“I protest, my dear Empress! The Grand Executor of the Order of Ecclesia cannot have a human apprentice! This is an affront to the Imperium! I will not stand for it!"
Archduke Eleg Valesky
Rodi Tieberg
United Galactic Peacekeeping Mission
8167 Battalion, Infantry
Old Ruins, Stavanger, Oslen
“Can you believe that this thing even exists?” Alwin asked, as he scanned the rock formations before them.
A day has passed since the siege of Oslen by the Boellian forces had begun. After being resupplied and given new weapons, Lieutenant Tieberg and his two men were quickly transported to the believed location of the psionic relic.
Deep inside the city of Stavanger, a secure complex lay hidden by the slums and the destroyed buildings from the old Coalition War. Rodi and his men have patrolled around this area before, but really thought nothing of it. Ruins and slums that were built over or left behind? It was extremely common, especially in the Dannian Confederacy; not something out of the ordinary.
After unlocking the complex with the keys they received from Brigadier General Faust, the trio travelled down a flight of stairs for what seemed to have been around half an hour. At the end of the stairs lay a door, and past the door, a dark corridor. Scanning it would reveal that everything appears to be made of a mixture of neutronium and dark energy. Somehow, the neutronium was imbued with dark energy; it was reminiscent of hard-light materials used by the Imperium, yet different.
“Of course it had to be some ancient Enigmatic Technology wizardry.” Thum-Bael muttered under his breath as Alwin read the scan reports.
“Only way is forward. Keep moving, be alert. Make sure there’s no traps.” Rodi explained while motioning the two men to move forward with him.
It was a large corridor, all things considered. All three of them were walking side by side, and there was still some room to spare. Considering their chunky armor, it could probably fit around five, maybe six average sized humanoids in width.
After an uneventful and uninteresting walk forward, another door appeared, with a terminal by the side.
“Is this it?” Rodi asked, looking at Alwin.
Alwin tapped the terminal a few times, inserting the second set of keys received from the Brigadier General. A loud crack was audible in the background, as stagnant motors kicked into gear after many years of disuse. Eventually, the door opened, creaking loudly.
“Well that isn’t unnerving at all.” Alwin joked as the light from inside the room filled the corridor behind them. Flicking the light of his weapon off as he stepped in, the room seemed to expand in all directions.
Inside, a large box stood in the middle of the room, with a single panel in front of it.
“Is that it?” Thum-Bael asked as they all approached carefully.
It was a box made of transparent material, potentially duraglass or something similar. By the side, a door, no doubt actioned by the terminal.
“I think so.” Rodi replied, lowering his weapon; he’d leave it hanging by the shoulder strap.
Inside the box was a single pedestal, holding a large blue crystal.
“A psionic archive?” Alwin asked from the side.
Both Rodi and Thum-Bael turned towards him, looking at him as if waiting for him to expand on that information.
Alwin awkwardly cleared his throat before explaining.
“I’ve heard about these. Psionic archives are crystals made from Zro. Most of them contain the essence of ancient psionics, or all sorts of archived information from different psionic empires.”
“What is a Psionic archive doing here? On Oslen, out of all places? What do Dannians have to do with psionics?” Thum-Bael asked, to which Alwin merely shrugged his shoulders.
“No point worrying about this now.” Rodi chimed in while approaching the terminal. Its controls could no longer be made sense of. Whatever was in that box had been in there for so long that the displays were unreadable. “Our orders are to retrieve the artifact and then return to HQ for its extraction.”
“Respectfully, Lieutenant. I do think we need to worry, considering there’s a full on planetary invasion with the sole purpose of retrieving this artifact.” Thum-Bael protested, visibly frustrated that neither Rodi nor Alwin could see the severity of their situation such as him.
“Invasion is a diversion, technically.” Alwin muttered under his breath, leading to Thum-Bael knocking him in the shoulder with the butt of his rifle; much to Alwin’s amusement.
“Enough… Alwin, come here. I cannot read the controls.” Rodi motioned him over.
“Let’s see… Terminal appears to be severely damaged, let me try hacking into it.” As he set himself to work.
However, much to Alwin’s annoyance, he could do nothing to activate the device.
