“He will,” Giselle said. “Dorsky is his man.”
“I’m not so sure about that.”
“Cygni?” Giselle’s eyebrows drew together. “No holding back.”
She looked at Biren. He nodded.
“Dorsky helped me put the spy-grain in Revenant’s office.”
Giselle rolled her eyes. “So we can’t trust anything we get off of it.”
“Or maybe we can. He’s pretty upset that Revenant is ending his run as Premier.”
“Upset enough to betray his master?” She scowled.
“I think so, maybe,” Cygni took in a shuddering breath. “I’m pretty sure.”
She expected Giselle to object. Instead she stroked her narrow chin with long fingers. “I think I know a way to be sure.”
Her eyes lit up. “You do?”
“Leave it to me. I’ll need your help to get him to meet with me, though.”
She frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“I told you I have specialized cybernetics to get people to tell me things.”
“Whoa, now you’re talking about interrogating the Premier?” Biren asked.
“It’s better than killing him,” she responded.
He deflated. “True.”
“I just need to be close enough. You said he helped you. Maybe you can use that to get us a meeting.”
“Can’t the baroness do that?” Ila asked.
“Yes,” Giselle met Cygni’s eyes. “But I think it best not to involve her in this just yet.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. In the meantime, maybe you need to feel out how Agent Vargas is. Is he really on board for taking down Revenant?”
She nodded. “I guess we have a direction now, and a plan.”
“One my mother still won’t accept,” Biren said.
“Then tell her you’ll do the assassination and then don’t. It’ll buy us time. Put her off as long as you can, say you’re getting it set up. That should get us a few weeks at least,” Giselle said.
“Wait,” Sanul piped up. “I think Rega’s done with having me do those Siren canister runs to the Palace, but that doesn’t mean we can’t fake another one.”
“Trouble is,” Giselle said, “we won’t know if the Premier is going to be there when we go without either getting his itinerary or setting up a meeting.”
“Oh, true. Well, Baron Revenant is supposed to return soon, but there isn’t a CCTCN in Helix. I checked. So ‘soon’ means, at the earliest, about two standard months from now,” Sanul said.
“Tell your mother that,” Giselle said to Biren. “We have two-months to pull this off. Keep her from acting before we do. Let’s get to it.”
Cygni nodded. The plan might work, but there were still a lot of ifs.
“Who wants Khoreshe behh?” Giselle headed for the kitchen. Sanul and Ila followed her.
She took a step and found Biren’s hand on her arm. The touch drew her gaze up to his, and he leaned in close. His usual musk was stronger than normal, and her olfactory sensors detected his pheromones spiking.
“Are you okay?” He asked.
She shuddered, knowing that he wasn’t referencing anything they talked about tonight. “Shkur hasn’t even tried to get in touch with me since I saw him last. He’s moved to the bazaar. I still can’t believe it.”
“Sanul moved back home, right?” he asked.
“Yeah. That is an odd question.”
“Not really. It means you’ll be alone tonight after dinner.” He paused. “Unless you don’t want to be.”
“What are you asking?”
He smiled. “Think about it.”
She cocked an eyebrow. Was he asking what she thought he was? And if he was, did she want it? She wasn’t sure. She spent years hating him for abandoning her on Minlea IV, but those feelings were gone now. He seemed like the man she wished he’d been all those years ago since this whole mess started, and yes, she did want that, but he wasn’t hers anymore. She supposed being jealous meant some part of her hadn’t really let go of him. Since this seemed to have turned into a night of honesty, yes, she did want some piece of him, but she wasn’t sure if that desire was the pheromones from Ila, or something else. She wasn’t sure she would want all of him again, though, either, and it was so soon after Shkur… She couldn’t put herself through what Biren did to her again, but maybe he wasn’t saying she needed to do it. She didn’t want to be alone tonight. Had he seen that in her eyes? Was this some gesture of comfort, or was he angling to use her again? It’d be pretty stupid to do that right when they were in as deep as they were. Maybe she didn’t care either way. Maybe she just didn’t want to be alone.
