How long it took us to figure that out . . . and so many Clansmen still cannot accept it, no matter the decades that passed. Instead they reach for other explanations. The Elstars. The neo-Crusader philosophy, rumored to have started with the Hell’s Horses and now growing with parts of the Jade Falcon Touman, of total war. The entire Sea Fox Clan? Mystics?
He opened his mouth until it cracked, ratcheting the jawbone back and forth to unseat the tension riding as thickly as beetles on dung in his neck muscles, while his mind chewed on that line of reasoning before letting it go. Bad enough to be so handicapped in a fight, but then to have the weight of failure bowing him down . . . What I would not give for Kopek’s Cat or Liso’s Hawk right now.
“Commander, the Fox has left the beach, heading up a river that cuts through the jungle. Looks like we got a small canyon about a klick or so upriver.”
“Hold for the rest of the command.” Not that I have much of a command. He gritted his teeth again, further tightening already tight-as-strung-wire muscles.
To be stuck with such a small command, knowing what was coming. . . . He ran his tongue along his teeth, pinching it in frustration. That they must split up through the entire region to search for any clue of the Raiders made sense, as they were pushed for speed. But despite Clansman arrogance about their superior skills in a one-on-one duel, it never came to that. Two ’Mechs were down for repairs in the last week alone due to ambushes.
And yet they had no choice. They had to keep to the timetable. Had to hope that the combined-arms Star of a ’Mech, two vehicles, and three Points of battle armor would be enough to hold out against a concerted attack long enough to allow reinforcements to be dropped in via Nearstar, constantly kept one step from liftoff for just such an event. Had to hope the Nova Cats’ skills were sufficient to pull out a miracle, or be a worthy sacrifice to the glory of the Clan if they . . . were unsuccessful. Except they could not afford to lose so much equipment . . . and regardless, to date the plan failed. Miserably.
Kisho glanced at the radar monitor, picking out the other Pegasus as it protected the armored personnel carrier, which slogged through the sand like a bloated hypogat out of water. Kisho pulled up to a quick stop to avoid hitting Parak’s ride, accidentally kicking sand onto the flanks of the Pegasus. He punched up the magnification through the forward viewscreen, and the perspective dizzyingly swooped forward into a natural swath through the thick forest-style jungle. Though the foliage on this side of the island usually fell well below the height of a ’Mech, near the freshwater river the strange trees ballooned in height and girth, until the setting sun threw long shadows, like arms of oblivion stretching across the gap. He tried not to shiver at the image it presented, and talks with Yori on his first trip to The Republic surfaced. Bakemono. Demons. Monsters.
Have you become afraid of shadows as well, surat? The derision almost coated the inside of the cockpit in the thickness of his scorn. Yet it did not keep the shiver from raising the hairs on his arms.
“It is a trap, Mystic,” Parak spoke after almost thirty seconds. The doddering APC finally pulled up, sand cascading like a child’s tantrum, flying in every direction. The whine of the Pegasus vibrated even into the confines of the cockpit, the wash of high-pressure air adding to the general visual maelstrom.
“Of course it is a trap,” he replied. Why not state the obvious a few more times?
“But we will move forward, quiaff?”
Kisho toggled through radar, magscan, and infrared and could find nothing. If only his aerospace fighters were not flying a defensive position over the Nova Cat main encampment to stop another raid. He clenched and unclenched fists and arched his back, trying to ease the throbbing. No good. “Aff.”
Silence greeted the statement. Not much else to say. “They will hit us from within the canyon.”
“Aff, Mystic. That is where I would lay such a trap.”
Kisho’s eyebrows slowly rose, as the silence stretched out like myomer pulled taut against heavy current.
“If I were ever to lay such a trap,” Parak finally added, his voice a mix of annoyance and scandal for such a statement.
Despite everything, laughter bubbled—not enough to activate the throat mic, but enough to lessen the tension in his body. “Aff, Parak, so would I. So would I.”
