Guardian of Empire

by Kylie Chan

  ‘Sounds like he’s missing out, if you ask me,’ Leckie said.

  ‘Believe me, he is,’ Griffith said.

  ‘If he identifies as male then why does he wear make-up and dresses all the time?’ MacAuley asked.

  We all stopped and stared at him.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You some sort of pre-dragon American or something?’ Leckie said. He affected an awful mock-American accent. ‘This boy will turn into a ho-mo-sexual if he wears women’s clothing.’ He changed to his normal voice. ‘As if a man can’t be femme and pretty now and then.’

  ‘Uh . . . yeah.’ MacAuley glowered at him. ‘I am. I know I look thirty, but I’m eighty-nine years old, and I was born in America. I already had grown kids when the dragons arrived.’

  ‘Whoa, you’re ancient,’ Leckie said. ‘Wait – you’ve never worn a dress and gone out feeling really pretty?’

  ‘Once or twice?’ MacAuley said, obviously equivocating. ‘I mean, I’ve thought about it, but—’

  ‘Dude.’ Leckie pushed him. ‘We are going shopping and doing a full make-over for you. Dresses and make-up all around. The girls in West Barracks will love you.’ He stopped. ‘Don’t feel forced. Only if you want to. You are single, right?’

  ‘I am, yeah.’ MacAuley thought about it, then shrugged. ‘If I can do it with you, it should be fun.’

  ‘Excellent.’ Leckie turned to Griffith. ‘Cathy? Come along. You need to be pretty too. We’re all in uniform way too much.’

  ‘I’m in, but only if we do our hair as well,’ Griffith said, delighted.

  Masako reappeared and I put my hand on her shoulder. ‘Let’s go home.’

  ‘If I ever wear that much make-up under my armour shoot me,’ Imran said, almost to himself. ‘All that mascara must wreak bloody havoc with the goggles.’

  3

  Snapclick’s mating ceremony was four weeks later, to give everybody time to prepare. Every click in the Empire wanted to be there, and the Council of Clicks themselves were to preside. We gathered in a large, open-air space with a stone floor that was surrounded by enormous trees on the clicks’ home planet. The Empress herself and a small retinue were present, the Empress broadcasting grief at losing one of her favourite consorts.

  Snapclick and Terrclick were at the edge of the platform polishing each other’s exoskeletons. The upper part of their hard shells had been inlaid with intricate patterns of precious metals that honoured their sacrifice, leaving the soft lower parts free for the babies to eat through. When Snapclick saw me, it came and stopped at the edge of my bubble of higher gravity and oxygen atmosphere.

  ‘Are those what I think they are?’ it said, staring at the basket I was carrying.

  I pushed the basket through the barrier. ‘Welsh Golds from my mother’s farm.’

  ‘Thank you!’ It took the basket and held it to its nose-analogue behind its front legs. ‘They are divine, they’ll make us delicious. Thank you so much. We’ll eat them as soon as the eggs are laid. The babies will have an exceptional start in life.’ It turned to Terrclick and raised the basket, and Terrclick raised a foreclaw.

  Snapclick turned back to me. ‘I’m so nervous,’ it said. ‘Both of us feel bad about abandoning our attempt to talk to the cats when we’ve made no progress. We’ve been so engrossed in talking to the cats that we haven’t done enough practice, and I’m sure I’m going to forget half the dance and the whole thing will be a disaster. I haven’t done the dance in years and I’m so unprepared—’

  ‘This is a side of you I’ve never seen.’

  It rubbed its rear legs over its wing cases and I felt a blast of its strongest emotion – something I didn’t often feel from insect-type aliens. It was terrified.

  ‘I can feel your fear,’ I said, wiping my eyes. ‘I wish I could give you a hug—’

  The Council of Clicks had gathered on the other side of the clearing, and one of them made a few loud clicking sounds.

  ‘That’s my cue,’ Snapclick said. ‘I have to run.’

  ‘I love you dearly, my friend,’ I said, but it was already halfway across the clearing, running swiftly on its three sets of eight legs. It placed the basket of potatoes with the other mating-party gifts.

