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Wedgewood
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Out of sight of Wedgewood, Ivan slipped on a pair of infrared goggles and spurred his eenu into a canter. The night was moonless. Trooper Sendrant, following, was the only man he could spare to join him.
“Chief,” the combat controller aboard the Alexis sounded in his ear. “The admiral says the matriarch is worried about your lack of backup. She’s gone into seclusion to help the counselors at Terrabac. The admiral said he’d arrange for backup.”
Ivan ducked a branch and hoped Sendrant was alert enough to do the same. “Well, we’ll just have to manage. Everyone else is engaged in the conclave.” The thought of facing an unknown plasma-armed threat vexed him, but the lasers in the forearm stock of their handbolts were no toys. They killed just as dead as plasmas, but their pencil-thin holes demanded better shot placement.
“The admiral has a better idea.”
Ivan swerved around a tree, and his eenu suddenly jumped a log he missed that blended in the infrared background. Damn, I’m going to have to slow down. “What’s his idea?”
“Uh, command checked with the Judge Advocate’s office, and they say we are cleared with ULUP.”
“Cleared? Cleared for what?”
Senior Corporal Meridia strapped in. He snapped his Mk 4 heavy-assault plasma rifle into its seat bracket.
“Hey, Lewy, I thought we were standing down. The matriarch is aboard the Alexis, isn’t she?” asked a Marine.
Normally, it was Meridia’s job, as acting platoon sergeant, to keep order in the platoon, but he let the idle chatter on the platoon comm net go because he wanted to hear their lieutenant’s answer.
“Yea, we got a mission, dirtside,” the lieutenant replied. They had no time for a briefing. When the scramble call came, they had just enough time to grab helmets, check weapon charges, and buckle in the assault lander. “Mission briefing is in your suit AIs now.”
Meridia scrolled through the heads-up display in his powered-suit helmet. He called out over the platoon net, “Check in once you’ve read it.” The landing deck antigrav boosters jolted them into place. They’re not messing around, must be hot. The voice of the launch-control officer for Spirit’s Fury sounded in all the armor suits on the assault craft. “Warning, warning, expedited launch sequence commencing now.”
“Shiren,” someone cursed on the net.
Before Meridia could see the name of the offender on the roster, the assault lander hit eight G’s. The inertial dampers in the craft’s crew bay, combined with the adaptive environment of their albaminia armor, kept the platoon from being squashed like so many bugs inside their suits. Still, Meridia was sure he left his guts back in the launch tube. The Marine assault lander was out and away from Spirit’s Fury in a blur. As soon as they cleared the hangar vapor-barrier, the pilot smacked the twin neutrino drives and kept up the eight G’s, screaming past the bridge of the cruiser Alexis, through the battle group’s escort screen, and aimed directly for the planet down below.
“How many drops, Corp?” It was the voice of the platoon’s newest member.
“This makes thirty-three.” Meridia struggled against the inertial forces of the flight. “Those were all against Turboii. This is my first against corsairs on a Class E.”
“Wow, thirty-three.”
Meridia would have nodded could he move his head. Twenty drops were the average before you were either posthumously recognized for service or transferred out of Assault Brigade. In recognition of drops-in-service, they’d given him a choice. He opted for assignment on board the Spirit’s Fury; it was supposed to be cake duty. The only reason the old Marine carrier was still in service was Fleet needed a reserve battle group stationed to defend the planet Avaria, and it had a Marine battalion detachment, a last-ditch defense against an invading Turboii fleet. The ‘Fury’s patches and repairs had patches and repairs.
Ivan pulled up his eenu and looked to the night sky.
Sendrant stopped beside him, peering up. “That’ll attract attention.”
Ivan sniffed. “Yeah, how are we going to explain that?”
In the dark morning, the fireball eclipsed all the stars. The blaze from the Marine lander’s energy heatshield went from orange to white. The vapor trail began to steepen. Anyone in Wedgewood looking to the night sky would have a growing sense that the heavenly object was heading for them.
