Lover

by Valerie J. Long

  “Ask him yourself.”

  “He’s a Wyvern.”

  “He’s not to be blamed for that.”

  “Well.” He rose. “Mister Dragon—I am Shogun Nakamichi. How may I address you?”

  “I am Achrotzyber Paxxchfztnach. My foster mother called me Arko. It seems the human throat may suffer damage from correct pronunciation, so Arko is sufficient.”

  “So it shall be. Mister Arko, why did you decide not to continue your attack?”

  “It was a mistake. You should ask me why I had commenced the attack. My foster mother had lied to me. She said there would not be any other Dragons. She said the humans would have chased my kind away, would have stolen the throne from the rightful ruler, the Golden One. The usurper would be our target.”

  “There aren’t any Dragons left indeed—that is, there weren’t any Dragons. Except for you.”

  “And the Golden One there, my Mistress.”

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Thirty-Seven

  Surprised, the Shogun turned back and fixed his gaze on me. “That’s what she claimed? Being a Golden One?”

  “No,” Achrotzyber objected. “She did not claim it. She has legitimated herself in a way that only Dragons command and that only Dragons can recognize. This way you cannot claim and cannot lie. She is Dragon, she is a Golden One.”

  “But I’m a human!” I protested.

  “Your body is human, your mind is Dragon. Only that counts.”

  I’m a Dragon? No, Ghost is a Dragon?

  —This unit is an inseparable part of your mind.—

  I’m a Dragon? How? The signature?

  —It comes from the way you are using the signature. This in turn depends on your thoughts and actions. You act like a Dragon, and the signature reflects your character.—

  What accounts for a Dragon character?

  No, I didn’t have to ask my brain crutch. I could figure it out myself. Acting like Zoe, using your own skills in the service of the greater good, where it really mattered.

  My thieveries didn’t count. Dragons had a different view on property. They didn’t need much, and the little they simply took. The term prostitution was meaningless for Dragons.

  I was one of the good ones, and that counted. When I started a mission, I pulled it through with Dragonish consequence, and that counted. If it was important to me, I even risked my life.

  Yes, if I contemplated how I had lived my life lately, there was a lot of truth to it. Where was the lunatic Jo who cared a shit about others? This Jo no longer existed.

  “Tell me one thing, Mistress. Why did you not kill me when we met? You had come for this purpose, correct?”

  Correct. Why not? At that moment, I’d have had a tiny chance, and I had gambled it away. I had examined him with fascination, including his deadly claw, until the bullet had hit me. I had no longer wanted to kill him.

  “I couldn’t.” That was only half the truth, and the realization caught me on the wrong foot. “I fell in love with you.”

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Thirty-Eight

  “What does that mean, Mistress?” the young Wyvern asked.

  Yes, how did you say that to a Dragon correctly? “That means that I���d like to make you my Companion.”

  Could you shock a Dragon? In this case, I seemed to have managed it.

  “Mistress!” He lowered his head. “I am not worthy. I am too young, and I am abnormal.”

  “You’re the only one of your kind on this planet. You define the norm. You match the norm. You’re perfect.”

  “Your logic is perfect, Mistress.”

  “Regarding the age—I’m prepared to wait. We’re not in a hurry, are we?”

  “No, Mistress. Command my fate, and I will follow.”

  Nakamichi had discreetly withdrawn. Now, he stepped forward again and harrumphed.

  “Protectress Johanna, Mister Arko, pardon me. There’s someone who’d like to talk to you.”

  “Who is it?”

  “My superior, the Emperor.”

  “Oh.” Then I probably better stand up?

  Status?

  —Healing of severe injuries not completed yet.—

  No. Then I’d better remain lying. This must have been on the tip of the physician’s tongue, too, who I now smiled at. “May I have a pillow for my head? I’ll remain lying here.”

  The physician nodded. “Your head isn’t injured—Protectress. Would you like to cover yourself?”

  Oh, right. “A space blanket would be appropriate.”

  “At once!”

  The Shogun waited patiently. When I nodded at him, he spoke a quick order into his radio. A short time later, the heavy steps of a dozen armored guards approached, and among them I heard the soft steps of leather soles.

  The procession came into my field of vision. The Emperor looked young, younger than me.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” the Shogun said as a welcome.

  “If the Dragons cannot come to me, then I come to them. That’s only appropriate.” He made a deep bow to Achrotzyber. “You came at the right time to save Us. Again, like at the time of my father.”

  “I had no part in your rescue. You owe that to my Mistress.”

  “He says she’s a Golden One,” Nakamichi prompted his Emperor. “Only by her intervention in this battle, could the guard hold the gate.”

  “And she’s sacrificed herself. History repeats. Will she live?”

  “I will live,” I answered myself. “I’m already healing. In a few hours, I will be able to appropriately bow before you.”

  “You will not do that, Protectress. I bow before you.” That he did. “Are you a Dragon’s daughter?”

  “Spare me the religious stuff. My parents are human.”

  “But then—I don’t understand. You are a Golden One?”

  “The power of Dragons now runs in my body. I don’t want to tell more about it.” There were more important topics anyway. “The Dragon cult had also planned an attack on the government.”

