“It shall be as you say. Prepare for a trip to the surface. We depart one subperiod from now.”
The Hudathan left, the hatch hissed downwards, and Norwood was left to contemplate what she’d done.
The cabin was large by shipboard standards, befitting someone of Lance Commander Moder-Ta’s rank, and Baldwin felt his heart thump against his chest. Why had he been summoned? What did the Hudathan want? A hundred questions jostled each other looking for answers. He rose as the officer entered the compartment and sat in a fold-down chair.
Moder-Ta was big, but not as large as Poseen-Ka, and wore a large blue gem in his weapons harness. His eyes were like stones, black and unyielding. The skin along one side of his head was furrowed and ridged where a blaster bolt had come within a hairsbreadth of taking his life. His mouth, thin-lipped like a frog’s, formed a line across his face.
“You may sit.”
Baldwin sat.
“So,” Moder-Ta began expressionlessly, “you heard about the courier? About the Dwarf’s defeat?”
Baldwin frowned. “The Dwarf?”
“Spear Commander Ikor Niber-Ba.”
“Thank you. That is to say yes, I heard about his defeat.”
“And your opinion?”
A lump had formed in Baldwin’s throat. He forced it down. “Humans can be ingenious when cornered. Had Commander Niber-Ba struck quickly, and done so with overwhelming force, he would’ve won.”
Baldwin held his breath. He had taken the chance and said what he really thought. How would it be received?
There was a long silence while Moder-Ta looked through him to the bulkhead beyond. The answer, when it came, was all Baldwin could have hoped for.
“Yes, human. I agree with you, and more importantly, so does Grand Marshal Pem-Da. Tell me, what do you think of our strategy overall?”
Baldwin felt a sense of joy bubble up from deep within. It could be a trick, could be an attempt to set him up, but he didn’t think so. No, the message was clear. Moder-Ta thought that Poseen-Ka was in the process of committing the same error that Niber-Ba had, and wanted Baldwin to confirm that opinion. And, knowing that the Hudathan had Grand Marshal Pem-Da’s support, the human would be foolish to do otherwise. He spread his hands before him.
“I fear that the fleet could fall into the same trap that destroyed Spear Three. We should strike for the heart of the empire, and do it now, before they are ready to receive us.”
“Well said,” Moder-Ta hissed. “Well said indeed. Now, answer me this ... Would you be willing to testify to that? Even if it meant going against War Commander Poseen-Ka’s interest?”
A sense of caution rose to replace the excitement that Baldwin had previously felt. “Testify?”
“Yes. The loss of Spear Three necessitates an investigation. mThe war commander will be asked to explain and justify his actions.”
A variety of thoughts churned through Baldwin’s mind. This amounted to a court-martial. Of course! Moder-Ta opposed his superior, and more than that, wanted his position. Baldwin’s testimony, added to whatever else the chief of staff had up his sleeve, could bring Poseen-Ka to his knees. It made perfect sense. But was it in his, Baldwin’s, best interests? What if Poseen-Ka was exonerated? What then?
“Well?”
Moder-Ta wanted an answer.
Baldwin steeled himself.
“Yes, I would testify as to my opinion, even if that testimony ran counter to the war commander’s interests.”
“Excellent,” Moder-Ta hissed. “You won’t be sorry.”
Some bio bods had built a fire in a corner of what had been the admin offices. The resulting smoke had a tendency to gather near the ceiling before making its way through the makeshift chimney.
There were many schools of thought as to what burned best, but Major Ralph Hoskins favored the nice thick manuals provided by the idiots on Algeron, since they were extremely dry and made violet-colored flames.
He grabbed one, saw that the title had something to do with quarterly fitness reports, and threw it into the fire. Flames licked up and around it, turned the cover brown, and danced upwards. Hoskins removed his gloves and held his hands towards the heat. It was cold, barely above freezing, and had been for days. The bozos who had designed the base had relied on a civilian fusion plant for power and he was paying the price for their stupidity. The plant, like the city it served, had been destroyed during the first few hours of fighting. He heard movement behind him.
