She was completely surprised when the tailgate clanged down and Surgun Jates stepped out the back gingerly, favoring one leg and leaning on a makeshift crutch. A greeting caught in her throat as Jates turned toward her with a grimace and no one else followed him.
Then a heavy duffel bag flopped out, and Dave Czajka hopped down after it. He straightened to attention and snapped a crisp salute to her. It was not protocol for him as a contractor to salute a military officer, but Dave decided protocol could go screw itself. “Reporting for duty, Colonel.”
Emily raised a hand halfway to return the salute, hesitated, dropped her hand and stepped forward to plant a wet kiss on Dave’s lips. At that moment, she also did not give a damn about protocol. “Dave! I thought you were-” A single tear ran down her cheek.
He touched his lip, which had split open again from her kiss. Forgetting about his broken thumb, he pressed it to his sore lip, making the bandaged thumb throb and he grunted in pain. “Ow,” he shook the thumb, a bad idea. “Us? No, Jates and I are too ornery to kill.” With his good hand, he wiped away her tear and whispered “We tried to contact you, but the Verd commando unit that found us didn’t have secure comms. We only learned you were here when we came through the outer perimeter. I was worried about you.”
“I was fine,” her eyes flicked to the soldiers watching them, and she took a half-step backward for proper decorum. Dave Czajka did not need to know the details of what she had been doing since fighting broke out. “What happened to you?”
“Oh, you know, we crashed a dune buggy-”
“You crashed it,” Jates growled. “Colonel, we escaped an ambush. Civilians, but they were armed with rifles, rockets and small-caliber artillery. Czajka,” he jerked a thumb toward the security contractor, “should never be allowed to drive anything more complicated than a tricycle.”
Perkins found it impossible to read the alien’s expression. “You don’t want to serve with him again?”
“I didn’t say that,” Jates’s eyes narrowed. “Your boyfriend is, as you humans say, a crazy motherfucker. I do not think any other human has survived unarmed combat against a Kristang,” he shook his head in wonderment. “Czajka, I’d serve with you any day.”
Despite his unofficial status, Dave snapped another salute, and winced as the gesture made his broken thumb throb again. “Same here, Surgun.”
Jates returned the gesture. “Get yourself patched up, there’s a war on. There are a lot of hateful lizards on this planet, and they need killin’ fast.” With a nod to Perkins, the big Verd limped off toward the medical tent.
Emily carefully touched the dried blood around Dave’s split lip. “You killed a Kristang, without a weapon?”
“Ah, the lizard didn’t have a weapon either,” he wrapped his good hand around hers. “I had a knife at the end.” He flashed a wicked grin, causing blood to trickle from his split lip again. “You know what? The Kristang may be tough on the outside, but their insides are just as squishy as ours.”
The next morning, Perkins received orders to fly back to Legion HQ with Ross. She tried to get seats for Dave and Jates, but the stealthy transport aircraft only had seats for six and was already overloaded. They said tearful goodbyes and parted, with Emily more determined than ever to find a way for the Legion to win the ground battle.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Perkins tugged her uniform top to straighten it before approaching the doorway to the partition Ross was using as an office. He knew she had been out in the field and would forgive her dirty hair, the mud on her boots and the hydraulic fluid splattered on her left side. He would also appreciate her taking a moment to be as presentable as possible, given the circumstances. She tried to run her fingers through her tangled hair, then gave up. Meeting outside would have been better, as she would have an excuse to wear the cover she had tucked under one arm. “Sir?” She said as she came through the doorway that was little more than a tent flap.
“Perkins, come in, sit down.” General Ross rubbed the stubble on his face, and took a gulp of cold coffee, grimacing at the bitter taste. “Rough day?”
“Rough night, Sir.” She tried and failed to stifle a yawn before she could reply. “I was up all night setting up defenses around the Launcher energizer. Our fearless leader,” she automatically glanced toward the door in case a Ruhar was passing by. “Thinks the lizards won’t touch the Launcher complex because they need it intact. I would rather be certain of our security.”
