Fury of the Crimson Serpent

**Year: 23 NAC**

*A remote station*

*Two bounty hunters*

*Two thousand foes*

## Part 1: Microfilament in a Junkyard

Navigating the Crimson Serpent Line was the spacefaring equivalent of trying to find one’s way around the myriad twists and turns of a sprawling megacomplex in zero gravity, while simultaneously drunk and high on the most brain-numbing of chems, all while strapped upside down and maneuvering a ship’s controls with one’s tongue. At least, that’s what Tarhin had been told. Being a machine, he could neither get drunk nor high save through certain recreational subroutines, but he was beginning to have a certain degree of empathy for the organics who went through such a sensation. Ordinarily, he’d have no trouble piloting his way through any region of space, from the open stretches of void to the densest of asteroid fields. This was different. It were as though the region were alive, some giant cosmic organism that rejected his ship as an organic body rejected a virus.

Until he actually arrived at the Crimson Serpent Line, the journey had been mostly peaceful. There had been no great resistance from anyone or anything, save the occasional raider. That had been enough to satisfy the machine. His charge had no idea he was coming. He had the advantage of surprise. It was only now, when he was so close to his destination, did things start to go wrong.

The whole region was simply pure chaos. There was no better way to describe it. At every turn, every slight deviation for his path, he found Obsidian struck and buffeted by heavy asteroids and the debris left behind by those unfortunate souls that never made it out of the Line. All Tarhin’s focus on was on his flying. The Line was yet another obstacle on his path, one of many that he meant to conquer.

His prey awaited him.

Effias Mors. Shepard’s Satellite.

Those were the only two bits of information he had to go on. Digging up anything else about Mors had been an exercise in futility. No matter where he looked or who he spoke to, no-one seemed to know who he was. Ordinarily, he could accept such a limit - Aoshtai was a big galaxy, and not everyone could be expected to remember the name of everyone who crossed their path. They were, after all, only organics. This, however, was different. It were as though Mors had gone to great pains to scrub his identity from everywhere. Tarhin had combed the Padwar Settlement Solutions database for any reference to him, only to find nothing. Even now, Tarhin was not certain whether Effias Mors was his real name, or just a pseudonym. It being the latter made some sense. Firmament was an organisation shrouded by their love of secrets and lies. They protected their own with the shroud of anonymity.

On the subject of Shepard’s Satellite, however, he knew a little more. It was a small outpost hidden deep in the Crimson Serpent Line. In an earlier age, it was a waypoint of sorts; a trading hub where travelers came to restock and refuel before carrying on the long journeys deeper into the Line. In the wake of the Railway Project, it had since been abandoned to the predations of time, and no-one went there anymore save for pirates and other assorted scum that needed a refuge.

The perfect hiding spot.

Not that it would be safe for much longer. Tarhin had the station’s exact co-ordinates.

Something heavy rammed against Obsidian, throwing the fleet vessel off course. Tarhin gripped the controls tightly, forcing the ship back on course. Out of the corner of his optical sensor, he spied something long and conical reeling through space, spinning away from Obsidian’s hull. From what little he could see of it, Tarhin could tell it was too smooth and metallic to be another asteroid, and too directed to be just another collision with space debris.

It was coordinated. He was under attack.

Engaging the controls, Tarhin pivoted Obsidian around in midair, his viewport turning to face his attacker.

Approaching him were two of the ugliest fighters he had ever seen. They were asymmetrical and malformed, hulls cobbled together from what appeared to be the wreckage of a dozen different ships. There was no sense in their design, and appeared to be nothing more than floating mounds of space garbage. He might not even have noticed them were they not zipping around like angry insects. Tarhin activated Obsidian’s weapons and targeted the junk fighters. Being comprised of the region’s stellar refuse, he calculated they were structurally weak. A good hit from a torpedo would, in all likelihood, finish them off quickly.

His efforts were rewarded with frustration. No matter how many times he calculated he had a lock on one of the fighters, it would always flit out of sight at the last second, or the other one would dart in front of its fellow, momentarily confusing Obsidian’s targeting sensors. With every move the fighters made, Tarhin maneuvered Obsidian to counter. The ships danced in and out of the asteroids and space junk floating around them, each trying to catch the other off-guard. It was hard to keep them in sight as they dipped in and out of the debris field. They were, Tarhin realised, trying to confuse him.

Tarhin scanned the debris field, trying to identify the specific parts of the ruins and wreckage that belonged to the ships. It was like looking for a microfilament in a junkyard. He could have stared for hours and never found them. All the while, they had ample opportunity to close in on him. It was imperative that he found them first, before…

There! It was only a brief glimpse, but Tarhin spotted something move among the drifting refuse. It might have been one of the junk fighters, or it could have been another basic set of debris. He didn’t know for sure, but he wasn’t willing to take a chance. His hand flying to tactical control, he locked onto the junk and launched a torpedo.

Never had he been so relieved to be right.

The torpedo soared through space and exploded against the fragile hull of the junk fighter. The force of the blast ripped it apart, space junk flying to all corners of the debris field. Tarhin never saw the pilot.

As one ship went down in flames, the other one pivoted and darted deeper into the field. Emboldened by success, Tarhin urged Obsidian onward after it. The fighter weaved through the wrecks of ships ancient and new, and around massive asteroids, until both ships reached a clear, more open patch of space.

There, floating before them, was a tall, tower-like structure, floating unaided in the void. It was surrounded by a set of two rings which rotated slowly on massive gyros.

The junk fighter darted towards it, and Obsidian followed. In the cockpit, Tarhin felt satisfaction fill his fusion core.

He’d been led right to his target. Shepard’s Satellite awaited.

