Zero's Return (8 page)

They didn’t care
about
Joe
.  They wanted to take him out in public and get their picture
taken with the legend so they could send it back home to their Aunt Jenny—or
tell the tabloids about the size of his cock during an hour-long exposé on his
lovemaking skills, after which they quit the Army and retire to Kaleu to live
on the royalties. 

Not for the
first time, Joe cursed himself for going back to Torat, rather than finding
another war to get lost in.  He was turning to leave when the Prime Commander
touched his arm.

“Sir,” she said
sincerely, her face a picture of innocence, “you don’t have to go at it alone.”

Joe knew it
wasn’t kind, but he snorted anyway.  “No offense, lady, but shows what you
know.”  He tugged his arm out of her grip and turned to stalk across the parade
grounds to the place where he’d left his haauk.  He wasn’t sure if she was
actually sincere or not, but he’d had way too many innocent-looking girls grab
him by the arm and look up at him with those same soulful doe-eyes and say
something similar, only to find a new documentary about him on the newsfeeds a
couple weeks later, narrated by the very girls he’d taken to bed—undercover
reporters for one of the Peacemaker news agencies—after his ‘innocent’ young
playmate had left him one morning without even a note.

‘Jaded’ didn’t
even begin to describe Joe’s outlook on life.  He knew as much, but he didn’t
really care.  Not anymore.  He didn’t care about much of
anything
anymore.  He woke up each morning, forced himself to leave Jane under his
pillow, got out of bed, went to the mirror, and recited to himself what he had
to live for.

War.

That was pretty
much the extent of it.  He lived for war.  He lived for the buzz of plasma, the
scent of ozone and burned flesh.  He used the legend of Zero to scare a few
recruits into shaping up, then went home to drink himself into another stupor.

Pretty burning
pathetic.

As Joe got on
his haauk and drove himself home, he wondered what Daviin would have thought,
seeing him now.  Without even looking at himself in a mirror, Joe doubted
Daviin would approve.  He knew his uniform was rumpled, his boots laced
haphazardly, his sleeves loose and baggy.  He had permanent rings under his
eyes from an increasingly chronic insomnia, his gut was starting to pooch from
twenty turns of being able to eat whatever he wanted, and his left hand started
to shake again whenever he didn’t have a good, stiff drink, so he drank
whenever he was alone.

And, as the man
wearing Zero’s legend, Joe was always alone.

He really wasn’t
looking forward to his next chat with Daviin, but he had the nagging feeling it
was coming soon.  He hadn’t even spoken to the Jreet in a couple rotations, but
he saw his old buddy making waves in Congress just about every time he turned
on the newsfeeds.  The last time he’d talked to his former Sentinel, Joe had
been busting up yet another Huouyt takeover on Telastus, and he hadn’t had time
to talk.  Joe, PlanOps had quickly learned, had a better sense for Huouyt than
an Ayhi-manufactured zora scanner, and they’d put him to work combing his way
through all the government positions on Telastus, finding plants. 

After all,
scanners were wrong twenty percent of the time.  Joe had only ever been wrong
once.

Well, twice, Joe
amended, thinking of Galek.  But Peacemakers had interfered on that one, and
had given Galek’s chip to his assassin, so that, mentally, the Huouyt continued
to register to Joe as the Ooreiki.  Joe liked to think he would’ve been able to
tell the difference if he hadn’t been chipped—and talking to him in his mind—as
Galek.

Excuses
,
he thought, miserable. 
So many died for you and you have nothing but
excuses.

God, he wished
he’d stayed on Telastus.  In a war, with death around every corner, slipping up
to him in the darkness, wearing the faces of friends, he hadn’t had the time to
think.  Now, when his only real duties were to show up once a week to dress
down a few PlanOps hopefuls, he had nothing
but
time.  It had quickly
become apparent to him that taking the recruiting job on Torat was one of the
worst decisions he’d ever made.  Every time he looked those young faces in the
eye, he felt Jim Beam calling to him in the back of his head.  And, raising her
seductive voice with his, Jane.

Joe dropped the
haauk to the roof of his private apartment, ignored the flashes from nearby
roofs as the paparazzi got their pics, and unlocked the door to his pad.  Once
he was inside, he shut the door, leaned his back against it, and tilted his
head back to rest against the cheap metal as he stared up at the dusty ceiling.

Just a couple
more turns,
he thought. 
I can go a couple more turns.

