Extremis (15 page)

—just as a tiny vehicle, with four wheels that were each almost as big as its body, came whining out of the building to the immediate right of the first truck. Before anyone could react, the little toy car had sped and disappeared under the second segment of the truck, its electric engines screaming. For a moment, there was silence: the truck’s immense wheels rolled slowly forward—

Then: a bright, savage flash; a sharp, percussive roar. The center segment of the first truck seemed to jump like startled prey. It twisted as it ripped clear of the head and tail sections, flying upward and sideways against the second story of the building to its left as if it, too, were nothing more than a child’s toy. The concussion blasted every window on the block into a spray of glassy sleet, did the same to the windows in the cab of the following truck, which slammed to a halt—just before the rear segment of the lead vehicle, back-flipped by the force that had severed its middle section, cartwheeled into and crushed the cab.
Selnarmic
death spikes—piercing, sudden, wrenching—told the fate of the Arduans there. Similar truncated death jolts came from the other cab a moment later as its fuel lines, ruptured when the middle section tore away, caught fire: a low-pressure wash of flame gushed out the windows of the lead vehicle’s cab with a hoarse roar.

That was when the second remote-controlled toy—almost invisible in the smoke and falling debris—skittered out of the doorway of the next farthest building on the right hand side of the street. Bouncing wildly over and through both the stationary and tumbling detritus, it shot under the already-crippled second vehicle.

This time, the explosive-laden toy car must have detonated near a fuel tank; an orange-yellow fireball roiled out from underneath the truck, sending it almost a meter straight up as it broke into its three constituent pieces. The wave of terrified, agonized death surges shocked Lentsul so profoundly that he reflexively pinched down his
selnarm
link—a cowardly act, he knew, but this was not just any discarnation: his brothers and sisters were being incinerated. That manner of passing lasted just long enough to experience the full agony of it. It was a memory that was said to transfer into all later lives with a horribly crisp clarity.

The trailing defense sled—the first in a formation of two—had already lifted quickly up and rearward on its thrusters, thinking to give the second vehicle sufficient space to back away from the flaming wreck at the head of the column. As it turned out, that maneuver fortuitously put the sled just beyond the blast pattern of the largest, flaming chunks of what had been the second vehicle’s rear segment.

Then the two cruciform specks doubled back and straight-lined in toward the mortally wounded convoy. As the first Enforcer sled’s weapon blisters began firing, and the second sled boosted up over the rooftops to engage them also, a street-level explosion—almost three blocks behind the convoy—sent masonry and old conduits hurtling skyward in a violent, dirty smudge. Then another blast, a block behind that. At the peripheries of the city’s jagged skyline, a converging ring of delta shapes—the combat air patrol, inbound to stoop protectively over the stricken vehicles—splintered into different directions, some continuing on their inbound course, but almost half sweeping in the direction of the two explosions.

Almost unnoticed amidst all the destruction and the
selnarmic
waves of horrible pain coming from the wounded, another, smaller toy car appeared out of the smoke. The little truck—covered in an eye-gouging combination of blue, red, and metallic gold—rushed forward with a high-pitched whine, threatening to jump out of the screen at the viewer—

Then the whole scene suddenly seemed to tumble wildly down and away. A brief impression of level flight, a view of the rooftops—

—and then the recording ended.

Heshfet—tall, golden, beautiful, aloof, and, above all, fierce—narrowed her central eye. “That’s all?”

Lentsul twitched his smaller cluster tentacles. (Apologetic.) “That’s all they sent us from the recon hopper’s recording.”

(Contempt, disdain.) “Hoppers. A
flixit
-brained idea, those. Instead of a truly useful airborne-observation platform, we get a little aluminum garbage can with some semi-sophisticated electronics and the capability to make rotary-winged hops of a few hundred meters, at best.”

Lentsul sent a (reassurance) that was also an appeal to reason. “The hopper was not intended for military reconnaissance, Manip Heshfet. It was originally designed as a drone to survey potential landing sites. They were meant for frontiers, not battlefields.”

(Fury.) “Yes, like every other piece of
nerjet
-motleyed equipment we’ve been given. Everything designed for settlers; nothing for soldiers. If they had given us real military equipment, this would never have happened.”