“Where do you want them, chief?” asked the combat controller. “I have two full sticks of Avaria’s finest. Locked and loaded.”
Ivan considered the controller’s question. Assault Marines were indeed some of Avaria’s finest. They were first in, when, for worse is certain, or so the saying went. The pointy end of a galactic spear. He expected the Marines would be vast overkill for what he and Sendrant faced. “You got a vector for the search party?”
“Affirmative. Two-hundred seventy-two degrees to your relative. Moving south on a course of one-hundred eighty-two degrees. Dead straight, no deviations. No data on what they are following, nothing on aural or infrared. We’ve pinged the ground with radar, but the background scatter on that mountain with those big trees is too cluttered. Whoever the search party is tracking is blacked out.”
“Right,” he acknowledged. “Calculate their rate of travel, assume their target is non-motorized, and put the Marines down a thousand meters beyond the farthest possible point of travel for the target. Have them disperse in a skirmish line and advance in this direction until they make contact.”
“Roger that,” answered the controller.
“Where’s my recon package? I could use some drones and bots for eyes and motion sensing. Whoever the search party is tracking has to be moving.”
“Recon package on your location in thirty seconds.”
“How is it the search party can track the corsairs and we can’t?” Sendrant asked.
Ivan answered, “Dogs.”
“Let’s wait for dawn here.” Alex stared up at the night sky. “We get much closer, and they could ambush us. No telling how far back help is.”
Lettern was too tired to argue. Her whole side hurt, not just her ribs.
“What do you think that is?” asked Pottern, staring at the blazing object in the night sky. At first, it looked like it was coming straight at them, then it changed direction. The white flare streaked away, disappearing beyond the trees.
Alex shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s been a strange night.”
“They’re noisy,” said Mitchern.
“What do you mean?” asked Lettern.
Mitchern gazed in the direction of where the glowing object disappeared. Like all telepaths, he could sense Human aural energy, particularly unshielded emotionally-driven thoughts. “It’s confusing, but I think, I think they, whatever that is in the sky, is coming to help.”
“You mean there are people on that?” Pottern exclaimed.
“Yes.” Mitchern looked blank.
“Mother’s sweet breath,” Pottern said.
Alex shifted his shield on his shoulder. “What is Noodles sending?”
Mitchern pointed. “She’s standing guard in a tree. Waiting for us.”
The Defender nodded. The dog would have to keep waiting; Lettern was nearly played out. They would rest until dawn. “Keep Noodles close. Don’t let her wander.”
Night surrendered to a deep shade of grey. Slowly, the grey resolved to lighter and darker shades. When the first greens appeared in the landscape, the combat controller called to Ivan, “Search party has resumed movement, same direction.”
“Confirmed,” he said. Both he and Sendrant, running on no sleep for the past twenty-four hours, had taken stim shots. He let his multi-func project the holograph image of the tactical situation, so Sendrant could see it as well. Two recon drones were doing figure-eights over the four-mile distance between them and the probable location of the supposed extrasolars. A string of twenty recon bots hovered along the plotted route of the search party. The bots would, unbeknownst to the searchers, monitor their progress. The platoon of Marines was arrayed in skirmish order across the track a half mile further out.
“Weapons fire. Plasma weapon fire,” the combat controller reported laconically. “Shots directed at the search party. No hits.”
Ivan cursed. “Mount up.”
“Got anything corporal?” asked the Marine lieutenant.
“Negative on visuals. Energy pulse came directly to my front, three hundred meters.”
“Noodles!” Pottern yelled. “Come here, girl! Come!”
“He’s got us pinned,” Alex whispered to Lettern. “Probably waiting for us the whole night.”
Lettern nodded. “As soon as Noodles crested that rise, he shot.” She recalled the image of the Nakish standing next to her in Murali’s tent just as he pulled his weapon. A cooled hatred began to boil again.
“Trying to kill our dog,” surmised Mitchern.
“What is that thing he’s shooting?” Pottern gasped, holding Noodles, who had jumped into his arms. The dog was a white and black bundle of squirming energy.
