Empress Fallen - Chapter 1 - Part 2

ii. Advena

Aliya shifted restlessly, the song of the dying imprisoning her mind. She was starting to shiver. Two men limped past her, hauling another younger man between them. They laid him gently across two canisters as they tried unsuccessfully to revive him. The suffering was everywhere.

And there was no sign of Sitara or Malik.

She shrugged the thick, grey jacket off her shoulders. All slaves wore the same. The heavy, high-necked jackets had a folded overlap that fastened at the right shoulder, made of an itchy, coarse material. On the surface they made the heat almost unbearable as the merciless sun watched their labour, the great silver drills roaring with a sadistic mockery. Beneath the jackets were grey, long-sleeved vests that laced up to the neck with black cords, equally uncomfortable and difficult to keep clean as they were only supplied with two or three a month. And the black boots had thick soles for the harsh rock, leading to permanent blisters, cloying sweat, and hardened skin.

Aliya hugged her knees weakly, eyes flicking round the vast room. Emergency lights pulsed along the perimeter, transforming each gaunt figure into a ghostly apparition. There must have been four hundred slaves packed into the area, most, the inhabitants of level Sigma:2. Most, wounded badly. The hostile stench of blood was everywhere, crouching in the sweaty air like a pride of Ignian Leech Jackals, reeking of death.

Lost. Perhaps that was the feeling? It was one she had been exposed to all her life. She had not been born on Ignis. That much she knew. And that set her apart, the cold fact that had always isolated her. They were subtle differences, yes. But this subtlety did not escape her notice. Her skin was lighter. She was taller. Her hair was paler. Her eyes were not brown, but a frosty grey. And she had never quite adopted the jagged, Ignian accent. She had been abandoned . . . that much she knew . . . Yes. An orphan. All she had were the objects safely hidden in the bag under her cell bed, and the shuddering memories that so eluded her.

Frightened. Another feeling. Up until that very morning she had never witnessed a revolt. Nineteen years enslaved on the irate, searing world, and she had never seen such united fury claim the minds of the people. There was always unrest around the quarterly ritual of the sacrifice to the Blood Lake, when one slave was selected supposedly at random, and executed on the surface altar beneath the full moons. But this was something entirely different. A revolution. Surely that was what it had been?

There were forgotten legends of a resistance from the days when Ignis was first colonised almost two millennia ago. The human race was new to the system following the thousand year odyssey across the galaxy. The odyssey. It was a thing she had only heard about in stories. In forbidden rumours.

The stories of the Core Origins.

It had been an escape, a desperate flight in the face of extinction. The Civil War between the Western Empire and the Eastern Alliance had raged for centuries. But it all suddenly ended with the induction of the supernova that consumed the Eartha Origin, a blue and green planet where humanity had been born.

The discovery of antimatter. The most dangerous and fateful in human history. It had secured their destiny. But it had not been the Empire’s discovery. No, it had been that of the Eastern Alliance, and it annihilated them. The several million left alive endured the odyssey under the Empire’s oppression, and when they finally reached their new home, it seemed they were to be left alone, struggling for survival on the three smallest planets. And they prevailed.

But it would not last. The pretence of freedom had shattered. A mere one and a half centuries later, the invaders came. They came in search of the Empire’s Arcanum ore with huge drilling machines and great weapons. Thousands were murdered as the Validian Army created the Enforcer factions from their Imperial Cohorts, enslaving the countless millions into a regime of hatred and corruption. The invaders stamped out what was left of the Core language, the religions that still lived on from the time of the Eastern Alliance . . . their entire culture. One thousand prison complexes had been dug into the red rock across the planet and Ignis had become a slave colony.

Incarceration made for a bleak existence. But to be a part of such violence had been unimaginable until those few hours ago. And what had induced it? Surplus Day had been cancelled. The Enforcers had come in greater strength, and rations, instead of doubling, had been withheld entirely.

She peered at a group of men by the door locked in argument. All she could discern was a single, fluctuating muttering. One of them broke off, hurriedly picking his way towards her.

‘Aliya,’ he murmured, crouching. It was Harith Nayar, six years her junior. His family’s cell was near Malik’s, a few sections along from her. Harith’s face was swollen and bloodied, but his russet eyes were glinting.

‘Aliya, there’s a few of us who want to organise . . . something.' He shifted his weight, throwing a frenetic glance over his shoulder. 'But - Father's furious. He doesn't think we should fight. Nadir Simha's on our side though. He thinks we should move now because something's happened out there. He thinks there's been some sort of mass revolt on Atrox or Ruina and the Marshal's ordered an increase in the military presence. And stopped our rations. And if that's true, we shouldn't wait. Maybe the balance of power is shifting.'

Aliya blinked, trying to process his words. There were nearly three hundred thousand people imprisoned in the four hundred story underground complex. They had virtually no means of communication. They were perpetually monitored by the Enforcers. They were no army.

‘Harith-’

‘We're trapped Aliya. Vindex damn them. It's time. Now. Right now.’ He leaned forwards and suddenly she felt cold inside. ‘We want to overthrow them Aliya, we want to take over the entire complex.’

