The Mechaneer

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 30: Algreil Prime

Silver, blue and red. Jack didn't have to look far to see where Algreil Aerospace's colors came from. Algreil Prime, the world they'd colonized as equal parts corporate headquarters and manufactory, glowed like an immense logo. Outside the massive arcology complexes, it was an uninhabitable desert. The Algreils didn't terraform it, Otto had once said, because they didn't want to risk damaging the rare minerals in the soil.

Jack wondered if they hadn't left it unterraformed to avoid damaging their company colors.

"It's been a while, hasn't it, old buddy?" Otto. Grinning his usual shit-eating grin, no doubt.

Not long enough, Jack thought, but he knew he didn't mean it. Deep down, he was glad to be back. If it weren't for his separation from Ellie and Chloe, he would have almost looked forward to what being back meant.

He said, "Huh."

Otto chuckled. "Brace up, man. I've got business to attend to, and I don't want you hangdogging it through meetings. It's defeatist."

"The hell do you want me at meetings for?" Jack asked. "I'm no bureaucrat."

"You're the Emperor's daughter's adoptive father," Otto said, "and a decorated war hero. And, you're in serious contention for the silver medal for second best bullshitter in the galaxy. I want to show my colleagues that we have a serious chance of winning this thing – and fast, this time."

"You think that's true?"

"I think it's closer to true now than it will be in ten years. The Feds will take us apart if we don't do the same to them."

Jack grunted. Hard to believe he'd have welcomed that news a few months ago. Principle, had it only been that long?

"Besides, if that bastard Avalon hadn't pulled a second destroyer out of the deep blue sea at exactly the wrong moment, we'd be halfway to winning already. The Feds' best fleet decapitated with no confirmation of who did it, and us with plenty of time to get into position to put the Senate down. To say nothing of your daughter."

"Instead," Jack said, "Chloe's Principle knows where, we slunk off the planet on a smuggler's bulk transport, and we probably got here about a week before a Navy task force from Etemenos. Almost doesn't cut it."

"Relax," Otto said. "I've got everything under control."

Says the self-proclaimed gold medalist bullshitter of the galaxy, Jack thought. Hell of it was, Otto could almost convince him they had a chance – and that it mattered they had a chance.

Almost didn't cut it.

The transport that had brought them, their battered mecha and a handful of Algreil Aerospace escapees from Wellach to Algreil Prime swooped toward the station orbiting the planet atop a massive space elevator. Jack felt the familiar jolt of merging gravitic fields as ship and station joined, and idly wondered just how much Otto had paid the transport's captain to get them out from under Federal interdict.

"Gentlemen, you are cleared to disembark," the transport's computer announced. "Have a safe and profitable trip."

Not likely, as far as Jack could see.

For all his carping, though, he found himself following Otto as the Oligarch stalked toward the big airlock of his home station.

The airlock doors hissed open. Only on the transport side, Jack knew, because even during the Civil War Algreil Aerospace's headquarters had used smooth, silent nanomachines rather than hydraulics.

Two lines of suited men bearing the Algreil crest flanked a broad passageway in alternating electric blues and reds. Otto stepped onto the silver carpet down the center, motioning for Jack to follow.

A quartet of further Algreil men, these in Devil Ray armored flight suits, stepped forward and snapped off a crisp salute. "Mr. Chairman, Colonel Hughes," the leader said. Jack didn't recognize him from the Civil War. The blazon on his chest indicated he had served with the Marchess Wardens rather than the Devil Rays. "If I may say so, sirs, it is good to see you back in one piece."

"Good to be back, Colonel." Otto returned the salute. Jack, automatically, did likewise. "What's our situation?"

"Under advisement from the board of directors, Boardmember Marchess-Algreil has assumed temporary control. She has forestalled Federal action by condemning the attack on a Federal Navy vessel and disavowing knowledge of your location. Officially, sir, we do not know you're still alive."

"Good girl," Otto said. "Nice to hear she didn't panic or get sentimental."

The Warden frowned slightly. Jack assumed 'Boardmember Marchess-Algreil' was Otto's wife, heir to the United Shipping Magnate, and that the man before them had changed corporate families when his heiress did.

"Is Alarie on the station?"

The Warden nodded. "She is presently engaged in negotiations with Senator Howell, sir."

"Negotiations! There's a laugh. Since that senile old fool only speaks marks, I assume you mean bribes? Again, good. He'll think we want to play along, and he's small-time enough not to damage the war chest." Abruptly, Otto switched topics. "Senatorial mood?"

"Guarded, sir," the Warden said. "They do not appear to want open conflict, but we have no indication they are willing to permit the incident to drop as a mere accident."

"Typical." Otto started walking again. His men fell into line automatically. If Jack hadn't remembered the habit from his Civil War days, and had a week in transit to practice, he'd have been left behind. "Don't inform Alarie I'm back until she's done talking to Howell. I'm going to stay 'dead' to the Senate for as long as it takes them to figure it out, and we can't trust her not to let it slip. In the meantime, we need as many of the 'Koi' contacted as possible. Secure communications, obviously."

"Obviously, sir," the Warden said.

Jack had followed the rapid-fire Oligarchical delivery up to that point, but now Otto had completely lost him. "The 'Koi?'"

"C.O.I.," Otto said. "Captains of Industry. The Oligarchy within the Oligarchy, if you will. Those who weren't happy about Kalder-Black and getting screwed out of the spoils of war."

"Just how long have you been setting this up, Otto?"

"Long enough."

Which, Jack knew, was all he would get from his once-and-current boss. Just like old times, he was on a need-to-know basis, and how much he needed changed with Otto's whims. Of course, Otto usually planned those seeming whims a few months in advance, with a dozen backup options per hour.

The Warden said, "When Boardmember Marchess-Algreil concludes her conference with Senator Howell, shall I instruct her to join you, sir?"

Otto shook his head. "I'll tell you when to contact Alarie, Colonel, and it won't be until after the C.O.I. meeting. She may need to run some more unwitting interference while we decide on a course of action."

"If I may, sir, the Boardmember has been very concerned –"

"You may not," Otto snapped.

"Very good, sir," the Warden said flatly.

Jack kept his mouth shut. He had to. He'd never met Alarie Wein Marchess-Algreil, and even if he had, her and Otto's marriage was none of his business.

Chloe hanging out with Otto's brother, on the other hand... Jack had to suppress a shudder. Principle, let her be too smart to see the charming side of an Algreil and ignore the rest!

Otto led his small party to one of the tram cars that spun around the station's outer ring. He must have given it an order through his flight suit's computer, because the numbers indicating its destination changed as it rolled over to admit him. "All aboard," he said, motioning for Jack and the Warden colonel to take a seat. The rest remained behind without so much as a word.

Jack climbed in. For someone who liked such spartan conditions in his office, Otto sure as hell knew how to arrange transportation in style. The tram felt roomier than the entire Mother Goose, though Jack would have traded them in a heartbeat.

"I can't believe you're taking me to a damn meeting," he said. "What do you expect me to do?"

"I already told you," Otto said, "you'll put the C.O.I.'s minds at ease."

"You're gonna tell them you've got Chloe," Jack said. "Right?"

Otto grinned. "The thought had crossed my mind."

"And when they find out you don't?"

"By the time they find out," Otto said, "it won't be a lie. Or don't you think we'll get her back?"

"I'm only here because I think you've got a shot at it – which is more than I've got. But the Feds are on site, not us, and Avalon already beat you once. What makes you think Chloe and your little brother can lay low on Wellach?"

"Don't underestimate Rudy. He's not half as stupid as he looks, which, I'll admit, isn't saying much. He'd also sooner die than give in to the Federal Navy, and he's not an easy guy to kill."

"You sound like you speak from experience." Jack laughed.

Otto didn't. "He'll buy us enough time."

He sounded as far from cocky as Jack had ever heard him.

Suddenly, Jack found he didn't much care for the conversation. He said, "At least it keeps the Reformer pinned down."

"Actually, Colonel Hughes," the Warden said, "the Reformer left Wellach orbit two days after you did."

Jack and Otto both stared at him.

After a too-long pause, Otto said, "Explain."

"I was under the impression you were apprised of this, sirs. Admiral Avalon's flagship departed the planet at maximum sublight and entered a compression tunnel eleven hours prior to your transport."

"That doesn't make a damn bit of sense," Jack said. "There's no way Avalon would leave Wellach, not unless –"

"Unless he had your daughter," Otto finished, "or knew where to get her."

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 31: Reunion

"Where are you taking me?" Ellie asked.

The marines flanking her said nothing.

At Avalon's orders, she occupied a guest suite aboard the Reformer and received the treatment due a senatorial attache or visiting Oligarch, not the hybrid wife of a salvager suspected of fighting for a renegade company and harboring an imperial fugitive. She dined with the admiral and his senior staff, read, watched and listened to whatever she requested from the destroyer's databanks, fielded no questions, suffered no torture.

Yet she remained a prisoner, and miserable.

The Reformer's crew resented her, she knew. They would have even if most of them didn't consider her an animal, because their magnetic, hypnotic admiral lavished every consideration upon her. He all but waited on her hand and foot.

Why?

Ellie didn't flatter herself that Marcel Avalon was smitten. Maybe in her prime, when her looks had sufficed at least to get her into trouble, but not after fifteen hard years of salvage mechaneering. People said spacers looked younger than their age, but hybrids generally didn't live as long as unmodified humans. When Ellie looked in the mirror, she saw more than thirty-six human years in the smile lines crinkling her eyes and the streaks of early gray in the fur at the tips of her ears.

She'd initially thought the admiral wanted to get to Chloe through her. Perhaps he did. If so, he was a consummate actor, never allowing anything to break through his mask of concern.

Sometimes, she thought he genuinely felt as sorry as he said he did.

Whatever the reason for his solicitousness, she would have traded all of it for a lightless dungeon cell and an intermittently filled bowl of cold gruel if she could have had just a glimpse of Jack or Chloe in return.

"This way," the marine on her left said. He pulled her by the arm as though he didn't think she could figure it out for herself, or as though it was the only outlet he had for his resentment.

Or perhaps, she thought sadly, both.

The marines marched her to an almost identical pair, except that these wore solid gold shoulder pads on their dark green, mecha-like battle armor. Ellie's escorts snapped off crisp salutes.

"Here's the package the admiral requested," the one who had grabbed her said.

"Good work, Corporal," one of the gold-shouldered marines said. "We'll take it from here. The two of you are free to return to your regular duties."

"Sergeant," Ellie's guards said in unison, stepping back. She didn't watch them march down the hallway, but she could hear them all the way to the tube station.

"You," the other gold-shouldered marine said, "come with me."

At least he let her walk under her own power.

He escorted her through the double-doors he and his comrade guarded.

Ellie gasped.

She stood on the Reformer's primary bridge for the first time. She'd seen promotional posters for the Federal Navy displaying non-classified views of their most advanced warship, but seeing it first-hand would ordinarily have eclipsed those. The bridge stretched fifty meters across and its dark green bulkheads were almost luminous with reflected glow from hundreds of screens and holograms and the huge three-dimensional image displaying their position relative to objects within a megameter.

