Arcturus Mengsk

Chapter 33: Arcturus Mengsk

The skyscraper temporarily serving as the 33rd Ground Assault Division's headquarters had once belonged to the UNN Global News Network. About a thousand people had worked in the towering building, but now it stood abandoned and silent as a ghost town.

The elevators in the UNN branch building had long since stopped working, so Augustus and Warfield could only climb the stairs to the 42nd floor. It made Augustus wonder whether his older brother had some kind of strange hobby.

After dutifully climbing all those stairs, Augustus finally reached the top floor. Judging by the signs that had not yet been removed, this floor had housed the offices of the local station's editors-in-chief. The guards at the stairwell let Augustus and the others through only after checking their ID cards and scanning their retinas.

There were no guards outside the division commander's office. A painting of a lion hung on the door. Arcturus had always been fond of these creatures from Earth, which existed only in literature and films. He had always longed to defeat one of the mighty beasts someday.

Warfield carefully checked that his uniform was neat and pressed before solemnly knocking on the door.

"Come in." Arcturus's voice sounded much like Augustus's. Most of the time, it had an indescribable warmth and magnetism, calm and gentle enough to make people feel an instant sense of closeness.

"Aren't you coming in?" Augustus asked, looking at Warfield as he stepped aside.

"This is a private conversation between the two of you," Warfield said sternly.

"...All right." Augustus wondered why Warfield had meticulously smoothed every wrinkle in his uniform if he had no intention of seeing Arcturus.

When Augustus pushed open the door, his older brother, Arcturus Mengsk, stood with his back to him before a huge glass window, gazing out at Pride of Boke in the darkness. Arcturus wore a dark brown officer's coat, its shoulders covered in tasseled brass epaulettes.

Though the office had been hastily assembled, its furnishings still made it obvious at a glance that it belonged to a nobleman. Arcturus's desk was made from expensive Chau Sara Sunwood. Its surface retained the natural grain, protected by only a coat of clear varnish against rot and moisture. Countless tiny sunburst patterns, each just a few inches across, clustered together in extraordinary beauty.

Piles of documents and books covered the desk. Augustus noticed the only framed photograph standing upright on it: a picture of Arcturus at twenty, with Augustus, their sister Dorothy, and their mother.

For a moment, Augustus didn't even recognize himself in the picture. Between their mother and older brother stood two very similar little girls with silver twin tails, wearing white dresses.

Augustus decided he would have to destroy that photograph someday.

A carpet covered the tiled floor, embroidered in gold thread with a star map of the Terran Confederacy's territory in the Koprulu Sector.

Beside the desk stood two gene-locked liquor cabinets. They were filled with wine, whiskey, and ale from across the Confederacy, from its core worlds and dominion to its fringe worlds. Clearly, this reflected the Mengsk Family's habitual fondness for alcoholic drinks.

The wall opposite the desk chair was covered with animal heads and hunting rifles. On another wall hung a solitary oil portrait of Augustus's mother, Katherine Mengsk.

A twenty-fifth-century artist had painted Katherine in the style of the Renaissance period of ancient Earth. The artist seemed to have taken inspiration from paintings of the Virgin Mary, depicting Katherine in a red evening gown as utterly sacred and radiant.

"Augustus, my little brother. Come here and let me get a good look at you." Hearing the door open, Arcturus immediately turned around. His face, with features as sharply defined as if chiseled by an axe, looked as though a Greek sculptor had carved it. A genuine smile spread across it.

Augustus felt that his brother's smile was entirely sincere. Arcturus himself had never admitted as much, but the habits and mannerisms their father had acquired as a politician had influenced him time and again. People often said that politicians wore a thousand different masks. That was certainly true of Arcturus.

Augustus's tense shoulders relaxed. He walked toward Arcturus with an air of complete trust, just as he had in the past.

"I heard you defeated a squad of Kel-Morian Assault Cavalry on your first day out of boot camp." Arcturus was even taller than Augustus. At twenty-eight, he had broader shoulders than his younger brother, who had only just turned eighteen. Colonel Arcturus was a man of iron, standing straight-backed and strong. When he calmly looked at someone, he had an imposing presence that made people feel his authority.

"Haha! Guess what I told the staff officer who reported it to me? I said, 'That's exactly what you'd expect from a Mengsk!'" As he spoke, Arcturus clapped Augustus firmly on the shoulder, pleased to see him stand as unshakably as an iron tower in the wind.

"I've always been lucky," Augustus said with a smile. "Those Kel-Morians just happened to stumble into the place where we were resting."

"Then I have to admit, your luck is unbelievable." Arcturus's cold gray eyes shone brightly. Since joining the military, he had not returned to Korhal or seen his family in seven or eight years. On the rare occasions they did speak, it was only through brief interstellar video calls with terribly unstable connections.

Only rarely did supply fleets, which traveled between Char, Sigma, and Tarsonis every two years, deliver letters from home to soldiers on the fringe worlds, along with recent family photographs and local specialties that had passed inspection. Arcturus's father, Angus, never wrote to him. Only Katherine and his younger siblings regularly sent things and letters to the eldest son.

When he was young, Augustus had idolized his brother, the soldier. He had cherished him as a hero.

Though Augustus grew more and more rebellious as he grew up, he still sent his brother local specialties year after year, such as cold weapons forged by the Sterling Master Craftsman Association for nobles and the wealthy, and Monarch No. 7 whiskey made in Pasha, the central city of Korhal IV's largest continent. Augustus always asked Arcturus about his military life in his emails, yearning to hear exciting adventures and tales of glorious exploits.

But Arcturus's most recent memory of his little brother was still of Augustus at fourteen.

Back then, Augustus had looked like a rebellious teenage punk. He had long hair tied in a ponytail, pierced ears, and tattoos.

In the end, Angus had personally dragged Augustus to the best laser cosmetic surgery clinic in Sterling to have his piercings repaired and tattoos removed. The most advanced laser cosmetic procedures could now reshape someone without incisions or lasting side effects, so no one could tell that Augustus's ears had ever been pierced.

Only Augustus's hair had escaped unscathed, but he soon cut it himself because people kept mistaking him for a girl.

Arcturus was glad that Augustus had shed the restlessness of youth and grown calm and self-possessed. He had been worried about his younger brother.

"How is Mother?" Arcturus pulled over two chairs, and he and Augustus sat down together. He naturally began chatting about the family.

"Mother's doing well," Augustus said. "After Dorothy turned sixteen, Mother took the lead in establishing more than a dozen charities and orphanages in Sterling. She's admired throughout Korhal. She's busy every day, but she's also fulfilled."

"And Dorothy? She's stopped writing to me." Arcturus nodded, but then his expression grew a little sad.

"Her schedule at the academy is always packed. Besides classes, she has to study etiquette, dance, and court swordsmanship," Augustus said. "Dorothy's all grown up now. She's as beautiful and charming as Mother."

"Yes, Dorothy has grown up..." Arcturus paused.

Back when Arcturus was still studying on Korhal, Dorothy and Augustus had both been little children who sat on his lap and playfully tussled with him.

"Does she have many suitors?"