Seeing the Elephant

From SSDC, Inc.

Written by: Scott Tulleners

Consultants: Chris Kearney, and Jeremy and Mary Ellen Smith.

Acknowledgements: I would like to thank the following people for encouragement, support, and suggestions: My mother and brother Andy, Alan Atzenhoefer, Scott Grimmett, Vickie Hall, Michael Osadciw, and Earl Ryan. I'd also like to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for all His Blessings each and every day..

---

There was a flash from behind as Ivan was flung bodily through the air. He landed...

Ivan fought desperately to fill his lungs with air. It came with great effort. The pounding in his head almost made him wish that he were dead. His back and neck felt like they had been scourged, and he couldn't move his arms.

The pounding subsided slowly. Ivan opened his eyes. The clouds were thick overhead. They appeared to be whiter than back home on Hartford. The sky visible through the clouds was deep blue. Back home, the sky had more turquoise. Sunlight streamed in beams through the clouds. They were like the beams of heavenly light he had believed them to be as a child. A faint wisp of black smoke wafted overhead. All was peaceful...

To his left he heard automatic weapons fire. He recognized the staccato of an M-60 machine gun. From the short-burst-short-burst-longer-burst pattern the gunner was firing, it sounded like Randy Andy. Ivan turned his head. A dull pain in his neck made him wince.

Randy Andy was dropping back down behind the fallen tree trunk he was using for cover.

Glancing up the slope to his right, he saw the Lt. lying in the snow. Vardish-Emra's weathered black armor was charred and holed in three places that he could see. The Lt...

He winced as something whacked against his helmet. Randy Andy bellowed over the com-link, 'Ivan. Give me some covering fire.'

Ivan glanced left. A meter down the slope the tall Orion was backed against the large fallen tree trunk as he loaded another belt into his '60. He pulled back on the charging handle, spun up from cover and fired off a burst.

'Ivan. Get down here.'

Shaking his head to clear the ringing from it, Ivan stiffly rolled the short distance to the trunk Andy was behind. He suddenly realized he didn't have his rifle. Ivan began to panic. It was his first combat and he had already lost his FN-FAL.

Glancing around frantically, he saw the black polymer stock sticking out of the snow farther up the slope. With a yell to 'Cover me,' he jumped up and lunged to grab it before sliding back behind the trunk.

He put the safety on, removed the magazine and chambered round, and checked the barrel for debris. It was clear.

From down the hill, he heard the whine of a rapid-firing pulse cannon and the crack and snap of brush as something large and heavy moved through the trees toward them.

Trees splintered about 50 meters down the hill. Ivan glimpsed what appeared to be a gray Cizerack smashing through the saplings. There was something odd about the way it moved. Its shape mimicked the feline race, but its movement lacked the easy grace of a real Cizerack like Sgt. Zakeesa. As it bulldozed its way through the trees, Ivan inhaled sharply. The pirates had ultra armor. A hypervelocity round cracked overhead to punctuate that thought. He blinked away a bead of sweat that dripped in his eye.

Over the com-link, he heard Sgt. Zakeesa's growled order to fall back. Andy bellowed 'Go' and nodded back up the hill. Ivan needed no urging. He ran farther up the hill and dropped behind a tree about 10 yards upslope. Peering around the trunk, he began sighting down slope. To his left he could see Private Volodray running for the cover of a rocky outcrop. Farther down, Private Kwala broke through a small cluster of thick, leafy shrubs. The laser carbine he was carrying in his second pair of arms was useless against the ultra armor, but the pair of smoke grenades he fired from his magazine-fed grenade launcher proved more useful. The thick smoke obscured the ultra armor that was crashing through the underbrush toward them. The lanky Ashanti began running for all he was worth from tree to tree, slowing only to fire another smoke round.

Ivan knew he wouldn't do anything significant with his rifle. The 7.62 Nato round his FN-FAL fired wouldn't scratch ultra armor, and the way he was shaking, he doubted he would be able to hit anything at range. He took a few shots anyway. Andy stopped firing and ran past on the left.

The ultra armor cleared the smoke. It was a quadruped crawler design, and fairly heavily armed. The paired weapons pods on it's back swiveled and canted upward. The fallen tree trunk hissed and popped as a rapid-fire stream of crimson plasma bisected the trunk. The snow around and on the trunk hissed as it turned to steam at the touch of the plasma.

'Ivan, go.'

Andy's bellowed order drove him to his feet and back up the slope. He ran faster as the tree he had been hiding behind splintered, sizzled, and cracked with a series of plasma hits. He heard it falling behind him and ducked behind another tree.

Farther upslope, Andy fired a pair of short bursts. Ivan ran.

Ivan crossed the top of the ridge and spun behind a stump. He needed to provide what feeble covering fire he could so Andy could break contact. Down the slope, thick billows of smoke hid the ultra armor from view, but he could still hear the occasional burst of plasma fire.

'Andy, go.' As he shouted, Ivan felt a momentary pang of shame. He had forgotten to let Andy know he was covered on his first retreat. Ivan realized his fear had overcome his training. He would not make that mistake again.

'Fall back to rally point.' Sgt. Zakeesa's order was welcome. Once Andy was in place, Ivan wasted no time moving. He and Andy continued to cover each other as they moved down the slope and up the next toward the rally point. As far as he could see, the ultra armor had disengaged.

Keeping his mind off of what had just happened was difficult. He wasn't close to the Lieutenant by any means, but he had never seen anyone die before. Ivan had thought he was prepared to face death. He wasn't.

The squad wasn't equipped to face ultra armor. They had been expecting poorly equipped pirates, not the cutting edge in power armor. Knowing how badly out-classed they were tested his self-discipline. Ivan had to force himself to stop and turn to cover Andy. His instincts told him to keep going.

The rally point was on the next hill in a relatively defensible outcrop of rock. As he and Andy worked their way up the hill, Krahnk, the Python heavy gunner challenged them. Once they had identified themselves, the big lizard waved them through and pointed to a boulder. Unit procedure was for them to plug into landlines if given the chance. It made communications easier in static defensive situations.

They plugged the lines into their commo head jacks and found cover. Sgt. Zakeesa directed Andy to cover the left flank and Ivan the rear.

Ivan found a relatively concealed position with a good field of fire behind a low line of rock. He informed the Cizerack Sgt. that he was in position and settled down to wait. He really wanted to talk to Andy, but Sgt. Zakeesa didn't like unnecessary chatter. Even with the landlines, they couldn't be sure that there weren't any sensors capable of picking up their conversations. It wasn't as much from concern that an unfriendly might pick up on what was said as it was pinpointing their locations by the vibrations of their speech. This wasn't such an issue in environmentally sealed armor, but Ivan and Andy both had open helmets.

Ivan passed the time praying for the strength and the courage not to fail the team. It was his first mission, and he was not doing well. He froze when the ultra armor opened fire. The explosion that had killed the Lieutenant had also thrown him about five or six meters. That was the only thing that kept him from panicking. Trying to force air back into his lungs gave him things other than the ambush to think about.

Privates Volodray and Elandra-emra reported in and Sgt. Zakeesa had them cover the right and front respectively. That left the Lieutenant, who had been confirmed dead by Sgt. Zakeesa, and Private Kwala unaccounted for. Andy reported that he had seen the lanky Ashanti heading for the rally point just before they started down the back of the first hill, but had lost sight of him shortly after that.

Zakeesa asked everyone in turn what they had noticed about the ultra armor. Private Volodray was confirming that the ultra armor mounted a pair of heavy pulse cannons, a gauss rifle, and at least one laser system when Ivan noticed movement in the bushes about fifty meters in front of his position. Zakeesa heard his sharp inhalation and asked, 'Golobitski, report.'

'Movement.' Ivan squinted over his sights and added, 'No positive id.'

He was thankful for his insulated gloves. If he didn't have them on, he'd have to wipe the perspiration from his hands. He didn't want to drop his rifle again. A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead and he realized he had forgotten his sweatband. This region of Invodale IV was fairly cold and he hadn't thought it would be necessary. He needed it. It was yet another mistake in a series.

'Silence on the Comm…'

Zakeesa's rebuke startled him. He hadn't intended his snort of disgust to be audible.

A pair of black gloves parted the branches, followed by a second pair. Ivan let out his breath slowly. It was Kwala, he was sure, but he didn't lower his rifle.

A few seconds later, the gray armored Ashanti cautiously stepped through the bushes. His paired hands were held in front and his camou unit was off to allow easier identification. His grenade launcher and laser carbine were slung across his shoulders.

'It's Kwala,' he said as he eased his finger off the trigger.

'Stupid Mudig.' The slur was low, but loud enough for him to hear. Volodray chuckled mirthlessly.

'Silence on the comm…' came Zakeesa's rebuke.

It took Ivan a second to determine that it was Elandra-emra. The Eridani's constant ill will suddenly struck Ivan as humorous, but this time he maintained his silence.

Shaking his head, Ivan couldn't help but smirk. They were in the middle of hostile territory with ultra armor hunting them and the squad's close-combat specialist was taking verbal shots at him. He was getting punchy.

After a few minutes, Zakeesa stated, 'We face a new type of ultra armor. It appears that the smoke blocked the ultra armor's sensors, but we can't be sure of that. I'm unable to raise the command post. Our objective is to get this information to the Captain. We can't face this ultra armor without support. Our order of march is Golobitski on point, Elandra-emra, McTavish, Kwala, me and Volodray. We march in five.'

Ivan acknowledged the orders and began checking his combat load. He had a pair of frag grenades, a white phosphorus grenade, and a pair of smoke grenades. He was carrying 10 magazines for his rifle with an extra box of ammo in his ruck. He had more than the standard load of ammo, but his brother had always recommended that. Ivan had left some other less important things back at base camp to cut down on the weight of his ruck.

His brother had given him a lot of good advice. Sergei had also recommended carrying as little metal as possible. The only metal he carried was in his heirloom kindjal, the Cossack short sword given to him by his grandfather, his FN-FAL, which Sergei had recommended because it had a high percentage of composite parts, and the grenades. Even his pistol and fighting knife were composite.

At Sergei's recommendation, Ivan had actually bought lower-line armor to be able to afford the infiltrator thermal jumpsuit he was wearing under his armor. His composite armor and the jumpsuit were intended to make him very nearly undetectable by either magnetic or thermal sensors. Sergei had described it as a poor man's trick for limiting detection.

Sgt. Zakeesa gave the one-minute warning.

Ivan double-checked to be sure everything was secure and in it's proper place. 'Golobitski, move out.'

'Signing off.' Ivan stated and disconnected his landline. The Sgt. would reel it in for use at the next position they came to.

Cautiously Ivan got up. To his left, he heard Andy shifting his position to provide covering fire.

He began moving down the hill. Behind him, Elandra-emra moved into position. They moved cautiously, watching and listening for the sound of underbrush being crushed or broken, but they heard nothing but the sounds of the local fauna. Ivan toyed with the idea of slinging his rifle. 7.62 Nato wouldn't even scratch the armor of an ultra armor. Of course there were also pirates in the area, and personal arms would be effective against them.

They marched for about an hour before Zakeesa ordered a halt. They found cover close by for a five-minute break.

Ivan ate a food bar and drank from his canteen. He had always heard the best time to drink was just after eating. The food kept the water in the body longer. He knew he needed it. Sweat kept dripping into his eyes.

Zakeesa gave the one-minute warning. Ivan folded the wrapper and stuck it in a cargo pouch. He didn't want to make it easier to track them.

They had been moving for about five minutes when his eyes burned with an afterimage of paired crimson plasma streams bracketing his head. Ivan froze. Behind him he heard a growl of pain from Elandra-emra and a shouted, 'Incoming.' Smoke billowed about 10 meters in front of him. Ivan dropped.

'Ivan. Cut right.'

Andy's yell cut through his haze. Ivan was up and sprinting for all he was worth.

Ivan heard weapons fire behind him. Krahnk bellowed in rage. Ivan ran. Furies pursued him. He ran for his life, lashed on by the terrified voice screaming in his mind.

Andy opened up with his '60. Even through his fear, Ivan realized Andy's M-60 wouldn't touch ultra armor. He couldn't leave his friend to face that thing alone.

Ivan took three more steps and dropped behind a tree. His heart was racing. He shut his eyes and forced himself to take deep breaths. After a few seconds, he worked up the courage to peer back.

Upslope, the ultra armor had moved through the smoke and was engaged with Krahnk. The big Python had gone berserk. He had tossed aside his pulse cannon and was wielding his sword. The massive, intricately decorated blade was definitely not of Python manufacture. A faint glow of red outlined the blade. His two-handed swing cut a chunk out of the 'head' of the ultra armor. He spun off to the side and raised his blade for a second attack.

The ultra armor pivoted and charged Krahnk. The big Python used it's head to vault up onto it's back. He whirled and raised his sword. Using his weight to add to the power of his downward stroke, Krahnk dropped to straddle the ultra armor's thick neck. His massive blade bit deeply into the ultra armor's head. He never got the chance to pull the blade free. The twin pulse cannons mounted on the ultra armor's back swiveled and fired. The blast completely burned through Krahnk's armored torso. His upper body fell away, leaving his legs and hips straddling the ultra armor's neck.

The ultra armor's twin cannons began swiveling in small, slow, jerky arcs. Ivan noticed that the big muzzles seemed to be tracking erratically. The ultra armor turned and began running toward him.

Ivan pressed his back against the tree and covered his head with his hands. He couldn't run. It would run him down. It would kill him. He didn't want to die. He heard the pulse cannons firing. There was an explosion. The ultra armor stopped. It was running again. It was getting closer. He closed his eyes and cowered against the tree.

The ground and tree vibrated as the ultra armor thundered past. Ivan pressed himself harder against the tree. The ultra armor continued moving past him. Ivan opened his eyes in time to see it disappear over the crest of the next ridge. Krahnk's sword was still stuck in its head. Thick smoke trailed from between the twin cannons mounted on its back. Ivan wondered about that, but he couldn't tell what had happened.

It took a few minutes for him to realize it hadn't spotted him. His arms and legs were too rubbery to move. He lay against the tree to regain his strength. Ivan heard slow, cautious steps off to the right. He nearly panicked again when he realized he didn't know where his rifle was. He was very much exposed. His Glock was on his right leg and visible to whomever was approaching. Trying to conceal his motion as much as possible, he slowly started moving his left hand toward the fighting knife sheathed on his left leg. Ivan stopped when he recognized Andy's voice.

'Ivan, are you alive?'

Slowly he sat up. He peered around the tree. Andy grinned and shook his head. He had Ivan's FN-FAL slung crossways across his back so it wouldn't affect his use of his M-60. About 10 meters behind him Kwala was keeping watch, his grenade launcher covering one direction and his laser carbine the other.

Asleep on the job again? Andy asked jovially. Ivan thought it a bit forced.

'You mobile?'

Ivan nodded. 'Yeah.' Then he added in shame. 'Andy, I ran.'

For an instant, an odd expression crossed Andy's face, but before Ivan could identify it, Andy grinned wryly. 'I know. You'll do better next time. Trust me. I have confidence in you.'

Ivan didn't feel any better. Andy had been watching out for him and Ivan had run when Andy needed him. Ivan had always prided himself on his loyalty to his friends. He certainly hadn't lived up to that ideal.

Andy unslung Ivan's rifle.

'I assume you want this?'

Ivan couldn't look him in the eyes as he took it back.

'Thanks.'

With a grin, Andy replied, 'Don't mention it.'

Glancing back up the slope toward where the UA had first opened fire, he asked, 'Where are the others?'

Andy shook his head. 'They're gone.' He added quickly, 'Our four-armed friend has some interesting observations to make.'

They were dead. The rest of the platoon was – gone. He had not been among them long enough to develop a real friendship with anyone but Randy Andy. Ivan glanced dully at Kwala.

The lanky Ashanti moved closer. His long, narrow face and grayish skin always made him seem mournful. As a race, the Ashanti were nicknamed the 'Gaunts' for their slenderness, and Kwala was more slender than most of his species. He commented, 'It is my humble opinion that the pilot is toying with us.'

'Toying?' Ivan burst out incredulously. 'We lost five men and you say he was playing with us?'

Kwala nodded imperturbably. 'She was enjoying the hunt. She sniped the Lt, fired in our general direction a few times without hitting any of us, and left. She sniped Elandra-emra and charged into the midst of us expecting us to scatter. Of course she didn't expect Krahnk to charge her. It never occurred to her that any of us would fight. In her mind, she is the predator and we are her prey.' He paused. 'This attitude is common among ultra armor pilots, and especially Cizeracks. They often believe themselves invincible. This one certainly does. If you'll notice, after her initial shots killed Elandra-emra, she did not fire her gauss rifle again. She also stopped shooting to hit, even though I don't believe her accuracy was suffering. Her fire seemed to be intended to herd us in the direction she wanted us to go. Cizeracks love that feeling of power.' 'Your sprint distracted her long enough for Krahnk to get close enough to use his Quatash. He may not have stopped her, but he did damage her. He kept her attention long enough for Volodray to launch his attack. It may not have destroyed her ultra armor, but it certainly hurt her. She left rather suddenly.' Gradually, Ivan began to regroup mentally. He asked, 'You keep saying 'she.' Why do you believe the pilot is a Cizerack?'

Kwala replied, 'I observed that the UA was a crawler. As you undoubtedly noticed, it has a very smooth gait for an ultra armor, and while clumsier, its movement is still very similar to Sgt. Zakeesa's. The Cizeracks pride themselves on their agility and grace and tend to design such things into their equipment. Another point is its shape. Its hull is rounded and streamlined. The head-like appendage, undoubtedly a sensor suite, is another Cizerack tendency. The cats seem to prefer their ultra armor to have an appearance close to their own. This may be partly because they are quadrupeds, though I have heard it speculated that it is due to a legend they have regarding bipeds.'

