In Death's Shadow

by S. F. Edwards

  Admir caught a hint of longing in that statement, or at least what might pass as longing in their species. Could the War Chief have had a soft spot for this warrior? A Telshin with a soft spot? That’s a laugh, I’ve never heard of such a thing.

  “They appear to be a good looking lot,” the Sergeant commented. “Orders?”

  “Have them stow their gear and turn in for the cycle. We’ll get them acquainted with our veterans on the dawn. We leave in two cycles for our next assignment. Admir, come with me.”

  As the War Chief and Admir reached the end of the line, the Sergeant fell back to issue those orders.

  Hects later, Admir and the War Chief sat in the War Chief’s tent going over handover paperwork and plans for the cleanup operation. “It is at times like this that I find myself eager to be a foot soldier again,” the War Chief commented. “I hate this bureaucracy.”

  “Unfortunately, it’s bureaucrats who run things,” Admir replied.

  “The Confederation taught us that word, bureaucrat. We had no such before.”

  “Must have been nice. But, as an old commander once told me, ‘glory brings responsibility, and responsibility brings paperwork.’”

  “My first War Chief had a similar saying. ‘Never accept more glory then you can be responsible for.’”

  A rustling of the tent flap pulled their attention away, and Admir pulled his helmet back on.

  The War Chief waited until Admir sealed the helmet, then turned to the door flap. “Enter!”

  Two of his newest warriors entered the tent. Still clad in their combat flight gear, the young bloods with grey Human and midnight blue Pharad death helms came to rigid attention. They waited for the War Chief’s acknowledgement as he looked them over. He finished the form in front of Admir, then returned his attention to the pair. “Stand at rest,” he ordered.

  The pair complied, turning their heads to look at their War Chief.

  “What brings you to my tent this dusk?” he asked.

  “A matter of heredity has come to our attention,” the young warrior with the Pharad death helm replied. “We wished to clarify it, if at all possible.”

  “There is also a matter of provisions for our gunships,” the one in the Human death helm continued. “We came in on minimal supplies and were told that we would be resupplied here. However, the quartermaster has informed us that will not be the case.”

  “Sergeant, what is this supply issue they refer to?” the War Chief asked.

  Admir felt his hearts jump when the Sergeant emerged, unfolding from the darkness like a shadow come to life. He hadn’t left the tent since the inspection and didn’t realize that the sneaky bastard was hiding there.

  “The quartermaster just gave me a report,” the Sergeant announced, handing a document to the War Chief. “It seems we are low on missiles and Zee Keps, and our hydrogen plant is working at less than optimal efficiency. We will be able to equip only the dropships before we set out, but not the gunships, if we are to remain on schedule.”

  “How did this happen?” the War Chief replied, snatching the report from his hand.

  Admir called up the same report on his HUD. Avionics spares were also missing, avionics needed to complete repairs on at least two of the gunships.

  “War Chief Comain demanded that his unit receive a full resupply before they set out earlier,” the Sergeant replied. “He showed the quartermaster that his unit was heading to the frontline and more urgently needed the supplies,” the Sergeant continued, with a note of disgust in his voice. “Our quartermaster is doing his best to get replacement supplies from other units. He has submitted to the whip because of his failure in the matter.”

  “He need not submit to the whip,” the War Chief replied, a note of anger in his voice. “We’ll have to set out without our gunships in that case. Have all capable weapons systems mounted to the dropships instead. I won’t go into battle without my Telshin air cover. In the meantime,” he said to the two warriors, “until your gunships are repaired, you will be on foot with the rest of us. You will gain glory where it is most earned, in close combat, where the enemy sees death coming.”

  “I will see it done right away, War Chief,” the Sergeant replied, making his way from the tent.

  Admir moved to go with him, but the War Chief held up a hand, staying him.

  “Now as to the matter of heredity,” the War Chief said, fixing his gaze on the warrior in the blue Pharad death helm.

  The young warrior straightened his back.

