by Reiter
“Tolip,” Llaz said softly. “What’s going on?”
“You made it very clear you wanted that ship,” Silnee explained as she turned back to her console. “I just applied some of Maxworth’s math and decided not put the pick-up ship in a position where its power reserves might not be enough to get it to the rendezvous point. The Cruel Intentions can make its run and break mo’sphere in a heartbeat… if it needs to cut and run.”
“Is that how things add up?” Pristacia asked as she tapped lightly on Llaz’s arm. She knew the Second Mate was among the last to lose his composure, and Llaz had already told Pristacia what he had been contemplating. It was, at the very least, a gutsy move and there was a good chance that even JoJo was going to be impressed… if they managed to pull it off. The woman called Princess wanted to make sure that Llaz remained properly distracted from his mounting concerns to keep from reacting emotionally.
“We haven’t found one entity that can track us with our stealth fields,” Silnee stated. “Why not use them to their maximum potential?”
“Sounds like good arithmetic to me,” Pristacia said as she turned to look at Llaz who simply nodded as he swallowed hard.
“Take care of yours, Tolip,” Llaz said softly.
“Aye-aye, Boss!”
Taking a sleeve-pulling cue from Pristacia, Llaz turned to leave the Bridge once more. He kept from speaking until the doors closed behind him and Pristacia. He opened a channel on his brace-com as he closed his eyes. “Tank?”
“Yeah, Boss.”
“Short and sweet, man. Tell me about Maxworth.”
The young man cleared his throat and took a breath. “Life’s a gourmet meal,” he started, “with us, the crew, our crazy Shootist-Edger-Pirate Captain, and a blue-skinned genius battle lord alien are the entree… you could say that Maxworth was the perfect appetizer!”
“Good enough, Tank,” Llaz replied. “Thanks. Llaz out.”
“You mean, Boss out!” Mel corrected.
“Get back to work,” Llaz ordered with a smile on his face. He closed the channel and then looked at Pristacia. “As soon as the lander has cleared the estate grounds, open a secure channel with the Captain and advise her that we have stolen the Prism Passion.”
“Don’t you think that’s premature?”
Llaz looked away, thinking about the question. When his eyes came back to Pristacia’s, he shook his head ‘no’. “Nope. Not at all.”
“I’ll ready the secured channel,” Pristacia said, giggling. The crew was not a perfect body, but it was a functioning one, and things were steadily getting better. Z had relieved the crew of one potential problem, and there was no telling what he was going to do with Ephaliun and the others. Pristacia, however, was becoming anxious to see their return. That anxiety reminded the young woman of the development the First Mate would be expecting to see in her.
Reaching the lift pole, Pristacia decided to see to what Llaz had asked of her and then make her way to the Simulator Room. Techniques that had been very successful for Llaz awaited her, and she knew it would be better than simply waiting for an update.
** b *** t *** o *** r **
“What?” Bantar asked, quickly lifting his head up from his work. “Who goes there?”
“My, aren’t you the diligent one,” Tuitonn asked as he came into the light just in front of the door of the room that had been dedicated to the research of the collected majikul artifacts. “The First Mate takes two-thirds of your team without so much as a decent word of explanation as to why he would leave you out, and you just keep working.”
“Z told me he was leaving with the ship,” Bantar argued as he blindly reached for the sheet the three used to cover the desks when they were not in the room.
“You seek to hide something from me, child?” Tuitonn asked, taking on a soft glow of white light.
“Computer, sound alarm!” Bantar said as he threw the sheet over the floating sphere. He hopped down from his stool and bolted desperately for the door. As they opened, Bantar’s feet slid as he tried to reverse his course too quickly. A tall slender man walked into the room, carrying a bloody knife. He was dressed in a high-end business suit, collarless and reaching up to the chin. His blonde hair was slicked back, save for a few strands that fell over his face, showing signs that the man had been engaged in some measure of physical activity.
“Hello son,” the man said as he walked into the room. Bantar lost his footing and fell to the floor.