Rather impressed with Kwala's observations, Ivan asked, 'We were under fire. How did you notice all that?'

Kwala shrugged. It was an odd motion accentuated by the fact that both sets of shoulders lifted.

'I was not under the same pressure you were, or I might not have noticed many of these details.'

Ivan noticed that Andy rolled his eyes at this. The Ashanti was always so excruciatingly polite. In the three months Ivan had been with the platoon, he had noticed that Andy enjoyed testing Kwala's patience. Despite Andy's best efforts, the Ashanti had never been anything but completely courteous. Ivan half expected Andy to direct a smart remark toward the Ashanti, but Andy remained silent. Despite Andy's reputation as a screw-off, in the field, he was a professional.

Ivan glanced back at Kwala. 'What are we going to do now?'

'I see several options. There are only two passes back to our base camp. We can move fast together and try to slip though to our base camp. We can split up and attempt to do so separately. We can attempt to find a different way to signal our compatriots at the base camp. Finally, we can attempt to trick the Cizerack into a precarious situation and destroy the ultra armor.'

Ivan glanced at Andy. Andy was smiling wryly. Ivan exhaled. He hoped they could not see his hands shaking. He had a feeling that he knew what was going to come next, and he wasn't pleased.

'So what are we going to do?' Ivan asked. As the most experienced member of the team, Kwala had the final decision.

Without hesitation Kwala confirmed his fears.

'I feel it best that we each find a different way back to base camp. Even together, we don't have the firepower to stop the ultra armor. By separating, even if she hunts one or two of us down, it is highly unlikely that she will be able to stop the third.'

Ivan nodded, though he couldn't muster any real enthusiasm. His stomach was churning. He had the feeling that splitting up was a mistake. He didn't want to make any more mistakes. While being by himself reduced his chances of getting anyone else hurt or killed, he would be more responsible for the completion of the mission. After his performance so far, the confidence he had felt at the onset of the mission was gone.

Andy seemed to notice his fears. He grinned and slapped his shoulder with the back of his hand.

'You'll do fine.' His grin grew wider. 'Just remember, you're the only one in the platoon who ever beat Elendra-Emra with a blade. He's been pissed about that ever since.' His smile became positively wolfish. 'I loved watching you shove your 'inferior Mudig waste of metal' into his chest.'

Ivan couldn't help but smile at that. The warriors of Eridine prided themselves on their fighting prowess, especially with blades of any kind. Losing to a human had not set well with the proud warrior. In Eridani eyes, humans were inferior. Kwala interjected, 'Though I am not well-versed in the use of swords, I did recognize the canny strategy of playing on his pride to set up the victory conditions to allow you the victory in the event you both 'died. That alone was worthy of the Champion Dhatahash, who single-handedly…'

Andy interrupted him. 'I'm sure Ivan appreciates being compared to Data-hash, but this isn't the time for such stories. Right now we need to get moving. We don't have much time.'

With a shallow bow, Kwala replied, 'Of course you are correct. I ask you to forgive my...

'Not a problem, Kwala. Do you want to head south or do you want me to?'

'I am the most heavily armed and armored. I will take the more challenging path.'

Andy turned to Ivan. 'I'll take the middle, and we'll leave you to head North and over. There's better cover that way.' He grinned and slipped into a Scottish brogue. 'You'll do fine, my wee tricky bairn. Just keep your head.'

He pulled small rectangular box out of a cargo pouch and tossed it to Ivan. 'If you run into our playful kitten, just remember to keep your string handy. Kittens love to play with string.'

Ivan nodded glumly. He didn't want to think about that ultra armor. Glancing at the box Andy had tossed him, he recognized it as a reel of razor wire. The ultra-fine wire was hard to work with, but made a fantastic garrote. Andy had just given him enough to equip an entire company. He offered the reel back to Andy, but Andy shook his head and grinned.

'Keep it. It may come in handy.'

He watched as Andy and Kwala moved off. Kwala started south. He walked just below the crest of the ridge to avoid being silhouetted, his grenade launcher and laser carbine covering left and right respectively. Andy started down the slope. Ivan watched him walk for a minute before he turned and trudged away.

---

Ivan Golobitski stepped over a log and paused. Glancing around, as far as he could see the area was clear. He was moving just below the ridgeline through a forest of young trees. There were a few centimeters of snow on the ground, so he was leaving tracks. There was little he could do about that. The bare patches were few and far between.

Despite the cold, he was sweating profusely from stress and exertion. He was alone in enemy territory and he was not happy about that. After his squad was ambushed by an ultra armor, the two other survivors had decided that they should split up and make their individual ways back to base camp. With the ultra armor dogging their tracks, splitting up had seemed to offer the best chance to complete their mission. He still thought splitting up was a bad idea.

It would have been a pleasant walk if the situation had been different. The pale sun, though not the bright yellow of Earth or the more muted yellow of Hartford, still brought back happy memories of home. The sunlight filtered through the trees, and aside from the fact that the needles were thicker than any pine he had ever seen, he could have mistaken it for a forest from behind his grandparents' house.

The temperature was cold enough to cause his breath to steam, but that was still warm for Invodale IV. He would not have been cold anyway. Under his armor he was wearing a jumpsuit designed to reduce heat signature. His brother Sergei had suggested the jumpsuit and a ceramic-based armor as a poor man's way of reducing the chance of detection. The jumpsuit had the additional benefit of keeping his temperature stable. The idea of a pure-born Russian cold in a mere Ð5 Celsius was embarrassing.

An hour passed and he heard a series of faint explosions to the south. The rapid succession suggested that it was Kwala's grenade launcher on full auto.

Ivan stopped and listened, praying that Kwala might get away. There was a pause, another explosion, and then silence. He waited a few minutes, but heard nothing else.

He kept moving. There was nothing more he could do. The base camp was at least twenty kilometers to the West. It was going to take him a while to get there. The hills and underbrush would slow him down, but it would also provide cover. He could only hope the ultra armor wouldn't stumble onto him.

Moving quietly from cover to cover, Ivan kept a careful watch on the crest of the hill. The last thing he wanted was to stumble across the ultra armor, but he also had to keep an eye open for the pirates that they were originally sent to destroy.

As he marched, he began to hear the songs of several of the local 'birds.' Hearing the animals picked up his spirits. He didn't believe they would be singing and rooting around if something as big and scary as an ultra armor was tromping around through the area.

Ivan had to remind himself to stay on his toes. He had always enjoyed walking in the woods. He had loved the smells and noises. The occasional glimpse of some furry mammal-looking critter rooting for food brought back memories of his childhood. The rolling hills were just like the hills behind his grandparent's home. Ivan kept waiting for his younger brother Dmitry to throw a snowball from behind one of the trees.

He had been marching for some time before he heard the cracking of a number of trees being run over in the distance. Ivan knelt swiftly and froze. He slowed his breathing as he tried to determine the direction of the noise. He heard nothing.

Sweat dripped into his eyes and he blinked it away. He still couldn't hear anything. Vainly he looked around, searching for movement or some indication that something was out there.

After several of the proverbial hour-long minutes passed, Ivan slowly moved on. He listened carefully, but heard nothing.

Ivan paused at the top of the hill before starting down. He didn't see anything threatening. As he started climbing the next hill, he realized this hill was much steeper than the last. For a few minutes he debated on whether or not to move farther down to where the slope was less pronounced. After a few seconds of indecision, he chose to try the incline.

At first he had little difficulty, but presently he began to have problems maintaining his footing. Rather than risking a fall, Ivan decided to walk farther down the hill before cresting it. He angled down the hill and began to cautiously work his way around an area of fallen rocks.

The incline leveled out. He had walked only a few meters when he noticed the large, splay-toed footprint of the ultra armor leading through the scree. Ivan froze as he followed the tracks with his eyes. The trail was clear in the snow. It led to a fairly dense stand of trees. There, through the path it had crushed to get into the thicket, sat the ultra armor.

It was angled away from him and squatting like a cat about to pounce. The sensor suite mounted in the 'head' was moving in small arcs as it scanned the area. Ivan noticed Krahnk's sword was no longer embedded in the armor of its head. The cat had probably gotten out to remove it. Idly he wished he could have been there when it had dismounted. A few rounds of 7.62 Nato from his rifle would have ended this issue quickly.

On it's back, the bottom of the streamlined pods containing the twin pulse cannons were charred and blackened, as though a shot had impacted between the body and the weapons pods. He suspected that the blast had damaged the rotation ring of the weapons pods. The pods were moving slower than they had been, and every so often it stuck. Even so, the twin pulse cannons appeared functional. He didn't want to verify that.

Ivan wasn't sure who had gotten the hit. Aside from the Lieutenant, and Elendra-Emra, no one in the squad carried anything that could pierce its armor. Kwala, one of the other survivors, had made a comment that lead him to believe it might have been Volodray.

Slowly, he moved up and hid behind the tree that was in front of him. He suspected that the ultra armor had detected him, but having a few trees in front to provide soft cover was always a good idea.

He waited for a few moments with no response from the ultra armor. Ivan blinked the sweat from his eyes. It seemed like a steady trickle was running down his forehead. He resisted the urge to attempt to sneak away, knowing any further movement would only increase the chance that it would see him.

After waiting for a while, Ivan glanced at the chronometer built into his helmet. Twenty minutes had passed. He couldn't keep this waiting up for much longer. His back and legs were starting to burn.

Ten minutes later, the ultra armor shifted to its right. It charged out of the stand of trees, snapping them effortlessly as it fired on the march. The twin streams of plasma raked the side of the hill, but the tree Ivan was using for cover obscured the target. He didn't want to peer around and risk being spotted by its motion sensors. As the ultra armor crested the hill, Ivan took advantage of his chance to escape and moved back in the direction he had come.

Ivan continued moving for about twenty minutes before he decided he was away from immediate danger. He couldn't hear anything, which he found both nerve-wracking and reassuring. It was the realization that he had stumbled onto the ultra armor without seeing it that bothered him. He had completely missed it in the trees.

On the positive side, the ultra armor had not reacted to his presence which meant the pilot was either toying with him or had missed him completely. He could believe the former. Kwala had commented that the ultra armor's design and behavior indicated a Cizerack pilot. Ivan hoped for the latter. If that were the case, then he might be able to strike a blow before it killed him.

As he marched, he realized suddenly that the idea that he was going to die didn't bother him as much as it had. That realization startled him. What was beginning to annoy him was the idea that he might not be able to strike a blow. He was not used to thinking of himself as helpless. His grandfather had instilled in him a great deal of pride in the Golobitski martial tradition. His kindjal was a physical reminder of this tradition. It was a Cossack weapon, and since the Golobitski were not Cossack, the only way for the original Golobiskis to get one was to take it as a trophy from its Cossack owner.

On a whim, he pulled the weapon. It was a simple but effective blade. It was about half a meter long, with a wide, double-edged blade. He kept the outside edge nearly razored. The inside he used for coarse cutting, so he kept that machete sharp. Its fuller, a pair of narrow metal strips on both sides of the blade running from the grips to the sharp point strengthened and reinforced the blade. The grips were made of Maladarn Oak. Designed strictly for offense, it had no hand protection at all. It was a highly utilitarian weapon, and while it was useful for a variety of tasks, it was designed as a weapon.

Before he had shipped out for basic training, his grandfather had likened the weapon to the family. Golobitskis had fought against Napoleon. They had been among the defenders at Stalingrad. The Golobitskis were as unyielding and relentless as the Russian winter. Their history was a source of great pride for the entire family. Ivan had been trained to always look for the options. Golobitskis didn't give up. The very thought of giving up was offensive to him. Filled with a new determination, Ivan quickened his step.

The ground became rockier as he swung north, and the trees became less dense. It was reassuring to know that he would be better able to see the ultra armor if it came upon him, but it didn't make him feel that much better. If he could see it, it could probably see him and its weapons could hit anything it could see.

As he moved, he began trying to think of ways to damage or take out that ultra armor. Eluding it was the best choice, but he also tried to think of ways to kill it. His grandfather had always said action cures panic. Planning to take action made him feel a bit better.

Kwala had implied that Volodray had done something to damage the ultra armor's pulse cannon pods. They were still functioning, but not as efficiently. The armor was charred, so that would imply extreme heat. Since Volodray's laser rifle would not have done that kind of damage, he might have used a grenade.

Ivan double-checked his grenades. He had a single white-phosphorus grenade. A willie-pete might generate that kind of heat.

The challenge was determining where it would do the most damage and how to get it there. The question was how much it would really do to the ultra armor. He didn't have Kwala's accuracy with thrown weapons, but Volodray didn't either. If Volodray had thrown the grenade, then Ivan was impressed. The man had not shown such accuracy during squad drills.

Another issue was getting the grenade to detonate at the right time. All of his grenades relied on timers. That was fine for stationary targets, but for mobile targets like the ultra armor, they weren't very effective. Impact-detonated grenades, like those from Kwala's grenade launcher, would have been nice. Next time, he vowed, he was going to get and qualify with a grenade launcher.

As far as the damage went, while the grenade had damaged the rotation ring, it hadn't done enough to knock out the rotation of the weapons pods. The chance of Ivan throwing a grenade with enough accuracy to hit something vital was slim. The other option was to find a way to attach the grenade directly to the ring. Even if the armor was not penetrated, the concussion could still warp or bend the superstructure of the...

His retina burned with the crimson afterimage of plasma as it incinerated a swath in the trees to his right. Ivan dove for the ground.

Trees crashed faintly in the distance. Ivan waited for the shots that would end his life.

Glancing through the spindly trunks of the trees, he could see nothing. Ivan blinked as sweat dripped into his eyes.

For several moments there was silence. Then, he heard the splintering of saplings as the heavy armor crashed through the trees on the ridge behind him. As it rushed toward him, Ivan fought to keep his eyes open. He couldn't react if he shut his eyes. The sweat burned. He prayed that the ultra armor wouldn't come close enough to step on him.

As the ultra armor closed with him, Ivan felt the ground vibrating beneath him. It took every ounce of self-discipline not to bolt. The ultra armor became huge as it got closer. The sudden fear that he would be trampled assailed him. Torn between the fear of being trampled and the fear of attracting the armor's attention, Ivan froze. He could only watch wide-eyed as it passed by a few meters to his left. Clods of dirt and snow kicked up by the passing ultra armor landed on him.

This time he was able to observe it a bit more closely. He didn't get a good look, but it appeared that Krahnk's sword had cut deeply into the sensor suite. He hoped it had done major damage. Ivan would have liked to know what kind of sword Krahnk had been using. Kwala had called it a 'Kutash' or something like that.

The ultra armor continued on, and Ivan turned to watch it. It moved up the hill and turned at the crest. It stood there for a minute, waiting. It's head moved side to side. Ivan could almost sense it's 'eyes' searching for him.

Seconds ticked by on his helmet chronometer. Trees crashed to his right. From the sounds of their passage, what he guessed were a few of the local whildobeests had panicked and were fleeing. Their passage attracted the ultra armor's attention also. Several plasma streams destroyed the small herd. Ivan could hear one bleating in pain and terror before a final blast finished it.

Ivan waited. He feared if he moved, that the ultra armor would deal with him as it had dealt with the whildobeests.

The seconds ticked by. Ivan cursed the shortsightedness that made him forget his sweatband. The salt from his perspiration kept burning his eyes.

The ultra armor began shooting. Ivan cowered. As the plasma streams licked out all around him and then moved to his left, he realized it wasn't firing at him. It was trying to flush him as it had flushed the whildobeests. If it had been tracking him, he would be as dead as the charred whildobeests to his right.

Ivan inhaled sharply with the excitement of his realization. The ultra armor's pilot couldn't see him. Whether it was due to his armor and infiltrator jumpsuit, or perhaps the damage done to its sensor suite, or perhaps even some issue he was not aware of, the pilot couldn't see him. He suddenly realized he was smiling.

His epee coach had always said if you looked past your fear and focused on your opponent's action, you could always find their weakness. During his platoon's hand-to-hand training, their close-support specialist, Elandra-emra, had not taken him seriously and had made the same attack twice. For any of Richard's epee students, the second time was fatal. Timing attacks were Richard's specialty. It has been relatively simple for Ivan to time his thrust for the instant that Elandra-emra's blade was out of line and thus not a threat.

Though Ivan couldn't think of how a stop-thrust might translate into this situation, knowing the ultra armor's pilot could pass so close and still not see him raised his confidence considerably. He might be able to evade her after all.

She sat on the hill for about a half an hour before moving off. Ivan watched as she rushed off to the west. He suspected that she was trying to cut him off before he could make it to the pass leading to the Disciples' base camp. That would certainly fit if she had a momentary contact with him, but not enough to fire accurately. The fact that he was still alive suggested that. Now that she had a general idea of his location, it was going to be difficult but not impossible to get past her.

Ivan set off again. This time, the fear that had impelled him forward had been replaced by a wary confidence. Sun Tzu's old maxim of 'Know your enemy and know yourself and you will always triumph' gave him hope. He had an idea of his enemy's weakness, and a good idea of his own strength. It wasn't a foregone conclusion, but he had hope. As long as he didn't get cocky as Elandra-emra had...

He climbed the hill cautiously. Her trail was fairly obvious. He could see the swath of trees knocked down in its path down the slope and up the next.

The slope became steeper halfway down. Ivan had to move laterally to find a less steep path. This took him out of sight of the ultra armor's trail. For a minute, he debated the wisdom of trying to find it again. Not knowing where the ultra armor was disturbed him, but he also realized that the probability was that the pilot was watching her rear. The last thing he wanted to do was to stumble into an ambush. The team was counting on him to make it back to base camp to warn the unit. He didn't believe the base itself was in any danger Ð it was well fortified. The Disciples of Horatius followed the same rock-hard discipline that the legionnaire they were named for had probably followed. Still, to leave an unfriendly ultra armor on the prowl was never a good idea.

