by Jessica Snow
I'm just tying my left boot when Jensen comes up, Tauren with him, remarkably unrestrained. “Tauren has given me his word of honor that he will not try to kill me and escape,” Jensen explains at my surprised look, amusement in his voice. “And I've promised to not demonstrate the reasons I was able to survive ten years in the Arena. It's a fair trade. Come on, let me fill you both in on the results of my trip to the capital.”
I follow Jensen, Tauren in between us, to the large dining area that I've only used once. There, I find freshly cooked food, and we move through the line, sitting down at a table in the corner. Tauren sits between us, and pokes at the food for a moment with his fork, then shrugs and takes a bite. “I've had worse. Compliments to your cooks, they're better than most Lancer regiments'. They've got a way to go on the palace's.”
Jensen chuckles and takes a bite of his food. I follow suit, and I agree with Tauren, it's not the worst food I've ever had, but it's not the best either. “And compliments to you, not waiting until we'd eaten to see if it was poisoned or not. Aren't you worried our human food is bad for your system?”
Tauren grins, shaking his head. “I see Mogar's hand in your sense of humor, Jensen, you know perfectly well we can eat the same things. By the way, I tried to bribe your sister yesterday with a promise of telling her where the other human colonies were supposed to be located. She turned me down.”
“Good, because I already know them,” Jensen replies, and I can feel a mental battle being waged between the two men. I eat silently, watching as Jensen and Tauren feel each other out, both of them obviously leaders, both of them so-called alpha male types, but coming from their respective backgrounds, untrusting of each other. I've been in the background of conversations like this before, usually standing against the wall silently as nobles jousted in their own ways. With Neyilla, it was watching a combination of simpering before the Queen and high-handed haughtiness with those she felt superior towards. With Neyton, he often hid his attacks in flattery, only to turn what his opponent said to his advantage.
Jensen and Tauren though are very different, like two fighters warily circling each other, not saying much but communicating volumes. Tauren stirs his food and takes another bite before speaking again. “So how was your trip to the capital?”
“Productive. The Resistance delivered its demands to your father. I was able to ensure that they were received.... and that the last of the gladiators got out safely,” Jensen says. “How do you find the camp?”
“Intriguing, I'm impressed by the use of the caves, although your sense of interior decoration is severely lacking. The woods are nice though. It's been a long time since I've been this far north,” Tauren replies. “The royal forces will have problems finding you here.”
“That's the idea. We'll probably have to move on soon, I have other units preparing camps in other areas. We move, we survive,” Jensen says. “My people are in no shape to take on a Lancer or a Guardsman regiment, even with our recent reinforcements.”
“No, I don't suppose they would be. But then again, guerrilla tactics have been effective at times throughout history,” Tauren says. “At least, Mogar always taught me so. Let's just hope, for your sake, that he hasn't taught my father the other half of the coin.”
“Counter-guerrilla tactics?” Jensen says. “That's the question we have to answer, isn't it?”
Jensen takes Tauren out for a while to give me a chance to have some time to relax, so I go looking for Mathias. I've been worried about him, there was so much anger in the way he acted before he left. I find him in the rear corner of the cave, in a wide, half protected area that's been set up to allow the slaves that haven't had any sort of military training to learn.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, watching as Mathias assists another man with the basics of operating a powerlance. It's one of the training models, without some of the functions I have, but it's still potentially lethal. There's no room for ineffective models in the Resistance, it seems.
“Helping my brothers and sisters,” Mathias replies tersely, not looking up from his task. “What about you?”
“Free time,” I reply, waiting for Mathias to finish his hints to his student. He's a good instructor, patient with the man, and by the end, his student is able to fire a low power plasma charge at the target lined up against the rock wall. “I wanted to see how you did going back.”
Mathias turns, and I notice that he's dressed in an all-black jumpsuit similar in style to what I'm wearing, except for a leather sleeve on his right forearm. Looking closer, I see that there are two Neyla crystals attached to it, one red and the other green. Mathias notices and smiles broadly. “My first two measures of revenge, Audie. Come on, walk with me, I can use some fresh air.”
