Secret of the Legion

by Marshall S. Thomas

  "Here's what he had," he said, passing something to Dragon. Dragon examined it, than passed it to me. I strained to make it out in the dark. It was an enhanced, enlarged printout of my face. I recognized the pix immediately.

  "We picked him up at Pearce Plaza," the shadow told Dragon. "He had a phony Front ID, and he was showing that pix around, asking if anyone had seen him. He wasn't the only one, either—at least two others got away."

  "They're getting a little pushy, aren't they?" A voice from the dark.

  "That pix is from my Nimbos ID card," I said quietly.

  Dragon put one foot up on a chair and leaned over the captive. "Do you know who I am, Systie?"

  The Systie looked up. He was an Outworlder. We could read the fear in his face. He licked his lips and responded. "Yes sir. It's the Deadman."

  "That's right. Your designation?"

  "Designation. Uhh…Three Two Glenn."

  "Your unit?"

  "We're with Keltos City Special Branch—Polcrime Investigations, sir."

  "Your mission?"

  "The mission was to locate William Fifteen—the fellow in the pix. Locate and detain."

  "Did they tell you why? What had he done?"

  "Thoughtcrime, sir. They said it was important. The order came from off-planet—from the SIS."

  "Scut!" Whit exclaimed. A hush settled over the room. The captive was sweating in the cold. He probably figured he was as good as dead. Dragon motioned to the door. We followed him out to the hallway. I fumbled at my oxy mask and took a deep whiff. My throat was burning and I was dead tired hauling my body around in that grav. Just walking was a major effort on Yida.

  "If the SIS is after Three," Whit said, "it means the Stardust is in danger as well. We've got to get off this planet right now!"

  "You're right," Dragon said.

  "Nelson!" Whit snapped into her comset. "Tear itself away from those underaged beauty queens and get to the car—now! We're leaving!"

  "On the way!" the comset squawked. Nelson had evidently been romancing some of Dragon's more comely guerillas.

  "Sir…" it was one of the guards. "What shall we do with the Systie?"

  "He's just a cop," Dragon replied. "We're not at war with them. We'll free him…later. Check with me later."

  "Sir!"

  "You coming, Dragon?" I asked.

  "Yes!" Whit exclaimed.

  "No," Dragon said calmly. "No, afraid not. I belong here."

  "Dragon!" Whit stared at him, stunned. "We came here for it! Only for it!"

  "Sorry. Can't do it."

  "It said it loved us!"

  "I do—but I'm not going to walk away from the Front. I'm needed here."

  "We need it more!"

  "Then stay here. Stay here, with me."

  "No…we can't." It was a whisper.

  "Don't you love me?" A thin smile, from Dragon.

  "Intrusion!" The comset at Dragon's waist crackled urgently. "Center, Noran. We've got three DefCorps hotcars, overflying us headed roughly northeast."

  "Center, Memorial." Another voice on the comset. "We've got a flight of four DefCorps hotcars, heading east, high altitude."

  "Let's go!" Dragon barked. As we charged up the stairway with our long-haired guide, the comset was alive with transmissions.

  "Noran, Memorial, Center. Please confirm these are DefCorps aircars, respond."

  "Definitely! Center, Noran. They're DefCorps hotcars, now losing altitude."

  "Center, Memorial. We confirm four DefCorps aircars."

  "Center, Parks. We've got two DefCorps airbuses, escorted by four hotcars, passing low over Mount Condor, heading southeast."

  "All air defense units, stand by."

  "Permission to fire!"

  "Permission to fire!"

  "Negative, negative, stand by all!"

  We had reached the ground floor corridor and skidded along the hall, bursting noisily through the exterior doors and into icy air by an aircar lot. I stopped, gasping. The sky was grey and smoky. Light sleet peppered my skin—the concrete walkway was covered with ice. Dragon had his SG out. He was scanning the skies. The streetkid was glancing around nervously, fingering his vac gun.

  "Do it…do it." Dragon muttered under his breath. Then the comset crackled again.

  "All air defense units, fire at will and disperse immediately. Repeat, fire and disperse—let 'em have it!"

  "Good!" Dragon snapped. "Where's your car?"

  "Nelson, where is it!" Whit shouted into her comset. "We're on the other side—get over here!"

  "On the way!"

