Battle Cruiser Read Online Free PDF Page B

them—as did their instincts. They were political animals, and they knew their fates were now tied to their leader. If he failed now that he’d announced his official intentions, they failed as well.
    Throughout this surprising twist of events, I have to admit, I was still paying more than half my attention to the woman who’d mounted the steps. She’d all but brushed by me in the process. She was a captivating creature, but somehow, I felt a certain otherness about her when she was close at hand. She was distracted at the very least. Could she be drugged, or worse…?
    It wasn’t until she reached the top of the dais where my father was standing with hands raised over his head that it dawned at me Lady Astra wasn’t going to stop. Father was too busy accepting the cheers of his party members to notice.
    Almost without thinking, I mounted the steps, taking two strides after the woman in green.
    “Lady Astra,” I called, “there will be time for personal congratulations after—”
    That was as far as I got. The words died in my throat as she reached for my father, who was at last gazing at her in puzzlement.
    Two blades—that’s the only way I could describe them—emerged from her hands. They were gray polymer, from the look of them.
    Those lithe, lovely hands had split apart, peeling away with a wet slap of blood and flesh. It was as if the bones of her hands had fused and transformed into stained gray blades, cutting their way out of the thin meat covering her slight body.
    Shocked, my father took a half-step back, but the thing that Lady Astra had transformed into advanced with wicked speed. It thrust its gory twin weapons at his midsection. Each blade came to a triangular point, and the two moved with unerring aim.
    For my own part, I knew my father was dead. He was to be butchered in front of my eyes. That was a foregone conclusion. Revenge already simmered in my mind.
    Cursing myself for reacting so slowly, my hands flew to my sides. I drew my pistol and my saber.
    Regulations hampered me. My gun came up, but it would not fire. The power pack inside was charged and ready to release a bolt, but the safety system wasn’t so easily activated. One of the many precautions my government had seen fit to install included an elaborate safety system in my sidearm. Ostensibly, this “smart” system was to prevent accidents, or to stop someone from stealing my weapon and discharging it without authorization. When first drawn, the pistol had to recognize the operator and confirm my identity through remote transponders.
    That process should only have taken a fraction of a second—but it wasn’t working. I fumbled with the override, but I realized I didn’t have a second to spare.
    I dropped the pistol and charged up the steps with only my saber. The blade was likewise neutered, as it could not be powered without an elaborate safety procedure—that said the edge was still razor-sharp steel.
    Off to my sides, I saw other security people swarming in. They’d been kept outside, naturally, as the mere sight of them had been deemed inappropriate by the party. None of them could possibly get through the backpedalling crowd and beat me to the assassin, not even Rumbold who stood cursing at his pistol at the bottom of the steps.
    The woman’s twin triangular blades stabbed into my father again. They withdrew and thrust repeatedly like pistons with hammering force. My father went down, howling in pain. But he was still alive, still writhing.
    The woman in the sea-foam gown stalked him. She crouched like an animal and moved with unnatural bird-like jerks and twists.
    Her gray blades stop plunging into Father’s abdomen. Retargeting, they lifted upward, aiming now for his face.
    She never managed to stab out his eyes or cut his throat, if that was her plan, because I managed to ram my saber into her back first. She stiffened, and straightened her spine. She whirled, and almost took my saber out of my hands.
    Two bloody