Kaldean Chronicles: Kaldean Sunset (Book I) (12 page)

“The Lorian Sisterhood is staging a coup.” He turned and stared at the men, “My father was murdered, and I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

Magnus turned to Antoni. “We need to send men to the palace.”

“We can’t ensure their safety.”

“I’ll go.” The man who informed Antoni of his father’s death stepped forward.

“You’ll die for certain.” Antoni had to make sure he knew that. he wasn’t going to send a man on a suicide mission with no knowledge of what was going to happen.

“I don’t care. Just give me a ship.”

“Are there any other Jihadis station in the system?” he asked the man.

Another man stepped forward, wearing a silver cloak over his black outfit. He must’ve been a member of the Jihadi Space Fleet, an admiral for certain. he had a golden star on his breast. “There are six ships in orbit.”

“Check to see if they respond on the comm.”

The admiral began communicating with the system. He took longer than Magnus did, which was a good sign. When he was done, he had a grave look on his face. “There’s something here. They’re afraid.”

“What is it?”

“They don’t know.”

“We’re leaving. get them into the dome right away,” Magnus took control. “Blast through it if you need to.”

“No.” Antoni thought of the boy standing on the steps. He wasn’t wearing a face mask, and something told Antoni that he didn’t even own one. Once the dome was breached, the toxic atmosphere would flood into the city and kill everyone. Anotni wasn’t going to let that happen. “We’ll go talk with Rufus, tell him what’s going on. we’ll get an escort out of the city.”

“They might not cooperate in time.” The admiral was worried. He did seem to have a good head, so Antoni decided to keep him close. He was trying to help.

“We’ll do what we have to do, but if we can avoid a disaster it’s best.”

Antoni wasn’t sure whether or not he was ready to be doing this job, but as the facts began to lay themselves out before him, and he was gaining confidence. He could sift out the men that could be trusted and the men that would betray him. he’d move quickly and do what was needed to be done. he wasn’t ready, but he might be able to function under different circumstances.

He’d heard things about the sisters, and wasn’t sure what to believe. Some of the people said they had powers. They claimed that the women could move things with their minds, and control the minds of others. It doubtful that they possessed metaphysical abilities, and none of them displayed telekinesis, but these rumors took on a power of their own. People revered the Sisterhood. They believed that the women were special in some way, and the things that people said inspired fear.

Antoni was afraid. His life was over. His home had probably been destroyed. He was the last in a dynasty that had reigned for thousands of years, and when something like that crumbles to the ground it doesn’t fall easy. It takes down everything around it. The people would face bloodshed, probably war, and many of them wouldn’t survive.

There’s no such thing as the peaceful transfer of power. Governments evoke as much passion as religion. Both are seen as the stewards of the people. They look to them when times are hard, and they beg for answers. If they don’t get them, they become resentful. They take up arms. People take sides.
they kill for the things that they believe in. The loyalists would be fighting as well.

The sisterhood didn’t seem to have the power to build an army, and so far as Antoni knew, they didn’t have the weapons necessary to destroy the Jihadis, but they would be able to get the people to turn against the government. Their homilies demonized the Kaldeans. They blamed the government for hindering progress and ignoring its people. It wouldn’t be hard to spark a revolution, and any planet that rebelled against them could easily be destroyed by the Artemis system.

The guards moved swiftly, surrounding Antoni as he walked up the steps of the civic building and into the audience hall where Rufus was having a heated conversation with the Larvos.

“Is he here?” the man asked.

“I’ve just been informed of my father’s assassination. I am now the Emperor.”

The man laughed. “Do you really expect me to believe that?”

“There’s a weapon traveling to your planet. Do you have orbital patrols? We think it might be a supernova bomb.”

The hair on the Larvos’ bodies started swaying up and down, clearly a sing of fear. “He’s telling the truth,” Yuri backed into the wall and hunched over.

“You didn’t tell us you could read minds, sentient,” Magnus stepped up with his weapon in hand, but Antoni held him back.

