The Terran Mandate (29 page)

Promise

Dekker opened his eyes to the sound of a
purring coo drifting through the air around him. He blinked and saw a wall of
gray as the sound became louder. He moved his head to look at Lt. Simmons and
blinked again. The world arrived as a blur of light that fell into itself until
he could see her face staring up at the sky with vacant eyes. Her uniform shone
with the slick red of blood where shrapnel had torn into her and knocked her
away from the machine gun.

His voice was barely a croak.
"Lieutenant." Her mouth was agape and her arms were extended over her
head, lying on the ground with palms open. He grimaced as his body surged with
pain to the tempo of his pulse. He closed his eyes. "Ah, fuck."

He felt something rough brush against
his cheek and he forced his neck to turn to see what it was. Shahn'Dra was
huddled next to him with her knees pulled into her chest as she brushed his
cheek with the wrinkled leather of her knuckles.

"Your mind breathes a while
longer," she said. Her antennae weaved back and forth over her head and
she unfurled her snout. The sound of her song flowed over him again and he
realized it was the only thing he could hear. The snap of rifles and the
relentless pounding of the machine gun were gun, as if they had been turned off
by a switch. He lifted his arm and groaned again. The pain beating his body
with the rhythm of his heart subsided into a throbbing ache and he decided not
to check his wounds, whatever they might be.

He squeezed his eyes hard and opened
them again, his vision clearing but still veiled by a wetness in his eyes
brought on by the pain. Major Walker's body lay silently on the slope. The case
was gone. He squinted, working to focus his eyes as he swept his gaze down the
slope. General Godfrey and Shoahn'Fal were loping towards the Terran Guard
carriers lined up in front of the Pyramid, the Old Scrolls locked in the clutch
of the Shoahn's clawed hand. A thin veil of white smoke rose up from the first
carrier while the second lay flopped on its side, now abandoned. The stench of
burned out coils drifted up the hill and stung his nostrils.

Further away from the Pyramid, troops
were gathered beneath the remaining three Cats, none of which were moving now.
He looked away, not wanting to see any more - knowing what they were going to
do to the pilots.

"Will you help me now?"
Shahn'Dra asked.

He turned to look at her.
"What?"

"I will need your help now."
Shahn'Dra stood up and raised her hands in front of her face and moved them
around each other, as if she were caressing a ball. "You promised."

Dekker looked back at the two figures
moving away from him, carrying the Old Scrolls to the Pyramid.
"Right." He dug his elbows into the ground and pushed himself up from
the ground. He grasped the plasma rifle and leaned on it, gathering his
strength to focus on one last mission.

He craned his head around and beckoned
for Jommy to join him. The carrier hatch flew open and Jommy ran towards him at
a dead run.

As Shahn'Dra filled the air with a deep
drone that Dekker could feel through the ground beneath him, he told Jommy,
"Check the belt. How many cartridges are left?"

Jommy picked up the belt and pawed at
the pouches. He shook his head. "They're all empty."

Dekker tugged at the cartridge mounted
in his rifle, but wasn't able to pull it out. "Here, pull this one out so
I can see it."

Jommy knelt down next to him and placed
one hand on top of the weapon and grabbed the magazine with his other hand and
yanked it out. Dekker pushed down on the canister loaded in the top of the
magazine, feeling it firmly set against the rest below it.

"Four rounds," he said. 
"OK, put it back in and get behind me."

Jommy wrestled the magazine back into
place and then scooted back to look over Dekker's shoulder.

Dekker shouldered the weapon, wincing at
the pain that came with every movement, laid his cheek against the stock and
then wrapped his hand around the grip behind the trigger housing.

Shahn'Dra stopped moving her hands and
then opened her arms wide. She took a breath and let out a piercing screech.
Through his site, he saw Shoahn'Fal and Godfrey both stop dead in their tracks
and look around as if they were caught in a net. Dekker squeezed the trigger.

The first canister landed just behind
them. As the blue haze of the plasma faded, he saw they were both still
standing just beyond the shimmering heat wave now rippling from its impact.

Dekker twisted the windage knob for the
rear site. "They are really far away," he said.

Shoahn'Fal turned and looked straight at
them. Shahn'Dra let out a yelp and then held her hands out in front of her with
her claws curling in as if they were squeezing something.

Shoahn'Fal fell to one knee and his
antennae unfurled from the top of his head.

In a voice that sounded like it came
from a caged animal, Shahn'Dra said, "Hurry."

Dekker pulled the bolt back and squeezed
the trigger again. A blue flash leapt up from the ground to the side of his
target. Godfrey tugged at the case, but Shoahn'Fal held it firmly in is claws.
Staring at Shahn'Dra, he cocked his head and she let out a yelp. She stumbled
back, still holding her hands in front of her face. Shoahn'Fal turned around
and both he and Godfrey resumed their run towards the Pyramid.

As they passed the line of troops
guarding the carriers, Dekker fired his third round. It took a moment for the
round to close the range and then one of the troops erupted in a blue smudge.
Dekker pulled the bolt back and exhaled.

They reached the alcove framing the
entryway to the Pyramid and Shoahn'Fal set the case on the ground. He opened
the lid and removed something - Dekker couldn't see what exactly because of the
distance, but a chill washed over his body as he saw Shoahn'Fal press something
into the wall next to the entryway.

Shahn'Dra pushed her hands out, a low
drone mixing with a wail of desperation. Shoahn'Fal staggered and then whipped
around to look at them one more time. He set down whatever he was holding and
raised his own hands in front of his face, then took a step forward.

Shahn'Dra screamed and fell flat on her
back.

Dekker let out a screeching howl as the
pain - which had merely been a throbbing hammer pummeling his body from the
inside - slammed into his body and ripped through him like hot steel.