Yet the view through the wall-spanning main screen captured her whole attention. Even the Reformer looked like a toy next to the gargantuan vessel sprawled before it. She recognized it immediately.

Oh, sweet Principle, no, she thought. The Reformer would only have left the Wellach system for one reason, and she knew it.

Because Chloe had.

They had tracked her –

– to where it all began, all those wonderful years ago. To the hulk of a derelict Imperial battlecruiser, and a silvery mecha, and a luminous being who entrusted Jack and Ellie Hughes with the gift and the burden of a lifetime.

"Mrs. Hughes," Admiral Avalon called. In public, it was 'Mrs. Hughes' and 'Ma'am.' In private, uncomfortably often, it was 'Ellie.' "Please join us."

As if I have a choice, Ellie thought. She didn't push Avalon's hospitality. If she did, she knew it would vanish and she would be treated like the prisoner she was. She would take a stand if and when her doing so actually mattered.

The marines didn't bother escorting her to the high-backed chair Avalon commanded the bridge from. He perched on it, leaned forward, muscles tensed, eyes fixed on the screen, a sprinter awaiting the start of a race – or a predator awaiting a moment of weakness in his prey.

He flicked his eyes to her as she approached. "I would offer you a seat, but I fear we are at battlestations and cannot spare one. Please forgive me."

"It's no problem," Ellie said. "But, Admiral, if you're at battlestations, should you really have a civilian –" An enemy civilian, she thought with fierce, irrational pride, though you insist on ignoring it. "– on the bridge?"

"I may need your assistance," Avalon said. "Even the few seconds it would take to connect to your chambers could mean the difference between life and death."

Ellie laughed. "I'm a pretty fair sensor operator, Admiral, but not good enough to win you a battle. My moral support certainly won't do so, even if I choose to give it."

"Not our lives or deaths, Mrs. Hughes," Avalon said. "Your adopted daughter's."

The laugh died in Ellie's throat.

"She is aboard that ship, and in very dangerous company. As soon as we pinpoint her location, we will attempt to contact her and then extract her. She must place her trust in us, Mrs. Hughes. You must convince her."

"You can't expect me to do that," Ellie said. "As far as I'm concerned, you're still Chloe's enemy."

"I've told you many times, I want only to help Chloe."

"You've told me," Ellie said, "but you haven't shown me."

"Nor can I," Avalon countered, preempting an angry interjection from the junior officer seated on his far side, "unless you give me the chance to."

"I guess I'll just have to take your word for it, then," Ellie said, "because I won't help you without some sort of guarantee of Chloe's safety."

"I cannot make such a guarantee," Avalon said, "because she has placed herself in grave danger."

"How?"

"Lieutenant Richards, please display the ship we trailed here." Avalon waited for a holographic image of a large civilian transport, its sleek, bird-of-prey lines painted black and white. The registry information hovering beside the image proclaimed it the Errant Magpie, one of the late-war Garuda-class transports that supplanted the Mother Goose's Balder-class.

"Is this supposed to mean something to me?" Ellie asked.

"This ship is registered to the Seven Stars Trading Company," Avalon said, "which is owned by Lightspeed Joe's Easy Marks, a dubious financier operating out of the Kellermain system."

That company, Ellie recognized. She wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Those loan sharks. Jack made the mistake of mortgaging the Goose through them and we've never heard the end of it."

"In that case, you may be fortunate we confiscated your ship, Mrs. Hughes," Avalon said, "because 'Lightspeed Joe's' is a front for the Kronistine Syndicate."

"The crime family?" Ellie's gaze flickered from the hologram to the admiral. "You're saying Chloe came here on a ship owned by the Syndicate? That's crazy! She'd never take such a risk."

"She has done so," Avalon said. "I assume she was led astray by the advice of my old adversary the Crimson Phoenix. No doubt Rudy Kaine Algreil believes he has the situation entirely in hand. I assure you, and would assure him, he does not."

"How do I know any of this is true?" Ellie asked.

"You still believe I would lie to you?" Avalon sighed. "Well, I suppose it does not matter. You'll see for yourself when we hail the men occupying that derelict battlecruiser's bridge. I have it on good authority a member of the Kronid family's inner circle leads them."

Avalon tapped a button on one of his armrests. At the wordless command, a communications feed displaced the battlecruiser's image on the main screen.

"Admiral Avalon, I presume," said the black flight-suited figure on the screen. "I'd say it was an honor to attract the attention of the Federal Navy's finest, but let's be honest. We both know I think nothing of the sort."

"Do I address Stephan Kronid?" Avalon asked. Ellie had to step back to avoid blocking a hologram that erupted at the admiral's side, confirming his supposition. A criminal record longer than Ellie was tall rolled past the projection of the Syndicate man's face. She caught 'mass murder' and 'high treason' and couldn't stomach the rest.

She thought of Chloe in such company and shuddered.

"You do address me," Kronid said. "Which begs the question, what do you want from me?"

"Your life, scum," Avalon snarled.

Kronid either hid his emotions well or held up better in the face of Avalon's wrath than anyone Ellie had met. The Syndicate man didn't even draw back as Avalon's extraordinary voice assaulted him. Calmly, he said, "I suppose you'll settle for the lives of my passengers, though? Or do you want to hold out for the erinyes, too, for whatever good it would do you?"

Ellie's ear twitched. Erinyes?

"Abhorrent as I find it, I will offer you a deal," Avalon said, hate simmering just below the boiling point in his voice.

Kronid nodded. "Which is, of course, the only reason you came within a pentameter of me."

"Perhaps."

"Certainly." Kronid folded his long frame into a command chair much like Avalon's, steepled his hands. The chair seemed to fit him well. He glanced at something below him and his hands tightened on the arm-rests.

The communications window showed only Kronid, his perch, and an empty expanse of carpeted floor behind him. Ellie wondered what the Syndicate man was looking at. Something on the bridge of the battlecruiser? Principle alone knew what carnage lay at the former "brain" of the dead ship.

"But in any case, Admiral," Kronid said, "why should I make a deal with you… instead of dealing with your little destroyer?" He toyed with controls Ellie assumed tied to the battlecruiser's weapons.

"You're bluffing, and badly," Avalon said. "Your Errant Magpie could not carry a battlecruiser crew if you packed them elbow to elbow in its cargo hold."

Kronid shrugged theatrically. "True enough – if only my Maggie were here. I took the precaution of calling in reinforcements as soon as I knew where your prize wanted to go, and why. Really, Admiral, you ought to know we of all people know how to operate this ship. But if you require a demonstration…"

The battlecruiser's external lights flared to distorted life, bending weirdly under its powerful gravitic shields.

"Shields," Avalon called, but his crew had reacted instinctively to pull them up as soon as the other ship did. "Prepare for evasive maneuvers."

Kronid laughed. "Now, now, Admiral. This ship is big, but it's also old and damaged. I don't know I could kill every last one of you Federal bastards before you got in here with your mecha. I'd much rather not have to try."

Ellie watched Avalon wrestle with the decision. He seemed unable to control the way he projected his emotions. His audio-visual empathy might make him an effective leader, but she doubted he could run a bluff to save his life. He cycled through rage and frustration and concern and settled on satisfaction.

"Bringing the shields up and turning on the lights? I remain unimpressed, criminal, and unconvinced. These are simple tasks, suitable for a less than skeleton crew. If that ship's main guns still functioned and you controlled them, you would have attempted to fire before I raised my shields." Avalon smiled grimly. "Although, they would have been up in time anyway; Otto Algreil taught us a painful lesson in punctuality."

"Perhaps I don't need or want to kill you myself, Admiral," Kronid said. "Perhaps all I need is time.

"Perhaps," he said, "I find it much more appropriate to let Madame President's favorite hunting hound catch his quarry and find out how badly outmatched he really is."

"If you intend to use Chloe Hughes and the erinyes against me, Kronid," Avalon said, "you will be disappointed. Her adoptive mother is aboard this ship. The daughter will not harm her."

"An amusing lie, but Chloe will do what I tell her," Kronid said. "She's proven delightfully pliable so far."

"You lying bastard," Ellie snarled. She leaped forward, as though she could throttle him through the Reformer's main screen.

Kronid actually seemed at a loss for words. Then his cool slipped back into place. "Well. Ellie... Hughes, I suppose, now. You really are aboard that ship? I figured it was Avalon's turn to bluff. And, I might add, you're as lovely as ever."

She blinked. "What?"

"I'm a little sad, though not surprised, you don't remember me," he said. "We only met briefly, and we were both quite young. I certainly remember you, though. I would even if your brothers hadn't always spoken so highly of you."

"My brothers –?" She shot a glance at Avalon. "What is he talking about?"

Kronid answered. "Didn't the admiral tell you, Ellie? I know his grossly misnamed comrades in Federal Intelligence are aware of it by now, so I can only assume Madame President passed it on to him. Your family and mine go back a long way."

Ellie stared at the crime lord, picturing the man behind the mask of the black flight suit.

Beanpole thin. Sharp-nosed. And that voice...

Ellie had known a man with that voice in a life so long ago she scarcely thought of it now. Like most free hybrids, she'd been a liegewoman to a noble house. Her lords had answered to a greater house, and the owner of that voice had been its favorite son.

Stephan Kronid?

Stephan Kyrillos.

Psychic. Mechaneer-aristocrat. Hero of the Civil War.

A man who Ellie, and every other girl she'd known, had fooled themselves into thinking they loved, before she learned what a paltry imitation of love that empty crush was.

The last man Ellie would ever want her daughter around – and, maybe, the best hope her daughter had.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 32: Revelation

"What's going on?" Rudy jetted up to Slava and got as much in the ursid's muzzle as he could manage in zero gee. "Is Stephan talking to the Reformer? What frequency are they using, dammit?"

Slava ignored the questions. He went around Rudy with two quick bursts of maneuvering thrusters and continued toward the far airlock and the mecha bay beyond. His head stayed cocked the whole way. Listening to words from Stephan on high, no doubt.

Rudy's flight suit played with frequencies, seeking the one that would let him and Chloe in on a conversation that was probably determining their fates.

Stephan, he figured, would turn them over to the Feds in a heartbeat. Probably buy the sleazy bastard a few pardons, or at least a few Federal megamarks. The only thing keeping Slava from trying to grab Rudy and Chloe had to be his boss dickering on the finder's fee.

Rudy followed the ursid through the miasma of twisted Imperial corpses not because he wanted to buddy up to the ursid gangster when Feds and Syndicate settled on a price, but because he wanted to be as close to the mecha bay as possible.

The nobs were supposed to have had some damned fine machines. From what Chloe said, her mother's mecha surpassed even those. Maybe, with its power, he could renegotiate terms favorable to him and Chloe.

Assuming he could subdue an ursid twice his height and four or five times his weight.

Assuming Chloe could get her mother's mecha running.

Assuming either of them could pilot it.

Assuming good old Marcel didn't bring enough firepower to laugh it off – to throw bodies at the problem until it ceased to be a problem, in true Fed style.

Those sounded like painfully long odds, even to Rudy.