  ‘You’ll be able to speak to it more when the dance is done and they’re connected,’ Marque said. ‘Everybody will have a chance to say a proper goodbye and bless their union.’

  ‘It will feel weird speaking to it while it’s in the process of mating,’ I said.

  ‘Just remember it won’t be weird for them.’

  I nodded. ‘It’ll be worth it, even if it is for only a few minutes. I’ll be glad to tell it how much I appreciate its help.’

  Snapclick and Terrclick went to stand in front of the Council of Clicks. The five senior clicks spoke quietly to them in their own language. Snapclick and Terrclick listened to the council, then turned and went to the centre of the clearing. They moved so that their six bodies were standing in a circle, all facing the centre.

  The Council of Clicks proceeded to click their pincers against each other in a slow rhythm. Snapclick and Terrclick lifted their wing cases and released their foremost wings so that they fanned out. The wings were gauzy and transparent, brilliantly pink and purple with gold edges in a vivid display of colour.

  Snapclick and Terrclick began the mating dance. They raised their front pincers, then stepped in time to the clicks from the council. The council members sped up their clicks, and added a complicated rhythm. Snapclick and Terrclick danced faster in a circle, raising and lowering their bodies and tapping their front pincers against each other’s.

  They spread their four hind wings, dark blues and purples splashed with gold. Each click’s body now had six wings fanned behind it in a spectacular display. They turned so that their hindquarters nearly touched, then turned back around to face each other, raising and lowering their bodies in time to the clicks. They swung around and joined their back ends together in three pairs. The clicks intensified, and Snapclick and Terrclick rapped their pincers against each other in the circle with their rears joined together. The rhythm became a steady rattle, and the clicks’ movements became more frantic.

  The clearing went silent, and Snapclick and Terrclick froze. All six of their heads rotated at the same time to see the Council, who hadn’t moved. The area filled with the confusion of everybody present.

  ‘Jian, it’s happening,’ Marque said. ‘The cat fleet is dropping out of warp. They’re weeks earlier than we predicted. Fumi’s on her way.’

  All the clicks present spoke at the same time, filling the air with their high-pitched buzz.

  ‘Not now,’ I said with disbelief. ‘I can’t bless the union and confirm my role as post-ingestion if I go now! The cats weren’t due to attack for six weeks – are you sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  I sighed with feeling as Fumi appeared next to me.

  ‘Tell Snapclick I’m sorry, and that I love it,’ I said as I put my hand on her shoulder.

  ‘Snapclick already knows,’ Marque said as Fumi folded me home to collect my gear.

  *

  When I was home, I ran into the armour bay and put my arms out. The bay fitted me and I checked my chilli bombs and the heads-up display on my spacesuit. Fumi folded me onto the main gallery of her ship, where the rest of our battalion were gathering. She disappeared and then popped back with Leckie. The cat fleet filled space around me, still in their glowing warp cocoons.

  ‘Variation in energy,’ Marque said, ‘I just need to confirm . . . give me a moment, synching . . .’ Its voice became urgent. ‘Confirmed! They’re dropping out of warp. Calculating. At the rate of energy transfer: you have thirty minutes. I’ve started the broadcast. ATTENTION CAT REPUBLIC. THIS IS THE DRAGON EMPIRE. DO NOT ATTACK OUR HOMEWORLD, OUR RETALIATION WILL BE SWIFT AND PAINFUL. REPEAT. DO NOT ATTACK—’

  ‘Mute that,’ I said, and the announcement stopped running through my helmet.

  I led my team to the transf
er pod and we entered. The door closed behind us, and we were sealed into a four-by-four-metre room, ready to be transported onto a cat ship. Putting us in modules ready for transfer made it easier for Fumi to carry us across. There were ten pods on Fumi’s ship, each with ten human soldiers in them, one pod per cat ship. I hoped we would be onto our cat ship in time to stop them before they were aware of our chilli weapons and could take counter-measures; we were seventh in order to be transferred. My heads-up display showed the scene outside the ship: the energy bubbles around the cat ships were fading.

  ‘Are they replying to your broadcast?’ I asked Marque.

  ‘No.’

  I checked my bombs again. ‘Keep us updated on when we’ll be transferred.’

