Ninth City Burning (37 page)

I'm about to tell her, but it's too late: The lights around me go out, then, after a few beats of total darkness, in which the air becomes noticeably still and silent, conventional power kicks in, and the room fills with cold, fluorescent light and the whirring of fans circulating air. I run down the hall to the communications room, trying not to think about the anarchy no doubt unfolding in the habitation decks below. I just hope Kiz has taken my request seriously.

The communications room is empty, the harvester's entire crew probably up above decks, getting some air while they wait for the power to return. We're out in the middle of nowhere, a hundred kilometers at least from anything Romeo might conceivably choose as a target, though that won't do us much good if the whole Valentine Host comes crashing through Lunar Veil.

I switch on the radio and turn to long-distance recreational, a channel reserved for cadets with an interest in conventional communications,
meaning it would probably be free even if we weren't in the middle of an incursion. “Kizabel?” I say, depressing the transmit switch. “Kiz, are you there? Come in.” Nothing. I try again and am similarly disappointed. And then I hear a distant, electronic whine, and Kizabel's voice comes crackling through the speaker.

“Vinneas? Is that you?”

“Kiz, yes,” I say, relieved. “I'm here.”

“What's so important you've got me using a stupid cog radio?”

“Your equus—does it fly?”

Silence, then, “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“The equus you've been building secretly in your workshop for the past several months,” I say slowly. “Does it work?”

Another long pause. “Yes,” she says finally.

We have a chance, then—a very, very small chance. I take a deep breath, going over the possibilities in my mind, calculating and considering my plan. How sure am I the Valentines are really coming? How sure am I we can stop them? Sure enough to ask my friend to do something that will almost certainly get her killed?

“Kiz.” For a few frantic seconds, I rack my brain for another alternative—anything else—and come up with nothing. It's got to be Kizabel, this girl I've known since we were six years old, or the world. I have to ask her, and if she refuses, I have to convince her.

“Vinn? You still there?”

“Kiz,” I say again, exhaling, doing my best to hold my voice steady. “I need you to do something unbelievably dangerous.”

F
lying an equus takes discipline. Training and dedication and talent, but discipline above of all. It's something you never truly understand until you've felt one of these giants come alive at your touch. The uninitiated see only the colossus of metal and stone, the suit of armor that allows a creature of mere meat and bone to contend with a horde of alien machines. And with good reason—we equites are trained to make it look easy. Only after we've proven ourselves a hundred times over are we finally given an equus of our own. We're taught to fly, yes, and to fight, but beyond that we're taught respect. The equus, more than any other weapon we possess, is attuned to thelemity's primal currents, its wild and chaotic nature. The power an equus wields is a force, like the wind or the tides, a force that can turn on you at any moment and rewards carelessness with swift and decisive brutality. Respect your equus, respect its power, or it will kill you. That's something every eques learns early on.

Cruising speed is a perfect example. Legionary equi are capable of attaining tremendous velocities. The average equus in Ninth City's defense force could travel from Earth's surface to the Moon in under an hour, assuming an unobstructed route and a constant and reliable source of thelemity. The trouble is that thelemity is rarely available in constant and reliable quantities—at least not when you're moving at three hundred thousand kilometers per hour. At that speed, you would shoot through a first-factor umbris—slightly over three kilometers in diameter—in about four-tenths of a second. Once you're out the other side, your equus turns back into a pumpkin, as the saying goes. No few headstrong recruits have ended their careers plummeting to Earth in a fancy-looking hunk of rock and metal that used to be a fully functioning equus. It happens often
enough that we have a name for it: blasting out. The faster you go, the smaller those little bubbles of power that fontani project seem. On your way into battle, flying in formation with a source at the center, you might well be positioned right up against the edge of the umbris, so close that a single mistake will send you careening into the aeter. Traveling at cruising speed is a little like riding a cresting wave. Thrilling, but constantly poised on the edge of disaster. To make it as part of the Legion's Armored Cavalry, you need the nerve to toe that edge, but—more importantly—the discipline to never venture over.

Right now we're traveling at roughly 2,000 kph, just under twice the speed of sound—generally considered a safe speed for a full-sized sortie, one that includes infantry and artillery in addition to the faster and more maneuverable Armored Cavalry, otherwise known as the equites. Speeds for an emergency intercept run three and four times the rate we're moving now, and that's only when we're planning to remain within Earth's atmosphere. Once you leave Earth, you leave the world of quadruple-digit velocities behind also. But today our orders have us heading for the Second Principate—a hop, skip, and a jump, relatively speaking—and only in a reinforcing capacity, as reports tell us the Sixth and Third Legions have already engaged the enemy.

