Avon - A Terrible Aspect

by Paul Darrow

  It soon became apparent that he and Amiyak were of above-average intelligence. Amiyak, despite his quiet dedication to the learning process, despite his slight frame, was gaining strength and would grow into a hardened adult. Kerr, on the other hand, preferred guile to force, always ensuring that any opponent was in a weak position and on unfamiliar ground before he struck.

  Thus it was that the two of them gained the respect of their tutors and fellow students alike. A respect that made them candidates for advancement. The rumors abounded that they would achieve the ultimate and be entitled to complete their education on Earth, the breeding ground for the regime’s true elite.

  This delighted Rowena and she watched her son grow with evident satisfaction. She shared his happiness with his academic successes. Admired his cunning and ruthlessness in combat examinations. She taught him to be self-contained and to trust only a few.

  That she succeeded in moulding him in the image she required was evidenced by the fact that, apart from his “Brotherly,” relationship with Amiyak and an obvious affection for Anna, he formed no close connection with any other. Rowena remained the strongest influence on him.

  When a combat instructor described him as vicious, amoral and a crude opportunist, Pi Grant wondered if it was a rebuke. His mother considered it a compliment and an indication of the realization of her intent.

  The boy grew to resemble his natural father.

  In almost every geture, in his deceptive movements, in his quick brain, in his still menace he reminded Rowena of that time long ago on Phax when she had been loved by a man she would never see again. Except, perhaps, reborn in their son.

  It was about the eyes that he most resembled Rogue Avon. His were the same dark pools of pain and disappointment, alleviated only by the bright smile that was all too rare.

  When he had attained fifteen Earth years and had been a “Grant” for little more than ten of them, she knew the time was right to tell him the truth about his father. For, by this time, she had learned it herself.

  5

  To all intents and purposes, Rowena had been for ten years a dutiful, beautiful, devoted mother and, for want of a better word, wife.

  However, as she grew older and acquired the knowledge and accompanying cynicism of maturity, a canker grew within her that would lead to her ultimate destruction.

  With all the guile that could be described as the most useful attribute of her sex, she gleaned information from Grant, his colleague the Coordinator and others that led her to a full understanding of the philosophy of the Federation, its politics and of the struggling factions within it. She learned most from Amiyak’s adoptive father, the Principal of the Academy—Makarov.

  Confined to a wheelchair, he was a thin, angular, cantankerous, garrulous relic from a bygone age. Of indeterminate age, he was certainly old enough to be not long for this Universe.

  Ambitious for power, he had formed an alliance with a number of other Federation luminaries and tried to force himself on to the High Council. He made no bones about the fact that he had felt himself betrayed when his friends had switched allegiance and he had been dispatched to Saturn, far from the heartbeat of the system he had sought to influence.

  He had revealed his knowledge of Rogue Avon and the circumstance surrounding his death.

  It was at a dinner party. A glittering Saturn evening arranged to celebrate Rowena and Pi Grant’s bonding. Markarov was an honored guest and he spoke the name that seared into Rowena’s brain like a lightning bolt.

  Try as she might, she could not find a way to persuade the old man to elaborate on his brief overheard remark.

  She encouraged Grant to invite the Principal to their mansion whenever the opportunity arose. Sooner or later she would extract what information she could from him.

  Meanwhile, her enquiries, of necessity discreet, produced nothing. There was no record of Rogue Avon’s existence. It was as if he had never been.

  Makarov, flattered by the attention of Grant’s much-admired lady, was a frequent visitor and, slowly, he revealed snippets of information that, in time, Rowena was able to piece together into a cogent whole.

  She learned the names of his former “allies,” Axel Reiss, Pel Gros and a Martian called Pruth. Information about the latter was easily obtained.

  “I’ve never seen a Martian,” Rowena said, as she and the old man sat in a glass-covered conservatory attached to Grant’s house.

  “You haven’t missed much,” he replied irritably.

