1:3:6 Stolen (Part 1)

Alone. Char sat in the office waiting for her turn. She had not long seen Lore disappear into the lift and was waiting for The Three Armed Rexian to return. Her stomach was tied in knots as the progressing time and silence ate away at her confidence. That silence was broken as the lift whirred closer and closer. The Three Armed Rexian disembarked and strode across the room to the door to Syd’s office. She opened it and used her free hand to gesture Char through.

The room was much nicer than she had been expecting, softer than the waiting room and the office yet still just as imposing. The ceiling appeared to be at least half a floor taller than the waiting room too. Char scouted the office with her eyes as she moved towards Syd’s desk; the soundproofing on the walls gave her pause for concern. Char firmed her grip on her pistol. Why did an office at the top of a building need sound insulating? Possibilities ran rampant through her head as she finally came to the desk. The large leatherette chair opposite her swivelled to face forward.
“We’ve got a problem.” Syd started. “It would seem your ship has drawn itself some attention and not from the locals.” Syd took a sip from her drink. “And going from what my officers have told me and what I’m seeing here, I’m inclined to believe that some myths are real.”
“Where’s Lore?” Char tried her hardest to sound confident but wasn’t sure how well it translated.
“Wherever they are, they are all the safer for being there and they are most certainly safer than you. Now to business.” Syd shook her head.
“I’m sorry?” Char quietly unclipped her holster to further ready her pistol.
“Not long after your ship made planetfall, a Protectorate ship of unknown configuration and identification requested entry to the system. That ship headed straight here and deployed an escort class ship to the planet’s surface. While we couldn’t scan the carrier, that escort ship had twelve life signs on it.”
“Well, I don’t see how this has anything to do with me or Lore.” Char was telling a half-truth as, while they were enemies of The Protectorate, the ship could have been part of a routine visit to The Protectorate’s interests.
“Once that ship reached orbit, I got a message from an interesting individual, an Inquisitor. Honestly, I didn’t think they were real but apparently they are. They told me about the fugitives I had let dock on my landing pads and even offered to get rid of you for me. Naturally, I told them my people would more than suffice to get the job done.”
“You’re protecting us?”
“You’re useful. And if I’m correct about you, you’re more than useful. Lore is safe down in the mines but I need you for a special job.” Syd pushed a book across the table to Char. The front cover was adorned with embossed Quatarri symbols.
“Rice and wine?” Char shrugged.
Syd scowled at her. “That is a history book about the Quatarrians. One of the only human written records of your people. You have no idea how much a book like this costs. Out of print and completely copy protected so it doesn’t even exist on the internet. There are only a hundred and fifty of these still floating around.”
Char opened the book and saw the title on the first page. She scanned the table of contents and saw that it had omitted several key events in her people’s timeline. She immediately turned to the three year month. “’Human intervention gave way to a temporary ceasefire however the peace was broken when the Eastern Quatarri detonated a subterranean Tempora crystal destroying the entire planet?’ That’s not right.”
“So you are Quatarrian?” Syd’s stony demeanour cracked slightly as she began to smile.
“Maybe I am, perhaps I just know my history.” Char resigned. “What of it?”
“Mauve you old git.” Syd shook her head. “If you’re Quararri and if any of that book is true then you’re one of the most dangerous people in the galaxy.” Syd shut the book. “And I’ve got an offer to make you.”
“I don’t think I really have a choice but to listen.” Char readjusted her grip. She realised how little she had been doing to obscure her readiness. Syd just didn’t care. Regardless, Char maintained her readiness.
“You do. Just no pleasant alternatives.” Syd smiled again. It really didn’t suit her. “I want the Inquisitor and the troops they’ve brought with them gone, you probably want them gone too. Now, you can kill them, convince them to leave, bit of both, I don’t care. I just want them gone.”
“Have you got any information about who they are or where they are?”
“According to their transmission they are being led by an Inquisitor Reid. While she doesn’t exist in our systems, her eleven squad mates all do and they are all the best of the best at what they do. To answer your second question, their ship laned in an old Reds conduit mill, not too far from their current mining operations. That would be your safest bet.” Before Char could object, Syd stood. “Now let’s get you some toys to play with.”