“Major Hoskins?”
The voice belonged to Sergeant Ayers.
“year?”
“The geeks sent an emissary with a white flag.”
A part of Hoskins’s mind wondered how the aliens knew what a white flag signified and another part didn’t give a shit. He was tired, very tired, and not in the mood for puzzles.
“So? Shoot the bastard and grab the flag. Doc’s running short on bandages.”
“This bastard is a woman, sir, a colonel, and she claims to be from Worber’s World.”
Hoskins turned his back to the fire. Ayers was almost unrecognizable under multiple layers of clothes. The winter-white outer shell wasn’t so white anymore. A red splotch marked the spot where she had taken a round through her left biceps.
“That’s impossible. Worber’s got waxed early on. There were no survivors.”
Ayers shrugged. Her clothing barely moved. “Yes, sir.”
Hoskins groaned. The situation was bad enough without stray colonels wandering around. “She got any geeks with her?”
“No, sir. Not close by anyhow.”
“I’m coming. Jeez. Can’t a guy take a break around here?”
Ayers shook her head sympathetically. “That’s the Legion for you, sir. If it ain’t one thing it’s another.”
Hoskins zipped his jacket to the neck, shoved his partially warmed hands into his pockets, and made for the emergency exit. The power lifts had gone belly-up along with everything else.
Hoskins opened the steel fire door, waited for an in-bound patrol to clatter past, and started upwards. The stairs were thick with half-frozen mud, trash, and empty shell casings, leftovers from the night the geek commandos had penetrated the perimeter and made their way inside. Something of a mistake since they had run right smack-dab into a pair of Trooper IIs.
He hadn’t slept for two rotations and had four flights of stairs to climb, so Hoskins was puffing by the time he reached the surface. Plumes of lung-warmed air jetted out to meld with colder stuff around him. He paused by the main doors, nodded to the cyborgs on duty, and received their salutes in reply.
“Going for a stroll, sir?”
“Yeah, I thought I’d slip out for a nice cold beer.”
The borgs laughed and opened the blastproof door. It made a screeching noise as it slid out of the way. Bitterly cold air and driving snowflakes bit at the officer’s face as he stepped outside.
The base had been dug into a low hill, one of the few things the engineers had done right, and commanded a 360-degree view of the fields that surrounded it. They were white with new-fallen snow. It hid the bodies that no one had the energy to bury and granted the base a beauty it didn’t deserve. The city of Loport appeared and disappeared through the snow, its blackened spires pointing accusingly towards the sky, its citizens buried under heat-fused concrete. The horror of it was so immense, so appalling, that Hoskins couldn’t get his mind around it.
Lieutenant Marvin Matatu materialized out of the snow. The hood, goggles, and scarf obscured everything but a narrow band of brown skin that ran from one cheek to the other.
“Major.”
“Lieutenant.”
“Did Ayers find you?”
“Yeah. What’s this flag of truce crap?”
“Beats me, sir. Shall we bring her in?”
“Can we see her from here?”
“Yes, sir. Straight out and about thirty feet to the left. Next to the burned-out APC.”
Hoskins accepted the binoculars, felt the cold
bite his hands, and zoomed in. The APC had been destroyed on day one. Less than four days ago but it seemed like a month. He panned left, found a snowsuit, and stopped. The woman stood at parade rest with a staff in her right hand. The flag was white and snapped in the breeze. Her hood had been thrown back to expose her face, and he was struck by the fact that she looked pretty, and very, very cold. Hoskins handed the glasses to Matatu and jammed his hands into his pockets.
“How did she contact us?”
“On freq four, sir. She knows radio procedure backwards and forwards.”
“And she claims to be from Worber’s World?”
“That’s affirmative, sir.”
“All right, Marv. Run a body scan on her, bring her in, and tell Ayers to strip-search her. If she’s bent, blow her head off.”
“Yes, sir.”