  “What was he like?” She smiled and the question seemed innocent enough.

  The old man snarled and flecks of saliva danced on his withered lips. “An intellectual who became a buffoon. He was seduced by his ambition and greed.”

  Rowena plied Makarov with the best Saturn wine she could find in Grant’s cellar. “What happened to him?”

  “He conceived some outlandish plan that he hoped would frighten the High Council so that he could assume the role of a saviour. So that we all could, for that matter. I was against it from the start, but Axel, once he became aware of it, was enthusiastic. Unusual, I thought. Axel is a cautious man.”

  “What was the plan?”

  The man smiled evilly. “You’re too young to remember the wars,” he said patronizingly. “The High Council was split. Not to put too fine a point on it, the majority were terrified.”

  “It’s hard to imagine the Federation would be terrified of anything.” Rowena said quietly.

  “Well, it all started to go wrong when the dissidents on Uranus put up a better fight than expected. That’s when we saw our chance. Our chance to gain influence, to discipline the Federation philosophy, to create a strong, unbeatable war machine that could even enter the Beyond and conquer galaxies that haven’t yet been thought of, let alone discovered.”

  “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  Rowena smiled. “But you failed?”

  Makarov grimaced. “Pruth failed. Axel had to pick up the pieces.”

  “Pruth was killed?”

  “Yes. His grand strategy backfired on him.” The Principal laughed. “Almost literally backfired.”

  Rowena said nothing, merely waited for him to continue in his own time.

  “Why do you want to know all this?” he asked suddenly.

  “I’m surprised that a man of your undoubted ability has not been more greatly honoured by the system. I want to know why.”

  The old man snickered appreciatively. “They could have had my head, but they didn’t. I’m indebted to Axel for that.”

  “He sounds an interesting man.”

  “He’s the most ruthless, cruel, savage, brilliant man I have ever met. Without him, and men like him, we would be ruled by aliens or homosexual weaklings.”

  “Perhaps I’ll meet him one day?”

  Makarov grinned lasciviously. “I’d like to be there when you do.”

  Very gently, very subtly, Rowena led him back to the continuation of the story she wanted to hear. “What was the plan?” she asked when she thought the moment was appropriate. “You still haven’t told me Pruth’s plan.”

  “Well, I’ve already told you that some of the Council were panicking. Of course, the Iron Guard soon destroyed any opposition on Uranus, but the fact that they were needed, our best troops to quell a bunch of ill-equipped guerrillas, was alarming. Pruth wanted to prey on that alarm, to exacerbate it. As luck would have it, he came into contact with a fugitive, one with a heavy price on his head. At first he was inclined to collect the reward but, after making enquiries, he took a different course.”

  Rowena grew impatient. The old man stopped talking, seemed lost in thought.

  “What did his enquiries reveal?” she prompted.

  “What? Oh, his name, his reputation. The fugitive had achieved some fame when he deserted the Federation. You could say that he had been a footnote in our history books.”

  “What was his name?” Rowena was almost breathless with the anticipation of hearing i
t again.

  “Rogue Avon. Not much of a man, but a man for all that. He certainly shook us up. We manipulated him. Made him run for Earth. He was going there anyway, we helped him on his way. We wanted to show the Council that one man, if he was determined enough, could penetrate any defense they could devise. Pruth was meant to take him alive, but Avon outmaneuvered him. It was left to Axel to finish him off.”

  The Principal did not seem to notice Rowena’s sharp intake of breath.

  “Anyway,” he continued, “Pruth was dead and we had been made to look incompetent. Axel salvaged something, I suppose, but he sacrificed me in the process.”

  “You did say he was a cruel man.”

  Makarov laughed. “I did, didn’t I? What I couldn’t understand, still can’t, is why Axel went along with it. We were like children trying to gain the attention and the admiration of grownups. Not his style at all.”

  “But if your men had been shown to be the only ones who could capture Rogue Avon, a man your propaganda had built into a great threat, then surely it would have served your purpose?”

