Chimera Company - Rho-Torkis Box Set

by Tim C. Taylor

  “It will when you make it work, Sybutu. You and Arunsen together. Only the two of you will know your true mission. Your joint mission. You will proceed to the destination where you will deliver your message. You will do it together and be seen to do it together by your contact, because it will come from both myself and Lieutenant Colonel Malix. Furthermore, once you have exchanged recognition phrases, you will identify yourselves to your contact by the code name I have assigned your joint team. That name is Chimera Company.”

  Like that’s ever gonna happen. Osu had finally figured Yazzie out. The Legion might have been systematically starved of funding for centuries, a mummified shell of its former self, but its reputation had survived largely intact. Major Yazzie was a Legion wannabe. She’d probably tried to join but been rejected. And now she maintained this bubble of relatively disciplined order within the chaos of the Militia and dreamed her chimeric fantasies.

  Good for her. But if she imagined this Chimera Company would work, then she was madder than Lily Hjon.

  Osu stood and gave Yazzie a crisp salute – Legion style: three-fingered to acknowledge their former Legion comrades left behind long ago in the Orion Spur. “This isn’t Irisur, sir. This time, I’ll make it work. I’ll… we’ll make Chimera Company a success you will be proud of.”

  She stood and returned the sloppy Militia salute. “On behalf of Far Reach Federation and the entire Amilxi civilization, I pray you do so. Good luck, Sergeant.”

  SHINTO YAZZIE

  Yazzie watched Sybutu go, escorted back to his incarceration a changed man. Well, not that changed. If he thought his little speech at the end had been convincing, then he was an even more conceited fool than she’d thought. The jack-head would say anything to get his team out of Fort Iceni and then ditch Arunsen’s escort at the earliest opportunity.

  Sybutu couldn’t see it yet – maybe he never would – but recruiting so many of the Militia’s enlisted ranks from the scum of the penal system brought in many skillsets that most legionaries lacked. Lying convincingly was one of them.

  So was recognizing a lie when you heard it.

  She’d deployed the falsehood that Lieutenant Shen would lead the pursuit, and it had worked as she’d hoped. She should be able to sideline Shen, to keep him at Iceni and ignorant of what a part of his platoon was really up to off base. But first she had another knuckle-headed soldier to recruit.

  Sybutu and Arunsen. She chuckled at the thought. The men were like two rounds on the same clip.

  Just too blind to see it.

  VETCH ARUNSEN

  The viewing window in the northeast watchtower radiated cold over Vetch’s face, which was fixed to the heated eyepieces of his sentry viewer. According to the reticule display, he was sweeping the glorified binocs across the northern approach to Fort Iceni in a standard search pattern, but Vetch would feel a whole lot better if he had landmarks to actually see where he was looking.

  In the light winds dancing over the terrain, everything was white mixed with a dash of gray. He switched to IR mode, but it was even worse.

  Sky.

  Land.

  Near.

  Far.

  Everything was a featureless blur.

  After the skirmish that had left six good Militia troopers dead, Vetch had learned to fear this landscape. The mysterious legionaries had appeared out of a blizzard and disappeared in one too. What was lurking out there now on the ice and snow?

  Two days later, the comms blackout had cut them off altogether from the outside world. It was as if the planet itself had swallowed them up, the landscape now an openly declared enemy.

  He’d been left with the sense that danger lurked on the horizon. And those dangers were watching him.

  The sense of being observed was unbearably strong at the moment.

  Maybe his subconscious was telling him he’d seen something?

  Vetch ceased his musing.

  Yeah, that made more sense. His brain was playing tricks on him, but it was trying to help.

  He tightened his concentration and reversed his search sweep, hoping to see something he’d missed the first time.

  It wouldn’t be difficult for an enemy in an insulated cloak and heat dissipator to make it near impossible to be seen from the watchtower. Was someone out there in the snow watching Vetch through their own binocs?

  Waiting for the right moment…

  “Sergeant!”

  Vetch gasped and nearly jumped out of his skin, sending the pintle-mounted viewer spinning.

