“I am Lucius of the 906th Dawntreaders” the legionnaire answered.
Jun was cut-off before he could ask more questions. “To my right are Tybalt, Galahad, Nerva and Cassiel. On my left are Fendrel, Tariele, Hadrian and Trajan. Does that sate your curiosity?”
The Dawntreaders removed their helmets and Jun was taken aback to see that they all, even the females, had the same silver hair as Lucius. He laughed nervously in response. “Partly, yes-” he began.
“Humans always have it in such great quantity, when you should only have a little to keep yourselves safe” Nerva said. Her eyes were a deep brown and like Lucius she seemed to look through him as if they both doubted that he belonged.
“You want to know why you are here” Lucius said. It was a blunt statement of fact rather than an attempt to clarify Jun’s next question. Only now did Jun notice that the Senators had still said nothing and were watching the legionnaires talk to him like they were figures of supreme authority. Perhaps they knew better than him, though. Maybe they already knew when they were supposed to be silent and when the legionnaires would want them to talk.
“Yes” Jun agreed needlessly.
“Must we make it any more obvious?” Fendrel asked, his voice flat and toneless, belying the true intention of his sharply-meant words.
“To some, obviously” Nerva replied, never withdrawing her gaze from Jun, making the whole interaction even more uncomfortable for him.
Then Lucius spoke again and the authority in his speech seemed to diffuse the atmosphere of the room. “You have been brought here for one reason and one alone” he announced, cutting through the tension life a hot knife. “You have begun to wonder about the nature of the man who has power over the entirety of your race. We are here because your suspicions are correct.”
Jun wasn’t given enough time to consider the full meaning of that as Lucius continued without pause. “This group are the few among your Senate who are not afraid to face the truth, the single reality that threatens to destroy everything the Apostles and my fellow legions are attempting to save. The Lord Governor, the solitary man with absolute power to wield over the Gothican Empire, has been Corrupted and he’s more likely than not been such for a long while”.
Jun let the words sink in, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t seem to believe what he had heard. On the one hand, all his fears of being watched by hostile eyes seemed ridiculous and made him feel like a fool for getting it wrong. On the other, reason told him that if the legionnaires thought the same thing about the Lord Governor that he did, then it must be true. Humanity was being led by a madman who could take them in any direction he wanted, including the involvement in a war that the species couldn’t possibly hope to endure in any capacity.
No longer able to look at Lucius for fear of revealing the conflicting thoughts tearing through him, he glanced at another of the legionnaires who took up the conversation instead. It was the one named Galahad, if he recalled the hurried introductions correctly.
“We’re going to kill him Jun, but we need your help…” Galahad explained, completing the destruction of Jun’s understanding of the world around him.
Chapter 5
THANOS STOOD ON the bridge of the Nighthunter, the Blackstar of his sister Nightingale and waited for the news he had heard moments ago to settle in his mind.
“My Lord Cerberus, we have lost Volantia” Azrael had said. Though he had no cause to be upset with the commander of his legion, Thanos couldn’t help but feel angry and it came out in his terse reply. “Come back to me only when you have good news, Azrael, not a moment before”.
The holographic projection of the legionnaire bowed and faded away without any sign of emotional reaction. Thanos regretted his tone almost immediately, but the feeling passed just as quickly. He had to give the Guardians’ of the 73rd Hellhounds credit for their stoicism; he wasn’t the kindest or the most stable of Apostles, but no matter what aspect of himself he threw at them, they served him loyally and without question. He liked to think they understood his nature, Azrael most of all, but he couldn’t fool himself about that all the time, not when he remembered the beast he turned into on the battlefield.
“You are always so harsh on yourself…” a ghostly voice sounded behind him.
Thanos never heard his sister Nightingale arrive on the bridge, but he wasn’t surprised by her ability to appear undetected. They had served in war against the Phantoms for a year together now out in the Tempest Sector, the north-eastern fringes of the Gothican Empire. He had heard his own troops share stories and tales of her powers and the ways in which her legion fought, but he had personally seen them all validated with his own eyes anyway.
