by John Short
“Something about his father paying us for saving him.”
“Jar, have someone from our intel team go talk to his worthless ass. Find out if his father is called Boss King and where to contact the male to collect our reward. I'm sure he'll tell us to kill his kid and go away, or something along those lines, but if we can contact the male, maybe our computer teams can find him. Then we'll send in our Special Troops to collect him and bring him to us. I want to know why he ordered his people to fire on one of my shuttles and then to tell me to drug one of our passengers.” Jon thought about his plan before adding, “I'll wager you your next cycles earnings that the plan was to keep the High One away from the novice, get the novice hooked on lustor and sell her to one of the pleasure houses. Except something went wrong and he sent his baby boy to destroy Sanctuary from space where no evidence could be found that linked this back to him. It seems like a lot of trouble for just one small female. I want vid of everything that male does, even if it’s just using the relief chamber. If he gives us what we want, we might arrange a meeting between father and son. Won't that just be special?” Jon looked at Jarrieal with an evil grin on his face.
Jarrieal returned Jon's grin before leaving the bridge in a much better mood than the one he had been in when he arrived. All he had to do now was keep Phillie away from King. If she found out about the person responsible for the young female's condition before they had the information they wanted, they'd never get anything out of King's dead body.
Jon commed down to Data and reminded them to be sure they copied all the data in the pirate Destroyer's banks. He could have saved his breath. They already had several copies with teams carefully examining every bit and byte of the data.
Chapter Seventeen
It had been an easy task to locate one of the trusted ships and torture its Captain to reveal where the planet was located. He could pay the male three times what the mourners did to keep it hidden, but why spend the money when an hour in chains with whips could pry the information from the male for free? Helios was very proud of what he'd done and could not contain himself as he told the entire story to the Investgator from Leviathan who had questioned him. He even gave him a direct com link to reach the crime boss who had been running most of the pirate operations and the slave trade on the rim.
Leviathan's data teams had easily located Boss King using the information they'd gotten from his son. It had been as Jon suspected. Boss King was the father of Helios and he was most happy to pay for his child's return. In fact, he was so happy, he was coming to meet them himself instead of simply sending one of his lackeys to fetch him. Helios had been sent out to pick up the novice but after several weeks with no sign of her arriving, he'd taken it on himself to attack Sanctuary. He thought that she had found a different ship to travel on, perhaps one of the ones trusted with the coords to the planet. His father had a real surprise in store for Helios and it would not be to his liking.
Taking only his two most trusted men with him, Boss King left the slipway at the appointed coords and could already see the Destroyer he had assigned to his worthless son sitting in the distance. What he could not see, because it happened behind him where his own viewers did not show, was the Leviathan's bright flash as it came out of jump. His first grasp that something was wrong was when a golden mist surrounded his yacht and his expensive systems began to shut down.
Soon he was floating in space with no power. Only then did he hear the sound of grapples grabbing his ship and pulling it into the maul of the huge ship that had somehow captured his little private yacht. As the only surviving partner of TransCo, he'd soon learn who had hijacked him in deep space and make them pay. He had spent cycles building up his position as partner in the company and as the faithful servant of the Regent. Now after several carefully arranged accidents, he owned the company, lock, stock, and escape capsule. He was also in line for promotion among the Royal Houses. Nothing would stand in his way, not his offspring and certainly not whoever this monster ship's Captain was.
When the knock came against his hatch, he readied his plasma weapon and opened the hatch to greet his captors. As he raised his pistol in their direction, a sudden pain shot through his arm and into his brain before he watched his arm fall on the deck.
“You won't be needing that here Boss King.” a strangely familiar voice told him. Looking to his left he almost fainted from fright when he saw the massive male dressed in a silver tunic and black leggings wielding a sword that seemed to burn with its own light. The massive male who stood before him was also wearing a midnight black cape with gold edging that hid his face. The image of a fierce dragon floated behind this overly huge male.
