The Price of Honor

by Jonathan P. Brazee

  Hell, Burger!

  “Back up!” he ordered.

  He couldn’t do anything for the fallen Marine except hope he could be resurrected, and for any chance of that happening, the rest of them had to hold the field of battle.

  The three reached the road, and then joined Wolf and the rest, spreading out in a half-circle around the path leading to the gate. Hondo tried to see what was happening to Cara, but they were out of sight. There were sounds of crashing, as if heavy construction crews were at work, and Hondo could imagine the Grubs breaking into the monastery.

  Which made their protecting the entrance superfluous, like admiring the lock on the front door while the thieves went in the back window. But the skipper was there, and he knew they had at least six Grubs heading their way.

  As if reading his thoughts, the skipper passed, “Another nine are heading up Alverson now.”

  “Just worry about what’s in front of us,” Hondo said.

  “The six down the hill in front of us, or the nine coming up fucking Alverson in front of us?” Pickerul asked.

  “Pick your poison, Tammy.”

  The sound of sliding scree reached them, and a moment later, the tops of two Grubs appeared.

  “Fire!” Hondo shouted, as he sent his fifth hook out, glancing it off the top of a Grub, wasting it.

  PFC Joseph, with his sonic projector, stepped up and fired. His target shuddered and contracted, but then with a screech—only the second time Hondo had ever heard a sound from one of them—it launched itself up the last 40 meters of hillside faster than Hondo would have thought possible. He fired another grappling hook, this one biting into the back of the beast, but it didn’t seem to notice the current flowing into it.

  Joseph took a step backwards just as the Grub slammed into him, almost breaking his sturdy PICS in two. His avatar grayed out immediately.

  The Grub swung toward RP, but it was trembling, its movement herky-jerky. Hondo hit it with yet another hook, and this time, it collapsed on itself, deflating like an old balloon.

  And then the rest were on them. Hondo fired his last three hooks, frying one of the Grubs and causing it to retreat. After the final hook, he switched to grenades. Wolf was throwing flames, hitting Hondo once, bathing him with fire but doing no harm. What was doing harm were the Grubs. Hondo’s shields were dropping.

  RP backed away, still with nine grappling hooks in his magazine.

  “RP! So, help me, if you run, I’ll come back to haunt your ass!” Hondo shouted.

  In almost slow motion, the rear area warrior turned to Hondo, eyes wide behind his faceplate. He screwed up his face, then with a wordless scream, charged the nearest Grub, launcher out like a pike, and hit it, triggering all nine remaining pikes before his PICS gave out. The Grub stiffened, then blew, the shock wave managing to knock Hondo over before he could scramble back to his feet.

  “Sergeant, the skipper!” Doc Leach shouted.

  Hondo was moving slowly. His PICS wasn’t working correctly, but he didn’t have time to run an analysis. He turned to see one of the Grubs advancing on the gate. Morales was down, a wisp of smoke rising from his back, but the skipper and the first sergeant were standing shoulder-to-shoulder, pikes outstretched before them.

  Hondo tried to fire his shoulder rockets, but nothing happened.

  Snap the hell out of it, McKeever.

  He focused on his readouts. He’d fired every piece of ordnance he had.

  There were still pikes, though.

  Hondo tried to force his balky legs to the flatbed, but the Grub charged before he could reach it. He grabbed one of the four or five pikes that were there just as the Grub reached the end of the path and slammed into the two unflinching Marines, flattening them against the ornate gate itself. The Grub shuddered, but then started pounding on it, using its own body as a battering ram.

  With the pike in his hand, Hondo started running forward, his internal alarms blaring. His shields were gone, and power was being shunted to keep the suit moving. The Grub never turned, and one of the massive gates broke open just as Hondo drove the pike deep into its hind end. He let go, triggering the charge.

  The result was spectacular, more than he would have expected. The Grub seemed to pull up, as if becoming taller and thinner at the same time. It went stiff, and the right half collapsed, like a Grub stroke victim. The left half still moved, and it dragged the rest of the body to the side where it went still.