The recording had reset; the first image from the hopper’s point of view—of the first truck entering the street—had returned to the playback monitor.

Memreb, Heshfet’s first junior manip and fellow
Destoshaz
, stared at the image also. “Why did they not show us these recordings until now? Did they think it would disturb us more than our own memories of the ambush?”

Heshfet switched her tentacles like a flail. “Part of the new post-combat recovery sequestration imposed by the Sleeper Ankaht—that
almgr’sh
.”

Lentsul started at the slur. “She is an Elder and a Councilor, Heshfet.”

“She is the much-filthed mating pouch I say she is. She stands in the way of our destiny as a race. Taking us off duty for three weeks to ‘recuperate’ is just a weakening of our forces, of our efforts.”

Lentsul projected (calm, counterpoint). “It was her attempt to ensure that we were protected from further provocation, and so would not thereby discarnate the
griarfeksh
by the hundreds, as happened last month at the village they call Bucelas. After we were ambushed”—he gestured at the screen—“we were all furious, desperate to strike back. We would have sought any pretext to discarnate any humans we encountered, however we—”

Heshfet rose to her full height, emitting (suspicion). “You call them ‘humans’? And you speak in support of the
almgr’sh
Ankaht? You are indeed no
Destoshaz
, Lentsul”—and she looked down on him from her terrible, and very titillating, height—“but even an
Ixturshaz
such as yourself should be able to see that Ankaht is lethal to our future on this planet. Indeed, I thought such deductive powers were the forte of your caste.” The group’s collective
selnarm
rippled with derisive sniggers. “So, tell us, little Lentsul”—for he was indeed small and dark, like most of his caste—“what do your deductive powers tell us we should have done after this ambush? Sat about and moaned the loss of our fellows? No. We should have been soldiers and marched to avenge them.”

“No. We should have exercised more restraint during the action.”

“Restraint? How, and upon what?”

“Restraint when engaging the two aerial toys, and the little one that charged the hopper.”

“What madness is this, Second Junior Manip? Has your mind been disordered by all the numbers you count with your other little caste-mates? We were ambushed, we were vulnerable, and so we destroyed all potential remaining threats. And we were angry.”

“And we were fools.”

“Why? Because we were surprised by the
griarfeksh
trick?”

“No. Because we needlessly destroyed the few remaining pieces of
griarfeksh
equipment that survived the attack.”

“And just what would that rubbish have told us?”

Lentsul kept his
selnarm
(patient, clear). “To begin with, the electronics of the toys would have been the basis of reverse-estimating the operator’s transmitter range, which has obvious tactical implications. Beyond that, a close examination of the toys might have indicated the place and time of their manufacture, perhaps their distribution.”

Heshfet’s acquiescence was (grudging). “Agreed. If we had been able to determine the transmitter range, we could have triangulated a controller zone. But what is the use of the production data?”

“Manip Heshfet, the
griarfeksh
manufactured these vehicles as common toys and distributed them as such. This means that, at some point, many of these tiny delivery systems were removed from their place in a legitimate toy-store inventory and became the property of a local Resistance cell. Simply knowing where the toys were last sent as inventory items could have been a clue that allowed us to track down these Resistance fighters. And that would have been a great help to us. This is their fourth, and most devastating, attack, and in each they have depended upon these remote-controlled toys.”

Heshfet shook her lesser tentacles in (frustration, stubbornness). “No matter. Now that we are no longer in ‘sequestration,’ we have been given the honor—and the pleasure—of hunting down the
griarfeksh
who have been mounting these cowardly attacks.”

Lentsul raised a lesser tentacle from each cluster. “So you have told us, Manip Heshfet. But you neglected to tell us: from whom do these orders come?”

“It was no less than Second Blade Daihd who so charged us, and in so doing she passes Torhok’s direct orders—and encouragement—to us.”

Lentsul shifted slightly and projected (tact). “Since the order has to do with the security of Punt, and is therefore primarily a local and domestic matter, should it not come from the Council of Twenty, or one of its officers?”

Heshfet stared down from her height and Lentsul tried to repress—and conceal—the swift mating urge that it excited in him. “It
has
come from the Council, Lentsul. Daihd speaks for Torhok. And is not the senior admiral’s voice the greatest in, and first among, the Council of Twenty?”

