Was Once a Hero (27 page)

Fenaday
returned to the
Pooka
to find an exhausted
Telisan and Belwin Duna.

“Captain,”
Duna began, “please forgive me.
 
If I
hadn’t argued against you...”

“Ancient
history, Mr. Duna,” Fenaday replied.
 
“I’m in charge, whatever happens is my responsibility.”

“So
many dead and hurt,” Duna mourned.

“Telisan,
what’s our situation?” Fenaday asked.
 
Painful-looking flash burns marred Telisan’s leathery face and his usual
optimism seemed absent.
 
He stared
hard-eyed at the battlefield.
 
It was nothing new to Telisan,
Fenaday
thought.

“Twenty
dead,” Telisan answered.
 
“Fifteen badly
wounded, two of those are critical.
 
Almost everyone bears some small wound.
 
Half our ammunition is gone, as well as a quarter of our robots.
 
The big problem lies with the shuttles.
 
Farriq
is a total loss.
 
Banshee
took the worst hit, but she is flyable, as is
Pooka
,
though both are holed by shrapnel.
 
We couldn’t take them into the high atmosphere, much less space.
 
I think if we can find a machine shop, we
might repair
Pooka.
 
I suspect it will take a shipyard and some
live shipwrights to repair
Banshee.
 
The pressure door is blown in, and I have no
idea how to fix that.”

“We
cannot even retreat to space,” Duna murmured, “and I have killed you all.”
 

“Belwin,”
Telisan said gently, “you forget.
 
We can
bring the ship down.”

Fenaday
nodded. “I didn’t want to if I could avoid it, but we have no choice now.”

Li
walked over to them with some coffee.
 
Steam rose out of plas-steel cups.
 
Fenaday reached for a cup gratefully.
 
“Good man.”

“Well,”
Li said, “if you ain’t dead, you need coffee, and maybe even then.”

The
gallows humor drew grins, save from Shasti, who sat a few feet off and declined
the coffee with a shake of her head.

“Telisan,”
Fenaday asked, “are you sure
Banshee
is airworthy?”

Telisan
nodded wearily, his bright yellow eyes on the horizon.
 
“The blast went mostly upwards.
 
Banshee
sat partly hull down behind that little rise of ground, so the debris hit her
mid and upper hull.
 
The thrusters, drive
units, and controls run through the armored floor.
 
It was simply bad luck that a large piece of
Farriq
hit both the pressure door and
the turret.
 
Otherwise, she would be in
better shape than
Pooka.
”

“Damn
Nusam,” Fenaday said.

“Are
thee so immune from fear?” Telisan snapped.

Fenaday
started to reply, but Telisan, his leathery face suddenly turning pale, stood
up and bowed.

“Forgive
me, please,” Telisan asked, “I forgot myself.”

“It’s
all right,” Fenaday said, putting a hand on the tall alien’s shoulder.

“Okay,”
Fenaday continued, “so far these things don’t seem to show any sign of
regenerating.
 
We don’t know if they
do.
 
We bugged out of the library too
fast to see if that one came back.
 
We
know that when we killed the self-aware one last night, it had some
effect.
 
Maybe it was some sort of
subcontroller.”

“Certainly
the attack fell apart after it did,” Duna added.

“I
don’t want to be here at nightfall to find out.
 
We will pick a landing site and bring the
Sidhe
in.
 
Then, it’s back to
orbit and maybe just home.
 
We appear to
be overmatched.

“Meanwhile,
Telisan, go get those burns attended to.”

The
Denlenn looked as if he might protest; but Fenaday cut him off with a raised
hand.
 
“No argument, Mr. Telisan.
 
I need reliable people around me.”

He
regretted saying it instantly.
 
He hadn’t
aimed the comment at Shasti, but she could only think she was the target of
it.
 
Well,
he decided,
it might not be the worst
thing.

“Mr.
Duna,” Fenaday said, “stay close to Telisan, please.
 
We will call the ship from
Pooka
.”
 
He started off, half expecting he would be alone, but Shasti trailed
alongside him.
 
He searched for something
to say, could not come up with anything and damned himself for it.

As
they passed two of the Landing Force troops, Shasti stepped aside to speak to
them for a second.
 
They hurried off in
the direction of
Banshee
.
 
She caught up to Fenaday effortlessly, her
long legs covering the ground quickly.

He
looked over at her.
 
In the morning
light, her face seemed colorless, except for the lustrous jade green eyes.
 
“Anything I should know?” he asked.

“It
is going to occur to people,” she replied tonelessly, “that wherever Duna is,
the things strike hardest.
 
The monsters
will clearly not stop with him, since no outworlders survived on Enshar; but we
have many frightened people here.
 
Someone may figure it increases their own odds of survival if the last
Enshari on the planet is dead.”

“Very
sensible,” he said.
 
It sounded stilted
even to him.
 
She did not reply.
 
It struck him with a sudden clarity.
 
She looked and sounded the way she did when
they met in the shuttle bay, years ago.
 
His anger at her actions in the wood had ebbed, replaced by the memories
of all the times she’d saved his life.
 
Years wiped out
, he thought,
me and my damn mouth.
 
Still, he could not bring himself to approach
her.
 
The familiarity they had shared was
shattered, and he above all others knew how lethal Shasti could be when
provoked.
 
For now it seemed best to walk
on the eggshells and let matters settle.

They
reached
Pooka.
 
A weary Angelica Fury looked up from under a
panel as they entered.
 
She held a micro
torch and battle patches of malleable ceramic.
 
Fury was smart enough not to bother him with questions.
 
