To Sail the Stars / by Alex Piper
Prologue - Draft 2 - 1999/07/26

The young man gazed at the reports on the table in front of him.  They
represented information gathered from worlds in all corners of his empire,
at all levels of society.  He had kept power for a long time now, and much
of it was due to the vast amounts of information he collected, about every
facet of his empire.  However, for a while now, patterns he had been
seeing in the reports had been catching at the edge of his mind.

Reports from areas around the outplanets had begun to filter in of minor
troubles befalling his official couriers and shipping. Nothing suspicious
when taken on their own; a routine customs hold-up here, a paperwork mixup
there, nothing truly serious but always enough to cause delay in the
precise workings of his empire. He hated delays; delays meant that the
carefully orchestrated machinery of his empire - the interactions of
people, resources, and information - were thrown off-balance.

But perhaps more distressing was the complete void of information relating
to the outplanets themselves.  Information on the outplanets was always
spotty due to their great distance from the seat of his power - a fact
that continually irked him.  But lately, the information was spottier than
usual, and when it did arrive, it was often too late to be of any
relevance.

The young man sighed, pushing the stack of papers aside on the desk in
front of him and standing to walk across his office to the window.  The
heels of his shoes made quiet clicks on the polished hardwood floor; he
considered the austerity of polished wood far more elegant than some
extravagant plush carpet.  Let his underlings surround themselves with
outward luxuries, and grow soft; he preferred starker surroundings. Those
who met him recognized the power he could wield through his strength of
command, not through the trappings of decadance.

Resting one hand on the reinforced glass of his study window, he gazed
out over his capital city.  The grand arches that made up the design of
the mansions of lesser dignitaries in his entourage cast a golden light
out into the city beyond, gilding the buildings of the city beyond with an
ethereal golden glow.  Within that golden haze, small sparkles of light
marked the lights of individual houses, like bright jewels.

Many people found it to be a grand display of the sort of resources that
his regime could muster; he himself merely considered the extravagance of
Alteran City to be useless showmanship, a waste of resources better spent
elsewhere.  But even he would have to admit that the unearthly beauty of
the city in the dark of night could soothe a troubled soul.  And the
luxury allowed the citizens of this city was a visible sign to others that
power rested here, with him.  It also kept his underlings content and
sated, and unlikely to find the strength to challenge him.

The focus of his gaze shifted from the night skyline of the city to his
own reflection on the glass.  The face that gazed back at him was young,
barely out of its twenties, with bland brown eyes and short brown hair.  
He ran his gaze over the outline of his face, memorizing the new lines.  
He'd worn this form for barely a few days, and had not had time to accept
the reflection as his own yet.

Seeking solace in the familiar, his gaze narrowed focus to the eyes of the
reflection.  Through the unremarkable brown eyes, he saw the familiar
strength of purpose, and the power of command.  Through the eyes of this
stranger, he saw his own soul gazing back, as he had in so many other
reflections over his long life.  In the centuries he had held power, he
had changed bodies many times, to cheat death and age, or illness and
injury.  What his enemies would not give to learn the secret of how one's
soul could be placed into another body, and gain that power for
themselves.

Ironic, then, that he himself would give almost anything - even his very
soul itself - to truly comprehend the inner workings of the device upon
which his power rested.  For all that his empire was built on that device,
he knew nothing more than how to operate it; he could not dismantle it for
fear that he would never be able to make it operate again, nor could he
have anyone else investigate its workings for fear that they might
understand it well enough to unseat him.  And so it remained an enigma to
him.

He hated enigmas.  In his world, everything was orderly and precise;
everything had an explanation, a place in the scheme of things.

With a sigh, he turned from the window, running a hand through his hair
and walking briskly back to his desk, to face the more immediate enigma.
This information void in the outplanets was unacceptable; it could signify
any number of things, from political unrest to outright rebellion.  Some
might look on it as simply coincidence, but he did not believe in
coincidence.  Pure chance had no place in the operation of his empire.

For a long moment he simply stood by his desk, gazing at the flickering of
the electric lightglobes in their wall sconces.  In his mind's eye, he
could picture the huge network of wires running throughout his manor like
a huge orderly web, all meeting in a great knot where the generator
endlessly boiled water, using the steam pressure to generate the power for
his use.  Much like the web of his own empire, where the many lines of
information and command extended throughout space, powering the empire.
And the knot where they all eventually met was where he himself sat,
reaching out through their medium to oversee the extents of his lands.

Finally, he turned back to his desk and began to write out orders,
directing members of his elite intellegence corps to the outplanets, there
to use whatever means necessary to uncover the cause of these anamolies.

Yes, he hated enigmas.  But an enigma, once explained, became simply more
information - and he knew how to use information.  He would uncover
the truth of this mystery as well, he resolved.  And that information
would flow along the web of power his empire was built on, and strengthen
it further.

His mouth curled up into a small, cold smile; an expression
unfamiliar to the young body he wore, but an old friend to the ancient
soul within it.  In time, this face too would become accustomed to these
expressions, and would be marked by them; proclaiming to all the world
that the soul of their ruler wore this body.  A soul with the power to
shape or destroy worlds.

His hand moved steadily across the paper on his desk and gave that power
form and purpose, shaping the potential into a reality.  He read the
orders one last time, and nodded in approval.  Then, with a gravity due
one whose mere word could control the lives of countless billions, he
signed his name at the bottom of the document.

"Lord Damien Lansing, Imperius."