by T J Mott
He looked around. Ailin was nowhere in sight. “Dammit!” He fired his carbine indiscriminately towards the mouth of the alley where the police would soon enter, firing so many laser blasts that the overheat warning on his carbine lit up. Then he threw it to the side, where it clattered against a concrete wall, and scooped Ria up, tossing her over his shoulder into a rescue carry. He ran as fast as he could down the alley again. She was small and light, not even fifty kilograms he guessed, but he knew he couldn’t continue like this. He couldn’t shoot back anymore and his pursuit was seconds away from entering the alley.
The alley was narrow and mostly clear. But near the midpoint was a single large industrial-sized dumpster, nearly two meters tall. He groaned, sprinted up towards it, wondering how he was going to toss Ria over the top. But as he approached, he saw it had a small sliding door on one side, making it easier to dispose of garbage without needed to reach over the lid.
The door was already open. He shoved Ria through it, then pulled himself through, struggling to do so one-handed. But he succeeded, and seconds later, he crashed into the rubbish within. Then he slipped out of his radio pack while clamboring back towards the door, losing his balance twice before reaching it, and slid it shut.
Just in time to hear heavy footfalls outside as the police patrol sprinted through the alley. “Dammit!” someone said. “Lost sight of them.” The footfalls slowed, and Thad heard heavy panting outside. “Unit 14, see anything at your end?”
The next voice sounded like it came through a radio. “Yeah, they exited the alley on our side. Really fast, we couldn’t keep up on foot and we’re heading to the car to continue pursuit.”
“Copy. One dead Ailonian kid back here. He had a hell of an infrared rifle on him, too. So the others are on your side?”
“Sure looks that way, 12.”
A pause, filled only by heavy breathing. Then the radio came to life again. “Unit 12, we need you reinforce east of the fuel depot.”
“Copy, but be advised there are still some Rebels out here to the west.”
“Well it sounds like you lost them,” the dispatcher said mockingly. “And there are a lot more Rebels to the east, trying to retreat from the fight. Get going! Unit 18, you’re in a quiet sector. Move east to 12’s position. Check out the dead Rebel that 12 reported and patrol that area, just in case there are more.”
The banter got quieter and quieter as the patrol left the alley. Then he grimaced as he felt all kinds of foul-smelling slime soaking into his clothes.
He didn’t dare utter a word in case they’d left someone in earshot. Having no weapons, he couldn’t possibly fight himself out, and waiting was his only chance at survival.
Slowly crawling over the garbage, he tried desperately to make no sound as he moved within the dumpster, quite a challenge because its contents shifted and moved every time he did. Some of it tried to suck him under like quicksand. But somewhere in the rubbish he could hear the quiet sounds of a crying woman who was trying desperately to stay unheard.
Finding Ria, he managed to get himself into as close a sitting position as possible and pulled her into his lap. She still had her medic’s backpack on, though it was soaked through with garbage now. He gingerly removed it and tossed it aside, then pulled her head into his left shoulder while wrapping his arms around her. She was breathing heavily. Pressing his fingertips against her neck, he realized her pulse was dangerously high. “Ria,” he whispered into her face softly, trying to reassure her. She pulled herself into him and kept sobbing and trembling violently and hysterically. It was ten minutes before she started to calm down, though her trembling continued.
“Ria, where are you hit?” he whispered.
“My leg,” she answered weakly. Now, she sounded more terrified than hurt.
“How bad?”
“Not sure. Chad…Jason…” She started crying again, much louder this time, and her trembling intensified again.
The side of her face was buried in his shoulder. He put his hand on the other side of her face and kissed her temple. “Shh,” he hissed, trying to sound comforting.
“Ailin?” she asked. “Couldn’t keep up with him.”
“I think he got away,” he answered, remembering the police report that the fleeing Rebels had escaped from the other end of the alley. They must have seen Ailin and mistakenly thought the whole fireteam was with him.
