Chapter 26

* * *

A small glider, like a yellow soapbox, was speeding over the black surface of the road, covered with light patches of trash and glowing dots of markings. Forever chained to the ground by the primitive nature of its grav-mirrors, it was content to do little and, with its engine rumbling melodiously, glided at arm's length.

"We arrived here, it was already blazing, but they hadn't taken over the stations yet, and the Flow was running..." Krain said, keeping his eyes on the winding road that was now and then blocked by abandoned and wrecked vehicles. "But now the rebels control all the stations. They don't let anyone take off or land, and they don't give a jump vector either, so it's all over... Only demons know what's going on in orbit now. There were rumors that the Imperials have imposed a blockade..."

"You mean we can't fly away?" Alex asked, listening half-heartedly, cradling the heavy plastic carcass of the "shorty" in his lap. "Where are we going then?"

"To contact, I know. We'll get back to our senses and see what's going on. I've got about five more hours, tops. Unless, of course, anyone has a better idea." He added, turning back to the passengers.

Both passengers had no ideas, staring silently out the windows - Lord Cassard in the side and Lord Lister in the back.

"That's what I thought for some reason." The rebel muttered, picking up speed.

My head was buzzing, and I was thirsty. The stress, the drugs, and the constant paralysis were taking their toll, and despite three days of "chemical sleep", I wanted to sleep.

Alex leaned his head against the window. The tight stream of cool air hit his face and took the drowsiness away with it. The lowered glass was completely draped over the anti-blaster waistcoat, but a narrow slit remained at the top. The same waistcoats were sandwiched between the seats and side doors, as well as tucked under the front and rear bonnet, turning the service glider into an improvised armored vehicle. The loose ends of the waistcoats, thrown over the windows, fluttered under the incoming stream like short brown wings, fluttering against the unfamiliar city.

The arrow-straight side streets, alternating with the rhythm of a metronome, were completely empty and would have looked like two peas in a pod were it not for the abandoned cars and the revolutionary proclamations on the walls, which did not shine with the variety either. "PVD", "Don't forget the Four", and calls to "Kill the grey creatures".

The town seemed extinct. In the twenty minutes they drove, Alex didn't see a single person. Only the granite squares of buildings, the glass strips of floors, surrounded by shiny scatters of broken windows, the gray scraps of security shutters, the black stains of burned machinery, the yellow fluttering drops of small islands of flame, and a thin layer of rubbish - from broken plastic and empty bottles that looked like colorful cones to torn clothing and spent blaster blocs.

Lone figures of small yellow droids, resembling a hybrid of a dustbin and a hoover, tried unsuccessfully to remove this plume of 'revolutionary masses' from the streets, revolutionizing the shops.

"I wonder how 'Death to the Grey Creatures' and shoplifting combine?" Asked Alex a rhetorical question as they drove past another looted building.

"This is a corporate district. Corporations are active supporters of the emperor." Explained Krain. "And a good source of booze." He added, shrugging as if to say, It's inevitable and natural.

The glider plunged into the orange-glowing jaws of the vast tunnel. The windows flickered with the red-black pillars of the many columns, reflected in the white gloss of the walls. Ahead of them was a darkened carcass, lit by yellow flames, partially blocking the passageway. Alex lowered the readiness lever just in case and ducked down. As they drove closer, they could see that the carcass was something that looked like a dark gray APC with hypertrophied huge wheels and two "machine gun" turrets. The transporter was flipped on its side and looked as if someone had chewed it long and hard and spat it out. The walls around it were covered in soot and numerous traces of blaster hits. Near the walls and the APC right on the track, there were numerous piers in which tongues of fire were beating, which from a distance, Alex mistook for the remains of a fire:

"What are those piallas with the lights?" He asked as the glider picked up speed again, coming around the obstacle.

Lord Lister's voice came from behind before the rebel could open his mouth:

"They are put at the place where the man died." He said dryly, without turning around, and added for some reason. "It's a tradition."

The bloodless revolution didn't work. Alex commented mentally, turning away from the window and settling deeper into his seat.

"How long has it been like this?" He asked aloud.

"The first demonstrations started about twelve days ago. We..." Krain paused for a moment and, catching Alex's gaze, jerked his chin toward the back seat where Lord Brenor was sitting with his back turned to them, watching the tail.

Seeing the rebel's mute question, Alex hummed and shook his head negatively, as if to say, 'Fuck knows, so better not...'.

"... didn't think there could be such a thing," Krain continued after exchanging glances with Alex, "they're just stupid, though... what can you take from them, s-s-students...," he stretched mockingly, "no brains."

The tunnel curved slightly upwards. Ahead of them was the exit portal, illuminated by the edge of a pearl sky. The glider sprang out onto a curving trestle, which abruptly broke off as it ran into the motley wall of the barricade.

Overturned cars, some huge orange containers, fragments of fences, grates, rubbish bins, and wall debris were all piled together to form a huge barricade that completely blocked the flyover at the point where it branched off in three directions.

Krain reacted almost instantly. Glider braked sharply and spun on the spot. The engine howled, accelerating the car back towards the tunnel. But not fast enough - this was a service vehicle, not a sports car, after all. From somewhere on the right, something very large and orange emerged from under the overpass. A huge arm, like a twin bucket, swung over the car. The interior of the glider was filled with the sounds of scraping metal and cracking plastic, the shattered windows spattering into the interior with a subtle clang.

The manipulator flipped the machine sideways as if it were a toy and ripped it off the scaffolding, and lifted it three meters into the air. From above, the pearly skies were obscured by a massive disk-shaped body with four long arms, one of which was clutched a small yellow glider with the word "Yummy" written on it. Alex, hanging from the harness, saw through the broken and mangled starboard window as a small black sphere spun under the belly of the steel monster, turning to face the clutched glider with a glowing scarlet eye.

If it's a cannon, we're screwed...

He tried desperately to reach for the "shorty" that had fallen down somewhere. Krain was busy trying not to fall out. Alex was blocking his view, and Brenor was trapped by the crumpled roof, and he could only hope he was alive.

"Who do we have here?" A speaker-enhanced voice boomed overhead. "Corporants..." The manipulator shook the jammed machine, and the numerous pieces of body armor piled into the glider spilled onto the scaffolding. "Decided to play 'special squad'..."

During the jolt, the coveted 'shorty' fell out through the broken left-hand side windows, and there was nothing left to shoot back with. That left the usual blaster, but "the chances of damaging such a stupid thing with three shots..." There weren't many options left and, sighing heavily, Alex grabbed the edge of the door and peered out the broken window:

"Have you all gone mad?!" He shouted at the top of his lungs. "Don't you see, your own!"

For a few seconds, nothing happened, but the silence gave way to a measured throbbing hum, and the huge carcass moved towards the barricade with its prey.

"Is everyone all right?" Breathing heavily, Alex asked after he'd climbed back out of harm's way and helped the insurgent, hovering over the control handle, to get comfortable.

"I seem to be in one piece, but I'm pinned down." I heard from the back seat. Krane, in turn, confined himself to nodding.

"So then... no sudden moves - we'll try to "negotiate".

From below, the piles of barricades floated by, and the humming of the engines of their "captor" changed - it was clearly going down.

"Put it there." Shouted from somewhere on the ground. "We'll see what kind of 'ours' they are."

The car tipped over again and collapsed with a crash onto the black pavement of the trestle.

* * *

By the time Alex had recovered from the concussion, the barrel of a long-barreled hunting rifle was already pointed in his ear, so he looked around without making any sudden movements, with just his eyes.

On the other side of the barricade was a makeshift camp: fifteen or twenty men and non-men and a couple of aerocars. The side door of one of them was open, and a stretching awning was unfurled beside it, partially covering the car. Alex couldn't look up, and the roof would have been in the way, but judging by the quiet hum, the huge spherical carcass was also here, hovering overhead.

The chewed glider was surrounded by about a dozen "rebels", extremely diversely dressed and heavily armed... no less diversely. Judging by the color of their faces and the distinctive glint in their eyes, many of the 'revolutionaries' around them perceived reality to be more beautiful than it was and were at the height of a long binge.

The wielder of the long-barreled gun resting against Alex's ear, a young dark-haired lad with eyes red from either sleep or substance and sporting a tight, bright orange jacket, looked doubtfully at the men he had captured:

"It really does look like his own..." he said uncertainly and turned to the others. "The jackets are the universities..."

"Then why did you run from the barricade like a cosmic from his debts?" A categorical objection came from somewhere behind.

