The Tejano Conflict (24 page)

Parked in the Command Cart with Rags, Jo looked through the windshield at the Dycon line ahead. She knew what their CO must be thinking:
What the fuck?
First, the unit that had the wellheads secured and locked into a sure win just up and fucking left! And now, another company was rolling toward them at speed! Why? Why didn't they just take over the wellheads? They could hold off a larger force for the twenty minutes before the whistle sounded—

What the fuck?

Rags, on the opchan:

“Okay, people, everybody park and throw what you got, TOA. War is going to be called in eighteen minutes, no point in us saving ammo. Light it and flight it.”

If the officers in the field wondered what the hell he was doing, nobody brought it up. Jo would have asked if she hadn't known what she knew.

The first streamers following their rockets appeared, and the booms of RCLRs began, joined by the machine guns and assorted grenade launchers and mortars.

If it didn't catch the opposition totally by surprise, it certainly gave them something to think about.

They returned fire, and the battle began.

– – – – – –

“—two APCs coming from the south, mortars, you see 'em—?”

“—copy, L1, we have them, keep your head down—”

“—body spike that grenadier, he's walking 'em right at us—”

“—man down, man down, can I get a medic these coordinates—?”

Jo said, “There's a gap in our coverage, seven hundred meters west, we have enemy boots approaching. Kay?”

“Here.”

“Let's go.”

Nine minutes.

– – – – – –

“—somebody lay some grenades on top of that APC—”

“—got two men down here, I need a medic—”

“—you think, asshole? Eat this—!”

– – – – – –

Jo looked at the overview, listened to the chatter. Dycon was attacking, and CFI was getting hammered, but they were holding.

For now. Another seven minutes to go, and it was iffy; the numbers didn't favor them.

Shit.

No help for it now, they were committed—

“Jo, we got help coming, hang on!”

“What?”

“A company of Vim's troops, from Dycon's rear.”

“Christus, with an atomic bomb about to go off?”

“Volunteers,” Rags said. “And Colonel Buckley is leading them.”

Jo laughed. “Got more balls than brains. But we won't be able to get back to the wellheads in time.”

“Even so, nice to know they won't let you get shot to pieces out there. Maybe we can't win, but maybe we won't lose, either.”

“I'm gonna buy the man the biggest steak in Tejas,” she said. “Ow!”

“Jo?”

“Some asshole
shot
me! Hold on a second . . .”

She examined the wound. Through her lat, just under the left arm.

“Jo?”

“Still here. It's a through-and-through, didn't hit anything serious.

“No problem,” she said, “minor.” She allowed her neurochem to flood some painkiller dorph into her system.

“And I'll make sure Vim has something good to wash his steak down,” Rags said.

– – – – – –

Two minutes.

One minute.

– – – – – –

The Monitors sent the signal, and it blew across every open channel in range, the traditional ten-second countdown:

“ATTENTION COMBATANTS: HOSTILITIES MUST CEASE IN TEN SECONDS . . . NINE . . . EIGHT . . .”

Jo, her wound already itching under the pressure-stik bandage, worked her com: “Almost done. Nobody on either side is at the wellheads.”

Rags said, “We didn't lose.”

“But we didn't win, either.”

“. . . THREE . . . TWO . . .”

Almost a kilometer behind Jo, the fake-nuke robot exploded. It was simple-chemical, but sufficient to scatter the thing over a couple of hundred meters. Didn't do any damage where it was when it went up, save for a shallow crater in the ground under it.

The horn sounded:
Ooogah!

The Tejano Conflict was over. Neither side got the water they wanted.

Junior's rage was palpable even though he tried to keep his voice low and even; he couldn't keep it from seeping through:

“You need to pay me a visit, Cutter, and I don't mean tomorrow or after lunch, I mean right
now
.”

“Sure, Junior. I'll be around directly.”

He waved the com off, glanced at the time sig. “I'm surprised he waited this long.”

Gunny stood there. Gunny had a burned patch on her shoulder armor but didn't look otherwise damaged from the grenade fragment that had bounced off her.

“Gunny?”

“Of course Ah can do it, but Ah'm not sure Ah should.”

Cutter nodded. “I understand, but you need to trust me on this, Gunny.”

She looked at him. “What if you are wrong?”

“Then we'll find out, won't we?”

Gunny shook her head. “I never liked
Pachelbel's Canon
. I don't want to have to listen to it at your fucking funeral.”

“Me, neither.”

– – – – – –

In Junior's office, he was on his feet, waiting.

“Come in, Cutter. I'd ask you to have a seat, but you won't have very long to get tired standing.”

The door closed behind Cutter.

Junior raised his sidearm and pointed it at Cutter. From four meters, it would be hard to miss.

Cutter kept his hands spread wide, away from his own weapon.

“Take your pistol out, two fingers, and put in on the floor.”

Cutter did so, moving slowly and carefully.

“Shove it over here with your foot.”

Cutter obeyed.

Junior came around from behind his desk and bent to collect Cutter's gun. He glanced at the condition-read, nodded. He pointed it at Cutter, moved back behind his desk, and opened a drawer. He put his pistol into the drawer and closed it.

