David Drake - General 01 - The Forge.pdf - David Drake - margozap

The General, Vol. I: The Forge

by S.M. Stirling and David Drake (1991)

A Baen Books Original

Second printing, March 1995

[blurb]

"We made it!"

They were still two hundred meters ahead of the first Colonists. Carbines cracked and spat, but

you would have to be dead lucky to hit a moving target from a galloping dog. Of course, once the

platoon were bunched on the slow-moving ferry, nothing would prevent the better than three hundred

pursuers from deploying and shooting their quarry to ribbons long before they moved out of range.

Not to mention the pompom that was bouncing along behind the Colonial cavalry. The

quarter-kilo shells would be more than enough to deal with the ferry even without the carbines of the

riders.

The buildings were blurring by, adobe and pole frames. "Rifles out and take what cover you can

as soon as we get on board," Foley was shouting. Try and take out the pompom crew! The ferry bulked

larger and larger, but the four-meter gap of the loading ramp was an absurdly small target for thirty-odd

men galloping on dogback.

Raj grinned to himself as he thought of galloping toward it without pursuit. It would be terrifying.

Collisions, dogs falling, men being trampled or thrown against wood and machinery with bone-snapping

force. It was wonderful, how circumstances redefined the term "danger."

Chapter one

The rat screamed.

Raj Whitehall spun on one heel, the beam of his carbide lamp stabbing out scarcely faster than

the pistol in his right hand.

"Shit," he muttered, as the light fell on the corner of the underground chamber. The rodent was

dead now, dangling from the jaws of a cat-sized spersauroid, a slinky thing with a huge head and slender

body carried high on four spidery legs. It blinked at them with eyelids that closed to a vertical slit, and

then was gone with a rustle of scales against rubble. Raj grimaced. One of the few pleasant things about

living in East Residence was that Terran life had mostly replaced the local. But not in the catacombs, it

seemed.

Thom Poplanich laughed. "Careful, Raj," he said. "Those bullets will bounce, you know."

Raj grinned back a trifle sheepishly as he holstered the weapon. A genuine five-shot revolver, it

was as much a badge of nobleman's rank as was the saber he carried slung over one shoulder. Both

were as familiar as his clothes; Whitehall had been born in Descott County, hard country two weeks'

journey north of the capital, where men went armed from puberty. The platinum stars and hunting scenes

inlaid in the steel of the revolver were a badge as well, of membership in the Governor's Guard.

"Spirit of Man of the Stars," Raj said, and touched the silver wafer etched in holy circuits that

hung around his neck. "This place makes my skin crawl." Everyone knew the catacombs under New

Residence were ancient and huge . . . but those were just words until you saw it. This complex could

house the whole population of the capital, with room to spare—and New Residence was the largest city

on Earth.

"Not a spot for a picnic," Poplanich agreed.

The abandoned elevator shaft he had found below his apartments ended in this floor of rubble;

from the hollow sounds and the way it shifted, there must have been levels below. Rust-streaks marked

the lines of ancient machinery. Now there was only the cool gray surface of fused stone, and one

half-open door . . . no, wait.

"Look at this," Poplanich said. He walked quickly over the broken rock and flicked his lantern's

beam downward, moving with a studied grace. " That hasn't been here since the Fall."

It was a tallow candle stub, resting in a congealed puddle of its own grease. There was a

smokemark above it, but dust lay thick over all.

"But it's been there long enough," Raj commented, trying the door. It was frozen in its half-open

position, but there was just room for his barrel chest. "Hand me the paintstick, will you, Thom?"

They would need to be very careful not to lose their way, down here in the catacombs. He

touched his wafer again. Everything around them was a product of men who had lived before the Fall,

when the Spirit of Man of the Stars had infused their souls. You could see it in the way the rock was

carved, seamless and even, in the strange bits and pieces of shattered machinery, the very materials

unfamiliar. There might even be . . .

"If we come across any computers, we'll have to tell the priests," he said.

Thom laughed. "They don't need genuine relics any more," he said with easy cynicism. "Haven't

you heard what the last synod ruled about the Miraculous Multiplication?"

Raj flushed; they were both just turned twenty-five, but there were times when Thom Poplanich

made him feel very much the raw youth, a rustic squire in from the provinces. Even in tweed and leather

hunting clothes, the other man had a slim self-assured elegance that spoke often generations of urban

aristocracy. Raj touched his amulet again. It was comforting to know that this was the genuine article,

recovered two centuries ago and blessed by Saint Wu herself. Even if the Church had ruled that belief

made the relic holy, rather than the reverse.

He forced himself into the door and pushed with knees and hands, back braced against the wall.

For a long moment nothing moved, until he took a deep breath and threw the strength of shoulders and

back into it, timing the contraction to the exhalation of his breath the way the family armsman had taught.

A seam parted along the side of his tight uniform jacket, and the thick slab slid open with a protesting

screech of tearing metal. Raj dropped to the floor in a crouch, panting slightly.

