Chapter 64: …And Despair!
A/N: Very sorry for the long delays, my life has been very hectic lately. In a good way, definitely positive developments, but there just hasn't been very much time for writing.
"
On some level, Kasios was aware of his communicator buzzing and vibrating away on the end table to his left. But it was as if his brain had shut off the connectors that allowed him to really comprehend what stimuli like that meant. Yes, he was aware that an object near him was trying to get his attention, but his mind wasn't working at the level required to comprehend that there was a person behind the object, that someone was trying to call him. At this moment, the communicator was no different than a loud fly, buzzing around the room, ruining an otherwise peaceful moment, an irritant and nothing more.
Still in in a stupor, knowing what was happening at this very moment aboard The Savery, knowing that he could not stop it, and knowing the grave injustice that was about to be committed by the organization he had dedicated most of his life to, something like a buzzing communicator just wasn't going to draw his attention right now. If he were to move over and pick it up, he'd probably just hurl it at the wall, treating it as nothing but an annoyance, and not a prompt to start a conversation.
So, he sat there, right in the center of the massive den, amid a collection of matching furniture and decor, lights dimmed, alone with his thoughts. More than anything else, he wanted to just disconnect from the rest of the universe for a while, exist somewhere outside reality, so he could pretend that all these things had no bearing on him. Like it was all just some fictional novel he was reading.
Eventually, the buzzing stopped, leaving Kasios alone once again, the former High King forgetting that it had ever been trying to attract his attention in the first place.
"
Endymion practically punched the primary button of the built-in communicator, ending the call the moment he heard it about to request a recorded message, then immediately hitting it again to re-engage it. "Come on, come on, come on," he hissed under his breath.
"Your Highness, what happened back—" Kunzite said trepidatiously, peering out from the cockpit over towards the High King.
"NOT NOW!" Endymion bellowed, taking only the briefest of moments to glance in Kunzite's direction to acknowledge him before turning his focus back to the communicator.
"I…I've put the ship on auto-pilot, we're going to Mercury as fast as we can," Kunzite said quietly, feeling rather cowed by the frenzy his charge had been worked into. "Your Highness, you need to tell me what's going on, whatever happened on The Savery is going to look very bad to the galaxy."
"My father is about to be assassinated and you're worried about the agency?!" Endymion snapped, ear again tightly clasped against the communicator earpiece as he waited out more trills.
Kunzite's eyes widened a good deal. "W-what are you talking about?!"
"Just get back to the cockpit, and focus on getting us to Mercury as fast as possible!" he said, despite Kunzite having just explained that there was no getting to Mercury any faster than they already were. Which he knew full well. But rational, logical thinking had gone out the door.
Kunzite opened his mouth to start protesting, but quickly thought better of it. Even further questions about this supposed attempt on Kasios's life would clearly not be welcome right now. So, as much as Kunzite despised having so many factors at play that he was uninformed on, he turned away, ducking back into the cockpit.
Endymion rapidly punched the center button twice again, his call having gone unanswered for a second time. Anxiously shifting his weight back and forth, he waited, imagining all the different ways his father might be beats away from being assassinated.
"
"Son of a…" Kasios snapped his head up slightly, looking over at the end table next to him, no longer able to ignore the consistent stream of grating buzzing from his communicator. Whoever this was clearly was desperate to talk with him. Of course, Kasios's current state over that fact was annoyance rather than concern.
Reaching over towards the disc to his left, grumbling to himself, his thumbs found the central button to connect the call. "Let me guess, I'm fired? You're really that desperate to tell me that you have to—"
"Dad, get out of there!"
Kasios could feel his stomach metaphorically twist up at the sound of that ever-familiar voice, as well as the addressing of 'Dad', something that only one person in the galaxy would have any reason to address him as. Immediately, he awkwardly vaulted up to his feet.
"What the…Endymion?!" he snapped, so completely unprepared for this possibility that he had absolutely no idea what to say. "What—"
"Dad, listen to me! You need to get out of there, right now, and get somewhere safe!"
"
Endymion was gripping the handhold next to the communicator so tightly, it seemed inevitable that it was either going to crack or his fingers were going to snap. You could almost see the nerves tensing and pulsing inside his long digits. He was so overstimulated in this moment, that he was struggling to figure out the quickest way to get Kasios to stop asking questions and do as he said. He was even back to calling him 'Dad', something that he had been trying to do away with after recent events.
"I-I, what in the hell are you doing?! Why are you…" he could hear Kasios fumbling with the communicator. "...w-why are you on Kunzite's ship?!"
"People are coming to kill you, get out of there now, get somewhere safe," Endymion said, trying his very best to sound at least somewhat in control of himself so that he might be taken seriously. He thought about ending the call, giving his father no opportunity to further question him and leave him only with his warning, but it was a risk he couldn't bring himself to take. "G-Go somewhere you wouldn't be expected to be! Borrow someone else's ship and get off planet!"
"N-Now, hey, hey, if you think I'm doing anything you…who is coming to kill me?!"
"
Kasios anxiously paced around his living room, holding the disc up close to his mouth. He was so overwhelmed by surprise, he was incapable of actually doing anything of substance. It was taking physical effort for him to process Endymion's warning. Had the warning arrived from literally any other person in the galaxy, he would have already been at a neighboring house, securing use of a starship.
He suddenly darted over to a nearby window, peering out it, as if he might spot approaching assassins, even as Endymion continued to plead with him through the disc. He was barely even listening to him anymore, and it all basically amounted to the same thing anyway.
"D…Did you…how did you get released so fast?!" Kasios asked, unable to stop himself from turning back to that particular topic, no matter how much Endymion was trying to convince him that his life was in danger.
"Dad, I will explain everything, but you need to get—"
It happened too fast to feel anything. Rather than a typical explosion, which would have collapsed the ground out from underneath Kasios's manor, making it cave inward, the specialized explosive that had just been planted deep underground more or less just expanded upward, vaporizing everything that it touched on the way. So, one moment, Kasios was standing there, trying to make sense of his son's sudden freedom and warning, and then, he ceased to be, along with his entire retirement home and several neighboring properties as well. He hadn't even lived long enough to hear the whirring pulse from the massive eruption.
The entire area was bathed in a blue energy that annihilated all matter, a technology bordering on magic that was only made possible by an incredibly large amount of hyper-pure imperium. It was a truly massive amount of destruction, all in the service of killing one person.
