Warlord

by Mel Odom

  “I was told,” Keladra choked out, “that if the Terrans should accompany you there, your granddaughter’s head will be left on the Lorald Stone.”

  “Then I will go alone,” Leghef said. Even as she said that, she felt certain she and her granddaughter would most likely not live through the situation. But not going was unthinkable.

  “With Throzath.”

  Leghef nodded. “As you say.”

  Hesitantly, Keladra hugged her, then pulled back. “A group of Tholak’s men wait outside, Quass. You will need to go with them. Wear your cloak. The storms have come.”

  Leghef stepped away from the other woman and walked toward the door.

  The soldiers posted outside the door stared at her.

  “I am leaving,” she said.

  “But Colonel Halladay—” one of them said.

  “The colonel doubtless has his hands full,” Leghef said, and drew upon her diplomatic prowess to brook no argument. “I need to attend to my people. I have done all that the colonel has asked of me. Now I need to go.”

  “Ma’am,” the other soldier said, “meaning no disrespect, but it’s dangerous out there.”

  “I have a group of my people waiting for me outside. I will be fine.” Leghef looked at the soldiers. “You are risking more than I am. I’m not a combatant in this confrontation. As Quass, I’ll be a valuable prize for the Phrenorians. You and I—and Colonel Halladay—know that. I’ll head into the jungle to join my people. When I am safe, I will let the colonel know where to find me.”

  The soldier was silent for a moment, then said, “The colonel wants to talk to you.”

  “Quass.” Halladay’s voice came from a speaker on the soldier’s armor.

  Leghef assumed the armor had pick-up as well as broadcasting abilities. “Colonel, my mind is made up. You and I both have things to do and people who are waiting on us to lead them. Talking with me regarding my decision will only waste time for us both. Time that we don’t have. Can you understand that?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Halladay didn’t sound happy.

  “You would have evacuated me from the fort soon anyway,” Leghef said. “I’m only leaving ahead of you throwing me out. Would you rather I fight you to stay here? With my people who have been wounded? Instead of trusting you and your med staff to care for them?”

  “No.”

  Leghef drew a breath and pushed away her fear for Telilu. “Neither would I. So release Throzath to my custody so I can get him out of this place as well.”

  “Are you certain you want to do that?”

  “I am.”

  “Then I’ll clear the way.”

  Leghef steeled herself and gave away none of the anxiety that coursed through her. She had gambled a lot over the years as the Quass. She knew how to keep herself centered and let no one see her secret self.

  “Thank you for everything you’ve done, Colonel,” she said. “I wish you all the best, and I hope to see you again.”

  “Yes, ma’am. And thank you. It has been a privilege serving with you.”

  Leghef took her leave then because she didn’t want to have to trust her voice anymore. The thought of Telilu in Tholak’s hands, in the clutches of the callous Phrenorians, was too much to bear. She had to go to her, and it took everything in her power not to run for the nearest exit.

  FORTY-NINE

  Kequaem’s Needle

  En Route to DawnStar Space Station (remnant)

  Makaum Space

  0646 Hours Zulu Time

  “They found us again!” Wiyntan yelled from the helm.

  Several of the Terran military soldiers sitting on the bridge’s deck were joined by Turit, Daus, Darrantia, and Honiban in creatively cursing the Phrenorians once more chasing them.

  Morlortai sat hunched over slightly in his command chair and rocked as the ship’s pilot took evasive action. Blue-white plasma blasts blazed through space only meters away.

  He tracked the monitor at the front of the ship and glanced at the views of the pursuing Phrenorian gunship provided by the rear vids and their three surviving drones. Primitive fear quivered inside Morlortai, something he hadn’t let touch him in a long time, not since he’d quit Fenipal to find a life out among the stars.

  “Don’t let them catch us,” Morlortai advised.

  Wiyntan snorted and cursed, then she juked around the broken, slowly spinning remains of a space freighter. Plasma bursts from the Phrenorian ship’s forward guns slagged the dead husk of the ship as they ducked behind it.

