Chapter 357

TELKAN-2

One Week After the Battle for Hesstla

Brentili'ik looked at the document and sighed.

Private Kelvak, in defiance of personal danger and extensive physical injury, used his physical therapy frame and, with the help of two green mantid engineers, held the Precursor autonomous war machines at the south gate at Striker Base Boop to enable the medical evacuation of over two hundred military and civilian wounded.

Despite grave injuries, Private Kelvak fought, often alone with the exception of the Mantids 222 and 640, for nearly two hours. At the end, according to records recovered on site, Private Kelvak, with the remainder of his ad-hoc fire team, defended the landing pad against overwhelming odds. Once the last patient was evacuated Private Kelvak and his team of wounded human compatriots, despite mortal injury, continued to draw enemy fire until finally he was struck by a 52mm high velocity burst and killed.

For his valor in the face of overwhelming personal danger as well as his persistence despite mortal injury, the Telkan Marine Corps has determined that Private Kelvak's actions upheld the highest traditions and expectations of the Telkan Marine Corps, the Confederate Military Services, and the Telkan People.

It is with solemn regret that I record this.

--Signed: Admiral NGwark, Space Force, Task Force Commander, Hesstla

Another one. Hesstla had been a disaster as far as she was concerned. Out of fifteen thousand troops nearly two thousand had been killed.

She had to admit, not as dramatic and heroically as this one, many of them killed during deployment when the Task Force dropped into an ambush, but still, too many for her liking.

The fact that nearly 1/3 of the deaths were listed as "Temporal Warfare Casualty" and some of them had apparently served aboard Space Force vessels for over sixty years before expiring of old age, just made the entire thing stranger.

Brentili'ik had spoken to Colonel Harvey, who had told her that the casualties were severe, but not unexpected for an unblooded unit facing their first deployment under fire in a surprise ambush.

She looked at the list of next of kin for Private Kelvak and nearly cried.

Two broodcarriers and four podlings nearly two years old. He had a step-mother and a step-father, as well as step siblings, but according to the records his mother, father, and siblings had all been killed during the First Telkan War.

He had been old enough to join the first class of Telkan Marines by exactly forty-two minutes when he had taken the oath.

Added was a recorded message for his next of kin.

Brentili'ik didn't want to, but she listened to it.

"When mom and dad died, when my siblings died, you made me feel like someone still loved me. I love all of you, and I'm sorry I can't come home. Podlings, take care of your broodmommies, and I love you." played at the end.

Brentili'ik dried her tears and authorized the recording for release.

Poor kid, Brentili'ik thought. Not even a body to recover.

She tabbed the file to be printed and sent out and moved on to the next one.

Citizenship is a heavy duty, she thought to herself.

-----------------------------

Hesstla System

Time/Date Error In Progress

Specialist Grade-Four Thom Dunmet had been Graves Registration for several decades. The promotion point score was a tough one, but there was a high enough turnover that a being could gain rank somewhat frequently. He'd made Sergeant several times, but sooner or later he'd get drunk and get in a fight and find himself in the back of a military police car about to lose some rank.

Still, he was Graves Registration, and allowances were made.

He had to admit, this had been a rough deployment. Nagging headaches were least of it.

It was all the locals, the civvies, coming in missing the tops of their heads and their brains, that had really made it tough. The most common cause of death was 'cerebral extraction' among the civilians.

Then top it off with everyone's SUDS going on the fritz, he'd found himself checking off 'clinically deceased' less and less and 'permanently deceased' instead.

He would eject the SUDS memory cartridge and pack it up, although more and more as time went on the cartridge had error telltales blinking.

It was late, he'd switched shifts to handle night casualties after working day shift for quite some time. The morgue was dim and cool, not to mention quiet like he liked it.

The Clankers and their masters had been pushed back, giving the Terrans time to breathe and regroup. Which meant the casualties had come in thick and heavy for the last two days, leaving the morgue full of bodies.