“Then let us be about springing it,” Bordi spoke, the other Pegasus revving its primary lift fan like a Spheroid teen gassing a hoversled in challenge.
“Aff.” Without another word, Kisho revved the Wendigo, drawing more energy off the fusion reactor, sending the machine forward at a good clip.
The sun dropped away, a verdant curtain cutting off its bright stage light, throwing shadows into every crooked tree branch and darkness under every bush. The sounds of heavy military machines sat heavy against the susurrations of nature, all but annihilating the soft wash of shallow water across a bed of centuries-smoothed stones, and the sigh of a light breeze through the lush vegetation. Almost Eden.
But sights were deceiving. The entire area reeked of rotten eggs. An active vent on the slope of the secondary cone of the island was located not five kilometers from their current location, and spewed sulfur and who knew what else into the region. The twisted vegetation would kill as quickly as any PPC. The flora had adapted to the poisons constantly infecting the ground water like a disease eating the body of the island, spoiling its blood with pollutants and heavy-chemical effluvia.
“Star Commander Fost, prepare to deploy your Elementals on my mark.”
“Aff, Mystic. Preparations under way.”
They moved forward, fanning out as much as the limited terrain allowed, the twin Pegasus flanking ahead right and left, with the APC behind the central hub of Kisho’s Wendigo. “Alpha Base.”
“Confirm, Alpha Star.”
“Alpha Star, proceeding to”—he checked the coordinates—“thirty-four by twenty-seven, to grid Beta-tango four.”
“Copy, Alpha Star. Do you want Nearstar prepped?”
Tension spiked again. Prepped did not mean prepped, it meant launched. Against Warlord Pesht’s forces four decades ago, the Nova Cats learned harsh lessons of broadcasting clear intent, even on encrypted channels. But if he told them to prep and they found nothing . . . Tivia’s eyes haunted him almost more waking than asleep. One day she would call him out, and if he did not find something to show for it . . .
“Neg,” he finally said. It might be a death sentence, but better to die on the field of battle than to find your honor stripped and your disgrace paraded through the entire Clan. A mystic who is no mystic. An unbeliever.
A heretic.
“Copy, Alpha Star. Advise, quiaff?”
“Aff, Alpha Base,” he managed to respond, breath hitching and shoulders and back twinging under new spikes of pain running steel fingers through sickened muscles. A heretic. Might as well call me a freebirth and a Spheroid and get it over with.
While his mind played this way and that, like a Lyran trying to decide what new shiny thing to buy, eyes roved over the terrain. The river—more like a large creek—meandered, the dense forest carefully following its route. Though the canyon walls loomed less than a kilometer in the distance, the river cut hard to the left and, less than a hundred meters up ahead, swung back to the right, as though a drunken god had tried for a straight line and failed miserably.
They had made their way past three such bends when, of a sudden, Kisho knew he could not stop, but also could not go forward. Pain, always a constant weight on his stomach, spiked hard, but in a new way. Not in worry, or remembrance, or shame, but in something else. Despite his frantic state of mind, he smoothly kept at the controls, knowing he must not slow down, but not why. Something within. Something. A feeling swept from toe to forehead, face instantly dehumanizing, raising goose bumps, pinpricks springing along shoulders and scalp, bringing a sense of understanding: knowledge.
He knew.
Mind already in a heightened state, he immediately threw a hitch i
nto the Wendigo and slowed it considerably, coming to a stop a handful of meters before the next bend. Though he hated acknowledging weakness, the alternative would be worse. Far worse. “Need to stop for a moment. Shoulder”—he swallowed, gritting teeth, not just for show!—“spasm. It will pass.”
“Aff, Mystic,” came three sets of perfectly neutral responses.
Eyes beat across sensors like hands battering themselves bloody. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not on magscan, or infrared—could not trust it anyway in this infernal heat and thick foliage—not on any sensor. Not a stravag thing. Yet the knowledge burned like a new star in the firmament, bright and incessant.