“Dad?!” Bantar stammered.
“I cured Mommy and your big brother,” the man said as she approached. “… now I’m going to cure you, and then your baby sister!”
“But you’re dead,” Bantar whispered as he crawled on his back, trying to get away from the man.
“You’re sick, son,” the man said as he reached for Bantar’s face, falling just short of his aims. “We’re all sick.”
“You’re dead! I know because I killed you!” Bantar yelled, getting up to his feet and running to the wall.
“You tried your best, son. You were always so strong; the strongest of us… but even you’re not strong enough to fight this off. There’s only one cure, son!”
“No,” Bantar panted, pressing his back into the wall. “You can’t be here!”
“That is your perspective,” Dungias said appearing as light shined down on him in the corner of the chamber. His arms were folded, looking completely oblivious to the situation. “… but just because you feel a certain way, does that really define the reality of the moment? Are you going to wait to feel the sting of that blade to ascertain whether or not your life is in danger?”
“Don’t be afraid, Bantar,” the man said softly. “It only hurts for a few moments, but it quickly passes.”
“No!” Bantar shouted. “I won’t let you get to Jossi,” the young man declared as his hands clenched into tight fists. He was too engaged to take note of the soft breeze that flowed through the room. The doors had not opened, and the ventilation systems were still inactive at the moment. “I stopped you before, I’ll stop you again!”
The slender man chuckled as he looked at Bantar. He shook his head and gestured toward the young man. “You don’t have a gun this time, son.”
“I’m not the child you tried to kill last time either!” Bantar hissed as his eyes sparked with a bronze light. Raw MannA coursed through his body as he threw his hands forward. The most common combative expression using raw MannA was a bolt, thrown by the InvokeR. It was fluid streams of electrical fire that arched toward the slender man, wrapping around his body, tearing through clothing and flesh as it lifted the man’s body from the floor. He screamed as the energy burned throughout his body.
“It’s okay, Dad,” Bantar whispered as his rage subsided. “It only hurts for a few moments.” His body shuddered as a pulse of energy was sent through the streams that caused the slender man to explode. “… but it quickly passes.” Bantar dropped to his knees, but it was not from being spent. The light of his MannA slowly died, leaving the marks of a charred floor and wall.
“Perhaps I should revisit my paradigm regarding how to approach members of this crew,” Tuitonn thought as the ceiling fans activated to clear the smoke. “But alas, it is too late to turn back, and this latest information is most interesting!
“Bantar, are you all right?” Tuitonn asked, choosing to float closer to the young man. “It’s just me, young man. It’s Tuitonn.”
“Tuitonn?” Bantar asked, looking around the room, seeing what he had done. There was evidence of everything he had done, but no sign of the body that had been his target. Bantar closed his eyes and shook his head. “It was an illusion, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was.”
“Of all the things you could have put in my head, why did you have to bring that up?” Bantar asked as he got up to his feet. “What possible point of reason or logic explains that decision?!”
“I would rather not waste the time in making the effort,” Tuitonn quickly admitt
ed. “It would only add insult to injury. However, in light of your reaction and performance, my reasons for testing you have been adequately justified. You allowed Teela to leave here thinking that she was the most gifted caster of the three of you. For her sake, I hope that serves to her advantage.”
“She is the strongest caster!”
“Is she now?” Tuitonn argued. “Look at the floor and walls and tell me that once more!”
Bantar glared at Tuitonn before he allowed his blue-eyed gaze to survey the research lab. One of the reasons why the room had been chosen was the resistance the tiles had to energy emissions. The tolerance of the building materials had been overwhelmed. Bantar walked over to the floor tile he had marked and squatted down, touching his fingers to the large black spot. It was still warm to the touch and he could feel where the MannA had burned into the tile.
“I did this?” he thought.
“Yes, you did,” Tuitonn replied and Bantar quickly powered up his goggles, though they were in the format of a necklace at the moment. “Well, that was rude!”
