Fireblade ran one hand along her armored forearm, checking the atmospheric seals near the joints. All good. The suit's oxygen supply was full, the armored segments moved cleanly over each other, and the familiar pressure in the front of her mind confirmed that her helmet's amplifier was working correctly.
In the crowded main cargo bay of the alien prowler, the only sounds heard were the clicking of metal on metal as soroin checked their own armor and weapons, turning then to double-check the equipment of the arms-sister next to her.
Even the human ODSTs were silent, following what could only be their own version of the same checks.
Acknowledgments were sent out distractedly as Stillstorm threaded her way through the busy crowd. The Lashret sent to Fireblade, {Teidar, you will keep a close guard on the command group on this boarding operation. The Soroin Tiris will lead her own caste-sisters.}
{Affirmative, Lashret.} Fireblade sent. It was as expected, with only the one teidar present. Uncounted battles against the Shells had confirmed just how much of a force-enhancer even a single one of her caste could be, and Fireblade knew without false modesty that she was exceptional even among teidar.
So when a mere sixty loroi set out to board an ancient Tonsillat — a Soia Dread-Star itself! — it was unsurprising that she would be called upon to focus solely on her own powers rather than lead other warriors.
But that was not the only cause for the freezing cold which danced along her nerves. During the march back to the dropship from the bunker facility where he had first been encountered, the human Colonel had mentioned much about the Soia and their soldiers.
Of particular interest to Fireblade had been their 'Guards.'
Loroi granted the gift of telekinesis, much like herself. But in return for that gift, they had been… 'engineered' to be forever loyal to the Soia who commanded them. Loyal even to the point of death. When Tempest had been betrayed and the Empire split, very few loroi had stayed in the service of their creators.
But no Guards had changed side.
With her own Guards lying dead on the ship from which she had been hurled, Tempest had found herself the only warrior outside of the Empire who held telekinetic power. Had attempted to 'encode' that power into some of the loroi who now fought against the Soia.
Had succeeded at least in part, as Fireblade's own existence proved.
But the Colonel had explained that Tempest's true skills had never laid in such science, for all that she had advanced humanity's understanding greatly. And that the Soia Guards had been designed by the very greatest of Soia augmentation engineers.
And he had warned just now that the Tonsillat would have its own Soia-made stasis chambers, as effective as those within which his warriors and ship had lain dormant for 270,000 years.
Fireblade had never had to fight another loroi in her life. Few had, since the war with the Enemy had sunk its harsh talons into the collective psyche of her people. Even the attempted coup against Emperor Greywind had been a mostly non-violent affair — by loroi standards, anyways — with the conspirators mostly resorting to legal trickery rather than more honest weapons.
Would that change, today?
One of the tenoin in the cockpit sent out a warning, along with what she could see from that vantage point. {We are entering an open hangar now. Nothing hostile sighted at this moment.}
And even though her sanzai was thin and limited by the distance between Fireblade and the cockpit at the other end of the ship, the teidar got enough of an impression of just what a 'hangar' the small prowler was nosing into.
{You could fit a fleet in there!} sent one of the gallen, awed.
{From what the humans have said, the Soia did fit fleets aboard their tonsillat.} noted a soroin.
The pilot's vision was limited to her sensor readings, with the hangar itself completely unlit and the vast, featureless expanse of this 'slipspace' beyond providing no illumination. But the radar returns showed a vast, open space broken up by uncountable docking gantries jutting out into nothingness.
They sat in pristine condition, unmarred by the eons that had elapsed since the light of any sun had played across their metal surfaces.
{Then where is the fleet?} asked a younger soroin.
The other tenoin answered {The human colonel says that the small-ships docked here must have been used to evacuate the Dread-Star. The hangar-bay doors are locked in the open position, otherwise we would not have been able to dock here.}
The prowler rocked gently as it settled down on one of the docking arms. A wave of alerts from the soroin in the main hold presaged the arrival of the human warriors, minus their pilot. "Are your people ready?" asked the alien leader.
The other two critical loroi officers stepped up alongside Stillstorm. Beryl was no surprise, as an utterly-unprecedented event such as boarding a Soia Dread-Star was easily one that a listel would have given anything to record. And for the other…
Parat Tempo glanced at Stillstorm. {I am prepared.}
For once, there wasn't even a hint of dislike in Stillstorm's sending to her mizol minder. {Very well. You are prepared to speak to any surviving Soia personnel aboard, hostile or no?} If anything, the Lashret's tone of thought was downright… excited.
