<< Back to Ch. 20 --- Continue to Ch. 22 >>
21: The Stalker
"This isn't so awful I suppose," Elisa thought to herself as she and the rest of the group prepared to move in to the fortified shack they had managed to find out in the woods two days ago.
They had landed their small ship and suitably camouflaged it. A thorough search by a very determined party might unearth it, but that was unlikely since they had traveled a good distance from their pursuers and had thus far seen no signs of further pursuit.
Elisa stood in front of the shabby little building, examining the ugly thing. It wasn't ideal by the farthest stretch of the imagination, but it would do for now.
She looked down at her sleeping son, and she was glad he had decided he didn't mind this change of setting. After the wild ride he had experienced in the ship, she had been unsure whether or not he would be in the mood to take to a more rustic situation.
"Juji, don't eat that!" David's voice carried to her ears from somewhere nearby, followed closely by the outraged squawks of the comic bird.
"I told you not to." David chided the obviously unhappy animal. "Little prickly animals don't digest well."
Elisa chuckled to herself. Juji had made her laugh more in the past years than any person – perhaps with the exception of Wolf when he and she were much younger.
Her half-brother had been her best friend for many years before they had parted ways; he had joined the GRN and introduced her to Dommel; she had opted to occupy her time studying the more formal workings of the royal court and other formalities that would have driven most people insane.
Her parents had been supportive of both of their children's choices, but Elisa could never help wondering what her biological father would have had to say.
Treinel Trefus had been a wonderful father to her – at least for the short amount of time she could remember. He had died not long after her second birthday.
As a half-Iscandarian, half-Gamilon, child Elisa's life hadn't been entirely normal. One mercy she had been afforded was being born with the skin-tone of her world of residence, though it was a little lighter than most of her Gamilon friends'. To their credit, her childhood companions hadn't ever brought up her heritage, but despite their kindness to her, she had always known that her split-lineage made her something of an oddity.
Her mother, Meital Trefus – later Frakken – was marked by the white skin of her race, and though most of Gamilon society had accepted her, there had been those who were unhappy. Ronen Frakken – her step-father – had seen to it that they knew their opinions were not appreciated; for that, Elisa had greatly loved and respected him.
When Wolf was born, Elisa had been delighted to have someone else to talk to – even though he could not understand or respond for a while. Sometimes just having someone like her there to listen was all she needed.
A flutter of feathers preceded Juji's landing on her shoulder.
"And what do you want?" She asked the bird, turning her head to look at him.
In return she received a comical series of squawks, chitters and head bobs. Then the bird snatched a strand of her blonde hair and started chewing on it.
"Juji!" she scolded, lightly smacking the animal's beak.
He protested, but Elisa gave him a "Bad bird. Stop" look.
"Go follow Wolf around or something." she pointed towards her brother who was just entering the shack.
Juji chittered, happy again, hopped off of her shoulder and waddled towards the man, trumpeting his greetings.
Wolf looked at the bird, sighed, and motioned for him to hurry up.
Elisa smiled.
"You can go in." Masterson said, walking up to her from off to one side. "There isn't anything too overly disagreeable in there. Surprisingly."
"Thank you." Elisa replied. "But I just got rid of Juji by sending him after that brother of mine. I think I'll stay out here for a while before I go in."
"Very well." the teenager shrugged and started to walk away.
"Masterson." Elisa stopped him.
He turned back around.
"You..." She fished for the words, "You're not entirely... 'average,' are you..."
The teenager let a small smile cross his face, "Not really, no."
"May I ask why?"
"You may ask, Elisa, but I'm afraid I cannot answer you."
Elisa thought about his response then nodded and said with a smile of her own, "Alright. I'll accept that for now."
Masterson started to walk away again.
"But know this, 'Turov.' I'll find out eventually."
Masterson nodded, "Of that I am sure." then he left to start another sweep of the area.
"So let me get this straight." Zimring paced the shack, his shoes stirring up dust and dirt as he walked. " That bird of yours," he inclined his head towards Juji, who had just entered on the heels of Frakken, "brought us the 'right' end of a tracking device? The end that does the tracking instead of the end that's tracked?"
"That is correct." Dommel nodded.
