Vegetation petered out as they gained altitude, the scrub woods along the side of the road turning to weedy grass, which became patchy and finally disappeared altogether. At night, shielding his eyes from the ship’s lanterns, he could see a great wheel of stars marching overhead, far outshining the handful he’d been able to make out from his window at the Academy. They seemed distant and cold, and he would have gladly traded the view for the smoky, overcast sky of home.
On the fourth day, they began descending again, the cutter’s engines straining to keep her from careening wildly down the rock-strewn slope. Pahlu was surprised to see grass on this side, too, and even a few stunted trees; this was the edge of the Waste, after all. But of course it was only the edge, and few of the Enemy ever made it as far as the passes.
Pahlu had always been careful to think of them as the sraa, since that was the official designation. When his turn came to stand night watch, waiting with a rifle in his hand by the rail and staring out into the darkness, he thought he understood the impulse to make them sound more mystical. The Great Enemy. The Plague. He imagined them gathering just outside the circle of light, circling around the little landship and waiting for their chance to strike.
Silly, of course. Even if a sraa made it this far east, it would be a small one, and more likely to hide from a Grand Alliance ship than attack it. But Pahlu could not seem to prevent his hands sweating, however much he wiped them on his brand-new uniform trousers. He decided to chalk it up to anticipation. After all, his whole life—since the day he walked out of his home forever, his father’s anger still ringing in his ears—had been preparation for this moment.
When the sun rose on the sixth day, the captain of the cutter gave a sigh of relief at the sight of the Marilei’s Wrath, nestled quietly against a low hill. Taller and wider than the cutter, the light cruiser’s proportions made her look squat by comparison. On each side of the warship, two heavy struts arched down to connect to a single long pod wrapped around a caterpillar track, while two forward legs bore conventional wheels. Her hull looked like a fat cigar cut in half, rounded side down, with the struts disappearing into long vertical slots. A tall, blocky superstructure amidships was topped by the bridge tower, and she carried two six-inch guns in fore and aft turrets.
Colored lights flashed from the shutterbox attached to Wrath’s tower, too fast for Pahlu to follow. The cutter flashed the ACCEPT signal, three green lights, and powered across the flat ground to draw alongside the larger landship. It wasn’t until they came close that Pahlu appreciated how much bigger the cruiser was. She towered above them, so much higher that she had to lower a rope ladder to reach the cutter’s deck.
He was ready by the time she did, his few possessions gathered into a backpack, his red uniform unfaded by sun or weather. His black leather cap—slightly too large, if truth be told—still had the factory shine, and the single bar at his collar gleamed. He’d spent the past night polishing all the brass on his uniform, feeling simultaneously embarrassed and unwilling to look less than his absolute best.
The cutter captain, a civilian in a faded blue greatcoat, emerged onto the deck and looked at him with an unreadable expression. The man had wings of gray in his close-cropped hair, and Pahlu wondered how many young officers he’d delivered this way, and how many of them had come back. For a moment he thought the captain was going to offer some worldly advice, but he merely grunted and turned away, walking to where a couple of his men were fastening a hooked line from the cruiser to the knot atop a sack of mail.
Pahlu waited a moment longer. When no one seemed inclined to tell him what to do, he turned around and took hold of the ladder, climbing hand over hand toward his new life.
The deck of the cruiser was corrugated steel instead of old, stained wood, and everyone in sight was wearing the familiar red and black of the Grand Alliance Navy. Pahlu swung his legs over the rail, straightened up, and found two women approaching him from the direction of the bridge tower. On sighting the pair of stripes denoting a first lieutenant, Pahlu drew himself up and saluted, fist pressed against his heart.
They made for an odd pair. The lieutenant was Kotzi, like most of the crew, with a tight fuzz of curly hair under her cap and deep brown skin several shades lighter than his own. She was tall and broad-shouldered, with a formidable air of solidity, and she stared at him with an expression that said she was not pleased with what she was seeing.
