The Last Paragons

Part One

The Last Paragons

Parte Unus

The small Republic shuttle piloted itself and emitted a soft hum as it glided toward the contact point. Moor stared straight ahead as the craft maneuvered gracefully between the maze of mainly empty but brightly lit spires, tall towers, and elevated spheres of the capitol city, Geneseo Plex.

To the west, and through the gaps of the Mid Quadrant capitol buildings, the sky showed just a hint of hazy morning light on the eastern horizon. Another quiet, dead dawn was coming to a Polis that several Annums ago, while still under the full Pure rule, would have been bustling with life and activity, even at this early hour.

Signifying an elevated level of importance, Paragon Colonel Kael Moor had received this particular cessation dictum from an outgoing Supreme Counsel Magistrate. It had come not from a subordinate, but directly from Osland Earle himself. At one hundred and eighteen annums of age, Earle had not quite yet reached his mandatory Council vacating time, but he was being forced out anyway.

It was clear to Moor that Osland Earle would not be relinquishing his position in the Minority chamber gracefully. The old Magistrate was going to do as much damage as possible to the Ameliorates in the time he had left, but that was of no concern, nor any business of Paragon Moor.

Earle was a Pure, just like the younger Kael Moor. Despite their age difference they both knew of what had been done upon the birth of the Enlightenment Period. Earle had lived it, while Moor had been privately told of it and taught the truth by Pure pedagogues. This new way forward had been ushered in by the avant-garde ruling class of Ameliorates, or Amelias as they were more commonly called.

The Amelias had gained power through the art of political deception, discreet treachery, patience, stealth, and indoctrination - not open warfare. The promises they made of unbelievable new technology - that would be made available to all, unlimited wealth opportunities and their prediction of a utopian world that would know peace at last, had swayed the masses.

Like so many before, in the position of unbridled power going back through millennia, the Amelias had quickly discarded their stated noble intentions. Forced and mandated technology dictates on the citizenry were made. Both physical and cerebral enhancements were deemed standard procedure for whoever could be swayed and or coerced.

There were many Pures that were forced to capitulate, while mass cessations occurred during the Great Uprise and the sham convictions for those who had rebelled. Precious few were successful in escaping and had joined a minor exodus of the population who fled to the outer territories.

A minute fraction of Pures, who came from different sectors across the Republic including civilians, government and military were allowed to avoid enhancements to falsely portray a united populace to the common citizens. An oath of allegiance to the Republic and loyalty to the Amelia ruling class was required by any Pures chosen to be spared enhancement. The slightest infraction resulted in the termination of life.  

Moor had been directed to this exact location by an old and clandestine Paragon internal system, whose use had been supposedly outlawed long ago. A brief profile and semblance portrait of the target had been provided.

He was a rogue statesman, by the name of Gren-Warrels Crett, and he was very wealthy as most Ameliorates were. He was also the new Governor elect of the United Americas, Mid Quadrant. That most certainly meant private security with him, most likely in the form of a Full Mech.

