The Better Part of Valor

by Tanya Huff

  The engineer looked sheepishly down at the fruit in his hand. “Ship’s partly organic, Staff.”

  “And it could be trying to get you to ingest it as a way to infiltrate the Confederation. You have no idea what you’d be shitting.”

  “You really think so?”

  “No. Get rid of it.”

  Heer sighed and tossed it back into the tank with its parent plant.

  A quick glance at Werst showed the other Krai staring challengingly back at her. His jaw might have been moving. Nothing she could do about it now if he’d eaten something and, besides, if it came down to a one on one, Big Yellow against a Krai digestive tract, smart money would be on the colon.

  “At the bottom of the ramp, we head across the atrium on a diagonal. Keep moving until we’re out of all this cover. Maintain PCU silence unless there’s no other option, and keep the dialogue to a minimum. We clear?” Heads nodded. “Orla, get your goddamned helmet on.” The patch of fuchsia amidst the gray disappeared. “Go.”

  The back of Torin’s neck crawled as they moved down the ramp. The public HpGs were always crowded. There should have been hundreds of people, dozens of races, every size and age, all milling about in a space that now held fourteen Marines, two scientists, a reporter, and a salvage operator. She should have been able to smell a dozen things but mostly the gardens. There should have been noise.

  It was the lack of noise that bothered her the most. Unlike the Krai and to a lesser extent the di’Taykan, Humans relied a lot more on their sense of hearing than on their sense of smell, and silence was a warning more often than not.

  It’s too quiet.

  And she was well aware that there was often truth in old clichés.

  Exhaustion had momentarily shut up the Katrien although Presit seemed to be mumbling to herself as she followed Guimond down the ramp.

  They were strung out across the park in a staggered diagonal when someone sneezed, someone else made a sound like wet fingers rubbing glass, the air filled with the smell of cinnamon and, an instant later, with weapons’ fire. As Johnston and Heer raced for the dubious cover of a copse of tarrow—Captain Travik making them almost fatally slow—Torin dropped to one knee and began firing back along the incoming trajectory, hoping to buy them some time.

  The moment the spiky, broad-leaved plants closed behind them, she dove and rolled, gouging through the pebble bed that provided the illusion of a traditional garden but still allowed the liquid nutrients to reach the roots. Under normal circumstances, leafy vegetation would not have been her first choice in a firefight, but these weren’t normal circumstances, and Big Yellow apparently had no more actual knowledge of plants than it did of sofa cushions—which made the tarrow difficult to get through but not totally useless as a protective barrier.

  As she scrambled behind the triangular leaves, an energy bolt exploded in the pebbles by her right leg, throwing a hundred or so tiny missiles against her. Her combats absorbed most of the impact, but Torin could feel bruises rising along the length of her calf.

  Heer bled sluggishly from a nick in the edge of his outer ridge and the back of Johnston’s left hand had been scored in a cross-hatched pattern—probably by a leaf tip. The captain remained unconscious. Bright side to everything. Craig Ryder and Harveer Niirantapajee had actually dug down into the pebbles.

  Smart. She wasted an instant wondering which of them had come up with the idea.

  Torin could see Guimond, the Katrien, Orla, and Jynett in the next clump of garden—Jynett’s HE suit a brilliant and unmistakable orange against the green—looking back, she could pick out Nivry, Huilin, and Werst. If Tsui had been walking as tail end, he should be…yes; the unmistakable spit of a benny came from up a branched palm.

  Up was good. It gave him the best line of sight.

  “Tsui, were they waiting for us?”

  “Negative, Staff. I think they were just crossing the park at the same time.”

  Just? Torin doubted that very much. It wasn’t coincidence that put both groups here—heading out of different passages, heading into different passages—at exactly the same time.

  “Has anyone taken a look at the passage behind us?” Not the way they needed to go but preferable to a firefight.

  “Way ahead of you, Staff. It’s been sealed.”

