Naj Zero - part 3
I'd failed my oath-brother. Swoop was dead.
The memory of his body on the ice burned my brain for the three days the yappers had me in the fishbox, a clear, coffin-sized tank filled with buoyant fluid and lots of little medprobes the docs used to pump me with entek and drugs. I'd handed out some payback, but not enough. Deadboot still lived, and the Pig as well.
I'd have been dead, too, if the Wolfgirl hadn't showed up. It took me awhile to decide I was grateful, to be honest. With Swoop dead on my account, it didn't seem right for me to have survived. But the expression on her face when she dropped in made me think twice. Whether or not she thought much about me, she cared enough to prevent me from being beaten to a pulp for yapper laughs. In the end, I decided only to be mad at the yappers who'd set things up with the Pig in the first place.
Not to mention, a body had to live in order to get revenge. I didn't know exactly what I'd do, but I was determined to do something to avenge Swoop's sacrifice.
In the meantime, I had to heal up. Before the Wolfgirl interrupted our little dance, I'd suffered a concussion, seven broken ribs, a broken wrist, and a cracked pelvis. Not to mention all the nice bruises. I'd been lucky enough to keep my teeth. Guess the Pig had wanted to wait until the coup de grace to ruin my smile. Not that I felt like smiling.
So there I lay, pumped full of painkillers and second-rate entek I hoped wasn't going to grow me a lizard's tail while it patched me up. On the third day, the camp Commandante paid me a visit. He was a cold fish even for a yapper, but he'd played fair enough by us.
"Have a seat," I offered when he came in. There wasn't anyplace to sit other than my fishbox, of course. The docs had been kind enough to fit my air mask out with a microphone, and there was something on my right ear that let me hear without all the underwater echoes. Captain Yapper stood there like he was on the parade ground. Of course, I was naked as a baby in my box, but circumstances being what they were, I didn't think he'd mind that I was out of uniform.
"I'm sorry about the incident the other night," he told me.
"'Salright," I said. "Just a night out with the guys. You know: a few birus, some music, watch the snot get beat out of some poor scrof- oops, wait. That was me, wasn't it?"
"That wasn't my doing," he said stiffly. "The men responsible have been punished?"
"What about the girl?"
He didn't miss a beat. "Don't worry about her. I'm sure she'll be taking out her share of your tribesmen before too long."
I almost grinned under my mask. This yapper officer had juice.
"I didn't come here for small talk," he continued, "but to make you an offer."
"I'm not ready to get married, sorry."
"The offer is simply this: if you agree to fight a duel against a certain individual, you will be freed if you win."
A duel? Did they want me to finish things against the Pig? "What if I lose?"
He shook his head, his expression telling me all I needed to know. If I lost, I'd go wherever the yappers threw their garbage, most like.
I chewed on that thought for a few seconds before asking, "OK…. Who's the opponent?"
"Ur-Warlord DiVaragas." He said it simply, but the words hung in the air like electricity. They were going to give me a shot against their biggest kahuna? Suddenly it all seemed too unreal. There had to be a trick somewhere. Nobody was this nuts.
"Are you interested?" he asked.
"Why me?" I shot back, stalling while I tried to figure the angle.
"You and your erstwhile opponent, warnom 'Ripsaw.'"
"What? The Pig? Both of us against your general? You crazy?"
"Ur-Warlord DiVaragas is a trained duelist, perhaps the finest we have. If our tribes weren't going to war, she'd probably be competing at the Firetruce."
"So call things off and send her along, ayia?"
My needling must have been wearing thin, but he stayed polite. "Your choice is simple, Najrasami. If you two defeat the Ur-Warlord, you'll be released and provided with transport back to Blood Eagle territory. Here are the conditions of the match: armor without headgear, blades only."
"Sounds like the kind of deal I can't refuse."
He hesitated. "Before you give your final answer, I should tell you that the Ur-Warlord has already fought three such matches in the last six weeks."
That shut me up for a moment. "All two-on-one deals?"
He nodded.
"All dead?"
He nodded again.
Raw God.
I had to give the yapper credit; he gave me every opportunity to refuse. I wanted to after hearing about the other matches, but I couldn't push Swoop out of the decision. He'd given his life to help me, a stranger. He did it for his honor, for the principle of doing what was right. Now I had a real chance to avenge him by cutting off the head of the yapper army. OK, so it might not work out to be a happy ending. DiVaragas was a practiced killer, it sounded like, and everyone knew how bad she hated B-E. But the alternative would be another ice-whacking vacation and death by boredom. And shame. Whether or not I always bought into it, I did have an appreciation of honor. Mine was on the line now. If I walked away, I'd never be able to pass a mirror without Swoop's dead face staring out of it. This way, I'd have a shot at accomplishing something, even if I had to work with the Pig.
