One couple, Alonso and Hermia Fontaine, were stationed at the smallest of the moons Padua, still trying to keep the fighting spirit alive during times of separation. When they came together, they spent their entire time doing the wedding night and honeymoon over and over.
Afterwards, Hermia wanted to go see her friends in Cyprun. So Alonso and Hermia made the trip themselves there to see them. They took the trip by cruise spaceship just so they could say they travel in style. When they got there, they separated. She went to find her friends while he went to find his.
Hermia found hers in the hospital. Diana was the first to see her. They were busy guarding the wounded, but they still had time to give out hugs. Juliet was the most proud.
The clique was complete. Since the nurses were busy, Hermia decided that all of them had to go out for the night. She had told her husband to tell the same thing to the boys.
That night was on Moonshine Day.
The nurses and the girl warrior went by train to Centina Plaza, the party center for teenagers and young adults as well as the political centers for ministers. Throughout the ride, it was nothing but laughs and remembrance.
“So what did you do out here while I was away?” Hermia asked.
All of the girls wondered something else. Juliet broke the talking. "We should be asking what you were doing back in Padua with Alonso?”
“Must you ask? Do you want all the gory details? I don’t think you’re ready for it.”
Hermia told them anyway and held nothing back. All the nurses giggled.
“What about you guys?” Hermia asked. “How are all the men here?”
“You should ask Juliet,” Diana said. “She’s the one with the man in her life.”
Hermia smiled. “What’s this all about? Is any of this true?”
Juliet knew she had to say something or the other girls would just beg it out of her. So she told the story about all the trips they made together, all their conversations.
From her mouth, Lucius Gaines was the man of the hour and the nurses listened carefully.
When Juliet finished, Hermia asked, “So when’s the wedding?”
“Not for a while,” Juliet said. “Maybe when all of this is done.”
“Well, you better not waste the time. This is going to be over before you know it and who knows how long that love will last.”
More laughs followed until they came to the station. Then, it was a good and exciting walk to the Plaza. There, near the entrance, they met up with the boys. Alonso led the pack as he went to Hermia, held her up in the air and kissed her passionately. Lucius was pleased to see Juliet, but the closest thing to affection they had was a handshake.
All went inside the Plaza crowded with Cyprians. All waited for the glow of the lights, which could be seen thanks to the stars in the sky. The Centina Plaza was an outside stadium, so there was a chance to see the starlight as close up as they wanted. The middle of the stadium was made into one grand dance floor. Wine flowed from artificial fountains and everyone wanted a sip. Hermia wasted no time and went straight for the wine fountains.
Despite all the fun around them, Lucius could not bring himself to do it. He had to have fun, like Juliet told him to, but all he could think about was the upcoming attack. He found a spot where it was not that many people, but no matter where he was, there were people outside, mostly in romantic interludes. A part of them really disgusted Lucius to the point when he had to be alone from his friends, the party, and everything else.
Lucius ended up going to a cliff and seeing the stars, something he did back in Solaria in the Nican Desert. Just as he was enjoying his solitude, streams of light illuminated the sky. He was sure that his friends were enjoying it. The fog of lights reminded Lucius of the aerial dogfights from his missions. There was no way he could be in high spirits as long as there was a chance an attack was coming.
****
In space, there was a sort of silence a person could never get when he was home.
That was what Chosen thought as soon as he was out of the mothership and heading for his destination. He felt as if time was going slow and all he could see was stars that seemed to grow in size as he approached his destination.
He could see the lights flashing, along with the five thousand or so Vandals planes heading in the same direction. He felt like a mere proton compared to them. All he knew was that he had a mission to perform and he could die if he thought anything else not pertaining to the mission.
He kept telling himself to take it easy and do what he was ordered to do.
"Take it easy, Chosen! Take it easy! You done this before. This is just another mission!"
He was pleased about one thing: thank goodness his mother and brother were not at Cyprun on this night that would go down in history as the day the ATM stood still.
****
78 B.E.
He was back in Solaria, awaiting orders and feeling defeated to the point he just wanted to go out in a blaze of glory. After everything that had happened, ace pilot Lucius Gaines had to think about a couple of things. He knew that his fellow comrades were facing a dilemma. After so long at war, the stigma was still there, no matter how much alcohol he tried to drink to take it away.
Alone in his old room pacing around waiting for word on anything, he faced the demons head on, making sure they did not see him sweat. He refused visitors and his own parents. He came out every now and then to eat and wash his body in the bathtub.
Other than that, all he had were the memories of that night Cyprun died on Moonshine Day...
****
It happened so suddenly. Lucius was alone, sleeping under the stars near someone’s villa when it happened. He had just come back from the festivities of the great moonlightings.
