The Children of Zegandaria - Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov (world best books to read txt) 📗

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN: THE BIG BLOW

Many would say that Jail Hunter was a scumbag. Ever since he was a commando he'd looked to cross and harm himself to "hit the fucker," but somehow he kept going between the drops. So many years!

He remembered the impressive emboran suits they wore, and he remembered being a ghost warrior. He wanted the respect that this prestigious position gave him. He craved to develop professionally.

No one knew what happened. Jail was innocеnt, and they blamed him for the simple reason that he was the bad boy of the platoon. The extra recruitment committee didn't investigate him because they found no wrongdoing whatsoever! Of course, they didn't fire him outright, but they sent him out on patrol - at least until this scandal died down.

He was at various sites - he was even supposed to guard Om Gur Nal, but purely on official visits, he would never have the opportunity to be part of his personal security, as he was already

He was marked. He was stamped and felt like a leper! Yes, Jail Hunter was simply cursed! He needed to make one last strike! Oh yeah! He needed to take it back to those bureaucratic rats who ate the bread of the common impoverished soldier.

Jail had decided to prepare something truly spectacular. He intended not just to rob the refinery, but to personally transport all the fuel to the Outer Ring planets. This undertaking was extremely dangerous, but he was going to try to make it happen!

By this time, Namuro had almost graduated from the elite Artuk College. Although he remained a loner, it couldn't be said that his classmates didn't like him. But one night, Savage Ryan found his mentor in the hall and informed him of his demise.

Jail went mad as if someone had squeezed his scrotum with a vice. But he made sure his expression in no way betrayed his true thoughts. He had to protect himself somehow though. Ryan had never cried, but now he shed a tear:

Namuro was my only friend!

- "Shut up!," whispered Jail. "Otherwise we're going to the movies! We have to be able to rely on ourselves!"

After questioning him, Jail Hunter thanked the gods that they hadn't tried to dig deeper at all. They could have gotten to him too easily. Now they just had to calm Ryan down and cheer him up for what they had to do. But he still decided to ask with a concerned expression:

- What happened?

- There was a problem with one of the inner students. Someone named Esodo. Clearly, he was a snob! And they had just somehow gotten into a fight and squished like cockroaches!

A seasoned commando like Jail didn't feel like listening to such whining, but he still had to try and show some sympathy.

- Look, Ryan, it's part of life! It's none of our business to meddle in the affairs of providence!

- "But you sent him there!," persisted Ryan, wiping away his tears.

- Yeah, but he made his choice and just didn't follow the instructions I'd given him. It's his own fault he broke his head! Plus we'll only be sharing the two of us! Just think - your share will be bigger!

Savage Ryan was a tough bastard. A real psychopath, come in off the street. He'd survived all these years - just barely. And there, he knew, only the strong remained. There was no room for slobbering and sentimentality. But this time he looked at Jail very strangely. He didn't say anything, but...

The refinery was about to be upgraded with new and more skilled workers who were aware of the filtration process and the new type of engines.

This was also entering into Hunter's chicken plan.

The fuel tanks in the distant future looked like huge massive heliosan cubes, but they were too well insulated because anything could happen. Yes, the viscosity of the fuel was lower, but it could still burst into flames.

People were pacing this way and that-everyone caught up in their thoughts. The filtration process consisted of some specific features.

Special filtration skyscrapers, called virants, were connected to underground nanoplasma-based cadmium probes that extracted the fuel from the bowels of Zegandaria. A three-stage filtration process followed, which was particularly important before the special enrichment.

Everything was running on schedule, but the overlapping shift was still not fully aware of its duties. Jail had received all the necessary information from the head of security. Yes, he was in his debt!

Hunter was no fool. He guessed that Ryan might be suffering from an internal split and was plotting to fuck him over. Unless he beat him to it! He wasn't going to give in to those pallets! Once he'd lost one bait, now he'd use the other!

The colleagues who were about to join in were well aware that a court martial awaited them. But a hefty profit as well. Hardly anyone was going to head for the planet Kickluk Sor, though. Yes, Jail was thinking of living there for a while. But then it would blow somewhere. Well, maybe he'd have a good time - he didn't need too much!

By some rough calculations, stealing fuel would have brought in at least three and a half million credits, far exceeding his half-million-dollar debt, heavy as a millstone.

Ryan was living his own inner hell. He knew he had to distract the patrolling security guards who, on a set signal from their embedded man among the staff, were to go after him. Jail had a little surprise in store for him though.

