Chapter Fourteen: Wrath
"The events following the Great Mutiny were unlike any in Xim's reign. While they featured less overt violence than his Cronese purges, to say nothing of the League conquests, Xim wrought damage of a more subtle kind by culling his records, institutions, even the names of places and ships, all to remove the marks of those who'd risen against him. A generation later it is nearly impossible for us to recreate the lives of the mutineers and understand their motivations. Some of Xim's successors have attempted to rehabilitate those expurgated names, but in doing so they merely create new legends. Who, truly, was Thane son of Thalc? Who was Gelistar, whose name is now the vilest of curses on Ranroon? Who was Erissa Orenaia in her final moments? We shall never know."
Taith Onderas, Xim and His Legacy, 548 LE
When the Gravity Scorned fell out of hyperspace its crew was prepared for anything, including a colossal space battle. What they found instead was tension. Dozens of warships drifted over Ranroon. None were firing but all were waiting violence to burst. Strapped to a jump seat in the back of the Gravity's cockpit, Erakas could feel it in the Force.
"We've found a hell of a party," Kroller muttered from the pilot's seat. "Got a feeling nobody's gonna appreciate wedding crashers though."
His banter was dry, without enthusiasm. Erakas wasn't in the mood either. He asked Reina, "Are we getting any hails?"
"Take your pick," she said. "We've got seven—no, eight—requests to identify ourselves. Make that nine. What do we tell 'em?"
"Nothing. Just burn straight for the planet as fast as you can."
"Had a feeling you'd say that," Kroller muttered, and added power to thrusters.
The Gravity shuddered as it plunged toward Ranroon. The cockpit vibrated and Erakas's teeth clacked together in his jaw as he asked the Gravity's fourth crewman, "Is your father behind us?"
"Right on our tail, accelerating to follow," said Tam'pres. The young Saheelindeel was strapped to the sensors and weapons station, the one where Vaatus should have been. Erakas had manned that console himself over the years, but it was agreed that his talents would probably be needed elsewhere soon, so he was bound to the seat next to the cockpit's rear hatch.
He saw Ranroon's blue and white quickly fill the forward porthole. Then came the flare of friction as they bounced and jerked through the atmospheric envelope.
He asked Tam'pres, "Are they still behind us?"
"Don't worry, they can handle it. That shuttle's tougher than this ship…. No offense."
Reina and Kroller didn't seem to have heard. As they continued to fall toward Ranroon, Erakas closed his eyes, pushed back the tremors and the noise, and tried to find Essan.
She came instantly and easily, and that made him worry. Her Force-presence was a beacon of distress. He sensed anger, confusion, grief, and most of all guilt like he'd never felt from her before. But at least she was still alive, and he reached out to touch her and let her know he was coming.
To his relief, she touched back. There was no relief in her, just urgency. Come fast, she said. I don't know how much longer we can hold out.
He opened his eyes. They'd cleared the worst of entry and were still diving toward Ranroon's white-capped oceans. He called, "Are we heading to the Palace?"
"Oh, is that where we're supposed to go?" said Kroller. "I thought you said the south pole."
His usual sarcasm was ready to tear open with anger and grief. Erakas hoped he kept it together long enough to pull off this rescue. He felt it when the Gravity Scorned pulled out of its plunge and began flying level through the atmosphere, and he peered over at Tam'pres's sensor board to see if they were getting close to the Palace. According to the nav data enclosed in their mysterious package, the great castle was built outside Ranroon's capital city, on a long spit of jagged coastline. There was no place to set down nearby and he saw that wouldn't be an option anyway; the sensor board picked up two small craft approaching from the direction of the palace.
"What's on intercept?" he asked.
"Two Imperial battlebirds," Tam'pres reported. "The shuttle's got four missiles."
"Good, 'cause we've only got two little bitty cannons," said Kroller. "You know how to use 'em, kid?"
"I've got it," Tam'pres said and focused on his console. Just knowing he was a few years older than Sohren twisted Erakas's heart with grief, but also with admiration. When this was over he'd have to congratulate Pres'carn on his boy's grace under fire.
Erakas plucked a wireless headset from the wall behind him and strapped it over his ear. "I'm going back to the hatch!" he told the others. "Keep it steady for a second!"
"Will do," said Kroller.
Erakas clambered carefully out the cockpit. As he passed through he looked over-shoulder to see Reina watching. Her face scrunched tight; she gave him a single nod. Erakas nodded back, then climbed into the Gravity's central shaft and up its ladder. When he reached the airlock vestibule he swung himself inside and activated the magnetic clamps on his boots, then called up to the cockpit to tell them he was in position.
It must have been right on time too, because the Gravity immediately wrenched itself into twists and turns, and the sound of its single cannon echoed through the hull. Erakas looked through the airlock hatch's tiny porthole and saw sky and sea shifting around them, then the flare of a distant explosion. He saw land: rocky coastline, gray stone with white veins of snow. The Gravity changed course again, a steady curve, and Kroller said in his earpiece, "We're at the target! Where the hell is Essan?"
Erakas wrenched the airlock clamp and pushed the hatch open. Cold wind rushed into the vestibule; just then the Gravity tipped and he'd have fallen out if not for the boots sealing him to the deck. Erakas pushed his head through the opening and saw they were banking near a pile of white-stone towers. In addition to the battlebirds, defensive turrets were spraying bullets in their direction. They were out of the guns' range but would have to get perilously close to reach the Palace.
But where was Essan? Squinting into the wind, staring at the Palace, Erakas reached out with the Force. He felt her still: angry, grieving, and also embattled. He felt her, specifically, inside the nearest tower, in one of the lower levels.
"Get me to the closest tower!" He called. "Fly over it if you can!"
"Where is she?" Kroller asked. "I don't see her!"
"Just do it! And be ready to come around for another pass in a few minutes!"
He wasn't sure if Kroller understood, but the man didn't argue. The Gravity Scorned cut a straight line toward the tower. Erakas de-magnetized his boots, then held himself in the portal with his own two hands. Wind rushed hard but he looked down as the Gravity banked to give him a clean shot at the tower, its conical roof, the handful of balconies jutting from its sides.
The balconies were what he needed. Could he get there? It was funny how, in moment of crisis, of direst need, his doubts all melted away.
Like Master Sohr used to say, a Jedi was most a Jedi when he acted.
Erakas knew when the moment was right, simply knew. He released and fell through the air, body flat, limbs stretched out. Wind slowed him a little; the Force slowed him more. He directed his fall not toward the wide rooftop (too easy, too far away) but to one of those jutting balconies. A smaller target, a longer fall, but he believed he could make it. He knew he could. This was a plunge he'd never taken under Sohr, but after Gedor he could.
