Chapter 63

I didn't kill another man right away, even though I was sorely tempted to do so. Instead I started talking to the man from Action Network. The guy proved to be very cooperative. He didn't know where Dindraine was, but he did know who everyone in the room was. I put him to work placing him under the supervision of some of my troops so that he could move through the group and identify everyone for me. As he picked out people, I had my soldiers haul them away and put them in places where I could deal with each group separately at a later time. I had them put everyone who worked for a network linked to my consortium in one room and everyone who worked for the other consortium put into another room. Anyone identified as sitting on the wall and not belonging to either of the consortiums I had put into a separate room. The selection process included all the politicians as well. They went into whatever group they were affiliated with. While the fat man and my soldiers did that, I got on the line to Richards again.

"Talk to me Richards," I said into my translator, "and tell me about the situation."

"The grounds and the buildings are now secure," the man responded after a moment of silence. "Currently I'm identifying people in the tower and the bungalows and I'm teleporting the slaves out of those locations and I'm sending them back to Oak Hall. When I'm done I'll focus my attention on bringing in all the other bastards in small groups so that you can deal with them personally. As for phase three of this operation, we'll be ready to go whenever you say so."

"All right," I told the man gruffly. "For now keep at it and keep me informed if there are any more problems. I'll get back to you when I'm ready to progress on to phase three."

With that done I called on my three force leaders. One by one I got situation reports from each of them. Talbot reported that he had the perimeter secured again and that he was posting sentries to cover all the access points to the main complex from the exterior. He also reported on his casualties. His men had been hit the hardest in the first few seconds of the counterattack that we'd suffered. He'd lost a total of twenty-six men out of his force of fifty, all of them dead. The robots while limited in their tactics had been deadly accurate with their weapons. I told Talbot to do his best for now and I'd get him reinforcements when I could find them. I spoke to Danvers next. He reported that he had men in the tower and surrounding the bungalows so no one could escape. His force had only taken eight casualties. Tobias reported to me in person. The man had come to check on the situation in the main complex. He really didn't need to tell me what had happened here. I'd experienced it first hand. Still he came to me and made his report. The guy was almost in tears over what had happened down in the medical centre. I had nothing to say to him that would have helped in that moment. It hadn't been his fault that the robots had gone for a medical facility rather than a strategic position like the control room like we had thought they would. That had been my call anyway and I'd screwed up. I told him so but it didn't sink in and I wasn't in the mood to repeat myself. As for his losses, his force had suffered seventeen men and women dead. It had been a blood day for us and the day wasn't over.

Our biggest problem was that our medical services were stretched thin and there was nothing I could do about it. While most of our troops had been killed instantly, a few had been injured by ricochets and by flying brick and glass that had struck them when a robot's shots had been just sprayed. In addition to these men, there were several ex-slaves who had been injured in the same manner. That number also included people like Dork. I had a couple of soldiers drag him down to the medical centre to be looked after as soon as possible. The big guy was still out of it, but he was still breathing. I thanked whatever race he was that he was still alive and left it at that.

By then things had gotten sorted out by the fat man and the soldiers and it was time for me to start questioning people. I started with the easiest group of the bunch; those belonging to my consortium. That proved to be a real stupid idea.

"I thought we were on the same side!" That was the attitude that I got the moment I started asking them questions.

"We're your partner in this!" was another response. "You can't be doing this to us."

I didn't let it go on very long. I had two soldiers grab the biggest complainer in the bunch and I had them drag him out to where I was standing. The man started screaming for help from his colleagues, but that was in vain. Not another soul in the group even tried to interfere with what I had in store for the man. When the man was clear of the group I drew my pistol and knee-capped him in both legs. The man howled in agony in response and the two soldiers holding him almost dropped him when his legs gave out under him because he weighed so much. They didn't have to keep him up for long. I walked over to him and shoved my pistol into the man's gapping mouth. My next shot shut him up.

"Does anyone else have a complaint?" I asked angrily to the remaining group. Again I got no reply. With that I got down to business.

I asked one simple question of the fat guy who had ratted out the tall, thin man that I had killed and when I spoke to him, I told him he'd better have a good answer for me.

"Do you know where Dindraine is being held?"

I asked it coldly and as I said it I pointed my pistol at the man's head. I'd already asked this question of him once and the man had replied no. I was hoping for a different answer now. I didn't get one. That was unfortunate for the man. I just shot him in the head and said aloud, 'next'.

