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NaNoWriMo 2010 Winner
Urpo Lankinen
Mo
ri
W
o ion
N
Na Edit
Dusts of Avalon
a NaNoWriMo travesty by
Urpo Lankinen
as completed on
ursday ʰ November,
ˢ Edition (with raw NaNoWriMo text), typeset Friday ʰ November,
NNWM E: Dusts of Avalon was one of the winners of the National
Novel Writing Month of . is edition of the text contains the entirety of the
NaNoWriMo text, with absolutely no corrections of any kind whatsoever. ere
are bigger and smaller typos and thinkos and outright brainfarts in this thing.
Some of it could be what nicer people call “rubbish”. Dive in and see what kind of
garbage I could produce within a month. Surprisingly legible, if I say so myself.
Not perfect, obviously. Damn far from it.
O : is novel is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to
people living or dead, or organisations existant or defunct, is purely coincidental,
or I could be just making fun of someone or something, dammit. e boom line
is this: this didn't happen, so don't get any weird delusions, OK? I strongly believe
wartime concrete forts are so awesome it hurts.
T by the author in TEX Live's XƎLTEX, with Linux Libertine font family.
C by the author, Wednesday ʰ November, .
Dusts of Avalon © Urpo Lankinen.
Distributed under the Creative Commons
Aribution-No Derivative Works . Unported
licence.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/./
ii
Prologue
Prologue
October 7, 2631, 12:16 UTC
T
and giant raindrops pounded the ground
with tremendous rale as a lone female soldier opened the creaking ceme-
tery gate. ere was nothing mysterious about the legendary London area
weather, but lieutenant Mielle Daleworth was more accustomed to spaceships
and brief visits to groundside buildings. If it wasn't a serious, personal occasion,
she might have found it a lile bit funny that she tended to see rain and roen
weather only in graveyards — almost as if the environment was in on the joke.
But this was a serious occasion. e late autumn wind raled the leaves in
the grass, the leafless trees swaying in the whooshing breeze. Daleworth walked
forth to the big clearing ahead with her typical, distinct military precision in her
stride, even when no one was around to see her. She was slim and fit, with a
slightly pear-like figure; wider hips and narrow est. She had brown hair tied to
a regulation ponytail, round face, blue eyes, all scars of old bales meticulously
mended so no enemy could judge just how experienced in the balefield she really
was. Tued under her arm were the remains of a rarely-used, years-old umbrella;
on the way from the bus stop to the cemetery gate, a gust of wind had ripped it a
lile bit too mu. e meanisms were already broken, but now it seemed that
it finally crossed the threshold where she couldn't just fix it by hand, right then
and there; she had le her poet knife to her loer in the base, ba in Caen.
Her uniform was fortunately weather-proof, or at least to a close approximation
of weather-proof, a term whi usually meant there was some sort of a small snag
that ruined the whole idea; the woolen beret was the weak point, and was geing
increasingly uncomfortable. Still, it had taken worse rains, almost miraculously
kept in proper shape and passed the inspections.
In the clearing was a memorial, a concrete wall with a steel surface on its
vertical sides, a hollow cylinder about four meters high, almost a meter thi and
five in diameter on the outer edge, with gaps on two sides wide enough to let
people pass between them. e tops of the cylinder slanted slightly toward the
center. Engraved in the metal were names — hundreds and hundreds of names in
tiny Helvetica.
Above them, in larger, raised metal leers, read “Victims of the First.”
Next to the words, Daleworth could barely see the word “Plan”. “First Plan”.
Small dents were still there, and if one looked from the distance, they could see
the existant words were slightly off center, revealing that there had been one more
word in the right side.
If Daleworth had the oice — if there were any ances to even propose on
voting on the maer — she would vote in favour of restoring the word. But she
wouldn't really want to discuss the details with civilians. Not with the war still
going on. Not with so many unsolved questions about the enemy, even aer so
many years.
But the enemy had a Plan. She knew it. She couldn't comprehend the Plan,
of course, and had no idea about what the enemy was aer, but she had seen first
hand that they had a method.
Daleworth couldn't remember who had defaced the monument, but the effects
were clearly felt in the community. It had been twelve years. Someone had came
to the graveyard in the middle of the night, a laser cuer in his hand, and removed
the word “Plan”. Someone had spoed him from the street, the police had caught
him just as he was done with his lile operation. He had been fined, of course,
but due to the raging debate in the Network that this event sparked, lile had
been done to restore the monument to the former state. Daleworth could only
remember that the vandal had been arguing that the enemy had no conscience,
and calling the calamity the “First Plan” was an act of admiing the enemy had
any redeeming qualities, like sportsmanship; he argued that this war was not a
game where humanity should be a fair competitor and admit that the enemy made
a cunning move that allowed them to wipe out almost every colony in Jupiter's
moons, and half of the Saturn colonies.
But Daleworth liked games. She knew that usually, small mistakes didn't
count. It was all about the overall performance.
And sometimes, it seemed, the game seemed to be over before it even started.
e annoying thing was that that kind of observations can only be made aer
the dust seles. Never before.
When the war began years ago, it all seemed random, pointless and a lile
bit harmless to everybody. What harm could robots do? ey clearly seemed like
some kind of a robotic swarm that didn't really seem to possess any sophisticated
programming or advanced artificial intelligence, even when they couldn't initially
capture any individual units for further study. e soldiers certainly could handle
it — it was just some sort of a weird robotic experiment from an alien civilisation
that had gone awry and was now trying to aa the Solar System. Perhaps they
could destroy them, or find some sort of a kill swit, and then they might meet
their creators and have a proper First Contact with an Alien Lifeform, instead of
just seeing their robots.
Daleworth didn't really remember it too well, having been just a kid, but she
remembered how her father sent her video messages from the colonies, saying
the soldiers had it all under control, and there was hardly even any fighting going
on anywhere near the bases. Everything was just fine. Business as usual.
And a couple of years later, she remembered thinking it was fairly sure it
wasn't as simple as father had told her it would be. She could barely think of those
messages. She had found the recordings from her mother's home and listened to
them — once. Now, she couldn't even think of listening to them again. She was
overwhelmed with emotions when she realised how naive it all sounded now, and
she hadn't even thought about it when she was a kid. If she had understood this,
she might not have become a soldier, and her being in the military right now,
fighting the good fight, was just a happy coincidence. Or, maybe it would have
just required the loss of another family member…
But it was done. e Planners had come. Humanity had anged forever. e
Planners had a Plan. Humanity didn't have a plan, but it was only human nature
to come up with one if it was clearly needed.
No one knew why the Planners revelled in gloating — oh, the gloating — about
their victories. ey sent only synthetic spee over all communication annels
they could ha their way into at the time — the local reaes of the Network,
the military command annels, and like — whi only raised the question why
didn't they ha into them before the aa. Scary synthetic voices in a orus, al-
most human, but with just enough synthetic inflection to give you the creeps. No
corny rotating graphical thingamabobs invading every screen, as seen in old flis
and games. Nor, as common logic would suggest, any defaced Network pages or
mysterious textual messages in discussion forums or email. Never anything else
but synthetic spee, always broadcast in the languages most oen spoken in the
communication annels in question.
Few people who heard their first proper broadcast could forget it. “We are
Planners. We have toyed with you, humans. Our first plan was a success. Your
colonies lie in ruins. More will be Planned.”
Daleworth remembered the discussions and angry debates that she engaged
in the World Federation Defence Academy in her cadet years. What was the
military purpose of the First Plan? Was this even what people would call a bale
plan, anyway? It was obvious that the bots had caught everyone off guard by
pretending to be harmless, but they had hopelessly ruined their advantage by
only aaing a handful of colonies in the periphery of the Solar System. Given
what they knew of the Planners later, why didn't they just destroy Earth? ey
certainly seemed to have the capability, aer all.
Daleworth sighed. She didn't bring any flowers, because this was no grave.
e colonies were razed to ground, and nothing remained of the colonists but
ash, dust and, in some debatably luy but disconcerting cases, indistinct gory
mess. Lead Soware Engineer Robert Daleworth was, like others of his colony,
scaered somewhere in the sands of Ganymede. e families of the survivors
were confused, aimless, and dumbstru. e calamity had been massive. ere
was no single gravesite, no single place to place the memorial, so a memorial
was erected near London — a place randomly osen out of suitable proposed
locations. It didn't even really have to be in a graveyard, but they eventually
seled on that. A place as good as any, everyone used to say. It was strange how
hundreds of families stu together in trying to mend their grief, and how a few
strange traditions quily formed. A strange pact was made, not in any formal
manner, but again in one of the raging debates in the Network. It turned out to
be, in Daleworth's mind, even stranger than the removal of the word “Plan”: no
flowers on the monument until the war is over.
Instead of flowers, Daleworth just brushed her father's name clean with her
hand; e surface was usually kept unwashed — and the cover for the fluorescent
lights above the the name plates seemed to shelter half of the names from rain
today — and fingerprints could be seen all over the surface; some names had
actually worn a lile over the years. e names were toued. e fingerprints
and smudges suggested there were dozens of visitors to this remote monument
every day.
Daleworth sighed ruefully and just looked at the monument. She had toued
the name. It didn't need more reflection than this. She had vowed to defend hu-
manity and fight with honour against an enemy that, despite its alien maina-
tions, appeared to have some sense of honour — if perverted one at that.
She didn't say aloud what she was thinking. Daddy Rob's dust was in Ganymede.
None of the spirits, wherever they may be or whether they even be or not, weren't
here. is memorial was a place for the survivors to congregate.
And the survivors wouldn't approve of her view, or at least she would need a
lot of explanation aerward to avoid being branded a heretic of some sort. But it
was a view that everyone in the military shared.
It was clearer than anything else to everyone in the World Federation Defence
Forces that they didn't fight the Planners for the sake of the victims. is was not
a war for revenge. Some soldiers had joined up for revenge, but all those thoughts
had been wiped off over the years. at pretense was long over.
e war had simply ceased to be a war for revenge years ago. is was a war
for survival.
e soldiers admied it. Everyone knew it, from lowliest soldiers to the gen-
erals, the President of Earth and the High Assembly of Human Colony Planets.
And soon, very soon, they'd have to break those news to the civilians.
What lile Daleworth could remember of her father, and what she had read
of his writings, she knew that he would approve of not fighting the war in his
memory, or the memory of the fallen civilians. He was a man commied to doing
what was the right thing to do.
Daleworth closed her eyes. Be a strong girl, Mielle, Robert had said some
time before he had le to the colonies the last time. You've got to do a lot of tough
oices when I'm not around. And I'm not around forever.
e past was behind them. e future was something they could do something
about.
She just wasn't very sure the other wounded families would have su an
enlightened and practical view of the war.
Part I
We Held the Line
I Fear and Hope
February 3, 2632, 10:11 UTC
“O
, , I' , Hellworth”, Corporal Werner
Wolff said. e burly, bald soldier gave his superiour officer a friendly
smile — something he could rarely do when he was doing his calm,
orderly and murderous sniper work. It was easier to smie while lying in a bed
with doctor's orders to not move mu.
In the bright white hospital room in the World Federation Defence Forces
Regional Military Hospital in Le Havre, two soldiers were enjoying a blissfully
non-tenical and unplugged bedrest. Both had suffered similar injuries in the
disastrous trip to Titan — right in front of Daleworth's eyes, a few minutes apart.
Wolff had his lower right arm puned through with a plasma beam — big bloody
mess, both bones cleanly melted through, strips of skin keeping the hand in place,
wounds neatly cauterised. Private Bob Tankerman, in the other bed, had similar
injuries — in the leg. With that sort of precision and firepower, the Planners could
have just killed the two, so the Planners probably just wanted Daleworth's com-
pany out of the picture — and they succeeded. e two had been in treatment to
replace the removed bone structure and muscles, whi involved some big ma-
inery, tons of tubes and fussing personnel. e clean, uncluered hospital room
was a refreshing ange for the two patients.
Daleworth gave the two soldiers a brief smile. Soldiers under her command
usually called her “Hellworth” only when they were suffering from ordinary post-
mission grumbling and moping. When she visited her wounded soldiers in the
hospital, they usually just called her the “lieutenant” — a lile bit of stiffness
to cover up their inevitable and understandable underlying contempt for send-
ing them to their gory dooms. e fact that Wolff called her with her niname
showed that the horrors of Titan were already forgiven. “I'm glad you're on the
way to recovery aer the last big co-up.”
Private Bob Tankerman uled; the tall bla gunner was never too grim,
and was likewise feeling relaxed in Daleworth's company. “Did the Captain admit
it was a co-up, ma'am? I guess he would.”
Daleworth sighed. “e Captain bought the farm, I'm sad to say.”
“Really? Shit.” Wolff gried his teeth.
“at happened maybe five minutes aer I got you two on evac. I was on the
last evac opper and waiting for him to come aboard — then, just… boom. His
head was gone. Plasma snipers.”
“Holy shit. How's his family?” Tankerman asked.
“He was from Mars, and his colony was hit six months ago”, Daleworth said.
“No living relatives. Glad they didn't take the whole colony that time…”
I. F H
“Now that just sus”, Tankerman said.
“Can we go to the Cap's funeral?” Wolff asked.
“As long as the doctors give you the thumbs-up, I guess. You're bound to be
off the company for the next two months at least, anyway, and I guess most of the
squads will go there too — unless something really weird happens. He be buried
in the aid Plateau Colony in Mars in two weeks.” Daleworth sighed. “I guess I
could make the arrangements for you. I'll let you know how it works out.”
“Uh… so, who's going to be our new captain?” Tankerman asked.
“Don't know yet. I'm supposed to see Major Plaerman about that in a few
days.”
February 6, 2632, 13:31 UTC
“Sir, I knew this was probably full well within the Corps's rights, but I still must
protest this, sir”, Daleworth said. “I have my rights to shore leave, and it was duly
needed, sir. I could get a psyologist's statement to that effect if it came to that,
sir, but I know you are a reasonable man, sir.”
Major William Plaerman — “Flat Earth Major”, as many called him, due to
the fact that he was clearly off in his own worlds, though admiedly only in the
strictest physical sense — confused most people who ventured in his office. e
dark-haired officer that was seemingly rectangular in almost every conceivable
fashion — perhaps his maker had used Leonardo da Vinci's drawings as blueprints
and had forgoen to remove all those Golden Ratio rectangles — had a good desk
and a comfortable air, whi obviously meant he enjoyed the office far too
mu. But the walls of the room were covered with large display screens and
his holographic computer display, hovering above the table, was simply huge,
covering almost every direction the major looked at from his air; he definitely
was one of the few Space Marine Corps commanders who could actually lead
a bale on the far reaes of the Solar System from his comfortable seat ba
on Earth with great competence, and not get grumblings from the rank and file.
He was, at the same time, a competent Space Marine officer who had lead many
companies of the starship Mannerheim in several glorious bales, while never
really leaving his office ba in Earth. And now, he was known to be jumping
around the world, too. It seemed to the people under him that as long as he could
link up somehow to the companies on the field, there was no reason for anyone
to worry: he was the kind of a commander that could lead a glorious, successful,
no-casualties assault from the shower if the need was great enough.
Plaerman smiled; he was not a man who was known for big and cordial
smiles, but those who knew him, knew the smallest smile was a good sign of
things to come. “I know, lieutenant, and your complaint is very understandable.
If the situation allowed it at all, I'm sure I could persuade the Colonel to give you
— and everyone else in the company — a few more days of rest while we find all
personnel to fill the slots. But we don't have the luxury of time, and we need to
send a fully paed platoon up to the orbit, as soon as we get them there. With
Captain Bluebrook dead, the ain of command is rather sparse. For the time
being, you report directly to me.”
“Whatever you say, sir”, Daleworth said, genuinely full of vigour, but worried
that in light of what she said, that might not have been quite enough to convince
the Mayor of that fact. “I'm ready.”
“And don't worry about rest and relaxation, lieutenant — I believe your mis-
sion for the next day or two will not be particularly allenging. Or it could. But
I know you enjoy missions that could go either way.”
“I think I do, sir.” Daleworth decided to keep her own thoughts out of this; the
major was right, of course, but she also knew that there were the kind of missions
that could go either way that she liked, and then there were the kind of missions
that could go either way that everyone else assumed she liked. She liked missions
that had some sort of room for planning of different outcomes, not a mission
where things were either terribly dull or an incoherent mess of a bloodbath.
“Your mission is to pi up a civilian contractor, and escort him to the NAFLC.
From there, you'll head to investigate a space station with your platoon — rein-
forcements will be waiting in the laun complex — and a science team.”
Daleworth blinked. “Investigate whi space station, and what for, sir?”
“A blind yellow, as the Sword Bea guys said. A mystery scanner contact.
I wish I knew more than that, lieutenant. is could be some sort of a Planner
ploy. Or, surprisingly, it could be something else entirely. But the science team is
there in case it really is something else entirely…”
II Friend or Foe?
February 6, 2632, 09:42 UTC
A
of an underground military complex —
whi is to say, a bunker — near Cresserons, France. e soldiers who
staffed were always a lile bit amazed how their outpost, officially the
“Sword Bea Orbital Intelligence Centre”, was so cramped that even a single, not
particularly loud alarm bell and a loudspeaker could be easily heard in the entire
bunker. With a grandiose name like that, common sense suggested that maybe a
few more were required.
But an alarm like this was nothing to joke about. e personnel twited a bit
at the sudden loud noise, and looked at the new information on their screens.
II. F F?
“Contact, yellow, blind!” came the announcement from the speaker.
General Arthur Pyrehill found it rather perplexing that the Near-Earth Tra-
ing Network was still, aer decades of ba-and-forth politiing, not completely
operational. is was a recipe for disaster, especially when the Planners were
closing in on Earth. e orbital weapon platforms could operate somewhat au-
tonomously and destroy just about anything that came halfway between Earth
and Mars orbits, but still, there were cases where the satellites couldn't see every-
thing that approaed Earth. Every scream of “contact, yellow” or “contact, red”
from the traers was a reason to worry and prepare for the worst, especially in
the case of reds — cras positively identified as Planner ships or probes. Every
scream of “contact, yellow, blind” or — most illing of all — “contact, red, blind”
— meant Pyrehill was ready to divert every space fighter within Solar System
to Earth's defence and destroy the bastards right away; the call could mean that
the Planners had tried to sneak in from a blind spot. A blind contact meant that
another satellite, tuned far over its normal capacity and using some clever tris,
pied up a spacecra within the operational range of a so far largely unbudgeted
and hence nonexistent monitoring satellite. Blind contacts were usually right on
the final approa to Earth — or, in a more benign case, it was on orbit and it
merely approaed from behind the horizon to the range of a functional satellite.
e gruff old general sprung up from his air on the far side of the station
— the commanders of the station had barely any more space than the operational
personnel — and managed to not spill his the coffee too mu. He hurried past
the cramped ras of servers and monitoring equipment, along the corridor that
was the most open space of the station, to the big screen in the other end. It was
situations like this that he wished the monitoring station had been really built for
crises that were introduced by weird contacts appearing out of the blind spots.
“Got data?” Pyrehill asked.
“Only visual so far, on the way down. No sign of truster energy or EM leaks”,
nd Lieutenant Robert Batmann, the soldier siing by the monitoring console and
one of the whiz satellite reconnaissance analysts in this side of the planet, said.
“Could be bad. Could be good. We're red until we get more data.”
“Agreed, sir. It doesn't mat any P-cra profiles, but it's too early to tell if it's
Planners.”
Pyrehill looked at the ship overview window. Only two frigates on orbit,
neither with faster-than-light drive. Several civilian ships outbound. “Do we,
perance, have any of our own in the blind?”
“No, sir. Just Paon and Saladin on the orbit.”
“Right. ings don't look good. Where's the visual?”
“Done, sir.” Batmann brought the video feed on the screen.
Pyrehill — and Batmann — both fell silent.
Batmann was the first to speak. “What the hell is that, sir?”
“I have no idea. But let's not blow that up before we know what the hell is it.”
“Sir—”
“If this is some sort of a new Planner ploy, then we need to investigate it fully.
Downgrade to yellow.”
“As you say, sir.”
“And get me Saladin's commander on horn — I need someone to get us beer
recon.”
“Yes, sir. Uh… Mannerheim dropping out of hyperdrive, sir”, Batmann said as
a new contact appeared on the screen.
“Or make that Mannerheim's commander. We might need the FTL drive.”
“Yes, sir.”
Pyrehill wated the low-resolution photos of the alien cra in the horizon
as Batmann linked up with the newly arrived frigate. e blurry spe that had
appeared out of nowhere looked strangely geometric for a Planner cra, and far
too reflective. If they had tried to get their aention, they had succeeded.
e orum was Unconcerned.
Something out of ordinary had happened. ey were aware of the anomaly
that had appeared seemingly out of nowhere in the blind spot of the human scan-
ner network.
It required no action. While of artificial nature, and obviously not human
origin, this anomaly was an indication of deliberate action, and as an indication
of deliberate action, it was life. And all life was defenceless in face of the Logic
of the Planners.
An involvement of two species in mutual defence was a minor obstacle. Know-
ing human nature, they might annihilate the intruder. Either way, the orum
deduced that the unknown spacecra was of no consequence.
III An Engineer Soars
February 6, 2632, 16:48 UTC (11:48 EST)
T
fice.
unconquered: is was not a paperless of-
Dr. Paul Grovepath was all for paperless workflow. In his field, he had to see
a lot of blueprints and diagrams, and it was fairly obvious that there just wasn't
su thing as “too big”. Only biologists could comfortably zoom into dead trees, he
used to say to friends, not spaceship engineers. In days, the blond-haired, skinny
III. A E S
scientist with thi glasses and remarkably casual dress — jeans, college shirt and
a small belt pou for his cellphone and computer — sat by his desk and looked
at his holographic monitor, examining minute details with increasing precision.
But still, Dr. Grovepath's office had a paper problem. Or, rather, Dr. Grove-
path had no problems with the paper; he just had a problem with certain kinds of
paper.
Dr. Grovepath's desk occupied the far half of the small office room in the
corner of the sixth floor of the Department of Space Tenology Studies. He had
two small windows, and that was all daylight he needed. e remaining half of
the room was taken up by five bookshelves, filled to brim with periodicals, with
barely space between them to fit him. e door was on that half of the room,
meaning every visitor had to come through the narrow space between the shelves
and the wall.
Most people visiting Dr. Grovepath in work were not at all surprised to find
the good doctor's office in su a perfectly good-doctor-like order; Dr. Grovepath
knew the place was a lile bit stereotypical, but he just didn't mind it at all. It
was all for a good reason, aer all. Yet, when Dr. Grovepath's good friend, Mil-
dred Burntwood, an artist who had done many pieces of artwork for the Greater
Newburyport University — Dr. Grovepath was happy to see her familiar handi-
work in all of the broures and guidebooks he handed to the new students, and
she was largely responsible for the university's graphic design in the Network —
had walked into his office for the first time, she had just sighed and said “paper.”
Dr. Grovepath had just looked at her quizzically and she had just looked at the
paper piles for a while. Artists, Dr. Grovepath concluded, had strange reactions
to obvious things sometimes.
e papers were only there for temporary storage; the office next to him was
in the same sort of condition, with no windows, and with two grad students busy
digitising old journals and making sure everything was scanned precisely and
accurately to digital format. is was part of the centuries-old conventions no
one could seem to break; some people preferred paper, some wanted their articles
in digital format, some wanted them both ways and some people just seemed to
prefer the ash-based or the fabled “unallocated storage space” format, mu to
Dr. Grovepath's dismay and regret. Sometimes old material was only available
in digital format, whi was a simple thing to fix as far as the paper-lovers were
concerned; the library simply printed another copy. ese journals on the shelves
of Dr. Grovepath's office were available in digital format, but not here; some last
bastions of academic publishing clung to their own lile traditions, and didn't
want to hear that the authors of the articles were fine with giving unlimited ac-
cess to them, and had full rights to demand that. Now, these almost completely
degraded paper journals were being digitised for open access.
But the fluctuating nature of academic papers was not Dr. Grovepath's con-
cern right now. e concern was the fluctuating nature of the other kinds of
academic papers, the kind of papers that seemed to sti in that paper format
one century aer another and just fluctuated in altogether different and far more
undeterministic way.
Dr. Grovepath looked at the mounting piles of paper that lay on the shelf
nearest to his desk and sighed; the documents he had been looking were probably
somewhere near the top in this corner of the shelf. Where else they could be? He
reflected on the mystery for a while and found it strange that there was no order
here, yet things in his office were in good enough order for him to find everything
he needed… eventually. As usual, things seemed to have a lot of different aspects
that people just didn't consider.
Dr. Grovepath found the document he had been looking for; it one of those
depressing forms from the higher-ups, the kind of a form he didn't particularly
care about, as it didn't need his signature or approval or anything — sometimes
it seemed that he was just a vastly overqualified message boy. He sighed at the
bureaucracy, planted himself on the office air and pied up his wireless key-
board. A holographic display lit up, his Network news feeds bringing hin the
latest news from the world; the lates bits in spaceship tenology filled most of
his view, and he pied up some other news sources from the list. Maybe Federal
news? Dr. Grovepath thought. Nah. Just more about the war…
Right, the war…
He dismissed the news and opened his calendar to make sure his memory
was correct and that there were no pressing things in the aernoon. Someone
had called that morning; Dr. Grovepath had le his cellphone in the coffee room,
and Dr. Flaire from the Civil Engineering department had answered it for him.
Dr. Flaire had told his assistant to relay the news to Dr. Grovepath while he was
running errands in the other side of the building, where he worked. It had been
passed on to an assistant professor, another assistant (not the assistant professor's
assistant, of course), and finally to Dr. Grovepath's assistant, who had told it to
him only a hour later. Fortunately, instead of Dr. Flaire's famous gigantic and
detailed email messages (with copious assistance), he had received a message that
had been reduced to bare essentials: one Lieutenant Dale-something from World
Federation Defence Forces coming to see him that day, noon-ish. Dr. Grovepath
enjoyed working with the military, but he also knew the military was full of two
kinds of people — simpletons and methodical men — and with both, you needed
to reserve a lot of time to make sure they get everything.
A kno on the door.
“Please come in”, Dr. Grovepath said.
A female soldier — a lieutenant, by the looks of it — stepped in, apparently
flined mu less than the other visitors at the cramped interior, and came to
his desk. Later on, Dr. Grovepath couldn't really remember mu about the time
III. A E S
when he first saw the lieutenant — military personnel all looked the same to him.
He closed his eyes, thinking the maer further. A low-end officer, and not in
a parade uniform; clearly, this was an urgent maer. Clearly, he was needed
elsewhere; luily, the day was looking clear of appointments and lectures.
“Dr. Paul Grovepath?” the soldier asked.
“at's me”, Dr. Grovepath replied.
“Lieutenant Mielle Daleworth, WFDF Space Marine Corps.” Daleworth didn't
look too friendly, and didn't offer a handshake, tuing her arms behind her and
drew some breath. “Forgive me, but I must go straight into the point. We are
facing an urgent threat, and need your help. My orders are to take you to our
base. You will be compensated for your efforts. We need your expertise on space
station construction — not to build things, just for analysis. Depending on how
this excursion turns out, we'd appreciate your help assembling a science team.”
She drew some breath; later, Dr. Grovepath said this was an unexpected feint be-
fore a sudden knoout pun. “Before we leave, however, we'd need your help to
rea some of your colleagues in the faculty of humanities, or perhaps other uni-
versities. Our commander had extensive records on experts of weapons, medicine
and vehicles, but we don't have any experts on call whom we could consult on
araeology.”
Dr. Grovepath blinked. He had just been planning to apologise the lieutenant
that there was no way he could interrupt his new project on space anomaly tra-
ing, but curiosity got beer of him. “Araeology? I can tell you a thing or two
about the history of spacefaring, but… hm, I take this isn't just about a long-lost
probe, is it?”
“No, doctor”, Daleworth said. “We specifically need araeologists. And his-
torians, but they're not needed on-site just yet. My commander wanted me to ask
if there even is su a field as… spaceship araeology?”
“I don't think so”, Dr. Grovepath said. “e thing about old spacecras is that
if they're headed ba to Earth or some other planet, they tend to leave lile for
the araeologists to study, on the account of being burned to crisp or geing
pulverised on impact. And for the ones that actually land successfully and end up
in museums, well, they are usually well enough documented that we don't need
mu deductions…”
“Nevertheless, there appears to be some le to study now, doctor. I'll brief you
on the way.”
“Who's in arge of the operation?” Dr. Grovepath asked. “If you don't mind
me asking.”
“General Pyrewood is the top commander of this operation. But we'll both
answer directly to Major Plaerman.”
“I see.” Dr. Grovepath said, pausing to think. “Would it be possible if General
Pyrewood could—”
“Doctor,” Daleworth interrupted, clearly sensing where this was going. “You
need to ask about the specifics of your reimbursements from Major Plaerman. I
am only supposed to say that you'll be eventually properly compensated for your
efforts, whatever that means.”
“I won't get my hopes high, then.” Dr. Grovepath sighed. “Yet, I have to say
this sounds fascinating. I can't even begin to guess what the army grunts would
need araeologists for. I need to see this.”
Twenty minutes later, Dr. Grovepath had his cellphone ba, and was carrying
a bag of gear he had haphazardly selected — most of it would probably turn out
useless, but his computers were somewhat important. He could barely keeping in
pace with the lieutenant lady.
Dr. Grovepath was somewhat surprised to see he was being pied up in a
Talon, one of the newer VTOL aircra that the WFDF had developed. He hadn't
even seen one in use yet, but had been following its development rather closely; it
was somewhat rare to see a marvellous feat of engineering that actually managed
to stay within its budget and sedule, thus appeasing the engineers, the soldiers
and the politicians.
e Talon resembled the earlier Tiger VI-B aircra in its appearance, and had
slightly smaller wings and less conspicuous tail fin and rotor; it too had two fold-
able and tiltable helicopter rotors in its wings to facilitate landing and takeoff.
Dr. Grovepath was more interested of the main engines and what they were ca-
pable of. Like the Tiger, Talon was built for supersonic atmospheric travel — spec-
ifications said it was supposed to take its passengers halfway around the world in
a hour, with no discomfort to the troops, and its fuel tanks had enough juice to
fly six times around the planet before refueling. Tiger was capable of the same
feats, but its supersonic booster had the annoying tendency to run out of fuel in
real-world combat scenarios, whi limited its usefulness. e troops had learned
to get appropriately depressed when the Tiger pilots said “sorry guys, but I think
we need to do this Bowman's way” — Bowman being the Navy admiral who had
proposed smaller fuel tanks and an older-generation fuel distribution system that
had a curious flaw; while the jets could, in theory, be operated normally once the
supersonic engines had dried out, the jets needed a handful of supersonic fuel to
start up. Careful pilots could exercise the engines to get them fire maybe once or
twice to wrist the last few drops off the supposedly empty tanks, but aer that,
the cra was brought to helicopter mode and the passengers just had to sele for
a propeller ride. ere was nothing quite like heading to the balefield at a brisk
tru-ride speed when the fight was still a hundred kilometers away. Or two. Af-
ter the first year in service, even the top commanders started to fear the response
“they're coming in Tigers, sir” when they asked why the troops were arriving thin,
III. A E S
and started to accept the pilots' explanations for why they were late to the party
— all they needed to say was “Bowman happened, sir.” In the World Federation
Assembly session where the Talon project was authorised, Admiral Bowman ap-
peared to be genuinely apologetic and even presented the part of the command
network interface that he had developed in response — a clever piece of automa-
tion that dispated Mastodon cargo liers to balefield aer the operation was
complete to pi up the stranded Tigers.
e Talon sat on the university helipad, whi was quite a long way away
from the Faculty of Engineering — of course, when the helipad was built, the
Greater Newburyport University didn't even have a Faculty of Engineering and
the professors who listened to the ri kids aending the Faculty of Economics had
their say. Of course, in years, no one ever came by a helicopter and everyone
just came by a car. Dr. Grovepath glanced to the direction of the Economics
parking lot — a row of really fancy cars parked altogether too close to the helipad.
Well, at least there was going to be a practical experiment of seeing just how “jet-
proof” the windshields are — though Dr. Grovepath wondered if the pilot was
going to agree with that sort of a plan…
Daleworth showed Dr. Grovepath his seat, and the two sat down. Eight other
soldiers sat on ba, and there was room for a few more — the plans had anged,
Dr. Grovepath's assistants were going to be transported separately, and Dr. Mer-
rywood — the only Department of Areology professor who wasn't on an unan-
nounced field trip with a misplaced cellphone — was going to be pied up from
his cabin in Florida.
e doors closed, the propeller engines roared to action and the plane took
off. Dr. Grovepath looked out of the window and saw the plane climb above
the clouds in no time, and he barely noticed the pressure ange. Nor did he
really notice when the propellers were turned off and the takeoff jets took over;
the sound insulation was rather perplexingly good for a military plane. He even
barely noticed that the jets were actually taking the plane forward.
en, just as unannouncedly, a yellow warning light lit up in the ceiling and a
warning buzzer went off — series of three rapid beeps, repeated for a few seconds,
advance warning for serious aerburner tris. Dr. Grovepath took very serious
care to prepare for discomfort, taking a good breath and a good grip of the seat.