Alex shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“I’m going to kill him,” said Lettern.
The Defender peered at her. She stared back, her brown eyes in a black mood.
He grudged, “How do you want to do this?”
She outlined the decoy plan. When they had agreed to their roles, she said, “Just don’t get yourselves shot.”
“Search party on the move,” signaled the controller.
Ivan and Sendrant had been forced to dismount because the ground had become steep and rocky. “Unhitch their reins,” Ivan instructed, “they’ll follow. Let’s run.”
Moving forward in skirmish order, the Marine to Meridia’s left called, “Contact.”
“Contact,” reported two more Marines.
“Search party is enveloping a point that matches the projected firing location.” The combat controller gave a running monologue of the evolving situation. “Recon bots have motion of a single probable target. Heading due west. Directing bots to gain visual.”
Alex peered around the tree. He saw a clump of ferns move and called out, “Hey you! Stop!”
“Plasma fire,” reported the controller.
The white blast tore the bark off the Ungerngerist Alex hid behind. “Ula, maybe I should find a bigger tree,” he said to no one in particular.
“Hey!” Mitchern had enough nerve for one short word. He was promptly rewarded with a plasma burst that spanked—in a glaring flash—the granite boulder he was hugging.
“Five targets closing,” reported Meridia. “I have four classified as provincials and one with a visual as a confirmed extrasolar. ‘Fury is running an ID search.”
“Chief,” the lieutenant called from the lander. “Rules of engagement?”
Ivan stopped running for a moment. “Do not fire unless fired upon. Attempt to apprehend the extrasolar. Do not shoot the provincials!” He knew it was a strange set of orders to give Marines accustomed to fearsome firefights with Turboii. He hoped they could manage it.
“Target closing, classified female provincial,” the Marine immediately to Meridia’s left called out. The entire platoon, along with the staff in the Combat Information Center on board the Spirit’s Fury, could see, via their displays, the evolving action. “Fifty meters.”
Then, vivid in the Marine’s telescopic sights, a woman edged around a tree and carefully climbed a log beside it. She was slim, her long brown hair in a tangled bun; she was wearing buckskin britches, knee-high boots, and a torn blouse exposing her midriff. She carried a curved length of wood strung with string. One of the Marines identified it as a primitive weapon, a bow. The woman’s ribcage was bandaged, the dressing discolored with blood and ooze.
“That’s a plasma shot,” the Marine said of her wound. “She’s taken a plasma hit.” There was silent respect up and down the line.
“Hey, you there!” A man’s voice called out from in front of Meridia. He saw the understory move. A cloaked figure rose and aimed a plasma pistol at the challenge. Then the woman atop the log, concealed behind the adjacent tree, stepped clear. She pulled her bow to full draw and let fly, seemingly without aiming.
The arrow hit Quorat just as he fired. The pistol, in auto-aim, sent the plasma bolt a hand’s width above Alex’s head as he ducked behind his tree.
Knocked down by the force of the arrow, Quorat rolled in the grass. Things were not going as he wanted. Now he had an arrow, an arrow of all things, stuck in the synth-flex armor webbing of his cloak. It had hit hard but not penetrated. He struggled to dislodge it. Whoever shot him was behind and to his left. He checked his multi-func. The device displayed her aural ID, the same from last night. Yes, there she is. I thought I killed her? What it did not show, because the Marines were shielded from aural emanations, was the full platoon just to his front.
Quorat was tired of this game. It was time to end it. Got to kill them and get to the sled and back to the Intruder. He needed to upload the videograph of the pegmatite, but the laser comm relay was at the sled.
Meridia spoke into his suit mic, “Advancing to apprehend.” He perceived the woman to his left, but he focused on the extrasolar immediately to his front.
Lettern saw her enemy rise from the underbrush and turn to face her. She drew back.
Meridia saw the extrasolar raise his weapon. “He’s going to smoke her. Permission to fire.”
Ivan stopped.
