Sins of the Past
October
31st, 4996 (Holy Terra calendar)
Since it always calms my nerves to
compose in my journal, I undertake to do so now, for rarely has
my need for calm been so great or my nerves so aflame. For so
long have I heard the priests who tutored me condemn crime and
the criminal, painting with words a picture of terror for he who
commits such an error. Never did I think while a youth in the
rectory that such a litany would be turned against me.
I am now faced with the moral quandary
Julia Abrams mockingly warned me of when first we joined company
in the entourage of Lady Erian Li Halan. "Wipe the mother's
milk from your lip, priest," she had said, "If you travel
with us, you're going to break all the rules."
I smiled then, used to such airs of
superiority from working class freemen, who seemed convinced that
only they knew the ways of the worlds and that only their feet
were not weary from walking them. "Let not thy vows to Mother
Church be forsaken, and all resistance will yield to thee,"
I quoted, so confident, even though the Avestites were then on
our heels. But I knew that their hunt was only political. At least,
it was then. I fear our actions have made it otherwise. I have
broken my vows to Mother Church and touched the sleek and cold
brilliance of technology, risking my soul in the act, and the
souls of others in my care.
My sojourn into sin began when Earl
Sebastian Hazat de Aragon made loan to Lady Erian of a starship
in his family's care. He did so in return for my liege's later
favor in an as yet undisclosed matter. The vexing charity of the
nobility is best left unaccepted, but we were in dire need of
transport to Kurga, for on that embattled world was rumored to
be a long-buried secret vital to House Li Halan. Possession of
this secret could very well restore land to Lady Erian.
We took possession of the craft with
Julia Abrams as pilot. Even though we had traveled far already
in her company and had become fast friends, sharing life and death
struggles together, she proved her guild ties once we were in
the craft. A loud argument ensued when she raised the matter of
compensation for her piloting the craft. She dared to ask her
boon companions - nay, the Lady who succored her - for money.
The guilds bathe in such filth, preferring the clink of coin to
life-giving water. The matter was finally resolved when all of
us threatened in return to charge her for our once-freely given
aid in future matters. She relented and consented to pilot the
craft in return for a share of any profit our group's endeavors
might one day yield.
I shall perhaps later add an entry
concerning our journey though the vast spaces between Aragon and
her jumpgate, and the void which awaited us on the other side
of that gate. But I am eager to address the matter of which I
now write - of technology and its misuse in the eyes of the Church,
and the rabid hate invoked in those whose mission it is to guard
the faithful from such sin. My sin.
We landed on Kurga undetected, for
the Hazat and the Kurgan rebels were fully engaged in bitter warfare
at the gates of the capitol, a battle which, as with many others
in that location before, would come to naught but death for many
soldiers with victory for none. The capitol stood firm. Far from
it, in the deep forests to the north, we landed our craft near
the spot to which our data had led us. From a long-slumbering
think machine on Aylon I had retrieved a map of this very place,
detailing from a millennia ago the city which once thrived here,
but was now swallowed by root and loam, canopied by leaf and vine.
Such wilderness expeditions were not
unknown to us, and our Vorox companion, Onganggorak, led us through
the winding paths to the remains of a structure wherein rested
our secret find. After digging a while to gain egress, we traveled
by fusion torch light through corridors untouched for generations.
After nearly a day of such travel, with many false turns and dead-end
alleys, we finally came to the vast vault.
I gasped in astonishment at what lay
before us. I had seen weapons of war before, but rarely so grand
as these. They stood in perfect ranks, unblemished by the centuries,
perfect metal cannons of destruction such as have never been seen
by the faithful souls of our modernday Empire. Such Second Republic
monsters could only have been crafted by godless men, who knew
not compunction or remorse for the horrors their metal children
wrought.