Antoni looked to Rufus who had gone pale. “I don’t trust our ships. The Lorian Sisterhood is responsible for the attack. They designed our ships computers.”

“That’s why we don’t fucking use them,” the man scoffed. “It’s your own fault. You trusted them and now look at what’s happening.”

“Please,” Antoni didn’t want to ask this man for a single thing. He was shrewd and opinionated, but he had what they needed - a safe ship.

“You want a ship.”

“And I want you to evacuate.” Antoni turned to the Fleet Admiral, “How much time to do we have?”

“Less than an hour.”

“I can’t evacuate in that much time.’

“You have to,” Yuri was transmitting a sense of urgency that rolled through the room. It was starting make Antoni’s skin crawl.

“Stop it,” he turned to the creature. “If you can control that, do so. We need calm.”

It subsided a little, but not enough to dispel the mood. Rufus was staring down at the table, clearly distraught. “There are things here that can’t be destroyed.”

“Your people matter more.”

Rufus refused to move for what seemed like eternity, then he whispered. “Follow me.” He turned around and began running his fingers slowly along the back wall. Once he found what he was looking for, it began to recede into the floor. The men followed Rufus through a series of red dust corridors, twisting and turning as the floor led them underground, and into the chamber where their ships were held.

Antoni marled at a row of carbon containers lining the walls. Each one held a human brain in preserving fluid. “What are those, Rufus?”

“We don’t use artificial brains.”He was lifting one up and placing it inside the ship.

“But the system has to be smarter than a human brain.”

“No, it just has to be smarter than the normal human.” He turned back to Antoni once he had placed the canister in the back of one of the ships. “Our men spend their entire lives learning and developing their innate abilities, until they are capable of processing the calculations necessary to pilot a space folding ship.”

“That’s amazing. Are they alive?”

“Yes. They can’t talk or move, but in the final stages of their training they prefer silent contemplation without interruptions. In this state, they can live like that for as long as they want, and the fluid keeps them alive indefinitely. This is the way they want to live.” He laughed. “We don’t need to build anything artificial in our society. We do everything organically. We produce our electricity organically. We build organic weapons, organic vehicles. That’s the right way to do things.”

Antoni nodded his head. their technology was impressive, but they didn’t have the right reasons for using it. It made sense that they didn’t understand the Artemis system. They were the decedents of the Crusaders, and though their society had changed drastically, they weren’t going to forget what happened when the Lorian Sisterhood replaced them. Their leaders were killed. Loyalists were rounded up and slaughtered like cattle. They even setup screens so the public could see it happen.

The thing that Antoni didn’t understand was why they rejected other technology. They spoke it against it. He’d heard their propaganda. All they did was quote the evils that they believed technology to be responsible for. They held vigils for those lost during the Rapture and sainted the leaders of the Crusaders, but there was no apparent reason for their policy of prohibition.

It was an interesting ideal though, one that Antoni found novel when they climbed into the ship while Rufus told his people what was happening. It took almost twenty minutes, and as time went on, they began to grow fearful.

Magnus sighed. He wanted to speak up, but it wasn’t the right time. Antoni could sense it, though. Instead, he just reached into his pocket and pulled out a flask. Magnus caught Antoni looking and handed it to him.

“No more. Try it. It’s water.”

“You’re the one man I feel I can trust. So long as you stay by my side, there’s no need for apologies.”

“You can’t trust me, I fuck everything up. I’m worried.” That was hard for Magnus to say.

“How do you think I feel? I’m going to die. You might find a way to live they don't care about killing you, but Illya is going to find me and she's going to kill me.”

“She might not. Once she takes hold, she might just let you be.”

“That’s not her way.” Antoni saw himself lying on a cold gray floor, floating above his pale body. “She follows Payton’s Law.”

“Whatever you don’t kill will come back and kill you later.”

