by Eric Thomson
Cut off from the world, Marta never discovered how many died at the hands of the warring factions or as collateral damage. But the numbers must be astronomical, especially if the rest of the planet’s major settlements were as damaged as its capital. She could not help wonder what sort of safety Sigrid and Stefan might find in a galaxy bent on self-destruction if Mykonos’ recent descent into factional violence was an example.
Heloise must have sensed Marta’s sinking mood because she reached out and gently squeezed her hand. Though the gesture didn’t dispel the gloom enveloping her, it reminded Marta she was not alone, and that mere thought gave her spirits a small but welcome lift.
As they reached the upper atmosphere, she caught a glimpse of Karinth, the planet’s second largest continent, though not the coastal city of Thera where, the Almighty willing, her children waited for a ship from the Order of the Void. What chances did she have at seeing them again in this life if she was headed to Yotai and they to parts unknown?
She’d been raised in an old-fashioned noble household, where stoicism was prized above almost everything else, yet silent tears rolled down her cheeks nonetheless as she clutched at the memory of happier days to ward off a renewed surge of despair.
“Take heart, my dear,” Heloise unexpectedly whispered into her ear. “The Almighty would not set us on this path without a purpose.”
“My heart is being sorely tested these days.” A pause, then, “Will I see them again?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked at the sister with a teary smile, “Thank you for not lying to me.”
“Avoiding the truth never ends well, even though we often wish otherwise.”
**
The frigate’s captain, a careworn, fifty-something woman with sad eyes met them on the shuttle deck shortly after landing.
“Welcome aboard, Lady Marta, I’m Rika Weever,” she said, holding out her hand. “Viceroy Custis sends his best.”
“How kind of him. Thank you for your welcome and for transmitting the viceroy’s greetings. I gather you weren’t warned I was traveling with my lady-in-waiting, Heloise.”
“Indeed, not.” Weever turned to the sister. “Welcome. Please accept my apologies in advance. I’m afraid we only prepared one VIP berth.”
Marta waved Weever’s apology away.
“No worries, Captain. Heloise and I will gladly share a cabin.”
“Very gracious of you, Milady.”
“But if I could ask for a favor?”
“Certainly, if it’s in my power to grant.”
“Before we break out of orbit, Heloise briefly needs access to an undamaged planetary communications node so she can make sure her relatives are settling into their new homes. We weren’t able to find a working connection before leaving. Dendera’s loyalists destroyed much of the planet’s vital infrastructure during their futile resistance.”
Weever’s eyes went from Marta to Heloise and back again, as if she sensed something unusual in the request, but didn’t want to deny someone traveling in her ship at the orders of the Sector’s overlord.
“The CIC will set up a link and route it to your cabin.”
Weever was true to her word, and Heloise wasted little time wending her way through a cybernetic labyrinth to find a sibylline message left by Sister Averyl.
All is well.
“Averyl posted the notice three days after we parted ways. It means they reached Thera without issues and settled in to wait. Since there are no further missives, I can only assume nothing has changed.”
It was the best news to reach Marta’s ears in almost two weeks, and a tentative smile touched her lips. But moments later, she realized this might also be the last time she heard of her children, and the brief spark of joy vanished.
The next day, at Heloise’s suggestion, Marta joined her in a deep meditative trance shortly before Vindicta crossed Wormhole Mykonos One’s event horizon and left the star system. Though she let the tears run freely when they resurfaced, the moment of peak emotional crisis was behind her. Not for the first time, Marta wondered whether she’d have gone mad without the gentle yet surprisingly tough Sister of the Void as her companion and spiritual guide.
But Heloise seemed distant, almost lost in herself, as if something had chased away her accustomed aura of serenity. When Marta gave her a questioning look, a sad smile briefly lit up the sister’s pale features.
“It’s nothing. I’m overtired. Perhaps I should take a nap.”
Heloise climbed into her bunk, stretched out, and closed her eyes. Within moments Marta heard her breathing fall into the regular rhythm of sleep. How she envied Heloise’s ability to cut herself off from the cares of life and regenerate.
