Pride x Familiar (60 page)

Beside me, Duncan rose to his feet and walked
stiffly over to the windows, obviously feeling the weight of the
heavy gravity that afflicted the cafeteria.

I picked myself up off the floor, and staggered
after him.

Caprice and the other girl were staring at the
starship as it slowly moved south over the academy. They didn’t
turn when Duncan approached them, and Steiner looked surprised when
he grabbed her in his powerful arms, spun her round and slammed her
back against the window.

His whole body trembled as he yelled furiously
at her.

“You’re with Crescent? Your
mother
is
with Crimson Crescent? This is all your fault. All of this is your
fault—you Familiars are the problem!”

I yelled, “Duncan—stop it. Let her go.”

The girl with the rifle pressed the barrel
against his head. “Let her go, or lose your head.”

Duncan didn’t look at her. “Now you’re
threatening us? You’re just like Crescent. Go ahead. Do it. You
know what will happen to you.”

I swallowed and yelled, “Please stop this,
Duncan. Please, let her go.”

Without warning Duncan flew back through the
air, and landed some twenty odd feet away from Caprice Steiner.

I didn’t understand what had just happened, but
Caprice calmly stepped away from the window. The girl glared at
Duncan who was slowly rising to his feet. “You know nothing about
us. Don’t ever associate me with Crimson Crescent.”

Duncan swayed unsteadily but pointed an accusing
finger at Steiner. “You Familiars with your Fragments are the
problem. You’re a danger to everyone. You’re kind can’t be trusted.
Why the Hell do our Prides give you so much power?”

“To protect you,” Steiner retorted acidly. “To
serve as your dogs and keep your kind safe—safe from people like
Crimson Crescent. Safe from people that despise the Prides, and the
Aventis.”

The emotionless mask that Caprice Steiner
usually wore had vanished.

The girl trembled and I saw it for what it was.
Hatred, anger, bitterness.

Her reaction was fueled by the encounter with
her mother.

I didn’t know the circumstances but it appeared
that her mother had betrayed the Prides and abandoned her daughter
for a life with Crimson Crescent.

I could barely imagine the reasons why.

However, I realized it wasn’t the only reason
why Steiner trembled.

The fact she was chained to a Pride burned her
emotionally.

Yes, she was granted the power of a Fragment,
but I knew that deep down Caprice would trade it for freedom – the
freedom to choose her own destiny.

I thought of Crimson Crescent.

I remembered reading about their possible
mandate.

It was something that analysts and experts could
only speculate at.

Freedom for Familiars.

In many ways, Familiars lived lives far more
restricted than Regulars. In fact, Regulars lived like ‘normal’
people. Many Familiars also lived normal lives but there were those
Familiars forced into a life of servitude to one of the eight
Prides. Those Familiars were like Caprice, and they were known as
Specials. This much I knew because Severin Kell had explained this
to Alistair, Siobhan and I only two weeks ago, yet it felt like a
lifetime ago.

Caelum was like Caprice.

He was tied to the Lanfear Pride.

People believed Crimson Crescent wanted to
change this, but the Prides would never agree to letting Familiars
act on their own.

It was ironic how they used Familiars to fight
Familiars.

No, it was unjust.

But Duncan was right about one thing: Familiars
equipped with Fragments were a danger.

Yet, Familiars like Caprice were a necessary
evil.

Who else was going to oppose Crimson
Crescent?

During the entire time since the incident began,
I hadn’t seen or heard from any of the habitat’s Enforcers. As for
the academy’s private security, they were probably as incapacitated
as the rest of us.

Though I agreed with Duncan on one hand, I had
no intention of making an enemy of Familiars like Caprice and the
girl who’d fought alongside her. They had done what they could to
protect us. I was grateful for that.

Though my body felt twice as heavy as normal, I
still managed to walk over to Duncan. Standing before him, I kept
my back and my legs as straight as I could.

“Haruka—?”

I slapped him.

I put my strength into it.

I let him feel my disappointment in him.

Duncan swayed wildly before straightening. He
pressed a hand to his left cheek and stared at me in
astonishment.

I took a deep breath after clearing my throat.
“I’m ashamed of you.”

With that I turned my back on him, and walked as
calmly as I could over to Caprice. “Thank you, for what you did for
us.”

Steiner’s eyes had burned with anger, but now I
saw that anger fade a little. But she gave me a hard stare as
though unsure of my intentions.

I bowed to her politely, then turned and walked
across the cafeteria level to where Siobhan and Alistair sat with
their backs to a wall.

I heard Duncan call out to me, but I ignored him
as I sat down beside my friends. I kept my eyes averted from his
lonely figure, watching him through my peripheral vision as he sat
down heavily where he stood, like a marionette with its strings
cut.

The storm that surrounded the Crimson Crescent
vessel continued to howl outside the building, even though I could
see the starship had moved away to the southern end of the academy
grounds. I heard the storm clearly through the holes in the
ceiling.

I sat against the wall, and wondered when all
this would end.

It had to end right?

Surely Crimson Crescent had what they wanted.
Why else would that starship pick up its members and then move
away.

Flashes of light visible through the south-side
windows attracted my attention.

I’d glimpsed them before, and a number of the
braver students had edged to the windows for a better look.

Now I turned my head and gazed through those
panoramic windows at the habitat’s interior, watching bright beams
of light – some golden, some azure – lance across the vista,
striking buildings and the sky and ground with reckless
abandon.

This went on for a few minutes at least.

What the Hell was going on out there?

I saw plumes of smoke billow high into the air.
Fires had broken out across various district blocks, and emergency
vehicles flew in the sky, trying to deal with them, despite the
dangerous light show playing out nearby.

