Death to the Imperium (Imperium Cicernus)
Read Death to the Imperium (Imperium Cicernus) Online
Authors: James McGovern
Death
to the Imperium (Imperium Cicernus Book 2)
James McGovern
http://www.jamesmcgovern.co.uk
http://www.facebook.com/McGovernWriter
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Cover Blurb
In the far future, the galaxy is dominated by the Imperium,
a galactic empire that encompasses a million planets. The Imperium has enjoyed
relative peace for centuries, but now war is looming.
A massive, unidentified ship is orbiting a mysterious
planet called Chaos in the outer reaches of the Paradonian Sector. Its purpose
is unknown, but its actions can only be seen as hostile. The Imperial Navy
fears the possibility of a rebellion.
Harlan Glitz, a convicted smuggler, is offered the chance
of a full pardon. To earn his pardon, he must travel to the planet Chaos and
find out the intentions of the alien ship. He is accompanied by his fellow
convicts Tekka and Doland, as well as the beautiful but imperious Captain Alyce
Wickham.
The unlikely crew travel to the Paradonian Sector in a
ship salvaged from a scrapyard planet, seeking to discover the truth about the
planet Chaos. But even a tough criminal like Harlan Glitz is unprepared for the
terrible secret that the planet holds...
[This is a standalone novel in the
Imperium Cicernus
shared universe.
Death to the Imperium
is set approximately 300 years
prior to
On The Imperium’s Secret Service
. Like all my books, it is
DRM-Free.]
Author’s Note
As I am an author from the UK, what appear to be
spelling or grammar errors may actually be British variations. If you enjoyed the
book, feel free to join my Facebook page. Also, all reviews on Amazon are
greatly appreciated.
I am indebted to Christopher Nuttall both for allowing me
to write a novel in his
Imperium Cicernus
series, and for carefully
editing the text to improve continuity.
If you aren’t already familiar with the idea, the
Imperium
Cicernus
universe was originated in Chris’s book
On The Imperium’s
Secret Service
, and authors are invited to submit proposals for further
books in the series. These books are not collaborations; rather, they are simply
set in the same universe.
Death to the Imperium
is a standalone
adventure set roughly 300 years before the first book.
If you are a Kindle author interested in writing for the
series, the best place to start would be the discussion forum on Chris’s
website (www.chrishanger.net).
Badlands
Paradonian
Sector
The
young Lieutenant approached the Captain of the ship and saluted. “We’re
approaching the planet Chaos now, sir.”
“Thank
you, Lieutenant.”
The
Captain stood up and approached the main scanner. The
Churchill
was an
auxiliary warship, significantly smaller than the Imperial superdreadnoughts
that he was used to. The ship was designed to supplement the larger Navy crafts,
and it was chosen for this particular assignment because it was fast and
inconspicuous. The brief was simple: the Navy had become aware of an
unidentifiable ship in orbit around a planet called Chaos, which was located in
the Paradonian Sector. Ten years previously, a scientist working for the Navy
had invented a system called MARS, which stood for “Multiple Area Response
System”. The system consisted of thousands of small drones, which roamed the
entire galaxy systematically, detecting any unusual occurrences or possible
signs of hostility. The discovery of the strange ship had alarmed the Navy—the
planet Chaos was a known wasteland planet, with no desirable natural resources.
The
Admiralty Board had come up with several possibilities for the ship’s presence.
One option was that an unauthorised terraforming process was taking place on
the planet. Another possibility was that a rebellion was forming. Admiral
Blaize, one of the key commanders in the Navy, had argued that they should send
a fleet of ships to neutralise the threat, but the rest of the Board had argued
for more furtive tactics. Although the ship was unregistered, and of an unknown
origin, there might be an innocent explanation. After all, it was not in the
vicinity of any Imperial base or outpost. If the ship
did
contain rebels,
the Navy wanted to gather as much information as possible before destroying it.
In the end, it was decided that a Navy officer would take a single ship to the
area to discover the truth, and make a full report to the Admiralty Board.
Now
the ship was approaching the planet around which the ship was in orbit. Captain
Blane walked over to the wide range scanner and looked at one of the display
screens. The ship was almost the size of two Imperial superdreadnoughts. The
planet of origin of the craft could not be determined.
“Possibly
not human, then,” Captain Blane said, swallowing.
“Captain,
you might want to take a look at this,” Lieutenant Ava said.
