CHAPTER 1
The rebels would kill him, Felix Ibensen was sure of it. Bullets ripped through the wide fronds of a jerjama bush and thudded into a tree whose top vanished into the canopy. Felix ducked behind the just-pockmarked tree and fought for breath.
“Gunnar? Gunnar, where are you?” Felix said into the mic built into his visor. The faceplate over his helmet did a decent job of cycling fresh air to his mouth and nose, but the exertion of running and fighting made every breath stuffy. This wasn’t the time for “helm terror,” as the Flankers called it: when a soldier couldn’t get enough oxygen in his helmet and threw the damn thing off before it could kill him.
Things were bad enough. The highway ambush had killed most of the company in the first minutes. The Dahrien insurgents usually preferred to hit and run, but this time they’d swarmed over the convoy with no intent of taking prisoners.
Single shots cracked a few yards from him, answered by a squeal of pain from the jungle.
“Sarge, peel back!” Gunnar yelled from somewhere close by. “Who’s that out there? You got frags?”
Felix tapped his chest rig; the exo-frame built around his arms and hands and extending down his back, waist and legs worked well enough to haul his weight, and the flack plates over his interception bivy suit. But when it came time for the fine motor control needed to activate a grenade, his Flanker panoply became difficult. Especially when his hands were shaking.
“Got one frag!” Felix tried several times to flick the pin onto a small hook on his chest rig.
“Then use it, by faen!” Gunnar yelled back.
Felix yanked the grenade off his chest rig, saw the pin tumble into the underbrush, then swung around and barely cleared the side of the tree. The grenade flew away, and Felix wasn’t exactly sure where it would go, but grenades had always been more of a “to whom it may concern” weapon.
The brief movement of his hand was enough to highlight his position to the insurgents and they opened up on him before the grenade could even hit the ground. The thud of impacts shook the tree against his back. Lumps of bark were sheared off as heavy caliber rounds tore past him, missing him by inches.
Felix shrank into himself like a child afraid of thunder as the fire continued.
The thermobaric grenade exploded into a wall of overpressure that enveloped Felix with a brief, yet awful, embrace. The interception bivy and helmet automatically stiffened to offset the effects. The insurgents trying to kill him were having a much worse time than he was. Ruptured ear drums, collapsed lungs, and concussions might be enough to give him and his company’s survivors the chance they needed to escape.
Felix glimpsed Gunnar and another Flanker moving down a hillside. He took off into the jungle, more scared of losing sight of them than the rebels following him. Jerjama fronds bent and slapped at him as he went along with the snap of bullets from an insurgent who was far too motivated for Felix’s liking.
“Was that ’nade not enough to convince you I don’t want to play? Fuckers,” he muttered to himself. He stepped over the edge of the hill and followed the obvious path left by the other two Flankers. His stride increased with the slope. Green and brown undergrowth slapped at him as he moved faster and faster down the hill, until he lost his footing and tumbled forward.
His bivy absorbed most of the impact as he rolled down. Felix hit flat on a small patch of grass, forcing air out of his chest in a horrible sounding hurf. Momentum carried him over and flopped him into a shallow pool.
Felix flailed about, unsure if he was sinking or swimming as water washed over his helm. A hand grabbed his carry handle and dragged him out of the pool and into an abandoned farmhouse. The roof was rotted out and rays of sunlight lit up dust and mold particles over him.
“What the hell, Felix?” Gunnar checked Felix’s biometrics panel on his chest, then gave him a playful slap on the side of the helmet. “You trying to break a leg and make this day even worse?”
Felix unlocked his visor and lifted it up. He took a deep breath of thick, earthy air and rolled to his side. He coughed for several seconds, clutching his carbine to his chest. Water oozed out of the suit. He touched the inflation lining around his breastplate, surprised it hadn’t gone off.
“Trips when you’re vertical, not when you’re playing in the kiddie pool, dumbass,” Gunnar said.
“I just . . . gimme a minute,” Felix said.
The other Flanker knelt in the corner, a holo map projected off of his forearm screen.