She put her hand on his chest and continued crying. He held her close, feeling terrified and helpless himself but trying not to show it, and listened to the not-very-distant sounds of police cars and foot patrols outside. As his ears adjusted, he began to hear an intense, roaring fire, too. He stayed as alert as he could, trying to decipher what was going on in the city around him while Ria’s sobbing slowed and grew quieter. She stopped trembling and her breathing became shallow but regular as she gave into exhaustion and fell into a light sleep.
***
He let her sleep for a while while he tried to assess their situation. She was hurt and he didn’t know how bad. They had no radio and no weapons, they were cut off from the rest of the Rebels, and from the engine sounds he’d occasionally heard, there were at least two AFPF cars patrolling nearby.
She woke up almost an hour later. “You did the right thing,” she whispered.
“Huh?” he asked.
“Jason,” she said. She sobbed once, then just as quickly regained control of herself. “It would have been hours of terrible pain before…” Her words trailed off, and he feared she would start crying again. “He lost his parents in the last war. Killed or enslaved, we never figured out which. He lived and hid in the streets. Almost a year after the war ended, he stumbled into my clinic. Just an adolescent. We took him in, put him to work. Now he’s gone too.” She rubbed a hand up and down his right bicep. “Thanks for…for…taking…” She started to tremble and choke up again. “Taking care of him like that. He was in agony. Leaving him…would have been cruel.”
He stroked her cheek, fighting back some tears of his own. “Your leg?” he finally asked.
“We were running down the alley. Ailin’s fast. Never seen anyone run that fast. I couldn’t keep up, and I was so terrified. I felt heat, burning on my leg, and I tripped and fell. And I was just so scared. All of that, and…Jason…I just collapsed. I was so afraid, and couldn’t keep going. I gave up.”
He continued stroking her cheek. “How bad is it? Your leg.”
“It hurts. And now it’s soaking in garbage.”
He sighed. “Listen, I’m trying to triage you, here.”
“Look, I don’t know!” she spat back in a loud whisper. “I’m sorry! I don’t know! I…I don’t know anything right now!”
“Ria,” he cooed. “It’s going to be all right. I’m going to get you out of here and back to base, and you’re going to be okay.”
She shook her head, and a trash-soaked lock of her red hair slapped against his cheek. “I know you’re trying to reassure me. But they’re just words. After watching Jason…anything can happen. To anyone, at any time. Confident and reassuring words don’t keep reality away.” She paused, and sighed. “I’m sorry. It’s hard to see anything positive right now.” She rubbed her face into his shoulder. “Chad, whatever happens here. Just know that I’m so glad you came to Ailon. One day, you’ll be a hero in our history books.”
He suppressed a shudder, which was only partly caused by soaking in cold, wet garbage. Only if I die here and Ailon never learns my identity. He wondered where the crossover point from monster to hero was. If Ailon won the war because of him, and they learned the truth, would that redeem him in their eyes?
She laughed suddenly and nervously. “This will be so unromantic. We’re soaking in trash in a dumpster. But Chad, I love you. I have for a while, and after everything that happened today, you need to know that.” He didn’t see it coming, not in the pitch black interior of a closed dumpster on a dark night, but suddenly she was kissing him.
“Ria, I love you too.”
And he meant it, despite all the uncertainty he felt about his past and what that meant for Ailon or Ria. But he felt it. “And that’s why I know I’m getting you out of here and back to base.”
She laughed again, and even though he couldn’t see, he knew she was smiling. “Well you better get started now. I have a wounded leg soaking in trash water. Don’t make me give you a medical description of what that could lead to.”
He frowned. “Please don’t, I think I can piece that together on my own. I had a good teacher, once, a long time ago in a Foundation mobile clinic.”
She crawled off his lap and he groped around to find the dumpster’s side door. He slid it open and helped her through it, watching helplessly as she crashed to the ground on the outside. As he struggled to climb out himself, he wished for his prosthetic hand back for the millionth time since it had been damaged.
