Imperium: Revelation: Book Two in the Imperium Trilogy

by Paul M Calvert

  Karen realised Adam had obviously sent a message on ahead, as Graham seemed to be expecting them or must have had a very good surveillance system. She looked around the room again, more closely this time. It was surprisingly devoid of anything, just the chair, table, and dais, which were in the middle of the room about one foot higher than the rest of the floor, ten foot in diameter and coloured deep blue.

  “Which one of you will go first?” Graham asked, looking at them both, giving Karen the impression he thought she knew what she was here for. Adam stepped forward, onto the dais and began removing his outfit, until he was standing in his underwear.

  “Do I have to do this?” Karen asked, not sure if she wanted to strip off to her smalls in front of this stranger.

  “Yes, you will, but once you’ve seen what happens then you’ll understand why. Don’t worry, just watch.”

  Karen couldn’t see Graham do anything, so decided he must be controlling events with his mind, for no sooner had Adam disrobed on the dais, then the blue floor beneath his feet began to flow upwards, slowly encasing his lower body, moving upwards until it reached his neck and flowed down along his arms, completely covering everything down to and including his hands.

  “Now hold still while it makes its initial calibrations,” Graham called out to Adam, circling the dais and checking him out from various angles. He turned to Karen. “Look at that wall over there, it will afford you a more detailed view.”

  Karen looked to where he was indicating, just as the entire wall became a screen, displaying at three times normal size the blue metal encasing Adam. At this level of detail, she could see the metal move slightly as if it was adjusting itself to his contours.

  “What’s happening?” she finally asked, not wishing to admit her ignorance but wanting to know what was going on and why she would be going through it. Immediately, a flood of information came in from Graham via her implant, initially overwhelming but with Vimes subtle help, it quickly became easier to follow the details and understand what the process was all about.

  “What is it doing to him?” Karen asked, addressing Graham.

  “The best way I can describe it to you without getting too technical, Karen, is it’s a reading suit which builds the matrix that will be used to create suits on demand specifically for Adam anywhere that has a copy of his template.”

  Karen looked thoughtful but resisted the temptation to simply ask Vimes to interpret what Flower had just said for her. “So why does he have to go into the reading suit; why not simply take his measurements normally. You know, take a three-dimensional laser scan or something?”

  Flower looked puzzled, debating if he should bother responding to the silly question. “Wasn’t it obvious?” he thought to himself, before deciding it wouldn’t do to annoy the Prince by insulting his guest, especially after waiting such a long time for him to be measured.

  “The suit is stimulating his nervous system to determine how it reacts to any given situation,” he finally responded, trying to make it as simple as he could for the young woman who obviously had some influence with the Crown Prince, “It uses this to determine what level of force feedback is appropriate. The calibration takes some time but the advantage is that no period of training is required to learn how to operate the finished armour. Normal suits require weeks of training for the operator to learn how to use them without injuring themselves or others. With this system, you can pick up an egg with armoured hands seconds after wearing a suit for the first time.”

  “So why doesn’t everyone have one of these suits and save on training?” Karen asked the obvious question, getting the distinct impression that Graham thought she was an idiot, but still determined not to ask Vimes, wanting to find out things for herself.

  Flower sighed, wondering why he was surrounded by idiots who took so long to understand even the most simple of things. “Many reasons. Templates contain vast amounts of data, effectively a map of a person's nervous system. It’s not cost effective, nor safe, to hold the data for billions of Marines on every ship. The cost of building a bespoke suit is at least ten times that of an ordinary one, so you can see it’s just not practical,” and with that, he went back to examining Adam.

  “Karen,” Vimes interrupted her observation of Adam, “a high priority message has just come in for Adam but I have blocked it for the moment as it would upset the suits readings if he was to receive it whilst being scanned.”

  “What is it?” she asked, fearing it was bad news about Adam’s father.

  “Alexander is alive and well, but has lost all of his fleet, however, the majority of the crew are safe and well. He will be arriving here secretly in ten days, so none of this can become general knowledge. Not a word to anyone. I will advise Adam the moment his readings have been taken, then he has to see Christine immediately. You are to remain here for your own measuring, then I will guide you back to the Palace.” Vimes sounded relieved.

  “The secrecy is because this information has come via the hidden communication device, I take it?” Karen asked, pleased she had figured it out for herself, “But what does this all mean, what’s going to happen next?”

  “Civil War, Karen. It means the Empire is going to war with itself.”

  Scene 15, Wormhoudt, France. 28 to 29th May 1940

  Alexander was brought back from his miserable thoughts by large drops of cold water falling onto his position beneath the trees. “It must have been raining for some time,” he thought, for the position was well sheltered by leaves and branches. He was surprised at how much time had passed since pulling himself away from the scene of the massacre. Since promising himself never again to stand idly by when evil men went about their business, emotionally he was now feeling a little better. Taking the drones out of overwatch, he sent them off in two directions; one to witness what was occurring on the crowded beaches, the other to check on whether the Germans had done anything with the bodies of the British they’d murdered or just left them in the open.