"
All Endymion heard was the sound of the connection going dead, a sudden dull buzz of static taking the place of his father's voice. Immediately, his thumb came up to jab the center button on the communicator twice. He hunched over slightly, scowling in frustration at his inability to get his father to respect the threat that was coming his way. When he failed to hear a soft tone from the device up against his ear, he quickly hit the button twice yet again.
"Oh, shit!"
His focus was broken by Kunzite's profane outburst up in the cockpit, and he glanced up. Leaning his body over to the left to peer up the small walkway, he saw Kunzite playing with the controls beneath the dashboard display in front of him.
"Oh, Gods," Kunzite rasped. Even though his head was partially turned away from Endymion, the High King could see the look of shock and horror on his face, an outward display of emotion unbecoming of someone like him.
"What?!" Endymion demanded, realizing that the communicator fob by his ear was still not indicating that it was attempting to connect.
"I…I, uh…"
"Kunzite!" Endymion snapped, chucking the communicator fob down to the floor in a fit of frustration.
"There's…there's a massive energy spike on Mercury," Kunzite said. "Where K-Kasios's manor is, I…I was monitoring the status there, the whole area got flooded with—"
The Falconeri eased out of its jump, speed decreasing massively as it approached the cusp of Mercury's orbit. The small blue planet immediately took up a majority of the view through the front window of the cockpit.
Both Kunzite and Endymion knew where Kasios's retirement manor was on the planet. So when they saw what looked like a massive glowing blue pillar, extending up from the planet's surface, high up into the sky, big and strong enough to be visible from space, coupled with what Kunzite had just reported, the puzzle pieces quickly slotted into place.
Endymion just watched the column of energy for several beats, stunned at what he knew must have been a truly monstrous amount of imperium to create a pulse of that size. But then, the actual ramifications dawned on him. His eyes flickered down to the display screen that Kunzite had just been looking at, showing the off-the-scale energy output emanating from that column. The sudden loss of connection on Endymion's communicator call. The tremendous difficulty in pulling off an assassination attempt on someone like former High King Kasios via any typical method. It all made sense. It all added up.
Endymion didn't waste any time on false hope, or denial. Nothing inside that pillar of energy could possibly have survived. It was unlikely that anything within that pillar even existed anymore. Reduced to atoms. Hundreds were probably dead, and the property loss probably ran into several hundred million creds. Honestly, the planet's integrity may well have been compromised by something that powerful. But Endymion's focus right now was, understandably, on one of the victims only.
The two young men just stood in shock for nearly half a secunda, processing the sudden flood of information they had just been given. Kunzite, slowly, turned to look over his right shoulder, having put together the pieces just as Endymion had.
The High King staggered forward slightly, buckling over, crumbling to the ground like he had just been turned into wet paper. The sharp clang of his knees hitting the floor snapped Kunzite out of his stupor, and he quickly stepped forward, punching some commands into the center console. The Falconeri changed course, making a hard turn to the left and shooting away from the planet. Clearly, this place was not safe, a fact that was obvious even though Kunzite didn't know everything that was going on yet.
"Your…Your Highness," Kunzite said, slowly and stiffly, turning back to look at his charge, still on his hands and knees on the cockpit floor. The High King gave this horrible, eerie, strangled cry, conveying a level of despair that you would not have believed possible coming from someone like the ruler of a powerful and prosperous kingdom.
Kunzite couldn't see Endymion's face, but it was a similarly-unsettling mask of sorrow. You couldn't even have called him a High King, or royal of any kind, at this point. Not even an adult. In an instant, Endymion had been reverted back to a child. Nothing more and nothing less. Gone was the tremendous status and power he had been born into, the massive palace he resided in, the collection of priceless artifacts, the rooms filled with decadent clothes, the ability to drastically affect the lives of billions with a few words, all of it. For a moment in time, he was just a child, trying to handle the reality of losing a parent. And he was handling it no better than that child would.
"I'm…I am so, so incredibly sorry, Your Highness," Kunzite said, knowing that there were no words that he would be able to put together right now that would make anything better, but also knowing it was better than simply holding silent right now. "I don't understand what happened here, but…I…"
Endymion raised his right fist up in the air above his head, then brought it down with great force onto the floor beneath him, generating a cacophonic clang. Kunzite winced and quickly abandoned his attempt to console him. Endymion repeated the violent motion, bringing his hand up and slamming it back down, over and over again, the floor shuddering with each blow.
Kunzite didn't even dare to try and stop him, knowing that this was a time to allow him to burn himself out. So, even as Endymion slammed his fist down into the ground for the tenth, twentieth, and thirtieth time, the Earth general made no move to stop him. Finally, the blows ceased, Endymion left to just pant out tired sobs.
Slowly, the High King picked his head up. Kunzite wasn't in the least bit surprised to see obvious evidence on his face that he had been crying, most of the sobs having been covered up by the clanging. However, the sheer, unfiltered anger and hatred in his gaze as he leveled it up towards Kunzite forced the General to take a half-step back in shock.
Springing to his feet, Endymion launched himself at Kunzite with a feral roar. This transformation was even more shocking, and had Kunzite not been witnessing it personally, he wouldn't have believed it possible. That a royal by birth, who grew up in palaces, surrounded by servants, raised in the most elite and prestigious of circles, could become something beneath that of even the lowest human. But his animalistic growl and monstrous mannerisms perfectly invoked that of a wild beast.
His hands reached for Kunzite's neck, the general quickly reaching up to defend the vulnerable area of his body. He grabbed Endymion's wrists, intending to quickly gain full control of the situation and get the High King neutralized, but he was immediately shocked to find just how much strength he had to exert just to keep Endymion from reaching through his grip and strangling him.
"Wait, no, Your Highness!" Kunzite pleaded, holding off his charge for a moment before managing to push him back with a grunt of effort. Typically, the force that Kunzite had applied to knocking Endymion back would have easily put the wirey royal on the ground, but this time the High King barely took half a step back before launching himself right back into his general. Kunzite was so surprised he even allowed Endymion to forcibly ram his shoulder into his chest, knocking him back.
Kunzite knew more about Endymion than anyone else in the galaxy, and that included his physical capabilities. Fit and capable were words he'd use to describe his charge, but certainly not muscular or powerful. Kunzite, on the other hand, perfectly defined both of those words in his stature and strength. So not only was it bizarre to him that he couldn't quickly and immediately overpower the High King, but the fact that Endymion's charging shoulder blow actually forced Kunzite to give some ground was a shock. Clearly, mad with grief as he was, Endymion had managed to tap into some well of strength that he hadn't made use of before.