After shoving the other observers aside, a mustachioed man of indeterminate age with ripe aubergine skin and glistening dark eyes approached the car. He wore a gray jumpsuit that encased a beer belly and a round orange helmet that had obviously been removed from someone else. He wiped his sweat-shrouded forehead with his sleeve and looked at the prisoners with no small amount of doubt:

"Look at the eyes!" He muttered, glancing unkindly at Alex. "And the jackets must have been stolen or taken from the dead... what a bargain..." He spat at his feet and held his head up, shouting upwards. "Come on, get them out! Get your arms out to the sides..." He added, playing with a short silver blaster.

The revolutionaries moved back a little, and a huge metal paw appeared from somewhere above and came down on the bonnet, crumpling the metal like paper. At that moment, there was a rattling noise from above, and a second paw easily tore off the glider's roof and tossed it aside.

"I said stolen!!!" The mustachioed man shrieked happily as the prisoners emerged from the remains of the glider. "He was barefoot, the other two, and his pant leg shoot. They probably take it from a dead man."

"This man was wounded in battle, fighting for your freedom!" Alex interrupted him, glaring at the twitching Blade of Honor. "And we're barefoot in mourning. A lot of our comrades died in battle today - it's our custom."

"Don't shut me up!" The mustachioed one squinted. "How can you prove it?"

Well, it looks like the game of "prove you're not a camel" is about to begin. Alex thought to himself and decided that this was a totally futile exercise, so he went on the offensive:

"I'll prove it," he said firmly, and (If I'm going to tell a lie, it must be something big, he decided) slowly drew a card from his pocket from the Tallana Emergency Committee. And, making sure they had a good look at the inscription, he asked coldly:

"How can you prove that you are not a traitor or a provocateur? You have infiltrated this detachment and are taking advantage of your position to disobey discipline and sow discord among the progressive forces... Think, comrades, how long have you known this man and whether he is who he says he is?"

At that moment, the crowd around the prisoners parted and, zipping up his brown PVD jacket as he went, a very young man, in his twenties, with long dark hair gathered in a ponytail and tenaciously slanting eyes of grey, blazing with revolutionary determination, approached the glider. He appeared to be the local 'commander'.

As he approached the prisoners, he silently took Alex's card and, taking something resembling a miniature torch from his jacket pocket, "shone" on the seals.

Under the beam of the torch above the seals, holograms of some colored symbols flickered in the air.

"Hm, the pass is authentic." He said without hiding his surprise. "But that really doesn't prove anything."

"I'm telling you, they robbed the dead!" The mustachioed man shouted from behind the commander.

The commander, gesturing with his hand to silence him, asked Alex, returning the card to him:

"Who are you and what are you doing here?"

He opened his mouth to tell a plausible lie, but Krain beat him to it:

"You've got to be kidding me." The rebel grinned mockingly, shaking his head. "That's actually Atur Chermega and Bren, representatives of the anti-Imperial alliance with Tunai! I am their escort from the PVD. Our squad was ambushed not far from here, trying to break through to our people. There... we broke through."

"Chermega, indeed..." Krain from somewhere in the back rows, a cheerful and obviously drunk voice. "It looks like..."

"What the hell is a Cermega?!" The mustachioed man went on, turning black with anger. "Why was he even on Tallana? Since when did Tunaians go barefoot in mourning?"

"What are you, an expert on Tunaya or something?" Alex snapped. "We have arrived. Comrades, he's a pure provocateur!"

"Order! Discipline!" Shouted the commander in a breaking voice. "Let's get things sorted out. Let's get in touch with the revolutionary headquarters and get on with it! Tarb, let's make a request." He tossed to the man in the orange jacket, who darted off in the direction of the tarpaulin aerocar.

Under the awning was a terminal, clearly torn from somewhere, to which a bay of colorful wires stretched from under the trestle.

"I'm sure of it." The commander continued with a wicked smile. "That if 'Atur Chermega himself' had been present at Tallana, especially as a representative of the emergency committee, the revolutionary headquarters would have known about it."

We screwed. Unhappily Alex thought, frantically wondering what to do.

In a combat encounter, the odds were slim: the huge spherical carcass still loomed overhead, leaving no doubt as to the outcome of the battle.

Now revolutionary legitimacy is about to descend upon us. Though there's still a blaster on my belt, and Lord Brenor still has two. If I shift sideways a little, get behind the Commander, block the line of fire, and try to take him as a hostage...

Alex threw a quick glance at Krain - the rebel was outwardly perfectly calm and, seeing Alex's gaze, winked imperceptibly at him.

Deciding that the rebel knew what he was doing, Alex decided to wait while giving Lord Lister a look that he wouldn't make any sudden moves.

The returning "communicator" jumped up to the commander and whispered loudly in his ear. As he spoke, the commander's shoulders slumped, and the fragments of phrase he heard were a healing balm to Alex's soul: "Really coming... Grand himself... to meet with the Emergency Committee... in our area... to assist in any way possible."

The rebel seemed to know exactly what to say. Alex thought contentedly and smirked as he looked at the commander.

"Well?" He asked. "Has the necessary clarity been made? Can I finally put my hands down?"

"Of course, of course!" The commander nodded and shook his hands regretfully. "Sorry, respected Chermega, there's been a mistake. But you reacted so strangely to our barricade, so we suspected..."

"That's how we got ambushed near the same barricade!" "Atur Chermega" shouted, gesticulating emotionally. "The scum grabbed it. When we got close, they attacked us! Who knows if it was the same here? Risking again? It's stupid! We wanted to reconnoiter first, and you..." Alex added a hint of accusation to his voice. "You didn't even try to look into it first! You ruined a commandeered vehicle, and at least no one was hurt!"

"But we..." The commander started to look deflated but was interrupted by Alex:

"And it is absolutely right! Revolutionary awareness and caution!" And, ignoring the rounded eyes of Lord Lister and the equally astonished Crane, he climbed onto the remains of the glider and addressed everyone. "This is the only way to win our hard fight! But unreasonable suspicions must not be allowed," he glanced at the mustached man, "to create dissension in our ranks! Together we are a power! Together we will win!"

The crowd responded with cheers, and someone elbowed the mustachioed man, "I told you so, Chermega, and you...". Seeing this, Alex grinned mentally and continued to build on his success... Four minutes later, the whole small "barricade squad" was listening to him with interest, especially animated after the explanation of the concept of "expropriation of expropriators".

Thinking the job was done, he climbed down from his makeshift podium and found the "commander":

"Comrade..." Alex squeezed his shoulder and looked expressively into his eyes. "I'm sure you understand... a matter of revolutionary importance... we need a vehicle and a doctor."

* * *

The allocated aerocar swallowed up the kilometers and the low squares of corporate district buildings, replaced by the giant squares and half-kilometer spires of the municipal area.

The pilot was separated from the cabin by an intermediate wall with a small window, and "the representative of the Tallana Emergency Committee, Atur Chermega, and his escorts", were left to their own devices.

A touch on his elbow distracted Alex from contemplating the beauties of Tallana, nestled comfortably against the large side window:

"Lord Cassard, don't misunderstand me..." Lord Lister began somewhat tentatively when Alex turned to him. "I don't want to accuse you of anything, but are you sure this was all acceptable? Calling yourself by another name, and then that speech..." the Blade of Honor paused as he chose his words. "I am essentially a liberal man, but there is an oath of allegiance to the Emperor. after all."

"I think you're taking this a little too seriously," Alex replied with a sigh. "After all, you can come to a carnival or a masquerade wearing a pirate mask, present yourself as a pirate, and even talk like a pirate, but would that be dishonorable?"

"But this isn't a masquerade, Allesandro." Brenor protested. "It's not a carnival, and you're not wearing a mask."

"Well, at least I have a masquerade costume." He smiled back, picking up the sleeve of his PVD jacket. "And for that matter, I didn't introduce myself by another name. I was introduced by our fellow sufferer. Yeah, I didn't say anything. But we mustn't shoot with these madmen, who thought we were either Imperials or Corporatists, which we most certainly were not. I don't think they, in their condition, would listen to reason. So I don't think it was a lie, but a military ploy, after all, you've hidden your sword too."

"I thought it unlikely that they would search us at once." Lord Brenor replied, looking somewhat embarrassed as he removed the hilt of his sword from the sleeve of his jacket. "It would have had the effect of surprise anyway. They were standing close. I might have managed to take a dozen with me."

"Exactly the right idea." Alex agreed and pushed the thought in the direction he wanted. "Same here, as long as they thought I was one of them, 'Atur Chermega', I still had the surprise factor, a common military trick designed to balance the odds where they were unequal. And as for the speech, remember I never said a word against the Emperor, and I really don't have the best feelings for corporations."