{It has been some time since I have engaged in a hostile interrogation, but I have maintained my training.} Replied Tempo. Her mind-signature seemed truthful, but as an expert mizol it would have been simple enough for her to falsify that.
Fireblade mentally shrugged. Not her responsibility.
Stillstorm nodded to the human leader. "We are."
"Good." He hit the side of one fist against a button next to the top of the ramp, which began to open.
Fireblade trotted down the ramp, mind alert and probing for any signatures. {Nothing detectable. Uncertain if the Soia use the same psi-blocking material in their ships as they had constructed that bunker out of.}
"Do the Soia use mind-blocking metal in all of their constructions?" asked Tempo, following behind the teidar.
"Hmm? Oh. First I've heard of it, actually." the human answered, surprisingly.
"Is that so? The facility in which we found you and your warriors was built from a metal which blocked all sanzai and mind-sensing." replied Tempo.
Fireblade was only half-following the conversation, straining every one of her senses to detect any hint of a trap or danger. The hangar appeared completely empty, but who knew what might lurk aboard the ancient craft?
"Tempest never said anything about it, and I, well, didn't exactly notice."
The party reached the nearest cavernous door leading further into the ship. Easily five times Fireblade's own height, it towered over the loroi and loroi-oids arranged before it.
{The Soia sure liked to build things large.} noted a junior soroin.
{I'm more curious why they built things that large.} added one of the gallen. {People generally don't build warships bigger than they have to, outside or inside. If you build a moon-sized warship and fill it with corridors that you can drive a dropship through...} she let her sanzai trail off.
That… was a very good point. Older Union capital ships — such as the lost Tempest — had their crew compartments built larger than strictly needed, but that was done to help maintain crew morale on long, extended patrols. A luxury of pre-War designs, really, and one whose minor inefficiency in wasted space had still only lasted up to the Vortex-class. The warships built after her — in the grim aftermath of the failed Semoset Offensive and mounting attrition at the front — squeezed their crew into tighter quarters, corridors narrow enough that two warriors had to step aside when passing by in order to avoid physical contact.
The Colonel waved one of his troopers forwards. The human soldier jogged over to one side of the colossal door, where a smaller portal was built into the wall. This one was still large enough for a loroi to enter, but did not extend all the way down to the floor underneath. Rather, it was a triangular doorway, point down, situated two mannal off of the deck.
"[This'll only take a minute, sir.]" said the warrior in her own language — it had actually come as a surprise to many of the loroi when the ODSTs had removed their helmets aboard the Did Ever Plummet Sound and it turned out that most of them were human females. With the bulky armor that the aliens preferred, it was difficult to tell the difference when their faces were not visible.
The technician knelt next to the doorway and fished an electronic device out from a pocket at her belt. She held it up against a small panel alongside the hatch — presumably a control console.
Beryl looked longingly at the larger door. "It is certain that we cannot travel along the main corridors?"
"Not if you want to remain in one piece." said the Colonel. "Soia built to last: if there's still enough left of the ship's systems to have the artificial gravity up, that means there's still enough left of the security systems to kill you."
"Yet you seemed certain that the maintenance tunnels are safe?" asked Tempo.
"We have the override codes for the tunnel systems, not the main corridors."
"And how did you acquire those access codes?" asked the mizol.
"When the loroi split off, a large number of the Soia's Engineers went with them." He evidently anticipated Tempo's question even as it was forming in her mind, and added "Their Engineer creations are single-minded: give them a machine to tinker with, and they're happy. They don't care who they work for or under what conditions."
{Those would be of great interest to the Union.} sent Tempo, specifically sending to Fireblade and Stillstorm. "You said that there might be surviving Soia personnel aboard this tonsillat fragment. How will we recognize these 'Engineers'?"
The ODST at the door straightened up just as the entrance itself cycled open. "[We're through.]"
To Fireblade's irritation, Stillstorm had agreed to the alien's insistence that he went first down the tall, V-shaped tunnel. So the teidar was stuck watching his back as they went single-file down the corridor.
Over his shoulder, the human kept talking. "The Engineers are floating gas-bags. Tiny little head out front, long blue tentacles hanging underneath, body's usually purple or blue. Your standard Soia construct." He glanced back briefly, and Fireblade could see the smirk on his face through his depolarized visor. "And don't worry, there's probably going to be a good few of them in the maintenance-oversight compartment we're headed to."
