“Who are these people who accompany you?” the Emperor asked, noticing the rest of the group for the first time.
Nakamura stepped into clearer view.
General Attila rose to his feet almost involuntarily. “You!” cried the man known as “the Bold”—hardly bold at all at this moment.
The Emperor gasped. “Nakamura? Hideo? But—I was told you were dead!”
The general smiled back at his ruler. “Perhaps, sire,” he said. “Politically, if not physically.” Flames danced across his fingertips. “But I’m feeling much better now.”
13
Tamerlane followed the Inquisitor and the general out of the tunnel and through one last doorway. The next thing he knew, they were emerging into the grand hall itself, the main sanctuary of the Church of the Relique. A broad arc of seated dignitaries blocked off much of his view but, far ahead near the center of the chamber, he could see the Emperor and a host of other Church and political and military figures seated behind a table on a raised dais.
Tamerlane turned to Arani and reminded her of her first part of their plan. She nodded and accessed the local Aether network, connecting directly to every Special Forces sniper in the building. Most of them, she knew, would be safely hidden in balconies like the one she’d originally been assigned to. A few others would be scattered out, here and there, in whatever spots seemed particularly advantageous.
“Major Arani to cover squad,” she called. “I am entering the sanctuary alongside General Nakamura, Colonel Tamerlane, the Grand Inquisitor and two of his assistants. Do not fire. Repeat—do not fire.”
At first no one argued. Then one of the men from a different unit called back, “Major—I don’t see any of their names on the approved list. Are you certain—”
“Think about who they are, soldier,” Arani sent back angrily. “Do you want to be the man who goes down in history for assassinating our top general or the Grand Inquisitor? Do you suppose the Inquisition would take it kindly if any one of us pulled the trigger on their leader?”
After that, no one bothered to argue. The Ecclesiarchy troops, overhearing, reacted about the same way—they had started in toward the interlopers but now they moved back, nervous and unsure of what to do or how to react.
The party moved out into the crowd along one radial aisle, drawing closer and closer to the dais and the Emperor. For a few moments no one took notice of them. Then Stanishur approached near enough to see who the new Ecclesiarch was, and to hear his words. His head nearly exploded in fury. Hurrying forward, he shouted up at Barmakid and that man in turn shouted at him.
Arani looked at the others, forlorn. “There went the element of surprise,” she lamented.
“It wasn’t going to last long, anyway,” Tamerlane replied.
“Barmakid!” Nakamura cursed. “A heretic! A cultist! As head of our Church! It defies logic—defies reason!”
“Something very, very strange is most definitely going on,” Tamerlane said by way of agreement. “There’s no other way to go from accused cultist, stripped of your titles and position, to leader of the Holy Church, in only a few weeks.”
The Emperor was speaking to Nakamura now, and in response the general followed the Inquisitor up onto the dais. For his part, Barmakid looked ready to chew metal and spit nails.
“Majesty,” the Ecclesiarch said with a bow, “I must object to these two—trespassers—being allowed onto this panel.”
“Trespassers?” The Emperor scoffed. “These men are two of my oldest and most trusted advisors.”
Barmakid reddened but didn’t reply.
Instead of taking a seat, Stanishur stood before the table and bowed again to the Emperor. “Majesty,” he began, “I can only imagine that you are not fully aware of the changes this...man...and his cronies in the Church have proposed.”
“You know nothing,” Barmakid shouted. “You cannot comprehend what we are accomplishing here today.”
“Colonel Barmakid,” Stanishur snapped, evoking the man’s ire by using his old military title rather than his new Church one, “I was not aware you were such a religious and legal scholar.” He nodded toward the other members of the Inquisition—all much younger—seated along the far side of the table. “Perhaps my colleagues in the Holy Inquisition have read some things I have not had the opportunity to see yet.”
“Well, I—”
“But,” he went on, “I did know this about you. I did know you were captured recently by the military on Trezibond, leading a cult that worshipped Vorthan.”
The Emperor looked from Stanishur to Barmakid, his face reflecting surprise and confusion.
Barmakid was already on his feet; now he nearly came over the table at the Inquisitor. “Lies!” he cried. “How dare you?”
