Chapter 6

It hadn’t occurred to me that I had a chance to find out some information as well. And this would be the perfect situation to do it. It would take several minutes for the Protectorate’s drones to get inside. I had one attacker awake and all but begging me to ask questions.

Celina knelt down beside the woman and flipped her visor off. The woman’s eyes were mostly closed, but the pink rims around her irises could still be seen. I was a little shocked at how pretty she was despite the look of pain she was making. Her face was thin and her lips were almost none existent. She had a very long, slender nose, and her teeth were as white and straight and perfect as Governor Mandela’s. Her orange jump suit, I suddenly realized, was actually just coveralls. They were so big on her and so baggy there was no way to tell what was under them.

A sudden realization hit me and it made me wonder if the Governor didn’t have a better point about my sister and me than I had realized. I could have told anyone what color the assailant’s hair was and that she was female and what she wore, but the finer details had totally escaped me. Could my sister be the same way?

“Hi,” Celina said. “Does that hurt?”

“Yes, it gretting hurts,” the woman growled through clenched teeth.

I shifted a couple steps to my right to better clear my line of fire.

Celina pulled some kind of injector out of her suit pocket and pressed it against the woman’s neck. She almost instantly relaxed. Over the next several seconds, the woman relaxed more and more, her eyes finally glossing over. Celina had to take over holding the woman’s ruined shoulder when she no longer was able to do so on her own.

Celina took one hand and moved the woman’s face to look at hers. “How are you doing, sweetheart?”

The pirate’s eyes blinked so slowly, I wondered if she had even heard the question. “What… what was that Sol?”

Celina smiled pleasantly at her. “You liked it?” Her voice was gentle and conversational. “That’s good. Why don’t you return the favor and answer a few of my questions?”

“Okay.”

“Great.” She looked at me and glanced at my belt. For a long couple of seconds I had no idea what she wanted. “Mic?” she questioned.

I stood there like an idiot. She obviously wanted to record this conversation, but I didn’t have anything to do it with. My entire coms system was sub-dermal. I told her so and she blinked at me. Finally, something broke off her staring and she looked back to the woman on the floor. “What’s your name?”

“Jewel,” she said in a dreamy voice.

“Very well, Jewel,” Celina continued, “who sent you here to kill the Senator?”

Jewel smiled and gently caressed the side of Celina’s face, leaving blood in its passing. “Lucifer,” she whispered. “She is light-bringer, Day-Star, Daughter of Dawn.” The volume in her voice brought her to the precipice of normal speech. “She has ascended to the heavens. Among the planets of God she has set her throne on high. She will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of space. She has ascended above the height of the clouds. She will make herself like the Most High.”

We looked at each other more than a little stunned. I completely understood that Lucifer wanted to kill Senator Lacy. I got that. It just confirmed what was already thought of as a fact. But what was with the rest of what she said? To that end I asked, “Is that from the drugs?”

Celina shook her head emphatically. “This is what the Senator takes every night to sleep. I mean, I had read somewhere that the radiation meds Uranian’s take don’t mix well with it, but this…”

She turned back to Jewel. “Why does Lucifer want to kill the Senator?”

Jewel’s hand had never left Celina, though it had moved down to her arm when she was looking at me. Now it moved to her breast but Celina seemed to pay it no mind. “Be sober-minded. Be watchful. Your adversary, Lucifer, prowls around like a lioness, seeking someone to devour.” By the time she ended, her hand had made its way down to Celina’s hip and now rested there.

“What, the Sol?” I don’t think I had cursed this much in my entire life. But then, in the last twenty-four hours I had pulled my gun more times than I had in my entire Protectorate career.

“Why, Jewel? Why does she seek someone to devour?”

Jewel smiled sweetly. “Her tail will sweep down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to oblivion. And Lucifer will stand before the woman about to give birth, so that when she bore her child she might devour it.” Her other hand came up then to touch the other side of Celina’s face. “How the oppressor has ceased, the insolent fury ceased.”

“This woman is scaring me to no end,” I whispered.

Then Jewel passed out, all her limbs falling limply to the ground. Celina looked up at me with confusion and amazement on her face. “W-what…” she trailed off. Blood was smeared all over her, anyplace the pirate had touched, which made more me uncomforted.

I nodded. “Yeah. Right there with you.”

Faintly, I could start to make out the sounds of drones approaching. We were out of time. Not that it really mattered, because all we were getting was some kind of craziness. Nothing she said made any sense.

But the craziness didn’t end there. A nurse walked up to me, his hands shaking almost violently and handed me a holo-cam; he had recorded the entire thing. I took it from him with my off hand, but didn’t get a chance to thank him because he literally ran, full-sprint, down the hall and disappeared. I pocketed the small thing as the drones rounded the opposite corner.

These drones were the same as the ones that I had seen the night before. They had six arms that symmetrically stuck out from a spherical core. At the end of each arm was a cone that pointed downward. Each cone had its own tiny DME inside. The drones were never quiet as the engine core tended to have a loud hum to it. They were painted white and marked with large black letters and numbers signifying their designation. The flashing, obnoxious, green lights on the front of their bodies all but blinded anyone looking directly at them, but for me it didn’t help a lot to look away.

They flew over to us and stopped in a hover over the prone pirates. “Please step back from the assailant’s, Protector and Assistant Senator,” the two drones said in unison and we did. “Please confirm, the male is deceased.”

“Confirmed,” I replied. I hated these things, but it always fascinated me to watch them work.

Inside each drone were a number of different tools that they used to apprehend, secure, and transport anyone that was arrested. The drone over Jewel opened a hatch on its underside and lowered to just above her shoulder. A gel suddenly shot out and covered her wound. It then hardened quickly. Once this was done, an arm came out of the rear with a claw like pincer at its tip. The pincer closed over one hand and slowly moved it over her other hand. The pincer then released her first hand, leaving a sticky goo behind which quickly dripped down over her other hand and sealed the two together. The drone quickly spun ninety degrees and two arms came out either side of it. Unlike the other spindly arm, these were much bigger. Netting ejected from them both, completely covering Jewel. It then slowly and cautiously rolled her over onto the netting and ejected more of it so she was completely incased. It then rolled her back and slowly lifted her off the ground and zipped down the hall, proclaiming, “Please clear the path. Venusian Protectorate Drone 5851 with assailant in custody coming through,” on repeat as it flew.

The other drone just used the netting to get a hold of the man and flew off, with no regard for him at all. It did, however, make the same proclamation as it flew, though with its own number.

“Erik, are you even listening to me?” Celina said and I became totally aware of the fact that she had been talking to me the whole time the drones were working.

“I’m sorry,” I told her and turned to look at her directly.

Celina had cleaned most of the blood off her face, but it was still all over her suit. “I badly need to change.”

“I need to get to the air field ASAP,” I told her.

Her face twisted up a bit. “Is there any way you could wait for me?” she asked. “Without the Senator’s retinas I have no way of getting into his limo and no easy transport.”

I started walking back toward the room and Celina matched my pace. “I’m sorry again, but no. I should already be on the road. I’d love to talk to you about all this though.” I held up the holo-cam in front of her, “And watch this with you.”

She nodded at me. “Me too. What if I changed in your car?” she asked excitedly. “We’d have the whole ride to talk about it and then you wouldn’t have to wait for me.”

I thought about it for a second and then nodded. “That should work. I’ll need to make a report about this incident at some point during the trip, but as long as I can get that done, it sounds like a fine plan.”

“Great!” she said, and rushed forward. “I’ll meet you in the car port.”

Next Chapter: Chapter 7