Neon Trimpot still stood with him, having come to the archipelagos to throw himself on the mercy of the duke’s grace. The rebel leader, with his dandy tunic of lotus print, hot pink up-do, and cocky, simpering face, claimed he’d lost control of his people and had no hand in this assassination attempt –which, according to Legacy, had been targeting Kaizen himself.
Legacy.
She’d been in his bed when she confessed the murder plot. Before they’d parted, Kaizen and Legacy had shared a kiss that could’ve fused metal, much less their two bodies, and then –when he went to find her, after all the horror and madness, thinking she’d be there, safe, waiting for him–
Kaizen pushed the thought from his mind.
Trimpot had also claimed that Kaizen’s father made him a deal, offering him a position within the court in exchange for his loyalty. As a show of good faith, Trimpot made haste to reveal the location of Chance for Choice’s hidden headquarters: inside the hollow copper mountain at Heroes Park.
Kaizen had now called on his father’s court of six to attend him, with the exception of the constable, who had been sent to research Trimpot’s claim. Excepting Abner, the duke’s primary counsel, and Claude, his secondary, both of these afforded quarter in the castle, each of the court were residents of Lion’s Head, the aristocratic quarter of Icarus. Only comprising ten of its total one hundred acres, Lion’s Head was contained within high walls beyond the business district, and most had never set foot or laid eye within. It was conveniently placed, as any member of the duke’s court would reside within the castle itself or there, and even by foot, traveling to the archipelagos would take only minutes.
The court consisted of the scribe, the chancellor, the constable, the treasurer, the steward, and the personal advisor. As they each arrived, they offered their condolences, and of course, their full support to Duke Kaizen, who had been nothing but a boy to any of them only hours ago.
“I’m going to be honest,” Kaizen announced, looking over the panel of men, all significantly older than he, save Trimpot. “I’m not exactly sure what I’m doing.”
“Would you like the notes from our previous session to be read to you, sir?” Kristoff, the scribe, asked.
“Yes, that sounds good,” Kaizen guessed, trying to sound authoritative.
“Claude had established the parameters of the security detail for the coronation,” Kristoff began.
Claude, the Steward of Public Events, immediately stiffened.
“Malthus expressed his doubts that the coronation would be successful.”
Kaizen nodded, maintaining a neutral expression.
“N.E.E.R. reported a sudden shortage in their serum supplies regarding Curiosity and Calm.”
He hadn’t actually thought about New Earth Extraneous Relocation in a long time. It was an uncomfortable thing to consider. The operation was presented as a helpful alternative to those who had exceeded their single child limit for whatever reason, but in truth, the orphans were not found loving, childless couples or even moved to larger cities. They were raised on Old Earth and worked to death, providing materials the floating cities would need to maintain energy and production. They weren’t taught to read or write. They were hardly even clothed or bathed. Their passions were chemically tempered on a weekly basis to ensure their manageability. Every city of New Earth had one: a dome on the ground, filled with mind-numbed orphan slaves. It was the kind of fact one just got used to shoving to the back of their mind and ignoring.
“I suppose we should get them more,” Kaizen replied dully. “I suppose that would be the best thing to do.”
“Already on it, sir,” Ando, the treasurer, piped. “It’s easy enough to locate Calm, but Kill Curiosity . . . that’s technically illegal, and so – although we have increased our supply, we must wait for nightfall. And we must wait to ensure that the Center is well-guarded during the drop.”
“Yes, well, I can’t control what has happened,” Kaizen fumed. “I’m sorry if the Center has had some staff diverted to the castle, but it was the contingency plan! Between the Center and the castle, which one do you think needs to be guarded at this time?”
“The castle, of course,” Ando asserted. “Of course, my lord, it’s the castle.”
There was a stiff silence as the court seemed to mentally congregate and weigh who should speak next.
“Would you accept a word of advice?” the chancellor, Jonathan, suggested.
“Oh, thank God, someone’s going to say it,” Abner sighed.