Still not wanting to hurt his charge, Kunzite reached out in an attempt to wrap his arms around Endymion's torso, trying to pin his arms to his sides and lift him off the ground. The High King simply used the opening to slam his fist right into Kunzite's nose, a sickening crunch indicating that he had managed to break it, and even daze the Earth general a little bit.
However, Endymion tried to go back to the same well again, and this time Kunzite was able to redirect his fist away, and then use his momentum to spin him around. For as much as Endymion was displaying impressive strength and speed, he was also incredibly reckless, and it was a simple matter to turn it against him.
"Please, enough!" Kunzite grabbed Endymion by the forearms and tried to squeeze them down to his sides, working to quickly neutralize his ability to fight back. In almost any other circumstance, it would have been over. But not right now, with Endymion's rage fueling him. Swinging his right arm out of Kunzite's iron-like grip, he wildly whipped his right elbow behind him, slamming it into Kunzite's chin.
"Your Highness, stop this!" Kunzite growled, charging at the High King and practically tackling him, deciding he needed to use a little more force to get control of this situation, even if he risked actually injuring Endymion. Clearly, for some reason, his charge was placing some of the blame for his father's death on him, and that was not something he could expect to just burn out in the next few beats. The two young men crashed to the floor violently, Kunzite pinning his charge beneath him. "Stop, that's enough!"
Any sane person would have realized that the fight was over, but Endymion was far from sane at this moment. He continued to push, kick, scratch, anything and everything to try to get Kunzite's significant mass off of him.
Feeling rather silly, like he was dealing with an unruly child, Kunzite managed to grab Endymion's wrists and pin them to the floor. "Endymion, please! Stop this nonsense, immediately—"
A blaring alarm from the console behind their little fight rang out, suddenly pulling the two young men back into reality, back into a world beyond just their little physical altercation. Kunzite twisted his head around, looking over his shoulder, focus pulled away from Endymion. Even the High King seemed to lose a bit of his edge at the loud sound cue, as he didn't attempt to utilize the distraction to regain the upper hand in his fight. After all, as furious as he was, that alarm may very well have been warning of an imminent collision, and he wasn't so angry that he had lost his survival instinct.
Kunzite quickly got to his feet and took the two large steps needed to get to the console, immediately finding the red blinking light that indicated that his ship was caught in a tractor beam. He slammed his fingers down on several buttons, bringing up several viewing screens on the front window, giving multiple points of view around The Falconeri.
To their left, there was a Class E starship, a massive interstellar vehicle that nevertheless maintained a sleek and nimble design, contrary to most freighters that had the class designation. Neither High King nor General recognized it, but it was clear that it was the source of the tractor beam.
Kunzite glanced back at the control panel, making sure that the throttle was still where he left it, going full blast on auto-pilot. Despite that massive amount of force attempting to push The Falconeri away from the strange ship, the engine may as well have been turned off for all the actual good it was accomplishing.
As Endymion stared at the massive cruiser, dumbfounded to the point of temporarily forgetting his blind rage, Kunzite stabbed his right index finger down onto a button on the bottom left corner.
"Attention! This ship is part of the Earth's Royal Fleet, and currently has the High King and a General of the Palace on board! You are in violation of several laws by utilizing your tractor beam on this ship, and if you do not immediately release—"
"Calm down." The responding voice was distinctly female, and even those two syllables were distinctive enough to identify the speaker. "I'm here as a friend. A friend who wants what I deserve. I'll pull you guys into the hangar and we'll talk it out."
That low, almost sultry voice instantly sparked Endymion's rage back. Fortunately for Kunzite, that rage was now directed elsewhere. For even though Kunzite had his part to play in the chain of events that lead to Kasios's death, there was no doubt who was directly responsible for it.
And that person had just declared themselves to be Endymion's friend.
Quickly steeling his expression, Endymion turned and marched out of the cockpit. Kunzite cast one less helpless look down at the command console, as if looking for some magical button to push that could get The Falconeri out of this situation, or better yet, reset the entire day, but quickly chased his charge out into the main holding room of his ship.
"Your Highness—" Kunzite went up to grab Endymion's shoulder, but was rebuffed with a violent push back against his hand, the High King not even turning to look at his General as he did so. "Please, this is—"
Both young men stumbled slightly as the ship gave a shuddering jolt. A small red light on a panel right next to the back ramp of the ship flicked to green, and Endymion immediately marched over towards it.
"Wait!" Kunzite held his hand out towards Endymion, but the High King was clearly well beyond any consideration of taking advice. And, to be completely fair, the ship was inevitably going to be opened, even if it had to be forced open from the outside. Still, Kunzite was well aware that it was a tremendous failure on his part to allow his charge to be put in such a helpless and dangerous situation.
With a tap of Endymion's fingers, the rear hatch of The Falconeri began to slowly unfurl out with a pneumatic hiss. Kunzite glanced towards Endymion's back, shoulders tightening as he thought about the extremely high likelihood that this was going to end with the High King dead or captured by a malicious entity, and that there was very little he could do about it. About the only comfort he had was that Endymion was behaving as if he knew who this woman was.
The ramp opened up to a modestly-sized hangar room, wide walls and high ceilings, relatively non-descript and unremarkable. Kunzite crouched down slightly on seeing a dozen large men, six to either side of where the ramp had just set down. Already, his mind began trying to work out a way to even the odds if this turned into a physical altercation. However, he couldn't help but be slightly distracted when he realized who was standing behind the collection of men.
He hadn't been able to recognize the voice on the communicator the way Endymion had, but things quickly fell into place on seeing the highly distinctive-looking woman who was clearly behind this hijacking. Tall, thin, form-fitting purple dress and long red hair past her waist, such a conspicuous look was easily associated with notorious criminal Beryl.
Endymion marched down the ramp, eyes glued to Beryl, ignoring the dozen men larger than him in the way. After a few steps, he was unable to do that, as one sidestepped into his path.
"You know, all things considered, you don't look nearly as happy to see me as I expected," Beryl said, voice silky and alluring. "You know I'm the only person in the galaxy who could have pulled all that off."
