Echoes of Harmony

Beacon Hills Apartments

Mornage, Stariek

12 February 3296

Ethan Fischer set a bowl of freshly made popcorn on the low coffee table at the center of the cramped living room. Almost immediately, before he even had a chance to sit on the couch next to her, his little sister's small hand reached in and came back with a handful. Several pieces fell to the tabletop and floor. Ethan playfully slapped her wrist, though it did nothing to dissuade her.

“You know the rules, Emmie.” He grabbed a handful for himself and piled it into his mouth as he plopped down onto the couch. The force caused her to bounce slightly. Still chewing, he continued, “When I make the popcorn, I get first dibs.”

“You snooze, you lose,” Emmie replied, snuggling against him and tossing her brown hair so it smacked him in the face. “What are we watching today?”

“Whatever you want.”

Ethan grabbed the remote, a slim piece of smooth, black plastic, from its position on the arm of the couch and handed it to her. Without a moment’s hesitation, she turned the holographic TV on. It whirred to life, displaying images for the variety of different holos produced in the last few years. He regretted the decision at once. The first choice was her favorite TV show, one about magical sea creatures having inane adventures.

As the cartoon started playing, Emmie slid the remote onto the table and grabbed the bowl of popcorn. She pulled it to her and wrapped her arms around it to hold it close. As she devoted her full attention to the show, Ethan found it hard to not let his own attention wander and simply skim the CoreNet from his CAM. Something about the characters made it feel like they were staring into his soul.

“So how is school going, kiddo?” he asked, grabbing another handful of popcorn.

“Fine, I guess.” She shrugged and played with a piece of popcorn between her fingers. “It’s school.”

“How are your grades doing? Still getting straight As?”

“Mostly,” Emmie said with a roll of her eyes. “My math teacher doesn’t like me or something, so…”

“So what?” He nudged her with his elbow when she didn’t answer. “Come on, out with it.”

She looked away and whispered, barely audible, “I may be failing math.”

Ethan sharply inhaled, sucking air between his teeth.

“Do Mom and Dad know?” He tried to keep the accusation out of his voice. The hurt look on Emmie’s face told him he failed.

“Not yet, but progress reports are going to be sent out on Friday. I don’t know what I’m going to tell them.” She looked at him with a sly grin. “The military hasn’t taught you anything about hijacking CoreNet messages, have they?”

“Even if they did, I wouldn’t be able to do that,” he said, playfully pushing her shoulder. She laughed and pushed him back before throwing a piece of popcorn at his arm. “You’ve gotta work harder, you know. Silver Ridge Academy is a great school, and you need to keep your grades up. If there’s anything I can help you with, just let me know.”

“Like you’re going to be able to help me when you’re out fighting pirates.” She crossed her arms and pouted. Her eyes stared at the holographic TV, but he could tell she wasn’t paying attention to the show.

“Hey, I’ll still talk to you.” He placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Just because I’m a billion kilometers away doesn’t mean you aren’t still my sister. I’ll send you a message at least once a week. Maybe we can find some time to do some study sessions together.”

“Do you really have to leave, Ethan?” Emmie asked. She looked at him like a puppy wondering why their human was leaving for work. Tears sparkled at the corners of her eyes. “Why can’t you just stay here? First, you move out, then you leave the planet. You keep leaving us.”

“It’s my job,” he said, wrapping his arm around her and squeezing her shoulder gently. She rested her head on his shoulder. “I don’t want to leave you guys. Some day, you’ll get a job and won’t be able to spend as much time with the people you care about. I shouldn’t be away for more than a year. Plus, they’re giving us shore leave at Christmas time, so I’ll see you guys then. It’ll be just like every Christmas.”

“Promise?”

She held out her pinky finger to him.

“Promise.” Without a moment’s hesitation, he hooked his finger with hers and shook it before kissing her on the top of her head. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Now, let’s forget about that and watch your show.”

#

Hyperion Training Facility 143

Invicem System

15 February 3296

Such filth.

