That was when he started thinking about going into a new line of work…
****
Isabella Santos stopped worrying about Hector when her father passed away. As far as she was concerned, she was the substitute Santos queen until Hector got married again.
One thing she did know too well was her husband’s infidelities. She knew almost all of the women Hector had slept with, ranging from prostitutes to wives of most of Crystal Metropolis’ prestigious cursers and strators. There was never any love in the relationship since they were set up to marry. Isabella was content with the arrangement, giving her the chance to breathe a little easier.
The only thing that bothered her about the arrangement was that Hector forbade her seeing any men, as if she did anything, it would cause scandal. Sometimes, he would express this notion through verbal abuse. He told her that not only will no man ever love her, but if someone did, he was a dead man.
By this time, Hector had already received the reputation of a tyrant, and Isabella tried all she could to escape it. She had known of the repercussions of being more than what a leader was supposed to be.
One day, as she came out of her room from resting, she headed to the throne room to see the court. She ran into a conversation between Hector and a mysterious curser. She had seen this curser before and heard him talk about collecting some arms. What was shocking was that this was not an inquisition, but a backstabbing action on the king’s part.
Words were exchanged about each other’s character. Then, Hector came down from the throne and went to the curser. They were standing a few feet from each other.
“I want what’s yours,” Hector said. “Do you think you can run an operation like that and I wouldn’t know? You must be a bigger fool than I thought? And if that’s the case, then I have to do something about that.”
Then, from out of nowhere, Hector brought out a pistol and shot him in cold-blood. He smiled as the curser's body fell on the marble floor. She had seen first-hand that Hector was just as cruel as his court.
At that point, she was in fear for her life and had no one she could turn to for help because anyone could be a spy of Hector. So many times she asked herself why deal with it another day, but it faded quickly without another thought.
She told herself there was only one way to take out a man like Hector. Someone had to kill him. With Bianca and Pedro dead, no one else could control his maniacal urges.
Sometimes, she wished that Bianca was here; the only person she could talk to about anything in her mind. She never knew her fate except what the papers said.
She was murdered by pirates, they said.
Something in her heart never believe the news for one second. Seeing how Hector acted the minute she died, suspicion pointed straight at him. If he could have his own mother killed, she was in greater danger than ever.
She decided to leave Crystal Metropolis for a while. In taking several of her trips, she had found two new friends; one in human form, the other liquid.
Metine DVX came in her life in her first trip. She was with some friends, wives of Crystal Metropolis strators. They had turned her on to it, seeing how she felt with the burden of being queen. They told her it would relax her senses, but wanting to feel defiant for once, she tried it out.
The first taste was the greatest sensation she ever had. Those few sips were out of this world for her.
“Where could I find some of this stuff?” she asked her friends.
They told the perfect spots in the ATM to find more. They even told her that Hector himself has some metine bases he required secretly, which meant violently to her.
Metine had become a part of Isabella Santos’s new program on her life. Every chance she got, when she felt her body needed a push into the extreme, she took large quantities by mixing it in with some herbal tea so that Hector never found out.
There was only one problem. Sometimes, she would get headaches. That was when she called on a doctor to tell her some information about metine. Iago Fenton, the son of Dr. Claudius Fenton, told her that in taking the drugs, the headaches were only part of the package, but nothing to worry about. Iago knew of the influx of metine users and seen similar situations.
“It was nothing to worry about, my queen,” Iago told her. “Just shorten up on your doses when taking it.” He could have told her to stop, but metine wasn't seen as a narcotic, so there was no cause for alarm.
In taking another trip with some friends was where the second new friend came into the picture. He was the pilot: Lucius Gaines.
She had heard of this man from her housewife friends. He was a former general of the Beau Lombards fleet in Crystal Metropolis that flew to all of the planets of the ATM. He stepped down from the title and became just a part-time pilot, something that was comfortable with him.
Wanting to get away from the loudness of her friends, she went to talk with the pilot and sparked a conversation with him. Before she said a word, she saw that Lucius was smoking a metine pipe, another way to inject metine into the body.
She grinned. “I heard that your name is Lucius Gaines. Nice name.”
Lucius saw that the Santos queen was speaking to him. He circled to see if anyone else was around.
“Don't worry! No one's around. Besides, no one needs to know my business any more than Hector deserves to be king.”
He was in agreement.
The two of them talked about everything from life to their destination, Tier, for some kind of gathering hosted by a religious leader calling himself Kasuto.
“He’s some kind of motivational speaker who practiced the Code of the Second Renaissance,” Isabella said.
