“Do you have any idea how many people you’d get in trouble doing that?” Doris asked.
Kirrah just looked at her a moment. Then her gaze slid out the window to the courtyard full of wounded, came back to her friend’s dark and sober countenance. “Doris, how many people just died, because I didn’t do it before? This is enough.” Her sweeping gesture took in the wounded people, the wounded city around them. “These people trusted me to keep them safe. They trusted the Regnum, us, Doris! Their strongest weapon is a barrel of black powder! Against a tac-nuke! Please help me.”
“What do you… This is insane! What do you think you could do, two of us could do, even if we could get away with a shuttle?”
Kirrah replied, “We can get above the atmosphere. We can kill the Kruss and their base, stop whatever it’s up to. With a Spitball.” Into Doris’s shocked expression, Kirrah continued: “The shuttle carries four of them, I saw them in inventory on one of their engineering screens. They’re just Mark IV’s, but we don’t need the extra smarts, just one quick stab from orbit will do the job.”
“Are you crazy?” Doris hissed. “You can’t use gravitic weapons against a planetary target! You’d kill everyone in their damned city! The entire Civilium would sanction you! It would sanction the Regnum too, just because our equipment was used! And they’d give the whole planet on a platter to the damned Kruss, just to make an example out of us!”
“Doris, I have to do this. If you can’t help me…” Kirrah’s words were interrupted by the firm, calm voice of the blue-robed woman sitting beside them, softly saying a single word:
“No.”
“Issthe! Don’t try to stop me! I can’t explain it, I just have to do it!”
“You don’t have to explain it, aska. And I am not here to stop you. I am here to guide you. When a person first fully embraces kaena’hachk, they may injure themselves if unguided. When we teach this to our children, we are careful to channel their energy and protect them. I believe your world has not taught you this, and now you need it.”
“You’re saying I shouldn’t be angry?”
“No, Kirrah, I’m saying anger shouldn’t be you. What you are feeling now, aska, is utterly right. Your friend here is frightened to see your power, but she is also afraid of where you are aiming it. Think, Kirrah. I do not know your tools, but you do. How can you use this kaena’hachk like an artist? Embrace it, but do not injure yourself with it, nor harm those you love as well as your target?”
Kirrah could feel the darkness shift in her at Issthe’s words, no longer seething and uncontrollable, but coiling now like a snake, ready to strike; searching, demanding an outlet, but following her mind and not just her heart. It felt a little like her first time at the controls of a Tubeship, all the power of a black hole to fold space around her, but guided by her hand, exquisitely, powerfully guided. She took a deep breath, and suddenly, it was all there.
“Issthe, you should be teaching a course at our War College! Your kind of wisdom is needful in the Regnum.
“Doris, you’re right. And so am I. I still need that shuttle. But I won’t kill the Kruss with a Spitball.” Kirrah reached into her suit pouch and pulled out the Kruss smartshot Peetha had brought to her nine days ago, held it up between thumb and forefinger.
“I’ll kill them with this!”
Doris looked at her old friend as though she’d taken leave of her senses.
Kirrah added, “And furthermore, I’ll do it without killing all the O’dai in their city, and without breaking Admiral Dunning’s rules. Not quite… although I may piss her off a little. Old friend, how often do a couple of Survey jocks get a chance to save a whole planet? Are you with me?”
“Aww shit, Kirrah Roehl! If you can keep it inside those lines, I have to come along for the ride, just to see what you’re planning! I’m going to regret this, but I’m in. What’s another RSS career more or less, anyway?”
“Compared to a whole planet’s future, I figure, not that much, Lieutenant Finch,” her friend answered with a sober but grateful look.
“I believe my place is with you also,” said Issthe. “You seem to be a little new at this, I may be of some further assistance.”
“You are probably right, Issthe, but if this goes as I expect, it is not certain we will survive our night’s work. Much depends on Admiral Dunning’s response to our actions.”
“I have weighed her, and I gladly place my life in her hands for this cause, Warmaster,” the blue-robed woman replied. “And in yours.” Kirrah looked again into the dark gray eyes of the healer: bottomless, accepting, utterly calm. As when she first met the woman, she saw recognition in those eyes, but now there was something else as well… was it respect? For some reason, her doubts seemed to vanish.
