by Peter Nealen
“Come on, Kunn,” Kahane pressed. “You’ve got to have some opinion.”
“I have never watched the sport,” Kunn said, in his usual dead monotone.
Kahane sighed. “What do you do during your personal time, Kunn? You don’t watch sports, you don’t hunt, you don’t mingle with the other squad sergeants… Don’t tell me you just sit in your cell and stare at the walls.”
“I study.” Kunn turned away to stare vacantly out the window.
Scalas did not comment, even as Kahane harrumphed in annoyance. Kunn might be strange, but he wasn’t a problem. Not yet. Until he became one, Scalas wouldn’t be too concerned with his oddity.
They passed under the eaves of the forest, bringing the sleds into deep shadows beneath the thick, intertwined canopy of branches and spatulate leaves overhead. The road turned ahead, the first of a series of switchbacks that would allow them to work their way up the mountain without straining the engines climbing the nearly sheer slope ahead. Every now and then an occasional ray of golden sunlight or reflected reddish Kaletonan-glow would break through and strike the windows, but for the most part they rode through a deep twilight.
And then at last the sleds broke out of the trees before the gates of the Keep.
The Avar Sector Keep was fairly typical of such Brotherhood fortresses across the Spinward Reaches. Tightly clustered around a central spire stood four squat, cylindrical towers, their domed peaks housing powerful ground-to-space defensive batteries. Those batteries would only be unmasked as a last resort, and would hopefully be made unnecessary by the powerguns and heavy laser batteries emplaced at strategic points in concentric rings around the fortress. No attacker would find the skies above a Brotherhood Keep uncontested. The Avar Sector Keep had never needed to employ these defenses, but in almost eight centuries of existence, the Brotherhood had made no shortage of enemies, and having strong defenses around their headquarters was simply common sense.
As the sleds sped forward, the gates swung open silently on well-oiled mag tracks, then closed again as soon as the sleds had passed. Keeping the gates shut at all times was one more aspect of Brotherhood discipline on display.
Not far into the shadowed courtyard, the two vehicles glided to a halt, the pitch of their fans changing as they braked. Golden lights, not far off the spectrum of the sun, blazed down on them from atop the towers. A massive figure in the red tunic of a Brotherhood legate stood at the top of the steps leading into the main spire. Even from a distance, there was no mistaking the man.
Brother Legate Michael Kranjick.
Kranjick stood well over two meters tall, barrel-chested, with arms bigger around than most men’s legs. In fact, everything about the old Brother Legate seemed weighty—not just his size and presence, but his very manner, his faintly brutish, battered features, his slow, ponderous speech, his look of perpetual boredom. Yet any Brother who crossed his path was quickly disabused of the notion that his slowness was indicative of dullness of intelligence.
Scalas climbed out of the sled and mounted the steps, halting just below the Brother Legate to render his salute. Kranjick returned it gravely with his well-worn, ancient KT-5 pistol, much as Scalas had returned the novice’s salute. As was fitting—Scalas had learned to be a Brother and a leader under then-Centurion Kranjick’s command.
“Report, Centurion,” Kranjick rumbled. He holstered his sidearm, turned about, and began to plod back inside the spire, motioning for Scalas to walk with him.
“The mining outpost is secure again, Brother Legate,” Scalas said, accompanying Kranjick into the Great Hall. The gothic arches were hung with battle banners from nearly eight hundred years’ worth of engagements across the Spinward Reach. “The yeheri pirate band has been wiped out. A few survivors of the ground fighting might have surrendered, but the local militia opened fire on them.”
Kranjick nodded solemnly. “We cannot always expect the local forces to act with honor. Which is why we must always be on our guard. I take it you did not allow their actions to lead you to violate the Code?”
“Of course not, Brother Legate. Though matters grew tense with some of the militia toward the end. There was a single survivor. A pilot, I believe. The militia wished to execute her.”
“And, of course, you prevented them,” said a familiar voice.
