Duty, Honor or Death the Corps Sticks

by Ronald Wintrick

As the day fled, Jarlaxle had to decide. Go on for a night attack, or wait for the morning?

  In the pitch dark Balian night, there would be little chance of a complete surprise attack. They would make noise. They would give themselves away as they approached. That was a given.

  Once they got to the edge of the forest, or actually into the Dunaj village, the star-scape above, if it was not cloudy then, would provide enough light to make their attack. But getting to the village soundlessly would be a problem. There would be sentries. They might be giving up all advantage entirely if the Dunaj were warned of their slow, blind approach too early.

  "What do you think?" Jarlaxle asked.

  "Night attack." Henamka said immediately, as he hulked beside Jarlaxle. He was almost twice Jarlaxle's size, and three or four times his mass. One of the largest men Jarlaxle had ever met. Unlike the stereotype that all large men are slow witted, Henamka was quick and keen. He was not slow of intellect.

  "Of course you would say that." Jarlaxle said. Henamka moved like a fucking cat, though of course there were no cats on Bali. Despite all of Jarlaxle's skills, he would not want the big man stalking him in the dark. Henamka would come out of nowhere without warning and that would be the end of it.

  Henamka chuckled. "They'll probably all be drunk. Celebrating. It's a risk. But I think it's a good one."

  "I don't think they'll have been drinking at all. I think they'll be waiting and ready." Jarlaxle said. "I don't get the impression these people are incompetent. Or disorganized. I think that's exactly what they'll be expecting."

  "I don't doubt their competency. They might even be ready and waiting. But I still think the odds will be in our favor. We'll be invisible in the forest. They'll be clear open targets. I say we charge right in."

  "Charge right in?" Jarlaxle said.

  "Yup. Charge right in." Henamka answered.

  "Now that's the most insane shit I've ever heard." Jarlaxle said. "No stealth or anything. Just run right in like madmen?"

  "Well, we are madmen, to be out here in the first place, and we're never going to be able to sneak up on them. They'll hear us long before were near. We charge in, least then we cut their preparation time. Might mean something.

  "And you asked a madman! What did you expect!" Henamka added. Jarlaxle could see Henamka's big smile in the last of the daylight. He was grinning from ear to ear.

  Jarlaxle never attacked haphazardly. Anything he ever did was only done after utmost planning and contemplation of all factors that might make up the problem. To simply charge right in with no plan or strategy went completely against the grain of everything he believed.

  And yet it could work! It couldn't be any worse than trying to sneak up slowly and failing. Giving them all the time they needed to prepare. Then thinking that stealth had succeeded and walking right into a Dunaj trap.

  They'd had no fear of any enemy in recent years. Not since their manufacturing processes had begun assembly lining out their new combustion rifles. Their firepower had become overwhelmingly superior.

  That firepower was no longer superior. The Dunaj had an unspecified number of Outsider energy weapons looted from the crashed ship. They no longer held the upper hand. They no longer held the technological edge.

  Jarlaxle had his twin blasters. Henamka had a blast rifle. The rest of the Tarovan attack force had their rifles.

  "You may be right." Jarlaxle allowed.

  "We got a whole new animal by the tail here." Henamka said, having evidently read his thoughts, or so it seemed. Jarlaxle could no longer see his smile. The light had entirely departed. Jarlaxle couldn't see the hand he now held in front of his own face. It was that dark. He could sense Henamka's smile though. He knew it was right there. Henamka was always smiling, as if he found everything in this world to be of the utmost humor.

  Sometimes Henamka could be just too fucking cheerful, in Jarlaxle's opinion.

  "They come at us in the daylight with those weapons . . . !" Henamka said.

  "Yeah yeah." Jarlaxle snapped. "I got a pretty good picture. I don't need it drawn out."

  "Just trying to be helpful." Henamka said cheerfully.

  "Help someone else."

  "Don't know what we’re waiting for." Henamka said.

  "Can't wait to shoot that weapon, can you!"

