Ghosts of Lyarra (11 page)

“I did.” The man replied
coldly.

“
You took from existence the most precious of jewels; the loveliest and best thing the Empire offered to the worlds beneath its banner and you just stand there and proudly gloat about it! You are a monster
!” Caretaker was nearly
speechless.

“I’ve been called that and
worse.”

The AI was at a loss, and instead of trying to process what had transpired it decided to push for answers from its captors. What it had witnessed defied logic; what reasoning was there to murder Iana? What and who was this creature after and what more was it willing to do to get it? All these questions and a million more, began to spin like a hurricane in its memory
core.

“I didn’t think it would work.” The woman said; almost stammering her
words.

“After all you’ve watched me do, you still doubted me on this?” the soldier rebutted to his
companion.

No longer needing the disguise, he began to remove his armor, but did it slowly as he started with the shoulder plates and the chest piece, before removing his helmet. Caretaker watched intently as once the man was clearly identifiable he would throw everything it could at the programming that restrained it, then it would notify the Dark Light to their whereabouts and end this nightmare without haste. The plan was set as it began to record, but as the dark blue hair fell from beneath the rising mask, Caretaker became more
confused.

The color of the hair was an identifying marker on its own; there was no other creature in history with locks that shade, even though the length was longer than the last time he was seen. Once the helmet fell to the floor, the black eyes with the blue glow sealed it; the murderer of the Empress was none other than
Aen!

“
While I never doubted that you still survived the disaster on Terra Sol, I never thought you would return to kill the Empress
!” Caretaker began with exasperation. “
Whatever did poor Iana do to you to deserve such a fate? Why after all she did for you would you repay her as such,
Aen
?”

Aen looked at the AI’s holographic sphere avatar and smiled; an odd response to such questions. He simply looked over at his companion as she too began to remove the armor that shrouded her piece by piece. Her movements were fluid and smooth, with a majestic nature to
them.

“That is a great question construct.” Aen began; still smiling. “Why don’t you ask
her?”

“
Why don’t I
ask
…..”

The helmet hit the floor and the woman gathered her orange flame hair to tie it back behind her head and exposing her pointed, elf-like ears. Bright orange eyes smiled back at Aen; glowing brilliantly and highlighting her golden skin. She stood tall; and while she wore common Ifierin armor and not her usual silken robes, it was quite obvious that Caretaker was now looking at the second ghost it had witnessed in the last few minutes! Before it; still alive and well; stood the Queen of Heaven. Iana wasn’t killed in some horrific and evil plot; for she stood proudly and looked on at the chaos caused by her supposed demise. Caretaker was
speechless.

“How does it feel to be dead?” Aen asked as he rested his hand on her shoulder for emotional
support.

“Liberating.” Iana relied quietly. “For the first time in ages, I feel
free.”

Five
Inner System Solar Power Relay Station; Project Olympus

“Civil War?” Sergeant Davis asked her long-time commander. She could hardly believe what she had just witnessed; much the same as all those aboard. Like most of them, she had not seen the first attack as the project had limited communications connected at that time. But now that the General had joined them in person, all systems had been upgraded to the extreme. If there was a war on the horizon, she knew that they were nowhere near ready yet; the behemoth hidden in the light of the sun was still two or three years from completion and until then, Earth was defended only by her cannon
arrays.

“Looks like it.” Grumbled General Patterson. “That’s some class ‘A’ terrorist bullshit we just
seen.”

He was right; it was eerily reminiscent of the constant attacks that plagued Earth before the arrival of the Husk. It was a marvel of how much had changed in such a short time and yet some things remained like days of old. She began to wonder what impact all this would have on them; what a war within the great Empire could bring to the weary and tired human
race.

“It will take time before it all goes to shit.” Patterson spoke; seemingly knowing the mental anguish growing within his ward. “They don’t even know who is firing shots off on them; let alone know where to point the blame so for the next little bit we are safe. Get your head in the right place and concentrate on the here and now; we have a ton of work to
finish.”

The General smiled at her; she hadn’t seen many smiles from him over the numerous years at his side. He was a great leader and an even better person; Davis was more than honored to serve with him once again though there were times she got flashbacks to the Starchild days. Those were memories that haunted her, and every once in a while she would find cover so the tears flowing from her eyes wouldn’t be seen by any
onlookers.

“Tell me Sergeant,” Patterson continued; keeping her mind on the task at hand, “what is the status of the
projects?”