A Marine to Lettern’s right had a perfect view. He saw the sweat on her flanks, the wrecked bandage, how she balanced on the log, the tangle of her hair, and the set of her jaw.
She stopped her draw. There was something to her enemy’s left. A shape, more of a reflection or a shadow. She chose to ignore it.
The Marine watched the woman come to full draw, aim, and loose.
Auto-aim flashed green, and Quorat fired.
Meridia responded to Ivan’s call to fire and triggered a magna pulse.
Quorat’s shot went high, auto-aim unable to compensate for the wild jerk.
Lettern jumped down from the log, adrenaline pounding her heart. The flash of white had gone over her head, but close enough to feel its heat. She notched an arrow and approached where the stranger lay in the ferns. Then she stopped. The image she’d seen shimmered and solidified into a green-camouflaged Humanoid shape. She stared, her eyes wide as saucers.
Meridia unsnapped his helmet and pulled it off. He smiled to reassure her. Trusting his suit’s AI to get the language translation correct, he spoke to her through the suit’s external speaker. “Nice shot. You hit him first. Almost made me miss.”
She stared at him. Holding her bow at the ready, she stood rooted as he approached. Looking him up and down, she realized he had red eyes. His hair was buzz-cut short, and his face clean-shaven. Taking in the shape and construction of his armored suit, she turned and pointed at Quorat, who was dead with her arrow through his neck and the top half of his head missing. His blood poured along the arrow shaft into the pine needles. “That one of yours?”
“Nope. Definitely not.”
“Who are you?”
“Me?” He gave a smile. Two more apparitions resolved themselves into other Humans who removed their helmets and stood nearby. “I’m Senior Corporal Illian Meridia, Second Battalion, Fourth Regiment, Avarian Assault Marines. And you are Lettern Stouttree, branch warden, for the Wedgewood militia, Second Ward.”
“And a hell of a shot,” said one of the other Marines, a woman.
“Tough, too,” grunted the other Marine, pointing at her bandage.
“Knows how to hunt Humans,” said the female Marine. “Tough gig for extrasolars.” She pointed her weapon at Quorat’s body.
“Who are? What is that?” Lettern pointed at his armor. “What are you doing here?” Her questions spilled out.
“We’re here to help,” answered Meridia.
Lettern gave him a scowl. “You could have come sooner.”
He shrugged inside his suit.
“What is that?” She indicated his weapon with a tilt of her chin.
“A Mk 4. A heavy-assault Rifle,” he said as if she’d understand.
“How do you know who I am?” she asked, frowning.
“The ship pinged us your ID. Looks like the IDB has been here awhile,” he smiled.
“Ship?” Her confusion was complete.
Meridia skipped the question. “You should let us take care of that,” he was looking at her bandage. “Down here, dirtside, those can get infected, easy.”
Ignoring his offer, she stepped closer and looked him in his red eyes. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-one standard. On this planet? That would be twenty-two.”
Lettern appeared concerned. “That’s how old I am, but you look older. Way older.”
This time, the corporal’s smile faded, but not completely. “It’s a hard life. We do our time.”
“Well, I’m going to get me one of those.” She indicated his rifle and then turned her back on them and waded through the tall grass to where Quorat lay.
A Marine edged closer to the female Marine and, looking at Lettern’s backside, said, “Nice ass.”
If Lettern heard the comment, she chose to ignore it. As she reached down, a familiar voice called to her: “You can’t have that.” Quorat’s plasma pistol lay just within reach.
Ivan trudged up the slope. He took in the scene and shook his head.
“These friends of yours?” she asked, still bending over, hand outstretched to the weapon.
“Yes. They are.”
She straightened and looked at Meridia. “Him too?”
“Yep, him too.”
Alex, Pottern, and Mitchern came into the clearing, as did more Marines. Pottern dropped Noodles, who promptly ran to Quorat’s body and started sniffing, circling around to the open head wound.
Alex surveyed the group of Marines as they watched him. They took in his dented shield, his scarred armor, the worn handle of his sword, the age lines on his face, and the grit in his eyes. Everyone knew who the veterans were.
