Lt. "Elvis" Kalija gets a little closer to her comrades and two "combat" missions lead her to question what her role is when the squadron's claws are trimmed and their teeth muzzled. Growing closer to her human comrades, she also meets another one of her own kind...

The last part of the dogs-of-war moreauverse trilogy hits its second chapter. A growing sense of unease and frustration with the limitations of their mission underpins Kalija's growing closeness to her human comrades — far apart from what she'd first expected. Thanks to :iconSpudz: for suppressing threats to the story by selfless engagement of countless hostile grammatical and plot issues. 

Released under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license. Share, modify, and redistribute -- as long as it's attributed and noncommercial, anything goes.

The Mighty Wind Arises, by Rob Baird — Ch. 2, "Sweet Thames"

---

Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song,
Sweet Thames, run softly, for I speak not loud or long.
But at my back in a cold blast I hear
The rattle of the bones, and chuckle spread from ear to ear.

A rat crept softly through the vegetation  
Dragging its slimy belly on the bank  
While I was fishing in the dull canal  
On a winter evening round behind the gashouse.
Musing upon the king my brother's wreck  
And on the king my father's death before him.  
White bodies naked on the low damp ground  
And bones cast in a little low dry garret,  
Rattled by the rat's foot only, year to year.

– TS Eliot, “The Wasteland"

There were many things that Kalija had never really done. She had never visited the memorial to Washington, DC in the grey zone. She had never seen a cowboy. She had never gone to what the others referred to as a “strip club."

And she had never witnessed a battle fleet execute a combat jump before.

The Bellau Wood went to general quarters, which meant nothing for the pilots, really: they could not very well launch when the ship was jumping. The far wall of the ready room was a hologram that could present a view of the outside with perfect fidelity, and so they watched this. A few bright flashes signaled the jumps of their escort ships.

Then, with a strange thud in her inner ear and a flicker of nausea, the stars outside abruptly shifted. LCS Bellau Wood jumped after the escort cruisers but before the supply ships and the marine transports — just in case. The pilots waited.

In the worst case scenario they would be ordered to scramble, and they were all suited and ready for whatever was to come. Commander Fuller watched the display, too, glancing periodically at his wrist. After a minute or so, the flexible computer lit up, and he snorted. “Well, there's another one done. Alright, guys, back to work."

Kalija blinked, and walked up to the hologram. If she craned her head she could just barely see the bright point of light that marked the planet, hundreds of thousands of kilometers away. It was too dangerous to jump next to a planet — they had picked a trajectory that swung in around Pike's moon, using its gravity to aid them. Now there would be a few days' travel: back to the long, boring grind. “That was it?"

“Expecting fireworks, Elvis?" the commander asked.

Roulez, the big Cajun bombardier who flew with “Zippo" Jovanovic, spoke up before she could answer. “Don' reckon. We ain't gotta sofa to hide under, nonc." And when she glared at him, the man grinned. “Req one then, yeah?" 'Requisition one, then, yeah' although he said it reck won dan, yayuh? and it took her a moment to parse.

“Ask her," Bucky Fuller snickered. “Elvis, you take it from me, yeah? You know how they say any landing you can walk away from is a good one?"

“Yeah?"

“Any jump you can sit through is a good one." He turned to leave. “Guys should stay alert, though. We'll be sortieing soon enough."

“I don't," Kalija told Roulez, “hide under sofas." 

“Probably could. More comfy than those bunks." Again it took her a moment. Mo' cawnfee dan dose bonks. 

While she was formulating a reply, Zippo patted her bombardier's shoulder. “He means, at least you'd fit." 

Jasmina Jovanovic was about as tall as Kalija, which meant that she was just barely within regulations — 165 centimeters or so. She came up to her bombardier's shoulder, but when they were standing next to one another Zippo looked to be about the size of his leg. “Is that what he meant?" Kalija asked. “You can understand him?"

“Fuck no," she laughed. “I just smile and nod. But he could put a bomb through a gnat's asshole from low orbit, so what do I care?"

The lieutenant's response was to rattle off a sentence poured through such a thick accent Kalija could not be certain he was even speaking a human language — let alone English. And then a big-mouthed grin. “Tu komprawn, Zippo?"

Zippo smiled, and nodded.

“Stomach says it's breakfast," Roulez said, dropping back to something more comprehensible. “You in? Hobo? Puppy-dog?"

“Gotta get back to work, like Bucky said," Kalija admitted, and looked around for Micro — who had wisely made himself scarce. Noodle's bombardier had pawned his responsibilities off on Kalija, and the dog was cross. “I'll be in the supply office, I guess."

“Bring you somethin'?"

She shook her head. “Thanks, though."

Hundreds of hours of training had given Kalija the right to call herself an aviator, and the right to fly the A-17E waiting for her in the hangar bay. But none of the pilots were only pilots. On a good week, she knew, they would fly three sorties; two was more common. Two hours of briefing; an hour of preparation and walkthrough. Three hours of flying, if they were lucky. An hour of debrief.

It left a lot of time unfilled. 

A discussion with Commander Fuller had revealed her aptitude for numbers; perhaps he'd even guessed it, because most moreaus had one. And actually, the more she thought about it, the more she decided she'd walked right into a trap — which was very unprofessional, for an attack pilot.

“How's your mental arithmetic?" Bucky had asked.

“Pretty good, sir."

He went for his computer. “Yeah? What's your maximum-efficiency throttle?"

This question was straight from the Intruder's manual, and not particularly challenging. “Two-thirds, sir."

Bucky nodded. “Three hundred kilos of fuel. How long do you have at max efficient with one engine out?" 

At two-thirds throttle, each Excelsior burned a hundred and fifteen kilograms of fuel per minute. Simple math: “Two minutes, thirty-six seconds."

Again, he rewarded her with a nod, and then looked up from his computer with a grin. “You weigh thirty tons. Can you make orbit?"

The mutt was still inclined to treat the problem as a test of her flying knowledge. He was referring to the very specific delta-v tables in the NATOPS manual. At thirty thousand kilograms, max efficient thrust gave the Intruder three kilometers per second of delta-v for every hundred kilograms of fuel. In two and a half minutes she could be flying very fast, indeed, but: “No. Nine point three kilometers per second; that's well inside the red zone, sir. I'd be below bingo. Divert or punch out."

“Did that all in your head?"

She nodded. “It's pretty simple arithmetic, sir."

And then he'd grinned wider, and put the computer away. “Good. You can take over the budget, then!" 

Managing the squadron's budget had previously been Micro's job, because he had been the youngest pilot at the time and because he had not been smart enough to feign a complete ignorance of elementary mathematics. Now it fell to the dog and, reviewing the endless spreadsheets, she could not help but think that every minute spent on it was a minute she was not spending in a cockpit.

The Colonial Defense Authority, Bucky reminded her, was not a charity. This was true. Every deployment had a cost attached to it. The corporations and colonial governments paid for services rendered, and it was incumbent upon CODA's faithful servants to accomplish those services for the price tendered. She'd heard stories about the marines: the spaceborne troops were paid a bounty for completed missions; individual units could volunteer for high-paying jobs.

It was a nice, if risky, way to make a living.

Things were not so straightforward in the Fleet Air Arm; the decision to commit to a mission came from Fleet Operations Command on the flagship, and Commander Putnam was obliged to agree. But VA-226 still had a budget, and they were expected to stay within it. In theory Kalija did not have a problem with this arrangement; in theory she understood that if the colonies wanted a strike mission, they needed to be willing to cover the costs.

In practice she was staring at thousands upon thousands of lines of expenditures and income. Six obols paid to the quartermaster for twenty liters of hydraulic fluid. Four obols paid to Air Wing Maintenance to rent a pair of calipers for an hour. Seventeen thousand obols paid to DEC for an upgrade to one of their diagnostic computers. Three hundred obols received, each week, for laundering the uniforms of VA-171. There were holes all over the spreadsheets: missing data and calculations that didn't quite add up. Micro had not been particularly dedicated, and after six straight hours trying to sort it out she understood why.

Two days later, she also understood why the squadron budgetary officer had a private office well away from the section of the ship dedicated to the squadron's headquarters. Every wall was covered in computers, and when she'd first sat down she assumed that the data were sensitive, or the wallspace was needed for maximum efficiency, or the records needed to be kept separate from the squadron operations area for legal reasons. No. It was private and remote for the same reason that it was soundproofed: the poor soul condemned to the task needed to be able to scream at the top of their lungs or go mad.

