V
V
"It's a 1-lie, isn't it, Vaclav?" asked Abel in a tone that suggested he believed Havel would answer in the affirmative. "Are you on some special assignment? D-damn. Did I interfere?"
"If you seriously think so, won't you quietly disappear, Abel?" Havel replied indignantly. He was smiling as he stood up, but his eyes were filled with murderous hostility. "Or else, will you come with me? Our Neue Vatican will welcome you gladly."
Abel shook his head as if he couldn't hear what Havel was saying. "A-aren't we comrades? Then why?"
Know Faith's eyes warmed at Abel's question. "You never change," he said as his eyes reverted to their usually calm state. He gazed at Abel as a loving father would, noticing that Abel was about to cry. "You really don't change and, therefore, absolutely don't understand our human feelings." Suddenly, darkness returned to Havel's eyes. "Please let me pass—or do you intend to hinder me? If so, I'll have to kill you."
"I-I can't do either one. I can't fight a friend," Abel replied.
"I can," Havel responded adamantly. With both hands hanging limp and launching his body using only his feet, Havel careened into Abel's chest as though he'd been teleported.
Abel's cassock ripped loudly, and as soon as a wave of severe pain washed over him, blood began to gush from the breast of his garment.
Havel's hand waved in the air before he forcefully thrust it down toward the crown of Abel's head. A few of the priest's silver hairs were cleanly cut off as he dodged to avoid impact.
"I missed? I wanted to send you to God painlessly. What a pity," Havel lamented.
"Vaclav, please stop," Abel cried as the hand on his chest turned red from the flowing blood. "You have no reason to kill a comrade, do you? Please, stop this madness!"
"No reason to kill a comrade?" asked Havel, contorting his neck. "I've already killed a comrade—and my oldest friend at that. Isn't killing two people the same thing as killing one?"
"Wh-what do you mean?" asked Abel. Behind his glasses, his eyes had grown large and round. "N-not Professor!" he cried as he crumpled to the floor.
"I used scopolamine—it's a muscle relaxant. First, you fall asleep, and then your heart slowly stops. He died painlessly," assured Havel.
As Abel screamed bloody murder, he raised his percussion revolver and released a line of fire that caused a frenzied roar—but the traitorous priest wasn't there. "Where . . . ?" asked Abel, confused.
As Abel searched for his enemy, he heard a voice behind him. "That was a lie. William is just sleeping. But..." said Havel, "your emotions are so easily manipulated that it's funny. That was cause for concern when you were my comrade, but as my enemy, it's a little unsatisfying."
"D-damn!" said Abel. As he listened to the faint noise of the wind splitting, he prepared to die. At this position and angle, I can't avoid it!
It actually was Havel who ended up having to preserve his safety. He pulled back his hand blade that was going to ensure Abel's death and jumped far back. A second later, the place on the stone floor where he'd been standing split open. "Ugh!" Havel exclaimed.
"That's far enough, Know Faith!" shouted Caterina, her slender shadow emerging from the door. The priest who stood by her side like a loyal watchdog fired a handgun that shot with the force of a cannon, leaving a trail of pure white gun smoke. "Vaclav, I don't think even you can make enemies of two agents," Caterina said to the traitor, checking with one hand that Gunslinger was still firing. "Return my brother and surrender. My power can save you, if you do what I say now."
"I'm sorry, Your Eminence, but my only salvation is in perfect faith — and that's the only thing Your Eminence doesn't have." Havel also had dared to bitterly tell the cardinal, who was God's representative and the most powerful person in the Vatican, "There is no faith in you." In an inquisition, that single line would assure death by fire.
Unlike Caterina, who'd gone pale, the criminal fingered the collar of his cassock coolly. "Besides, are you forgetting my power, Your Eminence?" asked Havel as his cassock loudly split open. "I am Know Faith — it wouldn't matter if the whole human race battled me!"
"Duchess of Milan, permission to fire?" Tres said as if scolding his master who stood frozen and silent.
At that point, a violent transformation already was taking place inside the heretic priest's body. Stripping off the remainder of his cassock, Havel revealed a bodysuit that gradually grew transparent.
"Invisible Field — invisibility camouflage!" Caterina cried. But by the time she realized what was happening, Havel's body had nearly disappeared before their eyes.