The other woman was a head shorter, with the paler, nut-colored skin and delicate features of a Remnant, descended from the people who had once lived in the Waste. Her hair was straight and hung past her shoulders, and instead of a uniform she wore a long khaki coat, thick with buttoned pockets and stained at the edges. She was, to all appearances, a civilian, and so Pahlu was surprised when the lieutenant stopped a half-step behind her and let her take the lead.
“Hmm,” she said, staring at him. Instead of a military-style cap, she wore a band of dark fabric across her forehead, with variety of odd things sticking out of it. Pahlu saw several pencils, a ruler, and some sort of optical device on a hinged metal clip. The woman’s hand went to the latter, apparently out of habit. The lieutenant cleared her throat.
“He’s not a specimen, Rev,” she said. “He’s our new officer. Remember?”
“Oh yes.” She blinked big, watery eyes. Pahlu held his position, hand pressed against his chest. His back was starting to ache. “What’s he doing?”
“Standing at attention,” the lieutenant said, with an air of exasperated patience.
“Why?”
“It’s customary. You ought to welcome him and tell him to relax.”
“Sir,” Pahlu said, overcoming his hesitation to interrupt a superior. “I think there may have been an error. I was ordered to report to—”
“To the Serrianople,” the lieutenant said. “I know. I sent for you. You are Second Lieutenant Pahlu Vitali, correct?”
“Sir, yes sir.” His eyes were drawn toward the shorter woman, who had flipped down a complicated arrangement of brass and lenses and was fiddling with dials around the edges. The lieutenant, following his gaze, sighed.
“You may as well relax,” she said. “I’m Lieutenant Sark Elb. This is Professor Revya Ahldotr.”
“Yes?” Revya said suddenly, looking at the lieutenant. Her movement set the device hanging in front of her face to swinging and clicking. “What? I’m here.”
“And I’m to report to you?” Pahlu said.
“That’s right,” Sark said. “I’ve got all the paperwork down below, if you want to look it over.”
“Understood, sir.” Pahlu saluted again. “It will be an honor to serve!”
“If you say so,” Sark muttered, looking Pahlu up and down. “Well. Come along. We’ll get your things stowed.”
“Of course.” He turned to the professor, only to find her already walking away, one hand on her lensed device as she stared at the horizon.
“Don’t mind her,” Sark said. “She’s always like that.”
“It’s not that she means to be rude,” the lieutenant explained as they negotiated the cramped corridors of Wrath’s underdecks. “She just doesn’t care, you see. Her attention span for anything that doesn’t involve the sraa is about thirty seconds. It’s best to warn you going in, so you don’t think it’s personal.”
“Can I ask,” Pahlu said, turning sideways to let a pair of ratings hurry past, “in what capacity she’s . . . serving?”
“I’m not sure how the Admiralty classes her on the official books. Hell, I’m not sure she even gets a salary, not that she’d know what to do with one. She’s out here as a sraa expert, gathering intelligence. Some kind of secret project.”
“And you, sir?”
“I’m here to keep her alive. Which is a challenge even when we’re in port, let me tell you. And since we lost our last second lieutenant, I’ve been short a pair of hands.”
“Was there an enemy attack?”
“What?” Sark looked back at him
and chuckled. “Oh, no. She just couldn’t stand to be around Rev anymore, so she petitioned the Rear Admiral for transfer. I asked the Academy to send us a replacement. I assume this is your first posting?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you’re Querbi.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Are we going to have any religious problems?”
Pahlu winced. The only thing that most Kotzi seemed to know about his homeland was that it produced more than its share of fanatics, clinging to their weird, singular god. For a moment he saw his father’s face, purple with anger. Domus will not forgive you for venturing among the heathens!
“No, sir. No problems.”
“Good.” They reached a doorway, half covered by a thin curtain, that led into a narrow room. The walls and floor were all gray metal, and two wooden beds took up nearly all the floor space. “You’re in here with me until we get back to the Serrianople. Rev’s next door, when she can be bothered to sleep.”
