Warlord

by Mel Odom

  “You failed to kill Zhoh,” Kiwanuka said. “As a result, he used your failing to launch a preemptive strike against Makaum.”

  “Blame the Alliance,” Morlortai said. He clamped down on his anger. “They should have given you the soldiers and the supplies to properly safeguard this planet instead of playing political games with the Phrenorians. The Empire should never have been allowed on Makaum.”

  “Permission to blast free of the area, Captain?” Wiyntan asked.

  “Not yet,” Morlortai said. “First the staff sergeant and I need to agree on what we’re going to do.”

  “Begging the captain’s pardon,” Wiyntan said with a trace of sarcasm, “but the Phrenorian gunships are coming this way.”

  “I know that.” Morlortai focused on Kiwanuka. “Here’s the agreement: I get you and your people to safety, and you clear the way for my crew and me with the Terran Alliance.”

  “You want a free pass?” Kiwanuka shook her head. “I can’t do that, and if I said I could, I’d be lying to you.”

  “I just require passage out of this system,” Morlortai said. “Once I jump through the Gate, we’re even.”

  Kiwanuka hesitated only a moment. “I can do that.”

  Wiyntan snorted. “None of that’s going to matter if we can’t get out of our present situation. Maybe I need to point out that this escape ship isn’t built for combat fighting or for planetfall. And once we start moving, we become an instant target for the Phrenorian gunships.”

  “Then we’re going to have to move fast,” Kiwanuka said.

  That surprised and pleased Morlortai. He still hadn’t worked out their escape from anyone other than the Terran military. Getting to the planet’s surface and finding another ship was a distant hope.

  “You have a plan?” Morlortai asked.

  “I do.” Kiwanuka sounded confident. “First we rescue our people.”

  Morlortai liked that she had said “our” people, grouping their objectives into a common effort. Ny’age probably appreciated it as well.

  “And after that?” Wiyntan pressed.

  “We do this one step at a time,” Kiwanuka said.

  “I would like to know more,” Morlortai said.

  “I would like it if we weren’t gunning for each other only minutes ago.”

  “For what it’s worth,” Wiyntan put in, “I’d like it if we weren’t being hunted by the Phrenorians. Maybe we could think about that.”

  “Noted.” Morlortai swung his attention back to the monitor. “We have two groups of people in two sections of what used to be this ship. Staff Sergeant, how would you recommend we proceed?”

  Kiwanuka stepped forward and surveyed the broken ship pieces in their immediate vicinity. “I left one of my teams in the corridor in front of the lift.”

  Wiyntan tapped a keyboard and the ship section lit up in soft blue light. “Here.”

  “Yes,” Kiwanuka said. “We go there first. Then the engine compartment.”

  The pilot shifted uneasily at her station. “Once we blow free, the Phrenorians are going to see us. By the time we reach that section, some of them will be on to us. Our approach to the engine compartment will draw fire.”

  “Then,” Kiwanuka said, “I guess we’re going to find out how skilled you are.”

  “I’m amazing,” Wiyntan said.

  “Let’s hope so.” Kiwanuka glanced back at Morlortai. “I assume this vessel has armament.”

  Morlortai nodded to Turit, who was already moving. “It does.”

  In less than a minute, the ship’s armorer unlocked the heavy-duty laser cannons from hiding and pulled out skeletal seats from the floor. Workstations reconfigured to weapon controls.

  “They’re not much,” Turit said in his mechanical voice, “and we can’t go toe-to-toe with the Phrenorians, but they’ll give us fangs against the gunships.”

  Morlortai gestured to the available seats. Kequaem’s Needle was set up for twelve passengers on the bridge. Holding all of the Terran military soldiers in armor would be a tight squeeze. Morlortai didn’t look forward to the claustrophobic environment once they were aboard.

  Kiwanuka and her team sat and strapped in.

  “Ready when you are, Captain,” the staff sergeant said, “and let’s hope your pilot is as good as she thinks she is.”

  Wiyntan snorted mockingly and tapped her keyboard. “Blowing docking ring in three . . . two . . . one . . .”

