Deathstalker 05 - Deathstalker Destiny

him out, and he fell endlessly in a moment that seemed to last forever, before he finally emerged into that moment of time sustained within the stasis field.
    He fell to his knees on a thick pile carpet, shaking and shuddering, and for a time all he could do was lie there while his thoughts slowly came together again. At last he sat up, and looked around him. The chamber was about the size of a standard Family mausoleum, with a single bed where the coffin should have been. Various mechanisms he didn't recognize filled the rest of the chamber, none of which he felt like meddling with. Random was touched by an uncommon
    sense of wonder. Here, the man called Dram had slept through the centuries, chasing his father down the many years, all in the name of hate.
    Random knew the basic story. Everyone did. The original Deathstalker, Giles, had a son whose name was now lost in time. He betrayed his father, or was betrayed by him, depending on which version of the story you believed, and vowed a terrible vengeance. Somehow he discovered his father had placed himself in stasis, and arranged the same fate for himself, to wait until his father should reemerge. So he could have another chance at killing him. Only Lionstone found him first. Awakened him, probably not with a kiss, and made him her man. He took the name Dram, and became the Empress's official Widowmaker, just to keep busy till his father reappeared. And when Giles did, son followed father into his Family's greatest triumph and tragedy: the Darkvoid. Dram died there, on the Wolfling World, and everyone assumed Dram's chances for revenge on the Family and Empire he hated died with him. But Random could bring Dram's dark dreams back to life again, if he chose. Who knew what terrible knowledge, what awful weapons, could be retrieved from this old Empire crypt, to be used by Shub against Humanity?
    "Lionstone?" said Random. "Can you hear me? Lionstone!"
    There was no reply, and Random smiled and relaxed just a little. The crypt was in another time, as far as Shub was concerned. Lionstone would have to wait till Random emerged again to question him. Which was what he'd privately hoped. He'd never had any intention of handing anything over to Shub that could be used against Humanity. He might be an outlaw, but he hadn't gone mad. He was here looking for hope in forgotten old Empire tech. A cure for the nanotech plague perhaps, or powerful weapons that could be used against Shub and the Recreated.
    Or even by himself, in his continuing war against corrupt authority.
    He set about searching methodically through the various forms of high tech scattered through Dram's old crypt. Some were clearly responsible for maintaining the stasis field. Others were variations on existing tech, slightly behind or ahead of current thinking. Some he couldn't recognize at all, either in design or function. But there were no obvious weapons, and nothing that even suggested nanotech. So; no cure, after all. No mighty weapons to save the day.
    Random sighed tiredly. He would have liked to have been able to save Humanity one last time. If only to rub their noses in it, to prove they couldn't manage without him. An unworthy thought, perhaps, but what the hell.
    What he did eventually find, in a locked box bearing the Deathstalker Family seal, concealed behind a secret panel in Dram's bed, was a collection of holos, documents, and other papers from a forgotten age. Random broke the lock easily with his bare hands, and sat down on the bed, emptying out the box's contents before him. He pawed slowly through the collection, and gradually assembled a history of sorts of the beginning of Clan Deathstalker. Much of it was handwritten, presumably by Dram. Random snorted. He would never have taken Dram for the sentimental sort. More likely he'd assembled these reminders of his past to refire his hatred. Selected memories of hate and betrayal, to remotivate him during the long wait for his father to reappear. Who else but a desperate and half-insane man would sleep for centuries, to awaken in a strange new world where everyone he knew was dust and less than dust, if not for hatred and revenge?
    Dram was his father's son.
    There were a series of letters, to Dram, from himself, written down on paper because that was still the best way to preserve a secret; a single copy to which
    only you had access. The sheets were creased and crumpled, from much rereading.
    And a holo, to which Random's eyes kept returning;