He replaced the packet and strolled forward, Trace at his side. Both of them kept their rifles on their backs, and stopped before the parren. Erik left his glasses on — rude in most cultures, given the data constantly displayed upon the lenses. A person could be reading a book, or watching TV, while pretending to talk to someone. But he tilted his head to look up at the central parren’s towering headdress, chewing gum and looking unimpressed. The tall parren glowered at them, with that faintly malevolent stare that all parren of authority seemed to use on everyone.
It was an aide to one side who spoke first. “Do you understand?” the translator spoke in Erik’s ear.
Erik glanced sideways at the parren who’d spoken. Then back at the head parren. “Yeah,” he drawled.
“You are Captain Erik Debogande?” Again the aide. Erik suspected the aide’s job was to clear the ground before serious conversation could start, establishing that the correct alien was the one speaking, and that his translator was working.
“No,” said Erik. “I’m Tobenrah.” Definite consternation on the faces of parren before him. A few small glances sideways. Erik wondered if they’d gotten their cues on human behaviour from Lisbeth. Lisbeth was always so polite and friendly. Having had five days of relief to think about it, Erik was not at all surprised that she’d managed to find one group of parren more friendly than the others, and charm them. Being in Family Debogande gave plenty of opportunities to practise manners, formal or informal, with all kinds of people. Erik had always been better at it than most — a quality that had gained him only suspicion when he’d first joined a combat vessel in Fleet. Some had whispered he’d only gained the post by being rich and charming. Now he found that all the rules of charm and manners he’d lived by could just as easily be inverted. Just like being a warship captain in a fight — one learned the rules of engagement so that one knew how and when one could break them.
“You are Captain Erik Debogande?” the parren repeated eventually.
Erik spat on the tiles, and said nothing. The parren waited, as the spit sizzled in the heat. Finally the headdress grew tired of waiting. “I am Chorkolrhi. I am of the Togreth. The Togreth are a neutral denomination of House Harmony. We do not take sides in denominational disputes. We administer the house law. Do you understand?”
“You’re the civil service,” said Erik, with no concern that the translator probably couldn’t manage the term. “I understand.”
“You have been challenged to a catharan by Aristan, leader of the Domesh. He charges that the UFS Phoenix did deliberately and without warning assault his ships by the world of Pashan, inflicting casualties. He charges you with treachery, and with the breach of an outstanding agreement. Do you answer these charges?”
“He kidnapped my sister,” Erik retorted, and it took no effort to fill his voice with contempt. “This is the agreement he made with us. He held a gun to her head, and threatened her life, to gain our cooperation. In human custom, there is no behaviour more dishonourable.”
“You are not among humans here,” the Headdress said sternly. “Aristan has the right to maintain an Ashara if he can keep her. You are in parren space, and are so ruled by parren law.”
“Fuck your law,” said Erik. God knew what the translator made of it.
The parren’s eyes narrowed. “Your insolence will result in your destruction,” he observed.
“And in yours,” said Erik, unmoved. They stared at each other. A gentle, hot breeze fluttered at the rows of black robes, the only sound on this platform between flights of stairs, save for the dry rustle of leaves in neighbouring trees. Erik could see the parren weighing his words. Nuclear warheads on PH-1’s missiles. The UFS Phoenix in overhead geostationary orbit. All would be destroyed if the parren chose… but would do enormous damage first. And the drysine data-core would be lost, to the distress of Aristan, and possibly to Tobenrah. To say nothing of the humiliation that such an event would inflict, in the minds of possible future supporters, to have presided over such a catastrophe.
Erik did not doubt that parren would believe his suicidal threat. Parren were all too willing to throw their lives away for some greater cause. But those were the causes of followers, in the service of some greater leader. Out here, alone in alien space, Phoenix followed no one. What cause did she serve? Whose orders did she follow? Erik could almost see the puzzlement in the wide, blue eyes, trying to figure out these troublesome aliens. Perhaps, given the rumours, they’d conclude the humans were under the command of this malevolent drysine entity onboard. Perhaps they’d all sworn loyalty to her cause, and now threatened to die in her service. Or would a parren be able to comprehend that some humans followed no one, and made their own way? Could a parren even truly grasp such a concept? Or were their minds so fixed within their own psychologies that it remained an unknowable thing?
