The War for Profit Series Omnibus (98 page)

Capellan Marine Pilot Michael Stovall took up a light jog as he made his way down the flight line to his Interceptor. The sun had just come up and the solar flares were clipping the atmosphere. He didn’t feel any excessive solar radiation but he didn’t want to be exposed any longer than necessary. Mandarin’s orbit would soon bring it right under the solar flares. Going outside unprotected would soon be harmful or fatal. Today, it was just enough interference to make sensors and targeting systems unreliable at standoff ranges.

This mission was basic. Flight Control’s ground-based sensors had detected a Mosh drone but were unable to engage it. The drone flew in before sunrise and was on station at high altitude to scan the area around Mandarin City, the capitol city of Mandarin. It had to be on its own, pre-programmed to get on station and likely programmed to fly back to its base after sunset, loaded with useful information for Mosh tactical planners. Stovall would fly up, get a visual, shoot it down and then come on back to base and then take the rest of the day off.

His ground crew stuffed him in his plane and the crew chief gave him a thumb up. Stovall taxied to the end of the runway, saw the light on the control tower turn green, then accelerated along the runway and angled his nose up to eight hundred mils and shot into the sky at three times the speed of sound. He stayed on vector and leveled off and saw the drone to his left, twelve hundred meters away. The lights of his comms gear showed red and amber status indicators, so he didn’t bother with trying to report. He’d do that later, in person.

He made a wide turn and came back toward the drone and gave it three good blasts with his dual medium lasers. One blast was sufficient but he wanted to slice up the debris as well. Out of habit, he nosed up a bit to get over where the target had been and then went into a shallow dive, looking back over each shoulder, back and forth, head on a swivel. To his high left rear he saw a bright streak, a trail like a tiny meteor might make. But it changed direction and vectored toward him. Stovall climbed and rolled so he could get a better look at the object. Looking straight up through his transparent canopy he identified a boxy, awkward Mosh space fighter.

It fired its lasers at him, narrowly missing. Stovall then swung around behind it, to follow the Mosh space fighter in its shallow dive. Easy money, the Mosh spacecraft had no atmospheric control surfaces, just flat surfaces causing immense drag. The space fighter was sluggish here, this deep in the planet’s gravity well. Stovall judged that the Mosh fighter couldn’t get out of its dive, and its dive was steepening; it was doomed to crash.

Stovall matched its mach 3.2 speed and casually lined up his rail gun’s visual sights. He said, “Dumbass,” and fired a two second burst square into the Mosh fighter’s flat rear panel. The space fighter disintegrated. The debris passed under Stovall’s Interceptor but the ejection pod which contained the Mosh pilot in his detached cockpit managed to clip the tip of Stovall’s left stabilizer. He slowed to under Mach 1 and felt the aerospacecraft’s new flight characteristics. He then looked down at the terrain and realized he was vectored toward Mosh territory.

A warning light flashed. Stovall looked and saw that he’d lost a great deal of atmospheric thruster fuel, an entire two blocks jettisoned by the Interceptor’s computer when it thought a collision was imminent. Sensors, unreliable because of the solar flares, caused the computer to make that mistake. Stovall did some quick mental calculations and realized he couldn’t make it back to base. He looked for a place to land, or ditch.

Ground fire greeted him, some Mosh anti-aircraft guns near their front line of advance. Stovall accelerated and climbed, avoided the attack easily. But he was now over Mosh territory. Better to ditch in the rear area, far away from front-line troops who’d have the good sense to kill first and think later. Stovall found a soybean field with a wooded area at its far end. He flew low, fifty meters off the ground, and when he was over the field he punched out of his Interceptor. The cockpit separated, detected the atmosphere and deployed its parachute. It set him down in the woods, the landing hard enough to stun him but not hard enough to injure him. Stovall shook his head and listened for the explosive sound of the Interceptor self-destructing. Too late to hear that, some time had passed while he was blacked out. He then raised his canopy and took off his harness, assed the detached cockpit.

