Legion Of The Damned - 02 - The Final Battle

by William C. Dietz

“I believe it was Counselor Rewa-Ba, or a member of his party, Sector Marshal.”

  Poseen-Ka gestured disgust and stepped over the body of a dead and nearly desiccated worm. A beautifully wrought glass dagger protruded from the creature’s side. The Hudathan was a soldier, and soldiers destroy things, but for a purpose. The wanton destruction of a building was as foreign to the Hudathan as the human concept of pity.

  Kenor Rewa-Ba, Counselor to the Hudathan people and nephew of Triad member Selor Rewa-Ba, was a bit frightened. And with good reason, since he had acted without his uncle’s knowledge, and contrary to expectations, in a society where expectations were synonymous with duty.

  But the Triad was a long ways off, and sometimes weeks behind the news, which meant that he must act on his own. Fortunately, after months of prolonged nagging, his uncle had released Rewa-Ba from the tedium of governmental affairs and permitted him to conduct a “fact-finding mission” out along the frontier, a wise investment, and one that was about to pay off.

  Rewa-Ba aimed the vehicle-mounted recoiless rifle at another one of the fantastically shaped crystalline structures, sighted on its base, and fired. The muffled bang, followed by an equally muffled crash, and sheets of falling glass were most gratifying. No wonder so many of his peers had chosen the military. Destroying things was fun. The fact that his bodyguards thought he was an idiot, and gestured to each other behind his back, was lost on him.

  Rewa-Ba had chosen another building, and was just about to bring it down as well, when Dagger Commander Molo-Sa touched his shoulder. “Sector Marshal Poseen-Ka has arrived.”

  “What? Who? Speak up, you idiot.”

  Molo-Sa’s face was completely expressionless as he removed the protectors that covered the counselor’s funnel-shaped ears. “Sector Marshal Poseen-Ka has arrived and is waiting to speak with you.”

  “Well of course he is,” Rewa-Ba replied irritably, jumping to the ground. “He wouldn’t want to speak with you . . . now would he?”

  “No,” Molo-Sa replied woodenly, “he wouldn’t.”

  “Good,” Rewa-Ba said importantly, “at least that’s settled. Well, come on, the marshal is waiting.”

  Poseen-Ka was waiting, and judging from his expression, none too patiently. He was huge, somewhat grizzled, and very intimidating, as were the heavily armed troopers who stood around him. Rewa-Ba felt fear tickle the bottom of his belly, told himself that he was in charge, and assumed the same arrogant attitude that his uncle was famous for. “Poseen-Ka . . . how nice to see you.”

  Poseen-Ka made note of the fact that the greeting was overly familiar, coming as it did from someone he had never met before, and intentionally rude, since his rank should have been included. He ran a critical eye over the short, pudgy figure in front of him and knew his initial impression had been correct. Rewa-Ba was a minor functionary who abused his authority, believed the lies fed him by subordinates, and couldn’t find his posterior in broad daylight. He responded accordingly. “Please get to the point, Counselor . . . why have you seen fit to interfere with fleet operations? And why are you wasting my time with this meeting?”

  The direct, clearly hostile approach took Rewa-Ba by surprise. He found himself on the defensive and the stutter that had plagued his younger days threatened to return. He managed to control it, but just barely. “I suggest you watch your tone, Sector Marshal . . . especially in light of the fact that I am the direct representative of the Hudathan people.”

  “More like the direct representative of your uncle’s anus,” Poseen-Ka replied contemptuously. “Answer my question or face charges in a military court.”

  Rewa-Ba’s bodyguards exchanged amazed looks as their leader scrambled to recover some of his dignity. “I intercepted the fleet in order to provide you with critical information.”

  Rewa-Ba allowed the words to hang there, waiting for Poseen-Ka to ask the obvious question, but it never came. The soldier remained silent, certain that Rewa-Ba would crack, and unsurprised when he did. Having been unable to elicit the response he’d hoped for, the civilian tried the next best thing, a dramatic statement. “I have reason to believe that a spy has infiltrated your staff.”

  Poseen-Ka checked to make sure that Rewa-Ba was serious, turned, and looked at his bodyguards. He gestured towards Isaba-Ra. “Really? The Confederates have a spy on my staff? Is this the one? Or how about Kalo-Ka over there? . . . He’s mean enough to be human. All right, Kalo-Ka, take off that mask, and show us your real face.”

