Portal Wars 1: Gehenna Dawn (21 page)

Kazan sat looking back, a stunned expression
on his face. Taylor was taunting him, challenging him to call for
the guards and have him arrested. The crazy fool really didn’t care
what happened to him.

“I fought for ten years to defend Earth…it’s
the only good reason I was ever given to be here.” Taylor’s sat
perfectly still as he spoke. “But now I wonder if a species that
voluntarily surrendered its freedom to the likes of you out of
nothing but base fear is even worth defending.”

Kazan slammed his hand on his desk. “That is
enough, Major Taylor.” He stood up, his chair falling over
backwards behind him. “You will go back because you are told to do
so, you arrogant, insignificant nothing!” Kazan had lost all
control over his rage.

“You will go back because I need you there.
Because those miserable recruits stumbling like cattle through that
Portal will die that much more quickly without you there.” He
stared at Taylor, hatred burning in his eyes. “I don’t care how
many we have to send through…how many thousands die. Do you? There
are always more ignorant farm boys to send through.” He moved
closer, his face 30 centimeters from Jake’s. “How do you feel about
that? Do you care about the thousand…the ten thousand…others that
will be sent here, ones who might have remained home to live out
their miserable lives?”

Taylor was silent. Kazan had hit a tender
spot. Jake had come to believe the newbs he saved were doomed
anyway, but the thought of more young men being forced into service
to replace them was something he hadn’t considered.

“You like the thought of that?” Kazan’s voice
dripped with bitterness and condescension. “How about those friends
of yours?”

Taylor’s gaze had shifted from Kazan, but now
it snapped back.

“Captains Black and Samuels…Lieutenants Young
and Daniels…if you defy me again, they will lead their forces into
the most hopeless battles men have ever fought. You will sit in a
cell, and before you are shot, you will know that every one of them
is dead, their bodies left to rot and blow away in the desert.”

Taylor’s shoulders fell. Kazan’s words were
slicing into him like daggers, draining his resolve.

“And that girl you like so much…” Kazan’s
voice dripped with venom. “…I will find the most sadistic gang of
twisted sodomites in Earth’s worst freezones, and I will have them
conscripted and sent here. And I will give her to them, let them
use her to vent their anger. I’ll make sure she knows why before I
do.” Kazan was relishing the words as he spoke them. “She’ll think
she was fucked by a felled tree by the time they’re done…by the
time they have used her in every sick and degrading way you can
imagine. And a hundred you can’t. And then she will die too,
cursing your name.”

Taylor sat silently, hunched over, his spirit
broken. The fight was gone, the determination drained entirely from
his body, from his soul. He had lost, and he knew it. “I’ll go
back.” He spoke softly, almost a whisper.

“What was that, Major?” Kazan was gloating,
the arrogance in his voice unmistakable. “I couldn’t quite hear
you.”

“I said I’ll go back.” Taylor forced it out,
loud and clear.

Kazan nodded. “Then get going.” He gestured
toward the door. “But first, don’t you think you should thank me,
Major? For making you see the light.” Kazan was determined to
humiliate Taylor.

Taylor was struggling, trying to keep from
lunging at Kazan. He could kill the miserable little bureaucrat in
less than a second; he was sure of that. But Kazan would have his
vengeance from the grave…every punishment he’d promised, every
horror he threatened to heap on Hope and Blackie and the
others…Jake knew all that would happen if he killed the miserable
piece of dogshit.

“Thank you.” Taylor spat it out.

“You are welcome, Major.” Every word was a
mockery, sapping what little remained of Jake’s spirit. “I trust
that you will be a good little soldier from now on?”

Taylor just nodded. Then he got up and
wordlessly walked to the door.

“Wait, Major.” Kazan’s voice was
imperious.

Taylor turned and looked back. “Yes?” His
voice was pure exhaustion.

“Here.” Kazan tossed a small box to
Taylor.

Jake glanced down. There were two small
silver eagles in the container. What is this, he thought…some kind
of sick fucking joke? He stared at Kazan, a confused look on his
face.

“It’s a schedule promotion, Ma…Colonel
Taylor. And we don’t want anyone thinking anything is out of the
ordinary, do we?”