## Part 2: The Crucible

As he guided Obsidian towards the station, Tarhin kept his guard up. He’d fought off their initial defenses, yes, but that didn’t mean he was in the clear just yet. Firmament wouldn’t have survived if they didn’t eliminate those who stumbled onto their secrets. He didn’t detect any other ships or weapon placements around the station, save for the junker ship he’d been pursuing. On first impressions, Shepard’s Satellite was completely unguarded.

But Tarhin knew better than to take things at face value. Very little in the galaxy was really what it seemed.

As the junk ship zipped towards Shepard’s Satellite, Tarhin’s hunch was proven true.

Obsidian’s sensors picked it up first, but he could see the faint flash of engine burn. A large, rusty missile roared across the void, its head aimed squarely at Obsidian. Tarhin engaged the controls and Obsidian dropped downwards. The missile soared overhead, and the ship’s sensors indicated that it had passed completely over him and was soaring off into the maddening void. Tarhin turned his attention back to Shepard’s Satellite and urged Obsidian forward. The goal was in sight, and nothing would hinder him now.

A moment later, he knew his calculations were off.

A loud explosion rocked Obsidian, shoving Tarhin forward into the console. Alarms rang out across the cockpit and alert notifications sprang up in his optical sensors. He silently cursed himself. Why had he not expected a guided missile? What a fool he was, he calculated.

His optical sensors glanced over the alerts Obsidian was feeding him. The engines had taken damage and were losing power. Navigation and sensors were also affected, and power to the landing gear had been cut completely.

The telltale smell of burning metal and smoke reached his olfactory receptors, and he glanced back down Obsidian’s cockpit. Flickering orange light danced faintly across the walls, its source somewhere in Obsidian’s main hold. The missile had, by the look of things, impacted one of the ship’s EPS conduits, and started a fire.

His neuro-processor firing on all cylinders, Tarhin cycled the atmospheric controls and set them to decompress the hold. A fire couldn’t burn long without air to sustain it, and it wasn’t like he needed to breathe. The air around him grew colder as Obsidian cycled out the artificial atmosphere, and the orange light disappeared in an instant.

Despite the warnings of Obsidian’s systems, Tarhin powered the vessel forward, scouring the station for a hangar or docking bay. An entry of any kind would do, even if he had to blast his way through it. He was boarding the station, no matter what.

There! Just below the second ring’s hub, there was an opening, and it was large enough to fit Obsidian inside. He doubted it would stay open for long. Tarhin urged Obsidian onward, trying to get as much out of the engines as possible. Even in their current state, they could still give plenty of other ships a run for their money. Still, the ship felt more sluggish after the missile strike. Tarhin quickly rerouted as much power as he could from other subsystems, but if an EPS conduit was out, it wouldn’t be as effective.

A flash from Shepard’s Satellite told him it had launched another missile, perhaps with the intention of finishing him off. Tarhin tensed and gripped the controls. He wasn’t going to go down that easily, not now. As the missile approached, Tarhin activated Obsidian’s weapons. Flashes of plasma fire tore through space. The missile, Tarhin knew, was guided, but surely it wasn’t intelligent enough to dodge an incoming assault.

It wasn’t.

Obsidian soared through the demolished missile, detritus of its hull bouncing off Obsidian’s. He guided Obsidian with all the strength he could muster. With every passing second the ship slowed. Tarhin calculated it wouldn’t be long before it was driven on inertia alone. This, he knew, was going to be a problem. It was all well and good getting onto Shepard’s Satellite, but if he couldn’t get off again, he didn’t like his chances of survival. This had quickly become a suicide mission, and Tarhin was no stranger to those.

Shepard’s Satellite loomed large over him as he approached, aiming Obsidian squarely at the opening. Just beyond the metal frame, Tarhin spied an empty hangar, yet he could also see it wasn’t going to stay empty. Tiny dots, which he calculated were people, were filing into the hangar, forming ranks in the centre of the open chamber. There were about fifteen that he could make out distinctly, though he was certain more would join them before long. Undoubtedly, Tarhin suspected, they were armed. So was he.

Tarhin aimed Obsidian’s nose straight at the hangar, right at the assembling crowd, and braced himself. He couldn’t deploy the landing gear, so he was forced to go in hard. At least he could make it count for something, and even the odds.

With a sickening crunch, Obsidian rocketed through the hangar entrance and slammed against the floor, throwing up a tide of sparks as inertia dragged it across the ground. The assembled crowd made to scatter to the hangar bay’s corners, but many of them were too slow, and bounced hard off Obsidian’s hull. Tarhin held tightly onto the controls, willing himself to remain in place as Obsidian screeched across the bay, the sound of metallic grinding echoing around the cockpit. The ship slowed and came to rest against the back of the hangar.

For a long, enduring moment, an uneasy silence hung in the air as Tarhin waited. He slowly pried his hands from the controls and raised himself from the pilot’s seat. He strode to the ship’s armoury just as the sound of muffled peppering gunfire reached his audio receptors. The mob outside - or what was left of them - were trying to shoot their way in. Silently, Tarhin wished them luck. It would take more than a few simple rifles to break through Obsidian’s hull.

From the armoury, Tarhin took his pistol and Etherwound, affixing the sword to his back. Pistol in hand, he strode into the main hold and, for the first time, saw the destruction the missile had caused.

Damaged EPS conduits hung from the ceiling, covered in a thin layer of dewy frost from being cooled so quickly. Panels had fallen to the ground and cracked in two. Superficially, it wasn’t so bad, but going by his experience outside, Tarhin knew it was much worse than it looked. Still, the matter of Obsidian’s engines was a problem to be solved later.

