by Richard Fox
“I—and my fleet—are quite happy with our current situation,” she said. “You stay in your yard, I’ll stay in mine, and we’ll both be just fine.”
“Is that why you damaged the Crucible as soon as we came through?” the admiral asked. “Keep all our yards separated?”
“What?” Faben said in a sing song voice. “I would never do that. Must’ve been our rude house guests.”
“Do not toy with me. This is the last time I’ll say this,” Lettow gripped the edge of his holo tank. “You will surrender—”
“I don’t answer to you!” Faben shouted.
Lettow’s head rocked back slightly in surprise. This Faben did not speak or act like any admiral he’d ever met.
“We stand apart from the Union. Now and forever more. Just because we used to be on the same team doesn’t mean we gave up the right to self-defense. You want to put your money where your mouth is and you’ll learn the same lesson we taught the other ships you sent after us. Leave. Us. Alone.”
Lettow ran course projections through his holo tank. If he raised anchor and made for the Ibarran fleet, he’d leave Oricon wide open for the alien fleet. If he moved to protect the planet, the Ibarrans would have a straight shot at the Crucible gate and escape.
“Are you really so bloodthirsty that you don’t care about the colonists?” Faben asked. “The Atlantic Union Navy I served in put the lives of civilians above all else.”
Anger flared in Lettow’s heart. He knew Faben was trying to goad him, but he also knew she was right.
“What happened to the colony?” Lettow asked. “Why can’t we reach them?”
“The Kesaht arrived with far less caution and manners than you did,” Faben said. “They hit the atmosphere with one of their ionization scramblers and landed troops soon as they arrived. My fleet managed to pull them away before they could bomb the capital into slag.”
“You called them the Kesaht. You’ve dealt with them before? Do you know some way to contact the colony?” Lettow asked.
“You threaten me and my fleet if we don’t bare our throats at your command and now you want to be best friends? Don’t insult me. We saved the colony. You’re welcome. Good luck finishing the job.”
The transmission cut out.
Lettow grumbled and punched the side of his holo tank.
“The personnel database has one record for a Faben,” Strickland said. “Most of the file’s been redacted. All that’s available is an Ensign Faben on a manifest from the Breitenfeld. No first name or picture. Everything was redacted, date on that was just after the Battle of Ceres.”
“Right at the start of the Ember War,” Lettow said. “Her identity isn’t as important as gaining control of this situation.”
“What are your orders, sir?”
“We need the Crucible operational and cleared of any explosives. Then we’ll have some room to maneuver. Faben said her fleet arrived before the Kesaht, but she didn’t mention why she was here in the first place, and she doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave,” Lettow said. “Whatever she’s after…she hasn’t found it yet.”
“What good does that do us?” Strickland asked.
“Know your enemy. Know yourself. Hard to secure victory if either of those is in the wind. We need to talk to Oricon, see what they can tell us.”
Chapter 8
Roland churned along an access road, his legs transformed into treads. The armor’s travel form could cover ground faster than the legged combat configuration and saved battery life in the process. The vibration in his womb was almost soothing, but the rumble from even his sound-dampened treads kept him on edge.
“Still nothing on sector scan,” Cha’ril said from just behind him.
They rolled along an access road of hardened photovalic cells running parallel to a raised hyperloop line. The double tubes were incomplete, with stacks of paneling piled high every few hundred yards, waiting for robots to come and complete the job.
“Got nothing but static on radio,” he said. “If the Ibarras are still out here, they’re not using any Terran standard comms.”
“Roland, should we be fighting the Ibarras?” she asked.
“Not like you to question orders.”
“‘Friends do as friends will’…an old Dotari saying. The Ibarras defended the camp and are searching for missing children. These are not the actions of an enemy,” she said.
“I wish it was as cut and dried as it is with the Kesaht or Vishrakath. See them? Shoot them. Simple. The Ibarras…you want to know what scares me about them? The ones that were back at the camp were called legionnaires. That’s an old human rank for the Roman Empire—‘empire’ being the important word. The Ibarras might not see themselves as another part of the Terran Union, but as something new and different.”
