  he shrieked, expressing himself one last time to a world that he would know no more.  he pulled the blade towards his elbow, feeling the skin separate.  blood flowed more freely now, and he began to feel himself slip into unconsciousness.

he leaned back against the wall of the cell, saw the door crack open.  they must have heard him cry, or perhaps they had infrared cameras in the cell.  either way, Tocts welcomed the ray of light.  he almost grinned, thinking, you’re too late, as the StarEx troopers gathered up his nearly-lifeless body.  as they carried him out of the cell, he was bathed in brightness.  he saw Furlia’s face floating above him — he reached for it, but did not have the strength.

“i’m sorry,” he whispered as he faded into nothingness.

**

Issac raced through the corridors of Gorshen plant, avoiding miners who traveled exclusively in the opposite direction.  since his time at the plant, he had become more and more familiar with the complex and intertwining corridors, but now he felt as though he were a blind man running an obstacle course.  there were occasional signs along the ceiling that indicated the direction of the reactor, and Issac followed each one of them.  as he came around one corner, he collided squarely with a hulking miner, sending both careening to the floor.

“you’ve got to get out!” the miner screamed over the intensifying rumble in the plant.  “it’s going to blow!”  the miner drew himself to his feet, brushed Issac out of the way and rushed towards an exit.

for a moment, Issac considered the thought that Cillian had already left.  could he be charging into a vacant death trap for no reason?  then, he considered the stubbornness of the sandy-haired miner, and knew that Cillian would hold his post until the bitter end.  he rushed forward.

*

Sorensen attacked the keypad vigorously.  he adjusted flow rates and manipulated exhaust systems as quickly as he could.  the pressure continued to rise.  every minute or so, he saw a drop in the pressure that could not have been a result of his actions — Cillian.  he was still in the heart of the reactor, doing everything he could to prevent the inevitable meltdown.  for a moment, Sorensen wondered if, between the two of them, they might contain it.  another tremor — one much more violent than the one that had preceded it — ripped through Sorensen’s office, knocking notebooks of data off carefully organized shelves onto the floor.  Sorensen nearly fell off his chair before the vibrations subsided.  then, a second later, another burst of energy assaulted the structure of the refinery.  a light bulb burst above his head, and in a flash, his computer died.  Sorensen stared at it dumbly for a moment as the aftershock continued to wreak havoc on his chamber.

“oh, no,” he said, rising from his chair.

*

the roar was deafening as Issac entered the cavernous room that housed the reactor. he had never seen it before, but recognized it immediately.  three massive columns protruded upwards from an underground housing to a mammoth, spherical chamber that worked its way into the room’s ceiling.  the rightmost of the translucent columns, each of which was filled with the fire of production, was stable: the center and leftmost reactor stems trembled mightily.  in Issac’s brief pause, he saw each of the unstable columns wretch violently, as if they were about to erupt.  he saw a metal staircase before him, and it lead to a door conspicuously marked “reactor,” a door that existed directly below the center reactor stem.

Cillian.

Issac rushed down the staircase, and braced himself as another mighty quake agitated the walls and floor of the massive room.  he felt heat on his face, and it grew in intensity as he approached the door below.  as he finally stumbled to the door itself, the heat was almost unbearable, and another tremor, this one more violent than the rest, shook the plant.

“CILLIAN!” he screamed, pounding on the door.  “CILLIAN! OPEN THE DOOR!”

*

the pressure had risen to a critical level, and seven more ventilation pipes — by Cillian’s account — had ruptured.  he had closed every crank he could find, but it had not made a difference.

then, he felt the convulsions quiet.  could it be that Sorensen had found a new way to vent the pressure?  just as he thought this, the steam bursting out of the ruptured pipes calmed, albeit only slightly.  Cillian kicked open a utility compartment and quickly found some high-tensile bonding tape.  the venting seemed to be slow enough that he might be able to patch the pipes and, possibly, slow or prevent any further buildup from the reactor.  he began with the pipe nearest to him, and rather easily sealed it with the tape.  he grinned to himself, and began running through the conversation he’d have with Sorensen after he, Cillian, saved Gorshen plant from certain destruction.