They were nearing the knot of Brothers waiting in the center of the hall, but Centurion Joachim Dunstan was standing closest to the door, his hands resting on the impeccably polished pistol belt around his equally impeccably tailored and filigreed tunic. As always, Dunstan’s uniform was slightly flashier than anyone else’s in the room, including Brother Legate Kranjick’s. And unlike most of the Brothers, he wore a thin mustache beneath his narrow beak of a nose.
“And what if they had insisted?” Dunstan continued. “Would you truly have been willing to sacrifice Caractacan Brothers’ lives for the sake of a pirate?”
Kranjick halted, but said nothing. He simply watched and listened, like a massive, observant, sapient mountain.
Scalas looked Dunstan in the eye. “Yes, I was willing to do precisely that. The battle was over. She was wounded and unable to defend herself. The Code is fairly clear on such matters.”
“And yet she was a pirate,” Dunstan countered. “Condemned to be executed regardless.” He peered behind Scalas as if looking for something. “I do not see this yeheri prisoner.”
“That is because she died of her wounds before we had even cleared the battlefield,” Scalas said levelly, knowing what was coming next.
“Well.” Dunstan raised his voice so that his words echoed from the walls of the Great Hall. “I suppose it is a blessing that no shots were fired in defense of a pirate who was doomed to die anyway. Certainly not for a pointless display of ‘honor.’”
“I should be careful speaking so lightly of points of honor, Centurion,” Kranjick said grimly. He did not raise his voice, yet his words traveled nonetheless. “The Code is what makes the Brotherhood, after all.”
“And yet how many Brothers were lost on Pontakus IX because of points of honor, Brother Legate?” Dunstan asked. “We might hold dearly to the Code, but our enemies surely will not. Disaster was averted this time, but by how close a margin? And what honor is there in defending a captured pirate who deserves nothing but summary execution in the first place? What was the point?”
Scalas’s eyes narrowed. Dunstan was not speaking extemporaneously; this was a prepared speech. Scalas wondered just what had prompted the other centurion, who was known to be one of the most outspoken of the New School, the so-called “pragmatists,” in the Legio X, to think that he would have the opportunity to use it at this particular time and place.
“If you really don’t see the point,” Kahane shot back from behind Scalas, “I wonder how you ever pinned on Centurion.”
Dunstan fixed Kahane with a glare. “Your superiors are talking, Squad Sergeant,” he said coldly.
The thickset high-grav worlder stepped up beside Scalas and folded his massive arms across his chest. “No,” he replied, just as coldly. “Only those who outrank me, apparently by virtue only of time in service.”
Dunstan’s lips went white, and he too took a step forward, one hand dropping reflexively to the sidearm at his side. Instantly the atmosphere in the Great Hall crackled with tension. Brothers did not threaten to draw weapons on Brothers.
Scalas and Kahane stood motionless, staring Dunstan down. Kranjick stayed aloof, saying nothing, only watching. Dunstan was shaking with rage.
And then the man looked around, as if only then realizing that all eyes in the hall were on him—and none of them particularly friendly. His lips formed a thin line beneath his mustache, and he abruptly turned on his heel and stalked away.
“Centurion Dunstan,” Kranjick rumbled. Dunstan looked for a moment like he was going to keep walking, but then stopped and stiffly turned back around.
“I suggest that you study Volume II of Donagan’s History of the Caractacans t
onight, Centurion,” Kranjick said, still managing to look and sound bored, though there was a note of steel in his voice. “You seem to have forgotten some things.”
Dunstan stared at him for a moment, then clicked his heels together and saluted. “I shall certainly look at it, Brother Legate.” He spoke as if the words pained him, then he turned and left the hall.
Scalas turned to Kranjick, his frown deepening. “Where did that come from?” he asked.
Kranjick looked as if nothing of particular note had just happened. “Dunstan is ambitious,” he said simply. “As are the rest of the ‘pragmatists.’ It is nothing new.”
“That was,” Scalas argued. “He was looking for a chance to preach his lack of principle in front of an audience. Has something happened to embolden them?”