He had no better ideas, so he played them anyway.

He and Slava burned to a hard stop a few meters from the airlock. Slava wasted no time tearing the cover off and hurling it to bounce off the floor. His big hands worked the controls with surprising delicacy, sliding the great circular lock open faster than Rudy could have.

He sure seemed in a hurry.

Maybe negotiations had fallen through.

"Chloe, come on," Rudy said – no reason to screw around with 'Petras' and 'Ollies' now – before realizing she hadn't bothered to stop. She was in the airlock, barely clearing the opening door, barely stopping at the far one. He joined her.

"What are we going to do?" she asked.

He shrugged. "I'll figure something out."

"In case you don't," she said, jetting next to him and slowing herself by clasping his hands, "I want to apologize."

"You want to apologize?"

"For everything you've gone through," she said, "and for how little you've gotten in return."

"If you're propositioning me, Clo, I'd much rather you waited till we were in an atmosphere where we could safely unseal these flight suits."

"Please be serious, Rudy." She sounded so heart-rendingly earnest, he couldn't say no. Damn that girl! "You're not a spacer, so you probably can't understand how much it bothered me when you asked what you did."

She trailed off.

Rudy sure as hell wasn't a spacer, but she was wrong. He knew enough about their culture – from going on two months in Chloe's company if nothing else – to understand pretty damned well.

He'd known that for a long time, but he sure as hell hadn't let it stop him from raising the subject. Sure, he'd been kidding. Mostly.

He didn't think it was something Spacer girls kidded about.

Maybe it was time he started thinking about that, huh?

"Listen, Clo," he said.

"Let me finish." She seemed to get her confidence back, then lost it again just as quickly. "I think we're gonna die or get separated or worse."

Rudy gulped. "You have a hunch?"

"I have a brain," she said.

He wished he could tell her not to worry, but since she probably hadn't thought of half as many of their problems as he had, he didn't have the heart to. "Go on."

"Rudy, I, someday… someday, if you…" He could see her gulp through her flight suit. "… what I'm trying to say is, you've done so much for me, and I wish I could give back half as much. I hope someday I can. Knowledge and power, of course, and anything else it's my right to give."

"Chloe," he began. He had it all laid out, a genuine rarest-of-all-rarities Rudy Kaine Algreil apology. He was the one who didn't get it. He'd been tired and angry and scared and coming off the god of all adrenaline highs, and what he'd wanted to say as a joke came out serious, and when she went off on him it had pissed him off so bad he couldn't even see straight. He didn't want knowledge or power or any of that crap, and she sure as hell was his friend as long as she wanted to be, and anything else she wanted to be, and if he'd hurt her, then dammit he meant to make it up to her a hundredfold! And he –

– never said a word of it.

The airlock finished its silent, stately roll to the open position.

"We have no time," Slava said. "The Reformer is here!"

The ursid grabbed Rudy and Chloe, moving quicker than anyone that big had any right to. He hauled them into the mecha bay on full jets, leaving a superheated particulate trail that rapidly dispersed in vacuum.

Row upon row of mecha, painted white and gold and pale green – Imperial Guard colors –, filled the hangar. One look at the sleek elite models and Rudy fell silent, more awe-struck than by the battlecruiser itself. These were mecha decades ahead of their time. He could tell at a glance that the Epee, though considered state of the art by Federal and Oligarchical standards, wrestled with design flaws these had already solved.

Principle, talk about knowledge and power! If Otto could have put models like this into production, Rudy would have three or four Etemenos Cups on his mantle.

Yet none of the Imperial Guard mecha had launched during whatever attack doomed their ship.

None of them looked like the silvery mecha Chloe's parents had told her about.

"I don't think it's in this bay," Rudy said, shouting because the senses of scale and motion seemed to dictate he should. Without any kind of background noise, the feedback from his voice sounded painfully loud over the comlink.

"It isn't," Chloe said miserably. "I would feel it if it were."

Great. Wonderful. Their trip through the battlecruiser's hellish interior amounted to exactly squat?

Rudy sighed. "Now what?"

"We have to find it, Rudy." Chloe stretched out her long fingers and gripped Slava's flight suit. "Slava, you have to slow down! We have to search another mecha bay."

"There is no time," the ursid gangster said. "I am sorry, but the Magpie must pick us up."

"No! We have to find it," Chloe insisted. "We can't let the Feds get mother's mecha."

"They won't." A new voice entered the comlink conversation – Stephan's. "The people responsible for Empress Karissa's death dare not approach her erinyes. That angel's flaming sword would destroy them as surely as it will defend its rightful owner."

"What the hell does that mean?" Rudy asked.

"It means get your Oligarchical ass on the Magpie, Rudy Kaine Algreil, or I will have the pleasure of leaving you to rot on this ghost ship." Timed to Stephan's words, the mecha bay doors opened, moving in eerily silent fits and starts, and the Errant Magpie slid expertly through them. Its own, much smaller mecha bay opened in a single smooth motion as it swooped toward Rudy, Chloe and Slava.

Before it reached them, a mecha emerged.

It looked like a black version of the Imperial Guard models lining the mecha bay. Long arms ending in long, elegant fingers with vibrating, razor-sharp backs, a sextet of long thruster-wings emerging like a black sun from its smoothly rounded, humanoid torso, a sloping, avian head, pointed feet equipped with thrusters of their own, clearly designed exclusively for zero-gee use.

On its raven-feather shiny breastplate gleamed a white-outlined emblem of a black crow on a black field, soaring above a white tower.

Black crow.

Black Rook.

"Son of a bitch," Rudy swore. "That's where I recognized his voice from."

"With a razor-sharp mind like yours, I have no doubt you'll one day provide your company with record profits," Stephan, or whatever his real name was, said. "Now get aboard the Magpie."

"What are you gonna do, Rook, checkmate a whole destroyer?"

"I backed that destroyer off," Stephan said, "using my brain. I told them Her Highness had the erinyes and that she would destroy them all, assuming this battlecruiser does not. While they seemed disinclined to believe either, I expect the bluff to hold Marcel Avalon long enough for the Magpie to clear the battlecruiser's gravitic shield."

"Wait, what? 'Her Highness?' 'Erinyes?' I thought you nobs spoke the same language as the rest of us." Rudy slipped Slava's grasp and pulled Chloe after him. "I think you owe us an explanation."

"I certainly owe Princess Chloe an explanation," Stephan said. "You may be present if she wishes. However, I also owe her the service of getting her away from the Federal Navy."

"Princess?" Chloe looked down at herself. "There must be some mistake, Mr. Kronid!"

"Then we will learn as much later," he snapped. Belatedly, he added, "Your Highness."

"You still haven't explained why you're out here in your mecha," Rudy said. He hadn't explained a whole hell of a lot of things, starting with why a Periphery noble apparently ran a crime ring in his spare time.

"Because unlike you," Stephan said, "I do not need a ship to create a compression tunnel with which to escape this place. I will create a diversion to keep the Divine Auric Drake and his men from realizing you intend to flee, then join you."

"Are you sure you'll be all right?" Leave it to Chloe to worry about a guy who'd consistently played her and Rudy for fools. She sounded genuinely concerned about the bastard. "Can't you just come with us?"

"My first duty is to ensure your safety, Highness," Stephan said.

Rudy rolled his eyes. What was the harm? Chloe couldn't see him do it.

"Besides," the crime boss-cum-noble – or was it the other way around? – added, "the Crimson Phoenix has twice defeated the Divine Auric Drake. I hardly think the latter will provide me with a challenge."

That's it, Rudy thought. You'd better live, you bastard nob, 'cause I've got to kill you myself.

Chloe squeezed Rudy's hand, bringing him back to the moment. "I know what you're thinking," she whispered, "and maybe you have a right to, but this is not the time. Right?"

"Right," Rudy sighed.

He and Chloe followed Slava into the Errant Magpie's mecha bay, while the Black Rook faded into the shadows of the battlecruiser's larger one. Stephan's machine seemed to vanish. Rudy wondered if he just blended in, or if he used the same camouflage of light-deflecting psions the Animus Hunter had at the Wellach Cup.

Rudy also wondered what had happened to the Animus Hunter at the Wellach Cup. He'd seemed like the more powerful psychic in his duel with the Black Rook, at least to the point Rudy lost consciousness.

Rudy glanced around the hangar he hadn't been able to get into. Four smaller Civil War-era mecha, equipped like the Black Rook had been at the tournament, filled four of the bays. Probably mecha for Stephan's men-at-arms. Four bays sat empty, including the two largest. Rudy assumed one of those belonged to Stephan's preferred mecha and the other waited for Chloe's mother's.

Her 'erinyes?' Did Stephan mean the silvery mecha they'd come to find?

He shrugged. Whatever it was called, they weren't gonna get it this trip, and Rudy didn't fancy coming back for it.

"Up, little ones," Slava said. "To the bridge."

With a last glance at the mecha – not that Rudy particularly wanted to pilot one of the Civil War relics left in the bay – he bounded up a ladder and pulled Chloe after him. Good thing. She almost slipped, and he didn't blame her. Moving in normal gravity felt crippling after only a half hour of zero gee.

The long-locked door slid open as they approached. Rudy charged through and sprinted upwards. He hated feeling powerless and in the dark, and away from the bridge, he was both. At least he'd be able to see the fight on the Magpie's main screen.

He wondered who he should root for. The enemy of his enemy, in this case, was another enemy.

He decided to back Marcel. The enemy he knew and all that, and besides, if the admiral and his men took Stephan down, Rudy still felt confident he could wrest control of the Errant Magpie from the latter's thugs.

Where he would take the ship, now, posed a greater challenge.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 33: Turnabout

The Errant Magpie jerked upwards. Chloe would have been hurled across the bridge if the ship's artificial gravity hadn't dampened the acceleration. Instead, she recognized the motion only from the images flashing across the main screen.

"Strap in, Your Highess, Commander Slava," Tarkov, the Kronistine helmsman, called from the front of the bridge. "This could get choppy."

Chloe noticed he didn't bother to warn Rudy, who strapped into an empty chair anyway.

She wondered how much maneuvering the Magpie could do. The Mother Goose could never have executed such a turn at all, much less one capable of taxing the newer ship's obviously better-than-line-model inertial dampeners.

Slava asked, "Where is Lord Kyrillos?"

Chloe realized with a start that the hybrid commanded in Stephan's absence. Until the Kronistine men revealed their actual allegiance, he'd acted the part of a common thug.

"I've lost contact, Commander," Quinn, the sensor man, said. "He's stealthed."

"The Reformer?"

"Coming in fast," Quinn said. "It will be onscreen – now."

The Magpie finished its turn toward the sea of stars. A blunt wedge loomed on their left, its well-lit exterior growing larger with every second.

Tarkov glanced over his shoulder. "Sir?"

"That is not so good," Slava said. "Your Highness forgive us, we must wait."

"It's your ship," Chloe said. "And please, don't call me that."

For an awful moment, Chloe thought the Reformer intended to ram the battlecruiser. Its searchlights lanced at the battlecruiser all across the visual spectrum and even beyond, painfully bright.