— 20 —
“Your Excellency?” General Marat stuck his head through the half-open door to the governor general’s private office.
Danton’s eyes broke away from the latest, and so far dismal report on the campaign to cleanse this continent of any remaining loyalist strongholds as he glared up at his military commander.
“What is it?” The acid of unrestrained irritation dripped from his tone. “If you’re here to tell me Vindicta left the Mykonos star system, en route to Yotai as per Grand Duke Custis’ orders, it could have waited until the daily update conference.”
Then, the dismay on Marat’s face registered and Danton waved him in.
“You look like a man who caught his most trusted subordinate in a plot to replace him.”
“If only it were that,” Marat carefully closed the door behind him and took one of the chairs facing Danton’s desk. “Vindicta left, thankfully. Shortly before she crossed Wormhole Mykonos One’s event horizon, Wormhole Three’s traffic control buoy reported twenty-one starships crossing over from the Cascadian Sector. Their transponders identify them as belonging to the 27th Imperial Battle Group.”
Marat’s emphasis on the word imperial did not go unnoticed.
“Are you telling me a loyalist naval unit entered my star system?” Incredulity transformed Danton’s sour face.
“It seems so. At last count, the 2nd Fleet was among those who didn’t rebel against Dendera.”
“But the Cascadian Sector is home to the 10th Fleet, and they’re on our side.”
Marat replied with a helpless shrug.
“Perhaps Wyvern finally realized this rebellion isn’t just a few discontented admirals and viceroys indulging in a fit of pique and sent out expeditionary forces to bring them back into line. The fleets protecting the Home Sector field almost twice as many capital ships per battle group as the outlying ones.”
“And their officers’ devotion to the Crown is unquestionable,” Danton added in a thoughtful voice. “They’re as deeply conditioned as any Guards general. We can’t fight off that many, Harvey.”
“Indeed, Your Excellency. One doesn’t need Commodore Sekine’s spacefaring acumen nor her congenital pessimism to discern the obvious.”
Danton scowled at Marat’s openly sarcastic retort but took it as a sign of the general’s nervousness. Dorean Sekine, flag officer commanding the 166th Battle Group’s Mykonos Task Force was Marat’s naval counterpart, though she took her orders from Yotai, not the star system governor general.
And faced with a force twice the size of hers, not to mention heavier in capital ships, Sekine might simply decline to fight and follow Vindicta through Wormhole One. After all, Mykonos wasn’t a strategic junction, nor did it boast infrastructure vital to Grand Duke Custis’ ambitions, and hard to replace starships were better used as a fleet in being, not thrown away for little gain.
“She’ll bug out,” Danton said.
Marat inclined his head.
“That goes without saying, which leaves us almost wide open. We have next to no long-range ordnance left and the few remaining orbital platforms won’t survive a cruiser’s guns for long.”
“I’m open to suggestions.”
“Surrende
r and beg for mercy? Bullshit them into believing we’re loyalists who are fighting off rebel scum? Beg Dorean for space on her ships to evacuate anyone whose head will adorn the Government House gates once imperial forces land?”
“Speaking with you never fails to cheer me up.” Danton’s thick fingers tapped the marble desktop in an irregular rhythm as his scowl deepened. “Bullshitting them is probably out. LeGris fired off a message naming me as the leader of the Mykonos rebellion. Whether it reached Wyvern is open to question, but every damned subspace relay along the way has kept a copy since it went out as class one priority. Gambling that an expeditionary force from the Wyvern Sector won’t query functioning relays is on the same level of stupid as a player who bets his entire fortune when he holds nothing more than a pair of deuces.”
“Now who’s being cheerful?”
Instead of replying, Danton stabbed at the screen embedded in his desktop.
“Contact Commodore Sekine.”
More than a minute passed in tense silence before the miniature hologram of a naval officer sitting in her CIC command chair materialized above the screen.
“What is it, Your Excellency?”