SP4 Dunmet had finished the last autopsy, wheeling the corpse into the refrigeration unit, and had moved over to start on the paperwork. He moved over to his desk and started downloading his notes from his datapad to his console, making sure the files were loaded onto the correct casualties.

The lights flickered and Dunmet looked up, switching to a different screen.

The door slid open and black mist rolled in, pouring out of the doorway.

Dunmet moved his thumb over the icon that would summon base security.

Robed figures moved in and Dunmet heaved a sigh of relief.

Religious personnel, probably from the Chaplain's Office, he thought to himself. He went back to his paperwork, keeping one eye on the six robed figures.

They were all obviously Telkan under the robes, shuffling forward. They had black robes that seemed to shine in the dim light, matte black masks over their faces rather than the normal Telkan tan and brown, and moved slowly in a single rank of four with one to each side slowly swinging a thurible that left trails of incense smoke.

They moved up to one of the drawer doors, the lead one opening it. They pulled out the drawer, revealing a covered corpse that was only half the normal length of a Telkan. When they pulled back the sheet they revealed the ravaged body of a young male Telkan, missing below the bottom of the rib cage. The Telkan male's jaw was missing teeth, a cyber-eye was crudely jammed into an empty socket, wired led from the back of his skull, cut free a few inches from the exposed spinal column.

Dunmet watched as they stood around the dead Telkan, one holding a heavy tome marked "The Book of Telkan" close to his chest with black gloved hands.

"This is the one we want," one of them said, his voice low and serious.

They all nodded.

Dunmet was looking up when it happened.

The three that were not carrying items touched the dead Telkan.

There was an eruption of purplish black smoke that then sucked back in on itself.

The Telkans, including the corpse, were gone.

Dunmet hit the security icon.

---------------------------------

The scribe was blind, had been blind since a Precursor machine had torn out his eyes and tongue to broadcast his agony over GalNet. His delicate fingers, sensitive beyond reason after the Precursors had torn out his vestigal claws, traced over the long strip of bronze/warsteel alloy. His tools were delicate but precise as he began slowly carving another rune, a rune that burned with white fire in his mind's eye. Each tap of the hammer against the engraver made his soul sing, each curl of dark bronze metal brought the joy of vengeance to his heart.

The strip was nearly two feet long, a handspan wide, with a single column of runes engraved down the face of the inch thick metal strip.

As he finished the strip it was passed to the worker next to him, who would inlay the graven runes with molten metals that would never cool.

Around them the faint whispering could be heard.

soft podling warm podling brave podling strong one and one is two two and two is four red shape is square blue shape is round soft podling smart podling clever podling warm

None of the workers could hear the song as it was sung, they had been made deaf by the cold steel claws of the Precursors.

But they heard it in the depths of their souls.

-------------------

Each of the robed figures had learned their lessons. Taken by those who understood the secrets of dark forbidden science to a place where they had all the time they needed to understand the nature of life and death and the dark science in between.

All of them looked as if they were wearing close fitting armor that was somehow biological yet mechanical at the same time. A light drinking black material that pulsed with a life of its own. All of them had the burning eagle in molten warsteel on their chests. There eyes were burning chrome that leaked smoke as violet as the skies they had stared out for eternal moments.

Shuffling silent workers brought forth heavy pieces of equipment. Each piece of equipment was put in its proper place and slowly a form took shape.

Heavy footpads with four claw-like toes evenly spread. Heavily armored legs, the thick armor concealing pistons, gears, drive-belts, and struts. Articulated hips to allow the legs to move and provide stability to the torso portion. The torso was large, blocky, heavily armored. Gaps were in the armor, the weapons that would normally be mounted there missing. The arms were missing below the elbow, the implanted weaponry being built to the side by technicians who had devoted lifetimes into studying exactly how to put the custom built jewel mechanism machinery together.

It had no head. No reason to provide a small target.

