War for Orion: Ghosts from the Past (29 page)

Anlon and Kanti followed Emer over to a
different part of the room that lit up as they neared it. When the
lights flickered on, an obstacle course that was enclosed in walls
was revealed to them.

"Today, I am going to teach you stealth and
how to get through places without anyone knowing," Emer informed
them.

"You didn't teach him this yesterday?" Kanti
snickered.

"I should have," Emer grinned. "Seems he
isn't very good at not getting caught," She walked into the
opening. "I will demonstrate how to get through the obstacle course
before you proceed. A screen will come up that shows you my
progress, so you'll know exactly what you will be up against once
you enter the simulation."

The screen showed her creeping through
hallways, always staying hidden from view. When she reached what
appeared to be the end, a person came walking down the hallway. She
silently took him down and dragged his lifeless body into the
shadows of a corner then emerged with a key in hand, entering
another area in the simulation.

Races were walking back and forth all over a
warehouse carrying out their work. She kept to the shadows as much
as possible on her way through, every now and then leaving the
cover of the shadows to get to a different part of the warehouse.
Slowly, she made her way through the entire warehouse without
raising suspicion of a single race and opened a red door to another
level.

This time she walked into crowded streets and
races emerged immediately from around a corner, guns pointed
directly at her. She disappeared into the crowd for cover, weaving
in and out of them to avoid the pursuing races. Emer made
everything look smooth and natural, hiding in the shadows just as
the first few races sprinted past her. As the last one approached,
she leaped out and took him out before dragging the limp body into
the dark alley. She emerged from the darkness with his weapon and
stalked the others from behind, taking them out once by one without
the public seeing a thing. Once the last enemy was taken out the
simulation flickered off and she walked out of the door.

"That is how it's done."

"That was great!" Kanti clapped. "You made it
look so easy!"

"Doesn't look too hard," Anlon shrugged. "How
does it work?"

"It is just a projection. Every time you saw
me open a door, it was just the changing of scenery and a new level
of difficulty. I made all of the levels yesterday, and those are
the only ones that you're going to run through today. None are too
difficult, but they're good areas to start."

"I'll go first," Anlon walked forward.

"No," Emer grabbed his arm. "You both go in
together. If you're bringing her with you, you won't be sneaking
around by yourself. You need to practice together because that's
what it's going to be like when you're out on your mission. It's
much more difficult for two to hide, but that's what you're going
to be doing."

Kanti walked up next to him. "Let's go,
partner."

They both walked through the door and didn't
even get halfway down the hallway before an alarm started going
off. Anlon had slipped out of the shadow just enough that the
camera caught him, triggering the alarm.

"Camera saw you," Came Emer's voice. "Start
over."

The scenery changed back to the office and
Anlon and Kanti started over, making it all the way to the end of
the hallway, only to get caught by the guard they couldn't take
down quickly enough.

"You're going to do this over and over until
you get all the way through successfully," Emer's voice boomed
through the simulation. "You're going to have to work together as
one if you want to make it through. If even one of you tries to act
alone, you will fail."

It took Anlon and Kanti over two hours to
finally make it through the entire simulation, but they
accomplished it. The first level had started out with alarms to
show they failed, but after that, shock guns were the punishment
for failure. They hurt, but didn't do much harm to the body as they
were only made to simulate the same feeling as being shot with a
laser pistol. Anlon had lost count of how many times he had gotten
shot, but his entire body ached in pain and he could tell by
Kanti's face hers felt the same.

"Took you two long enough. Still think it's
not that hard?" She teased Anlon. "You both did good for first
timers, now you need to go home and rest. Training only gets harder
from here on out."

Anlon and Kanti both smiled at Emer and
walked towards the elevator, exhausted and ready to get some
relaxation.

"See you two tomorrow!" Ferris waved. "Don't
forget to practice not getting beat by a girl, Anlon!"

Anlon rolled his eyes and Kanti laughed as
they entered the elevator. It lurched up and Anlon looked to
her.

"Is it what you thought it would be
like?"

"It was much worse than I imagined," Kanti
said, still grimacing in pain from the shock simulators. "The blade
training was fine, but those shock guns hurt after five or six
times. I don't know what getting shot by a laser feels like, but I
have no doubt the simulators do a good job of showing you."

"I wasn't quite ready for the shock guns
either," He rubbed his arm in one of the spots he was shot. "Now I
get to tell Moran what's going on. I'm not sure how he's going to
react once I tell him that you're coming along with me, so let me
try to do all the talking."

The doors slid open and Anlon bumped directly
into Moran. "What is she doing here Anlon?" he asked.

"She's coming along with me on my mission.
I've already told her everything, so it's impossible for me to
leave her behind now."

Moran looked her up and down. "Okay."

"Okay?" Anlon asked, surprised. "Just okay?
No questions or objections?"

"Nope. Just okay," he repeated. "If you think
she's a good companion to bring along, and I think she is from what
I've seen of her in blade practice, then it's all up to you."

Kanti smiled at him. "Anlon said you wouldn't
want me to come."

Moran shrugged. "I don't want to know the
story behind why you're going with him. I'm sure it has something
to do with him being dumb, so you can keep that to yourselves. If
he wants to bring you, it's all up to him, it's his mission. I've
watched you quite a bit and you can definitely handle yourself.
It's not a bad decision on his part to bring you along with
him."