“Good work,” Ross covered his mouth while his jaw stretched wide in a yawn. “Ah, damn, it’s contagious. Listen, Colonel, I just came back from a pow-wow with the Commissioner, and we are in big, big fucking trouble.”
“More than the obvious? We’ve fought the lizards to a stalemate, at least for now.”
“A stalemate means we lose. The Ruhar didn’t have a raging hard-on to take this planet in the beginning,” he was too tired to care about using polite language. “They sure as hell are not going to double-down on this losing bet by bringing in the second wave, until the Ruhar upstairs can establish space supremacy around Fresno. Without the second wave, we are fighting a battle of attrition, and our supply line stretches back through two wormholes. The lizards only need to hang on while we get weaker every day.”
“Does it matter anyway?” She frowned with one side of her mouth. “Our local contractor lost all their supply dumps to railgun strikes. That sleazy lawyer guy, uh-”
“Milstratt,” Ross spat the name out like a piece of sour fruit.
“Yeah. He wrote a report claiming that Glabosor is absolved of responsibility to deliver under the contract, unless the government pays to ship in replacements for all the gear they lost. No way are the hamsters doing that, even if we stomped the lizards flat down here. Sir, are we pulling out?” Her eyes narrowed, trying to judge the general’s reaction to her question.
“We are not,” his reply was less than reassuring. Then he added “We are not.”
“Sir?”
“The Kristang head honcho down here contacted Yusafft this morning, to offer a deal. An immediate cease-fire on the ground and across the star system, followed by forces pulling back to positions to be negotiated.”
“All right,” she said cautiously. “A stalemate without fighting is better than one with people getting killed. We don’t have the ammo to continue the fight for more than a couple weeks anyway.”
Ross shook his head. “That was just the first part of the offer. Once our positions stabilize, the Kristang will allow the Legion to conduct an organized and peaceful withdrawal, under their supervision, of course.”
Perkins was confused. “But we’re not taking the deal to pull out? You said-”
“The Commissioner is strongly considering the offer, on the recommendation of his military advisors. The lizards will allow a courier ship through to contact hamster leadership, if Yusafft accepts the offer.”
“Ok,” she could not conceal her disappointment. Withdrawal was a defeat for the Alien Legion, and a shameful defeat on the Legion’s first mission would be the end of the experiment. Her experiment. She forced a smile. “Live to fight another day, huh?”
“No. You haven’t heard the worst part yet. The Kristang are willing to negotiate details and be flexible, as long as the Legion withdraws from the planet. They also stated one issue is not negotiable: humans stay here. They consider us traitors, and our presence here fighting alongside their enemy is treason. The Verd-kris and our hamster overlords are to evac, but we stay here,” he jabbed a finger at the ground.
Blood drained from Emily’s face. They were dead. She had gotten them, all of them, killed. For nothing. “That is a death sentence.”
“You haven’t heard the worst part.”
“It gets worse? How?”
“The lizards mentioned you by name. You and your team. Supposedly there will be assurances that most humans here will not be mistreated,” he worked his jaw side to side, the distaste of his words making him sick. “You ca
n be assured I know that is bullshit, but Yusafft may grasp at it to cover his ass. Senior leadership of the human Legion contingent, like you and myself, are to be executed for treason, as an example. That applies to your entire team, the six original Mavericks. I’m sorry.”
She had to swallow to keep down the meager breakfast she’d eaten. “The Commissioner can’t-”
“He can and he will, if he thinks it will save his own skin. And save his career. I heard from our Verd friends that Yusafft has his political flunkies researching the legal niceties of abandoning us here. Technically, UNEF never gained status as a client species of the Ruhar, so legally they are not responsible for us.”
“Son of a bitch.”
“That was my reaction. I might have used harsher language than that,” he added without humor.