And he did. At the last second before impact, Erakas righted himself, bent his knees, and landed on his boots. His body crumpled and rolled; even with the Force to soften the blow pain still shot through his limbs and joints. But he didn't break anything. He rolled to his feet feeling giddy with triumph and drew his lightsaber from inside his jump suit. When he looked at the sky he saw the Gravity Scorned and Pres'carn's shuttle racing away, pursued by two battlebirds. Inside the tower, Essan was fighting for her life.
He'd have to be quick about this. Erakas ignited his saber, cut through the sealed door, and plunged into the Palace.
-{}-
Help was coming. Essan wasn't sure the extent of that help, or whether it would be enough to save her, but she clung to it, because it was all she had left.
She, Xim, and Oziaf had made a hasty retreat from the rocket silo, but not a perfect one. Their pursuers knew which way they'd come, which way they'd fled, and what part of the Palace they were now inside. Oziaf knew some of these interior passages but without Indrexu they had no real guide, and soon they were forced into the open halls.
This was a different tower from the queen's but it had the same structure of one large hallway corkscrewing upward. The enemy was surging from below to chase them, forcing them higher and higher. Essan was able to call on the Force for necessary strength while Oziaf could dart with impressive speed on all-fours.
It was Xim who slowed them down. His injured shoulder was still bleeding, and half of his white shirt was now dyed vivid red. His face was pale and gleamed with sweat but he lurched onward, breathing harder the more he pressed. She sensed his will, still burning nova-bright, and knew it was the only thing pushing him ahead while his body failed him.
She didn't know if it would be enough to get them to Erakas. She didn't know if it should. She'd joined Ranroon to fight the Empire; now she was with the emperor himself, while Ranroon's soldiers raced to kill her. The universe was turned upside-down and she had no orientation, no way to tell right from wrong or even if there was right and wrong.
She reached out in the Force and begged Erakas to hurry, knowing that he was hurrying already. The clap of boots was getting louder behind but beneath their noise and heavy breathing she could hear Erakas pounding the floor ahead.
Then she heard the slap of body and metal on stone. She stopped, turned, and saw Xim on his knees, using the rifle as a brace as he tried to rise. Oziaf was immediately at his side, but the T'iin T'iin couldn't lift a full-grown human to his feet.
Essan wanted to believe that galaxy would be a better place without the despot and his henchman, but doubt wormed inside her. With Xim gone his empire might collapse into a civil war more chaotic than any of his conquests. Admirals would fight admirals, planets against planets; she sensed the violence ready to burst over Ranroon right now, and if it flared over Ranroon it might flare over countless worlds.
Only Xim, damn him, could stop that, but by ending today's conflagration he might start a bigger one in the future. She simply didn't know, and the Force did not avail her. But she remembered the hard clasp of Xim's hand on hers, and his angry, desperate words:
She swore an oath. So did you. Does it stand?
Indrexu had kept that oath, and in keeping it had spelled her own doom. But she'd held to her promise because she truly believed it was the right thing to do. Essan didn't have that belief but she did have the promise, and the example of a woman she'd failed to save. That would have to be enough.
Deliberation lasted only a second. Essan used the Force to tug Xim to his feet. His head lifted and his eyes met hers; he knew what she'd done and was grateful.
That was when the enemy caught up with them: a dozen soldiers in heavy armor, all sporting rifles. Half dropped to one-kneed firing stances. Two standing soldiers hurled grenades.
Apparently they didn't know that was a bad idea. Thankful for their mistake, Essan easily caught the explosives in mid-arc and sent them back to the soldiers. They scattered, but not before the grenades went off in their midst.
But it wasn't a violent explosion; rather, a bright flash of light filled the hallway and a droning noise filled Essan's ears. She'd been turned away from the explosion, already running, but the noise seared into her brain and made her stumble.
The hallway was still full of smoke and she didn't notice the figure racing past her until his lightsaber ignited. Then she felt Erakas in the Force: blazing, determined, moving with an almost mindless grace as he danced amidst the smoke, cutting down and disabling soldiers before they even knew what was happening. She felt the grief that compelled him and pushed him to reckless violence, but also a new confidence that contained his dangerous impulses. Something seemed to have changed within him.
As she watched Erakas dance through the smoke, she didn't even think about joining. There wasn't a point. He had this entirely in hand.
A voice, deep inside her but not her own, said Embraced his choice Erakas has, so great power is his. Yours it can be too. Gedor was gone as soon as he arrived, but Essan felt flushed to know he was still with them, lending aid in crucial moments.
When the smoke cleared and the dance ended, Erakas emerged unscathed. Oziaf stood on two legs, watching, jaw agape in an almost-human expression of astonishment. And Xim leaned against the wall, rifle dangling from his good hand, watching the new Jedi with an angry smile.
Erakas strode right past him, toward Essan. Xim called at his back, "You're late, magician."
"I did what I could." Erakas didn't even look back. He shut off his saber and clasped Essan's shoulder. "Are you alright? You look alright."
"I'm okay," she breathed. "There's going to be more. Do you have a way out?"
"We'll find out in a second. Let's go." He began hurrying upward; Essan followed, as did Xim and Oziaf. As they walked, Erakas pushed back hair from the side of his face, revealing the familiar wireless headset kept on the Gravity Scorned. Erakas said, "Can you read me? Reina, do you hear? Can you get back to the tower? Yes, the same one I dropped onto. I'll be ready in three minutes. Tell him to do a slow pass beneath it. I've got Essan. A slow pass. Yes, we'll be there."
When he was done he asked Essan, "Where's queen?"
"She's dead."
He slowed, only for a stride, then hurried ahead. "I'm really sorry."
"So am I."
"I came as fast as fast as I could. When we got that message I knew it was an emergency."
"What message?"
"You didn't send it? It was some some kind of weird faster-than-light something-or-other the Object picked up."
"Faster than light? That's not possible."
"Well somebody told me to be here and I guess they can do the impossible. We'll figure it out later." He glanced over his shoulder. "Who are they?"
If he hadn't figured it out yet, she wasn't going to tell him. She'd made her choice and she'd embrace it, but she'd save explanations for later.
"How are we getting back to the Gravity?" she asked.
"You can probably guess," he said, and hurried ahead.
Essan could feel more enemies surging beneath them. She hurried too but kept looking back at Xim, and whenever she looked like he would fall she tugged him upright with the Force and nudged him on. He knew what she was doing but he didn't say a word.
Finally Erakas broke from the hallway and led them into an empty room. Beyond the room were broken doors, and past them a white-railing balcony that looked out on a nearby fjord. He immediately stepped onto it, ignited his saber, and lofted it high. Essan did the same, but when she looked to the sky she saw nothing.
