A soldier pointed them over to a small building.
It was clear it was a strategy room; maps and large monitors covered the three tables. But Governor Bain looked far too tired and worried for things to have been going well.
“Vas, it’s good to see you,” he said as he stood up. A thin, gray man with a short beard and light blue eyes, there was definitely more stoop to his stature than should be.
“Bain, good to see you. I don’t know if you’ve met my second-in-command, Deven?”
Deven shook the older man’s hand. “Honored to meet you, Vas has told me stories.”
Vas looked at him quickly; she had, but not a lot and quite a few years ago. In his day, Bain had been quite a character with a unique style of doing things. It did seem that Deven’s older memories were intact. Now if they could get the more recent ones to come back.
“Hopefully none too embarrassing,” Bain said and smiled, but quickly let it drop. He nodded to the guard at the door who stepped out and pulled the door shut with him.
“I don’t want my people to know what’s happening, but we’re losing this fight.”
“What? We just set this job up and the report was for light reinforcement to offset troop fatigue.” Vas sat down near one of the maps. He was right, the line had fallen very recently.
“And that’s what I hired you for. We’ve been fighting a small band of rebels, folks not happy with the current government who finally got enough backing to challenge us in battle. I took command for old times’ sake, but we’ve lost so many in the past day that I’m commander for real now.” He shook his head. “They received some heavy reinforcement two nights ago. My spies were able to give me limited information before they were silenced. Three unmarked shuttles landed quickly in the middle of the night, let out their troops, then fled. The only ship in orbit was a large Rillianian transport—but as far as I knew the Rillianians weren’t big on sending troops off planet.”
“Damn it,” Vas said. “The Rillianians don’t have ships anymore. Too long of a story, but they ran into some trouble they couldn’t handle and are now back into pre-flight days.”
Deven had been about to take a seat, but rose back up. “These new soldiers, were they dressed in all black suits with helmets?”
Bain scowled. “That’s not good news about the Rillianians, they were never my favorite people, but it’s even more disturbing that someone else is using ships registered to them. Or your connection missed one.” He walked over to one of the monitors and turned it to both Vas and Deven.
“These are the only images I received before my spies were killed. No black suits that I can see.”
Vas leaned forward. The images were grainy due to the use of night vision equipment. But the people she was seeing were not wearing the unwelcome black suits. They were garbed in loose pants and tunics and all armed with multiple swords or pikes.
But she couldn’t see any of their faces. The images all had them turned away from the camera.
The use of a Rillianian ship—Marli was going to be pissed there was one still out there—made Vas think of the gray ships and black suited soldiers. But maybe they had found some other fighters, or someone else was taking advantage of the lack of Rillianian ships. Or those damn black suited bastards had shown up here, too. They’d been on Mayhira for a while, and they weren’t far away from that system.
“Whoever they are, they are fast and deadly. Our line was pushed back drastically. We’ve lost what we gained in the past week in a matter of hours.”
Vas rubbed her face, that sounded like the black suits. They’d taken this job just to get close to the planet Aithnea had indicated, but Deven’s words to Hallam about this being a real fight were coming true for her as well. They had to see what they could do.
“I’ve only got twenty people, plus Deven and myself. But we’ll try to do what we can. Now where have the new troops been hitting the hardest?”
THE DEBRIEFING only took a short while, but by the time Vas and Deven got to their shuttle, even Marwin was looking like he was going to bust out of it.
“All right, slight change of plans. They’ve had a recent influx of new combatants on the other side, and our side has lost serious ground in the last day.” Vas called up the schematics on the shuttle’s screen and pointed where they’d be going. “This fight is no longer a distraction—we need to find out who those new players are and level out the playing field.”
Hallam quickly proved himself a keen strategist as they worked on the plans, and even Marwin was impressed. Deven still seemed to be holding back judgment, but he agreed with Hallam’s assessment of the terrain, and the locations of both groups of fighters.
It took forty minutes to get to the fighting in a pair of troop transports Bain provided. Rather, the fighting came to them in forty minutes on the dirt road, when they still should have been a good half hour away.
“Captain Tor Dain?” It was a good thing that Bain had shown Vas images of his people out here, the woman calling her name was running fast enough to get attacked by Vas’s people as they came out of the transports.
“Stand down, she’s with us,” Vas yelled then waited for the woman soldier, and five more men and women running behind her, to come closer. The road was impassible by vehicle at that point, and all of those running toward them stumbled over the uneven terrain.
“Thank the deities you’re here.” The woman dropped to her knees and Vas noticed dark blood coming from a wound in her side.
“Where are the rest of your people?” Two more followed the other five in, but none looked in great shape. Maybe they were trying to send their wounded back behind the line.
“These are my people.” The woman closed her eyes briefly, then opened them. Blood burbled on her lips. She was dying even as Vas and Deven tried to stop the bleeding. “There aren’t that many of the enemy. But I’ve never seen soldiers like these people. They were so fast.” She gave a bloody smile. “I hope you’re as good as the rumors say.”
