The Shattering: Omnibus Read online

  The

  SHATTERING

  Omnibus

  Legion I: Lords of Fire

  Legion II: Sons of Terra

  Legion III: Kings of Oblivion

  VAN ALLEN PLEXICO

  Copyright 2015 by Van Allen Plexico

  WHITE ROCKET BOOKS

  www.whiterocketbooks.com

  The books collected in this volume are also available as limited edition hardcovers and trade paperbacks from White Rocket Books.

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Legion I: Lords of Fire Copyright 2013 by Van Allen Plexico

  Legion II: Sons of Terra Copyright 2014 by Van Allen Plexico

  Legion III: Kings of Oblivion Copyright 2014 by Van Allen Plexico

  THE SHATTERING

  This Omnibus Collection Copyright 2014 by Van Allen Plexico

  Cover art by M. D. Jackson

  Cover design by Van Allen Plexico

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form, save for brief passages to be quoted in reviews.

  Also Available in the Shattering Saga:

  The Above, Vol 1: Lucian: Dark God’s Homecoming

  The Above, Vol 2: Baranak: Storming the Gates

  Shattered Galaxy, Vol 1: Hawk: Hand of the Machine

  And

  The Legion Chronicles 1: Cold Lightning

  All by Van Allen Plexico

  And available at Amazon.com or at www.whiterocketbooks.com

  INTRODUCTION

  “Wait a second—aren’t you that superhero writer guy? What are you doing writing this stuff?”

  A fair question. Yes, it’s true that the main thing I’m known for writing is the series of novels about the Sentinels, a superhero team operating in the modern day. But that doesn’t mean superhero stories are the only things I enjoy. This omnibus collection you’re holding now is testament to that fact. I’ve been describing it from the start as a combination of Space Opera and Military SF, with a certain “gothic” sensibility incorporated as well. And I love both of those fields.

  I’ve always enjoyed Space Opera. As a kid it took me three tries but eventually I was able to fully get into, appreciate, and finish the entire Dune series. There was also Larry Niven’s Known Space stuff, along with Ben Bova (writing material that today would be classified as Young Adult), and later Vernor Vinge with his amazing novels set in the far, far future. Mix in lots of other influences along those lines in other media, from Jack Kirby and Jack Katz to Space: 1999 and Battlestar Galactica, and I was a total Space Opera fan from the very start.

  Military SF, on the other hand, was never a huge thing with me. It’s true that much of even non-Military SF tends to focus on armies and fleets of warships in space, for a variety of reasons. But the good old, all-American “pure” variety of that sub-genre, as practiced by guys like David Drake and Jerry Pournelle and later John Ringo and David Weber (and, honestly, even Tom Clancy and all of his clones)? I read a lot of it over the years, but it was never my favorite thing.

  Then a few years ago I discovered the British versions of Military SF, from folks such as Dan Abnett and Graham McNeill (writing Warhammer 40,000 books and stories for the Black Library) and Peter F. Hamilton. This was a revelation for me. I was fascinated by how they combined supernatural and “gothic” influences with otherwise “straight-up” military action. I would also lump in with them Chris Moeller, whose Shadow Empires/Iron Empires comics for DC were enormously influential upon me back in the mid-1990s. (If you can find that series, or the follow-up, Shiva’s War—don’t hesitate! It’s criminally underappreciated.)

  That was all it took—a little scary stuff stirred into the mix. A little dark, spooky, alien, demonic action to leaven all the hardware and tech-speak. At that point I was hooked.

  So that’s how the foundation was put down. As for how this series came to be, the answer lies in my first SF novel, Lucian: Dark God’s Homecoming. That book established a mysterious pantheon of godlike beings existing within a far-future SF universe. A couple of years later I wrote Hawk: Hand of the Machine and, at first, I didn’t necessarily intend for the two to be linked at all. There came a point in the writing of Hawk, however, when the backstory from Lucian simply fitted in perfectly and helped flesh out that universe. Realizing then that something very dramatic and cataclysmic (and therefore worth writing about!) must have happened to the galaxy between the events of the two books—a shattering, if you will—I set about plotting what eventually became this series.

  You can read them all in whatever order you like; it doesn’t really matter. They were intended to be stand-alone tales (though of course you’ll want to read this omnibus in the proper numerical order presented here—Legion I, Legion II, and then Legion III—because it’s one big story). If pressed I would suggest order of publication (starting with Lucian), but that’s not a requirement by any means.

  Okay—enough outta me. Many thanks for giving this a shot. Now—go ahead and flip on over and meet the First Legion. There’s no more time to waste—the galaxy’s about to burn!

  (Oh—and keep hands and feet away from Iapetus at all times.)

  —Van Allen Plexico

  Somewhere in Southern Illinois

  April 2014

  LEGION I:

  LORDS OF FIRE

  For Wayne Reinagel,

  Present at the creation.

  “In our youths, our hearts were touched with fire.”

  —Oliver Wendell Holmes

  “Not all that dwell in Hell are demons, nor do all demons dwell in Hell.”