It was the first time Lucius heard anyone of royalty speak of the religion since his rescue mission in the Force of Arms War. Since then, it had been one scrimmage after another from the sects. So he stayed away from it. Still, it was a pleasant time with the queen without him asking why she was taking this trip.
The plane landed on Tier’s Galla Pucheria Airport. Before they got out, Isabella asked Lucius to come with them to see Kasuto for himself. Lucius agreed and he was the only man in a gang of women. On one hand, he wished that one of those women were Juliet. On the other, with the conversation he had with Isabella, it may not have been the right time.
At a temple known as the Galla Temple, thousands of Second Renaissancers gathered to see the spiritual leader for themselves. Isabella was a little anxious, but her friends were full of comments.
"He's so handsome," one of them said.
"Is he married?"
They saw him as some handsome player.
Then, the moment came. From a caravan of robotic horses and cloaked men and women, on the only elephant in the bunch, Kasuto presented himself to the masses. They were heading from the desert to the Galla, where the people waited with cheers and screams. Most of the females exposed their breasts to him to see if he would touch it. Lucius was able to get a closer look at the character.
Then, something clicked in his head.
“It can’t be,” he said.
Isabella saw Lucius’s face. “You know him?”
“At this point, I wish I didn’t”
Kasuto was none other than Traveling Byzant trader Chosen Toshio. Lucius could recognize that yellow face from anywhere, despite the long, white facial hair and the small wrinkles around the eyes from his time in the desert.
He came off of the elephant and unleashed his hands to the masses. They touched them as if he was a god. Lucius smiled. A former student he saw as a jealous overachiever who was against the universe and a pilot who went against the Santos order, was getting all the praise from an array of followers; mostly women.
Kasuto walked with his entourage inside the Galla. Guards came to the front of the door, blocking the passage inside. Everyone tried to come in and followed him, but it wasn’t time yet. Lucius chuckled at the ridiculousness of these people.
“What do they see in him?” Lucius asked the queen.
/> “Who’s he to you?” Isabella asked.
“Someone I knew from home. A long time ago.”
The queen and her friends finally made it inside the Galla and were astonished with the spectacle of the inside; designs and paintings of different Second Renaissance figures all over the place.
“The message is more important than the masterpieces,” Isabella said.
Then, they went inside a stadium-like room with seats everywhere, except a center circle, where there were a few seats and a podium for Kasuto. Lucius sat with Isabella. The other women separated themselves from the queen so they can say what they wanted about Kasuto or her.
“Why do they call him Kasuto?” Lucius asked.
“It means the light,” Isabella said. “What was his real name?”
“Chosen Toshio.”
“Nice name,” Isabella said.
Then, out came Kasuto, in different white and brown royal-like clothes; the signature colors for Second Renaissance. He came to the podium and everyone started clapping as loud as they could. Kasuto raised his arms and the clapping stopped immediately.
“All praises to the Cypher and Flamer,” Kasuto said. Everyone repeated after him. Then, he said, “All of you are here for a sermon. Well, what if I told you that this is not a sermon?”
Everyone commented among one another.
“I came here to plea for the suffering. The suffering caused by the treachery of the Santos king. Some of you know of this treachery. Some of you are part of it directly. Do not worry. I'm not aiming at you. The Santos king will know soon enough the power of the Code. There’s no room in the new universe for the viciousness of Hector Bozario Santos.
“I want all of you to know that this is being recorded for all sides. Soon, the Santos will feel this message. There will be no more sermons. If you’re not in this battle, then this is the time to leave. You won’t be disrespected as anything lower than what you are. Just know that destruction of the Santos regime is underway.”
As Chosen Toshio, or Kasuto, continued to talk, Isabella's hands sweated. She thought there was going to be some kind of planet-shattering sermon. Instead, Kasuto issued a direct attack against King Hector.
Lucius could tell from the words that it was the same old stuff. Nevertheless, his audience clapped, asking for more. Some of Isabella’s friends cheered for him as well. He wondered if Isabella noticed her friends’ reactions. Isabella got up from her seat and walked out of the room. Lucius followed her.
Isabella went outside. She could see the sky turning slightly dark. Lucius came out and stood near her. He wanted to comfort, but he didn't want anyone to see him and spread rumors.
"What is it?” Lucius asked.
"I don’t know,” Isabella said breathing hard and holding her head. Lucius was going to comfort her, but Isabella stuck out her head to stay away.
Then, she whispered, “I… I hate that man…”
"What?”
"I hate Hector. He’s as treacherous as Kasuto said. I know this for a fact. I’ve seen it. He doesn’t care about the Santos family. He doesn’t care about the ATM. I’ll be surprised that he cares about anything.”
"Isabella, why haven’t you told anyone about this?”
