Rattatak IV - Near the Coalition Border


Doctor Moora gazed up to where rust-coloured clouds obscured the sun. He ran a free hand across his brow, wiping away a generous helping of sweat. His chest slumped as he gace off a quick sigh. For six days he and his group had travelled and still they could not find the Ratti. They had visited all twelve sites where previous goers had recorded their presence had been unable to shake off their persistant companion of failure. The natives had either migrated to another part of the planet or were avoiding them.


" Doctor?"


Moora turned to look at the brunette who had called. He regarded her for a moment and admitted to himself just how much he lusted for her. She was quite a woman at that - though some might call her a girl - with long brown hair and eyes to match and a not unpleasing hourglass figure. Were he half his age, he might very well have stolen away with her during the night.


" Yes, my child?"


" We have not seen any of the Ratti. Do you think they knew we were coming?"


Moora nodded his head from side to side. " Doubtful, Sister Era, doubtful. The Ratti are not technologically advanced. We are being tested by Ulah - we must prove resolute. We myst stay our course and bring knowledge to this barbarians. They will embrace the light, in time."


The woman nodded and swept her long ceremonial robe about her. She moved off and almost ran into another follower as she did. " Brother Tran - what news?"


Short a bit larger than most, the young man fell onto his bottom and drank greedily at a water-container. " We went five kilometers out to where the river flows. No sign of life."


Doctor Moora stood, and held his staff skyward. Please God of Gods, guide my hand. Show me the path we must take to spread the word of your teaching. Hear me god and aide your disciples!


A sound replied. Moora whirled about but both the young woman and the corpulent boy had moved away from him, they were not to blame for interrupting his prayer. He looked further down to where the other twenty missionaries were resting - all were accounted for. A pang of fear washed over the doctor and the sound of many falls upon solid earth grew louder in the distance, like a locomotive's approach.


" They are coming!" Moora exclaimed, holding high his staff. The others were prepared and readied themselves for the truest test of endurance. Their cereominal robes were unfurled and a great banner bearing the words Faith and Light let fly from an etched staff five meters tall. From the assemblage their came a slow incantation praising the name of Ulah and calling those unenlightened into worship of his name.


Doctor Moora sought out the highest peak he could find, a cropping of rocks nearby. From there he closed his eyes and gave off a quick prayer. Opening them he shuddered for at a full gallop came the Ratti mounted on beasts ten meters tall if they were one. The animals looked to be sheathed in a type of armor while the Ratti themselves bore their flesh to the air. Wretched they did look with a reddish skin like the clay and stone around them, two close-set eyes and odd protrusions of bone from where humans had hair. They were muscular creatures of hideous appearance but great strength. Their numbers swelled as they rode on, giving off a hellish cry that quickly droned out any amount of spiritual noise the missionaries could hope of making.


Doctor Moora felt his faith waiver ever so slightly as he called out in the direction of the heathen but failing to cease their charge. The distance between native and alien shrunk in seconds and then the Ratti were among them and not receiving the word of Ulah with any fervor. They speared and cut the defilers of their land, tearing entrails from innards and leaving the clay soaked in blood. Even the great banner was soaked with red when wind cast a coating of desert dust overtop.


And as quickly as they had come the Ratti had gone. They left behind them the twenty-one bodies of religious zealots who dared call them savage and disappeared into nothingness. In death the zealots may not have found clarity or an answer to the ultimate question but did find the company of the thirteen expeditions who had gone before them.

" Good morning, Field Marshal."


The morning sun cast its rays downward with impunity so making Field Marshal Alexei Prem squint as he turned to see his visitor. At first he could not discern between the dark-green hue of a Naval uniform or the slightly greyer version of the Army. Then the figure moved forward and there was no doubting the person of Marshal Eduard Saint-Cyr.


" Eduard," the Chief of the General Staff replied, placing a cut rose on the ground and standing as tall as his interrupted frame would allow.


" Ever the avid gardner, I see. Did you order the Corps of Engineers to expose this part of your quarters to the air or did it come like that?" asked Prem's guest which drew a bark of a laugh from his host. " No matter. Have you read the news this morning?"


Saint-Cyr tossed a pad to Prem. The older man easily caught it and thumbed through the displayed text. " Yes, I saw. United beat Slobendale in the Corellia Cup again. I lost several thousand credits on that bet."


" Not that you twit!" Saint-Cyr joked, snatching the pad and switching to another article burried nine pages behind the first. " This!"


