The Empire of Ruin

by Robert I. Katz

  They floated sedately along, guided by their jets. The tunnel curved once, then again. They went single file, careful to stay to the center. They had no difficulty seeing, as all around them, energy surged in tiny, flashing annihilations of primordial matter. Finally, after more than two hours, Michael stopped. He reached into his travel kit and pulled out the box that he had used to enter this warped space and triggered it. Once again, a glowing blue circle formed, floated forward and expanded in front of them. “If the calculations are correct, we should emerge underneath the government complex, in the sub-basements of Parliament. The basements are usually used as store rooms. We don’t know what’s in them now. There could be prisoners. There could be guards. They could have mined the place with explosives.”

  “We know this,” Curly said. “You’ve told us more than once.”

  Michael knew that they knew. Now that they were here, at what he hoped was their destination, he found himself hesitating. “Right,” he said. “Curly, do you want to do the honors?”

  Curly seemed to shrug, difficult to tell through the massive armor. He stepped forward and vanished through the ring.

  “Alright, people, let’s move it. We don’t know what’s happening on the other side.”

  Michael was once again the last. Gravity immediately pulled him to a concrete floor. They stood in a large room, filled with desks, chairs and crates of various sizes. Michael sighed in relief. “Alright,” he said.

  At least half of the soldiers had already fanned out into other rooms. They knew what they were doing. If they had encountered any resistance, they had dealt with it without making a sound. The door opened and one of the armored soldiers came through, walked up to Michael and saluted. “This level appears to be clear,” he said.

  Anson sniffed and rolled his eyes. Anson, a Colonel in his Imperial Majesty’s Marines, figured that Anson should be in charge of this mini-invasion, not Michael. The fact that Michael knew things that he did not, that his background was a mystery, seemed not to matter to him in the slightest. Anson was a marine. Michael was something else.

  Michael suppressed a smile. By now, Michael was well used to Anson’s attitude. It still annoyed him but it amused him even more. “You know what to do,” Michael said. “Let’s get to it.”

  The sub-basements connected through a series of tunnels beneath the entire complex. They split up into squadrons and drifted away. All of the squadrons had their assignments.

  “This way, people.” Michael moved down a dimly lit corridor, the crew plus ten Illyrians following.

  As he walked, he queried his internal server. “Romulus?”

  The coded response came immediately. “It is good to hear from you. I was uncertain.”

  Uncertain seemed to sum up this enterprise. “So far, so good. We’re here, and we’re all alive.”

  “There has been no news and no official announcements. So far as the citizens of Dancy are concerned, nothing is amiss besides the recent explosions.”

  “Nothing else happening?”

  “Not yet. Not that we can detect.”

  Michael grunted. “Keep me informed,” he said, and logged off.

  Parliament was the largest building in the complex. They came to a door that opened on a stairwell. They climbed one flight and silently crept out onto a second basement level, again used for storage. They quickly explored it, confirmed that nothing was amiss and went back to the stairs. Two more levels similarly remained quiet and unoccupied.

  Michael felt a vibration beneath his feet. Somewhere in the complex, Arcturus’ men had made contact with the enemy.

  “They’ll be alert, now,” Curly whispered, “or they will be soon.”

  The next flight led out into a corridor on the ground floor, which led to a large atrium from which in turn, more corridors, stairways and lifts led into the rest of the massive building.

  The distant sound of gunfire came to their ears, then again, closer.

  “Ready?” Michael said.

  They all nodded.

  “Then let’s go.”

  Chapter 35

  A laser flickered over Michael’s head. He rolled, threw a stun grenade and ducked behind a stacked pile of furniture.

  The Illyrians were as good as any troops that Michael had ever served with and they had hit the enemy fast and hard. Still, they were outnumbered. The Winter Palace had been re-taken, the Prince and his family rescued but not without injury. Prince Nikolai’s youngest son, a twelve year old boy had suffered a broken arm. The Prince himself was burned over twenty percent of his body as one of his erstwhile captors blew himself up rather than be taken.

  The local governor was dead, his palace nearly demolished. Liberated, in a sense, but not much of a victory.

  The Prime Minister’s residence was still besieged. His wife had managed to lock herself plus the children in a shielded room but if the bad guys blew the place up, that probably wouldn’t save them.

  The Prime Minister himself had been attending Parliament when the place was invaded and now, after an hour of back and forth fighting, Parliament was still the center of the action. Michael had ordered the release of a horde of minidrones but the enemy had set up an EMP generator that had quickly knocked out the drones. Before they died, the drones had been able to give Michael at least an overview of the situation. All the MP’s present, along with a slew of visiting dignitaries, were locked into Parliament Hall, a large circular amphitheater rising in tiers, each tier containing multiple workstations where the MP’s would sit for debate, voting and judgment. Now, they were huddled together on a central platform in the center of the room, armored guards standing on the rows above them.

  A grenade sailed through the air. Michael blasted it with a laser and ducked again as shrapnel sprayed his position. A piece of shrapnel pinged off his armor. He ignored it.