Lord Brennor nodded absently, but his eyes didn't seem to dispel his doubts. Mentally he shrugged, the desire to be too good has never been good for anyone. Alex left Blade of Honor alone with his thoughts, crept to the back of the cabin where the dozing rebel was nestled, and gently tugged at his sleeve.

"I'm just in case." He whispered as Krain opened one eye and muttered something indefinite. "I'd really like to know who this Atur Chermega is. And how quickly they'll know I'm not him?"

"Nobody," Krain whispered back in the same way. "It's an alias used by a few of the PVD leaders. The real Atur died five years ago in the penal colony."

"There must be a PVD leader posing as "Atur" somewhere around here, and it's a matter of hours at the most to uncover us." Sadly concluded failed Chermega.

"Uh-huh." Nodded Krain. "He's lying hacked to pieces on the warehouse floor. Under this name that Melatian, who's been with Grand, arrived, and I doubt he'll turn up to expose you now." The Rebel reached up and, with a heavy sigh, straightened his injured leg and added. "I've been at the terminals for a reason, after all."

"Did you find out anything else useful?"

"Only that the anti-space defense forts have managed to put up shields and are not going to negotiate with the rebels. As for the rest, everything that could be copied I copied, but I'm not a "lance", you know."

Finding that his cover story would still work in the near future, Alex hummed contentedly and moved closer to the window again.

Soon a huge circular building, like a giant indoor stadium, appeared below. On its roof was the familiar green symbol often seen on medical equipment and doctors' coats. It appeared to be the promised hospital.

The aerocar made a semi-circle over the building as if aiming and began to descend cautiously. Alex pressed his forehead against the cool glass and looked down: a large landing pad located on the roof was creeping up from below, increasing in size. Tiny black dots and specks of color turned into people and cars - the pad was densely packed with both.

The aerocar nestled neatly between two white cars with stripes along the sides. The quiet, melodious humming of the engines disappeared, and Alex opened the side door and jumped down onto the sprung white roofline.

While they were helping Kryn out of the aerocar with the help of the pilot, a skinny, tall man in a green lab coat approached them. His eyes had black circles under them, and his cheeks were covered in a blond two-day stubble. He was accompanied by a small black droid that looked like a nightstand with two long arms:

"Well, what have you got?" He asked tiredly, looking over Alex's shoulder.

"Here it is." He moved to clear the narrow passage between the cars and pointed to Krain.

"Light." The doctor concluded with a glimpse of the rebel's leg. He held the infoblock up to his eyes, red with sleep, and made some notes and waved towards the large square superstructure. "Get in line."

A queue emerged from the door, several loops wrapped around the lift superstructure and pressed tightly together under a small canopy.

Fifty people, at least. Decided Alex. And practically not moving. How long it lasted inside the building was anyone's guess.

"The revolution..." he prodded, holding the Emergency Committee card up to the doctor's nose. "Has to develop, or it will fall over."

And seeing that the card had little or no effect, he added a blaster:

"This man needs to be back in action as soon as possible." Declared Alex. "This is critical. Who's in charge here?"

The doctor focused his gaze on the blaster and waved the infoblock towards the door of the superstructure with some unimaginable fatigue:

"It's all there. I'm just a sorter, don't disturb the work."

A small flyer whirred melodiously overhead and began to descend gently into the distance. The sortie looked at it with an unseeing glance and, ignoring the blaster pointed at him, moved on to the next landing site.

Alex exchanged surprised looks with Lord Lister, and slipping his blaster back into its holster, shouted into the back of the receding figure:

"Hey, sir, is there even a stretcher or a wheelchair we can get somewhere?" I didn't want to carry a rebel on my back.

The doctor, without turning around, made some indefinite hand gesture, either "piss off" or "look over there". There was nothing there, except for two green-striped light green aerocars.

Deciding it was probably the local ambulance and there might well be a stretcher. Alex left the rebel in the care of the pilot and went there with Lord Brenor.

The first vehicle was locked. Having unsuccessfully yanked on the doors, they decided not to open them yet and approached the second vehicle. After pushing the handle, the side door of the second vehicle slid gently to the side.

Alex peered cautiously inside. In the aerocar, face down on the dashboard, a young dark-haired man in a light green jumpsuit with a green emblem on his chest must be the pilot, and in the center of the cabin, half a meter above the floor hung a long white platform well suited to play the role of a stretcher.

"Lord Cassard, would you like to try to get out of the queue?" Brenor asked after they had removed the stretcher from the vehicle carefully so as not to wake the pilot. "I don't think that's quite fair..."

"It's very fair." Alex protested. "Our comrade's life, and ours too, depends on how quickly we can leave this place. It won't make any difference to the rest of them if they get help half an hour later, and it could cost us our lives."

"I guess you're right." He nodded. "I hadn't really thought about it that way."

After loading Krain onto a stretcher and ordering the aerocar pilot to wait for them in the car park, they proceeded to the lift superstructure.

As the stretcher with Krain approached the wide sliding doors, more and more disgruntled looks were directed at them in addition to the queue:

"Where are you going?" A disgruntled woman's voice came from behind me. "The queue starts there..."

"We're on a procedural matter." Alex snapped back without turning around. People don't even react to the blasters on their belts.

To the disgruntled muttering of the queue, they entered the lift, and Alex jabbed at the "Distribution, Registration and Information" button.

The lift, which seemed to go down only one level, brought them to a very spacious if not huge room decorated with a statue of a beautiful girl, which seemed to Alex something familiar. Around the statue was a round table, behind which were about a dozen droids, apparently the local receptionist.

The hall was filled with a huge number of people sitting, sleeping on mattresses on the floor, eating, or talking. They did not look sick or wounded. The hall was filled with a multitudinous hubbub and the smell of something resembling oatmeal. Refugees or something?

Making a poker face and waving his Tallana Emergency Committee ID card, Atur Chermega made his way almost to the counter, then the stretcher twitched and stopped:

"Hey, spit, are you watching where you're going?!" There was a shout from behind me. "Stop right there..."

When Alex turned around, he saw a big, red-faced man grabbing Lord Lister by the scruff of the neck, who was pushing the stretcher from behind.

"Apologise immediately..." Blade of Honour whispered through his teeth, glaring at the brute.

"What were you gurgling at?" He asked as he moved closer to Brenor's face so that he was almost pressing his forehead into it. "I'm going to make such an apology..."

Alex, with the nerdish appearance and generally subtle physique, had somehow forgotten who Lord Lister really was; he was still figuring out how to blow the bouncer away, and the "blade of honor" drew his sword and spun, going in behind his back. The flaming blade swept through with such speed that it smeared into a solid golden loop, punctuated by bursts of smoky, sparkling flame where the sword had touched flesh.

The brute collapsed to the floor with a howl, the surviving arm scratching the pavement helplessly, the other lying beside it. The legs were not cut by the blade, but judging by the depth of the wound, it was only a little short.

"Apologize at once." Lord Lister repeated, bringing the flaming blade to the offender's face. The man made an indecipherable sound and then he turned to shout. He shouts in a frightening way.

"He's not up to it," Krain commented, lifting himself up on his elbows.

"I think we'd better get a move on," Alex spoke up, still somewhat shocked by what he saw.

Brenor glared at the wheezing brute and switched off his sword.

In the silence, broken only by the moans and cries of pain of the unlucky brat, they reached the reception area and asked how to find the "chief". They hastily retreated to the lift:

"Yes, you're right..." Lord Lister began in response to Alex's surprised look as the lift doors closed behind them. "He's clearly a commoner and couldn't possibly have insulted me, but..." he said with a look of regret. "I simply couldn't help myself, Lord Cassard. In any case, it will serve him well."

"Memorable at the very least." He sighed back.

The lift doors opened with a melodious chime, and leaving Krain in the care of some girl in a white coat, the two lords set off in search of the 'head man' which fortunately did not last long:

"Well, you see, I can't! I swear by Protectress. I can't." The doctor on duty, a short mirlisti in a green dressing gown, was persuading them. He ran quickly from one wall of his office to the other, gesticulating frantically. His long, coiled ears twitched angrily as he began to explain something particularly emotionally. He looked like a hyperactive little sheep with huge violet eyes, but he was clearly a sheep at heart.

Realizing that Alex wanted to trick him into a Vitalin treatment, he stubbornly refused:

"Your comrade's wound is light. We'll operate on him quickly, out of the queue, put a matrix on, crystalloids in the blood, three tablets of detox, and he'll be walking in four days."

"Revolutionary necessity demands..." 'Atur Chermega' began again.

