Stars of Blood and Glory (33 page)

The floor shook as another system ruptured
somewhere beneath the bridge. A new set of alarms joined the
rapidly growing chorus.

“
I must thank you, however—and
congratulate you on a victory nobly won. And if it’s any
consolation, at least you’ll die knowing that you saved your
people.”

Katsuichi’s arms began to shake
uncontrollably as stars of pain shot across his vision.
“You—you—”

“
Goodbye, Your Highness. And
please understand: None of this is personal.”

With that, Colonel Webb rose calmly to his
feet and strode out the door.

“
Webb!” Katsuichi shouted, his
voice raw and full of pain. “Come back here! Come back and face me,
you bastard!”

It was no use, though—the lower half of
his body simply wouldn’t move. He tried to drag himself across the
floor with his arms, but the pain in his stomach soon became so
unbearable that he nearly blacked out.

“
Katsuichi-sama!” came a frantic,
girlish voice. For a surreal moment, it seemed as if Hikaru had
come to help him. Then he looked up, and saw the tear-stained face
of his communications officer.

“
Y-your Imperial Highness!” she
shrieked, her frenzied hysteria made all the worse by her apparent
uncertainty how to react. She reached down to help him, then
stopped her trembling hands short before pressing them to her
cheeks, then reaching down to him again.

“
We have to get you out,” she
decided. Taking great care, she turned him over on his back. Even
so, he groaned in agony as she reached beneath his armpits and
started to drag him toward the door.

A distant explosion sent her sprawling
backwards, over Kenta’s lifeless body. She cried out and pulled
herself up, but Katsuichi felt his grasp on reality slipping. His
vision swam before him, and as much as he tried to fight it, he
knew he didn’t have much longer before he passed out. In that
moment, his father’s voice came to him, as clearly as if the old
man were standing right above him.

You must repay this debt of honor, Katsu.
You must not let it overshadow us.

The edges of his mouth turned up in a grin,
and in spite of the terrible pain, his laughter rose above the
blaring of the alarms.

“
Y-your Highness?” stammered the
communications officer, once again by his side.

“
I’ve repaid the debt, Father,”
Katsuichi shouted, his voice wild with glee. “We are not … honor
bound to the … Federation any longer!”

“
Sir,” said the officer, tears
streaming down her cheeks like rain. “Sir, please
don’t—”

Katsuichi reached up and grabbed her by the
collar. “The sword,” he said, looking her in the eye. “The sword.
Where is it?”

“
O-over the doorway,” she
stammered.

He let her go and collapsed to the floor
again. “Bring it to me,” he whispered.

She obeyed his words without
hesitation. The ship lurched, but she knelt down
seiza-
style and held it out carefully to him.

“
It’s here, Your Highness,” she
said, bowing her head.

“
Good,” he said. “Take it … to my
sister.”

She looked up at him, her lips quivering
like a child who has just lost her father. “But—but sir, your
wounds—”

“
Leave me,” he commanded, still
grinning. “You’ve done … all you can … for me. Take the sword … to
Shinihon … and to my sister.”

“
Sir!” she cried, bowing her head
so low that her forehead was pressed against the bloodstained
floor. Another explosion rocked the ship, and the smoke in the room
began to grow thick and pungent.

“
Go!” he ordered. With a hesitant
glance, she rose quickly to her feet and ran out the door, the
sword pressed tightly against her bosom.

It’s done, Father,
Katsuichi thought to
himself as he breathed one last, painful breath. His lips turned up
in a grin, and the alarms and explosions suddenly seemed very
distant, as if the sound were coming to him through a
tunnel.
I
did what you asked me to. I repaid the debt of honor and saved our
people.

The tunnel grew longer and longer, until the
noise faded into silence. He closed his eyes and let himself drift
into a state of peace, where he no longer had to worry about the
burdens of being emperor. And if he listened very carefully, he
thought he could hear the voice of his father, calling him home
across the starry sea.

Chapter 20

Rina stirred and opened her eyes as the
bodies all around her began to shift. Her sleep the past few days
had been long and dreamless—which was more comforting than it had
been in a long, long time.

“
Any news?” grunted one of the
soldiers at the head of the crowded shuttle. The place was
beginning to stink of sweat and body odor, but after all she’d
experienced, that was hardly any concern.

“
Good news,” boomed Roman’s
voice, not just to the soldier but to everyone else as well. “We
have picked up signal. It is Federation battleship, with two
Rigelan escorts. We are establishing contact and will soon make
rendezvous.”

A hearty cheer erupted in the tightly packed
space of the cabin. At once, everyone was hugging each other and
talking in warm, excited tones. Though the portholes still showed a
dark, sunless landscape, it felt as if dawn had finally broken
after an almost unbearable night.

Rina closed her eyes and tried to reach out
with her datalink implant. Normally, she would have been able to
pick up a signal, and perhaps even infiltrate the network through a
back door. Instead, she felt an empty void, like the remnants of
muscle memory for an amputated limb. She reached behind her neck
and felt for her neural sockets—they were still there, so she could
still manage to get in through a hard connection. However, without
her datalink implant, she was cut off.

It felt strange to be free of that device.
As she reached back into her memories, she couldn’t help but feel a
bit melancholy—which was strange, because hardly anything had ever
made her sad when the datalink was directing her thoughts. Perhaps,
then, it wasn’t that a part of her was missing, so much as a
missing part that had finally been returned.

The conversations around her rose in pitch
as the engines began to engage. Working quickly, the soldiers tore
down their hammocks and stowed them under their seats. Roman went
down the aisle, making sure they were all buckled in. He stopped at
Rina and looked at her for a moment, as if trying to speak with her
through her mind.

“
It doesn’t work anymore,” she
said.