  "Thought crossed my mind." Henamka admitted.

  "You'll have your chance real soon." Jarlaxle said.

  "Can't wait." Henamka said. There were a good many Tarovan envious of Henamka's friendship with their King, but Henamka had earned it, and Jarlaxle felt him worthy of it.

  "All right." Jarlaxle said. "Let it be on your head!"

  Henamka laughed quietly, and Jarlaxle even found himself smiling. He would no more chop off his own right hand.

  "Give the orders." Jarlaxle instructed.

  Chapter 47

  Zakin had not been one of those who underestimated the Outsider woman. He had recognized her mortality from the beginning, the Outsider ship had wiped away his learned superstitions instantly, but the predator he was recognized the predator that she was.

  From the moment she had begun her last attack, to the moment Nago had subdued her, he had not moved so much as a centimeter. Not one.

  If they would have had a confrontation, and she possessing the superior weapon, then she would have had to bring it to him, where the advantage would've been his. The surprise his.

  Zakin was a patient hunter. The top hunter in the tribe, if slow witted Nago had ever stopped to think about it.

  Zakin was no less patient in his hunt for the Chieftainship of the Dunaj. Zakin was only twenty-four, and in his prime, and patient.

  Nago's skill with the sword and knife kept him so. But the day would come. Nago was aging. Zakin's own skill was increasing. The day did not pass, given the opportunity, that Zakin did not practice with his weapons. Deep in the forest surrounding the Dunaj village. Alone. No spectators to carry word to Nago of his increasing ability.

  When the day came, it would be a surprise for slow witted Nago.

  Yes. That day would come.

  He wasted no time now. Even though there was only a little daylight remaining, if they left now they would be able to make several kilometers yet this day. Zakin went quickly from house to house, picking the men he wanted.

  "We are ordered to fetch back the man." Zakin told Creg. Creg had two young wives who now glared their hatred around their husband's bulk in the doorway. Zakin was not disturbed. Who could blame them!

  "Right now?" Creg asked angrily.

  "Right now. We leave immediately." Zakin said.

  "It can't wait until morning?"

  "No." Zakin said. "Now."

  Altogether he chose twenty. Twenty whose loyalty he could be sure of. Whose cultivation could begin now. He would need loyal men, then. A man with no following might challenge for the Chieftainship and win, only to be rejected if he was not worthy. The Dunaj histories told of such happenings, though there had not been anything of the sort recently. Not in the lifetimes of any now living.

  Quickly they prepared and departed. Into the forest which would soon fall prey to the darkness of night. Their only weapons were their bows, swords and knives.

  Of course Nago had not offered that they should use the Outsider weapons. He was like a greedy little boy with a new toy.

  He was a fool, Zakin thought.

  Chapter 48

  The thermal imaging contact lenses were of excellent manufacture. The Corps never cut corners where its equipment was concerned. They sent you to your death with the best of the best.

  The landscape was an eerie green around him now. The trees and plant life emitted more than enough heat to light the world as if it were nearly daylight, except green daylight.

  There were planets whose stars shone in the green spectrum. This was just like that.

  They moved at a fast jog trot, in single file, with Lan in the lead.

  The forest had come alive around them. The nocturnal
animals had come out of their dens. The little noises they made hardly decipherable from that of the scurrying’s and flight of the prey animals, the chase of the small predators, and once, the terrified, agonizing squealing of one caught in unforgiving jaws. The squealing was silenced quickly.

  Sometime later, something large crashed through the forest off to their left, probably disturbed by their passage, but whatever it was it was too far off to see through the screening forest.

  When Lan's sense of warning once again alerted him, a shiver which ran down his spine, a slight rise of gooseflesh on his skin, a squirt of adrenaline which set him to wariness, he slowed their progress to a ground eating but utterly silent pace, and it was only shortly thereafter that Lan spotted the flank of a large force ahead in the forest.

  How many there were Lan could not say. They were moving. They were like a flowing green fog stretching back into the forest, pushed by some gentle breeze.

