by Dave Walsh
“See,” Oystein laughed, wiping his blade on the downed guard’s shirt. “I like this one.”
They gathered up in front of the doors, weapons at the ready, Alva and Oystein caked with blood—most of it from others, some of it their own. Alva was sporting a gash on her thigh that they had quickly bandaged up, and Oystein had a gash on his right arm and was favoring his ribs on his right side. Trella’s internal sensors told her she was relatively undamaged. She knew Alva had the ability to scan herself as well and wondered if she was doing so, but didn’t bother to say anything.
“It’s going to get hot in there.” Oystein stood at the door. “You two ready for this?”
They both nodded and he smirked, bringing his large boot up and smashing it into the door, and it burst open with a loud crack.
040. Meeting of the Minds
Jace
His side stung and he didn’t feel like budging off the wall he was leaning against. Jace gripped at his side, with the pulseaxe laid across his chest, his right hand still grasped onto it and afraid to let go of it. There were a lot of things in his life he had never done before and dueling someone was one of those things—until now—especially the part where he had to kill the man. He had only heard of Alistair Giger, but now he was intimately aware of many sides of Alistair Giger, including the look in his eyes as his life left his body.
Jace wasn’t particularly skilled with the pulseaxe and was, in fact, a bit embarrassed that after Oystein had given him an opening that put Giger on his back that he didn’t just finish the fight there. He felt a responsibility to let Giger die an honorable death and it was almost the end of Jace’s life instead. Giger pulled out a dagger while Jace waited for him to get up and got a solid slash in on his left forearm. It wasn’t deep, but it stung and gave Giger a chance to regain his composure.
The strike that came from Giger’s saber almost connected, but Jace reacted quickly enough to deflect the blow with the hilt of the ax but was knocked back. Giger continued with a flurry of right and left slashes that backed Jace into the wall. The color went back into Giger’s face as he believed he had the upper hand, but he wasn’t expecting Jace to swing his ax down near his legs and hit the back of his left knee—the one that the big guy hadn’t hit—which sent him down to the ground.
There was no remorse left in Jace at that point, only the will to survive and he brought the ax down with a thud onto Giger’s face. Jace had expected there to be more to killing a man than that—more drama, more last words and regret—instead, his body simply twitched violently while his eyes were wide open and in a heartbeat, he was gone. Alistair Giger was deceased and it was at the hands of Jace Krios. This was only a small piece of revenge but it felt disconcerting, not like he had helped to dispose of one of the heads of the snake.
Jace leaned forward, picking himself up with a grunt, favoring where Giger had slashed at his stomach and opened up a cut. He looked down at the lifeless body of Giger and noted how his once-pristine white suit was drenched in blood, dark crimson up by the collar and only a splattered pink near the bottom in some places. His job was done, though. When he saw Trella in danger, he urged Loren and Katrijn to run on ahead while he took care of Giger. There weren’t many times in his life where he got to be heroic and while it might still be questionable and bungling, he did ensure that Trella went free. The added bonus was seeing her reunited with Alva, even if he knew that there were going to be some complications with their plan knowing that Alva was not only in the palace but she was en route to the audience chamber and to claim Cronus Freeman’s head.
“You stay here.” Jace patted Giger’s chest only to recoil at how damp it was, wiping his hand on his pant leg. Trella, Alva and that big guy had gone down the hallway, which meant they had hopefully cleared a path to wherever they were heading. It seemed like they knew where they were going, as did Loren and Katrijn. The irony, of course, was that Jace had never even been near the palace, never mind inside it and had no clue where he was going. It seemed like everyone else did, though.
