Tei’Varyk introduced Kahn and the staff to his guests before ushering everyone into the residence. Jafari’s sibs swirled around Ludmilla’s feet begging for a ride. Tarjei hovered close in case Ludmilla tripped over them.
“I’m sorry about the trouble at the gate,” Dyachenko said as they walked. “I could talk to the governor for you.”
“It’s fine. I’m sure they’ll be gone tomorrow. They’re harmless.”
“Annoying though.”
“That is a truth. I’m sure there are similar protests outside the embassies in Yangsho. There will be shouting about tailless interlopers or tradition being upset.”
“You think so?”
“Probably nothing so overt, but there will be mutterings in the clan and caste meetings. No one likes change. It will all settle down when people begin experiencing the benefits.”
Kahn dismissed the staff back to their duties, and Dyachenko’s detail took guard positions. Tarjei directed the chaos into one of the rooms with the best views. Like Tei’Varyk’s office this one had a sliding glass wall that allowed access to the grounds. The room was a good choice, especially if they wanted the cubs to run off some of their excitement.
Ludmilla murmured approvingly and headed into the gardens trailed by the cubs. Tarjei darted a desperate look at Tei’Varyk and followed her out, but he remained behind with Dyachenko to watch. Ludmilla put Jafari down and picked up Taryn for her ride. Her sibs started wrestling for the right to be next.
Dyachenko laughed at the sight. “Things have been good for you?”
Tei’Varyk indicated places to sit. “All is well here. Tarjei is recovered and the cubs are in good health.”
“But?” Dyachenko said choosing one of the mats, and not a chair.
Tei’Varyk appreciated the courtesy. He took a place next to him to watch Ludmilla playing with the cubs. Tarjei had insisted on buying chairs and tables to accommodate Human guests, but so far all had followed Shan customs out of respect for their home. It was much appreciated.
“I miss Harmony,” Tei’Varyk admitted reluctantly. “My cubs are growing quickly. They’ll soon be strangers there.”
“Children do grow so fast,” Dyachenko said. “Mine have their own lives and families now, but I know what you’re feeling.”
“Forgive me but that isn’t possible,” Tei’Varyk said. “Shan cubs are adult in less than half the time a Human child needs. Seven orbits from now my cubs will be choosing their paths in life. They cannot do that here.”
Dyachenko nodded. “I did wonder about your people’s integration when you joined the Alliance.”
“The colony on Snakeholme is the prototype of what I think is the answer.”
“I hope you’re keeping knowledge of that quiet.”
Tei’Varyk flicked his ears. “We aren’t spreading the news, but it isn’t a secret back home.”
“That worries me. Burgton won’t react well when a ship full of newsies arrives in his system. I dread the day it happens.”
Tei’Varyk flicked his ears and nodded. “Transplanting a piece of Harmony there complete with all the clans, the castes, and the traditions has made it possible for our young to thrive.”
Dyachenko nodded. “You’re thinking of expanding the enclave here along the same lines?”
Tei’Varyk wasn’t thinking of the enclave at all. He was yearning for home, but it wasn’t something he could articulate to his host world’s president. Instead he spoke in general terms.
“My people will colonise worlds of their own one day, and they’ll import our culture in its entirety. The Great Harmony will become a reality at that point. Cubs born on one world will find themselves at home on any of the Shan worlds, just as Humans can find places and live happily on any Alliance world.”
“That doesn’t work perfectly in reality, or it hasn’t yet.”
“That is a truth, but Human laws and customs only differ in small ways from planet to planet. Shan ways are entirely separate. Without the Harmonies and the teachings of our ancestors we would cease to be Shan.”
“You’re saying we can never fully integrate? Your Great Harmony will be a separate Alliance in all but name.”
“An allied Alliance perhaps,” Tei’Varyk agreed. “I do think enclaves on Alliance worlds could work, but they would need to be large like the colony on Snakeholme.”
