The Tetra War_Fractured Peace

by Michael Ryan

  Yet I knew fighting defensively would end badly.

  I advanced rapidly and went low, trying to hit his knee or ankle.

  He ran and rolled away from me.

  I chased.

  I brought a massive swing down toward his face.

  Doole seemed to freeze in place, but miraculously moved his head at the last fraction of a second as my spiked ball hit the ground. He smiled and rolled away. I jumped back, evading the trap he was setting. Overconfidence in a man-on-man fight is usually deadly; you don’t have anyone covering your flank or stepping in when you make an error in judgment.

  I started swinging my weapon in a circle again, getting centrifugal force to move the striking portion of it into a blur. I watched Doole’s eyes to see if I could catch him telegraphing a move, but he kept his glare directed center mass and gave nothing away. I looked left and moved right, but he was prepared to block my advance. I wondered if he’d practiced with the flail. If so, it meant there were unknowns working against me.

  There were moves he could make that I’d not be ready to defend against. I needed a ploy.

  Pow’s advice came to mind: Don’t play by any preconceived rules.

  I moved the weapon to my left hand.

  Doole was right-handed as well, so by going southpaw on him, I’d done something he wasn’t expecting. He hesitated for a fraction of a second as I brought my flail into range.

  I took advantage of his pause.

  He fell for the bait. When he tried to parry my strike away, the two cords got entangled, which was what I’d hoped for.

  I released my weapon, freeing both hands, and rushed him. The weakness of the flail was apparent – its useful range didn’t include hitting an enemy that was standing close enough to smell your breath.

  I rabbit-punched him in the throat with brutal force and crushed his trachea.

  He dropped the flails, and his hands clawed at his neck.

  I rammed my knee into his groin with all my might.

  Doole appeared to scream silently and his legs buckled.

  I delivered a stiff-fingered strike to the throat again. He fell backward. I jumped on top of him like a predator bringing down a herd animal and pushed my thumbs into his brutalized windpipe, cutting off his airway. His arms flailed at me as he fought in vain to inhale, and his body began to convulse. I kneed him in the groin again for good measure and then straightened and moved to my weapon. After untangling the two flails, I tossed his aside and used mine to deliver a coup de grâce to the head.

  I felt relief, but no joy in this particular act of killing.

  But the natives cheered.

  They picked up their fallen warrior and carried him to the funeral pyre. There was not a single trace of hostility. The chief of the tribe approached me and extended his arms as if to hug me.

  “Embrace him,” Pow said. “He’s welcoming you to the tribe as a brother.”

  I felt the warm skin of the leader’s bare chest on mine, and I accepted his bear hug with humility.

  The killing was over.

  “Congratulations, Avery,” Abrel said.

  The ceremony began as it had the night before, with drink and dancing.

  The native warriors approached me one at a time and embraced me as a new member of the tribe. I received their adulation with humility. I knew many challenges would face us in the coming months, and there would be nothing to be gained by allowing anger or loss to taint my victory. The wife of Doole was brought to me. Tears ran down her face, and I felt a lump in my throat.

  “What do I do, Pow?” I asked.

  “Take her to the victor’s tent and do what men and women do,” he said.

  “I’m married to Callie,” I said. “There are some customs we have, Pow, as humans. I can’t do this.”

  “You must.”

  “I will not,” I said. “There must be another way.”

  “If you reject her, Avery, she’ll end up on that pyre with her dead husband. Do you want to add another death to your conscience tonight?”

  “No. But…”

  “I’ll explain to the chief you need me to interpret,” Pow said. “We’ll figure something out.”

  Pow talked for a minute, his arms waving around and his fingers pointing at me, the woman, and then the victor’s tent. He took the woman’s arm after the chief apparently gave him consent to intervene. I followed his lead, and the three of us ended up in the tent alone.

  Pow spoke in whispers to the woman. After a moment, she looked at me and nodded slightly.

  “What did you say?”