Then she realized the bigger ship's shields had come up, distorting the view. The destroyer executed what seemed like an impossibly close pass before vanishing overhead.

"Now?" Tarkov asked.

"Wait for Lord Kyrillos," Slava said.

A mecha's smaller searchlight pierced the hangar.

Chloe tensed. The Magpie, she realized, had its own lights off. But wouldn't the Feds recognize it anyway?

They never got the chance.

A blur shot from the shadows beneath them. The probing searchlight spun wildly into the vacuum, still attached to the dismembered arm of the mecha bearing it.

A silvery form unfolded before the line mecha, bathing the hangar in brilliant light.

For a moment, Chloe thought it was her birth mother's mecha, but it looked somewhat smaller, more mechanical than her parents had described that machine. Besides, Chloe recognized the outline if not the color scheme: Stephan's machine. "Why does he look like that?" she asked.

"I can guess," Rudy said. "I'll bet the Black Rook there is trying to sell Marcel on you having your 'erinyes' and knowing how to use it. I'll also bet he's piping his communications through the battlecruiser so it looks like he's still aboard."

"This is so," Slava said.

"But why?" Chloe asked. "Say I did have my mother's mecha. Say I even knew how to fight. It still wouldn't amount to a hill of beans to a whole destroyer, right?"

Slava, Tarkov and Quinn exchanged glances.

Chloe gulped. "Right?"

"What exactly is Stephan trying to sell?" Rudy asked. "I think we better know, in case we need to back up his bluff."

"Erinyes," Slava said. "That is an Imperial's mecha. With that, with Her Highness to pilot it? Admiral Avalon would have no time to be afraid."

"You expect us to believe," Rudy said, "that one mecha, however powerful, could take on a modern destroyer?"

"Or a whole fleet," Slava said.

"Then how come this 'erinyes' is sitting in a mecha bay on a dead battlecruiser, Chloe grew up with adoptive parents instead of her allegedly invincible real ones, and we're cutting and running?"

Slava's whole head bent forward with a frown of concentration, difficult for his jaw to form. After a long time, he said, "That, I do not know, Oligarch's son."

Rudy groaned. "Wonderful."

Chloe kept out of the interchange. She felt an inkling of a hunch, an answer just beyond her reach, but her mind refused to grasp it. She wondered why her intuition – her clairvoyance, since she had no reason to deny what it was anymore – instinctively shied from this truth.

Once she learned to use her powers, she'd understand.

She blinked. She had come to the battlecruiser for knowledge and power, believing her mother's mecha held both. In doing so, she had delivered herself into the hands of people who could, who surely would, train her to use her psychic heritage.

Did she know for sure which outcome her clairvoyance had predicted?

Before she could consider the implications, the view on the screen recaptured her attention.

Stephan might not wield the power to destroy the Reformer, but his mecha had so far done nothing to dispel the illusion he did. Every sweep of his machine's glowing arms sent a wave of laser-like white light rippling through a squadron of Fed mecha. The waves cut through stubby line mecha like monomolecular scythes, casting the machines' dismembered remains into deep space. Even if the Reformer hadn't moved to the far side of the battlecruiser to avoid the alleged erinyes, its guns could not have targeted something as small as the Black Rook through the cruiser's powerful gravitic shield.

"Are you sure," Chloe asked, "he can't beat them all?"

"Those crappy line mecha are just here to flush us out," Rudy said. "Once the elite mechaneers in Wyverns show up, much less the Divine Auric Drake, Stephan will have to bug out."

"That is not so certain," Slava said. "It is the ship my lord fears, not the men."

"Oh, please," Rudy said. "That's the kind of attitude that lost you guys the Civil War."

The ursid growled.

"What? You did, remember? Lose, I mean. Even before the Feds butted their noses in, the Oligarchy was winning."

Chloe reached for his arm. "Rudy…"

He glanced at her. "You don't buy this crap, do you, Clo?"

"Stephan does seem awfully powerful." She thought, but didn't say, he beat you using one of those 'crappy line mecha' you're disparaging, and you in your Epee. Doesn't him being powerful make that less shameful?

Rudy rolled his eyes. "I'm just saying, he's ridiculously outnumbered. The Feds can take these kinds of losses. Billions of kids would give an arm and a leg to call themselves Federal Navy mechaneers. A war hero never has to sleep alone, you know? And those line mecha literally build themselves. I've seen the nanopaste colonies working the asteroid belts. Plop a canister down, come back a month later and you've got a batch of newly minted cookie-cutter mecha."

"This does not mean my lord loses," Slava said, "only that his winning this fight does not win a war."

"It means the Feds will keep throwing troops at him until he makes a mistake," Rudy said. "Everybody makes mistakes, and it only takes one. How many young noblemen you guys have waiting on an opening in the mechaneer corps? Ten? Five? Any?"

Slava didn't answer verbally. His curious, ursid frown said volumes.

"Thought so," Rudy said. "What about mecha? How come you men-at-arms don't get fancy ones like your boss's? Don't suppose you can't make new ones like that?"

Again, Rudy's question elicited no answer.

"Look," he continued, "I'll be honest – I really don't want you guys to build back up and win a new Civil War, although I'm not sold on the idea the Feds are an improvement. With that said, you're at least not actively trying to kill me, so here's some free advice: 'your lord' is out there because he wants to show off, not because it's important enough for him to risk his precious noble ass over."

"You have no right," Slava snarled. He surged from the captain's chair.

Rudy met him halfway across the bridge. He rolled inside an overhead swing and kicked himself back and airborn before the ursid could clasp him in a killing grip. The impact rolled Rudy smoothly to his feet and sent Slava rocking back on his heels.

Quinn shot from his seat in defense of his superior. Tarkov apparently didn't dare switch to autopilot when he was waiting for an opening to flee, but he craned his neck to watch.

Rudy vaulted Quinn's lunge and kicked the Kronistine man into Slava as the latter started to right himself. Rudy followed the tangled men down, snagging Quinn's ankle with his own and spinning the stunned sensor operator up into a punch that smashed him across his console to the lower deck where Tarkov sat.

Slava had his footing now, though. He socked Rudy backwards into a darkened, unused bank of controls and lunged after him. The ursid reeled back, gagging, from a punch to the throat. He recovered almost instantly, hurling back a second punch with his massive forearm and smashing Rudy into a screen.

Rudy didn't stay down long. He whipped his legs up to grip the ursid's neck. When Slava pulled his arm back to wrench Rudy's legs away, Rudy snapped himself forward at the waist and jabbed the ursid's nose. The momentum sent them both sliding toward the center of the bridge, Rudy's fists shooting like pistons into his dazed opponent's snout. He flipped off before Slava crashed to the deck.

Chloe had watched the whole exchange in a single unconsciously held breath.

Now she exhaled – and moved.

"Get the sensor man," Rudy shouted. "We can take the ship now –"

Chloe tackled him.

She couldn't have hoped to scratch Rudy in a fair fight. She lacked anything approaching combat training, much less martial arts, he outmassed her by kilos overall and even more in muscle mass, and she possessed all the killer instinct of a frightened deer.

But knock him back while he stared, stunned?

That, she could do.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, her face flush and her knuckles white with rage.

He stared up at her. "Thought we were gonna –"

"You didn't think, Rudy, not even a little. You never think. You just wing it and fly by the seat of your pants and want to make a big show of fighting these men because you're mad Stephan's a better fighter!"

"We planned on this, Chloe," Rudy hissed. "Remember? We had it all worked out."

"When we thought we were dealing with gangsters," she said. "Even then, you swore you'd only fight them if they betrayed us or if you thought it was the only way we'd survive."

"Whatever you say – Princess." Rudy spat the title like a curse.

Chloe climbed unsteadily to her feet and took a step back.

She felt Slava's hand on her arm, tensed.

"You are well, Highness?" he asked.

"Of course," she said. "Rudy would never hurt me."

"Too bad the feeling isn't mutual," Rudy said. He flipped to his feet and backed up against a console. "Seeing as how you probably just got me killed."

"No one is going to hurt you, Rudy," Chloe said. "These men aren't gangsters. They're men-at-arms to a member of the mechaneer-aristocracy, and they think that I'm the daughter of the Emperor. Even if they're wrong, I'm at least a noble."

"They're Stephan's thugs," Rudy said. "They may be something else as well as gangsters, but that doesn't mean they're any less gangsters."

"But they aren't really criminals," Chloe said. She looked over her shoulder at Slava's bloodied face. "They just pretend to be part of the Syndicate to sneak around the Federated Stars. Right?"

The ursid didn't answer.

"How do you think," Rudy said, waving a hand to encompass the Magpie's battered bridge, "they keep this operation running? The Feds froze all the nobles' assets and drove them from all but the most remote of their physical holdings. Stephan does operate the Kronistine Syndicate. It's the only thing that makes sense. In fact, I'll bet it's nothing new. When did you people take the Syndicate over?"

"There was no need," Slava said. "It is ours, always was. Intelligence division."

"You boys must've been pretty slick back then. Are you slipping nowadays, or are most people as gullible as Chloe?"

She flushed, more embarrassed because she couldn't deny it than angry because he said it.

"It is not so hard," Slava said. "The crime is always there. We organize. We guide. Then we listen. Effective, yes?"

"Like I said, pretty slick. I doubt Otto has as good of an intelligence service, and the Feds sure as hell don't."

"What happens now?" Chloe asked.

"Now," Rudy said, "your friends here probably shoot me."

She followed his gaze. Quinn had drawn a long, heavy-caliber pistol. He pointed it at Rudy's chest.

"No," Chloe cried. "You can't!"

"He attacked us, Your Highness," the sensor man said. "He could've killed me, knocking me over the railing like that. Or all of us, if he damaged the controls. For your safety, we have to put him down."

"He made a mistake," Chloe said. She tried to interpose herself between Rudy and Quinn, but Slava's grip was iron on her arm. She whirled on him, twisting uncomfortably. "He thought it was what I wanted."

"It does not matter," Slava said. "Quinn –"

The Kronistine helmsman inclined his head. His finger tightened on the trigger.

Rudy tensed, his eyes flashing about as he searched for cover and a way to get to it.

Slava stood impassive, his bloodied jaws forming his subordinate's name.

Tarkov split his attention between the standoff and the main screen, where the Black Rook's arm froze, faux-erinyes light forming to lash out at the first of the elite Wyvern mecha cresting the view.

The chronometer's count of seconds disappeared, awaiting its near-instantaneous replacement.

A drop of blood, Slava's or Rudy's, pooled at the edge of a broken console and, sparked into motion by a stray wire, began its plummet to the floor.

Chloe saw it all, down to the minutest detail. She felt like she had an eternity to take it all in, like she could step outside the moment and put it in a glass and keep it forever.

Then time flowed back, and a gun crashed, and Chloe moved.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 34: Scars

Ellie stood on the Reformer's bridge, not because she believed she had any place there, not because she wanted to see what promised to be a bloody spectacle, not because she would stop Chloe from destroying the ship if she could, not even because anyone had ordered her to stay.

