Chapter 38

The debriefing by Roxanne was quite extensive as it had become apparent we’d stumbled upon a goldmine of information about an area of historical time almost entirely redacted from Orc records, though it was also apparent that we didn’t have anything like the entire story.

“So, these Vultoqi were regarded by the Orcs as fearsome warriors who didn’t congregate in large enough numbers to justify orbital strikes… or rather the few they did try were ineffective somehow?” Roxanne mused after a quick synopsis of the data we had started translating was given.

“Yes, the records we have suggest orbital strikes didn’t work and killed far more Orcs than Vultoqi… or rather that’s the general assumption. I get the feeling that they didn’t get any and it unnerved them,” Xi replied.

“Interesting, we could do it via teleportation, but there are other methods I can think of as well,” Roxanne nodded.

“I suspect the Orcs didn’t want to damage the planet too much either,” Xi shrugged.

“Any clues on just how they eventually won?” I asked.

“Wasn’t Thaumaturgy, apparently these Vultoqi were… immune to it despite losing their Higher Powers and they would be attracted to Thaumaturgists as sharks to blood in the water.”

“Any descriptions?” Sinnead asked.

“Again no, just that they were deadly warriors and that taking one down required hundreds if not thousands of Orcs.”

“Sounds like a planet full of High Mages,” Arch replied, frowning.

“There’s no real mention of them using magic, save in avoiding orbital strikes… even then that’s just an assumption on my part,” Xi replied. “What we have here is a lot of data giving some details of what the Orcs tried… and failed to do, which involves bioweapons, chemical and nuclear strikes, none of which appear to have had the slightest effect on the Vultoqi.”

“Surprised the Orcs won,” Roxanne mused.

“There’s nothing here to say that they did,” Xi shrugged. “But we’ll go through the entire data as all we have here is an initial synopsis, there will likely be further clues to be found. What we do have though is a list of vaults on other Earths where more data is stored.”

“I very much doubt the Orcs will let us anywhere near them, Xi. This last raid will no doubt have them extremely concerned over what we did and found.”

“We don’t need to raid them, we can remotely access them. There’s a set of codes here a Seer can use to quickly transfer data into our storage. A Mage could do it, but nowhere near as quick and that would increase the detection time.”

“I can feel a ‘but’ coming on,” Roxanne chuckled, getting a smile from us all.

 “But, they’ll have to be on the planet and at or near a feeder station. There just happens to be one in the military base though,” Xi went on.

“No, I don’t want the Orcs looking at their military bases for any reasons we might give them,” Roxanne ordered.

“There’s the Antarctica power base where they have that geothermal tap they draw energy from.”

“That’s a possibility, they don’t tend to go outdoors there a lot,” Roxanne nodded. “Look into it, but do it quickly, I’m pretty sure they’ll be setting up countermeasures to prevent anyone not authorised getting near them.”

“Yes, Roxanne,” Xi acknowledged.

The other good news is, our suspicions were correct, other than the Seeker, Orcs do not use portals save into the central one in any city. Destroy that and we can act at will… until they realise this. Clearly different rules applied on Nansack where they were known to portal Waargs and Eviscerators.”

“Probably to do with control over a possibly rioting populace,” I shrugged. “Surprised the military base doesn’t use them though.”

“It’s to do with how they are built and controlled,” Brianna explained. “It’s all just point and click. It requires a little time to set it up, but one portal links to all others. It would be possible during an insurrection for a rioting horde to pour into the military base, hence the lockout system and prevention of portalling anywhere other than another portal.”

“Oh right, another security measure that only works if you don’t have an enemy like us,” I chuckled.

“Yes, John,” Roxanne nodded with a grim smile.

***

“You have done well, Seeker,” Karkol stated to Crnnch during one of their regular meetings.

“Not well enough, revered Archimandrite. Still this enemy eludes me and those I have selected to study them.”

“This cannot be helped. I was referring to your ability to infer what was going on in Pock and bring in a Saltigue to assist in approaching the record centre.”

“It was not easy, revered Archimandrite, and the reasoning for it is again locked away within my core memories.”

Karkol frowned and then muttered a chant in old Yr’ch as Crnnch suddenly found the records of the event and why open to him.

“We are in serious trouble… revered Archimandrite,” he finally finished after what some Archimandrites would have considered an unforgivable pause.