That isn't to say we're attending as casual spectators. No one's bringing any party favors today. Our sortie consists of seven full cohorts, more than two-thirds of Ninth City's active defense force, strung out in an arcing line five hundred kilometers long. We have a complement of five fontani—further evidence that Command isn't screwing around—each projecting a sphere of thelemity and traveling at supersonic speeds, surrounded by a swarm of legionaries hanging on for dear life. First, Second, and Fifth Cohorts, those weighted most heavily toward armored fighters, are clustered together in the lead, moving in close formation. If we're ordered into battle, they'll be the ones to breach the enemy lines. The rest of us are dotted behind, one cohort per source, trailing all the way back to Ninth City, where Seventh Cohort has just launched. My 'drille—126th Equites, Sixth Cohort Armored, Ninth Legion—is with the next bubble out.

We're at the rear of the formation, just the place for a 'drille of jockeys who have yet to dance with Romeo toe to toe. We've been on active duty only a few months, though it feels like years since I was dismissed from my afternoon lessons with orders to report to the Curator's office. My hopes for
the meeting were low. Joint exercises with the Academies of Fifth and Eighth Cities had concluded only days before, and the celebration afterward had gotten notably out of hand, especially among the Ninth Equites Aspirant, who had dominated the field. As Decurio, responsibility for the squad's behavior rested solely with me, and I was prepared for a full dressing-down. Instead, I found Dux Reydaan, Ninth Legion's highest-ranking officer, seated in front of the Curator's desk. While Curator Ellmore looked on coldly, the Dux explained that he would be inviting me to graduate to active duty with the Legion's equites. Of late their ranks had dwindled to a dangerous low. While there was no shortage of volunteers, so few successfully completed training that it was becoming infeasible to supply armored fighters to the Front while maintaining a stable defense force at home. He wanted to see whether there was a future in accelerating the training program for certain exceptional candidates, and having watched my Ninth EAs in the recent exercises, he decided it was worth a shot. The Curator didn't try to hide her disapproval but stressed that if I wanted to volunteer, there was nothing she could do to stop me. I could have two days to decide whether to accept the Dux's offer and recommend eleven other animi from the program, enough for an escadrille. “If you don't mind, sir,” I said, “I can tell you now.” Joining up wasn't a question. I'd spent the past five years training for this moment. As for my recommendations, I could think of at least twenty animi who could have held their own with the Armored Cavalry, but as it happened, my first string numbered exactly twelve fighters, myself included. I doubt it was a coincidence.

Now we're on our third official sortie—fourth counting that first mission rounding up nocos in the valley—flying in close formation at the tail of Sixth Cohort. Though we've already settled into cruising speed, I'm keeping us in the tighter spiral formation—typically used only during the chaotic moments directly following launch—as a reminder to stay sharp. One false move, one misjudgment in course or heading, is still enough to put you outside your umbris. Maybe Seventh Cohort would dive to catch you, and you'd get to spend the rest of the mission as the rookie who couldn't control his equus, but more likely you'd drop like a stone—because you'd be inside of one. Assuming your safety gear deployed properly, you'd still have two or three days to cool your heels, all alone in noco territory, before anyone bothered to track you down, so the Legion could give your equus to someone who actually had the chops to fly it.

Once we clear the cloud deck, however, I give the order to relax formation. From here, it's a straight shot to our destination over the Second Principate. Ahead, I can see the shimmer of another umbris, Fourth Cohort buzzing inside like a swarm of gnats, and further still the marble-sized umbris carrying Third. Blue horizon stretches on every side, fading to black overhead, while a daytime moon looms, pale and huge.

My order to relax formation is also the signal that conversation beyond orders, acknowledgments, and status updates is now allowed, and Ottumtee, who can't stand long silences, speaks up almost immediately.