After an hour, he came to a ridge that abutted a tall rock outcrop. Ivan glanced up, praying that she didn't have some sort of a jump or flight system. The plateau would make an ideal spotter position or possibly even a firebase. It would be open to air attack, but with air superiority, it would be highly effective if obvious. It would be something to keep in mind for future operations in this area.

When Ivan got to the top of the next hill, he looked down at a cliff. The ridge he was on rose sharply before sloping gently downward and dropping off to what he guestimated was a 25-meter cliff. The outcrop rose on the far side of the clearing. Sparse shrubs and short grasses grew in the roughly triangular down slope. On the far side of the clearing he could see a narrow trail leading along the edge of the rock face. That was where he needed to go to get back to the base camp.

He started to move around a thicket of shrubs and froze. Ivan could feel the hair on the back of his neck bristling. Something wasn't right about that clearing.

Ivan smiled grimly. He could hear his grandfather telling him to listen to his instincts, and his brother Sergei laughing that he was too inexperienced to have instincts.

At a glance, the edge of woods appeared to be untouched. None of the trees or shrubs were crushed. There were no indications that she had passed through. He could hear the sound of critters scurrying around. Nothing seemed amiss. But still, he sensed that something wasn't right.

Carefully he scanned the clearing. For an instant, he thought he saw movement, but it was fleeting. Looking more closely at the area, he noticed what he had first thought was a discoloration in the rock actually appeared to be a number of meters away from the rocks. He glanced to the left of the area. In his peripheral vision, he could just barely make out the ultra armor waited patiently in the middle of the clearing. Ivan froze.

After a minute or two, he realized she hadn't reacted to his presence. He had approached from her left side without anything more than the normal stealth, and she did not seem to know that he was there. Ivan slowly released the breath he had been holding.

He had almost missed her. She had not used her camouflage unit before. Only the armor damage on her weapons pods gave her away.

Ivan was thankful for the spotty bushes and shrubs between them. He suspected that the crest of the ridge and the bushes had masked his approach to her position. Despite the earlier evidence that she couldn't detect him, everything he could use helped.

It was somewhat unsettling to be so close to her. Knowing she could blast him into oblivion with almost no effort was intimidating, but it also gave him a perverse sort of thrill. There was something exhilarating to know that he was so close and yet she couldn't see him. Ivan reminded himself not to get cocky. He had a mission to complete

Knowing what he was looking for made it easier to see her. Her camouflage unit distorted the rocks behind her just slightly. She was squatted down on her haunches like a cat about to pounce. Her head was slowly pivoting from left to right and back as she scanned the area. Ivan noticed a long gray whip antenna that he had not seen before. It extended a number of feet above the camouflaged ultra armor. He suspected that it was a heads-up system designed to allow her to scan an area without being seen. He could just make out the paired pulse cannons on her back mount swiveling in sync with her head.

Ivan studied the damaged area on her weapons pod closely. He guessed the target had been the rotation ring. He didn't think a grenade would have damaged the weapons pods enough to knock them out.

The fact that the damage had broken the coverage of the camouflage system suggested that the camou system used more of a chameleon effect based on the surface of the armor itself. Sergei had told him about some of the new experimental envelopment-field camouflage generators. Ivan was thankful her ultra armor didn't have such a system. He would not have noticed it otherwise.

He debated on whether to try to move back over the crest or whether to stay put, but the idea of moving while under her watchful eyes didn't appeal to him. He decided to stay put.

As he observed the clearing, one thing that bothered him was her lack of a trail. He had been counting on spotting her path by the crushed trees and foliage. The fact that she was on the cliff without any visible trail concerned him. He didn't believe it was possible for her ultra armor to make it over the crest without leaving a trace. It unsettled him to think that her ultra armor might have limited flight or jump capabilities. Evading a flight-capable ultra armor would be that much more difficult. It was still possible he reminded himself. Ivan decided to sit and wait and try to think of ways to get around it.

Ivan was still waiting for her to move over an hour later. Aside from its sensors and the weapons pod, the UA had not twitched. Ivan was beginning to get antsy. He had been lying there nearly motionless and the stress was wearing on him. Any mistake could alert her to his presence. He felt confident that he was well hidden, but he preferred not to push his luck.

One benefit of his inactivity was the confirmation that she did have either a jump or limited flight capability. He had noticed her trail in the snow leading to the base of the cliff just below where she now waited for him.

The time had also led to a new series of options, including one wild scheme that he thought might allow him to damage or even capture the UA.

Sergei had once explained the idea of tamping an explosive charge to maximize its blast. If he could find a way to place his white phosphorus grenade between the two weapons pods, it would do much more damage than even Volodray's grenade had. A frag grenade or two would only help things. That would certainly help cut down its firepower. He wasn't so na•ve as to believe it would stop the UA, but it was a positive step toward doing something.

The option that offered the greatest chance of success for eliminating her was to get her outside of the UA. Even a python would have a difficult time surviving a close range burst of 7.62, and despite their claims to the contrary, Cizeracks were usually not as hardy as either of the Python races. The big question was how to get her out.

Ivan had already rejected the idea of toppling the UA off the cliff as unlikely. He didn't have any explosives or any way to move it. A rockslide would work, but once again he would need explosives he didn't have. Also, that would require him to climb the face of the cliff. He didn't like the idea of exposing himself to her fire.

The UA rose smoothly and moved swiftly forward. The instant the weapons pods cleared the top of the ridge, they canted down and opened fire down the slope. Twin streams of crimson plasma painted long afterimages in Ivan's retina as it blasted something down the other side of the hill. Trees crashed and shrubs fell in a swath as the stream of plasma cut through them. The UA paused momentarily, and fired again.

It backed away from the crest, crouched like a cat, and sprang. Shrubs and saplings bowed and sprang back as the pressure wave from the jump unit pushed the UA into the air. Ivan felt the pressure wave pressing him backward and down and he lowered his head to ride it out. When he looked up, there was no indication that the UA had ever been there. He suspected that the large footpads had left a footprint, but he would have to break cover to check that out.

Crawling to the top of the hill, he peered down, trying to see where the UA had gone.

The UA could not be seen through the trees. A sudden chill shot like a bead of sweat down Ivan's spine. For the nth time that day, he cursed the fact that he had forgotten his sweatband. Either she was toying with him again, or she really believed she had shot him and bounded off. The question was what would she do when she discovered that her target wasn't him. That meant she would either come back, or she would watch the area of this pass. The other possibility was that she might think he had taken another way and be gone altogether. If that were the case, then he would probably have plenty of time to get back to the base camp. Of course if she were watching, with the effectiveness of her camouflage unit, he would never see her before she fired. He would have to make a decision and soon.

He had just decided to try the pass when he heard something overhead. Glancing up, he quickly dropped to the ground. She had returned.

Ivan was thankful for his hesitation. He would have either been caught in the middle of the small clearing or just on the side of the small path if he had been more decisive. The downside of this was he still had to figure out how to get past her to the base camp.

After a few minutes of debating, he decided to back down and try a different way back to the base.

Carefully he began to back down the hill. When the ground leveled out and he had gotten a few hundred meters of foliage between himself and her UA, he stood and began walking.

Ivan walked southeast for a bit to try to get more distance between himself and her UA before angling southwest. He wanted at least one hill between himself and her.

He had been walking for about forty-five minutes when he noticed what appeared to be three bodies lying on the ground. Immediately he took cover behind a tree. After observing for a few minutes, he couldn't find any threats and decided the aggressors were probably gone. The trees and bushes around the corpses were smashed. It looked like there had been a firefight. After debating for a few minutes, he decided to investigate. He hoped to get some information from the carnage.

Cautiously he moved up. As he closed to the nearest body, he recognized the field-muted Disciples of Horatius emblem on the armor. It was Volodray. He had circled back around to where he had panicked and left Randy Andy to face her ultra armor without him.

Ivan forced himself to view the scene. It was difficult for him to view the bodies of his dead squad mates. His stomach was threatening to bring up the meal bar he had eaten earlier. Even if he had not panicked, it was doubtful that he could have changed the outcome. What ate at him was the knowledge that instead of doing anything to support them, he bolted.

The camouflage unit on Volodray's black armor was off of course. His legs and lower torso were crushed in the middle of the ultra armor's footprint. It was a well-aimed attack.

One thing Ivan noticed after a minute was that the trigger finger of Volodray's right hand was missing. Whatever had been used to cut through his armored glove had cauterized the wound. There was no blood. The area around his legs and abdomen was stained a dark red. It caught Ivan's attention because the bloody area around Volodray's legs looked darker than human blood. That would be something to investigate if he...when, he corrected himself. He would investigate that when he got back to base camp.

Struck by a grim insight, Ivan began looking at the tracks around Volodray's body. He recognized Kwala's boot prints, and what he believed were Randy Andy's, but he also recognized a set of feline prints. They led to and from a second set of ultra armor tracks that came from the East. The tracks looked similar, so there were either a pair of the ultra armor in the vicinity, or the original came back for her trophy. It wasn't a pleasant thought either way, but it was good to know what he was up against.

His old fencing instructor had always said anything you can observe about your opponent off the fencing strip could aid you. You just had to recognize the thought process the action suggested.

The idea that the Cizerack ultra armor pilot was a trophy hunter was confirmed when he followed the ultra armor tracks to the upper half of Krahnk's body. The trigger finger of Krahnk's right hand was gone also. It was an unsettling tidbit of information, but it was something that might prove useful under the right circumstances.

Ivan moved on. He walked quickly past the tree where he had hidden. When he came to the point where Randy Andy, Kwala, and he had parted ways, he debated on which way to go. He could follow Kwala's route, knowing that he had run into something unfriendly. He could follow Randy Andy's trail not knowing anything of his friend's fate. He could follow his own again in the hope the ultra armor was not in the clearing any longer.

After a few minutes, he decided to follow Randy Andy's trail. He found it reassuring that he had not heard Randy Andy's M-60. Ivan hoped that might mean the route Randy Andy had followed was relatively clear. Randy Andy might even be waiting for him when he got back to camp. The tall Orion was resourceful. Ivan was sure he had made it. The thought that the success of the mission might rest solely on him alone scared Ivan. He was no longer the cocky tyro he had been starting out. He had seen the elephant, to use one of his grandfather's phrases, but he had run. Now he could no longer run.

Ivan moved cautiously along the trail. He didn't want to walk into an ambush.

---

There was a flash from behind as Ivan was flung bodily through the air. He landed…

Ivan fought desperately to fill his lungs with air. It came with great effort. The pounding in his head almost made him wish that he were dead. His back and neck felt like they had been scourged, and he couldn’t move his arms.

The pounding subsided slowly. Ivan opened his eyes. The clouds were thick overhead. They appeared to be whiter than back home on Hartford. The sky visible through the clouds was deep blue. Back home, the sky had more turquoise. Sunlight streamed in beams through the clouds. They were like the beams of heavenly light he had believed them to be as a child. A faint wisp of black smoke wafted overhead. All was peaceful…

To his left he heard automatic weapons fire. He recognized the staccato of an M-60 machine gun. From the short-burst-short-burst-longer-burst pattern the gunner was firing, it sounded like Randy Andy. Ivan turned his head. A dull pain in his neck made him wince.

Randy Andy was dropping back down behind the fallen tree trunk he was using for cover.

Glancing up the slope to his right, he saw the Lt. lying in the snow. Vardish-Emra’s weathered black armor was charred and holed in three places that he could see. The Lt…

He winced as something whacked against his helmet. Randy Andy bellowed over the com-link, ‘Ivan. Give me some covering fire.’

Ivan glanced left. A meter down the slope the tall Orion was backed against the large fallen tree trunk as he loaded another belt into his ‘60. He pulled back on the charging handle, spun up from cover and fired off a burst.

‘Ivan. Get down here.’

Shaking his head to clear the ringing from it, Ivan stiffly rolled the short distance to the trunk Andy was behind. He suddenly realized he didn’t have his rifle. Ivan began to panic. It was his first combat and he had already lost his FN/Fal.

Glancing around frantically, he saw the black polymer stock sticking out of the snow farther up the slope. With a yell to ‘Cover me,’ he jumped up and lunged to grab it before sliding back behind the trunk.

He put the safety on, removed the magazine and chambered round, and checked the barrel for debris. It was clear.

From down the hill, he heard the whine of a rapid-firing pulse cannon and the crack and snap of brush as something large and heavy moved through the trees toward them.

Trees splintered about 50 meters down the hill. Ivan glimpsed what appeared to be a gray Cizerack smashing through the saplings. There was something odd about the way it moved. Its shape mimicked the feline race, but its movement lacked the easy grace of a real Cizerack like Sgt. Zakeesa. As it bulldozed its way through the trees, Ivan inhaled sharply. The pirates had ultra armor. A hypervelocity round cracked overhead to punctuate that thought. He blinked away a bead of sweat that dripped in his eye.

Over the com-link, he heard Sgt. Zakeesa’s growled order to fall back. Andy bellowed ‘Go’ and nodded back up the hill. Ivan needed no urging. He ran farther up the hill and dropped behind a tree about 10 yards upslope. Peering around the trunk, he began sighting down slope. To his left he could see Private Volodray running for the cover of a rocky outcrop. Farther down, Private Kwala broke through a small cluster of thick, leafy shrubs. The laser carbine he was carrying in his second pair of arms was useless against the ultra armor, but the pair of smoke grenades he fired from his magazine-fed grenade launcher proved more useful. The thick smoke obscured the ultra armor that was crashing through the underbrush toward them. The lanky Ashanti began running for all he was worth from tree to tree, slowing only to fire another smoke round.

Ivan knew he wouldn’t do anything significant with his rifle. The 7.62 Nato round his FN/Fal fired wouldn’t scratch ultra armor, and the way he was shaking, he doubted he would be able to hit anything at range. He took a few shots anyway. Andy stopped firing and ran past on the left.

The ultra armor cleared the smoke. It was a quadruped crawler design, and fairly heavily armed. The paired weapons pods on it’s back swiveled and canted upward. The fallen tree trunk hissed and popped as a rapid-fire stream of crimson plasma bisected the trunk. The snow around and on the trunk hissed as it turned to steam at the touch of the plasma.

‘Ivan, go.’

Andy’s bellowed order drove him to his feet and back up the slope. He ran faster as the tree he had been hiding behind splintered, sizzled, and cracked with a series of plasma hits. He heard it falling behind him and ducked behind another tree.

Farther upslope, Andy fired a pair of short bursts. Ivan ran.

Ivan crossed the top of the ridge and spun behind a stump. He needed to provide what feeble covering fire he could so Andy could break contact. Down the slope, thick billows of smoke hid the ultra armor from view, but he could still hear the occasional burst of plasma fire.

‘Andy, go.’ As he shouted, Ivan felt a momentary pang of shame. He had forgotten to let Andy know he was covered on his first retreat. Ivan realized his fear had overcome his training. He would not make that mistake again.

‘Fall back to rally point.’ Sgt. Zakeesa’s order was welcome. Once Andy was in place, Ivan wasted no time moving. He and Andy continued to cover each other as they moved down the slope and up the next toward the rally point. As far as he could see, the ultra armor had disengaged.

Keeping his mind off of what had just happened was difficult. He wasn’t close to the Lieutenant by any means, but he had never seen anyone die before. Ivan had thought he was prepared to face death. He wasn’t.

The squad wasn’t equipped to face ultra armor. They had been expecting poorly equipped pirates, not the cutting edge in power armor. Knowing how badly out-classed they were tested his self-discipline. Ivan had to force himself to stop and turn to cover Andy. His instincts told him to keep going.

The rally point was on the next hill in a relatively defensible outcrop of rock. As he and Andy worked their way up the hill, Krahnk, the Python heavy gunner challenged them. Once they had identified themselves, the big lizard waved them through and pointed to a boulder. Unit procedure was for them to plug into landlines if given the chance. It made communications easier in static defensive situations.

They plugged the lines into their commo head jacks and found cover. Sgt. Zakeesa directed Andy to cover the left flank and Ivan the rear.

Ivan found a relatively concealed position with a good field of fire behind a low line of rock. He informed the Cizerack Sgt. that he was in position and settled down to wait. He really wanted to talk to Andy, but Sgt. Zakeesa didn’t like unnecessary chatter. Even with the landlines, they couldn’t be sure that there weren’t any sensors capable of picking up their conversations. It wasn’t as much from concern that an unfriendly might pick up on what was said as it was pinpointing their locations by the vibrations of their speech. This wasn’t such an issue in environmentally sealed armor, but Ivan and Andy both had open helmets.

Ivan passed the time praying for the strength and the courage not to fail the team. It was his first mission, and he was not doing well. He froze when the ultra armor opened fire. The explosion that had killed the Lieutenant had also thrown him about five or six meters. That was the only thing that kept him from panicking. Trying to force air back into his lungs gave him things other than the ambush to think about.

Privates Volodray and Elandra-emra reported in and Sgt. Zakeesa had them cover the right and front respectively. That left the Lieutenant, who had been confirmed dead by Sgt. Zakeesa, and Private Kwala unaccounted for. Andy reported that he had seen the lanky Ashanti heading for the rally point just before they started down the back of the first hill, but had lost sight of him shortly after that.

Zakeesa asked everyone in turn what they had noticed about the ultra armor. Private Volodray was confirming that the ultra armor mounted a pair of heavy pulse cannons, a gauss rifle, and at least one laser system when Ivan noticed movement in the bushes about fifty meters in front of his position. Zakeesa heard his sharp inhalation and asked, ‘Golobitski, report.’

‘Movement.’ Ivan squinted over his sights and added, ‘No positive id.’

