by Matt Thomas
Dauod laughed. "Fair point. We'll fend off the Hetarek, who are killing our people, occupy our planet, and, you know exist. They'll get our backs against a mythological swarm of robot beasts. Make sure you update the flight roster to reflect that."
"I'll get right in that."
"Speaking of which, any word on replacements?"
Jean shook his head. "They're just aren't any fighters. They have pilots but every Petrel out there is either in use or deadlined. The Fleet Asset Management office says they're cannibalizing existing ones for parts on Intrepid. Most of what they recovered from Excelsior are either scrapped or assigned out already."
"No shit. You sure they're not just blowing us off as escorts?"
"I asked my dad. He said they're theoretically still building them, but that all of Emphemeris's resources are being used for making drop ships. He said he'd find out about getting us a crate of spares, but even that's fudging it."
"So we're just down two fighters forever. What are we supposed to do?"
"I guess get fucked on the roster and get pissed like Quinn." Jean shrugged. "But otherwise it's just us."
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
For a ceremony of such importance, Xander found it strange that they would hold it in a modestly-sized conference room. He’d seen the auditoriums on Wanderer before, cavernous spaces that could be filled with hundreds of Ahai. He had expected that the Community Elevation ceremony would be more like a promotion or graduation, given the extreme honor. But S’Maned had explained to him that the ceremony focused on how the individual being elevated was a gift to the community, not the other way around. So everyone stood in a mass in a smaller room, where everyone felt connected to everyone, usually because they were actually touching each other in the confined space, with the honoree in the middle.
Oddly, S’Maned, even though he was the parent of the honoree, stood far from the center. It was believed that those elevated served those who needed it most, so the Ahai with greater status stood furthest from the center to let others have closer contact.
M’Frete, soon to become K’Frete stood by, dressed in bright blue, his arms outstretched, while one of the elders read his list of contributions to the community. It had something to do with art, using quantum physics to project Ahai images across space to places they had not yet visited. Xander understood little of it, either how it worked or how it earned the Ahai such a great honor, but he didn’t let either show.
“You must be very proud.” Xander told his counterpart when the ceremony was over.
“I am.” S’Maned replied. “For engineers and navigators, the K’ is more readily available. But for an artist... it happens rarely that one is so talented as to meet the requisite contributions. M’Frete, K’Frete, now, has certainly benefited us all.”
“I’ve seen and heard his work.” Xander replied, referring to the handful of examples S’Maned had shown him years before. “It’s no wonder. You have an incredibly talented offspring. If this keeps up, soon you’ll be equals.”
“He has always been my equal,” K’Maned corrected. “But I take your meaning. My work helps our people day to day. After I have gone, I doubt my legacy will remain. K’Frete... his art will survive amongst our ships for generations.”
“If he surpasses you, at least you can spend your retirement with him in his palatial quarters.”
S’Maned waggled his head abruptly, clicking rapidly in an Ahai laugh. “Perhaps.”
Xander’s tablet beeped on his belt, embarrassingly. Several turned to stare at him and he had to leave the formality of the ceremony escaping to the hall to answer the call.
“Sir, we need you on the OPCEN floor.” He recognized the voice on the other end as one of the junior soldiers working in the operations center, but he couldn’t hear what was going on in the background.
“I’m on my way.” He answered. Xander made his excuses to S’Maned, and once again passed on his congratulations.
Wanderer and Columbia had docked to exchange supplies as they underwent the process of disentangling the humans from the Ahai. Since the meeting with the Doyen, relations had become extremely cold. Preparing the two species for separation after a generation, however, required close contact and coordination. In some ways, Xander felt like part of a divorcing family still forced to live together. S’Maned’s invitation had been a welcome sign that perhaps not everything had been lost between them.
It took him about ten minutes to cross over the docking port between the ships and navigate his way through the corridors and elevators on the command ship. When he came to the sally port blocking off the highly secured area of the ship she called home, the young soldier standing there, fully armed, as always, recognized Xander and waved him through without examining his credentials. It was a small community, but Xander made a mental note that he ought to have corrected the soldier.