“And you are always so surprised to witness it” Thanos replied. He turned from the podium that acted as a communications channel for the bridge and saw her take a seat, though with her spectral appearance it looked as though she melded with it.
“What happened at Pheia was never your fault, brother…you must learn to move on. All things are transient. All things fade…”
Thanos crossed his arms, anxious over the memory of it and closed his eyes. “I should have been on board when it happened Night, you can’t disagree. Maybe I could have saved her, seen the danger before it became too late”.
Nightingale shook her head sadly. “No, Thanos. What happened to the Resolute was meant to happen. Perhaps only Seraphim could divine the purpose of that fate, maybe only the Lion could reveal the lesson in it, but it cannot be changed. This war will claim more casualties yet”.
Thanos laughed morbidly. “Though none of them will be us, least of all you.”
When he said that, she gave him a dark, threatening look that he’d never seen before. “Bullets may pass through me and blades will never find their mark, but there are more kinds of death than the physical” she bit. “We would do well to remember that, when all this is over”.
Thanos felt his ire rise at her harsh tone, but he saw the wisdom in her words and reluctantly agreed with a nod of his head. He turned to regard the bank of devices on the port side of the bridge. They were an array of holo-projectors and the sight they displayed now was one that he was growing wearisome of.
Like always it seemed, he looked upon a scene of death and destruction as the Black Guardian legions duelled with a Phantom fleet for control of the planet Erebos. “Will it ever be over, sister? Or are we destined to fight his conflict forever?”
This time, Nightingale said nothing.
OUT IN THE cold of space, Vice-Commander Vulpus of the 73rd Hellhounds fought to outrun a pair of Nightshade fighters. She banked to port and barrel rolled as their guns chased her Voidhawk. She took a glancing hit, causing her cockpit to scream frenzied noises at her. Casting the holo-warnings away with her left hand, she grabbed the joystick again and made her fighter dive towards the nearest Guardian vessel.
“Need any help, Vice-Commander?” a voice asked over the intercom.
Since the Phantom craft decided to continue their pursuit, she decided she didn’t. “Everything’s going as planned Aetius, the enemy’s doing my work for me” replied, feeling her lips curling into a smile that the other pilot was never going to see. He could hear it in her voice, though.
“Does your plan involve ramming one of our own ships? I quite like the Infernus…” Aetius asked sarcastically, indicating the destroyer that the vice-commander was on a collision course with.
Vulpus laughed. “As do I. Don’t worry, she’ll survive”.
Continuing on her path towards the legionary vessel, she twisted the Voidhawk from left to right, shaking the enemy fire that sought to end her. Soon the looming hull of the Infernus filled her vision and she anticipated the message from its crew before it came through her speakers.
“Vice-Commander Vulpus, this is gunnery Sergeant Balta of the Infernus. We cannot provide supporting fire against your bandits; they are too close to you. Pull out of our fire zone and divert from your collision course”.
>
“Negative. I requite your Captain to raise your starboard shields. I’m going to fire my flares at you” Vulpus replied.
There was a momentary pause during which she made another series of evasive manoeuvres. Fortunately, though the enemy were relentless, they had terrible aim. Balta came back with, “That’s ridiculous…How can you expect us to allow you to fire on our vessel?”
The gap between her and the enemy was closing. She had to convince him fast. “I’m not firing at your hull Balta; I’m firing at your shields! Are you seriously questioning the vice-commander of your own legion at a time like this?”
“Of course I’m not, but it is not my ship, it is the Captain’s-”
“No, it belongs to our Lord Cerberus. Do you think he would like to hear of your disobedience to me?”