  Two of them came at him at once, one swinging a rifle like a club, the second waving a weighted cudgel. Michael leaned back by half a centimeter as the rifle swept past his face, kicked his attacker’s leg out from underneath him and put a quick bullet through his faceplate. The cudgel hit him on the shoulder. He rolled with the blow, then reversed and shattered the second attacker’s knee with a kick from his powered armor.

  Both of them were down, one dead, the second barely able to crawl, his leg twisted behind him at an unnatural angle. Michael ran on. He dashed across the room, pulsed his jets and briefly activated his suit’s AG. He rose toward the ceiling, bounced off at an angle and launched a round of grenades before the enemy, surprised by the tactic, could react. The grenades splattered against the wall over their heads, bringing down a couple of tons of plaster which obscured half of the atrium in a cloud of dust.

  “There has been a new development,” Romulus said.

  “Tell me.” Michael didn’t stop what he was doing. He jetted through the dust cloud, his radar pinpointing the enemy and dropped a series of stun grenades, then he zipped behind a partition and waited for the boom.

  Curly, Frankie and three of the marines darted out from a pile of rubble, running a zig-zag pattern across the giant room. Lasers crackled against their shields, then the far side of the room lit up as Michael’s grenades exploded and the lasers abruptly cut off. Curly and the others stopped for an instant and then kept going.

  “Can you talk?” Romulus asked.

  “I’m a little busy,” Michael replied. “What’s up?”

  “The naval base on Sumeria has been attacked. There was no warning. The domes have been breached, the fleet effectively destroyed.”

  Sumeria was the nearest moon, the largest of the three. So much for the long, secret infiltration. The Imperium had evidently decided to go for broke. Offhand, though, it didn’t make a lot of sense. Dancy contained the heart of the central government but each province possessed its own bureaucracy and there were hundreds of military installations. Unless they had enough ships to destroy the Empire suddenly and totally, they were going to find themselves in a war th
at they couldn’t win. Even here, despite the destruction of the base guarding Dancy, there were at least twenty more ships patrolling the system. It would take those ships a couple of days to get here and by then, whatever attack was underway would be over, but in the long run, the Imperium was going to find itself outgunned.

  Unless they did have enough ships and men to destroy the Empire suddenly and totally, or unless they had allies. That was a disquieting thought.

  “Who? Where are they?”

  “A few minutes after the attack, ten military vessels appeared. Their stealth technology is superior to that of the Empire’s. They were not seen.”

  “How far away?”

  “Two hours.”

  Enough time for panic and chaos to engulf the little world. Great.

  “What are their demands?”

  “Nothing as of yet. They are remaining silent.”

  Curly, Frankie, and the others had by now dragged their unconscious adversaries out into the open, pried them out of their armor and tied them up. The cloud of plaster had settled, covering everything with a fine, white coating of dust. Above their heads, a small, loose chunk fell off the wall and slid to the ground.

  “Two hours is a lot of time,” Michael said.

  “Shall I contact Arcturus?”

  “Yeah.” Michael hesitated. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

  The fight dragged on but all of the men and women under Michael’s command were well trained and the enemy, while there might have been some elite troops among them, were mostly mercs—pretty good but lacking motivation once it became clear that they were losing. In less than an hour, the complex was secure.

  All the MP’s and assorted dignitaries were assembled in Parliament Hall. Two, in particular caught Michael’s attention. He cracked his visor and raised the faceplate.

  A big man who looked a lot like Douglas Oliver peered at him, then grinned as Matthew and Marissa walked up. “Hey, Squirt,” he said. “Muffin. Dad sent us a message. We thought you might show up.”

  “Don’t call me Muffin,” Marissa said.

  The young man smiled and held out his hand to Michael. “Celim Oliver,” he said. “You must be Michael Glover.”

  “What are you doing here?” Michael said.

  “My sisters and I were in the process of negotiating the final terms of Illyria’s membership in the Empire,”—he waved a hand at the destruction—“when all of this happened.” He smiled even wider. “I believe you know Catherine Halliday?”

  “My people are beginning to arrive on Illyria,” Catherine said. “The re-settlement is going smoothly. Douglas Oliver asked me to assist with the diplomatic mission.”

  “Well…” Suddenly, he felt awkward. Frankie, he noticed, was staring at the two of them, a quizzical frown on her face. Catherine was standing very close, gazing into his eyes with dewy, parted lips, one palm nestled casually against his armored chest. He blinked and took a small step back. Catherine looked over at Frankie, tilted her head to the side, and suddenly seemed to get it. She smiled, a little wistfully.

  “Thank you for the rescue,” she said.

  “Don’t thank me, yet,” he said. “I’m afraid it’s not over.”

  Chapter 36

  He should have looked worried. Maybe he was worried on the inside. Michael hoped so. He was tall, sandy haired, well-built and good-looking, a fantasy caricature of the intrepid leader of men. “Name?” Michael asked.

  “Trevor Howard,” he said, and grinned.

  Trevor Howard had his hands bound behind him and was tied to a chair. They were sitting together in a small conference room near Parliament Hall. Henrik Anson sat next to Michael and Arcturus was linked in by vid.

  “So, Trevor Howard, who are you and what was your plan?”

