by Alma Boykin
“Yes, Private Skeet?” Rada bared her fangs as Zabet inspected the armor.
“Ah, um, your meal is here, Lord Mammal. Um,” he stuttered a bit, then spat out, “You look like something out of a nightmare!”
“Thank you, Private. I’m supposed to.” Rada nodded, then dismissed her guard. He seemed relieved to take his place outside the door of her shelter.
<
“Captain Eishte managed to grab it when he, the Palace Guard, and the King Emperor and heir fled the Palace. The computer is experimental, as are parts of the com system, but the armor itself is a better version of my old set,” she explained as she settled down to eat.
<
“Yes, you are. Because there is no one else alive who knows all the back routes in the Palace, up to and including, ahem, Lady Chow.” The female called ‘Lady Chow’ was one of the more available courtesans. No, Rada admitted, despite pretentions and some reportedly novel skills, she remained a mid-price prostitute with Court connections. The servants had a standing bet as to whose sleeping platform she’d be found on next.
Zabet glared at the mammal. <
“No, Boss. I’m suggesting that although she is familiar with some of the back routes in the Palace, you are by far her superior in that, as well as in all other ways.” Rada chewed carefully, expression neutral.
<
It was a good thing Rada had already been sitting down. She blinked hard a few times as she digested this little bit of news and tried to think of a safe response. “Have you replied yet, Boss?”
<
“Do you want to stay in our business contract, or shall I see about having Marli start the division of our accounts?” There was no way her charade of keeping Zabet as her concubine equaled the opportunities Tirahla offered and Rada knew it.
<
“Yes. You’d be safe, secure, pampered and well provided for. No one shooting at you to get to me, no more ducking and dodging the Traders, and no more worrying about is your pilot going to survive the next battle,” Rada ticked off the points. She did have a little worry about Tirahla’s paying attention to Zabet and not to the matters at hand, but didn’t say anything.
<
Sergeant Biss pretended not to notice the True-dragon draped like a throat warmer over the Lord Defender’s shoulder and chest when he came in to deliver the day’s last report.
Two days later, just after midnight, Rada finished her prayers and made one last check of all the systems and components in her armor. In three hours the first boat would launch, drifting two kliqs downstream before grounding on the palace-side shore of the Zhangki. As the main force came in over the river, the diversionary troops would be noisily working through the forest north of the complex. Several squads of Defenders had spent the last two days in the open, practicing climbing ladders and otherwise doing their best to look as if they were planning an assault up the back of the plateau, close to the Imperial family’s quarters. And Rada had a little surprise that would help that illusion.
Now, she finished pulling on her gauntlets, double-checked her blaster, knives, and sword, and left her shelter. Zabet fell in on the Lord Defender’s blind side, while Sgt. Biss stalked on her left, Private Skeet ahead as usual. Biss, Zabet, Skeet, Schriik, and Scheer would form Ni Drako’s personal guard and part of the commando squad accompanying her in the assault. As the group reached the main assembly point, Zabet gave her lord a mental nudge, and Rada glanced over to see Lord Kirlin and his mate, both in armor, standing with his bodymen. <
At his gesture she and Zabet climbed onto the platform to stand at his left shoulder. The Prince Imperial and the Great Lords stood on Chi-tak’s right and Ni Drako could feel the rising tension in the gathered soldiers. Nudges, whispers, and hisses flowed freely as the men caught sight of Zabet in her full armor and weapons and the True-dragon reared up, her steel-clawed gauntlets flashing in Shibo’s light as she looked around before settling back onto all four feet. Chi-tak stepped forward and everyone knelt or touched head to ground. He ordered them to rise, then gave a short speech that Rada ignored in favor of studying the other commanders. Lord Dissch acted especially nervous and she wondered why. He’d managed to fight through and escape the attack on his manor, and he’d be part of the reserve, so what was bothering him so much? She dropped that line of speculation when Chi-tak turned and motioned for her to come forward.
Commander Rada Lord Ni Drako, Lord Defender of Drakon IV, surveyed the assembled reptiles. She’d put her helmet on and knew even before the reactions started that she looked like one of the monsters out of Azdhag folklore. “I’m a soldier, not a courtier, so you’re spared the inspirational speech.” A few brave souls laughed or thumped their tails. “You know what to do and how to do it, so I’m not going to waste oxygen. I’m proud of how far we’ve come in the past three sixts, and I know you’ll bring honor to your Houses and your units. Now let’s show these traitors and their hired help how real warriors fight. Azdhagia!”
Over two thousand voiced roared back “Azdhagia!” as Ni Drako turned to her liege, bowed, and returned to her place.