“Indeed, I believe we are, Seeker. If this enemy finds the other data storage vaults it is possible they may be able to summon the Vultoqi. However that information is not available to me either, it is just surmise on my part. Yet I, like you, have to assume the worst, even though I suspect I do not as yet know what the worst might entail.”

“One cannot help but wonder why the secret of their expulsion is held a close secret, revered Archimandrite.”

“Indeed one can’t,” Karkol replied by way of dismissal.

“A most impressive Seeker,” Brnnt stated from his seat where he had remained silent, once Crnnch had left the chamber.

“He is. He is also very close to heresy, assuming he hasn’t passed that line already,” Karkol replied after a moment’s thought.

“I suspect he has. Serendipity blessed us when that idiot Inquisitor placed him under our care as a Seeker.”

“Bittern moves against Chusok tonight,” Karkol added, changing the subject.

“I have already warned Chusok. How he chooses to use that information is up to him.”

“Hopefully he will survive and keep this contest open.”

“Let us hope, brother,” Brnnt nodded.

***

Antarctica was Antarctica, though as far as we were aware, the Orcs didn’t have a name for it, other than the southern wasteland. What they did have on each world was a geothermal core tap which powered a massive bank of generators to supply what we considered Australia, Chile and South Africa. This one just happened to be on the Earth called Kriq. That construction also had a remote data tap capable of running the plant with a minimum of Orc involvement.

So, currently my team were outside the plant whilst Arwen was linking her mind to the data tap and sending a code to a specific site in a small city in the southern hemisphere.

“I’m in,” she finally confirmed.

“Is it there?” Clara asked.

“Yes, reams of it. Beginning transfer now,” Arwen confirmed.

“How long?”

“About an hour, I could do it faster but the bandwidth limitations on the station would set off alarms and we have several more to go to.”

“Take your time,” I nodded. “We don’t want them locking down or removing the centres from access.”

We all waited patiently in the near whiteout conditions around the site as Arwen transferred and translated the Orc software from their trinary based programming state to our binary one.

“I know our magic is keeping us warm, but damn, it feels cold,” Kate giggled, breaking the silence.

“Mind is a strange thing,” I chuckled.

“True, I rather doubt anything will go roaming today.”

“As far as we can tell they rarely do, though their drones will come out to do repairs occasionally,” Arwen added.

“Eesh,” Kate shuddered.

“We think they’ve been adapted for the conditions, but they’re low on our priorities for study.”

“Might as well do a base scan for the medics,” I shrugged.

“On it,” Kate nodded.

“I’ll study the tap arrangement, though it’s nothing special,” Clara added.

“50 megawatts per generator as far as I can tell from tapping magma pockets for supercritical steam. The Veda use a similar system according to Tchac’trar,” Callum nodded as we settled patiently to wait on Arwen.

“How’s the romance going?” I asked him after a while.

“Slowly and carefully, too many people watching to see if I step out of line,” he chuckled.

“I’m pretty sure William won’t disembowel you for giving his daughter the occasional kiss,” I chuckled.

“So am I, but she tempts me quite a bit when we do,” he replied with a grin.

“She’s not going to step out of line and get you into trouble, are you, Arwen?” I stated trying to look stern and probably not fooling her at all.

“No, Uncle John, but I’m certainly going to fly close to the limits,” she replied with a grin, making us all smile, save a nervous looking Callum.

“That’s my lovely Princess,” I laughed.

“Besides, I have my man now; just have to be patient till the right time.”

“Yes, I spoke to your father about that. He reckons a hundred is the right age for a young Fae Princess,” I chuckled, watching the rest hiding grins.

“Good job I don’t consider myself fully Fae,” she replied with a demure smile and a smouldering look at Callum. “Ah, got it all.”

“Right, let’s go,” I nodded, taking mercy on a very flustered Callum.

In less than a day we had the full set of data and were now piecing it together, though it was proving awkward as there was a lot of duplication and competing styles. Whoever had written one, clearly hadn’t been permitted to write another. Still, it gave the Seers another task to get on with amongst their busy schedule whilst my team prepared for another mission, to try and bag an Adept.

***

“Chusok survives,” Brnnt stated with a grim smile, the following day in his regular meeting with Karkol.

“Indeed he does and his defence position is unassailable from what I can tell. Though we have ensured he is in no position to go on the offensive,” Karkol nodded.