Ethan turned to see Doctor Kurlin being strapped into a third and final probe chair, but he was struggling—kicking and screaming at the top of his lungs, demanding his rights and asking for a legal counsel. Ethan eyed the old man for a moment and then shook his head. “This is a military trial, you old skriff, and we’re not in the Imperium anymore. We have no rights.”
One of the guards holding Kurlin down sucker punched him in the gut, and the doctor doubled over, paralyzed with pain. His arms and legs were promptly sealed into the manacles, and then the guards withdrew to either side of the room.
Kurlin turned to glare at Ethan. “You sound as though you’re enjoying this.”
Ethan smirked back. “You threatened to reveal me, and then you did. You started it.”
“You stunned me and stuffed me in a stasis tube! What was I supposed to do when I got out?” Kurlin shot back. “You could have sent my family back like I’d asked and then none of this would have happened, but instead you insisted on taking us all to the netherworld with you! You left me no choice!”
“Well, it’s ironic that we made it safely across Sythian Space after all, and now we’re all headed to the netherworld because of you.”
“I’m surprised an uneducated grub like you can even recognize irony,” Kurlin replied.
Ethan gritted his teeth at the insult. No matter how thick his skin had grown during his time as an outlaw and later as a convicted felon on Etaris, being called a grub still cut straight to his marrow and made him see red. “It’s a shame they locked us in these chairs, Kurlin. I would have liked to help you.”
Kurlin’s eyes narrowed at that. “Help me?”
“Yes, I would have liked to crush your throat and put you out of your misery.”
“Is that how you solve all of your problems? You’re just proving my point, you Philistan.”
“I’m from Roka IV, not Philista.”
“Are you two done?” Atton said.
Ethan turned to his son and jerked his head at the doctor. “Ask him.”
“Ask yourself. Rather than sit here insulting each other, we should be thinking of a way to get out of this.”
“There is no way out of this,” Ethan replied. “Of the three of us only you have a chance for something lighter than a death sentence. As for me and the doc, we may as well start praying to the Immortals.”
“I’m not a praying man,” Kurlin said, turning to look out at the empty rows of seats arrayed in front of them. They sat on the stage at the front of a large briefing room. That implied that their trial would be a public one, but so far no one had arrived besides the squad of sentinels who had brought them in.
“Well, it’s never too late to learn,” Ethan said.
Before Kurlin could reply, the doors swished open, and Admiral Heston walked in flanked by four more sentinels, their plasma rifles held across their chests. Behind them walked a group of prisoners, their hands bound with stun cords, and two more sentinels. Ethan frowned, and his eyes narrowed as he studied the faces of those prisoners. They looked familiar. . . . as they drew nearer Ethan suddenly recognized one of them, and he did a double take. “Is that Commander Caldin?”
“Where?” Atton asked.
“What did she do?” Then Ethan noticed who else was with the commander—her entire bridge crew, as well as Gina Giord, and her copilot, Alara Vastra. “Frek . . .” Ethan whispered, watching as sentinels forced the prisoners to take seats along the front rows. Caldin caught Ethan’s eye and scowled at him as she sat down. Alara also looked up at him, but her expression was full of sadness, not loathing. Ethan offered her a tight smile, as if to say, don’t worry; everything’s going to be all right, but she didn’t smile back.
The admiral walked straight up to Ethan and stood gazing down on him with a stern expression and hands clasped behind his back. Ethan noted that Heston was probably ten or twenty years older than him, his hair even more grizzled than Ethan’s own.
“You must be the overlord,” Heston said. His gray eyes were bright and full of contempt.
Ethan shook his head. “No, sir. I was just keeping his throne warm.”
Heston snorted. “I’m going to give you a chance to come clean, Ethan. Who are you? And is there any reason at all that I should not have you probed here today, in front of this body of witnesses?” The admiral half turned to indicate the shackled prisoners. Ethan noted that besides the guards and the prisoners they’d brought, there were no other witnesses. Where’s the jury? Ethan wondered. Looking back to the admiral, he shook his head. “This is hardly a fair trial, Admiral. The men and women sitting in this room with us are the ones most likely to judge me with a bias. They can’t be jurymen.”
