Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

abandoned me! I should have known better than to trust you.”
    “I thought . . . I believed your growing power made you too dangerous, too disruptive; a threat to the Golden Age we were trying to build for everybody.”
    “Did you know the oversoul would pick up my mind, after my body was destroyed by the uber-espers?”
    “No. But I hoped.”
    Diana frowned, and looked at Silence’s side. “I sort of sense someone with you. Investigator Frost?”
    “Can you see her too?”
    “No. There’s no one there,” said Diana. “Oh, Father, won’t you ever let her go?”
    While they were talking, Alicia sidled into Silence’s mind, just for the fun of it. It wasn’t difficult, for all his two trips through the Madness Maze. Silence had always suppressed his greater powers. Perhaps because he was afraid of becoming like his daughter. Alicia needed a distraction. If she could dominate and possess his weaker mind, she could seize control of all his Maze powers, and use them to kill Diana. She found the image of Investigator Frost in Silence’s mind, and giggled like a girl as she slipped into it, like a maggot wriggling into an apple.
    Frost turned suddenly and looked at Silence with cold eyes. “She’s just an ungrateful bitch, John. She never appreciated all the things you did for her. Kill her.”
    “What?” Silence said loudly, and everyone looked at him.
    “Kill her. It’s necessary; just like before. And afterwards, kill the runaway King and the traitor Emperor. They’re not worthy. You should be in charge. You’re the only one left who is worthy to lead Humanity. Do it. Do what you always wanted to do, John.”
    Silence looked at her. “You’re not Frost. The Investigator would never say that. You’re . . . her. Alicia. I can feel you, creeping about inside my head.”
    “ Do it! ” Alicia shrieked, pushing all her considerable presence into Silence’s mind. He cried out, shrieking piteously in pain and shock and horror, falling to his knees. His arms trembled, his fingers twitching with someone else’s intentions. He could feel Alicia pushing him further and further into the back of his head. The court fell away, as though at the end of a rapidly diminishing tunnel. She slithered through his thoughts like an inexorable impulse, and he knew he wasn’t strong enough to hold her off. But he’d always been his own man. So while his hand was still mostly his own, he pulled his disrupter from its holster, set it clumsily against his heart, and shot himself. One last act of duty, and of honor. Alicia fled laughing from his guttering mind as he slumped towards the floor. With the last of his vision, Silence saw Diana moving towards him to catch him, and knew she wouldn’t get there in time. He hit the floor of the court hard, and never felt it. All the lights went out.
    And he heard Investigator Frost saying Welcome home, Captain , and he smiled a last smile.
    Diana sat on the floor, holding her dead father in her arms, glaring at Alicia. “What did you do to him?”
    “I always break my toys when I play with them,” said Alicia VomAcht Deathstalker.
    Diana put her dead father aside, and rose slowly to her feet, gathering her power around her. And then there was the sound of running footsteps from the corridor leading to the court, and everyone turned to look as the man called Carrion burst in, his black cape flapping around him like a gore-crow’s wings. He ignored everyone but the fallen Silence. He walked forward to stand over the dead body for a long moment, breathing heavily.
    “I could feel it happening,” he said finally. “But I couldn’t get here in time.”
    “You couldn’t have saved him, Sean,” said Diana.
    “I always thought we’d die together. Probably with our hands around each other’s throats. Old friend, old enemy.”
    “Legends always die alone,” said Diana. “It goes with the territory.”
    Carrion turned to look at Alicia. “You. You did this. I am the Ashrai; and we condemn you to death.”
    “Get in line,” said Alicia.
    She lashed out with all her awful power, a blast of sheer annihilating energy designed to wipe everyone else out of existence, as though they’d never been. Diana Vertue met her attack with a scream of pure defiance, all the power of the oversoul channeled through her mighty, grief-driven mind. Her clothes began to smolder from escaping energies. The two women stood facing each other across the court, impossible forces raging between