Imperial rogue, p.17
Imperial Rogue, page 17
A small beep shattered the silence, and he immediately swung around toward the living room display, which had lit up automatically, showing the alley outside. Five individuals wearing black tactical clothing, harnesses, and visored helmets, carrying carbines, were carefully casing his lodging’s door. There could only be one explanation, since the entrance was nondescript and more likely a side door to the disused warehouse surrounding the apartment.
“Damn.”
Morane knew his luck had finally run out. He grabbed his jacket and blaster and headed for the bedroom. There, he touched a control button hidden in the baseboard, and lines suddenly appeared on the previously blank wall, outlining a panel, which slid aside moments later. Still carrying the beer bulb, Morane entered the small dark space behind the panel and touched another control, sealing the opening once more.
He climbed down a narrow shaft on a ladder until he reached a low-ceilinged horizontal tunnel faintly lit by dying glow globes. Water dripped randomly from cracks in the walls and ceiling, and slime made the floor slippery.
As he took cautious steps, Morane figured that if the OSR didn’t know about his secret escape route, he still had a chance of eluding them. But then what? Another change of appearance, of course. The increasing amount of surveillance sensors blanketing New Lena, at least in the more respectable quarters — they tended to malfunction in the rougher parts of town — practically demanded it. And then, he’d try to disappear among the city’s growing transient population, perhaps move to the second largest agglomeration on Yotai, five hundred kilometers south of New Lena.
He reached the end of the tunnel and another shaft with a ladder pointing toward the surface. Having done the trip several times to familiarize himself with both ends, Morane knew he’d emerge in a hidden closet at the back of one of the abandoned warehouse’s offices, but wouldn’t be able to see if anyone waited for him outside.
Morane gently touched the controls to open the closet door, and it silently slid aside, exposing an empty office with a thick layer of dust on the floor. So far, so good. He listened for almost a minute, but beyond the faint sounds of small creatures scurrying about unseen, he heard nothing.
Then, he carefully stepped out and made for the office door, cracking it just enough to peer out. Still nothing. Encouraged, Morane crossed the bare warehouse floor, noting the only traces in the dust were those of little three-toed native rat analogs. Clearly, the OSR was unaware of his escape route. For now. They’d eventually find the hidden door in the apartment, and he needed to get out of here.
He slipped through the half-open cargo doors at the other end and headed across a yard overgrown with tough, native vegetation reclaiming its little piece of the planet. One glance at the alley through a gate hanging drunkenly to one side to confirm it was empty, and he stepped through.
After orienting himself, Morane headed deeper into what was generally acknowledged as the city’s lawless zone, where transients lived cheek by jowl with criminals, drug users, and assorted riffraff. The local police occasionally patrolled the area but generally left the people to prey on each other. The authorities didn’t care what happened to the dregs of society in Derik Juska’s enlightened Republic.
Once at the heart of the zone, Morane made his way to the hidden saloon back room where the Identity Maker held court. There, he dumped a handful of cred chips on the counter, and in half an hour, he received a new appearance and new credentials that were good enough for everyday use.
After thanking the man, Morane returned to the street and searched out the flophouse he’d previously reconnoitered in case he had to vacate the apartment quickly. Taking care to appear tough and intimidating, he stepped over a few addicts in the throes of their drug-induced hallucinations, while meeting the eyes of losers and outcasts sitting in doorways, sizing him up for a quick mugging. Bearded, with long hair, a craggy face, and a piercing gaze, Lucas Morane exuded menace in the way he carried himself. Those who’d served a hitch in the Defense Force recognized a fellow former member, while the pure civilians saw a man who shouldn’t be crossed.
He reached the flophouse and entered.
“Got a cot for three nights?” He asked the thin, scruffy-looking woman sitting behind a pane of transparent aluminum that protected her from the rowdier inmates.
“Yep. Ten creds, in advance,” she replied in a thin, scratchy voice, pointing at a sliding tray cut through the pane. “No fighting, no drugs, and no sex. Otherwise, you’re out on your ass with no refund.”
“Sure.” He dropped a ten-cred chip in the tray and watched it vanish in an instant.
“Second floor, room twenty-three.” She indicated the stairway behind her.
“Thanks.”
Morane climbed the grimy concrete stairs — no lifts in this part of town — and found his room near the landing. He opened the door onto a space that made ordinary closets look spacious. It contained a narrow bed, a tiny table, and a few shelves, nothing more. After keying the door lock with his thumbprint, Morane found the communal washroom and availed himself of the facilities, then took the stairs back to the lobby and exited the flophouse, looking for food.
He found a rundown tavern one block over, entered, and, after a scan of the sparsely populated taproom, took a corner table. The place was cleaner than its outside appearance suggested, though the furnishings showed signs of age and heavy use. A large man in a sleeveless shirt held court behind the metal-topped bar, a giant blaster holstered at his hip. Morane figured he had little trouble with the riffraff.
