Between Burning Worlds (System Divine #2) - Jessica Brody Page 0,204

he was going to use the Third Estate to do it.

“I don’t understand.” Chatine started to pace. “If all he has to do to take control of the Regime is kill the Patriarche, why doesn’t he just do it himself? Smother him with a pillow in his sleep? Mess with his hunting gun so it blows up in his face? Poison him like he did with the Premier Enfant? I can think of several easier ways to kill someone than going through all this trouble.”

It was a valid question. One that Marcellus didn’t immediately have an answer to. But he was grateful that someone else in the room did.

“Because,” Alouette said, her voice soft and pensive, “the System Alliance will never support his claim to the Regime if it looks like a military coup.”

“She’s right,” Marcellus said, a shiver of comprehension passing through him. “The System Alliance is funded and run by the twelve heads of state of the System Divine. If they get wind of a possible plot to overthrow one of them, there will be resistance and most likely war.”

“But,” Alouette went on, “if he mimics what happened on Usonia and makes it look like a revolution, like this is the people’s doing—”

“—and he’s the hero who steps in to restore order …” Marcellus added.

“Then the Alliance has no choice but to support him and back his claim to the Regime,” Alouette finished with a nod.

“But first he needs to make it look like a people’s revolution,” said Marcellus gravely. “Once the Patriarche is gone, nothing will stand in his way.”

A tense, grim silence fell across the little Med Center. For a moment, no one spoke. No one even dared to breathe as this heavy, noxious cloud descended upon them. Upon their home planet.

Laterre had known clouds.

It had known storms.

But never one like this.

Marcellus now understood it all. The real reason the general had to kill the Premier Enfant, the last remaining Paresse heir, was not to start a riot. That was just a convenient side effect. It was so that he could finally inherit the keys to the Regime. The Regime he believed he deserved all along.

Check mate.

No. It couldn’t be. This could not be the end. There had to be another way.

Marcellus could suddenly hear his grandfather’s voice in his mind. As clear as if they were still sitting in front of that Regiment’s board, a carnage of fallen pieces scattered across the table.

“Sooner or later, Marcellus, you’re going to have to start playing the game like someone who actually wants to win.”

“We have to do something.” Cerise was back on her feet, pacing again. “We have to stop him.”

“How?” Chatine asked.

Cerise threw up her hands. “I don’t know! But if there’s a kill switch out there, then now is the time to find it.”

“What’s a kill switch?” Chatine glanced curiously at Cerise.

Marcellus groaned and was about to respond that they were wasting their time talking about fantasy solutions instead of trying to find a real solution, but Cerise spoke first. “Many people believe,” she shot a look at Marcellus, “that the Skins were originally designed with a switch that can disable them.”

“All of them?” Chatine sounded dubious. “At once?”

“It’s not unheard of,” Cerise said defensively. “Any good hacker or technicien knows that you should always build a kill switch into any large-scale system in case something goes wrong and you need to shut it down. If we can find this switch, we can disable the Skins. All of them. And stop the general from using the Third Estate as a weapon.”

Chatine snapped her gaze to Marcellus, a hopeful twinkle in her eye. “Have you heard of this?”

Marcellus sighed. “It’s just a conspiracy theory! Wishful thinking. There is no kill switch. It doesn’t exist.”

“Actually, it does.”

Everyone turned to see who had spoken, and Marcellus’s gaze landed on Brigitte. It was only now that Marcellus realized the two Défecteurs in the room—Etienne and his mother—hadn’t uttered a single word since the Universal Alert had begun. Etienne still bore a displeased expression, and the médecin was just standing there, watching them all with relaxed interest.

“She’s right,” Brigitte went on. “There is a kill switch. It was built when the original engineers designed the TéléSkins. As a precaution.”

Marcellus scoffed. Of all the people to believe in ridiculous Laterrian conspiracies, a former cyborg living in a Défecteur camp would be the last person Marcellus would suspect.

“Do you know where it is?” Cerise asked eagerly.

Brigitte gave a single, tight nod.

Cerise’s eyes