Prem looked at it and shrugged. He moved past the other Marshal to were a steaming cup of caf sat on a counter. " This is not news. It was to be expected. They have tried what, twelve time, to convert people on Rattatak to their religion and the natives won't have it. They would get the same reaction if they ever threw a pamphlet into an Imperial garrison-base."


" This makes fourteen and you're right. I honestly don't care, in fact most of our citizens don't either. These people are a nuisance but a tolerable one. However, Rattatak is is a rather important position now, strategically. It could act as a thorn in the side of its neighbors forcing them to move resources off to counter any deployments we make, tying down a few formations. And, when we need it, it could be a jumping off point. If nothing else, the world would be an excellent acquisition."


Prem grew serious, deadly so. " The natives would have to be eliminated. All of them. I know there a few civilized ones, those we can keep, but I wont take a chance with anyone not immediately loyal to the Empire. We can throw them on transports and send them to an abandoned moon or eradicate them. Know of a commander up to the task?"


" I know of one."


" Very well - then get it done. And Eduard - keep thinking this way, and you may find yourself behind my desk before you know it."

This ship was not built for the comfort of its crew.


Lieutenant M. K. Voroshilov wiped sweat from his brow and stomped off down the corridor separating two long-range missile batteries. On either side ran pipes for venting plasma. Below sat the large holds that stored the missiles themselves. Above ran power conduits: above that the hull and then space. To keep the highly reactive explosive powder in the missiles from detonating, the air was humid and hot making everything, including passers-by, sticky. When Voroshilov felt the whoosh of doors closing behind him, sealing off the corridor, the climate controlled drive section blasted him with cool, breathable air. The sweat on his body froze and all discomfort washed away.


" All well, Chief?"


A grizzled non-commissioned officer looked up from the console into which he angrily entered data. " Damned thing is working now, but I can't say for how long. I've got a dozen sons of whores working here and they wouldn't know their pricks from hydrospanners."


Acting-Captain Voroshilov suppressed a smile when several nearby technicians turned towards the Master Chief Petty Officer with gazes that could have pierced durasteel. " We will be out of hyperspace in thirty hours. Then we won't have to run hot for some time. Intelligence reports no ship-to-orbit capabilities so we won't run shields until needed. You can finish that overhaul of the distribution matrix you have been itching to do."


" Doesn't matter to me Captain, it's whether or not you want the drive section to tear itself apart from an overload."


Voroshilov nodded and came about. The door greeted him like a demonic centurion but he summoned his strength and entered the unbearable passage once more. The walk took him five minutes and then he was safe again in the bow. He looked down at his orders on the pad he carried and felt both pride and resentment. His was a career relegated to infamy. He had no choice but to reduce the cith of Zith to ashes during the Meikill War and since he had been assignments too large for the Inquisitoriate to handle but required the singular villiany only a select members of the Fleet possessed. He was one of those few and now was careening towards an oblivious world to ply his trade.


" Captain," chimed his comlink. Swiping the device from his belt, the thirty-year old officer recognized the voice of his all-too alluring second in command.


" Go."


" Captain. The drill is complete and the report is awaiting signature in your cabin."


Voroshilov smiled and took off at a run for his modest stateroom. On a Destroyer his accomodations would have been little more than a closet but on a frigate or even light cruiser they were lavish indeed. The cabin door whooshed up into the bulkhead before him and a pair of hands lanced out to grab ahold of his tunic. He was pulled inside with his attacker and sealed in darkness as they tossed and wrestled. Eventually he bettered the assailant and called the droid-controlled illumination to half-power. There, on his bunk,. he towered over and pinned down the slightly older but well built woman and smiled to himself.


" My report?"


" We have missile readiness thirteen minutes after reversion. Topographic charts provided by Intelligence have given us a clear picture of where things are - all things but the natives. Recommend we send down our scout."


" Hmmm," the Captain purred, considering her recommendation as he held her hands above her head. " Just what incentive do I have to deploy my mini-TIE?"


Junior-Lieutenant Sasha Oxdorff grinned evilly with a twinkle in her eye. She grunted and caught the Captain off guard, bringing her hands down and flipping Voroshilov against the wall, her form pressing against him.


" Point taken. We will send down the scout. But not until we arrive. Now, about the rest of my report," he said, teasing at her face with a kiss that was quite feverishly returned. The two tangled together long into the night as the Exacter travelled through unclaimed space towards a system of hapless beings and underdeveloped people soon to be no more than a memory.