“We’re all dead,” she whispered. She felt drained of emotion, unable to confront the horror.
“Speak for yourself, Colonel. I plan on living,” Ross said with grim determination.
“How?”
“I don’t know yet, but I’m not giving up.”
“We go down fighting, take as many lizards down with us as we can?”
Ross wriggled uncomfortably in his flimsy folding chair, threatening to make it collapse. “That’s going to be tricky. The deal offered to Yusafft makes him, meaning the Ruhar and Verds, responsible for disarming us poor primitive humans. And for rounding us up and handing us over to the lizards. We would have to fight our allies before we could fight the Kristang.”
“Fuuuuuuuck,” she groaned. “When is this going down?”
“The cease-fire could happen by 0437 tomorrow morning. I know, it’s an odd time for us, but a nice round number on the clock the Kristang use.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“You’re a smart officer, what do you think?”
She considered for a moment. “I’ll start quietly stashing weapons and ammo in areas we control.”
“Exactly. Not a word of this to anyone, Colonel. Not even your team.”
“I don’t want to tell them anyway,” she spoke the absolute truth. Screw it, she thought. No way was the proposed deal to abandon humans on Fresno going to stay secret for long, rumors were going to get out. “Damn, Sir. I’m sorry I got us all the way out here, for nothing. Worse than nothing.”
He managed a tight smile. “The Army mentioned there might be danger when I signed up.”
“I don’t remember the Army warning me about danger from alien allies.”
Ross made an exaggerated shrug. “We used to think the lizards were our allies, remember? Getting stabbed in the back by the hamsters is really nothing new.”
“Shit. Yes.” She recalled the first time she had heard about the ‘fortune cookies’, back when she served as an intelligence officer on Paradise. Messages from Earth, smuggled in food packets, telling the truth about how Kristang were oppressing the human population and ravaging the Earth. Those messages had only confirmed what she had already concluded: that the Kristang were more enemies than allies.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Colonel,” Ross said.
Perkins cocked her head in surprise. “No?”
The general opened a drawer, pulling out two pieces of chocolate and tossing one to Perkins. “You know the lizards. No way does this ceasefire last more than a day or two. We now know the battle for this rock has become sort of a matter of pride across Kristang society. Most major clans donated troops and material, so their command and control is even more chaotic than usual. I suspect the smart clans used Feznako as an opportunity to get rid of their worst troublemakers. We know in some areas, the lizards have been fighting each other as much as fighting the Legion. Right now, the Swift Arrows clan is exerting some control over major operations, but anything below the company level is a free-for-all. Some local clan warlord is going to see an opportunity to hit the Legion and gain ground as we pull back.”
“They could just wait, and gain back that ground without fighting.”
Ross snorted. “Riiiiiiight. Because patience and self-control are what warlords are known for. Some hothead out there is going to see the Legion pulling back from a rival’s territory, and hit us to take the territory before the rival can move. Or, this ceasefire is just a breather so the lizards can consolidate and assess where and how to hit us.”
Urmat Fobish wet an index finger on her tongue, and picked up tiny crumbs left in the food packet. Then she carefully turned the packet inside out, and licked it clean. That was the last packet of Ruhar food recovered from the crashed Buzzard, which was now sunk to its roof in the river.
“Sorry I couldn’t find any more food for you in there,” Dani said, staring out across the forest. After she killed the grikka, the three of them had moved away from the river, to the top of a ridge which was a more defensible position. Dani wanted to move farther inland, but Fobish was too heavy to carry far, and the Ruhar officer was too weak to walk on her own. Sergeant Colter not only had a broken shin bone, both of his thighs had angry purple and black bruises from being trapped under the fallen tree. He also had blood blisters that did not look good at all, and there wasn’t much they could do about it. They had no weapons other than sharpened sticks, no more food for Fobish, no communications, and no sign that the Legion was coming to rescue them. As far as the Legion knew, everyone aboard the Buzzard had died in the crash. No one was coming to rescue them in the middle of a war, a war the Legion was likely losing.