He also knew he could not use their encrypted channels. It made so much sense now. The pieces came to him as though his subconscious had chewed on them continually, choosing this moment to present them in ordered fashion. How they managed to always avoid them. Always stay one step ahead. No idea how they managed it, but they must have deciphered their encryption and, despite the Nova Cats’ attempts at subterfuge, still divined their every battle plan. Once more, the knowledge burned within him, the sun at high noon, scouring away any vestiges of foggy doubt. Under such pressure, there could be none.
He knew his Star mates. They would follow. They were good warriors and they would follow their mystic. With smooth actions, he powered down primary targeting acquisition systems to avoid detection, while powering up weapons. “It is passed,” he said curtly, sliding the throttle forward, while sidling towards the edge of the coming bend, as though trying to avoid some particularly slippery section of river.
From one step to the next, the knowledge once more sank into his gut, blossoming in an explosion of light and understanding: now. Legs automatically stomped down onto jump jets and he feathered venting pressure slightly to realign and send the ’Mech sailing over the foliage bridging the river. If not for the aerial view, he would have missed the shapes lying in the water—submerged pop-up turrets of some type, perhaps jury-rigged, in a deeper part of the river. Even without the targeting reticule, he swung the PPC into line, feeling the shot, unleashing a fusillade of azure fire as the ’Mech peaked the jump and began to descend towards the river. Steam exploded like a winter avalanche defying gravity across a swath twenty meters long as the particle cannon sizzled water in a torrent of energy.
A rain of missile fire leapt downrange towards the bend in the river, as though nervous fingers, surprised by the assault, had triggered preset coordinates without assessing the situation or revising for new circumstances. Following contrails, Kisho throttled jump jets to full power near touchdown, while easing into a shotgun blast from his LB 10-X. Trees exploded in an avalanche of flechettes, scythed down as though by a series of spinning, giant machetes. A sympathetic explosion rocked the jungle, argent fire throwing harsh light onto a series of portable rocket launchers and screaming men milling about. Not enough to down me, but enough to peel off some serious armor and perhaps take out a vehicle or two.
Plasma screaming from magnetic baffles, the Wendigo slammed into the rocky edge of the river as two untouched makeshift turrets boiled up out of the water, lances of ruby slicing towards his position. Yet both shots missed, their remote pilots finding it too difficult to track the turrets so far off preprogrammed firing arcs. With casual ease, whips of cerulean energy popped the small black canisters like ugly zits, and black, burning metal vanished into hissing water and charnellike rapids of oozing, smoking oil.
You may still wage better strategic wars at times, but you will find, as ever, a Clansman is without equal in immediate tactics. The grin of satisfaction for biting back at the striking Raiders, albeit against only a handful of desperate infantry, brought a relief so powerful his vision seemed to waver momentarily.
The three vehicles gunned around the bend, weapons already tracking and missile launchers spewing towards targets he could not see. He smiled sheepishly and reactivated the primary targeting systems, and several threat icons blossomed onto the screen, while the target reticule appeared, ready and begging for a dark gold tone of hard lock.
He watched as the Elementals disgorged from the APC like a bird regurgitating food for its young. But this food struck with a vengeance. Though it could not compare to taking down a ’Mech, the chance to finally do something more than made up for any lack in the battle, and he knew his Star deserved a taste as well. The battle armor swam into the trees, army ants eager for the slaughter.
He moved the Wendigo slightly, facing the canyon and checking sensors once more, then slowly shook his head. They will be gone by now, knowing we sprung the first part of their trap. But perhaps this is a sign of things to come. A turning point?
A sign. With an abruptness to steal away breath, the realization of his line of thinking clenched iron-banded fingers across his chest, and the maelstrom of events leading to the discovering of the trap cascaded back into consciousness. How did I know? How? His stomach clamped again, while hands gripped joysticks until tendons popped. I did not hunt for it. I did not fall into a trance to find it. It came to me.
It . . . just . . . came. . . .
He changed his mind and throttled the machine up, slamming into the nearest woods, hunting for a few elusive infantry desperately scampering away from the metal god bringing their doom. He shied away from his own memory of a similar event.
