June 10th, 4:02 PM
The only place big enough to take the crowds was the Conquest Square. The crowd had started gathering as soon as the announcement was made: the Titanium Tyrant had arranged a public event to take back control of the kingdom.
The grand statues of the Tyrant and the Conquerors were covered in people, despite the ‘DO NOT CLIMB’ signs. Late-arriving reporters pushed and shoved to get into the area marked ‘Press’ near the front, where the raised platform was defended by the Captain Palatine and half of the uniformed knights of the Royal Guard - the rest of the guard being scattered around the buildings surrounding the square, watching the crowd. Victoria had, by judicious use of elbows, made it into the middle - the least safe place, but what assassin would go after her when there were so many higher-priority targets? Her only sleep had been the brief nap at Steelmind’s while the battle raged before his drones had awoken her and informed her that it was over, and the Tyrant was back in control. She’d brought a baseball cap, scarf, and pair of binoculars, which, while it would mark her as someone disguising herself, would at least suggest that there were several people whom she might be.
It had not taken her long to run for safety, her and her team both. If the Tyrant wanted a scapegoat, Nicator was the best option he had. But she couldn’t look away.
The crowd clamoured as the Titanium Tyrant, still in the Durendal, approached the podium, flanked by guards to keep off the press. Behind him were his three children, all wearing their armors. With their helmets visible the only way to tell them apart was the heraldry of the armors, two blue and silver in different shades with different colors of the snake-and-crown, one red and gold and the last gunmetal grey.
Victoria envied them. Victoria had envied them all her life, just as so many others did. She deserved a Durendal, she deserved to be queen, she deserved all else the world had to give. The Nicator armor was lighter and faster and madder, but with so much less durability and power and reliability, if the day ever came when they faced off armor to armor her speed wouldn’t make the difference, but the Durendal’s strength.
There was the Tyrant, close enough for her to shoot if she dared. She could spot others in the crowd; the Counts had had no reserved places, but they and their retinues could shove their way close to the front, or bring their own hoverplatforms to block the views of everyone trying to see from the back.
The Tyrant reached the height of the podium, popped his helmet to show a man who had gotten even less sleep than she had. The guards - and his family - behind him kept theirs on.
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“My subjects,” said the Tyrant, voice smooth though no one in the crowd could miss the simmering, half-bridled anger beneath it. “Twenty-nine years ago, I was sent to prison. Yes,” he said, “you must not forget. I was a jailbird, and the lowest of you has that in common with me, ere I rose to rule. I was chained in an American dungeon, far from my friends, trapped with no weapons or allies to call my own, and yet when I escaped - a process that took two years - I returned to find the Royal Court waiting for me, knights and servants and retainers, all fully armed and supplied with all the resources I might need, their training unslackened and their discipline pure.”
“Now I am a king with servants in the thousands and tens of thousands, and when I retreat to my laboratory for two weeks to mourn my wife -” now the anger returned to his voice “- I return to find chaos. Knights murder each other on the streets of Novapest, rebel terrorists rob and murder my counts unpunished and my own children brawl in the streets! I shall not permit this to continue.”
His eyes scanned the sober crowd. “Yet there have some who have displayed constancy, and they must have their just due.”
He raised a single finger.
“Count Just, come forwards!”
Just was smiling in what he probably thought was a moderated manner. He had been escorted by four knights, but they stood outside the roped-off area as he approached the podium.
“Count Just. Your nature alone has been steadfast in the face of all dangers. You, and you alone, have maintained a single policy in all your actions, throughout your tenancy as my vassal.”
Just bowed soberly. “I don’t deserve your generosity.”
“Since your nature was wholly treacherous and venal, you certainly do not!”
The Captain Palatine crashed next to him, picking him up by the neck with one rocky hand, the other pointing at Just’s knights. Just’s captain Heartfire stepped back, eyes glowing, to ooohs from the crowd.
“You have robbed the people I gave you to rule, stolen from your vassals to pay my enemies, sheltered the enemies of the realm. You are not the worst man I have ever led, but I am here to mend Novapest and you are first among those whom I have no reason to let live!”
Just choked, and the Tyrant continued. “For your criminal support of rebels, your neglect of the duties, your defiance of the law of the realm, I sentence you to death.”
Palatine’s hand twitched, and the crack of Just’s neck could be heard through the realm. He dropped the corpse on the ground.
“Thus always to traitors,” declared the Titanium Tyrant through the cheers. “Now that I have returned, this period of disorder is at an -”
Victoria heard the bullet moving through the air and she saw the Titanium Tyrant stagger and fall, saw the blood pumping from the hole in his forehead, saw the unpainted suit of armor catch him, the armor whose wearer heard whatever his last words were, if any.
Then all was chaos. All she remembered afterwards was herself, somewhere in the push as tens of thousands of men and women struggled to get to the podium or away from the podium, as a thousand cameras clicked, screaming at Countess Zero straight through the phone:
“Now, move now, the Titanium Tyrant is dead and I didn’t do it!”