Storm World (Undying Mercenaries Series Book 10)

by B. V. Larson

  “What’s going on?” Galina demanded when we reached the command center.

  The squid ops officer eyed her for a moment then glanced at Armel for approval. After all, we were in his legion’s headquarters, not our own.

  Armel gave his officer the nod.

  The sub-centurion squid shuffled his many thick appendages around to face us.

  “The ship lurking in deep space has reacted to your query from last night,” he said. “It is transmitting messages and flying closer.”

  “Let me see what they have to say,” she said, stepping toward the main screens.

  Again, the squid checked Armel’s mood. After getting a second nod, he touched his console.

  An old, grizzled Mogwa appeared in the holo-tank. His body was bloated and his limbs squirmed impatiently. Unlike the usual black sheen of a Mogwa body, this specimen was pale in patches that looked fleshy and wrinkled.

  Could it be they shed their chitinous shells like hermit-crabs as they got older? I wasn’t sure, but that’s what it looked like. When I was out there, I hadn’t seen too many old-looking Mogwas. No matter what the reason, he was sinfully ugly.

  “Slaves,” the Mogwa began, “I am Sateekas. I’m the new governor of Province 921. I’m here to witness Earth’s capabilities firsthand. When the enemy arrives, you are instructed to engage in battle immediately. Behave as if I’m not here. When I pass judgment, rest assured that I intend to implement an honest verdict.”

  Galina, Armel and I reviewed this message together.

  “Sateekas!” I boomed.

  They both gave me blank looks.

  “Don’t you recognize him? That’s good old Grand-Admiral Sateekas! He’s been out here a few times… The last time he was in the province, in fact, he was commanding Battle Fleet 921.”

  “Ah…” Galina said. “That old bastard… How could I forget?”

  “They do all look similar,” Armel said, “but he’s clearly an ancient specimen. What alarms me most at this point is your apparent familiarity with this Mogwa, McGill.”

  “Oh yeah,” I said. “Sateekas and I go way back. Way back. I know him almost as well as I know Xlur.”

  “Speaking of whom,” Armel said, “where has Xlur gone? He’s apparently been replaced as our governor, but I don’t recall hearing anything about the transition, or why it happened.”

  “Well Tribune,” I said, “that’s a funny thing—”

  “Shut up, McGill,” Turov said, cutting me off.

  “Yes sir.”

  Turov stopped staring at the message, which she’d been replaying over and over while we talked.

  “What matters most are the unspoken details of this message,” she said. “Sateekas mentioned passing judgment. He mentioned coming to a verdict. Could that be related to our performance here on Storm World?”

  “Maybe he wants to see if we can beat the Wur,” I suggested. “We are the local enforcers.”

  “But…” Armel sputtered, becoming alarmed. “He can’t possibly be weighing Earth’s capacity to wage war now. It would be monumentally unfair. We are grossly outnumbered. We can’t launch a serious offensive at this time. It will take days just to get the rest of your legion back into the field.”

  Galina shrugged. “You’re right, of course. But the Mogwa rarely consider the fairness of their judgments. It’s my assumption we must win this planet in short order. Otherwise, there’s no telling what they might do.”

  “How are we going to do that?” Armel demanded. “Your legion is half-dead, and mine—”

  “Is made up of half-trained apes, yes, I know,” she interrupted. “We’re going to have to request reinforcements from Earth.”

  “I’ll go!” I boomed.

  They both cast me sour glances. They knew about my occasional side-trips home during far-flung deployments.

  “I don’t think so,” Armel said.

  “I agree,” Galina said. “It will not be McGill this time.”

  “Good,” Armel jumped in. “I’m glad that’s settled. You’re easily the best of us, Turov. With you serving as our ambassador to Earth, we’re sure to get the forces we require.”

  Galina looked annoyed and worried at the same time. “All right,” she said, surprising everyone. “I’ll go.”

  I’d expected her to put up a fuss. By the way Armel’s eyebrows shot up, I knew he’d expected the same.