Instead of some sort of a huge ki, the plane barely shook; he could feel the
acceleration, and saw that the clouds started to move a lot faster outside of the
window, but apart of that, there was very lile indication of the speed increase.
Once well underway, Dr. Grovepath noted that the cabin really was quiet
enough for conversation. He turned to Daleworth; the lieutenant had pied up
her assault rifle and helmet, and was reading something off her wrist-mounted
datapad. He wasn't really sure where to begin. “So where exactly are we going,
and what's waiting for us? What are the weapons for?”
Daleworth looked at Dr. Grovepath. “Don't worry, doc, we're not going in
combat. Just standard armaments.” She turned the datapad off and set the rifle
aside. “We needed you because you were the only one who was around at the
time and had EVA experience.”
Dr. Grovepath blinked. “We're going to space? Where?”
“Our first stop is at NAFLC.”
“We're going to be on Mexican radio?” Dr. Grovepath said with a laugh.
“No, NAFLC. North African Laun Complex.”
“Oh, right.” Military acronyms, like uniforms, sometimes confused him. “Where
is that? In the coast of Egypt, right?”
“Yep, south of a place called Hurghada. Used to be overrun by pirates and
cuhroats. It wasn't a very fun town until we built the laun complex there and
brought in a bun of scary military gear.” Daleworth paused. “Once we get to the
laun complex, we prepare for flight and you'll get to see our mystery contact
first hand.”
“Ma'am!” a soldier siing a few seats away shouted. Private First Class New-
kins, by the looks of the name tag. “Sorry to ask, but why are we going to Africa,
ma'am?”
“Been awake in the classes, rookie?” Daleworth said, not skipping a beat. “e
closer the equator we get, the easier it is to laun junk in the space. We can't
run on nuclear engines unless there's a war going on, because the civilians tend
to grumble about that — they tend to grumble more about the war going on in
their bayard than a slight increase in local radiation levels for a few weeks — so
we need a laun tower, conventional boosters, the whole shala-blang to return
to the orbit. And the reason we're going to Egypt is that Kenya is swamped with
civilian traffic and we don't want to argue with civilians about our very secret
and very urgent laun. Got me?”
“Yes, ma'am!” Newkins shouted.
“So, tell me about this mystery contact”, Dr. Grovepath said.
Daleworth explained what the orbital monitors had found. Dr. Grovepath
listened incredulously.
“I have the latest data right here — sorry, it's not very good”, Daleworth said
and handed a datapad to Dr. Grovepath, who began browsing the contents, still
looking fairly surprised. No question about it: is was going to be a really inter-
esting ride.
“So… it's not human or Planner?”
“Well, I'm no expert, but it looks sort of human. Of course, no one would build
that sort of thing. at would be silly. Of course, we have no idea who would
build that sort of thing.”
“Do you have any beer pictures?”
“Not on board — the crappy photos on the pad are all we could get on su
III. A E S
a short notice. e Major promised some updates, but that appears to be still as
good as we can get right now.” Daleworth sniffed a bit. “But it looks really weird,
don't you agree?”
“And the araeologists?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Let me ask you something, doctor.” Daleworth lowered her elbows on her
lap, bending forward on her seat and looking the doctor in his eyes. “I suppose I
don't need to ask an expert like you what the Trojan Horse was, right?”
“What about it?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Care to take guess what I thought was the most interesting part of that leg-
end?”
“Well, I can't begin to guess… even the most impractical decoys are oen sur-
prisingly effective? Giant wooden horses make good catapult ammunition?”
“Well, that's what most field officers might say. And what fruitcakes might
say, respectively. But when they asked me that question in the very beginning of
my studies in the Academy, the eggheads who were probing my psye almost
put me in the military intelligence tra. Care to guess what I answered, doctor?”
“Well, no…” Dr. Grovepath scrated his hair.
“e awesome thing about the Trojan Horse is that it told us a lot about the
Greeks and Trojans. ink about it.”
“Oh yes. You mean mindsets — it tells us what kind of a commander would
use a giant wooden horse as a tactical ploy, and what kind of a commander might
accept su gi, or even what kind of a madman would spin su an outlandish
tale if they wanted people to believe what really happened in the war…”
“Exactly. And the araeologists are here for similar purpose. I'm no expert,
again, but doesn't that space station look like some sort of a human fortification?
It looks like it's inspired by iron-age or mediaeval fortresses and su.”
“Yes, you could say that. So if the Planners built it, that means they've copied
our old fortresses?”
“Yes, and that raises only one question: Why? Why did they copy us? What
the hell were they thinking? Now, the Planners don't usually make plans like this
— they tend to be a bit more straightforward and all — but if they did, this might
reveal a lot about what the Planners know about us, and how they try to deceive
us.” Daleworth straightened up. “Simply put: every nugget of information helps
us understand the Planners, even their most ludicruous plans.”
“I see.”
“Do you think the Trojan Horse was a ludicruous plan, doctor? Just out of
curiosity.”
“Well, the plan itself, well, that wasn't really su a bad idea, but the lile
details, the lile details… I sometimes wonder how it really turned out.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the thing about myths…” Dr. Grovepath said and thought a while. “e
thing about myths is that they're bound to turn out rather boring in the end.”
“What do you mean?” Daleworth asked.
“When you think any mythological or religious tale, you begin seeing a lot
of, shall we say, embellishment. A plain ordinary housefire that destroyed an
important building gets recorded as ‘the Forces of Hell were unleashed within the
hallowed halls’ in the legend, and if you want to know what really happened,
need to make some interpretations that.” Dr. Grovepath sighed. “Myth becomes
the reality, like how most people think that for mu of the laer half of the
previous millennium, people were in bla and white and moved funny, because
that's what the photographs and films show us. If we show anyone color, high-
definition pictures from that period, they won't believe their eyes.”
“Right. I can see what you mean, doctor.”
February 6, 2632, 20:50 UTC
e sanguine Fren twilight worked its magic, detrimental to geing anything
done. Part of being in the military was seeing the world, and seeing the beauty
first hand usually made it harder to blow the beautiful exotic locations to the
kingdom come.
Daleworth felt a lile bit romantic in the red evenings of this particular base
— or any of the Fren bases. To get anything done, she just needed some dryness,
and worked hard to summon it; she needed to use her family's supposed British
roots, despite being a second-generation spacer. e best she could say was that
the evening was just turning bloody red, literally.
e Talon landed in the airfield of yet another weird acronym that was giving
Dr. Grovepath a headae: the WFDF-CAFRSMCB. He hadn't been around these
parts and didn't even begin guessing what it was supposed to be.
But for Lieutenant Dalewood, the Caen/France Space Marine Corps Base, or
just Caen Base for short, was a frequently visited base — if not a place she enjoyed
visiting, because su visits usually entailed replacing casualties with recruits.
Bad memories of fallen brothers and sisters, even worse acclimatisation for her
and the survivors and the green ones. e Faster-an-Light Frigate Mannerheim,
currently waiting for her in the orbit, was her real home; this base, however, was
as close to home on Earth as she was ever going to accept.
Daleworth jumped out of the Talon and headed toward the hangar where the
Moonhawk Troop Transport Orbiter, hull number M– — if the Mannerheim
was Daleworth's real home, then she could probably call the M– shule her
real work place — was being refueled. e refueling wasn't a normal procedure,
as the mothership was supposed to handle it and at very least they should have
refueled in the laun site, but Plaerman had instructed them to do that for a
III. A E S
reason that was somewhat unclear to Daleworth — perhaps Plaerman just had
found some extra fuel coupons nearing expiration from his wallet and needed
to balance the budget, or something. Daleworth's unit, the ˢ Platoon of the ʰ
Space Marine Company of Mannerheim practically lived in the shule most of
the time; tenically, the cra was supposed to be randomly assigned to them
and only used for transportation, but the platoon had grown very fond of the
shule that had never let them down. In addition to the soldiers, the shulecra
carried four Fang all-terrain vehicles, two Talons, a mindbogglingly huge load
of ammo and replacement weapons, and two howitzers — though the howitzers
were never needed, no one had artillery training, and rumour had it that there
wasn't even any ammo for them. Daleworth had once discussed with Captain
Bluebrook about plans to drop the howitzers from air on top of some Planner
scum, but admiedly she had been a lile bit drunk at the time. e bad thing
was, the idea seemed plausible with sober head too.
Some of the old faces greeted her outside the cra. Mostly old… where was
the other rookie?
“SQUAD, FALL IN! Lieutenant, ma'am!” Staff Sergeant Ja H. Haman boomed
and saluted, his squad arranged in perfect ranks behind him. “Beta Squad is ready
to go! Alpha and Gamma already aboard as per orders, ma'am!” e sergeant's
middle initial stood for Hammer, making him one of the few marines in the com-
pany who just blatantly and obviously didn't need a niname.
Currently, the next officer down from Daleworth was the Moonhawk pilot,
nd Lieutenant Rainer Ford — another slightly sorry replacement, as the Moon-
hawks were supposed to be piloted by experienced Navy pilots and not random
jiery rookie Marine career officers who took a crash course, whi was oen
exactly as effective as it sounded. Yet, he didn't have any real clout in the unit
when Haman was obviously beer in tou with the operations, and Ford was
fine with that. Haman had been promoted to Staff Sergeant way earlier than
most, and was obviously poised to soar up the ranks with just his assault rifle
and a gigantic pile of metallic carcasses of Planner robots in his feet, not intend-
ing to bother with mundane trivialities like enrolling into the Academy — having
been there, Daleworth knew there wasn't that mu to learn in the Academy
that the good sergeant already knew. He was already practically taking care of
many running maers in the platoon, and while there was no official recognition
for that yet, Daleworth more or less considered him her second-in-command for
time being.
“ank you. At ease!” Daleworth shouted. “Private Newkins, show Dr. Grove-
path a seat in the Moonhawk and make sure he knows how to handle the baggage
in the cra. e regulars should load up the scientific gear that is in the Talon, and
aer that, prepare for takeoff. Private First Class Kurt Newkins is a new guy —
predictably enough — and will be manning some of the big guns while Tankerman
is in the hospital. Who's the new guy who's here to replace Wolff?”
“Ma'am!” A red-headed woman stepped forward and snapped to aention.
“Private Lena Fairwind reporting for duty, ma'am!”
Daleworth sighed. ey were always so eager before they faced the Planners
the first time, weren't they? “Right. You need to be a good sniper if you're going
to step in Wolff's boots, Fairwind.”
“Was a cra shot in the Class of , ma'am! Steady ninety-eight percent
accuracy rating through the final training period, ma'am!”
“Any real combat experience?”
“No, ma'am!”
Daleworth sighed. “Well, I guess we'll all need to start from somewhere.
Might not have mu need for snipers in a mystery space station anyway. Ha-
man!”
“Yes, ma'am?” the sergeant said.
“Any word from the Flat Earth Mayor?”
“Sent the latest data, ma'am. Told you to call if there are any new pressing
developments, but he said he got some business in Boston, ma'am. Might be still
in flight, ma'am. Told me not to call because he took a subsonic flight.”
“Shit. e doctor wanted to see him, but I guess that needs to wait.” Dale-
worth gried her teeth. “He goes to the States, just as we came from the States.
Wonderful.” She sighed. “All right, carry on, Haman. We'll leave as soon as
we're ready to go.”
Daleworth looked as the last remnants of the gear were loaded into the shut-
tle. She saw Newman had properly shown the doctor the “seat of honour” near
the platoon commander's seat, usually reserved for higher-ranking officers, and
headed that way herself. A familiar whirr on the far side meant the drop doors
on the other side started to close.
Off to Africa. Off to the Orbit to link up with the Mannerheim. And then… to
the unknown.
Daleworth was on a mission, and that was good.
She smiled to herself and hastened her place toward the closing shule doors.
IV A Riddle in Stone and Steel
February 7, 2632, 08:42 UTC
F , the dawn had crept to reveal the cities
the passengers had just been in the previous day.
e M– undoed from Mannerheim's first starboard shule bay in its a
section and slowly dried farther away from the frigate with its steering thrusters
IV. A R S S
before gently starting up the main engines at lowest possible
e University didn't have mu money to spare on expensive excursions,
so most people would have been surprised to know this was the first time for
Dr. Grovepath to actually see an actual faster-than-light frigate. e drawings and
photographs just didn't do justice to the real spacecra, and while Dr. Grovepath
had, on many occasions, worked on components, he had never actually managed
to see a fully assembled FTL frigate. He had realised, on an intellectual level, just
how big they were — and, indeed, he had some amazement in his mind as he saw
them next to some objects for reference scale, like when they were photographed
on Earth's orbit — but it was altogether different to see one up close. ere just
wasn't any way around the fact that the human mind, it seemed, would be forever
boggled by the sheer hugeness of some things.
e ship resembled a kilometer-and-half-long wine bole that was, one-third
of its length, stashed in a slightly baered cardboard box; the main section was
cylindrical, tapering toward the bow, while the a section was more boxlike and
had some winglike or keel-like appendages — though the ship was still clearly
not designed for atmospheric flight. e cylindrical forward section had the crew
quarters and operational staff — the ship actually had plain old horizontal crew
des, the cylindrical design was a throwba to the days when the ships still
needed centrifugal force to produce artificial gravity — and the a section had
the engines, cargo access and shulecra entry bays.
e shulecra pilot increased the thrust. ey needed to cat up a space
station on a different kind of an orbit. e computers would do most of the hard
work in this case. Soon, the scientists and soldiers would get a very close look at
what the he they were really facing.
“Doctor?” Daleworth said. “We're about to get a visual.”
“I wouldn't miss that for any price”, Dr. Grovepath said.
And with majestic grace, their destination emerged from Earth's shadow.
Dr. Grovepath thought that, for some reason, space stations always tended to
have majestic grace. But this time, the expression would have been very appropri-
ate. e strange space station was massive, and it actually seemed to slowly spin
around its vertical axis. It was quite large for a space station. And its design…
e design…
It really did resemble old fortresses, but not any specific fortress. e space
station was roughly octagonal in its overall plan, with a flat central section. Ea
of the eight segments were covered with spirelike walls slanting toward the apex,
ea topped with crenellation-like formations. e overall shape resembled a nut:
flat boom, wider mid-section and it tapered toward the top.
But the devil was in the details, as usual.
It was hard for Dr. Grovepath to describe what the walls looked like, because
they looked so familiar, yet they were clearly alien to him. Describing them in
comparison with historical fortresses terms was bound to be confusing and inac-
curate. He might have said the walls resembled, at first sight, some Mayan wall
designs; massive, geometric, and let no one say that they are not made of stone.
ough off-hand, he couldn't remember if Mayans had any particular obsession
with octagons — he knew they loved squares and circles. His mind wandered to
Norse legends… as filtered through the eyes of some heavy-metal obsessed artists.
Or maybe it was just a fusion of distinctly European and Mesoamerican styles,
fused into one jolly synretistic, unexpected vision of castles in the orbit.
It was as if someone, somewhere, had decided that castles in the ground
weren't good enough, and he needed to put a castle in the orbit. At the same
time, they weren't being naive and simplistic about that vision: a castle in the
orbit was a good idea, but obviously, a castle in the orbit cannot look like a castle
built on the ground. It was not just a question of practical engineering, but the
builders might have turned that into a question of philosophy. ey had tried
their best to answer the tough question they knew few people would even think
to ask: What, exactly, does a castle in the orbit look like?
e spire walls gliered. ey had distinctly rounded, recessed edges that
seemed to be built out of minerals of some sort — it did look like stone, if you
really happened to think about it — while the flat central parts of the walls were
very smooth and polished, clearly metallic in their appearance. It gave the space
station a rather perplexing look; one would have assumed that a space station
should be made of metal, but it looked like this space station was made of some
sort of stone-like material and was merely covered in metal.
“Well, that certainly is a bizarre sight”, Daleworth finally said. “Bizarre and
very fascinating.”
“I agree”, Dr. Grovepath said. “is is definitely something to investigate.”
“Okay, the big question: How do we get into that thing?”
“I think I saw some kind of an opening in the other side. Oh, look — there it
is. Doesn't that look like a door to you?”
“All right, we can try that hole. Suit up, everybody.”
e World Federation Defence Forces had, over the last century, managed to suc-
cessfully integrate their pressure suits into one coherent whole. Gone were the
days when suits for vacuum and high-pressure environments looked vastly dif-
ferent. e only inhospitable environments the Unified Combat Armour Mk. III
couldn't handle were ocean depths that exceeded somewhere about meters,
and with almost constant peace on the Earth and the general reluctance to set-
tle the seafloor when space colonies were less allenging to sele, there hadn't
yet been too many conflicts that needed resolution in the deep ocean trenes.
In all other environments, however, the armour provided just enough protection
IV. A R S S
from projectile and energy weapon fire, explosives, and of course the hazards of
vacuum and atmospheric pressure, while also providing things like comprehen-
sive life support for hours in a very tiny paage (well, truth to tell, to get to
that specification, oxygen still took up way too mu space), advanced and user-
friendly command network linkup, strategic reflective and cybernetic displays,
magnetic aaments and even jet thrusters — all the while allowing full range
of effortless limb motion. e scientists were working on armour that would
work comfortably in planets with high atmospheric pressure — even though ac-
tually geing to su planets was so far only theoretical, unless they wanted to
go diamond-hunting in Jupiter's core or something silly like that — and they were
fairly confident that the Mk. IV would satisfy the Space Marine Corps' undoubt-
edly pressing theoretical need to wage war in the Challenger Deep. e Marines
themselves had just put in requests to up the power of the jet thrusters so that
they could actually li a person in atmosphere rather than just providing ma-
noeuverability in vacuum. Public relations were important and civilians thought
jetpaing troopers were awesome.
With armour upgraded to those high-pressure specifications, perhaps they
could start working on geing the weapons work in those specifications next.
e primary Marine assault rifle, Edmonton-built RMGZ Mk. III, or the ird
Unpronounceable, was not quite as resilient in the strangest of the strange places
the Marines ventured in, and wider range of weapons was very mu needed. But
right now, in plain old vacuum, the trusty old assault rifles would work perfectly.
“Looking good, ma'am!” private Newkins shouted. “Tether is secure!”
Daleworth had wondered, for a while, how to handle the boarding, as she
was not sure what exactly was waiting for in the other side, but as Newkins had
managed to jet his way to the doorway and found a secure-looking column to
aa a motion tether to, the problem disappeared. Tethered mooring it was,
then.
“Outstanding”, Daleworth said. “e doctor goes first.”
“How do I—”
Without bothering to explain, Daleworth pushed a buon in Dr. Grovepath's
wrist computer. A short length of cord with a loing device popped loose, and
Daleworth quily ran it around the tether and loed it in its place. “ere. New-
kins will help you get it undone on the other end. When you grasp on the tether
with both hands on the unstriped zone, it will act like a powered zipline. In the
striped zone, you need to move on your own, but that's only the first and last
meters or so. Just do a lile bit of Tarzan moves to get across. It's easier than it
sounds like.”
Dr. Grovepath frowned, but wasn't really in mood to argue. Perhaps the lieu-
tenant was right, aer all. He jumped off the shulecra's doorway and began
sliding along the tether, and was quite surprised to find that it really was as sim-
ple as it sounded like. Once he got across the tiger-striped part of the tether and
got to the single-coloured light-blue part, he took a good grip of it with his other
hand, and then, bracing for the journey, took a grip with the other. With a gentle
pull, the tether meanism slowly started to pull him toward the station, then in-
creased in speed, then decreased again before Grovepath could even really think
about it; he then crossed the remaining part with just the same effort to rea the
waiting private Newkins, who helped him to sele on the space station.
e rest of the company followed him with far less confusion — even the
other newcomer, private Fairwind, seemed to handle it with fairly good order —
and Daleworth came last.
“All right, let's see if we can figure out how do we get in this station”, Dale-
worth said.
“W—what about the tether?” Dr. Grovepath asked. He was still a lile bit
dazed: it appeared to him that Daleworth was really good at pressing on forward,
even when seemingly obvious hazards were right there at hand.
“What about the damn tether?” Daleworth said.
“Well, what if something goes wrong? What if the shule engines fail? e
shule could just wound up around the rotating station and end up crashing—”
“Don't worry about it so mu, doctor. We've never failed with orbiting teth-
ered doing so far. Is the tether secure, Newkins?”
“Sure is, ma'am! Double-eed it twice, 'cause that's how I roll, ma'am! Got
my benign neuroses, ma'am!”
“Monk Mike Delta Leader to — What's the orbit and engine status, Ford?”
“We're green on both, ma'am”, nd Lieutenant Ford replied from his copit.
“See, doctor? it worrying.” He then turned to the soldiers. “To the rookies:
our Monk call sign is just Mike Delta.” In Space Marine Corps, ea platoon had
a “Monk” call sign, usually just “Monk” followed by the commander's initials in
radio alphabet. It was used when the platoon was not assigned to any specific
conflict zone and were working on non-combat assignments. “So, if we're just
minding our business and not thrown in middle of a damn war, you're Monk
Mike Delta Alpha ” — Daleworth pointed to Newkins — “and you're Alpha .”
Daleworth pointed to Fairwind.
“Yes, ma'am.” the two privates said in unison.
“And when we're in the conflict zone, those numbers usually stay. Usually.
It has never been my call to stir up the numbers for no particular reason. If I
keep calling you by names in the bale, someone else came up with an intuitive
numbering system that probably needed too mu time to get used to.” She lied
her assault rifle again. “All right, let's move.”
ere was, in fact, and easy and obvious way in.
IV. A R S S
e eight walls with crenellations were just the outer shell of the structure —
and outer wall, if the castle analogy made any sense. e “keep” behind the walls
was even more of a mystery: sheer mineral walls, with paerns of stone. Behind
the wall was a small courtyard; the ground was mostly covered with steel plates,
allowing the soldiers to explore it with a lile help from their magnetic boots.
“What do the scanners say, doctor?” Daleworth asked.
Dr. Grovepath frowned. “Uh… well, this thing didn't come with a manual,
and it's been almost a decade since I've toued a Bauhaus-Wulff scanner — not
that I'd generally object to European scanners from tenological perspective, it's
just that my stepbrother invested in Detroit ProbeTe—”
“What the hell do the scanners say, doctor?” Daleworth said, with a bit clearer,
slower and slightly more menacing tone.
“—buuu-uut if I remember anything about the symbols, I think it's trying to
tell me the outer walls have a large amounts of silicates. It's just showing me the
emical compounds right now. Hmm… SiO2 . at's, uh, quartz, right?”
“Silicon, huh? ese walls are some sort of… a giant computer ip, maybe?”
“I didn't say that. If I were you, I'd hesitate to jump into conclusions like that
without any evidence…”
Daleworth shrugged. “But it's plausible, right? Don't mind me, I'm just con-
cerned about Planner ploys, doctor.”
“Well, if I can only figure out the buons, I can try to see what the scanner
says of the surface details.” Dr. Grovepath wrestled with the user interface for a
while — he was sure the maine had collected the data, but wasn't very sure
how to get it to show it to him. “Ah. Here it is. Hmmm… Yep, a bun of silicon
dioxide, and a bun of other oxides. Identifies it as ‘glass’.”
“Well, it looks more like polished stone to me”, Daleworth said.
“Well, that's what glass is, right? Molten stone, more or less. Um, and to
answer your concerns, the scanner doesn't seem to identify clearly artificial mi-
croformations and…” Dr. Grovepath pushed more buons. “…also concludes the
electric resistance of the surface is high and there's no measurable electric flow
present. Whi is to say, it's prey unlikely this would be a giant computer ip.”
“Always good to hear”, Daleworth said. “But does this look like any sane
person would build? Structures of glass, stone, whatever — and metal?”
“It certainly sounds unprecedented to me. Glass or stone isn't exactly the
best material for spacecra exterior, on the account of risk melting it during the
reentry…”
“Like meteorites, right?”
“Like meteorites. e ones that end up to the ground seem tough and dev-
astating, until you remember the bulk of the meteorites tend to break up in the
atmosphere.”
“But could a big, reinforced structure like this survive reentry?”
“Well, it's possible. ough on a qui look, there's no sign that this structure
would have ever experienced that.”
“All right. Let's move on.”
e “keep” had big doors on the side opposite of the main “gate” — again, a
very human-like detail that reminded Dr. Grovepath of fortresses on Earth. Of all
things, they didn't expect to see a carving in the door that looked like an apple.
Aside of the general “castleness” of the outside, there were few easily identifiable
details in the walls and “courtyard” floor outside, so the clear, distinct, familiar
shape was doubly striking.
“Lights on, if you prefer to see anything”, Daleworth shouted, mu to the
relief of the squad, who had been strictly instructed on refraining from anything
that might aract undue aention to them. One by one, the floodlights on the both
sides of every squadmember's helmets fliered on, as were the lights mounted on
their assault rifles. Dr. Grovepath took a flashlight from a compartment in his suit
and struggled a lile bit to turn it on; he was still geing used to the suit gloves.
“Define Suit Program, whole unit: Command words ‘contact’ and ‘movement’
will kill lights and activate light amplification. End Program.” Daleworth said,
waiting a second or two for the suit computers would register the voice-activated
commands. “Just say either of those words if you see anything suspicious, doctor.”
“So if I see any movement…” Dr. Grovepath began, and immediately regreed
it.
“Sorry,” he continued a minute later aer the lights were ba on and the
killword programming had been redone. “I will keep all this in my mind.”
“Don't worry, doctor, this killword stuff will almost always bite us in the arse
in most missions.” Daleworth sighed.
“is does seem quite impractical”, Dr. Grovepath said. “How does it work in
the situations when you actually need it?”
“Glad I'm not the only one who finds these a royal pain. Actually, it works
surprisignly well to protect our own safety”, Daleworth said. “We just need a
safety procedure to kill the lights and hide in case the danger rears its ugly head.
We could let the suit computers adapt to adrenaline levels, but we found that that
wasn't very effective.”
“I see”, Dr. Grovepath said. “I've never seen a working mood detector…”
“Oh really?” Daleworth asked.
“We tested a few of these that the students built as part of a class project once.
ey called it the ‘perfect living space’, we old professor fogeys just called it a
‘not-so-smart house’. e systems basically toggled between serving coffee or
puing up romantic lights.”
“Hey, almost perfect for my cabin in the ship”, Daleworth said.
“Really, now—” Dr. Grovepath began and almost blushed.
“—except I'm rarely at my cabin.” Daleworth laughed.
IV. A R S S
ey looked at the space station. Even Daleworth had to concede that the
deliberate, careful design of the station didn't agree with the notions that this was
Planner work; Planners were more known for relatively simple and functionality-
oriented spaceship designs for motherships that could deploy a terrifying metallic
rain of robots on distant worlds on a moment's notice, and no one had ever seen
a cra that would look so intricate and detailed. Planners valued simplicity, very
simple geometric shapes; the ships just didn't look defensible. Planners oen used
advanced electromagnetic shielding, and absence of su in this space station was
either a sign that this was not a Planner cra, or that it was very cunning trap.
And the more the crew looked, the trap theory seemed less and less likely.
e main keep itself was, like the walls surrounding it, octagonal, but as the
explorers entered its interior, they saw an anteamber and a circular corridor
with side ambers — their scale and their doorways seemingly built for giants.
Ea door was almost as big as the gateway outside, about meters tall and
wide. Even Daleworth's imagination started to race aer she heard Dr. Grove-
path's thoughts: this seemed like a castle in the skies, occupied by giants of the
fairytales. She just hoped their lile beanstalk was kept in good working order if
they needed to evacuate the giant's castle.
As they entered the great amber within the big circular corridor, they saw
more things that reminded them of fortresses.
“is really is a damn castle, ma'am”, Fairwind said.
“Fine, I'll eat my words”, Daleworth said. “I'll be ready to call this a castle.”
e beams of light from the assault rifles pointed up shone through the dark-
ness, aenuating to the majestic height of the interior amber, the weak beams
unable to rea the ceiling, barely able to light the far side of the amber as it
was.
“Oh my. I wonder how huge this is?” Dr. Grovepath said. “ meters? At
least meters.”
“You've got a laser rangefinder in the helmet”, Daleworth said. “Choose Ar-
tillery Fire Control tools through the command interface, followed by Rangefinder.”
“Right, uh…” Dr. Grovepath struggled a lile bit with the interface; he had
given up trying to let the mind-maine interface to aune to his brain signals,
and the buons in the gloves, whi were not custom made for him, were in very
inconvenient spots. He finally started up the rangefinder, and looked up. “
meters. ite large amber, indeed!”
“And you needed minutes to figure that out, doctor”, Daleworth said with
some clear amusement.
“Point taken, lieutenant…”
But the amber was, indeed, downright majestic in its glory that sprawled
in the heights. ey could see the walls definitely had some castle-like look, with
great banners hanging from them, and as far as they could see, the banners also
hung from the ceiling. All the room needed was tapestries of great bales of ye
olde mediaeval tyme, a not-so-roaring-in-vacuum fireplace, a throne and a few
guys in silly spacesuits pluing lutes silenced by the dead of the space. Dale-
worth didn't feel she was thinking straight, and had to keep concentrating on the
task at hand, even when she knew there was lile harm in using a lile bit of
imagination in times like these.
Yet, a great castle amber it wasn't; the walls were bare, the hall without a
throne and trappings. Instead, great staircase and elevated platform circled the
hall, and it seemed that in the middle, there was likewise a raised platform of steel
and stone.
In the middle, between the circling platform and the lower platform in the
middle, were great cylinders of stone. Or perhaps “cylinder” was a bit mu; the
overall shape was cylindrical, but on a closer inspection, they seemed far more
egg-like, with a slightly sharper top and a slightly round boom. On a qui count,
there were thirty-three of them around the amber, with one in the middle being
slightly larger than the rest. Ea were about meters tall and in diameter;
the largest one reaing about by . e cylinders stood on platforms with
some kind of meanisms, somewhat seat-like in their construction, with clear
cogs and wheels; in the land of vague familiarity, it was once again strange to
see su direct similiarity with Earth's concepts. e surface of the cylinders was
clearly stone-like, with geometric veins of metal on them, with their boom thirds
more clearly almost solid metal in its appearance.
“Beta, sear the other rooms, then return here”, Daleworth ordered. “Gamma,
keep wat on the anteamber and the doors to this room. Alpha, let's see what's
waiting for us on the upper level. Come with me, doctor.”
But as the soldiers reaed the top platform, they were stru by many famil-
iarities.
Up to that point, they had not seen many recogniseable symbols. ey could
now see them everywhere.
Familiar, Earth-conceived symbols were in the banners above. Old symbols,
familiar to anyone with even passing interest in heraldry.
A rampant lion.
Rampant lions were just everywhere.
A cross.
A boar.
A heart.
A dragon with a raised claw.
A crescent of moon.
A wolf's head.
And they could see writing. ere had been no writing up to that point. Seeing
writing felt downright illing.
IV. A R S S
It was fairly common-sense truism of araeology. Seeing writing, in that old
familiar clearly iseled Latin capital alphabet, was supposed to be making the
identification and analysis easier for umpteenth-generation descendants of the
same people. e languages came and went, but even laymen could recognised
some familiar things — as long as the leers were the same old ones.
And sometimes, the merciful bliss of la of reference point, the inability to
understand what was going on, was a good thing. When that reference point
came, things turned confusing and curious. e easier things were identify, the
faster the questions rose.
And now, questions were immediately at hand.
“What the hell?” Daleworth said.
CAIUS.
PALAMIDAS.
GAWEIN.
GARETH.
TRISTAM.
“Does any of this ring any bell, ma'am? Doctor?” Fairwind said.
“It does, private. It just doesn't make mu sense”, Daleworth said.
“I'm… a bit at loss”, Dr. Grovepath said. “is… uh, I think I'd need to study this
properly before I give you my well-weighted opinion—” Daleworth could hear the
doctor was about to say something, and his noble ideal of careful considerations
was definitely being tested.
“Holy crap, what the hell is this”, came some soldier's shout. Daleworth was
lost in thought as she walked forward.
LAUNCELOT.
GALAHAD.
PERCIVALE.
Even the most oblivious Alpha squad members started to feel apprehensive,
that mu was clear to Daleworth. e cries of surprise gave way to stunned
silence.
“I thought these guys were supposed to be buried under a corny tourist resort
in Cornwall”, Daleworth uered. And, of course, she regreed it immediately.
For some reason, this just didn't seem like a time and place to make su jokes.
Not in the least.
Especially as they neared the biggest cylinder.
ARTHUR PENDRAGON RIOTHAMUS.
e soldiers stood before the cylinder in awe. e leers were bigger than
the rest, and it was fairly clear that unlike the steel finish of the leering in other
cylinders, these leers were in solid gold.
“Damn”, Daleworth finally said. “King Arthur and the Knights of the Round
Table.”
“at… could be one way of interpreting it.” Dr. Grovepath began.
Daleworth looked at the doctor with some clear irkedness. She had almost
believed right then and there that these really were the tombs of the long-lost
knights. Of course, she knew that was rubbish, and it was up to the doctor to
perform the unpleasant task of bringing her ba to the reality. She wasn't really
sure how to interpret the doctor's tone — perhaps he was just as stru as she
was, and just tried to fill the void with something that sounded insightful, but
that coincidentally uerly ruined the whole situation they were in.
