Chapter 28: Enraged Wolf
"Well, you were definitely right about the wife thing," Ptilol said, walking alongside Cronus down the right-hand side of the large open hangar, hands down at her sides. "We've heard way too many whispers out of the palace for it to be false. She moved out."
"I suppose that implies that Endymion was somehow doing all of this without her knowledge until recently," Cronus mused, putting his hands into the pockets of his coat, voice not carrying more than a few paces thanks to the large symphony of buzzing and whirring coming from the various workstations inside the hangar. Various modest-sized ships were being modified, examined, and pieced together by a couple dozen engineers. Orange sparks scattered up into the air consistently from various welders, giving the room a sense of danger even as it was all quite safe and controlled. "He's quite brilliant to pull that off as long as he did."
"Just putting it out there, sir, it occurs to me that if his wife is the thing keeping him from re-entering the business, then maybe our aim should be to get the wife out of the way," Ptilol said over a noisy drill.
"Are you under the impression that having a Princess killed would be any easier than having a Prince killed?" Cronus asked.
"It'd probably be a little easier," Ptilol mused. "Look, I'm just spitballing. I'm not saying it's a good idea. But, it has to be said, we're running out of time. We're not too far away from needing to consider some desperate, less-than-optimal solutions."
"I'm aware," Cronus stated. "I'm considering methods by which we could expedite things. But violence and threats are not options we should be considering right now."
"Have you heard any buzz from the agency about the raw product?" Ptilol asked. "If they suddenly came into possession of a large quantity of raw imperium of that purity level, we'd hear about it, right?"
"As near as I can tell, the agency is halfway to considering the 'Tuxedo Mask' situation a cold case," Cronus replied. "From their perspective, he's disappeared, along with his product."
"I just think we should find a way to be proactive," Ptilol said. "Sitting around, hoping that His Royalness gets his head on straight in time, leaving things completely to fate, I don't like it. You've spent the last decade amassing money and power specifically so you would be able to dictate the actions of other people when you needed to."
"This is a special circumstance," Cronus said dismissively. "Over ninety-nine percent of the galaxy, they'd already be working in my laboratory, one way or another. A Prince requires a more delicate approach."
"We're less than a cycle away from having a galaxy-wide, massive network of sellers and nothing for them to sell," Ptilol said. "Delicate is about to get very, very expensive."
The two of them moved towards the back corner of the large warehouse, towards an area cordoned off by a massive blue tarp that cascaded down from the ceiling to the floor. "Believe me, I'm feeling the urgency of the situation too. But there's no magic pill solution. Now, let me focus on this for a moment."
Ptilol reached forward and pulled a separation in the tarp to the side, allowing her boss to enter a closed-off area. In the corner of the warehouse, an orb-shaped silver spaceship was mounted up on a docking port, the top hatch wide open. An abrasive whirring sound was coming from inside the ship.
Cronus walked up to the ship and knocked his knuckles on it a few time. "Viluy! How are things?!"
The whirring continued and there was no indication that she had heard Cronus. After a moment, Ptilol went over to a long steel table right next to the ship, grabbing a metal wrench from it and tossing it up into the air towards the open hatch door. It arced through the air, flying into the ship.
"Ow!"
The whirring stopped, and an irritated Viluy poked her head out of the ship's interior a moment later.
"I'm working with delicate things in here!" she snapped, glaring over at Ptilol. "You could have broken something!"
"Well, I'm sure you could have fixed it," Ptilol said dismissively.
"Did she break anything?" Cronus asked. "And is there anything in there that would have been a big loss had she broken it?"
Viluy rubbed the top of her head. "It's close. The precision on the autopilot still isn't good enough, but it's very close."
"Well, it's more important to be precise than to be quick on this one," Cronus said. "As much time as you need, you have it. If this ship ends up just jumping right into the surface of Pandora or pulling out of the jump before getting past the shield, we'll have effectively set two billion creds on fire."
"Two billion creds that we can't spare," Ptilol added.
"Everything'll be perfect, I think I could have it ready in ten days," Ptilol said, ducking her head back down into the ship. "As long as no more wrenches get thrown in here by rubes with no regard or respect for the artistry of what I'm doing in here!"
Cronus glanced over at Ptilol out of the corner of his eyes. "And the payload?"
"More than enough to accomplish our goals," Viluy yelled. "Check the rockets over on the floor behind the ship if you want to see for yourself, they're safe to handle."
