A Pale Dawn

by Chris Kennedy

  Movement on her Tri-V showed the troops following her had engaged other HecSha soldiers who had been following the one she killed. She sent one of her platoons to the left and another to the right to stop the leakers, then yelled, “Follow me!” and raced up the street with the other company trailing her.

  Although she was receiving—and processing—the feeds from a number of soldiers, she didn’t feel like she had a complete grasp on the situation, so she tapped her jumpjets and rocketed into the air. She immediately got a good picture of the battle, but just as quickly became the focus for a number of her enemies’ weapons. She spent the next couple of seconds alternating her maneuvering thrusters to dodge enemy fire as she came back to the ground.

  The embattled forces were only a block in front of her as she touched down, and she raced forward to find her troops fighting hand-to-hand with the HecSha. Though her troopers had the advantage of a longer reach with their swords, and they were lopping off heads and pithing the smaller HecSha like frogs, the aliens had the advantage of numbers, so while a CASPer pilot dealt with one HecSha, another would step back and fire its laser. Her troopers were doing the dance of death with their laser shields out, spinning, firing, jabbing, and—just as often—dying.

  As she raced forward, she saw Captain Reynolds gut a HecSha, only to have a laser beam reach out from behind another building to spear her in the back.

  “No!” Sansar yelled, tapping her jumpjets to boost over the building. The two HecSha taking cover there didn’t see her until she was right above them and her suit blocked out the sun. They both turned to stare as she crashed down on one and slammed her fist down onto the other like a giant piston, shattering the bones in its skull and neck, driving it to the ground.

  The battle, while fierce, was over within minutes. The platoons she had sent to the wings swept back in on the HecSha, flanking their force as their leader had been trying to do to hers, and crashed into them from behind.

  A squad led by Staff Sergeant Jacobs caught the command element trying to retreat to their command bunker and killed them, and the rest of the HecSha forces surrendered.

  By then it was too late for some of her troops, though. Over half of Captain Reynolds’ squad, including the captain herself, had given their lives to hold back the aliens’ assault.

  * * *

  Johnstown Starport, Talus, Talus System

  Colonel Jim Cartwright waved to the Tri-V camera and tried to look like the liberating merc commander. It wasn’t easy. His side felt like a burning ember was lodged inside. Splunk was sitting on the pillow next to his head. She hadn’t moved from the spot since he’d woken after surgery. Apparently, he’d died twice before they got him stabilized.

  “The people of Talus wish to thank you, Colonel,” the reporter holding the camera said. “Do you have any advice for the new government?”

  “Yeah,” Jim said, and sat up a little straighter. He grimaced a bit as he moved, not really caring if the viewers noticed. “Don’t do something stupid like last time. People deserve a say in their own leadership.”

  The reporter blinked, not knowing what to say. Jim glanced to the side and gestured with his head. Hargrave moved in. “The colonel needs his rest,” he said. Two more Cavaliers were at the door, both armed. “Thank you for taking the time.”

  “I’d hoped to ask some more questions,” the man complained as Hargrave took him by the elbow.

  “Maybe later.” Then the man was gone. Hargrave came back in and shook his head. “Jesus Christ, kid, don’t sugar coat it, okay?” He tried to look serious, but a chuckle escaped.

  Jim gave a little laugh that turned into a gasp as the ember burned brighter for a second. Hargrave looked concerned. “I’ll be okay,” Jim assured him. Splunk looked surly.

  “The hell you will,” Hargrave reminded him. “That barb inside you, the doctors can’t figure out what it is.”

  “A little souvenir from the Canavar,” Jim said, then made a dismissive gesture. “Is Colonel Spence outside?”

  “They can wait. We need to transport you back to New Warsaw and get the thing removed.”

  “I’ll go back when everyone else does. They can treat it well enough for now. So, who’s out there?”

  “Xiang, Jennings, Koppenhoefer, and Pieper, too.”

  “Nobody from Triple T?”

  “No,” Hargrave said. “The survivors are still trying to decide what to do.”

