War of the Fathers (10 page)

“What do you want?” Adar asked as Tarner and Lous followed
Tere into the alley. Both of them looked down at the body with a measure of
surprise.

Tarner took it better than Lous did. Adar had to keep
his hand from touching the tip of his ear that Tarner had sliced off. It had
been a long time since he'd taken a wound that was more than a cut that left a
scar and that was because Tarner had attacked him when his back had been turned.
It was a cowardly thing to do; he had been keeping Jorad from killing Tere.
Tarner had seen that but hadn’t cared.

Adar would have to keep an eye out for Tarner in the
future. He remembered giving Tarner some training back when he'd been a scrawny
and short boy. Come to think of it, he hadn't gained much height since. He was a
great deal more bulky and Adar wondered if Tarner kept that way on purpose to
make up for his lack of height.

Lous was affected by the body. Adar didn't know Lous
from before and hadn't yet had a chance to learn his last name. When he did,
that might tell him a little bit more about the man and why he'd been sent on
this particular expedition. It seemed like Abel never did anything without
having multiple reasons for his actions. Lous might have been somebody that
Abel needed out of the way to get something done or perhaps Abel just didn’t
like the man and hoped that he would die on the trip.

“Jorad was taken by the town guards.” Tere looked down
at the body of the bounty hunter. “It seems that he takes after his father. He’s
wanted for murder.”

“One of the guards almost killed him,” Tarner said,
his voice devoid of any emotion. “Xarda was sure they’ll try again tonight.”

Adar didn't bother to respond as he pushed past them
and rushed out onto the street. The guards would have taken Jorad to the
guardhouse. The quickest way to get there would be through the town square. Of
all the times, why did this have to happen now? This smelled of Erro. That
jealous fool son of Neare couldn’t leave well enough alone, could he?

As Adar ran past the party of people who'd been
relaxing and drinking, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of guilt at not doing
more to try to save the town. When he'd had the conversation with mayor Keerit she
hadn't even bothered to keep the amusement off her face. What could he do about
something like that short of producing a live Hunwei so that they believed him?

As he got closer to the town square, he became
alarmed. People were crying out. He’d didn’t remember anything particularly
noteworthy happening at the town square tonight, but he rarely paid attention
to those things. Despite his urgency to get to Jorad, he slowed down. The cries
did not have a note of merriment to them. He thought about the scream he heard
earlier and wished he had gone to investigate it sooner.

Adar slowed as he approached the last turn that would
put him on the street that went to the town square. He knew what he would find
but had to see it firsthand.

He could hear the cries more clearly now and there was
a lot of light coming from around the corner. The smell hit him next. He didn't
have the right words to describe it but he could tell that some of it came from
smoke. The rest didn't smell like anything that he'd encountered before. He
noticed that Tere was walking beside him. Neither spoke as they turned the
corner and found the town square engulfed in mayhem. Tere said something that
Adar didn’t catch because that was when the explosions started. Adar dove to
the ground, the rumbling thunder blocking out the sound of his own curse.

The Hunwei were here.

THE YEAR OF THE SEVERING

As the wind from the open
doors of his balcony touched and cooled his sweaty forehead,
Rend
wondered if he was making a mistake. He wiped
his brow and sighed.

Millions were about to die.
At first he'd been certain about his decision to continue the mission, but as
time had worn on, his thoughts weren't so clear.

He'd lost weight in the weeks leading up to the
assault and he couldn’t remember the last time he had a restful night of sleep.
What would he feel once it was done? Would it be relief or horror? Was this just
the first step on a path that would leave him abandoned and forlorn?

He steeled his nerves. Even if that
was to be
his fate, he would proceed.

Most believed that the fleet had been destroyed by the
war's end, but the holographic display in front of him proved the lie. A
full
third of the
ir
fleet was intact and moving in on the Hunwei home world.

Rend used the computer to call Admiral Joner, but his
hail went unheeded. That wasn't a surprise, Joner rarely answered. The man had
been sent on his mission years before by Ghar
Chandlir.
Joner
didn't feel the need to explain himself
to
the likes of
Rend.

Jbyte would track Joner down if Rend asked but the
thought of interacting with Deren's cursed program made him want to punch a
hole in the wall. It frustrated him that Jbyte was always monitoring him
anyway. The last thing he wanted was her bothering him as the attack began.

He took a breath, letting the cool air calm him. The
last time he'd punched something he'd been lucky. It had been a chair that
easily gave way. The rock walls of Rarbon palace weren't so forgiving.

There was a flurry of activity on the display that
drew Rend's attention. At first, Rend assumed that the attack was under way,
but it was the last of the fleet moving
in
to
position. He was surprised because he'd been following the fleet closely and
had thought that everybody was already into
their
assigned places
. Perhaps Joner had changed his orders at the last
moment.

