The door opened and a uniformed figure nervously poked his head in.
The Sergeant whirled on the private with annoyance. “Get out of here, Jeakes! Can’t you see we’re busy? What is it?”
“Transmission, sir. Urgent. Seems as if a message from a certain Colonel Zaul came through from, I don’t know, some planet I didn’t catch the name of.”
“Zaul, never heard of him.”
“Neither have we.”
“Of course.” Salhan clicked his tongue. “Watch this sharper. No better yet, come with me, Buldis. I think I need you to work on this cricket fellow in the other room. I don’t like the look of the brute. A dull sod with a high tolerance for pain.”
They left to attend to the details and Miko was left in his cuffs to ruminate on his predicament. The situation was untenable. At least he wasn’t floating out in space asphyxiating on a derelict ship. Still, he was looking at life digging ore in the mines, or a quick execution if he couldn’t talk his way out of this. Damn that Fenli! He’d strangle him if he had the chance.
As Miko’s blood rose, he felt the familiar crackle of electricity surge around his body and ripple up his spine. The current coursed through his nerve ends.
Bzt. He looked up, saw the red lens of the vidcam flare. So, maybe this invisibility phasing in and out was spurred by electric fields? Or maybe his stress levels? That would be recorded on camera. Nothing he could do about it.
With anticipation, he passed out of his body, leaving cuffs behind. He slipped through the wall, eerie as a goblin.
Supported on his astral limbs, he glided down the hall. He could get used to this newfound power. Hell, he was beginning to like it! Military and security personnel strode down the halls decked in grey and white.
Soon he came to a hub of hallways, each lit with ceiling fluorescent panels. In a skylight overhead, a dim patch of yellow sky loomed. Strange ships hovered in the air, one of which looked similar to a Jakru light cruiser. Could they have tracked them this far so soon? Miko did a double take. He saw the Sergeant down the cross-corridor speaking animatedly into a coin-sized handheld device. Miko floated grimly over to eavesdrop.
His interrogator was talking to Colonel Zaul, directly on his communicator.
“Who are you? Is this some hoax, Zaul?” Salhan waved off his corporal who was gesticulating at him. “Nobody ever told me about any Empress gone missing.”
Miko heard a crisp cold voice crackle from the communicator. “I assure you, Sergeant, the Empress is missing—95% probability she was aboard that locust vessel.”
“Impossible! I saw this Lexia, as you call her, on public broadcast, delivering a speech two days ago about the Elefrian affair.” But the Sergeant’s expression indicated there was something familiar about the face he had missed.
Miko heard the voice rise, “It was a cover-up, you imbecile! To not raise panic in Quandria. That was only a clever double you saw on naturalnet.”
“A double?” The Sergeant’s lower lip quivered. For once, Salhan seemed to have nothing to say. “I’ll look into it. But I can’t promise you anything, Zaul. And I’ll remind you, that you are in violation of our airspace, ‘Colonel’. Kindly move your unauthorized attack vessel back to the free zone. Fortunately for you, we have a treaty with the Jakru, otherwise we would have blasted you out of the air long ago.”
The voice trilled ominously over the com.
But Salhan cut off the receiver. In a livid voice, he swore. Rubbing his temples, he paced back and forth. “Cocky sods! Strangle me and my mother if the whole lot of the cretins aren’t playing us. Some political manoeuvre. They can piss off for all I care.”
Miko floated, stunned. No wonder the Jakru were so keen on getting the woman back. Fenli was right about her being an important person. A faint rumble shook the base. The Sergeant’s ears perked. His eyes darted upward to the Jakru vessel and he groped for his weapon. A blast of heat and a ball of translucent yellow appeared in the middle of the hall. The Sergeant stared at it dumbly. Without warning, a space opened up around it and it imploded. With a silent whoosh of energy, a massive stun wave reverberated through the halls, levelling anyone in the vicinity.
Salhan fell like a tree.
Miko hovered away, feeling the effects of the blast like a brush of air against skin. His body tingled.
Bzt. The shock waves joggled whatever strange, electrochemical transformation had come over him since the amalgamators had first whisked him across the galaxy. He saw his physical chest glimmer, fade, then glimmer again. Just in the same way as when the camera flicked on in the interrogation room.
Bzt. Back to invisible.
The glass smashed above his astral projection. A team of Jakru soldiers came paratrooping down through the jagged gap. Miko shimmered, struggling to recover from the crushing energy of the stun wave, his astral sight blinking in and out in a psychic blur. In seconds the militia had infiltrated the landing complex and he stared through his astral eyes, bewildered.
Clearly, the Jakru wanted the Empress back alive, even willing to jeopardize peaceful relations with the Skullroxers. The locust aggression had driven the fires of vengeance in them. Likely turned them into take-no-prisoners savages. This Zaul, or whoever he was, was obviously a fearless leader who would risk all.
Miko used his astral will to pull the bowie knife and keycard ring from the fallen Sergeant’s belt and he slunk out of the hot zone before the enemy troops noticed the shiny metal floating in midair. He debated whether it was better to leave the troublemaker Fenli behind, but he realized the need for allies at
