by John F. Carr
Deathmaster Quilland was perfectly willing to hand over command to First Citizen Diettinger, Cyborg Rank Köln was not. Boyle was somewhat in awe of the Cyborg and in a normal battle situation would have backed him completely, but as commander of the surviving Saurons he left a lot to be desired. Cyborg Köln was the perfect Super Soldier: his job was killing and he did it with economy and grace. However, he knew nothing about setting up communities and preparing the Race for a future on this hostile world.
Most of the other Soldiers Roger had spoken to had agreed with this assessment. However, no one in his right mind wanted to see a division between the Cyborgs and their brilliant commander—the man had saved them from the worst military disaster in Sauron’s history.
Boyle, for maybe the hundredth time today, ran his fingers over the four rectangular gunmetal pips at the corners of his collar tab—Fourth Rank, and a combat command to go with it!—and felt his spirits begin to lift. Regardless of this rift in Sauron command, this was his first combat duty and he intended to do well. Sure he was a little anxious, just as he had been before his experience with ship-to-ship combat aboard the Leviathan; but, tech or no tech, he was a Soldier first.
Boyle squatted at the edge of the pad and waited while Sargun finished hauling himself up the forty-meter cliff face. Soldiers would die if their leaders disagreed, so he intended to bend over backwards to avoid arguing with his arrogant superior.
Climbing, the Cyborg was a continuous flow of movement. Sargun never shifted his weight off one foot while climbing, until he had at least a toehold for the other. He also seemed to have acute eyesight, even for a Cyborg, able to find toeholds where Roger would have sworn a hopper couldn’t grip. Then he would move one foot up, find the next toehold as he moved, and repeat the process.
At last Sargun pulled himself over the lip, brushed himself off and looked down at Boyle from his full two and a half meters.
“All company Soldiers present and accounted for?”
“Yes, Cyborg Rank Sargun.”
“Fourth Rank, status of our transport?”
Boyle looked behind him at the three big tilt-rotors with improvised armor. Both the machines and their armor had been scavenged at Fort Fornova. How much cannibalization had gone into making them operational, Boyle didn’t know. He decided he didn’t want to, either. With Sargun in command, he had enough things to worry about.
“Fully fueled and inspected, sir.”
“Prudent. You have done well. Now, call the Soldiers for a briefing.”
Roger remembered the first time he’d faced a charging carnosaur at the Lebensraum Preserve. Even with a rifle that he knew would stop the beast, his stomach went cold and his mouth dry. How did Cyborgs compare with carnosaurs? The answer: They were more deadly.
“With all due respect, Cyborg Rank, I gave the basic tactical briefing while we were waiting for you.” Which was twenty minutes longer than it should have been, thanks to your decision to play climbing vine, he thought wryly to himself.
“Without my orders?”
“You gave no orders against the briefing. Our orders from the Deathmaster were to lift off at 0820.”
Sargun looked at the sky. Boyle doubted the Cyborg could tell time by the position of Cat’s Eye yet, so the gesture annoyed him. He remained at attention, although if he could have willed the dirty butter-colored hair on his head to stand upright—he’d have done it.
“Very well,” Sargun said finally. “You have done your duty as you saw it. Perhaps you will not need as much instruction as I feared a tech might.”
Boyle won the battle to keep the burning flush from rising above his jaw. Probably I won’t, war machine. But I’m not making bets about you.
Sargun gave the pilots a thumbs-up; the turbine engines coughed, spewed black smoke, and began to whine.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I
The half-ruined village had been overrun by bandits twelve years ago, when Baron Hamilton was still settling the affairs of Castell and “King David” Steele. Its survivors had joined the Castle Whitehall garrison, women, or labor force, depending upon their age, abilities and inclination.
Herdsmen and peddlers still used the few buildings that kept the wind out as a way station. So even the most paranoid Sauron would find nothing suspicious in the odd light and a few tethered muskylopes with saddlebags.