Mathias gives some instructions to one of the other men, who I see is also wearing all black, and I can't help but feel a little disturbed seeing the similarity in their appearance. They've even gotten their hair cut the same way, almost shaved on the side with a single strip about the width of my hand on top. Mathias' is pulled back into a little ponytail in the back, while the other men’s hair isn't quite long enough for it yet. Finishing his instructions, Mathias turns and we walk towards the front of the cave. “Mathias... where did you get those Neyla crystals?”
“Like I said, my first two measures of revenge,” Mathias says, grinning broadly. “A clothes shop owner and his wife on the outskirts of the capital. They wouldn't give us the clothing we asked for.”
“So you killed them,” I finish for him, and maybe I'm disgusted because Mathias' eyes cloud over in that way he often did when he and I would argue back when we were lovers. He's upset, and he's being stubborn. “Mattie, they were merchants, not nobles.”
“They were slave owners!” Mattie replies, his eyes on fire. “So what if they only had one Neyla or a dozen, or if they had one slave or fifty? They held humans in slavery, they deserve what they got.”
“What does Jensen say about this?” I ask. We reach the entrance to the cave, and I let Mathias take the lead out. Once outside, we start walking through the woods, back towards the field where we'd landed the royal transport when we arrived. “Mattie?”
“He's not happy, but I honestly don't care,” Mathias replies, stopping under a tree. “He's trying all this soft approach bullshit. Oh, let's talk to the Tamarians. Oh, let's just ask them to release the slaves. Oh, we'll try to influence Tauren to see the truth about the way we've been humiliated, raped, tortured and violated for centuries. We'll only kill them when we have to. Did you know, the whole time we were in the capital he insisted that we only use non-lethal settings on our powerlances?”
“He's trying to prevent bloodshed, Mathias. You've been out of the cave; I've been here since you guys left. Yesterday, they weren't a fighting force, they were a scared mob,” I reply, looking back. “I had to pull my lance on our own people.”
“Yes, I've heard what you did. I'm not angry, but Audie.... you pulled a lance on your own people to protect a Pinko. What's that say? I know what it says to a lot of people in the Resistance, and not just the ones in the cave. It says that you side with the Pinkos,” Mathias says. “Fact is Audra, a lot of people in the Resistance are tired of the long view game that Jensen's been advocating. Some of the people I talked to... they want action. They feel like I do.”
“Which is?” I ask, nervous about the reply I'm anticipating.
“The only way we're going to get our freedom is by standing on a pile of dead Tamarian corpses.”
Mathias' words, the hatred that drips off every syllable, is even more chilling than the northern winter air, and I look at my friend and former lover, wondering if I've gone insane. “Mattie.... what happened to you? You used to be sweet, and kind. We used to play with the flutterflies together, remember?”
Mathias nods, then looks up at the sky through the canopy of the evergreens. “I remember, Audie. I remember, and I remember a few years later when Neyilla got her hooks into me. You tried so hard
to help me, you remember that?”
I nod, shifting uncomfortably. “I... I remember, Mathias. I still bear some of the scars, the ones that won't fade?”
Mathias' eyes glimmer with regret, but he only nods. “I know. I bear scars too, Audie. You can still have children, at least. Me.... she ruined me, Audie! Neyilla, the girl that we played with, she did this! Her and her father and their Pinko friends!”
“Not all of them are evil!” I shoot back. “Mogar's the person supplying us! He's the one...”
“He's just trying to put a velvet cover on the iron chain!” Mathias nearly screams. “He's just like all the rest, trying to maintain Tamarian control while keeping us humans crushed under heel! Well, we're not going to take it any longer, I promise you that!”
“Mattie....” I whisper, shocked and horrified. This isn't my friend. This is someone else. “Mathias. So what are you going to do?”