"Told you I would be good to bring
along."

"Did you find the Deimos Brotherhood's base?"
Moran looked to Anlon.

"They're on Erebos," he replied. "I found
them tracking their ship."

Moran stroked his chin. "Not a bad place for
them to hide out. Still close to their original base. Not too much
on Erebos, which leaves them with plenty of hiding places."

"How am I going to find them?" Anlon asked.
"I just know they're somewhere on the moon."

"How are
we
going to find them?" Kanti
corrected.

"Scout," Moran said. "That's all you can do.
Just find a place to lay low and look out for them. Their ugly
heads will come out in time."

"So we're just going to sit around and wait?"
Anlon asked.

"Mostly. You'll be using a lot of what Emer
is teaching you, so pay close attention to that stuff. You'll
eventually find enough information from the locals that you'll have
an idea which places will be best to sneak into. Once you gain that
information, it's just a matter of getting in and out successfully.
Scouting isn't an easy job, but if you do it right, you'll find
where their base is located."

"Sounds simple enough," Kanti said. "We'll
get more than a few leads from the locals, I'm sure of it. They're
criminals and that means they don't know how to keep quiet."

"I guess," Anlon shrugged. "When do we
leave?"

"End of the week," Moran answered, moving on
to the next thing. "Did you get the clue for the Queen like you
were supposed to?"

"Yes. I'm going to call her when I get
home."

"Get home and tell her immediately. She needs
to know as soon as possible."

"We're leaving now," Anlon headed for the
door. "See you tomorrow, Moran."

Anlon drove back to his house and Kanti left
for the prison as soon as they arrived. He went inside and sat in
his dad's office, pulling out his comlink to call Adira.

"I have something very important to tell you
Anlon," Adira said, before Anlon could tell her about the clue he
had recovered.

"What is it?" Anlon asked.

"Donnchadh told me the leader of the Deimos
Brotherhood is Kirill."

"Wasn't that your assassinated husband?"

"Yes," she nodded. "But he wasn't
assassinated. I had Armino kill him."

"You had my father
kill
your
husband?"

"He was trying to kill me and take my spot on
the Throne. I had someone trick him and I got it all recorded as
evidence before I acted. If I hadn't had Armino kill him, he
would've killed me and taken the Throne."

"Why did he want the Throne so bad? He
already had almost as much power as you. The power was split
between the two of you. It's not like he was powerless to do
anything."

"He needed me gone because I was the one
calling a majority of the shots. He had a plan to cleanse Orion of
all races he didn't deem worthy. A pure Orion he called it. One
consisting of only humans and he knew I'd never go along with
it."

"That's horrible! Does anyone else know about
this?"

"There are a few, but we decided to keep it
quiet," she said. "It turns out that he wasn't killed though. It
was him who created the Deimos Brotherhood after surviving and has
been planning to take my spot on the Throne ever since."

"Are you sure?" Anlon asked. "Could it be
someone else who's claiming to be your husband?"

"I'm positive. Donnchadh said he has seen DNA
confirmation."

"Are you sure that you can trust anything
that Donnchadh says anymore?"
She took in a deep breath. "I think so. He seems weak and broken. I
believe Kirill saw the same weakness when he caught him and that's
how he turned him against me. The truth is probably what finally
broke him, along with some lies to make it seem like I was the bad
one."

"What does Kirill's continuing survival mean
for Orion?"

"It means my daughter is even more important
because if he gets to the Throne, he'll carry out his plan of mass
genocide. If he finds out she's alive before I find her, he may try
to capture her and use her as leverage, or he may even kill her so
nothing stands in his way of the Throne."

"Well, luckily for Orion, I think I found the
clue today. She's on Demeter with the Waldmunt's."

"Waldmunt," Adira repeated. "Ex-GSOU. Armino
picked a perfect place for her then. Thank you, Anlon. I am sending
a team to retrieve her right away," She looked down at something.
"Did you find what you needed in the database?"

Anlon nodded. "They're somewhere on Erebos.
That's all that I know right now."

"You'll find them," she encouraged. "I'm
afraid I must go though, I need to get the team ready to retrieve
my daughter as soon as possible. I'll call you to let you know when
we have retrieved her. Good bye, Anlon."

The comlink hung up and Anlon took a deep
breath. Things were definitely starting to heat up. The Queen's
dead husband was trying to kill her to take her spot on the Throne
and he just didn't want power to feel superior, he wanted to wipe
out all races that he deemed inferior. Anlon
had
to find the
Deimos Brotherhood's base on Erebos and stop his plan of mass
genocide.

Nimesha landed her small Falcon Stealth
Fighter on Gaea. She never questioned Kirill's orders, but this
mission was one that she definitely felt like questioning. Killing
a young boy? How was that even right? She was used to killing
politicians and fighters that were dangerous to Kirill's plans, but
not kids. Questioning him wasn't an option, orders were orders and
she had no choice but to follow them, unless she had a wish for an
early death. He had been her boss since she was seventeen and was
well aware of what happened to those who defied his orders.

She moved her slender, flexible, body off of
her glider. Her grey printed fur blew with the breeze as her golden
eyes locked on to her prey. Instinct told her that this was wrong,
but that was something she had stopped listening to long ago. The
prey moved into the house and she knew his time was quickly coming
to an end.