“If dis was part of a plan,” he said quietly to Jean as they ran, “I hope you know what you doin’. Be a shame if Cyclops got killed ’cause we didn’t step in for him.”
Jean didn’t respond. Nor did she look his way. But even in profile, Gambit could see the fear in her eyes.
TEN
“YOU are either a spineless coward or a traitor to the Empire!” Deathbird spat in anger as she paced the Great Hall of the Capitol Building. Her governmental seat, an actual chair in which she sat when making public declarations, was too similar in appearance to a throne as far as Gladiator was concerned. Its ornamentation was a reflection of the ostentatious decoration of the entire room. So regal were her surroundings, that Deathbird’s court might be considered insulting and even blasphemous by many on the Shi’ar homeworld of Chandilar.
It was improper. His dislike for the Viceroy had multiplied dramatically over the previous few hours, and yet here he was, putting up with her abuse once more. For one of his station, there could be no retribution, no response at all other than respect and obedience.
“Viceroy, I have attempted to explain,” he began patiently and was encouraged when Deathbird merely glared at him rather than launch into another verbal tirade.
“We were on the verge of overall victory and the apprehension of five X-Men and one member of the band of pirates known as Starjammers,” Gladiator insisted, and ignored Deathbird’s angry muttering about the Starjammers. He himself was bewildered by the actions of the cyborg Raza, who was born of the Shi’ar and yet whose cause was not often the same as the Empire’s.
Gladiator gestured toward Cyclops, who knelt on the floor in front of Deathbird’s seat of power. His arms and legs were bound, and a clamp had been placed around his eyes. The only other people in the Great Hall were the other four members of the Guard who had accompanied him. Gladiator ignored them, however, and concentrated on Cyclops.
“We had finally felled this one, taking him immediately into captivity,” Gladiator announced. “Unfortunately, Oracle had lost her battle with one of the X-Men, and when we searched for the others, they were nowhere to be found.”
Deathbird’s lip curled and the feathers atop her head and under her arms ruffled with the shiver that passed through her. She strode furiously across the dais to where Cyclops knelt and gave him a savage kick to the head. Gladiator grimaced as the X-Men’s leader grunted and fell to the ground, blood spilling down his right cheek.
“They are probably all working with the damned Kree rebels,” Deathbird hissed, eyes ablaze with paranoia and hatred.
“None of the Kree came to their aid, Viceroy,” Gladiator said. “I doubt that …”
“When I want your opinion, Gladiator, I will command it of you,” she roared. “If you and your fellow Guards were more than incompetent fools, all of the X-Men would be in this room, awaiting execution.”
Gladiator heard hushed cursing behind him and felt the heat of Starbolt’s power surging.
“That’s enough!” Starbolt growled. “I would dearly have loved to see any of your personal guard last more than a few moments with the X-Men, Viceroy. The Imperial Guard is ever vigilant and loyal to the Majestrix of the Imperium. You would do well not to question …”
“Starbolt,” Gladiator said coldly, but with an air of command that caused the Guardsman to go silent.
“No, Gladiator,” Deathbird said sweetly. “Let your man continue. After all, despite the Imperial Guard’s failure and buffoonery, I have yet to question your loyalty. As Starbolt has breached the subject, and seems to hold the X-Men in such high regard, perhaps I was hasty in assuming that your failure was due to cowardice or idiocy. Perhaps I ought to have thought about treachery and treason.”
There was absolute silence in the Great Hall, broken only by the occasional groan from the unconscious Cyclops.
Far too often, Gladiator’s temper had gotten him in trouble as a youth. As he matured, he had found a way to harness it, to bury it beneath reason, calm, dedication. He was a soldier, and a good one. That meant swallowing his personal pride from time to time and holding the pride of the Imperium above it. It was a hard discipline to learn, and once he had, remaining true to it was his entire life.
And yet …
Surely, Starbolt had been out of line. It was possible that Deathbird could attempt to prosecute him for treason and insubordination, and perhaps even succeed. But Gladiator had taken just about all he could stand from the Viceroy, and he wasn’t about to lose one of his best warriors to her rampant paranoia, or worse, in one of her insane games of power and manipulation.
