Ch 2
Extract from the book "Confessions, an Admirals tale volume I"
For the past three years I had been a sailor in the Imperial navy, since that was what the state wanted of its citizens whether they were willing or not and despite my titanic efforts to avoid the whole war, fate had other plans for me!
Before the war I was running a medical transport business and one day my ship was boarded by a pirate raiding party from the Republic and like any sane sentient with half a brain I immediately surrendered and asked for parole, which was a fancy way of saying: 'If I do not fight you and surrender all my goods, you will do me the honor of not introducing my brain to your axe'.
It worked out for the most part, the aforementioned Republicans seemed alright ,about as alright as killers and thieves and God knows what other kind of madmen and women from one of the most savage dictatorship know to the galaxy could be.
It was only myself and Suzaku that day and I am grateful for the fact that none of the women who sometimes served on my ship where present.
Thrust me, those Republicans may look like pleasant fellows, with they're silky long hair, pointy ears, shiny skin, and deep beautiful eyes and absolutely gorgeous humanoid anatomy( just because I don't like them, doesn't mean I can't admit they're pretty!) but that's the only good thing about them.
Though I am not saying that their particular brand of savagery was worst that the one practiced by the Empire or Federation oh no, we all had an equal timeshare in that, theirs was just of a different flavor, that's all.
And to be hones as individuals they were pretty decent fellows.
That is if you're not they're rivals, of which the Imperium or Empire as it was called back then (and is still used in battle cries) found itself at that particular moment in time.
As they looted our ship taking anything they could: pills, syrup, cushions, fabric and fabric samples for footstools (seriously what kind of pirates steals stool samples?) at one point they opened the crates that contained bottles filled with medicinal alcohol.
Alcohol that was to be specifically used externally and only externally!
And pirates being pirates they immediately opened the bottles and started drinking it, granted the alcohol was put into recycled wine bottles, but unlike what the press would want you to believe, we did not intentionally put them in those bottles in the faint hope that pirates would pop out of nowhere and start consuming them, but rather the fact that the bottles were cheap, at the ready and reliable for our purposes and since our venture was a small one we needed every penny we could skim!
So I tried frantically to warn them, because honestly who deserves a slow and painful death? But my pleas fell on deaf ears, mostly from the fact that they did not speak Imperial Standard and I was not familiar with their language, that and the fact that at that point in time the two of us where both tied and gagged in a corner of the room, made my chivalrous intentions doomed to failure.
Well not a total failure, the by then half drunken pirates where having a good laugh at how the two of us where moaning and struggling with the ropes and gags as we tried to stop them and one of our viewers liked out impromptu mime show so much that he decided to reward me with a good kick in the chest that made me collapse to the ground and elicit a bout of laughter from his comrades.
A moment later the rest of our adoring audience joined in to let me know just how much they 'appreciated' me and they appreciated me a lot!
It only lasted a few moments but it was like hell, but even so I wanted to stop them from consuming the alcohol.
And to those of you who did not spent their youth studying medicine, the reason medicinal alcohol is not used for consumption is that there is the danger of it containing methanol, which is a very poisonous type of alcohol, why just 10 ml of the stuff can render you permanently blind and 30 ml can kill you!
Now don't misunderstand, every bottle of medicinal alcohol is purified before being released to the general public, but the main problem with our stock was that we where transporting it to a purifying facility! And with those idiots chugging it down their throats like it was ice tea on a beach you can guess what followed immediately after.
Now, I was not to fond of them back then and my opinion over the years has not changed by much, but even if they where a cutthroat band of thieves and murderers, who if they could they would have sold both me and Suzaku to be some plantation owner's slaves or worst playthings, but as I said before a slow and painful death in which you become blind, you're insides burned, every muscle in your body spasmed and intense pain jolted throughout your body was not something I would wish on anyone, not even them!
So I laid there on the floor waiting for the inevitable and when it came it was truly horrible, a great scream of agony erupted from every pirate, forming a hellish choir that could be heard from all over the ship, as one by one the poor souls had their fates sealed.
