The Tyr: Arrival #1 The Tyr Trilogy Read online

  The Tyr

  Book 1: Arrival

  By

  Richard Fox

  For Professor Elizabeth Samet

  thank you for the books

  Copyright © by Richard Fox

  All Rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.

  ASIN:

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  An excerpt from the next novel, The Tyr: Ordeal

  From the Author

  Read THE EMBER WAR for Free

  Prologue

  The last of the An-Ra lay dying.

  A mercenary in matte black power armor stood over the alien as it lay gasping near the crest of a desolate hillside. The human soldier lifted his visor, shaped into a death mask laden with scars, and stared down at the creature. Different-colored striations ran from the An-Ra’s blunt—but sharp—beak and down her neck. The flesh of her arms and legs was a pale grey with dark spots. A vestigial shell on her back was a poor leather shield that formed a low arc behind her shoulders.

  The An-Ra lifted a hand off a wound to her side, inky blood staining her fingers.

  She spoke, but Daniel Clay knew nothing of her language. He aimed the muzzle of his battle rifle over her chest. The same weapon had sent gauss bullets tearing through her abdomen a few minutes before. I would have been too easy to end the alien there and then…but Clay hesitated.

  Smoke rose from a small village burning around the hill, darkening an ochre sky the same hue as the earth beneath the An-Ra.

  Hourglass-shaped pupils stared up into Clay’s eyes and she spoke again.

  “I…I’m sorry,” Clay said, gripping his rifle harder.

  “What’s the problem?” Another mercenary came up a path worn into the hillside. “Village is clear.”

  The An-Ra spoke words in hisses and pops, reaching to the sky.

  “Can we let this one live, Hulegu?” Clay asked.

  “Why? Corporation’s got all the bio samples they need.” Hulegu raised his rifle, but Clay held up a hand. “Mission’s sweep and clear…wait…” Hulegu canted his head slightly to one side. “Why’re your emotional suppressors turned off?”

  “Because I wanted to know if I can still feel,” Clay said.

  “Can you?”

  Clay didn’t answer.

  “You’ve got the last indig right in front of you,” Hulegu said. “You want the bonus for the kill or not?”

  “The last one…how many were on this planet before it was marked for colonization? Tens of millions? A month later, and we’ve got them culled down to her.”

  The An-Ra reached over and grabbed Clay by the ankle.

  “You wounded it, but it ran uphill…odd.” Hulegu looked down at the blood trail.

  “There’s a shrine up here.” Clay went to one knee and touched the back of the An-Ra’s hand. She felt cold to the touch, different from the warriors he’d torn apart when they were in the grip of battle rage.

  “Her gods or whatever aren’t going to answer her, buddy. This your…what, eighth Compliance mission? You starting to crack?”

  “It’s my last.” Clay stroked the top of the An-Ra’s bare head as her eyes went dull.

  “She’s fading. Get the kill and get your bonus. I owe you one for that crash you pulled me out of,” Hulegu said.

  The alien slumped to one side, her breathing growing more and more shallow with each breath.

  “No.” Clay threw his rifle away and went down the path.

  Behind him, a single shot sent a long-forgotten ache through his heart.

  “Can’t change it, Clay!” Hulegu called out. “Can’t change what we’ve done.”

  “I don’t have to be part of it the next time,” Clay tossed his helmet aside.

  Chapter 1

  Fifteen years later.

  It was time for his second face.

  Daniel Clay walked up to a mirror and slowly turned his head from side to side. His cheeks and jaw were raw from a too-close shave, his blond eyebrows trimmed down to the point they were almost invisible against his skin. A flap of pale silver hung from the middle of his neck like a bib, and strands of auburn hair dangled down to the leather belt strapped over his black tunic.

  Better get used to this one again, he thought as he pinched and stretched his face.

  “House, give me a reading.” Clay placed his hands beneath the synth-flesh of his second face and pressed it against his skin. The synth-flesh molded against his features, wiggling as it bonded to him. He dabbed at his forehead and jowls with his palms as his alien face took shape.

  Small screens appeared within the mirror—surveillance feeds from hidden cameras arrayed for blocks around his home in King’s Rest City. The normal commuter traffic of delivery trucks and double-decker buses were on the roads, and Daniel could almost smell the exhaust from ambary oil that would form into an off-green smog by midday. Most of the government workers wouldn’t arrive for hours, as no work would commence until the King rose for the day.

  There were a few things he wouldn’t miss about Tyr, the pollution being his main complaint.

  “Constable frequencies and landlines have had no mention of this address or employees since your last query,” a computer voice said as graphs appeared on the mirror. “Military networks have 8.27 percent more traffic than baseline. Is this of concern?”