Taylor didn’t say a word. He put the box in
his pocket and walked out the door.

From the Journal of Jake Taylor:

Darkness and despair. They are my
world, my reality. The closer we get to victory, the more leaden my
spirit becomes. There is a feeling of hope in the air among the
men…but it is false. The troops can feel victory; they can perceive
the weakening of the Machines. But that triumph will not be ours,
the men who fought and bled for it. It will be UN Central’s. For
us, banished forever from home, there is nothing.

People will trust in something
simply because they cannot face the reality that there is so little
worth believing in. It’s a defense, your mind’s attempt to protect
itself from surrender, from madness. I look back on things I
accepted, that I believed, and I feel like a fool. Being honest
with yourself, seeing things for what they truly are…it is
exhausting. I feel a gloominess I cannot adequately describe. I am
lost…there is nothing, nothing at all to work for, to strive for,
to fight for. Nothing I do, nothing any of my men do, will make any
difference.

I see how people think, how they
convince themselves of so many things, utterly ignoring the facts
to do so. Part of me wants to grab them, shake them…make them see
things for what they really are. The hopelessness…the corruption
and evil that permeate every aspect of life. But what would that
serve? I let them deceive themselves…it is little more than a
mercy. I see the truth, but they, poor deceived fools, are far
better off than I.

Even my own mind is conflicted. I’ve
learned to manage my fear in battle, but it’s still there. Every
time. It has been years since I really cared if I came back from a
fight, but it doesn’t matter. It’s instinctive. No matter what my
intellect dictates, how much I long for the peace of death, to lay
down my burdens…my subconscious wants to survive. It pushes me,
makes me use all I have within me to stay alive. And that is really
starting to piss me off.

“I’m worried about him, aren’t you?” Tony
Black spoke softly, though he and his cohorts were alone in the
mess hall.

“Jake’s the toughest guy I’ve ever met,
Blackie.” The small plastic chair looked almost like a toy under
Samuels’ huge frame. “I can’t believe he’s losing it. He’s just
tired. How could he not be?”

Hank Daniels let out a long sigh. “I don’t
know, Bear.” He looked at the big man then at Blackie. “Have you
ever thought about how much pressure he has on him? 24/7?” He
paused. “We all lean on him too. We’re his friends, but tell me
there’s one person in this room who doesn’t look to Jake when he’s
got a problem.”

There was no response. They were all quiet
for a minute. Daniels had put into words what they were all
thinking. He was their leader, their friend. There wasn’t a man in
the room who didn’t love Jake Taylor like a brother. But now they
wondered, second guessed. Taylor had always been there…for all of
them. Now, they questioned themselves…had they been blind to his
pain…or at least the extent of it? Had they failed to be there for
him?

“I’ve known Jake for eight years. Nobody’s
saying he’s losing it.” Blackie looked around the room. “But he’s
more stressed now than I’ve ever seen him. He’s always been strong
for us, Goddamn it, it’s time for us to be strong for him.” Black’s
tone was firm, definitive. “We’re moving out at 0700 hours
tomorrow. I want everyone at 150%. No slipups, no mistakes. We
execute perfectly. We don’t give him a reason to worry about
anything.” He looked around the room again, pausing to lock eyes
with each of them in turn. “Understood?”

“Blackie’s right.” Daniels was nodding as he
spoke. “Jake needs us to back him up now. We need to be at our best
tomorrow. Even more than usual.” He looked up at Blackie. “Are we
all agreed?”

Daniels was being technically insubordinate.
Blackie was the highest ranked after Taylor, and anything he told
them to do was, by definition, an order. But Black knew Daniels was
on the same page…and what he wanted from everyone wasn’t something
a command could compel. He was after everything they had deep
inside…their inner strength. He wanted them to give their all, even
more than they always did.

He took a step forward toward the others and
extended his hand. Daniels did it next, followed by Samuels and
then Young. They grasped hands in the center of the circle.

“For Jake.” Black said it first, and they all
repeated his words. “For Jake.”