The Exacter slipped from hyperspace without any excitement and went about its work without any delay. The ship had an arrow-shaped command section, a rather thin central spar straddled at center by two large rectangular outcroppings, followed by a smashed-looking drive section where four twin-engines glowed a bright red. Entering realspace, the souls aboard thought the small ship and its four-hundred occupants to be the only civilized presence at Rattatak. To their dismay, a sensor sweep of the system proved them wrong.


" A space station? Here? Report!"


Captain Voroshilov was not pleased. His mood had soured greatly in the span of a few seconds. He had spent almost six hours in the pleasurable company of his forbidden love and now, with bad news at his face, he was visibly angry. There is a shortage of intelligence at Intelligence. Again.


" Readings have it as a civil station. I see maybe a half-dozen light weapon emplacements and several civilian craft, mostly freightors. The biggest of them is an old Action-XII Transport with a light turbolaser."


Lieutenant Oxdorff looked up from her station, not wearing her regulation forage cap as was her style. " That station has an IFF from the Brandt Coporation. Shall we open communications, Captain?"


" Negative. Our orders are to purge this system of indigenous life and annex those deemed capable of loyalty to the Emperor. They may contact us, but until then we have work to do. Chief Wohill?"

A short humanoid technician put the Captain through the mini-TIE pilot. " Yes sir?" replied the Chief Warrant Officer via the commsystem.

" Begin your run on the planet surface, full scan. You find something resembling sentient life report back with a grid reference. Understand?"

" Loud and clear, Boss."

Lax as discipline was on the small ship, Voroshilov paid no attention to the improper title. " Get going then."


An hour later...


TIE-series craft all had one thing in common: the ball-shaped cockpit that had been representative of Imperial power for almost a half-century. The mini-TIE also known as the Scout-variant, was simply that. The ball cockpit mounted just aft a small sensor compartment and a slightly larger fuel reserve that most, but no wings or solar panels. No gunner could hit one without a hideously wasteful barrage, though to do so would be pointless - the scout carried no weapons. It was the eyes of a ship and nothing more, save perhaps a high insurance premium for the pilot.


Chief Wohill was not particularly enamored of the small craft himself, preferring the TIE Defenders he had been trained in. His attempt at courting the daughter of his squadron's commander, however, had earned him a stern reprimand and relegation into Starfighter Corps obscurity. To be fair, he was getting paid much more to be a suicide jockey as Fleet jargon went. Earning the name aptly, he swooped down low to the broken arid terrain and unleashed the full power of his Merg-Arms sensor package.


It did not take long for a group of beings to register on his equipment. He changed course and downed a quick caf-mug while he closed distance. Sure enough, there were some primitive structures dub in to the side of a rocky cliff.


" Scout 1 to Big E, Scout 1 to Big E. I have located target Alpha 1, Grid 4, sector 8, 34-22."


" Copy that, Scout 1 - make best speed due north immediately."


The Scout banked left and startled every hunchbacked desert dweller now looking into the rust-colored sky. The mini-TIE disappeared over a ridge line and the natives returned to their routine. One youngling looked up to where the sun burnt through the clouds and saw a burning sphere coming down directly towards him. He screamed at the top of his lungs and ran about the elders pointing wildly over his head. One chieftan grabbed up the type and, being indulgent, cast his eyes above. There he saw the growing mass flaming as it thundered towards them as if the sun itself had shed a section and sent it to warm the surface.


The natives ran to and fro, some mounting titannic beasts that carried them away at break-neck speed. The descending object slammed into the rock-face with the fury of the Gods behind it making hotter the desert than any sun ever could. Flame leapt from surface to surface as hoardes of objects were vaporized instantaneously. The young and old alike perished without a trace while stone and dirt was flung from its place.


When the dust settled and the cloud of smoke moved on at the urging of the wind, it was easy to see that where a ridge had existed now was home to a valley. No object, living or dead, remained where it had been twenty minutes before. The Ollassi Tribe was gone.


The miniTIE flew on in search of more prey.

" Captain."


Moridok Voroshilov stood on the port side of the bridge, hands poerched at the small of his back. He watched intently the one of the ship's four-tube missile batteries rotate ever so slightly on its top-swivel pedastal. The sealant-hatch popped open sending a few unlucky molecules of reprocessed oxygen into the vacuum of space. A flare came from inside the tube when ignition circuits were activated. Soon thereafter the aerodynamic nose of a Triton missile poked itself from the tube and then rocketed off towards the surface. Little time passed before all visual contact was lost, leaving Voroshilov to picture the destruction it would cause.