“You would rather all of humanity be under one rule?”
“It sure beats the alternative of potential enemies. Humanity is good at killing each other. We’ve been at it since Cain decided he didn’t like living in his brother Abel’s shadow. We go to the VR range and we train to shoot Vishrakath, Haesh, Naroosha…not other men and women. You’ve seen that tacky Last Stand at Takeni movie, right? Dotari were fighting those banshee things—how’d you feel about that?”
“The banshees were no longer Dotari,” she said. “That they were unwillingly transformed into the Xaros’ foot soldiers would not stay my hand. They would have killed my mother and I had not one of the Breitenfeld’s Strike Marines saved us…which reminds me. I need to go back to Bailey’s bar once we’re on leave.”
“Why aren’t you going back to Dotari?”
“Stop distracting me,” she snapped. “Focus on your assigned sector before your small talk gets us killed.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Roland switched to IR sensors and swept the area ahead of them. A blur of cool air cut through the edge of the forest that made up the bulk of their search area. “Got a temperature inversion. Might be a ravine we can use to get closer without being detected.”
“Then switch to combat config and lead on,” she said.
Roland leaned forward and widened the distance between his treads. He planted both hands against the road and rolled forward, snapping his treads back into their leg housings as they lifted off the ground. He kicked his legs forward, landed at a run and hurried to a slight decline leading into the forest and into a ravine where black, twisted roots poked from the dirt walls.
“We’re out of line of sight from the camp’s IR mast,” Cha’ril said. “Pigeon up.”
A cylinder popped straight up off her back. A clear balloon inflated and carried the cylinder aloft, where it would send a data packet back to the camp and to Gideon, once it caught sight of the camp’s communication tower, and relay any waiting messages back to her. The pigeon would disintegrate soon after and vanish like dust in the wind.
Roland continued through the ravine, his rotary cannons angled up and scanning back and forth for any threats that might appear along the edges.
“This is not a mission for us,” Cha’ril said. “We are armor. We are not designed for subtlety or stealth. This is a job for Path Finders or Strike Marines.”
“I didn’t see either of those teams back at the camp,” Roland said.
Cha’ril squawked something in Dotari and Roland decided against asking for a translation. He slowed as the ravine began to level off.
“There’s a clearing just ahead,” Cha’ril said. “Behind a mountain spur. Would be an ideal spot for a landing zone and resupply point as a decent pilot could fly the valley and stay hidden.”
“Can’t ever fault your ability to read terrain,” he said. Roland swung his rotary cannon around to check the canyon edge behind them and caught a glimpse of movement. A black cube arced into the air and fell toward the ravine floor.
“Contact.” Roland reached a fist back and rammed it into the dirt wall, swinging the power of his hip and shoulder actuators into the blow. The wall crumbled and a black-clad figur
e came tumbling down in the avalanche. Roland caught the man by the neck, lifting him out of the dirt and into the air. The legionnaire struggled, kicking at Roland’s arm like a fish on a line.
He felt a thump against his torso.
“Don’t.” The word came from the top of the ravine. Roland swung his rotary cannons around but couldn’t find the speaker.
“Roland…” Cha’ril sent him an image capture of a cone attached to his armor, angled straight at his womb. “I’ve got two on me.”
“You kill him and it’ll end badly for you,” echoed through the ravine. “You try and remove those spikes, it’ll end bad too. How about we talk and no one dies?”
“We walked right into an ambush,” Cha’ril said. “I’m not aware of any viable options. You?”
Roland lowered the legionnaire so his feet touched the ground but kept his grip around the man’s neck. He switched on his speakers.
“We can talk,” Roland said. “Just know my finger servos are a bit twitchy. This one won’t like what happens if my system goes down.”
Another legionnaire walked out to the end of the ravine, a rifle and a thick cylinder wrapped in leather slung over his back, hands up with a detonator in his grip. He came down the slope, skidding across loose pebbles as he approached to within a few yards of Roland.