For the
thousandth time since leaving the Geuji sprawled over that box on Koliinaat,
Joe heard the muffled, tinny words, “
But with great responsibility, one
finds great loneliness.
”  His hand started to tremble again, and Joe
squeezed it into a fist.  Not for the first time, he wondered what would have
happened if he’d accepted the Geuji’s plea for friendship.  He hadn’t
understood Forgotten’s meaning before—had been too narrow-minded and
self-centered to even begin to comprehend—but now he did.  He understood it all
too well.  Every soul-wrenching second, he understood it. 

He needed a
friend.  Someone who wasn’t stuck debating with fat old sootbags or hunting
down intergalactic criminals or making babies while detonating Huouyt ships. 
Someone who could sit across from him over dinner and listen to him pour out
his woes, or take him out for target-practice when he felt that
spirit-smothering urge to use Jane.  Joe found himself wondering—again—if he
could find Forgotten and get on his knees and ask him for a second chance.

No,
Joe
thought, the bitterness returning in an acrid wave. 
He would have used you,
and you would have danced to his tune.  You’re an amoeba to his space station. 
You can’t be friends with something like that.

And yet,
sometimes, when Joe was staring into that mirror, after waking up alone and
hung over yet again, the stale taste of old alcohol or bile burning his throat,
he wondered if Forgotten could have helped him.

He was still
standing there, yet again trying to convince himself not to go seek out the
pistol under his pillow, when the call feature started buzzing on his
wrist-com.  Joe reluctantly glanced down at the device, then winced when he
read the origin ID.

Old Territory,
Koliinaat, Headquarters of His Excellency, Daviin ga Vora, Representative of
the Jreet.

“Burn me,” Joe
muttered.  He dropped his arm and leaned his head back against the wall to
again stare at the ceiling.  The last thing he wanted to do was to get lectured
on honor and duty by a self-righteous prick on his lunch break.

A few moments
later, his wrist-com activated, without his consent.  One of the bennies of
being a Tribunal member, one that Daviin made use of shamelessly, was the
Tribunal’s right to commandeer private technology for the Regency’s purposes.

“It says you’re
alive and conscious,” Daviin’s irritated voice said from the device around
Joe’s wrist.  “And that you’re not being tortured or otherwise detained, nor
are you in the middle of excellent sex—something my assistant tells me you
haven’t had in six turns—which makes me wonder why you would ignore another
call from your best friend in this miserable world.  Are you drinking again?”

“None of your
damn business,” Joe muttered, still not bringing the unit to his face.  “What
do you want, you unlovable furg?”

The Jreet
Representative went quiet for so long that Joe brought the wristcom up,
thinking Daviin had hung up on him.  To his surprise, the Jreet was there, but
his expression was grave.

Upon seeing
Joe’s face, Daviin grimaced.  “You look like something a Dhasha shat out,” he
muttered, but it was halfhearted, at best.

Joe narrowed his
eyes.  Usually, Daviin would spend at least an hour lecturing him on the
different hells he would enter for his lack of discipline.  Never before had he
just let it go with a single line.  “All right,” Joe growled, “what the hell’s
wrong?  Another Neskfaat?  Dhasha allied with the Jreet?  Forgotten side with
the Huouyt?  What?”

His old friend
looked extremely uncomfortable.  “Forgotten gained the recognition he wanted
for his species and then disappeared.  We’ve heard nothing more from him since
the captured Geuji were granted communications amongst themselves.”

Recognizing the
Jreet way of beating around the bush, Joe muttered, “Spit it out, Daviin.  I’m
missing an important meeting.  J.B..  I’m sure you’ve heard of him.”

Joe knew the
call was serious when threats of intentional inebriation didn’t even get a
twitch of response from the Jreet.  Instead, Daviin gave him a look
of…apology?  He straightened, obviously steeling himself, then said, “Joe,
Earth is about to get convicted of violating the Second Law of Congress, with
intent to violate the First.”

Joe froze, the
smirk sliding from his face.  “Excuse me?”

Daviin continued
to look uncomfortable.  “I’m calling to invite you to Koliinaat.  To stay.  As
my guest.”

“Just hold up a
second,” Joe snapped, shoving himself away from the door.  “What the ash are
you saying?!  Earth was burning around with genetics?  Was it that flake my
brother got mixed up in?”