“Welcome to Leviathan, Boss King. Please follow these kind gentle males and they will bring you to your quarters.” Carefully studying the apparition before him, Boss King could not make out the face of the man in the cape because the hood had his features so obscured.
“Why should I follow your men anywhere?. You've ruined my arm, not to mention my best suit!” King yelled. Recognition hit him like a blast from a plasma rifle! Despite all his efforts to end Jon Connell, here he stood alive and with an armed force of males backing him up!
“Well for one thing, if you don't, my men will have to shoot through you to get those two you brought with you. If you do, I'll deal with your men before I come to pay my respects at your quarters. I am a man of my word Boss King. I will not harm them provided they throw down their weapons and follow you to their quarters without causing trouble. If they try anything, I'll be right behind them and you. Once I've cut them in two, I'll hack off both your legs before I take your other arm and finally your head.” This male had it coming, but Jon needed information before having him and his son killed.
Looking over his shoulder Boss King nodded to his men giving them a signal to attack anyone who entered the yacht. “I'm leaving now.” he said. “I happen to be Lexonian from the Royal House on Haven. You have no authority over my family or me. Give me my son and we'll leave. I won't even press charges for the damage you've done to my arm. Any good Healer can repair that minor problem.”
“Strange as it seems, I agree with part of what you've said.” Jon calmly said. “I am also from Haven and have some experience with you bunch of overly self important Royals from the Summer Palace. However, neither of us is on Haven now. You are on my ship, far beyond the rim in deep space. There is no ruler out here except the male with the biggest militia. Right now, that's me and I'm slowly riding the sector of your pirates. I have claimed legal salvage on your four TransCo. Destroyers and half a handful of your larger cargo transport ships. Now I apparently have your private yacht too. It would seem that you own nothing out here and have very little left on the inner worlds that my people haven't taken including your hidden accounts on Lexon II, but the clothes on your back still belong to you. So you see Boss, on my ship you are nothing. Come out here, now!” Jon demanded.
“He cut off the Bosses arm with a sword and there is no blood!” came an excited cry from inside the yacht. “I didn't come out here to get killed for you King. I'M COMING OUT!” one of the males yelled, before tossing a pistol to the deck and quickly getting out of the yacht where he was taken into custody by Jon's team who put restraints on him and led him away.
“Thirty seconds and I come in.” Jon hollered up into the yacht.
“You'll kill me if I come out. I know who you are now Butcher, you're that freak Connell.” King shouted down.
“If you stay in there, I'll just toss you back into space with no power and let your lifeless body float forever after you run out of air.” Jon threatened. “I've heard that's not a very nice way to die.”
“Alright! I'm coming out too!” and the second of Boss King's males threw his weapon down and jumped to the deck to be taken into custody.
“Don't make me come in after you King!” Jon shouted. “My mid-meal is getting cold.” Jon's team snickered at this and Jon gave them a stern look to silence them.
>
“Go get that piece of sandworm dung.” Jon ordered. “Stand him right here in front of me.” Four men ran up into the Yacht and the sounds of muffled gunfire could be heard coming from inside the ship. In a few minutes, Jon's men came back out carrying the limp form of Boss King. They dropped him to the deck and stood away from the unconscious male.
“We only stunned him sir. He was trying to get another weapon.”
“Take him to the same room as his offspring and throw him in.” Jon ordered. “Let's see what they'll have to talk about once he wakes up.”
“What should we do with his arm?” one of the men asked.
“He won't be needing it anymore. Dispose of it with the trash.” Jon told him.
Several hours later, Jon was sitting alone in the Umin control room at one of the stations that controlled the planet killer weapon. This had become one of his hiding spots on the huge ship. When he felt the need to be alone, he often came here. Talga more often than not soon joined him and sat beside him to be petted.