“They’re not. They’re the witnesses to your crimes.” The admiral turned and pointed to a gleaming black wall along one side of the room. “The jury is sitting over there.”
“How do I know that?” Ethan asked. “I can’t see their faces.”
Heston turned and snapped his fingers at one of the sentinels. “Lights in the jury box, sergeant.” Ethan noted that unlike most of the sentinels in Dark Space, these ones wore complete sets of thick, matte gray plasteel armor. That sergeant could survive a plasma grenade. Ethan watched him move to one side of the room and fiddle with a control panel there. Then the dark, shiny wall was illuminated from within to reveal a group of five men and women. The admiral turned back to Ethan. “Satisfied?”
“No,” Kurlin replied. “This is a witch hunt, not a trial. If you want to give us a fair trial, give us a defense counsel.”
Heston turned to the old doctor and smiled. “Why, are you afraid that the truth is not enough to speak for itself?”
“A mind probe is very dangerous, Admiral. That is a death sentence in itself, so in a way you’ve already judged us.”
“Yes, but we’re short of time, and I’m short of patience—if you turn out to be innocent and you suffer an adverse reaction to the probe, rest assured your family will be compensated accordingly. Nevertheless . . .” Ethan watched the admiral’s gaze return to him and remain there. “I’m going to ask you one more time—is there any reason you can give me not to proceed?”
Ethan frowned. It was as though the admiral were looking for an excuse not to probe him. “I can’t say I’m innocent, but I’m also not as guilty as I seem.”
“That’s it? No other reasons . . . perhaps during your time as overlord you’ve come by some classified information which would be dangerous to share so publicly?”
Ethan’s eyebrows slowly rose. Where are you going with this? he wondered. Gazing up into the admiral’s unsettling gray eyes, Ethan felt a shiver creeping down his spine. The last thing he wanted was to give the admiral a reason to single him out for a private hearing. That sounded more like it would be a private torture session. Ethan wasn’t sure why the admiral was asking, but he decided to stick with the truth. He was tired of hiding. “The most dangerous secret I possess is the one you all already know. I was caught wearing a holoskin and impersonating the overlord.”
The admiral’s eyes narrowed sharply; he seemed unhappy with that answer. “Very well.” With that, he turned and nodded to one of the other guards who had come in with him, this one unarmored, but wearing the silver uniform of the sentinels. His shoulder was marked with a red and white patch which identified him as a medic. In his hands he carried three implanters. The points of their needles glinted with deadly promise, and Ethan winced in anticipation. The medic handed two of the implanters to an assistant and then walked up to Kurlin with the third. He pushed the old man’s head forward until his chin touched his chest.
Kurlin shook his head vigorously, trying to resist as he wailed, “I’m an Imperial citizen! You can’t do this to me!” An assisting corpsman stepped forward to hold Kurlin’s head still. “Let me go!”
“Wait!” a woman cried. “Stop it!”
The admiral turned to see an old woman standing up along the front row. “Sit down, please, ma’am.”
Ethan recognized that woman as Kurlin’s wife. He was surprised they’d allowed her into the trial room.
“Sit down, Mrs. Vastra, or I’ll have you thrown out.” Reluctantly she sat down, and Heston turned back to the medic and nodded. “Proceed.”
The old man whimpered as the needle went in. “Please . . .” he said.
Ethan glanced back down to the row of “witnesses” to see that Alara’s face was pale and stricken. She didn’t remember Kurlin as her father, but even Ethan was starting to feel sorry for the old man. As the medic withdrew, Kurlin began to sob. Ethan was next in line.
The admiral turned to him. “Last chance.”