“You’re saying it won’t happen quickly.”
“It can’t. The enclave here will be the only one like it for many orbits... years. My cubs will be the only ones seen on Earth for a long time. That hurts them in ways they haven’t discovered yet.”
“Have you asked to be recalled?”
“No,” Tei’Varyk said. That was true, but he wished to very much.
“Perhaps you should, or request the enclave be expanded to colony size.”
“Would the Council look with favour on such a proposal?”
“Well I would. I can’t speak for everyone but I can’t see why anyone would oppose it.”
“The Humans First Movement would not be happy.”
Dyachenko grinned. “I think they’d be shouted down by all the people sharing pictures of Shan cubs on Friendbook.”
Tei’Varyk laughed.
“Seriously. I’ve seen protest groups like them come and go over the years. HFM are a fringe group. They won’t last the year.”
“I’ll think on it. A second colony so soon might not be possible. Kajetan doesn’t lead our people unopposed—”
Tei’Varyk looked up to see Kahn entering the room. The Harmonies revealed his agitation.
“Tei, Mister President. I think you need to see this. Something’s happening in New Washington.”
They rose and followed Kahn into Tei’Varyk’s office. The big wall screen was on and displaying a news report. A banner scrolled along the bottom of the screen.
... Vote of no confidence in President Dyachenko passed ... Government in crisis ... Faragut fallen to the Merkiaari ...
“My god,” Dyachenko said. “Faragut fallen. I need to get back to Washington.”
“What does this mean?” Tei’Varyk said. “No confidence in what?”
“Me as president of the Alliance. They want me out.”
“Can they do that? I didn’t vote.”
“Technically yes. It needs 66% of the chamber to propose and vote for it. They ambushed me. They knew I’d be here when they made the motion. I could’ve blocked it if I’d been there. The war gives me veto powers.”
“Can you overturn the vote?” Kahn said.
“Not after the fact.”
Tei’Varyk struggled with the concept. A vote of no confidence was very un-Shan in concept. Kajetan led their people for life and couldn’t be removed by anything short of death. Was Dyachenko even the president anymore? If he wasn’t, who was?
“Explain this to me. Are you still president?”
Dyachenko grimaced. “A vote of no confidence isn’t like impeaching me. I’m still president, but I must call an election despite the Red One. With the war on the normal election cycle has been in abeyance. If not for the Merkiaari we would’ve had one last year.”
Tei’Varyk flicked his ears feeling better about it. “Then nothing has changed. You’re still in charge.”
“Everything has changed. I can’t make any new policy decisions until after the election, and there’s no guarantee I’ll win this time.”
“Then we must ensure you win,” Kahn said. “Surely?”
“It’s not that easy,” Dyachenko said sweeping a hand through his hair in agitation. “Elections can take months and Faragut has fallen. We need to react quickly, but we can’t. My government is paralysed until after the next president is sworn in.”
Tei’Varyk’s ears flattened. “The Fleet will respond?”
“Without my order you mean? Yes of course. There are standing orders and contingencies for that. Admiral Rawlins will carry on without me.”
“That’s reassuring,” Kahn said. “How
can we help?”
“There’s nothing. We call this sort of thing a constitutional crisis. Everything else stops until it’s resolved.”
Tei’Varyk turned off the screen. There was nothing new being aired. They went back to the other room to find Ludmilla and Tarjei still playing. Nothing had changed for them.
“I need to catch a flight back to Washington, Tei. Can I give you a lift?”
Tei’Varyk flicked his ears and added a nod. “I’ll vote for you.”
Dyachenko nodded his thanks. “It won’t help. They needed 66% to pass a vote of no confidence. What makes you think they’ll suddenly change their minds and vote for me?”
Tei’Varyk stared wordlessly at his friend. In the Harmonies Dyachenko was already defeated. Tei’Varyk shivered at the realisation. He turned to watch his cubs at play and wondered what was to become of them.
“I’m finished,” Dyachenko muttered.
