by Sarah Hawke
“As one,” Mosaad said, stabbing his psi-blade into the reinforced double door protecting the bridge. Natalya thrust her sword in a fraction of a second later, and between the two of them they sliced through the metal as easily as a high-powered laser drill. Once the carved slab fell forward, Mosaad rushed inside, fully prepared to fight off another squad of mechs or even soldiers.
But the bridge was almost completely empty.
“You’re late,” a familiar voice called out from the captain’s chair up on the elevated command deck. “I expected you several minutes ago.”
Mosaad frowned. Like all Omega-class battlecruisers, the Damadus had an enormous, sprawling bridge that looked more like an interstellar amphitheater than the control center of a starship. The walls were completely translucent; it looked like they could walk a few steps in any direction and float out into the vacuum. The command deck itself was essentially a giant saucer suspended above an enormous crystalline pit. Mosaad could feel the psionic energy coursing through the stones, and he could hear the telepathic echoes of the Synesthetes controlling the ship. They had a kaleidoscopic view of the battle raging around them, and it was genuinely difficult to focus on anything besides the starfighters and energy bolts whipping past them.
But despite all the distractions, he pointed towards the steps and forced himself to focus. He and Natalya slowly ascended to the command deck, their psionic blades humming in anticipation as the captain’s chair slowly pivoted around to face them. Emperor Falric was sitting there calmly, the tips of his fingers idly tapping the armrest. His flowing blue cape was sprawled out around him, and the tassels of his white-gold uniform glinted in the bright light.
“It’s over, Falric,” Mosaad said, pointing his psi-blade at the other man’s chest.
The Emperor smiled. “Be honest: how long have you been waiting for this moment, Wynn? How long have you dreamt about standing here with your sword at my throat?”
“Too long. Now order your forces to surrender. No more lives need to be lost today.”
“Spoken by the man who gleefully started a civil war,” Falric said. “Spoken by the man whose pride and arrogance have gotten millions of loyal Dominion citizens killed.”
“They died to save the Dominion from monsters like you,” Natalya spat. “Surrender!”
Falric scoffed. “How utterly, predictably self-righteous. You honestly have no idea how much damage you’ve caused, do you? Look around, Wynn! The Dominion fleet is in tatters. The Wings of the Seraph are nearly extinct. Even if we stopped the fighting now, it’s already too late. Your ‘revolution’ has cost us any chance of rebuilding and stopping the Convectorate.”
“As if you ever cared about that,” Mosaad muttered. “I can still hear the ghosts of Talasea crying out for vengeance!”
Falric continued glaring at him for a long moment, his head slowly shaking in contempt. “I always knew your arrogance was boundless, but destroying your own people just to sate your thirst for petty vengeance….”
“He’s stalling,” Natalya said, shaping a second blade in her free hand. “We need to finish this. If he won’t surrender—”
“You’ll just kill me, is that it?” Falric asked. “Two Blades of the Seraph assassinating their rightful emperor…well, at least this time you’ll strike the killing blow yourselves. You didn’t give my father that luxury.”
“Enough!” Mosaad growled, thrusting his sword forward until it was barely a centimeter from the other man’s throat. “This is your last chance, Falric: surrender!”
“There are times I wish I were a stronger telepath,” Falric said. “I would love to hear whatever nonsense is rattling around your brain. What do you expect to happen once you kill me? Do you think the people of Keledon or Eladrell or Regdar will bow to a usurper? Do you seriously believe the people of the Dominion will follow a washed-up Blade and his filthy mongrel of a concubine?”
Mosaad thrust out his free hand and clutched Falric’s body in a telekinetic grip so tight the younger man actually wheezed as the air vacated his lungs. “I expected you to finally see reason,” Mosaad growled. “I expected you to finally do the right thing for your people!”
Falric’s lips curled into a dark, twisted smile. “I already did.”