40
The rest of the now dead commander’s people stumbled forward down the dirt road. Although none of them looked like they were ready to join her yet, they also didn’t look like they would be any use in a fight.
Hrrru came forward and began checking wounds, Divee and Marwin helped. Hallam looked on with a growing scowl.
“How many did they have?” Vas asked as she gently released the dead woman. Bain had said things were bad, but not this bad.
“No more than a dozen, Captain. But they’re fast. I’ve never seen that kind of speed.” The man who answered was leaking blood from his thigh—a lot of it.
“Damn it, we have to get these people back to Bain, they can’t fight.” She was ignoring the nagging voice in the back of her head until they got these now non-combatants out of here. There was another group of soldiers she’d come across that moved faster than believed.
The damn black suits.
They’d been using highly illegal programming to do mini transports, or hops, while fighting. During their first encounter, Gosta had been able to block the hops with a jamming signal from the Warrior Wench. Hopefully, that would still work. Or at the least slow the black suits down enough to give Vas and her people a chance.
“I can escort them back, Captain,” Hrrru said and the look on his face said it wasn’t motivated by fear.
As much as Vas felt he needed to get some real-life fighting experience in, she also knew that fighting against the black suits—if that was who they were after—was not where he should start.
“Agreed. Take them back and tell Bain he needs to find more fighters; we’ll do what we can.” Vas knew she didn’t have enough people left on the ship to bring more down, but she wished they had time to wait for more of her own people from Home.
She called her ship. “Gosta, I need you to be ready to address a certain potential situation. One we faced in a ground fight against the black suits.” She had to be careful what she said over the comms. Technical
ly what she was asking him to be ready to do—jam a frequency the black suits shouldn’t be using anyway—could itself be considered a violation of the low-tech rule.
“Get the particle mover ready?”
“No. The other.” She knew Gosta would figure it out.
“Ah, I see. We have that kind of situation?” The slight distraction in his voice told Vas he was already getting the electronic jammer working.
“I believe we might. I’ll notify you if it looks like that’s our issue.”
“Aye, Captain. Gosta out.”
Most of her people were waiting, ready to follow commands. Hallam had continued to scowl, but it appeared he was scowling at the terrain rather than the situation. “If we’re going to fight here, we need a different plan. This area is less open than where we’d planned on.” He started using a board to draw more diagrams.
Vas was okay at strategy, but mostly left that to Deven and Gosta. It might be handy to have another strategist on their crew.
Deven watched silently as an improvised battle plan was finalized. He gave Vas a nod before he led Hallam and half their contingent toward the cover of a grove of trees which was, hopefully, dense enough to hide their movements. Their goal was to flank the opposing forces and, with luck, end up behind them.
Vas and her fighters readied their swords. She wasn’t happy that people were dying, and even less so if the black suits were somehow involved, but it did feel good to have her blades out and be ready for battle. The holosuite was a good workout, but it wasn’t the same as facing a real opponent.
The first enemy appeared around the bend almost the exact moment Deven and his crew vanished into the trees. Vas blocked the attacker easily with her Zalith blades, but then he shifted a bit to the left and her return strike was blocked.
Damn it. They weren’t as fast as when she’d faced them with Carrix, but these had to be black suits using the same illegal tech.
“Gosta? I need you to do what I mentioned—now.” She was taking a risk on a primitive planet, some tech was allowed, what these fighters were using wasn’t. And neither was what Gosta was about to do.
“Done.” Gosta’s voice came out over the open comm.
Vas smiled and spun on her attacker, both of her blades in full form. A clean scissor slice across the neck told her she’d been right. The scramblers had allowed the black suits to move outside normal space for the briefest of seconds, making them impossibly fast. The hood fell back as the head fell off and a familiar black suited body tumbled forward. There was very little blood and there appeared to be micro wires inside the neck.
“They are the black suits!” Vas whirled on another of the enemy, as Hallam, Deven, and the other fighters came from behind. They’d waited to make sure there were no black suits still coming down the road, but now ran forward into battle.
Even with their ability to jump time gone, they were still furious soldiers. And they didn’t seem to care that Vas and her people saw what they were now.
“Vas!” Deven’s voice cut into her thoughts. She’d been fighting, but thinking about the damn black suits. One had almost struck her. She waited as it moved closer, then lashed out and took off an arm. The head quickly followed.
The fight wasn’t long—luckily there were only twenty of the black suits, but still long enough to end up with injuries on most of her people—including a cut Vas herself got on her hand.
“Captain? Another ship is coming in.”
Vas swore, did whoever brought these bastards in have more? “Rillianian?”
“No, Silantian. They want to know if things are okay since a non-sanctioned Rillianian ship brought in unsanctioned troops.”
Vas looked down at the scattered bodies. Good to know they hadn’t actually been approved. She would love to steal one of them, and let Gosta and Terel find out what it really was. But now that the Silantians were getting directly involved, that wasn’t an option. Unless she moved quickly. A brief call to Gosta’s private comm and most of the black suit body before her silently vanished.
