A Burning House

Posted on Tue Mar 12th, 2024 @ 3:50pm by Commander Rylen Lyo

479 words; about a 2 minute read

Mission: Home Sweet Home
Location: Lyo’s Personal Quarters
Timeline: 0800 hours, Morning After Get Together on the Dance Floor

“Bridge to Commander Lyo,”

Distantly, as if it was coming from a planet light years away, Rylen heard the summons. The Kriosian turned on his back and stretched his entire body widely, for the moment not paying attention to the fact that he had fallen asleep fully clothed. The sheets and blanket of the bed were twisted and contorted in every direction imaginable; silently, he wished there was a pleasurable reason for the condition of his bed.

“Commander Lyo, respond please.”

Rylen had to give the on-duty communications officer credit - they were persistent.

“This is Lyo,” responded Rylen somewhat snippily. “You do understand that I am technically on leave, right?”

“Yessir,” said the duty officer. “Your messages are starting to pile up though.”

“Define ‘pile up’.”

“Thirteen messages from the House Lyo estate. Eleven messages from the Kriosian Royal Palace. Seven from Prime Minister Paegys. Six from Councillor Garvis. Four from…”

“Point taken. Forward them to the work station in my quarters please.”

“Yes Commander.”

Given the events that had occurred in the Kriosian capitol city yesterday evening, Rylen has fully expected to be contacted by his family. The messages from the Kriosian Prime Minister and Krios’s Federation Council representative has been a surprise, but not a shock. Examining the message queue further, Lyo also saw a single message from His Exalted Majesty Jarna IV, First Monarch of the Sovereign Dynasty of Krios.

The ruler of his home planet, his King, had sent him a personal message.

The gravity of events seemed to finally take take root in Rylen’s brain. His father and brother, on their way to the Royal Palace, had been killed in an explosion at their estate's transporter station. Because of House Lyo's standing within Kriosian society, a planetwide day of remembrance had been declared by Parliament. It was well known on Krios that the estates of High Nobility were built like fortresses, making them the most heavily fortified civilian institutions in the system.

From these facts alone, Rylen was able to draw only one possible conclusion: House Lyo had been betrayed. Whomever had orchestrated this tragedy, one thing was certain...they were within the walls of the Lyo Estate.

An Estate that now called Rylen Lyo its Lord.

Rylen had never aspired to the Lordship. His brother Selton had been a different story. Groomed from birth by virtue of his being the firstborn son, Selton had always embodied the qualities that one expected from a Lord: intelligence, poise, charm, and a rapier wit. Almost a diametric opposite to his bookish, somewhat awkward brother Rylen. Now Rylen had no choice but to be that person that saved his family by rooting out the traitor within House Lyo and bring them to His Majesty's Justice.

House Lyo was burning, that much was certain. But it was not going to fall. Not on Rylen's watch

 

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