  Makarov sighed wearily. “That was the trouble. We could have taken him, should have taken him, at any time. We let him run too far and too fast.”

  “How did he die?”

  “Pruth?”

  “No.”

  “Axel cut him to pieces. They fought man on man. I got the feeling it was very personal.”

  “Why?” Rowena was hanging on his every word.

  “I’ve no idea.”

  Later, during the course of further conversations with the aging Principal, Rowena learned the details of Avon’s run to Earth. Of how he had killed a villain named Gilpin. Of how he had outgunned Pruth. Of how Axel Reiss had cut his head off with a twin-bladed knife with serrated edge.

  It was then that the tumour of revenge lodged in her heart. Makarov, Pel Gros, Alex Reiss would die by her hand, or by that of Rogue Avon’s son, or they would both die in the attempt.

  Makarov’s demise was easily contrived.

  On an evening when she had arranged for him to dine with her and Pi Grant, she placed a fierce, slow-acting poison in the wine that he was accustomed to consume to excess.

  He took ten days to die. As the final agony came upon him, Rowena leaned across his death bed and whispered one word in his ear. The old man’s eyes opened with shock and surprise. The word “Avon” was the last he ever heard. Rowena’s triumphant, cruel smile the last thing he ever saw.

  6

  Rowena was impatient to continue, to conclude her vengeance, but her remaining targets were inaccessible.

  Pel Gros was a member of the High Council—someone who had succeeded where Makarov had failed—and controlled a huge business enterprise from Earth. Axel Reiss was an unknown quanitity. Officially an adviser on military matters, in this time of comparative peace, he was keeping a low, almost invisible, profile.

  It was a Federation law that, unless he had been born there or was of proven Earth blood, no citizen could visit the mother planet of Empire. The World was racially pure. It was a fortress protecting the values for which the Federation stood and on which its survival depended.

  The hint that Kerr might conclude his education on Earth soon proved to be more than that. He was officially ordered to enter the Iron School.

  Situated in the lush mid-Western section of the World, it was the best, the only school for ambitious, talented students.

  Rowena found it hard to contain herself. Her plan was being carried out by the Federation itself. Her only regret was that she could not accompany her son on their trail of destruction.

  She worried that the task that now lay upon the boy would prove too onerous. She need not have concerned herself.

  Mother and son strolled through an orchard designed and carefully nurtured by Pi Grant. Artificial birdsong filled the air. No real birds sing on Saturn.

  ”I don’t have to tell you how proud I am,” Rowena said.

  Young Avon, who was now fifteen Earth years, said nothing.

  ”You are being given every opportunity,” his mother continued. “A fine education, a settled, secure environment.”

  ”And a parallel education from you.”

  Rowena smiled at the interjection. “I trust you will put it to good use.”

  Avon shrugged.

  Rowena, detecting an air of rebellion in the sullen youth, said, “Never forget, never forgive. Promise me that!”

  Avon’s sad, dark eyes scrutinized her carefully. “Tell me why?” he asked.

  She took him by the shoulders and held him like a lover. “They killed your father and they must pay. They toyed with him, hunted him down like an animal, and then they destroyed him.”

  ”We all have to die,” her son whispered.

  Rowena held him away from her and looked into the familiar eyes that haunted her with memories. “I have nothing else to live for,” she said. “There isn’t anything else in the Universe that I can bring myself to care about.”

  Kerr Avon shrugged himself free of her grasp. “I could contradict you,” he said, an ironic smile playing at the corners of his mouth, “but I won’t.”

  They walked on through the aisle of fruit trees, a breeze ruffling their clothing and hair.

  ”There’s no purpose to life,” Avon said. “It’s just a tiresome journey towards death. I rather wish I had never been born.”

  Rowena was momentarily stunned by the remark. “You have one important purpose,” she said finally.

  Her son treated her to a rare, dazzling smile. “For the second time I ask you—why?”