The dog stiffened when she heard the door opening, and felt her hackles going up involuntarily. Alamo poked his head in. “Hey. You having fun?"

Kalija curled her lip, and snarled warningly.

“You want a drink?"

“What kind?" Alamo invited himself all the way into the office, and at her question he simply tossed her a plastic bottle. “Salta?"

Salta was a South American soft drink — carbonated maté, flavored with just enough cane sugar to mask the staggering quantity of caffeine. Civilized people did not drink it. Classy people did not drink it. Sane people did not drink it — needless to say it was, with deuterium, one of the two fuels that a flying squadron ran on. “You gonna growl at me again?"

She was thinking about it. To stall, she cracked the tab of the drink open; it hissed and went ice-cold in her paw as the chemicals in the bottle worked their magic. It was frigid, and the carbonation prickled, and it tasted like the piss of ill-tempered hummingbirds — but she lapped at it anyway, still glaring at her bombardier. “Do you know how much this costs?" she finally grumbled.

“It's free. One of the perks."

Her head jerked in the direction of one of the spreadsheets. “It's not. It's forty-six chalks a bottle. Forty if we buy it by the case — which we do. Comes out of the general fund. Did you know that?"

“Nope."

“Well," she said, and tipped the bottle back into her muzzle for a longer drink. It was awkward to consume such beverages, as a dog. In school, she'd learned that the trick was to curl her tongue up against the lip of the bottle so that it formed a little trough, and to pour just enough in for a good mouthful. Done quickly, it almost looked natural: she swallowed, licked her nose, and set the Salta down. “Well fuck you for being able to say that."

Barton laughed, and stepped close enough to look at what she was working on. “How far does this go back?"

“These line items?" Kalija had opened one of the books directly into the surface of the desk. Dense rows of numbers and text covered it like newsprint. “This is for today. Everything that's charged against the squadron account; everything that's paid to the squadron account. You req a new camera sensor for our bird, it goes here. You fire a Krait, it goes here. You need a new button for your uniform, it goes here."

“Fuckin' hell... you're supposed to know all that?"

She dragged her paw aimlessly over the desk's surface, and the spreadsheet wavered and danced. “Technically, only requisitions over ten thousand obols. And a lot of it gets zeroed out..." She pulled up a new document, which promptly vomited a series of graphs and charts onto the desk. “This is fuel expenditure and electricity for the cats and stuff. Oxygen, water... we get a daily allowance for that. It's tracked, but..." Another wave of her paw banished the colorful graphs.

“Are we... in the black?"

Kalija shrugged.

“Well. I got good news for you, at least."

“Yeah?"

“We're up tomorrow. Thirteen hundred."

The mutt's ears lifted, and for a moment she forgot the spreadsheets. “Really?"

Her bombardier laughed, shaking his head. “Ah... Elvis..." 

“What?"

“D'you reckon y'have any idea what you look like when you do that?" He lifted middle and index fingers up in a 'V.' “With your ears? You look like a dog."

Her eyes narrowed. “I am a dog."

“Oh. Might could be that's what —"

“Do I need to growl again? C'mon — op. You said an op. What's up?"

“I dunno…"

“Tell me!"

“Wag your tail?"

Kalija huffed, and gave him a withering expression. But in any case the promise of flight had lifted her mood: presently she cocked her head to the side, perked her ears up as far as they'd go, and put on her best open-mouthed grin. “Fly? We're gonna fly?" She panted quickly, letting her tongue loll between the excited questions. “Can we go flying? Can we fly? Huh? Alamo?"

It only took a second of this before he burst out laughing — one second more and he had to look away, holding up his hand so that he couldn't see her even in peripheral vision. “Jesus Christ, Elvis." 

Immediately she stopped, although the smile was still there. “Flying?"

“What the fuck," he muttered, not quite recovered. “Yeah, yeah. We're flying. All goes right, we oughta getta download, couple hours maybe? Far's I know it ain't combat."

“More sensor sweeps?"

“Fuel boss says they're tanking us for an orbital cycle."

She licked her chops. “Fun!"

The human cast a glance around, at the mess of numbers. “Well, more than this, right? Caught a few minutes with the piss-off earlier today. Shit's hittin' the fan."

It always was. They could only ask how much, and how fast the fan was turning. Still, she tried to put the right degree of wariness in her voice: “What did he have to say?"

“Open fighting in a couple of the southern provinces. In the north, the spaceport at Aurora is under total control of the rebels, now. Governor's been talking about shutting down that inclination."

Kalija blinked, and her tail stopped wagging. “A blockade?"

“Officially, it's a quarantine," Barton shrugged, but they both knew what that meant. “Illegal, yeah. But who's gonna fight it?"

Most of the colonized planets had not been colonized by one nation only: Pike's situation, of an independent world with many other outposts, was the most common situation. Free trade was — had to be — sacrosanct. “We are?"

“That's the spirit," Alamo snorted. “I hope you're wrong."

They were supposed to be in space by 1300; that meant a prebrief at 1030, from John McCaffrey. Kalija and Barton Glenn were the first to arrive. Polo — it was easier to think of him as 'Polo' than as John — lifted his head. “Hey dog; hey tex."

“Good news for us?"

“Maybe, Alamo. I'm your flight lead. Me, you, Red and Driver, Noodle and Micro."

The others filtered in a few minutes later, along with Polo's bombardier. The prebrief was scheduled for 1030; by 1025 they were all looking at the hologram that Polo had prepared. Two thirds of the squadron was taking part in the operation — eight Intruders in total. They were to be flying escort for a pair of cargo ships that were scheduled to land at Cosmodrome Dawn Fitzgerald, which bounded an artificial lake just south of Aurora.

It was not, in theory, so much different from the sensor sweep they'd flown before the jump. Polo reassured them that they didn't expect to meet any resistance; they were there as a show of force, and to remind traders that Pike was still open to all business. Noodle asked what the ships were carrying, though, and Polo grinned: “Who's asking?"

One orbital cycle down, circle, and come back up to meet the fleet on its next revolution around the planet. It was exceptionally simple. These were the kind of missions that Kalija's spreadsheet liked: the freighter captains would've been paying for the escort, and with nothing but fuel and wear on the airframes expended it was easy money for VA-226.

Although the dog assumed she'd do well in actual combat, it wouldn't be so bad for their first encounter on Pike to come without anyone shooting at them. Not terribly exciting — but a good way to get the lay of the land. She could tell from the way Polo talked that he saw it as a training operation, himself: they would go in armed; they would launch and recover and behave as though under fire.

Micro stared at his mission card. “So, uh. If we're not getting shot at, why are we wasting the mass on weapons?"

“Why not?" Micro's question was answered by a lieutenant commander with a startling auburn mane. She was 'Driver'; her pilot was 'Red,' and the hair virtually ensured that Kalija would be confusing them for weeks. “Freighter pilots like to see us with weapons. Makes 'em feel safe."

Even though, from two hundred kilometers up — with friction setting the air ablaze as they tumbled like fallen angels to the surface — there was not a damned thing that a Krait salvo could accomplish. “And who knows," Polo added. “Maybe they'll want a demonstration."

Commander Putnam herself led the actual briefing, a few minutes later, with the rest of the squadron. Polo's assurances notwithstanding, Kalija paid close attention to everything that was mentioned. The weather. The political situation on the ground. Abort conditions. Their recovery alternatives if they could not make the Bellau Wood — and at this, the dog frowned, because Aurora was surrounded by unfriendly territory. With Governor Korablin's forces ringing the continent's perimeter, the city appeared almost to be under siege.

“I'm going to remind you again," the commander paused, so that everyone looked up. “Weapons release is absolutely not authorized. Pilots cannot authorize it. Flight leads cannot authorize it. I cannot authorize it. That has to come from FOC himself. If your tapes come back and I see you guys touched your master arm switch after you're in the AO, I'm going to... be very disappointed in you."

The briefing was exhaustive. Done properly, they always were. What to do in the case of a systems failure. Recovery vectors — they would recover directly to the task force, at a steep angle to spend as little time as possible in unfriendly airspace. What to do if they lost contact with the ship they were escorting before the final retro-burn. What to do if they lost contact afterwards. What to do if the Uniform Data Link went haywire, as it sometimes had a way of doing.