“Sergeant Hamar . . . that you? From Second Platoon?” Felix asked.
“One each,” Hamar said. “Central walked us straight into that ambush.”
“Why would Central do that?” Gunnar asked. “Patrol Base Equity was begging for support before we left the wire.”
“Equity went dark within an hour of the convoy rolling out,” Hamar said. “SOP is for us to return to base until a vacuum breather or some other collection platform can figure out what’s going on, but Commodore Malthus had other ideas. Fucker.”
Felix looked over the holo map. Several cities and towns had red borders, indicating significant rebel presence.
“We need to get back to base, tell Central what happened,” Gunnar said. “Organize a rescue mission for the others. Did either of you see what happened to Captain Olin?”
“I saw the Flags scalping him,” Hamar said.
“He said he’d always keep us alive.” Felix slapped his visor back down and crouched just high enough to look over a windowsill. The house had once been a farm, ramshackle at best. A pile of rusted-out tools lay against a small shed made of slightly off-sized bricks, the mortar laid down sloppily. Patches of gardens and a single large field were overgrown with weeds. The jungle was retaking the place inch by inch and day by day.
“Wasn’t his decision to make,” Hamar sighed. “Something tells me we’re not going to find anyone else from the company.”
“Can we even get back to base?” Gunnar asked. “Flags are all over that hill. Bet they’re on the highway too.”
“The way we came is a no go.” Hamar nodded. “We need to get to . . . Rabak? Rabak should still be ours. Got a whole battalion of Skien tanks there.”
“Where?” Felix made a quick squint of his left eye. The sensors in his helm read the gesture and activated his onboard map pack. The onboard navigation plotted out a course to the city.
“We might get there by morning,” Gunnar said. “Maybe.”
“Master Sergeant Kerr ran a tight ship in first platoon. You two have full batteries?” Hamar asked.
“Oh shit, he was in the truck right behind me,” Felix said. “Did it get hit too?”
“Burned out from a rocket hit,” Gunnar said. “I think we’re all that’s left.”
“W-we can’t be.” Felix’s shoulders tightened up. “The whole company was in the relief force and—”
“Captain’s own drones counted almost a thousand Flags during the couple minutes we fought back. We never stood a chance,” Hamar said. “Sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves does nothing. I’ve got the stripes. I’ve got command. Staggered line march through the valley to the bridge over the Baror River. We’ll follow the road to Shendi, there’s still a garrison there. Let’s go.”
Felix took a swig of water from a tube inside his helmet. Hamar was a good sergeant and Felix had a glimmer of hope that he might live to the end of the day. Maybe.
Hamar bumped a fist against his chest, the Hegemony salute, and jogged out of the house in a crouch.
The sniper’s bullet arrived with a crack against Hamar’s shoulder. The round pierced through his torso and burst out of his thigh, leaving a crater of blood and shattered bone in his leg big enough to stick a fist into. Hamar collapsed forward, dead before he hit the ground. The report of the high-powered rifle echoed through the farm.
“Run. Run!” Gunnar snatched Felix by the arm and pulled him through a side door. They sprinted through weed-choked rows of abandoned rice and potatoes. Gunnar made a random jump to one side. Felix did a double take as Gunnar was now a few steps behind him.
Felix’s boot caught on a potato leaf and he pitched forward. A bullet snapped over his head and annihilated a potato plant. Insect-eaten, yellowed leaves rained down around him.
“Keep going!” Gunnar yelled as he stumbled past him, zigging and zagging to throw off the sniper’s aim. “Get to the tree line!”
Felix rolled to his left. The sniper’s next round punched the ground where he’d fallen. The impact reverberated through the ground and into Felix’s body. He let out a pitiful cry and ran towards the jungle that Gunnar vanished into. Felix pushed his frame’s leg braces harder than they were rated to run, ignoring the warning icons on his visor.
His right leg frame seized up and he slowed to a limp, still short of the green hell that might provide him a bit of protection from the sniper. Felix could feel the crosshairs on his back as he slowed to what felt like a leisurely stroll.