He stood on his seat and looked around, grateful for the woods that screened his position, gave him shade from the sun and its flares. He grabbed the survival pack and hung it on his back, removed his flight helmet and put on his ground-troop brain bucket, checked the load of his sidearm and climbed down to the ground. He used his feet to scuff aside some leaves to clear a patch of dirt and knelt and drew some lines, figured he was forty klicks inside Mosh territory. He could cover that distance in a couple of nights, moving at night to avoid those damned solar rays. He knew that after three or four more days, the flares would be bad enough to fry him at night unless he found a rat hole to hide in…for the next two weeks. Too long.

He stood and ate an energy bar and then started walking. Better to get out of here now, risk today’s negligible exposure to the radiation in order to cover some ground. He’d just left the tree line and stepped between rows of soy beans when he heard a loud pop and felt shoved from the left, hard. He fell on his right side and rolled, entangled in a net. Two Mosh warriors smiled down at him. One held his sword at the ready, the other held a large-mouthed shotgun-like weapon. The second Mosh opened his weapon’s breach and inserted a cartridge that looked more lethal than a net-capture round. He pointed the weapon at Stovall while the first Mosh used his sword to cut away the netting. He then sheathed his sword and removed Stovall’s pack, gun belt and helmet, and then lifted Stovall to his feet.

The Mosh then drew a shock stick and prodded Stovall to get moving toward the road at the edge of the field. Stovall said, “You guys speak Standard?”

The Mosh Warrior said, “Yes,” and poked Stovall with the shock stick again. “Shut up.”

They walked a hundred meters along the road and had Stovall climb up into the back of a light duty truck. After a few minutes, four more Mosh warriors came and got in the truck and it carried them back to a Brigade-sized headquarters camp. There, Stovall was bound and gagged and blindfolded and tossed into the back of another truck that carried him and a squad of wounded Mosh warriors through the night, arriving at the outskirts of the ruined city of Cherry Fork just as the sun was rising.

Stovall was unloaded and untied, his blindfold and gag removed. He stood for a moment and then an older Mosh warrior walked up and said, “Follow me,” and then turned and walked away. Stovall gave it some thought, shrugged, followed the old warrior into a tent. The Mosh pointed at a fold-up chair by a field table and said, “Sit.”

Stovall sat. A tall, young, full-figured blonde woman in a leather bodice and knee-length red skirt came forward and put a glass of water and a field ration on the table and said, “Eat,” and stared at Stovall. He took a sip of water and reached for the ration. She turned and left.

The old Mosh warrior said, “I am Olaf, second son of Hallgarth, the High Chief of the Five Clans of Mandarin.” He pointed at Stovall. “You are my bondsman.”

Stovall’s face scrunched, confused.

The High Chief said, “You are not familiar with our customs. You have proven yourself worthy, you and your Interceptor pilots. You have fought well and with honor and have killed many of my warriors. You are now my bondsman for one year and during that year you will make up for those losses.”

Stovall said, “I don’t understand.”

The High Chief turned away and said, “Jackson! Explain this to him!”

Jackson was an unarmed man, of medium build and height, clean-shaven. He wore khaki coveralls, “Right, Chief!” He stepped up to the table, slid up another chair and sat. The Mosh High Chief left the tent. Stovall weighed his options, his chances of escape. Not yet. There would be plenty of time for that later, after dark.

Jackson said, “The Mosh. What do you know about them?”

Stovall noticed Jackson’s short black hair, light brown complexion. “Their pilots suck.”

Jackson laughed. “They began as a slave race, selectively bred and genetically altered to serve as cheap labor for a terraforming corporation. A group of them rebelled and took off to deep space more than a thousand years ago. There, they created more worlds and established a loosely confederated empire. Now, they are back in old Terran Empire space to loot and plunder.”

Stovall said, “So what?”

“Their gene pool is getting a little stale.”

“Inbred.” Stovall laughed.

Jackson pointed at Stovall. “You are going to fix all that.”

“What?”

Jackson said, “You and your Interceptor buddies have killed more than two hundred Mosh warriors. They want those lives back. You will breed with Mosh women, sire at least five hundred children, to ensure they get back at least two hundred males worthy of warrior status.”

“I can give them enough material for that in a couple of days. What happens to me after that?”

Jackson smiled and said, “No, they like it all natural.”

