by Rick Partlow
There was a sharp crack and a wisp of smoke out the open door, and the point man spun into the entrance, firing off a long burst from his carbine, the rest of his squad rushing in behind him. Lyta stayed where she was and let them do their job, her trigger finger tapping the receiver just above the pistol grip, impatient, dissatisfied with her inaction.
Muffled reports made their way out of the entrance, out through the shattered windows, gunshots, another breaching round, more grenades. They were running entry on the constabulary. A long but distant exchange of fire, then something still further away but much easier to hear, at the back of the building.
“They ran into the squad we put out to guard the rear,” Grant reported into her earpiece over the comms.
Yes, thank you for today’s Incredibly Obvious Report, she thought with far too much snark to let herself say it.
She didn’t bug the platoon leader for a status report because that was just the sort of thing micromanaging assholes did and she’d determined years ago she wasn’t going to turn into one of those. Instead, she waited until the firing had stopped and there was time for reports to filter back. Grant jogged down the street to her position, the woman’s left hand covering her ear reflexively to better hear the calls from her squad leaders.
“The building is clear, ma’am,” she told Lyta. “No Marine prisoners.”
“What a shame,” she murmured. “Civilians?”
“None,” Grant replied, shaking her head. “Apparently, the intelligence we got from the militia back in the canyon that Grieg was moving all the civilians to the temple was correct.”
“Then that’s our next stop,” Lyta decided. “Pull everyone out and form them up.”
“Colonel Randell, do you read?”
It was Captain Lee. She’d sent him out with the sniper team to occupy the rooftop of one of the warehouses and keep an eye on the rest of the city so no one snuck up and bit them in the ass while they were concentrating on their objectives.
“I got you, Lee,” she replied. “We just cleared the city hall and the constabulary...”
“You need to get over to the temple, ma’am,” he cut her off, a strain in his voice she’d never heard before. “There’s something going down here and I don’t like it.”
Ruth Laurent could smell their fear. They were silent but for the quiet sobs of a few children, and she wondered if they would have been screaming and pleading if there had been more air available inside the temple, if dozens and dozens of people hadn’t been jammed in so close. The children and elderly had been given the seats, at least at first, but in the end, there’d been so many stuffed into the temple’s worship area that everyone was standing or leaning. And staring at the fire-team of Marines, and Grieg…and the molded, half-meter sheets of plastic explosives affixed to the front walls.
She turned her own glare towards him, not so different from the look of the terrified captives. He was standing in the entrance corridor, nearly taking up the whole, narrow space and still managing to pace back and forth, a caged lion. Sweat beaded on his forehead and he licked his lips periodically, a nervous tic she hadn’t seen from him before Revelation. In his right hand was a service pistol, the barrel still smoking.
Outside, sprawled on the carpet of the entrance walk, was the temple priest. An ancient man, probably a hundred years old, his skin tanned and stretched taut over a skeletal face, what was left of his hair grey wisps down to his shoulders. His robe was stained crimson from the gunshot wound in the center of his chest. He’d made the mistake of protesting when Grieg’s Marines had set the charges. The Colonel hadn’t argued with him, hadn’t yelled at him, hadn’t said a word. The gunshot had been so loud, so abrupt she’d nearly cried out herself.
“We’ve lost contact with Captain Sibelius and the Mobile Armor company,” she informed him with a cool detachment to her voice she wished matched the feeling inside her gut. “Captain Gerhardt has not reported in from the city hall in the last ten minutes. We need to get back to the drop-ship and get reinforcements from the Sleipner.”
“No.” He didn’t even bother to meet her eyes, just kept pacing, the gun in one hand and the remote detonator in the other. It had a hinged guard over the ignition switch and he kept flipping it up and down with his thumb, an incessant clicking. “These Goddamned mercenaries and their civilian militia will not defeat me. I will not disappoint Lord Starkad.”
She checked the Marines out of the corner of her eye. She couldn’t see their faces beneath the tinted visors, but their stance was nervous, uncomfortable. They understood the situation as well as she did. They were a fire team, three men and a woman, and they were probably all that was left of a company.
“We have another light company of mecha on board the cruiser,” she reminded him, an unfamiliar edge going into her voice. “How will Lord Starkad feel if he finds out you failed in your objectives on this mission with almost half your Mobile Armor sitting in the cargo bay? Along with a pair of assault shuttles we could use to escort them?”
“They’d cut us down before we could reach the drop-ship.” It was a half-hearted objection and she wanted to scream at him. “And we can’t communicate with orbit from here anyway. They’re jamming local signals and the drop-ship has our orbital communicator.”
All right, she’d give him that. She squeezed past him, careful not to step on the priest’s body. His eyes were still open, blood slowly clotting on his lips. His death stare was accusatory, as if Mithra Himself peered at her through the hazy blackness. Down the street, she began to spot them, formless shades moving from one shadow to the next.
“They’re coming,” she told him.
“I’m going to make them come in here,” Grieg said, nodding to himself as if she weren’t there, eyes glancing upward, outward, at the captives. “I’m going to draw them in to save the hostages. Then I’m going to blow it. I won’t let him down, I’ll take them all out at once.”
