Chapter 9 – City of Chains
Taksipa City stank of ozone, fried grease, and despair. Towers of rusted metal and glowing Orange Stone jutted into a perpetually smoggy sky. Hover-carts groaned through crowded streets, piloted by species of all shapes and sizes—hulking Brutes, sleek Traders, and everywhere, the darting, fearful glances of slaves.
Beneath the Cloak of Whispering Mycelium, Skodar was a ghost. He moved through the main thoroughfare, a river of misery and commerce. He saw cages. Hundreds of them, stacked in open markets. Not just Vakhas, but other frail-looking species: the feather-like Ciel, the mineral-based Grott. They were prodded, priced, and sold.
His blood simmered, but he kept his energy pool still. Intelligence, not battle.
Following the flow of the most heavily guarded slave traffic, he found the Pens of Lament—a fortified compound near the city's colossal Arena. The walls were high, topped with crackling energy fields. Yunvarn guards, their red skin glowing dully, patrolled with plasma rifles.
His cloak allowed him to slip through a service entrance as a grime-covered Varikdar worker hauled in a cart of nutrient paste. Inside was a labyrinth of damp corridors and echoing cries.
He moved silently, becoming one with the shadows cast by flickering Yellow Stone lamps. He peered into holding cells. His heart hammered against his ribs.
In Cell Block D, he saw them.
Not his family.
But Vakhas.Dozens. From different villages. They huddled together, their blue skin bruised, their eyes empty. He saw the face of a young girl from a neighboring village, her arm bent at a wrong angle. Rage threatened to crack his focus.
He pressed on.
The compound had a central processing area.A surly Yunvarn overseer was barking at a clerk. "…and log the two from the Gorge raid separately. Kharsok's orders. Special biological interest. Tag them for the Arena's premium stock evaluation."
Skodar froze.
The Gorge raid.
The clerk scrolled through a holographic ledger. "The old female and the juvenile male? Vitals are weak. Barely worth the cost of stasis."
"Doesn't matter," the overseer grunted. "The Arena's bio-scan wants to study their degradation response to trauma. Stage them in the High-Value Hold. Section H."
Section H. Skodar committed it to memory. He melted back into the shadows, his mind racing. They were alive. In stasis. But marked for the Arena's cruel "study."
He needed the layout of Section H. He needed the guard rotation. He needed to know where the Genes Amplifier Liquid was kept.
As he turned a corner, his cloak's field flickered for a nanosecond—a surge of his own unchecked emotion. A passing guard with enhanced cybernetic eyes stopped, his head tilting.
"Energy spike. Low level. Check sector seven."
Skodar didn't wait.He moved, not with panic, but with calculated speed. He slipped into a recessed alcove just as two guards stomped past. He held his breath, his energy field pulled in tight.
The moment passed.
He had what he needed.His family's location. Their fate.
Now,he needed the Arena's heart.