“What's the matter, Cutter? No cries of outrage, no ‘What are you doing, Junior?'”

Cutter shook his head.

“You know, my father never said so, but I know he thought you were a better soldier than I was. When you were cashiered out? He knew you'd been set up to take the fall, and I'm sure he knew it was my doing, but he never spoke to that, either.”

Cutter remained silent.

“You fucked me on this war. You worked it so it ended in a draw, and that cost me a shitload of money. You were supposed to win.”

“You wanted us to win, why did you send an assassin after me?”

“You're a fucking moron, you know that? I didn't think for a second that clown had a chance of killing you! That was just to keep you looking the wrong way.”

Cutter thought about that. “What about the bribe Dhama offered?”

“Not a chance in hell your people would have taken it. You are all too fucking
honorable
for shit like that. And if they had? They would have been put to work doing something that didn't matter anyhow. It was just more misdirection.”

Cutter didn't speak to that.

“I never liked you, Cutter, but this war was your side's to give away! Wood should have kicked their asses seven ways to Sunday! Why the hell did you throw it?”

“Justice. Balance.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“We looked at the bottom line. We won, you got rich. We lost, you got rich. Nobody wanted that. Nobody likes you, Junior.”

“You fucker!”

“Just part of it. We figured out what the two factions wanted. One side is religious, they want the water for their ceremonies. The other side is secular, they think religion is a shackle. If they had won, they would have poisoned the water or blown up the wells.

“I'm not much on religion, but nobody makes the Bax drink the holy tonic if they don't want it; the secularists would have denied that possibility. One offered a choice, the other didn't. So we decided the best thing was to put it in abeyance. If the religious group wants the water, they can cut a deal with the government, which will take over the wells. They had any brains, they'd have done that in the first place; they were trying to get it for the price of a little war, and they didn't. So nobody gets to screw with Earth's resources on our watch.”

“You fucking assholes!
I
wanted the religious side to win! They have more money, so it would have been a bigger payout, but that would have given you your fucking
justice
!”

“But if they'd lost, you would have still done okay. The only way you'd have come up empty would have been if the Monitors zeroed it out or it ended in a draw.”

“Which you saw to.”

“Life is hard.”

Junior came back around the desk, still covering Cutter with his own weapon.

“And for some, life gets cut short. Here's how it is going to go. I am going to shoot you. Then my staff will hear signs of a struggle. The door is locked, so they'll have to override the program to get in. By the time they do, they'll find you dead on the floor and me a bit winded. You came to kill me, but you got careless. We wrestled for your weapon—mine was in the drawer and I couldn't get to it—and during the struggle, the gun went off.”

“You'll have to be closer than you are to make that scenario work, Junior.”

“Go ahead, take what little joy you can calling me that; your clock is running out. Oh, and my office recording system is on the fritz. Been acting up all week, the tech came, fixed it, but it's something in the hardware. And there's a jammer on my secretary's desk stopping any UA transmissions from in here, so if you came wired, too bad. The only person who can offer up what happened here is me, you being dead and all.”

Cutter shook his head. “Got it all worked out, haven't you? What about what my people and Zoree Wood know?”

“Knowledge isn't proof. Besides, you won't care, being dead and all. Not going to beg me to spare you?”

Cutter shrugged. “Would it do any good?”

“No. But I'd love to see it. My father thought you were a superior soldier, but I was always better at sub-rosa tactics. I outmaneuvered you on Morandan, and I did it here.”

“Except for the war and the money.”

“But I'll be around to figure out another way to get more. You won't be. My father would be upset to see you go down this way.”

“Is that what this is about? Your wanting to prove something to your father?”

Junior gave him a mirthless grin. “Maybe a little. He'd be distressed that you were so easy to set up and take down, his shiny samurai. He thought you were quite the strategy-and-tactics guy.

“Thing was, the samurai were brave and loyal and fierce fighters, but the ninja had their place. Straight up, maybe you'd win, but you don't get the choice.”

“I've already paid for your screwup on Morandan.”

“There are people who know you got a raw deal. They'll understand how you would want to see me dead. You got to the place where you couldn't stand it anymore, came to take me out, but too bad for you, I beat you. A classic tragedy.”

“So you murder me to keep covering your ass for the death of all those civilians.”

“That and you screwing me out of all that loot. This time, the bullet you take will be real and fatal.”

Junior took a step forward. Still outside Cutter's hand-to-hand range.

“Come on, Cutter. Come at me. That's your only chance.”

“Yeah. You're right.”

He jumped—

The muzzle was only centimeters away from his heart when Junior pulled the trigger—

The loudest sound in the world is
click!
when you are expecting
bang!

But if you know that
click!
is coming? It gives you an advantage.