“Will we be returning soon, sir?”
As though his question had been an invocation, the ship shivered, rolling slightly as the legs shifted on their springs. A new vibration thrilled through the decking, and Pahlu felt a slight lurch as they started forward. Sark shifted her balance to compensate, automatically, and he found himself envying her unconscious ease.
“We’re headed that way,” she said. “But we’ve got a stop to make first. Do you need a few minutes?”
Pahlu tossed his backpack onto one of the narrow beds and squared his shoulders. “No, sir!”
Sark gave him a broad smile, with only a hint of malice at the edges. “Oh, good. A nice keen lad.”
Several hours and a few minor lacerations later, the edge of his keenness was a bit dulled.
Sark had sat him down in an empty room, with a big, leather-strapped chest and a canvas sack that clanked when she pulled it across the deck. The sack, it turned out, was full of scrap metal, scraped up by the crew from the site of a past engagement. Most of it was junk, but mixed in were bits and pieces of sraa, which needed to be sorted out and wrapped in linen for transport back to the Collegium in Kotz. She’d given Pahlu a pair of thick leather gloves for his hands, but he’d manage to nick his forearms a couple of times handling some of the larger pieces of shrapnel.
He set aside a chunk of twisted armor the size of a dinner plate and reached carefully into the bag for the next piece. It was a real find—a whole sraa leg, practically intact. Pahlu held it up to the lamp, marveling at how light it was. Fully extended, it was nearly as long as his arm, and it could bend inward through six different joints, giving it a marvelous range of motion. The steel-gray struts were wrapped in a complicated network of tiny brass rods and pistons, with intermeshing gears where they met. When he moved it, the parts all clicked and turned in an absolutely smooth ballet of mechanical perfection. At the “foot” end, there was a polished sphere, a flawless steel bearing in a universal mount, flanked by a pair of long, curved blades.
Pahlu folded the leg up, until it was curled in on itself like the limb of a dead insect, then reached for the roll of linen wrapping. He was just getting it stowed away when the lieutenant rapped at the doorframe behind him.
Sark looked at his progress and gave an approving sort of grunt. Pahlu jumped to his feet and thumped a salute.
“Making progress, sir!” he said. “Another few hours.”
“Leave it,” she said. “You can finish later. We’re coming up on Old Gotterlak, I want you on deck with me in case Rev decides she needs a sample. Here’s your first standing order: don’t let her jump off of anything. I swear, that woman thinks she can fly.”
“Yes, sir!” A bit relieved, Pahlu followed the lieutenant back down the corridor to the main stairs, then up into the open air of Wrath’s deck.
The ship was buzzing like a hive, men and women in red-and-black uniforms hurrying across the deck in all directions. Both guns—small enough that they were set on hand-cranked swivel mounts rather than motorized turrets—were manned and ready, and both rails were lined with riflemen.
Beyond the ship stretched the Waste, an endless, uniform expanse of red-brown earth, swelling here and there into low hills. Patches of sparse grass grew here and there, and the occasional shrub protruded from a rocky cranny, but there was nothing larger, and no animal life at all. It was so utterly unlike the foggy, riotously green landscapes of Pahlu’s youth that it seemed as though it belonged on a different planet.
The lieutenant touched his shoulder, and he realized he’d been staring. He turned, embarrassed, and found her holding out a rifle.
“I assume you can use one of these?” she said.
“Yes, sir.” Pahlu took the weapon, popped out the five-round clip in the butt to make sure it was loaded, then worked the bolt with a satisfying snick-snack. “I won a first-year prize for marksmanship.”
Sark chuckled. “Let’s hope you won’t have to show off.”
She led him up toward the bow, past the forward gun crew and several lookouts. It felt odd to be sauntering casually along the deck while so many ratings were clearly intent on important work, but the lieutenant didn’t pay the enlisted men any mind, and Pahlu followed her example. At the forward rail, Revya was staring into the distance through the brass scope clipped to her headband, now swiveled into position in front of her right eye.