  The series of detonations rang throughout the ship and it shivered for a moment as it fought to free itself. The external drones showed the docking ring blowing apart.

  “The Phrenorians have noticed us,” Turit said.

  Wiyntan fired the thrusters and heeled the ship back toward the section that held Kiwanuka’s first group of soldiers. “They still have to catch us.”

  Outside Interview Room B

  Security Building

  Fort York

  0604 Hours Zulu Time

  “I don’t want to go!” Telilu protested. She had her arms folded over her chest and glared at Leghef. “I want to stay with you! I want Jahup and Noojin to be here with us!”

  Knowing the child was afraid and there was nothing she could do about that, Leghef didn’t give in to her own weakness. Consoling her granddaughter when it might all prove false wasn’t in her.

  They stood outside the interview room where Throzath awaited interrogation.

  “Telilu,” Leghef stated in her flat, no-nonsense voice. “Things have gotten dangerous for us here.”

  “I know!” she wailed. “That’s why I want all of us here!”

  “We can’t be here. Not for long. We won’t be safe.”

  “We will be safe! That’s why the soldiers are here! That’s what you said! You said that if the soldiers came to live with us, we would be safe! All of us! Instead, Jahup nearly got killed by Oeldo because he was drinking again and Noojin had to shoot him!”

  Leghef looked up at Pekoz, who stood nearby. Today he looked thinner and more withered than ever. His bony face looked tight around his small, sad eyes. His skin was so pale the gray scars on his hands and features were hard to see even in the hallway’s bright light. Today he used a cane to walk.

  The old man shook his head. He still wore a shiny silver bandage around his head. He held a backpack containing Telilu’s things in one scarred fist. Despite Captain Gilbride’s admonishments, and her own instructions, Pekoz had refused to lie abed any longer. Not when Leghef needed him.

  “She has been talking with her friends,” Pekoz said. “Over those . . . devices.” He didn’t care much for the computers the merchants had brought to Makaum. “I didn’t know until it was too late.”

  Leghef waved that away and returned her attention to Telilu. She knelt and put both hands on the girl’s shoulders. “Daughter of my son,” she said in that old way so that her granddaughter would know she was serious, “times have changed.”

  Tears leaked from Telilu’s eyes. “No,” she whispered. “No, don’t send me away. Please!”

  Leghef smiled but showed no weakness. She could not let her granddaughter see what was truly in her heart. She brushed hair out of Telilu’s face. “I must.”

  Telilu shook her head in denial. “I won’t go.”

  “Then you will have to break Pekoz,” Leghef said, “because I’m going to have him take you to Keladra. Once I set him to this task, he will not fail me unless you beat him senseless. Are you going to do that to him?”

  Telilu glanced up at the old man. “I would never do that,” she promised.

  Pekoz smiled. “Thank you.”

  “Pekoz and Keladra will keep you safe until I can join you,” Leghef said.

  Telilu looked back at Leghef with more desperation. “Why aren’t you coming with me?”

  “Because there are things here I must do if we are to be safe.”

  “I don’t want to go.”

  “And I don’t want to be away from you, little one, but we each must do our part. Mine i
s to stay, and yours is to go. Now come. Tell me goodbye and that you will mind Keladra and Pekoz until I return to you.”

  Telilu’s face crumpled and a wave of guilt rushed over Leghef. She made herself stay strong as she hugged her granddaughter back as fiercely as the little girl hugged her.

  Then Leghef peeled herself free and stood. “Do you have your doll? The one Noojin gave you?”

  The doll was special because it had a transponder in it that Telilu could use to signal for help.

  Telilu sniffed and nodded. “She’s in my bag.”

  “Good. Then you take care of her and I will see you soon.”

  Telilu nodded, took Pekoz’s free hand, and walked away.

  Leghef took a breath, put her heart back together, and faced the door to the interview room. On second thought, she put her heart away. She wasn’t going to use it for this.

  FORTY-FIVE

  Operation Anthill

  Yeraf River

  Southwest of Makaum City

  0607 Hours Zulu Time

  Do you require more medical attention, Master Sergeant Sage?