That was the nature of the job, though. Rocket science was complex. Flying was complex. Fighting was complex. Orbital combat operations presumed to do all of it together: to launch a squadron of fighters and guide them in aerobatic perfection — to direct them to a precise point in space at a precise time, where the precise hands of trained killers could do their precise work. And then, the next day, to do it all again.

But when she finished, and asked if there were any questions, the questions were as mundane as the briefing. Were they to use the fleet-standard radio encryption, or one that the spaceport could also hear? What if they were approached by any Pike starships? Should they set their transponders to register with the planetary orbital traffic controllers?

No. They would stay silent. They had been asked to provide escort, and they would provide escort — but there was no reason to be any more combative than was strictly necessary. The goal, in Putnam's words, was for VA-226 to do its job so politely that Governor Korablin would invite them over to dinner afterwards.

This admonishment was, in Kalija's opinion, undermined by the state of her Intruder. Six of the underwing pylons were carrying weapons, and two of the innermost ones had been equipped with boxy LAU-262 multiple-launch canisters. Each could hold four missiles. “Kraits," Alamo nodded, referring to the AVM-20s that served as the Intruder's primary stand-off weapon.

“Twelve Kraits? Would you invite somebody over for dinner if they came to your housewarming with a dozen missiles?"

“Maybe," Barton grinned. “Of course, they won't let us use them, so what's the point?"

Nothing on the walkaround was out of order. Spaceman English kept Wagon 510 in good shape — no spots or stains or scratches that could not be attributed to expected wear. Even the canopy glass had been polished.

They were third for departure. Waiting on the catapult track, Kalija turned and watched her bombardier studying his computer. After a second he looked up: “Ain't no problem. I'm just running the diagnostics again."

“Careful?"

“Paranoid," he admitted. “It's always the simple hops that get ya."

Kalija was reminded that she had no real idea what had happened to Alamo's previous pilot, except that it had not been a transfer. This was, however, not the sort of conversation to be having in the cockpit — waiting for the solid, punching rush of the catapult firing, slinging them out and into deep space.

Hanging outside Putnam's office was a plaque, belonging to a predecessor, that quoted some long-dead theorist. Air support is, it said, the precise application of overwhelming force. The second part, boastful and silly and so trite as to be meaningless, was supposed to be VA-226's motto.

The squadron had chipped in to commission a painting: a cartoonish frontiersman, wearing the Trailblazers' squadron patch and positioned in such a way that he appeared to be driving a nail into the plaque to hold it in place. A closer look showed the 'nail' to have guidance fins, and his right hand, posed in mid swing, grasped an Intruder by the tail. His mouth was open in a crooked-toothed grin, and his words formed the painting's caption, scrawled in big block type:

When all ya have is a hammer...

Intruders made for powerful hammers indeed, and 'escorting' a freighter in defense against targets they were not allowed to shoot at was one hell of a bent, rusty nail. But a sortie was a sortie, and a cat shot was a cat shot, and she savored the adrenaline anyway when the Bellau Wood fired them out, to be consumed by the waiting stars.

Pike burned bright and welcoming beneath them. The hologram in Dr. Müller's briefing had been shot during the wintertime; now it was summer in the northern hemisphere, and the whole continent coming into view glittered in gorgeous emerald. Auloniada was the largest, most populous landmass on the whole of the planet. Endless kilometers of farms and forest, shining cities and busy harbors... 

They'd see it up close soon enough: the dog set her throttle into maneuvering mode, and settled in on Red and Driver's wing, trailing by a kilometer or so. Somewhere slightly further ahead, Noodle had done the same behind Lieutenant Commander McCaffrey. 

“Everything okay?" she asked. Just checking.

“We're good." Alamo leaned back, to suggest that he was relaxing — although his helmet showed he was still focusing right on his computer.

Six hundred kilometers distant, descending towards the spaceport by Aurora, were the objects of their affection. According to the brief, they would be focusing on the LV Saint Elias, a container ship that massed sixty thousand tons empty. Not one of the largest starships, certainly, but among the largest that could reliably reach the surface and return.

More typically, the big superfreighters that were equipped with jumpdrives stopped at orbital transfer stations and moved their cargo into smaller, sublight ships for transfer to the surface. This was the most efficient thing to do: jumpdrives were heavy, after all, and expensive. But the major orbital stations were under control of the government in New Sydney, and freighter captains were understandably cautious.

“You ever thought about doing that, instead?" Alamo asked.

“Working freighters?"

“Yeah."

“Not a chance." She shook her head, for added emphasis. “Always looked like it would be incredibly boring. Besides, I can't anyway."

“Can't?"

“Need a certificate. Piloting colleges won't sponsor dogs, so I'd have to buy my way in. Or join a crew as somebody's bitch, scrubbing deck plates and stuff like that..."

Despite all the progress they'd made, Kalija was more than aware that moreaus were second-class citizens — not even that, most of the time, because the only path to citizenship was through the armed services and many dogs weren't willing to enlist, either. It was easier for her than it must've been for the first handful — dogs like her father, who had freed himself from a corporate barracks and been forced to join CODA when he found no other options.

He had never seemed bitter, though. He had a dogspeak name, but her mother had been the only one to use it. To everyone else he was 'Miller,' and until five years previously 'Mr. Miller' — for Chief Warrant Officer Miller had taken proudly to his rank. Now, in retirement, she caught his restless pacing when she called him at home — and the way he listened eagerly for her updates. His friends were mostly soldiers; most were also moreaus, but more than a few were humans.

She'd been seven years old when she told him that she wanted to join up. A private conversation, apart from her mother — the shepherdess had a dim view of the Yucatan Alliance in general. Retiring to the Dawa Free Colony, a small moreau community on a neutral planet, was her idea. After traveling all through her youth, Kalija found the township stifling in a way that her mother would never understand. A year had passed; she'd had time to appreciate all four seasons, such as they were. The prospect of enduring them for the rest of her life was... stifling.

“We're free here, though," her father pointed out. They were technically residents of the Yucatan Alliance — at least, the surrounding colonies were Yucatec — but nobody bothered them. Three hundred farmers and artisanal craftsmen were, in any case, not really worth bothering. “We don't need the others anymore."

It had been her mother's words he'd been channeling. Kalija's mother was a dark-furred shepherdess whose past as a corporate dog had permanently soured her on the entire human race. Like Miller, she had earned her freedom fighting on planet Jericho. Unlike him, she had earned it by way of armed rebellion, and the Commonwealth that formed afterwards had never resubmitted to the Alliance's control.

Kalija had answered her father's question with contemplative silence. “You're unhappy here?" He prompted.

“I can walk from one end of town to the other in five minutes," she finally said. “It's not a home, it's a cage."

The Border collie, with the twinkling eyes he always reserved for his eldest daughter, grinned. “Mayor Iskoshunja would say that you know nothing of cages."

If anything, though, she was even more bitter than Kalija's mother. “Comrade Iskich can stay here as long as she wants. I want to do what you did." He'd started as a radioman and ended as a signals analyst — there was no piece of electronics that he did not seem to have an intuitive understanding of. Kalija did not have his natural aptitude, exactly, but...

Miller had not tried to dissuade her. Neither had his friends — not even the human ones. Only her mother — snarling furiously — had rejected the idea categorically. She'd asked the same question as Barton Glenn: what about a freighter, if she was so damned interest in seeing the galaxy? Weren't there nakathja on freighters? Weren't some of them even owned by moreaus?

But a life on an ancient, creaking tramp ship, without even artificial gravity, had no appeal for the headstrong mutt. In the end she'd arrived at a compromise that was begrudgingly granted, which was that she would attend school first. Using a common moreau trick she'd applied as 'Kara Kalija,' and 'forgotten' to attach her hologram to the essays. And when the largest scholarship had been for an aeronautics program, and funded by the Colonial Defense Authority, well... wasn't that just a bit of bad luck?

Kalija knew that her mother referred to her as “Shadla, some human's pet, I guess," and that her father never mentioned her name without adding lieutenant first, and she was at peace with both extremes. It was better than wasting away tending the granary in Dawa. Better to be among the stars than to be dreaming of them. And if it took serving with CODA, she had more than her share of role models. Better role models than some hapless cargo ship crewman, that was for certain.

