London Wild (58 page)

February sighed
. Why did everyone she loved want to die fighting? Well, she supposed he was right. If they found this place, they’d know he was Herbaht, and it would be harder for him to just vanish than her.

‘Why can you not convert it back to being a holotheater?’ This
came from Kitty. ‘Perhaps you might convince the soldiers this place has never been a headquarters.’

‘It wouldn’t work,’ February told her
. ‘The tracking devices found in the rifles are enough to name this place. Even if its function was to be changed back, there are thousands of witnesses who could claim that this room has always been closed to the public.’

Kitty nodded sadly
. ‘And they might have a spy satellite watching the comings and goings of this place.’

‘Perhaps,’ agreed February.

‘So,’ Stenhas said, drastically changing the subject again, ‘what can I do for you?’

‘Well,’ February said,
‘there are two things, really. Kitty and I are leaving for Mars in a day or two. Kitty needs a passport.’

‘Leaving for Mars?’ Stenhas seemed a little surprised
. ‘Not going to stay with us to fight the good fight?’

‘The good fight won’t miss me,’ February told him.

‘I think you’d be one of our better fighters,’ Stenhas told her. ‘I mean, after all you’ve done for us I don’t think anyone will really begrudge you the right to go where you feel you need to. But we’ll miss you.’

‘I doubt it,’ February replied
. She might be okay at night when hunting, but in a real battle she doubted her abilities. ‘Besides, I never did take orders that well.’

‘Well,’ Stenhas commented,
‘I won’t force you to stay and fight with us, and it’s possible you might be of more value to us starting a new front on Mars. However, Conrad, our usual forger, isn’t here, so I don’t think we can help you.’

February seemed crestfallen for the moment. Their plans to get to Mars would count for nothing if Kitty didn’t have a passport. They wouldn’t be able to go. ‘I guess we’d better be heading out
, then.’

‘Hold on a second,’ Stenhas said, seem
ingly lost in thought. ‘I’m not sure if it will help, but I can get you my passport. If they aren’t too observant you might be able to fool them with it at the check-in desk. Just don’t use one of the automated ones!’

‘Why not?’ Kitty asked.

‘Your thumbprint is likely to be somewhat different than Stenhas’,’ February told her. ‘As it is, I think security during a state of war is going to be too high for us to get away with it, but it might be better than nothing.’

‘Well
, we are going to head north a little first,’ Kitty commented.

‘Shouldn’t make a difference
as to how well they check your passport,’ February replied.

‘Look,’ Stenhas butted in, ‘okay, look, I can give you Conrad
’s home address, but don’t tell him where you got it from, okay?’

February looked at him for a moment
, astounded. With the threat as it was, all the records of who lived where should have been destroyed. It was good that she and Kitty now had a lead as to where to go to get a passport, but she couldn’t help wondering whether or not she had ever told Stenhas her home details, not that it mattered so much now that she had moved out. She decided not to dwell on it. Stenhas must know what he was doing. ‘If he has the equipment to do a good job,’ February said a moment later.

‘Well, we don’t keep his stuff here
,’ Stenhas replied. He ripped a piece off of one of the papers on the table. Then with a little bit of effort, since he had no spare hand to hold the paper steady, he wrote the address down.

‘I guess we’d better make a move
, then. Thanks for everything, and I hope to see you again soon,’ February told him.

‘When we both dwell in the arms of the
Goddess,’ Stenhas replied.

February nodded once
, taking the proffered paper, and then got up, turning to leave. Kitty was tugging at her shoulder as she did, though. ‘What about the warning?’ she insisted.

‘There’s no one here to warn,
’ February said sadly, ‘and if I understand correctly, no one will be here before it’s too late. There’s nothing we can do.’

‘We could tell Stenhas,’ Kitty whined
. ‘Even if no one else came here to get the message from him, we can at least try.’

‘You’re probably right,’ February told her
. ‘It’s unlikely to get too far, but we must at least try.’

‘We could warn Conrad as well,’ Kitty added, ‘once we find him.’

February returned to the seat she had recently vacated. Again, she imparted Kitty’s thoughts on the real reason why the assault on Sou’nd was so well advertised for a good thirty hours before the attack itself.

Stenhas listened carefully and even made one or two notes. When February finished
, which wasn’t too long, he said, ‘Well, I’m not sure what we can do. We’ll warn everyone we can, but it’s hardly likely to get around to everyone within a week, and that might be too long. As for passing it on to other headquarters, I really can’t say. We’ll do what we can.’

‘At least we tried,’ Kitty commented.

‘Indeed,’ Stenhas told her, ‘and if this was any other time I’d be glad to have you among our numbers. I think you’ll be very helpful to Febby on Mars. You have a good head on your shoulders, even if you are of domesticated stock.’

‘Thank you,’ Kitty blushed.

‘Look, Febby,’ he said, ‘I’ve been thinking, and I want you to have them.  When you go back into the security room you’ll find a small desk with three drawers. In the top drawer you’ll find about a thousand pills that can be taken as a replacement for herd meat. I thought you might be able to use them.’

‘Pills? You were stockpiling pills?’ February seemed more than a little surprised at this.

‘I’m not much of a hunter since I lost my arm and my eye,’ Stenhas explained, ‘and my wife was killed nearly twenty years ago. True, for the most part I’ve lived on the kills that have been brought in exchange for our services. But those that supply those services should always get the first choice. Besides, not everyone likes to live on the herd meat. I’ve been taking them as a supplement to the meat. Others take them all the time, won’t even touch herd meat. We cater for both here.’

