Instead it looked, for the first time ever, hesitant.
"That... might prove to be difficult," it said.
Confusion looked odd on a creature like the Clayor champion. It was taller and more heavily built than its smaller brethren, clearly a warrior. Being unsure twisted its face in weird ways, like he was unused to second-guessing himself.
"I understand that it would be difficult—" Aria began.
"Not difficult. Almost impossible," said the champion. "We have to consider this. We will have to wait for a more opportune moment."
"Why?" Aria asked, desperate to tease more information out of the Clayor. "What's going on now?"
The Clayor's eyes narrowed.
"As we predicted," it said. "The Brions are on a warpath. Three sectors around the generator and its controls are shut down while they search every inch of Ilotra for us. We need to be sure their defenses can be broken. We must consult our friend."
Aria listened, wide-eyed.
"You said they couldn't find you," she said, thinking out loud.
For another first, the champion looked concerned.
"They are scanning the fortress constantly for our genetic sample. Yours as well. We hide now, but it's only a matter of time before they figure us out. Their general is relentless. We—"
The Clayor stopped, realizing it had said too much. With a grunt, it turned and left Aria alone again.
She stood, speechless, more confused than ever before. Was it her? Had the hive mind really been right about her and Ryden?
Aria thought of the general's vicious grin when he spoke of the people on Ilotra, showing his obvious lack of sympathy for them. She wanted nothing to do with a man who dealt out life and death based on his whims. Right?
Right. Only why did it make her heart thud in her chest then, to know he was out there looking for her?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ryden
They hadn't found her.
Three days had passed and there was no sign of Aria or the Clayor champions Ryden knew were on Ilotra. He knew that for a fact, because the detectors had picked them up a couple of times.
The Conqueror wasn't simply a flagship, it was a technological wonder packed with everything the Brions had ever developed. All of the fifteen armies had a smaller flotilla following the flagship too, but the huge warships that led them were a miracle, nothing less. There was almost nothing they couldn't do; they alone were the lion's share of the firepower Brions had.
One thing the Conqueror could do was search out specific genetic codes. Every species in existence, including the ones Brions had wiped off the face of the galaxy, was there in their database. Since the moment he'd found out about the Clayors already being in the fortress, Ryden had had the ship run the scanners over Ilotra non-stop.
The results surprised the council, who were not happy with him using the otherwise forbidden device. In times of peace, it was considered an intrusion into private matters, especially on a moon where thousands of mixed-race people lived.
Someone's genetic heritage was personal by the decree of the union , but Ryden wasn't going to let them jeopardize their safety over it. And the results further confirmed his suspicions. The general hoped he was wrong, and that the Clayors had developed some sort of a cloaking device. Unknown technology would have been considerably better news than the Host being on Ilotra.
Without proof, Ryden chose not to raise the alarm. The hive mind was always watching, with hundreds of eyes and more. If he sounded it, he risked a massacre.
At first, scan after scan, the results showed none of the enemies.
The council jumped at the opportunity to doubt him, but Ryden saw signs of worry on their faces. There was something terribly amiss on Ilotra, and they needed to find out what it was as much as he did.
Then he added Aria to the scan. Her specific genetic marker, not just "a Terran." Like all the others, she'd given her sample when she came to Ilotra. And again, the scan turned up nothing.
The council questioned whether it was possible the ambassador had been taken away from the fortress, but Ryden ruled that out. By his command, the noose around Ilotra was airtight. No vessel could have passed by unnoticed.#p#分页标题#e#
That left two ugly possibilities. Either Aria was dead—and he refused to believe that—or he was right about the Host.
.
Ryden ordered his men to double their efforts. Now that he had an idea of how it was all possible, things were finally becoming clear. He needed to see it with his own eyes, but so far the enemies eluded him, lurking as if under a shadow.
One moment, there were none, and then suddenly the Clayors appeared on the scanner, and tracking them was no harder than it should have been in the first place.