“So be it. Peetha, we’re going to need some muscle. Do you think you could find my old friend Prax’soua-ro'tachk? And several others his size or larger? We’ll also need help from Captain Schmado, I think we can trust him.
“Now here’s what we’re going to do…”
Forty-five minutes later, a number of shadowy figures were gathering under the Sun Gate. Two large tough-looking men in the orange-and-white ribbons of the city guard, driving a market cart that carried a lashed-together wood platform, a large coil of rope and the butchered carcass of a shaggy creature the size of a Terran sheep. A blue-robed member of the Healers’ Guild, her robe’s narrow black and white trim a symbol of authority that few Regnum personnel would recognize. A medium-height, competent-looking ex-O’dai fleet-captain in Talamae civilian clothes. And two combat-armored Survey Service Lieutenants, one looking considerably more anxious than the other.
“Where is she?” hissed the more anxious of the two.
“There, Warmaster,” said Lieutenant Rash’koi, pointing at the mismatched pair of figures just emerging from the darkness of the west end of Slow Water Road. Farther to the east, scattered fires were still flickering as rubble and damaged buildings burned fitfully. Kirrah was very grateful for the Talamae’s mostly-stone construction, which alone had prevented the devastating explosion from escalating into a full-fledged firestorm.
“Peetha! Good, did you have any trouble finding another… Lord Tsano! What are you doing here?”
“I overheard your messenger asking for ‘large’ and ‘strong’ volunteers. I believe I fit the Warmaster’s specifications. And don’t splutter at me like that, Kirrah. Besides outranking you, I have something you may find useful later on this mission.” By now Kirrah was in full goggle, staring speechless at the unexpected co-conspirator. On the King’s face, tiny glistening tracks of medicinal gel shone where his lacerations had been sealed earlier that night. He continued, “I have rank. I am what your Reg’num’s Doctor Penni’ton called a ‘head of state’. If Lucinda Fleetmaster should feel compelled by duty to strike against you, my presence may give her pause. Or excuse. Now let’s stop wasting time, it will be dawn in another takka.
Damn, he’s right, Kirrah realized. We’ve got the weight, let’s use it.
In another few minutes their caravan pulled up under the side of Argosy’s Shuttle One, parked neatly in the center of its circle of scorched earth. An exterior light came on in response to their approach.
“Advance and be rec… oh, it’s you,” said a familiar voice over the external speakers.
With an inward sigh at the choice of duty guard that luck had cast her, Kirrah replied, “Hi, Marcus. We’ve got the raft for that damned Kruss’s dinner, we should be going soon. Open the cargo door, please.” In a few seconds the bottom of the craft’s tail split and a belly-ramp extruded. Lights came on in the three-by-nine meter bay.
Grunting convincingly, the four men carried the heavy log raft up into the compartment. Kirrah and Doris carried the large coil of mooring line, and Peetha slung the thirty-kilo carcass over one shoulder with practiced ease. Issthe followed the conspirators, broadcasting ‘who-me?’ innocence like a deep-space nav beacon. While Kirrah saw to the shipshape securing of thei
r cargo, Doris opened the door to the forward compartment. Her voice carried back bright and cheerful and loud:
“Corporal Gilman, too! Why, this is unexpected! We thought you’d all be bunked down somewhere. Damn! it’s been a long night, hasn’t it?”
“Yes, ma’am,” replied Adrinne’s light contralto. Shit, thought Kirrah, I hope that’s all of them. This is getting sticky. At least they don’t sleep in combat armor. Her team sauntered casually down the off-center aisle, Prax’soua and Rash’koi gawking unfeignedly at the unfamiliar interior of the vessel.
Adrianne continued, “The Lieutenant and I just bunked here in the shuttle, seemed as good as anyplace. Terribly sorry about the bombing, Kirrah, there’s no way that should… Hey!” At Kirrah’s signal, Prax’soua and Rash’koi, who had placed themselves nearest the female Marine, each grabbed a wrist and stepped back, suspending her between them.
