Initiation to War

by Robert N. Charrette

  The shot he'd taken had ripped away nearly all the armor sheathing the Commando's arm and torn up a significant amount of the internal structure. The Commando' s laser was out of commission, and he was reading intermittent malfunctions on several activators. Armor was down fifty percent or more in most locations. Veck wouldn't approve. Kelly's battered Commando was hurting, but at least it was still functional, and he concentrated on keeping it that way while heading for Veck's rendezvous point.

  He was congratulating himself on managing to do it as he reached the rally point. Until he counted heads. Only Veck's Vindicator and JJ's Javelin were present.

  "Where's Sam?"

  Kelly's heart chilled as he remembered the banshee scream of the Pillager's gauss rifles echoing across the lake.

  25

  World Spine Mountains

  Arousian Region, Epsilon Eridani

  Chaos March

  25 February 3062

  "We have to presume she went down," Veck said heartlessly.

  "No!" Kelly protested. "Her commo was out. Maybe she's trying to get back to us. We need to—"

  "What we need to do is be realistic. If Liu is still operating, she will join us when she can. Meanwhile, we have a job to do. We can't afford to go back into that slaughterhouse to get her. It's time to be a soldier, Kelly. We move on before the Duvics catch us. You got me?"

  Kelly mumbled his affirmative reply. Mercifully, Veck didn't demand he repeat it with enthusiasm.

  The surviving Vigilantes headed their 'Mechs away from Dori and through the verdant shore region and out into the foothills of the World Spine Mountains north of Lake Arous. It was rough country, much broken up by valleys and canyons, many of which were inundated by the storm's water. They avoided the worst of the flooding and crossed the numerous tempest-frenzied streams where they could. It wasn't an easy passage and the dying storm made it no easier. The trek was a test of their piloting skills. Fortunately, no one failed.

  Though Kelly kept checking, he saw no sign of Sam following them. But there was no sign of the Duvic 'Mechs either. They had achieved their escape.

  At what cost?

  The storm was finally ebbing by the time they reached the old minehead where Veck had stashed Lady Shu. She emerged from her shelter as the 'Mechs stomped into the narrow-mouthed canyon. The rain-laced wind whipped her coiffure into disarray but did nothing to dampen her regal composure as she greeted the dismounting MechWarriors. She listened gravely to Veck's synopsis of the action, giving Kelly a sympathetic glance when the commander described their losses.

  Kelly and JJ both set up the two-man shelters from their 'Mechs' emergency kits. Veck's was already up and in use by Lady Shu. Dinner was ration meals. Veck set JJ on first watch, posting him high on the canyon wall where he could command the approaches to their hiding place. Then he snagged a commo unit for himself and headed for even higher ground.

  "With the storm blowing itself out, I should be able to get through to command. Either way, we're moving out at first light. Get some rest."

  Veck's suggestion was good. Lady Shu retired to her shelter, but Kelly didn't bother. He knew he wouldn't be sleeping. He huddled by the dying cookfire, seeing images of death and destruction in the flames, but unwilling to give up its faltering warmth. When there was little more than embers, he heard a soft footfall behind him. It was Lady Shu.

  "Couldn't sleep," she said sheepishly.

  "I know what you mean."

  Lady Shu settled beside him. She was a warm, comforting human presence that reminded him that he was alive. Still, he couldn't quite shake the chill that shrouded his feelings about the day's events. He got the feeling that she would understand. He wanted to talk to her about it, but he didn't know how to start. She sat, quiet and undemanding, until he found his voice.

  "It's cold, isn't it?"

  The lady slid closer and laid a comforting hand on his leg. "It is always hard to lose comrades."

  Her instant understanding touched him. It also pointed to a hard knot of emotion that was twisting inside him. She had said "comrades." First, Stubel. And now, today ... As much as he hated to admit it, he had begun to see that his father was right. He really hadn't understood what was at stake. But he was beginning to.

