“Do you ever feel there is too much happening at once, Ono? I mean, call me crazy, but we have at least four unrelated and completely different conspiracies in just a couple of day. First: we disappear into uncharted stars.” Rieven raised a finger for each point as he counted them off, “Second: members of our own navy open dead zones, willingly, on their own ships. Third: Dream-octopuses try to scuttle our navy. Dream-octopuses! What even are those? Yet they exist and they are determined to ruin our lives.” Then he raised a fourth finger on his hand, “Now we have some of Big Red’s sons, and some of the sons and daughters of the imperial ruler on my ship. My ship, Ono. What is this? I thought time was supposed to keep things from happening all at once!”

  Rieven could feel himself beginning to lose his temper, he could feel anger creeping in on him from all sides, reasonable and unreasonable. Finding baby dragons shouldn’t have gotten him so worked up, but it was one thing after another and as satisfying as it was to have executed every traitor to the emperor, it wasn’t cathartic enough. Blood thrummed through his veins demanding action. The axiom within his system was crying out for justice against the thing in the shadows that had it out for him and his new navy.

  I don’t even know if that’s true, he railed inside his own mind. They might be connected or they might not be. I don’t even know. All I know is that this is one thing too much right now. Too many conspiracies, too many traitors, too many hidden players moving us like chess pieces.

  “Sir, to my mind this is the result of several conspiracies crossing lines. It’s inevitable when things are operating at such a high level as we see here. Two empires. Two races. Two ways of doing things. They find each other and fallout is inevitable. Backhall deals from our empire meeting power plays from the draconic one. Tug on one string and the other moves closer because of you, Rieven. You are the fulcrum here. You would have had to deal with only our empire’s scum, but now you were pulled here and you have to deal with theirs too.”

  The walls in his mind slammed down and his spine firmed. “Very well,” he said, talking to the unsub causing him problems, “very well you pieces of trash. I have had enough. I have had enough of this! I will burn your world, reave it of every good thing, and leave your corpse-ash flying through the void in a waste puck. You are over. Your schemes are coming to an end. Your possessions are mine. Your chattels, mine. Your power, mine. Your ideas, dross. This I swear by the stars in all their symphonic glory, in the presence of three witnesses of the Operatic Empire.”

  He was breathing heavily and looking at no one, just the space in front of him. After a few moments his breathing slowed and his heartbeat calmed and he looked to Ono, “Got a little bit worked up there, Ono. I wasn’t planning on swearing an imperial oath against my enemies today, but I wasn’t planning on doing anything after Medusean Gambit other than training and sleeping and look how that worked out.”

  Ono smirked. “In other news, I have a new name for you, sir.”

  Rieven just looked at him blankly, emotionally exhausted after his outburst and entirely uninterested in feeding this particular line of thought. “Kaname, sir. Kaname. Means pivot, or focal point. You’re both, sir, you’re both. You’re the verb and the noun. You’re the pivot between these two empires. You’re also the only one positioned such to become the pivot these empires change direction around. In that sense you are the focal point. Hmm. I’ll have to pitch it to my boys and girls, see what they come back with.”

  Rieven just looked at him. “I happen to like my name, Ono. It was given to me by,”

  “Yes, it was given to you by your mother as she died. Her last act. No Rieven, I’m not digging up your old pain, nor am I replacing your name. I’m calling a spade a spade and I’m giving you a family name. What do you think of that?”

  Rieven’s mind whirled. A family name. Such a thing could, in theory, be earned in the service but had only been granted four times previously. He knew each story. They were men and women of such renown it was illegal to possess a name too similar to theirs. Ono was correct. He had the authority as his master in the Omageth and as the master sergeant. He could do it.

  He looked up and met Ono’s eyes. “Yes, Ono, I would bear such a name with privilege, but not in the imperial way, I will take it after the manner of my homeland, the last bit of meaning left to me from the ashes of that world. I will be Kaname Rieven. Family name first, given name second. Thus in the annals of the empire I shall remain commandant Rieven; you know the number counters won’t honour another’s culture, if they’re even aware of it. This way I get the best of both worlds. Thank you, sincerely.” Then he bowed.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  Ono smiled gently and put his hand on Rieven’s head. “Very well, sir.” His tone changed to Imperial Court Standard, “With the authority of the master sergeant of the Operatic Empire as well as the authority as your master in the Way of the Omagethic Paths, I name you Kaname Rieven; and issue this additional name and brand it as your familial name. In honour of your homeworld’s ashes I pronounce that your familial name shall proceed your given name in the records and annals of the Operatic Empire, and should it prove necessary, shall be made secondary to your given name at any function or rank as you wish.”

