I Was Legion
Imperium Of Terra Book I

Prologue
Orion Command Carrier Delaware
“Earth.” The man snorted as he looked at the blue-white world as it grew on the main viewer, “What a shithole.”
“I would appreciate it if you watched your language, Commander,” Captain Hidan Clarke growled aside at the other man. “That is hardly becoming of an officer.”
“Apologies, Captain,” Commander Grave Washington said, just slightly louder than his previous statement.
Hidan sighed, but let it go at that. At least the man had pitched his voice low enough not to be noticed, or at least low enough that anyone who did notice could pretend otherwise. It wasn’t a habit he wanted to encourage, however. They were on a diplomatic outreach to the home world and statements like that, however accurate, would hardly help the Orions’ political standing with the Holy Terran Empire.
Not that it’s much of an Empire.
The planet was far from one of the nicer ones in the galaxy at large, Hidan had to admit that much. The scars of millennia of bearing Humanity showed even to a cursory glance as they approached the planet’s orbit. He found himself tracing the shape of the continents, trying to merge them with what he’d been taught in school, but found that he couldn’t. They bore too little resemblance to the world his ancestors had left behind just a few centuries earlier.
Hidan could track his lineage back to the East Coast of the former Americas, the city of New York to be precise. He knew where it was, the coordinates at least, but as the planet revolved slowly beneath them to bring that section into view, there was nothing but water to be seen. No hint of the metropolis that had been the home of his ancestors for centuries.
Sea level rise had swallowed up New York and all the coastal cities centuries ago, reclaiming them from the humans who’d built and occupied them with such zeal. What had been above the waves had inevitably been hammered down by decades and centuries of neglect from that point.
“Spectrometer shows atmospheric carbon dioxide is above a thousand parts per million, Captain,” Lieutenant Mercy Sai said from the Command Deck’s long-range scanner section. “Other atmospheric pollutants are high as well. Advise that anyone on extended leave carry bottled air.”
“Levels are coming down,” Hidan said, slightly surprised, “Ahead of the more optimistic schedules too. Looks like they managed to dodge a runaway effect after all.”
“Yes sir,” Mercy acknowledged, before gently nudging the Captain with his original point. “about the bottles…”
“Yes, yes, issue the advisory.” He knew that the levels in the atmosphere weren’t dangerous to humans, but they would be indicative of how much worse it could get in enclosed areas or possibly cities. He wouldn’t want to be breathing that sludge for an extended period, and he was a healthy adult. He had little doubt that young and elderly people with respiratory issues wouldn’t last long down there.
“The last report we had put the levels at closer to two thousand PPM,” He mused, “of course those are a few decades old.”
“Almost a century, Sir,” Mercy filled him in.
“Has it been that long?” Hidan asked rhetorically. Time meant little to colonists. Life extension had long reached the point where practical immortality was the norm. Most people only lived a few centuries, on average, before something happened. Accidents, foul play, the occasional unchecked medical conditions, or simply deciding to check out were the top causes of death, with checking out being the leading one by a long margin. “I suppose it has. What are the methane levels?”
“Just over four thousand parts per billion, Sir.”
Hidan gestured absently, calling up the environmental report for himself and perusing it.
“Huh. They’ve reduced those as well, a little at least, and the planetary temperature average seems low.”
“I expect that has to do with the satellite constellation in low orbit, Sir,” Mercy said, highlighting the appropriate section of the scans.
Hidan glanced it over, and nodded, “Weather control system. Crude from the looks of it, but the colonies never bothered with anything like it so what do I know?”
“We’ve never needed anything like it,” Grave said, “Our air isn’t polluted so badly that our worlds actively try to kill us.”
“We had advantages,” Hidan said softly, “By the time the colonies were established, we had already seen how badly things can go if you don’t take some care. We also had a tech advantage that Earth paid for, with interest.”
After a moment, Hidan shrugged, “That’s a discussion for another time, however. ETA to orbit?”
“Five hours to Geo-Stationary Orbit, Captain.”
“Contact the Orbital Controllers, then,” Hidan ordered, “And get the coordinates for our parking orbit. Make sure there’s enough space for the entire group, I want a standard neutral orbit picket.”
“Aye, Captain.”
“Be sure that everyone cleared to the surface knows not to irritate the locals,” Hidan ordered. “Terrans are a prickly bunch, at least when it comes to off-worlders.”
“Yes Sir. Orders have already been issued.”
“Good work.”
*****
Imperial Palace, Almansca (Formerly: North Eastern Germany)
Old Earth, Terran Empire
384PD (Post Diaspora)
Sylban Gyver’s boots clicked rhythmically on the stone of the courtyard as he made his way through the security checkpoints, working in to where the Court was sitting for the celebrations. Security was everywhere, slowing the wave of people into the court as best they could, but it was like trying to stop the leading edge of a supernova’s blast wave.
The guards who moved to check his progress were set back when he exposed the badge that was partially concealed under the flap of his uniform jacket. Not even the blade on his hip, or the beam-lock he wore at the small of his back would be enough to entice them to interfere with him after they saw that, and that was the way he liked it.
It was a beautiful day for the celebrations of the Empress’ third centennial, he had to admit. The meteongineers have outdone themselves this time.
He wondered briefly how much tinkering it had taken. If everyone involved was lucky, only minor tweaks would have been required. If not, well whatever bad weather would have normally struck would have to be redirected elsewhere.
Some poor village might well be drowning in rain right now, He supposed with some dark amusement, though it was likely that they would have been able to redirect it to somewhere that needed the moisture.
Despite the last century of the Gaia Network working to maintain ideal conditions as much as possible around the globe, there were still droughts and floods and all the general sundry nastiness associated with extreme climates. There were just fewer of them, and they were generally better predicted.
It was better than it had been, after centuries of a near runaway greenhouse effect almost destroying all life on the planet, but there was still a long way to go before the damages caused by irresponsible exploitation of the closed system would be repaired.
It was a testament to how easy it was to damage things, and how very hard it was to repair them.
“Sylban!”
Sylban glanced up, noting a familiar man heading his way. He permitted himself a comradely smile, raising a hand to greet the approaching man.
Eryn Aubrey was dressed much as Sylban himself was, wearing his charged carbon weave uniform, and sporting the short saber of the Imperial Legion. Sylban knew that he would have a beamlock pistol attached to the belt at the small of his back, and likely a small auto-pistol hidden under his uniform as well.
Sylban did, after all.
“Eryn, good to see you,” Sylban greeted the blond-haired figure as he slowed. “Are you well?”
The younger of the two, Eryn smiled awkwardly, but nodded.
“The time off was welcome,” He said, “I’ve been worn from training, but graduation is almost here.”
“You’ll be a full Legionnaire then, brother.” Sylban nodded, “Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
“Thank you, what?” Sylban asked, smiling slightly.
“Thank you, brother,” Eryn said a little hesitantly.
“Very good, but remember that out here we are Legionnaires first, and Brothers second… so far as anyone else is concerned,” Sylban said as he started to walk, making Eryn move to keep up with him. “Duty is our highest calling.”
“Of course,” Eryn nodded instantly, as though he understood.
Sylban didn’t bother correcting the young boy though he was quite certain Eryn didn’t truly understand. He would learn… eventually.
“Come,” Sylban said instead, “It would not do to keep her Majesty waiting.”
A look of almost panic flitted across the younger man’s eyes, nearly drawing a laugh from Sylban.
“Right!” Eryn said, increasing his pace until he was pushing ahead and starting to outrun Sylban.
The older man reached out and pulled Eryn back by the shoulder.
“March, don’t run. We are not the rabble you see around you.”
“Yes sir,” Eryn slumped, “Apologies.”
“Don’t apologize for enthusiasm, merely temper it. There is a place for it, as with all things. Just not here, and not now.” Sylban said firmly, “For now, we have somewhere to be before the ceremony.”
Nodding, Eryn matched pace with the precision of Sylban’s steps as the pair made their way toward the central court, where the ceremony would be taking place shortly.
*****
Imperial Palace, Royal Quarters
“The time is almost on us, your Majesty.”
“Thank you, Richard.”
Her Imperial Majesty, Empress Lian Conwin, The First of her Name, settled herself internally as she looked out upon the throngs of people assembling to celebrate the day of her birth. It was ironic, in a way, it had been so long that she almost couldn’t remember what day it fell on.
After a while, it became meaningless. The years just sort of flowed into one another, growing indistinct in their passage. Only the big round numbers began to matter, and then only to other people.
Most years, her birthday passed with little recognition within or without the royal court. The last big affair she could remember was a decade earlier. Frankly, it wasn’t long enough.
“So troublesome,” She sighed as she allowed her lady to check the state of her dress in preparation for the ceremonies.
The Terran Empire was a growing power in the local arm of the Galaxy, but far from the most powerful. After the exodus during the Diaspora, most of Earth’s best and brightest departed… taking huge amounts of her most vital resources along with them.
In the years that followed, rapidly increasing climate issues had nearly destroyed civil society across much of the planet. The Earth all but lost access to space and, with that, access to many of the raw materials desperately needed to fuel their civilization.
The Conwin family had been one of several that took control in those days, securing the former European Union from anarchy. Over the years, through alliance or conquest, that control had extended across the face of the planet and, eventually, beyond.
Earth was the poor old uncle of the civilized galaxy, however, and the more powerful forces really only regarded her as having value of nostalgia rather than any inherent value of its own. That left them largely ignored by the more violent of the space faring empires, since there was little value in taking the Earth and a fairly great political liability if they tried to cut off the citizens of other Empires from their regular pilgrimages to the ancient seat of human culture.
That same… courtesy… didn’t apply to Earth’s off-world assets however, which was the source of her current unease.
The party was a distraction neither she, nor her allies in court, needed at this juncture… however it was a desperately needed distraction for the citizens, and a valuable draw for off-world tourism, which remained one of the most important industries in the Empire. It also presented her with an opportunity to enact a plan of her own, one she had been hoping for… and dreading, in near equal proportion.
“Shall we go, Your Majesty?”
Lian glanced to see The Royal Steward extending his arm and waiting for her response and shook her thoughts from the ether they had strayed to, smiling at the man with forced pleasantry.
“We shall, Lord Jaol,” Lian accepted the offered arm and settled in at his side. “Let us make this a day for everyone to remember.”
“I have no doubts, your Majesty.”
The two left the chambers, heading for the Royal Court with smooth, even steps.
Behind them, the retinue of her Majesty followed suit in quick, but disciplined steps.
*****
Order of Terra, Almansca Chapterhouse
Sylban led the way into the chapterhouse, brushing aside the doorman with the slightest of gestures. He was well known in the house, of course, it had been his base of operations for three decades by this point and everyone was well familiar with him.
“Welcome, Sylban, it’s been some time, hasn’t it?”
Sylban turned, his expression betraying a little surprise as he recognized the speaker, “It has! Barran, I haven’t seen you since you went off world, almost twenty years I believe?”
“Somewhat less for me,” Barran Oska nodded, “Relativistic effects and all that.”
Sylban nodded, understanding. While Jump points were near instantaneous for those on board, there was a limited relativistic effect compared to anyone not breaking the rules of the macro-universe. Also, travel to and from the gate was often done at low to mid-relativistic velocities just to save time and resources.
A single trip wouldn’t alter one’s own time by more than a few hours compared to a worlder, however, which told him quite a bit about Barran’s activities over the years.
“World hopping has it been?” He asked, smiling slightly.
“Yes, though not for tourism or the like,” Barran chuckled. “I’ve been spending time with the Free Peoples, and their worlds are spread out a fair bit.”
Sylban nodded.
The Free People of the Antares Cluster was the full and correct name for a group of loosely affiliated colonies founded by libertarian idealists in the early days of the Diaspora. Wealthy industrialists, a handful who thought genuinely in that manner and quite a few more who merely paid lip service to the ideals, had funded the ships along with massive investments from individuals who bought shares in their own geo-former robots, energy converters, and such things that a colony would need to grow.
In the early days it had been something of a disaster according to the histories, descending rapidly into a group of pocket tyrannies largely led by the industrialists who controlled so much more of the vital resources than anyone else could hope to match.
Those self-same industrialists had made a bad miscalculation, however, in forgetting that the people they were trying to oppress were most certainly not the sort to roll over and take what they were given. According to the histories written by the Free Peoples, the Liberty Conflict had waged for over a century before it was finally won.
Which led to another period of complete disaster, since revolutions rarely… if ever… turned out well for any of those involved. Still, after another couple centuries or so, they’d managed a stable, or near enough, culture.
Since then, the Cluster Worlds had been one of the main trade centers for all human colonies. Not that it was an entirely safe one, of course, the Cluster always had some group of freedom fighters either causing trouble or liberating people, all depending on who you asked. It had become something of a tradition, almost, in the Cluster much to the genuine perplexed confusion by most outsiders.
Literally the only time the Cluster seemed to be of one mind was when someone made the mistake of attacking them, at which point every minor combatant stopped trying to kill each other and all turned on the new guy. For that reason however, even the worst of enemies would treat the Free People’s land as a neutral space, which did allow for a reasonable degree of diplomacy to be conducted with minimal risk despite those glaring issues.
The Cluster were well regarded by most, or at least respected for not involving themselves in other’s concerns unless invited, and rarely even then. Arguably it was because they were always too busy with their own problems to stick their noses into other people’s concerns, but even so it was one of the things people liked about them.
“How are the Cluster Worlds?” Sylban asked, “I’ve always been curious.”
“Odd,” Barran said with a chuckle, “Some are wild and free, sprawling cattle ranches, open range… the sort of thing you see in the history vids, but the Worlds also have some of the highest technology concentrations in the known worlds, with mega-cities that literally touch the very edge of space.”
Sylban nodded, he had heard as much. There was supposedly no real standard in the Cluster, where people could freely move and live as they pleased for the most part. With plenty of open space available to them, and more being geo-formed every year, many of the restrictions that existed on Terra were simply unthinkable to the Cluster.
“Must have been nice,” He said neutrally.
“I wish I’d been able to spend more time,” Barran confirmed. “Their frontier worlds are a pleasure and a joy to live on, if you like that sort of life. However, duty calls.”
“Of course.”
Duty.
It was the one calling above all others, above even their promises to their brothers. Duty could set brother against brother, if those who wielded that fealty were undeserving, but it was also what set them on their life’s path.
Sylban understood what Barran was saying and simply nodded as he looked around the central meeting room of the chapterhouse.
“A lot of new faces here today.”
“Aye,” Barran confirmed, “Prodigal sons and brothers from beyond the stars. It’ll be a crowded house at the revels tonight.”
Sylban nodded, eyes roving the new faces.
When humanity abandoned Earth, the order had gone with them of course. Chapterhouses existed on every human world, and a few non-human now, with members numbering beyond any official tally. The Empress’ tri-centennial had drawn those with the ability to come like moths to the flame.
It would be a system wide party, the sort of event that only came once in a lifetime… even lives as long as humans tended to live these days. It was history, even considering how little power the Empire wielded on the Galactic stage. The Empress of Earth was throwing a party for her birthday. Everyone who could gain an invitation was coming.
History was playing out, after all.
Sylban sighed, “I suppose it’ll be an event then.”
Barran laughed at him, “I think you underplay it. Look to the stars, my friend.”
Sylban glanced up at the ceiling of the Chapterhouse, eyes widening slightly in surprise as he took in the projected image of the galaxy that always shone there. The golden glow of the Earth’s sun was still instantly recognizable, but it was the other brightly lit colors that drew his attention this time.
Each time a member from off-world was in attendance, the light of their sun was raised in observance of their presence. He’d rarely seen it lit with more than a dozen or so separate lights in the past, but this time there were many times that at least, if not significantly more.
“Wow,” Eryn blurted from beside them, surprisingly Sylban slightly, as he’d all but forgotten the younger man. “How many worlds are here?”
“All of them, if you mean on Earth,” Barran chuckled easily. “In the Chapterhouse? Easily a hundred, likely a good deal more, I would need to check the rolls to be sure. Brothers from other worlds, my friends, but brothers all. Tonight will be the party to end all parties, my brothers… but first, we feast!”
Sylban groaned, “Barran, you always did think with your stomach.”
“And you always overthought everything, even when you were a middling little acolyte, looking up to me with those shining eyes of yours,” Barran laughed at him, causing Sylban to grimace and pointedly not look at his own ‘middling little acolyte’ who was standing there beside them.
Instead he glared at Barran, “I’ll thank you to be a little more circumspect in addressing me, even if you were my mentor. I have a position to uphold here and now.”
“Ugh, so formal,” Barran shook his head, “Come on, both of you, I’ll introduce you to a few offworlders you should meet. We have a short time before the ceremony, network while you can.”
Sylban, though irritated by the complete deflection of his concerns, had to admit that he did find the prospect of offworlders of clear influence to be appealing. So, he allowed himself to be dragged along, with Eryn pulled equally in their wake, into the middle of the mixer that was going on within the Chapterhouse.
Barran seemed to lock onto someone in the crowd, zeroing in like a missile as he called out for attention.
“Ah, Hidan my good man, I’d like to introduce you to a friend and his young protégé…”
A tall and rather imposing figure turned in their direction and merely stared as they approached. Eryn found himself shifting nervously under the gaze, eyes flitting between the man’s stony features and the emblem of the Orion Alliance resting on his lapel.
The Orions were one of the more belligerent of the human governing bodies in the Galaxy, expansionist and powerful, noted to mask much of that behind the pretense of securing freedom and peace in the galaxy. They were generally disliked, though not so much as to seriously compromise their diplomatic endeavors… power was a great compensation for a general lack of manners, after all.
Like the Antares Cluster Worlds, they largely professed adherence to freedom and self determination. However, in contrast, the Orion Alliance generally played lip service to the idea and acted entirely differently in every way that mattered.
Despite that, they were still considered one of the key bulwarks against tyranny in the Galaxy.
“Barran,” The imposing man said firmly, “A pleasure.”
“Don’t be such a stick, Hidan,” Barran laughed in the man’s face, making Eryn shift a little farther from the man, eyes wide as he half expected violence to break out.
Even Sylban seemed slightly wary of his old mentor’s actions.
“This is one of my old friends, I was his mentor when he joined the Chapterhouse,” Barran said as he indicated Sylban. “Sylban Gyver, of Her Majesty’s Legionnaires’ Service. Sylban, this is Hidan Clarke, Captain of the Orion Navy.”
Hidan examined Sylban with slightly more interest, looking down his nose at the other man. Sylban merely matched the gaze, tilting his head back just enough to do the same as he matched the very slight sneer on the Orion’s face.
“Interesting,” Hidan said finally, nodding, “Pleasant to meet you, Mr Gyver.”
“And yourself,” Sylban returned, gesturing to where Eryn was still shifting nervously, “My own young acolyte to the house here, Eryn Aubrey.”
Hidan shifted his gaze for a moment, taking in Eryn for all of a few seconds, before seemingly dismissing him and nodding curtly back to Sylban.
“I understand the requirements for the Empresses’ Legion are rather stringent,” He said simply. “I wonder how they stack up to an OSCOM deployment.”
Sylban smiled thinly, “Hardly a comparable match. We have very different operational stances, as I understand things. Your OSCOM forces are merely well-trained thugs, after all.”
Eryn almost missed the slight narrowing of the Orion’s eyes and the flare of his nostrils, but he couldn’t have missed the sudden ratcheting of tension in the air if he were blind and deaf. What is Sylban doing? Trying to start a fight in the chapterhouse? The Patron here will have his hide.
The Chapterhouse’ Patron, one of the top members of the order on Earth and entrusted with the care and guidance of the Capital’s own Chapterhouse, was not a man that even Sylban should risk irritating… and there was no question that starting a brawl in the chapterhouse, on this day of all days, would be an… irritant.
“I don’t believe I would categorize OSCOM soldiers in quite that way, Mr Gyver,” Hidan growled out, his tone brooking no disagreement. “However, I suppose I could see my way to understanding the ignorance of a man whose own service still requires him to carry a sword.”
“I can’t imagine any other way to categorize them,” Sylban said airily, seemingly oblivious to the tone or, more likely, completely uncaring of either it or the content of the man’s words. “You train them to fight well, yes, but there is so much more to being a Legionnaire than fighting. We are trained to fight a battle, command a ship, plan a war, stand alone or with our comrades, negotiate treaties, solve problems…”
“Jacks of all trades, masters of none,” Hidan snorted derisively.
“Specialization is for insects, Mr Hidan,” Sylban countered in similar tone. “I believe a Mr Heinlen once said as such. And as I recall, he’s rather a popular historical author among your military, isn’t he? OSCOM are very good thugs, Mr Hidan, but violence is their only talent.”
“Violence has solved more problems than anything else in history,” Hidan said tersely. “Heinlen also said that.”
Sylban shrugged, “I never said the man was always right. Violence has never solved a single problem, ever, in all of history.”
“Tell that to any number of despots whose careers ended at the crack of a rifle,” Hidan returned.
“Such as Adolf Hitler, I suppose?”
“A pistol in his case, I suppose, but yes indeed.”
“And yet, only a few decades later, actual Nazis marched openly in the streets, and less than a century after that, the Fourth Reich made it’s appearance.” Sylban snorted. “You and I have very different definitions of ‘solving’ a problem.”
Hidan seethed, but Sylban gave him no time to mount a comeback.
“Violence is not a solution, Mr Hidan,” The Legionnaire repeated himself firmly. “Violence is a currency. An important currency, one we desperately need, but merely a currency for all that.”
The Orion frowned slightly, head tilting to one side, “And what do we purchase with this currency, then?”
“Time, Mr Hidan. We purchase time.” Sylban said with a weary sigh, a sigh of man who had been forced to repeat himself too many times, only to find no one listening. “Ostensibly, time that can be used for other people to actually solve the problem, but too often it’s merely time wasted by lazy fools and their spoiled children until the problem comes around once more. That is why Legionnaires do not specialize. We have to understand that time alone is not enough. Your OSCOM’s best efforts will be futile, if no one takes advantage of the time they buy.”
Hidan glared, but was saved from responding when Barran cut in.
“Alright you two, back to your corners until the bell rings to start the next round,” The jovial man laughed at them both, drawing an incredulous stare from Eryn who was trying to distance himself as much as possible from either.
Sylban spared a last disdainful glance at the arrogant Orion, receiving a matching one in return, but acquiesced to his old mentor’s request.
“Of course,” He said smoothly, “I apologize. I do get a little… patriotic concerning the Legion and Empire, you do understand I hope?”
“Certainly,” Hidan rumbled in response, smiling thinly. “If you didn’t, I would hold both in far less esteem. A man should be able to have pride in his home and his duty.”
“Indeed,” Sylban responded, returning the expression, though his tone matched Hidan’s in that neither truly sounded like they considered the fight to be decided. “It is a poor governance that cannot inspire pride in those who serve within.”
“Indeed it is, my friends,” Barran put arms around both their shoulders, rolling his eyes and winking in the direction of Eryn as he did. “Now come, we’ve a party to begin… the first of many to come. Long live her Majesty!”
“Long live Her Majesty,” Sylban echoed seriously, his smile dropping away as he moved his right hand unconsciously to his heart.
The sentiment was instantly echoed from all quarters, not merely those next to him, in various forms and with similarly varying enthusiasm depending on the source of the response. Not everyone present was from the Empire, of course, but brothers all in support of their own. And if their own wanted to celebrate an Empress with plenty of good booze and wild partying, well that was something that even the most far flung of the travellers would be willing to… sacrifice.
The Empress’ birthday celebrations were just getting started all over the world.
It would be a day to remember.
*****
Chapter I
Imperial Palace
The capitol palace of the Imperial Family was really more of a city unto itself than a mere fortress, however extravagant, home to over three quarters of a million people on any random day of the year. During festivals, that number could easily triple overnight.
A major event, like the Empress’ tri-centennial, easily put that number well into the multiple millions of people crowding into the streets and swarming around the ancient construction.
Built after the second wave of Diaspora vessels had shaken the foundation of Earth’s socio-economic culture to the core, the Palace had been a statement by then warlord Pitr Via Conwin, the first of his name. The statement had been a simple challenge to any who would look upon his growing domain with envy.
If you want it, come and take it.
Over the centuries, more than a few had tried.
Warlord Conwin became king by his own hand and, as it turned out, was not inclined to stop there. A noted strategist and a man who led from the front of every battle he personally directed, Pitr Conwin added to his palace with every victory. Each addition symbolic of what his domain had gained.
The palace was done in an ancient style, but with materials that had been expensive and incredibly advanced even for their time. Tall spires reached kilometers into the skies, and the sprawling design of the area was out of a fantasy domain rather than the real world, designed to impress rather than exist as a defensible position.
In an age of orbital weapons and air superiority, walls and keeps were of significantly less value than they had once been, but the design of the palace harkened back to times long before even the Diaspora.
For her Majesty, Lian Conwin, it was simply home.
“Your Majesty, we have to prepare…”
“The festivities can do without Our presence for a short time, Lord Jaol,” Lian said firmly. “We have business to attend that does not pause merely because Our day of birth has arrived.”
Jaol Szorak sighed but nodded in acquiescence. It was trouble enough to divert her Majesty when she was wrong, there was simply no way he was going to waste effort attempting to do so when she was right.
“Very well, your Majesty,” He said as he preceded her into the Palace’s control center, the most advanced command and control setup on the planet, and in the Empire.
The central projector had put up a hard-light image of the solar system, showing all Imperial ships, mining installations, research bases, and so forth. Monitoring all of those facilities was generally the job of an interconnected network of individual departments that fed their data into the Palace’s systems.
“Report,” Lian said, coming to a stop at the primary control station.
“Your Majesty, all current projects continue apace. Raw materials are at expected levels…” The Officer of the Watch answered instantly.
Lian’s expression darkened, knowing that the expected projections were well below the requirements she had for the Empire.
The Diaspora had cost Earth greatly, sucking out the greatest minds of generations of Terran Citizens as they emigrated to colonies where the opportunities were greater, the health of their families would be protected… where they would have a future.
For a time, the idea that Earth might have a future had been a nearly laughable concept.
Global temperatures continued to increase into the twenty-second century, flooding coastal towns and cities, driving increased droughts in some regions… massive flooding from torrential rains in others. In northern and southern climates, the winters became harsher while the summers baked the land.
The effects were effectively irreversible by the time the first Diaspora ships were announced, with no way that things would become better no matter how humanity scaled back its excesses the rats had opted to flee the sinking ship.
The brain drain had never stopped after that, only slowed at first when the Earth all but lost the technical prowess to reach space.
The outer colony worlds promised so much that Old Earth could no longer provide, so as long as people could escape to them… they inevitably did.
“I understand,” Lian said somberly. “Please extend my thanks to all sectors for their continued efforts, and my personal wish that they could be here for the celebrations.”
“Our people understand how vital it is to maintain an uninterrupted supply of raw materials, your Majesty. It is our Honor to serve.”
She inclined her head slightly, “As is mine. How are our illustrious guests behaving?”
That, she knew, was the real information to be had. The status of resource development was important, but there were no large changes moment to moment in mining and harvesting. The tri-centennial, however, had invited representatives from every colony and alliance in human controlled space.
Not all of them had much love for each other, let alone the inhabitants of the mother world.
“The Orions have secured an entire sector to themselves, putting up pickets to prevent anyone from approaching,” The Officer of the watch said, “Their Carrier group is sitting there, attracting all the attention, of course, but we’re having a devil of a time tracking their stealth destroyers.”
“Not unexpected,” Lian sighed, “Continue as you have been. The Orions like to play games, do not let them know how irritating they are. No sense in offering up the satisfaction.”
“As you say, your Majesty.” The officer hesitated, then went on, “Of course there are a few dozen vessels from the Cluster, scattered all over the place. They keep bumbling into security corridors and generally making a nuisance of themselves, but most of it seems innocent enough.”
“Most?” She asked, eyebrow arching.
“I’m fairly certain that they’re intentionally antagonizing the Orions,” He said with a twist of his lip.
“Also, not surprising. The Free People of the Antares Cluster find the Orion Alliance to be… distasteful,” Lian said thoughtfully.“ And the Orion Alliance are frustrated with the Cluster almost by default. They lose many of their wealthiest innovators to the less regulated Cluster Worlds, just as we lose many of our brightest to the Colonies in general. The Orions like to appear politically similar to the Cluster, but they love their military power too much to give up the strong central government that levies it. Try to keep the Cluster ships from causing too much trouble, at least until after the celebrations.”
“Of course, your Majesty.”
“Does anything else stand out?” Lian asked.
“Only the diplomatic squadron dispatched by the Republic, your Majesty.”
“Oh?” Lian cocked her head. “How so?”
The Republic of the Nine Stars was not normally a group that caused much trouble with foreign powers. While powerful, they generally had been dealing with internal problems that kept their attentions firmly fixed within in recent years. The latest intelligence that had passed her system didn’t indicate any change in that stance.
“Small things, primarily, your Majesty.” The officer said, frowning. “Initially I had thought that their commander was inexperienced but…”
“But what?”
“Their maneuvers look sloppy up close, however if you step back and look at the squadron as a whole, it looks practiced. I think they’re intentionally trying to look less disciplined than they truly are.” He sighed, shaking his head. “I’m not sure, however. I could be reading more into it than is really there.”
“Perhaps… keep a watch on them,” Lian ordered. “I will be most pleased when this day is over. There are too many variables waiting to cause us problems here and now. We have plenty of troubles on our own right, we don’t need these colonial issues coming to our doorstep.”
The watch officer nodded, “Yes, your majesty.”
The Colonies were well known for playing political games with one another, often right to the edge of war. Rarely did it break out into full warfare, but such things had happened in the past. The logistics of interstellar warfare made such things rather difficult, thankfully, which kept most of the intrigue limited to proxy wars for the most part.
Lian took a breath, “Thank you for the briefing, Commander. Continue as you were.”
“Of course, Your Majesty.” The watch officer bowed slightly from the hip as she stepped away from the primary station and headed out of the room.
“Lord Jaol,” Lian said as they left, “Keep me updated on the status of our guests from the Republic. Likely they are merely hiding their intent from the Orions. However, they’re still playing their games here in our space.”
“Of course, Your Majesty. I’ll keep people on it through the entire festival.”
*****
Lian made her way to the throne room, where the ceremonies would begin, her entourage keeping up with her while remaining entirely out of her direct line of site. If not for the occasional echo of a footstep or whispered word, she might almost have been fooled into thinking she were alone and had some semblance of privacy.
That was something she could not remember ever truly having, not even when she was a child.
Lian pushed off those thoughts as she entered the throne room, her footsteps echoing through the large room as she did. The room was still sealed to the public, but there were people there making preparations, including one of the few she was genuinely pleased to see.
“Mother!”
“Hello Jinsha,” Lian said, smiling at her youngest daughter and child. “Are you enjoying the party?”
Jinsha Conwin nodded. The young girl of twenty was the fourth born of the Empress and a favorite child in the Court. Of course, at twenty she was no longer a child by some standards, but age had come to mean very different things than it once had. The age of full adulthood was around the age of twenty-five, after the physical development of the brain was confirmed to have achieved full maturity, rather than younger ages as it had been in the past.
A young adult in the Empire could expect another thirty or more years of schooling, and that was assuming they had a good idea of what they intended for their future and didn’t change their minds. Most tended to spend at least fifty years of advanced schooling, the first twenty or so often just spent sampling different disciplines while polishing the core competencies they would need in later life.
“It’s been fascinating, Mother, there are so many different people here now,” Jinsha said, smiling infectiously. “I’ve seen them from almost every world! It’s incredible!”
“It is,” Lian nodded in agreement as she stepped up to the throne and spun casually around before taking her seat. “Come, tell me about what you saw.”
“Well there were Orions in uniform,” Jinsha said, “Many of them were so strikingly handsome, I wonder if they were sent here because of their looks?”
“It is possible,” Lian said, “Though Orions profess to care about competence above all, they’re quite taken with first impressions and looks, in my experience at least. Their current Primarch is noted for having something of a thing for it, even.”
“That would explain it, I suppose,” Jinsha said thoughtfully. “They were terribly stiff, though.”
“Military people under orders to put forward their very best,” Lian filled in, “They’re all alike, aren’t they Lord Jaol?”
The Royal Steward, Richard Jaol, himself a General in the Imperial Army smiled tightly before responding, “We do seem to be, yes, your Majesty.”
“You do have other, more positive traits as well, I suppose,” Lian allowed, amused by the very limited expression shift on the man. “Are things ready for the ceremony?”
Jaol nodded, “We merely have to assign your personal guard for the duration, and of course those of the Princess and other Royal Blood. I believe that they should be waiting outside in short order. Once they’re in place, we are prepared to proceed.”
Lian nodded, patting her daughter’s hair lightly, “I believe it is time to move along then. Why don’t you see to that while I chat with Jinsha?”
Jaol bowed from the hip, keeping his back very straight, “As you command.”
Lian watched him turn on his heel and march out for a brief moment, but quickly turned her focus to her daughter again.
“Now then,” She said with a smile, “Tell me more about what you’ve seen.”
*****
“Come along, Eryn, we have our place to be in shortly,” Sylban said sternly as they moved through the palace. “You know your duties today?”
“Of course, Sylban, I won’t fail.” Eryn said firmly
Sylban glanced at him, expression inscrutable, only to nod firmly before pressing on.
Once they’d made it into the palace proper, the crowds had fallen off enough that they could move without being forced to fight their way through a throng of people pressing in on them from all sides. Now they mostly only saw uniforms and dignitaries as they passed, heading for the rally point they’d been assigned.
Members of the Imperial Legion had been summoned to provide additional security for the event, though their job was mostly to stand out and draw attention to themselves. The Legion uniform wasn’t flashy exactly, but it was distinctive and rare enough to stand out. In combination with their reputation as the Empire’s premier elite force effectively guaranteed that when they were on site, few people paid attention to the more common uniforms that might be milling about doing their jobs.
It was not the most enjoyable of duties the Legion could be assigned, but it was far from the least of those as well.
Sylban and Eryn entered the large ante-chamber that had been designated as the rally point, and noted that the room was nearly filled with Legion personnel already. A dull roar of their combined chatter raised the ambient noise in the room enough that one had to speak loudly to be heard… which, of course, made the problem worse.
“Stay at my side,” Sylban ordered, pushing his way through the crowd.
Eryn nodded firmly, pressing in as he followed in the older man’s wake.
The pair made their way through the room to the dais setup at the front, where they could see General Jaol standing at the podium in the uniform of the Imperial Forces, preparing to speak. A tone rang through the room, silencing all discussions in an instant as all eyes turned to the General who served as the Royal Steward.
“Legionmen, Legionwomen,” He said firmly in greeting, “It is good to see so many brothers and sisters in arms in one place that isn’t a battlefield.”
A quiet round of chuckles rippled through the room at the small joke. It wasn’t funny, exactly, but it was a sentiment that they all understood and shared. Legionnaires were rarely assigned in large numbers to any position and could often be almost entirely out of contact with their fellows for years on end.
If you ever got a large group of them together, that generally meant that things had gone so far bad that the light at the end of the tunnel was a WMD going off. That, in fact, had happened on certain occasions, much to the horror of the enemies of the Empire at the time.
“With Her Majesty’s Tri-Centennial celebrations about to kick off, we want a highly visible security presence,” Jaol informed them firmly. “It has been determined that you will form the vanguard of that operation. While not as demanding as some of the missions I have assigned you in the past, do not make the mistake of taking this lightly. The world, and the Galaxy, is watching. I will brook no foolishness that makes the Empress and Empire look any less than perfect in this.”
He glared around at them, looking for any hint that they weren’t taking him seriously, but apparently found none as he nodded curtly with a satisfied look on his face a moment later.
“Be visible, be friendly, answer questions, head off problems,” He commanded, “But most of all keep the attention focused on yourselves. Palace security is very good, and they will be working in the background to solve problems as quickly as possible. Your job is to keep focus away from them in this… a position I know you’re all familiar with.”
Another round of chuckles followed that, as it was certainly the sort of job they were often assigned… though in a hopefully less bloody battlefield this time.
Legion deployments tended to attract attention in a media saturated world, where practically everything one did was captured by a hundred cameras and broadcast live by someone, enemy, ally, or neutral. Oftentimes, hiding something was more a matter of trotting it right out under the public’s nose while distracting them with something more interesting.
The Legion were, by their nature, always the most interesting people in the area.
“Most of you have your assignments,” Jaol nodded, “Go about them.”
The room full of people saluted, practically as one before most of them broke rank and headed off to their assignments.
Eryn and Sylban remained behind, along with a few others, waiting for the General to finish up whatever details he was working on and turn his focus to them.
“Gentlemen, Ladies,” The General said firmly when he finally turned his focus to them, “Thank you for your patience.”
None of them responded, knowing it was a pro-forma statement, instead they opted to wait for their orders in silence and at attention.
Eryn shifted nervously, realizing that those who remained were a mix of veteran Legion and newly inducted members like himself.
“I’m sure the younger members here are wondering why they’ve been singled out,” Jaol said, a little more relaxed as he looked them over.
He didn’t wait for a response, not really expecting one.
“The Empress’ family will be in attendance, obviously,” Jaol said, “And so I’ve requested that some of our brightest up and coming members be made available to watch over them. You’ll be standing security, of course, but also acting as escorts and guides if the need arises. You are expected to be polite, friendly, and generally the life of the party… within the limits of decorum.”
He paused, glowering at the group, “You will not become inebriated, you will not embarrass yourselves or the empire, or you will find yourself quite permanently on my bad side. I would suggest to you, very seriously, that is not a place you want to be. Clear?”
Eryn just managed to keep from swallowing hard as he answered ‘clear’ along with everyone else.
“Excellent,” Jaol was smiling again as he straightened, “Your orders are in your personal accounts. Retrieve them, read them, enact them to the letter. That is all.”
They all saluted before being dismissed, and the last group of Legion personnel broke up and quickly went about their business, each checking their accounts immediately.
“What were you assigned to?” Sylban asked, not quite sounding bored, as they walked.
“Lady Jinsha,” Eryn responded.
Sylban glanced over sharply for a moment, eyes narrowing briefly before he nodded seriously. “Very well, see to your orders. I will see you later.”
“I will, Sylban, thank you.”
They stepped out of the inner antechamber of the palace and back into the ever-growing crowd of people, walking together in silence until it came time to part ways. Sylban headed on straight while Eryn took a small corridor off the main hall and headed deeper into the palace.
*****
Chapter II
Imperial Tower, Imperial Chambers
The Lady Lian looked out over the city that sprawled below the Imperial Tower, a mixture of feelings filling her as she thought about the event that was about to unfold.
“My Lady?”
“Legionnaire,” She said with a small smile, turning to see Sylban Gyver standing to attention at her back. “It is good to see you again.”
“You as well,” Sylban said stiffly.
“I trust all is prepared?” She asked simply.
“Indeed,” He nodded, “All progresses apace.”
Lian chuckled softly, “You have always had a way with words, Sylban. I think you much enjoyed old stories more than was quite normal.”
“In that I do not believe I was alone, Lian.” Sylban said with a melancholy smile as he relaxed slightly and walked forward. “Are you prepared for the day?”
She sighed, but nodded firmly. “It will be an event to remember, will it not?”
“One for the ages,” He responded in kind, his tone promising her just what he said.
“Good. The people need this,” She said.
They stood in silence for a moment, looking out over the city that was visible through the sparse cloud cover below the level upon which they stood.
“I noticed you assigned my Ward to your daughter,” Sylban said after a time.
Lian nodded, “It was… fitting. If you would have children yourself, I would have selected them, I have little doubt.”
“Not this again,” Sylban rolled his eyes, “No child should endure the consequences of the life I have chosen.”
“And yet how then, if they should not, do we pass on what is best of us for the future?”
Sylban had no response, his eyes troubled as he gazed on the city. Lian didn’t push him for a response, and the pair stood in silence for the remainder of their time in the privacy of the Empress’ chambers.
Finally, The Lady Lian sighed and turned away from the view.
“Once more unto the breach, my dear Sylban,” She said. “Who knows? Perhaps the gods will smile on us this time and things will be… better.”
“We can but hope, My Lady.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Observation Deck Twelve
Jinsha Conwin found herself people watching from the private balcony that overlooked the great square outside the Imperial Tower.
Hundreds of thousands had already flowed into the square, dressed in all manners from the most common and basic of clothing to uniforms to costumes from all manner of sources and even more levels of quality. She’d rarely, if ever, seen so many people on one place, despite living in the Imperial Capitol her entire life.
At twenty, Jinsha was still very much a sheltered child and she was well aware of that fact. She expected to be exposed more and more to the city over the next few years, eventually going out on her own when she was twenty-five and an adult in her own right, fully free to choose her own path as she began her advanced education.
She couldn’t wait.
Jinsha had already begun picking out the details of what courses she would begin with, and the type of apartment she would have. It was tradition that she would not use the Imperial holdings during her first few years of advanced education, so she would have to rent a place. Part of the reason for her being sheltered was, in fact, to keep her pictures from being spread far and wide, so that she could spend the early years of her advanced education with minimal influence caused by her position.
She would have resources, of course, but those would be on the order that any moderately wealthy Noble Child might have, and nothing more.
It was all terribly exciting, a true adventure in her eyes.
The sound of someone clearing their throat behind her caused Jinsha to jump, turning to see a young man standing there beside Lord Jaol.
“My Lady Jinsha,” He said, heel snapping together as he bowed from the waist.
Jaol glanced down at the young man with a tolerant look before turning back to Jinsha, “My Lady. This is Legionnaire Aubrey. He has been assigned to you for the duration of her Majesty’s birthday celebrations.”
“Thank you, My Lord,” Jinsha nodded to the older man, offering a somewhat shy smile to the young man in the Legion uniform.
“I will leave you to it then, My Lady, Legionnaire,” He said, shooting a mild glare of warning to Aubrey with his parting word, then the Lord Jaol turned on his heel and strode out of the room, the metal of his boots clacking with authority in each step.
“I do apologize for Lord Jaol,” She said with a smile, “He is somewhat… overprotective.”
“Not at all, My Lady,” Aubrey said with a shake of his head, “It was only right and proper.”
She sighed, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. She’d experienced far too much of the bowing and scraping over the years and, quite frankly, was tired of it all… at least sometimes. A little dark secret of hers was that she rather enjoyed making certain irritating individuals follow strict adherence to protocol.
Those were not the normal sorts, though, and for now she was not in the mood.
“Come up,” She said, turning back to the crowds just a few hundred feet below them. “The crowds have begun to gather, and I have been watching them, join me.”
She heard the click of his boots on the floor as he walked up beside her, but her focus was once again on the people below.
*****
Eryn wasn’t quite sure what to think of the Princess.
He knew that she was the youngest of the family now, but also the only one currently in the direct line of succession. Few people wanted to put up with the hassles of court, particularly when the Empress was expected to live for many centuries yet to come, and her other children had removed themselves from succession over the previous decades and more, many of them leaving the planet entirely to find their own paths going forward.
Young Lady Jinsha, less than a decade his junior, was largely an unknown beyond the confines of the Imperial court. Her birth had been celebrated two decades past, of course, with minor celebrations every year since in her honor, but no pictures had been released officially, and it was no secret that the Court ‘leaked’ photos of body doubles regularly to confuse the issue among those who might be trying to identify the young Lady of the Court.
The actual woman at his side was quieter than he had expected, glittering eyes intent on the crowds below. Eryn observed her out of the corner of his eyes while he too swept the crowds, though in his case he was looking for likely sniper positions and any threats that might need to be reported.
She was reasonably tall, nearing her full physical growth, standing at or just barely short of six feet compared to his own six foot three. Eryn himself wasn’t particularly tall for a man, just a bit above the average for one of his genetic background and class. The Princess was fairly tall for a woman in the modern scheme of things, though he knew that the Royal bloodline was noted for their height.
Emperor Conwin, The First of his Name, had been Six foot Three himself in an age when the average height for a man was around Five Foot Eleven. It was a trait that had been passed along to his progeny, clearly.
Beyond her height, The Lady had long hair that flowed down her back, glittering in the light cast by the sunlight as it descended down the tower. Silver blond, silken in the way that only came with some rather consuming efforts to make it so, the hair framed her face as she stood in the morning light.
Her sharp nose, another trait of the family he knew with certainty, was the defining feature of an otherwise baby-ish face, though he suspected that if her gaze was turned on someone it would be… riveting.
She was, in short, every bit the perfect princess he had expected when he received his assignment… except, she was quieter than his image of her had been, clearly shy and awkward in his presence though she tried to mask it with her interest in the crowds.
Interest that is clearly not feigned either, Eryn noted with awareness.
She was clearly examining individuals carefully, her expression one of avid interest in the goings on.
“Have you seen such crowds before, Legionnaire Aubrey?”
The question caught him by surprise, and it took Eryn a few moments to formulate a response.
“I’m not certain, My Lady,” He answered truthfully. “I have seen, and been in, crowds many times but this event is… special. There will be more here than normally gather, even for the largest and most important of events.”
“I see,” She said softly. “I have never been allowed out of the Imperial Tower, excepting controlled vacation visits to certain places.”
He nodded.
The tower itself was a nation unto itself in many ways. The exact number of people who made it home was one that fluctuated and was quite classified, but certainly numbered in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions. He had seen speculation that tens of millions could easily live within the massive structure, given that it brushed the very edge of the atmosphere itself.
Over the centuries, there was no doubt that many had lived their lives within it and never once stepped out into the world beyond.
He didn’t know, for himself, if he considered that impressive, tragic, or both?
He knew of many people who rarely, if ever, left their provincial region or city across the world, so he supposed it was just an extension of human nature.
“This will be my first introduction beyond the court,” She said, smiling slightly though her eyes were troubled, “I am… unsure how to act, I suppose.”
Something else he had no idea how to respond to. He couldn’t give the Princess advice, that was absurd, yet it seemed she was asking for just that.
Eryn hesitated, “I… I think that if you act as you will, while keeping to your duty and your honor, you will accomplish your task with ease.”
She laughed softly, “Is that the secret? So simple, you think?”
“There is an old turn of phrase,” Eryn said softly, “from a religion that no longer exists… If it harms none, do as you will. For most, this is the easiest of things to accomplish. For yourself, it will be much harder. Your actions, even in innocence, could cause harm to a man ten thousand miles away, who has never heard your voice, nor seen your face. Power, in any form, is a force multiplier. It makes our actions more effective, but our mistakes… more tragic.”
“You do not make me feel more at ease, Legionnaire Aubrey,” She said, sounding more amused than aggrieved.
“Apologies, My Lady Jinsha,” He bowed slightly, “But there is a truth there, I promise you. Mistakes will be made, people will be harmed, by your actions, by mine, by your mother’s… by everyone. There are two things an adult does that makes them an adult…”
“And what, Legionnaire Aubrey, pray tell would those be?”
“First, an adult thinks about the consequences, and tries to avoid causing harm,” He said firmly, remembering what Sylban had told him one afternoon after he’d accidentally injured a fellow trainee in sparring. “Most harm is caused by thoughtless action, and thus it can be avoided.”
“And when it cannot?”
“That is the second thing an adult does,” He said. “Take responsibility for the actions you caused, however indirect and unintentional they may have been, and seek to correct the harm as best you can.”
“Responsibility,” She said, seemingly tasting the word. “I’ve heard it many times, that word. Always it has a different meaning, depending on who’s mouth it comes from.”
“Aye, My Lady” He nodded agreeably. “Our language is an old one. If you can find only one meaning for a word or phrase written or spoken in it, then you have not actually looked for any other meanings.”
The Princess laughed, turning to look at him for the first time since they had been introduced.
“You, Legionnaire Aubrey, I believe I will come to like. Please, in private I am Jinsha.”
Eryn turned to her and tipped his head slightly.
“Eryn, then.”
*****
Imperial Court
Lian Conwin steeled herself as she made ready to give her speech to the gathered nobles, one that was required by tradition but also had a deeper meaning this year. She looked around the assembled court, wondering if anyone outside the rarified circles in which she walked would ever believe her if she told them the truth of how the Empire ran.
Once, it was true, the Imperial might… such as it was… was ruled by a single warlord.
That was no longer the truth.
“Pitr Conwin was a hard man,” She began to speak, drawing the attention of the court, “A man who lived in some of the hardest times ever faced by humanity in all of recorded history. He forged an army amid chaos, becoming a warlord. One among many. Over three decades, my grandfather eliminated his rivals and contemporaries, or he survived them in a few cases.”