"Tell who, Lucius? Who can I tell? I mean he cheats on me with other women and I’m supposed to say nothing about it. But he would kill me if I ever betrayed him. I have to make friends in secret. What kind of life is that? You tell me, Lucius Gaines! What kind of life is that?”
Isabella turned her head and started crying. Lucius came closer. This time, he stretched out his arms and Isabella leaned into him. In fact, she came to him and hugged him tight. Lucius could still hear the cheers from inside the Galla. It was louder than ever. It became clear that from the mounting enemies of the Santos throne, another name has been added to the list.
In looking at particles of stars forming in the sky, Lucius Gaines also made it clear that from this moment on, for some reason, whether it was the intoxicating smell of her perfume or the curves on her body, but something made it clear that he had to look more into protection for Isabella, the last surviving child of the late King Ichiamo, his good friend...
****
112 B.E.
There was a word in the new decade of the ATM that people got familiar with
Connections.
It was a word Hector was getting familiar with too well, at least according to his biggest critics, the Strator Circle. No one knew what Hector was doing behind the scenes, but they knew what he was doing above it.
The above picture wasn't a pretty sight. He still had his parties and his orgies. Worse of all, he still had his torture chambers with likely and unwilling suspects to put in them. Even worse, taking a page from an ancestor, Cheron Priam Santos, he brought back the execution machines that were infamous during his time and for those exiled in Hungaro, he signed death warrants for them to be executed on the exile planet using those machines.
There was only one positive Hector’s transactions had gotten him. The ATM was starting to notice the Santos regime branching out more than in the days of Nero Santos, especially with trying to find the source to the metine supply. Hector was more eager to control it and called it his own. Hector made a name for himself without even trying.
Most times, it got bloody.
Since space pirates emerged from the darkness of space disturbing trading routes, Hector had to be more and more persistent in his approach. The last thing he wanted was petty marauders stop his rise to complete dominance.
The people of Crystal Metropolis saw him as a pretender and the ATM saw him as a joke. In handling the pirate situation, he would have served two purposes: presenting fear and instilling self-confidence.
However, the pirates were more relentless than ever. Hector gave an order to send Democrat Guards to the Cyprun Valley and liberated the cluster of pirates. Taking on the new role as a personal army, the relentless and disciplined Democrat Guards attacked the bases of some of the ATM’s most notorious pirates.
They were successful in liberating pirates in Sardin and Cyprun. The downside became that Hector needed more men and more firepower.
If the pirates weren't enough, Hector had to deal with his own circle of political lords set up by the late Queen Bianca Santos.
When the pirate attacks started happening, they thought it was good. Then, one of the main ATM leaders, Guapa’s Lord Elibali Tranio, started to do some personal investigating. His scouts came back with startling results. It became clear Hector Santos was trying to buy arms to keep his rule secure. The plan went further to destroy all the plans his mother had done and establish his own sadistic rule.
Lord Tranio brought the leaders of Bianca Santos’ circle together for a special meeting held in his Guapa palace. After hours upon hours of arguments and outbursts, they figured if they couldn't stop him, they could at least share in the spoils to protect themselves from a possible war with the Santos king.
Pretty soon, even the leaders of the planets of the ATM that were supposed to side with Bianca and her son, turned their back on him, all for the power to control in their own right.
If that wasn’t enough, an old nemesis reared its ugly head ready to capitalize on a weak reign.
While most of the galaxy tried to figure out what life was all about, the Second Renaissancers were already expressing it with two stories: The Code of Cypher and Flamer and a historical book The Code of Byzantium by Savil Nassar. Seen at first as enemies, the religion had turned into a galactic phenomenon expressed by millions. The townships received their first taste of Second Renaissance when The Code of Byzantium entered their lives. It became one of the most widespread books to ever arrive in Crystal Metropolis. Before long, it reached the merchants, who saw the Code of Byzantium as a guide for make better business decisions. The Strator Circle ended up reading the book and observed their old practices they had gotten away from, making them insignificant throughout the years.
Second Rena
issance had already planted seeds in popular planets like Syra, Tier, the Hallow Points, and Solaria.
One of the leaders of the new movement was Kasuto. Crystal Metropolis citizens knew nothing about him except from fables and myths. Some saw him as a vicious warlord to rival the Santos kings. Others saw a depressed man lost a long time ago and found his redemption with Second Renaissance.
By the new decade’s ending, with the shrinkage of pirate attacks, Hector was at the top of his twisted game, but Second Renaissance had somehow snuck its way back into the fabric of the ATM.
Gossip spread that it was only a matter of time before the entire galaxy become Second Renaissancers.
INIQUITOUS DOMINION: The Galactic Classic Page 44