Ashes Page 3

  Despite the questionable origin of the author of the book as the student of Confucius; Aquilinus had acquired a copy of the works of Sun Tzu and was studying them. The Empire had experimented with outlawing this particular book, but after realising its value had only restricted its availability to the general populous. It would not have done to let such a work fall into the hands of a rebel leader. Enough damage was being done to the standing of the Empire as it was with guerrilla movements springing up in ever increasing numbers. What puzzled Aquilinus was that the Hell-Worlds, where all troublemakers were sent had hardly been touched by rebellion, and were seen as “easy postings” by many of the men. Granted there were law and order difficulties, criminal gangs and the like but no idealistic rebellions. The hothouses of the rebellions were well-provisioned worlds, with no prior history of trouble. They used words like freedom and reverted to their old religions. Lieutenant Gratius had never had much time for religion after he had seen the pyres erected in the main square of some backwater world and the victims eviscerated for the entertainment of the crowd. He would bend his knee and attend the occasional service but his heart was not in it. Service was for the lives of his men rather than some grand ideal of the Empire in which he no longer truly believed. A victory was, for Aquilinus, not the successful destruction of a patch of rebellion, but the return of his men with no deaths among them. To this end he was seen amongst his superiors as a careful but uninspiring officer to whom a task could be given and it would be completed with the minimum of fuss, just no flair. This had limited his prospects for promotion but he had the advantage of possibly still being alive at the end of his service.

  Idly Lieutenant Gratius wondered what Trans out would bring. Briefings were not given to troops on Trans out as the destination could be leaked to escapees. They were less likely to try and escape if the destination were not known, for the prospect of a world even less hospitable than the one they already inhabited was always a possibility. Thus the objective of their next assignment could be a full war zone or ceremonial duty for some planetary governor. Lieutenant Gratius knew that his troops would face months of punishment detail should they end up as ceremonial guards for they seemed completely incapable of keeping their uniforms in regulation condition. There would always be button missing or a boot not shiny enough. His troops were better suited to irregular duties, guarding potential targets and scouting the outskirts of combat zones. Even though Sergeant Curtius was a disciplinarian he was also similarly afflicted with untidiness and so the men could hardly be expected to take an admonishment for that particular shortcoming from a sergeant exhibiting the same inadequacy. Given the number of rebellions in the Empire at the time Gratius was realistic enough to know that the men would be grateful for such a posting despite the punishments. Punishment detail was infinitely better than being stuck in some forsaken trench somewhere with artillery blasting at your senses, shots whizzing past your head and some ideologically committed opponents trying their damndest to kill them. Once a rebellion had taken place the Empire only responded with one sentence - death. Death for every man, woman and child within the area. They would be taken from the place they had once called home and transported to the nearest Internment Camp for the Inquisition to deal with them. Soldiers were never expected to dirty their hands with executions. Once the fighting was over and the prisoners transported it was off to the next posting, or an extended period of rest and relaxation.

  The book was placed carefully on the bedside table as the light was blown out. To the casual eye it would seem that the placing of the book was with exaggerated care so that lines of the table and the edges of the book were aligned. The room itself was little more than a shoebox, but it was certainly better than sharing billets with the squad. After a night of heavy drinking the normal snores and assorted back of the throat and nasal noises made by sleeping troops would be somehow even louder and more annoying. Aquilinus was grateful for the quiet as he checked his com-link was on and audible and then closed his eyes to enjoy what sleep he could get before the first call of the night came in. If he was lucky he could count on a couple of hours sleep followed by another four after dragging the more inebriated troops back to barracks to sleep off their self-inflicted conditions. Sleep did not come easy; it never did the night before Trans out. The possibility of Trans directly into a war zone was ever present and Lieutenant Gratius did not relish taking his men directly into that, especially if they were all suffering the after effects of inebriation as he knew that at least some of them would be. Any hesitation in that situation would be lethal to both the man suffering with a hangover and potentially the rest of the squad, but there was nothing Gratius could do to stop such activities for the loss of such an opportunity for these activities would harm morale and damage the squad more than the possibility of only one day below full capacity. It was unlikely that an immediate tactical posting would be imminent and it was all Gratius could do to hope that it didn’t happen the following day.