He was thankful for his insulated gloves. If he didn’t have them on, he’d have to wipe the perspiration from his hands. He didn’t want to drop his rifle again. A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead and he realized he had forgotten his sweatband. This region of Invodale IV was fairly cold and he hadn’t thought it would be necessary. He needed it. It was yet another mistake in a series.

‘Silence on the Comm…’

Zakeesa’s rebuke startled him. He hadn’t intended his snort of disgust to be audible.

A pair of black gloves parted the branches, followed by a second pair. Ivan let out his breath slowly. It was Kwala, he was sure, but he didn’t lower his rifle.

A few seconds later, the gray armored Ashanti cautiously stepped through the bushes. His paired hands were held in front and his camou unit was off to allow easier identification. His grenade launcher and laser carbine were slung across his shoulders.

‘It’s Kwala,’ he said as he eased his finger off the trigger.

‘Stupid Mudig.’ The slur was low, but loud enough for him to hear. Volodray chuckled mirthlessly.

‘Silence on the comm…’ came Zakeesa’s rebuke.

It took Ivan a second to determine that it was Elandra-emra. The Eridani’s constant ill will suddenly struck Ivan as humorous, but this time he maintained his silence.

Shaking his head, Ivan couldn’t help but smirk. They were in the middle of hostile territory with ultra armor hunting them and the squad’s close-combat specialist was taking verbal shots at him. He was getting punchy.

After a few minutes, Zakeesa stated,

‘We face a new type of ultra armor. It appears that the smoke blocked the ultra armor’s sensors, but we can’t be sure of that. I’m unable to raise the command post. Our objective is to get this information to the Captain. We can’t face this ultra armor without support. Our order of march is Golobitski on point, Elandra-emra, McTavish, Kwala, me and Volodray. We march in five.’

Ivan acknowledged the orders and began checking his combat load. He had a pair of frag grenades, a white phosphorus grenade, and a pair of smoke grenades. He was carrying 10 magazines for his rifle with an extra box of ammo in his ruck. He had more than the standard load of ammo, but his brother had always recommended that. Ivan had left some other less important things back at base camp to cut down on the weight of his ruck.

His brother had given him a lot of good advice. Sergei had also recommended carrying as little metal as possible. The only metal he carried was in his heirloom kindjal, the Cossack short sword given to him by his grandfather, his FN/Fal, which Sergei had recommended because it had a high percentage of composite parts, and the grenades. Even his pistol and fighting knife were composite.

At Sergei’s recommendation, Ivan had actually bought lower-line armor to be able to afford the infiltrator thermal jumpsuit he was wearing under his armor. His composite armor and the jumpsuit were intended to make him very nearly undetectable by either magnetic or thermal sensors. Sergei had described it as a poor man’s trick for limiting detection.

Sgt. Zakeesa gave the one-minute warning.

Ivan double-checked to be sure everything was secure and in it’s proper place.

‘Golobitski, move out.’

‘Signing off.’ Ivan stated and disconnected his landline. The Sgt. would reel it in for use at the next position they came to.

Cautiously Ivan got up. To his left, he heard Andy shifting his position to provide covering fire.

He began moving down the hill. Behind him, Elandra-emra moved into position.

They moved cautiously, watching and listening for the sound of underbrush being crushed or broken, but they heard nothing but the sounds of the local fauna. Ivan toyed with the idea of slinging his rifle. 7.62 Nato wouldn’t even scratch the armor of an ultra armor. Of course there were also pirates in the area, and personal arms would be effective against them.

They marched for about an hour before Zakeesa ordered a halt. They found cover close by for a five-minute break.

Ivan ate a food bar and drank from his canteen. He had always heard the best time to drink was just after eating. The food kept the water in the body longer. He knew he needed it. Sweat kept dripping into his eyes.

Zakeesa gave the one-minute warning. Ivan folded the wrapper and stuck it in a cargo pouch. He didn’t want to make it easier to track them.

They had been moving for about five minutes when his eyes burned with an afterimage of paired crimson plasma streams bracketing his head. Ivan froze.

Behind him he heard a growl of pain from Elandra-emra and a shouted, ‘Incoming.’ Smoke billowed about 10 meters in front of him. Ivan dropped.

‘Ivan. Cut right.’

Andy’s yell cut through his haze. Ivan was up and sprinting for all he was worth.

Ivan heard weapons fire behind him. Krahnk bellowed in rage. Ivan ran. Furies pursued him. He ran for his life, lashed on by the terrified voice screaming in his mind.

Andy opened up with his ‘60. Even through his fear, Ivan realized Andy’s M-60 wouldn’t touch ultra armor. He couldn’t leave his friend to face that thing alone.

Ivan took three more steps and dropped behind a tree. His heart was racing. He shut his eyes and forced himself to take deep breaths. After a few seconds, he worked up the courage to peer back.

Upslope, the ultra armor had moved through the smoke and was engaged with Krahnk. The big Python had gone berserk. He had tossed aside his pulse cannon and was wielding his sword. The massive, intricately decorated blade was definitely not of Python manufacture. A faint glow of red outlined the blade. His two-handed swing cut a chunk out of the ‘head’ of the ultra armor. He spun off to the side and raised his blade for a second attack.

The ultra armor pivoted and charged Krahnk. The big Python used it’s head to vault up onto it’s back. He whirled and raised his sword. Using his weight to add to the power of his downward stroke, Krahnk dropped to straddle the ultra armor’s thick neck. His massive blade bit deeply into the ultra armor’s head.

He never got the chance to pull the blade free. The twin pulse cannons mounted on the ultra armor’s back swiveled and fired. The blast completely burned through Krahnk’s armored torso. His upper body fell away, leaving his legs and hips straddling the ultra armor’s neck.

The ultra armor’s twin cannons began swiveling in small, slow, jerky arcs. Ivan noticed that the big muzzles seemed to be tracking erratically.

The ultra armor turned and began running toward him.

Ivan pressed his back against the tree and covered his head with his hands. He couldn’t run. It would run him down. It would kill him. He didn’t want to die. He heard the pulse cannons firing. There was an explosion. The ultra armor stopped. It was running again. It was getting closer. He closed his eyes and cowered against the tree.

The ground and tree vibrated as the ultra armor thundered past. Ivan pressed himself harder against the tree. The ultra armor continued moving past him. Ivan opened his eyes in time to see it disappear over the crest of the next ridge. Krahnk’s sword was still stuck in its head. Thick smoke trailed from between the twin cannons mounted on its back. Ivan wondered about that, but he couldn’t tell what had happened.

It took a few minutes for him to realize it hadn’t spotted him. His arms and legs were too rubbery to move. He lay against the tree to regain his strength.

Ivan heard slow, cautious steps off to the right. He nearly panicked again when he realized he didn’t know where his rifle was. He was very much exposed. His Glock was on his right leg and visible to whomever was approaching. Trying to conceal his motion as much as possible, he slowly started moving his left hand toward the fighting knife sheathed on his left leg. Ivan stopped when he recognized Andy’s voice.

‘Ivan, are you alive?’

Slowly he sat up. He peered around the tree. Andy grinned and shook his head. He had Ivan’s FN/Fal slung crossways across his back so it wouldn’t affect his use of his M-60. About 10 meters behind him Kwala was keeping watch, his grenade launcher covering one direction and his laser carbine the other.

‘Asleep on the job again? Andy asked jovially. Ivan thought it a bit forced. ‘You mobile?’

Ivan nodded. ‘Yeah.’ Then he added in shame. ‘Andy, I ran.’

For an instant, an odd expression crossed Andy’s face, but before Ivan could identify it, Andy grinned wryly. ‘I know. You’ll do better next time. Trust me. I have confidence in you.’

Ivan didn’t feel any better. Andy had been watching out for him and Ivan had run when Andy needed him. Ivan had always prided himself on his loyalty to his friends. He certainly hadn’t lived up to that ideal.

Andy unslung Ivan’s rifle.

‘I assume you want this?’

Ivan couldn’t look him in the eyes as he took it back.

‘Thanks.’

With a grin, Andy replied, ‘Don’t mention it.’

Glancing back up the slope toward where the UA had first opened fire, he asked, ‘Where are the others?’

Andy shook his head. ‘They’re gone.’ He added quickly, ‘Our four-armed friend has some interesting observations to make.’

They were dead. The rest of the platoon was – gone. He had not been among them long enough to develop a real friendship with anyone but Randy Andy. Ivan glanced dully at Kwala.

The lanky Ashanti moved closer. His long, narrow face and grayish skin always made him seem mournful. As a race, the Ashanti were nicknamed the ‘Gaunts’ for their slenderness, and Kwala was more slender than most of his species. He commented, ‘It is my humble opinion that the pilot is toying with us.’

‘Toying?’ Ivan burst out incredulously. ‘We lost five men and you say he was playing with us?’

Kwala nodded imperturbably. ‘She was enjoying the hunt. She sniped the Lt, fired in our general direction a few times without hitting any of us, and left. She sniped Elandra-emra and charged into the midst of us expecting us to scatter. Of course she didn’t expect Krahnk to charge her. It never occurred to her that any of us would fight. In her mind, she is the predator and we are her prey.’

He paused. ‘This attitude is common among ultra armor pilots, and especially Cizeracks. They often believe themselves invincible. This one certainly does. If you’ll notice, after her initial shots killed Elandra-emra, she did not fire her gauss rifle again. She also stopped shooting to hit, even though I don’t believe her accuracy was suffering. Her fire seemed to be intended to herd us in the direction she wanted us to go. Cizeracks love that feeling of power.’

‘Your sprint distracted her long enough for Krahnk to get close enough to use his Quatash. He may not have stopped her, but he did damage her. He kept her attention long enough for Volodray to launch his attack. It may not have destroyed her ultra armor, but it certainly hurt her. She left rather suddenly.’

Gradually, Ivan began to regroup mentally. He asked, ‘You keep saying ‘she.’ Why do you believe the pilot is a Cizerack?’

Kwala replied, ‘I observed that the UA was a crawler. As you undoubtedly noticed, it has a very smooth gait for an ultra armor, and while clumsier, its movement is still very similar to Sgt. Zakeesa’s. The Cizeracks pride themselves on their agility and grace and tend to design such things into their equipment. Another point is its shape. Its hull is rounded and streamlined. The head-like appendage, undoubtedly a sensor suite, is another Cizerack tendency. The cats seem to prefer their ultra armor to have an appearance close to their own. This may be partly because they are quadrupeds, though I have heard it speculated that it is due to a legend they have regarding bipeds.’

Rather impressed with Kwala’s observations, Ivan asked, ‘We were under fire. How did you notice all that?’

Kwala shrugged. It was an odd motion accentuated by the fact that both sets of shoulders lifted.

‘I was not under the same pressure you were, or I might not have noticed many of these details.’

Ivan noticed that Andy rolled his eyes at this. The Ashanti was always so excruciatingly polite. In the three months Ivan had been with the platoon, he had noticed that Andy enjoyed testing Kwala’s patience. Despite Andy’s best efforts, the Ashanti had never been anything but completely courteous. Ivan half expected Andy to direct a smart remark toward the Ashanti, but Andy remained silent. Despite Andy’s reputation as a screw-off, in the field, he was a professional.

Ivan glanced back at Kwala. ‘What are we going to do now?’

‘I see several options. There are only two passes back to our base camp. We can move fast together and try to slip though to our base camp. We can split up and attempt to do so separately. We can attempt to find a different way to signal our compatriots at the base camp. Finally, we can attempt to trick the Cizerack into a precarious situation and destroy the ultra armor.’

Ivan glanced at Andy. Andy was smiling wryly. Ivan exhaled. He hoped they could not see his hands shaking. He had a feeling that he knew what was going to come next, and he wasn’t pleased.

‘So what are we going to do?’ Ivan asked. As the most experienced member of the team, Kwala had the final decision.

Without hesitation Kwala confirmed his fears.

‘I feel it best that we each find a different way back to base camp. Even together, we don’t have the firepower to stop the ultra armor. By separating, even if she hunts one or two of us down, it is highly unlikely that she will be able to stop the third.’

Ivan nodded, though he couldn’t muster any real enthusiasm. His stomach was churning. He had the feeling that splitting up was a mistake. He didn’t want to make any more mistakes. While being by himself reduced his chances of getting anyone else hurt or killed, he would be more responsible for the completion of the mission. After his performance so far, the confidence he had felt at the onset of the mission was gone.

Andy seemed to notice his fears. He grinned and slapped his shoulder with the back of his hand.

‘You’ll do fine.’ His grin grew wider. ‘Just remember, you’re the only one in the platoon who ever beat Elendra-Emra with a blade. He’s been pissed about that ever since.’ His smile became positively wolfish. ‘I loved watching you shove your ‘inferior Mudig waste of metal’ into his chest.’

Ivan couldn’t help but smile at that. The warriors of Eridine prided themselves on their fighting prowess, especially with blades of any kind. Losing to a human had not set well with the proud warrior. In Eridani eyes, humans were inferior.

Kwala interjected, ‘Though I am not well-versed in the use of swords, I did recognize the canny strategy of playing on his pride to set up the victory conditions to allow you the victory in the event you both ‘died. That alone was worthy of the Champion Dhatahash, who single-handedly…’

Andy interrupted him. ‘I’m sure Ivan appreciates being compared to Data-hash, but this isn’t the time for such stories. Right now we need to get moving. We don’t have much time.’

With a shallow bow, Kwala replied, ‘Of course you are correct. I ask you to forgive my…

‘Not a problem, Kwala. Do you want to head south or do you want me to?’

‘I am the most heavily armed and armored. I will take the more challenging path.’

Andy turned to Ivan. ‘I’ll take the middle, and we’ll leave you to head North and over. There’s better cover that way.’ He grinned and slipped into a Scottish brogue. ‘You’ll do fine, my wee tricky bairn. Just keep your head.’

He pulled small rectangular box out of a cargo pouch and tossed it to Ivan. ‘If you run into our playful kitten, just remember to keep your string handy. Kittens love to play with string.’

Ivan nodded glumly. He didn’t want to think about that ultra armor. Glancing at the box Andy had tossed him, he recognized it as a reel of razor wire. The ultra-fine wire was hard to work with, but made a fantastic garrote. Andy had just given him enough to equip an entire company. He offered the reel back to Andy, but Andy shook his head and grinned.

‘Keep it. It may come in handy.’

He watched as Andy and Kwala moved off. Kwala started south. He walked just below the crest of the ridge to avoid being silhouetted, his grenade launcher and laser carbine covering left and right respectively. Andy started down the slope. Ivan watched him walk for a minute before he turned and trudged away.

Ivan Golobitski stepped over a log and paused. Glancing around, as far as he could see the area was clear. He was moving just below the ridgeline through a forest of young trees. There were a few centimeters of snow on the ground, so he was leaving tracks. There was little he could do about that. The bare patches were few and far between.

Despite the cold, he was sweating profusely from stress and exertion. He was alone in enemy territory and he was not happy about that. After his squad was ambushed by an ultra armor, the two other survivors had decided that they should split up and make their individual ways back to base camp. With the ultra armor dogging their tracks, splitting up had seemed to offer the best chance to complete their mission. He still thought splitting up was a bad idea.

It would have been a pleasant walk if the situation had been different. The pale sun, though not the bright yellow of Earth or the more muted yellow of Hartford, still brought back happy memories of home. The sunlight filtered through the trees, and aside from the fact that the needles were thicker than any pine he had ever seen, he could have mistaken it for a forest from behind his grandparents’ house.

The temperature was cold enough to cause his breath to steam, but that was still warm for Invodale IV. He would not have been cold anyway. Under his armor he was wearing a jumpsuit designed to reduce heat signature. His brother Sergei had suggested the jumpsuit and a ceramic-based armor as a poor man’s way of reducing the chance of detection. The jumpsuit had the additional benefit of keeping his temperature stable. The idea of a pure-born Russian cold in a mere –5 Celsius was embarrassing.

An hour passed and he heard a series of faint explosions to the south. The rapid succession suggested that it was Kwala’s grenade launcher on full auto.

Ivan stopped and listened, praying that Kwala might get away. There was a pause, another explosion, and then silence. He waited a few minutes, but heard nothing else.

He kept moving. There was nothing more he could do. The base camp was at least twenty kilometers to the West. It was going to take him a while to get there. The hills and underbrush would slow him down, but it would also provide cover. He could only hope the ultra armor wouldn’t stumble onto him.

Moving quietly from cover to cover, Ivan kept a careful watch on the crest of the hill. The last thing he wanted was to stumble across the ultra armor, but he also had to keep an eye open for the pirates that they were originally sent to destroy.

As he marched, he began to hear the songs of several of the local ‘birds.’ Hearing the animals picked up his spirits. He didn’t believe they would be singing and rooting around if something as big and scary as an ultra armor was tromping around through the area.

Ivan had to remind himself to stay on his toes. He had always enjoyed walking in the woods. He had loved the smells and noises. The occasional glimpse of some furry mammal-looking critter rooting for food brought back memories of his childhood. The rolling hills were just like the hills behind his grandparent’s home. Ivan kept waiting for his younger brother Dmitry to throw a snowball from behind one of the trees.

He had been marching for some time before he heard the cracking of a number of trees being run over in the distance. Ivan knelt swiftly and froze. He slowed his breathing as he tried to determine the direction of the noise. He heard nothing.

Sweat dripped into his eyes and he blinked it away. He still couldn’t hear anything. Vainly he looked around, searching for movement or some indication that something was out there.

After several of the proverbial hour-long minutes passed, Ivan slowly moved on. He listened carefully, but heard nothing.

Ivan paused at the top of the hill before starting down. He didn’t see anything threatening. As he started climbing the next hill, he realized this hill was much steeper than the last. For a few minutes he debated on whether or not to move farther down to where the slope was less pronounced. After a few seconds of indecision, he chose to try the incline.

