Hostage To The Stars: A Sectors SF Romance (10 page)

“I didn’t see you coming,” she said grumpily, stepping through the break he made in the brush barrier.

“If I’m doing my job correctly, you’re never will,” he said. Tilting his head, he raised one eyebrow. “Although you were so lost in thought you didn’t hear my bird whistle signal. Care to share what’s on your mind?”

“No!” She brushed dirt from her clothes. “What’s the situation in the village?”

He was immediately distracted, a serious expression settling over his features. “Completely deserted.”

“Could everyone be gone to market, or a festival or a ceremony?”

“Not the whole village.” He shook his head. “And the buildings are dilapidated. The Farducciri might be poor but the people have pride about the appearance of their homes and businesses.”

“Do we give it a pass then? Try to find shoes for me somewhere else, further north?”

Johnny frowned. “I have a bad feeling about this. I think I ought to investigate a bit but I don’t want to leave you behind. I watched the place through my viewers for a long time and there’s no one home, nothing moving, so I don’t think you’d be in any danger if you came with me. “

“Sure, I’d rather tag along than wait here anyway. But if you were acquainted with people years ago, that means if we did meet villagers, it’d be ok, wouldn’t it?”

“Maybe. I told you the Sectors pullout wasn’t pretty. And the village has clearly fallen on hard times since. You and I would be worth a lot, if an informant let the warlord know we were here.”

“I trust your assessment of the situation. I know you wouldn’t put me at risk unnecessarily. Let’s go.” Scared but pleased he wanted her at his side, Sara was determined to live up to his trust in her to handle whatever they walked into.

In the end they walked into the village via the well-trodden path. As Johnny had observed earlier, the place was deserted. Doors swung open in the wind and windows were broken. Several huts had collapsed. The fences that had presumably kept the livestock penned were broken in places and she saw no sign of the herds he’d described. Johnny left her behind a shed beside one house while he checked the small barn behind the dwelling and jogged back shaking his head. “Not good. Six skeletons. Whatever happened, no one took the time to release the animals sheltered in the barn.”

“So the poor beasts starved to death?” Horrified, she tried in vain to scrub the mental picture from her mind.

“Apparently. Predators cleaned the bones a long time ago by the condition of the remains.” He glanced at her as if afraid he’d provided too much stark information but Sara swallowed hard and nodded.

When they reached the square, he stopped on the edge and swore. She crowded behind him and tried to see the cause of his outburst.

“Serious firefight here,” he said. “See the impact marks? Local weapons fire. Maybe an energy weapon or two.” He pointed at various walls. “And dried blood. Stay here.”

His tone was so flat she didn’t dream of protesting. She retreated, stumbling a bit, and took shelter in a doorway, training her blaster on the square, trying to provide cover. He advanced at a deliberate pace, stopping to scrutinize the dirt road periodically and examining one of the pitted and burned walls for a long moment. Weapon at the ready, he disappeared into a building and she had to bite her lip to stop herself from crying out in protest. As long as she could see him, she felt she handle anything, but the scene was eerie without another living being. Sara shivered. If ever a place had ghosts, this might be it.

 
He re-emerged from the building just when she gathered her courage to defy orders and go in after him. He stooped to retrieve something from the ground and came to where she waited. Taking her by the elbow, he drew her away from the square and retreated toward the edge of town. She bit her lip to hold all her questions in abeyance, afraid to know what he was going to tell her. When Johnny paused in the shade of one of the outermost houses, he handed her the object he held.

“A doll?” She flipped the crude, homemade plaything over, admiring the sewn on mouth and nose, with green beads for eyes. The seamstress had put a lot of love into this. “Johnny–”

“The way I read it, a good-sized, armed force came into town, rounded up all the people, loaded them into vehicles and took them away. There was resistance, obviously, from the indications we saw in the square, but futile. No wounded or dead left behind.” He touched the doll with a fingertip. “A whole pile of these next to the tracks, kids’ comfort lovies. I took this one because it reminds me of Chaela, one of the kids we knew, although of course she’d have been a mother herself now.”