"I was hoping to do just that, actually," Cronus said, shoes clicking on the concrete floor as he maneuvered around the ship, Ptilol hot on his heels.
"
"Okay, here it is," Jadeite began, leaning back on the plush couch and resting his right ankle on his left knee, looking over to his left at Nephrite. "A farmer is standing on the edge of a river that he has to cross to get home. The farmer has three things with him, a fox, a rabbit, and a head of cabbage, and he has to get all three of these things home. He has a boat that he can use to cross the river, but the boat can only carry the farmer and one thing at a time. If he leaves the fox and the rabbit alone on one of the sides of the river, the fox will eat the rabbit. If he leaves the rabbit and cabbage alone on one of the sides of the river, the rabbit will eat the cabbage. What can he do to get home with all three?"
Nephrite thought briefly, putting his right fist into his left hand. "He gets a boat that isn't really shitty."
The massive holographic projector on the table right in front of the couch was depicting a pair of handball teams beginning to take the pitch to start a match.
"No, he can't get a better boat, that's the only boat he can use," Jadeite said.
Nephrite took a drag from a glass bottle after picking it up off the table to the left of the couch. "Well, that's a really shitty boat. I think getting a better boat is a higher priority than getting some cabbage home."
"Okay, he has to use this boat," Jadeite insisted. "Come on, how does he get across?"
"That doesn't even make any sense," Nephrite continued. "A fox weighs more than a rabbit and head of cabbage combined."
"It's not about the weight!" Jadeite said. "It's a magic boat, it can only cross the river if it's carrying the farmer and one thing."
"Is the farmer wearing a hat?" Nephrite asked.
"...what?" Jadeite asked. "Why does that matter?"
"A hat is a thing," Nephrite said. "You said the boat could only carry the farmer and one thing."
"Okay, the farmer isn't wearing a hat," Jadeite said, starting to sound a little exasperated.
"Is he wearing a shirt?" Nephrite asked. "Or any clothes?"
Jadeite sighed, tilting his head back on the top of the couch's backrest. "Are you trying to be a pain in the ass?"
"I just want to understand the riddle," Nephrite said flatly.
The door to the lounge room suddenly flew open, Prince Endymion marching in, a look of determination on his face as he moved over towards the coach that currently played host to half of his generals.
"Oh, Endymion, what's up?" Jadeite asked cheerfully, waving over towards his charge. "Hey, you wanna watch? Big match tonight!" He gestured over towards the projector.
Endymion marched right up to the table and propped his foot up against the side of the projector base, emphatically pushing it off the table with a grunt, sending it crashing to the floor. Jadeite jumped to his feet, his eased smile quickly disappearing.
"Hey, what the—" Jadeite began, watching the projector's shell casing crack on contact with the floor and the holographic projection flicker off. Endymion turned back towards him, and this time, Jadeite spotted the glint of a silver knife in his right hand. Suddenly, as the Prince advanced on him, a vicious look on his face, the projector seemed far less important.
Nephrite stood to his feet as well, so shocked by Endymion's actions that even he wasn't reacting as quickly as he was capable of. Jadeite quickly spun around and hurdled the couch just as Endymion brought the sharp-looking blade down in a slashing motion towards the blonde Earth general, driving the weapon deep into the couch cushion where he had just been sitting.
"Gods!" Jadeite yelped, quickly booking it over towards the door that Endymion had just entered through, sprinting as fast as he could. Endymion swung around to cut him off, but Jadeite managed to widen his path out to keep away from the Prince and then quickly burst out into the outer hallway. Endymion, with a feral growl, exploded out through the doors after him.
Right about this time, Nephrite stopped staring at the bizarre scene with his mouth agape and realized he should probably participate. He took off after his charge.
"YOU GET BACK HERE AND YOU DIE LIKE A MAN!" Endymion shouted, sprinting at top speed down a long hallway after Jadeite, knife still in his hand. The blonde general, a deeply concerned look on his face and eyes wide, pumped his arms at his sides, just a few steps ahead of the murderous Prince.
Jadeite tossed his right hand up high into the air as he passed a small table with a marble bust of King Epeius. The table slid out into the middle of the hall, right in front of Endymion's charging path, and it was all he could do to skid to a halt in time to not violently crash into it.
