The events in this story take place three monems after the Peacekeeper Wars
Vise and Valise
Chapter 1: Awakenings
The light burned red through his eyelids. Almost instantaneously he noticed the floor beginning to heat under his palms and stood up, burying his head in the crook of an arm. He looked down for a moment and saw that he was naked, and that even looking at the reflection of the lights in the metalloid floor made dark splotches in his vision. A guttural roar shook his body as he realized that no matter where he went in the room the light was inescapable, and the soles of his feet were beginning to itch and tingle. "Reduce to minimal levels," someone commanded; they sounded like a patchwork of computerized output and the calming voice of a mother. The light ebbed away, and the floor immediately became cool to the touch. Jothee lowered his arms to his sides and spat through his nose. He was staring directly into a glossy black circle on the shimmering wall in front of him, about his height, a henta in diameter.
"Hello Jothee," the crooning voice was coming from the black viewport. "Sorry I woke you, but you seemed almost too peaceful, and a body at peace must know disruption from time to time in order to remain…kinetic. As a Luxan Cleava, I'm sure you understand?" Jothee's cold blue eyes narrowed at the obsidian window, and he cupped his hands together like a crude battering ram. As the flesh of his fist malleted into the center of the viewport, a sharp electric jolt went through his bones that had contacted the surface, and they immediately dissipated into food-cube mush in his hand. His screams echoed metallically off the walls.
"What did we learn?" Through the immense pain of his now liquefied hand, Jothee could hear an audible smile in the speaker's voice. "Who…the hezmana…are you?" His voice was low and vicious as he pushed back into a corner, cradling his hand.
"A friend of a friend."
"What do you want with me?"
"You…" She heaved an exasperated sigh that sounded like something being dragged over a metal grate; it pained her to speak.
"…nothing. But I've been tracking your vessel for a while now and according to DNA tests, my inclinations have proven correct. Tell me, where is your father; where is D'argo?"
Jothee, usually stern and straight-faced, chuckled dryly as his father did at times like these. "Go frell the nearest power source, tralk."
"Please," said the voice, becoming considerably more life-like for a moment, "he was a friend of mine…"
"He's dead!" Jothee stood up now, forcing his usable hand into a fist at his side. "Is this how you honor a friends memory? By killing his offspring from a distance?" The seething insanity in Jothee's voice rose; each word was delivered like a single, pulse blast.
"WHERE-IS-MY-SHIP? WHERE-IS-MY-CREW?"
"Jothee, we are not going to kill you," the voice was monotone and mechanized again, and it betrayed deep intentions.
The lights in the room leapt up around him like a Luxan Smith's kiln. As heat upon heat racked his body, Jothee realized this metaphor fit all too well: whoever they were, they were honing him, pounding him into a shapely weapon that they could wield against someone.
Behind the black glass a humanoid hand, seeming to shift in and out of existence like an image on a vid-screen, switched the comms system off, abruptly cutting the burning screams with silence. The hulking figure turned to one of the mercenaries in the small viewing room, a sweaty pudge of a Nebari named Frindle.
"Is the Qualta blade's distress beacon transmitting?" The figure's breath was a death rattle. Frindle nodded solemly.
A tear, red with iron sulfate, trickled down the metal face plate. "Leave me," she choked out. Frindle paused for only a moment at the door, before scuttling away like an Altarian crab down the dingy track-lit corridor. She turned back to the window, opening the comms again, lowering the radiance level with the mishmash of controls they'd commandeered over the years from salvage operations. The screaming subsided, and what was left of her humanoid mind cleared.
"No Jothee," she said stoically, looking through red slits of eyes, "your father is not the one who betrayed me and my people…not the one whose offspring I wish to destroy."
