Arthur smiled at them both, and Perseus continued a moment later.

“Myrmidónes are Kidemónes that have matriculated through the Academia Psionica. It’s a pretty popular point of pride for us to work with them, despite my brother’s surliness. The Grand Imperium’s Paladins have a Fortress-Monastery and garrison force for it on Hellas, like they do in every other stable system in human space, but this far from the Imperium psionics are more or less allowed to defer joining if they don’t want to.”

That was a surprise. Arthur hadn’t thought the Imperator would ever be so liberal.

“That’s unheard of for anyone above Delta rank in the Fringe,” Arthur observed with interest, “and it’s even less tolerated toward the Core, from what I’ve heard.”

“The Myrmidónes have an understanding with the Paladins,” Perseus explained while they chatted and the odd passersby threw them curious looks, which Arthur ignored. The Kidemónes were the only ones of their kind in the Customs area, surprisingly enough, and Arthur wasn’t unaware of how odd it must have looked for them to be casually standing around chatting with him.

“They are free to serve the Ascendancy and fight for their homeland, and in return, they will answer the call if the Paladins ever need them.” Perseus continued while oblivious to the attention they garnered on occasion. Or seemingly oblivious, at any rate. “Terra’s power is respected even this far out, as unlikely as it might be for the Imperium to project power. Nobody wants to make the mistake of being the star system that pushed the Imperator too far.”

“Even with them being so disconnected from the Rim?” Arthur asked curiously.

“Everyone in Graecia knows what happened to the Morlane Confederacy.” Perseus said with a shake of his head. “An entire inner-Rim nation powerful enough to be a true multi-stellar state, and with the economy to challenge the outer-Verge powers just… dismantled.” He shrugged and continued. “All of it happened within the span of a few Solar months, and the timeframe was only that long due to the Imperium’s forces having to travel over a thousand light years.”

“It might have been before we were born, but we’ve met people from Morlane.” Endymion added grimly. “Most Rim citizens have. You don’t forget stories like theirs.”

Arthur was careful to nod seriously, but otherwise avoid overt reaction.

“And Myrmidónes—” Arthur said while shifting the topic back for the sake of his own clarity “—are something similar to Aurelian Chevaliers, I’m guessing?”

“In essence.” Chloros agreed with a slight shrug of his armored shoulders. “They are independent investigators and enforcers, tasked with rooting out spies, traitors, and extremely dangerous criminals or dissidents. Their psionic gifts make them particularly skilled at the work, and give them formidable capabilities in battle.”

“Their Callandium compatibility must be high.” Arthur murmured half to himself.

“It is.” Perseus confirmed. “They have a generous helping of psions, too. None of them are above Delta in strength, and most are apparently Epsilon or lower. Otherwise I don’t doubt the Paladins would have forced them into service already… though I’ve heard a rumor their Strategos is on the cusp of Beta.”

“Andino!” Endymion growled.

“It’s just a rumor…” Perseus grumbled.

Arthur held up a placating hand. “I get it, Endymion. Thanks for answering at all.”

“It was our pleasure.” Perseus said a moment later with genuine warmth. “You’re an interesting man, Arthur. I can’t say I’ve met anyone as effortlessly charismatic in a while.”

“Just good genes.” Arthur half-joked.

“We did notice that.” Endymion grunted. “Symmetrical features, powerful frame, not a blemish or flaw to be seen, and you move like a man that can and will leap to violence quickly if properly provoked.” he folded his arms and shrugged shamelessly. “Part of why I consented to escort you was to observe your nature for myself. You could do a lot of damage very fast if you wanted to, I’d wager.”

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Arthur’s eyes tightened a little at Endymion’s assessment, but he didn’t try to deny it.

“You’ve got me dead to rights, it seems.” he said with a half-hearted smile.

“Not quite. You could be a Parthian spy.” The senior Kidemónas said flatly. “But I doubt it. You’re not the type they’d want. There’s too much to notice about you, and you’re too easy to like. We’re extensively trained in Parthian tactics—and they haven’t tried to trojan horse us in decades.”

“What happened to the last one?” Arthur asked despite his better judgment.

“Defected to Graecia.” Perseus said with a laugh. “Hilarious when you think about it. I heard the Parthians were livid. We landed a whole cache of intelligence as a result.”

“Normally I’d reprimand him for that, but it really was decades ago. It’s history at this point.” Endymion remarked gruffly. “And as I said, you’re too easy to like. I almost felt your anger at the idea of Parthian slavery, odd as it is to say. I can tell you’re not like those animals on Xerxes.”

“That’s… genuinely flattering, Endymion.” Arthur said with a wry smile. “Thank you.”

“Mm.” Endymion grunted.

“Before we go, Arthur, would you answer a question of my own?” Perseus asked curiously.

“By all means.” Arthur said permissively. Turnabout was fair trade, after all.

“Which sort of Freelancer are you?”

Arthur hesitated for a moment at Perseus’ question, and then felt a small encouragement erode his natural wariness. He’d kept his skills under wraps during his negotiation with Larriman, but something—instinct or otherwise—told him it was important he be honest with the Kidemónes.

So he was.

“I’m a Knight-Errant.” Arthur said as calmly as his spiked heart-rate would allow. Despite his mind telling him it was the right thing to do, a deeply rooted part of himself balked at the idea of giving away that information. “I can pilot and build Ninth Generation Eidolons.”

Both men went very still when he said that, and then turned to one another rapidly.

The clicking was rapid-fire almost immediately upon them turning to each other.

Engineered Interaction Dual Origination Linear Operation Neuralink Weapons, also simply called Eidolon Weapons or Eidolons for short, were the hardest to pilot and most difficult to master warmachines in the Humanosphere. They stood on average between 15 to 25 meters tall, with the ability to transform between a highly maneuverable starfighter and powerful humanoid form.

Eidolons were easy enough to build. Finding pilots was a far more difficult prospect.

The largest reason, of course, was that the people that could even be considered as pilots were one in ten million, and of those only one in ten million would be considered truly formidable.

And of those, perhaps one in a hundred million would be classified as a prodigy.

Capability was only one part of it, of course. The other factors were far more esoteric. The mental bandwidth required to operate one of the machines was hard to gauge without simply putting candidates in a cockpit with a neuralink to test them, and the result could range anywhere from a failure to move the training machine, to the too-common-for-comfort cases of sudden-onset brain death.

And the likelihood of which result would manifest was difficult at best to predict.

“Arthur.” Perseus said after several long moments of silence. “Are you telling us that you are a trained and veteran Eidolon pilot from the mid-Fringe with the capability to replicate mid-Fringe technology?”

“Yes.” Arthur said simply. There was no point lying, for all that part of him was raging at his own stupidity. The urge to be honest remained, but another part of him was livid for agreeing with that urge. He couldn’t have explained the compulsion if he’d wanted to.

“You realize what that means, right?” Perseus asked skeptically.

“I’ve got a pretty good guess.” Arthur replied with resigned amusement.

“We’re going to have to ask you to follow us.” Endymion said grimly.

“You’re not in trouble, Arthur, but if what you say is true…” Perseus trailed off.

“It’s going to cause a whole fucking circus of bullshit.” Endymion said flatly.

“Yeah.” Arthur said simply. “I figured.”

“Hey, there’s a bright side to this.” Perseus said while Endymion signaled to some nearby officers, and started barking orders for them to clear a path through the crowds after they ran over.

“What’s that?” Arthur asked skeptically.

“If all goes well, you’re gonna find that work you wanted, and then some!”

Arthur couldn’t help himself at that.

He laughed.