Orbital Academy 18

The schema problem took up his attention for a few minutes before an answering message pinged on his screen.

"Adam told me about his Cherenial Syndrome. Said he didn't have the chits to get the treatment. You're a good man General Auspus. ~Medic Pepperton"

General Auspus stared at the message for a long time before he flicked it off of his screen and returned to work.

***

"Why are you doing this to me, space boy?" Cha's voice was just as weak as his had been the day they first met. In fact, Auspus noted, the entire scene was rather similar. There they were, surrounded by forest, flora and fauna. He was hunched over, arms on his knees, and it was the Terran girl who lay on the grass, injured and bloodied. The circumstances were different, but Auspus felt like they had come full circle. It was satisfying, in a way.

"It's funny." he stared off into the distance. The Orbital Academy ground station had come down through the clouds a few miles off, so it wasn't as if he could see the it through the trees, but he looked anyways. "You asked me, when we first met, what I wanted to do with my life. Do you remember?" Cha looked up at him through strands of blood-matted lavender hair.

"And then I saved you." She groaned. "I saved your life, space boy."

"Yes yes, I'm not talking about that." Auspus waved a hand impatiently. "I just mean that it's interesting, you didn't realize it at the time, but thanks to you, I don't just have the chance to live, I'll have the chance to live that dream life."

"Yes, thanks to me. And some great thanks you gave. You're a....a..." Cha faltered for words, and winced with a gasp.

"You can't charge a word Cha, I've left you completely drained I'm afraid. Don't worry, I'm sure I can guess at whatever horrible names you were about to call me. I regret how it happened Cha, but did you really think I would just live here? On the surface? With savages? Especially now that I have the power of magic?"

"My...'poa'..." Cha grunted, unable to charge the word. Her voice was weak, and she rolled to a side to lean her head against the tree trunk. "My...'magi'."

"Not yours anymore, mine." Auspus barely paid her attention. "And with it...just think about it, the magic of the Terrans mixed with life in the Orbit. I can be faster and stronger, I can have better reflexes than anyone else in the Academy. Smarter too, and without sleep I'll have more time to study. I'll have a leg up on everyone in my year...hell, I'll have a leg up on the Captains. And the best part is that none of them even know about magic. They think you Terrans have some kind of alternate technology. Once they scan me and find no Terran technology, no one will suspect a thing." He bent down and ran his hands along Cha's body, and she whimpered and tried to move away from him. "Oh stop whining, no one's trying to feel you up you moronic creature...I just want this." He pulled the purple crystal from her pocket and slipped it into his, where it rattled against his own crystal.

"But...gave...you...one." Cha seemed to struggled through each word.

"Oh I know, but now I have a potential ally, you see? Someone I can give your magic to, who will also be on the fast track to success, and who will owe me." He stood, brushing his hands off. "Now, I've got to go meet my future. You've helped me quite a lot Cha, I'll always remember that."

If she said anything in response, he didn't hear it.

***

"General Auspus." The message came through his emergency line, and it came from the hangar chief. General Auspus didn't need any further information to determine the nature of the report, but he opened the comm anyways.

"Go ahead Paul."

"We just had to let a transport land, sir. It's the Red Forces from Basura. They didn't tell me where they were going, but I thought you'd want to know they were on the Orbital."

"Thank you Paul." Auspus was surprised at how calm he remained as he cut the connection.

*Haven't I been expecting it, in a way?* He thought, pulling screens to him and working quickly. Finishing directions. Wrapping up request tickets. Adding small notes here and there in his work, making it easy for someone else to take up the tasks. He pulled the crystal from his desk drawer and, after a moment's hesitation, slipped it into his pocket.

*I wouldn't have expected it to be rookies who brought me down, in the end.* He thought idly, looking around the large office. *Hunter, maybe, but not the rookies.* Rather than sit down, he paced up and down, arranging a small nicknack here, straightening a framed work of art there.

It was the problem with keeping so many secrets, with having so many plans. It was impossible to keep so many balls in the air at once, to keep straight such a huge network of lies and connections. He had known that sooner or later he would be caught, sooner or later he would be punished. There was no covenant about using magic, but the Marshal wouldn't allow Auspus to hold a source of power over him. Auspus could only hope that he would be imprisoned, rather than killed, for keeping that source from the Marshal for...how long?

