Alarion woke to the sound of birds chirping angrily at one another as they did battle over crumbs on a nearby open window. The contentious melody felt right at home with his fractured memories. He'd been fighting. Killing. He'd... won? His body felt impossibly heavy, as if his blood had been replaced with lead. When he tried to move, pain lanced through his abdomen, sharp enough to force a hiss from between clenched teeth.

The pain helped, though. It brought things into focus.

Hospital. He was in a hospital.

The realization came slowly, fighting through a fog of alchemy and exhaustion. Memories flickered at the edges of his consciousness—Bergman screaming for help, Dimov standing over him with his face an utter ruin. They'd been carrying him, he'd seen Sierra standing along one wall, and then... nothing.

No. That wasn't right. Sierra was dead. He'd... seen her before? But that made little sense either.

Alarion turned his head carefully, taking in the small room with bare walls and minimal furnishings. A vase of wilting flowers sat on the bedside table, Bergman's idea no doubt, alongside a pitcher of water. Thick blankets covered his legs, and a line snaked from his arm to a bag of crimson fluid hanging beside the bed.

He attempted to sit up, only to fall back against the pillows as the pain in his abdomen flared again. This time, he yelped, and the trio of birds paused in their struggle to glare at him in unison.

"I see you are awake."

Alarion shot up on instinct at the sound of the Brigadier General's voice, and he instantly regretted the reflex.

"Stop," Williams instructed him with an upraised hand. "You do not need to tear anything else for decorum's sake."

"Sir," Alarion answered, though the words were weak. His throat felt like sandpaper, as though he had not spoken in months. "How long?"

"Six weeks, most of that in a magically induced coma," the officer told him as he poured Alarion a glass of water and manipulated something underneath the bed to help him sit upright without searing pain. "To be frank, I have never seen a living Awakened in a worse condition."

"The others?" he asked without hesitation.

"Of the thirteenth, there were eight survivors. The rest of your squad were walking wounded, and another lost an arm, I believe."

Alarion heaved a sigh of relief. The casualties had been tremendous, but most of them had been nothing more than faces to him. Strange as it was, after being alone for so long, he considered Bergman and Kali to be comrades, even friends. He might have even grieved the loss of Dimov, had the young man perished.

"Where are we?" he rasped after a difficult drink of water. Even holding the glass was proving to be a challenge, though Williams helpfully provided him with a crooked straw to make drinking possible.

"Ashad-Vitri," Williams answered.

"What? Why?"

"Where else?" the man shrugged. "You were stabilized in the field as best they could, but you'd have died without proper treatment. Ashad-Veldi was the closer choice, but was off the table for obvious reasons."

The mention of Ashad-Veldi brought their mission to the forefront of Alarion's mind. "Were we fast enough?"

"You were," Williams confirmed. "We are still compiling a full after-action report, and I will expect a detailed summary from you once you are able, but it seems like you killed it during the storming of Ashad-Veldi's outer wall. Fortuitous timing, as the revenants had already committed the bulk of their forces. They still took the outer wall and ravaged the lower city, but they never breached the mana font and were routed shortly thereafter. Given the circumstances, casualties in the hundreds are better than we could have hoped."

"And the others?"

"The Shae-Istol infestation was eradicated without issue. We are safe here. The eastern district was not so lucky. Even with your information, their subjugation is ongoing. At least ten thousand dead, more likely three times that number. The entire district is in open revolt."

"What?" Alarion asked incredulously. "With fiends on their doorstep?"

Again Williams shrugged. He looked tired, as if he'd aged a year in the weeks since Alarion had last seen him. "They are scared. Scared people do stupid things, and I am certain that more of these Bones of Ashad terrorists are provoking the uprising."

Alarion lay his head back against his pillow, trying to imagine the scale of it and failing. He thought back to his father's death, and the hundreds who died when Eloim's contract burned. At the time, it had been everyone he'd ever known or even met, along with many strangers. And that had only been hundreds. This was tens of thousands. The scope of the tragedy was incomprehensible.

Then, just as quickly, a thought occurred and derailed Alarion's dark musings.

"Why are you here?" Alarion was a specialist. One with a strong patron and a high Aptitude, but in troubling times it seemed like Williams should have bigger priorities.

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"Because we need to talk before I return to Vitria. It is why I had them wake you. I needed to see if there was a person to talk to."

Alarion's eyes narrowed. "How close did I come?"

"Multiple organ failure," Williams told him. "I am told that Specialist Dimov spent most of the evacuation with his hand inside your chest, making sure your heart continued to beat. Since skills like evaluate do not work on the unwilling or unconscious, we had to wait and see if your mind survived."

Rather than respond immediately, Alarion turned his attention to the waiting wall of system notifications, setting aside the level and skill notifications to focus on his conditions.

The list was extensive. There were the gunshot and stab wounds, the necrosis, and the miasma poisoning. His potion toxicity had reached critical levels, either because he'd somehow swallowed one last potion, or more likely because Bergman had forced it on him to save his life. The worst of it was the internal damage. Triggering [Pig-Headed Resilience] a second time had compounded the damage.

[Internal Organ Damage – Critical] – 99% Malus to all physical Attributes. 85% Malus to all mental Attributes. Reduced healing speed of all conditions by 75% until this condition is fully healed. 5% hourly chance of organ failure. -0.5 HP/second.