" Captain."


Voroshilov turned to see Sasha standing behind him, looking a little irritated. It was a look he had gotten before. The Captain knew straight out he had been day-dreaming and had ignored whatever she said up to that point.


" Yes, Lieutenant?"


" One of the civilian freightors is coming over the horizon from the space station. It reads as an early-model Rendili ore transport, but Ensign Kamarov believes it to have been refitted and now hauls human cargo. It is using active sensors and appears to be looking for us. They will acquire our position in forty minutes."


The Captain mused for a moment. He knew all-too-well when he heard of the station's presence that this operation would not be a smooth erasure. " Is the ship armed?"


" Two blaster turrets, captain - nothing that is a remote threat to us," replied Kamarov from elsewhere on the bridge.


" Lay in an intercept course then. Navigator - bring us out of the planet's shadow directly ahead of them."

The smaller transport had no warning that she was about to overtaken. All was quiet, her scopes clear of any and all threats when alarms pierced the silence - a ship was on her back! The sensors registered an Imperial identifier but those who viewed the craft on holoscreens could not discern her class. The Captain, for his part, though a private citizen and employee of the Brandt Corporation, knew discretion was the better part of valor. He gave orders to kill the engines and the transport hove to.


" Transport vessel, I am Captain Voroshilov commanding the Frigate Exacter. State your business here."


" We're looking for you, Captain," the transport commander replied. " My orders are to ask you to accompany me back to the station. The Director would like to speak with you."





The meeting room aboard the station was nicely appointed, large floor-to-ceiling viewports on one wall, a painting on the other, a large table in the center of the room, and a few plants scattered throughout to give a more relaxed feel. It was a bit colder than Captain Voroshilov had expected, but he recognized the reason. Lower temperatures mean fewer heaters running and less draw on the reactors. The bottom line rules here.


" Please, be seated," said a fragile-looking male whose clothes seemed to be hung on him, and only then just barely. He gestured at the chairs around him and smiled at the Imperials as they sat, not seeming to mind the curious looks the officers were giving him.


" I am Director Brandt, CEO of Brandt Corporation. What brings you to Rattatak?"


Captain Voroshilov sat motionless for a moment. The man was very congenial, pleasant even. He couldn't get out of his mind that he was being deceived - it was very odd for a space station, and a privately owned one at that, to be orbiting some all but forgotten world in the Rim. Trap or not, the Captain decided on honesty - blunt and cold. " Imperial citizens were murdered here and we are dispensing justice."


" Dispensing justice," the old man repeated. " Justice. By justice you mean you've brought that ship of yours here and will wipe out everything you can find then erect a flag on the highest peak and bring this planet into the Emperor's dominion."


Voroshilov stirred in his seat, though his face remained motionless. " I am not at liberty to disclose mission details."


" Of course you can't. I don't need you to. You're here to eradicate the populace. I know that. It's a righteous goal, to be sure, but I need the natives. They're not the brightest, but I have found them to be indispensible to our operations here."


The Captain's curiosity was not piqued. " Indispensible? How?"


The old man rose and motioned to the door opposite the one through which they had entered. " I'll show you."

Rows upon rows of spherical cages greeted the quartet of officers when a door whooshed open to admit them to a raised catwalk. Their eyes traced left and right into a vast arena that spread out on all sides, appearing to be a foundry or assembly plant. The cages looked odd, being only steelen frames with rough edges and holes in every beam - not secure by any means. Captain Voroshilov focused his gaze to the left and notcied that the cages were not cages at all, for there were no natives inside. No, the primative humanoids were clamboring around them, some carrying tools, others gaggled after tall sentry droids that lead groups to and fro; all of them were dressed scantily, though their rages were replaced by abbreviated items that did not look like the beasts could have made them.


" What is this?" asked Lieutenant Oxdorff for her comrades. The acird smell of smelted metal wafted up into towards the open catwalk, forcing all but the Director to cough. Sparks flew from a dozen locations as beam was welded to beam. A symphony played out around them full of sight and sound, the litany of construction and movement everywhere.


