First Casualty (21 page)

“Mary,” Lek interrupted her, “one, maybe two ships have landed in front of A company.”

“If Captain Teddy Boy can't handle two ships with twice the people we had to hold six ships, he's not much of an officer.” Lek didn't ask Mary what she honestly thought.

* * * *

Rita lifted ship fast, but a Society cruiser was swinging by just as she did. With no other target, it devoted itself to her obliteration. Rita jinked and ducked the other way, heading in-system—away from the jump. It got her out of range of that damn cruiser soonest. She was almost clear when a laser sliced through the Friendship's cockpit like it was a ripe grapefruit.

* * * *

Mary watched as the battle raged, in space and on the ground. Transports didn't hang around this time, but took off fast. Still, Commander Umboto got a couple of long range missiles off at them.
That woman is one bloodthirsty lady.

Mary didn't feel even a tiny bit guilty twelve hours later when things started to settle down and her sixty klicks had not been tapped. Only a fool looked for a fight.

“Lieutenant Rodrigo, battalion here. Report to A company and assume command.”

“Sir?”

“Do I need to repeat myself, Lieutenant?”

“No sir.” She recovered herself. No need to ask over the net for what he didn't want to give her.

“Lieutenant, we're assuming all radio and cables are compromised. There will be a coded situation report waiting for you at A company HQ. Try to straighten up that mess over there.”

“Yes, Major.”

Mary was quite amazed at what a command rig could do. She made it back to A company in two hours even with stops to return fire. The HQ was a shambles, but casualties were few. The miners and kids had learned how to look out for themselves.

She doubted there were more than two companies attacking, but they'd spread out and come in as infiltrators. The captain had done a poor job of spreading his outposts. When they broke through, he'd led a fire team out to fill the hole—and died.

It took Mary most of the next day to stabilize the situation. Keeping a firm hold on her center, she threw her teams first at her right flank, then at her left. Once the colonials saw they weren't going to take the pass from the rear, they fell back in good order. Mary tried to track them, but they spread out and went to ground. They'd be back.

“A company, battalion here. Could you spare C company a platoon? They're being pushed mighty hard.”

“They're on the way, Major.”

“Thanks for cleaning up the mess.”

Mary refused to say “You're welcome.”

She hadn't cleaned up all the mess. She checked in where they had the captain's body. The wound was in the back; it had come at close range. So the miners and kids had done what they had to do to keep their casualties down.

She turned to the medic who'd brought her. “Clean the burn off his armor and patch it. We may need it. Once you peel the body out, make it presentable and send it back to brigade.”

“Will do, sir.”

Mary wondered what other messes she'd have to clean up.

* * * *

Out of consideration for his rank, they informed Longknife the day before the casualty list was released. They asked him to invite a vid crew out. He should make a statement, he and industrialist Ernest Nuu. They didn't tell him what he should say, but something along the lines of “It is a joy to die for the Fatherland” was strongly hinted at. Ray told them to go to hell.

Mrs. Nuu's wailing went long into the night. It did not keep Ray awake. He sat in the chair he had been sitting in when they brought him the news. He had sat there ever since. The doctors said he had to move, to circulate blood and avoid skin lesions.

The doctors could go to the same hell as the politicians.

About 0200 hours, Mr. Nuu came to his door to apologize for his wife. Ray invited him in, offered him a seat, and pointed to where an untouched bottle of cognac waited. The man poured two glasses, offered him one, and sat. For a long time, they stared silently out the window, undisturbed by the weeping. “I am sorry I could not protect your daughter, Mr. Nuu. I always thought it was a man's place to die, a woman's place to live.”

A wail from upstairs punctuated Ray's sentence. It died out and the night was quiet before Mr. Nuu shook his head. “Since she was twelve, Rita wanted to be a pilot. 'How can I carry a man's child if he has faced death and I am too delicate to stare it in the eye? Let me fight, then see the mother I'll be.' “ The man took a long drink. In the dim light, Ray saw his eyes blinking. Ray's did too; it was not easy to keep the tears back.

“She would have been a very good mother,” Ray finally said.

“Yes,” her father sighed. After a long moment, he muttered, “What a waste.” He seemed taken aback by his words. He glanced at Ray, expecting condemnation. Ray was long past any emotions.

“It's all a waste. All of it. This whole war is nothing but a waste. Those who died under you. Your being crippled. My daughter. It is all for nothing.”

Ray let the word—nothing—roll around his skull. It was a good word. To feel nothing. To be nothing. A good word. For now, he could do nothing. Say nothing. Begin being nothing, as so many of the men and women under his command had become. Did their mothers still weep? Were their fathers looking at what they had sacrificed their lives for and seeing nothing?

Ray deserved to be nothing with them.

“We had such hopes, such dreams when it all began. Unity would bring us together. United behind one powerful man, there would be nothing we and Urm could not do. Foolish lies by those who said them. Foolish dreams by we who listened. And a foolish old man has killed his only child.” Now the man wept, deep, racking sobs that shook his body, yet hardly a noise escaped him.

Ray left him to his silent tears. He had much to contemplate. He had gambled with the lives of so many men and women. They had died, trying to make true the foolish lies he spoke as orders. Rita had said he was forgiven, and in her body he'd found the words could be true. Now she was gone, swept away by a commander's foolish lies. Gone, leaving him alone with hundreds of faces, faces that screamed “murderer” at him, “foolish dreamer” at him, “nothing” at him.

An officer and a gentleman would use a pistol. Yet among all his gear that Rita had brought to her parents' house, neither pistol nor knife were present. He raised his glass in silent salute to the hundreds of eyes accusing him in the dark. “To nothing,” he whispered, and drained the glass.