He looked over the crowd, slapped the ground with his tail, and ordered “Come,” and made his way off the platform. Rada nodded and the commanders began rallying their troops and scattering to their assigned positions. She would meet up with her group a bit later and Rada slapped Biss and Zabet on their shoulders. “Meet you inside the gates,” and she trotted off.
“Which gate?” someone muttered. “Gates of the palace or gates of Hell?”
Biss glowered out from under his helmet but no one admitted ownership of the voice so he swished his tail and pointed, “You heard Lord Mammal. Three credits says we can beat him in.”
<
As the reptiles moved out, Ni Drako climbed ungracefully into Night’s Claw’s cockpit. She would be the first major distraction, along with some of the other Defenders’ pilots. Rada started her engines, then briefly flashed the wingtip lights on and off. At the signal, the ground crew scattered for cover. She gave them twenty seconds, then rotated the exhaust nozzles and Night’s Claw lifted straight up from the forest clearing. The rendezvous point, a bend in the Zhangki, shimmered in the light of a full and half moon. What a beautiful night to have to kill people during. Zabet and I should be hosting a moon viewing party, not sneaking into the Palace and blowing up things. But that was her job, Rada knew. Someday she was going to have to pay for all the blood she had spilled over the centuries. Tonight she’d spill more and she scanned the skies above her, looking for the flecks of light that marked a squadron of Defenders’ ground-attack aircraft. Her fighters patrolled above the ground attack aircraft, watching for any air-support the traitor lords might have put together.
Exactly on time a shadow appeared between the Lord Defender and
Shibo, growing larger as it slid into position on her seven o’clock. “Ground One, Claw One,” the ground attack pilot called.
“Ground One acknowledges,” she replied. Silence returned to the airwaves. Her wingman’s arrival meant that all the other Shardi-class aircraft were formed up and ready to proceed to their targets. Once more Rada flashed her tip-lights, and the others scattered out, a few heading for the traitors’ depots and gathered forces. Rada and her wingman turned east of south, heading for the soldiers currently preparing to attack the palace from the north. She checked her weapons, frowning a little. Unfortunately, her armorer had been a casualty of the first attack on the palace, so although she had plenty of rockets and two JadeCloud missiles, she only had a thousand rounds of ammunition left for the chain gun and no way to reload until they captured the Imperial armory. Another thing she needed to do more often—practice soldiers arming the Claw instead of her usual aircrew.
“Target in three,” her wingman announced.
“Roger,” Rada flipped on the targeting software, watching green lights beginning to fill in on the display of available tools of mayhem. She waited for the tone of radar or sonic recorder intercept, but nothing registered on the threat monitors. Fools to try and hold something against the woman who oversaw upgrading the defenses! The first commando attack, three nights previously, had been aimed at the radar dishes and Gray’s Raiders hadn’t had time to get them repaired.
The two fighters whistled over the top of the forest, three meters above the canopy. They were low enough that ingesting birds (and branches) posed a serious concern, but that’s what bird screens were for. Rada heard the tone of the auto target lock, followed by a query prompt as the computer recognized the target and flagged it as friendly. “Not at the moment it’s not,” the Wanderer whispered. Then she triggered the pair of JadeClouds, closing her eye and pulling back hard as the missiles streaked away from their mounts. A click told her that the canopy blast shade had activated, and Rada looked back at her wingman and beyond him to the target.
The northern outer wall of the palace, the one backed by the public gardens, had been breached, as had the inner wall. The secondary force should be moving to secure the breach, and Rada’s attention turned to other things. She flashed her ship’s lights again, and her wingman peeled off, turning to join the nearest group of Shardi on their target. Rada reversed course as soon as he got clear, then circled around low and fast, trusting her night vision and the moonlight to keep her out of trouble. Someone took a pot shot at her and the Lord Defender ignored the winks of several low-power blast rifles as she flew past the palace’s east wall.
Instead, she focused on her primary target. Rada accelerated briefly, then pulled up in what humans would have called a half Cuban Eight. As she rolled back upright, she began reducing power, decelerating hard as she crossed over the fighting at the spaceport. She bared her fangs, then triggered the chain gun. She didn’t aim at the shielded and reinforced panels of the Soldiers’ Gate, but instead at the frame on the west side of the portals. Stone shattered and the hinges gave way, opening another gap in the walls. Rada hauled the plane over the wall, bracing against the seat as she slammed the thrust nozzles forward, then down, stopping the plane in mid air. The ‘Claw turned to face the gate and Rada fired a pair of high-explosive rockets at the listing gates. As she touched down in the enormous open courtyard, the gates buckled outwards; their energy shields not designed to withstand a blast from the rear.
The Lord Defender had her harness unlocked and was on the way out of the cockpit before the shutdown sequence completed. She tripped the palm-lock on the canopy and ducked under the belly, opening a small panel and trading her flight helmet for her ground helmet and rescuing a standard rifle, bandolier, and her short sword from the storage bin. Then she ran away from the plane, keeping as low as she could and aiming for a dark patch not far from the shattered gateway.