Outside, the gunfire was growing more and more insistent. The goons outside were clearly eager to meet him. Tarhin decided not to keep them waiting. He raised his pistol and, ready for whatever greeted him, lowered the hatch.

## Part 3: The Rock and the Hard Place

The moment he felt air brush against his armour plating, Tarhin leapt forward with all the ferocity of a wildcat. The air was thick with sterile oxygen and bullet smoke. Shapes of humanoids were barely visible through the haze. Drawing his gun, Tarhin fired into the chaos. Blue bolts of plasma flashed through the wall of smoke. He spied two of the shapes drop to the ground, their weapons slipping through their dead fingers and clattering to the ground.

Tarhin ducked behind a set of storage crates. Bullets rapped against the large metal boxes with an irregular cadence. As he raised himself up above the crates and opened fire again, he felt something small and hot whiz past his head, coming dangerously close to striking him.

They were using slug-throwing weapons, he realised. Primitive ones, too, by the looks of them. That alone was enough to rouse Tarhin’s suspicion. If Firmament were as powerful and influential as he suspected, they would surely be able to afford better weapons.

Tarhin was not capable of eating, yet he was forced to eat his words when a bullet sank through the plating on his left arm, just above his elbow joint. A jolt of pain ran through his internal sensors and he reeled backwards, almost dropping his pistol. He sank behind the crates again, his free hand clasping against the open wound on his arm.

The pain wasn’t the worst part of his injury. He’d dealt with worse before. What concerned him this time was just how easily the projectile had sank through his new armour. Not only was it new, it was stronger than the plating he’d donned in his previous body, thanks to an infusion of koelium. If what they had could penetrate that, he calculated, then he had to be even more careful.

Tarhin kept his head down, waiting for the gunfire to subside a little. Sure enough, he got his wish. The noise of bullets drumming incessantly against his cover eased as several of his assailants paused to reload their weapons. Tarhin seized the moment and rose from behind the crates. With great deliberation, he aimed into the mass of shooters and fired several times. Some of them were in the middle of reloading their hefty slugthrowers, and were caught completely unawares as plasma bolts blazed holes through their torsos. The others took cover behind whatever they could effectively hide behind. Tarhin kept his finger firmly on the trigger, firing again and again until the pistol began to glow with heat. The ring of slug-throwers echoed around the hangar.

A yell of anger caught Tarhin’s attention, and he spied, out of the corner of his optical sensor, a belligerent-looking human charging him, two knives drawn.

The challenge, Tarhin calculated, was comical.

With his free hand, he drew Etherwound, raising the blade as high as his arm could take it. As soon as his assailant was in striking distance, he brought the blade down. It sliced through his attacker’s shoulder, cleaving through ill-fitting armour, cloth and flesh. The knife-wielder fell to the ground, coming to rest in a puddle of his own blood.

The numbers of attackers were dwindling fast. Only two now remained alive, and both were still peppering his position with bullets.

It was time to end it, before Effias Mors slipped through his servos.

Tarhin abandoned his cover and charged the pair. Etherwound gripped tight in one hand, and a white-hot plasma pistol in the other, he struck at them both. The first didn’t manage to avoid Etherwound’s blade in time, and found it rammed through his skull. The other felt the burning kiss of a searing plasma pistol barrel shoved against his face. They slumped to the ground, only one of them still alive and whimpering in barely-controlled agony.

Tarhin holstered his weapons just as a fresh surge of pain tore through his wounded arm.

It didn’t take long to find it. There, lodged in his secondary liquid fuel pump, was something stubby and narrow, and certainly not where it should be. Carefully, Tarhin reached into the wound, delicately holding as still as he could. His steel fingers clasped tight around the small object and, with little effort, he yanked it free. A gush of liquid coolant and oil followed, splashing to the ground and splattering his legs.

Carefully, Tarhin lifted the bullet up to the light. It was stained with oils and coolant, but the faint blue tint to its outer shell was unmistakable, if not impossible.

The bullet was made out of koelium.

The same material that had forged Etherwound, that now permeated his very body, was in the hands of the enemy.

In that moment, Tarhin felt as vulnerable as an organic. Firmament had a source of koelium. That alone was an impressive feat. Koelium certainly existed out in the wider galaxy, but only in the most negligible trace amounts. This he knew from the Argen mineral processing plants. To take those trace metals and make them into a bullet was an immensely difficult undertaking, and he suspected this wasn’t the only one in existence either. That told him more about Firmament than any number of classified documents or underground rumours.

“Attention, intruder!”

The disembodied voice echoed around the landing bay. Tarhin glanced around for the source, but could find nothing. The voice itself was smooth, and oozed confidence.

“You’ve just experienced the smallest fraction of the forces arrayed against you!” the voice boomed. “There is no escape from this place. You’ve come to your grave. You’ll die here, alone and forgotten.”

That was big talk, Tarhin calculated, coming from someone who wouldn’t even show their face. Even if his foes were armed with koelium weapons, he wasn’t intending on dying here. He could not die until he had destroyed Firmament completely.

A silence descended on the hangar bay. It appeared Mors had nothing more to say.

Tarhin pressed forward, leaving the hangar bay behind and heading for the closest door. It opened with a faint hiss, exposing the grey, utilitarian corridor beyond. Tarhin paused just before he crossed the threshold. He had expected Mors to have sealed all the doors, if only to try and impede his progress. The fact that, apparently, he hadn’t done so sparked suspicion in his neuro-processor. It were as though Mors and Firmament weren’t taking him seriously.

There was something off about everything here. He couldn’t describe how he had come to such a conclusion, except by using an organic phrase; a gut feeling.

Tarhin walked down the corridor, following its many twists and turns until he came to a stark silver door. By the looks of things, it was an elevator. He tapped the access panel, but the door didn’t budge. He tried again, and again the door didn’t open.