So what are the chances we'll see combat this sortie?
he asks from his equus, 126-005, call sign LanceLightning. It isn't exactly his voice I hear—more an impression of it. During missions, equi most often communicate by Directed Speech, a method that solves many of the problems inherent in traditional verbal communication. By conveying words directly from the speech-generating area of one brain to the speech-interpreting area of another, DS cuts down on opportunities for misunderstanding—particularly useful during the confusion of battle—without requiring you to decipher another person's actual thoughts, a process so cumbersome it makes interpreting garbled radio signals seem simple by comparison. An interesting side effect of DS is that it often doesn't sound much like the person's actual voice—what you hear is how that person sounds to him- or herself. Ottumtee, a tall, sturdy guy with a voice so deep he usually sounds like he's speaking from the bottom of a well, comes across as smaller and younger over DS, and his wry, almost sarcastic tone, easy to miss in normal speech, stands out more clearly.

Slim to none,
Iftito answers. He graduated from the SoR near the top of First Class, and could easily have gone on to intensive studies at Philosophy if he hadn't been picked for the Equites Aspirant. He can always be depended upon for accurate information delivered swiftly and free of ornament. In person, people often find him abrasive, but the voice coming from his equus, 126-011, call sign ThunderWalking, is unexpectedly silky in tone.

Well,
Pelashwa says
, that all depends on how you define “see.” I'm sure we'll have a perfectly good view of the battle.
Pesh and Ottumtee are close friends, and she'll take any opportunity for banter. Her equus, 126-007, call sign FallingLeaf, sidles up to Thunder but stops short of giving him a playful bump, something she'd do if we weren't on a mission.

That's if the battle is still going on,
Midmurro interjects.
Sixth and Third Legions should have things pretty well mopped up by the time we get there. The only reason we'd have to engage is if we were all pretty thoroughly buggered already.
Midmurro is an excellent flier and extremely resourceful, but I nearly left him out of this 'drille because of his obnoxious habit of playing the utmost authority on any and all subjects, especially those he knows nothing about. There are hundreds of scenarios that could end up with us in combat, and in only about half of them would we be pretty thoroughly buggered. Fortunately, no one else in the 'drille takes him very seriously.

Shut up, Middy,
Sensen snaps. As the oldest in the 'drille—she was in her last few weeks as an Officer Aspirant when we were promoted—Sensen has assumed the role of unofficial disciplinarian, making it her duty to curtail all behavior beneath the dignity of the Legion. It's a job I'm glad to leave to her.

A few moments of silence pass, then Pelashwa says,
So when you say what are the chances, are you looking for like an over/under or what?

Are you offering odds on whether we get into it today, Pesh?
asks Uo. He's one of the few exceptions to the rule that equites, as a type, are highly competitive and rigidly self-motivated. Despite being ranked fourth in overall scores back in the program, he comes off as easygoing to the point of laziness.

I just want to get back to our game of tarot before
someone
messes with my hand,
Pelashwa answers.
I've noticed every time we leave in the middle of a game, the cards mysteriously shift in
certain
people's favor.

Are you accusing me of cheating?
Uo asks, his voice ringing with insincerity over DS.

You're on record as admitting you cheat on almost every hand,
Ottumtee points out.

It's all part of the game,
Uo insists.

Isn't cheating by definition
not
part of the game?
Pelashwa asks.

Let's call it extraregulatory strategy, then,
Uo clarifies.

And what exactly are your “extraregulatory strategies”?

For tarot? Mostly just stacking the deck so I get better cards.

That's
cheating
!

I actually would settle for just a look at a battle,
Ottumtee says, apparently trying to get the conversation back on track.

I would like to officially extend my invitation to shut up to Uo and
Pelashwa,
Sensen says.
Ottumtee, too, actually. Why don't all three of you just—did anyone just see that?

Something has just flashed by to our right, an object moving so fast it was little more than a pale-colored blur. Immediately, I order my 'drille into combat posture. Though it takes less than a second, by the time we've readied our weapons, the object is well past—already barely a speck shrinking into the distance as it races alongside Sixth Cohort.

I reach out to the DS conduit reserved for officers and raise Centurio Kitu, the commander of Sixth Cohort.
Sir,
I say,
FireChaser here, Decurio of the 126th. We've spotted an unidentified object moving in your direction at high velocity.

We see it, Chaser,
Kitu replies. He's a veteran of the Realms, with three tours and hundreds of enemy kills to his credit. Rumor has it in all that time he's never raised his voice once, even with a pair of Valentine Zeros bearing down on him.
We're trying to make contact now. Maintain your position and wait for orders.