Something clipped her wing. She was getting frustrated now. After another pause of silence, during which she could hear Balta arguing with someone outside their conversation, she saw a brief flash on the Infernus as the power of its shields were increased to maximum. She knew the ship would have to sacrifice weapons power to do so, but she wasn’t in need of those.
“Firing flares!” she announced, more to herself than any outside observer of her madness.
The heat-intense projectiles flew from her fighter like a shower of promising stars. She pulled harshly on her joystick, slamming the engines into full-forward thrust as she forced her Voidhawk into a steep climb. She missed the Infernus by a matter of metres, but the Phantoms, dependent on heat-seeking sensors and radar, were too slow to determine which source belonged to her. As she hoped, they tracked the flares instead of her fleet.
It was not the sight of the explosions that caught her by surprise, but the actuality of them. Part of her expected the Phantoms to see through her plan and to continue tracking the heat of her craft, but instead they had fallen for her trick like she counted on them doing. Of course, they would have perceived the massive signature of the Infernus on their radar, but if they saw what they thought was her Voidhawk continue towards it, they would have assumed it safe to follow her. Instead, they were met with a wall of pure energy that saw them obliterated upon impact.
“That actually ended well!” Aetius remarked, close enough to her position to have seen her stunt.
“Not for them” she smirked.
When she pulled back round to view the centre of the battle, she could perceive a hundred different events unfolding. Destroyers duelled with each other, a pair of Blackstars fended off an Oblivion, enemy carriers were trying to deploy troops to the ground of Erebos and were harried by squadrons of frigates whilst everywhere swarms of Voidhawks danced with their Nightshade opponents. It was both her training and experience that taught her the skill to sift through what she saw and find the priorities.
“Aetius,” she began, her voice more serious than it had been for hours since the beginning of the battle. “Identify the ship approaching the planet from the portside of Nighthunter. Is it what I think it is?”
She pushed her fighter towards the scene, twisting out of the path of others and evading the majority of duels where her help wasn’t needed. Eventually Aetius was able to reply, his own reality occupied with a superiorly numbered enemy. “It is indeed an enemy carrier, if that’s what you mean”.
Vulpus ignored his attitude. Their friendship existed beyond the boundaries and limits of rank, their experiences in war shaping their understanding of each other to know when things were said with intent or if they were spoken flippantly. “And those things leaving its belly?” she pressed.
“They would be Nester drop ships. A lot of them, I’ll give you that” he confirmed.
Vulpus could see that, but somehow she needed someone to confirm it. She groaned to herself. For the last few days the legions had been defending the planet from enemy invasion with everything they had. Very few if any legionnaires, pilots in particular, had enjoyed much sleep. They were too busy fighting every moment of their waking lives, to save the human population down below who should have been evacuated months ago, to rest.
Sometimes, Vulpus would resent the Gothicans for being so incapable of defending themselves and getting away from their worlds in enough time. It was only when she considered the power of the enemy and their speed that she could start to forgive the humans for being so slow. The legions had a duty to protect them, no matter how they felt about it.
“Then we have failed” she sighed, “and now the ground war will begin”.
A few minutes passed, during which Vulpus engaged and destroyed another two Nightshade fighters. This time the pilots seemed completely mindless, keen to shoot something but inept to avoid being fired upon themselves.
“Should we inform the Apostles?” Aetius eventually asked, ever conscious of the demi-gods who had authority over them.
Vulpus was about to answer when she saw the Nighthunter disengage from its current feud to begin thrashing the Phantom carrier that had broken through the defensive net. “No,” she answered. “They already know”.
NIGHTINGALE ORDERED THE Nighthunter about to bring its broadside guns to bear on the Phantom heavy carrier. By the time the lance batteries and plasma torpedoes had begun to gut the enemy vessel, hundreds of drop ships were already escaping to the planet surface below.
“Azrael, give the order for Vulpus and the command echelon of the 73rd to return to deck. We are going to spearhead a counter-assault to relieve the humans on Erebos” Thanos said, using the podium on the bridge to communicate with his legionary commander who kept himself to the Primary Tactical Hall to co-ordinate the legion’s forces.