  Everyone, including Kalo-Ka, laughed uproariously. The very notion of someone of another race passing as a Hudathan was absurd. Rewa-Ba felt his resolve start to melt away and knew that his only hope lay in being right. “Right makes its own rules,” his uncle liked to say, and Rewa-Ba knew it was true. If he was right, and could prove that he was right, Poseen-Ka would have to eat his words. “Go ahead and make light of the situation if you wish, Sector Marshal Poseen-Ka, but remember this: if there is a spy on your staff, the Confederacy knows that you’re coming, and is waiting for you.”

  Poseen-Ka gave it some thought. In spite of the fact that the Confederacy would be expecting an attack on Algeron, expecting and knowing were two different things, since the latter allowed for a concentration of forces that could overwhelm his fleet. So, annoying though the counselor might be, it seemed prudent to hear him out. “All right Rewa-Ba, where’s your proof? Let’s see it.”

  Rewa-Ba loved drama and this was the moment that he’d been waiting for. He gestured to his bodyguards and imitated the tone that his uncle used with underlings. “Bring the human and the holo player.”

  There was an uncomfortable pause while one of Rewa-Ba’s functionaries made his way over to a carefully sealed command vehicle, ordered a guard to unlock the side hatch, and drew his side arm. The door slid open and a human stepped out.

  The prisoner wore an olive drab flight suit and a red baseball cap. He hadn’t shaved for three or four days and looked tired. The name tape over his left breast pocket read “Lt. Bruce Jensen” and he was scared. The same luck that had helped him out of a hundred jams, including the one on Jericho, had suddenly deserted him. He’d gone hyper to escape a Hudathan DE, exited on the edge of the Orlani System, and discovered that both of his normal drives had suffered battle damage. That’s when he’d sent a distress call, finished a bottle of Old Hand, and drifted off to sleep. He’d been asleep—okay, passed out—when Rewa-Ba and his merry men had happened along, intercepted the distress signal, and tracked it to its source.

  The aliens had already blown the outer hatch and were hard at work on the inner one when a cacaphony of alarms pulled Jensen out of a rather pleasant dream and into a real-world nightmare. He had barely managed to scramble into his space armor and was about to execute a random hyperspace jump when vacuum sucked the atmosphere out of his cabin and a Hudathan appeared. The good news was that he was alive, but at what cost? Highly classified information had fallen into the enemy’s hands, and it was his fault.

  A pair of troopers grabbed Jensen’s elbows and half carried, half walked him to the place where their superiors stood. Jensen looked at the officers and hoped that the smaller, softer one was in charge. It quickly turned out that he wasn’t.

  “So,” Poseen-Ka hissed, “who are you?”

  Jensen was surprised by the Hudathan’s command of Standard and swallowed to clear his throat. “First Lieutenant Bruce Jensen, sir.”

  “And your assignment?”

  “Pilot of the LRS-236.”

  “LRS stands for ‘long range scout’? Sometimes used as couriers?”

  Jensen shrugged.

  “And you were captured without being able to destroy the dispatches you carried?”

  Jensen stared straight ahead. Poseen-Ka signaled understanding and turned to Rewa-Ba. “So, Counselor, show me the information recovered from the human’s ship.”

  The official gestured and some jury-rigged electronic components were brought forward. The markings and relatively small controls
were clearly human in origin. A folding table was put in place, cables were connected to a power source, and switches were thrown. The relevant section of a much longer message was cued and ready to go. Rewa-Ba couldn’t resist the temptation to introduce it. “My intelligence officer informs me that the speaker is General Marianne Mosby . . . and that her message is directed to General Ian St. James.”

  Poseen-Ka had heard of Mosby and met St. James immediately after the Battle of Algeron. A battle that he had lost and the human had won. Though still somewhat skeptical about the value of Rewa-Ba’s intelligence, the sector marshal wanted to judge for himself. He signaled understanding and waited while the final button was pressed. The air shimmered and an image appeared. The human female wore Legion khaki and seemed to be on familiar terms with the person she was talking to. “. . . so, although it wouldn’t be prudent to discuss how we know, suffice it to say that we have it on good authority that Poseen-Ka will attack Algeron, and soon. With that in mind we are sending additional naval units to your system along with two battalions of marines. Now, moving on to the question of supplies . . .”

