Territory Slaves

Chapter Two - Caged

Jahhan awoke dragging in breath after breath of heavy liquid, until the liquid began draining from the tank. As soon as the fluid cleared his face, he began gagging on the mixture of taking in air and coughing out liquid. By the time the tank had emptied, he’d choked out the last of the liquid and gratefully sucked in sweet air.

Then he realized the liquid had temporarily distracted him from an important change since he was last conscious. Jahhan felt no pain. He glanced down at his body, expecting a bloody horror. Instead he saw nothing but smooth, unbroken skin, and perhaps some fine white lines.

Even as he tried to understand what had happened, the latest set of restraints fell away and two men half-dragged, half-guided him from the tank. They led him to an alcove in the wall, similar to the one on Sesul’s ship, and stuffed him inside. A panel closed him in and ice cold water soaked him through. He tried to huddle away from the water so cold it burned, but the jets of water crisscrossed the alcove and rained from above.

Jahhan shook hard enough to crack teeth by the time the water stopped, but warm blasts of drying air coming on the heels of the jets of water helped him recover a small amount of body heat.

The alcove opened and the men ushered him resolutely out of the room with the tank. Another man waited for him at the door. “Follow,” he said with a thick accent. Thicker than Sesul’s.

Jahhan hesitated. More than hesitated; he froze solid. The last time he had followed blithely, he’d been led to his torture. The man gave him a moment to move, then gestured across the hall. They were directly across from the torture room. The door was open. The room had been scrubbed clean of Jahhan’s blood. “Follow,” the man repeated. “Or stay.” He gestured to the torture room again.

Jahhan nodded reluctantly and followed the man. He was led through the plush corridors back to another silent, eerie lift. They waited longer than Jahhan had waited in the lift with Sesul, and when the door opened, the corridor beyond was a uniform gray. The lights were bright enough, but had nothing of the warmth on the other level.

Also, unlike the maze of corridors which had confused Jahhan on other levels, this corridor was short and had no connecting corridors. He saw five doors. One on each side of the lift and three across. The guide led him to the last door in the corridor, diagonal from the lift. He keyed a sequence in the panel by the door and it opened to a tiny, bare, gray room. The man indicated Jahhan should enter. He did, uneasy, but certain he would end up in the room one way or another.

The man told him in thickly accented words, “Sesul come. Follow Sesul.” The gray door shut, leaving him alone in the empty room. Then the lights went out. They wanted to break him down psychologically. That much was obvious. But, really, “Sesul come” was all Jahhan needed to hear to be thrown into an escalating cycle of fear.

Jahhan found a corner of the cell and curled into a shivering ball. The walls were smooth, uniform and cold. The darkness and the silence were absolute. Jahhan had nothing but waking nightmares to occupy his mind. Nightmares and questions he didn’t know if he wanted answered. He didn’t know where he was or why he was here. He didn’t know why he’d been tortured. Hell, he didn’t even know if that had been real. He was fairly sure it was real, but part of him wondered, hoped, it had been some kind of nightmare. Maybe a horrible trick they had. After all, his body was undamaged. Or maybe he’d been in the tank for long enough to heal. He’d been unconscious so much, he couldn’t know how long had he been gone from home.

Home. Home brought the worst thoughts, the worst of the possible nightmares he faced. Was his family here too? Five cells. Five members of his immediate family. He saw in his mind his wife and each of his daughters alone in the dark and afraid. And how had they been treated, if they were here?

He covered his face with his hands. He couldn’t think about that. He simply couldn’t. The last time he saw them, they were at home. NDSF took him to the front of his home, and them to the back. NDSF knew someone was coming for him. Just him.

The round of thoughts started over again.

Just when he felt that he might start screaming in the dark, a small light illuminated a section of the cell. A small panel slid open at waist height. He risked leaving his corner and peered inside. He found a bowl filled with a white mash and spoon sitting in an indentation. He took the bowl. He had no illusions about them needing to poison him unawares, so he tasted it. Bland and room temperature, but definitely edible. His stomach assured him, strongly, that it didn’t care how bland it tasted. He cleaned the bowl.

As he was eating a red arrow appeared above the space where he’d found the bowl, pointing down to the alcove. He placed the bowl in the alcove and it slid shut silently, but a rushing sound came from the alcove for a minute. Another small light illuminated a small red button on the wall. Experimentally, he pressed the red button. Water poured out directly beneath the button. Under different circumstances, he might have laughed at the childish set-up. He drank deeply. The lights illuminating the arrangement went dark, but the button glowed, a dull red glow. He pressed it again, wondering. The water still came. Water whenever he needed and food. He wasn’t meant to die in here, but he knew that. Sesul come. He knew a promise when he heard one.

