The Misfit Crew

“She was one of the first to die, Zea!” Ti’Alm laughed. Zea charged forward, intending to ram him into a wall and shatter his lungs so he would shut up, when Ironclaw and Asher held him back. “She led the first riot inside this very palace. There was no choice but to put her down and so down the chain of command they were killed. The next riots had leaders too. I remember them. My grandfather made me remember them. Haka, Senool, Wenju, Tzel, Irum, and then Ren’Lu, until the rest finally gave up.”

Zea snarled, optics filled with uncontrollable anger. He knew those names well. Senool was the head nurse among the slaves and he was the best at it. Wenju was a fellow painter who always smiled even when he was being punished. Tzel was a beautiful femme, one that everyone was sure Zea would be paired with in the future. Irum liked to sneak food into his room during the night and was never caught. Ren’Lu was responsible for the garden, since her color arrangement was considered an art to Emse Janis. And they all were dead now. His friends, borderline family, gone, slaughtered like animals for what they believed in. And for what? There were still slaves on Nabiin. Their numbers were greater than that of the idnons; they should have won! Why didn’t they win?!

“I’ll take your payment, Zea,” said Ti’Alm, getting a woken servant to carry the load out. “But since you are a figure of history, you are worth more than you believe. I would charge more but seeing you like this gives me more satisfaction than money can buy. My grandfather would have been proud.”

Zea snarled again, spitting out curses—the same way Seismicwave would do in a situation like this—in fifteen different languages. He wished the palace to burn in Holloc, he wanted Ti’Alm to die by a deadly and disgusting infection by the words of the Tanu, he cursed the crops to wither and die for the next seven generations in the vernacular of Xixiots, he wished in Bexyc for the spirits of the revolutionist slaves to be revived and terrorize Nabiin for all eternity until their brethren were set free, and so on in other dialects that Ti’Alm would never be able to translate.

Asher stepped forward, knowing that their time here was near spent and they would not be welcomed much longer by the idnon. Ironclaw and Packrat dumped half of the gems onto the floor and carried the rest in its chest while following Zea out of the palace. Ti’Alm barked at Sanse to clean up the pile and take it to his private quarters, all the while following him to make sure that he was not going to sneak any of them for his personal savings that would buy his freedom as well.

The green mechling told Ironclaw and Asher to go back to the ship. He had somewhere he needed to be and Packrat would look after him until he got back. The smaller mech asked where he was going, but he ignored him. Zea was too lost in thought to think about anything else than but his dear mother and friends.

He remembered the day that Seismicwave preached to them. The captain had always “gained back his letters”, as he called it, whenever he was talking about something important, going from “ye’n yers” back to “you and yours.”

“What right do they have to determine you are a slave based on your birth? Slavery is meant as a debt; you owe someone a great service for a great wrongdoing you performed to him or her. What debt do you owe now? Are they the debts your ancestors acquired those millions of years ago? I stand before you now to tell you that their debts are paid. They have been for longer than the ages of your many generations of masters combined. You have helped them build their culture, build their cities, build their homes and farms and shops. You have copied their books for them, made and washed their clothes, and delivered their goods. You have hunted for them, you have read stories and sung songs to their children. You have cared for them under the unwritten law that all cybernetic Nabiinii are slaves for life. 

“I am not saying to exact your revenge. Revenge becomes a vicious, bloodthirsty cycle with hundreds of year’s worth to clean up after it. No specie is superior over another. What you need to understand is that you are equals. It may not seem so, but in the eyes of the universe you are equal. A king is no better than a peasant, for he only has so much power if his people allow it. Will you allow the idnons to keep you and your young as slaves forever, especially if they treat you with such harshness?

“If you are of the lucky ones that have a loving master, then know that there are others that go through far more punishments than just a skipped supper. You should help your brethren. Help them out of their abuse. You may think, ‘What can I do?’ The answer is: Whatever you can. If you’re able to help, help them, for no one else will. And to the masters of loving hearts, help them as well, for gods above know that the ones who whip their backs will not.

“Should you take anything from what I say, it should be this: You did not deserve this. You did not ask to be born a slave. You did not ask to be used and abused under the law that the idnons are permitted to do so. You are not livestock, you are people, and you will demand to be seen and treated as such, without demeaning others.”

Orbs in thick glass boxes. That is how most slaves ended up at the end of their life on Nabiin. There were rows and columns out in an open, plain field of yellow grass of glass boxes with small metal orbs. Zea scanned the area to find his mother’s name among all those who had been melted down after their decommissioning or extinguish. One could tell how old some of these were, for the style on the corners of the boxes. The more ancient ones had what looked like runes, and the newer boxes had swirls.

“Uh, Zea? Kid?” Packrat muttered, as though if he made his voice any louder it could stir something terrible in the dark. “What is this place?”

“Mababuri. A graveyard for slaves.”

“Oh… That’s not creepy at all…” He took a closer look at the boxes. “So these li’l balls are…?”

“They were once slaves, yes. At the end of their life, their spark casings are removed and used as a mold. The body is stripped for spare parts and the rest is melted down and put into the mold. Each one has different markings according to the pattern that were in their casings.”

“Okay, I take back what I said ‘bout the graveyard part. What you jus’ said there is creepy as hell.”

“That’s how it is here.”

After half an hour of search, he found the box that was inscribed in Nabiin runes: Haka. He kneeled to look at the metal orb, at the crisscross shapes that looked like an unplanned map of a city. This was what the slaves referred to as a blueprint. It was proven long ago that no one slave had the same line pattern as another, almost like snowflakes. The only way to see this blueprint was after the spark was put out. And here was his mother’s, right before his eyes. He knew one day he would see it, but he did not think that the day would have come so soon.

“You should have come with us,” he whispered. “Maybe then you would have lived… But that wouldn’t have stopped the others from fighting, would it? Everyone else would still be dead… If I know you… knew you… then you went down swinging.” Tears started pooling at his optics, and he had to speak louder to force through the lump in his throat. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here… I should’ve been here, to fight with you. Maybe I could’ve saved you!”

“Believe me, kid, the way ya were back then? Ya couldn’t do jack shit.”

Zea flashed him a glare. The mech put his hands up in surrender and backed away. The mechling turned back to the glass box, the moonlight gently reflecting his face.

“He’s right… I probably would have ended up dead, too… Maybe it was better that I went… The captain’s made me strong, stronger than I could have ever thought. You would’ve liked him, mom, he’s a great guy… Heh… I called him ‘dad’ once and he didn’t object… I’d like to think of him like a dad. “And after all I’ve been through, after all I’ve been taught, I know what to do now. I promise, mom, I won’t let you down.”

Zea stood up. More tears streamed down his face, but he did not weep. He smiled, instead, knowing that his mother’s suffering was through and that she would continue to guide him in spirit.

“We goin’ back home, chief?” Packrat asked.

“Yeah. But I’m coming back to Nabiin.”

“Back? Why? There ain’t anythin’ else here for you to do; ya bought yer freedom.”

“Aye, but the others are not free.” Zea turned his body to him. The smaller mech tilted his head, knowing exactly what that look was all about.

“That’s near suicide, kid.”

“That’s why we’ll need to be ready.” He looked up at the sky. “I’ll come back here. Maybe not for a long time, but I will. I will be side by side with my brothers and sisters and the idnons who support us, and we will all be equal upon this planet.