Deputy Chairman Prescott’s voice interrupted the thought.
“Brother?” the politician asked. “There’s no mention of a relation in the man’s file, or did I miss something, Hoffman?”
“He was my brother,” Gabe said before Hoffman could reply. “I don’t care what the file says. He was my brother.”
Prescott raised an eyebrow. From his desk he picked up a folder—Wyatt’s personnel file, Gabe assumed. Coolly, he said, “I just want to make sure I have a complete understanding, Lieutenant Colonel.”
“Then you might want to look beyond what the file says, Deputy Chairman.”
Unable to help himself, Gabe had loaded the reply with as much insolence as he could muster, but still Prescott’s face remained unimpressed. He set the file back down.
“What really interests me right now, Diaz,” Prescott said, “is Imulsion.”
Gabe looked at his shoes, grinding his teeth. Here it comes, he thought.
“Who gave you the order to collapse that mountain?”
“No one,” Gabe said, fiercely. “It was a tactical decision. We were going to lose that battle otherwise, and at least this way the Imulsion source is kept out of enemy hands.”
“Oh, yes,” Prescott said sarcastically. “A brilliant tactical move, as you’re coming to be known for. But strategically you may have just cost us the war!”
The man slammed a fist on his desk to punctuate this point.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Gabe held the Deputy Chairman’s gaze for as long as he could, then glanced at his Captain. She averted her eyes. So he looked to Hoffman. The Colonel at least had the decency to stare back. Empathetic at what Gabe was going through, perhaps, but not enough to stand up for him.
“Well,” Prescott said finally, “what’s done is done, I guess. We have to move forward. Phillips? Hoffman? Impress upon the Lieutenant Colonel here that winning a battle means nothing if it doesn’t serve the greater goal. Then get him back to Gatka Ridge. I don’t like it, but he’s the most qualified person to oversee the operation now. Give him whatever he needs. Troops to fend off an inevitable counterattack from the UIR, air and naval support as well. As much excavation equipment as you can find. I’ll approve it, whatever the cost. We will have that Imulsion.”
“That Imulsion,” Gabe said, “is buried under a mountain. This is madness.”
“I don’t care what it’s buried under, Diaz. We need it, and you’re going to get it for us.”
“The hell I am,” Gabe shot back, before he could bottle the words up.
“We’re done here,” Prescott said. “Do your duty, Gear.”
His image vanished from the small display screen.
Slowly, Phillips reached across the desk and switched the comm off.
A silence began to stretch, and in it Gabe felt a fresh wave of fatigue worm back into his mind. He needed sleep. He needed a proper medic. And he needed his brother back.
Mustering the last dregs of his civility, Gabe said, “Permission to be dismissed, Captain?”
“Denied,” Phillips said. She was staring daggers at him. “I know you’ve been through hell, Diaz, but we’ve got a lot to discuss.”
“Hell? What would you know about hell, sitting behind that desk, Captain?”
“You’re out of line, Diaz!” She leaned forward, her fists pressing into the hard wood surface of the desk. “The Deputy Chairman himself just gave you an order, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll follow it. Follow it right back to Knifespire, back to that pile of rubble you left behind.”
“I left my brother behind, Captain.”
“That’s war, Diaz!” she roared. “We all lose people. Half my fucking sailors aren’t coming home thanks to your little self-proclaimed victory out there.”
“Exactly!” he shouted back. Then, quietly, “Exactly. They’re gone because of my choices. My orders. Wyatt was only one of them, but he’s going to be the last.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
Gabe reached up and started to pull the rank insignia from his uniform. “Captain Phillips, I resign my commission—”
Phillips came to her feet in an instant, her face contorted in rage. She looked as if she were going to vault the table and physically stop him from what he was about to do.
“Now hold on,” Hoffman said. He’d stood, too, and had a hand on the Captain’s arm. “Would you mind if I had a word with the Lieutenant? Privately?”
Phillips ignored him. Her glare, fixed rigidly on Gabe’s hand, did not falter.
“You’re seriously going to resign over this?” she asked.