She simply didn't know where else to go.

On the main screen, Marcel Avalon's Divine Auric Drake and four Wyverns of similar design converged on a silvery mecha obviously meant to evoke images of the silvery mecha within the battlecruiser.

Ellie had seen Chloe's mother's mecha with her own eyes. The dancing quicksilver fake was impressive – but she knew it for a fake from the outset.

She wondered if any of the Federal Navy men could guess what she thought of the mecha, decided they couldn't. To read her expression, they would have to pay her the slightest attention.

None, save for those whose duties kept their gazes locked to their consoles, looked anywhere but at the mecha duel unfolding before them.

Ellie knew Stephan Kyrillos had to be the pilot of the silver mecha. Unlike most of the mechaneer-aristocrats she'd served, he had loved to boast about fooling the Oligarchical forces as much as he'd loved to boast of destroying them in open battle. Playing the role of a crime lord should have constituted his most spectacular deception. Impersonating an imperial and disguising his mecha as what he and the Federal Navy called an erinyes trumped it easily.

He might require his tricks just to survive now, but she'd never believe he didn't still enjoy them.

Ellie would have shared his amusement at the consternation of their mutual foes – for such the Feds surely were – if she hadn't so disliked the idea of Stephan having access to Chloe.

Ellie didn't fear for her daughter's life. Stephan had every reason to protect her.

He also had every reason to use her.

Ellie had not numbered among Stephan's conquests back then, but not for lack of trying. She'd watched other girls catch his eye, while her own best efforts only managed to enchant her own liege, Corin Basilios. He'd been younger than Stephan, even younger than Ellie's teenage self, barely more than a boy, and only a knight besides. Nonetheless, on the eve of his shipping out, she'd agreed to his advances.

At the time, she'd felt mortified when, afterwards, Corin cried himself to sleep in her arms. She felt like she'd failed herself by not winning the affections of a greater lord.

It didn't occur to her until a month later, when she learned of Corin's death, and her brothers', and as far as she'd known, Stephan's, why Corrin had wept. That was when it sunk in for her why the mechaneer-aristocracy had been reduced to sending teenagers to war.

A month after that, her homeworld fell. What remained of the Basilios family was executed on the spot. What remained of Ellie's, the Feds dragged to their VCL camps.

Thinking of the camp, she took a fierce joy from watching one of Stephan's blasts of coherent light slice cleanly through a Wyvern's torso, sending the halves spiraling apart as their separated thruster-wings fired at opposed angles. Anyone who flew for the Feds deserved the worst Stephan Kyrillos, Otto Abeir Algreil, and anyone else who cared to join in could imagine!

A small part of Ellie reminded her that the Navy pilots had probably never even heard of the VCL camps. She refused to excuse them their ignorance, though. Unlike civilians, they could have found out. Unlike civilians, they could have done something. Resigned, as Jack had over just a hint of what had happened, or revolted in such numbers the Senate would have had to stop.

Ellie found her back to the wall of the Reformer's bridge and her head in her hands. She'd done so well, despite the familiar Federal uniforms and the familiar Federal green walls, but now she'd broken her cardinal rule.

She didn't think about the camp. Ever.

Seeing Stephan again, she couldn't help but remember.

She wondered if he knew.

That she and her family and friends and rivals had been rounded up for "processing" after the Basilos family was destroyed and the survivors of House Kyrillos fled for their holdings in the Periphery.

That Ellie had been pregnant by Corin, and that the Feds had murdered their baby – son or daughter, she never had the chance to know, oh Principle, they never told her, no matter how much she begged for even that much, no matter what she did.

A hybrid was valuable. A half-hybrid demonstrated genetic compatibility with humans, and that created uncomfortable questions the Feds would not permit.

She had never told anyone, even Jack. He knew most of it: the cruel guards, the cramped barracks, the occasional deaths, and the planned experiments that would have killed the rest trying to unlock the secrets of artificial psionics. But not, never, about her and Corin's baby. Nor that the reason she couldn't bear Jack's children had nothing to do with genetic incompatibility, everything to do with Federal-mandated sterilization.

Ellie knew Jack would feel her baby's loss as his own. She knew he would have fought the people who'd done it. And she knew he couldn't win.

If Chloe could...

Ellie shook her head. No!

She didn't wish war on Chloe! She would not, never, risk her adopted child's life and happiness to avenge her murdered one's. If bringing the Federal Senate to justice meant Chloe using her powers, then the Feds could damn well continue to exist.

Even so, Ellie prayed Stephan would win the battle unfolding over the battlecruiser.

Unless Marcel Avalon's skill at deception exceeded that of all other men she'd known, Ellie truly believed he was a good man, that he wanted to help Chloe, that he did not know what his Senatorial masters had ordered, and that he would never believe it.

She just as truly believed his character meant nothing. Avalon would follow his orders to deliver Chloe to the Senate, and the Senate could not suffer an imperial heir to live. Principle knew, they had no compunctions about killing innocents! As long as Chloe existed, as long as anyone descended from her existed, billions of people would consider themselves subject to her. If Avalon's fear of engaging an awakened erinyes was justified, Chloe had the power to press those claims.

Stephan, on the other hand, was not a good man, though Ellie couldn't judge if he was truly a bad one. He helped himself first and foremost, his family second, his fellow aristocrats a distant third. He would use Chloe to his advantage. He would seduce her if he could, and he would surely persuade her to use her power against the Feds.

But unlike Avalon, Stephan would make his own decisions. He followed no orders, obeyed nothing but his own ambitions. Ellie saw no reason he would want anything but Chloe's continued health. He would want to sire the new imperial line, not destroy it. He might even be persuaded to settle for the mere existence of that line.

Ellie wished for a far better pattern to Chloe's days than what Stephan would provide. Better a poor pattern than none at all.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 35: Imperious

Chloe slid to a stop between Quinn and Rudy, facing the Kyrillos man-at-arms. Behind her, she heard Rudy slam against a bulkhead as the slug hit him.

Help him! Her every instinct begged her to run to his side and see if she could help. To see if he was still within her power to help. But if she did that, he wouldn't be. The Kyrillos men would kill him, if they hadn't already. He'd been right about them, so right, and now, because she'd interfered –

"Step aside, Your Highness," Quinn said. "I have to make sure –"

Chloe locked gazes with him.

"Put the gun down," she said. She hardly recognized her voice. She felt like she would shake apart, but she sounded perfectly calm.

"Highness –"

"If you don't put the gun down," Chloe said, "if Rudy is d... if you do him any further harm... I will destroy this ship and kill every last one of you."

Quinn hesitated.

"It is enough, Quinn," Slava growled. "Put it down. We must talk."

The pistol clattered to the Errant Magpie's glaringly white floor.

"There is nothing to talk about," Chloe said. "You call me Princess, you call me Your Highness, and you will obey me as such. You will disarm yourselves, and then you will take Rudy to our quarters and render such medical assistance as you are capable of."

"He's dangerous, Your Hignness," Quinn said. "He's the one who started the fight. Forget killing me and Slava. If he'd pushed the wrong buttons, he could have alerted the Reformer to your location!"

"Rudy was wrong to act when he did," Chloe said, "but he and I arranged ahead of time for him to seize this ship at the first sign of trouble. After all, as is now painfully clear, we were dealing with gangsters. The fault is as much mine as his, and even more your lord's. Had Stephan told us the truth from the outset, we could have worked this out without violence."

Chloe's tone seemed to freeze the Kyrillos men in place. Slowly, the two who were still armed unbelted their guns and lowered them to the floor. Slava took a half step toward Rudy, looked to Chloe.

She nodded.

She allowed herself to turn as the ursid approached Rudy.

He flashed her what was probably meant as a grin, but looked more like a grimace. He'd stumbled into a console and sprawled on the floor, and she could see cracks in his flight suit where its nanomachine fabric had hardened into ablative armor. From his expression, she figured he had cracks inside, too. The suit prevented the slug from penetrating his body, but it could only do so much to disperse the kinetic energy.

But he was manifestly, unambiguously, wonderfully alive.

Chloe fought back her cry of relief. She could not afford even the slightest show of weakness in front of the Kyrillos men – not if she wanted Rudy to remain alive.

"Can you move?" she asked, her voice still unnaturally calm.

He nodded, and winced. "Not and like it, but yeah."

"How bad is it?"

"Broken collarbone, suit says. Couple of cracked ribs. Had worse. Hurts to talk."

Chloe nodded. "Slava, please help Rudy to our quarters."

"Highness." The ursid bent to obey.

Rudy pushed him away. "Said I've had worse." He braced his legs and uncurled himself, carefully avoiding supporting himself with his hands. "I'll make it."

"You need to lie down and either get medical nanopaste on your chest or let your suit work if it has that functionality." Chloe hated not being able to sound as concerned as she felt, but if she let go of the illusion of control, she didn't think she could get it back.

"Works for me." He took a few steps toward the door, hesitated.

Chloe swept to his side and, gently as she could, hooked one of his arms over her shoulder. "I'll help you."

Slava's shadow fell over them. "Highness, we still have troubles. It is not wise for you to leave."

Chloe looked up at the ursid. She half-allowed and half-forced her smile, her inclination to trust hybrids and her shock and fury at the Kyrillos men's actions combining into an expression she hoped looked imperious. "I leave the escape in your capable hands, Commander."

"Highness." He bowed, fist pressed to his chest. "We do our best."

"Then the Reformer is as good as foiled," Chloe said.

The ursid bowed deeper.

Chloe acknowledged the bow with a nod and stepped backwards, easing Rudy through the bridge doors.

She didn't dare speak or relax until she and Rudy were down the hall and into the quarters they'd shared. Until the door slid shut and she eased him off her shoulder and onto the bed. Until, finally, she could sink onto the couch and bury her face in her hands and breathe.

Rudy said, "Wow."

Chloe spread her fingers enough to peer out at him. He'd propped himself up on his elbows; but for the cracks on his suit, she'd never have guessed he was hurt.

"I mean, damn – I thought your Petra Jaric was a good performance, but that was something else." He gave her a thumbs-up.

"You were faking," Chloe said flatly.

Rudy shrugged. "Sort of. I'll have a bruise the size of a dinner plate, but nothing a little tender love and care – I mean, a little medical nanopaste – won't fix up. It takes more than a candy-ass pistol like that to punch through this gear. This is Marchess Threelete series nanofiber, so cutting edge the Feds can't even get it on the open market. Works like a dream."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Well, this is the first time you've wanted to get me into bed…"

Chloe slumped back on the coach and closed her eyes. "Be serious, Rudy. Please?"

"What's wrong, Clo? You were great up there! Seems I didn't do half bad, either, so barring any intervention from our pal Marcel, we're good to go."

She heard him stand and sprint to her side. She felt his hands closing around hers, and realized the latter had been shaking.

He whispered, "Chloe?"

"Great? I don't feel 'great,'" Chloe said. "Don't want to be 'great.' It's all too big for me – or maybe I'm scared it's not too big, maybe I am –"

Rudy shushed her. His hand slid along her arm and up to cup her chin.

She opened her eyes.

