Honor of the Fallen

A lone man who carries the name of the Empire's ultimate shame and anonymity, 'John Smith.' Stripped of everything from his past, cast out and stumbling through the world, he sees everything he grew up believing with new eyes. The harsh realities of his world nip at his flanks and heels every day of his new life, while memories and painful traumas of his old life plague his days and even nights.

~~~~~ Excerpt ~~~~~

Kazimir Chroynos fiercely drove his hands through his hair yet again.

The interminable trip from the Cursed Citadel to his building had frayed his last nerve. Landing on the 'highest authorized pad' for the public cab had been infuriating. 'Walking' to the elevator had set his blood to boil. His barked rebuke to the assholes and dumb bitches, who had tried to join him in the car, was mildly satisfying.

The forty-five floors the infernal elevator car had to travel were bad enough, but the moron engineer who had crafted the car to travel slower with every floor needed to die screaming with his skin stripped off, and intestines pulled out slowly into a bucket while he watched. Maybe hung from the ceiling upside down for hours so he had to piss over his dangling guts and into his face and nose.

Kicking the frame of the elevator door while pushing his disheveled, ear length hair, back from his eyes again, then a second time, Kazimir fumed with inaction. The now greasy black mess held nothing of its perfect styling that his personal stylist had added at the beginning of the day. Now the oils and hair products 'what's-his-name' used every morning were white flakes of broken goo and sticky residue in Kazimir's fingernails. Smudging his filed nails, and marring their perfectly rounded shape.

Like a common peon, he was forced to use his 'building cash card' of all things! He had almost forgotten that he had that thing at all, let alone that he'd needed it for this menial transaction.

It only added to his frustration and rage that his own building was so primitive and inert that they didn't even have proper scanners to identify him and pass him without hassle as it should.

There was a reason he paid people to handle those transactions. Kazimir didn't need to be troubled; he had more important things to do.

Like ruling an Empire… And not this! This absurdity! This … usurpation of order!

Stepping back and slamming his foot into the elevator door, his right ankle and toes hurt fiercely. But he left a satisfying dent in the finely finished stainless steel door. The injustice after all the years of planning, patience, sacrifice, and work was … somewhere light-years beyond frustrating.

There was no blood shared between the CEO of city's founder corporation, whose offspring incompetently managed their empire straight into Chroynos hands, and the current Chroynos Dynasty. It was all a paperwork shuffle and an illusion to keep the plebs inline, while wrapping their feeble minds in the warm blanket of the lie that there was continuity and stability in their lives.

Kazimir scoffed at the insipid legend and its accompanying deceptions.