  It was 16:00 and only two soldiers had been arrested the following night. It wasn’t that they had had some precognition of coming trouble and been moderate with their drinking, it was more that the scarcity of agricultural products had made the production of alcohol prohibitively expensive due to the cost of raw materials. It also meant that the only beverages available to those of less than affluent means were more likely than not brewed in an old boot somewhere with the hygiene and care afforded to a manure pile. The uniforms were more often than not scruffy and poorly looked after. Only two soldiers looked as though they had spent any time over their appearance; Sergeant Curtius, who was not particularly well turned out but at least was better than most of his men, his spare uniform trick had once again achieved its objective. The other member of the squad was Halberdier Amatius Balbus, known as “Noob” as he was the newest member of the squad. Unfortunately, for a soldier given that nickname it would stick, which could theoretically lead to a Colonel still referred to by his peers as Noob. Halberdier Amatius had every aspect of his uniform to regulation standard; boots shone and uniform pressed and freshly laundered. Lieutenant Gratius knew this spoke of a lack of combat experience; a man who had been in battle would always look to the function of his equipment first before seeing if he could get it to regulation standard. Weapon functionality and then uniform comfort were the two most important things to men in an active zone. Whether the uniform was pressed swiftly fell by the wayside when the mud was rising and the bullets were flying. When trench foot started playing through the ranks, the concern over whether the boots were waterproof and fit well had a tendency to override the level of shine.

  “TEN-SHUN” Screamed Sergeant Curtius as Lieutenant Gratius came onto the courtyard. The winces of several men told Gratius all he needed to know about who had actually managed to reach insensibility the previous night. Again he prayed for a gentle start to this tour, there was no way this squad in its present condition could deal with artillery fire if even the shouting of a Sergeant could make them feel pain, the sound of artillery rounds going off right next to them would really make them suffer. “Officer on the parade ground!”

  The squad snapped to attention with a practiced ease, with the exception of Halberdier Amatius who looked like he had to think about the precise combination of movements a little more, but all achieved the end result within tolerances. Lieutenant Gratius proceeded down the line, inspecting his troops, pointing out imperfections in the turn, out. A missing button was noticed here, scuffs on boots there, all in all it was not the worst that the squad had turned out like but it was close. They had been hit by the lack of a proper gap between assignments. There of course had been little choice in the matter given the length of the march to the transportation hub. Had the hub been within the colony then the squad could have had another day within the comfort of the hub prior to trans-out. It would have still been a little short and Lieutenant Gratius was worried by this - it spoke of a hurried deployment and lack of planning. Still the 16:00 trans-o
ut did give a vague sense of hope as they could have been given an immediate deployment.

  “As usual men I don’t know where we will be transporting to and I don’t know our mission, but as always I know that it will be in the service of the Empire and Sol Invictus himself. We can be strong in that thought at least. Know that wherever we end up posted I will expect nothing less than I normally do. We serve. and by the grace of Invictus. we are saved. Those who may face us will not have his support and will be vanquished. I cannot promise that you will all survive this deployment, but I will, if Sol Invictus wills it, ensure that this unit survives and as many of you, as humanly possible, will survive with it. Those of you that do not will be forever bound in his glory and his victory.”

  Although he knew that many of his men did not do much more than nod their head in the direction of the Temple when required, Lieutenant Gratius knew that at least some of the men would be comforted by the speech and reminder of their duty to Sol Invictus. Halberdier Amatius for one had in the final stages of the speech plumped up his chest so much he had nearly lifted off the ground. Lieutenant Gratius knew that he would learn that the glory of battle and the grace of Sol Invictus counted for little when the moment arrived to pull the trigger and to find out the metal from the meat. In that moment all the glory and the grace counted for little for it would not stop the round from shredding your organs nor would it turn aside a blade. Worst of all no-one who had seen the aftermath of a large scale battle could ever describe glory in terms of war without inwardly seething in self loathing inside.

  Arches over-hung the courtyard of the transportation hub, white and spotlessly clean in the afternoon glare. For once the sky on Albina 7 was clear and light blue, the reflection from the copper tinted ice running true even within the atmosphere. The blue was much lighter than on Invictus itself as Invictus’ atmosphere reflected the light from the liquid oceans whereas here the snows came from the destruction of large drifts and the raw materials were blown back into the atmosphere, the ice was eroded by wind action and the water never melted. Clouds were made up entirely of ice crystals and could give an amazing show when light was refracted through them in exactly the right way - with a myriad of rainbows resulting.

  Lieutenant Gratius as always before a trans-out fixed every detail of his surroundings in his mind - the sight of hub personnel evacuating the courtyard in preparation for the Trans; the slight and accelerating movement of the arches giving the sensor readings for the computer to map their atomic and sub-atomic structure. The marvellous pale blue sky was almost blinding in its intensity. The chances of things going wrong in the Trans were in Lieutenant Gratius’ mind but also part of the problem was that he knew how a Trans worked. Anti-matter was created at the same time as matter of the same type (only reversed in atomic charge); after a brief and symmetrical journey this recombines to create nothing. The entire process is caused by a quantum shift upwards of the energy levels of the “nothing” which is temporary. The antimatter and matter are created in the same place and thus should destroy each other the instant they are created but they don’t, they are time-shifted; they don’t exist in the same time frame. One is pushed forward in time, the other back. The problem therefore was to move an already existing particle forward in time. This meant creating a polar opposite particle in antimatter and throwing that back in time. That throws the initial particle forward leaving the energy to simply create a copy of the particle in the present. Thus a third particle is created. The two original particles therefore travel through time and return where the antimatter particle collides with the copy and the original particle is unharmed and survives the time-shift. The copy acts as a bookmark if you will, holding the place in time open. A pre-made copy of the original particle at the destination is transported back and a copy of the antimatter particle is transported forward. The original particle arrives and at the exact same time as the pre-made copy is sent back to the point where the antimatter particle and other copy particle are to be destroyed. The original particle therefore stays in the destination time. The antimatter particle comes back to the destination time and destroys the copy which had to be created in the present time to send the pre-made copy back to be destroyed.