  It was only a matter of moments before the first drone travelled the short distance to the barn and began sending back images. To Alex’s disgust, the bodies had simply been left where they had been shot. Wanting to check on what they had done to the officer, he moved the drone, only to see that whilst his body still lay there, of the other soldier there was no sign, just faint traces of blood moving away from the position that were quickly being obliterated by the heavy rain.

  Nearby, large numbers of other German soldiers were closing in on the Barn and surrounding area, although these were dressed differently from the others, lacking the black collars, armband and twin lightning bolts from their uniforms. Adam watched intently as the first Germans reached the scene and saw bodies lying everywhere. Several moved cautiously to the barn, their weapons raised, while one ran back towards two officers who were with the main body of men, shouting out a warning. Alexander moved the drone closer, wanting to know if these were as bad as the others and what they would do. He could clearly see the look of disgust on the men’s faces as they entered the barn and saw the carnage within. Through the sensor, he could smell what they did, the cow manure not quite able to mask that of the blood and spilled guts. Rapidly, the officers and the other soldiers reached the barn and began searching the area, the men following barked instructions to fan out.

  He watched as several followed the path taken by the British officer and the wounded soldier, reaching the body. They called out, requesting someone senior to come and look at what they had found. The soldiers were plainly angry but waited until one of the two officers came over to look at the dead officer.

  “I want the area searched and any bodies found taken back to the barn. I don’t have to tell you to treat them with respect,” he ordered the waiting soldiers.

  “Sir, who do you think did this…?” one of the men began, whom Alex thought reminded him of a certain Marine Sergeant from his father’s bodyguard back home. The man was cut short by his officer.

  “Who do you th
ink, Unterfeldwebel? It was those god-damned SS, probably the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, that passed through here before us. They don’t take prisoners, making it all the harder for us. Verdammte Scheiße, as if I don’t have enough to deal with already.”

  Obviously annoyed, the officer stomped off back to the barn, skirting the pond, while the others began searching the area. It was only a matter of minutes before Alex heard a shout, calling out a survivor had been found. He swung the drone over to get a better look and watched as two Germans carefully pulled a British soldier out of the ditch where he had dragged himself, about fifty yards away. With a shock, he recognised him as the man with the badly damaged arm who had been helped by the British Officer and shot in the head. He’d thought him dead and was cursing inside that he hadn’t bothered to check for himself. Despite his wounds the man had dragged himself away, hiding in the ditch.

  Alexander tensed, for if these Germans tried to shoot the man he would act, even if it meant losing his own life in doing so. He could not stand by twice and do nothing. Fortunately, it was obvious that these Germans were different from the others and he watched as a medic was called over and began treating the man’s ghastly wounds.

  “Will he survive, Vimes?” he asked.

  “Unlikely, given the state of medical science, but you never know, Alex. The human spirit is a marvellous thing and despite their primitive technology, he might just pull through if his will is strong enough. That he managed to pull himself so far while suffering those wounds, is a testament to the man’s strength of will,” replied Vimes, sounding thoughtful.

  “There is nothing more to be done here and soon you will need to make a decision. Will it be the Germans, the British or will you throw in your lot with the French and try and pass yourself off as a local? What is it to be?” he asked, hoping to force Alexander into making a decision and also stop dwelling on what had happened here.

  Alexander didn’t need long to consider and almost immediately simply said out loud, “The British.”

  Vimes was not surprised by Alexander’s decision, knowing how much the massacre had affected him. “What’s your plan, then, what do we do next?”

  Alexander called up an image from the second drone, overlaying it with a map of the area retrieved from the lifeboat before he ejected. He could see several British Destroyers moored in close to the beach despite the risk of becoming beached. Two others, belching thick smoke to disguise themselves from the attacking planes, were taking people from the badly bombed harbour. Dozens of smaller boats, some little more than pleasure craft, appeared to have made the perilous trip across the channel separating Britain from France. Alex could see dozens more heading back, full to the gunwales with tired, desperate looking men. Overhead, flights of German bombers began attacking the beach again and he watched as sticks of bombs fell down on the helpless soldiers, throwing up great gouts of sand as they exploded.

  The main harbour was still functioning, but much of its infrastructure had been wrecked. Cranes lay toppled or with their arms bowed down to the water. All around, plumes of smoke rose lazily into the air, before flattening out beneath the low clouds and spreading evenly for miles, mixing with that from the Destroyers. Compared to the previous day, Alexander noted there were even more men and abandoned material crowding the beach and approach roads. The crump, crump of artillery shells could be heard, the British guns making a distinctly different sound to those used by the Germans. By now he fancied he could tell the difference between the two sides simply by the noise their weapons made.