The Invisible Field was lost technology that used quantum mechanical overlap created by electromagnetic waves and the resulting interference to dramatically transform the optical characteristics of matter, such as light absorption and refraction, to give mechanical soldiers perfect "transparency." The Vatican had once fervently pursued the implementation of technology that made invisibility camouflage possible, but its application was extremely difficult, and because it had proved unprofitable cost-wise, the research was halted. Afterward, the prototyped systems had been officially disposed. Agent Father Vaclav Havel—Know Faith—possessed technology from that research.
"Father Tres, permission to fire! Drop him now!" ordered Caterina.
The M-13s Tres held in each of his hands shone dully. Gunslinger fixed his aim on his former comrade who was approaching complete transparency, pulling the trigger hesitantly.
"N-no, Tres!" yelled Abel. If Abel hadn't waved his hand to distract Tres, two bullets would have blown off Havel's head. But the bullets, which passed through empty space, only gouged the white wall.
"Out of the way, Father Nightroad! We have to defeat him now! "Tres shouted. Shaking off Abel, who was clinging to him, Tres again raised his guns. Setting all of his optical and non-optical system sensors to maximum sensitivity, he tried to secure his former comrade's location.
"It's already too late, Father Tres," echoed Havel's seemingly sad voice throughout the empty space. "I can't be detected by infrared or supersonic waves—because I was made that way."
The mechanical soldier's body turned around and was blown backward as if it had received a direct hit from a cannon. A human-shaped hole was gouged through the white wall he struck.
"Tres!" Abel exclaimed, dropping his jaw. The blow itself didn't have that great an impact, but the damage to Tres' brain was great after having been fiercely shaken by the lever principle. By the time he collapsed, his body was motionless.
"D-damn . . . Caterina!" cried Abel.
The beauty who had lost all of her battle strength in the blink of an eye stood with a stupefied expression, but upon hearing Abel's voice, she came to her senses. Her eyes widened as she ran over to her little brother, who was still collapsed in the center of the room. The instant she extended her fingers to try and touch the drugged boy, his body floated up into the air.
"Know Faith!" Caterina glared at the man she couldn't see, although she knew he certainly was there. "Return my brother Alec!"
"Are you speaking as the cardinal who controls the Vatican and speaking of him as a puppet — or as an older sister who offered her little brother as a sacrifice in order to gain power?" asked Havel sharply.
The spark in Caterina s eyes dulled for a moment. "Th-that's . . ."
"Caterina, a little while ago, you said, 'I can save you with my power,' but you can't save anybody," said Havel without a trace of boastfulness. He wasn't accusing, either, but merely pointing out the truth. "You don't understand the weakness of the human heart, because all you have is a vengeful heart. You can't understand people's weaknesses. Actually, you didn't bother to notice your brother's suffering at all."
Caterina stood still as if frozen.
All of a sudden, Know Faith turned around, carrying the Pope's body.
"Why . . . why you . . ." Caterina muttered. Her seemingly numb heart finally began to beat at the sight of her brother being abducted. Into the open space, the cardinal shouted, "Why are you doing a thing like this, Know Faith?"
Havel's faint but pronounced voice answered her shout: "I know faith. Therefore, I must embrace the crown of thorns."
***
"Somehow, this has gotten absurd," Antonio said. His declaration, delivered as he checked for split ends, sounded about as profound as saying, "Yesterday's lunch was nasty." He failed to notice that the expression on the face of the room's owner was growing vicious. "Actually, isn't the abduction of a Pope a rare event that happens only every two thousand years? At least Cardinal Sforza was unhurt."
"I wish it had been the reverse. How dare she shamelessly return alive when His Holiness has been kidnapped by heretics!" said Minister of the Department of Doctrine Cardinal Francesco di Medici as he glared out the window at the neighboring Papal mansion. He couldn't stop himself from verbally abusing his half sister who'd just returned from Prague ten minutes ago. "This time, it's the end for that woman. On top of the traitor being one of her subordinates, she can't make any excuse for His Holiness being kidnapped. There's been some contact from Neue Vatican, hasn't there, Father Borgia?"
