The Stories: Five Years of Original Fiction on Tor.com

by Various

  In the hologram, Dennison’s flagship exploded in a spray of metal and light. Varion was perfect. And Dennison was perfectly incompetent. He didn’t make this acknowledgement despondently or with self-pity. It was simply a fact. Varion had won Marcus Seven in barely two hours. The fiasco Dennison had just watched was a recording of his fourth attempt. He’d needed seven tries to win.

  Dennison sighed, rising and leaving the hologram chamber. He needed to stretch. The lavish passages of the Stormwind were oddly empty, and Dennison frowned, walking along the carpeted corridor until he encountered a minor aide. The man paused briefly, saluting and showing the same discomforted confusion the junior officers usually gave Dennison. They weren’t certain what to make of a High Officer who hadn’t been given a command, yet was important enough to share dinner with Admiral Kern every evening.

  “Are we in battle?” Dennison asked.

  “Um, yes, sir,” the younger man said quickly, eyes darting to the side.

  “Be off with you then,” Dennison said, waving the man away.

  The junior officer eagerly dashed away. Dennison stood, frowning to himself. Had he really been so absorbed that he hadn’t noticed the battle alarm? Not that Kern’s flagship was really in any danger. This would be a minor battle; Varion’s personal fleets handled all the serious fighting. Still, Dennison would like to have watched the fight. He headed for the bridge.

  The Stormwind’s main bridge was larger than those of ships Dennison had commanded, but the central feature was still the battle hologram. Dennison left the lift, ignoring salutes as he stepped up the railing, looking down. Kern himself stood in the hologram, but said little. He was a traditional commander; he left most of the local decisions to his Squadron-commanders, who flew in smaller gunships or longships who were in the thick of the battle.

  Varion didn’t use Squadron-commanders. He fought every battle himself, controlling each squadron directly. That would have been foolhardy for anyone else, but Varion did it with the aplomb of a chess master playing against novices. Dennison shook his head. Enough of Varion for the moment, he thought.

  Kern’s own battle didn’t look like much of a fight. The High Admiral’s ships outnumbered the opposition by at least three to one.

  The battle progressed as expected. Dennison felt a longing as he watched, a wistfulness that he thought he’d quashed back in the Academy. His study of Varion was awakening old pains. He could almost feel the moves on the battlefield. When the squad commanders made their decisions—the orders manifest in the movement of the holographic ships—Dennison instantly knew which choices were better than others. He could see the majesty of the entire battlefield. Kern’s forces needed to press to the northeast quadrant, drawing fighters away to defend their command ships so that the gunships to the south would fall. That would let Kern’s superior numbers drain the enemy of resources until the rebellious group had no choice but to surrender.

  Dennison could see this, but he didn’t know how to accomplish it. As always, he grasped the concepts, but not the application. He was not a practical, hands-on commander of the type the empire preferred. It wasn’t so odd. Dennison knew of men who loved music, couldn’t play a note themselves. One could enjoy a grand painting without being able to replicate its brush-strokes. Art was valuable for the very reason that it could be appreciated by those of lesser skill. Remote leading and battlefield tactics were indeed arts, and Dennison would never be more than a spectator.

  “Where are we, anyway?” Dennison asked an aide.

  “Gammot system, my lord,” the aide answered.

  Dennison frowned, leaning down on the railing. Gammot? He hadn’t realized that Varion had gotten so far, let alone Kern’s mop-up force. He waved for an aide to bring him a datapad, then punched up a map of the empire and overlaid it with a schematic of Varion’s conquests. He was amazed by what he saw.

  It was nearly done. Varion’s forces were approaching the last rebellious systems. I really have been distracted lately, Dennison thought. Soon there would be peace. And with that peace, commanders wouldn’t be as important. They hadn’t been during the Grand Eras.

  Why, then, was it so imperative that Dennison be forced into Varion’s mold? Everyone—the High Emperor, Kern, Dennison’s father—acted as if Dennison’s studies were absolutely vital.

  It had to be his father, pleading for Dennison’s continued training—not because it mattered to the empire, but because Sennion didn’t want a failed warrior as a son.

