Aetheral Space Chapter 102:4.15: The Prince

I’d like for you to imagine three things.

The first is a puzzle that has never been solved. It doesn’t much matter what kind of puzzle you imagine it as -- a jigsaw or a matter of nurology or perhaps so kind of video ga -- so long as you keep in mind that this is the most difficult puzzle to ever exist. Nobody has ever beaten it and it is believed nobody ever will.

The second thing you need to imagine is the person attempting to solve this puzzle. Let’s call them the player, for ease of reference. This player is an ordinary person, like you or , and he’s not actually that adept at solving puzzles of this kind. That’s fine, though -- he can learn, and all experience is valuable.

The player does absolutely nothing but sit in this room all day and attempt to solve the puzzle. He does not succeed, nor will he. Let’s get this out of the way -- this person has absolutely no chance of solving the puzzle. His only role is to be the first.

He sits in this room for days upon days, months upon months, years upon years. He still does not solve the puzzle. One day, he dies. It doesn’t matter how he dies. Nothing matters, except the puzzle.

Once the first player dies, soone else enters and begins trying to solve the puzzle. This is the second player. And then that second player tries to solve that puzzle for the rest of his life, until he expires and a third player enters -- and a fourth, and a fifth, and so on.

You might think, based on what I’ve told you, that the struggle of these players is futile -- no matter how many people try it, the puzzle cannot be solved. It’s aningless, no matter how many people devote their lives to it -- there’s no accumulation of experience, no effort taken by a single player making things easier for the next.

You only believe this because I haven’t told you about the third thing you must imagine yet.

Imagine there is another person in the room, watching while the players do their utmost to solve the puzzle. We’ll call them the observer. This observer is completely and utterly immortal -- he will never age, and he will never die. You might wonder why this observer doesn’t simply try to solve the puzzle himself. Surely, over the course of an infinite life, he would fare better than the sad little mortals who devote themselves to this labour?

Unfortunately, the observer does not have the capacity to attempt such a feat. He is capable of only two things: he can watch, and he can listen. He watches the players work at the puzzle, noting what works and what does not, what courses of action bring forth the optimal results. Over countless iterations, he becos wiser, more experienced -- and he passes that experience over to the players he watches. In a way, it is as if they beco wiser just as he does.

And as the players try to solve the puzzle, there is little for them to do but talk -- talk of their lives, their skills, their own mories and experiences. The observer is a supre listener -- he rembers every last scrap of that information without fail, and he passes that on as well. Perhaps the puzzle reaches a stage where knowledge of plumbing is required -- well, the first player was a plumber, and so the observer can communicate the required expertise to the two-hundred and sixteenth. Although many people have tried to solve the puzzle, it is almost as if they have apparently beco one person -- a cascading gestalt consciousness tied together by their common observer.

How long would it take this dual being to solve the puzzle?

Now, there is only one thing left for you to imagine. Imagine that this observer has a na.

Imagine that it is called The Prince.

"Good evening to you," Jai Pierrot said pleasantly. "I’d like to challenge you to a duel."

The Prince began it’s analysis instantly, taking in every facet of the short, round little man before him. It whispered to him how people of that size usually fought, what skills he was likely to have developed in his own occupation, the state of his health judging from the pallor of his skin, his likely first move based on the tension of his muscles, his most common emotions based on the shape of his face, his planet of origin based on the accent with which he’d spoken.

A thousand dead eyes, all belonging to The Prince, scrutinized the man, dragging out every scrap of information it could.

Then it told Pierrot, based on that information, how best to kill him. It so often ca down to that in the end.

The little man scoffed, pulling his hands out of his pockets -- and The Prince instantly identified the knuckle-dusters he now held. The experiences of one of the previous holders, an Aether smith, told Pierrot that those weapons were most likely Aether Armants. The inherited mories told him that the small indentations on the outside of the dusters were telltale signs that they were intended for ranged attack.

"I have no reason to accept that request," the small man snapped. Liar. Pierrot could see, even without The Prince pointing it out, that this Supremacy commander was itching for a fight. The bloodlust was visible in every wrinkle of his face.

