The Blockade

by Jean Johnson

  Jackie quickly accessed her pocket tablet as she strode forward. It took less time to call up his personnel file—she could see his name tag from yards away—than it did to reach their side of the shed.

  “I meant real stripes! Jungen stripes!” the girl called back, first cupping her hand to her lips for the catcall, then flipping it dismissively. “Come talk to me when you’ve grown up!”

  The sergeant set down the crate he was heaving off the hoversled and planted his hands on his hips, “Listen, little girl—”

  “—Belay that, Sergeant!” she interjected sharply, raising her voice to be heard while she strode a little faster. Ironically, the last patch of sunlight on the area slid away, banished behind one of the hazy clouds drifting into place overhead. From the looks of the weather, it might rain by nightfall. Then again, Ton-Bei was an M-class world.

  (Trouble?) Li’eth asked. He was still trying to wake up from their nap in one of the officer bunkhouses, doing so by helping the Grand General deal with the mound of V’Dan paperwork that inevitably grew whenever a government or a military force—or unfortunately, both—started doing things in earnest.

  (Probably not.) Out loud, she addressed the college student. “Young lady, how old are you?”

  “Twenty-two,” the girl asserted, lifting her chin a little. “I’m not that young.”

  “First Sergeant Ivan Khrebet, here, is twenty-eight. Terran and V’Dan years are close enough in length that a single day’s variance a year does not matter. He is older than you by six full years. He did you the courtesy of presuming you are an adult because you are attending a school of higher learning. Perhaps you should do him the courtesy of realizing that as the equivalent of a High Sergeant, a Fourth Tier soldier, he is clearly a competent, educated, highly trained adult.

  “Considering that we Terrans have traveled hundreds of light-years specifically to protect you, perhaps you should do as your own Empress has commanded and strive harder to see us as adults, stripes or no stripes.”

  “I am a Third Tier! Why should I take orders from a stripeless—” the V’Dan student started to argue.

  “—Ja’ana, that’s the Grand High Ambassador,” one of the other students interrupted her. The new speaker was a young woman with darker skin splotched with pink stars, including one on her jawline. “Don’t you recognize her?”

  “Yah, don’t be a S’Arrocan,” one of the two young men added, his Imperial High V’Dan heavily accented. “She’s First Tier, not Third. Treat her with respect!”

  “Don’t criticize your friends too much, either,” Jackie added. That resnared the attention of the youths on the other side of the fence. “All of you, don’t get angry, don’t act snobbish, don’t be disdainful, and don’t dismiss what you do not understand, yet. Accept that we Terrans are the same species but a completely different culture that deserves your full respect.

  “As my own people once taught me when I was in higher education many years ago, think before you speak,” she emphasized in V’Dan. “Not just the words you intend to use right now, but the possible repercussions into the future based on what you are going to say.

  “Speaking of which . . . go easy on the flirting, all of you. Even for a mind-speaker, there are far too many things we still do not know about each other’s cultures, yet. But do take the time to get to know each other,” she added, looking over both groups. “We have a common enemy, and that makes us allies . . . but it would be a lot better for everyone in the Alliance if we could also learn to respect each other as friends.”

  A couple of the students nodded, and the young woman who had recognized her nudged two of the others. The group moved off, with backwards glances. Jackie turned back to the sergeant and his Squad. They had gone back to quietly opening, checking, and resealing boxes of parts. Idly curious, Jackie squinted at the labels, a jumble of numbers and letters in Terranglo.

  The first sergeant answered her without her having to ask. He did so in Terranglo. “These are replacement parts for the leg joints on the Class IV heavy mechsuits, sir. The Major brought a hundred mech for mobile light artillery, and everyone has ceristeel light armor plating. And . . . I apologize for losing my temper with her. She was cute, but . . . young. I forgot for a moment that our Human brains don’t finish maturing until twenty-five or thereabouts, and that means not until after she’s out of whatever passes for a V’Dan college in this place.”

  “I’m glad to see you paid attention in your psychology sciences classes, in school.” Jackie hesitated, then repeated herself from earlier, in Terranglo this time. “Go easy on the flirting, all of you, and pass the word on that. It’s in the manual you were given, on the basics of intercultural interactions—and in my opinion, it should have been listed every few pages in bold lettering to be cautious and reserved whenever you’re in doubt on how to act.