As with all ordered Council and Amelia cessations carried out by Paragons, they were never questioned, never investigated and the source of the order was never revealed. Moor and his fellow Paragons while in the field, had full discretion and unlimited assessment judgements on additional collateral targeting or threat removals.  

~~~

The interception location was a courtesan lounge called Venus Karaj. One of an increasing number of similar lounges across Geneseo Plex. These lounges and other pleasure establishments were frequented almost entirely by Amelia patrons, while the employees and workers were exclusively Pures. It was situated in the once fashionable, but now deserted, Grand Pinnacle Building.

The exact location of the Venus Karaj was located on the very top floor and was illuminated by a green glow that alternated between bright and dim. The profile report on Crett also said that he owned the top five floors of the Grand Pinnacle, but all the rest were dark at this hour.

Moor’s shuttle positioned itself smoothly into an open bay and docked securely. After logging in and confirming his arrival, he shut down all systems and exited. He noted one ultra hover, an expensive and rare Lehare HT, as well as three old utilitarian single seat mobyles docked nearby.

Moor entered the enclosed, exterior promenade that circled the top floor. It was a brightly lit tube and the walls reflected rolling ocean waves that were a soothing sea green in color. The gentle sound of an artificial ocean surf contrasted with his heavy boot steps echoing down the walkway. 

In the past, Moor would have had a partner, but a dwindling Paragon Force deemed that they now worked alone. The Great Malady had not spared anyone, except those who had been inexplicably immune. It had swept around the globe for two consecutive generations. The Republic and the world population for that matter, had shrunk dramatically. Civilization and basic societal norms had teetered on the edge of collapsing altogether.

But while whole nations and general order had crumbled, technology had remained and even accelerated. That technology, however, was available only to the current ruling Amelia’s and a few of the select Counsel Pures who had been politically spared. Only through the Counsel, had the Paragons been able to access that advanced technology.

It was Moor’s belief and many others, including Amelias and Pures alike, that Paragons were the only ones holding together what was left. They were not military, not citizenry, and had no connection with standard policing. They had no ideology or political affiliations. They simply enforced general order and protected the Republic, serving whoever ruled or was in a seat of power, carrying out their directives.       

As he walked, Moor patted his equipment and armament doing practiced but quick system checks on his high grade Icanium armor. Satisfied after this little personal ritual, he ended as he always did, by pounding his chest plate with a hard-fisted punch.

Moor had been carrying under his arm, the midnight blue service helmet, with the now meaningless United Americas emblems on each side, but now he slipped it on and dropped the lighter colored blue chrome visor. When he locked it in with his torso armor, all hardware and systems were sequenced. The signature audio tone for Crett’s presence began, beeping soft and steady at this point. 

At the lounge’s outside entrance, Moor noticed it had not changed from an interrogation visit he had made here two years ago. The only thing new was a three-dimensional vision of the head and neck of a beautiful woman.

The image floated in an open space display above the gold entrance doors. Her auburn hair was blowing softly in a faux wind, and she turned slowly to look down at Moor with one eyebrow arched. A small smile curled seductively at the corners of her mouth, and she purred, “Welcome. Pleasing awaits…” She stopped talking and stared at him with a frozen smile, but only for a moment. “You have been validated, enter the Venus Karaj and enjoy.”

As he stared blankly at the apparition of the woman, the stillness was broken by a muffled sound of a yell or scream from inside the establishment. Could be a loud argument, some sort of disturbance, or just substance induced behavior. It really didn’t matter.

At almost the same moment, his scanner alerted and showed him a menace approaching the front door from inside the lounge. It was identified and announced in his ear as a Full Mech. As it lumbered out the door, Moor backstepped, triggered, and then dropped a small Gelid canister.

The condensed Gelid fog enveloped and slowed the Mech. Standing almost three metros high, it raised a huge arm holding an attached Rail weapon. Moor moved quickly to his right in the limited space and threw another Gelid cannister, but the Mech fired a short burst. The powerful current beam was silent initially but then boomed as it traveled past Moor, narrowly missing him and blazed down the corridor. The heat from it alone would have melted anything but Icanium armor.

Moor cursed the new Gelid technology and darted to his left this time while closing the distance between himself and the Mech to engage it directly. He stopped short when he realized the second Gelid cannister had done the job after all. The Mech had halted any movement and the white glow behind the eye slits was dimming as the unit was attacked inwardly by the deadly acidic substance adhered and now eating into it. It was an expensive piece of junk for now, until an ordnance technician would later try to salvage the parts.      

He simply walked past it and entered into a very large and very dark, main room. His external helmet lights popped on. A vintage beverage bar lined the back wall. The only other illumination in the room was provided by tiny, marble sized orbs of soft light. They slowly, rhythmically blinked on and off while floating randomly around the top of the high ceiling. He recognized a soft and seductive Monody that was playing.

Moor stopped after a few steps inside and did another quick visual and thermal scan. Just as the scan stopped, a shrill whoop turned into a scream and then raggedly stopped. Then there was a man’s deep bellow, followed by a guttural laugh.

He moved forward steadily and without hesitation. The personal sensor tone for Crett increased and continued to strengthen as he walked. Another scream, longer this time, this one full of terror and pain. He scanned the bar area and saw that behind that back wall, there was a hallway and pod rooms.

There was also a live and glowing mass outline that was crouched down behind the bar. The form’s profile read fear, immobility, and no danger. He saw additional figures, although less distinguished, that were present in those back pods.

