Thirty-Seven
“I was meeting with Dina, talking about succession,” Lero breathed slowly, eye glazed over as the holopad began to play the video. It showed gorgeous gardens that sprawled about, hiding that they were in a ship and not an outdoor park.
“There were more nobles waiting for us when we arrived in system. Along with independent Chapterhouses and some others I didn’t recognize. I…I failed, Benny. I should have seen it. There were so many and from other world-ships.” Lero trailed off as his breathing hitched and Kon feared the worse. The stubborn inquisitor dragged himself back from the brink, iron resolve settling on his features as he stabbed a button on the holopad and the video began to play.
Dina was a handsome, older woman. Long silver hair in a braid as she wore a similar suit to the mechanics, just without the grease or stains. She walked slowly, her gait easy and without hurry as she looked around and just enjoyed nature.
“Security tapes that I secured before we left. Proof I was framed,” Lero rasped. Kon frowned at that as another wrinkled was added.
Lero matched her pace, head down as he stared at a holo. His mouth was moving, but no sound came from the speakers. For a moment Kon was lulled into complacency, thinking that the murder of the old woman would take place elsewhere. Her death came suddenly and with little warning. One moment they were walking along the path, both in casual clothes as they talked to each other. The next there was a blast of light and Dina was gone.
The explosive had been placed in the garden beds and had detonated the moment Dina had stepped next to it. Concussive force had tossed Lero out of frame, but he appeared a second later, steam rising off of him as he stared down at the blasted remnant of the governor.
“Proximity mine. So simple and I never would have guessed it. Wasn’t in my suit, didn’t have sensors. Thought security had swept the area. Just laziness,” Lero whispered. Guilt was weighing on him as much as his injuries and the painkillers were.
“I thought terrorists at first. It wouldn’t be the first time. I was already sending orders, but my comms were blocked. I hadn’t noticed since I was with the governor I had muted them. The entire area was in a blocker, couldn’t communicate in or out. Had to pull the physical drives on the cameras to get them,” Lero explained. Kon understood a moment later as a group of armored Knights walked into the gardens, all of them bristling with weapons.
There were no insignia on them that denoted one of the Orders, but the paint on their pauldrons were matching. A Chapterhouse that Kon didn’t recognize, but their actions were a declaration to which side they had sworn their blades too. All four Knights raised their rifles and began spraying the entire area down with laser fire. Plants burst in fire, water features turned to steam and Lero jerked as a pair of bolts struck him.
“They thought I was just some investigator, a spy, nothing more,” Lero whispered before a dark, rasping laugh left his battered body. The image began to burst in and out, full of static as the air around Lero warped and changed. Kon felt like there should be something there, shapes all around Lero.
“Activated runes can’t be seen by machinery. You need to be living to see it,” Benny said, answering Kon’s silent question. A different camera took over with a far wider view than their last camera’s limited one. Kon could see how the Knights had spread out, their rifles aimed at where Lero had been. But the High Inquisitor had moved, his form a dark flicker as he appeared in front of the first Knight.
The Knight was well trained at least, if not imaginative. They dropped their rifle and punched outward, a long blade in their gauntlets shooting out to pierce Lero’s skull. Pure power beat training as Lero grabbed the blade and snapped it, along with the Knight’s forearm.
All around the combatants the air was warping and shivering as if heat waves were visible, explosions and blurs of bodies as the garden was turned into a battlefield in moments. The cameras couldn’t keep track of the fight, recording little more than blurs and bursts of light that destroyed wide swathes of the area, but in a matter of minutes it was over. All four Knights were laying in broken pieces as Lero swayed on his feet, injuries marring him.
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“Took most of my injuries here, but I don’t think Sommers understood what being your apprentice means. Four outer fleet Knights with only a layer or two?” Lero shook his head slowly, pain on his features.
“You fought well from what these cameras show. If you had been in your armor you would have succeeded without the costs,” Benny whispered.
