Marshall Thomas: Soldier of the Legion

“It is perfect, Priestess.”

“No it isn’t…it’s overdone!”

“It’s perfect, Priestess. Perfect! It doesn’t matter if it’s overdone or not. Did you make this for me?”

“Yes. Yes, for you.”

“Then it’s perfect, Priestess. Now open the wine.”

We drank Veltros wine and ate Korkush flanpie on a little table that folded down from the wall. The flanpie was not so bad. I don’t really like Korkush food, but I knew Priestess liked it.

“Those are the last two flanpies I had. Is it good?”

“It’s wonderful, Priestess.”

“Not too burnt?”

“It’s fine.”

“I was saving them for a special occasion. I know I’ll never taste Korkush food again.”

“Well, you can never tell.”

“You know I never will. It’s a shame. It was a wonderful world.”

“Perhaps you shouldn’t have left.”

“Then I’d not have met you. No, I have no regrets. Thanks for the certificate, Thinker. Do you think we’re all going to die?”

I took another sip of wine. Veltros wine is vastly under-rated. I really thought it the best I’d ever tasted.

“Priestess, I think whatever happens is going to happen to both of us. We’ll be together, no matter what.”

“Do you believe in life after death?”

“I don’t know, Priestess…I don’t know.”

“Do you believe in God? Do you think Deadman is really watching over us?”

“I believe in love. Give me your hands.”

Hand in hand, I could feel her soul. I closed my eyes, and waves of love overwhelmed me. It felt as if we were one person. I opened my eyes.

“Do you feel it, Priestess?”

“Yes. It’s like…something magnetic.”

“It’s love. I didn’t used to believe in it.”

“Is it God?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t used to believe in Him, either.”

“Is He real? Will He protect the Legion?”

“I don’t know if His Area of Responsibility includes the Legion. But I think He’s real. Can’t you feel Him? He’s right here, right in this cube. He’s all around us. I think we make Him ourselves. I think He’s a God of Love. That’s what He is. A God of Love. And if we love each other, He’ll be with us, always.”

“I’ll never stop loving you, Thinker. It’s a shame we have to fight the Omnis. I wanted to live with you somewhere, like Korkush, and have your baby. Do you remember that baby on Coldmark?”

“You changed his life, Priestess.”

“I’d like to have a baby like that. Your baby.”

“I’m not sure the Legion would approve.”

“No, I suppose not…but I can dream.”

I pulled her to me. Sweet silky hair, her warm body close to mine.

“Dream on, Priestess. I promise I’ll be beside you, whatever happens. I’ll be there.”

“I love you, Thinker.”

“I love you, Priestess. Forever.”

Andrion 3, I thought. Every frac brought us closer to Andrion 3. I knew what a hellhole it was. And that’s where we were bound. The mission wasn’t complex. We were going to kill the O’s, or the O’s were going to kill us. But there was one big problem-nobody had ever killed an O before. Your mission is to die for the Legion, the Second had said. Well, that wasn’t my plan. My plan was survival. I wanted to get through this, with Priestess, and live with her forever. I squeezed her hand. She squeezed back.

I prayed to Deadman. What else could I do? I knew there was no turning back.

Veltros Training Command – Basic – Intro – Science.

Date: 312 CGS – TRAINING USE ONLY – COPY 401

Unit 6 – Legion Science Definitions

You will familiarize yourself immediately with the following basic science definitions. Those of you with future need to know will be familiarized in detail with appropriate subjects.

Antimat drive -

1. The antimatter annihilation propulsion system that powers most current spacecraft.

2. The stargate technology that creates a traversable wormhole in spacetime, enlarging a quantum wormhole to bridge two distant points in spacetime, manipulating quantum effects and antimat power to hold the artificial wormhole open with negative pressure for the duration of the sub-lightspeed flight through hyperspace. Antimat propulsion is a proven, reliable method of starship propulsion and artificial wormholes have opened up the galaxy to the human species.

Artificial Wormhole – The artificial rotating wormhole, enlarged from a natural quantum wormhole and manipulated with quantum effects and antimat power to form a controlled dimensional vortex through hyperspace, held open with negative pressure, and connecting two distant points in spacetime. See Antimat Drive.

Biogen – An artificial human, generated from human genetics but normally grown on a metal or fiberite framework. Biogens are sentient beings but are carefully programmed to function as required. The latest fiberite models are not easily distinguishable from humans.

Cloaking – Visual and electromagnetic camouflage for small starships and other small craft that renders the cloaked ship invisible to enemy forces. This Legion technology is COSMIC SECRET.

EnviroSim Room, E-Sim Room, ES Room – An artificial but realistic holo-generated simulated training environment useful in familiarizing Legion troopers with new or unfamiliar targets. ES Rooms project the new environment visually around the trooper who moves within a changing holo sphere while responding to a series of challenging pre-programmed developments.

Eyemote – A subminiature recon probe the size of a dust mote that provides realtime audio and video images of a target environment. Eyemotes are virtually undetectable, although they can be destroyed by routine air filtration.

Holcard – A holo card that generates a holographic light projection of a still image when activated.

Holo -

1. A still holographic image, either a solid or a light image.

2. A moving holographic image of a subject or an environment transmitted from within an ES Room equipped with two-way imaging.

Hyperspace – The alternate dimension, which we use as a bridge to travel to distant points in our universe through artificial wormholes. Although we penetrate this dimension with our wormholes, we do not enter it. It still appears physically impossible for anything from our universe to actually enter this dimension.

Iomags – A powerful artificial magnetic field used to accelerate promat to generate an iomag shield, a fail-safe containment chamber for antimatter generation and storage. See promat.

Natural Dimensional Stargate, Natural Dimensional Vortex – Unstable areas of spacetime that are heavily influenced by the presence of nearby adjacent universes. Stardrive initiation is forbidden in these areas because of the danger of destruction of the ship or of exiting into the adjacent universe and the inability to return. Antimat drive starships are capable of penetrating adjacent universes by accident but no ship has ever returned from such a disaster.

Promat – An artificial elementary particle created by ConFree with properties useful in antimatter generation/containment systems.

Psycher – Mentally gifted persons, normally female, generally capable of telepathy, who are brought to their full potential to serve the state.

Solcard – A holo card that generates a solid holographic projection.

Solid – A solidified holographic projection generated by a solcard, generally permanent or decorative.

Universe, U – Our Universe, designation U1, is one of many universes. An ever-changing network of quantum wormholes in spacetime connects our universe with a multitude of other universes. Many other universes are not directly connected to ours. D-neg, a source of negative pressure that fills the adjacent universe Plane Prime, is not present in U1 but it is D-neg’s influence that has created the dark energy that expands our own universe.