“The humans you stole are of no account,” said Tawfiq’s artificial voice, “but the Hardit people you murdered… this is different matter, a crime of purest evil. One hundred eight-seven of our brave people were killed in your terrorist raid.”
Liar, thought Arun. It was far more than that.
“We shall punish your race. For each glorious Hardit citizen slain, we will kill one thousand of you humans. That is large number. We need to kill every one of your species on this continent and half on the other. You can save them, if you wish. It is easy. All humans at Detroit lay down arms and surrender. We kill you but you save many tens of thousands of your worthless friends. To them you will be heroes, yes?”
Two Hardits, garbed in a simpler versions of Tawfiq’s uniform, grabbed the arms of the nearest human and twisted her roughly around so that she faced the camera, her back to the trench.
Arun’s heart skipped a beat. The slave woman’s head was meekly bowed in defeat, but he recognized her. This was Esther, the leader of the local Alabama Aux workers. The woman who’d aided Arun in Operation Clubhouse. Saved his life.
And now Tawfiq was about to get her revenge.
Suddenly, Esther sprang to life. She lunged at the two Hardits holding her. Even in her emaciated state, she had the strength to make them stumble and fall.
Arun expected her to run, but she didn’t. Instead she stared directly at the camera. “Do not give yourselves up. They will kill us anyway. Extermination of all humans is Tawfiq’s plan. Avenge us!”
The sound cut out but the images would not go away. The two Hardit guards regained control of Esther, yanking her arms behind her hard enough to make her scream. Watched by a gleeful Tawfiq, another Hardit walked in front of Esther, unsheathed his claws and calmly disemboweled her.
Esther collapsed to her knees, trying feebly to hold back her intestines from spilling into the dirt.
In the ops room in Detroit, no one spoke. The sound came back on in the Hardit feed but no one spoke there either. Arun watched Esther’s death throes to the sound of his own panting breath.
The horror stretched on until the gore-spattered Hardit who’d murdered Esther kicked her, still alive and clutching her guts, making her fall backward into the trench.
“And this is second useful function of you humans,” said Tawfiq, coming into camera view. “Your corpses enrich the soil. You make good fertilizer.”
“You won’t get away with this,” said Nhlappo. “We’ll hunt you down and kill you.” Arun dragged his gaze from the screen to look at the lieutenant. He was surprised that it was the oldest amongst them who’d lost her cool and spoken out. “Your death will be slow,” she added.
“Unlikely,” said Tawfiq.
No, not unlikely, thought Arun, just difficult. I swear you will die for this.
He glanced at his fellow officers. Nhlappo was cooling into a more calculating rage. Xin and Brandt’s expressions were as cold and relentless as glaciers.
“Every ten seconds, we kill another,” continued Tawfiq in her emotionless voice. “Unless you give yourselves up and spare so many lives. Yours is very important decision – most important you ever make – because money is riding on the outcome of your choice. I myself have wagered a small fortune.”
They watched in silence as a second slave was gutted, and then shoved, still screaming, into the trench.
“There are only a few of us here,” whispered Nhlappo.
“But is this a real choice?” said Brandt.
“No!” Arun slammed his armored fist against the table. His strike was hard enough to snap Hardit bones, but the ops room was built to withstand such abuse with ease. “Tawfiq’s frakking with our heads,” he said. “She’ll kill those slaves anyway. They’re already dead. Heed Esther’s final words. All we can do now is avenge them.”
Arun watched as a third slave had her guts ripped out by the Hardit executioner. This time instead of taking the time to enjoy the sight of the human staring wide-eyed at his intestines falling out into the dirt, the Hardit threw the dying slave into the trench straight away. Already it seemed to have grown bored with its murderous task.
“Sergeant Gupta,” said Arun over the local comm channel.
“Yes, sir.”
“Cut transmission.”
The viewscreens blanked. But Arun knew Hardits. Once set on a plan, they followed it relentlessly. Out there along the trench under the blazing sun, the killings would be continuing.
