Chapter 154
Back at Alexandria, orbiting the planet in his ship. Sigismund was sat in the loading bay as his body was still 10ft tall due to his war gear and Psionic abilities. He had spent the first week of the siege of the world idling in orbit while foul insects and abominable Artificial intelligences scoured the planet below.
After he finally got into the thick of the war however, The conquest of the planet quickly snowballed thanks to his might and the moral boost he injects into his warriors by his mere presence.
As he was sitting in the loading bay, he had Techno mechanics do repairs to his war gear while he had documents handed to his overly large hands to read. As he finished inspecting one document, another was given to him that peaked his interest.
It was a dossier from his spy in Kathrine’s mercenary company. The spy may be loyal to Kathrine in principle, but a little money makes and mercenary’s shake their tails. Sigismund liked Kathrine, which is the exactly why a spy was necessary, to make sure he can continue to like her.
“Now lets see.” He mumbled as he began turning through the pages. “A lot of personal drabble. To be expected from a first timer. Husbands brother died. Yadayadayada, tch,tch tch. Kathrine’s private hire?”
From what Sigismund read without extra information, the Spy clearly admired the man and had only given the most basic of information. ‘Either she’s holding back a little, or there is very little known about him.’
“Hmm, Apollo Lambdason . Apollo? Like my ancestor? Names a bit Archaic, could be an alias, an Arcon? Probably not then.” Sigismund grew intrigued by the mystery man as he continued reading. He frowned distastefully upon finding out the man had unknown origin Xeno armour, but let it go as it would be hypocritical to think while his sword was on his hip.
Learning more about the man, Sigismund continue to grow impressed. “18 and already a powerful Psionic wielder, a unique wielder as well with an animal companion?” Sigismund let his mind race a moment thinking about the animal in question. However as he turned the dossier over, a recording of some sort was taped onto the page.
Sigismund proceeded to transfer the recording to a nearby screen after a techno mechanic cleared it from malware. He sat forward, placing his hands on his knees while cupping his hand in together into a fist and rested his mouth upon them as he watched.
He initially cringed at the man who seemed to be posing for the recording in the middle of the battle against… “Ah so they actually were Deimos…” He spoke aloud. He had seen them in the palace archives back on Ecumenopolis 1 before and was genuinely surprised to hear about them from Kathrine.
To his left, a woman Techno mechanic peered up at the screen and admired the Deimos. With her modulated voice she muttered subconsciously. “Beautiful.” Sigismund did not chastise, but warned his long term assistant.
“Be careful Jocasta, there’s a fine line between what you do to your body and the abominations on the screen.” He said as he gestured towards the human parts still visible on Jocasta while wearing her robe.
“My apologies your grace, I shall simply continue on with my duties.” Jocasta, the smartest being currently on the ship said and scurried off.
Ignoring the sound of metal connecting with metal as Jocasta walked away, Sigismund continued watching the battle until he noticed an intense fight in the background. He said nothing and barely took a breath as he watched the fight between what he assumed to be Apollo and the most definite defective Phobos.
His eyebrows raised when it looked like the man was about to lose to the robot and thats when Sigismund’s eyebrows had gone higher on his forehead than ever before at the ‘animal companions’ appearance. He still remained silent however, and continued watching the battle until Apollo pierced his sword through the Phobos’ head and passed out shortly afterwards.
He had not realised it himself, but watching the fight had kept his emotions in check to the point he shrank back down to his normal size. He only did after he exhaled heavily and stood up.
Knowing Jocasta would now ignore his summons with some sort of excuse, he simply messaged her to place the young man known as Apollo on his list of potentials.
It seemed Jocasta had not gone to do work and instead hid herself nearby as the sound of metal hitting the floor grew closer. “Your grace are you sure? You haven’t added anyone to your list in over a decade! Should we begin full prep or are we doing it the other way?”
“The other way. Lets just see if this planet, which is not being called Alexandria anymore by the way, was a fluke. Or perhaps he will impress me again if I manage to find out. Just place him on the list, but do not prepare anything for now.”
As he watched the techno mechanic run away, this time with a suspicious silence in her steps, he chuckled before resuming his rummaging through the dossier. He grew surprised once more to find out the man managed to hold off the swarms numbers all by himself for a short while, but could not linger on the thoughts of a single man for much longer.
He finished up the rest of the spy’s dossier that did not pertain to the mystery man before taking a break, as he was now to correct size to move through the ship.
He had his Techno mechanics remove his war gear and he began strutting his way through the ship in a simple toga they had ready, all the way to his room where a hot bath and a doctor was waiting to give him a temporary lobotomy so he could finally have a break from his emotions as his self awareness diminishes for a time.
…
Meanwhile on home world, Jewel was multitasking countless wars while also taking a short moment to reflect on the planet she was just eliminated from a few hours ago.
Other than the spectacular kissing with her Beloved in the 5 bodies she took over, there was only one other highlight. As she devoured many of the prey soldiers on the planet, she had come to affirm her belief that the influx of Psionic beings was astronomical in that galaxy.
Roughly 2675 out of the millions of beings she managed to devour had the potential to have a Psionic awakening. This was unheard of to her as its usually 1 in billions in other galaxies.
Although it needed further testing, she deduced that, that galaxy must be truly a special Psionic hot zone and that would make sense as her beloved came from there and he had the most delicious, she meant the most powerful Origin she had ever seen.
She wanted to amass her entire being to rain down on that galaxy, but she had promised her beloved a few hundred years of lighter attacks on any galaxy he visited so he could have time to explore. And considering how sweet and perfect he was, she would fulfil that promise.
Jewel’s pleasant singular concentration was disturbed as simultaneously, several powerful presences began to express their desire to return to visit their mate. Angry at her primes, she sent a Psionic pulse to fry there brains and knock them out for a few minutes, caring little for the casualties and waste of biomass that would cause.
She sometimes wondered if developing her emotional state so she could share a stronger bond with her beloved was a bad idea, as the stronger bio forms such as the primes also develop, causing them to annoy her like a moment ago.
However, as all the times Apollo and she had rushed through the collective link, She knew that she would make that choice again and again.
…
I was sitting in my room with Kathrine leaning up against my shoulder and an emboldened, invisible Onyx laying her head on my leg. Apparently there had been a tv of sorts in my room the entire time and I did not realise as it was pretty much an entire wall.
Kathrine had finally caught up with the, ‘ Immediate do now, do not ignore, super important,’ paperwork and needed a non sexual way to destress. “So that’s actually your friend?” I ask as I point to the woman on the screen as we were watching some reality show.
“Yea, she is a huge slut though, screwed pretty much every noble on Ecumenopolis 1 who does not have a wife, and quite a few that do.” She said as she was munching on a bowl of fruit.
“Didn’t you used to host orgies with hundreds of nobles at a time? Its like pot calling kettle black.” I said as I nudged her slightly. She scoffed in derision at the remark and replied. “Thats completely different. There was no political scheming at play during those parties. Just good, well what I thought was good back then, old fashioned fucking left and right.”
I was about to come back with something witty, but Caleb’s ‘Angelic’ voice spoke throughout the ship once more.
“Crew begin preparations for planet side, we land back at base in 30 minutes.”