One of those lights was a candle, burning in the middle of a camp table set on a dusty floor. On camp stools to either side of the table sat Baron Albert Hamilton of Greensward and Brigadier Gary Cummings of the Haven Volunteers. Hamilton was bent over a sheaf of papers, squinting at them with eyes that had many more wrinkles around them than two years ago.
“Thanks for putting it all on paper, Gary,” the Baron said finally. He straightened up, then winced and put a hand to the small of his back. “In another generation we’ll be back to abacuses and wax tablets if things continue to go on this way.”
“Be sure you get a reliable scribe to copy this onto something more durable once you’re home,” Cummings said. “This is from our last batch of flash paper. We didn’t want anybody caught with it, ourselves included.”
“I understand. I’ll have Mattie do it. She’s only five weeks to term, but she’s going to climb the walls if I can’t find something for her to do sitting down.”
“I’m glad to hear it. How is Ingrid doing?”
“She misses her father,” Hamilton replied. “I would have brought her with me, but I wasn’t sure how safe it might be.”
Cummings nodded, trying to ignore the disappointment he felt inside. “That was the wise thing to do. I take it you didn’t tell her you were going to meet with me.”
“Ha!” the Baron shook his head, laughing. “No, or it would have taken a tamerlane to keep her at Whitehall.”
“How is she adapting to provincial life?” Cummings knew there was little time to waste, but Ingrid was the last of his family. Albert Hamilton had lost two brothers, a son and a grandson in this war against the Saurons. Still, he had his son John and daughter with him.
“She’s doing quite well,” Hamilton said, his eyes sparkling. “She’s got the household staff in tiptop shape and agitating to go out and kill Saurons.”
Cummings shuddered. “You’re not letting her—”
“Do I look crazy?” Hamilton said with a laugh. “I promised to keep her safe, and I’m a man of my word.”
Cumming’s nodded. “I know; it’s just…”
“Yes, she’s the last of your family. I’m fortunate to have grandchildren, and Matilda is close to term again,” he finished with a smile.
“How many grandchildren is this? “ Cummings knew he should remember how many grandchildren Matilda Hamilton and Aram Mazurin had produced for the Baron, but he was bone-dead tired and his memory failed him.
“This will be the fourth, and the other three are all alive so far.” The Baron looked around for some wood to tap, then compromised by thumping his own forehead.
Cummings grinned.
The sound of scuffling outside the hut wiped the grin right off his face. A few moments later, Sergeant Major Slater—who’d been his Top Sergeant with the Land Gators since ’21 came in through the door with a disheveled John Hamilton in tow.
“Look who I found skulking outside.”
“It’s all right. You can let him go.”
Slater released Hamilton from his neck lock, saluted and returned to silent sentry duty.
The Baron spoke first, “John, what the bloody hell do you think you’re doing violating the Brigadier’s hospitality—”
Cummings silenced the Baron with a slicing motion. The two Hamiltons are peas out of the same pod; if they get to arguing I’ll never find out what this is all about without alerting every Sauron from here to the Citadel.
John took the reprieve to run his fingers, comb-like, through his tangled hair. There were some streaks of gray in it for the first time, Cummings noticed, but John had those holo-star look
s that only got better as he grew older. It wasn’t for nothing he’d been called the rake of Castell.
However, he’d settled, though, when he had to. He’d been his grandfather’s right hand in turning the barony into a feudal domain, and done as much as most to bring down the late unlamented “King David” Steele. So what is bothering him now?
John Hamilton answered his grandfather’s question and Cummings’ at the same time. “I want to fight the Saurons. I’m tired of waiting things out at Whitehall, waiting for the other shoe to drop. One of these days—maybe it won’t for another twenty years but it will happen—the Saurons are going to want to seize control of our little backwoods portion of the Shangri-La Valley. Then they will be our problem, which means someone from Greensward’s got to know how to deal with them, negotiate with them or fight them. We just can’t go on living in a fool’s paradise of They’ll Never Come Here.
“They’re coming; it’s only a matter of when!” he finished.
