Table Of ContentExile: Arc
978-1-105-61691-4
_.Star Saga._
Copyright © Jack Lance
"Let me tell you a story," Arc said, then gripped his hand at
her and palmed the starry sky, "A wonderful, terrifying
story."
Part I
The Citadels Aren’t There
2
Blood Money.
An eye opens, taking in the sight of a hundred thousand
stars flying by.
The blazing fire of the stars burned within the man’s eye.
He blinked slowly and then turned away as the view ahead
cleared, and from the flames a single point of light flickered
and glared out of the dark, only to be eclipsed a moment
later by a large, bright red and blue planet. It’s surrounding
rings angled and stopped, or rather, relatively the ship did
so, and then all ahead was still and dead.
Nine left the observatory, with the man leaving last. He
affixed a helmet to an illuminous white suit and cocked a
pistol ready, as did the others ahead of him.
Their vessel slid slowly down into the planets orbit. No
alarms sounded, no ships ran to intercept, since the
solar defence grid had been fully hacked on approach. The
space mainframe would recognize the ship as an innocent
mineral hauler no matter what the circumstances that
followed.
From an opening in the side of the titanic bright white
craft, the figures stepped out and walked toward the
underside. As the ship approached close enough to burn
against the atmosphere, it swivelled so to move the figures
into the harsh blast.
3
They stood within the fire looking at one another through
the mockingly deformed animal shaped helmets.
Once one had nodded to the rest they crouched and leapt
up from the ship, falling down toward the planet.
“Hello and welcome to Cequodus Prime.” the automatic
tourist welcome message of the planet fed through as they
dived down through the ionosphere, automatically
mistaking them for nine visiting space craft. “This is the
capital planet of the Cequodus Royal Dynasty. Adopted in
47133 for its central position between particle trade routes,
while also being uniquely situated on a Lord layline within
less than a light year, the planet has seen generations of
Cequodus bring prosperity and hope to this quadrant of
Lantis space, and provide goods and services to every
species within the Eclipse Empire. We do hope you'll enjoy
your stay!”
The nine listened to or ignored this as they dropped down
from the harsh upper air into the cloud belt and down
through hills of grey gas. Lightning snarled ahead as they
bombed through faster each moment, before suddenly the
cloud ended and the ground, so much closer than on many
other planets with less intense weather cycles, emerged and
closed fast toward them. They dropped between tall, dark
mountain peaks covered in black forests toward a palace’s
grounds, built into one of the mountainsides.
Seconds from impact the nine twisted with more power
than the greatest of galactic gymnasts, and landed feet first
in the courtyard of the Cequodus Dynastic Palace.
4
The nano-scale pistons within the suits took all of the force
of the fall, dispersing the impact across the wet marble
courtyard, shattering it in nine shallow, wide craters.
The rains continued as if nothing had occurred, as they
each crouched in a ball for a moment, to get their bearings.
Another snarl of lightning and its close thunder moved
through the cloud above.
They each stood up slowly, and looked around at the rain
battered yard before a raised lawn, and the tall palace and
mountain beyond it. The leader of the nine nodded again
and they began to walk forward through the gardens toward
the palace.
In the main room the lights were on bright and inside
through opaque glass could be seen silhouette figures sitting
here and there and the sound of discourse between them.
The nine moved to the glass wall fronting on to the lawns,
and looked inward a moment before walking aside in two
rows to the doors.
At the mark of another nod from the tallest of them they
shouldered through the doorways into the room and spread
out aiming their wrist weapons and pistols at the seated
figures. The one closest to the leader was clearly Pybus
Cequodus. His fat, arrogant smile was spread all over his
face. The leader shone the laser pointer of his weapon into
his eyes and held it there for maximized discomfort, before
pulling it away.
5
The others looked between their leader and the sitting
figures of the Cequodus family. Their leader reached and
pressed the face of Pybus with the tips of his fingers and
watched as his head fell backward and shattered upon the
wooden floor.
The nine stepped forward to see the rubble of the figurine.
Within could be seen a small, old fashioned tape recorder
playing back the voice of Pybus.
“They made us.” one of the two women said. “Let’s get
outa…”
”Check the vaults.” their leader said quietly, and the two
women skipped and ran off toward the back of the
building.
One of the others walked close and whispered “Ace, we
have to get out of here now.”