It started out as light-sounding explosions. Then, the sounds grew louder. Lucius' suspicious mind was on high alert, but in a split second, he thought it was his head playing tricks on him.
He saw some lights in the horizons, but these lights were whiter than usual, and were making grand explosions. He started running for the explosions. Before he knew it, he was in the midst of the firefight. Missiles and bullets came from everywhere, blowing villa after villa. He saw from a distance that parts of the Centina Plaza were in ruins.
From that moment, two things entered his mind. One was that he faced another full-scale attack and he was in the streets; and all he wanted was a plane so this time, he could fight back along with his friends, who he was sure were already defending themselves.
It took him a while to get to the airport and he was anxious as a scorching fire to get into an Ostro. When he did, there was no stopping him. His Ostro was full of dirty tricks and Lucius made sure that he used them all to his advantage.
He could see the Vandals swarming like locusts on crops. He only hoped that his friends were okay and if they were not, he could get to them in time before they were killed.
The firefight lasted for hours before the majestic beach planet Cyprun laid in ruins. Lucius landed on the streets near the demolished Centina Plaza. He could not find anyone he knew. Nothing but panic and bloody deaths were around him. For the second time, he observed war and destruction up close and personal. However, unlike the attack on Tier, he was disgusted and his bloodlust was increasing. He wanted to follow them and take out as many enemy planes as he could, going out in a blaze of glory.
The only stopping him was that he had friends to find.
He took his shadow Ostro and flew down to the hospitals to find information. What he found next was applauding. Bodies coming in left and right. There was so much commotion that people coming in stretchers was falling off them and being run over by an influx of wounded and scared Cyprians. Some of them were pilots fighting from the land and in the air.
He rubbed his forehead roughly, breaking apart internally.
"Juliet, where are you?" He asked himself.
The first person he was able to find was Nurse Diana Cartier.
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"Diana, where's Juliet?"
Diana said nothing and went back to helping out with separating bodies between the wounded and dead. Those that were dead were given a mark on their forehead while the wounded were put somewhere in a room where they could be tended to. Being a nurse, Diana knew a day like this would come and she was ready for it, whether she liked it or not. She was more worried for the pilots who had to go back to the fight when all was calmer.
When she got a chance, Diana took a trip with Lucius to another hospital where Juliet and his other friends could be. They had gotten separated after the attack. By this time, the Cyprian hospitals was getting situated with their people. Part of it was due to the doctors from other bases coming to Cyprun upon hearing the news about the attack.
Lucius saw Juliet for the first time as more wounded and dead entered her hospital. She with so much worry that she could not contain herself. Lucius tried to comfort her.
Then, he saw Alonso Fonatine in a corner, losing it to the point he wanted to die.
“What happened?” Lucius screamed.
Alonso kept rocking back and forth. Lucius had seen this look before and it could only mean one thing. He had lost comrades to the bony hand of death.
“She’s dead,” Juliet told him on his shoulder.
“Who?”
“Hermia.”
Lucius took another look at Alonso breaking down in tears profusely. He went to the room that he was near and saw that there were a few dead bodies inside.
One of them, he was sure, was Hermia Rasetta Fontaine.
****
Weeks after the attacks, there were many funerals. Some were for soldiers; other for nurses and other civilian workers in the war. Then, there was several for family members and other citizens. Around this time, spending more time in Sicili before he left, Lucius received news that Cyprun was not the only planet hit by Vandal planes. Padua and Tyre were hit the worst since they were the first to be hit before Cyprun.
The end result was Second Renaissance won the day in the Cyprun.
What really made the day of the soldiers were when Crystal Metropolis figurehead King Ichiamo came to visit and to give his condolences, with a large caravan of Democrat Guards with him. He shook the hands of the soldiers. It was the first time for Lucius to see an actual Santos king. He could not even be proud of the moment because his minds were on the fallen.
“You deserved these days more than I do,” Ichiamo told them. “You need time to relax.”
When the Santos king left, Lucius and the rest had left back to separate bases. He and his friends went back to Solaria to try and regroup upon the orders of the Santos king.
It was time well spent.
Lucius went back to see his family. The first time being home, he felt cold and old. It was not the same home when he left it. His neighborhood had become just another strip of land to him. He could not be satisfied with seeing them because for a year and a half, his only family had been his comrades. He ate their food, slept in the same bed he had been in as a child.
Still, there was not any warmth. It was as if he longed for loneliness more and more...
NINE: BYZANT UPRISING
The Second Renaissance was a young group of science and religion fanatics with no stable organization. So far, the only reason why they had not disintegrated after turbulent changes was because of the might of the House of Latium, one of its first sects. They had a hierarchy and titles to play around with and used them whenever they wanted to keep control among the followers.