* * *
28 ~ Damaged Goods
Forward Operating Base Hamilton, San Luis, Year 9AST
Fire. The dream always began with the memory of fire. Eric stood atop the heap of rubble, and marvelled as the sky burned. Some trick of atmospherics had turned the clouds into a mirror, to reflect the burning city below.
“Beautiful,” he whispered.
“If you say so,” Stone said sourly. “The general did say he’d light a fire on San Luis. He kept his word.”
Eric nodded. Burgton had promised he would build a bonfire, and pile the Merkiaari on top for what they’d done here. San Luis was Burgton’s homeworld. It was also Eric’s. He’d lived not too far from here as a child; that, and tomorrow’s mission, was very much on his mind. Operation Clean House was the prelude to Burgton’s end game for the San Luis campaign. This was his last chance to go home.
“I have to go, Ken.”
“Want some company?”
He shook his head. “I think I can handle this one alone.”
“AWOL is more my style than yours, Bro.”
“No worries there. I’ll be back before the assault none the wiser. Run some interference for me?”
“You need to ask?”
“Thanks.”
Ken headed back to find a meal and some rest, while Eric watched the city burn in the distance.
The regiment had stood down to rest and prepare, but the perimeter was still heavily guarded by Alliance Army and Marines. Both forces were on planet in large numbers. They would join the main assault in the morning.
Eric watched the army’s sentries, and the mech equipped Marines, using his sensors set for a wide security scan. The mech patrols owned the bomb-blasted streets, but they remained vigilant. Stray Merkiaari weren’t the only danger here. Looters, so desperate they’d kill their own kind to steal a weapon or ration pack, were still a danger. Some of those crazy sons-a-bitches had tried to eat him last week. No joke. They did eat each other if they couldn’t find anything else.
He concentrated upon the perimeter guards, looking for an easy exit he could use. The army had been tasked with locking down the FOB. No one in or out until after the assault kicked off. It was overkill. It wasn’t as if anyone would leak information to the Merki.
Eric plotted a route, and slipped silently away. He wasn’t detected, and didn’t blame the sentries for the ease of his escape; they were watching for Merki or crazy cannibals, not a lone viper.
A few hours and a marathon later, he was home; what was left of it. There wasn’t much. He hadn’t expected there would be. He’d seen fighting on San Luis, and most of the population centres were ruins, so he’d known what to expect.
Greenville was no different to other towns he’d fought over; better in some ways. Cleaner. The fighting had ended here long before he hit the LZ. The stink of death, and the horrors he’d seen, weren’t evident here. Time and nature had cleaned up the stupidity of war. He preferred to think that way, and not imagine the cannibal gangs doing it. They probably had. There were no bones. No dogs, cats, Merkiaari... or Human. The town had been picked clean.
Greenville was a small town; a suburb of the much larger Hamilton really. He’d been born and raised here. He remembered how quiet it had been with a feeling of reverence now, but he’d hated it as a boy. No action, he would have said to friends. These days, no action meant death. Only the dead knew peace.
Oh God, he missed peace.
War was never quiet, and his life was war. He inhaled it like oxygen, and exhaled violence—even in dreams. Only the little death gave him the peace and quiet he craved, but it never lasted. He always survived. Ready or not, and it was always not, he came back for more.
Always.
Eric circled the house, keeping to the shadows, using the ruins as cover. His training never failed him. His programming he liked to say. He’d fought so many battles now, he could perform most tasks using his version of auto-pilot. Need Objective A scouted? Select Pattern B, and away he went like a good little droid.
All is programming.
His father had called him something similar once. Eric fought the memory back down. His father hadn’t wanted him to leave San Luis to fight for strangers. He’d been horrified when he heard Eric had volunteered to be a good little government robot.
“I’m going where I’m needed, Dad,” Eric had said back then.
“Your family needs you here. This is your home. Fight here if you must fight.”