She took a breath, looking over the faces who were staring at her in now rapt attention. It was rare that she spoke of her grandfather, and even rarer that she spoke of his victories.
That was something she left to others.
“Humanity on Earth was facing extinction,” She said in no uncertain terms. “Our climate was spiraling ever into the pit of a potential runaway greenhouse effect, but that was not the immediate threat that caused the fall of societies. No, we did that to ourselves.”
Lian looked to the visitors’ section, where representatives of the off-world colonies were seated. They too were listening closely, and she knew they would not like what she had to say next.
“The Diaspora movement that fed our Colonial descendants,” She gestured gracefully in their direction, “Cost this world every resource that could easily, and not so easily, be acquired. Colony ships are expensive and building them took money and funneled it off world. Metals, precious, common, and rare were torn from the Earth and shipped up to orbit, then flew away to other worlds. Trillions of tons of pollutants were poured into our skies in order to put those millions of tons into space… and our most brilliant, most educated, they filed onto the ships and left for the stars… leaving us, the remainder, to deal with what, and who, was left behind.”
She sighed deeply, “And when people realized what had been done… they revolted, though they saw and took action too late by far.”
Lian looked down, not wanting to see the expressions of the faces looking at her. She knew that they would be angry, betrayed, scandalized perhaps. Some would hate her for telling the truth, others for perpetrating propaganda that they’d been taught was false. She did not care. It was time.
“The world revolted.” She said firmly, looking up evenly again, “Against nations that cared not for the welfare of the people, but only for that of the corporations, or the rich, or the well connected. The people were rising up, only to find that the world they lived in had already been looted to the bedrock, and there was nothing left to save.”
Lian found Sylban’s eyes from across the room, and he looked straight back without looking away even for a moment. He was her rock in that moment, one of her oldest friends. She could not do this without him, she was sure.
“Upon that realization,” Lian said, her voice growing terse, anger flowing into her as she relived her first realization of what had happened, even through the filter of history. “The revolts fell into chaos. Helpless, and hopeless, filled with rage, the world descended into anarchy for a brief time before the warlords began to rise. Pitr Conwin was one of those, just one among so very many. Unlike many of his contemporaries, however, my grandfather understood what he was doing and the cost it would take from him. He was violating some of his dearest oaths with every conquest, with each freedom he stripped from the people, with each death he personally ordered. My grandfather, Pitr Conwin, chose to destroy his soul, a sacrifice to the altar of humanity on Earth. He took rights that were inalienable, and he buried those rights among the bodies of those he slew. He became everything he despised, because he saw no future for humanity here on Earth, unless we united.”
Lian took a deep breath, mouth dry, but refused the water that was offered by an aide at her side. She did not want her words to be lost in the image of her pausing for the comfort of a drink.
Instead she reached down and picked up a worn and tattered book, that was covered in stains, some of which looked to be blood.
“His hope for the future was written here,” She said, “He oppressed billions. He stole from them their rights, their self determination, their dignity, and even their lives… He did all this so that their children, and children’s children might one day reclaim those rights as well as a world upon which they might thrive!”
She paused, looking out over a sea of faces that were now rapt with attention, hanging on her words. She knew that was about to change.
“I say, that day is come!”
That set off a reaction.
They were no longer staring in rapt attention, the Nobility were openly scowling and calling her down with rapidly rising voices. The visitors had shifted, from their previous low- grade distaste to an intense interest. She could see signs of approval from the representatives of the Antares Cluster, which was expected. The more intensely avaricious looks from the Orions was also expected. She had no doubt that they were already calculating what they could gain from this shift.
The other visitors all held mostly the expected reactions that she had calculated already, just like the first two.
“My grandfather paid for our survival with his soul,” She said softly. “I ask that we return it to him, heal what we can of that poor tattered spirit, by fulfilling the one wish he had through that entire hellish time. Return the power to the people, where it belongs. I call for a return to free elections, and a shift of the power of legislation to representatives of our great people.”
She set the journal of her grandfather down on the podium and tapped a command that sent the unredacted contents out to every person within the Sol system.
“This is our duty, and I call on you all to fulfill it.”
Lian stepped down from the pulpit, leaving a roaring chaos in her wake.
It is done. The die has been cast.
She smiled as she walked off.
Finally. After so many years, I finally had the nerve to say it. Now, I just have to make it happen.
*****
The Empress’ words still ringing in his head, Sylban walked softly into the side room attached to the court, eyes scanning the occupants briefly before he nodded to them in turn.
“About time you arrived,” An irate man at the front growled. “We warned you what she was going to do.”
“You did,” Sylban nodded, his expression calm. “Have you considered your response?”
The change in the room could have chilled a lesser man, but Sylban just ignored it as a slight sneer played on his lips.
“Response!?” The man, the Marquis de Malances, slammed his hand down on the table in front of him. “What other response is possible to that… that… outrage!?”
Sylban raised an eyebrow, “If you choose this path, there is no going back. Consider that well, Marquis.”
“Damn you, we did not choose this, she did.”
“Very well,” Sylban nodded simply. “You have until the first steps are taken to reconsider. After that… there is no going back.”
He didn’t wait for a response, but simply turned and walked out of the room without giving the slightest attention to the once again shouting and arguing room.
*****
Chapter III
Imperial Tower, Public Ballroom, Ground Floor
Being sheltered from public perception had its advantages, Jinsha decided as she and her escort crossed the ballroom, barely causing a ripple in the crowd as they pushed through. There were so many people, she felt like she had as a child when she first got to explore other areas than the Tower, albeit under controlled circumstances.
The sights, sounds, and even smells were ambrosia, she decided as she danced through the crowds to the rough beat of the music. She could feel the presence of her Legionnaire escort, staying tight to her side as his sort always did, and was a little disappointed that he wasn’t any more relaxed than the older guards she normally was saddled with.
She wasn’t surprised, of course, professional was the watchword for his type. She was well acquainted with how that worked, having seen it all her life. She hated that almost every person she was permitted to associate with was essentially just doing their duty, but it had been a part of her life for as long as she could remember and so it just was what it was.
Still, she paused enough to let him catch up properly so she could jab him playfully in the side. She wasn’t surprised when he didn’t flinch, the armor under his clothing was easily felt as it responded to her action by tightening noticeably.
“Lighten up, Legionnaire,” She leaned in as she spoke, loud enough for him to hear but not loud enough for the sound to travel far. “It’s a party, remember?”
Jinsha was mildly amused to see a brief warring of emotions in conflict across his features, and honestly surprised when he smiled… slightly, but it was a smile, and nodded to her.
“You’re right, of course, Jinsha,” He said, his voice only slightly forced as he spoke her first name.
She raised an eyebrow slightly, amused to see the young Legionnaire… Eryn, she reminded herself… make a visible effort to relax. After a moment she laughingly rolled her eyes, “Hardly perfect, Eryn, but it will do. Come, dance with me!”
Then she pulled him more into the crowd, the press of the other dancers guiding the pair as they followed the flow.
*****
Eryn wasn’t quite sure how to deal with the situation, but he was doing the best he could. Legionnaire training did actually include dancing lessons, but those were nothing like this. The press of humanity around him was such that he could move with only rather restricted range, and the motions were more in line with nearly uncontrolled jerking motions than anything he might consider a dance.
The Lady Jinsha was enjoying it, as best he could tell however, so he followed suit and merely adjusted his motions so that he was slowly orbiting her, making her turn to face him while he was splitting his attention between her and eyeing the crowd and what was beyond them as part of his duties.
The Royal Guard would be in the area as well, of course, and likely would handle any issues long before he spotted them, but duty was duty.
*****
Orion Command Carrier Delaware
“Commander Washington?”
“What is it?” Grave Washington looked up as the Deck Watch approached him, he was actually reading the former Emperor’s journal as the recording of the Empress’ speech was paused on his desk’s display.
“We’re monitoring an increase in communications in cis-lunar space,” The young lieutenant said.
Grave shrugged, “That doesn’t seem surprising, Lieutenant. The entire planet is probably buzzing right now and would be after that speech even if there wasn’t a major planet-wide celebration.”
“Yes Commander, however, this is encrypted communications,” Andrea Smith said, frowning as she looked at her hand tab. “We haven’t yet been able to crack the encryption. Security is requesting clearance to use more computer cycles, that requires either you or the Captain to sign off on the request.”
“Encrypted? Interesting,” Washington set aside his own tab and got up, extending his hand to Smith. She handed her tab over without comment, and he flipped it around so he could see the details.
High level encryption, not what you’re likely to see a civilian use to hide their indiscretions, he noted with some interest.
He nodded, handing the tab back, “Authorized. Tell them to go ahead as long as they don’t bite too deep into normal operations… and nothing that affects readiness.”
“Aye Commander,” Smith said, tapping out a command. “Clearance authorized, limitations specified and entered into the log. Countersign?”
“Washington, Grave. Commander, Orion Navy. Countersign authorized,” Grave said into the record.
“Order confirmed, signed, and sealed. Thank you, Commander.”
“Not at all,” He said, gesturing idly, “Dismissed, Lieutenant, unless there’s anything else?”
“No sir, thank you sir.”
He watched her go briefly before turning to his own system and calling up the transmission tracking she’d brought to his attention.
The increase in encrypted signals was outside the expected rates they had projected based on the original baseline the Delaware had taken when they arrived in system, but the Empress’ speech had certainly put the cat among the neo-canaries so that wasn’t a surprise. The use of military grade encryption was a bit more of an eyebrow raising item, but probably didn’t mean much.
Military grade wasn’t exactly hard to come by. It was just overkill for most civilian use and would chew up computer cycles like no one’s business. It could be used quite easily, all the same, however.
Still…
He reached for the control panel and opened the Delaware’s own communication system, pinging the Captain.
“Clarke here,” The Captain’s voice came back almost instantly.
“Captain, Grave,” Grave said, “Delaware has picked up an increase in high grade encrypted signals, ranging from planetside to lunar orbit.”
“Unsurprising, I suppose,” Hidan replied, “Given her Majesty’s little shock-bomb. How much of an increase are we looking at?”
Grave checked the files quickly, “Three hundred thirty eight percent as of twenty-eight minutes ago.”
Hidan was silent for a moment, “Can we decrypt?”
“I’ve authorized enhanced computing cycles, as long as they don’t interfere with readiness, but I don’t know Sir.”
“Understood. Thank you, Commander. Contact me if you learn anything significant.”
“Aye Captain. Delaware out.”
*****
Imperial Plaza, Almansca
Hidan closed the communicator, frowning slightly.
“Problem?”
He looked over to where Barran was looking at him and shook his head.
“No, probably not, just the buzz from the Empress’ speech throwing our predictive systems off,” He said with a shrug. “A Command Carrier doesn’t like it when the area of space it is parked in suddenly lights up with encrypted communications from one side to the other.”
Barran laughed, a booming sound, “No, I expect not. It was an… interesting speech, was it not?”
“Very much so,” Hidan nodded. “I look forward to reading Pitr Conwin’s journal, I must admit. As a Brother, I had wondered how he could have justified many of his actions. Not the wars, of course, but…”
“Yes, the loss of freedoms under his rule were… notable,” Barran agreed soberly. “And quite clearly a violation of his oath.”
“Not the first time it has happened, but I wonder if I might not have done the same?” Hidan mused idly.
“Trapped on a world that was slowly destructing around him? Society crumbling, rule of law all but gone, even the planet itself seemingly in revolt?” Barran said rhetorically, fingers idly rubbing his Legion insignia. “I do not know. It is easy to criticize, of course, the actions taken in the moment are rarely ideal compared to what can be suggested with the benefit of hindsight.”
“All too true,” Hidan agreed before he forced a smile and lifted his glass, “Still, his descendant does us all proud. To her Majesty.”
“Long Live Her Majesty!” Barran boomed, his own drink sloshing as he lifted it.
The toast was echoed around them in a wave that propagated through the plaza as the pair downed their drinks and signaled for more to be delivered.
Hidan could feel the cheer in the plaza, masking the general discomfort he’d felt since landing on the world. The people of Earth had little love for off-worlders, there was a history there after all, and his uniform had garnered him more than a few looks of darker nature than he could rightly be comfortable with.
Now, however, almost all of that was gone. Vanished into the ether, as if by magic or something else. The Empress’ words were a balm to the wounded soul of the Mother World, perhaps. Hidan had little doubt that there would be more injuries to that soul before her vision came to pass, but he wished her the very best in making it happen.
That is a woman with Graph-Steel in her spine. Long live her Majesty indeed.
*****
Imperial Tower
Sylban walked casually down the hall, his pace easy and measured such that he knew exactly how many steps it would take to arrive at his destination. To an observer, he would have been simply walking as casually as anyone else in the area on that day, but those few who knew him would have recognized the stride in an instant.
A woman joined up beside him, neither looking at the other.
“Operation is a go.”
“I understand,” She responded seriously. “It’s been…”
Sylban cut her off with a gesture. “The walls have ears. I know.”
She nodded curtly and broke off, heading down a diverging hallway. He never altered his pace through the entire exchange.
Similar meetings happened dozens of times as he made his way through the Tower, his mind split between the moment and the future and the past.
Other men might have asked how things came to the place he was in, but Sylban wasn’t that sort of man. He knew exactly how he had gotten to where he was, every decision he had made paved the road he now strode upon.
At the center of the tower he walked right into an open lift door without pausing, having timed his arrival impeccably, then lightly touched the inside of his wrist to check his messages as the lift began to drop.
Nothing.
The Nobles would have one last chance to back down.
Then it would be beyond the point of no return.
*****
Imperial Tower, Second Floor, Open Air Public Address Overlook
Lian stood just out of sight on the overlook, shielded from the crowd by a reflective field that allowed one way transmission of light so she could see without being seen as she prepared for her speech to the people this time. Most of them had not yet heard of what she’d said in the Court, the second speech would be for them.
The crowd looked good, massive but well behaved. The Guard were there to ensure that, of course, so it hadn’t really been in doubt. They were very good at their jobs, after all.
“Your Majesty,” The Royal Chamberlain bowed slightly as he arrived, “All have signaled their readiness.”
“Very well, give the word that I will begin my speech shortly,” Lian said with a slight smile.
“Of course, My Lady Lian.”
He retreated, leaving her alone with her thoughts.
The end of an era of shame, she thought with quiet satisfaction.
It was, in fact, the culmination of three generations of planning. Overdue, even, as the final step should have been taken by her father but he had been blocked, of course, by the Nobility. Stubborn bastards they were, worshipping their power above their oaths.
It was not as though they would lose their fortunes, or even much of their power. Representatives, elected by the people, would simply take over the power of legislation. It was not the end of their decadency - it was merely a return of basic rights to those who properly owned them in the first place.
Lian believed, as did her father, and her grandfather, that the actions taken were necessary, but that did not make them right.
The rights of the people may not be a suicide pact, but that did not mean that there were, or should be, no consequences to trampling them. Not even if, and perhaps especially, when it was done in the best interests of said people.
Her family line was responsible for more deaths than most of the more brutish dictators in history.
I hope this begins to pay that bill.
Lian took a breath and walked out to meet the crowd.
She spotted Sylban appear just then, their eyes meeting, and was struck by the neutral gaze that stared back at her. Lian smiled at him anyway, then schooled her expression to a pleasant warmth as she prepared to greet the people.
*****
Imperial Plaza
“Come, Jinsha,” Eryn urged, “Your mother is about to give her speech.”
Jinsha nodded happily as she followed along. They were in the open air now, in the plaza below the overlook. The crowd was glorious, filled with all manner of humanity, and she could not help but stare in every direction she possibly could in an attempt to take it all in.
The people were all pressed in on them and each other. Everyone seemed eager for the upcoming speech, more than she had expected. She could hear people whispering excitedly. Her mother’s name seemed on everyone’s lips as was to be expected, but there seemed to be more excitement than would be explained by her annual birthday speech.
Or she believed so, at least?
Perhaps it’s because I see her every day, Jinsha thought.
She followed Eryn to a place where they could well observe the speech and looked up to the Overlook where she knew her mother would be presenting from.
At the moment it was empty, but that would change soon, she noted as the display monitors lit up to show that the Empress was preparing to speak.
The crowd quieted down, all eyes rising to the Overlook.
*****
Hidan settled in, leaning back against the open-air bar that he and Barran had staked out quite early in the day. The drinks were pricey, but that was a small price to pay for the comfort and service as they waited on the festivities.
The event was turning into an even bigger landmark occasion that he had been prepared to observe when he was assigned to visit for the Empress’ birthday celebrations. The command structure in the Nebula would be very interested in every bit of it, so he had his personal systems recording and tight beam broadcasting back to the ship, as he expected many others of the crew assigned ‘leave’ at this time were doing.
“This will be one for the ages, old friend,” Barran said beside him, leaning back with an odd smile on his face.
“I have no doubt of that,” Hidan answered, glancing over briefly before focusing back on the Overlook. “She’s already guaranteed that much, no matter the outcome.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Second Floor Overlook
Sylban watched as Lian stepped out into the open, the roar of the crowd hushing.
Last chance, He thought as he tapped his wrist to pull up his messages.
His heart actually skipped slightly as he saw the message there from the Marquis, and quickly opened it.
There were only two words.
Do it.
Sylban closed his eyes and took a deep breath, then he tapped his wrist again to open up his peer to peer communications channel.
“Operation is a go. I say again to all points. Operation is a go.”
*****
Chapter IV
Imperial Plaza, Almansca
Hidan leaned forward, eyes on the Empress as she took her place at the forefront of the Overlook. She looked… peaceful, and pleased with herself, he noted. He supposed that just by putting her message out, the feeling of taking the step was there, though he doubted it would be so easy to convince the Nobility that it was time to surrender any portion of their power.
If she truly believed that it would be so easy, the woman had less Graph-Steel and more rainbows and unicorns in her, but he didn’t get that impression from her original speech. She’d been fired up there, angry though in control. She knew the resistance she was facing.
I suppose that she’s just enjoying the moment.
One had to take their victories where they could, that was a lesson he’d hard learned.
He turned aside to speak to his companion when a wet slapping sound startled him, and a warm liquid spray splattered across his face. Hidan jerked away, like he’d been slapped, just as the whizzing sound of something passing through the air reached him, followed by a crack of the sound barrier being broken.
His body was already in motion before his head connected all the dots, grabbing Barran from where the man was sitting, and hauling his friend to the ground as he covered him with his own body.
Once there, however, he saw the blank look in Barran’s eyes, the fog of death already starting to form, and he knew he’d been too late.
He still has that smile on his face, Hidan noted numbly as he rolled off the body and scrambled for cover as other sonic cracks filled the air, just ahead of the screaming.
From cover, behind the open bar, Hidan risked a glance but couldn’t see much for the crowd. He automatically tapped his wrist, opening his personal computer.
“Hidan to all points, withdraw to the dropship! This is a direct order, do not get involved in the local fighting unless you are directly threatened. Again, I say, all points are to withdraw to the dropship. Pilots, prep for immediate dustoff!”
He looked regretfully at the body of his friend, reaching out to close Barran’s still open eyes before he took his own orders to heart and withdrew under cover amid the sound of screaming and gunshots.
*****
Eryn didn’t recognize the sound at first, he found himself looking around in slight confusion, expecting to see the Royal Guard closing on some fool who’d opted to set off fireworks from the crowd. People screaming and milling about, pushing, and shoving at one another as they tried to escape the area was not what he expected to see.
He stared, looking through the brief gaps in the crowd and his eyes widened as he saw a figure on the ground not far from where they were. Whoever it was, wasn’t moving, but what shocked him was seeing the familiar grey and gold of the Legion uniform.
He took an involuntary step toward the fallen Legionnaire, but a tight grip on his arm caused him to pull back and turn to the Lady Jinsha.
“We need to get under cover,” He said, more cracks filling the air as he grabbed her and wrapped her as much in his own body as he could, pushing toward the tower.
She let him guide them both, and they moved against the crowd, running now for the Tower.
“What’s going on!?” She yelled over the commotion.
“I don’t know, but it’s not good,” Eryn responded, shooting glances over his shoulder in furtive motions.
He saw the Royal Guard pushing people away, trying to clear space, and he headed them in that direction. Eryn ran with one hand behind his back, under the flap that concealed his auto-pistol, hand wrapped around the grip but he didn’t want to risk drawing the weapon with what looked like a lot of very edgy guards on the scene.
The closest guard was moving to block them until Eryn triggered his identification and he saw it ping on the Guard’s scanner, the light glimmering in the man’s eye. The guard moved back, pushing others clear as Eryn roughly pushed the Princess past the line and into the tower. He didn’t slow until they were inside, and well under the cover of the Tower’s walls and ceiling.
“Wha… what was that?” Jinsha panted, shocked.
“I don’t know,” he told her again, “but I think there was a sniper.”
Her eyes were wide, glittering with emotion as they turned on him.
“Someone was… shooting?”
He nodded, eyes sweeping the room. “We need to move. It’s not safe here. We’re still in the public areas. Let’s get you up to the Royal levels and find out what is going on.”
Silently she nodded, allowing him to lead the way deeper into the Tower.
*****
Sylban was moving as soon as the first crack of the sound barrier being broken washed over him. He sprinted out to where Lian was standing, grasping her, and turning to shield her with his body as he called out to the guards.
“Sniper threat!”
They were already moving, but that got them running faster as they jumped to their tasks. The defensive screen projectors whined as they began to power to full strength, and Sylban turned his head to look out over the crowd as the air between him and them began to darken from the screens.
He could see empty spots in the plaza, places the crowds had fled from. A body in the center of each hole in the crowd. Dozens of them, more. A lot more.
At the center of each, he recognized the grey and gold of the Legion Uniform.
“We have to move, Sir.”
Sylban nodded to the guard. “Form a perimeter around her Majesty. Proceed directly to the door, on my count! Three. Two. One. Move!”
Keeping the Empress’ head down, he moved with the guard on all sides, quickly making for the entrance to the tower. Behind him the screen had fully powered, becoming almost entirely opaque as it reached a strength level that would completely block small arms and even lower level artillery, as well as Beamlocks with no issue.
They got inside in seconds, where Sylban let Her Majesty straighten up.
“Mr Gyver,” She said crisply, brushing down the ruffled sections of her dress. “A status report, if you please?”
“The situation is evolving, My Lady, however at the moment I believe we shall assume an assassination attempt,” He said firmly. “The bodies I saw in the Plaza were all of Her Majesty’s Legion.”
Lian sucked in a sharp breath. “How many Legionnaires were present in the Plaza, Mr. Guyver?”
“Too many, My lady. Far too many.”
In point of fact, Sylban knew that most of the current active Legion were in the Plaza at that time.
“My Lady Lian,” He said. “We need to move you to secure quarters while the royal guard and your remaining Legion deal with this.”
Lian nodded, her face a mask.
“I see. Yes. Let us go.”
“This way, My Lady,” Sylban gestured inward to where the lifts were located.
*****
Almansca Spaceport, VIP Section
Hidan found when he arrived at the dropship that he was the last to arrive, though likely only because he stopped to round up a couple stragglers who’d showed up on his IFF as he’d passed. He shoved them into the ship ahead of him, then clambered in himself and pulled himself to the front by way of grabbing head rests and using the leverage to propel himself forward.
The pilot was already strapped in, bringing the reactors online while his partner was on the communications rig with the locals.
“Negative Almansca Control, we cannot wait. The Orion Navy is not party to your internal conflicts. Provide clearance and an approved route now…”
The man was growing irritated, which Hidan didn’t blame him for really, as the voice on the other side was clearly arguing with him. Hidan just tapped his wrist and overrode the communications link.
“Almansca Control, this is Captain Hidan Clarke of the Delaware. My dropship will be leaving the surface in thirty seconds. Provide an approved path to orbit or we will make our own.”
He left the signal open, ignoring the sputtering of the local orbital controller as he linked up with the Delaware.
“Delaware, Hidan,” He said.
“Go for Delaware, Captain Hidan,” Grave’s voice came back instantly.
“We are leaving the surface,” He said, “Monitor our flight, if anyone fires on us, consider it to be a hostile act and respond with all military force.”
“Aye, Captain. Will monitor, fighters are scrambling now. Delaware out.”
Hidan killed the link, satisfied that the local had gotten the message, and turned to the pilot.
“Commander, take us up. Full countermeasures stand ready, but take no hostile action unless they start it.”
“Yes Sir,” The pilot nodded to just behind Hidan, “Strap in, Boss. This might get bumpy.”
Hidan nodded and pulled down the folded-up jump seat, shrugging his arms into the straps as the pilot finished the check list. In a moment, the dropship had gone from whining to a deep rumble as the power was directed from the reactors to the thrusters.
A moment later he was pushed solidly back into the jump seat as the lithe craft leapt into the air, climbing hard for space and the waiting Delaware.
*****
“Sir, we can take the Princess from here,” The man in the guard uniform held up his hand as Eryn and Jinsha arrived at the central lift.
“That will not be happening,” Eryn shook his head. “I was ordered to provide escort and protection, and until I’m relieved by my superior, or someone in my chain of command, I am not leaving her side.”
The guard stared stonily at him, lips thin. His knuckles were white where they gripped the weapon in his hands, but it was aimed down and away so Eryn ignored the man’s tension and just stared him down.
“He stays with me,” Jinsha spoke up, her voice surprisingly steady given how badly she was shaking.
“Very well,” The guard said finally, stepping out of the way.
Eryn led the princess into the lift, the guards crowding in around them before the doors closed. Then they began to rise, heading up to the Royal Levels far above. Eryn’s thoughts, however, were back out in the plaza with the fallen Legionnaire he’d seen in those last moments before he’d gotten the Princess into the cover of the tower.
What just happened?
*****
Imperial Tower, Crown Level
Sylban led the way out of the lift into the open atrium of the Crown Level, head swiveling as he looked for any sign of a threat. Nothing was evident, so he waved the guard and the Empress out next, signaling the ranking guard over to him.
“We need an update on what’s going on,” He said, “Get someone to communications, and have us patched into the full command and control on the situation.”
“Yes Sir.”
The Guard in turn grabbed a junior member and sent him packing with the same orders while Sylban turned back to her Majesty.
“Are you alright?” He asked.
She smiled sadly, but nodded, “I am.”
Sylban nodded, turning as he heard steps behind him.
“Your Majesty,” Lord Jaol said, “It is good to see that you are well.”
“Yes, yes, good indeed,” The Marquis De Malances said with an entirely insincere smile on his face.
Sylban resisted the urge to roll his eyes, instead ignoring the Noble in favor of Lord Jaol.
The Lord looked them over briefly before turning to him, “I see you accomplished your tasks.”
“Yes, My Lord. As ordered.”
“Good work.”
Lord Jaol turned to the Empress, “Your Majesty, security on your rooms has been increased. The attack on the capitol has shown us the existence of a deeply entrenched anti-Imperial terror group.”
Lian eyed him darkly, lips twitching as she stared him down.
“Is that truly the best story you could come up with, My Lord?” She asked disdainfully.
“It is more than sufficient,” The Marquis sneered.
Jaol sighed, rolling his eyes.
“Fine,” The Lord said, “If we’re quite through with the veil of civility…”
“Civility. How many Legionnaires did you order killed today, My Lord?” Lian demanded. “A hundred? A thousand?”
“Enough to remove the threat of Her Majesty’s Own military force from the field,” The Marquis snarled. “The Guard belongs to the Court, and the Military to the Nobility. You and your arrogant assertion, that you even have the power to call for elections… of all the absolutely imbecilic concepts. The people, as if any of them have even the slightest idea of what needs to be done, what lies behind the decisions we make. They’re rabble, and you know it.”
Sylban chuckled as Lord Jaol barely hid his aggrieved annoyance with the Marquis’ foolish spouting. It was amusing to him, in that way that dark humor could become truly black and somehow become even funnier.
“Enough.” Jaol growled, “Secure her Majesty in her quarters. I’ve put a communications lock on the entire floor, we will be able to finish what needs to be done before we-”
He was cut off by the door of the lift opening, revealing a group of Royal Guardsmen, the Princess Jinsha, and a single Legionnaire who was looking rather confused as he took in the situation.
*****
The doors opened and Eryn made a half step forward before he recognized the faces in the group that had turned to face him. He should have been ecstatic, seeing Sylban and her Majesty, as well as Lord Jaol, all in one place. However, the positions they were in and the tension he could read in their body language made him retreat back that half step and frown in puzzlement.
“Ah, Eryn,” Sylban said, smiling at him in a way that Eryn had never seen the older man do in the past. “Good work bringing the Princess to her Majesty. Come along, bring her out, we’ll get the pair to the royal quarters and then go to help put down this little act of terror.”
Eryn stared blankly, knowing that there was something more to the situation, but unable to figure out what it was. Sylban had always been cool, overtly professional to a fault, and the change was setting off alarms. Eryn put his arm up, stopping the Princess from rushing out to join her mother.
“Sylban… what is going on?”
Sylban’s lips quirked up a bit more, his eyes dancing in amusement.
“Very good, Eryn,” He whispered, the words barely audible. “Very good indeed.”
“Enough of this,” The Marquis snapped, “Guards, kill the boy, secure the girl!”
Eryn Aubrey saw the motion out of the corner of his eye, registering the Guardsman drawing his weapon, and acted on instinct before his head could catch up to the situation. He twisted his torso, bringing the barrel of the pistol on his back in line with the Guardsman even as his hand closed around the grip of the auto-pistol.
His finger curled around the trigger as he turned to identify the weapon that was being leveled on him.
Eryn fired, the burst tearing through the holster the gun occupied, and the concealing flap of his jacket, the recoil aiding his draw speed as three spear tip piercing rounds hammered into the Guardsman armor from point blank range. He brought his pistol up in the other direction, inverted as he bent forward to evade the shot taken by the Guardman on his other side. The round struck the lift wall and whined as it ricocheted.
The Princess!
Eryn kicked out, sweeping Jinsha’s feet from under her as he fired his second burst into the Guardsman’s face. Blood sprayed the wall of the lift, Eryn pivoting to target the next as the Princess fell backward with a look of shock and fear plastered across her face.
His pistol roaring in the confines of the lift, Eryn pivoted with each burst to change targets, his free hand reaching down to snag Jinsha’s dress at the shoulder before she managed to hit the floor. He used the grip to ease her from a heavy hit to a softer landing as he fired his last burst into the sole remaining Guardsman, the man hitting the ground as Eryn’s pistol locked open on the empty chamber.
Crouching over the princess, Eryn took several deep breaths, adrenaline flooding his system. He heard a slow clapping sound behind him, and slowly turned as he straightened up, keeping his body between the Princess and those outside the lift.
“Excellent form, Legionnaire Aubrey, truly Excellent,” Sylban said, clapping. “Don’t you think so, your Majesty? Lord Jaol?... Marquis?”
The way he said the last word, filling every syllable with the most obvious dripping disdain Eryn had ever heard caused the younger man to glance in the Noble’s direction. The Marquis was on his ass, scrambling backward away from the lift, his face as white as death, eyes wide with terror.
“Kill them!” The Noble screamed. “What are you waiting for!? Kill them!”
“Calm yourself, Marquis,” Jaol growled. “The boy is unarmed, his weapon is empty.”
Eryn’s eyes flicked from Lord Jaol to Sylban, who genuinely seemed to be enjoying every moment and had no apparent inclination to offer his own suggestions at the moment.
“I… I don’t understand,” Eryn said, fighting to keep his adrenaline up as he could feel it already beginning to ebb, bringing the post combat shakes much earlier than he was prepared to deal with them. “What is happening here?”
“Oh, don’t disappoint me now, Mr Aubrey,” Sylban smirked at him. “It’s a coup, of course. Perhaps I could convince you to sign on with the winning side? I assure you, the rewards are… significant.”
*****
Chapter V
Imperial Tower, Crown Level
“What.”
Honestly, Eryn couldn’t think of another thing to say. He didn’t actually believe that he’d heard Sylban correctly. His mentor had trained him in the rigors of duty, of honor. It made no sense to his mind, it was like Sylban had just spouted pure gibberish. Actually, that would have made more sense by far.
“Well you certainly can’t believe you have a chance, can you?” Sylban said reasonably. “That was very nice, of course, but taking out a handful of Guardsmen with your pistol in close quarters is a far call from taking out twice that number who already have you in their sights, while you’re trapped in a lift… and even if you could, boy, do you truly believe you can take me?”
Eryn’s eyes darted, taking in the situation.
Sylban wasn’t wrong.
There were ten armed Guardsman, all with their weapons already drawn and aimed at him. His empty pistol wasn’t going to be much help. Hell, even if he could get his single reload magazine into the weapon it wouldn’t do much. He’d be cut down before he got the weapon brought onto target.
He briefly considered his beamlock, but it was a single shot weapon, and he doubted he’d even manage to get to draw it before being cut down. Behind him, Eryn felt the Princess getting to her feet, but remaining hidden mostly behind him.
“Your beamlock, right?” Sylban asked, “You’ll never draw it in time, and even if you do… who do you choose before you’re killed? Me? Lord Jaol? The Marquis?”
The noble squeaked in terror, but they all ignored him.
“Surely you wouldn’t waste that single shot on a Guardsman, would you?”
Eryn tensed, hands twitching as he slowly moved it closer to where the Beamlock was holstered.
*****
Sylban grinned, “Look at him, My Lord. He’s actually running the numbers, thinking about going for his ‘Lock.”
“I see it, Legionnaire Gyver,” Jaol rumbled, “You trained your apprentice well. Too well perhaps. Children should know their place, and when the situation they’re in is untenable. You Legionnaires, stubborn to the point of suicide. Boy, don’t be a fool. You’ll be cut down in an instant, and the Princess might be killed in the exchange.”
That was enough to make the boy stop the motion of his hand toward his Beamlock. He still stood there, though, uncertain yet defiant. Jaol might have considered it impressive, if it weren’t so damned irritating.
“Why should we care if the girl dies! Kill them both!”
Jaol shifted to look at the Marquis, who had gotten to his feet. His deathly pale features had become flushed, a deep angry red suffusing his face as he ranted at them. Jaol ignored him.
“Boy, send the girl out and you’ll both live.” He said simply. “My word of honor on it.”
*****
Sylban was proud of himself for not laughing out loud when he heard that offer. The action would likely have been taken… wrongly.
He did, however, sigh aloud.
“Eryn, it’s time to come out, you’re risking the life of your charge,” He said firmly. “There is no exit plan here, you’ve been cornered. Live and learn, fight another day.”
Sylban focused on Aubrey’s body language, and he could see the boy considering the options, looking for a way out. He knew there was none, and, when Eryn’s shoulders slumped just slightly, he knew the boy had determined the same thing.
He knew the boy was about to surrender.
Sylban, in that moment, drew his auto-pistol, aiming at Eryn.
“Now, Mr Aubrey.” He shifted the aim of the pistol, putting the sights on the head of the Princess behind him, “Or I kill Lady Jinsha.”
“Sylban!” Lian called firmly, no hint of panic in her tone, “Your oath!”
Sylban’s eyes flicked to one side, focusing on Lian.
“I remember my oath,” He said in his coldest, most emotionless tone. “Well, Eryn? You have from Three. Three.”
He waited a moment, eyes not leaving the Empress.
“Two.”
She tensed as he flicked his gaze back to the pair in the lift.
“One.”
Sylban tightened his finger around the trigger of the auto pistol even as Her Majesty threw herself forward. His pistol roared, the burst hammering three blows to the center of Lian’s chest. A blossom of red flowed from her gown as she continued to fall. Sylban forced himself to focus on the boy he’d trained, however, the boy he’d mentored, brought into the Order.
He felt a bit of pride when the boy dropped his pistol and went for the Beamlock Sylban knew he was carrying.
It didn’t stop him from firing, however.
The auto-pistol roared again, and again, and again. He put burst after burst into the boy’s chest, the rounds flattening against the charged carbon weave, but staggering him back into the princess, pushing her into the wall behind them. Sylban strode forward with even steps, the Guardsmen behind him moving into position to get shots of their own but held back as he blocked the path.
Sylban’s weapon locked open and he cast it aside without a thought, drawing his own beamlock in a smooth motion. His thumb flipped a wheel on the base of the weapon, breaking the seal that kept the chemicals within separate. The weapon warmed as the two chemicals mixed, charging it with power.
Eryn had stumbled, sliding down from the hits to his armored jacket. His eyes were wide as he stared down the lens of the beam weapon.
Sylban smiled thinly and adjusted his aim up, aiming right for the Princess.
“NO!”
Eryn surged up as Sylban fired, the pencil thin beam carving through the charged carbon weave armor like it was nothing more than paper. It burned through flesh, bone, more of both, then hit the carbon weave on the other side before running out of power.
The princess screamed, Eryn dropped, and Sylban turned the weapon to look at it in annoyance before he tossed it too aside.
He didn’t pause in his stride toward the lift, however.
*****
Eryn gasped agony. He felt like his chest was on fire, and then realized that probably wasn’t a horrible description for what had happened. He slid to the ground, Jinsha screaming above him.
They were going to die if he didn’t get them out of there.
He didn’t even think about it really, just automatically turned his wrist up and tapped it to activate his personal system. He was still on the lift system, and as he stared at the approaching visage of his mentor, the betrayer, walking toward them, Eryn repeatedly hit the command to shut the doors.
They slid closed as Sylban walked right up to them, closing right as the other man was against them. Any closer and he would have jammed his nose in the door, Eryn thought with some level of hysteria.
Jinsha was screaming and crying, his chest was burning such that he wondered if he were dead already and just hadn’t been smart enough to give up.
Maybe I am… but I won’t stop until I can’t go on.
He entered a command, letting the lift whirr to life and start climbing again.
*****
Sylban stood face to the door for a long moment before he turned around and walked over to where the Empress lay on the floor.
She wasn’t moving, and he knew that she would not move again.
“What did you do?” The Marquis whispered. “We needed the Empress alive!”
“We can make this work,” Jaol said. “The rogue Legionnaire assassinated Her Highness… no… The Legionnaires did as a whole. The entire unit is to be declared rogue and hunted down. Sylban, you will see to it.”
Sylban considered that for a moment, tipping his head, “As you wish.”
Jaol turned to the Guardsmen, “Go! Find them, capture them if you can, kill them if you must, but I want both of them - or their bodies - in front of me within the hour!”
The Guardsmen snapped into action, saluting before they started trying to follow the order, talking rapidly into their communication systems.
“That won’t help,” Sylban said, rolling his eyes at the antics, “We scrambled comms, if you all recall? You need to go floor by floor, in person.”
They stared at him, like they didn’t understand what he said.
“You heard him!” Jaol snarled, “move!”
The guards ran.
*****
Imperial Tower, Lift
“Oh god, oh god, don’t die, please don’t die.”
Eryn opened his eyes, looking up at the Princess who was leaned over him. The wash of her hair was brushing across his face, making him desperately want to sneeze. He flopped his hand up, brushing her hair away and rubbing his nose to relieve the urge without actually sneezing and maybe rupturing his lungs if the laser had burnt up anything vital.
“I’m not going to die,” He groaned, hoping that was true.
He forced himself up, leaning against the back wall of the lift and looking around briefly before checking his personal computer. They were still going up on the track he’d set before. He hadn’t been out for too long, apparently.
He took a breath, testing his lungs as he gingerly poked his finger through the hole in his armored uniform jacket. The laser had burned a neat little hole, and there was plenty of blood around it but not enough to have hit an artery.
Just as well, I doubt I’d have woken up if it had.
He held his breath slightly but didn’t feel an unusually sharp pains beyond the obvious, and no bubbling air came out of the hole either.
That is just unreasonably lucky.
“I’ll live,” He reiterated, awkwardly patting the princess’s shoulder. “The beam missed my heart and my lung. I’m not going to have a good time of it, but I will live.”
He looked at her and knew that she was riding close to the ragged edge. He didn’t blame her, not in the least, considering what had just happened, but she couldn’t break down. Not yet.
“Help me up,” He said.
“W- what?”
“Help me up, we have to get moving.”
He put an arm over her shoulder, then waved at her with the other.
“I’m serious. You need to help me up.”
“But you’re hurt!”
“I’ll be a lot more hurt if they find us,” Eryn promised her. “Come on, help me up.”
She stared at him, wide eyed, but nodded and started to stand up. It was a struggle for her, his weight was awkward on his shoulder, but she managed it and in short order, Eryn had his feet under him.
“Where are we going?” Jinsha asked, looking up as if she could see the destination from inside the box.
“Military hangar,” He said, “Level Thirteen Hundred. It’s used for VIP transit mostly, but there’s also a ready response squadron stationed there. They’ll probably be deployed by this point, give what happened below, so it should be clear of all but the deck crews.”
“Are… are we leaving?”
He nodded firmly, “We can’t stay. My… Gyver shot the Empress, and we know that the Nobles are in on it, some of them at least. There’s nowhere to turn right now that’s secure. We need to get off world, I think.”
“Off… world?”
Her voice was filled with both trepidation and wonder at the words.
“Yeah. The Nobles control everything on Earth,” Eryn said tiredly. “They own the military by and large, in effect at least, since the Officer’s corps is formed from people sponsored by the Nobility. That puts us in a bit of a pinch, well… me at least.”
He looked over at the Princess evenly.
“Only you?”
“Maybe.” Eryn sighed, “Look, if you surrendered to them, the chances are they’d treat you well. They wouldn’t let you go anytime soon, or maybe ever, but you’re the next in line to be Empress. You’re valuable to them. I’m not.”
Jinsha stared, wide eyed, her expression like an animal caught in the brights of an aircar.
“I’m not saying you should, or shoudn’t,” He said, “Just want you to know the options. I have to get offworld, you have a choice…”
“Flee, or… be locked up in my rooms for the rest of my life.”
“I didn’t say it was a good choice.”
*****
Is he serious?
Jinsha had never been forced to think about something this serious before, let alone have it dropped on her like this.
So much had happened.
The attack, then her mother…
Don’t think about that now, don’t. Don’t!
The day had destroyed her world, and she didn’t know how to deal with the changes. She did know, however, that she couldn’t trust the people who killed her mother.
“I can’t go back. I’ve been locked up my whole life, for my own good,” she said, cringing. “Now, if I go back, it’ll be for someone else’s.”
Jinsha shook her head, her vision blurring as she resisted the urge to wipe at her eyes.
“If they catch us, then so be it,” She said, “but I won’t go willingly.”
Eryn looked at her seriously for a moment, his silence making her nervous until he finally broke it.
“Alright. Then listen carefully,” He said, eyes closing as he took a breath, “Lean me back against the wall.”
She did so, as gently as she could, and he braced himself so he wouldn’t slip or drop.
“Ok, I need you to search the bodies, get the magazines for their weapons,” He told her. “They are interchangeable with my pistol. You’d better grab one of the pistols for yourself, and a knife. They’ll have knives under the thigh flap on the right.”
Jinsha cringed as she looked at the bodies, her initial reaction being that there was no chance she was going to touch any of those. However, her brain caught up with her emotions and she steeled herself to do what had to be done.
She found a knife first, pulling it out of the sheathe and holding it up.
“Cut the sheath free from the belt,” He told her, “You’ll need something to keep it in, it’s sharp.”
Right.
She did so, surprised by how quickly the tough material parted under the edge of the blade. In a moment she’d recovered the sheathe and slide the blade back into its home before tucking the slim package into the waistband of her gown.
The Magazines came next, and Eryn had to instruct her on how to eject them from the weapons, but in short order she had ten mostly full magazines, one knife, and one pistol for herself.
“Pass me some of the magazines, keep whatever you can carry,” He said, “We probably won’t need them, and it’ll be worse if we’re spotted lugging around an obvious pile of ammunition, so drop the rest.”
Jinsha nodded, finding places to hide as many as she could on her person, which wasn’t as many as she’d have liked. Eryn seemed in a similar spot, but in the end, they had to leave four of the magazines behind as the lift chirped that it was about to arrive.
Eryn pushed off the wall, his pistol in his hand as the doors opened and he peered out.
“It’s clear, come on,” He gestured,
Jinsha cautiously stepped out, only noticing the smell that had permeated the lift when she felt the fresh air fill her lungs. She gagged, a hand flying to her nose, but he pushed her along as he hit a series of commands before staggering out of the lift himself.
“What did you just do?” She asked as the doors closed.
“Sent it to the top, express run,” He told her. “There’s a private space port there, with a short hop flight to the LaGrange stations. It’s a likely destination someone who’s running might head for. Either that or down to the ground, or one of the public hangars for private craft on the lower floors… since we were already heading up…”
He shrugged, nodding up on up ahead.
“Ok, try to walk naturally,” He gritted his teeth as he straightened his spine and started to walk with a surprisingly smooth cadence. “Don’t talk to anyone, don’t look at anyone. You’re the daughter of Nobility, everyone here… me especially… is below your notice. Clear?”
Jinsha nodded uncertainly, feeling a bit of a tremble in her hand as she followed along behind him. It was all, she had to admit, rather exciting. The terror was still there, of course, but without actual guns pointed at her or… well, without all that, she felt a little like she’d always imagined the heroes on vids felt.
The corridors were quieter than she expected, which she quietly asked about.
“There’s an active alert,” Eryn said, “everyone is at the stations or locked down. Especially on levels like this, there won’t be many people out. Just people who need to be… and us.”
“I think we need to be,” She offered tentatively.
He turned to look at her and flashed a confident smile, “We do indeed. Come on, it’s right up ahead.”
Jinsha nodded, following him as Eryn lead the way.
*****
Imperial Tower, Command and Control
Lord Jaol strode into the center, eyes sweeping left and right as he ensured that his people were all in the proper locations. He didn’t expect any issues, but it was better to have as few variables unaccounted for as possible when dealing with the complex interactions of potentially hostile situations.
Aside from the death of Her Majesty, which was of minor impact in his mind, the plan was thus far progressing quite nicely. The Princess would be recaptured shortly, which would ensure that the bloodline of the Conwin family remained in control of the Empire, even if in name only.
A child of the young girl, properly trained from birth, will be perfect to ensure the continued growth of the Empire. What was Lian thinking? Taking votes, when the Colonies were taking all our offworld holdings, one at a time? Utter lunacy!
He did regret her death, in a personal way, however.
Lian Conwin was a good woman, merely an overly idealistic one. Well suited to leadership under most circumstances, but too soft to deal with the harsh realities of the hostile galaxy in which they existed. If the Terran Empire wanted to be more than just a footnote in the history of Humanity in the Milky Way, hard decisions would have to be made.
Jaol doubted that the Nobility were ready for what they’d just started, but that was not his problem.
If they gave him any problems, well he had his own Legionnaire who did understand what the galaxy really was, and they merely had conventional security. Sylban could slice through any of that with his eyes closed, and any of the Nobles who endangered the future of Humanity in the Milky Way would meet him in their last moments on this Earth.
Jaol had little care for what power struggles and hedonistic pursuits they engaged in, so long as they did not get in the way of Terra’s destiny.
He gestured to one of the Deck Officers, and the man rushed over.
“Have they located the Princess yet?” He demanded coldly.
“Not yet, My Lord. The Guardsmen have alerted all floors, but it would help if someone had identified the lift car…”
“Unfortunately, we didn’t manage to get the serial,” Jaol growled. “Find her and bring her back safely. Her kidnapper, well… I care significantly less about.”
“Of course, My Lord!”
*****
Chapter VI
Orion Command Carrier, Delaware
Hidan strode onto the bridge of the Delaware, his steps sure and with purpose as he headed straight for the central console.
“Report,” He demanded simply.
“Very little is being released to the public as of yet, Captain,” Grave told him. “Official traffic is, of course, heavily encrypted. We have intercepted short range traffic, intermittent of course…”
Hidan nodded. Short range comms weren’t powerful enough to reach far, but a good communications suite like that on the Delaware could occasionally pick them up from far beyond the expected ranges.
“Anything of note?”
“Guardsmen within the tower have been alerted that the Princess has apparently been kidnapped, and there’s some confusion about the current status of the Empress,” Grave said seriously.
“Kidnapped?” Hidan asked sharply, “How? You’d have to be pure magic to get anyone out of that place. It’s a literal fortress, and they’ve grounded all flights. We practically had to threaten war just to get our people back on board the ‘Ware.”
“Unknown, however they don’t think she’s been extracted as of yet,” Grave said, “The intercepts indicate that they’re searching floor by floor for the kidnapper and the Princess.”
“Whoever it must be mad. Do we have an identity?”
“A Legionnaire, apparently, by the name of Eryn Aubrey.”
