Strange how things had worked out, Fox mused with a quirk of her lips. Here she was with the amulet around her neck, but now she worked for the other side. Not even for better pay, and this was the part that really had her confused. Was she developing an incurable case of morality? She hoped not.
Fox let out a deep breath, and resumed her critical task with a sharp sense of urgency. The files were accessible now, and she tried to download them, but it was asking for another authorization code. She cursed, and tried to use a keygen program, but doubted there was enough time for it to crack the server's code cipher.
“Aargh!” she slammed her fist on the wall of the server housing. She wished she had Turk's help on this, but would have to send a signal from the faraday cage to get it. She might as well wave around a big red flag if she did that...no, she'd have to fly solo on this.
Fox muttered a curse under hear breath as the hack did its work. She wished she could speed it up, but Turk had assured her that this was the best. She checked the charge on her newly acquired weapon, and then looked back at the console. Almost there! This was the only chance they had, and she was determined to succeed no matter what. She tried doing a workaround on the system while the keygen kept at it from the front.
Fox heard a burst of voices and footsteps enter the other room. Sounded like guards. She nervously glanced over her shoulder and gritted her teeth, gripping the console in a state of near panic. “Come on! Just one more minute!” she whispered desperately as the guards entered the server room. She was almost out of time.
They couldn't see her yet, since she was on the far side of a tower, but they kept getting closer, and it would only be a matter of seconds before they had her cornered. Unless...
The grates that served as a floor were removable for maintenance access, and a plan suddenly came to her. Dangerous, but the only option she could see right now. The guards were getting closer. Almost right on top of her. Maybe five more seconds, and they'd have her. Fox could hear heavy footsteps just around the corners of the server housing she was connected into, and made her decision. She just hoped she could do this in time...
“Lords of the Brigadier Empire,” the Regent began with a broad smile, “Thanks to those of you who were able to come on such short notice. I understand you have all been quite busy with the dragons at the gates...” he paused. His head was pounding. There was an incessant ringing in his ears, and it was driving him mad. He massaged his brow and continued.
“It has become increasingly evident that we face a deeply entrenched rebellion, and must take quick, decisive action.” There were murmurs of assent through the great hall in the House of Lords as Varion looked up at the vaulted ornate glass ceiling. He groaned in discomfort, but continued through the buzz in his head.
“We are clearly being poisoned from within, and the time has come to clean house.” He held his hand up to his throbbing temples, and looked at the exits, all of which were manned by his own contingent of more than a hundred Knightshades. Each was dressed in the black and silver armor of the Brigadier Knights, their faces hidden behind dark visored helms. A truly effective fighting force, untroubled by trivial matters of conscience. Obedient dogs of war.
Something felt slightly off, but he couldn't put his finger on it. Varion heard the words continuing to eschew forth from his lips. They tingled, felt like they wanted to close but couldn't, and he could feel his pulse racing as the sweat from his hands saturated the wood of the podium.
“I understand you might not be willing to admit your complicity in recent events,” Varion spat, “but after much consideration, I have passed my judgment as Regent. As of this moment, we are under the rule of Martial Law.”
The air thickened with objections, but Varion continued with more force and volume. “You have all been judged by this office as a threat to the continued safety of the Brigadier Empire, and I hereby pronounce your sentence as death! To be carried out immediately!”
Wait, had he actually just said that? What was going on? His mind had become a soupy mush of hazy memories and fragmented ideas. It felt like he was being mentally torn apart, bombarded with strange images and sounds, and a cry of anguish escaped his mouth as the agony hit him full force.
The pain of his headache doubled him over, and Varion gripped the sides of his podium to prevent himself from falling to his knees. The Lords leapt to their feet and screamed litanies of curses and condemnations at him. Part of him wanted to agree with them, but he collected himself and stared them down as his eye twitched uncontrollably. He moved his hand to his face to massage it out.
“You've gone insane!” Lord Calais exclaimed.
“The High King'll have your head!” Lord Yards proclaimed as he shook his fist.
More threats rose up like a dark tide in the great hall, but Varion was unmoved by the flying accusations and signaled over his earbud to his Knightshades. “Do it,” he sneered.
In unison, they leveled their lances at the panicked Lords, and a loud crackle of energy filled the air as they charged up to fire into the assembled body of nobles.
Some members of the House drew weapons from within their vestments and fired at the armored Knightshades, refusing to go down without a fight, even if the battle was completely one-sided. These were politicians, after all, not warriors.
Varion ducked as Lord Yards fired a shot at the podium, and watched as his body was blasted by a Knightshade's lance. He realized he was crouching, and stood again to his full height.
Varion felt the tension ease from his mind as his Knightshades returned fire into the assembly of Lords. The dignitaries were cut down mercilessly as stalks of grain before the blades of the harvesters. None escaped the bloody massacre, and soon the once lively room was gripped in a dusty silence.
With his task completed, the Regent's conscience no longer troubled him. He breathed an easy sigh of relief. What could have possibly had him so concerned? It had all been perfectly simple. It was something that had to be done...wasn't it? As he thought about it though, he couldn't say exactly why he felt that way. Another brief twinge in his temple.
