Starfist: Kingdom's Fury by David Sherman & Dan Cragg Read Free Book Online Page A

and staff of 26th FIST, continued. Sparen remained. He needed the briefing as much as his officers did.
    Soldier of the Lord Prudence didn't know whether the long hours he spent watching the surveillance display board were penance or an indulgence. If he was committing the sin of spying as he watched the blips and images, listened to the sounds, and saw the other symbols that meant nothing to him, then this service was a penance. If, on the other hand, his superiors in the Army of the Lord knew he was true to his name and worthy of being entrusted with privy knowledge he should not normally have, then he was being rewarded and the hours were a blessed indulgence.
    One source of Prudence's unsettlement about his assignment was a thought that he kept carefully tucked away where he wouldn't have to consider it: The devices that fed their surveillance data to the display board could be of great use to the Collegium. It was the sacred responsibility of the Collegium to root out heresy wherever it attempted to germinate. Surveillance devices such as these could help the Collegium catch heretics before they became firm in their apostasy. They could also be used to spy on and capture, for punishment, anyone who might challenge the Collegium. Prudence had heard rumors that the Collegium did not restrict itself to finding heretics. Although he praised the Lord for the necessary and soul-saving work the Collegium did, he also feared its potential for evil. That a sacred instrument of the Lord could be used for evil was something he could not bear to think about, so he kept that reason for discontent tucked away where he wouldn't have to examine it.
    Soldier of the Lord Prudence was startled from his reverie by something he realized had been on the display for a time, unnoticed by his wandering mind.
    Whether this job was penance or not, he would have to do penance for this neglectful conduct. But later, now he called out: "Lesser Imam Macque, I have movement on sensor seven!"
    Sergeant Macque, gun squad leader, second platoon, Charlie Company, 26th FIST, and off-world infidel who had been granted command of Dominion Company of the 811th Sacred Fusiliers of Kingdom's Army of the Lord, came from behind his desk in the garrison's command bunker. He leaned forward to look over Prudence's shoulder at the surveillance display board.
    Prudence pointed at white blips on the display.
    Macque reached past him and hit a control. The red lines that appeared around the blips were thin, indicating that whatever they represented were small. "Could be Skinks," he said softly. "They don't give off much of an infrared signal."
    "Demons in the middle of the afternoon?" Prudence believed that demons only appeared at night, when men were weak and their faith could be more easily tested.
    Macque snorted. "They might be creatures out of somebody's hell, but they aren't demons." He also was surprised at the possibility of Skinks moving so close to the perimeter during the day, but said, "Maybe they show up better in infra at night and they're moving during the day to mask their signals. Got some over here too." He pointed at another group of red-rimmed blips. "Come on, baby," he murmured.
    "Come to mama." He tried to will the moving blips to get in range of a visual sensor so he could make positive identification. "There's more," he said, pointing at a fresh grouping of blips. He picked up the handset of the hardwired comm unit. "We've got a lot of movement in sector Delta Hotel Seven," he said to the battalion ops duty NCO as soon as the recognition and acknowledgment exchange was over.
    "You got that Charlie Six?" the battalion duty NCO asked.
    "Roger," replied the Charlie Company duty NCO. The battalion order was for all surveillance reports to go directly to Battalion, and for the relevant company headquarters to listen in. Each Marine company was integrated into a Kingdomite regiment, with the Marines in all command billets. The FIST's infantry battalion