Pride x Familiar (45 page)

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(Caelum)

The Countess gently asked, “So you met him.”

I nodded while looking out the window of the
Student Council meeting room. “Yeah, I met him.”

“First impression?”

“Arrogant and confident.”

I didn’t want to mention the fact that he was
clearly laying claim on Caprice.

I heard her sigh as she placed her tea cup down
on the saucer.

The Countess said, “Well, he’s demonstrated his
affinity with the Kaiser’s Blessing, and silenced any who doubted
his talent and combat ability.”

I folded my arms unhappily. “Good for him.” I
clenched my hands into fists. It took some effort to relax
them.

The Countess’s words were whispered. “But not
for you…or for us.”

I almost missed the last part. I shot her a look
and saw Simone staring down into her cup.

“My tea is cold,” she muttered, then stood up
and walked over to fill herself a fresh cup.

My gaze followed her progress. I forced a change
of subject upon the conversation. I really didn’t want to talk
about Jaxon Deneve. Instead I asked, “What does the President have
to say about all this?”

“He said it wasn’t his place to comment.”

“So he’s just towing the party line.”

“Severin doesn’t have a choice. Then again, he
can be quite sneaky, so he could be planning something behind the
scenes.” She finished preparing her cup of tea but chose not to
walk back to the table. Instead, she sipped it while standing
beside the kitchenette.

“Where is our esteemed President?”

“Busy with the troops.”

“Ah, I see.” Another briefing in the President’s
office.

I turned back to look out the window. The
courtyard some distance below was replete with students enjoying
their lunch. They were oblivious to any threat that Crimson
Crescent posed to the academy.

“Countess, do you think Crescent will make their
move soon?”

“They broke the encryption on the sixth seal
last Wednesday during the ruckus at lunch time.”

I spun my head and stared at her in blatant
shock. “They broke the sixth seal?” I straightened away from the
wall beside the window. “That means one more and they have access
to that part of the network. Why aren’t the seals being
re-established? I mean, surely the Powers-that-be can create new
encryption keys for them.”

The Countess shook her head. “I have no idea.
Perhaps they’re laying a trap for Crescent. Or maybe they just want
to learn what Crescent is after. The Powers-that-be may have chosen
to involve the Student Council, but they’re still less than
completely candid.”

I regarded her for a while as she calmly sipped
her tea. “Countess, why are you here and not in the President’s
office with the others?”

“Because I just don’t care anymore.”

I frowned at her. “What?”

“I don’t care what Crescent does. If Severin
wants to continue being a puppet of the Powers-that-be, or rather a
puppet of my mother’s then I simply want no part of it.”

My frown grew twisted upon her words. “Is that
true? What about wanting to protect this academy? What about
everything you told me in the storeroom?”

“That was then, this is now.”

“I don’t believe that. Not from you.”

The Countess sipped her tea her face betraying
no outward reaction to my words.

Her voice was another matter. “What I said
doesn’t matter anymore. Also, my mother told me in clear terms that
I was to have no more involvement in the operation. She expressly
forbid me from becoming involved with any new developments.”

“So you just walked away from it all.”

“I did. I don’t have a choice. She is my mother
and I live under her roof and by her rules.”

“That doesn’t sound like you, giving up so
easily.”

She bit her lower lip and gave me long,
thoughtful look. “You don’t know me, Caelum. You can’t say that so
offhandedly.”

“I didn’t. I really believed you wanted to play
an important part in protecting your academy.”

She put her cup and saucer down on the
kitchenette bench. “I did want to play a part, but not as a puppet
of my mother’s. The way things are now, I have no meaningful role
to play at all.”

I remembered her stating she made her own
shadow.

I laughed curtly under my breath. “That’s a
pity. I really wanted to mess up Crescent’s plans, but helping you
out was an added bonus.”

“Truthfully?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

I turned away and walked back to the window.
Looking down at the peaceful scene below, in contrast to what I’d
witnessed in the cafeteria last week, I couldn’t help voicing my
doubts. “But after thinking about everything that’s happened, maybe
we shouldn’t get in Crescent’s way. Maybe we should let them take
what they want.”