“It’s a bust. We’ll need to crack that door open.” He explained. “But I’m concerned about the facility locking down.”
“We don’t exactly have another option…” Rodi muttered under his breath before pressing a few buttons on his bracer.
“STAVANGER-ONE to STAVANGER-ACTUAL, come in.”
“STAVANGER-ACTUAL copies. Go for.” It was the Brigadier General’s voice.
“We’ve run into a problem. We cannot activate the terminal before the artifact. How do you copy?” Rodi explained as Alwin and Thum-Bael gathered by his side.
“STAVANGER-ACTUAL copies. Can you blow it open?”
Rodi clicked his tongue while Alwin reached into Thum-Bael’s backpack for the explosive device; the two then kneeled before the entrance to the box.
“STAVANGER-ONE. We can, but we don’t know how the facility will react. Please advise.”
A brief pause.
“STAVANGER-ACTUAL advises you use the explosive device we’ve given you. According to intelligence, the automated defenses no longer function. Only the access control. You should be fine.”
Rodi furrowed his eyebrows in disbelief.
“Should?” he asked. “What sort of answer is that?!”
“STAVANGER-ONE, make haste. The situation above ground is getting worse. Our positions are being contested as we speak. We’ll not be able to extract you if you take too long. STAVANGER-ACTUAL out.”
“If we ever make it alive…” Thum-Bael said from the side. “May the Great Spirit be my witness, I will shove my boot up the Brigadier General’s backside so hard it'll come out his mouth, even if it lands me in martial court.”
Rodi turned towards Thum-Bael and pointed his finger at him. Thum-Bael shuddered, refocusing his attention upon the explosive charge.
“You think it’ll blow a hole in it, Alwin?” Rodi asked while Alwin took a few steps away from Thum-Bael and the door.
“It should. It’s laced with dark energy.” He replied, before sighing. “You know… Lieutenant… I think that they knew about this artifact being here all along.”
“I know. I think so too. Forces here have always been larger than on the other Dannian worlds, even before the Boellian revolt erupted. Probably making sure they could respond to anyone threatening this… thing.”
A short while later, Thum-Bael turned towards the two and gave them a thumbs up. Charges were now planted, and it was time to blow open the door.
“Your charges, you can have the honor.” Rodi explained, while motioning Thum-Bael to trigger the explosion.
With a loud whistle, the charge set off, melting through the door, and collapsing it. If anything, it was sort of anticlimactic; much to Thum-Bael’s and Alwin’s disappointments.
Stepping through the door, Rodi could feel the air becoming heavier. A lingering, throbbing pain clawed away at his head the longer he stared at the crystal. With a single swipe, he grabbed the artifact and deftly placed it inside a pouch on his belt.
“Is this it, then?” Thum-Bael asked. “I kind of expected something else, you know?”
Rodi stared at him in disbelief before waving him off.
“STAVANGER-ONE to STAVANGER-ACTUAL. Target is secured. Heading out to the rendezvous point.”
A few moments of pause.
Rodi and Alwin stared at each other, as the response did not come back.
“STAVANGER-ONE to STAVANGER-ACTUAL, do you copy?”
No response.
Thum-Bael meekly muttered under his breath.
“I jinxed it again, didn’t I?”
“STAVANGER-ONE to STAVANGER-ACTUAL, last time. Do you copy?”
For the third time, no response; Rodi terminated the communication channel, cursing loudly as he unstrapped his weapon and motioned towards the entrance.
“We’re going. Now.”
Breaking into a jog, the trio blitzed through the room and the long corridor. As they approached the stairs and started to climb, Alwin asked.
“What now? What do we do?”
“Assume we’re on our own.” Rodi responded curtly.
Half an hour of stairs; this is what they now had to quickly get through. By the time they reached the top, they were a tired, heaving, sweaty mess. Thankfully, their suits filtered and disposed of the mess, keeping them as clean and comfortable as possible while scaling the stairway.
“We’re close!” Thum-Bael called out ahead of them, as he flung the door to the entrance open to a blinding light.
Rodi and Alwin quickly followed him, their weapons drawn; but the light blinded them too for a moment while their visors adjusted to the intensity.
