Chapter 33

For the Ilmainian Fleet Command it was a nightmare. Of the twelve fleets they had, half were working with reduced numbers due to maintenance constraints, whilst the inclusion of the Crown Princes and their retainers on the various flagships, along with their conflicting orders and priorities, caused most of the fleets to arrive at the rendezvous point in a state of disorder ... to put it mildly. Yet still they arrived, the most powerful display of Ilmainian might ever assembled and more than a match for those Imperial upstarts, thought Crown Prince (and eldest son of the King) Torrand who was also considering the possibility of using the fleets to move against his father ... assuming his brothers agreed, or could be eliminated.

“Plan out the details to have all the fleets arrive in Lorca at the same moment,” he airily commanded the First of the flagship.

“Yes, Sire,” the First replied, holding his emotions in check as the real plan was to kill Torrand and his people once word reached them that their children were safe.

Still, the First did plan out, along with the Firsts from the rest of the fleets, some sort of battle plan, just in case their whole plan went utterly wrong, or this was just a gigantic trap by Rentap.

On the planet Ilmaine, King Rentap was preparing to retire for the night and was considering which of his wives would sate his needs. He was currently doing it using a selection screen as he, generally, other than his senior wife, could not remember their names, only those of the sons they produced. As for daughters, he occasionally figured he must have some, though their names and how many, he could not recall at all.

‘This one, I think,’ he finally decided. ‘I remember her from the last time. She at least struggled and made the chase worthwhile.’

Dismissing his security detail, he undressed and pulled on a robe, waiting for the arrival of his prey. There was a soft chime and the door from the harem section opened and a young woman carefully, and somewhat fearfully, entered, totally naked so as to ensure the King’s safety.

“You sent for me, Sire?” she asked in a quavering voice.

“I did. Now, do your duty and prepare me!” he ordered, enjoying her wince as he opened the robe and watched her drop to her knees.

What happened next, though, caught him totally by surprise, as she reached to move her hair aside and then launched herself at him, holding a non-metallic knife that had been hidden in her hair and that had passed through the sensors.

Caught off balance, Rentap could only desperately grab for the woman or the knife only to gasp as her body had been oiled and his grip was no use as the knife blade went ever upwards, under his chin and straight into his brain, killing him immediately.

All over the Kingdom key supporters of the King fell, sometimes to their wives or concubines, more often than not to the poison some lowly servant had slipped into their meal. Elsewhere landing craft sallied forth from various stations and seized the buildings where the spaceborn fosterlings were held. Many were simply handed over by those in charge of them (mostly the lady of the house) with a warm smile, heartfelt thanks and best wishes.

Others occasionally had to be fought for as royalist retainers still held key positions and posts and the Kingdom had procedures for dealing with a coup ... though their blind spot had always been assuming the King’s survival ... along with the proximity of any Crown Prince and a navy.

Gukong Kubbe was amongst the last of the major targets to die. A slight change of plans had him attending a ‘house of soiled doves’ (brothel) to see to a night’s entertainment as he’d heard one of the young women performing had a passable likeness to the Imperial High Bureaucrat Taisha. Hence he was not at home when a bomb went off, though this only delayed things as the proximity sensors of his guard detail attracted the attention of a landing craft which dropped off elite spaceborn marines who, with hyperbeam fire, killed the guards and left Kubbe sliced in half as his new ‘friend’ screamed her head off.

The Ilmainian fleets were progressing towards the rendezvous point when the message for the Firsts of the majority of the fleets from various sources in the spaceborn organisations arrived. So the mutiny began, usually with the death of a Crown Prince and his retainer guards who discovered that they weren’t the only ones with heavy arms aboard most of the ships.

All over the Kingdom senior officials were becoming aware that something most definitely wasn’t right. Being aware and doing something about it, however, were two different things. The plotters were swiftly moving their people into positions of power. There was no communication with a majority of those who held real power in the Kingdom. Most of the officials decided to obey orders from those giving them as they appeared to know what they were doing.

Naturally, not everything went to plan. Several generals of the Kingdom’s ground units were still at large. They were in a position to move against the plotters ... at least those plotters on the planets. The spaceborn had moved swiftly to decompress the barracks on their stations and outposts to clear house of any with the capability of countering the plot. Still, on several planets the Kingdom ground units moved into the regional capitals and deployed, though as yet none of the Generals had any idea of just what had and what was happening.

Crown Prince Torrand was barricaded in his state rooms aboard the Dreadnought Caville, along with several of his retainers who had survived the initial assault by the spaceborn. Currently two of the retainers were struggling to connect up the antiquated comm gear placed specifically to counter a mutiny or call for help. The problem the retainers had was that the comm gear was unmaintained as the crew were not supposed to know of it, nor were the retainers familiar with it as those who were had died on the seized bridge of the flagship.