The
ship was now in visual range. The Captain peered at the main scanner. It
certainly wasn’t an Imperial or trade ship. The planet it was orbiting was dark
and sinister-looking; a fiery seam ran through the centre. Captain Blane’s
brief had suggested that there was nothing there of any importance. So why was
the ship so interested in it? Before the Captain could begin to think properly
about any of these questions, there was a loud crash, and the deck of the
Churchill
shuddered.
“Enemy
fire!” the Lieutenant shouted.
“General
quarters!” the Captain cried.
The
crew jumped to battle stations, preparing to fire on the enemy ship. Captain
Blane had been prepared for a fight—Naval commanders always had to be—but he
hadn’t expected one. The mission was supposed to have been a peaceful one; they
were to make contact with the mysterious ship and find out their intentions. It
seemed it had been a foolish idea to send only one ship; in fact, he had argued
against the idea originally. But most of the admirals had gotten their
positions because of their aristocratic connections, and many of them didn’t
have very sound judgement.
“Concentrate
fire!” Captain Blane said. “Antimatter cannons and phase torpedoes—fire!”
One
thing was clear in the Captain’s mind. The ship had malevolent intentions.
Whatever it was doing orbiting the mysterious planet, it wasn’t something good.
You didn’t just start shooting at an unknown ship unless you had something to
hide. Another crash rocked the ship. The Captain glanced at one of the screens;
they were too close to the planet to make a phase jump. The operator manning
the antimatter cannons checked the console; the weapon was fully charged. He
slammed his hand down—
—but
it never touched the launch button. A white stream of… something shot out from
the enemy ship, perhaps some kind of vastly improved plasma bolt. The last
thing the crew saw was a blinding light. Captain Blane didn’t feel his life
flash before his eyes, like the old cliché. In fact, he didn’t feel anything at
all.
The
world simply stopped.
Interstellar
Shipyard
Terminal
Island
Varon
Harlan
Glitz scowled at the guards as he was pushed forwards by the steady flow of
prisoners. Glitz was a tall man of around forty, with a tangle of brown hair, a
thick growth of stubble, and a muscular chest. The prisoners were all
handcuffed, and he knew it was futile to attempt to escape. A single prod with
a shocker, one of the guards’ electric cattle prods, was enough to make you
comply. Glitz wondered vaguely why convicts always seemed to be men. In the
group of criminals being led inside the ship, there wasn’t a single woman. Glitz
nearly tripped on the entrance ramp as he went inside the ship. It was a
standard Imperial prison ship, with conditions worse than those in a 4th class spaceliner.
Once
the prisoners were all aboard the ship, the ramp was quickly raised, and the
ship sealed. Prison ships in the Imperium had a somewhat unusual layout: the
entrance led on to a large open space, almost like a warehouse, which was
called the floor. The floor led on to several other parts of the ship,
including the canteen, the living quarters, the flight deck and the officers’
lounge. Prisoners were generally confined to the floor, the canteen, and the
living quarters. The floor was usually where prisoners would be forced to
perform menial tasks. In this ship, however, the floor was filled with tables,
vidscreens, and even a gravity-ball net. It was presumably some kind of cruel
trick to give the prisoners a false sense of security.
“Next
stop, hell,” Glitz muttered.
“Shut
it!” one of the guards yelled. He was a thin man with pimples.
“You’re
young for a guard,” Glitz said. “Shouldn’t you still be in school, kid?”
“How
dare
you!”
“That’s
enough,” the Commander said, and Glitz continued to grin at the guard. The
guard began to redden with annoyance.
“Sir,”
the young guard protested, pointing at Glitz. “He’s still smiling at me. Can’t
you make him stop?”
“Grow
up, Narko,” the Commander said. He turned to face the assembled band of
convicts. They were all dressed in regulation prisoner uniforms, which were
grey bodysuits bearing a circular badge with the letters “P.I.” The letters
stood for “Property of the Imperium”. Once someone was successfully convicted
of a felony—unless they were an aristocrat, of course—they became legally owned
by the Imperium until they had finished the period of their sentence.
“Now,
my name is Commander Halland Rica. You will find that I am a fair and just man,
but that I can also be ruthless if you get on the wrong side of me. If you all
behave like civilised people, we can look forward to a pleasant journey. If
not, you will spend the trip in irons.”
Yeah
, Glitz thought.
Pleasant, that’s funny.
