That Distant Dream

by Laurel Beckley

  “I’m sorry, but I have no clue what you’re saying,” she replied in Saturan, thinking maybe he could understand her even though she didn’t understand him. “I think what I know is called the Old Tongue, which is no longer spoken in this area.” At his raised eyebrow, she added, “And you sound like a stuck pig.”

  Kubicek waved a hand. He had black smudges on his fingers. “I didn’t catch a word.” He leaned deeper into his seat, physically uncomfortable but self-assured in his knowledge. “Are you sure that’s not just some language she made up?” He directed the last to Dar’Tan.

  It was the major’s turn to bristle. “She spoke pretty well with the local leaders in Veskie.”

  “Huh.” The professor gave her another look. He reached up to rub his chin, spotted the smudges on his fingers, and folded his hands, tucking his pamphlet onto his lap. “Well, that might be of use. However, we will make more progress now that I’m here.”

  The shuttle lurched, lifting into the air.

  Melin settled into her seat, closing her eyes and focusing on the whining thrum of the engine. There was no strain, no indication tech was going to fail. This was safe. It was fine.

  As the shuttle settled into its flight plan and hit altitude, the chitchat in the cabin picked up, everyone settling in for the duration.

  The professor sorted through his pamphlets and occasionally discussed their upcoming game plan with the major, ignoring Melin. Sorem joined them halfway into the flight while Temir remained in his corner, blocked off by the squad of soldiers and clearly concentrating on something on his implant—Melin assumed he was snapping out important taskers to the interns.

  The soldiers did what all soldiers did during down time—they napped, chatted about love interests and new hobbies, and ripped open packets of ready-to-eat meals and dug in.

  Melin tilted her head against the edge of her seat, hoping for a bit of shut-eye herself. The shuttle bounced in the up-and down drafts, lulling her to sleep. She wished there were some sort of window in the shuttle so she could see the outside and the terrain they were passing over, but the motion through the air and the gentle vibrations from the engine lulled to her sleep.

  *

  Light pressure on her shoulder woke her from a miraculously dreamless sleep.

  Melin’s hand snapped up, gripping the wrist tightly before recognizing Dar’Tan. His touch was light, enough to wake her but not enough to be threatening. She released his arm with grimace of apology, and he stepped back, concerned expression smoothing to polite pleasantry as if to downplay her overreaction and avoid causing a scene before the others.

  “We’re almost here.”

  She nodded in acknowledgement, and he raised his hand as if to pat her on the shoulder, then dropped it down to his side without touching her. He retreated to his seat without a second glance. Melin clenched her jaw, wishing she had never fritzed out on that kid. But she had, and all she could do now was move forward.

  Melin checked her bun to make sure it was still presentable, rubbed the sleep from her eyes, and adjusted her medals, all things to avoid looking him in the eyes. She wasn’t going to lose it in a confined space before an important diplomatic meeting.

  The atmosphere in the cabin had transformed from low-key nerves to full-blown tension as they came closer to their destination.

  Kubicek gripped his harness straps with both hands, staring with barely concealed fear as the soldiers got ready for a potential engagement.

  Two of the suits were already filled. The space armor doubled the soldiers’ sizes, making it physically impossible to sit in the human-sized seats, much less strap in. Occupied, the suits took up even more space, hammering home that this was a diplomatic mission that might become ugly. Each soldier knelt in the center of the aisle by the ramp, plas-rifles cradled in their arms, barrels pointing down.

  Melin hoped the soldiers had enough training in the armor to prevent an accidental crushing of their plas-rifles.

  “How long have we been flying?” she asked Dar’Tan, hoping she sounded as normal as possible.

  He was bent over a display, shoulders hunched. “About four hours.” He bit his lip, fingers tapping at the screen. After a few minutes he sighed and chucked the display into the empty chair beside him.

  Melin did the math in her head. It tracked from where she had judged Corlay on the map in Sorem’s office.

