Chapter 16 - Shade
"I WANT HER FLESH AND I WANT IT NOW!" The Baron Chief-Seer spat a mouth of stringy chicken and phlegmy saliva across the table, slamming his heavy fist down with a thunderous bang. Plates rattled, and knives clinked together as the wooden surface shook.
A Vora Baron mothership is truly a sight to behold, a beast in its own right. They are much larger than the usual barges and tugboats you'd find prowling about nomad space; large enough to comfortably house hundreds of Barons at a time, but just as rugged and poorly maintained. In this instance, several dozen Barons of various forms and sizes (although generally on the larger side) were crowded around a large table in the ship's main hall. Thick, creaking brass grating lined the floors, dripping with freshly spilt viscera. The grease-lined walls were adorned with poorly-hung weapons, trophies, and prisoners, crudely strung up by puncturing bare metal cables that weaved in and out of their limp bodies.
The Baron Chief-Seer was sat at the head of the table. He was draconic, with deep red scales glittering against his skin, violent orange eyes, and a pair of tattered, large wings sat upon his shoulders. The hall was busy with the sound of chatter and discussion, but also with the clumsy scratching of pencil on grease-stained paper. Sheets were scattered about in seeming disarray across the table, and several had also been pinned up against the walls. Some were covered in notes, written in a messy illegible scrawl for the most part, but most had a familiar amethystine face drawn on them, with varying degrees of accuracy.
"If I may, Chief-Seer..." A smaller, human male stood by the side of the gluttonous dragon. He stood out a little from everyone else in the hall, thanks to his somewhat normal weight and height. He had a slick, black side-swept fringe and a cunning guile to his step. His voice had a synthesised hum to it, emanating from the bionic neck that connected his head to his otherwise completely organic body. He clearly shared something in common with his larger cousins, but seemed distinctly different to them in another, more insidious way.
The man raised a far more accurate and well-drawn portrait of Seeth up to the Baron, and tapped on it with the pen in his other hand.
"...This is the closest image we can verify... but this really isn't the issue. And I think you know that." He gestured to the litany of drawings strewn around the hall.
The Baron huffed loudly, swiping a fist-full of paper off the table and reaching for a fresh leg of meat as his lesser continued.
"You're fighting an opponent that is wielding no less than field artillery, that can overpower us Barons up close, and seems remarkably illusive for such a physically dominating presence. There needs to be a shift in tactics - a shift in priorities."
"Get to the POINT, Theyrun." The Baron rasped, his throat thick with juices and mucus. His beady eyes drifted towards the human's throat in a not so subtle manner.
Despite the Baron's threat, Theyrun seemed unphased.
"You said it yourself, Chief-Seer. You want her flesh. Your Barons are trying to bring her down in the usual prey manner, ideally preserving her life or, failing that, preserving as much of her meat as possible. It should appear obvious at this point that she is not prey. Our supplies have decreased dramatically since she appeared, we're having to launch more and more attacks that we no longer have the manpower for, and we are coming back less and less successful each time. We are both painfully aware of this fact, and she is too. She is using our own greed against us."
"So, what do you suggest? You think we should go open season on her? For just one woman?"
"With respect, Chief-Seer, this 'one woman' has single-handedly disabled over fifteen barges over the course of this week alone. We were at our peak a few mere months ago. Our hunts were more successful, and our bounties bigger, than they'd ever been before in Baron history. But now? We've hit some of our worst casualty rates since the Cyrune incident."
Theyrun quickly cast his gaze towards the entrance of the hall where several Barons were just lumbering in, wearing masks and full environmental suits, and carrying huge silver casks on their shoulders. "She has restored the nomad's confidence in the sector to the point where even our prisoners know who she is! They speak of 'Lockblade' in the cells of this very ship, right now, hoping that she comes for us."
"Famine Bringer..." The Baron growled. The bone in his hand, which had already been picked clean of its flesh, was promptly snapped in two with a loud crack that echoed around the hall.
"Your efforts to not appear intimidated by her has only enabled her further. We cannot pretend that she hasn't affected us, else we may give her the room to destroy the entire fleet. How many Barons has she slain? How much cattle does she need to 'liberate' before you consider open season? She has taken several hundred times her own body-weight in food from us! The scales are unbalanced! Need I remind you what happened to the last Baron lord who failed to feed his kin?"
"No..." The Baron replied in a surprisingly soft tone, sinking back slowly into his creaking chair. "I was her body. Her meat. I will not be embarrassed by one single woman. The Barons will not be dominated by this... thing." He flicked at the drawing of Seeth in a mixture of embarrassment and disgust.
"Doubling down will not solve this issue." Theyrun continued to press his master. "If you're not willing to recall the barges or to issue a kill on sight order, then I propose a counterintelligence strategy. She must have a support network, and there are only a few merc dens still in operation. Let's track down who is still supplying contracts, and cut the creature's head off at its source."