" This is why you cannot liquidate the people down there. They are serving the Empire and saving me a great deal of money in doing so." Director Brandt let a thin lipped smiled crease his aged face, twisting his features into a visage that might have been taken from a page in a child's holofable. " This is the next age of science, Captain. My chemsist found a way to make them malleable and now they do as ordered. In this room they're assembling TIE Defender cockpits. Their brains can't handle advaned work like electronics or computers but they can do rudimentary assembly. They're very physically strong which certainly aids their productivity."


A clattering sound emanated from below, prompting all, even the director, to turn down and investigate. A dozen levels below a group of the brozne-skinned natives stood around one of their number who had upset a cart carrying durasteel planks en route to the first stage of fabrication. They could be seen conversing loudly though all noise was drowned out by the sound of the factory. As if decided, the group dispersed leaving the muscular cart-puller to himself. The natives walked away and a sentry droid approached. The cart-puller shrugged and was escorted away, not even gone from view when another droid brought in a replacement who went about the intensive work of uprighting the cart and restacking the metal planks.


" Where is he going?"


Director Brandt began a casual stroll towards the opposite end of the catwalk. " I cannot afford loses or mistakes, especially on an experiment. Please, come; there is more to see."


* * *


The tour lasted another three hours, the aged Director leading the party of wide-eyed Imperials through chamber after chamber, each one a variation on a common theme: natives under Brandt Corporation's thumb doing manual labor in the name of the Emperor. Some welded, some served as semi-sentient beasts of burden, others pull levers and push buttons that manipulate huge cauldrons of motlen steel. With each new vista viewed, the question unasked resounded in their heads: how? Reports furnished by Intelligence rated the natives as unable to perform such tasks let alone work compliantly in orbit.


Brandt laughed off the suggestion that Imperial propoganda holos had done the trick; Voroshilov only meant it half jokingly. Brandt refused to elaborate on details, but the basics were explained - chemicals were pumped into each of them that made them docile and accomodating. Productivity was high and profits soared but the dangers loomed large over the refitted Golan II platform.


Before departing, Brandt had given the Captain an admonition that was seemed to be as much chiding as it was intended to be wise: " Guns cannot always solve the Empire's problems. Sometimes a little finnesse and ingenuity is needed."

Several days later...


Log Entry, Lieutenant Voroshilov - Captain, Frigate Exacter

Rattatak is a desolate place. The natives below exist in deserts and plains of short grass that provide little excitement to those of the crew wishing to go ashore. Wonders are few and enticements even fewer. Thankfully this is not our duty station and I doubt it will be. Things bode ill for us and Brandt. This morning was an instance the Director attempted to hide but failed under our sensors: a new group of inductees to the planet surface reacted poorly to the chemical treatments administered to them while being ferried to the station. They acted our and began rebelling against the droids; Brandt destroyed the transport craft, explaining it was a reactor malfunction. My scanners tell me it was a destruct sequence. I believe Brandt has bitten off more then he can chew.


Several days after that...


Whether he wants to admit it or not, Director Brandt is losing control of the natives. They are growing tolerant of the drugs he is giving them. I have, of course, no proof, but my visit to the station revealed many strained faces and pale skin that did not look to me like the symptoms of overwork. Brandt plays a dangerous game of Gods with them. In doing so he has delayed my mission and placed the lives of his own employees at risk. When he places the lives of mine, his experiment ends and my orders will be carried out. I have no time to placate.


One week later...


The steady vibration of the deck plating bumped for a moment, the rhythm interrupted by a change in flow patterns from reactor to manifold to injector: more power was being pulled from the drive chambers into the engines themselves so the warship could fight the pull of the planet below and escape once more from the clutches of Rattatak's changing gravity. At first unsettling, Lieutenant Oxdorff had grown accustomed to the occurance. She was a woman who drew strength from regularity, serenity from uniformity. To herself she admitted it was so in all aspects of her life: if five years of service on three different ships, not one command had been taken that the Captain did not share her bed.


The woman smoothed out the sleeve of the jumpsuit she was wearing in place of the uniform of the day. She reclined in the captain's chair, letting the power of its leather seat embrace and hold her. Authority resonated from the dias on which it sat and she sat ensconced in its pull; power ebbed and flowed and she was its center, its master, its wielder. There was an attraction to command, an aura of enticement around all things from which command emanated and Sasha Oxdorff was not resistant to its magnetism. Long fingers moved down the chair's arm, its black leather cushioning caressed with the tenderess shown a lover - in this case, perhaps, it was not coincidental that a lover occupied it most of the time.


