Markov's Prize

by Mark Barber

  ***

  “Come on, mate,” Tahl said as he carefully dragged Van Noor up the open, spiral staircase leading to the top of the archives, “nearly there now.”

  The din of battle had intensified, and the building regularly shook as heavier munitions detonated nearby. Two of the three corridors leading to the central archive room had collapsed, and Tahl nervously eyed the last entrance as he climbed toward the skylight, wishing he had taken measures to deny the enemy this last route in.

  Van Noor had stopped talking. Tahl had removed both of their helmets so Van Noor could at least see his friend face to face; hopefully that would offer some encouragement. But the older man’s eyes drifted in and out of focus and his head lolled down sleepily with every few paces he was dragged. A burst of gunfire swept up into the skylight, shattering the grimy dome on one side and sending showers of broken glass crashing down on the marble floor not far from the top of the staircase.

  “Ryen?” A familiar voice called from down below somewhere. “Ryen!”

  Tahl peered over the bannister of the winding metal staircase and looked back down to the ground. Below him, Rhona sprinted into the room from the last open corridor.

  “Katya!” Tahl shouted down. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Rhona looked up, her face hidden behind the cold, robotic exterioir of her helmet’s visor.

  “Ryen, we’ve got to leave! Now!” She called up in desperation.

  “Up here!” Tahl called down. “I think I can get us out through the skylight…”

  “There isn’t time!” Rhona shouted. “That bastard Owenne has called an artillery strike in on this building! It’s due any second! We’ve got to get out, now! There’s a whole rabble of Outcasts right behind me!”

  “Okay,” Tahl nodded, “we’re on our way down.”

  “Quickly!” Rhona urged as Tahl turned around to drag Van Noor back down the staircase. “I’ve mined the entire corridor and if any of those Outcasts…”

  As if in reply, the entire corridor behind her detonated with an earsplitting thunderclap of explosions as several plasma grenades erupted as one. The explosion lifted Rhona up off her feet and catapulted her across the room as billows of smoke and chips of stone blossomed out behind her. Tahl shouted out to her and set Van Noor down before sprinting down the staircase. Rhona was quickly up and on her feet, dragging her helmet off to reveal her tired but beautiful face, sweat soaked strands of black hair falling down over her purple bandana. She held a hand up as he approached.

  “I’m fine, I’m okay – where’s the senior?”

  “Up at the top, he’s in a bad way. We need to get him out of here before it’s too late.”

  The entire building rocked to its very core, the shock of the blast knocking Tahl and Rhona aside and sending them clawing out for balance. A second blast erupted, and then a third. Tahl looked across at Rhona. The look in her eyes reflected his own feelings. It was already too late. The artillery had arrived. Tahl stumbled over to Rhona, taking her shoulders in his hands.

  “You shouldn’t have come!” He shook his head. “You should have stayed put!”

  “I couldn’t leave you,” Rhona met his gaze sorrowfully, wincing as another artillery shell caused an entire section of the building to collapse somewhere behind her. “I knew the risk. I… dammit, it’s over now so it doesn’t matter how stupid this sounds. I’d rather die next to you than carry on on my own.”

  Another explosion shook what was left of the building again, and a row of archived records to the left were knocked noisily to the floor. Tahl pulled Rhona in and rested his forehead against hers.

  ***

  His vision blurred, and pain now replaced with only a dull ache, Van Noor moved a shaking hand to his utility belt and flipped one of the pouches open with great difficulty. Above him, the smoke had parted a little, and a few narrow pillars of light shone through the shattered skylight, picking out details in the masonry around him which his eyes could not focus on. He had heard the conversation below him. He knew they were being bombed into oblivion and again, for a second time, this would be the death of him.

