I
AFTER THE DEPARTURE of Kaiser Reinhard and his retinue from Heinessen, the planet’s security became the responsibility of Admiral Volker Axel Büro. Iserlohn’s fleet was left in the hands of Commodore Marino, who enlisted Rinz, Soul, and Lao, among others, to help him prepare for the dismantling of its military organization.
By July, peace and order were more or less fully restored on Heinessen. This, incidentally, was how it was proved that the underground organizations that had previously plagued the planet had been operated through the late Adrian Rubinsky’s personal efforts.
On July 8, the imperial military police discovered that one of the people who had been injured and hospitalized during Rubinsky’s Inferno was carrying false documents. His questioning would send new ripples across the galaxy.
“Your name?”
“Schumacher. Leopold Schumacher.”
The man replied casually—carelessly, even—but the name he gave shocked the officers questioning him. It was the name of an enemy of the state—the man said to have helped Count Alfred von Lansberg abduct Erwin Josef II, boy emperor of the former dynasty. Schumacher’s hospital ward quickly became the venue of a formal interrogation, but, as he was quite willing to talk, neither violence nor truth serums were employed.
Schumacher’s next claim was that the body discovered earlier in the year had not, in fact, belonged to Erwin Josef II.
“Explain yourself.”
“Erwin Josef II escaped from Count von Lansberg last March. Where he is now and what he is doing is anyone’s guess.”
After the boy’s escape, Schumacher explained, the count had become psychologically unstable, stolen a cadaver of roughly the correct age from a morgue, and treated it as if it were that of Erwin Josef II himself. His account of the boy’s illness and death had been the product of pure delusion, despite being meticulous enough to completely convince the empire’s investigators. In all probability, that story had been the finest work Count von Lansberg ever created. Later, Schumacher’s testimony would form the basis of the imperial government’s official records on the topic, which noted only that Kaiser Erwin Josef II’s final destination remained unknown.
“One other thing,” Schumacher said at the end of his interrogation. “The last remnants of the Church of Terra have not abandoned their designs on the kaiser’s life. From what I heard through Rubinsky, the last active cell infiltrated Phezzan itself. It should have about thirty people in it. Every other part of the organization has been destroyed, so taking them out will end the Church of Terra for good.”
Asked what he intended to do with himself now, Schumacher answered coolly, “Nothing worth speaking of. I plan to keep a farm with my former subordinates in Assini-Boyer Valley on Phezzan. Permission to travel there once you’re finished with me is all that I ask.”
In the end, these hopes were not realized. Schumacher did return to Phezzan after being pardoned and freed two months later, but the farming collective had already been dissolved, and his former subordinates were scattered to the winds. For a time he served as a commodore in the Imperial Navy, having been commissioned on Vice Admiral von Streit’s recommendation for his insight and experience as a man of the former dynasty. But eventually, he disappeared during a battle with some space pirates.
Schumacher’s information was conveyed to Marshal von Oberstein, then en route to Phezzan. The marshal, so incomparably cold that he was also known as the “Sword of Dry Ice,” read the entire communiqué without so much as a cell in his face moving. He then sat in silent contemplation for a long while.