A holographic menu popped up from the tabletop, and he studied it with one eye — a list of drinks and a much shorter list of food items. Then his nostrils caught the aromas wafting from the kitchen, and they were more enticing than he’d expected. Morane ordered a hot-pot and a beer and sat back, eyes roaming over his surroundings. He must not have looked out of place because no one paid him the slightest bit of attention, and for the first time since the display in his former apartment bleeped to life, he felt some of the tension in his shoulders drain away.
After a while, Morane smiled as he thought about how far he’d fallen — from commodore in the Republic’s Navy to vagrant and political criminal on the run. Then again, his friend Farrin Norum had fallen from far higher and, after ten years on the run, ended up in the clutches of the OSR. Derik Juska had much to answer for, and Morane would gladly put a round from his blaster through the president’s skull, but that had to stay in the realm of fantasy.
— 32 —
“It’s quite simple.” Sisters Desra and Bree stood outside Farrin Norum’s cell, watching him via a display beside the door. “And rather complex at the same time. We enter his mind and imprint good feelings about President Juska and his government onto his memory engrams. But finding the right engrams can be difficult, and we theorize that the attempt to imprint the wrong engrams causes the negative reactions we’ve seen from time to time. But we have yet to find proof. The whole science of manipulating the mind by etching false memories directly onto the brain is still poorly understood. And that’s mainly because of the two-hundred-year moratorium on research thanks to Sister Marta, the great-grandmother several times removed of our Admiral Norum.”
“What happened?”
“The way I understand it, she was experimenting with psychopathic prisoners in the Windy Isles, attempting to cure them. One died a horrible death under her care when her brain literally burned out, and Marta never forgave herself. She had the Summus Abbatissa of the time forbid further research and experimentation involving direct intervention in another’s mind.”
“And Elana removed the strictures.”
Desra nodded. “Just so.”
“Do you wish me to join you in his cell?”
“Yes. And since Ygritte indicated you might be interested in becoming a re-educator, you’ll accompany me in entering the subject’s mind to observe what I do and how I do it. We shall join our consciousnesses, so you sense what I sense.”
“I have never joined with another Sister.”
“You’ll find the experience interesting. We retain our individuality, of course, and cannot enter each other’s minds unless we want to. But it’s not necessary. Discovering the ability to join is another result of Elana finally allowing research.”
“Interesting.” Bree studied Norum, who sat in his cell’s only chair, staring at an entertainment screen. “I am ready, whenever you wish to begin.”
Desra touched a control surface embedded in the door jamb, and it slid aside noiselessly. An obviously alert Norum turned toward it almost immediately and watched the two black-robed Sisters enter.
“I am Desra, and this is Bree. We are your re-educators.”
“I won’t lie and say I’m pleased to meet you, Sisters. Let’s just say I abhor the notion of meddling with another’s mind and changing parts of it against his will.”
“In that, you do not differ from any of the other subjects who pass through our hands.”
“Subjects? Is that what you call your victims? Nicely dehumanizing, if you ask me. But then, considering you’re abominations, I shouldn’t expect anything else.”
A cold smile briefly touched Desra’s lips. “Abominations? Do take care with your epithets, Admiral, for I can show you terrors like you’ve never imagined.”
“I’m sure you can because I’ve witnessed Sisters of the Void Reborn doing so to loosen the tongues of criminals. Not a pleasant sight. But I understand they’ll no longer do so since they’ve submitted to Lindisfarne and are withdrawing from those secular affairs that are contrary to the Spirit of the Void.” He paused and then, injecting as much contempt and loathing into his voice as he could, he added, “Whereas you’re embracing the vilest of secular business. At least the Void Reborn never tried to rewrite someone’s thoughts.”
“Retreating back to the old ways will ensure the lesser Void Orders vanish, leaving us as the only true servants of the Almighty.”
“The way you’re going, Sister, the Almighty will turn away from your debased version of the Order, leaving it to serve the darkness.”
“Enough,” Desra snapped. “You are not in a position to criticize us, you who betrayed the Republic and its citizens by defecting to our existential enemy.”
Norum let out a bark of laughter. “You’ve swallowed Juska’s and the United Stars Bloc’s propaganda wholesale, Sister. It doesn’t speak well for you.”
Desra took a few steps and placed her dry, cold fingertips on Norum’s neck before he could protest. Almost at once, his capacity to shrug her off vanished.
“You bloody witch. Give me back my free will.”
“Shush, Admiral. This will go much easier and faster if you simply sit back and relax.”
Desra held her other hand out to Bree, who took it. A second or two later, the latter felt Desra’s consciousness brush up against hers. Then, she followed it as they plunged into Norum’s mind, looking for places they could use to anchor new memories of admiration and respect for Derik Juska. It was painstaking work, and when Desra finally broke contact with Norum an hour later, both she and Bree were exhausted.
“That will suffice for today, Admiral. You may now exercise your free will once more.”
“Gee, thanks.” Norum rolled his stiff shoulders and slowly loosened his neck muscles. “And thanks for causing me massive muscle seizures in my upper body.”
“If I didn’t have to keep you forcibly still, you wouldn’t be in pain. Think about it the next time.”
With that, Desra and Bree left the cell.
“How did you find your first experience?” The former asked as they walked along the corridor to the Sisters’ break room for a breather.