“Arm shoulder lase”, his voice was calm inside the helmet, and he heard it whine while powering up. He also drew his macro bore LS7 from his thigh holster as he continued toward the back deliberately.

There was no rush by Moor. He had no orders to prevent, save or rescue on this night. Cessation was his only mission and goal. Moor had seen Paragons killed by compassion and emotion, so he tamped down those temptations. It was a different world now. Gone was the valor and virtue he had once owned.

Another scream split the air, louder still and hysterical. Then a stumbling figure lunged into view coming from right to left and he had almost fired out of sheer reflex. His helmet lights illuminated a petite female, dressed in a torn midriff white satin top and nothing else. The contrast of all the red blood and white was glaring.

The courtesan either fell or slipped on her own blood, then tried to crawl towards him but she could go no further and raised her eyes up to him. She held that desperate look for a moment but then her head sank to the floor.  

Monroe stepped around the dead body of the courtesan and came to the open end of the bar. He looked down its length to where a wide-eyed man cowered. The man meant nothing to him either way and he headed for the corridor the female had just come from. Reaching the corner, he saw three pod doors down the narrow hallway, two open and the last one shut.

As he passed the open doors, in the first he saw a bloodied and butchered courtesan on the bed. She was registering a flat line of vitals on his scan. In the second pod there was an empty bed that was drenched in blood. The stumbling girl out by the bar had no doubt come from this bed.

From behind the closed door of the third pod came another shrill scream, this one more in surrender and lost hope. The wail stopped abruptly just before Moor entered. The tone for Crett’s presence was now a steady and uninterrupted loud hum.

He opened the unlocked door with a rush and went in low with the LS7 ready. Moor was ten metros away from the foot of a pallet bed. A courtesan was being straddled by a naked man. Crett’s bare back was to Moor and he saw the man was twirling a large knife around but not using it.

The Simms Macro bore LS7 was thought by some to be an outdated handheld ordnance. Maybe it was, and as a Paragon he had a large arsenal to pick from, including his activated shoulder lase, but the power and accuracy of the LS7 had always made it Moor’s weapon of choice.  

There was no light or sound as it instantly burned a surgically perfect hole, roughly the size of a fist, through the upper back of Crett. It was so clean and quick that he temporarily remained upright. Moor saw the back of his head tilt downward to look at the exit wound in his chest, even as he was dying. 

Being an Amelia, there were a series of small power arcs that jumped from Crett’s head and arced across the skin of his upper body. There was also a brief flare around the circle of the hole in his back, but both bodily reactions lasted only seconds. When he flopped forward onto the courtesan with a wet slap, there was a lazy twirl of smoke that rose from him.

After he dropped, Moor had a clear view of the expected circle shape that had been torched through the headboard of the bed and halfway through the metal wall behind that.

He walked to the side of the bed and roughly pulled the man’s body off the courtesan. It thumped to the floor but there was a metallic clang as well, when the wicked sharp Durk blade he had been using fell off the bed too.

Moor had seen these long, ornate, and wavy bladed daggers before. Fancied by wealthy Regent Amelias, the weapon was usually just a purely cosmetic piece, or a formal uniform accessory. Usually. This one also had a distinct custom-made jeweled handle with a family crest. A crest he thought that he might have seen before.

None of that really mattered because his only concern was completing the job he had been given, but Moor’s ancestral police roots clicked in. He had come from a long line of Investigates and Paragons. It was clear that Crett had finally found, in the lone female survivor, what he had been looking for.

The naked courtesan who Crett had been straddling was secured to the bed with well used thin leather straps that assuredly came standard with the room. She had been cut, but only superficially. Her eyes were wide with terror, and her entire body was shaking.

She looked at him as he raised his visor. Moor’s face was emotionless, showing no signs of his intent. She turned her look away and waited, unsure of her fate. Moor had no official duty or responsibility to free her wrists and ankles, but he did so by cutting the straps with the Durk blade. She rolled quickly off the bed and then slid under it.

He walked out of the pod and double checked the other rooms and the expired females. As he expected and now knew, the two dead females were Amelias. Easily proven during an autopsy, but autopsies were never bothered with in cessations. Moor did not need an autopsy anyway.

Due to unexplained hematological changes that no one had ever been able to understand yet, the blood of Amelia’s became an unnaturally brighter shade of red, as physical and cerebral enhancements were completed. After a full transformation the type, thickness, coagulation properties and any other blood characteristics stayed the same. Color didn’t.   

The two dead courtesans had been disposed of by the Amelia because he had wanted a Pure for pleasing him and did not find her until the third pod. Moor did not know the exact political reason for killing Gren-Warrels Crett, or remember where he had seen the familiar crest on the knife, but once again he dismissed those thoughts. The dictum had been successfully completed. His job was done.

In addition to confirming the completion of the ordered cessation, he would also need to summon an extraction of the dead and a sanitization team for cleanup when he got back to his hover. Moor headed for the front entrance but then stopped.

He looked back over his shoulder and instead of exiting he went behind the bar, walking slowly past the displayed rows of multi-shaped, colorful decanters and carafes. The server was still back there, crouched down in the corner. He was slack jawed and frozen in place, with wide eyes that were locked on Moor.

Stopping when he found the orb shaped bottle of Sheller Spike, he removed his helmet and sat it on the bar. Moor slid his look over to the cowering server and removed the decanter’s topper. Not knowing for sure if the man was a Pure but suspecting he was, the Paragon placed a tumbler on the bar and poured.

Reaching down, he handed the tumbler to the reluctant barman. The man just held it, unable or unsure of whether to take a drink. Moor shrugged, clinked the bottle and the tumbler together as if in some sort of toast, then took a long pull out of the bottle.

~The End?