“And then what?” she demanded once she’d been able to pick her jaw up off the floor. “They still have a company of mecha out there.”
“But you’ll have a chance then,” he said, eyes feverish with what he probably saw as inspiration. “You can get to the drop-ship, bring down our mecha and secure the data crystals.” He nodded, a smile spreading across his face. He probably imagined it was beatific and beneficent, but to her, it seemed totally mad. “I’ll accomplish the mission through you, Captain. Would you do that for me?”
“Of course, sir,” she said automatically, because you didn’t contradict a madman with a gun and a shit-ton of explosives.
The Rangers were surrounding them, tucked into every bit of cover on the street, cargo trucks, rovers, storage bins. Every shadow, every nook bristled with weapons. One of them didn’t bother with cover, though, didn’t attempt to hide or take shelter. She strode across in the middle of the street, carbine tucked under her arm, her balaclava off to reveal a spiky, brunette mane and a face Laurent recognized from just the day before.
“You’re Lyta Randell,” Laurent said.
“I am,” the woman replied, her voice strong and unwavering despite the outraged, sidelong glance she gave the priest’s body. “You people need to surrender before any more innocent civilians get killed.”
“You’ll have to come in and get us!” Grieg roared from behind Laurent, only half his face visible from behind the door. “We won’t be surrendering and you won’t open fire with the building full of civilians!”
Laurent closed her eyes, squeezed them shut as if this were all a nightmare she could force herself to wake up from. When she opened them again, life remained a nightmare. She sighed and turned, heading back inside, stepping past Grieg.
“Did you hear me?” Grieg bellowed, his voice painfully loud in the entrance hallway. “You’ll have to come in and root us out, and we can shoot at you!” He cackled, speaking aside to her in low tones. “We’ll fall back to the rear of the civilians and when they get inside and try to get to us…”
“Laurent, what…”
She pulled the trigger. As loud as the shot outside the front entrance had been, this one was a million times louder, the concussion a vibration through her sinuses, a ringing whine in her ears. She lowered her weapon, tucking it crisply back into its holster and blowing a long breath out through her nose before she turned to the four Marines. They stared at her, one with his rifle half-raised, their expressions indiscernible.
“Colonel Grieg was guilty of rank incompetence and dereliction of duty,” she declared. “I’m in command now and we’re getting out of here. If any of you has a problem with that, the time to say so is now.”
Behind them, the civilians were murmuring, confusion and perhaps just a glimmer of hope warring on their dirty faces. They didn’t move, didn’t make the rush she’d been afraid they’d attempt, perhaps sensing the end was near.
She couldn’t look them in the eye. She felt too much shame for that. Instead, she bent down and pulled the detonator out of Grieg’s slack, lifeless hand and walked out the front entrance, motioning for the Marines to follow.
“We’re coming out,” she announced loudly. “Hold your fire.”
Randell was still standing there, but her carbine was held at low ready now, her eyes sharpened and seeking a target.
“Where’s Grieg?” the Ranger officer demanded.
“He’s in there, if you want him,” Laurent told her, jerking her head back toward the temple. She held up the detonator. “This controls about ten kilograms of plastic explosives planted inside. I could use it to blackmail our safe passage out of here, back to our drop-ship.”
She spat aside and tossed the switch into the ground at Lyta Randell’s feet.
“I think enough civilians have been hurt.” She gestured between herself and the four Marines. “We’re leaving. We won’t be captured and we won’t surrender, so you can either shoot us down in the street or we’ll ride that ship back up to the Sleipner and leave you to this miserable shithole.”
Lyta Randell seemed to chew on the words, grinding them to powder inside her head, but finally she nodded.
“Let them go,” she ordered her people. She motioned to one of her officers. “Get in there and get those civilians out.”
Laurent was already walking towards the port, to the landing zone where their drop-ship waited.
“What’s your name?” Lyta called after her.
“Captain Ruth Laurent,” she threw back over her shoulder. “You’ll see me again, Lyta Randell. And when I beat you, I won’t need to hide behind civilians to do it.”
Logan squatted on the ground at the feet of his Sentinel, staring down at the cold and bloodless body of Lana Kane.
As near as he could piece together from the shape of the wreck, she’d been manning the heavy machine gun in the back of the technical when a rifle grenade had busted the front axle and flipped the damned top-heavy thing right over. She’d broken her neck.
“So fucking stupid,” he hissed under his breath.
It was over. They’d won, done exactly what she wanted, but she just couldn’t stay out of the fight. She’d died at the edge of town, before she’d had the chance to fire a shot. More of the gun trucks burned fiercely or already smoldered, the alcohol flames burned out. Not one had survived to breach the town, though some of the crews had made it out. One of Prevatt’s pilots was tending to their wounded as best he could, cross-trained as a medic. He’d already called for the Ranger medics, but it would take them a while to make it out this far.