Azrael bowed dutifully before disappearing to perform his task. Without further instruction, he would start to prepare the ground troops of the 73rd and the other assembled legions on board the Blackstar for deployment to the ground.
“By the time we arrive to support the humans, their capital will already be under siege. There were tens of thousands of Phantoms in those Nesters” Nightingale thought aloud morbidly, her voice as ethereal and ghostly as her physical form.
“Then it would be best for us to act swiftly” Thanos replied, turning to regard his spectral kin. “I will lead the attack. I am better suited to a land war where I can feel the soil beneath my feet, not this void stuff where I can only observe and command, but barely be involved. I never could fly a Voidhawk for shyl”.
Nightingale titled her head to one, suspicious of him implying something else by what he said. “Are you suggesting that I would rather stay up here instead?”
Thanos raised an eyebrow. “No-”
“Because I thirst for real combat too, brother” she smiled mysteriously, raising herself from the bridge’s throne like smoke from a candle.
Thanos laughed affectionately. “I forget how much we really do have in common”.
Nightingale nodded at him and called to her legionary commander who waited for her nearby. “Naomi, prepare our legion for planetfall.”
The Commander of the 101st acquiesced by falling to one knee and dipping her head. “As you Command, my Grace” she said, her voice eerily beautiful and sweet as honey.
At the same time, another legionnaire approached Thanos to give him an update on the surface situation. “We are receiving distress calls from the capital. The attack is underway in full. Casualties are heavy, but thanks to the humans following our advice this time, their defences are holding…for the time being” Thanos explained upon seeing Nightingale’s curious gaze, turning to regard a screen that fed them more information.
“It is time for us to join our legions in the hangar, Thanos. Now is the moment where we can once more unleash our wrath on the enemy the way we were supposed to; up close and personally”.
Thanos, feeling himself transform into Cerberus if only by temperament and his rising battle ire, was already on his way out of the bridge when he answered her. “Phantom presence there or not, Erebos will bear witness to monsters this day!”
ON THE HUMAN
world Erebos, shuddering with fear, Albirreo of the Capital Defence Army crept along the hallway of a flat near the outskirts of the city, gripping his rifle to his chest like it was his protective mother. He wept and shook his head defiantly as the images of what happened before returned to him again and again.
He and his platoon had been sent to reinforce the walls of Lotus City, the capital of Erebos. The planet was under attack, that much was clear by the drop ships that boomed into the atmosphere, but since then there had been little sign of the enemy.
All the war tales and stories he’d heard said that at the best of times, a Phantom attack is akin to a master's ambush, planned for years and tweaked to perfection. The enemy just happened to make it look easy in a matter of hours instead of years. Today, Albirreo and his men had found that those tales weren't just rumours; they were true. The first warning came when there was silence after the last drop ship was sighted. On their way to the wall, Matias, one of Aliberreo’s squad mates, remarked about how deserted the capital suddenly seemed to be.
One moment they were running at a good pace towards the looming wall, which they could see towering above every building and the panicked cries of civilians echoed all around them, then there was nothing. Not even a single sound. They were alone in the street they were using to get to the frontline, where Command informed them the Phantoms had begun their attack, but until now they knew that everywhere people, whether military or civilian, were going somewhere.
In unison, the squad came to a halt and tried to listen for movement of any kind. Each of them had a haunting suspicion that the enemy was already there inside the city and everyone else but them had been smart enough to hide. It made Albirreo think something supernatural had happened. Usually, even in a dead city, there were noises. Whether it was the vermin or just the wind, there was always some level of racket.
Soon nobody said a word. Not even the squad Sergeant could offer anything up to explain what was happening. It was like they had been transported to a dead city. The silence drowned them. Shouldering their weapons, the platoon spread out, expecting the worse.
The Deian War: Conquest Page 8