From the anger showing on the baron’s face, Cummings could see this was an old argument. He could almost hear the old man’s thoughts: “Haven’t I given enough to the Empire? My son, my favorite grandson Raymond, two brothers, one uncle—where does it end? Here and now with the last of the Hamiltons? Our name may not be a great one, but it is a damn good one. Our banners fly, in Imperial Hall. Edwin Hamilton was the first man to discover the shimmer stones, out-foxed the Bronsons, returning to Haven with enough credits to bring Whitehall, an old Scot’s castle, from Earth. Old Colin Hamilton was the first commander of Haven’s many-times decorated 77th Imperial Marines—the ‘Land Gators.’
“Do we owe our blood to the very last drop?”
As silently, Cummings gave his reply.
Sorry, old man, but the answer is yes. Fathers, sons, daughters and children were dying all over Haven thanks to the Saurons. And the red harvest had just begun.
It was still autumn. The Saurons had bombed all the food factories and power plants. The Shangri-La Valley, the most temperate clime on Haven, grew only enough food to feed half its population. With fields bombed and burnt and food stocks carted off by Sauron raiding parties, what would happen here when the bad weather blew in?
Hunger, then famine, and then how many dead? Half a million, a million, two million, four million dead?
What about the rest of Haven, like the Highland steppes, where life already was on a knife’s edge? The Sauron’s didn’t need to sweep Haven clean of resistance. In far too many areas, winter would do it for them.
On top of it all the boy was right. Whitehall needed to know more about the Saurons—good, if there was any; and bad, which there was a lot of. Otherwise, the baron’s legacy would be no more than bleached bones behind crumbled walls.
“Albert, listen to your grandson. He’s making good sense. The Saurons aren’t going away. They’re here for the duration. And don’t count on any help from the Empire. If the Saurons haven’t won, they’ve about done the next worst thing. Driven the Empire back to defending the core worlds, and hang the frontiers!”
The old Baron flinched at each word as if they had been blows.
“As for you, young man, I’m going to make you an acting captain in the Haven Volunteers—”
“I thought it was Cummings’ Brigade.”
“Over my dead body, and I mean that literally. The Brigade is still called the Haven Volunteers, which has two regiments, the Fighting First, under my command, and the Falkenberg Irregulars—who are in disarray since Colonel Harrigan’s death. When I’m pushing up veldgrass, they can call it anything they damned well want. Meantime, you have a lot to learn about the military. Lesson one: you never interrupt a superior officer—even if he’s blathering, which I am most certainly not!
“Lesson two: you do not disobey orders, the way you did with your grandfather here tonight. I don’t want any foolish heroics. Your job with me is to observe and survive, not die leading the Charge of the Light Brigade.
“Are you with me so far, Captain Hamilton?”
“YES, SIR.”
“Good, because I’ve got some important things to say to you and your grandfather, and not much time to do it in. If the Saurons find anything or anyone from Greensward within my command, their patience with you will evaporate. Right now you’re tolerated, and as long as you’re tolerated there’s a chance for non-Sauron civilization on Haven. Give them an excuse to strike you, and that chance vanishes. So does Whitehall.”
“I thought you took out the last of their nukes, sir,” John said.
“So did I, Captain, until they laid several megatons on Fort Kursk. Understand this, our intelligence of the Saurons is somewhere between negligible and zero. All we know is what we see. That may have been the last of their ready weapons. Even if it was, I wouldn’t bet against their scraping up enough deuterium or plutonium for several pony bombs. There’s only one commander on Haven who’s certainly out of nukes, and you’re looking at him.”
John Hamilton frowned. “Would they risk their own people assembling a pony bomb... sir?”
“If they were desperate, yes. Or they might ask Enoch Redfield to ‘volunteer’ a few technicians.”
The Baron frowned. “The Satrapy’s that far into their pockets?”
“It might be, but there’s no pattern. What we have is all down here, anyway. Read it for yourself later.” Cummings tapped the sheaf of flash paper.