“Tobenrah, ruler of House Harmony, has declared that the ruler of the Domesh Denomination has the right to issue the UFS Phoenix with a catharan,” the Headdress resumed. “You can only maintain this standoff, and prevent your destruction, until your food runs out. And you will never be allowed to leave. Parren are patient. You must accept.”
Erik pointed his hand, in the general direction of Brehn System, and the way they’d just come. “Deepynines are not patient. They attacked Brehn System, they destroyed Mylor Station, and they killed more than forty thousand loyal parren citizens. Where was their protection? Who will protect the many loyal citizens of this system, when the deepynines come here?”
There was movement among the robes to the Togreth’s rear… a parren arm outstretched to the sky, with some kind of device in hand. Immediately, Erik noted something dropping from the sky. It was one of the camera drones. It hit a tree beside the platform, bounced through branches, then crunched into the ground. A moment later, a drone hit the paving on the platform’s other side, and broke. Then more commotion about the arm-upraised parren, a strangled cry, and the body fell from view. Other bodies converged around it, and the commotion was lost amidst the wall of black.
“Steady,” said Trace on uplinks to her marines. “Hold steady. I think they just killed him. He took out the drones, and they killed him. He didn’t want anyone to hear that bit.”
Erik was almost surprised at how unalarmed he was. He’d grown accustomed to facing threats with Trace and her marines at his side. That, plus PH-1’s cannon, helped his nerves enormously. Of course the parren were riven with factions. Multiple interests were represented here. Those interests were playing for high stakes, and someone had just died to protect the interests of his ruler. With parren, however alarming, it was no surprise.
“What is the catharan?” Erik asked the Headdress, as though the murder had not happened. There were more drones zooming into position even now, like giant insects in the hot air. “Humans have no knowledge of this word.”
“It is a trial,” said the Headdress. “The trial can take many forms. The form required by Aristan is combat.”
“A trial by combat between whom and whom?” Trace cut in for the first time. There were tales of parren ritual combats. So sensationalised were these, among human media and popular entertainments, that most humans’ knowledge of parren consisted of little else.
“Between the Commander of the UFS Phoenix, and an appointed champion of the Domesh.”
“Acceptable,” said Trace, before Erik could open his mouth. Erik refrained from gaping at her. Was she fucking serious? “The Commander of the UFS Phoenix is a warrior specialised in starship combat. He will require a warship in which to demonstrate his superior ability. Will he be permitted to utilise his existing warship? Or will one be supplied to him?”
Erik nearly laughed. Trace Thakur, you razor-sharp, brutal fucking genius. The parren’s double-take of pure consternation only increased his amusement. “The combat ritual of catharan is always with hand weapons,” the Headdress retorted.
“Unacceptable,” said Trace, with hard contempt. “Worse than unacceptable. Disho
nourable and cowardly. Human custom does not elevate to command the wielder of knives, it elevates the wielder of warships. I am a wielder of hand weapons, and I am only the third-ranking officer on the Phoenix. Warships elevate civilisations, not knives. It is little wonder you parren decline in the Spiral, while we humans only rise.” Erik could have hugged her.
“We are in parren space,” Headdress insisted. “This is parren law!”
“Parren law to appoint a trained specialist to assassinate a warrior whose superior strength lies in a different field?” Trace said scornfully. “This is a trickery and a fraud by the coward Aristan. A people who observe such practice deserve extinction. The deepynines shall oblige.” The Headdress glared at her. Erik suspected private, uplinked conversation between parren, wondering how to proceed. “The UFS Phoenix demands the right to appoint its own champion,” Trace continued.
“You have not the rank to make such demands,” Headdress retorted.