  “Touchdown in twenty minutes,” the pilot’s voice crackled over the intercom. He could have easily addressed everyone through their implants, and Melin didn’t think the adjustment was for her benefit.

  “What happens if tech goes down while we’re on site?” she asked Dar’Tan. She wished there were windows. She’d wanted to see Corlay from the air to get a sense of what the city was like, how people away from the capital lived. Was Corlay as battle weary as Veskie-Jidda? Or had it been spared from the IASS’s gun-barrel diplomacy thanks to its damir’s collaboration? What was their economy like? How did the Damir of Zakuska Province run his government? “Does the damir have a manor or castle near the city where we can stay?”

  Would they even be welcome there? That had a simple answer. No.

  A more troubling question was if the Saturans had even known they were coming.

  “There’s a field by the outskirts of the town,” Dar’Tan told her. “The Saturans will have spotted the shuttle, and the duke will send a party out to greet us. We’ll drop down near them instead of having to tramp into their city and face an ambush.” Melin listened with rapt attention. The shuttle was armed, thank goodness, but she didn’t want to murder civilians. “If tech goes down, we’ll stay in the field and leave when it comes back.”

  Melin pointedly did not ask what they’d use against the Saturans if tech went down, leaving their modern weaponry useless. The suits wouldn’t operate without power, and while they were equipped with plas-swords as a last resort if something happened to their array of death-makers, none of that would be helpful if it didn’t work. Guns wouldn’t work either. They’d be reduced to throwing rocks.

  “How far from the city will we be?” Kubicek asked, having shamelessly eavesdropped on their conversation.

  “You planning to visit?” the major joked. His expression turned serious when the professor nodded, eyes lit with excitement. Dar’Tan added, voice devoid of humor, “The Saturans will gut any offworlder they find. Unless the duke invites us past the gates and guarantees our safety—which I doubt will happen—we’ll stay with the shuttle.”

  “I had hoped to expand my research with field time,” the professor replied.

  “The other scientists can’t leave the embassy,” Dar’Tan said. “Consider yourself lucky.”

  “She did.” Kubicek pointed to Melin.

  Dar’Tan shrugged. “She’s not a scientist.”

  “What is she then?”

  “Back up,” Dar’Tan said at the same time as Melin replied, “The science experiment.” They exchanged a look. Melin raised an eyebrow and Dar’Tan’s lips twisted. Melin smirked. Point to her.

  The shuttle banked sharply, causing Kubicek to gasp in surprise. Someone—Temir—shrieked.

  The initiated, all well versed with military pilots, breathed deeply through their noses to settle their stomachs, although Melin clenched her harness straps for leverage.

  Forward momentum ceased in a sudden lurch, the shuttle coming to a bouncing hover as the pilot announced, “Party of twenty riders at north end of the field, five clicks from the city. Scans show swords and crossbows? No weapon heat registers. One is flying a blue flag with a funny symbol, and another has a white flag.”

  Dar’Tan’s eyes closed. Melin assumed he was accessing his implant and not taking a nap.

  Her suspicions were confirmed when the pilot replied to the unspoken order. “Copy, sir. Depressurizing cabin and opening back hatch.”

  Both space-armored soldiers stood, rifles at the ready, and clanked toward the hatch. The rest of the squad slapped open their harnesses and knelt
on the floor, preparing to follow the suits when the shuttle contacted the ground.

  The hatch hissed as it opened and sent in a rush of cool air as it formed a ramp.

  Bright light flooded the compartment.

  The first soldier stepped forward and dropped into the air before the hatch was even half open, the second following shortly after.

  Melin leaned forward in her seat, catching sight of the ground below. They were about four hundred meters up. The suits were designed to handle standard-atmospheric entry without additional cushioning—this was nothing.

  The soldiers landed in a crouch, spooking the horses.

  It was an impressive entrance, even from this distance.

  Melin stared longingly at the third suit.

  She’d give anything to fall through the sky just one more time.