Still, his common sense was winning against that bloodlust. The Prince’s advice ca through loud and clear:

Death likely within next sixty seconds in current situation. Highest chance of success lies in deploynt of pre-arranged gambit. Execute now.

"You have every reason to accept my request," Pierrot smiled, placing a hand over his heart. "You see -- there’s a bomb inside my chest."

The angle of the rifles pointing at him grew more urgent, but Pierrot wasn’t especially concerned -- only nineteen of the fifty or so soldiers in the room had dispositions that would lead them to shoot without direct orders, and Pierrot was fairly confident in his ability to evade those nineteen. The Aether program called The Prince excelled at calculating shot trajectories, after all -- it would lead him to the spot with the greatest chance of survival.

The little man snorted. "You’re lying."

"I am not," Pierrot shook his head, pulling the sleeve back on one of his arms to show off the bracelets there. "These Aether Armants are known as the Revolutions. They allow to phase parts of my body through matter at will. Using them, I was able to take a heavy-duty mining charge and place it within my own body. It will detonate when I speak a certain codeword, causing heavy damage to this ship -- and, of course, killing all of us."

The commander’s brow furrowed, clearly trying to work out whether Pierrot was bluffing.

He was not, needless to say. The Prince had decided that risking his own life was vital for the success of the mission, and Pierrot had learned long ago that The Prince was never wrong.

"A duel," the commander muttered. "Under what terms?"

"You versus . All weapons and techniques permitted, save for detonating the bomb inside my chest. The duel ends when one of us is dead."

The commander shifted his stance slightly, raising his arms up like a boxer. The gathered soldiers took a few steps back, creating a space for the duel to take place -- their rifles still pointed inwards.

Pierrot took a step forward. He had no intention of finishing the duel in this hangar, but he still had to make a good show of it. "Your answer?"

"Very well," the commander sniffed. "Are you ready to die, degenerate?"

"Almost."

Hand moving in a blur, Pierrot tore away his captain’s coat and tossed it aside, leaving only the white vest beneath. Age had done nothing to dent his muscular physique, and without the bulky coat, the holster for his plasma pistol was clearly visible. He wouldn’t need to use it.

"That’s better," Pierrot sighed. "Much more freeing -- even if your ships are dreadfully cold. One last thing before we begin. What is your na?"

The commander narrowed his eyes, still clearly watching for a trap. "What’s it to you?"

"You may be the last person I exchange words with. It would bring so comfort to know who my killer might be."

A chuckle. "Fair enough. I gave up my na many years ago -- you may call the Instructor."

"A pleasure," Pierrot said, droll. "And with that -- shall we begin?"

"Yes," the Instructor grinned. "I think we shall."

For a mont the two of them were still, facing each other in the clearing of the crowd. A frozen mont of utmost tension and patient death. Then, they both moved at once -- Pierrot feinting for his pistol and the Instructor shooting forward like a cannonball, fists ready to execute a devastating assault.

The duel began.

Forty years earlier…

"Are you satisfied?" the young soldier nad Pierrot spat down at his defeated opponent. "Satisfied with… all this?"

They were standing in what had once been Caput Leon’s command bridge -- but had beco, over the course of half an hour of furious battle, a wasteland of broken steel and glass. The Caput himself lay sprawled out against a remaining pillar, blood staining the outside of his mouth. The blonde-haired bandit smirked up at his vanquisher.

"Satisfied?" Leon mused, his voice like broken glass. "Yeah. Yeah, I suppose I might be. Everything is as it should be."

Pierrot narrowed his eyes, his body shaking with fury. "Everything as it should be?" the curly-haired young man hissed. He waved a hand to the view outside the colossal windows. "Then what the hell is this?!"

The battle outside had lasted many hours, and Pierrot couldn’t even begin to guess how many on both sides had been lost. The Unite Prosper floated burning through space, and what was left of the Unite Hope buffeted like hail against the hull of Caput Leon’s command ship.

Leon’s forces hadn’t fared much better -- the pirate fleet had been shattered like matchsticks, chunks of hull and balls of fuel and floating puddles of human beginning their last flight of indignity. Perhaps they’d stay floating here forever.

The most feared pirate fleet in UAP space, and they’d destroyed it in an afternoon. It hadn’t been worth it. The fireworks outside had been paid for with blood.