The torso was open, the main hatch opened to reveal the armor was a foot thick of warsteel laminate armor. Inside the torso were complex mechanisms with a dark and terrible purpose, created and imagined by dark minds unfettered by something as simple as morality.

Finally, the mechanisms were prepared, the massive machine trembling slightly, not with the power of the reactor that drove its mighty heart, but with terrible purpose.

The rent and damaged body of the Telkan was brought forth. The wound below the ribcage, where the rest of his body had been obliterated, was sealed with thick biomechanical tissue. The missing arm was sealed at the stump. Covering his face was a heavy mask, more akin to a skull than a living creature. It was bolted to the Telkan, the heavy warsteel bolts sunk into the bone structure.

The chest rose and fell slowly as the mask inflated and contracted.

On the bare flesh of the chest implanted metal gleamed and shined. Cybernetics, something largely unheard of for the Telkan people, invaded the body, giving purpose to the surrounding tissue.

The body was lifted, kneeling Telkan reciting prayers from the Book of Telkan, and placed in the opened torso of the massive machine.

Technicians dark and terrible moved in, connecting the quasi-corpse to the machine. Heavy probes went into the skull, the drill bit biting deep into the bone to bring forth a gush of blackish blood. The probes were sunk deep into the neural tissue, microscopic filaments squirming out of the probes to link up with neural tissue.

The one remaining eye opened at one point, the pupil contracting, and the quasi-corpse writhed for a half second before going limp.

The technicians secured the damaged body into the massive machine, sometimes cruelly with heavy warsteel bolts, other times with gentle webs of cloth woven from the shed down of podlings, other times without emotion using plasteel straps.

The body was protected from kinetic shock, radiation, sound, biological hazards. One by one each threat of the modern battlefield was negated as best as the silent technicians could create it. Once it was done the empty internal spaces were packed with specially woven cloth inscribed with runes, prayers, and symbols of faith and devotion.

The inner lining was closed. Parchments inscribed with prayers were pasted to the metal alloy. More shock dampening was added.

The outside of the hull was closed. Two black armored foot tall mantids were lifted up and placed gently in the twin housings on the upper rear of the torso, covered with padding, and the shells closed.

Computers, nearly covered with strips of paper inscribed with prayers, whirred to life. Ancient style storage platters spun up with a scraping whine. Nanorelays and cyberware linkages clattered to life, clicking to themselves.

The gathered Telkan, one of which still reading from the Book of Telkan, watched as the great machine shuddered and shivered.

The blackish-bronze alloy square in the middle of the chest, just above the burning eagle, suddenly lit up with a gold light.

A rune slowly inscribed itself on the alloy square.

KAPPA

"Arise, Kappa, and serve!" the Telkan with the book cried out.

There was silence for a long moment.

"Beyond death, I still serve, buoyed by the laughter of podlings," the massive machine intoned.

----------------------------

In the wreckage of a city on a small planet a puff of purple smoke erupted, billowing out to cover a large area before suddenly vanishing, sucking back into itself and disappearing with a purple flash.

Standing in the wreckage was a massive war machine. One arm terminating in a powerful four fingered clamp with a plasma napalm ejector at the palm. The other arm a heavy tri-barrel autocannon capable of tearing through the heaviest armor. Its chest contained mortars to provide indirect fire support, battlescreen projectors better fit to ships of the line, and was covered in runes.

It stood still for a moment, the only sound the wind making mournful noises as it moved over the heavy armor.

Finally it raised a thick antenna and broadcast a simple message.

"Warbound Kappa. Online and awaiting instruction. Even beyond death, I still serve."

-------------------------

AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

I don't know about that. Are you sure you should do that?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

What's wrong with it?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Where did you learn to do that kind of thing?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

The Imperium of Wrath guys that Daxin leads.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Oh. OK.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

I still don't know about this.

I wish TerraSol and the others were here to talk about this.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TNVARU NEW WORLDS

So do I.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

Yeah. It really feels lonely without them.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---