Tempo's satisfaction at that was easy to receive. {Teidar, precision in the use of your powers will be essential if any Soia personnel that we may encounter attempt hostilities. Any survivors, however hostile, are of great historical interest to the Union and must be left alive if at all possible. Are you prepared?}
Well, not every mission could be the fun kind where her only objective was 'Turn Shells into fragments.' {Affirmative, Mizol Parat.}
The maintenance tunnels indeed had clearly not been designed for walking creatures. At shoulder height, they were wide enough that Fireblade could stretch her arms out to each side without touching the walls, and yet she had to half-twist to put one foot directly ahead of the other on the very narrow horizontal floor. The sloping v-sides would arrest any sideways fall, at least.
By the way they chattered on in their language, the Helljumpers following behind her must not like it, either.
"[Look at that Guard strut! Work it, girl!]"
"[Really, Corporal?]"
"[I'm just admiring her form, sir! I haven't been able to roll my hips like that in twenty years!]"
"[You think their suit mics aren't recording, Anders? You're getting volunteered to explain to her when they ask, later.]"
They came to another T-intersection, Jardin taking the right-hand exit without pausing. Still no signs of life were detectable to Fireblade, not even out to the limits of her ability to sense. It was… eerie.
Fireblade struggled to wrap her mind around just how colossal the vessel was that they found themselves in. A genuine Tonsillat, a Dread-Star the size of one of Deinar's moons.
And it had been only one of many in the Soia's armadas…
As they passed each intersection, a quartet of soroin stayed behind to guard the side-passages and to relay sanzai messages to and from the ship. Their suit radios should be able to transmit across even the distance that the Colonel had quoted to the target compartment, but with trained warriors a sanzai relay was faster.
"Here we are." The human commander finally said, stopping in the middle of a 4-way intersection. He pointed at one of the two wide doorways set into the side of the corridor. "Should be the damage-control center for this sub-sector of the ship. And… of course it's got a stasis-field active on the whole compartment. How the Soia got that to keep running here in slipspace..."
He looked back at the loroi following behind him. "Be ready for live Soia personnel inside. We're close enough to the main hangar that there might be some combatants, but it should be mostly just Engineers and Technicians. The emergency Stasis field would have engaged after the moon-ship broke apart, so expect anyone inside to be near-panicked and disorganized. The Engineers are no threat. The Technicians are big guys, four legs and two arms. They might try to fight, but they're not really trained for it."
{Teidar, you will be the first through the door.} Stillstorm commanded, as they formed up outside of the entryway. {Use your discretion in engaging any targets. But remember that we want as much preserved as possible.}
Beryl added her strong agreement to that message, radiating her giddy excitement to see actual working Soia machinery… and possibly even living Soia creatures.
"On four." Jardin said, holding one hand in front of the door controls while the other gripped his blaster-like weapon tightly. "One, two, three… four." He palmed the hatch open and stepped aside.
Immediately, Fireblade heard a conversation snippet from inside, as a low-pitched gravelly voice finished a sentence that had sat paused for over a quarter of a million years.
"—aged, we're frozen."
Fireblade stepped quickly through the door, eyes flicking back and forth as she took in the situation.
Diffuse but bright lighting illuminated the rectangular open chamber, walls covered in storage lockers and data displays tightly interspersed with power lines, pipes and manual controls. The sort of thing you would find lining any starship's engineering spaces.
Closer to the middle of the room, six control consoles were arranged in a circle, displays facing inwards. In their midst was an elevated platform, reached by a shallow ramp which extended downwards and pointed to the entrance in which Fireblade stood framed.
And at those consoles were… aliens.
No, cousins.
Centauroid creatures, skin as blue as Fireblade's own on their un-gloved hands, stood at the stations. Two upper arms tapped at a narrow keyboard raised nearly to their long, elongated faces. Two lower arms — or forward legs — manipulated larger control surfaces, placed at a lower height. And the rear 'legs', tipped with the same sort of 'hand' with its loroi-esque form marred by an elongated palm and thickened fingers that the front legs bore, sat open-palmed on the floor.
One of the fellow Soia creations looked up from its work-station, two wide-set eyes meeting Fireblade's own. The creature blinked. Was it hostile? She could see no weapons on its un-armored suit, and its mind-glow betrayed no sense of alarm.