“Now, John, I want you to give to your grandfather everything that might link you to Whitehall. That means your university ring, even your underwear—if necessary.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good, you’re learning. Now, Captain Hamilton, say good-bye to your grandfather. I’ll be outside with the horses.”
II
After John emptied his pockets and wallet, it took all of his intestinal fortitude to look his grandfather in the eyes. “I’m sorry I disobeyed you, Grandfather. But—”
His grandfather stood up, interrupting him and letting off a stream of oaths. When he’d finished blowing off steam, the Baron sat back down. “Curse every one of those Sauron motherless bastards! I know, I was young—once. No one could have held me back from a good fight, either.” The Baron clinched his eyes, until they were all but closed. “You’re all I’ve got left….”
John shook his head. “You’ve got Mattie—”
“I know, I know, but the family name…I know it sounds selfish, but it would kill me if anything happened to you. I didn’t live this long to be the last of the Hamiltons…”
John felt as if he’d just been slugged in the chest. Grandfather’s an old man; he won’t live long—Saurons or no Saurons. Why couldn’t I have just given him the only real thing he wants. I’m not a kid anymore and Ingrid would have made a nice wife; we could have had children—What the Hell am I thinking!
“I’m not going to do anything stupid, Grandfather. I’m not joining the resistance to die a hero, either.” No, I’m just trying to get away from the woman I dishonored and striving to do something honorable in the process.
“I know you’ll do the family proud, John. You just don’t know anything about the enemy you’re about to face. Saurons—and I’m not talking Super Soldiers here—just run of the mill Sauron soldiers. They’re fast, so fast you can’t even see them move. And strong; I’ve seen them leave fingerprints in durasteel—Brigadier Cummings has a souvenir like that. With their enhanced senses and abilities, you cannot go up against one by yourself and survive—it just can’t be done.”
John had heard stories of Sauron prowess all his life, but now he was really listening. Do we have a chance at all, against these monsters? he wondered. “Look, Grandfather, I’m not on a suicide mission. I just want to help the resistance effort, and who better to serve under than Brigadier Cummings?”
“You have me there, John,” the Baron said. “I don’t know a finer officer or man, nor one better prepared to lead the resistance. He’s forgotten more military lore than I remember. If anyone can stop the S
aurons in their tracks, it’s the Brigadier.” He looked wistful for a moment. “Hell, I’d join up with him myself, if I were thirty years younger.”
“Grandfather, you’ve got your work cut out for you at Whitehall. Somehow you have to maintain local order without attracting Sauron attention. That, in itself, is a tall order.”
The Baron nodded. For the first time, John noticed that the short beard that framed his face was now all white. The lines bracketing his grandfather’s eyes were deeper, too, as were the furrows on his high forehead. He is getting old. I’m sure he needs me more now than he even knows.
“I’ll be back, Grandfather, I promise.” John knew that was one promise he had no business making, but the older man needed hope. In fact, so did all of Haven….
Chapter Twenty-Three
I
Cyborg Rank Zold swung his feet over the Springfield village wall and dropped the five meters to the filthy alley below. Such a fall would have brought the best-trained cattle and even some Soldiers to their knees, but Zold barely flexed his legs, then sprinted for the village square where the screaming and shouting seemed to be the loudest.
A dimly lit doorway loomed to his right, with a figure silhouetted in it. As long as it was upright, it was potentially dangerous. Zold wheeled and struck.
He felt his fist sink through the flesh and into the skeleton of a baby or young child, slung across its mother’s breast. The mother herself flew backward, hard enough to crack her skull on the chimney. She slumped into the ashes of the fire, and her clothing began to smolder.
Zold waited only long enough to see that she had no weapon to confiscate, then took off. This one-man attack on the rear of the square would raise his reputation higher than ever if he succeeded. But it might not succeed without all the speed he could make. It might even do worse than fail. It might mean the end of Cyborg domination. They had been in control on Homeworld, finally. Now, they needed to dominate this colony and establish their leadership over the Sauron norms.