"Your Highness, please!" Jadeite shouted over his shoulder, chancing a quick look back at his pursuer.
"Get. BACK HERE!" he demanded, spinning around the bust. He was about to take off after Jadeite again, when suddenly, Nephrite came up behind him and wrapped both of his strong, muscular arms around him as tightly as he could. The burly general was able to spin his charge over towards the wall on the left side of the hallway, focusing on keeping his arms pinned at his sides so that the blade couldn't accidentally hurt him or Endymion.
"Your Highness, calm yourself!" Nephrite hissed into his ear. "Stop this, now!" Endymion continued to struggle to try to break Nephrite's grip.
"Let me go, right now, that's an order!" Endymion shouted, jerking his body around as powerfully as he could. A clattering sound echoed through the hallway as, in his struggles, he released his grip on the knife.
"Your Highness, I can't allow this to happen," Nephrite said. Endymion was trying to kick his legs back into Nephrite's knees, so Nephrite pinned him against the wall. "Now, take a breath, and we'll get you to the infirmary. You need to calm down. Whatever this is about, we'll take care of it."
"You don't know what's going on here, stay out of this," Endymion growled in a dark, dangerous tone. "Just let me go and walk away!"
"Endymion, I can't do that!" Nephrite said. "Okay, okay, Your Majesty, you need to trust me, you're having some sort of a hallucination, I think. Whatever you're perceiving is not real." Bedside manner was not one of Nephrite's strong suits, but he was doing the best he could.
Meanwhile, at the end of the hallway, Jadeite stuck his head out from behind the wall, still looking quite concerned and afraid. "You got him?" he called out loudly.
"Yes, I have him!" Nephrite grunted, Endymion still struggling to be released. "Your Highness, I need you to believe what I'm saying, this isn't real! Calm down!"
"It's real! I saw it!" Endymion protested. "Nephrite, I'm giving you an order, let me go!"
Slowly, Jadeite crept down the hallway, tentatively feeling a little safer with the large, muscular Earth general helping protect him.
"Okay, Your Majesty, let's talk this through," Nephrite said, trying to force some degree of calmness into his voice. "Let's use logic here, just stop struggling and listen! You are currently chasing your loyal general and guardian around the palace, with a knife, threatening to kill him. Why are you doing this? What makes you think this is a good idea?"
Endymion finally stopped fighting to try to break Nephrite's grip, slumping over slightly and exhaling powerfully. "Because, HE—" he jerked his head violently over towards Jadeite, "—had sex with my wife!"
Nephrite, whatever he was expecting Endymion to say, was clearly not expecting that. He swallowed down hard, trying to think of what to say. "Your Highness. I'm sure it feels very real right now. But, I assure you, you're hallucinating, please, let's just go see Dennis."
"I'm not hallucinating!" Endymion shouted.
"Hey, buddy, she said it was your idea!" Jadeite protested, putting his hands up defensively.
Nephrite began trying to shuffle the Prince down the hallway, dragging him away from Jadeite. "Yes, that too, she said it was—" Nephrite suddenly stopped, eyes going wide, then twisted his head around over his shoulder to look at Jadeite. "What?"
"She did!" Jadeite persisted. "How was I supposed to know she was lying?!"
Nephrite released his grip on the Prince, turning around, staring at Jadeite. "You...did you...Jadeite. You had sex with Princess Serenity?"
Endymion roughly tugged his tunic around, trying to straighten his clothes out, scowling deeply.
"Yeah, what...she...she invited me up into her room! What was I supposed to do?!" Jadeite argued. "She said there was some sort of tradition where Earth royals share their wives with their generals!"
Nephrite's shoulders drooped fractionally. "Jadeite."
"I had no reason to believe she was lying! Why would she say something like that as a lie?!" Jadeite continued to try defending himself.
"Nephrite. Get out of my way and let me kill him," Endymion demanded, looking over Nephrite's shoulder, gritting his teeth and glaring daggers over at Jadeite.
Nephrite just stood there, arms slack at his sides, and then moved to the side of the hallway. "You know what? Go ahead," he said, resignation in his voice.
"HEY!" Jadeite shouted, jumping back a half-step. Endymion lunged forward, right hand going towards Nephrite's belt and yanking the small plasma pistol off of his hip.
