Vit’r’an stood there for a moment his chest rising and falling quickly, Aileen watched him without moving, she knew that he was in a trance, as he always was after fighting. It was the animal part of the Ra’a’zani brain, he needed a few moments to snap out of it.
After he cooled of Vit’r’an turned towards the door on the left with Aileen following, the next room was a Ra’a’zani bathing chamber, basically it was a pool.
He stepped in the water and submerged, Ra’a’zani could spend up to half an hour underwater. Aileen moved to the edge of the pool, she could see the Rasari, the fish that Ra’a’zani brought from their own world, start eating the blood and gore from Vit’r’an’s scales, it was their way of cleaning themselves. Ten minutes later he resurfaced, his face now clean, but didn’t exit the pool, instead he rested his back on the edge of the pool and looked at Aileen.
“I will never understand how some of you humans can remain so indifferent to the deaths of your own kind.” He said, commenting on Aileen’s blank face, it was a face that she had to perfect in order to survive.
“There are worst things than seeing death Dakar.” Aileen said.
“Perhaps there are.” Vit’r’an said, his lizard like head tilted back, a pose that meant he was thoughtful. “Tell me again, why did you betray your people to us?” He commanded.
“To survive, Dakar.” Aileen answered, Vit’r’an enjoyed asking her that question, even though she always gave the same answer.
“You were taken care of, you were doing what nature intended you to do. Your life wasn’t in danger.” Vit’r’an said. So it’s going to be one of those. Aileen thought, Vit’r’an usually left it at her answer, but sometimes he liked to poke deeper, he fancied himself an expert on human psychology, and always tried to peek further and discern the reasons for our actions.
“Nevertheless, I needed to survive, Dakar.” She said. Against her wishes the wall in her mind between the past and the present cracked, she closed her eyes and images poured through. Cold, her back scraping against the stone floor, grunts above her, crying. NO! Don’t go back to the dark place. Slowly the wall went back up and she opened her eyes, Vit’r’an was studying her, she must have given something away, but he didn’t push further. He submerged himself once more, and then resurfaced and climbed out of the pool. He went to the corner of the room and entered a small chamber filled with mist. A minute later he exited now dry, the mist had collected all the water of his scales. He went back towards the dining room, with Aileen following. The room was now clean, some of the other slaves did their job and cleaned it. He passed through the room and into the main area, a comm unit was placed in the middle of the room, with another Ra’a’zani sitting in front of it.
“Anything important?” Vit’r’an asked.
“No, we still haven’t been able to identify the strange reading from the belt, and we are yet to find the shuttle that disappeared, Dakar.” The other Ra’a’zani answered.
It was rare for Ra’a’zani to lose track of their assets, but accidents do happen, the Solar system was a big place and they couldn’t monitor it all. What made this instance strange was that they lost all sensor capability prior to the shuttles disappearance in that area.
“Inform me immediately if you learn something.” Vit’r’an said. He walked to the rack mounted on the wall by the front entrance and took of a belt, it contained a pulse pistol, a comm device and a few other items. He then exited the door with Aileen following. Vit’r’an always took Aileen with him everywhere, she was his trophy, a way of saying to the other Ra’a’zani that he was the one in charge of all of the slaves, he also liked to question her about humanity, Aileen didn’t care as long she didn’t go back.
They stepped out and onto the streets of what was once Rome, the Ra’a’zani leadership decided that they would make their base there amongst the ruins of once great city. Aileen believed that they didn’t know the significance of the city before they chose it.
As they walked the streets Aileen could see other humans hurrying about doing their master’s bidding, there were few Ra’a’zani outside, they preferred to spend the days in their baths.
“Do you think that it was the resistance?” Vit’r’an asked after a few minutes of walking.
Aileen knew that he was talking about the missing shuttle.
“Perhaps, Dakar.” She said. She had long since made peace with the fact that humanity will never again be free.
“Why do you think they would need a shuttle?”
“There are many reasons. Perhaps they simply needed one, or they plan on using it to sneak up on you, Dakar.”
“Yes, I always forget about your cowardly tendencies. We will watch for that. Why do you think they acted now? There haven’t been any activities from them in years.”
“I don’t know, Dakar.” Aileen said.
“Perhaps it was only an accident, I believe we showed you what happens when you try to rebel.”
“Yes Dakar.”
“We could make another demonstration. Perhaps you need to be reminded that we are in charge.” Vit’r’an said thoughtfully.
Aileen remained silent.
“But we have no proof that it was the resistance. We wouldn’t be very good masters if we did things without a cause, and it would send a message to the other clans that we can’t control our slaves. No, we will wait and see.” He said.
They arrived at a walled off building, with armored Ra’a’zani standing guard, big metal towers were constructed on every corner of the rectangular wall. They were immediately let through, as the guards recognized Vit’r’an. It was the Ra’a’zani headquarters, monitoring all activity on the planet.
They went to a few other security checks and then entered a large command room.
“Anything new?” Vit’r’an asked his second in command.
“We have another batch of slaves ready for shipment to the clan Grakkova, and the breeding group is ready for transport to the home world.” Sa’r’an Tekar of clan Ooruvan said.
“Good, the trip to the home world is long, so make sure that everything is in order with the stasis units.”
“Of course Dakar.”
Aileen felt her chest tighten, Breeding group. That could have been me. She quickly buried the thought, No, I escaped that fate.
“Anything else?”
“We estimate to be able to expand our mining operations deeper in the system in five rotations, as the first of the slaves out of the initial breeding programs reach maturity.”
“That is good, the increase in production will give us a lot of influence with the core, it has been a while since we found so rich a solar system.” Vit’r’an commented, looking at the hologram on the left wall, showing the entire system. He walked up to his usual place on a railing overlooking the room, he locked his legs and just watched as his underlings worked. It was a part of his daily routine, they would spend the greater part of the day here watching over the work. Aileen found a comfortable pose and prepared herself for another long day.
Book 3 of the “Rise of the Empire” series coming March 2015
Contact the author: ivankalrote@gmail.com
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Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by Ivan Kal
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.