Never one for pleasantries to begin with, Commodore Sekine, a woman well in her sixties, with a pinched face and pursed lips stared at Danton through emotionless, dark eyes.
“You’re aware of the incursion from the Cascadian Sector, Commodore?”
Sekine nodded.
“Twenty-one warships are hard to miss, especially when they’re not bothering to dampen their ID beacons. Since they were nice enough to let the wormhole traffic control buoy contact us before destroying it, I can only surmise the 27th Battle Group’s commander wants to make sure everyone is aware they’re coming at Mykonos. Otherwise, they might have tried a stealthier approach, such as sending one ship through an hour or two earlier than the rest to take out the buoy.”
“The buoy is gone?”
“That’s what I said. If they use standard imperial tactics, their commander will dispatch ships to Wormholes One and Two, so you can expect their traffic control buoys to vanish within the next day.”
“What are your intentions, Commodore?”
“Withdraw through Wormhole One before ships from the 27th blockade it. My orders give me discretion if I face vastly superior enemy forces. My commanding officer and Admiral Zahar would rather I didn’t sacrifice ships needlessly.”
Danton and Marat exchanged glances.
“You’re leaving us defenseless, then.”
“My recommendation is surrender before they sterilize the surface with kinetic strikes. Our most recent intelligence reports suggest the empress directed loyalist commanders to show no mercy. Anything other than instant submission results in devastation. Dendera would rather rule over depopulated star systems than put up with a single spark of dissent, and the officers of the Home Sector fleets are happy to oblige.”
“But they’ll execute everyone in the Mykonos government and military forces if I surrender.”
“Without a doubt, but by sacrificing yourselves, you can at least avoid subjecting the population to further horrors. Kinetic strikes from orbit leave lasting scars, and if they’re aimed at critical infrastructure, Mykonos will go from thirty-sixth-century living standards to those of the eleventh century in less than an hour.”
“Take my staff and me with you, Commodore. If we’re gone, the imperials will see no reason to bombard the planet.” The words came out in a rush, propelled by a sudden vision of his own head on a pike beside that of his predecessor.
A humorless cackle greeted Danton’s entreaty.
“My ships are already well on their way to the hyperlimit, Your Excellency. I can’t afford to turn back and waste hours taking on evacuees. If you can’t stomach surrendering because you’re almost certain to face summary execution, may I suggest suicide? Perhaps someone with more intestinal fortitude can hand control of the Mykonos system to the 27th Battle Group’s commander in the hope your troops suffer nothing worse than forced labor in exchange for rebellion ringleaders facing imperial justice.”
“I find it incredible one of Admiral Zahar’s flag officers is peddling defeatism.” Danton’s indignant tone didn’t quite mask his growing fear.
“Things will get worse for everyone before they improve. If they improve. I’d rather fight to save a single star system and make it secure against anyone so we can rebuild instead of wasting ships trying to protect everything against the empire’s inevitable entropy. As for your fate and that of your people, we have a saying where I come from, Excellency. You made your bed. Now lie in it. After what you did, you’ll get no sympathy from the spacers in my task force. Sekine, out.”
The holographic projection faded away, leaving a stunned Danton to stare at his blank screen. He finally shook himself and glanced up at Harvey Marat, only to see the barrel of a high-powered blaster looking back.
“What—”
“Since I know you’ll try to pull a twilight of the gods scenario and take Mykonos into the abyss with you instead of surrendering, I’ll implement Commodore Sekine’s suggestion. Except instead of suicide, we’ll do this via murder.”
Before the governor general of Mykonos could reply, Marat’s blaster coughed once, and a neat black hole appeared between Danton’s eyes. He remained seated upright for a few seconds, an almost comical air of astonishment on his florid face, then he fell forward onto the marble desktop with a loud thud.
“Time to disband Mykonos command, the planetary government, and any hint of military or civil authority, then head for the hills,” Marat muttered to himself. “Let the imperials find a planet without leaders, without defenses and with nothing that might threaten the resumption of Dendera’s misrule. But by all means, why don’t we let the imperials find you, Your Defunct Excellency. It might go some way to assuage their wrath.”