“We have it!” came a cry of triumph as the gear finally lit up and began sending handshake codes to other units.

“At last, now let’s summon aid to retake this ship,” Torrand snarled, then grabbed the microphone. “Command protocol, Torrand, Crown Prince Alpha 1!”

“Protocol recognised. No units are responding,” came the well-modulated reply.

“Are we the first?” Torrand asked, a little confused as the unit channel was supposed to be monitored at all times ... or so he had been told.

“You are the first user to go online in over five solar cycles,” the unit replied politely.

“Five years?” Torrand asked, dumbstruck. “Aren’t you monitored constantly?”

“This ceased ten solar cycles ago.”

“But ... why?”

“Insufficient data.”

“Is there anything out there responding?”

“I am detecting alien transmissions. Nothing of Kingdom origin.”

“Where from?”

“The Lorca system,” the unit replied before going silent.

“It must be picking up Imperial signals, they’ll no doubt be encrypted,” his senior retainer offered.

“I realise this, but what do we do now? We can’t retake this ship!” Torrand stated in disgust.

“Operate the self-destruct and take the traitors with us, Sire.”

“Any other ‘reasonable’ suggestions?”

“Offer surrender?”

“I said reasonable. You saw what they did to our comrades. I doubt they’ll let us go!”

“Well ... not you,” another retainer replied, drawing his hyperbeam pistol and aiming it directly at Torrand.

“We have confirmation. All is in place,” Parliamentarian Hallad informed Conna via a secure comm channel to her quarters.

“Make the announcement and see who accepts,” she ordered.

“Yes, my friend,” Hallad replied with a nod as did Bondholder Oilo, who was listening in.

“We shall move against any ground units that refuse to return to barracks,” Oilo added.

“Let us hope they show sense,” Conna acknowledged with a heavy heart.

“That we control the high ground ought to be warning enough. I’m holding my people’s anger in check, but there will be incidents if they do not return to their bases.”

“I know, but the decision is not mine to make. Let’s hope the announcement works.”

All over the various planets of the Kingdom there was confusion and occasional violence as a few rival groups attempted to take advantage of the situation to settle accounts with each other. Various security forces generally managed to keep law and order in the various ‘inurbs’ of the upper class, though totally abandoned the poor working-class areas. The merchant classes used their own security guards and hunkered down, hoping that it would be enough to protect their goods from what they thought would be a wave of looting and violence.

The announcement came as somewhat of a surprise as Parliamentarian Hallad broadcast to all worlds on the seized emergency broadcast system, breaking into any current broadcasts.

“People of the Kingdom,” he began. “It has become obvious that the former King had only the interests of himself and a small group of nobles in mind when he seized power twenty standard years ago. He impoverished our nation to build fleets of conquest; enslaved the children of the spaceborn to man those fleets; and lined the pockets of himself and a few others with the profits of those conquests; leaving the vast majority of us to pick up the tab of rebuilding those conquered worlds.

This has now ended. The King and those who lined their pockets at our expense are dead or under arrest. The Crown Princes are dead and the spaceborn have control of our fleets but seek not revenge but a true partnership with the groundborn. This is an opportunity to now reset our fractured society and so I’m calling for calm, for our various ground units to return to barracks and only to return fire in defending themselves. I’m calling for the Parliament of Worlds, along with representatives of the spaceborn and other interested groups, to assemble and debate where we go from, here. In the meantime, keep calm, carry on with your work or business. Food deliveries will be maintained, as will power and other services. We have the opportunity to reform society, but, we cannot do this with our planets in flames. Long live the people of the Kingdom!”

Fortunately, the people of the Kingdom, other than the higher reaches of the noble class, were used to doing what they were told if it appeared to come from authority. The various Generals also knew what an orbital bombardment would mean and hence slowly but surely pulled their troops back to barracks and hoped the sky wasn’t about to fall. It wasn’t all peaceful, riots broke out in some cities and towns, but of these, local law enforcement, beefed up by armed retainers, soon had them contained, often brutally, but certainly contained. Occasionally news reports were broadcast; one mentioning the Imperial fleets were withdrawing, another that the Imperial High Bureaucrat Taisha recognised the current regime as legitimate successors and that the Empire would deal severely with any Realm who tried to interfere in the Kingdom’s internal problems. This was followed up by an announcement that the Technocracy would do the same. Further announcements followed, confirming that the Kingdom fleets were withdrawing back to their bases.

The Black on Black investigated the alien fleet, taking particular note of what appeared to be a building frenzy of ship construction.

“Looks like they intend to beat us by massively outnumbering us,” Yuni commented.

“If they are, I suspect they’ll get a surprise,” Kliss replied as he made preparations to guide their ship out of the area the aliens occupied and back to a place where they could report.