The Empress' Hand Prologue Part 1

Hi folks. For the foreseeable future, I intent to post my original story updates for Patrons first. Depending on how many of you enjoy my stories and provide feedback, I plan t have a month or so exclusive period when they're exclusive on Patreon before uploading them to a few of the sites where I'm posting my fanfiction stories in order to receive broader feedback. The first part of my original story, The Empress' Hand is available for everyone so you can decide if you like my writing and ideas. I should have a further edited and expanded version ready and posted for Patrons over the next couple of days barring unforeseen developments on my end. I hope you'll enjoy the ride! 

The Empress’ Hand

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Prologue: The laughing man

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Part 1

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Otto Secundus

Attica System

Scylla Rift

Mira winced as her young sister clutched her arm in a death grip. While the little girl lacked the strength to cause her any harm under normal circumstances, there was nothing normal about what was happening that evening. Sores and scrapes covered her arm. The distinct sharp sweet smell of the Sickness carried around her despite hastily thrown bandages she made from an old shirt by tearing it to long strips and liberally soaking them with a lot of uncle Jonas moonshine. Contrary to popular belief, the strong alcohol did little to soothe the burning pain, if anything it made it even less bearable by making Mira’s arm itch horribly, which was simply wrong. The Sickness was a well known bane among the colonies in and around the rift – it wasn’t supposed to be particularly dangerous as long as there was at least a nurse around along with a basic first-aid kit. Barring that, high proof alcohol should have been enough to soothe the pain and make it bearable!  

It wasn’t supposed to itch at all! Mira shook barely keeping herself from scratching her arms, which she knew would only make things worse. “Lydia, sweetie, take my hand, please?” Mira offered her sister a watery smile and gently pried her small fingers away from her bandaged arm. She took Lydia’s trembling arm, squeezed her reassuringly for what little it was worth it and gently pulled her towards home. “We’re going to see granny Ana, she always has sweets for you!” Mira babbled and wasn’t really sure if it was a futile attempt to calm herself or reassure her kid of a sister.  

Their home-town, Liira had a nice old lady as a resident doctor and she had everything needed to cure the Sickness. Why, just a few weeks ago, Mira had to visit the clinic to get rid of the disease after falling and scrapping her knees on the forest path! She knew granny Ana had a lot of experience dealing with the Sickness, she had to do it practically every week! There was always someone who got unlucky enough to get the fungus causing it into a scratch or just a scrape. Mira could only hope that the doctor was still in town and hadn’t turned strange like everyone else! She didn’t really want to go into town, not after what happened in the afternoon, however it wasn’t like they had much of a choice!  

Mira frowned at her sister – every time someone offered Lydia sweets, she immediately perked up with a huge sunny smile on her face. That girl had the largest sweet tooth in the family and that was saying something! Yet, tonight she simply trudged along with a vacant stare. Not that Mira could really blame her kid sister, when all she wanted was to curl somewhere safe and cry…

The harvest season was almost over and with it the most unpleasant work for the rest of the year! Soon, it should have been time to celebrate and relax! That’s why everyone had smiles yesterday, Mira thought. They all knew they were almost done with the harvest! It was certainly more than enough to cheer her up, even Lydia too, though it wasn’t like the kid had anything to do besides not be underfoot during the ongoing harvest! She was going to get all the attention she craved once they were done and began the slow and steady preparation for the winter.  

Besides, dad always found time for the little brat, even when he should have been maintaining some of the older harvesting drones! Instead of sticking around, where Mira could keep an eye on her while supervising the active harvester drones, Lydia had ran to their father making a nuisance of herself. It wasn’t like she found mechanics in any way interesting, Mira fumed. She knew that the pain and ever constant itching were driving her to be mean and spiteful, however she found it kinda hard to care! It hurt, and dad just left them! He suddenly got up looked at them with a very wide and creepy smile on his face and then just went to the skimmer without a word and drove towards the town! If it wasn’t for that, she wouldn’t have caught the Sickness in the first place! Their fields were too far to easily make it on foot and with Lydia crying at being left behind, Mira saw no other choice but to go to their uncle’s summer cabin – it was much closer, on the edge of the fields bordering the forest and even if he wasn’t in, she knew he had a comm unit.  

