Cassandra
The Nerthus System, and the twin worlds of Nerthus and Taranis were protected by the massive star fortress Alport. Alport was massive for any Star Fortress throughout the Settled Worlds, but in Bolgar Space it was one of the largest. Home to close to a million people, it was an ancient star fortress which had withheld attack after attack from the Skoll, and gave shelter to millions who fled the creation of the Old Ruins as Mannkind fled the onslaught of the Skoll during the Thousand Year Darkness until they were hunted to extinction in the Old Ruins.
Nerthus was the capital of the small kingdom of Nerthus, one of the four kingdoms which made up the Nakon Union. The king was nothing more than a sector-lord in truth, and just barely at that by Furse standards, Cassandra thought to herself, but that didn’t stop Patrice Knox from being called a king, and that was something she guessed.
Cassandra stood in guard formation with the rest of the company which had drawn the duty to escort the General planet side to meet king Patrice, while the rest of the battalion waited outside the palace grounds. She was an older woman who even with the glow of gems, and her crown couldn’t hide the fact that the anti-aging tech and treatments were beginning to fail her.
It had taken them five weeks to reach Nerthus from the Jom System, but king Knox had proved at least a generous host with their arrival. After General Dodge had met with the king for the first time, she had declared several days of feasting, and celebrations were to be held around the world in honor of the 10th while ‘The Cave’ maintained orbit.
General Dodge had granted the legion leave to enjoy the feasting, and Nerthus was a large enough world that Cassandra was able to hide away with Edmund during leave several times as the General and senior staff went over details of the contract.
Several large settlements dotted the world of Nerthus. Most lived scattered about the work on small estates but there was more than enough land for the almost billion that called it home. Nerthus had long been a refuge for these seeking safety from the many subsystems that dotted the sector of space.
Cassandra had enjoyed the feasting as much as anyone. More so than most more likely. She had drunk and partied all her down time, and returned to ‘The Cave’ still drunk more than once. At times even the stims didn’t sober her up when she was on duty. She had been disappointed when the time finally came to leave Nerthus was announced, but knew it had been coming.
Now several days later, Cassandra stood inside the throne room in full power armor, and her rifle slung over her shoulder. There was only one member of the more than two hundred members of the 10th legion who had their helmet off. General Dodge stood before King Knox as she spoke.
Cassandra couldn’t hear anything the king was saying. They were too far in the back, behind rows of nobles from the small kingdom, and the king’s own guards. Only the General’s own retinue stood with him, and like the rest of the legion, they looked like cold, shining closes of one another. Their gear was all painted the colors of the Jom, with the badge of the Jom was clear on their right shoulder, but their left shoulder held their own personal house or clan sigil s and color.
Some of them, like Cassandra’s, and Edmund’s gear were clearly better, new sleeker armor which few could afford, but the 10th ensured that all had at least a basic set, and so they each stood like armored Bots while the King’s own guard stood outmatched with their matching combat armor which stood little match for power armor.
The meeting was nothing more than a public display before the legion went on to conduct it’s training, and patrol mission of several small minor sub systems sworn to the king who he could not in truth defend or protect them with her limited resources, although she had enough to pay for the expensive costs of the 10th legion of the Imperial Guard of Jom.
Cassandra stood at attention next to Edmund as the King of Nerthus spoke to General Dodge from her below her own throne.
“Will the wind bag finish already?” Cassandra complained.
“That wind bag is a king,” Edmund responded to Cassandra through their comm system.
“No, your father is a king,” Cassandra said quickly. “My mother makes this hag look like a minor lord. The Hearth System had more than three times the population of the entire kingdom, never mind the other five major systems of the sector.”
Edmund just grunted. “Maybe, but King Knox is part of the Nakon Union, and united the Union is more than a match for the Jom, and would gladly reclaim the system, and even my father wouldn’t wish to war on the Union.”
Cassandra couldn’t deny it. The Nakon Union might have been made up of mostly minor systems, and unable to project it’s strength outside it’s own borders, but when threatened and attacked, they were just as stubborn as the Furse, and fought to defend their home worlds with everything they had.
“Besides,” Edmund continued. “Even a king of a shit hole is worthy of respect.”
Cassandra grinned inside her helmet. He wasn’t wrong. Even a king of a moon was better than no king, and even a king in union with three others was better than sworn to someone unworthy of your loyalty.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get to see the shit hole of this so-called kingdom,” Thane Vault cracked in.
The 10th had taken a contract to patrol several sub-systems around the Nerthus sector and help train local forces from pirates, and other raiders which often launched attacks from the Old Ruins into Nerthus Space, but Fabian raids from the Holy Fabian Protectorate were not uncommon, or even raids from the other Bolgar kings of the Nakon Union worlds were just as likely.
‘The Cave’ would leave orbit, and establish a patrol route, and position several comm and listening beacons throughout the sector as the ship deployed troops on several worlds to aid in training local forces.
Cassandra had studied everything the ship had on the target world their Battalion had drawn. She had studied every detail so much that she almost felt like she had been there before, while Edmund and the other members of the retinue seemed not to have a care in the galaxy.
It made Cassandra uneasy to think about being left behind on some world while the ‘The Cave’ left to some distant system. Eight hundred and fifty men and women of the Imperial Guard of Jom on a world of 10,000 with no clear way of retreat, and hoping if enemy ships appeared that ‘The Cave’ wasn’t too far out of position, and could arrive before the raiders could cause too much damage or worse, kill them all.
It looked like a beautiful world though, Cassandra couldn’t deny that, but she hoped that it would be a quiet assignment. Commander Peak had been pushing the battalion hard in the training rooms on ‘The Cave’. They had trained for all sorts of scenarios as best they could in the confines of the ship. The holographic training rooms were only so large and could only do so much though, and their training covered everything from simple police actions to full scale invasions or planetary uprisings.
General Dodge gave King Knox the formal salute of the Imperial Guard, put on his helmet, and turned on his heels to watch down the long aisle of the throne room.
“Fuck, finally,” Cassandra said as the General walked by and the company fell in position behind him to make their way to the waiting shuttles that would bring them back to ‘The Cave’ waiting in orbit.
