Balada: When death did not exist, nor yet Eternity Part I 043

Extract from the book “Confessions, an Admirals tale volume I”

It had been more than a week and at least eight star systems, since we departed from Volun 4 and things where not as bad as they’d been, as they where when we left off.

 Oh no, they were worse!

After arriving at Volun 3, I immediately ordered a slight change in our route, instead of going to the Vi or Tory System, we went to Formett, and from there we travelled to the Ernichand. After that, there followed a long jump to Zulawilla, where we were currently traveling trough.

Now for those of you who are not familiar with this region, the route I have taken was the most illogical and impractical of all, in terms of ease of navigation, s.p.a.ce stability, destination and general sanity.

 The reason for this, was to discourage any further pursuit or at least send a smaller fighting force against our heavy fleet, since a route like this costs vast amounts of fuel and any self respecting naval cadet would see the error in chasing a small portion of the enemies s.h.i.+ps with the majority of your forces, while leaving your territory vulnerable for the enemies main fleet.

But once more, the sheer lunacy that is war had reminded us, just what a stupid idea the action of actually trying to find ration and reason in the whole b.l.o.o.d.y thing, really is.

But I had little time for philosophy, well less than usual, as I made my way to the conference table for our latest little meeting, and once more I used as much willpower as I could to not vomit or look away from the monstrous beings surrounding me. I know how it sounds, saying how the very sight of someone different than you makes you want to hurl, but it was never out of choice, even after years in the armed forces, my body was still not accustomed to the countless species I would encounter during my service years.

And the more chowder heads of my readers will curse and shout ‘SPECIEST!’ and call me a bigot and xenophobe, to those blockheads I reply with:

 Yes! I have bigot, speciest and xenophobic tendencies within my person, but I never let them decide my actions and judgment, and although I ignore them and rely on rational thinking and sound judgment for my decisions, I do have evil thoughts inside me. But you point to me one sentient that denies having them and I will point out, that you’ve shown me  a cartoon, a caricature or the biggest liar this side of existence, for you see, we all have darkness inside us, but we always fight it and choose the light, does that make me or any other sentient evil?

No! It makes use mortal, and despite what others might have said I was and still am a mortal, with flaws, and the biggest flaw of mine was that I kept getting into hazardous situations by my own design!

 So, this meeting had the intend of avoiding disaster for our forces and since that included me, I was most eager for it to bear fruit, so much so, that I spend some time before stargazing and even some during it, rehearsing on how to get the desired result out of the meeting.

Joining me on the round imitation mahogany table was Valyria, along with Tarkan and Georgaian, who were both using a hologram to project their presence on the designated seats, where they would have been physically. Both where commanding portions of the Heavy Fleet and where using this method for convenience’s sake, Adrian was not here, but was serving as the commander of the Light Fleet.

 A pleasant aroma of exotic perfume told me that Butz was right behind me, ready to either hand me any papers I might ask for, provide refreshments, take orders or memos, or if need be, as was so often was in my career, defend my person from attempts on my life.

“Ladies and gentleman, the enemy is about ten hours away and closing in, we have three star systems as our next option and I would like to hear your opinions on them.” I asked, waiting for their answer, while mentally rehearsing the various ways in which I could maneuver the conversation in the direction I so desired.

“The N’otuse and the D’ese systems are both sensible choices, since they both lead to Imperial lines, they seem like valid options for us.” Valyria said and I suppressed a desire to call her stupid, since she was stating the obvious and wasting our precious time, so I simply nodded and waited for the others to say their peace.

“The question is, whether we can reach our own lines before the enemy catches up.”Tarkan added, the former sergeant used a tone reserved for lamenting a situation brought about by an ‘incompetent’ officer, but since he was one of those officers, it had more of a self-hating tone to it, but it was not as powerfully p.r.o.nounced as it normally should have been.

 After all, we all have a tendency to avoid criticizing our own actions or at least to do so in public, except for yours truly of course.

“Butz, take a message.” I said.

“Yes sir!” he replied and got out a pen and paper.

“To the enemy commander, surrender now or forfeit any future opportunity for such!” I dictated and Butz scribbled away the message in his elegant hand writing.

“Now that we’ve followed the rules of war, we are free to show no mercy to the enemy when the time comes, so that solves our little dilemma on what do to if the enemy reaches us.” I said with a flippant att.i.tude, which was expected of a soldier of my rank and reputation, and the act did brighten their spirits and restore some semblance of moral.

“Seems fair that we give the enemy as many options as possible, we don’t want to be bullies after all!” Georgaian said and a polite, if somewhat half-measured laugh went all around the table.

And sensing the mood they were in, I immediately presented my plan.

“Although the aforementioned systems are both valid choices, I have another destination in mind, namely Ear.”

“The Ear system? But that leads us back to the Volunian lines, wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of us avoiding battle sir, and be against our mission to draw the enemy out?” Tarkan inquired, and I was all too happy to oblige.