“I’m Major Aiza,” he said. “That’s Sergeant Jaso you’ve got there. I’m willing to drop those spikes if you’ll let him go.”
“You’ve got more men around us. Who have more spikes,” Roland said.
“And you’ve got enough firepower to turn this forest into matchsticks,” Aiza said. “Let’s treat each other with a bit of professional courtesy, eh?” Aiza opened his grip on the detonator and the spikes on the Dragoons’ armor detached with a pop.
Roland mashed a heel against the device, crushing it into scrap, then released his hold on Jaso. The legionnaire went to the fan of loose dirt that was once part of the ravine wall and dug out his gauss rifle. Aiza cocked his head to one side and Jaso jogged back up the slope and ducked around a tree trunk.
“I am Third Lieutenant Cha’ril. By order of the Terran Union, you and your men are to be detained for desertion.” Her rotary cannon slowly swept across the top of the ravine.
“I’ve never sworn an oath to the Union. Never served in your armies. Can’t see how you’re in any place to give me orders. The other one a Dotari too?” Aiza asked.
“My name is Roland. I don’t know your history, but there is blood between the Union and the Ibarras and you’re wearing my enemy’s colors.”
Aiza grabbed his helmet and lifted it off. He looked to be in his late thirties, with dark eyes that hadn’t seen sleep in days and a fair stubble across a heavyset jaw. He had a tattoo beneath his left eye that read AB NEG.
“Don’t mean to be your enemy. Not my mission to scrap with the Union today. Maybe tomorrow. But if you came looking for a fight, we’ll give you one. Something tells me that’s not why you’re out here.”
“The Kesaht have prisoners,” Roland said. “Have you found them?”
“We have,” Aiza said. “It’s a gift from the Saint that you arrived when you did. Come, I’ll show you.”
Within his womb, Roland’s hands clenched into fists and his armor followed suit. This Aiza must have spoken of Saint Kallen. If the Ibarrans venerated her too…Roland forced the implications out of his mind and followed Aiza up the slope.
“Roland, I made a detailed voice and face scan of this Aiza to search against the Union’s personnel database, but I doubt we’ll find him,” Cha’ril sent him over IR.
“I’m certain he’s a proccie…and a new one. This means the Ibarras escaped with procedural-generation tubes.”
“The Ibarras have a source of tailor-made manpower…and they’ve had it for years,” she said.
“All way above our pay grade. Stay frosty. I trust them about as far as I can throw them.”
“He weighs roughly two hundred pounds. With a full recruitment of your armor’s servos, you could throw him—”
“Focus. Cha’ril. Focus.”
Aiza led them through the woods, where more legionnaires appeared, all larger than most Strike Marines and Rangers Roland had ever come across. The Ibarran troops moved with practiced ease and formed a perimeter around the major and the armor, keeping their weapons pointed away from the two suits.
Roland raised his rotary cannon’s barrels to the sky but didn’t lock it in place.
“What are you doing on Oricon?” Roland asked.
“The admiral ordered my cohort to defend the civilians from the Kesaht. Here we are. I take it they sent you down with less information,” the major said. “Not a surprise. The Kesaht ionized the atmosphere in their initial attack. We’re not sure how they do it, but it’ll fade in a few days.”
“You’ve fought them before?” Cha’ril asked.
Aiza looked up at her, his face grim.
“Of all the Terran soldiers, I thought they would trust armor with the truth.” Aiza slid down a slight depression where a legionnaire manned a command post covered by active camouflage tarps.
Roland got a good look at the cylinder on Aiza’s back. The leather straps wrapped up and down the length and a studded metal end cap didn’t resemble any military equipment he’d ever seen before. It looked like a hilt missing the blade, but far too large for even the oversized Ibarrans to wield.