Mosaad frowned for a second before a flicker of movement from the translucent window drew his attention. He risked a quick glance back over his shoulder…
And his mouth fell open. Tiny flashes of light lit up the sprawling starscape as ship after ship suddenly emerged from hyperspace. At first Mosaad thought Falric must have somehow called in reinforcements, but it only took a moment to realize that the ships didn’t belong to the Dominion.
They belonged to the Convectorate.
“No…” Natalya rasped. “No, it can’t be…”
Mosaad’s hands balled into fists, and his blade dissipated into mist. The incoming fleet was enormous. Destroyers, frigates, and even battleships charged right into the Covenant lines, plasma bolts streaming from their cannons and fighters spewing forth from their hangars. Admiral Grayson’s command ship was already valiantly coming about to try and fend off the newcomers, but he and all the rest of his ships were hopelessly out of position…and hopelessly outnumbered.
“Seraph have mercy,” Mosaad whispered. “What have you done?”
“I have saved our people from the abyss—again,” Falric said pointedly.
“By allying with the Tarreen? Have you gone completely mad?”
“On the contrary, I am apparently the only one willing or able to see reason,” Falric said. “The Hierarchy doesn’t want a second war any more than I do, and they know that’s exactly what will happen if your ‘Covenant’ prevails. They are investing in the future…and so am I.”
Mosaad glanced down at his holopad, but the com was being jammed. He couldn’t signal Grayson and tell him to withdraw…not that it would have been possible anyway. The Covenant had committed everything to this assault. They had known all along that there would be no retreat and no surrender.
Instead, there would be another Talasea.
“You son of a bitch!” Mosaad hissed, igniting his psi-blade again. “I should have killed you a long time ago!”
Rearing back, he slashed straight down at Falric’s head…and watched in horror as his blade inexplicably carved through an empty chair.
“You still don’t get it, do you?”
Mosaad whirled around. Somehow, Falric was standing on the opposite side of the bridge, his hands calmly dangling at his sides.
“I am not the man you humiliated in the throne room all those years ago,” Falric said. “I have mastered techniques the other Seraphim thought lost forever.”
“How…?” Natalya whispered, reflexively clutching her sword in both hands. “Is he some kind of hologram?”
“No,” Mosaad said, grimacing. “He’s a clairvoyant.”
She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t,” Falric sneered. “You are not Seraphim, not really. You are a mongrel riding on the coattails of superior genes.”
Mosaad scowled. “No Seraphim clairvoyant has been able to manipulate time for a generation, not even his father.”
“If he could, he would still be alive,” Falric said. “Your Blades wouldn’t have had the chance to fail him.”
Mosaad dragged his eyes back to the viewport, and his stomach clenched when he saw even more Tarreen ships entering the system. Unless he could figure out a way to end this—unless he could kill Falric and somehow convince his forces to withdraw or surrender—then the Covenant was doomed. And he refused to let that happen.
“I don’t care what powers you think you’ve learned,” Mosaad said, hoisting his blade into a ready position. “I will not allow you to destroy the Dominion. Not again!”
He rushed forward again, faster this time, and he swept his blade in a wider arc to make it even harder for Falric to get away. But this time, the other man didn’t move; he stoo
d there still and stoic as if baiting Mosaad to try and harm him. And then, a fraction of a second before the burning sword cut him in half, Falric’s hand moved at lightning speed…and conjured a psionic blade of its own.
The weapons clashed and unleashed a telekinetic shockwave so powerful Mosaad flew backwards several meters. Natalya skidded across the command deck and smashed into a control console hard enough the plastic actually cracked.
“How…?” Mosaad whispered, staring at the brilliant beam of energy stretching from Falric’s fingers. “Only the Blades—”
“The Blades serve the Emperor,” Falric snarled. “Or they did, until you betrayed your oath.”
Mosaad grimaced, wondering who in the hell could have possibly taught him how to shape a psi-blade. The technique was a closely-guarded secret; even the Seraphim Councilors didn’t know it. Still, there was a difference between shaping a weapon and actually wielding it, and Mosaad couldn’t imagine a spoiled brat like Falric having the patience to learn swordsmanship…
“You have already lost, old friend,” Falric said, lifting his sword in a mock salute. The blue-white beam of energy didn’t look entirely stable; sparks of energy dripped from the blade like flaming rags from a torch. “I can see the future while you are trapped in the past!”