He wanted to be angry about the data crystals, about the short-sightedness of taking their location to the grave with her, but all he could think of was her little brother and what the boy was going to do without her. Still, she’d given her life for something she’d thought was worth dying for, and now he’d have to do his best to make sure it hadn’t been for nothing.
“Hey Boss,” Kurtz called over his earbud—his helmet was back up in the cockpit of the Sentinel. “We got a vehicle incoming.”
He rose and scanned the road back toward the canyon, but it was still too far away.
“It’s one of ours,” the platoon leader added.
He’d already figured. If it had been the enemy, he’d hoped Kurtz would have warned him. It took another minute for the small passenger rover to make it through the hedge of twisted trees and into the midst of the platoon of assault mecha. Before it stopped, he could already see Acosta and Katy in the cab…and in-between them, Lana Kane’s brother, Alec.
“Why the hell did you bring him here?” he asked Katy when she stepped out of the driver’s door. He instantly regretted the edge of anger in his tone, but he hadn’t been able to contain it. When he’d radioed back to Katy and Acosta that Kane had died, he hadn’t expected them to bring her brother out to look at his sister’s broken body on the battlefield. The kid was obviously already holding onto the trauma of his parents’ deaths.
“We didn’t want to,” Katy assured him, not seeming to take offense. “He insisted.”
“He what?” The kid had never said a word to him, or anyone else that he’d seen.
Alec scrambled out of the car, his mop of brown hair ratty and unwashed, dirt smeared across his left cheek. He didn’t run, didn’t scream, didn’t seem surprised when he saw his older sister’s body. He knelt down beside her, his face impassive, utterly neutral, as if this were just a normal day and he was coming to visit his sister at work. He stroked her hair gently.
“She said this might happen.”
Logan blinked, unsure for a moment who had spoken until he realized it was Alec. The boy’s voice was soft and a bit scratchy and raspy, as if he wasn’t used to talking.
“She said it when she first came back,” Alec said, finally looking up from his sister. “She told me I had to do something for her if anything happened to her.”
Acosta had slipped out of the passenger’s side while they spoke, and he seemed oddly restrained, not at all his usual, snarky self. He reached back into the back seat of the vehicle and pulled something out, a heavy, lead-lined storage box, dirt and sand still spilling off the edges of it. Logan hesitated for only a moment before he rushed over to Acosta, running his fingers across the surface of the lid, cold and metallic.
“He took us to where it was hidden,” Acosta explained, “but only after we promised to bring him here afterward.”
“She said it was important,” Alec told them, still kneeling at his sister’s side. “It was important that she keep her word.”
Finally, it came, the crack in the boy’s mask of detachment, just a twitch beside his eye at first before it spread across his face. The tears came, single tracks of tan skin visible through the dirt, then a flood washing it clean, though he didn’t give into it completely, didn’t let himself sob, kept his shoulders firm.
Logan turned away from the storage case, from the accomplished objectives it represented, and went down on a knee beside the boy, putting a hand on his shoulder. Alec didn’t acknowledge it, still sobbing
“I lost my mom when I was younger than you,” he said, the words pouring out of him, unplanned. “To soldiers in a war. And I was the oldest, so I had to be strong for my little brother. But it hurt keeping all that inside. It made me wish there was someone who could have been there for me, who could have been the strong one. Your sister did that for you, and I think that’s the way she’d want you to remember her.”
The kid didn’t respond, but some of the tightness went out of the boy’s shoulder under his hand. Katy slowly moved between Alec and the body of his sister, absently wiping something out of her eyes.
“Why don’t you let us take your sister into town, to the temple,” she said. Logan though
t he heard a slight break in her voice. “We can let them prepare her for the funeral…”
“No.” Alec’s words were so soft Logan could barely hear them. “She wanted to be buried with our parents. At the old house, where they died. We have to take her there.”
“Then we will,” Logan told him. He sat back, the sand grinding into the seat of his fatigue pants, and let the charnel-house carnage of the battle wash over him. The ordure of death wafted off the town and he thought of something General Constantine had quoted to him once: “nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won.”
“I have a feeling,” he said, mostly to himself, “we’ll be burying quite a few bodies today. I hope it was worth it.”
23
“We gotta figure out a way to get gravity in here,” Kammy said, his broad features screwed into a scowl as he regarded the zero-g ration packet turning small circles in front of him, floating above the superfluous galley table. “I mean, why the hell did we even build any of this shit,” he waved around him at the chairs and booths of the Shakak’s galley, “oriented like this if we knew we were going to be in free-fall the whole time?”
“Because that’s the way the Imperial researchers built it in the first place,” Tara Gerard reminded him, drinking coffee from a squeeze bulb and not looking too happy about it.
Terrin grinned at the sight, and at the thought of the lifelong spacers being uncomfortable eating in free-fall, but then his mind drifted to the problem of providing some sort of artificial gravity to the ship and let his thoughts spiral into that hole. Most ships boosted at one gravity between jump-points, but the stardrive alleviated the need for physical acceleration. Maybe they could spin the ship along its axis? Would the stardrive even work if the ship were rotating while projecting it? Probably not.