  “I did not take this assignment to bring my cub under me,” the War Chief said. “It was a matter of chance, but one I accept. I will treat my cub the same as any other young blood until his glory is proven to me on the battlefield, is that understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” the pair replied in unison. Then the warrior in the grey Human mask raised his hand.

  The War Chief motioned him to speak.

  Admir felt sure that words of fealty and explanations of unintentional disrespect said before they arrived were to follow. Why else would he stay?

  “You speak of a single cub, War Chief, but such is not the case,” he revealed, stealing a look at the Telshin beside him. “Our helms reveal our heredity as sure as that of any other in our Tadeh Qudas. My sire kin beside me wears a helm in the colors of his mother and the guise of his sire at the time of breeding. But I wear my sire’s colors on the helm of my mother.”

  Admir looked closely at the three. They were all of a similar height and size, but without seeing their faces or better yet, their blood, he had no way to guess at, let alone prove, their heredity.

  “How is this possible?” the War Chief asked, looking at the pair. “Your mother would have died before she could bear you,” he continued. “But your helmet, I see now, bears my markings, and your mask, is that your mother’s?”

  The young blood nodded. “My mother fell on the field before I was to be born. But her squad leader, upon finding her body, discovered that I still lived and cut me from her womb. I was small, but strong, and to his amazement, I lived.”

  “I cannot believe that I bear kinship to this one. He is so small and frail,” the warrior in the Pharad mask commented, disdain in his voice.

  Admir almost did a double take. There’s what, maybe a decimetra difference in height between them?

  “Small I may be, but frail I am not,” the other retorted.

  “Silence, both of you,” the War Chief called out. “Do not judge a Telshin by size alone,” he commanded. “We all stand a scant margin above this Anulian, and you are shorter than the rest of your squad yourself,” he said, fixing the Pharad death mask in a hard stare. “Still, I stand taller than any warrior on the field for the glory I have garnered. Our lack of height is the fate of nearly all of us born on the field of battle.”

  The silence became oppressive, and Admir wished he could disappear like the Sergeant had. What I wouldn’t give to know what’s going on in their heads. Why are they so quiet? Is the War Chief looking up their records, trying to figure why he’d never heard of his other son’s birth? I could, if I knew their names. Why do these Telshin have to be so blasted secretive?

  “What squad will we be assigned to?” the Pharad helmed warrior asked finally.

  “First squad,” the War Chief replied. “All gunship crews will join me in first squad. Veterans not leading other squads will finish first squad out. The Sergeant will announce final assignments next cycle at dawn, and we will begin assimilation training before moving out.

  “I keep you together only to maintain cohesion in the gunship crews. You know how your crewmates fight, so breaking up your crews will not be to our advantage,” the War Chief explained, more for Admir’s benefit, he realized, than that of the warriors.

  His sons exchanged glances.

  “You are dismissed,” he ordered, fixing the one in the Pharad helmet with a gaze. “You stay a moment,” he said to the other.

  With a quick salute, the Pharad helmed warrior depart
ed the tent. For several tense moments, father and son stood in silence. Admir felt invisible, as the pair regarded one another, and dared not move lest they take offense at his presence.

  “War Chief Gorick raised you. You bear his sire name,” It was not a question.

  The young blood nodded.

  “Why, when you knew of your parentage?” the War Chief asked.

  “I did not know until a handful of annura ago,” his cub answered. “War Chief Gorick had always felt slighted that you sired me. It was no secret in our Tadeh Qudas that he felt you rose to War Chief too young.”

  The War Chief nodded and turned to Admir. “Something you might not know, Anulian, we Telshin tend not to breed with those outside of our rank.” He looked at the cub again. “When I met your mother, I was not yet a War Chief, but was well on my way. Your mother was three ranks below me, but we were of a similar age. When Gorick heard of our pairing, he transferred me.”

  “Should we discuss this before the Anulian?” the cub asked.

  “If you’d seen his record, you would have no compunction. We speak only of the dead now. Their names are his to hear.”

  The cub nodded. “It drove a wedge between Gorick and me when I discovered the truth and presented it to him. He put me to the lash when I repainted my helm to match your old colors.”