  “With which they succeeded, if our latest reports are correct,” the Shogun agreed after a side glance at his Emperor. “But once we can bring you back into the palace, I can lead a part of the guard against the parliament occupants.”

  “I will accompany your men, Shogun, if you allow.” No. “Both of us, Achrotzyber and I, will accompany your men.”

  “Then—one moment.” He interrupted himself and listened.

  Meanwhile, the Emperor talked to the physician. “How bad is it?”

  “She should long be dead. But her wounds only bleed very little, and even her inner injuries don’t seem to impair her much.”

  “That’s misleading. Her pain must be terrible. However, if she heals like a Dragon, you cannot do anything for her.”

  “As you say.”

  “My father often told me of the day when the Dragon’s daughter saved us. She’d been severely injured, too.”

  “What?” the Shogun was just calling, then he turned to me. “Excuse me, Protectress Johanna. Do you know a Captain Stokes of the American Navy?”

  “Yes, why?”

  “He’s here and wants to see you. Good, then—let him pass.”

  I heard a quickly approaching rush. Seconds later, the Captain stood before me—in a Frostdragon armor suit—and glanced back and forth between the Dragon, me, the Shogun, the physician and the Emperor. Then he began in English. “Um. Captain Stokes, United States Marine Corps. I’m delivering greetings of the rightful American President, an apology for our intrusion on a friendly nation’s sovereign territory, and the offer to support the fight against the Dragon.”

  The Tenno himself spoke up in English, too, before his Shogun could say something.

  “Why are you here, Captain?”

  “The President told me, word by word—it cannot be that we let a young woman, who’s done so much for us, join battle with a Dragon all alone. Loyalty works both ways. Take your men and suits, go there and help her. But it seems as if we we
ren’t needed anymore.”

  “The Dragon has accepted the Protectress as his empress. But now that you’re here with your men, Captain, would you submit to the leader of my guard to free my government?”

  “Protectress? Empress? But—yes, of course.”

  The Emperor leaned over me again. “In this case, it would be appropriate to do without your support, wouldn’t it?”

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Thirty-Nine

  Appropriate? As broken as I felt, I only longed for a warm bed and a lot of time for sleeping and healing. I should let others pull the chestnuts from the fire.

  “That���s out of the question,” I disagreed with the Emperor anyway. “Whatever I started, I’ll bring to an end. I’m the one legitimately commanding the only Dragon on Earth now. So I’m the one now to confront the Dragon cult and the Dragon Order and tell them their way is wrong. Whoever devoted himself to the Dragon must follow me.”

  “You’re speaking truth, Golden One.” The Emperor nodded at his Shogun. “You lead, and we will follow. Shogun, this is my wish. Obey this young woman.”

  “Yes, my Emperor!” He dropped on his knees before me. “What are your orders, Protectress?”

  The Captain looked around between us. “I’m completely lost right now. Can someone explain me what’s going on?”

  “Captain Stokes,” the Shogun answered him. “My Emperor has just confirmed the Protectress’ rightful claim for the supreme command of the Imperial guard and the Japanese forces. There is no higher instance than a Golden One. The Dragon confirmed that this young woman is a Golden One, so she’s entitled to lead us.”

  “But…” The Captain glanced down at the injured, helpless bundle of human that was lying at his feet and as that I felt.

  I smiled back at him. “I’ll be up shortly, Captain. And then we’ll thoroughly kick the Cartel’s and Dragon Order’s asses, okay?”

  “We’re talking of battle armor suit against armor suit. What do you want there? I don’t recognize you, Jo.”

  “Well, I don’t recognize myself anymore.”

  Who was I? Or first—who wasn’t I? The whore Jo hadn’t existed anymore for a long time, as she had died together with the athlete. The Dragon engineer Jo had always been somewhat strange to me—basically she’d been left behind on an Australian garbage dump. The path of the successful gambler, thief, and street rat Jo had ended in Denver. Yoshi and Yori had always been shallow roles. Velvet—an amusing interlude, no more. I had already discarded the lunatic before. The largest part of my life was façade, was a lie—a lie that couldn’t persist in the light of truth that Achrotzyber’s signature so clearly shed for me. A Dragon signature couldn’t lie—he had confirmed that. “But we all must face the truth one day, Captain. I’m a Golden One, with all consequences.”

  “You’re no soldier.”

  “Put the formalities aside and think of how you’ve witnessed me. Well?”

  He didn’t have to think for long. “Okay. You’re a warrior. But do you have a clue of tactics and strategy? Can you command an army?”

  “If necessary, that, too. But now it’s only about taking out a small score of armor suits and demoralizing a larger score of crooks.”

  “That can be your death. Even with your suit.”

  “I don’t think so. Come with me and watch.”

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Forty

  “Are your men in position?” I asked Captain Stokes via radio. The authoritative road blockades deployed by the Dragon cult shouldn’t have been an obstacle for camouflaged armor suits.

  “Positive.”

  Again I checked my feeling. The stray guidance quarks emitted by their micro fusion reactors could be perceived by anyone commanding the respective receptors and knowing what to look for. “The opposition maintains position, too.”