“You’ve got one shot at this, Tuitonn!” Bantar stood up, shouting and shaking. “You just sent me back to a time in my life where… where…”
“I think it will suffice to say that it was inhuman,” Tuitonn suggested. “If it means anything to you, Bantar, from what I am able to see from your memories, the dementia your father suffered from… it was induced.”
“WHAT?!”
“Allow me to illustrate,” Tuitonn said, creating another image of Bantar’s father, but this time as the man had truly appeared to the five year-old child. The image was focused on the face, and it was clear that Sholdren Forsetta was indeed weeping as he marched down his youngest son. “Tears,” Tuitonn pointed out. “It is quite seldom that dementia subjects demonstrating homicidal tendencies exhibit regret for what they are doing.”
“Seldom leaves room for–”
“Your eyes glanced over a murder report for your mother and brother,” Tuitonn interrupted. “You may not be able to see the report, but your subconscious has a very good picture of it. Two-thirds of the wounds on both of their bodies were shallow, Bantar; hesitation wounds. They were not killed at the same time, and they were the second and ninth victims of a spree your father carried out that horrible evening. The second… and the ninth!”
“Yeah, you’d think if he had gone total psycho… he would have warmed up to the idea by victim number nine.”
“More than that, you also managed to see one other report,” Tuitonn reported.
“Dr. Omdáo,” Bantar recalled.
“Only two wounds on that man’s body… one stab to the chest, reaching the heart, and one slash to the throat, striking bone!”
“That kind of inconsistency doesn’t make sense,” Bantar reasoned.
“Not with the normal development of the condition,” Tuitonn added. “And as cold as it may be to say, that is not why I am here.
“You have incredible potential in you, Bantar,” Tuitonn projected to Bantar’s mind, showing that he had reached a work-around of Z’s mental defenses. “… just not as the sort of InvokeR you envisioned.”
Bantar deactivated the mental shields. There was no sense in wasting perfectly good battery reserves. “And what sort did you have in mind, you evil marble from Hell?!”
“Good,” Tuitonn projected as a beam of golden light shot from the orb to Bantar’s forehead. “… so long as we have no delusions about who and what we are... we can get started!” Tuitonn gathered the information he had collected during his time on this ship and more importantly, during his time with the MannA Keys. He readied himself and Bantar for a considerable transfer of information.
“And just what are you, Tuitonn?” Bantar managed to ask, impressing the orb even more.
“Child, I have seen whole systems of planets come and go, and I have been made to serve some of the most powerful minds and wills the Stars have ever seen. But in all of that time, I have never wanted to serve any of my masters so much as I was compelled to be of use to them, lest they find another way to make the most of my being. There are two exceptions to this. The first was my creator. He was taken from me while this body of mine was still cooling.” The transfer began and Bantar’s eyes rolled back into his head. His eyelids closed as he clenched his hands together over his chest. “And now I find myself wanting to serve another. She will not be taken from me if I have any say in the matter!” Bantar blew out a deep breath and his body relaxed as the transfer continued.
“You want me to take his place?” Bantar asked, his mind picturing images of the Black Gate Professor who had managed to orchestrate the capture of Dungias. “A damn DreamCasteR?!”
“No, I want you to exceed him!” Tuitonn replied. “And their sort is hardly cursed, merely misunderstood and feared. I will task you to guard our mutual mistress from his sort… you will be her Dream Guardian and I will be the living nightmare to all her mean her harm!”
I like to use ‘I Can’t Believe it’s Not Butter’ on my toast in the morning, because sometimes when I eat breakfast, I like to be incredulous. How was breakfast? Unbelievable!
Demetri Martin
(Rims Time: XII-4203.15)
Lightly touching the fine linen napkin to her lips, Jocasta put it back in her lap before taking hold of the wine goblet, the only one on the table, to drink the last of her wine. She then looked at one of the servants and held up her empty glass. That servant looked to Oedelorana who quickly nodded them to refill the goblet.