  Dar’Tan’s eyes were still glazed as he took reports from the suits on the ground and prepped the squad leader to secure the perimeter as the shuttle landed with a gentle thud. The remaining soldiers burst free at a run to establish the rest of the security, although the two suits were more than capable of leveling the entire city without external assistance. And if the suited soldiers had been doing their jobs, they would already have set up watch markers about the field.

  Melin slapped her chest, disengaging the harness with a snick as the straps protracted, and then she stood, waiting for Dar’Tan’s lead. He rose as easily as her, while the other three civilians fumbled with the strap releases, Sorem quicker than the other two.

  “Do I get a weapon this time?” Melin asked Dar’Tan after he seemed to refocus on his immediate surroundings instead of the outside situation. She hadn’t told him—and wasn’t planning to tell him—she had a knife in her boot, a barter from one of his soldiers. It was real steel, and she was entirely grateful she hadn’t been wearing it or the one Trudi had lent her (tucked up her sleeve in a make-shift sheath) when she’d nearly strangled that kid the week before.

  One of the flight crew, who had stepped into the middle of the cabin to prep for a potential immediate takeoff, grinned at her question. They unsealed a compartment with a wink and tossed her a holster.

  Melin caught it with her good hand. Stunner. Fully charged.

  With a grin of thanks, she snapped it onto her belt, ready for an easy draw.

  Dar’Tan’s lips thinned, but he didn’t protest.

  “Wait—don’t we get one?” Temir asked, his voice high with worry.

  “Do you have any active qual?” the major asked dryly.

  “Does she?” the aide replied.

  Melin shrugged, trying not to smirk.

  “We done with this chit-chat?” Sorem asked. She smoothed her suit and straightened her collar before stepping forward to adjust Melin’s medals, frowning at how they’d already tangled. “I think the duke himself is here to meet us. He usually sends a lieutenant. Be on high alert, and don’t do anything to offend him.”

  Dar’Tan opened his mouth as if about to add an extra bit of advice, then shrugged and led the way out of the shuttle without saying anything, Sorem close behind. Temir went next, and Kubicek cut swiftly in front of Melin with a humph of importance.

  Melin shared a glance at the crewmember, who went back to planning for a quick getaway. Their hands trembled.

  That wasn’t concerning at all.

  With a sigh, Melin followed the others.

  Chapter Sixteen

  She had expected a barren field.

  From the air, it had looked brown and empty, but they had landed on well-maintained farmland. She stepped carefully over a row of ankle-high plant life, and glanced back at the shuttle, which had landed in the exact center of the crop. Impact sites from the suits made flattened circles next to it. Well, this is going to make us popular.

  The field was surrounded by thick green hedges. The hedges formed a natural boundary and were too thick to cut through with anything short of a plas rifle and too high to jump or climb over without assistance. Gaps in the hedge revealed woods to the north and west, more fields to the east, and a dusty road to the west. All were easy avenues of approach to guard if the tech went down and they had to spend the night here.

  They’d picked a good defensive position, but she didn’t like the sensation of being trapped in this field if the shit really did hit the fan.

  The Saturans waited on the west edge of the field, faces expressionless. They were all astride horses and conspicuously unarmed. Their weapons were in a neat stack four meters from the nearest horse. The flags whipped in the breeze, Melin’s eye catching the glint of metal from a spearhead that didn’t look ornamental. Judging from the way the flag bearers sat, hands easily grasping the flags and poles squarely planted in a stirrup, those banners transitioned into weapons.

  Each rider sat placidly, ignoring the two space-armored soldiers facing them and the ring of IASS soldiers standing outboard in a wary semicircle, rifles held in a tactical carry, pointed to the ground but ready for anything. Instead, the riders’ attention was on Melin’s group.

  And Melin’s attention focused squarely on them. They wore navy and silver-hemmed thigh-length tunics split up the center for riding, which clashed horribly with the emerald-green-and-gold sashes across their chests, and loose pants tucked into calf-high boots. All but two wore burnooses over their heads and faces, leaving only their eyes uncovered.