the next two pipes sealed with similar ease.  as he proceeded to the fourth pipe, he caught a glimpse of the dead Uhriah further down the hall.  he cringed, but knew he did not have time to concern himself with one man right now: the salvation of the plant, and perhaps the rebellion was at hand.  certainly, his own life was in the balance.

with a deafening burst of sound, the whole structure shook.  Cillian lost his footing, sprawled onto the floor.  the unpatched pipes reinvigorated their venting, but the pipes he had patched held firm.  he brought himself back to his feet, determined to repair the remaining pipes.

another tremor shook the room.  this time, Cillian was able to keep his feet, but he heard a prodigious roar coming from outside the sealed reactor hall.  they must be going, he thought, or at least two of them. the failure of even one of the reactor stems would have been catastrophic.  still, Cillian believed that if he could get these ventilation pipes sealed, he might be able to control the reactor, so long as Sorensen was still up there managing the controls, venting the exterior pipes.

a third explosion rocked the hall, and this time Cillian could not stay upright.  the disruption sent him wheeling backward, and his head cracked soundly against the bulkhead.  he sat for a moment, dazed, mesmerized by the outpouring of steam from the ventilation pipes, steam that was quickly clouding the hall.

in that moment, it dawned on him that it was too late.  he coughed, attempted to stand, was unable to.  no, he thought.  i can still fix it! he pushed himself upward again, managed to gain his feet.  he stumbled against the opposite wall, barely propped himself up on one of the sealed pipes.

“Cillian!”

he heard his name distantly, followed by several loud bangs.

“Cillian!  open the door!”

thoughtlessly, he kicked at the door’s release.

*

Issac had both arms around the broad, sandy-haired miner, who had obviously been injured, and badly.  “come on!” he shouted. “let’s get out of here!”

“no, i can still…i can still…” Cillian reached towards the recklessly venting pipes across the hall.  “i can…”

“no, you can’t!” Issac barked, attempting to pull Cillian out of the room.  “we’re both going to die if you don’t fucking come with me!”

Cillian’s head turned lazily up to meet Issac’s eyes.  the roar of the self-destructing reactor stems nearly made all communication impossible, but Issac somehow heard Cillian say, “but don’t you hate me?  don’t you want me to die?”

“oh, jesus,” Issac said to himself, angry that he had alienated his friend so, but also aware that the man he was interacting with currently was not Cillian, but an injured, distraught version of him.

with all his might, Issac hauled what was now an unresisting Cillian to the foot of the metal staircase.  Issac eyed it woefully, knowing they had little time left, and doubting his own strength.

slowly, one step at a time, he pulled Cillian, who had now slipped completely into unconsciousness, up the steps.  one reactor stem began to spew orange fire from a crack in its casing.  as the fire burned, the crack grew, until a stream of fire was ripping through the reactor chamber.  Issac was exhausted, defeated from the heat and struggle.

then he felt two strong arms grip him below the arms and pull him to his feet.

“grab his legs!” he heard someone shout.

without thinking, Issac complied, and only once he had lifted Cillian’s feet off the steps did he realize that it was Sorensen who had come to aid them.  they lifted Cillian by the shoulders, and together they carried him up the staircase.

*

they had gotten Cillian out onto the scorched dayside dirt just moments before.  Issac was sucking wind feverishly, and Sorensen was short of breath as well.  Cillian shook his head unconsciously, moaned.  he was alive.

Issac turned to face Gorshen plant, which was now perhaps two hundred yards distant.  to Sorensen, and between gulped breaths, he asked, “so what the hell do you think happened?”

and just then, the reactor breached entirely.  in one huge pillar of fire, Gorshen plant erupted in a monumental explosion.

debris landed near the trio, but hit none of them.  Issac’s ears rang from the incredible violence he had just witnessed.  as the smoke began to clear, it became evident that what once had been Gorshen plant was now only a pile of rubble.  Issac turned to face Sorensen.  the daysider was ashen, in a state of total disbelief.

“we’re finished,” he mouthed, though Issac could not hear him.