Then the roar of starship engines filled the air, and the crackle of repeating cannon fire. Three ships raced in low from the other side of the Palace: the Gravity Scorned, an armed Federation shuttlecraft trailing smoke, and an Imperial battle-bird giving chase.
The Jedi kept waving their sabers. The Gravity dropped attitude and began to wheel back toward them. The battlebird pulled an even harder turn and swooped down on it, but it didn't have the chance to open fire before the Federation shuttle unleashed a streaking missile. The 'bird pumped out chaff and bullets to intercept; when the warhead detonated in mid-air the hot concussive wave washed across the balcony, nearly dropping the Jedi to their knees.
But the shuttle didn't give up. It dove toward the battlebird, pumping more cannon fire at it. The Gravity took advantage of the distraction to wheel around, decelerate, and aim for a fly-by of the tower. There'd only be one chance at this.
Xim and Oziaf hobbled onto the balcony. The T'iin T'iin jumped onto Erakas's back without asking, peered over the crown of his head, and said, "We're going to jump aren't we?"
"Afraid so," Erakas grimaced.
Essan looked to Xim. Their eyes met and suddenly his rolled back. His rifle clattered to the stones and he sagged against her. She caught him with her free arm and was shocked how thin he was, how weak, how warm and mortal.
Then Erakas shouted: "Now!"
He topped the balcony rail and hurled himself over. Oziaf clung to his back and both fell, slowly. The Gravity Scorned wasn't even here yet but Essan jumped too. Then the starship appeared under them. They hit its hull and hit it hard; Xim released a howl of pain and rolled away but Essan grabbed him in the Force to keep him from plunging to the rocks below.
Erakas fared better; his magnetic boots secured him to the hull. The airlock opened and Reina pushed her face outside. She waved and extended a hand. Essan was closest and she grabbed, dragging Xim with her. She handed the wounded man off to Reina first, who pulled him inside. Erakas, secured by his boots, clambered down the hull, and Oziaf made the final bound through the hatch, brushing a nonplussed Reina.
And then, just as both Jedi came in reach, the sky shook with an explosion. Erakas, Essan and Reina all looked to see the fireball barreling down. The Gravity jerked away; Reina grabbed Essan's hand and tugged her inside just as debris came slanting by. Essan was afraid Erakas had gone with it but no, he pulled himself through the hatch, dropped onto the floor beside Reina, and immediately tugged it shut behind him.
"What went down?" Essan called to him. "The battlebird?"
"No," Erakas croaked, voice weak with new grief.
-{}-
"One ship down, the second is pulling away," reported the technician in the security room that had become a command center. Xer, Vardoc, Gelistar and Rossu had all been bent close to the screen, watching the daring and seemingly pointless attempt by those two ships to buzz the palace.
"Good riddance," Gelistar said. "Have that 'bird chase the second one and shoot it down."
"Hold on, Mister President," Xer told the Yutuski. "That's an Imperial 'bird out there, which means it's mine to command. Got that?"
"Of course." Gelistar smiled, eyes full of loathing. Xer was glad to see it. A king nobody hates is a piss-poor one.
"Good. Now, give the order to chase down the other ship and—"
"Sirs," called one of Rossu's guards, "we have a problem."
"What now?" Xer growled. Things had finally been going well. Not only were those ships chased away, but Indrexu was dead and Xim was trapped in the leeward tower.
"Report came in from the tower teams, sirs." The guard looked anxiously between them. "They say Xim's escaped."
"What do you mean escaped?" Xer huffed. "That's not possible!"
"They suggest he, ah… jumped, sir." The guard swallowed. "From a balcony."
"He killed himself?" Gelistar gaped. "Get teams out there! Find his body!"
Then it clicked for Xer. A stupid grin slashed across his face. "Don't you get it, you idiots? He jumped onto that ship during its fly-by!"
"That's impossible," said Vardoc. "Nobody could do that, the ship was too fast."
"You've seen what that witch can do." He spun on the guard. "Did she escape too, and Oziaf?"
"Ah, seemingly, sir." The guard swallowed again. "They also report a second—um, not a witch, since it was male, and human, but some kind of… warrior."
"Unbelievable." Rossu ran a hand over his naked scalp. "We have to shoot that ship down!"
The technician, who'd been sitting beneath Xer all this time, looked at him, awaiting orders.
Xer should have given the pursue-and-kill call. It was the only thing that made sense, but he balked. Yes, he wanted to take Xim alive so he could suffer a suitably poetic punishment, but there was more than that.
Once, so long ago he could barely remember, he'd killed the boy's mother. He hadn't even meant to, hadn't known about it until later. Probably he hadn't even done it directly, but he'd been there for the death of Thalis El'Ana. For many years after he'd adamantly refused to let it bother him (because a king laden with regrets was a piss-poor one) but during his long captivity he'd had too much time to dwell on his buried guilt.
And there was more. All this time, even during his years of captivity when he'd been forced to listen to Xim recount his exploits, he'd never imagined his son as anything other than a stiff-bodied, hard-brained martinet barking orders at lesser men. Never had he imagined Xim with the boldness, the ingenuity, the daring to escape his hopeless situation by throwing himself onto a passing spacecraft. It was the kind of thing Xer would have bragged about in his youth.
But most of all, it was the security camera footage they'd seen from the gateway to the rocket silo. Indrexu had literally reached out to her guard captain, only to receive a bullet to the heart. It was the first and only image Xer had seen of his son's chosen bride and he'd been struck by the woman's battered but resilient dignity. It wasn't fair for her to have died, he'd thought as she crumpled to the deck.
What really astonished him was Xim bursting into the room a second later, rifle blazing, cutting down all three Ranroon guards in a frenzy, then immediately falling to his knees beside Indrexu's body. Cradling her head in his lap. Touching her like he had, in some twisted way, actually cared about her.
That pixelated image of his son, bent away from the camera, hunched in grief, would remain with him for the rest of his life.
Beside him Gelistar was raging, "Give the order, you ugly old bastard! Shoot him down!"
But Xer didn't. He looked at the president and wondered what it would be like to snap this one's neck. It had been a very, very long time since he'd killed a man, and he'd rather the first new blood on his hands not be Xim's.
From the other side, Rossu grabbed the technician by the hair and shoved his face into the console. The minister bent over the audio grille and said, "This is an open order to all ships: Shoot down the starship pushing out of Ranroon now! Don't ask question, don't answer its hails, just kill it."