Well, to be honest, it wasn’t just her father’s fault that she got sick. It was Mira’s own idea to take a shortcut past one of the small automated water treatment plants that provided moisture for the fields. It was build in a tiny tree corpse with the tall local woods providing shade for both the equipment and anyone who came to maintain it. They were just passing through when Mira’s foot caught on a tree branch well hidden in the ankle tall grass, fell and scrapped her arms. She was pretty sure she got the sickness then and there, which was immensely frustrating – the water stations were few of the places that got regularly treated against the damn thing to keep it away from the water if nothing else!   

By the time they got to uncle Jonas’ cabin, Mira’s scrapes were already red and puffy. A few of them even oozed clear liquid with a very distinctive sweet smell – the tell tale sign of the Sickness, which was just one more thing to be wrong today! The last time she got it, it took couple of days for her scrapes to get that bad and then Mum drove her to town to get them fixed! Those scrapes were even much worse than she got today!  

And she was rambling in her head, wasn’t she? Anything not to think about the pain, right? Mira grit her teeth and tugged Lydia’s hand a bit harder than she meant, yet her sister didn’t protest and instead continued to trudge along in silence. Unfortunately, right then and there it was either thinking about what they found at the cabin or about the pain and she wasn’t even sure what was the better option!  

The cabin… well, it wasn’t like the cabin itself was the problem – it was just as she knew it to be – a large-ish metal square with a much smaller one to the side, which was the air-conditioner. It was plain, without any decoration – just a door and one window and that was all. Well, the keypad too and fortunately, Mira did know the combination, which she hastily typed in without bothering to knock. Her arms already burned by then and she needed to get some kind of relief, fast.  

“Uncle Jonas?” She had shouted as she opened the door. Only silence met them – there was no trace of the man inside so Mira sent her sister to the small fridge to get a bite to eat and looked for something to help her. To her immense frustration, the first-aid kit was missing, its empty place on the wall stared at her mockingly! That’s why she found one of their uncle’s older shirts, tore it to strips with the help of a small kitchen knife, then cleaned up and bandaged herself as well as she could after finding his stash of moonshine.  

Naturally with this day being cursed, the comm unit refused to work only emitting very unpleasant hissing noises. As if that wasn’t bad enough, when the girls left loaded with a few supplies for their trek to town, uncle Jonas stumbled out of the forest.  

Even now, hours later, Mira’s brain refused to comprehend what she saw. Uncle Jonas shambled staring straight ahead with unseeing eyes. He had just the same creepy smile as dad did before he left, however that was far from the worst. Mira blinked away tears at the mere thought of how he looked back there. Uncle was a large man, tall and proud. What came out of the forest was anything but – he was hunched, oozing sores covered his arms and chest clearly visible under his shredded shirt. And the blood… all that blood… Lydia’s shriek made Jonas slowly turn his head towards them. His mouth opened and closed a few times, his smile twitched into a small frown and he moaned painfully.  

“Ruuunn...” That was all uncle managed to say before his face twisted back into a rictus grin and his eyes lost focus turning milky white as they watched.  

They ran for as long as their feet could carry them and eventually collapsed in an already harvested field. Ever since then, Lydia has been silent and not all there, offering no resistance as Mira dragged her towards town. At least they were getting close. The sky in the distance beyond the trees was lit up by Liira’s lights. They were taking the shortcut – which was only useful if someone was stuck on foot. It brought them to a small forest in the hills overlooking the town and a familiar trail that people often used when they went hiking – pointedly either long before or after the harvest season had begun or was safely over. They were almost there and soon could call for help and tell mum what dad did!  

Mira was carefully guided her sister down the trail wondering if it would be best to just scream for help, however every time she thought about it, that creepy smile that both uncle Jonas and dad had stopped her. The girls were halfway down when she saw two figures creeping out of town. She froze and clutched Lydia’s hand harder. She squinted hard trying to see better in the twilight. Mira was pretty sure that one of them was Constable Klein – was he stalking some ne'er-do-wells?  