Then Varion saw something on his earbud's visual display that could ruin everything. “No!” he hissed, and rushed from the full chamber of smoldering corpses toward the great lawn. He had to escape and regroup!
28
True or False
“Rok! Mtumba!” Stella shouted as she grasped at the empty air behind her. She cried as she was pulled away from her friends by the rolling waves of people around them. The hole through the building had helped them gain some ground, but they still had a ways to go until they arrived at the House of Lords.
Stella tried to squeeze her way back through the heavy press of men and women. She wanted desperately to reach out and hold onto her friends' outstretched hands, but couldn't. She was carried away by the surging crowd, knocked about by the crazed throng as it converged toward the great lawn.
Some of the mob descended on the scattered peacekeepers, and they responded with a desperate, lethal intensity. People were being swallowed by the chaos, but Stella chanted to herself, “Almost there, almost there.” It helped.
“Death to the Regent!” a man shouted. “Long live the true High King!” People rallied to the cheer as they fought the oppressive forces against them.
It had become a full-pitched battle between the government and the people everywhere in the Citadel, and the people seemed to be winning, but Stella couldn't be completely sure. All she could say for certain was that everything was loud and violent, and that she had serious concerns about her ability to find the High King in the middle of all this madness. She saw a dragon scream across the sky, followed by several small shining points that must be Brigadier Knights. Stella's heart was racing. “Mtumba, where are you?” she yelled. “Rok! Eli! Kita! Where are you?”
Someone jostled her from the side, then the other, and suddenly she was knocked in the shoulder and sent spinning toward the ground...but just before she was trampl
ed on the flexiphalt, a strong mechanical arm caught her and lifted her up.
“They're fine for now,” a gruff voice said, and Stella recognized the rugged face of Quinn Deston. He crinkled a smile as he cleared them a path through the mob. “They said I should watch over you right now,” he explained, “so let's make sure you get to the High King in one piece.”
“Thanks,” Stella smiled, and he nodded.
Suddenly she heard excited shouts that the High King had been seen in the royal city. Reports were streaming in from all over, but no one could say exactly where he was, since he moved so fast. The people simply knew that he had returned.
“Long live the High King!” they shouted, and Stella could feel the mood of the crowd shifting away from one of desperation. Their hope had been rekindled, and even in the face of all the violence she'd seen, Stella felt herself carried along by the spirit of the people.
Quinn yelled over the roar of the crowd, “Rumor has it that John Phoenix was attacked in the royal hangar by several platoons of the Regent's turncoat shock troops, but they barely broke his stride.” Stella felt a shiver run down her spine as it dawned on her how powerful the High King must actually be.
To think that she simply knew him as old John, the gentle farmer who played his guitar at night under the stars for three lost children...Stella felt tears of gratitude well up for the time he had shared with them. Quinn moved them into the Grand Circle itself, which was surrounded by beautiful, massive buildings that instantly ignited a sense of antiquity, power and grace.
“The House of Lords,” Quinn shouted as he pointed at a huge structure in the center of the great lawn.
“Wow,” she whispered.
Because there stood the most majestic building she'd ever seen, its elegant spires reaching up toward the heavens like the arms of twelve golden angels, crowned by a thirteenth, and its wide base set solidly on a circular marble walkway in the center of the great lawn. The base was adorned with a garden of lilac bushes and lavender. The last remaining piece of calm in the royal city.
Behind the tall, gleaming chrystum gateway, Stella could see the Regent's private silver yacht sitting untouched upon the green grass, a shining beacon of opulent corruption. The mass of people crowded closer to the gates, hungry to see what would happen now that the rightful ruler had returned.
Stella even saw some of the peacekeepers were helping citizens, and the spirit of the rebellion had rapidly shifted toward one of heartfelt revolution. Everyone was rallying together against the tyrant who had been lying to them for the last five years. Quinn helped Stella to the massive gates, making sure she had a good grip on the bars.
Then the chrystum bars trembled in Stella's hands, and on the far side of the lawn stood old John. “Yes!” Stella cheered in gratitude. She smiled at Quinn, and felt herself choking back tears of joy. “He's here! I knew it!”
Quinn smiled and nodded as the crowd exulted in the moment. Then everything fell to a silent hush, and all Stella could hear was the rustle of the grass.
John Phoenix, ancient High King of the free people of the Brigadier Empire, had come. His gold and blue armor gleamed in the light of the sun as he strode purposefully toward the entrance to the House of Lords. Stella could see the large double-doorway set into an ornately carved alcove.
“Varion!” John shouted from across the grass.
The large double-doors to the House of Lords swung open, and an austere, pale, middle-aged man stepped forth from the darkness. The crowd whispered, but quickly slid back into silence to hear what was being said. Stella felt something leaping within her as the strange drama unfolded. A gust of wind pushed her hair in front of her eyes, and she quickly tucked it behind her ear. She needed to see this. Every bit of it.
Regent Varion took a step as if to greet the High King, but stopped at the threshold of the large double-doors, half shrouded in shadow. “Welcome back, John,” he called out. “You're early...I hope you like what you see...I did it all for you.”