‘But the docility drug!’ February implored.

‘No,’ Stenhas replied. ‘These are not herd-made pills. We have a little factory that churns them out in Sou’nd. Or at least we did. They’re made the same way, the same ingredients, vitamins and minerals that the herd pills have, but they have one vital difference. They lack the docility part.’

‘Why have I never heard of them before?’ February insisted.

‘Why should you?’ Stenhas commented. ‘As our race has grown, finding herd meat has been harder and harder. They aren’t stupid. They protect themselves, and we lose many hunters every night to the armed patrols, as well as to prey that weren’t as helpless as the hunters had first thought they were. The pill is a less dangerous alternative. Except it doesn’t keep our people trained in those hunting skills that we’re finding so necessary right now.’

‘I wish I’d known
, all the same,’ February explained; ‘something like that might’ve been useful to know.’

‘We didn’t like to encourage it,’ Stenhas told her
. ‘Sometimes someone would hear from someone else taking them, or someone might come and ask us if there was an alternative. In most cases, though, we caught them getting the herd-made pills for themselves, so we supplied them with our safer version instead. There was no need for you to know. You hunted regularly and were thus honing your skills. It would’ve been a shame to blunt those skills through disuse as so many of our people have.’

‘The soldiers are going to walk right through us,’ February said.

Stenhas shook his head. ‘We have the Matriarch and the Patriarch, and their battle skills are not dulled.’

‘Why tell me about the pills now?’ February insisted
; now wasn’t the time to get into a theological discussion.

‘Simple,’ Stenhas explained, ‘Mars is a very carefully watched place
. The corridors are well lit, and all major paths have cameras watching everyone’s movements. You won’t get too much hunting done there.’

‘Sounds awful,’ February replied.

‘You’re welcome to stay with us and fight the herd,’ Stenhas offered.

Kitty’s expression changed to one of being afraid and perhaps a little startled at the idea.

‘I feel I’m letting my people down if I don’t,’ February replied, ‘but I know I’d be letting Kitty down if I don’t go and at least make sure she’s settled and safe before returning. I’m sorry, but my mind is made up. I’m going… no,
we’re
going to Mars.’

Stenhas bowed sadly
and replied, ‘Well, if I’m still here when you get back, you’ll be welcome back.’

Rules Of The Game

Sult’s NS2C skirmish flyer was hovering near the northernmost pole of the target planet. With him in similar fighter craft were Simon Dunwoody, codename Lark, a sub-lieutenant from New York State
, and Ursula Reese, codename Spirit, also a sub-lieutenant from Arkansas.  They hovered over the pole so the natural magnetic fields of the planet would help to block their presence from detection by those on the surface.

Sult held the position of command for this small strike group because though he too
ranked no higher than sub-lieutenant, he only needed one more point to be raised to full lieutenant within
The Game
and technically outranked the other two
.

This was supposed to be a simple reconnaissance mission
; they were here to spy on the planet and work out its defensive and offensive capabilities. This would take a long time from the pole. The magnetic field of the planet would interfere with their detection equipment as well. They had the advantage, though, in that they knew the planet was there, whereas those on the planet (hopefully) didn’t know about them.

What automatic defense systems were installed? How many defensive turrets did the place have? How many craft, if any, were actually stationed here? And was the area around the planet mined? Everything had to be checked at least twice because, from the North Pole, the magnetic field of the pole tended to create echoes. There were also many other things that could be checked while they were there, but his
clan
already knew most of the answers to those, such as how much income the planet was worth.

The planet Enbardo III had been in the hands of the
Gnomes of Power,
Sult’s own
clan,
as recently as two days ago. Between the two of them, the
Deathdealers
and the
Monarchs of Chaos
had been nibbling quite a few chunks out of the
Gnomes’
Empire, and on this occasion it had been the
Monarchs
that had tried their luck.

As the information Sult had procured flooded into the data banks of his craft, he kept a watchful eye. However recently the
Monarchs
might have taken the planet, they did have regular patrols. And although many of these patrols would be automated, since no one liked to play
The Game
just to stand patrol, it was always possible that a real live pilot might be among the patrolling craft. A patrol was a fairly safe if boring way to gain a few points towards the next rank, and it wasn’t unusual to see someone doing just that because they were close to their next promotion. It was especially common for those about to make Captain, as at the rank of Captain players had access to a larger and better range of fighter craft.

‘Okay,’ Sult said over his radio as the last of the information was recorded and checked against the previous sweeps, ‘let
’s go home.’

‘Confirmed,’ Simon and Ursula both replied at virtually the same time.

Sult orientated the craft away from the planet and prepared to enter light speed back to a friendly planet when something else caught his attention. In the distance, maybe half a million miles short of the planet, a large strike force had appeared.

Sult blinked twice and then got on the radio
. ‘Get that information back to base. I’m going to take a closer look at those, see who they are.’

‘I’ll come with you,’ Ursula responded,
continuing, ‘you might need support. Simon can deliver the information himself.’

‘Why should I miss out on the fun?’ This was from Simon.

‘Someone has to get back,’ Ursula insisted.

‘Then you go,’ Simon pressed.

‘You both go,’ Sult ordered, muttering to himself under his breath about the lack of discipline of civilians. ‘I’m only going to take a look. I’m not going to engage. Now get out of here.’

‘But…’ started Ursula.

‘If I report you for failing to obey an order, you could actually lose points. Now get,’ Sult told her.