by Ian Woodhead
He lowered himself into a lying position, attempted to calm his secondary heart, and tried to work out how best he could describe what he saw once Walish Din returned to his tribe. His spawn donors and the elders would need to know every detail. Was this an invasion?
His eyes were keen, another reason why they gave him this the boring job of tending glikgliks. Still, perhaps he shouldn’t complain too bitterly. After all, thanks to him, his tribe would now know about this invasion before any of the other Diannin tribes scattered across the surface of this planet. He focused on the statue-like figures closest to the edge of the basin. He frowned. They were human. He was sure of it. There were a few of that species who had built shops in the centre of the settlement.
Walish Din didn’t know much about the species, but he was sure that they didn’t go around invading planets, certainly not one as backward as the dirt-ball he had the misfortune of being spawned upon. These were different to the traders in town. For a start, the traders moved about, and none of the humans in town had bits of metal and what looked like dozens of wires attached to their flesh.
The humans were all grouped into huge circles, each one containing hundreds of individuals. He counted thirty of these circles across the canyon basin. Another species surrounded the humans, one that Walish Din had never seen in the settlement. They were truly frightening. The creatures towered over the humans by at least a foot. Thick orange-plated armour covered the creature from head to tail. Just like the humans, they too were immobile and had strips of metal and wires attached to them.
Walish Din decided that he had seen enough of this unearthly wonder. Smarter Diannin minds were needed to unlock this puzzle, and his instinct as well as his touch told him that this vast collection of statue-like aliens were not going to vanish anytime soon. How much longer would they stay inactive?
He did not know exactly what the elders would ask of him once Walish Din was allowed to speak in their presence. Perhaps it would be best to ensure he saw everything that needed seeing before running to them.
“Listen to yourself, like those old fools knew anything about alien activities.” He did have a point there. They might be experts on milking the farmain orchards and glikglik breeding methods, but when it came to off-world activities, those idiots were about as knowledgeable as the glikgliks down there, now grazing close to his tent.
Still, it would not be proper to return without every scrap of information he could glean from this bizarre sight. He took his eyes off his flock and reluctantly looked back at the canyon basin. Not all the humans were surrounded by the orange dragons. He wasn’t sure if that was important, but he remembered it anyway.
His glikgliks had started bleating again; they had probably run out of grass pods. Walish Din turned around, intending to shout at the stupid things, when he saw they were all looking up at the sky.
He followed their gaze and cried out when several bright lights shot through the thick cloud cover, heading straight for the canyon basin. The lights smashed into the earth, and once the dust had returned to the ground, another orange dragon, complete with the metal additions, appeared at the edge of the humans. The lights continued to streak through the sky, each one adding another dragon to the collection of aliens down there.
Walish Din had seen enough. He had to get out of this place. Right now, the shepherd just wanted to run home and take shelter under the earth.
The number of lights were increasing, their illumination changing night into day. Surely, he could not be the only one who was witnessing this? Yet, Walish Din saw no movement from either his settlement or from the town.
He tried to swallow down the lump of fear that was lodged in his throat and started to look for a safe way down, to see if he could map a route. Walish Din turned and lowered his legs over the edge, holding onto a lump of jutting-out rocks while his left foot managed to find a gap large enough for him to lower his body down a few inches.
Walish Din whimpered and sobbed as he continued to move down the rock face, while his flock of glikgliks sounded like they were bleating out encouragement. It didn’t shock him in the slightest to see they were now directly beneath him. “I don’t like this at all!”
The lights still rained down, each one vanishing behind the rock to strike the canyon basin. He now believed that whatever life he once had would soon be well and truly over. He was witnessing what could be the end of his world as well as the end his spawn donors’ comfortable lives as well. The glikgliks were now beginning to panic, only the ones underneath him weren’t. Walish Din stopped climbing down, flattened his body against the rock face, and held on with all his might as the touch slammed into him.
He saw dozens of those lights veering away from the basin. They struck the ground close to his settlement and the town. Walish Din’s eyeballs rolled up into the sockets. For the first time since connection, the touch severed the cord between him and his flock before taking his spirit far across the planet, and into the only city on the Diannin planet which possessed a working spaceport. From there, he heard himself screaming in terror as his spirit took him from his own planet, across the blackness of space, before depositing him onto the surface of a strange world. Walish Din had no time to marvel at this impossibility as, just like on his world, similar events were happening here. He saw dozens of aliens and humans all running for their lives as the lights smashed into buildings, roads, and vehicles. The orange dragons emerged from the rubble and the twisted metal. Walish Din’s spirit stood in the midst of a food establishment and listened to humans and tall, blue, hairless aliens gasp as these monsters all pulled long, thick silver poles from off their backs. Just like the monsters, grey wire wrapped around the surface of the devices.
