Guardsman

by Pam Uphoff

  “Princess School?” Lucky Dave wrinkled his nose. “Please tell me you are kidding.”

  “’Fraid not. It’s a college level school, concentrating on Political Science, Psychiatry, Sociology . . .” She broke off to glare at some snickers. “Magic, manipulation, and yes, assassination. I believe the powerful female descendants of the Prophet were married off to men they needed to monitor and possibly influence and control? Yes? Well, these days they skip the married part and just assign them to monitor . . . umm, what, maybe a thousand men?”

  “Up to sixteen hundred, last I heard.” A tall handsome woman in a gi, black belt.

  “So the One knows what they’re up to, and can stop them before they do something stupid. Lucky Dave, this is Feol, the head of the Guard Princesses.”

  Feol grinned and looked him over. “You look pretty ordinary, for the reputation you’ve got.”

  Lucky Dave squirmed. “I am definitely going to have to catch some of these movies people keep referring to.” He looked back at Rael. “And I’m beginning to think people around here are used to people looking a lot more harmless than they really are. A trained assassin, eh?”

  A lot of snickers, coughing, wheezing from the eavesdroppers.

  Rael was definitely blushing. “I . . . have a reputation as the world’s most incompetent assassin. Slightly offset by some news vids of the Auckland raid. Hmm, your next vid probably ought to be ‘Cannibal World.’ Fortunately a problem that has been resolved.”

  A shifting and glances swapped around. Quite a few grins. A snort from Scar, as he edged out of the crowd. “We show vids here, Wednesday nights. You and Davos should come. We can get a good selection of vids based on recent events for you and answer your questions.”

  ***

  “In the meantime, Rael, the riot’s organizers, having gotten much publicity, are going to try it again tomorrow.”

  So . . . Major Eppa, head of the Black Horse Guards, wants Rael’s opinion . . . I need this woman’s history. Lucky Dave eyed her narrow-eyed thinking.

  “I can try a little psychology on the steps . . . perhaps with some extra guards standing by inside in case my reputation is in danger of getting trashed again.”

  Eppa’s attempt to look stern lost to a smile. “Psychology on the steps? That’s going to be interesting. I’ll place some extra spy cams. Just for our later amusement.”

  Rael giggled. “One way or the other.”

  Isakson shook his head. “That should settle the rioters, but the troops still need to learn to handle them . . . oh so carefully.” A disgusted snort.

  Lucky Dave bit his lip. It’s not my problem . . . yet.

  “What does the ground look like?”

  They all looked at him.

  Rael pulled out her comp and clicked at it. The huge screen on the wall lit up.

  An aerial view of the front of a large building. Swooping in for details.

  It was on a mound, with a paved skirt maybe six meters wide, with a meter high wall to the outside above a vertical drop of an additional two meters to ground level, a lawn sloping down to the sidewalk.

  Except at the ornate main entrance.

  A broad flight of steps was flanked to either side by wide platforms. In the pictures, with four black horses on each. With riders, of course, and ramps down to street level.

  Equine and vehicular access to the palace.

  A modestly sized paved area, that served as a vehicle drop off . . . a quick fast forward to the mounted guards trotting down in formation, making a couple of passes, eight more coming from the side for a well-executed windmill, then splitting up, with the old guard trotting off and new taking their places on the platforms.

  “The changing of the guards is a big tourist attraction. Every hour, on the hour.” Major Eppa sighed. “But not yesterday. Show fourteen-hundred hours yesterday.”

  Yep. Rioters with signs and handkerchiefs around their lower faces, a lot of hoods. Signs, a nice mix of homemade and printed. Chanting. Moving up the steps. Guards in riot gear and plex shields in a shoving match. People further back throwing things.

  Then a coordinated rush up the side ramps, with poles of some sort. The riders were focused on the shoving match, and one side was taken by surprise.

  The poles must have had some sort of shock device on the ends, the way the end horse flinched back, was poked again, reared and jumped sideways into the next horse . . .

