by E. E. Knight
“I took it for granted that he’s fought them.”
The defense counsel nodded to Randolph. “Then why didn’t you make it clear that they were Southern Command soldiers and not prisoners? Why didn’t you give them uniforms?”
“I identified them repeatedly. I didn’t have any uniforms to issue, and even if I had, they served as scouts in the Kurian Zone much of the time. That’s what made them so useful. Putting them in our uniforms would have detracted from that. Even if they were naked, it shouldn’t have made a difference because—”
Loud boos and catcalls came through the windows. “You’ll answer the questions asked, Valentine,” Randolph said. “No more. You run on again and I’ll have you arrested for contempt.”
The men outside cheered that.
“I’m giving evidence; I’m not an official of the court,” Valentine said. “You don’t have that power.”
“Don’t go tentpole-lawyering with me,” Randolph said, “or as soon as you get off the stand you’ll be brought to a cell.” The men outside cheered him.
Styachowski stood up, her lower lip swollen from her biting it. “Sir, can we close those windows and shutters? The circus outside—”
“Is of your own making. The camp is in disarray. This isn’t a Star Chamber. The men have a right to know what’s going on.”
Valentine looked at Martinez’s face. The General ran his knuckles down each side of his beard. Triumph shone in his bloodshot eyes.
So it was with trepidation that Valentine stepped away from the courtroom and went out onto the wide porch. An egg overshot his forehead and smacked the door’s lintel, releasing a sulfurous reek.
“Next person throws anything deals with me,” Nail said, stepping up and putting his thin frame in front of Valentine. The Bear was sunken-chested, but his tattooed arms were solid muscle and tendon. Perhaps it was just the aggressive stance, but his blond braides seemed to bristle. Men in Southern Command with regard for the integrity of their skeletal systems listened when a Bear made a threat; the catcalls quieted.
He escorted Valentine through the crowd using his elbows, an icebreaker smashing room for the larger ship behind. They made their way through the dirty camp. Nail found one of the squared-off green bottles, sniffed the mouthful that still remained inside and drained it.
“Goddamn that’s vile, Captain.” Nail sent the bottle spinning down the hillside, and after a faint, tinkling crash led Valentine uphill a short way on a trail. Valentine smelled more cannabis smoke from a cluster of men in a hollow.
“How long have you been in this zoo?”
“Long enough to know it’s falling to pieces. If you ask me, a couple regiments of Quisling militia could sweep us off this hill. With slingshots.”
“You can see it. Why can’t the others?”
“The General got them out of a tight spot outside Fort Scott. These Guard brigades were the only ones to make it out of that pocket more or less intact, considering. Every time they thought they had us cornered, we got away. There’s been some desertions, but no bad casualties since he took over. Food, light duties, wine, women and song. Everything a soldier could ask for, as long as they don’t ask for a victory. Whatever else you want to say about the General, he knows how to slip out of a noose.”
“I think he’ll slip out of Styachowski’s.”
“You stepped into a private war, Valentine. Word around the campfire is Martinez tried to pull her pants off using his rank, if you follow.” They crossed a narrow gully using a log bridge, with a rope strung as a handhold.
“When you say tried you mean—”
Nail winked. “Failed.”
“He’s been making her life hell ever since?”
“More like the other way around. She came out of Mountain Home GHQ, one of these invisible staff types that suddenly show up to fix screwups. Really sharp. Martinez made her his intelligence chief, but she quit. She landed in the quartermaster tents. If the men are well fed, I’d say it’s because of her. The only ones to leave these hills are her scavenger patrols. Funny ideas, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“She said she was a Bear.”
Valentine raked his memory over. “I never met a woman Bear—but then I don’t know many in your caste.”
Finner shrugged. “No such thing. If she is one she’s the only one I’ve ever met, too. I heard they tried it on a few women, but they died from whatever that goop is that the Lifeweavers pass out to the Bears at Invocation.”
“We lost one when I became a Wolf.”
“Yeah. Bears, too. But it’s a hundred percent failure with women.”
