The Final Battle

“I think I owe you an apology, Lieutenant,” Colonel K’zekaa said, her head bobbing in embarrassment. “You were quite right about those goddamned Hammers, and I was wrong.”

“Thank you, sir,” Michael said, his smoke-damaged voice a hoarse croak, “and I’m sorry I was so rude.”

K’zekaa waved the apology aside. “Don’t worry about it,” she said. “I did talk to the Jamudans, though, and they told me they’d take the threat seriously.”

“What happens now?”

“Your lawyer hasn’t seen you yet?”

“No. You’re my first visitor. I told the hospital to tell everyone that I was too tired to talk to them. You must be very persuasive is all I can say.”

“Oh, I am. Anyway, to answer your question, nothing happens until a court-appointed doctor says you are fit enough to appear.”

“Shit!” Michael said.

“I thought you’d be happy about that. You know what might be waiting for you?”

“I do. My lawyer has been telling me the same thing.”

“So why the rush?”

“Two reasons. First, I don’t need to worry about the death penalty. The Feds will never execute me. It won’t happen. Ever.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” K’zekaa said with a frown.

“What will be, will be. I can’t worry about it. Fact is I cannot go on like this much longer. I didn’t want to be here, I never planned to be here, and I wouldn’t be if Admiral Ja-if I hadn’t been kidnapped. But now that I am, it’s tearing me apart. I want closure, and sooner rather than later.” Michael paused, taking a deep breath to settle himself down. “I know it won’t make any sense to you,” he went on, “but you haven’t been through what I have.”

“No. But I do know this: I’ve read your file, and I cannot judge you.”

The silence that followed was broken when a nurse stuck his head in Michael’s room. “Hey!” he said. “What are you doing here? No visitors, so please leave-now.”

Saturday, November 9, 2402, UD

Kovak planetary defense base

The door of the holding cell banged open to reveal the substantial figure of Sergeant Habash. “It’s time, sir,” he said.

“And not soon enough,” Michael grumbled. “I’ve had enough of Jamuda, I can tell you.”

“So you keep telling me.” Habash chuckled. “We’re sorry to see you leave.”

“So tell those Fed motherfuckers I’m not coming.”

Habash looked right into Michael’s eyes. “I wish I could. None of this is right.”

“No, Sergeant Habash, it’s not. Come on; let’s go.”

Flanked by two more guards, Michael followed the man out of his cell and down a series of corridors until they reached the prisoner outprocessing center, a bleak room filled with a large contingent of grim-faced fleet police in Fed shipsuits. One of them stepped forward, a dour-looking woman sporting a warrant officer’s badges.

“I’m Warrant Officer Yamazaki, Federated Worlds Space Fleet. I have orders to return you to Terranova planet, Lieutenant.”

“Show me,” Michael demanded.

Yamazaki held out a single sheet of paper. Michael took it and read through the dense legalese. He wasn’t left much the wiser. He had no idea whether what he was looking at was valid, but he was determined not to give the Feds any more slack than he had to.

“Looks okay,” he conceded, handing the orders back to Yamazaki.

“It is. Now, your hands, sir.”

“Is that necessary? There are hundreds of you bastards, you’re all bigger than me, and we’re inside a planetary defense base. How far do you think I’d get?”

“Just do it, sir,” the woman said, her voice flat and cold.

“Why are you such an officious asshole, Warrant Officer Yamazaki?” Michael snapped.

“Now!”

With reluctance, Michael held out his hands. He was cuffed by the largest spacer in the escort. The man ran a thin plasfiber cord from the cuffs to a band on his own wrist. “Oh, come on!” Michael protested. “That’s not necessary either.”

“Not your call, sir. Let’s go.”

“No kidding,” Michael muttered as he was led out of the cell, with the rest of Yamazaki’s team of fleet police falling in around him.

Flanked by his escort, Michael stepped out into a hot Jamuda morning. The sun hammered down. It turned the ceramcrete apron into a blazing sea of heat and light that brought Michael to an abrupt halt, his eyes flooded with sudden tears. “Shit,” he hissed, wiping his eyes with the back of a plasticuffed hand.

“Come on, sir,” Yamazaki said. “Keep moving.”

The warrant officer looked anxious. As well you should, Michael thought. The Hammers might deny any responsibility for the abortive attempt to kidnap him, but that had not stopped them from jacking up the rhetoric, with their embassy demanding that he be extradited back to Commitment to face Hammer justice. And Yamazaki would have known every bit as well as Michael did that the Hammers would stop at nothing to get their hands on him.

“Okay, okay,” Michael said as they set off again. They had gone a few meters when Michael stopped again. His mouth dropped open. In front of him was the Federated Worlds Space Fleet assault lander waiting to take him back to Terranova.

His heart sank. He was about to come face to face with the very people whom he had betrayed, whose code of honor he had despoiled, whose reputation his actions had so traduced.

The cell door opened to admit a young spacer carrying a tray. “Lunch,” the man said.

“Thanks,” Michael said, getting to his feet.

The spacer leaned forward. With great care he spit into the food. “Enjoy,” he whispered, holding the tray out.

In an instant, rage consumed every part of Michael’s being, and he erupted into violence. He smashed the tray aside. His hands lunged for the spacer’s throat. He rammed the man back against the bulkhead with a sickening thud that drove the air from his lungs in an explosive woof. Michael spun the man around and pulled him back and down to the deck, one fist clubbing his tormentor’s face in a brutal, frenzied attack that gave the spacer no chance to protect himself.

Within seconds the cell filled with bodies, and Michael was dragged off. His chest heaved, and his heart pounded. He was still consumed by anger, and his arms and fists lashed out until sheer weight of numbers pinned him down. A soft pffftt and stinging pain from a gas gun ended his fight. “Tell that little fuck I’ll kill him next time I see him,” Michael screamed as blackness closed in. “You tell that … little …”

The marine corporal sitting on Michael’s unconscious body eased himself off. He stood up, shaking his head. “Now what the hell was that all about?” he asked.

“Who knows?” his buddy said. “But I’d bet it was something-” He reached down to pull the whimpering spacer to his feet. “-this sad sack of shit did.”

“Visitor for you,” the intercom said.

“Piss off,” Michael muttered. He refused to open his eyes even when the cell door opened, furious with himself that he had lost his temper, even more furious that his left wrist had been secured to the bulkhead by a plasfiber restraint.

“Lieutenant Helfort,” a voice said, a woman’s voice, authoritative and controlled. “I’m Commander Kadar, captain in command of the FWSS Pilgrim.”

Discipline, deeply ingrained, forced Michael to his feet. He snapped to attention. “Apologies, sir,” he blurted. “I didn’t know it was you.”