  “Even with my Gestalt bond with His Highness, I am still blindsided daily by the little things each side still doesn’t know about each other. You don’t have telepathy to help you. But do try to make friends. As the old saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my ally, but it would be even better if I can make him my friend.”

  “Sir, yes, sir,” the first sergeant agreed. The others nodded, still shifting boxes into storage. He lifted his chin off in the direction of the other temporary sheds and warehouses. “Are you going to be on hand for the mechsuit demonstration they’ll be giving this evening, Colonel?”

  She shook her head, smothering the urge to yawn. “Unfortunately, no. My group has to ship out to get to Zon A’Gar in three more hours—which means leaving as soon as the last pieces of Terran personnel and gear are safely on this planet.”

  “Just long enough for a smooth transfer, eh?” he sympathized. “A pity you can’t stay, sir.”

  Jackie shrugged. “You know the military, hurry up and wait, mixed in with long periods of boredom punctuated by way too much excitement. Plus far too much work to do on far too little sleep. Be proactive when talking with the others about this little incident,” she reminded him. “The more we Terrans talk it through, figure it out, come to expect it, and know in advance how to handle it, the better off we’ll be because we’ll carry ourselves with a confidence our fellow Humans will react to instinctively—we have similar physiologies, after all, and that means similar psychological reactions to posture and attitude.

  “Try to remember that yes, they have a lot of technology that’s more advanced than ours, whereas we are the more mature culture, when it comes to things like skin color,” she added, giving him a pointed look. “Don’t expect them to know how to get it right on the first try. But do feel free to go up through the chains of command to Grand General I’osha if things start to get out of hand. She is trying hard to treat us right and will be Major Slovaskoff’s best ally if you can’t handle things internally, once I’m gone.

  “. . . I do not want to have to come back here to fix any personnel problems,” she added sternly.

  “Sir, yes, sir.” This time, it came from a smattering of his fellow soldiers, not just from the sergeant.

  Pleased with their willing response, Jackie gave the little group a nod. “Carry on. Or rather,” she amended, switching back to V’Dan, “. . . carry on, soldiers. Don’t forget to practice the local language.”

  They eyed each other, puzzling through her words, then one of the privates sucked in a sharp breath, grinned, and held up a finger in mental discovery. “. . . Ah! Neh-yah-veh!”

  His use of the V’Dan phrase no-yes-maybe, which also meant more or less, made Jackie laugh. It wasn’t completely wrong as a reply, nor all that inappropriate, but as a linguist, she found it funny the private considered it a go-to reply when at a loss for words in the local tongue.

  CHAPTER 7

  AUGUST 15, 2287 C.E.

  AVRA 8, 9508 V.D.S.

  PELE-KASTH, PRIME CONTINENT, V’ZON A’GAR

  Li�
��eth had not expected each encampment to be the same from planet to planet and was not disappointed by all the differences when they landed. There were more buildings and fewer tents at the Terran base on V’Zon A’Gar than there had been on V’Ton-Bei. Then again, the Terrans sent here were using an official camping ground designed for large events hosted by the Trinitist faith of V’Dan, not just making do on the athletics grounds of a lesser university. Despite being nowhere near the three moons of V’Dan—and V’Zon A’Gar only having one moon—the symbology of all three moons appeared over and over. Pale full moons, dark new moons, quarter moons and gibbous moons and crescent moons, all were used as a decorative motif for the site.

  This time, Li’eth, Jackie, and the Terrans on the Embassy 14 were met by familiar faces. Robert and Ayinda were two of them, having brought the Embassy 1 into the makeshift landing site for the campground; both greeted Jackie pleasantly enough, then clustered with Captain Mamani and Lieutenant Paroquet to talk shop with their peers, as was only to be expected after several days of being apart. The others had news on how the embassy staff back on V’Dan fared, and he knew Jackie was hoping for solid good news on how Rosa was handling everything.