A burst of fire rattled leaves in the jungle as Gunnar laid down cover. A tree trunk ahead of Felix cracked open into ivory colored wood and shattered bark. Felix leapt into the jungle and landed in a shallow puddle. He crawled forward through slick mud, not caring where he was going, just trying to get out of the sniper’s line of fire.
His breathing grew labored. His arms and shoulder burned and mud caked his visor. Felix bumped into something and gave up. The phantom sound of sniper rounds cracking overhead still rang in his ears.
Then something moved.
“Aah!” Felix scrambled back onto his haunches and snapped his visor up.
Gunnar was there, shadows from the thick overhead canopy nearly swallowing him.
“You done acting like an idiot?” Gunnar asked. “Because I don’t think we want to stay here. Flags are pissed about something. I don’t want to be here if they’ve got ripper drones to spare.”
“Th-they killed Sergeant Hamar.” Felix waved behind him as he got to his feet. He cycled the function on his right leg brace and a double ding sounded in his ear. The stiffness along the limb abated.
“Yeah, pretty sure that was a .60 cal anti-armor rifle.” Gunnar flipped up his visor and wiped sweat from his face. The stress of months of combat were written across his twenty-something-year-old face. “Waste to use that on us squishies. Like I said, Flags are pissed right now. How many do you think you got with that grenade?”
“I dunno . . . didn’t look. Too busy pussying out from the fight,” Felix said, following Gunnar through the woods, walking a few steps to one side of the stream.
“Nothing wrong with runnin’ from a fight you’ve already lost. We did stop getting shot by the lot of them, so maybe they’ll be happy with taking out the whole convoy and let us slide. Except for that sniper—who was very much a ‘fuck you in particular’ sort of asshole,” Gunnar said.
“Flags haven’t ambushed an entire company for . . . months?” Felix patted the mag pouches on his chest rig. “Not since they scalped that division from Nazare over in that province that got X’d. I’m green on ammo. One smoker ’nade left.”
“Yeah . . . how’d intel miss the buildup? I’m amber on mags. Zero ’nades. Didn’t even grab my frickin’ go bag. That had all my lefse in it . . .”
Felix handed over a pair of ammo magazines.
“I’ve got some tong if you’re hungry.” Felix tapped a pouch hanging from the back of his utility belt. The locally produced beef jerky was far too spicy for his taste but it held up in Dahrien’s heat and humidity.
“That was lefse from home, Felix.” Gunnar shook his head. “My sister made it for me. It came in the last batch of care packages. When was the last time you even heard about a ship coming here from Syddan? Only reason that one even came was to take casualties back home. Did you get anything—oh, that’s right. You’re Syddan by descent.”
“I’ve been to the home world a couple of times. Did basic there,” Felix said.
“We don’t call it the ‘home world,’ you weird-ass spacer, it’s the arinheim . . . listen to us. No NCO to bust our balls and we’re yammering like territorials. Watch our left flank and our six. We cross the bridge and it’ll cut almost thirty klicks off the walk to Tabuk City,” Gunnar said.
“What’s the chance the Flags are—”
“Shh! Don’t jinx us,” Gunnar snapped.
The canopy shook with the occasional bird or small simian species as the pair worked through the jungle. Felix kept a close eye on his Flanker suit’s power readings, cutting back the onboard cooling to save the battery and cracking his visor to breathe untreated air. The humidity clung to his face, pulling out a constant stream of sweat.
The suit was rated for full power operations for up to thirty-six hours, but just how long it would be before they could find a friendly unit or a battery resupply was an unknown. While the visor could run off his body heat and muscle power captured by the frame, trying to fight with zero effective power to the rest of the system would be like going into battle with one arm tied behind his back and a leg hobbled.
“Not optimal for survival or victory,” as the officers liked to say.
They reached a steep embankment high over a river, the surface white with rapids. The sun was high and blazed through the occasional break in the tree cover.