“You are silent, Gladiator,” Deathbird said, eyes narrowing. “Could it be my words have struck upon the truth? Shall I have all five of you executed with the rebels, instead of just Starbolt?”
She looked at him with the gaze of a vulture sighting carrion. But Gladiator was no dead thing, unable to fight or even run. In truth, he was most dangerous prey, and not nearly as dull-witted as Deathbird so obviously assumed.
“Starbolt spoke in anger and haste, Viceroy, because you goaded and insulted him,” Gladiator declared, stepping onto the dais and stopping mere feet from Deathbird.
“Do not test yourself against me, Praetor,” she began, but Gladiator would not be stopped.
“As a member of the Royal Elite of the Imperial Guard, Starbolt will be officially reprimanded for his insolence, and there is the possibility of punitive action,” he said. “However, such may only be determined by the Majestrix. And you,” Gladiator said in a low, threatening voice, “are not she.”
Deathbird’s features contorted with rage.
“I do not need a reminder from one such as you!” she shrieked. “For your insolence and insubordination I will have you executed this very day! I will …”
“You forget yourself, Viceroy,” Gladiator said calmly. “You forget as well that few may claim to know the laws of the Imperium and the responsibilities of its citizens—and that of my post—better than I.
“I am not guilty of insubordination, but if I were, it would be the Majestrix’s place to determine my guilt and punishment, just as it is in the case of Starbolt. As you instructed, we found the X-Men. Though we failed to bring them all back, we have captured their leader. You have decided to execute him, and as long as you have cause, that is your prerogative.
“As long as you continue to act on behalf of the Imperium and the Majestrix, and in accordance with her commands, the Imperial Guard is yours to command until the prisoners have been executed or we are recalled by the Majestrix herself. If you think to take some action against the Guard, I urge you to reconsider, at least long enough to consider the repercussions.”
Gladiator turned away from the primal fury that warped Deathbird’s features. The four Guards who had accompanied him, including the volatile Starbolt, stood well back from the dais, heads lowered and eyes on the stone floor. Cyclops still lay on the ground but, though his eyes were covered, Gladiator thought he seemed alert and awake. He had a moment of uncertainty, knowing that Deathbird was at least partially correct, that they had not fought as hard as they could have against the X-Men. He brushed the thought away. It did not matter to the questions at hand.
Once more on the stone floor, Gladiator turned to face Deathbird once again. She seemed to have regained much of her composure, but still stared at him with hate-filled eyes. She raised her chin and looked down her nose at him with a haughty manner he was long familiar with.
“Take the prisoner to the others,” she said finally. “Confine them together, and they may die together at first light. Then take the Guard out again and search for the others. Do not return until you have found them, or the Majestrix herself shall have to come to retrieve you,” Deathbird said, smiling cruelly as she gave the order.
Gladiator was tempted not to respond. It would be easy enough to follow the Viceroy’s order and allow things to happen as they would. If it were not that he felt some guilt for his reluctance in battl
e, he might indeed have kept his silence. In the end, he could not.
“I do not question your wisdom, Viceroy,” he began. “However, we have battled these X-Men in the past, as have you. You know their loyalty to one another. Don’t you think the others will come back for their leader? And if so, should not the Guard be here to prevent them from freeing all the prisoners?”
“You slow-witted fool,” Deathbird hissed. “They are involved with the rebellion, I have told you. The rebellion will not sacrifice itself for one individual, or four. And even if they were foolhardy enough to storm the Capitol, which they must know would be tantamount to suicide, my own guards would be more than sufficient to repel and capture them.”
Gladiator considered her words a moment, fighting the urge to respond. When he had overcome it, he motioned for the other Guards to lift Cyclops and convey him to the prison levels far below them.
Not for the first time, Gladiator wondered if Deathbird was merely an evil, paranoid schemer, or truly insane. He still was unable to make a conclusive judgment, a fact that profoundly disturbed him. One way or another, Deathbird was unpredictable and dangerous. If the answer that his instincts gave was true, and the Viceroy was both evil and insane, then they might all be in grave danger.