“This changes nothing,” said Arun grimly. “Brandt, you’re responsible for Detroit’s defenses, including liaison with the Resistance. Lee and Nhlappo, I’m still waiting for that battle plan.” He paused. “Not a word of what you’ve just seen to anyone. Do you understand?”
The three officers chorused their acknowledgment.
Arun had entered this room intending to step aside and urge someone else to take command. That was ancient history now. As Major McEwan he was going to see this through to the bitter end.
— Chapter 47 —
The swollen red sun hung low in the early evening sky, casting a fiery reflection over the gentle waters of Lake Sarpedona, and the island in the lake’s center. Devoid of natural land-based predators, the wooded island was a haven for birds that feasted on the rich fishing grounds of the lake waters. The island and its flocking birds was itself a rich hunting ground fought over by the guinshrikes and other aerial predators who nested in the mountains ringing the lake.
To the humans, the island held another feature of vital importance: cut into its soil was the main entrance to Beta City.
The lake filled a natural caldera — the collapsed fossil of a long-dead volcano. The mountainous lip around the caldera had been partially eroded away along its circumference, except for a section to the west that was entirely broken, the legacy of an ancient kinetic attack on the planet.
From Arun’s position inside the eastern foothills of the caldera, the result felt like a temple to the sun god, the gap in the western mountains filled by the swollen red orb.
In the hour since Arun’s Force Patagonia arrived, angler birds had swooped and squabbled over the fish-filled lake. Now they fell silent as if paying homage to the sun god.
Like the woodland where they’d tried to make contact with Spartika, it was another example of how beautiful Tranquility would be if only the Hardits weren’t here to spoil it.
Unlike the woodland, Arun was here to extinguish all life in the lake. The trees on the island, the quiescent birds and the fish they feasted on: Arun would destroy it all… so long as they managed to carry out Xin’s plan. “Sergeant,” he asked, “will Patagonia’s new formation perform?”
“Tolerably,” Gupta answered. “The march from our insertion point was all it needed.”
“Tolerable is good enough,” Arun replied, but he remained concerned.
With so many casualties, Force Patagonia had left its severely wounded behind at Detroit. 2nd Section had been reinforced by Lance Corporal Owusu’s fire team taken from Brandt’s Force Mexico. Springer and Umarov were now attached to Owusu’s section.
After the injuries she’d taken over the past two days, Arun had questioned Gupta’s decision to take Springer with them. Puja had assessed her as suffering from blood loss, exhaustion, and superficial burns – nothing the self-repairing physiology of a Marine couldn’t fix with a little rest. Maybe so, but surely Gupta was asking too much to turn her around onto another mission within hours, especially in an uncalibrated battlesuit reclaimed from one of Detroit’s long-dead defenders who had been left where she fell.
When he’d questioned the veteran NCO, Gupta gave him a look he’d never used on Arun before. Trust me, it seemed to say, I know what I’m doing.
Dammit! Arun couldn’t shake the memory of holding Springer in his arms on the ramp of a Stork spooling engines in eagerness to evacuate. But he had deferred, letting Gupta get on with his job.
Gupta had made other changes too, transferring the other effectives from
2nd Section – Schimschak and Bunning – to join the survivors of Hecht’s 1st Section.
Even with the reinforcements, Patagonia had been reduced from the 22 who’d descended in the dropships to 15.
All these changes meant the unit had taken on an ad-hoc feel, which was why Xin’s plan called for Patagonia to fill the tactically simplest role: to protect the entry point, while Nhlappo’s Force Kenya pushed inside the city to plant the gamma bomb.
The sun dipped lower still. To anyone without vision enhancements such as the Marines enjoyed with their helmets, the sun would be blinding. Just as Xin intended. And this mission to raid Beta City was her plan.
“It’s time,” she told Arun.
He activated the FTL link to Beowulf. “You ready, Indiya?”
“We’re in geosynch orbit above you,” the ship’s captain replied. “Ready to deploy the zero-point weapon cone on your command. Our sensors aren’t designed to scout the surface for you, but we’re picking limited energy signatures in the city. The lights are on, but it doesn’t mean anyone’s home.”