“I believe the most pressing matter is how you respond to this appalling attack on the castle and the monarchy,” the chancellor continued. “Icarus is waiting for your reaction. So, too, is Ferraday. The entirety of New Earth. If your reaction is not sufficient . . . his certainly will be.”
“Yes,” Kaizen agreed. He was certain that the monarch would be in contact shortly with instructions, and would likely deploy his own troops or himself to investigate this matter, in spite of the six day duration of flight. He looked to Abner. “What were you going to say?” he asked.
Abner glared at Trimpot. “What is he doing here? That was another note which Kristoff failed to read,” Abner added. “Your father discussed whether or not to kill the man you’ve invited to the royal court!”
Constable Wesley entered the throne room and approached, bowing. “We have returned from Heroes Park,” he decreed. “Recovered roughly fifty weapons, both melee and ranged, as well as some unique inventions, the functions of which are uncertain. They’ve been retained for further documentation and examination in the evidence room of the police headquarters. We’ve also intercepted a Hermetic transmission from Monarch Ferraday in regards to an investigatory squadron.” Hermetic transmission was the only method of third party secured two-way communication, and the only method at all of two-way communication over great distances, such as that between Heliopolis and Icarus. These devices were tiny, winged silver balls of astounding lightness, which often contained audio tape of the message or written messages. They traveled more swiftly than bullets, and with the intelligence to target an individual based on the location of their registered automata. He supposed that was why the constable had intercepted this missive on his behalf. The castle was completely offline, for all intents and purposes. The distance between Heliopolis and Icarus could be covered by one such device in roughly six hours, so it must have been sent as immediately as the CIN-3 bulletins had come streaming. “The monarch offers to send his own team as soon as possible. Projected arrival in one week,” Wesley said. “If I may quote, sir?”
Kaizen gestured. “Freely.”
“To see that this insurrection is immediately and thoroughly stamped lest military force become requisite, end quote,” he finished.
Trimpot raised his hand. Although, to the untrained eye, such a gesture would seem self-conscious, Kaizen recognized this as coy and smug. Perhaps he and Trimpot just had too much in common to fool one another. “If I may make a suggestion?” Trimpot spoke.
Abner was apoplectic. No wonder Malthus had liked him so much. Both men were married to the caste system, and to them, the thought of this ragamuffin –at best, a charming jester, never to be a man of consequence –truly becoming a courtier was just heartrending. Kaizen had no doubt that his father’s offer had been intended as purely symbolic, if not an outright lie.
“Let’s smother the rebellion before Ferraday’s men–”
“Monarch Ferraday the Third,” Abner corrected him.
“–arrive,” Trimpot finished with a glower. “The plot is simple. Disinformation. We seed disinformation through Dyna Logan to ensure that the CC is lulled into a false sense of security. We continue to claim that there are zero leads. Even that Malthus–”
“The late duke,” Abner inserted.
“–is still alive,” Trimpot continued.
Kaizen had to admit that the notion of “stamping out” the insurrection prior to the arrival of Ferraday’s personal squad was preferable. Not
for any political reasons, but because he feared what the monarch might do. Ferraday would certainly show Legacy no special mercy just because she had that willful pout –not that Legacy probably deserved any mercy. Kaizen’s face darkened. She’d probably engineered that willful pout just to ensnare him. His father had claimed that, all along, he’d been her simple puppet, and that canceling the coronation would have played into the CC’s hand. But then, she had warned him of the assassination plot . . . and at great personal risk; another man, or his own father, might have killed her for it. If Malthus had listened, he’d still be alive now.
Trimpot had not yet stopped talking. “. . . rally, but it’s a trap. I have a small personal assistant which is connected to the majority of CC followers. I could use it to send the message. Then, when everyone congregates, they’re arrested immediately. It would save a huge amount of time.”
Kaizen glared thoughtfully at the young rebel leader turned shrewd informant.
“Abner?”
“Yes, my lord?”