  Long lines of weary men wound their way down from the rows of houses that lined the beach’s beginning, through the sand dunes and down into the surf, snaking out to sea until they were standing deep in the water, the smaller men often up to their necks and having trouble keeping their heads above the incoming waves, often being helped by their taller comrades. At the end of each line, boats of all sizes were picking them up, the smaller ones leaning perilously to one side, often eliciting shouts from the sailors on board to be careful. All the while, the enemy kept up the bombardment, the toll of dead and wounded rising inexorably. Further inland, Alexander could see the British and others, who he assumed were remnants of the French army, trying to stop the German advance by taking up fortified positions just outside the town. Burnt or wrecked vehicles and artillery were everywhere and there wasn’t a road for miles in any direction that was not littered with the debris of war and bands of soldiers making their way to Dunkirk.

  Alexander brought the second drone back slowly, looking for a safe route to help him get to the beach and join with the soldiers. He felt it might be possible to pass himself off as a French soldier, having noticed several men with darker skin in their ranks, unlike the British who were a homogenous group. He calculated it would take him a good seven to eight hours to reach the coast from where he was hiding, twenty miles if he stuck to the roads and footpaths. His preferred path to Dunkirk was cut by a wide canal and it would take him over a bridge which he hoped wouldn’t be blown by the British before he got there, for he didn’t really want to swim across and spend the rest of the day in wet clothes.

  “What to do, what to do?” the question burned in his mind as he sought desperately for an answer. Although the British seemed to be holding the Germans off for the moment, at most it would only be one or two days before their position became completely untenable and they would be forced to either surrender or fight to the last man. After witnessing what the SS were capable of he didn’t fancy their chances should any of them surrender to those particular troops.

  Carefully, he made his way along the pathways, ready to throw himself into one the ditches that ran alongside should either of his drones show he was in danger of being observed by any Germans. That way, he would be able to cover much of the distance today before it got dark and then continue on until he had moved behind the British lines, at which point he would rest up for the night and try to make his escape the next day. Occasionally he came across dead horses, some still in their traces, flies crawling around their dead eyes or on the gaping wounds. The primitives here were obviously still using domesticated animals alongside their mechanical units and Alexander idly wondered what the poor animals had made of all the carnage and noise going on around them.

  The rain had stopped several hours earlier and Alexander decided he was hungry. He had walked through a number of small villages and settlements, some no more than a handful of houses, but of the local population, there had been hardly any sign. The terrain had changed too; as he neared the coast there was an increasing number of water-filled ditches and small canals, crisscrossing the fields to drain water away from them. He set the drones on overwatch and sat himself down beneath a wooden signpost, set in a little bed of coloured flowers, it’s faded arms pointing forlornly in two directions. One pointed towards Looberghe, yet another village and his next destination. He pulled off his survival bag and sat down, then fished out another protein bar, sitting there quietly, taking the occasional swig from his flask, the smell of distant smoke mingling with the sweet perfume of the flowers around him. Alexander wondered about the craziness of war, the ridiculousness of his current position bringing a wry smile to his lips, the first since the massacre. Here he was, heir apparent to the greatest Empire in human history, sitting on a bed of flowers, eating a ration bar amidst the carnage of a primitive war, on a planet so distant from home that the system wasn’t even on any star charts.

  “You couldn’t make this stuff up,” he said out loud to himself, shaking his head slightly.

  A warning came in from one of the drones and he immediately called up the image, shoving the last remnants of the protein bar into his mouth. Near the bridge he needed to cross, about fifteen minutes walk away, he saw a small group of soldiers begin to set up a number of positions that would cover the bridge and road in an arc of fire. He recognised the weapons as those used earlier by the British, rapid firing and able to maintain a good rate of fire, so he assumed
they were part of a rear-guard sent to hold the bridge and delay the advancing Germans, who he thought had been remarkably slow in pushing forward. A number of the small, tube-like artillery pieces were also being rapidly assembled by three-man crews, their barrels pointing high into the sky in his direction. Several men were crawling around under the bridge, attaching boxes onto the main supports.

  “Vimes, what do you make of this?” he mumbled over the remaining bar, switching to thought as it stubbornly refused to be chewed properly without another drink from his flask, “Should I introduce myself to them and if so, how? I haven’t the faintest idea.”

  “I think the Germans are going to provide the answer for you, sooner or later, Alex. I note that a large number of those black-clad soldiers, referred to as SS by that German officer, are about two miles away from here, moving slowly towards this position and should be here in an hour or so.”

  “How’s that going to help me?” Alexander asked.

  “You can approach these soldiers at the bridge and warn them of the approaching Germans, thereby gaining their trust. If they let you go through, then fine. If they hold you for questioning, then the arrival of the Germans will show you spoke the truth and you tried to help them, at which point they will either let you go or you will have the chance to work with them in fending off any attack, further gaining their trust. When they are relieved or fall back, you may be able to go with them, thus having the perfect excuse for getting through the final defensive positions and getting onto the beach without too many questions being asked.”

  Adam considered his options. He could easily swim the canal at a different point but, sooner or later, would have to pass through the defensive lines of the British, risking capture or worse. If he did as Vimes suggested, then he risked being shot out of hand, probably not by the British who had so far proved themselves honourable, but more likely by the Germans when they attacked. He remembered the lifeless eyes of the officer and the laughs of the Germans as they fired into the barn, the memory deciding matters for him.