Endymion glanced up at the man who had just stepped in his way, face locked in an intimidating scowl. Unfortunately, this was not the kind of man who would falter under something like an intimidating scowl, and Endymion had enough of his common sense remaining to know that he was in no position to move him.
"Look, if you're sore about the tractor beam thing, think about what I just had to do. You think I'm putting in that kind of work and not making sure I get compensated?" Beryl asked.
"I didn't ask for your help," Endymion snapped. "I didn't need your help."
"You were under lock and key inside The Savery, a place no prisoner has ever escaped from. Ever. Until today." Beryl put her right hand up on her hip.
"I wasn't a prisoner!" Endymion protested, leaning a little bit to the left to look over the man's shoulder so he could stare at Beryl directly. "I had everything under control!"
"You had been in their custody for over a day," Beryl said dismissively. "You can call that whatever you want, but trust me, you were their prisoner. And if they knew about even one percent of what you've done, you were never getting out of there."
"I had a deal arranged, everything was fine!" Endymion spat. "You getting involved was the last thing I needed—"
"Before I got involved, you were stuck behind a trillion creds worth of state-of-the-art defenses. Now, you're free and clear, and the organization that had you imprisoned has been crippled. If you think your crown was going to bail you out with the agency, then you don't know the agency," Beryl retorted.
Endymion seethed, nostrils flaring, clearly wanting more than anything in the world for the dozen bodyguards between him and Beryl to all spontaneously combust so he could have a run at her. "I was brought in for questioning. That's it. Nothing was going to happen, I was going to walk out of there before dinner, and now what do I do?!" He threw his right arm out to his side. "How do you think this looks to the galaxy right now?! There are hundreds of dead bodies on The Savery in my wake!"
She shrugged. "Well, you've at least got your freedom. And plenty of money and connections. If I've been able to stay alive and free for the last few years, then it should be a breeze for you. And, I took care of the person behind your incarceration."
Endymion heaved a malicious sounding sigh. "You took care of him?"
"Well, you don't have to worry about him anymore. Trust me," she said, sounding casual and indifferent. "You'll see it on the news when—"
"I didn't ask for this shit!" Endymion snapped. The bodyguard closest to Endymion, standing just to his left, took a little quarter-step towards him.
"Calm down, Your Highness," Beryl said. "You might be High King on your world, but on this ship, you're just a visitor."
Endymion winced, scoffing over towards the bodyguard who was trying to menace him. "That was my father you killed," he said quietly.
"Family's overrated," Beryl said dismissively. "Particularly when they want you locked in a cell for the rest of your life. He put you in that cell up there, I got you out, and made sure he can't do it again."
"You expect me to thank you?!" Endymion said, practically quaking with rage. Behind him, Kunzite was practically paralyzed with indecision, well aware that this was a powder keg but completely unable to even imagine a plan to defuse it.
"You probably should," Beryl said smugly. "Do you know how hard what I just pulled off was? How much I had to put my body through, channeling all that imperium? Hopping through hundreds of different minds on The Savery, trying to find the exact right chain of events to cause a prison riot? There hasn't been a damn prison riot on that station, ever! Not one that lasted more than two secundas. Not a single escape, until today." She gave Endymion a hard glare. "I burned through enough imperium today to power your capital city for a week. It's a miracle I'm not in a coma." She huffed. "And I will be compensated."
Endymion's face wrinkled.
"I've already decided the terms." She slowly approached him, weaving past her bodyguards, the bottom end of her staff clicking on the floor every couple steps. "They're not negotiable, and they're fair in light of what I just managed to pull off."
"If you—"
"If I don't get what I want, I will beat it out of you and your general," Beryl warned, getting just a few steps away from the seething High King. "And I assure you, I'm more than capable of making the prison cell I just sprung you out of look like paradise." She squared her stance up towards him, the air between them practically turning red with hostility. "Obviously, you've chosen to leave the imperium business. But, you've still got the raw supply. If you had sold it, or gotten rid of it, it would have popped up somewhere by now. But there hasn't been any new pure product in some time." She pointed her staff at him. "Whatever you have left, give it up."
Kunzite quickly stepped in. "There isn't any left, that's why we quit," he stated plainly. "We can—"
"I don't recall talking to you," Beryl hissed, glancing up at the white-haired general for a beat before going back to Endymion. "You wouldn't have tossed your imperium around so flippantly if that was all you had, so don't even try that. Whatever you have left, you hand it over." She took a few more rapid steps up to Endymion, seemingly unafraid of the obviously infuriated royal. "That's the price for you getting to leave. It's the right thing to do and you know it."
Endymion continued to simmer with rage, now close enough to reach out and strike Beryl if he so chose. But even in his compromised state, he knew better, with so many of Beryl's men standing around him, and her own abilities that even he did not know the scope of. So, he just stood there. However, as he stood there, his mind was working overtime, gears turning hard in his head.
"Endymion?" Beryl asked. "Come on now. If you're not using it, then you may as well give it to someone who will."
"I don't know where it is," Endymion said slowly. "I never knew."
Beryl chuckled. "I thought you might try to lie your way out, but I didn't expect something that pathetic."
"The raw imperium was kept on a freighter ship. The ship never stops moving. It's on autopilot, following a course determined by an equation. And I don't know the equation," Endymion explained, sounding so calm it was almost off putting given what had just happened to him. "I never knew it."
"Your Highness!" Kunzite hissed.
"Only one person in the universe knows it," he continued. "And it won't do you any good either. You need the formula to synthesize it. And someone who knows the process inside and out. Or else you'll lose most of the efficiency."
"Look, you can say whatever you want to say, you're not leaving this ship until I get what I want." Beryl scowled, clearly starting to lose her patience.
"Oh, don't worry. Everything you want is right behind me."
Slowly, the High King of Earth turned around, then raised his right hand up to point over at Kunzite. The Earth General looked horrified, slowly starting to realize what Endymion was going to do.
"W-wait a minute!" Kunzite said, shiftily looking around at the surrounding bodyguards.
"He knows where the raw product is. And he's been synthesizing it for years. He knows the formula and process as well as anyone in the universe. If you want to actually use that imperium, or sell it, you'll need him." Endymion turned back towards Beryl, robotically dropping his arm back to his side. "So take it up with him."
Beryl pursed her lips, looking almost amused now. "So…what? You're giving him to me?"
"I-If you think I'm helping a known terrorist make so much as a single cred, you've got another thing coming!" Kunzite interjected.