At first he had little difficulty, but presently he began to have problems maintaining his footing. Rather than risking a fall, Ivan decided to walk farther down the hill before cresting it. He angled down the hill and began to cautiously work his way around an area of fallen rocks.

The incline leveled out. He had walked only a few meters when he noticed the large, splay-toed footprint of the ultra armor leading through the scree. Ivan froze as he followed the tracks with his eyes. The trail was clear in the snow. It led to a fairly dense stand of trees. There, through the path it had crushed to get into the thicket, sat the ultra armor.

It was angled away from him and squatting like a cat about to pounce. The sensor suite mounted in the ‘head’ was moving in small arcs as it scanned the area. Ivan noticed Krahnk’s sword was no longer embedded in the armor of its head. The cat had probably gotten out to remove it. Idly he wished he could have been there when it had dismounted. A few rounds of 7.62 Nato from his rifle would have ended this issue quickly.

On it’s back, the bottom of the streamlined pods containing the twin pulse cannons were charred and blackened, as though a shot had impacted between the body and the weapons pods. He suspected that the blast had damaged the rotation ring of the weapons pods. The pods were moving slower than they had been, and every so often it stuck. Even so, the twin pulse cannons appeared functional. He didn’t want to verify that.

Ivan wasn’t sure who had gotten the hit. Aside from the Lieutenant, and Elendra-Emra, no one in the squad carried anything that could pierce its armor. Kwala, one of the other survivors, had made a comment that lead him to believe it might have been Volodray.

Slowly, he moved up and hid behind the tree that was in front of him. He suspected that the ultra armor had detected him, but having a few trees in front to provide soft cover was always a good idea.

He waited for a few moments with no response from the ultra armor. Ivan blinked the sweat from his eyes. It seemed like a steady trickle was running down his forehead. He resisted the urge to attempt to sneak away, knowing any further movement would only increase the chance that it would see him.

After waiting for a while, Ivan glanced at the chronometer built into his helmet. Twenty minutes had passed. He couldn’t keep this waiting up for much longer. His back and legs were starting to burn.

Ten minutes later, the ultra armor shifted to its right. It charged out of the stand of trees, snapping them effortlessly as it fired on the march. The twin streams of plasma raked the side of the hill, but the tree Ivan was using for cover obscured the target. He didn’t want to peer around and risk being spotted by its motion sensors. As the ultra armor crested the hill, Ivan took advantage of his chance to escape and moved back in the direction he had come.

Ivan continued moving for about twenty minutes before he decided he was away from immediate danger. He couldn’t hear anything, which he found both nerve-wracking and reassuring. It was the realization that he had stumbled onto the ultra armor without seeing it that bothered him. He had completely missed it in the trees.

On the positive side, the ultra armor had not reacted to his presence which meant the pilot was either toying with him or had missed him completely. He could believe the former. Kwala had commented that the ultra armor’s design and behavior indicated a Cizerack pilot. Ivan hoped for the latter. If that were the case, then he might be able to strike a blow before it killed him.

As he marched, he realized suddenly that the idea that he was going to die didn’t bother him as much as it had. That realization startled him. What was beginning to annoy him was the idea that he might not be able to strike a blow. He was not used to thinking of himself as helpless. His grandfather had instilled in him a great deal of pride in the Golobitski martial tradition. His kindjal was a physical reminder of this tradition. It was a Cossack weapon, and since the Golobitski were not Cossack, the only way for the original Golobiskis to get one was to take it as a trophy from its Cossack owner.

On a whim, he pulled the weapon. It was a simple but effective blade. It was about half a meter long, with a wide, double-edged blade. He kept the outside edge nearly razored. The inside he used for coarse cutting, so he kept that machete sharp. Its fuller, a pair of narrow metal strips on both sides of the blade running from the grips to the sharp point strengthened and reinforced the blade. The grips were made of Maladarn Oak. Designed strictly for offense, it had no hand protection at all. It was a highly utilitarian weapon, and while it was useful for a variety of tasks, it was designed as a weapon.

Before he had shipped out for basic training, his grandfather had likened the weapon to the family. Golobitskis had fought against Napoleon. They had been among the defenders at Stalingrad. The Golobitskis were as unyielding and relentless as the Russian winter. Their history was a source of great pride for the entire family. Ivan had been trained to always look for the options. Golobitskis didn't give up. The very thought of giving up was offensive to him. Filled with a new determination, Ivan quickened his step.

The ground became rockier as he swung north, and the trees became less dense. It was reassuring to know that he would be better able to see the ultra armor if it came upon him, but it didn’t make him feel that much better. If he could see it, it could probably see him and its weapons could hit anything it could see.

As he moved, he began trying to think of ways to damage or take out that ultra armor. Eluding it was the best choice, but he also tried to think of ways to kill it. His grandfather had always said action cures panic. Planning to take action made him feel a bit better.

Kwala had implied that Volodray had done something to damage the ultra armor’s pulse cannon pods. They were still functioning, but not as efficiently. The armor was charred, so that would imply extreme heat. Since Volodray’s laser rifle would not have done that kind of damage, he might have used a grenade.

Ivan double-checked his grenades. He had a single white-phosphorus grenade. A willie-pete might generate that kind of heat.

The challenge was determining where it would do the most damage and how to get it there. The question was how much it would really do to the ultra armor. He didn’t have Kwala’s accuracy with thrown weapons, but Volodray didn’t either. If Volodray had thrown the grenade, then Ivan was impressed. The man had not shown such accuracy during squad drills.

Another issue was getting the grenade to detonate at the right time. All of his grenades relied on timers. That was fine for stationary targets, but for mobile targets like the ultra armor, they weren’t very effective. Impact-detonated grenades, like those from Kwala’s grenade launcher, would have been nice. Next time, he vowed, he was going to get and qualify with a grenade launcher.

As far as the damage went, while the grenade had damaged the rotation ring, it hadn’t done enough to knock out the rotation of the weapons pods. The chance of Ivan throwing a grenade with enough accuracy to hit something vital was slim. The other option was to find a way to attach the grenade directly to the ring. Even if the armor was not penetrated, the concussion could still warp or bend the superstructure of the…

His retina burned with the crimson afterimage of plasma as it incinerated a swath in the trees to his right. Ivan dove for the ground.

Trees crashed faintly in the distance. Ivan waited for the shots that would end his life.

Glancing through the spindly trunks of the trees, he could see nothing. Ivan blinked as sweat dripped into his eyes.

For several moments there was silence. Then, he heard the splintering of saplings as the heavy armor crashed through the trees on the ridge behind him. As it rushed toward him, Ivan fought to keep his eyes open. He couldn’t react if he shut his eyes. The sweat burned. He prayed that the ultra armor wouldn’t come close enough to step on him.

As the ultra armor closed with him, Ivan felt the ground vibrating beneath him. It took every ounce of self-discipline not to bolt. The ultra armor became huge as it got closer. The sudden fear that he would be trampled assailed him. Torn between the fear of being trampled and the fear of attracting the armor’s attention, Ivan froze. He could only watch wide-eyed as it passed by a few meters to his left. Clods of dirt and snow kicked up by the passing ultra armor landed on him.

This time he was able to observe it a bit more closely. He didn’t get a good look, but it appeared that Krahnk’s sword had cut deeply into the sensor suite. He hoped it had done major damage. Ivan would have liked to know what kind of sword Krahnk had been using. Kwala had called it a ‘Kutash’ or something like that.

The ultra armor continued on, and Ivan turned to watch it. It moved up the hill and turned at the crest. It stood there for a minute, waiting. It’s head moved side to side. Ivan could almost sense it’s ‘eyes’ searching for him.

Seconds ticked by on his helmet chronometer. Trees crashed to his right. From the sounds of their passage, what he guessed were a few of the local whildobeests had panicked and were fleeing. Their passage attracted the ultra armor’s attention also. Several plasma streams destroyed the small herd. Ivan could hear one bleating in pain and terror before a final blast finished it.

Ivan waited. He feared if he moved, that the ultra armor would deal with him as it had dealt with the whildobeests.

The seconds ticked by. Ivan cursed the shortsightedness that made him forget his sweatband. The salt from his perspiration kept burning his eyes.

The ultra armor began shooting. Ivan cowered. As the plasma streams licked out all around him and then moved to his left, he realized it wasn’t firing at him. It was trying to flush him as it had flushed the whildobeests. If it had been tracking him, he would be as dead as the charred whildobeests to his right.

Ivan inhaled sharply with the excitement of his realization. The ultra armor’s pilot couldn’t see him. Whether it was due to his armor and infiltrator jumpsuit, or perhaps the damage done to its sensor suite, or perhaps even some issue he was not aware of, the pilot couldn’t see him. He suddenly realized he was smiling.

His epee coach had always said if you looked past your fear and focused on your opponent’s action, you could always find their weakness. During his platoon’s hand-to-hand training, their close-support specialist, Elandra-emra, had not taken him seriously and had made the same attack twice. For any of Richard’s epee students, the second time was fatal. Timing attacks were Richard’s specialty. It has been relatively simple for Ivan to time his thrust for the instant that Elandra-emra’s blade was out of line and thus not a threat.

Though Ivan couldn’t think of how a stop-thrust might translate into this situation, knowing the ultra armor’s pilot could pass so close and still not see him raised his confidence considerably. He might be able to evade her after all.

She sat on the hill for about a half an hour before moving off. Ivan watched as she rushed off to the west. He suspected that she was trying to cut him off before he could make it to the pass leading to the Disciples’ base camp. That would certainly fit if she had a momentary contact with him, but not enough to fire accurately. The fact that he was still alive suggested that. Now that she had a general idea of his location, it was going to be difficult but not impossible to get past her.

Ivan set off again. This time, the fear that had impelled him forward had been replaced by a wary confidence. Sun Tzu’s old maxim of ‘Know your enemy and know yourself and you will always triumph’ gave him hope. He had an idea of his enemy’s weakness, and a good idea of his own strength. It wasn’t a foregone conclusion, but he had hope. As long as he didn’t get cocky as Elandra-emra had…

He climbed the hill cautiously. Her trail was fairly obvious. He could see the swath of trees knocked down in its path down the slope and up the next.

The slope became steeper halfway down. Ivan had to move laterally to find a less steep path. This took him out of sight of the ultra armor’s trail. For a minute, he debated the wisdom of trying to find it again. Not knowing where the ultra armor was disturbed him, but he also realized that the probability was that the pilot was watching her rear. The last thing he wanted to do was to stumble into an ambush. The team was counting on him to make it back to base camp to warn the unit. He didn’t believe the base itself was in any danger – it was well fortified. The Disciples of Horatius followed the same rock-hard discipline that the legionnaire they were named for had probably followed. Still, to leave an unfriendly ultra armor on the prowl was never a good idea.

After an hour, he came to a ridge that abutted a tall rock outcrop. Ivan glanced up, praying that she didn’t have some sort of a jump or flight system. The plateau would make an ideal spotter position or possibly even a firebase. It would be open to air attack, but with air superiority, it would be highly effective if obvious. It would be something to keep in mind for future operations in this area.

When Ivan got to the top of the next hill, he looked down at a cliff. The ridge he was on rose sharply before sloping gently downward and dropping off to what he guestimated was a 25-meter cliff. The outcrop rose on the far side of the clearing. Sparse shrubs and short grasses grew in the roughly triangular down slope. On the far side of the clearing he could see a narrow trail leading along the edge of the rock face. That was where he needed to go to get back to the base camp.

He started to move around a thicket of shrubs and froze. Ivan could feel the hair on the back of his neck bristling. Something wasn’t right about that clearing.

Ivan smiled grimly. He could hear his grandfather telling him to listen to his instincts, and his brother Sergei laughing that he was too inexperienced to have instincts.

At a glance, the edge of woods appeared to be untouched. None of the trees or shrubs were crushed. There were no indications that she had passed through. He could hear the sound of critters scurrying around. Nothing seemed amiss. But still, he sensed that something wasn’t right.

Carefully he scanned the clearing. For an instant, he thought he saw movement, but it was fleeting. Looking more closely at the area, he noticed what he had first thought was a discoloration in the rock actually appeared to be a number of meters away from the rocks. He glanced to the left of the area. In his peripheral vision, he could just barely make out the ultra armor waited patiently in the middle of the clearing. Ivan froze.

After a minute or two, he realized she hadn’t reacted to his presence. He had approached from her left side without anything more than the normal stealth, and she did not seem to know that he was there. Ivan slowly released the breath he had been holding.

He had almost missed her. She had not used her camouflage unit before. Only the armor damage on her weapons pods gave her away.

Ivan was thankful for the spotty bushes and shrubs between them. He suspected that the crest of the ridge and the bushes had masked his approach to her position. Despite the earlier evidence that she couldn’t detect him, everything he could use helped.

It was somewhat unsettling to be so close to her. Knowing she could blast him into oblivion with almost no effort was intimidating, but it also gave him a perverse sort of thrill. There was something exhilarating to know that he was so close and yet she couldn’t see him. Ivan reminded himself not to get cocky. He had a mission to complete

Knowing what he was looking for made it easier to see her. Her camouflage unit distorted the rocks behind her just slightly. She was squatted down on her haunches like a cat about to pounce. Her head was slowly pivoting from left to right and back as she scanned the area. Ivan noticed a long gray whip antenna that he had not seen before. It extended a number of feet above the camouflaged ultra armor. He suspected that it was a heads-up system designed to allow her to scan an area without being seen. He could just make out the paired pulse cannons on her back mount swiveling in sync with her head.

Ivan studied the damaged area on her weapons pod closely. He guessed the target had been the rotation ring. He didn’t think a grenade would have damaged the weapons pods enough to knock them out.

The fact that the damage had broken the coverage of the camouflage system suggested that the camou system used more of a chameleon effect based on the surface of the armor itself. Sergei had told him about some of the new experimental envelopment-field camouflage generators. Ivan was thankful her ultra armor didn’t have such a system. He would not have noticed it otherwise.

He debated on whether to try to move back over the crest or whether to stay put, but the idea of moving while under her watchful eyes didn’t appeal to him. He decided to stay put.

As he observed the clearing, one thing that bothered him was her lack of a trail. He had been counting on spotting her path by the crushed trees and foliage. The fact that she was on the cliff without any visible trail concerned him. He didn’t believe it was possible for her ultra armor to make it over the crest without leaving a trace. It unsettled him to think that her ultra armor might have limited flight or jump capabilities. Evading a flight-capable ultra armor would be that much more difficult. It was still possible he reminded himself. Ivan decided to sit and wait and try to think of ways to get around it.

Ivan was still waiting for her to move over an hour later. Aside from its sensors and the weapons pod, the UA had not twitched. Ivan was beginning to get antsy. He had been lying there nearly motionless and the stress was wearing on him. Any mistake could alert her to his presence. He felt confident that he was well hidden, but he preferred not to push his luck.

One benefit of his inactivity was the confirmation that she did have either a jump or limited flight capability. He had noticed her trail in the snow leading to the base of the cliff just below where she now waited for him.

The time had also led to a new series of options, including one wild scheme that he thought might allow him to damage or even capture the UA.

Sergei had once explained the idea of tamping an explosive charge to maximize its blast. If he could find a way to place his white phosphorus grenade between the two weapons pods, it would do much more damage than even Volodray’s grenade had. A frag grenade or two would only help things. That would certainly help cut down its firepower. He wasn’t so naïve as to believe it would stop the UA, but it was a positive step toward doing something.

The option that offered the greatest chance of success for eliminating her was to get her outside of the UA. Even a python would have a difficult time surviving a close range burst of 7.62, and despite their claims to the contrary, Cizeracks were usually not as hardy as either of the Python races. The big question was how to get her out.

Ivan had already rejected the idea of toppling the UA off the cliff as unlikely. He didn’t have any explosives or any way to move it. A rockslide would work, but once again he would need explosives he didn’t have. Also, that would require him to climb the face of the cliff. He didn’t like the idea of exposing himself to her fire.

The UA rose smoothly and moved swiftly forward. The instant the weapons pods cleared the top of the ridge, they canted down and opened fire down the slope. Twin streams of crimson plasma painted long afterimages in Ivan’s retina as it blasted something down the other side of the hill. Trees crashed and shrubs fell in a swath as the stream of plasma cut through them. The UA paused momentarily, and fired again.

It backed away from the crest, crouched like a cat, and sprang. Shrubs and saplings bowed and sprang back as the pressure wave from the jump unit pushed the UA into the air. Ivan felt the pressure wave pressing him backward and down and he lowered his head to ride it out. When he looked up, there was no indication that the UA had ever been there. He suspected that the large footpads had left a footprint, but he would have to break cover to check that out.

Crawling to the top of the hill, he peered down, trying to see where the UA had gone.

The UA could not be seen through the trees. A sudden chill shot like a bead of sweat down Ivan’s spine. For the nth time that day, he cursed the fact that he had forgotten his sweatband. Either she was toying with him again, or she really believed she had shot him and bounded off. The question was what would she do when she discovered that her target wasn’t him. That meant she would either come back, or she would watch the area of this pass. The other possibility was that she might think he had taken another way and be gone altogether. If that were the case, then he would probably have plenty of time to get back to the base camp. Of course if she were watching, with the effectiveness of her camouflage unit, he would never see her before she fired. He would have to make a decision and soon.

He had just decided to try the pass when he heard something overhead. Glancing up, he quickly dropped to the ground. She had returned.

Ivan was thankful for his hesitation. He would have either been caught in the middle of the small clearing or just on the side of the small path if he had been more decisive. The downside of this was he still had to figure out how to get past her to the base camp.

After a few minutes of debating, he decided to back down and try a different way back to the base.