Unfortunately for the consortium people, several ended up dead before anyone gave me an answer that was halfway reasonable. The man who did it was a politician. According to him, Dindraine was being held at the headquarters of Onyx Network back on their Earth. When I asked him how he knew this, he admitted to being at a cocktail party of other politicians and network representatives only a week ago and the girl's fate had been raised in conversation. One of the Onyx politicians had reassured everyone that Onyx had the girl under their control. I thanked the man for his assistance and I let him live. I did order Richards to teleport him and the rest of the surviving members of the consortium off to the slave markets of Izmir. As far as I was concerned, they could help make Lord Omar rich. Naturally they all protested that I couldn't do that to them, but their words fell on very deaf ears. I just turned and headed off to talk to the next group of prisoners.

The next group proved to be no better than the first bunch. All of them declared that they had no knowledge of where Dindraine was and all of them continued to declare that I had no right to treat them the way I was doing. I just shook my head at how oblivious these people were. Then I put a new magazine into Nimue's pistol and I shot a couple more men. After that several spoke up and told me what I wanted to know. In essence they told me the same thing as the man from my consortium: that Dindraine was on their Earth and the Onyx had her in their control. Where she was exactly was up to discussion but at that point in the game I didn't really care. Again I thanked the helpful people and then I dealt with them. In their case I didn't send them off to a life of slavery. Instead I told Richards to teleport them into the most inhospitable places on Game World and let them go. If they lived, so be it and if they died, I really didn't care.

The last group of course was made up of Onyx, Gold, and Bronze Network. I dealt with the members of Bronze Network first. I had my troops drag their members out of the group and assemble them in one place. There were a total of seven men and all of them were looking at me in terror. I just gave them a big grin and then I started asking them questions.

I asked them about everything but Dindraine. I asked them about their headquarters and their building security systems and I asked them about how many employees they had on site. I asked them about their communications systems and all manner of access codes for their computer systems. I only had to kill one man before the other six started to talk. I made certain that every word they said was taken down for future reference. I'd have need for that information very soon. When I had milked them of everything I could think of I just smiled at them again and told them to remember one thing. I quickly pointed out that they had been given the chance to join my consortium and that they had voted against it and had chosen to side with my enemy. I then shot the six remaining members of Bronze Network without even blinking an eye. Not one of my people raised an eyebrow over that.

I didn't separate Gold Network from Onyx for my final round of questions. I was honest with these men when I spoke to them. I told them that they were all going to die in the next few minutes and that they couldn't prevent it from happening. All they could do was to choose between dying easily and dying the hard way. If they cooperated with me, then I would drop them where they were currently standing and that would be that. If they didn't cooperate then they would suffer. I assured them that there were plenty of people on Game World that would love to spend a day torturing them under the watchful eye of my mate. I guaranteed that Nimue wouldn't let them die until each and every one of them had suffered the way she had suffered when her sister had been ripped from her on Minos. Nimue just smiled and nodded in agreement when I said that.

All of them decided to cooperate. One by one they provided me with the intelligence I wanted to know about their facilities on their Earth. They told me how many people worked for them and what their security measures were for both their building and their communications systems. The politicians with them blathered on and told me everything about their government and the buildings that they worked in. They also made it clear that the corporations were the real power behind the throne. They also told us where we could find Dindraine. Their reward for cooperating ended up being something other than what I had offered them. I sentenced them to being teleported to Patagonia.

On my Earth, Patagonia is a heavily populated farming region of the Kingdom of Argentina. On Game World it was in the same location, but unlike my world it was sparsely populated at best and that population consisted mostly of sub-human species from Earths that had never evolved beyond the ape-man stage. It was a hostile and unforgiving area and survival there was very hard. What made it worse was the fact that it was the location where Isanti Network had placed their populations of dinosaurs. Anyone sent there to live would have to avoid becoming dinner for a velociraptor. The boys from Gold and Onyx weren't very happy about that. Personally, I thought it was a fitting end to the bastards. Nobody in my party disagreed.

By the time I was done with that lot it was fast approaching morning. I was exhausted and so was Nimue. Unfortunately we still had a lot of work to do. Luckily help arrived in the form of Elsa.

"Charles," Elsa said when she saw me, "I am so sorry about Kola. I don't know what to say."

There wasn't anything to say and I didn't have a reply for her. I took her in my arms and held her for a while and then I pulled Nimue in with us and we held some more. When we were done, I found a place where we could sit and talk in private. I also ordered us some coffee. I needed it and it had been a long time since I'd had any. Once it was brought to us and I was sipping it, we got down to business.

