search for the rosebird pendant volume 3...she was listening out for a rocket launcher being...

Scavengers of Ditbard Search for the Rosebird Pendant Vol 3 2/9/2017

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Search for the Rosebird Pendant

Volume 3

She stood in the lift and tried to calm her breathing. Her hands were sweaty and this mixed with the dust from the rock and it made a sticky mess. She wiped them on the side of the lift and most of it came off. The lift was quiet except for the whirr of a small motor and she wanted to listen to the sounds coming from below her and above her. She had no idea at that point what was happening in either place but what she did know was that the action in these two venues would determine her fate. She cursed herself.

I should have timed how long the descent was. I would then know how close I was to the surface. I was so caught up in the excitement of the chase that I forgot the basics of survival. I don’t know how long I’ve been in here or how long I have until I reach the surface. I don’t know...

She stopped herself from thinking so that she could concentrate all her efforts on listening. First she lay down on the floor of the lift and trained all of here hearing on below. She was sure that this was the only lift in and out of this part of the mine so she assumed that she was safe from meeting them face to face. But she had no idea what weapons or communication they might have. She was listening out for a rocket launcher being assembled or the click of a radio. She knew it was in vain – her hearing wasn’t that good - but she had to try.

Then she climbed back on to her feet and listened as intently as possible to the space above her. The motor for the lift was in the top right hand corner of the lift so she stayed over to the left to give her some chance of hearing if there


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were people above preparing for her arrival. She couldn’t hear a thing. She was about to climb back down the interior dirty yellow cage of the lift when she was sure she heard a voice from above. Then another. She decided that the best way to deal with this was to look serene, as though nothing had happened and use her disguise to get her out of this situation if needed. She had paid good money to Cros and Star for getting hold of this disguise and she might as well use it. She had come up with the idea for the disguise to move across places like this in peace. So she might as well put it to the test. It wasn’t as though she could trust Cros and Star now. She had to use the goods they had delivered to their full effect.

She dusted herself down. To make the best use of the disguise she had to appear as though she was there on an assignment. She wrapped the Pendant of Rosebird in her red headscarf and buried it deep within her bag. It wouldn’t survive a thorough search but it wouldn’t be obvious as she walked past people. The lift slowed. She knew that she must be reaching the surface of the planet. It might be time for action.

Deep breaths. You need to appear cool and calm. Whoever it is up there, they will believe you if you act the part. Make sure that you feel serene and you will look it. They may not recognize the lawyer straight away because she has aged so much since she was last here. Deep breaths. But if you feel the part they will be convinced.

The lift slowed to a painful speed. All she wanted to do was get out and deal with the voices she heard above. But it was as if the lift didn’t want to be any part of it. It was as though the lift didn’t want to deliver her to the people above. The motor whined and then it seemed to pick up speed again. It arrived with a judder and the doors opened automatically. As she looked out from the dirty yellow cage she had been captured in for what seemed like hours, she could see or hear nothing but silence. She wanted to know and see the people that were waiting for her, if indeed there was anyone there. An ambush or a sneak attack weren’t in her plans. Although she has great reflexes if there were a handful of people up there she wouldn’t stand a chance. As she stepped out of the lift the doors closed behind her quickly. It was the fastest she had seen any part of the lift in her time at the mine. She looked as it descended and knew that it has been called by the two men she had left behind at the bottom of the shaft. She didn’t have long and turned back toward where she had left her craft. Then it all went black.