As a piece of technology, though, Kalija had to admit that the LV Saint Elias was impressive enough. No Bellau Wood: she was barely two hundred meters long. Her smooth underside looked every bit like a ship's hull, except where it was broken by the thick ridges of her stardrives. Big thrusters — it took a lot of power to bring more than a hundred and twenty thousand tons, fully loaded, to the surface of a planet and back again. That was why they landed on water: to cushion their landing, and because those engines would melt rock.

From the top she seemed more bizarre — blocky protrusions that shielded her cargo-loading cranes, and the big ungainly doors that kept her cargo containers safe from vacuum and radiation and the stress of reentry. It was all functional, like the Shenandoah or the Spirit of Orc, but on the Saint Elias it looked more as though someone had left the freighter unfinished.

“Tracker Two, take her port side. Tracker One-Two, stick with me on starboard. Position as briefed," Polo came in over the radio.

“Tracker Two-One, roger." That was Red. On her holographic display the dog saw her wingman's velocity indicator shift as Red started a slow drift over towards the far side of the freighter. Kalija followed, with easy, almost casual touches on the controls; from the outside the Intruder scarcely seemed to be changing course. The gravity compensator indicator barely moved. Their escort positions had been specified in the preflight briefing: five kilometers, alongside the freighter's thrusters near the stern of the ship. Any further forward and they risked incineration when she retrofired.

“Saint Elias, this is Tracker One-One. Lieutenant Commander McCaffrey — your escort for this flight. You guys having a good day?"

“Better now, Mr. McCaffrey." Actually, Kalija fancied she could hear the relief in the freighter captain's voice. And why not? Eight of CODA's finest soldiers were keeping watch. After a fashion. “We're on landing trajectory. Deorbit burn in about ten if we want to make this cycle..."

“Can you?"

“Sure!"

McCaffrey signaled his intentions to the task force, and the Intruders eased a few kilometers further out so that they would not be caught in any interference from the stress of the Saint Elias's entry. Kalija cast a quick glance over her cockpit. Nothing out of place. A flashing alert in her helmet informed her of transmissions on the traffic control channel, so she switched one of the auxiliary radios over to listen.

“Pike Orbital, Maersk Three-Niner-Two is an R-class transport, landing weight one-one-zero-zero, on approach to Fitz via Darwin and Griffith. Will burn next at Darwin, t-minus seven minutes."

This was not phrased as a request, which caught the attention of the controller on the other side of the conversation. “Maersk Three-Niner-Two Heavy, we don't have records of you clearing transit processing. Retransmit and signal when complete, over."

“Ah, negative."

“Maersk Three-Niner-Two Heavy, say again?"

The captain, who appeared to be enjoying the cockiness that comes from armed escort, continued: “Yeah, we don't have anything to transmit. Just advising you of our intentions."

“Maersk Three-Niner-Two, you're not cleared for your approach. You need to return to the transfer station and get your processing cert. Do you copy?"

“I hear you," the man said. Kalija laughed quietly to herself. “But we're not going to do that. Switching Fitzgerald approach now, Maersk Three-Niner-Two Heavy."

Kalija followed suit. Her radio monitor suggested that Orbital Control was still transmitting — but nobody was there to hear them. Freighter pilots! Well, how often did they get to stick it to someone like that? When she thought about it a little more, though, the conversation had been the appropriate way to proceed. The Saint Elias was letting Pike know that she was landing, and along what route, so that anyone who needed to might be able to get out of the way.

Out of the way of what? “Holy shit, Elvis; look at that..."

LV Saint Elias had four main thrusters, housed in huge fins at right angles like the fletching of an arrow. Now, as the two watched, the fins extended, and the stardrive nacelles swiveled a full hundred and eighty degrees to point straight for the ship's prow. “Guess she can't turn so quick..." 

Their Intruder wouldn't flip over either; their thrust reversers could direct some fraction of the Excelsior's power forward — not nearly as much power as they made ordinarily, but enough to follow the freighter towards Pike's surface. “Tracker flight, prep for deorbit," Polo called out. “T-minus two minutes."

Kalija went through the checklist. The control surfaces were locked. There were no warnings from the heat shields. All their temperatures were within the safe zone. Kalija switched her throttles into 'Orbital' mode and pressed the button marked 'DEORBIT' on the panel for her maneuvering computer. “Alamo?"

“Good here."

“Tracker Two-Two, ready," she reported, and adjusted her gloved paws on the Intruder's controls. One minute to go. 

She was following the countdown from the mission brief when the LV Saint Elias suddenly burst into flame — the whole length of the ship vanished in white fire as the thrusters opened up at full bore. The glare was so bright that her visor had to dim to compensate: staggering power that made her own Intruder's engines seem rather pitiful by contrast. With the inertial compensators active, their own maneuver was hardly noticeable to either of them in the cockpit. 

The fire disappeared as quickly as it had started, and the Saint Elias reappeared looking quite unscathed. Still: “You ever think about what it would look like if we had to land the Bellau Wood?"

“Messier. The carrier ships are bad enough." The big landing carrier ships were designed to swoop down into the edges of the atmosphere to launch and recover the CLS-37 “Strix" used by CODA's marines — which, unlike an Intruder, was not capable of sustained orbital maneuvering. “I was on one once — an' if I never do that again, dog, hell, I tell ya, it'd be too soon."

To say nothing of the CLS-37s themselves! Strix dropships fell upside-down, thrusters burning for a steady one g worth of acceleration. “Just like on Earth," she'd been told by one of her classmates — a Strix jockey who was transferring to attack pilot school because it was less stressful. He'd gone on to explain that every combat drop ablated half a meter of thermal tile from the dorsal side of the ship.

“Ablate?" she'd asked.

“It vaporizes and disappears. If it fails, well..."

Anybody who thought spontaneous combustion was a myth had never talked to a Strix pilot. The Intruder's own re-entry was not exactly sedate, but at least she had the sense it was not so brutal. At the end of the deorbiting burn they were precisely on course, heading for a rendezvous with the warm embrace of a proper atmosphere.

“Check your temps," Alamo reminded her. 

“Good. Climbing. Ninety degrees."

Kalija called up a magnified image of the Saint Elias in her helmet. The underside of the freighter was beginning to glow. At their speed, even the rarified air simply couldn't get out of the way in time — under increasingly intense pressure it became hotter until they could see it, almost a tangible thing. 

“Three hundred degrees."

They did not bother with stealth. There was no such thing: at eight kilometers a second, the solid bulk of the Intruder brutally shoved the air until it flashed into plasma, a glowing trail that stretched out behind them like a ship's wake. There was no way to hide this. The Saint Elias would be doing the same thing — she could no longer see it from her window, but the image in her visor glowed so strongly it was oversaturating the holographic projector. 

Abruptly, it vanished. “Lost sensors," Alamo noted. His voice was dispassionate; he was reporting on a natural consequence. They had, Kalija thought, entered the most dangerous time. Any failure would mean their destruction, and they were blind to the outside world. If the Pike defense forces wanted to send a missile their way — and if the heat didn't obliterate it — there would be no way of knowing until she was already in the next world.

In a combat scenario they would angle their descent to spend less time in that window, but a civilian ship like the freighter wouldn't be able to take the stress on her hull, and it was bad for the Intruder's frame as well. Instead, they could only hope. “Sixteen hundred degrees." The dog made a quick survey of her systems: still nothing unusual, not that she would've been able to do anything if there was. “You know, back when they used chemical rockets, they used to come in unpowered?"

“You ever done a glide landing?"

“Have to. For training."

“Thought maybe you skipped that, too." Alamo had his visor up, and by the look of his blue eyes he was smirking. “How'd you do?"

“Alright. I lived. The ship lived." 

“An' was it good for much after that?"

“Artificial reef," Kalija snickered. Actually she had managed a perfect score on the test — one of only two in the training squadron to do so. “Have to visit next time you're back in Hawaii."

Her bombardier stared, like he couldn't quite decide if she was serious. “I don't know that I believe you."

“I believed you about cowboys." That had ended with Hobo laughing at her in the mess hall. Even a spacer, he'd said, knew what a cowboy was. “So think on that, why don't you? Oh, hey. Temperature's dropping. Crosscheck."

Immediately he was back to work. “Positive return. Give me a sec... ready. Cycle."

“Cycling." She lifted the switch cover and pressed the button to trigger the sensor cooling system. There was only enough liquid for two charges. “Talk to me."