Norwood had just about decided to give up, to turn around and hike back to the waiting Hudathans, when the transmission came over freq 4.
“Stay where you are. An escort will bring you in.”
The snowflakes were falling more thickly now, circling her like butterflies trying to land, pulling the sky down to the ground. That was good because the less she saw of Frio’s tortured surface, the better.
The legionnaires seemed to materialize out of the ground in front of her. They wore snow-white parkas, green berets, and the winged hand and dagger emblem of the famed 2nd REP. Four of them faced outwards, guarding against attack, while a fifth ran a scanner over her entire body.
Norwood stood completely still, controlling the words that wanted to come pouring out, filled with pride. These men and women had held, and held, and held, and were still holding against impossible odds. Stripped of the support they were entitled to, standing against an entire spear, they had held. Oh, how she longed to grab a gun, to stand beside them, to fight a battle she could understand.
The legionnaire with the scanner nodded to the others and made the device disappear.
“All right,” a corporal said. “You’re clean. Follow Baji and be damned sure to put your feet exactly where he does. There are mines all around us.”
Norwood did as she was told, pausing for a second as they passed a Trooper II, its gigantic form spreadeagle in the snow. A shoulder-launched missile had taken the cyborg’s head off. Time had passed, and the heat from the Trooper II’s body had melted the surrounding snow and lowered the creature into a temporary grave. A thin crust of snow had already formed on the cyborg’s chest and would eventually hide it from view.
She was still thinking about the cyborg as they led her past a hastily built barricade, through a maze of sandbags, and up to the installation’s main entrance.
There a sergeant named Ayers took over. She was pleasant but firm and had some legionnaires to back her up. Both were women. They took Norwood into an unheated storage room where she was ordered to strip and grab her ankles. The cavity search was far more humiliating than anything the Hudathans had done to her.
When it was over, Ayers pulled the rubber gloves off, nodded towards her clothing, and said, “Sorry, Colonel. You can get dressed now.”
Norwood struggled to keep her composure, but knew she was blushing, and hated the legionnaires with every fiber of her being.
They led her down some muddy stairs, through a fire door, and into an office. Smoke swirled above her head, drifted towards a makeshift chimney, and disappeared. A fire burned in one corner of the room. She saw a tall, somewhat stooped officer throw a binder on the blaze, stand, and turn her way. He had a long homely face and inquisitive eyes. Stubble covered his cheeks and he looked tired.
“Colonel Norwood, I believe? My name’s Hoskins. Major Ralph Hoskins, Imperial Legion, 5th REI. Welcome to IMPLEG Outpost 479. Sorry I can’t offer something more in the way of hospitality, but the O club is temporarily closed.”
Norwood grinned in spite of herself. It felt good to be in the presence of a regular human being again. His hand was at least a couple of degrees warmer than hers and guided her towards the fire.
“Sorry about the search, but the geeks are clever, and try new things on us all the time.”
Norwood started to reply but stopped when Hoskins waved a .50 recoilless in her direction.
“One more thing, Colonel. I haven’t got a lot of time to screw around, so tell the truth, or I’ll blow your brains all over the fraxing wall.”
The smile had never left Hoskins’s face, and while Norwood believed every word the officer had said, she liked him nonetheless. She nodded, accepted a seat in front of the fire, and started her story. It took the better part of an hour to tell. All the while Hoskins listened attentively, asked intelligent questions, and stoked the fire.
Norwood told Hoskins everything, right down to the doubts she had about what she was doing, and the possibility that she was a well-intentioned traitor.
Both were silent for a long time afterwards. The legionnaire spoke first.
“Well, I’ll say this much for you, colonel: you’re either one helluva liar or one of the most amazing officers it’s been my pleasure to meet.”
“Thanks, I think.”
Hoskins smiled. “So, here’s a sitrep. I have fifty-six effectives, seven of whom are Trooper IIs, which nearly doubles our firepower but doesn’t make much difference in the long run. The Hudathans can clean our clock anytime they want to, and if it wasn’t for this Poseen-Ka fella, would’ve done so by now. I know it and you know it. Ever hear of a battle called ‘Camerone’?”