"He's all yours," Endymion snarled. "He'll take you right to it. And if you give him the right equipment and materials, he'll make you all the refined product you could ever want."
"He doesn't sound too enthusiastic about it," Beryl pointed out, glancing over Endymion's shoulder towards Kunzite.
"Well. I guess you'll just have to convince him," Endymion answered coldly.
Quick as a flash, Kunzite pulled a small firearm off of his hip and brought it up to bear in front of him, pointing it towards the nearest of Beryl's henchmen. This immediately prompted all twelve of Beryl's men to draw their own firearms, showcasing exactly how hopeless Kunzite's current situation was. "Absolutely not!" Kunzite growled.
"Thought you'd be smarter than that," Beryl said mockingly. "You think you're shooting your way out of this one?" She scoffed. "Earth's finest."
"Put it down, buddy," one of the henchmen ordered. "If this turns into a shootout, Royal Highness over there's definitely getting caught in the crossfire."
Kunzite gave Endymion's back the quickest of glances, then returned his focus back to the nearest bodyguard.
"My, my. Trouble in paradise," Beryl mused. "A High King willing to hand his General over into slavery, and a General who doesn't mind letting his High King die."
Kunzite's shoulders slacked a bit, and then he gradually lowered the silver pistol back to his side, acknowledging that his foes were correct in their assessment. With a frustrated grimace, he tossed the weapon to the side.
"So." Beryl looked back to Endymion. "You hand over your General, and you get to leave. That's what you're proposing?"
Endymion paused for a moment, then slowly nodded. "He's all yours."
She extended her right hand out towards the High King slowly. With some degree of hesitancy, Endymion put his own right hand out, taking the powerful psychic's appendage and shaking it.
Kunzite, while unable to keep himself from glaring at the back of Endymion's head, slowly put his hands up behind his head in surrender. There wasn't any other way for him to make it out of here in one piece, and if he had to sacrifice himself for the sake of his charge, then that was part of the job. After taking a couple moments to think it through, this was the only thing that made sense. He could always be rescued later.
A few of the bodyguards closed in on Kunzite, roughly grabbing his elbows and forcing him the rest of the way down the ship's ramp. Kunzite went willingly, eyes still glued to the back of Endymion's head, wishing that he could have had even a secunda back in the ship to discuss a plan with him before this encounter. The white-haired Earth General was led several paces away, when Endymion finally spoke up.
"Wait."
Beryl quickly raised her right hand up towards the four bodyguards who were escorting Kunzite away, getting them all to immediately stop. Endymion slowly turned around, approaching the quintet. Kunzite, his gut instincts still telling him that this situation wasn't as scientific as he was hoping, just watched the High King carefully.
Endymion stopped two paces away from the small crowd, staring at Kunzite.
"I watched Venus die."
If Kunzite was to make a list of things he expected Endymion to say, the list would have had to get up to several million entries before he would have gotten to that. His eyes widened and his mouth opened the tiniest slivers, even his remarkably sharp mind taking some time to process this statement.
"I was there. And I watched her die," he continued in a cold monotone. "It wasn't Aphrodite. It was me. I poisoned her, and I watched her drown in her own blood in the middle of nowhere on Uranus."
Kunzite's mouth dropped open a tiny bit more, as a dawning realization started to hit him. This wasn't just a ploy so he could escape Beryl's clutches and attempt a later rescue.
"I had the antidote in my pocket," he added. "I could have saved her. Even to the very end, I could have saved her. But I didn't."
There were many things going through Kunzite's mind. But the first thing to take over was his survival instinct. Quick as a flash, he took a rapid step towards Endymion, closing the distance between one of the escorting bodyguards, and decked him right in the side of the head. Trying to quickly break out of the circle of henchmen he was trapped within, he quickly lifted up the stunned guard and tossed him to his left, towards his nearby associates.
"Oh, for the love of—" Beryl groaned as all twelve of her present bodyguards quickly converged on Kunzite. "The hell do I pay you guys for?!"
Despite the initial concentration breakdown that allowed Kunzite the chance to do a little damage, he was ultimately outnumbered beyond even his ability to overcome. A wayward haymaker from his fist did manage to connect with the first man who charged him, but quickly, he was surrounded, and found himself on the receiving end of a myriad of vicious smacks from the butt ends of plasma rifles. Each one generated a wince-worthy thud and grunt from Kunzite, and before long he was overwhelmed by the team attack and went down.
"Don't kill him!" Beryl yelled over the repeated sounds of metal slamming down on flesh and bone. "Maybe none of you were listening just now, but we need him alive."
The beatings came to a quick halt, Kunzite making no move to get back up, knowing that it was over. With the adrenaline rush subsiding, he just stared over towards Endymion, expression of confusion, and perhaps even hurt.
"Well. I can't even begin to imagine what happened between you two," Beryl mused as her henchmen forced Kunzite up to his feet and started dragging him off. "And I can't imagine you're in the mood to talk about it. So, are we square?"
Endymion didn't turn his head at all, still glaring at the crowd of large men that were pulling Kunzite away, offering no indication that he had even heard Beryl.
"Endy!" Beryl said, finally getting his attention in the form of a sideways glance. "Come on, now. I can tell it's been a hard day for you. But I need to hear you say it before you leave. I just pulled off one hell of a trick to spring you from The Savery, so I think I'm entitled to hearing you say we're on good terms before I let you go."
"Sure," Endymion grunted in a low voice. "Just…whenever you're done with him. Get rid of him for me."
Beryl's eyes widened a tad, and she gave a little chuckle. "Wow. That mean what I think it means?"
"Yeah," Endymion said.
"Alright." Beryl casually walked past Endymion airily. "You can leave. Play your cards right, move quickly, and you'll be back in the good graces of the galaxy in a matter of days."
As if suddenly reminded that time was of the essence, Endymion quickly dashed for the entrance ramp of The Falconeri, forcing himself to stop thinking about the unbridled rage and sorrow he had been through over the last few minutas, and turn his focus to damage control.
He sprinted up the entrance ramp to Kunzite's ship, beelining straight for the cockpit, stamping his finger down hard on the ignition button before he had even hit the pilot seat. Before The Falconeri had even started to levitate off the ground of the dock, he already knew his first move.
