Daughter Of Ethos: 0.5 - 1 - 2

by L M Lacee

  Peyton was not sure what that meant, but she understood the next part of the plan better. Agnes would implant Darby and the other scientists with a locator chip. So if they somehow managed to get off the world, which Thanikis seemed to think would be highly unlikely. But in the event they managed it, his hired enforcers could scoop the women up and take them to the planets that had paid for them. He confirmed to Ian White, the scientists like Darby had already been paid for, and delivery was to be by the end of the month.

  Agnes read about his opinion on her lack of performance and his disappointment in her obvious false information. How Peyton did not have control of the Warriors, which they ascertained from the meeting with her. He agreed with Ian White that it was unlikely there were Warriors in the town.

  Then he stated that as Doctor Johnston’s information was worthless, throwing doubt on everything she had passed along to him in the past. He found he had no further use for her or desire for her in his bed. He would accept the offer from a world that needed a physicist, unless Ian wanted her.

  Ian White declined and asked what price a physicist and mathematician received nowadays. Thanikis quoted the figure he had received for her.

  Agnes let one sob go as she finished reading her lovers' cold transmissions. Then she straightened in her seat, anger and dismay sending a blush to her cheeks.

  ‘No, this cannot be. He promised I would have everything I wanted. I have it in writing.’ Her breathing quickened and sweat broke out on her body, closing her eyes she stated almost to herself. ‘I will not believe it, he promised. He said I was to be his and his alone. He is going to make me his Empress.’

  Peyton shrugged, and her voice when she spoke was devoid of warmth or pity. ‘The shock of it, he lied. Maybe you should have got that in writing.’

  Agnes sent her a resentful look out of eyes swimming with tears, and started crying loud, noisy sobs as tears ran down her cheeks.

  Janet watching was undecided if the tears were because she was remorseful or because her betrayal had been discovered. She wanted to believe it was because she was remorseful, but her gut told her differently. Still, the woman was an educated and celebrated scientist. Surely that had to mean something, didn’t it?

  Peyton watched Agnes impassively for a while as she sipped her coffee. The fact she was instrumental in all the scientists including Darby, Peyton had in hiding being sold was an unforgivable sin as far as she was concerned. She had spent the better part of this morning trying to understand and find a reason to get pass that fact. Nothing had come to mind, except her anger had surfaced, and she admitted to herself she was furious at Agnes’s betrayal. She could feel it eating away at the restraints she had placed on her temper years ago.

  ‘How you, an intelligent woman, could believe him, amazes me. Did it not cross your mind just once, that if you were willing to betray us, they would eventually assume you’d betray them?’

  Agnes shook her head.

  Surprised that this woman could not work that out, especially someone as educated as Agnes. Peyton asked again. ‘Not once… really?’

  Again she shook her head.

  Peyton just stared at her. She did not think Agnes was in love with the Ambassador. No, it was more than likely he was a means to an end, just as everyone in the town had been for her.

  Agnes was irritated beyond belief at these stupid questions, but more at Thanikis, as the full import of his duplicity came home to her. She hurriedly looked for a way out of the hole she had dug for herself as she wiped the tears from her face and sniffed indelicately.

  ‘Obviously I did not know what he had planned. Why would I? Not that there was ever anything of importance to tell him. Everyone is so secretive. No one has even said what day we are to leave. When I asked, all anyone would say was soon, very soon. So I had to give him my best guess.’

  Peyton asked. ‘Which was when?’

  Agnes gave her a militant look, Peyton smiled without warmth. ‘Agnes, you may as well tell me. I will find out and right now it could serve you well.’

  Agnes narrowed her eyes again and shrugged, thinking that maybe Peyton had a point, telling her may benefit her. ‘I told him all indications pointed to four or five weeks.’

  ‘When did you tell him this?’

  ‘When I saw him last time. Four days ago.’

  Peyton drummed her fingers on the table in thought, which was broken when Agnes asked. ‘So what will you do with me? Will you leave me behind, hand me over to them. Shun me or better still, make me work for free.’

  She gave her hair a pat as she said. ‘I mean, you may as well let me go with you. My family is all dead. I think I have a sister still alive somewhere, maybe.’ She shrugged carelessly as she let her eyes slide to Janet, who stood impassively staring at her. The gleam of a smile entered her eyes when she thought she saw a glimmer of sorrow enter the soldier’s eyes. That was until she looked deeper and flinched from the condemnation she saw there. She quickly returned her eyes to Peyton, watching for any reaction from the silent woman.

  After a few minutes, when Peyton still had said nothing, she became impatient and sat up straighter, her voice becoming bored. ‘Listen Peyton, I am sure you know how amazingly intelligent I am and how I always get results. Things get done when I am in charge. I know of procedures even the formidable Darby doesn’t know. There may be other good physicist or mathematicians but no one near as brilliant as I am. You really cannot do this without me!’ She smirked as she finished speaking, knowing she was right, they really had no choice but to take her with them.

  Peyton raised her eyebrows. ‘So sure of your value and yet I know you already sold me and everyone else out and would do so again given half a chance. I know you would sell us to the lowest bidder if it served your own twisted logic. You have no honor as a woman, or even as a human being. Fern was right, you are the scum on the bottom of a shoe.’