“Down.” Gunnar went to one knee and tossed pics from his optics to Felix. A double lane bridge stretched over the river, burnt out cars jamming any possible traffic. The electric vehicles were of local manufacture, all scorched on the sides and bottoms from the batteries melting down.
The road leading away from the bridge on their side of the river led to a small village. Thin columns of cooking smoke mingled through rooftop solar panels.
A zoomed-in pic of a manned guard post on the near side of the bridge sent a chill through Felix’s chest. A pair of armed men lounged in a small guard shack made of jungle leaves and branches near the bridge.
“Ah . . . shit,” Felix said. “Something tells me those aren’t the only two out there.”
“Bridge’s been out for months. Probably just lookouts for the village. You see the Fedayeen red on them?” Gunnar asked.
“Huh, sure don’t. So, they’re just local militia and not proper Flag insurgents?” Felix asked.
“Prolly. The ones that swear they’re going to kill every Hegemony citizen and soldier they can are pretty proud of those red bandanas they like. But just because they’re locals doesn’t mean their bullets can’t kill us,” Gunnar said. “There’s no sneaking by them. We wait for dark and word’ll get here that there were survivors from the ambush. We’ve just got to get across the bridge, then it’s nothing but old tea plantation roads and backcountry to Tabuk.”
“How do you know we’re not going deeper into Fedayeen territory? There are civvies in that town over there.” Felix ducked a little lower.
“Everything over the river was X’d by Central almost a year ago. Dagger drones detect anyone without the right IFF transponder and their life ends in a high-pitched squeal and a splat when the warhead goes off. I bet that’s why they’ve got a guard post over there. Keeps idiot kids from scrounging through the no-go zone,” Gunnar said. “We’re this close to being home free.”
The warble of Gunnar’s stomach sounded through his suit.
Felix took out a lump of shrink-wrapped dry meat and gave it to Gunnar. His squad mate tore it open and bit off a chunk before giving it back.
“Damn, Felix.” Gunnar dry coughed. “Why’d you get the super spicy tong?”
Felix took a bite and his lips immediately burned.
“Do they make any other kind? Hangar I got it from said they have to use the strong stuff or it’ll go moldy.” He mashed his eyes shut as they began to water.
“Friend of mine on squadron staff said he’s had it mild. Locals just sell us the painful shit because they fucking hate us,” Gunnar said. “Guarantee this’ll give us the wet shits later . . . still better than being hungry. Thanks, brother.”
“Who needs caffeine supps when we can eat dried out fire?” Felix slipped the tong back into his pouch.
“Set for suppression,” Gunnar said.
Felix twisted the flash suppressor on the end of his carbine barrel, opening up a honeycomb of holes down the length. He dialed back the power setting on the carbine, slowing the velocity of the bullets the next time he fired. The setup was ineffectual against any armored targets or anything behind substantial cover, but it would cut down the distance the sound of their shots carried.
“You get left, I’ll get right. Let’s go.” Gunnar reached back and slapped Felix on the leg. Felix smacked Gunnar on the shoulder and the two crept through the jungle side by side. They moved through a muddy depression, the sound of their boots sloshing through water masked by the churning river. Tall light-green fronds swayed in the breeze and blocked most of their view of the guard post.
Sweat dribbled through Felix’s mustache and into his goatee. It tasted of salt and grime, but he didn’t want to huff it away for fear of fouling up his visor’s display. They crept closer to the guard shack until he could hear the a capella music the locals preferred playing from the simple structure.
A man stood up, rifle slung across his chest, and came around the back of the hut. His arms and shoulders were bare, and he wore an older pattern of camouflage pants, the cuffs folded neatly over a pair of sneakers.
Felix and Gunnar froze. Gunnar raised his carbine slowly.
The guard stretched his arms overhead, then fiddled with his pants in preparation for a piss.
“Mine,” Gunnar said through their suit-to-suit connection.
A sudden gust of wind depressed the foliage around them, exposing Gunnar’s weapon for a brief moment. The guard froze, then leaned his head forward, eyes squinting. He said something to one side and clutched his weapon.