The hall was clear, which felt eerie considering that it was the palace and there was most likely thousands upon thousands of people wandering the halls at any given time. He saw two bodies up ahead and his heart skipped a beat, hoping that it wasn’t Trella or her friends. He quickened his pace only to see the distinctive uniforms of Cronus’s elite guards and felt a wave of relief come over him. They had both been brutalized, which made Jace feel a lot worse about his butcher-job on Giger just down the hall. He rounded the corner, only to hear the sound of raised voices. His senses were on full alert and it became clear to him that he was about to enter another tense situation. Before advancing, he doubled back around the corner, looking down at the guards and finding an elite guard rifle, slinging his pulseaxe over his back and picking up the rifle. It felt more his speed and depending on the situation, running into that room with his sidearm didn’t feel right.
He took a deeb breath in a feeble attempt to calm his nerves and rounded the corner, approaching the doors with his rifle at the ready. The doors had a split near where they met and looked like they had been bashed in. The closer he got, the louder the shouting got. Jace sidled up along the side of the door and peered in only to find his view partially obstructed by the other door. Gently he pushed at it with the muzzle of the rifle, hoping it wouldn’t creak or alert anyone to his presence.
“You’re all being fools,” O’Neil’s voice carried throughout the room.
“You’re the fool for stooging for this tyrant!” Jace recognized the voice as Alva’s, and peered around the door to see her with her pulseaxe around the throat of one of the guards. Trella and their brutish companion were being held by two guards.
“You don’t understand the larger implications here, Alva,” O’Neil sounded pained, tortured, but Jace couldn’t quite make out why he was standing up to Alva and not just helping her. It had always been a part of the plan that if they converged to try to work together.
“His head on a pike in the front of the palace is the only way this ends, Old Man,” she snarled. “For Ingen, for my father and for all of these people. You haven’t been here, listening to their stories, listening to how he ruined their lives.”
“That’s where you are wrong,” O’Neil said, his voice sounding calm, collected but sullen. “I served under him for years, I watched him develop into a monster, I did my best to guide him, as did Kara here, but he was beyond saving.”
“I’m right here you insolent cunts!” the voice that Jace had burned into his mind as Cronus Freeman’s scolded. “I am still the emperor and—
“You’ve made nothing but grave mistakes, son,” a new, female voice came out. Jace was starting to get an itchy trigger finger, but he didn’t see Katrijn or Loren anywhere. That either meant they had run into trouble or they were waiting. Jace fumbled for his holoscanner and went to send a voice message, but opted instead to send a text, not wanting to make any unwanted noise.
Where are you?
He fidgeted with the gun, wanting to just burst in firing, but it wasn’t clear who he should be firing on—if he should indeed be firing on anyone. “I don’t have to take this,” Cronus’s voice rose again. “What I did, even if it felt misguided or…monstrous as you all keep claiming—it was done for the people of the Andlios Republic.”
Jace could feel the rage boiling over inside him, remembering the call he received to inform him of his wife’s passing, the cold indifference they had toward her life or his grief and the quick settlement they reached with him in private. He had paid someone he knew down at the records office to see the official report on her death, it costing him a full month’s salary and the potential to be thrown into a cell, but he didn’t care. The images had broken his heart and sent him into a rage. The bite marks from where the dogs had sunk their teeth into her flesh, the bullet holes from where she was shot, the knife wounds from where she was cut, all horrific in their own way. That wasn’t the work of a troubled lead
er, it was the mark of a madman.
“You are a monster,” Alva said, calmly.
“You don’t understand what it means to rule! These people, they need me, they need—”
Jace had heard enough, so he kicked in the door and leveled his gun toward the guard holding onto the big guy, pulling the trigger and seeing the shot trace across the room and hit the guard right in between the eyes. It took him off guard how accurate the shot was. The whole room had turned to see what the commotion was long enough for the big guy to grab ahold of his pulseaxe and smash it over the head of the one holding onto Trella.
Alva quickly pulled her blade across the throat of the guard she had in her arms, letting his body fall to the floor and Jace burst into the room with his rifle out. “You don’t understand, you piece of shit!” Tears were clouding up his eyes, and he used his shoulder to wipe them off. “You don’t understand the harm you’ve done to these people, you don’t—”
“Jace, no,” O’Neil staggered toward him, his hand outstretched and looking worse for wear. “Please, son, you don’t understand.”
