The Deian War: Conquest (2 page)

  
But for how much longer?
Valkyrie wondered. Phoenix and Waterfox could offer no help to the Tempest Sector; they were fighting their own, crucial battle for the factory world of Kraxus and had been for well over a year now. The surface of the whole planet was covered in manufacturing facilities that produced the weapons, war vehicles and ammunition for the Gothican Empire; except, with the educating help of the legions, it was now producing the advanced weapons that the Black Guardians were in desperate resupply of. If Kraxus was to fall, the Apostles would have limited options for rearmament of their armies.

   So it was that the Orpheus and Tempest Sectors stood alone, yet closer than any other star systems in the gala- no,
dimension
, Raina corrected herself. After all this time she was still adjusting to the truth behind the cosmos. It was hard to just replace her understanding with the terms the Black Guardians used to describe the stars and universe.

   As
grave as the situation was in the north-east of the Empire, she could not pretend it was the only war front. In the north-west her sister Calla, Whitewolf, was fighting for the remnants of the Abodian Sector. Of course, she did not fight alone. The Lion was with her as always, but Raina could not stomach the idea that he was, in the more romantic sense of the word,
with
Calla.

She considered it a crime that the two of them should fight the same campaign; if they were truly in love - a fact that Raina could hardly
support - then being so close together would surely cloud their judgement. They now had the largest number of legions at their disposal, at over one hundred, but just how many would either one sacrifice to save the life of the other?

   Raina was glad that another Apostle was with them, even if it were only one. Gaia, the Eleventh, was the third part of the Abodian Campaign. Raina would never have left Calla’s side as peacefully as she did
after the fall of Pheia, in fact she raged and fought against it with all her might and she could have done more to reject the Lion’s command, if Gaia had not been there to watch over the First and Second in her place. Just knowing that she was there with them gave Raina a small hope that she could focus them on the war. It was not Calla she doubted, but she was not naïve enough to think that the Lion couldn’t sway her sister to do something rash and distract her from their purpose.

  
Then again…the Lion does so dearly love the humans
, she thought. He will safeguard them as his duty and mission dictates and perhaps not even his love for Calla would sway him from that. After all, the Phantoms had swept over the Frontier in the first month of the Deian War, obliterating all orbital defence of Byzantium after the ruination of Pheia. Strangely, the Phantoms had left the surface intact as if to tease the Guardians of their power and tempt the humans to spread fear and anxiety to the rest of the Empire.

Only after that had the Great Enemy divided his forces
, leading to the Lion’s decision to abandon relief efforts of Byzantium and pursue the enemy across the stars. Valkyrie had never agreed to it, but the other Apostles had seen the sense of dealing with what he called the ‘pertinent threats’.

With the Abodian Sector closest
to the Frontier, a large force of Phantoms had invaded the worlds in a sadistic attempt to exterminate every human resident; a number that was close to seven billion. It was the Apostles’ duty, the Lion had claimed, to evacuate the humans to a safe harbour. How he loved to claim that honour for himself…That perilous sense of honour was going to kill them all someday, but only Raina seemed to see it.

   So it fell that the greatest number of Apostles and the mightiest deployment of legions would be held in the Abodian Sector
until the enemy spread further into other sectors, causing the Apostles to mimic them. Raina had been one of those to remain in the Abodian system at the start, but now only the other three remained. Sensing the humans’ increasing agitation and their twitching need to get involved in a war that was too horrific for them to endure, the Lion had given her the command that cemented the wedge between her and her so-called brother. It was only Calla’s insistence and pleading that swayed Raina to obey - no, not obey, but
acquiesce
.

   Now, having allowed herself to be directed by the sole Apostle that she had truly ominous feelings about, Raina sat in the same throne aboard the same ship in the same sector that she had been in for almost two years. She was bored, she was restless, but
most of all…she was weary.

It took a bewildering amount of energy to shield the Nimerian from detection and though it had been easy at first, the days soon grew to weeks, then to months and finally to years. All that time her legion, the 402nd, had been monitoring the Gothican Senate. All that time, they had been waiting for a sign, an indication of what the human government was planning to do.

   With the fall of Pheia came a fall in reputation and trust in the Apostles. Though they had claimed a large deal of it back through the battles and successes that followed the pyrrhic lesson at the Frontier, the Senate seemed determined to force their own people into the Deian War. There was little time or resources for the Apostles to act on a whim and dissuade the Senate from any action; instead, only Raina had been sent to observe and wait and be patient. It was laughable. Surely, with the extra reports that the Outer Worlds had given to the capital as more and more refugees flooded to the Meridian Sector, those in power should have come to realise that the war was everything the Guardians warned them it would be.

   Stumbling out of her thoughts with a sudden realisation that her straying mind would deprive the psychic aura encasing her vessel, Raina snapped back into focus and concentrated on rebuilding the shield
that had slowly started to falter. It had almost failed enough for them to be detected. It was not the first time, either. As she brought the deceptive cloak back to full strength, she began to hear a voice that helped to return her to the present. Who was it and why were they so insistent?

   With the shield fully active once again, she allowed a part of her mind to receive input from her immediate environment. Vita,
the highest fleet captain of the 402nd, was at her side by the command throne. Her mouth was moving, but Raina could hear only the faintest of whispers. She allowed a greater portion of her mental energy to reawaken her conventional senses.

   She looked up into the face of her subordinate. “What
is it, Vita?” she asked, her voice croaky with the slow awakening of her conscious mind.

   The
captain was holding something in her hand and moved it toward her. “My Grace, I was informing you of what we have discovered.”