“Understood. That matches what Corporal Narciso’s sensor box is telling us. Wish us luck. We’re going in.”
Arun cut his connection to Beowulf and re-opened one to Xin. “This is your show, Lee. Take it away.”
“Yes, sir.”
A few seconds later, Barney reported the first of four missile launches. These were the blinders that Nhlappo had discovered hidden in Detroit. If all went well, hundreds of miniature semi-intelligent bombs would be scattering themselves over the lake, the island and the shoreline. The blinders would be searching out enemy targeting systems while hiding from detection themselves, waiting for the signal to activate.
Drones were released at the same time. As recon devices, they were a slight improvement now that Del-Marie had worked his software magic. Mechanically, they were no more stealthed than the noisy fliers Caccamo and Hecht had flown into Detroit when they’d first landed on the planet. But Del’s update meant these drones would hide, leaving only one to broadcast tactical updates in short bursts, after which it would go dark and shift position. If one drone was destroyed, the next would automatically take over.
Arun’s concentration was broken when Hecht unexpectedly interrupted.
“Sir, it’s Tremayne. Wishes to speak privately with you. Says it’s her pre-cog thing.”
What the hell? “Put her through.”
Even before Arun had spoken his confirmation, Barney had understood his intent, and interfaced with Saraswati to set up a private channel over LBNet.
“Go ahead, Springer,” said Arun.
Springer didn’t reply. A distraction was the last thing he needed right now. And Springer was distracting enough without going into her enigmatic mode. Arun hardened his heart to snap at her to stop wasting his time, to wait until this show was over. He stopped himself when he heard Springer gasping for air. She sounded panicked.
“Standby, Lieutenant,” Arun told Xin. “We might have a problem. Wait for my signal.”
“Acknowledged,” Xin replied. She did not sound pleased.
“Springer, I know you wouldn’t bother me unless you thought it vital. Try to describe what you’ve sensed. Just speak. Don’t try to interpret anything yet.”
“Pulsing. Orange. Silver ribbons fluttering in the eddying current of life’s fluids, cold and seminal. Alien. Pulsing like the superbeat of the multiverse. Ughh So… so… so cold. It’s inside me. Oppp… Opening me up for scrutiny. Like being stripped naked, but a violation a thousand times worse. Ughh!”
“Is there some advice you can give me? An action to be avoided?”
“I’m not having a pre-cog vision, Major. It’s a message. I… Ugghhh!”
“Springer! Talk to me!”
“We use this human instance as a conduit.” The panic had left Springer’s voice. She sounded more like a Hardit’s speech synthesizer.
“Springer, is that still you? What’s happening? Are you okay?”
“Remember your oath. The future demands this of you.”
Oh, crap.
Arun’s mind leaped back two years, to a moment when he’d been betrayed, sleep deprived, and drowned for hours on end: all so that he was vulnerable to scrutiny by the Night Hummers. As far as he knew, it was these naturally pre-cognitive balls of pulsing fluids who had started the chain of events that had led to the fledgling Human Legion. They had whispered into Jotun ears that Arun McEwan was a being of destiny. A deep conspiracy had emerged to protect and nurture him. Everything else had spiraled from there.
Two years ago, hungry and exhausted, he would have promised anything for the chance of a hot meal. When a Hummer promised food, drink and rest in exchange for Arun’s oath to protect the Hummer race, the idea that he would save an entire alien species by placing it under human protection had seemed an insane joke.
Arun wasn’t laughing now.
“Arun. Arun, it’s gone,” said Springer. “Whatever took control wanted to say those words through me.” She paused. “Arun. What oath? What have you done?”
“Hecht here, Major. Tremayne’s acting like she’s possessed. Does she pose a threat?”
“Negative, Hecht. The incident has passed. She’s good to go now.”