"Showoff," Thom said as he sidled past. There was surprise and slight envy in his tone; his friend

grinned.

"A strong back comes in useful for other things than pulling a plow," he said, raising his own

lantern. "Let's keep turning to the right."

-=0=-***-=0=-

Raj genuflected again, touching brows and heart to the ancient, dust-shrouded computer terminal.

"Look, there's not much point in going on," he said. This was the fifth level down from their

starting-point. Emptiness, offices and storage space, eerily uncorroded metal and the smell of damp

stone. And enough computer equipment to stock every church in the Civil Government and the barbarian

lands as well.

Poplanich ran a hand over the swivel chair before the terminal. Dust puffed up behind his hand,

silver-yellow in the light of the lantern.

"Feel this," he said, fascinated. "It looks like leather, but new leather. This area's been

abandoned since the Fall, it should have rotted away to shreds." He swung the chair back and forth. "A

greased axle won't turn that smoothly, and this doesn't even squeak ."

Raj shrugged. "They had powers before the Fall. The Spirit withdrew them when they proved

unworthy."

Thom nodded absently; that was from the Creed. "I still think this was a naval installation," he

said, picking up a plastic sign from one desk. It was made of two strips joined at one long edge; one side

was blank, and the other bore black letters in the Old Namerique tongue. Wez cainna bie fyr'd: slavs

godda bie sold . His lips moved silently, construing it first into modern Namerique, and then into his native

Sponglish. He frowned absently. Well, of course , he thought.

"I don't know," Raj replied, heading cautiously out into the corridor again. "The Book of the

Fall—hey, there's a stairwell leading down here, hand me the paintstick again—says the military joined

the Rebellion." They had both sat through enough droning sermons on that .

Thom's teeth flashed in a grin. "Just as my own interpretation—and please keep this from the

Invigiles Against Heresy, will you?—I'd say that the Brigade and the Squadron and the others were

pretty low-echelon units, out in the wilds when the Fall came. They didn't cause the breakup of the Holy

Federation, they just seized power where they could when we were cut off from the Stars."

Raj felt a slight discomfort; that was not outside the canons of interpretation, but it was

dangerously free-thinking. "Come on," he said. "Two more levels, then we go back."

-=0=-***-=0=-

"That's a light," Thom said in a hiss as they turned the corner. His foot brushed aside a crumbling

human femur; they had seen enough skeletons on this level to grow blasé. A brittle pile of brown-gray

bone, hardly marked by the teeth of the rats, bits of rope and stiff leather and rusted metal scattered

about it.

Raj squinted, then turned off his lamp. His friend followed suit, and they waited for their eyes to

adjust. He could feel the darkness fading in around him, and with it the enormous weight of the

catacombs. His mouth felt dry. That is a light , he thought. A soft white light that was unlike anything he

had ever seen; not like sunlight, stars, fire, or even the harsh actinic arclights that you sometimes saw in

the Governor's Palace or the mansions of the very rich. This was the light of the Ancients; the light of the

Spirit of Man of the Stars.

"Live equipment," he whispered, genuflecting again. Blasphemy. Fallen Man's eyes are blind to

the Light of the Spirit. I am not worthy . With an effort of will he relaxed the rock-tense muscles of his

neck and shoulders.

"Thom, we shouldn't be here. This is something for a Patriarchal Council, or the Governor."

There was a slight tremor in his hands as he drew his pistol, swinging the cylinder out and checking the

load. The unnatural gleam shone off the polished brass of the cartridges. He was conscious of the

uselessness of the gesture; what good would a revolver be against the powers of the unFallen? Of

course, it was no more useless than anything else he might do . . .

"Priests . . . " Thom visibly reconsidered. "Priests aren't notably more virtuous than you or I, Raj,"

he said reasonably. His eyes stayed fixed on the unwinking glimmer, shining slightly with an expression of

primal hunger. "Of course, if you're . . . uncertain . . . you can wait here while I check. I wouldn't think

less of you for it."

Raj flushed. I'm too old to be pushed into something stupid by a dare , he thought angrily,

even as he felt his mouth open.

"I'll use the pry bar," he said. "Get it out, would you?"

Thom rummaged in his rucksack, while Raj advanced to examine the door. The feeling in his

stomach reminded him of waiting behind the barricade during the street fighting last fall, when the sound

of the rioters had come booming around the corner, thunder of feet and massed chanting of voices:

Conquer! Conquer ! Just like then; he had seen the eyes of the rankers flick toward him, as they stood at

parade rest. He had strolled up to the chest-high barrier of carts and furniture and paving stones as if he

were walking out the front gate of his father's manor, going to inspect the dogs. Sergeant major, first

company to the breastwork; prepare for volley fire, if you please . His voice hadn't been the shaky

squeak he'd expected, either.

You could get through anything, once you'd decided you had to. Look at it as a job to be done,

and then do it, because somebody had to and it cursed well wasn't going to happen if you waited for the

next man. Not to mention that his role in putting down the riots had gotten him a Captaincy and the still

David Drake - General 01 - The Forge.pdf

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