Now, it seemed, Mors had seen fit to seal access points.

He tried to pry the panel off the wall, but froze as he felt the unmistakable tip of a gun press against his back.

## Part 4: Thicker Than Blood

“Drop your weapons, and turn around.”

The voice was unfamiliar to Tarhin. It was oddly nasal and high-pitched. Its owner spoke slowly and steadily, clearly not wanting Tarhin to miss a single word.

On command, Tarhin opened his hands, and his pistol and Etherwound fell from his grip. They clattered to the ground audibly. Tarhin clenched his hand into a fist and spun on the spot, striking out with all his strength. Steel met flesh, and his knuckles grew slick with organic blood. A humanoid shape came into focus as he turned. It was thrown to the side by the force of his strike and slammed audibly against the corridor wall. Tarhin righted himself and faced his attacker. It was not what he had been expecting.

His would-be assailant was an Aoshanti.

She stood about a head shorter than him, her dark brown feathers ruffled where his fist had struck her. Thin streams of blood trickled from her injury, dripping down her ramshackle body armour. At her feet lay a hefty rifle, half-covered in rust and dirt.

Tarhin seized his weapons and leveled Etherwound at the Aoshanti, its tip aimed squarely between her eyes.

“Don’t try anything.”

The Aoshanti squinted at him, her amber eyes darting up and down his form.

“Rhya,” she swore. “You’re that robot, right? The bounty hunter.”

“You’ve heard of me,” Tarhin observed.

“Of course,” the Aoshanti replied, almost eager. “We’re in the same line of work, you and I.”

“You’re a bounty hunter?”

The Aoshanti nodded shakily. “I’m with the Combine. My name’s Bantia Klaro.”

This, Tarhin had been expecting. The Crimson Serpent Line was the heart of Sojourners’ Combine territory. It made sense for Mors to hire a few of them. As far as bounty hunters and mercenaries went, they were a lot more reliable and effective than most companies.

“Who employed you?”

Klaro’s eyes narrowed.

“Can’t talk about that. Client confidentiality. You under-”

She was cut off as Etherwound’s tip brushed lightly against her throat.

“You seem to think this is just another job,” Tarhin said warningly. “It is not. This is more than that. Now, answer the question.”

Klaro glanced down at the azure sword and swallowed nervously.

“An agent of Padwar Settlement Solutions.”

Tarhin hadn’t been expecting that answer. It made sense, though. He’d always found it odd that Padwar had tasked him and only him with rooting out Firmament’s agents. He’d never been so glad to be proven wrong. Padwar had been smart about this task. This was a multi-pronged offensive.

“That’s who hired me,” he replied. Admittedly, it was only a partial lie. An agent of Padwar’s company had hired him too, in a sense, only it had been the ultimate agent - Padwar himself.

“Then we want the same thing,” Klaro insisted, cautiously eyeing the tip of Etherwound.

“Not necessarily,” Tarhin pointed out. “What’s your mission?”

“I was sent to discover what Effias Mors has been doing here.”

That matched his mission, Tarhin realised. Maybe they did want the same thing after all. Still, this was too great a coincidence. Something in the very back of his neuro-processor was telling him to keep his guard up around her.

“What did you find…”

He was cut off by the sound of distant footsteps at the other end of the corridor. They grew louder with each passing second. Tarhin lifted his pistol from the ground and readied himself.

“Friends of yours?”

“Mors’ men,” Klaro replied, picking up her rifle and checking it over briefly. “They’re after you, I bet. I heard your entrance from two decks up.”

“Agreed,” Tarhin nodded. “But I don’t think they’ll expect the two of us.”

## Part 5: All it Takes

A half-dozen men rounded the corner, each one brandishing lethal-looking ammo-fed rifles. From a glance alone, Tarhin couldn’t tell whether these carried koelium bullets or not, but he suspected that was not the case. Koelium was rare, much too rare to waste on hirelings like this. Beside him, Klaro raised her rifle and checked its ammo clip. Seemingly satisfied, she turned her attention to the oncoming force before them.

“They outnumber us,” she observed.

“That’s never been a problem.”

As the group of enforcers approached, Tarhin raised Etherwound in a high guard, the tip of its blue blade almost scraping the ceiling.

It didn’t take long for the bullets to fly. The corridor was filled with the acrid scent of gun smoke as the irregular rapid cadence of weapons fire echoed down the hallway. The sound was almost deafening.

Tarhin lowered Etherwound and lunged forward, driving it towards whichever poor soul was at the end of its wrath. Bullets flaked and shattered against his koelium-infused armour plating as the blade found a home in the gut of one of their attackers. Tarhin wrenched the blade free, and a spurt of deep crimson blood spattered against his gold skin. His attacker collapsed, half-slumped against the bulkhead.

Wielding a sword as long as Etherwound was difficult in such a constrained environ. Even in its reconstituted state, where it was a good deal shorter than its original form, Tarhin had to be careful about knocking it against the bulkheads. He pivoted carefully, the bloodied blade dancing in midair. Sparks and bits of shrapnel flitted off the blade as it flew through the air and came down, slicing a pair of rifle-wielding hands from their arms. As the human that they had once belonged to howled in agony, Tarhin crouched and drove Etherwound upwards, its blade piercing through his chest and emerging through the nape of his neck.He lifted the blade, and metal sliced through bone and muscle.

Even in the cacophony of battle, his audio receptors could pick out Klaro’s shots. They were well-timed and precise, managing to do with one bullet what the fools attacking them hoped to do with ten. One well-timed shot from her, and two of Mors’ men collapsed on top of each other.

