“What happened?” I asked.
Cassius the Elder sighed. “Nothing much, in the grand scheme of things. My father sent his household guard to separate us. They burned down our hospital, her village, and then delivered her head into a basket. They said the baby was taken care of, though. I understood their euphemism and eventually recovered the bones decades later. They’re in the family crypt if you’d ever bother to visit.”
My eyes widened. “My God.”
“God had nothing to do with it,” Cassius the Elder replied. “Satan, perhaps, but only the aspect of Crius’s patron saint that lies within each man. I was nothing more than a spoiled prince in the eyes of the men, some of whom I’d grown up with, and I’d disgraced myself by lying with a natural-born whore. I spent six months in solitary confinement as punishment with my father believing I was suitably chastised.”
I started to speak then stopped as everything about my father’s story felt true. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t pity me,” Cassius the Elder said, his voice lowering and becoming dangerous. “Because I understood the game from that moment on. I devoted the rest of my life to gaining power in my house. When I was finally stronger than my father, more politically secure, I had him injected with a neurotoxin from Shogun that made him unable to receive cybernetics. It also left him paralyzed in his own body. I had his throat removed and paid for a doctor to certify his brain as having gone senile. I kept him that way for twenty-five years, long after he’d gone insane. I killed every single one of the soldiers involved in that massacre, occasionally making sure they knew their own sons and daughters had been slaughtered in the fields of the insurrection first. David, the House Warmaster who trained me in dueling, I sawed the limbs off of and spent three days making a puzzle of his flesh. It was messy, gory business but showed me just how pleasant vengeance could be as well as what sort of amateur-hour pampered dragonshit son I’ve been raising to understand what the purpose of power is.”
“Which is?” I said, realizing in that moment my father was insane. I’d never realized it until that moment.
“Gather as much power and wealth as possible or you will be vulnerable to the people you have wronged,” Cassius the Elder said, assuming another dueling position despite my wounded state. “Like me.”
“I have not been so colorful in my murders,” I said, both pitying and being disgusted by father at once.
Not that I would have done so different to someone who had wronged me in such a way. I’d have at least killed them.
“You have killed over a hundred men in battle and some of your fellow Crius, either in defense of your pathetic peasants or because the officer’s corps is rife with pampered cowards who aren’t eager to rush to die. Men you forced into the front despite their manifest incompetence out of some perverse sense of duty.”
“That was two,” I said. “I—”
“Every one of those people left someone they loved. Husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, and other. You have created enemies whether you like it or not. People who view you as the monster who ruined their hopes and dreams for a continued life with their loved ones. That doesn’t include the fifty-thousand people of Kolthas Station, butcher.”
For the first time, I felt inferior in morality to my father. It was not a feeling I enjoyed. “You are correct.”
“We are going to lose this war, my son,” Cassius the Elder said, his voice grim and resigned. “This is true despite the fact our insane idiot prince makes declarations we’re winning every day. The Commonwealth can field ten units for every one we field and replace their losses faster. Wars are not won by bold heroics and glory-seeking playboys like yourself but by logistics. We lost this conflict the moment you and your men destroyed Kolthas Station. The only thing can do is expend as many Commonwealth lives as possible that we are able to negotiate favorable terms for surrender.”
“Germanicus will never surrender,” I said coldly. “He’s, as you say, an insane idiot prince. Even if he wasn’t, his father, the puppet archduke, and sister, the ground forces commander, have their own reasons to carry on the war. Their positions would never survive surrender.”
“You’re right,” Cassius the Elder said, smiling. “You’re finally learning. In any case, I am making preparations for our house’s survival in the post-Crius world.”
“I will have none of it,” I said, feeling like a child but refusing to believe it was simple math. The Commonwealth’s morale would surely break with the devastating losses we were inflicting. “I will see my men triumph.”
My father raised his sword and aimed it at me. “Just show me how you fight. Maybe at some point you’ll learn the value of cheating.”
I did. Just not that day.