  — Doran Karah, Reflections, 18th Millennium

  “All things, oh priests, are on fire.”

  — The Buddha

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  Imperial First Legion: Key Personnel

  General Hideo Nakamura, “The Supreme,” commander of First Legion and Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial military

  Colonel Nikolai Barmakid, “The Cunning,” adjutant to General Nakamura

  Colonel Ezekial Tamerlane, “The Relentless,” Chief of Imperial Security; longtime friend and confidante of General Nakamura

  Major Konstans Belisarius, “The Belligerent”

  Other Personnel of Note, First Legion:

  Major Niobe Arani, Special Forces officer

  Major Den Senjanik, Special Forces officer

  Major Shae, assignment unknown

  Captain Durin, Special Forces officer

  Sergeant Garner, assigned to support Special Forces operations on Trezibond

  Lieutenants Singh, Reilly, Dalton and Westerfeld: assigned to Tamerlane’s expedition to NM-156

  Lieutenants Torval, Landau, Keefe and Ling: assigned to Gen. Nakamura’s support team

  Imperial Second Legion: Key Personnel

  General Esteban Attila, “The Bold”

  Colonel Ioan Iapetus, “The Unyielding”

  Major Berens Barbarossa, “The Daring”

  Imperial Third Legion: Key Personnel

  General Abdul-Rashid Beyzit, “The Thunderbolt”

  Colonel Arnem Agrippa, “The Golden”

  Major Yevgeni Vostok, “The Cold”

  Major Selim Iksander, “The Lightning”

  The Royal Family

  Janus IV Rahkmanov, Emperor of Anatolia, one of the four Empires of Mankind

  Lisbeth Salome Rahkmanov, Empress Consort

  Augustin Rahkmanov, Archduke and Heir Apparent

  Marens Rahkmanov, Princess

  The Emperor’s Guard (selected members)

  Osman, Captain of the Guard (Emerald armor)


  Zeyid, Guardsman (Ruby armor)

  Abdul, Guardsman (Sapphire armor)

  Rashid, Guardsman (Garnet armor)

  Planetary Governors of Note

  Amon Rameses, “The Undying,” Governor of Ahknaton

  Suleyman Mehmet, Governor of Bursa

  Iyesu Tokugawa, Governor of Edo

  The Holy Inquisition

  Gabriel Stanishur, Grand Inquisitor

  Lorval Chopra, Inquisitor’s Aide

  Leisle Delain, Inquisitor’s Aide

  The Ecclesiarchy—

  The Holy Church of Those Who Remain

  Wallin Zoric, Ecclesiarch

  Salid Donnan, High Priest

  Edan Reichenbach, Warrior-Priest

  Father Octavion, Warrior-Priest

  Some of “Those Who Remain”:

  Selected gods of the Empire

  Alaria, goddess of beauty

  Amenophis, god of death and resurrection; favored by the citizens of Ahknaton

  Baranak, god of battle; once the possessor of the Sword of Baranak, a weapon of incalculable power that can also slice through dimensional barriers

  Goraddon, god of persuasion; disciple of Vorthan

  Karilyne, goddess of battle and lover of Baranak

  Korvak, god of the current

  Lucian, god of evil and mischief, rebellion and non-conformity

  Malachek, god of wisdom

  Vodina, temperamental goddess of the waters and the Furies

  Vorthan, god of toil; later worshipped as a god of fire and death

  PROLOGUE

  By the time the lasers began to fire their murderous crisscross pattern, slicing deeply into the metal on either side of the shaft, Tamerlane had already cut his cable and dropped to the hard concrete floor some fifteen meters below.

  Despite his best efforts he landed hard. Rolling over, he popped up and took a quick inventory of himself. Nothing broken; just a few places that would bruise over soon enough. No more time to waste; the beam weapons that had narrowly missed him above, as he’d descended into the deep, round, three-meter-wide access passage of this central vault complex by a thin cable, would be working their way down to his level at any moment. They were moving much slower than normal, due to the computer virus he’d introduced into the local network a few moments earlier—and that was the only reason he was still alive now. Once the beams reached the bottom of the shaft where he stood, the jet-black deflector suit he wore over his uniform would protect him from that type of firepower for approximately two seconds—if he was lucky. Then he’d be sliced into a thousand very small pieces.

  He spun about, eyes moving across the gleaming silver surface that curved all around him, looking for the access hatch. It was there, somewhere—all of his sources agreed on that point. Unfortunately, none of them agreed on exactly what it looked like, or how to open it. If there was a potential bottleneck in the whole operation, this might well be it.

  Save for a single line that looked to run, like a ring, all the way around at a height of about one meter from the floor, the metal appeared seamless. He moved forward, choosing a spot at random, and ran his gloved hand across it. Nothing.

  The crisscrossing beams were ten meters above his head now. Nine. Melting metal hissed above his head.

  He moved around the circular floor quickly, fingertips sliding along, lenses in his goggles magnifying what he was seeing and analyzing it for any clues to the location of the hidden hatch.

  Eight meters above him now. Seven. The hum of the lasers and the crackle as they ate into the metal grew much louder.