Marat holstered his weapon.
“You know, I never could stand the Imperial Guards, and you were one of their least appetizing specimens.”
— 21 —
Lyonesse
“Lyonesse Defense Force, atten-SHUN.” Rear Admiral Jonas Morane’s voice echoed across the Lannion Base landing strip, converted to a parade ground for the occasion.
Fifteen hundred right feet came up off the tarmac and stamped down next to fifteen hundred left feet in unison with a mighty thump.
“Shoulder ARMS.”
A disembodied voice wafted over the thousands of spectators, including, in places of honor on either side of the reviewing stand, Chief Administrator Gaspard Logran, Speaker of the Colonial Council Rorik Hecht and Lyonesse University Chancellor Emma Reyes. Quasi-invisible news drones floated overhead, transmitting live video of the ceremonies to every corner of the planet and to the starships in orbit.
“Please stand for the arrival of Her Excellency, Elenia Yakin, Governor of Lyonesse, and Commander-in-Chief of the Lyonesse Defense Force.”
A silent, open-topped staff car adorned with plates bearing the governor’s seal, a golden, double-headed Vanger’s Condor on a green background clutching a banner with the defense force’s newly proclaimed motto ‘We Shall Prevail’ entered the parade ground.
Elenia Yakin, resplendent in a vice admiral’s dress uniform, complete with gold bullion aiguillettes hanging from her right shoulder sat in solitary splendor on the bench-like back seat. The sky blue beret on her head was the same model worn by human military forces since before the Commonwealth’s formation, but it sported the Lyonesse Defense Force’s condor, anchor and crossed swords emblem rather than the old, crown-topped Imperial Armed Services badge. Though they had broken with the rest of humanity, Morane wanted to keep a few links to the past, and the beret was one of them.
Her aide, Lieutenant Hetty Grimes, formerly the supply depot’s commanding officer, sat up front beside the driver, a corporal from the Lyonesse Rifle Regiment. Both were in the dress uniforms of their respective branches, tho
ugh Grimes also wore gold aiguillettes over the right shoulder.
The car came to a smooth stop precisely in front of the reviewing stand. Both Yakin and her aide-de-camp got out, the former climbing up the stand’s steps while the latter took position beside it.
“Lyonesse Defense Force, to your commander-in-chief, present ARMS.”
Fifteen hundred weapons, mostly carbines and rifles, along with the swords carried by officers and command non-commissioned officers, came up. The Rifle Regiment’s band burst into ‘Ruffles and Flourishes,’ and the gubernatorial flag unfurled on a traditional navy mast to the reviewing stand’s rear.
Yakin received the Lyonesse Defense Force’s salute with the aplomb of a veteran flag officer, thanks to time well spent in practice under the sharp eye of Regimental Sergeant Major Bedros Havel, the Lyonesse Rifle Regiment’s top kick.
When the music died away, Morane called the shoulder arms and invited Yakin to inspect the troops, formed into four battalion-sized units. The 21st Pathfinder Regiment, as the most senior unit present, held the right of the line. Next came the Lyonesse Rifles, who’d been granted the status of an Army regiment as per traditions predating the empire. The Lyonesse Defense Force color party occupied the center of the formation, followed by a naval contingent, under the command of Captain Mikkel and formed by spacers drawn from the three ships in orbit. The fourth and final unit, holding the left of the line, was the Lyonesse Defense Force Support Group under Captain Lori Ryzkov, Narwhal’s erstwhile commanding officer.
The band struck up a traditional slow march as Yakin, with Morane on her right, slowly marched down every row, meeting the eyes of each Marine, soldier, and spacer.
The march past that followed the inspection was, for the vast majority of spectators, one of the most stirring displays of martial pomp and pageantry they’d ever seen. Fifteen hundred officers, non-commissioned officers, and junior ranks passed the reviewing stand in perfect step to the sounds of a full military band augmented by the Marines’ beloved bagpipes.