  Another shell landed and the southern wall of the room collapsed entirely, obliterating the ground floor in a cloud of dust. Van Noor slowly and carefully recovered the contents from his utility pouch, feeling the item expand as it was freed from the compression pocket. Taking in a long, painful breath, he forced himself to concentrate for one last moment, focusing his eyes on the carefully painted model soldier and the two pictures on his viewscreen. One was Van Noor’s favorite picture drawn by his son – a fast spaceship zooming through the stars. The other was a family picture, the four of them together in the afternoon sun in their back garden, faces all smiles from happier times. His eyes lingered on Jabe, Alora, and Becca, taking in every detail he could of their features and imagining himself back in that moment from years before, enjoying the sunshine and the company of his family.

  Another shell impacted the building as his vision faded.

  ***

  Tahl could not see Rhona now, even if he was able to open his eyes. The explosions were deafening and the air was filled with acrid, stinging smoke. His head pressed against hers, the two held onto each other as they waited for the end. A shell detonated to the right, picking up heavy archive shelving units and tossing them through the air like discarded child’s toys.

  “I’m ready for death, I guess,” Rhona said to him softly through the shard, her voice able to reach his mind directly and bypass the onslaught of violent noise around them. “But I can’t get one thing out of my mind. Look… if, if your God protects you and you successfully regen, and you remember all of this, and… if by some miracle I come out of this, in one form or another… promise me you’ll do all of this again. Win me over again, promise me that. I’m not a bad person, and if I get another shot at life, and I don’t remember all this… Promise me you’ll do this all over again. Promise you’ll come get me.”

  Tahl nodded.

  Chapter Twenty One

  The silence was jarring but fitted seamlessly with the sunlit, turquoise skies. Clouds slowly parted as rays of sunlight came down in golden pillars. Tahl opened his eyes. He assumed he was Tahl at least; he had no idea where he was or if this was what it felt like to be reactivated as a clone. He realized that he was still clinging on to Rhona. She looked up at him.

  “Well, well, well!” Owenne’s voice boomed out as the mandarin wafted one hand in front of him, stumbling over the rubble and through the rapidly dissipating clouds of dust. “Looks like the plan worked!”

  Rhona’s eyes widened and she jumped back from Tahl.

  “Looks like you’re all good, Boss,” she nodded, smacking a fist into his shoulder. “Let’s get you and the senior out of here.”

  “Bry?” Tahl looked up toward where the domed skylight once was, his mind still numb with confusion.

  The staircase still stood, and with it, a pair of supporting pillars and a few fragments of each floor of the archive room. The rest of the building was entirely destroyed and clear, unobstructed views of the sky and the surrounding buildings were visible in every direction. A pair of medi-drones hovered up to Van Noor’s prone form and quickly went to work as a squad of strike troopers advanced through the dust.

  “Will he be alright?” Tahl asked as he looked up at Van Noor.

  “I don’t know, I’m not a bloody doctor,” Owenne grumbled.

  “What happened?”

  “Artillery Procedure 151 Beta,” the mandarin replied, “as planned.”

  “151?” Rhona asked.

  “151 Beta,” Owenne corrected, “a Beta Strike. You thought I’d called in an Alpha Strike when you started babbling and whinning at me, but it was a Beta Strike. I called in a precision artillery bombardment to destroy everything at my markers, not the entire area. I could see you quite clearly, and I was being very careful to obliterate everything around you. But not you. So this whole area has been pacified by ever
y gun in the 17th Assault Force. Everything. I called support away from every other friendly unit in the city to protect you. I destroyed my objective and everything I’ve worked for to protect you. So remember that, next time you call me a bastard.”

  “Yes, sir,” Rhona said quietly.

  Tahl looked around, still dazed by the barrage.

  “They’re all dead, Ryen,” Owenne explained, “that was the one positive which came out of all of this. The Ghar knew I wanted something here and poured everything they had into this area. One assumes the strategic genius leading their little rabble was willing to gamble on me being unwilling to sacrifice this building and what was in it, hence them bunching up their forces nicely. Unfortunately for them, their gamble was a poor choice. I was willing to sacrifice it all. For my friends. You’re still a bunch of complete pricks for ruining everything, but it was the correct decision.”