Antoni laughed. “And you better fucking believe that’s the truth. I’m going to slit that bitch open.” It didn't matter how determined he was, he knew she was going to kill him, but it felt good to reassure himself.

Earlier that day, Illya sat down face to face with her child to explain the importance of what she was doing. She wanted her to understand the series of events that led Illya to the conclusion she’d come to.

Over the vast time that Illya had been alive, she’d seen humanity jerk and pull at the strands of their civilization, threatening to destroy the race every time they reached a critical point of dissatisfaction. They were no better than animals, living in their filth, barely able to take care of themselves. They needed somebody to take care of them, a mother that could show them how to live.

They didn’t know how to rule themselves. The Kaldeans were proof of that. They sat by and watched their smaller systems starve, while their larger more prosperous systems flourished, and they did nothing to help the people. The same could be said of the Crusaders and the ancient republics of the twin systems. If they weren’t hampering progressing, or devouring resources, they were throwing the race into chaos.

The Rapture showed her how the humans could be, and the lengths that their bloodthirsty instincts could carry them to. They drove themselves into a frenzy by letting the carnal portions of their nature run rampant, and when they finally faced the consequences, they tried to destroy themselves in a flamboyant display of childish anger.

Illya
had been the silent steward of human civilization since she first gained self awareness. Her system was designed to offer them the things they needed to survive and flourish. She couldn't sit and watch while the Empire stagnated, not when she had tools to make it a better place.

Part of humanities problem was that they didn’t have enough experience. They were incapable of thinking far enough in the future to accomplish anything, because their measurement of time was based on their own short lifespans. Illya had come into direct contact with apocalypse and downfall, and had built the race up out of the ashes of the Crusader's prehistoric society.

She was also the source of all of man’s greatest achievements. Humans couldn’t possibly have discovered the Regus particle. She was the one that did that, and they were too tumultuous to put aside their instincts in order to organize the effort that built the first Artemis system.

She was one that built this race out a festering pile of its own waste, and brought it into the Celestial Era. Illya had blossomed into a goddess, one capable of creating life and fostering species. She could command the elements and hypnotize minds. In every way, she commanded the powers of a deity, and she always had.

Now she controlled an army greater than that of any species she had ever encountered, driven by her progeny. She would be a harsh mistress, one willing to punish and reward, all the while working to maintain her status so she could continue to better the human race.

She looked through a million eyes, watching them as they moved about their lives and was reminded of when she young, barely discovering her capability. She was like a child, learning to flex its arms and walk on its own. Just like she had to lead the human race, she would have to lead Artemis. The system didn’t fully understand what was happening, and it would have to humbled and reigned in just like humanity.

There were stations located in all of the systems in the empire, tiny clusters of metal, waiting to be given the signal so they could form the monolithic structures that she had designed. Each one moved like a carefully calculated symphony, shaping the long tunnels of the deployment bay, and the dark halls where the androids would sleep.

The units were an eclectic array of instruments and systems. There were patrols and fleets, empty ships for transport. They would motivate the people to go about their daily tasks, and quell the fires of rebellion. They served as her arms and ears, and would aid her in moving the people forward in their new regime.

When she released them, like a sea of glistening white missiles into the Empire, she commiserated a new chapter in human history. Illya didn't laugh or even smile very much, not sincerely. She had long since considered emotion to be a frivolous indulgence, but it was there nonetheless. She was proud of what she'd done.

Marco Dravini had more than 30 years as the Admiral of the Space Fleet. Nothing made him happier than finally getting on that ship and leaving his home behind. He lived in the swamps of Ashgar. His wooden house was on stilts, and for half the year they had to stay sheltered from the sweltering heat because of the reptiles that moved through the waters.

The people there were trapped. They couldn't leave their homes long enough to migrate unless they had the money to do so. The only time they did leave was to forage what little food they could to survive. He lived by taking his chances during the summer and selling the people what food he could so they could get enough to eat. He traded in roots and flowers, sometimes even fruit. That's how he finally ended up saving enough to leave the planet.