tissue, Burks started beating him up.
At first Tor was tempted to just run away. But that wouldn't work any better than fighting would, maybe less. Tor tried to respond like he'd been practicing at least, which didn't do him a lot of good, but at least let him touch the Ancient a few times.
“Target vital points.” Burks said conversationally while his hands and feet blurred. It wasn't the speed of the movement, but that Tor couldn't track it all, like with the jugglers he'd seen a few months prior. They'd seemed super humanly fast, but the actual movements weren't at all. Grab and release, about once per half second. It was just too much to see. That's what Burks was doing to him and really, what he had to try to do in return.
For a while, nearly twenty seconds, he managed to do all right. True, he was moving at his best speed and Burks was still holding himself to less than half that, but it was something. Right up until he found himself suddenly laying on his back, a low and prickly weed under him, looking at the steel gray clouds above. Tor rolled, but not fast enough. When he hit the dirt, he'd paused. It was more than enough time for Burks to slowly move in and “kill” him.
Sigh. Well, he still had over a week to get better. It would take more work and attention. When he said this to his grandfather it just got a nod. Not happy or sad, not insulting his limited ability and definitely not praise. Just a slow and gentle movement of the head.
After that all they worked on was running and fighting, with weapons and without. Tor even had to learn several kinds of Austran devices just in case he was left unarmed in a pinch. All he'd have to do is disarm a guardsman and take what he had. Easy.
They went on training until the day before they left for the docks in Warden. That was the pick-up location. Of course their entire plan fell apart less than two minutes after the Captain came ashore to pick “Torrance Baker” up.
The Captain was a medium sized man, almost exactly six foot, taller than Tor, but not intimidating to Burks by any means. Without preamble the man held up a black box with a shiny gray screen and pointed it at the older man as he stood waiting to leave.
“Ah! Hello Count Lairdgren. I'm here for your grandson I believe? Is he about by any chance?” The man wasn't being smarmy, but seemed genuine and professional, even having just obviously caught them out like that. It was clear he was military, but that their military was less prone to yelling than the Noram one was. One of their Captains would be hitting someone by now. After a bit of back and forth the Count gestured for him to come out, in order to leave.
It was less than satisfactory all things considered.
The device somehow knew the difference, it could be height, weight, the slight difference in their build or even the difference in their field pattern. Tor was eighteen, Burks three thousand and muckity. It made a difference, even under all the similarities. The Austran device wasn't buying their plan at all.
Stupid Austran science device.
“Oh, here I am.” Tor said dismally, looking at the man with a rueful grin.
“I was hoping you'd take him instead. This whole things is… Well, I'm too young to marry, or be put to death, you know? Figured you might miss the difference.” Every man for himself, that was the Austran way, but had he gotten the idea right? Really, who would sell out their own grandfather like that?
The Captain chuckled.
“Well, that's not my part in this. I just need to get you from here to there. Ready to go then?”
Tor shrugged and grabbed his little bag of toiletries. He could at least die with clean teeth. Burks smiled, then winked at him, as if it was the plan all along or at least what would most likely have happened regardless, which may have been the case. For all Tor knew the gadget the man dressed in the all white uniform complete with white funny hat, was used every day over there. What would have been the point though? Letting him worry less?
Well, if that was the case, Tor appreciated it. At least he'd been able to sleep and keep food down. He gave Burks a nod.
“Well, off to die now Gramps. Tell everyone thanks for nothing. Remember to feed my pet fish for me. It likes ocean food best. If I don’t end up dead, I expect it to be there alive and well when I come looking for it.” The last bit was code, if mentioning the ocean like that could be taken as clever at all. Hopefully Burks got the idea. Take his place and wait in the ocean as Tor was supposed to have done.
He looked surly, or tried to, as he stomped up the slanted wooden board to the door in the side of the boat. It was funny looking and an ugly blue gray, but big. Nearly as big as the one he'd made for the Afrak trip. At the top of the, they weren't really steps he decided… ramp? At the top of that thing, another man came and passed a device over him carefully. Tor figured they'd take all his amulets, even his back-ups, but they didn't. The new man just turned to the other and spoke calmly.
“No weapons detected.” The voice held strong certainty. Tor wondered what to make of it, hoping the man might have been sent by Denno to facilitate things, his heart falling when the Captain redid the whole search.
“Agreed, clean.” The man held out his hand to shake, a country type thing, so Tor automatically returned it. As soon as he did Tor realized that he was probably about to be clapped in irons, but it was just a firm handshake instead, no twisting his arms back or grabbing him.
“Welcome aboard sir. This isn't a luxury craft, but we do have an exercise facility and some light entertainments if you wish to use them. Let me show you to your room. This way please?” The tone and manner was courteous, but the man behind him openly held a weapon. It was one of the kinds he'd practiced with earlier in the week. It sent out jolt of electricity that was carried on a beam of light. It was more complicated than that, but that's how Burks explain it to him. He knew they worked though, having one used on him twice before.
The shield he wore would stop it cold, but no need to give that away yet. For that matter, Tor ignored it as if he didn't know what it was. The less able they thought him the better.
The trip was decently boring, but at least it wasn't a cage. The room was tiny compared to the other big ships he'd been on, but then, Tor had made those personally, so it probably didn't count. His room was ten by ten, had a bed, a sink and a toilet, next to a writing surface that folded out of the wall. Most of the time he just sat on the deck. On day five he worked out what was going on with the apparent freedom. He wasn't trapped by the water, he was supposed to be held hostage by the murder of thousands of his people if he left.
Ah.
That or the Austrans just hadn't been paying attention. He could fly after all.
The bombs were bowel loosening in theory, huge nuclear devices that used magic to create a vast and poisonous explosion. At first Burks had tried to explain that it wasn't magic, because it didn't use the direct field of a person to created it, just physical action, but the end result was bad regardless and it kicked out magic level effects while it happened, reorganizing space on the fundamental level and ordering information away from the central point. That was really all magic was Tor had argued, reordering base information, with Burks agreeing after a few minutes. It was the first argument with the older man Tor had won. That wasn't saying much, since all the other arguments had been fake, and Tor had thrown them.
In reality the nuclear devices didn't scare Tor too much, because of one single fact. Glost didn't have them. He might think he did, but Denno Brown, the Austran Ancient said otherwise. True he might be lying and the whole thing was a convoluted Tor trap, but if that was the case, why set up a rescue? They could have really just told Tor and even Burks, that they had to come or else, and they wouldn't have had a choice. In the end his one life wasn't worth thousands. That kind of scenario didn't leave him a lot of options.
There were about fifteen really good ways it could be a trap, but Tor was hoping that it would be something simple, like Denno was really just a prisoner, and Tor could go in and get him out, then meet Burks out in the ocean. If that didn't work, if he wasn't stripped of his “trinkets” Tor could fly out on his own. Either way would be alright, he had amulets for nearly everything consolidated around his neck on three pieces, instead of the near twenty he had a week prior. He'd also worked devices into his toothbrush and the container that held his toothpaste. They didn't have sigils, but if stripped of everything he could shield himself and fly away in a fast carriage. Worse come to worse, he could rebuild anything he needed in a few hours.
The boat moved decently for something its size and only took ten days to get all the way to Austra, which Tor appreciated. The longer they took, the worse his anxiety would be. To cut down on it and pass the time, Tor meditated, being careful not to do anything that would show off any visible magic to the crew. Not that they’d recognize as such at least. His clothing was, but no one seemed to care that it changed periodically and stayed clean.