“Yes, it is the greatest”—and Lentsul elected to skip over the
first among
classification, which was language that leaned toward a military coup—“but my question is this: Should the command not be issued through a Council mandate, passed on to us by—?”

Heshfet actually, physically, smiled. Her
selnarm
was not friendly, however. “Little Lentsul, have you become a prime who specializes in the laws of governance? We are
Destoshaz
—most of us—and we have our orders. They have come to us through a duly recognized chain of command. We need know nothing more than that. We will find the
griarfeksh
who have killed so many of our fellow Wanderers, and we will kill them.”

* * *

Sandro McGee approached the doors of the store and almost bumped into them when they didn’t open on their own. He looked more closely at the entry to the unimaginative, single-level prefab known as
Rashid’s Sport and Tool
and saw a note taped on the inside of the right-hand door: “Push.” Cocking an eyebrow—and surreptitiously checking the street behind him—McGee entered.

Trained to react swiftly to unexpected noises, McGee almost went prone when he heard a light metallic tinkling as the door swung open—but listening a split-second longer, he discovered that it was but the first in a rapid sequence of tinny musical notes: small copper wind-chimes, bumped when he had opened the door. Evidently, the door’s buzzer had been turned off along with the automatic doors. A sign of the times: outages and costs had both increased since the Baldies had come to town.

“Rashid?” McGee’s voice was the only sound in the store. Then, a shuffling noise from about two-thirds of the way down the central aisle, and Rashid’s head—flecked with more gray than McGee remembered—poked into view around a corner display. “Be there in a minute.”

“ ’Kay.” McGee smiled as he said it, then inspected the nearby shelves. A little shabbier than pre-war, but at least Rashid’s was still open: the large chains had shut their doors almost immediately after the invasion. Not only did people want to stay close to their homes when shopping, but the big stores had depended upon the big shipments that no longer came. McGee meandered over to the sales registers, saw only one powered up, heard nothing besides the movement of his feet and the hum of the overhead lighting.

“See anything you need?” McGee turned at the sound of Rashid’s voice, which had, over the course of the occupation, become as reedy as the rest of him. McGee smiled again and tried not to stare. Always of slight build, Rashid was starting to look withered, and the onset of a slight stoop told the same story as his graying hair: those persons who were chronologically older felt the loss of the antigerone supplements more profoundly, and more swiftly. Three months ago, Rashid Ketarku had looked about forty; now his chronological age of seventy-eight was rapidly asserting itself. McGee kept his voice casual, cheery, as he said, “Hi, Rashid. Business looks slow today.”

The shop’s proprietor smiled ruefully. “Yep, hard times,” he said, waving at the empty aisles but also following McGee’s eyes down toward his own diminished torso. “Now, what can I do for you, Sandro?” His pitch modulated slightly; his smile widened a bit too much. “Your usual supplies?”

“No, Rashid, I need…I need to ask you a favor.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.” The flat tone combined a faint hint of honest irony with Rashid’s carefully innocent diction. No Baldy listening in—if they could do so—would detect anything amiss.

McGee put on his best crooked smile. “Look, you know the merchandise I keep here on account?”

“Um…let me just check the computer.”

He’s a pretty good actor,
thought McGee.
Hell,
I
almost believe that he has to check “my account.”

“Yes, I see it. Do you need more, Sandro?”

“Uh, no. Actually, I don’t have any immediate need for that merchandise. I was wondering if you could just hold it for me.”

Rashid’s act broke down for a moment: he looked up sharply. “I can hold on to the toys for as long as you need, Sandro. But the—the construction compounds…I can’t do it. I—I don’t have the right kind of storage space for—special—compounds.”

McGee nodded casually for whatever surveillance might be fixed upon the store but felt a needle of dread in his gut. Where else could he stash the explosives he’d ordered through
Rashid? He’d drawn away from his friends when he had started his local bombing campaign against the Baldies, because if the invaders ever bothered to mount true counterinsurgency operations, anyone associated with Alessandro McGee, RFN Marine Reserve, would be on the short list for detention and interrogation. Nothing personal, of course: just standard operating procedure.