  “I told her that your wife is a jealous witch. If you share your seed, Callie will curse her. I then explained that you’ll lie to the village to protect her honor as a woman. I explained that with your permission, I’d share my seed with her so that she can continue to bear children. I hope this is acceptable to you.”

  “Let’s see, I get to stay faithful to Callie, and you get laid?”

  “What is ‘get laid’?” he said.

  “Sex.”

  “Oh, yes. It’s the most pragmatic solution I could think of,” he said.

  “Works for me,” I said.

  “Perfect. Remain with her for at least an hour. After that, join the celebrating. You’ll be reunited with Callie in the morning.”

  Pow left the tent and I rested.

  The new widow curled up next to me and cried herself to sleep.

  In the following weeks, after being happily reunited with our female members, we began to learn the customs of the tribe. We hunted moose, learned to fish, and ate glorious feasts. Even Ace’s former partner learned to accept her new role and appeared content with her new family.

  “The men seem happy,” Noleerz said to me one night.

  “Yes,” I agreed.

  “This won’t last,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “What do you think will happen?”

  “I look into the sky every night expecting to see a heli-jet,” I admitted.

  “Gurts, Teds, or Meckos?” the lieutenant asked.

  “It could be any of them. Maybe even the Errusiakos,” I answered. “I know how the Gurts are with hardware and accounting. They’ll show up. I’m certain of it. The question is whether an enemy gets here first. If that’s the case, I suggest we try our best to get away from the tribe. They don’t deserve to be sucked into our war.”

  “I don’t know if you’ll have a choice, Avery. They take loyalty as seriously as we do.”

  “Well, let’s hope the Gurts land first.”

  “What happens to Pow?”

  I thought about it for only a second. “Sir, with your permission, I’d like to agree that he died in the heli-jet crash. I’ll get the men to agree.”

  “You’re asking me to commit a serious violation of my duties.”

  “We’d all be dead if it wasn’t for him,” I said.

  “He’s still part of the enemy intelligence that has acted against humans and purvasts,” Noleerz said. “He’s officially still a prisoner of the Gurt Armed Forces. You’re still MIA, accruing pay back home.”

  “I have no home,” I said.

  “You have a duty,” he said.

  “Sometimes duty requires a man to elevate himself above tribal forces and do what’s right.”

  “What’s right, Avery?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’re not a philosopher; you’re a soldier.”

  “Yes, sir. Understood.”

  He stared off into space for several moments before grunting quietly, as though making a decision. “We’ll talk more. I’m inclined to side with you and prepare a defendable lie.”

  “Sir?”

  “Pow is now a brother-in-arms in our tribe, Avery,” he said. “I’m not sure which duty to be more beholden to. I’m an officer, but I’m not a monster. As you correctly pointed out, we’d be dead if Pow hadn’t been loyal to us.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “It might not mat
ter,” he added. “The Chemeckos might find us. Or the Teds and Pros might show up and take us all prisoner, Pow included. No point in worrying about what we can’t control.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said. “So what next?”

  “I’m going to take a native wife and pretend we can live like this forever.”

  “Pragmatic, sir.”

  “Indeed.”

  The lieutenant got his wish; he married a beautiful young native shortly after we spoke.

  The honeymoon didn’t last long. He was killed in a tribal skirmish a month after the consummation of his marriage.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The test of any man lies in action.

  ~ Admiral Slox

  Chief Gunju instructed Pow to give us Tsalagian language lessons every morning. He was a good teacher, and we decided it would be smart to also learn some basic Mecko, which was the slang term for the language of the Chemeckos. Talamz, like Earth and Purvas, had hundreds of tongues. Mecko and the language of the other dominant nation, Rhanskad, were the most popular.

  I felt like I was back in school, but it was also fun in a way, and we weren’t killing anyone.