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She struggled but it was no use. Someone had her legs, someone else had gripped her tightly around the chest and there was a bag over her head. She knew that all she could do was wait until her captors let her go. The only positive that she could take from this was that they had left her bag over her shoulder. She could feel the Pendant of Rosebird nudge her between the shoulders as the bag swung back and forth when they moved her from where she stood to another location. The bag on her head didn’t completely obscure her view and she was aware that she had been taken to an inside location. There wasn’t much around that area so it was her craft, theirs or the mining control tower. The tower was used to maintain safety in the mine as it had views across the area and the banks of CCTV monitors relayed views from all over the different mine shafts and tunnels. Each miner wore a camera on their helmet so any unusual activity could be brought up on the screens and viewed by the controllers. They were not only in charge of safety but they were put in these privileged positions by the politicians that wanted their cut if the mine profits. The controllers made sure that the workers never stopped. Even in times of exhaustion they would threaten them with expulsion from the planet and a life of fear. Being expelled from a major work site like this would mean that the worker could never find a job again. Their record would be scarred for life and they would end up working in the dangerous mines where the owners asked no questions or a life of hunting down scrap for money. Neither were great prospects. The mines were dangerous and the reason the owners asked no questions was because they needed a constant supply of workers to replace those that had died. The life of a hunter was one of picking up odd bits of scrap that nobody else wanted to sell to the merchants that controlled the market and offered a tiny reward for a hard day’s labor. It was thankless.

The other area where the controllers ruled supreme was if there was another find apart from the minerals they were looking for. In the mine that she was stuck near now, on the planet of Ernclaw, there was nothing of note found. It was the mine that had taken down the mighty corporation because it spent so much money working through hard rock to find nothing. But if a miner came across some gold or a piece of platinum then the controllers always knew about it and always collected it when the miner returned to the surface. The controllers took this part of their job far more seriously than they did the safety of the miners. The miners got to the point where they would see gold, which has trebled in price in the Guinnotionian galaxy over the last few years, and they would leave it where it was and walk past. They knew that it wasn’t worth their effort to


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extract the gold to just give it up to the controllers. The stories passed through the mines of men that had tried to hide a gold fins and sneak it past the controllers was the thing of legend. Torture was the order of the day. It only took the controllers a few seconds of torture to locate the gold. But then they carried on until the miner was completely broken. They would never try anything like that again. And they served as warnings to the other miners. You could tell a miner that had tried to sneak out gold from the look in their eyes. It was as if the torture would never leave them.

She thought about the torture chambers that she had been told about many years ago by some of the miners she met and decided that she didn’t want to be in the control tower. She would much rather be in a space craft, even if that meant her being taken somewhere else.

She decided to relax and wait it out. The grips around her were gone but she felt as though she was locked inside something. She hadn’t moved to investigate but she just felt caged. The best thing to do was to rest until she was un-caged and un-hooded s she could deal with the situation then.

Relax. Empty your mind. There are times that you need to fight, times that you need to run and times where you need to wait it out. Relax. There is nothing you can do from here. But you will get your time to act. Relax.

She must have fallen asleep because a kick to the side made her curl up in pain before sitting up. She then tried to stand up and felt a pair of hands lift her clean off her feet before setting her down on the floor. She heard the voices again and tried to listen to what they were saying. Apart from the breathing she could feel from whoever had lifted her, the rest of the occupants of the room were far away – too far away to hear in any clarity. As the voices became more hurried she thought that she made out a few words before it had all stopped. She was sure that she heard someone say, “She can’t know that I am here. She can’t know that I have anything to do with this.” It was a voice that she had heard before but she couldn’t place it. Suddenly a bright light came across her face and she realized that the hood had been lifted. She didn’t know how long she had been under that hood but as the light flooded into her pupils she couldn’t see anything except a yellow glow. It was painful at first but as she rubbed her eyes with her hands everything soon calmed down and came into focus.


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Standing next to her was the giant of a man that she had encountered on the moon. It was the miner who had told her where to find the Pendant of Rosebird.

“It’s not her,” he said, looking back and forth between her and the other occupants of the room. They were behind a bright light so all she could see were silhouettes. He was confused. He had told the people who had paid him that they would find a certain person under that hood and what they found was someone else completely. He hadn’t the brain power to work out what to do.

