Which was exactly what happened to Ivar.
The Victor’s bots had quickly seeped through his skin and into his bloodstream, then climbed his brain stem until they’d found the nanobot filaments which led to his neurocomp. Since the Xerans had already installed a series of nanotech upgrades to his various systems, the comp had no way to keep them out. And once the bots controlled the neurocomp, they controlled Ivar. Within hours, he found himself nothing more than a puppet.
No. A slave.
Wearing Ivar like a cheap suit, the Victor had ordered his priests to surrender whatever bits of ooze they’d collected. He’d then absorbed it all, regaining his power and memories with every drop he reclaimed.
Using Ivar’s body and brain as templates, the colony could rebuild the Victor with greater solidity than he’d had in decades; he’d been growing more and more unstable since the death of his human host.
But just when the Victor thought he had everything under control, a group of renegade priests refused to surrender the nanobots they’d collected. The rebels coolly informed their incredulous leader that they were tired of licking the boots of some bot with delusions of godhood. And who could blame them?
Well, the Victor, for one.
The god had used Ivar’s stolen body to lead his loyal priests in battle against the rebels. The resulting religious war had claimed thousands of lives and left the Xeran home world in blasted ruins, all in the space of six months. Only the Victor’s iron control over the planet’s media had kept the Galactic Union from finding out what was going on.
In the end, the god colony managed to recover the last of its missing nanobots. It then ordered the execution of the captured rebel priests. Once they were all safely dead, the colony warily left the shelter of Ivar’s hijacked body and reformed into the familiar towering persona of the Victor.
Even so, the nanobots refused to release their grip on Ivar, maintaining tight control of their battleborg slave. Just in case.
Though Ivar hated the Victor’s guts with a spitting hysterical fury, he knew he’d have done the same thing. No matter how the surviving priests sought to demonstrate their extravagant submission—wrapping their genitals in spiked silver wire was one popular gesture—the Victor knew the truth.
The seeds of rebellion still lurked in his priests’ traitorous hearts.
He needed to make some really spectacular gesture that would scare the fuck out of everybody. Something even bigger than the bonfire of burning priests he’d lit in the capital square.
Something like, say, executing Nick Wyatt and exterminating every last one of the alien Sela like the abominations they were. Gods, how the little creatures revolted him. There was something intensely disturbing about their huge, glistening eyes, six furry limbs, and pacifistic ways.
Creepy fucks.
Then he’d kill every Temporal Enforcer who’d ever stymied his plans, beginning with Galar Arvid and his Sela-infected abomination of a wife. Next he’d do Riane and her flea-bitten, unnatural wolf. Of course, by then the little bitch would probably find her execution a relief, what with Wyatt so spectacularly dead.
He’d save Alerio Dyami and his whore, Dona, for the bloody climax, when they’d suffer his most viciously inspired butchery. Something medieval perhaps. Like the executions ancient human kings once used to send a message to their rebellious subjects.
Perhaps drawing and quartering. Ivar had seen a human killed like that during a mission once; he’d been fascinated by the shrieking agony of the victim, not to mention the truly impressive blood splatter.
So he’d start by disemboweling Alerio the same way. Slowly, while Dona watched. He’d do it in the Crystal Arena with the capital’s entire population in the stands and Xer’s trid services broadcasting the whole thing to the rest of the planet.
After he’d personally gutted the Warlord, he’d cable Dyami’s arms and legs to a quartet of combat skimmers, which he’d send jetting in four different directions. The chief would be ripped into four bloody chunks while his whore shrieked and the people cheered.
As for Dona, Ivar would order her raped to death by his priests.
He was God, dammit. He’d kill any motherfucker who thought otherwise. He . . .
No, wait. That was the Victor. He was Ivar Terje. Who was . . .
Nobody. Not anymore.
But somehow, some way, I’m going to change that, Ivar thought in the one hidden nook of his brain he could call his own. I’ll get back in the driver’s seat, and everybody who ever fucked with me will pay in blood. Wyatt, Riane, Frieka, Dona, Dyami . . .
And the Victor.
Especially the Victor.
Dona was still cursing herself the next morning when her comp told her Alerio had called an assembly in the Main Briefing Hall.
He’d probably come up with a battle plan for dealing with Ivar and his threats. Knowing Alerio, he’d been up all night working on it, considering all the tactical angles and running computer simulations to check his conclusions. The chief was the most thorough commander she’d ever had, being both a brilliant investigator and a damn fine tactician.
What’s more, he was genuinely concerned for the people under his command. If you had a problem, odds were good Alerio would show up at your quarters with a bottle of Vardonese ale. Before you knew what hit you, you’d be spilling your guts.
In retrospect, it was surprising the chief had kept his nose out of the situation between her and Ivar as long as he had. Gods knew they’d had some pretty spectacular fights, even before Ivar had tried to kill her.
More than once in the aftermath of those brawls, she’d found Alerio watching her, his gaze steady, questioning. Silently telling her he was there if she needed to talk. Or do something really stupid, like file a complaint.
Yeah, that would have gone over well. Kind of like taking a tachyon beamer on a temporal Jump. By the time Ivar got through expressing his opinion, the resulting crater would have been visible from space.
Seven hells, she’d been a fool. But after what happened with Colonel Kavel, Dona had been determined she’d never have an affair with another commanding officer.
Unfortunately, Alerio Dyami was a hell of a lot more tempting than any commander she’d ever had. Including the colonel.
Especially the colonel.
So instead she’d focused her passions on Ivar Terje . . . and what a clusterfuck that had turned out to be. Her taste in men sucked liked an air lock venting into space.
Dona found Main Briefing packed with Enforcers. Every chair in the cavernous room was occupied, wide rows of them sloping down to Alerio’s massive black podium. The elegant obsidian stand stood center stage on a platform that ran the width of the room.
Above that was an enormous trid screen that displayed the blue and silver Temporal Enforcement shield. The ancient scales of Mother Justice hung superimposed over an hourglass that in turn floated above the Galactic Union’s star field.
A sharp bark drew her attention, ringing over the murmur produced by a thousand chatting time cops. Frieka stood on his hind legs in one of the seats, forepaws braced on its back. The chair next to him was empty; he and Riane had held it for her.