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“It will. Our age is ending. I feel the days shortening. The brief light dimming upon the kingdom of man.”
“Roque…”
“Let him do it,” Victra says from behind me. “He chose his fate.” I hate her for being so cold even now. How can she not see that beneath his deeds, he’s a good man? He’s still our friend, despite what he’s done to us.
“I’m sorry for what happened, Victra. Remember me fondly.”
“I won’t.”
He favors her with a sad smile as he strips the Imperator badge from his left shoulder and clutches it in his hand, drawing his strength from it. But then he tosses it to the ground. There’s tears in his eyes as he strips away the other. “I do not deserve these. But I shall have glory by losing this day. More than you by vile conquest shall attain.”
“Roque, just listen to me. This not the end. This is the beginning. We can repair what’s broken. The worlds need Roque au Fabii.” I hesitate. “I need you.”
“There is no place for me in your world. We were brothers, but I would kill you, if only I had the power.”
I’m in a dream. Unable to change the forces that move around me. To stop the sand from slipping through my fingers. I set this into motion but didn’t have the heart or strength or cunning or whatever the hell I needed to stop it. No matter what I do or say, Roque was lost to me the moment he discovered what I am.
I step toward him, thinking I can take his razor from his hand without killing him, but he knows my intention and he holds up his off hand plaintively. As if to comfort me and beg me the mercy of letting him die as he lived. “Be still. Night hangs upon mine eyes.” He looks to me, eyes full with tears.
“Keep swimming, my friend,” I tell him.
With a gentle nod, he wraps his razor whip around his throat and stiffens his spine. “I am Roque au Fabii of the gens Fabii. My ancestors walked upon red Mars. They fell upon Old Earth. I have lost the day, but I have not lost myself. I will not be a prisoner.” His eyes close. His hand trembles. “I am the star in the night sky. I am the blade in the twilight. I am the god, the glory.” His breath shudders out. He is afraid. “I am the Gold.”
And there, on the bridge of his invincible warship as his famous fleet falls to ruin behind him, the Poet of Deimos takes his own life. Somewhere the wind howls and the darkness whispers that I’m running out of friends, running out of light. The blood slithers away from his body toward my boots. A shard of my own reflection trapped in its red fingers.
Victra is less shaken than I. She assumes command as I linger over Roque’s corpse. His lifeless eyes stare at the ground. Blood thunders in my ears. Yet the war rages on. Victra’s standing over the Blue operations pit, face drawn in determination.
“Does anyone contest that this ship now belongs to the Rising?” Not a sailor says a word. “Good. Follow orders and you’ll keep your post. If you can’t follow orders, stand up now and you’ll be a prisoner of war. If you say you can follow orders but don’t, we shoot you in the head. Choose.” Seven Blues stand. Holiday escorts them out of the pit. “Welcome to the Rising,” Victra says to the remainders. “The battle is far from won. Give me a direct link to Persephone’s Howl and Reynard. Main screen.”
“Belay that,” I say. “Victra, make the call on your datapad. I don’t want to broadcast the fact that we have taken this ship just yet.”
Victra nods and punches her datapad several times. Orion and Daxo appear on the holo. The dark woman speaks first. “Victra, where is Darrow?”
“Here,” Victra says quickly. “What’s your status? Have you heard from Virginia?”
“A third of the enemy fleet is boarded. Virginia is aboard an escape pod, about to be picked up by the Echo of Ismenia. Sevro’s in the halls of their secondary flagship. Periodic reports. He’s making headway. Telemanuses and Raa are pinching….”
“An even match,” Daxo says. “We’ll need the Colossus to tilt the odds. My father and sisters have boarded the Pandora. They’re striking for Antonia….”
Their conversation feels a world away.
Through my grief, I feel Sefi approach me. She kneels beside Roque. “This man was your friend,” she says. I nod numbly. “He is not gone. He is here.” She touches her own heart. “He is there.” She points to the stars on the holo. I look over at her, surprised by the deep current she reveals to me. The respect she gives Roque now doesn’t heal my wounds, but it makes them feel less hollow. “Let him see,” she says, nodding to his eyes. The purest gold, they stare now at the ground. So I unscrew my gauntlet and close them with my bare fingers. Sefi smiles and I gain my feet beside her.
“Pandora is moving lateral to sector D-6,” Orion says of Antonia’s ship. On the display, the Severus-Julii ships are separating from the Sword Armada and firing at each other to try and skin away the leechCraft which festoon them. She’s shifting power to engines and away from shields and angling away from the engagement. “Now D-7.”
“She’s abandoning them,” Victra says, dumbfounded. “The little shit is saving her own hide.” The Society Praetors must not believe what they’re seeing. Even if I brought the Colossus to bear on them, the fleets would be evenly matched. The battle would last another twelve hours and exhaust both our fleets. Now it crumbles apart.
Whether by cowardice or betrayal, I don’t know, but Antonia just gave us the battle on a silver platter.
“She’s left us a gap,” Orion says. Her eyes go distant as she syncs with her ship captains and her own vessel, thrusting the huge capital ships into the region formerly occupied by Antonia, which brings them into the flank of the main enemy body.
“Do not let her escape!” Victra snarls.
But neither Daxo nor Orion can spare the ships to pursue Antonia. They’re too busy taking advantage of her absence. “We can catch her,” Victra says to herself. “Engines, prepare to give us sixty percent thrust, escalate by ten percent over five. Helmsman, set our course for the Pandora.”
I make a quick assessment. Of our small battle at the rear of the warzone, we’re the only ship still battle-ready. The rest are drifting rubble. But the Colossus has not yet made an action or a declaration that its bridge has been taken by the Rising. Which means we have an opportunity.
“Belay that,” I snap.
