Spirit of Empire 4: Sky Knights (6 page)

Galborae entered with a hand resting lightly on Limam’s neck and his thoughts focused completely on her. He took two steps into the room and stopped, ordering Limam to lay on the deck.

Limam did not obey. With one foot lifted and her ears pointed forward, every one of her senses were at full peak. She registered each person in the room and sniffed the air, then she stared at Borg, the Great Cat who was sitting at attention in front of Lady Krys and Sir Tarn.

Borg’s eyes narrowed and his head reached out toward Limam as he returned the look, then he said in amazement, “I sense her. So do my brothers. She senses us as well.”

Limam shook off Galborae’s hand and padded deliberately across the room, her attention shifting between Borg and the other Great Cats. Absolute silence reigned, and most held their breaths waiting to see what would happen.

Limam stopped directly in front of Borg and stared up at him, both cats taking the measure of the other as Borg looked down on her from his sitting position while she remained standing. Galborae felt himself locked out of her thoughts, something he had felt only rarely and then only when Limam was on the attack. His hopes plummeted, but he held to one critical shred of evidence—her back had not arched.

Limam broke eye contact with Borg, then she padded to his side and joined him, sitting with her eyes taking in the whole room with her ears pitched forward.

Borg’s gaze went to Galborae, then to Washburn. “She protects,” he said. His amber eyes brightened for a moment, then he turned his head to Limam and growled low in his throat.

She tossed her head and returned the growl with a soft snarl, then stood up. Borg also stood and padded over to the other Great Cats, passing before them. Limam followed, looking each of them in the eye as she passed. When Borg continued toward Stven, the dragon, Limam did not hesitate, though she had opened her thoughts to him again and he sensed her unease. He also sensed her trust in Borg. The two of them passed before each member of the crew with Limam making eye contact with each, then Borg returned to Galborae’s side.

Galborae placed a hand on Limam’s neck, and she got the message and sat beside him, but her gaze remained on everyone in the room, not threatening but protecting. The room itself almost seemed to breath a sigh of relief.

“This is a first for me and my brothers,” Borg said.

“For me, as well,” Galborae said. “She sensed the demons and guided us to them. As you can see, her wounds are still healing.”

“We see,” Borg said. “She is welcome here.”

Galborae had been on Aldebaran I for three months, and his patience was at an end. All the marines wanted him to do was train, train, train. They seemed to have no other purpose in life. He had done everything they asked of him: learned to use their stunners and blasters, the combat armor and visor, and he had kept up with his unit during the grueling exercise periods despite his still-healing wounds. In return, they ignored his demands for action. He neither heard or sensed any urgency concerning Tranxte.

He barged into General Stymes’ office with Limam close on his heels, her ears flattened to her head. Despite Galborae’s constant mental reassurances during the preceding months, the cat still projected anxiety when among certain aliens, especially when Galborae was, himself, upset. He crossed through the general’s conference area—comfortable, padded chairs he had occupied on a sporadic basis during planning meetings—and in just a few more steps reached the general’s desk.

The general had his back to him and was deep in discussion with another man, both of them dressed in immaculate, white uniforms, their hands shifting several computer projections through the air. Both of them were big men, the general blond-headed and barrel-chested while the man next to him was darker complected and trimmer with hair just starting to turn silver.

“I have to get back,” Galborae said, the tone of his voice brooking no argument.

Both men turned. When Stymes saw the look on Galborae’s face, he reached into a pocket for his translator. He attached it to his ear, handed one to the other man, then looked a question at Galborae.

“I have to get back, General. Even now, there might not be anyone left to get back to,” Galborae insisted.

Stymes nodded his understanding. “I know, but we’re not ready. I won’t let my men go up against gleasons unprepared. I want at least a thousand shuttles, and I’ve only modified 21 so far. There’s some big operation in the works for the Queen, and they’re tying up all our resources. Ships especially are in short supply. I’m sorry, but we need patience until the Queen completes whatever it is she’s up to.”

Galborae leaned forward, planting both fists on the general’s desk. “Don’t you get it? My people are dying. Let me go with what you have. Please. Any help is better than nothing.”

Stymes glanced to the man beside him, then glared back at Galborae. “No. These are gleasons we’re talking about. I want to hit them all at once, everywhere on the planet. So far as I know they’re loners, but I’m not certain. I won’t give them any opportunities to organize against me.” He sighed, softening his glare. “Have patience, Galborae. If we do this right, more of your people will live in the long run. So will more of mine.”