Daviin
grimaced.  “Not just that.  They uncovered an entire program.  Shapeshifting,
telemorphosis, telekinesis, telepathy…”  The Jreet’s scaly ruby head turned
away for a moment before reluctantly returning to face Joe.  “Mekkval and
Aliphei have already made up their minds.  The Humans will lose the Trial.  And
since Humans only have one planet, they’re all being branded as traitors.”

Joe’s heart
stammered at the word ‘traitors.’  He swallowed, his chest suddenly afire with
adrenaline.  “Did you just say they’re killing all Humans?”

“No,” Daviin
said reluctantly.  “A total recall.  One of Mekkval’s nephews died in rooting
out the secret installations.” 

As soon as Joe
heard the word ‘nephew,’ he knew who it had been.  “Keval,” he whispered, his
heart stammering for his old friend.

Daviin nodded
his ruby head in commiseration.  “Your Second in hunting down the Prime
Sentinel Raavor ga Aez, yes.”

“Soot,” Joe
managed.  Keval, like his father, Bagkhal, had been one of the good guys.  One
of the only Dhasha that didn’t take slaves, or eat sentient creatures.  One of
the only ones Joe had been able to call a friend.

Seeing Joe’s
reaction, Daviin gave him a moment of silence before he went on.  “It just took
one
of the Human experiments to kill Keval and twenty others.  All
war-hardened Dhasha, some with hundreds of turns in service.  Dead by one
single
Human, you understand?  The Dhasha want blood.  I’m pushing for penance,
instead.”

Joe’s heart was
hammering like a miscalibrated engine drive.  “Define ‘penance,’ Jreet.”

Daviin’s scaly
ruby face again grimaced.  “It is not my place to say.  I’ve already violated a
few dozen non-disclosure laws with this call.  But I wanted you to know I’m
sending my fastest ship—”

“Now
hold on
a minute,” Joe snapped.  “Sending your fastest ship for
what
?”

Daviin
hesitated.  “To pick you up.”

“To move me to
Koliinaat,” Joe said.

“As my guest,”
Daviin agreed.

“Because they
think I was somehow involved with the experiments and they’re recalling me to
Earth.”

Daviin’s
reluctance was enough to send a cold chill down Joe’s spine.  “Because they’re
recalling the entire Human Ground Force and disbanding the Human section of the
Army,” the Jreet replied.

“Fuck me,” Joe
whispered, Bruce Thomson’s colorful Earthling vernacular still coming to Joe’s
tongue even four turns after the Scot had served as Joe’s Second on Der’ru.

“I’ve told you a
hundred times you wouldn’t like it if I did, Human,” Daviin said, a ghost of
his old playfulness back.  Then his golden eyes sharpened.  “You don’t have
much time.  Aliphei is calling for a Trial.  He’s giving the Human
Representative one rotation to prove Earth’s innocence, but there is no
defense.  The proof is irrefutable.”

“What are you
saying,” Joe said slowly.  “All Congies are getting recalled?”

“All
Humans
,”
Daviin replied, almost unwillingly.  “You only have one planet, and it was that
planet that broke the laws.  Therefore, you will all be sent home.”

“Earth is not my
home!” Joe snapped.  “Last time I was there, the ashsoul furgs didn’t even want
me there.  One of them spat in my whiskey right before I rearranged his face.”

“Get on a ship,”
Daviin said.  “Head for Koliinaat.  My ship will rendezvous with you.  If we
can get you to Koliinaat in time, you’ll have diplomatic immunity.”

But Joe just
stared at Daviin’s picture, unable to believe what he was being told.  “They’re
gonna take almost a quarter billion Congies and just throw them back on a
planet that hates ‘em?  And what?  Ask them to play nice?”

Daviin gave him
a long, uncomfortable stare.  “Joe…  If Mekkval gets what he wants, they’re
going to bomb all the bases, tech centers, and universities, drop kreenit on
the major cities, then leave Earth to serve penance for a Sacred Turn.  It’s
quite possible the Congies are going to be the only ones to survive.”

Joe felt his
blood burning in his veins.  Kreenit, the ancestral predators of
Dhasha
,
were installed on the worst rebel planets as a way of making sure conquered
races couldn’t rebound and rebuild immediately, giving their populaces a chance
to learn their ‘lesson’ before being allowed to rejoin Congress.   All he could
think to say was, “Female Congies are
sterile
, Daviin.”