I heard the Countess inhale sharply. When I
looked at her over my shoulder, I saw her staring pensively at the
floor.

Seeing her this way, I couldn’t stay silent.
“Back in the storeroom, maybe you were right when you said the
Student Council shouldn’t have gotten involved.”

She pressed her lips into thin line. “It’s too
late now. The wheels are turning and plans are in motion. Even if
we don’t know what Special Interventions has in mind, I doubt
there’s anything we can do that will change the course of
events….”

That was indeed a distinct possibility.

I couldn’t hide my mixed feelings from flowing
onto my face.

At that moment, I felt the faintest of shivers
run across the floor of the room.

It was something I wouldn’t have noticed before
becoming a Familiar.

I glanced at the Countess, but she was lost in
thought with her eyes downcast.

Then I felt it again, and this time I
straightened and looked about the room carefully.

The Countess blinked and looked up at me. “What
is it?”

“I don’t know. I felt the room tremble—there!
Did you feel that?”

She frowned and then her eyes narrowed. “It
could be the artificial gravity, maybe a fluctuation in the
effect-fields that simulate it.”

For some reason, I had the urge to look
outside.

Far below in the courtyard, the students were
beginning to notice it as well. I saw them stand and look about
with faint worry.

Then I turned my attention upwards to the
habitat ceiling. The mimetic field mimicked an afternoon sky
complete with white puffy clouds, but it was only a simulation.

Yet now I saw the sky darken considerably as
though a real black cloud was spreading overhead. Tremors rattled
the contents of the room. I heard the Countess gasp in fright when
the items on the kitchenette fell over.

But I was engrossed on what was happening
outside. “Simone—something’s happening above the academy.”

I pushed the window doors open and stuck a good
third of my body out the opening. While holding onto the window
frame I was able to look directly upwards.

“Caelum, be careful.”

The room and walls were trembling harshly now. I
had to hold onto the framing tightly so that I wouldn’t fall
out.

Then I felt Simone’s arms wrap around my
waist.

“Caelum—stop it. Get back inside.”

“Simone—look. Look above us. What do you
see?”

“No, I don’t want to.”

I heard real fear in her voice. It fueled my
limbs and drove my body to retreat back into the room.

The Countess was holding onto me tightly, but
her eyes were wide open in fear.

I winced and gasped. “Simone—Simone you’re
holding me too tight.”

“Please, please don’t go. Don’t go Caelum.”

I reached down and put real effort into forcing
her arms open. “Simone, relax. I won’t leave you but we can’t stay
here. We need to leave the building and find shelter.”

Her eyes shifted upwards and her gaze met mine.
“What? No, we’re safe here in the academy.”

I grabbed her arms and squeezed them hard,
causing her to wince sharply. “Simone, listen to me. We need to
find shelter, maybe even escape Habitat One.”

“What? Why?”

I released one of her arms and pointed at the
ceiling. “Because there’s a trans-light breach opening up right
over the academy grounds.”

Her eyes widened and she mumbled, “That’s not
possible.”

“Yeah, well tell it to whoever is opening up
that breach.”

The shelving was shaking so badly it was
separating from the walls. I felt the room sway nauseously before a
piece of the ceiling crashed down on the large meeting table.

From outside I could hear the sounds of students
screaming and yelling.

Then, almost in afterthought, an alarm began to
ring out across the academy.

Then a violent quake hit the room, and I heard
the building groan like a titanic wounded beast. Simone and I were
knocked to the floor. Instantly my body over-clocked and I wrapped
my arms around Simone while forcing my body to twist so that I
would cushion her fall. The habitat lighting failed as my back hit
the carpeted floor, and the room’s lights flickered and died a
heartbeat later.

The sudden darkness was filled with even louder
screams and cries for help. I could hear people panicking wildly in
the hallway outside. I could hear them stumble and fall over each
other.