With only a beat or two to react, Jadeite instinctively ripped a chunk of marble out of the wall to his left, getting it to float up in the air between him and Endymion. The white-hot discharge from the weapon splashed over the slab of marble, and Jadeite quickly dove head-first into the hole he had put in the wall. The charred slab quickly slammed back into the hole from where it had come, slotting in perfectly, preventing the Prince from giving pursuit. Endymion ran up to the sealed hole and threw his shoulder into it as hard as he could, then tried to push on it with all his might when it didn't give.
"Jadeite, get out here!" Endymion demanded, beating his fists on the wall. "Jadeite, I mean it!"
Endymion backed up a couple steps, pointing the plasma launcher at the place on the wall where the hole had been. Just before he tried to burn his way through, his wrist was grabbed by a firm grip and he was roughly pushed over towards the wall.
"Your Highness, enough!" Kunzite growled, giving the Prince's wrist a couple of shakes and forcing him to drop the weapon. Endymion glanced up, finding Kunzite's stern face, before he felt his back get pressed up into the marble behind him.
"Kunzite, I mean it, stay out of this," Endymion said, eyes searching the floor for the discarded firearm. "Let me go."
"Endymion! Clear your head!" Kunzite quickly glanced down both sides of the hall, grateful to find that they had not yet attracted attention from the palace guard.
"Kunzite, you don't know what's going on here," Endymion hissed.
"Yes, I do!" Kunzite insisted. "I heard everything, it doesn't matter, you have to control yourself! Chasing your general around with a knife, firing a plasma bolt in the palace, you're going to attract attention! And when you attract attention, your father is going to hear about this, and then he's going to have questions! How are you going to answer his questions?! Do you want him to find out about everything?!"
Endymion slowly stopped struggling, gradually and begrudgingly realizing that Kunzite was correct. His scowl remained as severe and pronounced as ever, nostrils flaring in anger.
"Kunzite, he...my wife. He. Had sex. With my wife. Do you understand that?" he seethed. "Am I supposed to...just stand for that?!"
"Your Highness, Jadeite did a very stupid and foolish thing. And he should be disciplined and held accountable. But not like this." He began to slowly relinquish his grip on Endymion's arms, trusting that the worst of his rage had passed. "Let me handle that part of it. You go back to your room, cool off, come back tomorrow morning, and we'll deal with this like civilized people."
"Civilized people," Endymion repeated. "Kunzite, I...look." He managed to wrench himself free of Kunzite's relinquishing grip, spinning around to hold his right hand out towards his guardian. "You're not married, you couldn't possibly understand what's going on here." He pointed at the ripped-out segment of the wall. "That...I can't just…"
"Your Highness. Think. Do you really want to cause a ruckus, and then have to explain it to your father? There are bigger things happening here." Kunzite raised his eyebrows. "Think it through. Please. Jadeite did something very stupid, but he is not the core of your problems right now. And you know that. He didn't do this just to hurt you. The person who did, she's the core of your problems."
Endymion glared over at the wall section that had been ripped out and roughly shoved back in, and then with an angry growl, began marching down the hallway in the direction that he had come from.
Kunzite and Nephrite slowly tracked him with their eyes as he bent down to retrieve his knife from the floor, then continued to stomp right past Nephrite. The burly, brown-haired guardian, typically not intimidated by anything, was quick to shuffle to the side to allow the Prince to pass, clearly a little cowed by his rage.
After a couple secundas, the sharp tap of Endymion's shoes on the floor stopped echoing down the hall as he disappeared around the corner, reluctantly accepting the situation. Kunzite glanced over at Nephrite.
"And you shouldn't be encouraging him," Kunzite scolded. "Our job is to protect him, and sometimes that includes from himself."
"The man slept with his wife, Kunzite," Nephrite said under his breath.
"Right," Kunzite muttered. "Speaking of which." He went over to the roughly-placed slab of marble and knocked on it a couple times. "Jadeite, come out! He's gone!"
No response. Kunzite rammed the butt end of his fist into the wall a few more times.
"Jadeite, I mean it! You have to face up to what you did, get out here! Endymion left, that's the best you're getting!"
Still nothing.
"Jadeite! Come on, I know you're still in there! I promise Endymion left!"
"Prove it," Jadeite's muffled voice finally requested.
Kunzite sighed, rolling his eyes.
"
Serenity, laying back on the bed and holding a book up in front of her face, barely glanced over when Endymion practically slammed his way through the bedroom door. No sooner had he slammed the door shut behind him then he rounded on an unaffected Serenity.