Syd turned away from Char and rose. As she did, she depressed both of her chair’s arms slightly until they each clicked thrice. The sound dampening foam to their left fell away into the floor revealing an offshoot room. She looked at Char expectantly as if it were obvious that she wanted her to follow. After a lingering death stare, Char took the hint and crossed the desk to the room. She had been expecting the room to be similar in size to perhaps a small cupboard but Char was instead greeted to three rooms, all almost the same size as the bridge of The Destiny. The walls illuminated revealing a catalogue of lethality. Weapons from various cultures and species, all stored and ordered as if ready to take from the wall and use. The room on the left was packed entirely with melee weapons, some blunt but most bladed; the room on the right seemed to carry bigger guns. Syd strode to the centre of the room and gave Char a moment to explore. She’d never seen so many variants of swords or pikes or clubs. While most of them were from ancient human cultures from Aztec to medieval, there was the occasional alien diamond in the rough. Rexian hunting knives, Sat’Mach duelling shields, Soloss bumper swords and even an Aetar chakram had Char in awe and wondering what the right room held. Syd was waiting, still at the centre of the room. She smiled at Char as she dug her heel into a very specific spot.
“This is where I keep my weapons. Or the weapons I prefer to use. Not even my personal staff have access to these.” She gleamed. “But this, this I think was made for you.”
A frosted glass plinth rose from the floor and eventually stopped when it reached Syd’s eyeline. She tapped her heel once more and, as she did, the frosting thawed and the box cleared up. Char recoiled immediately.
“I love being right.” She stopped for a moment to think. “But that also means Mauve was right which I hate.” She soaked up the majesty of the finest weapon in her collection. “Beautiful isn’t she?”
Char’s golden hue had melted leaving only a pale underlayer. “That’s…” One word escaped her lips.
“Well, I suppose it is for you.” Syd had the top of the case open and the long, cylindrical device already partially removed. Quatarrian brassy gold with the characteristic crimson highlights. “I have to admit, I like your style. Grafting such artwork directly onto your body is pretty efficient but powering that weapon with your own natural energy is even more impressive.” She shook her head. “Chills.”
“ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?” She had more questions than she could properly express. “How…Mauve… How did he even come by this?”
Syd just shrugged. She rolled up Char’s sleeves and examined her arms. “Left or right?”
“I’m left handed so it goes on the right.” Char removed her watch and replaced it on her left wrist. She was on autopilot, stunned into subservience. Syd slid the tube over her arm, lining it up with the scars already on Char’s wrist. Char hadn’t even considered where the scars had come from but now she had an idea. Char took over, pulling the whole weapon assembly forward, shrouding her wrist and fist. Once in its correct position, the device shrank, clamping down around her. It wasn’t too tight but it was still, noticeably smaller than her memories led her to believe. She winced as two pins fired either side of her wrist, securing the device. Char disconnected her pistol’s energy line and connected it to the new weapon. It whirred and clunked as it accepted its first dregs of power in near to a thousand years. A slight golden glow filled the tubes along the hull of the device. It began to cycle as it charged. Each time the light completed a circuit around her arm, it grew in intensity. She disconnected the tube after hearing a series of tones.
“Even more beautiful than I thought and so much sleeker.” Syd sounded as though she was drooling over the device but her expression was closer to neutrality. “Mauve said it was a weapon. How right was he?”
Char turned her arm to examine the device. Just looking at it sent goosebumps across her body. “It’s a little more than that. This was a mate-breaker. A weapon designed to end a war. I only saw one up close at the very end of the war but we were told it could give a soldier the firepower of a tank.” Char was careful with her smirk. Syd took a step back. She was torn about the weapon. In part, it was a useful tool that would most certainly help with the mission ahead and if it was on her wrist, it wasn’t on anyone else’s but at the same time, it made her feel dirty, guilty; as though merely possessing it were a crime.
“First time then.”
“Close to it.” Char was slowly beginning to realise that she had actually never handled one of these but her memories seemed to be enough for now.
“Three will escort you out.” Syd handed over a holographic map. “Get it done then.”