  * * *

  “Of course there will still be a need for commanders,” Kern scoffed as a servant ladled soup into his bowl. “What makes you think otherwise?”

  “The Reunification War is nearly over,” Dennison said.

  Kern’s dining chamber was a compact version of one in an imperial mansion back on the Point, complete with marble columns and tapestries. The High Admiral’s rank forbade his fraternizing with his other Sub-Commanders, but Dennison’s higher birth and relation to Varion Crestmar made him an exception. Kern seemed able to relax and dine with Dennison—as if he didn’t see him as an underling, but rather as a young family member come to visit.

  Kern snorted at Dennison’s logic. “There will be insurrections for some time yet, Dennison,” he said, attacking his soup. Kern lived like an imperial nobleman, but he was far less reserved than most. Perhaps that was why Dennison got along with him.

  “Yes, but Varion and his officers will be free to handle them,” Dennison said, ignoring his own soup.

  “All men age, and new blood needs to replace them,” Kern said.

  “The empire doesn’t need me, Kern,” Dennison said. “It never has. Only my father’s stubbornness keeps me here.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Kern said. “Either way, I have my orders. How is your training coming?”

  Dennison shrugged. “I fought the Marcus Seven battle four more times today and lost twice. Still can’t win it consistently.”

  “Marcus Seven,” Kern said with a frown. “You’re taking your time. At this rate, it’ll take you another year to get through Varion’s archive.”

  “At least I’m not complaining any more.”

  “No,” Kern agreed. “You aren’t. In fact, you actually seem to be enjoying yourself.”

  Dennison took a sip. “Perhaps so. My brother makes for an interesting subject.”

  “When you first came on board, I could tell you hated him.”

  Dennison rested his spoon back in his bowl. “I suppose I did,” he finally said. “At the Academy, I was never given a chance to succeed—the other boys challenged me to battles before I was ready, each one wanting the prestige of defeating Varion’s brother. I became a loser before I could learn otherwise. I didn’t choose my path—Varion chose it for me. “But, now . . .” Dennison trailed off, then he looked Kern in the eye. “Could any man really hate him? How can you hate someone who’s perfect?”

  Kern seemed troubled. Finally, he turned back to his meal. “At any rate, you should soon have a chance to meet him.”

  Dennison looked up, surprised.

  Kern took a sip of soup. “The Reaches are nearly subdued. In two months, Varion will meet with an Imperial Emissary on Kress, where they will hold a ceremony welcoming him back to civilization. You may attend, if you wish.”

  Dennison smiled broadly. “I do,” he decided. “I do indeed.”

  * * *

  Dennison was surprised by how bright the colors were. Kress was a sparsely inhabited world near the border of the Reaches. Its weather was obviously unregulated, for the wind blew strongly against Dennison’s face as he stood in the speeder’s door.

  Dennison stepped onto the soft ground, sneezing and raising a hand against the bright sunlight. The vibrant green grass came up to his knees. What kind of world was this to greet a returning hero? A pavilion had been erected a short distance away, and Dennison made his way there. Here, at least, a local weather regulator had been set up, and the wind slowed as he entered
the invisible confines of its influence. There, he unexpectedly found his father standing with a delegation of high-ranking ambassadors and military men. Sennion’s perfect white uniform was a pristine contrast to the wild lands around him.

  A small pavilion on a rural world? Why not meet Varion with the adoring crowds he deserves?

  Dennison could see a drop-ship descending through the wild air. He stepped up beside his father. Dennison hadn’t seen him in over six months, but Sennion barely nodded in acknowledgement. The drop-ship fell like flare. It plummeted, slowing only when it neared the ground, its plasma jets carelessly vaporizing the grass. The weather-sphere kept the wind of its landing from unsettling the pavilion’s dignified occupants. Dennison edged a bit closer to the front, waiting eagerly as the drop-ship doorway opened.

  He had seen pictures of Varion. They didn’t do him justice. Pictures could not convey the confidence, the powerful presence, of a man like Varion Crestmar. With his silver hair and commanding eyes, he walked down the ramp like a god descending to the mortal realm.

