Warlords race for power while the final battle looms! (Swords Versus Tanks Book 4) (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

The Egality’s policy of retroactively-consensual assimilation of developing peoples is clearly different from Elitist Imperialism. Unlike the exploitative warmongers, we sweep the arbitrary local barbaric customs into the figurative dustbin of history, and replace them with a system of governance based on pure reason, going forward.

In short, we make a difference.

— David Hamilton, "In praise of inter-societal redistributive justice," (Egality Information Department, 1931)

#

Field Marshal Williams put his hands over his ears.

It didn't work. The complaints of the burghers filled the Council Chamber until it seemed that even the carved heads on the bench-ends lent their voices to the din.

Williams frowned. Kinghaven Town Hall might be in a central location, but it made a lousy Regional HQ. It was as if
he
were the one being hauled up in front of the burghers, and not the other way around.

Things would be different once the Post Office Engineers got around to removing all the bourgeois frippery – carvings, cushioned benches, tapestries, and all those paintings of fat rich bastards — and replaced the stained glass with more utilitarian Flexiglass. That would teach the proto-Elitist scum.

Somebody tugged at his elbow. A Post Office Sergeant blinked up at him through thick glasses. She shook her head. "The telegraph wire’s cut in multiple places."

Williams' mind reeled. There was no chance of contacting Objective One unless the radio reception improved. "Ungrateful barbarians, we should have shot the lot!" His words boomed loud in the now-silent Council Chamber. Shock flitted across the faces of the burghers.

Williams cursed himself as he fumbled for his little pills. He was used to dealing with savages too ignorant to understand civilised languages. It was bad enough that Hamilton had acquired his own pet king and made himself hero of the hour; the last thing Williams needed was to spark a local revolt. He smiled at his guests. "You are all eligible for the Basic Dole," he said, as if the last two minutes hadn’t happened. "However, you need not concern yourselves with the collateral damage experienced during the Glorious Liberation."

The leader, and most vociferous troublemaker –
Master
Timberman — said, "But you said your soldiers would respect property, Milord. And the warehouses belong to us."

"That remains to be seen." Williams eyed the grizzled merchant while the pill took effect. The man’s head was still bandaged from the fighting. Williams would have had him shot out-of-hand, along with all the other Proto-Elitists who resisted the liberation. Alas, the Committee had decreed that combatants who were not
actually
members of the oppressive feudal hegemony must be suffering from False Consciousness. "The socially useful businesses will become State Property," explained Williams. "The Egality will undertake any repairs."

"But what of us?" blurted another merchant in the outraged tones typical of capitalist pigs watching their unearned privileges vanish.

Williams didn’t bother to hide his amusement. "You’ll work for the People."

"You keep saying
people
," said Timberman, sounding thoroughly out of his depth. "But we
are
people."

Williams laughed, enjoying the clarity granted by the pills. "But you hardly work for the Social Good, do you?"

Timberman looked blank. After a moment he said, "We bring back goods from far places. Why hazard our persons without profit?"

General Ibis-Bear leaned forward. "I thought this was a spiritual age!" she wheezed. "Is profit is your only motive?"

Timberman frowned. "I do not understand."

Was the merchant simply too primitive to grasp the concept of Social Good? Williams rubbed his chin. Hamilton could have answered that question, which was why he had been tolerated for so long. There had to be a way of taking control of the Post Office without causing a mutiny.

A muddy dispatch rider staggered in. She waved her arms. "Clear the office. Secret stuff."

As the Carbineers hustled the last of the Burghers through the Council Chamber’s ornate doorway, the rider blurted, "The Gate’s stopped working!"

The words echoed around the huge room. The medieval faces staring out of every painting and carving now seemed as unreadable as those of the Bunker Thirteen Aliens. When the bullets and gasoline ran out, the Army of the Egality would be lost in a hostile world. Williams shuddered and hugged himself. His colleagues edged closer.

"There’s more," gasped the rider. "Almost everybody stationed at Objective One is heading this way for an Army Council."