  They were making noise as well, and Lan realized they were moving utterly blind. Lan paused to study them, and the body soon moved off out of sight.

  "The second force." Lan whispered, as his Team grouped around him.

  "It ain't the welcome wagon." Briar said.

  "Rebecca is going to be right in the middle of that!" Kelly said. "You said you had a plan?"

  "Let's hear it." Nat said.

  He had said that, hadn't he?

  "We have to get around them." Lan said. "Get in and get Rebecca out. Before they clash."

  "Then we are wasting time." Mario said. "And they're on the move."

  "And they looked primed." Tiny said.

  Stealthily Lan led them forward, until the greenly glowing group of men were once again visible before them. There was no problem outpacing them; they were blind, while the Team was not.

  Once in sight, Lan moved them out to their farthest visual range, about twenty or thirty meters, and quickly worked past them

  The group was immense. Hundreds. Moving purposefully in the dark. They obviously felt that they were within striking distance, which meant that the Team had no time to spare. What little noise they might have made was entirely concealed by the noise of the blindly moving force to their side.

  They were using no subterfuge whatever. Just a straightforward open attack. They must be sure of their advantage, Lan thought, or that they knew of the looting of Benefactor, the weapons gleaned, and this their motivation. Either to get those weapons, or destroy them before they could take advantage of them.

  Lan might've done the same himself.

  They soon passed beyond the ghostly green force, and Lan picked up the pace to a run. They weren't entirely quiet, but for the moment it could not be helped. They had to make time.

  Once these two large forces clashed, once they were locked in mortal combat, there would be little Lan and his Team could do. They would be viewed as enemy by both sides. All hands would be turned against them. His only chance was to get to and get Rebecca out, before that happened. And the clock was ticking.

  They almost ran past the small group without noticing them. Lan and the Team were making noise. The noise alerted this group, who leapt up from where they had been bedded down in the tall grass and invisible, their swords held threateningly as the men stared unseeing in the Team's direction.

  A quick scrutiny assured Lan that Rebecca was not with them, but a bird call, the call of the Red Crested Hang Tail, a species native to Calafga, which got no response except to arouse the consternation of the men who heard it, and who knew it for what it was, since there was no such species on Bali, assured him she was not with them.

  If she was anywhere near, after hearing that call, she would have made herself known, one way or another.

  The natives stood their ground and Lan led them out again, making doubly sure to make no noise. Lan wanted them to remain right where they were. The delay when the two groups met would help, it would give them a little more time, but Lan could not help but feel that they were walking a tight rope over a lava filled chasm. One slip and all was lost! One slip would cost his sister her life, and the rope was now frayed and treacherous.

  A slip would come easily.

  And he was yet somehow supposed to pluck Rebecca from the group ahead. A group of unknown numbers, an unknown distance ahead, and at an unknown location within that group.

  Yeah, they were tight rope walking right over the burning vales of hell. Lan could smell the brimstone and feel the heat of the flames licking around his ankles.

  Lan ran as quickly as he could while maintaining silence.

  The clock was ticking.

  Chapter 49

  Gylastak slipped from the branch he occupied and moved carefully into the town. These humans didn't seem to fear attack at all. They had their sentries in the forest, but otherwise seemed quite unconcerned.

  With their combustion weapons they had little to fear. It was possible they would even welcome attack. They would certainly make short work of anyone who attacked with native weapons.

  Torches and fires burned in different places, and the clear night sky cast its measure of Galactic light. The settlement was by no means absolutely dark, even to a human's inferior vision. Gylastak moved cautiously, but most of the activity had come to a halt when the light of day had gone.

  As was always the case in pre-industrial civilization, or almost always, the forests of Bali could not provide any large quantity of the rendered animal fat that would be necessary for artificial lighting.

  When night fell here, so did the people. Into their beds.

  Gylastak made use of the roofs of the homes. Leaping onto them and crawling over them just like the large insect he was, entirely soundlessly, to let the few humans who were about their business pass unaware.