Better than to face his own reality at the moment. Laughter seemed to follow him. Laughter from a voice that never laughed.
Interlude III
The Founder:
We will do what we must. Three centuries ago this day, Operation Klondike ended, Golden Century, imminent flowering; justification and fulfillment. We follow hallowed footsteps. We will do what we must.
—The Remembrance (Clan Nova Cat),
Passage 467, Verse 29, Lines 21-28
Ways of Seeing Park, Barcella
Nova Cat Reservation, Irece
Irece Prefecture, Draconis Combine
26 May 3122
He huddled, today’s hurts and black marks starting to go away. The Machine was done with him and he didn’t want to think about tomorrow.
Three cried in his arms, while Two sat with a small space between them, but they could still touch each other. If they needed to. But Two was looking away. Two always looked away now.
The cold floor made his right leg hurt extra bad—not his fault, Eight should not have gotten in the way of the Machine and they both got it—and he needed to pee in the corner hole. But it could wait. He had to make Three stop crying. They didn’t like that.
“Three, it’s okay. Your bad feelings will go away.”
The deep grooves in the skin across the top of her head showed like extra bad black marks. Like the Machine beat her extra bad today, but she was only in Dark, right? And it didn’t matter if it did or didn’t. They told them no. Told them no over and over and over again. Told them it was only in their heads. Sheesh, never mind the black marks on their heads! Right there on their heads! He tried yelling that one time and spent an extra period in Dark.
“Three, please. Come on,” he said, young voice barely above a whisper, as he looked around. The rest of the kids in the darkened room were trying to sleep, or stared at walls like they wished they could just walk through, or were scrunched up into as small a ball as they could make themselves. And he didn’t want to pay attention to those, ’cause if they stayed that way too long, they came and you never came back.
He saw Seven waving real hard to be quiet. He also saw Nine, Fourteen, and Twenty-two were inching their butts along the floor to get away. He hated them for that. He might do the same, if it wasn’t Three. But still hated them. Hated them bad.
“Two, you don’t have bad feelings at night. Right? Right?” He had to talk softly, ’cause he didn’t want them to know. And you couldn’t really talk loud, ’cause you could only take little itty breaths, ’cause you just never seemed to get enough air if you breathed hard at night.
He looked at Two, but Two would
n’t look him right in the eyes and he knew that, too. Scared eyes. But never scared out loud. No, not Two. But they drew his number first. And it had been forever since they told all of them that today were all a cycle older and they had a special present for everybody. But they couldn’t do it together. So they called numbers and five kids went away and five came back. But they didn’t all come back sometimes. But no one would talk about what the present was. But the black marks were sometimes worse. And more kids would curl up into the little bitty balls you did when you were just a baby. And they’d lie there and you couldn’t get them out. Even when you told them to stop it. Tried to even take an extra deep breath and yell real, real loud, ’cause they didn’t want to not come back. Did they? And so, even though they told them it was going to be a great present, some of the kids started to kick and scream real loud when they came to get them. And they read their numbers out loud. And it never worked, ’cause they were all giants. And you could scratch and kick and bite and they wouldn’t say anything.
And later, Two told him the present was an entire whole extra period in Dark. A whole extra period! And so Two only shook his head, but wouldn’t say anything now.
And that only made his heart jump and he had to lick his lips some—they were chapped something bad, and the salty taste made him thirsty, but no water bulbs till light—’cause most of the kids had gotten their presents, but he hadn’t yet. And Three got her turn four lights ago and then they brought her back and she wouldn’t sleep and when she did, it was bad. Real, real bad. She kept making funny sounds and she moved and he tried to hold her, like they always did to keep warm on the cold floor, and she pushed him away. Honest. Pushed him away! And now she talked about bad, bad dreams. And he wasn’t sure what to do. But he just knew it was almost light time and they’d come and they’d call numbers and he knew One would be read aloud. Just knew it. Just knew it.
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