Starr vs the Emperor of Space Pt. 04

"Ahem."

"-keep-"

"AHEM!"

The two pirates turned to face Claudette. Her glare was fierce -- and aimed directly at Shellington. She held in her hands two halves of one of the 10cm flack warheads that would have been bought by Alta at no small price. She hefted the warhead cap, then tossed it to Shellington.

"That's a dud," she said, firmly.

Shellington caught it, spluttering. "What...I...you!"

"Goldilocks, don't insult my best supplier," Alta said, sounding irritated.

"Bless your heart and do me a favor, dear, check the shell yourself," Claudette said, scowling. "I've checked three -- two are duds. That's completely unacceptable." As she spoke, Alta examined the round, then frowned slowly as she did so. She turned her glare on Shellington, who held up his hands, stammering.

"H-Hey, we get what we can find, Polaris!"

Alta grabbed his collar, lifting him up with her cybernetic arm. As she did so, her wrist opened and a dagger thrust from the base of her palm, the tip pressing to his throat. Shellington's eyes widened and his legs kicked.

"Please! Polaris! T-Take two! Take two crates! T-Throw out any duds you find!"

Alta glared at him -- but it was Claudette who spoke.

"Three, I think is fair," she said, her voice the sugary sweet that only a Southern Belle can muster up when serious snide sarcasm is simply required. "After all, ya'll want us to keep on telling everyone what a good quartermaster you are?"

Shellington nodded, his eyes widened. "Three! Take three!"

Alta dropped him and smirked down at him. "Well. I suppose that works just fine...friend."

As the crates were packed up by the imp boy, who was loading them onto a wheeled cart that looked as if it had a small engine attached for mobility purposes, Alta took Claudette's arm, drawing her aside. She murmured to her.

"How by the Mount of Mars did you ever know how to find dud ammo like that?" she whispered.

"You get dragged all the way through the Italy campaign with your Missus, you learn to check artillery shells!" Claudette said, sticking her nose into the air.

Alta gave her an odd look -- one that was hard to read. "Well, Goldilocks, you...have hidden depths."

The two stepped from the shop, the crates trundling behind them...

And from the shadows stepped figures in robes, with swords in their hands, gleaming under the moonlight of Ceres. Alta grabbed Claudette, shoving her back. The figures formed a half circle around the two, their blades glittering -- and from beneath their hooded robes, red eyes glowed like ruby gemstones.

"Stay behind me!" Alta growled, drawing her own saber with her organic hand. "...these are the none other...than the Death Commandos of Mars!"

***

Mark Styles was, at heart, a reporter. He had wanted to be one before Uncle Sam had needed his help on the beaches of Normandy -- the only reason why he hadn't been a war reporter had been that he had been seventeen years old when he'd lied on his draft papers, eighteen by the time he was in Europe, and while he had tried to get a place working one of the local newspapers as a kid, he hadn't quite had enough hustle at the time. It was only after he had been bloodied in the fields of Europe that he had learned exactly what it took to throw oneself into a job -- be it flushing out some Kraut machine gunners or...finding the truth of a story.

And the Star Princess Zella's little story about the conquest of the solar system seemed to strike Mark as being only one half of the story -- at best. No one conquered anywhere, not without leaving behind the detritus of an invasion scattered here, there, and everywhere: Rebellions, saboteurs, and resistance fighters. There had to be some kind of organized resistance.

He just had no idea how he was supposed to contact them while trapped within the Plutonian Ice Castle of the Emperor himself.

His chambers, at least, were comfortable. When Zella wasn't enjoying his company, he was kept in a smallish chamber that adjoined a central corridor that was used by a great many servants and other pleasure slaves. He had done a quick exploration of the surrounding area -- learning precisely where the kitchens, the baths, and the storage rooms were located, as well as meeting the rest of the staff. The majority of them were from the subjugated kingdoms of the solar system: Hawkmen and Faemen from Venus, Catmen and Wolfmen from Mars, Tuskmen from Titan, and more.

All of them treated him with a brusque disinterest -- as if he was more of a curio that was going to be abandoned soon, and thus, not worth taking any interest in.

Mark sighed as he tapped his finger against the bottom of his matches box, the single match he had left within rattling around inside of the cardboard thing. Other than it and a few smokes, he had nothing left of his belongings. "What I wouldn't do for a 1911..." he muttered under his breath. "Okay, Styles. You're a journalist. Get to talking to folks." He rolled to the side, standing up in his bedroom. He stepped to the door and opened it -- half expecting guards. But no, there were still no guards at his door. He supposed, with the collar on his neck that could control his very nervous system if the Princess wished it, there wasn't much need for guards.

