by Jean Kilczer
I thought they would join the fray, but they just sat in the front seats, the vehicle droning as it idled, and watched the battle below. I closed my eyes and lowered my head. I had a battle to face within my own heart.
Chapter Twelve
“Anybody catch sight of the cupcake?” Big Sarge growled into his comlink from his position behind an ice boulder overlooking the village.
No answer.
“Keep your eyes peeled for him, and for Sophia. We don't know where the hell the Cultists are holding those two.” He peered over the boulder and watched Cultist forces spread out on a hill to the south. “They're coming, tags,” he called airily into his comlink. “Now repeat after me, we take no prisoners. There ain't no POW camps on this ice-ball planet.”
A few of Sarge's mercs repeated the order through their comlinks.
Sarge stroked his drooping mustache and held down the anxiety he felt at the coming battle. His men, hand-picked and ready, still needed a cool, steady hand. “Remember our plan, you leap-frog in. Keep your heads low down and don't waste your charges. Just waste the enemy. Luck.”
Chancey ran up to him, hunched down, and slid behind the boulder. “We're outnumbered about four to one,” he said.
“Oh, yeah? Only four to one? The poor bastards. We'll carve them into Polar bear steaks and feed them to the Druids. Are the Druids in place?”
“Just waiting fer your signal, Sarge. They're chafing to massacre some cults fer what they did to the Druids' people. I heard your order through my link. What's leapfrog, man?”
“One team holds down the enemy with fire, the next team rushes forward and takes cover behind the huts, and so on, into the village.”
A Cultist jeep, hit by air beetle missiles, exploded. “Score one for us,” Sarge said.
“I hope so.” Chancey stared at the flaming jeep.
“What does that mean?”
“There's so much confusion down there, nobody's seen Jules, but…”
“But? You don't end a sentence during a battle with but, Private, unless you're talking about saving your butt.”
“Private? Hey, man, when did I join your army?”
Sarge looked through graphoculars and chuckled. “Gotta love those air beetles. Poor bastards really thought they were birds. Ain't the brightest bunch of their mothers' litter I ever seen.” He scanned with the graphoculars. “Here comes our people from down the hills. We're gonna be hanging onto their belts.”
“Why we want to do that?”
“We'll be so close to them, Private, they'll be shooting each other.” He lifted his comlink to his mouth. “General Ara Saun. You out there?”
“Just behind the hill, Sarge. My people are in place.”
“OK. Stay put until my signal, General.” He lowered the link. “Everybody's a fucking general or a fucking lord. These Slatties are a bunch of pissers. Now about that but, Private.”
“The scuds tied Sophia to the front of a vehicle, man! Some of your men are trying to get to her before she gets killed.”
“For Christ's sake! What were you waiting for to tell me that? A written invitation?”
“I alerted your troops not to fire on that particular vehicle, Sarge. Just take out the other ones, I told them.”
“Did you mention that the air beetles are programmed to take out all the Cult vehicles first?”
Chancey took a breath. “I didn't know.”
“You do now.”
An air beetle high in the sky targeted a vehicle and plowed a path for a close missile launch.
“Jesus Christ,” Sarge muttered as he swept the enemy vehicles with his graphs. I see her now. It's the jeep in the marketplace. The one that's being targeted. Captain Attila!" he called into his comlink, “abort the strike. Abort. They've got one of our people tied to the jeep.”
“Aye, sir. Aborting now,” came Attila's smooth voice, touched with an Asian accent.
Sarge stared at the screaming beetle as it sliced through air toward the vehicle. “Fucking abort!” he whispered to himself.
Chancey held his breath, eyes wide, jaw dropped.
The beetle exploded in mid-air. Shrapnel spun into the snow, ripping hot paths, and into the running troops.
“Hope it didn't hit any of ours. Apache John,” he said into the link.
“Here, sir.”
“The Cults are bunching up for a defensive fight. Time to tell the Druids to break the ice under the enemy. They know what to do with them.”
“Aye, sir, they sure do. Over and out.” Apache John broke the link.
Sarge swung his rifle as a Slattie ran toward them behind boulders.