His spirit pushed Walish Din closer to the store window. He found himself next to a human female. She had long blonde hair and bright blue eyes. Just like everybody else in the food establishment, her gaze was fixed upon the closest orange dragon. He heard a couple of humans calling them Gizanti. An old human male standing beside the female was shaking his head in disbelief. He was telling everybody that they could not be Gizanti, as those big orange bastards grew all their own gear.
His remaining words were drowned out as everybody screamed in horror when the orange dragon aimed the long device at a group of young blue aliens who were racing across the road. A stream of blue fire erupted from the end and incinerated the fleeing creatures.
Walish Din wept. His spirit showed him their last journey towards the Plains of Gopin as the orange dragon lumbered away from the front of the shop. He didn’t want to be here anymore. The shepherd wished he hadn’t opened his big stupid mouth to ask for something more exciting than tending his flock of stupid glikgliks.
“You need to make your way to the city, Walish Din.”
Was she speaking to him? Of course she was; the female had said his name. She looked directly at him and repeated her words.
“You can see me?”
“I’m not here and neither are you. Get to the city, young Diannin, and get off this world. There is no need to tend to your flock anymore, shepherd. I’m also afraid to tell you that there won’t even be time to tend to your grief either.”
The girl then did something utterly bizarre. She leaned towards him and pressed her lips against his mouth.
“You have to come here and find me, Walish Din. You need to find me before the other one arrives.”
“What other one?”
“I only know he’s called Danny. Come here. Find me before it’s too late!
Walish Din’s eyes opened and he found himself looking up into the sky. The lights were still hitting the ground. Sounds of distant screaming reached him. He turned his head and saw flames rising from his settlement. He knew the orange dragons with their Godlike weapons were now stomping through the narrow streets, killing anyone that moved.
“No!” he yelled.
His flock bleated below him. The girl’s words echoed through his head, and Walish Din pulled on
e hand away from the rock-face. He said a silent prayer for his spawn donors who were now surely wandering through the Plains of Gopin before he took his remaining hand off the rock.
Chapter Three
Philip Diocolis, Prime Chaplain of the Third Imperial Order, watched impassively while hordes of strange alien grey orbs streaked across the surface of the Gizanti home planet. The terrified local population scattered in every direction, some seeking shelter under their living vehicles, some falling to the floor and curling up inside their armour plating. It didn’t make any difference. When the orbs flew over the creatures, a sick yellow light emerged from under the orb and the Gizantis disappeared.
This had been the fourth time that he had watched the newest recording. Just like the past three occasions, he wanted to dismiss this as a piece of ridiculous fiction. Something vomited from the mind of some raving lunatic whose only future contribution to the empire would be when his composted body enriches the roses in the royal garden.
The Prime Chaplain gave the silent command and took a small sip of his meat broth while he waited for the forward monitor’s extra viewing screens to fold out. To even contemplate that The God-Emperor was no longer the only human in the galaxy with the revered gift would be suicide, even for a subject as highly placed as himself. If word got out that he took these dreams seriously, he would likely be sharing the same cell as the ex-Trooper Cole.
“Run comparisons again. Time index fourteen point six on both versions. Remove emotive interference and restore primal designation on just the Imperial copy this time.”
He watched the two recordings again. The scenario on the left, taken from the feverish mind of their young God-Emperor, while the scene playing beside it was recorded at the exact moment, yet this one came from the sleeping mind of the minor heretic.
“And there is total surety regarding the origins of both recordings.”
“There is no disambiguation. The sources correspond,” replied the soft voice of the priest’s personal index.
Did he just detect an undertone of indignation hidden within that electronic voice? No, that was ridiculous. His mind was obviously playing tricks on him, making him believe that he had upset her feelings by suggesting she had mixed up the recordings.
The Chaplain’s mind certainly wasn’t playing tricks on him when it came to the implications of what this meant for the future of the greatest empire in the galaxy. The Chaplain sighed to himself. Even that ‘fact’ no longer rang true.
To think that only eight days before he, like most Imperial citizens, believed that the will of the God-Emperor would never be broken by the Empire’s many enemies, whether alien or from the increasing armies of human heretics. Unlike the ordinary citizen, he knew exactly the terrors and threats the Empire faced, and yet his conviction in his faith and the Emperor was absolute. At least, that was the case until exactly one week before.
Being summoned to attend a gathering with the Revered Holy Order, headed by the High Priestess herself, had not been how he expected to begin his day. The Prime Chaplain anticipated that they were to give him another post within the Holy Office. It was something he had been expecting for over two years. It was about time that the Revered Holy Order recognising his due diligence with a promotion.
His dreams of a larger congregation as well as hopes of a chance to join the Holy Order was promptly shattered when the woman, second only to the God Emperor, told Philip that an unknown alien force had penetrated the outer defences of two minor Imperial agrarian planets and depopulated the surface.
She suggested that this unprecedented threat could become humanity’s downfall. Just to hear the High Priestess utter such blasphemy had shaken the Prime Chaplain’s faith to the very core. Looking back to his tumultuous thoughts once he had received his executive orders, as well as the Priestess giving him special dispensation, perhaps it had been best to allow such impure ideas run their strange course. Whilst still within the chambers of the apostolic palace, there was still a chance of the very walls to cleanse him.