"
Queen Serenity wasn't sure how long she had been sitting on the edge of her bed, eyes wide as the full moon, mouth covered by her hand. She didn't know what else to do. It was far too much information to process all at once. She was paralysed by all the things that had happened in tandem with all the things that may have also happened, implied by the things that had happened.
The hologram projector on the table in front of her was displaying The Savery space station, a cube-shaped structure that looked completely normal externally, giving no indication of the supposed chaos within. The young Queen had been glued to the endless stream of reports coming out about the riot in the prison that had forced an evacuation, and had, somehow, not been suppressed by the army of guards stationed on board. Only now were reinforcements starting to take control of the station back, and there was still so much that was unknown about the situation. However, it was clear from the reports that hundreds were dead, and Endymion had not been among those evacuated. How such a large oversight could have been made, Serenity couldn't imagine, but at the moment, she was left to assume the worst.
And then, you had the other major breaking news of the day, and it was difficult to determine which one was more distressing. For as much as the possibility of losing her husband was alarming, she already knew for a fact that her father-in-law had just been disintegrated in a massive eruption.
It was a lot to take in all at once. She hadn't even been able to cry yet, because it just didn't feel real. For her to lose two of the most important men in her life at effectively the same time wasn't believable. Plus, regardless of her pessimism, it was far from confirmed if Endymion was actually dead, which left her more in a state of limbo. She couldn't even begin to try to process the cause behind everything, it was going to be quite some time before she could think about that.
As the hologram changed, morphing instead to a detailed projection of the massive crater in the surface of Mercury that had resulted from the eruption of energy, it finally occurred to her that this was probably a very bad time to be ignoring her communicator disc. She jumped up and quickly dashed around her bed, up towards the table next to the pillow. She could see the indicator lights around the rim blinking even before she got there.
Just as she was scooping the device up in her small hands, a dull hum caught her attention, and she spun around to look out the massive windows of the Earth Palace's master bedroom. A Class A starship was right outside the balcony window, hovering in midair just a few paces away from the handrail around the balcony.
She gasped. In her current mental state, she was inclined to assume anything that happened out of the ordinary was bad, so she quickly darted towards the center of the room. Chibiusa was asleep in her crib over in the far corner, so her first priority was to collect her. Halfway to her crib, however, Serenity threw a quick glance up towards the starship, and this time recognized the exterior as Kunzite's ship.
Still hovering in midair in the same place, the back ramp of The Falconeri fell open. Serenity watched in shock as Endymion appeared, jogging out onto the ramp and making the short jump down to the ledge.
Serenity unfroze and ran forward towards the glass balcony door, coming up to it just about the same time her husband did. She roughly twisted the lock and pushed it open.
"Endy, what's going on?!" Serenity gasped, quickly stepping back out of the way as he brusquely pushed his way past her.
"We need to get out of here, right now," he said, The Falconeri descending down to ground level behind him. "Get some things together, enough for a few days, I don't know how long it's going to take for me to make a deal."
"Make a…Endy, do you know what's been happening?!" Serenity gestured towards the holographic projector on the table, still displaying the giant crater in the surface of Mercury.
"Yes, and that's why we need to go!" he enthused, marching across the room towards the closet. "The next few days are going to be crucial to our continued survival and freedom, get Chibiusa ready and think about what you're going to need to last on board a Class A ship for a few days!" He practically punched the closet door open, swinging it wildly on its hinges.
"Endy, wait, how are you here?!" Serenity sprinted up behind her husband. "W…did they let you go?"
"Serenity, I need you to focus!" Endymion hissed, barely giving her a quick glance back before ripping a few simple tunics off the nearest wall inside the closet and draping them over his shoulder. "I'm calling The Bastion up to the balcony, we're getting on it now, and we're not coming back until I've settled with the agency!"
"S…settled?!" Serenity put her hands out to her sides. "Endymion, I…your father—"
"I know!" Endymion grunted, gritting his teeth down hard as he quickly glanced over the massive closet again, trying to make some quick conclusions on what was worth taking with him. "Serenity, I know everything that's happened, and I know it's awful, and I know it's way too much to digest all in one day, but right now, we have to go somewhere where I can negotiate from a position of leverage!"
"Uh…" Serenity was still so frazzled, trying so very hard to keep up, she wasn't even sure where to start. "Endy, wait, how…what do you mean, negotiate? What happened?!"
"Serenity, I promise I will explain everything as soon as we're out of here," Endymion said. "A lot has happened, and I will give you the truth, but we are not safe right now!" He went over to the near right corner of the closet and yanked a large luggage container out of a row of identical ones, kicking the lid open and dumping the tunics on his shoulder into it.
"W-we're in the royal palace, how are we not safe here?" Serenity asked, slowly starting to calm down, getting herself into a state where she could actually work through logic in a stable and controlled manner. "That doesn't—"
"The agency is probably in the process of getting The Savery under control right now, as soon as they realize I got out they're going to make assumptions." Endymion ripped a few blouses off a set of hooks. "If they know we're here, who knows what they'd do. We need to hide out and open up a line of communication with them, it's the only way to ensure I'll have a chance to explain what happened."
"A…assumptions?" Serenity repeated.
"Serenity, please!" Endymion tossed the blouses into the luggage container. "We don't have time, they might be coming here right now!"
As Endymion pushed past Serenity back out into the master bedroom, moving frenetically, Serenity found herself uninterested in being swept into his chaos. Instead, her eyes were drawn back to the hologram projector on the table by the bed. Still displaying that large, ugly crater in Mercury's surface for a couple beats, it picked that moment to flick back to The Savery.
"Endymion, you…how did you get out?" she asked. "They wouldn't just let you go, I don't…I don't understand. K-Kunzite had just left to meet with you when this started."
Endymion, however, had sprinted over to his bedside table and yanked the drawer open, quickly scooping some of the contents into his cupped hands and shoving them into his pockets. She wasn't sure exactly what he was taking, as she had her focus taken back to the hologram of The Savery yet again.
"Endymion, did…you escaped, didn't you?" she said slowly, looking back towards him. The High King had just finished ransacking the drawer and was a few steps into running over into the far corner towards Chibiusa's crib. "You escaped The Savery."
"N-No!" Endymion protested. "W-Well, I mean…yes, but…I…I had to get out of there, there was…we'll do this later!" He quickly closed the remaining distance between him and his half-asleep daughter.
Serenity, mouth hanging half-open, glared at Endymion's back, the pieces slowly slotting together in her mind. "Endymion." She slowly put her right hand out towards him. "Stop."