  He removed his hand as he finished speaking, and Rieven rose to his full height a new man. He grinned at Ono and looked passed him and saw Steeltoe and Grief tapping on their datapads furiously. News of his name wouldn’t be unknown for long. He looked back to Ono. “We need a meeting. This one is passed due and requires you, me, Jefferies, Jergson, Hardy, Gahst, and Jackson. I’m going to crush these powers arrayed against us and require a plan of action. We’re not set up here yet for such a meeting, soon hopefully. Let’s call it on the Hidden Dagger in the Council Room. We may as well use that one, I’ve always wanted to but never had cause to crack the seals on the door. This’ll be exciting.”

  Ono started contacting folks and arranging things for him. Rieven turned to Grief and Steeltoe. “Boys, you want a break with the baby dragons?” They simply smiled with more happiness than Rieven had seen in years.

  -x-

  “Word got around, somehow Arctus. Not sure who let it spill, but someone did, and now we know commandant Rieven has a family name – personally given by the Sarn’t. You know it, an’ I know it. Commandant Rieven is goin’ places man, an’ we’re ridin’ his coattails all the way there.”

  The marine he was with looked scathingly at him. “Jackdaw, you know how word spread. It was that Dragon Guard. They witnessed it in life and passed that down the line. It’s important. Additional names are rarer than new ones, and it’s not a secret; check with the SI.”

  Jackdaw ran to a nearby terminal and pulled up the commandant’s profile. Sure enough on the screen there was another name: Kaname Rieven. “Wait a minute, I thought he was receiving a family name? Why’s he got another given name? Is Rieven his family name now?”

  “No, you stupid idiot. See that?” Arctus pointed to a small numeral in red after the commandant’s name.

  “What’s that?”

  “Press it.”

  Jackdaw did, and the screen changed, showing a detailed explanation of the commandant’s homeworld, with the section on the order of family names and given names highlighted in bold lettering of a different font.

  “See Jackdaw, our commandant is so important he gets to put his family name first. That’s pretty special no matter how you slice it.”

  “But the system is going to mess it up all the time and call him commandant Rieven. It’ll get it wrong.”

  “Sure, but the Dragon Guard says that’s intentional, a way to game the system and keep his given name as the operating name functioning as this navy’s head. It’ll be in all the histories as commandant Rieven, just like he wants.”

  “But why?”

  “Because he doesn’t want to warn stupid idiots that he’s coming to reave their worlds. Looks like his name has meaning. See that section there in the red?” he pointed at part of the screen where the meaning of the name Kaname was described in detail.

  “But why’s he coming for them, and who are they?”

  Arctus looked at him with a judgemental stare. “Imagine everyone causing him trouble getting what they deserve.” Jackdaw paled. “Now imagine how he feels with people causing those problems while they’re safe and protected. Now imagine what he’s gonna do to them. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out he’s going for them, but the commandant likes his games, see. Things have meaning to his mind, so he sets this little warning for any who’re smart. He’s coming and he’s not happy. Nope. Not happy at all.”

  Jackdaw looked at him with suspicion. “How do you know all this? You’re just making it up!” He pointed an accusing finger in his face.

  Arctus swatted the finger away, “No I’m not making it up. The file says that’s why his homeworld did it that way. He’s probably doing it for the same reason, stands to reason, no?”

  Jackdaw punched him in the shoulder. Hard.

  -x-

  Major Hardy was confused. Why were there two conflicting accounts in this data? He looked again. One screen showed orders being given from Big Red for the working to bring the humans here, and the other screen showed orders from Big Red’s rival doing the ordering. What was going on? He turned to Hemendez, “Time to do some digging, Hemendez, we need answers and if you get ‘em you’ll be swimming in promotions.”

  “Aye sir,” she said with a smile. I’ll have those right out for you.

  Good, he thought, we could use some answers, especially about why we’re even here in the first place. Too much is happening all at once. He turned to another screen where he saw the message from the master sergeant come through. Looks like we’ve got another ‘let’s change everything’ meeting coming up in an hour or two. Good. That’ll give me a deadline to find the answer. We need to know what’s going on to plan for the future. Why would something like this happen in Homeworld?

  He thought on that for a bit. Something like this would happen on Homeworld when one person is feeding another person false information to determine who is the leak and what they will do with the information. Probably. It could also be fourteen other things, but I’ll bet that’s what’s going on. Dragons are supposed to be smart but not subtle. That’s what Jackson says, but I’ll bet that the information wasn’t subtle. I’ll bet he gave it out in the open knowing ears were listening and then he followed the whispers. That’s a predator for you, laying out bait and then following the bait-eater back to its den to devour its children. Definitely something they would do.

  He sighed as he sat back in his chair. This was exhausting. They were working on gaining access to the dragon’s comms but hadn’t yet because they needed to be subtle about it. That should happen by tomorrow evening, he thought. That might give us some clues. That computer we spiked on the Death’s Silence should give us what we need.

  He looked into a corner of the small room where an arc with a copy of that computer rested. Two techs were hooking it up to an autistic terminal. They were going to find out how to compromise those dragon ships without them knowing. Every secret would be theirs before they left this space.