Only one remained. The final assailant seemed to have some sense, because he took one look at the two, tossed his rifle on the ground and fled, growling something along the lines of “Don’t get paid enough for this shit!”

Klaro raised herself up from her position near the door and made to pursue the fleeing goon, but Tarhin threw out a metal arm, blocking her path.

“What are you doing?” Klaro protested. “He’s escaping!”

“We’ve got a bigger target than that,” Tarhin replied.

“What if he warns Mors?”

“He already knows I’m here.”

“Not about you! If Mors finds out I’m a spy…”

“You’ve already blown your cover,” Tarhin pointed out. “This station’s littered with surveillance equipment. He probably knows already.”

Klaro scowled and drew a sharp intake of breath.

“I suppose you’re right,” she said at last. “Fine. We need to get moving.”

“My calculations exactly.”

Tarhin flicked the blood from Etherwound and re-sheathed the sword before turning his attention to the door.

“Am I correct in guessing you have access codes?”

“I do,” Klaro nodded. “Whether Mors has invalidated them now, I couldn’t say.” She approached the door. “Time to find out.” She reached out carefully and tapped a set of numbers into the access panel. For a moment, nothing happened, then the doors slid open with a grinding screech of rust.

Before them waited a narrow crawlspace, much smaller than the door’s size belied. It was dimly lit, but Tarhin could tell it was just as neglected as the rest of the station’s systems. Maneuvering in that tight space would be difficult, but not impossible. He unhooked his pistol, crouched low and pulled himself into the crawlspace.

Tarhin had been in plenty of tight spots before, but never had he been in one so literally. The walls were uncomfortably close. They weren’t touching him, but he felt like they could wrap around him and crush him at any moment. Behind him, he heard Klaro pulling herself into the crawlspace behind him. They moved cautiously through the narrow tunnel, following its twists and turns. Tarhin suspected it was taking them closer to the heart of the satellite.

“Where will this take us?” he asked at last.

“If I’m right, which I think I am,” Klaro replied, “this should take us to the primary smelting chamber.”

Tarhin paused. So far, he’d been under the impression that this was simply a trading hub and pirate’s den.

“What sort of trade hub comes with its own smelter?” he wondered.

“It’s a mistake we both made,” Klaro grunted. “Padwar’s agent sent me here to retrieve some data from the station’s servers. Thought this place was some kind of archive for Mors’ operation.”

“What did you find out?”

“This place isn’t an archive at all,” Klaro replied. “Padwar was misled.”

“Then what is it?”

“It’s a…well, it’s a refinery.”

Tarhin paused and looked back at her. Were he capable of showing emotions, he would have shown surprise.

“A refinery?”

“Sure looks that way,” Klaro shrugged. “Every so often, he sends his goons out to mine the asteroids and salvage whatever scraps they can find. It all gets brought back here and dumped in the smelters. That’s where this access tunnel leads.”

“They’re refining koelium,” Tarhin realised.

“They don’t make much,” Klaro observed. “I’ve seen the production line. For all the metal they put in, they only get a handful out. Never seen an operation like it. Mind you, I’ve not seen many refining operations.”

Even a handful of koelium, Tarhin calculated, was dangerous in the wrong hands, and Firmament’s hands were definitely wrong.

They turned a corner and found themselves facing another sealed door. As they approached, it seemed to detect them and hissed open. They were likely programmed to unlock automatically from one side, Tarhin calculated. He hauled himself through the aperture and pulled himself to his feet.

The first thing he noticed was the heat. It was a sensation he was all too familiar with, as he was no stranger to industry. It was stifling. He could only imagine how it would impact an organic. Plumes of thick smoke rose from enormous vats, which were connected by a set of perilously high walkways. For a moment, Tarhin calculated that the room was home to several giant silver insects, but as they dipped and weaved through the smoke, he could see they were merely drones sporting several lengthy mechanical arms. Some of them bore large trays laden down with scraps of dented dirty metals and chunks of asteroid.

Tarhin made to step forward, but before he could lift his foot from the ground he felt something heavy pulling him down towards the ground. He summoned all his strength to resist, but whatever force held him was stronger. He sank to the floor, forced into a kneeling position. His hand remained firmly clamped around his pistol, but he could no longer lift the weapon.

“You know, machine,” echoed the smug, self-satisfied voice of Effias Mors, “I think I like you better this way.”

## Part 6: Where Sojourners Rest

Tarhin attempted to lift his pistol again, but found whatever force had seized it had taken his entire body. No matter his commands, his limbs would not obey him. He could barely move a micron. His weapon had become an anvil, pressing powerfully against his hand.

“Klaro,” he grunted, straining to even look at the mercenary, “help me.”

Klaro, however, didn’t meet his gaze, or even react to his voice. She was staring up at a small box of light in the furthest wall, which Tarhin calculated was some kind of office or control room.

“Excellent work, Klaro.” Effias Mors’ snide voice rang across the refinery. “Report to me at once.”

Without even sparing a glance at the prone Argen, Klaro swiftly crossed the refinery and vanished through a rusted door. Tarhin mutely cursed himself. In the past, he would have seen a betrayal of this kind a mile away. He’d grown too trusting. That or his instincts were growing dull. He’d been away from organics too long.

He could feel a set of eyes on him. Mors was likely reveling his victory.

“So,” the snide voice echoed, “this is the glorified calculator that’s given my associates so much trouble. If only they could see you now.”

Tarhin didn’t know which he hated more; that Mors was gloating to try and make him feel shame, or that it was working. Never before had he felt so unworthy of his profession. It was an amateur mistake.

“Well, I hope coming here was worth it for you,” Mors continued. “It certainly was for me.”