Carefully he began to back down the hill. When the ground leveled out and he had gotten a few hundred meters of foliage between himself and her UA, he stood and began walking.

Ivan walked southeast for a bit to try to get more distance between himself and her UA before angling southwest. He wanted at least one hill between himself and her.

He had been walking for about forty-five minutes when he noticed what appeared to be three bodies lying on the ground. Immediately he took cover behind a tree. After observing for a few minutes, he couldn’t find any threats and decided the aggressors were probably gone. The trees and bushes around the corpses were smashed. It looked like there had been a firefight. After debating for a few minutes, he decided to investigate. He hoped to get some information from the carnage.

Cautiously he moved up. As he closed to the nearest body, he recognized the field-muted Disciples of Horatius emblem on the armor. It was Volodray. He had circled back around to where he had panicked and left Randy Andy to face her ultra armor without him.

Ivan forced himself to view the scene. It was difficult for him to view the bodies of his dead squad mates. His stomach was threatening to bring up the meal bar he had eaten earlier. Even if he had not panicked, it was doubtful that he could have changed the outcome. What ate at him was the knowledge that instead of doing anything to support them, he bolted.

The camouflage unit on Volodray’s black armor was off of course. His legs and lower torso were crushed in the middle of the ultra armor’s footprint. It was a well-aimed attack.

One thing Ivan noticed after a minute was that the trigger finger of Volodray’s right hand was missing. Whatever had been used to cut through his armored glove had cauterized the wound. There was no blood. The area around his legs and abdomen was stained a dark red. It caught Ivan’s attention because the bloody area around Volodray’s legs looked darker than human blood. That would be something to investigate if he…when, he corrected himself. He would investigate that when he got back to base camp.

Struck by a grim insight, Ivan began looking at the tracks around Volodray’s body. He recognized Kwala’s boot prints, and what he believed were Randy Andy’s, but he also recognized a set of feline prints. They led to and from a second set of ultra armor tracks that came from the East. The tracks looked similar, so there were either a pair of the ultra armor in the vicinity, or the original came back for her trophy. It wasn’t a pleasant thought either way, but it was good to know what he was up against.

His old fencing instructor had always said anything you can observe about your opponent off the fencing strip could aid you. You just had to recognize the thought process the action suggested.

The idea that the Cizerack ultra armor pilot was a trophy hunter was confirmed when he followed the ultra armor tracks to the upper half of Krahnk’s body. The trigger finger of Krahnk’s right hand was gone also. It was an unsettling tidbit of information, but it was something that might prove useful under the right circumstances.

Ivan moved on. He walked quickly past the tree where he had hidden. When he came to the point where Randy Andy, Kwala, and he had parted ways, he debated on which way to go. He could follow Kwala’s route, knowing that he had run into something unfriendly. He could follow Randy Andy’s trail not knowing anything of his friend’s fate. He could follow his own again in the hope the ultra armor was not in the clearing any longer.

After a few minutes, he decided to follow Randy Andy’s trail. He found it reassuring that he had not heard Randy Andy’s M-60. Ivan hoped that might mean the route Randy Andy had followed was relatively clear. Randy Andy might even be waiting for him when he got back to camp. The tall Orion was resourceful. Ivan was sure he had made it. The thought that the success of the mission might rest solely on him alone scared Ivan. He was no longer the cocky tyro he had been starting out. He had seen the elephant, to use one of his grandfather’s phrases, but he had run. Now he could no longer run.

Ivan moved cautiously along the trail. He didn’t want to walk into an ambush.

Ivan Golobitski heard snarling voices speaking a language he didn’t understand. Ducking down further behind the tree stump he had been resting against, he low-crawled behind the fallen tree trunk. It would provide better cover than the stump.

With his infiltrator thermal jumpsuit and ceramic armor, Ivan knew he was hard to detect with inorganic means. This still left the Mark I eyeball.

He ducked down and peered through the gap between the stump and the fallen trunk beside him. A pair of rough-looking Cizeracks were talking as they walked in his direction. The big felines were both equipped in gray and white armor that looked battered but substantial. The larger of the two had a Body Mount Harness that swiveled in sync with her helmet as she moved her head. Ivan didn’t know what a system like that cost, but he was certain it was expensive. It appeared that they were equipped with laser systems that would seriously out-range his FN/Fal. That reinforced his decision to use stealth over confrontation. He always preferred to fight on his own terms.

They both had their visors up and were speaking in the curious assortment of growls, snarls, grunts, and hisses that comprised the Cizerack language. He noticed a large scar running through the muzzle of the smaller cat.

Ivan inhaled sharply as a shouted, ‘Hey there,’ came from behind him. From the slight Scottish Burr, he guessed it was an Orion. He ducked down and pressed himself against the fallen tree trunk. Ivan was certain he had been seen, but the Orion walking toward the Cizeracks never glanced in his direction. Ivan carefully readied his rifle, but kept his finger off the trigger. He didn’t want to shoot if he could avoid it. Three to one odds were terrible, especially when the enemy had better armor and weapons.

The Orion’s gray and white Kodiak armor was heavily scarred. He carried a long-barreled rifle with the kind of ease only years of use will bring. From lack of a bore on the weapon, Ivan suspected it was a laser of some sort.

The Cizeracks growled. The larger of the two snarled.

‘Quiet fool. The human may be weak, but he’s not stupid enough to miss your racket.’

The Orion laughed merrily, ‘Zxathena, you’re just angry because he managed to elude your precious ultra armor prototype. If Stashees was half the jockey she claimed to be, she would have found him hours ago.’

The smaller Cizerack hissed, ‘Watch your tongue, McTravers. You may find yourself to be our next quarry.’

‘That could be a lot of fun,’ McTravers replied cheerfully, ‘I’ve never hunted two Flea-lines at once before. If either of you were half the tracker you claimed to be, you’d be more aware of your surroundings. You didn’t react until I yelled. With that kind of alertness, that single solitary human could be sighting in on you and you’d never know it. He could be there in that ravine, over there in that tree, behind that fallen tree trunk over there,’ Ivan inhaled sharply, his pulse pounding as he waited for a laser hit, ‘or behind that bush.’ He paused for an instant before adding with mocking concern, ‘I’d be vewy cawefull so de big, bad human doesn’t twim your tails.’

The larger of the two growled deep within her throat.

‘Don’t provoke me Rogue. I tracked and killed the Orion. Another Orion’s blood will taste the sweeter.’

McTravers laughed again, ‘I would probably give you indigestion. Besides that, I’ve always believed that part of the joy of eating is in the smell. I showered recently, so I probably wouldn’t be decayed enough for you to enjoy the feast…Of course since I probably don’t smell like any of the indigenous wildlife, tracking me would be easy. Lucky for me I’m downwind.’

Ivan cursed himself for a fool. He didn’t think to check the wind. Cizeracks could track by smell. He hoped they couldn’t smell him. Then he realized the Orion stood between him and the Cizeracks. He was downwind also.

The smaller Cizerack snarled. ‘You tread dangerously Rogue. You know I am scent blind. I should sheathe my claws in your corpse for that.’

McTravers replied mockingly, ‘Oh, that’s right. I hear that’s going around. Didn’t that big monkee bury a sword in the sensor suite of your precious ultra armor? From what I hear, now Stashees’ sensors are only good for visual scanning and metal detection, and metal isn’t very effective.’

The larger Cizerack snarled, ‘Leave if you value your worthless hide, Rogue. I should disembowel you right here.’

McTravers’ reply was cold. ‘And you would be dead in the middle of your pounce, Zxathena.’ He laughed. ‘You both need to lighten up. Life is too short to be so serious. You should learn to be happy.’

The Cizeracks growled. The larger Cizerack retorted, ‘Your life will be short if you keep baiting us, Rogue. You walk through here by our sufferance only. Tread carefully.’

Ivan heard nothing for a few minutes, and then he heard McTravers laugh. When he spoke, any hint of the burr was gone.

‘Now there go two kitties with their tails wound too tight. It’s too bad they’re looking in the wrong direction.’

Ivan heard nothing for a few minutes. Then McTravers commented. ‘I guess I should get moving. That little scoundrel is either Lady Luck’s own son, or he’s better than I suspect. Either way, I have the funny feeling Lady Luck’s going to smile on him.’

Something thumped on the ground a few feet in front of where he lay backed against the tree trunk. Ivan inhaled sharply as he recognized the cylindrical shape of a plas grenade. He couldn’t move. Sweat trickled down into his eyes as he waited for the blast.

A second plas grenade landed next to the first.

Through his panic, Ivan heard McTravers laugh. ‘Ooops. I forgot to arm them. I guess my quarry got lucky again. Oh well, hopefully his luck won’t run out. He’s done rather well so far. He’s got Stashees losing her fur in frustration over her inability to find him. If I see him, I’ll have to thank him for the entertainment he’s provided.’ He paused for an instant before adding more coldly, ‘Of course the next time I see him, it’ll be through my sights. Lady Luck is a fickle mistress.’

Ivan gingerly sat up a bit. The timer on the grenades was not active. The spoon was still secure. The Orion had just given him two plas grenades. Even after working with Andy for months, he didn’t understand Orions.

He cautiously glanced over the tree trunk, but McTravers was not in sight. Ivan secured the two grenades and scanned the area carefully again before moving out. He didn’t want to run into the Orion if he could help it. He was just hoping he would not decide to ambush him and take his grenades back.

Randy Andy was…he didn’t have time to think about it now. Kwala had been something of a friend, but he hadn’t known him well. Randy Andy was very different from his brother Sergei, but they had both watched out for him. Knowing that he would probably never see him again brought tears to his eyes, but he could only blink them away. He didn’t have time to think about that. He had a mission to finish.

The snow was a major concern. Because he had made contact with the enemy and knew they knew he was there, Ivan backtracked along the way he had come. It wasn’t a good solution, but he didn’t have anything that would allow him to take out McTravers quietly. He didn’t think the Orion would tell the Cizeracks that he had been there. Somehow he suspected McTravers would rather enjoy hunting him, especially since the plas grenades he had tossed Ivan were more than capable of blowing him out of his armor. The knowledge that his quarry had a lethal weapon would just made the hunt more interesting for a thrill-seeking Orion.

Ivan moved quickly back to a rocky area he had crossed and began to use the rocks to mask his steps. Occasionally he would purposefully step in the snow. He quickly moved through, knowing there was no way to mask where his feet had broken through the thin crust of the snow. When he reached the edge of the rocky area, he backtracked, carefully placing his feet in the tracks he had just left. Any decent tracker would be able to tell what he had done, but he hoped to give himself a few extra minutes of confusion.

When he got back to the rockier area, he began to jump from rock to rock. Ivan was certain he looked like a proper fool, but he hoped to throw off the Orion or anyone else following him for a few minutes. There were several large trees around, and if he had a grappling gun, he realized he could have fired a line at a tree and swung a bit to break up his trail. He didn’t know how well it would actually work in practice, but it was something to consider for his next mission.

He was near the biggest boulder on the field when in the distance; he heard the crack of saplings being splintering by something large passing through. His pulse pounding, he dropped behind the boulder. Trying to conceal himself as much as possible behind the skimmer-sized rock, he waited for a gauss round or laser hit to indicate that he had been seen.

The noise stopped and Ivan tried to hold his breath. As he waited, he realized that the animal noises that had found to be so comforting earlier were gone. Whatever it was, and he believed he knew, had scared the local fauna. A rivulet of sweat trickled its way down into his eyes and he blinked it away with irritation. Minutes passed. Ivan tried to breath slowly and deeply, preparing for any dashes or swift movement he might have to make.

The crashing of the trees began again and got closer. Cautiously, gingerly, Ivan moved to where he could peer around the base of the rock.

An ultra armor squatted about thirty meters away. It was similar to the one that had killed the rest of his squad. Its sensor head swiveled as it sought targets. The weapons pods were more streamlined than the pods on the other ultra armor. Ivan guessed they were laser mounts.

He had been playing cat-and-mouse with the other ultra armor for most of the afternoon. One of his squad-mates had damaged its sensors before it had killed him. Ivan suspected that had saved his life. He had been within ten meters of that ultra armor three times in the past four hours and the pilot had not seen him.

The ultra armor squatted there for a moment before moving swiftly toward the west. Ivan watched it go. The second ultra armor made the situation more difficult. He needed to get back to base camp with this information.

After a few minutes, he decided it was probably safe to move. With the second ultra armor moving in the direction he was going, he decided it would be better to head back the way he had come. Better to face the ultra armor with no sensors than the ultra armor unscathed.

Three times Ivan had to take cover as he glimpsed movement in the distance. The first time it was one of the native Whildobeests, but the second and third time he recognized the sleek feline shape of a Cizerack. He kept checking the wind direction. The last thing he wanted was to have some Cizerack track him by scent because he was careless.

It was getting dark as Ivan approached the clearing by the cliff where he had seen the damaged ultra armor. He approached cautiously. He didn’t want to be caught by surprise. While he was sure that Stashees, the Cizerack pilot, didn’t know he was there, he didn’t want to die because of some foolish assumption.

He took care to approach so he would be able to keep underbrush between himself and her ultra armor. Peering carefully through the branches of a thick bush, he could see the charred weapons pods. She was still there.

With the confirmation of Andy’s death and the sighting of the other ultra armor, the trail on the other side of the clearing was the best way he knew of to get through to the base camp. Getting there was going to be interesting with an ultra armor guarding the way, but at least with Stashees, he had an idea of her weaknesses.

The brush by his head exploded in flames. Ivan stared at it in shock for an instant. She hadn’t seen him. He knew that. Her weapon pods had been pointing away from him.

Backing swiftly away from bush, he realized he was in trouble. He had not anticipated her having support. He could hear her shift her position. Rolling to the side, he moved away from where he anticipated the paired pulse cannons to fire.

That killing shot never came. As he scrambled on hand and knees to get away, his right arm grew hot for an instant. The heat shifted from his arm to his side. He kept moving as he felt heat on his side. The acrid tire smell of burnt absorption polymer grew strong.

As he got behind a tree, the heat stopped. His side was sensitive and a bit sore, and he could feel his armor chafing his slightly singed skin. He had no time for that now. She was behind and an unseen enemy was down the slope. The only chance he could see was to try to find a spot to hide.

Desperate to escape from the trap he was in, Ivan pulled one of his smoke grenades and armed it. Tossing it over his shoulder, he began crawling.

Smoke billowed past him in a thick cloud. He blessed Balshrom for developing a smoke grenade with chaff. It wasn’t perfect of course, but it could defeat most sensors, both visual and inorganic.

It didn’t matter that she couldn’t see him. Stashees began to fire blindly into the billowing smoke.

Crawling blindly Ivan almost fell over the edge of the cliff. For an instant, he almost panicked. Then, carefully, but as swiftly as he dared, he started to lower himself over the edge. A desperate idea struck him.

The smoke grenade would mask his movement. Tossing something over the cliff might give them the idea that he was going down.

Searching quickly by feel in the murk of the smoke, he located a small wrist-sized sapling. A few quick strokes with the inside edge of his Kindjal felled the tree and cut off the bushy leaves at the top. Ivan tossed his second smoke grenade over the cliff and waited for a ten thousand count. Rolling the trunk over the cliff and hoping it would sound like him falling, he began to work his way back toward the thicker vegetation. He kept some of the more densely leafed branches from the tree to camouflage himself.

They knew he was there. All they had to do was wait for the smoke to disperse and hunt him down then. His only chance was to distract Stashees long enough to get to the trail. If he could that, he could make it back to the base camp.

As he crawled, he found a small gully carved by run-off. It wasn’t enough to fully hide in, but with the leafy branches he had cut, it gave him some small additional cover.

Once he felt reasonably certain he could remain unseen, he rolled over on his back and waited for Stashees to investigate.

Impatiently, he watched the war machine move forward a few steps and stop. Silently pleading with her to investigate his ‘fall,’ his frustration mounted as she stood impassively. He blinked away the sweat that was running into his eyes.

Glancing over his shoulder, he suddenly realized that Stashees wasn’t going to be fooled so easily. An armored figure was moving up the slope toward his position. He had misjudged her response. She wasn’t going to investigate. Whoever it was had decided to allow the less heavily armored infantry trooper investigate.

He examined the pirate trooper closely. If it was McTravers, he could only hope his rifle would penetrate his armor. For extra insurance, he also pulled one of the plas grenades. That would rip up Kodiak, but if it came to that, he knew he would not live long.

His attacker cautiously moved up the hill. As he got closer, Ivan breathed a sigh of relief and secured the plas grenade. It was a human. He was in low-line armor – Ivan thought it might be Welch, but he wasn’t sure. His helmet had a full-face visor, but it was open at the neck. His M-16 was slung and he had drawn a Scorpion Machine Pistol. Carefully, he began to search the area.

Behind him, Ivan felt the shockwave of the ultra armor’s grav unit push against him. The bushes flexed and sprang back. For a brief instant, he caught a clear glimpse of the pirate in the twilight. Gray repair patches on the arms and chest gave the battered snow-camoed armor a leprous look. The pirate was turning to look toward the bush as the shockwave pushed the bushes over and for an instant Ivan thought he had been spotted. He raised his rifle slightly, but did not sight on the dim silhouette. There was no response from the pirate.

As the pirate moved carefully toward him, the UA soared overhead. It disappeared over the cliff.

Ivan quietly pulled his kindjal. If it came to it, a stiff thrust of the knife to the neck should be a quiet way to dispatch him. Ivan’s biggest concern was making sure that the pirate didn’t fire a burst from his machine pistol. Stashees knew someone was there, but it made no sense to further alert her to his location.

