Zein: The Homecoming (24 page)

Yi was concerned like her that one whole quadrant of the busy city had been cleared of all residents and they had seen prison transport ships flood in over a short period of time, the tell-tale sign of the crossed bar insignia on the side of the large ships indicating the slave cargo.

Yi’s spies, scattered amongst those retained to clean out the homes and office blocks in the quadrant, fed back on the wide range of species from every planet conquered by the Xonians who spilled out of the cargo hold. They talked about the stench of the hold, which they were made to clean, and what distressed them the most was the
bodies they had to bury, who had died in the cramped and appalling conditions; some still chained to their position on the hull floor.

For a race like the Oneerions, the callous disregard of life the Xonians had demonstrated by this slaver mentality shook them to the core. Yi was a kindly man, and on hearing these stories he had sought out Prince Jernli to protest. It had changed nothing, except place him and his son on menial work adding to the city defences as punishment for his insubordination.

He felt the arms of Gi encircle his waist. Yes if the Xonians were to be defeated, belief and trust in this new race from across the stars was needed. They stared across the city as the sun fell in the sky until the planet was plunged into an uneasy darkness.

Zylar cautiously stepped forward to review his latest recruits. Since his arrival he had worked tirelessly in building his new Ilsid army. When he had arrived the Xonians had shown why they had conquered over one hundred galaxies. Their organisation, ruthlessness and readiness to follow commands had delivered over seventy-five thousand new recruits to his zombie-like army.

He surveyed the floor of the skyscraper with its many cubicles containing the thrashing bodies of the prisoners they had presented to him as part of the deal. This was the tenth and last floor today for conversion. The subjects were still struggling with the drug which was the first stage of the conversion to an Ilsid warrior.

Zylar moved to the first cubicle and the Xonian medical staff pulled back the dome cover. He found himself staring at a humanoid figure, similar to a human except that there
was no nose or ears. He had been clear in his instructions that he needed two legged, relatively tall and strong males or females of adult size who were fit or strong. The Xonians had scanned their vast prisoner ranks from conquered worlds that had never known what had hit them when the dominant armies of Xonia invaded. Surprisingly they had found many species that fitted the specifications. Without any thought of the safety for the prisoners, they shipped them out toe to toe in disgusting conditions on the basis, if they were weak they would die and the strong ones would live. Zylar laughed out loud, making the staff around him jump…he had to give it to them, they were the lowest type of scum he had ever seen. You just had to admire them.

He looked on the thrashing body in front of him, noticing the good muscle tone. He reached forward and place his hands either side of the creature’s head and concentrated. His magics flowed from his fingertips into the skull of the prisoner as he built the connection to his subject. The intensity increased until the body slowly stopped thrashing and lay still. He readied himself for the first rush of thoughts, which was a natural part of the “change”. Old memories, loved ones and details of a life that had once been calm and full of hope. Even now Zylar felt the pangs of regret as he wiped the creature’s memories from his brain…the little good inside him rebelling against the magics that had taken his soul away many, many years ago. The brief rebellion was quelled immediately, any pity was ruthlessly extinguished. The creature became a silent shadow of what it had been, its thoughts now a simple vessel for Zylar’s commands.

‘Death do us part,’ Zylar said, humourlessly, before he moved to the next victim and repeated the same process.

The day went slowly as Leila waited for the early morning of the next day. She tried to pass the time playing with the children but time still dragged. She slept in the early evening as Rosanna was taken to Zylar’s room. Rosanna was Italian and a very beautiful girl from Milan. She was fortunate that Zylar paid her little attention as he seemed to prefer lighter haired girls, but tonight her fate was one with which Leila would not wish upon anyone. She gave her a quick hug, told her to be brave and she would see her in the morning. As Rosanna left, Leila vowed that she was going to free all of them as soon as she could.

She again drifted off, warmed by the heat in the room and came to only when Clancy shook her awake. Leila looked at her watch and saw that it was early morning and groggily pulled her body from the chair she had dozed in.

They made their way carefully through the corridors. They were on the tenth floor of the building and the communications room was on the fifteenth. The plan that Yi had devised was for one of the cleaners to set off a fire alarm so the room would be evacuated and the whole floor cleared. A door would be propped open allowing Leila to gain access to the room and Yi had provided one of his operators, a young Oneerion called Kian, to patch her into the communication link connected to the Aeria Cavern on Zein.

She remembered his parting words as she left. ‘We can make the link but you need to understand there may be no one on the other side to take the message. It has been years since we sent any messages – Zein became lost to us.’ Leila had heard the words but struggled to take them in; with all this danger the prospect she may fail with the message was something she just could not accept.

