Page 96 of Keran's Dawn

I had not initially understood the reason why Gavin had told my captain not to let the two ships align. But as we began to land, I got a better view of the underbelly of both vessels which revealed the presence of the beam used by Guldans for their Siren attack. Once two ships equipped with that lethal technology aligned and activated their siren beams, any building, ship, or structure caught in the beam’s path would sustain massive ultrasonic damages. Any life form within them would sustain even more traumatic injuries possibly leading to death.

My frigate and our other two chasers began to harass the two enemy ships, forcing them to divert their attack. As soon as our own chaser landed, Gavin did not even wait for the ramp to finish lowering before he jumped out of the vessel. He rushed towards the entrance of the building where the hybrids had taken refuge. Debris from the explosions had piled up in front of the entrance, blocking them in.

To my utter shock, as soon as the hybrids saw us approach, the angry expressions on their faces faded into one of awe. When they all started whispering Magnar Gavin, my blood turned to ice. What the fuck was going on? How had the rumor being spread on our home world reached the hybrids on Haven? Although visibly distraught to have them refer to him this way, Gavin remained focused on the task at hand.

“We must remove this debris and get you out of here quickly before those two ships return,” Gavin said.

He summoned his Berserker power at the same time I did, amplifying the strength of both our men and the hybrids. But seconds after we began to work on removing the debris, Gavin jerked his head to the right.

“Keran,” he whispered with a terrified look.

He dropped the piece of twisted metal he’d been removing and broke into a run. I cursed again, ordering two of my men to follow and for the others to free the hybrids before chasing after the boy. I couldn’t begin to imagine what else we were going to find. But before we had even advanced by a few meters, Keran—aided by two of his guards—turned the corner of the building.

The sense of dread that had been growing inside me since we began this journey reached its apogee when I saw the state the Crown Prince was in, not to mention the blue blood staining his clothes and those of his guards. Why had they battled and killed Sarenians? What the fuck was going on? And what had they done to Keran?

He appeared to be struggling to breathe as red blood trickled from the side of his mouth.

To my complete horror, Gavin emitted a savage growl then pulled out his blaster, setting it to lethal before aiming it at Keran.

“Gavin, no!” I shouted as the boy started running even harder.

Just as horrified, Tagar and Nowik raised their blasters at my grandson, ordering him to stop. When he failed to comply, they both fired at him. Despite their weapons being set to stun, it never should have come to this. What madness had taken over the boy?

Gavin dodged into a roll and activated the energy shield from his bracer as he got back to his feet, carried by his momentum. Without slowing down, he aimed again at the Prince and fired. Tagar and Nowik shoved a half-dazed Keran to the ground, sheltering him with their bodies while raising their weapons to shoot at Gavin again, along with Baldur, Thanor, and his other men who were following him.

However, Gavin didn’t shoot at the three men on the ground. Instead, he continued shooting straight ahead. Only then did we see his shots striking the stealth shield of someone behind where the Prince had previously been standing. The illusion flickered while Gavin—jumping over Keran and his guards—continued to unload his weapon on the invisible assassin. As one, Keran’s men also fired at the stealth shield, which collapsed in seconds, right before Gavin landed in front of the Sarenian thus revealed.

The assassin swiped his blade at Gavin, who easily dodged it before twisting and breaking his arm. Even as he cried out, the Sarenian raised the blaster in his other hand to fire at my grandson, but he never had a chance. In one swift movement, Gavin snapped his neck. As the assassin collapsed, the boy placed his foot on his chest and pulled, tearing his head right off. He tossed it to the side like so much refuse before turning back to Keran.

An almost deafening silence descended over us as we stared in turn at Gavin and at the dead Sarenian with complete disbelief. A few seconds more and Keran would have been dead, assassinated while standing amidst his guards.

But our sense of awe instantly vanished as Tagar and Nowik moved off the Prince while Gavin crouched before him. The wheezing sound of Keran’s breathing turned into a choking gasp, and violent spasms shook his body.

Gavin turned him around. Searing fury surged through me at the sight of a massive larvae worming its way out of Keran’s chest. By its location, it had either perforated his lungs or travelled through his heart. Orin rushed to his side with a panicked look on his face. More blood shot out of Keran’s mouth.

“The larvae are killing him,” Orin said. “We must get him in stasis at once.”

Gavin didn’t wait for him to complete his sentence to pick up Keran. Carrying him in his arms, my grandson ran back to our shuttle. In the distance, one of the two enemy ships was plummeting to the ground, destroyed by my men, while the other was fleeing.

Chapter 29

Dawn

By the time Haven’s peacekeepers finally arrived, the battle was already over. Such a slow response was beyond outrageous. I couldn’t tell if the mind tampering the Sarenians had done to them explained this epic failure, but the planet’s defense leaders would have a lot to answer for.

Thankfully, Jaek, Vintor, Tagar, and Krygor handled them. I had no time for the local law enforcement or dealing with the massive political and diplomatic mess that would follow. My only concern was for Keran. I’d still been trapped inside the building when I saw Gavin run back to their chaser carrying the Prince. I nearly lost my mind before realizing they had found another way out of the building.

Turning around, I pushed my way through the crowd, and used the secret passage at the back of the stage to find the other exit. Under different circumstances, I would have reveled at the sight of Deimos’s broken body in the hangar alongside the corpses of his acolytes. But fear for Keran’s welfare overrode every other thought. I barely registered that Jaek, Vintor, and others had followed me.

Realizing there was an already open way out, they redirected the others to exit through here instead of continuing to remove debris from the entrance. To my relief, when I came running up the ramp of the chaser, the purebloods manning it did not try to stop me or question my demands to know where Keran was. Instead, one of them led me to the Infirmary.

The longest wait of my life began at that moment. Keran had gone into cardiac arrest. Twice they had been forced to revive him, barely succeeding the second time. One larva had pierced through his heart, and another was trying to carve its way out in the same area. Considering the extreme state he was in, Orin—their medical officer—decided to put him in stasis after injecting him with their most advanced medical nanobots. They would continue to work on him even through stasis.

It took more than five hours of the nanobots diligently stitching back the most grievous internal injuries before Orin considered it was safe enough to perform surgery on Keran in order to remove the remaining larvae and patch up what the nanobots couldn’t fix or would take much too long mending.

The entire time, Jaek stood watch with me, berating himself over the state Keran was in. He had implanted the eggs in the safest path possible. But making Baldur zap Keran had set them in a panic, and they had veered off, heading towards vital organs instead. He had only done it to win over Deimos’s trust, never expecting it would backfire like this.

As much as I wanted to console him, I was far too consumed with worry for Keran and with horror at all the dreadful things that had been occurring while I’ve been helplessly sitting through the Sarenian’s forced training. Just like Jaek was berating himself, I couldn’t stop beating myself up as well for not finding a way sooner to help us escape. Had I been smarter, the Prince wouldn’t be fighting for his life.

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