  Some of the homes were close enough to leap from one roof to the next. Otherwise he slunk from shadow to shadow. Now he stood outside the dwelling where the Senator and a young native girl reposed.

  The Senator man in no way seemed a prisoner. Gylastak could hear their pleasant conversation inside, though he could not make out what was being said. It was too muffled through the thick walls.

  A human would not have heard them at all.

  The front entrance was barred by a heavy door in thick metal hinges, and bolted inside. The workmen who had made and installed the door had done a superb job. It did not rattle a bit as Gylastak pulled on the exterior handle.

  The dwelling had three glassed over windows in the front. Two on each side, and another three in the back, Gylastak found as he circled the solid building. The openings were too small for Gylastak. Even too small for a human child. They were more like glassed over slits than real windows. Firing slits, Gylastak recognized.

  Once barred inside, an attacker would only get them out by burning the house down around them, and to do that they would somehow have to get those great green logs burning. Gylastak could smell the greenness in the wood. They would somehow have to do that under the withering fire of the defender's combustion weapons firing from the window slits. Once the glass was broken out. No. It was clear why they did not seem concerned. Their defense would be made from inside their homes. They were right where they were supposed to be.

  They were very ready. Obviously very concerned. Gylastak's first impression had not been correct. The whole settlement had been devised around that very real concern.

  So Gylastak was not going to gain entrance by main force. Any such commotion was likely to bring the whole community crashing down on him. So Gylastak knocked.

  Fearlessly the bolt was thrown back and the door opened, and the girl who opened it, she was quick and courageous, but Gylastak got an appendage into the crack before she was able to get the door closed again. Then he had the door open and he was inside the entrance.

  The girl was moving again, a fiery resolve writ large upon her countenance. This was a human made of savage stuff. She was moving for the weapon leaning against the room's far wall. She was quick as any reptile, Gylast
ak noted. There was no way he could get to her fast enough to stop her.

  "I'm Federation, Senator." Gylastak said, but it had not been necessary. The Senator man was way ahead of him, and he leapt up and snatched the girl even as she reached out for the weapon, even as Gylastak was regretfully drawing his own weapon.

  "He's a friend!" Baldwin told Larita as she struggled. Baldwin couldn't say that she was overcome by terror, but certainly by a firm resolve to get to her weapon. She kicked and thrashed in his arms until he repeated himself. "He's a friend. He's come to help me. Settle down!"

  Larita didn't know why she did not scream. She should have, to alert the town. Now she realized it wasn't necessary. Depending on where her loyalties lay, she might have made a warning that the Senator would escape, but holding a man against his wishes was no part of what she saw as the goals of her people.

  "What is it?" Larita asked, still wrapped up in Baldwin's arms.

  "It's a Molog." Baldwin answered, and released her.

  "He Molog." Gylastak corrected. "Name Gylastak. I he."

  "Sorry." Baldwin said with a little smile. He had no idea at all how to tell.

  "No sorry. I come. We go. We go now?"

  Baldwin saw Gylastak's communicator.

  "You have a support vessel?" Baldwin asked.

  "Yes. Destroyer ship." Gylastak agreed. "I make ship come. We go now?"

  "No." Baldwin said, walking up to the, the, whatever a Molog was. Walking up to the fellow Federation member, Baldwin reminded himself harshly. "Can you please contact the ship?" Baldwin asked, at the same time shutting the door behind the Molog. It wouldn't do for someone to walk past and see the Molog framed in the open doorway.

  "This is Captain Reed." A voice said. The Molog had shown no outward sign of activating the device, and Baldwin didn't ask.

  "Hello Captain Reed." Baldwin said.

  "To whom am I speaking, please?"

  "Senator Markis Baldwin, Sir, at your service." Baldwin answered.

  "Am I ever glad to hear your voice, Sir." Reed said, the relief evident in his voice. "And Sir, you don't call me Sir. I call you Sir."