The Eternal Front: A Lines of Thunder Novel (Lines of Thunder Universe)

by Walter Blaire

  For all love, Gawarty sighed. If Sethlan had any shame, he would not receive comfort from this battered old man. The general had not left the front in months. If there was a chink in Sethlan’s reserve, it should have been wedged open by the general’s asymmetric sympathy.

  Sethlan only waited, though he seemed slightly troubled.

  “We’re all hoping for that, sir,” Gawarty stepped in. “The boots on the line look tired too.”

  The general gave him a weak shrug. “If I sent them over the top, they would fall asleep halfway up the ladders. This batch is due to rotate out tonight, but their relief units are still under-strength and barely rested. Someone in the back-lines has been fussing with the trains, and the Sesserans aren’t letting rations or ammunition through.”

  “We aren’t, sir?” Sethlan said.

  His father’s eyes darted back, almost too eagerly for a broken man. “The trains are all askew. There are some Sesseran units who have…who have detached themselves from duty. Everybody gets hungry, of course. It’s perfectly understandable. The provisions trains have been knocked over and pillaged.”

  Gawarty spoke before he could consider. “Sesserans are breaking the leash?”

  Sethlan shot him a dark look.

  “Oh, it’s not completely irregular,” the general said quickly. “Fatigue hits everybody, Happie and Sessie alike. The Planners build disruptions like this into the schedule. I guess we’re lucky the Haphans, at least, are still following orders, eh?”

  “I don’t like to hear about Tachba failing in service, much less Sesserans,” Diggery said.

  “Then it’s a sad day for you, isn’t it, helpie?” the general answered, with a hint of his regular sharpness. “Captain Semelon, I’m afraid it’s quite bad now. I’m getting discipline reports from every quarter, from good officers. Do you follow? These are fellows who half want to be Tachba themselves, so much do they admire the Tacchie spirit and, erm, utility.” He glanced up, “These are experienced Haphan officers and I don’t doubt their judgment. We’re getting back-talk and disobedience at the front, haut captain. I’ve just received my third request for summary discipline.”

  Whatever wall Sethlan had erected now finally started to crack. “Summary discipline? A summary execution would destroy the unit, sir.”

  “But I now have my third standing request. I have two more requests that were pulled, but I can’t convince every officer. I need to plan the offensive, but instead, I have the same disciplinary conversation five times in two days.”

  “Sir, if a Tachba unit is attacked by the South and hectored by the Haphans, it will not be useful long. Surely you haven’t forgotten this.”

  “How delicate you are,” the general said blandly. “Remember, I said these are good Haphan officers. I’m not talking about the city-living tyrants who spend their lives flogging drunken Tacchies in the barracks.” The general’s antipathy fell away like a cloak. “I trust your judgment, Semelon. Imagine yourself coming to me with a request for a firing squad. What kind of behavior from your men would would drive you to that?”

  “It would never come to that. I’d—”

  “Imagine this, Captain, if your mind permits you. You give a direct order to a soldier, and the scrag up and pours a bucket of piss over your head. Can you imagine that?”

  Sethlan stopped short.

  “Here is the latest one.” The general pulled a paper off his desk. “Upon which I duly ordered a policing of the TL, and Skirmisher Hlallady flung the latrine bucket upon my person. I am therefore bound... et cetera. Haut Captain Semelon, what is your opinion?”

  “I would have shot Hlallady,” Sethlan said. To Gawarty, he almost sounded relieved to say it.

  Gawarty saw a grim smile on his father’s face as he replaced the paper. The smile was gone when he turned back to Sethlan.

  “We cannot shoot our Sesserans, Semelon, not after all these years of friendship. I mean, we can’t shoot them at the front. As you say, it would destroy the unit. Perhaps Skirmisher Hlallady is afflicted. Perhaps he can’t answer for himself. Perhaps he’s on a date with Pretty Polly.”

  “That is only a reason to shoot him twice.” Sethlan grated. “Why was this not taken care of by Hlallady’s fellow boots? They should have stopped him before or finished him afterward.”