  When last seen on the Imperial Homeworld, Varion had been a smooth-faced boy. Now he bore the lines of combat and age; he was in the middle of his fifth decade. He wore an imperial uniform, but not one of a standard color. Dennison frowned. White was for nobility, blue for citizen officers, and red for regular soldiers. But . . . gray. There was no gray.

  A group of officers walked down the ramp after Varion. Dennison recognized many of them. The woman would be Charisa of Utaries, a celebrated fighter pilot and squadron leader, one of the first rebel commanders who had joined Varion. The histories and biographies spoke often of her. What they didn’t mention was the way Varion rested his hand on her elbow as they walked forward, the way he watched her with obvious fondness.

  To Varion’s right were Admirals Brakah and Terarn, two men who had been with Varion at the Academy, then had requested assignment under his command. They were said to be his most trusted advisors. They walked behind Varion as he approached, walking with the sure step Dennison had imagined. Varion stopped just short of entering the pavilion.

  Sennion Crestmar, High Officer and Imperial Duke, stepped forward to greet his son. “In the name of the High Emperor, I welcome you, returning warrior.” His words carried over the wind that still whipped outside the pavilion. “Accept this as a token of our esteem, and take your rightful place as the greatest High Admiral the Empire has ever known.”

  Sennion extended a hand bearing a golden medal emblazoned with the double sunburst seal, the highest and most prestigious of the Imperial Crests.

  Varion stood in the wind, looking down at the medal that swung from his father’s hand. He reached out, taking the award in his hand, then held it up before the light, dangling it before his eyes.

  All were still.

  Then Varion let the medal drop to the grass.

  Sennion’s gun was in his hand in an instant. He pointed the weapon at his son’s forehead and gave no opportunity for retraction. He simply pulled the trigger.

  The energy blast burst just millimeters before Varion’s face and then dissipated. The High Admiral hadn’t moved. He was unhurt, and apparently unconcerned.

  Around Dennison, the pavilion’s occupants burst into motion. Flex-blasters and slug-drivers were pulled from holsters as men jumped for cover. Soldiers and officers alike drew. Dennison stood, immobile amid the yelling and the gunfire, and realized he wasn’t surprised.

  The greatest High Admiral the Fleet has ever known . . . perhaps the greatest commander mankind has ever seen. Of course he wouldn’t stop with the Reaches. Why would he? Dennison’s father fired again, weapon held just inches from Varion’s face. Again, the blast evaporated, hitting some kind of invisible shield.

  This is no Imperial technology, Dennison thought, stepping forward obliviously as others opened fire. Energy bolts and slugs alike were stopped by Varion’s strange shield. Twenty years on his own, autonomous and unfettered by Imperial control. . . . Of course! He captured the most technologically advanced worlds first. That’s why some of those choices didn’t make sense. He was planning for this even back then.

  Men called for Dennison’s father to get out of the way. Some were firing at Varion’s officers, but they too had the strange personal shields, and they stood calmly, not even bothering to return fire. Dennison continued to walk forward, drawn to his brother. He watched as Varion reached down and unholstered his sidearm and raised it to his father’s head.

  “You are no child of mine,” Sennion said, proudly staring down his son. “I disavow you. I should have done it twenty years ago.”

  Dennison froze as Varion pulled the trigger. The duke’s corpse crumpled to the ground, a few wisps of smoke rising from his head.

  A wave of gun-blasts stormed from behind Dennison, ineffectively firing at Varion. The grass and earth before Varion exploded with fire and weapon blasts. Someone called for a physician.

  Varion turned to regard the attack, raising a hand, waving his people back into the ship. Then he noticed Dennison. Silvermane steeped forward, carefully picking his way across the scarred ground. Dennison felt like scrambling back toward his speeder, but running would be useless. This was Varion Silvermane. He did not lose. People did not escape him. Those eyes . . . looking into those eyes, Dennison knew that this man could destroy him.

  Varion stopped right in front of Dennison. The High Admiral’s eyes looked contemplative. “So,” he finally said, voice clear even over the gunfire and yells. “They did clone me. Well, the High Emperor will find that I am even capable of defeating myself.”

