“An’ I told you I ain’t giving it a care whether the rules changed, that piece of paper there says the Baron himself wants this delivered to those co-ordinates. If you want to rouse him from his rest this early, then be my guest.”
T’sala could hear the rumsey clearly from the place in the floor where her and Alec were once again hiding amongst the meagre goods the Rumsey planned to smuggle into the place where her people were. T’sala had a hard time keeping up with the unique way the Rumsey spoke, so she often found herself looking to Alec often the previous night. He would nod in assurance, and that put T’sala at ease even if she didn’t quite understand. They had planned to wake before sunrise, and they had two stops, if they made it through the first one alive. The second T’sala was the most interested in, the place where her people were locked away on this planet. The images from Rumsey’s recorder haunted her throughout the night, and she was not able to sleep.
T’sala had learned the Baron here was desperate and without many resources, not like the man she had lived under. But poverty and desperation could drive a different kind of viciousness. The conditions here were hard, and that made the people merciless. The Rumsey had also told them that in the cold, all but a metal man and an Aamaranth woman would pass in hours. Frozen to the core. It made what Rumsey did here valuable to the Baron and gave them the ability to pass into the compound they now sat at the gate of.
There was a muffled voice from beyond T’sala’s hearing, then the Rumsey responded, “Scan it all you want, it ain’t expiring, but it is precious, if the flavours off on his brand of Veiss’s wine, I’m blaming it on the radiation from that thing… Yeah… didn’t think so… ha!.. I wouldn’t wake him either. It’s one cask, but it can’t touch this icy air, so gate thirty-eight should work fine.”
There was a large blaring of an alarm that sounded like a smaller rift station, and T’sala felt the rumble of something large being dragged across the icy ground. That must be the gate, the Rumsey had said it was large, but to cause the truck Thunder to shiver so much, the gate must be dense too. That was locked in T’sala’s memory, tracking it in case a quick getaway was needed. Back the way they had come would not be the wise choice with a gate like that. She felt the vehicle lurch forward and two large bumps as they cleared the security gate.
Even from within the smuggling bay, she could hear the Rumsey sigh with relief. She looked over to Alec lying beside her. He was tense, she could feel it in her blood, but his eyes reflected the soft blue confidence she found so alluring. Her purple glow grew to match but was stifled as the Rumsey chimed in. “Shouldn’t be more than ten minutes now for the pair of you. Thirty-eight is a specialty bay for the baron receiving things he wants to keep from prying eyes. Like I said last night, the roots of rebellion are growing amongst the townsfolk here. Empty bellies and cold nights will do that. Unfortunately, most of em’ by that shit the baron sells them that it’s Teretha’s fault.”
The offworlder seemed to be caught off guard by the speaking as well. “fzzzip squawk flarburgr!” They had neither managed to fix the new voicebox nor dislodge it in the time they had had. The man, Alec, ’s free hand went up to stifle the sound, and his eyes grew dark with embarrassment.
“Ha! Couldn’t have said it better myself, metal man!” The Rumsey chimed in again, clearly from her tone, enjoying the nonsense coming from the electronic box. “Flarburgr indeed! The point being, Thirty-eight has very little human presence and no recording devices of any kind. Do you remember the route?”
This was the part T’sala had focused her mind on when she could not find sleep from the images of her suffering people. “Right, straight, Left, third door on the right, stairs, put jam to the door, then Alec knows what we seek.” T’sala felt proud and looked to the off-worlder and nodded confidently. He smiled at her and moved his free hand to tip her chin in confirmation. The vehicle lurched, and his hand instead brushed her cheek gently, and she felt her purple glow fill the cab.
T’sala wanted to pull the man, Alec, close and finish the moment they had almost shared before the Rumsey had stolen it. If T’sala was head of this tribe, she would change her name to Rumsey, moment stealer, so all in the tribe would know. She realized she was pouting when the man, Alec’s gloved thumb, tapped her lip. Her glow had flared to light up the entire space.