Leon simply looked out at the devastation, chuckling to himself. Despite his accomplishnts, he didn’t strike an imposing figure -- with his scruffy hair and rough shave, he looked more like a holess man who’d wandered onto the bridge than anything else.

"You think this is funny?" Pierrot hissed.

"Nah," Leon shook his head, still smirking. "Not funny. Necessary. Lotta people had to die to get us in this situation. The ends justify the ans."

Pierrot could take no more. With a roar of righteous anger, he slamd his leg into Leon’s torso with a devastating kick -- sending the pirate flying into the wall. The bastard just kept laughing.

"The ends do not justify the ans!" Pierrot snarled, reaching out and grabbing the villain by the collar, doing his best to resist the urge to strangle him. "How many people have you stolen from?! How many have you hurt?! How many have you killed?! What end could justify all that?!"

Leon sighed, his face inches from Pierrot’s.

"Would you believe ," he asked. "If I said it was ’peace and joy for all mankind’?"

Pierrot didn’t make a noise as his face was slamd into the wall. This pain was necessary for victory, but the loss of his dignity was not. Instead, he whirled back around, smashed his elbow into his opponent’s stomach, and jumped backwards to avoid the cords that shot out at him in retaliation.

Those knuckle-dusters were interesting weapons. Their form caused those who saw them to assu they were specialized in close range confrontations, but in truth they were designed for long-range combat.

The Instructor punched at empty air again -- and glowing white cords shot out from the knuckles, latching onto Pierrot’s arm and pulling him close for another assault. The white cords looked diminutive, but Pierrot had no doubt that against a lesser fighter they would have ripped the limb straight off.

Pierrot let the cords pull him in close -- then shifted his body into a dropkick midair, smashing his feet into the Instructor’s round stomach. The Instructor slid backwards across the floor, detaching the cords with a trigger on the side of his knuckle-duster. He needed a mont to recover, clearly, and didn’t want to be dragging Pierrot along with him.

That was fine. Defeating the Instructor was only the secondary objective in this situation -- the first was reaching the desired destination.

They were no longer in the hangar where the fight had begun. As they’d fought, they’d gradually moved, passing through hallways and function rooms as their battle grew fiercer and fiercer. Pierrot had been careful to make this travel seem incidental -- the result of them driving each other back with the sheer power of their attacks -- but in truth this had been his objective for the beginning.

Pierrot closed the distance, smashing a fist into the Instructor’s face that could have shattered bone -- but he was pulling his punches. He couldn’t allow this fight to end before they reached the engine room, after all.

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They’d begun their assault on the Regent by destroying the engine. It seed only fair that an eye be exchanged for an eye.

"It wanted to et you," Leon coughed, still half-laughing through broken ribs. "To see you."

Pierrot faltered, looking down at the defeated man slumped against the wall. Despite everything, all the atrocities the Caput committed, Pierrot couldn’t see any trace of deception or malevolence in him right now. Every word seed genuine.

Still, he didn’t move his gun away from Leon’s head. "Who wanted to et ?" Pierrot asked quietly, sweat sliding down his brow. "What are you talking about?"

Nothing about this situation made sense. This was ant to be the end of Caput Leon’s reign of terror -- his fleet vanquished, his allies abandoning him, his command ship annihilated -- and yet the criminal seed just as in control as he’d always been. More, even -- as though a great weight had been released from his shoulders.

"It wanted to see you," Leon repeated -- rhythmically tapping a finger against his temple. "The prince."

Pierrot took a step closer, gun still trained on his adversary. "A prince? What prince? You had royal support?"

Leon laughed uproariously, as if this whole thing were one big joke. "What if I told you," he said, wiping an amused tear from his eye with a shaking hand. "That I had a constant companion? A voice in my head that knows exactly what to do to reach a happy ending?"

"I don’t believe you."

As if Pierrot hadn’t even spoken, Leon went on. "An Aether program inside my head," he muttered dreamily. "Passed on and on and on for hundreds of years. Peace and joy for all mankind, you understand? That’s the end goal. Everything I’ve done -- everything -- was necessary for that purpose."