His electric blue eyes twinkled inches from her face. "You know what you need, Clo?"

Chloe shook her head. "Rudy, please don't. No kidding around. Please. Not right now."

"You need," he said, "to calm down and take a deep breath. Maybe not in that order."

"Oh." She smiled wanly. "Guess I kind of jumped the gun, huh?"

He chuckled. "Tell you the truth, I was going to crack a joke if you hadn't asked so nicely. So... not really."

"Heh." Chloe reached up to remove the hand on her chin. Her fingers didn't seem to want to obey, because they just lay over Rudy's.

She gulped.

Rudy cocked his head.

Chloe opened her mouth to tell him he was too close. She couldn't find the words.

He leaned forward.

Chloe wrapped her other arm around his neck.

And the Errant Magpie shuddered sideways, throwing both of them to the floor.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 36: Fire Support

Rudy winced as his back impacted the Magpie's hard floor for the second time in ten minutes, again when Chloe landed atop him. He eased her aside and rolled to his feet just as another tremor rocked the transport.

Chloe looked around frantically. "What in the world?"

"Sounds like Stephan's goons didn't live up to your expectations." Rudy sprinted across the rocking deck to the screen on the far wall. A touch of his palm brought up the view from outside.

It wasn't pretty.

The Black Rook, shedding silver and no longer glowing like a wannabe Imperial, smashed through a pair of line mecha and into the battlecruiser's hull. One of the aristocratic mecha's arms ended at the wrist. One of its thruster-wings vented fuel from a severed tip. The Divine Auric Drake and two smaller Wyverns swept down after it, backlit by the vast searchlights of the Reformer as it pressed weirdly through the gravitic distortion of the larger capital ship's shields.

"I take it back," Rudy said.

Chloe joined him at the window.

"Stephan's the one who isn't living up to expectations," Rudy continued. "Slava must've made a run for it because his boss is getting his ass kicked."

"We have to –" Chloe bit her lip.

"What? Help him?"

"Stephan is risking his life for us. For me, anyway."

"Bully for him," Rudy said. "For once, though, he has the right idea. Namely, that we need to get the hell out of here. We're already taking fire from the Reformer, as seen by our unfortunately-timed trip to the deck."

Chloe looked away. Either she didn't want to concede the point, or thinking about them almost kissing clammed her up.

Rudy suppressed a sigh. When it wasn't her spacer morality or his acting like an asshole, the universe just had to step in and throw a wrench in the proceedings, didn't it? If he'd been a religious guy, he'd have had to question the beneficence of the Almighty Principle.

As though to emphasize his doubts, the Errant Magpie shuddered again. The Reformer's secondary guns tracked the transport, spitting shells bigger than the mecha fighting outside. The Magpie's shields couldn't create a gravitic distortion big enough to throw those anti-capital-ship weapons off course.

"Not too concerned about collateral damage, are they?" Rudy muttered.

"Why would they be? Me being with Stephan raises the stakes. They can't let somebody they think is an Imperial end up with the aristocracy."

"Point." Rudy had always hated watching others fight. With his and Chloe's lives on the line, he found new reserves of loathing. "I wish those guys up top would hurry. At this rate, I'm gonna get so sick of sitting here and watching things play out, I'll hop in a mecha and save Stephan's worthless ass."

Said ass certainly looked in need of saving. The Black Rook dashed one Wyvern against the battlecruiser hull with straight telekinesis. No light show now that he was fighting for his life, apparently. The Divine Auric Drake effortlessly rolled around the wave of invisible force, his remaining wingman close behind him.

Avalon's polearm shot out. Stephan turned the blow less than a meter from his cockpit, shearing off part of his mecha's shoulder and leaving a sparking line scored in the battlecruiser's hull.

Drake and Wyvern hurtled back from what had to be some kind of telekinetic shield, but while the smaller mecha struggled to correct its momentum, Avalon recovered almost instantly and surged back in.

Rudy whistled. "The hell'd he learn to fight like that?"

"He seemed very good at the Wellach Cup," Chloe said. "He almost beat you, right?"

"Yeah, but this is just over the top. Hell, at this rate, he's gonna practically solo a nob. I've never seen Marcel pull off moves like this."

"Maybe he's never had to."

Rudy shot her a glare. She ignored it.

The Black Rook seemed just as surprised as the Crimson Phoenix. He flew backwards across the battlecruiser's hull, dodging lightning thrusts from the Divine Auric Drake, weaving between the weapon and sensor mounts protruding from the dead vessel.

One of those mounts exploded, raining shrapnel. Stephan rolled away. Avalon plowed through, batting aside debris almost casually.

Chloe gasped. "Now what?"

"The Reformer is sitting inside the edge of the battlecruiser's shield bubble. Half its guns can fire through it," Rudy said. "Marcel must have called in fire support."

The two mecha circled. Against the gigantic backdrop of the battlecruiser, they looked like two armored men facing off. The other Feds backed off, apparently less confident than their leader in their ability to dodge the Reformer's fire. Or maybe less confident the destroyer would hold its fire on their account.

The Black Rook stretched out a palm. The Divine Auric Drake tried to dodge, but instead of blasting Avalon, Stephan pulled him forward. The once-again-black mecha's other arm shot forward to meet the gold with the telekinetic blast Avalon must have expected from the first gesture.

Then both disappeared into a cloud of swift-dying fire and cascading metal.

Chloe glanced at Rudy, her eyes wide with confusion.

For a few seconds, he could only return the same look.

Even with his mechaneering experience, it took until another explosion rocked the battlecruiser before he understood what he'd just seen.

The Reformer had found the range to the mecha dueling beneath it. Every one of its shells massed more than the Divine Auric Drake and the Black Rook combined and slammed into the battlecruiser's composite armor with more acceleration than the best inertial dampener in the galaxy could negate. With its attacker inside its shields, even the battlecruiser itself couldn't survive that kind of pounding.

Two mecha on its surface sure as hell couldn't.

Had Marcel Avalon actually killed Stephan Kyrillos?

Had he died trying?

Or both?

Rudy leaned toward the screen, fists balled. He didn't know who to root for, or whether he should hope both men dead, but he sure as hell wanted to know what had happened.

Despite the violence of the impact it hurtled from, the debris moved painfully slowly. The last inflamed battlecruiser atmosphere burned away, the artificial asteroid field of shattered armor parted. Something metallic moved under its own power within the cloud.

Then the scene collapsed as the Errant Magpie's compression tunnel warped the light into unintelligible patterns.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 37: Compression

Rudy shouted, "Chloe!"

Her eyes flew open. For a second, she saw Rudy's face contorted with – what? Agony? Terror? Rage? Why couldn't she tell?

But the face centimeters from hers was only flush with concern, reflected the dim light of the suite.

"R-Rudy?" Her pounding heart began to slow. She blinked. The awful double vision of Rudy faded. The vision she wanted to see remained. "You're okay?"

"You know me, I'm always okay." Rudy flashed a brief, almost automatic grin, but it couldn't hide the worry lines surrounding his electric blue eyes. "What about you? What the hell happened?"

"What was I doing?"

"You were screaming, kiddo," Rudy said. "I heard you across the hall. If I didn't expect them to have us both under all kinds of undocumented surveillance, I'd say it was a wonder your buds in the Kronistine Syndicate weren't piling in here thinking I tried to murder you."

That loud? "I had a nightmare." Saying it let her gulp down a breath. Only a nightmare. "We're still in the compression tunnel?"

He nodded. "Hell of a trip."

Longer than any Chloe remembered in her years aboard the Mother Goose. Just how far out was Stephan's estate? Far enough to survive a galaxy that had turned against its master, she supposed.

"Folks say staying in one too long can mess with your head," Chloe said. "Maybe that's why I freaked out."

Sure. A side effect of too long in a compression tunnel. Not because of the horrors she'd seen in the battlecruiser. Not because her parents had been kidnapped because of her, Rudy's company attacked because of her, Stephan, perhaps, killed because of her.

Rudy's raised eyebrow suggested he didn't buy her explanation, either. "Because of the tunnel, huh? Must've been one hell of a bad dream."

Chloe tried to remember the details, regretted it.

She recalled just enough to know she didn't want to know the rest. Scenes from the battlecruiser. A broken world, twisted bodies, but in her dream, the screaming faces belonged to people she knew. Her parents. The Mother Goose's old crew. Spacers she'd met. The Kronistine men. Admiral Avalon. Stephan.

And, over and over again, Rudy.

Shuddering, she tried to pull away from him and realized for the first time she was already huddled against the wall where it butted against the reactive gel bed of Stephan's vacated suite.

Rudy gripped her shoulders and tried to force her to meet his eyes. "Clo?"

"I'm fine, Rudy," she whispered. "You should leave now."

"The hell I should. You're about as 'fine' as an Epee with no coolant."

"I said you should leave," Chloe snapped. She pushed him away and scrambled to her feet, sinking almost to her ankles in the yielding gel. Where did Rudy get off, barging into her suite that way? And climbing onto the bed while she slept!

He let her shove him off the bed. He rolled to his feet at the end of the motion, arms crossed.

"Go!" Chloe pointed a shaking finger at the door. "Get away from me!"

"No."

Chloe's fists clenched. She started to snarl another retort.

Instead, she sank back to the bed and wrapped her arms around her knees. She pressed her face against her legs and shut her eyes. She felt Rudy's hand on her shoulder and leaned into him. She fought to keep from crying, though she wasn't sure, as the dream faded into increasingly obscure snippets, who she wanted to cry for.

She forced down a deep breath, set her jaw, looked up.

Rudy frowned down at her. "Feeling better?"

Chloe shook her head.

"Well," he said, "at least you're honest." He winked.

A chuckle fought its way from her lips.

"You better watch it," she said. "Your humor is contagious."

"An epidemic," he agreed solemnly.

"Thanks, Rudy," Chloe said. "I do feel better now."

"Damn straight. I'd hate to waste all this talent." In the dim light, she almost couldn't see how strained his grin was. Chloe was glad her memory of the nightmare continued to fade. She must have sounded even worse than she felt.

Rudy squeezed her shoulder. "No more bad dreams, you hear?"

"Principle willing!"

"You want me to stick around and make sure? I double as a dream catcher, you know."

"Y–" Chloe, remembering at the last minute they were huddled together on a bed, bit back an unthinking 'yes.' "I mean, you... better not. We took separate quarters and all."

For a wonder, he didn't push it. He patted her shoulder and uncoiled himself, hopping back to the floor. "If you need anything, Clo..."

"I'll call you," she promised.

And she would, and he would answer –

Or, the echo of a dream whispered in the back of her mind, he would die trying.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 38: Captains of Industry

"Ladies and gentlemen," Otto Abeir Algreil said, spreading his arms to encompass the long oval table before him, "welcome to Algreil Prime."

Jack, sitting behind and to the side of his once-and-current boss, followed the sweep of Otto's arm. A who's who of Oligarchs presumably "sat" at the table, but their holograms had no distinguishing features. Plausible deniability, in case the Feds won and won fast.

