by Richard Fox
“It’s best we never mention Roland ever again,” Aignar said. “And hope we never cross swords. He’s our enemy now.”
“You’re sure of this?”
“My feelings don’t matter. I have my orders,” he said.
“A cheap answer. What of the hatchling? He has not impressed me.”
“He has his moments. You know his dad’s famous?”
“For what?”
“Alcohol and having lots of illegitimate children. More for the alcohol.” Aignar pulled his shoulders back and took a deep breath through his nose.
“That makes you famous?” Cha’ril asked, sidling up to Aignar, pressing her shoulder to his.
“You’d be amazed at what makes humans famous. You don’t even have to be good at something. You can just be terrible—but passionate about what you’re terrible at—and famous. You ever seen a 21st Century classic film about a man named Johnny and his future wife Lisa?”
“Perhaps later. You know where I can get some coffee beans?” she asked.
“There’s instant in the mess hall.”
Cha’ril spat on the catwalk.
“I missed you too, Cha’ril.”
****
Santos lay on his bunk atop the tightly made sheets. The ring of his plugs felt hot against his skin, nagging him to abandon something as trivial as sleep and return to his suit.
Sighing, he removed a slate from a thigh pocket, swiped it on, and tapped a message. A screen opened and his father sat on a couch.
Orozco wore slacks and a shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest. He looked like he’d just finished filming another whiskey commercial.
“Nino,” he said, bringing his hands level with his shoulders and letting them drop to his side. “You made it…Armor. Big shoes to fill, yes? Sorry I couldn’t make it to your graduation on Knox—scheduling conflicts. You understand.”
Santos smirked. “Busy schedule” was always the excuse.
Orozco’s shoulders drooped.
“I blame myself,” he said. “I was never around while you were growing up. And when you came up on your mandatory enlistment…what did I do? I put my foot down. Told you what not to do. What an idiot I am. I never told you why the Armor get that reaction from me. I don’t like talking about that day. When Elias and the rest held off the Xaros, I was right there. In the middle of it all…it was terrifying. To see the Xaros up close like that, the true Xaros, not their drones…men shouldn’t see true evil. It brought out something in me. Something I’ve not been able to shake. I got over it by—no, I hid it. I hid it with women and work.”
Orozco picked up a whiskey glass and held it up with his trademark half smile.
“So, you going the tin-can route—” Orozco looked over a shoulder. “Don’t tell anyone I said that. You going to the Armor Corps brought back a host of issues. Excuse? Yeah. Good one. No. So what, huh? This just your old man trying to justify being a bum? Maybe. Probably.”
Orozco set the glass down and slid it a few inches across the table.
“Stay safe, son,” he said and crossed his arms over his chest. “For me. When you come back to Earth, maybe we can go to Armor Square and I can tell you more of what happened that day. Recording off.”
Santos put the slate back into his pocket. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat for a few moments, elbows on his knees.
“Now he cares,” he muttered. “And he only cares about how it makes him feel.”
He got up, re-tucked his sheets to remove wrinkles from his presence, and headed back to the cemetery. He would sleep in his suit, ready for the next call to fight.
Chapter 24
The Templar and Nisei lances marched down a wide ramp to a landing pad on top of a Navarre skyscraper, Marc lagging a few steps behind. The overcast sky held dark clouds, on the verge of rain, though light shone through the thinner areas, creating a dichotomy of doom and hope.
Stacey Ibarra waited on the pad, a squad of bodyguards lined up behind her. Her face was as inscrutable as ever, her silver body covered by a heat cloak to keep the icy effects of her body from freezing those around her.
Colonel Martel knelt to one knee before her. He dipped his head then raised it slowly, taking his hilt off his leg and unsnapping the blade over his knee.
Neither Lady Ibarra nor her bodyguard flinched.
Martel gripped the blade with both hands and raised it over his head. Then, with all the force his Armor could muster, he slammed it toward his knee.