  Lieutenant Gratius however had no faith in the process and was not entirely sure what, or who, was being destroyed at any one time. In a godless age of technology it is all very well to speak of copies and the destruction of these copies, but when Gratius was not sure where in this equation the soul ended up. Suppose that the soul was not transported and was destroyed along with the copies? Suppose he was not transported at all and his copy ended up at the destination each time? The copy would not know the difference and each time he Transed out he was in fact destroyed each time. Even if that was not the case, imagine the lifespan of the various copies. That they could be called into being for only a fraction of a second to be eradicated from existence each time. A brief second of life, which consisted only of the agony of being destroyed. What price would that thought bring to his soul each night; that he had killed himself over and over again? This was why he concentrated on all the details he could perceive, from the heavy breathing of certain members of his squad, to the stale smell of alcohol exuded in the sweat of his men. The concentration on the scene in form of him helped distract his mind from the unpleasant prospect of imminent destruction or the willing suicide of his copies.

  As the arches rotated faster and faster the blue flickering of the scanners played over every part of the squad from almost every perceivable angle. Integral to the success of the transport was to detect and map every atomic and sub-atomic particle, not only its position but also its velocity, energy level and vibration frequency. Any mistake would result in an imperfect copy and the consequences of that mistake on sentient beings being transported had not been fully assessed. Even the priests didn’t seem to agree on the effects on the immortal parts of the individual - they didn’t even seem to understand the science. The calibre of priests assigned to the rank and file, and even the lower officers, were not the most gifted thinkers of the clergy. The gifted thinkers were assigned to the upper echelons of Invictine society. Thus it was left to the men, in the absence of any meaningful reassurance, to stand within the spinning arches and play of blue scanner light to fortify themselves to the possibilities and take the possible consequences of interstellar transport. Faster and faster the arches spun, the landscape of ice becoming visible to the eye through the arches - a visual illusion due to the spinning speed of the arches. Soon the arches became a blur, hardly visible at all. The blue lights from the scanners played so fast through the air that it seemed to be an azure haze. A bright white light formed in the middle of the courtyard. It was halfway from the top of the highest moving arch to the ground and equidistant from the edges. At first it appeared as just a minute spark but grew in size flickering, sometimes with a hint of red sometimes green or yellow then blue but always just a hint of colour never anything more. The spark grew, becoming greater and greater, expanding with exponential speed. Other sparks grew from the original and floated around the courtyard, appearing and disappearing seemingly at random, sometimes floating back and recombining with the expanding original. Soon rings of pure light circled around the exposed area and smaller rings appeared where the smaller sparks had appeared, randomly expanding and contracting into nothingness. As the initial spark expanded to encompass the entire squad the roaring sound that had been growing with the spark disappeared and an unnatural quiet washed over everything. The silence was aggressive, invasive and attacked even the sound of breathing, any sound generated, form the rustling of the unquiet cloth in the uniform of a fidgeting soldier to the scrape of a boot on the asphalt as balance shifted. The white light became brighter and brighter almost agony to the retina itself. Every man in the squad closed his eyes to the light or risk being blinded as a result of bravado. Red shone through the eyelids as the light even broke through that protection.

  Suddenly it was over, the
light had ceased and the aggressive silence had ended. Arches were once again visible to the eye slowing and coming to rest as arms were lowered, removing hands from protective positions covering eyes. As the arches came to a stop, normal sounds once again resumed as personnel of this new transportation hub returned to their assigned duties, moving supplies and equipment from towers to the courtyard and back again. In layout this hub was exactly the same as the one they had just left, including the uniforms of the personnel and the size of the arches and towers. Every man-made aspect within the complex was the same. Titanium-steel was still the construction material of choice and its grey was institutional throughout the Empire. The air seemed warmer somehow, although officially the interior of any Imperial building was maintained at exactly 21oC. This meant that they had at least been Transed to a world which was at best moderate and at worst so scorched by the system star that special suits would have to be worn to traverse the surface. If that were the case another gruelling march lay in front of the squad and Lieutenant Gratius was sure that this would be unwelcome news given the amount of dehydration the squad was suffering due to their hangovers. He fervently hoped that the order to march, if it came, would wait until the following day. The sky was a brilliant blue, which at least indicated the presence of water on this planet, and as the strength of the system star shone through the transparent dome it became less and less likely this was a scorched Hell-World but a temperate world in the general populous of the Empire.