“Aubrey?” Hidan frowned, “That sounds… familiar. I may have met the boy, if it’s who I’m thinking of. He’s a bare pup, only out of diapers on a technicality from what I saw. No child that young plans something like this.”
“There’s no word of whether he’s acting alone,” Grave said with a shrug.
“Has the name…” Hidan snapped his fingers a couple times, “Gyver. Sylban Gyver. Has that name come up?”
“Yes Sir, how did you know?”
“Is he implicated as well?”
“No, Captain,” Grave said firmly, “Sylban Gyver has been placed in charge of the effort to locate and destroy the terrorists and has issued orders to kill the kidnapper on sight.”
Hidan straightened up, eyes narrowing as his nostrils flared.
“Captain? Are you alright?”
“I’m fine. Monitor the situation, keep me apprized.”
“Yes, Captain.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Military Hangar, Level 1300
Eryn walked into the Hangar, focusing to ignore the pain in his chest as he kept his pace even. The deck crews were in the area, but they were all focused on their jobs and generally had no interest in bothering someone in a Legion Uniform anyway, which was working in his favor.
“Over there,” He hissed softly, nodding to where there was a craft sitting quietly in the alternate positions near where the Ready Squadron would have deployed from.
It was an IF-98 ‘Raging Roc’, one of the mid-range multi-purpose fighting vehicles in the Imperial inventory. The Roc was armed, of course, but more importantly it was capable of getting out of the atmosphere and moving around the solar system.
They walked toward it. Eryn was mostly focusing on not doing anything that would attract attention the entire time.
Like walking along with a freaking princess in a full gown.
Part of him was surprised they didn’t gather more attention, but the part that had been enduring military training for the past decade knew that when you were doing your job, you didn’t pay attention to anyone who looked like they halfway belonged there. He figured that he and the Princess qualified for halfway, if only barely, as long as no one got a close enough look to see the blood stain growing on his uniform jacket.
The ramp into the back of the Roc was down, so he just walked right up it like he owned the damn bird.
Once inside, and out of sight, Eryn fell into a jump seat with a groan.
“Are you alright?” Jinsha hissed, looking back the way they had come furtively.
He nodded, getting his breath back and focusing on driving the pain back down.
“Fine. Go over there, there’s a medical locker, bring me the case inside, would you?” He asked, pointing
She swallowed, but nodded and headed in the direction indicated. She found the locker easily enough, and it was designed to be self evident for both visual and how to use. She pulled the case out and hurried back, dropping it in the seat beside him.
Eryn popped the case open and grabbed a high-pressure multi-injector. It wasn’t proper care, but it would do for what he needed just then. He dialed up the fast-acting painkiller first, injecting himself just above the heart, then followed that with an antibiotic dose and finally a strong stimulant shot.
He sucked in a deep breath as the stim hit, wincing in anticipation of the pain but the first shot had already done its job. He set the injector back in the case and dropped the lid shut before he got back to his feet.
“Ok, I’m good for a little bit.”
“Don’t you need… a doctor?”
“Probably,” Eryn acknowledged, “But that won’t happen for a bit, and we need to get out of here.”
He checked the lockers and was disappointed though not surprised when he didn’t find any flight suits. Eryn gnawed nervously at his lips as he considered that.
Strictly speaking, they didn’t need flight suits to take the Roc out, but he knew for damn sure that there was a good chance that the local response squadron would be on their tail in short order, and he didn’t want to be in vacuum without a second layer of defense in case of an atmospheric leak.
“I have to go get something,” He said, checking his pistol quickly before he slipped it into the horizontal holster along the small of his back. “I want you to go sit in the cockpit and duck down. Just stay out of sight, I’ll be back as quickly as I can.”
She nodded slowly, “Alright.”
“I’ll be right back,” He stressed, “Don’t panic, just wait calmly.”
Jinsha nodded.
Eryn backed out a few steps, watching as she ducked into the cockpit, then pivoted and took a moment to put back on his ‘official’ attitude.
Then he was down the ramp and back out into the Hangar proper.
*****
Imperial Tower, Her Majesty’s Legion Command
“We have Code Blacks all over the Plaza, Watch Commander! Three hundred and eighteen so far, still counting!”
The Watch Commander was stunned to his core, unable to process the deaths of that many Legionnaires in so short a time, at a celebratory event of all places! In a battle, this would be a tragic day. He didn’t have words for what this was.
“Send reinforcements,” He ordered, “Call the Guardsmen, find out what’s going on from them and tell them we’re dropping a response team on site!”
“Guardsmen are not responding, comms are scrambled… direct lines are just dead.”
“That’s impossible.”
And it was, as far as the Watch Commander knew. In order to kill the direct lines, it would take an absolutely unprecedented infiltration of the Tower’s security systems.
The only way that could happen was…
“It’s Treason, I’m afraid.”
Those in the room turned to the voice, recognizing the man who’d just entered.
“Legionnaire Gyver? You know what this is all about?” The watch commander started to cross the room, looking at his fellow Legionnaire and hoping for answers.
“Oh yes,” Sylban said, “I’m afraid I do.”
“Well, what hap-”
Sylban reached up over his shoulder, hand closing around the hilt of the saber held there. The blade glowed as his biometrics were recognized and, as he drew the weapon up, the scabbard snapped open to free the blade on a short draw. Sylban just swept the weapon over his shoulder, slashing down across the other man’s shoulder and chest.
Charged carbon armor that could stop nearly any sort of projectile or even a laz-beam in sufficient charge and weight parted like tissue before the self-assembling edge of the single edged Legion field saber.
The watch commander managed to let out a yell of warning before he was cut down, but Sylban didn’t pause as he kicked the dead man aside and strode in. The pair of Legionnaires inside were already pulling their pistols, the snub barreled weapons seeking him as he moved. Sylban ignored them, mostly, intent on closing the range and willing to trust his armor against the guns in question.
They both snarled as he strode in, lifting his off hand up to cover his face with the armored sleeve of his jacket. Sylban knew that they were using the weapons primarily to slow him down as they drew their Beam-Locks, the single shot weapons being the preferred tool to perforate Legion armor at range.
He heard the hum of a lock’s power core catalyzing, then the snap of it firing. His chest heated up, burning him under the armor as the heat spread through the sinks, but unfortunately for the pair Sylban had changed to heavy field armor and made certain that the graphene capacitance of the jacket was fully powered before he entered the room.
In another second he was amongst them and with two quick slashes the fight was over.
With three bodies cooling on the ground, Sylban walked over to the communications console and entered a code.
“Legionnaire Gyver reporting, operation concluded.”
“Good work, Gyver,” Jaol’s voice came back a moment later. “The Guardsmen are having issues locating the Princess. If you can find that young whelp of yours, do so. Otherwise, continue as planned.”
Sylban snorted but kept his thoughts out of his tone.
“Will evaluate the scenario and advise.” He said, “Gyver out.”
The communications link closed, Sylban tapped in another command into the system, bringing up an overview of the Tower Schematics.
There weren’t many options for young Aubrey to take, not given the scenario he was facing. The guardsmen were idiots, Sylban decided as he noticed that they were actually doing a floor by floor search.
Certainly, every floor needed to be checked, at least in a cursory manner, of only to be certain that Aubrey wasn’t faking them out and intending to double back, but Sylban strongly doubted that was the boy’s plan. Doing a fully intensive search was an impossible task, and an obvious waste of time.
With what he knew, the boy had to be planning on leaving the tower as quickly as possible. He knew that the tower was hostile territory, and with the Princess in tow there was no way the boy was planning on a little guerilla style revenge.
Priorities, Eryn. What are yours?
Sylban filtered out every floor that didn’t provide an exfiltration point, which was the bulk of them. That left a few private transport hangars, all owned by the Nobles, the top deck launch point, the lift mechanism of course, and a ready response hangar just up past the midway point of the tower.
At least the guardsmen have the lift points locked down, so he won’t be using those to get back down, Sylban noted. Even guardsmen get something right once in a while.
There was one lift still in motion, on an express heading for the top deck.
That makes sense, He thought.
The top deck included an orbital launch point, used to put VIPs in orbit as economically and comfortably as possible. That would get them off world, at least out to one of the LaGrange stations, from which they could grab a shuttle and make a run for any number of other destinations.
With the Free Worlds and Orions, among so many others, represented in orbit, the Princess could easily negotiate sanctuary, Sylban noted, and from what he knew of her she might just do that.
Eryn, however…
His young protégé wouldn’t even consider that option, however, for multiple reasons. He wouldn’t be used to thinking in those terms for one, but more importantly Eryn would try to keep the situation internal for as long as he could. That was how he was trained to think.
Involving outsiders would potentially harm the Empire.
So… the private hangars or… the ready response deck?
There was no real question which.
Sylban tapped in a quick message, then initiated an administrative wipe on the console before he turned and strode out of the Legion Command Center, jabbing fingers at the waiting Guardsmen he’d told to stay outside as he passed.
“You two, clean up the mess in there,” He ordered. “The rest of you are with me.”
“Yes Sir.” The squad leader said as they fell in behind him. “Where are we going?”
“Level 1300.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Ready Response Hangar – Pilot’s Ready Room
Eryn slipped into the room, eyes sweeping the area. There wasn’t anyone around, which wasn’t a surprise since the squadron had clearly been deployed, but he didn’t want to take chances. He might be able to bluff his way through, but he’d rather not push his luck at this point.
The pilot’s lockers were open and empty, of course. He made his way to the back of the room, finding the supply locker. His override still worked, though for how much longer that would hold he didn’t know. Hopefully long enough.
Inside were backup suits, as he’d hoped. He grabbed one in his size, then had to guess at the Princess’. She was slim enough that he expected the smallest one there might be a bit large for her, but that would have to do. Pilots tended to bulk up a little as part of their training in resisting Gee forces, since the inertial systems on smaller craft worked on a fractional basis. Letting one gravity of force through to the pilot could enhance the craft’s performance by several multiples of that, and the efficiency went up significantly with the degree of force allowed through.
Thus, the best pilots trained constantly to endure the highest pressures possible. Every newton of force they personally endured represented an exponential increase in their maneuvering effectiveness.
The Roc wasn’t one of the highest performance craft available, but it was still more than capable of pulping a human body if the pilot wasn’t careful with how they handled the power it could offload. He hoped to get away clean, of course, but if it came to maneuvering, he’d already be giving up enough of an advantage to veteran pilots with just himself, let alone the Princess along for the ride… he couldn’t afford to give up the flight suits as well.
Eryn slung both suits over his shoulder, then quickly raided the lockers for anything else of value. There wasn’t much, but he grabbed a few hundred loose Imperial Eagles as well as some snack food. There would be water and rations on the Roc, but currency and comfort would be in short supply.
After checking to ensure that he was still either unnoticed or ignored, he didn’t care which, Eryn took a moment to scan through the local news on the room’s display. It wasn’t good.
The Legion are being blamed for this?
Eryn didn’t understand any of it. How could anyone think that the Legion would assassinate the Empress? They were her men and women. The Legion had served to enforce the Empire’s will for almost as long as there had been an Empire. Unlike the military, they were sworn to the Empress’ name specifically, and could only earn their uniform through merit.
Eryn had never had a sponsor in the nobility, if he’d not been accepted by her Highness into her direct service, the most he could have hoped for was to finish out a long career as a senior NCO, possibly a junior officer if he been both brilliant and lucky.
The Lady Lian’s will was his own.
And now she was dead.
Eryn didn’t know how long he watched the news before he shook himself loose of its grip. The Empress was dead, but her daughter was not and Jinsha was counting on him. One way or another, he was going to get her off-world and away from whatever insanity had infected the world he had believed that he knew.
She had brothers and sisters both, out in the Colonies. Family that could take her in, shelter her. He would deliver her to them, and then he would decide what to do.
There had to be something he could do.
Right?”
Eryn couldn’t answer the question, and it hung over him as he folded up the suits and tucked them under his arm and headed back.
*****
Jinsha curled nervously in the big seat at the front of the craft. Now that there were no outside issues demanding her attention all she could focus on was the moment she saw her mother jump in front of the gun that had been aimed at her. Her mother’s last demand that the murderer remembered his oath, and his utter disdain for it, was branded in her mind’s eye.
His face was not something she would ever forget.
The cold, emotionless gaze from the face that had been smiling and mocking them just moments earlier. Like he didn’t care, the death he’d just caused wasn’t worth spending any emotions on, even though it had been the Empress… even though it had been Jinsha’s mother.
She cried.
After Eryn had left, alone in the overly large seat of the military craft, Jinsha sobbed uncontrollably. She couldn’t see through blurred eyes, her breathing was stuffed such that she had to suck air in through her mouth in between bouts of sobbing, but for all that she couldn’t bring herself to care.
Her personal attendants would be horrified.
That thought struck her as funny, and she broke out giggling… which quickly deteriorated right back into another bout of sobbing.
Finally, her body feeling like she’d been straining powerful for hours, Jinsha fell silent and just curled up there and found herself shivering as uncontrollably as she had sobbed.
After that, the time started to stretch out. She started feeling alone, and then a trickling paranoia began to crawl up her spine.
Eryn had been gone a long time.
Was he coming back? Did he get caught maybe? She shuddered again, but this time it was different from the shivering. She could feel the fear that was causing it this time, and though it felt cold to her… it wasn’t a physical cold.
After a time, she still didn’t know how long, she pushed herself up out of the seat. She had to wipe away the tears and used the fluffs of the shoulder of her gown to clean her nose. That was an action that felt cathartic in itself. While she liked dresses just fine, formal gowns were nothing but a pain.
That thought set her off on another round of giggles that turned to sobs and back to giggles. She cycled through those again for a bit, then wiped her eyes again, and used the other shoulder for her nose, barely managing to avoid falling into another spiral of uncontrollable giggles and sobbing that even she was educated enough to recognize as likely hysteria.
She didn’t know what to do, but she knew she had to do something, so Jinsha gingerly got out of the seat and peered back into the cargo/troop section of the craft she was in. It was empty, of course. The rear ramp was still down, and she could see out into the hangar beyond as much as was in view at least.
Not knowing what to do, she let her curiosity guide her as she checked around the interior of the ship, staying as much out of sight of the back as possible and keeping an eye out for any movement as she did. The extra magazines and single pistol she had taken from the guardsmen were still there, on the seats where she’d left them.
She picked up the pistol gingerly, knowing some basics about how to safely operate one since she’d grown up with armed guards who insisted that she know at least that just in case she ever got a hold of one of their weapons. They were careful, very careful, but they were all professional enough to know that mistakes happened no matter what you did, and the more careful and professional you were, the more those mistakes would catch you off guard.
A curious young royal was not someone they wanted to be caught off guard with a loaded weapon, apparently.
She checked the weapon, noting that it was charged and ready to fire, then picked up the belt she’d taken when she grabbed the pistol. The magnetic latch on the belt needed to be adjusted for her waist, but that only took a few moments to adjust and then it went around her gown with the holster on her hip. She dropped the loaded pistol in there with mixed feelings, hoping she didn’t have to use it but rather thinking that was a naïve hope.
Ok. Breakdown, check. Probably have more of them before this is over, she thought darkly.
For the moment, though, she was refusing to let it happen anymore.
A noise startled her, and she half turned, hand going to the pistol on her hip, only to stop when she recognized Eryn climbing back in.
“Easy,” He said, tossing a military suit her way. “Hope that fits, it’s the best I could guess for you. Get changed in the cockpit, I’ll suit up out here.”
She glanced back at the cramped cockpit skeptically, sighing.
“I’ll just change here,” She said, “If I try in there, I’ll wind up sitting on controls and doing the Gods only know what. Just… look that way.”
He hesitated, but nodded and turned around, placing himself to block the view from the hangar in case anyone else wandered by, she noted with gratitude.
Regretfully she pulled the gun belt off, thinking it rather a waste of her time earlier, but at least it kept her distracted from another breakdown. The suit, she quickly found, was a little large but not as bad is had seemed when she grabbed it. The material was bulky, had a real thickness to it, with enough stiffness that she could tell it would resist her motions and she’d probably tire herself out if she had to move much in it.
Jinsha snuck peaks at Eryn as he changed, shucking his armor quickly and efficiently. He had a nice build, she noted as she felt her cheeks flush. Trim, but muscled with no excess weight or bulk, something she hadn’t noticed given the tailored armor he had worn since they met. She envied how easily he managed to get changed more than anything else, though.
Her gown was a nightmare, normally requiring attendants to get in and out of. She managed, however, finally tossing the expensive but useless piece of clothing aside while Eryn was already fastening the belts and catches on his flight suit.
She struggled into the suit, the folds stymieing her constantly but ultimately, she managed to get in and start cinching the catches up. Her mumbled annoyance with all of the various pieces must have caught his attention, and Eryn was at her side in a moment.
“Here, let me,” He said, starting to get everything tightened and fastened. “This has to be done up right. I’ll show you how later, but for now we don’t have time.”
Jinsha nodded, letting his hands do the job far quicker than she could have. She watched, trying to remember how it was done, but quickly got lost. Most of it was simple enough, of course, but some of the connections seemed like esoteric spellcasting for all she could make heads or tails of it.
She was about to comment when both of them froze.
A pattern of sound, metal clacking against the deck floor. Not just one person, either, quite a few people were approaching.
*****
Chapter VII
Imperial Tower, Command Center
Lord Jaol let out a satisfied breath as he sat back in the high-backed chair at the center of the room.
The operation had all but concluded, with every objective checked off aside from the loss of her Majesty and the Princess going missing. The former was a slight setback, but nothing truly damaging. Her Majesty would likely have had to suffer an accident eventually anyway. It just would have to have been after everything had blown over, ideally.
Her death during the operation would cost them some support with the Nobles, but it would also allow them to increase the pace of the operations against Royal Loyalists who had now been listed as traitors and party to the assassination of the Empress herself.
A fair enough trade off.
The loss of the Princess was more of an issue, as if they could not get her back under control the Lady Jinsha could become a voice in exile that threatened the status quo of the new authority within the Holy Terran Empire.
That was not an acceptable outcome, of course.
To that end he had every floor of the Tower being scoured, something that would take days, weeks possibly, but it would be done regardless. With the Princess in hand, they could secure the blood of the Conwin line and cement the legitimacy of the new authority among even the most recalcitrant of the nobility.
Eventually, a child of Conwin blood would once more sit on the throne and exercise true power within the Empire… once said blood had been properly tempered with an appropriate paternal influence.
Jaol smiled thinly, considering the very bright future of the Empire under more… mature and realistic guidance.
*****
Imperial Tower, Ready Response Hangar
Jinsha and Eryn looked at one another, frozen for a brief moment as they heard the approaching footsteps. Eryn broke the moment first, drawing his pistol and moving to the back of the craft to take a peek out and around the edge of the Roc’s hull.
He ducked back an instant later, grimacing.
“It’s Sylban and a squad of guardsmen,” He hissed, “They know we’re here.”
“Are you sure?” Jinsha asked hopefully. “Maybe it’s just a… you know, floor check?”
He shook his head, “They might not be sure, but Sylban wouldn’t be here if it were just a check. He’s too good for that. He knows, or he suspects. Either is effectively the same in this case. They’ll be here in moments.”
He took a breath, holding up his weapon, “I’ll cover…”
“No,” She hissed, drawing her own pistol and wielding it awkwardly. “You go start this thing up. I’ll keep them busy.”
“Lady Jin-”
She cut him off with a chopping motion of her free hand, “I can’t fly this thing, Eryn. Go.”
He was torn, but finally the logic won out.
“The moment I lift the ramp or fire up the reactors, they’ll be on us,” He warned, “Be careful.”
“Just go.”
Jinsha swallowed as she clutched at the grip of the pistol in her hand. It was coated in sweat, she noticed idly, but the material seemed to cling to her hand despite that. It was almost comforting as she crawled around the interior of the craft, getting a line on the edge of the rear opening, and waited.
She didn’t have long to wait.
The ramp began to grind slightly as it lifted even as the reactors of the Roc whined to life. She could hear shouts and the sudden acceleration of metal on metal as footsteps began to run across the hangar.
Swallowing, she extended the weapon as she’d been taught, both eyes open as she looked over the sights. The first sign of movement caused her to flinch, her finger jerking hard on the trigger as the weapon roared in her hand. It scared her, somehow it felt different than it had on the firing range, but it seemed to scare the runner even more. She caught sight of a Guardsman hitting the ground on his butt and thought she’d hit him at first, but his hurried scramble to get back out of her line of fire indicated that probably wasn’t the case.
She didn’t care, he was pulling away, that was good enough.
Jinsha inched forward, leaning more out to get a better line, and fired again and again.
*****
Sylban raised an eyebrow as the bursts of fire erupted from the back of the Roc, sending the guardsman scrambling to get cover. He could see that none of the bursts were even coming close to hitting what he might consider a target, so he didn’t need to check and see who was lighting off the fires in the military craft’s reactors.
The Princess shows promise. I wonder what she would have been like with a few decades more weathering on her?
He didn’t falter as he walked toward the craft, even as it rose on it’s Lenz Repulser Drive (LRD) and pivoted over the alternate position it had been parked in. He saw the face of his apprentice in the pilot’s seat as the Roc’s reactors roared in a rush and the hefty fighter transport started forward.
Sylban turned casually as it passed him, watching as the craft left the hangar, penetrating the light field that kept the air pressure inside the hangar steady and vanished out into the sky beyond the tower.
Once it was out of sight, he turned and immediately found the closest deck officer.
“What was the status of that Roc?” He demanded.
“She’s our backup, in case any of the primary response squadron have a mechanical fault,” The flustered man said.
“Is it armed?”
“Of course, we’re on an alert here. I had it armed along with the rest of the squadron the moment the balloon went up.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Commander Center
Jaol stared unbelieving at the screen.
They escaped in an IF-98?
He slumped slightly, unbelieving. He was surrounded by incompetents.
Even Sylban, who’d actually been able to track them down at least, had failed to stop their escape. Though, to be fair there, he supposed that sending the man to deal with the other Legion Men in the Tower at the time might have been a mistake on his part as well.
“Damn it all.”
Well, there’s nothing to it.
Jaol straightened up, “Signal the ready response squadron, inform them that the terrorists have stolen one of our fighter transports. They are to intercept them.”
“Yes Sir, orders once that has been accomplished?”
Jaol hesitated, before sighing, “Order them to stand down. One chance. If they refuse… I would prefer the craft and it’s occupants intact, but I will not hold the squadron responsible if the worst happens.”
“Yes Sir.”
*****
IF-98 ‘Raging Roc’
Eryn leveled the Roc out, putting its nose up as he put more power to the repulsor drive, letting the craft accelerate up away from the planet far below them. He checked a few settings, casually turning off warnings as he visually confirmed that the systems in question were functional.
Jinsha appeared behind him, and he nodded to the co-pilot’s seat.
“Strap in,” He told her as she pulled herself forward, working against the acceleration of the craft. “Also, good work back there.”
“T-thanks,” She said, fumbling with the straps as she sat down. “Are we ok?”
“Not by a long shot,” He smiled, a little darkly as he reached forward and tapped a display in front of them. “See the blue icons?”
Jinsha nodded, “Yes…”
“Those are the ready response unit,” He said, glancing down, “The Condemned Condors, If I’m remembering correctly. They went into a full power climb just moments after we cleared the tower, no question they’re coming for us.”
“We have a lead, though, right?”
He grimaced, shaking his head, “Sort of, but not really. We have altitude on them, and we started first, so yes… but they’re closer to the planet, so their repulsors are going to get a better effect from the Lenz Drive. The power of the repulsor effect is inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the source of the magnetic field you’re pushing on. In this case, the Earth. They have a much higher acceleration than we do, and while it’ll drop off with distance same as for us, they’re going to hit a high intercept speed long before we can make an escape velocity from their interception radius.”
Jinsha stared at him briefly, eyes unfocusing.
“I think I understood that. They’re faster because they’re starting closer to the planet?”
“They accelerate faster, but yes, they will end up faster within the distance needed to mount an intercept.”
“Oh. So… what happens when they catch up?” Jinsha asked, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer.
Eryn forced a smile.
“That… is when the fun begins.”
*****
Condor Lead
“Condors, Split formation Gamma Three. Primary strike on my lead.”
Captain Genero Mikail adjusted his forward-facing targeting scans, refining them down to get a cleaner scan of the assigned target.
This is a new one, He thought with varying emotions that ranged from personal insult to hope that whoever had hijacked their spare bird hadn’t killed or harmed any of the deck crew. If the Condor’s had lost men from their deck crews, there would be hell to pay, orders be damned. Those men might merely be commoners for the most part, but they worked under the Aegis of the Condors. His Aegis.
“Target is transiting the air/space interface, accelerating to escape velocity. Range to confirmed lock…”
He scowled, checking his readings before he sighed and deactivated his primary targeting scanners.
“Target and Squadron will exit the atmosphere before intra-atmospheric weapons can be brought to bear. Switching to vacuum authorized tactical load out.” He said, bringing up the space optimized scanners. “Re-acquiring target.”
Engaging targets within an atmosphere was significantly different than outside of one. Lasers had to be optimized to a few hundred kilometers, at most, and generally worked best at a range of a few tens of kilometers before atmospheric haze made them less than reliable. Missiles that were optimized for air breathing were, obviously, not deployable in a vacuum but those weapons intended to function without air and in microgravity were generally less effective by several degrees of magnitude within atmospheric pressure.
“Roger that, Condors,” Command and Control responded. “We are re-directing the Montu’s Falcons to intercept as backup. Continue on mission.”
“Roger Command. Condors are on mission.”
Montu’s Falcons were a space superiority squadron, which made their deployment an obvious decision. The IF-122As they were flying were far better equipped for space combat compared to a Roc and could manage the engagement with a higher degree of certainty.
Which wasn’t to say that there was much doubt about what the outcome would be anyway. The Condors would engage the target long before the Falcons could hope to get on stations, and against one target alone?
Bastard doesn’t stand a chance.
Genero’s space scanners wound fully up, and he again painted the target up ahead of them, getting a confirmation back.
“Hostile IF-98 Roc, you have been targeted. Cease acceleration and standby for orders from Command or we will open fire…. I say again…”
*****
“Again, cease acceleration and standby for orders from command or we will open fire.”
Eryn reached out and turned the sound down a bit. He didn’t need the other pilot screaming in his ears.
“A… are we going to be ok?”
“I have no idea,” He answered honestly.
“What?” Jinsha looked over at him, stricken.
“We can’t outrun them, and we can’t outfight them,” He said, “and by now they’ll have called in space superiority squadrons to cover the high orbitals. Our window to escape is closing. Fast.”
He glanced over, seeing her face was an ashen color.
“We still have a window,” He told her reassuringly as he could. “It’s just closing. Those Space superiority fighters have to come from the LaGrange points where they’re stationed, and it takes time to build Delta-V. If we can evade the Condors without losing too much speed, we can slip the noose.”
“O… oh, ok.”
He chuckled.
“How can you laugh at a time like this?”
“Two reasons, Princess,” He said, still laughing. “First, I am Legion. We face overwhelming odds every time we step on the field. It wouldn’t be fair to the enemy if we didn’t.”
She glared at him, “Aren’t you just barely graduated into the Legion?”
“That brings me to the second reason, Princess… if I don’t laugh, I’m am going to cry.”
“Oh god. I want to be sick.”
“Please don’t,” Eryn pled with all seriousness, “once we start really maneuvering, anything loose in here is going to be… moved around with vigor.”
She groaned, turning greener at that image, and flopped back in the seat that was wrapped around her.
Eryn chuckled some more, checking the feed from the scanners as well as the network that Command and Control had, for some insane reason, not yet bothered to cut him out of. It was sloppy, but he supposed that treason was sloppy work.
The Condors were boosting hard, as he’d expected, they wouldn’t be able to engage him properly until they exited the atmospheric envelope, however, so he had a bit of time there. There was no sign of a squadron moving above them yet, but space was huge, and they could be coming from several vectors, so he couldn’t be sure they weren’t already moving into place.
More interestingly, there was a lot of traffic up in close Earth Orbit.
He had IFF signals from the Orions, the Free Stars, and a handful of single and small cluster polities all up in parked orbit, and all no doubt watching the events unfold with avid interest.
If only they knew what was really going on under their noses.
Briefly he considered making a broadcast, but the radio on the Roc was barely enough to properly reach the ships in higher orbit, and the frequencies he had access to wouldn’t be noticed by pretty much anyone on-world. All he’d be doing is wasting his breath, for the most part.
Maybe.
Eryn considered that again, thinking it through a bit more.
After a moment he reached out and flicked a switch that opened his radio to an unencrypted broadcast.
“To all Imperial pilots,” He said, “This is Eryn Aubrey, Her Majesty’s Legionnaire. The Lady Lian has been assassinated, and her daughter… my charge… is fleeing the traitors who killed her mother. Lord Jaol gave the order…”
He grimaced, harsh static filling his ears.
“Damn it.”
“What happened?”
“They jammed us,” He told Jinsha, “Jaol does not want that getting out.”
“But you told people, right?”
“Some,” He agreed. “But there can’t be more than a few thousand people on Earth who even might have heard that broadcast. None of them are likely to be able, or willing, to help. It might sew some confusion among our pursuers, though, and hopefully start some rumors spreading at least.”
“Oh.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Command and Control
“Signal Jammed, My Lord.”
“Good, I’ll not have that traitor trying to divide us now,” Jaol growled. “I want him shot down…”
A hand on his shoulder caused him to turn violently.
“My Lord,” His aide said softly, “The Princess…”
Jaol visibly got his anger under control. “Of course. Belay that order. If he will not stand down, attempt to damage the ship without destroying it.”
“Yes Sir.”
Jaol turned back to the displays, silently seething. He knew that transmission would have been intercepted by amateur broad band operators, and in short order it would be all over the planetary network and beyond. That was without taking into account the representatives listening in above.
He hadn’t thought the boy would air the Empire’s dirty laundry in the open quite like that.
It would not matter much in the long run, other than some minor annoyance, but that was enough for him to determine that he would make the young lad’s remaining life as unpleasant as he possibly could.
*****
Orion Command Carrier Delaware
“Well now, isn’t that just a thing,” Hidan said softly after listening to the broadcast a second time.
Beside him, Grave was frowning as he looked at the plots that they were tracking still several hundred kilometers below.
“Orders, Sir?”
“Orders?” Hidan asked, sighing, “None. There’s nothing we can do here without causing an interstellar incident.”
“If that broadcast is right…”
“Then the young man has to get the lady out of there,” Hidan said firmly. “I’m not starting a war with the Empire over their internal issues.”
Grave snorted, “Wouldn’t be much of a war.”
“It would be a distraction that we do not need right now. You know as well as I do that the Republic is always looking for any distraction they can use to take shots at our holdings. We may be able to take the Empire, but there are two big problems with that. First, we’d need to dispatch at least two battlegroups to do it… and where would those come from do you suppose?”
Grave winced, “Point taken… and the second?”
“Hm? Oh, well, frankly, the Empire doesn’t have anything we want that’s worth fighting over, now do they?” Hidan asked rhetorically.
“No sir, I suppose they don’t.”
Hidan sighed regretfully, “If that broadcast was accurate, and I suspect it was, I would very much like to help the young man and his Lady. However, we are bound by the chains of our duty, Commander.”
“Aye Captain.”
*****
Condor Lead
Genero clenched his teeth as he listened to the chatter over the secure channels, where the jamming was still clear.
“Do you think that was true?”
“No way. Just some terrorist lying to save his ass.”
“I don’t know, man. He said he was Legion.”
“Anyone can say they’re Legion.”
“Enough,” Genero cut in himself, shutting the squadron down. “No more comm chatter. We have our orders, and we have no clear intelligence that says that they are not legal and binding. The rants of a terror suspect fleeing in one of our own damn birds that he personally stole does not count. Am I being clear?”
The squadron quieted down other than a chorus of acknowledgements.
He rolled his eyes.
Pilots. I swear, we would be so much better off if they were all drawn from the Nobility like the command elements. The common sorts are talented flyers, but they really have no sense.
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
Jinsha clutched at the seat and straps holding her into the seat as the fighter they were in rolled over, changing directions enough that she felt it pushing her into the side of the bolster that held her in place and then slam her hard down toward the floor almost instantly after. She risked a glance over to where Eryn was working the controls, his eyes not looking up from the instrumentation.
There wasn’t a lot to see looking out through the cockpit canopy, she supposed. Stars, nothing much else, even if she knew many of the lights she saw probably weren’t stars precisely. There would be ships and satellites and other elements made by the Empire. The weather control constellation was the easiest to spot, if she looked really hard. It had a blue glimmer now that they were clear of the atmosphere, a tell tale of the solar panels that powered the system.
The ships were much harder to spot, though she could see some by their lights. They had to be in low orbit, she realized just as the ship snapped around again.
She desperately wanted to ask what was going on, but at the same time really didn’t want to distract Eryn from his flying.
“Seal your helmet,” He said tightly, reaching up to close his own.
Jinsha swallowed, her hand shaking as she reached up and activated the system that secured and sealed the helmet visor, lighting up a Heads Up Display automatically, giving her an view Augmented by the sensors of the fighter.
She could suddenly see the space around them in all directions and found herself looking around in wonder. She’d actually experienced similar in the past, using augmented reality systems on her private computer, but this was different because she was actually there in the middle of the space she was looking at.
Above them she could see icons showing all the individual ships, as well as a few for the habitats that existed out past low orbit at the LaGrange points. Jinsha looked around, then back down below them, and she spotted the red icons of the fighters rising up in pursuit.
“Where are we going?” She asked softly, blinking.
“Right through there,” Eryn said as a vector line lit up on her screen, showing the current heading.
“Why there?”
“There’s no cover to lose them in up here, so I’m improvising,” He said. “Hang on.”
Jinsha screamed as flashes of light exploded around her suddenly, causing her to flinch back into the seat.
“What was that!?”
“Countermeasures,” He responded, “They fired on us. Probably just a warning salvo, but I couldn’t take chances.”
Jinsha’s heart was pounding as she looked back down, below them again, toward the offenders that had just shot at them. The explosions around them were all lights and darkness, no sound of impact. Intellectually she realized that was because there was no atmosphere to conduct the shockwaves, but it still left her with an eerie feeling that just didn’t feel quite right.
An alarmed buzzed warningly, and she looked over to see Eryn who was visible to her even as much of the ship around them was filtered out so she could see through the hull. He reached up with an almost casual motion and flipped a set of overhead switches and suddenly a series of whooshing sounds erupted around her.
Jinsha looked around, fascinated as plumes of white smoke flew out behind them, looking like the wings of a majestic beast. She was still watching them in fascination when another flash of light made her jump, only the straps of the seat keeping her in place.
“That one wasn’t a warning shot,” Eryn said. “They’ve got our range now, so it’s going to get rough.”
That wasn’t rough?
*****
Eryn dropped a preset pattern into the navigation system, making sure that the variables were randomized slightly before he activated it. At the range they were currently engaged with the fighters below no human, even a Legionnaire, had reaction speeds sufficient to make a difference. Even computers had to work with predictive algorithms and hope that the enemy didn’t out predict the prediction at these sorts of ranges, with only seconds to react from a hypersonic rocket, and effectively no time at all when the fighters’ lasers came into play.
For the Condors below, it would all come down to a combination of luck, programming, and the ability to maneuver the enemy into a position where neither luck, nor programming, would be enough to save them. For he and Jinsha, the deciding factors would begin again with luck and programming, but his goal was to maneuver into a position where the Condors lost the ability to put him in that corner.
It wouldn’t be easy.
In fact, in open space, it would be impossible. There was simply no way to outmaneuver ships of similar capabilities that were as close as they were. In that situation, he’d have already turned his nose back to the planet with the intent of losing them in the geography below.
However, it wasn’t exactly open space ahead of him.
Eryn dropped a new variable into the maneuvering program, triple checking it, then set it running in the system.
*****
Chapter IIX
Condor Lead
Genero sucked air through his teeth in annoyance as the target deployed flares and active chaff, disrupting the lock he’d acquired and sending his rockets off target at the last moment. It was not unexpected, of course, that any somewhat decent pilot would have done as much, but he would prefer to get this over with before any more surprises were thrown in his direction.
It would be better, in a lot of ways, if the target was returning fire. That would make the entire scenario as clean cut as it could be, but he was monitoring the growing discontent among his squadron as the enemy continued to take every shot they sent, not returning fire, intent only on escaping apparently.
As if that were possible.
There was nowhere to go that the Condors couldn’t follow, and even if there was, the Falcons would be on station in minutes. He didn’t know what the other pilot was thinking. He’d have had more luck ducking back into atmo, diving for a mountain range perhaps, and vanishing among the rocks.
Out in space, there was nowhere to run.
“Condor Two, take the lead and fire when you have tone.”
A moment passed before Condor Two responded.
“Roger, Lead. Condor Two taking the lead.”
Condor Two’s Roc accelerated slightly, moving up ahead of him in order to ensure a clear firing line while Genero monitored his systems. The scanners took a moment to breach the remnants of the rapidly dissipating active chaff. Once through, though, the tone hummed almost instantly as the fighter locked on.
“Condor Two, Mike Mike Mike.”
The missile roared along on its way through the emptiness, seeking its target up ahead.
*****
Orion Command Carrier, Delaware
“They’re getting closer,” Grave noted mildly.
Hidan nodded, “I see it. Projection?”
“Coming up between us and the Freebooters,” Grave answered.
Hidan snorted a little at the nickname for the Free Stars citizenry but didn’t comment on it.
“Signal Alert Level Three,” He ordered. “I doubt they’ll risk messing with either us or the Free Star ships, but no sense inviting trouble.”
“Yes sir,” Grave said as he turned slightly and nodded to a listening attendant. “Call the ship to Level Three.”
“Aye Commander, Alert Level Three!”
Soft chimes rang across the bridge and beyond through the ship, alerting those on shift to be at their duty stations, no matter what they were doing at the time. Alternates were woken up, if they were sleeping, or alerted otherwise if they were doing anything else, and told to stand ready in case the level were raised.
Beyond that, ship routine continued as they had.
Hidan and Grave ignored most of it, continuing to watch the drama play out below them, even as it drew closer.
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
Jinsha flinched as another set of flashes indicated a close miss.
“Um… shouldn’t we be… shooting back?”
“Would just slow us down,” Eryn said, with a shrug. “No gain to it, and if I can avoid it I’d rather not kill people I called comrade yesterday, if you don’t mind?”
“Oh.”
She fell silent, thinking about that before she nodded.
“Ok.”
She hadn’t thought about that, and suddenly she realized that she’d been shooting at people who had probably been watching over her just hours earlier. She even knew the man who’d killed her mother and had thought that he was someone she called a friend.
None of it made any sense, and Jinsha felt the world spiraling around her, her breath suddenly growing ragged as everything began to darken, her vision growing black around the edges.
“Hey, hey! My Lady! Breathe! Deep breaths!”
She sucked in a deep breath, then another, and again. Over and over, her vision slowly clearing, she could feel her heart slowing from the ragged tempo it had been pushing into. She looked over, wild eyed, at Eryn who was sneaking glances back at her while still flying.
“I… I’m sorry, I…”
“You’re on the edge of going into shock,” He said, hand running over the controls in front of him. “You have no training to deal with this, no part of your life has prepared you for what has happened to you, and it all happened in the last hour. My Lady, there is no dishonor in your reaction in this situation.”
“But I don’t want to be like this,” She said, fists clenched as she shook.
“Good. Then take it all in, learn what you can, internalize the lessons, and grow from it. Life sends us all to the ground sometimes, Jinsha. Strength is not being un-thrown or unshaken, strength is being unwilling to stay down.” He said without looking in her direction. “But right now, just please try not to panic.”
She gulped at air, but nodded, closing her eyes, and focusing on her breathing.
“Sorry,” She said softly, uncertain if she were speaking to him, or to herself.
*****
The princess had said something else, but it was so quiet that he couldn’t hear her. Eryn left it be. He didn’t have the time to focus on her if they wanted to get out of this alive even if he couldn’t just let her slip into shock right there in the seat beside him. A few years earlier, it struck him that he probably would have been contemptuous of someone who reacted like she had, seeing them as weak himself.
It was… he didn’t know if it were ironic or not, but it was disturbing that it had been Sylban who taught him what strength was. Every time he thought about the lessons he had received, the admiration bordering on worship he had felt, he began to second guess everything the man had ever taught him in the light of how things went.
What terrified him most, though, was that he could not find fault in anything Sylban had taught him. Certainly, there were things that maybe he thought were not quite correct, or could be done better in some way, but the lessons… at their core, he agreed with everything his mentor had ever taught him.
Eryn was terrified of what that said about him.
He didn’t know how to separate the two sides of the man, if they even were two sides. How did Sylban go against what he’d taught, was it all a lie? Or, more terrifying indeed, had Sylban somehow managed to twist his own lessons and logic, his own beliefs, and managed to justify his decisions?
It bothered him that he couldn’t find any hint of the man who’d killed the Empress in his memories of the man who had trained him.
Will I be like that? Trained by a man like Sylban, is that my future?
Eryn didn’t know, and deep inside he felt a fear like none he had ever before experienced at the very thought.
For the moment, however, he just did not have the time to worry about it.
The pursuing fighters were taking their shots. They’d gotten his range dialed in and now they were looking for holes in his defensive program while he was trying to keep shoring up anything they might use to put a missile through the active defenses and light him up good and proper.
Given enough time, they’d succeed… or, at least, they’d run him dry of countermeasures and take him at their leisure.
Eryn was determined to not provide them with that time.
He entered a new program into the navigation system, calling up multiple alternates, and stood ready to shift to them based on what was about to happen.
“Let’s have some fun,” He said.
“What?” Jinsha asked, her head snapping over.
Eryn was quite certain that the look on her face was likely priceless, but he didn’t have time to enjoy it.
With a touch, he engaged the new program.
*****
Orion Command Carrier Delaware
“They’re turning this way, Captain! They’ll breach our outer exclusion zone in the next few seconds.”
“Sound alert level one,” Hidan said, “Scramble fighters. I want the ready response squadron sucking vacuum.”
“Aye Captain! Alert Level One! All Hands, Alert Level One!” Grave responded, leaning forward to send another command. “Ready response is on the Cat and launching!”
Hidan nodded, reaching for a hand-com that was hardwired into the system. He held the com up to his face, tapping in the command to give him a broadcast channel.
“Unidentified fighter, this is Captain Hidan Clarke of the Delaware. You are about to enter our exclusion zone. Change your course or we will consider you a hostile target and respond accordingly.”
A moment passed, then Grave shook his head.
“They’re not changing course, Sir… and… Captain, the fighters below are firing again!”
Hidan swore, watching the plot tracks of the rockets as they lanced up, countermeasures firing from the fleeing fighter as it maneuvered more sharply than it had to this point. The missiles went wide, having lost their target, and penetrated the Delaware’s exclusion zone. They were nowhere near the Delaware of course, but that didn’t really matter.
He keyed open his comm again, “Pursuing fighters, cease your engagement! Cease your engagement! You are violating the exclusion zone of an Orion Command Carrier! We will defend ourselves if you continue!”
“The fleeing fighter just entered our Exclusion zone, Sir,” Grave told him softly.
“Goddamn it.”
Hidan didn’t want to do it. He didn’t want anything to do with any of this. He didn’t have the information to know what decision to make, but his duty was clear as crystal.
“Target him with point defense,” He ordered. “Check fire until he enters inner exclusion… then light him up.”
“Aye, aye, Captain.”
Hidan selected the fighter on his screens, then focused in on a direct signal with minimal bleed before putting the comm back up to his mouth.
“Kid, if you are the kid I met in the Chapterhouse, I can’t help you. The Orion Administrative Republic will not intervene in the internal affairs of the Terran Empire.” He said quietly. “If you cross our inner exclusion zone, my men have their orders. They will light you up, and you’ll die out there… the Princess with you, if you’re telling the truth. Don’t make me do this, kid. Please.”
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
Eryn listened to the distress in the man’s voice, someone he’d only met the one time and barely had any interaction with, and honestly felt worse about what he was about to do than he had killing the guardsmen in the lift.
The mind is a strange thing, he decided as that stray thought got locked in his brain despite everything else going on.
Everything that was happening, and both he and Jinsha were focusing on the oddest things. Things that were largely immaterial, yet now seemed so much more important than even their own lives and they fought for them.
He didn’t bother open up a channel, there was no point in talking. He knew the other man wouldn’t… couldn’t shift from his position, and that was fine. It didn’t change what he had to do.
“Sorry Clarke,” He offered up to the universe, a whispered apology only he would hear. “Have to do this.”
Eryn brought the flight controls into his suit completely, lighting up his HUD and bringing neural linkages to his enhancement suite online. Against the precise procedural fire of the fighters below, there was nothing more effective than the computer, even an enhanced human just couldn’t hope to react faster than a properly programmed computer. What they were about to fly into, however, would be too much for any computer to handle.
“If you believe in any Gods,” He said aloud. “Now would be the time to call on them.”
“What.”
Jinsha’s voice was so flat and filled with disbelief at the question that Eryn almost laughed aloud. Instead, however, he just hammered the controls all the way forward.
The Roc twisted in space, its reactors heating past the redline, as Eryn dove into the inner exclusion zone of the Orion Command Carrier.
*****
Imperial Tower, Command Center
Jaol gnashed his teeth in frustration as he watched the feed they had from the fighter squadron and the satellite constellation monitoring the situation.
“Sir, Condors are asking for orders…”
He bared his teeth, angry enough to chew steel, but he wasn’t stupid enough to alienate the Orions just then. It was not time.
“Tell them to stand down, skirt the exclusion zone of the Carrier. Do not enter the Carrier’s exclusion zone.” He ordered.
“Yes Sir.”
Footsteps tapping on the floor behind him almost went unnoticed until the amused voice caught his attention.
“Well done my boy,” Sylban said, smirking as he looked at the screen.
“You approve of this!?” Jaol turned on him.
“He’s only doing what he must,” Sylban shrugged. “He cannot survive without evading pursuit. He has found a way to force your fighters to draw back. We can hardly blame him for being good at what he does.”
“If you were going to train the brat to be this ‘good’ at what he does, you could have at least brought him over to our way of seeing things,” Jaol grumbled.
“He is an idealist,” Sylban said simply. “Like all first generations brought into the Chapterhouse.”
Joal sneered, “That antiquated little organization of yours is the next on our list of course, you do realize that I hope?”
Sylban shrugged, “I suppose it was inevitable.”
“You’ll see to it, personally,” Jaol ordered.
Sylban tipped his head, “It will be done.”
“Good,” Jaol sighed, turning back to the screens as a wave of shock passed through the room. “Oh, for the love of… what is he doing!?”
“Attacking an Orion Command Carrier head on in a single squad transport fighter?” Sylban offered blandly.
“Thank you for that, it was so very helpful.”
“I but live to serve.”
*****
Orion Command Carrier, Delaware
“Young fool,” Hidan whispered as he watched the fighter transport twist in space and dive right in toward the inner exclusion zone covered by the Delaware’s point defense systems.
His hands were tied at this point. Even if he wanted to give the order it would be closing on betrayal, and certainly grounds for Grave to take command, declaring him to be compromised and compromising the safety of the ship.
Truthfully, he did want to give the order to stand down.
The boy was a Brother. One absolute of the order was that brothers do not kill brothers.
Hidan could, and did, say nothing, however.
He had warned the boy of the orders that he had been required to give, the choice from that point belonged entirely to young Mr. Aubrey.
“Hostile target has entered the inner exclusionary zone, Captain. Point defenses are engaging.”
Hidan nodded, he could feel the distant rumbling of the guns through the deck.
“I know.”
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
Fully immersed in the augmented reality afforded him by the ship’s computer and his flight suit was rather like flying through space unaided. He could feel the wind on his skin, though the wind in this case was a combination of radiation and particulates that existed even in the emptiest regions of space. At the speeds they were moving it all felt like a fairly brisk wind when filtered through his brain and neurological implants.
His senses were the scanners, active and passive, of the fighter. His legs were the thrusters that were powered by the twin reactors that thrummed in beat with his heart. More importantly, his brain was augmenting the computer’s processor capacity rather than the other way around.
The human brain was one thing that even all the advances in computing technology still couldn’t really match. Oh, there were computers that could do more processes per second, there had been for centuries really. However, there were none that could do it as efficiently as a human brain, or that were remotely as good at pattern recognition.
He knew it the moment the Roc crossed into the inner exclusion space of the Orion vessel, both because he felt the transition as a warning that chimed through his very soul, and also because the big ship opened fire.