  Jim nodded. “Ask them in.”

  “Kid, you’re still gonna need at least another nanite treatment,” Hargrave insisted.

  Jim gave him a hard look and nodded toward the door. His XO sighed and went out to collect the other commanders. Truth was, the fragment in his chest had him concerned as well. Nanite treatments could remove anything known to them as a foreign body, everything from bullets to wood splinters. They wouldn’t touch the fragment which was lodged in the side of his aorta. They’d fixed the artery, and doggedly refused to disassemble the splinter. He needed a top-quality surgeon, and there wasn’t one on Talus.

  While he waited, he tickled Splunk between the ears. She glanced at him with her blue-on-blue eyes, fear and concern obvious. His near-death experience had hit her pretty hard. The Duplato on Kash-kah had told him that if either he or she died, the other wouldn’t survive. Maybe it was a tight brush with mortality? “I’m fine,” he said. She scowled.

  Jim lifted the blanket covering his torso and stared at the morphogenic tattoo. His Raknar, Dash, stood on his sizeable belly, just visible under the bandages covering his chest. The formerly clean blue paintjob was burned away, and scrapes were visible, just like in real life.

  Antimatter, he thought. And where the fuck did that weapon come from? He knew the Fae had done that; there was no other explanation. Had they found the weapon? What was it called? He struggled with the memory of the word until it came back: Ia’kaa. Had they found it on Karma Upsilon? And if so, how did they find something nobody else had in the thousands of years that asteroid was sitting around? The old Raknar weapons were devastating beyond reason, and using them was so fucking addicting!

  His hospital room door opened, and he put the sheet back in place as the merc commanders filed in. They each looked at him with expressions ranging from amazement to awe. He had dropped from space in a robot the size of a skyscraper. After chewing up a few thousand alien mercs, he’d then single handedly fought two huge Canavar, blowing one up with a nuke (by their perspective), and ripping the other’s head off before throwing it at the aliens holding the city and daring them to fight it out.

  After looking at him for a minute, Colonel Spence came to attention and saluted. Jim began to shake his head when all the other commanders followed suit. Not knowing what he should do, he returned the salute, and they all dropped theirs. What the fuck have I done, he wondered.

  “What are your orders, Colonel Cartwright?” Colonel Spence asked.

  “Status of resistance?”

  “None remains,” the commander of Gitmo’s Own replied. “There was a small garrison at the political prisoner camp in that place—Drift Abyssal—in the middle of the desert. Colonel Jennings took care of it.”

  “We’d seen the least direct combat until then,” Jennings said, an attractive woman in her forties. “They were trying to organize for evac when we landed on them. A mixed company of Aposa and Besquith, they didn’t work well together. Probably why someone sent them out there in the first place.”

  “I want to thank you all,” Jim said. “Each and every unit did their part, especially Triple T.”

  “Gries was onnosel,” Colonel Koppenhoefer said.

  Jim accessed his Human language database. Onnosel meant stupid in Afrikaans.

  “He couldn’t get over a number of problems with how this shook out,” Hargrave said, sparing Jim the task of coming up with something equally diplomatic. “He’s dead now, so that’s that.” The other commanders all nodded, though Koppenhoefer’s nod was more perfunctory than the others.

&
nbsp; “Colonel Pieper, your team took some heavy casualties and needs time to recover?” Jim noted.

  “Correct, Colonel, but we’ll be okay,” Pieper responded, his Scottish accent strong.

  “I know that, Colonel, but we need some garrison forces here while we move to the next phase.”

  “You standin’ me down, sah?” Pieper asked. He didn’t look happy.

  “No, Colonel, I’m asking you to hold this planet. The Highlanders are the only unit we have with a large infantry contingent. They might be needed if the government falters. I’d also like you to help with the remains of Triple T. They need leadership until that company can put the pieces back together. Will you do that for me?”

  Pieper snapped to attention and saluted with his hand flat against his forehead. “Aye, sir, we will serve as you wish.”

