Authors: Tanya Huff
It took him a moment and then he smiled. “You’re sure?”
“Yes, sir. It’s my job to be sure.”
* * *
“Conn, what are you doing?”
“I’m looking at a vid of my daughter, what’s it look like I’m doing?” The corporal snorted and settled back against the grain bags, his slate propped up on his knee. “I took it just before we left the station; she’s showing me some kind of weird dance she made up.”
The Marine on his other side glanced down and grinned. “Hey, cute. Let me see.”
As Conn held out the slate, strong fingers closed around his wrist and augmented muscles dragged arm and slate back to his lap.
“Are you out of your mind?” the heavy gunner snarled. “Don’t you ever watch war vids?”
“The what?”
She rolled her eyes. “Some poor sap shows off a picture of his darling family back on station, and the next thing you know his brains have been spattered all over his buddies and they have to pry the picture from rigor mortis fingers. It’s guaranteed to get you bagged!”
“Guaranteed?”
“Yeah. It’s got the same bag rate as announcing to the world that you’re short. ‘Gosh, fellas...’” She plastered on a goofy grin. “‘...just three more months and I’m a civilian again and I know exactly what I’m going to do. I’m going to go into partnership with my dad. He’s old and he needs me.’” The grin disappeared and she drew a line across her throat. “Speech like that and next thing you know, bagged.”
“But I am short.”
She blinked. “What?”
“Two more months and I’m a civ...” It was Conn’s turn to blink as her hand clamped over his mouth.
“I don’t know why I even bother talking to you,” she sighed.
* * *
“Staff? You’ve got to do something about Mysho.”
“Do what?” Torin asked, looking up from an ammunition list. Then she took a closer look at the way the two men facing her were standing. That couldn’t be comfortable. “Oh. I see.”
“We didn’t want to say anything, but she’s got her masker turned up as high as it’ll go, and it’s still not helping. Even when we...” He met Torin’s eyes, turned very red, and rushed on. “... you know, take care of it. It just comes right back and it’s...”
He paused to search for a word and Torin hid a smile. “Distracting?” she offered at last.
“Yeah, distracting.”
“And embarrassing,” the other man muttered.
“I’ll deal with it,” she told them.
* * *
“But, Staff, why my tunic?” Binti asked a moment later.
“Because Humans can deal with this heat better than the di’Taykan can. Mysho’s environmental controls are operating at no better than half capacity.”
“But why
mine
?”
“Because mine’s not working at all and yours will fit her.”
“Oh. Do I get hers in return?” she asked, unfastening her vest. “I mean, half capacity’s better than nothing.”
“Do you really want to wear a tunic a di’Taykan’s been pumping pheromones into all morning?”
“Uh...” She considered it.
“And deal with the next Silsviss attack?”
“I think I’ll just sweat.”
“Smart.”
* * *
Sometimes,
Torin said to herself as she came back from burying Mysho’s tunic in the latrine,
I forget how young most of this lot is.
“Staff Sergeant Kerr?”
“Dr. Leor.” She turned to face him, noting how dull his eyes had become. “Are you all right?”
He raised a long-fingered hand as if to block her concern. “This one is merely tired.” Unclipping her slate from his belt, he passed it over. “This one has found an antidote to the poison although the Humans may die too quickly for it to do any good. And also, this one regrets to inform you that one of the Marines injured in the crash died in the night.”
And sometimes you can only get through it by forgetting how young they are.
“Fraishin sha aren. Valynk sha haren.”
“Kal danic dir kadir. Kri ta chrikdan.”
“We will not forget. We will not fail you.”
The bags flattened, and Torin added four more cylinders to the three she already carried. And all the others that she’d never entirely put down.
* * *
“Sir! Movement on the hill!”
Jarret hurried out into the compound and scanned the horizon, one hand shading his eyes from the noon sun. “Where?”
“Everywhere, sir!”
“Get off the roof, then, both of you! Before they start shooting.”
“It’s showtime, people!” Stopping by the lieutenant’s side, Torin handed him his helmet.
He put it on without comment. “What’s that coming over the hill to the north?”
Flipping down her scanner, she frowned. “I believe it’s a rock, sir.”
“Big rock.”