Stovall sipped more water. “You mean…”

“That’s right. The Mosh don’t like test-tube babies. They figure that a sperm that’s been caught by a lab tech and jammed into just any old egg can’t produce the best offspring. They figure there is a reason the right sperm has to get out ahead of the others, and that not every egg is suitable, that some eggs are so defective, no self-respecting sperm would ever bore into them.”

“So they don’t use artificial insemination?”

“They do when they have to, they aren’t complete fanatics. They use artificial insemination, mechanical gestation, even cloning when they are desperate, but they don’t like it. They try to live life naturally when it’s feasible. They are looking to restore their humanity, give life a natural balance. It’s not a completely achievable goal and they know that, but it kind of makes sense. They try.”

Stovall said, “So during the next year I’m supposed to knock up five hundred women the old-fashioned way.”

Jackson winked, “You have a year. They’ll have a schedule, healthy women of childbearing age who come to you when they are ovulating. Three to five a day, depending on who’s ready and available. I know that the Mosh don’t really expect you to produce five hundred pregnancies in a year. Just make an honest effort to keep up and you’ll be treated well.”

Stovall said, “What happens to me when that year is over?”

Jackson said, “You’ll be free. As a bondsman, you won’t have to serve the Mosh. You can go home or join their warrior class and go on raids if you want. Or just retire and take a wife and they’ll give you a lodge and a farm.”

“For real?”

Jackson nodded. “For real.”

“What about you? Are you a Bondsman?”

Jackson laughed, “I wish! No, I’m just a servant. I serve this Clan Chief as manager of his lodge. Right now it’s this crummy tent. After Mandarin is conquered, it will be a grand lodge on a thousand hectare farm. It is good, to serve the Mosh.”

Stovall said, “You keep telling yourself that.”

Jackson stood and said, “You’ll see. Eat your ration, you’ll need the energy.”

“Right.” Stovall opened the ration packet. Jackson left the tent.

Chapter Twenty One

Galen rode shotgun in his tactical skimmer and held an Eliminator shotgun at the ready while Bier drove and Wine stood up behind the medium laser swivel-mounted in the turret above the armored cargo bed. Fifty meters ahead was a troop on a Y-frame recon trike and behind was Tad in his tactical skimmer, with Capellan Marine Colonel Baek in his command car bringing up the rear. They turned right as they left the main gate of the Jasmine Panzer Brigade compound and encountered little traffic along the way. Military vehicles, mostly, cargo trucks escorted by lightly armored vehicles. Pedestrians on the sidewalks were few, generally young men and women in military uniforms, they walked together in groups of two or three. Lightly armed, in garrison uniforms, for the most part. The occasional civilian was older, elderly sometimes.

The city seemed subdued. The rooftops bristled with anti-aircraft guns of various types and sizes. Some guns were set up to sweep the streets, if the need ever arose. The outer perimeter of the Mandarin High Command compound had been expanded. Galen’s convoy paused at the checkpoint and was then allowed through, the guard presenting a proper hand salute upon recognizing Galen’s rank. Another block down that street, the convoy turned left and stopped at the entrance gate of the reinforced original wall of the compound. The guard checked Galen’s credentials, other guards inspected the other vehicles, called up to their supervisor, and then the group was allowed in.

They parked near the tunnel entrance facing out. Galen, Tad and Colonel Baek dismounted and waited. A Mandarin High Command light electric vehicle that resembled an oversized golf cart came. The Mandarin Regular Army Corporal driving it picked up the leaders and drove them into the tunnel, underground to the High Command Operations briefing room.

They were ushered to their assigned seats by a Senior Master Chief from the Capellan Space Force. Galen noticed his gimp, that his left leg seemed artificial. And his eye, his left eye, didn’t move. Or blink…

They sat in the back row toward the left corner of the room. Around the room were a few empty seats and the collection of leaders looked younger than before but more frazzled. Signs of stress here and there, hands clasping and unclasping, some sitting up perfectly straight but fidgeting, a woman in the front row who looked back over her left shoulder, then her right, ran her left hand through her hair as she the faced forward, only to repeat the process half a minute later. Her hair was wearing thin where she rubbed it, the scalp starting to show through the platinum blond bob.

The Supreme Commander entered and the leaders stood. The Supreme Commander had lost weight but didn’t look better. She looked tired, shoulders slumped. Her features hung on her face as she stood behind the podium and then hardened as she spoke, “Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome. Take your seats and I’ll get this briefing started.”