Endymion delicately lifted Chibiusa out of the crib, transferring her to a bassinet at the foot of the fenced bed, laying the small girl back into the cushioned interior of the carrier. "It's okay, sweetie, we're going somewhere together for a little while."
"Endymion," Serenity repeated. "What happened? I'm not going anywhere until you tell me what happened."
Endymion heaved out a labored, huffing sigh, grabbing the handle of Chibiusa's bassinet and lifting it up. "Serenity, we don't—"
"You…you did this. Didn't you?" she asked in a cold deadpan. "You…you did all that. All that, to get out."
"N-No!" Endymion protested, taking a couple steps with Chibiusa before setting her back down on the carpet. "Serenity, I had nothing to do with any of that!" Behind him, The Bastion had settled into a stationary hover just off the balcony, back ramp hanging open just above the railing. Endymion quickly covered the ground between him and his wife. "Serenity, I will explain everything once we're safe, but I got out of there because I had to, the place was getting torn apart!"
"Yeah." She blinked a few times as Endymion stopped in front of her. "Because of you." She pointed her right index finger at him. "You did it. You did all that, so you could get out." She paused for a few seconds. "And…and then, you killed him."
"W-What, NO!" Endymion immediately snapped, looking horrified. "Serenity, of…you know I wouldn't, why would I…no, I wouldn't! I didn't! I…I did everything I could to keep him safe! I tried to save him!"
Serenity blinked a few times rapidly. "S…Save him?"
Endymion squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. "I…I can explain everything, I will as soon as we're safe, but I did not kill my father! Now, please, get whatever you need, and get in the ship!" With that, he turned back around and sprinted over towards Chibiusa.
Serenity just stood there, stock still, observing her husband quickly shuttling over to the back door. No matter what Endymion had to say, no matter how many rushed assurances he offered, she found herself with absolutely no desire to so much as grab a single item, much less go anywhere near his ship. Quite the opposite, actually.
So, she slowly started walking over towards the right bedside table, perhaps looking enough like she was actually listening to her husband to get him to stop berating her. Slowly, the weight of her accusation started to hit her. She had said it with no emotion somehow, no real weight behind it, as if they were just random words strung together. But, saying it over and over again in her mind, the thought of Endymion crossing that final line, and working to have his father assassinated, was starting to really dawn on her. And her flat, emotionless expression was pulled into that of a fierce scowl.
Endymion still rushing back and forth behind her, she got up to her bedside table, grabbing her communicator disc. Slowly, with shaky fingers, she started moving the dials around the rim. After several beats, Endymion still scrambling around behind her, she had the disc set properly, and pushed her thumb down on the center button. Additionally, she pushed a tiny little switch along the rim, prompting a tiny little red light on the top of the disc to light up. Delicately, she set the disc down on the end table.
"I c-can beat this," Endymion muttered to himself as he neurotically darted back and forth across the room, at this point not even really accomplishing any actual gathering of items. "There'll be records somewhere, someone must have made a record of what I said before the riot broke out, it'd make no sense for me to have anything to do with all that." It wasn't clear if he was trying to convince Serenity, or himself, but the young Queen was hardly paying attention anyway. "Y-Yeah, it makes no sense." He sighed, standing straight up and looking around the giant room one last time. "Anything else?!" he asked loudly. "Anything you won't want the agency to get their hands on, Serenity? Think hard, I don't know how far they'll go."
He gave her maybe two beats before nodding and marching back towards the balcony door. "Alright, let's get out of here, by the time we get notified of the agency's approach it's probably too late."
Serenity didn't budge, however, back still turned to him, stoically rooted to the spot. Glancing down on the table where the active communicator was, her gaze suddenly fell on a silver knife with a golden handle, neatly laying atop a couple display rods on the corner of the table furthest from the bed. Lifetimes ago, it had been a gift from Princess Venus, on the day her marriage to Endymion had been announced. To her knowledge, it had only been used once, when she utilized it to fake a suicide attempt. Swallowing down hard, she straightened herself back up.
"Serenity?" Endymion said questioningly, still on the other side of the room from her based on his voice. She still hadn't even turned to look at him. "We have to go, now!"
He waited, but quickly started moving towards her, an urgency that Serenity could detect even without looking at him. "Serenity, what's wrong?! Is something missing?!"
"I'm not leaving, Endymion," she said, stilted and overly-loud in her delivery, wanting to make sure her communicator could hear her clearly. "I'm…I'm not going anywhere with you. Endymion."
Endymion sighed. "Serenity, I've been very clear, things are going to be very difficult for the next couple days, we can't be here. There might be an army of agency enforcers headed here right now, we need to stay on the move!"
Serenity nervously shifted her weight back and forth, then twisted her head to look over her shoulder at him. "N-No." She had no skill for situations like this, and so had no idea how to properly stall him. "I'm…I'm staying here. In the master bedroom of the Earth Palace, Endymion."
Endymion gave her a wrinkled, confused look, even wasting a couple precious beats staring at her. "S-Serenity, this isn't an optional thing. We leave, or we get arrested."
"I'm not going anywhere with you," Serenity said stiffly. "And that's that."
Endymion scoffed. "Serenity, is…listen, I need you to be rational right now, I did not have anything to do with what happened to my father! I have no reason, and I wouldn't—"
"Endymion, I…get out," she said, stumbling over her words, fighting to not glance over towards the communicator disc she had set up. "I…I want you to leave. Get out."
"Okay, that's enough," Endymion said sternly, stalking towards her. "We don't have time for—"
Quick as a flash, Serenity grabbed the handle of the knife, spinning around towards her husband and holding it out towards him. Acting entirely on rage-fueled instinct, she crouched down slightly into what could be roughly construed as a combative stance. "Endymion, get out, now!"
Endymion was temporarily frozen by shock. It quickly passed, however, and he found himself tempted to laugh for the first time in many days. He would have, had his emotions not already been so frayed by the events of the last few minutas. "Serenity. You can't possibly be serious right now."
"I am!" Serenity hissed. She was even more out of her element now. "Endymion, I mean it! You get away from me!"
Endymion couldn't stop himself from rolling his eyes. "Okay, put that thing down," he said dismissively, closing the few steps between him and her with a few long strides, hand held out towards her. "We're—"
"Get OUT!" Serenity snapped, slashing the silver blade forward towards Endymion's hand.