  She’d be willing to bet that the passage behind the bugs had been sealed, too. The ship was dicking them around again. In the vids, this would be the moment both sides would realize it and decide to work together against a common enemy.

  Torin jerked as a shot fried the edge of a leaf.

  Unfortunately, they were in a war, not a vid.

  “I see you’ve got each other pinned down again.”

  “Ryder, get back in your goddamned hole!” Shoving him to one side, she stayed reclining half over his torso as she took a quick shot at the glint of bug armor across the park.

  “You know, you’re not light.”

  “Not now, Ryder.” About to roll off, she froze, eyes locked on the center column.

  Two Marines up the column could provide enough cover for the rest to get out of the park. If the bugs were smart, they wouldn’t stick around to get shot at from the high ground, they’d make a run for the closest open passage. If the two Marines were in suits, they could drop smokers to keep the bugs in the passages and to cover their own fallback.

  Two bugs up the column could do the same thing and the door was out in the open, exactly between the two lines. Inset into the column, it offered shelter once it was reached. Reaching it would be the problem.

  And she had the shortest run on it.

  “Dursinski, where are you?”

  “Behind a bench about two and a half meters from the passage.”

  “I need you back here. I want two suits in the central column.”

  “Huilin and Jynett are closer.”

  “Huilin’s half blind.”

  “It’s not that bad, Staff.”

  “I’m not asking for your opinion, Private. Dursinski, move your ass. Drop back to Jynett’s position and then move to the column on my signal.”

  “Why didn’t the ship fry my fukking suit…” Dursinski’s complaint trailed off as the pattern of firing changed.

  While the bugs were distracted by the movement, Torin pushed off Ryder’s chest, ignoring his grunted protest. “Keep their heads down, people. I’m going over to open the door.” Clearing the plants with only minor damage, she tucked her benny close and sprinted across the open area. No point in ducking; the bugs tended to fire low. The column would keep the bugs on the far end of their position from getting off shots but the rest…

  An energy bolt nearly took her knee off.

  “Sniper on the upper ramp!”

  “I see him!”

  “So stop looking and try fukking hitting him!”

  Torin forced herself to dive and slide as her hindbrain kept insisting she wanted minimal contact with shiny, gray floors. She rammed shoulder first into the tower and flipped into the setback just ahead of a chemical impact. A single drop splashed up and hit under the edge of her right shoulder flash. Her combats had been woven from the same material the Confederation used to build ship parts and Torin had to believe they’d maintain their physical integrity long enough for her to get the job done.

  Way back in the real HpG on Paradise Station, she’d tried the door and it had been locked, a sign announcing Authorized Personnel Only in the three local languages as well as Federate. Odds were good that the copy was also locked. Not a problem. Last time, she hadn’t been armed.

  Another shot splashed against the edge of the door as she switched her benny to laser and began cutting the lock.

  “Keep their damned heads DOWN!”

  “Bugs know where you are, Staff. And they know what we’re trying to do. They’re not bothering to aim.”

  Wonderful. If they got lucky…

  Fortunately, the lock had only been designed to stand up to inquisitive teenagers.

&nbs
p; After the next splash—evidence suggested they needed time to reload—Torin backed out a step and put her boot to the door. It slammed open just as an energy bolt went wild past her shoulder and up toward the atrium ceiling.

  “Got her! Bug couldn’t resist taking a shot at your ass.”

  “Must’ve been a di’Taykan bug.”

  “Shut up, Tsui!”

  “Can the chatter,” Torin snapped, tucked into the setback’s one safe angle. “Dursinski, Jynett; you ready to run?”

  “Ready, Staff!”

  She spun out and aimed toward the bug position, squeezing the trigger as she yelled. “Go!”

  No one moved at their top speed in an HE suit. Fully aware they were bright orange targets, both Marines gave it their best shot as the rest of the team hit the bugs with everything they had. Jynett’s longer legs reached the setback two strides ahead of Dursinski, but they pounded up the interior stairs in unison.

  “Fuk, there’s a lot of them!”