* * *
HIS head throbbed dully where Deathbird had kicked him, and a more traditional ache had spread from behind his eyes to the back of his cranium. Still, Cyclops had lain silent, listening intently to the confrontation between Gladiator and Deathbird. If there had been any doubt in his mind that the Praetor of the Guard was in personal turmoil over the latest conflict with the X-Men, that conversation had erased it.
Unfortunately, Cyclops had encountered Gladiator frequently enough to know that the alien would do nothing to save him. Remorseful though he might be, Gladiator was loyal to the Imperium. Cyclops could not hope for rescue from that avenue. Luckily, that hadn’t been part of the plan.
At the very moment the Imperial Guard had attacked the marketplace, Scott and Jean had communicated through the psychic rapport they shared. They had no idea exactly where in the Capitol Building Corsair and the others were being held, except that they were on a lower level. They had to expect that it would not be easy for Jean to telepathically scan for them, that there would be psi-blocks in place even if they had time for a complete scan. With Scott already on the inside, hopefully near or, even better, with the other captives, Jean could pinpoint them instantly through their psychic rapport.
The plan built itself. While seeming to battle in earnest, they had to orchestrate it so the Imperial Guard would capture Cyclops, and only Cyclops. Jean had been concerned that Oracle would catch on, aware as she was how far superior Jean’s powers were to her own. Scott had assured his lady love that Shi’ar arrogance would lead Oracle to believe that she had simply grown stronger and more skilled. He had been correct.
Which didn’t mean it hadn’t hurt when Gladiator’s optical heat rays had scorched him, even though his costume kept his flesh from being burnt. And the kick to the head that Deathbird had given him was severe. Still, he had endured far worse, and the plan had succeeded.
With the other Guards following, Gladiator carried Cyclops over his shoulder. Scott assumed Gladiator knew he was no longer unconscious, but the Praetor said nothing of it. Then again, what did it matter? With his arms bound and his optic blasts reined in, he couldn’t have hoped to defeat one of them, never mind all five. Even if he wanted to.
Which he didn’t. What he wanted was simply to see his father. From Deathbird’s ranting, he knew that Corsair was still alive. But he had no idea what kind of condition the man might be in after a handful of days in the dungeons of Hala. Deathbird was vicious and unstable. Cyclops pushed the thought away and forced himself to look forward to the impending reunion. With the cadence of Gladiator’s echoing steps, a wave of memory swept over Scott Summers.
He and his brother Alex had been skinny kids when tragedy had struck their family. Everything had seemed so perfect. Their father, Major Christopher Summers, had just been selected for the space program—the name Corsair had been his pilot’s call sign. They were flying home from Scott’s grandparents’ house in Anchorage, Alaska, their dad at the controls of the vintage DeHavilland Mosquito he and Grandpa had lovingly restored.
That’s when the UFO had appeared. It fired on their plane, then locked it into a tractor beam that began to tear the wooden ship apart. There was but one parachute on board. Their mom had strapped Scott in and made him promise to hold Alex tight, and not to let him go until they hit the ground. He’d promised, even as tears spilled down his cheeks. The parachute was in flames as they fell, and they’d hit the ground hard, but in one piece.
D’Ken Neramani had been the Shi’ar Emperor then, and though Scott didn’t know it, the vessel that attacked them had been Shi’ar. The madman D’Ken had been collecting specimens throughout the galaxy, and Scott and Alex’s parents, Christopher and Kate, had been teleported on board the vessel. Dad had fought them too hard. As an abject lesson, D’Ken had murdered Kate Summers with his own hands.
Scott’s father had been sent to the prison world of Alsibar, where he became known only as Corsair. It was there he had met the Starjammers, there he had become the battle-hardened man who was now imprisoned in the bowels of Kree-Lar. It had been many years later, with Scott now an adult, that he had met and battled alongside Corsair. Even then, it had been some time before the two realized their relation. Only recently had they begun to warm to one another, to forgive fate for the years it had stolen from them.
Whatever it cost, Scott Summers would not allow the Shi’ar to take his father from him again.