Kaizen glanced coolly at Abner, whom he had never liked, and took a vindictive relish in his next words. “You have been relieved of your duties as the personal advisor to the duke until further notice. You may return to Lion’s Head as soon as possible.”
“But– my lord–”
For the first time, Kaizen wielded his father’s scepter. He used it to point to the door, and Abner acquiesced to its command as if compelled by the late Duke Malthus Taliko himself.
“Trimpot,” Kaizen commanded. “I may regret this. On the other hand, it’s probably wise to keep a close eye on you. I’ll honor my father’s promise and bring you into the court of Icarus until further notice.” The scribe was scribbling furiously now, and the only member of the cabinet not wearing a definitive scowl was Claude, the hawk-nosed steward whom Malthus had always privately suspected a sympathizer. “I believe that is all, then, for tonight. I still haven’t slept. I should do that. You’re all . . . dismissed,” Kaizen finished, waving his hand, and hoping that was how these things concluded, though from the confused expressions on the faces of his courtiers, it was not.
“I’m going to need protection, you know,” Trimpot added casually, as if in afterthought. “Being a turncoat is dangerous.”
“I have hardly any protection myself,” Kaizen snapped. “Did you not know that my entire guard staff has been blinded? That I subsist on auxiliary defence from local establishments? Did you not hear that the Center itself is without sufficient staff to send N.E.E.R. new supplies? How could I send even two to Lion’s Head?”
“Perhaps you need send none from the castle walls,” Trimpot suggested. “Perhaps you could afford me a small wing of the palace. Ah! Yes! Why not the dismissed advisor’s vacant quarters?”
You devil. “A home in Lion’s Head will be arranged until further notice,” he allowed. “However, you may stay in the castle keep, under the surveillance of the auxiliary sentries. You will always be free to go into Lion’s Head. If you feel unsafe, you may stay in the keep for this time.”
Trimpot silently deliberated. “I hate to be watched,” he murmured darkly, “but I’ll still take the castle keep.”
“I’ll accompany you there,” Kaizen replied. “We’ll send a man for your things.” In all honesty, he wanted to be able to control what the recent revolutionary had on his property. “I need to see the royal machinist, Master Addler, anyway. If any automata have been repaired yet, I’ll need to use it to contact Dyna and ensure that she maintain the claim that the condition of the late duke – I mean, my father – is stable.”
Master Addler’s wiry gray head was hunched like a surgeon over his worktable, an uncovered automaton sprawled before him. Most automatons had no porcelain coating left of which to speak. It had been crushed and lost in the massacre, or remained, horrifically stained. Seeing the bronze monster there, all the creations of gear and pulley, ball-joint and marble eye, slumped in a line against the wall, made the young duke slightly nauseated. Perhaps he had a touch of post-traumatic stress disorder, but then, he wouldn’t take that counseling.
“. . . be able to fix you up something,” Master Addler murmured to himself. “Though I still think you’re a very pretty–”
“Master Addler,” Kaizen announced his presence.
“Not you, too!” Master Addler sighed from where he dug in the brass guts, glaring over at Kaizen. His eyes were comically magnified behind the goggles he used for work with miniatures, perched at the tip of his bulbous nose. “Well, go lay down with the rest of them.” He continued fishing with his hook and his screwdriver, looking away. “Anyway, as I was saying–”
“It’s me, Master Addler,” Kaizen reminded him for the millionth time. “The duke,” he added.
“The duke,” a high-pitched, musical voice piped from the other side of Master Addler’s workbench, both smug and impressed.
“Sophie?” Kaizen darted to the opposite side of the bench and saw now that his illegitimate eighteen-year-old sister, Sophie, was bowed at the feet of the royal machinist, watching him work with her wide, wondering blue eyes. She used to be one of the most beautiful women in Icarus, with long, straight hair as pale as sunshine and a complexion as delicate as spun glass. But, born illegally under the Companion Laws, which prohibited any and all second children, she had lived an isolated and secret life within the castle walls. It had probably driven her a little mad.
Even now, she held a disabled automaton to her chest, idly spinning its cracked head.
