He would hold on. He had to.
24
Dawn was just breaking over Detron. Marine SLICs crossed above the city, still looking for any sign of the four missing legionnaires and one missing marine. Three were known to have been captured. Two, both leejes, were presumed dead. Their life signs had gone dark during the firefight.
The captive leejes’ life signs were a different story. Someone who knew what they were doing had switched them off. And of course, the marine didn’t even report life signs to the Legion net.
On Dock Street—the new focus of the protestor gatherings now that the galactic government had all but surrendered the streets and the city proper, like the local government had done before it—massive crowds geared in red and black surged out into the golden dawn light amid the smoke of cook fires and lotus they spent the night with, singing their resistance chants to the accompaniment of drum circles that seemed to form whenever and wherever. Sounds coming from anything that could be improvised to roll out a beat.
General Charles Sheehan, commander on the ground of Repub marine forces, was busy fighting with the House of Reason delegates who’d been sent to Detron on a fact-finding mission. It was this delegation, led by Arjun Kun, chief investigator for the diplomatic corps, that had insisted the marines pull back their presence on the streets to de-escalate the brewing conflagration.
“Brewing?” exclaimed Sheehan incredulously. “I don’t know if your understanding of current events is clear, Delegate Kun, but we’ve got six dead marines, four missing legionnaires, two of whom might still be alive, a missing marine who may also be alive, multiple civilian casualties, robbery, assault, mass looting, and no control over several fires currently consuming downtown structures. To use the word ‘brewing’ indicates that you somehow see things getting worse than they currently are. Are you aware of something I am not? Perhaps the House of Reason has opted to give the ‘People’s Council,’ as these rioters are now calling themselves, the self-destruct codes to the four reactors still currently providing power to the city? Because yes, then you’d be correct in describing the situation as ‘brewing,’ because that would indicate things are going to get a whole hell of a lot worse and far beyond the marines’ ability to influence outcomes.”
“Investigator,” replied Kun calmly from behind his wire-rimmed smartlenses. Entirely unnecessary. A fashion statement. People no longer wore glasses unless they wanted to. “Chief Investigator Kun. I request that you, General Sheehan, refer to me, and my team, by our proper titles as mandated by the House of Reason’s Diplomatic Relations Committee. I am a delegate, yes. But I’m here as chief investigator.”
The general couldn’t believe he was being talked down to by a mincing functionary who clearly had no idea how serious things had gotten. Brigadier Sheehan had been a no-holds-barred brawler who’d fought at Psydon, Muskovoplex, and a dozen other little adventures the House of Reason had seen fit to involve the marines in. Word was he was being fast tracked for a Military Council seat to advise and consort with the highest chambers within the House of Reason after this situation cleared up.
But though that might be his job one day, it certainly wasn’t his job today. Sheehan was boiling over and fed up with the game that needed to be played. The House of Reason had read him wrong. He wasn’t a political animal. He was just capable and had yet to fail. He certainly wasn’t their man, yet here he was being told exactly the opposite—that he was indeed their man. So, shut up and let this Diplomatic Relations Committee steer things toward what the vast chamber of the House of Reason wanted. Which was a colossal failure, designed as such in order to make the current leadership look bad… and perhaps debut a new rising star.
They’re setting things up for that little troublemaker kelhorn Hamachi-Roi, thought the general as he forced the look of disbelief off his face and ordered military bearing to take its place.
Sure, he’d surrendered the streets. Pulled the platoons and squads off the SLICs and given up the rooftops and forward observation posts. That was obeying direct orders. But he wasn’t going to be complicit in letting the situation turn into some kind of political rally. Figure out a way to prevent that from happening and keep command of the situation, ready to take military action if the opportunity presented itself… that was of paramount importance to Sheehan.
That, and keeping the legionnaires in line. They were breathing down his neck to get in there and find their missing men. And Sheehan knew the Legion. They’d be sending in a Dark Ops team to go looking as soon as they could get one into the system. Already one of the regular leejes was missing, even though it was being covered up by the guys in his detachment.
The general realized he had not been entirely right when dressing down “Chief Investigator Kun.” Things could still get messy. Another captured legionnaire, or a massacre caught live by the media jackals, and all hell really could break loose.
But if that’s what it took to get any of the missing five back… then Sheehan was fine with that.
Screw promotion.
“Listen… Investigator Kun,” Sheehan slowly began as he walked with the gaggle of government functionaries in their high-end-clothing-store adventure gear. Tan slacks. Dress shirts. Photojournalist vests stuffed with nasal retrovirals in case they came in contact with anything that was dangerous, or simply smelled bad.
Just like the star of the stream they all wanted to be. That’s how they’d all looked when they were shown into the command TOC. Like the entertainments star who always went around uncovering all
