21 - Re-Awakening - Part 5

It was the stench that pricked her nostrils which brought Sandrielle back from her unconsciousness. Metal, wet with blood and sweat, urine and excrement. A smell of fear and death. She remembered it like all the other things from her time with the Hive. Memories that were etched into her mind forever, no matter how much she had meditated, conditioned herself and tried to forget. A past that had followed her at every step she took along the path of her life until this moment when it seemed like she had come full circle. Quietly she resigned herself to that realization.

As she opened her eyes, Sandrielle saw what she had expected. It was a cell, four by six meters, without any facilities whatsoever except one: Weapons. There they were, hung from the wall. Knives and clubs of various design, all close combat weapons. They wanted this to be personal. No killing at arm's length. Sandrielle knew that game, and so she looked around in the dimly lit room to see who her opponent would be.

When she located him huddled in one corner with his arms hugging his legs and his head buried between his knees she could not help but chuckle grimly. 'You really thought you'd get a reward for delivering me, didn't you?' the Gallente woman said while she got up and began to stretch her limbs.

Mikkai Aluvetti jerked his head up to look at her. His grimy face still showed the curved pathways tears had dug through the stains on his features and his blond hair was scorched in many places.

'You greedy Caldari moron.' Sandrielle said as she went through her routine of breathing and conditioning exercises, preparing herself for what had to be done here. 'The Hive does not even have any ISK. What they need they either steal or build themselves.' She shook her head after pausing to look at the pathetic figure the Caldari trader had become. 'They have never paid any ransom or any reward to anyone. The only thing you can get from them is weapons fire and death.'

'B... but .. I .. I had a contract with them.' Aluvetti protested with a quivering voice.

'Not worth the quantum states it's encoded in.' Sandrielle replied dryly and resumed her exercise routine. She found that the effect of the drugs Aluvetti had given her had worn off. Her body, mind and senses were fully recovered apart from a burning thirst that made her tongue feel dry and swollen in her mouth.

It would be over quickly.

'They destroyed my ship and killed my crew.' Aluvetti wailed at her. 'What will they do with us now?'

'With you?' Sandrielle completed her routine and lowered her arms, exhaling slowly. 'They will do nothing with you.' she said while she approached the wall with the assorted weapons and examined them to choose a suitable blade.

'I don't understand.' the Caldari shook his head in confusion and fear dilated the pupils of his blue eyes when he saw Sandrielle take a combat knife from it's place on the wall.

The dark haired Gallente woman turned to face her opponent and looked at him dispassionately. 'It's a selection procedure, you see.' she began to explain. 'There comes a point when each Hive child is locked up together with another. Someone they hate. They are given no food, no water, nothing. You will stay in the cell together until both of you die from thirst or one kills the other.' Sandrielle approached Aluvetti slowly and weighed the blade in her hand. 'If one survives, that child is kept in there for another day.' Sandrielle pressed her lips together and her expression darkened with the memory of past ordeals. 'You would be surprised how easy it is to drink human blood if it's the only thing you get to drink. Some even eat the flesh of their fellow prisoner.'

Aluvetti began to push himself up from the ground, trembling and his back against the wall. 'You mean? Wait! Can't we find some other way?!' he screamed in panic.

Sandrielle did not react to the question. 'The one who survives goes to the next round.' she said 'In the next round you get locked up with the one person you have the strongest personal bond with.'

Then, with two quick steps and a single thrust of the knife she ended the life of Mikkai Aluvetti. By angling the blade upward from it's entrypoint at his throat she made sure that the cold metal would sever the spinal cord at the base of his skull. She was sure that he did not feel much while his eyes glazed over.

She had never liked the man, and he had betrayed her, but he did not deserve to suffer needlessly here.

Sandrielle remembered how much she hated the briny, metallic taste of blood.

At least this time they would not have anyone available for the second round of the game.

***

Shisei Kanioota had an advantage that none of the other Awakened Industries capsuleers had. He was neither a wanted pirate, nor a disgraced military officer prosecuted by his own government and the enemy alike. He did not have to hide from powerful capsuleer alliances or the secret agents of the Amarr Empire. Certainly, as a Caldari he would not receive the warmest welcome in Gallente space, neither would he have any corporate privileges in the State itself after he resigned from Ishukone Corporation. Of course, it was also not quite clear whether the Minmatar Republic and the Amarr Empire would stand down and cease hunting the capsuleers of Awakened industries, but Shisei was still officially a Caldari citizen, and as such he was reasonably safe under the regulations of corporate sovereignty.

