Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 6:43 pm
Part 11 - Seeing Stars
Galen stared at the metal walls of his cell within the former Royal Palace as the sunlight crawling slowly across the surface marking the shift of day into the tenth night of his confinement since the Royal Household had fallen.
He had been unable to discover anything about the whereabouts of Serena since the smoke had finally settled on the battle which had raged within the palace walls. The lack of knowledge did not cause him disquiet, so much as the fact that he had desired to know what had become of his wife.
They were not a love match, but a genetically desirable union, sanctioned by the Genetics Council, and which had been blessed with the creation of a child.
Serena was the mother of his daughter, but his feelings for her were more about familiarity than warmth. Since Tassia’s death, even that familiarity had seemed to become less of habit, as Serena gradually pulled away from him, and he from her until they were little more than strangers who shared the same roof.
The grate of the door being pulled open broke his concentration, and when the guard indicated that he was to proceed him out of the door, he rose stiffly from where he had been sitting cross legged on the floor.
He was taken to one of the integration rooms within the jail complex, and found himself amused at the irony of being on the wrong side of the table this once.
His amusement faded when Khivar’s second in command entered the room and sent a small, sinister smile in his direction.
<center>~~~~</center>
Still overheated from kissing Max, Liz was suppressing her desire to find the nearest air conditioner and cool herself down in its icy draft. With Maria hot on her heals desiring details of her encounter in the back room, she knew she was unlikely to be able to find an opportunity to seek such cooling relief.
Liz recognised the expression on Maria’s face as she pursued her around the counter; concentrated determination, Maria De Luca style. There was no escape.
Liz’s problem was how to choose the right words that could adequately describe the single most amazing kiss of her life, with alien details within earshot of her father and several of the residents of Roswell who were lingering over their meals as the clock crawled around to closing time.
“So?” Maria prodded impatiently.
“Um...like beyond.”
“Wait.” Now she had a look of concentrated alarm. “You guys didn't go...beyond?”
“No no no.” Liz replied with a roll of her eyes and a slight blush, because she knew if the scene of the crime had been somewhere else, like her bedroom, it might have been a different story.
“Gonna say...you were only out for 5 minutes.” Maria paused to think about it. “Mmm, maybe 10 or 15 actually.”
“Listen, Maria, if I...when...when...when I actually do it, it is not gonna be in between a plate of Kielbasa and a deep fryer.”
“Hmm.” The sceptical De Luca scowl was back.
“I saw things, Maria. Did you see things when you and Michael kissed?”
“What exactly did you see?” And the scowl was joined by its friend, Mr Worry lines, as Maria craned closer to Liz to hear her next words.
“Stars.”
“What? Just what have….”
“Okay girls. Time for the grand clean up.” Jeff interrupted, causing both girls to jump guiltily.
“Okay, so what did I interrupt?”
“Nothing, nothing!” They both replied together, but Maria managed a dead pan face, whilst Liz was hard pressed to suppress her giddy giggles.
“So, eh, you take the tables, I’ll take the milkshake machine?” Liz said, thinking on her feet, and bagging the chore that would station her under one of the air conditioning vents.
“Sure thing.” Maria replied, but her pointed stared made it clear that they would be discussing this subject in more detail later.
<center>~~~~</center>
Nicholas contemplated the prone figure of Galen on the floor of the integration room with a bored expression.
“Come on Galen, let’s be practical here. Your King is dead, your rather stalled career within the Royal Guard is now terminated. What more do you have to lose? Talk to me, tell me what I want to know.”
Galen rolled over gingerly, mindful of his cracked ribs, and heaved himself into a half sitting position. He wanted to be able to look one of the most powerful men in power at that moment in time in the eye and tell him to go to hell.
Nicholas moved closer, hopeful of some answers, but was forced to jump back as Galen spat out a mouth full of blood and spittle onto his boots.
“I can’t tell you anything, because I don’t know anything. Do you want me to write that down in the hopes that you get the message?”
He got a kick in the stomach for his trouble.
“You’re part of a dying breed, Galen. Loyalty to the former Royal House is a waste of effort. There’s a new power in control now.”