“What about Ila?” she asked.
“Niu was too shy to ask you niuself,” Biren said.
She let that sink in and felt her heart rate pick up. That had to be the pheromones, she reasoned. “Let me think about it?”
“Of course.” He smiled, kissed her forehead, then went to join the others by the kitchen counter where Giselle was serving dinner.
Did she want this? She wasn’t sure. Maybe it would prove a good distraction for the night. She wasn’t one to turn down novel experiences, but was that what it was? All it was? Knowing Biren it could be, but Ila? Isinari had complex customs when it came to this sort of thing. What if she wound up hurting Ila? Would it hurt the group if she did this? It was probably a bad idea. She should say no despite her curiosity, despite her empty mess of an apartment. She was sure saying no was the right thing to do. It was the only choice, really.
She sighed and her stomach growled.
Decisions like this were best made on a full stomach. She decided she would eat first, then thank him and Ila, but refuse…
She almost jumped out of her skin when someone activated the holographic projector in the center of the living room. She blinked, staring at the spectral image of one of her former coworkers, Brett Cannon, in his signature blue suit hovering over the floor.
“—a ban on all interstellar travel, including freight and passenger ships. The Premier claimed it was a temporary measure made necessary by the recent deaths in the Barony. When asked if this meant the barons were murdered instead of dying in a tragic accident, as had been previously reported, the Premier left the podium—”
“They banned travel?” She sat up straighter.
“One moment.” Ila said from the kitchen. “It is true. Premier Dorsky announced the travel ban today. All FTL ships were ordered to transit to 300 AU and commence a holding orbit. All shuttles to those ships have been grounded.”
“What the hell is going on?” she said.
“Why 300 AU?” Biren asked.
“That’s the emergency holding orbit. It is far enough out that the effects of the ship’s gravity won’t be felt in a significant way over long periods of time,” Giselle explained. “It means this ban will last a long while.”
“Damn.” He looked at the projector again.
Cygni looked over her shoulder, seeing the frozen surprise on the faces of her teammates. “What’s going on?”
“Mom is going to freak,” Biren said.
“Then make sure she believes you when you present your answer to her plan,” Giselle stated.
“I will.”
Cygni wasn’t so sure it was possible, but she knew Lalande better believe him for all of their sakes.
Chapter Eighteen
Seika Zōsensho
41:2:44 (J2400:3175)
Just like before, there was a green flash when the Cephalon Sphere moved them through space and time. Ichiro blinked away the spots in his vision as his cybernetic corneas adjusted to the dim light of the make-shift life pod. Moving, even slightly, jostled him against the rover’s restraints and his equilibrium shifted in the sudden lack of gravity.
“Radiation levels stable. So far it looks like the atmospheric pressure is holding.” Enéas stared at a control panel attached to their jury-rigged life support system. The twins were
seated in the back with Armstrong and himself taking the front seats of the vehicle. Tengu was stretched out between the back and the front seats in a position Ichiro knew couldn’t be comfortable. They had to tie him down with utility straps, and he could feel the cerberai’s urge to squirm like it was his own.
“We have three hours of breathable atmosphere,” Europa added.
Armstrong looked over at him from the driver’s seat. “Well, I suppose if they don’ get here in time it’ll be an interestin’ find, four dead bodies in a ground-car floating through space.”
“Five,” he corrected, patting Tengu on the head.
“Five.” She nodded.
He smiled. “The look on the scanner-operator’s face would be quite something.”
Armstrong barked out a laugh.
“Go ahead and turn on the beacon,” he ordered the twins. It was an emergency radio meant to bring rescue to travelers lost on the surface of a planet, and the distress signal wasn’t as strong as a starship beacon. In normal circumstances it wouldn’t have been enough, but this was Seika Zōsensho, a top-secret shipyard system which he knew his father had seeded with all kinds of detection satellites to prevent intrusion. One of them, at least, should pick up the signal and relay it to the command center. Would it be in time? That was the only question that concerned him.