Hoffman wouldn’t let Gabe answer. “Just… give us a minute, will you? I’ll talk some sense into him.”
“The hell you will,” Gabe said.
After a moment’s hesitation, Phillips stood and marched out. Hoffman waited for her footsteps to recede down the hall before he let out a breath.
Coming around the desk, he sat in one of the two chairs. And then he waited, saying nothing, until Gabe finally sat down beside him.
“Look,” the Colonel said, leaning forward, “I know how much Wyatt meant to you.”
“I really don’t think you do.”
Hoffman shook his head. “I do, actually. He talked about you all the time. You and Oscar both. The way he looked up to you… it spoke volumes about who you are, and how much you care.”
Gabe said nothing. There was nothing to say. Not to this man. Not to Phillips. Not to the Deputy Chairman or, hell, even the Chairman of the goddamn Coalition of Ordered Governments. He wanted to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.
“Talk to me, Diaz. Forget about rank and all that shit for a minute. Just talk to me.”
Without meaning to, Gabe let out a sigh of his own. A long one, and with it some of the anger drained from him. He couldn’t look at the Colonel, so he looked at the crack in the wall again.
“I’m tired, sir. Tired of bureaucracy. The chain of command. But mostly, I’m tired of carrying this weight, you know? I make these decisions because they’re the right thing to do, the move that brings us toward victory. But the cost, it’s too much. It’s… you know what, I don’t need to say any of this. You’ve been around long enough. You know what I’m talking about.” When Hoffman said nothing, Gabe decided what the hell, and kept talking. “Know what the difference between me and Wyatt is?”
Hoffman waited.
“The difference between him and me,” Gabe said, “is Wyatt didn’t need to understand. The justification, the consequences. He did the job, shook the dust off, and moved on. I can’t do that. I used to think I could, but after what happened out there, to all those who won’t be coming back, but mostly to Wyatt… I guess it taught me something about myself.”
“What happened out there was remarkable, Gabe,” Hoffman said. “I mean that. You have a brilliant mind for the battlefield. The loss of soldiers, it’s rough, especially when one of them is close to you. Believe me, I know. But it’s something every great leader faces and every great leader gets past, one way or another. You will, too.”
Gabe thought it over. “I don’t see how that can happen if I’m right back out there, putting our troops in front of the enemy’s guns.”
“So you’re going to resign? Throw away everything you’ve worked for?”
Gabe shrugged. “What other option is there? The reason I’m in these damned islands is as a reward for getting a bunch of Gears killed in—”
“The reward posting was for winning a fight no one thought could be won. Just like you did on Gatka Ridge.”
“Prescott seems to disagree.”
“He’ll come around. Or, he won’t. Hard to tell with that man. His brain doesn’t work like the rest of ours, I’ve come to believe.”
When Gabe made no reply, Hoffman went on.
“Look, if a change of scenery won’t convince you, then what about the job? Let’s find some other way for you to contribute.”
“Somet
hing where I’m not ordering people to their deaths,” Gabe said, bluntly. Hoffman nodded.
“If you want to put it that way, yeah. Just don’t resign. We need people like you.”
Gabe finally looked away. His eyes found the far wall, that same crack in the plaster again. It seemed as if it had shrunk in the last few minutes. Or maybe that was just the change in Gabe’s perspective, now that he was sitting down.
He stood again.
“Thanks for the advice. I mean it.”
Hoffman eyed him. “Sure. To be clear, though, you need to decide, otherwise Phillips is likely to throw you in the brig rather than let you walk out of here, and I can’t stop that. So make your choice, Gabe. Go back to Gatka Ridge one more time, or request a change. Whatever change you need. I’ll make sure it happens. Just… don’t resign.”
Gabriel Diaz looked at the man beside him, then back at the wall. Despite the resentment he felt, he could see there was wisdom in Hoffman’s words.
“What’s it going to be?” the Colonel asked.
“I…” Gabe finally replied. “I need to talk to someone else, first. Then I’ll let you know.”
* * *
“Wyatt’s gone.”