  Rewa-Ba gestured and the image disappeared. “There’s more, but it’s boring stuff, mostly, all about logistics.”

  Poseen-Ka could have told the civilian that logistics was the most important part of any war but saw no reason to waste his energy. “Thank you, Counselor, I retract my earlier comments, and indeed thank you for bringing this information to my attention. The Triad chose wisely when they sent you on your present mission.”

  Rewa-Ba felt his heart swell with pride. The great Poseen-Ka had praised him! Now, to make sure that word of his success found its way to the proper quarter . . . “So, you will inform the high command? And take the fleet back towards Hudatha?”

  Poseen-Ka registered surprise. “Take the fleet back? Whatever for?”

  Rewa-Ba felt confused. “Why, to avoid the trap, of course. You have no choice.”

  “Oh, but I do,” the sector marshal replied confidently. “Scouts will be sent to make contact with other elements of the fleet. They will head for Algeron and drop hyper at the same moment that we do. By destroying the Confederacy’s fleet, we will chop months, perhaps years off the war.”

  “But what about the spy?” Rewa-Ba said desperately. “Shouldn’t you find him first? What if he reveals this plan as well? Besides, the message never got through, so there may be less of an opportunity than you suppose.”

  Poseen-Ka struggled to control his growing impatience. “Anything is possible, Counselor, but consider the facts: The human chose to omit how the information was obtained. We use couriers as well . . . some of them are missing. Which is why we send important messages in a multiplicity of ways, as does the enemy. Why look for complex answers when the simple ones are more likely?”

  Rewa-Ba was far from satisfied, but knew he couldn’t win, and settled for what he already had: a success with no responsibility for whatever ensued. “I bow to your expertise, Sector Marshal. I’m sure you know best. How would you like to dispose of the human?”

  Poseen-Ka motioned to Isaba-Ra. “The human is of no further value. Shoot him.”

  Isaba-Ra drew his side arm, felt his stomach start to chum, and wanted to scream. Jensen hadn’t understood the words but the action was clear. He turned and started to run. Isaba-Ra led the pilot, knew he could drop him, and allowed the moment to pass. He jerked on the trigger, felt the recoil, and heard the bang. A glass sculpture exploded as Jensen sprinted for a building.

  Isaba-Ra was about to fire again when the sound of an automatic weapon ripped the air, Jensen stumbled, and jerked as a hail of bullets hit him. Isaba-Ra holstered his weapon, turned, and saw that Poseen-Ka was amused. “You’d better spend some time on the range . . . even I shoot better than that.”

  More than three standard days had passed by the time that Isaba-Ra made his final decision, checked to make sure that the clues were as they should be, and left the small but comfortable cabin. His diary, created over the last couple of days, would document a severe case of depression, as would some unsent letters and the dark, somewhat morbid sketches that decorated the bulkheads. He hoped to escape but any number of things could and probably would go wrong.

  The thing that worried him the most was the possibility that the Hudathans would discover what sort of creature had lived in their midst. He was worried not out of loyalty to the Hegemony, or the Confederacy of Sentient Beings, but to others like himself. Assuming that there were any.

  There was the normal ebb and flow of foot traffic in the corridors. Isaba-Ra saw spear leaders flanked by their bodyguards, ratings on errands, troopers headed to eat, and pilots just back from patrol. The same pilots who might be ordered to follow and kill him if he managed to clear the ship.

  Clusters of internally lit pictograms hung over the center of each intersection, evenly spaced light strips passed overhead, identical junction boxes appeared every twenty feet or so, and gratings clanged under foot.

  A pair of heavily armed troopers stood next to the command deck’s lift tube. They gestured the respect due to a sector marshal’s aide and allowed Isaba-Ra to enter. The platform carried him one level upwards, where more guards checked his identity and allowed him to pass. Poseen-Ka’s quarters were less than fifty feet away and the spy felt his heart beat faster as he marched down the hall, turned into the cubicle that served as his office, and paused to make sure that no one had followed. The corridor was empty. Reassured, he closed the outer hatch, drew the energy pistol that officers were required to wear aboard ship, and checked to make sure that it was fully charged. A second weapon, hidden in the waistband of his trousers, doubled the firepower at his command.

