by Kali Altsoba
They know it. They’ve always known it. Hearing it from their general is different. It makes it real. It makes it now. It makes it forever. She’s unrelenting, merciless with truth. “Most of you will not leave this place. Most of you will stay and die here, with me. Yet some of you must leave. Some of you must accept exile. Some of you must live so that Genève and Krevo shall not die.”
They’re starting to understand her at last, taking in each heavy word, weighing it before setting it down to grasp the next. They think they know what and why, but not yet who or how.
“Only a handful of warships remain in Toruń. I can tell you now that until this morning Captain Magda Aklyan and I were working on a plan to make a suicide ramming attack on the Kaigun flotilla circling over our heads. That was before new orders arrived from Aral, from the War Government of all Krevo. Now Aral and I both order Captain Aklyan and her crews, and many of you, to drink a far more bitter cup of poison. You will leave Genève when ordered.”
Audible dissent rises again, bursting out in angry confusion, in a toxic mix of fear and hope about who must stay and who shall go. It’s too much, being buffeted like this, staying or leaving, fighting on the berm or from exile, hoping to live or fated to die on Genève after all.
“We won’t quit fighting!”
“We won’t leave Toruń. You can’t make us!”
“What’ll happen when the enemy cross the berm, with so many still in the city?”
“I won’t leave my children.”
“I won’t abandon my city, not to the mad beast howling at the Gate. Never!”
“It’s shameful to run. How can we leave even one old baba behind?” says a shamed lad, who followed orders and marched away from a bitter old woman who threw pebbles after him.
Constance understands them. ‘It’s not about leaving their loved ones to a merciless enemy to go into exile. It’s about leaving at all. It’s about shame at running, and about losing. Orders or no orders. It’s about abandoning everything proud fighters and oath-takers are still prepared to die for.’
They glare back up at her.
‘Gods, I love our people.’
She cuts them off, with an air of menace.
“I know that few of you in those proud uniforms you wear want to leave. Some of you must, nonetheless. You will obey orders. I will decide who stays and who goes. There will be no appeal. Full military discipline will apply to anyone who refuse orders.”
The threat made clear and understood, she hits them even harder. “Know this, as well. All Exodus berths are reserved for military personnel only. No civilians. No families. No exceptions.” That stops all grumbling cold. The square falls silent. The truth is sinking in, that some must go but most will stay and die. That for all, separation is coming and it will be forever.
“Realism is the need of this dark hour, so I’ll speak to you only hard truth. I speak now to all serving military and civilians alike, as your general and your governor. I speak as a fellow Toruńite and Genèven. I say to you that we cannot win this war. Alone, we Krevans will never defeat the Grün Imperium. It’s too big, too powerful. They are too many and we are too few.”
Silence is everywhere her voice carries. Although most adults already knew what she says is true, to hear their general say it out loud still shakes them to the root. Quiet sobbing breaks out. Small children grow frightened by the fear they see in a parent’s eyes. Mothers think of all the interrupted joys of their children’s disrupted lives. Soldiers think of dead comrades and comrades soon to die, of final partings made or yet to come. Secret lovers wonder if they’ll ever embrace again.
“Yet, there is a way for Genève and Krevo to survive. And more.” Her voice takes on the power of righteous confidence. Of justice delayed, yet promised and certain. Of vengeance laid down in cold plans, to be had some distant day in hot blood. “We shall set aside all our old differences and small grievances to unite around one policy, one word, one act: resistance. We shall ready our children and our children’s children for war. Arm them, in body and spirit. Stoke furnaces of rage. Send them to howl hatred at our enemy, to meet their gory hour as ours meets us today or a near tomorrow.”
“Genèvens, accept exile! Accept it for one reason only. To prolong this terrible war. To bring our hate and our cause to the consciousness of all other decent star nations. To fight on until our old friends realize the deep and true nature of the Grün threat. Until they come to see the Imperium for the utter malignancy that it is, so that they return here with us to end it.”
“On that day, when all free peoples unite with us, we’ll start to beat these locusts from our doors. We’ll scoop their feeble and broken-winged bodies into great nets, bury vast hopper bands in long narrow graves we’ll make them dig themselves to receive their own corpses.”
No one speaks. No one interrupts. Few are crying now. Defiance is rising in a million breasts. Hate-filled and strong. Accepting that all life’s fate is death, but defiant all the same.
“We will stop this evil. We will take a full measure of revenge for the great injustice done to our peaceful lives and worlds. We will bring hard justice to those who did this callous thing to us. Who started this needless war. Who brought such malice down to our worlds.”
“To that end, know that there are far greater sacrifices than death that I must ask of you. Fighters of Genève! Do not burn out in a hopeless last battle that must also destroy our beloved Arbor City. Do not accept that the enemy has put you in the death ground, forced you to choose only life or death. For there is a third way, a way to survival for Toruń and for Krevo without forcing our surrender. A road not yet taken, an honorable path. A way to continue the fight!”