“We have enough rank to turn your parliament into a thermonuclear cloud. The catharan is a contest of skill, yes? Allow this challenge. I will fight.” Erik’s heart nearly stopped again. Trace you damn fool, what are you doing? From around the back of the shuttle, Erik fancied Lieutenant Dale might be preparing to intervene, to violently stop it from happening… or more likely, to volunteer himself. “And I will fight Aristan,” Trace continued. “This coward will not be permitted to hide behind his servants. He has made this challenge to the UFS Phoenix. He will fight this challenge himself, or all parren shall see him for a fraud and a coward.”
Headdress and his fellow Togreth glanced at each other, as uplink conversation continued. Erik guessed that from somewhere behind them, and possibly much further away, someone was negotiating on the Domesh’s behalf. If the Togreth were the mediators and rule-setters that they appeared, even Aristan would have to accept their judgements. Finally, the Headdress addressed Trace directly.
“It is dishonourable for one so high as the ruler of the Domesh to fight one so lowly as you,” he said. Erik suspected the parren did not mean it as an insult, merely as an observation. “Your insults have no bearing on his station here, and you will sway no honour by your words. But you are aliens, and the situation is barely precedented. Some flexibility is required. You will be permitted to fight the Domesh champion. He is here now. You may proceed.”
And with that, they made a quarter-turn, and moved aside. A black-robed parren emerged from the throng. Another green-robed Togreth moved up, holding a pair of ceremonial swords — one for the parren champion, Erik saw, and one for Trace.
“Lieutenant Hausler?” came Trace’s synthesised voice in Erik’s ear. “Get ready on that trigger.”
“Aye Major.”
A thousand parren eyes fixed on Trace. Erik’s heart pounded nearly out of his chest. As a total package, Trace was a superb marine. Even disregarding her skills with command, as a pure rifleman, to manoeuvre and fight with a variety of weapons, there were few better. But even Erik knew that hand-to-hand was Trace’s weakest skill. She had augments, as did all marines, which made her lethal even barehanded, and removed most disadvantages a woman might have against men… but without her weapons, she was perhaps only top-third in all of Phoenix Company. Good as she was, there were many better. And some parren trained for unarmed combat from childhood, as a matter of culture and ritual. Those parren were incredibly fast and skilled, and with weapons familiar to them but not to humans, Trace’s prospects seemed slim.
The parren champion took his sword, and tested its balance, awaiting the human’s approach with indigo-eyed contempt. Trace calmly pulled her pistol from its webbing, and shot him in the head. The body hit the paving with a thud, and lay limp. Parren stared in shock. Then looked back at Trace. Beside her, PH-1’s enormous rapid-fire cannon poised ready to kill them all.
Trace reholstered her pistol. “Aristan,” she repeated. “Or we wait here until hell freezes over.”
21
“There,” said Hausler, as Scan zoomed on a newly arrived shuttle, coming down from orbit with a defensive formation of assault vehicles ahead of it. “That’s carrying someone important. Look at that defensive spread, they’re expecting trouble.”
“Everyone’s expecting trouble,” Erik said grimly, standing behind Hausler’s chair, gazing out the canopy up the flights of stairs up which the Domesh tide had retreated an hour ago. “There’s enough heavily armed air activity to cover a planetary invasion. What the hell’s going on?”
Neither Hausler nor Yun had any more clue than he did. Eventually Erik headed back to the main crew hold, a cleared and empty floor in PH-1’s zero-G optimised interior, all the chairs on their supporting arms moved to the ceiling. It allowed the shuttle to carry mostly cargo when necessary, and now allowed Trace to practise her hand-to-hand moves against Lance Corporal Kalo, commander of Alpha’s Third Section, and one of the very best in that style on Phoenix. Trace’s initial challenge still stood, unanswered for now, yet the real possibility remained that a reply would come soon. Kalo had been an instructor in a martial arts gym as a kid out of school, until his obsession with unarmed combat had caused him to contemplate what it might be like to gain military-grade augments. That lure, he freely admitted, had been the thing that caused him to join, even more than patriotism or a sense of duty.