He walked over to the communications console,
passing one of Rigg’s people in the top turret.
 
Susan Bernard, one arm in a sling and looking like death warmed over,
set up the call to
Sidhe
without his
asking.

“Fenaday
to Perez.”

After
a brief delay a response came back.
 
The
screen did not light up with an image.
 
Fenaday assumed it was due to damage to the shuttle’s com system.

“This
is Micetich on the bridge.”

“We’ve
had a bad night down here, Micetich.
 
I
assume you received a situation report.”

“Affirmative.”

“We
can’t come up, so we are going to bring
Sidhe
in for a water landing.
 
Give me an ETA
for a planetary landing at my location.
 
If you can’t make it before nightfall, we will be relocating.”

“Please
hold, ground base.”

“Micetich,”
Fenaday snapped, “you’re supposed to have that figure at your fingertips at all
times.”

Silence
greeted him.
 
He repeated the call
several times.
 
He could see dismay on
Bernard’s face.
 
“They are receiving
you,” she whispered.

“I
know they are,” he said.
 
He turned to
Shasti.
 
“Get Telisan, Duna and
Mmok.
 
We have trouble.”

Shasti
vanished out the door.
 
She’d long ago
mastered the art of covering ground without looking as if she was in a
hurry.
 
Fury, Bernard and the gunner
stared at him, something like panic in their eyes.
 
“Do your jobs and keep your mouths closed,”
he ordered.
 
They returned to work, but
Fenaday knew they would listen to every word.

He
heard boots on the deck ramp as Shasti returned with the others.
 
Telisan arrived first, looking a question at
him.
 
Fenaday shook his head.
 
Mmok was plainly furious.
 
At that
moment, the speaker crackled.

“This
is
Sidhe
,” came Micetich’s voice, it
sounded shaky.

“Put
Mr. Perez on.”

“Captain,
Mr. Perez is unavailable,” Micetich answered.
 
“It’s this way, sir.
 
We will do
everything we can to get you off the planet, but the ship isn’t coming down.
 
We don’t want to be added to the body count
on Enshar.”

A
coldness spread though Fenaday’s belly.
 
“Micetich,” he said, “get Mr. Perez to the screen before you do
something you may not live to regret.”

“Forget
it, Captain,” came a new voice.
 
“We are
not going to take any chances.
 
You’ve
been down there seventy-two hours and you’ve gotten a quarter of your command
wiped out.
 
If we come in, it will be
just like the
Flamme.
Anybody who
doesn’t agree with us is under lock and key.”

“Naks,”
Mmok exploded.
 
He started swearing.

Fenaday’s
shoulders sagged.
 
Naks commanded
shipboard security.
 
He was an ASAT and
part of Mandela’s team.
 
They’d thought
him reliable.

“Shut
up,” Fenaday ordered Mmok.
 

Fenaday
considered, rubbing his hand over his face.
 
He had no leverage in the present situation.
 
If he pushed too hard, he might even lose the
slender thread of the help she’d offered.
 
“Micetich, if you attempt to break orbit, the ship’s engines and power
will go off-line.”

“Yes
sir, very clever.
 
Mr. Perez explained
quite thoroughly that we can’t leave orbit for four weeks due to the safeguards
you rigged.
 
We can wait.”

At least Perez is still loyal,
thought
Fenaday.
 
Still, he was glad he had not
given him the access codes.

“

“We
doubt it, sir.
 
We were brought into this
under false pretenses.
 
Nobody told us
about Enshar.
 
We are only contesting
your illegal order to land.
 
Otherwise,
we will still take your orders.
 
In any event,
we’d rather be judged by twelve than carried by six, not that we would even get
that on Enshar.”

“Very
well, Micetich.
 
You mentioned help.
 
What do you have in mind?
 
We can’t climb out of this gravity well in
the shuttles.
 
I’ve got critically wounded
here.
 
How do I get them out?”

“Can
you reach the spaceport at Barjan?” she asked.
 
“There may be ships there.”

“Try
harder, Micetich.
 
Those ships haven’t
been maintained in years, even if they are undamaged.
 
Add to that, most will be Enshari and unfamiliar.
 
It could take weeks to get one flyable.
 
There are people here you are going to kill
in twelve hours if we can’t get them to better facilities.
 
So add murder to your list of
accomplishments.”

There
was the sound of a scuffle and some unintelligible shouting over the speaker.

“Stand
by, Captain,” Micetich said and clicked off.

“She
is very polite,” Shasti said, leaning against the bulkhead, her green eyes
chill with promise.
 
“When we retake the
ship, I want her.
 
I’ll be sure to
apologize as I slowly strangle her.”

Fenaday
shook his head.
 
“Hold that thought.
 
She may not be wrong about a board of inquiry
finding them not to be mutineers.
 
The
government won’t want the public to know we launched our little expedition
without telling everyone where we were going.

“Also,
she didn’t have to even return our hail.
 
Once they knew what happened to the shuttles, all they needed to do was
sit tight for a few weeks and then leave.
 
They could then make up their own story.
 
Probably most of the crew doesn’t know for sure what’s going on.

“If
it weren’t for the presence of Duna and Telisan here, she might have opted for
it.
 
No one gives a rat’s ass for the
rest of us.
 
We’re all expendable, but
Telisan’s a war hero and Duna’s a Nobel Laureate.”

Fenaday
leaned back in his seat.
 
“She’s walking
a thin line.
 
She has to help us or face
the probability of prison for life—or life on the run.
 
I think we can rely on her in anything that
doesn’t bring
Sidhe
into atmosphere.”