  “Why indeed?” The general adopted a confused look. “What shall I do about this complaint?”

  “Forget the complaint, general.” Sethlan was finally exasperated. “Any decent Happie officer won’t care about soaking in a bucket of piss, not after the first surprise. The officer wrote that he was ‘therefore bound’ to make punishment. That only means he has some dignity which must be carried up-channel, pro forma. He wants you to decline the request and he’ll be relieved when you do.”

  “And that Hlallady criminal walks free?”

  Sethlan shook his head. “Once the Haphans overlook the Affront, the Tachba outrage will take over. Hlallady will be taken care of. Probably.”

  Gawarty watched the two officers without breathing, and Diggery showed rare wisdom by standing immobile in the darkest corner of the bunker.

  “So you see our predicament,” the general said finally. “We can’t shoot our servitors, and we can’t pet them when they go mad. We simply don’t have the time. My particular problem is that we seem to have a lot more madness than usual.”

  “I would suggest—”

  “Enough, Sethlan.” The general stopped him with a wave. “I said it was my particular problem.”

  He crossed back to his desk with none of the earlier lassitude. “Let there be no distance between us, haut captain. I hope I won’t have to break you open every time we meet. I always enjoy your visits, and so does Thache—and here’s his tea.”

  Thache hurried in, casting evil looks at all of them.

  The general continued. “If I was inconsiderate, please forgive me. I’ve fallen into the habit of testing everybody for this…madness.” He poured their cups and nodded to the map on the wall. “Shall we get to it, then? I need you to review our trench situation and provide your gloomiest opinions.”

  2

  Eponymous

  Back from the front, Sethlan trotted up the stairs to the club and quickly crossed the club before anyone could hail him. He let himself into the red door and strode down the artery hallway.

  Since we’re here with malfeasance in mind, this is now an Offense Against Trust, Sethlan announced.

  ~You schoolmarm. If we’re caught, better let me talk us out of it.~

  There was the phone, the categorically unwired phone. It was against the wall but not attached.

  ~No apparent power supply, either,~ the Voice said. ~Wouldn’t it have a crank or something? Let’s think this through…hey!~

  Sethlan picked up the phone and held the speaker to his ear. First, there was nothing but a series of clicks. He turned to the table and fanned apart a small stack of folders. “Beta-Handle Call Signs.” “Distrib Body Arm Sct 5.” “Art Robot Req.”

  “That’s odd,” said Sethlan aloud.

  Eponymous agreed. She was sure she recognized—

  “What’s odd?” said a voice through the clicking on the phone. The distortion continued, but it sounded more ominous now that they knew someone on the far side had silently waited for him to speak.

  “I have several Haphan folders, and they’ve not been claimed from the table,” Sethlan said smoothly. “I’m trying to settle it.”

  Eponymous admired that. He hadn’t lied, not exactly.

  “And you are?” the phone asked.

  “Haut Captain Hatcheta. Top clearance.”

  ~You can lie! And you can lie well!~

  Shut up, Voice.

  The phone prodded him. “And you’re calling me because?”

  Eponymous sent a warning tingle down Sethlan’s neck. Or, she would have if she’d known how. Luckily, Sethlan’s mind was already aroused and moving quickly.

  “Because you’re going to tell me wher
e they route, aren’t you? Else they get tossed into the street. Or am I calling from the wrong damn phone?”

  “I think I know what’s happening,” the voice breathed quietly. “You will please wait.”

  ~Now you’re going to get a central switchboard.~

  The calm voice was back immediately. “I don’t know of any Hacheta, Haut Captain.”

  A rill of amusement crossed Sethlan’s mind, washing over Eponymous’s sudden anxiety. Sethlan recognized the excuse, even if the tone of voice was wrong. He’d dealt with every sort of shirker in the past.

  “You don’t know me? So what?”

  “It makes very little difference,” the voice agreed. “Apparently, some idiot meddling Haphan lost track of some folders, but what’s new with that? How are they marked? Please do not open the folders.”