  Tahl opened his mouth to speak, but found no words. He looked across at Rhona for assistance, but the dust covered strike leader only flashed a white-toothed smile in amusement at the entire situation before the mandarin continued.

  “Now get yourself together because we need to fall back. The next wave of these little bastards isn’t far away, and with reinforcements in the system, it’s time we admitted that we’ve lost this one. The MAA and the Ghar can fight it out for Markov’s Prize. We lost.”

  Forcing an unconvincing smile which did little to hide his disappointment, Owenne turned to stride off with a flourish of the tails of his coat. Tahl felt a wave of relief as he saw Van Noor limping slowly down the battered staircase, supported on both sides by the hovering medi-drones. The two men exchanged relieved smiles. Tahl turned back to the mandarin.

  “Owenne!”

  The NuHu stopped and turned slowly back around.

  “Yes?” His tone was sarcastic as he spoke.

  Tahl walked over to him, reaching into his utility pouch. He pulled out an ancient, dull brown folder made of thick paper and offered it to Owenne.

  “Project Embryo,” Tahl explained, “this is everything that was here. I swiped it all before it was too late.”

  Owenne stared impassively at Tahl in silence. His face broke into an ecstatic smile, and a deep, loud belly laugh echoed across the ruins.

  ***

  Firebase Alpha

  Equatorial Region

  Markov’s Prize

  L-Day Plus 73

  The gentle waves lapped over Rhona’s ankles, soaking the material of her green barrack trousers up to the knees. Her bare feet waded through the crystal clear waters, finding another series of ridges in the sand. Staring out to where the sea met the horizon, Rhona stepped down on the ridges and broke them underfoot, feeling the sand waft up through the water around her. Several yan off to the right, she heard laughter and music from some of the troopers from her company, but it did little to disturb the peace she found in being alone in the midmorning sun. She had moved down the beach from where the others had set up next to the firebase itself to a stretch next to a narrow stream, trickling down to join the sea.

  “You okay?”

  Rhona did not turn to face the voice behind her on the beach. She suppressed a yawn and pushed her hands into her trouser pockets.

  “Yeah,” she finally replied.

  “Would you rather be alone?” Sessetti asked.

  “Nah, I’m easy either way.”

  She heard Sessetti walk out to sit by the edge of the water, near where she had left her boots. A few colorful sea birds circled overhead, their cawing adding some color to the gentle lapping of the waves. She glanced across at Sessetti and saw he was wearing his martial arts clothing, leaving her wondering if he had been training alone or whether Tahl had found time to get away from his work after all.

  “You sure you’re okay?” Sessetti asked. “I don’t mean to pry, but you don’t seem to be yourself.”

  “Why’s that?” Rhona asked.

  “I’ve spent nearly three standard months on this planet as part of your squad,” Sessetti replied, “in all that time you’ve found a thousand excuses to strip down to your underwear in front of people. Now we’re here, the war is over, we’re perfectly safe, off-duty, on a sun drenched beach, and you’re fully clothed.”

  Rhona failed to suppress a short laugh and turned to face him, shrugging.

  “I suppose it says something of the duality of my persona,” she said.

  “Now I know something’s wrong,” Sessetti looked up from where he sat, “because the Rhona I know doesn’t even know what the words ‘duality’ and ‘persona’ even mean.”

  Rhona had found herself at a loss ever since the retreat from Pariton. A wave of confused and conflicting feelings combined with weariness and a sense of loss were heightened when the Ghar fleet arrived and, to everyone’s surprise, revealed itself to be an evacuation fleet rather than reinforcements. Within a day, every surviving Ghar was recovered and left the planet, and neither the Concord nor the MAA felt inclined to stop them. With no Ghar to distract the Concord invaders and the fear of Concord reinforcements arriving at any time, the MAA had called a ceasefire and negotiations had commenced.