"The world isn’t any more peaceful because of you," Pierrot scoffed. "And people certainly aren’t happier."

"Not yet," Leon did his best to shrug. "But eventually. It’s the long ga, my friend. One day, because of what I’ve done here, it’ll all be worth it."

"How?"

Leon looked towards him -- and Pierrot saw the glint of zealotry in his eyes. A madness born of singular purpose. "I told you, didn’t I?" he breathed. "The prince wanted to see you. To see what you were capable of. To see if you were worthy. You are. You are!" He paused for a second, grin faltering on his face. "It wants to die now."

Pierrot bit his lip. Caput Leon certainly seed to have lost his mind, but Pierrot had seen strange things borne of Aether over the years. The kind of Aether program Leon was describing wasn’t necessarily impossible. Passed from person to person, with specific goals pre-programd by its original creator.

Still, though…

"You said it wants you to die," Pierrot called out, moving no closer. "What do you an by that?"

Shakily, with all the effort left in his body, Leon reached out with a grasping hand, reaching out for empty air.

"I’ll show you," he giggled. "Just take my hand…"

Pierrot endured the barrage of punches, each powerful enough to smash through steel. He’d been thrown flat against the main power unit, and the Instructor wasn’t allowing him a mont to recover or counter from this assault.

Destination reached. Objective accomplished. Defeat enemy and exit ship.

Easier said than done. When it ca to situations like a fast-paced fight, the Prince wasn’t in it’s elent -- it provided intelligence and guidance based on prior observations, of course, but it’s true worth lay in long-term planning. With that, it had taken Pierrot from small-ti leader of a pirate-hunting vessel to the king of UniteFleet itself.

He’d already done what he needed to, at any rate. The only thing left to do was win.

Pierrot’s hands lashed out, faster than lightning, and seized the Instructor’s fists mid-punch. The application of pressure shattered the knuckle-dusters that had been such annoyances with a satisfying crunch.

For a mont, the Instructor simply stared at Pierrot in surprise, his mouth a perfect circle -- then he lunged forward with his legs, dual kicks rushing forward to smash Pierrot’s chest in.

They wouldn’t et their mark. Pierrot was finished with these gas. He spun around, smashing the Instructor’s face against the power unit -- then whirled him around in his grip, securing him in a tight headlock with one muscular arm.

The Instructor’s legs kicked at empty air, trying to break free until he realized it was a pointless effort. His grey Aether was nearly spent, after all. "I give," he wheezed, eyes bulging. "The ship is yours!’

Pierrot ignored him. This man had caused him a great deal of trouble, after all.

The soldiers that had watched them throughout the duel looked to each other, doubtless wondering if they should intervene -- but no shots ca. That was not the way of the Supremacy, after all. Pierrot t the eyes of the young soldier at the head of the squad and stared, unblinking.

Pierrot squeezed.

Pierrot squeezed.

Pierrot squeezed.

Crack.

The corpse of the Instructor fell, an undignified heap on the floor of the engine room. Pierrot simply sighed in relief, adjusted the bangles on his wrists, and began marching back towards the hangar. The majority of the soldiers moved out of his way -- whether it was from fear or respect was irrelevant -- but the young soldier Pierrot had locked eyes with called out after him: "Sir! He said the ship is yours!"

"I have a ship," Pierrot said, voice dull, staring straight ahead as he marched. "I don’t need this one. I have only one demand."

"Of course!" the young soldier cried, hurrying to match his pace.

"Begin flying this ship back in the direction of the Supremacy border," Pierrot said. "As winner, it’s my right to demand that, isn’t it?"

"Of course!" the soldier nodded vigorously. "You have won the day. The codes of the first Supre accept you as a superior."

He’d gotten himself a true believer. How fortunate.

"Also," Pierrot went on, entering the hangar. "I’ll need a gasmask. My ship is flooded with gas, isn’t it?"

The young soldier furrowed his brow. "How did you…?"

"The gasmask, boy."

"Of course, of course!" the young soldier turned to his fellows, barking out orders before turning back to Pierrot. "You’ve won this day, sir, but one must remain supre through continual triumph. Perhaps one day we’ll et again -- and again we’ll determine who is superior among us."