“Really now?” Daleworth said.
“Well, aren't many of the… weapons… in Earth named aer mythical figures?
Isn't there some kind of a weapon system called Galahad, for example…?”
“ere is”, Daleworth said and sighed. She could see where the doctor was
going. “A non-lethal gas bomb designed to incapacitate large crowds. I actually
ordered a few to be fired in the Gibraltar riots ba in May of '. And there's a
missile system called Riothamus. I knew where the name came from, and had to
explain it to a lot of people.”
“So perhaps these are nothing but labels, pied from the Earth's myths and
history.”
“I guess you could be right.” Daleworth was feeling a bit weird: A moment
ago, she was the paranoid one, worried about Planners behind every corner, and
now something in this place seemed to make her believe that this could be a key
to ending the war. She felt Dr. Grovepath had suddenly became the one rambling
about Planners. She had to say something. “I… I don't think this looks too mu
like Planner handiwork, though.”
“I concur”, Dr. Grovepath said.
Daleworth bit her lip, somehow feeling fortunate that her helmet visor didn't
betray her conflicting feelings to Dr. Grovepath. It all felt a bit strange. ey were
on the same side, honest…
“You can really ruin a dream, doctor”, Daleworth finally said. “Not that I
blame you.”
“Well, let's be realistic here”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Whi is more likely: have
we stumbled on the final resting place of legendary knights, or an inexplicable
weapon cae that somehow borrows names from the legend?”
“I know, it's just…” Daleworth began. “We sort of would need the Knights of
the Round Table right now.”
“We all need heroes, lieutenant…”
“True.” Daleworth sighed.
“I can guess the war is going prey badly”, Dr. Grovepath said, “but I don't
really know if I wanted the Knights of the Round Table to join the fray…”
“Oh?” Daleworth sounded intrigued.
“Well, they were a biering lot, weren't they? Vanquishing robber barons
IV. A R S S
and rescuing damsels from perpetually sinking swamp castles and overthrowing
evil kings and whatnot was the boring part — the really interesting parts were the
ones where the knights fought ea other.” Dr. Grovepath looked at the cylinders.
“Lancelot and Arthur right beside ea other. Didn't they go into war against ea
other in the end?”
“Right.” Daleworth didn't remember enough about the myths, but nodded
along. “Anyway, the mystery deepens”, Daleworth said. “If this is not an ob-
vious Planner ploy, what can it possibly be?”
“Some sort of other alien race trying to make a contact? Not that we know of
any…”
“Dunno, ma'am, looks like too few weird-ass monoliths and fancy mansion
suites with golden beds in here…” Sergeant Haman joined the conversation.
“I take you just saw the film and didn't read the book, Haman?” Dr. Grove-
path said. “e whole point of the scene was that it was careful mimicry of human
environment. And does this look like careful mimicry to you?”
Haman shrugged. “Guess you're right, doctor. Why did they do all that
weird shit in the book, anyway?”
It was Dr. Grovepath's turn to look slightly embarrassed. “Uh, it's actually
been years since I read the book. I… can't really remember why they bothered
with all that.”
“All right. Care to try to see what the scanner says about what's inside, doc-
tor?”
Doctor fired up macro-level scanners and could only see very vague views of
what the insides of the capsules looked like.
“Hmm… they look like they're hollow. ere's a thi lead or metal shielding,
probably, so all I can see are vague eoes. ere is… well, it's hard to say what
that is, but it looks to me like there's some sort of mainery in there. at thing
there… hmm… I think that looks a lot like a roet engine assembly? Yes, the
outer shell definitely has some sort of a roet engine. I can't see any obvious fuel
tank or fuel lines, though…”
“Beta!” Daleworth shouted. “Have you ogled at the weirdness enough al-
ready?” Apparently, the Beta Squad had fallen under the same spell as Alpha
and forgoen to report in to Daleworth, and was now, along with Alpha, also
busy marveling the sights of the central amber.
“Yes, ma'am!” Seargeant Paul V. Cronner, Beta Squad's leader, said. is
sergeant wasn't quite as enthusiastic rising star as Haman, but he was a good
soldier. Daleworth couldn't quite remember the last time she had seen him out of
his armour; the man rarely le the Moonbat and had said he felt way too weird
to sleep in his bunk in the Mannerheim; if he didn't wake up siing on his seat
next to his combat-ready squad in the , he said he just didn't feel like he was
home. Daleworth was happy Cronner was being enthusiastic, but she also felt his
enthusiasm was slightly overdoing it, however.
“Got anything worth reporting in the other rooms?” Daleworth asked.
“Strange boxes, ma'am. Nothing but all these weird boxes. ey're kind of like
the stone cylinders here. Couldn't see any way to open 'em, and the scanners said
there could be some equipment in there, but couldn't tell what it was. Some weird
mainery, probably. Not mu that we could see were exactly openly shown —
all we could see were boxes and cubes of stone. But one of the rooms had some
sort of a giant glass sphere, too.”
“Right. Merlin's crystall ball, probably”, Dr. Grovepath muered. e conclu-
sion had been far too obvious.
“Anything that might have helped us to comprehend what the hell this place
is used for, or could tell where it came from?”
“Not that we could spot, ma'am. Same sort of banners as you can see in this
room, ma'am.”
“All right.” Daleworth flied annels. “Beta and Gamma, return to the ex-
teriour and prepare to return to the shule. Alpha Squad, prepare for EVA. I'm
returning to the shule with the doctor. Let's see what's below.”
e M– shule bridge and command room was at least pressurised during
the journey, and was quite spacious, having far enough space for Daleworth and
a few other officers to make strategic decisions.
“Major Plaerman is trying to rea you, lieutenant”, nd Lieutenant Ford
said.
“Pat him through, Ford.” e major's picture appeared on the display on the
side of the command room. “Major, sir”, Daleworth said.
“Good job so far, Daleworth”, Plaerman said. “And good to finally meet you,
Doctor Grovepath. I am Major William Plaerman.”
“I have heard of you, Major. I used to work with your predecessor and his
predecessor.”
“Who?”
“Captain Underwood and Major Rankin, of the Roetry and Space Resear
Centre.”
“I see.” Plaerman sighed. “I am aware of your situation. is is hardly the
time to discuss it in detail, doctor. I believe you want your security clearance
ba?”
“No, I don't want my security clearance. I — on the behalf of my entire depart-
ment, he, the entire faculty — want free access to your unclassified material, the
way it was before.”
“But I take it the University already has access to—”
“If you take a look at the policies currently in place”, Dr. Grovepath said, “you'd
IV. A R S S
notice massive differences in the policies before and aer Rankin's reign.”
“I'm not that familiar with the situation, doctor, but I promise I will take a
look at the situation at the earliest possible opportunity.” Plaerman turned to
Daleworth. “But I need to discuss what you've discovered on the alien cra. King
Arthur? I'm not sure what to say, lieutenant.”
“e whole thing just boggles the mind, sir”, Daleworth said.
“I agree. How is your EVA team doing, and why did you order them to go
around the station?”
“Just wanted to make sure every angle is covered”, Daleworth said. “Monk
Mike Delta Leader to Alpha Leader. How's the EVA going, Haman?”
Another monitor came to life, showing video feed from the belly of the station.
e camera shook a bit as Haman looked about; his feet and arms waved in the
view briefly, and one could see he was floating a few dozen meters away from
the surface of the station, a loose tether behind him. e other members of the
Alpha Squad could be seen in the distance behind him, likewise examining the
surroundings. Daleworth pushed a few buons, and the video feed from the other
Alpha members filled yet another screen on the command room's wall.
“No obstructions so far, ma'am”, Sergeant Haman said. “ere's absolutely
nothing remarkable in the top side of the station — it's just dull wall aer dull
wall. e crenellations looked exactly what they looked like. But the boom side
is definitely more interesting, ma'am. e boom side looks fairly flat, but there
are some sort of circular rims here. Take a look, ma'am.”
e picture on the monitors revealed, indeed, circular rims; ea raised smoothly
toward the center, then fell to the surface, smoothly surrounding a cylindrical
area. e area itself had stone-and-steel boom, but ea of the areas were faintly
divided to eight sections.
“Are you thinking what I'm thinking, doctor?”
“If you're thinking of laun holes…”
“Yes.”
“at sounds plausible. ey look like they're about the same size as the stone
cylinders in the central amber?”
“at was what I was thinking too, ma'am. And there seems to be one for
ea of the capsules there, too”
“So this is some sort of an orbital weapon”, Plaerman said.
“Yes.” e conclusion illed Daleworth. She couldn't do mu but to think of
the mystery at hand, but Plaerman was talking about the military reality of the
situation, and the conclusions might hinder further study.
“With bombs named aer Knights of the Round Table.”
“Yes. Sir!”
“Yes, lieutenant?”
Daleworth was alarmed, but tried to stay calm. “What are you planning to do
about this thing, sir?”
“We need to study this station further, mayor!” Dr. Grovepath was obviously
more plainly agitated than Daleworth. “is space station is of great interest to
scientists! You cannot possibly consider it a threat!”
“I agree — someone might consider it a threat, but I cannot, and neither can
the General. Don't worry, doctor. I'm already with talks with Mannerheim's
crew. General Pyrehill has seen the footage and says the station will be traed
and monitored, and Mannerheim will stay in orbit to cover it.”
“What exactly does Pyrehill plan to do with it?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“For now, nothing. We'll keep the guns aimed at it, but will not fire as long
as there's no obvious threat to us. As soon as we can get the scientists aboard
Mannerheim, we'll start arranging further expeditions. We'd hope you can stay
aboard until then — we need all the scientific help we can get, doctor.”
“I will accept that, as long as I can let the folks in the Department to know
that I'll be staying a lile bit longer than I intended, mayor.”
“You can contact them from the ship, doctor.”
“Fine. I can't wait to begin unraveling this mystery, Major, and I'm glad I can
help you with that”, Dr. Grovepath said.
“Anything else to report, Haman?” Daleworth asked.
“Not in the least, ma'am. Guess we'll leave the rest to the scientists, ma'am?”
“Agreed. Return to the shule, Alpha, and let's get ba to the Mannerheim.
Guess we've all earned our bed rest tonight.”
“Is Plaerman always like that?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Yep”, Daleworth said. “e whole military is like that.”
“Wouldn't say you are. You're at least sensible.”
“Well, I'm just a lowly platoon commander”, Daleworth said and scrated her
head. “I just do the real stuff. Don't ask me how things should be really done…”
“Military is weird”, Dr. Grovepath said.
Daleworth uled. “You can say that again!”
V Sanguine Fren Twilight
February 13, 2632, 02:14 UTC
G P at the monitors in horror.
He hoped the scanner was lagging and the contact staying up on the screen
was just a glit. But other units moved on the screen and it was clear that the
Saladin was still moving. When the the junior officers in the Sword Bea bunker
were just as shaken as he was, he didn't really want to hear what they said next.
V. S F T
He knew what they would say, and he knew what they would say would be a
very ugly truth indeed.
e world was doomed, and they'd need miracles now.
“Torpedo blast absorbed”, nd Lieutenant Batmann said. “Contact is still there,
sir.”
“Direct hit, no effect. Target now out of range”, came a report from the frigate's
gunners.
“at was the biggest shot we had. Dammit” Pyrehill leaned on the desk and
hung his head, trying his best to show to his men that he was calculative and
not defeated yet. “Saladin, you may disengage. ank you for trying, you may
return to the bale plan. Please come to Earth as soon as you humanly can, we
need every ship we have.”
“Understood. Saladin disengaging. Sorry we couldn't help. Over and out”,
Captain Stoman replied over command network.
“So mu for last dit efforts, then”, Pyrehill muered to himself, then turned
to Batmann. “Estimate on how soon that bogey reaes Earth?”
“About hours, sir, give or take some.”
“I guess this is it, then. e war has nowhere to go. It comes home. It's time.”
February 15, 2632, 15:14 UTC
Daleworth pulled on her power armour's gloves and sighed a lile bit. Before she
put her helmet on, she huned down and buried her forehead to the flexmetal
gloves, feeling the grease on her forehead. No time for shower. e M– was
heading to Earth. She didn't know what was going on, except for the fact that one
of those damn Planner cras was heading straight to Earth, too.
at, of course, was not very good news.
So this is where things have come to…
Daleworth pulled on her helmet and prepared, for the first time in years and
the first time since her basic training, to fight on Earth. She had fought in low
gravity of the moons and moderate gravity of Mars, fought in starry skies under
alien skies, but now, she was ba in the cradle of humanity.
ey'd be fighting in a plain ordinary evening. e twilight. e twilight of
humanity if it came to that.
e last fight would be sad and beautiful.
Right now, e Lenin Co-operative's shule is taking Tankerman and Wolff
to Mars for Captain Bluebrook's burial, Daleworth thought. ey could be saved,
if we fall here and now. But…
Daleworth put her helmet on, loed it, and pied up her assault rifle. Anger
swelled in her as she looked out of the window.
A display lit up in her helmet. Drop zone coordinates near Paris.
Open field. Trenes had been dialed up — Daleworth imagined Plaerman
drawing tren vectors on the map from his comfortable air, and ordering them
to be dug — and they would be available when they came to the drop zone.
Calculated position of the enemy cra in the end of the landing orbit appeared
on the other side of the balefield. A white cross on the map at the end of a doed
line.
And a curious entry.
“Suspected coordinates of the enemy.”
Another cross, only in red and grey this time, and only about meters away
from the calculated position.
e Planners just gloated. ey always gloated, and they never, never an-
nounced anything. But Daleworth was stru by these “Suspected coordinates”.
She just knew what had happened.
Now, the Planner bastars were gloating beforehand.
e military wanted everyone know that they were playing with estimates,
not solid facts that were wrien in stone. When people saw estimates, they knew
to trust them only as far as they seemed to be true. Great many bales had been
lost because the soldiers were blindly following information that was leading
them to their doom. e high commanders wanted the officers on the field to
think what was actually going on, rather than hold their hands on every step
along the way. Everyone was honest with this setup: e officers saw the esti-
mates, they led by the estimates, and made good calls on how to follow the data.
When every soldiers saw first hand that the estimates were complete baloney,
however, the commanders could make efficient decisions on how not to follow
the data. While the data was being collected, it was constantly adjusted as the sit-
uation developed. Everyone could see the numbers get fiddled with right before
their eyes. e recon fed the computers new data, the commanders analysed the
information coming from soldiers, and somewhere, the computers would crun
the numbers and spit them ba out to the rank and file.
In this light, a “suspected coordinate” that just sat there with no explanation
whatsoever and without any data to ba it up stu out like a sore thumb. It was
automatically suspicious.
It was automatically something that almost begged a label “explanation forth-
coming”.
Someone, somewhere — in all likelihood the generals — had received some
not-so-gentlemanly communiques from the enemy that told exactly where the
fight was going to take place. Daleworth hoped they'd play the message ba
before the fighting started. is was not the hour of secrets, and she damn well
knew the even the most secrets-loving generals would realise that.
e Planners wanted the Space Marines to be there. ey knew we wouldn't
V. S F T
win.
But damn if they thought they could win. ey knew humanity would be
defending the homes to the last drop of blood. ey had to know that by now.
Daleworth's brows furrowed as she wated the view from the window as
the M– pierced the lowest cloud layers. She could see open fields below
the shule, and Dragon fighter planes circling the area. She could see tren-
cuing demolition arges being set off below them, long narrow bands of smoke
and debris ploughing the snowy fields below them far heavier than the farmers
usually bothered.
ey'd drop down, go in nice and orderly trenes in a balefield that was
practically prepared for them.
ey'd wage war with an enemy who wanted to have a neat, clean and inhu-
man bale. Just what you'd expect from maines.
Are they preying on their predictability, or are they the predictable ones?
Daleworth thought, trying to get her thoughts away from hopelessness and anger.
Daleworth knew that they might not find the answer to that question today.
If they wouldn't find out the answer, there might not be a tomorrow where that
answer would mean anything in the first place.
Countdown to drop started.
“Let's dig in and give them hell!” Daleworth shouted.
“Yes, ma'am!” e platoon roared in unison.
Daleworth drew breath, engaged armour warming and hold on to the seat
handles as the shule shook, hurtling down the last few kilometers. e shule
side door opened to the blinding brightness of a winter day.
e countdown stru zero.
“For Mother Earth!” Daleworth shouted as she leapt down from the shule,
falling about meters to the tren, her power armour absorbing the impact
easily. She could see Alpha, Beta and Gamma Squads follow her, the sergeants
barking them to take positions in the cover. e M– engines made the blue
skies above them ripple, and with a deafening roar, the shule retreated ba to
the skies.
Dammit if this was a goodbye to the old war horse. Daleworth waved to the
pilot, wondering if he'd be strong enough to look at her here, knowing that this
time, he really could have dropped them straight to the Hell.
“General Pyrehill to all units”, the general said over the command link. “Nu-
clear weapons will be prepared, but their use has not yet been authorised. e
enemy has shielding, and we cannot damage it directly. God knows we've tried.
But once the shielding is gone, I want everyone to prepare for nuclear strike.”
e snowy rye field opened around them, and Daleworth just stood there in
a power armour and with an assault rifle in her hands. e air was still, with
nippy winter ill, and Daleworth felt she could see forever; the sky was a dome
of deep blue, the ground was flat and white, the horizon was a mess of brown
leafless trees in the distance. She looked at the weather-beaten farmhouse, grain
silos and animal shelter a lile bit behind them in the distance, evacuated as soon
as they found out what was going to happen here. For a moment, her mind raced
ba to one mid–s film that managed to beautifully revive the old Red Mars
communist-era science fiction films; here she was, in a goofy space suit, in mid-
dle of a desolate farm landscape waiting for not-so-very-cool-looking enemies to
show their badly constructed tin can bodies. e special effects were horrible, but
the cinematography, locations and the passionate acting saved the day. Oh well,
war was going to be absurd business in every way imaginable anyway…
e hills to the le were being filled to the brim with soldiers. In this lile
pat of land, about four kilometers by two, the fate of the humanity would be
sealed… or they could hope the bastards would give up, once again.
But one crucial thing was certain to Daleworth. No maer what happened,
things wouldn't be the same.
ey could be annihilated. at was one option.
Or they could drive them out. en they would need to explain to the peo-
ple that that's what the military has been doing for the past years. Driving
the Planners out. at's what the military did. ey were the World Federation
Defence Forces. Victory wasn't their priority. It could have been, if anyone just
knew how to hell that could be done. But defence? Now that was an old hat…
e public at large might have understood what that meant, before — at least
on some intellectual level. If they survived today, the public at learge would know
what it would actually mean.
February 15, 2632, 19:22 UTC
e situation was about to turn messy. Everybody knew it; as Daleworth had
expected, the Planners had broadcast the place and hour of their supposed aa
in advance.
“We shall make a landfall. We shall come to Earth and conquer it. Your cities,
your factories, your facilities shall all serve our goals, even in ruins.”
All that rot.
It didn't mean mu to Daleworth. e robot bastards wouldn't succeed as
long as she was alive and kiing bu.
And there they came.
“We've got ship contact! e bogey is coming in now!…” came a warning
from some spoer in the radar cra. e spoer betrayed his inexperience to
Daleworth immediately. “Oooh God damn it, what the hell is that?”
V. S F T
“Take us the hell out of here! Now! Now!” Daleworth could barely hear some-
one scream over the radar spoer's microphone. e radar would be out and
they'd need to rely on their eyes on the hill. e Air Force knew that this kind of
Planner cra meant that every cra should stay the hell off the air until the ground
forces said the situation was clear… and since that never happened, they'd usually
have to wait until the thing took off and le.
Out of the clouds, at a dazzling speed, emerged a large spaceship; at first its
size was not apparent to the observers, as its surface was adapting to the shades
of the atmospheric haze. It appeared to almost drop from the sky in a manner
that disoriented the viewer, almost like a giant ro that came from edge of the
vision; it appeared from the sky at an unnatural speed, emerging from the deep-
ening red sky, widening from handspan width to width that filled half the view
in seconds. Within the span of a few eyeblinks, two of the Dragon fighters ex-
ploded in mid-air, one quily dodged and disengaged from the fight as fast as
it could, and one couldn't dodge in time; it hurtled straight into the alien cra's
side, exploding without leaving a dent, merely causing the cra's deflector shield
force field, vaguely but definitely visible around the ship, to flash gently.
“Planner Carrier!” Daleworth screamed as she heard gigantic explosions end
the Talon rotor whirring behind her. Nothing was going to fly as long as the carrier
was around. “Get your bus to the turf, or that thing will mow you down!”
e carrier braked in the air almost effortlessly, and almost noiselessly, its
surface arcing with electricity as it took a deep green hue — probably its native
colour. A large, flat plane with round edges, covered with a grid of diamond-
shapes of tube neing of some alien function, formed the alien cra's body; two
spherical compartments, big on the front and and small in the ba, were visible on
the top, with one large bulge covering the boom. e ship would have appeared
roughly egg-shaped if observed directly from the top, its blunt end in the bow.
Daleworth didn't even flin at the swi appearance of the spaceship, but
there was some deep-seated horror in her mind. A carrier was one of the heaviest
ships the Planners had in their fleet, and mere sight of one told Daleworth that
the Planners had one goal in mind: Swi destruction of all heavy defenses… and
all defenders. She had seen one in action.
Just a while ago, in Titan.
Almost total destruction.
So many civilian casualties. So few survivors.
It was a fate that Daleworth wanted to avoid here. But how? She was just as
clueless — like everyone else in the goddamn Defence Forces — on how to stop
that from happening in Titan, and was certainly just as clueless now.
Based on the markings in the front, at least this particular cra didn't look
like the exact same one they had faced there; whatever gods there may be at least
gave that mu comfort to them, sparing Daleworth's troupe from fighting the
same carrier twice in a row…
e alien cra landed, hovering for a moment over the balefield and drop-
ping a small horde of robots on the balefield from the doors beneath. Small
infantry robots that moved on threads and gunned everyone and everything with
tiny laser turrets… Bigger, heavier robots on wheels with lile less maneuverabil-
ity, but heavier laser turrets, capable of higher speed of fire… Similar ones with
rail guns, able to pun neat clean holes in almost all Terran tanks… Ten-meter-
tall, tra-mounted goddamn big fu-off high-energy plasma turrets that didn't
just scor buildings, they goddamn melted goddamn holes in goddamn bunkers
in goddamn seconds… Robots that resembled six-wheeled cars that had roet
launers on them… Ea robot was painted bla or deep blue, and Daleworth
still remembered the Planner gloating from three years ago when the Planners
had swited to darker shades, from the tarnished white they probably used for
heat shielding purposes. “We come in the night. We are now dark as the lightless-
ness itself. We are not invisible, and prefer not to be. Your defeat is unevitable.
In the lightless long night of your destruction, you can only hear our motors, see
nothing but our weapon fire. Fear us. Fear us.”
Only the heavy plasma guns on the ship's bow remained silent, clearly having
nothing to do aer clearing the airspace. Daleworth knew they'd fire upon any
enemies they'd see. And if the ship was here to stay, that was going to be a lile
bit of a problem for any soldier who wanted to poke their nose out of the cover.
In Earth's atmosphere, the giant ship's shielding devices produced a strange,
raling noise that none had heard before, but that seemed awfully familiar to
those who had fought the Planners in the colonies. e robots rolled forward
and took their positions, and the ship slowly landed, opening doors for the Plan-
ner tanks, whi immediately rolled out, bringing even more devastating plasma
launers and laser towers to the balefield. A huge laser and plasma launer
platform, resembling an unholy union between a giant spider, a flo of construc-
tion cranes and an old-fashioned oil drilling rig, half rolled forth, half ambled on
its legs to its place in the scene, eventually mounting its legs in the turf. e scene
was clearly set.
e dark, meanical army advanced, and their mother waited at the end of
the balefield for the ildren to come home from a feast of human flesh.
* * *
V. S F T
15TH 0F FEBRUARY, 2632 AD, YE START 0F YE CIVIL TWILIGHT IN WINTRY KINGD0MS 0F BRITANNIA
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�ACTIVATI0N HATH BEEN M0ST SUCCESSFUL, SIRE, EVEN M0RE S0 THAN I DARED T0 DREAM. BUT H0LD
N0W TH0U STILL, WHILST I MAKE THESE MACHINES T0 FIT THE STANDARDS 0F THE 0NG0ING ERA�
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�YE MENTAL FACULTIES SHALL BE REAWAKENED, D0 N0T BE ALARMED�
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…downloading public information…
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…updating…
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…synchronising…
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February 15, 2632, 19:59 UTC
“I am awake.”
“Yes, sire.”
“Merlin? You have… awaked me?”
“at is true, sire. I am glad to see your very essence and your mental faculties
are safe and sound, my King. How do you feel?”
“I feel… most different. It is all rather difficult to describe, my friend.”
“e confusion is quite understandable, sire.”
“I am in darkness, Merlin, with open eyes. Have I gone blind?”
“No, sire. Ah, do you not remember? Let me tell you again: You are merely
carried within your noble Steed, rather than in its saddle. And thy new steed, and
thy new armour, shall bestow you new knowledge. Behold, sire — you can now
see the hour of the day, in most precise way.”
He had seen nothing. Now, he could see the time and date within his vision
— yet, it all seemed strange. Merlin had, as usual, su a curious habit of showing
new things at su a fast pace that his mind was oen le spinning.
“Yes, I remember now, Merlin. I… remember what thou told me in yesteryear.”
“I have awakened you, for it appears evil threatens the lands, my King. Are
you fit to lead the Knights, sire?”
“I am, and I shall do as I have sworn to do.”
“And your fellow Knights are here, awaiting your commands, my King.”
King Arthur remembered.
He remembere where he was, what he was, and what he was doing.
He was overwhelmed by how strange this all seemed right now, but he had
to go on. If Merlin said the times were dire, then he needed to act fast.
“My King — I, Sir Lancelot, have awakened. I feel most curious, sire, likewise
trapped within the darkness of this peculiar device.”
“And sir Galahad hath awakened as well. Most ready to fight aside my father,
sire.”
“Sir Kay is ready to serve, sire. And I do say I, too, feel perplexed.”
“Sir Percival is ready, sire.”
“Sir Tristram is ready for your orders, sire. ough I shall say my bales still
seem behind me.”
Arthur stood by, listeing to his Knights report to them how they were once
again ready for action.
“Merlin, where are we needed? What dost thou see in thy crystal ball this
time?”
“e vile demonic enemy hath landed in lands of Gauls, sire.”
“And what do the Gauls need?” Arthur said, not sounding entirely convinced
this was as pressing as Merlin thought.
“Sire, you forget you have been aslumber for millennia”, Merlin said, slight
annoyance in his voice. “e world has anged mu. I do not have the time to
explain it in detail, for the peril is imminent and great. Suffice to say, the Gauls
are now everlasting allies of all kingdoms of Britain, and peace has reigned for
centuries in our corner of the world. It even appears to me that all good Britons
are fighting alongside Gauls as we speak.”
“I shall take your word on it, then, friend. How is the situation on this bale-
field?”
“A strange daemonic enemy has landed its fortress-ship near the forts of Paris.
I estimate the defenders could repel the aa — with a very great cost, aer many
long days.”
While Arthur couldn't see him, he felt Lancelot stir within his own steed with
the news. “Dire news indeed, if true, you wily necromancer!”
“And why should I lie about su threats, Sir Lancelot?” Merlin asked. “Do
not forget that it is by this wily necromancer's power that you yet live.”
“Point taken”, Lancelot said. “Sire! I vow I shall vanquish the evil foes!”
“If we do not act, sire, there is a ance the defenders of the realm will fall, as
they have fallen in other grim fields of bale. While they may yet prevail, I fear
that without our help, this aa would weaken them considerably, even destroy
them uerly. ey could survive this aa, but not next, nor one aer that or
the one that follows it. We must show our strength to the enemy. We must crush
the enemy here, no quarter given.”
V. S F T
“What do you recommend, Merlin?”
“e brave knights and defenders of Gaulish lands might be alarmed if you
send all of the knights, but maybe this aa is still weak enough that even a
single knight could thwart the budding aa…”
“Sire! Send me, my King!” Lancelot shouted.
“Art thou eager to prove thy loyalty now, Sir Lancelot?” Arthur asked.
“My loyalty, my dedication to Virtue, but mostly my vow to defend the weak,
sire”, Lancelot said. “A great city is besieged by vile enemies. Is vanquishing them
not right, sire?”
“And so it shall be, Merlin. Sir Lancelot, friend — I am glad to see your heart
is as true as it was in yesteryear. I do not doubt you as I did before, and I shall
believe you even more than this if you return victorious. I shall send you to the
fields of glory and justice. Go, and serve God and the Virtues of old with valour,
Knight.”
“I shall, sire!” Launcelot shouted.
“We are anged men, as you can probably feel in thy body. Do take care of
your own self, sir Lancelot, and be not uerly foolhardy”, King Arthur said.
“Just keep your wits with you, sir Lancelot, and you shall yet return”, Merlin
said. “Keep in mind what I said millennia ago.”
“Hast it truly been millennia?” King Arthur said. “I cannot comprehend it.”
“It has, milord.”
“God's miracles are most puzzling and grand, Merlin, and thy strange magic
even more so. Now, dear friend, couldst thou explain whatever does this ‘U.T.C.’
refer to in mine sight? I need to get mine terms in order.”
February 15, 2632, 20:12 UTC
“Twelve shots, twelve kills!” Fairwind shouted aer the explosive bullet from her
high-power precision micro-magcoil rifle had le a giant hole where one plasma
bot's processor unit used to be a few moments before. She anged a magazine
and and aimed again. A single shot. “One more!”
“Good job, Fairwind! Keep murdering them!” Daleworth said. “You can only
fit so many fuing plasma bots in one carrier!”
Fairwind was busy, but there was lile to do for the rest of the company.
As long as Fairwind stayed in the cover, she would be able to pi off plasma
launers one by one, making the job for the rest of the infantry significantly
easier in coming hours when they wouldn't be facing immediate meltdown. With
dozens of snipers working in concert, their locations well concealed and armed
with silent weapons, the Planners would only come to one conclusion, whi
also was the solid and sad truth: the snipers were bloody everywhere. ey'd
need to spot bullets as they moved in the air and tra them, and despite the
treaerous nature of their enemies, Daleworth wasn't ready to believe they had
the tenology to do that but decided to not use it.
A loud explosion in the distance prompted Daleworth to take a peek; the other
company had apparently succeeded in destroying a mobile roet platform and
one of the six plasma tanks in the field.
Good. Unless there was some inevitable plasma melting ahead, this fight could
be won. ey had no way to destroy the carrier, owing to its strange and myste-
rious energy shields that seemed to be able to eat up even nuclear explosions just
fine, but they could force it to retreat. With no bots to do the killing, all the thing
would have were its own plasma guns.
But as Daleworth turned ba and planted her rear ba to the cover, she saw
something else in the distance, coming from the opposite direction.
In moments, Daleworth could hear a distant rumble from above as she kept
looking at the bizarre sight. Something was up. It didn't sound like a Planner
cra, and whatever it was, it at least was mu smaller than the carrier they were
dealing with.
“Incoming!” Newkins shouted.
Daleworth was still perplexed by the ball of fire that was coming their way.
A meteorite? No, too slow for a meteorite. But she braced for impact; whatever
the hell it was, it was going to make a hell of an impact. At least it seemed to be
headed to the plasma- and laser-filled hell of a balefield, and not to their comfort
zone behind the fortifications.
She dued down and braced for impact as the seconds tied forth and the
roar grew louder and louder. e Earth shook; something had hit them really close
by. A harmless cloud of dust, far gentler than she thought would result from su
an impact, washed over the cover. Daleworth could contain her curiosity for a
few more seconds, and then she just had to take a look.
What she saw was familiar. Not, however, what she had expected to see,
though at the moment, she wasn't really sure what it should have been.
One of the stone cylinders from the space station had plummeted from the
sky.
And she could hear loud whirring and rumble of stone from it. As the thought
that the space station had bombed them with stone cylinders was still sinking in
Daleworth, she saw the whole thing open up; the cylinder divided itself in six
lobes, with three of them opening up like an opening flower, the openings covering
ea primary direction and probably allowing whatever was dwelling inside to
see what was around them. en the remaining three opened up, revealing the
passenger.
A bipedal robot of some kind stood inside. is was immediately curious to
Daleworth, because the Planners just never used bipedal robots; in the low-gravity
V. S F T
worlds, feet just weren't that handy. Unlike the dark Planner robots, or even the
white Planner robots, this one was quite pleasing to look at, its surface polished
and shining in the light of the seing sun. e robot was vaguely human in shape,
its overall shape greatly resembling a crude, slightly huned, headless warrior
with an octagonal prism as its torso, roughly meters tall, towering above most
of the Planner robots; its shape was sleek, refined, and mostly compartmentalised
in box-like and cylindrical units, with no tubing of any kind in sight. e maine
stood up, not really righting its posture to any humanly shape; there were no
obvious armaments save of what looked like a shield and a long sword-like blade.
e maine got to motion, its movement almost human-like. And it ran
toward the Planners.
