Pokemon Brick Bronze: Return of the Shadow

by 2b2tEternalLegend

After two thousand years, the Dark Lord has escaped his prison, amassing evil forces to destroy the world. His parents kidnapped, Bronze Tercano sets out on a journey to defeat Team Eclipse, a sinister organization with demonic backing. Only Bronze, his friends, and the Pokedex Holders can stop this threat by applying age-old wisdom to a modern world dominated by science. (IN-DEV)

37. Battle For Earth: Stave VI

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Stave VI:

All This Haze Of Violet And Gold

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There was no measuring Tercano's victory over the Alliance in terms of ordinary men. Can you say he did this out of a sense of justice? Whose justice, then? God's or his? Remember, we speak now of the Bronze Tercano who ordered battle drums made from the flayed skins of his Eclipse foes, the Philsopher-Emperor who divided the Pokedex Holders and executed those who angered him, the Bronze Tercano who denied the civilized conventions of his past with a wave of the hand, saying merely: "I am the Emperor of Logaria. That is reason enough."

-from "Blood of Southernesse" by the Shahbanu Queen-Consort, Moon Tercano

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It was to the Court of the Evil Djinn, the old residency that the Un-Cypress had first occupied on Discordia, that they escorted Bronze Tar-Tercano amid the flowering and pride of his victory. The building stood as it had once been furnished, virtually untouched by the fighting although there had been looting by Rorian soldiers. Some of the furnishings in the main hall had been overturned or smashed. Red smears were left on the walls and floor when demons had been killed by blaster or bolt fire. And echoing far away in the unknown distance was the roaring of Giratina and Rayquaza's companies of angelic dreadnaughts.

Bronze strode through the main entrance with Jake, Tess, and company a pace behind. Their escort fanned out into the throne room, straightening the place and clearing an area for the Emperor. One squad began investigating that no sly trap had been planted here.

"I remember the hour Cypress set up his throne," said Jake. He glanced around at the beams and the high, slitted windows, then the ring of contorted bodies around the throne. "I didn't like this place then and I like it less now, though the corpses are more pleasant than they've ever been. They were all very loyal, I think, but he made them eat poison. Even though he could have killed them in their sleep, he sat there while they died. They screamed for water, for it was a thirsty poison."

"Two dozen less for us to kill," said Bronze with an eager energy that Tess disliked, then gestured to an attendant. "Take the bodies and burn them in the burial pit outside the Temple. Then destroy the throne with explosives once we have left."

"Spoken like a true Aredian," said Antarah, and he marked the cold smile that his words brought to the Emperor's lips. "Will you reconsider, Tar-Tercano?"

"This place is a symbol," said Bronze. "The Djinn has lived here. By occupying this place I seal my victory for all to understand. Send men through the outer temple. Touch nothing. Just be certain no Eclipse people or toys remain in the courtyard."

"As you command," said Antarah, and reluctance was heavy in his tone as he turned to obey.

Communications men hurried into the room with their equipment and began setting up near to the massive Eclipse sigil that lay on the walls, cracked with the heat of a dozen laser strikes. The Aredian guard that augmented the surviving death commandos took up stations around the room. There was muttering among them, much darting of suspicious glances. This had been too long a place of the enemy for them to accept their presence in it casually.

"Ryan, have an escort bring the rest of the staff and Moon," said Bronze. "But no further, for I think our work is not wholly done."

"The message was already sent on the orders of Lily Tercano, m'Lord."

"Are the Steelix and Tyranitar clearing up the demons by the western mountains?"

"Yes, m'Lord. The storm's almost spent."

"What's the extent of the storm damage?" said Bronze.

"In the direct path, on the Temple and the camp yards across the Plain?" said Lance. "Extensive damage, as much from battle as from the storm. We have lost twelve frigates out of twenty-one aggregate, have confirmed seven thousand-four hundred fatalities and an unconfirmed total of fifteen thousand casualties, with an additional loss of two hundred Pokemon. The enemy had lost one hundred and nineteen frigates, unknown but substantial material losses, and between eighty to ninety thousand human casualties."

"Nothing money won't repair, I presume," said Bronze.

"Except for the lives," said Robert, and there was a tone of reproach in his voice as though to say: When did a Tercano worry first about things when people were at stake?

"We are attrited at seventy percent," said Mohaim, "and there is evidence, m'Lord, to believe that an unknown amount of enemy forces remains in the Temple catacombs, including what remains of the Eclipse leadership."