"Will this revolutionary necessity of yours get me Vitalin? I have thirty thousand wounded with this revolution of yours!" Myrlisti exploded, pointing his finger angrily at the ceiling. "There are people lying in the corridors, and those are only the heavy ones, I send light and medium ones home after the operation. Even now, at four in the morning, five hundred new patients are arriving every hour. And all this at the clinic's expense, I must point out, a revolutionary necessity for all, and as for the treatment, it's an order. I'm running out of surgical supplies and you demand that I waste precious Vitalin on a lightly wounded man. And then what do I do if one arrives that's just as emergency and revolutionary, but critically ill? Or worse, in a state of artificial animation, or maybe even conserved. You, for instance," he ran quickly up to Lord Lister, "will be wounded. Deadly." He jabbed a long finger at his heart. "Sixth-degree penetrating burns, massive barotrauma, destroyed left lung, heart, and three vertebrae... So what? I say, "you know Vitalin's gone, wasted on a calf wound..." Your revolutionaries will kill me, and rightly so.

"We could..." Alex began menacingly.

"Shoot," Mirlisti said categorically, and with his hands in his pockets, he sat on the edge of the table, turning away from the window. "Let the droids do your operations then," he threw over his shoulder, "I'll look at you and laugh, oh I laugh, my dear."

"Allesandro, I think he's essentially right." Lord Brenor said in a half-voiced voice, pulling Alex aside. "It would be ungentlemanly to take advantage of the situation to deprive people of salvation. Our comrade is indeed lightly wounded."

The doctor on duty, pretending to look away, squinted a sly eye, waiting for his reaction. Alex turned his gaze to the blade of honor: Lord Brenor was full of sympathy, seemingly hurt by myrlissty's words. What a sly sheep.

"To hell with you." He sighed heavily, waving his hand. "But for fuck's sake, then," he wagged his finger, "it was the best surgeons or whatever you've got! Understand?"

"You'll have the best," Myrlisti muttered grudgingly, though Alex could have sworn his face was glowing with happiness.

Having left Krain in the care of the droid team and the surgeon, Alex was bored by the operating room door. Lord Brenor was asleep, curled up on a couch nearby. The rest of the corridor, white as the rest of the clinic, was perfectly empty and boring, except for an elderly gray-haired doctor lazily writing something in the infoblock.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Are you come from the Third?" She wondered. Probably from boredom too.

"No, what makes you think that?"

"So, it's been about four hours since all the revolutionaries from the Third Transit Station are coming. It's not much, but it's nighttime. I thought an assault had begun, don't you know?"

"I don't know." Alex shook his head and, sensing that the old lady was obviously well-informed, asked a leading question. "What made you think it was an assault?"

"Well, the other day, we had a real Assistant to the Third Department of the Municipality, a very knowledgeable man, he told me all about it... That's what he said: "The Imperials will take over the Transit Stations first thing, otherwise they won't land on the planet."

"Why is that?"

"Well?" The old woman wondered. "The Flow is in the way, and without Stations, it takes a long time to disperse it, that's one, power manipulators two."

"And there's no way around it?"

"Well, it's probably possible to bypass, if one or two ships, but if many? They'll divert the flow, and the ones that got through will be captured by a force grab, maybe one or two, but no more." She stated categorically.

"And that there is enough force grabs for all the ships?" With obvious doubt in his voice, Alex asked.

"Well, there's enough to control the flow. There are fewer shuttles on Forizzet, though..."

"On Forizzet?"

"So you're not from around here?" The doctor guessed, and with an affirmative nod, she immediately assured Alex. "So I'll tell you all about it!"

Mara Flasir turned out to be a remarkably well-informed person. The hospital was receiving wounded from almost all over the center, and with them, the information was flowing in. And Mara was the kind of person who took genuine pleasure in sharing information, some might say she was just a very chatty bored old lady, but in Alex, she found a very attentive listener. In half an hour of endless monologue, interrupted only by the local, grass-like tea, he found out the following:

Over the Tallana Revolution, the sword of Damocles was hanging over in face of "Fortress Forizet". It was the main base of the Sector Navy and Army. Simply put almost two million guns, not counting the heavy equipment. And that, of course, was more than enough to crush the entire rebellion. The only problem was that there was no way those two million men could make it to Tallana. No, they had the necessary transport shuttles and barges, but not enough.

As long as the rebels controlled the Transit Stations and their navigation computers, it was only a miracle that the planet could be reached. The navigation system wasn't producing correct landing vectors through the mishmash of transit Flow. And the power grabs of the Transit Stations intercepted those who were willing to take the risk. No, with certain luck, it was possible to break through with one or even two small vessels, but one could not dream of a full-scale landing in such conditions. Therefore it was necessary to wait until the fleet which had unsuccessfully left to Alyra will return. Take over Stations, and will return the Flow under control, and provide the landing of the army.

"And when is the return of the Fleet expected," Alex asked, digesting the information.

"Who knows?" The old woman shrugged her shoulders. "They say in five days."

"Can't this very Fortress Foriset, just destroy the interfering Stations, and drop off whatever it wants?"

"Well..." She was silent, thinking. "Maybe, but that's a lot of people... and it's not... The wreckage..." Her eyes widened in horror. "What would happen, oh Protectress forbid." The terror in her eyes faded away, replaced by a keen desire to share an idea. She took something from her pocket that looked a lot like a folding mobile phone and quickly dialed the number:

"Oya? Can you talk? What? Oh, come on, I've just found out..."

Realizing that he had temporarily lost his source of information, Alex sighed heavily and sank into his own thoughts:

It was, therefore, only a matter of time or political will. As Krain rightly said, the whole rebellion was doomed from the start. And when the Fleet comes back in five days, it's going to be a lot of fun, probably even with bombings. So we need to get out of here as soon as possible.

Soon a stretcher with Krain on it, accompanied by two droids and a bearded man in a baggy green surgeon's suit, emerged from the operating room. The Rebel was apparently under anesthesia, wearing a sort of shiny foil cloak instead, and the wounded leg was encased in a hard case of light plastic, starting at the knee and extending to the ankle.

"Well? How were the results?" Somewhat worried, Alex asked the doctor.

"The shadows are with you. What are the results?" The surgeon brushed it off, undoing the clasps at the elbow and pulling down the long gloves. "The wound is simple, even primitive. Predictable surgery. Even the droids would have done the job. Only the bone had to be fiddled with."

"So everything is all right?" He clarified.

"Yes, of course." The surgeon nodded and gestured for the droids to move the stretcher toward the lifts. "Now your comrade will lie under the crystalloid solution for another three or four hours, then we'll remove all the products of catabolism, and you can take him anywhere you want, even to the barricades."

"You mean he will be able to walk?"

"No. It's best not to put any strain on the leg yet, but he could limp."

The lift doors opened with a melodious chime, and the droids gently pushed the gravity stretcher out towards the promised "VIP room".

The featureless white walls of the monotonous corridors of the clinic were replaced by wood paneling, there was a claim to style in the lighting, and the ceiling was simply absent. The walls simply disappeared to a height of two meters, giving way to a boundless blue sky with occasional swirls of white clouds. A warm breeze blew lightly across his face, and somewhere in the distance foliage rustled.

Alex stared dumbfoundedly for a few moments but then remembered what the roof of the clinic actually looked like and realized that it looked like some kind of advanced hologram or something.

The stretcher stopped outside the wide sliding doors of one of the wards a lad in a recognizable PVD jacket was bored on a small couch nearby:

"Hey, who's that?" He exclaimed indignantly as he saw the stretcher with Krain being carried into the ward.

"And this is your brother the revolutionary," the surgeon answered him, "also an emergency commissioner, or whatever your name is."

"What brother..." The lad started but shut up when Alex showed him the Emergency Committee card.

"Who is that? And what is he doing in the room with my man?" Alex was equally indignant when he entered the room and saw another stretcher lying on which there was a glowing, tube-shrouded subject, who was clearly missing two legs and one arm.

The doctor pressed his finger to his lips in response, urging Alex to be quiet, and pointed to the door in the corridor:

"Don't make so much noise, for heaven's sake. Wake him." He called out to Alex as they walked out, leaving the droids fiddling with some tubes and tubes connected to Krain. "I told you, the same revolutionary."

"A member of the emergency committee by the way." Inserted the guy in the pvds jacket.

"And what is he doing here?"

"Waiting for the operation to begin, of course! What do you want? We've got people in the corridors. And it won't be long anyway. In four hours, the regeneration tank will be free, and we'll start repairing this poor guy's limbs."

"You said not to make any noise. What could Krain be waking up to soon?"

"No, your comrade will sleep for at least another three hours, but the representative of the emergency committee periodically regains consciousness, and I must say that despite the pain suppressors, it is quite a painful process."