Then she officially responded on the open comm line. “Tell them the Hight Collective lost a full company and then some. Legal penalties need to be placed against whoever called in the unauthorized troops.”
Merc regs had certain laws—one of which was not bringing in uninvited and unapproved guests.
“They agree and ask that you give testimony.”
Crap. She couldn’t stay, neither could Deven. An inquisition would freeze the fighting and could go on for a week or more. But she needed to get to Yholine.
“Captain, I would like to offer my services. I am the ship’s legal representative and I believe you and Deven are too injured at the moment. I believe Marwin could stand in your place along with me?” Flarik’s interruption was the best thing Vas had heard all day.
Luckily, they were far closer to their shuttle than to Bain’s headquarters. They could get off planet without being seen. “Excellent, the wounded will be back in the shuttle momentarily. Please advise the Silantians.”
Marwin ran up. “I heard, so I’ll stay? Shall I send Hrrru up as well?”
“Yes, tell them he is needed as a healer. The rest of you, come with us.”
Hallam started for the shuttle, then looked to Marwin. “I could stay as well. Two sets of eyes might be better?”
Vas was ready to say no, then Deven gave a slight nod. With a sigh, she echoed it. “You can stay. But you follow Marwin on everything. And both of you need to draw this out—we need time.” When both men nodded she, Deven, and the rest of the crew jogged back to the shuttle.
They got back up to the Warrior Wench with no problems. Gosta actually met them at the shuttle bay and handed some schematics to Hrrru. They were more calculations for the best place to look for Aithnea’s treasure.
“Now, stay here as long as you can, Marwin and Hallam are going to drag things out. Where is Flarik?” They had two shuttles and she’d need to take the smaller one down.
Gosta smiled. “She’s getting ready. And she has informed the Silantians that it might take a while as she needs to be prepared.”
“Tell her thank you,” Vas said. She turned and both Deven and Hrrru were back on their shuttle. “And how are you getting us out of here?”
“It’s very ingenious, Captain, I’m going to blow us up.” Gosta didn’t tell jokes, but the smile on his face was worrying.
“What?”
He flailed his long-fingered hands about. “Not like that. There will be a mild explosion to the side of us. Debris will be released, and you’ll fly through it. The explosion will unfortunately impair the Silantians’ scanners.”
The ship rocked as Vas scrambled into the shuttle and Gosta got inside the sealed shuttle bay control room. Obviously, he’d cut things a little close.
Another rattle and Deven had them out the shuttle bay doors and blending in with the debris.
41
The distraction appeared to work—at least no hails or weapon fire came their way. One would think a race that kept their home world as it had been when they abandoned it five hundred years ago would be more concerned about who might be visiting it. But they didn’t seem to watch it closely. Beyond who was allowed into the system for a neighbors’ fight, at any rate.
Deven was piloting so Vas and Hrrru could navigate them quickly to the landing spot. Even a lax government might get suspicious if they happened to notice the shuttle. They needed to land before they were spotted.
Hrrru looked up from where he was tapping on an old map. “I am sure of this, Captain. The village that was once there housed a convent of the Clionea nuns before the battle of Qanilif. That is where the image on the print was pointing.”
Vas studied the area Hrrru was pointing at again. She’d have to take his word. Beyond figuring out that the prolonged focus on that map—in the middle of a fight they knew they were going to lose—was a clue from Aithnea, Vas had nothing.
Deven was silent as he put down the shut
tle beyond the remains of the village. It was night and the moon was barely a sliver of light. Vas removed her duster and stuffed her hair into a black skullcap. All three slipped on night vision goggles and went outside.
Even the air around her felt old and abandoned, although Vas was sure she was reading into the desolation of the place. But somehow she knew that even if the planet’s two suns had been up, it would still look forsaken.
Carrix never spoke of his ancient home world, although he would have been a youngster when the place was abandoned. That many of the buildings were still intact spoke a lot to his people’s construction skills.
The buildings were probably quite elegant in their day, but they now looked like sad testaments to a people who had moved beyond them but refused to let them vanish. The Silantians had left their home world as its oceans dried up; even now there was very little plant life since the water never returned.
“This way, Captain.” Hrrru hunched under his giant pack and marched toward the closest clump of buildings.
He started to go into the one he’d targeted on his search, but Vas reached out and took his shoulder. “What about that one?” She couldn’t explain it, but the small two-story building at the end of the road looked promising. Rather, it felt promising. Vas honestly couldn’t tell if either of them looked more like one of the nun’s former locations than the other.
But she felt it in her gut.
“The nuns would have had something more substantial. I have researched them during this time. They were more widespread then.” Hrrru turned to go into the massive building.
As they stepped closer, Vas realized that it was definitely a Clionea building. There were visible markings that it was still in usage by the nuns. Or had been until their demise.
Victorious Dead (The Asarlaí Wars Book 2) Page 29
