Amateur Megalomania

The stately ship is seen no more,
The fragile skiff attains the shore;
And while the great and wise decay,
And all their trophies pass away,
Some sudden thought, some careless rhyme,
Still floats above the wrecks of Time.

William Edward Hartpole Lecky (1838-1903)

Section 1

“Why do you hate us?”

Keamanan watched the battered deck, worn smooth by generations, pass beneath his boots as he walked with Morium.  Overhead, the flickering lights cast dancing shadows that sketched out the hulks of soon to be abandoned refineries.  Mounds of raw minerals still covered the deck, waiting to be shoveled into the open maw of the machines.  The material would be gathered and moved to a new deck, but the machines themselves couldn’t be repaired.

Slowly, the Ship died.

He failed to suppress another sigh when Morium asked the question again, signaling they had entered the inevitable breakdown in their civil conversation.  Finally, after considering other responses, all of which led to the same sort of argument, he indulged in his own frustration.  “Why does it always come to this?  I don’t hate you.”

“Your people hate us,” she said.  “We are human, you know.”

“I’ve never suggested otherwise,” he said.

“But you support them.”

He sighed.  “It’s the right thing to do.  This whole deck is barely sustainable.”

She laughed, short and cold.  Quickening her pace, she moved ahead of him, tossing the words over her shoulder like a scattering of broken glass in his path.  “ALL of my people live on decks that you would call ‘barely sustainable’.  How many are going to die because of this?”

They reached the far side of the factory space and crossed into utility passages, branching away to either side.  Keamanan looked in each direction to verify that the passages had been sealed properly.  The welded plates terminated each end in a gray wall of metal.  Chipped paint on the bulkhead pointed the way towards compartments that were no longer accessible beyond the barrier.  Beneath the roughly painted letters, the fading remains of Builder script still showed through a layer of rust.  The spidery runes were unreadable to all but a few of the Clergy.

“What do you want from me, Morium?”  He called out to her.  When she stopped, he caught up with her.  “What would you have me do?”

She crossed her arms and glared at him.  It was too late to steer the conversation back to the original topic.  Her loose, brown robe was frayed where it rubbed against the gray metal deck.  A lock of black hair curled around her oval face, tucked under her fine chin.  “I want you to see the truth of what’s going on here.  I want you to admit that she’s shutting this deck down in retaliation.”

“The truth?” he asked.

“It’s all a form of control.  The Compact murdered a Priest, and now she’s going to shut this down and reduce the workforce.  Will those who lose work here be fed?”  She stared at him with a darkness that was all too familiar.  “You, of all people, should understand.”

“That was a long time ago,” he said.  “I’m not that person anymore.”

“I know.”  Her voice snapped like a taunt cable.

Now Keamanan allowed the suppressed anger to shove the words from his mouth in a rapid burst.  “You’ve changed too.  Your people don’t even know who you are.”

“I live up here because I have to,” she said.  “I do what I must.”

“And you enjoy it, don’t you?  It’s better than crawling around down there.”  He smiled.  “Do you go down there on your own often?”

Her eyes narrowed but she didn’t respond.

“I bet I spend more time down there with ‘your people’ than you do,” he said.

She leaned toward him, raising her voice.  “You’re only down there to gather intelligence, to build a better cage.  Don’t pretend you know them better than I.”

Keamanan opened his mouth to answer when he saw motion out of the corner of his eye.  He looked back to the factory they had just left to see three men approaching.  They wore the uniform of Crewmen, but something was wrong about the way the clothes fit.  One of the men was raising an object in his hand, pointing it at Keamanan and Morium.

“Gun!”  Keamanan grabbed Morium by the shoulders and threw her down on the deck.  His hand was already pulling his own gun from the holster when he saw the man pull the trigger.  His surroundings blurred.

Time slowed.

The gun sparked and misfired.

Shock registered in the man’s eyes as he struggled to pull back the hammer on the crude gun.  The two other men drew swords and charged down the corridor.

Keamanan took steady aim at the gunmen even as the two swordsmen closed within striking distance.  The gun may have misfired, but it was the greater threat.  He pulled the trigger and the explosion of powder echoed in the tight metal corridor, leaving him with a dull ringing in his ears.

The gunman dropped the weapon as a neat, red circle appeared on his forehead.  Even as the body tumbled backwards, Keamanan turned his attention to the nearer of the two swordsmen.  His left hand had already closed around his own blade, pulling it from his scabbard.

I’m not going to make it.  The calm thought passed through his mind.  He gauged the distance to the nearest swordsman, measuring it against the time it would take to cock the gun, factoring in the real possibility that his gun might also misfire.  Too close!