Kranjick resumed his advance toward the far end of the Great Hall. “No. Dunstan has been a centurion longer than you have. He wishes for a legate’s tunic, and thinks that challenging you and the Code will grant him the notoriety that will garner him such a promotion. Or so he believes.” The huge man laughed dryly. “Hence why I told him what to study. He has forgotten how advancement in the Brotherhood truly occurs. Popularity in the ranks has little to do with promotion.”
“So,” Scalas said in disgust, “politics rears its head within the Brotherhood.”
Kranjick stopped and turned to face him. “Politics is part of human existence, Centurion. Code or no Code, it was always inescapable. The Brotherhood has endured for the centuries that it has because of the Code—and because we are unmatched on the battlefield by human or alien—but we are still human, and still subject to human frailties, including politics and ambition. Pontakus IX was a Pyrrhic victory that scarred the Brotherhood for all time to come. It made many question whether the Code was worth the risk of death, whether honor was truly more important than life. And many of them were bound to pass those doubts down to those they commanded and trained. It is the way of the galaxy. We can only hold fast to what we know is right, and along the way strive to be better than those who would trample on honor for the sake of advancement or advantage. Is that not what you were taught as a novice?”
Scalas nodded, looking away from his mentor and commander’s deep-set, deceptively placid eyes. “I had only hoped that the Brotherhood was somehow immune from such petty squabbling. I have seen little of it so far.”
Kranjick chuckled. “That is high praise, as I have striven to keep it out of my legio. But trust me, boy, no one is truly immune. It would have come around sooner or later.” He studied Scalas for a moment, a faint smile on his lips. “Perhaps I should have you do some reading tonight, as well. Perhaps refreshing your memory about the aftermath of the Banash War might grant you some perspective. This is not the first such crisis the Brotherhood has faced. It will not be the last.”
He straightened, and looked back at the rest of Scalas’s squad sergeants. “Get settled back into your quarters,” he said. “We will do a detailed after-action report this evening, and the funeral Mass for the fallen immediately thereafter. What time is it, ship time?”
“We synchronized with the Sector Keep three days ago,” Scalas said. “We will be fine. I will have the century assembled for the debriefing in three hours.”
“Very well,” Kranjick said. “Vigilance and Honor, Centurion.”
Scalas straightened to attention and saluted. “Vigilance and Honor, Brother Legate,” he replied.
4
The battered ship’s Bergenholm fields cut out early. The drive did not ignite. Fully inert, the near-wreck of the Antares III class starship was slowly falling toward Tokanan’s star.
It might pass that star in fifty standard years. If it didn’t fall into the photosphere and burn up.
But the ship wasn’t entirely dead. Somewhere in the blasted ruin of its superstructure, a transmitter started beaming a signal deeper into the system.
The legio’s chief chaplain, Father Corinus, offered the last blessing over the caskets, committing the fallen Brothers’ remains to the ground in hopes of the final Resurrection at the end of time. The surviving Brothers of Century XXXII, alongside the crew of the Dauntless, stood at attention, flanking the caskets. Nine men had fallen on Iabreton II. Low casualties, considering how many yeheri they had killed in the action, but it was still a grievous blow to a century.
Scalas stood at the head of the row of closed caskets, dressed in his formal dress tabard, sidearm on one hip, ceremonial sword on the other. It was said that this blade had been presented to the very first centurion of Century XXXII, six hundred years before, by the grateful ruler of Rialexeton VI. Scalas did not know for certain if the story was true—enough time had passed that it could have been only a legend—but none of the other centurions had a dress sword quite like it.
A figure appeared in the door of the chapel, dressed in a tech’s uniform, the same as the warrior Brothers’ tunics except blue. The man stood at attention and waited, but Scalas was acutely aware of him until Father Corinus finished the prayers and the caskets were lowered into the vaults below the Keep. Ten stories of vaults carved into the mountain held the Brotherhood’s Avar Sector dead. Those who had been recovered.