  That left us both pondering while she replayed the message a few more times, tapping at her lips with a carefully painted fingernail.

  We were surprised because whoever went back to Earth would be carrying bad news home to Central. Galina generally avoided being the messenger bearing bad tidings as much as she worked to take credit for every success.

  But not today. She just kept replaying that message, frowning and studying it.

  “Uh…” I said. “Why are you playing that over and over, Tribune? I think we’ve got the gist of it by now.”

  She aimed a fingernail at the screen. “Watch this part. Listen to what he says again.”

  “…When the enemy arrives, you are instructed to engage in battle immediately…”

  I shrugged. Armel frowned. She looked at us with a worried expression.

  “He’s been watching for days,” she said. “We know that. Why would he talk about the enemy arriving soon? The Wur are already here.”

  “Perhaps it’s a translation failure,” Armel suggested.

  “Or maybe he’s talking about the next attack,” I said.

  They both looked at me. I grinned back. “Don’t tell me no one has figured out yet that the Wur are going to try to take this fort out soon? Just like they did the last one?”

  “Of course we’ve considered that…” Turov said, “but I don’t feel one hundred percent certain that’s what Sateekas is talking about.”

  I shrugged. For the zillionth time, I was glad I wasn’t running an entire legion.

  “All right,” she said at last. “McGill, you shall return to the walls. Help Graves arm and organize everyone he can. I’m leaving for Earth.”

  She marched quickly out of the control center, and we both watched her go.

  The moment she was gone, Armel gave me the boot out of his command center.

  I was happy to leave. I kind of wished I was playing messenger-boy by going back to Earth using the gateway posts, but that dream seemed out of reach now.

  Gathering my gear and my troops, I went to find Graves. I had most of my unit cobbled together by now, plus a couple of hundred salamanders.

  Graves eyed me critically when I reported for duty. The rains were watering the planet again, and the wind was blowing at a slant. Even with our visors down, we had to shout to be heard.

  “McGill shows up at last,” he said.

  “Um… We got in last night, sir.”

  “Last night? Who’s we?”

  “A few survivors of my unit, Tribune Turov, and my friendly native heroes.”

  I indicated the throng at the base of the wall we both stood on. They were sheltering from the storm up against the puff-crete.

  “Turov…?” he asked. “I thought she’d been evacced.”

  “That was me again, Primus. I showed her my underground system of tubes, and… well, we used it to come here. Currently, she’s headed to Earth to sweet-talk somebody into sending us reinforcements.”

  Graves nodded after checking my story on his tapper. He was the kind of man who often professed to believe me—but then checked every word I’d said against the record just to be sure.

  “I’ve been so busy marshalling the legion and redeploying,” he said, “I hadn’t heard that part of yesterday’s events. I’m impressed. There were very few who didn’t board the lifters to get out of Fort Alpha and yet still survived the night.”

  “That was us, sir. Where can we help now?”

  “Right here. You’re the new gate commander.”

  Sub-Centurion Churn sidled up to us as we spoke. At about this point of the conversatio
n, it became clear he was listening in.

  That wasn’t any kind of violation, as we were using local chat on purpose. If we’d wanted to exchange words discreetly, we could have created a private channel.

  “Yes, Sub-Centurion?” Graves demanded, looking up at the squid.

  Churn was impressively large, just like all squids. He had to weigh close to five hundred kilograms, and that’s a whole lot of raw calamari.

  “Excuse me, Primus,” he said. “But I do believe an error has been made.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “Your mama sewed too many arms on you.”

  Graves slapped my chest plate with the back of his gauntlet, and I shut up.

  “What error, Churn?” Graves asked.

  “There was some discussion of putting this person in command of the gateway. That is not possible, as I’m in charge of the gate.”

  “You’re challenging my authority?” Graves demanded.

  “Not at all, Primus. I’m merely challenging your grasp of certain realities. Tribune Turov has left the planet. Tribune Armel outranks you and therefore it is he who must be obeyed.”