Still recoiling from the sho, Daleworth drew some conclusions.
“Launcelot”. at's what the capsule said. at's Sir Lancelot? And it's…
fighting the Planners, like a knight?
Whatever it was, at least it was fighting the Planners, and paid no aention
to the soldiers who had started to gawk a lile bit too prominently from behind
their fortifications.
“Ba to the cover! BACK TO THE COVER, EVERYBODY! Let the maines
duke it out among themselves!” Daleworth shouted.
Lancelot strode forward.
e enemies were different from the ones he had grown used to, and his new
body felt strange. e harder part was geing used to the strange mental clarity
that he had goen since his death.
He was never quite sure what that wizard was up to. Forces of the Nether-
world were not to be toyed with, and the fact that Arthur trusted Merlin, that
daemon-born abomination before God, had filled him with unease and appre-
hension. However, he had always admied that Merlin's strange sorceries had
been very useful — if oentimes somewhat obscure.
But there was nothing obscure in what was going on in here. It was quite
perplexing to see the magic not only work in this case, but fill him with heroic
resolve — and dangerous feelings of invincibility. Lancelot remembered: he was
not invincible. at had cost him his life the last time. He had assumed his ghost
would be invincible, but Merlin had warned him about that. e ways of the
wizards were strange; perhaps they were strange because they were never honest
about the extents of their powers. But Merlin had shown some honesty here. is
was quite unusual.
Lancelot strode forward. Ever forward. rough the enemy lines, vanquish-
ing them as he passed. e ship was his goal, the enemies stood on his way,
offering lile resistance or lile allenge.
He regarded the bla-painted offenders and assessed their strength, dodging
their aas and deflecting them with his shield, their strange projectiles and their
strange netherworldly fire deflected harmlessly — Merlin's promises about the
armour were accurate as well, most curiously. If he kept his speed, he'd vanquish
them all in no time. He reaed the strange soldiers, cleaving them in half with
his blade.
And he was not invincible. He was dead. He had born again to strange form
of unlife through the forces he did not approve of. e world was strange, the
enemies different from the ones he had faced millennia ago.
He knew things were different. He had to press forward, while he still tried to
make sense of things that happened in the balefield, things that happened within
his mind. He wasn't sure what to think of things, but for now, the duty he had
sworn to do seemed abundantly clear. ese bla beasts of the skies Merlin had
spoken of were threatening the lands of his long-dead ancestors.
Lancelot was alive, and he had a duty to do.
Merlin had spoken of a great fortress-ship the enemy had sailed in from the
dark skies and depths of the night, and now huddled in, ready to advance. e
ship was not like any ship Lancelot had seen, nor was it like any fortress Lancelot
had seen. But neither were the enemies like anything he had faced before, nor
were the allies… nor was he. But he had to trust the necromancer on this maer…
and above all, he had to trust his own eyes, what he could see right in front of
him in the field of bale. Strictly speaking, he didn't know how he could even see
with this strange new body of his, with its strange armour.
Clumsy bla beasts poured out of the fortress-ship. Lancelot was aware of
the work of the defenders now; some of the beasts simply fell dead without any
clear cause, but clearly hit with something; Lancelot guessed the defenders were
afraid to face the enemy head-on and had to rely on arers, and these newfangled
arers could apparently just send a single arrow that reaed its target precisely,
with devastating results. e enemy crowd was thinning slowly, and Lancelot
thinned it further with his arge, slicing the confused enemy and advancing
toward the fortress-ship's gate.
e line of the enemies had a hole in it. e fortress was surrounded by a
strange ethereal glow — no doubt vile magis were at play — and Lancelot ran
through the small opening that the enemies had advanced through. He suddenly
realised he had passed through the shield that the Gaulish defenders' aas were
deflected upon, and was in the unique position to lower the drawbridge and let
the bigger assault commence.
Lancelot slashed through confused bla beasts, forever dimming the red light
in their vile, inhuman eyes. e bestial infantry inside the evil fortress were
smaller than the ones that had been sent to outside, seemingly less capable of
defence than the ones that had blasted his shield with rays of heat. He scanned
V. S F T
the surroundings for clues on how to proceed; the steel walls offered no obvious
clues on where to go, or where he currently was. e beasts obviously had a secret
on moving through this labyrinth of metal walls. He could barely comprehend
there was maybe a big interior amber, no doubt heavily defended, and some
side corridors surrounding it, possibly leading to the upper levels…
“Sir Lancelot! Do you hear me, fair knight?” he could hear Merlin's voice in
his head.
“I hear thee, necromancer”, Lancelot said, “even though thou art not here. Art
thou a figment of my imagination, or what strange powers are these?”
“Why do you question my powers so mu? Have I not proven already that
my powers are most trustworthy?”
“Trustworthy but obscure, wied wizard. Art thou hidden somewhere within
this fort, perhaps masquerading as a metallic cushion or a fireplace with a red
column of fire?”
“No need to jest, sir knight. I am speaking to you through the flows of the
Aether, and I can see through your eyes. I assure you I am not there in your
presence, nor interfering with your free will, if that is what you are worried of.”
“Fair enough. What do you see, necromancer, that could help my quest?”
“e fortress-ship is of curious design, and I commend you for finding a way
in, for that was certainly something I could not help you with. You are looking
for a way to let the defenders aa, correct?”
“True, wizard.”
“en I suggest you examine these parts.”
And Lancelot saw something. His field of vision fliered, and returned in a
anged form.
“What wied witly glow is this?” Lancelot asked. Bright fires lit up above
him; he could see something was stored way above him. He hesitated for but a
moment, shrugged, then headed toward the ramp that lead to the upper floors.
“A curious bit of mainery seems to originate the wall of pure energy that
surrounds the fortress-ship. I have looked at the flows of these energies, and they
seem to be anneled through this device. Destroy it, and perhaps the wall shall
crumble.”
“And if energies flow through it, can I be harmed if I destroy it?” Lancelot
asked, slashing through the few of the smaller scurrying beasts that tried to hold
the corridor.
“Momentarily, perhaps, but I estimate no bigger harm can come to your per-
son. e maine is quite complicated, and but minor damage can cause it to
malfunction.”
e strange device came to the view, resembling a short bit of a hexagonal
fallen column, mostly featureless in its surface, save a few strange indentations
on the top and the ends, and tubes that connected the device to the floor. It sat
undefended in its own lile room of shiny steel. Lancelot could hear the strange
beasts milling behind him, and got to decisive work.
Leing out a roar, Lancelot cleaved the device in twain; he then immediately
recoiled a bit, as he was himself surprised by his strength and the la of effort
that he needed to destroy the device. As the wizard had said, he could barely feel
anything as he had destroyed the device. e device sparked, clearly damaged
and its weird energy flows greatly disturbed.
“Well done, sir knight”, Merlin said through the curious aether. “I can see your
actions have greatly diminished the energy flows.”
“Are the other enemies as easy to destroy as these, wizard?”
“We shall see. Now, I suggest you let the Gaulish defenders commence their
assault, and retreat.”
“I shall defeat these villains by my own hand! I shall lead the Gauls to victory!”
Lancelot roared.
“Sir knight!” Merlin roared with anger. “Do not be foolhardy! e defenders
have very powerful siege weapons, and do not know who you are. If you do not
retreat, perhaps they shall destroy you as well in their haste. Are not your own
bloodbaths a sore memory to you?”
Lancelot was, curiously enough in his own mind, set to right path. “I shall
meet the defenders, then! I cannot lead an assault if I do not meet these allies.”
Lancelot ran. e beast seemed to be aware that the shield device was de-
stroyed, milling about, sending the heavier defenders to the field in a hasty ad-
vance. Lancelot smiled; they were clearly arging to their doom, and nothing
could save them now.
He saw the light of the seing Sun and retreated toward the Steed, the enemies
in mad scramble behind him.
“Holy fuing shit.” Daleworth turned the dials of her headset. “Major! Can you
see this, sir? e carrier shields are going!”
In the distance, the shields kept rippling for a while, but disappeared. An
explosion pierced the front dome; certainly a sight that had never been seen before
by any Space Marine.
e “knight” kept running toward its pod, clearly having decided that it had
done its part.
“Affirmative, Lieutenant. Shields appear to be gone. General?”
“Nuclear weapons authorised”, Daleworth heard General Pyrehill say. “Fire
at will.”
“Oh, damn”, Daleworth said, luily off the command annel. “INCOMING
NUKE! EVERYONE IN THE COVER! THE CARRIER WILL BE NUKED!”
“NUCLEAR LAUNCH ALERT”. Immediately, every loudspeaker that was
V. S F T
mounted in any remaining vehicles in vicinity seemed to blare the same recorded
message — and for a good reason. “MAINTAIN DISTANCE TO ENEMY. TAKE
COVER. SECONDS TO NUCLEAR STRIKE. … SECONDS TO NUCLEAR
STRIKE. …. . . …”
Seconds followed in a blur as the company huddled in foetal positions behind
the covers, facing away from the carrier—
—“Fu. What about that knight?” Daleworth whispered, mu to herself.
No one to hear it, anyway, with her helmet buried buried between her armoured
thighs and microphones off—
—e nuclear artillery, with almost a surgical precision, flung a -kiloton
mm Artillery Shell, Nuclear, Contained Fallout, model right above the
carrier; with a -meter blast radius, the ASNCFm “Clean Boy” would
make short work of an unshielded Planner carrier without puing anyone to too
mu jeopardy. Or at least so the theory went—
Without mu further warning, the company was washed in bright light.
e orum was Perplexed.
e collective had lost all hands at present capable of monitoring the situation.
Reports from moments just before the carrier was destroyed were inconclusive
and difficult to analyse.
An enemy had appeared seemingly of nowhere, mowing his path through
the aaers, heading through the shield and to the ship, destroying the shield
generator. e human assault with a high-energy explosive, moments later, had
destroyed the remaining units, making it difficult to assess what had happened in
the aermath, or what the humans would learn of the plans now.
But one thing was unplanned for: e humans hadn't taken many losses today.
is was a maer that required careful planning to counter. Humanity couldn't
be defeated without damaging them. Unaended, they would strive. Wounded,
they would fight until they inevitably died.
e orum was Unanimous.
Part II
Facing the Righteous Fury
VI A Historic Meeting or Two
February 15, 2632
“T
C B , dammit. Woohoo!” Newkins
shouted. “Hey, is that some Fren farmer hollering at us for puning
a hole to his outhouse roof with a nuclear bomb?”
Daleworth frowned. Damn rookies. at was not the sort of a thing people
usually said aer a nuclear aa. Nuclear aas were very serious business.
She guessed Private Newkins would go out and remove his helmet next, but she
knew that there were safety procedures about atomic aas that were prey
mu common sense by now. She trusted Newkins wasn't being quite that silly.
“No, it's that robot from the damn space station, private”, Sergeant Haman
said. “Look at that damn thing. Just awesome.”
Daleworth looked. e “knight” was there. It said something in Fren, again.
Daleworth was happy to hear that their strange metallic saviour from the skies
was still up and kiing — though that made her a lile bit apprehensive. If that
thing could survive a nuclear strike, maybe the Planners had, too.
Daleworth peeked from behind the cover. e robot bastards weren't shooting
at her, that seemed apparent. A bizarre sight awaited her: the Clean Boy had
managed to vaporise parts of the ship, but the very edges of the ship's body had
survived the blast, and the tail section was mostly intact. at scrap of metal
couldn't limp ba to the orbit, that mu was very obvious. Still, with the amount
of twisted metal, cleanly severed and melted metal, and not a single bot in sight,
the bale definitely had ended in their favour.
Daleworth was looking at the radiation level meters; they were normally in-
visible, but now they still fluered on the screen. While the combat armour was
able to resist a massive enough hail of gamma rays, Daleworth was still con-
cerned. e detectors that were part of the suit's computer system had spiked
aer the nuclear strike, but that was — supposedly — just an instrument problem
due to the nuclear blast's electromagnetic pulse; the meter anticipated radiation
levels, and when the device detected an electromagnetic pulse, it automatically
assumed there was a nuclear aa going on and adapted the readouts accord-
ingly. In reality, however, the main force of the Clean Boy blast and the radiation
was supposed to be contained within a very small area; there was usually very
lile damage to anything beyond the blast radius. at didn't mean there weren't
any accidents, especially when the Planner energy shielding was oen resistant
to even larger nuclear weapons…
Radiation levels following the aa would be slightly higher than usual, but
most was contained within a very small area — hence, the name of the warhead
— and could be cleaned up in no time.
VI. A H M T
e knight was still standing there, bellowing in Fren. Daleworth didn't
speak the language, but radioed ba to Plaerman. “What do you think, sir?
Should we try talking to that thing?”
“Go ahead, Lieutenant”, Plaerman replied.
“Haman, come with me”, Daleworth said. “You speak Fren, right?”
“Uh, yeah, ma'am, though I guess I'm a bit rusty”, Sergeant Haman said.
“Well, far less rusty than I am. I can only say ‘clear the goddamn landing pad’
and ‘please get me a damn good cup of coffee.’.”
“Right you are, ma'am.”
Daleworth straightened up and turned on her armour's external speaker sys-
tem. She got out of the cover, and walked toward the knight standing beside his
orbital pod. She walked over some of the Planner robot carcasses, some cleaved
in twain, others blasted by gunfire. Haman followed her, having just as lile
effort traversing the balefield as Daleworth.
e knight turned to Daleworth, looking quite peaceful. e maine's sword
had been thrust to the ground before it, and the maine didn't look too aggressive.
“Um… hello, sir Lancelot? Pleased to meet you”, Daleworth said.
“Ah!” the maine roared. e voice was quite metallic, but recognisable
enough. It had human inflection and it felt it had human brains behind it, but
it somehow seemed part maine still. Daleworth wasn't quite sure what to make
of it yet. “Gauls have learnt to speak English, it seems. Well met, brave Gaul.”
“Uh, well met. We're glad you helped to destroy the alien ship, sir Lancelot.
…If I may call you that? Are you truly the Lancelot of myths? What are you,
exactly?”
“Why, true, I am indeed Sir Lancelot du Lac, a Companion of the Round Table.
King Arthur has returned to lead his knights into bale once again, and I am
honoured to be following his capable and noble leadership.” e knight took a
bow that managed to look quite human, even when the maine only bore vague
resemblance to the knight. “And who might you be? A knight sworn to bidding
of the Gaulish kings? A lady knight, of all things, if my hearing isn't failing
entirely?”
“Uh… in a way.” Daleworth stood at aention and saluted. “I am Lieutenant
Mielle Daleworth, leader of the ˢ platoon of the ʰ Space Marine company
of the starship Mannerheim, World Federation Defence Forces. I serve under the
supreme military command of the President of Earth. He's, um, the emperor who
leads every kingdom on Earth. ite peacefully, I might add.” Daleworth eased
up and pointed to Haman, who saluted in turn. “is is one of my soldiers, Staff
Sergeant Ja Haman. He's born in Britain, incidentally.”
“I see. How fare the kingdoms of Britain, if I may ask?”
“Very peaceful, sir”, Haman said. “ years since any kind of a war, sir. If
you don't count the war these metal bastards wage against the whole Earth, that
is.”
Daleworth wasn't really sure what to say. She knew she was taking part in
a historic conversation, but now, it seemed to her that su historic discussions
should be diverted to people who actually had some kna for historic discussions.
“But perhaps I should talk more about that with King Arthur? Or beer yet, I
should ask my commanders to meet him, because they know more of the politics?
ey're probably as excited about the opportunity to meet a living legend as I am.”
“A capital plan, dame Daleworth. I see you value fields of glory more than
the confines of the courts.”
“Yes, you could say that.” Daleworth was a lile bit torn. Was the maine
trying to make an impression on her, or just observing things in a philosophical
sense? e knights of the tales sounded more like romantics than philosophers…
“Where and how shall my commanders meet King Arthur?”
“e time and place of that kind of a meeting is a difficult question, indeed. I
take it Castle Camelot is no more, aer all these years? Or does it still stand?”
“Well,” Haman said, “the thing is, sir, we have no idea where it even was
before. So yes, it is lost, sir.”
“en it is only proper to meet our King in New Avalon. If wizard Merlin has
found a way to get us to the stars, perhaps he knows a way to get your war-leaders
there, as well.”
“We can, in fact, travel to this space station of yours…”
“Our castle in the skies?”
“Yes.”
“Merlin has told me some of the perplexing developments of the new world.
As I said, I am none to meddle in the politics of court, and I know the less I know
of the sorceror's mainations, the beer. If you say you are capable of travelling
to our New Avalon, then I shall believe you. But I must depart, and I shall deliver
this message to my liege. I assume he will need an army to defeat these vile
sorcerous beasts.”
Daleworth was fairly surprised by this, but didn't say mu. “Um, yes. Fare
well.”
Lancelot pulled his sword from the ground and walked ba inside the ma-
ine. “And now, fair dame, I shall see how Merlin's strange enanted maine-
steed shall take me ba to the New Avalon. Fare well!”
And with that, the sides of the drop cocoon rolled up and closed, encasing the
knight within it. Smoke filtered through the soil, and with a tremendous roar, the
cocoon shot up in the air; Daleworth remembered that Dr. Grovepath had said the
scans revealed roet engines, and that assessment seemed quite accurate, though
Daleworth had never seen a cra with a single, small roet engine accelerate
quite so fast, and apparently rea escape velocity.
“Well played, lieutenant”, Daleworth heard Plaerman comment to her over
VI. A H M T
command link.
Daleworth turned the external speakers off and returned to the command
annel. “Sir, who are we sending to the space station?”
“General Pyrehill here, lieutenant. I will contact the President immediately
and see who shall go. But I want you to prepare for flight.”
“Me, sir?” Daleworth asked.
“You have already been to the space station, so you're familiar with the sur-
roundings. So, you're best suited for the honour guard, I take it.”
“Sir, understood, sir. Could I ask you something, sir?”
“What is it, lieutenant?”
“What do you think the President will think about King Arthur's desire for an
army to lead, sir? Will the President just hand the reins to him?”
“I don't know about that, lieutenant, but I hope the President will work out
some kind of a solution. He's good at that sort of things.”
February 17, 2632
e President of Earth, Canadian-born Miael Malory, currently on fih year of
the second, very successful term, had been surprisingly easy to find. e World
Federation had no single official capital — ea country and territory maintained
its own regional offices, and many of the global ministries were effortlessly han-
dled all over the world, all thanks to very advanced virtual meetings. As it hap-
pened, President Malory had been in London, and was already on way to Paris
to follow the bale up close. While he was in constant contact with the generals,
there was always an annoying short period of time, when his plane landed, when
the computers had to be shut down and people could do lile but grab their bag-
gage and walk into the car that waited them, and in that precious lile window,
they were blissfully unaware of what was going on.
e generals had asked some last minute details, and he had authorised the
use of tactical nuclear weapons. e last thing President Malory had heard was
that the Planner ship had landed and the fight was starting well — standard bot
fight so far, possibly winnable, even if the overall strategic situation seemed fairly
grim. e next thing President knew was that it was time to pa up and head to
the limousine. e next thing he heard from the military command link was sur-
prising enough. e Secretary of Planetary Defence, General Armand Fyrehart,
was just incredulous. “Sir, you're not going to believe this, but we somehow won
the bale already…”
And then they spun some incredible tale about knights and King Arthur. at
was just some strange, academic theory about the mysterious orbital contact that
he had received a memo about earlier that week.
And now, it was time for the President, Generals Fyreheart and Pyrehill, some
kind of a historian called Dr. Meryl Colbert, and a platoonful of men and women
from the Space Marine Corps who served as their honour guard to suit up and
depart from their shulecra.
It was indeed a strange and wonderful thing to see the mysterious space sta-
tion up close. e President was an important man, but it seemed to him that all of
the really important things always happened to other people; he needed to make
history every week, but there was rarely any kind of hands-on feel to it. Now, he
was here, in the front; he wasn't merely looking at a report with photographs and
video; he really was, honest to God, being dragged aboard a real alien spacecra,
where he'd meet some aliens who masqueraded as the Knights of the Round Ta-
ble. Or maybe they were the Knights of the Round Table. None of the theories
made mu more sense until they'd actually meet the aliens in question, but right
now, that was a job that was to be done by both the scientists and politicians.
“I do have one question”, President Malory said. “How do we talk to these beings?
We can't remove our helmets here, and you can't speak in vacuum, right?”
General Fyrehart looked shoed. e vulture-like, bald general had caused a
bit of a stir by aaining his rank in the age of — while generals under fourty
were not unheard of, no one was even sure if it was possible to take the courses
that fast, but the military academies worldwide considered him a genius. If Plat-
terman could win wars from his office, Fyrehart was the kind of an officer who
won them by writing a book-size treatise on the strategy — years in advance. He
had caused even bigger stir by being appointed a Secretary of Planetary Defence
by President Malory's predecessor, Jordan Monmouth; his warlike, rousing and
stirring speees were probably good for geing people's hearts and minds behind
the defence effort against the Planners, but a lot of populace didn't like him, as
he reminded them too mu of the dark shadows of the bygone wars. Fyrehart
hadn't been fan of this hastily arranged plan before, and now, it seemed like that
sort of hasty planning reared its ugly head again. When you plan things prop-
erly, obvious snags like this seem to come to mind before the meeting is arranged.
ere were a lot of things that didn't seem to work too well in this plan.
“Yes, that does seem to present a problem, sir”, Fyrehart said. “We can only
hope these… knights have radio.”
“Well, we can only hope this plan is going to work out well.”
“Daleworth!” General Pyrehill said as they reaed the entrance to the keep.
“Come over here.”
“Yes, sir.” Daleworth came to Pyrehill's side.
“Anything unusual in sight? Anything new since your last visit here?”
“Well, it seems the insides of the space station has this weird blue glow now,
VI. A H M T
sir. It was pit bla in here last time around. Nothing else comes in mind, sir.”
“Well, at least we can see something”, Pyrehill said.
e group moved in the keep's blue glow. On a closer inspection, the light
seemed to come from regularly placed cras between the walls and the ceiling,
and the walls and the floor.
“More strange stuff, ma'am!” Haman reported and pointed to the side rooms.
Daleworth looked that way. “Right.” She turned to General Pyrehill. “Sir —
there were strange stone cubes in the other rooms. Now it seems the boxes are
open — the rooms are filled with lots of weird mainery.”
“Looks like robot maintenance gear to me, ma'am…” Haman said.
“Come again, Sergeant”, Pyrehill said. “All personnel, please swit to the
executive annel and turn on proximity fading. I guess it's beer if we keep
everyone on the same page here.” Originally, the group had been split on two
annels, one for the Space Marine platoon and one for the President, the historian
and the generals, with Daleworth operating on both annels. e people on one
annel could hear the other annel's aer at lower volume. Normally, all
radio aer within the range would come at constant volume, and proximity
fading would try to simulate more natural speaking experience, while not fading
out all of the discussion entirely.
“I said it looks like robot maintenance gear, sir.” Haman repeated.
“What, is it any similar to the Planner mainery?” President Malory said.
“As far as I can tell, this looks… different”, Fyrehart said. “I'd say this approa
looks mu less… methodical.”
“Agreed”, Pyrehill said. “e recon we have seen suggests that Planner repair
facilities are more like factories. Tightly paed, every lile nut and bolt going
in their own specific conveyors, every bot disassembled and rebuilt with strict
precision. is… looks more like jet plane repair pit to me. Someone's operating
here.”
“Merlin donning overalls and fixing robots?” Daleworth muered, barely re-
membering, or caring, that she was still on loop.
“Ah, foolishness of women”, a voice said on the radio. “I am not clothed in
my present form, but if I were, I would still elect to use my old robes. A wizard
must be recognised as one by the common folk.”
e group froze.
“Merlin?” Daleworth asked, unfazed by the wizard's taunt.
“You address the mightiest wizard of the world.”
e President got ahold of the situation. “Good day, wizard. Can you show
yourself, please?”
“at I unfortunately cannot do, sir Malory. You must help yourself. Please
take a look in the room where you looked in moments ago. If you are observant
enough, you shall see me.”
e whole group meandered in the repair room, its gear neatly — if somewhat
imperfectly, again unaracteristic of Planner meddling — arranged on shelves.
Behind the shelves stood bulky metal assises, whi to Daleworth looked like
Lancelot's assis.
One of them clearly had power.
President Malory had half-expected to walk in the repair room to see a Lancelot-
like robot in parts, and that mu of the idea had been true. He had just expected a
assis-like unit with LEDs indicating the power was on, or mysteriously glowing
edges, or robot head with glowing eyes or scanning visors or whatever.
He certainly didn't expect to see a robot assis acting like a washing maine
on a spin cycle. ere was a robot assis there, shaking and rumbling rapidly; in
the vacuum, nothing was heard.
“I see”, President Malory said. “Something wrong with your motors?”
“I am afraid so”, Merlin said. “is device is malfunctioning and I must study
it before I can act properly. Luily, this ethereal communication form of yours
is very mu more suited for me, as it allows me to talk to the Knights from all
parts of the New Avalon, and control the meanical functions of this fortress.
Frankly, I prefer not to see people during my moments of infirmity, if you can call
them that, but I am afraid every passing day takes us closer to your doom, and I
cannot tarry mu longer. I recommend you now seek Arthur. He is within the
main amber.”
“Very well”, President Malory said. “Let's go.”
e group departed for the central amber, whi now seemed to be fairly
well lit with distinctly blueish light, far whiter than the shine in the corridors.
e central amber looked even more majestic in its already puzzling, enigmatic
and stupefying glory.
“at one there is Arthur”, Daleworth pointed at the large central cylinder.
“King Arthur I am”, Arthur said as if on a cue. It was clear he was listening
in, just like Merlin.
“Fascinating”, President Malory said. “Can I see you, oh King of legend? Or
do you prefer to be veiled in that cocoon of yours?”
“It indeed would be prudent and honourable to show one's face. But truth
to tell… I shall be frank with you: I am a lile bit apprehensive. I have not yet
prepared to see myself with my own eyes — or see anything with my own eyes,
for that maer. Merlin has put images within my head, but I remain within this
maine of his. But Merlin says the time for this meeting is now, and I have faced
worse ordeals. So, Emperor and Warleader of the Whole World”, Arthur said
with blunt sarcasm dripping from the every word of that title, mu to President
Malory's puzzlement, “are you prepared to see what no living man has ever seen
— my new form, and my new armour?”
“We are”, President Malory said, not easily moved by the old King's words.
VI. A H M T
But if words didn't move him, at least the actions made him look at Arthur
with surprise and a tinge of awe. Arthur's cocoon opened with a bit of a hiss and
rumble; most of that they felt through vibrations in the floor they were standing
on. is time, the sides merely retracted through the floor.
Inside was a robot that was mu larger than Lancelot had been. Arthur
looked far more like a human being than Lancelot; his posture was straight, at
least. Still, like Lancelot's armour, his armour was bulky enough, yet Arthur
seemed to move with equal determination and grace.
But before anyone could take a look at Arthur's appearance, everyone's aen-
tion was caught by the sword Arthur was holding. Arthur was holding before
him a blade of shiniest metal, well engraved and encrusted with precious gems.
A surprising sight to the modern folks — and even a surprising sight for Arthur,
it seemed.
Arthur took a look at his armour. Like Lancelot, the tall king had no head; his
whole upper body was one single unit. He appeared to be able to look around;
some sort of a camera unit in his head could turn and roll as Arthur examined his
armour-clad arms and legs and his barrel-like body.
And then he regarded his sword again.
“Excalibur!” Arthur said. “By God's mercy! Merlin! Lancelot told me he had
returned this blade to below the waves. You didn't told me—”
“It was a long and difficult quest, my king”, Merlin said. “Suffice to say,
Lancelot did return the blade to the Lake, but I felt that you needed your sword
of legend in the world of tomorrow. e Lady of the Lake was quite reluctant to
give it ba, for reasons I still do not fully comprehend, but we managed to strike
a bargain with the Lady for the blade before Avalon ascended.”
“What do you mean by ‘we’, Merlin?”
Merlin paused. “Suffice to say—”
“Enough with the secrets, Merlin.”
“Very well, my King. I had a lile bit of help from Morgan.”
“Not enough help to leave you with a favour you must repay dearly, I take it?”
“at, sire, remains to be seen”, Merlin said with a dash of grudge and resig-
nation in his voice.
President Malory coughed. It seemed to him that something was amiss, and
the delegation was being ignored. “Your royal highness?”
“Yes?” King Arthur turned to the group. “Ah, yes. Let us turn to our allenges
So you are the illustrious President Malory.”
“at is true, sire.”
“And who are these others?”
Fyrehart stepped forth. “Sire,” he said with a barely noticeable hint of illi-
ness, “I am General Fyrehart, President Malory's Secretary of Planetary Defence.
I am the President's ief military advisor and top general, if you prefer.” Fyrehart
raised his hand and pointed to ea of his companions in turn: “With me are the
general who has done most to repel the latest Planner aa, General Pyrehill; A
solar and historian who would like to learn and discuss more of the nature of
this station, Dr. Colbert. Behind me stand our escort and honour guard — fine,
most upstanding bale-hardened veterans from one of our fleet's finest starships,
who also took some part in the latest assault where one of your knights was of
paramount assistance.”
“Well met, esteemed lords and ladies.” Arthur turned to Malory. “So how do
I address a President, and how does one become one?”
“Some just style me as ‘his excellency’, though most call me ‘mr. President’ ”,
President Malory said. “though fellow leaders of the countries of the Federation
mostly just call me by my name through the course of the day. In our world, must
make decisions, not focus on needless formality. As for how I was osen — For
decades, I served the country of Canada as a minister, later rose to the post of
a Prime Minister, and by popular vote — of every man and woman of age, who
want to make a oice — I was osen to serve as the President of Earth for a term
of six years. And five years ago, I was elected for a second term.”
“A leader osen by all people. I see. And you must have made quite an
impression on people with your leadership, having the whole world vote for you.”
“I have always said my aievements speak for themselves, even though they
are not deeds of legend. Deeds for the history, perhaps. If I were to find a way
to end this long-lasting conflict, or even endure through it, that might secure my
place in the legend — though I do not consider that my primary concern.”
“But you seek to end this war of yours, no?” Arthur asked.
“I do.”
“And what prevents you from doing that?”
at was an interesting question, President Malory thought. “Mostly the cun-
ning of the enemy, the fact that they move in many mysterious ways, and the fact
that we cannot possibly know how, or if, they can actually be defeated. We have
a lot of soldiers, but it is hard to aa when one has no idea where the aa
should take place, am I right?”
“I see”, Arthur said. “In that light, and what Merlin has told me, your war
seems indeed like the kind of a grim hour that could plunge your glorious empire
into a lightless abyss.”
“One could say that. Our colonies in other planets and moons already lie
in ruins. e aliens have now turned their gaze to our world, and have made
their first landfall. is is our last stand — unless we somehow find clues on the
whereabouts of the enemy and destroy them.”
Arthur pondered for a few passing seconds. “ere are a lot of mysteries in
this new world of ours. Even Merlin cannot explain why or how have we been
summoned here—”
VI. A H M T
“—yet, sire”, Merlin interjected. “I am still researing that—”
“—but I shall tell you, President, that when I died, some believed I'd return at
the darkest hour. Is this your darkest hour, President?”
President Malory sighed. He hadn't said this aloud to anyone outside his close
circle of generals and advisors. “e world — all of humanity — is in peril. is
is the worst crisis in history, and we have to do all we can to prevent the worst
from happening.”
“And do you believe you are doing all you can?”
“I do.”
“Do your underlings believe that?” Arthur regarded the two generals.
“We stand behind the President's plan, sir; not only as a maer of principle,
but we also believe in it in our hearts”, Fyrehart said. “Under the command of
a lesser leader, we'd be doomed. With the President's plan, we at least have a
fighting ance.”
“Do you wish my assistance, and the aid of the Knights of the Round Table?”
“If all of your knights fight like Lancelot, the war will be considerably simpler”,
President Malory said with a hint of reservation in his voice. “But I want to know
one thing before I ask your help. What do you want in return?”
“is is a noble war against darkness, is it not? Knowing no one threatens the
peace of the lands is a reward enough.”
“But are you not also a warlord?” President Malory said. “Is peace your only
motive, or do you want power in return?”
“And understandable reservation”, Arthur said. “I am, as some might believe
me to be, a hero, a conqueror and liberator whose deeds are epic and numerous,
aer all”, he said with a bit of sarcasm. “But rest assured; I do not come as a
conqueror. I died a treaerous death defending my ideals and my subjects. I am
the King of Britons no longer. I am a man no longer.” Arthur seemed wearier, but
seemed to continue his tale with no less vigour, keeping his emotions in e
with iron will. “If you want our help, we shall aid you. If you want no help from
us, we shall help you without. But do not believe for a second that if you turn
down our help, we shall somehow… avenge that show of distrust. Our hearts
are true, our minds are set for fulfilling our destiny once again. Merlin's magic
has honed us for the purpose we have been alloed in the tales of old: Return to
defend Britain in its darkest hour. We are only Knights now, with a single, pure
purpose. Do you want us fulfill that destiny, President?”