It was well known that prison ships were
anything but pleasant. Often, prisoners were forced to work in the engine room,
which could be extremely hazardous.
“Providing
there is no trouble,” Commander Rica went on, “you will not be forced to do any
kind of work, and you can simply relax during the flight. Space knows you will
be worked to death once you finally reach the planet. You will notice that the
floor has been laid out with several diversions, which are provided for your
entertainment.”
Some
of the men exchanged disbelieving glances. Glitz wondered if it was a trick. He
knew that Imperial prison officers were often callous and cruel.
“That’s
all,” Commander Rica said. “I’m going to deactivate your handcuffs now, and I
expect you all to be on your best behaviour for the duration of the flight.”
The Commander had the air of a schoolteacher addressing a class of wayward
children. He activated a switch, and all of the handcuffs clicked open. The men
stretched their arms and wrists gratefully.
“We
make planetfall in approximately one hundred hours,” the Commander said. He
turned to his guards, and nodded. “Good work. I suggest we retire to the
officers’ lounge and get ourselves a large brandy.”
To
Glitz’s astonishment, every single one of the guards filed out of the floor,
following Commander Rica to the officers’ lounge. It had to be some sort of
joke. It was a total contravention of Imperial regulations to leave a ship of
prisoners unattended. Glitz knew this well, because he had once read the entire
Imperial Military Handbook
. When he was sixteen, he had been a cadet in
the Imperial Army, before being unceremoniously discharged for a romantic
liaison with an older female officer. Romantic relationships were strictly
forbidden between members of the armed forces. It had completely ruined his
life, but somehow he still didn’t regret it.
With
the roar of engines, the ship began to rise into the air. Glitz glanced around
at the occupants of the ship. Another man might have been intimidated by being
in a room full of prisoners with no official authority present, but Glitz
wasn’t the kind of man to be easily intimidated. He wasn’t particularly large,
but he wasn’t weak either, and he had picked up a few tricks in his years of
being a spice trader for the East Galaxy Company. Most people didn’t realize
how tough it was to pilot a freighter, but there was always some bastard that
wanted to steal your cargo.
The
prisoners all seemed slightly dazed. It appeared that, now they had been given
a measure of freedom, they didn’t really know what to do with it. A more
inexperienced person in a position of authority—like the guard with the
pimples, for example—would seek to harshly dominate the prisoners to quash any
possible stirrings of mutiny. But Commander Rica had spent too many years of
his life in the company of criminals, and he knew better. Discipline was
important, but providing the men behaved themselves there was no need to grind
them down. He had been in charge of prison runs from Varon to Malus for nearly
five years, and he had turned down two promotions during that time. He had no
pressing desire for more power. All Commander Rica wanted was an easy life, and
a regular pay check.
On
a longer journey, giving prisoners such a large amount of freedom might have
been a bad idea. But the trips to Malus were so short it would have been
senseless to expect a rebellion. As Rica had predicted, the prisoners did not
use their surprising liberty to start any big fights or to attempt to take
control of the ship. They knew escape was impossible, and so a revolt would
only have the effect of bringing punishment upon themselves. As the guards sat
with Rica, sipping brandy, the prisoners began to settle down and entertain
themselves.
Glitz
realised after a few minutes that Rica had actually been serious—they actually
were going to be treated like guests. He was grateful, but at the same time he
was conscious that it would make their time on Malus seem even more terrible.
Conditions on the planet were reportedly atrocious.
“Want
to play me?”
Glitz
looked up. A skinny man was pointing towards a chess board. He nodded. “OK.”
The
two men sat down at the table. It was a real chess board with metal pieces, and
Glitz thought it looked quite old-fashioned. He wasn’t really a chess player
anyway, but the last time he had played it was with a holographic board.
“I’ll
be whites,” the man said.
The
newcomer had white hair and small dark eyes, and a sort of nervous energy.
Glitz guessed that he was in his early thirties.
“What’s
your name?” Glitz said.
“Doland.
Raja Doland.”
“You
a Proteist, Doland?”
Religion
was frowned upon by the Imperium, as the Senate disliked any other organisation
that could hold power over people. Religions could become a conflicting source
of loyalty; this would be especially problematic if there was ever a
disagreement between the Imperium and a church. The official religion of the
galaxy was formerly Monarchism, a kind of emperor worship, but it no longer had
a statutory place in society, and it was hardly ever practised—largely because
the Senate discouraged it. The last thing they wanted was for the people to be
loyally devoted to the Emperor. Inhabitants of several planets in the Imperium adhered
to a religion called Proteism. It was a curious amalgamation of a few old
religions, including Planetiatry and Hullism, and it boasted many celebrity
members. It was perhaps most famous for its peculiar belief system, holding
that the only way to attain salvation was to engage in sexual encounters with
complete strangers.