"Our blades could have killed a hundred thousand more Alliance grunts and achieved nothing," said Bronze, sitting down in a chair that had been brought for him. "When the skins of their chiefs hang from the banners of Logaria, the chaos that the Djinn is making will be undone. He will be utterly powerless to take form ever again, and the Alliance will collapse like an anthive when death strikes down the queen."

"I bring report that the Djinn is still holed up in the remains of his Temple," said Rombur.

"For now, contain him there," said Bronze. "Have they found any of the admins yet?"

"They're still examining the dead. It was a mighty slaughter, Tar-Tercano."

Bronze sighed, resting against the back of his chair. He looked out the court's broad, shattered doors at the cloud-shrouded plain, and in the eastern distance battles still being fought between the temple's defenses and the Rorian's fast-flyers. Flashes and sparkles of laser fire and blazing wreckages of Eclipse ships illumined the Distortion World beyond the orange and black remains of the camps. Burning hulks of crashed ships burnt slowly in the growing dark.

Presently, he said:

"Bring me a captive Eclipse trooper, if any can be found. We must learn what defenses the Temple has while we recover."

"Yes, m'Lord."

Antarah turned away, dropping a hand signal to one of the death commandos who took up a close-guard position beside Bronze.

"Jake," whispered Bronze. "Since we've been rejoined I've yet to hear you produce the proper quotation for the event." He turned, saw Jake swallow, saw the sudden grim hardening of the boy-man's jaw.

"As you wish, m'Lord," said Jake. He cleared his throat and rasped: "But I can't think of anything to say."

"'And the victory that day was turned into mourning unto all the people,'" quoted Cobalion from the Coda, "'for the people heard say that day how the king was grieved for his fallen men.'"

Bronze closed his eyes, forcing grief out of his mind, letting it wait as he had once waited to mourn his parents when he considered his parents beyond him forever. Now, he gave his thoughts over to this day's accumulated discoveries, the mixed futures and the hidden presence of the Djinn within his awareness.

"My Emperor."

Bronze opened his eyes to see Antarah's black-bearded visage above him, the dark eyes glaring with battle light.

"You've found the body of Yanase Berlitz," said Bronze.

A hush of the person settled over Antarah. "How could you know?" he whispered. "We just found the body in a great heap of metal."

Bronze ignored the question, seeing the death commando return through the doors with another soldier, both of whom supported a captive Eclipse soldier.

"Here's one of them, m'Lord," said Ryan. He signed to the guard to hold the captive five paces in front of Bronze.

The man's eyes, Bronze noted, carried a glazed expression of shock. A blue bruise stretched from the bridge of his nose to the corner of his mouth. He was of the blond, chisel-featured caste, the look that seemed synonymous with rank among the Alliance, yet there were no insignia on his torn uniform except black buttons with the half-moon crest and the tattered braid of his trousers.

"I think this one's an officer, m'Lord," said Jake. "I met him during a fire in Cypress's Rapidash stables."

Bronze nodded, said: "I am the Emperor of Logaria, Bronze Tercano. Do you understand that, man?"

The officer stared at him unmoving.

"Speak up," said Bronze, "or your divine leader may die."

The man blinked, swallowed.

"Who am I?" Bronze demanded.

"You are the Emperor Bronze Tercano," the man husked.

He seemed too submissive to Bronze, but then the Alliance soldiers had never been prepared for such happenings as this day. They'd never hoped for anything but victory which, Bronze realized, could be a weakness in itself. He put that thought aside for later consideration in his own training program.

"I have a message for you to carry to your lord," said Bronze, and he couched his words in the ancient formula: "I, a Lord of a Great House, an Imperial Kinsman of Southernesse, give my word of bond under the honor of Logaria. If the person of Jonathan Rowell Cypress and his people lay down their arms, cease their deluded crimes against creation, and come to me here I will guard their lives with my own. This I swear."

The man wet his lips with his tongue and glanced at Jake.

"Yes," said Bronze. "Who but an Emperor of Logaria could command the allegiance of Jake Albans?"

"I will carry the message," said the officer heavily.

"Take him to our forward command post by the gates and send him in," said Bronze. "But in exchange for our releasing him to his lord, he must tell us if there are any dangers we might find within the Temple. If he says true, then he will not be killed, but live as a hostage in the court of Logaria for all his days. This I also swear. What say you?"

"Ai, my lord, do not do this!" said the officer, his eyes quivering like two emeralds in sockets. "My lord has demons and monsters, werewolves and wraiths, things he has not released on the battlefield! You would be killed and no one would hear of your death. There is a ring of fire before the doors to the great chamber that the Lord has encamped in, so I hear, and he has made a storm of flames at the bidding of his thought."

"Thank you," said Bronze. "Return him to his old master."