He retreated to his corner, still shivering. The lukewarm food and water did nothing for his cold body, but he found the food had helped settle his mind. In his panic, he hadn’t realized how desperately hungry he had been. He managed to keep calm, mostly by thinking of anything but reality. He recited one of his favorite plays aloud, altering his voice to play every part. His portrayal of the lead had earned him several awards.

Another light flicked on. Under the water button and food alcove, a squat stool emerged. Apparently, Jahhan thought with semi-hysterical humor, toilets look the same everywhere. He used the toilet and it slid away, followed by the same rushing sound as the food alcove. Clean up, he figured. He allowed himself to be comforted by the simple amenity. He wouldn’t survive if he dwelled in panic.

He continued his recitation of The Mother’s Tale, and somehow managed to fall asleep.

***
Dawn broke over the peaks of the mountains and bathed the green valley below in a soft, golden light. The surface of the crystal blue lake lapping at the base of the mountains glittered. The villagers began to stir. Many decades before, the Territories had devastated Elethera, but the devastation had been contained to mineral resources and the effect on the indigenous population. When Prince Rylam Li Sundeht arrived 30 years ago as an ambitious young man, the lush forests and snow-capped mountains which dominated the southern part of Sundera, the southern continent, had taken his breath away. He discovered later the Sunderans, scattered across the mountains and still clinging to existence, were just as impressive.

“You must go now.” Iler, the head of Rylam’s uncle’s personal security, insisted.

Rylam spent three decades building his perfect little community on Elethera. Thanks to age extension technology, he intended to watch more than one generation grow to adulthood. The thought of leaving made his heart seize.

“How can I leave? These are my people here. My friends.”

Rylam’s Sunderan advisor, Telizah, answered instead. “You’re in more danger than any of us and you won’t be able to help here. Our best chance is for you to speak to the Council in person.”

“I can’t leave.” He didn’t know if his heart could take it.

Until recently, his venture on Elethera seemed blessed. But after failing to have Safar opened for free slave trade, Prince Pietsi had commandeered Sundera Sation in a move that had seemed unusually foolish. Rylam wondered how he hoped to hold onto the station against the combined forces of Sundera and the Sundeht family. But when Rylam requested help from his family to remove Pietsi’s forces, they sent fighters to evacuate Rylam from the planet instead.

“Leave. You’re no good to us if they trap you here.” He’d hired Teli to help him understand his Sunderan subjects, but Teli had become a good friend. Teli had family here. He wouldn’t ask to be evacuated with the prince.

Rylam gripped Teli’s arm. “Please . . .”

“I’ll tell them why you’ve gone. They’ll understand.”

How could they? He wasn’t sure he could in their position. Before he arrived, they lived in shacks like refugees when they weren’t on the run. They never knew if they would have enough food to survive or if they’d be taken in the next slave raid. He came to Elethera to build a profitable neutral trade point midway between Baceti and Holsun. He intended to make a profit and carve out a nice holding, while trying to stabilize Sundera continent so his family might claim the southern continents.

Instead, he became a ruler. Eletherans from outside of Sundera sought the stability the society he built provided. They worked hard to build the picturesque town below his estate. He’d had to import craftsman to teach them how, since they’d lost much of their knowledge when their civilization had collapsed after the Territories took whatever they wanted.

The elders remembered the look of the architecture, and other pieces of a culture destroyed. Rylam used every bit he learned to build the town nestled in the valley between the mountains. The town boasted an architectural style unlike any in the Territories. The people had their own way of dressing, eating, dancing, living.

The prince hadn’t just built a trading port. He had built a home, for Sunderans, for him. He couldn’t lose it.

He drained half a tumbler of fine liquor and controlled the urge to slam it down on the table. When Prince Pietsi had illegally overtaken Sundera Station, he never thought he’d soon be forced from his home.

He sent slaves to pack some essentials, unloaded some of the best of his liquor stock on Teli “to see him through” until Rylam returned, and started gathering his most important document slides.

Iler had settled with his screen to organize the evacuation of the Sundeht staff at a later date. He started to his feet with a curse. “Prepare to leave now!” he ordered into his comm. He turned to Rylam with a grim face. “Baceti fighters are approaching Sundera from Nalari.”

Rylam didn’t understand Iler’s sudden fear. Mijre had no part in Pietsi’s attack. “Are they providing additional security?”

A strange expression flickered across Iler’s face. Rylam knew Iler hadn’t told him the entire truth about the situation. They wouldn’t be running from Pietsi alone. Rylam figured Pietsi had found a Council member to back him, but that backer would never be Mijre. She despised Pietsi, and she had never objected to the prince’s presence on the planet, even though she had established Nalari Province in the northern continent before he came.

Obviously, Iler believed Mijre presented a threat.