He stepped into the broad corridor and saw that several burly hawkmen in collars were working to carry a large silver cylinder through the corridor. He watched them as they brought it to the rear of the corridor, where they set it down. One of them began to work at the wall, opening it and revealing a similar silvery cylinder.

"What are you fellas working on?" Mark asked.

The first of the hawkmen turned. Mark was still getting used to the difference between a Hawkman and a Hawkwoman -- it remained odd as hell to him that the male of a species would have a beak, but the female wouldn't. Still, he could read the red feathered man's expression easily enough: Irritation at being interrupted on.

"Replacing the air filters," the red feathered hawkman said, jerking his thumb at the silvery container. "These filters take carbon dioxide out of the air -- we breathe it out, and if we get too much we're all in trouble. They're chemical filters, so they get used up and have to be replaced."

"Why not use plants?" Mark asked. "I may be some dumb human compared to you aliens, but on Earth, we have these things called 'trees' and plants and such, and don't they take up all that carbon dioxide and spit out oxygen for us to breathe?"

The hawkman regarded him, then laughed. "I guess you're not all dumb. No." He shook his head. "But the answer is simple: Space and energy. Pluto's equator is seven thousand space kilometers, roughly. Since the Emperor has spun the planet to produce gravity, there's only proper gravity along that equator -- closer to the poles, gravity gets lower and lower. This means we only have a limited amount of space that has gravity for growing -- a lot of the best plants for this can only grow with gravity. While Pluto has its own gravitational field, it's working against the centrifugal spin." The Hawkman crossed his arms over his barrel chest. "And a lot of that space is being taken up by the reactors -- this planet is stuffed with nuclear piles, producing vast amounts of energy every second."

"Wait, you said one of the problems was energy -- we got loads of energy, huh?" Mark asked.

"Yeah, the sunlight that plants need can be recreated with the reactors, true," the hawkman said. "But the Emperor has put as much energy as he could to the Nuclear Alchemy Engine. Every joule we have not running into the Engine is a joule wasted, by the Emperor's estimation."

Mark whistled. "So, instead of having plants, you have..."

"The filters," the Hawkman said.

"Sounds to me like the Emperor is making you all work harder so that he can get richer," Mark said, dryly.

Both Hawkmen laughed. "You have that right human!" He slapped the side of the filter he had to remove. "Here, if you want to help the wheels of Empire spin just a bit smoother, come here and help us with this."

Mark rolled is shoulders. "I may be scrawny compared to you Hawkmen, but I've put in more than my fair share of elbow grease."

"Hah! Scrawny!" The red feathered Hawkman said. "This human doesn't know our bones are hollow!"

The black feathered Hawkman snorted.

The air filters, as it turned out, had large handles on them that Mark was able to grip and yank against, pulling the silvery cylinder free. The two Hawkmen slotted in the new one, adjusted the connection, then swung the wall panel shut. "So, hollow bones, huh?" Mark asked. "Does that mean you can fly?"

"Oh, we could fly," the red feathered Hawkman said, his wing flaring behind him -- showing that his feathers had been clipped. "But we were captured by the Emperor, fighting against him. We were...lucky...enough to be enslaved, rather than deatomized."

Mark shook his head. "A horrible way to go," he said, quietly. "What...what the hell is that thing, anyway?"

"The Deatomizer?" the red feathered Hawkman asked while his fellow collected his tools. "It's a terrible thing indeed. The Nuclear Alchemy Engine works, in some part, by transforming energy straight into matter. When calibrated properly, it can make any element on the periodic table -- but when set to simply create randomly, it spews out hydrogen atoms at an incredible speed." He shook his head slowly his feathered crest flattening out. "Just as a sun does, but with the ability to be tuned and focused like a death ray. The Deatomizer is nothing more than deadly radiation like the kind your people witnessed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but multiplied by a million times, a billion times if Zardo wills it."

"You've heard of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?" Mark asked, genuinely shocked.

The two Hawkman chuckled. "Of course! Humans are spraying their radio waves into space as if they were alone in the universe," the red feathered Hawkman said. "Why, I even have a favorite team of your Earth sport known as baseball."

The black feathered Hawkman nodded. "The...how you call them...the New York Yankees?"

"Well I'll be a son of a bitch," Mark said, quietly. "You're a Yankees man?"

