62
Government Center , Nevcason, Vega
Dieron Military District, Draconis Combine
12 July 3039
Hauptmann-General Kathleen Heany scowled as the group of laughing officers entered the room. It was not that their light humor was offensive. The Good Lord knew that the current success of the invasion was likely to foster such cheerfulness among the young soldiers.
No, it wasn't the young officers who bothered her, but the way Field Marshal Nondi Steiner treated them. These youngsters and their counterparts throughout the Lyran Commonwealth Armed Forces were the fair-hairs, the golden children who received preferential treatment from the promotion boards as well as the quartermaster corps. What made it worse was the way General Steiner and the rest of the High Command listened to their ideas—ideas tainted by Davionist thinking.
Ymir's sword! Even having all Nagelring grads like Patrick Finnan in the High Command would be easier to bear.
Nondi and her clique ignored the sound and time-proven advice of officers like herself. Instead, Heany and many of her contemporaries were relegated to staff positions and given hollow honors. A poor thank-you for talented and loyal people who had served with distinction in Davion's war against the Capellans, soldiers who had borne the brunt of Operation Gotterdammerung and then been betrayed by the politicians who had thrown away hard-won gains.
Ah well,she told herself with a sigh. The Lord works in mysterious ways.
Heany swept her gaze across the room. The bright light of the planet's sun, though reduced by the tinted vitryl panel that dominated the outer wall, provided more than enough illumination for the large square chamber. She paid little attention to the posh furnishings and fine-painted screens that decorated the chamber; her interest was in the officers who had gathered. They stood talking in clumps or sat on the room's original upholstered armchairs or newly gathered straight-backed and folding seats.
Across the room, her old rival Patrick Finnan sat alone, looking as sour as she felt. He, too, had taken his lumps from that sneaky Kurita kid. The media wags made much of the mistakes he had made against the fledgling heir to the Dragon. She understood that treatment, for she'd suffered the same herself. It almost made her sympathetic to the hard-nosed Nagelring graduate.
Her thoughts were derailed as the great double doors of the room opened, and Nondi Steiner entered. The Field Marshal waved the assembled officers back to their seats as they rose to salute her. She walked to the fine imported mahogany table where Heany and the rest of the senior staff waited, and placed her compdeck down before addressing the assembly.
"Good morning, gentlemen, ladies. I'm pleased to see that you are all looking rested and fit. You'll need to be." Her face was stern for a second before a grin began to spread over it. "This morning's fax transmission contained the go-ahead for the second wave."
The room burst into enthusiastic cheers and martial shouts. Heany felt a rush of excitement that momentarily let her forget that she would have little part in the offensive.
A single sharp sound reached her ears through the tumult. A gunshot? Incredulously, she turned to look out the window. Many others had heard the noise as well. Heads craned, searching for an explanation.
An infantry helmet of Steiner style tumbled past the window on its way to the ground. A moment later, three lumpy objects splatted softly against the window, sticking where they struck. Heany spied the thin wires trailing toward the roof and was on her feet in an instant. Others were moving as well, but many officers had only just recognized the disturbance among their fellows when the globs of explosive detonated, shattering the vitryl panel. Shards rained in a crystal storm across the room, shredding uniforms and flesh with callous indifference. By the grace of God, she was untouched, but a wide-eyed Kommandant fell at Heany's feet. His mouth worked soundlessly, a vitryl splinter protruding from the back of his torn throat.
Another explosion blew the room's double doors from their hinges. The concussion tumbled furniture and people in a direct line from the blast. The room filled with smoke and screams.
Motion in the corner of her eye caused Heany to pivot back to the window. A half-dozen black-suited figures swung through the jagged-edged opening in the outer wall to land cat-footed in the chaos. The cords they had descended on snaked out the window to hang limply as the intruders' subguns coughed out death to those nearest them. Through a rift in the hazy air, Heany saw a dozen more DEST troopers pound through the demolished doorway. Their guns added to the cacophony.
Suddenly, Heany found herself face-to-featureless mask with one of the invaders. In that frozen moment, she imagined the cold eyes behind the red-tinted mirror faceplate. She felt them take her measure before the muzzle of his gun rose slightly. A cough and stir at Heany's side broke the tableau. Nondi Steiner struggled to rise from behind the overturned table. The DEST trooper pivoted to turn his gun on the Field Marshal. Without thinking, Heany threw herself to the side, knocking Steiner down as the intruder fired. Hot pain flared in Heany's leg as she collapsed atop her superior.
"I'm too old for this," Heany moaned.
Laser pulses clawed through the dissipating smoke, cutting down three of the DEST troopers. Around the room, intruders were breaking free from melees with Steiner officers. Two stood their ground, laying down suppressive fire against the Lyran troops who had finally arrived. Regrouping by the window, the Kuritans locked the dangling lines into devices at their belts and hurled themselves out the window. A high-pitched whine filled the room as they ascended to the roof. Lyran guards cut down the two remaining intruders and hurried across the room to fire up at the vanishing shadows.
As suddenly as it had begun, the attack was over.
More troopers poured into the room. To Heany, their gray field uniforms and battle vests looked strangely clean, inappropriate to the carnage of the briefing room. As soon as their officer had assured himself that none of the DEST troopers were playing possum, he ordered his men and women to assist the wounded.
Heany rolled off Field Marshal Steiner. The Marshal was ashen pale under the blood that splashed her face. Her own breathing coming quickly, Heany fumbled at Steiner's throat, feeling for a pulse. She huffed with relief when she found one. That comfort evaporated as she noticed the bright blood pumping from the Marshal's thigh. Heany shed her tunic, wadding it into a pad to hold against the wound. Blood soaked through to slime her hands, but the bleeding slowed.
"Medtech!"
When her first call only mingled with the other shouts for help, she added, "Field Marshal Steiner's been hit."
The medics hustled in, relieving her. They assured Heany that, with intensive care, the Field Marshal would live. But her wounds were serious. She would not be commanding any armies for awhile.
Heany stood and caught herself against the wall before she fell. Looking down at the leg that had betrayed her, she found her trousers were awash in blood. She said nothing. There were more seriously injured officers to be attended to. She leaned against the upturned table and surveyed the room, feeling her stomach rebel at the sight and smell of a conference room become abattoir.
So many! She counted heads, looking for faces she knew. Finnan was nursing a slashed arm, insisting that the medtech trying to bandage him ignore his rank and deal with the more seriously wounded. Brian Kincaid and Willy Thompson were among those who had merely taken gashes from flying debris. Uliosha Donovon lay in a pool of blood, face half torn away by bullets and her torso ripped into a mass of undifferentiated meat and fluids. Too many bodies did not move. Too many of the dead were young officers. She regretted her earlier antipathy. They were too young to die like this.