  Something else was bothering him too. Two Vigilantes had fallen today, but Kelly didn't have the same reaction to both losses. He ought to, oughtn't he? "I saw Harry go down. We were friends. I feel bad but not as bad as . . . I've known him a lot longer."

  "You will mourn for him. I think the difference you feel is because Samantha Liu was more than a comrade."

  "Yeah." He felt a little odd admitting that to the lady. "Veck tried to warn me to stay away from her."

  She gave him a sad smile. "I think Commander Veck was looking out for you. He can be crude and awkward at times, but his heart is kind. Not that he would be happy to hear me say such a thing to one of his soldiers, but I think it is important for you to know. He has lived a Mech Warrior's life for a long time. He knows that to lose a comrade is a hard blow, and that to lose a lover is harder still. To lose both in a single person can be shattering."

  Kelly was getting a first-hand taste of that. "I feel like maybe I should have done something more, something different."

  "You did all that you could, and all that could be expected of you."

  "Maybe it should be me lying back there in the wreck of my machine."

  "You must not blame yourself because you survived, and they did not. It is as it is. You must embrace life, for if you turn your back on life, you make their sacrifice meaningless." Lady Shu spoke with pure and utter conviction. "I cannot believe that you think so little of them."

  "I don't—I mean, think little of them." He couldn't dishonor their memory, could he? "I just keep thinking that—"

  She put a finger to his lips. "No. You will put this behind you."

  "I can't forget her!"

  "Of course not. You won't forget Harry Trahn either. Your feelings honor you and them. Accept your loss, but accept life as well."

  She leaned against him, putting her head on his shoulder. Her presence was comforting, a strong, warm reminder of life. They sat quietly for a while, Kelly soaking in her vitality. Feeling her beside him made him understand that he was alive. He had survived his first combat. Life was indeed going to go on. He was going to go on.

  "Strange, isn't it?" she said dreamily.

  "What?"

  "I could not sleep thinking of all that has happened, and dreading all that is to come. My tent was so empty that it seemed to echo my very breathing, and I came here looking for a little company and, perhaps, a strong shoulder that I might lean on for a moment, and instead I find myself being such a shoulder."

  "Thanks," he said. His response was clumsy and blunt, but he hoped that she understood that it was heartfelt. He wished he could do the same for her. This wasn't the sort of situation he was used to. After all, what did he have to offer to a high-born lady? "I, uh, I can listen."

  "A kind offer, and I thank you for it, but not now I think." She sighed, long and soulfully.

  Tentatively, he put his arms around her. She melted into them. Slowly, her scent filled his head. She looked up into his face, and he down into hers. He saw need there, desire too. He felt it himself. Her lips parted. His dipped to meet them. Their kiss was hungry, eager after the spark of life, seeking to reaffirm the truth of it.

  "The tent," she suggested when they came up for air.

  Hand in hand they scrambled into his shelter. Fingers fumbled in the dark, finding, losing, and finding again, in a needy, impatient rush.

  "I think," she said, opening the first clasp on his cooling vest. "That perhaps you should call me Romano." Adding as she opened the last clasp, "At least when we are alone."

  He finally did call her Romano and she smiled in that tense-abandoned way that one has in ecstasy.

  * * *

  He was alone when JJ woke him for his turn on watch.

 
; "Where is she?" he mumbled.

  "Who?"

  "Ro—Lady Shu."

  "In her shelter. Why?"

  "I, er, just wanted to make sure she was safe."

  "Dreaming again?"

  Could it have been a dream? No, her scent still lingered. It hadn't been a dream.

  Kelly sat his watch through the waning night, unable to grasp all that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. Luckily, exhaustion spared him his torturous thoughts.

  Finally, a gaunt-faced Veck called him down as the sky started to gray. The commander had indeed gotten through to headquarters, but the only report he gave his lance was "things don't look good." All else was reserved until Lady Shu finished her conference with the capital. Then the whip cracked, and the MechWarriors scrambled to make what few field repairs they could. They needed to be ready to fight. After all, who knew what the day would bring?