“No!” Chancey grabbed the rifle barrel and lowered it. “That's Huff.”
Huff slid behind the boulder, slammed into Chancey and sent him rolling.
“Sonofa-crotemunger's-ass!” Chancey snorted. “You clumsy damn fur ball.”
“I am Huff,” Huff announced, “and not a fur ball.” He crouched behind the boulder, which wasn't large enough for all of them.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Sarge demanded.
“I have seen my Terran cub.” Huff wiped a teary eye. “I watched them bring him to inside a vehicle.”
Chancey crawled back and huddled behind Sarge. “Where?”
“He is in danger of death and dying. I have prayed to–”
“Dammit, which vehicle?” Chancey shouted. “The one with Sophia?”
“No, that is not the one vehicle,” Huff explained.
“Tell us, Huff,” Sarge said through gritted teeth. “Which one?”
“The one,” Huff stood up and pointed. Chancey grabbed a handful of his thigh fur and yanked him back down.
“The one,” Huff continued, “that is sitting on the bump.”
“What bump?” Chancey barked.
Huff stood up again and pointed to the hill with the idling vehicle where Jules was held. “The wheeled metal box on that bump. Do you not have eyes?”
“Alert.” Sarge called into the comlink. “Alert. Another of our people, Pretty Boy Jules, is being held in the vehicle on the hill. Do not fire on it! I repeat. Do not fire on it.” He shook his head and lifted the comlink again. “General Ara Saun.”
“Here, Big Sarge,” Ara Saun called back.
“Can you send some of your seasoned fighters to rescue a woman tied to a Cultist vehicle? It's Jules' partner. She's part of the boss' team.”
“We're already on it, sir,” Ara Saun replied.
“Good man.” Sarge lowered the link. “Man, Slattie. Whatever the hell.” He looked around. “Where's Joe and the medic?”
“Bat?” Chancey asked. “They're in one of the huts. Joe's a little worn in the bones for hand to hand combat, but he's in there snipering. Bat's waiting for the battle to end, then he'll do what he's good at, helping the wounded.”
Sarge smirked as Druids smashed through ice under Cultists and dragged them down to slash their bodies with sharp curved tusks. Screams were drowned. Blood spattered the cracked ice. “Seems they got a bone or two to pick,” Sarge said.
Chancey chuckled. “If anybody does. Them Cultist been feeding on Druids an' selling their hides. Time fer the tables to turn. Or the ice.”
Boulders began rolling down the hills to target the Cultists, grouped in defense. The screams of the wounded and dying were a thing Sarge had hardened himself to long ago, when he first gathered his select mercs and announced to the Alliance worlds: “Soldiers of Fortune For Hire.”
He watched with pride and satisfaction as the Cultists broke ranks and ran up the South hill in a stampede. Most had dropped their rifles and were galloping on all fours.
“Round one for the good guys,” Sarge commented and lifted his comlink. “Let them go, boys. We don't shoot the enemy in the back, not even these crotemungering scuds. Gather their weapons and let the bastards go, except the vehicle sitting up there on the hill.” He slid Huff a look. “According to Intelligence here, that's where they're holding Jules.” H
is voice held a sardonic note. He turned to Huff. “Now you can stand up.”
Sarge got to his feet, brushed off his jacket and leather pants, and scanned the sky. The Cultist hovair, damaged and smoking, swooped high to escape the pursuing merc hovair. Sarge lifted the comlink again. “Captain Georgie Boy.”
“Yes, sir. Georgie Boy here.”
“We–” Sarge started.
“At your command, Sargie,” Georgie Boy interrupted.
“We can't let them keep their hovair.”
“No, sir. I agree. I'll see to that right now. Over and out.”
“Yeah, yeah, over and out.” Sarge watched the merc craft cut a swathe through the sky to head off the Cult hovair, and fire its ion cannon. The Cultist craft dived, and shrieked toward earth, like a bird who knew it was dying, its systems shut down, and slammed into the ground.
Sarge sucked his tooth as he watched. “Ain't no medic gonna put humpty back together again.” He kicked caked ice off his boots and walked toward the village with Huff and Chancey on either side.