  Major Eppa sighed. “At least the guys with the shock sticks were among the ones who got trampled and kicked on that side. One dead, three injured. On the other side, Wow hit them with stun spells before they got to the horses, and people started screaming that they’d killed them, and the mob panicked. Three dead, a couple dozen hospitalized.”

  Rael shook her head. “And the newsies are playing it as all our fault, right?”

  Lucky Dave frowned. “Put some men with good shields on horseback, on the outside of the quartets, so they can shield the flanks. And watch that wall, it wouldn’t take much in the way of a ladder to get people up and over it.”

  Eppa frowned. “We’re going to put up barricades, keep everyone away from the front. No?”

  “That just sets up a good visual for the newspeople.” Lucky Dave shrugged. “And a crowd over-running the barricade isn’t going to make your guards look very . . . competent.”

  That got him glares from all over.

  Lucky Dave eyed the picture on the comp. “Show me that first shot, with no one there.”

  He eyed it . . . “Do you have enough people to place horizontal shields on the ramps and steps? And however far out you want to keep them?”

  “Horizontal?” Feol crossed her arms. “Cut them in half as they run up on it?”

  “Flat on the ground. There’s no friction.”

  The Major’s eyebrow rose. “Oh . . . I see.”

  Rael giggled. “Can I do the steps? Pleeze, Daddy?”

  ***

  Lucky Dave watched the whole thing on the screen in the commander’s suite, with Davos and Umaya.

  Nicholas woke enough to eat a good-sized late breakfast, watching a newscast with the reporter talking to Rael as the Guards laid down a wide red strip of plastic.

  “So long as the protesters stay outside the line, everything will be fine. If they attack our horses again, well, the guys are pretty miffed, and Black Gold is so jumpy, he going to have to be desensitized . . . or retired. Poor baby, those tasers were juiced up with battery arrays, and could have easily killed a man, if they hadn’t been partially drained by hitting Goldie a couple of times first.” The Crazy Redhead turned to watch the horses trotting in, weaving back and forth, trotting a precise pinwheel. “We’ll have, maybe, two changing of the guard shows, before the protesters are scheduled to arrive, and tourists are advised to leave the area. We’ll have extra guards on hand to enforce the ‘do not cross’ line.”

  Commander Nicholas growled, “If they don’t show up early.”

  Lucky Dave nodded. “We’re . . . they’re watching for that. All the shielders are inside and ready to go.”

  The commander grinned. “You like them?”

  “Feels like home. But then Isakson’s training them in hand to hand—and that ditzy redhead? She beat him yesterday. Unbelievably fast.”

  Davos groaned. “You aren’t falling in love again, are you?”

  “No! One, she’s taken, and two, she’s older than she looks—she has two teenage kids.” Lucky Dave thought that over. “And judging by the one I met, I’ll be surprised if the world survives their coming-of-age.”

  Davos laughed. “You always fall for the impossible ones.”

  Lucky Dave snorted, and managed to not say out loud that the problem was that no one wanted to marry a man who couldn’t give them children with the power gene. I just have the weak Y chromosome gene . . . or . . . I used to. How do I find out if I can pass it on to my children?

  He looked at the TV . . . the screen. The horses were taking their places, and Rael w
as bouncing up the steps. No . . . don’t think I’ll fall for that one. But those “Princess” Guards, now those were a truly good looking bunch, with glow. I need to spend more time around them . . .

  The door chimed. The box beside it flashed green, and scrolled a name . . .

  “Qamar?” Lucky Dave pulled the door open . . . and gawped. The scrawny twelve-year-old with the bright eyes had been replaced with a tall glowing young woman, with bright eyes.

  “Lucky Dave!” She threw herself at him and hugged him. Stepped back, red faced and awkward as ever. Then she caught sight of her father and streaked across the room.

  Leaving Lucky Dave standing there with his mouth hanging open.

  “I can’t believe no one interrupted me and told me!” She had tears running down her face.

  The commander laughed. “Ra’d told me you were finishing your doctoral thesis. With a do not disturb note on your door. I told them to leave you alone.”

  Umaya sniffed. “You needed to not be interrupted even for good news! And then dragged halfway around the world when you were on the brink of finishing your masterpiece.”