“Um, fascinating. I’ve never been so deep inside another’s mind. But I still couldn’t sense anything beyond his emotions, which were quite strong and negative toward us.”
“That is normal. Reading another’s thoughts is still beyond us. Just finding the places in his consciousness where we can implant new memories is a stretch.”
“I saw nothing like that.”
“And you won’t until I begin the process of implantation. Then, you’ll discover what those places look like. But once you do, you never forget. We’ll tackle DeCarde after the midday meal. I should be sufficiently recovered by then.”
“Is it highly draining?”
“Yes.” Desra nodded once. “Implanting the new memories even more so. That is why it takes weeks to complete in even the most cooperative of subjects. Those with awareness of our doings in their mind take longer since they fight us. Some go insane; a few die.”
The matter-of-fact way in which Desra spoke made Bree cringe inwardly. The Order of the Void was supposed to ease suffering, not cause it. If this was their future, she might as well defect to the Empire as well because she could not see herself remaining in an Order so cruel. But first, she had to find a way of keeping Admiral Norum and Ambassador DeCarde from joining Juska’s cheerleaders, or worse, suffering insanity or death.
They were back in the detention block after eating, this time observing Currag DeCarde via the display beside his cell door. He, too, was watching the entertainment screen from the cell’s sole chair. After a few minutes, Desra touched the control panel embedded in the door jamb, and it opened.
“I am Sister Desra, and this is Sister Bree. We are your re-educators,” the former said as they stepped into the cell.
DeCarde kept his eyes on the screen but said, “I’m in no need of further education, let alone re-education, so kindly fuck off, Sisters.”
Desra reached out to touch his subconscious and found impassable barriers around it.
“You have defenses.”
“Congratulations for noticing. I guess you’re a real mind meddler and not some cheap imitation in black robes.”
“You will drop them.”
“No.”
Desra attempted an all-out assault on DeCarde’s barriers and let out a small shriek when he assaulted her in turn with gory images of dismemberment and death, forcing her to retreat.
“How did you do that?” Though in control of her words, both Bree and DeCarde noticed slight tremors in the tone, a sign the brief experience had thoroughly shaken her.
“It’s a genetic trait my family has carried since the time of the Ancestor before the First Empire was founded. But I can’t reach out to others, only project when others enter my mind.”
“I see. Then we have a problem.”
“You have a problem. Without access, you can’t reeducate me, and I won’t give you access.”
“There are ways to convince you, Ambassador. All human beings have a finite limit on the amount of pain they can tolerate. Once we find your threshold, we will apply pressure until you yield.”
“So, the Order of the Void, Lyonesse Version, is into torture as well as forcible mind-meddling now? How the hell did that happen?” DeCarde slowly turned his head toward Desra and cocked an eyebrow. “When I left five years ago, it was still a benevolent religious organization dedicated to succoring the afflicted.”
“We do not torture people, although the OSR will employ more robust methods of convincing political prisoners to cooperate with us. As for the forcible mind-meddling, as you call it, that is merely to correct antisocial leanings and help political prisoners reintegrate into society as productive, cheerful members.”
“I suppose telling yourself sweet little lies like that is a coping mechanism. Then you don’t have to look at yourself in the mirror and wonder why you’re such an evil, soulless bitch.”
A thin, icy smile briefly pulled at Desra’s lips. “Oh, I’m going to so enjoy re-educating you, DeCarde. Maybe I’ll slip in a few special behavior modifiers just for fun.”
“Good luck with that. My mental defenses will not drop even though you end up killing me. Understand that they’re up by default, and I have to will them down. For that, I need to be awake, conscious, and not in pain, because pain overrides my ability to lower them. It’s an instinctive survival mechanism. Don’t ask me how it works because I don’t know. We DeCardes are born with it.”
“We shall see. And if you are impossible to reeducate, you might provide one last service to the Republic by being executed as an example to others who would defect.”
“A Sister of the Void advocating for capital punishment simply because one disagrees with the president? What next? Execution for holding the wrong beliefs? You’re not the Order of the Void; you’re the Order of Darkness. The Almighty’s face has turned away from you, damning you and your Brethren for eternity.”
Desra shook her head. “You talk too much, Ambassador. I will refer you back to the OSR, and they’ll see what they can do. The Sister conducting your interrogation did not mention any defenses. According to her report, she entered your mind easily.”
“Because I let her.”
“I get the feeling a bit of vigorous convincing will open your mind. Enjoy the rest of your day.”
With that, Desra turned on her heels and left the cell. Bree gave DeCarde a sympathetic glance before following her colleague back into the corridor.
Desra’s words, especially her equivocation and hypocrisy, mildly shocked her, and she wondered whether DeCarde might be right — that the Almighty’s face had turned away from them for the monstrous acts Sisters were committing against other human beings.
— 33 —
The following day, a familiar, yet still nameless figure entered DeCarde’s cell as he sat in front of the entertainment screen — the business suit-wearing Sister who’d first interviewed him in the OSR dungeon. A thickset bald man with a goatee, also wearing dark business attire, followed her. He carried a briefcase in his left hand.