However, they were not the only sects. Thanks to one of Solaria's wealthiest families, another sect formed known as the Suntoris Faction. They learned from the House of Latium about better organization. Led by Tortila Suntoris, they started becoming dominant by recruiting believers among Troyuvant gangsters and drug dealers.
This became the Suntoris Faction's personal army, the Byzants.
During the Force of Arms War, to those outside of the religion, the Children of the ATM Defense Forces had a stable enemy in the House of Latium. To those in the trenches of the Second Renaissance religion, it had become more complicated.
It started off successful, as the Second Renaissance saturated Solaria and crossed over to other planets and moons. They created a challenge for themselves trying to convert Troyuvant. It ended up successful, but it fired back on them as Troyuvant went to war to promote Second Renaissance by force.
This resulted in the attacks on Tier and Syra. The House of Latium became a feared terror group that had to be stopped. Ichiamo unleashed his Force of Arms decree and the House of Latium scrambled to try and clean up their act.
Just as they came close to doing so, Tortila Suntoris began pushing his own orders. Feeling as if he had his own army and could do what he wanted, he declared the Suntoris Faction its own entity separated from the House of Latium. In essence, he declared war on both the House of Latium and the entire ATM.
It was here that Tortila Suntoris came up with his own ingenious plan. He needed a major statement. Using the Byzants, he ordered them to go after the best target he could think of in his diabolical head.
It would become known as the "Bloody Mark of Cyprun!" One of the most devastating attacks in the Force of Arms War as the planet Cyprun and its surrounding areas were bombarded with missiles. The Byzants showed no mercy as they attacked with fervor, leaving no stone unturned. Many lives were perished in defending the ancestral home of the Santos.
A major victory for the Suntoris Faction, but it had an unwanted consequence. It did not stop Ichiamo Santos from wanting to bring pressure to the Second Renaissance sects. Then, the House of Latium disassociated themselves from Suntoris Faction, leaving the galactic barbarian Tortila Suntoris as the lone enemy of the entire ATM.
****
In his normal routine at his palace, Baptista sipped his tea, opened his laptop, and connected with all the news from ATM Media about the Force of Arms War. It was here he found stories about the brutal attack of Cyprun, the old planet home of the Santos clan. Then, he found stories about Ichiamo's last-ditch plan to end in the war in the Nova Bomb.
He knew this also meant that he had to finish his end of the bargain in stopping the sect. However, there were two reasons why he stalled to do this for so long.
The first was that the task was not as easy as it seemed.
As he was reading, his butler Damin bowed and whispered in his ear, "He's here like you asked!"
"Bring him here," Baptista ordered. Damin left and seconds later, escorted a young man in dramatic street clothes into Baptista's dining room.
"Welcome, Dorcas Camillo!" He brought out his hand, but Dorcas stood motionless.
"What do you want?" Dorcas asked.
"Straight to the point, I see? I understand perfectly." Baptista sat down and made himself comfortable. "Let me start by asking you a question. Are you happy being associated with Suntoris?"
"Excuse me?"
"I've done some research about your group. I have to say. It doesn't sound like much. A bunch of criminals and drug dealers. Then I went further and a couple of you stand out. You was one of them."
"So what?"
Baptista stood up. "So here lies the question. Why be just a mere server of the Byzants when you can be the driver or even a trader?"
Dorcas understood the terminology. In the Second Renaissance religion, servers were the soldiers and followers of the Code. The drivers were the supervisors and protectors of the Code. If you became a trader, it meant a member was in the power seat. He could manipulate any situation the hierarchy of the Renaissance stood for.
Dorcas was not one of those men, but Baptista could see that there was something in him that he could exploit.
"What do you want from me?" Dorcas asked again.
"I want to uplift the cause," Baptista said. "That's all I ever wanted. I just don't like the reputation that our religion has right now. How did you feel about the attack of Cyprun? Do you think it was justifi
ed?"
"That has nothing to do with me," Dorcas responded.
"But it does. It has to do with all of us. The last thing I want is to be associated with terrorists. You're not one, I'm sure. You're just a drug dealer."
Baptista exposed him and Dorcas just put his head down. Baptista did not know how he would react. He put his hand on his shoulder.
"We need a new generation of leaders," Baptista said. "If not a leader, at least a symbol."
"That's what you brought me here for? Just to say that?" Dorcas asked.
"Just give you something to think about with the next decisions you make."
Dorcas took his word as such and just left. Baptista grinned until he left and his manservant stood to his shoulder.
INIQUITOUS DOMINION: The Galactic Classic Page 19