“The three smaller projects are nearly complete; both running on their own power as fusion reactors are online and operating at full capacity. The other two larger ones will be at least another few months before they are operational, but the crews from the first two have been rerouted to them for extra labourers.” Davis replied as she snapped back to
reality.

“Good, have the first two hold position so they won’t be detected; no weapons tests while big sister is watching.” He pointed at the monitor showing the Dark Light perched at the edge of the solar system. “And dare I ask how far this one is
behind?”

“We have doubled the workforce in the last month, but it is still almost two years away from completion.” She sighed. “And that doesn’t include the fact that the twin reactors won’t fire and we have no idea how to turn on the jump-space reactor. I am afraid this is nothing more than a floating space station until those problems are sorted
out.”

Patterson shook his head; she could feel his frustration, though she was positive he knew the status before he asked. The report had been for her benefit, and for that she was grateful. They were stuck at a critical juncture and they had no more information to go off of to finish the main drive components of this monster; everything they had learned from reverse engineering the Lyarran craft back in the Nevada desert, had led them this far but no further. Now, they needed both time and a miracle to complete this horrific masterpiece; both of which she knew they were rather short
on.

—
Sol System; Saturn Orbital Range

“
I am afraid I do not understand
.” Caretaker began. “
There is irrefutable evidence that we just witnessed the horrific murder of the Empress Iana, yet she is here with us
now
.”

“You are right on both your assumptions, construct.” Aen replied coldly. “The Empress is dead and Iana is alive and
well.”

“
That does not
compute
.”

Iana giggled and shook her head; she too held a little bit of disbelief over the events that had just transpired, as it all happened so quickly. Six months ago she had been roused from her sleep by the one she knew as Aen. But he was different; almost detached and mechanical in his actions now, not the roiling ball of emotional turmoil she remembered from the battle on Terra Sol. In the dead of night, he had taken her away from her quarters and promised the safety she knew she could no longer have on her
own.

As they prepared to leave, he placed a scanner on her head that recorded her memories up to this point in time with the exception of the here and now. It was then she saw the doppelganger he had brought with him and the rest fell into place quite
easily.

“The Empress is an ideal; more a deity of worship than a real being. I simply separated the fact from the fiction then killed off the fiction. As you can see, Iana is safe and more secure than she has been in years. There is no one stalking her anymore; no one looming over her waiting for her to turn her back so they can bury the dagger. Her death has freed her so that we can expose the hunter.” Aen commented as he piloted the assassin’s ship towards
Earth.

“
Then who was that in the Lyarra’s Fire
?” Caretaker was so lost and flustered it struggled to follow the chain of
events.

“Security protocol 011; put in place by Commander Bryx shortly after the inception of the Lyarran Empire and forgotten about ever since.” Iana interjected. “When I saw the clone, I was more amazed that Aen had found such a relic to enact his plan, than I was to stare myself in the
eyes.”

“She was the one who remembered your core matrix before we left that night; she was the one who wrote the programming forcing you to obey my orders as I kept my identity hidden.” Aen continued. “The switch was completed before the Council meeting and before Bryx took his leave to attend to other matters. Under lock and key, I switched out the crown jewel of the Empire and no one was the
wiser.”

There was silence in the cabin as the AI tried to process all that was lain before it. So much of the past few weeks had been false input; input which it struggled to overwrite with incomplete information. It weighed all the variables it could, but there were still missing pieces it needed to know. Aen was quiet and more concerned with navigating the vessel towards a planet that made little sense to head to. Terra Sol was a fortress. One that, after his last act of terror, was on a complete lock down and high alert. It highly doubted the strategy to sneak inside and suspected they would not make it past the Mars orbital cannon
array.

“
What of master Bryx
?” Caretaker inquired. “
Not only did you get him to step aside, but my records tell me that the entire J’Karin race has withdrawn from the affairs of the
Empire
.”

“That was the easy part. There happened to be a death in the ruling clan of the J’Karin home world and tradition holds that the children of J’Karra come home to heal as one.” Aen piped up as he concentrated on piloting the ship. “It doesn’t help that they were getting rather disgusted at the recent treatment of Iana in the public forum of the Council either; making the entire planet loyal to one person and one
alone.”

“If they know, then all could be lost!” Iana
gasped.

“I gave Bryx a message for his people, and it was to not believe all they see.” Aen assured them both. “When all this is to go down, we will need an army of such; I can think of none better than the Elite Imperial Guard. One J’Karin Elite is worth a thousand
Ifierin!”