  “How many’s a lot, Dursinski?”

  “Uh, seventeen, twenty-three…thirty give or take. Some of them are so close together they’re hard to count.”

  “So shoot them twice.”

  “Roger, Staff.”

  Sent in by General Morris to be pinned down by an enemy with a numerical advantage while attempting to keep a group of civilians alive.

  Déjà vu all over again.

  “We’ve got them pinned, Staff.”

  “You heard her, people. Move. Everyone into that passage before the bugs figure out a way around this.” At least, this time, it wasn’t turning into a bloodbath.

  “I’m hit!”

  If there was one thing in the universe Torin truly hated, it had to be irony.

  “How bad?”

  “Not good.” Tsui’s voice held as much anger as pain. “And I’m hung up on this fukking tree!”

  “Going back for him, Staff.”

  “Roger, Nivry.” Torin could hear the corporal moving behind her. Somehow the gravel ground out a different sound than it did for those moving out of the battle.

  “Staff. Dursinski. Bugs are on the ru…fuk!”

  A flurry of shots rang both up and down the column.

  “Bug on the way to your position, Staff! She’s inside our range!”

  “I’m on it.”

  Actually, it was anyone’s guess as to who was on whom.

  Trying for the legs under the armor, Torin threw herself out of the setback and slid round the curve of the column on her belly. The bug was up on her side sliding toward her, legs safely pointed away, torso folded back nearly flat against the abdomen. Torin’s first shot ran harmlessly above the floor. The bug’s hit high on the column—right about where Torin’s head would have been had she been standing.

  Torin flipped onto her side and kicked out hard as she passed.

  The bug started to spin but managed to get the curved claws on her lower arm around Torin’s ankle as the upper arms swung her weapon around.

  The helmet scans from the Marines on the Drenver Mining Station had shown that in hand-to-hand with a bug, the bug always won. But this was a new position for them, and as the claws closed, Torin realized that in bending so far back, she’d opened the waist joint in her armor. A thumb switched the benny to laser.

  A moment later, torso and head fell free of the abdomen.

  Torin kicked again with her free leg and took out the brain-case on the next spin.

  Eyes watering from the overpowering stink of cinnamon, she cut the claw off her boot.

  “Staff! I can’t get to Tsui. That ablin gon savit of a sniper’s got us both pinned down.”

  “Dursinski?”

  “Yeah, I can see her. She’s moved to a one-eighty from the door, Staff, second level. But the angle’s fukked for us. We can’t hit her.”

  “I’ve got her.”

  “How?”

  Another time, she’d have a chat with Dursinski about that tone. “I’m going to give her a target she’ll have to break cover for. Nivry, get ready.” Flipping her helmet scanner around to the side, Torin rose from behind the dead bug, studying the fake plants on the second level from the corner of one eye. The bugs on the mining station had been derisive of binocular vision. As far as the sniper was concerned, the stupid mammal was looking the wrong way.

  There. A glitter in the green as she rose to aim.

  Nivry’s first shot appeared to catch her under the upper armpit. The second spun her head around.

  Torin didn’t wait to see if there was a third; she was already sprinting for Tsui’s position.

  He was missing his left foot, sheared off clean just above the boot. Fortunately, the wound had cauterized—so it hadn’t been the bugs emitting the smell of burned pork. When he’d fallen, the strap of his benny had got hung up, twisting him around so that his good leg had been jammed in the deep vee of a lower branch. The only way he could free himself would have involved pushing off from the trunk with the bloody remains of his other leg.

  He was about to do just that as Torin reached him. She grabbed his calf as gently as possible and swung his leg out from the tree while freeing the spray tube of emergency sealant from her vest with her other hand. Nivry arrived an instant later, benny still covering the sniper’s position.

  “I hit her high, Staff, both times. I can’t be sure she’ll stay down.”

  “We’ll have to risk it.” The tube empty, Torin tossed it aside, snapped off Nivry’s tube, and kept spraying. The two together wouldn’t seal things as tightly as she’d like, but they’d have to do.