Only Jack, another Algreil man at Otto's back, and a trio of Marchess – or was it Marchess-Algreil? – representatives actually attended in the flesh. Alarie Wein Marchess-Algreil, seated at the far end of the table, was the only physically present 'lady' Otto could have been referring to, and she practically disappeared into her throne-like seat. Her two retainers, in Algreil colors but from the protective way they clustered around Alarie obviously still Marchess men at heart, only served to make her look smaller and sicklier by comparison. Beyond the table, the room was uncomfortably dark.

The holograms, and the Marchesses, fixed their gaze on Otto.

"I'm sure you all know by now why you've been called here," Otto said.

A murmur of agreements. The assembled Oligarchs sounded nervous to Jack, though it was hard to tell through the programs they used to scramble their identities.

"You've all familiarized yourselves with the material I provided?"

"We are fully prepared to judge this matter, Algreil," one of the holograms said. Jack found it hard to even figure out which one was speaking, though Otto seemed to follow their conversation easily. "The question is, are you prepared to hear our judgment?"

Jack didn't like the sound of that. He glanced at Otto.

The Oligarch's cocky grin hadn't wavered. He said, "Let's hear it."

Another hologram answered him. "It is the opinion of this council that you, Otto Abeir Algreil, provoked a confrontation with the Federal Navy destroyer Reformer, leading to the destruction of your assets in the Wellach system and the heightened tensions between ourselves and the Federal Senate. Furthermore, we believe this provocation was deliberate and that you intend to use the resulting conflict to push for open war between the Oligarchy and the Senate."

"All true," Otto said.

Jack stared.

Since none of the assembled oligarchs responded immediately, Jack figured he wasn't the only one who couldn't believe the admission. Not that Jack put the actions past Otto – he'd been plenty frank about his plans. No, what blew Jack away was that his boss would come out and say it to his colleagues.

"How can you possibly justify this?" one of said colleagues demanded. "How can you expect this council to sit here and listen to you bald-faced admit you're trying to provoke another Civil War?"

Both good questions, thought Jack.

"Was that ever in question?" Otto asked. "If it was, gentlemen, you have my apologies. Let me break it down for you: I am openly calling for us to fight the Federal Senate."

"You can't be serious!"

Otto cocked an eyebrow. "Of course I'm serious. You're the jokes. What did you think the purpose of assembling the Captains of Industry was? Did you think we were a Principle-damned social club? I formed this council following the dismantling and nationalization of Kalder-Black specifically to organize resistance to the Senate's overreach. Armed, military resistance."

"But the Senate is not overreaching this time," one of the oligarchs countered. "You opened fire on their ship!"

"After Admiral Avalon violated the Senate's own search-and-seizure laws and the Treaty of Etemenos, which grants our arcologies independent operation. Maybe Avalon had a warrant, but I sure as hell never saw it. And he's one of them usually going on about how sacred their 'law' is!" Otto snorted. "Legally speaking, I acted overzealously, but not outside my rights."

"You can't expect that to fly with President Ferrill. Even if her rhetoric is just that, she'd never be imprudent enough to send Avalon out without legal authority."

"I don't expect it to 'fly,'" Otto said. "That's my point. The Senate's signed, notarized promises aren't worth the paper they're printed on."

"Do you deny that you set up the situation to provoke the Reformer? You spread rumors you had an Heir! How else could Avalon have responded?"

"I was under the impression, gentlemen, that an Heir to the Astroykos dynasty, should such a person exist, would be just another citizen. After all, we're all equal under the law, right?"

Except for hybrids, Jack thought – and thought of Ellie. Not that the 'law' seemed to have done Chloe a damn bit of good, even though she was acknowledged as human by it.

One of the oligarchs sputtered, "You can't extend that kind of sentiment to a noble – an Imperial, for Principle's sake!"

"And why not?" Otto asked. "It is what the law says."

"Because people like that are too dangerous," the hologram's owner said. "Letting them walk around free is just asking for trouble. Measures have to be taken. Preemptive measures! Surely this council should support the Senate in controlling the old aristocracy!"

"Chloe's not dangerous to anybody," Jack snapped. He leaned forward and slammed his palm on the dark wood of the table. "She wouldn't hurt a fly!"

Only Alarie, seated at the far end of the table, even looked at him.

Otto waved him back.

Reluctantly, realizing he probably shouldn't have said anything, Jack obeyed.

"Too dangerous," Otto said. He sounded like he was trying the words out. He repeated them, cocked his head. Sighed. "Gentlemen, Colonel Hughes is right. The alleged Heir the Federal Senate was looking for was living peacefully as a spacer salvage worker prior to becoming the target of an Animus Hunter. She made no attempt to reclaim the throne the Senate believes to be hers, or even to employ the powers they believe she has."

"Are you saying she doesn't –"

"I'm saying," Otto continued, "that she didn't provoke a damn thing."

"Still, she was dangerous." The oligarch sounded sullen. He had to know Otto was leading him into some kind of trap, but if he didn't try to push through, he'd lose even more face than if his fellow oligarch made a fool of him. Better to be decisive than right, right? "If she had decided to attempt something, she would have been a serious problem."

"And you wouldn't?" Otto's eyebrow quirked up again.

"I – Huh?"

"You wouldn't be a serious problem if you 'tried something?' I wouldn't be? Any of us wouldn't be?"

"Enough, Algreil," a second hologram said. "You've made your point."

"Wrong," Otto said. "The Senate, and my illustrious colleague here, made it for me."

The oligarch Otto had used to get the point across still didn't seem to grasp it. "What are you trying to imply, Algreil?"

"The Senate demonstrates its blatant willingness to ignore laws, treaties, and the very constitution it was based on. Why? Because the target is 'too dangerous.' But who is truly 'too dangerous?' The side that lost the Civil War? Or the side that was already winning it before the Feds stepped in to take the credit?"

"We couldn't have beaten the Emperor," the second hologram said.

"Perhaps. But then again, we didn't try, either. That was the Senate's cause. Last I checked, they were the ones who dragged the imperials into the Civil War. We were fighting to keep local lords' noses out of our business, not to change the government on Etemenos."

"You think the Senate considers us a threat?"

"What do you think Morgan Kalder-Black thinks?"

"That was an isolated incident –"

"What do you think Chloe Hughes thinks?"

"The alleged Heir? That has –"

"He has a point –"

"– cannot risk so much –"

"– this is intolerable, Algreil!"

"We did not come here –"

"– but if we could –"

"Gentlemen!" Otto stood and leaned over the table.

The oligarchs immediately fell silent.

"We are a danger to the Senate," Otto said. "We broadcast their proclamations. We ship their food. We build their mecha. We do a thousand things they need, a thousand things they'd have to rebuild from scratch if we stopped. Rhetta Ferrill knows all this better than most of you seem to. And if we continue squabbling like this, like the nobs did, we'll lose like the nobs did."

"Even if we stand united, Algreil – which, I hasten to add, we do not intend to do – we would lose. Those mecha are already built. The Federal Navy has grown too expansive, the Animus Hunters are too powerful, and in any case we could never hope to break through Etemenos's defenses."

Otto shrugged. "You might be right. For all our power, that's a tall order."

"If we can't win, what's the point in fighting? We have no reason to think the Senate won't consider you an isolated threat and respond accordingly. Why should we sacrifice ourselves for a competitor's sake?"

'Cause if you think Otto's telling the truth, Jack thought, you'll be next on the chopping block. Why not fight when you at least have a chance?

He expected Otto to say much the same.

Instead, Otto said, "Because, gentlemen, this competitor has access to the power of the Heir to the Astroykos Dynasty."

"What?" It took everything in Jack not to join in the chorus. Not many of the holograms managed it. Alarie didn't, either, and since he could actually see her face, her shock would have been obvious even if she had kept her mouth shut.

"Colonel Hughes," Otto said, motioning to Jack, "is the adoptive father of the young woman who is, as the Federal Senate correctly deduced, the heir to the throne. He is also, as many of you are no doubt aware, a member of my Devil Ray squadron."

"A former member," a nearby hologram said. "I was given to understand that the falling-out was rather unpleasant."

"You were given to understand that, eh?" Otto grinned at the image of the man.

Jack's stomach lurched. He suddenly realized the bluff Otto was trying to run. No way in hell would the other Oligarchs buy it, though, not that he could see. Not even from one of their own.

Would they?

"Do you mean to say, Mr. Algreil, that you planned for Colonel Hughes to find and adopt the heir?"

"Of course not," Otto said. "That would be absurd."

Jack suppressed a sigh of relief. Partly because he didn't think the Captains of Industry would buy such a, as Otto said, absurd lie, partly because Jack had half convinced himself that Otto had planned it all.

"I released Colonel Hughes from official service so he could find the Empress and/or her erinyes," Otto said. "That she was dead and her daughter wasn't proved an unexpected bonus. Far better to raise a tame Imperial than to try to persuade one to help us."

"If that were the case, why would you have left her on a salvage ship bouncing around the periphery instead of bringing her to Algreil Prime?"

"If she'd been raised here," Otto countered, "who here wouldn't know it? Who wouldn't at least suspect? If all of us knew it, do you really believe the Feds wouldn't? If they had, do you think Algreil Aerospace wouldn't have had its own 'isolated incident?'"

"But the danger –"

"Was nonexistent. I had my best officer on the job." Otto clapped Jack on the shoulder. Jack was sure his grin looked pretty damn forced. He hoped the other oligarchs couldn't see it clearly. "Raising the Heir exactly as we would want. Training her exactly as we would want."

The assembled oligarchs stared. At least, Jack figured they did, because they didn't say anything and all their holographic avatars were angled at him and Otto.

Otto sat back down and leaned on the arm of his chair, smirking. "Any more questions, gentlemen?"

If Jack hadn't figured running his mouth was liable to shoot down Otto's house of cards – and Jack's own chances of saving Ellie and Chloe – he'd have had plenty.

The Captains of Industry did not.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Chapter 39: Etemenos

Ellie stared at the screens displaying the view outside the Reformer. Her eyes were wide, her mouth parted, her attention fixed on the silvery vista that appeared to erupt beyond the destroyer's hull.

She knew she should look upon the gleaming expanse with horror or hate.

She felt nothing but awe.

Etemenos!

Invisible from outside its world-shields, it unfolded before her eyes like a dream as the Reformer charted its course through the bubble of gravitic distortion.

The capital-world of the Federated Stars was the size of a small gas giant, far larger than any habitable planet, even more so than any other product of human artifice. Concentric rings of superdense metals whirled in a stately dance around its core, a giant astrolabe that was practically a system unto itself. Each of the seven rings could have docked thousands of ships as big as a battlecruiser, to say nothing of the smaller, privately-owned stations on different axes. Each glowed with warning lights and running lights and purely decorative lights, creating the illusion of internal stars offset by the weirdly distorted view of the actual stars through its shields. Some bore the glowing insignia of Oligarchical enclaves, others the Ouroboros of the government, others a dizzying mix of symbols from private holders and sub-Oligarchical companies.