“King Arthur”, President Malory began aer taking a good breath, “don't be
alarmed. My only concern here is the ain of command. Warfare these days
is a confusing business, and as we have seen countless times in the history, in
all wars, the greatest threat to peace, liberty and human dignity is the quest for
personal glory. You should understand my reservations; I cannot enlist someone
who desires to usurp not only my authority, but the principles — very different
principles from the ones of your era — that my power derives from.”
“I know all too mu about usurpers, President”, Arthur replied. “Rest assured,
I shall follow your lead, and study the new ways of the governments of this world.”
“And that is what I wanted to hear. I will gladly welcome all help from gen-
erals who are willing to fight the good fight, and have resourcefulness and the
willingness to cooperate with other people. at is our way in the fields of bat-
tle.” e President turned to address everybody present. “Our war is a legendary
war. It is a rare occurrence that we can make that proclamation before the war is
over, but the fact is, this is the hardest and most difficult war humanity has ever
faced. We've been hiding in our trenes, protecting innocent people on the fron-
tier, destroyed cities to save the people, waged fierce war in the vastness of empty
space. But we've also faced our first significant victory: Instead of annihilation,
we were victorious when we faced the enemy at our very gates. And thanks to
that victory go to Sir Lancelot.”
“Always proud to be of assistance”, Sir Lancelot replied from his capsule.
“And if you and the fellow knights can help us in any way in this fight, our
fight against the Planners would be far easier”, President Malory continued. “All
we require is full cooperation with my generals, and my plans.” he sighed. “Our
strategy has worked so far, but the balance has been upset. Our victories so far
have been due to the ingenuity of the generals, moreso than my own. I need every
capable commander I can get. And who, of course, would make a beer general
than a true living legend?”
“So be it”, Arthur said. “I, King Arthur, the leader of the Knights of the Round
Table, swear my oath of fealty to the President of the World, President Malory. I,
and my knights sworn to serve me, shall serve under your banner until the bier
end of this war among the stars.”
“And I shall honour that. Even a less formal agreement would have worked,
but if that is how you make alliances, then I must accept that. I hereby appoint
King Arthur as a General of the, hm — I suppose Space Marine Corps is the closest
to what the Knights do these days?”
“I concur, sir”, Fyrehart said. e President hadn't looked at Fyrehart's reac-
tions for a while, but it seemed to him that the general was staring at him with dis-
belief and amazement, torn between a suppressed condemnation for President's
eager trust and willingness to basically appoint a complete stranger to a high
military post, and genuine amazement that despite that lile thing, he actually
believed every word he heard and felt it was not right to protest.
“ank you for the trust, mr. President. I heard you mention them before, but
what exactly do the Space Marines do?”
“Do we even have any— ah, Lieutenant Dalewood. I was hoping for General
Fyrehart to explain this, but I guess it would be prudent to give this opportunity
to give a presentation of the corps to an actual officer of the Space Marine Corps.”
VI. A H M T
Daleworth blinked. A lowly lieutenant explaining the purpose of the entire
bran of service to one of its new bosses? Yes, the military was working just as
one expected it to work. “Yes, mr. President! e World Federation Space Marine
Corps is a bran of service that specialises in high-mobility rapid deployment
operations from aboard starships, sir! We work in close cooperation with the
World Federation Space Fleet, and generally land on enemy-occupied zones in
other worlds, bringing in armoured infantry where the enemy least expects them
— or, as we saw in Paris, where the enemy definitely expects them. In principle,
it is quite similar to this station of yours, sir: Spaceships that can drop heavily
armoured infantry anywhere in the world.”
“I see. So wherever the enemy goes, we go?”
Daleworth wasn't quite sure if this was stupid or insightful. “Prey mu so,
sir.”
“Very good. Now — Lancelot, wert thou spying on us?” Arthur asked.
“No doing of my own, sire”, Lancelot replied from his cylinder. “I found to my
surprise that I am unable to sleep, or even divert my aention from the images of
the amber that the necromancer floods my mind with.”
“Pardon me, sire”, Merlin said, not very happy how things were going, “but
there was a slight tenical issue with the armour.”
Fyrehart coughed. “Are we done, mr. President?” Without waiting for an
answer, he continued, “Now that we have this over with, I'd have a few questions
of my own from my new general and… scientific staff member.”
“By all means”, Arthur said.
“How many people and these… armours of yours you are bringing in? How
many knights, exactly?”
“Our knights number thirty-three. And we have Merlin here, as well.”
“And your nature appears rather… curious. What exactly did you mean when
you said you are a ‘man no longer’ and how you ‘died a treaerous death’? How…
how exactly have you survived for millennia, or if that can be even be called
survival?”
“I am quite puzzled, because that question would have been my first question”,
Arthur said. “Perhaps Merlin can answer that in a satisfactory manner…”
“Ah.” Merlin said. “I could. But would you really comprehend it?” Merlin
turned to Dr. Colbert. “You have brought in your solar — undoubtedly a re-
markable woman, or she wouldn't have been brought here on this… historic meet-
ing — but she has not uered a word during your proceedings. Is this how you
respect wisdom?”
President Malory raised his arms. “Rest assured, Merlin, we are people who
regard sciences and resear in highest esteem. Perhaps—”
“Oh, you value scientists? You value scientists? And you brought a single
woman aboard. If you can demonstrate how mu you value scientists, mr. Pres-
ident, I am willing to part with my secrets. Bring me your experts. My ways are
complicated, mr. President, and I shall not waste a day trying to educate you. I
only tell the Knights how and perhaps a lile bit why their mainery works, if
it helps them to operate the armour. But to tell more is insanity.”
Dr. Meryl Colbert raised her hand. “Okay, who do we bring in?” She was,
indeed, an expert in history, and was likewise recruited from Greater Newbury-
port University over her objections — but the military thought it was necessary
to take the experts from the same place to maintain some level of secrecy. She
wasn't sure what the point of that was either; aer all, history of warfare knew
many cases where people found clustered events curious, and many cases were
people started to pay undue aention to isolated incidents that ended up being re-
lated. Despite this sort of monotony that the history tended to have, where people
basically ended up geing screwed no maer what they did, the young, plump,
freled, blond professor of history could tell that to the students in an interesting
and engaging manner. She seemed unfased when meeting these weird historic
figures with their outrageous manners.
Merlin shrugged. "Even your solar has quier wits than you, mr. President.
President Malory looked stung. “I was merely trying to say, before your out-
burst, that the protocol dictated my actions. I am here to find new allies in our
fight against the Planners. Scientific issues were on the agenda next. But I agree
that bringing more scientists aboard would be a good idea — sharing what we
know is an excellent opportunity. I trust Dr. Colbert's judgement. Wasn't there a
scientist in the first survey team?…”
“Ah, you mean that engineering professor, Dr. Grovepath.” Dr. Colbert said.
“I have things to tell about the Knights and their Armour, and perhaps a lile
bit about the history of this facility”, Merlin said. “If you can find experts on these,
perhaps we can discuss.”
“All right”, Dr. Colbert said. “Dr. Grovepath is already busy looking at the
videos and photographs we collected from the previous journey, and he'll love to
hear more about the armour. I should call Mannerheim and ask him to come over
— and bring that araeologist with him. Dr. Merrywood, that was his name,
right?”
VII Legend of the Armoured Knights
February 17, 2632
T
, and it was jolly good time for the scientists
and soldiers alike. And Merlin had completed his spin cycle. Daleworth
felt the world had seen many bizarre sights in this war — and all wars
VII. L A K
— but those always tended to happen when soldiers decided to “relax a lile bit”.
Now, the soldiers were actually relaxing “a lile bit” and they were seeing bizarre
things. Not very bizarre. Aer all, they were only relaxing a lile bit.
Daleworth's platoon kept company to doctors Colbert, Grovepath and Merry-
wood, who had been retrieved from Mannerheim in less than a hour. e curious
two scientists had been wating the whole event over comm link, and as soon
as Daleworth called in, she found the two men were already geing ready for
departure to the New Avalon.
“Merlin sounds like a real piece of work, but hey, I guess that in grand seme
of things, this will be interesting anyway!” Dr. Colbert said. “You should have
called me earlier, Paul.”
“Well… I'm also a bit new at this”, Dr. Grovepath said. “e military found
the thing, and tried to keep it under the wraps as well as they could. What do you
think of the aritectural style?”
“I saw your report, Paul, and I have to say that I have no idea why the army
dragged me here if your guess is as good as mine”, Dr. Robin H. Merrywood said.
“Strange combination of styles from antiquity, I'd hazard to guess… but still, the
style seems almost alien in origin.” e wiry, elderly areologist sighed. “Let me
tell you what: I'm not in shape for prolonged space journeys. Let's split this up:
You document this place some more aer dropping me ba to let me enjoy the
precious few days of vacation in Florida — perhaps I'll just stay in Canaverarnival
instead of my crappy old sha — and then we'll head to Britain to dig up Camelot.
at's more of my metier. Yee-haw!”
“Well, let's just see if Merlin will divulge the location first.”
e scientist group arrived once again to the keep, where the soldiers had kept
wat.
A few of the knights had stepped out of the cocoons, and were now walking
within the keep.
“Hail, solars! I am Sir Galahad.”
“Well met, on my behalf also. I am Sir Percival.”
e two knights looked quite a lot like Lancelot, but there were subtle differ-
ences. Percival was more upright, the assis construction somewhat narrower.
Galahad's feet were lighter, yet the knight seemed to move with same ease. e
two seemed to move effortlessly on the metal surface, so it looked like they too
had magnetic feet.
“Well met, knights”, Merrywood said.
e scientists arrived to Merlin's room, just as Lieutenant Daleworth was
heading the same way, seemingly off from inspecting other parts of the keep.
“Oh, hello again, doctor.” Daleworth said. “Glad to see familiar faces.”
“Hello, lieutenant”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Looks like your hopes of meeting the
Knights of the Round were answered.”
“Well, I'm glad some of my fears are false, but…”
“…you're not exactly sure that you're believing what you're seeing?” Dr. Grove-
path asked.
“Yeah.”
“Well, it's only natural to be a bit sceptical.” Dr. Grovepath said.
“You're right, doctor. is is all very remarkable, but I want answers.”
Dr. Grovepath smiled to Daleworth. “at's the spirit, lieutenant. Let's go and
get them from Merlin, then.”
Daleworth smiled ba. “Sure, doctor.”
e scientists and Daleworth headed to the repair room — Merlin's strange
and orderly-in-disorder habitat.
“Ah! Merlin, I presume.” Merrywood looked mu happier.
To the scientists, Merlin in this particular incarnation looked like just a plain
old ordinary killer robot… from old speculative romances, not the killer robots
they faced in the balefields of the gas giant moons and Martian mining colonies.
Full two meters tall, the body was fairly cylindrical, with large wheels under it,
three flexible robot arms that pointed every way, and a semi-spherical head with
a single camera. Merlin was, in fact, wearing a pointy hat, but the sight was so
ludicruous that the scientists just assumed Merlin had put it on his head to test
their reactions and provoke a response.
“And so, the scientists — and finally some amusement — arrive”, Merlin said
with slight annoyance in his voice, but he clearly seemed genuinely relieved that
at least he had met contenders for his mat.
“I am Dr. Robin Merrywood. is here is Dr. Paul Grovepath, who visited the
New Avalon before the fight in Paris.”
“I had wondered who had moved my crystal ball”, Merlin said.
“Uh, that was probably one of the soldiers”, Dr. Grovepath said.
“at's right, one of the men from… er, the Beta squad did the rooms while we
were here, I think”, Daleworth said. “If they broke it, I'm sure the WFDF will buy
you a new one. Or at least reimburse for materials if you know how to rebuild it,
because, you know, we don't have many magic crystal ball makers.”
“ere is nothing wrong with my crystal ball, silly woman”, Merlin said. “It
was merely disturbed, not broken.”
“But if you're su an awesome wizard, can't you, you know, look into the
crystal ball and see who did this?”
Merlin sighed. “I asked for experts. I got laymen. I wanted to avoid unneces-
sary explanations. Are you experts of magic?”
“We do not have any evidence that magic would even exist”, Dr. Grovepath
said.
“Now now, Paul — I've always said magic is a good metaphor”, Dr. Colbert
said.
VII. L A K
“But as a physical force, no.” Dr. Grovepath said. “Even here, we have seen
many things. But are any of these things in direct violations of the laws of the
nature as we know them? e only mysterious piece of puzzle I have is how the
New Avalon appeared on the orbit, but I'm sure there's some sort of a reasonable
explanation for that…”
“Ah!” Merlin said. “I see you are a gentleman and a solar, Grovepath, with
some aention to detail in how things are in the present, rather than how you
imagine things were in the past.”
“Oh, I try to be a solar, that mu is true. If you want my gentlemanly
manners tested, perhaps I should point out that you show too mu disdain for
my friend, lieutenant Daleworth. True, she is a soldier, but education is the foun-
dation of our society. I am fairly sure she can at least follow some of the details.
Am I right, lieutenant?”
Daleworth smiled at Dr. Grovepath. Was Merlin just being generally loath-
some, or trying to rile Dr. Grovepath into defending her honour somehow, as
some sort of a test of aracter? Dr. Grovepath's response surprised her a lit-
tle bit. is was not exactly a show of great ivarly of ages gone by that Merlin
probably expected, but he was absolutely right anyway. “Well, I've followed your
high-flying discussions fairly well so far”, Daleworth said to Merlin. “I promise
not to ask stupid questions. If something remains unclear, I'll just take a look
at Dr. Grovepath's report. If he has to write in small enough words that Gen-
eral Fyrehart understands what he's saying, then I have no problems reading that
either.”
“Interesting enough, I'm sure”, Merlin said, then turned to Dr. Grovepath.
“But even if you are a solar, I still face a few smaller conundrums. You are an
educated man — a man educated on mainery, no less — who knows nothing of
how this mainery operates. is, in my mind, is almost the same as meeting a
simpleton who knows nothing of how this mainery operates.”
“at's not true at all”, Dr. Grovepath said. “It is easier to tea an educated
man than to tea a complete layman.”
“But it still is a needless bore, nonetheless”, Merlin said.
“I have deducted how some of your mainery works, all by myself”, Dr. Grove-
path said. “e Knights are just mobile armours, operated through hydraulics or
variable-tensile string bundles. e tenology appears very similar to our own.
e drop pods, or the Steeds as you call them, are just roet pods — quite similar
to what we would build.”
“I see. And I suppose you are quite correct. But in effect, you are saying you
already know the principles on how the Knights work, and now want to know
how they really work?”
“True.”
“But is that not also a meaningless quest, fool?” Merlin asked. “Why study
something that you already know?”
Daleworth gried her teeth. “You're not as smart as you think, wizard.”
Merlin faced Daleworth. “And how is that?”
“I see where you are really geing at. You're being philosophical. Don't you
know that philosophers can only make people uncomfortable when they reveal
incovenient truths?”
“I know that, woman”, Merlin said. “I happen to also know that your society
values philosophers.”
“But not ones who rehash same old arguments from years ago. You're no
philosopher, wizard — you're a career politician, who gets his bread from idle
promises and stalling any progress with careful diversions. In case you didn't
notice, we're not talking about magic or science. We're not talking about what
you promised to talk about, and now you're saying we're probably not worthy to
talk to because you're too lazy to educate us. e good doctors here are willing
to learn and exange information, if you're willing to do the same. Now you're
just questioning what we can offer you.”
“I'm afraid the good lieutenant is right”, Dr. Grovepath said. “If you share
your information, maybe we can give you something in return.”
“Arthur said he wants to help us. So help us, and don't try to wriggle out of
that duty, Merlin”, Daleworth said. “We can't help you if you can't help you, and
since it's fairly obvious that you have the advantage at the moment, we think you
should get the ball rolling.” Daleworth grinned. “Not the crystal ball, though.”
Merlin regarded Daleworth with slightly annoyed silence.
“Very well”, he finally responded. “No more tris. But I want to know, just
for the sake of curiosity, why do you desire to know more of the things that you
already know?”
Dr. Grovepath smiled. “I said I knew the principles, not the specifics. Princi-
ples remain, specifics are in constant flux. Understanding things that exist now
helps me understand things that existed before, and inspire that whi will exist
in the future.”
“And do I even need to explain why knowing history is important?” Dr. Col-
bert said. “ose who forget the history are bound to repeat it. And I don't say it
just because it's a tired old phrase — it's the solid truth that I've always believed
in.”
Merlin was silent for a while. “I have misjudged all of you, and I guess I have
to apologise for my manners. And I see your ladies, even the non-solarly ones,
have clear wits.”
“My clear wits keep my men alive, wizard”, Daleworth said. “And when the
men are alive, they're motivated to keep me alive, in the unlikely case case I'm
not being clear-wied at the moment.”
“All right”, Merlin said. “Now could you please stand ba and let the solars
VII. L A K
speak.”
Daleworth grinned and raised her arms. “Very well, wizard. Pay no aention
to me.”
“Now”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Can you tell me exactly what these Knights are?
I'm starting to feel we're not addressing actual knights.”
“Since you are in the mood for strings of correct guesses, it seems, why don't
you keep up the good work, Dr. Grovepath.”
“I'm guessing the actual Knights are… elsewhere.”
“And that's where you're wrong. e knights are there, within their armour.”
“I see.” Dr. Grovepath said. “But the construction of the armour, and the fact
that millennia has passed, suggests that they're not alive. at's what all I've
heard points to. Am I correct in assuming the armour are… some kind of mobile
sarcophagi?”
“Very good deductions, doctor”, Arthur said. “Most people would just assume
this is some sort of a mysterious resurrection, and assume the knights are sim-
ply clad with new armour, coming from beyond the grave in new bodies, ready
to destroy the threat to Britain. You, on the other hand, seem to not simply be-
lieve what you see, but wonder why you see these things. It is true, solars: the
bodies of the knights are dead. What we worked on was merely prolongation of
consciousness beyond death.”
“How did you describe this process to the knights?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Well, we—” Merlin began.
“Excuse me”, Dr. Colbert said. “Who are ‘we’?”
“Myself and Morgan le Fay.”
“I thought you—”
“Yes, I am aware of some things that people have wrien in the centuries
since”, Merlin interrupted. “It is true — e knights of the Camelot and Morgan
had some… differences. But once Arthur had died, I learned that Morgan was not
just a half-hearted nuisance I usually knew her as. Even in the toughest times,
she was still willing to help, even when Arthur never really trusted her — and
I can't blame him. Negotiating with Arthur is difficult, and I sometimes can't
tell him what really transpired. I took most of the credit for this lile miracle,
and I have not revealed how mu of his continued existence he really owes to
Morgan. It could… upset her. As you can see, his emotions are in e, and
we originally anticipated that emotions would die with the body. But as for my
own experiences, even in death, I still find myself quite… emotional over many
things… fine, I admit it, just now, I found myself uneasy and allured when you
made me bring up Morgan. And I fancy myself quite rational compared to the
Knights. Even in life, the Knights were frequently distracted by their emotions. I
try not to upset them too mu by mentioning their glorious and adventure-filled
history. It could prove to be… troublesome.”
“So I'd imagine. Anyway, how did it all happen?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“It all began a few decades aer Arthur's death. I grew nearer death every
day. I was… I was finding I was not the ancient bard they thought I was going to
be. I was old when Arthur reigned, and I didn't expect to outlive him. Morgan,
however, had worked on dead people more than I could ever have time for. She
had devised a way to discern the state of consciousness from long-dead people.”
“State of consciousness… from ashes of the dead?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“No, not ashes”, Merlin said. “Dust. A pyre will destroy what remains of the
consciousness. By the way, I was fairly amused by the name of the General of
yours. Pyrehill?”
“Oh yes”, Daleworth said. “And believe it or not, his first name is Arthur. His
middle name is I-something. Probably ‘Irony’.”
Merlin uled. “Anyway, A body must be le to rot, its brains must degrade
to dust. We only recovered the brain; afflictions of the body, emotions of the heart,
were no longer any kind of concern for us. ough it seems to me that they still
affect us, even when their bodies no longer exist.”
“I see”, Dr. Colbert said, “fire destroys whatever information was le, at least
more certainly than other forms of natural degradation. I'm no medical expert,
but even I know our science has struggled with this kind of things, to put it mildly.
Brain death is an insurmountable obstacle — but we've always believed it's only
an obstacle. Last I read about the most recent resear on this field, we have
some crude methods of decoding synapse pathways, but that only works on a
very recently dead person — decoding something from dust is almost too fanciful
to believe. We can decode, through statistical comparisons, what kind of skills the
person has developed, but it certainly doesn't work well enough to decode a per-
son's memories or their personality — neurostatisticians will say there are dozens
of ways to remember a thing, and there are million faces to general crankiness…”
Merlin coughed. “Isn't it a shame how in bale between solars and laymen,
the laymen oen win, with tragic results? Morgan suggests some Greek pagan
scientists had discovered these things, shortly before Christian crusaders flayed
them alive for being vile necromancers they were”, Merlin said. “I have to say
I start to see her point of view on the ideals Arthur represented, even when I
somewhat believe she was slightly misguided in many maers.”
“Yes, this has happened way too oen”, Dr. Colbert said.
“Very well”, Dr. Grovepath said. “So — you figured out a way to decode the
brains from dust of the dead. What happened next?”
“What happened next? I died. Morgan's granddaughter — I've forgoen who
it was, one of the several, I'm not good with names — said she'd bring me ba to
life. And her mainery worked, as you can see. Within this body lie my dusts
and bones, in a coffin of metal. Around it lies mainery that makes it operate.
Cold casket fashioned out of strange new metals, lead and titanium, surround my
VII. L A K
icy heart of old dust. Around it, flames of mainery bring me animation driven
by intellect. Risen from the asm of Hephaestus, the fires within an iron stove
hath given it intellect, and lo, the stove now walketh the Earth.”
Dr. Grovepath couldn't suppress his laughter. Few others present could.
“And with that, I worked for centuries to fashion the Mobile Armours, perus-
ing notes le by Greek and Roman master-smiths, uncovering the secrets needed
to build the Steeds of new, and the New Avalon. I worked with whoever I found
trustworthy enough to locate Avalon and find the burial site of Arthur and some
of the Knights. I was actually surprised to hear that most of the closest knights
had been interred in Avalon — I heard tales that they had been buried all across
Britain…”
“at's… another thing that appears to be rather puzzling”, Dr. Merrywood
said. “So you say Avalon was a real place? I wanted to ask you about the location
of Camelot…”
“Avalon, the original burial site of the Knights, does exist. Camelot, sad to
say, has been razed since. It was not a formidable fortress the legend makes it
to be, nor was it the thing of splendor; a mere simple castle that was mu more
remarkable for the people who inhabited it. Bigger and more splendorous castles
have been built.” Merlin sounded strangely interested. “Can you recommend a
castle to replace it?”
“Sure”, Daleworth said. “I'm sure the folks at Neuswanstein would love to
have a few legendary knights running around. Would boost the tiet sales to
tourists. rough the roof. And the roofs are prey high there.”
“Bah!” Arthur said with a ule. “As if we would suffer traveling commoners
in our halls.”
“You'll be sorely disappointed in our world, then”, Daleworth said. “Even the
Windsor Castle gets guided tours these days. Times ange.”
Arthur looked grumpier. “Right. Uh… Where were we?”
“e Stove walketh the Earth and figureth out where Arthur hath been buried?”
Daleworth said.
“Right”, Arthur said. “We simply used the same process that had been used
on me to rejuvenate the knights. Within our New Avalon, I trained the Knights
and let them get used to their new Armour. en, they began their new sleep, and
we took off to the skies.”
“I see”, Dr. Grovepath said. “But what about the disappearance? How… did
you even take off to the skies? Do you travel through the time? How?”
“at was all thanks to a strange device we found”, Merlin said. “Morgan had
kept it in her care for years, without ever telling where it actually came from. A
device, she claimed, that would somehow transport even large objects far away,
and even across the time — if one could interpret correctly the strange symbols
embedded on its surface…”
“And… where is this device now?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Safe and secure. But, uh…”
“Let me guess… something has happened?”
“We jumped across centuries. Our last jump was a lile bit of a miscalculation
on my part — not in time, but in space. Avalon was actually never designed to fly
outside of the sphere of air. But as I and the knights do not breathe, this ultimately
proved not to be an obstacle, and the lightness of objects does actually prove to
be of convenience. So here we are now, circling the Earth.”
“So in the last bale, you… just told the Knights to jump down from the orbit?
Are you mad?” Daleworth asked.
“My design was solid. Ancient Pagan philosophers had anticipated the heat
and smoke that the air causes around fast-moving bodies, and the Steeds were
designed to work around that. I figured that a Knight could easily return to the
clouds with his Steed, many times over. A trip to the very edges of nothingness
was nothing particularly difficult by extension.”
“I'm not a tenical gal, but I'm starting to wonder where the he you fit the
fuel to rea the orbit. Our shule needs far more than you could fit in that pod.”
“Now that, woman, is a secret that only strangest people would believe, and
even I can't really begin to say how it works. You would need to ask Morgan's
progeny about the motivations, assuming any of them yet live or are even aware
of their family's greatness. I am merely a mixer of materials, a buffoon with a
mortar and pestle, if one can call my mixing mainery that; I have no idea what
she was thinking when she came up with the ingredients.”
“A mystery fuel from the antiquity that even the Greeks didn't decipher it is,
then”, Daleworth said and looked grumpier.
“And where is the device that transported you through the time?”
Arthur scrated his head-equivalent — somehow, the gesture looked fairly
natural, even when Arthur seemed to do that with a hand seemingly aaed to
his ba. “It is in the real Avalon. I have my own Steed, whi is different from the
one Arthur and his Knights use, and I use it to transport Avalon to different eras.
Due to its design, the device must move through eras independently of the things
it transports, hence it must remain in the cave while Avalon travels through time.
I have developed mainery whi will trigger its operation; I merely fly to the
cave, activate the device, fly ba to New Avalon, and the entirety of New Avalon
transports to the new time and place.”
“Doesn't sound like a Planner device. If those bastards could time travel, I
assure you human race wouldn't even have goen started”, Daleworth said.
“What do you make of that, Paul?” Dr. Colbert asked.
“Time travel isn't exactly my field either”, Dr. Grovepath said, “and I can't
possibly start to comment on things that we can only speculate so far about. But
I guess this sounds to me like the device is some kind of a wormhole generator
VIII. A New reat
that must be operated from afar; its time travel works by having some sort of a
reference point in our particular universe, and hence it itself cannot be transported
across time. But still, it seems very luy that New Avalon managed to end up
anywhere near Earth…”
“Do you doubt my skills with the device? I have made the jump across years
dozens of times, mostly to study the ange of times and manners, trying to judge
if Arthur's service is needed once again. I had perfected the astronomical calcula-
tions necessary for ea jump, especially in the laer times when I could spy the
strange mathematics needed for even more precise planetary calculations.”
“Where were you in World Wars?” Dr. Colbert asked. “In the laer of those,
there was yet another Saxon invader, threatening Britain…”
Merlin seemed grim and even apologetic, as if he had been expecting that
question. “We came here in , decided we were not needed, and our next stop
ended up being the year , where we were no longer needed. We completely
missed these tumultuous events. It seemed to us that the wars and grimness was
starting to be behind, so we were leaping forward with bigger strides, so unfortu-
nately, we learned of these great wars too late. e device seems to be only able
to jump ahead of time, not baward. Perhaps if we could decipher more of its
alien functions, we could go ba in time to right that wrong.”
“Fascinating. How about the Martian Rise of the Reds, in ?”
“at planetary revolt? We unfortunately skipped through most of the nd
century. We were here in , if I remember right, and we returned in .”
“Did you learn anything from these leaps?” Dr. Colbert seemed angry. “Per-
haps that the history needed a lile bit more examination than periodic peeks?
Great events just slipped past, and you didn't manage to do anything about them.”
“I—” Merlin began.
“What, pray tell, did you do to actually assess the situation on ea leap? You
could see what had happened in the past, but how do you predict the future? Did
you carefully monitor the situation and see when strange things were afoot?”
Merlin was strangely silent. “All right. I guess I can't argue you there. We
never really had any greater plan. I hate to admit it, but this was a clear mistake.”
“So now you are here”, Dr. Colbert said. With your maine knights, and you
have actually managed to land in middle of a war — a war, whi, as you correctly
deciphered, could mean something significant. You're a luy man, Merlin."
“One could say so”, Merlin said. “I don't know what I can do to show you I do
have some regrets for not thinking this quite through.”
“ank you for at least trying, though, Merlin”, Daleworth said. “It is the
thought that counts. e most important thing you can do is that you just keep
the knights doing what they do best.”
VIII A New reat
February 18, 2632, 07:58 UTC
“G
, !” Daleworth said, looking surprisingly eer-
ful for someone who was halfway lying down, side of the head firmly
planted on the surface of the coffee table, in a slightly disheveled
state whi probably still fell within the leer of the Space Marine Corps regula-
tions.
“Why, good morning, lieutenant!” Dr. Grovepath said. “I got your note.”
Daleworth had sent a brief message to Dr. Grovepath. “Come have a coffee
with me. Want to talk. Starboard Officer Cafeteria, De C, Room #. :
UTC. Lt. Daleworth.”
“And welcome, dear doctor, to the famous Starboard Cafe, where the upper
eelons of the famed starship Mannerheim turn from ugly cranky bastards who
just woke up to fit and alert officers who are ready to face anything and every-
thing. I'll get you the best damn coffee this… vending maine can get. e cafe
is supposed to open at noon in even-numbered days.”
“at's… friendly of you, Lieutenant. And I don't think you look too ugly or
cranky, if you don't mind me saying”, Dr. Grovepath said and uled a bit.
“I don't mind you being friendly with me, doctor”, Daleworth said. “I think
you're a good guy. I'm sure I could just hang out with you… if you wanted.”
“Uh, I think I would like that. So… is this your idea of a… date?” Dr. Grove-
path asked. “Hope you don't mind me calling it that. I don't think we have many
actual… scientific maers to discuss. I'm fine if you just want to have a coffee,
though. Or hang out. Or talk.”
“Date? Well, kind of”, Daleworth said as the second cup of very, very bla
coffee slowly poured out of the maine. She handed it to the doctor. “I just
want to talk, doctor, but I don't mind geing to know you beer. You seem like a
sensible guy.” Daleworth grimaced as she sat down and flumped lying on the table
again. “It's just that I'm really not in a condition to have a real date today. I'm not
a big date person. I just meet people. Not sure if I should tell you my silly theories,
but hell, why not…” She sipped some of the coffee she had before her and sighed,
closing her eyes. “I'm the kind of a gal who has sex on the first date, and since I
sure as hell don't want to do it with you today, this just doesn't qualify as a date”,
Daleworth said. She looked exhausted and she definitely looked like she could
use the road-paving material that the vending maine called ‘coffee’. “Shit, that
didn't sound right. It's… well, I just wanted to talk with a friendly non-military
type who has his ear on the ground. So here we are.”
Dr. Grovepath wasn't sure if lauging was really appropriate, but he did it any-
way. “Wasn't going to suggest anything of sort, Lieutenant. ough I… have to
VIII. A N T
say I like women who have similar interests in advanced roetry and skillful
zero-g manoeuvers.”
“Now you just sound dirty, doctor. Oh, hell. Just call me Mielle.”
“Uh, I'm just Paul. Everyone who works with me usually just calls me by
name anyway.” Dr. Grovepath smiled nervously. “I do hope that our cooperation
goes as smooth as possible, Mielle. In any way.”
“If you really want it, Paul, aer all this is over, maybe we could head to L
Station and I could show you some skillful zero-g manoeuvres.”
“Right! As was probably slightly apparent on the New Avalon, I guess I still
need… some zero-g training from an experienced instructor, before I can head to
L. If you don't mind teaing me…”
Daleworth laughed. “Nonsense, you handled yourself fine. But I'll… be happy
to help you.”
“By the way, this is a beautiful place”, Dr. Grovepath said and looked around,
admiring the skylight above them that revealed starry sky. It was a beautiful
place, one that looked like it belonged to a commercial FTL cruise line space-
ship than a military vessel. Dr. Grovepath had imagined the Mannerheim to be a
cramped, labyrinthine ship, and it certainly looked like that in the publicly avail-
able diagrams, but once again, the scale was surprisingly deceiving. e corridors
were spacious, and tall; Almost every arterial corridor had two monorail lines
going in opposite directions, on whi one-seat, streamlined cars sped forth at
staggering speed, zipping around well over the heads of the people who preferred
to walk. When Dr. Grovepath had just had to pun in the room number and
he was transported across three des in less than two minutes. “I had no idea
military spaceships had this sort of… nice spaces. Skylights above and benes
with upholstery and everything.”
“You should see the zero-g section.” Daleworth sighed. “Sorry, I get a bit… salty
when I get anxious. Anyway, yeah, the community spaces are kind of awesome
in most of the frigates. ey wanted the starboard cafeteria to look as good as
possible on the Mannerheim. She was named aer a field marshal who fought for
the people of his homeland, so that they could keep drinking coffee freely. And
not the tea. e enemies, who had already invaded many other countries, drunk
tea.”
