by Dave Walsh
“No, sir,” Dumas said before clearing his throat. “The Krigans won, sir. There were so many of them, so much more than they expected. The first force moved in unchallenged, only to be met by an ambush that completely wiped them out. The Fourth Fleet are reporting massive casualties.”
“What about Navarro?”
“He was wounded.” Dumas looked down at his own holoscanner. “He’s in stable condition, though. He’ll be fine. He just took a glancing blow with one of those axes to the arm.”
“Well, we can’t win them all, I suppose.” He took a deep breath.
“Wait.” Alva’s eyes sprung open. “What’s going on? What did I miss?”
“It’s over.” O’Neil rummaged through his cabinets, pulling out a canister of coffee. “Looks like your father’s guys won.”
“I knew they would,” Alva said, rubbing her eyes and smiling wide.
“You aren’t surprised at all?” Dumas looked down at her. “They sent a pretty large force out there.”
“One Krigan is worth one hundred Banished,” she reiterated.
“I guess I’m starting to see that as well,” Dumas said. “So sir, what do we do?”
“Are there any plans yet? Anything for young Alva here to report back to her people?” He looked down at Alva. “I don’t mind if you stay, don’t get me wrong, but I know that you were here for a purpose.”
“From what I understand, they are regrouping for right now and have only defensive measures in place. There are no plans for attacks for at least a standard week,” Dumas added.
“Ah, well,” O’Neil said as he looked down at Alva. “I think that everyone would be concerned about you if you were gone that long.”
“Probably.” Alva stretched out, fastening the robe around her neck. “I should be going then.”
“You don’t want breakfast?” O’Neil flipped on his coffee maker. “I can always make something real quick.”
“No,” Alva said, shaking her head. “I am capable of finding something on my own.”
“Never said that you weren’t,” he joked. “I just know it is a day-long journey back.” He paused. “Dumas, these transporters can take two people at a time, right?”
“I believe so,” he said. “You need to increase the buffer size and make sure that there is physical contact between the two, but it does work.”
“Then how about you stay, have something to eat with us, and Dumas will just transport you back there?”
“I don’t trust those things,” Alva said, pointing at the Transporter Module on Dumas’s shirt. “I would rather walk.”
“Okay, okay,” O’Neil said. “Just wanted to offer. Tell Jonah...”
“Ingen.”
“Ingen, right,” he corrected himself. “Tell Ingen that they have a week to regroup before there are plans for any sort of attack. If anything comes up in the interim, I’ll have Dumas here send one of his men like last time.”
“Good,” Alva said, pulling the hood over her head and stuffing her hair into it. “Thank you.”
“You are welcome.” O’Neil raised his empty mug at her before the girl walked out of the room, the door shutting behind her.
“Sure are a weird people,” Dumas commented as he furrowed his brow.
“Kind of endearing in a way.”
“I guess.”
“So Jack,” O'Neil began. The coffee streamed from the filter into the pot, and O’Neil kept a close eye on it. “What do you think this all means?”
“I think that we’ve grossly underestimated the locals, Pete. These people are not going to just give up. It’s going to take something huge to put them down and to have them stop fighting.”
“How much longer do you think they have before the Earth Ministry just wipes them out of existence?”
“And us -- conspirators -- with them? I don’t know. After this last defeat, I think that the next assault is going to be for real. That might be it, Pete.”
“I don’t disagree.” He sighed and poured himself a cup of coffee. “Want any?”
“No, I’ve been up for a while now, analyzing the reports. Did you know that we don’t even know what Tyr -- Alva’s father -- looks like? He was one of the main targets for last night, and the description that we have on him is just laughable: tall, muscular and bearded with red hair.”
“Might as well add ‘uses a pulseaxe’ to that list.”
“Seriously,” he agreed as he shook his head in disbelief. “How have they done such a good job of keeping that a secret? The Krigans have always been proud people, their leaders being front and center.”
“Well, they didn’t have a guy named Ingen pulling the strings behind the scenes, I’m guessing.”
“You really think that this is all Freeman’s doing?”
“All? No,” he said as he took a long sip, the coffee hot, but not hot enough to burn his mouth. “But I think that his common sense and understanding of history goes a long way with the willpower, strength and determination of the Krigans. They have been able to handle just about everything in their history with force and sheer will after their great war. The Fourth Fleet is just completely different from anything that they’ve faced before.
“Think about it.” He leaned against the counter, mug in hand. “After World War III, we changed how war worked. We weren’t taking it to the streets anymore, digging trenches and deploying ground troops. Everything was fleet battles, ship-to-ship kind of stuff. Sending in boarding parties and so on. The Earth Ministry isn’t prepared for this kind of fight, just like the Krigans aren’t prepared to meet the Fourth Fleet in ship-to-ship combat. Even so, the Fourth Fleet is more regimented and better equipped, and everyone is lifelong military.”
“Freeman was military as well.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Exactly. He’s also a smart kid. He's studied his history and his military tactics. He’s applying simple stuff from our history to today's conflict, and it’s working. Our forces are trained for ship boarding, tight-quarters combat. They fight shoulder to shoulder, and they aren’t really prepared for the wide open spaces. Sure, we’ve been training them a bit here and there, but it’s a matter of conditioning. He’s working with clay, ready to be molded, already used to fighting in open spaces. In a way, it’s brilliant.”