"No, nothing in particular," Father Antonio Borgia replied, reclining on the guest sofa. "The group at the Department of Foreign Affairs seems to be feverishly gathering intelligence, but they don't seem to be making much progress. It's a little strange that there hasn't been any movement. It's been three days since the incident—hasn't His Holiness already been killed?"
"That's impossible," said Francesco, stroking his pronounced chin.
Alfonso d'Este, who led Neue Vatican, had a pushy temperament, but he was never a fool. Francesco, who was his nephew, knew that best. Without fail, Alfonso would show some movement in the coming days—and it would be substantial.
"Maybe there's been some kind of trouble," Antonio suggested. .
Francesco glanced up to find Antonio, who'd been intently checking his hair, avert his eyes with a smile.
"To them, this incident is like an opening performance. The abduction of a Pope probably will cause an unprecedented disturbance," Antonio said.
"Hmm, is that how you see it?" asked Francesco, shrugging his shoulders in an attempt to pretend he was disinterested. However, his eyes grew increasingly sharp as he peered at Antonio. I can't underestimate this guy, he thought. At first, when the young man had approached him, Francesco had thought the man was no more than a dandy of nobility. But, as he revealed unexpected sources of information from time to time and traveled in and out of Caterina's vicinity, the young man also seemed to be securing a place inside the Department of Foreign Affairs. He wasn't merely a buffoon. Besides, if anything happened to Alessandro now ... he thought as the visages of powerful, noble-born cardinals crossed his mind.
If his little brother were to die, the next Pope would be decided by the cardinals at a papal election meeting. As far as actual power and achievements were concerned, Francesco's superiority would not crumble. But because of his lowly birth—his only vulnerable point—it was certain that his political opponents would attack his status as the illegitimate child of the previous Pope Gregorio and a lower-class knight's wife. In order to avoid that, Francesco desperately needed the support of a high noble. The Borgia family possessed the most famous lineage in Hispania and had turned generations of prime ministers and cardinals into princes of Valencia.
"At times, Father Borgia," replied Francesco, resting his chin atop his intertwined fingers. "It's about your promotion to Bishop of Valencia, which your father asked about the other day."
"Excuse me, Your Eminence," interrupted a voice that seemed both restrained and assertive. After knocking, a woman wearing a special police officer's uniform entered the office. "I'm Sister Paula. You sent for me, and I've come."
"Ahh, thank you. Let me introduce you, Father Borgia," said Francesco. "She is Sister Paula, The Vice Bureau Chief of the Bureau of Inquisition."
"Sister Paula of the Bureau of Inquisition? So she's the so-called Lady of Death?" asked Antonio with a faint hint of surprise in his voice. Isn't Sister Paula of the Bureau of Inquisition the second-highest-ranking official of the Bureau of Inquisition after its bureau chief Brother Petro and the go-getter who substantially altered the organization? Compared to Petro, who was of Roman high noble birth and often was referred to as "the wild boar" behind his back, the woman nicknamed "Lady of Death" cast a dark shadow of fear over those who opposed the Vatican—or rather those who opposed Francesco.
The nun's expression was surprisingly tender, despite her reputation. With the calmness of a librarian, Paula whispered to her superior: "Your Eminence, an urgent message has arrived from the Duchy of Bohemia. Rebellion has broken out in the eastern city of Brno. The citizens revolted, executed the governor, and occupied the entire city."
Francesco's face clouded. "Rebellion in Bohemia again?"
The Duchy of Bohemia was located in the remote eastern region and was close to the Empire—a nation of vampires in which heresy and paganism had thrived for years. Only two years prior, a rebellion over heresy had occurred. The Vatican had intervened and finally subjugated what had become a profound civil war.
"Have there been any injuries to church workers? Has anybody been executed?" asked Francesco.
"There were no injuries. They led the uprising," Sister Paula replied.
"What?" asked Francesco, raising his eyebrows in surprise.
"The directors of the church in Brno led the rebellion. They're calling themselves Neue Vatican and are asking that the churches in the surrounding areas secede from the Vatican," explained Sister Paula. The next words of her report made the cardinal shudder. "Further, three hours ago, our local intelligence source confirmed Alfonso d'Este's presence in the city cathedral. Alfonso was said to be accompanied by a 'fifteen- to sixteen-year-old boy with pimples on his face.'"