Lieutenant Warden spun around like a startled cat, only to recoil as Peetha, who had been between him and Adrianne, stabbed two fingers towards his eyes. He recoiled a half-step back, straight into the arms of Lord Tsano. One huge blacksmith’s hand closed around the back of Marcus’ head, and the other grabbed his belt and lifted him bodily. Held horizontally on his back in the air, the big Marine Lieutenant could only flail his arms and legs ineffectually. His only contact, a left-handed, inverted grip on Lord Tsano’s left arm, had no more effect than a child’s.
Corporal Gilman was having better luck. She had reacted by running her feet up the back of the nearest seat, onto the ceiling and down the other side, effectively breaking the grip of both assailants on her wrists and forearms. She stood in a combat crouch in the aisle between Prax’soua and Rash’koi, the latter breathing deeply from a hard backwards kick that had landed in his belly. Doris was already pulling a set of restraints from a small locker and reaching for Lieutenant Warden’s right hand.
Peetha slid past Rash’koi, dropped low, and caught the foot that flashed toward her. Gilman twisted and went down writhing onto her back in the aisle. From above her head Prax’soua threw his body over her face and fought for control of either arm, both of which were alternately hammering the back of his head or ripping at his ears. But his weight did impede the gymnast’s flip that would have brought his opponent back to her feet. Peetha clung to one foot and Rash’koi pinned Gilman’s other leg at ankle and knee. After another few moments of intense wrestling, both struggling Marines were fully shackled in wrist restraints and belted into passenger seats, less injured in the process than their assailants. Prax’soua seemed the worst for wear, one ear bloody and the other an angry red. His grin was almost infectious.
“My apologies, Lieutenant, Corporal,” Kirrah said when the combatants had in part caught their breaths. “We did not expect to find you here. We wish you no harm. But I am borrowing your shuttle for a few hours. It’s the only solution. If you did not have the perverse Greenbutt habit of sleeping next to your duty stations, you would not be part of this at all.”
“Marines aren’t the only ones who sleep by their workstations,” said a voice behind Kirrah. She whirled in time to see the hatchway to the flight deck finish opening, and found herself looking down the barrel of a J-1P sidearm like her own, held in the white-knuckled but steady hands of Ensign Piersall.
Chapter 45 (Landing plus one hundred thirty-nine): Show Time
“Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities, because it is the quality which guarantees all others.” - Sir Winston Churchill, op.cit.
Kirrah took a deep breath. So did Margaret.
“Margaret. We don’t want to hurt anyone,” said Kirrah.
“That’s good. Neither do I, Ma’am. But I’ve got the beamer. What the hell do you think you’re doing on my shuttle?”
“Exactly what we’re authorized to do, Margaret. We’re delivering the food that filthy Kruss demands, to keep it from eating two children alive.”
“No, ma’am, then you’d be strapping yourselves into the seats, not assaulting my Marines.” Oops, perhaps we made a bit more noise than we intended, damn those vid pickups…
“That is not all we’re doing, Margaret. We are going to extinguish the Kruss presence on my planet. We were in a shooting war before you arrived, and in case you didn’t notice, the Kruss just upped the ante by four hundred or so lives and a whole new level of technology. They nuked my city, Margaret. These people don’t even have rifles or aircraft, and the Kruss nuked them.” The Navy ensign shook her head, but the gun didn’t waver. Peetha was now standing beside Kirrah in the narrow aisle, both women about three meters from Ensign Piersall and her leveled beamer.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, I truly am. But that’s for a Civilium court to rule on. I have my orders, ma’am. No use of Regnum weapons on-planet.”
“I’m sorry too, Margaret. We cannot turn aside on this. If it’s any consolation, we’re not going to use any of the shuttle’s weapons.”
“That’s for damned… what are you doing?”
“I’m getting out of my combat armor, Margaret. So is my friend Peetha. If I’m wrong, we’re both about to die.” Under the pilot’s incredulous gaze, Kirrah and Peetha stripped to their undersuits, laying their combat armor, including all their holstered weapons, across adjacent seatbacks. Issthe came up to stand beside them, the soft fabric of her robes rustling slightly as she moved in the silence. She raised one hand in the air, palm forward, behind each of the women’s backs and closed her eyes. Kirrah took a deep breath, paused a moment, and addressed the young pilot:
“Margaret, just please listen to what I’m saying. This entire planet is going to be partitioned, unless we can get the Kruss off it now. The Navy can’t do it. I can. If it’s partitioned, the Kruss will get their own Navy base here, in this system, behind Regnum space.” Kirrah searched the young woman’s face, realized she wasn’t winning.