He lobbed the gun at the swordsman with a casual flick of his wrist.  The man hesitated at the unexpected move.  It was just enough to buy Keamanan an instant to transfer his sword to his right hand and lunge.  The tip of the blade caught the man on the right side of his chest, and Keamanan pushed forward, shifting his weight to his extended leg.  The blade slid through, piercing the man completely.

Keamanan pulled the blade back, but the skewered man thrashed on his sword.  The blade caught on bone, and he lost his grip on the hilt.  He heard the other man to his right, and he turned with his empty hands spread wide, ready to do whatever he could.  In the back of his mind, he knew he was going to be cut.

The man grinned as he lunged forward, extending his left leg as he pushed his weight behind the thrust.  Keamanan saw the tip of the sword coming at him, and he threw his left arm up against the side of the blade.  The tip turned away from his chest and caught on the shoulder of his jacket, piercing the heavy fabric and tearing into his muscle.  He watched the thin shaft bend as the tip dug into his bone.  He felt a distant suggestion of pain, but it would wait for a few more seconds.

The swordsman leaned forward, slightly unbalanced.  Keamanan balled his right fist and drove it into the man’s nose.  He felt the cartilage pop as dark blood erupted from the blow.  The man staggered back with blood spraying.

Keamanan pulled a small dagger from his left sleeve as he stepped forward.  The pain from his shoulder had caught up to his brain, and he felt the warm flush of nausea.  Before the swordsman recovered from the blow, he rammed the dagger into the man’s neck, twisting the blade upward into the base of the skull.

He pulled the blade back, letting the body collapse to the deck.  He looked around to make sure all of the assailants were down. Satisfied they were all dead, he turned his attention to Morium.  She was picking herself up from the deck, rubbing her arm.

“Are you okay?”  Keamanan stepped toward her and was surprised when he found himself on his knees.  The nausea flooded over him and his shoulder throbbed in time to his pulse.  He felt the warm stickiness on his hand from blood running down the inside of his jacket.  The corridor shimmered before his eyes.

“I think I should be asking you that.”  He felt her pulling at the buttons on his jacket.  “Move over here.”  He crawled a few feet with her, leaning against the bulkhead as she worked the jacket from his shoulders.

She took the dagger from his hand and began to cut strips from his jacket.  “It looks worse than it is.”  She wrapped the strips around his shoulder, and pulled the edges of the wound together.  He grunted as she tugged on the strips.  “Sorry, but this has to be tight.”

He gritted his teeth and shifted his gaze to the three dead men.  “Looks like they’re going after me now.”

She continued to tie the cloth into knots.  “And you’re surprised?”

“No, but I hoped your man had more sense than that.”  He shifted his arm as she tied it off.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Keamanan grabbed her hand when she finished tying the last knot.  He held it until she looked at him.  “I know about you and Resnig.  You should take care, Morium.  I can’t protect you from treason.”

She ignored his words as she stood and looked down at him  “I had nothing to do with this.”

He nodded his head, “I know that.”

“Do you?  What about Procer?” she looked around at the bodies.  “Will she believe me?”

Keamanan struggled to his feet.  She didn’t help him.  “I don’t know.  Things are on edge.”  His legs seemed to steady as he took a few steps.  He grasped the hilt of his sword and turned it, working it loose from the ribs of the dead man.  The blade slid free, and he nearly fell back.  He wiped it clean on the remains of his ruined jacket, tossing the fabric down on the deck.

He heard shouts echoing along the corridor as his men reacted to sound of the gunshot.  Keamanan had security details scattered all over the deck, guarding the maintenance teams who worked to seal the corridors.  Despite that, the assassins had managed to infiltrate.  He looked at the sprawled bodies.  They would have to recheck the entire deck.

Morium retrieved his gun and held it out to him.  As he took it, she didn’t let go immediately, forcing him to meet her gaze.  “Keamanan, I don’t agree with you, and despite everything you’ve done to me, I still manage to have a little respect for you.”  Her tone changed, calling him back to the past, “It doesn’t have to be like this.”

“No, but it can’t be your way either,” he said.  “There is still hope this could end.”

Her stern features softened, and he found himself wanting to reach out and hold her, again.  “What if we don’t stop?”  She stared at him for another moment before placing a hand on his cheek.  “Be careful, Keamanan.”

She turned away and walked down the corridor, disappearing in the flickering gloom.  He stood there for another moment before he whispered to her retreating back, “God help us all if this isn’t the end.”

Next Part

Filed under: Writing