“Now who smells?” she asked Zabet, as the True-dragon finished shedding her protective gear and fastening her taloned gauntlets.
<
“Could have been the sanitary sewer and not the rainwater outflow,” Rada pointed out with a sweet smile, then gave the forefoot sign for “move out.” Zabet nodded curtly, and the mammal and reptiles skirted along in the shadows of the parade ground cum courtyard, heading for the door to the barracks wing. Biss and Schriik shared point, while for once Skeet brought up the rear as thirteen soldiers ghosted along the corridor after easing inside. Rada listened to the check signals from her various sub commanders, trusting them to keep on schedule as much as possible. Schriik also monitored the secondary frequencies, a backup in case something happened to the Lord Defender’s helmet communications suite.
“Zulu Tango, Zulu Tango!” someone broadcast, and Rada’s stomach sank.
“Calling Zulu Tango, report,” she snapped.
“Dissch’s troops are firing on us, repeat Dissch turned on . . .” static finished the transmission. The sound cut off.
The Lord Defender signaled for a halt and tipped her head towards a room off the hall. Biss nodded, tried the door and found it open. The Defenders slipped inside and Rada called up a status display. A map of the palace projected onto the wall from the microcomputer on her arm, and lights showed the current positions of the various groups. “Bugger,” the mammal sighed under her breath as she saw Dissch’s marker turning back, attacking the Defenders behind his position.
She made her decision. “Ground one to Shu, redirect attack. New objective: stop Dissch,” she ordered.
After a moment Shu queried, “Confirm orders, Ground One?” his disbelief obvious.
“Ground One to Shu, redirect attack. Stop Dissch, repeat stop Dissch. Code Zulu Tango.” As she waited for Shu’s reply, the Lord Defender pulled up a second map, checking where Crowns One and Two were. Two was closer to being able to reach what had originally been Dissch’s objective, she noted.
“Shu redirecting,” the other lord acknowledged, and Rada nodded.
“Crown Two, Ground One. Did you copy Zulu Tango?”
Crackle of static. “Affirmative, Ground One. Move on Dissch?” Tirahla asked.
“Negative. Dissch’s objective now yours,” she informed the Prince Imperial.
“Understood. Crown Two in motion,” and his marker on the larger map begin changing position as she watched.
“Roger. Ground One clear,” and she released the command master frequency. That would leave only the King-Emperor and his two squads as a rapid reserve, but Beerkali should have the spaceport secured in a few more minutes, freeing up some of his people if needed, Rada decided. “Alright, let’s get moving again,” she ordered.
As the others eased past, the Wanderer grabbed Sergeant Biss. “Biss, where’s the rest of your armor?” she demanded quietly. He wore battle gauntlets, a helmet, chest plate, and tail spikes, but no back plate, throat guard or hind-leg armor.
“Can’t move with the blasted stuff on, Lord Mammal. And never had the leg guards,” he admitted. She frowned, shook her head and glared at him but it was too late to do anything more.
Rada’s group only encountered light resistance as they swept up the barracks wing. As she’d hoped, her feints and the breach on the northern wall had misdirected the forces holding the Palace. She remained on full alert, in case Dissch had betrayed more than just the Defenders fighting near him. Indeed, as her squad began rounding a corner, blaster fire erupted from ahead of them. <
“Skeet, anyone behind us?” Biss asked, while Schriik a
nd two others kept up return fire at the head of the advance.
“Affirmative, and they’re shooting at me,” the private said hurriedly, trotting up to where the rest of the group had taken positions.
Rada gave them a nasty grin. “Good. Everyone follow Scheer and Zabet,” and she ducked into the wall as the others filed in behind. As soon as Skeet’s tail cleared the entrance, the Wanderer pulled it shut. It was dark, stuffy and snug, and the Azdhagi didn’t like it one bit.
“What the flaming fewmets is this?” Biss demanded in a whispered hiss as Rada led them forward.
Zabet answered. <
Biss shook his head in amazement. He’d tried talking Zabet out of coming with them ever since this mess had started, and now he was very very glad that he’d had no success.
“We behind them?” Rada asked under her breath.
<
“When Zabet opens the panel, come out firing,” Rada ordered. Zabet did as asked and Scheer blasted out of the opening, followed by the other Defenders. They caught their enemy between their own fire and that of the group that had been following them, managing to take out both groups. One lucky shot zipped past the Lord Defender’s back, making her curse and frantically slap her tail with her free forefoot. “That stings,” she observed, shaking off burnt fur as Private Skeet waved the stench away from his muzzle tip.