Saying the words finally made it real. Gabe, alone in his office, sat before the comms terminal with one hand over his wet eyes and the other gripping the microphone as if it were the head of a snake. He couldn’t look at the screen.
Couldn’t look at Oscar’s face.
“Tell me what happened,” Oscar said simply. Serious and to the point, as always. Gabe decided he didn’t care what was classified and what wasn’t. He told his brother everything, but never once looked at him. If he did he knew he would lose what composure he had left.
The story took less time to tell than Gabe thought, and that made it worse. It was just a small chapter in Wyatt’s life, in the end. The last chapter. At once fitting and somehow entirely unworthy of the young man. Finally, he ran the sleeve of his shirt across his eyes and glanced up.
And saw something he hadn’t seen since they were teenagers.
Oscar Diaz had walked away from the terminal on his end, his back now to the camera. There was a locked cabinet on the far wall. Oscar calmly removed a key from his pocket, stared at it for a moment, then inserted it. From within he removed a bottle and a glass. He poured himself a drink. A shot of something dark and amber. He drank it down, and poured himself another. When he returned to the comm, he set the glass down in front of him and looked at Gabe.
“Well,” he said, “go on, get yourself one. I hate drinking alone.”
“Oscar… I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” His brother had sworn off booze years before, when he, Gabe, and Wyatt had all snuck up to the orphanage’s attic with a stolen bottle. Gabe, after a few sips, had thought it nothing special. Pleasant, warm, and he liked the way it made the world a little fuzzy around the edges. Wyatt and Oscar, though, had turned their drinking into a competition. All at Wyatt’s prodding, of course. Oscar had obliged, for the younger man had gone through yet another rough day, and deserved a little slack.
The transformation in young Oscar Diaz was remarkable, even considering their age and inexperience. Suddenly there was this jovial, lovable goofball. Suddenly, instead of an older brother, mentor, and would-be father figure, Wyatt had a best friend. The two were laughing uproariously when Gabe excused himself and climbed back down to their dorm. They kept laughing for hours, and perhaps more.
Gabe fell asleep listening to that laughter.
In the morning, Oscar had overslept, missed class, and spent the day shielding his eyes from any light brighter than a candle. He’d vowed to never pick up a bottle again, and to Gabe’s amazement, he’d actually stuck to that.
Until now.
“You’re thinking of that night, aren’t you?” Oscar asked. Already his voice had transformed. There was a mirth to it, and a hint of something almost sinister. Gabe looked away, because of course Oscar was right.
“Well,” his brother said, “ fuck it! That night was the last time I actually had fun, damn it. It was the last time I was a person Wyatt actually liked. From what I remember, anyway. What better way to honor him, eh?!” And he slammed back a second shot.
Gabe could only shake his head. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected from the conversation, but it certainly wasn’t this.
“Who gave him the order, Gabe?!” Oscar suddenly shouted. “Was it Hoffman? That son of a—”
“I did,” Gabe said. “I gave the order.”
Oscar’s face pinched. His cheeks were red with anger, and there was a sheen of sweat on his brow. If was as if Gabe were looking at a different person.
Gabe could have explained. Told him that Wyatt had practically volunteered, taken the task on so that Gabe could lead the main assault. But what was the point? Oscar was right. Gabe had given the order. He wanted Oscar to yell at him. To crystallize everything Gabe was feeling, and ram it into him like a sledgehammer to a brick wall.
Instead, Oscar took another drink. The glass was shaking in his hand now.
“I’d hoped we could arrange a funeral,” Gabe said. “Take some time off. Mourn. Together.”
“And is that what he would want?!” Oscar roared. “No, brother, he’d want us to avenge him.”
“I already did—”
Oscar wasn’t listening. “No, he’d want you to avenge him, and as for me? He’d want me to be the brother he’d always wanted, and never was allowed. Poor bastard. Sorry about that, Wyatt. I failed you. We both failed you.” He was talking to the ceiling, and not making much sense. Breathing deep, he turned back to Gabe. “We’ll honor him in our own ways, Gabriel. I know what I need to do. You figure yourself out—but no funeral, okay? He would have hated that. Bury him quietly at sea if you have to.”