‘Harith, calm down,’ she swallowed, gesturing towards the group still deep in argument by the door, ‘the others?’ He glanced behind him again.

‘Like I said . . . Father.’

Aliya studied his face for a moment. The small crumpled form of the girl, the Enforcer looming over her, flashed behind Aliya’s eyes again. She got unsteadily to her feet and followed Harith over to the huddle, her left leg throbbing.

‘Malik’ll agree with me,’ he whispered to her over his shoulder, ‘I’m sure he’s fine by the way, we’ll find him later.’ Aliya managed a curt smile. She suspected he had run from the danger as usual.

‘Where’s Jagan?’ she hissed at Harith’s back.

‘Over here,’ he murmured as they reached the group. Nadir Simha was whispering frantically with Kuval Nayar, Harith’s father, easily the most respected slave in section Sigma. Aliya spotted Jagan towering at the back of the small gathering. Heavy, dark brows overshadowed the fierce eyes.

'What's going on?' she whispered, moving to his side. She couldn't help feeling calmer as her shoulder brushed his, that iron gaze catching her fast, so much more powerful than Malik's. She barely noticed she had made the comparison.

'They're planning another attack,' he murmured, his voice was twisted with tension. 'Simha wants - well, many others do too, they say we must act now, while the momentum and spirit still burns. Father . . . he won't condone unnecessary violence though. He-' Jagan frowned, 'he wants to negotiate, as I understand it.'

'And you?' Aliya said quietly, following his anxious gaze towards his father. Kuval shook his head firmly at Simha and walked slowly away, back rigid. Simha turned to mutter to his supporters, dominated by the hulking Tandon twins. Also hovering nervously were Simha’s wife, Madura, and his two daughters, plus the Johar and Verma families. They moved off quickly and the heated atmosphere dissipated marginally. But its embers were salvaged almost instantly around the room as others began to stir.

'We must fight.'

She nodded, seeing no other alternative. She suddenly felt very small.

‘I saw something, I-’ her voice faltered and died. Jagan straightened, taking in the horror creeping over her face. He searched her eyes as she tried to form words to tell him about the girl . . . and the Enforcer. But they all seemed to have fallen from her mind. His fingers gently brushed her eyes and she stared at the wetness on them, suddenly furious. Cold anger curdled within her mind, and for the first time she wanted to find the Enforcer, she wanted to make him suffer. Shock laced itself down her back. She wanted him dead.

Jagan moved to place a hand on her shoulder but she stepped back, glaring at the ground. A strange confusion stole through her.

'It will all begin soon,' Jagan hissed.

'What?' she looked up at him.

'They'll arrest a small group of slaves.'

'You don't know that.'

'But I do, Aliya.' She could see the pain in his eyes. 'They'll blame it on a handful of extremists. So it doesn't look like they lost control. That they had a full-scale revolution erupt right beneath them.'

Dread clamped round her gut as she blurted, 'Who-?'

'I need to talk to my father,' he said, voice frighteningly steady. She opened her mouth to offer a reply, her stomach weakened, but he just brushed past her, circling around the crowds.

Aliya staggered to the nearest canister behind her, stiffly lowering herself to the cold floor. Jagan knelt next to Kuval and Harith. Even from that distance she could almost reach out and touch his writhing anxiety, looming above him as though alive . . . sentient.

Several minutes crawled by as she closed her eyes, wracked by weariness. Her leg was aching. For a moment, it was as though a pretence of tranquillity had crept over her, she felt as lost as a thin insect held by a pool of water. So fragile.

It was then that she became vaguely aware of a soft voice carrying across from somewhere to her right, among the canisters. An ethereal, melancholy humming. A simple tune, no more than four or five notes, but unsettling in its sadness.

It ceased. There was a sharp intake of breath, then a manic shuffling. Someone was moving closer. They suddenly emerged from around the side of the canister she was leaning on. A lined, waxen face hovered before her, hosting a twisted nose, thick brows, and a tired, silver beard. A snaking, white scar curved down from his left eye, past his nose to his upper lip. And the eyes, not dark, but a fierce, icy grey, like steel. She had never seen such eyes. Like hers.

‘Excuse me?’ His voice was slightly unsure, but it held a faint shadow of something, a delicate hope. ‘Are you Aliyanca-Thrin Soter?’ He lowered himself into a crouch, glancing around nervously. A large bruise ringed his left eye, crossing over the frightening scar and throwing the searing silver eyes into a vivid brightness.

‘My name is Aliya,’ she whispered uncertainly, ‘Aliya Soter, Sigma:2.’ He seemed to contemplate her, head cocked, the ghost of a smile playing about his lips.

‘I’ve wanted to speak with you for - well . . . some time. You won’t recognise me, but . . . I’ve known you longer than you’ve known yourself.’ She stared at him, gripped by an odd shadow of fear.

‘I’m sorry, you - you must be mistaken.’ She shuffled further away, turning her back slightly, the cold, hard canister pressing into her already bruised shoulder. The old man only shifted himself in front of her again, eyes intense and unyielding as a shadow of grief contorted his features.

‘My name is Olundar, Olundar Cicatrix, and I killed your parents.’