  “How’re things with you and Bo?” Rhona asked, only half interested in the answer but keen to divert the conversation away from herself.

  “Ah… he’s still upset because I want to see this through for longer than he does,” Sessetti sighed, “and I do see his point, but we’re not joined at the hip, and I do resent him expecting me to run life decisions by him. He can do his own thing and I should be allowed to do mine.”

  “You wanna do your own thing so you think staying in the military is the best way to achieve that?” Rhona raised one eyebrow.

  “Not when you put it like that. But I do want to try and make this work. It just feels more important than going to clubs and parties and singing. Singing about meaningless crap. I want to be out here and be a part of this. I hate to sound like one of those awful adverts back home, but I do actually feel like I belong here. I’m not ready to turn my back on that.”

  “I wouldn’t worry. You and Bo’ll both be around for a while yet. Three months’ frontline time? Ol’ Uncle C3 ain’t gonna let you go home just yet. Not without giving a bit more first.”

  “So what are you going to do with your leave?” Sessetti asked. “You going to go see your brother? Or you seeing this guy of yours?”

  Rhona shuddered at the thought of either and both.

  “I’ll worry about that if it ever happens.”

  “There’s no ‘if’ about it,” Sessetti said, “we’re leaving in two days. That’s what I meant before when I said the war was over. I figured you would have read the bulletin on the company shard.”

  Rhona folded her arms and blinked in surprise.

  “The MAA surrendered this morning. The entire planet is now part of the Concord. The 17th Assault Force is being disbanded and we’ve all been given a month’s leave before the 44th is sent to Lothen Major for training and reserve duties. We’re going home.”

  Rhona swore.

  “I thought you’d be happy.” Sessetti stood slowly.

  “Happy?” Rhona repeated. “About what? I’ve been on the frontline without a proper break for I don’t know how long now. I don’t have a house to go home to. I can’t go see my brother because last time I saw him, it didn’t go so well. And I’m terrified of seeing that guy I told you about, because I know that as soon as I go home and all the romance and excitement of me being a frontline soldier fades away, he’ll see me for what I really am and realize there’s nothing behind the pretty face. No substance. He’ll get bored of me and I don’t think I can take that. I don’t want to go home! This is home! You said it yourself, you feel like you belong here! I…”

  Sessetti held out both hands passively to silence her.

  “Kat, you’ll be fine,” he said gently. “I’m sure your brother loves you and whatever happened, he’ll get over it if he hasn’t already. You don’t have a house? Jus
t go get one built. You’re still thinking like a Freeborn. When we go back to the Concord, there’s no money and no responsibility over a home. Just pick a site, pick a design, and get some drones to build it for you. Go and make whatever home you want, wherever you want. That’s why we were fighting here, right? To give people that life, what we’ve got back home. And as for your guy? C’mon. You could pick any guy you wanted, anybody, and if you picked him, then he must be alright. Girls who look like you don’t settle for somebody, they cherry pick the best. And if his head is screwed on the right way, he will see you for who you really are and everything will be fine.”

  Rhona sank down and sat in the shallow water, her legs stretched out in front of her as the waves washed over her waist.

  “All this training is supposed to keep us stable, clear headed, calm. None of it is working. Lian, I’m petrified. I don’t want to go back.”

  Sessetti walked out to sit in the sea next to her, a few paces away, which Rhona saw as an attempt to show that his intentions were purely platonic. It was a gesture she appreciated.

  “I’m glad you made it through, Lian,” she said without looking across at him, “you’re alright.”

  The two stared out to sea in silence as Rhona wrestled with her thoughts.

  ***

  The engineering drones backed away at the mouth of the neat tunnel they had spent the last four hours digging into the hillside. Owenne sent a mental command to one of them, forcing it to turn back around and illuminate its torch, filling the tunnel with light as he walked slowly down. He glanced down at the map in his hand, the ancient brown paper taken from the file Tahl had retrieved for him. If he had interpreted it right…