To his surprise, he saw that the High Priest had actually backed out of the tube, back onto the shuttle.
Nakamura looked back and saw this now, as well. “What are you doing?” he called after the priest.
But Octavion was gone, back inside now, and the hatch on that end closed as well, sealing them in with a resounding clang.
Tamerlane and Nakamura exchanged extremely nervous glances, realizing exactly how vulnerable they were, trapped in the docking tube. The colonel reached for the panel off to the right that opened the hatch, but all the lights on it were red. He moved to the manual wheel at its center, attempting to turn it, but it wouldn’t budge. He banged his fists on the hatch, while Nakamura started back down the other way, toward the shuttle.
Another clang echoed through the tube. Nakamura reached the other end, tried and failed to open the hatch there. He turned back, his eyes widening as he looked at Tamerlane.
“They cannot seriously mean to—”
The docking tube separated from the shuttle as the smaller ship pulled smoothly away. The air inside the tube evacuated instantly, carrying the two soldiers with it. They fell into the void.
2
“What exactly is this shindig we’re being sent off to,” Major Niobe Arani wondered aloud, “and could it actually, possibly be so important that they need Imperial Special Forces to serve as part of the security?”
She stood at a table in the passenger section of the Imperial transport liner Endymia, patiently reassembling her sniper rifle. After two weeks on Trezibond, where her unit had been essentially locked down, unable to leave the base and under strict orders not to speak to anyone outside of their little group, she was happy to at least be on the move again. Unfortunately, they were still for the most part locked down—but on a ship, now, instead of a planet—and on their way to some new and far-flung destination. All she really wanted was a break; a vacation; a chance to kick back for a few days and recharge her metaphorical batteries. Clearly that wasn’t in the cards anytime soon.
“I’ve heard it’s a religious conclave,” the soldier to her right—Captain Durin— said in a quiet voice as he worked on his own weapons. “Maybe even naming the new Ecclesiarch—or introducing him, at least.”
Arani considered this. “A new Ecclesiarch? Hmm.” The thought was somewhat comforting to her. The Empire had gone nearly two months without a head of the Church, ever since the elderly but still seemingly healthy Wallin Zoric had suddenly and inexplicably dropped dead. “That might explain it,” she mused, “but the security still seems excessive just for him. The Church has their own army—what do they need with us?”
The soldier to her right—Major Senjanik—leaned in close, his eyes flickering around as if he were afraid of being overheard. “I’ve heard a rumor or two, myself,” he whispered.
Arani laughed. “We’ve all heard rumors, Den. Durin’s here is the first one that’s made the slightest bit of sense to me.”
Senjanik’s expression remained grave. “No,” he whispered, speaking even more quietly. “Not about our destination. About the situation with us—the reason for the lockdown.”
Now it was Arani’s turn to frown. “Oh, really?” she responded—but now she’d lowered her voice, too. “So—what have you heard? And why should we believe it?”
Senjanik snapped the last component of his own rifle into place and held it up, sighting along the barrel. “I have a friend—no names!—inside the Church,” he said in a now-barely-audible voice. “The word they’re hearing is that somebody in our unit—in Special Forces—saw something they weren’t supposed to see. And we’re all on lockdown until it’s sorted out, so that it doesn’t get out to the press or the public.”
Arani started to bark a laugh at that—and then her laughter caught in her throat.
Surely, she thought to herself, surely it couldn’t be what I saw...
Her thoughts flashed back to that night on Trezibond when the soldiers under—what had his name been?—Sergeant Garner had helped her disrupt a Vorthan cult and expose their high priest as none other than Colonel Nikolai Barmakid, former adjutant of First Legion.
It couldn’t be that. Why would anyone in the Church—or the Empire in general—care if I knew that—?
She frowned. That was one of the things she had not been allowed to discuss with anyone—not even her fellow soldiers in her unit—since it had happened. And it hadn’t subsequently turned up in any media coverage she’d seen, though admittedly she never got to see much of that, or cared to. So it was being kept secret, but...
The others had been talking while she was lost in thought. She looked back up at them and quickly surmised that they’d been throwing out other rumors that had been making the rounds, none of which had sounded remotely plausible to Arani the first fifteen times she’d heard them.
This, though—the thought that someone was keeping Barmakid’s crime a secret... That somehow seemed much more plausible... and much more disturbing to her personally. After all, she was one of the few that even knew about it...
“I’ve heard we’re headed for Ascanius,” Captain Durin was saying. “That would fit with some kind of big religious ceremony.”
Arani nodded absently. There was no doubt Ascanius was the planet one would choose for a religious ceremony, what with the massive Church of the Relique located there. With its kilometer-high dome and massive sanctuaries for numerous members of Those Who Remain, as well as the colossal main hall, it had been home to many of the greatest ceremonies and religious events of the past two millennia, including most recently the coronation of Emperor Janus IV.
“Any other rumors worth chewing on?” Durin asked.
Major Senjanik scowled and turned away, clearly taking all this much more seriously than many of his teammates.
