After retaking the skies over Cordillia, we forced the Germans from the Capital. For days, the dead lay in the street, and my people suffered horribly.

  -From the writings of King Jean-Luc

  Gruen sat in a chair he had pulled up to a large window in Master Tenimus’s ship. He had been staring out into the void of space and watching whizzing stars pass. Cordillia and her destruction drew further into the depths of space as Master Tenimus approached the boy softly.

  “Sometimes, things must get worse before they can become better,” Tenimus plied, but the boy stayed silent, “I know…” He mourned, “Something of old Cordil will survive.”

  “But not all…” Scoffed Gruen, he kicked his feet against the plasteel hull of the ship. Tenimus’ eyes fell to the floor.

  When he looked up, the boy had drifted from the chair to a small kitchenette inside the hearth of the ship, its engines providing spare heat for a long-boiling pot that hung over a small opening in the ship's bulk. Gruen sat beside the pot and warmed his hands as a small fire danced before him. Tenimus knelt beside the boy and placed his hand on his shoulder.

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  “Perhaps a bowl of hot soup will soothe your aching soul,” he whispered, and Gruen softly nodded, “I don’t pretend to understand the gospel of Hurona, but I know that we all have a place on it,” he said as he fetched two wooden bowls.

  Gruen looked up, “What does that mean?” He asked innocently. Tenimus raised an eyebrow in surprise, and fiddled with the soup ladle before placing the bowl in Gruen’s hands to free his own.

  “It means that I am no expert on the future… I follow the word of Master Kree, but even he only understands what Hurona wants him to. After all, he is no Justician,” Tenimus said with a laugh. The boy looked up, confused, as Tenimus tipped the ladle into his soup bowl.

  The boy scrunched his nose, “The blind monks?” He asked with a sneer. The old Master smiled meekly and nodded.

  “Nevermind that…” Tenimus noted with a smile, “Let's eat… Tomorrow, your training in the ways of our Order begins.”

  Gruen’s eyes fell as he began to eat ferociously, silently wondering where they were going. Slowly, he looked out towards the vast plastiglass window beyond the kitchenette. From the depths of space, he could hear a strange sound. The void called to him.