Industry & Intrigue (31 page)

“
Is that it then? Is that
everything or do
you have more sisterly advice? Like where I should buy my next set
of shoes or what I should wear to business meetings?”

“
Luthais
,” she replied, her voice holding
genuine sympathy. “I’m sorry. Be careful.”

“
I will
,” he said. “I’ll get back to you
after I see Tegan and tell you all about whatever plans she
arranged. You concentrate on greasing those wheels you mentioned.
Goodbye Tessa.”

“
Goodbye
Luthais
,”
she replied as he exited. She was concerned about him. Luthais had
always been the one she could talk to and she would hate to see him
humiliated by Alyssa Huntington.

The woman was
c
unning and
she had gone to extreme lengths to get information on her
competition before. Tessa doubted she would think twice about
seducing the head of Typhon’s armaments division to find out what
they were working on. On the upside Luthais allowing a competitor
to seduce company secrets out of him would enrage Tegan enough for
her to boot him out of the company. He would be away from her
dominating control.

Luthais being humiliated would
be a small price to pay to get him away from Tegan’s
influence
.
The more Tessa though about it, the more she decided to keep an eye
on the situation. If Alyssa Huntington truly was using her brother
for more than sex she wanted to know, so she could be there for him
when it went bad. She didn’t have direct contacts in Huntington
Mechanics, but her paramour Thomas Hamilton did. She would ask him
about it tonight.

Chapter 27

A
watch officer pulled Victor Shepard
out of his cell and in a gruff voice said, “Get up. You made bail.”
The officer led him past the other cells, hooting sounds of support
emerged where his comrades were still locked up. The officer
smacked the bars with his nightstick and yelled, “Shut the fuck up
unless you want me to teach you how to be quiet.”

They still continued
until
Victor
signaled them with his hand. “Be patient comrades. You will be set
free soon, I promise you that.”

The officer
looke
d
annoyed that Victor had been able to keep the prisoners quiet when
his own threat had no effect. He walked Victor out of the cell
block and over to the transfer desk.

“
Please get Mr.
Shepard
’s
personal items,” he asked the clerk, who then spent several minutes
fussing around until he found the right compartment and handed the
items over.

The officer handed
them to Victor and
said, “Mr. Shepard you are free to go.” He handed him an official
slip of paper. “This is the date and time of your court appearance,
please do not be late.”

“
Of course not officer, I look
forward to it
.” It was true. Victor relished the opportunity to present
his cause in an official forum. Each time he did, his support
grew.

As he exited the watch
station,
Victor Shepard smiled as he saw his friend and fellow
revolutionary, Robert Argyll. Robert was dressed in a pale blue
suit. With his pale skin, bright red hair and fine clothing he
could have not looked more different from Victor.

“
I should have known it would be
you
,” he
said as he embraced his friend in a brief hug.

Robert was much smaller
than
himself
and he kept the hug light. If Victor wanted, he could do real
damage to someone with his muscular frame, though he had never
harmed anyone his entire life. One issue where the two of them had
strongly disagreed.

Victor was a
fi
rst and
foremost, a man of peace. He advocated for worker’s rights and he
formulated the first theories that formed the Laborers Revolution
Collective. Victor came from a noble background. His family owned
estates in Tatha province and were highly placed members of society
in plutocratic Silund.

H
e had turned against his family and his
background when he had seen the ill-treatment of workers
everywhere. The slave-markets of Ze Feros, the debt servitude and
plutonomy of Silund and the huge factories and plants of the Alkon
Empire.

He had written several books
which had been hugely popular with workers across the
empire, the most
famous of which was his
Workers Manifesto
. Many of his theories relied on working
within to reform the system and make it better for all.

Which was why he had moved
to
Alkos, it
had the framework of a political system needed to work within. In
Silund, his group would have been declared enemies of the state,
then hunted down and killed by the dogs of the rich
overlords.

Robert on the other hand
advocated a more confrontational
approach. He felt that a full blown
workers revolution was required to overthrow the hierarchy and
liberate the people. He believed that it was inevitable, though he
preferred to see it happen within his own lifetime. Victor had been
able to curb his more aggressive suggestions, but Robert still had
a core of loyal followers that were growing impatient. They wanted
to take more drastic measures and Victor was concerned that one day
they would not hold back.

The two of them discussed
matters as they walked towards the LRC meeting house. Who was still
imprisoned, who had
escaped and what the consequences would be.

“
They’ll give us a slap on the
wrist, that’s all Robert
,” said Victor.

“
You’re
certain
?
Despite what you may think about us having sympathizers in the
government, the reactionaries maintain control. If we do not act
soon, they will crush us beneath their steel boots.” Robert coughed
and spat towards the gutter.

“
They learned their lesson about
creating martyrs after the Railroad Strike, they won’t do it
again.” Robert was still trying to convince him to take a more
hardline approach, but he wouldn’t go there. A violent revolution
could cause more harm than good and he had no desire to see the
chaos it would create.

“
Don’t be so
certain
.
Minister Kao has been in the government since before then and I
have no doubt he would love to see a return to those times. Someone
should show him what we workers are truly capable of.” If Robert
had his way, he would be organizing assassinations of people like
Kao.

Victor sighed. He was in no mood to have
this argument with Robert again, yet it always came up. He decided
not to say anything in response for now, in the hopes that Robert
would let it lie for now.