It would be so very easy to transfer everyone to one of the other ships in his growing fleet of vessels then fly Leviathan to Haven first and then to Lexon II and blow both planets out of existence. He would destroy Haven first for turning him into the lonely adult he'd become and Lexon II for being home to the Royal House that had stolen away his one love. The last planet on his list would be Canari Prime. That was the place that had killed his friend Zeprik and was the largest producer of the illegal lustor drug. The very drug that was used to change Lexonian females from innocent daughters to sex starved pleasure females.
“Take a care Warrior” an angry voice called to him. “The time comes when you must decide to forgive. If you can not, my ship will betray you and you will be he of the painting knowing only darkness and death when love is calling.”
Jon had come to almost know that voice. Each time he allowed himself to have thoughts of using the terrible weapons hidden inside this ship, that voice had come to him, always warning him to forgive rather than give into his desire for revenge. Every time he dreamed, the voice came to warn him. It was as though the ship itself were telling him that it must never be used for personal gain or horrible things would happen. Over the last several sleep periods, Jon had given up trying to rest. Constant dreams of battles and of lost companions crowding the rest from his mind.
Lately there had been another voice in his dreams. It was the voice of his dead friend, Prince Zeprik, begging Jon to come and save him. Each time he heard his friend's voice, Jon had awoken with tears running down his face and sobs causing his chest to heave. “I tried to save you Rik. I promise you, I tried!” Jon called out to the empty room as for the first time in over a cycle tears ran freely from his eyes even though he was fully awake.
“There you are!” an excited Phillie said as she came into the Umin control room. “We've been all over this ship looking for you! Jar and I were worried sick that you'd over done it again and fallen someplace.”
“I'm fine little sister. Thank you for worrying about me.” Jon honestly told her. Phillie had not only been a good friend but Jon had learned to understand that she really did love him like her own brother, something he was very thankful for. “I come here when I need to get away and think.”
“What has you thinking this time that you need to hide yourself away in a place like this?” she asked, as she waved her arm around to point at the ominous room designed for only one thing, the utter destruction of a planet and all life on it.
“Phillie, what would you say if I told you I was thinking of getting everyone off this ship and hiding it again where it can't be found for another two hundred cycles? The power in this room alone is a great temptation. Too much for any one person to have. I may be the last person alive who carries the genes to operate it, but what's to say someone in the future doesn't figure out someway around that and bring it back for evil. This ship has served it purpose. It's time for it to be put to rest far away from evil males.”
“I could construct a remote so you could program it to go someplace only you know about. That way, one of your descendants in the future could find it if it's ever needed again. Just like you found it when you needed it.” Phillie offered.
“Phillie, I've come to realize that I will never have any offspring. I'm the last of the Connell line. The one female I will ever love as my mate, the one I would freely give my seed, has rejected me.” Jon sadly confessed. “Anyway, I could put everyone to work on the Destroyers and the Carriers, maybe even buy a few more ships. How would you like to be in charge of twenty or more ships? With what we already know about the King family, TransCo is history. Either I claim the rights to its vessels on grounds of the current owner's crimes or they get sold at auction. Then have Leviathan make her last trip, maybe fly her into a sun and burn her up so she can never be used again.”
“There is still too much we can learn from this old ship. The healing tubes in medical could save millions if we could figure out how they work. Engine construction is another thing. Yes, I managed to modify our slip drives, but to actually build a jump drive from the basics is far beyond our abilities. Leviathan is far too valuable to waste Jon.” Phillie explained. “If these weapons are all you're worried about, let me figure out how to take them apart and melt down the pieces so no one can copy the design.”
“Can that even be done?” Jon asked her.
“It must be. You can see how everything was molded, so the metal was a liquid once. Even those two tigers that stand guard over this room.” Phillie assured him. “Give me some time and I'll figure out how to do it again. That way we'll pull out the really bad stuff and keep the things we can put to a peaceful use.” Phillie almost begged. She had grown to love this ship and think of it as her home. She did not want to lose it. “Besides, I read in the data that only a certain group of Lexonian females could fire this weapon. So unless you find a way to turn yourself into many, all of them female and find a ring called the Sun Stone, the weapon can never be used.”