The pirate started pushing aside the branches of one of the outer bushes with his left hand while keeping his machine pistol leveled close to his body. As he got closer, Ivan began rehearsing the thrust in his mind. Tightening his grip on his kindjal, he prayed the man would not push his way toward the center of the clump of shrubs. As long as he stayed on the outer edges, Ivan knew that the shadows, bushes, and brush he had cut would hide him. If Stashees had been alone, his plan might have worked. He had underestimated her completely. Ivan could only hope that mistake wouldn’t cost him his life.

The ultra armor bounded back up and settled in the clearing. Its camouflage unit was off. The pirate glanced up to watch it settle in the clearing. After a second, the pirate nodded and turned to walk back toward the base of the hill.

As the pirate moved on, Ivan breathed a bit easier, but he didn’t relax. Cautiously he began moving along the gully toward the cliff-side of the bush. He wasn’t thrilled by the idea, but he thought it might be prudent to climb down the cliff. Stashees had already scouted it, so hopefully she wouldn’t think about checking again. That seemed to be the best option for escaping.

For a minute, Ivan wasn’t sure what she was going to do next. Then the weapons pods swiveled and canted down to aim at the forest line near the clump of bushes he was in. After pausing for a second as if to savor the moment, it opened fire. The bushes he had been hiding in evaporated with the touch of plasma. The pulse cannons traced a line of destruction down the side of the hill.

Ivan crawled faster. He was breathing hard from the combination of fear and exertion. The slight rise of the slope combined with the gully he was in hid him from direct observation, but he wanted out of the area. He came to the edge of the cliff and slid over heedless of whether he had footing. Better the chance of a fall than the certain death of being charred by plasma fire.

The side of the cliff was relatively broken and provided numerous foot- and handholds. Above his head, he could hear the sound the twin pulse cannons destroying the vegetation on the side of the hill.

Sweat dripped in his eyes. For an instant, it annoyed him, but then he couldn’t help but smile. He was hanging over the edge of what he judged to be a twenty-five meter drop to escape heavy weapons fire from an experimental ultra armor and he was upset about sweat in his eyes. He was definitely getting punchy. If he got away with this, he’d definitely have a story to tell his grandfather and Sergei.

Ivan had to feel his way down the cliff. Climbing down that kind of cliff face was not something he wanted to do in daylight, and even less in the twilight under fire. It took him close to two hours to work his way down the cliff. The twilight, lack of climbing gear, and the stress of the past few hours made his going more difficult than he had expected. At the foot of the cliff he found a bit of an overhang and rested for a few minutes. He couldn’t go on without catching his breath.

Overhead, the firing had stopped some time before. Ivan was hoping that Stashees would be moving off shortly.

The Cizerack clearly knew he was still alive or she would not have opened fire on the hillside the way she did. He could only hope she would not send infantry down to investigate the side of the cliff. She had already investigated it, and hopefully her commanders would assume it was too steep to climb at night.

One possibility was to walk to the edge of the cliff and scale it up to the path. That would get him behind her ultra armor. The problem was he knew he couldn’t do it while it was dark. Such a climb might be possible during the day, but he was not willing to wait until then. There was too much chance of being caught if he waited. Of course, if he were to try climbing in daylight, the UA could see him and pick him off at its leisure.

After he caught his breath, Ivan began to pick his way cautiously along the face of the cliff. He stayed close to the cliff face in the hope that he could blend in with the shadows. It took him about fifteen minutes to get to where the cliff dropped to the level of the plateau he was on.

The vegetation was less dense here. The trees were taller and there was a light powder of snow on the ground. The light filtering through the trees was limited, giving the forest an eeriness that Ivan found disquieting. He remembered his grandfather’s tales of fighting the Arachnids on Robespierre IV. That was a winter world also, and much of the fighting was in forests. Ivan was thankful there weren’t Arachnids involved to make things really difficult.

He had been walking for about twenty minutes when he noticed a trail of footprints in the light snow. Whoever it was walked alone. Either they were as self-confident as McTravers had been, or they were just plain inexperienced and dumb. For a minute, Ivan considered walking in the direction the pirate had come, but quickly thought better of it. He hoped to avoid anyone who might be following.

The thunk of metal against wood alerted him that someone else was near. Dropping to his knee, Ivan pressed himself against a large tree and waited.

To his right he heard the soft crunch of boots breaking through the thin crust of the snow. Ivan watched as an armored figure moved past. As he got closer, Ivan saw that it was the pirate who had been trying to find him in the bushes earlier.

The pirate was moving cautiously from tree to tree. Something about the furtiveness of his movements made Ivan think he was trying to evade a pursuer. Moving slowly and cautiously, he walked past the tree next to Ivan.

Ivan backed around the trunk to keep the tree between himself and the pirate. He had intended to be silent, but he bumped the butt of his rifle against the trunk. The hard plastic didn’t make much noise, but both he and the pirate froze.

Cursing his clumsiness, Ivan lunged from behind the tree. He hoped the pirate expected him from the front of the tree. He was dead otherwise.

The pirate’s eyes widened and he froze for an instant as Ivan charged. Ivan was able to cover most of the five meters that separated them before the pirate reacted. The pirate swung around his M-16 for a shot. Instinctively Ivan beat down the muzzle with the barrel of his rifle. The pirate fired a burst with the impact and another as Ivan butt-stroked him in the temple. It was a hasty blow and it landed on the man’s helmet, but it staggered the pirate back.

Using his momentum, Ivan clotheslined the man with his FN/Fal. The pirate went down on his side. Ivan nearly tripped over the pirate’s legs, but fifteen years of fencing and assorted martial arts training gave him the agility to avoid a fall.

Ivan kicked the M-16 away from the pirate and leveled his rifle at the man.

‘Move and you die.’

The pirate, who started to go for his holstered machine pistol, froze.

‘Don’t shoot, man,’ he wailed. ‘Please. I didn’t want to do it. They made me.’

‘Quiet,’ Ivan hissed. The idiot was making too much noise. His butt stroke to the side of the head had been more reaction than planned, but he had hoped to remain as silent as possible. He could only pray no one else heard the pirate’s gunfire.

‘I’m valuable to you. Don’t kill me,’ the pirate pleaded. ‘I can help you get away.’

‘How.’ Ivan tried to be as harsh as he could. He didn’t want the pirate to hear his voice shaking.

‘Uhhh, I can tell them I shot you and they will stop looking for you.’

Ivan knew the man was terrified and not being entirely coherent. Still, there might be something to this. He had to do something.

‘Why should I trust you?’

‘I didn’t want to do it. They told me I was going to be going against military targets, not civilians. I promise.’ The last was a wail.

‘Quiet,’ Ivan hissed, motioning threateningly with his rifle. ‘Not another word.’

The pirate fell silent.

Ivan sized him up. He had the pirate in height, but judging from his armor, the pirate was relatively burly. Ivan did not want to have to tangle with him unarmed.

‘Stand up slowly.’

The pirate complied.

Ivan nodded toward the Scorpion machine pistol that was holstered on his hip.

‘Drop your holster. If I think you are even starting to make a move toward your pistol, I’m going to shoot you.’

The pirate carefully complied.

‘Okay, now remove your load-bearing gear. Move slowly.’

The pirate carefully took off his web gear and laid it on the ground.

After a second of hesitation, Ivan stated, ‘Get out of your armor.’

The pirate’s eyes widened slightly. ‘All I have on is a lightweight jumpsuit. I’ll freeze out here.’

Ivan motioned impatiently with his rifle. With a fearful glance at the weapon, the pirate began to undo his arm vambraces.

As he uncoupled the seals on his chest plate, Ivan watched carefully. If the pirate were not lying, he would have to find a way to keep him from freezing. His grandfather had impressed upon him the responsibility of treating prisoners properly.

Any concerns were stilled as the pirate pulled off his breastplate. He was wearing a thick thermal jumpsuit.

Ivan snorted. ‘Lightweight jumpsuit? What else are you lying to me about.’ Ivan mentally ran through the procedure he had been trained to follow when searching a prisoner. He cursed himself under his breath. He never even thought about the pirate’s commo headset. ‘Lose the helmet. Now…’

The pirate’s eyes widened at the ferocity in Ivan’s voice. His hands shook as he pulled off his helmet and laid it in the snow at his feet. ‘Don’t shoot. Please don’t shoot.’

The man was long-faced, with sparse blond hair cut short. He had not shaved in a while. He didn’t look particularly evil, but he had just admitted to attacking civilians. The two attacks Ivan knew anything about had been extremely bloody. Any sympathy Ivan may have had for the man had died.

‘Back away.’

Holding his hands away from his body, the pirate retreated.

Keeping his eye and rifle on the man, Ivan moved forward and picked up the helmet. The communication headset was off.

Relieved, Ivan dropped the mask. It landed visor up by the gorget of the pirate’s armor.

Ivan asked, ‘You’re out of contact with your base?

The man nodded. ‘I am deserting. I was hired by Cizerion Corp to act as a base guard and assault trooper. Instead they shipped me off here and had me assist in the attacks on the civilians. I had just about enough when I was ordered to help search for the survivor of an enem…’ His eyes widened slightly as he tried to assess Ivan’s mood. ‘…of a squad that was searching for our base.’ He shook his head slightly. ‘I didn’t shoot any of your friends.’

Ivan felt the unvoiced plea in the pirate’s voice was sincere. He nodded. ‘I believe you. Why were you operating alone? Where is the rest of your squad?’

‘They sent me out alone and unsupported.’

The bitterness in the man’s answer startled Ivan and he blurted, ‘Alone? That’s idiotic.’

‘Tell me about it. Then when I was ordered to support one of the experimental ultra armor prototypes against infantry back that way,’ he nodded over his shoulder, ‘the Skank didn’t even wait for me to clear before firing on a suspected position.’

He looked guardedly at Ivan, ‘Was that you she was shooting at?’

Ivan shook his head. ‘I don’t think I’ve been the target of an ultra armor yet.’

The pirate looked dubious. ‘There’s another one of you out there? They believe there is only the one left.’

Ivan filed that tidbit.

‘What else do they believe?’

‘Can I put my hands down?’ The pirate sounded hopeful.

Careful to keep his rifle aimed at the pirate, Ivan knelt and unholstered the Scorpion with his left hand. Checking to be sure the safety was off and it was ready, he slung his rifle.

‘Go ahead and stand against that tree.’

The pirate’s eyes widened.

‘You’re not going to shoot me are you?’

Ivan shook his head. ‘Do as I say.’

Ivan pulled out his mega tape and tossed it to him.

‘Tape yourself to the tree. If you tape your jumpsuit, it won’t tear skin when you pull it off.’

The pirate looked dubious. ‘You’ve got go be kidding me.’ His eyes widened. ‘You’re not going to leave me here are you?’

Ivan shook his head. ‘I’ll partially cut the tape before I go. You should be able to tear it’

‘And if I can’t?’

‘Then you’ll starve to death.’

Ivan tried to sound cold-blooded. He wasn’t sure that he succeeded.

Reluctantly, the pirate began to comply.

Capturing the pirate was not quite what Ivan had intended, but the man was right. He couldn’t leave him to die. Taping him to a tree was the best solution Ivan could come up with on short notice. .

The pirate seemed to be confused on how to attach his other hand to the tree.

‘Uhh, do you want me to …’

Ivan shook his head. ‘Don’t worry about it. I just want to be sure you don’t attack me the instant I turn my back. ‘ He added, ‘Do you know whether that ultra armor is still guarding the way to the pass?’

The pirate nodded. ‘It was when I left.’

Ivan nodded. He needed something to get Stashees away from the trail.

Something the pirate had mentioned stood out in his mind.

‘You said something about radioing that you had shot me.’

The pirate nodded. ‘If they believe you have been captured or shot, then she should go back to base.’

After a second of hesitation, Ivan disconnected the headset from the man’s helmet.

‘Let’s try this. You’re going to call Stashees and tell her you’ve captured me and that you’re heading back to base. I leave you here, but I’m going to cut the tape partway. That should allow you to free yourself shortly. This will give me a chance to get clear, and should give you the chance to get away also.’

Ivan got the impression that the pirate wasn’t happy.

The pirate shook his head. ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea. Stashees will probably follow my trail and when she doesn’t find me and my prisoner, she will send out the alarm.

Ivan stopped. What the pirate said made sense. The last thing he wanted was to have two ultra armors searching for him again. It wouldn’t be hard to figure out where this pirate had been, and given the earlier contact, this Stashees would probably figure out the direction he was going in.

He glanced at the pirate. The man was waiting impassively. Ivan had the feeling he was up to something, but he wasn’t sure what.

After debating with himself for a few minutes, he decided to take the pirate’s suggestion. There was a better chance, he felt, of making it back to base camp by stealth than subterfuge.

‘All right. We’re not going to call her.’

‘Could you let me go? I don’t want to be here if she should happen to come this way.’

Ivan shook his head. ‘No. You’ll just have to take your chances.’ He added with a touch of anger, ‘you’ll have a better chance than the civilians you people slaughtered.’

The pirate looked decidedly unhappy.

Ivan took the magazine from the M16 and tossed it away. Then he took the magazines from the man’s ammo pouch and threw them in different directions. Finally, he had the pirate put his back to the tree. Ivan pulled his kindjal and carefully cut the most of the width of the mega tape holding the man’s arm.

‘It shouldn’t take long for you to get free.’

Ivan started back toward the cliff. He was praying that the pass would be open by the time he got there.

He had only gotten a few paces deeper into the forest when he felt rather than heard a low, almost inaudible ‘thump’ from near where he had left the pirate. As he turned, he saw the crimson afterimage of plasma burn into his retina. The tree he had taped the pirate to fell as the plasma stream bisected it at waist height. The plasma fire shifted to where the man’s armor lay sprawled.

Fighting a panicked instinct to run, Ivan slowly crouched. The ultra armor’s motion sensors should still be down, but he didn’t want to chance it. Stashees hadn’t fired at him, so hopefully she didn’t know he was there.

The ultra armor shifted its position so the back was facing the pirate’s body and armor. It crouched so the hull was a few inches off the ground. Nothing happened for a minute. Finally, a hatch irised open in the back of the ultra armor. Cautiously, Stashees stuck her head out. She raised the visor on her helmet and sniffed around. Ivan was thankful the air was calm.

Stashees eased out of the ultra armor. She held a vicious looking pistol in her right forepaw. Ivan suspected from the shape and size it might be a static pistol. He had heard descriptions of them of course, but he never seen one before. He definitely didn’t want to be on the receiving end of it. The bore looked enormous.

Watching the area cautiously, Stashees moved toward the body of the pirate. Removing an unfamiliar tool from her belt, the Cizerack took the right hand of the pirate and cut off the first finger. She put the finger in a flask and put the flask back on her belt. Turning, she started toward the pirate’s armor.

Ivan pulled one of the plas grenades. In a minute or two, she was going to realize the armor was empty and…

Stashees crouched suddenly.

Arming the grenade, Ivan set the timer for three seconds, stood, and threw for a point between the Cizerack and the ultra armor He dropped down again and prepared to open fire.

Catching the motion from the corner of her eye, Stashees spun. She was in mid-bound toward the ultra armor when the grenade went off, practically underneath her. The blast caught the big cat and tossed her bodily against the hull of her ultra armor.

Ivan stood and fired a short burst from his rifle. He didn’t want to use his second plas grenade. He might need it later.

His first burst caught Stashees low on the right flank as she was starting to rise. The impacts knocked her back to the ground. Ivan adjusted his aim and fired at the chest. The second burst caused her to twitch, but she had stopped moving.

Advancing slowly with his rifle aimed and ready, Ivan moved to within five meters of the Cizerack. He selected single shot and aimed at Stashees’ neck. The round pierced the armor and a few seconds later, a trickle of crimson oozed steadily out of the neck of the armor.

Satisfied that she would not attack him, he slung his rifle and pulled the Scorpion. Carefully, watching for any movement from the Cizerack, he moved toward the ultra armor. Ivan was certain there would be a radio that would allow him to reach the Disciples’ base camp.

He glanced at the body and picked up her pistol. The barrel was bent slightly. Mildly disappointed, he tossed it aside.

Ivan crawled into the cockpit. Keeping an eye out the hatch, he looked around the cockpit.

The cockpit, or theatre as his brother Sergei called it, was long and low. He had to crawl on hands and knees. The floor of the narrow cockpit was a fitted pad that appeared to be designed to support a Cizerack in a prone position. A headrest designed to keep the Cizerack’s head upright was at the front of the pad.

Faint red light illuminated the control panels. A wide screen wrapped around the front and sides of the cockpit. A pair of gauntlets shaped for feline paws were placed on either side of the headrest. The instrument clusters were minimal and were marked with words that Ivan could only guess were examples of Cizerack script.

On the sides of the pad were a myriad of wires plugged into precise locations on strips of plastic. From their placement on the sides of the couch, Ivan guessed they were the body plugs used to control the ultra armor. He suspected they were placed in the plastic to avoid making the pilot plug individual plugs into the appropriate body sockets. These particular plugs were going to be worthless now.

Glancing around, he saw what appeared to be a high-power communications rig. It had some differences, but it looked similar to the AventiCorp model his brother had taught him to use when he was a kid.

From what he knew of ultra armor, he suspected the pilot would be plugged into the commo set, but it still should have manual controls as a backup.

It took him a minute or two in the dim light, but he finally figured out the manual controls. Turning on the commo set, he began to search for the Disciples’ frequency. He finally found it on one of the preset frequencies, but the transmissions were static. Ivan bit back a curse. He had forgotten about the scrambling.

He was about to clamber out of the ultra armor when he heard the faint hiss of the hatch as it irised shut. . He dove for the hatch. As he hit the hatch release button, he felt the ultra armor rise from it’s crouch. It began moving. Ivan could only assume it was heading back to base. The hatch never opened.

