Sword of the Gods: The Chosen One
Page 29
Galactic Standard Date: 152,323.02 AE
Zulu Sector: Command Carrier ‘Light Emerging’
Colonel Raphael Israfa
Raphael
The Light Emerging hummed reassuringly beneath Raphael's feet as they continued their mission of searching for his missing friend. Major Glicki's communications console beeped, signaling an incoming subspace message. With practiced efficiency his second-in-command tapped the console to acknowledge the signal.
“Colonel Israfa,” Major Glicki said, “Supreme Commander-General Jophiel has sent an encoded message, eyes only. She wishes you to make contact within 10 minutes.”
“Thank you, Major Glicki,” Raphael said. “Please assume the bridge while I go down to my quarters.”
Their tone was formal whenever they communicated with each other in front of the other airmen, officer and subordinate, but the subtle tilt of her green heart-shaped head was anything but emotionless. Raphael could almost hear her calculating how much time until she got off-shift and how much liquor it would take to lubricate him enough to shake off whatever bad news Jophiel was about to deliver to him.
He checked his appearance as soon as he got back into his personal quarters and hid Jophiel's photograph in his desk drawer before queuing up the video monitor. Mikhail was her friend as well. She had overlooked the additional week which had passed without giving them new orders, but this would be the call. Father of her latest offspring or not, General Jophiel had a fleet to run and he was more valuable elsewhere.
Either that … or it was time.
“General,” Raphael greeted the videoconference monitor at the appointed contact time. “I'm at your service.”
“Colonel Israfa,” Jophiel said, her face a stern mask. “I assume you know why I'm calling?”
“I'm being recalled." Raphael attempted to state the expectation passively and failed. Jophiel was commanding him to abandon his closest friend for dead.
“Not quite,” Jophiel grimaced and breathed rapidly before regaining her composure. “I have another mission for you in that sector.”
“General … are you alright?”
“It is time,” Jophiel said without emotion. “By this time tomorrow, your son will be here.”
His son. Here. With her. And then the child would be sent away. His child would be sent away. Away… To the youth training academy to be raised by strangers. The only link he would ever have to her. The only child he might ever have! Raphael lost all semblance of emotional control and spoke what was in his heart.
“Let me be with you!” Raphael's golden wings trembled with emotion. “Please! I can take a needle and be there in an hour. Let me be at your side to give you this small comfort…”
“This is my twelfth child,” Jophiel snapped, “I'm quite capable of taking care of myself.”
“Jophie, don't be like that," Raphael said. "I'm only suggesting you deserve to have someone at your side. You don't have to do this alone.”
“I am never alone,” Jophiel said coldly. “The Eternal Emperor himself sees to it that I, and my offspring, are well taken care of.”
“He’s my offspring too!" Anger rose in his voice as, for the first time in his life, he contradicted a superior officer. “He deserves to know his father!”
“He deserves to know what the Emperor decides he deserves to know!" Jophiel grimaced with pain as she endured another contraction. “That’s an order.”
Raphael stared at the beautiful, cold woman who was, even now, giving birth to his child while simultaneously juggling command of the Alliance fleet. It was rumored she'd given birth to her fifth child right on the battlefield. Dropped into a trench when the contractions became too great to fly, given birth, and shot a Sata’an soldier in the face just as the child had slid from her womb. She'd fought her way out with her newborn in hand, killing two dozen Sata’an soldiers, and then immediately handed the child over to the training academy to be raised. She'd been rewarded by the Emperor himself with a medal, and a promotion, for her valor.
Raphael wished now he'd given more weight to those reports and not been so enthralled by her beauty and the honor of being chosen by a five-star general to mate. Their son would be a magnificent soldier who would someday rise to a position of power. That much he knew about all of Jophiel’s offspring. But he felt cheated. Damn her! Damn her for being so heartless and cold!
“Raphael,” Jophiel used his given name. The stern mask of a general disappeared, replaced by the tenderness he'd glimpsed during their courtship. “I didn't call to fight. I can't change the laws of our people. But I can do this for you."
Raphael paused the hand which had been about to commit the imprudent act of cutting off the transmission with the Alliance's highest ranking general before he did something even worse. Such as tell her what a heartless bitch he thought she was. Or break down and beg her to reconsider. The latter, probably.
"We have fresh reports of mercenaries running cargo out there on the spiral arm where your friend disappeared," Jophiel said. "Our intelligence indicates you may be right about a larger foray into that sector by the Sata’an Empire. I'm ordering you to go investigate." She gave him a wistful smile. "If you should happen to stumble across Mikhail while doing so … that would be fortuitous.”
He understood what she was doing. Jophiel offered him another consolation prize…
“You will send me images of our child before you send him away?” Raphael pleaded. “He's my son, too…" His voice was barely a whisper as a single tear rolled down his cheek. Hazel-blue eyes turned green with emotion as he realized this was the end of his relationship with her. With their son born and abandoned to the youth training academy to be raised, Jophiel had no further use for him.
“Once you've found your friend,” Jophiel grimaced as the next contraction hit, “I'll give you leave to go visit him." Her expression was pregnant with regret as she reached towards the screen to end the transmission and hesitated. "I didn't realize when we mated that such things mattered to you. You're the first one who has ever asked.”
He touched the screen, one finger tracing the downward turn of her lips as they bid each other goodbye. Her lip trembled as though she could feel the caress he wished to give her from halfway across the galaxy.
“It matters,” Raphael whispered, his heart heavy with regret.
As soon as the screen went dark, he fished the photograph of him escorting her to a state dinner at the Emperor's palace and placed it back upon his desk. He'd guided her out of her shuttle on his arm as though she was a movie star instead of simply allowing her to march in on her own, the usual custom. He'd never understood why she'd brought him out so publicly before selecting him to sire this child, but an ambitious reporter had captured her expression as she'd offered him her hand. She wore a smile like the heroine on the cover of a Mantoid romance novel might give upon meeting her hero for the very first time.
Silly romantic notions!
At least she'd manufactured an excuse to allow him to continue searching for Mikhail and would give him access to their son. He wistfully traced her smile. Perhaps she didn't have a heart of stone after all?
Chapter 26