  All Hondo could figure was that the pikes that the skipper and the first sergeant had impaled it with hadn’t activated until Hondo’s set them off. All three at once had fried part of the Grub’s interior circuitry.

  Hondo turned back to get another pike, but for the moment, the fight was over. Joseph and PR were KIA. One Grub was dead, and the one at the gate was wounded. He had no idea where the other four were.

  “What happened? Where are the others?”

  “On up the hill. I think they are trying to go around,” Wolf said.

  Hondo was frankly amazed that only five of them had been killed facing six Grubs. That had to be a record of some sort. But running through the status numbers, they couldn’t do much else. Pickerul’s PCS was dead, out of power, and she was in the process of molting. Tony B had 11 % of his shielding, while Wolf was at 2%. Doc’s shielding was gone, and his power was not much better. No one had much in the way of ordnance.

  “Can you raise the skipper?” Staff Sergeant Rutledge asked on the P2P.

  “She’s dead. First sergeant, too.”

  “I can’t raise the lieutenant or the gunny, either. Well, hell. Looks like I’ve got the company. Not for long, though. You’ve got another twenty-one coming your way.”

  “Any chance of some help, Staff Sergeant? We’re kinda running on empty here.”

  “Sorry, Hondo. We’re in the same boat. We’ve got Grubs tearing up the back of the monastery, and they’re almost inside. We’ve got enough for one last hurrah, but that’s it, and there’s no way we could make it there in time even if we tried.”

  “How long?”

  “Four minutes. Five maybe?”

  “Well, that’s it, I guess. Kick some ass, Staff Sergeant.”

  “You, too, Hondo.”

  Hondo went over to the flatbed and pulled out the last four pikes, handing one to Wolf, Doc, and Tony B. He kept the fourth.

  “What about me?” Pickerul asked.

  “That’s all we have,” he said. “Form on me.”

  He took a position in the middle of the road while the other four, including Pickerul, came alongside him.

  He turned his depleted PICS to her, and she said, “Well, nowhere else for me to be now.”

  Hondo had faced death twice before, and each time, a sense of calm flowed through him. This time was no different. He didn’t want to die, but it came to everyone eventually. If the main body came back and kicked Grub ass, then he might get resurrected if he wasn’t messed up too badly, but he wasn’t putting any stock in that. If it happened, it happened.

  “Shit, here comes more of them,” Wolf said as Hondo’s PICS’ AI registered something behind him—up and behind him.

  Hondo spun around, pissed that more Grubs were landing. But the objects descending looked different. It took him a moment to realize what they were: the cavalry.

  The Klethos were landing.

  Chapter 38

  Hondo

  “Damn, there’s a shit-load of them,” Pickerul said.

  Hondo picked up a rock and threw it down the slope. He had molted as well, the third time he’d had to do that in combat. That had to be some kind of record as well.

  The area was full of Klethos, at least a couple of thousand. Two hundred had landed around the monastery where they attacked the Grubs with their usual ferocity. Within 30 minutes, the hill was clear.

  Down in the valley, the fight had taken a little longer, but twenty minutes ago, Grubs started rising in their spheres, a reverse landing. A retreat. The Klethos seemed willing to let
them go.

  “That’s it, then,’ Doc Leach said, sitting down beside them.

  “How’s it look?” Hondo asked, not wanting to hear the answer.

  “RP, I don’t think so. Morales and the skipper, no. The first sergeant and Joseph maybe. Hanaburgh, I think so.”

  “Really?” Hondo and Pickerul asked in unison.

  “Yeah, really,” he said, flipping a thumb back to where the bodies were lined up in the zip-locks. “In fact, I’d go out on a limb and say that there’ll be no regen.”

  “Thank God for that,” Pickerul said, leaning back on her elbows.

  Hondo would never have thought that Hanaburgh, after facing down six Grubs, would ever have been a candidate for resurrection. But Doc’s verdict put him in a better mood, despite the word on the others.