Stacey caught the blade before it could hit home. “Why?” she asked.
“I have failed you, my Lady,” Martel said.
The rest of the Armor sank to a knee.
“The Aeon lives?” Stacey asked, her words lilting across the scene.
“She was alive the last we saw her,” Martel said.
“Then you have not failed.” Stacey plucked the sword out of the colonel’s grasp. The weapon looked almost unwieldy in her hand, but she tossed it up slightly and caught it by the hilt. The blade retracted into the guard.
“Grandfather?” she asked.
Marc came forward and handed her Trinia’s necklace. The data crystals glowed with an inner light and she rubbed a thumb across the central jewel.
“The Aeon gave us what we need for a final victory,” Stacey said. “I declare her part of the Ibarra Nation. Does the Nation abandon their own?”
“Never, my Lady,” Martel said.
“Then she will be free. What say you, Templar?”
“By my honor and my Armor,” Martel said and beat a fist against his heart as the rest of the Armor repeated the oath.
Stacey handed the hilt back to Martel. “Preparations must be made,” she said. “I will summon you when I am ready.” She turned and gestured for Marc to follow her and the two immortals left, flanked by bodyguards.
Martel waited until they’d disappeared through a doorway before rising. Big drops of rain smacked against his helm then a downpour engulfed the Armor.
“Templar,” he said, “leave your suits in the cemetery then report to the dojo. We train until morning. We will never be found wanting again.”
Roland punched the tarmac and cracks opened around the impact.
Chapter 25
Roland stripped off his uniform top, his cramped muscles almost failing as he removed the sweat-logged coat from his shoulders. His quarters were unintentionally Spartan. He’d slept in it a handful of times and hadn’t bothered to do anything with the space other than hang up his issued clothing. He took a moment between breaths before reaching into his closet.
Training had been intense. Sword work followed by the VR range in Armor until the targeting computers had recalibrated, then back to the mats. He’d not sparred with the Nisei before, and he learned a number of Iado and Kendo strikes the hard way.
A knock at his door kicked his heart into overdrive and he lunged for his uniform gauntlet he’d left on a small, two-person table. He feared he’d missed an alert or summons from Colonel Martel, but there was nothing in his message queue.
He limped over to the door, a welt in his thigh tightening his gait. Opening the door, he got a glimpse of void-black hair as Makarov rushed inside.
“Close it, close it,” she hissed.
Immediately conscious of his body order and disheveled appearance, Roland frowned and hit a button to slide the door shut. Makarov, wearing simple overalls that bore no rank or unit patches, set a padded bag on the small table.
“I was…” He jerked a thumb to the shower then went red in the face. “I mean, I was—”
“You look like you were beaten with a stick.” She sat at the table and pulled a clip out of her hair, letting curls spill out across her shoulders.
Roland swallowed hard, unable to find words.
“I’ve heard Armor training is intense. Who gave you that one?” she asked, brushing a light finger across his cheek.
Roland touched the spot and winched. “I think it was Morrigan,” he said.
“Save someone’s life and they don’t take it easy on you when it’s time to grapple.”
Makarov opened a flap on the bag and pulled out a cardboard carton, the smell of tomato sauce and spices wafting out.
“I know a guy,” she said. “Works the hydroponics farms and makes these by request.”
“Do admirals have trouble getting pizza?” Roland’s mouth watered as she opened the box—pepperoni, the standard by which all pies are judged.
“Can’t pull rank for this sort of thing,” she said. “I went in mufti and told him it was for the Black Knight,” she said. “You have a couple autographs to sign. I think I could have got some Italian sausage toppings out of him.”
She half lifted a slice out, then looked at the empty seat. “It’ll get cold,” she said.
“I stink on ice,” Roland said, glancing back at the shower.
“It’ll get cold,” she repeated.