“We have a witness present,” Stanishur stated, his dark eyes flashing from the Ecclesiarch to the Emperor.
Barmakid recoiled slightly, then seemed to recover. “If you mean the general here, I know for a fact that he witnessed no such thing. He was merely told about it—told lies about it, by my enemies. Or perhaps one of his over-zealous underlings saw someone who resembled me, or who wore a similar uniform, and reported this to the general erroneously.”
Stanishur scoffed at this. Then he motioned toward the audience. “Major—if you would come forward?”
Major Niobe Arani emerged from the crowd and tentatively approached the dais.
Barmakid stared down at her. There was curiosity in his eyes at first, then confusion, then something like fear. He opened his mouth, seemed to think better of it, and closed it again. He gestured.
Tamerlane, standing a few feet behind Arani, noticed the slight hand movement Barmakid made. He leapt forward, tackling her and driving her down. A heartbeat later, a blast of energy seared down from one of the balconies and passed through the space Arani had been filling.
Reacting to this, the Inquisitor leapt to his feet and gestured with both hands. A cloud began to form rapidly a few meters over their heads, dark and almost entirely opaque, across most of the center of the hall. Another blast came sizzling down but this one missed by a wider margin.
“What is this?” the Emperor demanded, on his feet and furious. “By all the gods! Stop shooting!”
“Hold your fire,” Nakamura shouted to the Special Forces troopers hidden in various spots around the walls of the old facility, while sending the same message over the Aether. “That’s enough!”
Another shot blasted down, and another. Whoever was shooting now, they clearly felt no compunction to obey orders—or, at least, not Nakamura’s.
Tamerlane, busy trying to get Arani to safety, looked up as a clanking sound echoed from the direction of the Emperor. There, emerging from behind the dais, came seven huge figures, gleaming in crystal armor of various colors. Their boots shook the ground as they moved, and they quickly took up protective positions around the Emperor, each gazing upward, searching for the source of the shots, attempting to see past or through Stanishur’s conjured cloud.
“Get these people out of here—in an orderly fashion,” Tamerlane commanded to the Ecclesiarchy soldiers all around. The white-clad warrior-priests looked from him to each other, uncertain whether or not to obey him. Meanwhile, the crowd was disintegrating on its own, most of the dignitaries in terror at the shooting. They were surging toward the exits, threatening to trample one another. “Now!” Tamerlane shouted. “There’s no time for you to consult the gods about it first! Get them out!”
Another shot blasted down, this one striking the first row of seats—now empty—and vaporizing several chairs.
Tamerlane quickly ran through the Aether links of each of the snipers in his virtual vision and couldn’t find any that hadn’t acknowledged the order and backed off. He shook his head when the general looked to him for that information.
“It’s not anyone under our control, Majesty,” Nakamura in turn reported to the Emperor. “It’s a renegade—an assassin—off the net. Working with Barmakid,
I’d imagine.”
The Emperor looked at Barmakid. “Ecclesiarch,” he called, “what is happening here? Is what these people say about you true?”
Barmakid staggered back a step, astonishment etched on his face. “Majesty,” he stammered, “I have only done what you wished—what you ordered!”
The Emperor stared back at him for a long moment, silent. The figure in black that had whispered to him before reemerged from behind the throne and again spoke in entirely inaudible tones to him. A short distance away, still protecting Arani, Tamerlane looked on and frowned; he could see someone conversing with the Emperor but his vision was somehow blurry at that spot; he couldn’t quite make out who it was.
The Emperor nodded then and straightened. “Lies about your Emperor represent the most vile form of blasphemy!” he shouted, looking directly at Barmakid. “I have been deceived! Guards!”
Two of the elite, crystal-clad Emperor’s Guards—Tamerlane recognized them instantly as Rashid in garnet and Abdul in sapphire—surged forward, reaching out to attempt to seize Barmakid. The Ecclesiarch moved quickly, though, leaping down from the dais and avoiding the grasping armored hands.
“Majesty—wait,” he called to the Emperor as the sapphire Guard jumped from the dais after him with a remarkable agility and grace. “It’s not too late—this situation can still be salvaged!”