Chapter Twenty
I stared at my father in the present, not sure how I should feel about his miraculous survival. Relieved? Angry? Upset? What did one say when a man you’d both admired and hated came back from the dead and took your identity? This wasn’t exactly a tears-and-hugs sort of situation—especially since he was next to two members of my family who’d tried to kill me.
So, as the pause between everyone’s response carried on, I finally said, “I thought you were dead.”
“I suppose you might think that,” Cassius the Elder said, a beatific smile on his face. Beside him, both my siblings looked uncomfortable. Everyone behind me was equally confused, I could feel it radiating off their bodies. I briefly wondered if this revelation would compel Fade to reevaluate his plan to assassinate my doppelganger.
I narrowed my eyes. “I was at your funeral where they buried your obese poisoned corpse.”
It was the last time I’d stepped foot on Crius and the last time I’d seen my wife save a short holo-call from the Revengeance before the Battle of Hoshi’s Point. I’d felt relieved that he’d finally died, ending his manipulation of me. Back then, I’d been naive enough to believe we could still win the war or at least settle down into a negotiated peace. It had been a delusion, but one I’d been all too willing to embrace.
“Yes,” Cassius the Elder said, his voice low. “A gift from Prince Germanicus. He determined I was responsible for planning and arranging the assassination attempt against him. Rather than a normal death, he wanted me to suffer a slow breakdown of my dignity before death. Your sister transported my brain to a new body.”
“That’s not possible,” I said. “The technology doesn’t exist.”
“Thanks to Zoe, it does,” Cassius the Elder said. “I spent a few weeks as a pair of eyeballs and a brain in a jar but my daughter has discovered a stopgap on the human race’s road to immortality.”
“You’ve always underestimated me,” Zoe said, smiling.
I didn’t smile back. “Not anymore.”
Zoe looked confused. She might have heard about her doppelganger’s death, but the fact was she had no reason to suspect I’d murdered her. Then again, she also wasn’t responsible for murdering an entire ship’s crew, torturing me, and taking William’s arm. I’d let her do it all because I’d wanted to trust her.
Never again.
“So you’re impersonating me and engaging in stolen honor,” I said, referring to the practice of impersonating a Crius officer. “All so you can, what, get revenge for our world?”
I wouldn’t blame him if he wanted to burn Albion to ashes. I had. That didn’t strike me as the kind of plan my father would cook up, though.
“The Commonwealth deserves to be punished,” Thomas said, puffing out his chest. “No words for your brother.”
“Many,” I said. “Under other circumstances, I’d be ecstatic.”
“But you’re here on behalf of the Commonwealth,” Cassius the Elder interrupted. “Tsk-tsk-tsk. Shameful.”
Clarice stepped forward and I worried she’d throw my father over the side of the walkway we were on, which was several hundred feet up, from the sight of it, and had no bannisters.
I kept my gaze on my father. “I developed an
overwhelming love of peace in these past seven years. I grew sick of children being sent off to die and be butchered so the rich and powerful could get their revenge. Crius is dead and I see no reason to kill its future so I can pretend the millions sacrificed on the altar was a justified expenditure.”
Cassius the Elder laughed and rubbed his chin. “I swear, you still talk like you’re doing theater. That’s the hardest part of impersonating you. You’d think living on a ship full of whores and thieves would have roughened you up a bit.”
“You can go fuck yourself for lying to me and stealing my name,” I snapped.
Some of the sentinels motioned for their rifles.
My father waved them away without looking at them. “That’s more like it. I’ve been following your career with great interest. Your work with the militias, your time as a scavenger, your brief period as a pirate, and trying to remake yourself as a navigator only to end up as a spy. A spy who mutinied, sank the career of the Watcher General, and destroyed an Elder Race marker along with stealing away with a Cognition A.I. from both my forces as well as the Commonwealth. Now you’re here, again, working for them. Why?”
He wasn’t going to let that go. “You really don’t believe I want to see this war end, do you?”