The Delaware led with point defense lasers, something that was effectively impossible to dodge at any range because the energy would reach you at the same time as any warning of it being fired… in theory.
In practice, there was actually a very minimal flash of laser nodes powering up, leading the beam by a few milliseconds. Not enough time for a computer or an unaided human to react to, but a computer augmented by a human brain was a fair sight faster.
The Roc snapped over in a tight roll, just as the beam scorched its dorsal armor. The searing heat was a painful wakeup call for Eryn as he rolled the fighter back level with a thought and kept his eyes wide, continuing the dive in toward the big ship.
Part of his mind was putting together other thoughts, now that he had the fighter’s computer accelerating his thinking.
“Princess,” He called, “Are you augmented?”
“What?”
Her response came several agonizingly long seconds later, but he rolled with it while he continued to dodge incoming fire as best as he could.
“Implant augmentation?” He prompted. “There are rumors that the Royals have their own custom suite. Any truth there?”
She hesitated. He could feel it through the fighter and her suit’s internal sensors, but he didn’t have time to convince her to hurry up. The Delaware had added magnetic accelerators to their mix, and those were a lot more dangerous than point defense lasers comparatively speaking, at least for the moment.
However, he could see those coming if he was looking in the right direction at the right time.
Eryn went full active with the fighter’s sensor suite, burning reactor mass at extreme levels to light up the entirety of local space as best he could.
“That’s… kind of a secret,” Jinsha said finally, several long seconds later.
“I’ll take that as a yes. Link up!”
“What?”
Her heart rate spiked, her face flushing and body surface temperature climbing a degree rather quickly.
“I’m not hitting on you, Princess, I need the processing power. Join the network.”
*****
Jinsha hesitated for a few seconds longer, then she acquiesced and found the local network and joined it with a thought.
The sensation almost took her breath away. The draw on her mind and implant suite was a physical sensation, like her soul was being sucked out through a straw. She could tell what was being accessed, though, and suddenly understood what was happening.
In a way she wished she didn’t.
The wall of steel and photons being thrown at them was not to be underestimated, but somehow Eryn was throwing the Roc around and through the gaps like a stunt pilot running an obstacle course they knew like the back of their own hands. She didn’t know how long he could keep it up, but with sudden determination she threw what she could into the effort and held nothing back.
Through the void, three became one. Princess, neophyte warrior, and inanimate machine of war. Two minds, one mechanical body, merged into a single entity for a brief moment as they faced the gauntlet and refused to flinch away.
*****
Chapter IX
Arrow Squadron, Lead, Delaware Flight Deck
“Arrows on me, you all know the drill. Secure the AO, eliminate any hostile contacts, don’t die,” Arrow Lead, Major Tom Brickman said as he keyed in the final launch sequence and got clearance from the deck captain for catapult activation.
He and his wingman were first up on the docket. They’d rushed out to their fighters as soon as the Alert One sounded. It still took precious minutes to get even a fully prepped fighter fired up and loaded into the launch slot, so the tensions were growing with every passing second as the alarms continued to sound and the guns started to fire.
There were no sounds of impact from enemy fire, yet, but that didn’t make Tom feel any more at ease.
Come on, come on, come on… get me out there!
The catapult officer finally gave him a thumbs up, which he returned as the man ducked down out of the way and the catapult controls were turned over to him.
“Arrow Lead, launching.” He said as he mashed down on the control that sent the electromagnetic catapult barreling down the flight deck, pulled along by pulsing energy that surrounded him on all sides. The deck vanished as he was funneled into a tunnel, his fighter stabilized by the EM forces that pulled him along, and then just as he reached the end, the catapult disengaged from his fighter and snapped away and down as he was flung out into space.
Right into the path of an oncoming fighter craft.
“Holy shit!”
Tom screamed as he hit the reverse throttle, flipped his fighter over, and then snapped back a second later as the other craft flash passed him at high speed.
“What the fuck-”
He was cut off by his computer screaming at him, and a narrowly missing pulse from the Delaware’s own point defense systems nearly tore him in two.
“Hey, you bobble headed idiots,” He snapped over the comm. “Watch where you’re firing! I’m out here now, damn it!”
This is just embarrassing.
He turned around hard, enduring multiple gravities in the process, and looked for the enemy craft. He really hoped they weren’t on a suicide run.
Nope. Skipped under the ship, but they’re running close.
Close was an understatement. The Terran fighter was skimming the underside of the ship, likely to stay ‘below’ the coverage of most of the point defense systems, and making the rest think twice about engaging because they didn’t want to inadvertently cause a collision.
He pushed his engines to the redline, his fighter screaming around him, and tore off in pursuit.
“Arrow Two, let’s get this son of a bitch.”
“Right with you, Screamer.”
“Oh, shut up.”
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
Controlling the fighter in full augmented reality mode was a rush like few others he’d ever experienced, and it was taking everything Aubrey could bring to the fore to keep himself from getting lost in it all.
He flipped the fighter, inverting them… or, putting belly to belly relative to the Delaware, depending on how one looked at things.
He got in tight with the bigger ship, the many kilometers bigger ship, and stayed as close as he could. Most of their guns couldn’t range on him there, and those that could wouldn’t be happy with shooting and missing, probably hitting the Delaware itself, or arguably worse… shooting and hitting.
The resulting explosion from that would probably cause more damage than if they missed, after all.
He could hear Jinsha squeaking beside him as he avoided varying protuberances. The Delaware was moving quite quickly along a diverging vector from his own path, but that slowed their converging speed somewhat, just enough to actually make it feel like they were going a lot faster against a much bigger object.
Even so, it took only seconds before they exploded out past the other side of the big ship, looking out into open space beyond.
*****
Orion Command Carrier, Delaware
“Well, that was a thing.”
Hidan’s voice was dry as the sun facing side of a tidally locked hot world, making those around him wince as they heard it.
“Drills, I think. Lots and lots of drills are in our future.”
Hidan looked slowly around. While he had not been pleased to be forced into a situation where he had to watch a Brother… however distant a one the boy might be… die on the sword he personally commanded, he was just as displeased that his exquisitely trained men and women, the pride of the Orions, had somehow failed to end the boy with all the weapons at their command.
“The enemy fighter is pulling away,” The weapons control officer announced. “They’re again entering our full engagement range. Fir-”
“Belay that,” Hidan ordered.
“Sir!” Grave stiffened.
“He’s leaving, Commander.” Hidan said, “Cease fire. Have the Arrows follow him out of our exclusionary zones, but do not engage unless he makes to turn back.”
Grave hesitated, but finally nodded. “Aye Captain.”
Hidan looked after the fading light of the departing fighter’s thrusters, noting that it was almost far enough out now to kick in proper space drives. Sure enough, a few seconds later the light warbled in the screens, then flickered and vanished as the fighter accelerated away at high speed on what looked to be a low lunar slingshot course.
Satisfied, he turned back to his display, rewinding the controls to watch the near suicide rush that had nearly resulted in a mid-space impact between the Terran Fighter and one of his own Arrows.
That’s something new, He noted with some curiosity. I do not care how good a pilot he was. He shouldn’t have survived a passage through our exclusionary zone in such a manner. I believe Orion Intelligence needs to take a closer look at what kind of flight tech the Terrans are fielding these days. Someone in Intel has been sleeping on the job.
“Captain, contact from the planet. They’re asking to speak with you,” Grave told him, bringing his attention back to the present.
“Are they now?” Hidan asked. “Well, let’s not keep them waiting I suppose.”
“Yes Sir. Putting them through now.”
*****
Imperial Tower, Command and Control
“Find them!”
Lord Jaol’s roaring could be heard an entire floor away, through sound secured doors no less. For those in the room with the enraged, military commander, the very air seemed to rumble with his displeasure. Everyone was cowering and throwing themselves into their task, hoping to either not be noticed, or to find something useful before they were.
Almost everyone.
Jaol turned on the chuckling man, “You seriously find this funny?”
Sylban extended his hands, fingers splayed in an amused gesture. “Honestly? Yes.”
The Lord just looked even more angry. “How in the hell did he survive that? Not even my best pilots could have entered that level of fire and come out unscathed.”
“He’s a Legionnaire.”
Jaol rolled his eyes, “Oh, spare me the Empress’ propaganda, Gyver. You’re not supermen. You die like anyone else. I should know, I’ve killed enough of you today.”
“You had them killed by sniper fire, while they were out in the open under orders to be seen,” Sylban said mockingly. “How many Legionnaires have you killed in combat, My Lord?”
“Do not take that tone with me, boy,” Jaol snarled, jabbing a finger at Sylban’s chest, “I was commanding the Empire’s armies three generations before you were a stain on your parents’ bedsheets. If you want to indulge in your little superman mythos, go ahead, but do it on your own time.”
Sylban just smirked back at him, leaving Jaol even more pissed off.
“Where would they go?” He finally demanded.
“It’s a mid range fighter,” Sylban said. “So they have their choice of any location in the solar system. But they don’t have a stardrive, so they’re not getting out to the colonies.”
“Right,” Jaol nodded, calming as his mind had something to focus on. “Luna City is unlikely, too close.”
“Unless they think you think that.” Sylban said, that smirk still on his face.
“Shut up.” Jaol sighed, thinking. “So Mars, the Jovian installations… Saturnus Col. The Inner system is mostly automated, they could hide among those facilities if we weren’t monitoring them…”
He turned to the people in the room. “I want all automated facilities checked on the hour. If anyone accesses them off schedule, I want to know about it. Then send an all-points to every Imperial asset between here and the Kuiper Belt with the registry of that stolen fighter. If anyone so much as glimpses it, I want to know.”
He sighed, thinking furiously.
The Empire didn’t have near as much control over the outer system as they liked to pretend, though the various communities did pay fealty to the Imperial Rule they also had right of self determination granted to them by Imperial Edict. Another foolish decision by the Conwin line, this one actually by Lian’s father shortly after taking over from his own father.
That meant that he technically had jurisdiction but would be pressed hard to exercise it right away. Jaol had plans already in motion to bring those holdings more firmly under his control, but it would be some time, years perhaps, before those plans could be brought fully to fruition.
He grabbed a junior officer. “Go find the Marquis. I want to speak with him.”
“yes Sir.”
Jaol turned back to Sylban, “As for you, get to the Station. I’ll have The Conquest waiting for you. Do the tour of the system we’d discussed, and go find your little golden boy too. Bring him back, dead, alive, I don’t care. Just make sure that the Princess is breathing.”
Sylban tipped his head, heels clicking together smartly.
“As you order.”
“Go.”
Sylban left.
Jaol let out an annoyed breath but said nothing to the back of the departing man.
*****
The Marquis arrived in the Command Center only a few minutes later, somewhat ruffled and irritated by the summons.
“Now see here, Lord Jaol, you don’t just order around the Nobility,” He started, only to be cut off by a slash from Jaol’s hand.
“Another time for your blustering, Marquis.” Jaol said coldly, “For now we have an issue, one you may be able to help resolve.”
The Marquis stared for a moment before gesturing for Jaol to get on with it.
“The Princess escaped.”
“What!?” The Marquis hissed, “That is a disaster! What kind of incompetent…”
“Enough. Heads will roll over it, I assure you, but for the moment we have other issues. She and her escort will be somewhere in the solar system, they don’t have access to a ship that can get them out to the colonies. That means they’ll be looking for one. I am quite certain you know of most semi-legal and, shall we say… other types who might be willing to help them?”
The Marquis paused, thinking, “I know people who know people, yes.”
“Get word out. A bounty on their heads. The princess, alive. Her escort? I honestly do not care.”
“Yes, yes… that will raise some eyebrows, but we can’t exactly tell them who they’re hunting…” The Marquis said thoughtfully.
“Provide imagery of the pair. He’s a terrorist, she’s his kidnapping victim,” Jaol said dismissively. “No names currently known or shared. They won’t be using their real names anyway. If they do our system will let us know and the local constabulary will be on them in an instant and we won’t need bounty hunters.”
The Marquis nodded, “Agreed. I’ll set the reward. Significant, I assume?”
“Whatever it takes.”
“Consider it done, but I have another issue to bring up with you, Lord Jaol,” The Marquis looked irritated.
Jaol sighed, “What is it?”
“You had my men in the Legion killed.”
Jaol blinked, “I did? Marquis, you didn’t tell us you had a man in the Legion. You were aware of the plans today.”
“Of course, I was, which is why I kept my plants inside the tower.”
Jaol blinked. “Inside? Oh.”
“Yes, Oh. You sent your little assassin, and he killed my men.”
“That is hardly my fault, or his, if you can’t be bothered to inform us of where we shouldn’t be wasting our time, these things will happen.” Jaol rolled his eyes. “It is an unfortunate loss, I agree, but not one we could reasonably have avoided.”
The Marquis snorted but said nothing more on the subject.
Jaol was satisfied to leave it at that.
He had far more important things to deal with.
*****
IF-98 Raging Roc
The low thrum of the space drive was the only thing that could be heard on the ship, aside from the gentle breathing and occasional rougher sounds of the two occupants asleep at her controls.
The silvery orb of Luna had grown rapidly and was now shrinking even more so as the mid range craft slung itself out into the outer system, moving at high sublight speeds and accelerating quickly to the edge of lightspeed through the twisting of space by its drives.
The navigation controls showed a single massive planetary body surrounded by dozens of small moons. However, the destination was not the planet or the moon… but a slowly rotating rock leading the planet’s orbit.
The pair slumped in the seats slept on as the ship flew, having collapsed of exhaustion almost as soon as the danger passed.
In the vacuum they traversed, no one could hear them snore.
*****
Chapter X
ISV Conquest, Approaching Saturn
Sylban stood on the flying bridge of the three-kilometer-long battleship, hands clasped behind his back as he watched the approach of the ringed world. He had changed from his Legion uniform to one that was a near mirror image, with black instead of grey base with silver rather than gold trim. He left it plain, no rank or mission badges.
They all seemed rather… unnecessary.
“Sir?”
“Yes, Captain,” Sylban glanced to one side as the other man approached.
“We’ve been cleared into a close orbit over Saturn. The locals have asked where you intend to visit?”
“You may tell them I’ll be visiting where I please,” Sylban said simply. “Have there been any reports of the stolen Roc?”
“No Sir, no signs of the ship have turned up… well, anywhere as best anyone can tell,” The Captain said, frustrated. “They must be low on supplies by this point, where are they?”
“Where indeed,” Sylban said. “Secure the Conquest’s orbit, Captain. I will take a detail with me. We have multiple goals here this trip. Be certain to take that into consideration.”
“I understand my orders, Mr Gyver,” The Captain said with just a hint of a sneer in his tone. “The Marquis briefed me personally.”
“Did he now?” Sylban smiled thinly, “How… interesting.”
Sylban stared the other man down, waiting to see if he would say anything more. When nothing was spoken, Sylban nodded simply.
“Well then, do your duty, Captain.”
Without waiting a response, the Legion man turned his back on the Captain and strode off the flying bridge.
*****
The Imperial Star Vessel Conquest was one of the Empire’s Vanquish Class Battleships, designed to bring insurmountable firepower to Imperial holdings within the Sol System and beyond. Three kilometers long, with four mass drivers running the entire length of the ship’s beam, the Conquest could end a civilization with a single salvo, turning a world the size of Earth into a dust covered ice world.
Such firepower had never been used in the history of the Empire, not to that scale at least, but the very threat of it had been sufficient to hold onto worlds and colonies that might otherwise have attempted to stake out a future on their own devices.
An elegantly curved superstructure rose above the upper deck of the gleaming vessel, supporting the flying bridge, the Imperial sigils flying from hard points along the entire length.
Around the massive starship, smaller support and defensive ships flew in escort pattern, a division of vessels thirty strong with their own strengths and specialities, as well as collier ships following with supplies to maintain, provision, and fuel the entire group.
When a Vanquish entered orbit, the ship and its support would eclipse the sun.
*****
Saturnus Col, The Floating City
The floating city of Saturn, Saturnus Col, was a marvel of technical innovation and what could be done when a determined force of personality guided the hand of human effort. Ranging in Saturn’s atmosphere from between five and thirty atmospheres of pressure, the city adjusted its altitude by harvesting helium as a side effect of mining exotic materials from the deeper ranges of the gas giant.
Saturn was one of the only sources of Helium 10, an exotic material prized as a reactor catalyst but with such an intensely short half life that under normal circumstances could not exist for any significant time, even in high energy particle labs. The exotic material was trapped in the lattice structure of metallic hydrogen that formed twenty-five thousand kilometers below and was extracted by the mining facility the city was built around.
Side products of the process were Helium Three, Helium Four, various rare trace elements, and quite a lot of hydrogen that was used to offset the city’s buoyancy and keep it at the desired altitudes without additional power expenditures.
Helium tanks provided a source of passive lift as a redundant backup for the Lenz Repulsors that were the primary lifting platform for the whole city.
The Floating City had been considered a wonder of the solar system since it was built and, in fact, was widely considered in the running for one of the most amazing human constructions anywhere.
*****
“Director Belkham, the Imperial Captain has demanded access to our systems. They want full administrative control.”
Durajsh Belkham looked at his junior like the boy was crazy.
“Are they insane?” He demanded, rhetorically because he knew the junior staffer wouldn’t be able to respond with anything useful. “I’m not giving anyone administrative access to our system. They could take control of the ballast tanks with that!”
The staffer just shrugged helplessly.
Belkham made an irritated sound, stalking his way out of his office as he made his way to the central control facility that maintained the operating necessities of the city. He was only halfway there when he heard some people speaking in surprise and looked around to see them pointing upward.
He looked up, then jerked in surprise as he could easily make out the gilded outline of the Imperial battleship in low orbit, passing as it was across the distant orb of the sun, well under the arc of the infamous planetary rings that filled up nearly a third of the sky above.
That’s not a normal Imperial consulate ship.
Whatever class of ship was, it was big, and it was low in the sky, apparently skimming the upper atmosphere.
“Sir,” Another aide ran up to him, “We have an Imperial dropship arriving on the upper level platform.”
“What?” Belkham barely managed to keep off from swearing, but only aloud. In his head he was cussing up an orange storm and inventing new curses every second word. “Damn it. Alright, get me a detail to the top platform, on the double.”
I asked them to tell me when they were arriving, damn it!
He now had to almost, but not quite run, grabbing a high-speed lift to take him up to the upper observation deck.
Saturnus Col was a massive facility, with hundreds of thousands of people living and working within its environment, even including exterior facilities for people to enjoy with proper breathing gear. The landing pad was one of the exterior locations, for obvious reasons, and so Belkham grabbed one of the public breathing masks as he left the lift and fit it over his nose and mouth while he pushed through the rotating door that provided fast filtration of the ammonia and other less than desirable gasses.
Once outside, Belkham shivered slightly as the city was currently resting quite close to its highest altitude and the temperature was a few degrees below freezing but not enough for him to grab a jacket as he immediately spotted the descending Imperial Dropship.
Designed for a hard drop through thick atmosphere, the dropship was typical of the overbuilt Imperial aesthetic, but Belkham noted that this was adorned with gilded sigils. The Conwin family, and thus the Imperial, Phoenix rising out of its own flames.
Belkham consciously adjusted his clothing, making sure it was as straight as he could manage in the blustery winds that carried rapidly melting ammonia snow from higher altitudes.
That is going to take some work to wash out.
He was mostly inured to the smell, as all permanent residents of Saturnus Col were prone to be. It was a common smell, and a few generations was all it took to get used to it.
The dropship extended its landing skids as it retro thrusted over the landing platform, slowly dropping onto the big gear, and letting its weight sink down fully.
Steam hissed from the dropship as it broke its seals, warmer high oxygen air within rushing out into the atmosphere of Saturn. The ramp under the ship dropped down, men already standing on the edge. The first off was a tall man in a black uniform with silver trim. Belkham didn’t recognize it by look, which seemed odd, though there was something familiar about it.
Troops followed behind him, a good-sized squad if not a short platoon.
Belkham took a breath and strode forward, meeting the obvious leader in the center of the platform.
“I’m Durajsh Belkham,” He said, “Welcome to Saturnus Col… Might I enquire as to the purpose of you…”
“No, you might not.” The leader said from under his own mask, gesturing to the troops.
They surged out around, quickly securing the platform as the man in black strode past Belkham, leaving the director confused as he turned and chased after him.
“Excuse me… My… Lord?” Belkham wasn’t sure, but the man seemed to be acting like at least a minor noble, if not a fully titled one.
“Do not call me that,” He said instead. “I actually work for a living.”
Belkham nodded slowly but was confused by the turn of phrase he’d not heard before.
“I am Gyver,” The man said. “That is all you need from me. What I need from you should have been broadcast ahead of my arrival.”
Belkham shook himself, remembering the only request he could under the circumstances.
“Administrative access to our systems is out of the quest-” He was choked off when Gyver grabbed him by the throat and pulled him in close.
“Administrator Belkham,” He said coldly as he reached up and pulled Belkham’s mask off his face, letting the ammonia and hydrocarbon atmosphere in. “The Empire is not asking. You are being told to grant access. Do so, or we will replace you with someone who will.”
Gyver let the mask snap back and let go as Belkham choked and fell to his knees, fighting to keep from pulling in a breath until the mask had been purged properly.
“You can’t do this!” He objected from the ground. “Our charter was…”
“Revoked. Thirty-four hours ago.”
“You can’t do that!”
Belkham struggled back to his feet as Gyver walked past him, heading for the revolving door lock.
“I believe, Administrator,” He said without looking back. “That you’ll find that not only can we do it, but it has already been done.”
Belkham hesitated a moment, then chased off after the man, mind awhirl of confused thoughts as he tried to determine just what in the hell had happened.
*****
Sylban ignored the man trying to keep up with him, but set his paces just enough to be at that uncomfortable point where the man couldn’t quite jog, nor could he comfortably walk, reducing the administrator to hop chasing him through the halls of the Floating City.
He had reviewed the schematics and floor plans for the city while transiting from Earth, not for the first time. He had actually been assigned to the city for a short time, and spent several operations coming in and out of the city during his younger years. Saturnus Col was a fascinating city, with everything one might want from a metropolis on the civilian side, one of the few places in the solar system other than Earth where one could walk out in the open air… at certain points in the city’s pattern, at least, with nothing more than a breathing mechanism.
Inside, it was ultimately a mining city, however. The economy was entirely centered around drawing metallic hydrogen up from the surface of the planet, an nearly impossible distance below. Between that and the funneling of hydrocarbon fuels to upper orbit, the city had an effectively inexhaustible economy.
That was why Jaol and the Nobility had determined that it was to be brought more firmly under the Empire’s control.
The original construction of the city had been, of course, funded and pioneered by Imperial engineers, pushed by Pitr Conwin’s determination to get humanity on Earth back into space at any cost. As part of his original intent to eventually return power to the people as well as several other more practical reasons, Pitr had signed a charter into effect that gave Saturnus Col effective independence.
A charter that was no longer in effect, wiped from the Imperial registry by the consent of the Nobility and the signature of Her Highnesses’ Royal Proctor, The Lord Marshal Jaol.
“Wait a moment! You can’t just… stop!”
Sylban ignored the man chasing him, casually turning down the corridor that would take him to the city’s central control facility. There were guards up ahead, of course, but they were barely armed, and his own squad had them covered and helpless long before he reached them. Sylban simply walked past, ignoring them entirely as the city administrator continued to chase after him.
He only came to a stop once he was in the control facility, looking around the systems that monitored every operation within the city, and controlled most of them.
“Very nice,” He said, “I do appreciate a well-run operation.”
He crossed to a central console, wide eyes on him, and casually brought up the command applications before he finally turned to look back at the Administrator.
“Your unlock pattern, if you please.”
“Absolutely not,” Belkham said, gasping at him. “I refuse-”
Sylban grabbed the man by the throat for the second time, fingers digging into his jugular and cutting off his breath while still leaving room for the blood to flow along the artery there.
“You use biometric locks,” Sylban said softly. “I want you to consider whether you wish to be conscious when the system is unlocked or… not. Choose wisely.”
It didn’t take long for the man to give up and manage a painful nod. Sylban let him go, and he fell to the deck again, gasping for air.
At least this time he isn’t sucking on ammonia and methane, I suppose.
“Now, for the last time, Administrator,” Sylban tapped the edge of the console lightly, his expression placid.
Belkham coughed but dragged himself to the console and put his hand and eye to the appropriate places, and the system unlocked. Sylban pushed him casually aside, slipping into the system and adjusting the biometrics before he tapped the inside of his wrist and a comm channel beeped softly.
“Conquest.”
“Gyver,” Sylban said simply. “The central computer is ours. Linking to your computers now.”
“We see them. The Captain says good work, Leg…”
Sylban cut the connection off, not caring any farther. He turned back to the now recovering administrator.
“Administrator Belkham, you’ve done admirable work during your tenure here,” He said. “Continue to do so under the more… direct control of the Empire and I expect you shall have a long and profitable career. Or, well… not. The choice is yours.”
Belkham only managed to nod painfully.
“Now, let us have another discussion,” Sylban went on, drawing an apprehensive look from the man. “I want to speak with you about any… new arrivals you may have had in this planetary system over the last few days.”
Belkham shivered as Sylban leaned in closely, his smile widening as he did.
*****
Unspecified Asteroid, Leading Trojans, Jovian Orbit
“What is this place?” Jinsha asked as she floated through the rough-hewn corridors, pulling herself along after Eryn as he led them in deeper.
“Legion depot,” He said. “There are dozens or more of them around Imperial space, probably some in other polities space as well, but I don’t know about any of those. This is one I was briefed on when I graduated.”
“What’s it for?”
“Emergency use, if things go really badly.”
She snorted, “This would likely qualify.”
“Yeah,” Eryn said uncomfortably.
“You don’t sound like you think this is a good idea, being here.”
“It’s not really an optional thing,” He sighed. “But the man who briefed me on the location of this depot?”
“Yes?” She asked with a sinking feeling.
“It was the same man who shot me.”
Jinsha shuddered, suddenly looking around with concern, “Should we be here?”
“Likely not, but that’s why I waited so long. I was looking for any sign of approaching ships, or hidden ones. If our ship had been faster, I would have rushed in and grabbed what we needed in a hurry but, well…anyway,” He said, “There’s been nothing even close. I don’t get it to be honest, but we can’t wait any longer either.”
Jinsha didn’t say anything, she couldn’t think of what to say. They’d arrived in the area the day before, their fighter transport not being the fastest sort of ship they might have chosen all things considered, but it had gotten them out to Jupiter orbit in a couple days. After that, she had wondered why Eryn had kept them resting in space, passive scanners on their highest sensitivity for so long.
Now she knew.
A massive metal door loomed ahead of them as they drifted to a stop in front of it. Eryn found a disguised panel in the wall along one side of it. Or she thought it was the wall. Perhaps it was the floor, or ceiling? Honestly, it really didn’t matter much in micro-gravity, she supposed.
He popped the panel open and entered a code, waited, then entered another one. After another significant wait, Jinsha jumped… or would have jumped out of her skin if jumping had been possible. She supposed she sort of shuddered in mid air instead when the deep rumble seemed to shake everything around her, and the door began to move.
Hesitantly, she followed Eryn as he pulled himself forward and through the doors into the surprisingly massive cavern beyond.
*****
Eryn took a moment to survey the area before he started to work.
The Legion depot was one of only a small handful he had been briefed on, and it should hold everything he and the Princess would need to get out of the solar system. He knew he had to get Jinsha to one of the colonies, ideally to one of her siblings who had denounced their claim to the throne.
They might had left the Empire, for all intents and purposes, but they were her family.
He hoped that would be enough.
He made his way to the row of lockers, a small replica of a Legion Quartermasters’ supply. He drew out a set of Legion armor for himself, and another for Jinsha. With her implant suite, he was certain he could train her in its proper use in a short time once they had a short time.
“Here,” He said, gliding it across the air to her, already moving on.
The weapon lockers were stocked, of course, and he grabbed a bag and quickly filled it up with replacements and ammo. One thing he took specifically for himself, however, was a Legion saber in a tactical sheath. He had left his own in his small apartment on Earth, thinking that his pistol and beam-lock would be enough, and the blade was a little too obvious for the crowds they were dealing with.
Never doing that again.
The tactical sheath was designed to fit over his shoulders, along his back with a pivot to allow the hilt to be accessible over the shoulder or at the small of the back. The sheath itself was a mechanical masterpiece that would open on an internal mechanism with a simple tug on the blade, freeing it so that it could be drawn with a short pull, something that a traditional sheath simply would not allow.
Modern military specification armor would sneer at bullets, and some could even stop infantry beams for a time, but nothing worn by current military, reg-force or special ops like the Legion, would do much more than slow a Legion blade. Legion issue armor was one of several military secrets held by the Empire, capable of stopping even light to medium anti-material rounds with no particular damage to the wearer, but against a Legion blade? It was paper.
He loaded the gear into a large bag, tugging it along behind him as he made his way to his actual priority at the moment. A field medical kit, Legion issue, was sitting there waiting for his use. He’d managed to field dress the wound, and the beam itself had done a lot of the work of keeping the bleeding down, combined with the implants and nanites that filled his body.
Even with all that, however, he really wanted a proper check of the injury as soon as he could manage.
The field kit was not that, unfortunately. However, it would ensure that he wasn’t bleeding to death by inches and would even encourage healing by several degrees more than his own body and implants could.
“Here,” He said, passing the kit off Jinsha. “We need this.”
She just quietly nodded and took it in hand, following behind as he again kicked off and headed toward the center of the cavern where the ships awaited.
*****
There were five of them there, Jinsha noticed with shock.
Five ships, of varying design, just sitting there in the cavern.
Parked.
She gaped at them, not really certain she was seeing what she thought she was seeing.
Starships were expensive constructions, even the small ones. Operational ones, no matter how old, were never… not ever left to sit around. They were worked until they were unfit for use, then they were stripped of everything of value, and the hulls were recycled into something else.
She hadn’t realized that the Empire had just left ships… lying around.
“How?” She whispered, not really intending to be heard, but Eryn did catch her question apparently as he turned to respond as they drifted in toward the ships.
“Captured mostly, pirates, smugglers, probably a spy or two from foreign governments,” He answered, “Take their ship in the commission of a crime and the Legion reports it destroyed in the battle. Everyone believes it, because the ship is never seen again since the Legion intentionally leaves them sitting for at least a couple decades even after replacing all the identifiers. Do that over a couple centuries, and you build up a decent inventory.”
“Even so,” She whispered. “There are billions in value sitting just here.”
“High billions,” He nodded. “Somewhere around a hundred billion Eagles apiece, most of them a lot higher since the Legion put money into making sure they were space worthy… and a lot of them were pretty marginal when they were taken.”
Jinsha stared across the ships, trying to recognize them. She only knew two of the models, one was a positively ancient Terran design from the very early days post-diaspora. She’d learned about the design in her history books, mostly because it was considered one of the most successful Terran workhorse designs, with knockoffs still being built all across the colonies even now.
The other, she was quite certain, was a Free Worlds design. Again, a noted workhorse that had become ubiquitous since it was introduced.
The other three, those she didn’t remember ever seeing before.
“Which one are we taking?” She asked softly.
Eryn sighed, looking them over.
“None of them have star drives,” He sighed, not answering as he considered the question. “So, we’ll need to find a freighter that can give us a lift.”
“Where will we find one willing to take us on?” She asked.
“Only one place in the solar system, my Lady,” He said wearily. “Saturn.”
Where the Empire would be waiting, with everything they could dispatch to recapture the Princess, he had no doubts at all.
*****
Chapter XI
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
Captain Theodore Katchkin strode into the Conquest’s Command Coordination Center. The ship’s Triple C was in some ways more central to the ship’s operations than even the bridge. While he could command the Conquest from the bridge, from the Triple C he could command the solar system.
Here and now, however, the Triple C was focused on the planetary system that surrounded Saturn.
Ninety natural moons, over half of which were large enough to deserve names of their own, and another forty eight constructions large enough to house small communities of their own. That didn’t count all the vagrant constructions floating around, marginally legal or outright illegal mining operations with less than a hundred people involved. A few registered private habitats, of wildly varying quality, and a completely unknown number of illicit ones.
Saturn was a solar system unto itself by many measures, even more than Jupiter since Saturn was the solar system’s key source of reactor fuel and exotic materials needed to fuel a stardrive.
“Status,” He ordered simply, uninterested in standing on ceremony as the officers present noticed his arrival.
“We’re in progress of claiming full control over the region,” A Lieutenant from the Intelligence Division said softly. “But it’s going to be a lot of work to get the entire region under our thumb, Sir. We’ve got a dozen long haul freighters in orbit, most of them half loaded, if that, while they fuel up for the outward-bound trip.”
Theodore nodded.
Terra was a net importer these days, with other systems having far better access to exotic materials and most of Sol’s easily accessed resources having been long ago mined out.
There were still a lot of materials in the system, of course, just most of it was harder to get at or yet to be discovered in some unsurveyed asteroid floating around. The stuff in and around Jupiter and Saturn that was just floating around in the most obvious of places, that was all gone same as the surface metals were long gone from Earth.
The Colonies still wanted Terran culture, though, and made in Terra had a bit of a niche cachet across the stars. That and the Imperial holdings beyond Sol gave them enough purchasing power to keep the freighters loaded when they came in, but most of what went out wasn’t nearly bulky enough to fill a long-haul rig.
“Put men on each of them, customs inspection,” He ordered.
“The Free Worlds ships won’t like that, Sir,” The Lieutenant warned.
“None of them are going to like it, but all of them are going to have to suck it up and deal with it,” Theodore replied. “Make it happen.”
“Aye Captain.”
Theodore looked over the holographic display that was centered around the massive ringed gas giant they were in orbit over. Just getting control of this region was going to be a nightmare, but their secondary mission of finding a pair of fugitives in this mess was almost asking too much.
“Be sure the ‘customs’ enforcement teams have pictures of our wayward souls,” He said, glancing up pointedly.
“Aye Captain. I’ll see to it,” The Lieutenant promised.
Theodore nodded, dismissing the young officer, then he turned.
“What about Col’s systems?”
“Mr. Gyver gained access for us, and we’ve gone over every aspect of their security recordings,” The computer specialist answered, shaking her head. “No sign of the fugitives on any of their systems.”
Theodore grunted, but really wasn’t surprised.
If they were to be shown up that easily, he expected that they would already have been flagged by the Inter-System Law Enforcement Database.
“Keep looking,” He said.
“Aye Captain.”
He straightened up from the Holographic projection table, eyes passing over it one more time before he shifted his focus.
The fugitives were important, but they were a distinctly tertiary level priority in his orders. Taking control of the planetary system was number two…
Number one, well that was going to take some finessing.
*****
Saturnus Col
The view, Sylban noted idly as he waited, was truly spectacular.
The floating city ranged in altitude, rising and dropping as needed to avoid the worst of the winds on a world where a gale force wind could hit or exceed fifteen hundred kilometers an hour. At the moment, they were at the upper apex of their usual altitude, floating at right about one atmosphere.
Another difference on Col over Earth was that they didn’t really bother with conventional altitude listings. They would be largely meaningless, and mostly just an educated guess anyway. What matter was at what atmospheric pressure the city was currently resting, and that could range from just under one atmosphere to as much as twenty.
At the lower end of the city’s travels, the sky would be dark even with the sun at its apex, dense cloud formations roiling above. Now, however, there was actually a bit of blue in the sky he was pleased to note, and the distant sun was refracting amazingly off the ice and particulates that made up the rings.
It was almost the very epitome of how Saturnus Col advertised itself to the tourists who were routinely brought in to celebrate their weddings and anniversaries.
Tourism was, however, the least of the attractions for the floating city.
The local economy was, of course, primarily based around exotic materials mined from the metallic core of the planet, but Col was also the defector center of trade for the solar system largely due to those very materials. Not every colony world could afford to build such a massive project, and without being willing to invest several centuries of a planet’s GDP, it was simply cheaper to buy from someone who had.
Sol, and Saturnus specifically, was one of the oldest sources of Helium 10 in a stable form. It also provided as much as a third of the total Rare Stellar Elements, of the type necessary to allow stardrives to function.
Earth might be the political center of the Sol system, but there was no question that Col was the center of the system’s economy.
That made the move the nobility and Lord Jaol advocated for an eminently understandable one, and one of the key things that they had clashed with the Lady Lian over. The self governing of Saturnus Col was guaranteed by the signature of Pitr Conwin. One of the last things the man did as his time as Emperor was coming to an end, and one of the least popular among the Nobles even to this very day.
Consolidating power within Sol was the primary objective of their little trip out this far and was only the first step in the Nobles’ ambition. Terra technically laid claim to a baker’s dozen outworld colonies, worlds close enough to Sol to be easily accessible for Terra’s needs but not so rich or inviting as to have been taken over during the Diaspora years by colonies powerful enough and with sufficient backing to becoming truly self sufficient.
The Empire was awakening, and that might well be a nightmare to many in its close proximity.
*****
Independent Bulk Carrier, Rubber Duck
The dull clank of the customs ship connecting to the airlock reverberating through the old iron of the bulk carrier’s hull, her Captain cursing as he rushed through the old corridors to get to the ‘reception deck’ before the customs assholes broke something.
He almost made it, wincing as he arrived to see the hatch get kicked open and bang off the inside wall with enough force to bend the handle.
“Oh, come on, I was almost here!” He complained, skidding to a stop as the armed team breached the area and swarmed in. “You couldn’t give me five damn minutes?”
“Captain Casul,” An officious looking man in Imperial Uniform, the only one not in pretty hefty body armor, “You were ordered to prepare for our arrival and inspection.”
“Do you have any idea how big this damn ship it?” Jan Casul asked wearily. “I was inspecting my cargo in one of the mid-holds when you called. That’s a couple klicks afterwards.”
“That is not the Empire’s problem, Captain.”
Jan groaned as he checked behind the airlock and confirmed that yes, the securing handle was indeed bent. He hoped it would still secure the lock when the idiots left, otherwise it would be a major job to fix, most of which would have to be done in vacuum to keep from venting too much of the ship’s air to the void.
“Whatever,” He sighed. “What do you lot want? I’m filed up on my paperwork.”
“Visual inspection to confirm the details.”
“Visual…” Jan stared in disbelief, “Are you out of your goddamn mind? This ship is five klicks, end to end. Most of my holds are open to space, and the ones that aren’t are big enough for you to get lost in, Lieutenant. I know that might not seem like much to your NCO here, but trust me, it’s a plenty big space.”
Jan supposed that mouthing off to the officer might not be the smartest thing he’d ever done, but he took some vindictive pleasure in how red the junior officer turned even as the squad escorting him visibly had to muffle laughter.
“Uncooperative,” The Lieutenant spit out a short time later, making a note on his tablet. “Sergeant, see that the Captain here causes no further trouble with the inspection.”
“Yes Sir,” The Sergeant said, gesturing casually to two of his men who detached from the group and quietly took up positions on either side of Jan, who just sighed.
“Fine, fine.” He said, “But there is no way I’m making my departure window now, do you know how much that is going to cost? I’m running on thin margins as it is, it’s not like this run is high profit you know. Running cargo from the colonies to the Empire barely pays the damn bills.”
“I’m quite sure you make do,” The Lieutenant sneered. “Now, let’s start with the closest hold.”
*****
On Saturn Approach
The orange ball of the gas giant was looming in the distance, the rings now easily visible even with unaided vision. Eryn had only been off world for training, and most of that time had been spent in flight training between Mars and Jupiter, so this was his first personal sight of the ringed world.
He had to admit that, while there was a certain missing of expectations when you compared it to the computer enhanced images that most saw, there was something he couldn’t quite describe that made the in person sight subtly more… there somehow.
Sight seeing, however, quickly took a backseat as he noticed his instrumentation reporting something he had half expected but honestly hoped not to see.
“Damn it.”
“Huh?” Jinsha looked over, blinking as she woke to his swearing.
“Sorry, My Lady,” He said automatically, “Just got close enough to Saturn to pick up the IFF signals.”
“Saturn?” She turned to look out the cockpit, through the thick armored crystal canopy, eyes lighting up as she found the ringed world. “I loved Saturn when we visited. There are so many amazing things to see.”
“Never been,” He told her. “But I’d like to get the chance to see the sights some day. Not likely to be now, though, I’m afraid.”
She glanced over, “Yeah. What were you saying? Eye Eff Eff?”
“Identification Friend or Foe,” He said. “IFF. There are a lot of Imperial IFF signals in Saturn right now, military codes. The big one, though, that’s the Conquest.”
Jinsha’s eyes widened again, surprised.
“The Conquest? I… I didn’t think that ship was finished. My mother told me that construction had been delayed on the class.”
“It was supposed to be,” Eryn nodded, “It was my understanding that the entire class was being considered likely to be cancelled for cost overruns. I didn’t think any of them were actually built, but if that is the Conquest…”
“Then where is Vanquish?”
“I don’t know,” Eryn said, “but I’m going to come in from the other side of the planet, use one of the secondary orbital control lanes.”
“Shouldn’t we turn back?” She asked, nervous.
“No, we need to go through Saturn and find a ride out-system,” He said. “We don’t have a choice.”
*****
Titanus Min, Orbital Control
“New contact on approach, they’re coming in on lane eighteen bravo.”
The senior controller snorted, “Well someone who knows how to fly, I guess there’s a first time for everything. He sent contact ID yet?”
“Yes sir. Independent miner ID, and the ship is an old puddlejumper.”
“Enough of them kicking around, what model?” the Controller asked curiously while he ran the numbers for the approach.
“Sona Avionics,” The junior said, “a Paragull Ninety-Nine according to the ID code.”
The Senior Controller nodded, “Nice model. I think that base hull was used for everything from mining to fast attack fighters, back in the day. Alright, I’ve cleared him for their approach. Cross check their ID with the central control database, make sure they’re not on the watchlist.”
“Yes sir. Running the ID now.”
*****
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
Captain Katchkin looked up from what he was working on when a chirp from the other side of the room caught his attention.
“What’s that?”
“Ship ID being run through the Col’s database, Captain. Routine check of an inbound ship.”
Katchkin nodded, “Has it cleared?”
“Yes Sir.”
He nodded, returning to his work before he frowned, “Run it through the Imperial database.”
“Sir?”
“Full pass,” He said. “Just run it.”
“Aye Captain.”
The process took only a few more moments before it came back.
“Confirmed ID, Sir. It’s a little spotty, but nothing worth our time. Mostly legitimate business, occasional dabbling into semi-illicit smuggling, a few other minor black marks.”
Katchkin snorted. “Your average prospector, then.”
“Yes sir.”
“File, forget it, move on.”
“Aye sir.”
*****
Saturn Approach
Eryn sighed as they got their clearance, along with instructions to follow the assigned ballistic path into orbit until they were assigned final approach. That didn’t mean they were fully in the clear, but it was a good sign.
He watched the edge of the planet, knowing that sunrise was coming soon.
And with the sun, so rises the Conquest.
At this distance, the sun was a small fraction of the disc it presented to the face of the Earth, but it was still uncomfortably bright to stare into. He squinted as it rose over the curve of Saturn, lifting a hand to shield his face from the light.
“It’s beautiful.”
He glanced over to see Jinsha looking out on the light filtering through the rings.
“What do you call a rainbow in space?” She asked curiously.
“That is called a Glory, my Lady.”
The sunlight was indeed casting a full spectrum Glory to their eyes as though it were a rainbow floating there in space.
It was, without a doubt, beautiful.
His eye was seeking something else, however, and he found it soon enough.
It was also beautiful, but it was a dark beauty.
The Conquest was more than just a warship. He’d seen the plans, of course, most in the Empire had really. Seeing it in person, though, that was something so very different.
It was a ship designed to impress just as much as it was created to oppress.
The entire class was supposedly delayed for years due to cost overruns. How did anyone get at least two of them built in secret? It must have taken thousands of people to finish, word would have leaked. The Legion would have to know, even if no one else did.
He swallowed.
Of course, maybe the Legion did know.
He was too junior to swear they didn’t. Even having worked with Sylban for as long as he had he hadn’t been fully privy to what even Sylban know, to say nothing of what the Legion as a whole was aware of.
But.
But that didn’t quite feel right.
The Vanquish class went against everything the Empress seemed to want. It was not something that was built when you were about to hand control of the government back over to the people.
The existence of the Conquest made it all seem much deeper than he’d been thinking. He should have known, of course. In his shock, Eryn realized that he hadn’t been really thinking about what had happened from the wider outlook. He’d been too focused on his little part of the story, trying to survive from moment to moment, and to extract the Princess from the situation.
I could not see the forest for the trees, He thought with dark humor. Sylban would be so very disappointed in me.
The assassination of the Empress, and everything that had been involved therein, had been planned much longer ago than he’d even considered…
And it must have involved so many more people in high places of power that I had considered.
Worse, Eryn doubted that the plan was anywhere near finished.
*****
Chapter XII
Titanus Min, Miner’s Paradise, Saturn Orbit
“Stay close to me,” Eryn said softly as they left the ship parked in the shielded hangar, after paying the fees and arranging for it to be refueled.
Jinsha nodded, pulling at a cloak she had wrapped over her shoulders to disguise her form a little.
Miner’s Paradise was a dirty little outpost that floated a few dozen kilometers over the rings, on a moonlet that wasn’t worth a name until a secondary command and control was built on it and a few miners began using it as a transfer point for smaller cargos, ones that weren’t worth waiting for a position in the larger Titan transfer point.
It was also known to be a common place to buy or sell less than legal materials, but the Empire generally left that be because the amounts were too small to bother with.
That, and it was a treasure trove of intelligence for all manner of groups that normally were a lot better at hiding from Imperial spies.
That made Titanus Min both a boon and a bane to Eryn in that moment. He had no doubt that he could find a ride out-system here, if he was just a little lucky. The sort of freighter owners who did business here wouldn’t blink at smuggling a couple people out of Imperial space. Unfortunately, he’d have to duck Imperial Intelligence in order to find the sort he was looking for.
They shuffled along the corridors burrowed through the interior of the big rock that had been carved out, first to build the control facility and, later, to house and entertain the miners who’d spent their off hours sleeping and partying there rather than wasting time flying down to Col.
Simulated gravity had been put into the rock, using some old first-generation gravity plates as best Eryn could tell. They were barely effective, and had to be power sinks by modern standards, but power was cheap, and you didn’t need full gravity to throw a party. In fact, it could get in the way.
He could hear a crowd roaring up ahead and nodded in that direction, leading the princess along with it as he headed toward the sound. They found a large open area hollowed out of what might have been a natural formation originally, now converted to a large bar with a fighting ring in the center.
There were a couple big guys in there as they entered, slugging it out with about as much style as a pair of drunks could manage. Most of the attention of the crowd was on the fight, which suited Eryn just fine as he found an empty table and dropped into a seat with a gesture for Jinsha to do the same.
A waitress hopped by a short while later, and Eryn ordered for them both, otherwise he just watched the crowd as they watched the fight. After they had their drinks, served in zero-gravity cups he noticed idly… which told him all he needed to know about the reliability of the gravity plates… the Princess finally got up the nerve to speak.
“Why are we here?”
Eryn didn’t say anything right away, his eyes falling on a grouping of people at the far end of the tavern in the cavern, and he nodded in that direction.
“Those people over there? Independent shippers,” He said, “One of them is our ticket out of this system.”
Jinsha snuck a look, making a face as she looked at them.
“I suppose they look marginally more respectable than the rest in here…”
He laughed softly. “Don’t let that fool you. The miners in here, the roughest looking of them is lightyears more respectable than the sort of shipper we need. Human smuggling is not a nice occupation. We’ll have to watch our backs once we make a deal, because the sort that will agree to transport a couple people out from under Imperial Intelligence’s gaze won’t, more often than not, blink at selling the same people to make a little extra money coming and going.”
She shot him a horrified look, but he just shrugged and went on.
“They used to call people like that Coyotes in some places on Earth, but they’re rarely anything more than slavers by another name.”
*****
It didn’t take long, not in a place as small as Titanus Min, for the less than savory element to take notice of a pair of fresh faces in their midst. The distraction of the fight certainly wasn’t enough to buy that kind of anonymity. Mostly the people watching just noted the two newcomers and then went on with their day. The pair were minding their own business and that was all they really expected of new faces anyway.
A few, however, paid closer attention.
Some quietly took pictures, sending them digitally to run against the Empire’s database, either law enforcement or intel, a few of them even did so legally. Of the rest, questions were whispered, with no answers forthcoming, and they eventually got bored of the new faces and settled down.