The leaders sat. The wall behind the Supreme Commander became a screen that showed a strategic map of the war. Not too detailed, it looked cartoony. With broad lines and labels, it resembled a tourist map. It showed a straight static front from the south, up about two thirds of the way to a point where the line angled slightly to the right. The entire Western Province was occupied by the Mosh, along with half the Northern Province. The Southern Province, snuggled up against the bottom of the Central Province, was free from immediate threat. The Eastern Province was an undeveloped wasteland, jagged mountains and deep canyons; it had yet to be settled. A few rugged individuals went there from time to time to scratch minerals from the ground, but there were no permanent settlements.

The Supreme Commander spoke, “The solar storm that we are entering has presented us with a real opportunity. It takes the Mosh fighter-bombers out of the fight. That gives us a chance to strike back.”

The screen behind her changed to show a depiction of the planet Mandarin, its sun and the solar flare. At first, Galen was alarmed. The cone ejected from their sun looked powerful enough to blast the atmosphere and possibly the outer crust away from Mandarin. A cone that large would cause the star itself to move sideways, enough to doom this planet by screwing up its orbit, leaving it well outside the habitable zone…

Galen realized the depiction was not to scale. It was exaggerated. The Supreme Commander continued her briefing. “It will take fourteen more days for our planet to move through the flare. Its intensity will neither increase nor decrease for at least three months. However, once we’ve passed through it, the flare will no longer affect us in any meaningful way. During those two weeks, to survive, we’ll have to shelter underground or in solid buildings with metal roofs, or inside armored vehicles. During the nights, near midnight, there will be time where it is safe to be outside for approximately two hours, so that presents relief for people who would otherwise suffer from being inside too long.”

The screen shifted back to a strategic battle map. The Supreme Commander continued briefing with practiced ease, but her narrative tone hinted at fatigue and sounded just a bit tired. “In the Northern Province, despite incursion by Mosh ground forces, our mobile space guns continue to harass the Mosh fleet. They target the more vulnerable support and cargo ships, chipping away at the will of the ordinary Mosh citizen’s support of the invasion. I—” She stopped, her face blank.

Galen thought the attacks to bash the Mosh cargo and transport ships would only make it harder for the Mosh to leave, their primary means of leaving the system damaged. And it would just piss the Mosh leaders off and make them more anxious to land more forces sooner rather than later. Galen also knew that the mobile space guns were lucky if they got off more than a couple of shots before Mosh counter-fire from space turned them into big char marks on the ground. But Mandarin would build more, train new crews. A drain on resources.

The Supreme Commander shook her head vigorously as if to clear it and continued, “In the North, the two Mosh clans are led by brothers, sons of the Mosh High Chief himself. They have been shown favoritism by their father, given greater resources and smaller sectors, while achieving less on the field of battle. Between them, they have suffered more than thirty percent casualties and have been handed more than a dozen tactical defeats in less than three months. Were they my Field Marshalls, they would have faced a firing squad long before now.”

Unsteady chuckles circulated around the room. There had been firing squads, ordered by the High Command and approved by this very same Supreme Commander. She pointed at the lower part of the map, the straight line. “These three clans have made steady gains and have exercised good judgment in the area of conservation of forces. They are cousins to the two leaders in the North, are the nephews of the High Chief. But recently, at the behest of the High Chief, some of their most powerful units have been taken away from them and reorganized into a mobile armored corps. Three armored divisions with support, with an able Mosh leader who distinguished himself in battle put in command. The reason for this is not clear, but this specialized corps seems to operate independently, reports directly to their High Chief, and has positioned itself behind the bend in the line.” She pointed at the junction where the straight line from the South angled slightly to the East, into the Northern Province.

Galen kept quiet and guessed that the new Mosh armored corps was put together to emulate his own Task Force. He smiled. Imitation, the highest form of flattery.

The Supreme Commander said, “We will take advantage of the petty jealously and favoritism evidenced at the highest levels of Mosh command. We will strike at a point where we can split their forces, drive a wedge between the favored sons of the High Chief and their cousins to the South. Our forces will emerge from the Kyok Forest and then drive into Guri, and beyond. Our initial forces will bypass Guri and then get in position to re-take Cherry Fork.