  "They've never done this before," Dragon said calmly. "It's the Systie garrison—first time they've attacked us. It must be you—they're attacking us because of you."

  "Deadman!" A couple of Dragon's militia tumbled out another door, calling to him. "What do we do?"

  "We got one!" Dragon's comset came to life again. "DefCorps aircar hit, falling—we got one!"

  "Disperse, disperse—now!"

  "Defend the building!" Dragon shouted at the kids, ignoring the comset. "Get to the popholes—now!" He started jogging towards them but Whit snatched him by one arm, skidding along comically over the ice behind him.

  "Dragon! Come with us! Please!" Our aircar rounded a corner of the building in a cloud of spray, heading right for us.

  "I told you…" Dragon began. The sky flashed, then turned a shocking pink. My blood froze. A titanic explosion split the heavens. A huge armored airbus appeared, a leviathan from Hell, crashing right through the parking lot, flipping parked aircars aside like toys. A Systie aircar shot overhead in a flash and the world erupted in a horrific bang, a million dazzling white-hot contrails crackling out to fill the sky. I could feel the heat, burning my skin. I scrambled up from the walkway, stunned. We had been protected from the blast by a low concrete wall. As I watched in horror, Dragon shouldered his SG and fired over the wall. My eyes snapped over to the parking lot to see what he was shooting at. Billows of glittering pink smoke parted briefly to reveal a great many fully armored DefCorps troopers coming right at us on foot. As I stared aghast they fired, and the wall of the cube bloc behind us erupted, peppering us with debris. The kid with the hair popped up with his vac gun and his head burst and he crumpled, bloody and lifeless. Whit screamed. Our own aircar floated over us like a slow motion dream, taking hits, xmax popping and flashing on the armored skin. I could see Nelson through the plex, snapping us a quick glance. I realized suddenly that he was going to bring the aircar down further along the building. We'd have only a few fracs to make it. Dragon had Whit by an arm, and we were running hunched over by the little wall toward the aircar, trying very hard not to slip on the ice. The air was crackling with laser and x.

  "Get in!" Dragon shouted. The aircar hovered, spraying ice and sleet, and the doors snapped open. Dragon threw Whit in bodily, then turned to face the DefCorps. I had my vac gun out but I knew vac wouldn't do any good against those armored troopers. Dragon carefully removed his sunglasses with one hand and tossed them aside. He shouldered his SG and the raincoat flapped all around him in the backblast of the aircar. The Systies were coming right at us, bronze-colored DefCorps armor, relentless, unstoppable, armored goliaths. Xmax exploded off the side of the aircar, a tremendous racket, the shrieking of laser, the whining of the aircar, and Dragon stood there firing, as cool as ice. My skin crawled as I suddenly realized that Dragon had decided to check out right there, calmly facing the DefCorps, going out like a moth hurling itself at a naked flame. I stood near the open aircar door and the car danced lightly over the downblast and Whit was leaning out of the aircar door screaming something, but I could not hear her. I raised the vac gun and fired right into Dragon's back. His arms flew up into the air loosely and the SG went flying and he collapsed face first onto the icy pavement.

  "What is it doing? Is it crazy?" Whit was suddenly out of the car and by my side, screeching into my ears, scratching at my clothing.

  "You want him or not?" I shouted bac
k. "Help me get him into the car!"

  We tossed him in headfirst—I can't imagine how we did it in that grav, but we had plenty of motivation. Laser burnt tracks into the side of the aircar as we scrambled in after him. Nelson took off so fast I almost blacked out.

  ***

  "Feeling better?" I asked. We were in the command lounge of the Stardust on vac run red, deep in the hole. I was sitting across a little table from Dragon. He was slouched over a cup of dox and Whit was standing behind him, lightly massaging his shoulders. It was quiet and warm, and my fingers and toes were rapidly defrosting. The air tasted so sweet after Yida it was almost intoxicating.

  "Let me get this straight," Dragon said, shifting in his chair. "You shot me in the back with a vac bolt. Is that right?"

  "That's it," I said.

  "I see," Dragon said, looking me over curiously. He had a nervous tic on one side of his mouth that I had never noticed before. "So now," he continued, "I'd like to hear one good reason why I shouldn't smash all your teeth right down your throat." His eyes were blazing, and his arms were twitching. I had no doubt at all he could do it, with very little trouble.