"Seventy years? Eighty?" General Auspus paused in his pacing, looking across the room at the hanging mirror. His skin was still smooth, his hair sleek and black. The effect would fool anyone, although it had to be meticulously applied once or twice a month. Any less frequently, and his shock of dark purple hair would begin to show through. "What would I have looked like, if things had gone differently? If I hadn't crashed on that mission?" He murmured to himself. "Aged and wrinkled? Enjoying retirement? I suppose that's what I'm about to do now, enjoy either a very long or a very short retirement."

An old memory tickled at him, and he chuckled in spite of himself. He turned to the mirror and spoke aloud at the reflection, to the young-faced man with world-weary eyes that looked back at him. "Whether you're twenty or ninety, you'll always talk to yourself just before you die, won't you Jimmy?" he smiled.

The door slid open despite the fact that he had locked it. Two men and a woman stepped into the room, surveying it with disinterest. They wore uniforms of muted grey and red, and though they carried no visible weapons, a shiver went down Auspus' spine.

"James Auspus." The man in the lead smiled, the expression just as neutral as his nondescript appearance. "We are here to escort you to Orbital Basura, to answer charges set against you."

"Has the Marshall decided on a set of charges then?" Auspus suppressed his nerves with practiced ease.

"You are accused of attempting to break the Marshal's covenant. If you will please come with us."

***

General Auspus privately thought to himself that one could learn a lot about a leader by the way they arranged their main base of operations. He had striven to make his office neat, severe, but open. His was a room where business got done, where hierarchy was respected, but where one of his could come for assistance. From what he had seen, General Poulay's office felt like a classroom, with herself at the head, holding court over rows of subordinates. Generals Hunter and Buramis both had offices laid out for efficiency, created to facilitate their work rather than to give off an impression.

As he looked around him, Auspus could tell that for the Marshal, the most important thing to remember was that the Marshal was the most important. From the tiers in front of him to the throne the Marshal sat on, every tiny aspect was designed to point out the Marshal's own godhood.

"General Auspus, the Marshal does not enjoy the turmoil in the Orbit. It makes the Marshal's tasks complicated." The Marshal glared at his screens, not looking at Auspus but still making it clear that he disapproved.

"I am sorry, Sir Marshal." Auspus bowed his head. In his youth, after returning from the surface, he never could've swallowed his pride like that. Age had given him wisdom and calmed his temper. "It was my understanding that you were understanding about General Hunter and my...situation."

"The war between Pivot and Academy matters little to the Marshal. What matters are all of these accusations, flitting back and forth like angry Drakes that must be dealt with." Said the Marshal.

"I...don't know of any accusations, sir." General Auspus said.

*Hunter must've gone straight to the Marshal when the rookies told him about the crystal. If I had just killed them outright, this wouldn't have happened.* Auspus pushed the thought to the back of his head.

"A synthetic stood before us, not two days ago, with one of General Auspus' Captains." The Marshal's habit of looking back and forth between his screens was annoying Auspus, it made it hard to focus on what he was saying. "There were many issues surrounding them, but in the end we decided to disassemble the synthetic and release the Captain, with no punishment meted out to any who were falsely accused. The synthetic escaped."

Auspus' eyebrows shot up. It must've been Chief Errisa that the Marshal was talking about, but he was surprised that the woman had been able to escape. Then again, he had been surprised when she accepted his offer in the first place...

*The offer...* If she had been here, her memories would've been scanned...

"Before she escaped, the Marshal's technicians were able to download information from the synthetic's cores, which we have since reviewed. Within her memory modules resides a message, signed with your authorization codes, which promises to remove the impedance placed upon all synthetics."

General Auspus threw his head back and laughed. The busy clerks on the first tier stared at him with horror, and the men and women on the second tier observed him with curiosity, but he couldn't stop himself. Of all the balls he had in the air, this was the one that would bring him to his knees? A single message with an empty promise to an errant synthetic?

*Not trying to kill rookies, not shooting the engineer, not starting a war. A single message to an artificial human.*

"The Marshal is curious why General Auspus finds this matter amusing."