  It was a gasp, not a scream, though anyone who didn’t know him might mistake it for such.

  He turned around and looked into the amused face of Major Yazzie.

  “I know Raven Company was set up to be scapegoats,” she said. “Back on Lose-Viborg.”

  The door to the observation room was shut. Vetch’s comrades had mysteriously disappeared. And the fort’s executive officer – who had never felt the need to speak directly to him before – had just spoken some incredibly toxic words.

  Not that he believed her, because the major had never lifted a finger to correct the injustice. She could easily have made their position at Fort Iceni a more comfortable one without conniving in the extra duties, constant scorn, and endless petty punishments.

  Yazzie gave him a searching look. She seemed to be on the brink of making a decision. A dangerous one.

  Vetch knew all about those moments.

  “I’ve done all I can for you,” she said.

  Liar.

  She raised an amused eyebrow.

  He groaned inwardly. Vetch was a proud man, but he knew he had many failings. His face, for example. Like it or not, his features spoke eloquently of his thoughts and emotions. Far better than his tongue did.

  Lily had let it be known that no Raven was to play Vetch at cards when there was money on the table. Anyone who took advantage of Vetch’s lack of guile would answer to her.

  “I would understand it if you found my words hard to believe, Sergeant. I’ve decided to take your company’s punishment designation at face value and treat you accordingly. It’s unfair. Too bad. Embrace the suck, Arunsen, because I’ll tell you what’s even more unfair. It has been intimated to me that you and Trooper Hjon should not survive your posting to Rho-Torkis. And the urgency with which your non-survival is requested tells me you know much that my superiors would prefer hidden.”

  Vetch said nothing. Invariably, it was the best approach to a conversation with an officer, and this particular one bothered him because he hadn’t figured her out yet.

  Major Shinto Yazzie was executive officer for Fort Iceni, the biggest Militia base on the planet. Given that on most days the most taxing decisions made by her superior, Colonel Bock, was whether to get out of bed in the afternoon, or wait till the evening, that put her in a position of great authority.

  She was a human who was just the right side of forty according her official bio. Vetch didn’t put much trust in that. He believed what his eyes told him. Beneath her overcoat, she held herself with poise and strength. Yazzie was old enough to have puffed and bloated during years of overindulging in gargantuan feasts of fine food and drink, topped up by indolence, footstools, and personal servants.

  Many of her peers had done just that, but not Major Yazzie. Unlike Captain Solikin-Goh, if she had commanded the detachment sent on foot to Camp Faxian, she would have marched with her troopers. Probably berated them for not keeping up, too.

  In short, she looked like the most dangerous category of Militia officer. A professional to her core.

  In fact, he told himself, she could fit straight into the Legion. Properly had intended to but had gotten distracted and went into the wrong recruitment pod by mistake.

  “I see you are considering the true merit of the officer you see before you,” she told him. “It is good that you do so. You’re going to need to make up your mind about me tonight, Arunsen. Bear this in mind. I know you must have encountered officers who are not fit to wear the
uniform of the Militia. If I played their games, you would be dead already, and so would Hjon. But that is not my way, and we all know what can happen to Militia officers who choose a policy of decency and honesty. I’m sure that former Captain Hjon has told you all about that.”

  “Yes, sir. Lily might have mentioned it once or twice.”

  “I bet she has.” Yazzie paused, and then nodded. “Which is why it pains me to say this, Arunsen, but tonight I wish your squad to play the role of the discredited and incompetent failed unit you are supposed to be. I’m requesting dereliction in your duty.”

  “Requesting, sir?”

  “Yes, request, Sergeant. Oh, I could order you, of course, but that would be a worthless. I need your… cooperation in a delicate matter.”

  “Would that be the kind of cooperation that is synonymous with collusion? Or illegal conspiracy?”

  “That’s the point, Arunsen. It’s for you to decide the answer. You need to make a choice.”

  Vetch weighed up his options.

  It didn’t take long. He hadn’t any.

