The Terran Mandate (6 page)

Paladin's
Prerogative

Major Walker stood in front of General
Lane's desk, still trying to think of the best way to tell his commanding officer
that he was moving the entire company of Cataphracts.

In a tired voice, Lane asked, "What
is it Major?"

"I need to move the Cats."

Lane raised his brow. "Really?  On
whose authority?"

Walker thought one last time about his
decision. He could still tell the General that his intent was to set up a
garrison for the Pyramid because a Shoahn' girl nobody knew was even alive had
revealed something that nobody would believe. He wasn't even sure he believed
it himself. The line between duty and loyalty felt like something scrawled
somewhere in the desert sands of Shoahn'Tu. He felt like a man staggering
against the wind as it swept over that line, blurring it to the point where he
didn't know where it was anymore. The only thing he knew to be true beyond question
was the terror he had seen in her eyes.

"Mine," he said.

"Why?"

"Exercises."

"Exercises?"

"Yes, sir." He pressed his
palms on the General's desk and leaned forward. "Look, the truth of the
matter is that you have been holding us in reserve for a while now. I'm not
contesting that decision. That's your call. But we've spent so much time
standing around and watching that my guys are rusty. I think we know the time
will come - and soon - when we are going to have to step up and help out with
the close fight. We need to get ready for that."

"So you're requesting -"

Walker cut him off. "I'm advising
you, sir. I'm advising the General that I'm taking the Cats to an undisclosed
location to conceal them from the enemy while we conduct exercises."

Lane leaned back, his face devoid of all
emotion. He narrowed his eyes. "It would have been better if you had made
that a request. You are under my tactical command, Major."

"I'm only under your command during
tactical operations, General. You initiate a tactical order for operations that
include engagement with the enemy and we'll be there. In the meantime, they
belong to me."

"That can change," Lane said.
"Real quick."

"I have a responsibility, General,
one that goes back long before you took over MEF. With respect, you don't have
the ability to train somebody else to do what I do. As for command, the Paladin
has always been chosen by his peers. It is not an appointed command."

"Why are you doing this, Major?  Do
you feel like you have something to prove or are you just a renegade?"
Lane leaned forward and smiled. "You know, I can relieve you of your
command. I can also do things like convene courts martial. Traditions are fine,
but there is a line and you have your foot half way over it."

"Maybe I do have something to
prove, General." Walker unfolded his hands and held them up. The rumors he
had heard about Lane's ignorance of his own need to develop as a regimental
commanding officer were turning out to be true. But Walker couldn't wait for
Lane to learn how to trust him. "I agree with Colonel Harris. You need to
commit the Cats to the main line. And we're not ready for that. Let me get them
ready."

"Well, Major, that's starting to
sound like something that resembles a request."

Walker felt his jaw tightening. He had
been the Paladin for twenty years. General Lane had been at his post for six
months. Was the MEF really this short on general officers who could fill the
billet?  "With respect, General, you sound like the one who has something
to prove."

Lane glared at him, jutting his chin
forward. "I will take your request under advisement and let you know,
Major. In the meantime, I want to know the current disposition of your Cats,
their readiness state and your current supply status. If any of your men take a
single step without my order, I'll convene a court. The Cats stay put. Are we
clear?"

Major Walker stood back up, letting out
a sigh as he rolled his shoulder back. "General Lane, you go ahead and
convene that court. In the meantime, I have training to conduct. Sir."
Before Lane could respond, he wheeled around smartly and marched out the door.

The General had been right. He had
crossed a line. What the General didn't understand, though, was that line was
one of his own making, not one drawn by the MEF. If circumstances had allowed,
he would have waited until the General figured it out for himself. But Walker
didn't have time for any of that. He only hoped that General Lane figured it
out before it was too late.

As soon as he was back in the compound,
Walker jogged to where the Cats were crouched in tight box formations at the
rear of the MEF compound. He ducked into one of the tents that had sprung up
behind them to find Captain Holt and the Company First Sergeant huddled over a
folding table discussing the status of their supplies and ammunition.