Galen once again struggle to sit up. “And you think I care who’s in power?” Galen replied laughing at Nicholas’ lack of understanding of his situation.
With Tassia’s death, the colour had gone out of his world. Nothing else mattered. Everything else was about routine and filling the hours that made up a day.
“One figurehead is very much like another. Zan, Khivar. I couldn’t care less. I’m not cut from the same cloth as the others. I never had any interest in doing and dying for an ideal. I wanted a career. I had a career, until you jokers killed the boss.” Galen began chuckling again, but his laughter was plagued with wracking coughs, set off by his damaged chest.
“I think I like Zan, excuse me, liked Zan even less than his people like Khivar, but a better opportunity never came along” Galen smirked humourlessly at Nicholas.
“Ask your questions again. You’ll get the same answer. I don’t know, because I never knew.”
“Tsk, tsk, Galen, how very cynical of you. You know, I think I might just believe you. I’m enjoying our conversation so much that I think we should continue anyway.”
The Radnorian guards who had been standing to attention next to the door walked forward in response to Nicholas’s hand gesture, and began to once again beat Galen where he lay.
Nicholas returned to his seat by the desk, and watched the pounding. It was all in a day’s work for him. The beating stopped immediately with one gesture.
Galen’s head was forced up and turned to face Nicholas by one of the guard’s fists holding his hair.
“Lets talk about your wife again, Galen. Where is the lovely Serena?”
<center>~~~~</center>
Maria’s plans of a scene by scene account of Liz’s epic kiss with Max were called prematurely to a halt by a telephone summons from her mother to return home straight from work. Maria was unwilling to push her mother’s good graces since she was still waiting for her punishment for Michael’s nocturnal visit to her bedroom.
Serena was waiting for Maria when she dutifully returned as requested. She was nervous, but tried to hide her emotions under the promise of an evening in and girlie chatter. Maria didn’t realise that her mother was walking her into a conversation trap bated well with ice cream and small talk.
They were tucking into the dessert round of Serena’s junk food feast and still Serena had not brought the topic of conversation around to the main reason for the evening. She knew that she was procrastinating. Potentially Maria’s response to her yet to be voiced suggestion could solve a lot of issues for Serena. That, of course, depended solely on Maria’s answer.
Calling herself every kind of coward, Serena continued to make small talk hoping her courage would finally returned to her before the evening was over completely.
“So what’s up with Liz?”
Maria grunted behind a spoonful of chocolate chip ice cream and fudge sauce. “She’s just into Max. Way into Max.”
Serena’s interest was piqued by Maria response, and she encouraged Maria to expand on the subject hoping that it might yield some much needed information.
“Oh really. How into Max?” Serena prodded. Eager for any insider knowledge of her charges.
“She’s seeing stars.” Maria replied with an eye roll.
When Serena’s spoon froze half way to her mouth, and she pinned Maria with a questioning stare, Maria regretted her unguarded words.
“No, no, no. Not like that. Come on, this is Liz we’re talking about.”
Serena put her spoon of ice-cream back in the pot, and sat back, waiting for Maria’s brain to catch up with her mouth.
In every respect other than biology she was her mother’s daughter as her back up white lie came to her lips after only a slight delay.
“Look, they’ve kissed, and she’s over the moon in love with him. Big time, but nothing else happened. “
Maria watched this piece of information sink in, and when her mother’s look of concentrated concern did not relax, she rushed to do further damage control.
“Nothing happened. Nothing that would require the phone call to Nancy Parker that you’re contemplating.”
Maria tried giving her mother a winning smile and wheedled further, “Please!”
“You promise me that it has gone no further?”
“Oh, absolutely.”
There was something in the way that Maria’s confident words didn’t match the unsure expression on her face that brought Serena up short. Much more was going on between Liz and the young King than Maria could ever understand.
Serena felt a shiver of apprehension tickle down her back. It was as she had feared. Events were slowly accelerating out of her control. Part of her always knew that this would one day have to happen, but that didn’t make the realisation any easier for her to contemplate.
<center>~~~~</center>
When Galen came to it was to find himself lying in an infirmary bed, not greeting his ancestors in the afterlife or face down on the cold floor of the interrogation room.