“My lord, we must leave now. If you please.” Security formed around him and pressed him out the door. Soon he found himself running across the courtyard.

He allowed himself to be bundled into the passenger compartment. He could fly his private ship, but only did so on routine trips. The pilots went through launching procedures faster than Rylam had ever seen them. Then they were rising toward the heavens, surrounded by Sundeht fighters.

Rylam could hear the voices of his personal craft’s pilots grow anxious. He interrupted, “Tell me.”

“Pietsi fighters, my lord.” The man glanced over his shoulder at his prince. His eyes panicky, despite the controlled tone of his voice. “In orbit. Baceti fighters still approaching over land. I’m sorry, sir. It’ll probably be a matter of who reaches us first.”

“Are we going to attempt to go through?” Rylam would leave the decision to Iler, who would best understand the risks and their chances. The pilot queried Iler’s fighter.

“Yes, sir. We’re going to try.”

Rylam nodded. “Very well.” He stopped bothering them so they could do their jobs.

He faced two very bad possibilities. If Pietsi captured him, he’d sell him to the highest bidder in a heartbeat. The man owed more money than he was worth. Mijre, on the other hand, could be diplomatic when it suited her. She might return him to his family to gain their goodwill. But if she decided she didn’t need the Sundehts’ goodwill, he could be in worse trouble than he ever imagined.

Their ships had a better chance against Pietsi. Pietsi’s fighters would be flown by free citizens. He’d never promote a slave to such a high position as a fighter pilot. But citizens rarely opted for more than stage one enhancements. The mortality rate was too high.

Mijre used both slaves and citizens. She had no problem risking her slaves’ lives with enhancements. He had heard she didn’t even use pilots in fighters unless they had two enhancement procedures or more.

The Sundeht family refused to put people who didn’t have the right to make their own choices in harm’s way, so they used volunteer citizens in fighters. Their citizens would be no match for enhanced slaves who were faster, smarter, and probably connected directly to their ships.

Still, he’d prefer to face Mijre and hope his family name could sway her. Iler might have had the same thought. One of the pilots had activated a screen to allow him to watch their progress. He could toggle through several views of the ships. They headed for a hole in the Pietsi blockade, but on an angle putting more distance between them and Pietsi, while remaining the same distance from Baceti’s ships.

The pursuing ships adjusted their course for Rylam’s trajectory and raced each other to the prize, as Rylam watched helplessly. Pietsi won the race, but they were soon overtaken by Baceti fighters moving at a frightening speed. One fighter passed Rylam’s personal ship so close, Rylam had to fight an urge to raise his arm in useless, but instinctual defense.

Over the pilot’s comm, Rylam heard a terse exchange between Iler and the pilots who had overtaken them. Everyone telling everyone else to break off pursuit. If he weren’t the bone being fought over, he might have found the exchange humorous. He wanted to talk to the fighters, but he knew he would only hamper Iler and his fighters. He was completely in their hands now.

The exchange escalated into a fight. One of the Pietsi pilots fired on Baceti fighters. Rylam’s ships continued heading away from the planet, straining to reach the safe distance to switch engines while their pursuers got in each other’s way. If only Baceti fighters hadn’t had such an obvious advantage. Rylam watched the short engagement on his screen. The Baceti fighters darted between the Pietsi fighters so rapidly he couldn’t follow their paths. They caused superficial damage to a few ships before Pietsi’s fighters broke away and headed for the station, leaving their opponents free to pursue him once more.

Too soon, the fighters were amongst them, weaving a complicated and intimidating pattern through Sundehts’ ships. A Baceti pilot demanded they return to the planet and land. Iler refused. He tried to buy time by listing the laws the Baceti fighters were breaking. A hard voice broke through Iler’s rant. “Prepare to be boarded.”

Rylam jerked on the couch. He rapidly keyed into the exchange. “No! We’re returning to the planet. Iler, give the order.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Rylam shuddered. He hadn’t realized how precarious his situation was until he’d seen how determined both Baceti and Pietsi were to have him. Now Baceti had him. He had no choice. Boarding put both ships in a vulnerable position. The Baceti fighters wouldn’t attempt to board until they’d eliminated all threats: the Sundeht fighters with their pilots, including Iler. The fighters were trained to put their lives on the line for him, but he refused to let them when he’d still be captured after their sacrifice.

The return flight to his estate seemed to take ten times longer than the race away. With his double escort of Sundeht and Baceti fighters, Pietsi’s fighters didn’t try to approach. The ships set down lightly, antigrav tech easing them to the ground. Half of the Baceti fighters landed. The other half vanished, probably to monitor the planet from orbit.

Rylam waited until his security stood in formation, then strode towards the Baceti pilots with as much princely arrogance as he could manage. His status and his family were his best defense.