"Top, I need a word with the
XO."

"Yes sir." The sergeant ducked
out of the tent, leaving the two of them alone.

"What's up?" Holt asked.

Walker shook his head and sealed the
tent flap. "You need to get the Cats moving to the Pyramid."

"How soon?"

"Now."

Holt cocked his head and then nodded
once. "Alright. What about you?  You're rig isn't ready yet."

"I'll be along as soon as I can.
Just get to the Pyramid." He looked over his shoulder and then took a step
towards Holt. Placing a hand on his executive officer's shoulder, he said,
"And if anybody tries to stop you -"

"I understand, sir. I didn't think
General Lane would think much of the idea."

"Indeed, he did not."

Edge of
Extinction

The lines etching his face were as
desolate as the ground that he hacked at with a hoe. Carefully working the
blade around the dried leaves of a plant that anybody else would have taken for
dead, he dug out clumps of dry dirt and clay to expose its withering roots. He
set the hoe down and knelt next to the plant, whose leaves were as frail as
burnt paper. He pulled a thin plastic vial of water from the pocket of his
field shirt. Holding it up against the orange glow of the sun, he counted the
tick marks on the vial. He leaned down and carefully poured a thin stream along
the roots. The water washed over the roots in a feeble rivulet and then
disappeared as the parched ground sucked it away.

"You're a miracle worker,
Emmet." He looked over his shoulder and saw Colonel Dekker standing at the
edge of his field. Emmet stood up, pushing against the ache that never left his
bones, and stretched. He ambled towards Dekker with a slight limp while blood
worked its way back into his muscles. By the time he reached Dekker, he was
almost walking normally. When he shook the Colonel's hand, he felt his own skin
scraping against Dekker's like sand paper.

"It's a living," Emmet said.
The two men walked together to a small rise overlooking the MEF compound and
the flats beyond its perimeter. The fertile ground of the Highlands, now
covered by the neat formations of the Terran Guard, weren't more than a few
miles away, but it might as well have been a thousand. Smoke still seeped from
the ground and curled away from burning vehicles. The men who could be
recovered to the medical bays were already gone. The rest had been dragged off
the field and tossed as ceremoniously as possible onto a burning pyre. As the
two men surveyed the scene, Emmet said, "I guess it didn't go too well."

"Sorry," Dekker said.

Emmet put a hand on the Colonel's
shoulder and said, "Come on inside. I have some root tea left." He
led Colonel Dekker back to a boxy structure made from the same resin that
prevailed in most everything the Exodus Fleet and the MEF had brought with
them. The sides were streaked with deep grooves from years of wind grinding the
grit of Shoan'Tu's dry ground into it. Faded black markings composed of partial
letters and numbers that were barely readable denoted its family group and function
as a temporary shelter for three persons. A small array of photovoltaic cells
attached to the structure by a bare coil of wire - its protective sheath long
stripped away by the wind and grit - fed enough electricity into the module to
power a single light and a small coil stove. On cold nights, the batteries it
charged provided just enough power for a vent blower to distribute a meager
flush of heat throughout the structure.

The two men ducked in through a ragged
cloth covering the door way. The plastic hut wasn't quite tall enough for a man
to stand up and they both had to stoop once inside. Emmet took a thin aluminum
pot from the plastic shelves molded into the side of the structure and placed
it on the coil burner stove. A clear plastic bottle half-filled with a
rose-colored liquid sat on the shelf next to it. Emmet unscrewed the cap and
poured a small portion into the pot. The coil was efficient and the liquid was
almost boiling within a minute. Emmet rubbed his chin, eyeing a small box made
from the bark of a cord tree sitting on one of the shelves. He took a quick
breath and snatched the box from the shelf. He set it on a cube of plastic
molded to the floor that served as a table and took off the lid.