“It is,” Dumas conceded. “But all of those tactics are nothing against an air strike.”
“No, you are right.” He stopped dead in his place, turning slowly to Dumas. “You haven’t heard of them planning an air strike, have you?”
“It was being discussed, still early stages, I just didn’t want to upset the kid...”
“Goddamn it,” O’Neil said as he shuddered. “We can’t let them do that, Jack. We just can’t. Innocent lives are at stake.”
“They could just target military installations.”
“If I know that kid even a little bit, he has military mixed in with civilians already in fear of an air strike retaliation. The Fourth Fleet could wipe out most of the planet with the flick of a switch, but it’s a humanitarian issue. We haven’t seen that kind of widespread brutality since World War II.”
“This is the frontier, Pete. Anything goes.”
“I’m just afraid that we’re going to see our very humanity ‘go’ with something like that.”
“You don’t think that he’d do it, do you? I don’t know him like you do, but he doesn’t seem that bad.”
“He’s being pushed hard. Men are capable of truly horrible atrocities when they are pushed. The Earth Ministry back home isn’t happy with him. They expected things to be settled by now. My guess is that they are willing to overlook any sort of horrors that go on here as long as they get their way. This planet is one of the saviors for our race -- at least we think -- so this is vital stuff here.”
“How did we get to this point?” Dumas sunk into the couch.
“I get the impression that we’ve always been here; we just didn’t notice it until now.”
“Something a
bout our mission felt noble for a time, though, didn’t it?”
O’Neil stared deeply into his coffee mug, the steam rising and disappearing into the air. “I’m beginning to think that it was just us, my friend. We were just cogs placed in the machine after the old ones wore out. The mission was always the same, with the same intent and driving forces behind it. We just couldn’t see it from our vantage point. Now we’re here, we’re getting a full view of the landscape, and it’s time for us to make our stand.”
“Are you saying that we should defect?”
“No,” he said. “Well, at least not publicly. We keep doing what we’ve been doing, but this is longer us working with the other side to come to a peaceful conclusion behind the Earth Ministry’s back. It’s just not gonna work, Jack.
“If humanity is going to exist, we need to find a way to do it right, or else what’s the point? What’s the point of having a new home planet for humanity if we had to wipe out whole societies to do so? These people are humans just like us. I’m not sure how or when there was a split, but there was one -- and right now, we are just doing what we’ve always done: wiping out our brothers and sisters over pride and lack of understanding.”
“Pete,” Jack said as he leaned forward, looking down at his hands in his lap. “We’ve been friends for our whole lives, and you know that I’m willing to follow you into hell and back. I’m with you on this, but we gotta play it smart. I like that kid as much as you do, but you let her stay in your quarters last night. I’ve done my best to staff this wing up with guys who are loyal to me, loyal to you, but I can’t control everything. You’ve gotta play it smart.”
“I know,” he said. “I just felt bad is all. I’m sick of all of this private, secretive stuff. My whole life has always been on display, Jack.”
“You think that I don’t know how that feels?” Jack stood up stiffly, turning to look at his old friend, doing his best to hide his disdain. “How long have I hid my relationship with Hideo? You think that it’s hard to deal with a cheating wife, an unrequited love and the pressures of being the man in charge? Imagine being his best friend and the guy who has to handle a lot of the public stuff he doesn’t want to handle and not being able to be public about a totally normal, healthy relationship. It’s worn on me as well, Pete.”
“Damn it, Jack.” O’Neil felt horrible. Sometimes he forgot how much Jack sacrificed for him and for the good of everyone else. “You’ve been a good friend -- don’t ever think that I take that lightly. I might not express my gratitude enough, but you know that I value you above all else.”
“I know that,” he said. “Don’t worry about that. I’m just... helping you with some context.”
“How is Hideo anyway? I haven’t seen him since we came down here planetside.”
“He’s fine, but we decided that he should stay behind. It didn’t make a lot of sense to bring a comm officer with us down here without raising a few eyebrows.”
“I understand.”
“So, please, just remember, I’m with you on this, but you gotta run this stuff by me so I can be better prepared in the future.”
“Can do.” O’Neil looked down at his holoscanner on the counter, then back at his friend. “Hey Jack.”
“Yeah?”
“How much do you know about Christopher Columbus?”
“Not much. Why?”
017. Exsanguination
Ingen the Krigan Warrior
Ingen sat in his bunk staring up at the ceiling, which was roughly carved out of rock. Two days had passed since the successful defense of Krigar, and there had been a lot of celebrating going around the stronghold. Tyr had been doing his best to remain excited, but there was a cloud hanging over him, wondering where Alva was. She had been sent out three days prior, right before the battle, in an attempt to relay information as quickly as possible back to the stronghold.
Alva knew how to take care of herself, but Tyr worrying had Ingen worrying as well. Ingen had explained to Tyr that Captain O’Neil was to be trusted and that he’d ensure the safety of Alva, but if anything were to happen to Alva, things could deteriorate in a flash.