The statement confused Tarhin. As far as he knew, he’d only come here with himself, his gear and his ship. Argen tech was fairly advanced, but from what he had seen of Firmament’s operations, they had access to technology just as advanced as he was, if not more. What, then, could Firmament want from him?

“Koelium.” Mors relished in saying the word. “It’s very rare, koelium. You could scour the galaxy for decades and only find one man’s weight in the stuff. Our operation here shortens that time considerably.”

“Why do you want so much koelium?” Tarhin growled. He wasn’t sure if Mors could hear him or not, but he couldn’t deny his curiosity, even at a moment like this.

“You really think I’m telling you?” Mors jeered. “Besides, you’re our jackpot.”

Tarhin froze. He didn’t like the sound of that.

Etherwound. The blade was pure koelium. Bringing it here was like guiding Mors to an oasis in a desert.

“You want my sword, is that it?” He would not let that happen. Etherwound was far too precious

“Your sword, yes,” Mors drawled, “but that’s not the only koelium you have, is it?”

“What are you saying?”

“I have friends in very special places, robot,” Mors sneered. “I happen to know all about your little resurrection trick, and I know there’s koelium laced into your very being.”

The revelation came to Tarhin in a flash.

“Now that you’re here, I can harvest more koelium in one day than I could find in a year,” Mors continued, “and eliminate a threat to my associates.”

In that moment, Tarhin heard the loud whirring of rotor blades tearing at the air and felt something large and bulky loom over him, drowning him in its shadow. He couldn’t look up to see this grim device, but he was certain it was there to bring him death.

“We won’t meet again, robot,” said Mors. “Enjoy your new life as a heap of slag.”

Cold metal pincers seized Tarhin by the arms and lifted him from the ground, effortlessly prying him free from his magnetic bonds. Tarhin looked up at his new captor, and found he was borne aloft by a boxy drone, kept airborne by a set of rotor blades. It sported four powerful arms, each of which ended in two-pronged, vice-like claws. Two of the drone’s arms had Tarhin held fast. The others handled Etherwound with the cold indifference only a machine was capable of. It raised Tarhin off the ground and carried him and the sword towards the closest smoking vat.

Tarhin sensed the heat before he saw it. A glowing pit of molten metal, roiling and bubbling angrily, simmered in the vat. A hot, gaping maw, ready to welcome its latest meal. He stared down into the molten mass and saw death. Not even he could survive those temperatures.

The moment he felt the drone’s claws loosen around his arms, he sprang into action. He thrust his arm up and seized the pincer. The drone swung its arm around wildly in an attempt to dislodge Tarhin, but he held on as tight as his servos would let him. As he clung on for his life, he reached out with his free arm and tried to grab at Etherwound. The drone seemed to sense his need for the blade as it opened its other arms and let it fall towards the molten mass.

Tarhin let go of the drone’s arm as it swung him towards the vat’s edge. He fell towards the roiling death pit, his optical sensors firmly on the plunging form of Etherwound. As he fell past the vat’s rim, he grabbed it with one hand, and the other wrapped around the very end of Etherwound’s hilt. The sound of sizzling metal reached his audio receptors, and he noticed the blade was half sunk in the molten mass. As the drone approached, claws wide open, he pulled the blade from its molten bath and saw glow white hot in the air. With all his strength, he swung the sword upwards, just as the drone was on top of him. The machine split in two, a glowing red gash running across each half. The remains of the machine fell into the vat as Tarhin clambered over the other side of the vat, towards relative safety.

He lowered himself to the ground, his grip on Etherwound as sure as the day he took up the blade. And just like on that fateful day, he swore a silent oath.

Anyone who stood between him and his target would die.

## Part 7: Death Valley

Join the salvage industry, they said. It would be exciting, they said. Whoever “they” were, Sheng Vandyr thought, they clearly had no experience of any kind of refinery. While he was happy to be away from the mudball that he called a home planet, he’d left with no intention of trading one industrial wreck for another.

He wouldn’t have minded were the work not the most tedious busywork in all existence. All he did was catalogue bits of scrap that other ships brought in. At first, he was excited to see all the strange pieces of lost and discarded metal from other parts of the galaxy. It didn’t take him long to realise that, despite its points of origin, it was all still metal in the end. It all went into the smelters and came out as that strange blue metal. He’d never seen its like before, but it had to be rare. Why else did they make so little of it? And what was being done with it?

Still, the pay was good enough, so he got on with it, cataloguing new shipments and sending the results on to his superior, where they did…whatever it was they did with them. He didn’t know, nor did he need to know.

So when the station went on alert, the only question that sprang to his mind was why anyone would attack them. There were plenty of salvage stations and refineries across the galaxy. The only thing that made this one so special was the rare metal, and that wasn’t worth raiding over.

Even with the general alert sounding, he wasn’t too concerned. The station had ample security personnel, enough to repel even the most well-armed of raiders. Not the normal kind of security one might see on a refinery, Vandyr thought, but the Crimson Serpent Line was a rather volatile region, and pirates were becoming ever more daring these days.

Best thing to do, he thought, was let the security task force get on with their job, and he’d get on with his.

Then another klaxon sounded. Higher and more shrill than a general alert, it was the one thing that Vandyr had been told he’d probably never hear in his time.

High alert.

The station was at severe risk. As of the alarm, it was locked down. All security forces were being called to action. Everyone else had to make for whatever shelter they could find. Vandyr was in the latter group.

Along with several other jumpsuited and just as confused workers, Vandyr was shepherded away from his work and down the many winding corridors that led to the worker barracks. The small crowd passed several armoured and helmeted security personnel as they moved, and Vandyr noted they each wore a glossy helmet that reflected his own gawking demeanour back at him. He couldn’t stop to get a good look, though. The crush of the crowd kept him moving forward, further down the corridor.

