Ashes of Freedom

by K. J. Coble

  As Cole Worthy disappeared, Ro turned to Crozier and touched his arm. His voice was a low growl. “Stay close. Follow my steps.”

  Crozier nodded, felt the first prickle of adrenaline. He took a long breath, his mind shifting to relaxation and conservation of body energy. Ro patted his elbow, then turned and knelt to crawl out of the cave. Crozier glanced over his shoulder. Vorsh and Sandy watched him with glaring, expectant eyes.

  He looked away, crouched to follow Atchraq’s boots out of this hole in the ground. He emerged seconds later into blackness and cold slapping him in the face. Ro waited, motionless on one knee beside the cave.

  The Grak led Crozier along the course of the creek, moving with the speed of someone familiar with the terrain. Crozier dropped his helm visor, a pattern of eyeblinks commanding the AI to switch to night vision. Darkness sprang into flat greenish clarity. He kept his eyes on Ro’s ghostly form, determined to focus on something other than the dragging ache in his muscles.

  The partisans angled up out of the ravine, avoiding the high ridge lines, always close to the larger trees where the underbrush was rarely dense. Crozier frequently lost sight of Ro and never saw the others.

  He pondered these new companions. High Command had little data on any of them, had only speculations on their makeup or their true number—would’ve been disappointed at the real total. Only about Ro could they say very much. Dependable, a patriot, a veteran of the Lurinari Defense Force who volunteered to leave the Free City States to raise resistance cells in the occupied territories. They said he could be trusted. They said he was a fanatic.

  Crozier’s stomach gave a twitch of protest. Slowing his pace and switching the blastrifle to his left hand, he reached for the pack at his belt and from it withdrew a proto-ration. The high-energy wafers crumbled in the teeth, taking on a pasty consistency as they were chewed. They tasted like drywall and always plastered themselves to the roof of the mouth. For a moment he dreamed of a barbecue pit in the country, the smell of fresh dressing and spices stinging in the nostrils.

  He lifted the ration to his mouth.

  “Don’t eat that now, human,” a tight voice said at Crozier’s back.

  Crozier turned. He didn’t see Vorsh at first, then flinched when he spotted the Shmali skulking low amongst ice encrusted brambles with his rifle aimed more or less at him.

  “And don’t slow down or stop. Ever.” The Shmali pointed his mouth down when he spoke, his words barely carrying.

  Crozier’s body crackled with fight-or-flight reflex. The glitter of the Shmali’s eyes was visible in the shadow for an instant, unmistakable as a razor’s edge with their promise of violence. Crozier willed a set-jawed expression as he nodded once and put the ration away. He turned and moved ahead, aware with every step of an itch between his shoulder blades, as if a knifepoint prodded him along. He would not look back. He told himself it was anger but knew at a deeper level that it was an unwillingness to meet that chilling gaze.

  He was unashamedly relieved when he caught sight of Ro again.

  A LOW OVERHANG OF EVERGREEN branches had shielded the ground from most of the snowfall, creating a natural trough into which Sandy slid. Not quite at the edge of the tree line, she had a good view downhill along a narrow, bare rise. A ridge rose a half kilometer away, speckled with clumps of trees. Another loomed higher beyond it and more densely wooded.

  Dawn had flicks of sun at her back, cutting through an increasingly clear sky and dazzling across white landscape. Hers was a good spot, lots of shadow, snow drifts hiding her entire body. The others would be moving on, but she knew this route, would catch up easily. There was time to be cautious and Sandy had felt a tugging uneasiness all morning that she had learned to trust.

  She slid the rifle forward and put her eye to the sight, cheekpiece cold against her face. She took a long breath, let her body settle like a boulder sunken into mud. When the crosshairs steadied, she let them crawl across the hill, passing over patches of razor grass poking through the snow, over boulders that looked like hunched old men.

  She lingered for a second on a flash of movement that turned out to be flying squirrels darting amongst tree branches in the hollow below. Her sight wandered on to the nearest ridge, dancing over scraps of brush and clumps of trees, too thin to be good concealment.

  Sandy blinked, relaxed slightly, wondered how much time had passed and how far behind she had fallen. Her tooth hurt. She wiggled it with her tongue, made herself stop when the pain grew.