Roland sat, feeling a number of new bruises he hadn’t been aware of until then. He reached into the box, practically tasting it, when he caught himself. Bowing his head, he said a quick prayer, thanking God and Fate for a meal he didn’t even know was possible.
He looked up just as Makarov crossed herself.
“Za zdorovja,” she said and touched her slice to his in cheers.
Roland took a bite, and the taste brought him back to happier, easier times. They wolfed down the first slice and Roland dabbed at his lips with a napkin. When he pulled it back, he was unsure if the red was tomato sauce or blood from a split lip.
Makarov stifled a laugh. “I’m sorry,” she said, covering her mouth, “but how does the other guy look?”
“Based on the number of licks I got in? Probably a hell of a lot better,” he said.
She giggled, ending with a snort, and then looked around his quarters. “So…this is what it feels like to be normal?” she asked.
“There was a time when I was a broke busboy in Phoenix,” he said, feeling the weight of the plugs at the base of his skull. “That was normal enough. This…is special.”
“I have a briefing in half an hour,” she said. “And if you think I’m leaving any of this behind…you are wrong.”
“Challenge accepted.” He reached for a slice across from him and she slapped his hand away.
“You think…” she paused and looked up at him, “you think things will ever be ‘normal’?”
“Not if we lose this fight.”
“Then it’s up to us to win.” She raised an eyebrow at him and kept eating.
Chapter 26
Toth hands grabbed Trinia by the arms and she felt the warm air of a warrior’s breath through the hood over her face. A claw poked against the bare flesh of her arms, goading her to get on her feet and start walking. Any hesitation would draw blood.
She’d learned a good deal about the Toth since they took her prisoner. Cruelty was their only way to communicate with her.
In darkness, she went down a ramp and was manhandled onto a seat too small for her frame. She heard Toth warriors barking commands and a sibilant hiss of several creatures in reply.
I’m out of the ship, at least, she thought as stale air wafted through the hood. The dreadnought smelt of moss and old oil. This was someplace different.
Her seat lurched as the transportation she was in moved forward. The warrior’s grip shifted to the back of her neck as the clamp of air-lock doors sounded behind her.
The transport slowed and the Toth shoved her to one side. She landed hard, rolling to a stop when her hip hit something metal. She heard the whine of hydraulics and the whirl of gears and her hood was plucked away.
A clawed metal leg was just in front of her face, the talons inlaid with gold and ivory.
“Be afraid,” said Overlord Bale as his tank arms grabbed Trinia by the wrist and hoisted her into the air.
The Aeon was brought level with the brain floating inside the tank. Tendrils touched the inside of the glass, as though it wanted to caress her.
“The last of all the Aeon,” Bale said. “What a prize you would have been.”
Trinia saw her reflection in the glass. Her eyes were worn, and her face carried the sorrow of failure.
“Get it over with,” she spat.
Bale dropped her to the ground and a leg clamped down around her throat. Trinia gasped as Bale jerked her in front of his tank and a platinum spike emerged from the housing just beneath his tank. The spike snapped open, and tiny feeder tendrils stretched toward her.
“Once…once you would have been a great meal of memory,” the overlord said. “A treat to be envied, an experience to be savored…just a taste, perhaps?”
A single tendril brushed against her forehead and Trinia closed her eyes.
The spike shut and Trinia was thrown to the ground.
“But things have changed, haven’t they?” Bale asked. “I am the last of my caste. The last of the overlords that would have had dominion over the galaxy had the humans not…outplayed us.”
Trinia looked around, searching for an exit. A single observation wall overlooked a desert planet and behind her was a door guarded by two Toth warriors in crystal armor.
“You brought it on yourself,” Trinia said, wiping a hand across her mouth and eyeing the halberds the warriors held. “I remember when Mentiq tried to kidnap a Qa’Resh, how that almost destroyed the Alliance.”
“Mentiq had his proclivities,” Bale said, “his peculiarities…his tastes. It was his appetite that destroyed him in the end. That was your doing, yes?”