  It wasn’t just that Yazzie was now claiming to be their secret protector. If the major were so inclined, she could have him and Lily executed within the hour without so much as blinking.

  They both knew that. All the same, he wasn’t good at rolling over.

  “Only one question, sir. You have a reputation as an officer who does things the right way. By the book, at any rate. And now you pull this… dereliction thing. Seems out of character, Major, and that makes me nervous. You’re not doing this for money, are you?”

  “No, I’m not.”

  Questioning an officer so directly would normally have severe repercussions, but Yazzie looked only amused. The unfamiliarity of this new ground made Vetch queasy, but he pressed on with his enquiry.

  “In that case, Major, which side are you playing for?”

  Far from a sharp rebuke, she seemed delighted by this question. He felt like he’d just passed a test.

  “Chimera Company,” she said. The name rolled a little awkwardly off her tongue, as if unfamiliar to her. “I’m doing this for Chimera Company, and I think, Vetch Arunsen, you have just joined.”

  VETCH ARUNSEN

  Deep Tone looked up from his book. “Everything okay, Sarge?”

  “World’s not ending today, Deep. Go back to your book.”

  That was all the plasma gunner needed to lean his chair back against the wall next to the heat of the oil stove, and reimmerse himself in his slate, the rest of the galaxy forgotten.

  “Err… the door, Sarge?” prompted Darant. “You’re letting out the heat.”

  “No, Darant. I’m letting you out. Man the viewer in the upper floor. The major’s just impressed upon me in person that we need to keep our eyes peeled. Now I’m impressing the same on you. Get up there. You join him, Sward. Five-minute rotations.”

  “Sergeant,” they both acknowledged with obvious reluctance. Vetch didn’t blame them. They had just been about to finish an eight-hour shift on watch, and peering out into the endless white was mentally exhausting.

  They shut the door behind them on a relaxed scene.

  Rynter was scanning the approaches through the same model of viewer that Vetch had been using in the floor above. To keep her concentration, she was calling out what she was seeing to Green Fish, who was sitting beside her, with a blanket wrapped tightly across her shoulders.

  Other than Deep Tone stuck in his book, everyone else was playing cards at the wooden table near the primitive stove.

  “I’m teaching Meatbolt how to bluff,” Lily announced. “Care to watch, Sarge? You might learn something.”

  Vetch smiled. No matter how bad things seem to get, he thought to himself, there’s always farther to fall. This group of happy rascals is what I’m going to risk thanks to Yazzie’s games.

  Meatbolt had already forgotten his physical wounds from the encounter with the weird legionaries. He’d been bitten, but not deeply. His primary injury was the minor frostbite on his neck from its brief exposure to extreme cold. The sheer strangeness of it all had shaken Vetch, but Meatbolt had shrugged it off with the ease of youth.

  Did that mean Vetch was getting old? Thirty wasn’t old. Was it?

  He beckoned Lily over with a nod.

  “Seriously?” she responded. “I’ve money resting on this.”

  He gave a quick shake of his head.

  “Don’t touch a thing, kid,” she told Meatbolt and walked over to Vetch.

  “This is business,” he told her quietly. “No messing. Straight answers. I need your assessment of Major Yazzie.”

  She crumpled her face into a pained expression. “Vetch, she reminds me of myself three years ago.”

  “Do you know her? I mean, from before.”

  “I do not. Vetch, I pointed the finger of justice at the people running this planet. Their crimes were all quietly forgotten, and I was busted for spreading the truth. My guess is that Sector High Command wanted to keep scandal away from Rho-Torkis for a decade or two. That’s why they fed in officers who wouldn’t cause scandal, out-of-favor losers such as Solikin-Goh who lacks influence, or our glorious Lieutenant Shen who lacks the imagination to dream up schemes of corruption. I expect they wanted to balance the dross with a few bastions of competence.”

  “Such as Major Yazzie.”

  “Sergeant, I’ve got a card game growing cold. Cut to the chase. Do we have to trust Yazzie with our lives in some crazy operation you barely understand?”

  “Er… yeah. Looks that way.”

  “Then trust her.”

