The aircar spun helplessly towards the unyielding Valkossan terrain. Well, almost helplessly. With a jerk that made Hephaestus Garrin's teeth snap together, the parachute fired, and the whirling stopped.
A moment later the whirling in Garrin's head stopped, too. "Where did that missile come from?" he demanded.
"No idea," the pilot, Akkad replied. "Somewhere street or ground level. Maybe a building."
Captain Bjorn slammed his fist into one of the panels, and it opened, revealing a quartet of blaster pistols. He tossed one to Admiral Garrin and kept one for himself. "Want one?" he asked the pilot.
"Hell yeah," Akkad grunted, pulling her seat straps tighter. "Hang on, we're landing!"
THUMP
"Stay here!" Bjorn ordered.
"Hell no!" Garrin exclaimed. "You think they ran out of rockets?!"
Both of them ducked out of the ship as the white canopy of the parachute settled over them. Akkad rolled out the other way, and all of them trained their pistols outwards.
Garrin's first sight as he pulled the canopy out of the way was that of Forgon Avenue - one of Valkossa City's busiest throughfares. "Anyone hurt?" he asked Bjorn.
"Us, no," Bjorn replied. "Don't think we landed on anybody," he snorted.
"Two minutes until the backup aircar gets here, sir," Akkad replied, transmitter to her ear. "Security lockdown is underway."
"Good luck to them," Hephaestus growled. "They'll be clean away by now."
A wide-eyed junior naval officer dashed up, pistol in hand. "What's going on here?" he demanded. Then he gulped. "I mean, 'what's going on here, Admiral Garrin, SIR!'" he corrected, standing to attention as quickly as he could.
"As you were, Lieutentant," the admiral ordered. "Maintain watch," he said, as the first police car hissed in on a cushion of air.
The excited burble of the audience dimmed as suddenly a great many of them remembered urgent errands they'd forgotten, or dinners left on the stove. "So much for witnesses," he sighed.
The naval air car droppedd in just at that moment, scattering forever any sense of order in the chaos. "Get a team to cover my aircar," he ordered the junior officer, who's idea of 'at ease' apparently meant relaxing to the consistency of aged concrete. "Go, man! It's evidence!"
The officer shook himself, and immediately started yelling at the police officers, one of whom began yelling into a communicator. Garrin sighed. Presumably the yelling would continue to the point where someone would actually do something.
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"Admiral Garrin, you look quite a mess," Kornax exclaimed, as a weary Admiral Garrin stormed into Marcel Gatreax's office. "What on earth happened to you?!"
"My air car got shot down, Kornax," Garrin ground out, annoyed. "Now where the hell is Marcel, dammit?! And what are you doing in his chair?"
"I do apologize," Kornax smiled thinly. "His Excellency went out shortly after you left, and left me in charge temporarily. I hope you don't mind that I'm using his desk for his business, do you?" He leaned back in Marcel's chair and steepled his fingers.
"Just tell me where he is," Garrin demanded.
"Quite impossible, sir," Kornax apologized, his face almost pained with sorrow. "His Excellency gave orders not to be disturbed for any reason."
"Kornax, get one thing straight. When the man responsible for defense of the realm is attacked, that's an act of war. Now, when the Lord of Valkossa's realm is attacked, I think it only fair that he should be TOLD about it!" Garrin pointed out.
Kornax nodded his head and pushed a button on the desk. "Rosted, please provide an escort for our guest the Fleet Admiral," he said.
"Rosted?" Garrin asked, the skin on his neck prickling. "Where's Sebastian?" he asked.
"He took a sick day, Admiral," Kornax replied. "I think you should take Marcel's advice and take one too," he grinned as a squad of Palace Security filed in. "Guards, take him away!"
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Kornax's smile dropped as the door slid closed behind the infuriated (and arrested) Fleet Admiral. "That man is proving notoriously hard to kill," he said, half-aloud.
The intercomm beeped. "Sir, Admiral Garrin's air car is still on the roof," Rosted's voice said. "They're asking how long Admiral Garrin will be."