“That’s right mam, you don’t say much, but when you do, it’s what I need to hear! I’ll keep Thunder runnin’, and you make your way back to me. Just remember, it’s a handful of people in there, but if even one sees you, you need to end them all before we leave, or that gate won’t be opening. Silence and stealth are the key. You got the code-jam, yeah?” This word was so foreign to T’sala that they did not understand the small octagon the Rumsey had given them as they climbed in. It was supposed to be the key to unlock the door that the energy source sat behind. The Rumsey had told them that they could power the small gate in the place where her people were held. They could escape the planet and leave it to the interlopers. T’sala hoped they battled amongst themselves until death, or starved in the cold, the way her people were.
The offworlder tapped her shoulder and pointed to the panel that sat between them and the main cab. He was wiggling the octagon. “Yes, we have the code jam”. She said it with no confidence except for the last part. She knew that word from the baron's breakfasts that she would hover over before. They must eat horribly on this planet if their jam can also unlock a door, T’sala thought.
The rumsey did not respond, but T’sala felt the vehicle stop, wait and then pull ahead slowly. “One walkin’ the floor, give it a few yeah? Let ol’ rumsey work her magic.” T’sala heard the door open, and the woman leave. A few minutes later, the panel made noise, and T’sala tensed, ready for battle. She felt the man, Alec, do the same as his free hand grabbed his revolver with no bullets. Bullets wouldn’t help anyway, but the threat of the oversized weapon with the purple lighting arc could buy them silence amongst a cowardly foe.
It was not a foe but the Rumsey with her wide, uncanny smile beaming down at the two of them. “Ol’ Rumsey gave him a pack of happy flares, and he’s off to find a corner, should buy you just enough time if you're quick. Go now!” The last was an urgent whisper, and both T’sala and Alec moved up in unison. She felt that since the dances, something had changed in them, and she no longer had to anticipate his movements, but rather their natural movement was a perfect dance. They exited the vehicle like two thieves in a three-armed race, bound where their hands clasped together with intertwined fingers.
T’sala recalled the path, and the off-worlder followed her lead, unlike when they had danced, and yet this seemed just as natural to him. He was a wonder to her, and she felt empowered in the way that he naturally assumed she could handle this. The winding corridors were short and clinically clean. Only once did they hear the voice of another person through a small radio. T’sala peeked her head around the corner in time to see a man dressed in body armour and a security visor walk through the door and close it behind him. T’sala heard a conversation trail off as the door closed, “Nah, that short little thing gave me the pack and said she’d unload it, gift horse and all that…” The door closed, and T’sala could not hear anything beyond. There, three doors, she was supposed to take the right, were right in front of them, with the guard's room door in between.
T’sala looked to Alec for support and saw nothing but unwavering belief in her abilities. She took a deep breath and pulled on her Aamaranth blood. She felt him do the same as they sped down the corridor at a speed that would have left nothing but the briefest purple flair in a human eye. T’sala loved this; it was exhilarating, and she could see the offworlder was ecstatic as well. The plan had been to slow the rate as they neared the door, but T’sala couldn’t find a reason to stop the draw on her powerful blood. They burst through the door and in a single leap cleared the stairwell, landing before the door softly clicked closed behind them.
The man, Alec, placed the jam on the door. It did not look like any container of Jam T’sala he had seen before, and it had a series of buttons he now pressed. There was a sharp whining noise and then a small arc of green electricity and a small pop. The large electronic lock on the door lost all power, and a soft click, similar to the upper door, sounded in the silence.
T’sala felt her offworlder disconnecting as he began to release the draw on her blood that they shared. She reluctantly began to release her power as they crept slowly into the room where the Rumsey had said her Offworlder would know what they sought. The man, Alec, moved with purpose and this time T’sala followed him. The room itself was filled with shelves and equipment that reminded T’sala of the instruments of terror the madam Zelsim had used to change her. Her pace slowed, and Alec paused for a moment. He looked concerned for a moment, then began to sign. T’sala realized he was focusing on bypassing the makeshift voice box so as not to draw attention from the guards above them.