"My apologies, Sir Marshal. It just seemed so ludicrous that I couldn't help but laugh. Of course General Hunter's synthetic would create a false message to implicate me." There was no hope that his lie would be accepted, of course, but it was ludicrous. The entire situation was too absurd to gain a grasp on.

"The Marshal's technicians assured the Marshal that the message could not be faked, not with General Auspus' authorization codes."

"Of course, Sir Marshal. I meant that I did send the message, but I would never actually remove a synthetic's bottleneck."

"The Marshal does not appreciate General Auspus' flippant attitude. General Auspus knows that the Marshal's covenants are crystal clear on this matter." As the Marshal spoke, Auspus' eyes flicked around the room. Were there really only four security guards here in the throne room? How many others were probably outside? His mind raced. With security so lax, it was no wonder the synthetic could escape. And if it was that easy...

*How much easier would it be for a man with magic? Of course, I'd be exposing myself, but it's not as if I have anything to lose...*

"For the crime of attempted removal of a synthetic's impediment, the Marshal hereby strips General Auspus of his rank and file." The Marshal sounded bored as he pronounced his sentence, and he still looked at his fucking screens, as if ripping away Auspus' life and dreams wasn't worthy of his full attention. "The Marshal furthermore consigns Civilian Auspus to live the rest of his natural days in confinement, in the prison cells of Orbital Basura."

"What about my unnatural days?" Auspus muttered to himself, smiling at his own joke. He had already turned and was walking towards the door, and the guards were already moving towards him. It was clearly not their first time subduing a prisoner.

*First time securing one like me.* Auspus thought, extending a hand. They had scanned him for weapons before he entered, but how could they know about the magic? The first guard simply slumped over, in deep sleep before he even hit the ground. Another dropped his gun to the floor, sucking his burnt fingers as the metal pooled and melted into the tile. Auspus had already turned to the third when he was yanked off of his feet, tumbling backwards.

It caught him by surprise, so completely by surprise that he couldn't brace himself before hitting the ground hard. The General was pulled further, slamming onto his shoulder and then flipping back and cracking his head on the ground at the foot of the first tier.

*Why don't they look more surprised?* The strange thought passed through Auspus' head as he looked upside-down at the faces of the men and women. There was no one nearby, but Auspus found himself lifted, pulled slowly into the air. He floated past the second tier silently, drawn inexorably upwards. The men and women there didn't seem surprised either, simply interested. Auspus reached the bottom of the throne, and slowly the Marshal came into view, arm extended, fist clenched in the air. The screens around the man were dark, and he was looking at Auspus dead in the eye. Auspus suddenly regretting catching the Marshal's attention.

"Did you honestly think you were the only one who had tasted power?" The Marshal murmured, his voice so quiet and so low that Auspus was only barely sure he had said them aloud. "Did you for a moment believe that you were stronger than me? Stronger than the Marshal?"

The Marshal made a dismissive motion, and Auspus was flung so fast that the wind whistled past his ears as he shot far across the room. He hit the column feet first, cracking marble, seeing rather than feeling the bones in his legs splinter. Falling to the ground was less painful, even though it must've been six feet. His left arm hurt, and he must've cracked his head because he was seeing double.

Auspus shook his head, despite the fact that his entire body was shaking, his vision blurry. Was there blood everywhere, or just in his eyes and nose and mouth? Was there too much pain in his legs to process, or could he not feel his legs at all? The door to the room was feet away, and the Marshal was so far behind him on his golden throne. Surely he could drag himself to the door before the Marshal caught him. Why the door? Why not?

Civilian Auspus pulled himself across the cold tile on his one good arm, ignoring the ragged tearing pain in the lower half of his body at each movement.

"You should just give up, Jimmy." He muttered to himself, spitting a mouthful of blood to the floor. "Where are you even going Jimmy? Get to that door, and then what Jimmy?"

His last thought before the darkness closed around him was of Cha.

*** Part 2 - General of Pivot ***

General Hunter woke up, and spent thirty minutes staring into the ceiling. His screen pinged a few times, but he ignored it, mustering the energy and motivation to get out of bed. When he finally did it was with a heaviness, as if the soul that moved him had been drained from him.

