Imperial Sunset

by Eric Thomson

  “Yes.”

  “Same as for the first. Take him out the moment you can.”

  — 54 —

  “Two-Niner, this is Niner.” Kayne was watching the soldiers from Lannion Company walk among the dead and dying reivers, picking up weapons and other items of interest.

  Former Marine noncoms, Sergeant Major Havel and Centurion Greff among them, gave those who were still alive the coup de grâce — a quick headshot with a pistol. It was not a job for weekend warriors about to crash from an adrenaline high. The battle was over in Lannion, but according to Myrtale, the Trevena Company — designator ‘Two’ — was still fighting.

  “Two-Niner here,” an out of breath Centurion Hamm answered. “I was beginning to think we were the only ones left.”

  “The situation in Lannion is under control. What’s your status?”

  “A bit of a mess, I’m afraid. A few of the barbs wised up and forced us to spring the ambush early. Casualties on both sides but no dead for us so far. The Trevena spaceport is pretty much in ruins now they’ve opened up with their ship’s guns, and so is the edge of town. We’re trying to put the calliopes into action, but they hit two of them already. About a hundred got off, but only fifty made it into the ambush zone. The others are trying to extract their buddies. Any chance of help?”

  “It’ll take an hour at least to move a company from Lannion to Trevena. But perhaps our Navy friends in orbit might come up with ideas. They’re relaying my transmission and no doubt listening.”

  “We are,” a new voice said. “I’m Nate Sirak, captain of the frigate Myrtale. We’re watching events on the ground, Trevena. I can’t fire from here without risking collateral damage. We’re too high for that sort of precision, but since the other reivers lifted off, could I suggest you withdraw your forces and simply let them go? Once they’re well off the ground, then I can engage. We’re already tracking the one that landed in Carhaix and will obtain a lock on the one from Lannion momentarily.”

  “You hear that, Two-Niner. Sounds like a plan. Try to break free. Abandon the heavy equipment if you need to.”

  “You mean run.”

  “I mean move out of the way and let them run so the Navy can do its thing. No dishonor involved.”

  A brief silence ensued, then, “Wilco. We’re pulling back now.”

  “Call when you’re clear, and he lifts. Niner, out.” Kayne took a deep calming breath. Casualties. Damage to the spaceport and town. Lannion was a fluke. Maybe once they compared timelines, it would show the Lannion ship was first to land and first to be ambushed. Its crew warned the others, if not in time, then fast enough to prevent the other raiding parties’ destruction. But no matter. The Navy was here.

  “Three-Niner, this is Niner.”

  He was about to repeat the call when an exhausted voice said, “Three-Niner here.”

  “What’s your status?”

  “Bruised, bleeding, burning, you name it. But the bastards lifted.”

  “Talk to me.”

  “The ship landed like we expected. Its belly ramp opened, and they poured out. Ugliest fucks you’ve ever seen. More like animals than people. About fifty of them were spreading out across the tarmac, and more were coming when for some reason they stopped. Looked around like they smelled something bad. Then, one of them opened fire and shot up the terminal building. That was the start of a free-for-all.

  “I don’t know what set it off, but weren’t able to trigger the ambush, so my folks returned fire with everything we own while the reivers pulled back into their ship. Then the damn thing pumped out round after round as it lifted. Carhaix spaceport is a smoking ruin as is a good chunk of the nearby outskirts. We have two dozen wounded, five dead. Could be a few of the citizens who stayed in their homes also took hits. We’re checking.”

  “Sit tight. The Navy’s here. They’ll take care of the reivers. When the satellite constellation is back up, we’ll sort out the casevac.”

  Kayne didn’t hear Centurion Janey’s reply. The gray overcast sky to the north suddenly lit up with an eerie glow, like a second sun above the clouds. It only lasted for a few heartbeats, but then, something roiled those same clouds in an ever-expanding circle as a distant thunderclap reached his ears.

  “Hello, this is Myrtale. If you’re wondering what that was, take heart. We took out the reiver that lifted from Carhaix as it crossed fifty thousand meters. The debris should fall somewhere on your arctic icecap.”

