'Just so we understand each other. Now get out of here, turncoat. If I have to talk to you again, I'll find you. And if you make me come looking for you, I'll be the last thing you'll ever see.'
He opened the door and Ffolkes bolted past him, out into the corridor, running at full tilt and to hell with whether anyone was watching. No amount of payment was worth this. Nothing was.
The
Mistport's espers saw nothing, heard nothing, never knew they were there. Legion was testing and expanding its abilities. Theoretically it had been certain it could shield the pinnaces even from a distance, but as with so many of Legion's powers, it learned by doing. Hundreds of silver ships landed one after another on a wide plain of snow and ice on the outskirts of the Deathshead Mountains; some distance away from Mistport but quite close to a small outlying settlement called Hardcastle's Rock. Apart from a few scattered farmsteads, it was the only other heavily populated area of Mistworld. A small town of no real importance, population 2031, according to the Empire's information. No real defenses, very little tech. A good testing ground, before the main assault.
Men and women came running out of the square stone houses to watch the pinnaces falling out of the sky. Legion might be able to fool espers and sensors, but even it couldn't hide the roar of so many thundering engines from the people directly below them. At least, not yet. The townspeople gathered by the high stone walls surrounding their town, and watched and babbled excitedly as the ships just kept on coming. It didn't take them long to figure out what was happening. They'd spent most of their lives expecting and preparing for an invasion. The day the Empire came to reclaim Mistport as its own. Men and women ran to get their weapons and hide the children from what was to come.
Troops filed out of the long narrow ships, weighed down by armor insulated against the bitter cold, carrying swords and energy weapons and force shields. The pinnaces had disrupter cannon, but they were being saved for Mistport. Marines moved quickly to establish a perimeter around the landing field, ignoring the town for the moment. Imperial troops stood in ranks, waiting for the word. Cold-eyed, seasoned, disciplined killers, eager to make a start. Sergeants barked orders, officers strolled into position, and still the ships fell, and more men came marching out onto the snow and ice.
Toby Shreck and his cameraman Flynn, wrapped in heavy-duty furs, lumbered out into the cold, swore briefly, and began filming. They'd been instructed to cover everything, and Lieutenant Ffolkes was right there to see that they did. He watched the army assembling, and swelled with pride. It was days like this that made you glad to be a member of the Imperial Fleet.
And finally, from out of the last ship to land, came the commander of the Imperial forces, Investigator Razor. He hadn't bothered with insulated armor or furs, wearing only the blue and silver of an Investigator's formal uniform. He didn't feel the cold, but then, everyone knew Investigators weren't really human. The Empress herself had placed Razor in charge of all ground troops. Partly because he had led invasion forces in the past, before his retirement, and partly to show that the Empress trusted him entirely, despite his age and Chojiro connections.
Razor's staff officers gathered around him, bringing him up-to-date, anxious to show that everything was as it should be. Razor nodded curtly. It had never occurred to him that it wouldn't. Beginnings were easy to plan. His personal staff officer handed him a pair of binoculars, and he studied the town and the surrounding area. Normally he would have linked into the ship's computers through his comm implant, and accessed the sensor arrays, but with Legion blocking all frequencies, he'd had to arrange for low-tech aids for himself and his troops. Apart from the town there was nothing but snow and ice for as far as the eye could see, except for the long range of the Deathshead Mountains, plunging up into the sky. They looked cold and indifferent, as though nothing that happened below them could possibly be of any significance. Razor smiled slightly. He'd change that.
He studied the ten-foot-high stone wall surrounding the town. It was solid stone and mortar, sturdy and well-constructed. A few energy blasts would take care of it. Men and women from the town stood watching from catwalks along the top of the inner wall. Most were armed with swords and axes and spears, but a few had energy weapons. Nowhere near enough to make any difference, though, and both sides knew it. The townspeople were all dead. They just hadn't lain down yet. Razor breathed deeply of the icy air, centering himself. This high up on the plateau, there were few mists, and the air was sharp and clear. He gave the order to begin, and a hundred marines opened fire with their disrupters. The stone wall exploded, stone fragments and bloody flesh flying in all directions.
