Chương 19: Shamballa

Trigger Warnings: Character abusing a position of power over another person, implication of nonconsensual sexual relationship Shamballa, Asteroid 2679 WLX The Singularity September 26, 2847"You called me here," Evelyn Livingston-Baylies said, her delicate chin thrust proudly upward, her dark eyes burning with anger.

"Well, here I am. What is it you want with me?" Ogden Autenrieth-Fujita the Second regarded her from the embrace of his comfortable desk-chair. It had been designed to fit his body, specifically, contoured to support his posture and cradle him in the greatest possible comfort. The cushions were covered in genuine galuchat, harvested from vat-grown stingrays. He ran his fingers over the sanded-down and polished, almost pebble-like texture along the armrests, while he let the woman stew in her own fear.

Behind him, a great armored window of layered, transparent aluminum oxynitride looked down on the floor of the Shamballa Casino, where crowds of people swirled from game to game, entertainment to entertainment. Numerous symptoms of fear and anxiety detected, though she is trying to hide it, Egeria told him. The shackled AI's voice manifested halfway between a whisper and a caress along the inside of his skull.

He could have had her simply display the information he wanted through the artificial lenses surgically implanted in his eyes, but Ogden preferred the internal conversation. Her breathing is shallow, and her jaw is clenched so tight that she's nearly grinding her teeth. She is sweating.

"What is it I want with you," Ogden repeated, teasing the words out as he allowed himself to relish the woman's suffering. It was ridiculous to imagine that he'd ever thrown his affections at her in such a pathetic way—but he supposed that he needed to use a bit of mercy in judgement of his past self. After all, he'd been quite a bit younger then, and had far less of an understanding about how the universe worked. She was still striking: that, he could freely admit.

At twenty-seven, Evelyn was no longer quite so skinny or coltish as she had been when they'd both attended Eton's campus on Wolf 1069. She'd lost some of the freshness, the feel of a flower just opened from the bud, that young women had, but she'd made up for it in the swell of her hips and chest beneath that elegantly-cut dress. Her breasts were certainly larger than he recalled. It was a pity, he admitted, that she'd likely given her body away to other men over the years.

He would have preferred to teach her how to please him without having to go to the trouble of making her unlearn the tastes she'd acquired from lesser lovers. Still, there would be a certain pleasure in breaking her.

"What makes you think that I want anything?" Ogden asked, once he'd left her waiting long enough. The first thing to do, of course, was to show the proud Miss Livingston-Baylies her place.

"I already have a controlling share of your family's corporation, as of Tuesday morning. At the shareholders meeting this afternoon, I will have your father's resignation from his position as chief executive. I've bought up your family's personal debts. In short, Evelyn, I am already in possession of everything which was once yours. What more could I possibly want?" He could see her jaw tremble—was it fury, or despair? How wonderful it would be, Ogden thought, if she lunged across his desk and struck him.

The Autenrieth-Fujita Security personnel waiting just outside his office were brutally trained, exorbitantly equipped with the latest combat wetware, and highly motivated to protect the brilliant young heir to the corporation. They should be: Ogden and his father made certain their families were well cared for, and their children groomed for positions of future responsibility within the company. He'd have to restrain them from splattering the beautiful Miss Livingston-Baylies' brains across his walls.

"I can't believe you're as petty as this," Evelyn practically spat.

"Yes, you've crushed my family. Congratulations. Livingston-Baylies Manufacturing was never in competition with you. Our annual net profit was less than half of Autenrieth-Fujita's. We both know that my father never had a chance of fighting back, once you'd set your sights on us. But what I can't believe is—is this really all because I turned you down once? It was ten years ago."

"Don't flatter yourself," Ogden shot back, leaning forward in his chair.

"However much you prize what's between your legs, Evelyn, there's seven billion other women in the Singularity with a cunt just like it, and I'm spoiled for choice. No, your father had something I wanted. The fact that I could have the satisfaction of seeing the look on your face while I watch your world crumble was simply—killing two birds with one stone." Evelyn recoiled, though whether it was at his coarse language or the sentiment behind it, Ogden couldn't be certain.

But she was intelligent—he had to give her that, even though her family had come out the losers in this case. He could practically see the wheels turning behind her eyes as she re-evaluated his motives.

"You want to be able to manufacture mechs at scale," she said, as much to herself as to him.

"Why? We haven't been at war with the Imperium in sixty years. Who are you planning on fighting—the other mega-corps?"

"Peace is simply the interval between wars," Ogden demurred. As if he would be tricked into giving the woman any information she could use against him.

"Something will come up, sooner or later."

"And war is simply the continuation of politics by other means," Evelyn said, and either she couldn't keep her lip from curling in disgust, or she was no longer bothering to conceal her true feelings.

"I'm surprised that the heiress to a fortune built on the back of a military-industrial complex would be so squeamish," Ogden said.

