Chapter 2: The Approach

Albion was tearing itself apart. There was a time when it was whole, and maybe, even as the first crack split its way between Human and Harbinger, Protector and Explorer, Living and Dead, there could have been a longing for the old symmetry. But it seemed that within Albion perfect unity could not exist. Four great powers were at work within the wandering Eden, and what moved them to abandon their lush, starry pastures for the unknowable deep, no causal mind could know. A silent bell had rung, and from pre drawn faults their schism was born. And yet Revol was calm, sitting cross legged in the center of Oak, waiting for the aged mother's reply.

"Seven thousand years," was her answer.

Revol sighed. He heard Catalyst call his name.

"We spinning up?"

Catalyst nodded from the doorway. Revol stood and followed him to the barracks. Their fellow Harbingers rushed through the hallways like arterial blood.

Ishtar, Haruspex and Forge were already in the armory. Eukary and Aster came last. They all geared up in silence, choosing their most trusty weapons and equipment. Revol wanted to break the quiet, but could only think of pointless things to say, so he kept silent, choosing the rifle that shot the straightest and a skullfort that never cracked.

Sensus was waiting in the conference room to brief them. His tired eyes looked old.

"You coming with us Cap?” Eukary asked.

"I am," Sensus replied.

When all eight of them were seated, the room went dark.

"Eno," Sensus said, "bring up Dawn Exigent. Night Op One, please."

The old machine birthed a hologram of Albion and the surrounding eighteen parsecs.

"Tactical, please?" Sensus asked.

The map turned from a starfield to a grid.

"What was that?" Revol asked. "Can we go back?"

"I'll explain everything, Revol," Sensus said.

"It looked dark, near the Phrastus Belt."

"Albion, darkening in the West," said Haruspex.

"Team," Catalyst barked. They all were quiet and still.

"Thank you, Cat" Sensus said. "Attack Group Six will be dropped ten clicks north. They'll make a quiet approach and hold off til we signal them."

So he went on, telling them what they could have deduced from looking at the map by themselves. Then he asked Eno to display the cartographic map again, but only for an instant, before the lights came back on and the map faded.

"Let me be clear," Sensus said, "mission protocol demands comm silence. We locate, we secure, we extract. Any discussion about our mission parameters will be had en route or on return. Once we're deployed, there's to be no communication between teams. We can't risk revealing our approach to Solomon."

And they were away, filing into their insertion craft. Speck was waiting amidships at port, and when they all strapped in he returned to the helm of their jumpship, Harbinger One.

"What's really happening?" Revol asked, once Sensus had cast his aura.

"I know we all trust each other," Sensus replied, "but we have to stretch our trust a little further than we have in the past."

”Captain?” Cat said nervously.

"Solomon was right," Sensus said.

"About?" Revol asked.

"Ulro, and its expansion."

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No one spoke for some time. Each considered what their captain said quietly.

Haruspex broke the silence. "Then why are we capturing him, and not delivering an apology?"

"The teacher we all loved is gone," Sensus said. He then held out his wrist. The others did the same. "I took a risk copying and smuggling this. It will play once and only once, before erasing itself completely. I have no clue where the root storage is, or if it even was preserved, so listen closely."

And they all heard the hissing of the heliopause at the border of the deep. The hiss was cold, a living static, but at the same it was a rattle in a dying throat. Then they heard a voice that shifted constantly in octave, and at times sounded unnatural.

Mighty Haleon, I bow to you before your throne of souls. Carry me away to Zar Zafaran and entomb me in your wisdom. Gracious Topar, lay me beneath your shadow on your bed of sweet bile. Nurse me as your infant son, and fill my empty mind with truth.

The heliopause spat and crackled as if it were struggling to silence Solomon's heretical words. But he persisted, naming all eight of the beasts that once brought the universe to the brink.

... nails were driven deep into their luminous fibers... their luminous fibers... take me to Nessus, Lovely Topar...

Solomon's voice again yielded for a time to the heliopause, then he broke through as he had once sounded, a shrewd and lucid man.

Red Orak is coming. Haleon's daughters have found a way through the Klippotic Verge and have begun sending their Archeus Knights through. I barely escaped their outriders, and the one I killed had information that we need. They used some sort of resonance to portal through. The daughters are weak from their singing, and Haleon himself is still in deep hybernation, but his son is mounting a full scale offensive. They must not be allowed to gain a foothold. If we do not act now to drive back Orak and his knights, Haleon's forces will pour through the Verge and all of Briah will burn.

And he was quiet again before resuming his chant to the tangent lords. The heliopause spared them their teacher's last tortured words, and then the files dissolved into silence.

"How is Attack Group Six composed?" Catalyst asked.

"Sentinels from the 79th," Sensus answered. "I saw to that personally."

"He only mentioned activity from Haleon," Eukary said, "and only by proxy. If you ask me, it sounds like we have time."

"As long as we act," Catalyst said. "We don't have time for the bureaucratic dogma that drove Solomon to leave in the first place."

"There won't be any of that," Sensus assured them. "Steps have already been taken to contain Ulro. The dark space you saw on Eno's cartography is reduced by two percent from its state three days ago."

"So the Artifexus will plug the hole while we kill whatever squeezes through?" Eukary asked.

"Boots on the ground," said Forge.

Sensus nodded. "But the Quorum wants this quiet. And they're worried about more than mass panic. They're afraid of Solomon, and I want to find out..."

The heliopause screamed its static hiss again, and Solomon's voice, lucidity restored, whispered a name.

Othominian...

"For the love of tits!” shouted Revol.

"Check your vams," Sensus commanded.

They all searched their vambrace computers for the sound file they just heard, but it was gone.

"A hidden piece of data?" Catalyst asked.

"Let's hope that's all that was," said Haruspex.

The proximity alert was a welcome noise, pulling them all back to the realm of the familiar. They readied their gear while Speck evaded the sensor buoys, then strapped in for insertion.

The world was a dead blue amidst turbulent grey, and its clouds were milky coals that seemed to drip black smoke into their own selves eternally. Beneath the black clouds was a gaseous curtain several miles thick where lightning greased the backs of great floating eels. Harbinger One burst from the underbelly of Solomon's stormwall and leveled out, soaring alone in a hollow grey haze of sky. Speck brought them down to the south of Solomon's grotte and deployed the sound dampening net before their craft ejected, hurtling deep into the ground and prying open the earth for their repulsor ramp to extend. Ready for actions they already regretted, the combat team of Harbinger One stepped onto the repulsors and rode the wind to the surface of Bindhu Prime, known commonly as the 'Temple of Fiends.'

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