He signed in Teretha quickly, “must focus, our people we help. Most important is….” His hand waved for a moment and then pointed to a small canister with a green glowing button on it. “This,” he signalled, pointing to it with a look of relief on his face. “This, this flies to…” the man, Alec, searched for words, then signalled driving. T’sala understood; he meant quip. This thing would get them to her people and the place she called home. The offworlder grabbed the device, and a small sphere fell off the shelf, rolling and bouncing into the darkness beyond. T’sala wanted to curse but feared the sound would draw added attention; perhaps they could hide and wait out a guard, assuming it was an accident.
The man, Alec, did swear, but it did not come out that way. “Glazvalfrap snart!” The vocal box sparked in the darkness as the sound echoed up through the stairwell. The man ales pushed the green power canister they came for into her hands and with his other hand drew his revolver. T’sala could hear footsteps coming down the stairs, and she drew on her power as Alec did. They moved in unison as a guard entered the doorframe. T’sala went low, and Alec went high as the band crumpled in silence. More footsteps were moving above them, but they had a chance without the alarm being raised to make it free. They would just need to speed ahead…
T’sala made to run and found herself anchored by her connected arm to the offworlder standing still, looking behind them. She followed his gaze to the back of the room they had just left. The bouncing, clamouring sphere had knocked a box free, and it had fallen, scattering glowing purple vials on the ground. T’sala saw the offworlders' eyes light with a ravenous hunger, and she could almost feel it in her blood. It was not just the power the man craved; he had that with her. It was the meditation of his process and the freedom it provided him. T’sala could feel that too, and it made her angry. “This!” She indicated the canister in her hand, “This and my people, home, quip, all of the things are here in this! You told me offowrlder!”
She could hear the footsteps organizing with radios above here as the downed man’s radio called for an update. Her eyes pleaded with the man, Alec’s. “ Can make it, save our people.” He signed to her, then lifted their connected hands and pulled free. She felt the needle leave her skin and the suit close up around it, insulating her completely again from feeling anything. Especially her offworlder. That feeling above all was the hardest, and she wanted to hate him for making her feel it. She actually hated him in the moment for what she saw next. He turned from her, losing the last of the blood he had drawn from her by the second and moved purposefully to the purple vials. At this rate, he would not make it before the guards defended the room. If she chose to help him, they would not make it free with the key to help her people, and the rumsey waited with Thunder above her. The man had wished her to leave and turned his back, so Tsala did.
She took the radio from the guard's belt and did not look back as she drew on her blood and became a purple blur. She saw the toe of a boot exiting the guard room as she drew near. Now free of her binding to another, T’sala could move freely. She slid low, and the guard registered nothing as she tore back the way she had come, feeling more alone than ever.
“Man down, man down. Single target observed!” Gunfire. The radio crackled with sporadic life through the last of T’sala’s journey. The Rumsey was in her seat as T’sala jumped the ladder to the door and entered the vehicle.
“Where’s the metal man!?”
“Go!”
“But?”
“Go!!”
T’sala could feel the rage and need for tears, causing her purple glow to fill the cab of the rummy’s vehicle. The rage burnt the tears, however, and she found herself hating the man, Alec. The rumsey pulled the truck ahead through another gate out of the compound and back onto the road toward the main security gate. “Let’s hope he keeps ’em busy till we make it through. If they manage to sound the alarm, the trip stops here for all of us. How did you lose him, darlin’? You two were literally connected at the wrist!”
T’sala ran her hand down to where she was connected to the man, Alec, not more than 5 minutes before. She felt empty and regretted hating him. She remembered the endless days of being bound by her baronhood captor and how she ached for freedom. She was ready to destroy her people and her planet to feel a moment of that. In her realization, her anger and glow finally faded. The Rumsey was looking at her with a look that knew loss. “Better get to your spot, gates coming up, darlin’, let's not let his sacrifice be in vain.” T’sala climbed into the smuggling bay with her thoughts. She would let the rumsey think it was a selfless sacrifice; it would do his memory more honour than a man who gave up everything for one taste of freedom. Even in her understanding, T’sala felt devastated that the world yet again had ripped the only goodness she had in life from her.