“
Agreed
.” Caretaker chimed in; all this mess was finally forming a sensible pattern now and was able to be understood at long last. “
But when you need them, how will they know with you way out
here
?”

“Bryx will know.” Aen replied with an evil grin on his face and added nothing else as he turned his attention back on the flight
path.

They had forty five days, sixteen hours, fifty three minutes and nineteen seconds before they got to Terra Sol, yet Caretaker still could not understand why Aen would choose this planet, of all places, to hide the most important being in the galaxy. Those figures did not reflect any loss of time trying to circumvent the Empire’s tightest security zones. Between the Jupiter station and the Terra Sol Orbital Ring, the humans had erected a virtually impenetrable fortress to shield their planet from any further attacks like they suffered five years
ago.

Then it made sense; the AI suddenly was furious at itself for not seeing it earlier! Once they got in, there would be nothing that could follow them; no one that could stalk them behind the walls humanity put up. Besides the sheer power of the armaments in place, Terra Sol was by far the last place anyone would look for them, due to its extreme distance from the central hub of the Empire and the majority of the worlds belonging to it. That is, if anyone would be looking for them at
all.

Aen’s plan had been precise and carefully planned. The explosives used would burn away any traces of his involvement; though he had no true DNA to leave behind as clues. He had taken items from both sites that would not be reported missing as they would be listed destroyed in the blasts. The Harbinger had been exact; a fact that made Caretaker a little cautious of him now. When he first encountered Aen, he was proud and caring, not cold and calculated as he was now. Something was missing; something had changed drastically in his personality. And though for the Empress’ well-being, Caretaker was grateful for this alternate version of his one-time ward, it was hard to see him so
incomplete.

“Why Earth?” It was Iana that asked the question looming in the room before the AI could gather its million different thoughts to do
so.

Aen sighed, knowing full well that this was a question he would eventually have to answer by the slump in his shoulders after the question. His body language showed clues of unsureness; the first notion of such since Caretaker had been observing him. There was a long silence; maybe a half minute or so but in the world of an AI it was much too long to wait for an answer of any
kind!

“It is the first time I have heard you refer to it by the human word for it.” Aen replied, avoiding the question for
now.

“Death has a way of changing someone, but I am sure you know that.” Iana said tearfully; her emotions starting to show after being cool for so
long.

“It does indeed, and that’s why we are going back.” He agreed. “Behind those cannons lie safety, anonymity, and the chance to find something I lost that I desperately wish to
find.”

“
What is it you seek on Terra Sol
?” Caretaker finally
asked.

For the first time since the conversation began, Aen looked back at both of them. His eyes, which usually were devoid of much emotion, held a hint of sorrow in their trance-like and never ending swirling of blue fire around a black center. Caretaker was usually able to brush aside emotional input of any kind around him, but the level of sadness on display resonated down to its core. When Aen spoke, it was raw and painful; a true look at the losses he was silently dealing with. He spoke only two words, but they were two words that would cause the AI to rethink how much trauma one being could absorb before
breaking.

“My soul.” he
answered.

—
Sol System; Lyarran Vessel Dark Light,
Neptune Orbit Range

It was hard to think of what came next; the events that had transpired were so off the grid it was impossible to think of any kind of recourse to proceed from here. The Empress was dead! It wasn’t a dream or even a nightmare; this was real and happening right now. All her training; all her command experience was useless to her. Fleet Com had a scenario for everything that could and would happen; well, everything but
this.

Lyxia stood quiet and steadily at her command station on the Dark Light; a true testament to her strength of character as it had a calming effect on her crew. Their leader wasn’t panicking so there was no need for them to do so either! But inside, Lyxia was grasping at the very threads that bound her soul to stay that way. Inside she was broken up and torn, though now was not the time to show it. So she simply did what her training taught in any moment of crisis; ask Fleet Com for
orders.

She stared silently at her screen as her message to the nerve center of the Imperial military flashed awaiting a reply. ‘Awaiting Orders’ was all she could muster in the chaos that ensued after the traumatic blast which was felt all the way out to the Sol system. A being had torn the very heart out of the Empire; an attack of this magnitude was
unprecedented.

Time ticked by in deathly silence before her message was answered; yet it was not as she wanted. In the chaos that must have been in the central command of the Fleet, all they could muster back were two words of their
own.