“Alright Phillie, I'll let you have your toy.” Jon smiled at her and she slapped him on the arm. “Its your toy. I'm just its mechanic!” she laughed. “Come on, the computer guys have some things to show you. You have really opened up a can of it this time Jon Connell.”
“Maybe I should use that as my call sign... Can Opener calling Wrenches, are you clean? Should we call Jackal?” he kidded her.
Phillie punched him in the arm, but she giggled at the same time.
Sitting at a long conference table in one of the rooms located on the same level as the Data Center, Jon watched the video that had been prepared of the father and son who had caused so much trouble among the planets for cycles.
“Boy, why didn't you make it to the meeting place on time?” Boss King asked his son.
“I was busy at the farm, why didn't you stop the High One from leaving Hiliost 5.” the son asked. “Besides the transport you arranged had orders to wait if my Destroyer wasn't there.”
“That wasn't my fault. Somehow they got their message through to the Butcher and he came for them. My people on the planet could not prevent him from taking them. Can you believe the nerve of that guy? He walks into a bar on a planet where I own nearly every night-club and pleasure house in town except that exact one, and walks out with the two females I've been paid to stop!
I sent six of my fastest ships to stop them in space. Two of them were fully armed fighters with trained pilots. Most of my men got blown up before the shuttle they were in just disappeared. Then three more shuttles were attacked. This time from behind! I saw the data from the surviving ships and they all matched. The shuttle just blinked out of space like that.” Boss King said with a snap of his fingers. “It appeared again out on the far edge of the system where another ship picked it up and it too blinked once and was gone! I've never seen a ship enter the slip so fast before.”
“Well, don't worry about it. I took care of it. There is no way she survived the bombs. That ne
w weapon is really nice, sit back and destroy an entire city without using any real energy. It's better than all of your suicide ships put together. That's what has me worried. If they got video of my ship bombing the Sanctuary, I'm toast. If that happens Father, I'm going to take you and U'Lanto down with me. I know enough to have you both put to death.”
“Don't worry about it boy. U'Lanto promised he would cover us. You're too young to remember, but back when you was just a bawling brat, your uncle and I did a job for him when we blew the tracks and caused that monorail to crash on Haven. That time we killed the Queen. U'Lanto came through for us on that one. Nobody questions him, not even the King.
This is nothing compared to causing the death of the Queen. This whole affair will be swept away in a month at most and we'll be promoted into the upper houses with a nice home on Lexon II, not that hole we have now on Haven. We'll have all the young females we can drug up and use in anyway we like. Just like we used to do with your mother.” the elder King laughed. “It sure would have been nice to get our target drugged and in our bed just once though. She was a real looker, but then you always liked the really young ones didn't you boy?”
Jon switched off the video and rested his head in his hands. After all these cycles to find out his parents had been killed during the murder of a Royal was a shocker, far beyond the other things he already knew about the two King males he had detained on his ship. This mysterious U'Lanto was somehow involved in both the murder of the Queen and having his friend the Crown Prince murdered in the Canari raid. It became too much for him to contain. Feeling his pain well up inside him, he threw his head back and roared like his pet tiger before slamming his fists down on the table and cracking the heavy wooden top!
Standing just outside the door to the conference room, Phillie looked at the three females that she had brought up to speak to Jon. They had all agreed that now was the time to show Jon all the truths they had uncovered and hope he could hear them. If he turned his back on these truths, he might not believe the two most important truths. That's when they heard his roar and the sound of him cracking the tabletop when he hit it come through the heavy door. Phillie actually shuttered and the others jumped. “I've never heard him that upset before. Something on the vid must have seriously set him off. You still want to try this?” she asked, looking between the females as they all nodded. “OK. Here's Jar now with the rest of Jon's flight crew. If anybody can calm him down, they can.”