  The third familiar person turned out to be Leftenant Superior V’kol Kos’q, not at all unexpected. The fourth familiar face, however, belonged to Leftenant Superior Ba’oul Des’n-yi. Or rather, Li’eth noted, Captain Des’n-yi, taking in the fact that the triangular outlines of the pilot’s insignia pins were now solid, polished steel instead of hollow outlines.

  “Congratulations, Captain,” he greeted the other man, holding out his hand in formal congratulations. “May this rise in rank bring honor to your family and glory to the Empire.”

  Ba’oul clasped it formally, dark brown and turquoise-blue fingers wrapping around the prince’s golden, burgundy-striped wrist. “May my sword break before my honor, and may my life burn out long before the glory of the Empire ever dies.” He twisted his lips in a wry, almost sheepish look. “Actually, I’m not too sure about how much glory my current round of duty gathers. They’ve pulled me out of the pilot’s chair and stuffed me into a desk chair.

  “Instead of sailing between the stars, I’ve been spending all my time playing amateur linguist since coming home—even when I was officially supposed to be on vacation from any duties right after my return. I’ve only seen my parents twice since landing here.”

  “Aiy!” V’kol muttered, wincing in sympathy. The brunette wrinkled his nose. “I at least have seen mine five times since getting back from Earth . . . though still more over the matrices than in person.”

  Li’eth nodded. “I knew that I wouldn’t get a break, thanks to my family and my position among the Terrans, but I did get to see mine every single day. You should have been allowed to relax for at least a few days.”

  “Well, now that the Terran military is here, I’ll finally get to do something other than translate block after block of common Terran phrases for the local branch of the Imperial Army to memorize,” Ba’oul stated, eyeing the unmarked men and women moving back and forth between cargo sleds and designated buildings. The tall pilot shrugged eloquently. “Of course, that merely means I’ll be translating block after block of living speeches, but at least I’ll be up and moving around. And . . . I find I am a bit terrified of the mere idea of going back into battle in a ship . . . only to be captured again. It’s a conflict of urges and duties and best interests.”

  “I still have nightmares of the cells,” Li’eth admitted quietly. Ba’oul nodded, as did V’Kol.

  “Well . . . If you can’t fly anymore, at least you can still run?” V’kol offered, using an old Trinitist proverb. It seemed appropriate, given their location.

  “And I’ll run my fastest, for as long as I can,” Ba’oul agreed, finishing the saying. He eyed the dark blond and pink-spiraled gunnery officer. “So . . . I gained a promotion, but V’kol, you did not? Even though you’re pulling along on the Captain’s coat hem?”

  V’kol flipped his light brown and hot-pink braid forward over his shoulder, mock-primping. “I’m decoratively useless.”

  “V’shakk to that,” Li’eth muttered. Both men blinked at him over the vulgarity. He shook his head. “They’re holding back on promoting you because I pointed out that I wanted you to be seen to be earning your solids, not gaining the next pin through being pulled along on my coat hem. You’re better than a rank earned through mere cronyism, V’kol. Your promotion will come in another month or two. Probably in just a month, once the current mess has settled and someone not directly linked to me has had a chance to review your work.”

  V’kol eyed his superior, then rubbed for a few seconds at the bridge of his nose. “Saints . . . Cronyism. Nepotism. Inner-parlor bargains. I’m beginning to admire the Terrans more and more—Ba’oul, did you know they had a political officer whose job specifically was to intercept attempted bribes and enticements? The poor lady died in the attack on the capital, but her job was to review all offers being sent to the Terrans to look for ethical considerations. The slightest hint of impropriety, and she banned that person from trying to contact the Ambassador directly.”

  “I only met her twice, maybe three times,” Li’eth admitted. “Even when we were in quarantine together, she stayed out of direct contact with the Grand High Ambassador, and by corollary, me. She said it was to keep corruption away from our officials, and that as a liaison, both before and after being officially appointed as one, I was considered to be too important to be pestered by bribery.”

  Ba’oul snorted and quickly covered his nose and mouth, muffling his wincing laughter. The other two men eyed him in curiosity. Sniffing to clear his sinuses, the pilot grinned as he lowered his blue-and-brown hand. “. . . Can you imagine how many such people we’d need, to attempt to push away all the layers of inner-parlor dealings in the Empire?”