His mouth felt bone dry, and with his full return to consciousness came the pain of the injuries that Nicholas’s zealous interrogation had inflicted.
He only noticed the presence of someone at the side of his bed when he was offered a glass of water. The hovering medic was rapidly dismissed by someone sitting at his bed side once the drink had been accepted and the glass half emptied.
“To what do I owe this honour?” His voice was low and forced, owing to the damage inflicted by Nicholas’ hands around his throat, but he was still able to convey his sardonic intentions to his illustrious guest.
“Sarcasm Galen, after a day in the tender hands of my second in command? I admire your spirit.”
“You expect me to bow and pledge my allegiances? Sorry, but I don’t appear to be physically able today. Come back tomorrow.”
Khivar laughed at Galen’s temerity, and Galen was reminded of the charming figure that Khivar had cut within Zan’s court before his true intentions were revealed with a bloody revolt and the slaying of the longest ruling Royal House in Antarian history.
He had been a prodigal returned to the bosom of his family. The son of a diplomat raised in the very heart of the household that he slayed, but Khivar’s genetic heritage rather like his public face had been as fabricated as his loyalty to Zan’s family.
Galen was suddenly tired of it all. Too tired to care what Khivar wanted and too tired to bother to be defiant any more.
“I will tell you what I told Nicholas, I don’t know anything.”
“I’m not interested in what you don’t know. I’m more interested in what I know.
I know that several of Zan’s foremost scientists have gone into hiding. Leaders in there field.
I know that the surviving body guards have also disappeared, and that your wife, the medical assistant of Tanic the Royal Physician has also gone under ground.
Coincidence? I don’t think so.”
“And how do you know they weren’t just killed in the blood bath at the palace. Your troops were hardly discriminating in their choice of targets.”
“Maybe so, but after their fun, I was careful to ensure that the bodies were logged and accounted for.”
“How very thorough of you.”
Galen made a hiss of pain as that he tried to suppress as he passed the now empty glass of water onto a table at the side of his bed.
Khivar smiled at the gesture. “I see that Nicholas has been most thorough in his interview with you.”
“He is most proficient in his art form, Radnorian scum. Death is way of life for your people, isn’t?”
“My mother was Antarian.”
“And the whore to the King of a race of genocidal inbreeds.”
The body guard that had been standing a short distance away stormed forward ready to silence Galen, but fell back immediately when Khivar held up his hand.
“Interesting Galen. I never considered that you might want an easy why out. My understanding of your character was that you were an individual who’s more interested in progression than ideology.
‘‘One figurehead is much like another’, isn’t that what you told Nicholas?”
Galen slumped back down again with a noisy sigh. He was uncomfortable because he didn’t understand what angle Khivar was trying to sell to him, and wished that he would simply get to the point.
“Where was I? Do you want to know who else’s bodies were missing? No? I’ll tell you anyway, the Royal Four. So, adding all that together, you can see why that has got me wondering.”
“With so many central players from Zan’s household missing, why are you focusing on my wife, who is by far the most junior and least significant of them all.”
“Because she is the weakest link in their chain. The least experienced and the most vulnerable, and you are my way into that inner circle through your pretty, grief stricken young wife.”
“Why should I care what I can do for you?”
“I think you should be more interested in what I could do for you.”
Khivar gestured to his body guard to approach, and accepted the metal box that the guard held out to him. He snapped the box open, and held it close enough for Galen to be able to see the contents without being able to reach inside and extract the storage crystal on display.
Galen response was rapid and violently abusive. “You sonofbitch!” He lunged for the box, but Khivar moved easily out of the way of the screaming man.
It took two guards to restrain Galen’s struggles despite his injuries, and Khivar’s rich laughter only infuriated him more.
“Radnorian filth, I’ll kill you myself!” Galen screamed, straining ever muscle in his body to rip Khivar limb from limb and get to that box.
It took a blow to his head and the sharp puncture of a drug gun delivering a strong tranquiliser to still his struggles.
Khivar’s face swam fuzzily into view as he fought to remain conscious. “You rest now. I think we have lots to talk about when you are recuperated.”
The last think that Galen saw before he was swallowed by the darkness of sleep was the satisfied smile that graced Khivar’s angelically handsome features.