Ellie couldn't begin to imagine the resources the Astroykos Empire had expended to create the capital-world. Even with nanoassemblers, which she wasn't sure they'd had, it would have taken the mass of a dozen planets. And since it rose from deep space, far enough from any star to allow vessels to emerge from compression tunnels just hours from its surface rather than days or weeks, all that mass had been transported across dozens of pentameters at least.

Jack had always called Etemenos's construction wasteful, and Ellie had never had reason to disagree.

Now she did.

The Reformer glided through a maze of shifting rings and space traffic. Perhaps because of its importance as the Federal Navy flagship, it only had to maneuver to avoid the former. Other ships, even bulk freighters many times the destroyer's size, circled around it. Watching from her quarters, Ellie felt they were moving slowly, but she eventually realized the scale of Etemenos was playing tricks on her. The Reformer moved faster than it had in Wellach's atmosphere, but it still took the better part of an hour to reach the immense silver sphere that was Etemenos's core.

At last, the ship settled into a concave cone that served as one of the core's docking bays. Carefully tuned magnetic fields formed much of the planet-sized sphere's outer structure, showing off the arena where the Etemenos Cup tournament was held and, at the heart of that, a second, smaller metal sphere where the emperors had once held court and the Senate now did.

I wish Jack could see this, Ellie thought. He would at least appreciate the outer layer of Etemenos's core. Thinking about what went on at its heart, Ellie at last recovered her dislike of the place.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the faint hiss of the door to her quarters.

She nearly jumped off the bed. She hadn't seen a human being since being escorted from the bridge after Avalon's battle with the Black Rook two weeks before. She felt sure she'd have died of thirst but for the dispensary in her quarters.

She didn't exactly see a human being now, only the armor of a pair of Federal marines, looking more like miniature mecha than men. One of them pointed to her, then jerked a thumb toward the door.

Ellie offered no protest as they led her through the ship's seemingly endless corridors. She wondered if Avalon had finally deigned to remember she existed, or if some Federal bureaucrat had.

She wondered for the thousandth time if Avalon was even still alive.

It seemed impossible the admiral would have left her completely unattended for weeks after all but waiting on her hand and foot. Whatever his reasons, he'd always treated her like a guest rather than a prisoner.

On the other hand, if he were dead, why would his first officer have left Ellie in her gilded cage instead of putting her in a literal one? Or, for that matter, dumping her out the airlock like the trash most of the Reformer's crew so obviously considered her? Had he simply forgotten her after having her hustled back to her quarters? She couldn't rule out the possibility.

For the thousandth time, she put her questions out of her mind. She gained nothing from dwelling on them, and in any case her answers probably lay wherever the marines were taking her.

That proved to be to an airlock big enough to have swallowed up mecha like the Goslings, if not the entire Mother Goose. Smooth and silent, it slid open on a waiting room hardly bigger than the airlock. "Sit," one of the marines said. Without waiting for a response, they turned on their heels and marched back through the closing airlock.

Ellie took in her new surroundings. There were no facilities or decorations, just four long, low couches of reactive gel with circular tables at each end. It seemed oddly plain compared to her image of the capital world-city. Because it was a military facility? In that case, she would have expected screens ready to display strategic updates. Two doors led off from the room. She didn't bother to check them, since even if they weren't locked, she had no idea how to escape or what she would be escaping to. After a quick pace around the room's outskirts, she sighed, stretched and seated herself on one of the couches to wait.

The next several minutes seemed to stretch into hours. Finally, the airlock slid open again. This time, enough marines and navy officers piled out to nearly fill the room, surrounding –

– a sleek, hovering medical chair, in which sat Second Admiral Marcel Avalon.

Ellie couldn't help but gasp.

The medical chair was a mobile version of a typical reactive gel chair, but its covering of nanopaste 'fabric' was more like that of a military-grade flight suit. It extended over Avalon's entire body, replacing his uniform, perhaps having merged with it when the suit's own medical subroutines proved insufficient, and a pseudopod-like extension covered the left side of his face. From the way he sat, Ellie suspected at least his left arm and both legs were injured to the point of uselessness.

Nonetheless, he managed to smile with the visible half of his face. "Ellie."

"Admiral!" Instinctively, she tried to rush to his side and was brought up short by the barrel of a marine's wrist-mounted gun.

"Let her pass," Avalon said. His voice sounded weak and scratchy, but if he'd suffered any serious damage to his lungs or vocal cords, it had already been repaired. Understandably, since soft tissue healed much faster than bone.

The marine lowered his weapon.

By then, Ellie had enough of her wits about her to remember that this man remained her enemy. She approached his medical chair, but didn't rush to comfort him as she'd been about to. "Are you..." Of course he wasn't alright! She swallowed that cliché and instead said, "I'm glad you're alive."

"And I as well," he said, "although I suspect if Limiters were not sealing off my pain receptors, I might feel differently."

Ellie wasn't sure if she was supposed to laugh at that; from the smattering of nervous chuckles from Avalon's subordinates, she gathered she wasn't the only one.

"Admiral," one of those subordinates said, "perhaps we should inform President Ferrill that you need more time to recover –"

"I have been asleep overlong already, Captain Little," Avalon snapped. Ellie wondered if the harshness in his tone was from his injuries, or if this was the continuation of an argument she'd missed. "I will give my own report."

"Sir," Little said stiffly, saluting and stepping back.

Definitely the continuation of an argument.

One, inevitably, Avalon's subordinate had lost.

"I'll, um, see that the ship is moved to drydock, sir," Little said.

Avalon tried to nod. The nanopaste extending up his neck restrained him too much, so he was forced to settle for a stiff "Very good, Captain."

Most of the officers returned to the Reformer with Little. The rest, and half the marines, exited through one of the room's doors, leaving Ellie and Avalon with the remaining marines.

"The President will want to meet with me in private, gentlemen," the admiral told the latter, "so you may consider yourselves on early leave."

Ellie could imagine the frown beneath the marine commander's expressionless helmet. "But Admiral –"

"Surely you don't think I'm in any danger here?"

"The prisoner –"

"She is acting as my assistant," Avalon said. News to Ellie. "And she is not a 'prisoner,' she is a 'guest.'"

The marines hesitated, but, to a man, headed for the doors. Avalon's orders were absolute.

When the door slid shut behind them, Ellie said, "They're right, you know."

Avalon raised his visible eyebrow.

"In your condition, I could kill you. Or take you hostage and try to get away."

"A prisoner might do so," Avalon allowed.

"I am a prisoner," Ellie snapped. "You probably killed my husband, you certainly tried to kill my daughter, though thank the Principle that was unsuccessful, I've been locked in that damned room for weeks. What would you call it?"

Avalon's visible eye widened. "Tried to kill your daughter?"

"What do you call firing a destroyer's main guns at a transport you thought she was aboard?"

"I never authorized any such action!" Avalon's voice broke, and he coughed harshly. "Dammit. If that's the case... You're sure the ship escaped undamaged?"

"Yes," Ellie said. "Your crew apparently weren't so pleased to hear of Chloe's escape. When I was escorted from the bridge, they were lamenting their misses."

Avalon breathed a ragged sigh of relief. "Heads will roll for that –"

"Stop lying to me," Ellie said. She slumped onto one of the couches and buried her face in her hands. "Even if you don't, the Senate wants Chloe dead."

"That isn't true," Avalon said. "I swear it. President Ferrill will swear it, too, when we see her."

"We?" Ellie looked up. "I thought you planned on a private meeting."

"I wanted to talk to you," Avalon said. "And to have the President talk to you. We must lay to rest these baseless fears. Baseless? Perhaps not – not if my own men violate their orders so egregiously." Something seemed to occur to Avalon, and his frown deepened. His eyes flicked to the wall behind which the Reformer loomed.

"What's wrong?"

"It's nothing," he said. Too quickly.

He's lying, Ellie thought. Possibly to himself.

Trouble was, she couldn't begin to guess what he was lying about. The Senate's commitment to Chloe's safety? Or something to do with the fight at the battlecruiser?

She tried to remember the details of the battle. Avalon had coordinated it from his mecha until he got caught up in his dogfight with Stephan Kyrillos. If he'd kept trying to run a fleet action and fight a duel, he'd have surely been killed, as, it seemed, he almost had been. The Reformer hadn't fired on the Kyrillos transport until after the dogfight began in earnest.

Did that mean Avalon meant what he said about keeping Chloe safe?

Or did it mean they hadn't had a shot at the transport until he was out of contact?

For that matter, the Reformer hadn't started firing at the Black Rook until the dogfight began. Had Avalon ordered that? Too many voices shouted through her memories. The Reformer's bridge was a loud place to be in a fight, especially for a felid.

"How were you hurt?" Ellie asked.

"Kyrillos struck me with a telekinetic blast," Avalon said. "Crushed most of my cockpit, but, fortunately, only most."

And the blast from the Reformer that was the last I saw of you? Ellie didn't say what she was thinking, mostly because from Avalon's troubled expression, he'd already considered the possibility that his injuries were neither Stephan Kyrillos's doing nor an accident.

Avalon was, after all, the one who'd told her of the competing factions in the Federal Senate. He might want to believe he'd left them behind when he left Etemenos, but had he? Could he?

Ellie thought of Avalon's crew. Of their loyalty to him, yes, but also of their cruelty to her. If Avalon wasn't lying about his and President Rhetta Ferrill's position, surely such men would want to thwart her.

Captain Little, the first officer? One of the battery controllers who guided the ship's weapons? An individual gunner?

It wasn't hard for her to see one or all of them as a would-be assassin.

If one of Avalon's men had wanted to assassinate him, though, why not do so when he was surely near death? Perhaps he was right about the cause of his injuries, perhaps the Reformer's medical staff weren't in on the plot, or perhaps there had simply been no plausible way to deny responsibility once Avalon was brought aboard.

She asked. "You've been unconscious all this time?"

"You heard Captain Little. I should technically have waited for the sickbay to heal me completely before waking. Talking and moving around makes the process more difficult."

"Then why are you talking? You don't owe me that, surely?"

"I owe you this and more," Avalon said. "As you say, your husband is likely dead because I attacked the Algreil arcology on Wellach, and now I have endangering your daughter on my conscience."

"You weren't the one who gave that order."

"My men, my ship – my responsibility." His right fist balled and rose as if to slam against the arm of the medical chair. It fell back, and he slumped.

Ellie rose and went to his side. "You're right about owing more than you can give, Admiral," she said quietly, "but I still don't want you to give more than you have."

"Thank you, Ellie," he said.

"Are you going to rest now?"

"I can't. Debts aside, I have my report to give. Will you escort me to the President's office? I am, as you can see, somewhat lacking in mobility."

To the president of the Federal Senate. Ellie suppressed a gulp. As much as she hated the senate, the thought of meeting its head in person left her feeling weak-kneed. Despite Avalon's supposed lack of mobility, she knew his medical chair was self-propelled. She didn't have to go.

But Avalon had promised that President Ferrill would allay her fears about the Senate's plans for Chloe.

If anyone could convince her of that, if she could breathe easier knowing the greatest power in human space didn't want her daughter dead...

Even if it wasn't true, at least Ellie might be able to sleep at night.

"Of course, Admiral," she said.