It looked away, back towards the raised dais. Then spoke in the same deep voice that she had heard earlier, "Ma'am! A relief team has arrived!"
"Understood, 304-18." came a new voice, source hidden beyond the lip of the raised dais in the center of the compartment. "It is most fortunate to see that the Fleet has arrived as instructed." The speaker stepped closer, rising into view above the platform.
A loroi.
It had to be — there could be nobody else underneath that armor. Maybe a human, technically, but the cold weight settling in Fireblade's gut told her just who — what — this was.
Fireblade had never before in her life hesitated in a fight. But… that had been against the Shells. Hated enemies of all that she had ever known. Despoilers and defilers, utterly alien.
This was an ancient being of her own species, an eons-old glimpse into the past brought to life. And there was no hostility in that mind-glow, as… 'unfamiliar' as it was.
The figure froze as she came into view, her helmet boasting an elaborate raised crest which danced along her brow-line and wrapped back over where her ears would be.
A Soia-made amplifier, so much older — and perhaps more dangerous — than the Soia-inspired one built into Fireblade's own helmet.
The Guard's neutral expression remained, even as her eyes swept the loroi before her.
Settled on a point just behind Fireblade, near the doorway. She knew on who.
The Colonel.
A mighty wave of psychokinetic force rocked Fireblade back on her feet. Yelps of alarm and pain rose from the soroin behind her as they were hurled back into the corridor.
Where another loroi — another teidar — would have screamed over sanzai to stun her opponents, the Guard bellowed aloud "ABOMINABLE TRAITORS!"
{Teidar, neutralize her!} sent Stillstorm, even as the Lashret swung her blaster rifle up to position.
"Signal the—!" the Guard's next shout, clearly directed at one of her subordinates, cut off as she froze.
Fireblade stepped further into the room, gaze locked on her target. It was a gamble — she was trusting that the other loroi — and humans — at her back would see to any other threat, while she focused on hammering a mental attack as deeply into the Guard's mind as she could.
It was… actually far easier than she had expected. Where another teidar or mizol well-practiced in mental combat would have resisted the heavy but crude spike of pure mental force, the Guard's defenses folded like those of a fuzz-headed girl fresh from her diral.
That said, Fireblade could feel the ancient loroi's mind still pulsing with fury, remaining conscious even after such an attack. An anger which only grew by the solon, at her confinement within her own body. If Fireblade took her attention off the target for so much as a solon, the Guard would regain control over her muscles… and more importantly, over her powers.
Time for plan M.
Sweat beaded on Fireblade's brow, trickling down to pool against her amplifier as she kept just enough mental force to keep the Guard mentally pinned… and poured the remainder of her ability into her thermokinesis.
Assuming the Guard weighed about as much as a modern-day loroi inside her armor, and that her biology worked about the same…
Four degrees. Eight degrees.
Twelve.
Fireblade felt the fading of her target's mind-glow a solon before the Guard's face flushed a dark blue, an autonomic response that worked around Fireblade's block on conscious mental command. The ancient loroi's chest heaved as her pulse raced, furious eyes still locked on Fireblade.
Eyes that stayed open, pouring hatred into Fireblade even as the Guard's mind-signature faded rapidly into unconsciousness.
Kept fading.
{Doranzer, do you have the tools to stabilize heat-stroke?} asked Fireblade, still not taking her attention off of her target.
No response.
{...Doranzer?}
Stillstorm shot the first centauroid as it drew a rifle-shaped object from underneath its desk. The power-four shot burned through the alien and charred a glowing-red divot into the wall on the opposite side of the room.
Soia-made or not, these aliens weren't exactly tough.
The soroin behind her took their shots at the other aliens, blasters set to lower power ratings as planned. Multiple shots volleyed into the other targets, and they slumped onto their desks. Stunned, but alive.
Stillstorm strode forwards, carbine sweeping across the room. No conscious mind-signatures detected in the room. But… {Watch those passages.} she highlighted a dozen small holes spread throughout the walls of the compartment.
With no further detectable threats, she checked behind her for the status of her troops. That Guard's psychokinetic push had swept across the loroi crowding into the room, still packed densely in the doorway.
Three concussions, four broken arms, a lot of angry sub-verbal sanzai… and one soroin sprawled against the wall, helmet twisted at an unnatural angle.