“The men are ready, Colonel.” Major Black
stood next to Taylor, his body upright, almost at attention. They
were about to launch the biggest battle since the war on Erastus
began. Black was usually pretty relaxed, but something about the
scope of the operation was making him feel more formal than usual.
He was nearly as cynical as Taylor most of the time, but now he
felt like they were really moving toward victory.

Taylor looked back, a sour look passing over
his face as it usually did when someone called him colonel.
“Excellent.” His tone was deadpan, devoid of emotion. “That’s the
third time you’ve updated me in the last fifteen minutes. What’s up
with you?”

Blackie looked back at Taylor. “Nothing’s up.
It’s just one hell of a big force we’ve got here, Jake.”

Taylor looked back suspiciously for a few
seconds then smiled. “That it is, my friend.” He let out a long
breath. “We will advance as soon as the Dragonfires complete their
second attack run.” The gunships had already made one pass, and
they were coming around for another. There was a wind coming in
from over the enemy positions, blowing the pungent residue of the
fuel air bombs over Taylor’s troops.

The objective was a crucial one, the main
enemy base and Machine production center on the planet. The
location of the facility was the enemy’s most closely guarded
secret on Erastus, but a simple communications intercept had
disclosed its location.

Taylor was suspicious. The enemy was never
careless, and this error had been downright reckless. His instincts
smelled a trap. But no one listened to his warnings. The high
command saw a chance to slice years off the duration of the war,
and they were determined to seize the opportunity. Their greed for
a victory overruled caution. Taylor was ordered to take command of
the operation over his boisterous objections. He knew what it would
mean to refuse, what a betrayal it would be to his friends…and to
Hope. He had not forgotten Kazan’s threat, and he knew they would
pay the price for his defiance. Taylor didn’t care what they did to
him…threats against him didn’t give them any leverage. But the
small circle of people he truly cared for…they were his Achilles
heel.

He may not have been able to cancel the
attack, but he was damned sure going to run things the way he saw
fit. He’d chosen an LZ 10 kilometers from the target and marched
the rest of the way, with clouds of scouts out in all
directions.

He heard the sound of the Dragonfires raking
the enemy positions with autogun fire. The first pass had been
devastating, but Taylor had ordered the second attack anyway. He
didn’t know what the enemy was up to, but he was sure it was
something. He was damned sure going to do everything he could to
protect his forces…against whatever was waiting for them.

“Colonel Taylor, Major MacArthur here.”
Taylor and MacArthur still didn’t really get along, but they’d
learned to respect each other after a fashion. “The second attack
run is complete. Returning to base to rearm.”

“Very well, Major.” Taylor’s enhanced eyes
were scanning the raging hell of the enemy position. “It looks like
you really smacked them hard.” MacArthur was an arrogant shit, but
Taylor figured he could be a big enough man to praise a job well
done.”

“Thank you, Colonel.” The gunship commander
couldn’t keep all the surprise out of his voice. “MacArthur
out.”

Taylor sighed. He was still troubled, worried
about what surprises the enemy had in store for his people. But if
he couldn’t get out of attacking, now was the time to get started.
He turned and looked at Black. “Blackie, it’s time for you to get
up there. You may commence your attack when ready.”

Taylor paced back and forth in the command
post. He hated being back from the action when his men were in the
battle line, but he was responsible for 3 full battalions, and he
couldn’t do his job pinned down in some foxhole. He hated every
minute of it. He longed to turn over the burden of command to
someone else, and go back and run his section. But he knew his
responsibilities…there were 3,500 men fighting out there, and every
one of them was depending on him.

“Jake...” It was Blackie, reporting in.
“…they’re pulling back. MacArthur’s birds must have really kicked
the crap out of them, because they aren’t putting up much of a
fight.”

It was good news, but it made his stomach
lurch. He was expecting some sort of a trap, and this only made him
more suspicious. “Blackie…” Taylor’s voice was firm, but the
tension was obvious too. “…keep your eyes open, OK? I mean really
open.” He paused. “I have a bad feeling about this.”

“They’re wide open, Jake. And the rest of the
guys too. We’re all looking for any kind of trap or surprise.”
Black’s tone was reassuring. He was worried about the stress he
heard in Taylor’s voice, and he wanted to do everything he could to
help his friend shoulder the burden he carried.