"Yes, m'Lord." Ryan motioned for the guards to obey and led them out.

Bronze turned back to Antarah.

"Moon has arrived," said Antarah. "She has asked time to be alone with her thoughts and be alone with you. She sought a private moment in the frigate after receiving the news of her mother's death. Great Tar-Emperor, beg your peace and pardon. She will come to thee soon."

In that instant, Bronze saw how Antarah had been transformed from the Aredian chief to a creature of the Tar-Emperor Shananshah, a receptacle for awe and obedience. It was a lessening of the man, and Bronze felt the ghost-wind of the jihad in it.

I have seen a friend become a worshiper, he thought.

In a rush of loneliness, Bronze glanced around the room, noting how proper and on-review his guards had become in his presence. He sensed the subtle, prideful competition among them, each hoping for notice from the Emperor, the Logarian Shah from whom all blessings flow, he thought, and it was among the bleakest thoughts of his life. They sense that I must take the throne, he thought. But they cannot know I do it to prevent the jihad.

Antarah cleared his throat, said: "Giovanni, too, is dead. Silver has not come to our summons. And Blue of the Pokedex Holders has fallen."

Bronze nodded. "Antarah, where are your guards?"

"Out doing what any good warriors should be doing in such times," said Antarah. "They're out killing enemy wounded and marking their bodies for the incineration teams."

"Here, I say―" cried Tess.

"You must understand that they do this out of kindness," said Bronze. "Isn't it odd how we misunderstand the hidden unity of kindness and cruelty?"

Lily glared at her son, shocked by the profound change in him. Was it his friend's torment that did this? she wondered. And she said: "The men tell strange stories of you, Bronze. They say you've all the powers of ancient legend, that nothing can be hidden from you, that you see where others cannot see."

"The Queen-Mother of Logaria should ask about legends?" he asked.

"I've had a hand in whatever you are," she admitted, "but you mustn't expect me to―"

"How would you like to live as a king?" asked Bronze. "There's a fabric of legends for you! Think of all those experiences from ruling, the wisdom they'd bring. But wisdom tempers love, doesn't it? And it puts a new shape on hate. How can you tell what's ruthless unless you've plumbed the depths of both cruelty and kindness? You should fear me, Mother. I am the Emperor of Logaria."

Tess tried to swallow in a dry throat. Presently, she said; "Once you said that you didn't want to be Emperor."

Bronze shook his head. "I can deny nothing anymore." He looked up into Lily's eyes. "You think because I'm what you made me that I cannot feel the need for revenge?"

"Even on the innocent?" she asked, and she thought: He must not make the mistakes our ancestors made.

"To God, there are no innocent," said Bronze.

"Tell that to Moon," said Lily, and gestured toward the doors.

...

Moon entered the Court thern, walking between the Aredian guards as though unaware of them. She walked with a fragile uncertainty as she crossed the room to stand beside Lily. Bronze saw the marks of tears on her cheeks. He felt a pang of grief strike through him, but it was as though he could only feel this thing through her presence.

"She is dead, my love," said Moon. "My mother is dead."

Holding himself under stiff control, Bronze got to his feet. He reached out and touched Moon's cheek, feeling the dampness of her tears. "Yanase cannot be replaced, but there are other things to love. It is the Emperor who promises this." Gently, he moved her aside and gestured to Jake.

"My lord?" said Jake, his eyes flicking from Moon to the Emperor. He seemed like a man who, having expected something to last a long while, finds that it is over before he has even gotten settled. Then his eyes stopped at Bronze with a strange gaze.

Will I lose Jake, too? Bronze wondered. The way I've lost Antarah? Losing a friend to gain a creature?

Tess felt like swatting Bronze's face. Very impressive, Tercano, very impressive indeed! Shoving off your woman like that! You'd expect us to give you a portion of our heart and hearing if your mother had fallen! The men would sing their dirges and proclaim that her spirit rests over all of us. Why does Moon bear him? What has happened to Bronze?

What made him become the ever-shrinking man?

(trust him, Tess, trust him)

She looked at Moon in surprise. It had been a sharing of thoughts so subtle it was almost unnoticeable; she had not heard words but rather a succession of vivid, warm images from Moon's mind. Tess had only done such a sharing before in the harmony with Jake, and Cobalion sent and received messages to and from his mind. Bronze remained permanently opaque to her. There was a word that Cobalion had used for it, khef or kything, something like that; a faint form of telepathy passed between those Arceus had bound together. She moved her thoughts to confer with Moon.

You accept him treating you so?