Her hologram flickered back to life just as Alamo gave her a thumbs-up. “We're back."

“DCS unlocked." They were too high up for the deflection controls to have much effect, but she gave them a test anyway. The slight movement was enough to be reassuring. “IMCS in ground mode. You got UDL?"

“UDL and comms are back."

“Tracker Two-Two, cleared entry." Next to them, the Saint Elias was still leaving a burning trail behind her. She looked substantially more out of place in the atmosphere: at least Intruders had wings.

“Roger," Polo answered. “Nazca, Tracker's in play."

“Acknowledged, Tracker lead. Nazca out." Nazca — the callsign for LCS Margay, the task force's flagship — was racing on ahead of them like everything else; soon enough they would pass beyond the horizon, not to be seen again until it was time to recover on the next orbit. 

For now it was time to begin their mission in earnest. The Saint Elias and her guardians were still well above the surface. Below them lay a great ocean that covered much of the hemisphere; they were still some distance away from land, and the defensive pickets of the planetary garrison. How well trained were they? How enthusiastic? Neither Kalija nor her bombardier knew.

The dog flew her Intruder in a sloping glide, watching the coastline approach warily until Polo's voice came back. “Fence check." They were getting close.

Kalija ran through her checklist. Flight controls, countermeasures, radios — like everything else, this preparation was designed in the hope that she would not need it. “Alamo, what's the word?"

“All good here."

She keyed her mic. “Tracker Two-Two, fence in." Her head was on a swivel. Good as her eyesight was, she was not likely to see anything suspicious first. But the glimmer of a signal hinted by the hologram projected in her helmet, or on the sensor panels in the cockpit before her... 

Tunnel vision was the quickest way to ruin one's day.

Honestly, Kalija believed the briefing: not much was likely to happen. With a heavily armed task force in orbit, why would Governor Korablin choose an undeclared freighter as causus belli? That would be stupid. But a tactically stupid reason would render her precisely as dead as a tactically brilliant one — and for pilots, caution was a renewable resource. They were always finding new things to be paranoid about.

Beneath them, the continent of Auloniada was shifting from the stark geometry of cultivated land to the deep green of virgin forest. Temperate, with broad, inviting leaves. The vast tracts had been planted originally to help stabilize the atmosphere, and to sequester carbon, and various other geoengineering functions that were beyond her understanding but had been placed in her intelligence briefing anyway. 

It looked pleasant enough, in its primeval way. Rather too much like what she'd left behind at the Dawa Free Colony — given a choice, Kalija would've taken Aurora or any of the other cities. At least, she assumed she'd prefer cities; to tell the truth, the dog had never set foot in a town larger than the twenty thousand people at the naval station in Hawaii.

“Heads-up, Elvis. We're intercepting the landing beacon for the spaceport."

“Fifteen degree right turn, by the brief," she answered, without looking. Sure enough, she saw the big stern thrusters fire on the Saint Elias, and the freighter yawed drunkenly towards its new course. The whole process was ungainly from an outsider's perspective. “Not much for quick turns."

“Like a hungover whale," her bombardier agreed. “Bet it ain't easy, though."

“Probably not."

“Tracker Two," Polo called to them. “Maersk Three-Niner-Two heavy is on final. Come right, climb a couple and monitor east, would you?"

Beyond the lake to Aurora's east, mountains rose sharply. He was asking the two Intruders to gain enough altitude for a good look over their peaks — to make sure nothing would surprise the awkward freighter or the little chicks that guarded her. Red's plane banked sharply, and Kalija followed her up toward the clouds. “Elvis, you covering me?" 

“Visual, Two-One." Then, to her bombardier: “Tag 'em just in case." 

A little box appeared around the ship in her helmet display; no matter which way she turned her head, a marker pointed back to where she could find Red and Driver. Their path was smooth, though — a steep climb, up to four kilometers, just below the pale wisps of late-morning clouds. “Tracker One-One, there's nothing on this whole horizon. Complete nothing..."

“Alamo?"

He nodded. “Nah, she's right. Sweet FA for signals, Elvis. I mean, I got, like, EM leaks from... I'd guess a power plant or something, about a hundred away? No traffic."

Red banked into a vulture's circle over the lake, and Kalija followed. The Saint Elias appeared first as a shadow — then a churning froth of white water kicked up by her thrusters. She disappeared into it, cloaked by the chaos of her landing; a minute later the spray cleared to reveal the freighter at rest, floating as sedately as any proper boat might.

“Well, this was a good use of military resources," Alamo chuckled.

“Chance to fly," the dog countered, although it had been rather mundane.

“True. Gorgeous day..." He looked out east, and up to the sun. Even with the halfhearted cloud cover it blazed strongly; she could feel the warmth through her flightsuit. “The long, delirious, burning blue..."

“Tracker flight, egress to Solomon. Maintain two zero." Polo was already at two thousand meters, well below them; Kalija reset her navigation computer to follow the pre-briefed vector away from the landing field. Like so many virtual things “Solomon" did not exist; it was merely a point in space, beyond which CODA judged they were outside the range of hostile intentions. “Stay alert, guys."

But nothing happened. Nothing happened on the way to the coast; nothing happened on the long climb back to orbit. The best case scenario — though still the dog thought that it could've been slightly more exciting. She trapped a fair two, and was ready to consider this a disappointment as well — but Red had done the same, and so had Polo, so instead she decided to blame the ship. The ship couldn't argue, after all.

After her watch ended, and before heading back to her bunk to sleep, Kalija paused in an observation room. The Bellau Wood orbited once every ninety minutes or so; at the moment, Pike was dark underneath them, but she would be seeing the sun soon enough.

Watching the planet soothed her. It served as a clear reminder of where exactly she was, and what she had managed to accomplish. Not by chance was she four hundred kilometers up in some meager planet's night sky, observing from one of the most powerful starships human hands had ever built.

“Alhakhnan goru, jankito," a singsong voice called.

Her ears pricked, and she switched into dogspeak for her answer, startled into it from the depths of her contemplation. She had thought the observation lounge to be empty, which was yet another reason she often sought it out. “A peaceful day to you, as well, comrade."

The interloper was a Border collie — one of the classic corporate standbys. Kalija didn't know the genetic details of why, exactly; she'd heard that they were easily programmed, and highly trainable. The first moreaus had been collies, and though the patents had lapsed long ago the companies kept making them.

This one didn't quite seem like a company dog. She carried herself with an oddly self-assured feminine grace, though, and that was good for a second look. Her blue-grey mane was lustrous, and beyond shoulder-length; her soft fur was shaped by a well-cut blouse and a sinuous skirt that shielded her fuzzy legs above the knee.

Uncommon. Barracks moreaus tended to dress functionally: vests and shorts were de rigueur, mostly for pockets to tuck ID badges and computers into. Left to their own devices they wore less; sometimes nothing at all. It was rare to see one emulating human fashion — let alone so well. “What's your name?"

“Taru Ikaja," the collie answered, and half-stepped, half-danced her way to join Kalija, watching the dark void of the planet below. “I heard that there was a nakath in one of the squadrons..."

“Kharåk Kalija Shada," she said with a nod. “I'm in VA-226. A pilot."

“A pilot!" Taru grinned. “That's even more unique!"

Kalija smiled, and permitted the other dog to sniff at her for a few seconds until she was satisfied. Not that the mutt even knew what she smelled like, anymore. Humans, probably. Humans and grease and ozone from the Excelsiors. “I haven't met any others," she agreed. “Are you with CODA, too?"

“No. I was leased from a consultancy firm and slipped through the cracks when they went bankrupt. Own my liberty deed and everything — CODA let me stay on because of my clearances and experience and... well, you know how they are, I guess. If only I could be a pilot..."

“It's not all that," Kalija reassured her, although she disagreed herself with this statement. “What do you do?"

Taru paused, and cocked her head thoughtfully to the side. Then she returned to English: “I'm a category specialist. I'm responsible for calculating the air wing's ATAQ."

The Colonial Defense Authority was organized like a typical military, and had many of the same responsibilities. It was, however, also an independent company — paid by the Confederate Congress back on Earth to defend her colonies and corporate sponsors abroad.

As such, the Board of Directors had broad leeway in how to execute any particular mission, and tended to err on the side of doing so cheaply. Any given assignment was given a Threat Coefficient; any combat unit had a corresponding Aggregate Threat Appropriateness Quotient. 

