Chapter 20

A/N: I have made some changes to Chapter 19—mainly near the end—before publishing this chapter, so if the last time you read Chapter 19 was prior to the release of this chapter (June 26, 2016), please go back and reread the last scene of Chapter 19. The events of this chapter will not make much sense otherwise.

Unnamed Planetoid

2 Epombria, 1 Xenia

"What is the meaning of this?" Xenia exclaimed.

"Isn't it obvious, Your Highness?" Caligo sneered. "Those treacherous Astos have no sense of honor! Princess Regent Xenia, on the cusp of officially taking power as Queen Xenia, and Duke Caligo Prove, leader of the Choron Alliance, off-planet and all together in one place? Why, you just handed them the reins of government on a silver platter!

"Of course, Rutilius is a politician, not a strategist. Hired bodyguards versus three sets of guards? His half-baked scheme fell to pieces, and as your distraught cousin takes the throne in place of the late Princess Xenia, his first priority will be to dismantle the whole treacherous cabal known as the Astos Coalition." Caligo chuckled at his own perceived brilliance.

"I must admit, yesterday's meeting derailed my plans quite significantly. Originally, I had wanted to try marrying you, with a number of … 'accidents' planned for you and your son if that didn't work out. Nomos sarki was just a last-ditch effort to keep you off the throne; I hadn't expected that Spectra would actually have solid proof that Zenoheld was dead. Waiting a year as regent would have been a small price to pay for becoming king in the end—and I wouldn't have had to kill you, either. So in a sense, Spectra did betray you, albeit unwittingly. By keeping the evidence, we now end up off-planet, and you'll soon face your end in space like Zenoheld. I'll be king, and no one on Vestal will be any the wiser."

"As if the people would believe your lies!" Rutilius retorted from behind the duke.

"Why shouldn't they?" Caligo replied, not even turning around to look him in the eye. "It's not as if you will survive to say any different."

"Even if you kill Xenia, Demophilus yet lives," Hierophanus said, "while your only heir is in parts unknown. And as High Archon, I have every right to dispense justice against a regicide."

Caligo shooed away an insect buzzing by his ear. "Both are true. However, it also happened that Rutilius was working in league with Spectra, who was disenchanted with the entire Royal Family. Through his connections as a Vexos, Spectra had a mole among the royal guard, ready to inform his sympathizers when the Vestal government was at its weakest so they could rise up and storm the summer palace."

"No," Xenia gasped.

"How dare you sully Master Spectra's name!" Gus exclaimed.

"Of course, we will arrive in time to oust Spectra's sympathizers before they do too much damage, and I will make sure that Spectra is swiftly brought to justice for the murders of both your husband and your late son." Caligo cackled. "I wonder: at his funeral, should I refer to him as 'Margrave' or 'Prince Demophilus'?"

A rumbling sound shook the cave.

"Is that the Vestal Destroyer?" Hopla asked.

"You wish," Caligo said. "That would be the Siga, my flagship. I will have to have words with the captain; if he'd flown any closer to the Destroyer, the Siga would have been identified."

"So that disturbance on the way over…was your flagship?" asked Gus.

"Guilty as charged," Caligo said with a smirk. "I do so apologize for the rumbling flight.

"Guards, make sure that you bring Xenia's body back to the ship relatively intact. I'd like to avoid going through this rigmarole a second time. Do whatever you want with Rutilius." Almost as an afterthought, Caligo added, "Oh—and get rid of Hierophanus as well. Better not to leave any loose ends."

Before any of the guards could react, Caligo dematerialized, teleporting back to the Siga.

"Well, Your Highness, do you have any last words?" said one of the ducal guards.

"Huddle around Her Majesty!" Hopla commanded.

Xenia looked past the guards to Spectra, who nodded once. "I do," she said. "Gauntlet, Power Strike!"

There was a brief flash of light.

After the flash of light waned, Xenia's guards looked at their surroundings. The cave seemed…off, somehow, in a way that they couldn't describe. And the ducal guards…

"Why aren't Caligo's guards firing?" one of the guards asked.

Another approached one of Caligo's guards warily. The ducal guard didn't even flinch. "It's like they've been petrified."

"Nothing happened to the guards," came the reply from outside of the circle. Everyone turned towards Spectra, who also managed to avoid whatever afflicted the guards.

"What do you mean, 'nothing happened'? The guards are as still as statues!" the royal guard retorted.

"Nothing happened to the guards," Spectra repeated. "We're the ones who have been affected. Xenia and I just opened a Bakugan battlefield."

"So the rumors that Bakugan battles can stop time—"

"Were true," Spectra said. "Zenoheld may have had his faults, but he wasn't an idiot. But we don't have time to admire the scenery; the effects aren't permanent. Unless a Bakugan brawl is started within ten minutes, this pocket dimension will collapse, and time will resume flowing. I suggest that you find a way to get Her Majesty out of here before then."

"Why not use the Vestal Destroyer?" Hopla asked. "Can't she teleport Her Majesty out of here?"

"Unfortunately, the Destroyer is outside of the pocket dimension, so it can't affect us here."

"And Caligo's goons will start shooting once time starts up again," Hopla muttered darkly.