  One of the barefaced riders, a saturnine, middle-aged man with a closely trimmed black beard and broad shoulders, stood front and center of the group. He wore the same uniform as the others, distinguished only by a silver chain draped about his shoulders.

  He was fascinating, but the Black woman at his left was even more intriguing. She sat straight and tall in her saddle, breaking the navy color scheme with a burgundy robe worn open over her uniform. Her gray-streaked brown hair was braided into a crown about her head, and her face was well-lined from age and weather. Odd white sparks flicked about her when Melin looked at her from the corner of her eyes but were nowhere to be seen when she examined the woman head-on.

  “Why are you here?” the silver-chained rider demanded. He spoke Standard with a heavier accent than Zhoki, the words tripping in his mouth like he struggled around a couple of rocks lodged in his throat. “The province of Zakuska has paid its annual taxes.”

  “Good afternoon,” Major Dar’Tan replied with determined politeness, squinting into the sun as he gazed at the man on his horse.

  Melin choked on a laugh. The Saturan’s position had been deliberately planned.

  One of the riders to the left of the leader turned to her, head tilting.

  Melin stared back, wondering how the hells she hadn’t noticed him before. Not only was he one of three with an uncovered face and head, he was the only one not dressed in a navy uniform. He wore harsh, unrelieved black from his tunic to his trousers to his boots.

  She felt compelled to look away, to ignore him.

  His outline blurred, but she fought it and focused on his face. His light-skinned features were unremarkable, save for a head of close-cropped, salt-and-pepper hair.

  When their eyes met and held, one of his eyebrows arched. Melin returned his stare, feeling a headache begin to form in between her eyes. Something told her to look away. The headache grew more intense, but she refused to lose this staring contest. She would not yield. The mounting pain solidified her determination. His other eyebrow joined the first, and he broke eye contact to glance toward his leader. Her headache vanished as quickly as it appeared, and the pressure in her chest released.

  “This is our translator, Doctor Kubicek,” Dar’Tan said, bringing Melin’s attention back to the exchange of greetings.

  She’d completely missed the point of what they were doing here. Renewing taxes? Power projection? Shaking out a new agreement of understanding? They’d brought enough power with the three suits to level a city.

  Hopefully, the Saturans realized their horses and swords and arrows were worthless against space armor. She wo
ndered if they cared. Maybe part of their strategy was to appear as archaic and defenseless as possible, and someone was hidden in the background with recording devices. There had to be some technology on this planet that wasn’t IASS controlled.

  Kubicek stepped forward and said something Melin didn’t understand. It wasn’t like anything she had heard during her brief outing in Veskie-Jidda, and it certainly wasn’t in the Old Tongue.

  Kubicek came to the end of his prepared speech, and the two lead Saturans shared a brief glance before the leader faced the IASS members. While the leader continued to stare down stoically at the xenoanthropologist, the woman held her hand to her mouth, either to choke back a cough or a snicker.

  The Saturans glanced at one another with looks of confusion on their faces as Dr. Kubicek stopped talking, coming to the end of his prepared speech. The woman rolled her eyes and leaned forward to the covered-faced companion to her right and, judging by their reaction, muttered something like, “Two hundred years and they still can’t speak our language. Unbelievable.” The two Saturans closest to her chuckled, and another bowed her head, obviously fighting a grin through her half mask. The space-suited soldiers twitched at the movements as they toggled between threat-no threat.

  The leader continued to stare down stoically at the xenoanthropologist, although his lips twitched in appreciation of the comment.

  Kubicek’s face reddened.

  Dar’Tan’s eyes had a glaze that meant he was rebuking Kubicek via implant. Undeterred, the major continued in Standard, pretending as if Kubicek hadn’t spoken at all. “Your treaty of understanding is reaching its ten-year term limit, and we have heard nothing from your duke. We are here to ensure the treaty is renewed.”