"So how do we know what the 'wrong' end 'a this thing is attached to?" the hermit asked.
"That would be Masterson's department." David put in, stepping through the back door of the shack and closing it behind him, "He's out looking around at the moment, but he'll be back momentarily."
"That boy does more sweeps than a broom." Zimring shook his head, "What's he so all-fired alert for? Isn't normal I tell ya."
Frakken missed the remark entirely because he was stopping Juji from swallowing something he couldn't identify but was pretty sure wasn't edible; David pretended to clean the dirt off of a nearby window and remained silent.
"No harm in being thorough." Dommel said, "He's proven to be trustworthy and I have confidence that he'll do nothing to put us in danger."
Zimring harrumphed. "Even after all those years in the GRN, you can still trust." he shook his head, "I guess I admire you for it. But," he pointed a finger in Dommel's face, "Just make sure that truster 'a yours doesn't get you killed someday." the hermit examined the tracker again then looked up at the other three men – and the bird – in the room, "I have to go into town soon. I'll need someone else along to haul supplies since I can't exactly take that ship a' mine. Guess I'll bring the boy."
The former innkeeper nodded then smirked, "Maybe he'll keep you out of trouble."
"I'm too old for too much trouble at once, Dommel." Zimring laughed, "But maybe I'll get the chance to find out what that young one's made of."
"Someone mention my name?" the back door of the cabin suddenly opened and in walked Masterson.
Zimring and Dommel exchanged pained looks, then ignored the question.
"Take a look at this thing, will you." Dommel shoved the tracker in the young man's face. "Since you seem to be the expert here."
Masterson laughed. "I assure you I am no expert, but I've had my share of experience." he accepted the device then found a place to sit that would give him sufficient light to work.
He sat down, then started fiddling with the back panel, finally prying it off; then he dove into the guts of the device, examining it thoroughly and making a few adjustments before securing the back plate again and reactivating the thing. The little device blinked a couple of times without any sound, then gave a little blip – indicating that it was on and ready for duty.
"Map." Talan ordered the thing.
A holographic projection appeared, hovering over the tracker. At first it was blank, then two points of glowing light appeared.
Zimring, Dommel, David, and Frakken crowded around Masterson and the device. Juji hopped up on Wolf's head again to get a clear view of the curious, blinking lights.
One light was now standing still and the second one was moving swiftly towards the first.
"Not an expert, huh?" said Dommel sarcastically. "None of us could get it to do that."
"Guardiana technology." Masterson sighed, "Same principles with a rather convoluted application."
At that the conversation took a more relevant turn.
"What is that?" David asked, pointing to the moving glow.
All eyes returned to the floating lights.
"Is there a way to find out?" the younger Lysis continued.
"Short of walking up to it and asking, no." Masterson replied. "The zealots are clever, but sometimes they overlook the obvious. Whoever was supposed to have this must have known who or what he was tracking and never recorded it on here."
Juji, who was now bored with the funny light, hopped down off of Wolf's head to chase a bug that had just whizzed by his beak.
"Then perhaps that's what we need to do." Frakken put in, eyes narrowed at the light blip. "Turov. Come with me." the former assassin motioned for Masterson to follow him as he headed for the back door.
The young man thought for a moment, then deciding that the group was in safe enough hands with Dommel and Zimring still there, he followed Wolf, deactivating the holographic map and tucking the tracker into his pocket.
The two left the area quickly, stopping only to make sure that Elisa went inside with everyone else as she was still sitting on what passed as the front porch of the shack.
A few hours' hike, with the guidance of the tracker, brought them directly to the object in question.
They came upon him rather suddenly, leaving Wolf and Masterson only the barest seconds to hide.
Once concealed, Frakken cursed quietly and said, "Fiske, you nachash*! Can't you leave me alone?"
"You know him?" Masterson asked, in an equally quiet tone.
"Unfortunately..." Wolf replied, thankful that the man in question was still too far away to hear their little exchange. "He's following me. He must have tracked our engine emissions here. At this rate, he'll find the ship in a few hours – finding us after that will be a mere formality. We have to take him out now. Permanently."
"You mean kill him." Masterson stated.
"Yes." a look of cold, hard calculation now permeated Frakken's face.