Arani started to respond, then hesitated. Something was nagging at her. She mentally ran down the list of who else likely knew about Barmakid. There was the fire team that had helped her on Trezibond... and the officers above her, headed by General Nakamura.
She couldn’t very well call up Nakamura to ask him about it, but...
She excused herself and left the compartment, moving out into the corridor beyond. The hatch slid closed behind her. Cool air blew from various vents along the walls, and the occasional crewmember hurried past. She stood there a second, breathing the fresher air, then oriented herself and walked briskly toward the communications center.
The lockdown they were under included very limited use of the Aether network, and it was being closely monitored. So she resolved to use the ship’s main comm array to openly make her call. If the higher-ups didn’t like it, at least they couldn’t accuse her of trying to sneak around and do something surreptitiously.
As she rounded the first corner, she thought she heard something behind her. She started to turn, then dismissed such concerns, figuring that with as many people around as the big transport was carrying, there were bound to be people in every nook and cranny of every deck. She continued on, pausing at the next intersection to reorient herself and remember which way led to the comm center.
It was the faintest click that sounded behind her, but it was just enough—and just familiar enough—to send her diving out of the way the instant before the energy blast sizzled by. She hit the floor of the corridor and rolled, instinctively reaching for her pistol—only to realize as her hand met only her hip that her weapons were back in the passenger cabin.
Continuing her roll until it took her back up into a tight crouch, she stared down the hall in search of her attacker.
No one was there.
Frowning, puzzled, she considered what to do. Part of her demanded that she rush down the hallway and find her attacker. Another, probably much wiser part of her, screamed that she was unarmed and exposed out here, and should seek immediate cover before whoever-it-was came at her again.
Torn by indecision, she remained in that crouch for another two seconds, then sprang to her feet and ran back down the corridor in
the direction from which she’d come—and the attack had come. Along the way, she accessed the Aether network. The rules said no normal use of the link, but this hardly qualified as “normal.” She needed to report the incident as quickly as possible, and that was the fastest way.
Even as the link came up in her virtual vision, however, she hesitated. If what she was beginning to suspect was even partly true, it had been someone in her own unit that had tried to kill her. If that was true, it was unquestionably at the orders of someone higher up—in her unit, or in First Legion, or...
She stood outside the door to her team’s cabin, her eyes flashing this way and that, her mind racing. Was someone trying to silence her—permanently? If so, who? And—what about the others who knew what she knew?
That might go a long way toward shedding some light on the situation, she realized. If any members of the fire team that had helped her on Trezibond had experienced any threats or violence, then the situation would rapidly move from the realm of wild speculation to that of serious possibility.
Her heart still beating rapidly, she riffed through the listings of other units in Legion I in her virtual vision, until she found the one she was looking for. “Ah ha. Sergeant Garner. There you are.” She placed the call, sending a request into the Endymia’s Aether link and from there out to the vastly larger network.
The call took only a few seconds to process, since most of the Aether’s signals traveled via hyperwave through the boundaries of the Above, reducing transit time to the functional equivalent of much, much faster than light.
Unfortunately, there was no answer—at least, at first. Then, after a couple of relay clicks, the call was picked up by a woman with a husky voice. “This is Major Shae. Can I help you?”
Arani was taken aback. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but I was attempting to reach a Sergeant Garner.”
A pause, apparently as Major Shae checked to see who she was on the line with. The pause then went on even longer—just long enough to begin to unnerve Arani. “Ah—Major Arani. I’m afraid the sergeant is unavailable.”
Arani frowned at this. “Unavailable?”
“Yes.”
Arani shook her head slowly, groping for what to say.
“So—if that’s all, I wish you a good day—”
“Wait,” Arani replied quickly. “Please.”
“Yes?”
“When you say the sergeant is unavailable, what do you mean by that? If I may ask.”
Another pause. “Actually, Major,” Shae said finally, “I am not at all certain that you may ask that.”
“What?” Arani was now completely taken aback.
“Our unit is under communications lockdown,” Shae explained, “as I believe yours is. You should not be making this call at all.”
“It’s an emergency,” Arani said quickly. “In that case—may I ask why Sergeant Garner has a major serving as his answering service?”
Nothing.
“Can you connect me with any of the other members of his fire team, then, Major Shae? Anyone who was with him on Trezibond?”
Yet another moment of silence. Then, “I have to let you go, Major. Good day.”
Before Arani could say another word, the connection severed at the other end, leaving her with nothing but the hollow tunnel sound in her virtual ears. Frustrated, angry, and a tiny bit afraid, she shut it off on her end and looked around.
What to do now? She didn’t know.
Is there any doubt something big is going on—and someone very high up doesn’t want me talking to anyone? Doesn’t want me alive, now, apparently?
She turned to enter her unit’s passenger cabin when the Aether came to life once again, this time with an announcement from the bridge: “Ladies and gentlemen, we have arrived at our destination. If you will all strap in, we will be landing momentarily.” She opened the cabin door and hurried in, slipping into her crash couch just as Senjanik was buckling his own restraint belts in place.
“Where have you been?” he asked, his voice low.
She shook her head. “I’ll tell you later,” she replied. Then, “Maybe,” she added. “Not sure I really want to tell anybody anything right now.”