The thing they both didn't know was that Jail had wiped their files at the school - as if they had never been there. He knew that when the refinery blew up, it was unlikely anyone would recognize Ryan's corpse. That orphan would be missed by absolutely no one. Even less of him.

"You'll be going to Namuro soon. And you'll be up there together!," he thought to himself. "You can't be spinning my numbers and changing the plan at the last minute! I hate to bottom for weaklings."

Savage Ryan looked around fearfully for where his trouble would come from. As soon as they spotted him, the guards chased after him. It didn't take them too long to close the distance.

Jail had brought in a bevonian ecodot[79], which greedily began sucking on everything. They had linked the machine to the nearest heliosan cube. Pretty soon his indicator was already reading fifty percent. Then suddenly everything stopped.

- "Thieves!," roared an unknown voice in the darkness. "You're trying to rob us!"

There were deafening growls that grew into a whole plethora of sounds.

- "Hurry!," urged Jail hastily, who in his desperation thought his whole plan was failing. "We'll be caught very soon!"

- "I can't just stop the machine," he retorted.

- "Act!," the commando shouted. "Damn it!"

Then a giant explosion was heard. One of the engines on Ryan's speeder had exploded. He'd decided that Jail was going to screw him and hadn't balanced properly on the vertical takeoff. A huge fire had blazed too close to where they were working.

Then Ryan had laughed with bloody teeth. And pointed his flying apparatus at Jail.

- Better in Hell than completely alone! Ah, you, scum, will get your just deserts!

Jail didn't even realize what was happening. If the commando had known things were going to end up like this, it was unlikely he would have ever given Ryan lessons in general piloting.

Jail Hunter was deader than ever.

A giant mushroom of fire had risen at the site of the refinery, еngulfing the underground installations as well. Everyone was dead.

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN: THE KIBERA’S PRAYER

After escaping a thousand tribulations, Kibera had still managed to preserve the Medallion of a Thousand Wishes. She knew of the artifact's power and hoped that she would use it properly and for its intended purpose.

Emborian had not been worthy to receive the full power, and was now drawing the consequеnces.

Kibera didn't want to die - not so much for her own life, but for the fact that somewhere out there, they really needed her help. She wanted to accomplish something big, but even the fact that she had survived to this point meant something.

Then she decided to pull it out and take a better look. It had some very strange symbols on it. The Gnostic system of peacemaking was something extremely subtle.

On the medallion was a picture of Abraxas, the guardian god of the universe. Kibera remembered that Kazuk Mon had explained to them that he was just and aware of the Plan of Creation.

Abraxas' medallion was a kind of electronic key that would lead her to the second hidden level, where Archibald himself was.

After inspecting it carefully, Kibera found a small narenzianan chip that had been placed inside the medallion. It was portable and could be inserted without surgery as well.

Kibera had never used such a gadget and would be extremely curious as to how to activate it.

Suddenly, something happened. And she saw before her Archibald Peos himself. But how had she ended up there?

Archibald Peos didn't see her at first, but a moment later her outline was visualized quite convincingly. The new interface was much improved over the old version Archie had used. Clearly what he considered a priceless gift was going to compete with something far more advanced. So in cyberspace, Kibera could do infinite things in comparison.

Archie decided to use his Nastarog and attacked Kibera in an excellent way, but he couldn't even scratch her. It was like he was numb. He tried again.

The voice whispered in his ear, "You must join forces for revenge!"

Kibera eyed Archibald curiously. He was so youthful. Younger even than herself.

The more she thought about it, the more she became convinced that something was eluding her. She decided to speak to him.

There were no cyclotron synthesizers in virtual reality, but it was possible to transmit "thoughts" through a complex algorithm built into the narenzianan chips.

- "Who are you?," she dared to ask him.

- I am Archibald Peos, the inventor of the Peos circuits, without which this reality would not look exactly the same.

- I think I've heard a similar name among the people in the sect.

- "What sect?," inquired Archie.

- "Tarashduk," was her reply.

- "So you're one of them?," dared Peos to ask her.

- "Well, to be honest, yes and no," she answered ambiguously.

- "How so?," the inventor was genuinely surprised.

- I've lived with them, but I've not been part of them. Of their ideas, of their power!

- "Ah!," replied Archie shortly. "And what was the name of her leader?"

- "Kazuk Mon," she replied simply.

Then their eyes met. And they realized they had to play on the same team. Whether they liked it or not!

As they headed to the next levels, they both clearly realized that the second hidden level