  Tribal life had a certain charm that I came to enjoy during our seven months among the Tsalagians. We hunted game, fashioned tools, and had long celebrations for things I couldn’t understand, given the language barrier. My newly acquired wife was cheerful and helpful. She befriended Callie and snuck off occasionally with Pow. Their secret encounters weren’t so secret, but I think my contribution to the tribe’s welfare was significant enough that the leadership looked the other way.

  Our unorthodox arrangement continued until modern troops arrived in a nearby valley, and our tribe prepared for war.

  “Pow, you’ve got to talk some sense into them,” I pleaded.

  “I’ve tried,” he said. “They don’t understand. They assume the troops are similar to your Raiders.”

  “Well, they are similar, except they have modern weapons and support.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Tedesconians,” I said. “Our enemies from the Tetra War back on Earth and Purvas. The Gurts were at war with them for years.”

  “But you beat them?”

  “The Guritains won the war, yes.”

  “But…”

  “Yes, but. There’s a group of humans on Earth–”

  “Your people?”

  “I’m three-quarters human and one-quarter Gurt, but my nationality and my loyalty is to the Guritain nation. I’m a citizen.”

  Pow looked at me with a glimmer of confusion. “How did you decide who to side with?”

  “It wasn’t my decision. I was born a Gurt.”

  “And these Ted people?”

  “My enemy.”

  “Why do you think they’re here?” he asked me.

  “The humans have a rebel group called the Prostosi on Earth. They joined with Ted Tetra War survivors and allied with them. They’re nothing more than terrorists and killers,” I said. My face flushed as I remembered that Pow had been part of an alliance with them.

  “The Chemecko government told us that the purvasts were good people and that we were helping a just cause.”

  “Of course they did,” I said. “I know you’re a good man, Pow.”

  He offered me a wan smile. “My real name is Ctunjurz.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “The nickname just stuck.”

  “I know. I like it. I like you, Avery. I like my…my new…I want to marry Genba and stay here.”

  “I won’t try to stop you,” I said.

  He held my gaze. “Do I have your word?”

  “Yes,” I said. Pow had become my friend. Some things in life are more important than others, and I couldn’t betray a man who had saved my life. He’d become a brother to me. If I was doing wrong protecting him, then I didn’t believe in what was right anymore. I’d always been a loyal Guritain, but I’d be damned if I would subject him to a terror he didn’t deserve.

  “If the tribe chooses to go to war against this Ted force, Pow, I can’t protect you. I won’t be able to protect myself. We’ll be slaughtered like lambs.”

  “What’s a lamb?” he asked.

  I looked away. “Prey.”

  The tribe held a council meeting.

  They voted to attack the Teds in spite of my vocal and angry attempts to explain through Pow’s translations that an assault would be suicidal.

  In the end, the issue became an argument about honor and duty.

  To not attack the group would be a great shame for the tribe. They had to contend with similar groups in the region, and the fight for territory and hunting rights had an ancient history. Pow explained that if the Tsalagians didn’t deal with the Tedesconians, they’d be seen as weak and ineffectual by other tribes, and that would lead to a constant state of war until they were eliminated by a stronger leader.

  So war was coming, from one direction or another.

  A recon mission convinced me that the Teds were a platoon of combat engineers. They were lightly armored, but still had light-years of advantage over a Stone Age tribe. It appeared their heli-jet had returned to civilization, and the engineers were building a facility. What kind didn’t matter. What mattered was that even though they weren’t TCI-Armored, they still had modern body armor and weapons and possessed the ability to call for reinforcements.

  “Please try to explain to Chief Gunju that his tribe will be wiped out completely. The Teds won’t hesitate to kill every single man, woman, and child in the tribe.”

  “I might be able to convince him to hide the women and children, Avery. But the men are going to attack them. There’s no way to stop that.”

  “It’ll be a massacre.”

  “As I conveyed during the meeting. I’m sorry, Avery,” he said. “I wish there were something…”

  “Hell. If this is happening no matter what…”

  I called together the Raiders for a strategy meeting.