*****
Jan Casul downed the rest of his drink, trying to ignore the noise around him as he drowned his sorrows.
The Rubber Duck was currently being held, pending a full search. That would take weeks, at least, and once that was done, he’d have to cover whatever fines the Impie bastards decided to tack on. Lord knew, he didn’t exactly run a tight ship and there were more than a few things in the holds that would raise some eyebrows among the customs inspectors, but damn if it wasn’t like anyone actually cared.
Running cargo star to star wasn’t a way to get rich, not unless you had the right contracts and could secure contacts along some of the richer starlanes.
Earth wasn’t on any of those.
An independent on this run, well he had to make his money somewhere, especially on the outbound trip. There was always a market bringing in products from the colonies. Foodstuffs, medicines, some of the more exotic metals that had long since been mined out of easier locales around Sol. Those sorts of things had a market on Earth and the other communities in the system, but there was precious little available here that had a lot of draw out in civilization.
The Empire had previously been fairly understanding about independents picking up a few somewhat underhanded cargoes in order to keep the books in the black. It was one of the ways they kept the trade routes running, after all, and that was just in everyone’s best interest.
Or it should be.
Whatever the hell was going on down well on Earth, and about all he knew about those events were that they were a big deal to the locals, the Empire had obviously gotten a bit of a shakeup.
He figured that the low level peons running the customs department were either trying to puff themselves up to look too important to be dropped by whoever came out on top back home, or they were taking advantage of the chaos to do a little ‘empire building’ in their own little territories.
Either way, eventually someone from farther up the chain would eventually have a ‘chat’ with them most likely, remind them that they shouldn’t put a crimp in the flow of luxury goods to the locals Nobs, but that wasn’t going to help him.
The Duck was idle now, and that meant he was bleeding money.
If he didn’t get his ship moving soon, he might as well just stay here and drink away his sorrows, because there was no way he could show his face back in the worlds. He’d have a repo team on his ass before he made orbit of any remotely profitable destination.
Movement on his right jostled his arm, nearly making him drop his drink. It wouldn’t have spilled, not in the damn sippy cup they served them in here, but he was still irritated on general principles.
“Hey, watch it, man.” He complained, not looking up as he steadied his drink and tucked it in closer.
A meaty hand slapped down on his shoulder, causing him to half turn and find himself staring up at a guy who had to be three times his weight and with a good foot on him in height.
“Hey, never mind,” Jan said with a crooked smile. “Jostle my drink anytime you like.”
“Man wants to speak with you.” The monster told him.
“That’s nice. Is he under eight feet tall? Cause my neck is sore enough already.”
The grip on his shoulder tightened until it was almost painful, as the big guy sneered down at him. “Funny man. We’ll see if the boss thinks you’re funny.”
“Look, mate, what is this about? I’m just trying to get drunk here.”
“You’ve been hanging around with a lot of Imp pigs. Boss wants to know why.”
Jan snorted, tipping his drink back and emptying it before slamming it down on the bar in front of him and nodding to the bartender. “Perfect. Just fucking perfect. First, those bastards tie my ship up in weeks of document work, and now the local godfather type sends his leg breaker to ask me why.”
He got up, still craning his head to look up at the guy front of him.
“Come on then,” He muttered. “May as well get this over with. Like I give a shit anyway. Might as well just end it all for as good as things are looking.”
The big guy didn’t say anything, he just gestured calmly and then followed behind as Jan started making his way in the intended direction.
*****
“There are a lot of people taking pictures,” Jinsha noted softly as she gingerly nursed at the drink they had ordered.
“I know. We have digital countermeasures up. We should be ok,” Eryn said calmly. “Most of them are probably only going to run law enforcement databases anyway. Our photos won’t be in those, even if they could get a clean scan.”
He wasn’t being entirely truthful there, he knew, but he didn’t want to worry her either. The Systems LEO database would likely have their photos, just ones that were paired with bullshit dossiers. He expected that he was listed as a terrorist by this point, and Jinsha was either an accomplice or a victim, depending on whether the Nobles wanted her dead or alive.
He was betting alive but couldn’t count on it.
He knew, however, that they would have to trust the projection countermeasures he’d setup from Legion assets. They were simple little devices that would interfere with the images taken by digital recorders, making minor alterations to the facial structure of anyone wearing them. Just enough to keep from making any positive matches against a database search, likely requiring a human to do an eyes-on match if they wanted to get anything reliable.
By the time that happened, Eryn intended to be a long way from Sol, hopefully getting Jinsha hooked back up with some of the prodigal members of her family well away from Imperial controlled space.
To do that, he needed contacts who could find him an outbound ship.
A serious look around the large area, and more importantly the people therein, allowed him to write most of them off. Miners were the predominant occupants, unsurprisingly, but there were a few fairly obvious members of the local criminal element. He could spot them across the room with little to no issue, which unfortunately meant that they would be of little immediate value to him.
The types who were obviously out in the open wouldn’t be the sort who could arrange anything. They would be bottom feeders, only good for leading him to their bosses. That, or Imperial Intelligence and local LEO agents undercover.
Motion across the bar, only a few dozen meters away, caught his eye. One of the local lowlifes, the obvious ones, was muscling up on one of the establishment’s fine patrons. Eryn examined the man briefly, noting the rough flight suit. It wasn’t a high gee model, nor was it in anyway new, but it was something that caught his attention.
It was an out-worlder model.
That made the man stand out in a room full of Terrans who bought made in Sol gear.
“Stay here,” He said softly as he stood up. “Keep your head down. If anything happens, call.”
Jinsha nodded jerkily, which was good enough he supposed.
It was the best he was going to get anyway.
*****
“What else is going to go wrong, I wonder?” Jan wondered aloud, half-buzzed and all pissed as he walked ahead of the meat stack behind him.
The man behind him didn’t respond, but frankly Jan didn’t care. Wasn’t talking to him anyway.
“Imp bastards have my ship in hock until they actually search the whole damn thing, which should only take a month or so with the manpower they showed up with,” He grumbled, “So I try to get a drink, and the fucking place waters down the whiskey. Then what happens?”
He glanced over his shoulder, interrupted by another drunk bumping into him. Jan scowled, glared at the guy as he stumbled off, then looked back at the meat stack.
“Then you show up and drag me off to what? Get my legs broken because the Imps wanted to swing their dicks around and I was the poor bastard who got in the face?”
“Just move it,” The man rumbled.
Jan rolled his eyes and went where he was pointed, being directed out of the tavern and into a side room. A pair of doormen stepped aside for him as he arrived, and he started to get the idea that he might need to keep his mouth shut once he got inside.
The décor inside the room beyond the door was markedly different from the rough-hewn look of the larger tavern and ring he was leaving. Red carpet, a lot of gold… he assumed was solid gold, the sort of thing that Terrans still thought meant something. Jan stifled the urge to yawn.
Gaudy as fuck was his impression, and the fat man with the blond weave and the obviously fake tan did nothing to relieve him of that impression. Really? Who gets a tan out by Saturn?
The circumstances needed to safely tan, for certain margins of the word safe, were actually pretty rare in galactic terms. There was plenty of UV radiation out and about to manage it, but you might as well just sign up for third degree burns and some time in a cancer ward. You’d live through it, of course. Modern medicine was a wonder, even around Sol, but it wouldn’t be pleasant.
“Mr. Serge, the transporter you wished to speak with.”
Serge, the man behind the desk, barely glanced up from what he was doing, but casually waved the man off and Jan felt him fall back to the wall.
Jan stood there, waiting, resting his weight on one leg, and slouching in place.
He’d dealt with this kind of guy enough to know that the whole scene was a power game, even the room itself was designed to impress the sort of yokel who didn’t realize that gold was worthless everywhere outside of Terra and Sol, and the only reason it still had value there was because some of the Nobs corporations had a nice monopoly on space based mining and had made it illegal for gold to be sold unless it came from Imperial approved mines.
It was all a joke, of course.
Gold hadn’t been valuable in centuries, and even the last time it had real value it was mostly still fake value.
Who does he think I am? I’m a Free Worlder, fat ass, not some local yokel.
Though his head was rolling around, Jan just kept his face looking bored until the fat man decided he’d milked the intimidation bullshit for as much as he could.
Finally, he looked up and met Jan’s gaze.
“Mr. Casul, I believe?”
“That’s me,” Jan confirmed.
“You’ve been seen in the company of Imperial Customs.”
Jan snorted, “If you call having my ship all but impounded while they do a deck by deck search being ‘in their company’. You have any idea how long it’ll take one inspection team to search a bulk carrier like the Duck?”
“I have some idea, yes.”
Jan didn’t offer anything else up, waiting to see what the fat man wanted.
After several long and awkward seconds, Serge went on.
“What did they tell you?” He demanded.
“Tell me? They didn’t tell me much,” Jan said, starting to relax a bit as he got an idea of what was going on. “They were hyped up, not sure what they’re looking for, but I got the idea that it’s a big deal.”
Serge grunted, tapping the interactive screen that made up the surface of his desk, then flipping the pictures that appeared over so that they were right side up from Jan’s point of view.
“Have you seen these two? Either of them?”
Jan blinked, but leaned in and looked closer before he shook his head. “No, though I don’t run passengers, and until I came in here for drinks I’d been onboard the Duck for the last few weeks, hustling as much cargo as I could for the outward bound trip. They important?”
“No one seems to know, but the indications are that someone believes so,” Serge said, closing down the photos of the man and woman. “Should you happen to see them, I would appreciate it if you contacted my people first. I would be quite grateful, perhaps enough to get your ship released?”
“That… would certainly be interesting.” Jan said. Translating, the Empire is offering a fucking fortune for these two.
Serge looked over Jan’s shoulder, to the big guy behind him.
“Give Mr. Casul the contact information, Gerald.”
“Yes, Mr. Serge,” The big guy rumbled, dropping his hand on Jan’s shoulder again. “Come this way.”
Jan sighed, but let himself be led out. He got the contact information once outside the door, and then was sent on his way with a proverbial pat on the ass.
Almost surprised the meat stack didn’t actually do that, actually.
Jan couldn’t wait to get the hell out of the entire shit hole.
Might be time to look for another transport route, Terra is not looking like a good place to spend time in the near future.
Unfortunately, for right now, Terra was the place he was in and it went against the grain for Jan to be sitting around. Time was money, and if he wanted to keep his ship when he got back to civilization, he was going to have to find some way to make his downtime turn a profit.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a damn thing in the mining belt that had any value at all on the Colonies.
Hell, the locals were still mining gold in some cases.
Ignorant Savages.
Gold was of entirely imaginary value, had been even before mankind managed to properly get into space. It was only worth money because people said it was, and apparently on Earth some people still believed in the nearly useless yellow metal.
The only places in the entire system he might find something worth shipping back would be on Terra itself, or perhaps Saturnus Col… and there was no chance in hell he was going to go anywhere near Terra. Not after the news he’d just seen. The whole planet was likely to be buzzing like an angry nest of wasps.
Col it is. Ugh. I hate the smell of ammonia.
*****
Trouble.
“What is it?” Jinsha asked, eyes on the face of her companion, who was looking rather sick.
“Trouble.” Eryn said what he was thinking. “Local syndicate has our picture, and they’re getting the local scum out looking for us. Digital spoofing won’t do us much good if we’re recognized in person.”
“What do we do?” She asked quietly.
“No change, we just keep our heads down and keep looking for a ship.”
“What about the man you tagged?” She asked, eyes glancing over to the man Eryn had ‘bumped’ into earlier.
“No go. His ship is being held up by Imperial customs, probably looking for us. He’s stuck, no use to us.”
She nodded sadly.
Eryn sighed, pushing his drink away.
“Let’s go,” He said, “we’ll check the local networks from the ship, maybe turn something up.”
Jinsha nodded, getting up with him as he tossed a few Eagles on the table.
*****
Titanus Min, Landing Field
Eryn hissed as he sat back, staring unhappily at the computer.
“What is it?” Jinsha asked softly from behind him.
“We have to go down to Saturnus Col,” He said grimly. “The local network is locked down.”
“Are you insane?” She demanded, reaching out to rap at the screen that showed the external view where the Conquest was still holding station. “With that ship out there, there’s no question that the Empire will be on Col in force. We’d never get back off.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Eryn snapped. “But we’re locked out of the information we need, and there’s only two places within a dozen AU that has it… Of the two, I think we’d rather take our chances down on Col, considering the Conquest is the only alternative.”
She paled, drawing back, and shrinking into herself slightly.
“What if…” She hesitated, “what if we wait them out?”
Eryn shook his head, “That’s no good. They’re going to sweep the entire system for you if they have to. Sooner or later, someone will recognize us from the photos they’re passing around. Digital spoofing will only get us so far, and a place like this?”
He gestured helplessly, “There’s not enough people to hide in. Down on the city, there are millions of faces. We have a better chance there.”
“Millions of faces, sure, but only so many ways in and out,” Jinsha said, “and they’ll be watching those close. You know that.”
“Yeah. I’ll figure something out.”
She shook her head, not really believing him, but honestly not knowing what else they could do either.
“This is a bad plan.”
*****
Chapter XIII
Saturnus Col, Command Center
Sylban’s boots clacked softly on the deck of the city level as he walked into the central command center of the entire city, two Imperial Marines following along in his wake.
Residents of the city mostly moved smoothly out of the way as he and his men approached, as they should, leaving him an almost unimpeded path through the crowds as he made his way here. Tourists were the exception to that rule, stopping to gawk at the uniforms and occasionally needing prodding to get properly clear. Thankfully, within the command center there were far less people of course, and none who so much as hesitated to get the hell out of his path.
“Administrator Belkham, I hope you’ve had a pleasant evening,” He greeted the man, only glancing in his direction briefly as he walked on by.
“Damn it,” Belkham grumbled, chasing to catch up as Sylban made his way to the Administrator’s office. “You can’t just keep coming in here like this! Just tell us what you’re looking for so we can help you find it and you can be on your way.”
“Where I go in the future is as may be,” Sylban said, as he stood in front of the Administrator’s computer access console, “but the Empire is here to stay. Do not assume my departure will change that.”
“We have a constitutional document from the Empire that guarantees the Sovereignty of…”
Sylban held up a single hand, cutting the Administrator off.
“Your document is valid at the pleasure of the Empire, Administrator. That pleasure is come to an end,” He said severely, “I suggest you get used to it.”
Belkham looked frustrated but had nothing more to say to that as Sylban accessed the city’s central computer network.
“What are you doing now?” He finally blurted, frustration bubbling to the surface.
“That is not your concern.”
Sylban didn’t bother to look at the city’s administrator as he worked, the man was truly irrelevant. The city’s network was a convoluted mess, in many ways he was surprised that any of it even worked in the first place, but the vital parts were kept clean enough he supposed.
He wasn’t concerned with those, however.
Saturnus Col was one of the key sources of certain exotic elements, and it was the key source within the Sol system. Those elements were vital to star-drive construction. Without the materials forged deep in the heart of the gas giant, no ship built in the Sol system would be able to jump past light speed.
His task, in addition to keeping an eye out for the Princess, was to ensure that the Empire had no shortages in those precious materials.
Finally finding what he was looking for, Sylban tapped his finger on the display.
“Where is this?” He asked, turning his head slowly to look at Administrator Belkham.
“Why do you want to know that?”
“Administrator,” Sylban stepped away from the computer, closer to the Administrator, causing Belkham to step back involuntarily. “That is not something you have any reason to know. Now, you will answer my question…”
*****
Eryn finished closing off the last of the post-flight checklist as he felt the suspension of the Paragull-99 settle on the deck beneath them.
“Well, we got down alright,” He said, blowing out a relieved breath.
“Getting down here was not what worried me,” Jinsha said darkly.
Eryn winced, but couldn’t exactly discount her comment, it was something he was worried about himself.
“I want you to stay with the ship,” He said, “I’ll get this done. You’re the person they’re going to be looking for most.”
Jinsha hesitated, but nodded after a moment, “Fine. But you better not get caught.”
“I’ll do my best,” He smiled crookedly.
Honestly, he was less worried about getting caught than a few other things that might happen. He probably wouldn’t live long if anything went wrong, he wasn’t valuable enough. The Princess, on the other hand, they would take alive if they possibly could.
Eryn grabbed a long coat, throwing it over his armor and weapons.
One good thing about the city is that as cold as it is outside, there’s always a good reason to wear concealing gear.
He paused at the airlock and glanced back, nodding with a weak smile before he stepped through and cycled the system.
As the oxygen was pulled from the room, replaced by the exterior atmosphere, Eryn dropped a breath mask over his face and settled a pair of goggles on his eyes. The process took only seconds, during which he worked his jaw to equalize pressure with the outside before the door popped and he was able to wrench the heavy steel handle back so he could swing the door out.
He climbed out, hand over hand down the ladder as the lock door closed behind him, before dropping easily to the deck below.
So, this is Col, is it?
The city was impressive, a sprawling construct that floated in the roiling atmosphere of a gas giant. Above him the sunlight glinted off the rings, glories filling the sky as ice crystals refracted the light in all direction.
He took a deep breath through his breather and began to walk along the deck, ignoring the de-icing spray that caught him as he walked to the entrance to the inside of the city.
Time to get to work.
*****
Saturnus Col, Materials Storage
Sylban smiled thinly as he examined the contents of the room, understanding better than most what exactly he was looking at.
Administrator Belkham shifted nervously behind him, but he ignored the man.
“Marine.”
“Sir.”
“Have a team assigned to this room. Nothing leaves until our transport arrives to pick it up.”
“Yes sir!”
Belkham paled, his expression aghast, “Pick it up!? You can’t! Everything here has already been sold.”
“The Empire says otherwise, Administrator.”
“You don’t understand,” Belkham insisted, “We’ll lose all credibility with our clients! Saturnus depends on that income.”
“No.” Sylban said, turning to the man finally. “It is you who does not understand, Administrator. The Empire is your only client from this day forward. Marines, you have your orders.”
“Yes Sir!”
Sylban turned on his heel, leaving the exotic materials storage, and the sputtering Administrator in his wake.
*****
Administrative Levels
Eryn watched the people move around him as he leaned casually on a wall, delicately adjusting his digital image spoofing so as to be less noticeable. He didn’t want to go into a high security area with any digital artifacting - that would expose him in a heartbeat. No one would dedicate the resources needed to do real time analysis for digital artifacting across an entire camera network, but security critical areas were a very different matter entirely.
Finally satisfied with both his adjustments and observations, Eryn pushed off the wall and joined the flow of humanity that was moving through the halls. He kept his head down, but his eyes roved the halls as he walked.
Imperial Marines were stationed at various points, but they were paying little attention to the throngs around them. He knew their procedures and wasn’t overly concerned by the presence of the Marines. They would be a problem only if he encroached on their orders, otherwise they’d just ignore anything and everything… or appear too at least.
The only issue that brought was that he wasn’t aware of what exactly their orders were, but he could make some educated guesses based on where they were stationed.
It would seem that the Empire is moving into Saturnus, extending its control beyond Earth and the few meager offworld resources still under Terran claim.
That was… interesting.
As a member of the local chapterhouse at Almansk, and a candidate for the Legion from a relatively young age, Eryn had grown up with several views of the Empire. He knew that many of the Nobility chafed at the backwater perception they lived under. They thought that Earth should rule the Colonies, and there was a lot of dark grudges held against those offworld cultures due to how they got their start during the Diaspora years.
If the Nobility were now in ascendance, as it appeared, Eryn was very much afraid that much of the work the Chapterhouse and the Order had been striving toward for centuries was about to be undone.
If the Nobles have their way, the people will never regain control of their own fates. Gods Damn you, Sylban, why would you violate your oaths so badly as this? You dedicated your life to the Order!
Eryn did his best to put his mentor the Oathbreaker from his mind, he needed to focus on the task.
Only Saturnus Col’s network… and that on board the Conquest, he supposed, would have the information he needed if he were to get the Princess out of the system. That was the priority.
He could get access in the Administration offices, of course, that that would be far too risky. Among other things, places like that were always open and airy so as to make the shifts more comfortable for the people in charge. What he wanted was one of the maintenance sheds, where the computer cores were maintained and cooled. He could jack into the network there, and no one paid any mind to the people who went there. Even in high security areas people who did maintenance were invisible and anonymous.
They would have security, of course, but Saturnus Col wasn’t a military base. He didn’t expect it to be anything he couldn’t deal with.
A ripple in the movement of the push of people caught his attention, causing Eryn to glance slightly to the source. He felt his skin grow cooler as the blood left it, a figure and face he knew too well was approaching with a Marine guard in tow.
I can’t let him see me.
He shifted enough to hide his face without, hopefully, being too obvious about it, while still keeping an eye on Sylban’s approach out of the corner of his peripheral vision. Eryn tried to move with the flow, looking as disturbed as the others were by this intrusion on their daily lives, stepping hurriedly out of the path of the approaching Imperials.
Sylban had dropped his Legion uniform, Eryn noted with mixed feelings.
It was another sign of the man’s betrayal, he supposed, but at the same time he didn’t deserve to wear Legion colors.
Not after what he’d done.
Eryn moved a little quicker, in pace with the throng of people around him, coming to a door along the way. He stopped and quickly turned through it, leaving his former mentor behind with some relief.
*****
Sylban paused in his march, half turning with an expression of confusion as he looked around himself.
“Sir? Is there something?” The closest Marine asked hand twisting slightly around the grip of his weapon.
“No…” Sylban said quietly as he took one last look around, “No, I think not. Come, with me.”
The Marines didn’t respond, just automatically fell into place as he continued back to the Administrative offices.
Belkham had to run to, at first, catch up and then to pass them. He interposed himself in front of his offices, arms spread.
“No. That’s it! No more of this, damn it,” the Administrator growled. “Saturnus Col is a free city. The Empire has no power here.”
Sylban smiled slightly, “Oh Mr. Belkham, you mistake power for legality. I assure, we have the power here, and thus… we dictate the legality.”
Belkham didn’t move, glaring eye to eye.
“Move, Mr. Belkham,” Sylban whispered, his words just audible in the now quiet corridor, all eyes having turned to the scene that was playing out.
“The Empire has no authority here.”
“Really, Mr. Belkham, must we do this again?” Sylban asked rhetorically, stepping forward.
He was marginally surprised when the pistol appeared in the Administrator’s hand, maybe even a little impressed. He hadn’t really thought the man had it in him.
“I’m warning you.”
Belkham’s hand had a tremor, but his voice was steady.
Rustling was heard behind them, followed by a muffled scream of shock as the Marines’ leveled their weapons. Sylban held a hand up, causing them to hold position as he took a step forward.
“What are you going to do, assuming you kill me, Mr. Belkham? The Conquest can turn this city to falling embers.”
“The Empire needs the materials we mine here,” Belkham sneered, “They won’t do that.”
“True,” Sylban acknowledged, “However we do not need… you.”
His hand flashed up and over his shoulder, closing around the hilt of the blade that rested unobtrusively there. As he pulled the blade up, the scabbard it was held within parted to free the weapon within. The pistol in the Administrator’s hand barked sharply, rounds hammering point blank into Sylban as he brought the blade down.
It hummed through the air, the almost soothing sound changing to a scream as it intersected the pistol in the Administrator’s hand. The metal of the gun was sliced clean, along with two fingers as the sword completed its arc.
Sylban casually flicked his weapon, sending a spatter of blood and powdered steel to the floor as Belkham collapsed back against the doorframe behind him, clutching at his bleeding fingers.
He glanced down and sighed, casually brushing the flattened bullets off his uniform. Few people were properly familiar with the nature of charged carbon armor, or the fact that they rendered all but the largest of hand-held projectile weapons quite worthless. There was a reason why the Legion trained with and used swords. The flattened bullets clinked along the floor while Sylban reached out and pulled Belkham away from the door, throwing him to the floor in the hall.
Without looking back, Sylban opened the door to the office and started in. Pausing at the threshold, he glanced back to catch the attention of the Marines.
“Get him medical treatment, then have him sent to the Detention block on the Conquest. He can be dealt with later.”
“Yes sir.”
Sylban stepped into the office and close the door behind him.
*****
The maintenance section was cramped, as he’d expected, but once he’d slipped through the first security check, everyone started treating him as though he were invisible… also as he’d expected.
No one ever sees the guy cleaning up the messes made by more important people.
Finding exactly what he was looking for was a slightly more complicated affair, but only slightly since he didn’t need any specific access point, he just wanted to hardwire into the network within the firewalls. He’d have to slice some security no matter what, but internal security was always far slacker than the external firewalls, especially when you had a bunch of lazy executives who didn’t want to maintain proper data integrity because it was inconvenient.
He let himself into one of the cooled rooms that held the city’s quantum computing cores, grabbing a key interface from a desk without pausing as he slipped through and went behind one of the racks of interface blades that regulated communication with the core. It hid him from sight from the door, and afforded access to a direct port into the core.
Eryn got in through the initial checks easily, noting that it was all off the shelf consumer security. He didn’t even need to slice through half of it. He knew the Imperial backdoor codes to completely bypass it.
I need a list of ships that have been loaded up and requested departure clearance…
He worked quickly, getting the master list before beginning to pair it down. Ships that were fully loaded were scratched off first. He didn’t want to get into the Colonies and be forced to beg around for a ship with the Princess depending on him. However, they got out of the system, it had to have room for their transport.
That didn’t take many off the list, however. He’d heard that Sol was more of a net importer than exporter, but Eryn hadn’t realized it was quite so bad as he was seeing at the moment. There were even ships that were outbound, effectively empty.
Filtering for those that had been granted clearance yet were still in system made things… worse, however.
Everything he was looking at had a hold order placed by the Empire, and the ships were being swept by customs enforcement teams, supposedly as part of some counter-smuggling move. That was pure bullshit, Eryn knew too well. The Empire didn’t have enough Customs Enforcement capacity to even begin to make good on that claim.
They’re looking for something specific… or someone.
It didn’t take much imagination on his part to work out just who that someone almost certainly was.
That was going to make the job so much harder that Eryn was actually stumped. They needed an interstellar ship, with enough jumpdrive power and storage to carry an in-system vessel. Aside from military craft, which required far too much crew to even contemplate stealing… and there was no question that he’d have to do exactly that… the only option he could work out was a freighter.
But if the Empire had them all locked down…
This is bad.
*****
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
“Captain.”
Katchkin lifted his head from where he was reading a report in his command chair, looking over to where the voice had come from.
“What is it, Ensign?” He asked the young officer standing watch at the Conquest’s Information Warfare Station.
Ensign Simon Belkin was frowning, looking perplexed.
“I think there’s something odd going on with the city’s computer, Sir.”
“What do you mean?” Katchkin asked, now setting the tablet with the report down as he got to his feet and straightened out his uniform.
“I’m seeing multiple information requests for outbound starships,” He said, “At first pass they look clean and authorized. In fact the city computers didn’t even flag them, but our systems did.”
“Oh? Why so?” The Captain asked, walking over.
“Incomplete authorization,” Belkin said. “They didn’t technically need some of the base certifications that are missing because the requests originated from within the security firewall, but the certificates are missing just the same.”
“Hmmm,” Katchkin hummed, looking over the young officer’s shoulder. “Interesting. Show me the requests made, in order if you please.”
“Yes Sir.”
The information stream scrolled past as the Captain quickly read through. He reached out after a few moments, dropping a hand on the Ensign’s shoulder.
“Stop.”
“Yes Sir.”
Katchkin stared at the screen for a moment before he nodded, “Good work, Ensign. As you were.”
“Sir? Uh… Yes Sir.”
The Captain didn’t bother clearing things up for the obviously confused young officer, someone else would handle that later he supposed. For the moment he was focused on what he was quite certain he’d just learned.
“Communications,” Katchkin called. “Link to the surface. Get Mister Gyver for me.”
“Aye Captain. A moment.”
Katchkin nodded and went back to the command station, content to wait for the connection.
*****
Saturnus Col
Sylban closed to the connection to the Conquest, expression thoughtful as he sent a command to the Marines outside.
“Sir?” The squad leader asked, stepping quietly into the former Administrator’s office.
“It would seem we have an intruder of interest,” He said.
“We do…?”
“Yes. Someone has gotten into the city administrative network and is using it to search for ships leaving the system,” Sylban said. “I would have that someone standing in front of me. Soon. Clear?”
“Crystal, Sir.”
“Be about it then.”
The Marine nodded and vanished back out the door, leaving Sylban to consider the situation. Few people would be running a search like that, fewer still would have been able to infiltrate even the civilian security that protected the city’s information network. It was possible that they were dealing with a local, maybe even probable if he were honest with himself.
Someone in the local administration, enough access to get within the physical firewalls to run their search, some petty corruption, fear of the Empire, that would drive someone like that to look for a place to run.
He… didn’t think that was it, however.
It would be a risky move, coming here while the Conquest rests in orbit, but that is how I trained you, isn’t it?
Sylban got up.
If Eryn was on the Col, then the Princess would not be far.
*****
Eryn closed down his search and slipped the stolen tablet into a pocket as he started making his way out of the maintenance section. He’d gotten the information he needed, but it wasn’t good.
The Empire had every outbound ship locked down, save the military and official representatives of certain galactic powers like the Orions who could cause enough of a stink to make things touchy. Since the Orions and others would be unlikely to lift a finger to intervene in the ‘internal affairs’ of the Empire, that information did him little good.
It seemed like they were going to have to give up on any immediate path out of the system and instead find somewhere with a hole deep enough to crawl in and pull the entry in after them.
The problem with that, of course, is that every hole I know, Sylban told me about… and I still haven’t figured out why he didn’t send people immediately to the Legion storehouse.
He’d expected to be faced with at least a security team there, but had felt it was worth taking a shot at anyway. What Eryn had not expected was for the storehouse to be entirely untouched, as though the coups had not happened. The only explanation that made any sense was that Sylban was intentionally keeping information from the other conspirators in order to make proper use of the materials himself at a later date.
It wasn’t like the man he thought he knew, though, to leave an opening for someone like that. Sylban knew he was aware of the supply cache, and he knew the Princess was a priority target. The Legionnaire Eryn trained under wouldn’t have allowed a priority target to escape just to protect a single Legion Cache from being revealed.
That meant the man was playing a game within a game, and Eryn wasn’t in the loop as to the rules, goals, or even how many games were being played.
It was all extremely frustrating.
He was jarred from his thoughts, however, by the clatter of feet on the deck from up ahead. Eryn pressed himself into a door well, risking a quick glance down the hall, and felt the blood leave his face as he recognized Imperial Marines locking down the section with robotic efficiency.
Damn it. So much for getting out clean.
This was not going to be good.
*****
Jinsha was slowly driving herself insane, worrying about what was going on out beyond the hull of the ship she was stuck in. It was so bad that when she got an alarm through the Legion monitoring system Eryn had setup, she was almost relieved. At least something had apparently gone wrong now, so she could stop worrying about when that was going to happen.
She crossed over to the pilot’s seat, dropping into the chair and opting to use the ship’s display rather than her implants to read the alert.
Well, that’s not good.
There was an alert out, broadcasting across the Imperial secure channels, and the Marines were all hopped up about something. No mention of Eryn was on the network so far, but she wasn’t sure that would hold for too long since they were actively looking for an intruder within the secure sections of the City Administration Offices.
She reached for the secure communications that Eryn had left with her, linking to the device with her implant suite.
“Eryn, we have a problem.”
*****
Eryn flinched slightly at the sudden voice in his head, but didn’t make a sound as he mentally prodded his communications suite, using secure Legion codes that the Marines wouldn’t have access too. It was a risk, if Sylban was looking, but it was all he had at the moment.
“I noticed,” He responded. “Marines are closing on my location.”
“I’ll come and help…”
“No!” Eryn answered instantly. “You’re the primary. I’m here only to keep you safe, not to get you caught or worse. If I’m caught, hide. I don’t care how. Stay out of this, Princess.”
“If you get caught, there’s nowhere to hide.”
“Then I won’t get caught. Just stay put, I’m heading back.”
Eryn secured the channel, checking carefully for any sign of the Marines before he slipped out of the door-well and began making his way back down the hall and out of the secure areas.
Imperial Marines were solid forces, he knew. He’d trained with them before graduating to a Legion Course load, and until he’d been plunged into the deep end of Legion training, the Marine S-Course had been the most brutal experience of his life. If you made it through what their trainers threw at you, there wasn’t a whole lot in the galaxy you couldn’t handle.
They would be locking down all the routes in and out of the area with stolid efficiency, working to the book almost to a fault. If he wanted to get out past them, he needed to get ahead of them, or just toss the book entirely into the bin of history and do something utterly stupid.
Let’s try getting ahead of them before we go down that route.
*****
“Secure this corridor.”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
Corporal Marin stopped at the corner of the long hall, positioning himself so he could look down both directions without issue, and settled himself into the position as ordered. He didn’t know what exactly was going on, but that was hardly anything new in his experience. ‘Hurry up and wait’ was second only to ‘If you need to know, we’ll tell you… and you never need to know’, when it came to his duties in the Marines.
Service was one of the easiest ways out of the poorest sections of the planet, however, and it guaranteed that you and your family ate well no matter what else happened.
Things had been getting better for years in those departments, especially since the Empress pushed to get the climate control systems full implemented.
Marin figured that the whole planet owed Her Majesty a debt that could never be paid for that alone, to say nothing of everything else she had accomplished in the years since she’d taken over for her Father.
It was just one of many reasons he had to hope that her assassins paid for what they’d done. They’d killed someone who deserved so much better, and for that he hoped they burned in the pits.
“Head’s up, Corporal,” An officer said, walking smartly in his direction. “The Commander wants all hands on this one, no one slacks off.”
“Yes Sir, Captain Serran, Sir,” Marin answered with the rote response he always had when dealing with officers he was unfamiliar with.
Most Imperial Officers in the Corps were either Nobility, or sponsored by Nobles, and even the best of them could be sticklers to protocol when working with the rank and file. The worst… well, they weren’t worth thinking on most times.
The Captain paused beside him, taking a moment to look down the hall in both directions before making a show of checking his orders again.
Marin decided to risk fishing for a little information.
“Do we know who we’re looking for, Captain?” He asked softly.
Serran glanced at him briefly before looking back at his computer.
“Precisely? No Corporal, we don’t. However, it may be the escapee from the assassination, so we’re doing this one by the book. Clear?”
Marin stiffened, surprised. He hadn’t expected to seriously get a shot at the assassin and kidnapper.
“Really, Sir? Yes sir.” He said earnestly, head swiveling as he examined the area even closer.
“We’re not sure, but treat it as though it were,” Serrin instructed. “The man who took the Princess and killed Her Majesty cannot be permitted to escape us.”
“No Sir,” Marin said firmly. On that he was in complete agreement with the Captain, whether the other man was a Noble or not. Some things transcended class conflicts.
“Good man,” Serrin said, straightening up as he finished his checks. “Hold this position until relieved, I’ll send up someone to reinforce your position shortly.”
“Yes Sir, Captain Sir.”
*****
Eryn watched from a recessed door-well as a second Marine approached along the hall, nodding to the first as he took up a position next to him. The pair were murmuring softly, just out of hearing, but he wasn’t overly concerned with what they were talking about.
The Officer who’d just left a few minutes earlier had been running an active comm network with standard security protocol, something simple enough to slice into, so Eryn patched into the Marine’s tactical network and began monitoring the situation from their eyes. Troop movements were overlain on the city map he’d copied from the local network, giving him an idea of what he was up against.
The good news was, the Marines were definitely spread thin. They clearly hadn’t brought down enough troops for a full lockdown of the city district he was in, which wasn’t a surprise really, but also the local police constables were dragging their feet with providing aid. Also, unsurprising, local cops generally didn’t much like it when their city was occupied by military forces, no matter the reasoning.
That was leaving holes in the network, which was his chance.
He waited for the nearest Marines to be looking the other way, then moved quickly behind them, his technique keeping his feet from making more than a soft whisper on the deck. By the time they turned back around, he was on the other side and moving down the hall with swift strides.
He needed to slip the net before it could tighten enough that the holes were too small for him to reliably take advantage of. And doing that meant moving fast, which brought risks of its own.
Needs must, when the devil drives.
*****
Jinsha growled when she was cut off by Eryn.
The boy was impressive, she’d be the first to admit, but she was beginning to find his impudent attitude far less attractive than it had been back in the palace tower, particularly now that it was aimed more at her than at the trappings of her gilded cage.
Why he didn’t seem to understand that he couldn’t just protect her, she didn’t understand. There were no safe zones anymore, if he was caught or died, then she was on her own, and Jinsha was self aware enough to know that she wouldn’t last long. Her education was, arguably, second to none… she could fly the ship she was in, if she must, and handle a weapon… if she must, and do so many things…
All of them in theory.
For practical purposes, however, she knew that she was less than a beginner in most. She’d had that set of lessons hammered home by her trainers. Knowledge was one thing. Experience was something very much other.
Jinsha hated to admit it, but she needed Eryn Aubrey. Inexperienced as he might be, he nonetheless had infinitely more experience than did she.
She looked over the system that linked her to his implants, noting the direction he was approaching from, coming to a decision.
*****
Chapter XIV
Saturnus Col Administrative Offices
Sylban smiled thinly as he watched the motion on his network monitor.
The boy had learned well, but he was still a wet behind the ears neophyte to the job.
Slicing the Marines’ network was good thinking, but he should not have been foolish enough to actively request information over it, Sylban clucked his tongue as he shook his head. Of course, I didn’t get a chance to teach the boy just how easy it was to spot Legion slicing techniques if you happened to know Legion codes.
He watched the intermittent signal as it clearly took advantage of the holes in the Marine’s network, making to break out into the open area of the city where it would be impossible to properly lock things down.
“No, I don’t think so…” Sylban murmured as he tapped in a command, setting his Marines moving to close off that path. He smiled tightly to himself, then sent a command that opened up a hole in the net in another location.
Class is in session, young Mr. Aubrey. Advanced counter infiltration, one oh one. Let us see how well you learn.
*****
Eryn swore softly as he watched the Marines shift around, closing the path he was taking. He took a moment, finding another path through the net before he set out again.
Navigating through the ever-changing net composed of Imperial Marines was a challenge. The Marines were no slouches when it came to this sort of work and they knew how to minimize the holes they left even given how thinly they were spread, but it was doable.
He had little time to plan, however, as the net kept moving and he had to do the same. Taking advantage of holes in the network that led in the direction he wanted to go when he could, but sometimes being forced to backtrack in order to prevent being spotted. It was frustratingly slow going, but Eryn felt like he was making progress and would shortly be clear of the Marines’ net.
As he moved, he heard snippets of the usual chatter, all off-net of course, as the Marines gossiped about the job they were doing to mask their boredom.
It stung a little that he was being blamed for the Empresses’ assassination, but more interesting was that it seemed the current popular rumor was that the entire operation had been backed by offworlders who wanted to keep Holy Terra weak.
He recognized that kind of talk, and very much doubted that it was a natural rumor. It fit too perfectly with what he was now suspected were the long-term goals of the Nobility.
Damn fools. If they go too far in this direction, they’ll bring ruin down on us all.
Eryn’s thoughts were cut off as he spotted another hole in the network, leading toward the ship’s parking zone, and took the opening presented with alacrity.
*****
Captain Serrin paused as he received updated orders, quickly dispatching his squad to the location indicated. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but the Commander had gotten involved personally for some reason and kept shifting his Marines around seemingly at random. It was frustrating for Serrin, second Son of a noble family, to keep taking orders from a hopped-up commoner like Gyver, but he gritted his teeth and did what he had to.
He looked forward to the time when all of the common trash that had been moved up the class ladder of the Empire by the foolish allowances of the former Empress were put solidly back in their places.
Until then, however, he had his jobs to accomplish. Following the orders of this clearly addled fool in Command of the mission was the least of those, but it had to be done just the same.
Imbecile probably doesn’t even realize that he just opened up a hole in our net.
*****
Sylban smiled slightly as he shifted a second Marine unit, just out of sight and off the network. The hole he’d allowed to open would draw the boy in, and just to be sure he closed up the network behind his position to pressure him to move in the direction he wanted.
Eryn was good, one of the best he’d ever trained, but he was still too young and naïve to properly handle himself in the field.
Watching the network requests carefully, Sylban saw the exact moment young Aubrey chose to make his move and head for the path to the ship’s platform.
Sylban closed the net behind the young pup, then sent a final order to the team he’d held back off the network.
After that, he closed the system and rose from his desk, heading out of the Administrator’s officer.
“Sir?” The Marine guard at the door glanced at him curiously as he emerged.
“Two of them remain on post here, the rest with me,” Sylban ordered. “We have a Princess to acquire.”
“Yes sir.”
*****
Eryn almost thought he was home free when the door suddenly slammed shut on the path he’d been taking.
Marines appeared in front of him, weapons dropping into position as if they knew he was coming, which was more than a little disconcerting since he had no clue they were there.
Why weren’t they on the net!? Eryn thought wildly as he dove for cover, heavy rifle fire erupting from the Marines.
He was still on the network and could see the Marine squads closing up behind him, but the ones in front were invisible to his sliced access. There was only one thing he could think in that moment.
Damn you, Sylban.
It was the only answer he could find. Sylban had outmaneuvered him, in the way the older man always seemed to. He wasn’t sure what gave him away, but that was a moot point at this time. He pulled his auto-pistol from the hidden holster at the small of his back, gaging the situation as best he could.
The Marines were in light duty armor as best he could tell, nowhere near as effective as the charged carbon weave he wore, but it would be more than enough to stop the light AP rounds loaded in his weapon. His beam-lock would slice through their armor, and them, easily enough but the one-shot weapon wasn’t exactly fit for an extended firefight even if he did have a couple extra chem-tanks for it in his pockets.
Going to have to get close, Eryn decided, reaching behind his back to where the inverted sheath of his short blade could be grasped under a flap in his armor.
“Halt and surrender your weapon! You’re being detained in the name of the Empress!”
Eryn’s features twisted angrily as they invoked the name of a murdered woman.
“Her Majesty is dead,” He hissed, eyes coming up to lock onto the closest of the soldiers. “And you serve the ones who murdered her.”
The Marines exchanged glances, focusing back on him as they readied their weapons.
“Give it up,” The lead man ordered again. “Surrender your weapon!”
“You can have my blade,” Eryn said grimly, “Either when you take it from my cooling hands, or razor’s edge first.”
*****
Sylban sighed, tempted to roll his eyes as he listened to the boy’s declaration.
He was riding the Marines’ implants, experiencing the world through their eyes even as he walked at the head of his own squad, moving swiftly to the landing deck.
Really, now Eryn, where are you getting this melodrama from? If you’re going to fight, fight, don’t try to talk them to death. They’re Marines, they aren’t smart enough to understand half of what you’re saying anyway, and if they were, they nonetheless wouldn’t compromise their loyalty.
The boy was holding up well, considering the injury that Sylban knew he couldn’t have had time to get properly treated, however. He was in fighting form, which indicated he was likely on a mix of painkillers and stimulants, but there were no signs yet of overusing either in the boy’s eyes or hands.
Sylban sighed, opening a comm channel to the Marines
“Stop playing with the boy. End this.”
“Yes sir,” The Marine in charge confirmed. “Ambush teams, Open fire!”
*****
A click of metal on metal gave the action away.
Nothing spectacular, just the guard of a rifle tapping lightly against the titanium-steel corner of the hall the Marine was using to steady his aim. The click propagating on the air, a pressure wave that was insignificant compared to everything else going on in that moment, but it was enough.
Eryn’s head cocked slightly to the right, the sound causing him to glance in that direction just as the Marines got their orders and opted to open fire.
He dropped flat as the hail of bullets cleaved the air where he’d been, a whining sound indicating that many, if not most or all, of them were ricocheting off the wall behind him. He ignored that, rolling as the fire tracked his motions, random rounds plucking at his armor.
More marines were joining the fire. Eryn had been able to count ten separate weapons firing at him before he lost the individual signatures in the cacophony.
He scrambled behind a corner, barely able to get cover from the varying groups that were firing at him, and pressed his back as tightly to the wall as he could in order to minimize his profile as he crouched there.
So much for getting in close.
Against a single squad to his front, with another closing from the rear, that was a viable tactic. Even Imperial Marines would be hesitant to open fire with their own in the line of fire, and by the time they adjusted, Eryn could have cut his way through and out the other side.
With more squads triangulating their fire however, that was suicide, armor be damned. Enough hits would deplete the charge his carbon weave held, after which the armor would rapidly reach a failure point under extended fire. Or, more simply, one of them could just put a round in his head and be done with it.
Eryn groaned, leaning his head away from the corner to keep fragments from bullets and the wall’s titanium steel from spraying in his face.
This… is not good. He wracked his brain as he tried to figure out a way out of the noose he’d blindly stumbled right into, but there was nothing that seemed to come to mind.
The holes in the Marines’ positions had been filled, and it was obvious now that they’d been there in the first place as a trap for him…
*****
Jan Casul was grumbling to himself as he headed back to where he’d parked his shuttle. Business was slow on Col. Apparently the Empire’s presence was making even the above board businesses keep their heads down, to say nothing of the grey and black market types. He supposed he had little else but time, given the status of the Rubber Duck at the moment, but it was still a frustration he didn’t need in his life at the moment.
He was willing to settle for anything he could flog off in the colonies, as long as he wouldn’t lose his shirt on the deal. Just filling the holds would make him feel better about the delay, even if it didn’t have much profit margin.
Unfortunately, everyone seemed to be shut down. It took everything he could just to get in to have some people turn him down in person.
The Terran Empire, for a one planet polity, was managing to become more of a pain than even the damned Republic, and that… that was saying something.
He’d rather deal with the Orions. At least they were good to their contracts, even if they’d do their best to screw you on the terms if you weren’t triple careful before signing.
With his head down, grumbling, Jan didn’t notice the cloaked figure in front of him until he almost walked right over her. He managed to avoid trampling her. He was pretty sure it was a girl anyway based on the size and sound she made when they barely avoided each other.
“Sorry,” Jan grunted out, “didn’t see you.”
She just bobbed her head, not saying anything else, and scrambled away in silence. He watched her go, noting that she was clutching something under her cloak, but couldn’t tell what it was.
These solar folk are wound so tight I’m surprised they don’t go around snapping like coiled springs constantly.
Jan sighed, making his way more casually in the direction the girl had run off to. He wasn’t sure if she were heading for the cargo platforms or if there was something else along that way he didn’t know about, but either way he would have to keep from bumping into her again.
He didn’t need the hassle of being accused of stalking or some such crap, and with the way his luck was running, that’s about the best he could hope for it seemed.
Jan was almost half the remaining distance to the pad his shuttle was waiting on when he started getting an odd feeling that something was out of place. He couldn’t quite figure out what, though, and it was really starting to nag at him because of that. He quickened his pace, not sure why, but more determined than ever to get to his shuttle and close the hatches.
The sudden explosion of weapons fire made for the end of that plan, and he threw himself to the ground and scrambled for cover even as he looked around wildly for where the fire was coming from or, he supposed more importantly, where it was going to.
*****
Eryn flinched back from a round that hit the wall near where he was covering. He could feel the bit of shrapnel chewing into his face and the warm trickle of blood running down his face and neck.
The situation had not gotten any better.
His machine pistol was in his hand, the small hyper-velocity rounds spitting back as he used bursts to keep the Marines at bay.
For the moment he suspected that they were happy enough just keeping him in place. They didn’t seem overly anxious to assault his position as best he could tell anyway. Of course, why should they? Holding him in place was enough to accomplish their mission, and he’d wear out long before they did, running out of energy or ammo, whichever came first.
He'd screwed up.
There was no other way to look at it, Eryn realized. He still wasn’t sure what else he could have done, mind you, given the circumstances but it didn’t really matter. The Princess had been depending on him to get her out of the system and to her family in the Colonies.
It was his duty.
And he’d failed.
Eryn closed his eyes briefly, hating himself for the failure.
That was getting him nowhere, however, and he drew the sword from his back as he got up off his ass to one knee. For whatever reason, and he honestly was unable to figure it out, Sylban hadn’t yet cut off his access to the Marines’ network. He couldn’t see all of the Marines’ locations. The ambush squad was still digitally invisible to him, but the others? They were still there, lit up like beacons on his mental HUD (Heads-Up Display).
“Legionnaire Aubrey!”
Eryn cocked his head, glancing in the direction of the officer shouting his name.
“We have you surrounded! Surrender yourself to the Empire!”