Alex glanced suspiciously at the PVD man and took the surgeon aside to inquire:

"Did you say Emergency Committee representative?"

"Oh, yes... Oh, I forgot, so did you..." He raised his eyes to the sky in misery. "Well, to be honest, they did not tell me his name. Maybe you will recognize him... But I can assure you that his life is not in danger. In six days, we will finish repairing his limbs, and in a month or so, he will be able to move properly." The doctor politely nodded goodbye and was about to leave, but was caught by the sleeve by Alex:

"I'm sorry, I'm not an expert, but..." He looked around once more defiantly. "I don't see any staff here. What if one of them feels ill?"

"Don't worry. There are bio-monitors in the ward. If anything happens to your friends, we'll know about it straight away, and a droid or duty nurse will arrive immediately."

"Biomonitor..." Alex stretched out in amazement as a crazy plan began to form in his head. "That's it? No visual surveillance?"

"That's enough." The doctor said irritably. "Anyway, if you want, you can sit and monitor visually. Can I go now? I have sick people waiting for me."

"Of course, just one last question. We fought my friend off from captivity. He was tortured and probably injected with Lim serum. It won't cause any problems in terms of drug interaction. Painkillers, for example."

"Lim's serum?" The doctor frowned. "You should have said so before the operation." He thought briefly before continuing. "Not at all. It is, of course, rather painful, but on a... shall we say physiological level, it is relatively harmless. I haven't heard of any side effects of painkillers, although, as far as I know, painkillers are often used at the end of an interrogation. So I think your friend is perfectly safe, but if anything suddenly goes wrong, it will be reflected on the biomonitors, and we can intervene."

"Thank you very much. Sorry for the delay."

After seeing the doctor off with a thoughtful glance, Alex walked back to his room and sat down beside the PVD man without saying a word.

The guy looked to be in his early twenties, probably even younger. His hair dyed the color of egg yolk, was cut short, with long, shaved lines that divided his head into even squares. His brown PVD jacket was unbuttoned, and underneath was a very thin turtleneck, a deep orange that only served to accentuate its wearer's thinness. The overly wide gray trousers with side pockets were belted with a black belt around an empty holster, and the blaster just rested in his lap. The gray slanted eyes and hunched nose gave an odd impression, but as he'd seen were common on Tallana.

For a few minutes, they sat silently beside each other, but soon curiosity got the better of him:

"Are you really from the Emergency Committee?" He asked, nervously licking his parched lips.

Alex was silent with a quiet nod.

The lad was silent for a while, but he soon made up his mind again:

"May I ask you a question?"

"You may."

"Why are you barefoot?"

"We have such a tradition." Alex sighed, leaning back on the couch and stretching his bare feet almost to the middle of the corridor. "To go barefoot in mourning. A lot of my comrades died recently."

"Ah..." PVD lad muttered, glancing at Alex's bare feet in surprise. "My name is Dirav, by the way." He held out his hand.

"Atur." Alex introduced himself and, after a moment's hesitation, confidently shook the outstretched hand. I don't know how they do it here. If anything, I'm not from around here.

"Where was the fight?" The lad asked after an exchange of handshakes, which did not seem to cause any surprise. "Here, or up there already?"

"What fight?" 'Atur' was sincerely surprised.

"Well, where your comrade was injured."

"Ah... He wasn't wounded in combat." Alex answered, and leaning closer to the lad, he added. "We fought him out of captivity. They tortured him."

"You mean with Lim's serum? What about his leg?"

"Lim's serum first." Agreed Alex, and with a grim look added. "And then they took the blaster and just abused him..."

"What a bunch of bastards." The PVD lad's eyes filled with hatred. "Bastards, they used to come to us too. They knew we only had freshmen coming, so they came especially to hurt us... but that's alright..." He gripped his hand on the hilt of his blaster. "We'll make it up to them..."

"And this one where hurt." Alex decided to change the subject before it got bogged down in a discussion of imperial wrongdoing.

"At the rally." The guy sighed, and seeing Alex's surprised eyes, he shook his head. "No, there was no attack. It was an accident. They made a bad stand, or maybe it was just bad luck. It snapped under the respected Gromom, and the rally was at the railroad station... He fell right on the track, and they were still under the power..".

"Yeah..." Alex stretched out sympathetically. "ShIt happens. Then what are you doing here?"

"Well, I kind of monitor it." The lad shook his hands. "Coordinator Turan told me to make sure nothing happens. Nothing ever happens. I'm the only one here." His eyes flashed with a thought:

"Respected Atur..." he stretched out piteously, looking into Alex's eyes. "Since you're here, can I make a quick run to the registration floor? I've been here for seven hours, I'm thirsty, but they serve tea and taymar and say they serve food..."

"Leaving the post then... What about revolutionary discipline?"

"Well, I'm here..." He started to make excuses.

"That's right. You stay here. If you've been assigned here, you're needed in case something happens. An imperial security agent infiltrates and kills a member of the emergency committee!" Emotionally gesticulating, Alex exclaimed. "Or worse, extract critical information."

"Well, you're here anyway."

"And who told you I wasn't an imperial agent." He smirked.

"Well, honorable Atur, you have an ID, I've seen..." objected the lad.

"Maybe it's fake? No, you can't leave the post. You stay here." Atur admonished, and seeing the lad's droopy face, he added. "And while you're at your post, I'll get you some tea or some teymar."

When Alex went up to the registration floor and found a place where tea and something that looked like dark and very liquid porridge were being poured out of huge bins, he realized that he would not be able to get tea today: The queue was simply mind-boggling. So he merely picked up two cups of white porous material, which looked like Styrofoam, and went to the floor, where the sleeping Lord Lister and the chatty doctor remained.

After making sure the 'blade of honor' was all right and still asleep, Alex found his 'informant' and confessed to her that he was overwhelmed by her tea, and if one of his mates didn't share this happiness with him, it would be safe to say that a huge part of his life had gone to waste:

"That's because you have to know how to brew." The doctor smiled flatteringly as she poured tea from a small oval teapot. The smile made the wrinkles on her face form an intricate network. "Even with regular tea, if you brew it right..."

"I think it's all about your experience." Alex smiled back, taking the cups, and was about to leave when he remembered something. He put the cups back on the table and, with a heavy sigh, asked:

"Respected Mara, can you help me one more time? To be honest, I've lost all my sleep. I'm exhausted." He confessed, and judging by the look of him, a good night's sleep would really do me good. "But I can't sleep, all sorts of thoughts start creeping into my head, and I can't do anything. I was thinking. This is a hospital. Maybe you have something to make it go away."

"Young people," said the doctor, "not even sixty yet, and you've brought yourself to such a mess. All right." She sighed and waved. "Let's go."

It wasn't far to go. After walking through three doors, she entered the office:

"Here." She held out a small clear vial, with little red capsules inside.

"Thank you very much." Alex thanked her, putting the bottle in his pocket. "Would it be all right if I took a lot of it?"

"I don't. If you take one, it's five hours of sound sleep, and then it's natural sleep. If it's two, it's seven hours, which adds up to an hour and a half or two hours."

"Can I put it in my tea?"

"You what?" Mara's eyes went wide. "Of course not. It tastes bad. You don't dare. It would be an embarrassment, not a tea."

"All right, I won't." Alex raised his hands conciliatorily and, after taking the cups of tea and thanking the doctor again, headed for the lifts.

Now, the main thing is not to mix it up. He mentally instructed himself as he counted out the pills into a cup. The other had to be placed on the floor of the lift. Left hand to me, right hand to him.

After stepping out of the lift, he waited a little while for the tablets to dissolve and then moved toward the ward.

Approaching the PVD man, Alex handed him a cup and sat down beside him:

"Here you go, fighter. Sorry, there was no teymar."

"Whatever, dear Atur." The lad smiled gratefully accepting the cup. "I'm so thirsty," he said.

He took a couple of sips, stopped, and began to race the tea through his mouth with a concentrated look:

"It tastes kind of nasty." He shared his doubts.

"Uh-huh." Alex nodded. "Mine too. They're saving money, I guess."

"You know, respected Atur, I don't think this is tea at all, but some kind of shitty synthetic..."

"I guess so. What can we do?" He shrugged.

There were synthetics in the tea, but they were not crap, and as it turned out, they were of high quality. The PVD lad was sliding off the couch before he drink half of the tea. The nine sleeping pills had done their job. Alex took the cup out of his hands so he wouldn't spill it. Alex laid the guy down on the couch. He sat for another ten minutes with a thoughtful look on his face, finishing his tea and finally deciding to put the cup on the floor and get up.

As he entered the room, he glanced at Krain, making sure the rebel was all right, and turned to the second gravi-bed.