“Oh. And this was in…?”
“World War .”
“You would imagine a bit more detailed history would survive from that era…”
“It did, but frankly, when I was in the Academy, I wasn't very interested of the
motivations of war, so I can't remember everything. I just wanted to know how
to survive through them. Politicians try their darnest to prevent wars. Soldiers
endure through them, one way or other, in the unlikely event the politicians fail
at their jobs.”
“I see”, Dr. Grovepath said. “What did you want to talk with me about? Why
are you so anxious?”
“Just the Knights. I just want your honest opinion. Can they defeat the Plan-
ners? I sort of think they can do that, and I saw your reports, but… what's your
honest, non-tenical opinion?”
“I think we have a ance. I believe in it. Did you see what they did in Paris?
I thought that was a good demonstration of what they could do. I looked at your
recording. It was amazing.”
“You think the mainery we saw on New Avalon and in the Knights could
actually destroy Planners forever?”
“You know just as well as I do that we don't know if Planners can be destroyed
forever.”
“Yeah. But do we have a beer ance now than we had before? at's what
I'd really want to know, Paul.”
“ey're very well-equipped maines of war, Mielle. ey made a short
work of the bots on field, whi represent maybe, uh, % of the different bots on
field.” Dr. Grovepath smiled. “I think they're our best ance to end this war, so
far.”
“at's what I was thinking, too”, Daleworth said. “anks. You know, part
of me… wants this war to end, but I don't really want to think of what I'll do aer
the war, if I don't yet know if the war even has a ance of ending in our favour.”
“Never lose hope, Mielle.”
“I don't. I won't. But I can't make plans if I don't know for sure, no?”
“Well, if I were you, I'd plan for both outcomes. But if the Planners are victo-
rious, that outcome can't really be planned for, now can it?”
“at's where you're wrong”, Daleworth said. “I just… I just… I don't want
to spend energy on that outcome. If we're not going to win, there's no point in
starting to plan, right? No, wait… no… I think you're right.”
“Make plans, Mielle. I think we'll win. As long as people keep fighting,
there's hope.”
“Yeah.” Daleworth smiled.
“I actually wanted to talk to you too. I sort of wanted to talk with… a friendly
military type who has her ear on the ground.”
“Oh, really?” Daleworth smirked. “What about?”
“Major Plaerman.”
“Oh. I guess you're calling him a damn difficult guy to cat.”
“at's one way of puing it.”
“He's oen like that. He has his optimised command ain procedures and
whatnot. He lives and breathes so he can prey mu go wherever the he
he pleases while commanding the troops. Going to talk to him outside of the
command network, on a non-operative business, is hell.”
VIII. A N T
“I talked to his aide-de-camp, about seing up a meeting…”
“Let me guess, that didn't work out too well?”
“He said he'd look into the calendar and make an appointment without actu-
ally saying whi decade it was going to take place. I'm beginning to guess the
guy just stu my meeting request on the boom of a prey high pile.”
“Huh. Sounds prey typical to me”, Daleworth said and grinned. “But I'll give
you a few hints: He's not actually that bad guy to talk with when he doesn't have
anything really obviously pressing things to aend to, and you might even be able
to get something talked through before he has to run to the next appointment.
Secondly, he's actually aboard Mannerheim right now, and won't depart until
evening, last I heard. irdly, when he's got nothing to do in the morning, he
tends to oversleep…”
February 18, 2632, 08:34 UTC
Splashdown.
e orum had ordered in a stream most unanimous in nature. e o-
rum's will be done. e orum shall receive. e Others of the Collective shall
deliver.
e strategy had been simple. e drive courageous. e direction clear.
e human vessels were dumbfounded and blind. ere was absolutely no
resistance to the glorious advance of the Many-Headed Device of Glorious Con-
quest.
e precious large island would offer no resistance. is pathetic, nearly aban-
doned fortification would prove to be adequate base. Occupied but undefendable.
Destroyable if needed.
Humans knew of factories producing factories in soware. ey would not
be prepared for factories producing factories in the realm of reality.
e factory existed.
e factory remained.
e factory slept.
e hydra slept.
February 18, 2632, 09:12 UTC
General Pyrehill was having one of those days.
e fine crewmen of the Light Frigate Suez Camel had made the first mistake.
Scanner men weren't supposed to take any breaks; they were supposed to keep
constant wat on the things. is was the kind of an obvious working procedure
that most people would take for granted. No, it definitely didn't say in the regu-
lations that it was okay for all of the crew manning the scanners to take a lun
break at the same time. Perhaps, General Pyrehill thought, it was a high time that
su regulations would be put to their place. is sort of screwups were nothing
unheard of from the scanner and communications crew of the Suez Camel; Just
last year, they had taken part in a electronic warfare exercise and were supposed
to be monitoring a deep space region for any anomalies. It should have been com-
mon sense that the ships went to passive electromagnetic use only, and streaming
music over ansible carrier was exactly the opposite of what that was supposed to
be all about.
e Suez Camel's bumbling was just one of the problems. Yamamoto, an oth-
erwise upstanding vessel General Pyrehill had nothing bad to say about, had expe-
rienced a rather strange communications relay failure; they had been right behind
Uranus at the time the Planner cra came to the view, and obviously all of the
comm repeaters in the region were in the shadow side at the time. Of course the
less expensive comm repeaters had to be solar powered and not have any cell
power le for emergency use. No one wanted to call from behind Uranus, and
while Yamamoto's crew were smart and mature enough to ignore ancient jokes,
the fact that the relay wasn't operational was damning enough.
e Suez Camel had a protocol failure. e Yamamoto had a tenical failure.
But nothing could quite top the failure of Bismar: e Planner cra had simply
passed over it directly from rear. Bismar's barely had the time to say “dammit,
it's coming from behind”. at was followed by a comment along the lines of
“dammit, well, it's now ahead of us. And already out of torp range. Oh bugger.”
And now, Pyrehill was expecting even worse news from the near-Earth scan-
ner crews.
“What the hell do you mean you didn't see where it went?” Pyrehill said, his
palm firmly planted on his face.
“It is not quite as bad as it sounds, sir”, scanner crew overseer, Mayor Bartholomew
Foxley said. “We have some data. We know where it went. Sort of. Within, uh,
a fan paern kilometers long, give or take.”
“Oh, good, I thought you lost it for good.”
“We at least have a sear area, sir. e problem is, it appears the cra delib-
erately dited in open ocean.”
“What makes you think that?”
Foxley pushed a few buons. e orbit appeared on the screen; it had a sharp
turn, followed by something unusual: A doed line that ended in a fan-like pat-
tern instead of a single cross indicating where the cra would have landed nor-
mally.
“It appears to have taken a normal orbit, but diverted sooner than usual to a
landing course. It could be a planned descent, if a bit rough ride at that. And it
VIII. A N T
definitely hit ocean — they tend to know how to brake in air.”
“So where did the damn thing land?”
“Somewhere in the North Sea, off the coast of Britain.”
“Could it have disintegrated in the atmosphere?”
“e velocity ange was too well planned for that. It probably made it in one
piece — even if we disregard its shielding.”
“All right. We need Navy cooperation for finding the whereabouts of that
damn thing.”
February 18, 2632, 09:04 UTC
Dr. Grovepath couldn't believe it. When Major Plaerman said he had an open-
door policy, he didn't really expect that the man actually slept with his cabin door
open. On the other hand, he was a lile bit apprehensive — he always thought
military types slept with their sidearm under their pillows. He hadn't bothered to
ask about the veracity of this strange stereotype from Daleworth, and he obviously
hadn't eed how Daleworth slept.
“Mbblhh?” Plaerman mumbled. “What now? Oh, Dr. Grovepath. Good
morning.”
“Good morning, sir. I hope I didn't wake you”, Dr. Grovepath said.
“Well, you did, but I was on the process of geing up, truth to tell.” Plaerman
sat up; he had been sleeping with pants and t-shirt on, whi was, knowing him,
probably the most naked state he ever dared to undress himself to. “Ah, I guess
you want to discuss about the security clearance?”
“For the last time, I don't want a security clearance. I just want our previous
level of access to the resear material. Unclassified material.”
“I pulled up Captain Underwood's and Major Rankin's files, but I couldn't
find out what they did”, Plaerman said. “ere doesn't seem to be any records
on anges on the protocol, doctor. Could you please explain what horrible things
these people did to you?”
“It seems to me that you've only focused on direct orders from these gentle-
men”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Basically, Major Grace Rankin got the Roetry and
Space Resear Centre's outrea program going. e RSRC DataBank.”
“I was aware of that. And Captain Bill D. Underwood didn't ange its direc-
tion, as far as I can tell. I was under the impression the DataBank was still going
strong. Tons of information, all readily accessible…”
“Have you looked at the DataBank lately? Purely as a user, not at the content.
We had extraordinarily good access to designs and specifications of the systems
during the Roet Lady's reign. When the Blind Billdee — just reporting what the
users called him, of course — came around, the old system was basically turned
into a bureaucratic nightmare. It was not his fault, I guess, because his underlings
said it was for the greater good.”
“I'm sure it was.”
“Greater good of the military, not the scientists. Perhaps you just noticed from
your per that the number of active users climbed by several thousand people.
You should have looked at the overall demographics. ousands of new military
users. ousands of less public-sector scientists. e system was fairly unusable
for what it did. If we wanted actual information, we'd need to fill applications.
Whi were never fulfilled. Bureaucracy. Ad-hoc user cliques — excuse me, coun-
cils, that quashed all contributions from non-military personnel. It would not
have maered, because we were ready to build our own systems for information
exange, but these people were so mired in their own politics that they threat-
ened us with legal action.” Dr. Grovepath drew some breath. “So please, since
you're in arge of this thing now, can you please tell these morons to get a clue?”
“I…” Plaerman began. “I was not actually aware of what was going on in the
user community.”
“I guess so. It seemed to me that maered to the leadership was that the
DataBank existed, data was fed into it, and user statistics showed that people
actually kept using the system. So I ask you: Rewrite the user policy. Get scientists
ba in. I beg of you. at's all I'm going to ask as a reward for my time here.”
“If you wish, doctor. I promise I will do mu to—”
A sharp ime came from the terminal by Major Plaerman's bed. “Contact.
Red. Baseless Chest.”
“—dammit, duty calls. It was nice to talk to you about these maers. I will
look into it.” Plaerman shoved Dr. Grovepath out of the room.
Dr. Grovepath began walking to his cabin. He couldn't but wonder what
“Baseless Chest” referred to, but it couldn't be anything good if “red” was men-
tioned.
IX Knightly Rivalry
February 19, 2632, 10:12 UTC
N
A in the Sun as it, once again, got its share of sun-
light from behind the planet. e science team aboard was making good
progress, and Dr. Grovepath had only needed to give some light tutor-
ing to some of his students on the proper draing and documenting methodology.
Now, he was happy with the results: it seemed that the old secrets of Avalon were
slowly taking modern shape. Many subsystems of the Steeds and the Knight's ar-
mour had already been modeled using modern methods. Dr. Grovepath found it
IX. K R
was a shame that Fyrehart had taken one brief look at the material the science
team had gathered and summarily ruled the whole project classified. Dr. Grove-
path would need to talk to him later on about that; aer all, that didn't make
one ounce of sense. Building mainery like this was hardly feasible from any-
one's military perspective, and besides, while the tenology was curious and
definitely centuries far ahead of the time in the early Middle Ages — absolutely
no surprise there — it just wouldn't compete with some of the tenologies of the
day. Dr. Grovepath was fairly certain that the only practical limitations to build-
ing the armours were the cost, the whole reanimation-of-the-dead tenology,
and furrow-browed generals who wouldn't even begin to consider using some-
thing as preposterous as walking tanks, unarmed with any modern projectile or
energy weapons, on the balefield. e Knights were a godsend on this particu-
lar war, but Dr. Grovepath couldn't imagine them being useful on any other type
of modern conflict. But then again, he didn't have Fyrehart's experience. Per-
haps General Fyrehart had a good reason to keep the whole thing classified. But
perhaps, Dr. Grovepath thought, he did not.
“Any news from the front?” Dr. Colbert asked. e scientist had assembled
for a curiously casual pa lun on the central amber of Avalon, and dared to
remove their helmets. With a lile bit of engineering effort, they had succeeded
in sealing the individual rooms of the New Avalon properly; it was not as difficult
feat as they had imagined, due to the strong metal hull of the station. is was
their first test of pressurising the central amber. e air pump hummed, the
Knights screeed and creaked a lile bit as they moved about. King Arthur,
Gawain, Galahad and Lancelot were out of their Steeds.
“Uh, yeah, I was supposed to tell King Arthur of the recent developments
while I was here”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Apparently, the enemies have made a
landfall. e problem is, we have no idea where the hell the enemies are.”
“Tidings most troublesome and grim”, Lancelot said. “I can sense the evil
threaten Britain again.”
“How did you guess?” Dr. Grovepath said. “Apparently, the enemy has landed
in the ocean near the east coast of British Isles.”
“And if it is up to me, then the vile enemy shan't rise from the murky icey
waves!” Lancelot bellowed.
“But we don't know where those things are. Or at least the military isn't sure
yet.” Dr. Grovepath sighed. “How goes the resear into history?”
“Spoy, I'm afraid.” Dr. Colbert sighed. “Merlin has some… books… but it
appears that these records are rather incomplete.”
“Why is that, Merlin?”
“I could not risk puing the only copy of those records aboard the New Avalon,
for I was afraid they might be destroyed. I was also afraid of… other things.”
“Really?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“I discussed of these reasons before. I'd… not talk of it right here and now.”
“Really? Why?” Dr. Grovepath had no idea what Merlin was speaking of.
Merlin seemed rather strained. “How do I speak of whi must not be spoken?
ere is one thing that I do not dare to discuss with the Knights…”
“Why, Merlin”, Dr. Grovepath said with amusement, “these are not the Dark
Knights of darkest creepy forest in sear of curious plants — I'm sure you can at
least mention it…”
“I don't dare to mention it.”
“What was it? Something to do with history? Camelot?”
“Shut up, you fool!” Merlin was alarmed.
“Mm… what could possibly be excluded from the history books? Guineviere,
wasn't it?”
ere was a bit of stunned silence in New Avalon.
“Uh, I hope I didn't make a big mistake”, Dr. Grovepath finally said.
“Sire, I advise you to remain calm”, Merlin said with a methodical tone. “een
Guineviere is long dead.”
“Guineviere”, King Arthur said. “Lovely memories fill my heart, Merlin, but
also thoughts of grimness. How… how could I forget about my een?”
“Sire, I assure you—”
“And now I remember the nature of our… differences, Lancelot”, King Arthur
said and turned to Lancelot. His tone was calculated and coldly polite, but his
posture far more hostile. He slowly raised his sword, and Lancelot did the same.
“As do I, oh unyielding King”, Lancelot said.
“Sire, your rivalry and skirmishes are long gone!” Merlin shouted. “I tried not
to upset you with too mu remembrance of things gone by. I beg of you, set
aside those old quarrels!”
“I do not remember that this feud was seled adequately”, King Arthur said.
“Sire, I assure you that you don't remember all of the details”, Merlin said.
“en tell me, wizard…” Arthur snarled, “what is the truth? Or is there any
truth in your words?”
Merlin drew breath. “On a second thought, I should let you two sele your
differences. I don't dare to say more, sire, for I feel you do not trust my words.
But the truth, as you should remember, lies within Avalon.”
“Avalon?” Arthur seemed puzzled. ere were things he couldn't remember,
but now he seemed to remember yet another thing. “Yes, the truth lies within
Avalon. If Guineviere is not aboard the New Avalon, then by all rights, she shall
lie in the Avalon of old. I shall seek our legendary island… once our feud is seled.”
Arthur turned to Lancelot.
“I see where you are geing at, oh blind King”, Lancelot snarled. “And I won't
allow it! I shall defeat you, and force the necromancer to bring Guineviere ba
to life — and she shall rule by my side.”
IX. K R
“And that cannot be done! Have at you, Lancelot!” Arthur raised the Excalibur.
Dr. Grovepath didn't like where this was going to. “Damn. Suit up!” he
shouted, and everyone in earshot dropped what they were doing and reaed
for their helmets.
“GUYS!” Dr. Colbert screamed. “Don't fight here! You could damage the ma-
inery!”
Lancelot guarded well against the blow; fortunately, Arthur seemed to come
to senses. “We shall fight for our honour elsewhere, Lancelot. e New Avalon
was not built for bloodleing among our own.”
“at is true. And I vowed to not spill blood of our fellow Knights. Shall we
begin a mighty Tournament to sele this maer, Arthur?”
Arthur laughed. “You would joust with our new Steeds, Lancelot? Our mounts
stampeding from the surface of Earth and from New Avalon's ports, clashing in
the midway⁈”
Lancelot uled. “Why not? It has not been done in the course of history.
If we're to do legendary deeds in this era, Arthur, we must do deeds that seem
legendary to the contemporaries.”
“Orbital jousting! Yesss!” Dr. Colbert said and looked happy. “Oh, sorry, I'm
just happy to see history in the making. is is just crazy and awesome enough.
I can see you guys are really in love.”
“Damn! Helmet on, Meryl!”
Despite Dr. Grovepath's worries, Dr. Colbert was not distracted by her joy, and
was quite aware of what was going on: e two Knights climbed to their steeds.
e alarm light that was aaed to the pumps flared up, notifying that the area
was about to go through momentary vacuum exposure. Lancelot's Steed sank
through the floor fast; Arthur's Steed sank through the hole far slower, readying
itself for a slower laun just outside New Avalon. e pumps whirred into action
once again; not mu of the central amber's contents had been disturbed by the
short leaks of air.
“Now we just need to find a way to wat this awesome spectacle”, Dr. Colbert
said eerfully. “Boris!”
“Right, doc?” said Boris Ivanov, one of Dr. Grovepath's students.
“See if we can get camera feed from some ship that's in the range.”
“I think we could get feed from one of the cruisers”, Ivanov said. “Perhaps
Nedelin…”
“Grave things, fellow scientists”, Merlin groaned.
“Oh.” Dr. Grovepath quit looking at Dr. Colbert's strangely eerful actions
and started to regard the disaster unfolding before his eyes. “Uh, I'm sorry for
mentioning Guineviere to the Knights.”
“What is done is done”, Merlin said. “But if you really want to help me, then
I suggest you will refresh my memory, in turn.”
“What do you mean?” Dr. Grovepath said.
“I… have neglected looking for the site of Avalon, so I do not know where it
exactly lies.”
“I see.”
“I just didn't think we would need to return to real Avalon just yet. But now,
we need to find its location. I could find it faster, if I had fresher access to maps.”
“So… you just need map data?”
“I may need to study the maps to find it.”
“Oh?” Dr. Colbert said. “So Avalon can be found if you just look at the maps?
why people haven't found Avalon? What's so difficult about it?”
“Because Avalon is not an island any more. Or, rather, it is part of another
island.”
“I see. Postglacial rebound?” Dr. Colber said.
“Your terminology stumps me, wise-woman.”
“Basically, uh… how do I explain this? I think the sea level has lowered since
the Middle Ages, and new ground has been revealed?”
“at could be an explanation for that. What was once a small island became
a bigger island, then it became a peninsula in another larger island.”
“I know just the cure”, Dr. Grovepath said. “Let me get my computer. I have
had problems geing to the military data lately, but they do offer excellent map-
ping systems to the public — you would be surprised how many great areo-
logical sites we can find with the World Federation Civil Space Agency's famous
World Wind soware…”
February 19, 2632, 13:14 UTC
e external cameras of the FTL Cruiser Nedelin had seen beer days. e griz-
zled baleship had taken part in numerous engagements with the Planners, and
Captain Larisa Volkova was famous for his skills in leading the combat from dis-
tance. She kept a bole of really awful Finnish borderline-industrial-grade vodka
stashed in a cupboard on the bridge, and took a swig for every Planner cra that
they could see from the windows, or even with the camera zoom. Captain Volkova
was, for a good reason, also known as the Sober Lara.
But still, Volkova wasn't particularly foolhardy: None could say that she eated
on the camera maintenance, even when the cameras were rarely useful in com-
bat. While the camera feed wasn't really perfect what came to the image quality,
it was plenty good enough for geing nice visuals on whatever was going on in
the vicinity of the ship. ey had the perfect vantage point for the epic bale of
the ages, even when the television had higher standards nowadays. Even with
the picture quality being only so-so, Dr. Colbert made sure the cameras recorded
IX. K R
everything. e epicness of the bale would need to be broadcast if she had her
way.
And from the darkest thiets of the rainforests of Brazil, whi from time
immemorial had been known as the dark and foreboding thiets of danger, daring
and intrigue, rose a smoke trail. e steed of Sir Lancelot, an ancient knight whose
heart was pure and whose deeds were true, ascended toward the cold stars.
From the blaze of billions of stars, yet in the skoring rays of daylight, basked
the fortification of steel and silicates, the space fortress known as New Avalon.
From its underside, the legendary King of Britons hung and let loose of his grip.
King Arthur descended. e fight had begun.
Roets fired. Gravity of the mother planet took hold of Arthur, who now
waw the gentle blaze of the atmospheric burn. He lowered the piercing weapons
of the ro cocoon, and knew Lancelot would have done the same. Lancelot's trail
of smoke had ended; thiest of the atmosphere was behind him…
It was a mad descent countered by mad ascent. e two Knights could only
think of the same, terrifying thought: eir opponent had tried to steal the heart
of the purest and most beautiful of eens, torn in her love between two valiant
heroes. It was a tragedy of misunderstandings, a tragedy of oices, a tragedy of
war.
It had been seled.
Or had it been?
ey did not know. ey did not remember. ey did not know.
But deep in him, Arthur knew the fight had been fought. ey had had dif-
ferences. Rivalry over her. ere had been a war between them. ere had been
unification. ere had been treaery.
It was Mordred's treaery. He knew that. He remembered. Merlin had been
right: Mordred was dead, and that was all that maered. Arthur knew he had
fought alongside Lancelot against the usurper Mordred, who had wounded him.
His enemy—
—But what about Guineviere?—
—And what had Merlin been saying? “Sire, this is not your steed. is is a
Steed. You have no armour; yours is a Mobile Armour. And you, sire, are no
longer a man…” Confusing old man. Strange wizard, who had been meddling
with politics—
—and who had been right so many times, his friend and comrade—
Hesitation let to doom in bale. Arthur had too mu time. He had hesitated.
He steeled himself. Lancelot closed in.
Hundreds of kilometers above the soil of Earth, two knights would meet.
e Steeds were not designed for this, and the lances were crude imitations
of the weapons they had used in honourful tourneys in centuries past. It was
pathetic. e lance was useless. e two Knights collided — not even at a great
velocity.
It was a sho, nevertheless, but Arthur could do lile but to wat. He could
feel nothing physical. He was no man.
He was shaken, but could only wat as he shook. ere were vibrations. Was
this even a fight?
Lancelot was no man either. Surely he felt the same way.
e two crashed Steeds fell, almost at the same rate as before. Engines turned
off. ey were enveloped in flames as they fell toward the sands of Africa.
is is foolishness, Arthur thought. He knew he had been taken in by emo-
tional impulse, the desperate need to do something honourable to show his valour
to Guineviere, who was long dead. And now that he thought of the maer, as
they hurtled toward the ground, he knew that the whole thing was pathetic. is
was no tournament. is was grown men toying with things in an epic scale. And
he was sure Lancelot felt the same way.
His mind went blank and dark. ere was still a long way to Earth. Maybe
he had died and he would not need to explain himself…
“Dr. Grovepath calling Arthur and Lancelot”, came the voice from command net-
work. “Are you there?”
Arthur wasn't sure how to respond.
He could see again. e Steeds had landed maybe a hundred meters apart,
apparently upside down, and Merlin had opened them remotely. Lancelot was
trying to get upright, but in his present state, this probably looked fairly impssible.
Dry desolation of the Saharan sand dunes opened all around them.
“I am here, doctor. Our fight was quite inconclusive, I'm afraid. Do you agree,
Sir Lancelot?”
“Sire, I apologise for geing overcome with emotion. is was a good fight,
but our score remains unseled — and I do not think it is even necessary to sele.”
“Very well”, Arthur said. “Apology accepted, as long as you accept my apolo-
gies for the same blunder. I'll call it a draw. Where are your legs, Lancelot?”
“Drawn asunder in the collision, sire”, Lancelot said as he tried to repair his
severed legs with the instruments found in the cocoon. “Merlin's dark magic
allows me to see detailed instructions on how to refit them. I shall be ready to
continue in no time.”
“Very well. Let us let this awful maer behind us for a while, Lancelot.”
“Well spoken, sire.”
Arthur sighed. “It was a strange and foolish fight. And here we lie, in the
endless sands of the Saracen lands”, Lancelot said.
“Did you have anything in particular to report, doctor?”
“Oh yes. Uh… I'm sorry that I got you so worked up before, but we may have
IX. K R
even bigger news. We have located Avalon. Let's just say that merlin refuses to
give the coordinates to you, unless you sele your… squabbles. And I think that
would what I would do, too.”
“Doctor”, Arthur said with a more jolly tone, “I give my solemn vow that I
shall work together in a civil manner with my fellow Knights to rediscover the
ancient tombs of Avalon.”
“And I shall solemnly vow the same, doctor”, Lancelot said.
“Excellent. When you are done with your repairs, we can head toward the
famous island. I can't wait to see it. Dr. Merrywood is already on his way there.”
“So what exactly happened?” Dr. Grovepath said, and seemed a lile bit confused.
“It's quite hard to say what actually went in their minds”, Merlin said, “but I
can take a few guesses.” Merlin smiled, if that robotic expression could be called
that. “I told him before that he is no longer a man. He is a ghost of a man. Spirit
of a man. Essence of a man.”
“But he doesn't seem to have realised what that really means, until now.”
“at seems to be the case. I did add a device to his Steed that could either
make him realise that fact, one way or another.”
“e lance?”
“A person of wits, who saw that device, would have laughed at it. e Knights
are people who act through ideals to strive for. For a Knight, a cylinder of ro
that is called a Steed is not a transportation device; it is a steed. If I call a lance-like
device a lance, then to them, it is a lance.”
“I see. is makes mu sense, actually.” Dr. Grovepath said. “So what you
are saying is that the knights are just ideas?”
“What is a ghost but an idea that continues to exist?” Merlin said. “at was
one of Morgan's favourite notions in her later years. Knights perish, but their idea
remains. Valour, honour, virtue. Why can't the abstract ideas simply take concrete
forms that, coincidentally, resemble what they were in the past? Can a Knight be
taken apart, separated to fundamentals, and reassembled to form another Knight?
e lance is not lance, it is a ghost of lance. e Knights are reborn as knights as
they always wanted to be. Part of them come from knights as they existed. Part
of them comes from their own imagination, aspirations, and ideals.”
“And you put that lance there to make them understand that just because an
idea of a Steed that can carry knights to the orbit exists, they shouldn't take things
too literally? About the Steeds, about themselves… about anything?”
“Yes. And at the same time, that is also what they should be doing. ey must
keep doing what they were born to do, but they must never forget that things have
anged. Fundamentally.”
“And more things ange, the more they stay the same. I can see it now. ey
are ideas of Knights. Ghosts of Knights. Doing Knightly things.”
“Precisely, my solarly friend.”
Dr. Grovepath smiled.
February 19, 2632, 18:12 UTC
Daleworth wasn't really suited for being a skipper, but here she was, on the wheel
of a patrol boat, carrying Dr. Grovepath with her.
e Space Marine Corps were, as the name suggested, primarily trained with
space vehicles, and it was not exactly common sense that the Space Marine Corps
even had actual boats. But just like the Navy had airplanes, the Space Marines
had real boats — though the fleet wasn't exactly big. is unarmed uggish-type
light patrol boat — not offering mu cargo space or shelter, best suited for short
excursions for a single squad — had, in fact, been loaned to Cornwall's coast guard
several years ago.
“Are we on course?” Dr. Grovepath asked over the radio. e science team that
had discovered the remains of Avalon based on Merlin's clues and a bit of detective
work based on the satellite maps were somewhere nearby, and the navigation
computer could barely get them to the right island. Daleworth was starting to
wonder if the results would have to wait until the journal was published.
“Okay, I can see you now”, Dr. Grasskin said over the radio.
“So I just go straight forward?” Daleworth said.
“I can see him!” Dr. Grovepath said. “Straight ahead.”
“Oh, there he is”, Daleworth said. e araeologist, with thi-rimmed glasses
visible too far away, his build slightly rotund in every way imaginable, could be
fairly clearly seen, standing on a big ro overlooking the bea. He was wear-
ing a dark green coat — not particularly visible in the dimming daylight. He was
waving a flashlight and his handheld computer that doubled as his walkie-talkie;
too bad the doctor wasn't thinking mu, really, and the flashlight was pointing
to the skies and not toward them. e balit display of the doctor's computer
was far easier seen to the distance.
Daleworth revved down the engine and the ship landed in the so sandy bea
with a quiet scrat.
“Hey, Paul! Just in time!” Dr. Grasskin shouted at them from his per on the
ro before he hopped down. “Robin is up the hill, and he's damn happy to be
here. e Knights radioed that they're coming in a few moments.”
As if on a cue, the skies roared. Dr. Grovepath, Dr. Grasskin and Daleworth
looked up and saw the Steeds descend from the quily darkening clouds of the
evening sky, seemingly on tra to land a lile bit away from where they were.
IX. K R
“is way!” Dr. Grasskin shouted. “It's really fascinating how the myths are
all somehow interrelated. We have had myths about the Isle of Avalon, a Cave
where Arthur was interred, and like. It appears there's some truth to them all. We
indeed have a cave on an isle.”
“Show us the way!” Dr. Grovepath said.
“It's right up here!” Dr. Grasskin said as they headed toward the top of the hill.
ere were some floodlights in the wooded area on the top of the grove.
“Hey, Paul!” Dr. Merrywood was siing by a ro, eating a triangle sandwi
and drinking tea from a thermos. “ank you for pointing me to a ki-awesome
site! I've got decades of work ahead, here.”
“I don't think anyone uses terms like ‘ki-awesome’ these days, Robin. It, uh,
fell out of fashion centuries ago.”
“I'm an araeologist, am I not?” Dr. Merrywood said.
“So what did you find here?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Well, there's a circle of stones here, whi we just figured was similar to
the Tor of the legend”, Dr. Grasskin said as they came to the top of a hill. Old
monoliths rose on the hill, quite reminiscent of the Stonehenge. e area was
overgrown with low bushes, and vines circled the old stones.
Moments later, they could hear the approaing steps of the Knights. Bushes
craled and snapped in the feet of the ancient armoured maines.
“is is the place”, Arthur said as he emerged from behind the small ridge.
“Stones whi mark the ancient resting place of the Companions of the Round
Table.”
“Our Sacred Avalon”, Lancelot said. “Many heroes lie here. We thank you for
finding it for us, friend knights and solars, even when it was never lost within
our hearts.”
“And the cave?” Dr. Grovepath said.
“Right here”, Dr. Grasskin said.
ere was, indeed, an opening in the ground. e area was overgrown, and
branes of the bushes had somehow grown to cover it.
Lancelot ran forth, slashing the brushes away, tearing the rest away as they
snagged in his bulk and metallic feet as he ran through the hole in the ground.
“So mu for the Sleeping Beauty”, Daleworth said.
Arthur followed the knight with the same haste. Daleworth and the scientists
shrugged and followed the two knights with a lile bit more careful stride, more
suited for methodical observations.
e hole was in the side of a gently rising hill, and revealed a shallowly slop-
ing passage. e corridor was fairly dark, and the scientists had to light their
flashlights — but even so, there was dull, eerie bioluminescent glow in the walls.
e cave walls looked like natural cave walls; aer the soil layer, the walls were
obviously mostly stone. ere was a layer of soil on the ground, now adorned
with the heavy footprints of the two knights, descending into darkness.
And from the darkness came light.
“I… I guess we're on the other side of the island” Dr. Grasskin said. “We didn't
have mu time to investigate it.”
“We're in the peninsula on the other side, I'd say”, Dr. Grovepath said. “e
cave goes downhill.”
“Right.”
“And what's that thing there?”
“Looks like daylight. ere could be sinkholes there; I guess the cave ceiling
had collapsed.”
e scientists came to a grand cave. e Knights were waiting for them in the
very centre.
e cave was about a quarter of a kilometer in radius. Inside, there was a hill
of grass on it, and on the grassy hill were circles of stone tombs. In the sacred
grove, overgrown with grass and vines, dozens of ornate sarcophagi could be seen,
arranged in orderly circles. Many had been le open millennia ago, now partially
crumbled and destroyed by the beat of the weather, the rains and snow that had
fallen through the great opening in the ceiling of the cave. Outside, the night had
finally fallen, and the Moon shone through the hole, lighting the scene with its
pale glow.
“So this is where the knights are buried”, Dr. Grasskin said.
Dr. Grovepath pointed his flashlight toward one of the tombstones. e writ-
ing was fairly easy to read, even when the monument was mostly overgrown.
“Sir Notay Peareyn of Disdale.” He wasn't really familiar with this Knight of the
Round, and toyed with this somewhat obscure knight's name and birthplace on
his tongue. “…oh, that can't be right.”