  “Our engines are failing!” the pilot warned. “They’ve taken too much damage for as hard as I’m pushing them! They’re not going to last much longer!”

  Morlortai knew that. The ship—their home—was dying around them. Every unaccustomed vibration that quivered through the bridge, every scream of tortured metal, told him that.

  “We can’t do anything if the engines blow!” Wiyntan yelled.

  “If they do,” Morlortai said, “we probably won’t have to worry about it for long.”

  Wiyntan screamed in frustration, kept plotting new courses, and pushed the ship till the roar of the engines filled the bridge. When she was desperate, though she hated it and wouldn’t admit it, she was in her element. She was the best pilot under pressure Morlortai had ever seen.

  “Shields are at seventeen percent and dropping,” Honiban said. As usual, his voice was calm. In the years Morlortai had known the man, Honiban had seldom been anything other than composed and collected.

  Morlortai nodded but said nothing. There was nothing he could do about the coming failure of the shields except to hope they held together long enough to see them clear.

  Another plasma blast struck them and Kequaem’s Needle jerked from the impact. Morlortai tightened his grip on the seat’s armrests and hung on.

  “Thirteen percent,” Honiban said.

  Wiyntan screamed more curses and plotted another course. Despite her best efforts, the distance between them and the pursuit craft kept dropping. The Phrenorian was just too fast.

  Morlortai looked at Sergeant Kiwanuka. “You still have a lock on that hangar?”

  “We do,” Kiwanuka answered tensely.

  She was afraid, Morlortai knew. She had to be. Anyone with common sense would be. But she didn’t show it. She also didn’t hide behind her faceshield. It was open and her face was there for all to see. She looked calm and collected, like everything was totally under her control.

  He decided he would hate to play cards against her.

  Before Morlortai could ask how far away their objective was, Wiyntan screamed with glee.

  “There it is!”

  Shifting his gaze back to the forward monitor, Morlortai spotted the huge section of space station dead ahead of them. He tapped his keyboard and pulled up the dimensions of the wreckage. It measured 1187.3 meters on its longest axis, 481.2 meters at its widest, and was 78.5 meters in height. The DawnStar Space Station had been the biggest he’d ever been on. The corp had lost trillions of credits during the attack. Not to mention the staff, guests, and other businesses.

  Morlortai was surprised the Phrenorians hadn’t already used the large section for target practice.

  “I see the docking bay!” Wiyntan called out excitedly. “It’s open, though.” As quickly as it had come, her excitement vanished. “All of those dropships are probably floating somewhere in space.”

  “The docking bay being open to space won’t matter,” Kiwanuka said. “The dropships will be anchored to the deck.”

  “They’re probably all scrap,” Wiyntan said.

  “All we need is one,” Kiwanuka replied.

  Kequaem’s Needle jerked again as the Phrenorian hit them with another plasma burst.

  “A dropship isn’t going to be able to take on a Phrenorian gunship,” Wiyntan said.

  “We’re not going to face off with them,” Kiwanuka said. “We’re going to outlast and outrun them. Those Sting-Tail gunships can’t enter a gravity well. If they d
o, they’ll break into pieces. Once we hit Makaum’s atmosphere, we’re home free. They can’t follow.”

  Morlortai knew it wasn’t going to be that easy, but he liked hearing Kiwanuka say it that way.

  “Except for the Phrenorians on the ground,” Ny’age said. “And that’s if we make it safely to a landing.”

  Wiyntan slipped around more debris as she shot toward the space station remnant. Several pieces of debris floated in front of the docking bay.

  “Clear the way!” Wiyntan shouted. “Clear the way!”

  Turit and Ny’age shifted their focus from the Phrenorian gunship behind them to the large, spinning sections of ship and space station debris speeding through space on an interception course with Kequaem’s Needle. Under their attacks, the wreckage broke into smaller pieces.

  As Wiyntan zipped into an approach path, she warned, “This is going to be rough.”

  Rectangular crosshairs formed on the forward monitor. They shrank and fell in on themselves and showed the flight path into the docking area.

  Another plasma blast rocked Kequaem’s Needle.