"Really?" Williams sensed an opportunity and his mood lifted. "The Gate is Postmaster General Hamilton’s responsibility. I wonder what excuse he’ll offer." An impeachment would solve an awful lot of problems. With the Post Office under Williams’s direct control, it would be a simple matter to bully the scientists into repairing the link with home – the thing about experts was they only made progress if you kept them scared.

"Um." Beads and charms rattling, General Ibis-Bear leaned closer.

Better yet, thought Williams, perhaps the mob might get out of hand. It was not unknown for an unpopular general to end his or her career before an ad hoc firing squad. You had to love democracy.

Ibis-Bear coughed, enveloping Williams in the stench of garlic. "Hamilton will say it was you who sent Lowenstein off on a suicide mission," she said.

"Ah." Williams had a sickening feeling that he’d walked into a trap. Units isolated from higher authority could elect officers as they saw fit. A good rule perhaps – that was how Williams managed his first upwards rotation – but nobody had expected it to apply to entire armies.

General Woodsman broke his silence. "We’re buggered."

Without a word –
less is more
— Williams made for the balcony. The others fell in behind him. A good sign. "Enough of problems," he said as briskly as he could. "Give me solutions!"

As his Carbineers swung open the doors, Woodsman said, "They can’t hold an election if there’s fighting."

Williams stepped onto the balcony. The icy sea breeze sucked the breath out of him. He shivered, drew his coat closed and popped another pill just in case. Below, grey-uniformed Carbineers drifted into Cathedral Square. Some huddled around fires built in the lee of wrecked tanks. These troops weren’t going to push the war into Winter, especially with a broken supply chain.

Williams cursed under his breath. In future he would trust his instincts! He’d never
really
believed Hamilton’s excuses for not salvaging the rusting hulks. Obviously, the Postmaster General intended them as a demoralising reminder of the last battle – an unpatriotic attempt to undermine Williams’s position.

Not that he could say any of that to General Woodsman – one had to protect the morale of one’s colleagues! "That just postpones the problem. Give me something better. Something which will
really make a difference
."

"What about a show of authority?" said Stella Ibis-Bear with just a little too much enthusiasm.

Williams shook his head. Once he had the Post Office back under control, he’d assign a Political Delivery team to discover whether her occult obsessions masked a Crypto-Elitist love of hierarchy. "The Army doesn’t like authority," he said as if to a child. "What we need is an achievement. Something to validate their efforts going forward."

Williams surveyed the square. A pity they’d had to bomb the Cathedral – now would have been a good moment to blow up a Proto-Elitist icon. Of course, there were plenty of other icons available for destruction.

Without turning, he said, "Being out of contact with the Committee also allows me to change policies as required." He grinned. "Let’s shoot us some feudal oppressors – the Army will like that." He raised his voice so all the hangers-on could hear. "Woodsman – please ask your Carbineers to round up all the aristo prisoners. That includes Citizen Lowther." He smiled. "We'll put it around that Hamilton was lying about his star prisoner joining the side of social justice."

CHAPTER THREE

The fire crackled. The ocean roared. Tom shivered. "Marcel, you’re hogging the blanket." He rolled over onto a cold, hard surface and smelled piss, stale sweat and sick. An empty whisky bottle rattled across floorboards and vanished into the half-light.

Another roar… not the waves on a beach; human voices. No tent. No Marcel. No Edward, either. Tom propped himself against the wall and threw up. He rubbed his temples. He had to be in a bar of some sort. That would explain his headache and the dozen or so dishevelled soldiers slumbering on the uneven floor.

"Hey, fucker!" A troll-like Carbineer bounced to his feet. He towered over Tom, swaying like a jack-in-a-box. The front of his puke-soaked combat greys glistened like a fresh wound.

Tom’s pulse raced. On instinct, he drew his knees in. Perhaps the beating wouldn’t be too bad if it were over quickly. That thought set off a flare of self disgust. He didn’t need a blunt longsword to defend himself. He half rose, then collapsed against the wall.

"You’ve fucking fucked up my fucking… um fucker." The Carbineer swayed. "Fuck you, you… fucking fucked-up fuckwit!" His lips puckered, then parted in an explosion of vomit. "Oh fuck! I’m fucking fuck-" He toppled across the legs of a half-dressed woman. Oblivious to his weight, she lay like an upturned turtle, snoring contentedly with each heave of her exposed midriff.