The three remaining pilots were all slaves, all fourth rank. Rylam wondered if Mijre was trying to intimidate him or if she really had so many pilots who had been enhanced four times that she could spare them from her personal security. They bowed deeply as he approached. One of them broke from the group and took several steps towards Rylam. The slave fixed a bland gaze on Rylam’s chin.

“What the hell are you doing?” Rylam said by way of greeting.

“Following my owner’s orders, your lordship. I apologize for inconveniencing you and your security.” The man bowed again and held the position for a long moment.

Rylam ground his teeth. Baceti slaves had a way of being intolerably polite when bullying on Mijre’s behalf.

“Why is Mijre involving herself in my affairs?” he demanded.

“Councilman Baceti filed a territorial claim for Elethera and Sundera Station, your lordship.”

Rylam’s breath left him in a rush. His uncle had known. That’s why they had rushed to evacuate him.

“I apologize, your lordship. We have orders to tag you.” The slaves started towards him.

“What?! I’m not Baceti property. You can’t tag me.” His security drew weapons. The slaves made weapons appear out of their wraps. Rylam signaled his security to stand down. These slaves would be able to shoot as fast as they could fly. But he couldn’t help backing away from the approaching slaves.

“For you own protection, your lordship. Pietsi waits for you in orbit. Our interference has kept you out of his hands today, but he may attempt to abduct you. Our owner has decided to deploy fighters in Elethera space to monitor the situation and to make sure you remain unharmed.” The slave gripped his upper arm lightly. Rylam tried to move away, but the grip grew tighter the harder he pulled.

“If you’ll escort us past Pietsi’s fighters to Sundeht Province, I’ll be safely surrounded by Sundeht security forces.”

“Our owner feels you should remain on Elethera until the matter of Elethera’s ownership is resolved.”

“She can’t force me to stay on Elethera and she can’t tag me like a piece of furniture waiting for the next owner! It’s illegal.” They surrounded him. Illegal or not, he couldn’t stop her.

The implacable slaves held his arms. One of them held a spray injector to his neck and injected the liquid filled with nanotrackers. They released him gently, bowed, and returned to the ships.

Confused emotions washed through the prince. Having Baceti’s nanotrackers didn’t make him a slave. Knowing they were flooding his system, broadcasting his whereabouts to anyone who knew the signature made it hard not to feel like a slave. But one part of him felt relieved. Whatever happened now, he would face it with his people, at his home.

He turned to Iler with a hard look. “Follow me.”

In the study, he shut the door on the other security, with an apologetic look at Teli who had seen his return and obviously had questions. He backed Iler into a divan. “You will tell me what you know. You haven’t been forthcoming and now I have . . .” A slave marker in my blood. He put a hand over his eyes in frustration.

“You know your uncle. He likes to hoard his information.”

Rylam put up a hand to stop him. “Tell me.”

“You know now Mijre has made a move to claim Elethera. She probably received the same intelligence we did that Councilman Ardres is backing Pietsi.”

Which meant Pietsi had a chance to win the vote even though he had no legitimate claim. The Council’s function was to prevent full-scale, inter-Territorial war, not to be fair. Therefore, Council members tended to back other Council members.

“My uncle can influence Udasi, get a Council member behind my claim.”

“I’m sorry, my lord. Your uncle has decided the political complications have become too risky for the Sundeht family to be involved.”

“My own family isn’t backing me?” His voice sounded like an abandoned child to his ears.

“I’m sorry.” Iler truly sounded sorry. So, his family had made a rescue attempt, but left him without allies.

“I’ve lost Sundera. I may have lost my freedom.” He sat heavily. He had known he was taking a risk when he came to Elethera, but the risk was supposed to be to his wealth and prestige, not his person. “Get off Elethera if you can. Tell my uncle I respectively request he change his position in light of my inability to leave Elethera.”

“Yes, my lord. May fortune light your path.” Iler bowed somberly and left.

Teli knocked almost before the door had closed. His face reflected the shock and worry Rylam felt. He must have gotten the short version of the frustrated escape attempt. Rylam opened the liquor cabinet and began making selections. Teli took two glasses and poured Rylam’s first selection into each.

“Any concerns at the estate I must address, Teli?”

“No, my lord.”

“Excellent.” He drained the glass and held it out to Teli. “Tomorrow I’ll have to think of some way I can protect myself and Sundera, but tonight I want to think of anything but.”

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DrkDreamer, madlodger and Jace J. Quin: Thank you for your reviews. My first ones!
madlodger: Jahhan is 34. He has dark brown hair and eyes, and light skin, but he's not pale. He has a narrow to average build and is 5'9". I always have trouble getting description into the story smoothly. I'm planning on having both M/M and M/F. So far, what I've written beyond Chapter Two has a lot of N/C M/M.

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