Trimpot grimaced as his eyes swept this area. “I’m not staying here, am I?” he asked dryly.
Sophie’s eyes flashed to him and revealed the long stitch down one side of her face –once so flawlessly pretty. As if she had really been one of these porcelain non-humans. It had happened during the coronal massacre, though she seemed to hold no ill will toward the bots.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Neon Trimpot,” he answered.
“Of the CC? The one responsible for all of this?” Sophie shrilled, clenching her fingers. A bead of blood slipped down the cracked face of the automaton and she gasped, raising the hand to her face and peering at it thoughtfully. “Hm.” She suckled the finger and looked to Trimpot again. “You’re the one who killed my friends.”
“No, no,” Trimpot replied smoothly. “Not me. I was expressly opposed, and now, now I’m going to help the dear duke catch the bad people responsible and put them away for a long time.”
“We should kill them too,” Sophie seethed. She began twisting the automaton’s head again. “Kill them too and never turn their keys again.”
Kaizen sighed. This was bad, but he really didn’t want to think about it now.
“I think so, too, Sophie,” Trimpot said with a thick attempt at sincerity. He glanced inquisitively at Kaizen. “Dude, who the hell . . .?” he whispered from the corner of his mouth.
“No one,” Kaizen replied with a twinge. “Don’t worry about it.” He shifted his pitch to address the old machinist. “Master Addler, what’s your projection for a functional staff again?”
“Hm,” Master Addler answered. “This is Newton-2. He should be refurbished soon. Tell Kaizen it won’t be long.”
Kaizen shuddered. Newton-2 had been the one to punch him in the chest with knuckles of brass and broken glass. “That’s all right,” he answered. “No need to finish Newton-2 anytime soon. No general projection?”
Master Addler sighed dramatically. “Do you ask a painter how long the canvas will take to dry?” he demanded.
“Dude,” Trimpot said again. Kaizen’s jaw clenched. “I don’t want to stay in here with these loons.”
“In here or back at the domestic district, where I’m sure your friends are curious how their headquarters were ransacked,” Kaizen replied to the pink-haired turncoat with a clipped smile. “As always. Your call.”
Trimpot looked back and forth between the old man in the magnifier goggles and the blonde girl with the long stitch o
n her cheek. He grimaced. “Where do I sleep?”
The City of Icarus Hospital was overrun with patients in dire need of blood transfusion to offset the lacerations given them by shattered porcelain; others were half-in and half-out of consciousness, having suffered the blunt force trauma of the literally brass knuckles on the attacking automata.
One young man, bespectacled, with black dreadlocks, visage almost rendered unrecognizable by swelling and discoloration, had ridden the deluge of incoming wounded right to the back cot of critical care, where he still slept. In all the confusion of the throne-room-turned-battlefield, the boy had been brought forth with no identification card on his person, with nothing save his tattered tuxedo and the enormous top hat to which he’d been discovered clinging.
Chapter Two
At first, the difference was subtle. It started with her dreams that night. Coal 106 didn’t normally dream at night. When she did dream, she dreamed of plunging her shovel into piles of coal and sending up plumes of soot. It was just like her waking life, except she never grew tired. She supposed these were what they called “nightmares.” The only break from the monotony of the dig and the thrust and pitch and the thrust was the trudge back to the trolley with the other miners, and then, back to the dome. There, she’d receive her hosing down, her towel, and finally return to her unit. Unit 106. The narrow chamber, fragrant with mildew, and the threadbare cot. Her tiny window, and the distant moon.
Then she’d wake up, and the alarm would be shrilling. A small gray tunic, freshly cleaned but permanently stained, would be hanging on her door, and the sun would be rising. The trolley would be waiting. The workers would be mulling forward.
But the night before last, something had happened that had never happened before.
The regularly administered shots–wide, mean-looking double-barreled syringes of glass, one of sickly yellow and another of deep, mossy green –were halted before she’d received hers.
LEGACY BETRAYED Page 2