The term ATAQ was mostly a cute acronym; “appropriateness" was a matter of debate, after all. But the thinking was that CODA would only commit the resources required to successfully complete a mission, and no more. It was not the kind of thing a moreau would naturally tumble to, which was no doubt why Taru had used english for her explanation.

“The entire wing?" Kalija asked.

Taru nodded. “Indeed! They used to have an entire section working on it, but I've been doing this long enough that I suppose they just didn't think it was worth it anymore!" And she laughed — not a human's laugh, but the chuffing, panting canine sound Kalija was familiar with from her youth. “I still think it would be more fun to fly. You had your first operation yesterday, right? Didn't you say you were in VA-226?"

“Trailblazers, yes. Just some escort thing."

“Low TC. Much lower than the squadron's ATAQ! Ah, blessed stars, Shadla, but you pilots are really so valuable!" Taru's tail had a chipper, youthful wag to it. “That shipping company paid very handsomely, of course." 

“I gathered." Kalija had tried to avoid other moreaus since her enlistment, but Taru's excitement was a little contagious, and the mutt was smiling herself. “We'll see about the next one, right?"

“More of the same! Nobody's calling for any high-TC operations yet — at least, not that I've seen! Not according to Dr. Müller, at least."

“You listen to Dr. Müller's briefings?"

Her eyes flicked about, and she leaned in to whisper, even though both dogs were back to speaking nakath-rukhat and there was nobody around to hear. “Not officially. But he agreed to teach me privately!"

Kalija canted her head. “Why did you ask?"

“Because it's fun to know! You can learn about all kinds of things! It doesn't always make sense at first, but... you pick it up quickly enough. Human pack structures, for example. Their politics are actually incredibly complicated."

The mutt couldn't help her smile. “I've noticed that. They have a way of resolving them... messily." 

“It's been like that for millennia. As far back as they know their history, Shadla! They're very territorial, too. And yet... yet... they've been able to do so much."

“Including us."

“That's right." The Border collie seemed to be far less concerned with this than many liberated moreaus. “If you think about it that way, we're almost their... well. Their legacy. I don't mind that. I don't mind humans at all — do you?"

“I've come to terms with them."

Taru laughed again. “Yes. But it's still so nice to see another nakath..."

And this, Kalija had to admit, was certainly true. Everything was easier — reading the collie's body language, and her facial expressions, was far more straightforward than trying to parse English. Her scent was pleasant, a refreshing break from military equipment and the stink of human beings. Her voice had a nakath's rough cadence.

Her fur, when she leaned abruptly into Kalija, was thick and plush. Taru's nose buried into the mutt's neck, and she nuzzled happily with her wagging tail growing only all the stronger.

Kalija craned her head, and bit warmly down on the other dog's ear. “It is," she agreed, “nice to finally meet another of our own kind here..."

Who did not question things, because she understood them. Unlike a human, Taru must've been able to tell at a glance that Kalija was unique — a mutt, for one. Black fur and tan highlights; that one obstinate ear she could never quite get to perk all the way up. A human, picking up on her mongrel ancestry and realizing it meant she must've been freeborn, would've had all manner of nosy questions.

Nakathja were not so inquisitive, nor so judgmental. The collie surely realized it, but she said nothing; nor did Kalija comment on how pristine her pelt was or how naturally she wore a human's clothing. Instead, when Taru flopped heavily into her new friend, the two dogs fell into the contented silence common to their kind. The statement having been made, neither of them wished or needed anything more than the other's presence. It was more than enough to relax, into the calm warmth of shared companionship.

She found herself returning to this thought a few days later, when a quiet meal in the mess hall was interrupted by William Price. Woody could've taken one of the other tables — any of the other tables, indeed — but chose to sit across from the dog.

“Hey!"

“Hey, Woody."

“How's it going?" 

'Smalltalk,' humans called it; her own kind had no words for the meaningless conversation. She indulged him, through a recap of the squadron's current readiness and the recitation of such gossip as he had on hand.

At least there was nothing obnoxious about it; no hidden, jeering slight in his words the way some humans felt themselves drawn to. He didn't even ask her if she was shedding. Pilots, she had decided; 'soldiers' generally, perhaps. They seemed to be less quarrelsome.

He made to leave, and she allowed that she intended to stay behind — the better to grab some food. To her surprise, he decided to stick around, and while she fixed herself a quick breakfast sandwich he went to pour another cup of coffee.

“Wish it wasn't so terrible. It's like the worst coffee I've ever fucking had..."

“I don't really drink it." That wasn't completely true; sometimes she had coffee, although not often enough to know what was good and what was bad. Nobody asked, and she hoped that nobody guessed, that she avoided coffee mostly because hot beverages were painful to lap up.

“That's probably smart."

“Orange juice does the trick," she said. “Our orange juice is alright." Though, like the coffee, it was overstock surplus stuffed in a warehouse somewhere and bought on the cheap.

He nodded his understanding, and watched her eat while he waited for his coffee to cool down. Then he gestured to her curiously. “How did you even get into this?"

She presumed that he was not talking about her English muffin, which she polished off before answering. “Flying?"

Woody nodded.

“Accident." She admitted it with a shrug; the truth was that, she knew, she had been lucky. “I was looking for a way out of where I was."

“From a company, huh? I guess that's not something you like talking about. None of ones I knew did..."

“You knew others?"

“Plenty. I grew up on ships." 

“You and Hobo, huh?"

Price had deep, dark eyes — almost black. They lost their piercing glitter when he rolled them. “Hobo's some Starlight dork. My parents have real jobs — back then they were salvagers. Orbital cleanup, mostly. I saw so many planets from five hundred kilometers up before I ever set foot on one. Anyway, laikas are cheap..."

She tilted her head. “What?"

“Space mutts. The first animal in space was a dog, you know? Laika. The Sovs did that, all the way back on Terra — five hundred years ago."

“I see."

“Mission wound up killing her. I don't know if that's what they were thinking about when they started calling the engineered ones that, but..."

She thought again of Taru Ikaja. Kalija had a hard time reading human emotions — they weren't nearly so expressive as moreaus were, with their body language, and English was a second language to her. She tried to decide how sympathetic Price might be, and gambled: “We don't learn a whole lot about that. We're not really... dog dogs. We're our own species."

The implication was that she did not wear a collar, or chase tennis balls; that she was, in fact, more than a little tired of hearing about family pets. Some of her more canine aspects were immutable, and she had learned to adapt — to play it up, even, when she felt comfortable. But the difference between dog and nakath — rukhat used a completely different word for the four-legged variety — had been pounded into her since birth.

Woody wasn't taken aback by the reminder. “I know. Lot of people disagree, though."

“Yeah."

“Some of the mining companies, OM and stuff like that? Order them in batches. There's a lot of shitty work in space — reactor maintenance, EVAs, sorting the rocks and stuff. They'd come out and say it, like, 'they're just dogs,' man." He looked into his half-finished coffee. “It was really fucked up, you know? I gotta say, I'm... glad you got out."

This reaction had surprised her the first few times. In general, people who met Kalija fell into one of two camps. Either they were repulsed by her existence, and the way she shamelessly presumed to be a human's equal, or they offered begrudging acceptance mixed with occasional snide remarks. A personal history with moreaus didn't change the equation much: either they had “known one of you dogs once" and that dog had known how to stay in its place, or they used it as evidence that they had no problems with “your kind."

Every once in a great while, though, she found someone who was carrying their experience with moreaus as a kind of burden. They'd had a family servant that hadn't been treated well, perhaps. Or they'd heard about the living conditions of barracks moreaus in the factories that produced their consumer electronics and felt guilty about it, though never enough to stop buying them. These people approached Kalija as though she could offer a kind of benediction.

It's alright, they wanted her to say. It was extremely patronizing — all the more so because she knew that they meant well. And because she, herself, did not really feel like a victim. It was odd that everyone assumed she had to be one: the locker-room ribbing was occasionally irritating, but they ribbed everyone. What did she have to 'get out' from? “I didn't," she said, flatly.

“Get out?" 

“I was born free. On a little colony of pure moreaus. A lot of them were corporate, or ex-corporate, but none of my friends or schoolmates."

“Then... why would you..."

