He looked up to his ancestor, but all Valmarion did was smile. Slowly, one by one, the spirits of the dead came into view. Sytre recognised them instantly. They were everyone that had died under his command, but not just in this battle, ever.
His mouth trembled, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” He looked to the ground, unable to face them.
“Raise you head, my Prince.” It was Forlen’s voice, the man that had been his second in every battle since he’d taken command of the Third Assault Force.
“Forlen…”
“Don’t grieve, Sytre. We do not.”
“But you all died!” he cried out. He was teary again. His heart hurt in his breast. He stared at Forlen, looking for answers. “You are all gone!”
Forlen grinned, happily, and placed his hands on his Prince’s shoulders. “That’s where you’re wrong. You are my Prince. No, you are my friend, Sytre.” The Prince looked into the man’s eyes, it was true they had been friends. “But I live on, we all live on, within you. Each of us have met our fates with open arms.” The spirits around them murmured in agreement. “It’s part of war. We all gladly laid our lives down for our country, or homes, our families, And for you.”
“Why me?”
Forlen snorted, “Because we believe in you. It’s within you we have placed all of our own dreams, our own hopes and our desire to protect Silverseat and the kingdom. So, you see, we live on through you.”
A moment of silence lingered between them. It dawned upon Sytre that Forlen was right. He knew that now. He felt another hand upon him, and then another. Soon all the spirits gathered around Sytre and he could feel their hearts. It filled him with something he’d not felt in weeks: Pride and honour. He was proud to be the one they trusted to carry on their will.
“Take care of my sister.” It was as a whisper in his ear.
Sytre blinked his eyes and he was staring into the shaman’s fire. The old beirshan looked into his eyes. “Something has changed in you, young blood.”
Sytre smiled, “Thank you, Elder, truly.” The shaman bowed his head, the short braided scruff under his chin waved as he did. Sytre rose from the fire and left the shaman’s hut.
Outside Myko was waiting. His brother didn’t ask anything of Sytre. He could see it in Sytre’s stride, in the way he held his head high. He recognised the familiar determination in his older brother’s eyes. Myko once more looked upon the Golden Boy of Silverseat, a true prince.
Chapter 6
Renewed Hope
“It’s with this responsibility and this purpose that I will continue to serve the crown and my people.” Sytre stood before his family, and the crowds of Silverseat. He’d finally allowed his Father to give him the victory celebration he’d wanted to throw when Sytre had returned, but Sytre wanted to take this opportunity to make it something more.
“I will honour the fallen and place their desires into my heart and carry their strength with me in all my years to come.” The crowds cheered and applauded. Sytre looked around. His brothers were all in their ceremonial armours, as were many more of his family. Agron bowed his head and Myko unsheathed his sword and raised into the air in Sytre’s honour.
He could hear Thuldin laughing loudly with his father and uncle somewhere behind him, he was recalling the time he’d whooped Sytre in training for so many years, times that he sorely missed.
Sytre’s eyes scanned the faces of the crowd quickly, before coming to the front of the crowd, to where the old woman from the parade stood, watching him. Though her eyes were wet from weeping, she nodded in renewed respect. “I take on these missions, these risks, because I have the faith of my people,” he opened his arms, welcoming all his citizens. “Because I can and will take on their sacrifices and their will, the will to protect everyone in the Kingdom of Silverseat, to support my heart.”
Sytre placed a hand over his chest, “They will stay there as each stone is cemented into the foundations of this city. They will be there forever, always strengthening my resolve.”
“Everything they fought for and believed in is entrusted to us, so that we may use it for strength and courage. This is what it really is, not some curse but a gift.” Sytre raised his sword into the sky. The power of the Light surged around him, enveloping him in a radiant golden glow.
“This is the Echoes of the Fallen.”
THE END.
EARTHBOUND by Andrew Knighton
The body floated three feet above the floor, a frozen spiral of blood trailing round as it drifted through the empty air of the warehouse. High above, the open roof revealed the shining points of a hundred spaceships scattered across the asteroid field.