As the grotesque scene unfolded around me, a sudden flash of light and a great boom came from my left, I turned my head to see what had just happened. Much to my horror, I discovered that one of the pirates in his pain induced frenzy had fired an arrow into one of his comrades, incinerating the poor or fortunate taffer in an instant.
This made all hell break loose or rather more of it, as the pirates started firing their bows and swinging their sword and maces around causing an inferno of fire, water, ice, wind, earth to engulf the corridors, of my ship and the pirate's ship.
Suzaku managed to get hold of a broken bottle and cut his bonds free and bless his souls he dragged my beaten and bloodied body to the sleeping quarters, where we locked the doors and waited for the carnage to end.
After a few minutes of what can only be describe as a wall of horrid sounds, silence fell and after untying me and waiting what seemed like an eternity, we armed ourselves with the axes that our ship had in case of fire outbreaks, opened the doors and cautiously peered out to have a look.
What we saw was something out off a horror movie, bodies laid everywhere, blood, excrement, and piss pouring out from them, the walls where filled with scars from the weapons discharge and a foul smell of death permeated the entire hull.
We continued our little journey throughout the ship, driven by a curiosity, which when you stop to think about it was borderline suicidal, but to our luck every pirate had consumed the alcohol.
After a few minutes we located the captain of this pirate crew and after a few gentle prods from my axe, we could finally relax.
I thought that the worst was over and gave out a breath of relief, when all of a sudden the ship shook violently. Suzaku and myself gave each other a look of worry, we both hoped that the warp sanctuary had not been damaged, when all of a sudden the sound of footsteps echoed throughout the ship as the door before us was blasted open and armed warrior poured in.
Much to our relief it was the Imperial Fleet who had boarded our vessel, the cavalry had arrived! A little late for my taste, but that's big government for you!
And I must say the look on their faces was priceless, behind me there was a corridor filled with battle scars, dead pirates all about and there I was bruised and bloodied, standing atop of the pirate captain with a bloody axe in hand( courtesy of my prodding of the corpse a moment ago to ensure that he had expired).
At that moment I felt like I was on cloud nine, but unfortunately for me, news of that incident spread far and wide, word of Captain Lelouch who single handedly killed 50 pirates with his bare hands became the talk of the local subsector.
After that a bunch of reporters came to cover the story and Suzaku being the sly business man that he was, charged them heavily for each interview, thus things where looking bright for us!
We had gotten out of a tight spot alive, we now had a very healthy sum of money to help our business expand and we were small town heroes in our neck of the woods (something the ladies appreciated) it was a small piece of heaven, but regretfully it did not last.
For a certain Commodore James Crackerjack had heard of our little adventure and the brainless glory hound immediately showed up a few days later and demanded I transfer to his command, the fact that I was a civilian and my trade was 'potions making' which by law protected me from drafting since I worked in healthcare was completely ignored by the tosser and despite my best efforts to get into his thick skull, the idiot ignored logic and reasoning and continued to press the issue.
Under normal circumstances I would have walked away, but remember that he was not some regular loony but a loony with a license to kill from the state, that and old James was not only a fool, he was a fool with a fleet of a hundred warships behind him and so much to my horror, they gave me my uniform, slapped a couple of golden buttons on my collar to show that I was now officially a Captain and thus I was dragged into the fleet.
Suzaku was ignored in all of this, that much was owned to the fact that sentients tend to only acknowledge the apparent leader of a group when that group allegedly does something impressive, so I somehow managed to convince Old Mad Jack to let him go on the grounds that he was my underling and he had to make sure my businesses' where looked after, him being an aristocrat and having some semblance of a brain nodded and let it be so and I was glad for that, I mean no sense in both of us going to hell I suppose.
So that's how I found myself being torn from a safe place, a newly minted Captain, given a ship which I christened 'The Vampire's Vengeance', with a crew that consisted at the top of the following: first officer Lieutenant James 'Butcher' Centengu, Logistics officer Sergeant Alega 'Baker' Sovorovda, and finally science and engineering officer Lieutenant Lloyd Colomas 'Candlestickmaker' Firebark and with this we were sent to fight in various mini wars and full blown wars over the years leading up to the Great War.