“When the time comes, and it is near, I shall ask most fighters gathered here today to march outside the berm with me, to fight and surely die defending our Arbor City. The enemy will cut 20 years, or 40, or 60 from each man or woman who falls with me outside the walls of Toruń. Laugh in his face, for he only cuts off one or two or three-score years of fearing Death.”
“I will ask of others a far harder duty and a much greater task. I ask you to leave Toruń to continue the long fight from exile. We who stay behind shall cut a path of fire for you away from Genève. We’ll hold the enemy here by his throat as you depart. In return we ask that in years to come you remember with your courage and defiance those of us who stay behind. And above all, we ask that you remember us with your hate.”
She pauses, chest heaving and voice cracking, but still strong and in control. Her image and her presence over the million fighters in the square below is overpowering. They would do anything for her at this moment. Anything. She’s their voice and soul. She’s their general.
“It’s not enough that you do your best. Not enough to die for Toruń or Genève. Some of you must do much more. What’s required. Your true duty. I understand that in our long history the hopeless cause has always been the only one worth dying for. I know that most of you are prepared for martyrdom. Yet, I prefer that some of you at least postpone it to a different day.”
“You must leave burning Toruń behind so that you may keep Genève and Krevo alive. In long days and years of struggle yet to come, in fights that none of us can yet foresee, you will remember us who stay, by living. As we shall honor you who leave, with our deaths.”
“Until then you must cleave to what is required above all things. You must live to fight on, until a day comes when you return arm-in-arm with all the other free peoples of Orion to liberate our graves. Water us on that day not with your tears but with the blood of our enemy.”
“Only then may you rejoin those of us who stay. Those who will die outside the berm or in the burning streets and towers of Toruń, fighting to the last so that you may keep our bright hate burning hot. Only then may you rejoin with all of us who stay, who refuse to lie with cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”
With that, she has them. They’re with their general now, heart and soul and b
ody. They hate as she hates. Vow red vengeance as she does. Stand determined to pay any price, bear any burden, suffer any sacrifice, go anywhere to continue the fight.
Standing in Governance Square in besieged and doomed Toruń under her iron gaze they give their assent. They commit to make murder and mayhem and bring vast destruction to the stars, tomorrow and forevermore. They agree to sacrifice their children and their children’s children down the generations. They consent to do what’s necessary. Whatever is necessary.
No one wearing green on the other side of the Toruń berm knows or understands this. No one over there has any idea how the whole war just changed. Not simple RIK conscripts. Not arrogant General Brusilov or cruel Jabo pilots. Not the men of Purity or SAC death squads.
No one on far-off Kestino understands it either. Not arrogant senior shōshōs already strutting their conquerors’ walks in Rikugun Main HQ, or cocky taishōs gliding through the silvery halls of the Kaigun Fleet Office. Not the far colder, gray-clad men striding down long stone halls to work the torture dungeons under SAC. Not anyone inside the High Court, already planning spectacular victory celebrations and jockeying for governorships of newly conquered worlds. Not one of the Admitted serving Pyotr in his private chambers in the Waldstätte Palast.
The opening battles of the war all have been won by the Imperium. But the fight’s not over. It’s far from over. It’s only just beginning. From now until forever, it’s a whole new war.
Contact
Jan Wysocki crouches low in a half-meter of ash, waiting. Staring into the dark past the wizened trunks of burned-out trees. Straining to see a shadow or a sign of Lt. Zofia Jablonski and the Forlorn Hope she’s leading back, away from the Berm Gate. Back from the RIK main assault line that she nearly stumbled right into, scouting out front for Madjenik Company.
He’s in a foul mood. Zofia is mad at him. The enemy is crowding the way in front of him, spread out in force and in all directions around the berm that encircles the wooden city of Toruń. Above all, he has no idea what to do next. He’s flummoxed. Stymied. Stalemated.
He finally sees Zofia appear out of the night, at the head of 30 fighters of the Forlorn Hope he sent out in front of five heavy platoons spread out still in attack echelon. He knew his last order would likely kill her and them. His breath catches in his throat to see her still alive.
He holds steady as she moves in and crouches right beside him, main weapon humming warm and low and pointed back toward the enemy at the berm. She motions her fighters to take up evenly spaced defensive positions on either flank of the company’s captain. She’s at her best in combat, showing all the skill that earned her the third spot from the top of her class at KRA Academy on her native Aral. ‘She’s not from Genève, yet she fits this company better than me.’
Only when they’re all in position does she look at him. It’s a stern look, almost cold. Her jade eyes glare out from her darkened visor, demanding that he lead. Demanding that he finish the job he has no idea how to finish. Demanding that he be the man she wants and needs him to be. The man he knows he’s not, and thinks he will never be.
His mood worsens when his HUD tac-display, already over-filled with red symbology marking off enemy armtraks, gun positions, companies and full battalions of elite infantry, suddenly flashes brilliant white and a startling blast of extremely loud static assaults his ears.
He slams his left hand against his helmet. “Mita helvettia! What the hell was that?” Zofia felt it too. She’s busy scanning her tactical screen display, trying to figure it out.