“Margaret, if you can’t trust our intentions, then trust our courage.” Kirrah slowly reached for and detached her suit’s wristcomp, and speaking in Standard for Margaret’s ears but with the output in Talamae, said:
“Peetha, I want you to walk forward until you are in contact with Margaret’s beamer. Do nothing to harm her, she is our ally. She will either shoot you, or stand down. If she shoots you, then I’ll do the same thing, and she will have to shoot me. Then this gentle woman behind me. Go.”
“Yes, Warmaster.” Peetha took a step. Margaret took a step backward into the flight deck, another, came up against the lowered back of the pilot’s seat where she’d obviously been sleeping.
“Are you all crazy?” she hissed. “Stop! I’ve got a gun! You have to stop!” Peetha took another slow, deliberate step forward.
Kirrah said, “Margaret, there are two things they don’t teach you about guns at Naval Academy. One is about power. Holding the gun only gives you the power to kill a person, not the power to control them. Only the other person can give you that, and we aren’t.” Peetha stopped directly in front of the thoroughly unsettled young Ensign. The muzzle of the sidearm was pressing lightly against the Wrth’s solar plexus. She seemed preternaturally calm.
“Ma’am! I’m begging you! Don’t make me shoot her!” Margaret said, her voice becoming desperate.
Kirrah said, “That’s the second thing, Margaret. They don’t teach responsibility at all well. They don’t even have a proper word for it. I’m not making you shoot this nice young woman. If you shoot her, it will be your choice alone. Do you not agree? After all, as you pointed out a moment ago, you’ve got the beamer.”
Kirrah allowed herself a moment of sympathy for the Ensign. This definitely wasn’t going according to the woman’s rules. Everyone stood, frozen, another few seconds.
Kirrah broke the silence. “There is one thing they do teach, though, that you seem to have forgotten about this particular weapon, Ensign. Sanak!” As Kirrah barked the Talamae word meaning “strike”, Peetha’s left hand came up in a blur too fast for the eye to follow, and slapped the hand beamer sharply
away from Ensign Piersall’s trigger finger. Before the weapon finished clattering to the deck, Peetha’s wiry grip immobilized the surprised pilot’s wrists together in front of her. Kirrah finished her statement:
“And that is its minimum safe firing distance. The automatic proximity cutout makes it harmless inside sixty centimeters, Margaret. Something I rediscovered to my chagrin, in the middle of a fight with a swamp monster shortly after I landed. Doris, we’ll need another pair of cuffs.”
“That was without any doubt the ballsiest piece of bluff I’ve ever seen in my entire career, Ms. Roehl. What are you planning to do with us now?” asked Lieutenant Warden a minute later, while a shackled and shivering Ensign Piersall was strapped into the seat in front of him.
“That sort of depends, Marcus. I assume you both knew about the beamer’s proximity limit. Why didn’t either you or Adrianne warn Margaret?” At least they have the good grace to look a little embarrassed, Kirrah noted, as her third captive turned in her seat and glared back at the two Marines.
“Well, you were giving such an interesting explanation of what you were up to, I just kind of wanted to hear all of it, before committing. Either way.”
“Thank you for that much trust, Marcus. I’ll tell you our plan, then if you want to play along, you can - in cuffs until I say otherwise, I’m not that stupid. Otherwise I’ll set you down twenty klicks out on the plains, beamers nearby.
“Now here’s the plan….”
“Well, what do you think, Corporal?” Lieutenant Warden asked three minutes later.
“Told you she was Greenbutt material, Sir. Either get us all killed in the first five minutes, or we’ll save the planet, keep the Kruss out of the whole system, and spend the rest of our lives in the stockade. Either one’s better than where the situation’s headed now. Sir.”
“Can’t say I disagree with your analysis, Corporal. We seem to be powerless at the moment, anyway. You wanna stay for the show, or get out and hike?”
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