“Yes, sir. I believe the word we’re looking for is boulder.”
Boulders, most taller than the Silsviss moving them, crested the hills to east, west, and south.
Jarret shook his head in disbelief. “How far did they have to go to get all those? That many boulders don’t just happen to be lying around on top of the ground, ready to be moved.”
“Yesss, they do,” Cri Sawyes told him, arriving in time to hear the lieutenant’s protest. “The area to the northeassst isss a glacial plain.”
“Next to a swamp!”
“The swamp isss to the wesst, Lieutenant Jarret. And it hasss been a very long time sssince the glaciersss rolled through.”
“Still...”
“There are a great many bodiesss out there, Lieutenant.”
“I’m aware of that, Cri Sawyes.”
“We have a sssaying, many handsss can move a mountain.”
“And apparently did,” Torin muttered.
“Yesss.”
* * *
“With two more dead, there’s going to be holes in the line,” Hollice mused.
“Yeah, holes. Nice to have an effect. My death’ll have no effect at all.”
Hollice sighed. “If you’re back in the depths of despair, I don’t want to hear about it. In fact, I’m sick of hearing about it and...” He turned to glare at the di’Taykan. “...if I hear one melancholy comment out of you, I’ll kill you myself.”
The turquoise eyes blinked. “That’s not...”
“I mean it, Haysole. I’ve had it with you. And I’ve had it with lying around here, too.”
“You’re in pieces.”
“So?” His right arm had been taped tightly against his side to keep it from losing its tenuous hold on his shoulder, the remains of the shoulder had been packed in under sealant, and thanks to the pain blockers, he still didn’t feel a thing. Dropping his left leg off the stretcher, he grabbed the edge with his left hand and hauled himself up into a sitting position. The world wobbled for a moment, then settled more or less level.
Reaching out cautiously, he scooped his helmet up off the floor and dropped it onto his head. “Staff Sergeant Kerr, Corporal Hollice. I have an idea that can free up two more Marines for the walls.”
“Two more?” Haysole asked when he flipped away the mike.
“Why not? You’re not holding your weapon with your toes.”
“I can’t
stand.”
“Can you sit?”
“I don’t know.”
“So try.”
“What if I can’t?”
“We’ll flip you over on your stomach, and you can fire prone.”
The di’Taykan suddenly smiled. “It is a position I’m familiar with.”
“Is there a position you
aren’t
familiar with?” Hollice asked him wearily.
* * *
“This one does not believe it is a good idea.”
“It’s not my idea,” Torin reminded him. “It’s theirs. They seem to know what they’re capable of.”
“Do they? Do they know how movement and gravity act on their injuries? They think because they feel no pain they are not as damaged as they are. If the di’Taykan is not taken out of here soon, he will die of the injuries that keep his legs from working. Move him around, and he will die sooner rather than later.” Dr. Leor ran both hands up and over his crest, smoothing the feathers down tight against his skull. “If you wish this one to continue doctoring your people, Staff Sergeant, you will not fight this one on this matter.”
“Lieutenant Jarret...”
“Neither of you will fight.” His shoulders sagged. “This one thinks there is fighting enough going on.”
Torin looked past the doctor into the room where the two Marines were waiting for her word.
If the di’Taykan is not taken out of here soon, he will die of the injuries that keep his legs from working.
“What about Corporal Hollice?”
“This one would prefer he remain on the stretcher; however, if you truly need him...” The shrug spoke volumes.
“We could certainly use him.”
“Then you may. Do you want this one to tell the di’Taykan?”
Yes.
“No, thank you, Doctor, it’s part of my job.”
* * *
“Corporal Hollice, I want you sitting, not standing; your weapon is to rest on the edge of the window, and the moment you feel you can’t contribute to our defense you are to let me know immediately. I don’t want any heroics, and I don’t want any crap. Am I understood?”
“Yes, Staff.”
“Good. North side window. Corporal Ng, outside on the south barricade.”
“Yes, Staff.”
“But before you go, Ng, give me a hand with this.” Together, they lifted the grain bag under the window up on its end. “Now, go. Hollice, sit. They’re caught in a crossfire on the north, so it won’t matter much if your aim’s a bit off. Haysole...” The look on his face stopped her cold. If she told him he had to just lie there, he’d be dead before sunset.