Erik watched him now, and saw a very rare sight indeed — Trace patiently taking instruction from someone notably better at this than her. She did not challenge Kalo’s assertions, and accepted his criticisms without question, even when Kalo challenged her already formidable technique. Partly, Erik supposed, there were so many things a modern Company Commander was supposed to master, that she simply hadn’t been able to spend the eight and nine hour days that Kalo had in his youth, doing nothing but grips, holds, feints and blocks. It was the thing Erik admired most of all about Trace as a marine, he decided — that for all her ability, and all the praise that others regularly heaped upon her, she possessed absolutely no ego when it came to learning new things from others.
“Captain,” said Yun from up front, “we have a cruiser incoming. Looks unarmed, civilian model. Coming to land behind us, I think.”
Trace didn’t need to tell anyone to be ready, marines stood constant guard outside, scanning for movement and with orders to be polite but watchful if any unarmed civilians used these stairs for their intended purpose — to walk to the house of government. So far, none had tried.
“I still don’t get how they just allow us to land on their doorstep and point nuclear weapons at them,” Kalo remarked, handing Trace her helmet while fastening his own, their sparring ended for the moment.
“The parren practise mutually assured destruction,” Trace told him, taking the helmet, and swigging some water. With the rear ramp open, the shuttle’s hold could not be airconditioned, and both marines were dripping sweat within their armour. “The idea is that violence is less likely if all sides are equally armed.”
“Actually not a bad theory,” said Lieutenant Dale, who’d been watching them practise from against the wall of the hold. The prospect of the Major volunteering for a duel had not agreed with him. Clearly he didn’t like Kalo leading her instruction either, despite the Lance Corporal’s higher qualifications, and he’d been watching them practise like a displeased competition judge, looking to deduct points. Erik suspected that Dale would have loved to take the duel himself. No, he was certain Dale would. “Best thing I’ve heard from these blue-eyed fools since we met them.”
“Cruiser approaching our rear,” said Lance Corporal Ricardo from outside. “Civilian, looks harmless.”
“Let’s stay inside,” Trace advised Erik. “Bigshots can’t go out to greet every errand boy personally, it doesn’t look good.”
“Okay Bigshot,” Erik agreed. The marines grinned. Trace tolerated it, as she did with most things that amused her marines. “Ensign Yun tells me she was reviewing Scan from before. Some of those Domesh were holding transmitters of some kind, they h
ad independent powersources, quite strong. Our theory is that they could disable assassin bugs. Assuming Aristan warned them about that.”
“Pretty dumb if he didn’t,” said Trace, gulping more water. “Or I wouldn’t have needed a bullet. But good to know, that’s one more trick I won’t be able to use.”
“Of course,” said Erik, “they’ll have no idea if some transmitter will even work on Styx’s technology…”
“Cruiser landing,” said Ricardo, as the whine of repulsors grew to a throbbing screech from outside, then faded. And a moment later, “Hey Captain, you’re going to want to see this.” Erik frowned. Was that a grin he heard in Ricardo’s voice? And then his eyes widened, realising…
“Stay,” Trace commanded him, with a light grasp of his shoulder as he strode for the rear. It was wise, Erik realised… any emotional vulnerability should certainly be kept inside the shuttle. But it seemed like an eternity before several parren appeared coming up the ramp, then parted to reveal a brown-skinned human girl in a flowing red robe that conveyed far more authority than any girlish gown, with a great, black belt about her middle, and black, frizzy hair pulled almost straight and severe over combs and pins.
Lisbeth smiled at him broadly, and surprised him by not bursting into tears. Embarrassingly, Erik thought he might. He walked across and hugged her, but not too hard, as there were parren watching, and even these things were uncertain. Finally he let her go, and then Lisbeth repeated the embrace with Trace, with utmost decorum. Trace looked delighted, and yet, somehow not at all surprised. Then Lisbeth even repeated the embrace with Lieutenant Dale. Erik realised with astonishment that he was actually feeling a little annoyed at her, and almost… jealous? She was supposed to be his little sister, to be most delighted to be back in his company once more… and upon realising it, he nearly laughed at himself. She was barely recognisable in her robe and hair, and one did not need to be her brother to look at her face, and know that the clothes were not all that had changed.
Defiance: (The Spiral Wars Book 4) Page 31