“Why?
Do I look like a Proteist?”
Glitz
pointed at his hand. “Your ring.”
“Oh,
right.” Doland glanced down at the ring on his index finger. Prisoners were
allowed to keep one item of jewellery if it had sentimental value. It was
engraved with a purple eye, which was one of the symbols of Proteism. “No, ha,
this isn’t sentimental. I just told them that. I just found this in the street.
I thought I could use it as a knuckleduster if someone attacked me in here.”
Looking
around, Doland felt that depictions of convicts in popular vidfilms had been
greatly exaggerated. When the guards had all left the floor, he had felt an
overpowering wave of terror. But no one had tried to beat him up or do
something worse… yet.
Glitz
nodded at Doland. “Your move.”
Doland
moved one of his pawns two spaces forward. He had never been very good at
chess, but it was useful for passing the time. Doland was just grateful that he
didn’t have to work in the engine room, and like the other prisoners he was
determined to obey the rules so he could keep his surprising measure of liberty.
“So
what you in for?” Glitz said, moving one of his pieces.
“Voting
fraud.” Doland sighed and leaned back in his chair. “I live on Opus, and we use
a computerised system for voting in our regional leaders. Each person of legal
voting age is sent a transmitter with two buttons, one for each Regional
Governor. The two candidates were Jog Rasputt and Charl Hens. Now Jog’s a nasty
piece of work. He’s been involved in more scandals than a tabloid news feed. But
for some reason the people of our region always vote him in. On voting day I
was especially fed up, so I took my wife’s transmitter and voted for Charl.”
“So
you had two votes?”
Doland
nodded.
“How
did they find out?”
“The
bitch told them. She would have voted for Charl anyway, of course—she voted for
him in the last election. But she’d been looking for an excuse to inform on me
anyway. Got another man waiting in the wings, I reckon.”
Glitz
felt a strange mixture of pity and amusement. He felt sorry for Doland, but at
the same time he couldn’t help finding it slightly funny that his wife had managed
to get him exiled to Malus.
“How
long’s your sentence?” Glitz said.
Doland
tapped his fingers on the table. “Five years. What about you?”
“Same.
Five years.” Glitz nodded. “Five stinking years on the most miserable planet in
the Universe…”
He
stared at the board, formulating his next move. Eventually, he decided which
piece to pick up.
“Bad
idea.”
Glitz
and Doland turned to face the man that had spoken. He had dark hair and his brown
eyes were intense and cold. His pronounced nose gave him the aspect of watchful
bird of prey.
“What’s
a bad idea?” Glitz said.
“You
were thinking about moving your bishop to D4. But look—” The man pointed at
square F5. “—that would allow this man to take your bishop. He could then move
his queen to D3, which would be checkmate.”
Glitz
examined the board. The man was right; he hadn’t noticed the knight at F5. He
turned to the newcomer. “How did you know I was going to move my bishop?”
The
man shrugged. “I find most ordinary minds easy to predict.” Without another
word, he walked away from the table in search of something more diverting than interfering
with chess games.
When
Glitz and Doland were nearing the end of their game, an electronic bell began
to sound through the ship. They heard a voice over the intercom, explaining
that it was mealtime. The metal canteen door slid open with the whirr of a motor,
and the prisoners made their way eagerly through it. The canteen was very
small, but large enough to seat all of the fifty or so prisoners. Unsurprisingly,
the guards didn’t show up for the meal. Glitz guessed that they had their own dining
area. A robot armed with a shocker was apparently in charge of the canteen. It
was an old X-90 model—roughly humanoid in shape but with clearly robotic
features and an immovable neck.
“Form
an orderly queue,” the robot ordered, its synthetic voice reverberating through
the canteen. Glitz hated robots, especially when they were carrying weapons
that could send over 1,000 volts at a current of 0.2 amps through your body.
Glitz
lined up behind an obese prisoner, who was carrying two meal trays. The man
pressed the button on the food machine twice, collecting two meals. He turned
around with an angry face, as if daring someone to question his right to have
twice as much food as everyone else.