Norwood shook her head.
“No? Well, it’s a big deal in the Legion. Sort of Masada, the Alamo, and the Battle of Four Moons all rolled into one. What it boils down to is that this guy named Danjou stumbled into some Mexicans, was outnumbered thousands to one, and refused to surrender. He was killed, as were most of his men, and that’s the way legionnaires are supposed to go.”
Norwood frowned. “Surely there was more. A purpose, a reason, an objective.”
Hoskins shook his head. “Nope. Nothing more than pride, glory, and honor. Danjou and his men died for nothing. And that, my friend, is both the horror and the beauty of it.”
Norwood nodded slowly. “So what are you telling me? That you’ll hold to the end? Die rather than surrender?”
Hoskins shrugged. “I don’t know. You say the Hudathans will accept our surrender. Do you believe them?”
“Yes, I believe Poseen-Ka.”
“But what if he loses his command? What then?”
Norwood looked him in the eye. “I don’t know.”
Hoskins was silent for a moment.
“I have what he wants, or something very close to it.”
Norwood felt her heart beat a tiny bit faster. “You do?”
“Yes. I have a set of orders from IMPNAV Earth, ordering me to withdraw, and another set from Legion headquarters on Algeron, ordering me to stay. The second set arrived just before the navy pulled out. I kept them in case I live long enough to get court-martialed.”
“So,” Norwood said slowly, “we can’t be absolutely sure, but it sounds as if Poseen-Ka is correct, and they’re laying a trap for him. More than that, it sounds as if the Legion disagrees with that strategy, and has mutinied.”
“Exactly,” Hoskins agreed, throwing the remains of his coffee against an already stained picture of the Emperor. “Which leaves me in a rather interesting position.”
“You can die a glorious death, or surrender and hope that Poseen-Ka remains in command.”
“Knowing that he’ll kill thousands, if not millions, of people.”
“Better millions than billions.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah.”
Hoskins stuck out his hand. “I’m with you, Colonel. Here’s hoping that we’re right ... and god help us if we aren’t.”
17
There is no retreat, but in submission and slavery. Our chains are forged. Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable—and let it come! I repeat it, sir, l
et it come!
Patrick Henry
American patriot
Standard year 1775
Planet Earth, the Human Empire
Sergi Chien-Chu was naked. The bright lights nearly blinded him. He tried to suck his stomach in but couldn’t. He started to say something, but the technician, an attractive young lady in her twenties, motioned for silence. She was naked too, a fact that threatened to cause an involuntary reaction, and made him blush.
The merchant closed his eyes as the woman dropped to her knees, pulled a pair of IR-sensitive goggles down over her eyes, and aimed a pair of tweezers at his pubic hair.
Had Chien-Chu known, or even dreamed, that participation in the Cabal would require this level of personal sacrifice, he would have refused to join. But it was too late now.
Even microbots generate warmth and this one appeared as a luminescent yellow dot against the light green of Chien-Chu’s body heat. The technician held the merchant’s penis out of the way, closed her electronic forceps around the tiny machine, and removed it from the forest of gray and black pubic hair. She stood and held the offending machine up to the light.
In spite of the fact that the robot was smaller than a piece of lint and almost invisible to the naked eye, it was capable of recording and retransmitting conversations up to fifty feet away. How it had found its way into his pubic hair he had no idea. There was little doubt about who had put it there, however. The Emperor’s security apparatus was legendary, and given the evidence now before his eyes, could literally reach anywhere.
“You can talk now. The forceps and the equipment they’re connected to function as a transducer. The bug thinks you’re watching a routine biz vid on changes in the precious metals markets.”
“Great,” Chien-Chu said, fighting to keep his belly in. “May I dress now?”
The technician placed the microbot, one of three she had found on and about Chien-Chu’s person, into a specially designed black box and sealed the lid. She had a rather nicely proportioned posterior and the merchant found it hard to ignore.
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