Insanely, their leader screamed out and opened fire into the
room. The others joined him in their frustration, spraying
the huge room with hot sparks of plasma. The ceramic
figurines of the Cequodus family burst and melted on fire,
with the fire then quickly spreading and engulfing the entire
room. When they had finally finished they heard over the
suit's intercom the voices of the two women.
“Can you read me?” one shouted. “The vaults are empty. I
repeat they cleared em out.”
6
“Teleporting in 5, 4, 3, 2…” their leader said, and in a crack
of magnesium light all but one of them disappeared.
Realizing the mistake, the man remained calm and walked
out of palace onto the first of the damp lawns. The storm
had cleared slightly, and through the gaps in cloud cover he
could see their magnificent white ship in orbit. It was
suffering a laser barrage from two other enormous ships
that now surrounded it. It seemed that the others had taken
control and were giving as good as they got, but in the
confusion it seemed they hadn’t noticed one of their
number had been left behind.
Behind in the palace firebombs were being teleported in to
cleanse it of the intruders. Such petty possessions were
simple to replace, and one of thousands of palaces that the
Cequodus family possessed.
The man stood watching the sky, trying to remain calm, as
the sounds of explosions drew nearer.
The white ship banked away, ramming one of the Shadow
Security ships out of its way, before engaging the
backspace-drive and disappearing back into the night sky.
The man heard slow footsteps approach from behind, and
he turned to see the person through his visor.
“Hello Arc.” Pybus Cequodus said as he stepped toward
him on the lawn. His fat, over inflated appearance hissed
and fizzed, denoting that it was a holographic projection of
the Cequodus prince. A similar holographic projection of
7
Arc and the surrounding place would be seen at the
opposite side.
The prince stepped around the man called Arc and then
stood staring at him in his suit. The deformed rabbit shaped
helmet grinned back at him insanely, twisted bucked teeth
and all. All in all it was not a scene the Cequodus would
ideally like to portray to those pre-packaged tourists.
“Ah. So very bold.” Pybus said leaning toward him slightly,
and then faded away.
Behind where he had stood, at the very far side of the lawn
a tiny crack of magnesium light opened a small backspace
gap, enough to pass through a firebomb. The object
dropped to the lawn with a wet thump, and then a second
later it exploded. The walls of the garden blew outwards
and the grass and trees burst apart.
Arc was thrown back from his feet like a ragdoll, and
through the now splintering front windows of the palace.
He flew into the room amongst a shower of glass, and slid
up to the foot of the burning sofa.
There he lay for a moment, a broken mess inside his suit
of armour, before reaching to claw with the last of
his meagre energy at the eye plate of his helmet. It squeaked
against his fingertips slightly, and then he gave up.
Arc lay panting and staring through the visor at the gaping
mess where the front grounds of the palace had been,
waiting now for his pain and injuries to take him into death.
8
He was delirious but noticed slowly that the garden had
become occupied by a large host of cloaked figures. They
glided slowly forward through the jagged windowframe and
gathered in a group before him. A menacing sight to
behold, they were draped from head to heel in a scaled
shroud, with what seemed an impossibly thin body and
limbs wrapped in a similar scaled fabric, at least so much as
could be observed within the cloak. Around their faces it
nipped quite tight, suggesting very alien features within,
especially at the bulb of the mouth.
There was a human chuckle, and Pybus walked between
them, followed by the rest of his odious family. With no
holographic interference this time it seemed they had come
to finish him in person.
“Welcome to Hell.” Pybus grinned nastily, and booted Arc
hard in the face, killing him instantly.
9
And where do I find my Soul now?
A sarcophagus lay in the center of a cold room.
Two hologramatic screens hovering an inch above each of
the two halves of its lid chattered and churned through
information about the occupant. Most were security analysis
readings, with speeded-up checks and cross checks on the
mobility of the man. Suddenly the data on the screen
flushed red and orange and then disappeared. The room lay
silent for a few moments save for the hiss of the nitrogen
coolants in the walls spewing icy gas through vents and
collecting on the floor all around.
The lids of the sarcophagus whistled and hissed before
moving aside spewing yet more cryo-gasses out to collect at
the floor.
A needle-like camera in the ceiling watched a man sit up
and hold his head in his hands. He was mostly bald and pale
skinned with a wiry muscular body.
The camera watched and listened as the man groaned
“Where am I?”
“Where am I?” he yelled up at the camera, having
apparently found it already.
“Oh my word.” he said putting his head back in his hands
for a moment, then looked up with wide eyes and spoke
almost in a whisper. “Who am I?”
10
