EDITED ON 14-7-15.
Holy slag! I can't believe its already been three weeks since my last update! But I do have an update at least. Its s bit shorter than I am really used to and that kinda irks me, but I just cannot get it to cooperate. So rather than force a longer, but subpar chapter, you get a slightly shorter chapter.
No clue when I'll update next. I've got drivers ed and college all starting at once in the next two weeks so please bare with me.
And without further ado, enjoy your weekly dose of quintesson craziness!
Chapter Twenty Six
Mental Strains
Alchana had very little sleep the night after her meeting with Volam. How could she, with the weight of what she'd gotten into with Volam. Their arrangement, if you could call mutual blackmailing an arrangement, weighed heavily on her mind.
To be degraded to making errand runs, for Volam of all squids, was insulting to her pride.
Now she was stuck with trying to figure out just how she was going get into the lab, which with her typical branch of luck, was located at the other end of Yaos towards the outskirts of the citadel. A place where a scientist of her particular division and rank should never be seen.
It would certainly make for an interesting undertaking.
Alchana leaned back heavily in the high-backed chair that was specifically made for three facers such as herself. The other scientists continued their own work quietly, having quickly grown accustomed to Alchana's more subdued, if not agitated, demeanor since Tiron P'thian's transfer.
It was a strange contrast really.
Where before she was much more involved in the everyday aspects of their work she was snappish and made no room for error. Now she was largely unresponsive, and whenever she did focus back on reality it was to explode into a violent tirade over something that previously would have gone unnoticed. The scientists who had been around the longest were unnerved, to say the least, by the professor's abnormal disposition.
Alchana, however, cared little for the thoughts of her lesser colleagues and quite honestly didn't care.
She had other matters to consider.
Like how she was going to casually levitate into one of the most secure, not to mention technologically advanced, facilities in Yaos. Without being noticed. Then proceed to hack into what likely was one of the most important databases in the possession of the Judges.
Alchana was far too stubborn to admit it, but the task was daunting.
She was quiet for a few klicks, pondering the problem.
It was clear to her that going in herself would be self-defeating. There was just no way that she could successfully pull off the reconnaissance in person. And Alchana detested that particular point with a passion.
Without Tiron by her side, she had no one that she could trust aside from herself. She knew of no other insurrectionists within her division, seeing as AI research and development was the site of the majority of those faithful to the Judges. So while it gave her a certain element of surprise to be coming from such a faithful populated division, it did make her job more difficult.
Alchana snarled suddenly and levitated out of her seat with no warning with blazing thrusters, startling a few nearby scientists.
Without consciously realizing it, Alchana started making loose circles around the lab. As she made her rounds circling the main workstations, every quint was sure to give her a wide berth for fear of being a further cause of her wrath.
Alchana's innermost thoughts were bubbling out of her in waves of loathing towards the situation Volam had put her in.
How was she to accomplish anything with that pit-spawned squid of a malformed pod watching her every move? She had no doubts; Volam most certainly would be keeping an eye on her and likely had been since the very first cycle.
The enigmatic politician had no right, no right, to spy on her like some kind of stalking animal and then force her into something that she wanted no part of.
But even in her current start of mind, Alchana knew that she was lying to herself. Alchana knew that he had given her exactly what she wanted, played her into doing his dirty work, leaving just enough bait to make her need to help him to meet her own goals.
And that made her hate him all the more.
To know that she could be so easily tricked into thinking the way he wanted her to think. After all that she had prided herself on being immobile in her ways, working towards her own goals and taking no heed to those who stood in her way.
Yet here she was, heating up her thrusters as she circled the lab as she tried to figure a way out of a situation she had practically levitated into.
She could almost feel him watching her, gauging every move she made, attempting to dig into her convoluted thoughts so that he could manipulate her further. It was like a prickle on the backs of her faces, an itch she couldn't reach.
With a near feral snarl, Alchana flipped around and glared at the small device centered on the wall behind her, blending in perfectly unless you knew where it was.
Her harshly accented features hissed silently at the wall and she hovered there for several klicks, frozen in her own blind –fearful- rage.
"Alchana!"
Alchana startled, her eyes rapidly switching back to their normal icy blue as she focused on Tiron. "What are you doing here?"
"Just checking in on you." Tiron shrugged, his shoulder guards bobbing up and down as he did so. "I was passing by."
Any relief Alchana might have had at seeing her colleague quickly faded at his words. "What makes you think I need you to check in on me?" The three-faced scientist snarled venomously, not even acknowledging how much just seeing his familiar face grounded her chaotic thoughts. He was her focus point.
When he was there, she could think clearly.
But Alchana continued anyway, "This lab is not even on the way to general engineering!"
Tiron was silent for a long moment, just watching Alchana. She was breathing heavily, as was expected of one after going on such a tirade, but she wasn't calming down as he normally expected her to.
"I thought it would be a profitable use of my time to come by the lab." Tiron said cautiously, unsure of what her state of mind had become during his absence. He did worry for his long-term colleague, hence his reason for being there. "I also forgot a rather important datapad." He added afterword, feeling just a touch sheepish for forgetting it.