"Do you really have qualms about your family's role as merchants of death? No, don't answer that—I don't care. I brought you here today, Evelyn, to offer you an agreement."

"Here it comes," she said, setting her shoulders as if preparing to receive a punch.

"Let's have it then."

"You have two options before you," Ogden said, while Egeria made herself useful and spun up a list of properties, accounts, and outstanding loans.

"The first is that I call in every loan your family owes. You'll find that I own the bank which holds the mortgage on your ancestral estate in Amarok City, for instance, your own penthouse suite here on Shamballa, and even that little vacation island on Hyperborea which you spend so much of your time enjoying." He shook his head.

"It seems that peace has, in the case of your family, been rather bad for business."

"In short, I lose everything," Evelyn said.

"Succinctly put." He smiled.

"On the other hand, I have no particular interest in managing the day-to-day operations of Livingston-Baylies Manufacturing, so long as my personal projects assume priority and are handled competently. There's no particular reason that your father cannot continue to manage the corporation for me; and, likewise, it costs me nothing to leave your debts uncollected and your properties in your hands." Evelyn Livingston-Baylies audibly ground her teeth; Ogden wondered what her dentist would say to her about the habit.

"And what do I have to do to keep my family off the streets?" she asked.

"I find myself in need of a competent personal assistant," he told her.

"Someone to organize my schedule and help me to keep a handle on my day-to-day commitments. Someone who would work with me very closely. On a long enough timeline, I will need someone with sufficient quality genetic modifications to provide me with an heir or two."

"I won't be your whore," Evelyn declared. Ogden laughed.

"My dear," he said.

"Whores are for the working classes. In polite society, we call them wives." He saw the precise moment when the light in her eyes broke. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. 𝝮 You aren't concerned that she will betray you? Egeria asked, while Ogden rode the high-speed elevator down into the depths of Shamballa. Two members of his personal security detail stood behind him, at attention, in their black and gold uniforms.

They did not interrupt his thoughts; no one made it to such a trusted and privileged position without understanding that their purpose was to be seen and not heard. No. I hold what she values most in my grasp, Ogden responded. She cares too much about her family to betray me if it means ruining them. Assigning her an Autenrieth-Fujita security team makes her, for all practical purposes, my prisoner. And once she gives me a child, that will bind her to me even more closely.

She's not the sort of woman who would ever abandon her own sons and daughters. It is fortunate that your own family is not such a weakness, Egeria said. In the event someone threatened to dispose of your father, it would simplify things immensely if we allowed them to proceed unopposed. Not unopposed. Ogden couldn't help but allow a slight smile to curve his lips. We would have to put up some token show of resistance, to keep up appearances.

And I would need to spend a few weeks playing the part of the grieving son. If the security detail had any reaction to the fact that their charge was clearly carrying out a private conversation in his own head, they gave nothing away outwardly. Ogden watched as the indicator lights showed the elevator passing beneath the maintenance levels, where the six powerful fusion reactors that provided Shamballa with power, and which fueled the grav-field generators, were carefully tended by technicians.

Somewhere far above, the guests who threw their wealth away in pursuit of an evening's pleasure were ignorant of what the inner recesses of the asteroid held. Still lower, the elevator dropped into the most secure sections of the massive rock, where only Ogden and his father—and those they trusted most—had clearance to enter. Finally, the doors hissed open on subbasement seventeen. Ogden stepped out into the corridor as soon as the way was clear, and his guards followed close on his heels.

He would never, after all, be fool enough to meet with this particular contact in any position which left him personally vulnerable. His shoes echoed off the metal floor, which had been textured with 'v' shapes to prevent the careless visitor from slipping, and the rough, unworked stone walls which had been cut out of the asteroid's interior did nothing to absorb the sound.

He had to make two turns and pass three airlocks before he reached the private docking bay where the Black Queen's Revenge, which had once been the SS Astraeus, lay in her berth. At just over a hundred and eighty meters in length and fifteen thousand tons, the destroyer was an impressive sight—though Ogden knew that it would only have been the smallest hull in a proper carrier group. Missile tubes, naval-grade railguns, and heavy lasers bristled along the hull.

To his disappointment, some of them were clearly non-functional. The destroyer's armor was thoroughly scarred from battle. In some places, railgun fire had shattered the ablative armor plating, while in others it had been melted by laser fire. Techs scrambled across the hull, cutting off sections of damaged armor, swinging replacements over on cranes or gantries, and in short swarming like a hive of ants whose nest has been kicked.

They'd been at it for weeks already, Ogden knew, but it was the first time that he'd come down to see their progress for himself. The thoroughly disreputable crew of the Black Queen's Revenge, scarred, unshaven, and dressed in a garish assortment of distressed clothing and equipment, stuck out to even the untrained eye. What passed for the pirate ship's engineers were making themselves a nuisance during the repair process, while the rest of the crew occupied themselves drinking, smoking, and gambling.