“Run the recordings again, Index. Overlay both using the Gizanti vehicle as the reference point.” The Index acknowledged his command. He leaned forward, watching one more time as these unknown orbs streaked across the alien sky, disintegrating every life form on the surface. Just as the Prime Chaplain suspected, the two recordings were not taken from the same perspective.
This was all the verification he needed. The minor heretic would not be facing a firing squad after all, although ex-Trooper Cole might be very well wish he had kissed traitor’s pole once Philip had done with him. It had been possible that the prisoner could have been picking up the Emperor’s original vision, distorting the original source while enhancing the copy. The theory was, at best, a highly improbable hypothesis, but it still needed verification.
The Empire had found another prophet. The Prime Chaplain took a deep breath, then grabbed the arms of his ornate chair in the hope that a connection with an artefact from the Second Reformation might help to steady his nerves.
“Did she know?”
“More data is required before the question can be answered.”
“Be quiet, Index.”
The threat from a potentially superior technologically advanced aggressive alien species obviously wasn’t enough for the Empire to deal with. The creator had to supply them with another prophet as well, one, from the single recording the Prime Chaplain had witnessed, made their God-Emperor look as revered as an Elasion slow worm.
The Prime Chaplain gripped the arms of the chair even harder after realising what he had just almost said aloud. No special dispensation would help him if the holy inquisitors had heard him commit high blasphemy. Yet, the facts, the pure unadulterated facts were there in front of him. Ex-Trooper Cole had indeed seen the future in his dreams. There could be no doubt.
“Index, separate the recordings. Focus on the sequence beginning with the first alien disintegration and ending with the orbs leaving the surface.”
The Prime Chaplain frowned at the lack of monitor activity. His heartbeat quickened and his blood pressure rose in response. They must have heard, the order of the Inquisition had heard his blasphemy even now; they were coming for him.
He swallowed hard, telling himself that he was mistaken. “Index,” he said, running his tongue across his dry lips. “Index, explain the reason for non-function.”
“New data from the superior recording suggests the Gizanti were not disintegrated.”
“I don’t understand. What else could have happened to them?”
“Displacement is the only logical answer.”
Philip almost burst out laughing. “No, that is totally impossible. There is nothing that can transport a population of two billion individuals from one place and another.” He stood up and strode over to the monitor, peering at the frozen image of the Gizanti under that vehicle, seconds before the beam hit the creature. “Index, recompile all data, state that your previous statement was an error.”
“There is no error.”
Was his mind and body capable of any more shocks? “Index, replay recordings from Imperial archives grouped within Zenus Incident.” He watched the two other scenarios pulled from the God-Emperor’s mind. Like the Gizanti world, the orbs stripped away the human populations of each world within a solar day. The poor resolution and grainy quality made it difficult to discover how the alien orbs could disable the planets’ defences with ease. Even if the Prime Chaplain did have the similar recordings from the minor heretic, he doubted just visual data would solve that particular problem. “Index, extrapolate theory that human populations could still live, based on the data taken from the superior recording.”
“No data available.”
No surprises there. Even if there was a possibility of the Imperial citizens still being alive, then surely he should give priority to their return priority to their safe return before seeking out the source of these orbs.
“Index, based on available information,
is it possible that theses orbs could have displaced the Imperial citizens to a location in the vicinity of the three affected star systems?”
“No data available.”
“There must be a viable planet close to the three systems that is large enough to sustain such a large amount of people.”
“No data available.”
“Fuck!”
The Prime Chaplain removed the papal key from within the folds of his ceremonial uniform, given to him by the Priestess earlier. He ran his fingers along the smooth edges. Did he have enough new information to contact her? He looked at the still images of one of these orbs floating just above one of the planet’s inhabitants. Even with the poor quality image, it was not difficult to seen to look of pure terror upon that citizen’s face.
Philip pushed the papal key into the slot in the chair arm and composed himself. He was Prime Chaplain; his duty was to the Emperor and to the billions of Imperial citizens, spread across an empire of almost two hundred planets.
The air by his side shimmered as the image of the High Priestess appeared before him. Her promptness started Philip. He had not expected her to be actually waiting. He jumped out of the chair, almost tripping up over his robe as he fell to the floor and pressed his forehead to the sacred symbol of justice, embossed on the polished grey stone, next to the chair.
“Glory be to the Empire and our revered Emperor,” he said. “May his reign last for another thousand years.”
The Prime Chaplain sneaked a sly gaze when she didn’t immediately return the required response. Was she choking? Had Philip said something wrong? He wasn’t sure how much more of this his poor heart could take.
The Priestess blinked then gave the Chaplain a smile that almost burst his already battered heart.
“You said that without a hint of irony. Congratulations. Now, am I to understand that you have an update?”