Alchana surprised him as her lips slowly quirked upwards of their own accord. She didn't say anything, but Tiron could feel the tension leave her posture.
"I cannot stay long; Hemir will be waiting for me."
Alchana scoffed, "That youngling is a waste of your time Tiron."
Tiron's eyes narrowed fractionally at the comment, but he brushed it off just as quickly. "He is still young and has much to learn."
Alchana felt no desire to prod him further. At that moment she was -perhaps not content- but semi relaxed at least, in Tiron's presence.
"It was good to see you again Duani." Tiron said softly as he went to grab his datapad. Alchana hadn't moved it from where he'd left it, and he couldn't help but to smirk inwardly at the thought of Alchana's sentiment. She tried to hide it, but he always managed to get under her skin.
"I… It-" Alchana stopped, continuing only once she had what she wanted to say straight in her mind. "I am… glad you forgot your datapad."
Tiron blinked, uncertain of her words. In the end, he decided not to comment on it, choosing instead to just leave. At the entranceway, however he turned and dipped his head respectfully towards his former colleague.
"I bid you farewell, Honorable Professor Alchana-Duani." He said intensely, his parting words reflecting the deep respect he had for her, though not often expressed.
Then he left.
However, he did not get very far before he was stopped by a regrettably familiar voice. Steeling himself mentally, Tiron turned around to face his brother, who was whispering at him rather ineffectively from the entryway he'd just exited.
"Rather than hovering in the doorway, why don't you come out here to tell me whatever it is that you want to tell me?"
Bithon rolled his eyes dramatically and made his way into the hallway where his brother was.
"I need to speak to you about Alchana." Bithon stated, not bothering to dance around the subject.
"Bithon, we've discussed this already and I don't have the time to argue with you right now." Tiron responded sharply.
"I'm not joking Tiron." Bithon reached up a tentacle and turned his pod brother around from where he had started to continue down the hall. "There is something going on in your professor's head -and it's not science."
Tiron blinked at the sudden seriousness his brother's voice and stopped dead in his tracks. "What are you trying to say?"
"What I am trying to say is: I don't think Alchana is stable." The older quint sighed, "And with the way the insurrection has gone lately, I'm not sure she ever was."
Bithon continued quickly when Tirons eyes narrowed dangerously, "I know we were all in this together when we started, and maybe we were all a bit... desperate to get one up on the Judges, but now I'm beginning to wonder if Alchana really knows what she's doing."
"You're backing out." Tiron replied skeptically, his tone bordering on accusatory as he pushed further, not willing to acknowledge what his brother was suggesting about his colleague. "Is that what this is about? Did you suddenly lose your taste for equality and decide to let the Judges get away scot-free for everything they've done!?"
"Never!" Bithon snarled lowly at his brother, "You're missing the point Tiron! I will always be faithful to the cause of the insurrection. The Judges have to be put in their place and you can count on me being there when they get thrown into their own pit; but make no mistake, I have no loyalties to Alchana." Bithon paused before adding, "Perhaps you should reconsider your own loyalties, be they with her or the cause you claim to serve."
The elder brother turned around then, without a further word, and returned to his workstation in the lab leaving Tiron floating in the hallway.
It had been a long time since he'd seen his brother like that. He often forgot, in all of his responsibilities and higher ranking, that Bithon was the older brother. Most often, Tiron had to tell him off for something, not the other way around.
That was how he knew that his brother was dead serious. Bithon never cared to be responsible for anyone other than himself; if he was trying to warn Tiron, then it was probably for the best.
What he was trying to say though…
Tiron didn't want to even consider that what Bithon had said might hold some truth. He didn't want to even think about it.
But maybe that was because he knew it might just be true.
After Tiron left, Alchana had a small moment of respite. There was a quiet in her thoughts that she didn't remember having in cycles. It left her in a bit of a daze really, and after finding a place to sit, she just sat there for several klicks.
It was nice to not have to try to think through the never-ending tirade of conflicting thoughts.
Peaceful, almost. At least it would be if she knew that it would last.
But she had work to do, plans to make, and holes to fill before she could go onto her next set of plans.
Another two klicks passed in silence and then her mind was moving again. Always in constant motion, a perpetual cycle of rage and then logic, and all pit breaks loose when the two traits work together. Volam had better be watching because Alchana would never allow him to continue his manipulation of her thoughts.
The insurrection followed her and her alone. He lost his chance when he was outvoted those vorns ago and now this was her turf. She was not going to let him go any further in his scheme to usurp her from the shadows.
She was not some puppet to be lead around on strings of deceitful promises.
No, she would do what Volam asked of her and she would succeed, but that did not mean that she wouldn't attain some information of her own. Information that could potentially cripple the Judges, or even Volam himself.
Whatever was in the data files that Volam wanted had to be important. If he wanted it badly enough to contact her, then there was no telling what he would do to get it out of her tentacles.
Alchana smirked, her yellow toned face lighting up with a near maniacal glee. She would have him wrapped around her tentacles by the time she was done with him, that was for sure.