As I watched, an octagonal pyramid building in
the distance crumbled amid a storm of grey dirt and debris,
scattering a few of the lev-craft floating nearby.

As some of the students voiced their horror and
disbelief, I thought of Caelum, and offered a prayer for his safety
wherever he may be.

(Caelum)

Flying into the palace citadel proved
surprisingly easy.

Staying low to the ground, moving too fast for
the sentry cannons to deal with.

Burning down the few ground artillery batteries
that foolishly aimed their barrels my way.

I was unstoppable.

In mere minutes I was at the inner citadel
wall.

I blew a hole in it using the quantum reaction
cannons equipped to Ravana’s forearms, and flew through the
opening, rather than over the wall.

Skimming the ground, I raced toward the main
fortified superstructure of the palace which stood tall and
imperiously above the foundations of the citadel and the
surrounding city.

The palace wall offered no more resistance than
the other fortifications did, even though this one employed
localized barrier-fields.

Inside was a resplendent scene.

The architecture embodied opulence and avarice
with enormous hallways with arched ceilings. I saw paintings and
murals, and wondered if I’d blown my way into a public functions
area.

No matter.

This wasn’t where I needed to be.

I chose not to linger, and ignored the armored
troopers that rushed to greet me. Waving one of Ravana’s arms, I
extended an effect-field around it, and knocked the soldiers away.
Then I flew onwards and deeper into the palace.

Through the link between her and Ravana, I could
feel her ever so faintly, and so I changed direction, flying
upwards through the palace floors and ceilings. A diamond shaped
piercer-field surrounded Ravana, cutting through floor and ceiling
alike as I soared vertically through the palace.

A hundred levels later, and I neared the
top.

I realized I should have just flown in from the
outside but I admitted this felt more dramatic. After all it was in
my nature to be dramatic. She called it my greatest failing, but I
knew she didn’t mean those words.

Ravana burst through the floor of an immense,
ivory white chamber, and quickly slowed to a hover, it’s vane-like
feet a mere three feet off the ground.

Using Ravana’s senses, I quickly took in the
surroundings.

The chamber was a good two hundred feet across
and circular, with twenty foot high windows offering a three
hundred and sixty degree view of the citadel and city beyond
it.

Yes, I should have flown in from the
outside.

After all, this was the palace’s observation
deck.

No, this was
her
throne room.

From here the Empress of the Human Empire could
observe her domain.

And from here, she could witness the end of an
era.

The end of her dominion.

The throne sat on a raised dais with its back to
me.

I willed Ravana to quickly circle round it,
directing it as I would my body with no discernible lag.

Ravana floated around the throne and its
dais.

I stopped and touched ground before it.

Yes. I had arrived. I had found her.

Ravana’s connection to her had not failed
me.

It wasn’t the Empress I looked upon – no, that
woman had fled long ago.

However, I had not come to this world for the
Empress.

I had come for the girl I had once taken for
granted.

A daughter given to me by her family as a token
of their loyalty – an offering to gain favor with me.

A shy, quiet girl. A fragile, resplendent
beauty.

I hadn’t appreciated her until many months
later.

I had dragged her along with me from one battle
front to the next, disregarding her well-being, her comfort, her
thoughts…her feelings.

I hadn’t realized how special she was until many
months had gone by.

By then, she was a presence I could hardly live
without.

I wondered how I’d ever lived my life without
her.

By the time I admitted my feelings to her, our
time came to an abrupt end.

She was taken from my side because the enemy
believed she was my greatest weakness.

And they were right.

My despair, my anguish, it crippled me…until I
focused it into rage and blinding determination.

It drove me through system after system, hunting
down the Empire – hunting down any sign of her – until eventually
it brought me here to their final seat of power.

But I didn’t come alone. I came with every
resource I had at my disposal, and I intended to crush the Empire
completely in order to reach her.

I stood before the dais…unable to move.

She sat on the throne, bound to it, dressed in
flowing, regal white.

She looked as beautiful as I remembered her on
the morning I departed for the front once more, promising to return
to her side in a few days’ time.

I’d been so afraid for her safety, yet I should
have kept her with me.

I should have kept her close by.

My first failing.

I had trusted the people around me – people
who’d vowed to protect her.

My second failing.

I looked at her seated on the throne.

I could have taken her for sleeping, but Ravana
detected only the weakest of life signs in her.

That was to be expected. Her throat was slit, as
were her wrists and ankles.

And red painted her dress, the throne and the
dais.

Too late.

I was too late.

This had been done not long ago, yet there was
no saving her now.

Even if she was an Aventis, she had lost too
much blood and couldn’t heal in time.

They had left her here for me to find, the final
nail in the coffin that was my misery.

Even if they lost the war, they would succeed in
breaking me.

All the power I had at my disposal, all the men,
women and machinery I commanded – all the terrifying might of the
Rho-Khan Ravana – and I couldn’t do anything but watch the last of
her life fade away.

Through Ravana…I felt her die.

My mind broke.

I lost all reason.

I screamed and Ravana responded to my abject
despair.

It blew the chamber apart.

#

(Simone)

Pain.

I felt it run through me.

Not physical.

Emotional.

A heartrending despair that made tears burst
from my eyes and run freely down my cheeks.

His pain.

Something horrible had happened and his pain was
flowing through the Vault and into me as I stood outside the black
sphere with my right arm deep into it.

I had to do something.

I had to do more than what I was doing now.

Releasing my hold on the twisted railing, I
slipped my left arm into the Vault.

And then I concentrated my feelings, pushing
through his anguish, and reached out to him.

My pure and honest feelings.

And the will to do whatever it took to remain by
his side.

I called out his name, over and over, not
knowing if he could hear me, yet believing that he would.