The rebellion is doomed. I understand that Krain understands that, and the Professor understood it. Thought Alex thought thoughtfully, looking at the mishmash of glowing tubes covering the body of the second occupant of the ward. Their goals extend far beyond this rebellion. They must have some kind of escape mechanism, some kind of secret passage, and I bet it leads off-planet. At least part of the top brass they must have taken out, just to be sure.

He paused beside a motionless member of the Emergency Committee:

And if I find out where this "escape mechanism" is, I may be able to use it with an ID.

A source of information lay before him. A high-ranking officer. He could not have been unaware of the evacuation plan, if it existed at all "unless, of course, he was an impostor like you".

Alex stood hesitantly beside the stretcher for a while:

Screw it all! What am I risking?

He retrieved the injector from his pocket and took a cylinder of Lim's serum from his trouser pocket and charged it.

And with a sigh, he pressed the trigger. The wounded man twitched faintly, probably from the prick, and opened his eyes.

Alex suddenly felt remarkably silly, as if he had been caught in some petty hooliganism, after all, he had never questioned anyone. Where to start then?

"So, full name, rank, position, how many tanks do you have, and where are your missiles?"

The wounded man blinked, his pupils constricted to a point, and he let out an incessant shorthand:

"Alaryan Tiliri, Imperial Security Sain, supervisor of the third PVD group, I don't know what tanks are. The missiles have been disassembled. The warheads have been transferred to PVD performers. The engine parts are stored in a warehouse at Tallana, Klaria, thirty-fourth block, Turanno Street, building twenty-four fraction five."

"Holy Mother..." Alex breathed out.

"Mother Valesa Tiliri..." The interrogator began, mistaking an involuntary exclamation for a question, but Alex was too distracted:

That's a 'member of the emergency committee'. Dumbfounded, he thought. There don't seem to be any real ones... This one's an agent of Imperial Security.

You thought you were "risking nothing. An inner voice came to life inadvertently. What do you think you'll get for interrogating an officer in the line of duty with special drugs?

Nothing will happen. He snapped mentally. How will they know it was me who questioned him? It's so chaotic in here. And then how did I know... Alex stammered and developed the thought. I didn't. Now I do... There's a PVD terrorist lying here, a member of the Tallana Emergency Committee, and an Imperial Security Officer. That's who was behind this. A lot of things were becoming clear. An imperial fighter jet flew over us before the shelling on the hunt. Then it also, supposedly by accident, destroyed the aerocar with the disarmed attackers, cutting all the 'strings'. Then an SS investigator with "technical experts" comes to me, and literally, one day later, the assassins pass through the security system undetected. And when that didn't work, we're descended upon by a whole posse in spacesuits, for whom someone has disabled the shield generator. And Lord Velaske's entourage had two of the SS. So the PVDs, all this time, were helped by Imperial Security...

Or was it the other way around? Maybe it was the PVD that helped the SS, or was it just their tool? Or maybe this guy is an honest undercover agent exposing terrorists? Or an equally honest provocateur and the SS had nothing to do with it?

He shook his head, dismissing the swarm of conjectures that filled his thoughts, and deciding that he could just ask, interrupted the wounded man's story about his mother:

"What does the supervisor of the third PVD group do?"

"Provide liaison between the PVD actors and the operation coordinator, management of agents assigned to the team, information gathering, and general observation."

Here comes the operation. Unhappily he thought and asked aloud. "What is the essence of the operation? Briefly."

"Destabilize the Sector Tail, demonstrating the incompetence and dangerous ineptitude of the local authorities. Create conditions for the imposition of a State of Emergency, bringing the Sector under direct imperial control."

That's lovely... Alex gulped nervously. But what's that got to do with me?! He thought, digesting what he had heard. Well, some high political games, why kill me? And what does this have to do with Lord Velaske?

"What was the purpose of the attempts on m..." Alex wanted to say "on me". But he corrected himself in time. "Lord Cassard?"

"I don't know," the injured man exhaled and spoke quickly as if something was pushing the words out of him in quick and hard thrusts. "I didn't do it. That's what the first group of PVDs dealt with. Grand himself supervised it. I wasn't privy to it. I found out about it by chance from Klayok when I asked what the assault suits were for..."

He raised his hand, interrupting the flow of the wounded man's words:

"Make a guess as to what it might have been for."

"To destabilize his Domain and House Fyron in general."

OK, that seems pretty logical. But why didn't they just accuse me of something then and execute the hell out of me? Or put me in jail. It's dictatorship and absolutism here... He raised his eyes to the ceiling, remembering everything he'd learned about the local polity from Thaer's notes and his conversations with Marquis Degrasto. Absolutism wasn't on the cards. And for a dictatorship, the nobles had very, very many rights. Let's assume that they simply couldn't act against me officially, the political climate didn't allow it. But what's that got to do with the Melatians? They are not supposed to benefit from the introduction of Direct Rule either. Wouldn't they? About the House of Melato, Alex knew woefully little. What interests they might have in this case was completely unclear. And he was talking about some missiles...

"What is the role of the Melato House in the operation?"

"I am not aware of that. I have not heard anything about Melato House in connection with the operation. Agents and PVD cells have not been sent into their territory. Perhaps the head of the operation knows more."

"О!h" Quite a smirk on Alex's face. "Who's in charge of the operation?"

"I don't know exactly. Probably Sheldon's deputy, Sain Captain Tarbell."

"Probably?"

"It was a delicate operation, almost no paperwork, all verbal. But he was the one who briefed me on the case. He also handed over the operational plan. He's also the coordinator. I report to him. There must be someone higher up in the center, but I don't know."

"Who else is running this operation? Imperial Security and the PVD or someone else?"

"I... I only know about the SS and the PVD. Even among the SS, few are privy to the very existence of the operation. Perhaps there are others involved. I don't know."

"Imperial Intelligence?" Alex suggested. He remembered that the tribunal investigator, who was also an intelligence officer, had spoken to him along with the SS specialists.

"No," the SS man shook his head with a pained sigh. "Intelligence is uninvolved at all, too important. The Emperor has never trusted those swaggering..." His tirade was interrupted by an impatient question:

"How do you know that?"

'One reconnaissance team got too close to the PVD. We found out about it. We have an informant amongst the instant communication operators in the fortress. We intercepted their report. The spy had to be eliminated."

"Maybe it's just that these particular intelligence people weren't privy to it?" Alex suggested. "After all, even among the SS, not everyone is privy to it."

Then the Head Office would just move them away from Tallanah so they wouldn't cause trouble. But they were working in a very substantive way. They weren't interested in the PVD. They wanted to know exactly who was behind them. It was very dangerous. For the whole operation. The whole thing could have fallen apart.

"Why? After all, the Emperor could have simply ordered it all to be put in the closet, in the sense of being classified."

"I don't know. That's what Captain Tarbell said. He said if Intelligence got wind of it, it would undermine the whole case. They have to be eliminated. I don't know why he said that."

"Make an assumption."

"Intelligence, they're still Navy. There are a lot of nobles out there. Information will spread even if it's classified. The mere demand for secrecy would confirm the existence of Operation Wave. It's unacceptable, politically."

"Operational Plan Wave..." Alex sighed heavily and drummed his fingers pensively on the bed rail, glancing around the room with distracted eyes.

"So what's the plan?" Finally, he asked.

"Completing the evacuation of selected PVD cells from the planet. Conserving agents for the duration of the explosions, waiting for the fleet to arrive and the army to land, legalizing..."

"Explosions?" Alex interrupted him. "What kind of explosions?"

"Explosions of missile warheads. The Constellation-BM type."

"And how badly is this Constellation exploding? And who is going to explode it and where?"

"The simultaneous detonation of all sub-munitions of the warhead in a Type I atmosphere will result in an explosion equivalent in power to the L-10 class. Explosions will be carried out by PVD performers. The first explosion will take place near the army's "northern base" on Tallana. I don't know where the rest of the explosions will take place, the instructions were on a sealed block, I don't know what's there."

"Make an assumption," Alex said.

"I, I don't know." The wounded man was clearly nervous, his eyes darting over the options, his face a panicked expression. "I can't answer that. There are too many possibilities!" he practically shouted.

"Easy, easy, no need to answer that question."

Alex looked around the room for a chair, but to no avail - it looked like they didn't count on visitors. He dragged a small bedside table to the bed with the SS man, sat down on it, and once again regretting that he did not have a recorder with him, suggested to the wounded man:

"Tell me the contents of the operational plan in detail..."