Doranzer mazil-toza Desire was already kneeling over the young warrior, hands racing to get the fallen soroin's helmet off. One of the ODSTs dropped next to her, taking over. Desire yanked a nerve-splice from the medical kit on her thigh and slapped it onto the back of the girl's neck as soon as the helmet was clear.
The soroin's mind-glow halted its decline, just as it had sat on the precipice of guttering out.
Desire sagged with relief, one hand shooting out to grab the ODST's shoulder for momentary support.
Situation stabilized, Stillstorm followed Colonel Jardin into the center of the room, half-receiving as the soroin organized a casualty team to carry the wounded into a more sheltered position away from the entrance.
"Well, that was surprising." The human commander drawled, standing over the nearest stunned centauroid. "Didn't expect a Guard all the way out here; alone, too. These bastards—" he nudged the slumped alien "—aren't much of a threat, if you've got your eyes open."
{Are those… Mozeret?} asked Beryl, stepping close.
Stillstorm wondered the same. The shape did match the supposed shape of the extinct Soia-Liron species. And it wasn't like that was a particularly common arrangement for organic life. It was pretty much just the Mozeret… and the Shells.
The maybe-mozeret twitched, one rear-leg kicking across the floor towards Beryl.
She leaped nimbly over the attack, and Jardin slammed the butt of his rifle against the side of the creature's head. The Soia construct slumped down further, upon closer inspection now more… languid than before. "Keep a weapon trained on them at all times, if you don't see their insides on the outside. They like to play dead."
ODSTs and soroin swept through the room, checking every angle and corner that might hide a threat.
Now for the prize… Stillstorm signaled the gallen forwards, at the same moment as the Helljumper who had opened the hangar door raced over to the nearest console. Parat Tempo supervised the gallen, while Stillstorm leaned over the ODST's shoulder, Jardin at her other side. Room now secured, Stillstorm leaned her blaster carbine against the console.
"Your girls got the jump on them. They didn't even have time to lock the computers." The Colonel traced one finger across the screen. And whistled. "I'll be damned, I was right." He looked over at Stillstorm. "You're standing aboard Grand Unity — or a chunk of her, anyways. The Soia Council's own flagship."
Stillstorm narrowed her eyes. "The same vessel aboard which Tempest was last known to be."
"The very same." the human responded flatly. He turned back to the human warrior next to him, conversing rapidly in their own language.
{Lashret, the data transfer will take approximately five-hundred solon.} one of the gallen reported.
Stillstorm met Tempo's eyes. {Then that is how much time you have, Parat.} She indicated the six remaining live Soia constructs.
The mizol nodded and knelt by the Guard first. A soroin had removed the comatose loroi's amplifier, but still both Tempo and Fireblade set an ungloved hand against the Guard's head. Better to play it safe.
{Mental signature is faint but alive. Still readable.} confirmed Tempo. {Well done, Pallan.}
Putting their muted sanzai to one side as they went to work pulling what information they could from the ancient loroi's mind, Stillstorm strode over to where most of the humans had gathered around one of the remaining mozeret. They had wrestled it away from the console and into an open patch of floor, an armored soldier kneeling on each of its limbs.
Colonel Jardin nudged its face with his boot. "Wakey wakey, Sleeping Beauty."
The mozeret's eyes blinked open and swept around the room, before coming to focus on the human leader crouched in front of it. Voice muffled by a face lying flat on the ground, it ground out "You."
"Me." replied the Colonel, in an eerily friendly tone. "See, I've got a few minutes while my friends work over your boss. So why not get a few questions answered?"
"You will find no answers here, creature."
Jardin drew his knife, pointing its narrow tip first at one of his subject's eyes, and then at the other. The mozeret tracked the gleaming weapon no more than a finger's-width from its eyes, but to the Soia construct's credit it did not flinch. That said, she could sense the growing fear bubbling upwards in its mind.
The Colonel's tone of voice was unchanged. "Oh, you guys always know just what to say. I always find answers, and you Technicians are the most fun to play with. See, the Office trained me to get cooperation out of people, even if I had to go through all twenty fingers and toes. And here you've got a full set of thirty!"
Stillstorm watched, intrigued despite herself. Normally, the exact… 'techniques' used to gather information from a resisting subject were handled largely by mizol specialists, and the interrogation itself took place within the subject's mind. It was interesting to observe how a species that lacked the ability to use such methods would try to overcome that handicap.