Galborae’s gaze darkened. “You’re wrong. You haven’t tested your modifications against a gleason, and you haven’t tested your tactics. What if they don’t work? It’s more lost time. Let me test them. Send me with what you have now, then send the rest when you can.”

“A small strike force wouldn’t stand a chance. Don’t forget, gleasons communicate mind to mind.”

“If your men are as good as you claim they are, it won’t matter. Every day we wait costs lives, lots of lives.” Galborae was rapidly running out of arguments. He straightened up and used his best weapon. “Your Knight made a promise to me. I’m told that a promise from her is a promise from the Queen.”

The man beside Stymes spoke up before the general had a chance to launch a counterattack. “Sir, I haven’t been part of this project, but he has a point. We really don’t know how to fight gleasons. An advance force might learn enough to make a difference when the rest of us get there.”

Stymes turned to the man. “Us? You’re including yourself?”

“You know I’ve been looking for a change of venue.”

“We’ve been all through that. The answer’s still no. I need you here. Besides, a small force would be overwhelmed.”

The man shook his head. “Not necessarily. It would if we tried to cover the whole planet, but not if we concentrated on just one small area. We could experiment with tactics, fighting mainly from shuttles for safety. Rumor has it we have a sensor that sees gleasons.”

“That’s what the modifications are all about.” Stymes shot a quick glance to Galborae, then said, “Actually, the modification is just software. It’s not the problem. The problem is transporters and shuttles. With the Queen tying up all our resources, we’re at least a year away from being ready, and it will probably be longer than that.”

“Wouldn’t it be nice to have a plan when we get there rather than going in blind?” The man lowered his voice and added, “Sir, the Knight will be back. It’ll be you who has to explain why we’re still waiting.”

Stymes stared at the man. He considered those words for a long time, then he motioned both of them toward the conference area. “Have you two met?” he asked Galborae.

“No, sir,” Galborae answered gruffly, sensing a crack in Stymes determination.

“Sir Galborae, meet Major Havlock. He’s in charge of security at our armories. He has not been part of our planning for Tranxte, but I value his creativity.”

The wide-spaced, dark brown eyes of Galborae’s rounded face met the equally wide spaced, dark brown eyes of Havlock’s longer face and prominent chin. The two sized each other up as two hardened hands grasped each other in a formal greeting.

“Sir?” Havlock asked, turning back to Stymes. “Everyone knows what’s coming, and I’ve been doing some research on gleasons in hopes of going with you. Sir Galborae is right—we know next to nothing about what we’re getting into. Gleasons never accepted the Empire, and we were never able to civilize them. After they nearly wiped out the Great Cats on Brodor 2,000 years ago, we placed their world off limits and maintained the blockade all these years, obviously at no small cost. The Rebels must have eliminated the blockade.”

“Actually, it was the Rebels who brought the gleasons to Tranxte,” Stymes said. “We still don’t know why. I’ve done my homework on the project too, though I’ve focused more on getting people and equipment in place than on the gleasons themselves. What else do you know about them?”

“Our studies of their home world have been conducted from orbit and with drones, not an easy task since gleasons are invisible most of the time.” Havlock rolled his shoulders, knowing he was briefing a man who probably knew everything he would say, but he had to answer the question. He pulled out his pad and found what he was looking for, then held the pad with its face out so both Stymes and Galborae could see it.

“This is a dead gleason.”

Galborae leaned forward, his eyes focused hard on the image. “I didn’t know,” he said gruffly, his eyes darting back and forth across the pad.

His response surprised Havlock. “Rumors claim you’ve fought them.”

Galborae shook his head. “Only one, and I never got a good look at it. I think I killed it, though I’ll never know for sure.”

Havlock frowned, but he pressed on. This meeting was more for his own benefit than Galborae’s. He really wanted a transfer, and if it took fighting gleasons to get it . . . well, he really wanted a transfer.

“They’re sophisticated killing machines,” he said to Stymes. “They have two of almost everything, so normal wounds just slow them down rather than stop them. The mottled skin makes them look like reptiles, but they’re not. They are warm-blooded killers. They have two brains inside one skull, two spinal cords, two circulatory systems including two hearts, four arms and hands with vicious claws, and powerful jaws with teeth designed for ripping apart flesh. They only have two legs, but they’re fast and strong. They can run upright, or they can leap using their legs and arms.”

“That much I knew,” Stymes said. “They’re hideous.”

