The Deian War: Conquest (14 page)

When he reached the table that had once seated the twelve most powerful beings in
the entire dimension, beside the Great Enemy Himself, he fought hard not to stare at every chair and decoration as though it would turn to dust if his unworthy fingers touched them.

   “Commander, you judge yourself too much” Hydra told him kindly
, reading his thoughts from his face flawlessly.

   Tiberius could not help but
find that ironic. “If that is the case then I take after you, my Lord”.

   Hydra’s laughter boomed suddenly and proudly, filling the stone walls with rich warmth that was rarely visited upon them. “Aye, that would be right. I s
ee you’re skilled with your words as well”.

   Tiberius bowed his head in genuine respect. “I am forever learning in your shadow, my Lord”.

   Hydra nodded at this and scratched his chin. He could neither deny nor accept the over-generous compliment. Despite his abilities and what he could do, part of him always felt ashamed for how he made his contributions to the war efforts. What he planned in order to guarantee even a small part of the Empire’s future exacerbated that shame.

   “In answer to your ever-forward greeting, indeed I finally have” he said.

   Tiberius had never been afraid to be direct and avoided all hesitation in speaking his mind. “Which sector will it be?”

   Hydra gestured for the commander to follow him to the
far end of the table. Once there, he touched his finger to the map of the Empire and tapped lightly. “This is the only one that makes sense to me, Commander”.

   Tiberius, upon seeing the Apostle’s decision, welcomed it with both his dutiful heart and logical mind. “I am glad, my Lord. I would have chosen the Pantheon Sector as well. When do we make our move?”

   Now Hydra did something the commander did not expect. He closed his eyes, sighed, and turned away. It was almost like he was turning his back on the decision he had made, but Tiberius knew better than to think it was that simple. “When will our ships be ready?” the Apostle asked.

   “They already are” Tiberius replied.

   Hydra turned his head to regard the legionnaire, but decided against it. Instead, his eyes were glued to the staircase that led into the room, recalling the history that had been made through their existence. He bit his lip, but then he spoke the words that would change everything. “Then we should go immediately, shouldn’t we?”

THE GATEWAY TO Apollia yawned before him with its magnificent blue light like it had always done and, like always, he was awed by it. It bathed his read armour and gave it an almost purple hue. It was utterly beautiful and filled him with a host of feelings. Nevertheless, he bore the emotion privately. If the aftermath of Pheia had taught him anything, it was that others would always fail to understand him.

  
But who could understand you, my Lord? You are the Angel, the Last,
Aquila had said all those years ago.
You owe none of them an explanation; they should be honoured for what you
do
share with them. The Auranair gave you the wisdom to discern the right moment, but they can never truly appreciate that.

   Seraphim had never forgotten those words, nor did he forget what he answered back to the Commander of his legion.
It would seem only you and my brother Hydra understand my role, Commander. Though, I think even he cannot see my purpose for what it is. Nonetheless, I do not require anyone’s understanding for me to do what I must. I only require your loyalty.

   Aquila had bowed, a sign of so much more than duty and respect. The 111th legion deferred to
no-one
else, not even the other Apostles. They were loyal to Seraphim above all. They could be called the most devout, perhaps to a flaw, but they took no blame for it. How could they show even the slightest of obeisance to the other Chosen when the one who led them was the Angel?

   Until the end of days, we are loyal
, Aquila promised him.

   From that day, Seraphim never looked back from his independence. Whilst the Lion had sought his contributions to the war on multiple occasions and he had given it, he had his own motives for everything. The Auranair had shown him a vision. She had given him the sole duty of safeguarding Her birthplace
and he would do everything in his power to do that, even if it meant his death and his legion’s extinction…Even if it meant betraying the trust of the other Apostles.

   He had come to Hydron alone. By now, he and his brother walked through the Gateway to each other’s worlds as though it were a mere doorway between rooms. The relax
ation of safety protocols had come about through a mutual respect and understanding of each other. Though their relationship with the other Apostles was vastly different, they shared an irrefutably common ground; they were both looked down upon for doing what they believed they must. Over time, their trust for each other built until such a point that even their legionnaires saw little use in being strict when it came to their use of the Gateway.

   Now, just as he was about to return to his own sanctum, safe and secure from the interference of the war, Seraphim did something he hadn’t for almost his entire life. He questioned himself. Was he right to go back to Apollia, to his reclusion?
Of course
, part of him assured. He might not have been waging war against the Phantoms directly, but his discoveries on Apollia meant he would never have to.

   With that in mind, he stepped towards the Gateway without further hesitation. He drove his body into the orb of energy, feeling the light embrace him for its own before transporting him to a place that no vessel could ever travel to. It felt like the touch of a god’s hand and he imagined it was rather similar to what the humans referred to as rapture.

   The feeling only lasted a few seconds before he was back on the surface of Apollia. It was a strange notion to think of it as a planet when he wasn’t entirely certain it was at all.

   “My Lord, it is good to see you returned” Aquila called out, evidently surprised that he was here.

   Seraphim saw him standing nearby. His intuition had been right, then. The Commander had been poised to step through to the Hydra’s House when he came through the Gateway. The fact meant only one thing; his legion had discovered more about the meaning locked in the runes of the cave walls beneath the city of Elysium.

   “Aquila, tell me what you have learned” he
said. When the legionnaire’s eyebrows creased and his eyes frowned more than his lips, Seraphim realised there could only be grave news to be heard. “Tell me everything, and spare me no pain”.