As they came
arrived at the
house, something did not look right. Victor noticed there were no
lights on. In addition there was normally a member at the door to
check everyone; but no one stood there. There was only a darkened
doorway, the door left slightly ajar.

“
Robert…” said
Victor.

“
S
omething ‘aint right.” Robert stepped
towards the door. “Shit,” he said.

Victor stepped forward to see why his
friend had reacted. There was a small patch of blood on the wooden
wall of the doorway. Robert put his hand on the door and looked
back at Victor. He nodded, indicating for his friend to
enter.

Robert pushed the door open and
it squeaked
.
He moved inside and Victor followed him. As his eyes adjusted to
the dark, Victor could make out more bloodstains on the walls and a
thin trial leading down the hall. He kept following Robert until
they came to the door of the main room. Robert pushed it
open.

It was too dark to see much, but the smell
assaulted Victor’s nostrils. It was the copper scent of blood,
mixed with piss and shit.

“
Hold on. I’ll get the light”
said Robert.
With the smell of death heavy in the air, Victor was afraid
to see what was in the room.

There was a click as Robert
flipped the switch
. The lights flickered once and then came on. A grisly
sight was revealed. It was so horrible, he had to blink several
times to make certain he was not imagining what his eyes were
showing him.

“
By all the
hells
,”
Robert said in low voice.

All across the room were bodies
of their fellow revolutionaries. There was a half a dozen piled in
the center
.
Each of them appeared to have been gunned down. Scattered
throughout the rest of the room were hacked–up pieces-heads, limbs
and torsos. Victor felt his stomach lurch and he fought to keep
himself from vomiting.

Then a moan sounded out from
the pile
.
They both ran over, careful to avoid slipping in blood. A hand was
moving beneath a body. Robert pulled the corpse off the survivor.
It was Iver Weir, the collective’s secretary. He had lost one of
his feet and had a nasty stomach wound, which was still
bleeding.

Victor leaned down, no
longer
caring about getting blood over himself. He held the man’s
head and gently lifted it up. “Iver, it’s Victor. Can you hear
me?”

The man moaned
again
,
“Victor? You aren’t dead?”

“
No my friend. I am fine. Can
you tell m
e
what happened? Who did this?”

Iver nodded slowly.
“We were gathered,
waiting for Robert to return with you. There was the sound of
arguing at the door and before we could react, he was inside. He
was dragging Daniel into the room, impaled him on a scythe. Then he
came after the rest of us.”

“
Fuck
,” said Robert.

Victor put his hand up and
said
, “Let
him finish.”

“
He was in
sanely strong and fast. I think
he killed everyone. Only reason I’m alive is he hit me over the
head and knocked me out. I guess he figured he I was dead.” Iver
looked down at his stomach wound.

“
Who?” asked Victor “Who
was it?”

Iver coughed a spray of blood
up
. “I don’t
know. He looked like death.” He coughed again, he wasn’t going to
last much longer.

“
Death?” asked
Victor
.

“
He wore a mask. A skull mask.
H
e used a
shotgun and a scythe. Never thought death would use a shotgun,”
Iver coughed again and his voice was growing weak.

“
Relax Iver. We’ll get you help,
don’t
worry,” said Victor in a reassuring tone.

“
Too late for me…don’t let them
get away with...Robert was right Victor…we need to show…strength.
We…” his voice trailed off and his body convulsed. A few seconds
later, he was gone. Victor closed Iver’s still open
eyes.

Robert was looking around, his face a
hardened with rage.

“
I know what you’re
thinking Robert. But we need to discuss this. We need to report
this to the authorities.”

Robert shook his head. “You have a
brilliant mind Victor, but you don’t have the will to take the next
step. You keep on with your writing to inspire us. I’ll going to
take the fight directly to the economic dictators.”

Robert stomped out of the
room,
not
looking back. Victor lowered his head, he felt that he would not be
able to reconcile with him, not after this. He stood up and slowly
made his way out of the room. He would go to the nearest watch
station. He laughed at the irony. He had been released from the
cells and now he was going straight back there.

Chapter
28

Lucina hated
waiting. The day of
her mission was here. The target had finally arrived and she was
waiting for Ral. He would provide her with the weapon she needed.
She was sitting in a small office of the administration building at
the University of Alkos. The occupant of the office was lying dead
on the floor. Lucina had slit her throat when she opened the
door.

The office was nice enough.
T
he woman
had been the deputy admin of records. Lucina imagined it was a
mind-numbing paper pushing role. The only profession she had ever
known was that of murder. The room was crowded with filing
cabinets, full of records on the students and staff.

She
stretched. She kept herself in top
physical shape with a disciplined training regimen. Her role as an
assassin demanded it. Ral had not informed her of the location of
her shot, but she wanted to be certain she was ready for wherever
she needed to be.

She
pulled her lean, muscular arms over
her head, out to the sides and behind her back. She flexed her
right hand, the one she would be using to take the shot.

Her skill with long distance
rifles had first been noticed by the firearms instructor in the
Arm’s secretive training
base. He had her practice with larger rifles and
she continued to display an aptitude with them; even the heavy
safari guns. Most people strained to even lift those guns to take
an accurate shot, but Lucina had hit the targets the first
time.