And that my readers, is how my inglorious career began, with poisoned drinks, crazy luck, a lot of pain, and my personal favorite stupidity and the eternal question of why such a combination exists and what it has against good and honest folk and me of course.
Lelouch vi Britannia , Freelance Potions Maker
"Nuts!" Lelouch muttered under his breath as his mind stopped its wondering and returned to the present.
And with the memories of how he had arrived at his current predicament still fresh in his mind, he for a few minutes entered into a slight depression, which was comparable to that of a canary who upon being captured in the jaws of a cat became impatient and said to the aforementioned feline: 'just do it already!' with indifference to its fate.
He thought of his current situation.
On the one hand having a few hundred ships and several thousands of warriors to stand behind when the warp cannons, missiles and energy beams started flying was a good thing, on the other he also had to worry about even more enemy soldiers targeting him, so a mixed blessing at best!
After his first battle and the first sight of his dead soldiers he had tried to think of his subordinates as nothing but tools, tried to distance himself from them, hoping to ease his guilt when they would eventually die in future battles, but it did not work and no matter how many victories he achieved and despite knowing that he couldn't have done anything better in the past to avoid his subordinates dying, he still wondered if he could have saved them.
Maybe if he had been faster, stronger or smarter he could have prevented more of his soldiers from dying, but that was not possible and even now, years after he was drafted he could still remember just how many had died, what their last moments where, but what really weight heavily on his mind was the fact that he was starting to forget their names and they're faces where starting to slip from his mind.
He knows that before he manages to leave the fleet, he will have forgotten even more names and faces and that would haunt him forever, making him contemplate the 'easy' way out.
After a few minutes Lelouch banished those vile thoughts, since in his opinion life was always worth living and you had to do your best to get over you're more difficult moments and move on.
That and the prospect of being turned into a corpse if he didn't snap out of it and get his act together or the prospect of eternal hellfire for choosing the 'easy way' made him come to his senses.
Releasing out a breath of mental exhaustion, he placed the farview he was using to research the culture of the Volunians on the table and laid back and relaxed for a few minutes.
"A sad state of affairs this is Lord Lelouch, this corps has a lot of good warriors and officers, properly deployed it is deadly, yet it is being misused in a tertiary role in the war against Volunia!" Jeremiah lamented to his master as he took out a small box from his pocket, extracted a pill from it and swallowed the pill, breaking Lelouch's state of mind with a not unwelcomed distraction from his less than cheerful thoughts.
"Don't linger too much on feelings of regret, think positive thoughts or you run the risk or seeing even the good side of life as meaningless." he replied.
"Yes sir, but I'm still a little depressed at this state of affairs." Jeremiah replied.
"Don't be, I'm rather pleased myself!" Lelouch said to his knight.
"My lord?" Jeremiah replied as he turned his head towards his liege, his head filled with confusion.
"Why do you think I accepted this commission?"
"For the challenge?" Jeremiah said to his commander with a smile on his face, one that grew bigger once Lelouch gave a nod of the head as his reply.
"But what I really meant to say is that here there is little chance of us being slaughtered by elite units from the enemy, thus we may be able to spent the whole war without the danger of us getting killed, but that's just my opinion, it only applies to me and I doubt it matters much to others." Lelouch thought to himself. He then looked at Jeremiah and started to wonder if his knight did not have certain problems, since Jeremiah always showed great doubt one moment and great resolve the next and despite not being an expert on the behavior of Jeremiah's species, he wondered if not perhaps he was also wearing a mask and knowing a thing or two about living a lie, he could understand if sometimes you let the mask slip, but that was a train of thought for another time, especially since the warp train was reaching its destination.
Just then his communication crystal started vibrating, indicating that someone wanted to talk to him.