Tom forced his breathing rate down. What was he doing in this dive?

He could remember the Security Workers frogmarching him back to Kinghaven Castle. His motorbike had been waiting, along with a note from Hamilton: All charges were dropped so that he could immediately return to Peasant Liaison.

It was only as Tom drove away that he had realised there was only one possible explanation: Even though he had rejected Tom, King Edward had demanded Tom’s safety as a precondition for cooperation. That thought had set Tom’s brain in a spin. His last clear memory was of setting off in search of a calming mug of wine.

Tom peered through the dark. He’d obviously found that wine, but where?

Thick beams spanned a big, low-ceilinged room lit only by small square windows. This looked more like a small warehouse than a tavern. It must be one of those unofficial drinking dens which sprang up wherever the army stopped. Post Office Security tended not to bust the dens. Hamilton claimed the hands-off policy was good for morale. It certainly made the Postmaster General popular.

Tom hadn’t made it quite as far as the country.His heart missed a beat.
How long have I been AWOL?

Hours? Days?

Tom’s head throbbed. He started to stand, felt dizzy, then slumped against the wall. He hauled his left hand up until his eyes could focus on his wristwatch. Less than twenty four hours. If he drove like a lunatic, he might escape with an Admonition from his Peer Committee. Of course, that would require being able to stand up in the first place.

The crackling sound, again. This time Tom recognised it: a ragged volley of rifles. The crowd roared approval. Who could they be shooting? It wasn’t as if there could be any war criminals. His stomach lurched. He tasted bile, coughed, then dry-retched. If he could only get to his bike, everything would make sense.

Head spinning, he levered himself up the wall. Slivers of daylight framed the distant doorway, casting a dim light on a tangle of sleeping drunks. Not all of them would be so obligingly enfeebled. Best to rest until he felt stronger.

Another volley jerked him back to consciousness. He drew his sleeve across his vomit-soiled mouth, then steeled himself to check his watch: three hours left. He could make it, just. If he got killed trying, so be it. Concentrating on every step, he lurched through the unconscious soldiers and somehow reached the exit without tripping.

The door opened onto blinding white. His foot collided with something solid, which vanished with a drawn-out clatter.

Tom tottered on the edge, flailing his arms. He clawed the empty air. His fingers found a length of rope and tightened on the rough woven hemp. He steadied himself and slowly drew away from the abyss. Cold sunlight stung his eyes. He averted his gaze and blinked until his sight returned.

The drinking den was on the first floor of a warehouse. Thanks to him, the ladder lay in the courtyard below, propped across a fallen motorbike … he blinked...
his
motorbike. The rope trailed down the wood-framed wall and ended in an iron hook. He traced it back up to where it looped over a pulley on the end of a beam which stuck out above the doorway.

The massed voices changed note, like an engine speeding up. A chorus of whoops and jeers swelled until it drowned out the background chatter.

Hackles rising, Tom finally looked out at the world. He found himself staring across the chessboard patterned Cathedral Square. A field-grey mob swirled around the base of the Great Steps. At the top, in the shadow of the Cathedral’s bombed-out shell, gaudy figures lay strewn like discarded rag dolls.

Somebody had decided to shoot the aristocrats.

A wedge of Carbineers pushed through the human tide like a steam yacht. In their midst walked a lean young man, his shoulders straight, his wrists tied behind his back.

They were going to kill Edward.

#

An icy clarity washed away the hangover to reveal just a single thought: Tom must get to Edward.

Counting down from a thousand so as to blot out any dissenting thoughts —
What would he do if he reached him?
— Tom wrapped himself around the rope and swung out over the courtyard.

He righted his bike, struggled to mount it. It roared into life. Pulse racing, he nudged it toward the courtyard gates.

Tom revved the single-cylinder engine until it sounded like an Elitist Reaper Gun. The crowd scurried out of the way, opening a path to the Great Steps. He changed up and thundered through the gap. As he neared the Great Steps, he squeezed the front brake hard, then gunned the throttle back. With a squeal, the bike slewed around to face the prisoner and escort.