Valentine smelled a mass of humanity ahead, even upwind. “Now who are these?”
“You’ll find out in about five seconds.”
They passed down into a dimple in the hillside where Post had pitched their camp’s tents. The tents were surrounded by a sea of uniforms. Guards, Bears, Wolves, even militia with inked insignia; all rose to their feet as Valentine and Nail crested the hill.
“It started at the Grog burial this morning,” Post said, coming up to them. Ahn-Kha followed behind.
“I would have liked to have been there, but my testimony was required this morning,” Valentine said.
“At first it was just the marines,” Post said. “Then Finner and some Wolves came up, and others just kind of followed. Before the holes were finished it was in the hundreds. They had their guns; for a second it looked like a lynch mob. Then Ahn-Kha said something in his tongue—”
“The Third Lament, for the unjustly killed,” Ahn-Kha added. “I practiced saying it so often in Omaha, I could recite it backward.”
“When Ahn-Kha spoke everyone bowed their heads,” Post continued. “When he finished, we all looked at each other. Like we’d all agreed.”
“We’re ready to come or go at your order, Captain,” Nail said. “Every man here’s had it with Martinez. We’re ready for a change.”
Valentine looked at the expectant faces, from old friends like Jess Finnner to strangers and back again. His stomach went tight and sour. The death of the Grogs and his actions had polarized the camp; if he stayed there would be open feuding.
He’d had enough of the torn bodies of friends and followers. A weary part of him had decided to vanish with what was left of the Thunderbolt’s complement. All he wanted to do was find a safe valley somewhere, then perhaps try for Denver in the summer. But he had to tell the gathering something.
“I’m glad you’re here, all of you. I think . . . I know what happened to Ahn-Kha’s Grogs was wrong. Right now in that cabin they’re deciding if there’s going to be a change, but even if there is, General Martinez will just be replaced by his Colonel Abraham.”
“He’s worthless!” a woman’s voice opined from the crowd.
“Look what he’s letting go on outside the guardhouse,” another called.
“Enough. He’s your superior officer, and mine too, for that matter. If this camp divides, it’ll be destroyed. If you’re unhappy about something, you’re free . . . you’re expected to bring it to the attention of your superior. I know you have the best intentions, but let’s not give even the appearance of mutiny. The soldiery of Southern Command I see gathered here is better than that. The trial is being conducted according to the Uniform Code. Whatever happens is going to be legal, and it’ll be our duty to accept the court’s justice.”
“They’re breaking now,” a boy called from the window, where he was listening to the voices in the guardhouse.
A restive mass of men, including Valentine, Ahn-Kha and those who had gathered at his camp, stood in the dark around the guardhouse, listening to the boy summarize the events inside. Colonel Abraham had placed a group of mounted soldiers around the court, putting them between the guardhouse and the men of any opinion. A massed fistfight had broken out when someone threw a rock at Ahn-Kha, and shouted, “You’re next, stoop,” but it ended when the horses waded into the fray.
Valenti
ne waited, rolling and unrolling a piece of paper run off by the camp’s primitive printing press. He had found it discarded in the camp.
SOLDIERS!
I write you from a cell, knowing the unjustness of the charges against me and sustained by your presence. I put my trust in the hands of God, for he is the final arbiter and whatever the outcome of my trial I can face him content that I have done right for you and for our Cause. I trust you to behave as the Loyal Hearts I know you are in this the darkest hour of our struggle. Carry yourselves as men of honor and obey until I am restored to command.
P. Martinez, General
Valentine reread the page-filling type. He admired the wording, equivocal enough to show Southern Command that he had asked the men of his command to keep order and obey those who had arrested and tried him, but he wondered if there wasn’t an implicit threat in the final sentence. One interpretation of “Until I am restored to command” simply meant that he was confident of exoneration. A darker possibility could be that he was telling his loyalists that if he wasn’t restored to command, he didn’t expect them to obey those who had removed him.