As the staff hurried to deliver Pierrot’s requests, he ignored the young man’s rhetoric. It was aningless, after all. Nothing he said would have any impact on the future at all.

The second he’d t Jai Pierrot, that young man had ceased being a living person -- now he was but a prologue to the dead.

Pierrot didn’t know why exactly he took Leon’s hand. Perhaps it was curiosity, or naivety, or so montary madness, but take the hand he did -- and a second later, the two of them were surrounded by a storm of bright blue Aether.

He instantly tried to pull away, to break free of Leon’s grasp, but the effort was fruitless. It was as if the two of them, for these few monts, had been locked together at the molecular level. He could no more separate himself from Leon than he could separate the two halves of his brain.

And through it all, Leon laughed -- a mad sound of cruelty and horror and a kind of breathless relief.

The words slipped from Pierrot’s lips once again, strained against the force surrounding them: "What’s...so...funny?"

It wasn’t clear whether Leon was answering Pierrot or just rambling, but he spoke all the sa. "I’ve had The Prince for three years now," he whispered. "And The Prince has had . It’s funny, isn’t it? I don’t know where it ends and I begin. I don’t even know if I’m anymore."

His eyes flicked up to stare at Pierrot, narrowing maliciously. He showed off his teeth with a grotesque, face-splitting grin.

"Well, you’ll see," he whispered.

And then -- in a single, transcendental mont of horror -- Caput Leon was undone. As strands of blue Aether poured out of his body and into Pierrot’s, that sa body began to fall apart. Leon’s skin crumbled into dust, his eyes lted into rivers of clear liquid, his teeth poured out from his mouth as smoke.

Before Pierrot could even blink, he found he was holding onto the hand of a bleached-white skeleton -- and then, a second later, that too evaporated into a fine white mist.

Pierrot stumbled back, staring at his own hand -- terrified that he too would begin to decompose. But nothing happened. Even as ships burned outside, and what was left of Caput Leon was expunged by the venting systems, Pierrot was unhard.

He opened his mouth to laugh in relief --

-- and then his mind opened instead.

Pierrot adjusted the gas mask as the cutter pod reached the midpoint of it’s journey back to the Regent. The equipnt was uncomfortable, but serviceable -- if nothing else it would allow him to get to the Widow’s ship without breathing the gas in.

He glanced up, looking through the cutter pod’s window at the Supremacy assault ship, growing smaller in his vision as it began its own return journey. He wondered vaguely if it had a na, but then again it didn’t really matter at this point.

Staring straight at the horseshoe vessel, Pierrot whispered under his breath:

"Fin."

The explosion was instantaneous: the entire back half of the vessel, where the power unit was, consud in an second of fla and light. Chunks of debris went flying in every direction -- and they would keep flying until the day they finally hit sothing.

There was no possibility of the ship recovering, or of there being any survivors. A heavy duty ship like the Regent could limp along for a brief ti after suffering such heavy damage, but this assault ship was made for hit-and-run. And it has certainly been hit.

It had been a simple matter to destroy the vessel. Pierrot had simply used the Revolutions’ phasing capabilities to pull the mining charge out of his own body and place it inside the power unit while the Instructor was pumling him. That had been his objective from the very beginning.

As the ship had begun moving back towards Supremacy space before it’s destruction, it’s corpse would continue in that direction for the foreseeable future. If the wreckage was discovered at that point, there’d be no sign that the UAP was involved.

That was ideal. It wasn’t yet ti for the war to begin, after all.

Pierrot leaned back and relaxed as the cutter pod zood back towards the Regent.

"Marco, report," Pierrot said as he marched towards the hangar where the Widow’s ship was waiting. He knew Marco was compromised, but at this point that didn’t really matter anymore.

Ten seconds delay. Then: "Reporting."

"Status of escape pods?"

"Inoperable."

"Status of crew?"

"Majority dead or dying. Those who are not currently dead or dying will likely beco dead or dying within the next hour."

Pierrot tightened his fist. "I see."

There was nothing else for it, then. The Prince confird it was ti to abandon ship. No more effort on Pierrot’s part would influence this situation. The ti for action had co to an end.

Pierrot entered the decontamination chamber just before the Widow’s hangar, sighing and rubbing the bridge of his nose. It had been a long day.