“Anything interesting, Rev?” Sark said.
Revya turned around. A bit too quickly, it turned out—her view through the eyepiece must have swung disorientingly, because she lost her balance and took a step back against the rail. Sark lunged forward immediately and grabbed her by the arm, yanking her back and pulling the scope out of the way.
“Not yet,” Revya said when she regained her footing, ignoring the entire incident. “But I still think this is a bad idea. These patrols are too predictable.”
“We have to check for oxcarts,” Sark said.
Pahlu, looking out at the Waste, had a hard time imagining any sort of animal living out here, much less a team of oxen. His confusion must have been obvious, because the lieutenant rolled her eyes.
“An oxcart is a sort of sraa transport,” she explained. “They load it up with salvage and send it east to do whatever it is they do with the stuff.”
“Build more sraa,” Revya said absently, scanning the horizon again.
“Don’t they teach you that sort of the thing at the Academy?” Sark said.
“No, sir,” Pahlu said, cheeks heating slightly. “Sraa studies are restricted.” He allowed a hint of pride to enter his voice. “Only a tenth of the officer candidates are accepted by the Navy, anyway.”
“They should teach everyone about them,” Revya said without looking around. “Every child of five should know how to kill a scuttler. Every schoolgirl should learn their weak spots along with her letters.”
Sark coughed and lowered her voice. “She can be a bit passionate on the subject.”
“The Grand Alliance has been too soft for too long,” Revya said. “We think that because we’ve gone a few decades without losing ground, we’re safe. We let ourselves fall into familiar patterns.” She laughed bitterly. “What’s a decade to the sraa? What’s a hundred years? Eventually—”
“There’s the city,” Sark interrupted, pointing. Revya, instantly distracted, peered in the direction she indicated. Pahlu looked too, more curious then he cared to admit. The Old Cities featured heavily in the tales that made the rounds of the Academy barracks. They were dark, haunted places, ruins ringed with trenches and barbed wire, silent monuments to futile last stands against the power of the Plague.
Some of that, he’d figured, was mere childish exaggeration. But he’d expected more than this. Pahlu leaned out to get a better look, and shook his head.
“There’s nothing left!” he said.
Not quite nothing. Here and there a stone wall still stood, flanked by piles of rubble. Some of the debris was recognizable—flagstones, tarry chunks of asphalt, some carved
stone pieces that might have been part of a statue. But there were no intact buildings, no trenches, nothing tall enough that he would have had to stand on tiptoes to see over it.
“They’ve been sifting through this place for years,” Sark said. “Persistent bastards. They’ll harvest anything but stone—metal, wood, bone, anything. They—”
“I see one!” Pahlu said.
He brought his rifle to his shoulder, peering over the iron sights, searching for the flash of movement that had caught his eye. It came again, the glitter of metal catching the sun. The thing moved in quick bursts, stopping as though getting its bearings, then dashing forward with startling speed. It was about the size of a dog, with a central oval body ringed by brass-mounted glass lenses and eight segmented legs. Even from a distance, the fluidity of its motion was disturbing. It moved as though it were truly alive.
“Well spotted,” Sark said, shading her eyes with her hand.
Pahlu’s hands were sweating. He shifted the rifle against his cheek. “Shall I fire?”
“Don’t waste the bullet. It’s only a scuttler. No danger unless he finds a few thousand friends. Quick, though, isn’t he?”
Pahlu nodded, slowly lowering the weapon. The little sraa didn’t so much walk as skate across the broken landscape, legs rising and falling neatly to match the ground so that the body barely stirred. He could see another one now, in the middle distance, poking its forelimbs into a pile of rocks.
Marilei’s Wrath shifted underneath them, bearing to port. Revya turned to keep the sraa in view.
“The captain will circle the city to check for oxcarts,” Sark said. “Too risky to try to go over all those rocks unless we have a good reason.”
Operation Arcana Page 9