Styachowski had been brilliant at the end, at least from what Valentine heard passed via the boy. The defense argued that it wasn’t murder to shoot a Grog any more than it was to put down a mule, and that rules that protected a Southern Command soldier simply didn’t apply to this case. After some back and forth the judges demanded that Styachowski give evidence that a Grog enjoyed the same rights as a Southern Command soldier.
After a pause—during which Nail predicted that they were sunk—Styachowski began a recitation of the court-martial of a sergeant in charge of a Grog labor detail recruited from the ranks of prisoners. One of the Grogs hadn’t moved quickly enough to suit the sergeant; he shot the laggard as an example to the others. The wounded Grog died, leading to the sergeant being brought up on charges of murder by the Grog’s keeper, a Mississippian named Steiner. Steiner pushed the case through both military and civilian officials, and testimony provided by Grog experts from the Miskatonic affirmed that the Grogs reasoned, felt emotions, formed attachments, created art, created tools and the tools to make more tools; indeed everything humans did. Because of the landmark nature of the case the sergeant, though found guilty, had his sentence reduced: even when he shot the Grog he did so in the leg, trying to wound rather than kill. The case was affirmed a year later when a barroom brawl between a Grog janitor and a riverboatman resulted in the death of the Grog and manslaughter charges against the sailor, who ended up serving a long sentence.
Martinez’s consul ended its defense with an argument that Grogs were often summarily executed when taken prisoner, and the General was simply following a standard practice.
The three judges, having no chambers to retire to, went out to the old garage of the guardhouse to discuss the verdict. They could just be seen in the gloom within through a single window in the back door. Valentine’s ears picked up Randolph’s raised voice again and again. “Just Grogs . . . emergency . . . situation requires . . . indespensible.”
Soldiers in the General’s camp lit torches. The numbers had swelled in the darkness as others came off duty.
Finally, the front door opened.
The crowd quieted. Had Valentine been in a better mood, he would have smiled at the first display of discipline by the men since his arrival at the camp. He was finally able to hear voices from within the guardhouse, thanks to his Lifeweaver-sharpened ears.
“Bring him out of his cell,” Meadows said. Valentine thought he heard Styachowski gasp, but he couldn’t be sure.
There were footsteps, followed by the sound of chairs scraping.
“They’re bringing him in!” the boy at the window shouted. The crowd froze; only the crackle of torches and the horses shifting weight from hoof to hoof came from the assembly.
“General Martinez,” Meadows began, “this court recognizes your service to Southern Command. Every man here owes you a debt that cannot be repaid. However, the Uniform Code gives us little room for interpretation. As the code now stands, a guilty verdict in a willful murder case carries with it automatic penalties that cannot be suspended or commuted by this court in any way. Indeed, the only leeway given with a guilty verdict is life imprisonment instead of hanging, and as matters now stand there is no possibility of commutation from an executive authority since the governor cannot be reached.
“Though the charges are of willful murder, this court, in cooperation with the prosecution, has decided to find you guilty only of simple murder, which gives us the leeway to—”
“Guilty!” the boy shouted.
Martinez’s supporters roared out in anger; Valentine heard no more. The mob threw two torches at the guardhouse. One sputtered out as it flew; the second landed on the timber roof, alight. Soldiers shot in the air, the muzzle flashes giving brief illumination to the mass of contorted, shouting faces. The most violent ran for the porch, gripping their guns like clubs to smash at the shutters and door. The guards ran inside, slamming the door behind them.
Nail barked an order and a triangle of men formed around Valentine, backs to him. They were Bears, big-shouldered giants who closed around him in a wall of muscle and attitude. Valentine, at six feet two inches, had to shift his head to see events around the guardhouse.
“Nail, can we get closer?” Valentine shouted.
“We can try.”
“Ahn-Kha, let’s get to the door,” Valentine said.
Ahn-Kha’s ears went back flat—the Golden One’s equivalent of a man rolling up his sleeves—and he went down on all fours, using his two-ax-handle shoulders to clear a path like a bulldozer going through brush. The Bears followed, surrounding Valentine in a muscular cocoon. The horsemen were having no luck keeping the mob back; a few of the crowd had even been vaulted onto the roof. They extinguished the incipent fire, then continued stamping hard on the wooden eaves. Others kicked at the posts holding up the porch.
