Balada: When death did not exist, nor yet Eternity Part I 003

“Nuts!” Metternich muttered under his breath as his mind stopped its wondering and returned to the present.

And with the memories of how he had arrived at his current predicament still fresh in his mind, he for a few minutes entered into a slight depression, which was comparable to that of a canary who upon being captured in the jaws of a cat became impatient and said to the aforementioned feline: ‘just do it already!’ with indifference to its fate.

 He thought of his current situation.

 On the one hand having a few hundred s.h.i.+ps and several thousands of warriors to stand behind when the warp cannons, missiles and energy beams started flying was a good thing, on the other he also had to worry about even more enemy soldiers targeting him, so a mixed blessing at best!

After his first battle and the first sight of his dead soldiers he had tried to think of his subordinates as nothing but tools, tried to distance himself from them, hoping to ease his guilt when they would eventually die in future battles, but it did not work and no matter how many victories he achieved and despite knowing that he couldn’t have done anything better in the past to avoid his subordinates dying, he still wondered if he could have saved them.

Maybe if he had been faster, stronger or smarter he could have prevented more of his soldiers from dying, but that was not possible and even now, years after he was drafted he could still remember just how many had died, what their last moments where, but what really weight heavily on his mind was the fact that he was starting to forget their names and they’re faces where starting to slip from his mind.

He knows that before he manages to leave the fleet, he will have forgotten even more names and faces and that would haunt him forever, making him contemplate the ‘easy’ way out.

After a few minutes Metternich banished those vile thoughts, since in his opinion life was always worth living and you had to do your best to get over you’re more difficult moments and move on.

That and the prospect of being turned into a corpse if he didn’t snap out of it and get his act together   or the prospect of eternal h.e.l.lfire for choosing the ‘easy way’ made him come to his senses.

Releasing out a breath of mental exhaustion, he placed the farview he was using to research the culture of the Volunians on the table and laid back and relaxed for a few minutes.

 “A sad state of affairs this is Lord Metternich, this corps has a lot of good warriors and officers, properly deployed it is deadly, yet it is being misused in a tertiary role in the war against Volunia!” Adrian lamented to his master as he took out a small box from his pocket, extracted a pill from it and swallowed the pill, breaking Metternich’s state of mind with a not unwelcomed distraction from his less than cheerful thoughts.

“Don’t linger too much on feelings of regret, think positive thoughts or you run the risk or seeing even the good side of life as meaningless.” he replied.

“Yes sir, but I’m still a little depressed at this state of affairs.” Adrian replied.

“Don’t be, I’m rather pleased myself!” Metternich said to his knight.

“My lord?” Adrian replied as he turned his head towards his liege, his head filled with confusion.

“Why do you think I accepted this commission?”

“For the challenge?” Adrian said to his commander with a smile on his face, one that grew bigger once Metternich gave a nod of the head as his reply.

“But what I really meant to say is that here there is little chance of us being slaughtered by elite units from the enemy, thus we may be able to spent the whole war without the danger of us getting killed, but that’s just my opinion, it only applies to me and I doubt it matters much to others.” Metternich thought to himself. He then looked at Adrian and started to wonder if his knight did not have certain problems, since Adrian always showed great doubt one moment and great resolve the next and despite not     being an expert on the behavior of Adrian’s species, he wondered if not perhaps he was also wearing a mask and knowing a thing or two about living a lie, he could understand if sometimes you let the mask slip, but that was a train of thought for another time, especially since the warp train was reaching its destination.

Just then his communication crystal started vibrating, indicating that someone wanted to talk to him.

He touched the crystal with his finger and it morphed into the small shape of a serpentine creature with grey scales, who was dressed in the same manor of uniform as the two had, but instead of the tricorn caps which he and Adrian wore, this serpentine creature wore a side cap that made it clear he was a staff officer and not a command one. His uniform stretched from his neck down to the end of his body, engulfing him entirely in the dark material, the sailor belonged to the Balfarmaini, sentients who where a serpent like race that had no arms or legs , but they made due with a very powerful telekinetic ability which allowed them to levitate and use objects close to their bodies, this ability was  very handy to the aforementioned Metty, since this was  Lieutenant Butz his personal aide who had been with him for almost as long as Adrian had been, and served as his a.s.sistant, driver, bodyguard, and whatever other role was needed, that was pointed out  by the fact that Butz’s body was covered in all kinds of pouches filled with everything from food, to drink, to medicine and all kinds of objects and tools, anything that Metternich might need.

“My lord, the train has reached the base.” Butz said to his commander.

“Thank you Butz.” Metternich said as he touched the farview at a certain point which started it’s deactivation process, but not before putting a bookmark on where he had left off, namely on the painting named “Fate”.

“Time to go Adrian! You said that this unit contains a lot of gifted officers?” he said to Adrian as he hesitated for a few moments, the option of delaying for a while was still open to him, especially since technically his new command wouldn’t be official until he arrived, but after a moment of deliberation, he closed his farview, sealed it with string and they walked towards the train’s exit. After all, the inevitable could only be put off for so long.

“Yes my lord, the corps’s commanders where all upper and lower cla.s.smates of mine at the academy and I can vouch for their skills. They are the finest soldiers in the Empire!” Adrian proudly said to his liege.

“Then why have they been sent here to a dumping ground unit? Metternich asked him.

“I have already told you the reason for that sire.” Adrian replied with regret and disappointment in his voice.

“Smart officers being sent away so those who are higher in rank but less in skill will not be outs.h.i.+ned.”

Metternich thought to himself and despite feeling a small sensation of joy, since it meant that it was even less likely that this would become the main theater of operations, but still he did lament the sad state of affairs the Empire seemed to be in since the beginning of its existence or at least since he arrived.

“ No matter how many or how bright the stars are, they pale when compared to the Sun, so the stars make sure no one sees the glory of the Sun.’” he quoted an ancient war poem to his knight.

“Yes Excellency, but ‘no matter how long or endless the starry night is, it always surrenders to the sun’s morning light’.” Adrian replied to his liege and looked at him with a proud smile and near hero wors.h.i.+p in his eyes.

“You know you don’t have to call me that, technically you’ve got better blood, pedigree, fortune and social rank than me; h.e.l.l! Up until three standard years ago I would be the one calling you my lord or something like that.” Metternich said to him.

“That is one of the few positives of war my lord, injustices like what you said earlier are rectified as great leaders rise to take their rightful place in society!” he replied.

“I consider myself a lucky man and an intelligent one rather than someone who has been blessed by heaven to be a leader Adrian.”

“That may be sir, but even then there are few people with those attributes and even fewer that occupy positions of authority and now the Empire needs them more than ever, which is why I believe you’re one who is destined for great things!” Adrian said and before Metternich could reply he added the following:

“The Great Founder of our Empire also said that she was lucky.”

At this Metternich half opened his mouth to counter but decided against it, Adrian was the type who was not only stubborn to a degree , but also very smart as well and by doing a quick onceover of the conversation he realized that he had just inadvertently quoted the Great Founder and his attempt to deflate his image had been interpreted by Adrian as humility, something that people like Adrian took it as something that reinforced the image of the great heroes handpicked by the Force of Creation to lead the Empire to greatness.

So the Commodore only inhaled a deep breath of air and tried to enjoy what few peaceful moments he had left before arriving at the boarding ramp.

“I may as well quit while I’m ahead, I’ll be needing every ounce of wit I posses in order to find a way to somehow survive here at the very edge of the civilized galaxy.” Metternich thought to himself as the ramp’s door opened and he crossed the point of no return.