Galen stared at the metal walls of his cell within the former Royal Palace as the sunlight crawling slowly across the surface marking the shift of day into the tenth night of his confinement since the Royal Household had fallen.
He had been unable to discover anything about the whereabouts of Serena since the smoke had finally settled on the battle which had raged within the palace walls. The lack of knowledge did not cause him disquiet, so much as the fact that he had desired to know what had become of his wife.
They were not a love match, but a genetically desirable union, sanctioned by the Genetics Council, and which had been blessed with the creation of a child.
Serena was the mother of his daughter, but his feelings for her were more about familiarity than warmth. Since Tassia’s death, even that familiarity had seemed to become less of habit, as Serena gradually pulled away from him, and he from her until they were little more than strangers who shared the same roof.
The grate of the door being pulled open broke his concentration, and when the guard indicated that he was to proceed him out of the door, he rose stiffly from where he had been sitting cross legged on the floor.
He was taken to one of the integration rooms within the jail complex, and found himself amused at the irony of being on the wrong side of the table this once.
His amusement faded when Khivar’s second in command entered the room and sent a small, sinister smile in his direction.
<center>~~~~</center>
Still overheated from kissing Max, Liz was suppressing her desire to find the nearest air conditioner and cool herself down in its icy draft. With Maria hot on her heals desiring details of her encounter in the back room, she knew she was unlikely to be able to find an opportunity to seek such cooling relief.
Liz recognised the expression on Maria’s face as she pursued her around the counter; concentrated determination, Maria De Luca style. There was no escape.
Liz’s problem was how to choose the right words that could adequately describe the single most amazing kiss of her life, with alien details within earshot of her father and several of the residents of Roswell who were lingering over their meals as the clock crawled around to closing time.
“So?” Maria prodded impatiently.
“Um...like beyond.”
“Wait.” Now she had a look of concentrated alarm. “You guys didn't go...beyond?”
“No no no.” Liz replied with a roll of her eyes and a slight blush, because she knew if the scene of the crime had been somewhere else, like her bedroom, it might have been a different story.
“Gonna say...you were only out for 5 minutes.” Maria paused to think about it. “Mmm, maybe 10 or 15 actually.”
“Listen, Maria, if I...when...when...when I actually do it, it is not gonna be in between a plate of Kielbasa and a deep fryer.”
“Hmm.” The sceptical De Luca scowl was back.
“I saw things, Maria. Did you see things when you and Michael kissed?”
“What exactly did you see?” And the scowl was joined by its friend, Mr Worry lines, as Maria craned closer to Liz to hear her next words.
“Stars.”
“What? Just what have….”
“Okay girls. Time for the grand clean up.” Jeff interrupted, causing both girls to jump guiltily.
“Okay, so what did I interrupt?”
“Nothing, nothing!” They both replied together, but Maria managed a dead pan face, whilst Liz was hard pressed to suppress her giddy giggles.
“So, eh, you take the tables, I’ll take the milkshake machine?” Liz said, thinking on her feet, and bagging the chore that would station her under one of the air conditioning vents.
“Sure thing.” Maria replied, but her pointed stared made it clear that they would be discussing this subject in more detail later.
<center>~~~~</center>
Nicholas contemplated the prone figure of Galen on the floor of the integration room with a bored expression.
“Come on Galen, let’s be practical here. Your King is dead, your rather stalled career within the Royal Guard is now terminated. What more do you have to lose? Talk to me, tell me what I want to know.”
Galen rolled over gingerly, mindful of his cracked ribs, and heaved himself into a half sitting position. He wanted to be able to look one of the most powerful men in power at that moment in time in the eye and tell him to go to hell.
Nicholas moved closer, hopeful of some answers, but was forced to jump back as Galen spat out a mouth full of blood and spittle onto his boots.
“I can’t tell you anything, because I don’t know anything. Do you want me to write that down in the hopes that you get the message?”
He got a kick in the stomach for his trouble.
“You’re part of a dying breed, Galen. Loyalty to the former Royal House is a waste of effort. There’s a new power in control now.”
Galen once again struggle to sit up. “And you think I care who’s in power?” Galen replied laughing at Nicholas’ lack of understanding of his situation.