The nighttime seemed impossibly bright compared to the dumpster’s interior. And the air seemed so fresh. A cold, gentle breeze occasionally blew through the alley. He heard all kinds of commotion coming from the direction of the fuel depot several blocks away, and silently thanked the stars that it was still burning and keeping the Avennians occupied. He had no idea how Eighth Platoon’s retreat had gone, but from the cop chatter he’d heard from inside the dumpster, there wasn’t much going on this side of the fire.
Grimacing, Ria knelt on the concrete and rolled up her left pantleg. Thad kneeled down beside her to assist, and she wrinkled her nose as he got closer. “Chad, you are the worst thing I have ever smelled in my life.”
He made a face of mock hurt and helped her roll up her pant leg. Halfway up the outside of her shin was a laser burn. Her flesh was already pink and puffy, probably in the early stages of infection. But the burn itself looked fairly shallow. “Looks like a graze,” he said.
“Yeah. Just a graze. I don’t think it hit any muscle. Still hurts like hell though.” He helped her climb to her feet, and she gingerly put her weight on it. “Looks like it supports me,” she said. “Now let’s get moving. We wait too much longer and I might have to join you in the people-with-missing-limbs club.”
He snorted, but let the jab go, and stayed close to her as they moved towards the alley exit. She clung to his arm and was able to walk, albeit a bit slower than normal and with a definite limp. But he heaved a big sigh of relief. When he’d seen her crumpled in the alley, he’d feared the worst. Especially just moments after performing a mercy kill on Jason. And then, all that time inside the dumpster, the worry of knowing she’d been shot and not knowing how bad it was or if she’d make it…
But for now, they were okay. And as thousands of liters of fuel oil burned through the night, he also knew their mission had been a success—a painful one, but a success nonetheless. And maybe the Ailonian Rebels had just taken the first step in loosening Avennia’s hold over the enslaved world.
***
The sky had just begun turning a dark shade of purple as twilight approached, when Thad and Ria stumbled in through the back door of their platoon’s duplex. Chet and several armed Rebels met them immediately, and Thad heaved another sigh of relief. Without his radio—its remains left behind in the dumpster—he’d had no idea what had become of the rest of his platoon, and he’d been worried about what he’d find back at base.
The platoon sergeant didn’t seem to notice or care that the two of them were soaked with foul-smelling garbage water. He gave both of them a hug. “Ria’s hurt,” Thad explained.
Chet turned and shouted into the duplex. “Sema!” he called out, referring to the only other woman in First Platoon. She was also a medic, experienced as a nurse in another Foundation clinic before the war. “Sema!” She showed up a few seconds later, a scrawny blonde woman a bit taller than Ria and about the same age. Chet gave Ria a look-over and made a face. “You smell like you slept in a dumpster.”
She chuckled slightly. “I did.”
“And you look exhausted, too.” He turned to Sema. “Help Ria get cleaned up and treated.” Sema nodded and took Ria by the arm as the two disappeared further into the duplex.
“We were so worried when we couldn’t raise you on the radio,” Chet said. “The others?” he added, carefully.
Thad sighed. “We got separated from Ailin, no idea on his status. And Jason didn’t make it.”
Chet looked down, suddenly very sad, shaking his head in grief. “Dammit. He was the kid brother of Clinic 12. How did Ria take it?”
“Not well. Chet, just so you know,” Thad dropped his voice, “I had to euthanize him. His wound was not survivable, and it would have taken a while to die. And Ria watched. That was not easy on her.”
Chet covered his face with his hands, and when he pulled them away, Thad saw tiny tears in the man’s eyes. “And you?”
Thad shook his head and shrugged, far too tired to feel much emotion. “I don’t know. It’s war. We move on.” He looked around at the rest of the cramped, dimly-lit duplex, at the piles of weapons and gear everywhere, the other Rebels sleeping on bedrolls in seemingly-random locations, a few men keeping a watchful eye on the outside through the windows and doors with their carbines slung across their chests. “How’s the rest of the platoon?”
“Good. Except for you. Second and Third Squads made a clean getaway. My fireteam got in a brief firefight, but we slipped away with no casualties.”
“And any news on Eighth Platoon?”