"I have an idea!" said one of the guards. "We can make a ladder for Her Majesty to climb over! She can then climb up and jump over Caligo's guards!"

"Excellent idea," said Xenia. "Guards, follow his lead."

The guard who came up with the idea went on his hands and knees, then gestured for his comrades to follow suit. One by one, each guard went on his hands and knees on the back of the guard under him or her, soon forming a living ladder for Xenia to climb over.

Once Hopla got on top, she said, "Hurry, Your Majesty! Time's running out!"

Xenia carefully climbed on top of the tower of Vestals, soon reaching Hopla's back. Spectra positioned himself on the other side of the ring of ducal and defector guards, ready to catch the queen.

Xenia jumped, causing the tower to collapse under her. She barely missed Spectra, but Spectra corrected his position just in time to break Xenia's fall.

After the two got up, Hopla yelled, "OK, she's safe! Now get out of here!"

When the flash of light waned, the first thing that Makhaira noticed was that Xenia was no longer in the middle of the circle.

The next thing he noticed was the sound of five of the ducal guards falling down dead, and as he turned his head, he saw Xenia's five guards rushing past the hole that the fallen guards left. Xenia herself was nowhere to be seen.

"What just happened?" Makhaira exclaimed. "Where's Xenia?"

"Why are you in such a rush?" said Rutilius.

"It's not like you can go anywhere," Hopla said.

In the confusion, Rutilius' bodyguards and Xenia's royal guards had formed a line between Caligo's followers and the cavern exit. The Temple guards, armed only with stun batons, stood between Caligo's followers and the remains of King Zenoheld. Hierophanus hid behind Dryoid's fist.

"I don't know what kind of voodoo Xenia managed to do, but it won't do any of you here a lick of good," Makhaira said. "Since the lapdog, the old man, and Rutilius are all unarmed, and since the Temple guards have no firearms, the odds are even: nine on nine. We can handle that."

"Look again, Makhaira," Hopla said. "There's barely any cover, Her Majesty is no longer your hostage, and even though the Temple guards have no firearms, they're yet another obstacle for you to deal with. You're still outnumbered. So I suggest that you just surrender."

"Surrender? Me, Makhaira Nytton, Captain of the Royal Guard, surrender to the likes of you? In your dreams.

"Guards, fi—!"

Makhaira collapsed before he could finish the sentence, having been felled by a stun baton. Immediately afterwards, a ducal guard fired at the brave Temple guardsman, killing him.

After that shot, complete pandemonium broke out.

Xenia's guards rushed at the line of Caligo's followers, wary of firing a shot lest it miss and possibly hit Zenoheld's corpse. Caligo's followers also went in for close-range combat, if only to gain more distance from the Temple guardsmen. For their part, the two remaining Temple guards stayed in place, focused on ensuring that no harm came to Hierophanus or the royal remains.

One of the defector guards had rushed straight for Hopla and threw a jab at her face. Hopla blocked the punch and countered with a jab of her own. The defector then aimed a kick between her legs, sending Hopla doubling over.

"I'm pretty sure that move wasn't taught in Guard training," Hopla wheezed.

"Doesn't matter, captain," the defector mocked. But before he could finish her off, a laser blast caught him in the head.

"Need help?" another guard said, this one with a hand extended towards Hopla.

"Thanks, uh…"

"Alexis," came the reply. He then yanked Hopla to the ground; a stinging pain across Hopla's back told her that Alexis had only just managed to save her from yet another shot. After Hopla rolled to her back, she saw a ducal guard fall to the ground with a laser wound to the chest.

"Alexis, duck!" Hopla said. Alexis obeyed immediately, giving Hopla a clear shot at a defector guard who was just about to cold-cock him.

After Hopla stood up, stars swam in Hopla's vision as a punch impacted her right temple. Hopla blindly threw a roundhouse kick, which managed to hit the ducal guard that had punched her. As Hopla regained her bearings, she had only fractions of a second to block a jab from that same guard.

The two exchanged punches, kicks, and the occasional shot, before Hopla finally landed a kick to the solar plexus, which she followed up with a shot to the back of the head, felling the guard.

After she fired one last shot to ensure that her quarry was dead, she noticed that there were no further sounds of a struggle. "Sound off!" she ordered.

"Sgt. Alexis, ma'am!" Alexis replied.

"Dexter Aithalo, ma'am," came another reply. "I'm with Rutilius's bodyguards."

After the Temple guards announced their presence, no other guards replied for a while, friend or foe. Then a groan sounded from the direction of Dryoid's fist.

Hopla turned towards the source of the sound. It was Makhaira, who was flat on his stomach. His hands were behind his back, and Gus was sitting over his hands, preventing him from moving.

"Do any of you have manacles?" Gus asked.

"We do," said one of the Temple guards. "We occasionally have to deal with one unruly person or another disrupting the Temple."

As Makhaira was coming to, the guard handcuffed him and helped him to his feet.

"I knew that you were despicable, but I never thought you would have this in you," said Hopla. "Nor that I would ever have to say this: In the name of Her Majesty, Queen Xenia Alethina Hestia, I hereby place you under arrest for treason, the murder of five Astos bodyguards, and the attempted murder of Queen Xenia."

A/N: Special thanks go to Sergio Turbo for his advice and help with the fight scene in this chapter.