The man's arm had been sliced open, tatters of skin and muscle emerging from beneath his rolled up sleeve. His head was flung back in agony, mouth wide, ice tears gleaming like stars on his cheeks.
'You know who he was?' Marcus Garbey approached the body, magnetised boots clanging against the rusted floor. He stepped carefully, trying not to disturb the evidence, though there was no forensics team out here to gather the traces, no crime lab to test for DNA.
'Sammy Oduya, a teacher out of Signus.' Captain Russell's voice crackled through the headset of Garbey's borrowed space suit. 'There was ID in his bag.'
Russell led the border guards who'd raided this place. Their tip-off had come up good, the warehouse holding not just drugs but illegal migrants bound towards the inner system.
'Any relatives?' Garbey asked. Legal or not, immigrants often travelled in families, and in Garbey's view a reliable witness beat any amount of evidence.
'His wife's in one of the holding rooms. No good talking to her yet, she's still in shock.'
Garbey tried to grab a cigarette from his breast pocket. Instead, gloved fingers brushed clumsily against vacuum-resistant cloth. 'Goddammit.'
Russell snorted. 'Can't wait till you're out of the suit, huh?'
There was blood on the floor, a thin patina of red-brown ice. 'Gravity was on when he was attacked.' Garbey pointed at the way it had spread. 'That's pooled beneath a body, not spattered from above.'
'Smugglers opened the hangars and switched off the grav when they heard us coming.' Russell spoke in a low drawl. 'Probably hoping to ditch their cargo into space.'
Garbey nodded, tried to rub at his throbbing temple. The suit had cheap, badly repaired scrubbers that left the air barely breathable. Between too much carbon dioxide and not enough nicotine he could feel parts of his brain rattling loose.
He reached out, stopped Sammy Oduya's slow spin through the void and peered at the ruin of his arm. Short, black wires protruded from the bloody mess.
'You get many cyborgs round here?' he asked.
'Who d'you think they smuggle?' Russell's tone was loaded with resignation, the sound so many local law enforcers made when faced with Garbey, the intruding murder cop. 'Hundreds of 'em every year, leaving their run-down mining planets for the dream of Earth. Chasing jobs and those streets that are paved with platinum.'
Garbey wondered what part of the dream had brought Oduya here. Poor bastard, all the hardship to get this far, just to wind up another borderland body, more debris floating among the asteroids. Sammy Oduya, with his teaching degree and his big soulful eyes, he deserved more.
'What do you dream of, Captain?' Garbey asked as he scraped a blood sample from the floor.
'I dream of you getting back on your ship, leaving me and my men to do our job,' Russell said. 'I dream of policing a border that isn't the size of the solar system. I dream of a commissioner's salary and a movie star wife. But failing all that, I could go for a coffee.'
'You fancy an interview with that?' Garbey turned towards the door. 'Friend of yours is waiting for us.'
Russell gripped his arm, sudden and strong. 'I know your game,' he growled. 'You ain't turning my men into the villains here.'
Garbey pulled his arm free, staring back into Russell's bloodshot eyes. 'He's just a witness,' he said.
But they both knew that
was a lie.
Carl Hooper was the sort of clean shaven, clean living kid who made Garbey's skin crawl. He sat forward in the cheap plastic seat, elbows resting on the battered table. He'd washed his hands, but blood still stained his boots and flecked the dull brown of his uniform.
'Coffee?' Garbey walked across the empty tool store that was his improvised interrogation cell, put one polystyrene cup down in front of Hooper, another in front of Russell.
'Thank you kindly, sir.' Hooper's voice wavered just a little, just enough. He didn't catch Garbey's eye, just stared down through the steam, one hand running across his blond buzzcut.
'Cigarette?'
'No thank you, sir. My poppa wouldn't approve.'
Garbey settled down next to Russell, the chair creaking beneath his weight. He lit up, took a couple of good long drags, letting Hooper stew in his own agitation. This was the way all cases should go, he thought. One obvious suspect failing to cover his tracks. One quick interrogation and then home.
'That's not your blood, is it?' Garbey pointed down Hooper's boots.
'No sir.'
'Whose is it?'
Hooper looked up, not at Garbey but at Russell. 'Do I have to answer that, Captain?'