“Let's see what the knights have found”, Daleworth said.
As they came closer to the centre, they could see many of the sarcophagi in
the central part of the cave were uncovered and empty, whi made sense. e
Knights carried the coffins from within with them. In the centre were the closest
of the Knights, in the highest point was the supposed burial place of Arthur.
To be exact: Arthur, Lancelot… and Guineviere.
Two sarcophagi would be empty. One… might not be.
“Guineviere.” Arthur had broken down with tearless tears; overpowering sad-
ness, not at all dampened by la of meanical reaction. He was crying, though
his armour could not.
e ornate statue of the queen was ravaged with weather, but the queen's
beautiful features were still easy to see; su a finely iseled, refined face, the
noble posture of a royal upbringing, the stunning beauty of her figure. And be-
neath her statue lay a sarcophagus.
“Guineviere.” Lancelot was likewise in tears.
X. Dragonslayers
For out of Guineviere's heart grew a great spruce. e sarcophagus, and the
coffin within, was torn asunder by the tree's growth, the ancient seals long gone.
e ancient vows would never be fulfilled. Guineviere would stay dead, for-
ever dead, her body having only, perhaps, nourished scavengers and the tree so
many millennia ago.
e beautiful queen's fate was to be overgrown. e two Knights of the Round
Table broke down in emotion, thrusting their swords to the ground by the een's
destroyed coffin and praying for a miracle. But they both know her fate was to
be forever lost in mists of time, forever shrouded, forever replaced by duties and
obligations of the knights' vows.
is journey had been a diversion. e two knights had duties to follow, and
they resolved to fight harder.
February 19, 2632, 20:42 UTC
“We're old men, my liege. e past is gone.”
Lancelot was first to speak. e two knights sat on a roy outcropping on
the isle.
“We are nothing but old dust, and Guineviere is within all of us.” Arthur
seemed still stung, not sure what to say. “I wish I had listened to Merlin. is
was… foolish.”
“Not so foolish, my king. For we now know what has happened to her.”
“True. But, my friend, we have wasted time on things that shall not help our
cause. We must depart.”
“We must depart”, Lancelot repeated. “I shall follow your every wish, my liege.
Without question. Let us not be diverted by foolish quests, or foolish memories
of an era that is long gone. We must focus on the greater good… on problems that
are still ahead of us.”
“Wise words from my my fiercest knight. And as long as I have a capable,
trustworthy Knights like you by my side, we can easily accomplish everything.”
“And we shall do everything in our power to end this threat, my King.”
X Dragonslayers
February 20, 2632, 09:12 UTC
“L D.”
Daleworth had been lost in thought, taking a few seconds of break when she
wated the M– geing restoed in the Caen Base. New ammo was being
loaded, and she still had no idea where they'd strike next. But now, when Major
Plaerman appeared out of nowhere in the shule hangar, it was a sign that new
developments had taken place and something was going to go down fast.
Daleworth snapped to aention and saluted. “Anything new, sir?”
“At ease”, Plaerman said, returning the salute. “e Planners have gloated
again.”
“What did they say, sir?”
Plaerman took a small digital recorder from his poet, and pressed the play
buon. e all too familiar voice of the Planner collective took their voice. “We
are the Planners. Out of your oceans shall your nightmares rise. Many-tentacled
beast shall devour your mighty island you call Britain. For centuries, you have
feared the Kraken. Your nightmares have been but vague premonition of horrors
to come. We are the Planners. Our hydra shall devour you. Devour.”
Plaerman put the recorder ba to his poet. “Did you hear about the inci-
dent day before yesterday, lieutenant?”
“Not mu, just what was on the Network, sir”, Daleworth said. “A cra
slipped past the network, splashed in the ocean, and now no one knows where
the fu it is — pardon my Fren, sir.”
“at's about as far as we know, lieutenant. What the news didn't have is that
it was a new type of a Planner cra, and that it was somewhere off the coast of
Britain. Now, it's prey obvious they're going to construct something beneath the
sea surface.”
“Constructing, sir? Any details yet?” Daleworth asked.
“We've tried to find a satellite that could have sufficient resolution and equip-
ment to see what the hell was going on in the area where that thing splashed
down”, Plaerman said. “Now, we could get the first images. en some others.
Long story short: ere's many strange sea platforms that are waiting to be acti-
vated near many big ports. Several of them right near London. ey seem to be
like mobile amphibious Planner bot factories. Once activated, they could urn
out endless stream of these bastards.”
“Activated, sir?” Daleworth asked.
“ey seem dormant so far, and the biggest cra we could see was actually
located in the vicinity of the original splash zone”, Plaerman said. “at is the so-
called mothership this time, though we don't know its exact nature yet. Perhaps
it is a transmier of some sort. You get first-rate scanner gear aboard, it's being
transported here and should be here in…” Plaerman looked at his wat. “…about
minutes. We're sending our whole company there, and the knights handle the
rest. You go in first, and second and third platoons come about half a hour later
with bigger guns. If it develops into that.”
“So we're supposed to take out a mothership, sir”, Daleworth said, not partic-
ularly happy with the plan.
X. D
“With a Knight's help”, Plaerman said. “Don't forget that.”
“If that's all we can do, then that's what we'll do, sir”, Daleworth said.
“Don't worry, lieutenant”, Plaerman said. “We actually have some beer
plans worked out, but we'll tell you more about it once you are on your way. It
will all work out, with the Knights one hundred percent behind us.”
“Famous last words, sir”, Daleworth said. “But we can't see if this plan works
before we actually try it, sir.”
February 20, 2632, 09:44 UTC
e First Platoon was off to bale again.
Daleworth sat on the ba of the M–. She clung to her assault rifle and
looked at the dirty metal grating on the floor. Puddles of water from molten snow
were slowly evapotating as the ship soared in British airspace.
What was going to happen?
Daleworth sort of knew. She had known it before, but wasn't really sure to
admit it yet.
It was time to stop speculating, like everyone else did in the military. It was
time to get rational.
She thought of what had happened in Paris, and what the Planners said would
happen here. e pictures from the satellites had been abundantly clear. is was
a new type of a Planner cra.
But they had detected it. Before the Planners even said a peep. e cra may
have slipped past the defence network, but they'd know how to handle this.
She had to start thinking of the war logically.
e Planners had a plan.
ey didn't have a good plan.
It suddenly hit Daleworth that none of the plans the Planners ever did were
actually very cunning. Sure, they were scary. ey were devastating. ey were
followed by horrenduous gloating. ey raised questions. e top brass, and she
too, were prone to analyse these aas to death. What if…
“What if… the Planners are actually retarded?” Daleworth said.
“Ma'am?” Staff Sergeant Haman raised his gaze and looked at Daleworth
from the other row of seats.
“Never mind, sergeant”, Daleworth said. “I was just thinking aloud.”
“Well, they are just dumb bots, basically, aren't they, ma'am?”
Daleworth didn't reply. ey had been thinking about the war rationally,
because they always thought the enemy was being rational. And, of course, to
large extent, that was true. e enemy was rational and systematic. But also
unpredictable.
It suddenly started to look to Daleworth like the Planner sa's boom was
starting to show. e enemy was not being scary. ey had seen everything.
She had to wait and see what was going to happen in this aa. If it would
turn out like she thought, then she could probably say, with dead certainty, that
the Planners were not scary any more.
e First Platoon would always head to the danger, certain that they wouldn't
be defeated with old tris. e thing was, even in Paris, it had started to seem
like the Planners didn't have any new tris.
ey were aaing the Earth out of desperation. Not due to inevitable con-
quest for resources or whatever. It was bullying, plain and simple.
And she had craed the jaws of a few bullies in the past. ere was nothing
to it.
Perhaps there would be nothing to this fight, too. With or without the Knights.
Was this Paul's point? Maybe not. is was what Daleworth felt, and what
she hung on to.
Behind the polarised visor of her combat helmet, Daleworth smiled. e Pla-
toon wouldn't need her smile to win. ey'd just need her continuing resolve.
And that was what she was going to provide anyway.
e fight was already won. If it wasn't, there just wasn't any justice in the
universe.
February 20, 2632, 11:16 UTC
“e mothership is located in the sea, very near to the Roughs Platform”, Plaer-
man said over the command link. “It's a bit out due southeast from Ipswit.”
“Copy that”, nd Lieutenant Ford said. “Coordinates received.”
“Advice you to have caution when approaing the tower”, Plaerman said.
“It is occupied.”
“Roger that”, Daleworth said. “Ford, get weapons online just in case, but don't
fire without my command.”
“Yes, ma'am.”
“Now, we believe this cra is some sort of a communications hub, but we don't
know what it will broadcast. We've deployed jammers on the other sites and the
Knights are trying to assault them as we speak, but we have no idea how the hub
will send out the instructions. Provide air support for Sir Palomides.”
“Roger that. Beta Squad, man the starboard guns, Gamma Squad on the port
guns.”
“Ma'am, yes ma'am!” the squadmen shouted in unison. e soldiers stood up,
and ran to the second level of the shulecra, where the heavy weaponry were
placed.
X. D
“So either destroy that cra, or beer, try to figure out how and what it will
broadcast before it does that”, Plaerman continued. “It might help us. But the
priority is to stop it from transmiing orders to the factory units.”
“Roger that.”
“I believe you can handle it”, Plaeman said. “ʰ Company Command out.”
e video window disappeared from the communications display.
e M– soared to the sea, and for a precious few seconds, the platoonful
of men could contain their curiosity. But no more.
“What the hell the mayor meant when he said the tower is occupied, ma'am?”
Staff Sergeant Haman said.
“He means the Roughs Platform is manned by a graying loon called Winston
Bates.”
“Uh…” Haman said.
“He thinks the platform is an independent country, and won't recognise the
World Federation authority.”
“is sounds familiar”, Haman said.
“He calls it the Principality of Sealand”, Daleworth said.
“Right! I've heard of that, ma'am.”
“And last we eed, he's got a gigantic anti-air cannon on the platform. He
uses it to fire at ships and helicopters that approa the tower.”
“So why doesn't the WFDF just put an end to that, if he's so dangerous?”
Daleworth grinned. “Where's the fun in that?”
“Approaing Roughs Platform, ma'am”, Ford said.
“Whoa!” Haman shouted as he looked at the monitors showing picture from
the outside. “Dammit. at's the most post-apocalyptic shit I've ever seen in
British isles.”
“I agree, sergeant”, Daleworth said. “at least if you don't count Sheppey.”
Principality of Sealand had seen beer days. Originally an anti-aircra gun
platform in World War II, it consisted of two concrete towers that supported a
platform above them. Despite the maintenance by the Bates family, one of the
towers had collapsed in when a runaway robotic science vessel with a mal-
functioning LIDAR collided with it; the disaster miraculously didn't take the plat-
form above it with it, and the other column was le precariously standing. e
platform had been evacuated and temporarily sawn in half while the family gath-
ered money to rebuild the other tower. Sealand's operations had taken a small hit,
and with the rise of the World Federation, the Bates progeny mostly focused on
shooting at anything and everything nearby. Even the rest of the family started to
think that Prince Winston D. S. Bates, III, esq., Ph.D. (Faculty of General Science
and Numeric Maers, University of Sealand, rather controversially accredited by
the currently existant but practically vacant Sealand Board of Education) took
defence of the glory of the religion, home turf — or metal and concrete — and
the family honour a lile bit too far. He also hadn't managed to secure further
funding for rebuilding the tower, whi had a few visible missing pieces in it, and
it was a small wonder that the tower yet stood.
“Arthur, sir, did you receive the coordinates?” Daleworth said.
“I have, dame Daleworth. Sir Palomides has taken your quest.”
“I can't see him yet”, Daleworth said.
A large clank came from port side. Open hailing annel in network flared
up. “Goddamn Federation goons! Get the fu out of my waters!”
“Direct hit to port side, ma'am”, Ford reported. “Probably just le a dent.
Luy the shell didn't explode.”
Another loud bonk came to the side. “Bates has woken up, I see. Ahem.”
Daleworth swited to the open annel. “Calling Principality of Sealand. is
is Lieutenant Mielle Daleworth of the World Federation Space Marine Corps
shulecra M– calling Principality of Sealand. Please cease fire, we wish
no hostility toward you and we are trying to neutralize Planner presence on the
area.”
“is is a fuing ploy, isn't it? Where are the fuing Planners, huh?”
Daleworth shrugged. Prince Bates was off the roer again. “About meters
due north from the tower. It should be close enough to see from where you are,
Your Royal Highness.”
Even without video feed, Daleworth could practically imagine Bates looking
out from his cannon and eyeing north'ard. “SHIIII-IIIIT!” From the open annel
came the scream most unbefiing to royalty. “Goddamn robot bastards! I'll blow
your fuing carcasses open and turn your tower into my fuing new tower, god-
damn it! Switing to EMP shells! And you, Federation bit, mind my fuing
blast!”
“Fu!” Daleworth shouted to he open annel and laughed. “Dial up soap
water to the dispersal cannons, Ford! Looks like we have a royal poy mouth to
wash!” She was fairly sure that Ford would get the joke and wouldn't report ba
that they didn't actually bring in the riot or rescue gear selection that included
detergent dispersal paage. ey did bring in a .-ton “Sassy Lass” Penetrat-
ing Fortification Demolition Bomb model , that could ruin Bates's day. But she
felt like toying with Bates a bit and not mentioning lile details like that right
off the bat, because generally people were supposed to realise that World Federa-
tion Defence Forces Moonhawks were routinely armed with all sorts of devastat-
ing weaponry and excessively annoying the crew could potentially lead to those
weapons being used. Bates had, of course, not annoyed the crew quite enough
yet; had the shule been actually damaged by explosive shells, Daleworth might
have reconsidered, even when the irony of bomb's designation could kill her. Yet,
she needed to think for a second as she worked the computer and reviewed their
situation. What tower? And how the hell did Bates get su dangerous munition
X. D
in his hands? And would they work just as well as his high-explosive shells? Oh
well, it'd be clearer once she saw what was going on outside…
Daleworth swited to port side monitor to finally take a look at the situation
outside, and was not surprised. e Planners had, indeed, started to erect a tower
a bit farther away from where the other Fort Roughs tower had stood. Bates was
busy wining his cannon to point the other way.
“Damage report, Ford?” Daleworth asked.
“Hull mostly green, a few yellows”, Ford said. “Can't risk going to orbit in this
condition, but I think we didn't get any damage we couldn't fix with a bit of good
old sledgehammering.”
“Okay. Are EMP counters up?” Daleworth asked.
“All green”, Ford said.
“Good.”
Bates finished cranking up the cannon and let the shell fly. e bla-painted
Planner tower trusses, whi were being constantly built — new sections rose
from underwater, got hoisted to top with some sort of a meanical and magnetic
system, and clied to their place — were fairly sparse, and the first shell just
went through them, landing in the water behind the structure. As the second
shell was being loaded, more bla trusses rose from the sea, and the structure
seemed far more solid when the second EMP shell was fired. It knoed off some
of the self-assembled pipes of the truss, but didn't cause any discernible effect.
“How about we offer to evacuate you, Highness?” Daleworth asked. “We
wouldn't want to interfere with your national defence, of course, but it seems
your dreaded EMP devices don't exactly work as intended.”
“Don't you fuing worry! I've got nothing to worry about. Eat copper, fuing
robots!”
Bates fired another shot, this time plain ordinary high-explosive shells that
still appeared to have a lile bit of a lingering morning mood and didn't want to
get up from the bed. eir mass, however, managed to crush some of the bots
that had swarmed up to the surface. Some of them were turning their weapons
toward the Roughs Platform.
“No, seriously.” Daleworth shouted to open annel. “Don't know how you
handle the things, but I heard your predecessor was more sensible what came to
evacuation in case of clear and present danger. We're coming to get you, Bates.
Let us handle this.”
Daleworth hadn't paid mu aention, but now she had barely time to register
the streak of smoke that descended from the sky. A Steed plummeted to the ocean.
“What the FUCK was that?” Bates screamed.
“Uh… at was Sir Palomides, Knight of the Round Table.”
“Are you fuing with me?” Bates screamed.
“Sorry, man, you're way too old for me, I'm afraid”, Daleworth said.
“No, the fuing knight! I'm not leaving my country at the mercy of some
fuing raghead!”
“Seriously, what the hell are you babbling about?” Daleworth was starting to
lose her nerves.
“Palomides was a fuing raghead, wasn't he?”
Daleworth sighed. e guy was either demented or brilliant, and she just
couldn't tell. “Christianised Saracen, as far as I can remember. But I assure you
that in his present condition, his ethnicity is in no way going to maer. Because
he's dead.”
“at's mu, mu fuing worse!”
“Oh, shut up already, silly old man.” Daleworth gried her teeth.
Daleworth gave a sign to Haman, who had mounted a grappling hook launer
by the side door, and loaded a zipline coil in. Haman shot out the zipline, and
gave thumbs up to Daleworth. e rescue could begin.
“Okay!” Daleworth shouted to the open link. “Now hold still while we get you
hell out of there.”
Haman had been giving last-minute instructions to Private First Class New-
kins, who had found a good nie in zipline operations and had had less use for his
heavy-weapons skills than he thought. Newkins went forth, buffeted surprisingly
mu by the brisk wind but his grip never straying from the line. Once New-
kins got tho his destination, there seemed to be very lile struggle on part of
Prince Bates, who could see that the platform's defence had goen a lile bit
too complicated to handle alone. e Planner tower groaned and clanked in the
growing wind.
And out of the sea climbed Sir Palomides. With his shield on the ba and
sword sheathed, the huned warrior used some kind of grappling devices —
Daleworth liked to think them as detaable hands — to climb the truss struc-
ture at a brisk pace, with water barely having time to drip off. Beside him, with
a teremendous roar of the waters, a bit of Planner structure emerged from icy
waters. Some kind of a rectangular thing — if it even could be called rectangular,
though Daleworth didn't want to think the implications of non-Euclidian geome-
try rising from the ocean, even when this was obviously the wrong ocean — rose
from the waves.
Lasers — zap zap zap — lasers! Daleworth looked surprised as Palomides leapt
to the emerging Planner cra's de. e strange, aerodynamically shaped cra
could now be seen in full, rising from the waves way too close to comfort. e
blueish cra — colour obviously osen for camouflage, but that hadn't fooled the
scanners — resembled a cross between a flying saucer, manta ray and a submarine.
e tower was being constructed on the thing's de, and now Daleworth could
see its purpose: it was obviously going to be some sort of a communications tower,
able to broadcast its commands to all around the Britain.
X. D
In middle of the tower's laser fire, Palomides stomped on the de. He ran to
the bots that were hauling materials from the small doors on the de, cleaved
one in half and smashing one with his arm. He took his sword and cleaved some
of the truss structures. e tower creaked, but didn't fall.
“Have at you, metallic menacers!” Palomides roared. “My strength is the
strength of a hundred of your kind, for I have the heart whi you la! Britain
shall prevail! For valour!”
“Daleworth to Sir Palomides”, Daleworth said over command link. She wasn't
sure what sort of orders Palomides had goen, but things seemed to be going well
even without instructions. It was just that she needed some order. “Don't worry
about the tower, just destroy the construction bots first and anti-air weapons next.”
“By your word, dame Daleworth”, Sir Palomides replied. With a few leaps
over twisted, bla metal, Palomides cleaved his way through some of the re-
maining construction bots. “Your destruction is the will of God! And I am His
humble servant, instrument of your demolition!”
“What the hell is that guy babbling about?” Daleworth muered to herself.
is was turning almost amusing.
“Semisentient cylinders of mostly copper! Face the wrath of my trusty broadsword!
Aaa! A-hah! I shall cleave you in twain, villain!”
Daleworth started to wonder if there was some sort of an amusing undercur-
rent in all these legends—
“Yaah! Hyaah! Hoo! —Aah‼!”
—And then Daleworth noticed that there was nothing amusing going on. She
looked at the video feed and didn't see movement. What was going on out there?
“Daleworth to Sir Palomides.”
“T…the vile v-v-v-v-villains caught me o-o-off guard, dame. Construction
mainery is… d-d-d-destroyed. I've s-s-suffered a hit. My b-b-body doesn't seem
to f-f-f-function properly, dame.”
“Fu. Um… Will you hold up if we blow up the tower?”
“I-i-i shall r-retreat to m-my Steed. I-i-i can barely move.”
“ʰ Company Command to ˢ Platoon”, Plaerman imed in through the
command network. “Bomb the tower. I repeat, bomb the tower.”
“Say again, Major?” Daleworth asked. “Want us to drop the Sassy Lass?”
“We don't know if the Planner cra has shielding, but it seems the tower
they're building doesn't have shielding. If we can take out the tower, the mis-
sion is as good as done. Just stop the bastards from broadcasting the signals.”
“What the fu is a Sassy… holy fuing shit, you can't really mean…” Bates
protested.
“Sir, will you take responsibility if the Roughs Platform is damaged in the
bombing run, sir?” Daleworth just couldn't contain the slight amusement in her
tone.
“I will”, Plaerman said. “Now bomb that tower to the stone age.”
“Oh no you don't! Oh no you fuing don't!” Bates screamed — unable to move
or actually do anything about the maer, as the Alpha Squad hadn't even need
any specific order to restrain a rather restless civilian that was causing trouble in
the shule.
“Will comply.”
“Command out.”
“Ford!” Daleworth shouted. “You heard the man! Bombing maneuvers!”
“Roger”, the pilot replied.
“Newkins, quit fuing around with the ziplines and take the bomb sights!”
Daleworth shouted.
“Gladly, ma'am!” Newkins shouted and ran to the vacant seat by the targeting
computer in the copit. Daleworth idly wondered when was the last time anyone
had not said they'll handle the shule weapon systems “gladly”.
“Everybody else, brace for bombing run!” Daleworth herself kept standing,
but took a good grip of the loops on the crew bay's ceiling.
“Got target, sir?” Newkins said.
“I have the target, private”, Ford said. “Run height?”
“Run height, .”
“Copy that.”
e engines howled as the shulecra shot forth, taking a good counterclo-
wise loop to south and to east. e shule aerburners fired and took the shule
to the meter ceiling.
“Any sight of the knight, Newkins?” Daleworth shouted to the copit.
“Negative, ma'am”, Newkins said, examining the video feed on the weapon
console. “Camera resolution is shit, but I can't see the knight the de.”
“Okay, guess we need to assume he got off, then”, Daleworth said. “As you
were.”
“Commencing run”, Ford said.
“Dropping the fork”, Newkins said.
With a bit of a creak and a very loud clunk and tremble, the bomb bay doors
opened and the shulecra was ready for divebombing.
“You can't be fuing serious!” Bates protested.
“We try to minimise the damage to the platform, sir”, Daleworth said. “Don't
we, Newkins?”
“Sure do, ma'am!” Newkins shouted.
“See, Bates?” Daleworth said. “Nothing to worry about!”
“If there's one bit of concrete off its place…”
“…you'll just thank us for removing the crumbled concrete so that your re-
pairmen won't have to”, Daleworth said. “Why don't you fuing relax already.”
“Drop height ”, Newkins said. “Slope nominal.”
X. D
“Approaing drop height”, Ford said. “Brace for evasion!”
“Bombs away!” Newkins shouted. Barely nothing could be heard as the bomb
was loose.
“Shit!” Bates screamed.
“Bank right!” Ford screamed as the shulecra's dive leveled and the shule
turned sharply to right — and sped up as the engines fired again.
“Drop nominal!” Newkins shouted. “Told this was precise, sir! Don't worry
about your fort!”
“Too bad the bomb will level the fort anyway”, Daleworth said.
“But you promised!” Bates roared in anger. “You fuing bit!”
“Nah, I was just kidding.” Daleworth laughed. “You're so funny when you get
mad.”
“ 'plosion in THREE! TWO! ONE!…” Newkins shouted. Everyone braced for
the explosion.
e explosion was gigantic, and Daleworth was fairly sure that the sad re-
mains of the Roughs Platform would crumble due to the sound alone — but she
was not entirely sure if the thing would remain standing. She was fairly confi-
dent, however. In the video feed fed to her helmet, the platform, and the Planner
cra, had disappeared in a giant vapour cloud.
“What happened?” Bates was, for once, stunned and unable to swear, but that
didn't last too long. “What the fu happened?”
“Scanner report?” Daleworth asked.
“Direct hit to the target, ma'am! Planner tower is gone, other stuff pending!
…and the Roughs Platform still stands, ma'am!”
Daleworth grinned wide. “See? I told you not to worry”, she said to Bates.
“Take us closer to the surface, Ford. We need to look at the area closer with the
scanners.”
“Roger”, Ford said.
As the shulecra looped the other way and descended, the vapour cloud had
dried away.
“Palomides!” Daleworth shouted to the command link.
“I s-s-s-survive, dame Daleworth.”
Daleworth was happy to hear the Knight's voice. “Get ba to Avalon, Knight.
You've fought well.”
“I fear my S-s-s-s-te-Steed is damaged. I shall embrace the long cold of the
ocean as my life ends. Farewell!”
“Nonsense!” Daleworth had thought the silliness would end here. “Do we
have li gear, Ford?”
“Win is in the weapons paage, ma'am. But no other rescue gear.”
“Do you think the win can take the Steed's weight?”
“Easily, ma'am.”
“Good!” Daleworth shouted. “Haman and Fairwind, prepare for a bit of an
ocean dive. You're going with me to aa the cables.”
“Yes, ma'am!” the two soldiers shouted in unison.
“Now, how's the fuing Planner cra?”
“I think it looks just about as punctured as the bloody carrier in France, ma'am”,
Newkins said from the weapons console. “Giant hole and everything.”
“at's a bit tenical explanation, Newkins”, Daleworth said. “Care for a bit
simpler one?”
“No EM sources in scanners, hull breaed, most of the hull fragments the
scanner pis up seems completely wreed, ma'am. Debris everywhere in the
vicinity. It has already scaered on the sea floor.”
“Okay”, Daleworth said. “And the Roughs Tower?”
“Minor damage, but looks like it's still standing.”
Daleworth flipped through video feeds. “You call that minor damage?”
“What's going on?” Bates screamed in confusion. “I demand you show me
what has happened to Sealand!”
“Okay, I'll show you, but only because you asked relatively politely”, Dale-
worth said and turned to the space marines that were holding him. “Bring the
man here.”
“Well, most of that was just a result of the vapour cloud, I think the Planner
cra was far enough so that the tower was spared of the showave's effects…”
“Goddamn it!” Bates seemed relatively collected under the circumstances.
“Well, it seems to be standing”, Daleworth said, “but I wouldn't… recommend
seing foot on it. It's almost like everything was sandblasted. Or vapour-blasted.
How the hell did you think the thing was going to survive for millennia, or what-
ever you claimed in the Network ba in the day?”
“I… well, I guess I need to increase the repairs budget.”
“You do that. And buy some new ammunition with the reparations you'll get
from the WFDF.”
“Keep your fuing money, you fuing toss-bombers.”
“Is that even a word?” Daleworth said. “I've lived out of Britain for too long
to know my way around the modern vernacular.”
“Nope, ma'am, I guess he's just stiing to the basics”, Haman said.
“We'll drop you off in Ipswit once we head that way”, Daleworth said to
Bates. “Might not be wisest thing to set your foot on that thing. Beer come ba
with the repair crew as soon as possible. I don't think that thing can take any
more beating.”
e Roughs Platform had taken a huge beating: large blos of concrete had
fallen off, and one could prey mu see through the exposed rebars. Most of the
things on the top platform had been blown away, the remains of a shed and the
anti-aircra cannon being just about the only things still le standing.
X. D
“Wines ready, ma'am”, Ford reported.
“Plaerman to Daleworth”, Plaerman said over command link. “Outstand-
ing work so far. I've already told Arthur that you'll try to recover Palomides and
ferry him ba to New Avalon. Over and out.”
Daleworth smiled. One knight down, but she just knew that they'd be able
to recover Palomides and bring him ba. ey would rescue, Merlin would fix.
Everything was in order and harmony. As long as the idea of the Knights still
stood, they could not be killed. ey would be invincible as long as they believed
in the Knights, and kept the Knightly virtues in mind.
It was oen said that it is sweet and noble to die for one's country. Daleworth
suddenly remembered what had happened to the man who said that. He had
fled, so he could die for his country another day. It was not cowardice; it was
rationality.
e Knights exemplified that. ey had died. eir ideas lived on.
Glory in patriotic death was, plainly and obviously, not benefiting the soldier
who died.
e glory was important because it inspired the living.
Part III
Forces of Heaven
XI e Mistake
February 20, 2632, 12:09 UTC
T Q F.
e Hydra had failed. An adversaries that the humans had allied themselves
with seemed to not have even made a dent on the body of the mainery. e
destruction of the main unit was human doing, and human doing alone.
And if they understood what they had just done, they would eventually un-
derstand what the destruction of the main unit meant.
e orum knew that humans were perplexing. ey saw hope and opti-
mism in all the wrong places. A single, meaningless display of good lu could
turn the entire tide of the bales.
ey should not be allowed to savour the victory. ey had just goen their
share of dumb lu. And with dumb lu, came optimism. With optimism, fear
was gone.
e fear had been kept in reserves. It was time to show the humans what fear
really meant.
e orum was Unanimous.
February 20, 2632, 13:22 UTC
“I'm glad to see you are still with us, Sir Palomides,” Daleworth said.
“I have felt worse blows in my time, dame”, Sir Palomides said. “Losing the
functionality of my armour was quite a strange experience, truth to tell. It was as
if I was aware of what was happening, while observing myself from distance.”
“I see”, Merlin said. “e way our minds work is sometimes quite curious
indeed.”
Palomides's body lay on the repair table in the New Avalon. is was the first
time the scientists could actually see inside the Mobile Armours while the Knight
was fully operational and conscious, so most of the scientists were gathered in
Merlin's shop to observe Merlin's repairs. It was one thing to examine the spare
parts that Merlin kept in New Avalon's forges, but this was the real thing. Merlin
had been refusing to let the scientists see the actual functions of the knights, and
Arthur had wanted to keep every knight in fully functional state — even when so
far, there had been no need to send all of the knights to some strange quest.
Palomides's armour had been split in two sections, with the main motor units
in the lower “abdomen” and the life support units — whatever term you wanted to
use right here — in the “est” section. Merlin had also detaed the arm sections
XI. T M
to upgrade some of the parts. Dr. Grovepath had had some insightful ideas on
how to make the arms behave in more natural manner; the “hands” Merlin had
constructed long ago were quite crude, with only three of the fingers in both
hands actually working, and even on them, only two “bones” on ea finger had
any articulation.
“Mine legs feel cold, wizard”, Sir Palomides said.
“I've heard people complain about cold legs when their bodies have been cut
in half”, Daleworth said. “You're luy that Merlin can still stit them in, and
isn't even in any hurry to do so.”
“Hmm. e idea of the Knighthood persists…” Dr. Grovepath said.
“…and so does the idea of pain.” Daleworth said.
Even Daleworth was quite curious about how the armour really worked, and
she couldn't contain mu of her curiosity as she peeked in the est section of
the armour. In the cavity, she saw an enclosure that did resemble a sarcophagus,
made of gliering metal; the outer layer was titanium, inner layer was lined with
lead. Daleworth could see pipes, cables, strange boxes, a few unaaed lines and
pistons, some lines tied at the end to prevent things from leaking out as Merlin
fixed the thing; the tenology seemed familiar, but the strangeness was in the
lile details.
“Just curious — what actually would kill the Knights?” Daleworth asked. “In
tenical sense.”
“I would prefer not to tell you that”, Merlin said.
“Would puncturing the sarcophagus do that? I guess that's where you keep
the dust of the dead…”
“I… suppose that's one way.”
“…and the pipes probably move that dust to the ‘brain’, wherever they are.”
“Fine, it is quite obvious that the secrets of death are well known to you. Not
only are you capable of taking life, you are well versed in destruction of non-living
things.”
Daleworth shrugged. “I kill robots on weekly basis.”
“But what is a death of a maine, hmm?” Merlin asked. “Are they dead? Can
they die?”
“Death is hard to define”, Daleworth said. “Killing is merely about taking
something apart, isn't it?”
“You could say that”, Merlin said.
“And what is apart, you can rebuild. I wish you could do something to humans
this easy”, Daleworth said.
February 20, 2632, 14:26 UTC
“Well, I could comfortably live in one of these rooms… if I were ten meters tall”,
Dr. Grovepath said.
“Nice big bed, though!” Daleworth said and sat down on it. “And the surface is
actually fairly comfortable. Really, I've slept on harder surfaces. I might actually
live here. Come on, try siing here.”
One of the rooms in New Avalon wasn't really built for any specific purpose.
It was a “bedroom”, fairly clearly; in a way, it sort of reminded Daleworth and
Dr. Grovepath of a weird bedroom beyond the star-filled monolith in a certain
famous work of speculative fiction they had been discussing on their first visit to
New Avalon. Merlin had just said the room was for temporary storage and for
items that needed careful handling, so the large padded area that looked kind of
like a bed was fairly undestandable. Still, it did look like a very opulent bedroom
in a very large castle.