Alex asked Ivan, “So, you’re Ancients?”
Grudgingly, Ivan said, “I suppose you could say that. In a way, we are, and in a way, we are not.”
Alex growled, “You’ve come back?” The turmoil, particularly to Life Believers, that the legacy of the Ancients had caused to Dianis reflective in his tone.
“Yes, well, not for long. They,” Ivan pointed at the Marines, “are going back to where they came from, like right now. Corporal, take this body back to the ‘Fury. Have fleet Intel run a full biograph on him and forensics on everything he’s got.”
Meridia motioned to the two Marines beside him to get the body. “How about his transport? It’s got to be around here somewhere. A dude like him isn’t walking far. Want us to sweep for it?”
“Yes, good idea.”
“What was he doing here?” Alex asked as a Marine easily hefted Quorat’s body with his powered armor.
Meridia de-coupled his gloves and approached Lettern; he gently reached out for her hand and lifted her arm.
Ivan watched and then answered, “He was after your aquamarine. Starting with the huge pegmatite you have sitting in, of all places, a party tent.”
Meridia was talking to their corpsman. “I can do that for you,” said the corpsman.
“I can manage,” replied the corporal. “Hand me the free spray.”
Alex ignored what the corporal was doing to Lettern. He decided that if there were to be more fighting, it would already have started. “Why aquamarine? What’s it to him?”
Holding up her arm, Lettern watched the corporal spray the bandage with some sort of oily penetrant. “This may sting,” he said and, without waiting, snapped the bandage off her skin. It came away clean, no skin attached, but pus-saturated. Lettern gasped. Meridia held her arm high to keep her from swaying.
Ivan answered, “It’s everything to us, unfortunately. That part the Paleowrights have right. Aquamarine-5 is important all across the galaxy. But here on Dianis, it is just a pretty blue stone.”
Meridia took another aerosol can from the medic, “This will hurt like hell, but it will kill the pain afterward and start accelerated healing. It will vaporize the pathogens crawling in the wound. It’s usually proceeded by surface anesthesia, but we Marines take it straight.”
“Pathogen?” she mumbled, watching him.
“Yes,” and he began spraying the wound. She immediately yowled, her knees going soft.
He saw a convenient rock and sat, propping her on his armored knee before she could collapse. He kept spraying, her body twitching at each pass.
Alex paused, the tableau, the strangeness engulfing him. Finally, he resolved himself. “The Paleowrights. They are going to be a problem. When they hear about this. About you, about the Marines, the weapons, they’ll come back to Wedgewood. It will be another battle. A war.”
“And I want that gun,” Lettern drawled, wobbling on Meridia’s knee. She managed to regain a measure of clarity to glare at Ivan. Meridia motioned to the medic for the next treatment.
“Sorry, Lettern, you can’t have it. None of this should have happened,” Ivan reasoned.
“But it did, damn you! It did!” She was close to tears. “Bratchert, Mattar, they’re all dead!”
“Not Bratchert. He’s on board their ship.” Ivan nodded to Meridia. “He’s being operated on as we speak. They’ll be able to save him.”
The pain, exhaustion, and adrenalin collapse all conspired to overwhelm her. She looked away in embarrassment.
“We’ve all been there.” Meridia put an armored arm around her waist. “It’s good to see you are still Human. Some of us...some of us don’t feel no more. When a friend goes—” he breathed. “Sometimes I think I should feel more, but it doesn’t come. I guess it’s better that way.”
Ivan dreaded it would come to this, so he played the only card he had. “Lettern, I’ll make you a deal. We’ll save Bratchert and return him to Wedgewood. He’ll be able to heal up and rejoin your ward. In return, you and Alex and the others promise me that you will never say a word about this.” The alternative, an impractical alternative, was to mind-wipe them.
Lettern nodded, but Alex just studied him.