"By the Gods, Serenity! I understand you're frustrated and angry, but there's a line!" he snapped, putting his arms out wide to his sides. "Jadeite?! Really?!"
Serenity glanced up from the book. "Endymion, I don't know where you think this line is, but I'm sure it's well before creating a criminal alter ego in secret!"
Endymion grumbled, rolling his eyes. "Serenity, you are still my wife, no matter how you feel about that right now! And, as my wife, you do need to hold yourself to some level of minimal acceptable conduct!"
"I'm not your wife," she said bitterly. "I'm your hostage."
Endymion put his hands on his hips. "A hostage?! Oh, what an awful prison I've put you in, Serenity!" He spun around the room, arms held out at his sides. "Just look at this place!"
"You think I care about any of that?!" she countered harshly. "Endymion, I don't want to be here! I don't want to be around you! You have forced me to be here! You can delude yourself into believing something else if it makes you feel better, but I am your hostage!" She shrugged. "And you know what, you're right! I'm stuck! I can't turn you in, I can't keep you away from me, I can't separate from you, congratulations, you called my bluff! But we are not together anymore, and I'm not going to accommodate you deluding yourself into believing that we are!"
Endymion emphatically swung both of his arms over towards the door. "Serenity, would you like me to go fetch the...piles and piles of documentation that affirms that you're currently my wife?! Because I'm happy to, if it would help clear up this confusion you seem to have about the current status of our relationship!" He gave an aggravated swipe of his right hand across his forehead. "W-what is even the point of you doing this?! I told you I was done with imperium smuggling, and I am!"
"Well, you're going to have to drop something to clear the calendar for next cycle when you decide to try your hand at contract killing, or freighter piracy," she said, voice dripping with biting sarcasm. "Or whatever other illegal hobby strikes your fancy, who knows what it'll be."
He gave a rattled sigh, grimacing violently. "You know, Serenity, you really could stand to just take a moment to consider the fact that, whatever wrong I did, I did it for you! If you could just open your mind up to that little piece of it, I'd really appreciate it!"
"Have you told yourself that so many times, you've actually convinced yourself that it's true?" she asked. "Like, do you actually believe that's the case at this point?"
Endymion put his hand up to his forehead. "Serenity, I don't know what that's supposed to mean."
"Endymion, if you don't like it, let me leave!" Serenity said simply. "Let me leave with Chibiusa and stay away from me!" She point over towards the balcony doors. "Do that, and you'll have nothing to worry about."
The Crown Prince gave a dangerous little smirk, giving her a wild-eyed look. "Oh, that's what you want, huh? You think this will get me to leave you alone? Well, you know what, Serenity? Please, by all means, I dare you, don't stop now! Feel free to have sex with all of my generals while you're at it! Have sex with the head chef, the captain of the palace guard, my tailor, hell, have sex with my father! Because I don't care, and I'm not going anywhere! You get that?!" With that, he spun off, marching over towards the bathroom door, tossing his hand up high over his shoulder in a gesture of farewell. "Just try me, and see what happens!"
"Suit yourself," Serenity said coldly.
"Oh, I will, I'll suit myself!" he growled, tossing the door open and then slamming it shut behind him.
"
"Alright." Zoisite held his palms out to either side of himself, looking over at Jadeite, then to Endymion. "Your Highness. Jadeite has something he'd like to say to you."
The Prince and his guardian were sitting in chairs on opposite sides of a small circular table inside Jadeite's private quarters. The room, heavily stylized with dark, strong tones and with several posters of well-known supermodels pasted to the walls, was normally charming to Endymion, but right now he found it obnoxious. Truth be told, he found everything about Jadeite obnoxious right now, including the fact that he was still alive. He was sitting back in the chair, arms on the armrests, scowling over at his general. Kunzite and Nephrite were both sitting right behind him, ready to spring up and grab him at a moment's notice.
Jadeite cleared his throat. "W-why is he holding a knife?" he asked. Endymion was indeed armed with a bladed weapon, holding it in his right hand.
"Y-yes, um, I was going to ask something similar," Zoisite said uneasily, looking at the shiny knife, Endymion starting to slowly twirl it around between his fingers.
Endymion didn't answer, simply staring Jadeite down with unblinking eyes.