The static stops crackling as their HUDs stabilize. In a nano-second, everything in Jan’s and Madjenik’s world changes as a clear, near-instant dialogue flashes back-and-forth between intelligent machines. It’s an Identify Friend-or-Foe (IFF) exchange between his HUD and...
‘Who? Whose out there?’
Zofia is motioning excitedly with her right hand. Jan feels a rush of desperation, almost despair. ‘Ahh gods, no! Did the RIK just break into our company coms?’
It’s not the RIK, not the enemy whose link is now siting every one of his fighters on a target grid. Zofia and his HUD are both telling him that Toruń Central Command is calling.
“Only electronics so far, no voice,” Zofia clarifies. “But it’s a friendly call, captain. The first contact with HQ we’ve had in months.”
In another instant, General Constance’s HQ restores his right to full data access. A tiny orange scroll appears in a corner of his visor confirming that his command-link is receiving updates, and far above the company and battalion levels for which Jan’s code is pre-approved.
Jan seems frozen in place to Zofia. He hasn’t moved at all. He makes no response to the data whir. Says and does nothing. He just crouches low, watching all the dancing lights on the interior of his helmet. She urges him in her mind, hoping he can pull himself together.
‘Damn it captain, you have to snap out of this funk! You did it. We’re back in contact with TCC. This is good news. Come on, get a grip!’
She decides to stick to the book, confirming out loud only what he’s already figured out himself: “HUDs are in range of TCC code bursts from friendly ground relays atop the berm.”
The KRA fell back on this primitive system after all its orbital milsats were taken out by Kaigun Zerstörers, its surface towers knocked down by RIK Jabos and its subsurface stations gouged out by orbital targeting. All other milnebs as well as the civilian memex emergency backup were immediately jammed tight by orbital hacking satellites. All within two days, before the start of the ground campaign. It made ground war almost easy for the enemy.
That’s why there was no command relay in range ‘till now, when short-range ground stations picked up Madjenik’s HUD link. Toruń is the last KRA base and free town standing. Its military relay the only one on Genève still broadcasting, searching for lonely survivors in the ash lands but without really expecting to find any. TCC is just as surprised as Madjenik.
Zofia says it out loud again, trying to break through Jan’s disturbing silence. “It’s Toruń Central Command linking us up. It’s TCC. Captain, you need to reply.”
“I know. Now be quiet, lieutenant. I’m thinking.”
Jan checks that his own up-to-date tactical package is ready and thinks a send order. It’s instantly executed by his HUD command-link in response to a quantum dot injected in his right cornea back when he made captain, long before the war. Long before he ever met Zofia.
In milliseconds all Madjenik’s up-to-date weapons data, tactical and march history for the past three months, current personnel and other unit information integrates with TCC. HQ’s AI-link auto returns a complete divisional portrait and grid layout of the city, and declassified diagrams of all city and berm defenses. Less than a minute later a silent message flashes three times on Jan’s and Zofia’s viewscreens and all company HUDs: “Welcome home, Madjenik.”
Jan’s integrated, long-range tac-display now shows vastly greater detail, beyond what Zofia’s HUD picked up before on its own as she crept up to the RIK line outside the berm: a basic if terrifying count of enemy units and guns she relayed to him before he ordered her back.
The berm now displays before him as a narrow yellow band. Above its ring a pastel blue miasma rises, a haze of aggregate information on 40,000+ sky cannon defending the city from the berm top and from upper balconies and rooftops of its highest towers.
There are too many friendlies in place around the berm and inside the city for his HUD viewscreen to identify each one individually. Most are too far away in any case. So his limited HUD quite smartly marks the whole city in a fuzzy blue dome, an azure fog representing a gaggle of friendlies stretching beyond his visor’s distance gauge. He knows that even more guns, companies, and whole battalions of blue KRA defenders continues all around the berm farside, protecting the western city well past where his glowing HUD symbology can follow.
‘They have to be stretched dangerously thin. Yet they’re concentrated targ
ets, too, if the Jabos ever get through our archie and come down low and fast. Surprised it didn’t happen yet.’
He’s right. He has a real good eye for these things. Better than he realizes. General Staff level, actually. Toruń’s defenses are indeed worn down after three months of fighting. The end of the siege is drawing nigh as the enemy gathers for a final assault directly against the berm.
‘What a bloody day and violent end that will be!’ He switches to mid-range tac-view and instantly a bad thought comes fast and unbidden. ‘Helvetti! This is going to be real hard.’
“Lieutenant, what do you think?”
“I think we’re in for a hell of a fight, captain.”
“At least they don’t yet know that we’re out here.”
“Agreed. If they did they would have swarmed us already.”
Masses of enemy units show in both their HUDs in classic threat color. The nearest red markers look like they’re positioned with the sole intent of stopping Madjenik getting to the Berm Gate. That’s not true, of course. It just seems that way. In fact, they all face west, toward the berm, unaware that Madjenik is poised in stealth and deep ash to their rear, in the east.
