Chapter 22

“Odd way of going about things,” I commented to Vrion as we left the meeting room.

“Yes, I’m not at all sure what sub-Commander Betchak was up to as the military, both Ground Forces and Fleet, do not pander to the newsies and aren’t really subject to direct pressure from them,” she replied.

“Might just be protecting the Ground Forces’ back by demonstrating they were taking the accusations seriously,” I shrugged.

“If that’s what it was, it would be a first,” Ginlo replied. “Betchak might be a Cillort supporter looking for revenge though, as he appears to still have tentacles everywhere.”

“Yes, I’ve no doubt ImpSec, FleetInt and GroundForInt are having a field day uncovering his machinations,” I added as we boarded a flyer to be taken back to the capital where Vrion was issued with new armour.

We were greeted happily by Dichint as soon as we got back to the Medical Centre and were back at work curing those that needed my help. The various tri-dee screens were showing the arrest of Cillort and others in his cabal as well as commentators expressing horror at the use of lethal weapons upon civilians. A few of the commentators were bitching about the Ground Forces causing the incident, but from what I could tell were being mostly ignored by a high percentage of the population, most believing they too could easily have used stunners. Evidence was also coming to light as to what Cillort had ordered his staff to do in covering his trail. Few had survived the traps, but enough had to condemn his actions.

Word did come through from Healer Norant that the Softwing was joining up with an ad hoc fleet to deal with the shipyard being built in the Coriola system in the hopes of capturing it more or less intact and add its capacity to the Empire’s resources. That meant we were transferred to cabins on the medic ship Soothe, which was remaining in orbit to deal with any Ground Force casualties as they dug out a few die hard fanatics amongst the shambles that was left of Cillort’s forces.

All of this was naturally ongoing as I set about my work and I was kept quite busy, at least until it was announced I had a visitor.

“Cure David!” came a loud, gleeful shout as Vrion, Ginlo and I were relaxing in between the cured patients being taken out and the arrival of a new batch for our attention.

“Oh, hi Teelae,” I greeted my reporter friend, then introduced Vrion and Ginlo.

“So now you’re the hero of Kansdoorf, capturer of the evil tyrant Cillort?” she asked with a grin.

“Just lucky and the bastard shot my leg off as well,” I chuckled.

“Well, I’ve done my Fleet interviews, now I’m doing the Ground Force ones, so also plan to take you up on your agreement to a follow-up interview,” she explained.

“Sure, no problem. I have a little time at the moment.”

“Good, we can do it here and now if you want?”

“Fine, this looks perfect,” she agreed.

Teelae fiddled about a bit with her floating tri-dee cams, getting the best image depth she could. Vrion and Ginlo attempted to move out of the way, but were asked to just hang around to prove that I wasn’t a one man band.

“Cure David,” she began once everything was in place. “Can you tell us why you are here on Kansdoorf in the midst of the chaos of the re-taking of this world back into the Empire?”

“I go where I’m needed; the Empire was expecting severe casualties in taking out Cillort’s forces and felt a Cure could help. Hence, when asked, I volunteered,” I replied.

“And once done you ended up helping out on the surface?”

“Yes. The people here are Imperial citizens too, if having been duped by Cillort. There were casualties from the invasion and fighting and so I came down to help.”

“Some would say they were traitors and should have been left,” she countered, though I knew that, personally, from her pre-interview comments, she didn’t believe so.

“They didn’t ask to be poisoned, damaged by nanites or crushed under buildings. It’s not the citizens who are at fault here,” I replied.

“It does appear your activities have increased the popularity of the Empire, due to your work,” she nodded.

“Yes, though I would have done it anyway, popularity or not.”

“Does the Empress approve?”

“I wouldn’t know, though I suspect she wouldn’t object.”

“You appear to have your own personal guards for this task?” Teelae suggested with a slight smile, gesturing at Vrion and Ginlo.

“Yes, and very useful they are too. The Empire is not popular amongst some of the people here due to an effective propaganda system and a manipulation of the economy to make the Empire look greedy and uncaring.”

“In what way?”

“The conspirators had raised local taxation with the connivance of several planetary Nobles to double that of the Empire, whilst only sending the correct amount along to the Bureau of Interstellar Revenue. They pocketed the remainder and, when the revolt took place, reduced taxation to the Imperial norm, claiming that supporting them enabled them to reduce taxes.”

“No one thought to complain?”

“One of the first things they did was to corrupt the AI in charge of the interstellar array to filter out complaints with a stock reply that this was the Imperial norm and to put up and shut up.”

