All My Sins Remembered Read Online Free PDF Page B

horrible it would make anyone want to weep.
    No one knew what had happened that had brought them to the point of committing these atrocities, at least, no one that was willing to talk, but there were rumors that Colonel Bakore had to be restrained by his own Marines after returning from one such mission.  The story goes that he had single handedly stormed the Naval intelligence offices and nearly killed the officer in charge with his bare hands, while he screamed the name of one of his men killed in action for each blow that he landed on the officer, or the name of one of those innocents that had been killed.  He was still screaming names when they dragged him off the  beaten and bloody form of the intelligence officer.  As it was, he escaped a court martial only because the officer in question was too afraid to bring Colonel Bakore up on charges, and the Republic Navy didn’t want the embarrassment of having their intelligence failures put into the spotlight.  A year later, after the officer was finally released from the hospital from recuperating from his injuries, he was dishonorably discharged, though the reasons why were never known.  Few blamed the Talons for their actions, save the Talons themselves.
    Failure in Naval intelligence is one of the things every empire in the known galaxy had in common.  The problem is, they Navy didn’t care.  They weren’t the ones in the trenches.  They didn’t have to see the horrors their failures resulted in, and that suited them just fine.  It was one of the unforeseen results of the PMC Accord.  War was now fought by proxy, which was just another way of saying that governments didn't get their hands dirty, but rather paid to have someone else fight their battles for them.  Tasha gave Colonel Bakore a respectful nod, who in turn used his foot to push himself off the wall he had been leaning on and walked towards her, offering his hand.  Swallowing nervously, Tasha accepted it with a firm handshake.
    “ Hello, Tasha.” Colonel Bakore said quietly.  Favoring the Colonel with a reserved expression, she motioned towards where Commander Spears was sitting.
    “Please, have a seat Colonel.” Tasha offered.  Tasha caught a quickly suppressed grin on the Colonel’s face while the Commander blinked a couple of times before the meaning of her words sank in.  Embarrassed, and more than a little offended, the Commander cleared his throat and jumped out of his chair.
    “Of course!  Where are my manners?” the Commander said, trying to salvage the situation with some measure of grace.  “I’ll wait in the lobby, Colonel.  Let me know when you are done.” Turning towards Tasha, he said, “Don’t forget to sign that document before we leave.”  Then he walked out.   Colonel Bakore settled into the metal chair just vacated by the Commander, which squeaked plaintively at having to support a man of his stature.  The silence seemed to drag on as the man studied her with grey eyes.  His gaze made her nervous, and the tension in the room grew before Colonel Bakore finally broke the silence.
    “The navy sent you and your crew to investigate the destruction of several vessels in the Deramaar system.  Why don’t you begin your story there?” Hawke stated.  It was not a question, Tasha realized, but a simple matter of fact.  She would start there, and she would talk.  She idly wondered, for just a moment, what would have happened had she no intention of doing so, but then set aside that curious thought as she began her story.
    “Our ship was the Pripyat , a standard Gadari Hound class cruiser.  I was the comms officer.” Tasha began, “When we arrived in the Perolsi system, our sensor sweeps detected trace energy readings of weapons fire.” Tasha paused, then shook her head.
    “No, that’s not right.  We assumed the energy readings were weapons fire, but in truth we only knew that they were trace energy readings found in the vicinity of the debris of a