Mira shuddered when she remembered what she saw when they reached the town. Constable Klein and Markus – the young man living down the street were arguing with a small crowd. Mira wouldn’t have cared if she hadn’t noticed her mum in the group from her vantage point in the forest overlooking Liira. Her mum’s favourite orange summer dress was distinct even from that distance and no one in town had one like it!  

A group of people stumbled from a nearby street and walked under one of the lights. When Mira saw their faces, she froze. At least a few of them had those same awful smiles! They looked around and the one in the front, who wore a duster with a pulled down hood, pointed at the creeping people. From the distance it looked like he might have been old man Ruben, however there were a few more people in town favouring those distinctive outfits.  

They ran towards the skull-grudging pair, who bolted, trying to get away. The man in the duster grabbed the taller and lankier figure and they struggled against each other near a lit up window – now Mira recognized him, that was Markus from down the street! He was much larger than the one in the hood and should have been able to shake him of easy. Instead, they continued to struggle for a few more moments before the other people jumped on Markus like a pride of ravenous shadow-cats! They soon brought him down and began kicking and punching him!  

The Constable came back then brandishing a stun baton and his needler. Whoever he shot or struck went down immediately, put under by the tranquillizers in the needles. It looked that it was all over, when more people came surging out of the darkness. One of them was mum – no one else in town had such a bright and pretty yellow summer dress! Tears went down Mira’s eyes when despite the distance she clearly saw the wide smile on mum’s face as she lunged at the Constable. He knocked her down with a deft strike of his baton and tried to help Markus up.

That proved to be a mistake. A lot of people charged at them paying no attention at those they trampled in the process. Within moments, Klein and Markus got swarmed and went under a constant barrage of kicks and punches. The sisters froze in shock and could only stare at the unfolding chaos. Soon it was over and the crowds dispersed leaving behind a lot of unmoving bodies.  

Mira didn’t know how long they stood kneeling on the twilight covered trail before her mind rebooted and she could think again. Her face was wet with tears, her arms itched, burned and hurt more than ever – it was the pain that broke through her stupor, she was sure of it. Lydia on the other hand, she simply stared ahead unresponsive. At least she didn’t protest when Mira carefully coaxed her down the trail and she didn’t know if she should have been glad that her sister wasn’t crying and screaming after what hey just saw or not…

Once they were off the trail and in the town’s outskirts, Mira left Lydia in a dark corner between two buildings and sneaked forward to check on their mother, hoping beyond hope that she was all right. As soon as she got close enough to see clearly it became painfully obvious that none of those left lying on the ground would be getting up ever again. Mum… Mira shook and ran to her sister sobbing silently. They had to get somewhere safe and call for help! She couldn’t let herself fall to pieces, Mira kept telling herself. She found Lydia and hugged the little girl wondering how they could get somewhere safe! The interior of the tow was too well lit up to sneak in by keeping to the shadows and staying out here, Mira shuddered at the massacre behind her. Staying out wasn’t an option. She could already hear approaching feet walking in their direction! Mira wondered if they should make a break for the trail. Perhaps they could wait the madness out in the hills?  

The darkness surrounding them shifted and shimmered. Mira’s eyes widened and before she could think about it, her mouth opened, a shriek already on the way out. She instinctively moved in front of her little sister as well when large metal fingers clamped over her face. The scream died in her throat, frozen by the hand and terror. The shimmering dissolved revealing a tall figure in black armour crouching in front of the girls.

“Hi there!” A gentle female voice whispered. “Will you two do me a favour? No matter what happens, stay put and quiet, all right?” The armoured woman requested.  

Mira blinked at the stranger and examined her. The woman wore an armour that made her gender impossible to figure out at a glance. She had a large weapon in her hands, which she handled as easily as Mira would have held one of her toys.  

 The woman turned around and Mira saw a patch etched in her armoured shoulder – a stylized bird clutching three lighting bolts in its talons. Above it stood the letters MARS.  

 Mira brightened. She had seen that emblem and those words on the holo before, she knew them! They were saved!