“Audra... there's a lot of people not happy with the way Jensen's been leading us. I never told you, I was able to make first contact with the Resistance nearly a month before I showed up in your room. I started making contacts, people who still live in the noble houses but are part of the Resistance, immediately. And let's just say... I have friends. Jensen can't ignore us forever. Not if he wants to still have an army at his back when the time comes for our retribution.”
Mathias turns and walks away, leaving me staring at his retreating form. I shiver again, and tears come to my eyes as Mathias storms away. I'm surprised when Jensen comes out of the woods, his eyes full of knowledge. I turn to him, looking my brother in the eyes. “Where's Tauren?”
“With Rebbie, back in his cell. She 'fessed up to me what she did yesterday, so she was surprised when I asked her to watch the door, but she's on duty now. I needed some fresh air myself. Then I heard you and Mathias... talking.”
Jensen starts walking again, and I follow him, my hands behind my back. “Jensen, please don't judge him... he's just angry.”
“He has every right to be angry. We all do. But I can't let our anger overwhelm everything,” Jensen says, sighing. “Audra, I wasn't lying to Tauren when I said that we can't stand up against a Lancer regiment. Sure, we outnumber them, and maybe we might have some more weaponry, but they're trained. Our people, you've seen them. Mathias is one of the more trained people in the cave, and he's only reasonably able to operate a powerlance. Can he man and fire a plasma mortar, or a railgun, or use a Gauss rifle?”
“I doubt anyone here can,” I reply, and Jensen nods. “So that's why you're working on appeasement.”
“Not appeasement, I truly believe that we have to learn to cooperate. Audra, Tauren told me some of what you two discussed last night. While I wish I'd been the one to tell you, I'm glad that you know. Cooperation has to be the basis that we build off of, not retribution. Sure, we might be able to terrorize the Tamarians into giving us a FTL ship, but we can't put every human on Tamaria onto a FTL ship to the nearby alternate sites. We do that, and all we do is delay a fight between our children and Tamaria's children, because both sides are just going to be brought up hating the other. Besides, don't you see? Take away Tauren's pink skin, take away the Neyla crystals, and he's you, he's me. We'd be killing ourselves if we do it the way Mathias wants. He wants to kill the Tamarians, until they're either too weak or too dead to resist. But I know the Tamarians, they're like us. We push them, they'll push back. We've got the numbers in the capital and among the noble houses, while they've got the technology and the weapons. We overwhelm them in the cities, perhaps. But then what? The farm slaves stop working the fields? Great, both sides starve, and besides, Tamarians vastly outnumber humans outside of the cities, the average Tamarian can't afford a human slave yet, let alone the numbers owned by the noble houses. Or worse, the Tamarian army drops a Q-bomb on the field, and the whole thing and the surrounding hundred kilometers is rendered useless for the next thousand years, and then both sides starve and die as well. If we do it Mathias' way, the only thing that's going to survive are the fucking cockroaches. Did you know those came from Earth too? Humans, Tamarians, and cockroaches.”
“And a bunch of other things,” I mention. “Like lamb, I bet. That's too damn yummy to have been bred here.”
Jensen laughs and puts an arm around my shoulder. “That's why I'm glad you're here, Audra. I'll be honest, it's been damn hard trying to be the strong one all the time. I could... I could use a sister to sometimes vent to.”
“Well, you've got one now,” I reassure him. “But, let's go back. I'd like to change clothes. Seeing what Mathias and his friends are wearing, I'm feeling a little too similar for my own personal comfort.”
“Deal. I like you better in separate pants and tops anyway. Oh, and after you get changed, I'd like to talk with you about the plans for the next camp change, it's in a week. I can use your help with the organization.”
I laugh, giving Jensen a hug around his waist. “Hey, when did being your sister mean I get drafted into being your assistant too? Besides, what if I'm just some idiot handmaiden?”