  "I'll give you two good reasons," I said, as calmly as possible. "First, I saved your life. If you had stayed there, you would have been killed—and I think you know it. Second reason, I felt kind of sorry for you and I wanted to even things out."

  "You felt sorry for me?" His face was turning purple—a bad sign.

  "You told me you betrayed us on Uldo, after ConFree psyched you."

  "Yes. What has that got to do with you shooting me in the back?"

  "You told me you felt badly about betraying us—so badly that you quit the Legion."

  "Yes—so?"

  "So there's no reason to feel bad about it anymore. We're even now. You betrayed us, I betrayed you. You can come back to the Legion now. There's no further reason to feel guilty. And we all want you back. You belong with us. You belong with the Legion. You're a soldier of the Legion. Your friends on Yida will get on without you."

  He just gaped at me, open-mouthed. Whit had been frozen during the exchange, but now she resumed massaging his shoulders.

  "That's right, Dragon," she said soothingly. "It's the reason we came here. Ten—uh, Redhawk wants to talk with it. Cinta wants to talk with it as well. She told me Beta was betrayed, sold out, dispersed by ConFree after its costliest, most successful operation. We don't even know who's alive or who's dead. We don't know what's truth and what's a lie. We've got to determine who survived, and who didn't. We've got to get the squad together again—no matter what it takes. We owe it to the past. And Cinta needs our help, as well. Talk with Ten. Talk with Cinta, it'll see."

  "Talk with them, Dragon," I urged him. "I have no memory, I can't help you. But they can. Just talk with them, then you decide. If you want to return to Yida, we'll arrange it. But talk with them first! I get the feeling we've all been royally screwed, and I'd kind of like to get at the truth. I don't even remember Beta, but I don't like what ConFree has done to us, if it's true. They erased me, just like Redhawk said. I don't like that. I'd like to get back at them. I'd like to find out who's responsible and track them down and shoot them right through the forehead. It's probably the same bunch that psyched you. What do you think?"

  He glanced toward me coldly, his eyes far away. "You know, you haven't changed at all, Thinker," he said calmly. "You always pretended to be so cool and rational, but underneath that you were a raving maniac. It's why I always liked you. All right—you're right. I feel the same damned way. But there's another reason I walked away from the Legion. And it's partially why I didn't want to go back with you. I told you before—everybody I know dies. I figured I had done enough damage to Beta already. If we pursue this we're all going to die—you, me, Whit…Redhawk, Cinta…Nelson, all your Cyrillians…everybody. We all die. That has to be understood."

  I held out my hand. He grasped it. Whit reached over and her slender fingers wrapped around ours.

  "Agreed," I said. "To the death."

  "Death," Eight repeated.

  "Death!" Whit whispered. Her eyes were closed. Our future was sealed.

  Chapter 4

  The Hand of the Legion

  It was a long way to Dindabai. We hurtled into the void, into the endless black dust of the hole, blasting our way right between the eyes of the Cosmos—an impossible antimat bullet, rupturing the magical fabric of spacetime. We were cold and dead and doomed, neither here nor there, somewhere between the in and the out, phantom travellers riding the edge of extinction. It was extremely cold and I could feel the pressure on my skin. Vac run red. I knew we were in the eye and I knew we would be there for a long, long time.

  The Stardust was so spotless and sterile it made me feel dirty. My little cube was so clean it almost glowed in the dark. I felt like a pig moving around in there, leaving impressions in the icy phospho green carpet, wrinkling up the neatly folded blankets on the bunk, leaving hairs in the sink, getting water all over the shower floor. On the other hand, just taking a shower was such a remarkable experience to me, after Nimbos, that it was almost erotic. It may have been a long way to Dindabai, but we were also a long way from Nimbos. And as we travelled further and further into the hole I felt I was leaving my old life—my false life—behind me forever.

  Whit said it was obvious that the Systie attack into the Freedom Front's pitiful little liberated area was prompted solely by a desire to kill, capture or neutralize…me. That gave me something to think about, all right. I thought it strange that no apparent effort had been made to attack or cripple the Stardust, after we had escaped the DefCorps garrison's downside attack. It didn't surprise Whit at all, however. She said the DefCorps was so rigid and paranoid that combat units were normally unable to adapt to changing situations, and unauthorized to do so as well. When we escaped their massive attack on the ground, the situation was out of their scenario. In addition, as a senso smuggler, the Stardust had first-class protection from the local authorities, who may not have been informed by a distrustful SIS. We were probably lucky—but there was no way of knowing.