The first time, Ryden had immediately ordered a pursuit, but the Clayors were fast enough to vanish again before any of Ryden's men reached them. After that he'd set up teams all over Ilotra that had to be ready to close in on their target at a second's notice. He knew it was ultimately futile, because the Clayors had a whole moon to use as a cover, but doing nothing wasn't an option. Sooner or later, the enemy had to come out of hiding and he would be ready.
The next time his warriors managed to corner and kill three Champions. From there on, it had been hit and miss for both sides, depending on how far away Ryden and his warriors were. They learned and adapted, but he hated playing the hive mind's game.
The general knew exactly what it wanted. The Clayors were tempting him to use excessive force, to blast them out not one by one, but one sector at a time. That was possible. If he put charges everywhere on the civilian-populated moon and showed no remorse, he could get them. The Clayors were fast, but they didn't teleport.
It was not an option, but in the meantime it left him looking weak. That was a danger in itself, but Ryden cared nothing for the opinions of the council. They'd hated him before he first set his foot on Ilotra and they would continue to do so long after he was gone. Their hatred of him was not enough of a motivator to abandon his honor.
The solution was simple, but it infuriated everyone on the moon. Now that he guessed the real danger hiding on Ilotra, Ryden put the fortress under martial law.
The council was livid, but he had no time for their complaints. He had an army to help establish the new order. He would hear their protests later, when lives no longer depended on him having to deal with them.
Every sector of Ilotra was now under the rule of one of his officers and the command center was under strict guard.
Reports told him the Clayor armies were closing in despite the opposing forces. There were simply too many. The Brion generals barred their way everywhere they met the enemy, but they couldn't be in several places at once. There were bound to be holes in the net separating the Clayors from Ilotra and the Clayors were exceedingly good at finding them. Benefit of being a hive mind.
The situation was irritating, but Ryden had expected nothing less and took the hand he was dealt with unshakeable calm. The enemy was coming, but it was also already present. Any mistake had the potential to have deadly consequences. Aria was still missing. And all Ryden knew was what he'd known from the start.
The only way to survive was to win. No matter what the council and the galaxy seemed to collectively think, Ryden had the union 's survival in mind instead of his own.
***
On the fourth day, another report of runners came to him.
Close enough that the general gladly answered the call himself. He had been burning with need to bloody his blade and face his enemy. Now they practically offered themselves up on a platter. In the back of his mind, Ryden sensed it was too easy, that there was something off about this latest sighting, but he couldn't bring himself to care.
For three days, there had been no sign of Aria. For three days, the sight of her dead had been before his eyes, refusing to leave. The way they'd parted, the hatred and fear in her eyes... he couldn't leave that as her last memory of him. She had to be alive, and he'd find her.
He took off running in the direction of the enemy, his warriors following closely in his footsteps. The com link was keeping him up to date with the movements of the Clayors.
The closer he got, the more evident it was to Ryden that it was a trap, but that wasn't an issue. The Clayors were many, but he was a Brion and would rather die than cower from confrontation. The only thing that could possibly stay his hand was the terrible urge to question one of them and find out Aria's fate from him. He could cut one of them from the hive mind like he had done to the champion in her quarters. Force the hive mind to abandon him, then extract any information he could.
It was against every union regulation and law, he knew that. He didn’t care.
The champions were ahead, four big brutes along with smaller brethren. Altogether there were about fifteen of them, but the Brions were more than a match for them. There would be no fight, but perhaps one of them could lead him to the others.#p#分页标题#e#
In the Brion battle lingo, Ryden gave the order to only pursue slowly. The warriors replied with affirmatives, but he sensed their reluctance. It wasn't the Brion way to fight a stealth battle in the shadows. They waited for the big armies to get there, so they could have an honest confrontation.
But they wouldn't get their fight. The shield generator was up and running, ready to be turned on at any moment.