  The grin grew wider. “Can’t tell you that, old chap. Cooperation with the enemy is frowned upon.”

  “Really?” Michael gave him a moody look. “Let’s see…the rules of war (if you believe that war can actually have rules) state that enemy combatants are to be treated humanely. Pirates, however, can be summarily executed. Same with spies.

  “You’re not wearing a uniform and legitimate soldiers are required to identify themselves if captured. You’re given us a name, which is most likely a fake, and no other identification whatsoever. That makes you a pirate or a spy.”

  Michael gave Trevor Howard a toothy grin. Trevor Howard frowned.

  “You with me, so far?”

  Trevor Howard finally looked a little worried. Good to see.

  “So, who do you work for?”

  Trevor Howard shrugged. “The Imperium, who else?”

  “And what exactly is ‘The Imperium?’”

  Michael knew the answer to this, of course, but he was curious to see if Trevor Howard did, as well. It turned out that he didn’t, not exactly. “They’re your main competitors. They have an Empire that’s just as large and even more advanced. They’ve been preparing to fight you for over a century. Frankly, you don’t have a chance.”

  “We took care of you, though. Didn’t we?”

  Howard shrugged. “It’s one battle, not the war.”

  “So, who, exactly, are you?”

  “First Sellurian Marine Division.”

  “Sellurian…”

  Arcturus, watching and listening through the screen, nodded, unsurprised.

  Romulus’ voice fed the information into his server. “Selluria is a warlike, mid-tech planet only recently contacted by the Empire. They venerate the memory of the First Empire and aspire to their ancestors’ martial greatness.”

  Anson leaned forward. “Sellurians would never betray their own side.”

  “This is true. The Imperium contacted us about the same time that you did. They offered us a better deal. You’re not our side.”

  “Who, exactly, is ‘us?’”

  “My government: Germanica.”

  “Selluria is not a unified world,” Arcturus put in. “There are at least one hundred independent nations on Selluria. Germanica is one of the smallest.”

  Howard shrugged. “We’re small but we’re tough.”

  “Also stupid, apparently,” said Michael. “The Imperium has lied to you. They’re about one tenth the size of the Empire and their tech is not better than ours.” Except for the stealth, Michael reminded himself. The stealth was worrisome. “It’s true that they’ve been working against us but in the end, they’re going to get crushed.”

  Howard frowned.

  “Nothing to say?” Howard looked away and frowned harder. It occurred to Michael that Trevor Howard was not exactly the brightest star in the firmament. “So,” he said again, “what was the plan?”

  Howard shrugged and seemed suddenly to slump in his chair. “Take hostages,” he said, “and wait for reinforcements.” He grinned weakly. “They’re on the way.”

  An hour later, a transmission was received from the oncoming fleet. The image of a tall, thin man in an Admiral’s uniform appeared on the screen. “I am Joseph Ryan, Admiral of the Imperium Fifth Fleet. This is not a negotiation,” the Admiral said. “This is a demand. You will deliver your Prime Minister, all assembled Members of Parliament and all members of the Royal Family of the so-called ‘Second Interstellar Empire of Humanity’ to us. You will cease hostilities immediately and surrender to our forces.”

  Prime Minister Khoory pasted a doubtful look on his face. “What do you hope to gain from this, Admiral? You appear to have us at a momentary disadvantage but that will soon change. We have more ships than you. Those ships will arrive here within forty-eight hours. You might be able to take this complex, or even the city, but you cannot hold it.”

  The Admiral grinned, as if he had no doubt of the outcome. “What I hope to gain is victory. Victory for the forces of the Imperium. You see, Prime Minister, while the Second Empire admittedly possesses greater military resources than the Imperium, those forces are diffuse and spread out, while we are in a position to capture or destroy you
r government, right here and right now. We’ve planned this for a long time.”

  Michael, watching from a conference room, said, “Ten ships won’t do it.”

  Arcturus suddenly frowned. “A convoy of armored cars has been reported twelve miles outside of the city.” He turned away, seemed to listen to something that Michael could not hear. “Two others as well, converging from all directions. Each convoy is accompanied by a fleet of airborne vehicles under AG.” Arcturus winced. “They appear to have planned this in more detail than we thought. The city is about to be invaded.”

  Terra Nova was one of the most sophisticated cities in the known Universe, a playground for the rich, famous and very, very important. The citizens of Dancy had no acquaintance with life in the state of Nature. None had ever starved. None had ever been threatened. None had ever been required to look death in the face.

  Until now.

  There was panic, but luckily, it was a quiet sort of panic, taking place behind closed windows and locked doors. They stayed inside, where it was safer. Those who had screens, which was most, activated them. A solid blast from an energy rifle would be absorbed, a bullet deflected. A medium sized explosive would overload the screens (they were meant to keep out intruders, after all, not a military attack with high powered weaponry), but hopefully, it wouldn’t come to that. Why should it? They were civilians. Best to hunker down and stay out of the line of fire.

  Which was just fine with Michael and Arcturus. “We don’t have a militia. It takes a long time to train a soldier to wear armor and use modern weapons. The average citizen does not know how to fight and I would just as soon not have to try to protect them,” Arcturus said.