Another of his advantages was, that – as a former corporate prospector, explorer and engineer – he had good contacts with the House of Records. All interactions between the State's megacorporations and third parties were collected by that governmental body, and since Shisei Kanioota had interacted with foreign powers a lot in his line of work, he had contributed large quantities of information to the Caldari State's vast datastores.

In general, access to the House of Records was restricted to citizens with corporate affiliation, but Information Analyst Aikano as more than happy to bypass regulations when it came to his old friend Shisei Kanioota. After all, the amount of information on wormhole phenomena that the State could get it's hands on was limited. Certainly after the defection of Hilen Tukoss who took some of the most experienced explorers and scientists in the field with him when he left the Caldari State.

Therefore Aikano accepted gladly when Shisei Kanioota had suggested a meeting on the space station of the House of Records orbiting Oniteseru's second moon. The nature of the information exchange Kanioota was looking for disturbed him slightly though.

'Why is it that you are interested in The Hive, Kanioota?' the gray-haired Information Analyst asked the man sitting across from him in the spacious main assembly area of station level thirty-six. 'I hope you are not planning to do any business with them, because that would not only be pointless but also deadly.'

Shisei smiled ever so slightly and shook his clean-shaven head. 'No worries Analyst Aikano.' he comforted the older man. 'It is only, that we recently encountered a Hive battlefleet which attempted an incursion into a nearby wormhole system. They proved to be formidable opponents and I would like us to know more about them in case we ever encounter them again.'

'I understand.' Aikano nodded and the creases drawn onto his aged face by his worried expression vanished. 'As you know, The Hive is an alliance of capsuleers residing in the border regions of New Eden, beyond settled space.' The old Civire official activated his portable neocom to access the available datastores for background information. 'Unlike most of the other capsuleer Alliances, they do not lay claim to any systems according to the Yulai Convention, but that is not the only thing that makes them special. They are unique among the capsuleer alliances in their way of recruiting.'

Shisei raised an eyebrow. 'In which way?'

'The Hive does not accept trained capsuleers from outside their ranks, rather they train all their pilots themselves from a young age. They regularly conduct raids on ships and colonies for resources. One of the objectives of those raids is to capture small children. We do not know the details, but it is assumed that The Hive conditions those children through a process of brutal brainwashing and dehumanization to make them into members of uncompromising loyalty. Once they have a subject processed, they turn them into capsuleers.'

'They have the facilities to create capsuleers themselves?' Shisei asked with surprise. The technology to integrate a capsule control system with a human body and nervous system was not only highly restricted but also notoriously costly and difficult to set up. Only the largest corporations and government bodies among the nations of New Eden could boast such facilities.

Aikano nodded. 'Despite not engaging in any trade, The Hive is very rich in resources. They have industry on a scale that equals and even surpasses some of the Caldari megacorporations. All of their facilities are mobile, based on capital ships that form the backbone of their fleets. Because the Hive members are so absolutely dedicated to their collective, the amount of personal effort each and every one of them commits to the community is quite staggering.'

The elderly Caldari paused. 'It is rather impressive actually.' he added with an undertone that sounded almost jealous.

'So where do they originally come from?' Shisei asked.

'We are not sure. Their symbol – the ebailla swarm insect native to Orvolle VI – suggests a Gallente or Intaki origin. The ebailla has migrated all over New Eden aboard ships, though and is now found on many worlds, so that is only speculation. Some say, that the highly militaristic nature of their organization derives from the Caldari State, others speculate that the strict hierarchy and fanatical devotion to the collective might have it's roots in Amarr culture.' Aikano shrugged. 'All we know is, that they appeared seemingly out of nowhere about two decades ago and began raiding outlying colonies indiscriminately.'

Shisei furrowed his brow in thought. 'Has any capsuleer ever left The Hive?' he wondered.

'Not according to the records we have. It goes even further than that. In all cases we have observed, they rather self-destruct their capsules than risk capture.' Aikano said.

'Do you think it is a possibility for a Hive capsuleer to break the conditioning?'

Aikano shrugged slightly. 'Even if that would happen, the M.O. based on all intelligence we have on The Hive suggests that they would either kill a defector or at least try to retrieve them for re-integration into the collective.'

The Civire Information Analyst paused with a worried frown. 'You look concerned Kanioota. What is it.?'

'I might have a case on my hands that would create a precedence in that context.' Shisei replied with a subdued voice.