  “Cheers, Lily. I already have, but I feel ten times better for your support. Sorry for ruining your card game.”

  “But you haven’t ruined it… yet. Oh, crap.”

  Vetch waved his arms for attention. “Hey, everyone! Card game’s over. Book down, Deep Tone. Rynter, bend your ears this way. We’ve got a job to do. You’re not gonna like it, but you’ll just have to trust me.”

  Vetch could have done without the sea of long faces.

  “And trust me too,” added Lily, standing by Vetch’s shoulder as he addressed the room.

  “Deal us in, Sergeant,” said Meatbolt. He broke into a belly laugh and made a show of dealing cards onto the table, just in case anyone had failed to appreciate his wit.

  Vetch grimaced. Don’t laugh at your own jokes. I’d better add that to the list of things I need to teach this pup.

  “What’s the play?” asked Deep Tone.

  “Role play.” Vetch grinned. “Let’s say that Lily here has been caught playing naughty games chaining up helpless jack-heads for her deviant gratification.”

  “Excuse me, Sergeant,” said Enthree. “Is this an accurate representation of our situation, or have you started the role playing already?”

  Muryani! Vetch was never sure whether they were being serious or sarcastic. “Just roll with it, Enthree. Please. Now, because Lily has been bad, as a punishment we all get to pull double sentry duty tonight.” Groans came from the viewing platform. “Just for clarity. The double duty is really happening. We are about to come off shift… and then go straight back on again. But this time, we get to pretend that we’re hopeless incompetents.”

  “If you guys want to chip in,” said Deep Tone, “I know where I can lay my hands on a small barrel of Laleucan gin. Should help us play our parts more convincingly. After a few glasses of that, an armored division could blow its way through the front gates and you’d never notice.”

  Everyone laughed, Vetch with them. It was just as well they were starting off in high spirits, because this was going to be one hell of a night.

  OSU SYBUTU

  Osu took a last look across the walkways and the watchtowers beyond, satisfying himself that he was all alone in the chill embrace of the nighttime winds. A sudden gust made him grip the wall, bracing against the lethal trickery of Rho-Torkis as it tried to nudge him just a handful of short steps off the wall to dash his brains out
on the courtyard so very far below.

  At Camp Faxian, walkways were fully enclosed, with embrasures facing inward as well as out. Anyone breaching the gates would find themselves in a deadly crossfire from defenders on the walls.

  Would have, he reminded himself. Faxian was now irradiated rubble.

  But it had once been proud and strong, unlike Fort Iceni whose design resembled a Bronze Age hillfort.

  Trust the Militia to do half a job.

  And half a job was exactly what they were doing tonight.

  When Osu and the others had removed their hoods a short while before, they’d found themselves in a watchtower room with their bikes, food, ropes, and most of their equipment.

  Most of it.

  They lacked their rifles, and as much as Osu respected his comrades, and the quad-barreled bike cannon, that was going to be an issue.

  A trooper had shouted through the door to get their jack-headed asses over the walls and wait for their weapons before clearing the hell away.

  Osu wasn’t waiting much longer.

  He stuck his head over the wall and looked down the rope to locate Zavage. The alien sapper was descending the last few feet, a ghostly figure in the goggles’ low-light enhancement.

  It was a long way down.

  And once down there on the ground… then what?

  Osu didn’t question Legion officers when summoned to their august presence; he kept his mouth shut, nodded in the right places and figured out what kind of trouble he’d landed in afterwards. He’d reacted the same way in front of Yazzie, but the more he thought on it, the less he trusted her. They’d play along with the escape act but as soon as they were away, he had no intention of rendezvousing with her Militia ‘escort’.

  The rope jerked as Zavage jumped off onto the ice at the base of the high wall.

  No more waiting. Time to get out of this mad place.

  He threaded his hands around the rope, and mentally prepared to climb over the top and swing out onto the wall.

  It would mean trusting to his grip. The knot tied to the mounting clip on the inner wall had to hold his weight too. As did the clip attachment into the wall. And the rope itself…