"I'm in," I told the Commandante. "Where do I sign?"
He touched a stud on his belt. "It's all recorded, Najrasami. Very well. The doctors tell me you'll be fit by this evening. We'll take you up tonight."
"I'd better catch my sleep, then, huh?" I managed a little salute at him, and closed my eyes to try to rest up.
The docs decanted me from the fishbox a few hours later. They'd done some electrostim therapy to make sure I didn't lose muscle tone, and they spent more time with me than I expected, considering I might be snuffing their supreme commander in a few hours. I got a skinsuit, a meal that actually wasn't CRAP for a change, and time to do some stretching. They didn't let me see the Pig, though. I didn't complain, since I wanted to enjoy digesting what the yappers clearly figured was my last meal.
I concluded they'd patched me up pretty well. Aside from some stiffness in one side, I felt fit. I still had that extra muscle from ice duty, too. While I didn't think it'd give me any edge in a contest involving powered armor, the idea that I was physically stronger than before I became a prisoner comforted me.
Awhile later, a hardshell guard hustled me outside. The Pig was there too, and after exchanging a couple of obscene gestures, we crunched on over to a turbograv transport, where some other guards were loading armor bundles into the t-grav's hopperspace. I got pretty close when I realized with a shock that one of the yapper guards in the t-grav was the Wolfgirl, blaster in hand.
While the Pig went on, I stopped and checked out the Wolfgirl. Up close she was real pretty, kind of thoughtful but with a mouth shaped like it was made for smiling. It wasn't smiling now. I figured I owed her some word of thanks for the other night, so I said, "Hi, Wolfgirl. Thanks for, you know… everything."
For a second, she didn't do anything. Then she jerked her head around toward this blonde girl behind her and turned back to me, definitely angry. Uh-oh, I thought. You made another mess here, Naj. I hadn't missed the other girl's snaky little grin, but it was too late to take back my words.
Wolfgirl pointed her blaster at me and then waved at the empty slot in the t-grav. "Get in the transport, scrof!"
I nodded. "Yeh-check." As I climbed up and strapped myself into place, I couldn't resist catching the blonde girl's eye.
"Heya, blondie," I said with as obnoxious a tone as I could manage before turning my back on her like she wasn't anything I hadn't seen a hundred times before. Truth to tell, Blondie was stone gorgeous. I liked my Wolfgirl better, but Blondie would cause males neck strain anywhere in the wilderzone.
"Smooth mouth, Naj," grunted the Pig.
"Go suck a chaingun," I snarled.
"Shut up, you two!" called the pilot. "No one says you have to have tongues in your heads in order to fight a duel, hear?"
I shrugged and let things ride.
They got us to a dropship pretty quick. Dark as it was, I didn't see much more of Ymir, which suited me fine. Even with the skinsuit, I was stiff and cold by the time we touched down. The Pig and I got to haul our armors up the ramp into one of the dropship's cramped passenger bays. With us came the sergeant-pilot, Wolfgirl, Blondie, and a huge blond scrof in Assault-class gear. The way this monster watched us, I thought he was playing goodboy for the sergeant's sake, but Blondie whispered, "See the big man? He has a special reason to hate butchers, so don't give him an excuse."
"Thanks for caring, dear," I said, which shut her up. She glared at me and I blew her a sloppy, exaggerated kiss. Wolfgirl had been taking care not to look at me when she thought I was paying attention, but I got a smile out of her with that comment, and she didn't seem quite so mad anymore.
Take off meant a few minutes of having a Juggernauts stamping on my chest since they weren't going to use grav comp for a little jaunt like this. After we got past the initial burn and the acceleration pressure lightened up, I took stock. The Pig was pretending to doze, and the sergeant was tinkering on a computer pad. The Wolfgirl sat a few seats away from me. To my surprise, she was gazing at Monsterboy with her lips parted and her eyes shining in an expression that clearly said she was sweet all over him.
Feeling suddenly defeated, I sighed to myself. No particular reason I should be disappointed. I had no claim on her, and would probably be space trash in a few hours, but I was disappointed anyway. Monsterboy didn't seem too bright, and he sounded worse than dense when he opened his mouth. I wouldn't have figured him for Wolfgirl's type.