"I would...I would feel much safer and more comfortable if you put down the knife, Your Majesty," Jadeite said meekly. "Please, put the knife down." He tried to make a calming gesture over towards the Prince. "Put the knife down, and then I'll say what I want to say."
"Sir, I think that's a reasonable request," Zoisite said, looking over at Endymion. "Please, put the knife down."
With a slow shrug, Endymion leaned forward a bit, then wound his knife-wielding hand up above his head, and slammed it down into the table blade-first. All four generals jumped a bit as he stabbed the blade deep into the wooden surface, sticking it down to the hilt. Jadeite stared with wide-eyes at the knife handle, then looked up at Endymion's seemingly-emotionless face.
"Um, J-Jadeite?" Zoisite prompted.
Jadeite gave his head a quickly shake. "U-uh, Your Majesty. I'm so incredibly sorry for what happened yesterday. I take full responsibility for not verifying what Princess Serenity told me, and I can't make any excuse for my actions. I know I can't take back what I did, I know that. All I can say is that I am deeply apologetic about it, and I give you my word that nothing like this will ever happen again."
Endymion presented no reaction to Jadeite's apology, just sitting back in the chair and staring at him.
"I had no idea that you and Serenity were having difficulties, if I had any idea I would have realized what was going on and left immediately. Again, this doesn't excuse my actions. I didn't apply nearly enough critical thinking to the situation when it was presented to me, and was very careless. I should have checked with you to verify her story. Once again, I'm very sorry."
Zoisite nodded, then looked over at the Prince. "Well, Your Highness, do you have anything you'd like to say in reply to all that?"
He didn't, continuing to do nothing but blankly stare, his fingertips digging into the chair armrest ever-so-slightly.
"C-can you please just blink?" Jadeite asked, averting his gaze away from him. "It's starting to freak me out!"
"Alright, I think we're done here!" Zoisite popped to his feet. "I think we've taken an important first step in addressing this, and that's more than enough for today! Let's, uh, let's go!" He quickly gestured both of his arms toward the door, and both Kunzite and Nephrite got to their feet as well.
"I can't undo what I did," Jadeite said quickly. "But I will do all I can to make it up to you."
"How?" Endymion asked, finally giving some indication that he hadn't suddenly gone mute. "I'm genuinely curious to know, how are you going to make this up to me? Do you have any understanding of the magnitude of what you've done?!"
"Look, Your Highness, just say the word, and I'll set it up for you, it'll take me less than a cycle!" Jadeite offered.
"Okay, okay, seriously, we're done here!" Zoisite said, rather loudly, trying to usher the Prince over towards the door.
"No, no!" Endymion put his arm out towards Zoisite. "I want to hear what he's going to say. I really want to know what the hell he thinks will make up for this."
"Well, obviously, things really aren't going well with you and the Princess, if she's actually doing something like this, so that's a tragedy, but, hey, silver lining! I'm all about silver linings, one word, harem!" Jadeite pointed at Endymion. "This is a prime opportunity for you to live the dream! You give me a cycle on Venus, I'll round up a dozen girls who are open to that kind of shit, bring them here, and boom! You'll be swimming in it!"
Endymion began to resume his dead-eyed stare over at Jadeite, eyes narrowing into dangerous slits.
"Okay, we're done here!" Zoisite said, quickly gesturing his head over at Kunzite and Nephrite, who stepped forward and placed their hands on Endymion's shoulders. "Let's go!"
"What?!" Jadeite asked. "It's an honest offer, he'd love it! He got married too young, it's clearly not working out, let's mix the formula up a bit!"
"Jadeite, just stop talking!" Kunzite snapped, pulling Endymion to his feet, wanting to get him out of the room while he was still at least allowing himself to be pulled toward the exit without protesting. "Gods!"
"Uh, just, keep it in mind, then?" Jadeite asked. "Something to consider if things don't improve?"
Quickly, the two larger members of Endymion's generals pulled him from the room, out into the grey hallway, Zoisite quickly shutting the door behind him before Jadeite could say something else that would trigger a violent reaction from the Prince.
Kunzite huffed out a large sigh. "Alright. Your Highness. I need your word that you're going to let this go. No more shooting at him or chasing him around with a knife. I know he's not perfect, but tell me that you're going to curb the worst of your vengeful desires, at the very least."
Endymion grumbled under his breath.
"I'll...talk to him about the harem nonsense," Kunzite added. "He won't bring that up again, I promise."