"I'm going to need you to run things for a while, Elsa," I told my mate, "while Nimue and I get a little rest. There are still over a thousand of these bastards locked up in their hotel rooms waiting to be spoken to by one of us. I've asked all kinds of questions of the lot that were down here when I arrived and all their answers have been written down. You'll need to ask the same questions of the other people as you process them and then when you're done you'll have to get somebody to collate the answers so we can act on them accordingly. Hopefully between the two of us we'll have everything we need to move on to the third stage of this operation."

"I'll get on to it right away," Elsa said calmly, yet hesitantly. After a moment she asked me a question.

"Do you think you're still up to doing this," she asked me pointedly.

"I will be in a few hours," I told her bluntly, but honestly. "If nothing else we can make them pay for killing Kola and Goiania ... and Mai Woo and all the rest. We have to do this and we have to do it soon."

I left Elsa in charge and I took Nimue back to Oak Hall to have a bath and to sleep. Both Asana and Samira met us on arrival and my two young mates cried in my arms for the first five minutes afterwards. Again there was very little any of us could say about what had happened that night. All we could do was to hold each other and tell each other that we loved Kola and that we'd miss her.

Nimue and I retired to Lord Barnabas' old bedroom. Once there we peeled out of our ruined clothing and we put aside our weapons and our armour. I turned out to be black and blue all over my upper body and my shoulders and on parts of my back where I had fallen. Nimue was in worse shape. I had to help her remove her armour and the padding under it and we found that her entire upper body was one giant bruise. Her injures became even more obvious once her restrictive armour had been removed. Pain coursed through her body with every breath that she took and I was forced to call for a doctor. Luckily Sarah Williams was back from the resort, having just arrived with the first of her patients, my mates and my friend. While she scanned Nimue, I learned that both Caitlin and Felicity would live, although they were still unconscious and I learned that Dork was awake and pissed off that he'd missed the final battle. He was also angry about what had happened down in the medical centre and he had made Sarah promise to tell me that he wanted to be with me when I took my revenge.

Nimue had cracked and broken ribs and that was what was causing her pain. She also had some muscle tissue damage but nothing overly serious. Sarah gave her a couple of pain killers and then ran one of Felicity's wonder gadgets over Nimue's ribcage. When she was done doing that, Sarah bandaged up Nimue's ribs. With that done, I tucked my little elf into bed and I told her to get some sleep. She tried to protest but the drugs worked very quickly and she was out like a light in only a matter of seconds.

Sarah wanted to check me out as well, but I told her no. Already the bruising on my body was beginning to fade. I instead had her take me to her make shift infirmary after I had put a robe on over my naked chest. I found Asana and Samira there, sitting with Caitlin and Felicity. Both of the wounded women had bandages wrapped about their heads where they had been shot and injured. Sarah reassured me that they would recover. When I was done seeing them, I had a word with Dork.

"So you big lug," I teased him as he gazed up at me from where he was lying, "will you be up and about in time to kick some bastards asses when we head into battle again?"

"I will," Dork grunted in reply, "and don't you forget it."

Then a shadow fell over his face and his eyes went blank for a moment or two before he was able to pull himself together and speak to me again.

"Sarah said that Goiania won't have known it was coming," Dork muttered sadly when he did speak again. "I'm happy about that you know, her dying while out of it, but I know that she would be pissed about it. She really wanted to make those bastards pay for what they'd done to us for all those years on Minos and for taking us from our families. She did have one back on her own world you know. It was one of the reasons she traipsed after you and fought beside you. She had a little sister just like Dindraine back on her Earth and every time she thought about what those bastards had done to Nimue and Dindraine she would think about her own sister and she would promise to herself that she'd make certain that the same would never happen to her kin. Now she will never get a chance to do it."

"But we will," I told Dork solemnly and then I turned and headed off to be alone with my own sorrow. Eventually I fell asleep.

I only got a few hours of rest but that seemed to be enough. When I woke I took a cold bath and cleaned myself up. By then almost all my bruises had faded away and all the cuts and scratches on my face and my hands were healed. Even my fist that had been aching since I had smashed the robot in the head had stopped hurting me every time I flexed my fingers. I put on my padding again and my armour and a tunic over it and then I put on my weapons. In addition to my bandoleer of throwing knives and my longsword and my hatchet and dirk, I added a holster with an automatic pistol and a munitions belt for magazines for the carbine that I had been using. When I was done dressing, I tossed my gorget and my armoured gloves into the sling pouch Kola had made for me shortly after we had first met, and the laser pistol that I had confiscated the night before. I hadn't tried it out yet but I was certain that I might find a use for it yet. After that I grabbed my shield and helmet and went out to talk to those I needed to see before I left once more for battle.