She fought tears, imagining the awful scene. “Who would do a thing like this to harmless villagers? And why? Was it the warlord, you think?”

“Umarri might have been involved. These people weren’t of his clan.” He stared at the surrounding hills for a moment. “I found a partial track from a vehicle. I’ve seen the pattern before – it’s the tread of a Chimmer ground vehicle.”

She shook her head. “Chimmer?”

“Mawreg client race, high ranking. Way above the Shemdylann or even the Betangray in their hierarchy, as far as we’ve been able to figure out.”

“You think the Mawreg kidnapped these people?” Horrified, she pressed her back to the wall behind her and raised her weapon as if the dreaded enemy was about to spring.

“I’m trying not to jump to conclusions.” His tone was patient but she sensed a great deal of emotion roiling beneath the surface calm. “We left a lot of gear on the planet when we pulled out. The enemy could have done the same. Although to my knowledge there weren’t any Chimmer reported here. No one ever detected an actual Mawreg infestation. If they had, the planet would’ve been destroyed.” He faced her. “Sara, I know I promised to get you home safe and I will, but I need to follow up on something.”

“Ok, I’ll wait.”

He shook his head. “Not here. I found a partial message in the headman’s office, from a larger town to the west; probably three days walk at the rate we can move. The message was a warning, cut off abruptly. I think the same thing may have happened there. I might be able to find out more if we go check out the situation. I know what to look for and in a bigger population center the people may have had time to leave more clues, intentionally or otherwise. I have to go, it’s my duty.” He could tell from the frown on her face, she wasn’t convinced and he genuinely wanted her to understand why he had to take a detour on what must sound like an unnecessary side trip. Why he expected her to take more risks despite his promises about her safety. “No other Sectors operator is likely to be here ever again so I’m in a unique position to gather intel. If there is or was Chimmer involvement on Farduccir, Command needs to know.”

Not meeting his eyes, she drew a circle in the dust with the toe of her battered shoes. “Can’t we just report what we saw here? I’ll corroborate your account.”

He shook his head. “Not conclusive enough. I know how Command thinks. My report about this one remote village would get shunted aside. But what if there is ongoing involvement from the Mawreg side? We can’t afford to have an infestation here in the heart of the Sector.”

She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and challenged his assumptions. “Playing devil’s advocate, didn’t the Sectors defeat the enemy here? Isn’t the victory why you all left? So how could there be any Chimmer presence now?”

“It would be unprecedented. But the Mawreg and their client races are devious, play a long game. Their concentration on the future is part of what makes them so dangerous to our civilization. Maybe the enemy tried a new tactic here, after we thought we’d won and we left. Or maybe a planetary official made a deal with them and they launched a fresh effort here.”

Umarri’s sly grin flashed before her eyes. Could he sell out the entire Sectors? Hesitantly she voiced her interpretation of what Johnny had said. “The warlord?”

“I’d bet my paycheck on him as the culprit.”

“My head is swimming,” she said frankly, leaning against the wall and pushing her hair off her face. “But you’ve convinced me against my better judgment we should investigate the larger town. I don’t like it and the idea scares me to death, but I see why we need to do it.”

He squeezed her arm and gave her a huge smile. “I like hearing you say ‘we’.”

“We’re a team, soldier, like it or not.”

He dug something out of the pack. “I snagged you these.”

The gift was a pair of sturdy walking shoes, beautifully worked in supple black leather and decorated with elegant blue and green stitchery along the side panels. He’d also brought a pair of incredibly soft blue socks.

“I think these’ll fit,” he said. “Since we’re going to the town, I’ll have to break into one of the shops or a house or two here, and find us clothes. We don’t look like Farducciri but in robes and hoods we can fool an observer from a distance. The last two days we’ll have to be pretty much in the open.”