  Sage struggled back to wakefulness and finally got his eyes open. The HUD gleamed before him and scrolled stats on his team and gave his GPS location as somewhere by the Yeraf River, which rang a bell for some reason but he couldn’t figure out why.

  Only he couldn’t see. Nothing but darkness lay beyond the faceshield. He tried to raise a hand to wipe his faceshield in case something had gotten stuck to it. Except he couldn’t move.

  Memory came back to him in a rush.

  Realizing he had to be lying on his face, he forced his hands out beside him and pushed. Even with the suit amplifying his strength he was hard-pressed to make any headway against the sheer tonnage bearing down on him.

  His head came up from the dirt and stone that covered him and he realized that the Phrenorian cavern hadn’t just imploded. It had exploded. He didn’t fault Culpepper for it. The fortress had been a high-tech powder keg. They had no way of knowing what Rangha had kept on hand.

  Incoming! the near-AI warned.

  Targeting crosshairs drew Sage’s attention to a Phrenorian troop transport bearing down on his position. He remembered there were two of them. He also saw that he wasn’t the first soldier to get to his feet.

  Six other soldiers stood in the loose earth that had rained down on them. Four of them raised their weapons as they followed the calls to action of the near-AIs.

  Sage found his Roley at the end of his arm. He hadn’t let go of it even when he’d been briefly unconscious. Focusing, he brought the Roley up and sighted in on the lead airship. Somewhere around him, eight other soldiers had to be lying buried. He wasn’t going to leave them unprotected.

  He squeezed the trigger and a line of depleted uranium rounds danced across the transplas nose of the troop transport. Two Phrenorian pilots sat behind the controls and never blinked.

  None of the rounds pierced the bulletproof transplas. Beneath the airship, a rocket pod shifted as it locked on target. Before the Phrenorian gunner could release a rocket, air-to-air missiles struck it in a sharp staccato of explosions.

  In the next instant, the Phrenorian airship became a twisted cloud of flaming debris. The ammo cooked off in a series of detonations that sped shrapnel across the jungle. The largest pieces that survived the attack knocked down trees in a ragged line thirty meters from Sage.

  The second troop transport airship whirled around and tried to dodge, but the two jumpcopters screaming in low over the jungle attacked mercilessly. Air-to-air ordnance leaped from firmpoints mounted on the boxy aircraft.

  The Phrenorian ship never got a rocket off. Trailing smoke, coming apart, it drifted sideways and crashed into the trees only a few meters from the Yeraf River.

  A commlink chirped for Sage’s attention.

  “Master Sergeant,” a woman said. “This is Blue Jay 12.”

  “Acknowledged, Blue Jay 12.” Some of Sage’s tiredness went away. He’d met the pilot briefly after the attack on Cheapdock. She was a stand-up soldier and fearless pilot.

  “The colonel sent us out here to give you a ride home,” Blue Jay 12 said. “Save you a walk.”

  “We appreciate the assistance.” Sage reached down in the loose earth, found Jahup, and pulled the younger man to his feet. His vitals looked strong and he was just now getting his bearings.

  The jumpcopters hovered above the soldiers—all the soldiers, Sage was glad to see—and payload masters lowered baskets attached to winches to the ground.

  “Jahup,” Sage said.

  “Yes, Master Sergeant.”

  “Make sure everyone gets on board.”

  “I will. Where are you going?”

  Sage held his Roley at port arms and advanced on the stricken Phrenorian gunship. “To find out if there’s anything worth salvaging. I’ll be along.”

  Three of the Phrenorians had tried to evacuate the wreckage but hadn’t gotten far. Their burned bodies lay stretched on patches of ground that still held flames.

  Two of the warriors inside the troop section were still alive, but death couldn’t be more than a few minutes away. Sage fired mercy rounds that put them out of their misery before wading through flames to get into the wreckage of the cockpit.

  “You’re going to get yourself blown up,” Jahup said.

  Sage glanced at the open cargo door. He’d known someone was coming and had been ready.

  “You’re not supposed to be here,” Sage said.

  “Everyone’s loaded up,” Jahup said. “We’re waiting on you. You said you wanted me to make sure everyone got aboard. I’m here to make sure you get there.”