" Lieutenant," coughed the chair's rightfull master, standing behind his throne. The chair's current occupant did not stir, of course - why should she? There were only four other crewmen on the bridge and all were in stations that faced forward. She remained for she knew what was coming, and indeed come it did. The Captain stepped forward and placed his weathered, rugged hands on her wiry shoulders and held them there for a moment as he pondered his next move. The decision, however, was for once not his. One of the four turned quickly, his eyes wide with alarm.


" Sirs, priority message from the station. They're requesting our immediate assistance for 'problems with the natives.'"


Captain Voroshilov took his hands from his executive officer's shoulders and stepped forward down a half-step into the first bank of monitors. " Problems with the natives? Nothing specified?"


" No sir - nothing. I'm not suprised, though; all of their communiques have been short and none-too-sweet."


Voroshilov ignored the comment but catalogued its truth before erasing from his memory altogether. He commanded speed from his engineer and the calling of all men to their stations. Ten or so minutes later, the frigate was moving at flank speed around the world until the Golan station filled the forward viewports. From a dozen places dotting the hull where housing quarters replaced turbolaser batteries and industrial furnaces replaced shield generators, gouts of flame presented themselves into the blackness of perpetual night. Blobs of a greyish-blue substance hung in grotuesque shapes near gaps in the protective cucoon of plasteel plating, each one the remains of molten duratseel flash-frozen by the coldness of space.


" This is Chief Holis of station security. Exacter, if you can read us - smash this station to bits as soon as our pods clear. I say again - fire on the station when the last of our escape pods clear." The voice crackled amid static, screams and shouts audible in the ambient noise. No reply was possible said the staccato nod of the communication officer's head from side to side.


" Are their escape pods clear?"


Another officer, this one at the close-in scanner station, shrugged. " I've no way of knowing how many pods they're launching let alone if they're all out. I'm reading two dozen and half as many shuttles of varying types."

Captain Voroshilov watched the expanding grey-brown cloud blotting out the panoramic view of Rattatak. Any other world, he might have thought to complain or at least disdain the impediment to his stargazing; on any other world. Rattatak, however, a brownish mass of arid deserts and deep canyons, was far from picture-esque. The cloud of debris was not a stain in orbit but rather an enhancement of an otherwise barren and boring place.


" What are you thinking?" querried a female voice from behind. The Exacter's commander did not need to turn, he knew the voice well. Sure enough, an arm snaked its way around his waist and a soft pair of lips kissed his neck. Despite the horror and death portrayed by atoms smashed asunder on the other side of plated transparisteel, Sascha Oxdorff thought only of pleasures of the flesh.


" That poor man," Voroshilov intoned, remembering the weak and self-righteous Director Brandt. His skin sank as his lover embraced him, a shudder of passion only, his breath coming out in a short gasp. Even with the woman's lithe form pressed against him in the empty port mess hall, the Captain was lost in his thoughts. Absent of mind, he let his hand wander to her hips, squeezing her close. His eyes remained fixed on some unknown point in orbit. " He thought he could control them, even after we warned him they would not be controlled. We try so hard, bringing order to chaos, civilization to the uncivilized. Our dedication makes failure so much harder to stomach."


" Mikhial?"


Voroshilov looked out, his face stern. He sighed to himself, his chest rising and falling under the grey-green cloth of his tunic. We are sometimes accused of being so arrogant, we citizens of the Empire, oh so much more those of us in uniform. I think it is those who have never served that are guilty of a far greater arrogance for they have never tasted defeat. So we are tasked with cleaning up their mess.


The Captain finally looked down at Lieutenant Oxdorff and smiled, a weak attempt but an attempt all the same. The side of his lover's face was illuminated by a bright flash from outside the viewports, one they were both accustomed to. They did not look, knowing all too well the rush of a salvo of Titan LXXI Missiles, seven-meter long devices packed with explosives possessing a remote-steering capability up to ten thousand kilometers. Through the debris the twelve projectiles pushed, bits of the station tossed aside in their wake before disappearing from view. Voroshilov released his embrace and looked out once more, having lost sight of the Titans but knowing each one was covering the distance needed to bring death on those who would defy the Emperor's Will.


Not through words or deeds but meer existence reprehensible to our tastes. So we destroy. Some people answer not to the voices of reason or the pressures of obedience - they can be broken by the force of arms, alone.

Epilogue


A few weeks later...