  He turned and left. Someone finally got a big repeating Calzer gun working, and it fired a blinding barrage of blue bolts. Varion’s shields repulsed them. There should have been some blowback, at least, but there was nothing. Varion walked up the ramp to his ship as calmly as he had strolled down.

  The Calzer soon drained the pavilion’s energy stores, and the weather sphere collapsed, letting in the full fury of the winds. Dennison stepped forward through lines of smoke torn and then dispersed by the gale, ignoring the voices of angry, confused, and frightened men.

  Varion’s drop-ship blasted off, throwing Dennison to the ground. By the time his vision cleared, the ship was a dark speck in the air.

  * * *

  “We knew he had something,” Kern said, watching the holo for the tenth time. “But his shield. Where did he develop it? We put spies on each world. . . .”

  “He brought them with him,” Dennison said quietly, standing against the view railing.

  “What?”

  “The scientists,” Dennison said from the side of the hologram room. “Varion doesn’t trust anything he can’t watch directly. He would have brought the scientists from Gemwater with him, probably on his flagship. That way he could supervise their work.”

  “Gemwater . . .” Kern said. “But he conquered that planet over fifteen years ago! You think your brother has been keeping secrets for that long?”

  Dennison nodded distractedly. “He knew from that first battle at Seapress. He understood that by quelling the Reaches, he would make the High Empire stronger and harder to defeat when the time came. That’s why he took Gemwater so early, to give its scientists decades to build him secret technology.”

  Kern watched the holo again.

  The universe felt . . . awry to Dennison. His father was dead. Sennion Crestmar had never been loving, but he had instilled in Dennison a powerful will to succeed. He’d been demanding, rigid, and unforgiving. Yet, Dennison had hoped that someday . . . maybe . . . he would be able to make the man proud.

  And now he never would. Varion had robbed Dennison of that.

  What does it matter? Dennison thought. The hologram below showed the firefight through smoke and verdant grass. Sennion wasn’t even really my father. I have no father. Unless Varion was wrong.

  No. Varion was never wrong.

  Only two men could verify the claim for certain. The first lay dead from an ene
rgy blast to the head. The other—The High Emperor, who had to approve all cloning requests—had yet to respond to Dennison’s request for an audience. But Dennison knew what the answer would be. The saddest part wasn’t that Dennison was a fabricated tool, it was that he was a defective one. Genetically, he was the same as Varion. He had even checked in the mirror and found a few silver hairs. Varion had started to go gray at twenty-three—Dennison’s age now.

  So many things made sudden and daunting sense. You cannot be like other officers, his father had said. The High Empire expects more. No wonder they had pushed Dennison so hard; no wonder they had refused to let him leave the service. He was Varion.

  And yet he wasn’t. Whatever Varion had, it hadn’t been transmitted to Dennison. That confidence of his hadn’t come from a random mingling of chromosomes. The victories, the power, the sheer momentum. These could not be copied.

  The High Emperor will find that I am even capable of defeating myself. Varion knew—knew that he was special, somehow.

  “Dennison,” Kern said.

  Dennison looked up. Kern sat below, in a chair just before the holo, looking up disapprovingly. He had paused the recording. The point he had inadvertently chosen showed a disturbing image. Varion’s weapon raised, smoking, a corpse falling to the grass below. . . .

  “Dennison, I asked you a question,” Kern said.

  “He’s going to win, Kern,” Dennison said, staring at the holo. “The empire . . . to Varion, what is the empire but another collection of recalcitrant planets to be brought into line?”

  Kern glanced at the holo, and—realizing where he’d paused it—turned off the image.

  “We are High Officers, Dennison,” Kern said sternly. “Such talk isn’t fitting.”

  Dennison snorted.

  “Varion can be defeated,” Kern insisted.

  Dennison shook his head. “No. He can’t. And why should we bother, anyway? When does a man stop being a hero and start being a tyrant? If he had the right to bring the rebellious Reaches into line, then why shouldn’t he claim the same moral right regarding us?”