   Raina took the hand-sized screen that Vita offered her and read
the information quickly as the captain continued to needlessly explain the situation. “One of the operatives from the 906th we have in the Senate has uncovered something. He reports the Lord Governor has drawn fresh battle plans. He intends to withdraw forces from the west so that he can engage the Phantoms in open war at the Frontier.”

  “Yes, I can see that” Raina snapped, regretting her tone immediately. She gave Vita a look that expressed an apology, but she did not care to voice one. She finished studying the details on her handheld screen, her brows furrowing in concern. With her helm removed and resting on the deck by her throne, her white hair was revealed in all its smooth appeal as she stroked an errant part behind her right ear.

   “What are your orders, my Grace?” Vita bowed, unfazed by the reproach.

   Raina had to consider her answer for a moment. If the operative had not made some fatal mistake, and the report was true, then what the Lord Governor intended would take months, if not years to implement. The Gothican forces stationed in the western Empire were a reservoir of strength that the Apostles would need to depend upon should the Phantoms break throug
h the lines of the Ghoul Hosts.

Though the latter were no allies to the humans, rather a deadly, inexorable foe, the Phantoms had no perception of this and waded in
to them without discernment. That thoughtless assault against a shared enemy was buying the humans time to evacuate the western flank of the Empire. Perhaps the Lord Governor thought the Ghoul Hosts would hold the Phantoms off forever, or that the Apostle Hydra would shoulder the burden in the Aurora Sector should the Empire’s original foe prove incapable of providing an impenetrable barrier. Of course, they had been too deadly for the humans to eradicate, so why wouldn’t they stop the Great Enemy’s forces? That was human logic though, which Raina knew was deeply flawed.

   No, there was no way the Lord Governor was correct to withdraw his forces and allow them to curve around
east of the Empire to the north and into the Frontier. It would mean total ruin to the armies he sent, no matter how large or confident they were. It would ensure the destruction of the Empire’s dignity. It would be the end of Gothica’s hope.

   “
Vita, spin up the jump drives. Our mission here is evidently at an end. Return us to the Abodian Sector as quickly as haste allows; we finally have the news the First is waiting for…and I’ve grown exhausted with this charade” Raina instructed.

  Vita nodded and began to issue commands to the bridge crew. As Raina withdrew from her throne to depart from the bridge, in the optimistic hope that she could now get some rest in her
private chambers, the fleet captain had one final question for her.

   “My Grace, what of the operative
s?” she asked, careful not to walk too quickly to resume her place in the command chair. She didn’t want to give the appearance she would jump in the Apostle’s warm grave as well.

   Without turning back, Raina called out her reply. “Tell the Dawntreader
s to stay where they are. Whoever comes back will need someone on the inside to update them.”

At the suggestion of a return, the captain gave her a tired look. Raina smiled, an expression that didn’t match her usual temperament at all. “
I promise you, Vita, it won’t be us” she said.

THERE WAS SOMETHING in the air. A smell, the faintest of them, but one that he could pick up with his advanced senses nonetheless. The odour of victory did not escape Lupus; the Lion,
the
First Apostle
. It had been over 12 years since that rank was made public, since he was referred to it time and again by his kin and the men and women serving under his command. He still couldn’t tell if it fit him, if it rankled or not.

   On all fours in his
Apostolic form, Lupus strode back and forth at the edge of the forest line. The smell of the tall, green trees was soothing to him, like it was an environment he belonged in. They reminded him of how he began on Gothica. He could scarcely believe he far he’d come since then and the things that he had done.

With him
were four brigades of the 617th and an elite company of the 10th Eternals, which together amounted to around six thousand Guardians. The Eternals, the allied legion to his own, would bow to his authority with duty and honour, but despite his rank, they owed their deference first to their own Apostle; Whitewolf. She was known as Calla to him, but he wondered how many legionnaires knew her human name too.

   A
familiar, pleasant aroma filled his nostrils. Before he could be informed by anyone else, he sensed her arrival. Turning to watch her stalk through the forest glade to the front line, he marvelled at her beauty. She too was in her form, her white fur immaculate and spotless despite the heavy rainfall turning the ground to a muddy mess. Her paws splashed through the soil but she remained flawless in her appearance.

   Lupus bowed his head in acknowledgement of his life companion, his love, his fellow Apostle. To him, the last of those facts was the least relevant and the first the most important. He couldn’t help but feel that their story belonged in a different setting, a different time. War was not their lot; peace and harmony was, but fate had a way of ruining their potential. Nevertheless, life had a way of providing opportunities for them. Even if it took a war campaign to bring them together, to fight side by side, then so be it. He would never let any harm come to her anyway.

  
Calla, it is good to see you. I feared you would let me lead the assault alone, with your legion begging me to bring you to justice for standing them up,
he joked. It was a psychic communication from his mind to hers. Regardless of the powers granted to them in the Blessing, they could not move their animal mouths and produce a human voice no matter how they tried. Instead, they had to resort to silent messages. Still, it allowed them to talk privately if they so wished. They had done so dozens of times, the only clue the legionnaires had of their conversation the long periods of apparent quiet from them.

   Calla seemed to smile with her eyes, a feat that he admired about her as much as he envied it. Could he do that too? Or was his face a constant threat of fury and righteous wrath against the enemy and those that happened to anger him, whether by mistake or with purpose?

   I have a duty to uphold, my love, just as you do. I wouldn’t let you have all the glory though, would I? Now
that
would be an injustice,
Calla replied. She heard his psychic laugh and it warmed her heart to see him in a good mood. The last year of the campaign had been tough on them all and only now did it seem that the Guardians were starting to get somewhere.