"Tell them he's in consultations with Lord Gatreaux," Kornax replied. "That will do for now."
"Yes, sir."
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Captain Bjorn nodded, in the air car. "Understood, Palace Central," he commented. "We'll return to the Defense Ministry until we're summoned. Bjorn out."
"Consultations, sir?" Akkad asked, still in the back seat.
"I don't believe it either, Ensign," Captain Bjorn snorted. "Head back to the Ministry. It's time to call in some firepower."
"Firepower?"
"Have you ever known the Admiral to inform his aide of something through an intermediary?" Captain Bjorn, the aforementioned aide asked wryly.
Akkad shrugged her shoulders. "You're right, sir," she admitted. "What's the plan?"
"We go in and ask Admiral Garrin for personal instructions. IF all is well, I get yelled at."
"You're hoping for a personal reprimand on your record?" she asked.
"That's right," Jon Bjorn replied, leaning back.
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A short time later, a highly irritated Kornax slammed the comm button on his desk. "Rosted, where is my tea?" he demanded. "Surely you don't have to harvest the berries yourself!"
"Er...coming, sir," Rosted replied. A moment later he walked in, pale and sweating, followed by Captain Bjorn and a pair of shiptroopers.
"Captain Bjorn," Kornax smiled thinly. "I'm sure you have an excellent explanation for this intrusion?"
Bjorn returned the smile with a smile that radiated even less warmth than Kornax's own. He moved to one side of Rosted, revealing the Mk. 29 blaster pistol he'd been pressing into the poor servant's back. "We've come for the Admiral, Mr. Kornax," he said. "He has an urgent...shall we say, 'consultation' back at the Naval Ministry."
"I'm afraid you're in no position to make demands, Captain Bjorn," Kornax snorted. He pushed a button on the underside of the desk. "Palace Security is on the way. You really should have brought more than two friends." He folded his hands behind his back and walked over to the office's window, taking in the scenery. "Any last words before your arrest?"
"Only that they'll be a little late responding to your call, Mr. Kornax," Bjorn replied. "It's rude to crowd the office of such an exalted public servant as yourself, so I took the liberty of sending one transport to the main entrance, one to the back entrance, and one to the roof."
Kornax blinked as a squat black air-truck coasted down to a smooth halt on the street outside. The hatch snapped open and a squad of shiptroopers raced out in good order. The devious councillor could only watch helplessly as two palace guards ran out the gilded gates, only to be shot down. "So it's a coup you want, Bjorn?" he demanded, whirling to face the three members of the Valkossan Space Navy.
"It's hardly worse than what you planned, Kornax," Garrin's voice said, rather tense with anger. He strode into the office, accompanied by a quartet of shiptroopers. The office really was getting crowded. "Selling Valkossa to the Colonials? Not your brightest hour, i fear." He wiped at a bleeding scratch on his face. "Attempted treason, regicide, kidnapping...it's not looking good for you, Kornax."
Bjorn and Akkad blinked, almost in unison. The shiptroopers might have been made of stone.
"Regicide?" Bjorn gaped. "You mean..."
"Until I see Marcel here alive, I'm going to be forced to believe he's dead," Garrin ground out.
Kornax gathered his dignity like an iron fortress around him. "Lord Gatreaux isn't dead, you fool," he smiled, looking completely smug. "He is even now on his way to the capital of the Colonial Alliance, as the leader of a secret negotiation team. Valkossan defenses will be seen to by Colonial forces; in exchange for certain...concessions."
"Such as Valkossan sovereignity?" Admiral Garrin asked, very, very quietly.
"Only if absolutely necessary," Kornax laughed.
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"You'll never get away with this, Garrin!" Kornax screamed from inside the prison cell. "You're far too late! The Colonials will be enroute in a matter of days, and they will win!"
Garrin shook his head as the forcefield to the cell activated. He turned to look at Bjorn. "Be sure the intelligence officer gets everything he asks for, please," he said. "I want ever last neuron picked clean. Whatever he's planned, it's nothing good."
(This message has been edited by ElGuapo7 (edited 06-07-2004).)