  When Lady Shu returned, she looked tired, but she still offered him a small, private smile. It was a sad smile and something about it struck Kelly as odd. She asked for a moment to speak to him.

  "Samantha is alive," she said. "Captured."

  Kelly started to say something, what he wasn't sure because his brain was awhirl. Romano put a finger to his lips.

  "No. Don't say anything you will regret." She caressed his cheek. "And don't regret anything that you've done. I don't."

  "But Sam—"

  "Need never know. We must step into the roles that the fates decree for us, even when they hand us parts we do not care to play, and that they have done."

  He looked into Romano's sad eyes. He felt the brief touch of her hand as she offered him a resigned smile. Then she called the others over and transformed into the brisk and efficient Lady Shu.

  "A state of war now exists between Duvic Palatinate and County Shu," she announced. "Severagol is indeed under attack. Fighting has been intense, but the situation is undecided. There have been other attacks as well. Minor in scope, but they've hurt us. County Shu has been rocked, but we have not been taken out of the fight.

  "Our dear, sweet president is doing nothing but calling for more negotiations." Lady Shu smiled bitterly. "I suppose we should be grateful that he's not siding with the Duvics. They are claiming that we started this mess. That we assassinated Commissioner Waterhouse. That we fired the first shots."

  "How can that be?" JJ wondered. "Their 'Mechs were hunting us before we found out Waterhouse was dead."

  "ENN is running footage showing comital BattleMechs firing on Duvic 'Mechs that are not yet up and running. A Jenner was completely destroyed. Sound familiar?"

  "Someone caught us taking on the Kuritans."

  "Exactly."

  "But Crawford had already come after us," Kelly protested.

  Lady Shu scowled. "That doesn't seem to have been recorded."

  PART 3

  Command Burden

  26

  Port Tsing

  County Shu, Epsilon Eridani

  Chaos March

  26 February 3062

  The intercom sounded with its well-bred and ever so annoying chime, making Gabriel Shu look up at the clock, fearful that it was time for his meeting with the council. It wasn't. He tapped the intercom button.

  "What is it, Pierson?"

  "You said that you wanted to know when Lady Shu and her escort reached the city, your excellency. They are entering the eastern gate now."

  The good news cracked the shell of his funk. When the first garbled reports of fighting in Dori had come in, he'd known something had gone terribly wrong with her peace mission. He'd feared for her safety, especially when word came that Minister Waterhouse had been murdered and that she was missing. The little bits of data leaking through the storm-disrupted communications only confused things, making visions of revived Capellan unification plots and anti-autocrat uprisings race through his head. And then the word of the invasion had come.

  The turmoil, confusion, and outright panic that had swept through the county and especially through his government, was appalling.

  Dear Lord, he'd missed having his sister at his side these last few hectic days.

  When he'd first heard that she had escaped the fighting in Dori, he'd been relieved. Of course, hard on the heels of that news had come word that Palatine Price was calling for a full investigation into Waterhouse's murder and what she called "the County Shu connection." Infamous! Though Price didn't name names, she hinted at high level persons being involved, which could only mean that Price wanted Romano blamed for the crime. It was utter nonsense, but Price's rhetoric roused the fears of the anti-autocrat factions, something that didn't seem difficult on Epsilon Eridani in these post-Federated Commonwealth days. They stood in real danger that reason might lose out to unwarranted fear. What was the woman thinking? She didn't seem to appreciate how dangerous her assertions were to the underlying framework of the planet's political structure. Did she truly think that the autocratic governing system was useless? Hadn't it served the planet well for centuries?