It was our mission to retrieve one
of these beasts, of the same design and type clearly once used
by the Li Halan long ago when they had secured their fiefs from
the sinful Republicans. But as I looked upon them now, I shuddered,
and remembered the legends of the early Li Halan, how they had
made pacts with demons and slaughtered their enemies with such
ferocity as to make the Pancreator weep. I knew doubt then. Could
I aid even my sworn liege in this task? To return to the Known
Worlds with such weaponry? Surely, to hand over this technology
would return Erian to the graces of her family - but to what use
would it then be put? These things could only deliver horror and
soul-death. Oh, the Emperor Wars had been one long night of terror
for too many, with similar rediscovered weaponry shifting the
balance of power for each house who discovered them. What if these
weapons convinced the Li Halan that they could defy the power
of the new Emperor?
I pleaded with Erian to realize what
we had done, and to leave these things untouched, to destroy the
data which had brought us here. But she was flush with the power
of these things, and heeded me not.
Even with the burns that now pain my
arm, I thank the Pancreator for the delivery of his punishment
then.
We were fools to think that the Avestites
had not followed us here. Ong had said too much in public under
the influence of drink, and word had spread of our goal. They
burst into the room brandishing flameguns and screaming their
litany of seizure.
Of course, we all resisted. We hid
behind the monstrous carcasses of the cannons and fired our weapons
while they fired theirs. But it was a short fight, for Erian was
struck when her shield burned out. We pleaded surrender, knowing
that because Erian was noble, they would have to return her for
trial rather than let her die here. There was always the hope
of escape then.
While I ministered to her wound under
their watchful gaze, they demanded that Julia show them the workings
of the cannons. She refused at first, but their brands convinced
her flesh, and her resolve soon followed.
Let what bad words I said of the guildsmembers
earlier be mitigated by my thankful admiration for their cleverness
-- as dangerous as it is. They are all trained in the art of talking,
used to befuddle their customers so that they might sell faulty
merchandise for good price before the dupe is aware of what he
has bought. Such a gift served Julia here, as she maneuvered the
Avestites to inspect the mouth of the cannon as she pressed the
remote control unit she had pocketed during the firefight.
The ensuing chaos allowed us to escape
down a side tunnel, which Ong collapsed behind us to stifle pursuit.
I followed in a daze, ashamed at my extreme relief. Like a child
who had avoided punishment, I was elated - but great Pancreator,
others suffered in my stead.
I can never forget the sight of the
Avestites blown apart by the fires belched forth from the metal
beast, asleep for so many years, awakened now at an instant to
destroy all in its path - including its own brethren, standing
in ranks before it. The fellow cannons' screams pained the ears.
They did not go gentle to their doom, for the fires in their innards
erupted outward, released from their long captivity by ruptured
steel.
It was only the fire-retardant robes
of the Avestite which stood before me that prevented my burning
in the blight. He burned for me. My clothes were alit and my skin
hot, but I was alive. Ong's fur was singed terribly, as was Erian's
clothing, but our fear helped us ignore the pain as we bolted
from that fiery chamber.
We suffered two days without food or
water in the winding caverns before finding escape from that tomb.
Our craft was still where we had left it, although the Avestites
had tried to search it. Of them, there was no sign. Did any survive
the conflagration? I pray for their sakes and ours that the answer
is no.
I have received a harsh lesson, and
one which I will endeavor to heed. But not so my companions. Erian
has resolved to not give up her search for similar engines of
her family's past. Julia is positively ecstatic about the power
she wielded with but the movement of her thumb on a switch. Cardanzo,
Erian's bodyguard, has sworn to be more cautious around such technology,
but has developed no fear of it. Only Onganggorak has realized
the full import of what we have seen. Bred among little technology,
on a world where only one's own strength can prevail over others,
he rightly fears what destruction can be wielded with such machines.
I have thought deeply on this but have
no easy answers. It was such technology that aided Alexius in
his ascent, and I am not one to deny the greater good he now delivers
to us. Indeed, I write this from inside a cocoon of metal speeding
through the void towards a machine greater than any yet conceived,
the jumpgate of the Annunaki. The Prophet admired such space quests,
yet abjured the cannons we have seen. He knew the terrible, seductive
temptation to use them.
I am only a young priest, but I know
that technology is a greater force than I, awakening desires within
me and others to remake the worlds in images not of my choosing.
Guiseppe Alustro