Smoke rose up, and sharp-edged rubble and small body parts pattered to the snow in an awful rain. There were shouts and screams as the survivors fell back from the great gaping hole in the wall. A few stayed to try and drag wounded from the wreckage, but the marines picked them off easily. More troops had moved into position on the other side of the town, and they blew that wall out, too. The townspeople had nowhere to go now, trapped between two advancing forces. Razor nodded to his staff officers, drew his sword and gun, and led the way into the small town of Hardcastle's Rock.
The battle was grim and bloody, but it didn't take long. The marines had the advantage of far greater numbers, massed energy weapons, and force shields. The townspeople fought bravely, men and women standing their ground fiercely. Swords rose and fell, and blood flew on the air, hot and steaming. There were screams and battle cries and roared orders, and bodies and offal lay scattered across the churned-up snow. There was no room or time for heroes, only two mismatched forces struggling in blank anonymity. Above the bedlam of battle came the occasional roar of energy weapons, followed by the sudden stench of roast meat. The troops couldn't use disrupters much for fear of hitting their own people, but the few townspeople with energy weapons barricaded themselves in their houses and sniped desperately from shuttered windows. But in the end, the Imperial forces were able to pinpoint which houses were being used, and blew them apart with concussion grenades and shaped charges. The squat stone houses collapsed inward as the powerful explosions ruptured the walls, bringing down the roofs and crushing those inside. The marines advanced remorselessly from both ends of the town, driving all before them, cutting down those who wouldn't or couldn't fall back fast enough. Until finally the townspeople were caught and trapped and slaughtered in the middle of their own town.
When finally it was over a sullen quiet fell across what had been the town of Hardcastle's Rock. The last defenders had fallen, and the few who had thrown down their weapons and surrendered, mostly women and children, stood huddled together in small, well-guarded groups. Houses burned to every side, crimson flames licking out darkening stone windows. The dead lay everywhere, mostly townspeople, some marines, well within acceptable losses. A few dozen marines moved among the fallen, marking wounded troopers for the med teams, and putting the wounded rebels out of their misery.
Investigator Razor stood in the middle of the town, in a small open space his troops had cleared for him. He looked unhurriedly around, not too displeased with the way things had gone. He'd lost more men than he expected, but then he hadn't expected energy weapons in the hands of rebels. He raised a hand and summoned his main staff officers and his Second in Command, Major Chevron. Chevron was a tall, well-muscled man who looked as though he'd been born to wear body armor. He crashed to a parade halt before the Investigator, but didn't salute. Technically, he was superior in rank to Razor, but they both knew who was in charge.
'The town is secure, sir,' Chevron said calmly. 'The townspeople are either dead or prisoners, apart from a few still hiding in their homes. The town has fallen.'
'They had energy guns, Major,' said Razor. 'Why wasn't I informed that the townspeople would have energy weapons?'
'There were only a few, sir. Like the town walls, they were there to defend against local predators. Nasty things called Hob hounds. It was mentioned in the original briefings, sir.'
Razor just nodded, neither accepting nor rejecting the implied criticism. 'Are we sure there are no more rebel settlements in the area?'
'Quite sure, sir. Just a few farmsteads, here and there. We can hit them from the air while traveling to Mistport. Word won't get there ahead of us. Legion is jamming all frequencies. Apparently it's not uncommon for communications to break down from time to time out here. Mistport won't worry about lost contact for quite a time yet. By the time they do realize something's wrong, we'll be hammering on their front door.'
'So we have some time to play with. Good.' Razor smiled slightly. 'Gather all the prisoners together and execute them.'
'Sir?' Major Chevron blinked uncertainly at the Investigator, caught off guard. 'It was my understanding that prisoners were to be used as hostages and human shields…'
'Then you understood wrong. Was my order not clear enough? Kill them all. That includes those hiding in their
