(Photo by SpaceX)

Silence…

No, not silence, stillness.

Chester stared at H’lay and the Solar King, both of whom stood before him, blank expressions on their faces. Blank faces, and blank minds. There were no thoughts in either of their minds.

“How are you feeling?” Chester asked them.

No response.

“Are you angry with me?” he asked.

No response.

“Can you hear me?”

“I can hear you,” the solar King replied.

“Yes,” H’lay said.

The brief flicker of brain activity ceased almost as quickly as it had begun. It wasn’t fair to say that nothing was going on in their brains. There was plenty of activity, keeping them standing, breathing, all the basic things, but there simply was no higher functioning going on. They weren’t thinking.

“Make a speech about your opinion on the fringe,” Chester commanded the Solar King as his panic beginning to rise.

No response.

“I think the fringe should be allowed their independence,” Chester said. If there was anything that would get the Solar King to respond, it would be that.

Still nothing.

Sweat was beading up on his neck and forehead even though it wasn’t hot in the throne room. This wasn’t the worst case scenario, but it wasn’t far off.

“I wanted to remove their free will so they couldn’t resist at all,” Chester said as the fear cleared away the tiredness from his mind. “But now they can’t make any decisions. They can’t think. They’re just…memory storage that I can make walk around.”

As if to prove his point he had the Solar King and H’lay walk around the room once, clap their hands, and then spout facts they knew about the fringe. As soon as he asked them to come up with something original, though, they fell silent. H’lay could tell him all about her nano and bio tech, but she couldn’t come up with any new ideas.

“Alright, alright…alright I, uh, what do we do now?” Chester asked himself. “The necrology lab still has a couple days before it’ll be open again. H’lay told her lab that she was meeting with the Solar King, and the Solar King told everyone else not to bother him for the rest of today, so…problems begin tomorrow.”

“Attention,” the Solar King, at the instruction of Chester, began to speak, “I, decree the fringe to. Be no longer under my, domain, and it is free. To govern itself.”

That was definitely not how the Solar King would say it. His voice lacked emotion and the cadence of how he phrased things was off.

“I’m taking a vacation,” H’lay said, again with Chester’s guidance.

She sounded fairly natural, at least. It made sense that H’lay would work better than the Solar King. Pumping two very different neural gels into the same subject had never gone well. This new variety was designed to neutralize the old gel and then replace it but there was no way for Chester to know how fully the neural gels had mixed. He also wasn’t sure how long it would take for the remnant of the old gel to get flushed out of the Solar King’s brain or if any of these problems would get better or worse with time.

“Okay,” Chester said to himself as he paced. “H’lay can be sent on vacation. That can buy me a few days there. The Solar King,” he looked over to the man and noticed he was drooling slightly. “How do I fix you?”

Could he be fixed? Neural gel was a silica based substance that filled in around the neurons in the brain, forming a self-assembling structure that interrupted the subjects natural ability to think for themselves, giving the controller a means of directing thought. In the Solar King’s original designs, the process caused irreparable brain damage, resulting in the short-lived, somewhat shambling army that he conquered the solar system with. The newer processes left the brain more or less intact but that didn’t mean it was an easily reversible process. In fact, until Smythe and the Solar King, Chester had never heard of anyone knowing of a way to undo it.

“I don’t think I can reveres this,” Chester said. “If I go too far, give the Solar King too much agency, he’ll kill me.”

Chester laughed. It wasn’t a pleasant laugh at all. There was a panicked desperation to it and hearing it only made him feel worse. He tried to make the Solar King walk around and act natural but it was painfully obvious to Chester that people would notice something was off even without the Solar King speaking. In fact, there was some of that shambling movement that the Solar King’s armies were known for in his gait.

“So no one can see him move or hear him talk,” Chester scoffed, “easy. All I have to do is keep everyone from interacting with him all while the fringe is trying to secede and the core is in an uproar over the saboteur attacks. Yeah, no problem.”

Chester slammed his fist down onto the table. Immediately he felt the shock of pain run up his hand, into his arm, and eventually stop at his shoulder. He hadn’t hit the table hard enough to break any bones, but it was certainly enough to make him stop before he hit the table again.

“Peace,” he said through gritted teeth as his fear was replaced with frustration. “All anyone really wants is peace. So, fine. Give them their peace and see what they do with it.”

Before he could reconsider, he had the Solar King open up communications with the entire solar system.

“I have, considered the situation. With, the fringe,” the Solar King said in his awkward cadence, “They, will not be ruled. By me so they will, rule themselves. From now on. My advisors will negotiate, for trade, for travel, for boundaries.”

It sounded terrible. No one was going to believe this was really the Solar King, and since it was so obviously fake to anyone who knew more than just the basics about necrology, Chester went a step further. Why not?

“As for. The core it, will be given to, my surviving sons they. Will govern in, my place. I am done. I am, tired. I will leave. Tomorrow. I will explore, the solar system. Once more. Good bye.”

When the communication ended, the Solar King was alone in his throne room, his advisors pounding on the locked door. Chester, his three security drones, and H’lay were on a rapid transport on their way to the space port. His clearance was being deleted even as they traveled. Chester had made the Solar King order all records of Chester be deleted. In another few minutes there wouldn’t even be security footage of him. The necrology lab and his necrologists were being gathered up now. That wasn’t by his order, but by the Solar King’s son who was already putting the clues together.

As for the saboteurs, they would meet him at the port. He wasn’t sure whether that was wise or foolish, but he knew he’d need every advantage he could get and those people had contacts in the fringe that might prove valuable. With luck, the Solar princes would keep the nature of their father a secret from the general public for as long as possible. Maybe there would be peace. Maybe there wouldn’t. It was out of his hands now.

While the rapid transport sped along, Chester let himself fall asleep. They wouldn’t arrive for another few hours and there wasn’t really much else that he could do in the time being, so he could at least close his eyes and get some rest.

He would need it.