Ignoring Springer’s comm requests, Arun tried to think through the implications. The campaign to recapture Tranquility was so precarious that he couldn’t cope with more complications. Did Springer’s possession change anything? The Night Hummer who’d scrutinized Arun on a captured asteroid had claimed Arun would kill it. Was Arun on the cusp of bringing about that death?
Arun cut all comm links and screamed his frustration in the privacy of his helmet. There were too many unknowns. He was speculating, and he had no time for guesswork. All they could do was go ahead and adapt to events as they happened.
He ordered Xin to delay another thirty seconds to give Springer time to recover, and then launch the attack.
Arun knew how Marines had been bred to think. Now that he’d ordered them to proceed, those who’d been aware of Springer’s incident would already have buried any concerns about her, and be utterly focused on the operation to attack Beta City.
Arun’s brain was not wired up like the others, though. He was a planner and a worrier. The two were inextricably linked, worse luck.
When Xin gave the signal for Arun and the rest of Patagonia and Kenya to stealth up and make their way down to the shoreline, Arun had to delegate control of the battlesuit to Barney, because the implications of the message from the Night Hummer was swirling around so violently in his mind that his vision was blurring.
He didn’t need any fancy brain augmentations to remember the most chilling thing the Hummer had said on that asteroid two years ago. To make good his oath to protect the Hummers, Arun would be forced into painful choices. He would need to make sacrifices. Arun looked around at his comrades. Stealthed as they were, they were nothing more than shimmering blurs and guessed outlines but Arun felt their presence keenly.
Who among them was he about to sacrifice?
Then they were at the narrow lakeside beach and even battlesuit stealth systems couldn’t hide bootprints in the sand and the splashes as the Marines entered the sun-burnished waters of Lake Sarpedona, diving for the darkness of the lake’s depths. For the island held one last secret. While the ground entrance was real enough, there were also concealed access ports deep underwater, broad enough to let a besieged Marine garrison sally forth in strength, and strike a besieger from the rear.
Between the best software experts supplied by the Navy and Marines – Furn in orbit and Del-Marie in Detroit – these underwater sally ports were already acknowledging Human Legion command requests.
They were about to let an attacking force in.
— Chapter 48 —
Barney cut the impellers clamped to their battlesuit and allowed Arun to drift down through the midnight blue to the underwater hatch. When Force Patagonia was in position at a total of fo
ur neighboring hatches – three Marines at each, with Arun, Puja, and Stopcock in reserve – Arun gave the order to attempt entry.
Detroit was situated in the bottom of a deep mountain valley. Here, on the other side of the world on the continent of Serendine, the Marine depot and defensive warren of Beta City was situated not just underground but underwater too; vehicular access was only through the small island above. The design had worked: as far as anyone had told him, Beta had never been taken by assault, only through treachery.
Beta had the capacity to be garrisoned by over 100,000 well-supplied defenders with enough food to last several years. Xin’s plan had 31 attackers to call on, but the objective was not to take and hold. Not yet, anyway.
The assault was starting well. Instead of having to blast through the heavily armored hatches, a time-consuming and attention-grabbing exercise, they opened obediently.
The Patagonia teams, Arun with them, cycled through the airlocks and pushed through into Beta City.
He relaxed a notch. All entry points into the city were guarded by strong defensive positions. If they had been manned, or if someone had thought to rig up some AI-controlled autocannons, Patagonia would have been reduced to fish food by now.
So far, the Hardits had demonstrated all the tactical sense of a clump of mud. Xin had been gambling on that and Arun’s force had been the stake she’d wagered.
Gambled and won!
Gupta took charge of the Patagonia Marines, spreading them out to secure the entry zone.
When he’d first returned to Detroit at the head of the Legion, Arun had felt as if he were disturbing a corpse. No amount of temporary power rigs could hide the fact that his home was dead. Beta felt different from the start. It was quiet but alive — functional. The absorbent floor coating sucked the water from their boots. The zig-zagging corridor welcomed them with heat and light. Hecht even reported that the heavy weapons trained on the airlocks were in safety mode but could be brought back online and into use.
Renegade Legion (The Human Legion Book 3) Page 18