Other than that, everything was going just great, Dani told herself.
“You did exceptionally well, Captain Grace,” Fobish waved a hand weakly. “Colter told me about your battle with the dino-saur,” she pronounced the word slowly. “I have heard about grikka but never seen one. Thanks to you, I am still alive.”
“You did great, Cap,” Colter agreed. “The Urmat and I were goners for sure, until you got on top of that Buzzard and attracted its attention.”
“Un,” Dani grunted, uncomfortable with the praise. Looking back, there was so much she would have, should have, done differently. Her training in psychology told her that such second-guessing was unproductive, but it was easier to know that than to put it into practice. “Urmat, we can’t stay here, simply hoping someone will find us. I’m the only one who is fully mobile,” she thought that was a more tactful way to say the others were not capable of walking. “I should head downriver, see if I can link up with a Legion unit. There is, or was, an outpost a hundred forty kilometers from here.”
“That is a long way to walk, in rough terrain, Ma’am,” Jesse said softly.
“An isolated outpost is likely overrun by the enemy by now,” Fobish shook her head. “Or the personnel were evacuated by the Legion by now.”
“We have to try,” Dani bit her lip and looked down at her boots. “Anything is better than sitting here waiting to starve, or be eaten by a grikka. I can-”
All three were startled when Dani’s zPhone made an odd squawking sound. Dani extracted the phone from a pocket and closed her eyes before looking at the screen, not daring to hope. “Jamming has stopped!” She announced with a whoop of joy. “There is a ceasefire! All units in the field are to report position and status,” she read the message, which was blurry from the tears that welled up in her eyes.
Jesse clapped her on the back. “See? Thanks to you, we’re getting out of here.”
“You never gave me an answer to the most important question, Colter,” Dani said as she carefully typed a message to send.
“What’s that, Ma’am?”
She turned to him with a grin that lit up the gloomy forest. “What do you want on that pizza?”
“Just up there,” Nert pointed to the top of the ridge with earnest enthusiasm.
No, that wasn’t the proper description. Annoying enthusiasm is how Shauna thought the Ruhar teenager was acting. He had been annoyingly enthusiastic and energetic since they started walking. Damn it, Shauna told herself. I am young! Nert wasn’t that
much younger than her.
There was no denying that the cadet was able to walk faster, farther and carry heavy loads better than Shauna, despite her dedication to fitness that had continued even aboard the Deal Me In on the way to Fresno and after she landed on the cursed planet. Finding a way to run, aboard a ship designed to accommodate beetles, was a challenge as much as the actual exercise. She was in good condition, excellent condition, yet there was Nert ahead of her, urging her on. What bothered her the most was the polite patience Nert displayed while constantly waiting for her to catch up. He was humoring her, slowing down because of her comparative weakness. More than once over the long days they had been walking, she had to bite her tongue to stop from saying a cutting remark about the easy advantages offered by Ruhar genetic engineering. That, she told herself, was the unfair edge the alien cadet had.
She sighed. Only a short sigh, she couldn’t afford to interrupt her labored breathing. “I know it’s up there, Nert. I picked this spot, remember?”
“Should I go ahead?” He hinted., hoping for a positive response.
“No, Cadet. Wait for me.” She hated saying that, and picked up her pace.
They were near the small UNEF base, or a base that existed on maps before the fighting started. Two days ago, they had seen a thin column of smoke coming from that direction, but they didn’t know anything. The smoke could have been coming from a Kristang village that was fifty kilometers beyond the UNEF base, she told Nert with a sinking feeling in her stomach. Or the smoke could be coming from a downed aircraft. It could be anything, they needed to see for themselves.
That is why they had added four hours of walking, to cut a wide circle around the theoretical base and approach from the north, where a tree-covered ridge would allow a view of the site. Shauna did not like the idea of walking into the base perimeter without scouting it first.
Deathtrap Page 34