Immediately on the other side of the door, however, a solid, pale red light shone in the hallway, tainting the color environment. Xander’s steps quickened as he navigated the well-known path to the OPCEN floor. The red light over the door flashed, and more people than usual hurried through hallway. Someone was in enemy contact.
Xander swiped his ID and the door opened, but so many people crammed into the back of the room she could barely make it to his elevated spot behind Lieutenant Colonel Berne. No one spoke but the static of the radio. Colonel Tamaka sat stonefaced in her rarely-occupied seat next to the Chief of Operations. The screens, in their shades of gray, clearly showed Earth. Bright white flashes all over the screen reflected the heat signatures of gunfire.
Berne waved Xander over. “What’s the status?” Xander asked.
“Two-Two was in the village making some contacts way the fuck out in the schleckt fields. They started taking heavy fire from building... What fucking building number is that?” He asked one of Xander’s analysts.
“Four-seventy-two.” On the giant screen in front of them, a red box appeared over a multi-story home. The windows, usually dark, continuously erupted in long bursts of laser fire. Following the streaks with her eyes, she saw the heat signatures of the team furiously fighting back, from their position behind a half-destroyed house.
“One truck is destroyed and they’ve already got one KIA...”
“Who?” He asked.
“Smythstyne.” Berne answered. “Took one to the chest trying to recover the Komodo. Riese got hit in the leg trying to pull him to cover, and we don’t have a good status on her.”
He was interrupted by the loud crackle of the radio. “Serpent Eight-Two, Beast Two-Two.” How spat out the words over the radio in one exasperated breath. “We’re now taking fire from building Four-Seventy-Five. We need room to move now!”
“They want Loki to fire on Four-Seventy-Two.” Berne explained. “Loki’s your asset.”
“And we’ll lose it as soon as it starts firing.” Xander finished. Once rounds started flying out of the satellite, every Hetarek ship in orbit would know the floating piece of junk was something else entirely and shoot it out of the sky. Xander pulled up a copy of the team’s pre-mission brief. That building was listed as a multi-family residence. “They’re outside the Tri-Cities?”
Berne nodded. “Heavy schleckt country. Also no cover for miles.”
“Loki has four more Komodos heading towards the village from the north.” An analyst announced from the back of the room.
One of the screens focused in on a small formation of small Hetarek troop carriers only minutes away from the village. Xander thought it strange that they sent in reinforcements by land and not air. Then he noticed the discoloration on Loki’s images. There was heavy cloud cover and light snow.
“Xander, you should also know that they reported that it was Metic Ahai who opened up on them.” Berne said. “They saw them through the window when they first TIC’ed up.”
After Taylor had been killed, everyone had become wary of the Metic Ahai, but the team had to
work with them anyway. This incident would only make things worse. It didn’t take a brilliant analytical mind to know what had happened. The weapon’s fire coming from the building was clearly Hetarek. The Hetarek must have provided weapons and incentives for the Metic Ahai to open fire and keep the team pinned down until the real warriors could arrive.
Xander glanced at the map just long enough to see that the team had to get around the building if they had any hope of either escape or defending themselves. “They want it, they get it.” He said.
Berne nodded. “JAG?” He shouted towards the lawyer ever-present on the OPCEN floor.
“Fucking kill ‘em.”
“There’s probably civilian Metic Ahai in that structure.” Xander mentioned, knowing that the JAG already understood that.
“I know.” The lawyer answered.
Master Sergent Popov picked up the radio. “Beast Two-Two, Serpent Eight-Two, Loki is cleared hot. I say again: Loki is cleared hot. Over.”
“Beast Two-Two copies.”
Sergeant Tennison sat at her screen in front of Xander, reading the data Loki’s artificial intelligence streamed through in text. “Loki has a lock and is going to fire a four round burst.” The platform only held a few high-velocity rounds, but the platform would be dead soon, anyway. On the screen, a set of completely undramatic crosshairs, barely discernible in white amongst the background, appeared over the structure. The data in the corner changed as Loki calibrated to fire. “Shots over.” Tennison announced that the rounds had been fired.