His hand shaking, he reached up and
tugged at the bolt, straining to pull it back as the pain drove him towards
another bout of darkness. His breath came in tight stabs as he pressed his
cheek against the stock and sited down the barrel. His focus wavered. For a
moment, he could see Shoahn'Fal facing the wall next to the entryway; the next
moment, all he could see was a blur. The site weaved through the air as he
struggled to tell his hand to hold the barrel still. A glimmer of a thought
surfaced, telling him he should adjust the windage again, but he didn't dare
move his hand from the trigger grip. He estimated the adjustment he would need
to make the canister arc out at its maximum range to find its target.

As his hand shook against the strain of
trying to steady the barrel, he thought of a picture he had once seen of a
world that was green and blue with clouds in the sky that swirled around it. Or
was it a dream?  Men like Emmet had said they could make Shoahn'Tu that way
some day. Generations from now, if they didn't have to worry about moving from
place to place to escape the ravages of war, they could make a world like that.
Others had scoffed, saying it was nothing more than a dream.

The site wavered relentlessly over the
head of Shoahn'Fal as he worked on whatever he had latched to the wall. Dekker
could just make out the antennae quivering over his head, as if he were nothing
more than a child excited at the prospect of his first visit to an amusement
park. He could sense, somehow, that the old Shoahn' was giddy.

Dekker let the image of leaves rustling
in the wind settle into his mind. A dream was enough. The site wavered and then
paused for just a moment, as if time had finally decided to let him have a
sliver of itself - even if it was just to see what he would do with it. The
master of all things let one more grain slip through that would determine
whether the leaves would one day be more than a dream or if they had come all
this way just to become another whisper in the dark, never heard by the
universe again. It was enough to take one more breath.

Dekker pulled the trigger.

Tomorrow

She
should have died hereafter.

There
would have been a time for such a word.

Tomorrow,
And tomorrow, And tomorrow,

Creeps
in this petty pace from day to day

To
the last syllable of recorded time.

-Shakespeare: Macbeth 5.5

Jommy was crouched behind Colonel Dekker
when Shahn'Dra screeched and fell on her back. He ran to her and started pawing
at her body as she stared at the sky, her antennae draped along the side of her
head. She wasn't moving. As panic welled up inside him, he placed his hand next
to her snout and felt the warmth of her breath. Then it stopped. It seemed like
forever, but then he felt another shallow wash of air. He turned to look at the
Colonel, started to say something and then changed his mind. He picked up
Shahn'Dra's hand and sat down next to her as Dekker fired the last shot from
his plasma rifle.

Dekker rolled away from the weapon with
a groan and leaned back against the crest of the ridge. Jommy felt his stomach
turn when he saw the slick of blood all along the side of the Colonel's body.
Dekker pointed at one of the bodies lying next to him with a red cross wrapped
around his arm. The Colonel's voice was strained as his face twisted against
the pain. "Get me the satchel of his back."

Jommy padded his way to the body, trying
not to step on the ground too firmly, as if he were tip-toeing into some sacred
place that would awake too easily at the sound of an intruder. He unlatched the
satchel from the corpsman's back and tucked it under his arm as he backed away.

The Colonel's voice was thin as he
sputtered his words. "Open it." Jommy unsnapped the flap and scooted
the satchel towards the Colonel's hand. Dekker grunted as he rummaged through
the bag and pulled out a white bandage. He unrolled the bandage, took Jommy's
hand and draped it over his palm.

"I know it will be rough,
Jommy." The Colonel wheezed in a breath and groaned. "Work hard. Keep
your head down. Be useful. Stay alive." The Colonel ran his hand across
his forehead and down the front of his face. "Remember what you've seen
here today. Maybe someday you can tell somebody. Don't ever forget." The
Colonel clenched his teeth and pushed out a raspy groan. "Until then, stay
alive. You have to stay alive."

He curled the boy's fingers around the
cloth and said, "It will be quiet soon." The Colonel winced and
sucked in a sharp breath. "When that happens, I want you to go stand on
the crest and hold this in the air as high as you can until somebody sees
you."

Jommy let his eyes drift to the crest of
the ridge and shivered when he thought of what must have been behind it.      

"When they come for you, tell them
your name." A ragged cough erupted from the Colonel's chest and blood
dribbled from the corner of his mouth. "Then tell them you
surrender."

Dekker dug in one of the bags still
slung over his shoulder and pulled out a handful of socks. Laying them on the
ground, he reached back into the bag and raised his hand to reveal the clay cup
cradled in his palm.

"This was made from the ground
where the Second Battalion, Fifth Colonial Marines Regiment fought their final
battle." He placed the cup in Jommy's palm. "Try not to let them take
it." Dekker looked at him and took a wheezing breath that Jommy could
barely hear. "We are more than walking shadows."

His face grew still. He stopped
breathing. Colonel Dekker's eyes froze then, and stared past Jommy. He looked
as if he had something more to say, but no more words came. Jommy felt like he
was looking at a photograph - something that would be lost in the winds when
there was nobody left to remember it.

He stood up, letting the rising wind
bite into is face and dry away the tears he felt on his cheek. He closed his
eyes, took a deep breath and then opened them again. He stepped deliberately to
the crest of the ridge and gasped when he looked into the valley below.

Shuddering at the sight of the smoking
shells of the Cats, the bodies still lying on the field and the broken corpse
of the Paladin, he raised the bandage as far above his head as he could and let
it unfurl in the wind.

"I surrender," he said to
himself, practicing the way he would say it when they came for him. He didn't
want to forget. He didn't want to sound scared. He just wanted to go home.

"I surrender."