The corridors were quiet due to the time of the night. The few Xonians they did pass had grown used to her
presence and since there was the intimidating figure of Clancy with her, the patrols had more pressing matters to progress. Leila noticed that a number of Ilsid were appearing more frequently as part of the patrols causing her forehead to wrinkle with concern. The training must be increasing at speed – yet another part of the critical message she needed to send.

They entered a darkly lit corridor and at the end was a locked door with one of Clancy’s colleagues guarding it. What had happened to the fire alarm? Leila turned to Kian with a questioning look, who in return shook his head in confusion, he could only guess that the soldiers had prevented the cleaners entering the room and curtailed the ruse.

‘Stay here,’ Clancy ordered, taking charge. He sauntered up to the Malacca man, an unsavoury type with a sullen look about him whom Leila remembered as one the guards she had sent to tell Zylar of the birth of Hanna. They conversed briefly before the man stood to one side. As he walked past Leila and Kian, his eyes lingered over her, not hiding his desire or intention. Leila glared back at him and he simply smirked. She hurried past as Clancy opened the door.

‘What did you say to him? How can you trust that he will not go straight to Zylar?’ Leila whispered worriedly, still rattled by the loathsome look the soldier had given her.

‘We go back many years, joining the army at the same time. Believe me he has no love for authority and Zylar scares the living daylights out of him,’ said Clancy, leading them into the communication room.

There were three people in the room, one operator and two more soldiers, all Malacca men. Clancy shook their hands, clapping them on their shoulders and gave them a knowing wink. All three laughed and left their positions,
going into a room at the back which Leila glimpsed was a kitchen of some sorts.

Clancy came back to his companions. ‘What are they doing?’ asked a confused Leila. Clancy looked a little embarrassed, which made Leila press her question.

‘I hope you don’t mind, my lady, but I had to say something to give us a little time here. They are taking a little break.’ His face blushed red.

‘What did you say?’ said Leila.

‘I said that I was on a promise, of eh…some fun, if I could have the room for a few minutes, and that I had an operator just in case a message came in,’ said the squirming Malacca man. Leila then surprised him by laughing, which the guards and operator heard as the door was closing on them – they let out some raucous laughter. When the door was shut, Leila stopped laughing and became business like again. She tapped him on his tree trunk like forearms.

‘You did well, just thought I would give you some bragging rights later.’

Clancy beamed his delight.

Glancing at the closed door, with the laughter echoing from the kitchen still, Leila beckoned Kian to the controls. Kian moved fast. He took out the recorded message that Leila had given him and which he had converted to the necessary authentication security algorithm, allowing it to pass through the security firewall to the external connectivity drives that fed the Universe-recognised messaging services. His hands flew over the controls, pressing the many holograms of information. His two watchers behind his back, kept their attention on the main door and the door to the rest area. They didn’t have much time for her message to be uploaded.

The soldiers’ rough tones and language echoed through the thin door to the rest area and it was apparent that
they had waited long enough. Kian made his final inputs and then stood up abruptly and moved away from the main control and stood silently with his head bowed. Leila leaned her body into Clancy and wrapped her arms around him. Clancy, surprised and a little slow on the uptake, left his arms at the side of his body. Leila grabbed one of his arms and placed it around her.

The returning soldiers took it all in as the couple came into their sight. They let out whoops and more bad language. Leila pushed away from Clancy with a suitable innocent look and Clancy, well Clancy just stood like a lump of wood, not sure what to do.

The Malacca operator joined in the jocular puns and sat down at his console. His hands darted across the dials and he frowned slightly and turned his head to look at Kian who kept his head down, refusing any eye contact. The operator kept his gaze on the top of Kian’s golden forehead and then shrugged his shoulders and returned to his work.

‘Clancy, can we go back now…I would like to show you my appreciation of seeing such a great room,’ said Leila, shyly. The inevitable hoots followed and the two sentries again gave Clancy many pointers. Clancy decided enough was enough and he hurried Leila and Kian out of the room. The guard on the door gave another lecherous look at Leila, which she ignored. They hurried through the corridors with Kian, peeling off to go to his own quarters, only after Leila gave her thanks for his help. He bowed deeply on their parting.

Back at the female quarters, Clancy took up his position on the door outside and Leila tired and worried that her message had not got through, fell onto her bed and into a restless sleep.

The console cranked into life under the layer of thick dust. The room, a darkened bunker deep under the transportation room in the Aeria Cavern, was an unremarkable room, empty of furniture except for a large chair in front of a sleek black desk with four main screens, which until a moment ago, had remained dormant for many years.

A wave of red dots flashed across one screen, the other screens began to emit a green code as the old system began to receive its first message for a long time. The noise increased until the room was filled with a whole range of whirrs and clicks. Then, as suddenly as the noise had started, the console switched off. Message received. The room returned to its quiet state, the console still covered in dust and no one the wiser for the noise. High above the room the Pod were scaling the barricades…the message lost within the unused console.