Rossu tapped a button, released the tech to nurse his bloody nose, then looked at Xer defiantly. The Pirate King of old would have at least beaten the smug, bald bureaucrat for his insolence and Xer almost did that, but Vardoc clasped his arm, met Xer's eye, and shook his head warningly.
They all watched the screen, now smeared with translucent red, as new markers raced toward Xim.
-{}-
The Gravity Scorned was blasting out of the atmosphere as fast as its rockets would allow. That was pretty fast—enough to outpace the battlebird that had dawdled in lower atmo, as though uncertain whether to pursue—but now ships in orbit were heading their way.
Not good. Reina watched her sensor screen anxiously as the computer tried to project times to intercept. As soon as they'd gotten aboard her father had Put the Gravity into a steep ascent and she'd had to climb up the ladder, hard rung after hard rung, to get back to the cockpit and strap into her comm station. She had a million questions for Erakas and Essan, and she wished she could do something for poor Tam'pres, whose father's shuttle had gone down with no signal. There just wasn't time. Everything was happening too fast.
Essan followed Reina up the ladder and strapped herself into the rear jump seat Erakas. Erakas ad stayed in the secondary hold to strap himself and the new arrivals for acceleration. The middle-aged man looked ready to pass out from all the blood he'd spilled over his shirt.
As they flared upward, Reina patched an internal signal to the hold. She tugged her headset back on and said, "Erakas, you read me? Are you settled down there?"
"Settled enough," he said. What's going on?"
"We're burning fast but ships up top are moving toward us. I'm not sure we can make it."
"Which ships?" asked a squeaky voice.
That must have been the little guy. Reina checked her screen. "I'm getting some ID feeds. Closest ones are… Falchion, Halberd, Repulse, Seawrack, Wavebreaker, Justifier… Does this matter? None of them sound friendly."
"Burn for Wavebreaker," the little voice insisted. "Tell them we have Queen Indrexu aboard."
"But we don't!"
"Just tell them! We'll explain everything once we're aboard. Trust me, do it!"
Reina didn't like it when total strangers insisted she trust them. "Erakas? Help me here."
Her husband sighed. "Just do as he says."
"Gods damn it, I hope you're right."
"Me too."
She immediately shut down the link and began patching a hail to the man'o'war. It was the largest of the ships bearing down on them; she hoped that was a good thing instead of a really, really bad one. After she sent out a hail she said, "Dad, plot a course for the Wavebreaker… and be ready to change the second I say so."
Kroller grunted and did as he was told. He was burned out of repartee. So was she.
Then she heard a new voice, with an unmistakable and barely-intelligible Ranroon accent. "This is the Wavebreaker. Identify yourselves."
"It doesn't matter who we are, what matters is we've got Indrexu aboard. You know, your queen."
The comm officer actually gasped. "If you have her, put her on the line."
Time to bluff. "I can't do that. She's badly injured and needs help. In case you hadn't figured it out yet, there's been a mutiny on the planet. Your queen just got ousted by her, um—"
Reina stopped, looked back at Essan. The Jedi called, "Gelistar and Rossu!"
"Right! Gelistar and Rossu," Reina relayed. "If you want the truth you'd better let us dock and don't let anybody shoot us down!"
After a horrifying three heartbeats, Wavebreaker replied, "Hold course and don't deviate. We'll cover you."
The line closed. Reina blew out a breath and sunk into her seat. "You hear that, Dad? Hold course, they'll cover us."
"Unless they decide to blow us up instead," Kroller said.
"Then at least it'll be over quick." Reina looked to the cockpit's rear. "That did the trick, I think."
"Good," Essan said, "but it's not over yet."
"Wonderful. Did anyone tell you you'd make a terrible doctor?"
The Jedi thought. "Never."
"Well, you'd make a terrible doctor. Erakas has a better bedside manner."
As soon as the quip was out she regretted it. Erakas. Bedside. Sohren, grief, the flaming downward spiral of a burning space station. Their crazy dash to and from Ranroon had charged her adrenaline and made her forget all that; it had even roused emotions for the first time since Santossa Station fell. But now emotions were coming back, awful ones, and she tried to swallow them down.
To distract herself Reina asked, "So, who's the injured guy?"
"Xim," Essan said.
"No, seriously. Who is he?"
"I said it's Xim."
Everyone looked at her: Kroller, Reina, even Tam'pres. She met their looks—stunned, accusatory, even betrayed—without flinching.
Reina took a deep breath, then turned back to her console. That was Xim? Honestly, she'd thought he'd be taller.
Kroller, however, growled, "I hope you have a damn good reason for bringing him on my ship, Jedi."
But Essan wasn't in the mood to fight. She looked away and said, "I hope so too."
-{}-
The situation over Ranroon had was locked in a torturous impasse. Jaminere felt trapped aboard the Stormrider, where all he could do was rage against his wife's betrayal. That Marco was innocent meant nothing, not when he was aboard the heart of the mutiny.
Then two ships had dropped out of hyperspace and plunged toward Ranroon. Only one came back up; the palace broke radio silence for the first time in hours to declare that this ship had to be destroyed. That was enough to tell Jaminere it must be saved, but the Stormrider was too far away. The Crown and Ascendant were also, but Admiral Krenn's Falchion was dangerously close. The little ship cut a straight line to Minasc's Wavebreaker, which gathered it into a welcoming embrace.
Captain Miral was even more edgy than Jaminere; she hailed the Wavebreaker, asking for an update and identification of the mystery ship. She and Jaminere waited together in anxious silence for any reply.
Then they got one. Everyone got one; it was broadcast on the widest possible frequency and relayed to the other side of the planet by Ranroon's orbital comm satellites so that every single ship could hear.
The voice was Xim's, but not as Jaminere had ever heard it. Every word was jagged with pain and barely-restrained rage.
"Today should have been a day of celebration," said Xim. "Instead it has become a day of betrayal and blood. Queen Indrexu has been murdered by her own people, acting under her Minister Rossu and President Gelistar. I saw her die, I touched her, and her blood is still on my hands.
"Admiral Thane has seized control of the Victor's Crown. To all loyal soldiers of the Empire: Do not listen to his lies. To all people of Ranroon: do not let your queen's death go unavenged. You must join and destroy these usurpers. I will not stop until every last one of them will be punished for their crimes.
"This should have been a day of dreams fulfilled. Instead, this will be a day of wrath. I will have justice for the death of my queen. All ships loyal to me or her memory, declare your intention to the Wavebreaker as soon as this transmission ends. All remaining ships are usurpers and will be destroyed."
-{}-
The man standing in the middle of the Wavebreaker's bridge was a pitiable sight. His clothes were stained with blood, much of it his own. His face was smeared by sweat and darkened by dirt and bruises. His right hand was a talon clasped to the nearest console; his left arm, drenched in red, dangled at his side. He looked like he could fall at any moment.