The silence was deafening, so much so that men haunted by memories of old had to cover their ears. Indeed the solitude, the very absance of anything, forced a mind to wander, to dig up old memories and create for them new thoughts, new analyses, new possibilities. With old memories came old dreams, and with old dreams came old nightmares. Mikhial Voroshilov tried to damn the flood, tried to beat back the surge of emotion and thought with recalling the present, his success, his victories. He failed.


Spreading out around him, the mess echoed with voices of the dead, each calling out from beyond the grave at him. Some he knew, some he had killed with own hand, most he simply ordered killed or merely be responsible for their deaths by the whisper or bark of an order. A lesser man might have collapsed, the shrieks and howls of the silence all around him. A lesser man.


Mikhail Voroshilov reached over a hand to his right and secured a stainless steel cup whose contents he drained in a single gulp. The liquor burned his throat and then his stomach, setting afire every piece of his inner body it touched. Soon enough the contents had been sorted by his organs and the alcohol did what it was supposed to - every so slightly, his senses deadened. The silence became a little more bearable. But not much. The cup found itself squeezed in his hands then tossed several tables down, rattling around until its inertia left and the silence returned. Voroshilov grabbed the bottle itself and the two occupants of the expansive chamber - man and bottle - strode over to the window.


Voroshilov regarded himself, looking over his reflection once his eyes had adjusted, filtering out the panorama of Coruscant beyond. His was a dashing image, every bit the descendent of the hearty souls that seven millennia before had darted into the night and founded a colony on the frozen wastes of a world foresaken by all others. Against the odds placed by all who could think, they had adapted to the snows and the cold, they had drilled through the rock and ice and sediment, they had prospered as the wealth contained beneath the windswept tundra was exploited. Voroshilov smiled - he had the dark hair, the deep set eyes, the large hands that some felt were more paw-like than human - he was a Siderian through and through. His clothes though were not the furs of his home, but the garb of an Imperial Lieutenant Commander. His new rank plaque, out of the box only a day, twinkled for an instant when a ray of sunlight bounced off the fin of a passing shuttle. He was dashing and dangerous.


Dangerous. Voroshilov considered that one a mixed blessing, staring at the order below his rank. It was a seven pointed star made of polished onyx, ringed with the darkest shade gold his eyes had ever seen. The Order of the Black Hand, a citation with no text, no plaque to be hung in a wall or insert for his military file. It was a decoration given by the Emperor himself to those who did his bidding without question and without remorse. It was not a decoration striven for, earned only through deeds. What deeds - why those that needed doing, what else? What else indeed........those no one else wanted to do. The darkest deeds, and the bloodiest. The spectres assembled around the commander of the Imperial Missile Frigate Exacter looked on and admired the award, each one's existence - or non-existence - a testament to the man's deserving of it.


I am a dangerous man. Newly promoted and newly decorated, Mikial Voroshilov was a force both scorned and admired. He had killed thousands in the name of the Emperor, but not like the heroes and figureheads whose names are spoken in classrooms or whose busts hang in the Halls of the Palace, no he had killed because he was told to, because he wanted to. Those that were enemies in ideology only, or purpose, or because of skin or species - the infirm, the impure, the inhuman. He looked at the award again, the ghosts of his victims looking on with him. He was not a perfect soldier, he was a perfect minion. Orders had been received only an hour ago commanded him to depart the Core and make haste to the Onyx Sector - there he would ply his trade as his masters saw fit. The realization that he was a puppet, a pawn, struck home as another swig of liquor drowned out the roar around him. How does that feel?


Voroshilov looked at his reflection in the mirror and in an instant the silence leveled off and he was truly alone. Another swig of alcohol vanished the few that dared remind behind, every ghost and memory banished. The image in the window glared back, a twinkle in eyes set back so that the color could not been seen around them, and the answer rang forth with the thunder of a thousand guns: It feels great








Author's Note: This thread is obviously far from what you've come to expect from me. That's the point, though - isn't it? To keep the reader guessing, to keep them enthralled? I think it is - so enter the darkest most vile character to grace my works, Lieutenant Commander M. K. Voroshilov. He lacks the sophistication of the Grand Inquisitor and the chivalrous spirit of the Grand Admiral. All have one commonality - they love the Empire and will do anything to protect it, expand it, and make it thrive. Now you have a glimpse of the three characters that represent the newest era of the Empire - the honourable, the cunning, and the ruthless.