It was a messy and telegraphed attack, something that even someone like the High King should have easily been able to avoid. But he was so completely convinced that Serenity wouldn't actually be able to do it, found the mere concept of it so ridiculous, that he paid the weapon no mind as he approached her. So, the blade, sharp and dangerous despite the item being largely decorative and having sat mostly idle for years on Serenity's bedside table, slashed right into his palm, gouging a significant cut across the flesh. With a surprised gasp, Endymion pulled his hand back as blood started to flow from the opened wound.
A horrified look on his face, Endymion stared down at the large gash across his palm, the entire opening seeping blood already. He was so shocked, he barely even felt the pain of the slash. As his blood started to drip down to the carpet, he slowly looked up at Serenity, in disbelief that she had actually attacked him. She looked rather surprised herself, staring at the bloodied tip of the knife for a moment. Air thick with tension, husband and wife staring at each other, Serenity eventually awkwardly lunged towards him, knife held up high over her head. This time, Endymion knew better than to assume anything, and used his uninjured hand to grab her wrist.
It was a trivial matter to jerk her hand back and force her to release the weapon, sending it clattering behind the Earth Queen, against the wall, and to the floor. He tossed her down to the floor next to him, away from where the knife had landed, easily able to take full control of the confrontation with her now disarmed.
"Ugh!" Serenity grunted on hitting the floor. Quickly, she twisted herself around to look up at Endymion with a hateful glare.
Endymion, for his part, still looked absolutely shocked and horrified, eyes darting back down to his open palm wound, then back to his wife. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" he asked, voice thick with genuine sad surprise.
And then, Serenity slipped up. With a glance towards her bedside table that the High King was able to pick up on, Endymion followed her gaze over towards her communicator disc, which he now realized had an active red light atop it. Quickly approaching it, a snapping glance paid towards his wife on the way, he grabbed the disc, immediately stabbing a button on the bottom of it with his un-injured hand.
A short collection of data appeared right above the disc in hologram form, just a few lines of simple text. The top one made his eyes pop wide and jaw flap open.
CONNECTED: GALACTIC IMPERIUM AGENCY EMERGENCY HOTLINE
The moment he saw that, he stabbed the top button on the disc, ending the call, but he knew the damage had been done many times over. He stared down at Serenity, who was just now starting to gather herself back to her feet. "How long had that call been connected?!"
She didn't answer, getting herself to her knees, still affixing him with a hateful glare that seemed to threaten to shatter her face.
"Serenity," Endymion said, disbelief strongly coloring his expression. "Don't you remember? If…Serenity, if I get caught, then…then we lose everything! Do you have any idea what you've done?! You've led them right here, they're probably a few secundas away!"
"Of course…of course I remember," Serenity said darkly, still not getting upright yet, huddled up on the floor on her knees, not used to being tossed around in physical fights like this, even if it was a relatively benign takedown.
"The Kingdom, the palace, everything, we lose everything if this happens, don't you understand that?! All of it goes, what are you thinking?!"
"I…I don't care," she said, her voice starting to shake a bit as she got herself up to one knee. "I don't care anymore."
"Serenity, you…" he gestured towards the disc he had absentmindedly dropped to the floor at his feet. "...why, you think I…Serenity!"
"You…you can't…you can't keep getting away with it," Serenity said maliciously, looking up towards Endymion, scowling deeply. "I don't care what happens to me, the Kingdom, the Moon, but…you can't keep getting away with it."
There was no hysteria in that statement. She hadn't screamed it or said it through a deluge of tears. Nothing that indicated she had acted in the heat of the moment and was now regretting her actions, or that the consequences of what she was doing had just dawned on her and now she was going to work to undo them. That little warble in her voice was definitely loaded with an obvious rage, but that did nothing to detract from the clear resolve that she had in this moment. Even knowing the likely effect it would have on her, she wasn't being moved.
Endymion felt like he had suddenly developed a sixth sense and could feel the presence of agency ships closing in on the Earth Palace, breaching the atmosphere of the planet and beginning a full-on assault on the massive structure. His brain was pulsing with alarms, aware that every single beat brought him one step closer to a lifetime spent on board The Savery. Closing his mouth, steeling his resolve, Endymion forced himself to accept what he had lost. Clenching his hand down hard on the still-bleeding wound on his palm, he turned away from his wife and marched towards the door out to the balcony.
Serenity tracked him across the carpet with her eyes for the briefest of moments, but then scrambled up to her feet with an audible gasp, scowl melting off her face as she realized that Chibiusa was still buckled into her carrier right by the door.
Endymion had a head start, and had longer strides, so his quickened gait easily got to the door first. Without hesitation, he grabbed the handle of the baby carrier with his right hand as he walked past it.
"No no NO!" Serenity snapped, sprinting towards Endymion as he pushed the door open, throwing herself into him and trying to reach around his body to grab the carrier. "Endymion, you—"
He brusquely pushed her off of him with his bloodied hand, easily tossing her off despite her best efforts to latch onto him. She fell to the carpet heavily, and without so much as a look cast back towards her, he marched out onto the balcony.
"Endymion, NO!" Serenity screamed, barely even hitting the floor before she quickly got back up, moving with an animalistic urgency in pursuit of her husband and daughter. However, those precious few beats had been all he needed, and the High King was using the balcony rail as a step to get up to the entry ramp of The Bastion, still hovering there just above the deck.
"Endymion, you—" Serenity continued, her look of absolute terror and panicked tone betraying that she knew she had already lost. With a little hop, Endymion was up on the open rear hatch of his ship, and quickly disappeared inside the vessel, Chibiusa in tow. Before she could even get halfway across the deck, the back door of the starship slammed closed. "ENDYMION!"
The Bastion zipped away from the balcony, dashing whatever wild ideas Serenity may have had of jumping onto the outside of the hull, as she ran up to the rail. Gripping the protective banister tightly, knuckles turning white as she helplessly watched the Class A ship turn upwards towards the sky, she could only stare in horror as the back thrusters engaged, sending the vessel rocketing up, quickly out of sight.
She didn't even have the breath to even vocalize her distress anymore, just staring at where The Bastion had been just beats ago, mouth hanging open and eyes wide as dinner plates. Every couple beats, a little whining whimper came from her tight throat, but she was otherwise eerily silent, far too scared to even begin to figure out what she should be doing now.