“I hope the Empire is checking out the other arrays,” Teelae commented.

“Me too. This has been terrible for all concerned. The loss of life amongst fleet personnel has been horrendous.”

“I know, but the Empire won.”

“Yes, but there could be other Cillort’s out there. He only succeeded because he had help amongst other corrupt power seekers in the system.”

“That’s true,” she acknowledged. “Have you finished dealing with the media’s attempts to trash your reputation?”

“For the moment,” I chuckled. “It’s actually fairly straightforward, they don’t lie about me and I don’t sue them.”

“Even speculation as to who and what you’re up to?”

“Definitely on the who. I’m not so bothered about speculation on what I’m currently doing as I’m pretty boring really.”

“So no wild affairs.”

“Not even remotely.”

“No spurious or otherwise offspring?”

“No one’s asked Kirim for permission yet.”

“Really?”

“Yep, not a single one,” I chuckled.

“I suspect she’d be pretty choosy anyway,” Teelae laughed, having met Kirim a few times now.

“I should hope so, this is me we’re talking about,” I added, laughing as well, along with Vrion and Ginlo. “At the moment though we’re just looking forward to the birth of our daughter.”

“How long now?”

“Six binary cycles (4 months).”

“Any thoughts on names?”

“We have talked about a few, but not settled on a specific one yet,” I smiled.

“Vrion, you were there when David took down Cillort, could you describe what happened?” Teelae suddenly changed the subject.

“Dave had spotted someone whom he thought was Admiral Spake emerging from a building. Ginlo and I investigated but, as soon as the suspect’s group saw our armour, they opened fire with lethal weapons,” Vrion explained. “Dave had drifted off to one side to keep out of our way as we intended to use stun weapons and he charged in amongst them to keep them off balance once they fired. We tried to pick them off as other Ground Forces arrived.”

“He attacked a group of men armed with hyperbeam pistols?”

“Yes, they were focussed on us, not the civilians. Also they were very cautious using their guns on him as he was inside their group and there was a pretty good chance they’d have shot themselves. Cillort eventually tried to escape into the crowd as the Ground Forces arrived and Dave took him down.”

“I’m told he also lost a leg?”

“Yes, though it happened just outside this medical centre and Healer Dichint, the senior Healer, here was able to re-attach it swiftly.”

“And you were injured too?”

“I was wounded in the arm, but my armour was able to quickly seal the wound.”

“We have obtained tri-dee footage of the incident,” Teelae stated, speaking to her audience. “This is how it went off...”

It was clearly edited to avoid showing the civilian casualties as much as possible. But, it did show the three of us making a pretty good account of ourselves.

“Comments?” Teelae asked.

“We were damned lucky,” I replied to which the others agreed.

“If they hadn’t been so risk averse in not wanting to take casualties themselves, they could have taken us easily,” Ginlo added.

“So you don’t see yourselves as the heroes some of the media are trying to present you as?”

“By the gods, no!” Ginlo almost exploded. “People died because we chose to investigate and that’s something we have to live with.”

“If Cillort had escaped though it may have been worse, surely?” Teelae asked carefully.

“Yes, probably, but I have to live with what happened there and then.”

“We did our duty,” I sighed. “But yes, I wish it had gone a lot better.”

“Yes, a few commentators on the media networks have not been kind,” Teelae commented.

“They probably thought Cillort was some form of hero, not the mass murdering scum he was,” Vrion shrugged.

“They claim that you should have avoided him in order to avoid casualties.”

“He was walking directly towards us,” Vrion replied. “That’s something I’m not in a position to ignore as my armour’s scanner would have made facial recognition once he got within range. Potentially there could have been bigger casualties as we had been sitting in a crowded food emporium. As it was, because of Dave’s suspicions, we were outside where at least people could run and avoid danger once they knew what was happening.”

“So what happened was inevitable, to a certain degree?”

“Sadly, yes. As soon as they started walking towards us a confrontation became inevitable. That they chose to use lethal force was a terrible tragedy, but it was their choice, not mine or Ginlo’s. They could always have simply surrendered, or chosen to use stunners instead. We know from the reports that Spake had one on him, as did others.”

“Would stunners work against your armour?”

“Probably not, no,” Ginlo admitted. “But at least there would have been no civilian casualties and they could have scattered and evaded arrest in the confusion without killing anyone.”

“That’s true,” Teelae conceded. “They certainly didn’t have to engage you at all.”