“They’ll tear it down in a minute,” Valentine said to Nail.
The door swung open. General Martinez appeared on the wide porch, holding his hands up for quiet. The men broke into cheers and whistles.
Martinez’s small round eyes were sorrowful. He was sweating, even in the cool of the winter night. “Soldiers, soldiers! Quiet, men, quiet,” he said, still moving his arms as if giving a benediction.
Even the men stomping on the roof stopped and waited for him to speak.
“I convinced them to let me speak to you. This madness has to stop. The camp is tearing itself apart because of these charges and this trial. As you have heard, the court-martial has found me guilty—”
Boos drowned him out until he held up his hands again. Valentine saw a self-indulgent smile cross his face, as if he found the whole proceedings to be a poorly executed practical joke.
“Yes, guilty, for doing my duty to the best of my ability. They are trying to destroy our army, the last, best hope for freedom for this land. Therefore I declare my emergency powers to be in effect, and these proceedings voided. This camp is in a state of martial law; the judges, Captain Styachowski, Captain Valentine, and any who helped them are under arrest for treason.”
Valentine and Nail exchanged incredulous looks. The legalistic gibberish made no sense to them, as technically the soldiery of Southern Command had always been under martial law, from the moment they raised their right hands to be sworn in. A general in Southern Command had no emergency powers over his troops to invoke, any more than he had wings to fly. But the words sounded fine to the men, at least to the more stirred-up among them. Martinez stood aside while a dirty flood of them poured into the guardhouse. Valentine heard fighting, a pained cry. A man flew backward out of the front window and lay on the porch, folded like a clasp knife, cradling his solar plexus and gasping for air. In a few seconds Styachowski was dragged out, held aloft by the mob with a soldier at each limb, followed by the judges, guns to their backs.
“General, sir, I’ve been
on your side the whole trial,” Randolph said, his mustache black against his fear-paled face.
“I’ll make my mind up about you later, Randolph.”
“None of the General’s orders are legal,” Styachowski shouted, held aloft by the mob. Blood ran from her nose as she turned to bite at a hand pulling her hair. “He’s no longer in command. He can’t—”
“Take her shirt off,” someone shouted. Others cheered and whistled. Valentine heard cloth tearing.
“General Martinez,” Valentine boomed, stepping up beside Ahn-Kha. “I started this. I arrested you. I held a gun to your head.”
The mob quieted at this; the men wanted to hear the exchange between their idol and his usurper.
Valentine felt a hard hand on his shoulder. “What the hell are you—” Nail began.
“I’m the one responsible,” Valentine continued, shrugging off the Bear. “Nobody had a choice once I arrested you; there had to be proceedings from that point on. This is still Southern Command. I’m the only one you should charge with treason.”
“Randolph, here’s a chance to redeem yourself,” Martinez said. “Shoot that mutinous bastard right now. Here, in front of his pet Grog.”
“Auuugh!” Styachowski shouted, still writhing atop her holders. “This is insane! Don’t be an idiot, Randolph. Put me down, now!”
Valentine saw the desperation in her upside-down eyes.
“You’ll be on the ground, all right,” Martinez said.
Valentine stepped forward. “What’s the matter, Martinez? Afraid to do a summary execution yourself? How come somebody else has to pull the trigger for you? You never been blooded?”
“Somebody shoot—” Martinez began. Randolph reached for his holster.
Ahn-Kha chambered a round in his long Grog rifle, and Martinez looked down the barrel of .50 caliber of death sighted on his chest.
Nail and his Bears came forward, again surrounding Valentine. “No,” Nail said, slowly and clearly. A short submachine gun appeared like magic in his hands. “Anyone shoots, Martinez, and my team comes up on that porch. After you. We won’t leave enough of you to fill a shoebox. Then we start killing everyone with a hand on Styachowski. Then everyone who tried to interfere with either of those jobs. How many of y’all do you think we’ll get before we go down. Twenty? Forty?”