Then, quite suddenly, everyone stopped. Vandyr and the others exchanged glances, then looked towards the end of the corridor. The heavy door was right in front of them, sealed tightly and, despite the best efforts of their security escorts, not budging even a little.

“I knew it,” Vandyr muttered inaudibly over the growing surge of angry shouts from the other workers. “I told maintenance to fix that weeks ago!”

“Contact!” A voice from around the corner called, and the sound of gunfire drowned all other noise. Several of the workers instinctively backed away, mashing Vandyr between them and the rest of the crowd. His wheezes of anguish and struggle were barely audible as the gunfire slowly grew quieter and the sound of metal parting flesh grew louder. Shouts of agony and terror blended with the cacophony, as did the splashing of blood and the arrhythmic thumping of bodies falling to the ground. Vandyr’s breath froze in his lungs. Whoever or whatever had boarded the station was hacking their way through the station’s staff. They were a killing machine, whoever they were.

Then a figure rounded the corner, and Vandyr realised just how right he was.

A robot, golden armour plating stained with splashes of crimson, advanced on them. In one hand he held a pistol that was still smoking, while in the other he held a sword made of blue metal.

*That* blue metal.

“Get down!” One of the security officers bellowed, and the workers collectively dropped to the ground. Vandyr clapped his hands over his ears as the officers fired on the golden robot.

It had little effect. The slugs seemed to bounce, harmlessly, off the machine’s armour, and they did nothing to slow his advance. The robot raised his sword with an upward flick, the blade slicing seamlessly through a security guard’s torso and bisecting him like a choice cut of meat. His pistol hand turned swiftly towards another, filling his chest with bolts of blue light that seared through armour, then flesh. The other guards opened fire, emptying their magazines. The robot didn’t even turn to look at them. He just kept moving forward, shooting and slashing until the decks were nearly flooded in blood. The sword was near invisible as it whirled sharply through the air, cutting and hacking. Blue sailed across the corridor, slowly becoming more and more tainted with red.

As the last guard fell, the robot paused. A thick river of blood trailed down the sword and dripped off the tip. At last, he turned his head, looking from worker to worker as if scanning them.

“We’re unarmed,” Vandyr croaked, finding his voice at last. The robot turned to look at him, and Vandyr met his gaze, staring into the blazing blue strip that the mechanical man seemed to possess instead of eyes.

“Where is Effias Mors?” The question was short, blunt and to the point.

“I…in his office, I think,” Vandyr gulped.

“That’s right,” another worker said. “It locks down in a high alert.”

The robot stepped through the group. The workers backed away, pressing themselves against the walls.

“W…what are you gonna do to him?” Vandyr asked.

The robot turned and looked at Vandyr again.

“What do you think?”

## Part 8: Thesis and Antithesis

Tarhin’s grip around Etherwound’s hilt remained firm and resolute. As he ascended to Effias Mors’ office, he took a moment to wipe the blade down. His hand was a poor substitute for cloth, but he couldn’t find one for the time being. Metal scraped against metal, pushing thin streams of blood off the sword and making them splash down against the ground, coating his legs in scarlet as he ran. Etherwound had drank well tonight, he calculated. It had not lacked for opponents today.

And they had been good opponents. They had fought well, and they had fallen.

Mors would not care. People like him never really saw the ones who did their dirty work.

As he rounded the corner, he found a gun barrel pointed at his face.

“D-don’t come any closer!”

The gun belonged to an armoured guard, his face obscured by a reflective helmet. Tarhin didn’t need to see his face to know he was afraid. Why wouldn’t he be?

“You have one chance,” he said, his voice measured, yet menacing. “Drop your gun, give me the key, and live.”

Odd. Mercy, he calculated, had not factored into his previous jobs. Or, perhaps, he’d had his fill of killing for today. The guard seemed to sense that too, as he threw the gun down on the ground and reached to his vest. He tore a thin strip of black card from it and handed it to the robot, backing away down the corridor the moment Tarhin snatched the key from him.

The moment he stepped across the threshold, a sudden flash of white light blinded his optical sensor. He paused, one foot in Mors’ office, and raised Etherwound. As the light dissipated, he spotted two figures standing across from his position. One Tarhin recognised as Bantia Klaro. She had a pistol in each hand, both of them aiming straight for him. The other figure was unfamiliar, but Tarhin knew he was looking upon Effias Mors.

Mors was taller than he had expected, standing about a head above Klaro. His dark hair was cut short, his skin free of blemishes and oddly shiny in the sterile office light. His eyes, narrow and beady, were so dark they might have been black. He wore a smart, nondescript black and white business suit. He could easily have been any of a million people in the galaxy. It were as though he had been engineered to be as unremarkable as possible. A perfect look for an agent of an organisation like Firmament.

“Well now,” Mors noted, sounding impressed, “talk about an entrance.” He tried to look past Tarhin and down the hallway. “Where’s my door guard?”

“Alive,” Tarhin replied, “which is more than I can say for you both.”

Mors smiled a wry, mocking smile.

“Really, now,” he said condescendingly. “What did we ever do to you?”

“You,” Tarhin raised Etherwound, aiming its tip directly at Mors, “tried to kill me, and you,” he swung the sword to aim at Klaro, “betrayed me. Besides, I’m on a mission from our mutual friend.”

Mors raised an eyebrow. “I’m not quite sure who you…”

“Carolus Padwar,” Tarhin interrupted. “I know about your dealings. I know about Firmament.”

The mocking, false mirth was gone from Mors’ face, replaced with a solemn frown.

“I see.” There was now an icy edge to his voice. “In that case, we’re done here. I’d love to chat more, but I’m quite busy. Klaro, take care of…this.” He retreated around his desk and began tapping commands into the computer.