Sometimes it was useful to 'soften up' the subject before the mizol went to work — the pallan kneeling a few paces behind Stillstorm was well-experienced at that — but to Stillstorm's understanding that mainly served to weaken their mental defenses rather than prompt an actual answer. Useful for subjects attempting to hold a lotai against their interrogators, but always with a risk of frying the mind before any answers could be extracted.
And given the inherent untruthfulness of spoken words, how could one gain anything useful from a subject compelled to speak aloud to their clearly-hated foe?
The mozeret's eyes tracked the knife as the human traced it along the being's limbs, not yet applying enough force to pierce the light-gray jumpsuit that the mozeret wore.
A mixed pulse of irritation, curiosity, and a trace of disgust came from the listel who observed alongside Stillstorm. {These are the only mozeret known to exist! To have ever been found alive!} she broadcast to nobody in particular.
{There remain four that are unharmed.} Stillstorm sent, keeping the 'for now.' part to herself. She indicated the remaining aliens as soroin dragged them into a clear area to hold at blaster-point.
The Lashret highlighted their size, comparing it to the cramped quarters aboard the UNSC prowler. {Although we have no way of safely taking even one back to the Union for study.}
{Yes, but...} the listel's sanzai trailed off into a churning pool of dissatisfaction.
"[Doc, you got a reading yet?]" asked the colonel, playing the knife-tip underneath a fingernail of the frozen mozeret.
Terror flooded off of the centauroid alien, but deep undercurrents of a steely resolve welled up throughout, which Stillstorm could not help but respect. It remained to be seen just how long that resolve would hold up.
"[Yes, sir.]" said the UNSC's field doranzer, kneeling over the mozeret and slowly waving some sort of datapad over the back of its head. "[Got two pings, pushed all the way down. He's hiding something, all right.]"
"[Let's not give him the chance. Plug him.]"
The human doranzer withdrew a cable from one of the many pockets lining his waist, attaching one end to the datapad. The other sported two sharp needles, perhaps as long as a loroi's thumb but narrow enough that Stillstorm had to squint to make out their form. The doranzer tapped a button, and the two probes started vibrating shrilly.
Just as the mozeret's eyes shot wide-open and looked back, the ODST plunged the device into the back of the centauroid's skull.
"[Scan's running, sir. Got one scooped already.]"
"[Good. Temperature?]"
"[Oh, he's cooking. Maybe a few seconds… there we go. Both nodes scooped.]"
The doranzer yanked the cable out of the mozeret's head, wiping the mixed streaks of gray and cobalt-blue tissue off on the alien's jumpsuit.
Blue blood dripped from the tiny holes left behind, pulsing out even as the mozeret's body began to twitch. The ODSTs stood and released its limbs, letting it thrash weakly on the floor as they stood back.
"An interesting technique, Colonel." observed Stillstorm.
The human doranzer unplugged the datapad and handed it to Jardin, setting to work fine-cleaning the other end of the cable with another machine from his belt.
"Thank you, Lashret." replied the colonel distractedly, his attention focused on the datapad. "Hmm. Bastard didn't know all that much, anyways. Ship jumped to slipspace right at the moment of destruction. Doesn't know what happened exactly, only that they suddenly lost contact with the other segments, and—" he froze.
{Great.} one of the soroin sent. {The humans have a computerized mizol.} Her side-channels conveyed the loroi's unease at the concept.
On the other end of the response spectrum, the listel's earlier unhappiness had been swept away by a burst of interest. {They have a computer that can interact with the mind!} She sent. {In field conditions, even, and very rapidly!}
{But rather destructively, it seems.} observed a junior doranzer, peering down at the still-twitching corpse. {Perhaps not the most useful interrogation technique, but it is an impressive adaptation to the humans' limitations.}
"'And'?" prompted Stillstorm.
The ODST colonel's voice was flat as he said "And the last Soia mind aboard faded shortly before the ship was destroyed."
Tempest.
Stillstorm frowned. "The mozeret could detect mind-signatures? You had said that that ability was restricted to the Soia."
"A damn rock can feel when there's a conscious Soia nearby. It's like a 'vibration' inside your mind, very deep. A backdoor into your mind, propped open and you can't close it. Gets stronger when she's angry, or when she focuses on you in particular." He kicked the dead mozeret at his feet, hard enough to shift the bulky corpse. "They engineered their servants to be especially vulnerable to it. If this bastard felt them fade, that means either the last Soia here decided to calm down and deactivate her greatest weapon, or… she died."