  ‘Cannot wait to have this done and finished and out of the damn way,’ Enrik said. ‘There’s seven galaxies out there for us to explore.’

  The time in my display moved excruciatingly slowly as it counted down the thirty minutes until the ships became accessible. The warp bubbles faded out on my display, and the cat ships were in normal space.

  I pulled a bomb out and held it ready.

  ‘The ships are completely out of warp. I’m giving Fumi the go-ahead—’ Marque said, and my head was split open by an agonised telepathic scream. I bent and put my hands over the top of my head in an attempt to block the pressure. The sound winked off.

  ‘Oh lord,’ one of my soldiers said.

  I opened my eyes and stared in horror. The cats were accelerating back into warp. The ships gathered the energy bubbles around them as I watched. Fumi had obviously been folding a pod onto one of the ships when it went into warp, and the warp field had pulled her halfway back into normal space. The pod was stuck on the edge of the warp field, stretched like soft plastic, pulled out of shape and squeezed. Fumi was on top and her body was stretched and mutilated. I zoomed the image out, to see that thousands of dragons and their human cargo had been similarly dismembered.

  ‘Get their stones!’ I shouted.

  ‘I can’t, they’re at the edge of the warp field,’ Marque said.

  ‘Will the stones still be attuned when they drop out of warp?’

  ‘They aren’t in warp. They’re at the edge of the field and space is too deformed there. The stones are destroyed.’ Its voice softened. ‘Fumi’s dead. Real Death. They’re all dead.’

  ‘Any other casualties?’

  ‘The soldiers who were on the edge of the warp field, and the dragons carrying them, are dead,’ Marque said. ‘The rest made it through to the cat ships. We just lost over six thousand dragons, and more than sixty thousand humans.’

  ‘How many made it through?’

  ‘Only a hundred and thirty dragons. Thirteen hundred humans.’

  Enrik put his helmeted head in his hands and moaned. ‘They were ready for us. We’ve already lost. So many dead.’

  I felt weak with despair and flopped to sit on the floor with my back against the wall of the pod. He was right. ‘With Fumi gone, we have no-one to fold us onto the cat ship and disable it. If they decide to destroy the dragon homeworld, we can’t stop them.’

  ‘We’re contacting the dragon sanctuary world to have them send us some more dragons to transport you,’ Marque said. ‘Word is going out through the Empire. The dragons are rallying. There’s a third generation dragon in the gallery of this ship right now: I’m explaining the process to her. The cat ships are still powering up their warp drives; if they decide to attack again, it won’t be for at least another of your hours. I suggest you take a break – eat and drink, sit and rest – until the cat ships are capable of leaving warp again.’

  I thumped the wall of the pod with my fist. All our plans had come to nothing. Thirteen years of preparation and we’d already been routed.

  *

  All the officers were gathered in Shiumo’s massive ship, more than three thousand of us sitting around tables as the leaders of the Empire decided what to do. The walls of the ship were transparent, and the cat fleet – now fully back in warp, and slowly moving in circles – hovered above us. The dead dragons and the pods they’d been carrying still sat at the edge of the warp field as they’d been for the past two weeks, a testament to our failure.

  No dragons were present on Shiumo’s ship. The dragons and most senior humans had been called to a meeting on Masako’s ship. The rest of us were sharing a meal, spread between the galleries of the largest dragon ships. I was with the hundred most senior officers, sitting around the officers’ tables sharing opinions on what was happening next. Shiumo herself was stuck inside the warp field, and we had no idea whether the dragons there were dead or alive.

  ‘We shouldn’t leave yet, it’s only two weeks,’ Major Winters said. ‘Two weeks out here is only a couple of days inside the warp field. There are live dragons and humans inside the cat ships. They made it through before the ships went to warp. We should stay on standby. I don’t want to leave!’

  ‘You know they’ve been discussing standing down and moving back to Barracks,’ I said. ‘If they give the order, we have to do it.’

  ‘More than a hundred ships made it through. They’re alive, dammit,’ Winters said. ‘And the rest of the cat fleet can see our ships waiting for them. The minute we move away, they’ll attack the dragon homeworld.’

