Chapter 3

Fleet General Sutar sat in the lead cruiser, staring at the viewscreen and the data contained on it. Goddammit, she had to find the fugitive, Karok, who was now disgraced. She peered at the schematics of the surrounding star systems with a sharp eye. No heat signature existed that told of a cloaked ship. There was nothing of him being on that godforsaken moon. Since she had downloaded his personal life signature and uploaded it to the computers of all twenty cruisers, they were reporting back with the same information. Checking the Pyrian homeworld had netted them nothing either. Goddess curse it, she wasn't going to have this renegade running around, causing more trouble and leaving more death in his wake. At the moment she was going to command the other cruisers to patrol in Formation Beta to take another circuit around the neighboring systems, her alarm chime pinged and Queen Vandai's personal magnopictoform, two swords converging with two energy fields, flashed on the screen. Queen Vandai was there, but hunched over, her golden scales turning that unhealthy bronzish hue.

Quick, Vandai," said Sutar without even taking a moment to find out everything first, as she knew there must be something terrible afoot. Vandai herself seemed paralyzed, with an expression of utmost fear on her face. "Oh hell, Vandai, what are you seeing?" asked Sutar. Someone was there, most likely Voloda, doing a quick mindmorph and taking readings. Voloda said quickly, "Queen Vandai's nestsister, Kerisha! In that black cave on that godforsaken moon, Koroku."

No. She wouldn't let it happen this way again. Voloda, for God Sake get the antidote you're working on what stage is it in?"

"the final stages, not ready for release." said Voloda, pulling away from her Majesty and looking at the com unit.

"Then for Goddess Sake, go and get it. There's no fucking time. I apologize for showing what you might fear to be disrespect but if you care about your Royal Highness's person, give your feet wings and go get it and inject her. The Sutar must take the royal fleet down to that moon and rescue her nestsister."

Voloda vacillated. "But... it's not ready."

"Now, Voloda!" Sutar barked in the most definite of tones, "Or Queen Vandai will terminate. If the Sutar guesses right, she has been given the Scourge. Do it!"

Voloda ran out of that room like her ass was on fire and War Commander Vorak was on her heels. She came back with the vial. She injected it into her Majesty who turned pale with the shock of the effects of the substance being injected into her. "Now I must go. Stay with her and the Sutar must rescue her nestsister. Give me a report when I get back...no, if I get back, but private com it."

the comm unit clicked off, and Sutar told the fleet to jump to the galactic coordinates of the moon.

"Now cloak! That's the best we can do, and hide behind that comet before we are found out. I must beacon now."

Sutar quickly evaluated her most important weapons and decided her plan of action even faster. She beaconed to that planet, feeling scared for the queen's nestsister, Kerisha Golden Designation. She took the same path Anara had taken all those moons ago, head butted War Commander Vorak in the stomach before he was going to stick some kind of wicked-looking three-bladed knife into Kerisha, and with a strength she didn't know she had, bodily hauled her out of the cave, Vorak hot on her heels. She entered a few commands into her translator and they were out. She told the head cruiser to head to Pyrian homeworld ASAP and it did as she ordered, as it always did. Thank the Goddess! Sutar whispered prayerfully as she finally hit the override switch and gently landed it on Pyrian homeworld for the time being. Still carrying Kerisha, she barreled into the queen's chambers, seeing the queen alert and being attended to by her maidens in waiting.

"Oh my Goddess! You have her! Sutar, you are a marvel! How did you do it!" Queen Vandai asked wonderingly and a little breathlessly too.

"Well, there is something to be said for placing beacons well," said Sutar, not knowing what to say when Queeny bestowed such a compliment. "But the Sutar placed a beacon on that moon the last time she was imprisoned there, and I can get there really really fast. The Sutar wanted to flame Vorak, for many reasons, but the Sutar knew her first priority was ensuring your nestsister's safety. Now how is your status, Queen Vandai?"

"I'm fine now," said the Pyrian queen, "but what happened? I was in soul-splitting agony, and it was just...gone."

"The Sutar had to order Anara's nestsister to go against her inclinations," said Sutar. "The Sutar went on a hunch that the vial of antidote for The Scourge was ready and other vials could be made when and if necessary. And thank the Goddess you're safe, and so is your nestsister."

"this is a goodness," The queen said, "I have a mind of making you an honorary member of my cabinet."

"No," said Sutar solemnly, "The Sutar gets there on her own merits."

"But you have," said Queen Vandai, "You have indeed."

"But the Karok disgrace is still loose, and the Sutar will find him," Sutar said, making Queenie's nestsister comfortable quickly and running out the door. She didn't need Queen Vandai's quick thanks to know that she was more than jubilant.

"I have the criminal!" said Tolar Red Designation as he dragged the worthless piece of vile to the Department for Punishment of Wrongdoers. Hurriedly, dragging Karok to a cell, he slammed him into the cell, keying it to his own signature as it was proper and setting a code. "the filthy disgrace to the Queen and Anara and Buron, rest their souls, will not be able to escape now."

Tolar was good at making very long codes that his charges would never begin to guess, but he remembered them. Sutar knew it would be a cold day in the pits of Hell before any of them would be able to vacate their cells until a trial was set, and it would be set. Even if Anara wasn't here to provide her own azure fire to negate any of Karok's lies, the results of the mindmorph ritual and another one shown to the Council of Witnesses would be sure to verify his guilt. But Sutar would move for a trial in the next revolution, so that this sorry bastard would die the slowest death to be devised.