  “Aiy! Maybe we should hire the Terrans to do it for us, too, because we won’t have enough bodies in the whole Empire for the job!” V’kol joked, snickering.

  Li’eth choked on a laugh of his own and quickly covered his mouth as he started to cough. Ba’oul snorted again and grinned. A moment later, the prince felt a tendril of curiosity from Jackie.

  (. . . Something amuses you?)

  (It’s . . . complex. A cultural thing. How are you doing?) he asked, peering around him to look for her. (Actually, where are you? I don’t see Robert or Ayinda anymore, either.)

  (The ship with the new copilot is coming into orbit; we’re on our way to the Embassy 1 to work out where they’re going to touch down, and when. The landing field is getting a bit crowded—augh! What is that on my . . . ? Ew, is that the equivalent of dog poo? Yuck!)

  He received a mental impression of her trying to scrape whatever it was off her boot with the help of the fuzzy yellowish vine that passed for ground cover, locally. (I’m not a native of V’Zon A’Gar, so I have no idea. You want me to ask Ba’oul?) he added politely, even if the subject wasn’t. (He’s still right here.)

  (No, it seems to be coming off. Travel the galaxy! Meet new sentients! Step in new forms of feces! Oh, how glamorous my life is as an interstellar Ambassador . . . Yuck. Just . . . booting yuck!)

  Li’eth choked on more laughter. He shook his head at the other two men with him, unable to explain what he’d just telepathically heard. Some thoughts—especially not his own—were not meant to be shared.

  AUGUST 17, 2287 C.E.

  AVRA 10, 9508 V.D.S.

  SU-CHELLIS MINING STATION

  VLLS-119 SYSTEM

  “Woo! Yeah! Look at that!” Lieutenant Commander Ramirez crowed in Brazilian, bouncing a little in her seat. Her restraint harness kept her in place. She had to wear it, as an unexpected design flaw of some sort on the Terrans’ part had rendered it impossible to install gravity in the cockpit of the Embassy 1. Not without taking the cabin apart and reworking it entirely over a period of weeks t
hat they felt they did not have. She thumped her armrest and pointed at the screen, which streamed a live feed from a heads-up camera on the helmet of a Terran Army soldier back on Ton-Bei. “You go! You booting go, girls!”

  “Practice your V’Dan, Anjel,” Jackie admonished. Part of her felt like cheering, too, as the projectile rifles in the hands of her fellow Terran soldiers spat out smoke and brief flashes of exploding light on her own viewscreens. Those rifles chewed up the Salik forces trying to make a successful landing a thousand or so klicks away from the new Terran base. But this was not a one-sided fight. Bright yellow light seared back in return, nasty laser beams concentrated so bright they were visible even in the gray light of early morning.

  That helmet-carried view was not the only one; Jackie had all the screens on both consoles at the pair of back-leftmost cockpit stations running similar streamed images from the hot zone on Ton-Bei. The pocket of Salik on that peninsula, Ke-chai, had been pinpointed by V’Dan forces, and V’Dan transports had been pressed into service, ferrying half the Terran brigade under Slovaskoff’s command into striking distance overnight.

  One of the camera views suffered a flash of yellow, spun, and pointed up at the sky at an awkward angle. Jackie quickly tapped it with her stylus, marking it with a red outline. That meant it was now inappropriate for broadcast past that point. She didn’t know if the soldier bearing that helm had died or was merely injured, but this was a broadcast compilation that was supposed to give the V’Dan and their allies a boost of confidence and hope for the future of the war. That meant minimizing on-screen casualties. That particular footage would not be erased nor hidden, but neither would it be broadcast publicly right now.

  She wasn’t the only one doing this task, but since they were between Ton Bei and several colonyworlds downstream, such as Ba-kan-tuu, Va’atuu, and Dai’a’s dome-strewn colonyworld of Du’em-ya, it was necessary to run censorship checks in a live stream as they passed through. Li’eth sat to the right side of the aisle at the back of the cockpit, strapped into his seat, speaking softly into a headset as he translated into V’Dan some of the commands being transmitted in Terranglo, providing a running commentary. Occasionally, he corrected himself, and sometimes pulsed a query to Jackie, who juggled it as best she could with her other duties.