"I can't do that – it isn't warranted. There are other options here aside from ending his life." Masterson replied.
"And what, pray-tell are those?" Wolf hissed. "We can't wait for him to get tired of looking for us and slink away. He won't ever do that – not Fiske."
"Who is he?" Talan asked, reactivating the map and watching as the second light hovered close-by.
"He's one of the zealot's best men – if not the best. He's the one who captured me to begin with. He brought me to them. That's the last memory I have before you pulled that shêd out of me. We can't let him leave here."
"One wrong does not necessitate another in return." the young man replied. "In any case, leading him away – sending him in a completely different direction – will buy us time, and may result in sending all of our pursuers in that same wrong direction."
Frakken thought on this for a moment, the skeptical look finally fading from his eyes to be replaced with a mollified expression. "And how do you propose we do this?"
"You're the assassin." Masterson replied in false innocence. "I'm only a teenager."
"You are like no teenager I've ever met." Frakken huffed. "But since you insist, I suggest a bit of bait to send him off track." he looked pointedly at Masterson.
"And you want me to be that bait." Talan filled in.
"Well... I am the assassin." Wolf smirked.
Seeing the sense in Wolf's choice of roles, Masterson checked Fiske's location. "Any suggestions before I go?" he asked Wolf.
"Don't let him see you. As long as he thinks there's a possibility you might be me, he should follow you."
"But won't his sensors tell him it isn't you?"
"If he hasn't spotted us yet, his sensors are still recovering from the knock on the head I gave him before we pulled out of Zimring's cabin."
"So that's what you were doing before you joined us." Masterson nodded, smirking.
"Just go." Wolf ordered.
Masterson sneaked around behind Fiske, coming around about two hundred feet in front of the man. Then, seeing his chance, he made a crunching noise with his foot that he knew would catch the hunter's attention.
Fiske's helmet immediately faced Masterson's position. The man popped the headgear off – further giving away his hampered sensors. The helmet folded itself into a fist-sized mass. A compartment on the back of Fiske's armor slid open and he slipped the item in, the compartment closing once his hand was out of it.
Masterson was still for a moment, waiting for Fiske to look somewhere else.
For an eternal minute Fiske stared at the place where Masterson was hiding. Then finally, he started to look around, his eyes surveying everything around him.
Once the hunter was facing the direction opposite of his position, Masterson ran, making sure to make some, but not a lot of noise. After all, he didn't want to give Fiske any reason to suspect anything.
It worked.
Masterson could hear the hunter pursuing him. Making sure to keep something between himself and the other man, he ran for several hundred yards, waiting for Wolf to make his move.
Suddenly, the brush stopped and Masterson found himself at a sheer drop. Scrambling to keep from plummeting off the cliff, he threw himself backwards and rolled away from the ledge, crashing through a couple of bushes along the way.
When he came out of his roll he looked up and found himself staring into the muzzle of Fiske's weapon.
"So why are we going North now?" Constance asked, skipping along happily next to her mother, Garen and Desslok.
"Because that is the direction we need to go." the prince stated without elaboration.
"Thought you'd say something like that." the girl said, stopping to pick a wildflower, then taking two running steps to catch up with the adults and teenager.
She twirled the flower in her fingers, then sniffed the petals and tucked the stem behind one ear. "So what's this prince like?"
"A prince." Desslok replied.
The girl rolled her eyes, "So is he cocky and spoiled? Or is he nice?"
"You'll have to make that determination yourself." the prince said, keeping his eyes on the ground ahead of them.
"Is he short? Or tall? Does he –"
"Connie, dear, I think Deuel wants to concentrate on other things right now." Dara stopped her daughter's one-sided conversation trail there and Desslok silently thanked her. There were much more pressing matters at hand – especially now with their previous destination destroyed and their single pursuer still on their trail.
"We must move more quickly if we expect to outrun him." the prince said over his shoulder. "He isn't gaining on us, so we still have time to lose him."
At this, Garen looked back the way they'd come, suddenly aware of the danger they were all still in – something he found himself forgetting more often now that Constance was there to take his mind off of it.
"How quick of a pace must we set to lose him?" the lieutenant asked, stepping back into his soldier mindset.