General Augusta Zorn had never seen such a disgrace in all his years of service in the Hyperion Empire. At one point, their armies were the best trained in the galaxy. Now, they wouldn’t even graduate from boot camp if the tests adhered to standards. But year after year, he watched as increasingly inept cadets were pushed through. Standards were nonexistent. The age requirement for enlisting continued crawling lower, with cadets as young as fourteen now making their way through training facilities. Anything to continue fueling the navy of the largest human empire the galaxy had ever seen.

Zorn couldn’t help but chuckle to himself at the fact he needed to qualify that statement. Their government always used it as a point of pride. “Largest human empire.” He saw it as nothing more than a limitation. If he had his way, there wouldn’t be any other empires. The Hyperion Empire would be the largest in the galaxy, period. Not second to the uptight Thalyssians. They didn’t deserve to hold the position of most expansive when they weren’t even the strongest. If one could not defend their claims, what was the point in having them?

What else should he have expected when such inept leadership took over a decade ago, though? When weakness sat at the highest echelon of their government, how could they expect to project a position of strength? If they simply gave Zorn the promotion he requested many times previous, if they just gave him the resources to do so, he could run a swath of destruction through the galaxy. Such fear and devastation was unheard of in this day and age. Perhaps it was time to allow it rear its head once more.

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After all, war is the deadliest sport. And humans are its best players.

General Zorn walked along the narrow, metal catwalk. Each of his steps was met by a clang as his metallic armor struck the floor. None of the cadets below paid any attention to him. He supposed he should give them credit for at least remembering to not allow distractions to bother them.

Two teams, one denoted by red markers and the other blue, made their way towards each other through a mock battlefield setup resembling a ruined city. The whining from pulse pistols and the report of ballistic rifles mingled in the air. Though they practiced with low power pulse weaponry and pellets rather than bullets, Zorn had to admit it sounded like the real thing. If only the same could be said for the teams’ coordination.

The practice drill ended with the blare of an alarm. Both of the teams started returning to their original positions to run through the practice again when Zorn made his way to a nearby stairwell. He descended with something between a walk and a jog.

“Hold it!” he yelled out when he reached the bottom, his voice echoing in the large chamber. The cadets immediately stopped, some of them panting from exertion and others looking bored. “Line up, cadets.”

Zorn gestured to the ground in front of him as if creating a line for them to stand on. Their basic cloth uniforms were drenched in sweat. They took deep breaths, trying to hide the fact they were out of breath from the exercise. The two instructors, who he could never remember the names of, stood off to the side, watching the encounter. He could tell by the looks on their faces they didn’t know why he halted the training exercise. Of course, they didn’t. No matter how much he tried to stamp out ignorance, it always managed to ooze its way back in.

“That last ‘exercise’ was difficult to watch.” Zorn paced in front of the cadets, slowly looking each of them in the eye. “My grandmother would have performed better than each of you, and she’s been dead for fifty years. In all my years serving our empire, never have I seen such inept cadets. All of you should be ashamed of yourselves.”

“What exactly did we do wrong, sir?” one of the cadets called out.

Zorn stopped his pacing at once. He turned to the boy, who couldn’t have been older than sixteen. The boy continued staring straight ahead. While dots of sweat already covered his forehead, a new bead snaked its way down his cheek. A look of concern spread over his face as quickly as he hid it.

“You are not to question your superiors,” Zorn said, stepping closer and looking down slightly at the boy. “I thought that would have been made clear to you already.”

“How are we supposed to improve if you refuse to tell us what we did wrong then, sir?”

A few intakes of breath came from some cadets to either side. They fidgeted nervously in place as Zorn continued staring down at the insolent brat. A smile touched the general’s face.

In one fluid motion, he brought his armored fist up and down into the boy’s nose. With a satisfying crack, it broke. The boy cried out, as did some of the others. His hands went to his face as he staggered backwards. Blood oozed between his fingers and to the ground.

The instructors moved forward at once.

“Sir, what do you think you’re doing?” one of them said as the other moved to shepherd the boy towards the exit. A trail of blood droplets followed in their wake.