Chet nodded solemnly. “Most of them got away. They lost a few.” The platoon sighed, then wrinkled his nose. “Go get yourself cleaned up, Chad, and get some sleep. You really look like you need it.”
Thad nodded and made his way to one of the duplex bathrooms, hoping that he hadn’t soaked in the garbage for so long that it wouldn’t wash out anymore.
Chapter 27
Thaddeus woke up from a fitful and dreamless sleep a few hours later. He didn’t feel well-rested at all, but with so many things on his mind he couldn’t fall asleep again despite how badly he needed more rest.
Ria was sleeping blissfully on her bedroll though. The lower part of her left leg was wrapped and bandaged and an intravenous bag hung taped to the wall above her. Glancing at the bag’s handwritten label, he saw it was filled with a mix of antibiotics and sedatives. Rin, her six-year-old son, sat next to her as if keeping guard. He pointed at the IV bag. “Medicine,” he said. “So Mommy doesn’t get sick.”
Thad chuckled and smiled at the boy. “Take good care of her.”
“I will,” he answered. “Chet ordered me to. He gave me a mission. I’m now Private First Class Parri.”
Thad laughed again and made his way to the kitchen on his side of the duplex. Chet was already there and the radio was active, apparently on the Rebel Council channel.
“Ah, Chad’s here now,” Chet announced. “Get any sleep?”
“Not really.” He stepped up to the counter where their tiny planning tablet sat, and eyeballed the situation map it was displaying.
Culper’s distorted voice buzzed through the tinny speaker. “Mr. Messier. That little fire you started last night is still burning, and the Avennians are quite upset about it. And Twelfth Platoon’s attack on the other side of the city was successful, too. I’m getting reports that they’re reinforcing all the remaining fuel depots heavily. Lots of patrols, both on foot and by vehicle, and they’re parking Army personnel carriers with mounted weapons on the streets nearby. I doubt we’ll be able to strike any other depots.”
“That’s a good thing, actually,” Thad said, glancing at Chet and noticing his confused expression. “If they reinforced the fuel depots, that means they’ve pulled troops and resources from elsewhere. So let’s find out what that elsewhere is, see how weak it is with fewer troops, and decide if it’s worth striking there.”
Chet raised an eyebrow and nodded in understanding. “What if they came from the garrison?” he asked. “They could have reinforced without pulling any troops from the war zone.”
Thad shook his head. “Unli
kely. Avennia has finite resources. I think they already have most of their forces deployed and they’ve even pulled some troops in from other cities. I don’t think they have troop reserves anywhere, not in any real numbers. The only way they can reinforce anything is by weakening somewhere else.”
“We need to press our advantage,” said Abram. “If Avennia is distracted with fuel depots, we should strike somewhere else. Immediately.”
Thad made a pained face. “We’re still very disrupted from having a number of our cells flushed out of hiding. They need to get settled in at their new locations, resupplied, and we need a clear picture of how the depot fire has affected Avennia. New intel could take a few days to come in. Until then, we should sit tight and wait. Just for a couple days.”
“But what if there’s an obvious opportunity?” He could almost hear Abram smile through the radio.
Thad rolled his eyes. “Do you have something in mind?”
“Oh yes. Check your map, now.” Thad turned his attention to the tiny map screen, and it updated as Abram sent it remote commands through the radio link. It panned and zoomed, settling on a region in the northeast section of Orent. “According to reports from Culper’s spies, most of the fuel depot reinforcements came from here, and there are not many left to defend it.”
Thad frowned. The map was zoomed in on one of the city’s two fusion plants. This one was near the spaceport, with large power conduits running to the spaceport, the garrison, the surface-to-space gun, and a bunch of other government and military facilities. “That’s absurd. It’s one of the most important facilities in the city, they’d never pull more than a few troops from there!”
“Yet they did, if we’re to trust the spy network that you helped Culper establish,” Abram continued. The map updated, showing counters that estimated the number of soldiers, vehicles, and other personnel at the facility based on spy reports. And the deltas showed that the numbers had dropped drastically, far more than any other location in the city. Nearly to zero. “This reactor is almost undefended.”