THE LUMINON SAILED through space at speeds unfathomable by human standards. The Blackstar class vessel, wrapped in a cocoon of energy that allowed it the slipstream required for hyperspace travel, was alone in taking its trip to what the Empire referred to as The Shield.

To say
The Shield was a defensive network would be a gross understatement akin to saying a star was hot. Formed from three closely joined star sectors, the existence of which were a secret to the Empire’s public population, The Shield was a vast complex of fortress worlds and space stations that, together, provided the most intricate military asset that the humans possessed.

    Forged to the
east of the Meridian Sector, home of Gothica itself, The Shield was all that stood in the way of the encroaching Vorlan Conglomerate. It had taken almost a century to build, its purpose required long before the Deian War became a reality.

With the arrival of the Phantom threat, the sheer importance of the
conjoined sectors became ever more apparent. With the Guardians’ help, its construction had been sped up with no cost to integrity and power, but the Empire had taken the legions’ advice and technology with little given in return.

   Now, Lupus and Calla journeyed towards the greatest achievement in human military history. However, before they could reach their destination, there was a place that Lupus had insisted
upon Orion to take them. He had kept it a secret to Calla, but she was aware enough to know they had taken a diversion on the route they had planned together.

They were moments away from arriving. It was a sight that Lupus had waited years to show her. He had dared to dream during the Purge Crusades, when it seemed he would never find her again, that he could bring her to witness the majesty of what only he and his legion had seen
and now that dream would be fulfilled.

   He had never been more excited to see her reaction to something as simple as a sight she could behold with her own eyes. When the comms-unit in his chamber clicked and Orion announced their imminent arrival, he fought to contain his eagerness. Calla hadn’t seen him so enthused for
an age, perhaps not since she was human on Gothica and all they knew was life at the Academy. His mood was infectious and the fact of its rarity didn’t escape Lupus either, but it was an overzealous joy that he didn’t want to fight.

  
He took Calla’s hand, kissed her lightly on the lips and told her to follow him to the greatest gift he could ever give her.

HE TOOK HER up to the
Luminon’s
observation deck, a vast room that sat on the centre of the ship’s sleek back. Resting atop a supporting spine, it crested the armoured ridge of the vessel like a clear bubble. When he first led her up on the service elevator, itself more elegant than its function had a right to be, he was glad to see that there was nobody else in sight. It would be the way he had arranged; just them, all alone.

   The doors to the observation deck hissed open smoothly, as if they had never been used. In truth, the room had only been entered by a select few since its addition to the
Luminon
, one that Lupus had insisted on when they first encountered the place he had brought the ship back to now.

   At first, Calla could see nothing. Though the room’s walls were quite clearly made of glass, providing a completely panoramic view to what awaited them outside, they were currently tinted black. She knew without being told that the deck’s design incorporated this function in order to make the glass opaque. Given the otherwise near-invisibility of a stationary Blackstar, or even one in transit, it would do little use to have a structure that would attract and reflect any hint of light and give away their presence to unwanted attention.

   Lupus waked to the centre of the room and she followed, partly magnetised to him, partly drawn alone by intuition of what he wanted her to do. When she stood side by side with him, she was surprised to find that he didn’t move to cover up her eyes for a final tease. She could feel his excitement; it was palpable in the air. It was beginning to overcome her too.

   “You realise the walls are still black, don’t you?” she
joked.

   He gave her a smile that she had never seen before, one that she could tell he had waited an unknowable time to express. “Calla Vaylian, what I am about to show you is a sight that no human eyes have ever seen. It is one of my dearest secrets and
this dimension’s biggest prize. Behold creation itself”.

   Calla smiled back, uncertain but trusting the power of his words. She began to form a reply, to ask a question that was nagging at her mind ever since she knew he was about to share with her something that only he and his legion had ever been privy to, but he stopped her.

   “First, you should see it. Then you will have both a thousand questions and a thousand answers all at once” he promised.

   She saw the earnest look in his eyes and the question she had vanished. “Show me” she
said tentatively.

   With that, Lupus took his gaze away from hers and looked at the section of glass directly in front of them. When her eyes copied his, the opacity of the walls faded with deliberate and perfect timing. The sight before her was like nothing she had ever seen before. Quite simply, there were no words to do it justice.

IT WAS A
vista unimaginable to even the most imaginative of artists and poets. There were all the colours of the spectrum; those that could be seen by their once-human eyes and the thousands of shades that their Apostolic vision helped them perceive. The sheer brilliance and variation was almost blinding, but not to them. It took several moments for Calla to be able to understand what she was seeing.

   Stars blossomed into existence, fires burn
ed with the fiercest intensity and the richest beauty. Clouds of astral dust gathered together and were haloed by the light of dying gas giants, while a hundred white dwarfs battled with their red cousins for her attention. After what felt like an eternity of staring in awe and fascination at the miracle that her brain could barely fathom and interpret, she glanced at Lupus and knew she would never be able to believe that he had brought her here and shared this perfection with her.

   It should have been impossible, but he had taken her to a place that seemed to be a miniature galaxy of suns. It was like their own private collection of stars, the young and old, the newly born and the ever-dying. In the space of a few moments they witnessed a thousand creations with a plethora of endings so profound and moving that no human eye would be able to withstand the experience.