“I have to say, this is a pretty crazy endeavor,” Enéas stated.
Ichiro looked back over his shoulder. The bucket seats did not afford much leg room, and both he and his sister had their knees up against the backs of the front seats. “You could have thought of that before deciding to join us.”
“Hey, you need us, remember?” Europa said.
“We’re going to ensure our father is on your side,” Enéas stated.
“If we live,” Armstrong said.
“She has a point.” Enéas nodded.
“Unfortunately, a very good one.” Ichiro looked out the window. The sealant the twins used on it made the reinforced glass look wavy. “Is our DNA cooking in the cosmic rays right now?”
“Phykor doesn’t have an atmosphere or a magnetosphere,” Europa answered, “so, this vehicle was already hardened against cosmic rays.”
“At least there’s that,” he said, returning his gaze to the stars. Setha must be out there among them somewhere, he realized he had no choice but to believe it. He would go looking for her, he knew, but not until after his duties to his family and his barony were completed. As much as he wanted to go find her as he had before, he couldn’t this time. There was too much resting on him.
Tengu pushed his head into Ichiro’s arm, drawing his gaze. Their eyes locked together, and a strange feeling crept over the nape of his neck.
“So, ah,” Armstrong said and hesitated.
“What is it?” he asked, pulling his eyes from Tengu with some effort.
“I was wonderin’, since we have some time now, if you might want to share more about that Vita Ex thing you were talkin’ about yesterday.” She winked at Ichiro and turned to face the twins.
Tengu snorted.
“It’s proprietary,” Europa said.
“And secret,” her brother added.
“But you already told me it has to do with the Gemini system,” Ichiro said, picking up on Armstrong’s lead. “And if I’m going to consider adopting it, I think I should know more.”
The twins twitched in their seats and stared at him. “You are?”
“Revenant has declared war on me, and if my efforts fail in the Barony, yes, I might need something to give my corporate self-defense forces an edge.”
The twins licked their lips from left to right in unison.
“Well, in that case—” Europa began.
“—we should wait for father,” Enéas cut in. His sister pouted, but gave a single nod.
“Sure you can’ talk about it?” Armstrong asked. “The boss here would really like to know.”
The twins looked at each other and smiled.
“How about we tell you what we got up to with Ichi the last time we saw him?” Enéas asked.
Ichiro felt himself blush. “I’d rather we not.”
Armstrong’s mismatched eyes swung back and forth between them and a smile spread across her face. “Well, that sounds good.”
“See? She wants to know.” Europa’s eyes gleamed.
“But she doesn’t have to,” he muttered.
“Don’ let the lack of a cold beer stop you. Start yappin’.” Armstrong leaned back, twisting in her restraints so she could put her shoulder against the window and still have the twins in her line of vision.
They looked like they were going to explode with excitement, and Tengu picked his head up, focusing both of his furry ears in their direction. Ichiro groaned and hung his head, dreading the words that were going to come out of their mouths.
“First we have to ask a question,” Enéas said.
“How long have you known Ichi for?” Europa asked.
“Lil’ while. Not that long.”
“You’ve noticed he’s a bit tightly wound?” she asked.
“Not the words I’d choose,” Armstrong said.
“Well, he was then. It was obvious from the moment we stepped off the shuttle,” Enéas picked up.
“My aunt was hanging over me. You would be tightly wound if you had an aunt like mine.” Ichiro looked down at Tengu and stroked him between his ears. “I was a teenager. Aren’t all teens wound up?”
“We wouldn’t know,” Europa said.
“Well, regardless, he looked like he would snap if a stiff wind blew past. We knew right away we had to fix that. So, one night—”
“—we convinced him to bust out of that floating prison he lives in and join us for an excursion into town.”
“Town?” Armstrong frowned.
