Emergence 3.0
A Novel – In One page Per Day
Day 315, Sunday
November 11th, 2018
Chapter Seven: Martyrs
There is a beauty to military formations, a Sublime blend of the simple
and the complex, when lighted in the ocean of space, every ship, every vessel
in motion, it is the greatest of all dances.
The god-fearers never considered that any faction within the Empire
would oppose them. They had been conditioned to expect obedience, they
cultivated it among their subordinates, rewarded it in those who evinced the
greatest capacity for following orders and sending those who did not to their
death in combat.
This was a serious flaw.
They had never engaged a military power in which they did not possess
the greater force. The Empire rolled over everything, every person, every
planet who would oppose them. The power they brought to bear was only limited
by their objectives, their code of conduct, and the rules of engagement those
codes articulated.
Every objective, every code, every rule was relative, a dispensation for
deviation from a rule or a violation of orders could be had at any time from
the Emperor, or the priesthood, speaking on behalf of the Continuum.
The Imperial forces were supreme, they were accustomed to being on the
offensive, it was an offensive posture that they took where they gathered, they
thought of their defense.
Their maneuvers were totally predictable by those on the general staff
who had decided to rebel. From the reserve forces that were left behind on each
of the million worlds, to their planetary, and star system defenses, which in
this moment of conflict were little more than auxiliaries, to where the
majority of the fleet had gathered in preparation for the jump to the Central
System, there was nothing unscripted about their planning.
They were slaughtered in each of the places where they had gathered; they
were slaughtered en-masse.
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