  “I think the women should take–”

  “No,” Callie said, interrupting me. “If you fight, I fight.”

  “It doesn’t make sense for us all to die,” I argued.

  “Then maybe we should leave,” Mallsin said. “If you and Abrel go to battle, I’m joining Callie and fighting with you. It’s a package deal.”

  “I don’t know if we can simply leave,” Abrel said, his voice low.

  “Why not?” Veenz asked. The lieutenant had become the ranking officer with Noleerz’s death; however, as we’d transformed into members of the tribe, the use of military rank as a function of authority had been ignored. “I have every authority to order all of you to follow me out of here right now. I’m beginning to believe it’s the correct thing to do.”

  “Sir,” I said, using a title I’d mostly discarded, “what if we could accomplish two worthy objectives?”

  “Such as?”

  “We join the Tsalagians against the Teds and do so under your authority. It would be no different than a mission in which Gurt infantry works with a joint task force.”

  Veenz frowned in thought. “And then?”

  “If we’re successful, we might be able to communicate with a Gurt unit and get rescued.”

  “I’m not sure I want to be rescued,” a corporal said.

  “We’re still under the authority of the armed forces, Corporal,” Veenz reminded him. “You’ve gotten accustomed to life here, and I understand that. But I’m still your superior officer. You’re still subject to Gurt law. You still have to follow orders.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said. “But I don’t have to like it.”

  “That’s true.” The lieutenant had always been favored by the men for being fair. I didn’t doubt that once he made a decision, everyone would follow him. But this situation was unusual, and I wasn’t sure that Veenz was confident about what our mission parameters should be. “You have something to say, Avery?” Veenz asked.

  “Sir,” I said, “here’s what I see. We help the
tribe take on the Tedesconians. If we win and can obtain comm, then we’re obligated to attempt to reach Gurt command. But it’s likely they’d destroy comm before we got our hands on it, which would put us back here, continuing as before.”

  “That’s not going to happen, Avery,” Abrel said. “The minute we attack, they’ll transmit a message with our coordinates. Even if we win this battle, they’ll have reinforcements on the way.”

  “Not if we take out their communications first,” I said.

  “Let’s say we somehow do that,” Abrel said. “Not that it’s likely to work. But let’s say it does. Once they go dark, we both know more troops will come.”

  “We’d be in the same or worse situation,” Mallsin said.

  “What’s the actual code, sir?” Callie asked. “What’s the rule here on whether we’re obligated to attack?”

  The lieutenant stood and paced. After a moment, he cleared his throat and faced us. “The code requires us to attack if we can formulate a mission plan with a reasonable expectation of success.”

  “And reasonable is defined how?” Callie asked.

  “There’s no exact definition,” he answered. “It’s a subject open to debate. If I were brought before a hearing board and charged with dereliction of duty for not attacking, I’d have to show that a majority of officers in the same circumstances would have acted similarly.”

  “And how–”

  “That’s the problem. If you polled officers in the safety of a command center, they’d probably all claim there was a reasonable expectation of victory, even if it was highly improbable. Not wanting to appear cowardly or dishonorable, most officers would advise attacking. Of course, bring the same officers and put them at the head of the line to be killed if it doesn’t work, well…”

  “That’s problematic,” Callie said. “So, basically to prove the mission is extremely likely to fail–”

  “You have to die,” the lieutenant said.

  “Let’s assume we’re going to attack. We need a strategy that could actually work,” I said. “It can’t hurt to formulate one, even if we ultimately decide to…”

  “What? Run off into the night?” Abrel said. “And go where?”

  “Abrel is right,” Veenz said. “We’re boxed in. If we don’t fight, our position worsens, and for all we know this area will be crawling with an entire legion of Ted regiments in short order. We won’t have a choice at some point other than to fight or move elsewhere. With this small advance group and our tribe fighting with us, we have the highest expectation of success if we engage the enemy now.”