  Whit wouldn't tell me why the System was so concerned about me. Ask Cinta, she would say—ask Cinta. It seemed that everything was fine as long as I was safely psyched, washing dishes on Nimbos. But now that I was on the move, and out of their control, things were different. I knew Whit was very worried about pursuit, even though it was highly unlikely in stardrive. We were bending spacetime, rushing into the future, leaving Systie vac far behind, bound for Dindabai and all it meant—bound for ConFree vac. I had heard only horror stories about Dindabai and the CrimCon. I didn't know what to expect.

  ***

  "Fireworks," I said, "filling the sky." I was in the lounge with Dragon. It was dark and cold. There was some spooky music moaning away in the background, and incense smoke hung in the air. Dragon was shirtless, sitting cross-legged on the deck. He was a strange one, all right. When I walked in he had been frozen, eyes closed, worshipping private demons.

  "Mongera," Dragon responded. We were playing association. I wanted him to explain my dreams, but I didn't want to give him the details. I was still suspicious. His pale brown skin was covered with dark tattoos. Glittering dragon-snakes writhed down his arms, armored beetles marched across his chest and strange indecipherable runes marked his earlobes and shoulders. The faces of the dead looked up at me from his knuckles. I didn't know where he had come from, and I didn't think I wanted to know.

  "Tell me about Mongera," I said. "The sky…tell me about the sky."

  Dragon closed his eyes. I knew he could see Mongera again. "It was beautiful," he said softly. "We made that sky. Warhound had the manport atlauncher. The techs had worked it out. It was psybloc, to counter the O's psypower, and we were giving it the first combat field test. The psybloc burst at high altitude—just like fireworks, and fell slowly down like hot rain. It scrambled the O's psypower projections, protecting us. There were different colors, for the different f
requencies. Warhound just filled the sky—it was heavenly. It was…it was us. We marched right at the O, under that holy sky. We didn't have any doubts we were all going to die. Nobody had killed an O before."

  That was my dream, I thought. That was my nightmare. A sky full of sparklers, falling gently down.

  "Flame," I said. "Raw flame—burning brightly. The whole sky, burning, white and green."

  "Mongera," Dragon said again, his eyes still closed. "Tacstars and biotics—the O was blasting us with tacstars as we advanced. The green fireballs were biotic saturation strikes, from the O. Psycho blew them apart with our own tacstars as soon as they appeared. The little squirt had quick reactions, I'll give him that."

  "Mud," I said. "A worm in the mud."

  Dragon smiled, and his eyes flickered open. "That was all of us—on Mongera. It started raining after we killed the O. Then the Systies surprised us." The smile faded. "You were hit—trying to reach One and Two and Nine. I told you not to try it, but you ignored me. That's when you lost your arm. The sky was alive with nukes by then—and we were squirming in the mud. Five dead—five immortals." His eyes were closed again. "They died for us. They died for the future."

  "We remember that sky." It was Whit, standing in the doorway. She had been listening, and I hadn't even seen her. "Cinta had gone in to help, and the DefCorps hit the escape pod. That's when we showed up in the aircar. We remember that sky—it was a glowing ocean of fireballs, and all of the city had been nuked. We prayed to God, for simple survival, as we approached."

  "You were our last hope," Dragon said quietly. "I could hardly believe it when you answered Cinta's nova. It was like a dream."

  And it was like a dream to me, listening to it. Whit was a pale, ghostly vision, slim and alluring. She glided over to Eight and settled down beside him, running long fingernails lightly over his flesh. Eight closed his eyes again. I regretted not having taken Whit up on her offer. What a stupid move. It was definitely a little late now.

  Further and further, into the hole. Dindabai was at the furthest reaches of the inhabited universe, on the far side of the Outvac, so far the mind was not really capable of grasping the distance. This was where the Lost Command was making its last stand—and this was where Cinta awaited us. She had all the answers, I knew. She was the ultimate destination, for me. It was a long way to go but I knew it would be worth it for me. I just wanted to fill in the blanks, that's all. I wasn't worried about the consequences.