“You need to see this.” Aiza lifted a holo-screen base out of the command post and held it up for the armor to see: a dozen large sheds at the base of a hyperloop pillar, surrounded by a fence of gleaming red lasers. Stoop-shouldered Rakka patrolled inside on both sides of the fence in groups of seven.
A taller alien ambled between the buildings, passing into full view for a moment, revealing a centaur body with a tail, the tip covered in spikes. It carried a long rifle propped against a shoulder.
“I’ve seen at least two Sanheel,” said the legionnaire in the command post.
“Any Ixio?” Aiza asked.
“No, but they wouldn’t be this close to the fighting,” the other Ibarran said.
“You want to bring us up to speed?” Roland asked.
“Kesaht are a collective,” Aiza said. “Three distinct species—that we know of—working together. Rakka are little more than foot soldiers—we’ve never seen them do anything but grunt work. Horse-looking sons a bitches are the Sanheel. Officer caste. We’ve had some success interrogating a few prisoners but haven’t been able to learn much. Third are the Ixio, can’t say they’re the ones in charge. We’ve observed them and the Sanheel interacting, doesn’t seem like one group answers fully to the other.”
“What do they want with human prisoners?” Cha’ril asked.
“This is the first time they’ve taken anyone alive,” Aiza said.
“You’ve found them? The missing?” Roland asked.
The holo screen changed to an infrared view. The glow of human adults sitting shoulder to shoulder bled through the walls of the sheds.
“Can’t tell how many more are inside,” Aiza said. “They’re inside a robotics encampment. Workers from Tonopah do maintenance, run logistics from there. They move the whole thing every couple days, keep pace with the construction.”
“The walls aren’t hardened.” Cha’ril hefted the cannons mounted on her forearm. “One gauss round will tear through the whole place like it was made of tissue paper.”
“Which makes an assault a problem,” Aiza said.
“There must be fifty of those Rakka, and that one officer we saw looks heavily armed,” Cha’ril said. “There are only six of you.”
“I had eight until a few days ago. We did our part well enough.” Aiza gave the holo projector back to the man in the command post and slung his oversized gauss rifle off his shoulder. “Rakka aren’t much of a problem, so long as you aren’t dealing with too many at once. Sanheel, though, they’ve got shields that can take a fair amount of punishment.” He gave his rifle a
pat.
“You’ve killed them before,” Cha’ril said.
“Set your gauss cannons to an offset double shot. Should break through in one salvo. We lost a lot of lives before we learned that,” Aiza said.
“You expect us to work with you to save the civilians?” Cha’ril asked. “For all you know, our fleets are destroying each other in orbit and whatever other forces you have on the ground are dead or in custody.”
“I know my duty,” Aiza said. “What the admiral orders will be done. I cannot return to her and announce that I held back when I could have accomplished my mission. I thought those from Mars would understand this.”
“We are armor. We do not fail,” Roland said. “If you are here to find the lost civilians, then we are with you.”
“And afterwards?” Aiza asked.
“If you still want to fight, we can. Otherwise, I’d just as soon forget that we ever found you,” Roland said.
“‘Forget’?” Cha’ril sent him over IR. “How can you forget? You’re talking to him right now. Is this some human negotiation tactic—”
“Not. Now.”
“We can hash it out…later,” Aiza said. “My men and I can give you covering fire as you approach. But with the amount of infantry they’ve got, I don’t know how much—”
“We’re not going to charge in face-first,” Roland said. “We’re not going to risk you crunchies missing a shot and punching a hole through five buildings and everyone in between.”
“You’ve got some other way in there you’re not telling me about?” Aiza asked.
Roland looked to the columns supporting the hyperloop railway…the eight-story-tall columns.
****
Roland crouched as he walked down the hyperloop tunnel, the sunset’s golden light creeping through the occasional gap in side paneling. The view, he decided, was quite nice from this height.
“You’ve made their job easier,” Cha’ril said from just behind him. “We send the ready signal and they blow the support column with a rocket strike. Take out the entire camp full of Kesaht with the rubble. Very efficient use of military munitions.”
