Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

on. It seems like only yesterday that I had armies of fanatics and followers all but falling over themselves to do my every bidding. But where are they, now I need them? I’m down to just a skeleton staff on some planets.” He stopped pacing and fixed Joseph with a glittering eye. “People are taking advantage. Defying my orders and regulations, and thinking they can get away with it, just because I’m a bit preoccupied at the moment. They’ve even started to feel they can walk the streets in safety, and we can’t have that, can we? My peacekeepers should inspire respect, fear, horror, and an urgent need to run as fast as possible in the opposite direction. A cowed population is an obedient population. Right, Joseph?”
    “Oh, of course, Your Majesty. Absolutely. People should know their place.”
    “I’m glad you see it my way, Joseph. Because I want you to take every transmutation engine you have, and put them in orbit around all the most troublesome worlds. And then I’ll let the shifty little bastards know that if they don’t behave, I’ll have every living thing on their planet reduced to protoplasmic goo. That should concentrate their minds wonderfully. Why are you frowning, Joseph? You know I hate it when you frown, especially when I’m being visionary.”
    “Oh, it’s an excellent plan, Your Majesty, it’s just . . . well, we don’t actually have all that many transmutation engines left, after what happened at Mog Mor. You . . . we deployed most of our engines there, to deal with the Mog Mor threat, and nearly all of them were destroyed. And, as I’m sure you recall, it takes a lot of time and money to build transmutation engines. Work is progressing, but . . .”
    “Joseph,” said Finn, calmly and very dangerously, “tell me something I want to hear, or I’ll have your testicles stitched together.”
    “Of course, the people don’t know just how short of engines we are,” said Joseph, thinking quickly on his feet. “Due to your wise decision not to allow any news coverage of what happened at Mog Mor. So, if we just put engines around a few selected worlds, we should be able to bluff the other worlds with the implied threat.”
    Finn sniffed loudly. “I don’t like to bluff. I like to do appalling things to people who upset me. And I can’t afford to have a bluff called, even once. Most of the outer planets are only waiting for one definite sign of weakness on my part, and then the ungrateful little shits will rise up. And where one leads, others will follow . . . Maybe we should destroy a world anyway, just to show we mean business. Yes, I like that. Find me a planet no one will miss much, Joseph, and put an engine in orbit. And one day when I’m feeling really depressed . . . we’ll have a nice fireworks display.”
    He threw himself happily into a chair opposite Joseph, and crossed his legs languorously. “If only all my problems were that simple. Most of my loyal people are currently manning the fleet I had to send out to stop the Deathstalker’s fleet. That man is a pain. I killed his whole family, and he still won’t take a hint. But my fleet will stop his. I’ve packed my ships with the very best military minds, and my most zealous and hard-core fanatics, to be absolutely sure they’ll have no compunctions about firing on their fellow ships. Still no reports, I take it? No, of course not. Too early yet. But I want it to happen soon. I want to hear about a massive victory, and hundreds of ships burning in the night. I want to see Lewis’s head on a spike . . . I need a victory, Joseph. A really impressive demonstration of how powerful my forces are, and how vicious and merciless I can be to my enemies. Something to cow the peasants and make them think twice about doing anything that might attract my attention. They just don’t worship and adore me the way they used to, the ungrateful little turds. I always knew the public were fickle and not to be trusted, even back when I was just a Paragon. The number of times I had to reinvent myself, just to hold their attention . . . So, it seems I am forced to desperate measures.”
    He smiled at Joseph, waiting for him to ask the obvious question. Joseph thought frantically. What the hell else could Finn have in mind, that would be worse than murdering a whole world with a transmutation engine?
    “What . . . precisely, did you have in mind, Your Majesty?”
    “I’m going to make a deal with the ELFs, and use their thralls