  “I can’t slow down much,” Wiyntan said. “If I do, we’re going to get dusted by the Phrenorians. And if I hit that docking bay wrong, we’ll smash across that section like a bug against a transplas screen. I also have to time the spin just right.”

  Morlortai didn’t say anything. Wiyntan was talking to herself in order to stay relaxed. He held on to the armrests and watched the hangar section fill the monitor till he knew there was no turning back.

  Just as they were about to slip inside, the Phrenorian fired again. Kequaem’s Needle jostled just enough to bump into the docking bay opening. Metal shrilled inside the bridge compartment.

  The soldiers who weren’t belted down in seats were thrown forward. They tumbled past the helm and smashed up against the monitor.

  Stabilized in the seat, Morlortai almost cried out because the belts cut into him. Kequaem’s Needle slammed into two anchored dropships and veered off in another direction just ahead of a plasma bolt that lit up the darkened interior of the hangar in a cascade of blue-white light for a few seconds.

  Skidding, throwing sparks that died quickly in the vacuum that existed inside the hangar, the ship rammed into another dropship and came to a sudden, painful stop.

  Then full darkness filled the hangar again.

  Kequaem’s Needle’s interior lights went out and Morlortai knew the ship’s generator and power supply were destroyed. The ship was now an empty shell and didn’t offer any real protection.

  Morlortai struggled to take a breath and couldn’t. He hit the release on the belts, but they were jammed and didn’t disconnect.

  “Warning!” the ship’s near-AI broadcasted. “Hull breach! Hull breach! Unavoidable oxygen loss occurring now! Get into safety suits! Warning!”

  Morlortai was already in his protective suit. He just needed his helmet. As the air inside the command center grew thin, he calmed the fear that filled him and reached to the side of the command chair to grab the helmet. His fingers brushed the helmet but he couldn’t reach it.

  He tried to call out to Turit or one of his crew, but there wasn’t enough air to fill his lungs. The cold from space bit into his exposed flesh. He tried for the helmet again, tried to free himself from the straps, but it was all to no avail. He was trapped in the darkness with the Phrenorian gunship still nearby.

  Fort York Airspace

  0713 Hours Zulu Time

  “Master Sergeant.” The tension in Blue Jay 12’s voice was palpable even over the jumpcopter’s roaring engines.

  “Go, Blue Jay 12,” Sage responded.

  “We’re a no-go on landing on a helipad. All of those are either in ruins or are under heavy attack. Colonel’s orders are to ignore them, and I’m in agreement with him.”

  “Copy that,” Sage replied, “but you’ve got to find somewhere to put us out. Up here, we’re deadweight and not earning our keep. We need to get into the fight.”

  “Roger that. When we get you guys off, we’ve got work to do too. For as long as we’re able.”

  The jumpcopter juked hard left just ahead of a spray of anti-aircraft flak that burst in the air only a few meters away. Shrapnel peppered the jumpcopter’s reinforced plasteel sides with sharp pings.

  Sage understood the pilot’s fears. He sat in the open jumpcopter doorway as the aircraft streaked across the sky. Below them, under a patchy cloud of black smoke from explosions, not the rain that fell in torrents, Fort York was undermanned and under siege. A staggered line held back the Phrenorians.

  Smoking craters dotted the landscape inside and outside the fort’s walls. Downed powersuits, Phrenorian and Terran military, sprawled on cracked plascrete streets or were buried in rubble of what used to be homes and buildings.

  Dead and wounded citizens, soldiers, and merchants lay in careless abandon in the no-man’s-land that existed between the Phrenorian front and the line drawn by the Terran defenders. That space was visibly shrinking, filled with rocket fire from aircraft and TAVs.

  Groups of Makaum people and offworld traders sprinted across the deadly patch of ground, but most of them tried for end runs around the combatants.

  The survivors all heading in the same direction told Sage the Phrenorians were offering no mercy during the battle. If someone stood in front of the Sting-Tails in battle, that person died. They weren’t holding back.

  The screaming debris shooting down from the destroyed space stations and ships that got trapped in Makaum’s gravity were killed impartially.