“Because it was fucking awful." She had to smile at the way he blinked in surprise to hear the epithet. “Three hundred of us. I could stay and be a farmer, or I could leave. I applied for a scholarship in an aeronautics course and turned out to be pretty good at it. After that... there's no way I'd go back. I love flying too much."

The human nodded: that was something they could all sympathize with. “It's kind of funny that everyone feels that way. Don't have to be human to love it, I guess."

“No. And to be honest, sure, sometimes my life isn't perfect. Dealing with the bureaucracy here when I joined up? That was a pain. Every step of the way, they fought me. When I tighten that harness down, though, none of it matters anymore. I'd put up with anything for that."

“Even us?" he joked. “Guess you probably take a lot of shit for being a... not-dog."

“Got a thick skin."

“And a lot of fur. They don't really mean anything by it, though. It's easy for me to say, I know, but I really do believe that."

So did she. “Of course. If you can't take people making fun of you, how are you gonna take people shooting you instead?"

“Right. Like to think we're all the same — if you can fly, that's what matters. And Alamo says you're pretty good, so..."

“What's his story, anyway? Will somebody tell me?"

Woody grinned, and went to refill his coffee mug, cutting it with water until it was not much darker than his skin. None of them would stoop to anything so dishonorable as milk or sugar. “He tell you where the name came from, at least?"

“Because he's from Texas?"

Woody shook his head. “Nah. If he hasn't even told you that, I guess he didn't tell you what happened before you. So, you know he needed a new pilot, right? And you know he used to be a full lieutenant?" 

She shook her head. “He's pretty quiet."

“I know. Well, this was two years ago, alright? I wasn't there — but I heard it from somebody who was, just before I transferred out to 226. And —"

A knock came on the edge of the hatch; they turned to find Zippo with a less than happy look on her face. “Hey, Woody; dog. We're up."

Woody set his coffee down heavily. “What do you mean? There's nothing on the schedule." 

“I know. But we're up anyway. Bring that." She pointed to Woody's coffee mug, when he appeared to be returning it to the recycler. “This should be good."

An unscheduled operation was, in fact, unlikely to mean anything good. They were not being scrambled — no alarms had gone off, and the ship had yet to be called to general quarters — but something was clearly out of the ordinary. Prompted by Kalija, Lieutenant Commander Jovanovic shook her head: Zippo had no idea what was going on, either.

Commander Putnam was busy organizing a hologram in the briefing room — shuffling around diagrams and dragging icons into place. Kalija dropped into the seat Alamo had kept open for her, and looked at him questioningly. “Don't know. We've got about sixty minutes to the next drop window, though."

“Cutting it close..."

Driver, in the seat behind Alamo, leaned forward. “They're already prepping on the hangar deck. Half the squadron's fueled and armed — when I was coming down they said the Longbows are up, too." VFA-995 flew the sleek F/A-206 Kestrel — a much more maneuverable fighter than Kalija's own A-17E.

Alamo read between the lines for them. “Well, ain't that grand? If they're pulling out the Kestrels, they must need somebody for suppression..."

“On an unprepped sortie with no cover," Driver agreed. “Guess we must be living in interesting times..."

Putnam finished her preparations and called the room to order. “Alright, here's the situation. We're hitting the next drop window. That means we need to be suited and preflighted in forty-five minutes. So I'll keep this short and let you study the mission cards. One of the PMCs on the ground has been contracted to evacuate a corporate campus on the eastern plains." Behind her, the globe rotated, and zoomed in on a nondescript town fifty kilometers from the coast. “We learned an hour ago that there are government forces inbound. The worry is that they'd try to detain anyone they perceive as... high value. We've been written a blank check to make sure that doesn't happen."

'Bucky' Fuller stepped forward, and as he spoke icons began to appear superimposed on the map. “Our call sign for this operation is 'Tracker' again. Tracker One is Pinball and Zippo; they'll take station at orbital point Dover to the southwest. Tracker Two, Polo and Woody, you're at orbital point Charleston to the southeast. Tracker Three, Red and Elvis, you're staying high and north at point Aragon. That's about thirty-five klicks up, so watch your DCS and your thermal profile. Now... we have a complicated battlespace going on..."

A wave of his hand, and a dozen more symbols appeared at once, weaving in almost indiscernible patterns on the map. Commander Fuller explained that these were the Kestrels of VFA-995 — and that they had, indeed, been ordered to watch for any signs of hostile tracking radars or missile sites. Well above the fray, it would be Tracker 3's job to keep watch and catch anything that was missed — to act, in other words, as bait.

“If you're thinking this sounds like fun, I've got better news," Putnam added. “Remember that as far as the Pike government is concerned, we're still here as guests. We're going in with live ammunition, but fleet command has instructed me to remind you of the ROE for this operation. You are not to fire unless fired upon. Tracking radars don't count. Guidance radars don't count. Angry looks don't count. A missile needs to leave the rails with your name on it for it to count as a valid target."

“What if they start hitting the civvies?"

“Well, now, that's the complication, Woody. If there is an exchange of fire, and if the corporate FAC on the ground highlights a specific target, you are to contact Nazca for explicit permission to fire. If Nazca grants it, you're clear to prosecute on the discretion of you and the FAC, but only on that specific target. If they decide it's a different hoverdyne, you're talking to Nazca again for permission."

Woody looked like he was about to say something unpleasant.

“I know it sucks, guys. C&C is not any happier about this. But if we shoot up the wrong government troops, we could be looking at a major escalation. Think of it this way: they're trusting us to not start a war. Let's hope we're up to it."

Kalija was inclined to think of the mission as being much like their previous assignment — a glorified show of force in the form of an escort assignment. The rules of engagement weren't especially troublesome: what were the odds that anyone would call their bluff, with nearly twenty attack aircraft airborne and the task force standing by to back them up? 

“Don't get cocky," was all Alamo said.

The launch went smoothly; settling into a deorbiting pattern went smoothly. Kalija flattened out the Intruder's descent, resting ten kilometers behind her wingman, and looked over the mission cards again. They were supposed to be watching for search radars or signs of activity; that meant that they would need to stay high, and relatively exposed — and, naturally, they had been given no jammers or additional countermeasures beyond the standard pods on the wingtips. “What's your take on the terrain, Alamo?"

“Ain't good for either of us. You won't be able to see much down there. Atmospheric haze might could screw up the whole damn scene if we don't get lucky — at least the cloud cover's not bad. But it's too hot down there. If somebody takes a liking to us, I probably won't see it until a few seconds after launch." 

“So I should be ready to move?"

“Might ought to be."

“Great." Kalija double-checked her maneuvering thrusters, just in case.

“Tracker flight, prep deorbit. T-minus two minutes." Commander Putnam — 'Pinball' — was calm and quiet as ever. “Remember your thermal clearances."

Their flight plan had them descending extremely steeply — far faster than they had on the escort mission. The longer they took to decelerate, the longer they would remain vulnerable; it was, the thinking went, preferable to get things over with quickly. In any case, the computer predicted that their hull would remain intact. “Should be within tolerances on my side," she told her bombardier. “How about you? More sensitive, right?"

“We should be fine. Just don't do anything crazy. I'm all good here."

“Tracker Three-Two, ready," she called in, and then looked over at Alamo. “You really think I'd do something crazy?"

“You're a pilot," he answered. “It comes with the territory."

“Oh, of course." Even though she had a reputation to uphold, as a pilot, she decided to err on the side of caution. Kalija waited until the flight path marker in her helmet turned green, and opened up the throttles to brake the heavy fighter. They fell towards the planet with disconcertingly little effort, soothed by the inertial compensators. “On course. Close in thirty." 

“Call your temps."

“One-twenty. Two hundred. Close in ten." A steady glow flickered and licked at the edges of the cockpit.

Her sensors went dark. “Blind," Alamo confirmed.

“Four hundred degrees. Six hundred." Going up fast. “Twelve hundred." The atmosphere — having nowhere else to go — was beginning to fight back against the Intruder's underside. “Getting a little wobble here. How are your instruments?"

“Good. Still good. All good, lefty."

“Sixteen. Seventeen." The A-17E's maneuvering thrusters were struggling to keep them straight in the increasing turbulence; this was even more critical on the sharp descent they'd planned, because the Intruder's thermal protection was designed to match only a very specific flight profile. The NATOPS manual was quite clear on those matters.