“We’ll take him together,” Mosaad said as Natalya returned to his feet. “He can’t escape us both.”
She nodded and clenched her teeth. “As one!”
They attacked. After hundreds of skirmishes across dozens of battlefields, Mosaad knew her movements nearly as well as her own. Even without actively using his telepathy, he could sense her thrusts and her feints, her parries and ripostes. And it only took a few moments to realize that his earlier theory had been right—Falric could shape a psi-blade, but he was no swordsman. He flailed about like a child with a holographic toy, and given remotely fair circumstances Mosaad would have killed him in five seconds flat.
But the circumstances were anything but fair. The Emperor moved with blinding speed; even with his poor form he had no trouble intercepting and deflecting every attack. Mosaad and Natalya pressed their advantage as aggressively as they could, hoping to tire him out, but Falric gained more confidence with each passing second. He eventually began to outpace them, and amidst a frantic flurry of swipes and thrusts he backhanded Natalya across the face with his free hand, knocking her to the deck.
Without her aid, Mosaad quickly found himself on the defensive. He parried a wild slash aimed at his head and barely turned aside a thrust for his heart, but the wild, desperate movements left him out of position. The tip of Falric’s sword burned through Mosaad’s leg armor, and he screeched in pain and stumbled away.
“I warned you,” Falric said, panting. “I am not the child you remember, and I will not allow you to destroy the Dominion with your arrogant pride…or pollute it with your wretched alien filth.”
Mosaad braced himself against the closest console. The searing agony in his thigh spread down his whole leg as if he had just stepped in lava. He was normally disciplined enough to ignore almost anything, but this…he could barely concentrate enough to sustain his psi-blade.
Natalya was in better shape, if only just. Blood streamed down her lips and chin; Falric must have shattered her nose outright. Still, at least she could stand upright…
“Your Covenant will die a final, brutal death,” Falric taunted. “Every traitor who stood against his emperor will be executed, and the Dominion will finally be whole once again!”
“With a Tarreen claw at its throat!” Mosaad snarled. “The Hierarchy won’t stop with the Covenant fleet. They will destroy every Dominion ship in the galaxy!”
Falric shook his head. “You forget that I am the one who can see the future—I am the one who has the foresight to rule. And one day soon, I will be the one who leads the Seraphim to vengeance!”
“You have no idea what the Tarreen are really like,” Natalya said, wiping the blood from her face with the back of her gauntlet. “The instant you let them set foot on Keledon you sealed your people’s fate. They will brutalize and ravage this world in ways you can’t even imagine.”
“Humans are not Subari,” Falric sneered. “We will never submit to the Tarreen or any other degenerate alien scum. Our banner will fly over the galaxy once again.” He smiled darkly. “And you know what, Wynn? I think I’ll let you live to see it. Perhaps one day you’ll even recognize your mistake and grovel at my feet.”
Clenching his teeth, Mosaad slowly dragged himself upright. “I will never bow before an emperor again.”
“Every man has his breaking point. By the end of the day, you will have lost everything. Your fleet, your allies, your crusade…” Falric turned and glared at Natalya. “And now, your mongrel whore.”
His body became a blur of movement as he lunged at Natalya. The sparking clash of their blades released another shockwave, pummeling Mosaad back onto the cold deck again. A fresh spike of pain lanced through his leg, but he forced himself to stand and lurch back into the fray. Falric was already pressing his attack, and despite Natalya’s perfect form she was slowly but steadily falling behind. Another clash lit up the bridge, then another and another and another…
Until he finally battered her weapon aside and drove his blade straight through her chest. The searing blue beam sparked wildly as it erupted from between her shoulder blades, and Falric held her skewered in the air for what felt like an epoch before his blade abruptly vanished. Natalya collapsed to the ground in an unmoving heap.