Gunnar fired off a three-round burst that stitched up the guard’s chest and neck. The man crumpled to the road, then rolled into the basin with the two Flankers.
A much younger voice cried out in terror, then repeated a phrase over and over again.
“Felix!” Gunnar trudged forward.
Felix aimed where he thought the other guard was in the shack and opened fire. The lower-velocity bullets broke through the sticks and leaves. Bits of green and splinters flew into the air with every squeeze of the trigger.
The screaming got even higher pitched.
Felix switched to full auto in frustration and brought the shack down through a long tat-tat-tat of fire. There was a rustle as leaves and branches fell away from the collapse.
“Move it!” Gunnar shouted through their channel. Felix struggled to move from where he’d sunk into the mud, then finally jumped into Gunnar’s tracks through the muck. He tried to ignore the dead man that lay at the bottom of the embankment. The man’s arms and legs were lopped at painful angles that sent a shiver down Felix’s spine.
He scrambled up the embankment and looked down the road to the village. There wasn’t any immediate activity and Felix had a spark of hope . . . until he saw the collapsed hut. An arm and head stuck out from the sticks and leaves, and a cell slate lay in a growing puddle of blood. The head of the man he killed was turned away from him, a small favor from the All Father.
There was an open call on the cell and the only word Felix could make out was “crab,” the Dahrien locals’ preferred term for Hegemony soldiers. Felix stomped on the cell and ran after Gunnar.
The cars on the bridge were mashed together, parked haphazardly across lanes to make it even more difficult to get across.
Gunnar shuffled from side to side next to a rusted car, looking for an easy way through, but it was bumper to bumper from one side to the other and from side to side.
“Just go over?” Felix asked.
“We’ll highlight ourselves, but I don’t think they’re—” Gunnar craned his neck up to look back at the village. He ducked down fast as bullets cracked overhead. Felix raised his carbine up and fired back toward the village. Dozens of men were streaming out of the homes towards the bridge.
“Smoke!” Felix pulled his last grenade off his chest rig and rolled it away. Purple smoke billowed out. Felix went prone as bullets cut through the smoke, leaving curling trails behind them.
“Stop waiting for the perfect time and move your ass.” Gunnar hopped onto a car trunk and started jumping from vehicle to vehicle.
Felix ignored the snap of rounds overhead and that thumped into the dead cars. He went through the worst game of hopscotch to get to the other side of the bridge and the overgrown road leading the hell away from this awful place.
Gunnar cried out and grabbed his left thigh. He fell onto a hood, groaning in pain.
Felix got to the car and tried to snatch a quick-clot patch from Gunnar’s chest rig.
“Get out of here!” Gunnar pushed him away. “I’m not going to make it.”
“You know I can’t.” Felix got Gunnar’s arm over his shoulder and slid him onto his back. He pulled two belts built into Gunnar’s suit and connected the powerful magnets together across his own waist. He used the built-in buddy sling to carry Gunnar. Moving across the cars was hard before; hauling around a bleeding man while being shot at made it even worse.
Neither saw the rocket-propelled grenade that came screaming in from the riverside where the smoke screen hadn’t spread. The warhead struck one of the mashed-together cars several yards from the two soldiers.
Felix felt a sharp pain in his back as the blast wave carried them both over the side of the bridge and into nothing but air. The buckle lost its hold and Gunnar fell away from him. Felix hit the river hard. The air was knocked out of him, and his visor filled with water.
The current pushed him along and Felix completely lost his bearings. His boots struck a rock, spinning him around. His visor was supposed to be sealed, but there absolutely was water filling it. Felix gulped down the last bubble of air and a mouthful of the river. He jammed his thumbs under the edge of his helm and tripped the emergency relief. The helmet was carried away but now the rapids were in his ears and rushing all around him.
He kicked hard and finally broke the surface. He thrashed about, unsure why his suit was trying to drown him after all his training led him to believe it was supposed to do otherwise. He slapped his chest rig and felt a pair of inflated air bladders built into his armor. The other four flapped in the current, torn and useless.