With Tassia’s death, the colour had gone out of his world. Nothing else mattered. Everything else was about routine and filling the hours that made up a day.
“One figurehead is very much like another. Zan, Khivar. I couldn’t care less. I’m not cut from the same cloth as the others. I never had any interest in doing and dying for an ideal. I wanted a career. I had a career, until you jokers killed the boss.” Galen began chuckling again, but his laughter was plagued with wracking coughs, set off by his damaged chest.
“I think I like Zan, excuse me, liked Zan even less than his people like Khivar, but a better opportunity never came along” Galen smirked humourlessly at Nicholas.
“Ask your questions again. You’ll get the same answer. I don’t know, because I never knew.”
“Tsk, tsk, Galen, how very cynical of you. You know, I think I might just believe you. I’m enjoying our conversation so much that I think we should continue anyway.”
The Radnorian guards who had been standing to attention next to the door walked forward in response to Nicholas’s hand gesture, and began to once again beat Galen where he lay.
Nicholas returned to his seat by the desk, and watched the pounding. It was all in a day’s work for him. The beating stopped immediately with one gesture.
Galen’s head was forced up and turned to face Nicholas by one of the guard’s fists holding his hair.
“Lets talk about your wife again, Galen. Where is the lovely Serena?”
<center>~~~~</center>
Maria’s plans of a scene by scene account of Liz’s epic kiss with Max were called prematurely to a halt by a telephone summons from her mother to return home straight from work. Maria was unwilling to push her mother’s good graces since she was still waiting for her punishment for Michael’s nocturnal visit to her bedroom.
Serena was waiting for Maria when she dutifully returned as requested. She was nervous, but tried to hide her emotions under the promise of an evening in and girlie chatter. Maria didn’t realise that her mother was walking her into a conversation trap bated well with ice cream and small talk.
They were tucking into the dessert round of Serena’s junk food feast and still Serena had not brought the topic of conversation around to the main reason for the evening. She knew that she was procrastinating. Potentially Maria’s response to her yet to be voiced suggestion could solve a lot of issues for Serena. That, of course, depended solely on Maria’s answer.
Calling herself every kind of coward, Serena continued to make small talk hoping her courage would finally returned to her before the evening was over completely.
“So what’s up with Liz?”
Maria grunted behind a spoonful of chocolate chip ice cream and fudge sauce. “She’s just into Max. Way into Max.”
Serena’s interest was piqued by Maria response, and she encouraged Maria to expand on the subject hoping that it might yield some much needed information.
“Oh really. How into Max?” Serena prodded. Eager for any insider knowledge of her charges.
“She’s seeing stars.” Maria replied with an eye roll.
When Serena’s spoon froze half way to her mouth, and she pinned Maria with a questioning stare, Maria regretted her unguarded words.
“No, no, no. Not like that. Come on, this is Liz we’re talking about.”
Serena put her spoon of ice-cream back in the pot, and sat back, waiting for Maria’s brain to catch up with her mouth.
In every respect other than biology she was her mother’s daughter as her back up white lie came to her lips after only a slight delay.
“Look, they’ve kissed, and she’s over the moon in love with him. Big time, but nothing else happened. “
Maria watched this piece of information sink in, and when her mother’s look of concentrated concern did not relax, she rushed to do further damage control.
“Nothing happened. Nothing that would require the phone call to Nancy Parker that you’re contemplating.”
Maria tried giving her mother a winning smile and wheedled further, “Please!”
“You promise me that it has gone no further?”
“Oh, absolutely.”
There was something in the way that Maria’s confident words didn’t match the unsure expression on her face that brought Serena up short. Much more was going on between Liz and the young King than Maria could ever understand.
Serena felt a shiver of apprehension tickle down her back. It was as she had feared. Events were slowly accelerating out of her control. Part of her always knew that this would one day have to happen, but that didn’t make the realisation any easier for her to contemplate.
<center>~~~~</center>
When Galen came to it was to find himself lying in an infirmary bed, not greeting his ancestors in the afterlife or face down on the cold floor of the interrogation room.