(it is not how you think, Tess. How little you know about the way Bronze deals with true grief. I am a Berlitz, trained and chained in Old Hisui, and we move on with the world to survive. We've got to move on like before)

That had been faint. It had been cutting out ever since the word how, but Tess heard it. Louder than the butterfly flutterings of Moon's khef or kything was the murmur of the Rorian soldiers outside humming one of their marching tunes, trying to keep up their spirits.

(and I'll move on with it)

"There're some Association people at the stadium back on Earth, too," said Mohaim. "Rowan's with them. They're demanding special privileges, threatening an embargo against Roria. I told them I'd give you their message."

"Let them threaten."

"Bronze!" Lily hissed behind him. "He's talking about the world government!"

"I'll pull out their fangs presently," said Bronze.

And he thought then about the Association, the five-hundred-year-old force that had specialized for so long that it had become a parasite, unable to exist independently of the life upon which it fed. They had never dared grasp the sword, and now they could not grasp it. They might have stepped him when they realized the error of specializing in Pokedex Holders as their minions. They could have done this, lived their glorious day and died. Instead, they'd existed from moment to moment, hoping the regions that they despoiled might produce a new host when the old one died. The Chairmans had made the fatal decision: they'd chosen always the clear, safe course that leads ever downward into stagnation.

Let them look closely at what they thought to make their new host, thought Bronze.

He imagined what was going on in the Eclipse camp; he forced his attention away from his surroundings and summoned up a vivid image of the Alliance's surviving men and their officers huddled inside the Temple, the bitterness on their faces and the desperation. Here and there among them, faces caught Bronze's attention briefly: admins measuring the preparations within a vast black room, planning and scheming yet for a way to turn defeat into victory.

Then he saw movement in the clustered people, a face and figure emerged from the crowd: Michael Berlitz, Moon's father, the tight Hisuian features with darkly pitted cheeks, the hunched shoulders, a look like the sudden onset of fragile age about him.

"There's the Berlitz patriarch," said Bronze. "Let him stand free, Ryan."

"M'Lord," said Ryan.

"Let him stand free," Bronze repeated.

Ryan nodded. Michael shambled forward as an Aredian lance was lifted and replaced behind him. The crazed blue eyes peered at Bronze, measuring, seeking. Bronze stepped forward one pace, sensing the tense, waiting movement of the lord of House Berlitz and his people.

"Lord Berlitz," said Bronze, "my back is to no door into which I can escape. I but learn this day how much I have caused you grief. You needn't forgive."

"The universe is full of doors," said Michael, "and my wife is behind one. You're Robert's son, are you not? You've his manner and the look of him in your eyes."

"Yet I'm my father's son," said Bronze. "For I say to you, Lord Berlitz, that in payment for your years of service to your family and my love for your youngest daughter, you may now ask anything you wish of me. Anything at all. Do you need my life now, Lord? It is yours."

Pitching his voice to carry in a half-whisper for Michael's ears alone, Bronze said: "I mean this, Lord Berlitz. If you're to strike me, do it now."

"Do you think that I who gave my life to uphold the old oaths should break them now?" said Michael. "Would I wish for the death of the Emperor that Arceus has given us? I only wish to stand before you, Tar-Tercano."

"Then we are amended?"

"Yanase has moved on and I may accept that it is so."

Bronze's exhale of air came as a low hiss. "If you think it best, Lord Berlitz."

...

He thought then of prescient glimpses into the possibilities of this moment, and one time-line where Revan carried a Scolipeded with poison in its horns, which the Chairman commanded he use against "this usurper."

The entrance guards suddenly stepped aside and formed a short corridor of lances. There came a murmurous hum from a series of small hoverpallets, whirring suspensors rasping with the poisonous dust that had drifted from the Plain of Discordia and into the residency. Each pallet had a hologram of an Association or corporate diplomat resting on top.

The glowing shapes of Professor Rowan and Steven Stone led their holographic attendants into the hall. Rowan had frayed his suit and his white stood out in disarray. His undershirt's left sleeve had been ripped along the inner seam. His pallet was without automated weapons, but his presence moved with him like a force-shield bubble that kept his immediate area open.

An Aredian lance dropped across his path and stopped him where Bronze ordered. The others bunched up behind, a montage of flickering blue color, of shuffling and of staring faces. Bronze swept his gaze across the group, saw Wicke with a few other woman women who hid signs of weeping, saw the lackeys who had come to enjoy grandstand seats at a victory for the Association and now stood choked to silence by defeat. Bronze saw the bird-bright eyes of Professor Juniper of Unova glaring beneath a pair of spectacles, and beside her the narrow furtiveness of the Sinnohian regional chairman.