Ethan watched the admiral’s gray eyes carefully, trying to read something behind the fire he saw burning there. “I don’t know what you’re expecting me to say. My name is Ethan Ortane. I’m an ex-con. I was arrested for smuggling stims and sentenced to Dark Space before the war even began. After the exodus I was released with the other convicts in order to—”
“What did you say?” Admiral Heston interrupted, waving a hand to cut him off.
“I said I’m a convicted felon. I was released because—”
“No, not that—your name. Who did you say you are?”
Ethan’s brow furrowed. “Ethan Ortane.”
“Yes, that’s what I thought I heard.” The admiral frowned and turned back to the one-way glass of the jury box. “I’m granting this man a temporary lenience. We will take a two hour recess as I consult with my advisers about how we should proceed. Thank you for your patience.”
REUNION
Chapter 9
Roan’s plan to sabotage the Valiant had worked better than he’d expected. Using what the humans had told him about the ship, he’d managed to restart the reactor after severing the power conduits. In that way, the radiation from the core would cook the crew like mollusks in their shells, and they wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. That was the plan, but then he’d seen radiation levels rise far beyond what his suit could shield, and he’d realized that he had to get off the ship before it cooked him along with the humans.
Now Roan sat inside an escape pod, trying to decipher the controls. He was about to contact Tova for help when he discovered the manual release for the pod. With a quick twist of that red lever, something clunked and he heard a sharp hiss followed by a sudden roar of acceleration. Glow panels flickered to life inside the pod, and Roan sat back with a smile.
Tova had explained the situation to him when she’d made contact recently. She’d told him that they were both at Ritan now, and she was being held prisoner aboard a station in orbit above the planet, while their human allies were leaderless and about to be taken over by Admiral Heston—the human who had refused to join their alliance.
All of that meant he and the rest of the Gors had to go to some extra lengths in order to preserve the alliance. Roan anticipated that once his escape pod was recovered, he would join Tova in prison, or maybe they would both be sent down to the academy on the surface.
After being cooped up on hot, stuffy human starships for so long, going to Ritan would be a vacation. It was a world not unlike his home world, Noctune. Roan watched through the small, round viewport in the front of the pod as he rocketed out over the dark exoplanet. Stars shone in the distance, and Roan remembered when he used to gaze up at those glowing points of light from the surface of Noctune.
Something inside the pod crackled, interrupting Roan’s thoughts; then he heard the confusing babble of a human voice. A translation echoed through the translator in his ear.
“Pod G426, this is Captain Cathrall of the Destine; please identify yourself.”
Roan hissed as he moved to answer the comm.
* * *
“Lenience?” Commander Caldin asked amidst the rising babble of discontent inside the trial room. She rose to her feet and shook her bound hands at the admiral as Ethan was released from his chair. “What is going on here?”
Admiral Heston turned to the commander with a thin smile. “That is none of your business, Commander.”
“It’s entirely my business! We’re sitting here in stun cords thanks to him! How are you going to discover the truth if you don’t probe him?”
“As I said, I will consult with my advisers about how we should proceed. Rest assured, justice will be done.”
Caldin stood there a moment longer, her jaw bunching and her eyes blazing. Ethan watched her gaze sweep up to him as he massaged his aching wrists. The manacles had begun to cut off his circulation.
A pair of sentinels grabbed Ethan roughly and escorted him off the stage. Hoff walked ahead of him, and all eyes followed them to the doors. As the doors swished open and they passed through, Ethan asked, “Where are we going, Admiral?”
Heston stopped and turned. Nodding to the guards who held Ethan, he said, “Bind his hands with stun cords.”
One of the guards produced a fresh set of stun cords from his equipment belt. Ethan held the admiral’s gaze as his hands were tied once more. Then Hoff took the electronic key which controlled the stun cords and nodded to the sentinels. “You two are dismissed. I’ll watch the prisoner from here.”
Now the guardsmen hesitated. “Sir, he could be dangerous. It would be better if—”
“It would be better if you followed your orders. Leave us, and stay here to guard the other prisoners.”
“Yes, sir.”
