Warrior Chronicles 6: Warrior's Glass

by Shawn Jones

  Biyadiq looked at the image and said, “Oh my god!”

  Ceram left the room as Cort stood up from his bed. He snapped in fingers in front of Biyadiq’s eyes. “You with me, Doc? Because I need you right here, right now. You have to focus on my brain. Buy me some time, then you can have a breakdown or whatever you need to do. But right now, I need your mind to be right here.

  “I’ve already risked the future for my own personal gain, and I have to face that. But things I’ve done don’t directly affect the future we know here, or on the other side of the wormhole. Anything we do now that we are on Threm, might. I won’t put any of you in that place, nor will I allow you to jeopardize the universe the way I did.”

  “Don’t want us to jeopardize you becoming a god, eh?” Biyadiq snidely asked.

  Cort was done with the woman. She knew what was going on but didn’t want to accept it. Fine, let’s give her a dose of reality. He searched her mind and said, “Doc, let me break this down for you. You haven’t been born yet. In fact, your cousin Abhay hasn’t been born yet.”

  Biyadiq was confused that Cort knew so much about her, but he went on, recounting the memories he stole from her mind, before she could say anything. “If you were to call Earth right now and tell your great-uncle to buy stock in Google, he might get so rich that he would get a woman on the side. He might decide not to have Abhay’s father with his frumpy wife. Then your cousin wouldn’t be there to push you out of the way of the school bus that almost ran over you when you were three. That means you wouldn’t be here to help save my daughter and myself. And that would piss me off so much that I would kill the you that is here right now. That’s paradox, and if you create it, I will kill you.”

  “How do you know…?”

  Cort pointed to his neck.

  Looking at everyone, Cort said, “So do you guys get it? We can’t screw this up.”

  —

  George had only records from Threm’s history to guide them. That meant he knew what happened from the moment the three of the species emerged to greet Cort, as he and Bane emerged from a ball of fire near one of their subterranean elevators, to the moment the Threm went back below the surface. Until that meeting, they had no script, and had to fight the war on their own. The upside was that, thanks to that same history, Cort knew how he was going to beat the exos. All the Ares warriors had to do was light the planet on fire. And figure out how to do that.

  “Igniting the air around one elevator is easy enough. But how do we ignite the entire atmosphere?”

  Cort didn’t answer Rai, but George showed them a holo-image of the planet. “We don’t have to ignite all of it, Captain Rai. The polar regions are cold enough that the exoskeletons are not active there. We do face the problem of what to do about the freshwater aquatic species that have been compromised.”

  “Great,” Rai answered, looking at the projected sphere. Slightly further from its sun than Earth or Solitude were from theirs, the planet’s two polar regions, the unaffected areas, covered nearly a third of the planet. “We only have to ignite two-thirds of the atmosphere on a planet larger than Earth.”

  George corrected Rai again. Threm was not larger than Earth. In fact, it was nearly the same size. Its larger mass was due to the higher iron content of the planet.

  Ceram clicked, asking George about the planet’s methane and natural gas reserves. That single question saved the planet. Cort remembered a mission in Turkey. “Yarnatas. The flaming vents of the Olympos valley. Ceram, you are a genius.”

  “Perhaps by human standards.”

  Seeing confused looks from the others, Cort told them what he had in mind.

  —

  “I’ve changed the battle plan a little. Only my wolf and I will be at our location. No one else.”

  Rai said, “That’s crazy, General. Pardon me for saying so.”

  “Yes it is, and it’s my order. When it’s over, we can talk about it, but no matter what happens, you leave us be. It has to be this way. The Threm never saw anyone but Bane and me.”

  “All the paradox crap?”

  “Yeah. All the paradox crap.”

  “Okay, sir. But can I ask? Are you going to survive? I mean this isn’t going to be like Sorano’s World where you tried to go out in a blaze of glory, is it?”

  Cort thought about what he remembered from his previous visit to Threm’s future, and what George had told him about how the battle happened according to that future’s history. Then he thought about Sorano’s World. In the final battle for the planet, he had started a chain reaction explosion by overloading the power packs of several downed CONDORs. He was the only survivor of the attempt, even losing a ship that was in orbit above the planet.

  “I didn’t try to go out in a blaze of glory then, Rai, but no. I’m not going out in a blaze of glory now either. This has to happen a very specific way, though. Bane and I will be at the farm site at 1700 ship time. You need to corral everything still on the planet to me at that time. Then just stay back and don’t let anything out of your perimeter.”

  “What about the cloud seeding?”

  “At 1645, if you have the seahorses headed to me, the seeding will begin just south of my location , . b B y 1715 , the storm will be in full swing and passing over me. By 1730 , the storm will be over, and the synthetics will be working their magic. At 1745, a second, low-altitude drop will take place. That time, it will be the same iron sulfide packets we used on Nill to stop the Tapons. The air will ignite a t s soon as they are released, which should incinerate whatever remains of the enemy.”