Cutter grabbed the surprised Junior and brought his knee up—

—Junior's responses finally came to life, and he turned, brought his own knee up to block—

—Cutter swung his right fist in a tight uppercut, driven by his hips, and slammed Junior under the chin, a solid blow. Junior's head snapped back and he fell, stunned. He hit the floor hard. He lost his grip on Cutter's pistol. He tried to come up, but Cutter drove the heel of his boot into Junior's forehead. Junior's crown smacked the floor, and even though the carpet was plush, it wasn't enough padding to keep him completely conscious. His eyes lost focus.

Just like that, done.

Cutter bent and retrieved his pistol. He ejected the doctored magazine and dummy round in the chamber, caught the fakes, then replaced the magazine with a fully functional one and chambered a live round.
Good job, Gunny.

He could have set it up differently. Could have arranged it so he shot Junior. He had thought about that. It wouldn't balance the scales, but it would have been personally satisfying.

But, no. Better to let the Army do that, in its own way. Avoid the paperwork.

“Your secretary is out to lunch, and his jammer got shut off when I got here. Have a look.”

He reached into his tunic and removed the tiny VP mikecam disguised as the top button on the tunic. The feed had gone a couple of places; there had been people listening and recording on the transmitter's band.

Too much for the Army to ignore, especially here on the homeworld. They'd have to do
something
.

Junior was fucked, and he had done it to himself.

He angled the mikecam to get a shot of Junior on the floor. “Because the samurai were honorable didn't mean they were stupid.

“Junior.”

He turned and headed for the door.

– – – – – –

“How did you know for sure?” Jo asked.

She leaned on the wall next to Gunny.

Rags said, “There were two possibilities as I saw them. He was worried that I had some evidence that might point a finger at him. He was pissed we'd cost him the Bax's money. So, I went to his office full of remorse and committed suicide, or I went to assassinate him and he outfought me and took me out instead. Either way, he needed my weapon to make the scenario work. I was betting on the fight—his ego made that more likely. A heroic encounter with a bitter old enemy who came to gun him down in cold blood? An unarmed man at gunpoint who prevails? That's a much better story than suicide. He couldn't resist polishing it that way.”

“You think the GU Army will court-martial him?”

“I'd guess they'd rather not air this dirty laundry. This business with the Bax would do it, but it's been a long time since Morandan, and other heads would have to roll if that came up. Some of the folks involved back then have risen in the ranks and doubtlessly have influential friends. That part would get messy, and Junior's lawyer would know it and wave it at them. Bad PR for the military all the way around, so why go there? Better to let sleeping dogs alone.”

Jo said, “Junior is going to have a sudden fatal medical condition or an accident.”

“It's been done before.”

Gunny shook her head. “They do it that way, you don't get exonerated. No reinstatement.”

He shrugged. “It doesn't matter anymore. People will know the truth. And I'm happy with where I wound up. It doesn't bring back all those civilians, but I will always remember the look on his face when he pulled the trigger, and the gun didn't fire.”

Gramps stuck his head into the office. “Hey. Formentara wants to talk to us. Says it's not that important, but we might find it interesting.”

– – – – – –

They were gathered around the table, waiting for hir to speak: Rags, Jo, Gunny, Gramps, Kay, and Wink.

Formentara smiled, and it was a blend of happy and wicked. “The program I've been back-burnering is a one-size-fits-all male/female multiorgasmic aug. Install, light it up, and you can screw your brains out and climax as many times as you can stand before you pass out.”

“Christus,” Gramps said, “you'll make a fucking fortune!”

Gunny looked at him. “That's a really bad pun.”

“But true,” Jo said. “Congratulations, Formentara!”

“Thank you. I've sold the aug to Galactic Pharmaceuticals. Sixty million advance against 5 percent of gross royalties.”

“Whoa!” Gunny said. “That's a shitload of noodle!”

“Not to GP—they'll make that all back in the first thirty days if the aug is as good as I think it is, and, of course, it is.”

Jo laughed. “I knew you were well-off. I had no idea how well-off.”

Formentara's smile grew larger. “You still don't. If I converted all the money I have into big-denomination t-note bills and started shoveling 'em into a furnace? I couldn't burn it fast enough to get ahead of the royalties that come in every year. I might have mentioned that I'm good at what I do.”

“So now you'll be superrich,” Wink said.

“Already am that.”

“Really? Just how wealthy are you?” Jo asked.

“I don't keep close track, I have people who do that. Three or four billion?”

“Mother
fucker
!” Wink said. “No shit?”

Gramps shook his head. “Buddha's nuts! I've been making jokes for years about how rich you are, but I didn't have a clue. Why are you
here
?”

Zhe shrugged. “Here, there, it doesn't matter. It's about the work. I can do it anywhere. And I am accepted here; none of you has ever looked at me crooked because I am
mahu
. Not once.”

Zhe nodded to herself. “That means something to me, you don't know how much. I'm giving you a token of my appreciation.”

Gramps looked at hir. “What are you saying?”

“You are my family. During this war, I could have lost any or all of you to a stray bullet, just like that.

“When Jo got hurt, it . . . disturbed me. They are your lives, you can live them as you want, but I thought you should have a choice. So the money from the new aug? It gets divided equally among those of you sitting around this table, advance and royalties.