"Wait!" cried a voice from behind him, just before the doors closed.

Soone charged into the decontamination chamber just before the cleaning sequence began -- Pierrot’s hand flew to his holstered pistol, only to relax when he saw who it was. A young male Underman, hands on his knees as he panted for breath.

It was easy to see why -- he clearly hadn’t been fortunate enough to find a usable rebreather, and instead had made his own counterasure against the gas. A bundle of reddened bandages were pressed against his mouth, and Pierrot could see that sa scarlet in his bloodshot eyes.

Pierrot put a hand on his shoulder reassuringly, allowing the Underman to catch his breath. "Hold up there, Underman. You’re safe now. Your na?"

"Werner, sir," the boy wheezed. "Danny -- Daniel Werner."

Pierrot patted Werner on the back, the slightest smile on his lips. At least this one person had survived. If nothing else, he had that. "You did well to make it here, Werner. We’re getting out of here. How’re you feeling?"

The decontamination sequence began, a fine wet mist filling the room as they spoke.

"I’ve been better," Werner coughed. "I’m just… I’m glad you’re alright, sir."

"The concern is appreciated, Underman, but you seem to be in more need of help than . We’re about to board a ship -- doubtless they have so Panacea aboard for your lungs."

Werner nodded, relief spreading over the visible portion of his face. "Then we can tell Command what happened here. What the Supremacy did to us. We can make ’em pay."

Pierrot sucked in air through his nose. So they’d hit this little snag. "I’m afraid not, boy," he said quietly.

"Sir?"

"If word of this gets out," Pierrot explained. "The governing council won’t be able to ignore this kind of aggression. It’ll an war -- a war we can’t yet win. It’s not yet ti for us to take on the Supremacy."

"But…" Werner took a step back. "But, sir, think about what they’ve done! The crew -- my friends -- they died choking and shot and -- and they did it like it was nothing! You want to pretend nothing happened?! People are gonna ask! They’re going to want to know!"

Pierrot’s voice was dull. "There was a failure in the shielding of the main power unit. An explosion occurred as a result, and the coolant leaked into the ship’s air supply. What happened here was simply a tragic mistake."

Werner looked down at the ground, fists balled at his side. "That’s…"

"A lie, yes. But a lie that will save millions of lives."

"But it’s wrong!" Werner snapped his head back up to look at Pierrot. "We can’t just let them get away with this! We can’t just pretend nothing happened! They’ll keep doing it until we stop them!"

"Soday," Pierrot sighed. "But not today. I’m sorry."

Werner didn’t break his gaze this ti -- he just stared right into Pierrot’s eyes. "Do you rember Ulos?" he asked, voice shaking.

"Of course." He’d lost many n that day, too. On that occasion it had felt worth it -- they’d saved so many in exchange -- but this ti…

"Nobody else wanted to fly in there. Nobody else wanted to save us! But you flew in there and you did what you had to do because it was the right thing to do! And -- and the right thing to do here is tell the truth. It’s the only way the dead can rest easy."

The passion in the young man’s voice was obvious. For a mont, Pierrot was reminded of that foolhardy boy of a soldier who’d fought against Caput Leon at the end of an age -- but he cast such thoughts away just as quickly.

He ran a hand over his tired face. "I can’t convince you, can I?" he muttered.

Werner shook his head. "I’m sorry, sir."

"That’s quite alright."

Pierrot took his gun from it’s holster and shot Werner in the chest.

It was a killshot. Werner stumbled backwards, staring wide-eyed at the smoking wound just above his stomach, one hand half-reaching out to the hole as if there was anything he could do to close it. Then, he looked up at Pierrot as he slumped against the wall, slid down it to lie on the floor. He blinked.

He didn’t do anything else after that.

The decontamination sequence finished, and the doors to the hangar opened. Pierrot remained for only a mont longer -- closing the eyes of the Underman as a show of respect -- before turning and striding towards the Widow’s waiting ship.

He couldn’t afford to delay. He couldn’t afford to compromise, or let virtue twist his path. He couldn’t afford to follow any route except the one to certain victory.

After all, the ends justified the ans.

Peace and joy for all mankind.