“
I know.”

She glanced down at his stomach. His shirt
was unbuttoned, so that she could see a large dressing wrapped
around his chest and torso.

“
I’m sorry for hurting you,” she
said softly. “That wasn’t me.”

He nodded. “And now?”

“
And now what?”

“
Is it truly you now?”

“
I—I think so. It’s been such a
long time, though, I don’t really know for sure.”

The shuttle jolted a little as it lifted
vertically from the surface of the planet. Roman leaned on one of
the bulkheads for support and put a reassuring hand on her
shoulder.

“
There is no hurry. You will know
soon enough.”

She looked up at him and smiled. “Thank
you,” she whispered.

“
No problem,” he grunted. “You
are one of us, after all.”

After living in self-imposed solitude for so
long, few words could have been more comforting.

* * * * *

“
Your Imperial Highness,” said
the chief Imperial advisor, bowing deeply as Hikaru entered the
throne room.

She smiled and returned the bow as
gracefully as she could manage in her cumbersome royal kimono.
After all that had happened, it felt strange to be back again—and
even stranger, knowing that her brother would not be coming back to
see her. She’d heard the news only a day before her arrival, and
the pain of his loss ate away at her, sometimes making her wish she
could scream. Still, now was not the time for that. Later, when she
was back in her quarters—when she didn’t have a whole planet to
rule.

Perhaps because of that, something about the
palace felt different to her. The wide, hardwood floors and
perfectly spaced wall panels looked the same as before, but felt
somehow more intimidating. Light streamed through the various
skylights set evenly across the high ceiling, and the throne itself
sat atop an imposing staircase with ornate ivory carvings and
ancient woodwork. Two dozen samurai, all dark-skinned and muscular,
stood guard with their swords and ceremonial armor. They bowed
deeply to her as she ascended to the throne, and her throat
constricted in something that felt very much like terror.

Is this how you felt when
Father died, Katsu?
Hikaru wondered to herself. She remembered how white his
cheeks had been, and how solemn he had sounded when he’d confided
in her just how much the prospect of ruling the planet had
terrified him. Now she knew exactly how he felt—and more than
anything, it made her want to run away.

The last few steps were the absolute
hardest, but she forced herself onward until she’d taken her place
on the throne. Her maidservants bowed, and she nodded to them,
hoping her gesture came across as graceful. With the noble houses
tending to their losses after the close of the war, the room was
conspicuously devoid of courtiers. Still, she smiled and nodded to
those few who had come to see her.

One in particular stood out. He was
conspicuously tall, and dressed in the crisp blue uniform of a
Federation officer. His eyes met hers, and he gave her a pleasant
smile.

“
Who is that?” asked Hikaru,
leaning over to quietly ask one of her maidservants.

“
The offworlder, Your Highness?
That is Colonel Webb—he was with your brother in the battle of
Eyn-Jalla.”

A lump rose in Hikaru’s throat, one which
she almost failed to suppress. As the chief advisor ascended the
stairs and stood at his place by her side, she leaned over to him
and motioned to the Federation colonel.

“
I will see that man first,” she
said. “Send for him right now.”

“
Of course, Your Imperial
Highness,” said the advisor. He turned and motioned for the
offworlder to approach the throne.

Hikaru got a good look at him as he climbed
the steps. He was tall and quite handsome, with striking features
and wavy blond hair. Though it had only been a few days since the
battle, he was perfectly groomed, his chin clean-shaven, his
uniform fresh and clean. His deep blue eyes seemed to penetrate
her, but he bowed gracefully with his hands at his side, following
the customs of her people to the letter.

“
Your Imperial Highness,” he said
in Gaian.

“
You do us honor with your visit,
Colonel Webb,” she said, bidding him to rise. “I understand you
were with my brother when he died. Is this true?”

He stood up straight and met her gaze
without flinching. “It is.”

“
Then tell me,” she asked softly,
“how did he die?”

“
Honorably, Your Highness. He
died with honor.”

She bit her lip and nodded. “Thank you.”

“
He was a fine commander,” the
colonel added, his smooth voice filled with energy and passion. “He
stood when no one else would. I will always be grateful for the
chance I had to go into battle alongside him.”

She smiled at him, choking back tears. He
bowed to her again, then stepped down the staircase backwards, eyes
never leaving her as he returned to the floor.

“
Are you feeling all right,
Hikaru-sama?” the advisor whispered. “If you wish, I
can—”

“
No,” she said, silencing him
with a gesture. “I’ll be fine, thank you.”

“
As you wish, Your
Highness.”

She took a deep breath and composed herself
again. As difficult as the coming days and years would be, she was
not going to run away from her duties any longer. She was no longer
a mere princess after all—she was the empress regent of all
Shinihon, heir to a line that went all the way back to the Earth of
Legend.

The thought made her
smile.
So
much for being trapped in the palace.
As she motioned for the next courtier, she
was already planning her first postwar tour of the system, as part
of her new duties as empress.

* * * * *

“
Abie!” said Prince Jahan,
spreading his arms wide as Abaqa stepped into his lavish quarters.
“Abie, it’s good to see you again!”

“
And you as well, brother,” said
Abaqa, giving him a warm embrace.

His brother kissed him on both cheeks and
stepped back to clasp his hands on his arms. The broad smile on
Jahan’s face made Abaqa forget about the embarrassment of being
pulled out of an escape pod by a low-ranking strike team
commander.

“
Ah,” said Jahan, “you are
looking more and more like a man every day. Not long now, and you
will be commanding your own fleet just like Gazan.”

“
I truly hope so,” said
Abaqa.

Jahan patted his shoulders and turned to
step into the room. “Come. Can I get you something to drink? Sit
down, sit down!”