  He’d traveled over halfway around the circle, and still nothing. Time was running out. He spun about, abandoning the careful search for a more general impression, and saw very clearly that the shaft wall was just as smooth and unbroken on the half he hadn’t inspected yet.

  His sources had all been wrong. There was no access hatch. And of course he couldn’t go back up. He was trapped here at the bottom of the steel and concrete well, and he was going to die.

  Six meters. Five.

  And the worst part was that he had never wanted to do this. He had never envisioned himself as a thief of any kind—much less a thief attempting to steal the most valuable, the most priceless artifact in history.

  Sometimes greatness is thrust upon you, they say. Hmm. Sometimes thievery is, too, apparently.

  Four meters. Three. He crouched down, still searching, the bottom of the shaft now lit up like a neon bulb by the blazing beams of death just overhead.

  But there was nothing to find. No hatch, no seams at all—other than that one ring all the way around. But it never intersected anything vertical that might indicate a doorway. And it wasn’t as if the entire bottom of the shaft could—

  Wait.

  Two meters overhead. The sound was deafening.

  Could it be?

  Reaching out, he pressed at the wall just below the seam. There came a click, almost inaudible over the noise of the energy beams. And then the entire circular wall from the seam line down retracted smoothly into the floor. This revealed four narrow passageways leading off in different directions.

  One meter. No time to think. Just go.

  He sprang forward, into the nearest passage, just as the energy beams dropped below the one meter mark. A few stray shots passed just over his head before the circular wall that had dropped down moved back up into position, blocking off the way he had come but also deflecting the beams.

  Tamerlane rolled over on his back and lay there for a few seconds, just breathing. He tugged his goggles off and wiped at the sweat running across his face and down from his close-cropped black hair.

  Another obstacle down. How many more to go?

  Tamerlane crawled through the access tunnel, cursing his fate in general and idly wondering if there was any chance he was in the right one of the four passageways. Luck had been with him so far; luck, plus a much more advanced brand of technology than had been anticipated by the people who had built this facility.

  No ordinary burglar could have gotten anything like this far.

  He’d overcome half a dozen deathtraps already, and still had no idea how close to his prize he’d gotten. But there was no turning back now. In truth, there had been no turning back from the moment this assignment—this utterly insane assignment—had been given to him. But there was simply no refusing the person who’d chosen him for it.

  So here he was, deep in the bowels of the most secure storage complex in the galaxy: the vaults of Candis. A complex inviolate from the intrusions of man and god for thousands of years. And he was attempting to steal the single most valuable item in those vaults.

  And—most murderous irony of all—if he succeeded, his reward would likely be to lose his job, his career.

  But, again, there was no saying “no” to the person who’d given him this assignment.

  So onward he crawled, and eventually he reached the end of the access tunnel and emerged into a small room about four meters to a side. Accessing his very secure and encrypted Aether link, he mentally studied the stolen plans he’d acquired and was pleased to see they matched up again. It took only seconds to locate the right spot. He stepped forward, attached two small, white discs to the gleaming wall, and ducked back into the tunnel.

  The explosions were simultaneous and very contained. They would do no more to alert the actual human beings monitoring the vaults than would his earlier adventure with the lasers, given the computer virus currently churning its way through the complex’s artificial intelligence array and overriding the sensors and visual scanners. That couldn’t be counted on to work for much longer, though; even if the computers were fooled, a random guard patrol might easily spot the signs of his presence. He had to speed things up, move things along.

  He hopped back out of the side tunnel and inspected his handiwork. The two explosives had done their job; the door between this chamber and the next was now hanging open. Forgetting what lay ahead, he ran through it�
�and stepped out into nothingness.

  He teetered on the edge of the drop for half a second, his eyes widening and his pulse surging, before he fell forward and tumbled down toward his death.

  In the split second before he’d fallen, however, he’d remembered what lay on the far side of the doorway, and he’d gotten his fingers on the dial at his waist, attached to a small box on his belt. He twisted it sharply and his rapid descent abruptly halted. The suddenness of it nearly broke his neck, but clearly it was preferable to the other way his drop could have ended: the floor of this shaft lay only a few dozen meters below.

  Adjusting the dial, he rose gently into the air and drifted forward at the same time, reaching the doorway opposite the one he’d passed through in only a few seconds. The device at his belt, working just as it had been designed to do, repelled the specific type of material the floor of the shaft was made from. He couldn’t exactly push the planet away from him, but the converse was just as good: It pushed him away—up and away, and through the doorway. His feet touched the floor and he switched it off.

  Surely only seconds remained before his computer virus was eliminated by the complex’s defenses. Any moment now, everyone on Candis would know he was there, and a few seconds after that, he would be captured or killed. His rank, his status, wouldn’t matter a bit. Candis was not part of the Imperial government. It had always operated as a private, independent entity, and it had the clout and the wealth to maintain that status. It had always been able to assert that it offered the galaxy the one thing no one else could offer: absolute security from theft by god as well as by man, and it charged fees commensurate with such a claim.