  ”You remind me so much of him,” Rowena said, striving to contain her emotion.

  ”But I’m not him and I never will be. Oh, I’ll complete the task you have set me. I’ll be the instrument of your terrible revenge!” he laughed. “I’ll kill Gros and Reiss for you. Then what?”

  Rowena said nothing. There was nothing she could say.

  Avon listened to the non-existent birds. “I have no hatred for the Federation,” he said. “I am indifferent. Of course, I will try to avoid the pain it is capable of inflicting and I’ll enjoy the privileges I am afforded. What I would really prefer...” He hesitated. “I would prefer to be alone. It’s a kind of hell to be a part of the human race.”

  Rowena felt anger welling up inside her. “As long as Grant lives,” she said, “I can have everything the Federation has to offer. So can you. When he dies, his protection dies with him. Don’t imagine that we have no enemies. Envy of success and wealth ensure that we have many. It’s possible that your true identity will be discovered and that knowledge may be used against us. It’s a regrettable trait of Earthlings that, the higher you go, the greater the number of those who desire to bring you down.”

  ”I very much doubt that the sins of my father will be visited on me,” Avon said quietly. “I have too much to offer our Federation overlords. Remember, I’m not only your child, but also a child of the regime. Besides, Makarov was right. Rogue Avon does not feature largely in the Federation memory. He couldn’t cope with the system, so the system destroyed him. It seems logical.”

  ”I won’t rest until Reiss and Pel Gros have paid my price,” Rowena said fiercely.

  Avon eyed her coolly. “Mother—I think you are quite mad!”

  She struck him a stinging blow across the face. He stepped back, his eyes narrowing, his stance tight with menace.

  The moment passed quickly, but Rowena, recognizing her vulnerability to his anger, made no move towards her son. Instead, he came to her.

  ”I’m sorry,” he said, but she wasn’t sure if he meant it. Then he smiled. “You may count the Earth days that Reiss and Pel Gross have left. But you must understand that I don’t consider I owe you anything. I make a present to you of their deaths.” He walked away from her and leaned against an apple tree. The leaves of its branches shadowed his face. “When it’s all over,” he continued, “I don’t expect I’ll ever see you again.”

&
nbsp; Rowena turned away, tears in her eyes. When she looked back, Avon had gone.

  Only the breeze remained.

  7

  Del Grant had been sent to the Iron School some years before. Neither Rowena nor Avon had known him well. Rowena because she was obsessed with her natural son, Avon because he was so much younger than his adoptive brother. By the time he had achieved an age when any kind of friendship might have developed, Del was gone.

  There remained Anna.

  For the ten years that they had been together, an affection had grown between the quiet, observant young boy and the ebullient wisp of a girl.

  They had shared the pains of growing up, such as they were. Their time together, limited because of Avon’s forced attendance at the military college, was precious. Truth to tell, Kerr was in love with her and it seemed she returned the favor.

  When the time came for him to travel to Earth, a kind of gloom settled on the Grant household.

  During the course of his last night on Saturn, Anna visited him in his room. An ominous silence enveloped the rest of the house.

  It was Avon’s custom to lie naked on his bed. Anna wore a simple, silk nightgown. She looked down on him.

  “I won’t see you for a long time,” she said.

  “No.” He was unperturbed by the steadiness of her gaze.

  “I’ll be a grown woman when we meet again.”

  He smiled. “You’re a grown woman now.”

  There was a long silence.

  “I’d like you to prove it to me,” she said.

  Avon sat up. “Why?”

  She laughed a bubbling, infectious laugh. “That’s your favourite word.”

  “But the question is never answered.”

  Anna removed her gown.

  Avon calmly appraised her nude body. Slightly built, she had a round, pretty face. Her nose was endearingly askew, her mouth full and mockingly sensual. Her long lair hair partly obscured her gray eyes. Her complexion rivalled that of the skin of a peach. Her breasts were small and firm, their nipples crimson and erect.