Gabe kept his mouth shut. Wyatt was already there, scattered across the Serano Ocean between two islands no one had ever heard of. All because Gabe had sent him there. All because Imulsion was worth more to Deputy Chairman Prescott than the lives of the Gears fighting for it. As if this were all some thrashball league.
Oscar was pouring himself a third drink. Or maybe it was the fourth.
“I’m signing off now, Oscar,” Gabe said. He reached for the terminal. Oscar, his mood transforming with each drink, lifted his glass and winked at Gabe before the image vanished.
* * *
He sat in his office for a long time, staring at the blank screen, trying to decide what to do.
Bruised and exhausted, not to mention grieving his brother, Gabe had fallen into the mindset that his choices were black and white. Obey orders? Gabe knew in his heart that returning to Gatka Ridge was out of the question.
Which meant the real choice here, as presented by Hoffman, was to resign, or reassign. Leave the COG and all its bullshit entirely, or continue to try and make this army into a force for good.
Both seemed right.
Both seemed wrong.
Gabe stood, and the chair creaked loudly, making that ugly popping sound. He turned to it, furious as always at the old thing, but instead of kicking it across the room as he had so many times before, this time he picked it up and lifted it over his head.
Two choices, Diaz.
Smash it on the floor as he should have months ago, or set it down and live with its uncomfortable cushion and old rusted bearings.
Smash it, that animalistic part of him screamed.
As Gabe began to swing it toward the floor, a third idea came to him, out of nowhere. At the last instant he flipped it over and set it there, upside down. The metal legs spun, squeaking. He left it like that, crossed the yard outside to the mechanics’ shop, and without asking borrowed a toolbox.
For the next hour he sat on the floor of his office, surrounded by wheels and bearings and bolts, meticulously laid out around him. He cleaned each piece, oiled them, and reassembled it all. Then he cut a line across the back of the seat cushion and started to pull out all the old, crumbled
foam padding. He stuffed it with the innards of four life preservers taken from one of the few remaining patrol boats. Let someone requisition replacements.
Not his problem.
When he had it all back together, the chair was better than perhaps it had ever been. Smooth, comfortable, functional.
Best of all, he’d spent an entire afternoon not thinking about the ramifications of his actions.
MEMORANDUM OF RECORD FOR LIEUTENANT
184729-H55R9-LM (DIAZ, GABRIEL)
SUBJECT: Revision of rank, transfer of assignment
1. PREVIOUS RANK AND ASSIGNMENT: Lieutenant Colonel, Vectes Naval Base, assigned to COG Army 7th Brigade and Vectes Joint Taskforce (Phillips, Janice, commanding)
2. NEW RANK AND ASSIGNMENT: Sergeant, Aldair Army Depot, assigned to 12th Mechanics Division, motor pool (Bowden, Samuel, commanding)
3. REASON: Self-demotion, personal
4. EFFECTIVE: Immediately
SIGNATORS:
Diaz, Gabriel
Phillips, Janice
Bowden, Samuel
ACT 3
THE GREAT SERAN REND
1: DAWN OF A NEW DAY
Kait closed the folder and laid it on the dash of the Minotaur, clicking off the flashlight.
The sky to the east had turned a dark pale shade of purple.
Dawn already? She rubbed her eyes. Took a swig of water from the canteen. Leaned her head back and closed her eyes.
Sleep wouldn’t come. How could it? After all she’d just learned, there was no way her brain would let her have a moment of rest now. Which was good, she supposed. One less night without the dreams.
Her mind drifted back to her childhood again.
* * *
The bedroom was dark, heavy drapes pulled across the windows to block out the blinding summer sun.
A lone lantern sat on the floor beside his bed, dimmed to its lowest setting. It cast her father in shades of warm yellow and deep shadow. Shadows much deeper than they had been even a week ago,Kait realized. He hadn’t eaten in all that time, save for a few gulps of broth that he mostly coughed up.
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