  Wolf came to join them. He’d just molted, and he smelled. Pickerul frowned and scooted over a meter.

  “What about him?” Wolf asked, pointing at Tony B.

  “As long as he’s got power, he stays in. It looks like the Klethos have everything under control, but who knows?”

  “Oh, thanks, Sergeant,” Tony B said over his externals.

  Pickerul languidly raised a middle finger, not bothering to look at him.

  “Any word on when we get out of here?”

  “Nothing. Staff Sergeant Rutledge says to hold tight. We’ll probably have to escort the VIPs back down to camp.

  “Speaking of which,” Wolf said, pointing back to the ruined gate where several people were exiting.

  Hondo stood up, stretched, checked his sidearm, and went over to meet them. Three turned to their right and started examining the Grub body, the one that had seemed paralyzed up to the point that the Klethos killed it. But in the other group of seven, Hondo recognized the xenobiologist.

  Her eyes widened in recognition as he came up, and she said, “Well, Sergeant McKeever, we keep seeming to meet each other.”

  “Yes, ma’am, we do.”

  “Sergeant McKeever has rescued me two times so far, Foue.”

  “It looks like he might have done it again,” the woman she’d called Foue said with a soft French accent, as she pointed to the dead Grub.

  “We are supposed to escort your party down to the camp, ma’am,” he said. “Transport will arrive, but we aren’t sure when.”

  “Well then, I guess we’ll just have to wait.” She turned to an older woman and said, “Thank you for your hospitality, Mother Superior, but I’d just as soon not go through this again.”

  The older woman—did this grandmotherly-looking woman really run that huge monastery?—laughed, then took the xenobiologist’s hand and said, “Things are not usually so exciting. Take care, child. I have a feeling your part in all of this will be significant.”

  The two women hugged, then the mother superior hugged the other woman and finally one of the men.

  The xenobiologist turned to Hondo and said, “We’re ready, Sergeant.”

  “Then let’s get you out of here, ma’am.”

  SAINT BARNABAS

  Chapter 39

  Skylar

  Sky strode along the Cobblestone Way, the 400-year-old stone pathway leading up to the First Cathedral Annex, the seat of government power on Saint Barnabas, the Brotherhood of Servants homeworld. Flanked by Foue and Norelco, the civil patrol kept the gathered crowds out of their way, but the people weren’t looking at the three diplomats. Their eyes were locked on the Klethos quad who followed Sky.

  Sky tried to exhibit a sense of righteous determination, chin out, eyes forward. Once again, she wondered how she’d landed in this position at a nexus of human—and Klethos—history. She had to produce.

  It wasn’t entirely on her shoulders. She had both Foue and Norelco, but more than that, on the other side of her earbud were her boss, the Second Minister, the Chairman of the Federation, the Confederation president, the Greater France president, and the UAM secretary-general. They’d been quiet since leaving the shuttle, but it was a nice safety blanket to know they were there.

  The crowd was surprisingly quiet as well. There was no shouting, no demonstrations, just a slight recoil as the UAM party came abreast of them. Sky was tempted to yell “boo” just to see them jump.

  They reached the 20-meter high double doors, made from the wood of an ancient kauri tree from New Zealand on Earth, which swung open for them as they approached. Sky didn’t change her stride but stepped into the dark interior.

  “This way, Mesdames Ambassador, Mister Ambassador,” a white-robed official said, ignoring the four Klethos behind them.

  All three of the humans had been granted temporary ambassador status for the purpose of this mission. It didn’t matter to Sky, but it evidently did to the career diplomats.

  Sky followed their guide down the Chandelier Passage to the Great Hall. She had no eye for the historical significance of the building. She just wanted to make sure that history was made today, and for the good.

  Inside the Great Hall, the first brother sat in the center seat on the dais. She’d always thought that the robes worn by a first brother were rather plain for a head of state, but that was before meeting the Jesuits. Now, as she approached, she could see the detail in the robe that reflected its own kind of extravagance.