There's a passel of faces time betrayed to me, Bronze thought.

He looked beyond the Sinnohian Chairman then, attracted by a movement in the shifting of the holograms. There was a tall, smiling man with broad shoulders and a hearty beard. He was wearing a brown jacket over a black shirt with trousers, and on his feet were tall, glossy, oiled boots. To his left, emitting from a projector on the same hoverpallet, Bronze saw a strong form with a fierce, pale face he'd never before encountered, not in time or visions or out of them. It was a face he felt he should know and the feeling carried with it a marker of fear.

He leaned toward Yellow and whispered: "The man in the brown jacket and the one to his left, the evil-looking one―who are they?"

Yellow looked, recognizing the face from her meetings with him. "The Commissioner of the International Police is the tall one," she said. "Be careful with him. The other is Agent Blake, Pokedex Holder. He's technically supposed to be a part of our order, but..." She shrugged. "He's never around. He has a Genesect: a genetic eunuch, and a killer."

The Commisioner's errand boy, thought Bronze. I'm right to fear them.

"Both will be executed at the slightest offense," whispered Bronze. "The International Police will have to be disbanded. Obviously they weren't effective enough to keep the Alliance checked."

"The Unovan Pokedex Holders won't like that," Yellow replied.

"To hell with the Unovan block," said Bronze. "The only one I could use is Black, and he's barely on my side."

He turned to Rowan and spoke. "Professor," and noted the jerk of surprised attention in Platinum. The words had been uttered with all the controlled atonals of the Logarian accent, carrying in it every shade of contempt and scorn that Bronze could put there.

I'll let him guess that I've known of his schemes, he thought.

Rowan cleared his throat and said: "Perhaps the respectable Bronze Tercano believes he has things all his own way now. Nothing could be more remote from fact. You have violated the laws of the Association, took command of a military operation as a civilian―"

"I have merely used the Association's military with the consent of its generals," said Bronze. "The Eclipse army was in my way and I was in a hurry to get to Jonathan Rowell Cypress, Professor, to ask him about some of his strange activities."

"The Corporate Alliance and the Aether Foundation have a fleet ready to blockade Roria's ports," said Steven Stone. "We'll cut you off from imports and make your economy plunge. I've but to say the word."

"Oh, yes," said Bronze. "I had forgotten about the Devon Corporation." He searched through the holographic embassy until he saw the faces of two Aether Foundation agents.

He spoke to Moon. "Are those the Aether agents, Moon, the two fat ones dressed in white over there?"

"Yes, Bronze."

"You two," said Bronze, pointing. "Get out of your broadcasting chairs immediately and dispatch messages that will get that blockade fleet on its way home. Make sure I can see you. After this, you'll ask my permission before you act so brazenly again."

"The Corporate Alliance doesn't take your orders!" the taller of the two barked. He and his companion pushed their hoverpallets through to the barrier lances, which were raised at a nod from Bronze. The two holo-men stepped out and the taller leveled an arm at Bronze and said: "You may very well be under embargo for―"

"If I hear any more nonsense from either of you," said Bronze, "I'll give the order that'll destroy Aether Paradise and all the Devon Corporation. Permanently."

"Are you mad?" the tall Aether official demanded. He fell back half a step.

"You grant that I have the power to do this thing, then?" asked Bronze.

The Aether official seemed to stare into space for a moment, then: "Yes, you could do it, but you must not."

"Ah," said Bronze, and he nodded to himself. "You've dipped your finger into the stew of the times, have you? You guess the people's wrath?"

"Yes! But you cannot turn them on us!"

The shorter of the pair said: "You would destroy yourself, too, and condemn yourself to damnation in your hell. Have you any idea what it means to wreak such a campaign over the Earth?"

"The safe world that has existed for so long would be burned up forever," said Bronze. "The rest of the Association is crippiled. Millions will die at the hands of Rorian holy warriors. Humans become little isolated clusters in their isolated or ruined cities. You know, I might do this thing out of pure spite, or out of ennui."

"Let us talk this over privately," the taller official said. "I'm sure we can come to some compromise that is―"

"Send the message to your fleets around Roria," said Bronze. "I grow tired of this argument. If those fleet's don't leave soon there'll be no need for us to talk. I'll send out another fiery speech, do you see it?" He nodded toward his communications men at the side of the hall. "You send the message and authorization code to our equipment. We'll do the rest."

"First we must discuss this," the tall official said. "We cannot just―"

"Do it!" Bronze barked. "The power to destroy a thing is the absolute control over it. You've agreed I have that power. We are not here to discuss or to negotiate or to compromise. You will obey my orders or suffer the immediate consequences!"