  “With you in the middle of it.”

  “I know. It sounds stupid, but it has to be this way. The Threm will be joining me at about 1800. As soon as you see them arrive from the elevator, head out and start clearing the surface buildings with Schwartz. George has about one thousand of the enemy marked in six locations. You will have ten hours to finish them off. Then we pull out and head back to the ship.”

  Rai shook his head. “Are you familiar with Alfred Lord Tennyson, sir?”

  Cort smiled. He wasn’t familiar with Tennyson, but he read Rai’s mind. Time to make him think I’m a genius.

  “The Charge of the Light Brigade. Theirs not to reason why, Captain. Okay, Bane is suited, so we’re heading to the farm.”

  Cort could sense Rai searching his mind to remember exactly what century Cort was born in. All the captain said was, “Yes, sir. My people are already starting the battue. We’ll send them to you.”

  “Good man.” With that, Cort called Bane to his side and headed for the farm two kilometers away.

  --

  Right on schedule, Cort’s panoramic view in his HUD showed masses of exoskeletons swarming his location like hundreds of thousands of crabs converging on a beach. Angela would know about swarming crabs, I’m sure. His CONDOR was coated in the special biosynthetics, and they roamed around the inside of his suit as well, crawling and itching like a million grains of wet sand stuck to his body. He looked down to see Bane twitching, a reflection of what he himself felt like doing. Putting his hand on the growling wolf, he said, “I know, buddy.”

  Just as the enemy reached his feet, Cort saw four flights appear on his HUD. Each of the small aircraft fell from low orbit, flashing yellow for ten seconds before turning green, as they carried out their mission. They dumped their payloads of custom biosynthetics, and broke away from Cort, leaving him to gain immortality in the eyes of the Threm. No reason to let the synthetics have all the fun.

  Standing in the middle of the growing enemy ring, he opened fire, shooting incendiary rounds into the mass of exoskeletons around him. After twenty shots, Cort holstered his weapon and drew his sword, while Bane bit through one after another of the creatures with his powerful jaws. Cort touched the stud on the hilt of his sword once, to align the molecules on the edge of the blade, and swung it in wide arcs to keep the exos from jumping onto him. The few that did get to Bane, and onto Cort’s armor, were immediately attacked by the new
synthetics coating their armor.

  Rain came in a sudden downpour, like a gift from the god Cort was about to become. Its acidic salinity permeated the air and burned the enemy, as they built a barrier around Cort and Bane. They rose up and over them like a wall, enclosing the pair in an oval dome. A quick tachyon scan showed it was getting thicker and thicker. They’re doing the same on the outside. They’re sacrificing a few to the rain, then they are going to collapse in and overwhelm us. At least they think they are.

  Blinking at the corner of his HUD, Cort heeled Bane, knelt, and linked his air supply to the wolf’s FALCON-c. Shielding his war hound underneath him, he deployed a fire-shield from the back of his armor. Coated inside and out with Ceram’s new synthetics, the shield conformed to their shape and hermetically sealed Cort and his wolf inside.

  “Now we wait,” he said aloud.

  The pounding rainfall weakened their lower outer ring and the shell of exoskeletons collapsed, crumbling to the ground, as if smashed by some unseen force, just moments before two more flights dropped from the sky, and released the iron sulfide from an altitude of just thirty meters. The exos fell on top of Cort and Bane who were protected by their fire-shield. The first flight dropped packets right on top of the scattered and confused exoskeletons. They ruptured on impact, and thousands of tiny fires ignited and shimmered like a field of fireflies. The second flight aerosolized the air with loose powder, turning the atmosphere around them into an inferno. The air blazed in a massive ball of heat and flames that made Cort think of being entombed in the depths of hell. Watching the scene through images from the flights above him, it was hard to reconcile that he was in the middle of the conflagration, with Bane at his side.

  In tens and hundreds, the exoskeletons were incinerated and vaporized, with more and more of Cort’s HUD going from red to yellow, and then clear. There were still a few thousand of the invaders alive when Cort’s onboard sensors detected a magnetic lift moving toward the surface.

  He ordered the fire-shield to retract and said, “Show time, Bane.”

  It’s true. This isn’t a battle, it’s a show. I’m putting on an exhibition so the Threm will make me a god. He remembered his days as a child on twentieth century Earth. His dad had been a postal employee, and worked in the section that handled the mail for a local televangelist. When damaged letters crossed his path, Cort’s dad had said more often than not, they were Social Security checks signed over to the ministry by their rightful recipients. Am I like that idiot was? I’m going to become their five-hundred foot Jesus. Fuck.

  The wolf was still under him when the shield disappeared into his cargo pack, leaving its synthetics behind. The hovering flight saw the lift doors open and relayed the image to Cort’s HUD. Three Threm stepped out of the lift a hundred meters in front of him, and Cort stood up. Like a gladiator, he whipped his sword around his body one last time. The arc of the blade cleared the area of thousands of exos, even as some of them still waged their own wars with the synthetics and the flames.