  “Roger.”

  I felt awfully weak. My body was a single battlefield where healing nanos fought for my survival. Instead of granting them a rest, I planned a new campaign, let myself be driven across Tokyo, and snuck to the front line.

  “Get ready,” I ordered the Shogun. He nodded and passed the order on.

  “Play.”

  An announcement that I had prepared was broadcasted by radio and numerous speakers installed around the government buildings, first in Japanese.

  “Sons and daughters of the Dragon! The Golden One commands you to put down your weapons and surrender to the Dragon Guard. The Dragon loyally sides with the Emperor!”

  Achrotzyber appeared proudly erect on a rooftop, close outside the distance across which a plasma weapon could be reliably used.

  “Clans of the Yakuza—you’ve overstepped your borders. The Golden One will not tolerate this. Surrender now, or bear the consequences!”

  The third message addressed the armor suits and thus sounded in English, “Armor suit wearers of the Cartel—you are using Dragon technology without authorization. Deactivate your fusion generators and surrender. Consequences are terminal. There will be no second warning.”

  Captain Stokes had considered that a bluff.

  “Do you know what happened to the suits at the palace?” I had asked him.

  “No, that’s indeed a riddle to me. The Shogun talked about a reactor malfunction. I can’t imagine that.”

  “There are different options. If the envelope field emitters fail before the deuterium feed is stopped, the hot plasma energy must go somewhere. Such can be caused by buggy programming.”

  “Similar to the misprogramming that leads to the failure of suit functions?”

  “Yes.”

  “Crap. You have to get close, don’t you?”

  “For that kind of sabotage, yes. Meanwhile, I came up with a different idea.”

  “So.”

  “I don’t need to get close. The rest is top secret.”

  Where would the suits place their bets?

  When they had arrived in Japan, it had looked so easy—they were armored, invisible and apparently invincible, at least if Jana hadn’t told them about Anahuac and Palmdale. Now they had already lost six fellows, from whom they hadn’t received any more signs of life.

  I very much hoped that at least some of them would listen to me.

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Forty-One

  “We don’t see anyone giving up,” the Captain reported.

  “No, they’re all still active,” I sadly agreed. “Switch to battery.”

  The Captain passed the order on. “Confirmed,” he then said, and I checked my perception.

  “Your men are cold. Fine.”

  It was so easy. Yes, I could sense the guidance quarks for the envelope field generators. What was far more important—I could also send such guidance quarks. The energy needed for that was marginal, very much opposed to the graviton projectors’ energy consumption. If I came close enough to a reactor, I could jam it, that is, I could weaken its envelope field through specific wrong control signals. Once the envelope field leaked, though, the reactor’s carrier was doomed.

  I neither had the power nor was inclined to sneak dangerously close to the Cartel suits and deactivate them individually. With a single suit, I might have tried it—but they had hostages and might come up with stupid ideas. Whereby I had to admit that the members of a government that had let the cult get that far didn’t really worry me. I accepted that they might belong to the collateral damage. I had to make a point toward the Cartel—Jana—that I was absolutely determined and prepared to do the necessary.

  Was I prepared? Basically it was murder, but within the cold logic of this war it was the right thing to do. It was a Dragonish measure, and I was a Dragon now—mentally.

  I only had to get close to the government building. According to my calculations, one- or two-hundred meters distance should be manageable, even if guidance quarks were very short-lived beasts.

  Ugh—the camouflage sucked at me. I wouldn’t be able to keep it up for long, so I had to move fast. Fast, while my legs would give in under me any time!r />
  The will is stronger, Jo. Only a little more. One step after the other. Lean to the wall, Jo. Fine, and now the last leg, once across the street. And across the apron. Nobody’s shooting at you, the camouflage works, so walk on. Good girl.

  Three steps more, and you may sit down. Ugh. I denied myself fainting.

  My projectors sent out a little stream of guidance quarks, and for a moment I felt dizzy. That was much easier than to neutralize a force field, I noticed with regret. Too easy, even if the energy consumption stressed me noticeably—enough to make my pain relief fail, while behind and above me several small fire flowers blossomed.

  “The suits are eliminated,” I stated gloomily and more to myself. “Go and get the rest.” Then I gave in to my pain and a longer recovery pause.

  Our suits and the Imperial Guard together shouldn’t have trouble with cultists and Yakuza. Only one task was left for me—Jana.

  Chapter One-Hundred-And-Forty-Two

  First, I had to find Jana. I had no reliable clue, and Tokyo was large. Where would the Cartel security head prefer to stay? As I judged her, she’d keep a safe distance from the events and collect reports there. From my point of view, the last news she had received told of a failed coup and suggested quick withdrawal.

  On the other hand, the Grand Master had told of measures for risk containment, so Jana might be under observation. It would be useful to learn more about it.

  Achrotzyber.

  The large Dragon came halfway toward me on the deserted government quarters street.

  “Yes, Mistress?”

  “Did your previous teacher talk to an American woman briefly before the attack? Who might have arrived with the armor suits?”

  “There has been one woman talking English. She did not mention her nationality. She introduced herself as Cartel representative. I do not know this term.”