  The inner hatch provided access to the small galley in which the sector marshal’s meals were prepared. First meal had been served and consumed. The cook was on his break and would return in fifteen minutes or so. Stepping inside, the spy tiptoed to the window through which food was passed, and inched the panel aside. His heart was in his mouth. What if Poseen-Ka had broken his routine? What if the sector marshal had chosen to sit on the other side of the table? And was staring at the panel?

  But the Hudathan was where he was supposed to be, back to the opening, peering into his latest terrarium. To the best of Isaba-Ra’s knowledge, tending the plastic bubble, and the miniaturized likeness of Hudathan countryside that lay within, was the only form of recreation that Poseen-Ka allowed himself. It seemed ironic that the aspect of Poseen-Ka’s personality that most humans could understand was the one that left him vulnerable to assassination.

  Careful to make no sound, he brought the energy pistol up, aimed it at the back of the Hudathan’s head, and put his finger on the trigger. This was the moment that he’d planned for, when he would kill the enemy leader, weaken the fleet, and reduce the possibility of a Hudathan victory. Because while the fleet had plenty of capable officers, none of them was on a par with Poseen-Ka.

  But the spy couldn’t bring himself to pull the trigger. Because in spite of the fact that the sector marshal had the blood of countless innocent sentients on his hands, Isaba-Ra liked and respected him. The pistol wavered and was withdrawn. Isaba-Ra slid the panel closed, tiptoed out of the galley, and into his office. He was in the lift tube on his way to the flight deck three minutes later.

  The process of signing out for a training mission, peeling away from the fleet, and running like hell turned out to be a lot easier than Isaba-Ra thought it would be. But the Hudathans were known for strict discipline, and when the prescribed number of interrogatories brought no response, fighters were dispatched to bring him back.

  The spy thought about killing some of them, but knew that it wouldn’t make any difference, since the fighter didn’t have enough range to reach a Confederacy outpost. So he looked out through the canopy, took aim on a star, and ignored his pursuers.

  Poseen-Ka was in the process of placing a tiny cabin next to a gunmetal gray lake when the news arrived. Nagwa Isaba-Ra, the best
aide he’d ever had, was dead.

  27

  Victory at all costs, victory in spite of terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory there is no survival.

  Winston Churchill

  To the House of Commons

  Standard year 1940

  Planet Algeron, the Confederacy of Sentient Beings

  Enormous though it was, the wardroom aboard the battleship Invictor was packed with officers. It was a long, narrow room filled with theater-style seating. Looped holos of famous naval battles, all against the Hudathans, graced the slightly curved bulkheads. Most of the audience were of human stock, but Sergi Chien-Chu saw others as well, including a contingent of hard-looking Ramanthians, and a scattering of Naa. They were the most visible evidence of his efforts to broaden membership in the Confederacy’s armed forces but not the most important.

  No, there were thousands of Trooper Ills to consider, with their melding of sentient and near-sentient life-forms, the Say’lynt in their spacefaring swimming pool, and a host of races busily producing the ships, weapons, and materials required by those capable of physical combat. And, thanks to the Hudathans’ ruthless extermination of even the most helpless civilizations, their suffering was widely known. As a result, the resentment Anguar feared failed to surface, all the races felt a sense of partnership, and the Confederacy had been strengthened rather than weakened.

  As the senior officer of LEGCOM Algeron, General Ian St. James had accepted the role of moderator, and launched into the inevitable introduction. Chien-Chu heard his name surface in the ocean of words and forced his mind to the task at hand. He waited for the applause that nearly always followed the list of his accomplishments, stood, and made his way to the podium.

  Although everyone present had seen him on countless news vids, many had never seen him in person, or in this person anyway, since his new, mostly cybernetic body was at odds with the rather portly version that had preceded it. He wore the uniform of a vice-admiral. The room hummed as the officers marveled, joked, and commented on his blond good looks. Chien-Chu understood and smiled from the podium. A sea of faces looked up at him. “Thank you, General St. James . . . and greetings, fellow sentients. We are gathered in the name of a great cause.” The words hung in the air, conversation died away, and Chien-Chu took possession of the room.