  Sage tore open the airship’s console, located the onboard computer, and stripped one of the input wires. He was by no means proficient with computers, but he knew how to break into a drive. He pulled a jack from his chest armor and let it thread itself into the drive.

  A screen popped up on his HUD.

  Making connection, the near-AI said. Connection made. Commencing download.

  A bar lit on the HUD and showed the progress of the download. All around Sage, the airship continued to burn, hiss, pop, snap, and crack. He hoped all of the firepower had cooked off. If it hadn’t been for his armor, he would have burned alive.

  Download complete.

  Sage returned the jack to his chest armor and climbed out of the downed aircraft. He had no idea what he’d gotten or if it was even worth the effort.

  The two jumpcopters hovered just above treetop level and the door gunners maintained watch behind 20mm cannons. Despite how welcome the sight of the airships was, Sage knew the flight back to Fort York would only provide a short respite. Zhoh would probably already be planning another attack. The newly minted Phrenorian general wouldn’t lose the fortress—even if its existence would mar Phrenorian honor—without exacting his pound of flesh.

  Zhoh would pursue the Makaum people, and then they would see the monsters they’d allowed to come to their planet. They would find out that the Sting-Tails wouldn’t let them leave the planet, and Sage was torn because he didn’t know how many of them the Terran military would be able to save in the time they had left.

  A dark shape slapped the surface of the river a few meters away. The jasulild surfaced and rolled, then flopped over as though in pain. Its head landed on the riverbank.

  Sage peered at the creature over the Roley’s sights, but it continued to lie there as young kifrik dropped by strands to land on the jasulild. The kifrik bit into the corpse and feasted.

  Just as Sage turned away, the jasulild blew up. Bloody flesh flew in all directions.

  Weakly, Corporal Pingasa stumbled from the dead monster. His armor was worse for the wear and cracked in places, but he was alive. He cursed in at least two Terran tongues and six alien languages that Sage was familiar with.

  “That was the most horrible experience of my life,” Pingasa said. He walked with difficulty, either because he was injured or because his
armor was damaged.

  “I thought you were dead,” Sage said. He couldn’t hide the smile of disbelief from his voice.

  “For a time, so did I,” Pingasa admitted. “I have never before been eaten.” He brushed dead jasulild from his armor and looked around. His gaze focused on the collapsed fortress and the cloud of smoke and dust that hung over it. “Was I in that thing’s belly for that long? Is it over already?”

  “Just this part, Corporal,” Sage told him. He ran over to the man, pulled one arm over his shoulder, and guided them toward the waiting jumpcopter. “We’ve got plenty left to do. This fight’s just gotten started.”

  Jahup grabbed Pingasa’s other arm. Together they managed a staggering double time toward the waiting exfil aircraft.

  As they clambered through the jumpcopter’s doorway, several flaming objects streaked from the sky and landed in the vicinity of Makaum City and Fort York, and spread out beyond into the surrounding jungle.

  The jumpcopter’s engines howled and the aircraft leaped into the sky.

  Sage tapped into the jumpcopter frequency. “Blue Jay 12, do you want to tell me why the sky is falling?”

  “It’s the Phrenorians, Master Sergeant,” the pilot replied in a hushed voice. “At 0529 hours, the Sting-Tails launched a space-based attack against the corp space stations and civilian spacecraft. We have no idea what the casualties are, but Command thinks they’re going to be extensive.” She paused. “Those people never had a chance, Master Sergeant.”

  Sage watched the space debris burn through the atmosphere trailing fire and it took away the fleeting sense of victory he’d gotten after the destruction of the weapons storage and Pingasa’s unexpected return. Emptiness and dread filled his stomach. Sour bile bit at the back of his throat. None of their planning involved dealing with an attack by Phrenorian spacecraft.

  If the Sting-Tails succeeded in surrounding Makaum, if the spaceports were destroyed, there was no way off the planet. They were trapped.

  Zhoh and his army would have free rein to ride roughshod over any survivors, especially if he was reinforced by new troops.

  Sage looked at all the destruction in the jungle and knew it would be worse in the sprawl.