  Crisp wind blew snow crystal before her, some of it tickling her face, beading into droplets on warm skin. She smiled. It was a good time of day, the details around her sharp, the land still, wind a moan of solitude. Her thoughts quieted and she felt peace to match the frozen contours of the land. No decisions to make or orders to take. No fear and no memories.

  Sandy looked back through the scope and panned across the further ridge. Hard to see anything with the heavier trees. The wind stopped. She listened to her pulse in the silence.

  What was that? Her pulse accelerated. Tightening her grip, she retraced the stretch of woods she’d just scanned. For a moment, she was certain she’d been mistaken. She re-acquired the spot, the curious snowdrift that had not been beside that tree—the stooped, gnarled one—when she looked first.

  The scope was Defense Force issue with high-resolution, holographic enhancement. Sandy zoomed in, the tiny computer in the sight compensating digitally for visual degradation. Her breath grated through clenched teeth. The crosshairs jumped in time with her heartbeats.

  The snowdrift moved, became a bulbous shape blurring between white and shades of gray. The faintest details of a helmet became visible as the figure turned to look at something. Another shape, barely a shadow, moved up behind, low to the ground. The Invader’s head and shoulders bobbed into view, a visored facemask obvious for a fraction of a second before dissolving into snow and swaying tree limbs.

  The crosshairs rested on the first Invader. Too far...too far, dammit... Two kilometers, at least, impossible, even with good light and good wind. She took her finger off the trigger, did not trust herself with the enemy in obvious view and—

  Where did they go?

  Sandy panned the scope back and forth with rising dread. Gone like a hallucination. She cursed, wished she could have the angry moment with the Invader in her sight back.

  Dread balled in her stomach, heavier than the anger. This close, they would be on top of—or in front of—the group in hours. Less, if she’d been spotted. A final scan of the far ridge told her she was unlikely to reacquire the Invaders again. She wiggled out from under the tree, rose from her hands and knees, and turned to sprint into the woods.

  Noise and stealth didn’t matter as Sandy crashed through bramble, stumbling, swearing and breathing hard and hoarse. Cuts and abrasions stung from the lash of briars and branches. She wore out quickly, pulse roaring in her ears, icy wind clawing through her lungs.

  Sandy’s foot caught a downed tree as she vaulted over it and she hit the snow. Sobbing for air and rest, she cursed herself and her weakness. She didn’t want to die this way. Not with her back to them...

  A hiss caught her attention. She tried to rise, rifle trembling in her arms. The hiss came again. She looked about, frantic.

  “Here, fool,” Vorsh’s annoyed voice said to her right. He showed himself with a wave of his hand.

  “Behind us.” Sandy managed between ravaged breaths. “Two, maybe three klicks.”

  “Did they see you?” Vorsh’s tone was quiet but impatient.

  She thought about the Invaders in her crosshairs, careless enough to be seen. “I...don’t think so.”

  “Patrol.” Vorsh showed enough of himself to meet her eyes. “Keep up. I’ll tell the others.”

  He was gone with a silent speed that astounded Sandy. She granted herself another few seconds’ rest before rising on uncertain legs to follow. The adrenaline was already fading, overtaken by exhaustion and the tightening chokehold of f
ear. Hunger and thirst gibbered in the back of her throat. She wanted more than sanity to stop but knew the Invaders would not. Not ever.

  She heard soft voices ahead, knew she must be close. She saw Ro and Vorsh’s hunched forms together in the shadow of a huge evergreen. She slowed, came to a stop, knelt by a tangle of thorn-weed where she worked her breathing back under control.

  “You all right?”

  The whisper passed through Sandy like a shot. She hadn’t seen Crozier, crouched practically beside her in the shade of a bush. His uniform rippled between blotches of white and green. He had his visor up and she could see his eyes, hard but colored with a touch of concern. Or pity. Anger flared inside her.

  “Shut up.”

  Crozier’s cheek twitched. He turned to watch Ro and Vorsh. Sandy’s anger grew. She wasn’t worth glaring at a moment longer? Part of her wondered why it mattered, at all.