  “No, House, the kingdom’s doing their annual drills in the southern plains. This is expected.” Clay flattened his second scalp and brushed hair away from his face. His skin was mostly silver, covered by a thin layer of ketafik, an amalgam of thin fur and down feathers that would be barely noticeable unless someone was close enough to smell his breath. Black swathes of ketafik covered his eyes and ran down from his ears to trace his jawline. Another pair of dark lines ran down from the inner corners of his eyes and around his mouth to join with the lines along his jaw, forming a smoky trail down the front of his throat. The borders of the darker color wavered ever so slightly against the silver as his disguise took shape.

  The Linker caste had features of all the other strata of the Tyr species…al
l but one.

  “Decrypted military communications indicate the Worthy Peoples have placed several of their strategic bomber squadrons on high alert,” House said.

  “Saber rattling.” Daniel rolled his eyes and fixed a ponytail to the back of his head. The long auburn braid, inlaid with silver and gold strands, fell over his shoulder. He touched a hidden biometric reader on the desk beneath the mirror and the top drawer popped open. Inside were pairs of contact lenses, each freckled with black spots. He frowned—one set was missing.

  “House, connect me to Sarah.” Clay looked over his more familiar face, then flipped open a lens box.

  “Yes, honey?” His wife’s voice came through the mirror.

  “Aaron’s eyes are gone. You know where he went?” Daniel blinked hard as he slipped in a contact lens.

  “He found a buyer for his tackla bird. Finally. I thought he was going to let that damn thing go on the way to the off-site,” she said as pots clanked in a sink.

  “Are you making breakfast? You know it’s Toil-day. Miska’s has the best morning grill and—”

  “We are not leaving a filthy house for the next crew. I had to make Michael his favorite dessert last night or he was going to slip into another one of his moods, and you know what a pain in the ass it is to make that pudding.”

  “Fair enough,” Daniel said with a sigh. He leaned toward the mirror and a grid covered the head and shoulders of his alien reflection. Several irises opened and closed as the lenses adjusted to the light. “House, how’s my synth?”

  “Thermal profile within tolerances, all bind locations read full adherence. You are cleared for infiltration,” the computer said.

  “Like you can stop me from leaving.” Daniel smiled.

  “Lockdown procedures are enabled. Any attempt to exit this facility without full compliance with Corporate policies will result in—”

  “Kidding, I’m kidding, House. I really hope the next team comes with a sarcasm module for your stack.” He adjusted a leather purse bound with silver string on his belt and gave it a pat, the rustle of coins bittersweet.

  “Primary locks disengaged.” There was a clack inside a nearby doorframe. Daniel grabbed a handle with a silver-colored hand, the fingers dark from the second knuckle to his fingertips. The synth-skin covered his entire body, disguising him as a Tyr from head to toe.

  He twisted the handle, putting pressure on it as House did one final security scan around their home. The handle gave way and he stepped through the inner doorway to a closet-sized chamber.

  The sounds of a city waking up—the rumble of engines and calls of neighbors to each other—carried through the frosted glass of the outer door. Not too different from the routine of Armstrong Archology on Luna.

  His mood soured as House bolted the door shut behind him. The thought of going home put a cold pit in his stomach. The Archology wasn’t the kind of place he wanted his son to grow up, and he held no illusions that the city of tens of millions built deep into Earth’s moon had improved much since their mission began on Tyr almost ten years ago.

  His family might rate a higher tier of housing when his contract was up…though that depended on Corporate keeping to the letter of his employment agreement. He chuckled at the joke and stepped out onto the sidewalk.

  The smell always got to him first, the walnut tang of ambary oil burned by vehicles throughout the city. Black telephone and power wires formed erratic webs overhead, stretching over the roads and coalescing into ugly knots at building corners.

  Buildings in this part of the city reached a few stories high, the walls clad in panels made to look like irregular decahedrons fit together. He’d lived in the neighborhood long enough to know where the cladding patterns repeated themselves after the quarter was rebuilt during the war.

  There was chattering overhead and Daniel glanced up as a pair of tanna ran along the wires connecting the buildings. The maroon creatures were as large as the rats back on Luna, but covered in scales and with tufts of fur at their joints and along the ridge of their skulls. Daniel stepped to one side, not willing to risk them spotting his tunic with their droppings.

  Rumor was that the tanna were smart enough to target homeowners that didn’t leave their leftovers out for the pests, but Aaron—his team’s zoologist—had assured him that the tanna weren’t that intelligent. Not that Aaron would go to the trouble of disabusing the locals of their theory.

  A squat truck drove past, the wheels rumbling over the ancient cobblestone street, the small cab providing room enough for just the Tyr driving the truck. He touched the bridge of his nose then held his hand palm up in a brief gesture of acknowledgement and respect to Clay. The driver’s markings were different from his, with dark pools around his eyes that pinched around the temple, almost like the extinct raccoons of Earth. A Toiler caste.

  Didn’t I hold his business in escrow while he was getting a loan? Daniel thought as he made his way down the sidewalk, his knees aching from the slope of the hill where his business and home were located.

  Another thing he wouldn’t miss—though the view down the road was a different matter.

