happen, if you fear the Drakken.”
“But we can do nothing else Reigel, I and the others have tried. Marshal has won the here and now, and that’s the end of it.”
“Nicholas do you think every war; every conflict depends on single a major battle. They don’t: apparently insignificant acts tip the balance, and everything falls. Neither of us has the benefit of hindsight…” Reigel hesitated; it wasn’t exactly true. “…To pinpoint how or if, whatever we do, will change what we know. Once any act is done, what other options there may have been, no longer affect that outcome. Please believe me, we: and it is not just my opinion, we know that this place in time will have dire consequences on the future.”
“I hear what you say good friend, but let me ask you this. With your knowledge of the Marshal, or whomever he pays service to, do you believe that he will not carry out his threat to use that thing?”
Reigel looked into his eyes. “He will do as he says.”
“Then in all reality, I and my friends have no future. I will fight with every means I have, but if I chose to take an option that gave him reason to unleash that thing; and lost, how could I face myself knowing what price it had cost?”
“You couldn’t “.
Nicholas looked at him “I owe you much good friend, not least of all the strength to choose the hard path. I hope that at the dawn I can still walk it with pride.”
Reigel looked up, his face wrinkled with indecision. “I once told you that I had broken many rules for you Nicholas.”
“I remember, and I am grateful.”
“I broke those rules because I wanted you to live. I want you to live now Nicholas, because I want you to fight Mars for me.”
Nicholas laughed out loud. “Is that all, and here’s me thinking you were only interested out of friendship?”
“You know what I mean.” Reigel’s admiration for the youth increased as he saw how he faced death. “Everything; you, the stone, the lineage, even the lost laboratory, are all intertwined with stopping Mars’s expansionism. As a catalyst you have the perfect credentials to begin that on Earth. What I propose will make me as much of an outlaw to my own people, as you are to the Marshal.”
“Then for my part I shall be good company.”
Reigel shrugged his shoulders. “Even though it could well likely end with you still dying; and me banished to the furthest edge of the galaxy?”
“And both of us will meet that judgment knowing we fought for the principles we believed in.”
Reigel stood. “Then Nicholas day of Boramulla we should take a little trip.”
More Quone-Loc-Sie, and other novels and stories by John Stevenson can be found by visiting
www.caelin-day.com
www.Australianstoryteller.com
www.Australianstorywriter.com
A False New Dawn Page 5