Osman, the Emperor’s Guardsman in emerald, suddenly rocketed off the ground and into the air, the antigrav flight pack that was incorporated into his armor sprouting a pair of broad repulsor wings that carried him up through Stanishur’s smoke cover and beyond it. He had a lock on the source of the fire and he shot like a missile towards it, soaring in seconds up above one of the lower balconies and then dropping heavily onto its ledge. The soldier in black who had until a moment earlier held that position scrambled backward, his sniper rifle clattering to the floor. Osman leaned forward, grasped the man by the collar, and flung him over his shoulder, over the balcony rail, and out over the main hall. He tumbled like a rag doll for two long seconds before impacting the marble floor with a thud.
Nakamura saw the sniper hit the floor and cursed. “So much for interrogating him.”
Barmakid took heart at this. He stood before the Emperor’s table, Stanishur lurking just to his right like some cobra about to strike. “Terrorists!” he called to the Emperor. “Our Council was disrupted by terrorists! But the heroic Guard defeated them!” He turned to Stanishur, leering. “A shame the High Inquisitor and General Nakamura, among others, were killed before the terrorists could be stopped.”
The Emperor only stood there, seemingly deep in thought—or else having gone utterly blank. “I—I—don’t—” he stammered, his eyes moving from Nakamura to Barmakid to Stanishur. “I don’t know—”
The figure in black leaned in again, whispering.
Nakamura meanwhile was shocked by what he was seeing and hearing. “Sire—you don’t mean you’re in league with this foolishness? You cannot mean Barmakid was operating under your orders?” He looked to Tamerlane, faltering; the thought of the Emperor he had served for years—served since that man was a child—being somehow responsible for this insanity... It was almost more than he could bear.
“Colonel Tamerlane!” came a cry from the rear of the chamber, and Tamerlane turned back at the booming bass voice. Pushing their way through the crowd was Colonel Arnem Agrippa and his Golden Phalanx, all suited up in their fine metal plate armor and brandishing heavy blast rifles. They carried their helmets under their arms.
Tamerlane met them a short distance from the dais and saluted. “Glad to have you here, Colonel,” he said. “Things are getting rather tense.”
“We were on our way to assist you,” the big, blond man reported. “I felt guilty about my role in turning you in to the Church—particularly after a few back-channel reports of a...shall we say, peculiar nature... reached me along the way.” He nodded toward the dais, where the Emperor, Nakamura, and Barmakid were shouting at one another. “What I’ve seen and heard since our arrival—it’s all being transmitted over the Aether, you know—has only reaffirmed my decision.” He moved in closer. “I’m sorry I doubted you, Ezekial. I should have known better.” He extended a massive hand.
“I appreciate that,” Tamerlane replied, clasping the hand. “Now—stand by, because I have no idea how this will develop next.”
On the dais, the Emperor turned away from the argument with the general and the Ecclesiarch to speak again with the man in black—the man no one present could quite look upon, or mentally acknowledge was even there. That strange figure issued more instructions to the Emperor, now in a hissed tone that was almost audible to the others nearby. This time Janus turned to face the man and actually said something back. The conversation grew heated, and at last the Emperor shouted, “I am in command here. Me! I will decide what happens—no one else!”
The figure in black hesitated, seeming to grow larger—to expand somehow, beyond mortal bounds—but then it shrank back, bowed its head, and faded into the background again. The Emperor turned toward the others and shouted for his Guard. He started to issue a new order but before he could say anything intelligible he choked and leaned against the table, coughing violently. Nakamura hurried to his side, instinctively coming to his assistance. Tamerlane left Agrippa and his men where they stood and hurried up to join Nakamura at the dais, now that the crowd was being ushered out of the sanctuary in an orderly manner. Stanishur and his two trusted acolytes, as well as Major Arani, all drew nearer as well. The eleven other individuals, men and women of the Ecclesiarchy, Inquisition and Imperial bureaucracy, were on their feet, sticking close to the Emperor but clearly wishing they could be somewhere—anywhere—else.