“Why would I? Everything I know about you, my son, has been you playing at soldier. What could possibly dissuade you now? Did you turn on your surviving countrymen because they offered you a uniform?”
“My wife is dead,” I said softly. My voice then got louder. “So are all my friends. I blame you, Germanicus, Germania, the Crius system, and myself for that every bit as much as the Commonwealth. I don’t believe in the Devil, but I genuinely hope both sides of this new war you’ve started burn in Hell!”
Cassius the Elder stared at me for a long time then looked at Zoe. “Have you got that?”
Zoe nodded and tapped her left eye, showing it to be artificial. “It’s my brother, all right. The brain patterns are an erratic traumatized match. He’s definitely suffering A-3 Class PTSD and substance withdrawal, but there’s no mistaking it. He’s also telling the truth, or at least believes he is.”
Thomas looked angry at my outburst then looked away. “I wish he wasn’t.”
I stared at my mouth. “You were testing me?”
“Can you blame me?” Cassius the Elder said flippantly. “I mean, you run into all sorts of Cassius Mass impersonators these days.”
I almost kicked my father over the side and it was Clarice who stopped me by wrapping her arm around mine.
“Ah, you must be the princess-turned-mercenary Clarice Rin-O’Harra,” My father said, ignoring the many other things Clarice had been. He then pointed to each of my companions in turn. “You are Isla the renegade bioroid, you Fade the Watcher deep cover agent, Anya Terra the terrorist turned reprogrammed Shin, and I don’t know who you are.”
“Your daughter took my arm!” William shouted.
“Ah,” Cassius the Elder said, clearly playing with my group. “Now I remember you, William Baldur the gladiator. How much would I have to pay you to forgive me? You look like someone whose dignity is for sale.”
“What?” Clarice said.
“Make me an offer,” William said, suddenly serious.
“William!” Clarice said.
“I’m not rich yet so I can’t afford to be picky with paid apologies,” William said. “I really liked that arm and she was quite unpleasant about it. That’s at least fifty thousand credits. Twice as much in Republic of Crius currency.”
“Sorry,” Zoe said, waving. “My copies are a bit buggy.”
“Buggy is slurred speech, not mass murder,” I said. “Also, allying with a member of the Elder Races.”
The words had no sooner left my mouth than I instantly regretted them. That was not something to mention casually.
My father became very still. “My, my, someone knows a great deal more than I would have expected.”
“Good going, Captain,” Fade muttered.
“I’m more observant than you realize,” I said, cursing myself.
“You would have to be,” Cassius the Elder said. “I mean, you missed the fact you were living in a totalitarian dictatorship.”
I really wanted to kill my father but I needed to talk to him about the thing that was living on this planet. As much as I despised him, he was clearly aware of the danger the Elder Races represented while Zoe was the world’s greatest expert on their technology. Admittedly, that was akin to saying Leonardo Da Vinci would be the best person to study a starfighter in the Renaissance, but it was still better than a bare bulb. Well, if she didn’t kill us all and dissect our corpses.
“The offer is sincere,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I wish to negotiate on behalf of the Commonwealth and discuss other matters. I request the safe passage of people and your hospitality as a noble of House Mass as well as my kinsman. I promise to make no move against you or your own as long as I’m here.”
Once that would have counted as a sacred promise to me. However, the time when all I had was my word was long gone. I had people I loved now. I’d break every promise in the world to keep them safe.
“If I believed in honor, I would believe you,” Cassius the Elder said. “However, I don’t. What I do believe is the fact you’ve very made things very complicated for me.”
“By surviving?” I asked, hoping he’d say yes.
Cassius the Elder sighed. “No, my dear boy, but by the fact I do believe you’re trying to do the right thing. The universe would be a far better place if people didn’t. Look at the Union of Faith. So much zeal, so much horror.”
“So you won’t consider the offer?” I asked, knowing it had been doomed the moment my father rather than my doppelganger was the one in charge of the FSA. He wasn’t a man to quit while he was ahead.