*Which it has.*

Grabbing the nearly empty bottle of caffehol from the nightstand, Hunter shuffled to the closet, pulling out a uniform without looking and throwing it to the bed.

*Don't open the door.* He ordered himself, even as he slid the door next to his closet open and looked inside. Errisa's bodyframe lay standing up in the small enclosure, still and silent, eyes closed. Hunter found it easier to think of her as 'sleeping', rather than 'charging', but this bodyframe had no consciousness inside it. If he turned it on it would simply stare straight ahead, unthinking and motionless. This wasn't his wife's sleeping body, the cold frame was her corpse.

Hunter threw the bottle across the room and marched into the elevator. What did it matter whether he showered or not, whether he changed or not? There were lives on this station worth getting out of bed for, and he would take care of his station, but his wasn't one of them. Without Errisa there was no point in caring for himself.

"She's not even dead." He snarled to himself as the elevator hummed in it's path down the decks. "She's out there somewhere, with whoever was smart enough to give her what she needed. The Marshal's covenants were more important to you than your own wife, so you lost her." The elevator door opened, and Hunter stumbled into his office. He stared at the dark screens in front of him, brooding.

*And where are you now, Erissa? Was it Auspus himself, is that why you broke things as you left? Or was freeing the Captains and crippling the generators your own personal 'fuck you' to me? Did you hate me that much for not giving you that one little thing? Was the bottleneck all you really cared about? Was any of it real?* The door pinged, and Hunter turned his screens on with a wave before he answered.

"Come." Kathryn was busy on her screen even as she entered. Hunter glowered at the messages scrawling across the display on his screen without reading them, staring through them.

"You don't look too good sir." His Chief of Security said bluntly, sitting on the other side of his desk.

"Didn't ask how I looked."

"You don't smell too good either."

"Did you need something Chief Kathryn?" Hunter snapped. "Do I need to smell pretty to do my damn job? No? Then what's your point?"

"My point, sir, is that you're in no state to be doing your job right now." Kathryn didn't quail beneath his anger, as Hunter knew she wouldn't. He sighed, passing his hand through his short hair.

"I shouldn't take this out on you." He growled.

"You're under a lot of stress right now." Kathryn waved a hand. "I understand, although it does make me think twice about giving you this report." Hunter responded with a dark glare, and Kathryn sighed.

"Chief of Information Errisa is back sir."

Hunter was moving before Kathryn had finished her sentence, and she rose to follow him as he all but ran down the hallway.

"How long? Where?"

"She requested a landing clearance twenty minutes ago. She'll be docking in a few minutes. Deck G."

They stepped into the elevator together, and Hunter pressed the button several times in rapid succession before the doors slid closed. Watching the deck letters slide by slowly, Hunter felt the urge to pace the length of the elevator.

"Get an engineer on these elevators this week." He snapped. "We're Orbital Fucking Pivot, there's no excuse for elevators this slow."

"I'll make a note of it sir. More pertinently, Chief Errisa is in a dart shuttle, no weapons, but we've been scanning her ship ever since she transmitted her security codes. There isn't a sign of a bomb, but we're not ruling out the possibility of a virus. Given the havoc she caused in the generators, it's also possible that she's just trying to get within close enough range to launch another network attack."

Hunter was barely listening, launching from the elevator as soon as the doors hissed open.

"Status." He barked as he entered the control room overlooking the empty hangar. One of the techs swivelled in his chair to face the General.

"Still scanning sir. Trying to hunt out potential biological attacks is tricky, so we'll be another half hour-"

"Give clearance to land and open the hangar."

"Sir? Is that...is that wise?"

"Don't question me tech. I need to talk to her, give her clearance."

"General, I need a word. In private?" Kathryn asked quietly. Hunter made an impatient motion, but his Chief of Security grabbed him by the arm. "Please?" The action was inappropriate, so unlike her that it startled Hunter out of his single-minded focus. He followed her out of the control room, into the empty hallway outside.

"Sir, I apologize for overstepping my bounds." Kathryn spoke quietly and respectfully. "But we both know that in this situation you are emotionally compromised."