She stepped forward toward the light to see if she could get a better look at the shapes behind it. But as she took her second step she was told to stop where she was. The huge man put his hand on her shoulder. Although she was sure that she could take him down, she had before, but she also had no idea of what weapons the other people in the room could be holding. In fact it was at that exact point that she started to wonder again where she was. She knew it wasn’t her own craft. Even though she had only bought it recently, she knew it well enough to be able to recall every part of it. In fact it didn’t look like the inside of a craft at all. She scanned the room. The walls were a mix of light and dark gray. The lights overhead flickered and couldn’t’ compete with the power of the lamp that was aimed toward her. Then she spotted a part of the wall that gave away where she was. Set in an exposed part of stone were some hand irons, where the miners were clamped to the wall before torture. She looked to where she had been laid and saw that she was in some sort of cage before being brought to her feet. She was in the torture chambers. But she felt strangely safe. It must have been the combination of knowing where she was and the fact that the man they had chosen to intimidate her had been floored by her with a kick only a few days earlier. She felt as though she was in a situation that she could control. It only took her a few seconds to assess all of this and she was back looking through the light to try to determine the identity of her captors.

But after murmurings at the back of the room, one of the voices spoke, “Madame, forgive us. We were looking for someone else entirely. Bring her over here. Turn off that light. Join us.”

The disguise. She realized that the disguise had worked. She had gone from captive to dignitary in a matter of seconds. All it needed was the hood to be removed from her head. She walked slowly over to the back of the room. Her eyes still stung from the bright light and she listened intently to the voices as


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she walked over. She was aware that one body moved out of the room as she approached. She guessed that this was the one that had said –

“She can’t know that I am here. She can’t know that I have anything to do with this.”

She would love to know who this was, but that might have to wait for another day. As she sat down, she was brought food and drink. She was thankful for this as it had been some time since she had last topped up her energy levels. There were two others that sat with her. She recognized them from her days as a trade negotiator on the planet of Ernclaw from a long time ago. She knew that they were the most militant of the natives when she had first arrived. She had to marginalize their influence at the time. This turned them even more militant. In the years that the corporation ravaged the planet for its natural resources, these two had become the leaders of the rebellion, which turned into the overwhelming majority of people. She thought to herself that it was strange how many rebellions became the government throughout history and smiled. They had not gone through the traditional route of becoming a calming influence when elected. These were still two of the most dangerous people in the galaxy. They ruled with force and repelled any visitors to the planet. Every outsider was treated with the same contempt. The fact that outsiders had turned their planet from a beautiful wilderness that had sustained the life of their people for millennia into a barren wasteland that was ripped apart and toxic in many places was enough to make the whole population suspicious of outsiders. These two leaders were more aggressive than any others in this feeling after being sidelined in the first negotiations that had ended up with the planet in this state of peril.

But the guise that she was wearing was the only outsider hat was welcome on Ernclaw. The lawyer had friends throughout the galaxy in her younger days but had disappeared after receiving death threats. They were anonymous but it was clear who they were from. The big mining corporations that stood to make billions from stripping planets of their natural resources and the politicians that granted the licenses were obviously behind it.

She sat with the two leaders and they talked. It was all small talk to begin with but she could see that they were dying to ask why she was back on the planet. In her years working, the lawyer she rarely won a case. She represented people with no money and was always up against a shadowy world that had enough money and power to bribe or threaten every judge and jury in the


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galaxy. The two leaders looked at her and wondered if it was just a coincidence that they were tipped off that they would find one old face from the past yet were presented with another. After a while the small talk died and they got down to business.

“We followed you down that mine. We wondered what you were looking for. We were told by our informant, “at that point he looked at the huge man with a steely glare, “that you were here to search for some treasure. That you couldn’t be here for any good. But now we know it is you, we are even more intrigued. Tell me why you have come back to Ernclaw after all these years.”

She remembered back to the days when the lawyer was in her prime. She remembered the type of cases the lawyer used to take on. She remembered how this gained the lawyer a lot of respect with the ‘little people.’ She spoke slowly.

“I have been given information that might help me in my quest to bring these large organizations and the shady politicians behind them to justice,” she started. She could see that by speaking slowly and softly the guise of the lawyer was convincing to them. Nobody could know how the mannerisms and voice of the lawyer would have changed over the years. By acting old, slow and wise she completed the disguise that Cros and Star had given her. She had them hooked.