He handed the datapad back to his doranzer and looked over at Stillstorm. "Guess which is more likely."
Tempo had finished her work, and walked past the two of them on her way to the remaining four mozeret captives. "You had known from the moment you realized how long you had slept that it was unlikely that Tempest had survived."
"Still hurts to hear the exact moment." He shook his head. "Oh, and if you're going to interrogate those other ones, work fast. The Soia started building failsafes into their minds towards the end of the War. Cooks their brains from the inside-out in only a few seconds if you poke them."
At his words, the other mozeret struggled against the soroin holding them down, but went limp as a barrage of mental attacks from the loroi battered their minds back into submission. The soroin kept weapons trained on them, just in case.
It was weird to see sanzai attacks — especially the untrained blows of soroin rather than teidar or mizol specialists — being so effective against aliens that lacked the ability to send. Like firing a blaster whose bolt was both invisible and silent, the only sign of any action being the impact on its target.
{Two hundred solons left on the data transfer, Lashret.} sent the gallen ranzadi overseeing the console hacking. {There is… a lot here. We've had to swap out full drives several times already.} Her excitement rushed through the young loroi's side-channels. {Maintenance and repair instructions — detailed ones! — for weapons, communications systems, reactionless drives, power systems… it's all there.} she shook her head in astonishment. {When we get this back to the Union, the Shells' existence is going on a countdown. And not a long one.}
Mental cheers erupted around the room. An appropriate prize, in return for Tempest's loss.
{Do these files include details on a 'slipspace drive'?} sent Stillstorm. Building better ships and weapons was one advantage. A very major one, yes, and one that held the potential to permanently shift the ever-changing tide of the war in favor of the Union. But if loroi warships could flat-out navigate around the border systems where the Shells parked their bivouac divisions…
The war would be as good as won.
{Only some, Lashret.} the gallen responded, tapping at the controls. {The references point to elsewhere in the—}
A bright flash of light and burst of flame engulfed the console, the gallen throwing one arm up to cover her eyes as a column of fire jetted from the console. Without hesitation, she dove into the flames, armor blackening in moments as she yanked the last drive from the console and flung it to the side.
Soroin rushed forwards as the gallen pushed herself back and toppled to the ground. Her hands scrabbled at her helmet visor, mind-signature leaking agony.
"[That's new. The paranoid fucks put thermite charges in their damn computers, now!?]" said one of the Helljumpers, as people around the room stepped away from the remaining consoles.
Alarm and concern raced around the room, as warriors looked for any further trap.
And from behind her, Stillstorm detected the faintest, nearly-suppressed flare of satisfaction.
She whirled to face the Guard… whose mind-signature now hovered just above consciousness. And who was focusing on—
Stillstorm didn't wait to see what would happen when the ancient loroi completed thermokinetically heating the charge pack in her confiscated energy rifle.
The two soroin — young girls, really, too young to have developed the same mental precision of awareness that Stillstorm's century-and-a-quarter had granted her — yelped as the Guard at their feet recoiled back, a knife-handle as wide as their palms suddenly jutting from the Soia construct's face.
"Nice throw." commented the Colonel. "I'd thought that thing was just for show."
"Only a foolish warrior carries a weapon that she is not ready to use." said Stillstorm, planting one foot on the Guard's neck and yanking the long-bladed knife from the fallen construct's face. She flicked her wrist, spattering cobalt blood and gray brain-matter on the wall. After a moment's thought, she wiped the blade completely clean using the Guard's own hair, and returned it to its scabbard.
A ritual humiliation that would have meant nothing to the ancient loroi, but one that helped focus Stillstorm's anger. {Doranzer. Her status?}
{She will live, Lashret.} replied the medic. {But we do not have the equipment to treat her fully, not until we return to a Union ship. Flecks from the chemical flame burned holes through her visor; her eyes are non-functional.}
{Status on the data?} Stillstorm sent to the remaining gallen, who was inspecting the data drive which her caste-sister had sacrificed her vision to save.
{We have a partial repair schematic for what is labeled as a 'jump drive,' Lashret. Further analysis will have to wait for proper facilities.}
Stillstorm fixed her attention on the listel tozet, and indicated the injured gallen. {Have this incident recorded for that girl's award ceremony, once we return to the Union.}