"He means it," the shorter official said, and Bronze saw the fear grip them. Slowly the holograms shifted to a view of Aether communications eqiupent.

"Will they obey?" asked Robert.

"Corporations and democratic governments have a narrow vision of time," said Bronze. "They can see ahead to a dripping red wall marking the consequences of disobedience. Every investor or stockholder in the Sylph Corporation, the Devon Corporation, or any other company can look to that same wall. There is no civilized promise of mine that I will not command my people to destroy them. They'll obey."

Paul turned back to look at Steven Stone, said: "When they permitted you to mount your father's position at the head of the Devon Corporation, it was only on the assurance that you'd keep the money flowing. A fine Champion of Hoenn you've made! I can launch such a war that they'll see that you've failed them. Do you know the consequences?"

"Nobody permitted me to―"

"Stop playing the fool," said Bronze. "The Corporate Alliance is like a village beside a river. They need the water, but can only dip out what they require. They cannot dam the river and control it, because that focuses attention on what they take, it brings down eventual destruction. The trade flow, that's their river, and I have built a dam across Roria. But my dam is such that you cannot destroy it without destroying yourself, because the dam is guarded with great warriors."

Steven Stone brushed a hand through his insubstantial hair and glanced at the backs of the two Aether officials. "Don't try your tricks on me. We don't need to do this. We have other resources and militaries. You dare to upend people's lives! You! An adventurer from the southern backwoods, a nobody!"

"Rowan's already admitted who I am," said Bronze. "Respectable, he said. Let's stop this nonsense. You fled the stadium because you thought the Alliance was a greater danger to you than I. And you were right by far. For I wish only to destroy your bodies if you disobey, not your souls."

"We are your rulers!" Rowan cried.

Bronze glanced at the Aether official standing now at the communications equipment and facing him. One of them nodded.

"I could send a spirit being to assassinate you," said Bronze, gesturing toward Cobalion. The sacred sword blazed suddenly and Steven put his hands up, as if forgetting he was only a hologram.

"You will not dare!" Crystal cried.

Bronze only looked at her silently, then turned away and cleared his throat. "Greathearts, there is a thing we have left to do. A Temple lies between us and the Dark Lord. How do we proceed and answer this riddle? Speak your minds, for crypts of darkness are in our path and I am in a hurry to get to the Djinn."

"There's a massed armada of the Rorian military over the Temple right now," said Ruby. "You've but to say the word and they'll―"

"Oh, yes," said Bronze. "I had almost forgotten about them. But I have not forgotten that such a bombardment will likely make the job of getting anywhere in the Temple ruins much more difficult than it is now, and not scratch our enemies."

"Bury them and let them lie trapped forever," said Rombur. "Their humans will die and their robots will decay."

"It would not be forever," said Bronze. "The lands change with time. And have we not seen that the Djinn is spreading poison over the Earth as we stand here?"

"Majesty, we both know a way out of our difficulty," said Antarah. "We attack with all the men and Pokemon that still can wield blade or blaster."

"Yes, thee speak true."

Moon moved up on Bronze's other side, said: "Do you wish me to leave, Bronze?"

He glanced at her. "Leave? You'll never again leave my side."

"There's nothing binding between us yet but God," said Moon. "If you wish to follow, I will, even in danger. But the battle will claim many more men."

Bronze looked down at her for a silent moment, then: "Speak only truth with me." As she started to reply, he silenced her with a finger to her lips. "Arceus is good. That which binds us cannot be loosed," he said. "Now, watch these matters closely for I wish to see this room later through your wisdom."

"M'Lord," said Jake darkly, "I had hoped for my day against the Alliance."

"You've had your day against them," said Bronze.

"There's no need for this," said Robert. "There are easier ways to kill them, Bronze. We only need to think of them."

"I know," said Bronze in a voice drenched with bitterness. "Poison gas, an assassin, all the old familiar ways. But maybe they should be considered."

"You promised me to whet my blade with the blood of demons!" hissed Jake, and Bronze marked the rage in the boy-man's face, the way the inkvine scar stood out dark and ridged. "You owe it to me, m'Lord!"

"Have you suffered more from them than I?" asked Bronze.

"My torture," rasped Jake. "My time as a slave―"

"My parents," said Bronze. "The safety of me and my companions, Tess's strife and the nightmares and terrors that kept me awake with clenched brow. My days as a fugitive without rank or succor...and one more thing: it is now between Cypress and me, and you know as well as I the rivalry will prevail."

Jake's shoulders sagged. "Call in an executioner to destroy him, if you must, or let me do it, but don't offer yourself."