Even six weeks later, after what Alarion assumed was competent treatment, the condition still lingered as[Internal Organ Damage – Major]. It was a testament to just how much damage he'd taken, and it wasn't alone.

Old Wounds

Description: Your repeated trauma has compounded over time, to the point where it can no longer be ignored and it can no longer be healed.

Requirements: None.

Type: Flaw, Passive.

Severity: Minor

Effect: Permanent 5% Malus to all physical Attributes. Pain.

It seemed Alarion would carry the scars of Carling Hill. Still, he was fortunate. For all the wounds he'd received, he very well could have ended up as the invalid Williams had feared he would be.

"Why?" Alarion asked after finishing his review.

"Why did I want to talk? Or why am I going to Vitria?"

"Both," the general's brow creased in annoyance, and Alarion clarified, "The latter, to start."

"I am a seated member, by grace and selection. My vote for Imperator is required, and must not be cast by proxy."

"An Imperator is dead?"

"No, not yet." When Alarion started to stammer his next confused question, Williams raised a hand to stop him. "I forget, you are... eighteen?"

"Seventeen," Alarion corrected.

"Too young to remember the last Fate of the Imperator," Williams said. "What do you know of Celesian history?"

If Williams had not been his superior, Alarion would have told him where to shove his lesson. Instead, he drew a calming breath and played along. "You will have to be more specific, sir."

"Fair, though it was more of a rhetorical question." Williams conceded. "The Celesians dominated the western hemisphere before the coming of the System, a vast empire centered north of Imuria, who kept the continent in bondage and slavery. They were dynastic in origin, power passed from one Emperor to the next and to the next in a line unbroken through eight centuries. Do you know how it ended?"

He didn't, actually, and despite his previous annoyance, he was actually curious. "No."

"They were struggling in the decades before the System, in particular with Imurian rebellions centered around an Incarnate Lal Kales. The Emperor at the time was weak and in his weakness he made bargains with his subjects, bartering away Imperial authority for stability. The greatest of these bargains formed the Celesian Curia, a council of lords and merchants who were to 'advise' the throne."

"And then the System came." Alarion knew this part at least. "Half the world went to war, overthrowing their rulers or taking from their neighbors. Millions died."

"And the Celesians did as well. They had a string of short-lived emperors, and each ceded more and more power to the Curia, including the expansion of the body to subject peoples such as the Vitrians. When Emperor Cameron took the throne, he tried to reassert his control and declared the Curia disbanded. The Curia responded by demanding he abdicate, a power that had been granted to them twenty years earlier, but never invoked. Cameron obviously refused. Do you know what happened then?"

Alarion shook his head.

"The senators, many of whom were Vitrian Awakened, barely a generation away from being slaves to the empire, dragged him and his extended family to the well of the Curia and began the executions. Emperor Cameron was stabbed seventy-seven times, then his son was invested for all of a minute before he was killed. Then his brother, his uncles, and their children. All the way through the line of succession until there no were claimants left for the throne. This was the Fate of Emperors, as they called it."

The story was grim, as history often was, but Alarion quickly understood the point that Williams was trying to convey. "You kill the Imperators?"

"As is tradition," Williams nodded. "We spent half a century with no executive, relying solely on the Curia. It was a difficult time, the government slow and plodding. So a compromise was reached. Two Imperators, for no man should hold absolute power. Forty-five-year terms, for no man should serve for life. And a guarantee of death, for all know the Fate of Imperators. The last was Imperator Gial and the calamity that was the first Ashadi war. Now it is Imperator-"

"-Lioric," Alarion said quietly. "So he is to be executed?"

"Once a new Imperator is chosen, yes. They may choose their method of death, though the location is always the well of the Curia. Most are traditionalists."

"They ask to be stabbed?"

"Symbolism is important," said Williams. "Which brings me to why I needed to speak to you, I suppose. You are being reassigned."

Alarion felt his stomach drop. He'd known his time with the 13th was temporary, that the entire section was pulled together for a specific task and would be reassigned the moment the task was accomplished. Yet somehow he'd felt as though that day would never come.

"May I ask where?"

"You are being moved to a more permanent posting in the newly formed Two-Hundred and Thirty-Eight Auxilia Company."

"Is that a joke, sir?" Alarion's jaw was tight as the words played in his mind.

"No, Master Sergeant, it is not," Williams seemed to get a perverse delight from the look of surprise on Alarion's face. "Nor was the name my idea, to be clear. I understand it has been used as somewhat of a slur among the Auxilia, but my superiors believe the number will make your unit more recognizable."

"My unit?" Alarion tried to sit forward, groaning in discomfort. "Sir, I-"

"Let me be frank, Alarion. May I call you Alarion?" at a nod, the general continued. "An entire district is in revolt. Thousands are dead, soon to be including an Imperator. This is a disaster of the highest order. And then I have you and yours. An Imurian boy, a merchant prince, a Godborn commander, and even a battle-scarred Vitrian. Together you discover a grand conspiracy, saving thousands of lives, and go on to risk your own to save a trade city from utter destruction. You are folk heros."

It took a moment for the words to sink in, and even more before Alarion knew what to say. "You are giving me a unit because..."

"Because there have been reporters camped in the lobby for three weeks, including two different overseas correspondents." Williams told him. "You are a symbol, and that is something the empire desperately needs right now."

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