Then I noticed Blondie giving Monsterboy the same moon-eyed look. What the Seven Hells…? I checked Wolfgirl again, then Blondie. They both practically drooled over the big guy like one of the cover scenes for a bad romance vid. I'd totally missed any clue on the t-grav, and when I thought back, I couldn't remember anything that stood out.
Something tickled at the back of my head, something from a briefing a few months ago, before the yappers came to Shek Two. Fury liked to keep her knights plugged into a fair chunk of intelligence, so we had a lot of starkissin' briefings. I'd be lying if I said I paid attention to all of them. But now, of course, I wish I had. There was something here that wanted to jump out and slap me… but I couldn't remember for the soon-to-be-shortened life of me.
I watched Wolfgirl like… well, I kept a close watch on her, not to use too many old clichés. Monsterboy caught me at it, and just for a second, I thought I spotted something ugly in his expression. Something vicious, but smart like a Charybdis tree-viper. Then he frowned, and his face went all stupid again.
The sergeant unhooked and said something cheerful I knew better than to pay attention to, when all of a sudden the Wolfgirl exploded. She saw me watching her, and as soon as Monsterboy frowned, her face twisted up and she swam over, swinging her free hand up to swat me in the face. Funny the way your brain grabs something irrelevant when you're about to die. Wolfgirl was ready to pop me with an armored fist and all I thought was, 'Nice move. She's been zee-gee more than a few times.'
"What do you want, an invitation?" she yelled. "Get moving!"
The sergeant wheeled and called her off. Good thing, too, 'cause with the armor on, one hard pop would be plenty good enough to take my head off.
The next second she appeared as surprised as the sergeant. She lowered her hand and looked at it like a gigantic spider had just appeared on the end of her wrist. "Sorry," she said in a husky whisper.
Interesting. That tickle in the back of my head hung in there with lots of little alarms going off, but nothing got any clearer. I didn't say anything, just grabbed my gear and followed the rest of the group out of the dropship.
As soon as we got into the main vessel, faux grav took over, and the armor got a lot heavier. Our guards moved us through the ship, past a lot of yapper stringers into officer country. Raw God, this was a big ship, bigger than any I'd been on directly, even though I'd done a stint of shuttle piloting here and there. They took me and the Pig to an elevator that dropped into what I guessed was the cargo section. We stepped out among a ton of crates and cryo-cylinders, then marched down a few catwalks until we came to an empty cargo bay of medium size, no more than twenty five kay cubic meters, I'd guess. Ten meter ceiling. Plenty big enough for a dueling arena. My stomach tightened.
This was it.
"What, no media?" I asked. "Thought you'd want to record this for posterity."
"Just get into your armor," the sergeant said, pointing to the nearest corner.
Fine. The Pig and I trudged over there and opened our gear. I was happy to see the yappers had tagged my suit right when they captured me. This was my Sweet Jenny, a Assault-class I'd packed around since I'd first entered Fury's service three years back. Jenny and I knew each other real well.
"Heya, baby," I said as I stood her up. "Ready for a last ride?" I reached in under the neck and hit the switch that would clamshell her open.
A deep voice cut into my reunion, pitched so I'd hear it, but not so loud that it'd carry to the yappers. "Naj."
"What is it, Pig? You want a last kiss or something?"
"Clear the wax outta yer flaps. We gotta take this biffer."
I stepped into Jenny and she closed up around me nice and snug. "Master of the Obvious Facet, Pig. You got a plan?"
"Yeh, Naj, I do." Raw God, he was serious! I glanced over to where he stood in his Assault-class. His face had the kind of sincere expression I'd seen on guys ready to throw themselves on a mortar shell to save their buddies. It threw me off, and for once I didn't have a smart comeback.
"I done some dueling, Naj. This yapper, she's gonna expect you to cover while I move in for the kill. I'm the vet, so I'm the big threat. This makin' a dent in that idiot brain?"
I shook my head. "I don't figure you for the sacrificing type, brah."
"No? Well, you right about me being honorless, boy. I got no reason to follow stupid codes, but you know what? This is my chance to do it right once, heya?" He clenched a fist. "I heard of this woman, Naj. She death on jets. Our best shot is to work together. You with?"
Feeling stupid, I just said, "Yeah."
"Good. We gonna cross her. I cover, you move in. She gonna expect the usual style, but I want you to use that twirly fem style of fighting you used down on Ymir. Got it? Mix her up." He held out an armored paw, but I didn't make a move to take it.
"I'll work this, Pig, but I ain't forgettin' you killed my friend down there. We get out of here alive, you and I still have business."
He gave me a greasy grin. "Sure. Whatever you say, scrof. But first things first."
"First things first," I agreed.[1]
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