And the SS man began to tell the story. Very quickly, clearly in a hurry. Pouring out the words in a restless, quick-talking manner. He seemed eager to tell everything as quickly as possible, to get rid of these questions as if they were something that hurt. From time to time, he broke into a completely indistinguishable recitative, and Alex had to stop him, starting again.

Fifteen minutes later. When he realized he seemed to have learned all he could, the Imperial Security Sain lying before him was breathing heavily with a wheeze, running his eyes restlessly around the room, waiting for more questions. The serum seemed to be still working, and all he could do was answer. But there was nothing to ask.

Alex had already learned all he wanted to know. He knew that the PVD were evacuating via the Sixth Transit Station and that today was the last day of the evacuation, so he had to hurry somehow. Because it was about to get really violent fun with bombings, the landing of the forces of the incoming Imperial Fleet, and other events that one didn't want to take part in. The man knew nothing of the events surrounding Lord Cassard, nor of what was happening outside of Tallana. It remained to be seen what to do with him.

He stood looming over the bunk, trying to figure out what to do. On a conscious level, it seemed to him that the most sensible thing to do would be to shoot the SS man. Just in case. But he realized very quickly that he could not shoot the wounded man, who had also done nothing to him personally. And besides, the shot and the wound associated with it would have triggered the biomonitors, and therefore cause completely unnecessary problems with the local staff and possibly with the rebels.

"Okay..." Alex muttered aloud. "He's about six days in the regeneration tank anyway, and what are they going to find out..."

Realizing that he couldn't leave him like that, Alex took a half-filled glass of sleeping pills and poured them into the SS man's mouth, soon causing him to fall into a deep sleep.

Carefully closing the door of the room behind him, he stepped out into the corridor and plopped down wearily on the sofa beside the sleeping boy from the PVD

Alex stretched his legs and leaned back, staring up at the illusionary sky that covered the ceiling.

White lambs of frivolous clouds, driven by the gentle whiff of a warm wind that tangled in my hair, drifted leisurely across the turquoise sky. Unnatural and unaccustomed, but frighteningly plausible. An oblique line of wavering white dots floated out from behind the clouds, and a multi-voiced melodic chirp sounded from above.

"They even have birds here." Alex gritted his teeth and threw an empty tea cup at the ceiling.

As expected, the cup hit an invisible barrier before it flew three meters and fell to the floor.

He gave him a tired look. He put his feet under him and rubbed his face with his palms.

He felt sick to his soul. So disgusting, as if he had bathed in a puddle of shit. He was nauseous and not so much from what he had learned as from the interrogation itself. It was just hard to watch. He didn't know exactly what Lim's serum was doing to the man, but clearly something extremely nasty.

He also felt like a complete stranger. Some people with some murky agenda were going to kill a bunch of other people.

And it's all in the middle of nowhere. In his mind, he groaned. On some planet with spaceships instead of the sky.

Alex heard a low buzzing sound, and when he opened his eyes, he saw a small droid, looking like a dustbin with an arm, drive up to the fallen glass.

"Esteemed." He rattled, turning two yellow lights-like eyes towards Alex. "If you'll excuse me, I'll put this cup away if you don't need it anymore."

Alex silently waved his hand, and the droid interpreted the gesture as agreement to pick up the glass. The top lid on its body parted to the sides, and the manipulator slid the glass into the container.

"I apologize for the inconvenience." He rattled, and with an equally quiet buzzing sound, he departed.

"Yeah, that's their plan." Alex grinned wryly as he glanced at the droid.

And the plan given to Alarjan Tiliri was, in essence, very simple: "Don't interfere with the PVD guys to throw the situation off balance, and don't let others get in the way, which was a bit more difficult - but doable."

The active phase began when they leaked to civilian channels a video recording of a group of "imperial soldiers" abusing Tallana students. Alarjan had no idea whether the tape was authentic or staged, but it didn't matter. Their job was to ensure as much publicity as possible and to ensure that the case would not be 'bogged down' by the locals or intelligence. This spark was enough for the PVD agitators to cause a disturbance on campus. What happened next was a pleasant surprise with a shootout between students and soldiers on leave - purely impromptu. But to the credit of the PVD people, they were able to make a big deal out of it, and the SS people again made sure that no one interrupted them...

The rest was easy - a couple of lorry loads of booze and a disgruntled crowd of students outside the administration building. An unfortunate "accident" prevented the nearest police flyers with heavy paralyzers from taking off, and the sentries went one-on-one with the drunken crowd. An attack on a flag, a few shots from the crowd at the guard, which were fired by the "right people" and here is a completely senseless and bloody massacre with hundreds of dead that has outraged the entire planet. Demonstrations of millions, a few arrests in the municipality of those who thought too well, and now the government has asked for help from the imperial center. The rebels have miraculously managed to break through the defenses of the transit stations and seize them all in a matter of hours, taking control of all short-range space.

What happened next, Alex already knew. And by the end of the banquet, for dessert, the organizers of this riot had prepared explosions of warheads "Constellations", each of which would be enough to completely wipe out a medium-sized city, and the rebels were given three of them... In general, there would be more than enough reasons to declare a State of Emergency.

All in all, in a way, not without elegance. Mentally, he admitted. Then they'll catch them heroically... If they can. Professor Takkar clearly understood what the ending would be and wanted to replay it...

In theory, there was still something that could be changed. The charges had not yet been detonated. Alex was aware of the plan and perhaps, in theory, could have done something to prevent it...

Utter absurdity. He declared to himself, trying to quell the tiny worm of conscience that was gnawing at his soul, demanding that he do something about it. I'm not a local. I have two blasters, a cripple, and a mentally unstable teenager moved by the concept of noble honor.

But the unpleasant feeling in the back of his mind did not subside, which was beginning to irritate him:

Screw them all anyway, he cursed in his head. What am I, a superhero to save everyone? Suppose I wasn't transported here at all, then what? After all, there's a whole planet of adult, intelligent people here who, if they want to live, could go and save themselves.

He made up his mind, and with a jerk, he rose from the sofa, heading for the lifts: Everyone is free to help themselves. That's what I'll do. The rest are at will.

After waking Lord Lister, Alex quickly gave him some tea (this time without any additives), and the two of them, without a word to the staff, snatched the sleeping Krain from his room along with the gravity stretcher and everything that was connected to it.

It was much brighter at the top, the purple sun was climbing up, eclipsing the pearly shimmer of the night sky, and the light wind that was blowing across the roof was noticeably fresher.

"Hey, get up." Alex knocked on the cockpit window as they pushed the stretcher up to the aerocar. "Take off."

The pilot sleeping in the front seat woke up and looked through the lords with an unseeing gaze, clearly not understanding who was in front of him.

"Open the back door," Alex commanded, seeing that the lad was up but not yet awake.

"Has he been cured yet?" The pilot asked in surprise, finally coming to his senses. "So quickly?"

"Not really. But we have to go now. Can you get us to Transit Station Six?"

"Er..." the pilot, clearly dumbfounded by the question, said. "Actually, this model, in theory, can go into close space, but it's not a shuttle, after all. And then there are the controllers that don't work."

"You mean you can't," Alex concluded. "Okay..." he was quiet, straining his memory. "Do you know where Ol' Tamit Stadium is?" He nodded affirmatively and then ordered. "Then that way, as fast as you can."

Obedient to its pilot, the aerocar came to life, and with a melodious purr of the thrust generator, it rose into the air, heading off into the distance away from the rising sun.

"Allesandro," Lord Lister asked in a whisper, closing the partition between the cabin and the cockpit. "Why are we going to the stadium? You said we could only leave from the Sixth Transit Station."

"The shuttles depart from this stadium for Transit Sixth."

"Oh..." Brenor sighed in surprise and, leaning towards Alex's ear, whispered even more quietly, "I don't mean to be indelicate, but how did you know?"

"I managed to get one man from the PVD to talk to me. I met him at the hospital," he admitted honestly.

"Won't we need some sort of password or something to get into the station?"

"I hope not. From what I understand, the rebels are now bringing large numbers of people upstairs to defend the Stations, so I expect there's not very strict control. As a last resort, I hope we can work something out."

The flight took them three hours, during which time Krain woke up, and while he was getting dressed, Alex introduced him in as succinct terms as possible.

"Sounds dangerous, like a pack of drunken swirls." A rebel commented on the idea of evacuating through the station. - The PVD is not a bunch of amateurs. I bet they know the names of those who will be leaving. And no Atur Cermega is on the list. Although with Grand's death, they could have started some chaos... And that little feller had to go somehow. I don't know, too risky anyway, more chance of the station getting to the calculation blocks and getting a vector to jump from some point away from the Flow."

"This requires a ship."

"Transit is halt. There are a lot of ships out there."