Now Admiral Heston grabbed Ethan’s arm and hauled him along. “This is not an easy situation for me, Ethan Ortane.”
The way the admiral emphasized his last name made Ethan wonder. “Do we know each other, Admiral?”
They stopped at a nearby set of lift tubes and Heston turned to him with a frown. “Not personally.”
Ethan frowned, wondering what that meant, but then the lift tube doors opened, and Heston shoved him inside before he could ask. The admiral turned and typed a deck number into the lift controls, and Ethan asked, “Where are we going?”
“Shut up and let me think. You’ll have your answers soon enough.”
Ethan gritted his teeth, but did as he was told—until another thought occurred to him. “What’s going to happen to the others?”
Heston turned to him. “Is that boy in there really your son?”
Ethan hesitated, wondering how the admiral knew that and whether or not he should tell the truth. “Yes.”
Heston took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’ll have to release him, too.”
“At least I know you’re not more than you seem to be.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
The lift tube stopped and the doors opened to reveal a luxurious foyer with muted gold lighting and a transpiranium dome roof which gave them a startling view of space. The admiral pushed him out into the foyer toward a broad, black door with gleaming gold inlay. Ethan saw that part of the gold inlay was text. It read: Admiral’s Quarters.
They stopped in front of the door, and the admiral turned to him before passing his wrist over the scanner. “Have you ever been in love, Ethan?” Heston asked.
Ethan’s brow furrowed. “Once.”
“Then you know it’s not a common thing, nor is it easy to find one who reciprocates your sentiments.”
“No, it’s not easy.”
“Can you tell me her name, please?”
“Why?”
“Humor me.”
“Destra Ortane. She was my wife . . . before the war.”
Heston’s sighed, and nodded. “That’s what I thought. You had a son together. His name was Atton, but the man in the trial room goes by Adan Reese. Is that an alias or is he another son of yours?”
Ethan shook his head. “How did you know his name is Atton?”
“You’ll see. I hope now you’ll understand that it’s not lightly that I introduce you to my wife and our daughter.”
Before Ethan could say anyt
hing to that, the admiral reached up and touched the door buzzer. A few seconds later they heard footsteps, followed by a woman’s voice coming through an intercom beside the door. “Who is it?”
“It’s me, darling—Hoff.”
The door was unlocked with a clunk, and then it swished open.
Ethan could have fainted when he saw the woman standing on the other side. All the blood drained from his face and his green eyes grew wide and glassy with tears. He shook his head. It couldn’t be.
That woman stared back at him with the same degree of shock.
“Who is it, Mommy?” came a young girl’s voice. A moment later the girl appeared standing behind her mother. “Hello, Daddy!” she said, smiling up at the admiral. She had his gray eyes, but her mother’s dark hair and button nose.
“Hello, sweetheart,” Hoff replied. “Are you enjoying your birthday?”
“Oh yes!” Atta’s gray eyes turned to Ethan. “Who are you? Are you a friend of my parents? My name’s Atta. It's my birthday today. I'm seven,” she announced proudly.
Somehow Ethan managed to smile at her. He blinked and tears ran down his cheeks. “It’s nice to meet you, Atta,” he said. “I’m Ethan. Ethan Ortane.”
Chapter 10
Destra couldn’t believe her eyes. She’d never expected to see Ethan again. Had he come looking for her? What right did he have to intrude on her life now, after so much time had passed? It wasn’t fair to either of them. She saw her husband smile—her most recent husband, Hoff. He said, “I can see that I was right to bring Ethan here. Your old husband has gotten himself into quite a lot of trouble, darling. He’s been accused of some very serious crimes.”
At that, Destra’s eyes hardened and she wiped away the solitary tear which was running down her cheek. “Again, Ethan? Nothing’s changed, has it? Did your time in Dark Space teach you nothing?”
Ethan wiped away his own tears and shook his head. “It’s not what you think, Des.”
“Really?” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Then how do you explain the stun cords around your wrists?”
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