“No caves?”

“No, we’re done with them for now.”

He sounded oddly relieved.

CHAPTER SIX

Johnny made a return trip to the heart of the village, after finding a secluded spot for Sara to wait. He was gone for so long her nerves were frayed by the time he came back, lugging a sack full of Farduccir robes. Sara ducked inside the nearest hut, Johnny on her heels and took a few moments draping the stolen clothing over their own Sectors garb.

“How do I look?” she pirouetted on her new walking shoes, causing the blue and gray tunic and long skirt to flare out.

Johnny took his time, gaze traveling from her head to her toes, and gave her a grin and a low whistle. “Fine. From a distance no one will suspect anything. Put your cloak on and the hood up.” He continued fussing with his own rust brown robes, making sure he could access his blaster and knife with ease.

“What’s our plan?”

“Walk cross country until we have to take the road. Are you ready to march?”

“Yes, although I hate being in the open.” Frowning, she glanced out the open door at the countryside. “Not much cover, nowhere to hide fast. I didn’t realize how safe I felt in the highlands.”

He nodded. “Me too, but these disguises are good and I speak fluent Farducciri. If we meet anyone, we both need to hide our faces with the scarves and I need you to play mute.”

“Gladly.”

The first day of the trip went smoothly. They saw no one and made good time, avoiding the road but paralleling its course. After camping in a small grove of trees for the night, Johnny rose early, persuading Sara to follow suit, munching energy bars as they walked.

“I hate being on the road,” she said, stepping onto the pockmarked pavement. “We’re too exposed.”

“I know what you mean, but it’s the only route for the next two days. There’s no good cover along the way.” Johnny paused for a moment and glanced behind them. Heat shimmered off the pavement. “I don’t think anyone’s used this road for a long time. We should have seen traffic, even if nothing more than farm vehicles going to market.”

“It is in pretty bad repair,” she agreed, skirting a pothole big enough to take a bath in. “If the Mawreg were here, or one of their high level client races, what would have happened to the people?”

“From what we’ve seen, as far as any briefings I’ve ever been given, when the Mawreg take over an inhabited world one of three things happens. Least often, they leave the whole place alone. Life goes on like there never was an invasion.”

Jaw dropping, she said, “How can that be? No one ever discusses the possibility of living in peace after the Mawreg arrive.”

“Sectors command doesn’t publicize it. The higher echelons don’t want people to get the idea we’re fighting this war for nothing, to know there’s any possibility you can be safe on a Mawreg-held world.” Johnny gave her a glance. “It’s never been seen on a planet where Terran-descent humans were the dominant species. The Mawreg seem to have identified us as their most dangerous foe. They’re not fond of any of the humanoid species but those Terran genes scare them beyond all reason. ”

“So what does usually happen?”

“The Mawreg clear the entire planet. If they’re directly involved in the invasion themselves, as far as we can tell, the population becomes food.”

Eyes wide, Sara stopped in the middle of the road, feeling faint. “Farmed? Slaughtered?”

“More like hunting. The Mawreg don’t make any attempt to keep anyone alive or breed humans, or whatever the dominant sentients were. The troops find every living being on the planet, including animals, and fish in the ocean, and process them in giant factory ships.”

“You’re making me sick to my stomach,” she said. “What’s the third outcome?”

“Client race status. We can’t fathom the Mawreg mind, why they do anything but on occasion their rulers choose to grant specific sentients a lot of independence, in exchange for serving their purposes. The Shemdylann, the Betangray, the Chimmer, a few others.”

“What would stop the Mawreg from deciding you were a client today and food tomorrow?”

Tapping his nose with his index finger to indicate the accuracy of her question, he said, “Exactly. We’ve found signs of at least once where that happened, a race of beings we call the Lost Ones. In the early decades of the war, we used to run into them and then suddenly no more reports of them. We found a few abandoned ships in the star lanes but the sentients themselves were gone.”