  ~Don’t open the folders,~ Eponymous said, abruptly urgent. ~He will know, he will hear. Trust me for once.~

  “I have something on ‘Beta-Handle Call Signs.’ Then there’s ‘Distribution of Body Arm Section 5.’ And something about artillery robot requisitions. There are several more below that.”

  “What’s that last, and don’t translate for me?”

  “Art Robot Req,” Sethlan read.

  “Articulated, haut captain, not artillery. I see that those documents were delivered to the Sell Street edifice, which is where you presently are. Are you not?”

  Sethlan’s vision zoomed as he glanced around. “I am indeed,” Sethlan said, his voice level. “However these were given to my hand not five minutes ago as undeliverable.”

  “You initially said they were on the table,” the voice replied.

  Eponymous cringed, but Sethlan said, “Some were on the table, some were given to me.”

  “Okay. By whom were they given to you, Hacheta?”

  “Some helpie, here today, probably dead tomorrow. I can track him down in five hours if you want, or you can come forth with some instructions.”

  “This happens sometimes,” the phone said without pause. “Useful officers doing good service will sometimes draw confused, and report documents as mislaid. Simply return those folders back where they are supposed to be, on the edge of the table. I will have an orderly retrieve them, and personally take your report. Can we consider this managed?”

  Sethlan dropped the phone back into the cradle as if it were hot, with high disquiet.

  ~Back quietly away from the phone.~

  You heard the all-knowing voice. We stay. We’ll get to the bottom of this—

  ~Back away.~ Eponymous tried to keep control of her tone, so she could sound unflappable and authoritative in the growing disequilibrium of Sethlan’s mind. She tried and failed. ~Back away from the phone, you fucking caveman. Go back to the club, now.~

  Sethlan blindly grabbed the full stack of folders off the table, ignoring Eponymous’s squawk of objection, and backed down the hall. The phone rang immediately after Sethlan’s first step.

  That was enough for both of them. Sethlan spun on his heel and trotted down the artery. Behind him came the sound of doors opening and boot-heels hitting the hallway floor. The phone was answered by a harsh, nasal Haphan voice, which then gave a peal of orders.

  Sethlan eased the red door open as quietly as possible and slid through.

  He closed the door with his back to the club and shoved the folders inside his jacket. He ignored the looks from the other Observer officers at their tables.

  Before they could ask him anything, he opened the red door again, as if he was just entering the hallway.

  Two Haphan officers tumbled through the opening at a fast clip, surprised and off-balance. They wore the green sash of the Haphan intelligence arm.

  “This door is to remain closed, snappie,” said one.

  The Haphan’s tone captured the attention of every officer in the club. Sethlan stepped to the side, still holding the door, so that the Observers could see. “Except when a Sesseran officer with clearance is stepping through it, of course,” said Sethlan. “Cleared Sesseran officers are permitted. I’m certain you meant to add that.”

  “Tss, it would seem someone needs a lesson in manners.”

  “We’re not playing,” said the other Haphan impatiently. He addressed the room, “Imperial business: did a man pass through this door, not fifteen seconds past?”

  He was answered by stares of cold indifference. He turned to Sethlan. “Well? You were standing right here. Do your duty.”

  After all his verbal lying on the phone, Sethlan now tried to shake his head, but couldn’t.

  Eponymous watched with frantic surprise as her Tachba’s muscles knotted and tightened. An actual block in the man’s head! Not brain-washing, training, or anything cultural…it went much deeper than that. It was genetic, an in-bred disinclination to convey a falsehood. Sure, Sethlan could shake his head, but now that he’d thought about it so long, it would require an obvious physical effort, which the Haphan officers would no doubt easily read.

  From that starting point, Eponymous quickly sensed the skein of the other compulsions, how they were written into the very neural architecture of Sethlan’s brain. She was seeing the actual twisting, the hereditary programming that had wrenched the Tachba into servitor warriors. As a CivGov attaché and agent, Eponymous had seen several brains from the inside. She’d had to accommodate odd, even scary personalities, but this was vandalization on a scale past anything she’d experienced. The mere fact that she could see the twisting, at her current rate of awareness, showed it to be primitive, ham-handed butchery.