“Was that the name of their hovair?” Huff asked.
Chancey shook his head.
“Yeah, Huff,” Sarge said, “that was the name of their hovair. Now the Cultists got egg all over their faces.”
Chapter Thirteen
“By the Ten Gods' snouts,” the Cultist driver said, “we'd better get our valued tails out of here.”
I leaned forward and peered through the windshield, pulling at the handcuff. Cultist troops were charging up the hill in a retreat, making for their home grounds, miles away, inside the ice walls. “Looks like the infidels might have won the day,” I commented.
The driver turned. “Shut up, spawn of a tree-climbing ape!”
“I would listen to Srorg,” the guard in the passenger seat told me, “the more you waggle your short snout, the closer you will get to the altar.”
Srorg put the vehicle into gear, swung it around, and headed south. Turning tail, I thought and smirked. Literally.
“They're coming!” the passenger guard said as he stared in the rear-view mirror. “Go faster, Srorg!”
“There is nothing left to go faster in this handle, Laruth.” Srorg slammed a fist on the console. “I think the Asian star merchants have sold us their junk!”
Ain't that a shame, I thought as I glanced back through the rear window and saw three merc jeeps shredding snow back into flakes as they tore after us.
Aburra was in the forefront of the Cultist rout, tongue lolling, cape flying, shoulders plowing as he headed for home. “Looks like your lord is leading the charge,” I said.
Laruth turned and slapped me.
That wasn't worth it. I kept my hand on my cheek, my thoughts to myself.
“Know this, Terran primate,” Srorg glanced over his shoulder, “if they take us prisoner, they will find you dead.”
Considering the likelihood as the three jeeps gained on us, I made my decision.
I closed my eyes and lowered my head, shutting out the scream of the straining engine, the kicks to my butt as we raced through moguls of crusted snow, even the sour smell of Slattie bodies too long out of the cleansing sea, and pictured a small tornado spinning behind my eyes. My body's energy was the warm vortex that fed it. A dark monster surged up from where it rubbed shoulders with my id, tightened itself and crouched, there behind my eyes, ready to spring with claws of fire. This was going to hurt, but not as much as dying.
I spun it faster, a cyclone of electrical force, threw the death blow at Srorg's neck, and recoiled as it sliced his brainstem with a searing cut, the unkindest cut of all. My head felt blasted, as though a stick of dynamite had exploded inside my skull. But I had to do it again with Laruth.
Srorg shrieked and threw back his head. Smoke rose from his slashed neck. He slumped forward. The vehicle careened out of control. His dead hand still clasped the control stick.
Laruth howled as though struck himself, gripped the wheel and held it steady. It gave him no chance to aim a rifle over the front seats and I took the opportunity. I conjured another tornado within my head, allowed it to suck up my remaining energy like an entity feeding, and braced myself with my free hand on the seat. The monster rose again, red and bloody, its fire claws seeking prey. Residual heat orbited through my skull. Laruth turned and threw me a frightened look as I released the fiend and directed it at his throat.
His head flew back. His hands spasmed on the wheel and slid off. His face contorted. “You–” he said, and crumpled to the floor.
“Yeah, me.” With my free hand, I clamped on my seat belt, this being an ancient vehicle.
I take no pleasure in killing, not even these scuds who may have already killed Sophia. The few times I've had to do it, it always left me with a sick feeling. This time, the sick feeling was worse. With no dead-man's switch to slow the vehicle, it plowed up a hillock, followed by the three merc jeeps. Its right wheels left the ground.
“Oh Jesus,” I muttered as it slammed back to all four, then yawed, tipped, and rolled down the hill. The world turned white as it buried itself in snow, and blurred as my head slammed into the side window.
I blinked up at the vertical seats, the rear door above me. I couldn't reach the seatbelt with my free hand, but this was comfortable. I closed my eyes. And warm. I heard shouts from outside.
Warm?
“Fire!” someone yelled. “Get the goddamn extinguisher.”
A being up in the sky opened the door and peered in. There were clouds behind him. “Hey, cupcake,” the bearded angel said, “you still in one piece?”