* * * *

Having successfully repeated one jump, they turned the
Sheffield
into an experiment. If speed mattered and ten meters per second got them to one system, where was the change? Fifty meters, one hundred meters got them to the same system. Somewhere between five hundred meters and one klick per second found them staring at a new sun.

Mattim relaxed only when he was once more gazing at four suns. Or, rather, he returned to that level of tension that had become his norm since the dead admiral ordered him to the tag end of the squadron line. Mattim wondered if he'd ever relax again.

Using both hands to push himself up from his chair, he stood. “All right, crew, we can repeat jumps. Let's knock off, get some rest, and look things over in the morning.” There were a few mutters, but most of the bridge watch headed for the hatch, the middies chattering enthusiastically to each other. Tomorrow, he suspected, they'd have a lot to say.

“Guns, have your chiefs make sure those middies get at least eight hours sleep.”

Guns was chuckling. “I've already had a few chiefs ask me if I'd back them up. I told them there was a baseball bat behind my stateroom door they were welcome to.”

“Exec, set a minimum watch. Keep the middies out of it.”

“Will do, sir.”

“Sandy, do I need to get Ivan to haul you away?”

“No, I've fought my demons. I'll get a good night's sleep and return a hardheaded rationalist.” With a wave, she went.

Mattim treated himself to a long, thoughtful shower. They'd gone where no human had gone—and come back. There was a logic to these damn jump points. Yet, they still didn't understand something. What was it about their original jump? The question did not keep him awake.

* * * *

Ray was still in his chair the next morning; he doubted he had slept. The day passed slowly, marked by the ticking of the clock on the fireplace. Ray let the tick-tock fill his mind. For a man who had been forever active—thinking, planning, doing—this was the closest to nothing he'd ever been. They offered him food. He ignored it, as he did the pitcher of tea they left.

Night and day and night came again. The cook begged him to eat, to drink. Mr. Nuu pleaded with him. “Even my wife eats something. Drinks a little tea. Please, Major.”

He answered them with nothing.

Captain Santiago arrived and sat beside him. The silence between them stretched. They spun it into soft nothing. Occasionally, the captain would add words, more to ornament the silence than break it. First words were about the brigade. It was being rebuilt as a division. Its commander had two stars, though until recently he'd been a party hack. Santiago had wrangled command of a company of old hands.

The quiet grew. Others left them alone. Only then did Santiago weep—and it was not for Rita. His kid sister had shared with her church group how much she didn't want her only son drafted. The police had come for her in the night. The family had been required to pay for the bullet. Only the captain had dared to face the police and collect her ashes.

Paying for the bullet was an old tradition. Santiago had never thought he would serve a government that followed it. Neither had Ray. For this Rita had died?

Ray did not notice when the captain left.

Another night and day passed . . . maybe two. The doctor came; he muttered of dehydration and punctured Ray's arm with a needle, left a pole standing beside his chair with a plastic bag that slowly emptied clear liquid into him. That night Ray removed the needle. They did not put another into him.

Time passed into nothing. A car drove up the tree-lined driveway. Rita raced across the grass. It was not the first time he had seen her. This time, she seemed so happy. Maybe this time she had come for him. He closed his eyes, willed himself to nothing.

The door slammed open. “Ray, Mother, Father. I'm not dead. I'm home.” Ray opened his eyes. Rita... bedraggled, begrimed, still in a pilot suit that stank of fear and old vomit. . . threw herself at his knees. “I'm alive, and you look like shit.”

If he had the moisture to spare, he might have cried.

* * * *

First Lieutenant Mary Rodrigo stared at the map projected on her eyeball. The damn colonials had landed another ship on her front. Just one. Not more than a company. More people to kill. More people killing her own. With an exhausted sigh, she began moving her forces to meet them.

For the next three hours, they came at her in twos and threes. Nothing bigger. Most of the time, Mary did nothing. Her troops were dug in; sensors out, rockets ready. Colonials died trying to cross her rim, find her people, fix them in place or force them into the open, do anything that would let them kill the pass's defenders, punch a hole through the wall into the crater.

The colonials came, and fought, and died.

And through it all, Mary hardly felt a twitch.

She felt nothing even when she sent Dumont out with a fire team to mop up what was left of half a platoon of colonials. She watched the hostile icons disappear from her map, but felt no relief. There were more behind those. She wasted no time on visuals of the fight. The enemy was colored pixels. Just that, no more. Her forces were different-colored icons. Just that. No more. Friendship was something hardly remembered from a distant, forgotten past. She sent a sergeant here, another there. She tried not to think of the name—Cassie, Dumont, whatever name had been attached to the rank.

In four hours, this battle was over, the wreckage of the colonials slinking back. She let them go; she had nothing to risk in pursuit. She'd held them, and kept them from learning what they could not be allowed to know. Company A was not here.

Mary commanded the remnants of first platoon, puffed up with a few green replacements. Second and third platoons were long gone, gone to reinforce bled and shattered C company. Mary could not remember how many times she'd held the pass. She'd held it again, and would keep holding it until. . .

Hold until relieved, her orders said. She wondered if there would be anything left of them by the time relief came. She shivered, and shook that thought off. She had things to do.

She keyed her mike. “Sergeant, fourth squad. The left needs some shoring up. Can you loan a fire section to first?”

“We're getting a little thin.” Cassie answered as the tough sergeant, then softened. “But Dumont looks to be even thinner. They're on their way, Lieutenant.”

“Thanks, Sergeant.”

“Mary.” The voice was soft, full of memories Mary couldn't afford to touch. “When are you going to take some R&R? Everyone's been back to brigade for a couple of hours. Everyone but you. Mary, you can't carry this damn pass forever.”