Klaro raised her pistols and fired. Heavy blasts of fire echoed around the office. Tarhin swung Etherwound upwards in a defensive stance. Bullets peppered the azure koelium blade, leaving behind faint scratches as Tarhin deflected them away. He rushed forward and brought Etherwound up in a slashing motion. With the grace and fluidity of a dancer, Klaro stepped back, Etherwound’s blade narrowly missing her face. Tarhin brought the sword down, but Klaro weaved forward, slinking past the blade and ramming the barrels of her pistols against Tarhin’s torso. Before he had time to react, Klaro pulled the triggers.

The force wasn’t enough to knock Tarhin back, but he felt the bullets burrow through the gaps in his armour plating and rocket through his internals. He staggered, a hand reflexively moving to the fresh wounds as he forced Klaro back with the flat of Etherwound’s blade. Out of the corner of his optical sensor, he spotted Mors standing up and wrenching the wall behind him open, as though it were a door. Another loud crack from Klaro’s pistols brought his attention back to the fight. Bullets grazed his armour as he took a guarded step back, putting Etherwound between him and Klaro.

He had to end this quickly, before Mors could make his escape proper.

“Nothing personal, Tarhin,” Klaro said with an air of cool confidence. “I’m just doing my job.”

Tarhin flicked Etherwound upwards, its tip raking across Klaro’s flesh and opening up her insides. She howled in agony and dropped to the floor as Tarhin raised the azure sword above his head.

“So am I.”

Etherwound fell, and blue mingled with red. Tarhin stepped over the corpse of his betrayer and moved behind Mors’ desk, looking at the computer monitor.

A single transmission had been made the moment he entered the room. Its destination was encrypted, and he had no time to find out where it had been sent.

Everything else was gone. Mors had wiped all the files.

Tarhin’s servos curled into fists. He’d come so far, killed so many, only to be denied at the last moment. Firmament was now beyond his reach.

Mors had sealed his own fate.

With fury unseen by neither man nor machinekind, Tarhin barreled down the hidden corridor. Acting on pure instinct, with rage guiding him every step of the way, he followed its myriad twists and turns until he spotted something familiar.

Obsidian.

He was back in the docking bay, and there was Mors running towards whatever shuttle might be waiting to ferry him away from this place.

Mors was a man of great means, yes, but little athletic ability. It didn’t take much effort to catch up to him. He seized Mors by the scruff of his jacket and lifted him off the ground. Etherwound’s tip pressed against his stomach. Tarhin only had to run it forward a few inches, and the life Mors so desperately clung to would be over.

“Now now, let’s not be too hasty.” Mors’ eyes darted from Etherwound to Tarhin and back. “You need me, you know.”

“Do I?”

“I’m your only link to Firmament!” Mors blurted. “I was one of their inner circle! Kill me, and you’ll never know…”

His words trailed off into nothing. Etherwound found its home in his gut. A red stain spread from the sword across Mors’ shirt, and the smug look on his face slackened.

“A long chain has lots of links.”

He kicked Mors from Etherwound, and the dead man slid from the blade with a sickening squelch. The body fell away, through the hangar entrace and out, as though tugged out by an invisible hand. Tarhin turned from the rapidly disappearing body and angrily slammed a fist into the wall.

With barely suppressed anger, he activated Obsidian’s engines and lifted the craft from the ground as it roared to life. He engaged full burn and blasted out of the station’s hangar. The silence of space fell upon him, and Tarhin leaned back in his chair. It had been satisfying killing Mors, but he had won in the end. The station’s files, which might have helped him find the other Firmament operations, were lost to him forever.

Tarhin had never been good at dealing with defeat, and this had been a defeat.

Something heavy knocked against the side of Obsidian, and Tarhin glanced cautiously out of the viewport.

Mors had come to see him one last time.

As he watched Mors’ body tumble away, borne aloft on the wild gravitational whims of space, a thought suddenly came to his neuro-processor. Mors had known about the koelium that infused his body. There were only a handful of life-forms that knew that particular detail, and all of them were Argen.

He was betrayed again. There was a Firmament agent on Auri. Worse, it was someone he knew.

#### Elsewhere

“The Seeker of Knowledge is dead,” sighed the Void Witch. “His light has gone out.”

“Then it is done,” said the Worm Alien. “He has performed his task. Our satellite received the transmission four minutes ago.”

“Are we going to replace him?”

“There are others who share our ambition.” The Worm Alien’s voice was level, without passion. “A replacement has already been found.”

As if on cue, a light flickered into life, shining down on a pale, well-dressed human with slick black hair and a gaunt, almost skeletal complexion.

“I don’t know him,” the Void Witch observed.

“He has performed a crucial task for us.” The Worm Alien replied. “This is the man who killed Carolus Padwar, and the new CEO of Padwar Interstellar Settlement Solutions.”

The Void Witch raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t realise we let assassins and corporate thieves into the inner circle.”

“Padwar’s assets still have use for us,” the Worm Alien said. “Padwar and his newly grown conscience were not.”

“Speaking of his assets,” the Void Witch said, a note of acid in her voice, “has our newest member found a replacement payload for the weapon?”

“We have several candidates lined up.” The new Seeker of Knowledge’s voice was singular and controlled, like hitting one key at a time on a piano. “They’re undergoing evaluation for compatibility.”

“And construction of the prototype?”

“We can’t proceed yet,” said the new Seeker of Knowledge. “We’re still waiting on our other contacts to deliver the schematics.” He produced a thin file and began to run it across his fingernails. “No cause for concern, though. Everything’s on schedule.”

Tarhin's adventures will continue in

**STUDENT OF THE CRAFT**