  “Taking after Victor, I hear.” The commander blinked and visibly fought off sleep. “I’m proud of you . . . and I have to . . .” He slumped over onto the table and started snoring.

  “Dad? Oh . . .”

  Lucky Dave hustled over, and Vet, who’d been playing invisible in a chair in the corner, helped him get the commander back on his feet and walked him back to his bed.

  Umaya and Qamar fussed over him, and Lucky Dave backed away. Made himself turn and walk back to the living room, collecting a wavering and unsteady Davos on the way.

  “Isakson is threatening me with demonstration sparring. In six weeks, he said. He might cut you a little more slack.”

  Davos snorted. “I doubt it. Vet said they’ve got a good gym across the way, and that he’d take me over there this afternoon.” He nodded at the TV. “So we can watch the riots while I work out with pathetically low weights.”

  Lucky Dave grinned. “Yeah, I met a bunch of the guards over there, and Isakson sneered at how weak my whole right side is.”

  Davos eyed him. “And . . . how carefully are we watched?”

  “Not very. Mind you, we’re inside a guarded compound, but I was pretty much on my own, once Rael had showed me around. I had lunch over there, and Rael just . . . asked if I could find my own way back, and left. I walked back alone.”

  “Sounds not too bad . . . of course we’re unarmed.”

  Lucky Dave blinked. “Rael let me examine her carry pistol. Loaded. Not that I was around their president or anything . . .”

  A snicker from Qamar as she walked back in. “They know the rest of us.” She dropped down into the chair beside him.

  Oh . . . She’s grown up gorgeous.

  “And you just aren’t as scary as Ra’d. Mind you, he’s mellowed with age, but he’s still got Alpha Predator aura.”

  Lucky Dave laughed. “I can believe that. He was one fierce trainee. What’s he doing, right now?”

  “Oh, he’s in the External Relations Directorate, on a Team that explores a lot of new worlds, and responds to trouble spots. They work pretty closely with Disco . . . do you know about Disco?”

  Lucky Dave frowned. “Dad described an old dance craze. Said it was insipid.”

  Qamar grinned. “It is. No, this is the Department of Interdimensional Security and Cooperation. The Dimension Cops, in other words. All the worlds in contact can send a couple of agents to work for them. If they want to. They don’t actually do a lot, most of the time.”

  “So . . . what are they a department of?” Stop admiring her cheekbones and listen, you dirty old man!

  Okay, okay, she’s not that young anymore. Sixteen years since they got out of the bag? So she’s twenty-eight, twenty-nine? Something like that, and I’m still forty-four and not magic.

  Qamar giggled. “Xen says that when they were setting it up, that sounded substantial and strong, like they had backing, and that there really isn’t a Concord of Worlds.”

  Davos growled. “Is this the same Xen who patched us up? Who’s teaching everyone how to teleport?”

  “Yep.” Her face fell a bit. “I haven’t managed it yet.”

  Glowing like a furnace. Dammit. Yet another impossible woman.

  I’m an idiot. Maybe I should go back and drool at the Crazy Redhead.

  Maybe I’d better go ask the Crazy Redhead for magic lessons.

  Right after the morning run. Tomorrow.

  ***

  Umaya kicked them out for being too noisy, so Dave took his little brother out to the barracks. Qamar watched Davos worriedly, and Lucky Dave strolled along, trying to be unobtrusively ready to grab if needed.

  He stopped at the gym and eyed the various machines. Vet showed up and made him do the absolute basics. Stepping up and down, making his right leg do all the work, and free weights, pitifully light for his right arm.

  Davos got something along the lines of a rowing machine, legs pushing, arms and back pulling . . .

  They didn’t quite crawl into the mess hall, and Qamar, who was apparently well known to all the guards, fetched lunch.

  And watched the scene around the Palace—Government House—on a huge screen.

  Mere normal sized screens covered other pickups, and two separate commercial broadcasts. With tunable earbuds, he could listen to whichever view he was interested in.