  A large, red sun rose over the bay that King’s Rest had grown around over the many centuries. Bands of pink and ochre against the horizon would fade away to blue skies as the sun rose, then give way to the muted red sky of Tyr’s nights.

  Nebula-occluded skies weren’t unheard of through settled space, but Tyr’s vistas were unlike anything Clay had ever seen in person or learned of in star surveys.

  Daniel acknowledged a fruit seller as she raised the corrugated steel shutters of her business, another of the Toiler caste with different facial markings than him. The smell of pollen and citrus filled his nose as the Tyr woman swiped a covering of ambary cloth off her wares.

  “Linker Clay,” she said, wagging a chubby arm at him. “I have fresh olisa fruit that your boy likes.”

  “Your delivery isn’t due for another half decem, goodwife.” Daniel tapped the analog watch on his wrist. “Olisa gets a bit chalky if it’s left out too long.”

  “Don’t you give my olisa the bad tongue.” She shook a fist at him. “Who can I go to for a balance if a Linker harms me?”

  “Maybe your shipment will come early and then I’ll get fresh olisa on my way back.” He bowed his head slightly as he walked past her shop, the Tyr woman grumbling at him in her caste dialect.

  A half-dozen jet fighters roared overhead, contrails tracing from their wingtips in the humid morning air. Daniel noted missiles slung beneath both fighters and made a mental note to double-check the kingdom’s air defense status before he and the rest of his household left for the countryside.

  Getting detected by the local air force might make their final moments on Tyr more difficult, and the replacement team would certainly not appreciate it if the locals were on alert for UFOs.

  The road leveled out into an open-air market. This was a Toiler caste area, but as a Linker, he could move about as he pleased. If his markings were of the Royal or Speakers…things might get ugly.

  “Miska,” Daniel said, touching fingertips to his brows in a quick gesture of respect to a heavyset Toiler cooking at a grill. Thin metal pins held hunks of raw meat between Daniel and the Tyr.

  “Clay, thought you’d come by.” The Toiler’s ketafik layer was puffy around his face and exposed arms, making him look almost corpulent, but his short-sleeved shirt and apron were tight over a slender build. “The usual?”

  “You were in the mountains for too long.” Daniel smiled. “All that cold makes me think your clan works the mines and not the kitchens.”

  “Bah, the Royals demand the best meat from wild hunts.” The cook drew three pins off hooks and laid the meat over smoldering coals. “I have to kill the damn things myself and come back with the cold still on my skin so they know that the beast was taken from nature and not the ranch.”

  “Good hunt?” Daniel asked.

  “In the end,” Miska grunted. “Good enough
that I can come to you and pay the last of the mortgage on my equipment. The Royal that owns my debt won’t be happy…but what do I care, eh?” He gave the meat pins a twist and sprinkled seasoning over the hissing cubes.

  “I will be more than happy to prepare the seal for you. Congratulations.”

  “Don’t be too happy for me. Royals tend to stop buying from those who’ve cleared their debts. I can make ends meet cooking for my own kind, but if I want to own my home too,” he clicked his tongue, “that’s another problem. But Royals do as they like, eh?”

  “Same as it ever was.” Daniel tilted his head slightly to one side, indicating that he did not wish to speak against a caste, such was his privilege as a Linker.

  “Seven.” The cook scraped meat off the pins and into a wax-paper-lined pressboard container.

  Daniel took a single silver coin from the purse on his belt and put it into a slot on a wooden box within a metal cage welded to the counter.

  Miska jingled the box and frowned at Daniel. “I said seven. You put in a fifteen.”

  “You put in some extra of my wife’s favorite.” Daniel took the box. “Don’t pretend you didn’t. Come to my shop when you’re ready to have your note paid. I’ll go to the Royal myself and see that the debt’s gone before second moon.”

  “Ha, that thief will duck you if it means another interest payment.” Miska chuckled. “Be well, Linker.”

  “Be well,” Daniel said and turned away, the warmth of the fresh food seeping into his hands. The smell of grish—a mountain lizard/goat analog with pink fur—was one of his first memories on Tyr when his team arrived. Another thing he’d miss.

  The squeal of brakes broke his reverie and the crump of a crash pulled his attention to the far side of the market.

  Shouts were mixed, the words accented by more than one caste. Daniel glanced at the food in his hand, then back to his house up the street. He walked briskly toward the commotion, the many Toilers crowding toward the site getting out of his way and calling for passage as Daniel strode forward.

  “I will have your blood or your silver for this!” a Tyr man shouted from beside a small truck whose front wheels were over the curb. The angry Tyr’s markings were a solid black line across his eyes, the hair sprouting from behind his temples and over his ears ivory-colored. One of the Blooded caste, the warriors. A cargo hauler was on one side of the road and fist-sized nuts with dark shells and thick strands were littered all over the place. Two emaciated Tyr were frantically trying to pick up the goods, placing them in the folds of long tunics made of undyed fabric. A third rail-thin alien sat against the rear wheels of the truck, his face scrunched in pain, an arm held against his side.