His mouth felt bone dry, and with his full return to consciousness came the pain of the injuries that Nicholas’s zealous interrogation had inflicted.
He only noticed the presence of someone at the side of his bed when he was offered a glass of water. The hovering medic was rapidly dismissed by someone sitting at his bed side once the drink had been accepted and the glass half emptied.
“To what do I owe this honour?” His voice was low and forced, owing to the damage inflicted by Nicholas’ hands around his throat, but he was still able to convey his sardonic intentions to his illustrious guest.
“Sarcasm Galen, after a day in the tender hands of my second in command? I admire your spirit.”
“You expect me to bow and pledge my allegiances? Sorry, but I don’t appear to be physically able today. Come back tomorrow.”
Khivar laughed at Galen’s temerity, and Galen was reminded of the charming figure that Khivar had cut within Zan’s court before his true intentions were revealed with a bloody revolt and the slaying of the longest ruling Royal House in Antarian history.
He had been a prodigal returned to the bosom of his family. The son of a diplomat raised in the very heart of the household that he slayed, but Khivar’s genetic heritage rather like his public face had been as fabricated as his loyalty to Zan’s family.
Galen was suddenly tired of it all. Too tired to care what Khivar wanted and too tired to bother to be defiant any more.
“I will tell you what I told Nicholas, I don’t know anything.”
“I’m not interested in what you don’t know. I’m more interested in what I know.
I know that several of Zan’s foremost scientists have gone into hiding. Leaders in there field.
I know that the surviving body guards have also disappeared, and that your wife, the medical assistant of Tanic the Royal Physician has also gone under ground.
Coincidence? I don’t think so.”
“And how do you know they weren’t just killed in the blood bath at the palace. Your troops were hardly discriminating in their choice of targets.”
“Maybe so, but after their fun, I was careful to ensure that the bodies were logged and accounted for.”
“How very thorough of you.”
Galen made a hiss of pain as that he tried to suppress as he passed the now empty glass of water onto a table at the side of his bed.
Khivar smiled at the gesture. “I see that Nicholas has been most thorough in his interview with you.”
“He is most proficient in his art form, Radnorian scum. Death is way of life for your people, isn’t?”
“My mother was Antarian.”
“And the whore to the King of a race of genocidal inbreeds.”
The body guard that had been standing a short distance away stormed forward ready to silence Galen, but fell back immediately when Khivar held up his hand.
“Interesting Galen. I never considered that you might want an easy why out. My understanding of your character was that you were an individual who’s more interested in progression than ideology.
‘‘One figurehead is much like another’, isn’t that what you told Nicholas?”
Galen slumped back down again with a noisy sigh. He was uncomfortable because he didn’t understand what angle Khivar was trying to sell to him, and wished that he would simply get to the point.
“Where was I? Do you want to know who else’s bodies were missing? No? I’ll tell you anyway, the Royal Four. So, adding all that together, you can see why that has got me wondering.”
“With so many central players from Zan’s household missing, why are you focusing on my wife, who is by far the most junior and least significant of them all.”
“Because she is the weakest link in their chain. The least experienced and the most vulnerable, and you are my way into that inner circle through your pretty, grief stricken young wife.”
“Why should I care what I can do for you?”
“I think you should be more interested in what I could do for you.”
Khivar gestured to his body guard to approach, and accepted the metal box that the guard held out to him. He snapped the box open, and held it close enough for Galen to be able to see the contents without being able to reach inside and extract the storage crystal on display.
Galen response was rapid and violently abusive. “You sonofbitch!” He lunged for the box, but Khivar moved easily out of the way of the screaming man.
It took two guards to restrain Galen’s struggles despite his injuries, and Khivar’s rich laughter only infuriated him more.
“Radnorian filth, I’ll kill you myself!” Galen screamed, straining ever muscle in his body to rip Khivar limb from limb and get to that box.
It took a blow to his head and the sharp puncture of a drug gun delivering a strong tranquiliser to still his struggles.
Khivar’s face swam fuzzily into view as he fought to remain conscious. “You rest now. I think we have lots to talk about when you are recuperated.”
The last think that Galen saw before he was swallowed by the darkness of sleep was the satisfied smile that graced Khivar’s angelically handsome features.