Senjanik gave her a quizzical look before returning his attention to his buckles.
I have to get off this ship, she told herself silently as the vessel began to shudder with entry into the atmosphere of the planet. I have to get off as soon as we’re down, and find someone—anyone—I can talk to. Someone I can trust.
“Welcome,” the ship’s captain was announcing over the local Aether link. “Welcome to the holy world of Ascanius.”
Someone I can trust, she repeated to herself, but—is there anyone in the entire Empire at this moment that fits that description?
She was terrified that the answer to that question was a resounding no.
3
Tamerlane, standing as he was at the opposite end of the tube when it separated from the shuttle, saw what was happening and understood that Nakamura would be flung out into space first. As the air rushed out, he leapt up and pistoned his legs against the hatch of the bigger ship behind him, driving himself forward at great speed just as the vacuum grasped him. He shot down the length of the tube and exited it into open space only an instant behind the general. He reached out, knowing he would get only one opportunity to do this, and grasped for the other man as he went by. His right hand slipped off the smooth smartcloth of the general’s sleeve but his left hand managed to snag his collar and he held on for dear life—for both their lives.
The dark red smartcloth that comprised most of the two men’s uniforms was already doing what little it could in such an environment; it was hardening into an armored shell to protect their bodies from the cold and the vacuum, while exuding a transparent helmet cover up from their collars that automatically extended over their heads to hold in what little atmosphere remained. It possessed no on-board oxygen supply, however—whatever remaining air they had with them now would be all they would have; Tamerlane understood that this amounted to a few seconds of breathing at best. When that was gone, they were finished.
Tamerlane pulled Nakamura tightly to him. They continued to spin, but now they moved together as one unit. The colonel could see the two ships flashing by repeatedly, with the glowing blue-white sphere of Adrianople far beyond, the tiny lights of the First and Third Legion fleets twinkling around it. Those other ships were much too far away—there was no way they could ever reach them before their air ran out. Their only chance lay in getting back aboard one of the two vessels that lay near them; then they’d have to take their chances with the Ecclesiarchy troops within. But that was a problem that lay literally a lifetime in the future; for now, the only priority was to get back inside a pressurized, oxygenated environment. The shuttle seemed like a bad option; that was the crowd that had engineered this little “accident.” In any case, that small craft was already pulling away and zooming back down toward the planet surface.
Our new abilities, Tamerlane thought then, even as he grew dizzy and nauseous from the head-over heels spinning. The fire. Is there any way we could use it to—
His thoughts were interrupted as he realized that Nakamura was already very clearly thinking along those same lines, and was doing something about it. The general was directing his hands outward, creating bright bursts of flame before them in space, at regular intervals. This puzzled Tamerlane at first. A couple of seconds later, it became apparent that Nakamura was using the fire to stop their spin, pulsing the flames like a rocket engine to steady them.
Once they were motionless, a few seconds later, he called to Tamerlane over a private Aether connection and gave him instructions. Tamerlane acknowledged and together they channeled their powers to create a sort of propulsion effect, driving them back toward the ship.
It had all happened very quickly, but had still taken too long; their air was almost gone now. But they were moving, and moving with impressive speed, closing rapidly
on the hull of the Ecclesiarchy cruiser. But, Tamerlane wondered—now what?
Nakamura was reaching out with his hands again, this time toward the cruiser. Flames sprang up across the gleaming metal of its silver hull—flames apparently feeding purely on other-dimensional fuel sources, as there was nothing but vacuum here for them to draw from. Tamerlane joined in and together they hit the side of the cruiser with a concentrated blaze that burned like a blowtorch. This had the added benefit of slowing their velocity toward that metal bulkhead. In the instant before their momentum carried them into the side of the ship, the circular patch of hull they had been focusing their flames upon gave way, melting into vapor. Air rushed out past them as they passed through into the ship and were immediately pulled down onto the deck by the artificial gravity.
Surrounded by air again, albeit rapidly outward-gushing air, they could hear—and what they heard was the wailing of alarms: Hull breach, hull breach!
Automated systems unleashed robotic arms that sprayed quick-drying foam across the hole, sealing the breach. Atmosphere gushed back into the space where they stood and their smartcloth uniforms responded by softening into cloth and quickly folding back into normal configuration, the helmets disappearing into the collars.
The two men stood, leaning forward, hands on hips, gasping for breath, as the sound of booted feet on metal deck drew nearer and nearer. When they finally straightened and looked up, they saw that they occupied a sort of dead end corridor, with a cadre of white-garbed and blast pistol-armed Ecclesiarchy soldiers arrayed across from them, blocking the only way out.
“General! Colonel!” cried the ranking officer—or rather, priest—of the company. He moved forward, concern etched across his dour features, and executed a quick sign of blessing in the air with his right hand. “By all of Those Who Remain! Thank the Above that you’re both alright!” He shook his head in seeming astonishment. “There must have been a malfunction in the docking systems—!”
“Yes,” Nakamura managed to croak. “I’m certain that’s what it was.”
The Shattering: Omnibus Page 18