  “Thanks, Myrtale.”

  “Glad to be of service. One down, two to go. Stand by.”

  “How’s everything else,” Janey asked.

  “Lannion pulled off a successful ambush. A hundred bastards dead. Their ship took a few hits before it bugged out. But Trevena only managed a partial ambush and found itself in a nasty firefight. They’re breaking contact now to let that lot lift as well so the Navy can finish them. I guess the Lannion bunch landed first, took a kick in the face and warned the others before they walked into yours and Trevena’s kill zone.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Another flash lit up the clouds, and another widening eddy roiled them.

  “Number two bites the plasma.”

  “Indeed,” the voice from Myrtale said. “It was the ship that lifted from Lannion. Two down, one to go. And I see number three is lifting from Trevena. Stand by.”

  Kayne fought off an irresistible urge to sit, now that his own surge of adrenaline was ebbing. The fighting might be over, save for the Navy taking out that third ship, but the cleanup job still lay before them. Starting with a hundred or so smoking corpses littering the Lannion spaceport road, and wherever armed colonists killed those trying to flee.

  “Zero, this is Niner.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Once the Navy kills that third ship, bring up the satellite constellation, then ask Chief Administrator Logran to sound the recall, so people can come out of the soggy wilderness and go home.” Except those whose homes in Carhaix and Trevena were smoking ruins. But that’s what neighbors were for. “And I’m coming back. Please tell Her Excellency that Lyonesse is once again safe.”

  Grimes chuckled. “Her Excellency knows. She’s been sitting behind me ever since you left for the spaceport.”

  **

  “Seems almost idyllic if you ignore the fact it was the scene of a battle against reivers a few hours ago.” DeCarde admired the blue-green orb partially obscured by shreds of white cloud now filling the CIC’s main display. “It’s a wonder how the bastards knew about Lyonesse. I’d not heard the name before meeting you and listening to your harebrained scheme.”

  “I don’t know. Traders working the frontier most probably. It certainly wasn’t through traffic since Lyonesse is an anomaly among G class stars with its single mapped, stable wormhole.”

  “And you never visited the place before today?”

  “Never. My knowledge comes from many sources, but none of it through personal experience. I’m seeing it for the first time. The only reason Lyonesse came to mind once I understood nothing could arrest the empire’s death spiral was because of an Academy classmate born here. She enjoyed speaking about her homeworld, and how it differed from the rest of the empire’s domains. Isolated and colonized mostly by those seeking to escape the Ruggero dynasty’s misrule, though the Lyonesse governor is appointed by Wyvern.”

  “Maybe you’ll meet her again on Lyonesse.”

  Morane shook his head. “Sadly, no. She was a Marine and died fighting reivers long ago in an unnamed star system no one wanted, and no one remembers.”

  “Occupational hazard. It was always thus for my kind, even before our ancestors left Earth.”

  “Ever been there? Earth, I mean?”

  DeCarde snorted. “No. I’m not one for museums and definitely not for the planet-sized version. It would give me the creeps. You?”

  “Once. As a young lieutenant. It was both interesting and depressing. I saw what was left of the old Commonwealth capital, Geneva, and the mo
nument to the Imperial Marines killed when the last secretary general ordered the city’s destruction rather than surrender.”

  “The Ancestor was there when it happened. He not only saw the antimatter explosion that wiped out over twenty-five hundred years of history along with an entire Marine division under his command, but he also led the forces that seized Earth for the first emperor. They put that monument up at his behest. A last act before leaving Earth, never to return.”

  “You’re talking about the forebear who started the family lore repository?”

  DeCarde dipped her head once. “The very same. I wonder what he would make of the empire’s slow death and our undertaking to save what knowledge we can.”

  “He’d probably experience a déjà vu moment.”

  “And curse in ten languages at the titled idiots tearing up what he’d reluctantly fought to build.”

  “Why reluctantly?”

  “The Ancestor spent most of his career in the Marine Corps fighting to keep power-hungry sociopaths from turning the Commonwealth into a repressive dictatorship only to serve an empire created by the Fleet as the sole solution to another murderous civil war.”