Why hadn’t the emergency lights kicked in?

Every room had emergency lighting.

Just how badly compromised were the academy’s
systems.

“Simone? Simone are you alright?”

“I’m an Aventis,” she replied in a shaky voice.
“I can—I can handle this much.”

“We have to get out of the building, and find
one of the emergency shelters.”

I fumbled for my palm-slate, pulling it out of
my back trouser pocket. Quickly I found the flashlight feature. It
would kill the battery in six hours, but that hardly mattered. Then
I started running through the map menu, looking for a map that
would lead us to the nearest emergency shelter.

The room wasn’t shaking as badly anymore, but it
was still moving in all three axis with enough force to hamper
walking. I thought I could manage running if I remained
over-clocked, but Simone didn’t possess that talent.

The Countess knelt beside me and pulled her
palm-slate out of a skirt pocket. I watched her thumb furiously
over the display but I had no idea what she was doing.

“Oh my gods,” she whispered.

I barely heard her because of the din
surrounding us.

The Countess showed me the slate’s screen. “This
is from the security cameras on the rooftop.”

I looked at the image on the screen and felt
simultaneously amazed and terrified.

A sleek trident shaped starship had entered the
confines of the habitat through the trans-light breach. A thunder
storm surrounded the vessel, with lightning flashing furiously
around it. The trans-light breach was quickly growing smaller. In
less than a minute it would seal shut. But the atmospheric effects
surrounding the large starship showed no signs of dissipating.

I spoke loud enough to be heard.

“They opened a breach and tunneled into the
Island’s mass shadow by moving through trans-space. Then they
opened a breach inside the habitat back into real-space. It must
have been possible because the Islands don’t have much of a mass
shadow.”

Simone shook her head. “But it shouldn’t be
possible.”

“Well tell it to
them
. They’re inside the
habitat.” I pointed at the screen. “Don’t you get it, that’s
Crimson Crescent.”

Simone’s mouth fell open and wouldn’t close.

I took the palm-slate from her hands. “Simone,
if Crimson Crescent is here then they broke the last seal. That
part of the network is now open.”

“But we still don’t know what’s inside.”

“That’s not our concern. Our concern is getting
out of here. The school has to be evacuated but we should leave
that to whoever’s still in charge.”

I struggled to rise to my knees.

Simone remained on her hands and knees beside
me.

The tremors afflicting the building and academy
grounds were not abating.

I pocketed my slate, but held up Simone’s. “Call
Severin. Ask him what he’s going to do.”

Before she could answer, the door to the room
was flung open. I aimed my palm-slate light at it and saw a girl
with familiar blonde hair standing in the doorway. Her baby blue
eyes looked relieved but she quickly grew annoyed.

Melanie yelled, “Damn it—I’ve been looking all
over the school for you.”

Simone and I stared at the girl bracing herself
against the doorway.

I croaked out, “Melanie? What are you doing
here?”

“I told you—looking for you and the Countess,”
she responded loudly. “Caelum Desanto, it’s time.”

With room the continuing to shift about all
around us, I held onto Simone, supporting her as best I could.
“Time for what?”

Melanie gave me a feral smile I’d never have
pictured on her beautiful face.

She laughed evilly like the villain on a
children’s show.

“Time to meet your sister.”

(Caprice)

When the tremors began Severin received a call
on his palm-slate.

His eyes widened, and he began tapping commands
into the remote data-slate he was using at the time.

The force of the tremors increased violently,
sending us all to the floor, and killing the lights in the
room.

“Backup,” Severin called out, and the battery
operated lamps around the room lit up.

Prissila cried out, “What the Hell is going
on?”

She had chosen to attend the briefing while the
Countess had not. I hated to admit it, but there was a chance she
was with Caelum. It was a dark possibility I couldn’t shake.

The room swayed and I felt the simulated gravity
surge and fall repeatedly.

Maya said, “Something’s affecting the
effect-field generators in the building.”