The crew of Indrexu's ship stared at Xim in disbelief. Silence reigned. Then one brave officer cleared her throat and said, "Incoming transmissions. They're piling up… Seawrack, Stormrider, Foamfollower, Icecrusher… Imperial ones too..."
Minasc nodded but didn't take eyes off Xim.
"What of the Victor's Crown?" asked a small, high voice from the corner of the room. "The Ascendant?"
The silver-haired admiral looked from the battered despot to the ones who'd brought him aboard. In any other circumstances they'd be the ones drawing stares: one disheveled T'iin T'iin, one scarlet woman, and one simple human man, outrageous only for the company he kept.
The comm officer answered Oziaf's question: "No response."
"It will be a fight then." Xim lifted his sagging head. "Admiral… will you command your ships?"
"I will," Minasc said. Her initial anger at Xim's arrival had faded. She would do what needed to be done. "You should know that Viceroy Jaminere is aboard the Stormrider."
Xim's lip twitched to an almost-smile. "Work with him. Tell all loyal Imperials to take his orders..." He closed his eyes, swayed, but remained standing. "I require medical attention. Please."
The crews' eyes shifted between Xim and Minasc. The admiral said, "Get him to the infirmary immediately."
Two ensigns popped from their seats and took Xim by either arm. The despot staggered toward the door, held upright only by them. As he passed the two Jedi and Oziaf he said, "Come with me."
They came. Oziaf followed Xim and the ensigns, Essan behind them and Erakas in the rear. He'd sealed his emotions tight as soon as he'd learned the name of the man he'd rescued and refused to look at her. She could only imagine what was boiling inside him.
Still, she was unprepared for what happened when they got Xim to the infirmary. The ensigns laid him on a bed, then ran to get the medics. As soon as they'd brushed past the curtain separating Xim's bed from the others, Erakas Force-shoved Essan and Oziaf to the nearest bulkhead. He was suddenly at Xim's side, using his bare hand to press the bloodied man to the bed.
Still pinning Essan and Indrexu to the wall, Erakas bent over Xim and breathed in his face. "Did you destroy Santossa Station?"
Xim's eyes fluttered open. His mouth creaked: "No."
Erakas pressed harder on his sternum. "Then who did?"
"I don't know."
"Liar. Who destroyed the station?"
Xim gasped, "I think… my enemies… trying to discredit me..."
"That has to be it, it's the only explanation," Oziaf begged as he writhed against the wall. "Let him go."
"Erakas, please!" Essan barked.
But Erakas held them there. He bent over Xim, peering into his eyes and perhaps his mind, for Essan could feel him reach out with tendrils of the Force, desperate for truth.
Then they heart footsteps, the shouts of medics. Essan and Oziaf dropped to the floor; Erakas stepped away from Xim. His hands balled to fists but he no longer directed his rage at Xim.
The medics stared at Erakas, uncertain what had happened, but when he stepped back from Xim they gathered at the patient's bed. Essan stood to the side, half-watching Erakas lost in his haze, half-watching Xim as they used scissors to cut apart his bloodied shirt. Washcloths applied to his torso turned red with blood, but they revealed the hole in his chest where the bullet had entered, right between pectoral and collar bone.
One medic called for anesthetic, but Xim clasped her arm and wheezed, "One moment." The medic froze. Xim's eyes met Essan's, beckoning. "Both of you."
Erakas didn't budge until Essan gave him a soft tug in the Force. Then he followed her to Xim's bedside. The despot lay on the bloody sheets, bare chest rising and falling, eyes only on the Jedi.
He said, "Use your magic… like you did for Indrexu… break them… end this."
"Why should we ever help you?" Erakas said through clenched teeth.
"You swore… an oath."
"I swore and oath, not him," Essan said. "But that's not why I'll do it. I'll do it to save lives."
"I don't care why… just do it..."
"Never," Erakas sneered. "If you think—"
But Essan took his arm and dragged him away. The medics were immediately on Xim, hooking him up with an intravenous and injecting anesthetic. Essan only released Erakas once she'd pulled him into the exterior hallway.
"You can't be serious! Why are you helping him?" Erakas jerked his arm free. "Why did you even bring him on the Gravity? You should have left him to die!"
Not a very Jedi comment, but Essan understood his anger. "I don't think Xim destroyed the station."
"It doesn't matter, he still caused it, just by sending his ship there!" Erakas wanted to lurch back into the medical room, but this time he restrained himself. "He said you swore an oath. What are you talking about?"
"Indrexu and I… it's not the time to explain. We stopped one bloodbath with the Force, we can do it again. But I need your help. Gedor was right, Jedi together can do what Jedi alone can't."
"This time we'll be helping Xim!"
"And Indrexu's people. And we'll be helping Reina. If we protect this ship we'll protect her too."
It felt like a cheap shot; there was no way Erakas could fight the argument and he didn't. He deflated before her eyes, anger draining away, leaving bitterness and regret but also a sense of duty. Despite everything he'd been through, he was Jedi enough for that.
"How can we do this?" he asked.
"We need someplace quiet where we can concentrate."
"Back to the Gravity, then?"
"If they'll still have us."
It wasn't a joke. There was no telling who was welcome where, who was on whose side, not anymore. But Erakas said, "Reina will make space for us. Come on."
-{}-
The Second Battle of Ranroon was inevitable as soon as Xim broadcast his speech, but the first shot fired from the Stiletto, a small harpice under Admiral Krenn's command. It impacted on another Imperial warship, a Thanium star-glaive called Resurgent, and ripped a ten-meter gash in its hull.
After that, hell broke loose. Imperials began firing on Imperials. Missiles arced between ships and there was no way to tell friend from foe. A mere Livien cutter, which had been sitting on the Victor's Crown's flank for hours, unleashed a volley on the dreadnought before running to the ironic shelter of a nearby man'o'war. Even the Federation was not united: Yutuski and Ranroon ships began exchanging fire.
Admiral Thane was in his element. The old pirate seemed twenty years younger as he bounced across the bridge shouting orders. But to Erissa, it was terrifying chaos. When she looked at the tactical screen she couldn't understand any of it. There were no colors differentiating friend from foe, just a swarm of lights devouring each other.
When the Comms reported a call for her she was certain it was Jaminere, begging for her surrender. But when she picked up the handset she was shocked by the young, plaintive voice.
"Mother, can you hear me?" Marco asked. "Are you there?"
"Yes. Where are you?" she asked hoarsely.