  Ashen now, Agnes sat there with the dawning realization that she may have miscalculated the extent of her betrayal and who she had betrayed.

  With no expression, Peyton told her. ‘Thankfully our fate is not reliant on your coming with us, it never was. You were part of the whole which will be filled by someone who is loyal to our endeavors. We do not need you. Your mistake was in thinking we did.’

  Agnes snorted derisively as she retaliated. ‘You mean loyal, just to you.’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘You think I cannot be loyal?’

  Peyton ignored her question. ‘You see Agnes; we can and will do this without your participation, and I will sleep better tonight and every night after this knowing you have ceased to exist.’

  Peyton leaned across the table and said harshly. ‘I am told we all go to an afterlife, after our bodies breathe their last. I really hope that is true, and you end up there. So you can dwell for eternity, knowing you sold out everyone who liked and admired you, for empty promises.’ With those words Peyton waved her hand, and the doctor was engulfed in a bright white light. When it cleared, Agnes was gone.

  Justice Realized.

  A voice reminiscent of a winter’s day washed through her mind. With hands that shook only a little, Peyton finished her coffee, letting the rage she felt calm. Without turning to look at the woman behind her, who remained silent, she huskily asked. ‘Janet, are we going to have a problem with this?’

  Janet had been a trooper for five years, then a military police officer for eight. At thirty-five, she thought she had seen everything. Especially in the last few months, but this… this was way above her pay grade. ‘Madam Peyton, I hope one day you tell me what the fuck just happened.’

  Peyton was aware Janet had not replied to her question, but she let it go for now and instead said. ‘Please retrieve her tablet. Darby will need to see it, and then we should bug out.’

  Janet re-holstered her forgotten weapon, then grabbed the tablet, cleared her throat, and stated. ‘You have been hanging with the General too long.’

  ‘Huh, I say tha
t. So I think we all need breakfast.’

  ‘Where, the restaurants are closed?’

  ‘Helen’s diner.’

  Janet swallowed and said as casually as she could. ‘Good idea, I like it.’

  ‘Well if you like it, it must be okay.’ Peyton quipped back in her normal tones as they left the dwelling.

  Janet actually managed a grin, it may not have reached her eyes, but it was there.

  Peyton hummed as she shoved the sadness she felt to the back of her mind, recognizing before this was done. She would have many things she may come to regret, but this, she thought, would not be one. The woman had been motivated not by love but greed. She had despised the Warriors and feared the unknown and was jealous of Darby, which was why she did what she did. Greed, spite and fear drove her decisions and her own death.

  Peyton sighed heavily, there was so much to do and very little time to dwell on the betrayal of one woman. She was more worried about how Janet perceived her now, and as she looked at her from the corner of her eye, she could see her drawing in on herself. There was none of the easy chatter and smiling guards that had escorted her to the house less than thirty minutes ago.

  A sharp stab of loneliness pierced her heart, but she pushed the feeling away. There was nothing she could do to change what had happened. And the part of her that was the Star Daughter did not want to.

  Ships would appear soon. The town would start receiving women from all over the world who were ready and willing to leave Earth. There was no time to mourn the loss of one person’s regard, even though it hurt.

  THIRTY-SIX:

  ‘What do you mean, they are not on the ships?’

  ‘You heard.’

  ‘Seriously, Melody. What is wrong with them?’

  ‘Who knows, they are old.’

  Peyton stopped pulling her boot on and looked at Melody, who was standing at the front door ready to leave. ‘Oh wow, I can’t believe you said that.’

  Melody shrugged self-consciously. ‘You will not repeat it.’

  Peyton finished pulling her boot on as she said. ‘Well, not today.’

  ‘Never, you hear me, star girl?’

  ‘I hear you. I am just ignoring you.’

  ‘At your own peril, remember that.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘You know we saw it on a vid last night.’

  ‘Huh, are you sure? I don’t remember.’

  ‘Why, am I not surprised? Regardless, you will not repeat what I said.’

  ‘Yeah… yeah.’ Peyton said, then she hugged Melody and asked. ‘Can you believe it, we are finally going?’

  Melody swallowed hard and plastered a smile on her face. ‘Thank goodness, I just want to be gone.’

  Peyton nodded and hugged her tighter, knowing she was as nervous as she was. ‘I hear yah.’

  ‘Well, stop grabbing at me and let’s go round your ladies up.’

  ‘So rude.’

  Peyton was thrilled and slightly nervous, the day was finally here. Months that felt like years of preparation were complete. Containers were filled with every conceivable plant and product, as well as farming and building equipment they thought they would need for building a new world. Every type of pot, pan, utensil, fabric and bedding, towels, beauty products. If someone had thought of it, someone else had acquired it in bulk lots and lots of bulk. They knew it would not last forever; the intention was to have enough to get them through until traders and growth could sustain them.

  The Warriors’ advice made sure they obtained supplies they had not even considered, and not just for themselves. Trading was a big fact of life in the Universe they were to call home. When Melody found this out. She had delegated one hundred of her soldiers and just as many Warriors the task of obtaining the items listed by Commander Roeah and his men.