The red feathered Hawkman laughed. "I have won many a space dollar betting on Yogi Berra."

Mark shook his head. "Well, if you two ever want to listen to any Earth radio, I'm always down to listen too. You get TV up here too?"

"Sometimes, yeah, but we don't have many sets," the red feathered Hawkman said. "But I would enjoy that. I am C'law and this is my bond-brother, W'ind." He gestured to the black feathered Hawkman, who inclined his head. "Take care of yourself, Mark Styles."

The two Hawkmen started off and Mark rubbed his chin, thinking-

Then pain.

Pain screamed through his body and he fell to his knees, clutching at the collar, gasping heavily.

A sneering voice spoke above him -- a deep, rumbling, male voice.

"I see your pain inducers are working better than your human eyeballs," Skar Tailscorn said, striding forward to loom above Mark as he clutched at his neck. His ever nerve felt as if it was burning. He fell to his side, gasping and looking up at the burly lizardman, trying to speak -- but he couldn't. The massive mountain of scaled spacer allowed him a few more moments of agony, before he adjusted his own control gauntlet and the pain ceased. Once he was no longer burning from within, Mark saw that the control gauntlet that Skar wore was considerably smaller than the Star Princess Zella.

"What...do you want?" Mark gasped out.

"The Emperor has called for your presence in his chambers. You were not within your rooms, and so, I have come to get you myself." Skar's lips curled. "And then I saw you fraternizing with the slaves. Interested in some homolove, Mark?"

"No..." Mark coughed. "I prefer my men in better dresses and less-"

Pain screamed through him again as Skar adjusted his control gauntlet again. "You give me cheek, human!?" He snarled. "Everyone knows humans are too primitive to understand our advanced forms of space lovemaking!" He adjusted the gauntlet again as Mark wheezed. "Now, stand and march before me -- we have an Emperor to meet."

Mark rolled onto his belly, raggedly, then pushed himself to his feet, stumbling forward as Skar prowled behind him.

Once again, Mark found himself in the Imperial Throne room -- but this time, he knew about the horrifying Deatomizer that waited, concealed behind one of the walls of the chamber. He tried to not think of it, even as he was marched forward along the glass floor of the room. He tried to not look down at the slowly swirling stars below him -- trying to not think about what it would be like if he was flung out of the room, sent tumbling into the blackness.

Emperor Zardo stood beside his throne, regarding the chair itself. He was dressed in only his military uniform, rather than in his robes. His advisor, the same one that Mark had seen at Commander Vile's execution, was lurking in the shadows nearby, waiting. Watching. Mark stepped forward -- and then Skar slapped his legs with his tail, knocking him to one knee. Mark planted his palms on the glass, feeling the cool chill of it through his skin, while Skar snarled.

"You will kneel before the might Zardo!"

"We don't have Emperors where I come from," Mark snapped, before he could think about it.

"Why you-" Skar lifted his arm, reached for his control gauntlet.

"Commander," Zardo's voice cut him off. Skar stood at attention. "Leave us."

Skar inclined his head. "Yes, my Emperor."

He turned and he walked out.

Mark panted, softly, then sat back on his heels, so that he was at least upright now. He didn't trust his legs to stand at this moment -- and Zardo didn't seem to mind him sitting back like this. He regarded the Emperor, not sure how exactly to bring up their current relationship...which involved the fact that, just twenty four hours earlier, Mark had been balls deep inside of this man's daughter.

"Has my daughter been pleased by your sexual prowess?" Zardo asked, turning to look down his nose at Mark.

"On Earth, we don't kiss and tell," Mark said.

"You are not on Earth," Zardo said, his voice tinged with amusement.

Mark's cheeks flushed. "...she did. I think."

"Good," Zardo said, his lips curling as he walked around the throne, then took his seat upon it. "I wished to speak to one who waged war against your Earth Nazis. I have long admired the Nazis and their conquests -- pitiful as they are when compared to the majesty of Zardo and the breadth of my dominion. Your Adolph Hitler, despite being an Earthman, would have made an excellent lieutenant of my Empire. Had he not disgraced himself with failure, he would ere now be governor of Earth under my dominion."

Mark tried to keep the raw hate and rage he felt burning within his breast, as it would burn within the heart of any red blooded American man at the idea of the foul ideology of the Nazis once more returning to haunt the world that had fought so long and hard to see it put forever to death. But from Zardo's sardonic smirk, he knew that at least some of his ire had shown -- and so, he let a soft, rough chuckle come from him.

"Ya know, I never would have guessed it. You're so much more restrained than those jackbooted jackasses."