'No son, you don't.' Russell's voice, that had held no tenderness for the late Sammy Oduya, softened for one of his men.
Garbey stifled the urge to yell at the captain. Barely two words in and the man was ruining the interview, letting Hooper escape the pressure. But the last thing he needed was to make this about him versus them, to give Hooper a place to hide with his guilt.
He took a swallow of coffee, mustered his best gentle uncle tone.
'It's alright,' he said, leaning forward, matching Hooper's own pose. 'I understand. It's hard not to lose control sometimes. I've done it myself. Run a perp down after a long chase, blood pumping, threats flying, and here he is, some thug with a face full of ill intentions. Here he is in my hands, and he's still squirming and struggling. My blood's still up, adrenaline's flowing. And fuck it, he deserves it. Just a quick knock to keep him down, to stop him fighting back. Just one for all the folks he's robbed and cheated, and all the other's he'll rob if he squirms out of my grasp. One quick knock. Why not?'
Hooper slowly raised his gaze to meet Garbey's eyes.
'Same thing happened to you, right? Chasing some guy down the corridors, one of these illegals you've been sent to stop. Some lazy back-planet dirt-dog, trying to sneak onto our world. He runs, he fights, you defend yourself. Of course you hit him. Maybe it's a bit harder than you meant it to be, but that happens, right? If he didn't want to take his knocks he shouldn't have run, shouldn't have broken the law in the first place. Isn't that right?'
'Yes sir.' Hooper nodded, staring at Garbey through the steam off his coffee.
'Detective Garbey.' There was a note of tension in Russell's voice, but Garbey just held up a hand, fending off the interruption.
'You never meant to hurt him, did you? Not really hurt him.'
'No sir.' There were tears in Hooper's eyes now. Garbey was stunned. Here was this man, six two of muscle and sheer chiseled jaw, the kind of kid they put in special forces commercials, and the fat policeman was about to make him cry. If someone weren't dead, he'd have to laugh.
'Just stop there a minute, Detective Garbey.' Russell's chair grated back across the floor.
'But that hurt happened,' Garbey continued, ignoring the captain. It was too late for Russell to interfere now anyway. The confession was practically on the kid's lips. One more nudge and it would all come spilling out. 'If you try to cover it up it'll just get worse. Bring hurt and shame back on you, your friends, your unit...'
'I said that's enough.' Russell slammed his fist against the table.
'This is your chance,' Garbey hissed. 'Your chance to make it right.'
'I'm sorry.' Hooper buried his face in his hands. 'I never meant to. I just got so mad, and I couldn't stop hitting him, and now... now he's in the hospital, and...'
Garbey frowned. 'The hospital?'
Russell shook his head. 'Another of the illegals was chased down and beaten during the raid. Just like you were talking about.' He squeezed Hooper's shoulder, but while his stance was one of comfort, the gaze he fixed on Garbey was hot with rage. 'I'd have told you, detective, if you'd listened.'
Garbey slumped back in his chair, crushed beneath the weight of disappointment. He'd been so sure.
There was a knock and a young guardsman poked her head around the door.
'Detective Garbey,' she said, trying not to stare at Hooper, 'we've found something you ought to see.'
The cyber-muscle lay on the table of the interrogation room, an ugly mass of nanofilament wires and vat-grown circuitry, its transparent plastic casing stained with blood. It was a crude, cheap enhancement, the sort they gave to mine workers or people living in high gravity. An extra bit of strength to help bear the weight.
'This yours?' Garbey asked.
Across the table, Jaime Vespes glared out from behind a curtain of greasy black hair. He slouched in his seat, fingers rubbing at a callous on his palm.
Garbey picked up the cyber-muscle. It was cold and sticky, leaving traces of Sammy Oduya across his skin. His stomach turned at the thought, but it wasn't the first blood he'd had on his hands. He waved the device in front of Vespes's face, watching the flicker of the cargo loader's eyes. Vespes shifted guiltily in his seat, but stayed silent.