  Containers had lined the streets of Runnerdale and the surrounding towns for weeks, waiting for the ships to arrive, which they had done two days ago. Now everything had been loaded and transported to the Warships and Battle Cruisers orbiting Earth.

  Today they had only the last of the containers to load, and she had been told they were near completion. Then they would say their final goodbyes to the planet that had given them life and fly away, toward a future that awaited them.

  Darby and her computer specialists as well as the scientists had been living on Hawk’s Warship for just over a week. Peyton was told that within hours of stepping on the ship, Darby had become enamoured with the replication devices. She and her people instantly started replicating thousands of new style tablets that were as thin as paper. They also produced what the Warriors referred to as a comm link or communication device, which was linked to the warship and could be linked to the data stream. It also doubled as an identity band or ident band, which held personal information and was worn on the wrist. They came in many colors. The device was also bio-scanned to an individual. Impossible Darby swore for anyone to breach, meaning her people had tried.

  Once Darby studied how to navigate the data stream and learned exactly what it was. She downloaded instructions to the tablets, so everyone else could also access what amounted to a universal space data computer. She also kept her promise and wiped all traces of the Warrior’s genetic creation from everywhere she found it.

  THIRTY-SEVEN:

  Peyton and Melody boarded the waiting shuttle, finding her seat she strapped herself in, then sighed and closed her eyes as Melody and the Warriors settled around her.

  Her thoughts instantly went to the women who were leaving with them. She was worried about how they were going to accept the fact that as soon as they stepped aboard the ships orbiting Earth; they became citizens of Maikonia. The solar system she would rule.

  She quickly shied away from that thought. There was really nothing she could do to lessen the changes they were going to have to deal with. Especially not from where she was right now.

  She thought about the shock she and Melody had felt. When they had run the numbers last night and found they had just over seventy thousand women leaving with them and not the thirty thousand they originally thought. It seemed combined with the messages sent out by Darby’s people along with Jean and Penny’s rescued women and word of mouth, their numbers had swollen. Not that they were complaining, they were just very surprised.

  Peyton’s plan had been successful. Women had been smuggled in by Melody’s soldiers and Hawk’s Warriors almost continuously since the notification was sent out. The towns had remained hidden from the satellites that daily searched for unregistered pockets of humanity. Jean’s program had paid off as well, and they had rescued hundreds of women and teenagers destined for other worlds and pleasure planets.

  To Peyton’s amazement, not every woman they rescued wished to leave. Several thousand wanted to stay and fight for a better way of life on Earth. And many of Darby’s cyber-hackers, who worked for the Undernet, also decided to stay and assist in the newly formed Resistance.

  Darby set them up with updated tech and a secure way to communicate with her in case they wished to leave in the future. Melody and Hawk stockpiled weapons and left shuttles for the remaining soldiers and resistance fighters. Melody also contacted Naya and Adam as she promised Peyton she would. Giving them contact details for the soldiers and other resistant fighters like Darby’s cyber-hackers and Mia’s family, who they promised to check in with.

  Heather contacted medics that had not wanted to leave Earth and had fallen off the grid, with help from Darby. When she explained there was a Resistance movement, they volunteered their services.

  Peyton gave the women who remained behind the town of Runnerdale and the surrounding towns as a base of operations. They promised to look after anyone that came to them for help and protection.

  Ticking off all the items, on her mental list of things that have to be done before we leave. She felt good that there were only a few things left and then she and the people remaining would join the others on the ships orbiting the moon.
r />   Opening her eyes when the shuttle landed, she smiled at Melody, who asked. ‘Ticked off everything on your list?’

  ‘Yep, you?’

  ‘Yep.’

  Together, they stepped down from the shuttle with eight guards following and walked into a huge building that was once a warehouse. For weeks it had been the depot for items to be sorted and loaded into containers. A few uniformed women were packing up the last of the containers. As children and women hurried back and forth carrying objects from inside to outside, where other containers were waiting to be closed up.

  Peyton stopped a young girl by grabbing the back of her shirt as she tried to skirt around the group, bringing her to an abrupt halt. She yelped and turned a frowning face toward them until she realized who she was staring at. The enormous male and female Warriors made for an intimidating sight.

  Peyton grinned and tapped the girl on the shoulder to get her attention. ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hiyah back.’

  ‘Can you tell me where I would find, Helen Merson, Brenda Wilkson and Esther Lioni, please?’

  ‘Are they in trouble?’

  Peyton grinned. ‘Only if they don’t get on the shuttle.’

  The girl laughed and waved her hand toward the end of the room. ‘They are back there with the others, making food. So you are here to make them and the other ladies go.’

  ‘You bet I am.’

  ‘Good, I like them.’ She said as she scampered off, her arms full of what looked like silk.

  Peyton’s hands started twitching. A sure sign she was ready to bolt into the tangle of people and containers. She looked around and muttered. ‘Organized chaos, I like it.’

  Melody laughed at the almost desperate expression she wore, sensing if given half a chance she would be in there organizing and moving stuff and people around.