“Yes, sir. This one’s dead. Imagine it alive, invisible, and sneaking up on you, or worse yet, leaping toward you on two legs and its four hands. It prefers to sneak up on you and tear you to shreds before you even know it’s there, but it’s capable of brutal assaults as well. We never established successful tactics when we fought them on Brodor. We just basically sacrificed soldiers until we killed them all.”

Stymes probably knew all that as well, but Havlock gave him a minute to think about what it would be like to face one of these creatures when it was alive. “Sir, we know they lose their invisibility if seriously wounded, but even then, since their bodies have so many backups, they keep coming and coming. They don’t stop until there’s nothing left of them. On top of that, they see into the infrared spectrum, so night does not hinder their hunting. The only weaknesses we know of are that they have poor vision, they have a strong body odor, and they’re not intelligent.”

Stymes shifted in his chair, clearly uncomfortable with what he was seeing and hearing. After all, he eventually had to fight these creatures. “I guess I have more homework ahead of me,” he said. “Being stupid could be a bonus for them and could make our jobs harder.”

Havlock shook his head slowly. “I’m not sure I’d call them stupid, sir. We believe they prefer to operate independently rather than in organized groups, but we believe they congregate in family units when they’re not hunting, and they have a rudimentary language.”

Stymes sat up straight. “They have a language? I was told they communicate mind-to-mind.”

“They do. What one gleason knows they all know, but they speak to each other as well. I’ve listened to recordings. We speculate that they communicate mind-to-mind on certain things, maybe, for example, while fighting or hunting, and they speak when they’re within their family units. They have crude weapons, though we have reports of them using modern things like knives and blasters when they can get their hands on them.”

“You said they prefer getting up close for the kill.”

“Yes, sir, but we have reports of attacks from longer range. I suppose in that regard they’re a little like us. We prefer to kill from a distance, but we can do it up close when necessary. They’re just the opposite. They can kill from a distance, but they prefer close up. At last report they’ve killed all the local fauna on their home world and have resorted to hunting others of their own kind.”

Stymes nodded grimly. Clearly that piece of information was not new to him.

“If they’re hunting each other, they must be able to turn off the mental communication at will or else they’d never be able to get close,” Havlock finished.

Stymes sat back and considered his subordinate, a man for whom he held immense respect. “You’ve done some serious research.”

“I have, sir.” Havlock hesitated, then made a decision and plunged ahead. “I’d be willing to take an advance force to Tranxte for you.”

“You
want
to fight these creatures?”

Stymes knew what Havlock was really suggesting. Havlock had lost his entire unit to the Chessori during the battle for Aldebaran I. He had been the sole survivor, and he still blamed himself for the loss of his men. Stymes had stood up for him at the inquest and even put through a promotion, but Havlock’s request to fight gleasons probably fell into the category of penance. In truth, maybe it was.

He stood up and motioned for Havlock to follow him. To Galborae, he said, “I need a few minutes in private. Wait here.”

He and Havlock moved across the room, and Stymes turned to him. “What’s this really about?” he demanded.

“You know very well, sir. I’ve kept nothing from you, including how I feel about my present position. I need something in the field, preferably as far away from here as I can get.”

“You can’t escape your past no matter how far you run, and now you want my men to pay the price?”

“No, sir. Whether I or someone else commands it, you know I’m right about sending an advance force. The Knight will expect us to have acted, and we really do need to find out more about what we’re getting into. There are just too many unknowns to go in blindly. The . . . other thing . . . will not affect my performance.”

Stymes looked at him sharply. “Won’t it? You still blame yourself.”

“How can I not? I lost my entire command.”

“You lost your men to the Chessori. Had you not rallied afterward, the rest of us would be dead. We’ve been over this time and time again. Everyone but you finds you blameless. We’re going to lose men in our fight against the gleasons, and I’m not sure you can accept that. How can I put you in command knowing your decisions might be flawed?”

“You’re right, sir. I will always shoot for zero losses.” He stared into Stymes eyes and said, “I won’t accept losses, but I’ll tolerate them. I tolerated them when I secured the planet here, even with my personal losses so fresh in my mind. Besides, there’s another whole aspect to this: we’re dealing with an emerging world. The Empire’s never done a good job of that. I’d like to be in on the ground floor and try to do a better job this time.”

Stymes brought a hand to his chin in thought and looked away. Eventually he looked back to Havlock with narrowed eyes. “You’re famous for your creativity, but it’s a huge risk, for you personally and for the men.”

Havlock leaned forward. “It is, sir, but it’s a bigger risk to send our main force in blind. We both know that the purpose of an advance force is to gather intelligence, not to win the war.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“I’ve been thinking about it some.”