'I said, is this yours?' Garbey's frustration was turning to anger. Hooper had made so much sense as a suspect, he'd grabbed him without doing a proper search. Meanwhile Russell's border guards had turned up this missing piece of the victim, and now the captain sat smug and superior, gloating at the ignorant cop who'd come in from the habitat, pretending like he knew what was going on here.
Anger could be a weakness, Garbey knew. You could lose control, rush around missing evidence in your focused fury. But it could be a strength as well. Garbey channeled his anger, letting just enough show as he slammed the cyber-muscle down on the table. Vespes flinched, looked away.
'Because if it isn't yours,' Garbey continued, 'that raises the question of what it was doing in your locker.' He glared at Vespes, inches from his face. 'Well?'
Vespes shrugged. 'Someone put it there.' He glanced at Russell, paused a moment in thought. 'One of them border men, maybe. They got it in for us here, always bustin' in, makin' out like we done somethin' wrong. Maybe this time they wanted to be sure.'
'And the blood-spattered shirt?' Garbey knew he was stretching, but no-one handled a thing like that and stayed clean.
'That too.'
'A blood-spattered work shirt with your name on it?'
Vespes opened his mouth, shut it again.
Garbey turned to Russell. 'Get your men to search the rubbish chutes. We find that shirt, we close this case.'
'You ordering me around now, detective?' Russell raised an eyebrow.
Garbey stood, stunned. Now this guy was kicking up about rank? Now, in front of the suspect?
'No, captain.' He lit a cigarette, hands trembling as he fought for calm. This wasn't about them. This was about Oduya. He took a deep drag. 'Just asking. Could you please arrange a search?'
'Of course.' Russell opened the door, called out into the corridor. 'Start searching the bins, boys. Bring me anything bloody.' He slammed the door shut and leaned back against the wall, watching detective and suspect with equal disdain.
Garbey sat down across from Vespes, offered him a cigarette.
'That a Sons of Earth tattoo?' Garbey pointed at the red lightning bolt on Vespes's arm. 'Sons have a thing against cyborgs, don't they? Breaking the purity of man, something like that.'
'That's right,' Vespes said, lighting his cigarette. 'Machine fucking freaks.'
'It must really twist you up inside, helping people like Oduya. Sure, the money's good, but what about your principles? How does that square with smuggling these scum into real human space?'
&n
bsp; 'Yeah, I...' Vespes stopped in his tracks, eyes narrowing. 'I don't know shit about smuggling.'
Garbey swallowed a curse.
'You might as well talk,' he said. 'Any minute now we're going to have you anyway. If you cooperate, it'll go better for you at trial.'
'You ain't got shit.' Vespes leaned forward, rolled up his sleeve to show a black star next to the lightning bolt. 'See this? I've been through the system. Done my time for the cause. Been sent to court by fat pigs like you, and seen juries turn soft 'cause the man got an innocent smile.' He brushed back his hair and batted his eyelids. 'I got a lovely smile.'
'Maybe that's how it works in LA or Juarez or whichever dirty corner you grew up in,' Garbey said, crushing out his cigarette and pushing back his chair. 'But things are different out here, aren't they Captain Russell?'
He caught Russell's eye, willing the captain to follow his lead, to move past their conflicts and move on the case. For a long moment he hung on the precipice of failure. But then Russell took his cue, stepping forward across the room, the two of them grabbing Vespes from opposite sides. In the corner, green drops of coolant dripped from a leaky pipe.
'That's right, Detective Garbey.' Russell said. 'Rules don't work the same way in the asteroid belt.'
They yanked Vespes from his chair, slammed him back against the wall.
'No internal affairs officers walking past interrogation rooms,' Garbey said.
'No civil lawyers looking to sue the city,' Russell continued.
'No human rights hippies looking for a cause.'
'A lot can happen to a suspect out here.'
'Especially one who tore a man's arm open and left him to bleed to death.'
'I never touched him!' Vespes yelled, his face lighting up with panic. 'I never even saw the guy!'
They hauled him up, heels kicking ineffectually against the wall.
'I swear! I found it in bay three. I never even been in the bay where they found him. Hernandez was with me, he'll tell you.'
9 Tales From Elsewhere 10 Page 13