When the last casket had disappeared into the vaults and Father Corinus had pronounced the final blessing and dismissal, the century turned on their heels as one and marched out of the chapel. Not a few eyes turned curiously toward the tech, who held his place, patiently waiting for Scalas and Kranjick. As the two men approached, the gray-haired tech saluted, which was when Scalas saw he had an artificial right hand. Scalas suddenly remembered the man: Brother Henryk Costas, one of Kranjick’s senior squad sergeants when Scalas had first deployed as a front-line Brother. Badly wounded, Costas had retired from the line, but had retrained himself as a tech to stay in service with the Brotherhood.
Kranjick returned the salute. “What is it, Henryk?”
“We just received a transmission from a ship at the edge of the system, Brother Legate,” Costas replied. “It is from a Valdekan starship identified as the Mekadik. She is apparently badly damaged, fully inert, and coasting in toward the sun at minuscule velocity. We have yet to locate her precise position and vector, but the crew aboard the Boanerges in orbit believes she’s at least three hundred ninety light-minutes out.”
“Did the message include what she’s doing here?” Kranjick asked.
“Negative, Brother Legate. It appears to be an automated distress beacon, operating on very low power. It was barely decipherable through the background cosmic radiation, never mind Kaletonan’s magnetic fields. There might have been more, but if so, it was lost in the noise.”
“Very well,” Kranjick said. He turned to Scalas. “I could send Dunstan or Soon, unless you would prefer to take it.”
Scalas considered. He knew why Kranjick was offering. The men of his century would be brooding over the losses they’d taken on Iabreton II, even more so now that the wounds had been reopened by the funeral. Often such situations were handled by ruthless field exercises or similar training, or even by busy work around the Keep—anything to keep the men’s minds and hands occupied lest they slip too deeply into the dark thoughts that can accompany mourning a fallen comrade. A mission might serve the same purpose, help the men get some distance from the deaths, and give them time to process the loss without sinking into despair.
He was tired, and he knew that his century was as well. They’d had days to rest on the transit from Iabreton II, but it had been a hard fight, no matter how quickly it had been over. Yet he would not beg weariness.
“We will go,” he said, glancing over at Captain Mor. The starship commander nodded his agreement. “It will give the men something to do.”
“We can be ready to lift in six hours,” Mor declared, stepping forward even as he signaled his executive officer, Commander Brage.
“Century XXXII will be aboard and ready to lift,” Scalas said formally. “Now if you will excuse me, sir, I need to get the men m
oving and counteract the usual grumbling.”
Scalas stood next to Mor’s acceleration couch on the command deck, fully armored, his mag-boots locked to the deck. “It’s a miracle she made it this far,” he murmured.
“It’s a miracle she survived any of that at all,” Mor replied.
The ship displayed in the holo-tank, enhanced by the ship’s computer to be visible in the dim starlight over forty astronomical units from the star, was barely recognizable as an Antares III. Her royal-blue, egg-shaped hull was scored and punctured in half a hundred places, and it looked like most of her compartments were open to space. The nose actually appeared to have partially melted. Her drive cones were dark, even in the infrared, and her reactor was apparently cold—the neutrino flux was almost nonexistent. If not for the looping distress call, the Dauntless would likely not have been able to track her down at all.
“Can anyone still be alive in there?” Scalas asked.
“It’s possible,” said Mor. “The Antares III has considerable redundancies, especially when it comes to damage control. There could well still be an air pocket inside somewhere. And there’s obviously still some kind of functioning power source aboard, or the transmitter wouldn’t be working. So yes, there could be survivors.”
Scalas started to turn toward the hatch, though his gaze lingered on the image in the holo-tank. “Well, I’ll take First Squad EVA to investigate. Can you get us closer?”
“I could dock with her, if she still had an intact docking collar,” Mor retorted. “What kind of scow pilot do you take me for?”
Scalas refused to rise to the bait. He clapped the captain on the shoulder before turning toward the lift in the center of the command deck. “I’ll be at Lock Number Ten,” he said. “Let me know when we’ve made rendezvous.”