  The squids could be kind of prissy when it came right down to it. You wouldn’t think it to look at them, but it only made sense. After all, in their culture, there were only two possible roles: that of master, or slave. Middle men played both parts, of course.

  In such a rigid society, no one messed around second-guessing as to who was in command. It had to be very clear at all times—otherwise, it was a squid free-for-all. They’d murder each other until someone proved himself to be top dog.

  “You’ve got a point,” Graves said reluctantly. “I’ve been operating the defensive effort based on the fact Turov is a tribune in command of a real legion. Since Armel and Turov are of the same rank, she had the authority.”

  “A real legion, that’s right,” I chimed in.

  They didn’t even look at me. Churn was aptly named, because his tentacles seemed to squirm around a lot when he was ticked off. I could tell he wasn’t happy we’d even tried to depose him. Squids were even more territorial than humans under these circumstances. They were sure to take any removal of authority personally.

  “Tribune Armel?” Graves asked, talking through his tapper again. Before he said anything else, he switched to a private link.

  While he talked, I stepped up to Churn and pointed. “You see that man? He’s older and more experienced than any squid that ever lived.”

  “I find that difficult to—”

  “What’s more,” I said. “He’s not just a primus. He’s what we call a blood primus. His rank insignia—see that star? It’s got a ruby in the center. That means he’s the most senior ranked individual in Legion Varus, short of Turov herself.”

  “I fail to see—”

  “I’m trying to tell you, squid. He’s in charge of Varus, and any human legion supersedes yours.”

  “That’s not my understanding of the command structure.”

  I crossed my arms. “Well, we’ll see.”

  Graves faced us again a few moments later. His expression was stony.

  “The gateway is to be bolstered with a larger force. We’ll have a full cohort of heavy Blood Worlder troops up here, plus McGill’s rag-tag army and some more elements from Varus.”

  “Uh…” I said. “But who’s in charge, sir? Please don’t tell me I’ve got to take orders from Inky, here.”

  At the label “Inky” Churn stiffened, and his tentacles whipped around like snakes.

  “Armel has decided to deploy Primus Fike at the gatehouse as the overall size of the force has grown too large for a centurion to handle. Both of you will place yourselves under his command when he gets here.”

  After handing out these orders from on high, Graves marched away, his boots splashing.

  Churn and I eyed one another in distaste. This wasn’t going according to any plan of mine. I could tell Churn wasn’t happy, either.

  At least that was something.

  -47-

  Primus Fike was a true asshole. It could be said—and had been said by many—that his entire home legion known as the Iron Eagles was made up of a parade of assholes just like him.

  But even in such company, this man stood out. It wasn’t his effectiveness, his professional qualifications or his fighting abilities I objected to. It was his insufferably superior attitude. He considered all troops from Legion Varus to be trash, and he let us know it at every opportunity.

  Fike didn’t like Blood Worlders much, either. As a result of these poor opinions of everyone he was commanding, he wasn’t happy—and neither were we.

  “All right, people,” he said to a collection of centurions and a few other supporting officers. “Let’s see if we can mount a proper defense without screwing up as badly as Varus did at Fort Alpha.”

  Harris tossed me a glare, and I knew he was wondering if I was going to mouth-off. He clearly wanted me to, as he lacked the balls and the rank to do it himself.

  Stoically, I ignored Harris and stared at Fike with my arms crossed over my breastplate.

  “McGill,” Fike said, zeroing in on me, “I want you and your freaks stationed right here at the gatehouse itself. You’ll provide overwatch and check every ground vehicle that comes in or out of the compound.”

  “Uh…” I said, lifting a finger into the air.

  “Do you have a question, Centurion?” Fike demanded.

  “Just a suggestion, sir. My unit has fought these Wur before—several times. I think we should be on the walls.”

  “Do you have any 88s?”

  “No sir. They were all destroyed or abandoned back at Fort Alpha.”