“The Kyok Forest is hilly terrain and densely forested with mature trees. Not generally considered good tank country, the Mosh won’t expect an attack from there. But the region has good logging trails and improved surface roads that can accommodate the movement of a large armored force. Most importantly, there is a heavy rail line capable of transporting the Ajax artillery pieces of the Jasmine Panzer Brigade.

“I will give a broad-brush outline of the operation so that you all understand the importance of keeping up with the timeline and the capture of every objective, no matter how insignificant it may seem to you individually. The main body of armor will push through the woods and envelop Guri. The Jasmine Panzer Brigade and its task force will bypass Guri and head toward Cherry Fork and take up positions about seventy five kilometers to the South and East of that city, just out of the range of the heaviest defensive guns of that city. They are there to secure firing positions for their Ajax guns, which will then crush the city’s defenses so that follow-on forces can capture Cherry Fork.

“But beware. The Ajax tanks cannot pass through the Kyok forest on their own. The hilly terrain is too steep and the roads too soft. They will be brought forward by rail. When the Jasmine task force bypasses Guri, Mandarin forces must then capture Guri so that the Ajax guns can be brought in to Guri’s railhead where they will be unloaded. They will then move into their firing positions to crush Cherry Fork’s defenses.

“Cherry Fork is the primary logistics hub for the forces in the North, and is also the only feasible operational base in the Western Province for the fighter-bombers that infest our skies. Taking that city will set the Mosh back significantly. They will be forced to base their logistics in the Skeleton Desert; their fighter-bombers will have to operate from the Skeleton Desert as well, meaning they won’t have the range to bother us nearly as much. I’ll expect the Mosh to pull back and establish a strong defense in the mountains east of the Skeleton Desert.

“When successful, this operation will put an end to Mosh offensive campaigns. It will put them in a position where they have to negotiate a peace and settle for accepting the Skeleton Desert as their new home. Over time, the Mosh and their culture will be absorbed into ours. Certainly, they will not lord over us. In a few generations, they will be civilized and assimilated.”

The Space Force Senior Master Chief made his way through the rows of seats, handing out flip-folders. Laminated cards spiral-bound at the top, they had a master event list with dates and times in the margins. Galen took his and shoved it into his left cargo pocket.

The Supreme Commander looked around the room and said, “As soon as you have your timeline, you may leave.”

The leaders stood and she left.

Tad flipped through his eight-page timeline booklet. “Cute.”

Galen shrugged, stood with Colonel Baek and Tad and waited for the other leaders to make their ways out of the room. “Nice plan.”

Tad said, “I couldn’t have come up with a better one myself.”

Colonel Baek said, “It’s your plan exactly, the proposal you sent up to High Command.”

“Yep.” Tad tucked his timeline in his pocket.

Galen said, “Only one flaw. We have to rely on the Mandarins to capture Guri.”

Baek said, “Either way. If we were tasked to take Guri ourselves, we’d have to rely on them to capture and secure the firing positions for the Ajax. I think that is too complex a task for them. Taking Guri is less of a challenge. It is a single, straightforward objective. They should be able to handle it.”

“Hope so,” said Galen. He turned toward the door and then stopped suddenly, snapped to attention.

The Chancellor extended his hand and Galen shook it. “Colonel Raper, so good to see you again. Lieutenant Colonel Miller, Colonel Baek. Glad you could make it.” Tad and Baek shook hands with the Chancellor. He glanced around, stood and smiled and waited until all the other leaders had left the room. He leaned forward and spoke softly, “I appreciate your cooperation in this matter. I’m counting on you to pull this off. This is it. Fail, and we’re done.”

Galen said, “Yessir. Are you well?”

The Chancellor said, “As well as can be expected, under the circumstances. I’m living down here now. The legislature has been dissolved and the High Command controls everything. The only reason they show me any respect at all is because of your obligations to me.”

Galen looked to Colonel Baek and said, “He’s right. Our unit charter binds us to defend the civil government against armed threats, at the behest of the Chancellor. We have no real obligations to the High Command.”

Baek smiled. “My orders attach me to your Brigade.”

The Chancellor smiled. “Good luck and God bless.” He then turned and left the room.