“He’s not getting away with all of this,” Jace was shaking and he knew it, but did his best to steady his fingers on the trigger. “I don’t care what kind of political games go down here, but he is a monster and he doesn’t deserve to breathe this air.”
“Jace,” Trella’s voice broke through the rage that was engulfing him. “Killing him won’t fix anything for you, it won’t bring Ro back.”
“What do you know?” He looked back at her briefly, seeing her standing with Alva. “You’ve found her, you get to be with her now. But for me? After all of this is done I’m alone again, I’m traveling through the mire of the fringes and dealing with scumbags all over again. He stole my life from me.”
Katrijn
“Look, I know we wanted to do this differently.” Katrijn felt her palms sweating, resting on the hilts of her knives, both her and Loren resting against the door to the audience chamber. “But you hear what I’m hearing. He’s not a killer, Loren. We can’t let him live with this.”
“I know,” he said. “We just don’t know what is in there right now.”
“We need to help him.”
“It doesn’t sound like we have much time, Kat.” Loren gave her a sullen smile. “But this isn’t a good idea.”
“Fine,” she grumbled. “Blame me if this goes wrong.”
“Noted,” he said.
“I hear you,” she said, pulling her knives out and gripping them tightly. Loren held up three fingers, then two, then one and they both pushed their shoulders into the door, the doors bursting open a bit easier than she thought they would and Katrijn almost barreling headfirst into the room, Loren catching her and helping to stabilize her.
“What the?” Cronus’s face turned pale.
“Aye, looks like we’ve got more coming to this party here,” a huge man that Katrijn recognized as one of her father’s old friends, Oystein, chuckled with his pulseaxe in his monstrous grip. In the hands of an average man, it would look large, but it looked almost like a toy in his.
“No,” Cronus was shaking his head. “You were, you are, you—”
“I’m alive, brother.” She surveyed the room, Jace still standing there with his gun pointed at Cronus. There were guards down on the ground, two still vigilant up near Cronus. Trella, Alva, Oystein, her uncle and—she paused—her mother was there. “Mother…”
“Oh, Katrijn,” her mother started to move forward, only for one of the guards to stop her. “I can’t even tell you how happy I am to see you.”
“Me too, Mom.” Her eyes turned back to Jace, who was sweating and not backing down. “Gods…Jace,” she said, slowly approaching him. “I know he’s cost you so much, but you aren’t a killer.”
“I thought I’d be able to stop myself, Kat,” he was fuming, but something was holding him back. “But now I’m here, looking him in the eye and he’s soulless, there’s nothing there, Kat. He deserves to die.”
“No one is doubting that,” she walked forward, sheathing her right knife and holding her hand out toward him. “But you don’t need that blood on your hands, Jace.”
“There’s already blood on my hands,” he said, and the closer she got the more she could see him shaking. “Down the hall a bit, his buddy Giger should be laying there. I split his skull with this stupid ax.”
“You’ve done enough, friend,” Loren spoke behind her. “Let us handle the rest, alright?”
“But, I…” Jace trailed off, tears streaming down his cheeks and his expression starting to crack.
“Don’t let him get the better of you, Jace, he’s just—”
“Just what?” Cronus bellowed. “Go on and do it already! You think this is all easy for me? You think I wake up every morning and feel good about myself? Put me out of my misery already.”
“Don’t you see, Jace?” She wrapped her arm around his shoulders, feeling how tense he was. “I didn’t know how I’d feel when I came face to face with him, either.” She looked up at her brother’s face, for a brief second getting a glimpse of the same pained expression she remembered from when he was just a boy. “He’s just a boy who never grew up playing a game he doesn’t understand.”
“That doesn’t excuse it!”
“I know it doesn’t,” she shook her head. “He has hurt all of us, all in our own way.”
“Then why?” He was starting to calm down, looking back at her. “Why?”
“I don’t know,” she looked him in the eye. “Just let us handle this, okay?”