"Well, they're not empty."

"I think a hint to the captain that he can get out of all this would be enough to get him to agree to almost anything. And I bet there are some empty ones, too."

"Okay." Alex agreed. "That would be plan B."

"Why the B?" Lord Lister, who had been silent until then, asked with some surprise.

"Well..." Alex was a little confused. "Because 'B' is the second letter of the alphabet, or isn't it?" He said uncertainly.

"Actually, the second symbol is 'Ra'. You know, Flame. Great shadows, I keep forgetting you've lost your memory. But, Lord Cassard, you can't have forgotten the alphabet, can you?"

"It turns out I could." He shook his hands, feverishly trying to figure out What has 'Ra' and flames got to do with it?

Alex closed his eyes, trying to concentrate. Letters and words were swirling in his head, he did not understand what "Ra" and "flame" had to do with it, and at the same time, this combination seemed natural to him.

No, that's not the way to do it. He opened his eyes, pressed against the window, and let out a long exhale, writing with his finger on a light patch of condensation. Flame.

For the next few minutes, he just stared at the inscription trying to figure out what was wrong, and it inexplicably caused some very unpleasant feeling in his head like a severe migraine, but everything seemed normal - "flames are flames...". But then it got to him:

Two signs. With quiet horror, he realized, there were only two signs on the glass. Two. It should be five: F-L-A-M-E.

As he stared at the inscription, the headache grew worse and worse, as if his blood pressure had suddenly spiked or he had just been kicked in the head, and Alex realized that he was looking at two intricate symbols, something resembling a mixture of Arabic script and hieroglyphics. "Rai'e" and "Ni'a" popped into his mind, along with another bout of headache.

"Lord Cassard, are you all right?" Lord Lister asked anxiously, watching Alex, with a trembling hand, write some strange symbols on the glass.

"Yes, yes." Quickly mumbled Alex, trying to spell 'flame' normally. "So just an experiment."

As it turned out, this required serious concentration, which only increased the headache, and his hand kept trying to draw a hieroglyph instead of letters. When he finally finished, there were five stubby letters F-L-A-M-E on the glass underneath the two signs.

Alex stared dumbfoundedly at the result for a moment, then stretched back in his seat, letting out a long sigh:

It turns out I've been reading fluently in another language all this time, and I seem to be speaking too, and I didn't even notice it! The headache slowly began to recede, leaving room for confusion. How can that even be?!

"Fr... Fl," Damn, what the hell is that, "Flame." He finally got it out.

"Sounds like some sort of swear word. " Krain, who was also watching Alex with interest, commented.

"Nobody understood what I said?" Without much hope, he asked.

"No. What was that, Lord Cassard? It sounded like Chihalrian. There were a lot of those sounds."

"I see..." Alex muttered. "It's just that your remark about the alphabet confused me, so I decided to revise my knowledge. It's funny, but I thought I was speaking another language the whole time..." He added with a bewildered smile.

Alex was willing to believe that the force that had transported him here could have stuffed knowledge of the local language into his head. Or perhaps the knowledge of the language was some skill he had inherited with this body. But, damn, why didn't I notice that?!. It took tremendous concentration just to notice the fact that unfamiliar letters were being used around. Causing a severe headache and discomfort as well. When this is all over, it's going to have to figure out how I got here. I feel it has something to do with the 'adepts'.

"It must be a consequence of the amnesia." Lord Lister judiciously concluded. "The scraps of your former knowledge are all mixed up in the most bizarre way."

"Yes, that seems to be the case." He nodded in response and turned to the window to let them know the discussion was over. And he remained silent, immersed in a whirlwind of rambling thoughts until he arrived at the stadium.

It was a very long and, by local standards, a low building, no more than ten storeys high, resembling an elongated white pavilion. The rebels - judging by the huge crowd and the haphazardly stacked cars and containers - were not using the stadium itself but the upper level of a huge multi-storey parking area.

There were just crowds of young men with guns flaunting brown jackets everywhere, so when their pilot finally found a suitable landing pad, the two lords and one former rebel instantly melted into the crowd. The only thing that made them stand out was their deadpan sobriety. Most of the real freedom fighters were slightly drunk and cheerful. Well, also Alex and Lord Lister's lack of shoes, of course. But that doesn't seem to bother anyone here.

They passed through chaotic piles of rubbish, abandoned vehicles, containers, and sleeping people and arrived at the 'meeting point'. A fairly large crowd of people was crowding closer to the center of the small relatively clean area where some tables stood, and behind them could be seen the massive white carcasses of giant white soapbox shuttles with black stripes of cabins in the front and the fancy hollows of docking elements on their humpbacked backs.

Alex stood up on his tiptoes and strained his vision, trying to see what was going on around the tables. As far as he could see, it was all down to a couple of phrases. No one seemed to be showing any documents.

One of the shuttles with a solid thud bounced off the ground. It closed the rear ramp in flight and flew overhead, gradually gaining altitude.

"I think it's this way..." Alex suggested as he glanced at the shuttle. "First to those tables over there to see where the shuttle was going, and then up."

A couple of questions posed to the local "natives" confirmed this assumption, and they moved toward the tables

"The more I think about it..." the Rebel muttered quietly as Alex and Lord Lister helped him waddle. "The more I realize it's a gamble that can only work in some holo. Five to one that we're going to get caught on our asses, if not on departure, then definitely at the station. Why don't we lay low after all?"

"Look how many people are here and how much of a mess it is." Alex objected just as quietly, waving a hand toward the chaotic crowd surrounding the 'coordinators' desks. "They don't check IDs. They just send everyone who wants one. You can get through a hundred or two without being seen, let alone the three of us."

Besides, I wouldn't want to be on the planet when the charges start blowing up in a very powerful way. He added mentally. One might be in the vicinity... Accidentally. But that won't make it any easier.

"The shadows are with you. But it looks like I'm about to regret it." Krain concluded even more quietly as they finally made their way to the coordinators' desks.

"We need to get to transit six." Alex turned to the exhausted girl with the infoblock in her hands.

"And the last shuttle has already been formed there." She shook her hands. "They'll be gone in about five minutes. Now we need people on the tenth."

"We should be on the Sixth, we've got comrades there. Maybe they'll take us on that shuttle as cargo, eh?" Asked Alex, showing the card of "emergency committee" added. "Well, we really need it."

"Why didn't you say so in the first place...." The girl muttered and looked around absent-mindedly. "I'll just run in and find out..."

"Don't need it." Alex stopped her. "You've got enough work to do here. We'll go ourselves. Which shuttle do you want me to go to?

"That one over there." She pointed to a nearby shuttle. Its rear cargo ramps were lowered. People with carts and some sort of elongated, gray containers were slowly being loaded into the yellow interior.

When they reached the shuttle, they climbed silently inside and sat on the nearest vacant seats along the sides. As expected, no one asked them any questions or stopped them.

There were a hundred people inside, maybe a little less, and although they were all dressed about the same, they were noticeably divided into two groups. Most were in their early twenties, their eyes glittering, talking excitedly and gesticulating frantically, and their flushed faces suggesting that they were obviously drinking alcohol "for courage" or an overabundance of adrenaline. The lesser part, however, were in their thirties, sober, and looked like bored professionals.

It looks like the PVD enforcers. Alex decided for himself.

People sat along the sides, and the center was rapidly filling up with cargo pulled up on hovering carts by several blue-colored droids.

It took the droids a few more minutes to finish loading and one of the PVD enforcers quickly counted the containers and said something into his communicator - the rear ramp crept up, slowly eating away at the last view of Tallana.

"Now we're in luck." Seizing the moment, Krain said as the shuttle began to ascend and the cabin was filled with the hum of engines. "But as experience shows, it can't last forever."

"And I happen to be lucky in life if it's not about gambling," Alex answered him, thinking to himself. And I really hope it stays that way.

There were no portholes inside the shuttle, the hum of the engines made my ears prickle, the folding seats were stiff, and for some reason, there was also a lot of shaking. Long gray containers occupied the entire middle of the cargo bay, leaving only a narrow passageway for people on both sides. The ascent to the station had been going on for half an hour. It was boring. Krain was asleep. There was no chance of talking to Brenor and no way to stretch one's legs because of the containers.

Alex couldn't help but push his neighbor to his left - who was chewing incessantly, staring up at the ceiling with an absent look on his face:

"Weapon." He stared at the ceiling again.

The PVD man turned to Alex and reluctantly parted his lips, and said:

"Weapon." He stared at the ceiling again.

"Which one?"

"Relax lad, it's for the more experienced ones."

Alex smiled wryly in response and also stared at the ceiling. I wish they'd come sooner.

* * *