"I'm at my station. We've just gotten orders and I know I shouldn't be calling you now… but Mother, what the hells is going on up there? We heard there was a broadcast from the Emperor, but we didn't get it down here. Was it something about a coup?"
He really had no idea. She envied him his ignorance, not that it would save him. This was the end of a foolish dream where she'd thought she could save him. In striving she'd doomed him instead. Maybe Xim's pet poet was right; we killed the ones we loved.
Erissa managed to croak, "Follow your orders, Marco. And… save yourself."
"Mother?"
"Whatever happens, don't die, please," she insisted, then hung up. He didn't try to call again. She bent over the comm station, ignoring looks from the technician while chaos swirled around the bridge. The ship trembled, alarms wailed, but nobody called out hull breaches.
She was alive, for now. Marco was alive. For now.
Then she heard the tech say, "Ma'am, it's the Stormrider and they're requesting to speak with you personally."
Erissa took a deep breath, then grasped the handset. "Put him on," she said.
-{}-
The first thing his wife said to him when the line opened was: "I never wanted this."
Was it an apology? Apologies didn't matter anymore; they were well past them. The space over Ranroon had become a bedlam but Jaminere was doing his best to impose order. While the Stormrider engaged Admiral Krenn's ships he'd barked commands to every Imperial or Federation that would.
The storm wasn't lulling, but he'd found precious minutes to call the Crown. Erissa's first words were thick with regret.
"If this isn't what you wanted, then surrender," he told her. "Save yourself. Save our son."
"It's not my choice."
"Then put Thane on the line. Let me talk to him."
No reply. The line crackled with static but he knew she was still there. "For Marco's sake, please—"
Then a gruff voice said, "What do you want, Viceroy?"
It was Thane. Somehow he was easier to talk to than Erissa. "Admiral, you have to stop this now. Order all your ships to cease fire and—"
"They're not my ships," said Thane, "they belong to Xer, rightful King of Argai! We're just taking back what you stole long ago."
"Thane, wait—"
The line closed. Jaminere nearly slammed the handset down. He looked at the tactical screen and saw the Crown holding position far from Stormrider, near the Ascendant. Other engagements had formed in clusters around the planet. Data filtered in from the Wavebreaker that allowed them to identify friend versus foe, and his heart lifted to see more green lights than red. Yet the Crown would remain stubbornly yellow; Thane would fight like a man with nothing to lose, and normally Jaminere would have no problems destroying him and his crew, even poor ousted Kadenzi.
But Marco. Erissa. The family he'd built for over twenty years was crashing before his eyes and there was nothing he could do, nothing.
Someone reported, "Viceroy, we've got a hail from the Ascendant. They say Captain Sovane has been 'relieved of command' and are requesting orders."
Things were turning in their direction. Jaminere looked at the screen again; it seemed that more red lights had flipped to green, while other hostiles were withdrawing from the battle-zone. As he watched a few even winked black and exited to hyperspace. It was like someone was adding weight to a balance, tipping it in their favor. He craved to ask Xim why but the Wavebreaker said the emperor had been rushed for medical treatment.
"Well, Viceroy?" Captain Miral called at him. "Orders?"
He looked at the screen. The choice was so obvious. The Crown had left itself exposed, and the Ascendant could easily take the other dreadnought by surprise and tear open its flank, killing hundreds, crippling the ship.
Miral saw it too. She stared at him, expectant. Jaminere's jaw hinged open, the words on his tongue, but he couldn't bring himself to give the order. He'd already killed his father and his brothers; he couldn't bear to kill his wife and son. They should have been a future that redeemed his past, but instead they'd made a closed circle.
Thane's dreadnought flared engines and surged ahead, outpacing the Ascendant. The ship cut across Ranroon's ecliptic, dipping lower into its gravity well as it cut a course to the heart of the Federation battle formation.
Thane was going straight for Xim.
He had forced a crisis point. As he watched the Crown move across the screen, pulling other traitorous Imperials in its wake, Jaminere knew he had no choice.
"Captain Miral, this ship can burn fast, can't it?"
"We'd have to shut down grav control and strap in, but yes it can."
"Then plot an intercept course for the Victor's Crown." He pointed at the screen. "Prepare a firing solution."
-{}-
Chaos dissolved; everything had become clear. There was only one way to win this battle and that was by killing Xim. Thane had cut to the heart of the matter with a knife.
The Victor's Crown was plying a blade-straight line toward the Wavebreaker. The dreadnought's internal gravity held but its deck shuddered under Erissa's feet as she watched the shifting tactical screen. Other Imperial mutineers and even some Yutuski were coming to join, while the Ranroon warships and Imperials loyal to Xim clustered around the Wavebreaker. None of those ships individually had armor or firepower to match the Crown, but they'd fight valiantly to protect the life of Xim and the memory of Indrexu.
And so would her husband. She saw the Stormrider on the screen, accelerating on an intercept course like only those fast Ranroon ships could.
She grabbed Thane's sleeve as the admiral passed. "Do you see that? Jaminere's ship is coming in."
"Of course I see it. We've already locked weapons."
"A ship like that's well defended, isn't it?"
"So are we. It already almost tore the Crown apart once. But do you know what our advantage is? Indrexu's dead. And your husband might be good at licking Xim's feet, but he's not half as smart a fighter as she was."
"What does that make you?" she bit out.
"I'm the man who's going to kill Xer's brat," Thane said confidently. "Now watch me."
-{}-
Essan remembered the battle at Eneska where she had, at just the right moment, compelled one person's mind. Things were so different now. She'd become stronger and Erakas was with her. Though they sat bound in the belly of the Gravity Scorned their minds roamed the space above Ranroon.
Just as they had during the first battle, Essan poured courage onto her their allies, while Erakas emptied grief and spite from his heart. It terrified her to feel how much despair was inside him; she'd always thought him the even-keeled one who could manage every storm, but losing Sohren had damaged him deeply. Yet at the moment, it was what they needed. Erakas made the mutineers' will falter while Essan roused the memory of Indrexu (and yes, even patriotism for Xim). She couldn't tell if Gedor was adding his strength this time; it might have been they two alone who turned the battle.
She recalled Eneska because she felt the same mind as before. Thane wasn't as unmistakably strong as Xim or Indrexu but his soul refused to be dominated. Earlier she'd brought it to a short, shuddering pause right when it counted. She was certain she could do it again.
With a wordless nudge, she directed Erakas's attention to Thane's flare. They felt anger, hunger, a monomaniac intention: kill Xim.