When the first reports of the planet had come into Rend's
office, he’d scarcely believed that they’d found the right place. The initial
photographs had resembled a big dust ball and he’d wondered how the Hunwei
survived with so little water, something just as essential to Hunwei as it was
humans. It wasn’t until later that he learned that what it lacked in oceans and
lakes, it made up for with rivers and marshes.

He’d been surprised to find that the Hunwei built cities
in harmony with their ecosystems. That was ironic. The Hunwei made no effort to
spare the natural resources of Rend's home and in many instances had destroyed
large swaths of
forest and vegetation
.

That reminded him of the question that had been
bothering him now for the better part of twenty years. Why had the Hunwei attacked
in the first place?

Because the Hunwei never tried to directly
communicate, the reasoning behind the war was hotly
disputed
among those that had survived
. Any attempts to reach out to the Hunwei
had failed. From what he could tell, the Hunwei had come to capture slaves and
destroy.
There had
to
be
more to it than that, but he didn’t have any idea what.

Regardless, the Hunwei would deserve what they got.
He repeated that thought several times, willing himself to
believe it.

Rend had rarely left his office since the first ship
had snuck into the system and sent back the photos. His wife Tira wasn’t too happy
with him about that. It would have been much easier if he just told her, but
then the burden would be on her shoulders as well. She didn’t need to feel the
responsibility for this atrocity.

She'd stopped to visit earlier when Rend had been
having a panic attack. He’d barely been able to engage in conversation and she’d
left in tears. A few more hours and it would all be over. She’d forgive him.

He stared at the fleet. If the reports he’d been given
were accurate, it would take less than an hour to destroy the planet. He didn’t
quite believe it, but he couldn’t help but hope.

Do I want this to be my legacy?
he
wondered. He set his jaw
.
I just want this over
and done. Joner is certainly taking his sweet time
. Anytime now, the
destruction would begin, and the nightmare would be over. After that, he could
get to work dealing with the political fallout and putting his life back
together.

Once the attack was complete, the truth would go out.
Joner had his hands full keeping his team in radio silence. There had been
several
executions in the last year
of
those from the fleet
trying to get around the blackout
order. Rend's heart went out to each of them, but he'd done nothing to stop it.

Who’s to say that the Hunwei hadn’t left spies? It
seemed unlikely, but it wasn’t a risk he was willing to take. The soldiers had
just wanted to know if their loved ones had survived, but order and secrecy had
to be maintained.

What a mess I’m in
, he thought,
it isn’t
even my fault
. The lie had been told long before he’d ever sat in this
office. His only sin was that of perpetuating it. That wouldn't matter though
when the truth finally came out. He’d be just as blameworthy as
Joner and Ghar Chandlir
. Even once everybody knew,
Rend
hoped that most wouldn’t condemn him and the
others involved.

He
had been outraged
when he’d learned the truth. How could Ghar Chandlir have been so blind to the
fate of his people that he’d sent so many of their resources away when his
people had needed them the most?

After Rend had calmed, he realized that Chandlir had
made
an impossible
call
and it was hard to find fault with it
. If the rest of the fleet had
stayed, who’s to say that they wouldn’t have been destroyed like all the others?

Rend’s first instinct had been to call the ships back,
but he’d hesitated. The Hunwei had brought humanity to the brink of extinction.
So many had died. His first wife, his sons, and all but one of his daughters.

Lief.

The thought that Lief was up there somewhere living
his life as a slave is what kept Rend from calling off the attack. That wound
would never heal.

It was unlikely that the ship that took Lief had
returned to the Hunwei home
world by now
. Rend
wasn't aware of a single Hunwei ship that could travel faster than light. While
it had taken ten years for the remaining ships in the fleet to get to the Hunwei
planet, it would take the Hunwei more than a thousand. It had been a mere two
years since the last Hunwei ships had
left and
everybody but Rend had declared victory
.

Faster than light travel had been his people’s one
advantage and little good it had done
them when the
war had been entirely fought on their home world
. How could a species
that was so advanced in other ways lack
something
like that
? Was it because the Hunwei could live for more than a thousand
years so they just didn’t bother? What good were slaves that were lucky to
live
past eighty? Rend wished he knew.

He pushed the questions away. It was one of many
inconsistencies with the Hunwei.
There were many more
questions he’d never be able to answer.

Here was Rend’s only opportunity to right this wrong.
He’d never be able to find what ship his son was on or where they’d taken him,
but he could ensure that any of those Hunwei ships that returned home would
find their planet gone. Much the same as what they'd left to the few human
survivors.

“Besides,” Rend whispered to himself. “This war isn’t
over.” There had been no declaration of truce. He had a distinct feeling that
the Hunwei would one day return.