"Please, sit down Colonel," he
said, gesturing at the small bench molded to the wall next to the table. He sat
down on the opposite bench, eased the lid off the box and pulled out two
crudely crafted clay cups. Keeping his eyes on the cups as he set them on the
table, he said, "Jommy made these from the clay field when it rained last
year." He turned his gaze to Colonel Dekker, waiting to see what he would
say.

"It's alright, Emmet. How much
water did you folks manage to extract from the field anyway?"

"Enough for a season. Barely."
He stood up and leaned over to fetch the pot by its insulated wire handle.
"He did the best he could, but it dried so fast. He didn't have time to
really finish them properly."

"It's a nice gesture, Emmet. Be
sure to compliment him for me."

Emmet poured root tea into each of the
cups, then placed the pot back on the coil burner stove and turned it off. He
lifted his cup and made a toast. "That they shall not perish."

Dekker picked up his own cup. "That
they shall not perish." Each man took a small sip. Dekker blinked hard.
"A little bit goes a long way, doesn't it?"

Emmet chuckled. "One of the few
things around here that does." He took another sip and shook his head as a
shudder ran through his body. "But I think you need it today."

Dekker carefully placed his cup on the table
and leaned forward. "Emmet, be honest with me." He glanced around the
small cube that felt like the inside of a freight container. "How much
longer can your people hold on?"

Emmet let out a slow breath through
tight lips. "Yeah, that's a good question." He took another sip of
root tea. "With the new rationing schedule, we'll lose another 10% of the
colony this season. Our stockpile will be gone by then, too."

"How long can you make it after
that?" Dekker asked.

"They don't tell me these things.
I'm sure the mayor's made his report."

"Reports are for politicians. I
need to hear the truth from a man I can trust. You've been here longer than
anybody." Dekker picked up his cup and took another sip. His body swayed
and he grunted as he set the cup back down. "What's the story,
Emmet?"

"Well, as we lose more people, the
crops we manage to scrape from this ground go further, of course. But the real
problem is we're losing women faster than men."

"And you're not breeding right
now."

"Nope. Generational decline."
Emmet took another sip of his tea and leaned back against the wall. He levelled
his gaze on Dekker and said, "Seems like we're back to square one."

"Yeah, maybe we should have just
stayed home."

"Nah. No chance there at all."

"How long, Emmet?"

Emmet shook his head and bit his lip as
he thought of the farmers like himself scratching at dirt, forcing it to yield
to their will and the bit of magic that came from chemistry. "We can't
make the ground here grow anything more, Ben. Whatever we pull out of the
ground this season. Well, that's all we're going to get."

Dekker froze. He stared at Emmet and his
eyes washed over with a glaze of panic that he couldn't quite hide.
"What?"

"After this harvest, we start
starving to death."

"If we get the Highlands -"

"We start having babies."

The doorway curtain rustled and Jommy
burst into the room. A twitchy 11-year-old wearing the same faded field service
overalls as his father, he stopped in mid stride when he saw Dekker. Turning to
the Colonel, he stood up straight and gave an exaggerated salute.
"Sir!"

Dekker smiled. "Hello Jommy. How
have you been?"

Jommy stared at the cups and pointed at
them. "Do you like them?"

Dekker smiled and said, "I like
them very much."

"Dad said it's against the
rules."

"It is." He winked at Emmet.

Jommy looked at his father and asked,
"Am I in trouble?"

"I don't know, son. That's up to
the Colonel here."

Jommy's eyes flitted nervously between
the two men.

Dekker lightly tapped his cup and asked,
"Why did you make these?"

Jommy knelt down next to the table and
rubbed his fingers along the surface of the cup sitting in front of his father.
Staring into the root tea, he said, "I made them for Mama. I wanted her to
have something nice." He pulled his hand away and looked at Dekker. "They're
not very good, are they?"

Emmet eyed the Colonel, seeing the man
choking back something.

"They're fine Jommy," Dekker
said. "They'll be our little secret."

Jommy looked up at Dekker and a toothy
smile spread over his face.