  Ro and Vorsh’s conversation reached a conclusion with the Grak pointing north and Vorsh scrambling into the woods. Ro turned, saw Sandy and Crozier and waved for them to follow as he changed course from the northward path they’d followed all morning to an eastward heading.

  Sandy rushed to catch up to the Grak. The collar he normally kept up to protect his muzzle had fallen back. The hair stood up in ripples across his face, a sign of agitation she’d not seen in quite some time.

  “What are we doing?”

  “Shroville,” Ro answered without looking at her. “The others will meet us there.”

  Sandy nearly stumbled. Shroville had been cleaned out by the Invaders eighteen months ago but the ruins still stood. Loners and stragglers occasionally holed-up there, to hide from Invader sweeps. Or each other.

  “We’re gonna go to ground?”

  “If we’re lucky, they pass us by,” Ro replied. His lisp worsened as his teeth clenched. “If not, we fight.”

  Sandy’s throat tightened and forced back any words she might have formed. She glanced over her shoulder at the offworlder.

  Crozier’s eyes had changed. The flashing green had taken on an intensity that made Sandy imagine the undeterred barrel of a gun.

  THE CRUMBLED DOMES of the dead settlement of Shroville made it a primarily Shmali village, laid out in concentric circles radiating from the jagged mass of what had certainly been a temple. To which deity of their polytheistic faith it had been dedicated, Crozier couldn’t say. The place felt lonely, forgotten like bones left to dry in the wilderness. Slivers of wood planking jabbed up through snow, shuddering in the whistle of the wind. Uneven sections of a stone wall traced the perimeter of the hamlet, gapped like a skull with teeth bashed out.

  An animal cried from the wooded ridge overlooking the plateau upon which Shroville lay. Other than the rise, steep and treacherous with brittle foliage, every approach to the settlement was uphill through thorn-weed no less hampering for being frozen. Good view and good cover. Ro had picked the spot well.

  Crozier felt the chill again, the knowledge that the fight was almost upon him. He blinked sweat from his eyes, was surprised he could be so flushed, so thirsty with the land and air icy around him. Muscles twitched, tiny movements fired by adrenaline and his enhancements. The back of his throat felt tight.

  He wasn’t scared, exactly. No, it was a heavy weariness, a desperate desire to be somewhere else, doing something else, anything else. He thought about his wife—the kids—realized they wouldn’t know if he died here in the next few minutes, seconds. The Coalition wouldn’t know, wouldn’t care. No medals for an ugly little fight in the backwaters of a backwater world. Not even the gaunt, winter-stripped trees or the dead town would care.

  Crozier chewed his lower lip as he focused on the edge of Shroville. He had the helmet passive sensors up, the AI cautious for signs of approach. The helm’s power source was Crozier’s body heat, collected by superconductors woven into the helmets inner lining. Ro had suggested he leave the helmet inert, worried that the Korvans might pick up some signature.

  A narrow path led from the low ground up to the heart of the ruins, the most obvious route the Korvans might appear from. Cole Worthy had strung a daisy chain of explosives linked by detno-cord in a twenty-meter arch across the route, buried first by his hands and then further by snow drifting in the winds.

  Crozier thought it far more likely the enhanced Korvan eye would notice Cole’s handiwork than pick up any hint of his helmet electronics. Leaning back from his weapon, he glanced around the shadowed confines of the partially caved-in hut. His eyes fell on Cameron Carlisle. My babysitter.

  Cameron sat with his back against the wall opposite Crozier, one knee up for support with the other leg fully extended. His left hand remained on the pistol grip of his rifle and the weapon balanced on the crumbled edge of what had probably been a window. His right hand lay on the extended leg.

  The boy looked quite at ease. Only his eyes, visible through holes in his animal hide facemask, gave any indication otherwise.

  Crozier looked back across the village. The others had disappeared, Ro and Cynthia to the temple, Cole into a hut like this, Vorsh out somewhere on the right. He had no idea what had become of Sandy. Their tracks had dissolved in the blowing snow. If Crozier’s helmet sensors could find no trace of them, then perhaps—

  A drawn breath from Cameron drew Crozier’s attention. The boy’s right hand went to his weapon, his posture tightening like a readied whip.