“Alex, as a docent of your faith, as a leader of the Mother’s Faithful, you must understand that the Paleowrights cannot learn what has happened here, and that means keeping it a secret from even your own people.”
“Not from Christina,” he said bluntly.
Ivan waggled his head. “I suspect she already knows Ancients are here. Has known.”
“Who else knows?” Lettern asked. Then, alarm began to register as Meridia aimed the final aerosol treatment for the plasma wound.
“No worries,” Meridia said gently. “The pain should be done. This will seal the wound and start the skin regeneration.”
When Ivan didn’t respond, Lettern looked at him as Meridia sprayed the sealant on her wound. “Does Achelous know?” she challenged. “Is he an Ancient, too? You worked for him enough. How about the high priestess?”
Giving ground where he needed, Ivan offered up Achelous but refused to concede any of the matronens.
“How about Baryy?” she pressed. “Does he know?”
Ivan stammered, “Baryy? He’s here?”
Meridia laughed. “Hand me the alcutrol,” and the medic handed him a medication injector.
“What’s so funny?” Sitting on his lap, Lettern looked down on Meridia’s face, fascinated by his red eyes.
“There’s no fooling you. Our mission brief cited Agent Baryy Maxmun.” The corporal returned the Ready Reaction chief’s glare. “Sorry, chief, I’m just a grunt Marine.” He squeezed her arm. “We normally do the alcutrol in a thigh or butt cheek, but you’ve lots of muscle in these arms,” he said appreciatively. To which the female Marine said, “I bet that’s not all you want to squeeze Meridia.”
Meridia punched the injector into Lettern’s bare arm. “It’s the final treatment and will put your system into overdrive. You’ll need to stuff your face for the next three days. You’ll be hungry.”
“Ouch!” she complained. “You’re not very gentle.”
A Marine chimed, “Sweetheart, for the job we do, you don’t want gentle.”
“Now, that’s going to make you feel woozy at first,” Meridia said. “It’s gonna creep up on you, so be ready for it.” He looked back to Ivan. “Chief, can I get one of those fancy in-country camo bandages from you? Ours are all high-tech. Can’t really have her running around with a blinky-light thing attached to her ribs.”
When Sendrant offered up one of his, Lettern’s head began to droop, her eyes unfocused.
“Lewy,” Meridia called into his suit mic, “how ‘bout we give the provincials and IDB a ride back to the town. This one I got here is whacked out. She isn’t walking or riding nowhere.”
“Affirmative,” came the reply.
“How ‘bout it chief? Wanna lift?”
Ivan idly wondered if the Marine corporal didn’t just want to keep his hands on Lettern, but he acquiesced. Yesterday and today were total disasters in maintaining ULUP protocol. So what if he gave four provincials and their dog a ride in a galactic assault lander. “Can you do it by waking only half the town?”
Meridia smiled. “Chief, we may be big, bad, and ugly, but we can be whispers on the wind if you need.”
Alex sat in the crew bay of the lander. Lettern sat across from him on the far bulkhead next to the corporal. Her head rested on his shoulder; she was in and out of consciousness. Noodles scampered around the crew bay, sniffing each of the Marines, its tail wagging fiercely. Ivan and Sendrant led their eenus up the ramp and tethered them to the drop handles hanging from the ceiling. Alex stared at the animals, amazed they were at ease. “They’ve done this before?” He said to Ivan.
“Oi.” Ivan turned to offer a rare smile at the Defender. He checked the animal and then slumped into the jump seat next to Alex. “I need a different job. This one’s getting old.”
“You can always join us.”
Slouching, Ivan looked over. “How so?”
Alex jerked as the lander rose in the air. “You’re a Life Believer. One of us. I don’t care where you come from. Ancient or not.”
The two men, grizzled soldiers, shared a communal silence.
“That man that Lettern killed,” Alex said, “he won’t be the last.”
Ivan looked to where Lettern snuggled against the armored chest of Meridia, who peered back at him. A deep sadness settled upon him. “No, I suppose not.”
Alex felt the heave and yaw of the craft. “Help us fight them.”