“I can’t go into too much detail at the moment but I think that this mine that was always said to have delivered no resources isn’t as it seems,” she continued. She was making it up as she went along but was very pleased with the way that the story was unfolding. This would give her the perfect alibi to get out of there and get them to help her do it. She smiled a little, not so much as the other two would notice. “I need you two to organize people to start mining again, but in the upmost secrecy. Word cannot get out.”

“So that was what you were doing in that mine. Why did you try to trap us, then?” said the senior of the two leaders. He had always taken the lead in early negotiations and she had targeted him first when it came to sidelining their efforts. She had to do the same here.

“I saw you go for your gun. I had no choice but to disable you. That mine is an unsafe place to use a weapon. You will find that out if you dig a little deeper.” She could picture them spending weeks, months or years digging for


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the imaginary mineral she had just tempted them with. “But I must go now. I need to discuss my findings further. Please take me to my ship.”

The sudden change of who was in charge took hold of the room. She had gone from captive to order-giver in a matter of minutes without a weapon or any violence. All it took was the identity of someone else. She could get used to this. She had no idea how long the identity would last for. If these two leaders tried to find the lawyer then they would find out that they had been tricked. It was time to retreat. She had what she wanted from Ernclaw. She had all she needed from this planet.

As she left in the company of the huge miner she could feel a presence still at the back of the room. The person who had stepped out when negotiations started was still present, probably listening in to everything that had been said. She would have to move quickly and find out who that was. It was essential to her survival.

Once back on her craft she caught up with her sleep again. She set the coordinates to return back to Ditbard but she wanted to take her time to get there. She had to arrive at the perfect time. She had to get back to The Black Market at the same time she had first visited there. The only ones that knew anything about her quest for the Pendant of Ditbard were Cros, Star, the huge miner and whoever had ransacked her apartment. She had to find out more before she went on her next quest and potentially put herself in danger again. She also wanted some assurances from Cros and Star that the disguise she had used on Ernclaw was good for more uses. It was time to return home.

She landed in the dead of the night. She tried to follow her previous path to the place where Cros and Star did their business but it was no use. The Black Market seemed to change every time she visited. The way that The Black Market looked and felt in reality didn’t match what was in her memory. What she thought was a left turn didn’t exist and when she thought she would get to a back door it turned out to be nothing but blank wall. She would have to start again and work her way around the market as though it was her first time.

After what felt like several hours she reached the door that looked like the one she had entered when she did the deal with Cros and Star. It was almost identical except for two small differences. Firstly the door was half open. Not enough for anyone to see inside, but enough to see without misunderstanding that it was open. Secondly there was a substance smeared across the bottom


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left hand corner of the door. She couldn’t make it out as anything in particular but knew that it wasn’t there the last time. She kicked the door open in the same way as she had the first time. She walked hesitantly into the room, aware that there could be anything happening in the darkness in front of her. She stopped. The smell was even worse than the first time. She covered her mouth and nose with her hand before it became overwhelming and made her vomit. She reached into her bag, felt the Pendant of Rosebird and carried on straight past it. She felt around in the bottom of her bag and found a flashlight.

She was hesitant to use it but grabbed it and held it in her left hand. She wanted to keep her right hand free in case she needed to defend herself. She could land a heavy blow with her dominant hand and then back this up with the heavy metal flashlight if needed. That was before she could use her feet. But something told her that she might not need to fight. The stench was more than Cros and Star. It was more than the fetid conditions they lived in and more than their disgusting food.

She called out, “is there anyone there? I’ve come to talk. I need your help.”

Silence.

She turned on the flashlight, pointed it dead ahead and then switched it off almost straight away. She had seen all she needed to see.

It was the bodies of Cros and Star. They had obviously been tortured and beaten but were still alive. She had to decide whether to get help or leave them there to suffer. She heard a groan from one of them. It was decision time.


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Copyright © 2017 by Fay Michelsen

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing by Fay Michelsen.

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search for the rosebird pendant volume 3...she was listening out for a rocket launcher being...

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