Initially unbeknownst to Jocasta, but to her ever-increasing delight, Princess Maradothia had brought a few friends along to attend the late-morning breakfast, making it more of a social affair. Each one of Maradothia’s three friends had an entourage of two guards, and it was a point of pride for Jocasta that she had kept from laughing at the sight of the small army that had been gathered up on one glass-walled sundeck.
Prunth Gusellon was seated at Jocasta’s left at the large, rectangular, crystal table, and he seemed to be the youngest of the invitees. He was a very observant young Vohlterran – had barely spoken three sentences since the introductions – but he did not mind being seated next to the pirate captain. He had been the only one aside of Jocasta who had actually taken the time to enjoy the meal. Both of his guards seemed preoccupied with keeping their eyes on Jocasta, especially when she leaned over to their charge to whisper something in the young man’s ear. Rarely did she say anything of import, Jocasta simply loved irritating the two guards and had informed the young man of the fact.
Kesia Zankath sat opposite of Prunth, and the Vohlbred female was too busy trying to measure up to Maradothia to be of any interest to Jocasta or what passed for conversation at the table. Her treated golden blonde hair was as real as her teal contact lenses and layered porcelain skin. It seemed that no matter what topic was brought up, Kesia would inform everyone at the table she had experienced the best of it.
Next to Kesia and opposite Jocasta was a young man who was something of a mystery. Like Jocasta, he was not Vohlterran, but he was also not Human either. Dyanko Ziez was Purdian, and his dark green skin was only emphasized by his choice to wear all white clothing. But it was not his blood that made him curious to Jocasta. They young man displayed a range of emotions. He went from looking nearly disgusted with his current surroundings to slightly anxious, as if he were waiting for something to happen.
“It’s not helping matters that I get an itch whenever I look at him,” Jocasta thought as another group of fighters flew overhead. “… and it sounds as if the dogfight is over. Sometimes coincidence is a very funny thing!”
“… and in the last circuit, Emperor’s Glory ran ahead of every other entry,” Kesia said before chuckling. “Lord Bellgrun’s son and I had a wager for five hundred thousand credits, but he was foolish enough to bet against your father, my Princess. The Emperor certainly has a way with horses.”
“Not at all, I’m afraid,” Maradothia advised. “Glory and two
other of my father’s champions were bred by Lord Yalzon. In fact, Yalzon horses have been the only ones to consistently beat my father’s. If anyone has a way with the equine, it’s that man.”
“You mean that he doesn’t sell his best to the Emperor?!” Oedelorana inquired, shocked at the notion of such a thing.
“It is a long standing relationship between families,” Maradothia explained. “In the forming days of the Empire, many of the KnighTs who guarded my family and defined the boundary of the Rims were of Yalzon blood! It seems they fell back to breeding mounts, but word through the Courts is that their skill with the sword is still remarkable.”
“Lord Durren Yalzon,” Kesia said with a coy smile on her face. “There’s all sorts of word through the Courts about the family skills.”
“Kesia!” Maradothia called to her friend, glaring at the woman seated to her immediate left. “Some things need not be repeated.”
“Then whatever would be the reason to have gossip?!” Kesia returned and Jocasta snorted a laugh.
“Damn fine spread, your ladyship,” Jocasta said as she smacked her lips for the first time since she had been seated at the table. “It’s been a port or two since I’ve had some high-handed human food!”
“I am glad you enjoyed your meal, Captain,” Oedelorana said with a smile and a nod for the woman seated to her immediate left. She picked up her glass and raised it, placing her eyes on the opposite end of the table. “To Her Majesty, the Princess, I hope this gathering and this meal was also to her liking.”
“I cannot say which is more sweeping, Lady Sylgarr,” Maradothia smiled, lifting her own glass. “… for I find the food and the company to be simply incomparable.”
“Speaking of,” Jocasta said, tossing down her napkin. “Perhaps we should get more acquainted. Princess, can you tell her ladyship and me about your friends? Let’s start with your Purdian cohort here.”
“You wish to begin with me,” Dyanko said just before wiping his mouth.