  Our commanding officer, Admiral Blake, appeared in the centre of the gallery with Masako. He was the same Blake who’d taken over from General – now Ambassador – Maxwell; he had been in charge of the original breeding program on Earth and had been recruited by the dragons to lead their defensive force. He was dark-skinned and heavily built, with a square jaw and protruding brows over his sharply intelligent eyes. He accepted our salutes with a nod, then moved to stand where everybody could see him. Masako’s expression was restrained.

  The room went silent as we waited to hear what he had to say.

  ‘Two days inside the warp field is plenty of time for our soldiers to incapacitate the cats and take them home,’ he said. ‘We have to assume that they were neutralised and that the cats will now wait until our fleet moves away before dropping out of warp and attacking the dragon homeworld, so we’ll do just that.’

  The room filled with the sound of the soldiers disagreeing. Nobody wanted to leave our people behind and stand down – it was admitting defeat.

  He raised his voice with determination. ‘We’re not giving up. We’re laying a trap. We’ll fold most of the ships out of view, but remain in contact through dragon scales. We estimate that it will take them three or four days before they see that we’ve moved away. They’ll think we’re standing down, and when they drop out of warp in response, we’ll come straight back. The dilation effect will give us plenty of time to be ready for them.’

  There was silence for a moment, then the feeling in the room turned positive.

  ‘Your orders are ready, all we have to do is implement them. I just fed them through to your tablets. Finish the meal, rest up, then tomorrow morning we’ll run through the plan, do a couple of dry runs, and implement it day after tomorrow.’

  The room went silent as everybody checked their tablets. It filled with the buzz of quiet discussion.

  ‘I’m briefing the most senior officers now. If you have any questions, put them to your superior officers,’ the Admiral said. ‘We can do this. Senior officers, with me, and I’ll give you the details.’

  We gathered around the dragons, and they folded us to the gallery of Masako’s ship. The walls were opaque rather than transparent, and it was fitted with a conference table big enough to accommodate everybody. We gathered around the conference table as Blake addressed us. ‘Here’s what the plan involves.’

  ‘Stop, Admiral,’ Marque said. ‘One of the cat ships is dropping out of warp.’

  ‘Put it on the table,’ Blake said, and the cat formation appeared as a hologram in the middle.

  ‘Which ship?’

  The display zoomed in on a single ship. Its warp glow still appeared bright.
<
br />   ‘Are there humans on that ship?’ Blake said.

  ‘Yes. Third battalion, Lieutenant Lee’s Gamma squad.’

  I tried to keep my face emotionless – but that was David’s team. David had been missing since the botched attack and he hadn’t been on one of the ships that was destroyed on the edge of the field. He could be alive and on that ship.

  ‘Steady, Choumali,’ Blake said. ‘We’ll get them back.’ He looked up. ‘Double-check – it’s really just one ship?’

  ‘Just one, Admiral.’

  ‘Put me through to all personnel.’

  ‘Done,’ Marque said.

  ‘Stations, everybody,’ Blake said. ‘One of the cat ships is dropping out of warp, and there are humans on it. Either the humans on that ship have taken control, or they’ve been taken hostage. If they’re in control, we’ll implement the original plan – bomb them with chilli and send the ship back to cat space. If they’re hostages, await further orders.’ He looked around at the senior officers. ‘Any questions?’

  ‘No, sir,’ everybody said.

  ‘To your stations, except Choumali to stay with me,’ Blake said.

  The rest of the officers gathered around their respective dragons and returned to their ships.

  I contacted my team. ‘Griffith, take the lead,’ I said. ‘I’m working with the Admiral.’

  ‘Ma’am,’ Griffith said.

  My comms filled with voices as everybody moved into position on their dragon ships and confirmation went up and down the line.

  ‘Delta squad in place,’ Singh said.

  ‘Confirmation: it’s only one ship coming out of warp,’ Blake’s assistant said.

  ‘Stand by, be ready for transfer,’ Blake said.

  Comms went quiet as everybody took position. The display on the table showed the single cat ship dropping slowly out of warp – the rest of the fleet was still in the glowing warp field. They’d stopped moving, but remained behind an impenetrable field of distorted space.