Gunnar bobbed up and down as they were carried away, face down.
Felix attempted to call out Gunnar’s name and swam toward him. He got a grip on Gunnar’s foot and pulled him over as whitecaps washed over them. Gunnar’s back was a mess of torn up ballistic fabric and hunks of ceramic plates. Felix rolled Gunnar over and clung to him like he was a life preserver.
“Gunnar? Gunnar?” Felix tapped the man’s helmet. Bubbles and air popped out of Gunnar’s life vest as shrapnel damage slowly deflated them. Gunnar moved along with the current, his head lolling against Felix.
“Damn it, hang on, brother.” Felix kicked hard and slowly swam them toward the shore. The current carried them towards a boulder in the river. Felix gripped Gunnar tight and turned his back to the rock, striking it hard. Felix cursed in pain and frustration. The muscles in his back tightened as the adrenaline dull wore off.
One foot scraped against the bottom of the river and he giggled in nonsensical joy. He got another foothold and swung Gunnar around onto the pebbled bank. He dragged Gunnar’s limp form into a patch of grass and fell to the ground next to him.
“Gunnar?” Felix snapped out of his momentary rest and pressed a button on the side of his helmet. The visor popped up. Water poured out the sides. Gunnar stared at the sky, his eyes still. A red stain spread from a tear through his abdomen.
“No . . . no, buddy, don’t leave me.” Felix shook Gunnar gently. “We are supposed to get out of here together. Please . . . I’m no good on my own!”
Felix winced as a sharp pain knifed up his back. He reached around and pulled out a hunk of serrated metal that had buried itself into his suit. Felix looked at the wound through Gunnar’s body and where he found the shrapnel. Gunnar had taken the hit and shielded Felix with his own body.
And not by accident.
“All Father, I’m sorry.” Felix touched Gunnar’s still chest, then snatched his hand back. “I was trying to help him. I didn’t mean to . . . I didn’t . . .”
Felix’s shoulders fell and tears joined the river water on his face. He glanced at the bullet wound on Gunnar’s thigh. The exit wound was too large to survive without actual treatment from a field hospital or a medic with a trauma kit.
“What am I doing? Where the hell even am I?” Felix pulled his knees to his chest and rocked for a moment, listening to the river and the wind rustling through the jungle. He looked to the sky and the pale blue overhead.
A moment later he reached under Gunnar’s breastplate and fished out a small double-sided hammer on a plastic chain; the silver was painted over with black paint but the hard edges still shone through. He wrapped Gunnar’s hands around the talisman, then kept his own hands wrapped around Gunnar’s. He mouthed words, then closed his eyes. Then he said out loud:
“All Father, your brave son lies here. I feel his soul next to me. His body still claims his spirit, but he cannot remain here. His life has run. Take him to your hall where the honored dead may feast at your table and carry your banner to the final battle . . . Your brave son died for another. He died for me. There is only so much room in your hall, if you must ever choose between Gunnar and my wretched soul, let him keep his place. The scraps from your table and the warmth of your walls is enough for me, so long as he remains by your side. Send your Valkyrie to carry him away. His time in the pain of this world is over. Let him rest . . . please.”
Felix closed Gunnar’s eyes.
He sat beside the dead man for several minutes, then slipped the carbine off of Gunnar’s chest rig. His own weapon was somewhere in the river. Felix took Gunnar’s magazines and the battery packs on his belt, then stood and carried Gunnar’s helmet in the crook of his arm.
“I have to take what you no longer need,” Felix said. “Forgive me. I’ll get to Tabuk and make sure word gets back to your family—oh, wait.”
He felt around the edge of Gunnar’s breastplate and pulled out a cord with dozens of identity chips. Names of dead men flashed on each one.
“You were the platoon ferryman the whole time? I thought it was Svenson. Falls to me, I guess.” He slipped the cord beneath his own breastplate and hooked it into his own identity chip. He ran a finger through Gunnar’s helmet and cleaned out a bit of mud.
He slid the helmet on, plotted a route to Tabuk, and walked into the jungle.