“Training.” He folded his hands behind his back, still smiling. “It’s something that you wouldn’t know anything about.”

“I have to report this incident. Surely you know that.”

“What incident?” Zorn frowned and tore his eyes away from the exiting cadet to look at the instructor. “I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

“We’ll see what the Council thinks about that.” The instructor turned to the other eleven cadets still standing there. “Training dismissed.”

Zorn watched as the boys—and one girl—scattered. All except one cast fearful glances in his direction as they left. That was good. Perhaps they might learn something after all.

The instructor watched to make sure the rest of the cadets made it out safely. Another reason for the severe drop in quality of their armies. If they couldn’t take a punishment from their commandant, how were they supposed to properly defend Hyperion interests? Better for them to learn how to handle stress and damage now than on the battlefield, where a second’s hesitation could mean the difference between life and death.

Satisfied, for the moment, General Zorn ascended the stairs he came down and left the chamber.

#

“What do you mean, ‘reassigned?’”

Zorn could barely contain his anger. His foot tapped aggressively against the floor under his desk despite his best efforts to stop it. The nails on his left hand dug into his palm nearly to the point of drawing blood. His desk bore the strain of his grip much better than he would have expected. A glass of wine sat near the holocomputer controls, and he had to resist the urge to down the contents and refill it.

It was for the better, he supposed, that Legate Niklas Rausch, responsible for deciding on all matters relating to the conscription and training of soldiers, was on the other end of a secure link to Imperial Command back on Hyperia. If this conversation occurred in person, he would not have been able to keep from smashing the legate’s face and throwing him out of the room.

“It means you’re getting removed from your training command, General.” The legate took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. His gray hairs were prominent after nearly five decades of service to their society. Zorn hoped he would have lasted as long. “Listen, Augusta, I don’t want to do this. There have been plenty of people who have watched your career with interest. Some of them want to see you succeed and know you are capable of great things. But you are too high strung. You have a tendency to explode at a moment’s notice, and we can’t keep covering these things up.”

“What happened was a training accident,” Zorn hissed. He spoke slowly to keep his voice from shaking. “The boy tripped and hit his head on one of the training set’s fabricated walls. It could have happened to anyone.”

“Around you, General, accidents seem to occur too frequently. It seems to me the only thing fabricated here is your story.” Rausch put his glasses back on and sighed. “Regardless, out of an abundance of caution, you are to return to Hyperia at once where you will find your new position waiting for you.”

“Abundance of caution… A fancy way of saying weakness.” Zorn snarled and restrained himself from destroying the holocomputer built into the desk. He leaned back and flexed his fingers to relax them, though it did no good. “What exactly is this new position?”

“You will be handling assignment of personnel under my supervision. I give you the paperwork, so to speak, and you file it appropriately. To the letter, I might add.”

Zorn ignored the not-so-subtle jab at his competence and instead focused on the less desirable portion of the comment.

“You mean to say I will be sitting behind a desk all day long.”

“No one said it would be glamorous, General, but it beats the alternative. It was the only way I could convince the Council to let you stay. Unless you’d prefer a dishonorable discharge.”

Of course, Zorn knew what a dishonorable discharge would mean in their society. At best, never holding a decent job again. At worst, his summary execution. But by agreeing to take a desk job—being nothing more than a paper pusher—meant he gave up on his goal of becoming a legate himself. Something he had been striving towards for more than a decade, ever since his promotion to general. However, as Rausch said, it beat the alternative.

“Very well, sir.” Zorn folded his hands in his lap to stop them from shaking. “When am I to report for duty at Imperial Command?”

“A shuttle is waiting for you now. See you in a few days, General.”

The connection cut out without a second of hesitation. Silence reigned with the disappearance of the legate’s image. Zorn took several deep breaths, attempting to calm himself, before standing and taking his glass of wine and throwing it against the nearest wall. Shards rained down on a pair of chairs unfortunate enough to have been sitting there. The large red stain from the liquid covered a painting of a Hyperion flower field and oozed down the metal wall to the floor.

Zorn straightened the fabric of his uniform before taking one last deep breath and storming out the door.

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