There were a lot of things going on at that moment as well. The victory of the siege of Krigar was raising the confidence of the Krigans, with more and more asking what they could do to defend Andlios against the Banished.
Plus, they wanted to see Tyr. Tyr was a hero worthy of the astounding folklore surrounding him. There were tales being passed around about Tyr’s super-human strength and his trusted adviser, Ingen, who was known as the Man with No Face. There was a sense of unease about Ingen and a mystery shrouding any real information about him, but it was known that he challenged Øystein and defeated him in hand-to-hand combat, which helped to legitimize him as an indispensable part of Tyr’s warband.
Ingen knew what the right move was right now: Tyr had to make an appearance in Krigar to rally the Krigans behind the cause. Many had seen the war as unwinnable, but Tyr was a symbol to the people -- he was their hope. Ingen knew that keeping Tyr away from the Earth Ministry was smart, but he needed to build his legend with his people to rally them to keep fighting until he could figure out a way to stop the war once and for all. Tyr needed to grow beyond myth into legend.
Ingen picked himself up and headed toward the doorway, pulling back the leather flap that served as his door and walked out toward the main hall. Tyr was sitting at the head of the great table, lost in thought even though it was late at night. He had known Tyr for the entire time that he was on Andlios, and it was unlike Tyr to be brooding so publicly, which could only mean something bad.
“Can’t sleep, either?” He sat down in the chair next to Tyr’s.
“Ingen.” Tyr looked up at him, forcing a smile. “Just thinking.”
“About Alva?”
He let out a mighty laugh before slumping back into the chair. “Nothing gets by you, does it, Ingen?”
“I won’t say that I’m not thinking about the same thing,” he replied as he shook his head. “She knows those wastelands better than anyone, right?”
“Of course,” he said. “In fact, she’s even led me through them before.”
“So we know that she’s not lost, which is a good thing. Look, I know these guys. Plus I know that security was probably tightened up after he crushed their forces at Krigar. I bet they are just keeping her there until the coast is clear. Alva knows the wastelands, and O’Neil knows the Earth Ministry.”
“You trust this O’Neil, don’t you, Ingen?”
“Of course I do. Otherwise I wouldn’t have sent Alva to gather information from his people.”
“No,” he said. “That’s not what I mean. I mean that you really trust this man; you trust him as much as you trust me. I’ve seen how you are with the warband here.”
“That’s different, Tyr. I’m the outsider here. I have to be careful, and Øystein --”
“Øystein is a giant puppy!” He slammed his fist on the table. “You trust this man, which means that I trust him. If you believe that he’ll take care of my Alva, then I believe it, too.”
“Okay, good. Now, look -- I know we talked about this before, but I think that you need to go to Krigar.”
“I’m here because you believed it best, Ingen. You told me that I was to be an underground hero of sorts, that it was for the best to remain hidden. You know that I am only doing this because you felt so strongly.”
“I know, and I appreciate that. But now is the time to build up your legend, Tyr. Now is the time to show strength. Our people did the impossible the other night: They held off highly organized, heavily armed forces with pulseaxes and lightly armored vehicles. They did so by your command, with your name on the tips of their tongues.”
“Of course it was under your direction.”
“So what? Do you really think that the Krigans are going to rally behind someone from the Earth Ministry? One of the Banished? I’m lucky that Øystein doesn’t slit my throat while I sleep.”
“Be that as it may, this is about you, Tyr. The Krigans need you out there, and they need to see you strong and unafraid. They need you to explain that you’ve been fighting for them and that you need them to fight for you. They need to see you strong, in charge and impassioned.”
“That shouldn’t be difficult.”
“Good. So you’ll leave for Krigar in the morning. I’ve already made the arrangements. I’m just glad that I don’t have to have Øystein drag you there.”
“You mean you wouldn’t drag me yourself?”
“I’m not sure that there is any place in Krigar for me, Tyr. This is about you. I’m just the background guy.”
“Ingen.” Tyr placed his hand on his shoulder, shaking his head. “Outside of Alva, you are my only family. Stay in the shadows all that you want, but you belong there with me. You are coming with me.”
“What about Alva? Shouldn’t someone be here when she comes back?”
“The rest of the warband will be here, and she knows them well enough. If she has anything urgent to report, they can easily communicate it to us. You aren’t the only one who can work the comm array, Ingen.”
“I know, I know.”
“Good, so it’s settled. We leave tomorrow.”
* * *
The air was cold when Ingen stepped outside of the stronghold. He had only been to Krigar once before and only for a short time. The rest of his time on Andlios had been spent within the stronghold with the rest of the warband. His time in Krigar was limited, and he spent most of it indoors. It was right after he landed, when Alva found him in the wastelands. Out of fear of repercussion, Tyr refused to let Ingen out.
It was the place where Jonah was born again as Ingen, the Krigan warrior, a member of Tyr’s warband -- and later, a member of his family. For that, Krigar had sentimental value to Ingen, but he also saw very little of it. He was kept within the confines of the Palace for most of his stay. He was still shocked at how advanced their technology was but how the warriors kept their strongholds rather simple.