"Bronze Tercano need not do this thing," said Moon.

He glanced at her and saw the fear for him in her eyes. "But the Emperor must," he said. "We will fight and we will win."

"Well, Lily, I see your son is a reckless one," said Crystal. She looked past him to his mother and then glared with disgust. "But he has led his sandlice to victory. For that, you can be forgiven even the abomination of his religion and hatred for the stabilizing force of society."

Bronze stilled a cold, piercing anger. "You, Crystal, never had the right or cause to forgive my mother anything!"

The Pokedex Holder locked eyes with him, and Bronze felt as though they were reaching a crucial division. The organism of the Pokedex Holders, which he was apart of undeservedly or not, was already divided. They had stood together and killed creation's enemies arm and arm, but now that a lull in battle came, the ugly factions he had created around himself would show themselves, maybe even destroy him. Would Gold side with him or the woman who had been his old friend?

"Try your tricks on me, cold woman," said Bronze. "Where's your support? Where's your army? Try looking at Arceus, Crystal, past all the lies and silly calculations of science and democracy into a place in your soul that you dare not explore! You'll find my eye and sigil staring out at you!"

Crystal dropped her gaze.

"Have you nothing to say?" Bronze demanded. "Have the Pokedex Holders nothing to say?"

"I welcomed you to our ranks," she muttered. "Don't besmirch that."

Bronze raised his voice. "Observe her, comrades! This is a Pokedex Holder, patient in a patient cause. She and her order have waited in disunity for two decades, waiting for the person that they were supposed to create! Observe her! She knows now that the twenty years from Red to me have produced that person. Here I stand as a Pokedex Holder! But I will not bow to them or her Association! I...will...never...do...their...bidding!"

"Crystal!" cried Green. "Silence him!"

"Silence him yourself," said Moon.

Bronze glared at the trembling woman. "You were part of the dead Chairman's counsel. For your part in all this I could gladly have you strangled," he said. "And Rowan and Samuel Oak would follow you to the grave. You couldn't prevent it!" he snapped as she stiffened in rage. "But I think it better punishment that you eat your long, bitter years as Arceus gives them to you, never able to touch me or bend me to a single thing your scheming desires, never able to do anything but watch as I conquer the peaceful, complacent world you thought was the end of history."

"Yellow, Platinum, Gold, what have you done?" Crystal demanded. "You've turned to his―"

"I'll give you credit where you've earned it," said Bronze. "You fought evils in the past, evils that came only as messengers or emissaries to the Great Evil. You saw part of what the world needs, but how poorly you saw it. You and the regional professors think to control humans and give a few Pokedexes to guide your master plan! How little you understand of what really drives the favor of the universe."

"You mustn't speak of these things!" hissed Crystal.

"SILENCE!" Bronze roared. The word seemed to take substance as it twisted through the air between them under Bronze's control.

Crystal reeled back into the arms of those behind her, face blank with shock at the power with which he had seized her psyche. Had there been death in the psychic force that the boy's voice contained? No, not so, not even with his glowing crown and all the perfumes of Southernesse about him! It had been the god Cobalion, she thought in terror, the member of those enigmatic creatures that before had carved their path through her life as mere Pokemon but now demanded to be treated as much more.

"Gold," she whispered. "Gold."

"I'll remember your branch of the Association's elite and its schemes," said Bronze. "I'll stand up to you as I'll stand up to the technocrats and Rowan's bunch, who thought they could dare control me! You remember this. I've magic that can kill you with a word."

The Rorians and Aredians around the court glanced knowingly at each other. Did the legend not say: "And his word shall carry death eternal to those who stand against righteousness."

"We know our way out of this difficulty," said Bronze to the assembly, "and it is the same road that we have taken before. Let us not put down the sword. Not yet."

He whipped out his dagger and it glinted like brass tempered with gold in the firelight of the room's lit braziers. He raised his closed fist above hs head and held the blade there like a shining brand.

"Who is a king's man?" he cried.

"We are, Your Reverence!"

"Then let's stop this nonsense and finish the victory! Logaria!"

As the men began to chant their bloody battle-cries, Tess and Jake moved to Bronze's side. "If you so much as―" Tess began.

"Please stand aside," said Bronze. He lowered the knife and pushed them gently away.

"Tess!" said Lily, touching the girl's arm. "He's like his father in this mood. Don't distract him. It's the only thing you can do for him now." And she thought: Great God! What has come upon my son?

"No!" Rowan screamed. "No! No!"

Bronze cleared his throat and said: "We were speaking of the embargo, Professor."

Steven's projection whirled and glared and Bronze. "I control the largest company on Earth!" he growled.