"Fine," he finally said curtly.
"Thank you," Kunzite said, clapping his large hands on Endymion's shoulders. "So, um...you and Serenity, anything?"
"Not particularly," Endymion admitted, shoulders hitched up tensely. "Just, what do I have to do?!" He quickly glanced down either side of the hallway.
"Just...wait her out," Kunzite whispered. "She can't stay mad forever. It's all you can do."
He gave a tired nod, and then slowly walked off down the grey hall, his terse anger seemingly having been partially replaced with a dejected sadness, shoulders hanging a bit.
"And try not to say anything rash to her right now when emotions are running high!" Kunzite added.
"Too late," he mumbled.
"
Pandora was one of the lesser moons of Saturn in terms of size and utility, and in a time of peace would have been fairly insignificant in comparison to other orbital bodies. However, it currently served as one of the more important areas under the control of The Rings, as its position as an inner satellite of Saturn, as well as it's chaotic, erratic orbit, made it a hugely important piece of territory in the ongoing civil war. The Rings had one of their larger weapons platforms and a significant portion of their foot soldiers stationed on the moon, and had invested heavily into protecting it with a state-of-the-art shielding system.
So, of course, the generator for this shield, a small little base on the eastern hemisphere of the body, was heavily protected, not just by the shield itself, but by a solid three dozen armed sentries, keeping an eye on every inch of space around the generator. If the shield were to fail, the energy drop would be immediately detected by Saturn, and within a minuta, they would be throwing everything they had into an all-out assault to try to take the key territory away from The Rings.
"Lousy bitch," Gregory grumbled through the cigarette between his lips, eyes constantly scanning the horizon. "Does she just have no understanding of what her father did during his time as King? She doesn't deserve that throne, she should know that and accept her fate."
"Oh, you know how these things are," Stephen said out of the corner of his mouth, leaning over a bit towards his colleague. "Not her fault, blah blah blah, she wasn't even born when he was doing most of his human experimentation."
"Hey, I don't wanna hear that," Gregory said. "Half of her came from him, didn't it? So half of her is no better than that crazy son-of-a-bitch who nearly ran this planet into the ground less than two decades ago. A clam has more of a right to sit on the throne than she does."
"I agree, of course," Stephen said quickly.
"How many more people need to die?" Gregory asked rhetorically. "Doesn't she get it by now? Doesn't she understand how this is going to go?"
"Nothing to worry about, buddy," Stephen said, rubbing his right hand over the barrel of his plasma rifle. "People are starting to hear about how weak she is. Rumor is you can smack her with a piece of paper and she'll fly across the room. Ain't nobody wants to stand up and fight for someone who can barely stand up for themselves. I think we're turning this war in our favor. Give it another year, and it'll be obvious."
"I hope you're right," Gregory replied. "It's been too long since Saturn had leadership worth a damn, I can't believe there's a single person on the entire planet actually willing to fight for someone like—"
Both men winced down hard at a bright, violent flash of white light filled the air around them, opening their eyes to find an orb-shaped, silver spaceship hovering a couple dozen haplouns above the ground, not that far in front of the two, having seemingly appeared out of thin air. Reflexively, both men brought their plasma rifles up and pointed them at the intruding ship, putting questions of how it had managed to get through their shield on the backburner for the time being.
Before they could get a shot off, the silver ship fired a volley of smoke-emitting projectiles towards the shield generator, each one releasing a little phoofm of sound as they flew from the frontal tubes. Gregory and Stephen turned around just in time to watch them impact the dome, erupting in massive explosions. The plume of destruction spread out in all directions as the dome was peppered with rockets, kicking up a massive cloud of dust and sending up waves of debris. The two armed guards quickly became more concerned with their own self-preservation and tried to run away from the generator, but after only a few steps the debris cloud crashed into them hard. Their fate was the same as the other thirty-four armed sentries, quickly killed as collateral.
The shield encircling the entire moon flickering off, the odd ship quickly spun around so it was pointing up towards the skies, and just as soon as it had appeared, it zipped away, jumping across the galaxy. The alarm would soon be sounded over the destruction of the generator, but given the massive damage done to the entire dome, there would be no fixing it anytime soon. And, down on the planet surface, news of the shield's failure would soon be spreading among Saturn's military, and a quick, but powerful, offensive would be carried out while the opportunity presented itself.