Helium3 Box Set

  Chapter 16

  Mervyn jumped one-handed to the strike rings.  The roar of the watching students slowly settled down in to a quiet murmur.

  ‘Maybe the Naga is a friend of yours?’  Mervyn said as they both swung from the rings, he could see De Monsero almost shaking with anger – was it the questions or the thought of being beaten by an Outworlder?  Mervyn hopped the latter.

  ‘That’s traitors talk, Bright.  You need to watch yourself or you might just get hurt.’

  The two opponents started each other out, furiously.

  The ball dropped; Mervyn dropped; he swung for the ball; something heavy crashed on top of him.  A bony knee connected with his stomach as he fell to the ground and he gasped for breath.  De Monsero had abandoned all pretence at fair play and thrown himself at Mervyn, winding him again.  The scoreboard beeped, somehow De Monsero had managed to swot the ball into the blue target as they fell.

  ‘Foul!’ Someone shouted through the fog in Mervyn’s head, it sounded like Loren.

  ‘Hit!’ Hidraba’s voice.

  ‘No!  De Monsero didn’t go for the ball.  He hit it by accident.’  This sounded like Tarun.  Then pandemonium broke out, as the whole class took sides.  From his position on the floor of the pool Mervyn tried to make sense of the cacophony.  Were the majority supporting De Monsero or him?  Would Tasha take sides?

  Tasha had to blow her whistle several times to cut through the noise.  ‘As the judge my decision in final…’  Mervyn’s ragged gulps formed the only sound as everyone waited breathlessly for Tasha’s decision.  ‘Hit!  Three: Two -- Rufus wins!’

  ‘What?' Mervyn croaked as the hullabaloo erupted again.  De Monsero’s supporters danced and cheered, drowning out the objections from Mervyn’s friends.

  ‘Tough luck, traitor,’ De Monsero mouthed through the noise.

  ‘Are you hurt, Mervyn?’ Tasha asked, releasing the pool door.

  ‘Nothing a bit of fair play wouldn’t fix,’ he muttered.

  De Monsero held out a hand to help Mervyn up, but the smirk on his face showed it had nothing to do with any belated feelings of sportsmanship

  Mervyn swiped the hand away and struggled to his feet, ‘Sorry De Monsero,’ he snarled, ‘didn’t see it – instrument failure.’

  ‘Temper, temper,’ De Monsero chided. ‘If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the Academy – you don’t belong here.’  Then he turned his back and stepped out of the pool, to meet his adoring fans, leaving a furious Mervyn to ponder his remarks and plot a rematch.

  Once Mervyn calmed down he realised De Monsero had let slip some useful information in the swot pool.  He discussed the incident with the others in the stardome.

  Loren summed up everyone’s thoughts, ‘Do you really think De Monsero knows the Naga is connected to the raid on Starlight?  Or is he just bluffing?’

  ‘Could be just a guess, as he says,’ Tarun said.

  ‘But what if he did know,’ Mervyn persisted.  ‘Who would have told him?’

  ‘Same person who told him not to interfere with the spybot,’ Tarun said.

  ‘You are right,’ Aurora said, she had tagged along without being invited on the pretext she had an interest in seeing justice done.  Now she hovered on the edge of the mound.  ‘It would have come direct from Lord De Monsero.’

  Mervyn looked doubtful, ‘But why?’

  ‘You know Lord De Monsero has volunteered to get the asteroid mines up and running again, don’t you,’ Aurora said.  ‘From his point of view, the mines are back in Ethrigan hands.  He has done well for himself out of this.  Too well.’

  ‘And by all accounts he’s bringing in his own people,’ Loren said in a rare moment of agreement with Aurora.  ‘He even turned the refugees away from Ethrigian because they aren’t citizens.  They’ve had to settle on Zetalona, the administrative centre of the Republic.  My uncles are furious.’

  Mervyn stared accusingly at Aurora, ‘Your Uncle’s doing?’

  To her credit she looked embarrassed, ‘De Monsero is the hero of the hour.  It is not a good time for the Patriarch to stand up to him – maybe if my Uncle were more popular...’  She shrugged helplessly.

  ‘We need more proof,’ Tarun said.

  Mervyn suspected Tarun was trying to distract them from the sorry state of Ethrigian politics, ‘We’ve got to find my dad.’  The disappearance of his father had played heavily on his mind for the past few days.  ‘He must have seen the attackers close up.  He’d know if it was the Naga’s Marauders.’

  ‘But that will only prove a link with the Naga,’ Tarun complained.  ‘What about De Monsero?’

  ‘Revlon,’ Loren said suddenly.  ‘We have to prove the spybot headed for Revlon.  That way we’ll know De Monsero wasn’t just guessing.  I’ve tracked the spybot as far as I can, but lost it in the dust clouds of NGC6543, we need to track it from there.  Did it head straight for Revlon or turn off in another direction?’

  Tarun shrugged, ‘And how do we do that?’

  ‘Easy,’ Mervyn said.  ‘We ask Professor Pike to organise a field trip to NGC6543 -- to help with our next project.  She’s bound to say yes.’

  ‘If Lord De Monsero is involved you will need to watch our backs,’ Aurora warned.  ‘Everyone is playing for high stakes here, and if De Monsero thinks you know what is going on you could be in real danger.’

  ‘Like you care,’ Loren muttered.

  ‘I have no more love for De Monsero than you do,’ Aurora said.  ‘If he is involved it is despicable and he should be punished – to think he is one of my uncle’s advisors.’  She shuddered.

  ‘Come on,’ Mervyn said, ‘let’s go see Professor Pike.’