  “I can’t feel my foot.” Tsui sounded mildly put out by the realization.

  “Because it’s not there.” The second tube hit the gravel, and Torin motioned Nivry around the other side of the tree. At 1.87 meters, the di’Taykan corporal had height enough to free the trapped leg.

  “Oh. So I guess you’re telling me I’m a foot shorter.”

  “Shut up, Tsui.”

  He snickered, then moaned as the shock suddenly wore off.

  “Now, Nivry.” Digging her boots into the gravel, Torin braced herself, not so much catching the injured Marine as directing his fall onto her left shoulder, minimizing the chance of his injured leg hitting her body. Two careful strides took her back out onto solid deck.

  Panting and swearing softly in three languages, Tsui struggled to get down.

  Left arm between his legs, Torin tossed her benny to Nivry and smacked him on the ass with her right. “Stop it! Or you can walk to the painkillers.”

  “Fukking hurts…”

  “I know.” Shifting his weight across her back, she started for the passage. Three steps to get her balance and then she was running. As she passed the column, she snapped, “Dursinski, Jynett; give me a ten count and then smoke them.”

  “Roger, Staff.”

  Torin counted strides. One, two…Nivry fired at something behind them. Goddamned bugs just don’t give up. Under normal circumstances, she appreciated tenacity but this was becoming too fukking much. Five, six…Tsui’d stopped swearing, but he was holding fistfuls of her combats tighter than he needed to keep from falling. Seven, eight…Where the hell is that passage? Nine, ten….

  The smoke canisters hit and blew.

  Firing ahead of her now and behind, the sound of HE boots slapping deck.

  She almost stumbled on the lip of the hatch but caught herself and Tsui at the last moment, then straightened and rolled the injured Marine into waiting arms. Breathing heavily, she slumped back against the wall, one hand held out to Nivry for her benny.

  “We have a way out of here?” she demanded of no one in particular.

  “Passage conforms to the map, Staff.”

  “Perimeter pins set?”

  “At the first corner.”

  Nice thing about working with Recon, they had the right answers to those kind of questions.

  Dursinski and Jynett pounded by a moment later, then Werst and Guimond backed into the passage in a
swirl of smoke.

  “Close it.”

  Facial ridges shut tight, Werst shoved Guimond behind him and slapped the hatch controls.

  Torin half expected the doors not to work, but with a familiar purr they slid into place. Big, open spaces in stations made people nervous, so builders always set decompression doors into the exits. Big Yellow had reproduced them here and, dogged down from inside, they provided a barrier the bugs didn’t have the ordnance to get through.

  Probably didn’t…

  She drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly as the adrenaline buzz of combat began to die. Her gaze slid over the captain—any relevant change meant he was either conscious or dead. The former would be obvious, the latter…He was a Marine and she’d fight to get him out alive because of that, but only because of that, and General Morris could just deal. She continued scanning down the passage. Kneeling on the deck beside the med kit, Frii had Tsui’s stump up over his thigh and was applying painkillers directly to the raw tissue. The rest of the team were checking their weapons, changing charges if necessary—still edgy, still psyched. Huilin had his benny a little close to his eyes, but his hands snapped the old charge out and the new one in with confidence. The Katrien had rushed for Guimond as soon as he came in and were both pressed up against his side grooming with short swipes of curved fingers and chattering almost quietly to each other. God help me, it’s becoming a comforting sound. Harveer Niirantapajee appeared to be asleep. “Anyone else hurt?”

  Harrop shook his head. “The plant life did more damage than the bugs.”

  “I’m sweating like a pig in this thing, Staff.” Dursinski pulled at a fold in her HE suit. “Can I take it off?”

  “No. If Jynett hadn’t been in hers, that chemical burn would have taken off her arm. Be thankful for the extra protection.”

  “I’d be more thankful if I wasn’t sitting in a puddle,” she muttered as Torin dropped down by Tsui’s side.

  * * *