Fine.
She bent and pulled his weapon out from under his stretcher and tossed it to him. “Hollice can’t reload one-handed, and you can’t get up or the doctor’ll have my ass in a sling, so you’ll be reloading for him.”
“Wha...”
Both combat vests landed close by Haysole’s stretcher. “Can you reach them here?”
“Well, yeah, but...”
“Good. Hollice needs a reload, he passes his weapon to you, you pass yours—with a full clip to him, and reload his. Hang on.” She dragged stretcher, di’Taykan, and vests closer to the window. “There.” Arms folded, she stepped back and studied the two of them. Then she smiled. “I guess together you’ll make one half-assed Marine.”
For a moment she thought it wasn’t going to work. The two able-bodied Marines on the east and south walls had turned to stare at her in astonishment. She glared their gaze back out the windows. The corpsman, trying to spoon some nourishment into a face ruined by the enemy’s explosion, was not looking at her so intensly that he might as well have been staring. They weren’t the ones who mattered.
Hollice’s expression she couldn’t read, not with the light pouring in the window behind him, but he hadn’t said anything, so he must’ve understood.
Haysole closed the fingers of one hand around the stock of his KC and lifted Hollice’s vest by its ruined shoulder with the other. “I’ve got more clips left than he does, Staff. What happens when he runs out?”
Torin started breathing again. “Use yours.”
“In his weapon?”
“The clips are interchangeable, Haysole. Or were you paying less attention in basic than I thought?”
He grinned up at her, and it almost masked the gray shadows on his face. “I don’t think that’s possible, Staff.”
* * *
When she explained what she’d done to the doctor, more so he wouldn’t undo it than because she felt he deserved an explanation, he shook his head.
“This one understands about the will to live, Staff Sergeant. You have devised an elegant solution.”
“Thank you.”
He stopped her before she made it out the door. “But what this one does not understand is why you seem to think you have— how do you Humans say?—put one over on the di’Taykan. He performs a necessary function.”
Torin sighed. “No, he doesn’t. If any of my people couldn’t reload one-handed, either hand, I’d kick their butts back to basic training myself.”
“But he accepted the function.”
“No, Doctor. He accepted the hope.”
* * *
“Settled?” Lieutenant Jarret asked when she returned to his side.
“Yes, sir.”
“Good, nothing happened while you were...”
All around the hills the boulders began to roll forward, two or three Silsviss behind each keeping it moving down the slopes.
“Nice of them to wait for me,” Torin muttered.
The lieutenant flipped his helmet mike down. “Fire at will but only if you’ve got a clear target. Don’t waste ammo. What’s the situation with the grenades?” he asked, turning to Torin.
“Insufficient quantity, sir, and they wouldn’t stop those rocks anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Well, they’re rocks, sir.”
As they watched, a Silsviss stumbled and was crushed by an errant bounce, his scream of pain lost in the shrieking of his companions.
“They’re crazy!”
“They’re only crazy if it doesn’t work, sir.”
“If
what
doesn’t work?”
“I expect we’ll find out in a minute, sir.”
The first of the boulders reached the flat and slowed considerably, the heavy rain of the night before not yet baked out of the ground. Then the first stopped, captured by the soft ground. A second slammed into it, the impact moving them both only another few feet.
* * *
“Follow the fukking bouncing ball,” Juan snarled, the muzzle of his weapon moving through jerky four-inch arcs. “Who can hit something moving that fast when you can’t see anything but fukking bouncing boulders.”
Beside him, sunlight gleaming darkly on her bare arms, Binti squinted through her sights and pulled the trigger.
Two hundred meters out, momentum moved a Silsviss through another three steps before he crumpled, a bloody hole where his chest had been.
The heavy gunner shook his head in admiration and grumbled, “Fukking show-off.”
* * *
“They’re not trying to get to us. They’re building a barricade.”
Torin watched the impact of another two boulders throw shards of rock up into the air and swore softly under her breath. The Silsviss now had shelter at the halfway mark. Race down from the top of the hills, charge in from the rocks. It would become a two-part attack and the part from rock to compound a fast dash instead of the end of a long run.
“That should mean we have twice as many chances to stop them,” Jarret muttered.