Loyalist ships, Ranroon and Imperial both, were hurrying to intercept. The Jedi didn't need tactical screens to know collision was imminent. Together they let the rest of the battle fall from their minds and touched the souls haloing Thane's brightest flare. This time Essan drew on her own supply of despair. She shared her grief at losing Indrexu and the older pain of losing Correa, and those dual failures converged with Erakas's suffering to blur the concentration of all the frantic crew tucked into the dreadnought's cabins, weapons arrays, engineering sections, command deck. Just when they needed it their determination left them. Their responses were sluggish; even Thane's ardor dimmed, delaying his commands for critical seconds.
Because of the Jedi's touch, the fire sputtered. It was left to others to snuff it out.
-{}-
Erissa's heart sank to despair, and even before the Stormrider fired its first shot, she knew that everything was lost. Indrexu's ship—now her husband's—fired a chain of warheads from each of its forward cannons. The Crown, perhaps because it was traveling at such a fast speed and had all its guns directed at the Wavebreaker, was unable to intercept all the missiles before they hit.
Hard, violent tremors ran through the ship. Erissa was thrown ahead; her stomach folded painfully over the back on an ensign's chair. Thane actually fell to his knees, but the old man sprung upright with impressive speed.
"Engines!" he shouted. "Report!"
"Thrusters two and four are dead, number five sputtering," someone reported.
"Reactor?"
"Still online."
"Then charge, dammit!The others can handle the Stormrider. Get us to Xim!"
"We're trying, Admiral, but the thrusters—"
"No excuses! Do it!"
The crew, cowed, tried to comply but Thane was asking the impossible. When he looked up his eyes met Erissa's across the smoky bridge, she could see that he knew it, but would try anyway.
More explosions, more alarms. She lurched over to the gunnery console and asked, "Is Section Eighteen still responding?"
"They're still there, Ma'am, but Sections Nineteen and Twenty are down. We're getting hull breach reports."
Marco was alive. For now he was alive. She clung to that because it was the only thing she had left. Thane would charge on to glorious death; he was beyond reasoning. And Jaminere, damn him would stop at nothing to protect his precious Xim. But she still might save Marco.
"Sound an alarm in Section Eighteen," she said. "Tell them to abandon ship."
The ensign looked at her, confused. "But ma'am—"
"Just do it!" She pounded his shoulder then whirled away. The deck bucked and she held onto the back of another chair to keep from falling. When she reached the comm section she grabbed another ensign by the shoulder and said, "Can we hail the Stormrider?"
"System are still operable, ma'am."
"Then do it. Tell them we surrender."
"But ma'am—"
A single gunshot cracked over the sound of alarm. Erissa literally jumped; her heart stopped, and when it beat again she realized it wasn't she who'd been shot, nor the ensign. It was the communications console that sparked and smoked in front of them.
She turned. Thane still had his pistol drawn and leveled at her. Only when their eyes met did he lower the weapon and holster it. Three long strides brought him across the deck. He grabbed Erissa by the arm and pulled her close.
"No surrender. Not ever." Thane growled.
"You animal, you just killed us all!"
He slapped her, hard. Erissa's head snapped sideways; her jaw dropped as she touched the stinging welt he'd left on her cheek. In all her years, she'd never once been slapped.
Thane's expression softened but he made no apologies. "We made our bed, Duchess, both of us. Time to go lie in it."
-{}-
The Victor's Crown was like a wounded monster, too damaged to fulfill its purpose but too massive and well-armed to die easily. So as its engines stuttered and it floundered well-clear of the Wavebreaker, it fired off volley after volley of missiles from every cannon, emptying its magazines in a moment of dying spite.
And it was a long, awful moment. Two warheads impacted on the Stormrider's bow, tearing open the hull in sections and killing crew. Two Ranroon pinnaces were outright destroyed; another frigate took critical damage to the engines. An Imperial star-glaive collided with a mutineers' star-glaive in the chaos and both ships exploded. And the Victor's Crown kept firing with everything it had. Ships tried to clear the area but it was pumping out too many missiles too fast.
There was only one way to stop the slaughter. Jaminere saw it, he knew it, and it destroyed him to give the order.
But he did.
"All ships," he said, strapped into the seat that had once been Indrexu's, "target the hull breach on the starboard side, fifty meters from the stern. Break it open."
A few well-placed warheads would be enough to peel away the armor; one more shot would burst the Crown's main reactor. And then it would be over.
The battle, his family, everything.
The Stormrider led the charge but other ships, Imperial and Ranroon both, fell in. They unleashed a wave of missiles, too many for the crippled Crown to fend off, then broke away. As his body strained under the g-force Jaminere kept his eyes on the tactical screen. He watched the lights marking inbound warheads converge on the Crown, watched them wink out, watched the Crown's marker to blink. A powerful shockwave buffeted the Stormrider, and when it had passed the Crown's light as gone, leaving nothing in its place.
The bridge rippled with cheers and sighs of relief, but Jaminere kept watching the screen. Though it still swarmed with moving lights, most of them green now, he barely noticed. He saw not them but the black-and-white checkerboard floor of his family's observatory on Sorasca, his place of escape as a child, the place where he'd killed his first family and called it thought the path he'd chosen was an ascending line but was in fact a circle, leading him to the place where he'd begun.
-{}-
Vardoc was a seasoned politician. He was used to weighing risk and reward and aimed to be bold but not reckless. He'd gambled on Xim all those years ago. It had been a mistake, but he'd lived to take another gamble meant to correct it.
This time he'd not calculated the risks properly. He'd lost everything: his daughter, his grandson, his power and influence. And when Xim's wrath found him he'd lose his life, probably in a method more agonizing than anything he could imagine.
The destruction of the Victor's Crown left the situation room bleakly silent. Rossu's people had rigged a tactical screen to show them the fight in orbit just in time to see how badly they were losing. Ship after ship abandoned Thane or outright switched to Xim's side. Admiral Krenn's Falchion was burning hard on an exit vector. What a pathetic ending this was.
The silence was finally broken when Gelistar lifted his head, turned to Xer, and said, "This is all your fault."
"My fault?" the old pirate scowled.
"Yes, your fault! We could have shot down Xim before he reached the Wavebreaker! As soon as he gave his speech, everything fell apart!"
"If you'd kept him locked in his cell, he'd have never gotten away."
"Enough," Rossu said. "Listen, this palace isn't just a palace, it's a fortress. We can hole up here and defend ourselves."
Tiredly Vardoc said, "You heard Xim. He'll have justice for what happened today, even if it means dropping a nuclear warhead on this castle." He looked at Xer. "Isn't that right?"
The old pirate was hard to read. He didn't seem angry like Gelistar, desperate like Rossu, even defeated like Vardoc himself. Xer seemed almost… peaceful.