“Hello.” It was an unknown voice. “You got out quicker than I expected.”
As the visors adjusted, the picture became clear. Thum-Bael and Alwin were both surrounded on each side by Boellians armed with plasma rifles. To the front, the Boellian psionic stood behind a masked figure. It was the same figure from the alleyway not too long ago.
Rodi cursed under his breath at their predicament, and slowly edged his hand towards his bracer, seeking to send out an emergency transmission.
In response, the masked figure clicked their tongue lightly before waving their finger at him.
“Nuh-uh-huh. I really wouldn’t do that if I were you.” He chided him as if talking to a child, before turning his right palm to face up.
Rodi felt his arm constricted, held in place by something invisible.
“It would be pointless, too. Look around, soldier.”
It was eerily silent. Rodi could no longer hear the bombardment and planetary anti air weapons. It was over. The siege ended, and given those who stood before him, it was clear who won.
“I’m sure you’ve clocked it by now, but your headquarters have fallen. Planet is now under Boellian control.” The masked figure explained. “Tell me, have you touched the crystal?”
Rodi remained silent.
“You have, haven’t you? I’m surprised your brain hasn’t been completely fried. Are you psionic, perchance? No… Psionic sensitivity, maybe, but you’re not a complete psionic. Well, it doesn’t really matter, honestly.”
Rodi remained silent, scanning his surroundings in desperation.
An entire Boellian platoon surrounded them. Enemies were also in the ruins surrounding them, ready to take him down should he make a poor decision. Both Thum-Bael and Alwin were disarmed and subdued by now; their hands restricted with magnetic cuffs.
“He doesn’t really seem to be talkative, Aardvark.” The masked figure turned towards the Boellian psionic for a moment.
The psionic shrugged briefly before raising his hand in Rodi’s direction.
Immediately, an invisible force compelled him to his knees, forcing him in place. He could no longer move at all; his armor creaked as the mechanical joints buckled trying to break free. After a short while, Rodi gave up lest he break the suit and immobilize himself.
“More like it.” The masked man said as he approached Rodi. Circling him once, twice, he placed his hand on his helmet before splitting it apart.
An immense sense of dread overcame Rodi as he was exposed to the planet’s atmosphere. It was much too warm for his liking, sure, but his helmet was cracked open. He was facing a psionic, but this was a duroceramic environmental suit for crying out loud; it was some of the best equipment money could buy a soldier; and it was broken through a simple touch, just like that.
“You’ll have to excuse me.” The masked man said. “Normally, I would do you the courtesy of showing you my face, but I am horribly disfigured, you see. I am…” he sighs “pretty conscious about it.”
He circled him again, before kneeling to Rodi’s level.
“May I kindly ask you for the archive?”
Rodi paused for a moment, before looking at his two men.
“Don’t give it to him!” Thum-Bael shouted, prompting one of the Boellians to hit him in the head with the butt of their weapon.
As Thum-Bael loudly guffawed from the hit, the Boellians surrounding him piled on top, battering him with their weapons, using them as blunt weapons rather than the rifles they are, shouting what was undoubtedly profanities that Rodi could no longer understand.
“It’s in my belt. Third pouch.” Rodi complied with a loud sigh.
The masked man patted him lightly on the shoulder before reaching for the pouch. With a few quick movements, he removed the archive, raising it towards the dim sun and staring at it.
“Mhm…” he exhaled loudly as he gripped the crystal tightly in his hand, pausing for a few moments. Psionic energies coalesced around him.
After what felt like an eternity to Rodi, the masked man turned his gaze towards him once again.
“You have my thanks, Lieutenant Tieberg. I believe the Galaxy shall thank you for your service.”
With the twist of his heels, he approached the psionic Boellian, Aardvark and nodded to him.
“I believe that this concludes the end of our partnership, my dear. Please remember the offer I have extended you.”
“What about those three?” he asked.
“What about them, indeed…” he pondered, turning towards them. Tilting his head lightly, he gave out an order.
“Kill them.”
Lieutenant Rodi Tieberg’s lifeless body collapsed; the plasma blasts and the thud of three bodies hitting against the floor rang out in the background of deafening Boellian war cries.