“Remember, I kept track of you during the time you were with Neyilla even if I physically saw you only those four times. I know how smart you are, Audra. You don't have a lot of work experience in being a senior leader of the Resistance.... but you'll learn.”
I'm warmed by Jensen's assuring words, and playfully punch him in the gut. “I'm not saluting or calling you Commander, got that?”
Jensen laughs, pushing me away. “Oh, you wanna see who's got the skills now, huh? Wanna see if the bodyguard can match up with the gladiator? Come on show me what you got, little sister!”
I jump on him, and the two of us end up half wrestling half chasing each other around in the forest. It's playful, it's fun, and by the time we stop, both of us are covered in sweat, dirt, and evergreen needles. It's glorious, because for the first time, I feel like I do have a family again.
Chapter Eight
Tauren
It feels strange, being a prisoner in the Resistance camp. For the first time in my life, except when I've been alone with Mogar or my parents, I do not have people kissing my ass on a regular basis. Even my year with the Lancers, I was coddled until I proved myself with them, although after that I was still given better conditions than the average Lancer unless I demanded differently. A whole year, and never once was I assigned guard duty, only getting it when I volunteered.
But with the Resistance, I'm treated differently. I guess part of it has to do with the fact that I'm technically their prisoner, even if Jensen does give me a remarkable amount of freedom for a prisoner. Every day for the three weeks that I've been with the Resistance, I've been given opportunities to walk around, to observe, and for those people who will talk to me, to ask questions.
The humans I've met in camp, they come from all the areas of Tamaria, from both of the major continents. Not all of them are escaped slaves either, nearly a quarter of them are free humans who have joined for various reasons. Like Rebbie, who seems to serve as a sort of welcome officer or den mother for many of the newer recruits.
“Aye, me and my husband, we lived on the Eastern plains, near the mountains, so this is nothing for me,” she says as I help her set up a tent. We've left the caves, and using a wide array of shuttles and other transports, gone southwest, deep into the temperate forests on the outer edge of the royal preserves, a large natural park of over twenty thousand square kilometers that has been set aside for preservation of Tamarian nature. Various noble houses have also set up preserves that border the park, and while my eyes were covered for the entire transport, I'm betting from the views I have had.... we're on Mogar's land.
“So what led you to the Resistance?” I ask, hammering a tent stake in. The line's tight, and Rebbie checks it, pleased. “Okay for you?”
“Aye, it'll hold in a fair gale if I need it,” Rebbie says, then she grins. “You do pretty good, Tauren. For a nobleman. As for your question.... my son, actually. He and his girlfriend, they went
into the city, they thought that their IDs saying that they were freemen would matter for something. They didn't realize that slavers don't really give a damn what your papers say.”
“He was taken?” I ask, and Rebbie shakes her head.
“Nay. Oh, he was taken at first, but he was a fighter, just like my husband was. They may have stunned him, but he woke up, and well, we'll never quite know what happened, but the slavers dropped his body from their transport, right in the middle of my garden. He....” Rebbie says, her voice catching. “He fell on one of the stakes, looking for all the world like a scarecrow when it impaled him. I pray, every night I pray that he was already dead when they dropped him. They must have killed him to get the ID out, since they knew where he lived and everything. He'd have never talked to a slaver.”
“And your husband?” I ask, dusting off my hands. I know she's telling herself a convenient lie, but it's one that only saves her pain, nothing more. “He fought the slavers?”
“No... we joined the Resistance the very next month, when he figured out where they were. That was nearly five years ago now. But my husband, he went out with a group of men to try and free some slaves from one of the noble farms... and the fucking dimwits turned on him. The slaves were those type, you see. The type that loves being pets to their Tamarian masters. The survivors of the raid, they said that my husband was actually stabbed by a girl he'd picked up, she was a cook they said. She stabbed him with a carving knife in the throat.”
“I... I'm sorry for your loss,” I reply softly, knowing my words mean little to her, but still.... I wish that the nobles that support slavery could see the pain in this woman's face right now. “I would change things if I could.”