“Not necessarily, for you see my reasoning is thus: It is clear now, that we are not the primary target of the Volunians, for I have no doubt in my mind that they wouldn’t send such an exaggerated force for our meager few hundred crafts, so this is not the result of our bating action.”

“That’s true, you wouldn’t even need more than 1.000, h.e.l.l 500-700 would do for our fleet, even if they are only composed out off destroyers and corvettes.” Valyria added.

 “Now, it is clear that they must have some intend with this course, since this is ‘backwater route’  is an alternate and more difficult course for them, we can safely a.s.sume this is a major campaign for the enemy. That is why I suggest we move towards Ear, not only is it out of their way but also, it’s at least ten days worth of warp travel, by contrast our nearest system is only three days from here, the enemy will no doubt expend more fuel and their crew will be even more fatigued, making it even less likely they will follow us, and if they do, then we can deal a great blow to them, by making them waste their resources, since currently we aren’t in any shape for a real sc.r.a.p.” I replied and I was confident the proposal would be shut down; After all, it sounded barney to begin with!

And you may wonder why I desired to be shot down and loose face in front of my officers. Well, simply put, after several days of being chased by certain death I said to myself: ‘Enough is enough! Time to give myself a good kick in the nadders and auto-expunge myself! ’

 Thus, I wanted to get discharged or at least achieve my dream of being rea.s.signed to an isolated post, and the only way I could see that happening, without intentionally sending countless soldiers to their doom, cause let’s face it, you can examine my memoires with a magnifying gla.s.s, but you will never find evidence of ‘Metternich the Butcher’ anywhere!

For you see, my plan was that after my proposal would be rejected, I would accept their no doubt more sounder ones, and once we hopefully got back to Imperial s.p.a.ce, I could use that as a pretence to resign from the navy, by  saying it was a matter of honor. I’ve met one or two admirals, who could understand that, and with a little bit of luck, I could trick them into thinking that it was too much for me to bear, ‘honor dictates satisfaction’ and all other sorts of hogwash.

 And if not that, then I could write a damming report about myself, that along with a glowing report of my subordinates, should be enough for me to finish my tenure as a mid-ranking commander, and  sabotage my career, while leaving those of others intact.

Say what you want about me, but even a blackheart like myself has some standards and I never have nor ever will try to hurt any one of my allies, past or present, and above all that, these where career soldiers, if they wanted to get shot at, while wearing higher ranks and fancier medals than what they already had, then being the good friend that I was, I did my best to help them as much as I could.

And so, I waited with barely contained eagerness and joy for my plans to fail and for I to be embarra.s.sed, and much to my expectations what followed was a disappointment.

For they all agreed!

“The option sounds good, since in our current state we can’t be much help to the main fleet, and I doubt there’s any allied vessel near our destination with an excess of personal for our s.h.i.+ps.” Georgaian added to the conversation.

“Also, this way  we can deny the enemy the usage of anything between two to three times our numbers of s.h.i.+ps if we play our cards right.” Tarkan said and Valyria added her two cents, minus three, to the pot for this insanity jambalaya.

“We’ve protected our wounded, and since we are about 200 strong and can delay anything between 600  to one thousand from joining the decisive battle I’d say that’s a fine move indeed!” she twisted the knife; black booted the a.s.s, then purple nurpled the nipple and wet willied the ear with that statement.

‘An even better move would be not dying!’ I screamed in my head, while looking on in horror, as everyone around me signed our collective death warrants, and much to my eternal regret my eyes blazed red, which signified that my undergarments where near the brown phase. But to others it looked like I could barely restrain my enthusiasm for battle, a fact not gone unnoticed by those in front of me, and their mood of acceptance for their seemingly inevitable demise was replaced by bloodl.u.s.t, my red stare had that devilish effect on people.

“Outnumbered 100 to one, isolated, cut off from help and supplies, and going to an open field s.p.a.ce desert.” I said and paused for dramatic effect while pretending to inspect my finger nails.

“Those poor Volunians don’t stand a chance!” I replied and with the ensuing laughter, my fate seamed sealed. Thus, we continued the meeting and discussed a few details of supplies and order of battle for all the good it would do us, after that I went to the bridge, since it along with the warp sanctuary was the  most secured place on any s.h.i.+ps, where I had a slightly bigger chance of surviving this whole mess.

Also, I thought when the inevitable surrender of myself and my Fleet would arrive, it would do me better to present my surrender from the bridge of my flags.h.i.+p, rather than an escape pod or from beneath my bed.

Thus, with trembling limbs, chattering teeth and loose bowls I waited, for what history would call the Battle of Ear, and if I had know what would await me then, I would have probably taken an escape pod, painted bulls eyes all over it and charged the Volunians with nothing but a ink pen and  a large kazoo, but things being as they where I obviously didn’t.

That and unfortunately we had a shortage of kazoos.

 Metternich per Pelasgiamus, Freelance Potions Maker