  At the moment, the big screen was showing the “Peaceful Assembly” on the grass-and-pavement plaza across the street from the Government House main entrance. The speakers were up on a truck, tricked out to serve as a platform.

  “. . . This UTTER disrespect, this reducing the Prophets and the genes of the Prophets to a few chemicals, CANNOT be allowed to continue. These False Oners are NOT the descendants of the Prophets!”

  Lucky Dave wrinkled his nose. Technically true, but since we’ve abandoned faith for fear of the One Hive Mind’s assassins, it hardly matters.

  “And the proof is that THEY HAVE NO POWER! Simply adding the One gene does NOT give them the ability to touch the power of the One! These demands of theirs are PREPOSTEROUS!”

  No power? Well Ra’d did say he didn’t know if I could use it.

  Lucky Dave tromped hard on that doubt. “Who is that?”

  Princess Feol answered. “Councilor Insa of Alcairo. Three terms in the Council, a founding member of the One First Party. Nickname—not to his face—Insane.”

  “A councilor is rabble-rousing?”

  “Two of them. I see the Crow in the background, waiting to speak.”

  A tsk from another Princess. Mayc, pronounced Mac. “That’s Councilor Ycrw, from Naples. Newly converted to the One First Party, just as . . . cold as ever.”

  “Ooo! There’s Rael!” Qamar sat up and started paying attention.

  The main screen switched to a view of the steps. Dave switched his bug to listen.

  Speaking of insane. The woman walked down to the bottom step, and raised her voice. “Let’s try to be civilized today, and not hurt innocent animals. The red line marks today’s ‘No Go’ space. Please stay on your side of it.”

  A surprising number of protestors eased away. The audio picking up a lot of mention of her name.

  But someone back in the crowd threw something. It splatted in mid-air—on a shield—and slid down to the ground.

  Rael shook her head. “Well, you’ve been told.” She turned and walked up the steps. More things flew, and they all splatted and dropped to the ground on the far side of the red line.

  Rael walked inside and something—it looked like a nice red ripe tomato—flew and landed partway up the steps. It splatted and oozed down a step to puddle on a flat spot.

  “For the One!” A group charged the steps, screaming and charging forward with their signs dropped down level, the long posts looking a bit like pikes . . . feet slipped and bodies sailed as momentum carried them past their scrambling feet. T
hey hit the steps hard. One man’s pole hit the vertical riser of a step and stopped him in mid-air, butt of pole to stomach. He slid down three steps retching and flailing all the way.

  “Ooo, the guy on the left hit nose first.” Qamar winced, even while she grinned.

  They all wound up down at the bottom, and got pulled back onto normal ground.

  The cameras switched to the flank attacks. The arm-flailing pratfalls on the frictionless surface were entertaining. From the sidewalk to the base of the wall the ground rose perhaps a meter. More than enough to ensure that the people rushing in always slid back. Not as treacherous as the steps. Some enterprising young men tried to get up enough speed to slide in at an angle and make it to the ramps. Too steep, they slid back. They threw things. Rocks skidded across the ground and up the ramps, where they hit a sideways half cylinder and shot back the way they’d come. More or less. A few people got hit on the ankles, with screaming and cussing.

  The ladders they had handy today they laid out to walk across. Multiple people bracing one end from beyond the red line. A hard sideways push started them skidding, then one of the impassive, expressionless guards had a bright idea, and pushed the top one way and the bottom the other and the ladder pinwheeled, shedding warm bodies in all directions, all eventually sliding back down to the sidewalk . . .

  “You know, if they aren’t careful they’ll have half the city up there just for the fun of it.” Lucky Dave shook his head as the relentless rioters tried lying down to be crawled over to form the next tier of a triangle stretching toward the wall. Which worked fine until someone lifted the shield up to near vertical . . .

  “Ouch, I think someone got hurt that time.”

  Isakson stopped beside their table. “This determined assault on the seat of government ought not be allowed.”

  Qamar sighed. “They aren’t really armed. Just those poles of theirs.”

  “That we can see.” Lucky Dave frowned at the screen. “So . . . where’s Rael? She’s not on the steps anymore.”