“Time to splash?” Xander asked.
He consulted his screen. “Sixty-five seconds.”
“Jesus, that’s fucking forever.” Berne muttered.
“Sorry, sir. It’s gotta come from orbit.”
In the images, a trio of heat signatures ran from the targeted structure. The intelligence officer could make out at least one carrying a weapon. All three were recognizable as Metic Ahai. Muzzle flashes continued to appear in the window.
Despite the crowd on the OPCEN floor, everything was silent, not even the creaking of a chair or the rustle of papers.
“Splash.” Tennison proclaimed.
Three seconds later, also without sound, the screen flashed white four times in rapid succession. Giant balloons of heat enveloped the structure, obscuring it from view. Of course, everything happened in perfect quiet. When the heat signatures dissipated, much of the building had caved in, leaving only the wall furthest from the team standing. The gunfire paused everywhere in view. More individuals fled the structure in multiple directions. The team’s stride didn’t stutter. As soon as the rounds impacted, Xander, and the rest of the staff watched the dots run into an adjacent building that had, moments before, been denied them by the volume of enemy fire. Loki could easily pick out two team members carrying Smythstyne’s body.
“Serpent Eight-Two, Beast Two-Two. Loki has good effects.” The radio transmitted each one of Howe’s gasps for breath. “We have moved to building Four-Seventy-Four to strongpoint. Break.” The muzzle flashes on the screen had resumed, this time focused on the building the team had just occupied, but, this time, there was a large volume of fire leaving the building as well.
“Serpent Eight-Two, request Loki engage inbound vehicles. Over.”
“Beast Two-Two, Loki is cleared hot to engage Hetarek vehicles. Over.” Berne didn’t bother asking. In for an inch, in for a mile, Xander thought. They might as well use the asset as much as possible before it was taken out.
The image shifted to the four armored vehicles, now about to enter the village. The ISR manager put up an overlay of expected paths to compensate for the vehicle’s travel during the time it took for the rounds to strike, since the only thing guiding the rounds fired by Loki was math. There was really only spot in the village for the vehicles to park and provide fire support. The computer on the satellite worked its magic and the image trembled slightly as the system fired.
“Shots over.”
One of the four vehicles pulled in exactly where Loki’s crosshairs lay, while the other three held back and began discharging Hetarek warriors. The confidence built by the vehicle’s heavy weapons emboldened the rest of the fighters, and any breathing room built by Loki’s first strike nearly disappeared.
“Splash.”
The rounds struck with enough force that they did not have to strike the vehicle itself. More flowers of heat blossomed on the screen, this time followed by two abrupt and asymmetric fireballs. The dots representing Hetarek scattered, some struck by the concussion wave and thrown to the side. Some rose, some didn’t.
“Loki is reporting sympathetic detonations.”
“No shit.” Berne said.”
“Loki’s shifting to engage the next Komodo.” Again, the image on the screen panned hard until the crosshairs lay firmly on a vehicle remaining between the team and the exit to the village. “Shots over.”
White words started flashing on the screen too quickly for Xander to read, but he understood what it meant.
“Loki reports it’s been pinged by Hetarek sensors.”
“Serpent Eight-Two, Beast Two-Two. We’re splitting into two teams. Alpha is going to remain in building Four-Seventy-Four. Bravo is going to move house-to-house to get some vehicles located on the south side of the compound, then bring the trucks to Alpha.” With the mic keyed on, the OPCEN heard the reports of the weapons fire, interrupted by the heavy, rattling impact as Loki’s rounds struck home. The team leader continued. “Once we get the vehicles here, we’re going to load up casualties and get them out. Over.”
“Good plan.” Berne said.
“Serpent Eight-Two copies all. Over.”