Eryn felt a smile tugging at his lips as he remembered an old joke.
If only there were two of us, He thought, darkly amused by the thought.
“You have to a count of three to surrender, Mr. Aubrey!”
Eryn brought his implant suite fully online, mentally starting the countdown before the Officer could say anything more. The world slowed around him. Time a relative experience for humans under normal circumstance became something even more fluid under the auspices of the electro-stimulation of certain parts of his brain.
“Three!”
The word sounded off, not quite like it was slowed down by a recorder but not normal just the same. More like it was spoken in the distance, along some non-physical dimension. Eryn turned his head, eyes tracking the Officer. He knew the man would be one of the Nobility, and likely would be at what he considered to be the safest position from which to command the operation.
That would mean the heaviest Marine presence protecting him… but it would also mean a clean escape route in case the situation went… badly.
“Two!”
Eryn ignored the second word as he coiled his feet under him.
It was time to make the situation go… badly.
“One!”
Eryn lunged.
And the entire area roared with gunfire.
*****
Chapter XV
Saturnus Col, Outer Ring
Sylban strode the halls of the city’s outer ring, heading toward the landing fields. He could hear the reports from his Marines as they pinned Eryn down, and thus far was satisfied with the outcome. The boy was promising, but even a properly blooded Legionnaire would have their work cut out for them in the situation he’d found himself in. The Marines would hold him, long enough at least even if he managed to find a way out.
Sylban had his own goal in mind.
The Princess would be close, he was certain of that. It was unlikely to the point of absurdity that Eryn would have abandoned her at any point in the solar system under the current situation. If they’d remained on Earth, he might have found loyalists to hide her, but by leaving the planet they’d cut off those avenues.
It was the boy’s inexperience showing, Sylban knew. He’d only seen the threat posed by the coups and intended to remove the Princess from said threat by the most direct means possible. Not bad thinking for an initiate, but it lacked in forethought. If Eryn had been thinking properly ahead, he’d have realized that he was locking himself into a single path of escape.
It would have been wiser to retreat back to the surface in the stolen Roc, lose pursuit in the mountains or one of the more desolate areas of the world, and then link up with loyalists who could arrange other means of escape for her Majesty.
A mentor’s duty never ends, I suppose, Sylban thought wryly as he paused at a junction and checked his location before abruptly turning to make his way directly to the landing fields.
“Spread out,” He ordered as they arrived on the open deck, the biting cold and smell of ammonia filtering through the breathing and environmental protection they wore. “Her Majesty will be in one of these ships. Search them all, no excuses. If anyone attempts to block you, deal with it.”
“Yes Sir.”
He waved them on, eyes sweeping the expansive semi-open deck and the ships parked on it.
The Roc, of course, was nowhere in sight. Sylban assumed that Eryn had ditched the rather obvious military issue craft as soon as he could. Most likely at one of the Legion cache’s he was aware of, since there had been no reports of stolen ships that he was aware of, and Eryn simply didn’t yet have the contacts to have acquired one elsewhere.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t entirely familiar with the stock available in those caches at the moment, so he couldn’t pick out the likely ship he was looking for by sight. And, even with Legion access, the database for identifying those ships was locked to Physical Command Headquarters only.
The Conquest did not have a copy of that database on board, thanks to the completion of the class not being authorized by her Majesty.
They’d just have to do this the hard way.
“I want the Princess alive!” He called the reminder abruptly, lest any of them forget that part.
“Yes Sir!”
A sudden eruption of rapid fire from a weapon he knew his Marine teams weren’t equipped with caused Sylban to stop and half turn, looking in the direction of the firefight.
Curious.
That didn’t sound like something Eryn was likely to be using either.
This bears investigating.
“You stay here,” He ordered his guards, “Make certain nothing is missed. I will investigate this personally.”
“Yes Sir.”
*****
Jan hit the ground before the cacophony really penetrated his skull, his instincts leading him to scramble against the wall and try to make himself a part of the floor and wall as the whining sound of rounds flying overhead punctuated the roars that had signalled the commencement of what god awful firefight.
He’d been closer to gun play more times than he cared to remember, but never in the sheer volume that had just erupted in his vicinity.
What in the hell just happened?
There was no obvious answer to his silent question, of course, but looking around furtively revealed the presence of armor-uniformed men laying down a truly horrendous level of firepower… from several directions at once?
Jan had to blink as he cowered there, unable to quite believe what he was seeing. The men had formed a goddamned circular firing line and were lighting the fuck out of the place like it was their job.
Well, he supposed it must have been their job, but that didn’t make it any smarter.
In the Colonies, cops and soldiers were trained not to shoot each other, whether they were wearing armor or not.
Jesus, these people are either idiots or they really want to kill someone.
Either way, it wasn’t conducive to his ongoing health to remain in the area. Jan got his legs under him and started crawling away from the shooting, half wishing he’d not left his own sidearm in the shuttle and half glad that he had… because he really wanted to be able to shoot back, but at the same time wasn’t sure he’d be able to resist the temptation to do exactly that and with all those soldiers that would honestly be suicidal.
He had made his way several meters toward escape when he spotted her.
It was the same girl he’d almost run over earlier, Jan was nearly certain. She had to be disoriented, because she was walking right toward the fighting.
“Hey!” He hissed, waving at her, “Get down!”
She didn’t hear him.
Crazy chick. Go get yourself killed… He thought, getting angry, though he couldn’t tell if it was with her, the soldiers, or himself as he finally growled and pushed off the floor.
“I said get down!” He called, running for her.
Jan’s eyes widened as the little slip of a girl opened up her cloak and revealed a weapon half the size she was, bringing it up to her shoulder as she leaned in and her finger slipped under the guard.
“Fuck!” He swore, diving to the ground and sliding along the floor as she opened fire on the soldiers, heavy rounds flying over his head.
Then the soldiers started to turn around.
Fuck my life.
*****
Jinsha ignored the strange man who’d been trying to warn her off, though she felt a little bad about him since he’d obviously done something especially stupid in an effort to help her. She didn’t have time to feel too badly, however, and with her implant suite running full on, her mental capacity was rather too focused for that anyway.
The Imperium’s Marines were well trained, and well equipped, but there were limits to what standard issue armor could take just due to basic physics. Charged carbon weave, the gold standard for armor, was limited primarily by the energy charge held within the material itself. The Carbon weave was decent enough protection on its own, but there were fundamental limits that any flexible material could manage in terms of defense.
Charged carbon weave could stiffen on impact, both absorbing and spreading the impact of any physical impact. There were still limits, however. Sufficient force would still pulverize the body within the armor, but that generally required in excess of 20 gravities of acceleration being applied across the body, which no handheld weapon could manage without doing equal force to the shooter.
More useful was that rapid fire could force the armor to use up its charge, draining it of the protective qualities in short order, until it was left as merely a tough fabric that may be able to stop a bullet, but would still transfer a great deal of energy into a small area.
Her weapon was capable of firing a lot of small, high speed rounds in very fast succession.
The Marines’ armor took the first bursts with no trouble, but spent precious charges as they reacted too slowly to the sudden assault from behind while she walked forward with her weapon firing.
*****
The pause in firing took him by surprise, causing Eryn to almost miss his strike as he slashed at a Marine’s rifle, then delivered a kick that sent the soldier stumbling into the wall as Eryn paused for a split second to re-evaluate the situation.
His implants were running hot, but he was still below the safety threshold, so they weren’t cooking his brain matter yet. That meant that he shouldn’t be hallucinating the pause, in theory at least.
What the hell?
He heard firing again, but it wasn’t centered on him any longer. Eryn sidestepped a lunge by the nearest of the Imperium’s Marines, grabbing the man’s helmet and controlling his momentum with an easy motion to send him right into the nearest wall with enough force to stun him even through his armor.
The distraction had bought him the time he needed, however, and that was all that mattered. He stayed on mission, stepping over the soldiers on the ground, eyes falling on the officer who was scrambling back on his ass with fear in his eyes.
Many officers in the Imperium’s Marines were good soldiers, most in fact, but Eryn knew too well that a lot of Nobles bought commissions for their lesser family members. Those types didn’t last long once they were deployed, but all too often they got decent men killed before suffering some… mishap of their own.
Eryn ignored him after a quick sweep showed that he’d dropped his weapon and posed no threat.
He was through the Marines’ blockade now, and while it didn’t mean he was entirely in the clear, this trap had failed.
Need to get back to the ship and find a way to hide myself and the Princess before the Marines get their act together. We don’t have long.
The shaking officer’s eyes that followed him were as nothing to him, much like the man himself.
*****
Jinsha threw herself around a corridor, pressing against the wall as a hail of fire roared back. The Marines had gotten their act together in short order, splitting their focus in response to the ambush that had taken them by surprise. She could see Mr. Aubrey’s icon on her implant’s HUD and knew that he was through the blockade.
Now I just need to get myself out of here.
Luckily, she had been on the outside, firing in, rather than the alternative, so Jinsha knew she had plenty of routes to escape. She called up a map on his implants’ display, deciding on the best course out, and was about to start running when she felt a hand grasp her cloak and spun around to bring the weapon to bear again.
“Whoa!” The man who’d tried to warn her batted the barrel aside. “Easy, lady, what the hell is going on!?”
She stared blankly for a precious second before saying anything.
“Are you insane?” Jinsha demanded, slapping his hand away as she stepped back out of his reach, putting the weapon back between them.
“Probably,” He snorted, looking over his shoulder, “We need to get out of here.”
“We?” She stared at him incredulously, “You are insane.”
“Lady, if I stay here, those soldiers are going to sweep me up as an accomplice,” He growled, stepping forward. She backed up, keeping the gun between then, causing him to roll his eyes in exasperation. “I’m hoping you have a plan for getting out of here!”
She half shrugged, an uncertain look crossing her face.
*****
Jan felt the blood drain from his face as he realized that the girl had no plan.
“Oh, you must be kidding me,” He snapped, looking over his shoulder.
They had maybe thirty seconds before the soldiers lost their sense of caution and started advancing with serious intent. There was no chance they were going to cut him loose if he were caught with someone who opened fire on an Imperial forces team. He’d spend the rest of his life in a prison on Earth, and there was no way he was going to let that happen.
He’d rather die than be stuck on that forsaken world.
Ass end of the Galaxy, and that’s without being stuck in some government gulag. Forget that.
The sound of armor-plated boots on steel deck decided the situation for him. He grabbed the girl’s wrist on impulse and started moving.
“Come on,” He growled, “They’ll be on top of us in seconds.”
“But… but… hold on,” She objected, stammering at him as she was dragged along.
“Are you seriously stuttering?” He demanded, somewhat incredulous. “What happened to the girl who just opened up a crate of kick ass on a squad of imperial goons?”
“Marines.” She mumbled, stumbling along with him.
“What?”
“They are Marines of the Imperium,” She said, “not Goons.”
Jan rolled his eyes, “Lady, now is not the time for semantics. We need an exit.”
“I… I can call for advice.”
*****
Eryn paused, ducking into an alcove as an Imperial patrol moved along a little farther down from him. His communications implants were nudging at his senses, and he took the moment to respond.
“What is it, Princess,” He asked, “I’m a little…”
Eryn paused, listening, his eyes widened.
“You’re where? You what?” He asked, unbelieving as he looked back the way he came. “I told you to stay in the ship!”
He listened a bit longer, blinking furiously.
“Well I’m sorry, your highness,” Eryn growled, using her title sarcastically without even thinking about it, “I thought it was my job to save you, not the other way around.”
He wanted to pull out his own hair, the frustration was welling up in him. The Princess had not only left the ship, but she’d engaged in fighting with the Imperial troops.
Alright, she had likely given him the way out he’d needed, but that didn’t make it better! His life was secondary to hers, and she should know that!
“Ok,” He said, calming down while bringing up her location on his extra-sensory implants’ HUD. “I see you. Some of the Marines are heading your way, I can guide you around them, but you need to be careful. Not all of the Marines are visible on my IFF network.”
He nodded slowly.
“Good. Follow my directions, I’m working my way to you now.”
Lords of Terra, he swore silently. Save me from people who mistake stubborn foolishness for independence.
*****
“Ugh,” Jinsha grunted after she killed the outgoing audio channel. “What a stubborn… foolish…”
“Your friend seems… annoyed,” Jan said, sounding more amused than he should in her opinion, given the situation and who he was talking to.
“My friend is an idiot,” She growled, covering her weapon in the cloak again as they began their retreat, “Who needed me to save his arse, and is now complaining about it.”
“I see.”
She shot him a glare for the tone in his voice but didn’t dare reprimand the rough looking man as she should, since he really didn’t know who he was talking to of course.
Instead she just pointed in the direction Eryn was sending her via their implant communications band, “This way. Hurry.”
*****
Sylban examined the scene with a mild expression, less interested in what had happened exactly than with how it had happened.
It was unusual to see so few casualties after an open firefight, but none of his Marines were dead and only a few had severe injuries. Certainly, their armor made that more likely than it might be, but he was aware of the weapons and training his young protégé was likely to be wielding.
You can’t go soft, Mr. Aubrey, or you will surely fall.
He walked past the grunts, leaving them to their treatment as the corpsmen moved around the scene. Sylban was only interested in one man at the moment, and as he approached the officer that had been leading the team, he was reviewing the fight through the amalgamation of the Marines’ implants.
“Well Captain,” he said, his tone flat and calm, “what have you to say for yourself?”
Serrin shot him a look of disdain, poorly hidden behind the sloppy salute the officer proffered him.
“Commander,” The Captain said, “The enemy was lucky and had support from beyond the ambush.”
“Yes,” Sylban drawled, “One barely trained girl. Truly, a frightening force to contend with.”
Serrin flushed angrily, but kept his piece, “Respectfully commander, you were not here.”
“No, if I had been, the girl would be in our hands now.” Sylban sighed, looking around slowly.
“My team and I will recover her and end the terrorist…”
“No, Captain,” Sylban turned back. “I am afraid that your services are no longer required.”
“You can’t discharge me! I am the son of-”
A single report filled the air, silencing the Marine Captain as a dark hole appeared in the center of his forehead. As he toppled, Sylban slipped the still smoking auto-pistol back into the holster he’d drawn from.
“Quite right, Captain,” He said to the corpse in front of him, “I can’t discharge you. My pistol, however, I can discharge anytime I choose.”
He turned to the next ranking Marine, who was standing at perfect attention.
“The squad is yours, Sergeant. Do not follow your Captain into failure.”
The Sergeant’s eyes flicked to the body, but Sylban detected nothing but contempt in them for the man he’d just killed.
“No Sir. Orders, Sir?”
“We have two quarries to run down, however the girl is the priority,” Sylban ordered. “Alive, Sergeant.”
“Yes Sir…” The Sergeant hesitated, glancing back at the body. “What about the Captain, Sir?”
Sylban spared a last glance at the dead man, snorting softly.
“Take him out and toss him over the side,” He said finally. “Perhaps a few million years in the crushing depth of Saturn will turn his carbon into something useful.”
He turned away, heading in the direction the girl had gone.
Sylban almost didn’t hear the Sergeant’s quiet response as he kicked over the Captain’s body.
“Not likely. Worthless Nob was never good for anything before. Can’t see a few million years changing that.”
*****
Eryn sent the next set of directions to Jinsha as he made his way around the cordon the Marines were setting up. He couldn’t see where Sylban was, but he could feel his mentor’s presence in the movements of the Marines he could see, and that feeling alone was putting him on edge as he moved.
He didn’t know what the other man was playing at, but he knew Sylban well enough… or thought he did at least… to know that there was some multi-layered game at play.
Leaving him with access to part of the Marines’ feeds wasn’t like Sylban, not directly at least. The man had hammered into him during training that you never give your adversary any intelligence that they can use. In fact, the only intelligence you should give them at all was something that suited your own uses, which almost always meant ensuring that the enemy only got misinformation if you could at all manage it.
That didn’t make him feel great about using the access that Sylban had apparently elected to leave him, but Eryn couldn’t see how the data from the Marines’ network could be misinformation. Not now, at least, when he knew that the data was incomplete. While he was in the dark about that, it could be used to easily push him into a trap, as Sylban had done… but now that it was revealed, he should have been cut out entirely.
Eryn shook off the feeling. There was nothing to it for the moment, he couldn’t just ignore the intelligence he was still getting, and Sylban no doubt knew that, but knowing that didn’t change anything. If he kept thinking about it he would just spiral down an endless path of knowing that Sylban knew that he knew that Sylban knew ad nauseum, until he was paralyzed by indecision.
Which is probably at least one small part of Sylban’s plan.
Damned Legionnaires.
*****
Chapter XVI
Saturnus Col
Jan followed the girl as she made seemingly random turns, sometimes just before he could hear the sounds of boots on metal floors from their previous course. Whoever was feeding her directions, they had a better view of the situation than he’d have thought possible… at least without access to the station’s security feeds, which seemed unlikely to him. But then, what did he know about the crap security of the Solar System?
Earth was a nearly forgotten world in the Galaxy at large, having wallowed in its own filth for the best part of three centuries.
Its claim to fame as the cradle of humanity was often countered by Colonists who likened it more to humanity’s diapers, with no small amount of truth to the joke. Earth was a cautionary tale just as much as a place of pilgrimage, a place parents told their children about when they caught the little brats littering.
He only ran the route because he couldn’t afford to break into any of the more profitable ones, and didn’t spend any more time in the system than he absolutely had to.
Now, thanks to whatever political machinations were going on in the Birth System, he might wind up in some third world prison for the rest of his life and his only way out of that lie in following some mysterious figure he’d stupidly tried to help keep from being shot in a firefight she was intent on joining.
Fuck my life.
The girl in question stopped again, a distant look in her eyes taking the place of the intense focus that had been there a moment earlier. That was something he was getting used to seeing as she received new information from whoever her contact was, and Jan readied himself for a new direction.
“This way,” She said a moment later, nodding down a side corridor.
Jan frowned, hesitating, “That’s a secured area.”
“I have the pass code.”
*****
Jinsha could feel her hand shaking as she hid it under her cloak, unwilling to show any weakness to a stranger if she could avoid it. She was biting back curses as she tried and failed to keep her hand steady, hating the refusal of her body to cooperate with her desires.
Instead she hunched over, keeping the cloak tightly wound about her as she walked with hurried steps, focusing on not stumbling.
“There’s a patrol ahead of you. Hold and let them pass,” Eryn said into her implant receiver, causing her to stop and nearly cause the man following her to trip up as he stumbled to a stop behind her.
She barely glanced at him, instead eyes focused forward as she waited. Sure enough, it only took seconds before she saw the group of men crossing the corridor quite a distance ahead of them. She pressed against the wall, trying to be as small as possible, and behind her could feel the man doing the same.
The squad passed without notice, however, and in a few moments Eryn gave her the go ahead and she started moving again.
“I don’t suppose you could tell me what that was all about back there?”
Jinsha spared the man a longer look as they moved, before focusing ahead forward.
“No.”
What could she tell him, honestly?
“Yeah. Figured.”
Well, at least he isn’t pushy.
She’d had just about enough of pushy for the moment.
*****
Eryn paused, eying the deployment of the Marines he could see on the network he was still plugged into, but part of his focus was now on counter-intrusion measures just in case Sylban was getting any ideas about following his signal back and tracking him in return.
That shouldn’t be possible, but he’d learned a long time before that underestimating his mentor wasn’t in his best interests. Sylban had a way of making him regret it every time he had done so in the past.
This time, however, the stakes were different. Giving Sylban an advantage here wouldn’t result in a painful lesson being dealt. There were real lives… literally… on the line.
Failing meant quite likely his death, and the Princess’ life spent in captivity at best.
It was not an option.
So he split his focus, making certain that his link to the network was hidden and that there were no connections riding back along the signal to feed information on his position to any interested parties, while keeping an eye on the Marines he could see… and working very hard to interpolate the locations of those he couldn’t.
He could tell that there had been a shakeup in the Marines’ command. Their deployment had lost the by the book finesse, tossing it in favor of a more direct efficiency that he recognized as the work of a career NCO. Sylban had always pounded into his head that the Non-Commissioned Officers were there to figure out how to get things done, and in the field his job would be to tell them what to do, not how to do it.
It was clear that the Officer in charge of the Marines was either giving his Sergeant more autonomy or something had happened to him.
I don’t think he was hit in the exchange, though…
It didn’t matter which, so Eryn put it out of his head. He had real problems to deal with.
His hands tightened on the grips of his auto-pistol and Legion saber, the hard contours of the weapons a comfort to him as he started forward again.
*****
Sylban stood still, standing in the center of an open atrium he had claimed, his troops pushing the locals out when they entered.
Against the back of his eyes he could see the layout of the city, focused on the nearby sections, icons of all his Marines roaming the maze of corridors in clean efficient search patterns.
Where are you going? He wondered, putting himself into the place of his young former-charge.
There was little use asking where he was. That was a question that he didn’t have the information needed to answer properly. Too many variables would make Eryn’s current location a matter more for the regimented search pattern he was already running.
Where the young man was going however, that was something that could be worked out.
Optimally, the boy had to eventually be planning on getting off the city, of course. That meant that somewhere in the open landing fields, there would be a ship that he was intending to get back to. What made less sense was what the boy was doing on Col in the first place.
He’d come to get access to the city database, of course, that much was obvious, but what information had he needed?
It took only a thought to bring up that very data.
Ah, of course. The Empire locked down outgoing starships, Sylban nodded thoughtfully. He needed a list of ships cleared for departure.
In the immediate area there were three places to get that information: the city’s control database, System Control itself and, of course, the computers of the Conquest. Of the three, the city was the softest target, but Sylban couldn’t help but shake his head in disappointment.
He’d have gone for System Control. Certainly, it was a harder target, with military defenses and guards, but compared to Col it had far more exit strategy potential.
Youth is wasted on the inexperience of the young.
It was possible that Eryn hadn’t been aware of the System Control facility, likely even. It wasn’t a widely known part of Starship Control, orders were habitually dispatched from Col, but everything originated from Control.
Still, the boy’s mistakes were largely irrelevant at this point, at least for future planning purposes.
Sylban accessed the Marines Tac-Net, directing an open channel request to the men he’d left in the landing field.
“Have you located any likely ships?”
“Sir, Yes sir. At least four that meet the parameters you gave,” The Corporal leading the squad there replied. “They all have good registration. However, everything checks out.”
Sylban suppressed a snort.
That was of no shock to him. The Legion registration on those ships was iron clad, such that even he wouldn’t be able to breach it, not without access to the Legion database within the central tower on Earth at least.
“Post guards on each but be subtle corporal. I know it’s not a trait you Marines covet, but in this instance, I do require it.”
“Yes sir, Commander. We can do subtle. We just don’t like to.”
Sylban snorted softly. “I will believe that when I see it. I’m on my way with reinforcements. Hold position until we arrive.”
“Yes Sir.”
Sylban closed the connection and looked to the Marines holding close to him, securing the atrium.
“With me,” He ordered simply, walking away without waiting for a response.
They fell in instantly, pacing him precisely as he began weaving his way through the corridors.
Now, Mr. Aubrey, Sylban began issuing orders over his implants, redirecting the Marines, let us see what you’ve learned.
*****
Eryn ducked as yet another squad moved along his path, staying just out of sight.
What the hell are you up to, Sylban?
The patrol pattern had just altered, becoming less efficient and more unpredictable. He could practically feel Sylban’s influence in the new pattern and knew without any doubt at all that the other man was trying to get a reaction from him.
What reaction, however? Is he trying to steer me somewhere, or flush me out of hiding?
The answer to that question would tell him practically all he needed to know, but without it, Eryn was guessing at Sylban’s actions and second guessing his own decisions with every step. Which, frankly, might have been the point.
Eryn steeled himself and made the call. He sent directions to Jinsha to bring her around to a meeting position from which they could determine if it was safe to head back to the ship or not.
He got motion from Jinsha and stepped from where he was covering, moving quickly to cross the city’s walkways and corridors, heading for a point overlooking the flight deck they had landed at.
He had to pause and wait twice, letting Marine patrols slip by the sections he was crossing, and direct Jinsha to do the same another four times for the same reasons. But in a few minutes of careful movements he and she were closing on one another’s position with satisfying speed.
He paused just outside the open atrium that overlooked the flight deck, checking all the Marines icons he could see as well as overseeing the atrium itself to assure himself it was clear, then he stepped in and waved the Princess on from the other side.
Eryn brought up his auto-pistol when he saw the man trailing her position, eyes narrowing.
“It’s alright,” Jinsha said, lifting a hand. “He tried to save me from the firefight and got caught up in it, so I let him follow me out.”
“Pr…” He sighed, biting back the title, “Jin, that was not a good idea.”
The man snorted behind her, “You’re telling me. Figure I’m doing someone a good turn and then they whip out an anti-personnel carbine and start hosing down government soldiers? If I’d known then, I’d have turned on my heel and would still be walking now.”
“That would have been preferable, yes,” Eryn said, frowning at the man before blinking in surprise.
Is that the freighter Captain I tagged? I think it is. What the devil is he doing here? Following us?
Eryn couldn’t imagine how that might be possible, but the idea set him on edge anyway. He used his thumb to flick his weapon from single rounds to short burst mode, eyes sweeping up and down the lanky figure of the out-worlder.
“We should be clear of most Imperial mishaps,” He said finally, eyes not leaving the man. “Unless they have an ident of you already, you should be in the clear. Not much I can do for you if they have you on their lists already, though.”
The man nodded unhappily, “Figured as much. This trip just keeps getting better and better. I don’t know what’s next, but it’ll have to be pretty bad to top how things have been going so far.”
Eryn sympathized, but didn’t have the time to worry about anyone elses problems at that point. He reluctantly shifted his focus back to the Princess.
“We need to move.” He told her. “I’ve got the list we needed but getting off Col isn’t going to be easy. We may need to shoot our way clear. Your friend here can find his own way from this point.”
“Damn right,” the man said, holding up his hands, “I want no part of a shooting fight with a damned battleship in orbit. You’re out of your damn minds.”
“No,” Eryn said, sounding tired, “We just have our backs to the wall. Stay back but follow.”
He led the pair of them to the spiraling stairwell that brought them down to the first landing platform, where larger ships were parked including the Legion blank vessel he and Jinsha had used to make their way to Col. They put their breathers on as he broke the seal on the lock and let the three of them out into the cold.
Jinsha clung tighter to her cloak as the biting cold snapped in, but shortly the heating elements in her and Eryn’s armor silently warmed them. Jan, behind them, simply tightened his coat and shoved his hands in his pockets.
The smell of ammonia made it through even their breathers, but the three ignored it. The path opened up, and they could see the ships up ahead, and Jan nodded to the left.
“This is where we part,” He said, “Good luck to you both, since I figure you’re both going to need it.”
Eryn just grunted softly and waved him off without seeming to pay any mind, but his other hand was resting on the butt of his auto-pistol while he watched every move from the corner of his eye.
Jinsha, however, gave a somewhat more friendly wave, “And you to you. I appreciate the thought, but you shouldn’t have gotten involved.”
Jan snorted, “You’re telling me.”
Those were his parting words as he hugged the wall along the way to the left, while they continued forward. Eryn darted a few sharp looks at the Princess as they moved, until her annoyance got the better of her.
“Just spit it out, Legionnaire,” Jinsha growled.
“You should have stayed in the ship.”
Jinsha scoffed at that, walking faster to catch up to Eryn so she could slap his shoulder.
“If I had, you’d be dead.”
Eryn paused, turning on her, “Then you should have let me die.”
She reared back, as if he’d struck her.
Eryn stepped in, his face deadly serious, “Your Majesty, my life isn’t worth sacrificing yours. It’s not even worth the loss of your freedom. My life for yours is a trade I would make every. Single. Time.”
Jinsha’s expression flared, “Maybe it’s not a trade I’m willing to make.”
“You don’t get a vote.”
Her expression hardened, “I say otherwise. What do you intend to do about it, Legionnaire? Chain me up in the ship?”
Eryn looked incredibly frustrated, “Jinsha, your highness, your life is more important…”
“No. If you die, or are captured, what am I to do?” She demanded of him, “At best, I live my life a captive of the people who killed my mother. Eryn, I cannot escape without you, but I will not endure that. If you die, so do I.”
Eryn stared blankly for a moment, unable to quite find any words to properly respond to her statement. She was right, he knew she was right, and perhaps more importantly she knew she was right… but he didn’t want to admit it.
His task was to save her, to bring her out from under the threat of the coup and deliver her to her family in the colonies or some other friendly location. He could only do that if he stayed alive, of course, and as much as he was loath to admit it, getting out of the system would be all but impossible for the Princess without significant aid. Few people had the training needed to figure a way out through military checkpoints, and options were far more limited once you were off world.
“Damn it, Princess,” He said finally, shaking his head, “Ok fine, you win. We’re in this together, but that doesn’t mean you should be walking right into an Imperial military squad like that. There are better ways.”
“Such as?” She asked pointedly.
“Such as reporting a sighting of yourself in another section of the city, for one,” He scowled. “You could easily have made a call like that to the city administration and had at least part of the forces pulled away.”
“Ah…” Jinsha reddened slightly. “I did not think of that.”
“Obviously,” He said dryly, “but we can discuss options when we’re in a better position. Come on, we need to get back to the ship.”
She nodded, falling in behind him as he led her along the rail that surrounded the perimeter of the landing deck. They ducked under the stabilizer of one of the resting vessels, eyeing the deck. It looked quiet, which bothered Eryn more than he was willing to admit.
It wasn’t empty, however. If it had been, he’d have reversed course without half a thought, a flight deck with no people in the area? That would be too obvious.
He could see some people coming and going, however, maintenance crews and what looked like owners going about their affairs. It looked right… but it didn’t feel right.
“Why are we stopped?” Jinsha whispered behind him. “The ship is right there.”
“I… I don’t know,” Eryn admitted. “Do you see anything wrong?”
“No, it looks fine.”
Reluctantly he nodded, pushing away the bad feeling. They were almost the ship, and that was when the trouble would start.
“Ok, follow.” He said simply, breaking cover and making for the ship with Jinsha in tow.
*****
Jan tried to walk casually as he saw a second squad of troopers passed by him, heading back the way he had come. They barely, if at all, so much as glanced in his direction. He was grateful for that, but now was feeling a little bad about leaving the girl back there.
The kid too.
Hell, they were both kids.
What did those two do to get this much attention anyway?
Jan was no fool. He knew that he’d just had a face to face with the pair that everyone in the damn system seemed to be looking for. They just hadn’t looked so young in the photos, somehow. It was sometimes hard to tell, life extension being what it was, but he doubted either of them had seen much more than their full growth, if that.
By Colonial rules, he wasn’t even completely certain they were fully considered adults, the age of majority being twenty-five for an un-engineered human.
He wasn’t much older, and the universe knew that he’d done some stupid, reckless, bullshit when he was younger but never had he even come close to engaging a military unit in a firefight. A few brawls in seedy bars, and he’d even drawn his gun a few times when dealing with bandits trying to jack his cargo, but he didn’t even know anyone who’d managed to get actual active duty military after them.
How in the universal abyss did a pair of barely grown kids manage it?
Jan wasn’t sure he wanted to know, not really, but the gnawing in his gut wouldn’t go away. He stopped in the hall as a third team of Imperial Marines marched by in triple time, looking after the armored men and women with a hesitance he was unaccustomed to feeling.
Of course, he rarely was pondering something quite so stupid.
Fuck it.
Jan turned and started making his way back, not know what he would do when he got there, assuming he found where there was even.
I am such a damn idiot.
*****
There was no one around the ship as they arrived, something of a relief to the pair of them. Eryn and Jinsha quickly circled around to the deck ramp, Eryn keying the order to open as they did.
His heart near stopped in his chest as he heard a sound he was all too familiar with.
A slow punctuated clap, a sound he would forever associate with someone being entirely unimpressed with his actions.
Eryn looked up the ramp as it lowered to touch the deck, black boots stalking down even as it dropped.
Sylban.
Chapter XVII
Saturnus Col
“I wish I could congratulate you on a good showing, Mr. Aubrey,” Sylban said in formal tones as he marched down the ramp, the sort of tone he used when delivering a lesson. “However, I’ve never lied to you before.”
Eryn glared daggers at him, pushing Jinsha behind him as he did.
“We have differing opinions of that, Sylban.”
Sylban rolled his eyes, “Please. Did you ever ask me if I planned a coup against Her Majesty?”
“The question never passed my mind,” Eryn snapped. “Of all things I could have thought, the idea of you betraying your oath? Never, not ever in the eighteen billion years that time has existed would that have passed my mind.”
“We have… differing opinions on the meaning of my Oath, Mr. Aubrey.”
“One of us right, and the other is you.”
“Droll,” Sylban said with a dry smile that did not reach his eyes, he stepped forward to the edge of the ramp, then down onto the deck where he paused briefly to examine the ship.
“A good choice,” He affirmed, reaching up to pat the hull of the ship he stood under. “I flew one myself, on assignment of course. Spent three years in the Colonies, doing missions for her Majesty.”
“Don’t you talk about my mother,” Jinsha hissed, starting forward only to be stopped by Eryn’s arm.
“Yes, I suppose that was indelicate of me,” Sylban said mildly, “I do apologize, Princess.”
“You can keep your…”
“Princess.” Eryn shook his head slowly, “Not now.”
“Indeed,” Sylban nodded, “Neither the time nor the place, sadly. You are both, of course, under arrest.”
Eryn slipped his hand behind his back, closing on the hilt of his blade.
“Do not even think of it, Mr. Aubrey. This is not a fight you can win.”
“He won’t fight it alone,” Jinsha growled, her voice shockingly low and angry, as she revealed the carbine she’d concealed under her cloak.
Sylban just rolled his eyes, giving Eryn a pointed look.
“He’s not alone either, Princess,” Eryn said, eyes flicking around.
Marines were there, surrounding them from the cover of other ships and equipment. None of them, of course, showed up on the channel Eryn was monitoring.
“Surrender,” Sylban ordered. “The princess’ life is, of course, guaranteed. Your own, Mr. Aubrey, I believe can be spared, though I hesitate to make promises there. You’ve managed to humiliate more than a couple members of the nobility in the past weeks, I’m afraid. You do know how they hold grudges.”
“I am aware.” Eryn didn’t have to say anymore.
He and Sylban both knew that story.
“The Princess lives,” Eryn said firmly.
“NO!” Jinsha objected, surging forward only for him to push her back.
“Of course,” Sylban said smoothly. “Her value is deeply rooted to her continued well being. Alive, she provides legitimacy to Jaol, the Marquis, and their faction among the loyalist Nobility.”
Eryn nodded reluctantly.
The Nobility, much of them in fact, couldn’t all be in on this. Most would likely be uninterested either way, if he were to judge. There would be a smaller, but significant, group that were loyal to the Conwin line, her Majesty directly, or some combination of the two. If they elected to move against the traitors, it would be bloody.
He couldn’t guess at who would come out on top, largely it would depend… ironically, perhaps… on those in the nobility who honestly didn’t care who won. Both sides would court them, and whichever enough of them chose to back would have a key advantage if it came to civil war within the Empire.
Giving up Jinsha to Sylban would put the Conwin bloodline under the control of the traitors, but it would also let her live to perhaps fight on another battlefield. One where, just possibly, she might be able to learn the lay of that land and have a chance at victory.
Eventually.
It would be cold comfort for her in the immediate future, of course.
“I believe Jaol has intentions on placing a child of his own blood on the throne,” Sylban said idly, a knowing smirk flickering across his lips, “So, I believe you can be assured that she will be well cared for.”
That was like cold water striking him in the face.
It was possible, many would think likely, that Sylban meant that Jaol would arrange for a gene-child to be birthed from a surrogate machine, but Eryn knew enough of the Royal line to know that could not be the case. The seat of the Empire could not be taken by any, save the blood of the crown’s body. To allow anything else, given the technology that existed, would be inviting chaos every time the crown was to be passed down.
For Jaol to be thinking that, he intended the Princess to be registered as having birthed a child of his blood.
His hand dropped, the blade silently triggering the opening of the scabbard as he twisted and brought it forward.
The monomolecular edge glowed as he brought the weapon up, looking over it as Sylban smiled and reached over his shoulder for his own blade.
Neither of them would bother with auto-pistols, or any slug throwers in general. Not against Legion charged carbon weave armor. Within the range they currently stood, doing that would only give the other man the chance to close the range and cut you to ribbons.
“Princess…”
“I’m ready,” Jinsha said behind him, her voice shockingly steady all things considered.
“Stay out of this fight,” He finished.
“What?” She asked, unbelieving.
“Very good, Mr. Aubrey,” Sylban nodded, “I will issue the same. You heard him, Marines, this fight is between Legionnaire Aubrey and I.”
The Marines lowered their weapons, marginally, but enough that Eryn could see it. He nodded and gestured again to Jinsha.
“I don’t like this, not one bit.”
Eryn glanced at her, but just shrugged, “What is there to like? This isn’t a fight for you.”
“Indeed not,” Sylband said, his blade dropping to a low guard position. “Shall we then?”
“We shall.”
The two faced off under the old spaceship, carbon black blades with glowing edges between them.
*****
Eryn circled away from the princess, placing his feet carefully as he eyed Sylban’s stance.
“You’ve never beaten me in a match, Mr. Aubrey, you should surrender while you can.”
“There’s a difference between a fight and a match, Sylban,” Eryn countered, knowing it was a bluff even as he said it.
Sylban was a grand master of the Legion saber, one of the few entrusted with training others in the use of a live blade. On all of Earth, there were only a half dozen with that level of skill. Lesser trainers used dulled blades, or those merely made of razor sharpened steel or carbon. An accident with those may break bones or slice deep in flesh, but a charged Legion blade would take a limb off with ease.
Sylban flicked his blade out in a light feint that Eryn recognized, but couldn’t quite ignore because it was setup to allow Sylban to redirect the blade into a shallow cut if he tried. Eryn snapped out the tip of his own saber, slapping Sylban’s blade away from him and using the resistance of contact to direct his own blade in a sharp slash aimed at Sylban’s chest.
Sylban took a half step back, letting the blade whistle past mere millimeters from his armor-clad flesh, then stepped back in leading with his own blade in a rising cut.
Eryn tipped his head back, and he felt the brush of the blade’s wind as it passed close enough to trim any beard he might have, were he old enough to properly grow one. He dropped his head, turning side on and leading out with slash, right to left, aimed for Sylban’s blade arm.
The black clad man flipped his wrist, bringing the lightweight blade around to an inverted block that caught Eryn’s mono-molecular edge with its own. The charge in the weapons crackled as they intersected, both blades constantly renewing the diamond honed edge even as the other attempted to cut it.
“A straight cut to my arm, really now Mr. Aubrey, you insult me,” Sylban chided.
They stepped apart, breaking contact, both flipping their blades as they circled, Sylban left to right, while Eryn moved counter to him. Eryn didn’t respond to the taunt, which was what he knew it was. He’d not expected to get through the guard of his mentor with that slash, and was only surprised that Sylban had opted to block rather than simply step back and let the blow pass.
“Not talkative today, are we?” Sylban asked lightly, his expression familiar to Eryn, who’d seen it a thousand times if he’d seen it once.
He’s treating this like a match, as if I’m not a threat. Why?
That wasn’t like Sylban, not in a real fight.
The answer, unfortunately, dawned on Eryn in the midst of their next exchange.
A simple flurry of strikes and fast blocks, all done by the books, made it clear.
My oath.
Eryn swallowed as he realized why Sylban was treating him like an amusement, not a real threat.
Sylban was well aware that they’d sworn the same Oath, the same promise on the integrity of their souls.
Brothers do not kill brothers.
Sylban’s actions had not relieved him of his position in the chapterhouse, or the Order. He was still Eryn’s brother by choice, despite everything.
He was counting on Eryn not becoming an Oath Breaker.
“You bastard. You think I won’t kill you?” Eryn demanded. “You slew your Liege! Our Liege!”
Sylban chuckled, “I did at that. Will you break your oath over that, Mr Aubrey? At what price, honor?”
“My honor isn’t worth her life.”
“Perhaps,” Sylban parried two more strikes, stepping aside to let a slash miss to the left at the last moment, then returned with a series of cuts aimed at Eryn’s throat and face that had to be ducked. “but really, what do you think happens if you kill me?”
Sylban’s eyes flicked to the waiting Marines, and Eryn got the message without words.
The Marines would hold their fire at Sylban’s command, but if he died here, then command would devolve to the next in command, and Eryn doubted that order would stand. He was in a situation where he could not find a winning path.
Sylban chose that moment to strike, pressing hard as Eryn went on the defense. He batted aside two probing cuts, then blocked a power slash aimed to cleave him at the next in a downward diagonal strike.
“You’re not trying to kill me either,” He said over the crossed blades.
Sylban scoffed, “Why would I bother?”
Eryn grunted as Sylban kicked out, sending them flying back to tumble to the deck, rolling over his shoulder and coming back to his feet in time to block an overhead strike that had been telegraphed so obviously Eryn had seen it coming while he was upside down.
“You’re a little baby legionnaire,” Sylban said mockingly. “All that fine training, but none of the experience to make a true threat. Be a realist, Eryn, it is over.”
“I refuse.”
Sylban chuckled, stepping back to clear their blades. “Noble. Naïve, but noble.”
Eryn just lifted his chin, “I am Legion. I refuse to acknowledge that there is no path to victory.”
“The Legion is ended, child,” Sylban said, shaking his head. “Do not be so eager to die on the blade of a fallen order. Either of them.”
Eryn froze briefly, then slowly straightened as he shifted his feet and brought his saber to a forward guard stance.
“Then I was Legion, and I will live or die by the Oaths I swore.”
Unlike some.
Eryn didn’t add the last words. He didn’t feel any need to, Sylban would hear them anyway.
Indeed, Sylban cocked a crooked smile at him and lifted the blade in mock salute.
“Touche,” Sylban said dryly. “Shall we, then?”
“Indeed,” Eryn nodded, lunging in yet again.
*****
Jinsha took a half step back as the fighting resumed, more vicious than previously, as though they were done testing one another out and now were ready to truly push one another.
She could barely follow their movements, and the movement of the blades as they slashed not at all. Embers erupted from the blades as they clashed, the charge along the edge repairing the damage caused each time. She knew a little about the blades, her bodyguards had always been Legionnaires growing up. Each strike would cost energy from the weapons’ charges, and the blades were not designed for a long-term fight.
Cutting anything lesser would cost almost nothing, the edge was harder than any steel and sharper than a razor had any possibility of becoming. But edge to edge against another Legionnaires’ blade, she doubted either weapon would be of much good after a short time.
The pair were clearly masters of the blade, only blocking with the edge… something that was unthinkable with most blades, but a Legion Saber would destroy another saber if it managed to strike the flat or the spine, and dodging or riposting more often than outright blocking.
They moved like lightning when they attacked, but often slowed to a crawl as they circled one another, blades darting in short blinding flashes that she almost wondered if she’d imagined, so quickly did they return to their starting point.
Jinsha’s heart leapt into her throat as the man who’d killed her mother suddenly went on the offensive, and Eryn was forced to back peddle for space and time.
*****
Eryn stumbled, catching himself as he barely twisted out of the way of a slash at his face. He felt the blade pass within millimeters of his flesh, and a waft of hair briefly drifted across his vision to speak to just how close the weapon had come.
He snapped out with his own blade in time to swat Sylban’s weapon away from a viciously fast thrust. With it turned aside, he’d opened a hole in Sylban’s defense, and Eryn rushed to capitalize on it.
The Legion saber was a cutting weapon by design, but it wasn’t incapable of a swift thrust, and so he twisted the blade to be parallel to Sylban’s ribs as he drove it forward with all the strength he could muster.
Sylban turned away from the strike, slapping the blade down with his free hand to the flat, and brought his own around in a vicious arc that flew through the opening of Eryn’s defense that had been created. Eryn saw it coming, but too late to stop the whistling blade coming at his head.
A crack sounded across the deck as it contacted him, flat of the blade smashing across his face and staggering Eryn away while Sylban took a step back and returned his blade to a low guard position with a flourish.
Eryn gingerly touched his face where the flat had slapped him, his fingers coming away bloody from liquid seeping out of his mouth where the skin had been torn by his own teeth.
“First blood to me,” Sylban said.
He didn’t need to say anything else, both of them knew that blow would have ended the fight permanently had Sylban not opted to twist his weapon at the last moment.
Eryn just nodded, spitting more blood out of his mouth as he lifted his weapon again, tipping his head to acknowledge the point.
“Surrender is still an option, Mr. Aubrey,” Sylban told him, smirking as he spoke.
“Shut up and fight.”
“As you wish.”
Sylban lunged in again, with Eryn reacting smoothy to parry and counter. Back and forth they went, each move practiced hundreds of times, thousands, even more. Their feet mirrored one another, footsteps flowing into one another until who initiated a move, and who was reacting, was all but lost.
It was a rhythm, one that became more important than anything else for a brief moment in time. A rhythm that Eryn lost himself to and, when he did, it was all over.
He swept aside a thrust, opening up a hole in Sylban’s defense, and went for it automatically, as he’d been trained. He stepped in, pivoted, and brought his blade up for a swift flick aimed for Sylban’s throat.
Sylban saw it coming, leaned back, and let the blade go by.
Eryn took a step back, returning his weapon to low guard with a mirror of the flourish Sylban had used only moments earlier.
Sylban quirked an eyebrow at him, visibly confused by the action as he returned his own blade to a similar position.
“Point… to me,” Eryn told him.
Sylban looked confused, then he felt a warm trickle run down his neck and slowly brought his off hand up to his face. His fingers brushed against the wet surface, and he brought them away to see the red blood coating them.
“I am impressed,” He acknowledged, returning his blade to low guard. “Again?”
Eryn nodded grimly, “again.”
Seconds ticked by as they eyed one another, both judging the position of the other as well as their own. Their eyes flicked, each considering the next attack, the next defense, playing out the fight in their mind’s eye.
Eryn moved first, stepping in to close the range as he swept his blade up. Sylban leaned to one side to let the blade pass, flicking the tip of his own weapon out to cut at Eryn’s chest. Eryn twisted out of the path, bringing his blade down in an arc that Sylban stepped into, throwing his elbow up to block the blow before he delivered an off-hand strike to Eryn’s nose. The pain blinded him briefly as he started to stumble back, and Eryn felt a crunching pain dully in his ribs as Sylban followed up with a kick.
He fell away, stumbling, trying to keep his balance. Something hit his back and he fell over it, then everything was falling before it all went black.
*****
Jinsha screamed, her voice drowning out a shout from Sylban as he rushed forward. He cast his blade to the ground as he ran to the rail that surrounded the landing platform and leaned over it.
She watched him stare down for a long moment before pushing himself back upright and look up at the whirling clouds that were above, around, and below them. Finally, he turned back.
“Sergeant.”
“Sir!” The Marine responded instantly.
“Send men to the deck below, recover the boy. Alive if he’s still breathing,” He ordered. “Bring him to me on the Conquest.”
“The Conquest, Sir?”
Sylban looked at Jinsha, “Yes, I won’t be waiting any longer to secure this package. Follow us up as soon as you secure the boy. Alive if he’s breathing or his body if not.”
“Yes Sir.”
Sylban walked past the Marine as the sergeant began snapping orders, pausing only to recover his sword before he stood in front of Jinsha.
“Your highness,” He gestured. “Please surrender your weapon and come with me.”
“And if I refuse?” Jinsha asked, surprised at how steady her voice seemed, her hands white as they clenched the grip of her weapon.
“Then I take it from you,” He told her evenly. “It will hurt when I do, and you will be spending some time in the Infirmary onboard the Conquest. Either way, you will be coming with me.”
She hesitated, her muscles tensing as she thought to bring the weapon up in a fast motion. He just shook his head.
“Don’t try it. I can read your mind, Princess.”
She moved, the weapon swinging up.
He stepped in, a hand on the carbine pushing it back down as he struck her in the arm and jerked it from her hand. There was a snap, a bone in her hand broke against the guard of the weapon, and Jinsha cried out briefly as her weapon was tossed to the ground to clatter away.
“Apologies, Princess,” Sylban told her, “but I did warn you. Marine!”
“Sir?”
“Secure the Lady, see her to a corpsman until we can deliver her to the infirmary.”
“Yes sir.”
“Time to come home, Your Majesty.”
*****
Chapter XVIII
Imperial Tower, Almansc, Terra
Lord Jaol looked up as the messenger rapped lightly on the entry way to his new office.
