Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

officers they’d targeted, and soon they were on the run everywhere. They came together for one last push, and actually succeeded in briefly separating Lewis from Jesamine.
    He cut and hacked fiercely about him, desperately trying to reach her, but the Church Militant fanatics packed tightly about him, their faces filled with the frustrated fury of animals who can sense their imminent death. They no longer cared about their cause, or even about winning; all they wanted to do was bring their hated enemy down with them. New strength flooded through Lewis as he saw Jesamine being carried farther away by the press of milling bodies, and he slammed right through the men before him, throwing their broken bodies aside like so many rag dolls.
    Jesamine fought doggedly on, faster and stronger than any of those who leapt and howled around her, but in the end the sheer weight of the crowd backed her up against a steel wall. Jesamine looked for Lewis, but he was too far away. Rage flooded through Jesamine, and she opened her mouth and sang. The terrible song cut through her attackers like a blade. Their eyes burst and blood ran from their ears. Some fell dead from heart attacks, and others went mad in a moment. The steel corridor was full of awful screams, all of them drowned out by the deadly song. Even Lewis flinched away from the killing sound. In the space of a few moments, every mutineer in the corridor was dead, the piled-up bodies scattered the length of the corridor. Jesamine stopped singing, and swayed unsteadily on her feet. Lewis was there in a moment, to hold and support her. She clung to him like a child.
    “What has the Maze done to me, Lewis? To my voice? My songs were never meant to do anything like that.”
    “There will be time again, for songs of love and joy,” said Lewis. “That’s what we’re fighting for.”
    And that was when Brett and Rose appeared around the corner of the corridor to join them. Lewis gave them both a withering glare.
    “Where the hell were you? What kept you?”
    “Stomachache,” Brett said briskly. “There’s something on this ship that doesn’t agree with me at all.”

    Some loyalists went down to the cargo bay of the Havoc , to kill the monsters from Shandrakor in the name of Pure Humanity. The monsters tore them all apart, and then ate them. One of the monsters sent up a comm request to the bridge:
    Send more loyalists.

    And that was pretty much it, for the uprising. There never were as many of them as they’d hoped or believed. Only the really hard-core fanatics had been able to lie to themselves about what they’d seen when Owen Deathstalker had appeared on all the bridges of all the ships at once and called them to his side. He was the hero of prophecy, the legend returned, and most of the crews would rather have died than fail him. The mutineers didn’t take control of a single ship in the rebel fleet. Good men and women had died, and there were bodies and blood to be cleaned up, but the night of the long knives was over.
    The few mutineers who survived the fighting were put out the nearest airlock and told to walk home. There was no time for mercy or clemency, with the Imperial fleet closing in. Lewis and Jesamine, Brett and Rose gathered together on the Havoc ’s bridge, and there on the main viewscreen was the attacking fleet, come out from behind its stealth shields at last. There were starcruisers beyond counting, and more dropping out of hyperspace all the time.
    “That is one hell of a big fleet,” said Brett.
    “And we are dangerously weakened,” said Silence. “All our ships took some damage, and we lost a lot of crew. We’re covering all the main battle stations, for now, but there’s no telling how long that will last once the shooting starts. Hopefully our opposite numbers don’t know that. The Mistworld and Virimonde ships were unaffected, but I don’t know how they’ll stand up to Imperial starcruisers. If you’ve got any Maze-given aces to pull out of your sleeve, Deathstalker, this would be a really good time to reveal them.”
    “Afraid not, Admiral,” said Lewis. “It’s all down to courage and honor now.”
    “We’re all going to die,” said Brett.

    The Imperial fleet fell upon the rebel fleet with silent fury, all guns blazing, and in a moment the situation descended into chaos. Starships of all shapes and sizes flashed back and forth, maneuvering in three dimensions, targeting objects of opportunity as they went. Force