“If it isn’t, why’d they leave?” Jbyte materialized as
she spoke and Rend looked up from the holographic display. Her image was
that
of a serving girl in a tight red dress. He
recognized the face but couldn’t put a name to it. An actress from before the
war? The holograph bowed low, an act of respect that had been out of fashion
for years.

Rend winced and wished he hadn’t. Jbyte’s sensors picked
up the smallest things. She enjoyed it when she got to him. Unfortunately, if
Rend ignored her, she’d do the same and he still needed her help. For now. She
was his only way of knowing what was happening with the fleet because Joner
wasn’t very
forthcoming and rarely answered a call
.

“We’re not done until they’re all dead
or they’ll haunt us forever.”

Stupid. His comment would just result in her
tormenting
him further
. If there had been
another way to continue this attack without depending on one of Deren’s cursed
inventions, even if it required a lot more effort, Rend would have taken it.

Deren had never built anything that was reliable. He’d
programmed that way on purpose and had called it intelligence. For Rend, Jbyte
was just a terrible nuisance.

“Care to make a bet?” she asked instead of continuing the
lecture she liked to give. He'd probably heard it more than thirty times during
the last week alone. That had almost been enough to make him want to shut down
the whole mainframe, but he couldn't do that just to spite a program.
Even a particularly annoying one.

The mainframe
was the
last remaining hub of information. Initially, when it became apparent that
humankind wasn't going to win the war against the Hunwei, the government
at the time
had been afraid of being sent back to
the dark ages.

To ensure that didn't happen, twenty-five secret mainframes
had been established throughout the world. The one hidden in the depths of the
Rarbon palace was the last one remaining. In the intervening years all the
others had been destroyed. By the time they were down to the last few, too much
of their technology had been lost to build anything new. It would take them
years to recover everything they’d lost. It was a lucky thing that Rarbon was
self sustaining, or even the final mainframe might have been lost.

Jbyte's words were still ringing in Rend's ears.
Care
to make a bet?
She knew Deren had been fond of those words. Her eyes
narrowed and she raised the side of her upper lip, an expression Deren had
frequently worn when he’d been lost in thought.

“It’s not too late. This crime will overshadow your
victory.”

Rend didn’t bother to correct her, they hadn’t won.
Even Tira could see that now. When the Hunwei had left, most had celebrated.
Eventually, other people began to come around to Rend's way of thinking.

“It wasn't a victory, they packed up and left.” He
tried not to imagine what a baby Hunwei looked like. He looked at the clock. The
attack should have begun by now.

“Get me Joner, he--” Rend stopped when he saw a flare
of light coming through the open balcony doors. His office was high enough in
Rarbon Palace that he could see the distant
outer
wall.
He could just make it out. The light was outside the city wall and far enough
away that he would have missed it if he hadn’t happened to be looking that
direction. Had it been a missile? A bomb? Whatever it was, Rarbon's shields
were continuing to hold.

It was a reminder of one more problem he still needed
to deal with. He'd been ignoring Araz for too long
and th
e attacks were becoming more frequent. Rarbon's walls would hold a
little longer. Once the Hunwei were dealt with, he could focus on Araz. Rend
would sooner see the mainframe destroyed than let it fall into Araz’s
hands but there wasn't much danger in that happening
.

Not even the Hunwei had ever managed to get past
Rarbon’s defenses for long. Araz wasn’t likely to make it past the shields
anytime soon.

Perhaps it was time Rend made a trip to the outer wall
to observe the enemy encampment firsthand. Tomorrow would be soon enough, once
this was all over, and he had a full night of rest under his belt.

“Where’s Joner?” Rend asked.

“Not responding. If this is right, why haven’t you
told your people?”

“I’ll tell them when it’s over. We have to keep our
plans secure.”

“Rubbish. You know they won’t agree with you.”

Rend was saved from having to respond because Joner
flashed onto the large display mounted on the wall facing his desk. Joner
looked as haggard as Rend felt. Normally, he would have stopped to ask how the
man was doing, but every minute they delayed was another chance for the Hunwei to
realize they were under attack.

“It’s about bloody time.” Rend approached the display.
“Why haven’t you attacked yet?”

“The attack is still several hours out.” Joner didn't seem
concerned by Rend’s look of alarm.

Rend struggled to keep his voice steady and had to
resist gritting his teeth. “You don’t have time, Joner. Launch the Borers. The Hooneys
will find you soon, if they haven’t already.”

Joner shook his head. “We won’t move until we’ve
completed a final analysis of the planets defenses. We have one shot at this; we
need to make sure we'll succeed.”

“You're jeopardizing the plan.”

“I'll let you know when the attack commences.” Joner
ended the transmission and Rend pounded the screen, enlarging a small crack
that had formed before when it had received similar treatment.

“Temper, temper,” Jbyte said. “Maybe he’s having a
crisis of conscience, that’s something you wouldn’t understand.”