"Go on outside," Emmet said.
"Check the roots for me."

"Yessir." Jommy stood up and
bounded out the door.

After the boy left, Emmet said,
"There's something else." He lifted his cup, took a sip and leaned
back against the wall. "Some of our farmers went to talk to the
Guard."

Dekker scoffed. "Any luck with
that?"

"They never came back." He
took another sip. "I don't understand them. Why won't they help their own
kind?"

"That's a question that's been
asked for generations now. The Shoahn' are gone and they still keep fighting
like they're protecting something," Dekker said.

"Why?"

"I don't know. Power, I guess. Or
maybe just because they were here first."

"Ben, I don't want you to take this
the wrong way."

"Go ahead, Emmet. No secrets
between us."

"Has anybody considered that it might
be time?" He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. "-maybe it's time
to surrender?"

"Can you carry a weapon,
Emmet?"

"I'm too old for that sort of
thing. I was thinking more about Jommy. You know?"

Dekker picked up his cup turned it in
his hand, studying the imprints of the boy's hand where he had formed the clay.
"They don't have much use for things like this over there."

"Really, though, how bad could it
be?"

Dekker leaned back as a cold mask fell
over his face. As the Colonel spoke, Emmet felt a shiver run through him.
"Guys like you, the old and the sick; they'll be put to sleep and tossed
on top of each other to burn. The young fellas; they'll get to the Highlands
just fine, in shackles, working the ground until they can't keep up and then tossed
on with the rest. They'll draw your blood, match up the women with the
strongest traits and let them have just enough babies to maintain their ranks.
And when they can't have babies any more, they'll put them in the fields and
wait for them to fall behind quota before tossing them on that pile. And boys
like Jommy. He'll be fine as long as he can shoot straight and take orders. And
they won't care when that order is to toss you on that pile."

"Come on, Ben, this isn't Old
Earth."

"No, but it's the same story. You
think they see us as human."

Emmet felt his hand starting to shake
and placed it flat on the table, hoping Dekker wouldn't see. "How do they
see us, then?"

"As less than that. That's when it
really begins. Once the last ties to our history are swept away, they'll
indoctrinate our children in The Way. They'll try to make us forget who we
are."

Emmet took a long breath and let out a
sigh. "But we would be alive."

A thin eerie grin crept across Dekker's
face as he pulled the cup to his lips and took another sip. He set the cup down
slowly and the grin disappeared. He folded his hands and leaned forward.

"Then you and I have different
definitions of what it means for a man to be alive." The Colonel took a
long drink, wincing as he set the cup back on the table. "The Way is a
hoax. A lie to smother their own regret because they can't admit they were
wrong. We can make something of this place. You've said it yourself. All they
had to do was let us. Surrender to the Terran Guard?  No. We didn't come all
this way just to give up on who we are."

"It was just a thought."

"Oh hell, Emmet, it's an option.
You're not the first one to consider it. I just don't think that's why we came
here." Dekker's expression eased and sadness filled his eyes as he seemed
to be choking something back again.

"What is it Ben?  No secrets."

"Alright." Dekker took another
sip and visibly had trouble putting the cup back on the table. "You
wouldn't be asking about surrender if it wasn't for me."

Emmet knitted his brow. "How do you
mean?"

"I'm the man who lost the Highlands
in the first place."

They both sat in silence as the words
hung in the air. Part of him wanted to reach across the table and grab the
Colonel by the throat and scream. He had heard it before, but now, coming from the
man himself, he couldn't deny it. The reason his people were starving was
sitting right in front of him. Except that wasn't really true, was it?  The
real reason was miles away, oiling treads aching to run through his home. They
hadn't done that yet. The man sitting across from him was the reason for that,
too. Embarrassed by his own thoughts, Emmet let out a chuckle. "You're a
good man, Ben. You need to let that go."

"No, I don't." Dekker turned
the cup slowly on the table, gently grinding it's dried clay against the green
plastic. "I just need to be a better Marine."