"You're all dead men," he said simply, without rancor. "My boy will see to that, and he'll make you suffer for it. As for me, I don't know. He may want to stick me back in my golden cage."
"Lucky you," Gelistar said sourly.
"Not lucky," Xer insisted. "I'd rather die than go back to his prison."
"Maybe none of us has to die," Rossu groped. "There's still the rocket. I can order it prepped for emergency launch. By the time we get down there it will be almost ready."
"What good can that do?" asked Gelistar. "It has no hyper-drive."
"Somebody might pick us up, somebody who'd protect us." The minister waved frantically at the screen. "I mean, they can't all be loyal to Xim, can they? Mister President, some of those captains have to be friendly to you!"
Gelistar frowned at the screen. "There are… some Yutuski ships up there."
"Then we find one and get aboard!" Rossu was actually shouting. "We have to do it! It's our only chance!"
He looked around pleadingly. Vardoc lowered his head. If by some miracle it did work, he'd live the rest of his life as a fugitive, suffering the memory of his dead family, surrounded by men he hated as they ran from Xim's justice. He didn't want to meet that justice either; frankly, he'd rather take a guard's sidearm and shoot himself right here.
But it was Xer of all people who said, shockingly confident, "It's not our only option, it's our best one. Minister, give the signal. Prep the rocket and get us out of here."
Rossu, relieved, hurried to give the order. Gelistar fixed Xer with a questioning look but the pirate king turned to Vardoc. Their eyes met and whatever Xer saw roused the most surprising reaction: a tight, comforting smile.
-{}-
Xer didn't know how old this rocket was, but it was certainly primitive. Fifty meters of a reinforced duranium tube, wrapped around a nitrous oxide pressure tanks and acrylic-filled combustion chamber, stood nose-up in a well beneath the Whitewall Palace. He wasn't sitting but laying back in his cockpit chair, straps digging tight around his bulging body, staring through the dirty glass windshield at the tiny circle of sky far above. The seat's leather was cracked and even the controls were dusty.
That was all right. His first spaceflight had been in something not much better. How long ago had that been? He still didn't know what year this was. All he knew was that, long ago, he'd been crammed into that exploding tube with a dozen other young men. They'd ridden its flare all the way to low orbit and he'd seen Argai for the first time. A beautiful sphere, and the stars had promised so much then.
Thane his been with him then. Watching the Victor's Crown wink out, their past had come back in a rush. He remembered the Headtaker, and how they'd wrestled for the affections of Thalis El'Ana, how grand it had felt to win her over, and how not even that had spoiled the bond between them, better than brothers.
So long ago, and so much better company than this trip: Stubbornly pompous Gelistar, Rossu about to unravel, Vardoc already given up. But Xer was determined not to let them bother him in his final moments.
None of them knew the first thing about spaceflight, so Xer took the pilot's seat. The controls were another thing that came back with surprising ease. As he flipped switched and prodded buttons the cockpit lit up around them and started to hum.
"Will this thing really work?" asked Gelistar skeptically.
"The queen's staff runs checks on it quarterly," Rossu assured, though his voice wavered.
"Well, don't worry," said Xer, "if it explodes, at least we'll die fast."
None seemed comforted but Vardoc, strapped to the seat beside Xer, kept his eyes hopefully on the silo exit.
"When can we launch?" he asked.
"Give me a few minutes and we'll be out of here."
Xer completed his checks, ignoring complaints from the others. He didn't warn them before he test-fired the engines; he simply stabbed the button and felt the entire rocket vibrate beneath them.
Rossu yelped. "What was that? Are we ready to lift off?"
"Ready as we'll ever be," Xer said.
He worked the controls one last time, ignited the combustion chamber to burn nitrous oxide, and the rocket roared to life. The cockpit vibrated even more violently as the explosion pushed them upward, out of the long dark silo, past the Palace and into the sky. Xer saw Ranroon's surface for only a second before they stabbed through the clouds.
The ride was rougher than he'd remembered. Xer didn't care. A young man's thrill shot through him as they pushed toward higher skies and the slow revelation of starlight. Soon they'd leave the world behind.
Gelistar and Rossu were thankfully silent. Vardoc asked, "When can we try and contact a ship?"
"Just give me a minute." Xer watched his controls and hoped he was doing this right. The thing about these old rockets was that if you fired hard and hot and long enough you risked burning through injector and igniting the nitrous oxide stores. Once you got into space, where there was less push-back from gravity, the engine got more likely to suffer cataclysmic over-load.
Pretty sure he was stable for now, Xer moved his attention to the comm node. It was a standard short-range transmitter that hadn't changed since he was a boy. He turned it on and set it to broadcast on the widest frequency. This rocket had poor scanners and he had no idea if his son's ship was in range, but somebody would hear this, and that was all that mattered.
"All ships, attention," he said. "This is Xim VIII, rightful king of Argai, along with Grand Duke Orenaia, President Gelistar, and First Minister Rossu, and I'd like to say the following. I would rather die a free man than live in a cage. I regret nothing I did today, except one thing. I thought my son was a soulless, cold-blooded shell of a man who could have never come from my loins, but it turns out I was wrong. You're worth more than any of the smug, over-civilized bastards locked in here with me, boy, and—"
"What the hell is this!" Gelistar barked. "Is this going out?"
Xer reached inside his jacket and pulled the pistol he'd taken from a guard on the way out. Vardoc cringed in his seat but Gelistar had no idea what was coming until Xer fired one shot into his chest. Rossu, helpless beside the president, got out one manic yelp before a second bullet found his heart.
Xer turned back to face the front. Vardoc cowered in his crash webbing, expecting death.
"Just a second," Xer said calmly, then bent to the speaker grille again. "Xim, you're a bastard but you're still my bastard. If anyone should rule this sorry mess of mankind it might as well be you. Goodbye, boy."
He shut off the transmission. Vardoc didn't stop cringing. Xer turned his attention to the other controls. The rocket was still blazing at full strength, threatening to blow heat from the combustion chamber into the nitrous oxide tank. Any second now.
Meekly, looking at the bloody bodies strapped in behind them, Vardoc asked, "Why?"
But he already knew why.
Xer looked from the duke to the lights overhead. Did all of them—stars and starships both—belong to Xim? If not now, the day would come. That boy had already accomplished more than Xer ever dreamed.
"Take your empire, boy," he muttered. "You've earned it."
The rocket began to shake again. Vardoc shouted in alarm but Xer bared teeth at stars and starships in a ferocious smile. Then, with one final shudder, the injector valve burst, the nitrous oxide tank combusted, and the rocket was overwhelmed by its own flame.
It was, Xer hoped, a pyre fit for a king.