I nodded, though it hurt. “Is Sophia here in heaven?”
“She's OK. We got to her before a wild shot could take her out. She's waiting for you.”
I sighed. “Thank you, Great Mind. I swear I'll live an exemplary afterlife from now on.”
“Ah, the bearded angel said,”and I was gonna grab your ass. Just like old times, cupcake."
My head began to clear. “Try it, and I'll burn off your balls with a tel-blasted blow.”
“Jules!” A dark-eyed angel with a mop of black hair and a swollen lip stuck her head into my chariot. “Babe! Are you all right? We'll have you out of there in a few minutes.” She looked back.
I heard chains rattle. Chains? Uh oh. Maybe not heaven after all. Where did I go wrong, Great Mind?
"Let me count the ways, Spirit answered.
Spirit, Syl 'Via sent. That's just not fair. Jules is doing the best he can.
All right, love.
Tel-whipped, I thought as they faded away.
“They're tying the vehicle to a jeep,” Sophia Angel said. “They're going to pull it up onto its four wheels.”
“Sophia,” I whispered, “I thought you were still alive.” I felt tears drip into my ears. “I'm so glad you're up here with me.”
A sharp-featured tag with a wrinkled military cap and eyes the color of the sky behind him, poked in his head. “We'll get you fixed up, Bubba.”
I nodded, and wondered if medics gave shots in heaven, too, or in hell?
Chapter Fourteen
Sophia snuggled against my left side as we lay in a bunk aboard our boat. Snowflakes scribbled on night windows.
Laughter and shouts drifted through the hypalon walls from Big Sarge's eight inflatable boats tied together. His men celebrated their victory over the Cultists with booze that flowed like Pan's own fount.
We were anchored in a harbor not far from the Slatties' village. The Rebels, too, celebrated, with piles of sushi, yellow pods, and a variety of dried sea plants.
The Druids had left with Cultist carcasses, dragging chunks of meat and fur below the holes to tow their prizes to secret dens in the sea. I had turned away from the butchering and the bloody water that sloshed over ice holes with floating fur, but who was I to judge their culinary habits? They didn't hunt or eat Rebel Slatties, just the fanatics who slaughtered and consumed the Druids' own people. Still, a mock meat plant on Kresthaven's stormy nor
th seas might make for better relations all around.
Joe had told us over supper that with the mercs fighting the Cultists, he was ready to call this mission finished, and head for home.
Huff didn't agree, but the rest of us thought Joe was right, and Huff, being his usual compliant self, thanked us for our help, but said he was staying to assist General Ara Saun in the fight. I felt torn between staying and supporting my good friend, or returning to Earth with Sophia and the team.
“Do you want more kids, Babe?” Sophia murmured.
“What? Well, if you want them.”
“I want yours.”
“How many?”
“Two would be nice.”
“Sounds good to me.” I kissed her forehead. “We can work on it when the fun and games are over on this ice-ball world.”
She lifted to her elbows and lightly kissed my nose, my lips. “I was thinking we could work on it as part of the fun and games.”
“I guess we could.” I glanced at Joe, Chancey, and Bat, asleep in their bunks. Huff was sprawled on the floor beside us. “We could even charge admission.”
“We could tiptoe to the bathroom and lock the door.”
I smiled. “You want to tell our kids they were conceived in the john?”
She kissed me again, harder.
“You keep that up, we might not make it to the john.” I let my hand slide down to her buttock and pressed her against me. “What the hell,” I said, “everybody else is celebrating.”
She got up, stepped over Huff, took my hand and pulled.
I let her lift me to a sitting position, stood up and tried to also step over Huff.
He snorted and rolled in his sleep. My feet were wiped out from under me and I sat on him.
“Oh, no!” Sophia exclaimed as he opened his eyes.
“Sorry, Huff.” I got up. “I fell out of bed.”
“I am happy,” he said sleepily, “that I was a soft pillow for you to land on.”
“Thanks. Go back to sleep now.”
“I cannot sleep again now.” He scratched his butt and sat up.