Morkenin paces, sheave in hand, one finger resting gently upon her lips in an unaccustomed gesture of contemplation.
"I intended to grace your Majesty these prisoners..." Night begins in his most obsequious tone, head bowed yet eyes glittering with anticipation.
"Shut up," Jupiter hisses, disrupting his interruption of Morkenin's discovery.
"Tersis!" he whips around on her, ready to retaliate her tone in kind. "Never..."
"Yes," Morkenin says sidelong, forceful even amidst her distraction, waving a dismissive hand at the little man, "as she said." Night's mouth snaps shut, and he bows lower, glaring with new, chilling fury at Jupiter.
"Of course, your Majesties." His voice drips with barely concealed irony, his sense of control over the situation slipping away. He back slowly, as if aiming for the shadows, but even so preoccupied, Morkenin flicks a finger to her attendant sims, and with a quick thunder of boot falls, a dozen android bodies step behind him, blocking any thought he might have of quick escape. Morkenin turns, a question almost blossoming on her face, when another voice addresses her from within. Balancing the sheave in her palm, as if balancing some delicate future, she lifts her free hand, and traces the tiny node along her neck.
"Your Majesty," the calm, steady voice of a distant sim whispers along the communication nub, "the Aegis ships have completed the neutral triatory. They await your review and signal of approval."
"The Abrasax clipper has yet to arrive," Morkenin replies to the air, then raises her head with something akin to a long suffering sigh. "Predictable, allowing the the insecurities of youth to lead one down the path of such vain abuses of newfound power." She cants her head, touching the node once more to become engulfed within a shimmering wash of stars. "If not the Abrasax Interim Sovereign herself, then whose ship do I note their presence?" Morkenin remarks with rising chill, nodding her head in response to the chart glittering all about her which only she can see.
"A medium class lightship," explains the distant voice, "not registered to her Majesty, Kalique Abrasax, Interim First Prime of the House Abrasax."
"Battle capable?" she asks rapidly, long accustomed to evaluating danger.
"Light armament only." She relaxes with a slight bob of her shoulders.
"A luxury yacht? Registered to whom?"
"His late Majesty, the lamented Balem Abrasax." With one lift of her eyebrow, Morkenin turns to Mr. Night where he remains with his head slightly bowed. Felicia squirms beneath the royal's examination.
"Balem, is it?"
"Caine!" Jupiter whispers under her breath even as Morkenin's lips twist ruefully. Foregoing her attempts at regal posturing, she blurts out "My family!" Morkenin turns a baleful eye to Jupiter's outburst. "Please, let me speak to them!"
"The lycantant?" Night mutters, his eyes red with suppressed fury. "Will I ever be free of this thorn? I should have ripped his throat out along with that buffoon of an entitled."
"What?" Jupiter stops and stares, turning what she thinks she just heard over in her mind. After the momentary silence, Night shivers, realizing what cat he just let out of the bag. "Ripped his throat?" Her brows contract in thought. "Back there, you said," she mulled over her words, "blanking works on splices, too." Her eyes widen with shock and growing fury. "You! It was you, all along! But why?"
"What did he do?" Kiza asks. "Wait, Caine was sent to the deadlands for just that."
"You," Gemma swivels around on Bob's back to surmise, "framed Caine." Kiza's face first falls aghast, then tightens with a savage glee.
"Caine will have your heart for this," she whispers.
"Why?" Jupiter demands, stepping straight into Night's face, grasping his collar in her fist. Her voice shakes as she pulls him closer. "Why would you do that?" Night's eyes slide sideways and he holds his bitter silence. Kiza also steps up, but her fist is raised, promise to make real her threat written in the violence of her stance. Bob's eyes are wide with fright. Gemma calmly looks away.
Night shudders beneath Jupiter's steel grip, making one vain attempt to loose himself and retrieve his dignity, but before he might broke any answer, Morkenin fills the emptiness.
"You certainly know how to make friends," she says with a sly, cool glance. Kiza's fist falters, and Jupiter steps back, chagrined. Night lifts his chin with a twist of his neck. "What better way to play the mighty Abrasax heirs against one another?" Morkenin's lips thin to a feral grin. "A trick you learned from me, I think. Following all possible lineages, testing any potential offspring."
"How does Caine framing Caine for murder have anything to do with me?" Morkenin strides a few, slow steps towards Jupiter, almost running a long, supple finger beneath Jupiter's jutting chin.
"He was waiting, you see, for you, Ms. Jones."
"For Jupiter?" Kiza asks.
"For one like her. The splice thinks to play a long game."
"Framing an Aegis legionnaire is a capital offense," Gemma remarks.
Chickanery sinks into thought, but even as he formulates some slippery defense, a chime echoes through the elegant receiving chamber.
Many a head snaps up, Morkenin, Jupiter, Kiza, Night.
Even as the blue pool begins to sputter and fade to black while the Aegis ships attempt to disengage, with a slide of her finger along her neck, Morkenin rapidly switches the view out into the spray of stars to where what was, just seconds before, empty space. Dozens of blue lights flare as ships portal nearby, then fade beneath their cloaking shields. The view shifts, more blue flares, and shifts again. They are surrounded.
"An ill advised attack. Compatriots of yours?" Morkenin asks Jupiter with a sidelong glower to hide her own thrill of fear.
"Not mine," Jupiter denies strongly, pointing to the sheave. "I came to you because of that, nothing else."
"You did make that address," Bob interjects.
"Not now Bob," Kiza pops a hand over his mouth, rapidly scanning the rebel force growing before their eyes.
Ignoring her uninvited guests in an instant, Morkenin begins barking commands to the beat of her pacing footfalls.
"Release the defensive field. Warm the canons. Prep any necessary life pods."
Somewhere, everywhere, from the ship, a vibration, a thrumming, indicates a mighty movement. From both sides of the now bristling celestial swan, a thick black haze streams forth, spreading like oil, flowing and surrounding the white ship in a hazy gray cocoon. Jupiter and Kiza pass each other a questioning glance.
"War hammers?" Night remarks with a mix of anticipation, concern, and relief. Anticipation, because this is the culmination of his efforts at rebellion, after all. Concern, because he is currently aboard an enemy target. Relief, because he believes in the might of a field of war hammers to protect them. Few pilots had the crazy skill of Stinger Apini, and the determination of Cain Wise, after all. But there was the matter of the second, far less protected entitled ship.
"My family is out there!" She rounds on Night. "Call them off!" But Night glances again at the protective field, and offers Jupiter only his most sly voice.
"If only I could reach them," he smirks. "But her Majesty has blocked all my communications, as surely as she confiscated our weapons." Jupiter can only gape as he turns back to the view hanging above them, his eyes alight as blue bursts begin to flare from every direction.
"Let them in!" Jupiter beseeches Morkenin. When she does not respond, lost in her own preparations, Jupiter leaps forward, grasping her arm, heedless of the multiple weapons instantly aimed in her direction, she forces Morkenin's attention. "Please, you must help them!"
"Because of this?" Morkenin lifts the sheave, considering. Jupiter's face falls, her eyes pleading, her hands clasped before her in dread. Morkenin turns her back to Jupiter, speaking softly over her shoulder. "I've relayed coordinates. That's all I can do. The rest is up to them."