  “Thank you,” Jim said, and saluted him back. Can’t get used to doing that. “As for the rest, I want you to finish cleaning up your casualties and police your gear. The new government gets another week to put its shit together, and then we start moving back to orbit. Time to return to New Warsaw.” The commanders nodded and filed out.

  “Well played with him,” Hargrave said, nodding to Jim. “He could have been difficult.”

  “We need heavy CASPer units for what’s coming,” Jim said. “He’s ideal to hold this planet just in case.”

  “Jormungd agreed to leave some ships behind?”

  “Yes,” Jim said. “I just talked to him. Not a lot of ships, but enough to maybe hold the emergence point. Now we need to get back to New Warsaw.” Hargrave’s jaw muscles worked, and Jim knew he was thinking. “What’s on your mind?”

  “That Raknar of yours,” Hargrave said. Splunk’s little head turned to look at the older man.

  “What about it?” Jim asked.

  “We need to figure out how to get it back to New Warsaw later.”

  “Later? We’re taking it when we leave.”

  “Jim,” Hargrave said, “you can’t fly that thing in your condition.”

  “Bet me,” Jim said. Splunk nodded as well.

  “Do you know what that thing of yours did out there?”

  “Sure,” Jim said. “We kicked the shit out of those alien mercs.”

  “Kick ass,” Splunk agreed.

  “Oh, you killed the shit out of them and those Canavar.”

  “I can’t wait to tell the other Horsemen about those Canavar,” Jim said. “They accused us of breaking the Galactic Union laws, and they used Canavar against us?”

  “I know kid. But what I meant was the other things you did.” Jim looked confused. Hargrave took out a slate and went over next to the hospital bed to show Jim. The image was of a devastated landscape. “This is south of the city here,” Hargrave explained, “bringing that Raknar down created a radioactive wasteland.”

  The slate showed images of people in radiation suits taking readings. Then more images from a drone vehicle approaching a series of metal plates lying in a badly charred area. As the vehicle approached the plates the image began to crackle and break up.

  “Radiation,” Hargrave explained. “Extreme radiation. That was the third drone containment vehicle. It was brought down from the Hussars’ ships where it was used for working on fusion torches and modified with tracks. Those are part of your Raknar’s landing jets you dumped there. They’re so radioactive you could roast a cow.”

  “Raknar powerful and dangerous,” Splunk said.

  “You can say that again,” Hargrave said. Splunk looked back at him with a defiant expression on her furry face. “Those things are as dangerous as the monsters you fight with them, and you still almost got killed.”

  “I won’t have the only one next time,” Jim said. Hargrave’s look was not thrilled. “Let the doctor know I’m ready for that next treatment, and please make sure my team has Dash fueled and ready for flight.”

  “You’re going to make another dozen square kilometers into a radioactive wasteland?”

  “I’ll take measures to make sure no more damage is done,” Jim assured him. Hargrave left to find the doctors, and Jim glanced at Splunk. He’d never given a single thought to the radioactive consequences of firing a fusion torch in a planet’s atmosphere. Not before, during, or after. The altered state he shared with Splunk when they were…Akee, was so incredibly intoxicating. As the doctor came in, he resolved to try and keep more of himself present.

  Eight hours later, his Raknar team took him out to where Dash stood waiting. They’d washed it down to rid it of any fallout from the antimatter explosion. Like his tattoo, the Raknar’s paint job was mostly burned off, and there were a lot of new gouges in the armor. Still, they’d defeated two adult Canavar this time. He now knew the three he’d killed on Chimsa had been young ones.

  A support vehicle from the starport lifted Jim and Splunk up to the cockpit access. As they were raised twenty meters into the air, Jim got a good look at the Ia’kaa in its two parts affixed to the Raknar’s legs. The cylindrical weapon fit into the legs so well, he’d never noticed it was there. The Fae back on Upsilon 4 were certainly working on more such surprises. He had so many questions, but they were racing ahead at full speed, and there was no time for questions.