The gentle rhythm of Gladiator’s stride ceased. There came the loud clacking of cylinders being rolled back. A loud hiss followed, the exhalation of a perfectly sealed room, now open.
“The cell has been prepared for you, Cyclops,” Gladiator said, then stepped into the room with Scott still thrown over one shoulder.
“Scott?” another voice said, his father’s voice. “Oh, no, Scott. I don’t think I can …”
“Silence, Starjammer!” a guard barked, and Cyclops was sure it wasn’t one of the Imperial Guard. Of course, Deathbird would have posted some of her best soldiers as sentries around Corsair’s cell. The sentry’s voice had come from close by, just to Scott’s right. His head throbbed from Deathbird’s kick, and hanging over Gladiator’s shoulder had caused the blood to rush there, making it even worse. It was hard to think, now. But he knew the plan, and he had to stick to it.
“You shouldn’t have come, Scott,” Corsair said calmly.
“Silence!” the sentry yelled, and his command was followed by a loud buzz and a cry of pain from Corsair.
“Don’t touch him!” Scott screamed, and swung the restraints clamped around his hands with all his might toward the point where he thought the sentry stood.
The heavy metal connected with a satisfying thud, but Scott’s momentum threw him off Gladiator’s shoulder. He landed on the floor of the cell, jarring his head wound. As he struggled to rise, he became entangled with the guard he’d struck. Cyclops was pleased to note the man was both down and, apparently, out.
Gladiator sighed heavily, then grabbed Cyclops just below his left wrist and lifted him as easily as if he were an infant. The feeling, the recognition of the power in Gladiator’s limbs, was disorienting. Cyclops felt incredibly vulnerable. He paid little attention as Gladiator held him by one arm and removed the hand restraints, only to replace them with individual clamps. He did the same for Scott’s feet, and in a moment the X-Men’s leader was spread-eagled quite uncomfortably.
“Get him out of here,” Gladiator’s deep voice rumbled.
“Yes, Praetor,” another Guard answered. Cyclops thought it was Titan. There came a rustling noise that he imagined was the sentry being removed from the cell.
Cyclops tried to get used to his predicament. Though his legs were spread enough that it couldn’
t really be called standing, he was able to put his weight on the foot restraints that held him. Unfortunately, he knew that wouldn’t last long, and then all his weight would be on his arms and wrists where they were clamped tightly above him.
He let himself relax, testing those restraints, getting a feel for what it might be like when his legs couldn’t hold him anymore. He sagged backward and unexpectedly hit a cold wall. Gladiator must have seen the surprise on his face. Though he’d been standing there in silence, he finally addressed Cyclops.
“Though I doubt you’d call it comfortable, you’ll find that leaning against that wall makes your restraints bearable,” Gladiator said. “In a moment, I will take off your optical restraint. You are quite familiar, I know, with Shi’ar technology. This room is equipped with an inhibition system which will drain all non-essential energies, effectively preventing you from using your optic blasts.”
Cyclops said nothing as he felt Gladiator’s arms snake past his cheeks and unsnap the restraint that had been clamped around his head. As he did so, he whispered more quietly than Scott would have imagined possible of him.
“There is little evidence against you,” Gladiator said in that hushed voice. “The others will still die, but if the Majestrix comes to Hala, she may find a diplomatic way to save you. If not, you will be executed in the morning. I will try to see that it is as swift as possible.”
Gladiator backed away, taking the restraint with him, and did not look back at Cyclops. Scott was surprised that his visor had not been taken from him, in light of the cell’s inhibition system. Perhaps Gladiator hoped they would find a way to escape, or perhaps it just had not occurred to him. In any case, Cyclops was glad. He hoped it wouldn’t be very long before he would need his visor again.
The Imperial Guard filed out, leaving four sentries in the hall outside the cell. Oracle stood in the doorway a moment, looking quizzically at Cyclops, obviously trying to get into his head. But Professor Xavier had spent years teaching him how to erect psychic barriers in his mind, and Oracle was not adept enough to overcome them. Finally, she left. The door was closed and bolted, the process requiring two of the sentries, and Scott noted the process, filing it away.
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