They all watched as four of their guys burst out of the building, weapons up and firing before they disappeared into the next building over. Much of the shooting had died down, although there remained a cluster of Hetarek firing near the burning hulks of their vehicles. It never ceased to surprise Xander how people could survive strikes like the one the Hetarek had just endured. A streak flew out from the Green Beret’s strongpoint and detonated on target, someone firing an AT-9 anti-vehicle round. A few more puffs of light nearby showed impact points of launched grenades. Bravo team emerged from one house and headed to the next.
The corners of Loki’s surveillance image flashed rapidly. “Loki reports hostile weapon lock.” Seconds later, the image went black. “Lost signal from Loki.” In place of the live feed, a still photo of the scene popped up, with icons showing the last reported locations. The lack of spectacle of watching a firefight had no impact on the work they needed to accomplish. None of the observers left the OPCEN floor. The battle captain reported to the team that they had lost their eye in the sky.
Strangely, it felt like the battle was over. Without the live feed, it was easy to imagine that the team didn’t continue to fight for their lives as the remaining Hetarek pushed hard towards the human strongpoint. The long silence on the radio could mean that either the situation was unchanged or that the team had been overrun and everyone was dead.
“We need to do notification for Smythstyne.” Colonel Tamaka said, her first comment since Xander stepped onto the floor.
“I know Caroline.” Master Sergeant Popov said. “I’ll tell her.”
Xander piped up. “How do we want to do it?”
Berne shook his head like he asked a stupid question. “In person. I think his wife is with the fleet.”
“No, sir. I mean... are we going to tell her where he was killed?”
“Shit, I forgot.” Telling the wife that Smythstyne had been killed on Earth meant they were no longer covert. Taylor had been divorced with no children.
“Serpent Eight-Two, Beast Two-Two, over.” The radio interrupted again.
“Go for Serpent Two-Two.”
“Be advised, we are continuing to take heavy fire, we are pinned down and unable to maneuver. Bravo is unable to reach the vehicles at this time and has falle
n back to my position, over.”
“Do we have a good casualty assessment?” Berne asked, wondering how bad the rest of them had been torn up.
“I’ll ask.” Popov replied.
Silence reigned for several minutes, hoping for an update on the team’s status.
“It’d be nice to know what’s going on with the Metic Ahai. First the incident with Sergeant Taylor, now this.” Berne said while they waited.
“Let me talk to S’Maned.” Xander said. “He’s been working with the intel we’ve gotten on the Metic Ahai. He may have some insight.”
Tamaka nodded. “Okay. But just take his temperature. I don’t need to stir shit up with them right now.”
“Roger, ma’am.”
“Anyway, I think we should tell her the truth.” Tamaka said, referring back to the notification to Smythstyne’s wife. “The Hetarek obviously know we’re there already. We can tell her the truth, and ask her to keep it quiet until this thing is done with it.”
“Maybe it’ll make her feel better.” Xander ventured.
Berne immediately shot back. “Fucking nothing is going to make her feel better.”
*****
Pins and needles pricked all over his body. His teeth hurt. His ears screamed to the point where he could barely hear anything other than the constant high-pitched tone. Loki's impact, even a few hundred meters away, turned Bryan into a numb jelly.
But he didn't have time to be numb.
He forced himself through an internal inventory. Smythstyne was dead. The body, its chest cavity a burnt crater surrounded by cauterized flesh, now shirtless after Jedynak desperately but futilely tried to get to the wound, lay shoved against a destroyed wall. It had become the lowest priority the moment he died. The medic in shock at the spontaneity and certainty of Smythstyne’s death was a concern, but Bryan couldn’t do anything about it so he stuck that towards the bottom of the list of worries.
He risked a look around the wall. The rear Komodo, their Komodo, smoked and hissed, its windshield shattered and antenna lying in the ground. The second Komodo still sat off to the side, idling. The tow straps stretched halfway to the other truck, where they stopped in a streak of blood. Pressed up against one of the giant wheels, hopefully protected from the incoming fire, Bridget tended Alona's severe leg wound. The still-functioning Komodo continued to fire bursts, meaning Starek was still operational.