"And get burned by every den this side of the DA's border...!? Hmm..." The dragon pondered Theyrun's words, scratching his chin as he weighed up the potential consequences of attacking a merc den. Generally, dens were seen as true neutral zones, and anyone stupid enough to mess with them would paint a target on their back for every merc in the guild to see. But these were the Barons, and the Barons were seen as fair game anyway... Besides, the nomads hadn't been much of a challenge up until this point. Once that godforsaken czarite was taken care of, there'd be no resistance at all...
"The priority is still to have her meat on our hooks. I will keep the bounty. But I heed your words, Theyrun. Perhaps it's time we go on the offensive."
The dragon fixed his gaze on the drawing of Seeth in front of him. His eyes stared into the paper as a concoction of feelings coursing through him.
"You still have contacts at the Black Lance?" The Baron asked, his mouth curling into a snarl.
Theyrun nodded in response, with the slightest grin visible at the corner of his pointed lips.
"Reach out to them, find who's dealing with her contracts. Let's pull the curtain back on this dick-swinging, top-heavy tart. If that means being burned by the rest of the mercs, then so let it be."
*
"This fuckin' BITCH! SHOW YOUR FACE!"
From deep within the darkness of the barge's interior, a faint metallic jangle echoed through the Baron's ears.
"L-Lockblade! S-She's here!" A nomad cried out from behind his cell bars, prompting a rush of footsteps behind him. Suddenly, dozens of bodies were pressing themselves up against the metal, staring intently out through the bars at the two Barons who were marching forward in the dark, each armed with a massive auto-cannon. Thick metallic flashlights were bolted to the bottom of the weapons, along with a softly beeping motion sensor, which was shining a weak green glow over their bodies as their eyes darted between the beam of light shining ahead of them, and the motion display. There were numerous doors on both sides of the corridor ahead, draped in shadow and interconnected by the labyrinthian design of the barge.
"Shut ya damn trap, meat! Before I pull you through the bars and eat you!" One of the Barons snapped at the prisoner.
"You're gonna die, Baron! And not a moment too soon!" Another nomad shouted, his voice hoarse and croaky.
The Baron turned and went to respond, but just as he did, the bleep of the motion sense caught his attention. Straight down the corridor, there had been a flash of movement.
"LIGHT HER UP!"
The auto-cannons roared to life and bright orange sparks of explosive lead hurtled down the corridor.
BLAM-BLAM-BLAM-BLAM-BLAM!
The corridor shook violently with each ear-piercing shot, shell casings clattering to the ground as the Barons held on tightly to their death-dealing machines. After several long seconds of sustained fire, the barrels rested, smoke wafting out from the glowing steel.
The motion sensors were silent.
"Did we get her?" The Baron's voice cracked slightly.
"Well I'm not fucking checking. I can't see shit down there!"
It was even harder to see down the corridor now than it had been before, thanks to the lead rain which had served only to further shroud the black interior with thick smoke, rising from the holes and craters where the bullets had impacted. Both of the Vora Barons stared down at their motion sensors blankly.
"You should -"
*Crack!*
The Baron tumbled forward as his knee suddenly buckled from beneath him, but before another syllable of pain could dribble out from his slobbering lips Seeth's hands had seized his head, and were twisting sharply. A bassy, muffled crack echoed down the corridor as he slumped forward and collapsed with a heavy, metallic thud.
The second Baron spun around on the spot and was immediately met with an earth-shattering punch, right in the ribs, sending blood rushing to his head. His autocannon was ripped out of his hands, but his vision was blurry, and all he could do was swing his fists clumsily into the darkness.
The darkness responded with overwhelming force.
Blow after crunching blow smashed into his body in a bone-shattering flurry. Blood leaking from his nose and mouth, his body quickly crumpled and keeled over. The corridor shook as the Baron hit the floor with a painful but unceremonious thump. He didn't move, didn't flinch, not even as Seeth drew her axe and brought it down on his neck, severing it cleanly. The head rolled along the floor ungracefully as the body rapidly exsanguinated at the stump.
As his blood slowly leaked out over the floor, the corridor was suddenly immersed in a deep crimson hue as the emergency lights clacked back on.
Finally. Took 'em long enough to get those back on, the fat sacks of shit.
Seeth sighed gently and turned to face the cell full of nomad prisoners. They were staring at her, a mix of awe and gratitude.
"I-It's really her! Lockblade! You've come for us!" One of them shouted out, his hands tightening around the metal bars, his tired face now full of hope.
"Lockblade?" Seeth raised an eyebrow.
Her axe jangled as she hooked it across her back. A thick ring of ornate keys hung from the base of the handle, all taken from other Baron barges, other victories. A suitable memento, she thought.
"Ohh... I see. C'mon, let's get you all out of there. Ship isn't clear yet."
She marched towards the bars and went to rip them from their hinges, but the prisoners inside shook their heads violently.
"D-Don't! You need the key!" They pointed to a vent in the ceiling, centred in the middle of the cell. "They have Ten Percent hooked up to us!"