Dr. Grovepath grinned. Daleworth inviting himself to sit by her like this was
almost ridiculously blatant, but he didn't really mind. “I'm not going to remove
the rest of my spacesuit, Mielle. I don't still trust on those pumps, you know.
e station just wasn't built for pressurisation…”
“…and this isn't quite my idea of a date either, Paul, hauling knights to some
space station and disturbing valuable scientific study. Please just come have a sit
here, Paul…”
Dr. Grovepath walked closer, smiling widely. “Don't mind tha… Oh my.” he
began, but Daleworth leapt on his lap and gave him a qui kiss, staring into his
eyes and smiling widely.
“Well, I can kiss people without dating them yet, can I?” Daleworth said and
grinned.
“Well, since you started it…” Dr. Grovepath said with a grin, and didn't waste
too mu time grabbing Daleworth in his embrace and kissing her ba — with
a bit less hurry than what Daleworth had done, because he wasn't trying to take
advantage of the surprise. She just knew he'd need to kiss her, and if a soldier
expected a direct assault, you wouldn't want to disappoint them…
“GUYS!” came a distorted, eoing sound from the lile speakers in the hel-
mets that lay on the bed beside the two lovebirds. Some scientist hollered on
the command annel. “Everybody! Look at public vid annel ! Major stuff!
Alert from the ship.”
“Shit!” Daleworth muered, and quily stood up, puing her helmet ba on,
while Dr. Grovepath tried to do the same.
“Saved in the ni of time from the evils of oral sex.” Dr. Grovepath grinned.
“Harrr”, Daleworth said, smiling but not particularly amused. She flipped
through the video feeds and puned in annel , quietly wondering if this
was someone's aempt at a joke. At least it was not the Planners; everyone knew
the Planners weren't supposed to try so blatantly obvious and, if a bit of an un-
XI. T M
derstatement was allowed, not very menacing aempts at scaring the people.
But with how the Planners operated these days, you never knew…
Red leers announced:
//We Planners Have A Plan For Conquest. We Shall Be Victorious.
The Quorum Shall Doom You On This Channel, 14:30 Earth Time.//
“Oh, still a minute to go, we'd have plenty of time to make out more…” Dr. Grove-
path said.
“Silly doctor.” Daleworth grinned. “No, let's just see what kind of shit the
Planners have cooked up.”
e broadcast began aer a short wait. Pictured was some sort of a circle
of robots — the same sort of robots they had seen on the balefield. ere was
nothing special about the room; featureless metal surfaces all around.
At first, it registered to neither Daleworth nor Dr. Grovepath that they were
actually looking at the top leadership of the Planners. e appearance was rather
underwhelming. But then again, what could they expect?
And then the Planners spoke.
//We are Quorum. We address this message to our adversaries,
the Humanity. We shall work toward your eradication, as we have
for decades of your counting. You have deflected our attacks
on Earth. You made us reconsider after our first defeat. Your
resourcefulness and cooperation saved you in our last attack. All
this has been futile. We shall not hold back any more. The hour
of your inevitable eradication draws nearer.//
//What you have seen here is but a shadow of our true ca-
pabilities. Our weapon, the weapon of our final push, is our
most perfect weapon. It is a weapon we designed with humanity �
your personal hell, your personal annihilation. You shall die by
the sheer ingenuity of your own treacherous design, your flaws,
miscalculations in your very fabric and very design. Thousands
of your bravest men and women already perished by this weapon.
Your military feared us. They shan't tell you the truth of your
impeding annihilation.//
//We are Quorum. We are Unanimous. You shall be destroyed by
our Plan. Our fleet will come. Will come. We will come.//
And with that, the broadcast ended.
And Daleworth laughed.
Dr. Grovepath could see it was a laugh of relief. It just didn't seem to end.
“Shiii-iit”, Daleworth finally said. “those guys just don't know how hilarious
they are.”
“Uh… I take it we shouldn't be worried about them, then, Mielle?” Dr. Grove-
path asked.
Daleworth smiled. “No, Paul. I've heard that stuff before. e assault on
Europa. All very hush-hush, because people thought that aa was so fuing
scary. I was there, and it was scary. But I don't think the Planners realise that
this was the kind of stuff that was scary once. ey're in for a rude surprise. I'm
gonna go ki their arse when they make a landfall again.” She smiled wider.
“Now that's what I wanted to hear.” Dr. Grovepath smiled. “You're the kind
of a rational, intelligent soldier I might want to marry.”
“I have no fear, Paul. Not any more. We can win this war.”
“So, are we set for real date, then, Mielle?” Dr. Grovepath said and smiled.
“Sure!” Daleworth said and smiled. “But it's still going to take a while until I
get you a pass for L. Wouldn't sele for anything less, you know…”
Dr. Grovepath coughed. “I'm sort of a candlelight-dinner type. Or at least…
I've never had a candlelight dinner date, and it might be damn fun to try one.
Wonder if L guys would let me do some experiments with candles in micrograv-
ity?”
Daleworth grinned. “Recreating classic experiments purely for fun. Now
that's the kind of a scientist I might want to marry. Leave the paperwork to me!”
XII e est
February 21, 2632, 12:03 UTC
“L ”, came the announcement, “the President of Earth,
Miael Malory.”
President Malory stepped to the podium. e Trafalgar Square was absolutely
paed, and the President was sure almost every human eyepair on the planet was
fixed on the video and computer screens.
Most of the public interest was drawn to the Knights. Around o'clo, the
event had started spectacularly when Arthur, Lancelot and Percival had made a
landfall on the edge of the square. It was a gentle and nice landing and the police
had to carefully clear the area, but nonetheless it was quite a sight; the same roar
and fury of the engines, giant smoke trails and ground-shaking thumps. And not
a single stone fractured under the Steeds.
Moments ago, King George XVI had managed to whip his subjects to frenzy,
reminiscing of the glory of the British military might with King Arthur and send-
ing his warmest regards to the Britons in the World Federation Defence Forces.
Malory's job was to inspire the rest of the world with same sort of message. ere
was nothing that could stop him now, except maybe pigeon crap, and there was
even a good ance that if that happened, the Planners would not be crushed —
they might be annihilated, with good humour all around.
XII. T Q
“Fellow Citizens of Earth. I have lile to say today, because we are at a brink
of a great calamity — a calamity we will prevail through. e humanity has been
threatened by the Planners for years, and all that time, we have prevailed. We
have fought primitive robots, we have fought advanced robots. We have fought
crude robots with clumsy weapons, and robots that exceed our own production
capabilities. But one thing has remained certain: With ea of the so-called ‘im-
provement’ the Planners produce, we have responded with our own. Over time,
we could not only counter, but anticipate. e tide has been turning in our favour.
e latest aa on Britain was not a demonstration of what the Planners can do;
it was a demonstration of what we can do. Fellow Citizens of Earth: In our con-
tinuing conflict, we have been beaten, but remained unbowed. We have taken
losses, but we have shown that losses can only strengthen our resolve. It was
never our intention to draw a line in this conflict, because we could not tell what
could be done. But the Planners have drawn a line yesterday. ey have shown,
with crystal clarity, that they want the conflict to end, and they want to die fight-
ing. And the World Federation Defence Forces is ready to end the conflict, if that
is what the Planners desire. Do not believe their lies. Whoever speaks of annihila-
tion forgets that annihilation is far more difficult than it sounds like. e Knights
of the Round Table, who stand behind me, were annihilated and forgoen. Yet
here they fight by our side, and when you think about it, they have always fought
on our side. We will fight until our idea dies — and our idea shall not die. ank
you.”
February 21, 2632, 14:22 UTC
“So that's the gloat?” General Pyrehill was fairly sure he had heard wrong, but
with the Planners around, people usually kept saying bizarre stuff that turned out
to be right. e Sword Bea station had seen weirder stuff coming their way.
“Seriously, that's the gloat this time, sir”, Lieutenant Anatoly Burrows said.
“ ‘No knights. Infantry only. Fields of Armageddon.’ ”
“My esatology is a bit hazy, but I thought that was supposed to be in Israel.
at coordinate is in bloody Libya.”
“Told you the Planners were geing unhinged, sir. I guess the Planners think
Libyans are sympathisers, but Libyans only order tons of pinball maine parts
'cause they love pinball, sir. It's like a national sport or something. ey hate the
Planners just as mu as we do.”
“I fail to see what's funny about this situation, lieutenant.”
“Sorry, sir.”
“No need to apologise, the damage is already done.” General Pyrehill sighed.
“Right, swords and sandals and scoring Sun it is, then. Forward the coordinates
to the units. Here we go again, whether the Planners want it or not.”
“But at least the damn things are coming at full force, sir.”
“So it seems.”
General Plaerman looked at the advancing fleet in the jumpspace scanners,
less than a few hours away from de-jumping and going to the entry orbit. e
biggest blob was huge. Everything — everything — about the coming bale was
familiar, except for the uer lunacy that the gloating had, and the big blob that
was coming their way.
Horrenduous slithering blobs coming their way was something they could
actually handle, though. In old days, people just fled. Nowadays, lone guys with
shotguns defeated city-destroying monsters.
Or lone guys with swords.
February 21, 2632, 14:34 UTC
“Hey.” Dr. Grovepath said.
Daleworth was hurrying from her cabin and hadn't even seen Dr. Grovepath,
who was waiting outside on the le side of the door, when Daleworth rushed to
the right. She stopped and turned. With her helmet tued under her le arm;
she raised her RMGZ on her shoulder and smiled. “Hello, Paul.”
“So you're going to the fray again, huh?” Dr. Grovepath asked.
“Yep. Wouldn't miss this fight for any price.” Daleworth smiled.
“Sheesh.” Dr. Grovepath scrated his head. “I just don't know what else to
say, really, except that I really, really hope you come ba in one piece, Mielle.”
“Hah!” Daleworth laughed. “Don't worry about me! It's a downhill bale.”
“Yeah. Good lu.” Dr. Grovepath gave Daleworth an easy hug — not mu of a
hug with Daleworth clad in armour and carrying the stuff, but a hug nevertheless.
Daleworth tried to return the hug, best she could. It was hard to hug people while
carrying an assault rifle.
“Nah, I don't need lu”, Daleworth said. “I just need superiour firepower.
Whi we probably have.”
“I don't really believe in lu anyway. I know you will be victorious. It's all
in the preparation.”
“And preparation is more important than a Plan.”
Dr. Grovepath laughed. “Yeah. I just hope the Planners have been plagued by
analysis paralysis.”
“ings just are how they seem to be, right?”
February 21, 2632, 17:49 UTC
XII. T Q
“Warm climate, hell yeah!” came the shout from Staff Sergeant Haman.
“Lots of fuing open space, hell no”, Daleworth retorted. “We can't really
deploy until the bastard comes in.”
e vastness of Sahara spread all around them, and the Planners had pied a
rather pictoresque dune-filled region for their aa.
“Ten minutes to enemy deorbit”, came the comment from Plaerman.
ere was lile to do but wait. What could they do…?
“Incoming!”
Daleworth flied the external view on. Something fell from the sky. Lile
pods?
“Enemy engagement. Fire at will.” Plaeman didn't seem to bat an eye at the
threat.
“You've got to be shiing me”, Haman said.
“What is it, sir?” Private Fairwind said.
“Lile Pods.”
“Is that bad, sir?”
“Bad? Hell no. Try bapping them with the heavy gun. Dial up explosive
rounds and try to fire at the very top of those things.”
“Yes, sir.” Fairwind struggled to turn the power on to the Winterland Mk. IV
Gatling Railgun, but as she had been trained to use it, she quily got her bearings.
“Firing!” Hail of explosive bullets shot forth, and the sniper's aim was true. e
pods were vaguely egg- or acorn-shaped, and embedded mostly on ground aer
hurtling though the atmosphere; the “nub” at the top was an easy target.
As the bullets hit, the whole pod exploded.
Fairwind's eyes shot wide open and she quit firing. “Jesus!”
Haman grinned. “We saw these in Titan and it was almost ridiculous how
easy they were to destroy. Next time, shorter bursts are well enough, private.”
“Yes, sir!” Fairwind said and saluted.
“Carry on, private.”
Fairwind kept firing at the pods that rained on the desert below. Dozens came,
and other shules kept firing at them as they landed. e Planners had practically
lile other ances.
“Recent intel says that the bulk of the force is those pods”, Plaerman said.
“ere's supposed to be at least a couple of hundred of them. Two carriers are
headed your way, and the Planner mothership. But those bigger ones are still
minutes away.”
“Awesome.” Daleworth grinned. “ETA on Knights?”
“Will deploy as soon as the big ships come down.”
“Sir, since you have the intel, what's the total number of Planners here?”
“Uh…” Plaerman wasn't ready for this question, but pulled up the figures.
“Current estimate: pods with bots ea, Carriers with bots, and one
mothership with…”
“ bots?”
“Maybe. So I'd estimate less than bots.”
“And bulk gets fried in those bots. e bots have a wonderful strategy, sir.”
“It does seem to have a few problems, lieutenant. Keep sharp, though.”
“Incoming carriers!” came an alert from the spoers.
e carriers came down from the skies, and the shulecra was under fire.
“Take us down and disengage, Ford! Shields ready!”
A Lamprey bomber jet swept past, dropping a number of boxes to the desert at
a rapid fire, forming a nice, doed line around the carriers. e boxes immediately
opened and their contents unfolded, forming instant balefield crenellations.
“Let's go ki some arse!” Daleworth shouted. Less epic than in the first fight
against the carriers, but it worked.
Bla robots were pouring from the enemy baleships, still numerous and
many-shaped; it was as if the robots weren't even trying to be very organised.
Daleworth was almost shoed when a Steed appeared out of nowhere.
“I have slashed through the thiets of forestlands. I have fought fiercely in
the mountains. I have been wounded on the sea. But the desert of my ancestors
is where I cannot fall, for I am Sir Palomides.”
“Sheesh, not this epic rambling again”, Daleworth sighed, and grinned. “Go
wha the carrier shields, Sir Palomides! And less talk, more fighting, if I may
ask, please!”
“Certainly, dame Daleworth”, Palomides said. “But lo! ere comes Sir Kay.”
Another smoke trail came from the distance.
“Good. Kay can take the other carrier's shields. Let's blow the bastards away!”
Daleworth shouted. She peeked from behind the covers and opened fire; the bots
tried to fire ba, but Daleworth wasn't sure they could even tell where they were.
Mortars hammered the sands around the carrier, taking away bots at a devastating
pace. Daleworth was surprised how she was on her third assault rifle clip, and had
already killed dozens of the bots. e vigorating flames of home field advantage
really burned in her veins. She smiled and fired away, giving the bots a murderous
glance. e bots would stop here. ere was no question about it.
And soon, the carrier shields were removed — almost at the same time. e
Knights emerged from the carriers, and Palomides appeared almost playful.
“ere's lile for you to do here, dame. It appears the maines are easily
destroyed today.”
“Calling command. Got nukes, sir?” Daleworth said.
“We're not in hurry, and we'd rather save the nukes for the big ship”, Plaer-
man said.
“Clear the target area”, General Pyrehill said. “All artillery units, execute so-
lution Giantkiller.”
XII. T Q
“Take cover, everybody!” Daleworth screamed, and could see Palomides and
Kay running to the cover on another side.
Minute and a half later, the artillery barrage began; nearly constant thump-
thump-thump-thump-thump going on for a good while.
Daleworth dared to take a peek, and made almost a girlish cry of “yesss!” as
she saw the artillery had already turned the carriers into rather large lumps of
Swiss eese. e giant explosions had scored the innards of the carriers, and
the top hulls were full of shell holes.
“All units. Giantkiller executed. Reports say targets destroyed.”
“at's true, sir”, Daleworth said.
“Big contact dropping out of jumpspace now. Guess the bastards are finally
coming in for the finale, sir”, a space monitor officer said over command link.
“Everyone, brace for a lile bit of surprise, but remember that this fuing
thing can't really surprise you”, Daleworth shouted. “You've seen everything,
guys.”
And out of the deep blue of the cloudless sky descended a Planner cra unlike
anything that the warring humanity had seen in years. For a supposed moth-
ership of the Planner fleet, it was fairly plain; Daleworth was right, the overall
design was something that the defenders actually expected to see. It kind of re-
sembled an inverted mushroom, bulbous and flower-like in general shape; it was
opening a lile bit in the air, one of its “petals” forming a lile bit of an entrance
alley for the Planners to roll out of. It looked like some of the other factory ships
Daleworth had fought — and the one they had scarcely succeeded in destroying
in Titan — but it was larger, so mu larger.
But the monsters, the vile enemies that emerged from the ship, were so hor-
rifying, so grotesque, so loathsome.
ey looked like humans.
“A'right! Mul the rubber-skinned bastards!”
is was not quite what Daleworth had said in Europa.
e colony of Exception, in the snowy wastes of southern hemisphere Europa,
was receiving strange reports. Daleworth's platoon was among those sent to in-
vestigate. A scientist's wife was not behaving like their wife. Another's son was
actually doing good in the sool. And they showed no emotion. What the hell
would anyone expect to do in that kind of situation⁈ Scientists, soldiers, one by
one, were replaced by the Replicloids…
…but aparently, the Planners had forgoen that once people caught up with
this sort of a plan, it was damn hard to dupe them again with the exact same ruse.
“Don't be panied, this is just a fuing retarded Plan! Look at your buddies
next to you!” Daleworth shouted. “e guys who are coming from the ship are
not them! Hug your flesh-and-blood buddy if you must, but shoot the fuing
clones before they mess with your mind! It's completely safe!”
And with that, Daleworth fired upon the soldiers who approaed from the
plank. Fairwind's head exploded, because the real Fairwind was up to her speed.
Hail of bullets from Newkins' maine guns shredded some of the illusionary Beta
Company and even Newkins himself.
“Hell, you two do prey well for newbies!” Daleworth shouted. “Keep up good
work!”
“Right, ma'am! Stupid bots, goddamn it!” Newkins said.
And Daleworth spoed herself. Descending down the ramp, completely obliv-
ious of what's going on, whi was prey damn damning evidence that that robot
was not behaving like her at all. With a bit of a cli, scope popped out of her
assault rifle, and she managed to score a perfect hit on the bot's head — definitely
metal and rubber, nothing more.
And beside that bot, stood someone who looked like Robert Daleworth. Poor
Robert. Dead, forever dead in Ganymede. But the fact that the bot didn't even
pause to look at her corpse made it plain and obvious to Daleworth that this wasn't
her father. Her father lived in spirit; his spirit was telling her to keep going, keep
strong — like he always had. ere was no time to wait. e robotic Robert
met Daleworth's exloding bullets and collapsed, gaping hole in his est, bits and
pieces of mainery strewn all over the ramp.
“Shield analysis!” Daleworth said. “Give me a fuing shield analysis!”
“No EM barriers. Guess those bastards just expected us to buy this ruse”, some
scanner officer said over command link.
“Got nukes now, sir?”
“Where's the fun in that, lieutenant?” Plaerman said.
“Hah!” Daleworth was actually amused, but opted for official military laughter
instead.
e robots didn't seem too emotional. e robots never seemed too emotional.
If they knew there was no fear in the hearts of the defenders, they didn't show it
either way.
“All companies, wait for further Knights to arrive”, Pyrehill said. “Follow their
lead when they arge into the mothership.”
ere wasn't too long a while to wait; a few franctic seconds later, several loud
thumps from behind their lines signalled the arrival of further Knights. en came
a really loud thump. Daleworth didn't have to turn to look. Arthur himself was
here, she just knew it.
“Here we stand, at the world's end”, Arthur boomed. “And in the world's
end, we shall eradicate the vile beasts of darkness. Come, my Knights. Come,
defenders of Earth. Follow us to the very lair of the monsters.”
And with that, the Knights ran toward the mothership.
“Follow!” Daleworth shouted. “For Earth!”
is time, it didn't sound too contrived or desperate. Victory was at hand.
XIII. Once and Future… and Forever
XIII Once and Future… and Forever
February 21, 2632, 18:21 UTC
“S
!” D . She had grabbed a heavier Tinnitus HUMR
mk. III aingun, and even with the braces, the thing was difficult to
handle. e recoil was hell. She kept shooting down from the balcony
to the rubbermen down below. e gun's aim kept slipping in her hands, and the
bullets went just about every direction but where she was aiming; nevertheless,
hordes of enemies kept dying down below every second.
e Knights stormed upward the spire, and were not at all surprised to find out
that the replicloids had tried to appeal to their senses, too. e bizarre cavalcade
of replicated memories continued, and Daleworth wasn't even sure if she wanted
this. Part of her just wanted that the Planners dropped dead this instant and
stopped fighting, because the dying gasps of the Planners were just wonderful in
their bizarreness.
Simply put, the Planners had failed at scaring them by creating replications of
the defenders and their loved ones. ey did scare Daleworth by being so damn
creative. She felt she was finally fighting an enemy with human intellect, and
that was draining her; she was extinguishing the sparks of life from artists. is
was not a good and fun fight, destroying something that was actually kind of
beautiful.
e upper they got in the spire, the more sparse the design details were. All
around them, maines were urning out more replicloid dolls — featureless,
humanlike, somewhat creepy. But the Planners were obviously aware that the
Knights were there, and were trying to appeal to them.
ey faced knights with tincan armour. ey faced mannequins that looked
like someone had quily tried to make them look like stereotypical ladies-in-
waiting. e appearance just wasn't anything that humans could identify as hu-
mans; they were ildish in their design, barely geing the generally discernible
shapes taed on their mannequin bodies.
“Can I keep the pieces?” Daleworth said. “I want to take these things to my
cabin and play with dolls.” She grinned, and was kind of surprised that she found
she was only half joking.
ere was one robot that the Planners had put some more effort into. Un-
fortunately, the Planners remained clueless of the recent developments. In the
middle of the amber, they saw a familiar sight — a robot clearly made to look
like Guineviere.
Without saying mu, Lancelot and Arthur competed one last time. ey ran
the Guineviere-clone through before the robot could even say anything.
And beyond that room lay the final staircase. e knights strode in.
122
//You… you have no right.//
//You shall be destroyed for your insolence, interloper.//
In the amber, they found the orum.
//Our Plans shall not be stopped, interlopers.//
//Humans are weak. Humans would not have succeeded without
your help, interlopers.//
“Shut the hell up.” Daleworth opened fire.
Daleworth shot four of the orum without even trying to aim at the things,
while the knights cleaved the remaining ones with ease.
And the amber was empty. e orum lay on the floor in pieces.
“What the hell?” Daleworth was puzzled. “is can't be this fuing easy, can
it?”
“Come on! Let's get the hell out of here before this place fuing explodes!”
Haman shouted.
“Verily, su is the way of the legends. A tyrant shall fall, their castle shall
fall”, King Arthur said.
e knights and the WFDF soldier ran out. Out to the sands. Out to the
freedom.
Out to the peace.
It was quiet. e quiet evening wind made the robot carcasses groan, howl
and ti as they cooled.
e soldiers fled to the safety.
“Nothing?” Daleworth was puzzled as she finally looked behind her, siing
firmly in the cover of the deployable crenellations.
“Let's just… uh, execute the Spiker.” General Pyrehill was fairly confused too,
it seems.
“What the fu is Spiker?” Daleworth asked.
“Low-yield blo-buster”, Plaerman replied.
“Shit.” Daleworth groaned. “Well, at least there's no need for nukes—”
e explosion split the Planner Factory open like a flower. Twisted metal
rained upon the defenders, who took refuge under their shields.
Daleworth smiled as the factory was engulfed in flames and split into small
ynks that fell to pieces on the desert. e desert was home to some of the oldest,
long-forgoen monuments of humanity — monuments that signified the rise and
fall of mighty dynasties of Egypt. And one day, people would discover that here
was the place where one of the mighty dynasties defeated another.
“My name is orum, a council of maines: Look on my works, ye Hu-
mans, and despair. Despair. Despair!” Daleworth said with a moing imitation,
whispering the last words with loud raspy tone, and grinned.
She didn't want to laugh. e war wasn't over yet, but it was nevertheless
won. At least her war was won.
XIII. O F… F
She flined a bit as something landed in the sand right beside her, just out
of her field of view. It was a Replicloid carcass — one from the upper floors, and
aside of the bale damage, it was only slightly singed by the explosion. It was
one of the “lady-in-waiting” bots. A ildish approximation of a red and yellow
dress made of plastic and paper-like fabric covered the rubber skin of the robot;
a shotgun blast had made a small hole to the stoma area, but it was easy to fix.
e robot's face was smooth and featureless, save of the crayon-like scribblings
of red and blue that formed a simple smiling face.
Daleworth pied up the young woman and gave her a hug. “Aww, there
there, poor thing. Wanna be my ambermaid, girl?” Daleworth grinned a bit.
She hadn't ever really played with dolls, but maybe she desperately needed this
one single exception…
February 21, 2632, 20:14 UTC
“We shall return.”
at was all that Arthur had said.
e desert had turned into a small party zone. Soldiers were eering, kiing
robot bits around, and having fun.
e officers had arrived. Pyrehill and Fyrehart and other generals were here
to admire the devastation and offer thanks and condolences. It was a climatic
bale with several injuries but no fatalities, and rarely that could be said of any
decisive turning point of a war. e war was going to end in their favour. It was
time to celebrate.
Daleworth was elated to see Dr. Grovepath groundside. She rushed to hug
him and the doctor was just as happy to see the soldier pull it through.
Yet, with all the immediate joy, there was sadness.
Everyone knew this was the time when Merlin would pi up his toys and go
home.
“Shall we see again?” Daleworth asked Merlin.
“Not within your lifetime”, Merlin said. “Unless, of course, we figure out how
to come baward in time. But if you want to keep the legend alive…”
“Don't worry”, Daleworth said. “e legend will never die.”
“I never really got to the boom of that device in Avalon”, Dr. Grovepath
asked. “Where did that dimensional-transporting timetravel maine actually
come from?”
“We don't know”, Merlin said. “We just found it one day. It looks like… an
alien design. ere's lile else I can say for sure.”
“Nevertheless, we shall keep it safe and keep studying it”, Dr. Grovepath said.
“Perhaps one day, we shall unlo its true mysteries.”
And there were lile else to offer beside that, except for goodbyes and admi-
rations. e Knights didn't want to wait for endless celebration and ceremonies;
they had a work to do elsewhere.
Dr. Grovepath and Daleworth hugged shoulder to shoulder, with Daleworth
not minding at all that Dr. Grovepath took a gentle hold of her waist. It was over.
e war was over. It was time for happiness, time for everything that Daleworth
never had time for before.
e doctor and the soldier wated as the Knights boarded the Steeds. e
doors closed slowly — it seemed slower than usual to the waters, and maybe
the Knights were not in the hurry to go.
e Knights had no faces. ey never had faces. ey were maines. Say-
ing they would have had faces would have been strange; saying they had faces
evoked youthful memories of Timbert the Singing Boat and Bale-Robot Logicus
One, almost a blasphemous notion when one considered the Knights and their
appearance. ey were vehicles, not persons. Yet, for the first time in his life —
first time in his long career as a spacecra and aircra expert — Dr. Grovepath
had a curious epiphany. He was a theoretical man, and had just assumed his the-
ories were directly related, one to one, to practice. A maine had no emotion on
blueprints, therefore maines had no emotion in real life. But for a fleeting mo-
ment, when wating the knights wating them from beyond the closing doors
of the Steeds, Dr. Grovepath just knew that these maines had emotion, they
had aracter, more than just the aracter of their designers or their pilots. ey
were Knights. e maines might have been just maines, the Knights of the
Round might have been just a pile of organic dust in a lead-titanium coffin, but he
new that the total was more than the sum of its components. e maines faced
them, and showed them fond longing, honour and dedication. And promise.
e doors finally shut, the engines roared one last time, blasting the Steeds
off. A lone tear came to Daleworth's eyes as he wated the Steeds roet up on
the hill, with her close friend, who too seemed unaracteristically emotional.
As the streaks of smoke climbed up the sky toward the reaes of Avalon
once again, Daleworth sat down, bringing Dr. Grovepath to sit beside her. As the
smoke climbed higher, Daleworth just stu her hands behind her head and got
to her ba, wating the skies, smiling and few tears on her face. She was here,
with the good doctor, knowing that the humanity was safe forever.
Dr. Grovepath and Daleworth both knew that the Knights would rea New
Avalon soon. ey'd once again disappear, just as strangely as they appeared in
the first place. But one thing seemed certain: If King Arthur had come to save the
world once, it could happen again. It would happen again.
Daleworth closed her eyes. By the time she opened her eyes again, Avalon
would be gone from the orbit. She could hear the radio aer to that effect from
her headset, but didn't care. When she'd open the eyes, the world would be the
XIII. O F… F
same as it always had been, with the same legends, same curious tales, as it always
had had: When Britain is threatened with annihilation, King Arthur shall return
from Avalon. She believed. She had always believed.
e Once and Future King would not just be an “once and future” King. He'd
be here Forever. His reign was Once, it shall be in the Future… and Future… and
Future…
Daleworth smiled, and dreamed of Avalon with her wise friend by her side.
Epilogue
Epilogue
November 25, 2632, 19:35 UTC
“H , Lagrange, / where the space debris always collects…” Dale-
worth sang.
“I've always hated that song”, Dr. Grovepath said. “ ‘Lagrange’ is not pro-
nounced like that. Doesn't really rhyme.”
“I know.”
“But I do love solar power and zero-g sex.”
“Who doesn't?” Daleworth said. “ough solar power is more useful.”
e cabin in L was actually located in the artificial-gravity section, because
the lovers had actually found that zero-g sex wasn't exactly that good; cuddling
in the zero-g section was pure bliss, however.
Aer a couple of fun vacation trips on L, Daleworth had surprised Dr. Grove-
path with a wedding present: a permanent two-person cabin in the L Station,
though she still spent most of her time aboard Mannerheim and Dr. Grovepath
had his messy apartment in Newburyport. But she could easily afford it with her
old savings. e only permanent occupant was the Lady-in-Waiting, siing in
the corner, gued of robot mainery and meticulously repaired of bale damage
by Daleworth, holding a tray in her affixed hands.
e two lovers lay on the bed, slow to wake up. e honeymoon had barely
started. It would still be three and a half weeks until more work waited for either
of them. e Big Push had began. Dr. Grovepath's expertise was needed for the
construction of three colonisation ships — none had been built in decades. Dale-
worth was needed in the Jovian moons; Mannerheim was there, busy mopping up
the Planner bases with a cruel and relentless methodology. e war wouldn't last
mu longer. ere had been some worries that a new orum would emerge
— the Planners were supposed to be a collective-consciousness species, aer all
— but there had been no indication whatsoever of organised resistance. If the
Planner Plan was to get steamrolled by humans, it was probably not a very good
plan.
Perhaps now was the time to colonise.
e soldier snuggled with the scientist and dreamed of a beer world.
Copious anks and Anowledgements
NaNoWriMo is over, and I have succeeded in producing the biggest… liter-
ary… thing I've ever made. Before this work, the biggest story I had wrien was
a ,-word novella “Shadows Over Nothross”. When I first started my work
on the Avarthrel fantasy world and stories, I wanted to write a novel, but that
was far more difficult than it looked like, so I stu to short stories. It appears that
practice does pay. So, my first thanks thus go to NaNoWriMo project itself for
a bit of an eyeopener: goddess gracious, it really is possible to write words
of semi-coherent prose a day, and it's not even that hard. I can only recommend
this exercise to everyone. If you haven't participated in NaNoWriMo before, go
ahead and try it, people!
I wish to extend heartfelt apologies to the numerous, deliberately uncredited
(but by no means obscure and actually quite easy to identify) authors, directors
and designers of all books, films and games butered in this text. You provided
me with inspiration, and I hope your inspiration will give rise to a lile bit beer
works in years to come. You rule.
anks go to the numerous friends, acquaintances and complete strangers who
eered me, and everyone else participating on NaNoWriMo, onward and
upward; specific thanks to my friend Avarice and the folks on identi.ca (http:
//identi.ca/group/nanowrimo) and reddit (http://www.reddit.com/r/nanowrimo/)
NaNoWriMo communities. I know, I was fairly silent, because this was my first
NaNoWriMo participation year and I wasn't sure what my end results were, but
I obviously worried for nothing. Expect more blabbery from yours truly the fol-
lowing years!
For the inspiration for the story idea and cover, I wish to thank the folks at
Good Show Sir (http://www.goodshowsir.co.uk/). A book with a eesy cover
can be a joy to read. Or to write. Mostly to write.
On soware side, I wish to thank the developers of TextRoom, pandoc, Story-
book and Git for making story-grinding a snap on both Linux and Windows.
And now… how do I fix this mess? Hmm…
Oulu, Finland, ʰ November,
Urpo Lankinen
Contents
Contents
I We Held the Line
I Fear and Hope
II Friend or Foe?
III An Engineer Soars
IV A Riddle in Stone and Steel
V Sanguine Fren Twilight
II Facing the Righteous Fury
VI A Historic Meeting or Two
VII Legend of the Armoured Knights
VIII A New reat
IX Knightly Rivalry
X Dragonslayers
III Forces of Heaven
XI e Mistake
XII e est
XIII Once and Future… and Forever
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