Chapter 32

　　"Have you seen the Baron?" Sylla asked a group of her aides as she stepped outside her office. It was evening, the sun had long since gone down, and it was usually the time that Kal stopped by to discuss tomorrow`s agenda and wish her a good night.

　　The Baron was routinely punctual to his strictly scheduled days. For him to be absent would mean something important had delayed him. For that to happen and for the Governor to be unaware was concerning.

　　Her aides shook their heads, replying with a round of no` and we haven`t seen him since this morning.` Nodding to the group, she walked briskly down the corridors to Kal`s room. The door was open, and it was evident at a glance that the Baron hadn`t been there since the morning.

　　"Where could he be." Sylla muttered, growing anxious. Leaving Kal`s room, she walked down several flights of stairs before coming to Tamara`s office on the first floor of the administration complex.

　　Ever since taking over as head of Kal`s House Guard, the older woman had passed leadership of the Marauders to others while focusing entirely on rebuilding their forces. At most hours, Tamara could be found in her office or the training grounds at the estate`s rear.

　　"Have you seen Kal recently?" Sylla asked, not evening greeting Tamara as she walked in through the open door.

　　Wearing her Guard uniform, she evaluated a series of reports on her datapad when the Governor entered. Looking up, she was instantly on alert, feeling the tension from Sylla.

　　"Not since this morning`s training. Why?" Tamara responded, closing the Datapad and focusing entirely on the Governor`s face. Her instincts were honed to react to trouble, and Sylla reeked of it.

　　"He didn`t show up for our meeting. He`s never late." Sylla replied. That was incredibly abnormal if something had come up, and neither of them had heard anything. Like the Governor, Tamara understood the Baron`s punctual nature.

　　"Check the VR Terminal storeroom. I`ll alert the Guards to notify us if they spot him on the estate." Tamara said, already on her way out of the room rapidly as she spoke into the secure communication device connected to her Datapad.

　　Sylla rushed to follow, splitting from Tamara and taking another stairwell into the basement where the VR Terminal`s storage room was located.

　　The room was empty, the lid of the VR Pod wide open. Entering, she confirmed the absence of the Baron in the device.

　　As she turned to leave, she spotted something on the wall. There were a series of indents in the concrete, notches and grooves from something striking it with force. Streaks of dried blood ran down several of the indentations.

　　Gasping, Sylla pulled out her communication device, keying in Tamara`s personal datapad contact information.

　　"I`m in the storage room. Something is wrong." Sylla said, explaining what she found to Tamara. Dried blood and the blows to the wall spoke of violence. Combined with Kal`s sudden disappearance, she feared the worse.

　　Shortly, a warning went out to the entire Household. Any sighting of the Baron was to be communicated to Tamara immediately. Every Datapad and optical implant in the estate connected to their network notified the residents that Kal was unaccounted for.

　　Sylla raced up the stairs to her office, intent on organizing her aides for a search, when her datapad sent out the ring of an incoming call.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it`s taken without the author`s consent. Report it.

　　"He`s on the roof of the southern wing. Sensors immediately picked him up when I had Gareth Pilot the Seraph for an overhead search. I`m heading there now." Tamara stated, the call ending before Sylla could respond.

　　Why is he on the roof?` Sylla thought, imagining different scenarios as she ran. Kal taken hostage at gunpoint while his kidnapper waited for transport and a list of demands. Or him waiting to leap from the building to his death. She couldn`t help picturing the worst.

　　Filled with worry, she ran as quickly as she could, climbing the stairwell of the south wing of the administration building and bursting through the door that led to the roof. Tamara had beat her to him, already bent over Kal while applying a bandage to his hand.

　　Kal was lying on the concrete roof, his back up against a ventilation duct. The Baron looked tired and pale, as if recovering from an illness. His hand was bloody, and Sylla gasped as Tamara wrapped a thick white gauze around it from a medical kit she had brought.

　　"Kal! What happened?" Sylla asked, rushing forward and kneeling on the other side of him. She ran her eyes over his body, looking for additional injuries. Kal looked at her wearily, his hand twitching as Tamara tied the bandage.

　　"Nothing. I had an accident, but I`m fine." Kal replied, his voice a whisper as he brushed off her concern.

　　"You`re not fine,` Kal. I saw your accident` in the storage room. It looked like you punched a concrete wall repeatedly." Sylla stated with a firm voice. Now that she knew he was still alive and safe, her concern turned to frustration and anger that he wouldn`t talk to her.

　　"Why are you on the roof, Kal?" Tamara said quietly from beside him. She had known him longer than Sylla and could recognize when he was upset. The little boy in her memories would turn quiet and closed off, hiding his pain from the world.

　　Kal sighed, knowing that he would be forced to talk about what happened, and that his friends wouldn`t let him get away without an explanation.

　　"I used to climb to the roof and look at the stars after I was confined to my quarters. It`s peaceful, and few places offered that solitude when my parents were still alive." Kal explained. The night air was filled with the sounds of insects, crickets and cicadas. Birds called to each other in the darkness, a song they could only understand.

　　"What happened in the storeroom?" Tamara repeated Sylla`s question, her tone conveying that she would not leave him alone until he answered their questions. Kal exhaled once more, resigning himself to explain what transpired.

　　"I purchased an Exosuit. The feeling of wearing it brought me back to somewhere unpleasant." Kal whispered, not meeting their eyes. To Sylla, she was suddenly struck by how young he was, something that could often slip her mind.

　　He was technically older than her and had been born more than five centuries before, but he was biologically only twenty, barely old enough to be considered an adult. He should be out in the world, learning and seeking adventure, rather than having the burden of ruling Caledon on his shoulders.

　　"Did it remind you of stasis?" Tamara asked, understanding the restrictive and uncomfortable feeling of first donning an Exosuit. She could imagine that Stasis would be similar. Kal`s nod confirmed her guess.

　　"There are moments when I`m unsure which is the greater punishment, the time spent in my thoughts in stasis, endlessly reliving my past or the years that elapsed while I was imprisoned. If you had asked me while I was there, I would have told you that there was no torture more terrible than I had suffered.

　　"But now&.I had so little in my life before my imprisonment. My parents and grandparents were gone, and I had no friends. I thought that time couldn`t take anything from me because I had nothing to give it. But I was wrong. Even when I`m free, the torture of my sentence haunts me.

　　"When I was in that Exosuit, for a brief moment, I had the irrational fear that I would be sealed in it, that I had returned to the cruel custody of time and would never be released. I`ve only begun to rebuild my life, and I was terrified that it would be taken away from me again." Kal whispered.

　　"You don`t have to be afraid, Kal. We won`t let that happen to you again. You`re safe here." Sylla reassured him. Despite her assurances, he couldn`t shake that terror deep within him.

　　"You need to return to the pod and wear the Exosuit," Tamara said. Sylla looked at her in shock at her callous response. The older woman didn`t spare the Governor a look as Kal met her gaze.

　　"The longer you let this fear grip you, the worse its hold will grow. Do not let others have power over you, Kal." Tamara advised. He stared at her blankly momentarily, processing her words before nodding.

　　"I will," Kal promised before looking back towards the night sky. "In the morning. I want to sit here for a while."

　　The trio sat on the roof until Luna was well into the sky, enjoying the peaceful atmosphere and the warm summer night sounds.