  “Which broke out nonetheless, though he and his contemporaries bought us a millennium of peace and prosperity. I daresay your ancestor might look upon our mission with approving eyes.”

  “Approving eyes, perhaps, but most certainly with a pungent comment.”

  “Sir?”

  Morane turned to the signals petty officer. “Yes?”

  “Their satellite constellation is up, and we’re being hailed. Audio and video. It’s coming from Lannion Base, the naval supply depot.”

  “On the main screen, please.”

  The image of four people sitting around the end of a conference table swam into view. Three men and one woman. One of the men wore a green battledress uniform and the expression of someone who was fresh from the fight. The woman, a striking, dark-haired aristocrat with a triangular face dominated by cheekbones sharp enough to cut granite, spoke first.

  “Captain Morane? I am Elenia Yakin, Governor of Lyonesse. We owe you more than we could ever repay for your warning, and for coming to our aid.”

  “I am Morane, Your Excellency, captain of the cruiser Vanquish and senior surviving officer of the 197th Battle Group.” He gestured to his right. “And this is Lieutenant Colonel Brigid DeCarde, commanding officer, 6th Battalion, 21st Marine Pathfinder Regiment.”

  “A pleasure. With me is Chief Administrator Gaspard Logran.” The bearded, pugnacious-looking civilian raised a hand. “Speaker of the Colonial Council Rorik Hecht.” The eldest and baldest man nodded gravely. “And finally Major Matti Kayne, commanding officer of the Lyonesse Colonial Militia. Major Kayne is a retired Imperial Marine.” Kayne stiffened to attention. “Sirs.”

  “We four make up the colony’s executive committee,” Yakin said. “And though we want to express our gratitude, we’re also burning with curiosity to know why you’re here. Not only did the last Marine regiment withdraw eight years ago, no Navy ship passed through since well before Admiral Zahar rebelled. Lyonesse is what you might call a barely known backwater though being ignored by the empire and now the rebellion suits us.”

  “It’s a rather long story, Your Excellency.”

  “We have all the time in the world, Captain.”

  — 55 —

  “Consider us refugees from the civil war, Madame. My cruiser, the frigate Myrtale who destroyed those reiver ships, and a naval transport by the name Narwhal, still inbound from the wormhole, are what’s left of an imperial battle group. The 197th was almost completely destroyed weeks ago in the Shield Sector thanks to a boneheaded loyalist admiral looking for a knighthood. We decided it was wiser to leave the empire altogether instead of aligning ourselves with either faction, knowing our lives were about to become nasty, brutish and short.

  “Since I figured Lyonesse was one of the places least likely to become a fresh battlefield, we traveled the wormhole network’s secondary branches whenever possible to come here unseen by either side. Along the way, I picked up a Marine Pathfinder battalion about to be massacred by rebels; a shipload of monastics fleeing deadly persecution by Admiral Zahar; three dozen children, survivors of a colony wiped out by reivers, and an Imperial Prison Service ship with over five hundred political prisoners condemned to permanent exile and an early death on Parth because of Dendera’s paranoia.”

  Logran’s bushy eyebrows crept up his seamed forehead. “Let me see if I understand this. You and the Marines are deserters, correct?”

  “If you wish to get technical, perhaps we are. I prefer to consider myself a rational survivor.”

  “These monastics, they belong to the Order of the Void?” Yakin asked.

  “Yes, Madame. Of every discipline. Healers, counselors, agronomists, teachers, and many more. Zahar’s troops razed the Yotai Abbey. They massacred most of the friars and sisters. About two hundred survived and traveled here under our protection.”

  Hecht shook his head. “Void Brethren. That’ll put a lot of noses out of joint on Lyonesse.”

  “Any reason why, sir?”

  “Distrust of their motives, mostly, I’d say. But I suppose no one can prevent you from landing them. And if they stay within Lannion Base’s perimeter, they’re beyond anyone’s jurisdiction, since it’s still legally Crown land, never mind the empire’s outer edges are light years away.”