“Hubris. Always be in your armor. Death waits for no man to get ready, “Lero said with the familiarity of a common phrase.
“What happened after?” Benny asked gently. Lero coughed and there was blood on his lips as he looked up at them.
“I didn’t understand still. I left the gardens, but several of Dina’s guards tried to stop me. They had received reports that I had killed her. I had to fight my way thorugh them and I couldn’t be gentle. It was after I accessed their systems that I understood better. The report that I had killed her came right as the bomb went off. Someone had been watching us and reported it the moment it happened. The Knights were supposed to be just passing by, heading toward a firing range, and they barged in to help put me down.”
“This wasn’t something done spur of the moment,” Benny muttered and Lero nodded, though he winced in pain.
“Within the hour arrest warrants were out for all Inquisitors and key members of the Dragon. Not the Knights, but the wealthy soft targets. The merchants and what few nobles they had. A conspiracy that Sommers said he’d found. The Inquisitors and merchants had worked together to put their candidate in the governorship and when Dina didn’t step down fast enough, we sped it along,” Lero said with a gasp of incredulous humor.
“Flimsy, even for them. But, I guess the panic on the ship covered up most of it. What did Randall do?”
“That was the second stage. An intervention,” Lero said as he clicked a button and another image started to play. It was a long range view of a yellow sulfurous moon that hung over a gas giant. White light flared and the moon began to split as a beam of pure energy shot through the moon and toward the camera.
“A-grade cultivator. Randall went and defended the fleet, as his duty.” Those words sent a bolt of electricity through Kon. Their quiet conversations about a cabal of A-grades or similar powerhouses who had decided to move against the Ulmna now had concrete proof.
A man appeared on the screen, hardly more than a dot in the great vastness of space. The bolt of energy that had sheared a moon in half stopped in front of him, held at bay by the man’s upraised hand. Kon couldn’t see what the man did but the gas giant’s surface blew apart, an explosion that sent a plume out of the atmosphere and to consume the broken in half moon.
“The moment this began, I activated the Survival Protocol. They tried to lock me out, but I beat them to it. Random forced jumps through the lanes. Sommers was able to evac off of the Oasis along with his upper officers, but the Oasis is still in their hands. At least they were. I don’t know what’s happened since.”
“How’d you get out?” Kon asked.
“Alexandros. He found me and Bob, smuggled us off the ship right as things got bad. Benny, warships started firing on each other. The fleet, Benny. They fired on each other,” Lero said as a tear tracked down his face.
“It’s alright, son. Just rest and recover and when it’s time, we’ll have our pound of flesh,” Benny assured him.
“I changed the jump coordinates and encrypted the nav systems. Our personal code. I know where the Oasis is going to arrive, Benny. Without its guardians. We need to get there, protect her,” Lero said, a feverish light in his eyes as he grabbed at Benny’s sleeve.
“We will. You seemed to have gotten some of the Dragon Knights out. They’re still loyal sons?” Benny asked and Lero relaxed a bit before nodding slowly.
“They’re still loyal and are ready to prove it. Many of their order were arrested. Jurgen made it out, we are light on hulls though.”
“Rest, just rest. We can do the rest,” Benny’s wrinkled hand patted at Lero’s shoulder as he got up and motioned for Kon to follow him. The door to the room hissed shut and the two of them were left in the hall as Benny sighed and shook his head, looking more his age than ever before.
“Oh, boyo. Let’s go and see if Bob has anything for us.” Benny’s words were flat, deflated, lacking any of the normal vitality it normally had.
“Are you okay, Benny?” Kon asked, hand halfway to touching his mentor’s shoulder. Standing so close to him, Kon realized he was bigger than the old man, broader and taller as Benny seemed to have lost that extra luster he had that normally swelled his presence to larger than life.
“No, boyo. No I’m not. But we will push through it. I can assure you that. Now, go and find Bob, we’re not taking that world-ship again without heavy armor.”