  “Exactly. You can’t stop a walking tree with a snap-rifle. You’ll man the gatehouse.”

  “But sir… our heavies have force-blades. We killed a lot of the enemy with those. Besides, I was figuring we’d get new gear. Lots of transports are shipping stuff down from orbit every hour.”

  “You figured wrong,” Fike said, looking down at his portable battle-table. It glowed, casting a blue-white glare up into his faceplate. “All equipment being distributed right now is going to successful units, not failures.”

  “Successful?” Harris spoke up, unable to stay quiet any longer. “What has this zoo legion every done?”

  Fike looked at Harris balefully. His two sub-centurion squids did the same.

  “We haven’t lost our fort yet, for one thing. We’re going to get our chance to shine soon. You Varus people had your shot—stop complaining. If things go badly enough, I’ll throw you into the fight. Until then, you’re strictly reserves.”

  Fike went on, detailing the placement of forces along the rain-soaked battlements. When he’d finished, I realized he’d skipped over my native troops. There was nowhere near enough room for them inside the gatehouse, there were too many.

  “Sir?” I asked.

  He sighed, flashing his eyes up at me. “What is it, McGill?”

  “What about my Scupper troops, sir?”

  “Your what?”

  “My native levies. They can’t all fit in here.”

  The gatehouse was about the size of a large multistory house. Leave it to Armel to build something complicated out of puff-crete and put it on top of his walls. I thought maybe he had some kind of a hard-on affair with medieval days, as his wall looked more like a castle structure than our usual simple designs.

  “Your what? Oh right… those tree-frogs…”

  “Salamanders, sir.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Their morphology more closely resembles—”

  Fike made a sweeping gesture with his arm, and I shut up.

  “Whatever,” he said. “Just keep them out of my way. Put them inside the walls, near the road. If anything gets past our defenses, tell them to attack it.”

  Harris and I glanced at one another and shrugged. Really, it was hard to complain too much, as the deployment made things easy on us. All we had to do was back
up Fike’s gorillas.

  Oh sure, I knew what he was doing. He wanted to make sure that we stayed out of this fight in order to give every drop of glory to his troops. The good Lord knew they needed it. These Blood Worlders looked tough, but they weren’t experienced. They’d yet to prove themselves in battle to anyone.

  The briefing droned on, but I’d tuned out. I messed with my tapper instead. That brought me to an interesting tidbit of information that Natasha had passed my way.

  My hand shot up again, and I waved for attention like a teacher’s pet.

  Fike ignored this for several minutes, but at last he pointed at me.

  “What is it now, Centurion? Do you have to go to the bathroom?”

  There was a general wave of laughter at that. Even the squids bubbled a little.

  “No sir,” I said. “But I thought I’d mention that this planet is being invaded.”

  Fike rolled his eyes. “Yes, I know. We’re the invaders.”

  The group laughed again.

  “Um… very funny, sir. But I’m talking about the new ships that have just arrived. They’ve warped in close, and they’re slipping into orbit. Check your tapper.”

  He did, and he frowned. “Uh… you all have assigned stations! Dismissed!”

  I turned around, but I heard heavy boots behind me. Fike was marching in my direction with a scowl on his face.

  “That information is need-to-know, McGill,” he told me. “Didn’t you read the entirety of the message? I can’t believe Armel even put you on the distribution list.”

  “Um…” I said, realizing that Natasha had stolen the information and passed it on. Whenever I had a good inside channel to spy on the brass, it wasn’t a good idea to give it up. Accordingly, I lied.

  “Sorry sir,” I said. “I was startled by the message. I guess I didn’t realize it was classified.”

  Harris was watching this exchange like a man watching a naked Ping-Pong tournament. His eyes flashed from one of us to the other with every word.

  Fike looked at him. “Take a hike, Adjunct,” he ordered.

  Reluctantly, Harris walked away.

  Fike lowered his voice and got closer to my ear. “Armel specifically warned me about you. Now I can see why he bothered. You’re a loose cannon.”