[Forlorn Ascension]|[Rites of Dominion]

by Desrium

The Righteous Cost

Elsewhere on the G.S.O, soldiers from all walks of life gathered in meeting halls to recuperate from their harrowing ordeal. The rooms were humungous and sparsely furnished, with numerous levels that the displaced soldiers and civilians-turned-soldiers stood around. At the center of the rooms on each level there was a chrome table that was long and broad, seating hundreds of tired, stressed individuals. There were benches that came out from the walls, running continuously along their length, but little else. Crowds of people simply stood about and there was a constant clamor as they spoke as one, voicing their fears and discussing their uncertain futures. The walls had flat screens mounted on them, but many were blank while those that were still operational were showing the slowly drifting wreckage surrounding the complex.

Alikir was on one of the upper decks inside a meeting hall, he didn’t know the precise location within the space complex himself. He was just following the moving masses as they went and found himself sitting on a bench some time later, alone though he was surrounded by so many, be them seated next to him or standing out in the open space. The sound of them all talking blended together into one overlaying noise in the background, almost melodic to the Space Ranger’s distant mind. He had his arms folded behind his head and his visor retracted, staring off past the groups of people. There was no campfire here, but he was still cast under a golden light by the few screens high up on the walls. And he was far from being complacent with the war consuming the galaxy. Whereas before he was still because his thoughts were calm, pacified by an impending inevitability, now he was stilled because of worries and uncertainty. Now he was obsessing over small details, going over his own skills and capabilities and thinking about what the next battle will bring. It was now that Alikir knew what Phineas meant when the pony said he was agonizing over his decision. For a week, the stallion must have felt this anxiety, weighing both the dire need for action and the horrific consequences that would come about from this action.

This time of reprieve was a torture as he stewed in his own mind, well aware of his own mortality. Alikir stared out into the crowd, knowing that his next fight could very well be his last. Images of his comrades, all proud in their combat armor and holding their guns like they were objects to be cherished, flashed before his eyes. One by one they met their end. These haunting images, distorted by time save for the most visceral of details, were what drove him to give up fighting in the first place. The screams of the fallen troopers resonated in his thoughts, the way their broken bodies were thrown about after receiving the fatal blow. But now they were Alikir’s motivation to carry on, the fuel to feed his soldier spirit. He had to honor their sacrifice, he had to keep fighting! Yet still the selfish fear remained. For all the emphasis on honor the Harmony imparted in its soldiers, he could not help fearing for himself. How could he not, when the enemy had weapons that could destroy whole formations in one strike?

Alikir sat there on the bench, what was visible of his face creased by his uneasiness. He cursed this moment of reprieve, he truly did. In the heat of battle he was precise and professional, almost running on automation programmed by his days as a cadet in training. There was no room to have the thoughts he had now during a fight.

The Space Ranger sat on the bench wishing he was in the thicket of a battle, if only to spare himself his anxiety. He feared his own demise, yet accepted it all the same. He wondered if his departed rangers felt the same way before they died.

”Only those who devote their life to violence know peace. Death is just an excuse to stop fighting, eh guys?” he mused.

***

“I wish I had their pendants…”

Ryagna-Elysia stood at the bottom level of a meeting area in one of many rings formed by grieving refugees. They all stood in assembly around the giant table at the center of the room, watching as the chains were brought forth by somber soldiers from various places in the assembly. The dangling ornaments were placed on the table and in such close proximity and number; the holographic pendants gave off a faint blue glow, the image of the spiraling galaxy within each one a point of light from afar.

And from afar, the arrangement of the pendants formed spiral arms in of themselves, a mural dedicated to all those who gave their lives in the fight for freedom. Perhaps elsewhere in the galaxy, other soldiers were making similar memorials for their lost comrades with the pendants they managed to retrieve. Thus was the toll this war had.

And as great as the number of retrieved pendants was, the fact of the matter was that there were many more that couldn’t have been salvaged. Critically damaged ships exploding made it impossible for anyone to retrieve the pendants their crew wore. Battles fought planetside suffered losses in circumstances that made gathering the pendants dangerous to surviving personnel, such as burning and collapsing buildings and rubble-buried streets. They could only be represented in spirit until they could be given a respectable ceremony: the dispatching of empty coffins into the void of space.

”If their pendants were on that table, at least the rest of these people would know what you all did. You wouldn’t just be ambiguous faces and statistics…”

The small ranger let out a small, near silent sigh as she watched the proceedings happen. Any soldier that stepped up carried a couple to a whole bunch of chains with them, dangling about as they went up to the table. They stayed there for a moment or two, fitting the ornaments into the mural and making their parting sentiments.

”There are hundreds… no… thousands… maybe even millions of others who aren’t able to do this. They probably feel just as bad as I do right about now…”

A few of the soldiers at the table started to make their way back into the assembly. Several more stepped forward to pay their last respects. The melancholy of the chamber was accentuated by the echoing messages that came over the communication equipment brought from a few ships. Messages heralding both great victories elsewhere across the galaxy… and crushing defeats. The latter was disturbingly more common than the former. And the warning of a second wave was a grim cloud hanging on the horizon, roiling and rolling, growing nearer while the pains of loss still ached in the hearts of the resistance.