“Wrong, Varion! What you have done to these people is abomination!” The High King shouted as he planted the base of his golden lance in the ground. “I offer you one chance only to submit peaceably, and you may have a trial by your peers instead of a military tribunal.”
“Unfortunately, John,” Varion sneered wolfishly, “My peers seem to have had a run-in with your Knights.”
“Mine? Unlikely,” John Phoenix frowned, and lifted his lance as he stepped forward.
“Sorry, old friend,” Regent Varion snarled, “but the Empire is changing, and it's time for a new order...” The Regent smiled, and tapped his index finger to his ear with a whispered command. A stream of armored Knightshades flew out from the dark doorway, and made a course to encircle the High King.
“No!” Stella shouted, but her voice was lost in the eruption of surprise from the crowd, and the horrible sound of lances crackling as they were leveled at the High King.
“Knightshades?” Old John pointed at Varion. “You would malign the honor of these good men by reducing them to this?”
“There are more than I can count!” Stella cried to Quinn.
“I wish I had my lance,” Quinn growled, and grabbed the gate. “Blast it!”
“Varion!” John Phoenix shouted, “Your madness ends here and now!” The High King raised his golden lance in an arc that split the air with blinding light. “Knights, if that's what you still are, I command you as your rightful King to stand down and assist me with the real battle above us! The dragons are beating at the shields, and the Rhikon is in flames!”
“Attack him!” Varion screamed as he re-sent the command.
With a lurching motion, the Knightshades converged upon the High King, lances raised, charging at him through the air. John Phoenix gritted his teeth and shook his head, then met the onrushing horde in a ground-shaking clash of armor and lance.
Old John moved like lightning in the storm. That was the only way Stella could describe it. The battle was both beautiful and terrifying to behold, the great lawn lighted by the scorching fire of dragon lances.
Some people who watched from behind the gates were hit by the occasional errant burst from a charged lance, and they were instantly vaporized. One Knightshade was hurled by the High King so hard that it bent the gateway before it fell to the ground in a motionless heap, its lance clattering against the chrystum before powering off and coming to a rest at Quinn's feet.
“Always together!” Quinn shouted, and reached through the gate to grab the fallen lance. He charged it back on, and shouted over his shoulder, “Stay away from the sparks, Stella!” Before the words were out of his mouth, he'd shot a Knightshade out of the sky, and it hit the turf with a spray of dirt, grass and fire.
“Knights!” Quinn yelled over his earbud as he scored a hit on another Knightshade. “This is Knight-Commander Quinn Orion Deston of the Silver Fist calling you on emergency channel Bravo! Drop whatever you're doing right now, and get yourself to the great lawn! Our High King has returned, and he's under attack by the Regent's Knightshades!”
Two more Knightshades turned in midair and made a course for Quinn, their lances aimed at him. Quinn blasted them before they could unleash their weapons at him, and both Knightshades crashed, smoldering into the lawn.
Stella could feel the heat from Quinn's lance as electricity arced along its chrystum surface. She felt the hair rise on her arms, and could smell the metallic scent of scorched air. How Quinn could hold and use the large powerful weapon was beyond her, but he clearly knew what he was doing. He took another Knightshade down, then another, counting them off as he went, “five...six...”
“Wow,” Stella whispered.
The hungry crowd pressed in as close as it could, because this was history in the making. They were rewarded as their High King cut a swath through the horde of Knightshades with a preternatural speed and strength all his own. One by one and five by five as they came at him, the ancient hero rended asunder their unrelenting forces with s
wift sentence and righteous might. He seemed unstoppable, and Stella prayed that was true. Even so, she was glad that Quinn was helping from the sidelines.
The wall of corrupted warriors flooded old John, and eventually covered him with a struggling, armored dog-pile. Nearly half the Knightshades had already fallen to their final rest upon the rich grass, but those remaining were fighting like a desperate pack of wolves.
“Where are the other Knights?” Stella shouted, but Quinn didn't answer. He just kept firing, and some people nearby were cheering him on. He was oblivious to their praise, though, focused completely on dispatching the Knightshades. Still, Stella could see a tear welling up in his eye. Why was he crying? He was a tough old man, and a Knight besides.
“Always together,” his lips formed the words as he shot down one more.
Stella looked at the writhing dog-pile, the other bodies strewn across the lawn, and couldn't believe what she was seeing. How could one man take on so many? She'd known, somehow, that it was possible, that the High King had done great heroic deeds in the past, had slain dragons single-handedly, but she hadn't truly believed the stories, not deep in her bones. Not until now.
From deep within the dark mass of Knightshades on the center of the lawn came a loud roar like unto a lion, followed by an earsplitting blast, and light spilled out from the spaces between the struggling bodies. With a concussive boom, the Knightshades were hurled away from the High King.
There was a faint hum, and then Stella gasped in surprise as the Knightshades were all simultaneously blasted from the sky in a stunningly synchronized attack by the real Brigadier Knights. As they joined the battle from above, there was a powerful sense of life and connectedness that emanated from the aerial host. Their clear unity of action was a breathtaking display of martial mastery that the Knightshades had not possessed.
Phoenix Rising (Dragon Legacy) Page 19