  “I see from your records that you are a noble warrior and an adept pilot. You were there when Gorick fell?”

  “Yes, my liege. He commanded us too far forward in pursuit of the fleeing enemy armor,” the young blood replied. “It was a trap. By the time War Chief Gorick fell into it, the rest of us were too far away to save him. We took heavy damage in the attempt, but managed to save the rest of our Tadeh Qudas. War Chief Gorick died amongst his men.”

  “A noble death, then. Your mother would be proud of you. Return to the others. We have much to do upon the dawn.”

  The War Chief’s cub made a precise about-face and marched out of the tent. The War Chief settled back into his chair and stared out the door flap in silence. “To discover I have another son, a son with, with one I cared for, it is almost too much.”

  “If you would rather I leave?” Admir asked.

  “No, stay, we have much to do.”

  UCSB Date: 966.355,Teshtid Prime, The Natig Plains

  Admir dove for cover when the explosions sounded. He rolled about, checking his sensors, as a ring of red contacts emerged all around them. Frag me sideways. Looking up, he spotted one of the dropships falling towards him and scrambled out of the way before it slammed into the ground only a few metra away and exploded. He looked skyward again. The other dropships were gone as well, two smoking craters marking their graves. Half of the soldiers in their Tadeh Qudas were still aboard.

  Plaser fire erupted all around him, and the rumbling of tanks told him all he needed to know. We walked straight into a trap.

  The ground stirred beneath him. Admir rolled away before a Galactic Federation shock trooper leapt up, discarding his therm-optic and scent camouflaged cloak. Admir pumped four rounds into the man’s chest and ran towards the rest of the Tadeh Qudas as it reformed ranks.

  He spied the War Chief as the warrior downed three more Shock Troopers, and ran for him. “They caught us with our trousers down,” Admir hollered and leapt amongst the Telshin warriors.

  “But how?” the War Chief cried.

  “Scent masks and Therm-Optic shrouds.” Admir snapped off a shot at one of the GF troops. “They knew we were coming, probably spotted us entering the valley last cycle.”

  “Plague their lines, a War Master couldn’t have laid a better trap,” the War Chief called out.

  “I’m broadcasting a beacon, but reinforcements are half a fragging planet away,” Admir yelled. “And better than half of these guys are Shock Troopers. This is a vengeance attack.”

  “We move to cover. There’s a break in their line,” the War Chief called out, pointing with his rifle and shooting a Galactic Federation soldier attempting to brace that hole. “If we widen it enough, we may get through to a more defensible position. Everyone, follow me!” He charged the gap.

  Admir followed, thankful that his ACHES gave him the ability to keep up with the Tadeh Qudas. GF troops tried to block their escape but Telshin warriors dispatched them.

  A blast knocked Admir from his feet, and when he looked up, a GF trooper was bearing down on him. He went for his rifle, but it was out of reach, knocked from his hands. He reached down for his side arm as the trooper brought his own rifle to bear, then felt a tug at his back. The young blood with the Human death mask jumped past and let fly one of Admir’s kuhks. It found a temporary home in the soldier’s face until the Telshin tore it free and ran past.

  Admir scrambled for his rifle and followed, running along behind the young one. “Nice move.”

  “Good knife,” he answered. “If we survive, I’ll get one of my own.”

  “Admir, shut down your beacon, they can track it,” the War Chief ordered over the link. “All survivors follow me. Deploy scent masks, active camouflage, and decoys!”

  It took more than a hect, but the Tadeh Qudas evaded the pursuers and went to ground in the foothills. The place where trees and high grasses met provided excellent cover. They had no way of knowing if the Galactic Federation forces followed their thermal decoys or not. But they had wounded to attend to and needed to recharge their suits more than solar crystals and their own body heat could.

  “How fare you, old warrior?” the War Chief asked the Sergeant as Admir tended to a plasma burn across the Sergeant’s chest.

  “I’ve had worse. I’m not sure how well these young bloods are holding up, though.” He nodded toward the young warriors nearby.