  The vehicle platform held in place while Jim and Splunk climbed inside and sealed the hatch. Minor repairs were already in progress, restoring the airtight environment after being penetrated by projectiles, one of which was still in his chest. Several pointed fragments were sitting on the cockpit gantry. He absentmindedly bent and took one as they went by. The fragment was pointed, deformed from penetrating the Raknar armor, and it was viciously barbed.

  His chest hurt as he climbed into the harness, and he wondered if it was from looking at the barb or the injury. One of those is in my chest, he thought. It was a sobering thought.

  “Jim, ”

  “No,” Jim said, “I just want to a simple flight to orbit.” Splunk didn’t complain, yet Jim was sure she was disappointed. He turned on the Raknar’s powerful external loud speaker. “Everyone clear,” he said. “Powering up.” The 360-degree Tri-V projection showed the ground crew retreating to a pair of vehicles a kilometer distant. “Start her up,” Jim said to Splunk.

  Fusion power thrummed through the Raknar, and Jim took the manual controls in hand. He hadn’t used them for some time, preferring to Akee with Splunk. As power built to operational levels, he took the first step, and almost faceplanted thirty meters of war machine right then and there.

  “Damn it,” he cursed and regained his balance before trying again, with nearly identical results. He was forced to admit he’d lost whatever rudimentary ability he might have gained to operate the mecha without Splunk. “Akee,” he said to her. To the Fae’s credit, she didn’t say anything about his earlier reluctance, just simply reached over to touch his pinplants.

  The now familiar explosion of consciousness enveloped him, filling Jim/Splunk with power and incredible capability. Joined with her, he/they could do absolutely anything.

  The first thing he did was look for any adversaries. There were forces about, but they were all tagged as allies. With a sense of disappointment, they tried to remember why they were there. Another mission, came to Jim/Splunk. Right, they needed to return to the transport in orbit.

  After checking that new high-power torch baffles were installed and that sufficient reaction mass was in the tanks, they almost took off immediately. Concern, echoed through their mind. No more harm to the planet.

  Jim/Splunk felt disgust as they fired their less powerful jumpjets, lifting all 1,000 tons of Raknar into the air. From a height of 200 meters, the mecha’s sensors could see more than 100 kilometers in all directions. There was an ocean 52 kilometers to the west. They flew in that direction, landing a kilometer from where they’d taken off, and then strode overland from there.

  The Raknar took huge loping strides twenty-five meters long, nearly a jog, which ate up distance at 90 kilometers per hour. Traffic on a
coastal road came to a halt, with people abandoning their vehicles to watch in amazement as the machine as tall as a skyscraper strode to within a short distance of the ocean shore and fired its jumpjets again.

  The Raknar climbed up and over the ocean with a roar audible up and down the coast, climbing quickly to a kilometer before the jumpjets warned they’d reached their limit. Jim/Splunk cut the jumpjets, and the Raknar began instantly to plummet. Then they engaged the fusion torches in each leg, and 1,000 tons of 20,000-year-old war machine rocketed toward space on a plume of pure energy. The ocean was left to absorb the radioactive residue.

  After they’d docked with Bucephalus, and Jim was himself again, they floated out of the Raknar and into the Cavaliers’ starship. Hargrave was waiting there with a physician.

  “I’m fine,” Jim said.

  “We’ll just let the doc make that decision,” Hargrave said. Jim relented without a fight. The entire time he was being scanned, poked, prodded, and examined, Jim had a hard time thinking of anything except the next time he got to become one with the Raknar.

  Two days later, the Hussars organized their fleet for departure, leaving a small squadron to defend the emergence point, and jumped for New Warsaw and the next stage of the war.

  * * *

  EMS Pegasus, Approaching Stargate, Asyola Star System

  Alexis watched the fleet form up as she transmitted her access request to the stargate. Her own crew was operating the gate because the Cartography Guild’s crew was dead. Her marines had carefully recorded everything they’d found there, lest she be blamed for that event as well. That crew would be staying behind, along with several other precious ships, to hold the Asyola star system against a follow up assault by Peepo.