“Come,” He ordered, turning his focus back to arranging the desk.
“Sir.”
Jaol let him stand there, at attention, for a moment until he was finished. Then looked up and nodded briefly, letting the man… boy, really… drop to parade rest.
“Well, out with it, son.” He said finally.
“Yes Sir, Milord. Communique from the Captain of the Conquest,” The boy said, “He confirms that Mr. Gyver has returned to the ship, accompanied by her Highness.”
Jaol smiled slightly, letting out a satisfied breath.
“That, that is very good news, lad. Thank you. Dismissed.”
“Yes Sir!”
The boy saluted again and pivoted on his heel, marching out. He was so stiff that Jaol wondered that he hadn’t sprained something, but that was as it should be.
So, they found her, and out by Saturn. Right where Sylban said they would wind up.
It would have been a disaster if the Princess had escaped. The rumors she could spread would have been considerable and, while not insurmountable, certainly would have made for an entirely new level of increased difficulty in diplomacy with the Colonial governments.
With her back under the thumb of the Nobility and the Terran Imperium, however, they were on a firmer foundation, one that would allow them to initiate the next stages of their plan.
Jaol reached out and opened a communication line.
“Yes, Lord?”
“Please contact the Marquis and have him meet me at the command center.”
“It will be done.”
Jaol killed the link and rose from his seat, casting a brief glance around the office before taking his leave. Finishing setting up his new position would wait, he decided. There was work to do, for the Imperium.
*****
Imperium Command and Control, Imperial Tower
Jaol was already standing at the center of the sprawling complex that was the command center for the Imperium’s military forces by the time the Marquis rushed into the room and crossed one of the catwalks that swept over the pits where people feverishly worked to keep everything running smoothly across the planet and Terra’s few offworld assets.
“Lord Jaol,” The Marquis gritted out, looking irritated.
“Marquis,” Jaol replied with a serene tone that only seemed to irritate the Noble all the more.
“I don’t appreciate being summoned,” The Marquis grumbled.
“My apologies,” Jaol said, his tone completely lacking any hint of an apologetic tone. “However, it seemed best not to delay.”
“Delay what?”
“The implementation of phase two,” Jaol told him.
“Phase… You mean she…?”
Jaol nodded, “Mr. Gyver re-acquired her Majesty some hours ago, she is currently being held on the Conquest.”
The Marquis’ eyes lit up and he nodded quickly, “Have the Conquest return to Terra as soon as possible. Her Majesty must be secured here in the tower without delay.”
Jaol hesitated, “The Conquest is needed for the implementation of…”
“Nonsense, Lord Jaol. We have the Vanquish and her sister ships already in position. The Conquest can redirect.”
“We do not have a fleet commander with the task group, Marquis. Sylban…”
“Then dispatch him on a fast transport. He will arrive before the Conquest possibly could anyway,” The Marquis said firmly.
There was something to that, Jaol supposed. The Conquest would supply a little more power to the second phase, but even arriving late that would hold true. Of course, he could suggest putting the Princess on a fast transport rather than Sylban, get her to Earth that much quicker, but he was loathe to put an asset that important on a virtually undefended ship no matter how well the Solar System was supposedly secured.
The young Legionnaire who had absconded with Her Majesty hadn’t been the only loyalist in the system, they would likely be stamping out those people for years to come. There was no sense offering them a shot at acquiring Her Majesty, in case there were any sympathizers on the Conquest, or here in the Command Center, to let her location slip out.
“Very well,” He nodded, “I’ll dispatch the new orders. The Conquest will have to see that Saturnus is secured, but that should only be the matter of a few hours, perhaps a day, to properly assign and dispatch garrison forces.”
“Yes, yes,” The Marquis held up a hand. “I’ll entrust those details to you, of course. The Captain of the Conquest is one of my best, he will see things done properly.”
“Very well,” Jaol nodded. “We have a plan of action then. Phase two?”
“As soon as your Mr. Gyver is with the fleet,” The Marquis nodded.
“Excellent.”
Jaol turned to look over the massive screens that displayed the status of the far reaches of Imperial influence.
“This is a great moment of history, Marquis,” He said. “The return of Terra to its rightful place. Earth is not the cradle of humanity - it is the throne.”
The Marquis nodded enthusiastically, expression gleaming.
“You’re right of course, Lord Jaol,” He said grinning. “And it is time to remind all those traitors of that fact.”
“Indeed, it is, Marquis. Indeed, it is.”
*****
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
“A moment, Mr. Gyver, and we’ll have this all put to rights.”
Sylban didn’t respond, not even to nod, as he rested his head back on the rest of the seat in the Infirmary. The cut to his face had not been deep. He’d nearly avoided the tip of Eryn’s blade entirely, but it was deep enough and bisected his right cheek almost vertically.
The Doctor brought out the dermal regen device, approaching him, but Sylban held up his hand, catching the Doctor by the wrist and holding him back.
“Just tape it up.”
“But it will scar if I do not properly treat it, Sir, it will take only a moment…”
“Tape it up,” Sylban ordered firmly. “The boy earned this one.”
The doctor hesitated but had little other option. He sighed finally, “Very well.”
Getting his cheek properly taped took only a few moments, a light anti-biotic glue finishing the job. Sylban examined the work in the mirror before nodding and accepting it as a job well done.
“Thank you, Doctor.”
“You have a few more hours,” The doctor advised. “If you reconsider in that time, I can prevent any scarring.”
“I understand.”
“Sir! Mr. Gyver!”
Sylban glanced aside, “What is it, boy?”
The young crewman held his salute so stiffly that Sylban wondered if the boy would snap.
“Urgent message from Terra for you. Private encryption.”
“Indeed? Very well, run ahead, inform them that I will be there shortly.”
“Yes sir!”
*****
Sylban turned left as he approached the bridge of the big ship, stepping into the bustling nerve center of the vessel. He was mildly irritated by the distraction, but duty did call.
“Mr. Gyver,” The Captain nodded to him, gesturing across the bridge to the secure communication terminal. “Message from the Tower for you. Personal encryption.”
Gyver nodded briefly and crossed to the terminal without saying anything.
The secure terminal used biometrics as well as cybernetic identifiers to ensure that only the recipient could decode a message. It was somewhat irritating, but there were no more secure methods of transmitting classified intelligence and orders, so he put up with it.
Logging in was the task of but a moment, and Sylban quickly decoded the message.
It was short, and too the point. He stared at the screen for a moment, rereading the orders as he rested his fist on the console. Finally, he sighed and nodded, pushing back from the terminal.
“Captain.”
“Mr. Gyver?” Captain Katchkin asked, looking over.
“I require a fast transport, courier class, long range with a star drive.”
Katchkin frowned, but nodded, “I’ll have one of ours prepared. Destination?”
“I will provide coordinates once we’re away,” Gyver said firmly.
“Understood,” Katchkin said in a tone that implied anything but. “Are you taking our guest?”
“No, Captain. You and the Conquest will finish supplying and staffing a local garrison with all haste, and then return immediately to Terra with our guest. Deliver her directly to Lord Jaol and await further orders from him,” Gyver said as he straightened up. “Do you understand your orders?”
“Of course, Sir.”
“Good. I will be in my quarters preparing. Inform me when my ship is prepared.”
Gyver then simply walked out, not waiting for a response.
*****
Jinsha stood in the center of her cell.
It was a… well appointed cell, with luxuries that did not belong on a starship, let alone a military vessel, but it was a cell nonetheless.
She flexed her hand, the phantom soreness still present, despite the treatment she’d been given upon arriving. Bones were easily mended, skin and blood vessels trivial to repair.
Some things, however, were harder to heal.
She felt empty inside.
Her weakness exposed, making her feel ill at the realization of it. With a weapon in her hand she hadn’t even been capable of giving a decent account of herself. All trying had gained her was a set of bruises and a broken finger, precisely as that man had warned her before she even fully thought of moving.
Now, Eryn was gone. She didn’t know if he were alive or dead, though she hoped the former given the orders that had been given before she’d been taken by Sylban Gyver, yet even if he were alive… what could one man do against a battleship the likes of the Conquest?
And that presumed he was well enough to escape the marines sent after him, which seemed unlikely, given the fall he’d taken.
Jinsha slumped into one of the settees that rested in the chambers, wondering at just how much her life had changed in so short a time. The past weeks had been a true rollercoaster, from the slow climb to the peak of her mother’s birthday, the unfathomable plummet that came on that day, the rocketing peaks and valleys that came while on the run, slowly building hope again…
And now…
This.
She looked to the future and did not like what she saw.
*****
Saturnus Col
Eryn woke with a jerk, sitting up before the sharp pains made him aware of his injuries. He grimaced, clutching at his chest and head in particular, but dull throbbing from his arm and legs quietly informed him that he had more to worry about.
“Take it easy,” A drawling voice with an accent he couldn’t quite place spoke up from off to one side. “You took a hell of a beating, and that was before you fell between the decks.”
Eryn groaned, turning slowly to see the speaker.
His eyes widened as he recognized the man.
“You? Why?”
Jan snorted, “Damned if I know. Maybe I just don’t much like the Imperium right at this moment, or maybe that girl of yours is kinda cute.”
Eryn glared openly at him, eliciting a chuckle from the other man.
“Probably the first,” Jan said. “But honestly, could go either way.”
“What happened to her?” Eryn asked.
“Can’t be sure. I had to move fast to beat those marines down to you, but it sounded like the guy who kicked your ass was taking her up to that battleship in orbit,” Jan told him.
Eryn nodded reluctantly, slowly looking around himself, “Where are we?”
“My shuttle,” Jan answered. “I was down on Col looking for cargo while the Imperium searches the Duck.”
Eryn blinked, looking confused, “the what?”
“My ship, The Rubber Duck,” Jan said, looking over at him. “Not a fan of old movies?”
Eryn shook his head, “Not a lot of old movies survived on Earth, and imports from the Colonies are expensive.”
“They’re digital! How can they be expensive!?”
“Digital files are quantum encrypted to protect the investment of importers,” Eryn quoted the political line. “Local media is cheap, but imports are locked.”
Jan rolled his eyes, “That’s barbaric.”
Eryn didn’t reply. Honestly, it wasn’t a subject he’d given much thought to. His time had been spent training and preparing for joining the Legion. Popular culture wouldn’t have been something he was knowledgeable about anyway, even currently popular material, to say nothing of older works.
He did, however, know the history.
Vast amounts of information had been lost right at the end of the Diaspora Era, when the last Colony ship blasted its way out of an attempt by the revolutionary governments to stop it from leaving with the resources horded by ten thousand millionaires. The ship’s sudden departure had knocked a single old satellite out of orbit, some ancient derelict apparently, but it had been massive whatever else it was.
It broke up, the pieces hit a few other birds, and they broke up in turn. From there, the cascading reaction was all but inevitable.
Within a few days, there was nothing but shrapnel in orbit.
That alone would have been a mortal hit to what little order there was left on Earth at the time, unfortunately that hadn’t been the end of it.
In contravention of multiple treaties, at least four satellites in that chain of events had been armed with nuclear warheads. MIRV warheads, to be precise. There had probably been more, but those four were on dead man’s switches. When they lost signals, they launched.
The resulting nuclear detonations had been bad, cities died, but a few of them detonated in orbit.
Electromagnetic Pulse had less effect than some of the worst-case projections, but it had been bad enough. The world was entirely digital by that point and while some material was stored on optical media and other hardened formats, the vast majority of modern culture at the time simply wasn’t.
Over a century of fighting, natural and unnatural disasters, and simple neglect, took care of the rest.
“Between the theft of culture by would be colonists, and the losses we endured when the lights went out, Earth lost far more culture than it retained,” Eryn said as he slowly stretched out his limbs, taking stock and seeing if anything was broken. “Someone from the Colonies shouldn’t be talking about barbarism.”
Silence reined between them for a time.
Jan broke it finally, blowing out a breath. “Damn I heard you Terrans held a grudge, but jeez.”
Eryn rolled his eyes and got up, having determined that he didn’t have any broken bones by some miracle.
“The world I grew up in is one in which children choke to death on the air itself, are poisoned by the water, irradiated by the soil... The weak, the sick… they don’t make it,” Eryn said. “If you live long enough, maybe you can get treatment for whatever the air has done to you, but it’s not cheap. The only way out for most is to join the military, and only the strongest can take what the atmosphere does to them and still make that cut.”
He looked over at the freighter Captain. “Her Majesty worked for generations, as did her father, trying to rebuild the planet. We’ve come… so damn far from where we began… but it’s been a long, grueling haul that most didn’t survive. So yes, a lot of us hold a grudge.”
“Look pal, I didn’t have anything to do with that. I was born centuries later, and so were you.”
“Yes, I know,” Eryn said, checking the charge on his armor, and looking around. “But do you really think that matters to people who grew up in the mess your grandfathers’ made? People are not rational, my friend. Groups of people, even less so.”
“Well, there’s truth there. What are you looking for?”
“My sword,” Eryn said, digging the weapon out from under a bench where it had been tossed. “Thank you for retrieving it.”
“How’d you know it was there?”
“Near Field Broadcast,” Eryn replied, “Small radio signal, less than a thirty-meter range.”
“There’s an active transmitter in that damn thing? They could have tracked it back here! Shit!”
“Relax, it’s unpowered, only capable of responding to a locator pulse, and there’s only two people around that could have sent that pulse,” Eryn said, returning the weapon to the sheath on his back. “And the other one, you say he took the girl up to the battleship. Unless you were followed, we’re ok for now.”
Jan snorted, “Whatever. What kind of nuts still carry swords anyway?”
Eryn ignored the question. Legion armor was a High Secret of the Imperium, and while he had no loyalty to those currently calling the plays back at the Tower of Terra, he wasn’t about to betray oaths made to protect the security of the planet either.
He was still wearing his auto-pistol as well as the single shot beam lock, so he was armed, for whatever that was worth considering what he was up against. Eryn looked around and got the layout of the ship, then made his way over to the hatch, wincing and leaning against the wall about halfway there.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Jan demanded. “You’re barely able to walk. A fall like that, it’s a miracle you didn’t break your neck. Hell, a little more force on his kick and you’d still be falling now, not that there’d be much left of you recognizable as human by this point.”
“He could have killed me a dozen times in that fight,” Eryn said, “He wanted me alive.”
“Bully for you. I doubt he feels the same about me, so I’d appreciate it if you didn’t pop your head up so the soldier boys out there can play wack-a-mole with it.”
Eryn snorted softly. “Then tell me if anyone is out there, because I’m going one way or another.”
“Goddamn it,” Jan growled, “Why are you so anxious to go out there anyway? I told you, she’s not on the city anymore.”
“No, she’s on the Conquest, and that means I need to get moving if I want to catch a ride up there.”
Jan just blinked, turning to stare.
“Are you out of your goddamn mind?” He demanded.
“Don’t worry about it, just let me out of here.”
Jan shook his head but checked the external cameras. With no one skulking about, he hit the release and opened the hatch. “Fine, and good riddance.”
Eryn started out the hatch, then paused.
“Hey, how big is the…” Eryn winced, “Rubber Duck anyway?”
*****
Chapter XIX
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
Katchkin walked the catwalk above the bridge stations, looking down on the sections as he passed, assuring himself that everything was operating as it should. He paused over the Space Nav Control station as a beep caught the attention of the young officer working there.
Katchkin waited until the officer responded and finished their task before speaking.
“Problem?”
“No Sir,” The Lieutenant said instantly. “The fast courier has requested clearance to depart, and we have the last Marine dropship returning from the city now.”
“Good, then we can be on our way,” Katchkin said. “Our orders are to be back in the orbit of Terra as soon as possible. I would prefer not to unnecessarily irritate the Marquis.”
He got no response to that, nor did he wait for one. Instead, Captain Katchkin made his way along the sections and stopped at the secure communication section a moment later.
“Inform the Marquis and Lord Jaol that the Conquest will be under way shortly.”
“Aye, aye Sir.”
Things were looking up, as far as Katchkin was concerned. The Marquis was about to have his prize, which would be a priceless coup for Katchkin’s career. The threat to the Empire was contained, and that damned Gyver was about to be off his ship.
As part of Terra’s Navy, and the regular forces in general, Katchkin had never much liked the Legion.
Answerable only to the Empress, they were an affront to the Noble families that had helped put the Empire where it was. A force that had no respect for its better in society yet had become the monsters in the shadows for those who dared speak against the foolish whims of a naïve ruler.
Katchkin supposed that this Gyver fellow was better than the rest, since he at least had chosen the right side, but it still irked deeply to have a commoner elevated above his position, given the right to give orders to his betters as he had.
Well, at least he was off the Conquest and on his way to being someone else’s problem.
*****
ISV Conquest, Landing Bay 03
The wail of alarms slowly faded into audibility as the atmosphere returned to the bay, giving the sound a medium to travel through. One shuttle was still rumbling into position, men in colored uniforms guiding it into place, running refueling hoses across the deck even as it was locked into place.
Once the pressure was returned to full atmospheric pressure the shuttle dropped its ramp, and men stomped off, then others climbed in. Maintenance teams made their way through the vehicle. Post flight checks were mandatory of course. In twenty minutes or so, the area around the shuttle was empty of all but those doing jobs that no one ever noticed unless they weren’t done correctly.
In the midst of that work, no one was underneath the shuttle when a head appeared from the open section of the hull exposed by the lowered landing gear.
Eryn looked around quickly, then withdrew back into the hollow where the landing gear normally rested, got twisted around, and dropped to the deck a moment later.
He winced, holding his head as he unwrapped thick material from around it. The landing gear area was not part of the pressurized sections of the shuttle, and while his armor could keep him alive in a vacuum, it was not actually rated for it. He had a pounding headache from operating in extreme low pressure for the entire trip from the floating city.
He glanced across the deck, eyes peeled for anyone who might be looking his way.
With only maintenance personnel around, however, Eryn casually tossed the makeshift helmet he’d used to survive the trip from the planet. He spotted the lock into the ship and started walking, straight across the deck, in plain sight.
Halfway there he crossed paths with one of the Deck crew, who he passed without even glancing at. The crewman didn’t meet his eyes and looked down when he saw the armor and sidearm, passing without a word.
Deck crews, like the lower echelons of the military, were pulled from the commoner classes. It didn’t pay for them to attract the attention of anyone who might be a Noble.
*****
Conquest, Command Deck
“Course calculated, all stations report green, we are ready to leave orbit.”
“Very good,” Captain Katchkin said, “Full power to the primary drives. Take us out of orbit.”
“Aye Aye, Sir.”
The Conquest’s drives ignited, but the insulation kept all but a faint hum from filtering through. They could be felt through the deck plates, though, more than heard even with all the insulation.
It feels good to be under way again, Katchkin thought to himself.
“Fast courier is leaving Saturn’s orbit as well, Captain. They’re on an outward- bound trajectory, as filed.”
“Good riddance.”
Katchkin turned his back on the communications section and walked away.
“If anything changes,” He called, “Contact me. I’ll be seeing to our… guest.”
“Aye, aye Captain.”
*****
Jinsha didn’t look up as the door opened, uncaring for whoever might be calling. She was writing in a journal, though she doubted that she would be permitted to keep it for long and so was not putting down anything significant.
“Your Highness.”
Sighing, she looked up to recognize the Captain standing there.
“Yes, Captain?” She asked simply. “What can I do for you?”
“That is a question I should be asking you, Your Majesty,” Captain Katchkin smiled warmly at her. “If you have any desires the Conquest can fulfill, you have but to ask.”
“I suppose my freedom is not on that list of things the Conquest can fulfill?”
Katchkin simply smiled a little wider, “I am very much afraid that it is now, your Majesty.”
“Then I have none. You may leave me to my cell, Captain.”
“Now, now Your Highness,” Katchkin gestured genially, “There’s really no need of that. You’ll be treated very well, I assure you. The Marquis has assured me of that.”
She snorted, but didn’t bother saying anything to that statement, instead opting to return to her writing.
Katchkin waited, the silence growing awkward in short order. He shifted, waiting several moments longer the situation called for, finally giving it up.
“Be that way then, your majesty,” He growled. “It makes no matter to your fate, you will be home on Terra in short order.”
He turned on his heel and stomped out, the door swinging shut on its pivot to seal the room.
Jinsha looked up at the sealed door, setting her pen down.
It makes no matter to my fate. He’s not wrong there, I suppose.
*****
Eryn found a laundry room two decks up from the shuttle and stole a set of BDUs from one of the packing rigs. He avoided officers’ uniforms. There would be too few of those on board the ship, even on a vessel the size of the Conquest. There would, however, be hundreds of nameless, faceless, crewmen.
He pulled the BDUs on over his armor, smoothing them out the best he could. It wasn’t perfect, he doubted he’d pass an inspection, but it would have to do.
It’s a good thing charged carbon doesn’t require trauma plates like standard armor does, he thought grimly as he tried to make his newly acquired uniform look somewhat fit for presentation. I look bad enough as it is.
He evaluated himself one more time, deciding that he looked like an inflatable toy for children, but there wasn’t much to be done about it. It would pass at a distance, and if he got up close with anyone who had an interest in checking him, well he would have to deal with that as it happened.
Best to not get close.
His Legion codes weren’t able to access the ship’s computers, which was something of a concern. Those codes were supposed to be hard coded into the systems. His own personal identifier could be locked out of course, but that wasn’t what he was seeing.
The system didn’t even recognize his Legion code.
That meant that the computers on the Conquest were not Terran Mil-Spec.
How did anyone get non approved contractors in on an Imperial Construction Contract as important as the Vanquish Class?
That was something else that should not have been possible. All contracts at that level needed the be signed off on by Her Majesty, or Her Majesty’s personal representative. For the computers on the Conquest to be so out of spec, the planning for the coups had to go back much farther than he’d imagined.
It also meant that he was going to have a much harder time finding out where they were holding the Princess.
Damn it.
*****
Imperial Fast Courier, Outbound
Sylban glared at the orders he’d received.
He’d known they were coming, of course, but they were too soon. The situation in the solar system was still in flux, therefore moving ahead with the plan outside the system was a high-risk operation.
High risk, high reward, it was true, but he would have preferred to minimize the risk. The rewards were a set, known factor.
As the courier approached the Decault point, Sylban’s thoughts went back to the job left undone.
Her Majesty had been delivered to the Conquest, which was really the task. However, he had not confirmed Eryn’s fate, the Marines on the ground were still looking for him. It seemed he’d been conscious enough to drag himself away from where he’d landed.
Sylban expected nothing less of the boy, if he were honest. Privately now, he would even admit some pride in what the boy had managed. He’d been placed in an ugly situation, and he had responded with actions that were things of beauty.
Few were the legionnaires that could have done better with what they’d been given, and limitations under which they had to act.
He expected that he could have gotten the Princess out of the system, had he been in the young man’s place, but only because he had a higher level of access to the Legion’s institutional knowledge and resources. He could have found a ship with a Stardrive and bypassed Saturn entirely.
The boy had done unexpectedly well within his limits, well outside what Sylban had calculated he would manage.
He almost managed to completely derail the plan, without even half trying.
It would be funny, if it weren’t so damn sad.
All the planning, almost gone up in smoke because he’d underestimated his own student.
There was something to be learned from that, he supposed, but he honestly wasn’t sure what the lesson really was.
Don’t underestimate the young? Or perhaps, don’t overestimate the old farts who thought they knew better?
Whatever.
“We’re approaching the Decault Point, Sir. Stardrive will be engaging in two minutes.”
“Thank you,” Sylban said to the pilot. “I’m going to get some sleep. Wake me when we reach our destination.”
“Yes sir.”
*****
Imperial Battleship Conquest
Theodore Katchkin grumbled to himself as he settled down in front of the Captain’s private communications terminal.
Arrogant girl. Acting like she is still somehow above me.
Theodore was of a minor noble branch, but he was Nobility, nonetheless. You didn’t get entrusted with the Command of an Imperial Navy Vessel if you weren’t either Nobility or, at least, had the endorsement of one.
The Imperial Family had always stood above.
A position none of them deserved. Not even the first Emperor. Pitr Conwin had created an Empire, yes, but he had not created it alone.
Theodore’s own family had played a key role. Without his two great-grandmothers, in fact, the Empire would have died stillborn. One would think the Conwin’s would be more grateful to the people who’d put them to their lofty position.
They didn’t lift a finger to help when his father had fallen on hard times, however, his family had fallen in importance and influence.
No, they’d just sat there in their tower, making their little plans to return power to the people.
The people!
The people who’d been tearing each other apart until the Noble Few had stepped in to save them from themselves. The people, so easy to be led around by the nose. So convinced they were right, that they ignored any and all evidence to the contrary.
Ha! Ignored.
Evidence that proved them wrong only made them more certain they were right.
Those were the people the Conwins wanted to return power too.
It was insanity.
When the Marquis approached him, well there was no question one side of Theodore Katchkin was going to come down on. That his agreement came with the assignment to Command one of the Empire’s newest and most powerful battleships, well that was just bonus points.
Katchkin hadn’t been quite so ready for how he’d feel when face to face with the last legitimate scion of Conwin’s line.
Her scorn had made him feel…
Furious.
Yes, furious. That was the word, not… anything else.
He pushed the other word… the other feeling from his mind. He had to deliver the little brat to the Tower. He’d keep his end.
Perhaps he might get a chance to make her feel… fury… at sometime in the near future.
*****
Jinsha silently finished the entry in her journal with a flourish, a gentle arc to end the final word. She closed the cover, letting the magnetic clasp click shut.
She looked around the room for a moment, considering how things had changed over the past shockingly short while. She’d grown up in rooms like the one in which she sat, something that was frankly a little disturbing to her for various reasons.
For one, such a room had no place on a starship, not a military one at least.
It brought her back to the stories she’d heard from her mother, growing up at the knee of the most powerful woman on the planet.
The ships of the Diaspora had rooms like the one she was in.
Her mother had used them as a cautionary tale, a story about the depths people could fall to in their pursuit of luxury. She’d never understood how her mother could talk about such things when they themselves lived in luxury themselves.
Her mother had simply said that it was not luxury, nor the pursuit of it, that was evil. It was, rather, the exclusion of any and all care for those who did not have the same opportunities. To empty the world of wealth, of culture, of all the things those in the Diaspora had taken… To run in fear, while billions suffered in your wake.
That was the evil.
Ships were a microcosm of such things. They were, at their heart, practical constructions. Comforts, those were understandable, but luxury? That was not something that belonged on a starship. Luxuries stole space from required systems, making the ships less capable of their job.
Imperial ships did not have luxurious space, not even for an Empress.
Not until now.
Jinsha felt like she was seeing the burning of everything her family had worked for over three generations, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
She got up from the desk, picked up the journal, and crossed to a bookshelf across the room. Carefully placing the book on the shelf, Jinsha let her fingers trace the spines briefly.
Books.
More things that had no place on a starship.
She sighed and made her way to the tiled bathroom, turning the taps to start a bath running.
A bath.
Jinsha shed her clothing, leaving it where it fell as she stepped out of it. The warmth from the water already beginning to waft through the room. She had told Eryn that if he died, so would she. Now she found herself honestly thinking about making that prediction a reality.
She stepped slowly into the bath, breathing coming slow even as her heart pounded in her head.
*****
Chapter XX
Imperial Battleship Conquest, Medical Center
“Hey Doc, got new orders here.”
Doctor Michail Devorich looked up over his work and blinked at the crewman holding up one of the electronic pads used to hand courier messages around the ship when the internal systems were considered inadequate to the task.
Such events were rare, and usually denoted high priority orders with… unusual clearance requirements.
“Well, hand it over then,” He demanded, reaching out for the device that was in the hand of the, rather poorly put together crewman.
Michail glanced him over briefly with a scornful expression but couldn’t be bothered to care about what one crewman looked like. That was a duty for his supervisor, who had clearly been lax in that particular area but that wasn’t any of his concern.
He took the pad and walked over to his secure terminal to pull the encryption codes. After a few moments, however, he found that he couldn’t find the codes much to his annoyance.
Idiots.
Michail lifted his head, annoyed, then turned around to the crewman.
“There is no decryption code…” He trailed off, looking around, only to find no one present.
Stupid commoners. He was supposed to wait until I released him!
Grumbling, he walked over to the closest communication terminal.
“Command, this is Doctor Devorich,” He snapped. “I require the encryption codes for the orders that were sent down.”
“A moment, Doctor.”
He rolled his eyes, “That’s fine. Until I decrypt these, I cannot do anything anyway.”
Idiots. I am surrounded by idiots.
*****
Eryn winced as the high-pressure hypo pushed a concentrated cocktail through his skin into his muscle. He paused for a moment, tossing the hypo into a nearby wall bin, and closed his eyes while the stimulant took effect.
He held out his hand for a moment, eyeing it carefully as the shakes subsided, then took a breath and pushed off the wall. He tucked his hand into his pocket, flipping the identification card he’d stolen from the doctor’s office over a couple times.
I need a computer.
Access terminals were common, but private ones… at least effectively private ones, those were markedly less common. Especially for crewmen from the commoner class with no connections to use.
If he were on any other class of Imperial ship, Eryn had no doubt he could find one easily. Of course, on any other class… he wouldn’t need to.
He wished he could just duck into one of the crewmen’s off duty rooms, but Eryn was quite certain that while the officers would be inclined to ignore him dressed as he was, the crewman on board would instantly recognize that he wasn’t one of their own.
Instead he made his way into officers’ country, walking calmly with another lifted pad in his hands. He stayed clear of the work areas, as well as the off-duty lounges. No crewman would have any reason, or right, to be in those areas for longer than a few minutes it might take to deliver a message.
The officers’ private rooms, however, were empty much of the day… their personal terminals left unused.
Finding an empty room was as easy as knocking. He was just a crewman with messages, after all. He knocked on two with tired occupants glaring blearily at him when they opened the door. They cursed him out to the lowest when he asked for a random name, slamming the doors shut in his face.
He just shrugged and moved on until he found himself a room that didn’t have a response.
Door locks aren’t half bad, but I wonder why they didn’t use better physical locks if they were going to invest in digital encryption this high?
He popped the lock, physically, after bypassing the sensors to make it think that the door was still sealed, then let himself into the dark room. It was one of the lower officers’ rooms, which probably explained the lack of decent physical locks, so it was rather narrow and small.
Unlike what was afforded crew members however, it was a private room.
He ignored the personal effects, pulling a swing out chair from where it was bolted to the wall and slipped down in front of the terminal.
With a medical override from the card he held, he broke through the first layer of security and that was enough to get a full layout of the ship, including secured areas. He copied the entire layout to storage in his implant suite and started running parameter searches in the background while he continued digging into the computer system of the Conquest.
Slicing the higher-level security proved more difficult. His Legionnaire Implant Suite was designed with data security and counter-intelligence applications, all intended to do very nasty things to computer systems that didn’t want to behave as he desired.
Eryn found it interesting that the computer system didn’t seem to have any defenses against his applications at all.
Why would they go out of their way to use computers that are not Terran Mil-Spec, seemingly to avoid Legionnaire access… but then not harden them against Legionnaire slicing tools?
Eryn pushed the mystery away as he got access to the system’s logs and ran a few quick searches, starting with Sylban’s name.
Reassigned. No forwarding information. Sylban’s off the ship, but where was he sent? The Princess… is she still here? Did I miss her?
Her name didn’t turn up anything, but there was reference to a ‘guest’ in one of the high-profile suites. That alone made him blink.
Suites? What is this, a cruise ship?
Whatever else it was, the room was in use, and listed as under guard. Inhabited by person or persons unknown.
He didn’t know for sure if it was Jinsha, but with everything else going on, he was going to gamble on it being her. He had nothing else to lose, if she were gone… well, then he’d failed.
If he’d failed, he had nothing left anyway.
He finished his searches, inserted a new user profile into the system so he could access the computer in less dramatic fashion, there were a few more orders he needed to slip into the network, and then closed up shop.
It was time to move.
*****
Katchkin looked over when his Executive Officer growled and pushed away from his station, looking frustrated.
“Something the matter, Conroy?” He asked.
“The Doctor,” Kyle Conroy rolled his eyes, “is on a tear.”
“What is it this time?” Katchkin asked, resigned.
“Apparently some idiot crewman showed up with an encrypted orders pad for him.”
Katchkin raised an eyebrow, “I don’t recall sending any encrypted orders for medical service.”
“No one does, and the idiot crewman didn’t stay after delivering the pad, so the Doctor wasn’t able to find out who gave him the pad,” Conroy grumbled. “So, we have a completely encrypted pad, supposedly with orders for medical service, and no decryption codes.”
“Send to all stations, enquire if they sent out any such orders,” Katchkin ordered, “and get someone to find out which crewman delivered it. If it’s a mistake by some commoner wasting all this time, I’ll have his hide. Literally.”
“Yes sir.”
Katchkin shook his head. “I swear, if we could staff these ships with the right sorts of people things would go much smoother.”
“Yes sir.”
*****
Eryn made his way through the ship, working his way deeper into the more secure sections. As he got deeper, however, he started to feel more and more like he had somehow… transferred seamlessly planetside.
Is this carpet? What the hell?
As he made his way deeper, heading for the high value quarters, it got worse. The ship was appointed like a hotel, a rather nice one in fact. It was far beyond the normal Admiralty deck one might expect on such a ship, and left Eryn honestly wondering if he’d just hallucinated the whole past few weeks and was back in the Imperial tower.
The Naval Uniforms he was seeing put an end to that thought - the Tower had its own branch protecting the Empress. None of the regular forces were entrusted that close to the throne, and for good reason.
Unfortunately, it had not been enough.
Here, he started getting some looks. Crewmen were not quite so invisible in this area, it seemed. That didn’t surprise him, he could see stewards were more common in this area of the ship and expected that they handled the majority of the mundane tasks normally assigned to crewmen.
That meant that his disguise was losing its value, and quickly.
He adjusted, walking firmly, with direction and focus. That would cause most to assume he had a reason for being there. His mind was split, partly on his immediate goal, partly on keeping an eye on the others he saw walking the halls… going about their duty… and partly pulling as much useful intelligence as he could from the Conquest’s computers.
*****
It would be… easy.
Almost.
Jinsha had never felt quite so afraid in her life, or quite so low.
She had no illusions about her future - the vision of it floated in front of her eyes as she soaked in the bath. The words spoke between Eryn and his mentor, the man who killed her mother, Sylban… they had, if not outlined her future in detail, certainly given the proper broad strokes.
She would be used, both in image and in body, to shore up the respectability of the new regime that had donned the corpse of the old, wearing her family’s legacy like some grotesque disguise made of that which they’d murdered.
She could stop that from happening.
It wouldn’t even be hard.
Jinsha examined the blade she had acquired, turning it over in her hand as she soaked in the steaming water, watching the light glint off the steel. It wasn’t a weapon - they’d secured anything that could remotely be considered such. It was, however, a very sharp blade despite its relatively small size.
Checking out, taking one’s own life, was quite common in the Imperium, as well as the Galaxy at large. It was a side effect of life extension so far beyond human norms, there came times when a person just got tired of living the life they had.
She was far too young to have considered such before, of course. Normally people were well past their second, even third, centennial before they seriously began considering it as an option. She was barely in her twenties.
Too young, most would say, even herself honestly.
However, she wasn’t bored with life, she wasn’t looking forward to seeing what happened next. She just wanted to throw a wrench into the plans that had brought her mother down, and put her in this situation, and if the price of doing that was her life… she was beginning to think it might be a worthwhile trade.
Only, something bothered her about the idea.
She wasn’t sure it would work.
*****
“Crewman!”
Eryn wanted to keep walking, but he knew that he couldn’t. There weren’t any other crewmen around. If he tried that, he’d just confirm suspicions. He gritted his teeth but came to a stop and went to attention as he turned to see the Imperial Navy Man-At-Arms striding in his direction.
“Yes, Sergeant?” He asked, noting the man’s sleeve hashes before looking around carefully to see who else was in the area.
There were half a dozen others looking on curiously, some with a hint of sympathy for him if he were reading their expression correctly, but most merely with the look of people who were otherwise bored and looking forward to a little entertainment.
“What are you doing in this section, crewman?” The Sergeant growled, looking him over with disgust in his expression as he looked over the uniform Eryn was wearing.
“Dispatch, Sergeant. Encrypted,” He said, holding up a pad.
The Sergeant took it from him without a word, thumbing the pad on and examining the display.
“There’s no sender on here.”
“Don’t know anything about that, Sergeant.”
“There’s no recipient on here either.”
Eryn shrugged, “I wasn’t told any details, Sergeant.”
“Of course, you weren’t,” The Man-At-Arms growled, going on to mumble under his breath. “Useless dirt farmer, should never have been assigned to a ship like the Conquest.”
The Sergeant sighed roughly, shaking his head, “Who issued the orders?”
“I wasn’t told.”
“Who gave you the pad?”
“My Supervisor.”
The Sergeant reached up to pinch his nose, “Who is your supervisor?”
“First Crewman Nowak,” Eryn responded, using an extremely common name from the Eastern Europe provinces of the Empire, where he knew a lot of military recruits were sourced from.
“Nowak… great,” The Sergeant mumbled, gesturing, “Alright come on, follow me.”
“Sergeant, I have to deliver the…”
“Follow me.” The Sergeant said firmly, before turning and walking away.
Eryn didn’t have any choice, he started following the Sergeant.
*****
Sergeant Eigan Mueller had better things to do with his time than figure out why dirt farming commoners were crawling around the upper decks of his ship. Vermin belonged in the holds, not on the upper decks.
He headed for the security office with the worthless fool in tow, where he’d get a hold of another worthless fool in what was all too likely to be a long line of worthless fools, until he finally found someone with enough authority to be able to even answer his questions.
Until he got that information, however, he wasn’t going to allow the filthy little vermin to crawl around the decks of his betters.
It’d be a lot less of a pain in his arse to have his office fumigated than the whole deck.
The security room was down one of the back corridors, positioned to be invisible to the guests who might be present on these decks, so he led the way down a narrow path and turned right to head to the security room.
He’d taken no more than three steps when he felt an arm snake around his throat from behind. Mueller responded instantly, as he’d been trained, leaning forward to pull his attacker off balance while he stepped back into him and stomped at his feet.
He was shocked when the moment he took his foot off the ground for the stomp, he received a sharp kick to the back of his other knee, his leg folding up instantly. He collapsed to the ground, the grip on his throat tightening as spots began to appear before his eyes.
As Mueller blacked out, all he could think was that he couldn’t believe that he’d just been bested by a dirt farming commoner.
*****
Eryn kept a grip on the Sergeant’s uniform neck as he let his grip loose and cast around. He knew he didn’t have long before someone would come along, and the man needed to be out of sight before that happened.
He found a utility closet on the ship’s layout in his implants and quickly dragged the Sergeant there.
Leaving the unconscious Man-At-Arms locked in the closet, Eryn reflected briefly on whether it would be better to simply kill the man, but he still couldn’t quite bring himself to engage in wholesale slaughter of people who had been his allies only a few weeks earlier.
Especially not to buy himself only a little more time.
In either case, however, with the attack on the Sergeant, Eryn was aware that the clock was now ticking. His presence on the Conquest would now be inevitably discovered.
He needed to get to the Princess before that happened, and there was no more reason to be overly stealthy about it.
*****
The blade danced in the light as Jinsha considered her options, limited and few thought they might be.
Ending it, leaving the traitors with nothing but a body for their troubles, it would certainly cause them troubles. Perhaps enough to ruin many of their plans, but Jinsha doubted it would be enough to bring them down. With or without her, she had no doubt that they had sufficient backup plans to make it work whether they had control of her or not.
Those who hold the position of power are best placed to maintain said power, she thought, recalling lessons from her mother in the history of her family. Whether they originally had a right to that power or not.
Her family history was one of taking power that did not belong to them, taking it and securing it against assault. She knew this game. She had been brought up in this game.
Jinsha simply had never truly expected to be a player of it.
She sighed, setting the blade down.
No, taking one asset from them would do little more than inconvenience the traitors. At worst, it might engender a brief civil conflict that would do little but end a great deal of lives for no gain. Without guidance, any counter revolutionary attempt would be doomed to fail, and who was there to lead such a thing?
Actually, that’s not a bad question. Who is there? Jinsha frowned in thought. There must be someone. I refuse to believe that all of my mother’s allies turned on her.
If dying for the Empire was of no value, she realized that she would have to live for it instead.
That was likely to be the less pleasant of the two options, but her family have never been the sort to shirk from a duty merely because it was unpleasant.
I will find the loyalists, even if I must do it from prison, she decided.
They could not use her properly if she were to be held in complete isolation, at least not for long. They would have to let her out, once they felt she was controllable. They would make mistakes - everyone did.
Jinsha would simply have to take advantage of them.
She was beginning to make her plans for the future she hadn’t really thought to have when a thud from the adjoining room startled her.
She twisted in the tub just in time to see a man dragging another into the room, covering herself up as he straightened and looked around. His eyes alit on her and he grinned.
“Princess,” Eryn said, ignoring a smoking hole in the uniform he was wearing, “It’s time to… wait, is that an actual bath? On…”
His eyes widened as his gaze dropped, and she flushed red.
“Get out!”
*****
Chapter XXI
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
Eryn paused as he examined the corridor to the VIP guest room he had flagged as the most likely location of the Princess. What he was seeing only compounded his belief that he had that part right.
There were two guards posted outside the door, both looking alert and without any of the signs of boredom and irritation he might expect from the types of people assigned to lesser stations. They knew their job and considered it important enough to put their full attention into it.
If he hadn’t encountered the Sergeant earlier, he might have elected to try for a more subtle approach. But with the clock already started, he didn’t have time for that, so he took a breath and stepped around the corner into plain site and started walking confidently toward the pair.
They spotted him instantly, of course, their eyes tracking him with more curiosity than anything as he headed in their direction.
He kept his pace even, forced his breathing to be slow and relaxed, and very carefully did not move his hands out of sight as he approached.
He didn’t smile. In fact, he tried to look bored. And, as if he wanted to be anywhere but where he was, falling into the role of the lowest caste member of the crew on a job he didn’t understand and didn’t care about.
He could see the guards shift subtly as he approached, they shifted slightly apart, their eyes scanning him for any threat. It wasn’t with intent. They were just following their training, evaluating him, categorizing him, and… he hoped, finally dismissing him as a threat.
The range between himself and the two dropped quickly, and as he got closer to ten meters, he saw them tense slightly. He’d been expecting it though, knowing that they were making their decision right then, according to their training. Once he was within ten meters, he was too close to reliably be certain they could bring their weapons to bear on him before he closed the range, according to the book.
Himself, however, he was relaxing as he reached that point, because unlike the guards, he knew that the book was wrong.
Just as he reached the ten-meter mark, the pair glanced at each other and a near invisible nod was passed between them as they stood down from their threat assessment. The two had apparently decided that he wasn’t a threat and were going to wait to find out what it was he was there for.
Eryn slowed his pace as he approached, nodding to the closest one finally, and lifting his pad with one hand as he turned slightly and let his other hand dip behind his back.
His movement was just beginning to register with the guards when he exploded into action.
The pad slashed into the throat of the closest guard, catching him by surprise and sending him staggering back as he gasped for breath and clutched at his bruised flesh. Eryn spun, snapping out as the second guard went to draw his weapon. Eryn stopped the draw with the ball of his foot, pushing the half-drawn weapon back into the holster.
“Sorry about this,” He said, dropping his leg back down and striking to the guard’s throat with an open hand.
Clutching at his throat, the guard fell back, so Eryn returned his attention to the first guard who was starting to recover. He caught him as he was pushing off the wall, snapping a palm strike to the guard’s jaw, jerking his head around, then stepped in and looped his arm around the bigger guy’s throat.
Pressure applied on both sides of the trachea cut off the blood flow to the brain, such that as Eryn held it for a few seconds, the already stunned guard quickly lost focus and strength, slumping into Eryn’s arms.
The second guard recovered just a bit faster than he’d expected, however, and this time got his pistol out of his holster.
Eryn pushed the unconscious guard out of the path of the shot as he stepped into the weapon to ensure that the barrel stayed low. The report was loud in the constrained space of the corridor, and he was certain that it would be reported in short order even if the computer somehow hadn’t registered the shot.
He barely felt the impact on his armor, though it did ruin his stolen uniform, and the guard went down hard a moment later as Eryn hit him with an elbow strike across the jaw that snapped his head to one side, rattling his brain putting him out cold with a concussion that his friend wouldn’t envy when they both woke up.
Damn it. I hope I got the right room.
The clock was definitely running down now.
With no time to waste, Eryn sliced through the security on the door lock. It wasn’t particularly difficult. Most of the effort seemed to have gone into simply disabling access from the inside, and then got the door open and dragged the first guard inside before returning for the second.
He immediately breathed a sight of relief when his Implants were able to recognize the Princess’ own suite as coming from the next room over and didn’t think about it as he dragged the unconscious guard in that direction. He dropped the guard inside the room, turning and smiling.
“Princess…”
Eryn trailed off, eyes dropping across her body as his brain suddenly blanked in a moment of panic that he’d thought was fully trained out of him.
Desperate for any sort of comment that wasn’t focused on her nude body, Eryn locked onto the water she was bathing in.
“Is that a bath?” He asked incredulous that such a thing would even exist on a starship.
“Get OUT!”
*****
Jinsha fumed as she got dressed, refusing to acknowledge that her current emotional state was a little more chaotic than pure annoyance.
She was actually happy to see Eryn alive, of course. For him to wander blindly into the bathroom while she was bathing, however, was beyond the pale.
And the first thing he notices is the bath!? Honestly?
No, she wasn’t going there.
She took a few breaths, steadying herself as she finished doing up the simple clothing she’d been afforded in the suite they’d imprisoned her in, then stepped out of the bath.
Eryn was trussing up the two guards, so she supposed that meant he hadn’t killed them. Jinsha didn’t want to know what it was like, fighting against friends… or, at least allies, but part of her wondered just how long he could manage to keep pulling his punches?
“I see you managed to escape,” She said aloud as she closed the door to the bathroom.
“Never got caught, thanks to that friend of yours,” Eryn said, pulling the weapons from the two and quickly pocketing the charge magazines for each.
She blinked, “Friend? You mean…”
“The freighter captain who tried to save you from the firefight you started,” He told her, sounding too amused for her taste. “He was also one of the ones we tagged back on Titanus. Runs a stardrive capable ship called the Rubber Duck, for some weird reason.”
“Really? Strange coincidence.”
“Not really. He needed cargo, which is one of the reasons we tagged him, remember?” Eryn straightened up, checking himself over. “And the only place to hunt for cargo in the area is down on Col. Small city, really, as such things go.”
He sighed as he examined the hole in his uniform that had, by this point, stopped smoking at least. It rendered the uniform useless, however, so he started stripping out of it, leaving it on the floor as he stepped out of the BDUs and checked the state of his armor.
“We have to move,” Eryn said, looking Jinsha over. “Is that all you have here?”
She looked down at herself, thinking she looked rather decent under the circumstances until she realized what he likely meant.
“They took the armor,” She told him.
“We’ll make do.” Eryn said, pausing briefly before he looked at her. “Are you still up for this? It’s another moment of no return.”
Jinsha didn’t need to think too hard about it. Not so long ago, she’d been considering taking her own life just to deny the people who’d assassinated her mother the value of propaganda that she represented, to say nothing of what other things they could gain from her.
“Let’s go,” She said without hesitating.
Eryn just nodded and headed for the door.
“Stay behind me,” He advised, “If there’s any shooting, hug the walls. We need to head for the landing bays, which means we need to get you another flight suit first. With me?”
She nodded.
“Ok, let’s go.”
*****
“That’s odd.”
Of all the phrases to hear on a Starship, even a large and well structured one like the Conquest, those two words were among the worst in Katchkin’s experience. He immediately turned and made his way to the Internal Security Station, eyebrow raised.
“What is it?” He asked.
“Noise alert on the VIP deck,” The young officer responded, “I thought that deck was sealed off?”
“No, it’s in use. What noise?” Katchkin asked.
“Profile reports as weapons fire,” The officer answered. “Single shot.”
“Dispatch security, immediately.”
“I already have, Sir.”
“Good man,” Katchkin answered. “Where are they now?”
“Negotiating entry to the VIP deck,” The officer admitted, “We’re having issues gaining all the access authorizations… I didn’t think there was anywhere on the ship that security couldn’t access with emergency authorization?”
“The VIP deck has been locked down, I’ll clear it myself,” Katchkin answered, reaching over the young man to punch in his own codes.