“No!” Mosaad shrieked so loudly the entire bridge rumbled. The pain in his leg faded into a distant memory as he dove on top of her and cradled her body in his arms.
“You’ve no idea how tempting it is to kill the last Blade of the Seraph myself,” Falric said into the grim silence. “To avenge my father, to avenge your failures, to be the one who personally purged your sacred order of corruption…it would almost be worth denying myself the pleasure of watching you rot away in a cell over the decades.”
Mosaad’s hands trembled as he tried to hold Natalya up, but her strength had already drained away. For the first time since he’d met her, he saw genuine terror in her bright blue eyes.
And then she was gone.
“I wonder, what would the founders of your order think if they knew you shared their precious secrets with a hybrid abomination?” Falric asked. “Can you imagine the look of horror on their faces when they learned you had taken her as a lover?”
Mosaad glanced up, his entire body quaking with rage. He clenched his teeth so hard he could have chewed through a bulkhead.
“Don’t humiliate yourself any more than you already have,” Falric said. “It’s over, Wynn. You know you can’t kill me. I am the Emperor of the Dominion. I am the Chosen of the Seraph. I am invincible.”
“You are a monster,” Mosaad rasped as a fresh psi-blade sprouted from his right hand. “And you will be stopped.”
Mosaad thrust out his hand and unleashed a wave of telekinetic force. Falric tried to move out of the way, but for once he was too slow. The wave crashed into him, hurling him backwards until he slammed into the guard railing on the other side of the bridge. He wheezed, momentarily stunned, and Mosaad leapt to his feet and charged.
Every footstep was agony; every millisecond was torture. But Mosaad pushed himself forward anyway. Clutching his psi-blade in a two-handed grip, he hacked downwards and screamed as if he were trying to cleave the entire galaxy in half. Falric’s blade materialized in front of his face at the last possible instant, but Mosaad didn’t care—he had known all along that he wouldn’t be able to strike Falric down in time.
But he didn’t need to. Fueled by Mosaad’s rage and Falric’s fear, the clash of their blades released yet another psionic shockwave, this one even more powerful than the last. The telekinetic explosion hurled Mosaad backwards exactly the way he had come, but it also flipped Falric up and over the guard railing. Time itself seemed to freeze as the Emperor’s b
ody hovered above the yearning chasm, his eyes wide in shock…and then plummeted into the depths of psionic core below.
Mosaad landed hard on his already wounded leg. The pain returned in full force, but he refused to relent. Crawling forward, he dragged himself to the edge of the railing and glanced into the depths of the crystalline pit some fifty meters below. Energy still crackled through the green shards, but aside from the faint hum of the psionic currents they were silent.
“Seraph take you,” Mosaad muttered. When he glanced back over his shoulder, his momentary joy was swallowed by a black pit of despair. The space battle was still raging, and Admiral Grayson’s command ship was on the verge of cracking apart. His ships were lost, his men were dead. The war was over.
Perhaps it had been for a very long time.
Pulling himself back to Natalya’s lifeless body, Mosaad took her hand and squeezed it in his. Her pale skin was already cold.
“I will find others,” he rasped, his voice a fragile whisper. “I will start again.”
A swarm of fighters roared past the translucent walls barely a hundred meters away, and Mosaad could feel the Convectorate fleet getting closer and closer. He knew he couldn’t afford to stay; he knew he needed to get to the Banshee and shift out of here as quickly as he could. But when he cradled her head against his chest, his arms refused to let go.
“I will not be the last Blade,” he whispered. “And you will never be forgotten.”
Chapter Five
Maz Sepa
Varsellian Sector, Far Rim
1101.7
“We have cleared the planet’s mesosphere; all systems still showing green,” Selorah said over the com. “Grinner and Sandbox are preparing to power up the astral drive.”
“Dammit,” Morningstar grumbled.
I frowned and glanced back over my shoulder to the Valkyrie hugging my starboard wing. “Something wrong?”
“He’s just a sore loser,” Cobalt snickered. “He bet me five-hundred chits she wouldn’t be able to get that big ugly boat into space again.”