"You shall have a company as large as I allow," said Bronze.

"We put down our arms and came here to respond to your insolence!" Steven Stone shouted. "You dare threaten―"

"Your person is safe in my presence," said Bronze. "A Tercano promises it. The Emperor, however, sentences you to do his bidding. But have no fear, Steven Stone. I will ease the harshness of my commands by first seeking other methods by all the powers I will have at my disposal. The wastelands that your factories have created will become green plains, full of gentle, growing things."

As the hidden import of Bronze's words grew in Steven's mind, he glared again at Bronze. "Now we see true motives," he sneered.

"Indeed," said Bronze.

"And what of Roria?" said Rowan. "Another garden full of gentle things?"

"The Aredians and Rorians have the word of the Emperor," said Bronze to all. "There will be flowing water here open to the sky and green fields rich with water and good things. But we have our souls and their salvation to think of, too. Thus, there will always be deserts in Aredia, and mountains in Frostveil, the fierce winds of the seas, and dark jungles on Crescent Island. These places will remain untouched and filled with wild Pokemon, and trials to toughen a man. These places will be solitary so that men can find God. There is a saying in the Hisuian Coda: 'Arceus created hardship to train the faithful.' One cannot go against the word of God."

Steven Stone had his own view of the hidden meaning in Bronze's words now. He glimpsed the jihad and said: "You cannot loose these people upon the world!"

"You will think back to the gentle ways of the Alliance and Association!" Bronze snapped.

"You cannot," he whispered.

"You're a man who knows truth," said Bronze. "Review your words." He took a deep breath.

"You cannot stay this thing, Bronze, if you declare it now," warned Robert.

Steven straightened, standing stiffly with a look of remembered dignity. "Who will negotiate for you, Emperor?" he asked.

Bronze turned and saw his mother, her eyes heavy-lidded, standing with Moon in a squad of death commands. He crossed to them and stood looking down at Moon.

"I know the reasons," she whispered. "If it must be."

Bronze, hearing the secret tears in her voice, touched her cheek. "You must fear nothing," he whispered. He dropped his arm and faced his mother.

"You will negotiate for me. Mother, with Moon by your side. She has wisdom and sharp eyes. And it is wisely said that no one bargains tougher than a Hisuian of the old blood. She will be looking through the eyes of her love for me and with the thought of her sons to be, what they will need. Listen to her."

Lily sensed the harsh calculation in her son and put down a shudder. "What are your instructions?" she asked.

"House Berlitz's entire holdings as dowry," he said.

"Entire?" said Michael, shocked almost speechless.

"Our families will be joined and the coffers used on projects to build up Roria. I'll want administrative positions and a Corporate Alliance directorship for my parents, and Robert in the province of Southern Roria. There will be titles and attendant power for every surviving man that fought here today, not excepting the lowliest trooper."

"What of the Aredians?" said Ryan.

"The Aredians are yours," said Bronze, "but the voice of the Aredian king is my voice. What they receive shall be dispensed by the Emperor. It'll begin with you, and with other Aredians as governors and ministers over the cities on the Aredian coastal strip, but that can wait."

"And for me?" said Lily.

"Is there something you wish?"

"Perhaps just our old hometown," she said, looking at Robert. "I'm not certain. I've become too much the survivor, and the mother of the Emperor. I need a time of peace and stillness in which to think."

"That you shall have," said Bronze, "and anything else that I or the gods can give you."

Lily nodded, feeling suddenly old and tired. She looked at Moon "And for the royal, uh, mistress?"

"No title for me," said Moon sternly. "Nothing. I beg of you."

"I swear to you now," he whispered, "that you'll need no title to me. But you will be my wife of Bronze Tercano in the meantime, because this is a political thing, and we must weld peace out of this moment, enlist the great families of Old Hisui. We must obey the forms. And because this is a religious and Logarian thing you shall be called Saint Moon Berlitz and the Shahbanu Queen, as the old empresses were known. They'll say you have pretensions of a literary nature, and that you find solace in such things. But I am not yet crowned and there is still a little time for simplicity."

"So you say now," said Moon, looking out the open doors and at the Temple beyond. "But you plan for the morning without first facing the night."

"Yes, our foes are not ended yet," said Bronze. He spoke to Mohaim and Rombur. "Divide the remaining men into three groups for a strike. Let them follow me into the Temple, provided that they are willing."

They were, of course, very willing. A soft voice fluttered into his brain, silken-smooth. At the end was the quiet, serpentine hiss of Emrett's tongue.

(fanaticism, Tercano. Even with all the knowledge in the world, I'll never understand you)