The access issues resolved immediately, and they could see the doors open on the overhead projection.
“Tell them to proceed directly to the secure quarters at the far end of the section,” Katchkin ordered. “Two guards should be on duty. I want to talk to them immediately.”
“Yes Sir.”
*****
“Roger that, Sir. We’re making approach now. No sign of guards on duty.”
The security team moved quickly but with caution as they approached the rooms in question, clearing every door and side corridor quickly as they moved, just in case.
The squad leader paused outside the door, sniffing at the air briefly before he brought up a handheld scanner.
“Spectrograph confirms, someone discharged a weapon at this location,” He said. “Check the door.”
One of the men took a step forward and keyed his security badge over the door lock, only to be rejected. He shook his head, “No Joy.”
“Hold,” The squad leader said, keying open his radio. “Request lock override.”
A brief moment passed before the lock buzzed, the muted red glow flashing to green as the door unlocked remotely. The squad leader nodded, and the closest man again keyed open the door as the rest of the team made entry by the numbers.
Inside they ignored the downed men they found, for a few moments at least, securing all the ante rooms first before returning to announce that the area was clear.
“We have two guards down,” The leader reported up the chain. “Both unconscious, but alive. No sign of anyone else in the room.”
*****
Eryn tilted his head slightly to the left, skipping a step and pausing briefly before continuing on.
“What is it?” Jinsha asked from behind him.
“Security just got a ship wide alert,” He said, “They’re looking for us now.”
“What do we do?”
He shook his head, “Same plan. No choice there.”
She nodded tremulously but didn’t hesitate to follow when he started moving again.
He hated how often he seemed to be making decisions because he had no other choices. That was the sign of a bad operative, or at least that’s what he had learned. Good operatives always had options, or they damned well made them. Yet he didn’t seem to be able to keep from locking himself into one one-way street after another, like some bumbling idiot.
Spent so much of my life training to handle the most dangerous missions my Empress might demand of me, and when he daughter is depending on me I can’t even seem to do anything better than bounce from one bad option to another.
He couldn’t help it, the next thought snapped into his mind unbidden.
Sylban would be ashamed.
Eryn grimaced, pushing that thought away with all the force he could muster. Sylban’s opinion of him didn’t mean a damn thing anymore.
Really.
“Cone on,” He said unnecessarily. “We’re just above the flight deck now, the ready rooms are just ahead of us.”
“Alright.”
*****
Katchkin was furious.
“Find her! Now!”
His voice boomed across the command deck as he screamed his orders into the system, sending them flying about the ship to the various teams already in motion through the vessel.
He was thinking furiously, trying to figure out what the hell had happened.
Surely the Princess didn’t somehow shoot her way out through two trained guards?
On the face of it the idea seemed ludicrous. No matter how he looked at it, it made no sense to him. She was a slip of a girl, the Conwin reputation notwithstanding.
We have a traitor on board.
It was the only explanation that made any sense to him, if he were frank about it. That the Empress had loyalists was something that everyone involved in the plan to remove her before she could destroy the Empire with her foolish notions were well aware of. They’d taken ever security precaution possible when staffing the entire Vanquish class of battleships, but it was clear that they’d missed someone somehow.
When I get her back, it will be time for a purge of the ship’s crew, Katchkin determined grimly.
*****
In the pilot’s ready room, Eryn turned his back to let Jinsha get dressed, keeping his eyes on the doors that he’d left open just enough to give him a partially obstructed view of the corridor beyond.
“So how did you get on the ship?” Jinsha asked, pulling on the flightsuit.
It was a poor substitute for the Legion armor she’d had taken from her, but it would be a necessity in short order, assuming all went well.
“Marine lander,” he said absently, “I rode up in the gear wells.”
Jinsha paused, staring at his back.
“Aren’t those… exposed to space?” She asked, disbelieving. “Where did you find a suit?”
“I didn’t. Oxygen supplies were easy enough, since we had breathers for the city,” He said, “but none of my gear is fully sealed.”
“Then… how?”
“I… improvised and accepted a level of discomfort.”
She stared at him, uncertain if he were serious. Eryn didn’t say anymore, however, he didn’t want to think about it. The human body could survive a lot, but hard vacuum was generally not within that range, even for an augment like himself. However, with some work, it was just possible to live through such trip.
You would not enjoy the experience, however.
He hadn’t.
“Ok, I think I’m done,” Jinsha told him finally, causing him to glance back.
“Almost,” He said, moving over to correct some of the fittings on her suit. “There’s a trick to some of this, but you’ll pick it up quickly.”
She nodded as he corrected what she’d gotten wrong, “Eryn…”
He looked up, catching her eyes, and freezing for a brief moment.
“What?”
“Do we… have a real chance?” She asked. “I mean, really? The entire Empire is after us, and… we still don’t have a stardrive capable ship, right?”
“Right,” He nodded, “and the answer is… I don’t know.”
He turned her around by the shoulders, a hand between her shoulder blades guiding her forward to where he knew the scramble route was for pilots in the case of an alert.
“What I do know is that we don’t have a lot of options left to us,” He told her, hating himself for that truth even as he said it. “We can choose to give up, or choose to keep fighting.”
She nodded slowly, “I want to fight.”
Eryn smiled softly, “Well Princess, I am your Legionnaire.”
“Not much of a Legion,” She laughed sadly. “Can you be a one-man Legion?”
“Maybe not,” Eryn admitted.
The power of the Legion in the Empress’ service hadn’t relied on fielding large numbers of men, unlike the Legions of ages past, but in a real way their strength was integrally tied to their fellows. Every Legionnaire could call on the expertise of their fellows in ways no other Imperial citizen could hope to do.
He wasn’t sure that he dared tap that unfathomable resource, however. Not with her Majesty dead, and Sylban having broken his Oaths to commit the deed.
He’d not dared for fear that he’d invite disaster on her Majesty.
“Maybe…” He hesitated, “Maybe I was Legion, your Majesty. Perhaps the Legion is broken… but this remnant serves the Conwin line.”
Jinsha looked at him, smiling hesitantly.
“I don’t believe I could do much better,” She finally told him.
Eryn didn’t agree with her, but he wasn’t going to correct her just then either. If she really believed that, well it would help her through what was to come.
*****
“Decks thirteen through eighteen just reported, Captain. All clear, no signs.”
Katchkin was ready to pull his own hair out.
“Don’t tell me that the decks are clear until we have her back!”
Ok, think this through. He forced himself to calm down. They won’t just be hiding somewhere. They must have a plan.
With the Princess in hand, there were only really two possible plans that made any sense to him.
First, if they had sufficient resources, a mutiny would put them in control of the Conquest and in a powerful position to exert pressure on the Nobility.
That thought made his back itch, and Katchkin found himself looking around carefully at everyone on the bridge with him, wondering if they might be part of such a move. He hoped that their security hadn’t been blown to that degree, but if it had he suspected that they’d all have received a visit from the Legion in the middle of the night some time ago and never gotten this far at all.
That leaves the second option…
They had to be intending to get her off the ship.
The flight deck!
“Get security alerted on the flight decks!” He growled, “Lock everything down. Nothing leaves this ship until we’ve recovered her!”
*****
Chapter XXII
Imperial Battleship ISV Conquest
Flight Deck Bravo
The alarms going off were a sign that things had gotten a little tighter than Eryn would have preferred, if it were even possible to have gotten tighter than they already were, which he wasn’t certain of.
“Keep moving,” He ordered, slowing his pace to let Jinsha come up beside him, “That ship right there, dead ahead.”
“I see it,” She hissed back, her eyes darting from side to side. “The guards…”
“I’ll deal with the guards. Don’t hesitate, don’t look back, just keep moving until they come after us…”
“And then?”
“And then you keep moving, but you do it faster.”
Jinsha swallowed but nodded.
They had to cross the flight deck of the big ship and were about a third of the way at the moment, the alarms howling from all sides. At the moment there was more confusion than anything else, which gave them time to get to the Imperial IFV-77 Fighting Transport that was resting just ahead of them.
Eryn had picked it because of all the available craft in the Conquest’s inventory, it provided the most options going forward. While not a stardrive capable ship, it had the legs to go pretty much anywhere within a solar system in reasonable time and put up a fight once it got there.
It wasn’t a space superiority craft, but it could put up a reasonable accounting of itself and had supplies for four squads already on board, which would go a long way to making him feel a lot more at ease once they got free.
They were about halfway when he heard a shout behind them.
“Ignore it, keep moving,” He said without looking around.
The shout was repeated, getting more strenuous each time. He could hear boots on the metal deck, getting closer with each passing second.
“Run when I tell you to,” He said.
Jinsha just gave him a curt nod, not saying anything.
“Hey, I told you two to stop!”
Eryn felt the air shift as a hand closed down toward his shoulder from behind. It pushed his hair aside slightly and the brief puff of displaced air brushed his ear. He twisted before the hand could land, dropping into a sweep that took the security man’s feet out from under him.
As he hit the deck, Eryn dropped to his side and rolled over fast to deliver an elbow blow to the man’s sternum, drawing his auto-pistol with his off hand as he continued the roll and splayed himself out behind the curled up and gasping body, using the other man to steady his aim as he started firing back down the deck.
“Run!” He ordered, needlessly as it turned out.
Jinsha was already moving fast for the IFV-77, and not looking back from what he could tell at a glance.
He didn’t spare much time either complimenting her for doing as he’d instructed or being grateful for the same. He stayed focused on keeping the people down the deck properly distracted.
His opening barrage had sent pretty much everyone scrambling for cover, as intended, but the security forces wouldn’t be on the back foot for very long. He paused to club his impromptu gun rest and potential bullet stop back into immobility when the man started to squirm, then started crawling backwards as quickly as he could.
He only had seconds, realistically, and he needed to take every moment of those if he wanted to make it to the ship before the security got their shit together.
He heard screaming from behind him as he scrambled around and to his feet, lunging forward, barely able to stay on his feet as he ran for the ramp of the Infantry Fighting Vehicle the Princess was already clambering up.
Stray shots rang out behind him, so he kept his head down and hoped any strays or accurate fire would be absorbed by his armor rather than his skull.
The gunfire was increasing in volume when he hit the ramp and pitched forward, falling to his hands and knees as he lost his balance, but kept scrambling up and into the fighter. He could hear the hum of the vehicle powering up and saw the Princess flipping switches from the Gunner’s seat.
Pulling himself up, Eryn ran into the forward section of the IFV and dropped into the pilot’s seat.
“Didn’t know you could operate one of these,” He admitted, hand sweeping a bank of switches that happened to include the ramp controls.
Behind them, the heavy deployment ramp rumbled up to seal off the vehicle.
“I grew up guarded by the Legion,” she said, rolling her eyes. “They may not have taught me how to fly in combat, but I learned to fly on military kit long before I saw the controls of a civilian flyer.”
Makes sense, He admitted to himself. “Sorry I didn’t ask earlier.”
“I was in no shape to be flying earlier,” Jinsha admitted softly. “I probably would have hit the moon during the escape.”
Eryn snorted as he finished powering up the vehicle, ignoring the Lenz Repulsors as they weren’t in the magnetic field of a planet so there was nothing to push against. Instead he used the fusion thrust to get the IFV off the deck, which had the side benefit of sending anyone brave enough to approach scattering back for cover.
“The doors are sealed,” Jinsha said nervously, eyes darting between the controls and the big-sealed blast doors. “Can we shoot through them?”
Eryn shook his head, “We might pop a hole in them with some of the armor piercing missiles, but the hole wouldn’t be much bigger than your fist.”
“How are we getting out?”
He smiled, “I had a little time on my hands before I figured out what room you were in.”
He sent a command and immediately a wailing alarm sounded, which cause everyone outside to freeze and look around fearfully before they bolted for the atmospheric protected sections of the deck.
*****
“Flight Deck is cycling for launch protocol!”
“What!?” Katchkin roared, “How!?”
“Security was overridden, Sir.”
“Override the override then!”
The ship’s Space Controller was furiously working at the system, clearly trying to do just that. He was shaking his head as he worked, “Captain I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s as if we were locked out by a superior authority!”
“There is no superior authority on this ship,” Katchkin growled, pushing him aside and running through his own personal overrides.
Unfortunately for him, he was getting the same results… which was to say, not very much at all. The only thing he managed to get differently was that his final and highest authority override triggered a single response.
Katchkin swore as he recognized the imagery slowly rotating on his screen, a logo anyone in the Empire would be familiar with.
The Conwin Crest encircled by blades and blasters.
The Legionnaire. But that’s impossible! The entire class was built using non-Imperial computer cores. The Conwin family’s thugs should have no power on this vessel!
“Impossible…” He mumbled aloud.
“Atmosphere has cycled, Captain. The doors are opening.”
Katchkin looked up helplessly as a single transport launched itself clear from the Conquest and began accelerating away.
He took a deep breath, anger rising in him.
“All weapons! Lock onto the target and…”
Everything went dark as the power went out, only the single screen with the Legion Coat of Arms still aglow, the spinning image mocking him.
Katchkin stumbled back to his console, trying every channel only to come up empty on all of them. The deck under his feet rumbled ominously, causing everyone to look around.
“What was that?” His XO demanded.
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Katchkin said, “I need a runner!”
“Sir!” A young officer stepped from the shadows.
“Good man. Get down to the flight decks, tell the pilots to get into space,” He ordered. “I want that ship hunted down. Captured or destroyed, I do not care which.”
“Aye, aye Captain!”
Katchkin watched the officer vanish into the darkness, then he turned back to his XO.
“Now let’s find out what that blasted Legionnaire did to my ship.”
*****
IFV-77
“What just happened?” Jinsha was staring at the camera feed from the rear of the ship, noting that there were spherical balls of flame erupting from different points of the ship.
“I was bored, and they left a lot of the internal security systems wide open,” Eryn answered with a grin, reaching across to make an adjustment to the ship’s yaw controls, having found that there was a slight tendency to favor a drift to starboard in the current setup. “Arranging for higher Oxygen levels in key areas was a simple matter, after that… well, power surges are easy to manufacture when everything is computer controlled and you’ve hacked the system.”
“So, the Conquest is disabled?” She asked hopefully.
He shrugged, “For a while, at least. However, they’ll still put fighters into space after us in short order, so we’re not clear by any means.”
“Oh.”
“Speaking of,” He nodded to the rear facing scanner display where numerous IFF lights were appearing on their system. “Hang on, this is going to be rough.”
He increased thrust, redlining the fusion reactors, twisting the controls to bring the IFV around to another course. Ahead of them, a few hundred thousand kilometers away, the shimmering ring around Saturn was visible.
Most of that ring was little more than gravel, but there were some sizeable chunks ranging from a few dozen meters across to multi kilometer chunks of ice and rock that were just short of being classified as actual moons. He knew that they had no chance of outrunning Space Superiority Fighters in open space, but the IFV had a few advantages over the ships that were coming after them.
The active RADAR warning sounded softly, nothing too jarring yet, just letting him known that the area had just been painted with the routine blasts of high powered EM radiation that would allow the fighters to see just where they were.
The active lock signals would come shortly, he knew.
Then things would get… interesting.
*****
Myrmidon Squadron
Major Suiter adjusted the focus of his forward scanning array, bringing the target into tighter focus.
“Myrmidons, take this by the numbers. Captain would prefer a surrender, so Lasers are free, all other weapons locked down until I give the order,” He said firmly as he powered up the Rotating Laser Array of the Hyperion Class Space Superiority Fighter he was strapped to, designating the fleeing IFV as the target.
His squadron acknowledged the orders by the numbers, offering no commentary or the like. He’d worked hard to keep his squad from degenerating into the sloppy types that had often marked Imperial teams in the last generation or so.
“Myrmidon Three, take four and make your pass,” He ordered. “Lead and Two will provide cover. Primary target is the cooling assembly for the fusion reactors. Confirm.”
“Primary targets, Fusion cooling. Confirmed,” Lieutenant Pimez responded from Myrmidon Three. “Three and Four to take the lead.”
“Roger confirmation. Execute.”
“Roger Execute, Lead. Three moving ahead.”
Myrmidon’s Three and Four increased their relative acceleration, edging out ahead of the six-fighter squadron as they closed on the target. Suiter settled back and let his subordinates make the first run while he watched for the response from the IFV.
There was no intelligence on who was piloting that craft, but they were taking a hard track into the rings around the gas giant. That either meant they were really good, or just plain crazy. Possibly both.
Unlike most of space, including the so-called asteroid belts, the rings of Saturn were one of very few places you could actually find some serious obstacles grouped together. They were held there by the gravity of the planet, and had been added too significantly over the past few generations as mining operations actively towed in more rocks to break up for the wealth they contained within.
The big pieces would make maintaining a lock difficult, but it was the small stuff that could tear them up in an instant if they weren’t careful. It would be like flying through a sandstorm at a hundred thousand miles per second. It didn’t matter what kind of armor you had - it would be stripped away in a hurry in that kind of mess.
*****
IFV-77
Proximity alarms were screaming from all directions as Eryn twisted the IFV around, diving it along the edge of one ring. They were still in relatively ‘clean’ space, the track that had been plowed out by one of Saturn’s smaller moons. But even so the sound of gravel rattling against the hull was audible even through all the insulation.
Eryn knew they couldn’t take much of this, but he was also certain that the pursuing fighters would be able to take one hell of a lot less.
Space Superiority Fighters like those launched from the Conquest were designed for deep space combat, with heavily degraded performance even within the upper atmosphere of a planet like Earth. They had armor, certainly, but it was more intended to protect from beam weapons, radiation in general, and such things. A good missile hit would take out even a heavily armored ship in the sizes of a fighter craft, so there wasn’t much point in packing on the tonnage to defend against something that would kill a fighter dead anyway.
An IFV, however, could reasonably expect to be in the range of heavy infantry weapons while dropping off, or picking up, a ground combat team or four. A lot lighter than Ship to Ship missiles, heavy infantry weapons could still more than ruin the day of a dust-off crew if they didn’t have some armor in place to cover their ass.
Another alarm squealed, causing Eryn to roll away from a stray chunk of rock, he saw it whip past between the face of Saturn and the IFV as they narrowly avoided it and judged the rock to be twice the size of the IFV and probably ten times the tonnage or more. He fired retro thrusters as it passed, putting it between the pursuing fighters and his tail, hoping it would cost them a few seconds.
“Can we outrun them?” Jinsha asked, eyes darting between the instrumentation and the view ahead of them.
“Not a chance in hell, not in open space at least. No, we’re going to lose them in the rocks.”
She looked at him fearfully, “You’re insane.”
“Yeah,” He smiled, “I’m starting to get that feeling myself.”
*****
Myrmidon Squadron
Suiter bit back a curse as Myr-Three lost the lock, then quickly had to evade the big chunk of rock rolling sedately through space in their direction. The unknown pilot might be good, that was yet to be seen in his opinion, but there was no question about his sanity at this point.
He examined the telemetry from his squadron, glaring as he saw that everyone already had yellow lights on various systems. No one had lost anything vital yet, Hyperions were tough birds all things considered, with a lot of redundant features, but it was only a matter of time.
There wasn’t any option, though, he couldn’t let this target go. That had been made abundantly clear in his orders.
“Myrmidon Five,” He called out, “Missiles free, I want you to target the rocks ahead of the target. Spook them out so Three can smoke them.”
“Roger, Lead. Missiles Free, Bird dogging for Three.”
“Confirmed. Execute.”
“Five Executing orders.”
“Three, get ready.”
“Roger, Lead. Three ready.”
“Myrmidon Five… Angels Three.”
The first missile flashed away through space a moment later.
*****
IFV-77
Jinsha turned in surprise when a new alarm rose above the rest. It was one she’d never heard before despite all the times she’d spent being transported in similarly equipped vessels.
“Missile, Active and tracking,” Eryn said before she could ask, his hands white as he gripped the controls.
“Shouldn’t we be… dodging?”
“It’s not aimed at us,” Eryn told her, turning his head to look at the side of the craft, his eyes shimmering in the dark such that she could tell he was interfaced with the craft now and seeing through the IFVs sensors. He nodded, “There it is.”
She linked in quickly herself and looked over as well, shivering at suddenly being plunged into space, the rush of the solar wind on her skin a faint punctuation from the gritty impacts of the rocks they were flying through.
The missile was lit up and easy to spot by the enhanced scanners, however, and she frowned as it blazed on past them.
“How did they miss?”
“They didn’t. Hang on.”
A sphere of light appeared briefly in front of them, gone almost as quickly as it had been.
A new set of alarms began to sound, ones that Jinsha could feel in her bones now that she was linked into the system. New lights appeared in the black around them, coming their way from up ahead even as another missile tore past them, detonating off in the distance again.
Eryn twisted the ship through space, and she looked sharply across as a dark shadow briefly occluded the stars as they whipped on past it. The IFV was being tossed from side to side by Eryn’s maneuvering, rocks flashing past close enough for her to see the features on them without even accessing the magnification systems.
“Hang on, they’re trying to flush us out to get a clean shot!” Eryn said, “I’m taking us in deeper!”
*****
Myrmidon Squadron
Suiter swore as he watched the IFV head deeper into the debris field, the Electronic Warfare signal breaking up as the metal rich gravel deteriorated their scanners.
“Myrmidons, we’re following him in. Weapons free,” He ordered, “No more games, just take them out.”
Alive was preferred but escaped was unacceptable.
Suiter lit off his weapons as he guided his craft in, increasing relative acceleration, the rest of the squadron following suit.
They still had a decent signal lock on the target, and he would be damned if he let this one slip away this easily. He got a solid tonal lock, flipping the security cover off the missile release controls.
“Myrmidon Lead, Angels Three.”
The rush of the missile launching could be felt and heard briefly before it left contact with the fighter, then there was nothing but a rapidly fading point of light vanishing into the black.
*****
Chapter XXIII
IFV-77
Within the augmented sensory environment of the transport, Eryn could feel all the sand and grit as well as the larger rocks as they collided with the fast-moving craft. That rasping sensation had done away with the gentle feel of the cosmic wind, leaving him feeling raw and bloody as he guided the transport through the ring of debris.
Peppered in among the gravel were the ship killers, though, the rocks that would end their flight just as fast as a missile could, and with the sheer level of interference they were dealing with, he was stuck flying primarily by sight, and even with magnification and software assisted pattern recognition, that was a lot more dangerous than he ever wanted to be flying.
A wash of heat roared over his skin, an audible roar coming through the system, but he knew that was just an audio conversion from the light of the explosion. The missile had been close, but not close enough to do real damage. The ring debris had torn it up, prematurely detonating it well before it could reach them.
Seems like the gloves are off then.
He dropped the ship below the ring, dropping out of the worst of the grit, and pushed his acceleration as best he could while the debris field was between them and pursuing fighters.
Tracking signals were an itch he couldn’t quite scratch, biting incessantly between his shoulder blades, a reminder that he had a literal target on his back.
He knew instantly when the pursing craft cleared the ring, as those signals snapped into clarity and the itch between his shoulder blades became a biting one, urgently letting him know that active targeting had locked him up.
From the power of the signals, he knew that the fighters were now within a few thousand kilometers. Knife range for lasers, except that with the sheer level of grit and debris they were flying through, no laser would do much more than warm the hull. They were literally doing thousands of times more damage just from the grit than even the ship mounted beams on the Conquest would be able to do in this environment.
That was why the fighters were doggedly closing the distance, getting close enough to use guns or missiles with accuracy.
It was also why he was just as doggedly forcing them to fly through the storm of debris that was Saturn’s rings in turn.
Just a little longer, they can’t keep this up for long.
*****
Myrmidon Squadron
We can’t keep this up for long, Suiter gritted out, trying to get an active lock but fighting the constant interference and worse that his fighter was dealing with.
He had warning lights across his entire board now. Almost no green systems remained, and more and more of the yellow lights were flickering to red as he pushed his fighter to get closer.
The IFV ahead was likely in better condition, but he doubted it was all that much so. Even with its heavier armor and slower general speed, it had to be getting chewed up by this insane flying.
They couldn’t maintain the same speed the IFV did as it passed through the debris, having to slow massively to both avoid large rocks and the lessen the damage they took from impacts of smaller bits of the grit they were flying through, and the pilot of the IFV was making full use of that.
As he dropped through the debris field, into the open space beyond, Suiter pushed the throttle forward again to make up for lost range. The IFV was clearly redlining the reactors, judging from the relative acceleration he was seeing, and had opened the range again, obliterating the initial gains they’d managed.
This isn’t working. He’ll outlast us if we keep this up.
“Myrmidon Three and four, stay on target. Five, Six, split formation and flank the targets. Keep him penned in.” He ordered. “Two, you’re with me.”
He barely noted his squadron acknowledging the orders as he redlined his own reactors, bringing his fighter farther away from the debris field, out into the section of space that had been swept clean by one of Saturn’s moons.
If he couldn’t catch him, well that was fine. It was time to stop playing the enemy’s game.
*****
IFV-77
Another missile had warning screaming at them, and Eryn ducked them deeper into the debris field, and the thickening grit chewed up the missile in short order, detonating it hundreds of klicks from its target. Using the rings of Saturn as a de facto chaff dispenser was rather amusing to him, if he were honest about it, but he knew that there were fundamental limits to what he could get out of such a tactic.
“What are they doing?”
Eryn blinked and quickly turned his focus to where Jinsha was looking and let out a curse.
Looks like they don’t want to play by the rules anymore. Damn it.
A pair of the fighters were accelerating hard through open space, skipping ahead of the IFV’s course. He didn’t have to check on the others to know what they were doing, but he did anyway.
There they are - two flankers while the other two keep up the pressure.
Strictly speaking, they didn’t have enough numbers to properly pull off the maneuver they were implementing, but the tactical situation made the difference minimal because he didn’t have any true safe areas he could retreat to.
If he tried to run, Eryn knew that they’d hunt him down, no matter where he went.
With his primary tactic now being supplanted by the counter, he again found himself backed into a corner with only one real option left to him.
It made him feel like a failure every single time that happened.
A man who found himself with only a single course of action was a man who planned his path… poorly.
Eryn gritted his teeth, “They’re forcing a fight.”
*****
Myrmidon Lead
“This should be far enough,” Suiter said, twisting his fighter around as he countered his acceleration enough to slow but not stop his vector.
The target transport would catch up to him in short order, but he wanted to keep enough Delta-V to evade incoming fire. Sitting still was asking to be shot, after all.
Myrmidon Two fell in behind him, matching course relative to him along his port side.
The debris was interfering with their Electronic Warfare systems, making their entire screens just a mess of chaotic signal returns, but they could still pick out some of the telltale signals. It was hard to hide the power signature of a fusion plant, even with heavy radiation shielding, to say little of the powerful electronic warfare systems that every ship in this little game were bringing into play.
Individual IFF signals were lost, however, there was just not enough signal clarity to isolate those with all the debris and interference.
That wasn’t much of a problem when there was only one enemy ship, though, and his team were paired up.
He and his wingman just needed to wait for the other Myrmidons to flush the prey out where he was waiting.
“Weapons free,” He ordered, “When you get a lock… open fire.”
“Roger, Lead. Weapons Free, Fire upon lock.”
Suiter slowly closed his HUD overlay down over his eyes, gaining an augmented view of the coming battlefield. The enemy pilot would have to come from a known vector, either that or be forced to fight his way through another of the Myrmidons. Either way, he would be able to see it happen just by following the Neutron signatures of the drive reactors.
There were, of course, five such signatures bobbing through the field on rapid approach as he prepared himself.
He flinched as the neat signatures suddenly exploded into a mess, neutron radiation appearing from multiple other sources.
Damn. He launched decoys. Desperate.
In normal circumstances it would be a smart move, but the pilot was grasping at straws given the situation. Without support, or even a place he could realistically run off too, the most he could hope for was a delay of the inevitable.
Suiter wasn’t intending to give him even that much.
“Clear safeties. Don’t worry about wasting munitions on decoys. If you see it, destroy it, move on to the next. He’s going to try to flood us with decoys, makes us hesitate so he can slip thought. Don’t.”
“Roger, Lead,” His wingman responded. “Safeties cleared. Auto-targeting enabled.”
It won’t be long now, Suiter thought. Here he comes…
The interference rapidly cleared, abruptly vanishing as the targets came through the debris. He wasn’t worried about wasting munitions. If he got a couple decoys, he was fine with that.
“Myrmidon Lead, Angels Three.”
Missiles lanced out from his Hyperion, snaking through space as they accelerated at hundreds of gravities.
The missiles were hot and on track, their telemetry running green as he prepared his next salvo.
Suiter was startled out of his train of thought as a series of emergency squeals suddenly tore through the cockpit of his Hyperion. He jerked his head up, eyes quickly scanning the augmented HUD, yet nearly missed the cause because it was so unexpected, he nearly refused to believe what his system was telling him.
Myrmidons’ Three and Four were squealing alerts, having come under sudden fire. At first, he thought that the transport had turned on them, and then he realized that his own missiles had locked onto them in the confusion of the limited scan quality due to interference from the debris.
Suiter tried to kill the missiles, but between his own delay and the limited speed of a radio signal, he was too late by far.
The first detonated short of Myrmidon Three, but the directed cone of destruction continued on to tear into the lightly armored fighter’s already damaged systems. Three immediately reported catastrophic system failures and was forced to pull out of the debris ring or be destroyed in moments.
Four was less fortunate.
Myrmidon Four was caught in a crossfire between Suiter’s missiles and those of Myrmidon Two, the tellatales on the fighter immediately going red across the board before abruptly vanishing from the squadron’s network.
Shit.
“Check Fire, Check Fire! Allies in the line!”
This was not going to look good in the reports.
*****
IFV-77
Eryn reached across Jinsha to flip a pair of switches, redirecting power to the drives again as the fighting transport rumbled and dropped from behind the twisting rock that was only marginally larger than it was.
Fires were burning in vacuum, visible from where they were, but Eryn ignored it as he put the power to the drives and made the fighting transport’s weapons live with a flip of his thumb.
Mentally he scratched off two of the fighters, he hoped the pilots were alive, but either way they were out of the fight and no longer a threat to his charge.
He hated what he was doing, but just didn’t see any other way… and that, he hated more than anything else.
Two fighters were cleanly showing on his augmented display, with less form tracking on the other two available due to the interference from the metal rich debris field.
“Princess, I don’t suppose anyone taught you how to gun one of these things while they were ferrying you around?” He asked lightly as he could.
She shot him an incredulous look, “No, that never came up.”
“Pity,” He said, “because I’m going to need you to take up the gunner’s controls.”
Jinsha looked at him as thought he was insane, and Eryn didn’t really blame her, but at this point there wasn’t a lot of choices to pick from.
“I’ll talk you through it,” He said. “Just reach up and clear the controls, I’ve unlocked them in the software. The big switch under the red cap. Flip it up and put the switch into the up position.”
She did so as he haloed the two clear fighters in his augmented vision, and he noticed the gunners position come alive in his peripheral vision.
“Find your targets,” He said, “Look around, see the haloed targets?”
She nodded jerkily, which he barely saw out of the corner of his eye.
“Speak to me,” He told her, “I won’t always be able to see you.”
“Yes,” She said, “Yes I see them.”
“Good. You have control of the guided munitions,” He told her, “I’ve unlocked all weapons on board, so glance down at the munitions list. You should see it in your view.”
“I… yes, I see it.”
Eryn hit the power, pushing them forward into the fight that the enemy had forced on them.
“Highlight the AS-90 Amarilla’s,” He told her. “Then wait for the solid tone.”
“What? Tone?”
“The beeping will steady out, it’ll become a single tone. That means you can fire.”
“Oh.” She swallowed, listening to the beep as the ship was manually turned around by Eryn’s hand at the controls.
Eryn was working the craft around to get a better signal for the computer to lock onto, a job that would have been easier with an experienced gunner, but needs must he supposed. He could hear the beep steady out, becoming a flat tone as the computer had a positive lock.
“Ok, the firing trigger is on the control in front of you,” He said, “Reach out, grip the control, and pull the trigger.”
Her hand was halfway to the control when Jinsha froze, her hand shaking slightly.
“Jinsha!” he snapped, “You can breakdown later, and I will not blame you, but I need you here, now! Squeeze that trigger.”
He could have taken control, fired the missiles for her, and part of him wanted to do just that… but he needed her, one man just couldn’t keep up with the needs of a ship like the IFV in a fight, he needed her eyes and her mind in the moment. Both of their lives depended on it.
Her hand moved forward sharply, wrapping around the control. There was another brief hesitation, but only one of a split second, before she curled her finger around the trigger and pulled it tight.
The transport shook slightly as the missiles detached, their thrust hammering off the hull briefly before they vanished into the black beyond the fighting transport.
Eryn forgot them as soon as they left. Either they’d hit or they wouldn’t, it wasn’t in his hands any longer, and he was focused on the next step.
The IFV had a decent complement of weapons, but most of them were air to ground rather than space to space. In general, it was assumed that if you were tangling with air or space superiority fighters in an IFV, you’d done something very, very wrong.
That was a point he couldn’t really argue with, but it didn’t help him much at the moment.
Aside from a small complement of the Amarilla’s, almost everything else they had was intended for clearing an LZ or supporting a squadron deployment. Against space superiority fighters, an IFV was considered a nice, fat, sitting duck waiting to be dropped from the screens.
That, however, could play in their favor, if he was careful, smart… and lucky.
*****
Myrmidon Lead
Suiter cursed as he worked the throttle, pushing the fighter back to full relative acceleration even as the computer started screaming alerts, more missiles suddenly showing up across their range.
The decoys were still screaming, preventing his fighter’s systems from locking onto the source clearly, so he wasn’t going to be waiting around to find out either.
He was pushed back into the seat, the fighter he was strapped to responding quickly to his demands. He knew now that the enemy wasn’t trying to slip through like he’d thought, like any sane person might. No, this one was a fighter.
Suicidal bastard.
“Myrmidon Two, break to port, split his focus. We’re going to have to take this guy, and fast.”
“Roger that, Lead.”
Suiter pivoted to starboard, accelerating out into the open space along the ring they were skirting. The delineation was cleaner than might be expected, but on human scales it was still a gradient and he could feel the grit chewing up his fighter.
He rolled his fighter, putting the heavier belly armor down to the thicker part of the ring while exposing his active LIDAR to the arc he’d picked for himself. LIDAR was less susceptible to metallic interference, but the dust did a bad enough job on it to make the signal just as worthless as the RADAR.
Lasers were just as crippled in the mess he was flying through, which left guns and missiles.
Missiles like the ones that were tracking hot and clear in his direction even as his fighter hit its maximum acceleration. Suiter waited, watching the weapons close on his position, then thumbed the firing switch on his countermeasures. Squealers and decoys launched, flying away from his position on diverging paths, befuddling, and leading the missile away from him.
The first missile took the bait, arcing off after the squealer, but the second kept on coming. Suiter cursed, expecting that the natural interference was reducing the effectiveness of the decoys as much as it was everything else. He twisted the controls, rolling away from the inbound missile, and hit the Lenz Repulsors.
Suiter was slammed down into the seat, the fighter abruptly jumping away from Saturn’s magnetosphere.
The missile tore on past, starting to arc around to reacquire his fighter, but was in turn torn apart by the grit and debris before it could complete the turn.
“Alright you bastard, my turn.”
Before he could burn the bastard out of the sky, however, Suiter needed to find him. The signal was still occluded by the debris and the decoys, but the vector on those missiles narrowed it down neatly. His computer wasn’t as quick to do that as he was, but some things the human brain still couldn’t be beat on.
Suiter rotated the nose of his Hyperion into the cone the missiles had come from, swinging the fighter around in an accelerating arc.
“Lead, Two.” First Lieutenant LaRoche said, “Viper, Viper, Viper!”
“Roger Viper, Two. Evade!”
That was a pointless command to give, since Suiter was well aware that LaRoche was already evading, but it was by the book, so he said it anyway.
The Viper call was standard code for an active missile lock, which meant that the target had put a significant salvo out into space in that previous attack.
He could see Myrmidon Two launching drones and decoys, luring the missiles off target, and put them out of his mind as he focused on the target.
Where are you hiding, you little worm?
*****
IFV-77
Eryn twisted the infantry transport through the drifting gravel, moving in and out of the cover of larger pieces of the ring.
“I can’t see them anymore,” Jinsha said, looking around the augmented display nervously.
“And they can’t see us,” Eryn said, before nodding a bit behind them and below relative to the transport’s orientation, “Besides, two of them over there…”
The Eryn turned and looked off ahead of them and to port, with a bit of elevation, “And the other two are that way.”
“You can see them?”
“No,” He shook his head, “I just know. You have eight more Amarillos, so wait for tone, and fire. Don’t hesitate.”
Jinsha nodded nervously, “I won’t.”
Eryn hoped she wasn’t wrong. He was working the controls quickly now, knowing that they were on a clock. More than one, in fact. Time was against them in so many ways by this point that he was honestly losing count.
Most immediately, however, was that the Neutron radiators he had launched to spoof the fighters’ tracking systems only held a few minutes worth of power. Once those went out, then he and the Princess would be sitting ducks.
“Contact coming up to starboard,” He said, “Get ready.”
Jinsha nodded, her jaw setting as she turned to her right, eyes already scanning the augmented display that allowed her to look out as though right through the hull of the fighting transport. It only took a few seconds and she spotted it, right where Eryn had told her it would be.
The fighter’s signal was weak but clear enough for the computer to initiate a base tracking lock. She doubled down on that, instructing the system to halo the target, which started the computer building an active lock.
It felt agonizingly slow, waiting for the set of tones to speed up, until they coalesced into a steady tone. Jinsha curled her finger around the trigger and felt it click as she triggered the missile release. She felt the rush of the missiles’ engines pushing against the transport as they left.
“New contact,” Eryn said, “Port side, turning into it now.”
She turned, eyes finding the target quickly, watching it sweep into range as Eryn turned the transport about. She waited, feeling the eternity pass until she heard the tone, then squeezed the trigger again.
“Good shot.” Eryn said, rolling the transport around, keeping an eye on the signals he was getting through the debris interference.
The first missile from earlier had gone wide, the pilot must have triggered his Lenz system to jump as clean and far as he had. Good maneuver, but limited and predictable.
The second, however, had flown true despite the best efforts of the pilot of the other fighter. Eryn wasn’t sure if it was a killing shot, he hoped not, but it was out of commission for certain.
Five or six left to go.
*****
Myrmidon Lead
“That’s it!” Suiter swore as he watched the telemetry from Myrmidon Two go dead. “Stop playing with this bastard! Move in, all flanks, no more screwing around!”
He’d straight up lost two Hyperions to a damned Infantry Mover.
If they didn’t take that bastard down now, he’d never live down this bullshit.
Suiter guided his fighter in closer, the others in the squadron following his lead. They had good vectors on the missiles now, so while the jamming was still active, they knew were the bastard was hiding.
It was only a matter of time.
*****
IFV-77
“We’re running out of missiles,” Jinsha said, eyes flicking to the red numbers that were blinking within her vision. “I can change to one of the others…”
“No, those are for air to ground clearance,” Eryn said, “They won’t lock on to fighters. They’re too fast, even if they would.”
He reached across her, making a quick adjustment, then settled back into his seat.
“Hold on tight,” He told her, “They’re coming in.”
Eryn twisted and rolled the fighting transport around a larger rock, matching its rotation and keeping it between them and the closest of the fighters. There he held position, feeling a tension building in his spine as the decoy’s Neutron interference began to fade and the signals of the approaching fighters got closer.
Timing was everything in life, it was something he learned… from Sylban, of course. A lesson that Eryn still believed in, though he no longer could believe in the teacher. Right then, he was waiting for the moment through all the tension screaming at him to act precipitously.
When the moment came, it felt like he was ready to break in two from the strain.
Thrusters screamed as Eryn redlined the reactor, flipping the fighting transport under the rolling rock and coming up at the underbelly of the closest fighter as it crossed over into knife range.
The ring debris would still attenuate lasers, even at close range, but against the heavy auto-cannon gimbal mounted in the nose of the IFV they barely even slowed it. The gun made a sound like a beehive from hell, shaking the interior of the IFV like they were being rattled about by the hand of an angry giant.
Eryn didn’t wait to see if he hit, he was already rolling the IFV back around the rock, bringing the gun to bear on the next target.
The enemy had forced a fight, one that he hadn’t wanted.
Well, now they got to reap what they had sown.
*****
Myrmidon Lead
They’d just flown into a buzz saw.
There was nothing else to describe it, Suiter decided, as he watched telemetry feeds vanish from his HUD.
He managed to slip aside as a burst from the IFV’s auto-cannon nearly took him out too, ducking his fighter behind the cover of a larger chunk of rock, taking a little tip from the enemy’s book.
He winced as another telemetry feed died but focused on closing the distance while the IFV was looking the other way.
You’re going to die here, you bastard. Screw taking you back alive. I wouldn’t if I could.
His squadron was mincemeat, turned into scattering debris by whoever the hell was flying that damned infantry hauler, but Suiter had edged close enough now and he was keeping the rock the IFV was using between them.
It had played a roll in surprising the Myrmidons. Now it was time that it played to surprise the bastard.
Turnabout was fair play, after all.
Not that he cared about fair play.
Suiter’s finger tightened around the trigger of his own autocannon as he prepared to come around the rock and pay his respects to the bastard.
His Hyperion swung in low on the rock, coming around fast to bring the guns to bear, and he tightened his finger to unleash hell.
Hell was particularly eager, it appeared.
*****
IFV-77
“There’s one left, I don’t see him!” Eryn said, twisting around to look in all directions he could.
Jinsha was also looking around but didn’t say anything as she had nothing to add.
The last few moments of the fight had passed so quickly that she could hardly believe it. She’d fired her last missiles amid the shaking of the gun firing, and maybe she’d hit one or two, maybe not. It was hard to tell in the mix of things.
Eryn was twisting the IFV about, looking for the last fighter as the remaining debris.
He looked up as the computer illuminated the new target as it appeared from behind the rock they’d been using to cover and hide behind. His blood chilled in his veins as he realized that he wouldn’t be able to bring his gun around to bear nearly fast enough as the Space Superiority Fighter had them cold.
He was still twisting the stick, trying to make the impossible happen, as time stretched out for him.
Eryn could almost imagine that he could see the face of the pilot in the fighter as he squeezed the firing controls.
Then the IFV shook around him, startling him as he reflexively started damage control checks, only there was nothing wrong. Then the rock they’d been using as cover exploded, the spherical blast enveloping the fighter in energy and kinetic force. When it all cleared, Eryn realized that they were floating alone in the rings of Saturn.
He slowly looked over to Jinsha, confused.
“What?” She asked, “You said the other weapons wouldn’t target the fighters. You were right. They targeted the rock, though.”
He opened his mouth, trying to think of something he might say, but honestly not a single word came to mind.
Finally, Eryn reached forward and clicked from the tactical system to the navigation HUD.
“Let’s go,” He said softly.
A few moments later, the IFV’s reactors flared silently. Bathed in the light of the gas giant, above the shimmering ring of dust, gravel, and debris, they powered up and accelerated out into the black.
*****
Epilogue
Rubber Duck, Crossing Orbit of Neptune, Outbound
The transport was not one of the biggest bulk carriers in space, certainly not in the colonies, but a five-kilometer-long train of cargo holds was nothing to scoff at in any sector. In Terran space that meant even more.
For Jan, he was just happy to be leaving Terra behind. He doubted that he’d be coming back anytime soon. There would be other lines he could run, better ways to earn a living than dealing with prickly Terrans.
The signal that lit up his board set off a mixed set of feelings in him, some relief, some dread.
“God damn, I did not think he’d make it,” The freighter Captain said with some significant disbelief.
Still he made a deal, and since he’d somehow gotten clearance to leave as promised, he would live up to his end. Jan sent a beep code response and opened up one of his empty cargo pods.
Cameras showed a military craft, one that looked worse for wear, ease out of the black around them and slowly slip into the pod. Jan closed the pod with them inside and switched to internal cameras to make sure that the craft was properly locked down by the automated systems.
He triple-checked the course, making sure the computer was adjusting for the new mass, then got up and started aft, only pausing to grab a gun belt on his way past. He buckled it on as he walked, heading for the spinal corridor that ran down the length of the ship to… welcome his passengers.
They were three klicks back, so getting there took him long enough that the pair had already cycled through the airlock into the spine of the Duck by the time he got there.
They were young, he realized again as he saw him. Younger than he thought, perhaps, and he’d believed them plenty young indeed. It might be that they looked relaxed, or closer to it than before, however.
“You made it,” He said to the young man. “I really didn’t expect you to.”
“It was close,” The man, Eryn he remembered, said, “Thanks for holding up your end.”
“We had a deal,” Jan said. “Don’t know how you managed it, but the Duck was in the clear just hours after you left Col. Just like you said.”
“I had some… private time with the Imperium’s computers on the Conquest,” Eryn said. “Where are you heading?”
“We’ll be jumping out of Terra in a few hours,” Jan said. “First destination is in the Cluster, that work for you?”
Eryn nodded slowly, “Yeah. That works. Can you get us to Sparta?”
“That’s a little out of the way, but sure.”
Eryn nodded, slumping as thought exhausted, which Jan expected he likely was.
The girl smiled, a little weakly. She looked tired too, but it was a nice smile.
“Yes, thank you,” She said. “For everything.”
Jan just shrugged, “Think nothing of it. Not like I want to come back to Terra anytime soon anyway. Come on, I’ll show you to some rooms, get you to some bunks. No offense, but you both look like shit.”
The girl had a flash of something, probably irritation he expected, but Eryn just chuckled.
“I expect we do. Bunks sound… wonderful, thank you.”
*****
ISV Vanquish
Deep Space, Near Liran’s Star
Sylban stood in the center of the Admiralty deck, looking out at the expanse beyond the confines of the ship.
The lights of the other six ships in the Class were visible, along with those of the Collier vessels waiting to supply them after the operation, and those of the escorts. Dozens of destroyers, cruisers, and various other support ships were all there on standby as they should be.
Behind them, out of sight, were the troop transports.
Ten million soldiers, all waiting for the payback that had been generations in coming.
Sylban wondered if the Colonies knew what was coming their way.
He doubted it, really.
If they did know, the Orions or the Republic would have done something about it a long time ago.
No, they all thought of Terra as the shithole of the Galaxy.
They weren’t even wrong, if he were being honest about it. Sylban knew that the world had seen better years, better decades, better centuries. Even better millenia.
But that was what made Terra so dangerous.
Twelve billion people, twelve billion angry people, lived on Terra. Holy Terra. The entire Orion Alliance only had around Eight hundred million.
And those fools taunt us every chance they get.
“Sir.”
Sylban looked up, nodding to the aide who was approaching. “Yes?”
“Everyone reports ready, Sir.”
Sylban walked over to the overlook where he could watch the operations deck, everyone preparing below made for a picture of organized chaos. He caught the eye of the Captain, who looked irritated at the distraction but paused long enough to nod in his direction.
Sylban nodded pointedly back.
The Captain turned around instantly and visibly began barking orders. In moments the ship’s alarms were sounding, General Quarters beating the ship to order.
So, it begins. This sleeper is waking, and a great many people are going to wish it had stayed slumbering.
*****
Rubber Duck
Eryn sat alone in the small compartment the Captain of the Rubber Duck had afforded him. He’d just finished dressing his injuries and found himself looking at the stims and painkillers that had been keeping him going for the past few days. He could feel the shakes starting, and it was tempting… so very tempting… to take another dose.
That path, well that led to bad places, however.
He slumped over his knees, bowing his head wearily.
Too much had gone on, he didn’t know how to process it all.
His life, his plans… everything was in shambles. Until this moment, he’d had no time to think, no time to consider all that entailed.
Now, he couldn’t think of anything else.
He threw himself back into the narrow cot, sweat already sheening on his bare chest as his hands shook and he felt the headache of withdrawal starting up at his temples.
Why did you do this, Sylban? Why destroy everything you claimed to stand for?
Sylban had never been a warm mentor, he was cold emotionally, but he had always been fair. Hard, yes, harsh even by times, but always with purpose. Always showing that he had cause behind his actions.
What cause could push a man like him, though, what cause could make him violate his most sacred oaths?
Eryn had never felt so alone in his life.
He was never supposed to be alone again. A Legionnaire was never alone, not even if they were the only living thing for a billion miles.
Something Eryn remembered saying came back to him then, and a cold chill that had nothing to do with the withdrawal stabbed through him.
I was Legion… once, and young.
END