His father’s words turned out to be prophetic. He had left, he had become a government robot—literally. Going where he was told, killing what he was told, but here he was, back where he started. Fighting for his homeworld. Too late. His San Luis was lost the moment the Merkiaari attacked the first time. The Alliance was only here out of stubbornness now, and because of a promise Burgton had made. Eric had been there when the general uttered his oft quoted words.
“I’ll make San Luis into a charnel house,” Burgton said that day, his face devoid of emotion, but with eyes glittering with hatred. “A Merkiaari’s vision of hell. I’ll turn it into a beacon for all to see. A bonfire. I’ll pile the Merki on top, and watch them burn. In their millions, gentlemen. In their millions.”
Burgton was well on his way to doing it. Millions of dead Merki all over the planet, proved something the regiment had always known. When General Burgton said something, it happened one way or another.
Eric tried to keep his mind focused on what he was doing, not on what he feared he’d find. His sensors needed no guidance from him. He left them trawling for threat, and listened to war’s background music—the distant sound of artillery.
His face was devoid of emotion as he surveyed the ruin of his family home. The fighting had left some neighbourhoods untouched, but not this one. The house was only partially intact. The first wave of Merki passing through Greenville had done a lot of damage, and the counter-attack still more. The second and third Merki waves had bypassed the town in favour of attacking other population centres. A lucky thing. He doubted anything would’ve been left for him to find if they hadn’t.
TRS was on high alert; it always was when active, but although his targeting reticule danced and spun across his vision seeking targets, it found none. He checked his motion sensors briefly, but they came up empty as well. Finally, he switched to infra, but the site was cold. The fire had burned out long ago, and infra reported no life signs.
His family would’ve evacced long ago, but hopefully they’d left him a clue where to contact them. He hoped so, because all semblance of government had long since collapsed. There were no aid stations or agencies to query. Refugees had scattered in all directions, most running into the wilderness.
For completeness, he scanned the EM spectrum before entering the house, but his sensors reported a dead zone. There were no magnetic, radio, or electrical emissions of any kind to find. No surprise. The power grid fell when the Merki first attacked, but there were local backups in operation in a few liberated towns. Greenville wasn’t one of them. The town had been abandoned by both s
ides.
The distant thunder of the artillery barrage was the only sound, and there was no movement. Not even a mangy mutt had survived. He pivoted in place one last time, before entering the house. The front was mostly intact. If intact meant some of the walls still supported the second floor. The back half had burned, but the collapse of the upper floors must have stifled the flames. He stepped over the debris, and ducked under fallen beams.
If he were his father, where would he leave a message for a wayward son? The studio, obviously. He headed that way, passing through the sitting room that his mother loved. She’d always liked it for the view of the garden, and often read there for hours on end. He stopped at the sight of his mother’s belongings strewn around. She would’ve been horrified to find her beloved books so abused.
Looters?
He checked sensors again.
No hostiles.
His dad was a stubborn man, but he wasn’t stupid. He would have packed and decamped for the mountains, the moment the news broke. There would be a message; some sign left for the son who abandoned his family for strangers on distant worlds.
Eric entered the studio, and found his message. He removed his helmet, and it fell to the floor, as the scene burned itself into his memory. The decomposed bodies were sprawled on the floor. Shot in the back while running, his processor reported.
Eric’s machine-self took over as his Human side fled wailing into the dark, to hide from the ghastly truth. It evaluated the scene clinically, displaying trajectories as red lines on his internal display.
The room faded, replaced by a digital simulation. Two people ran into the room, and were gunned down. Ranges and vectors painted the scene, tracking the shots. The room spun to a new point of view, and two people ran into the room, and were gunned down. More data flickered into place. Impact assessments. The room became a two-dimensional diagram. Two people ran into the room. More data. Instantaneous death due to impact trauma. Massive internal bleed…
...gunned down... two people were gunned down...
Incursion: Merkiaari Wars Book 5 Page 21