“I’ll hear it,” Cassius the Elder said. “But you’ll have to stay.”
“Stay?” I said. “What do you mean stay?”
“Yes,” Cassius the Elder said. “Until things are sorted out.”
“Forever, you mean,” I said, sighing. “Because I’m a threat to your identity.”
“You don’t have to be.” Cassius the Elder narrowed his eyes. “But yes, you’d have to stay for the next three or four years at our side as my body double. You’ll eventually be given a new identity, but I’m afraid I have to be the only Cassius Mass until all the treaties are signed and the war is over.”
“I agree,” I said, cutting him off before Clarice said something nasty.
“All right, then,” Cassius the Elder said. “The sentinels will escort Mr. Fade and Major Terra to a safe place in the regent’s palace. Then we will dine together, your friends and I, and I will see to your offer. Then we will discuss the Elder Races and your future role as a member of the FSA.”
“Like hell,” William said, complicating matters. “No one’s taking our captain anywhere.”
“I’m not loyal to the Commonwealth,” Anya said. “They broke my conditioning.”
“Interesting,” Zoe said, looking sideways. “I would have thought that would be impossible. May I examine your brain? My clone’s work should be flawless.”
“No!” Anya snapped.
“Then you have to go,” Cassius the Elder said. “However, I don’t want this to go poorly.”
“Too late,” William said, showing a remarkable lack of restraint in the face of a group of the galaxy’s most heavily armored warriors.
“So,” my father said, not missing a beat, “I’m going to give you a present.”
“A present,” I said dryly. “What would you have that I would even want?”
I noticed Clarice was holding a grenade behind her back. I grimaced and wondered about what she thought she’d be accomplishing here if she detonated it. Then again, taking the supreme commander hostage was a move. Just a very dumb move. Not that I had any better ones at this time.
As if on cue, the doorway to the regent’s palace opened
for a second time and a fat, shirtless brown-skinned man was dragged out by a pair of FSA Army troopers in black shirts and pants plus a pair of thick cyberglasses. Both men moved identically and there was something about them that unnerved me, as if all life had been drained out of them. I couldn’t put it into words, but they were like the vision I’d had of the shipyards and fleets above. Empty. I felt like I could see into their bodies and look upon their souls but found nothing inside them. Another sign I’d picked the worst time in my life to get sober.
Isla shouted an expletive before covering her mouth as I did a double-take between her and the prisoner. It took a second for me to realize the man on the ground was Octavian Plantagenet. Like my father, he looked like he was suffering from DNA poisoning, the kind of act generally used to cause a slow but inevitable breakdown of the body. I barely recognized him given he’d put on at least two hundred and fifty pounds while his face was starting to sag off his skull. He also showed signs of being tortured.
The body was taken through my father’s entourage then dropped at my feet. Octavian looked up to me, blinked, then did his own double-take between me and my father. He then looked at Isla then started crying. It was possibly the most pathetic sight I’d seen in my entire life.
I looked up to my father. “I take it you and your treasure had a…”
I trailed off, I wanted to make a quip but all I could think about was the fact Isla was face to face with the man who raped and tortured her. Instead, I walked back to check on her along with Clarice. Thankfully, Clarice hid her grenade before she did so.
Isla pushed us both away. “No.”
She reached for her useless gun then cursed under her breath.
“Had a falling out?” Cassius the Elder said, sighing. “Yes, I suppose you could say that. Thomas found out about his unpleasant habits not long after he joined the FSA. I would have eliminated him there but the needs of the many outweighed him. He worked, instead, as a prisoner until we’d bled him dry of his contacts. Somehow, though, he managed to slip a bulletin out that he was willing to pay top dollar for the recovery of the bioroids I freed. That included yours as well as a assassination on you and her other lovers. His use to the FSA is finished and I present him as a gift to your associate. Kill him, torture him, abuse him in the way he abused you. I do not care. Our blood ties are not so deep that it matters.”
Lucifer's Nebula Page 18