"Faster than we have been going. Right now we're matching him. Anything faster will stretch out our lead – give us the time we need to get away, but the faster go, the sooner we can accomplish that." the young man said.
"How do you know all this?" Dara asked.
"I have a... tool... that does sensor sweeps up to several miles away." he replied, keeping Mintra'el's existence concealed for the moment, "Our pursuer is on the very edge of our sensor range, but that does not mean he will stay there."
"Should we stop tonight then?" Dara asked.
"To go on when any of the group is unrested or cannot properly see the terrain is more dangerous than stopping." Desslok said. "Our pursuer has been stopping each night as well. We can travel a bit longer than we usually would, but we must stop eventually to ensure our own safety."
"Ah." Dara nodded, looking a little nervous,"Yes... I see your point."
"He will not find us." Desslok said. "We will reach our final destination. All of us."
Dara looked at the teenager, seeing again the fire that she had witnessed there before when Eliora's house had been raided. It gave her courage.
"I know." she said more confidently. Then, looking at the rest of them she said, "Well, I'm up for a run. Anyone else?"
The four took off, still headed North, the teenager they all knew only as "Deuel" in the lead. They dodged trees, boulders, bogs, small animals, and bug swarms, dropping back to a walk when they needed a rest then picking up the pace again. Only once did they stop for any length of time, and it was Desslok who called the halt.
His only explanation was, "There is something I must do. I will return within the hour." then with no further words, he took off back in the direction from which they had come.
True to his word, he was back before an hour had elapsed.
They continued on their way, keeping a slower and slower pace as the day wore on – mostly for Dara and Constance's sake since Garen's training had prepared him for such rigorous trips and Desslok seemed unphased by the day's journey as well.
The group continued on into the twilight hours, but when visibility became too poor to tell a tree from one of their fellows, they stopped, made camp in the dark, ate a cold meal and went to bed – all except for the prince, who again offered to take the first watch of the night.
The night was black, as it always was in the middle of the forest. The only lights that made it through the thick canopy were a couple strands of moonlight that had managed to weave through the leaves. Other than that, Mintra'el was the only source of light safely available to him, so, making sure that the other four were asleep, he took out the A.I.
"Light," he whispered to her, receiving a dull beam that could only be seen for a few feet before the blackness took over again.
He sat on a log facing away from his sleeping companions.
His thoughts drifted back to the horrors he had seen the night before: the destroyed cabin and a zealot troop surrounding its ruins.
"How could they have survived...?" he thought. Then it occurred to him that he knew nothing of this "Zimring" that they had gone to see, neither did he know what Frakken and Dommel were capable of as a combined force. "But six... against several hundred...? Surely not..." he despaired again before pulling his thoughts back in check and concentrating on the task that lay before him.
That was when his mostly-full pack caught his eye. He had taken it off his back and leaned in against the log he was sitting on. Picking it up, he opened the main storage pouch and began looking through the things he had brought with him from the crates in Eliora's tunnel.
He picked up the Iscandarium scarf, letting the bright fabric blow in the gentle breeze that swept through the forest.
He had no idea why he had kept it. It was such an impractical item – unless you were going through a radiation field for some reason, in which case it would be quite handy. Deciding it was still worth hanging on to – if only for the monetary value of the thing, he temporarily draped it around his neck so that he wouldn't lose it. Taking out several other random useful objects, he finally picked out something he hadn't really recognized before, but saw fairly clearly now.
It was an odd-looking glove with holes all over.
He took off his right glove and slipped the thing on.
Nothing happened. He took the thing off again and realized with a sigh that it was meant for the left hand.
He put his right glove back on and took his left off, slipping the thing on in its place. The white marking on his hand seemed to stick out all the more in the darkness and the hole-spotted article didn't help much to alleviate that perception.
Once the thing was on his hand he waited for a moment, staring at it, unsure of what to expect.
He was about to remove it again when it began to softly glow.
It did this for several moments before a quiet voice said, "Hello Desslok, third of that name, second-born prince of the Royal House of Gamilon, heir to the throne. This Interface has now been imprinted with your genetic code. No other user may gain access to Interface-only information through this device."
His heart began to race as he suddenly realized what exactly he now possessed.
* nachash - snake