“Okay…” Jace lowered his gun only for Loren to swoop in and pluck it from his hands with a smile. “I don’t even…”
“It’s alright,” she said, feeling the tension in his shoulders loosen up and his body fight to stay in place. “He’s not worth it, we both know that now. He’s just a sad—”
“I’m just what?” Cronus sprung off of the throne, unsheathing his saber from his hip. Katrijn turned to see her brother, red faced and dashing at her. He slashed wildly at her head, and she pushed Jace out of the way and barely ducked under the wild shot, pulling her other knife free and gripping tightly onto it. “Go on, finish what you had to say, dearest sister.” His right leg danced forward, his hand quickly flicking and the sword arcing toward her left arm. She brought her knife up to barely deflect the shot, feeling the force of the blow pushing her off balance.
“You are just a fool, Cronus.” She regained her footing, throwing a feint with her left knife that brought his sword up to deflect only for her to quickly rotate her right shoulder in, bringing the knife in toward his chest with a slashing motion. Katrijn could have easily connected and left a red gash across his chest, but instead, she pulled back, her shoulder driving into his chest instead, knocking him back onto the velour-carpeted dais.
“You are just a godsdamned fool, Cronus.” She looked down at him, laying on the ground and scrambling for his sword.
“You are beaten, Cronus,” O’Neil let out a sigh. “Don’t be a fool here, son.”
“You are not my father!” he screamed. “You aren’t even my uncle, we just call you that out of pity.” Cronus sprang back to his feet, wildly jabbing the sword toward Katrijn’s midsection, but she crossed the blades of her knives to catch it, redirecting the blade to her side and hearing it clang against the floor, leaving him disarmed.
“Oh, Cronus,” she heard her mother cry out. “Please, stop this now.”
Cronus reached for a smaller blade on his belt only for Katrijn to slash the left knife across his arm and brought the right one up to his throat. “Stop, please,” she found herself pleading. She wasn’t looking into the eyes of the madman who had murdered her father and had haunted her for years, it was just the scared little boy she had gone easy on when they practiced swordplay as children. “I don’t want to do this, brother.”
“You don’t understand,” he gurgled. “It’s over, we’ve lost.”
“I don’t…un
derstand.” She kept her grip tight and the knife at his throat. “Uncle?”
“Katrijn,” he nodded solemnly. “Your brother has made a grave error, I’m not sure that—”
“The gate has been activated,” Trallex’s voice echoed throughout the chamber, causing everyone to freeze. Katrijn felt her blood run cold.
“Dear gods,” O’Neil muttered.
“What?” She loosened her grip on the knife, pushing Cronus back, him falling back into the throne, grasping at the large gash on his arm. “What’s happening?”
“No, it can’t be.” Her mother stood up, approaching the Cydonian. “Has anything come through yet?”
“One ship has thus far,” Trallex stated. “It looks like a flagship.”
“Fuck,” O’Neil let out.
“What?” Katrijn felt so helpless seeing her uncle, mother and Trallex so concerned while Cronus sat in defeat, giving up so easily. None of this had gone as planned, that much was for certain.
“It’s a flagship, that means that more are soon to follow.” He turned to Cronus. “How many ships have your men built?”
“I don’t know what you are—”
“How many ships? I don’t have time for your bullshit, Cronus!” O’Neil snapped at Cronus, who cowered.
“The fleet should be about 4,000 or so…”
“That’s it? You’ve built 4,000 ships and you knew that you crossed them,” he rubbed his temples. “Dear gods.”
“Someone tell me what is going on here.” Katrijn was beginning to feel upset, overlooked.
“Your brother made a deal with the Earth Ministry, handing the Gimle system over to them to strip-mine in exchange for leaving us alone.”
“Wait, are you telling me we’ve been dealing with the Earth Ministry this entire time in secret?” She felt outraged.
“Yes,” O’Neil sunk down into Kara’s throne, grasping at his side, his skin pallid.
“That is a royal thr…” Cronus started, only for O’Neil to pull a gun from his belt and point it at his head.