The Emperor coughed again, even more violently, then raised his head and glared out. He screamed in wordless rage and fury, a sound no one had ever heard him make before. It scarcely sounded human.
The Empress rushed to him, the others moving aside for her as they realized who she was. The four children crowded close by, the younger ones crying. Nakamura saw them and ordered, “Get the royal family to safety,” but no one responded to his order. Everyone was staring in shock at the Emperor. Nakamura turned back and looked.
The Emperor’s eyes were burning bright red, glowing like hot coals, with rivulets of crimson energy trailing from them like streams of blood.
Before anyone could react further, Janus shouted to the nearest of his Guard, the one in the ruby armor, “Zeyid! Kill them!” His voice was hoarse and raw but it carried a more commanding force than anyone had ever heard from him before.
Zeyid stood there, his massive quad-rifle held at the ready, his armor sparkling crimson; he had been conditioned from birth to obey the Emperor without question or hesitation, but of course he required specific orders first. Being told simply to “Kill them”—that was an order he could not carry out, for his logical mind demanded to know the specific target being selected among this crowd of officers, soldiers and dignitaries.
And so Zeyid of the Emperor’s Guard did something his kind rarely, if ever, did: He spoke. And in doing so, he did something no Guardsman had ever done: He questioned his Emperor.
“Kill who, sire?”
“All of them,” Emperor Janus IV shouted, his voice now warped almost beyond recognition. He reached down and grasped the golden sword that lay before him, raised it overhead, and screeched. “Everyone! Kill them all!”
The Guardsman hesitated, processing this, considering it carefully. Then he nodded his gleaming helmet once and raised his gun.
14
The Guardsman was raising his quad-rifle—though, to do what, none would ever know— when Agrippa and his Golden Phalanx came charging up the aisle.
“Belay that order,” General Nakamura shouted. “Stand down, Guardsman. That’s an order!”
Zeyid hesitated again, looking from the general to the Emperor.
“Your master is not well—surely you can see that,” Tamer
lane added forcefully. “Stand down!”
The Guardsman in emerald tromped over, the sapphire one just behind him. None of them spoke—at least, not in a way that anyone else could overhear—but clearly a conversation was happening, likely over a private Aether link.
Zeyid in his red addressed Nakamura then, or at least started to. “General,” he said, “I concur that the Emperor is—”
“I gave you an order!” Janus screamed, and blood flew from his mouth as he did so. His next words were unintelligible as his voice dissolved into a horrific gurgling sound. Blood spilled out of his mouth onto the marble-faced table.
Looking on in horror, the Empress screamed.
No one was looking at the Guardsmen now, and so no one saw their own transformations begin. They, too, screamed and gurgled, but their helmets blocked off the sight and much of the sound of what was happening to them for the moment. Tamerlane did, however, see them raising their guns and leveling them at the last of the retreating crowd and at the individuals on the dais. He shouted a desperate warning and grabbed Nakamura, who was standing beside him, flinging him down.
The guns blazed to life, energy bolts slicing into the crowd.
Agrippa and his men saw what was happening and, though it violated every principle they held dear, they in turn opened fire with their heavy blast rifles on the Emperor’s Guard.
The result wasn’t quite what Agrippa had hoped for: The impact of the Phalanx’s superheated-plasma shots didn’t penetrate the hyper-dense crystal armor of the Guardsmen but it did at least deflect their aim, substantially reducing the number of casualties caused by the first barrage.
Furious, almost mindless, bellowing their inhuman rage, the seven Guardsmen rushed toward the Phalanx troops. Their first shots took down two of Agrippa’s warriors in a combined hail of particle-beam and depleted-uranium slug fire before the crystal-clad men seemed to lose interest in their guns, dropped them or flung them aside, and simply charged. They smashed their massive bodies into the metal-armored Phalanx soldiers and drove the nearest ones down to the hard marble floor. Red and green and blue crystal fists rose and fell, crumpling metal plate and metal helmets. The Guardsmen—or whatever they had become now—howled like banshees as they fought, all military training gone, now mindlessly seeking nothing but blood and death.
The Shattering: Omnibus Page 23