  Crozier’s gaze whirled to the edge of the village, motion slowing as his enhancements shuddered to life. Icons flicked into being across his visor display, movement highlighted, then actual images outlined, amplified and picked out in glaring red threat warnings.

  They weren’t there a second ago. Crozier had seen Korvans leap from trees, from buildings, emerge from solid ground and rushing water. But nothing ever got you used to the way they could just appear.

  Six—no, seven—materialized at the edge of trees and foliage in an arc, most of them visible only by his helmet’s holographic indication. They waited as the wind groaned, perhaps seeking some sign of the trail they’d hounded all night. Stirred snowflakes hung in the air about the Korvans, their passage gradual, like the passing of seasons to Crozier’s adrenalized vision.

  A Korvan emerged onto the path, each step an infinity. Details of bulbous battle armor, angular, grated facemask, gauntleted hands about a stubby plasma rifle and long, powerful limbs crystallized. The helmet turned, a subtle motion as the visor scanned Shroville.

  Crozier’s helm painted a holographic targeting dot painted over the center of the Korvan’s mass. He licked his lips and let the now familiar chill guide his finger to the trigger pad.

  WORTHY SAT WITH ARMS wrapped around knees and his weapon tight against his chest. He was damp and cold, with ice forming in his two-week beard and the need to urinate pinching in his bladder. But he did not shiver, fought to not even blink an eye. If he didn’t move, they couldn’t find him.

  Yeah, right.

  He was going to get it this time, could feel Death’s chill fingertip on his back. You only walked away so many times, and Cole Worthy had walked away from more than most. Time to run again, leave this shit, this damned Cause. There was always another cave, another shack with another patriotic family to hide behind.

  Worthy’s hands shook. He set down the radio detonator, a primitive, low-watt device he had rigged from an old remote control set for kids. Clenching his hands together eased the tremors, transferred some of the tension into his forearms and biceps. He focused on the crude stitching that held his gloves together and thought about Kat, thought about why he was here.

  The morning sun passed behind a cloud, slivers of light leaking through gaps in the wall behind him dimmed. He glanced at his surroundings, the simple stone and the mud floor. He sat in the collapsed remnants of a fireplace, imagining a Shamli family—perhaps not unlike his—the mother at work on dinner, the children at play, maybe a husband at a small table. If he didn’t move, Worthy could feel the ghosts of this place. />
  He looked out at the village. A Korvan stood at its edge.

  Cole’s tremors returned, a wave rippling through limb and torso, prickling across his lower lip.

  The Korvan surveyed the village with tiny movements of its head. It took a step, its weapon tight against the helmet, butt to the shoulder. Others rose from the snarled undergrowth like mist. The methodical, almost choreographed approach marked them as the Korvans’ slave-creatures, the Living Dead.

  Cole had seen this before. The leaders would send their gun fodder in first and analyze the situation through their unthinking eyes without exposing themselves.

  Something rustled, a twig cracking at Worthy’s right. His eyes turned, were the only part of him free of the white noise of fear blanking his mind. More Korvans slid toward the village, a second prong, perhaps three strong.

  The first group neared the stone wall and paused. The Korvan in the lead looked to his feet. The second pincer halted, as well.

  A voice screamed from the back of Worthy’s head. He was forgetting something. He was failing. He was...his gaze dropped to the detonator at his feet. Oh, God...Kat, they see the trap...they’re gonna kill us...I gotta run...gotta get out of...

  No, wait, dammit...wait...pick it up...pick...it...up...

  Cole’s hands unlocked themselves and fumbled for the detonator. Fingers wouldn’t clench, wouldn’t tighten on the switch.

  At the village’s perimeter, the Korvans took a step back.

  Cole pinched his eyes shut, willing the tremors away. He tightened his grasp on the device. His thumb steadied over the trigger.

  WHAT THE HELL IS HE waiting for?

  Sandy watched through her scope from the ridge overlooking Shroville. The Invaders were in plain sight, at least half of them in easy range of Worthy’s booby traps. Her crosshairs waited on the figure lingering at the rear of the party, the one she suspected was the leader, guiding its slaves into the meat grinder.