Chapter Two

REGRET

It took longer than Adjutant Kommandant Kaptain Eugene Thomas liked to finish his arrangements for a retreat, mostly because Kommandant Major General Porter, unwilling to delegate or make a goddamn decision, kept Thomas for a good half hour, going on about paperwork. Maybe Porter never thought the Federals would have the unmitigated gall to actually interfere with his little slice of republic cleansing, or maybe the old man had cracked under the pressure. He was certainly sweating enough. There were dark patches under the kommandant’s arms, sopping wet, and his flushed forehead was an oil slick under the crap melting out of his dyed-black hair.

At last, though, Gene saluted and was released with a packet of “sensitive documents” to take east, flimsies and digital keys rustling and clacking inside a tan leather pouch. The stairs outside Porter’s office were choked with guards, but no officers—Gene’s fellow shoulderstraps would know better than to possibly be sent on some bullshit detail while the degenerates were already so close. If Gene hadn’t been such a believer in prudently covering his own ass at all times, he would have already collected her from the pink room and would be speeding past the gate in a shiny black kerro, watching the girl’s face as she opened the box and the fur coat, vital and black and soft as a cloud, rippled under her chewed fingertips. Even her habit of nibbling at her nails was enchanting.

She’d be grateful for the coat and the escape—she would have to be. He’d finally see her smile.

The Kaptain accepted the salutes of the black-clad guards still unfortunate enough to be on duty with a single, frosty nod as he passed, keeping his step firm and unhurried in shining, scraped-clean boots. The ancient yellow lino in the hall of the admin building squeaked a little under his soles; there were no kampogs in striped headscarves or faded dungarees working at streaks of tracked-in mud with their inadequate brushes. One or two of the guards enjoyed smearing the worst filth they could find down the hall and kicking pogs while they scrambled to clean it, but Porter frowned on that.

The smell alone was unhealthy. Just because the pogs lived in shit didn’t mean the soldiers, being a higher class of creature, should get it on their toes.

Soldiers. Gene’s upper lip twitched as he lengthened his stride. As if any of these assholes had ever seen real combat. Kamps were supposed to be cushy jobs, good chances for advancement once your loyalty and capacity were proven. An endpoint like this meant hazard pay and extra alcohol rations, both useful things. So what if combat troops looked down on them, or if his fellow shoulderstraps were a collection of paper pushers and rear-echelon weekend warriors? He was probably the only true patriot in the lot.

A thumping impact made the entire admin building shudder just as he reached the side door, and he took the stairs outside two at a time. Mortars. At the fence. The degenerates weren’t in the hills anymore. They were moving fast, just like the hordes descending upon Rome back in the day. That rather changed things—he had to get back to the joyhouse and collect the girl—

Another wump. Something smashed past the fence, and a high whistling drone screeched across Gloria before the admin building shuddered again, hit from the opposite side. There was an instant of heat in Gene’s left calf, a flash of annoyance as the world forgot what it was supposed to do and heaved underneath him. Then the world turned over like an egg flipped on a griddle, and after a weightless moment he hit gravel with a crunch. It was a minor wound, all things considered, but the guard he’d paid and left with strict orders to watch the kerro dragged his superior to the now-dusty, low-slung black vehicle. Before Gene could shake the ringing from his ears, he’d been tossed in the back like a sack of processed starch lumps, and the guard—a weedy, pimple-faced youth who had less than twelve hours to live, though neither of them knew it yet—was already accelerating on the wide macadamized road out of Gloria.

Instead of watching the girl with her wide, empty eyes and pretty cupid’s-bow mouth and full underlip, Gene had to work shrapnel free of his own leg and grind his teeth, improvising a pressure bandage as the kerro bumped and jolted. The wheelless vehicle wasn’t meant for gliding at high speed, its undercells humming and sparking as chips of pressed rock jolted free under the repeller field.

Driving that way would have gotten the kid a reprimand two weeks ago. Now, though, Gene just dug under the seat for a bottle of amber Scotch—the good stuff, imported, he’d been looking forward to seeing her reaction when he produced it—and didn’t bother to glance out the back bubble, wasting a bit of the stinging, expensive liquid to disinfect the cut.

One small Rome had fallen, but the rest of the empire would endure. Or at least, Kaptain Thomas hoped it would. He settled in the cushioned back seat, easing his wounded leg, and took a healthy hit from the bottle.

If he drank enough, he might even be able to forget her—and the pink room—for a little while.