  One thing she and he agreed upon was the need for an investigation, but one didn't need to rouse a rabble to get an investigation started. Price spoke as though Gabriel was trying to stop it and seemed to be making the masses believe her, but reality was quite to the contrary. He didn't have Price's knack for playing the media, but he'd put in his own request that President Benton urge the Dori authorities to expedite the matter. No matter who the guilty party, it was best for everyone that the murderer be exposed. Sure as he was that the villain wasn't any of his people, he felt that when that truth came out, a lot of the wind would go out of the Duvic sails. People might even see Price for the slanderous troublemaker she was.

  But that was for the future. The present held Romano's return.

  At Romano's insistence, the three BattleMechs had been cleared to enter the palace grounds. She intended to arrive home as she had been spirited from the disaster in Dori. Roads cleared for the machines and crowds encouraged to attend to make a better picture for the media. After all, this was the triumphant return of rescuers, saviors of the county's designated heir. There would be no slinking, and the soldier heroes would be celebrated, no matter what sort of insidious defamatory distortions anti-Shu factions might put on it.

  Gabriel, accoutered in ceremonial robes, met them in the courtyard. On the steps of the Summer Palace, he stood beaming as the BattleMechs clanked and rumbled into line. Cockpits opened and access ladders rolled down. The three surviving MechWarriors scrambled down as nimbly as monkeys. Romano appeared a moment later. Gabriel noticed that Romano had managed to have her hair dressed so that just a hint of her wild adventure showed. She waved to the crowd (and the cameras), and made her own way down the ladder.

  Suppressing his desire to hug her, he greeted her formally. She played into his chosen presentation, showing herself to be every bit the proper lady despite the unladylike military uniform she affected. She introduced her rescuers simply as MechWarriors of the County Shu Volunteer Battalion, and he greeted them, naming them "heroes to the Shu family."

  Commander Veck led his soldiers in a traditional bow, before saluting and saying, "We were just doing our job, your excellency."

  "Your devotion and sacrifice is beyond simply 'doing your job.' You will be rewarded, all of you."

  One of the three soldiers looked unhappy. His name tag read 'Kelly.' "You have a concern, Subcommander Kelly?"

  "Has there been any further word on Subcommander Liu, sir?"

  Gabriel looked over the earnest, but nervous, soldier. Subordinates were often nervous when speaking to the count for the first time, but this man's eyes shifted away from Gabriel's stare with unusual frequency. Gabriel noted that the Mech Warrior's mobile eyes alit often on Romano. She seemed not to notice.

  "Beyond her capture and injuries," he told the soldier, "we have heard nothing certain."

  "Injuries? What injuries?"

  "I am not certain. Pierson, get the information for Subcommander Kelly." />
  "At once, your excellency," Pierson said in his best put-upon grumble.

  "And no dawdling," Romano added.

  "Indeed," Gabriel agreed. "This man has earned our regard. Easing his concerns is the least we can do. Come. We will speak more inside."

  As they stepped into the portico's shadow, a voice called to him. "Your excellency?"

  "You, too, Commander Veck?" At least the officer had waited until the media glare was averted. "What can I do for you?"

  "Approve my request for compensation to Subcommander Trahn's family."

  "Trying to take advantage of my good mood, Commander?"

  "If that's what it takes, your excellency. Dead men have little use for medals, and their families have less. Harry Trahn earned better."

  "As, I am sure your formal report will bear out. Pierson, see to that as well."

  Pierson, apparently infected by the rampant outspokenness, started to protest. "But the council needs to—"

  "The council needs a lot of things, but Commander Veck's request needs only my approval. Make payment from the private fund until the council approves drawing the funds from the public accounts."

  Gabriel's statement seemed to make the soldiers happy, and so he contrived to leave them that way, excusing himself and his sister. He hoped he'd feel happy about what he had ordered after he wrangled out the details with the council. The members of which, Pierson reminded him, were awaiting his pleasure. Romano raised an eyebrow as he shooed the disgruntled Pierson away. The council members would not be in a good mood with him delaying the meeting, but his pleasure was to speak with Romano first. He pulled her into a private drawing room.