  Flanking the first brother was the Alliance president, the Freedom Alliance secretary, and the Dentonian CEO.

  “Only the first brother and the CEO are real. The other two are holograms,” the voice in her earbud told her. “Just focus on the first brother.”

  Sky scanned the room until she spotted her old adversary, Bishop Van Meter, standing alongside the wall leading up to the dais. She let her gaze slide past him as if she hadn’t noticed the man.

  “Welcome, Ambassadors,” the first brother said, his familiar voice resonating throughout the Great Hall and raising a tiny shiver in her spine.

  He was a noted orator, but Sky wondered if he was having a little technical help with his voice. She shook off the shiver, and focused on his face, trying to read into it. His reaction, his decisions, would have grave ramifications.

  “Thank you, First Brother. The three of us, and our Klethos allies, appreciate this audience,” she answered as Foue stepped to her left and the four Klethos stepped forward into that gap, their sheer size intimidating.

  “Wait, and let them absorb our friends,” her coach passed.

  The first brother’s face remained impassive, but she could see the discomfort in some of the other worthies in the hall.

  Distaste or shame? she wondered.

  “I am here as a representative of the United Assembly of Man, an organization of which you are still a member,” she went on, pointedly ignoring the other three representatives.

  Everyone knew that it was the Brotherhood calling the shots here, and she’d had her instructions.

  The first brother nodded his head, and she continued, “Beyond the UAM, you are humans, part of the broad panoply that is mankind. So, despite your unfortunate and inopportune withdrawal from the task force formed to combat the Dictymorph threat, when your world of Destiny was attacked, the UAM responded with both Federation Marines and our Klethos allies to defend your world and throw back the invaders at a significant loss of life.”

  “Invaders that were only there because of your interference,” the first brother interrupted her.

  “We do not know how or why the Dictymorphs select their targets.”

  “So, you believe it was just chance that they chose to attack Destiny, home to the Saint Peter Canisius Monastery, a center of Dictymorph research?”

  “As I said, First Brother, we do not know why . . .”

  “Don’t argue with him,” the voice in her ear said. “The why’s don’t matter now. We went over this with you.”

  “. . . but what matters now is the fact that twice, now, the Dictymorphs have invaded human space. We believe that this is only the beginning. Just as they have spread through Klethos space, they will push their aggressi
on into our own.”

  She paused, and when the first brother remained silent, she continued, “It is obvious that your own forces, as vaunted as they are, cannot stand against the threat.”

  “We are developing better weapons, Ambassador.”

  “Better does not mean you can defeat them, only that you will take more with you before you all die,” she snapped.

  She waited for the rebuke from her unseen coach, but he remained silent. So did the Brotherhood, but Bishop Van Meter positively bristled.

  “With the full might of the UAM, we believe we can slow the inexorable push into our space, but despite the success on Destiny, we cannot keep this up indefinitely, even moving to a humanity-wide war-footing. We need the Klethos as our allies.”

  “From your own reports, Ambassador—reports I read with great interest, I might add—the numbers of your Klethos are not great.”

  She pounced with, “Yet they have been fighting the Dictymorphs for a century, and still they survive. And if I might candidly say so, we needed their assistance on Destiny. Without them honoring their commitment, Destiny would have been lost.”

  She had been ready with her response, knowing someone would mention the Klethos numbers.

  “Even if that was so, Destiny is but one world. Its loss would have been terrible, but not so terrible as to attract even more evil attention from the Dictymorphs.”

  Sky didn’t know why they were fencing like this. The Brotherhood knew what the rest of the UAM wanted. The UAM knew the Brotherhood’s objections. The question now was what the Brotherhood would do. All of this posturing was just that. Sky had no illusions that she was going to change anyone’s mind standing in the middle of the Great Hall, but appearances had to be kept.

  She hoped that what she was going to do when she left the hall, however, might affect their decision.

  “Granted that we are in a debt of gratitude to the Federation Marines who sacrificed their lives on Destiny, but beyond our thanks, just why are you here? What are you asking of our four states?”