Uriah paused and took a long gulp of his drink. His hand was shaking and he carefully and deliberately set his glass down on the desk as he continued.
‘I’ll never forget the noise,’ he said. ‘It was like a thunderstorm had suddenly sprung into existence, and our first five ranks were completely cut down, dead to a man without even the time to scream. The enemy’s bolts tore limbs from bodies or simply burst men apart like wet sacks. I turned to shout something, I forget what exactly, when I felt a searing pain in the back of my head and I fell over the remains of a man who’d had his entire left side blown off. It looked like he’d exploded from the inside out.
‘I rolled onto my knees and felt the back of my head. It was sticky and matted with blood and I realised I’d been hit. A ricochet or a fragment. Anything larger and I’d have lost my head. I could feel the blood running from me and looked up in time to see our enemies fire again. That’s when I started to hear screams. Our charge had ground to a halt, men and women milling around in confusion and fear as they suddenly understood the reality of what Havuleq had begun.
‘The thunder warriors put up their guns and marched towards us, unsheathing swords with serrated edges and motorised blades. The noise, oh god, I’ll never forget the noise they made. A roar like something out of a nightmare. We were already beaten, their first volley had broken us, and I saw Havuleq lying dead in the middle of the field. The lower half of his body had been blown clean off and I saw the same terror I was feeling on every face around me. People were begging for mercy, throwing down their weapons and trying to surrender, but the armoured warriors didn’t stop. They marched right up to us and hacked into us without mercy. We were cut apart and brutalised with such economy of force that I couldn’t believe so many people could die in so short a time. This wasn’t war, at least not as I’d read about it, where men of honour fought in glorious duels, this was mechanised butchery.
‘I’m not ashamed to say I ran. I ran, soiled and bleeding, for safety. I ran like all the daemons of legend were after me and all the time I was hearing the awful sound of people dying, the wet sound of flesh splitting open and the stench of voided bowels and opened bellies. I can’t remember anything much of my flight, just random flashes of dead bodies and screams of pain. I ran until I couldn’t run any more, and then I crawled through the mud until I lost consciousness. When I woke, which I was surprised I did at all, I saw it was dark. Pyres had been lit and the victory chants of the thunder warriors drifted over the killing field.
‘Havuleq’s army had been destroyed. Not routed or put to flight. Destroyed. In less than an hour, fifty thousand men and women had been killed. I think I knew even then that I was the only survivor. I wept beneath the moonlight and as I lay there bleeding to death in agony, I thought of how pointless my life had been. The heartbreak and ruin I’d visited upon others in my reckless pursuit of hedonism and self-interest. I wept for my family and myself and that was when I realised I wasn’t alone.’
‘Who was with you?’ asked Revelation.
‘The power of the divine,’ said Uriah. ‘I looked up and saw a golden face above me, a face of such radiance and perfection that my tears were no longer shed for pain, but for beauty. Light surrounded this figure and I averted my eyes for fear I’d be blinded. I’d been in pain, but now that pain was gone and I knew I was seeing the face of the divine. I couldn’t describe that face to you, not with all the poetic images in the world at my disposal, but it was the most exquisite thing I had ever seen.
‘I felt myself lifted up and I thought that this was the end for me. And then the face spoke to me, and I knew I was destined to live.’
‘What did this face say to you?’ asked Revelation.
Uriah smiled. ‘He said, “Why do you deny me? Accept me and you will know that I am the only truth and the only way.”’
‘Did you reply?’
‘I couldn’t,’ said Uriah. ‘To utter any words would have been base. In any case, my tongue was quite stilled by the awesome vision of god.’
‘What made you think it was god? Did you not hear what I said earlier about the brain’s ability to perceive what it wants to? You were a dying man on a battlefield, surrounded by your dead comrades and you were having an epiphany of the futility of the life you had led. Surely you can think of another explanation for this vision, Uriah, a more likely explanation that does not require the supernatural?’
‘I need no other explanation,’ said Uriah, firmly. ‘You may be wise in many things, Revelation, but you cannot know what goes on in my own mind. I heard the voice of god and saw His face. He bore me up and set me into a deep slumber, and when I awoke, my wounds were healed.’
Uriah turned his head so that Revelation could see the long scar on the back of his neck. ‘A piece of bone shrapnel had been embedded in my skull, barely a centimetre from severing my spinal cord. I was alone on the battlefield and I decided to return to the land of my birth, but when I returned I found my family home in ruins. The townsfolk told me that Scandian raiders from the north had heard of my family’s wealth and come south in search of plunder. They killed my brother then violated my mother and sister in front of my father to force him to tell them where he hid his treasures. They couldn’t know my father had a weak heart and he died before they could learn his secrets. I found my home in ruins and my family little more than bleached cadavers.’
‘I am sorry to hear of your loss,’ said Revelation. ‘If it is any consolation, the Scandians would not accept Unity and were wiped out three decades ago.’
‘I know, but I do not revel in death any more,’ said Uriah. ‘The men who killed my family will have been judged by god and that is justice enough for me.’
‘That is noble of you,’ said Revelation, real admiration in his voice.
‘I took a few keepsakes from the ruins and made my way to the nearest settlement, thinking I’d get blind drunk and then try to figure out what to do with my life. I was halfway there when I saw the Church of the Lightning Stone and knew I had found my purpose in life. I had spent my life until that point living only for myself, but when I saw the spire of the church I knew that god had a purpose for me. I should have died at Gaduaré, but I was saved for a reason.’
‘And what reason was that?’
‘To serve god,’ said Uriah. ‘To bring His word to the people.’
‘And that’s what you’ve been doing here?’
Uriah nodded. ‘It’s what I’ve been trying to do, but the Emperor’s promulgators traverse the globe with his message of reason and the refutation of gods and the supernatural. I assume that is why you are here and why none of my congregation has come to the church tonight.’
‘You are correct,’ said Revelation. ‘In a manner of speaking. I have come to try and convince you of the error of your ways, to learn of you and to show you that there is no need for any divine powers to guide humanity. This is the last church on Terra and it falls to me to offer you this chance to embrace the new way willingly.’