Zardo's smirk faded and he pursed his lips. "What I find inexplicable, what I wish to understand...what compelled you and the millions of your allies to fight with such ferocity against the Nazis? Why did you battle, from the depths of the Russian steppe, to Africa, to the bottoms of your Earth Oceans themselves, against an obviously superior foe?" He stroked his beard, slowly. "Was it for glory? For the reward? Was there...prize money involved?"

"You really don't understand us Earthlings, do you?" Mark asked, shaking his head slowly. "In America, we got a little thing called democracy. Freedom. Rule of Law. Those are all worth dying for."

Zardo shook his head slowly. "Then you are fools."

"And you, I think, underestimate your own subjects," Mark said. "Among us Earthlings, there's a saying...killing a Nazi is its own reward. I'm sure that more than a few people up here who might think the very same thing."

Zardo stroked his chin beard. "Hmm...yes...I think you are right."

He clapped his hands twice. His advisor stepped forward.

"Take the Earthman to the arena," Zardo said, turning to look at the advisor. "Have him face...the Cybrid."

"Yes, your majesty," the advisor said, his voice low and almost monotone.

Mark's eyes widened -- but then guards were rushing into the room. Clone soldiers grabbed him and dragged him along the glass, while Zardo watched him go, his eyes enigmatic and unreadable. Mark clenched his hands and shouted.

"And what will your daughter think?"

"She'll get a new toy. She has before." Zardo said, his voice brimming with amusement.

The doors slammed shut between the Emperor and the G.I.

***

The Bird of Prey lacked any way to descend from orbit -- it had been designed to defend the Kingdom of Hawkmen from threats in orbit, not for landing. Fortunately, like many rockets produced by the many people that dwelt in space, the Bird of Prey contained their very own winged rockets. Since they were short ranged and built for a price, they were considerably more comfortable. Jasmine was able to enjoy this fact as she watched the smear of orange light flicking along the hull of the rocket. S'hira had been tasked for flying the rocket, leaving her and Prince S'kye in the living quarters of the winged rocket, which reminded her of her very own private planes. The seats were comfortable and the whiskey was...

Quite good.

S'kye himself was sitting in one such chair -- and as Jasmine watched the glowing light of the reentry burn flickering along the hull, she could feel the burly Prince's eyes upon her. She bent forward, casually, letting the red band of her underclothes tug tighter against the cleft of her ass and the smooth, hairless folds of her sex. She could hear him shift in his chair, thanks to the excellent soundproofing of the room.

"Are you sure you don't want to strap in?" he asked.

"We're coming down slowly enough," Jasmine said, chuckling. "This winged rocket design is quite ingenious, you know."

She looked back and was pleased at how he had quite obviously tucked one leg over the other, to conceal any excitement from her.

"What is the Sky City like?"

"You'll see it soon enough," S'kye said. "I...remain unconvinced by your ideas. The Faemen and the Hawkmen have been at war for centuries -- ever since the Treaty of Venus was broken." He shook his head. "We had agreed on a way to begin to terraform the world -- to make it livable to us. To ensure the Hawkmen were able to continue our life as we know it, the plan was to seed the upper atmosphere with life, to make it so that one could breathe with ease at the levels our cities float at. The Faemen, though, betrayed us by trying to reduce the atmospheric pressure instead."

Jasmine cocked her head. "Your cities float...but why would that be an issue?"

"They do not float through rocket engines or hydrogen balloons, Jas!" S'kye said, shaking his head.

"The atmosphere pressure!" Jasmine exclaimed. "Venus' air is thicker than Earth air -- thus, a city filled with Earth air floats."

"Precisely," S'kye said. "The Faemen plan would have destroyed Sky City -- all so that they could live more comfortably in their burrowing warren cities." He shook his head.

Jasmine pursed her lips, considering...but not making any comment on that.

All thoughts on anything but what she was seeing were wiped away as they broke through the upper atmosphere and swept down towards the bright yellow-white clouds of Venus, which were sculpted into staggering beauty by wind and drifting pressure. Craiglike protrusions of cloud swept up and down, and formed valleys and dipping canyons, all formed from nothing more than foggy particulates. But there, drifting above it all, was the Sky City itself. It looked like a vast glittering mushroom, with a narrowed tapering point that dangled down towards the clouds -- the bulbous tip of that point looking like a counterweight...yes, Jasmine could see why: The heavy weight would keep the flat surface of the upper levels of the city from bucking about during stormy weather.