  Yakin nodded in agreement with Hecht. “If we are to consider the Crown’s writ has any force here. But that’s a discussion for another time. And prisoners, you said?”

  “A little over five hundred. They’re still in stasis, and will stay so until you permit us to decant them.”

  “Are they all politicals, with no actual criminals among them?” Logran’s eyes shone with skepticism.

  “A few. We’ll vet each one before decanting them.”

  “What if you find murderers or rapists? No doubt you’ll be looking to us for a few prison cells.”

  “Or we can set up a place of exile on some island group inaccessible save by air and maroon them there. It would have been their fate on Parth.”

  The chief administrator’s glare softened. “There is a place of exile in the Windy Isles, but we can discuss the matter in more detail later. And what is to be the legal status of your naval ships and the Marine battalion? What if the Arietis system commander sends a patrol here?”

  “There is no Arietis system commander. The rebellion withdrew, which is how these reivers could sail down the Lyonesse branch. Arietis faces a dismal future since it’s a not inconsiderable wormhole junction connecting with the outer frontier and the badlands beyond. Madame, gentlemen, you need to understand the empire is fracturing at an ever faster rate, with warlords proclaiming themselves rulers over individual systems. Before long, they’ll fight each other back into the pre-spaceflight age.”

  The four stared at Morane, surprised and to varying degrees stunned by the news.

  “You asked why we’re here, Madame. We’re here because of Lyonesse’s unique place in the wormhole network. I’m hoping it will escape the ravages of war and so become one of the places if not the sole place where human knowledge and human civilization can survive the empire’s collapse. A human knowledge vault, if you like. I intend to pledge my ships, crews, and Marines to help your Colonial Militia defend Lyonesse against any invader.”

  Yakin studied him with dark eyes that betrayed little of her inner thoughts. “Is the situation really that grim, Captain Morane?”

  “Grimmer than you can imagine. The Fleet is tearing itself apart, battle group is fighting battle group, Imperial Guards are grappling with Marines who’ve mutinied, admirals are assassinating viceroys and Dendera is squeezing so hard, everything is slipping through her fingers. Right now the rebellious sector commanders are cooperating, but that will quickly end as they vie to become Dendera’s successor. And their sectors are shrinking, or at least the Coalsack Sector is. Arieti
s wasn’t a frontier system by any stretch, but it slipped into the badlands, nonetheless. And because of the wormhole network’s vagaries, so has Lyonesse.”

  “A harsh assessment. But I won’t dispute its accuracy. The signs of a looming crisis were there for anyone to see even while I was still at court. But too many of my fellow so-called nobles were busy playing power games instead.” Yakin’s gaze remained inscrutable, yet Morane fancied it held a spark of interest. “Some would call you strange, Captain, coming here with a dramatic proposal to make this colony the last repository of humanity’s greatness as the galaxy burns up. Many colonists will scoff at you, and they’ll not be happy with an enlarged, full-time military garrison adding to the strain on our treasury. But I daresay today’s events will convince those paying attention that our universe now answers to different rules. That having only one wormhole terminus doesn’t prevent reivers from coming if no one is guarding the other end.”

  “Indeed, Madame. And a few raids later, any unfortunate colony that falls victim to the barbarians will suffer enough losses to face a catastrophic collapse. Many will die off entirely. This is not speculation. We saw two planets shorn of human life in the last few months, and helped two more, Lyonesse included, fend off such an attack. I would be glad to share the scans we took so you might see for yourselves.”

  “Except with you here, Lyonesse has a few ships and a battalion of Marines.”

  Morane nodded. “It does. More importantly, it has ships and Marines whose first and only allegiance will be to Lyonesse. The empire and the rebellion can’t call us away since we no longer look to either. Of course, without regular overhauls and repairs, the ships will gradually waste away. But if we know how to build more, we can develop the necessary infrastructure and remain capable of space travel. On a lesser scale, perhaps, but still. However, like the Lyonesse Colonial Militia, our Marines can keep replenishing their ranks for countless generations and destroy any reivers foolish enough to land.”