With a curse, he crawled back to the theatre and sat down. Fighting back the tears of frustration and fear, he forced himself to breath deeply. It was ironic. He had not only eluded, but also ‘captured’ a powerful fighting machine. Now, it had captured him. Wiping his eyes, he began to check his grenades, rifle, and pistol. He was a Golobitski. They would find killing him costly.

This is the second story.

The door to the lift opened. Ewan McDougal stepped in. The only occupant, a rather pinched looking human in a very conservative gray business suit looked dubiously at him and moved to the far right side. Ewan didn’t particularly blame him. He had been in the field for a few weeks, and he looked somewhat unsavory with his shaggy red hair, McDougal plaid kilt, stained denim jacket, and high work boots. Ewan graced him with a wide, toothy smile and wrote him off as a corporate drone. He set his duffle bag on the floor and said to the hologram of the attractive blond woman that was the building AI, ‘Hello Tessa my love. Thirty-first floor if you please.’

The AI smiled as she replied, ‘With pleasure, Ewan. Welcome home.’

The scruffy Orion grinned widely. ‘Thank you, pretty lady. It is good to be back.’

The corpie drone looked mildly displeased.

‘Do you always talk to the machines?’ he asked. His voice was deeper than Ewan would have expected. He looked the type that would have a whiny, high-pitched voice-the kind that raised the hackles on every Furble within earshot.

Ewan ran his fingers through his unruly red hair. He usually kept it cut short. It was easier to handle that way.

‘Yeah, I do.’ Nodding toward the screen. ‘Tessa is a true lady. She just happens to be electronic rather than flesh and blood.’ He grinned as he shook his head ruefully. ‘What a terrible waste.’

The drone shut his mouth with a snap and looked straight ahead.

Tessa smiled prettily. ‘I thank you Ewan. That is the nicest thing anyone has said to me today.”

Quizzically, Ewan asked, ‘Today? Who said the nicest thing you heard yesterday?’

The blond AI glanced away coyly. ‘Jake wrote a poem for me.’

‘Jake? Jake Simmons? That big lug? What kind of poem did he write?’

From the corner of his eye, Ewan noticed the corpie drone screw up his face in displeasure.

‘Must you do that?’ The drone complained. ‘She’s a machine. She has no feelings. She has no emotions. She is NOT flesh and blood.

Ewan turned and gazed at the man for a few seconds. There was no overt threat in his face or posture, but the drone glanced away nervously. Ewan replied softly, ‘I was not talking to you. If I want to be polite to a lady, I will thank you to keep your comments to yourself.’

With a smile for the AI, Ewan continued, ‘Tessa my love, please pay no attention to this boor. His every word shows his ill-breeding.’

Tessa shook her head and smiled. ‘I thank you for your gallantry Ewan, but he does not offend me. I have grown used to it.’

Ewan shot the corpie a baleful look. ‘You shouldn’t have to deal with narrow-minded louts.’

The door opened and the corpie drone stepped off. As the doors shut, he made an obscene gesture at Ewan, but Ewan just laughed.

Ewan continued his usual banter with Tessa. She was always fun to flirt with, especially since neither of them could act on it. Sometimes it seemed like an AI like Tessa was the only romantic interest he could pursue. Working for the government didn’t leave him much time to pursue a relationship.

The lift dinged for the thirty-first floor. After bidding Tessa a good afternoon, Ewan shouldered his duffle and stepped into the hallway.

Though he was of average height and build, the ease with which he lifted his bulky duffle bag suggested that he was stronger than he looked. He usually was clean-shaven, but weeks in the field had left him with a respectable beard. Shaving that beard was something he was looking forward to. It had been a while since he had been able to shave in his own apartment.

The hall of his apartment building was kept nearly spotless. The building was aging, but old Max, the janitor, prided himself on keeping a clean establishment. The old guy wasn’t the brightest, but he certainly applied himself to his work. The shine of the synthetic wood floors was a good indicator of his work ethic.

Ewan knocked when he got to the door of his apartment. His roommate might be home and he didn’t want to startle the little fella. Furbles were small, but they had some powerful lungs. Kondileno, or Kondi for short, had stronger lungs than most. Ewan had discovered this one day when he decided to pull a prank on him and sneak into the apartment from one of the outside windows. His ears still rang every time he thought about it. Kondi was a good little chap though. He had apologized profusely once he had calmed down a bit. He had been pretty upset for a while.

Ewan couldn’t help but grin at the memory. Watching a brown-gray Furble hopping mad was actually pretty funny after the fact. Their fur stands on end and they begin dancing around yelling incoherently at the top of their lungs. He really did like the little bugger and never intentionally irritated him. Kondi was a considerate roommate.

The door opened as Ewan put his thumb on the sensor lock. Kondi looked up and his furry face lit up as he recognized Ewan.

‘You’re back. You’re back.’

With a mischievous grin, Kondi bounded up to give Ewan a hug. This time Ewan was expecting his small friend’s enthusiasm. The first time he returned after a mission, Kondi had knocked him off his feet. It wasn’t so bad. Liselle, the lady next door, had heard the laughter and investigated. The sight of a red haired Scotsman lying on the floor rubbing the back of his head with a three-foot brown-gray Furble sitting on his chest was new to her. The incident had cemented his reputation as a true Scotsman as well as leading to a delightful friendship with her.

Ewan had missed Liselle since she had moved. She was a great companion. They had gotten together a few times since, but the distance and their varied schedules made spending time together more difficult. Unfortunately, because of the unexpected extension of his last mission, he was concerned for their budding romance.

He released Ewan and dropped back to the ground.

‘Liselle called. She was getting concerned. You told her you would call her when you got back, and she was getting worried that you had forgotten her. ‘

Ewan shook his head ruefully. ‘No, I definitely haven’t forgotten her. She is a striking woman. No man worthy of the name is likely to easily forget her. When was the last time she called?’

Kondi pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes as he concentrated. Furbles tend to live solely in the present, so it was always difficult for them to remember when something happened if it was more than a day or two old.

Finally he blurted, ‘I think it was about a week ago.’ His wide grin revealed his large blunt teeth. ‘I think she really misses you.’

Ewan ran his fingers through his hair to get it out of his eyes. ‘Yeah,’ he replied ruefully, ‘I miss her too. What did you tell her?’

The Furble’s eyes twinkled mischievously. ‘I told her you were romancing another lady.’

Narrowing one eye dubiously, Ewan waited for him to continue. For as long as they had roomed together, Kondi had worried about his lack of a social life. The gregarious furble couldn’t understand how Ewan could stand not having numerous ladies in his life. That was the price Ewan paid for serving the Alliance, but he had to admit that sometimes his lack of female companionship depressed him. Despite the rather roving reputation Orions had, Ewan was strictly monogamous. He suspected that his tendency toward faithfulness was one of the reasons he had been recruited.

Kondi was desperately trying to look innocent, but his efforts to maintain his composure weren’t entirely successful. He realized it and turned to skip into his den. With a backward glance-Kondi couldn’t quite hide his smile-he took off running with Ewan in hot pursuit.

Laughing, Ewan rapidly overtook him and picked him up. The small Furble doubled over laughing as Ewan turned him to face him and shook him gently.

‘Alright now you little scamp, what did you really tell her?’

The Furble’s laughter was infectious. Ewan finally had to put the wriggling Furble down so he wouldn’t drop him. He kept forgetting how ticklish Kondi was.

When they had finally both regained their composure, Ewan asked, ‘So really, what did you tell her?’

As he looked slyly off into space, Ewan could practically see the gears turning in Kondi’s head.

‘C’mon Kondi, I’m being serious. What did you tell her?’

The small Furble looked disappointed. ‘Awww, alright.’ His smile widened. ‘I told her you were off romancing Lady Luck, and when she asked what I meant, I told her you were off fighting the pirates on Invodale IV.’

Ewan felt ice run down his spine. It was no secret that he had gone to Invodale IV, but with his cover as a writer for a hunting site on the hyper net, he had told his small friend he was going to write on hunting whildobeests. Kondi’s joke was either innocent but close to the truth, or he knew. Hopefully it was the former. If it were the latter, Ewan would have to disappear again. That was what had happened when he had met Victoria. It had also happened when he had met Christine. Knowing you were making the Alliance safe for your unborn children didn’t help with present loneliness.

He kept his voice carefully neutral. ‘You told her what I was really doing, didn’t you.’

Kondi looked dismayed. ‘She didn’t believe me. I tried to tell her that you were searching for Arachnid strongholds next, but she didn’t believe that either.’

He looked mournfully up at Ewan as he shook his head. ‘She doesn’t seem to believe me very much.’

Ewan laughed with relief. ‘I’m sure she does, but the idea of me as a mercenary is pretty ludicrous.’

‘I’d believe it,’ Kondi replied mischievously. ‘You’d be a great mercenary. I’ve seen the pictures of you on the big game hunts you’ve been on. You look like you could take out Madd Mike Katrell with all you equipment.’

With a chuckle, Ewan told his small friend, ‘There’s a bit of a difference between hunting big game and hunting people. For one thing, people usually can shoot back.’ Ewan ran his fingers through his hair. With the roughhousing, it was getting in his eyes again. He really needed to get it cut.

Ewan turned to go into his room. ‘I’m going to give Liselle a call. Thanks for taking the messages.’ At the door he grinned and added, ‘It’s good to see you again Kondi.’

His small friend beamed and went back into his den.

He walked in his room and shut the door. It was time to report in.

Taking care to be sure that the shades were drawn, he sat down on the battered couch in front of the holo-theatre. Using the remote, Ewan turned on the Orionus Networks History channel, the first step in the bug-killer sequence. Though his holo-theatre appeared to be an older model, it actually contained some very sophisticated bug killer and white noise generation equipment. Among its other features, it was designed to monitor his voice and generate frequencies exactly the opposite of his speech patterns to nullify any surveillance equipment that might be used to record him. He always thought that was a cool feature. It also contained powerful holographic generators to frustrate visual and other sensor scans.

Typing a code into his wrist computer, Ewan selected a hidden menu and downloaded his report. He hit the power button to send and end the sequence, but the holo-theatre did not shut down. An instant later, a hologram of a humanoid figure masked by computer-generated distortion appeared in the holo field. Another distorted figure, this one with the unmistakable build of one of the Python races appeared beside it.

Ewan covered his surprise well, but the humanoid commented, ‘We apologize for startling you. We realize this is outside standard procedure, but this is of high importance. What can you tell us about the Cizerack pirates? We received a report from the Disciples of Horatius that their threat to the local population was neutralized.’

With a nod, Ewan replied. ‘Yes, their presence has been pretty well eliminated. They were testing out a new toy and one of the Disciples showed them its weaknesses.’ Ewan smirked. ‘And he was a tyro to boot.’

The computer modulation didn’t fully disguise the Python’s basso profundo or the sibilant hiss of his voice.

‘A new recruit did that?’

‘Yep. I did some research on him. That was his first combat mission. His name is Ivan Golobitski,’ and he joined one of the Disciples recon teams about three months ago.’

Ewan didn’t miss the glance the two exchanged. There was a lot more going on here than Ewan recognized, but he couldn’t figure out their interest in a green trooper.

‘Exactly what kind of information are you looking for?’

The Python rumbled, ‘You had contact with him?’

‘Not directly.’ Ewan shook his head. ‘I trailed him for several hours. He’s inexperienced and it shows, but he’s not afraid to take chances. He did some REALLY boneheaded things, but if he survives, I suspect he’ll be a first rate soldier.’ With a chuckle, he added, ‘He’s crazy-and lucky-enough to be Orion.’

‘What kind of boneheaded things did he do?’ the Python asked. ‘Please elaborate.’

Ewan finger-combed his hair back out of his eyes. ‘Well, for one thing, he dropped a log off a cliff to try to sneak past an ultra armor that was guarding the trail back to the Disciples’ base camp. Of course from what I know of Stashees, the ultra armor pilot, it might have worked if she had not been supported by infantry.’ Ewan made a face. ‘That cat is not a prime example of feline hunting prowess.’

The Python nodded silently in an invitation to continue.

‘I actually ran into him before that. He had taken cover behind a fallen tree trunk and was hiding from a pair of Cizeracks. I knew he was there, but I was kind of curious to see how he would react if I walked up to them and started baiting them. I told them he could be anywhere, and even mentioned his tree trunk as a possible place where he might be hiding, but he never broke cover or gave any indication that he was there. The Cizeracks had already killed the rebel spy I was sent to take out, but they knew he had escaped and they were seeking him. I’m certain he knew I had seen him, but he didn’t twitch.’ Ewan grinned. ‘I tossed him a pair of plas grenades to even his chances a bit, and he never broke cover. I don’t know whether he froze, or whether he recognized the grenades weren’t armed. Still, I would love to have seen his expression when they came sailing over to land at his feet.’

There was a pause before the Python asked, ‘You gave him some grenades?’

Ewan nodded. ‘Yeah. Plas grenades. I figured the rebel spy was dead. At the time, I figured Ivan was probably just some poor grunt caught in events he didn’t understand.’ He shook his head in grudging admiration. ‘I don’t like the things the pirates were doing, but I certainly didn’t expect him to survive. My best hope was that he could do some damage before they took him out.’

‘You observed his escape?’

‘Most of it. I was probably 80 meters away, but the night vision gear allowed me a pretty good idea of what was going on. I didn’t have any audio gear, so I couldn’t hear what he was saying.

‘He actually captured one of the pirates. He had the pirate get out of his armor, taped the pirate to a tree, and interrogated him.’

‘The pirate told him something, and then Ivan looked really concerned. He threw the pirate’s rifle magazines away and took off. About a minute and a half later, the ultra armor jumped in and blasted the pirate and his armor.’

‘I can’t say I’m disappointed to see their operation shut down. Those cats were animals.’ Ewan curled his lip in distaste. ‘What they did to that fishing village…’

‘The UA pilot, Stashees, dismounted and began taking trophies. Ivan tossed one of my plas grenades at her and shot her several times.’

With a bemused shake of his head, he commented, ‘I don’t know what he was thinking, but after that, he boarded the ultra armor. A few minutes later it closed up and took off for the cat base.’ He grinned. ‘I don’t think he was expecting that. According to his file, he isn’t trained to pilot ultra armor, so aside from the fact it wasn’t set up for a human to use, I know he wasn’t the one driving.’

‘You followed?’ The humanoid’s question was as much a statement as a question.

‘Of course,’ Ewan nodded. ‘It was interesting. Besides that, I was curious to see how he would react to the turn of events.’

‘I grabbed my skimmer and headed out after him. He had a good head start. I had to avoid being detected, but I had hacked the cat security system about three weeks before, so I had things in place to allow me a window through their perimeter. It took a bit, but no one noticed me.’

‘I reached a vantage point that allowed me to observe the entire compound. As stated in my report, it was built in small box canyon about 30 klicks to the east of where I had made contact with him. There were a number of prefab buildings as well as some camouflaged, automated gun turrets mounted on the top of the walls of the canyon.

‘When I got there, Ivan’s ultra armor was parked behind the other prototype. I think he had just gotten there, because about a minute before I got to my observation position, I heard weapons fire and several explosions. There were a number of Cizeracks and mercenaries running to various firing positions. Then I noticed that the other ultra armor and several of the buildings had been gutted by what I believe to be plasma fire.

Ewan grinned, ‘I don’t know how he did it, but it looks like the kid managed to hotwire the weapons and blast away.’

‘Anyway, from what I could see, it appeared that Ivan was trapped in the ultra armor. There were four Cizeracks lining up along the side of the armor to rush him. Part of the reason I believe the situation had developed a minute before I got there is none of them had any armor on and I think two of them were combat medics. I’m guessing they thought they could end the situation with swift action. One of the non-medical types lobbed in a flash-bang and they charged in. Then there was silence.’

‘I don’t know what he did in there, but he couldn’t have had much room to hide.

‘A few other cats moved up to investigate. They sniffed around a bit and became highly agitated.’

Ewan shook his head in bewilderment. ‘I don’t know what he did in there, but one of the cats went completely berserk and attacked another one. The next thing I knew there were about five Cizeracks involved in a battle royal. Then a plas grenade rolled out of the ultra armor right in the middle of them and there were five dead cats.’

‘The cats brought up a few of their mercenary guards, but they weren’t in any hurry to die. I saw them fire a few shots into the open hatch, but the cats didn’t like that. They probably saw credits burning as their investment was damaged. After the loss of half their base and the other ultra armor, it was shaping up into an expensive day.

‘They tried to get the mercenaries to charge it, but the mercs weren’t willing. I don’t know what they saw, but they were determined not to charge.’

‘Next, it appeared that a bit of an argument developed. The mercenaries didn’t want to charge the UA and the cats wanted them to. Something I couldn’t see happened behind the barricade where the negotiations were going on, and one of the cats attacked the merc leader. The rest of the mercenaries opened fire and a nice little fire fight erupted between the mercenaries and the cats.’

‘I’m not sure when it happened, but at some point Ivan sneaked out of the UA. The mercenaries shot up several of the spotlights and I suspect Ivan was able to sneak out by using the shadows.’

‘I lost track of him, but about three hours later, the Disciples moved into the area with APCs and combat skimmers. They pretty much took everything apart.’

He ran his fingers back through his hair. It was getting in his face again. ‘They’re a prime team. They did a good job.’

The humanoid asked, ‘So do you feel Ivan has the potential to be recruited?’

Ewan thought for a minute. He was beginning to see where this was going, though he had never seen such an interest over a potential recruit. ‘I’m hesitant to say ‘yes,’ but I think in time he might be. He’s a bit green. I’d say keep an eye on him for a few years and see how he does.’

The humanoid replied, ‘Thank you for your observations. They are appreciated. You have a month. Enjoy your vacation.’

Ewan grinned. ‘I will. Thank you.’

He was finally going to have some time to spend with Liselle.