“Well, we mean the nearest population center,” Europa said.
“Which happened to be Tai-something, um…” Enéas trailed off.
“Taizora city,” Ichiro muttered.
“That was it, yes! Well, we borrowed a boat when no one was looking and headed into Taizora city. Little Ichi was nervous and got seasick—”
“I wasn’t seasick. Taiumijin don’t get seasick,” he cut in. “I was sick with worry about what my aunt was going to do to me when we got back.”
“Well, whatever it was,” Europa picked up for her brother, “he turned green before we got into dock, but we weren’t about to let that stop us. As soon as we got off the boat we took him to that place, ‘The Floating—’”
She was cut off by the bright blue flash of light ahead of them heralding a ship’s exit from the spherical distortion in space-time.
“Oh thank the Will,” Ichiro muttered, watching the length of a ship emerge from the Eienstein-Rosen Bridge. Her black hull, a long spindle covered in dark protrusions with two large toruses and a set of large relativity turbines, shimmered in the Cherenkov light. The fore-section of the craft was hooked at the base, making it resemble the head of a dragon in the typical Mitsugawa style. The craft vanished in the flash of the collapsing bridge behind it, becoming a shadowy silhouette against the stars. Not a single light shone on its hull.
“What class of ship is that?” Armstrong asked. Ichiro looked over his shoulder to see her staring open-mouthed out the window. The twins wore similar expressions.
“It is my father’s greatest achievement in starship construction,” he responded, recalling the athenaeum file on the vessel in his implant. “She is the first, and bears the name of her class. She is the Kageryū.”
“Shadow dragon?” Enéas asked.
“You speak Taiumigo? Or are you using a translation program?” he asked.
“The former,” Europa answered. “Father is an old believer in implanting language skills.”
“He thinks relying on translation programs is a flaw,” Enéas added.
“My father was like that as well.” Ichiro breathed in deep and connected to the rover’s comm system. “This
is Mitsugawa Ichiro to the Kageryū-maru. Come in.”
He stared at the dark shape of the vessel covering the stars. As the moments ticked by a tingle began in his gut. The ship wasn’t responding. Did they not believe him? It was possible considering the unusual method of their arrival and the strangeness of having a rover floating in space. Still, the ship’s computer should be able to match his voice up with records to verify his identity. He decided to send his biometric signature to reinforce it.
“Why aren’t they responding?” Europa asked.
Armstrong gave him a pointed look.
“This is a top-secret facility. They are just being cautious,” he said.
“I suppose…” she trailed off.
“My lord?” A timid voice responded over the comm after the long silence.
“As you might imagine, I need a pick up,” he said.
“Ah… Stand by.”
“Is something wrong?” Enéas asked.
“Maybe.” He frowned. What in the Void was going on? His people were never like this. Even given the strange circumstances the response should have been quicker and more confident.
The gentle tug of the restraints on his body told Ichiro they were moving. Through the rover’s windows he could see a light appear below the forward part of the silhouette that was the Kageryū. It broadened into a rectangle holding the haze of a plasma window through which he could make out the inside of a large docking bay. The closer they got the more his sense of unease increased. It wasn’t just their response that bothered him, it was the tone in the crewman’s voice. Of course, they didn’t expect him, but the crewman wasn’t surprised in the way one was when a superior showed up out of nowhere. The shock in his voice was far deeper than that.
“Keep alert when we get aboard,” he told Armstrong while watching the glow of the docking bay grow. “Something’s wrong.”
“Gotcha,” she responded.
“What’s wrong?” Europa and her brother looked nervous.
“I don’t know, but something is.” He sighed, supposing they would all find out soon enough.
The light in the rover brightened once they were inside the bay. He watched the doors slide shut behind them before turning his attention to the circular airlock ahead. The optical tractor beam slowed them to a stop when they were within three meters of the symbol of House Mitsugawa painted on its iris. Armstrong released her restraints and put a hand on her gun.
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