  “We’ve taken nasty losses among the veterans as well,” Admir commented. “And I’m not sure if anyone received my signal.”

  The War Chief nodded. “We’re down to one squad and that’s just the three of us, four other veterans, and eight young bloods. If we’re attacked now…”

  “We’ve faced worse,” the Sergeant replied.

  “With experienced warriors on battle grounds with better cover, yes,” the War Chief replied.

  Admir applied a skin patch to the wound and bandaged it. “Some of these young bloods seem shaken up,” he commented. “That one in the green Krad helmet is shaking something fierce.”

  “I noticed that as well,” the Sergeant replied and began to pull on what remained of his chest armor. “We’ll make it though, I promise you that.”

  Admir hated statements like that. They always ended with cannon fire, and this was no exception. The ground around their squad exploded as Plaser and mass driver rounds pummeled the area.

  Admir reactivated his beacon, not caring if the War Chief approved or not. The enemy had them pinned, and he needed to get help to these Telshin. Retrieving his weapon, he joined the battle as wave after wave of Shock Troopers bore down upon them. He lost track of time as he fought. Running out of ammunition, he pulled his Kuhks and stole his enemy’s guns, the same as the Tadeh Qudas did.

  The ammunition from his latest acquisition spent, he looked for another and spotted the War Chief wrestling with a GF soldier for his heavy repeating Plaser. Behind him a Shock Trooper, legs crushed but with life still in him, crawled up behind the War Chief and prepared to gun him down.

  Admir raced towards him, but not before the young blood in the Pharad Death Helm leapt towards the Shock Trooper and called out, “Sire, behind you!”

  His call of warning worked against him however, and the Shock Trooper turned his rifle instead on the young warrior and opened fire. Two rounds ripped through the Pharad Helmed warrior’s chest before the third tore into his helmet, shattering the facemask and burning a gash down the side of his head.

  A plasma round slammed into the side of Admir’s head and dropped him to the ground. His vision blurred, he felt his Kuhks torn off his back and saw the Human Helmed Telshin leap upon the Shock Trooper. The young warrior s
ank one knife into the Shock Trooper’s thick armor and twisted the blade, cleaving the man’s heart in two. Blood sprayed when he tore the wicked blade free.

  Shots rang out a moment later, and the War Chief fell back, scorch marks on his chest from a pair of plaser blasts and another piercing his helmet, leaving a burn across his face and head.

  “Chieftain!” the warrior in the Grey Human Death Mask yelled. He pounced on the soldier who had felled his sire and buried a Kuhk in his face, before turning back towards his last two kin.

  Admir crawled towards the downed Telshin. Their chests heaved, hemorrhaging blood with each hacking blood-soaked cough from their charred lungs. I have to try and save them.

  Before Admir could cross the distance, two more Shock Troopers exploded from the grass into the clearing, rifles aimed at the last still-standing, blood-soaked Telshin. Admir froze as the pair stalked the young Telshin, breathing heavily as he watched the scene unfold on his sensors.

  The Shock Trooper on the left shifted his rifle to check the ammo counter. Kuhk in hand, the last Telshin standing leapt over Admir and his wounded sire to lunge at the Shock Trooper. He was too far away, though, and the Shock Troopers too fast. Rounds exploded from their rifles. The trooper on the right punched a plasma round into the side of the young warrior’s helmeted head.

  The helmet contained the blast, but shattered. Plasma splattered against the side of his head, searing his flesh. He recoiled but kept charging on the Trooper until several rounds breached his chest armor.

  Admir leapt towards the Shock Troopers, but the butt of a rifle knocked him on the back of his head. He slammed to the ground, his head awash with pain, and watched the Human death helmed Telshin toss a Kuhk into a Trooper’s chest before everything went dark.

  Admir couldn’t even guess how much time had passed, when the link in his helmet began to squawk at him, but it had started to get dark. “I repeat, we are homing in on your beacon. We read multiple thermal signatures at your location but no other friendly IFF. Are we cleared hot?”