Reign

THE EMPEROR

Still some emotion left. All the better. The savage attacker. The maniac. And me, Dennis Hamilton, killing him out of self-defense.

(THE EMPEROR advances.)

~* ~

"What the hell is going on down there?" John Steinberg roared, pushing open the door of the control booth.

"I don't know, John," Curt said softly. "I've just about given up all hope. The ship is sinking, and it's up to those two on the stage to bail it out. I don't know who's going to quit first – them or Dex."

"Have they stuck to any of the original moves?"

"Not a one. I don't know what the hell Drummond thinks he's doing – you see that bit where he took Dennis offstage? Even I don't know who's who anymore."

"Who's who…” Steinberg went pale. "My dear God."

"What?" said Curt, then realized the possibilities himself, far worse than two actors going up on their lines and moves.

Steinberg took a cased pair of opera glasses from his jacket pocket, snapped them open, and peered down at the stage. After a moment he handed them to Curt. "That's not Wallace Drummond," Steinberg said dully. "It's Dennis. Both of them are Dennis."

Curt lowered the glasses. "What shall I do, John? Lower the curtain?"

Steinberg shook his head. It was the first time that Curt had seen him totally at a loss. "No, I… I don't know… If it's real, it could distract Dennis… We should contact security, have them stop it… I'll… I'll go downstairs, get help." He left the booth as if in a daze, and Curt watched the duel continue, listened to the music rage on.

~* ~

In the loge, Dan Munro watched too, watched as the two men fought, saw one of them lunge at the other, saw a sleeve rip and blood flow, too real to be artifice, and slowly began to understand.

"It's him," he said to himself, even though others heard. "One of them is him."

He stood up then, pushed his way past the legs and knees of the others in the row. But he had a long way to go, up the loge stairs, down a ramp, through the mezzanine lobby, down the curving staircase, through the inner lobby, and all the way to the stage.

By the time he would arrive there, it would all be over.

THE EMPEROR

Does it hurt, Dennis? The cut? I feel your pain, your anger. I adore them. They feed me. But don't feel too much, Dennis. Let me take you slowly…

(THE EMPEROR lowers his guard. It is a subtly disdainful move, but enough of a breach for DENNIS to thrust his saber, wounding THE EMPEROR in his left arm.)

THE EMPEROR

“If you prick us, do we not bleed?" See how human I have become? And we are identical again! Triumph, tragedy, I take them all in, Dennis. You have done your worst. It is time to die. And to let me be born. Farewell, my father.

(THE EMPEROR lifts his saber.)

From the moment the Emperor and Dennis raised their weapons against one another, scarcely two minutes had passed. They were minutes filled with horror for Ann Deems. From the start she had known that it was the Emperor rather than Wallace Drummond on the stage with Dennis. There was no other explanation. Still, she only watched, knowing that Dennis had to meet his nemesis on his own, had to claim his own soul with whatever means were available – with a sword, if it came to that.

But then they had disappeared from sight, and when, a moment later, they had returned to the stage, they were so alike that she could not tell them apart. Blood flowed then, on both sides, and she heard Terri gasp beside her.

"What's happening?" her daughter said. "What are they doing?"

"It's the other," Ann said, not taking her eyes from the pair, watching them more carefully than she had watched anything in her life. She was not even distracted by the scream of terror that came from backstage when Dan Marks finally returned to the dressing room he shared with Wallace Drummond.

She only watched, and thought. "I can help him now," she said. "I know how." And she ran onto the stage.

(THE EMPEROR lowers his saber as ANN runs to him, and stands in front of him, as if protecting him from DENNIS.)

DENNIS

(In warning) Ann!

ANN

No!

THE EMPEROR

A fatal error. One I cannot pass up. We were confused before, we can be so again – and who would blame me for slaying the murderer of the woman I love?

(Before DENNIS can move, THE EMPEROR takes a step back, raises his saber, and thrusts it into ANN's back.)

Her eyes widened, not in surprise, but in fulfillment.

"Now?" she asked him gently, and he knew she had made no mistake. She had known him all along. And she had known too what the Emperor would do. "Now?"

She fell, and the movement pulled the blade out of her back, revealing the Emperor standing behind her, holding the bloody sword.

THE EMPEROR

All gone now, Dennis. No one left. No reason for you to live on. Let us waltz again. I must become you for the last time.