One, a man that Ogden recognized as Anne Royce's first mate, stepped forward. The pirate was a mountain of muscle, with shoulders wide enough to need their own docking bay. His scalp and jaw bristled with blonde fuzz, and he openly carried an antique pistol on his belt. Ogden couldn't quite recall what his name was—Thorvald, was it? Bjorn? Something that spoke of old Terran Vikings, at any rate.

Ogden had wondered, more than once, whether the brute had been born with it, or whether it was affectation, but he'd never cared enough to ask. The very question would demean him, lower him to the same level as these people.

"I will speak with Captain Royce," Ogden said.

"She's hip deep in the guts of her mech," Torsten said. That was his name, helpfully provided by Egeria who, of course, never forgot anything.

"Well, get her out," Ogden commanded.

"It's not worth salvaging anyway, and I already have what I need out of it." Torsten hesitated for a moment, and his eyes flicked to the guards standing at Ogden's back. But however much the big man might disapprove, he'd been at Anne Royce's side often enough to know that, without Ogden's backing—Autenrieth-Fujita backing—they would not ever have a ship like that destroyer, let alone a place to put in for repairs when they came out on the losing end of a fight.

The pirate nodded his head once, then turned and strode off through the hangar toward the stern of the ship. It had been a work of some engineering skill to retrofit the destroyer with the capability to not only carry a mech but also launch and recover it. The original design had provided for two shuttles, and those bays had been completely stripped to the bones.

Once the wall between them was knocked out, the expanded space was large enough to cradle the old FS-2 Black Harrier that Royce had scrounged up somewhere or other. The imperial mech was a generation behind the current Kestrels, and Ogden wasn't at all surprised that the self-identified pirate queen had come out on the losing end against an ace like Beecher Red Crest. If anything, he was shocked that she'd survived.

Anne Royce—or Annie, as she preferred—dropped down from the belly of the Black Queen's Revenge and made her way over to Ogden, wiping grease from her hands with an old rag along the way. She was an attractive woman, if currently filthy, with luxurious black hair that formed a sort of mane when it wasn't pulled back, and a lithe, dangerous body. If Ogden hadn't needed her for entirely different purposes, he might have been tempted to get her out of that jumpsuit and see what it took to make her scream.

But she was more valuable in her current role than as an evening's entertainment. Of course, he mused, if Project Erinyes was successful, the time of her use to his plans would rapidly come to an end, and that would open up new possibilities.

"What brings you down to our world, Chief Operating Officer Autenrieth-Fujita?" Royce asked, cocking one hip out to the side and resting her hand on it.

"I thought you'd stay up above with the beautiful people until it was time for us to head out again. Happy with what I brought you? It was a pain in my ass to keep the crew out of all that spike."

"Your ill-gotten gains were more than satisfactory, and I trust you and your crew have been paid out appropriately," Ogden said. He knew they had, of course, and Egeria flashed the precise numbers—along with the cargo manifest—for his reference. But in truth, he didn't care what Royce and her miscreants stole. The fact that they were out there, raiding imperial cargo ships, was far more useful to him than any actual plunder.

"Come along," he said.

"Stop wasting your time with that old thing. I have something much better to show you."

"The Black Queen's days aren't numbered yet," Royce protested, though she hurried along to keep up with Ogden when he turned and led her out of the bay.

"She's gonna come back from this better than ever, you'll see. Just needs a new leg, upgraded armament –""The cost to repair your mech isn't worth the benefit," Ogden declared.

"Not for a last-gen model that's already obsolete. It doesn't matter how many salvaged toys you bolt onto the hull, it's clear that your machine isn't enough to keep up with one of the Imperium's ace mechs. Which is why I am giving you a gift." They reached the airlock of the next bay over, and Ogden leaned down so that the biometric sensor on the door could scan his eye. Once his identity had been confirmed, the light over the door changed from red to green, and the airlock hissed open.

He stepped forward without hesitation, into darkness.

"What's all this?" Royce asked, but the motion sensors had already noted their presence and turned the floodlights on. For once, the pirate was struck dumb: all she could do was step hesitantly forward, to the rail at the very edge of the catwalk. At Ogden's command, it had been painted matte black, just like Royce's previous mech, from the thrust vectoring nozzles at the back to the missile racks. The only exception was the crowned skull and crossbones in white, on the left breast of the chassis.

"This," Ogden said, "is the YF-4 Megaera prototype. It is the most advanced mech ever produced by Autenrieth-Fujita's R&D department. It has been designed, from the ground up, around your piloting style, based on the combat recordings of every previous sortie you've made in that old rust-bucket in the other hangar. And it is, Annie Royce, from this moment forward, yours. Enjoy." Annie Royce, the Pirate Queen of Nepenthe, leaned out over the rail and smiled wide.

It was a smile, Ogden knew, that the people of the Imperium Stellarum were going to learn to fear.