  She let her consciousness expand along the neuronal causeways that connected complex to complex, piecing together a gestalt picture of the damage. On closer examination, some of the scaffolding seemed incomplete. In fact, a vast number of the superimposed controls were simply missing from the primitive, paleomammalian limbic system in Sethlan’s brain.

  For example, the amygdala node in each of the brain hemispheres was bordered, almost overgrown with a clunky, tacked-on control structure. The amygdylae were what controled fear and alertness, so this piece of twisting probably changed how the Tachba felt affection, how they responded to danger, how they even discriminated between what was safe and unsafe.

  But Sethlan’s amygdalae did not connect to the twisting. The control structure’s pathways were withered, as if they had never developed. A misprint of the twisted DNA, a transcription error that spared Sethlan some of the Pollution’s emotional manipulation. She realized the truth: Sethlan was high-function, as a Tachba, because his pollution hadn’t reproduced itself properly. He was closer to neurotypical humanity than the others. He was a throwback, thanks to a defect that kept the Pollution from taking complete hold over him.

  The Haphan officer snapped his fingers. “I won’t ask again.”

  Eponymous jumped back to the prow of Sethlan’s mind. ~Let me do this.~

  Let you do what, Voice?

  ~Just don’t fight me for once.~

  Eponymous grabbed control, and before Sethlan’s reflexes pushed back, made him give a tight shake of the head. The Haphan was watching closely, reading his face, probably trained to detect the manifold signatures of a Tachba trying to be clever. Would something as simple as a shake of the head convince this Haphan that Sethlan was being truthful?

  Sethlan added, “Perhaps one of the other doors in the hall?”

  Not quite lying, but it was enough for the Haphan officer. He turned away from Sethlan, obviously dismissing him, and pushed into the club, followed by his colleague. They crossed to the front door, impervious to the glares from the Observers, and exited down the stairs to the street.

  Sethlan glanced into the artery again before closing the door. It was full of Haphans with drawn sidearms. They were opening the other doors and shouting questions. He closed the red door unobtrusively and turned around. The officers of the 314th were staring at him as politely as possible.

  I can’t lie to them, Sethlan said.

  ~I heard you ly
ing like a dashta not ten seconds ago.~

  Cephas, of all people, saved him. He croaked from his table, “They wanted to be angry, but they couldn’t stop laughing.”

  Laughter trickled through the crowd, and to Eponymous’s amazement and huge relief, the officers turned back to their tables and their conversations. Sethlan noticed her surprise.

  Cephas said it’s just a piece of mischief. Anybody would jump at a chance to play a trick on the Haphans. They also know that anyone with a secret will soon have it spread across the entire front. They’ll enjoy feeling naughty until it comes. I think they’re pleased that I’m finally causing some excitement.

  ~Cephas was quick on the uptake, at least.~

  He really was, said Sethlan, disapproval strong in his mind. Anyhow, if this is what comes of wireless telephone machines, I would just as soon not have them scattered around.

  He returned to his table and found his morning bottle of bourbon among the glass.

  Eponymous said, ~I don’t understand how you can sit here and pour a drink, twenty feet from that door.~

  I intend to read through these folders that are so important and then go back through the door and give the telephone a good talking-to.

  ~Are you insane?~ Eponymous blared. Sethlan’s hand shook minutely. ~We almost died just now! Have a care for me, if not for yourself.~

  The figment, my rider. Sethlan smacked his lips and put his drink down. Why do you think we almost died? I believe you know what is going on, and you’re keeping it from me.

  ~Oh, you believe that?~

  And if you have seen anything about us Tacchies, you know we don’t like loose ends. We like things simple and straight. We see a string, we pull on it until the whole knot is unraveled. We like to keep busy that way.

  ~You’re threatening me again. It’s getting tiresome.~

  Why did you tell me to leave the hallway? How did you know he had summoned a squad of secret police? Why did you think he would hear me open the folders, even when the phone was disengaged?

  ~If I told you what I thought, you’d think I was lying.~