“I helped,” Trinia said.
“And was it you that brought Malal to my world and murdered billions of Toth?”
“No. Though I would have liked to see it happen with my own eyes. The galaxy is a better place with the Toth gone…you must be the last of the stain.” She stood up and raised her chin slightly.
“Trying to antagonize me into harming you?” Bale scratched at the deck with his forelegs. “Curious…you gave yourself up so easily on your empty world. You were an easy transport. Most meat species fight hard during transit. You’ve either embraced your fate…or you’re clinging to hope. Interesting.”
“And why haven’t you consumed my mind?” she asked, her hand passing over her shoulder. “Swallowed my soul.”
“Why, indeed.” Bale moved to one side of the observation room and a panel lit up. The muffled sound of moving machinery came through the wall. “You are a scientist, though perhaps not one versed in my glorious state of being. Consuming neural energy is a…method of pleasure. Not a method for education. Feasting on you would bring me days of euphoria…and a few of your surface thoughts. Gain a drop in the ocean that is your millennia of experience? A waste. You are a jewel beyond price, not one I will shatter just to see the cracks.”
“Then why am I alive?” she asked.
“The work! The work, of course,” Bale said, stepping back as a panel opened in the wall and a tube larger than Bale’s tank emerged, filled with light-green fluid. A humanoid shape floated within.
Lights flickered along the base of Bale’s housing.
A misshapen human thumped against the glass, features twisted, eyes dead but locked open. A bubble shot from his mouth and crawled up his face.
Trinia recoiled, but Bale grabbed her by the wrist before she could get more than a step away.
“To destroy your enemy’s cities is the lowest form of victory,” the Toth said. “Burn the worlds? Drive them into extinction? Better, but not exquisite. To enslave the enemy. To feast on their children for centuries until the race knows nothing but despair and devolves into little better than livestock…that is what it means to triumph.
“Humans achieved a victory, that’s true. But I, Bale, will prove to the galaxy what it is to fight the Toth. I will destroy Earth. The Ibarra worlds. Ignite every sky where they draw breath…then I will sip their minds, feast on their sorrow, until I can raise more overlords and punish the humans until the last star burns away.”
“They beat the Xaros,” Trinia said. “They can beat you and your Kesaht servants.”
“Different wars require different tactics,” Bale said. “And I have a number of other races that share my desired ends for humanity. This time will be different.”
Trinia pulled her hand free from Bale’s claws and regarded the misshapen mass in the tank.
“You’ve tried to re-create the procedurals, haven’t you? You’re a butcher, Toth. Not an artisan.”
“Setbacks, yes.” Bale’s tendrils quivered with annoyance. “Is that why the Ibarras wanted you? A kink in their production line? Something only the originator could fix? Irrelevant. Now that you’re here, your talents will be put to proper use.”
“I will never help you.” She gave him an evil look.
“But I am so hungry,” Bale said.
A hatch opened on the wall and a cage was pushed out onto the floor. A human girl was inside. She looked at Bale and began sobbing.
“What? No—” Trinia started forward, but a Toth warrior grabbed her from behind.
Bale ripped the top of the cage open and the girl began screaming. Bale’s claw tip closed around the girl’s neck and he slowly—almost gently—lifted her out of the cage as tears streamed down her dirty face.
The feeder spike snapped open and shut as it approached the girl’s face.
“They’re so tender at this age…” Bale said.
“Stop. Stop!” Trinia struggled against the warrior’s grip.
The spike pulled back ever so slightly, the feeder tendrils stretched toward the girl, stopping only a few inches shy of her.
“Empathy…curious,” the overlord said. “Is it because your species share a form? Do you look upon this one and see all the Aeon you killed with your mistake? What’s the life of this one to you? I have many more.”
“Don’t hurt her…please.” Trinia lowered her chin.
The warrior let her go and she stumbled forward.