Air surged in and out of his lungs like a bellows fanning a fire to fury. When the flame leaped, hot and bright, from his soul, that air burst out of him with a shriek of such hatred and savagery as had never before been heard on a stage.

The Emperor flinched before it. Dennis saw the sword tremble in his hand. Still, in another second the creature leaped over Ann, advanced upon Dennis, trying to drive him back into the wings again, to repeat the subterfuge that had once before confused them in the audience's mind.

It was like trying to harry the wind.

Dennis would not be driven back an inch. He parried, then attacked, not thrusting, but slashing. He was filled to bursting with emotion – loss, grief, fury, and above them all, hatred. Hatred for the Emperor and for himself, hatred that he had not been stronger, that Ann had had to make him reach inside himself with her own self-sacrifice.

"You… royal… bastard!" he shouted, advancing on the Emperor. It was Robin's voice and Ann's voice, Donna Franklin's and Tommy Werton's and Harry Ruhl's, all the voices of the Emperor's victims, all of their strengths. And it was Dennis Hamilton's voice, Dennis Hamilton's strength as well.

It was Dennis Hamilton driving the Emperor back, back where he had come from, and the Emperor paled and weakened, and seemed to shrink, and his arms did not come up as high to parry Dennis's attacks, and at last a cut flew through the defense, bit into the Emperor's side, and another followed like a silver flame, burning into the shoulder and neck, so that the Emperor's saber clattered on the wooden boards of the stage, the Emperor's body fell, spurting blood not his own, but made from Dennis's soul, now reclaimed, restored, and forevermore at war with itself.

He looked down at the dying Emperor, scarcely feeling the arms grip him from behind, only dimly hearing the audience's cries. Tears sprang into his eyes, and he blinked them away, trying to turn back toward Ann, seeing Dan Munro holding him, and, over his shoulder, Ann lying on her side, people all around her, Terri crying, Evan standing near, John Steinberg, arms crossed, a fist to his forehead. The stage seemed full of people now, running, crying, and he said to Munro, "Let me… let me…"

The policeman knew what he meant, and he staggered to where she lay, fell on his knees beside her, his hands held out in pleading, afraid to touch her. "Oh," was all he could say, less a word than a breath. "Oh…"

"Dennis," she whispered. "It's you? All… of you?"

"Yes… yes…" Every word was an effort for both of them. "Live," he sobbed. "Oh Ann, live, I can't lose you again…”

Her hand reached up and grasped his, trying to stay. But she could not obey his last command. Her grip weakened, her eyelids quivered, then closed, and she was gone.

Wrenching, desperate sobs broke from him, but no grief, no emotion, however strong, could bring her back.

"Mister Hamilton…” He heard the familiar voice, Munro's voice, like wind in his pounding ears. "I'm sorry. God, I'm sorry. But I have to know. Is he the one?" Dennis looked up at Munro standing above him.

"He's still alive. Is he the one? The one who did it all?"

Duty. He would have stayed at Ann's side till they dragged him away, but there was duty to be thought of. He did not look at her face again for fear that if he did, he could not leave her. Instead he rose to his feet, walked over to where the Emperor was lying, smiling, bleeding, breathing.

"No," Dennis said, with a cold that seared his throat. "He's not the one. He's nothing, no one at all. An imposter."

The smile shivered away, the teeth bared, stained with brackish blood. "I… am…" the voice said with hellish pride, "Emperor Karl… Frederick… Augustus!… Of Waldmont… of this theatre… of the world!"

"You are nothing."

"I am who I claim!" He coughed, and blood sprayed. "And I… execute without mercy… those who doubt."

"You execute them?" Munro asked softly. "You executed the others?”

“All…” The word was weak, but audible.

"Donna Franklin?"

"All… all of them…”

Dennis closed his eyes. Duty. He had done his duty to Sid. The creature on the floor had taken his pride, and now that same pride found it guilty and freed his friend. Keep the pride, Dennis thought, and prayed the thing heard. Let it die with you. When he opened his eyes, the Emperor was staring at him.

"The king is dead…” the Emperor said, and spoke again. The words were soft, but very clear. Unmistakable.

"Long… live… the king…" it said, and died.

They were the most terrible words that Dennis Hamilton could imagine.

He turned from the dead monster back to his dead love, and stayed with her, knowing that he would never leave her.

His soul was his own again, and he gave it to Ann.