  A salvo of rockets slammed into the fort’s front gates. Bubbles of flames lashed out around them. Two soldiers in powersuits fell back from their positions and were immediately strafed by Phrenorian aircraft.

  Some of the old fear from Sage’s childhood dawned inside him again. He’d been helpless then, his arms wrapped around his mother as he tried to protect her while she did the same for him.

  He shook off the memory and centered himself. He couldn’t fight that war, but he could fight this one.

  “Master Sergeant,” Blue Jay 12 called.

  “Go,” Sage replied.

  “I’ve got a spot where we can put down without drawing too much enemy fire.”

  “Show me.”

  Instantly, a GPS pin dropped onto Sage’s faceplate and marked the prospective landing zone in the middle of an offworlder market that was already entrenched in flames despite the heavy rain.

  “Not exactly luxury accommodations,” the jumpcopter pilot apologized.

  “Any port in a storm, Lieutenant.” Sage shifted and sent the information to the rest of his team. He addressed them over the unit frequency. “Once we hit dirt, we fight our way to the fort. Every Phrenorian that’s in your way gets put down as quick and as hard as you can.”

  “Copy that, Master Sergeant.” Culpepper was busy with the leftover explosives the team had. Pingasa was helping.

  “Ready?” Blue Jay 12 asked.

  “Roger that.” Sage held on and the jumpcopter slid sideways as it lost altitude and dove toward the stricken marketplace.

  The aircraft shuddered and skipped as much from the strain it was going through as from the explosions taking place all around them.

  The dizzying descent ended in a blast of thruster fire that slammed a wave of mud and small debris against the nearby buildings. Most of the structures lay in pieces. Goods lay out in the open, thoroughly drenched by the rain.

  Sage dropped from the jumpcopter as it hovered centimeters above the ground. Ripples skated across the surfaces of nearby puddles despite the pounding rain. His boots sank into the soft earth that had flowed onto the broken plascrete.

  Bright green leaves and roots showed in the cracks. The war had started only a little more than an hour ago, and already the planet worked to reclaim land it had grudgingly given up to the Makaum people and the offworlders.

  If everything gets destroyed, if everybody dies, Sage thought bitterly, the G
reen Hell is going to flourish.

  He turned to the soldiers as they gathered around him. “All right, then. Some of you haven’t seen real combat before. Well, you’re about to get a look at it up close and personal. So stay together, keep your heads on a swivel, and follow orders.”

  Their response was immediate, brave and scared and hopeful all at the same time.

  Sage assigned Culpepper to take the lead and they ran in single file through the fallen buildings toward where the detonations were loudest.

  FIFTY

  DawnStar Space Station (remnant)

  Makaum Space

  0719 Hours Zulu Time

  “Move out!” Kiwanuka released the magnetic fields in her gloves that held her to two of her soldiers who hadn’t been safely belted in. She pushed herself up from her seat and scanned the bridge. “Goldberg, get a team and get the civilians out of here!”

  “Copy that, Staff Sergeant,” Goldberg responded.

  Her green-limned silhouette showed on Kiwanuka’s faceshield.

  “Existing light amplification only,” Kiwanuka ordered. “No external illumination. We don’t want to advertise to the Sting-Tails that we’re still alive until we’re ready to evacuate.”

  She swept the bridge with her gaze and spotted Morlortai struggling in his command chair. He wasn’t wearing his helmet and his belts hadn’t released.

  She cursed and raced over to the assassin as her soldiers guided the rest of the ship’s crew out Kequaem’s Needle’s emergency exit. She located his helmet and jammed it onto his suit. It locked into place immediately and hopefully breathable onboard air pumped into the vacuum.

  There was no time to wait and see. He’d live or die and she couldn’t do anything more at the moment. She picked up Morlortai and threw him across her shoulders in a fireman’s carry. Once she had the exit located, she hurried through it.

  “I’ve got a dropship back here that looks solid,” Goldberg announced.

  A crimson GPS pin dropped onto Kiwanuka’s faceshield. She turned in that direction and followed the green figures ahead of her.