  For the final effect, Cort projected flames onto his, as well as Bane’s armor, and the two walked toward the Threm.

  Oh fuck! “George, I can’t speak to them. I already know their language, but in our time, I didn’t. If I used the translators now, it will create paradox.”

  “So long as my core doesn’t record the language in this time, there should be no paradox, as learning the language occurred in your past. This is why I couldn’t sync with my core. And wouldn’t their god know how to speak to them?”

  “I hate physics.”

  “That’s an odd statement, Father.”

  “Nevermind.”

  The Threm stood their ground amidst the devastation that seemed to be raining down around them, and waited for Cort to get close. He let the virtual fire surrounding his armor to gradually extinguish, and the pair stopped just two meters from planet’s inhabitants.

  Cort remembered meeting the Threm in the future.

  The Threm were about five feet tall, muscular, and nearly as wide as CONDORs. Woven cloth covered lightly furred, very pale skin. In the center of the three was a female, and she was flanked by two males who obviously deferred to her. Cort said, “I am Ares.”

  The female said, “I am called Wwelv.”

  Cort looked down to Bane, who still had embers of burning exoskeletons dying on his FALCON-c. He turned off the illusion of fire and said, “This is my companion Bane.”

  The male to Wwelv’s right was Ccoran, and to her left, the younger male was Nnil.

  “Wwelv, your world has been attacked. I am here to defend it.”

  “What is attacked?”

  Cort remembered the peaceful nature of the species. They didn’t even have a word for war. He explained, as best he could, that another species came from the heavens to struggle against their planet and try to change the surface.

  “From the black star? Is it they who take us when we face the black star?”

  In reality it wasn’t, but the distinction wasn’t important. “Yes, they are from the black star.”

  “And you struggle against them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you.”

  Cort pointed at the scorched ground around them, and told them that before the struggle was over , their entire planet would need to be burned that way. Wwelv asked about their crops and animals.

  “I will save what I can. Your crops will grow again, but your animals must be taken to your cities underground.”

  “And the animals we don’t tend?”

  Cort laid out his plan, and asked Wwelv for help. Because of the innocence of the species, she took Cort at his word, when he promised to save their planet. His sense of honor meant he would keep it, no matter the personal cost.

  —

  For three days, Human and Jaifan Marines, Neanderthals, Erom, and every drone George could control, helped the inhabitants of Threm harvest every crop on the planet that could be saved. A thousand subterranean elevators were buried under several feet of dirt. All the while, the exos spread. Another day was spent sedating and collecting samples of the planet’s threatened animal life.

  On the Remington, Cort met with Kim, Ceram, and George. Biyadiq took her place in the corner, as his sometimes silent shadow, yet again.

  George highlighted a map of Threm and said, “This pure methane pocket is too close to an underground city. I cannot pierce it from orbit. These three natural gas pockets are also questionable.”

  The four highlighted pockets were spread across the planet, but they were also in key areas of the infestation. George went on. “The shoulder mounted railgun on the HAWC will be necessary in those areas. But you will have to be on the shuttle. I don’t have enough time to print an atmosphere-capable drive for you.”

  Cort looked at a chronometer. He had less than a day left to rescue Diane. That same day would see either the salvation or death of the planet Threm.

  Kim looked at him, wishing she could search his mind the way he could hers. “But what about Diane? There’s only a day left for you.”

  He looked at her, and while she couldn’t read his mind, she did see the pain of defeat in his eyes. “It’s easy to condemn time, or people you never meet. But I know these people. I’ve eaten with them. I know what I become to them.”

  “Baby…”

  “There’s not enough time, Kim. When this is done, maybe Ceram can clone her with the DNA samples I got. She won’t be my Diane, but at least… Just be ready in two hours. If I stroke out again, you’ll have to operate the HAWC from here and finish punching the holes.”

  “If you have another stroke… “

  “You will do exactly what I told you to. Don’t put that burden on George, too. I’m already taxing his gel core.”

  Cort showed her the route he wanted to take, and issued his final orders. “The last of the DNA samples will be on board soon. Ceram, start your cloning process immediately. Once we’re done with this hell, I want to get back home as soon as we
can.”

  Before Ceram could click his assent, Cort was gone, not even letting Biyadiq stay at his side.

  Kim looked at the others and said, “We have to find a way to help him.”

  —

  Cort sat in his CONDOR on the Remington’s hull. He’d been walking around the outside of the ship since a visit to the rescued octopods. No matter the effort either species invested, they could not touch each other’s minds. Now, with the ship nestled in a space between Threm and its tiny pair of moons, he was completely alone. Cort realized that it was the first time his brain felt truly alone since before he’d first linked with Bazal.