He touched the crystal with his finger and it morphed into the small shape of a serpentine creature with grey scales, who was dressed in the same manor of uniform as the two had, but instead of the tricorn caps which he and Jeremiah wore, this serpentine creature wore a side cap that made it clear hewas a staff officer and not a command one. His uniform stretched from his neck down to the end of his body, engulfing him entirely in the dark material, the sailor belonged to the Balfarmaini, sentients who where a serpent like race that had no arms or legs , but they made due with a very powerful telekinetic ability which allowed them to levitate and use objects close to their bodies, this ability was very handy to the aforementioned Metty, since this was Lieutenant Butz his personal aide who had been with him for almost as long as Jeremiah had been, and served as his assistant, driver, bodyguard, and whatever other role was needed, that was pointed out by the fact that Butz's body was covered in all kinds of pouches filled with everything from food, to drink, to medicine and all kinds of objects and tools, anything that Lelouch might need.
"My lord, the train has reached the base." Butz said to his commander.
"Thank you Butz." Lelouch said as he touched the farview at a certain point which started it's deactivation process, but not before putting a bookmark on where he had left off, namely on the painting named "Fate".
"Time to go Jeremiah! You said that this unit contains a lot of gifted officers?" he said to Jeremiah as he hesitated for a few moments, the option of delaying for a while was still open to him, especially since technically his new command wouldn't be official until he arrived, but after a moment of deliberation, he closed his farview, sealed it with string and they walked towards the train's exit. After all, the inevitable could only be put off for so long.
"Yes my lord, the corps's commanders where all upper and lower classmates of mine at the academy and I can vouch for their skills. They are the finest soldiers in the Empire!" Jeremiah proudly said to his liege.
"Then why have they been sent here to a dumping ground unit? Lelouch asked him.
"I have already told you the reason for that sire." Jeremiah replied with regret and disappointment in his voice.
"Smart officers being sent away so those who are higher in rank but less in skill will not be outshined."
Lelouch thought to himself and despite feeling a small sensation of joy, since it meant that it was even less likely that this would become the main theater of operations, but still he did lament the sad state of affairs the Empire seemed to be in since the beginning of its existence or at least since he arrived.
" No matter how many or how bright the stars are, they pale when compared to the Sun, so the stars make sure no one sees the glory of the Sun.'" he quoted an ancient war poem to his knight.
"Yes Excellency, but 'no matter how long or endless the starry night is, it always surrenders to the sun's morning light'." Jeremiah replied to his liege and looked at him with a proud smile and near hero worship in his eyes.
"You know you don't have to call me that, technically you've got better blood, pedigree, fortune and social rank than me; Hell! Up until three standard years ago I would be the one calling you my lord or something like that." Lelouch said to him.
"That is one of the few positives of war my lord, injustices like what you said earlier are rectified as great leaders rise to take their rightful place in society!" he replied.
"I consider myself a lucky man and an intelligent one rather than someone who has been blessed by heaven to be a leader Jeremiah."
"That may be sir, but even then there are few people with those attributes and even fewer that occupy positions of authority and now the Empire needs them more than ever, which is why I believe you're one who is destined for great things!" Jeremiah said and before Lelouch could reply he added the following:
"The Great Founder of our Empire also said that she was lucky."
At this Lelouch half opened his mouth to counter but decided against it, Jeremiah was the type who was not only stubborn to a degree , but also very smart as well and by doing a quick onceover of the conversation he realized that he had just inadvertently quoted the Great Founder and his attempt to deflate his image had been interpreted by Jeremiah as humility, something that people like Jeremiah took it as something that reinforced the image of the great heroes handpicked by the Force of Creation to lead the Empire to greatness.
So the Commodore only inhaled a deep breath of air and tried to enjoy what few peaceful moments he had left before arriving at the boarding ramp.
"I may as well quit while I'm ahead, I'll be needing every ounce of wit I posses in order to find a way to somehow survive here at the very edge of the civilized galaxy." Lelouch thought to himself as the ramp's door opened and he crossed the point of no return.
Excerpt from the diary of Private Raz V'a van;
from the book
"We were the legionaries of Malus 'The World Breaker'"