15.1.18: Thermal dissipation envelope, exceeding of. Departure from plotted flight profile at the edges of the A-17E's thermal protection limits is not recommended. Any sustained excursion or deviation from the approved reentry vector will result in CATASTROPHIC FAILURE of the airframe (see interactive diagram 15.1.18A for failure points).

There were a lot of failure points. “Eighteen twenty. That should be it..." At some point the thickening air and their slowing speed would find a happy medium. Ten degrees later, they found it. “Okay, coming down. Eighteen. Crosscheck?" 

“Positive return, but we can't fire now. Gimme... fourteen, lefty." 

Their ship was still too hot for the cooling system to bring their sensors online safely. They had to slow further — although, to her great relief, the wobbling in her controls had ceased entirely and she could almost see out the canopy window again. “Fourteen. Come on." 

“Standby. Ready. Cycle."

“Cycling," she said, and fired the cooling system. Her visor filled with the characters of the diagnostic tests being run — too fast for her brain to capture. And then all the lights came back on.

“We're good, Elvis. Not bad, on that trajectory..."

They were off by only fifty meters from the computer-defined flight path. “So it's not. Alright. DCS unlocked. IMCS in ground mode. My lights are green — we got UDL?"

“We got UDL." 

“Sweet." She checked the radio. “Tracker Three-Two, cleared entry."

They were the last one to do so, as the trailing ship of the flight. “Nazca," Pinball called in to the command cruiser. “Tracker flight is in play."

The ground was still a long way below them — just over fifty kilometers of empty air separated them from the rolling countryside of the continent's interior. “Anything?"

“I'll tell you if there's anything, Elvis."

She banked the Intruder over to the side so that she could peer downwards. Towards the horizon, the thick tree cover dwindled, as it began to run out of rainwater; their target lay in the midst of a great plain that stretched out and beyond towering mountains. It looked like a paper map, crinkled with carelessness.

“Picking up signals from the Kestrels now. Cossack One-One and Two-One just reactivated their UDL. There's Three and Four now..."

Kalija nodded. A dozen F/A-206s were also assigned to the mission; there was no proper coordination between the fighters and Pinball's Intruders. Mostly they would plan to keep out of each other's way. “Should overtake us in about five minutes, passing on the port side."

“Looks like it. I'll keep an eye out."

“Thanks, Alamo."

Idly, the dog wondered what people on the ground must've thought. They could surely see the reentry. Was it no longer anything out of the ordinary, for them? Were they nervous? Could they also sense the coming storm? Even if nothing was bound to happen on that particular mission — and she felt reasonably certain that it would not — there would be others. Everyone knew the rebellion was going to have to come to blows. 

Eventually. She couldn't see the future, though, and there was no point in pretending otherwise. Focus, Shadla...

“Tracker flight, fence check."

At Pinball's order, Kalija made the Intruder ready for combat they were not supposed to even think about engaging in. Fuel, Engines, Navigation, Controls, Electronics. “Alamo?" The mnemonic 'FENCE' meant different things to the bombardier.

“All green. Link's good."

“Tracker Three-Two, fence in." She still wasn't allowed to turn the 'MASTER ARM' switch on, which grated — either they had a mission, after all, or not.

The Area of Operations was an awkward, roughly hexagonal perimeter with a radius of forty kilometers around a corporate “campus" that was really more of a small town — far from anything, so that they could operate without interference, they were also required to be self-sufficient. It had probably worked out well in the past; now, though, it left them vulnerable to raiding by Pike's central government.

There was no real indication that they had crossed over into their designated area; the tallgrass prairie below them looked to be completely desolate. On Red's orders, Kalija pulled the Intruder up and, slowing to only a few hundred knots, they began their steady overwatch. Orbital intelligence had supposedly detected a column of vehicles moving in from government-controlled territory.

Legally, they had every right to do so: they were the Territorial Guard, after all, and operating on Governor Korablin's orders. But since the separatists did not recognize the government, and since the Yucatan Alliance was loyal to the separatists, it was in the best interests of the civilians to leave as quickly as possible. And they had the money to hire a private military company to take care of the details.

The company in question was not, as far as Kalija knew, one of the major PMCs like AAI or her own Colonial Defense Authority. Innumerable tinier groups, with tinier scruples, picked up the slack in the Confederacy, working mostly on behalf of the corporations. According to the briefing, they possessed only lightly armored vehicles, and slightly modified civilian transports for use as improvised dropships.

Hopefully it would be enough. Pinball's four Intruders stayed low, flying careful patterns around the campus to sweep the area for any potential hostile forces. The big picture would be harder to assemble: with the task force now ahead of them, beyond the horizon, the Intruders of Tracker flight had lost any real-time orbital imagery. 

Red and Elvis, thirty-five kilometers up, became the closest thing to a replacement. For the first half-hour, everything stayed quiet. Then Alamo abruptly leaned forward to check something on his sensor display. “Hey, Elvis. I've got EM radiation coming from the AO. Entering on the east side. Faint, but it's definitely there. Two or three discrete emitters."

She looked in the direction he indicated, and called up an augmented view on her helmet, zooming in the display as far as she possibly could. Even through the haze, the shape of a vehicle on the move was unmistakable. “Two, I think. Can you resolve the lead a little better? Are those antennas it's carrying?"

“I'm trying. Can't change the laws of physics, Elvis. Give me a little bank and I'll try with the HF laser pod."

A rock of the Intruder's wings exposed the sensor array nicely; they were so far up that inertia carried them on an untroubled, drifting course regardless. The magnified image in her helmet sharpened as the targeting computers interpolated the data they were being fed. Definitely antennas. “IDs?"

“Lead's a Type 30, mod 7 or 8. Supposed to be a counterbattery radar, but they patch it in for light AA, too. One behind it is some kind of civilian vehicle — don't recognize the model, but it's got too many windows to be military." 

“Good point. Better tag 'em both." Kalija returned their ship to level flight, and called it in. “Tracker Three-Two, contact, two ground vehicles, left eleven. UDL markpoints, Delta-Charlie Four and Five. Four is some kind of a radar truck." 

“I see it, Three-Two," Red confirmed, a second later. “Driver says it's a Type 30, mod 8. Trap it and keep me posted."

“Roger, One."

“Trapped DC Four," Alamo told her without needing a prompt. The computer would make it a priority to keep watching the truck, paying attention to any signals in the bands their database knew it was likely to operate in.

Even a single radar was something to be worried about, in the dog's mind: it meant that the Pike government was serious about a confrontation. It also meant that the government had begun to activate its territorial defense forces. “Alamo..." she mused aloud.

“Elvis?"

“What do you suppose it means that they're sending Sanganese radar trucks?"

“They were cheap?"

“Probably." The political officer had implied that Pike was growing close to the Kingdom; it was bound to come with certain benefits. “But also, it means they've had them long enough to be trained on how they operate. You wouldn't send brand-new equipment to deal with some corporate evacuees unless you knew you weren't risking anything..."

Alamo grunted. “True."

“Maybe it's good, though. Means they won't use them..."

“True," he said again. “Well, we've got a great view if they do anything stupid."

They didn't, for the moment, though as the minutes ticked on the Territorial Guard had certainly gained the means to. Kalija and her bombardier counted four separate columns converging on the campus, moving quickly despite the lack of prepared roads. They were all of Sanganese design, using Pike governmental frequencies and markings — and showing off a wealth of tracking radars.

“Tracker Two-One, mud, right twelve, IRON PENNY. UDL Delta-Bravo One-Two."

“Copy," Woody, Polo's wingman in Tracker Two-Two, called in immediately.

Alamo added yet another marker to her display. “Tracker Two, Delta-Bravo One-Two is another type 44. Radar's in search mode."

“What is that, fifteen of them now?" Kalija's helmet was starting to feel claustrophobic.

“At least a company. Penny's a mixed-use set, remember. And not very good."

It was her bombardier's job to know all the details of the radar array that their intelligence referred to as IRON PENNY — the means of its operation and its typical frequencies. On the other hand, she had memorized the Type 44's threat card. Light hoverdyne: driver, gunner, four passengers. Eight-missile battery on the roof with a useful radius of fifteen kilometers and a service ceiling of four. Typically ineffective, the threat card said. But used in massed formations as a denial weapon or means of harassing CAS elements.

She'd learned at the academy that it came down mostly to a difference of style. The Confederacy tended, in general, towards highly precise weapons. Railguns stabilized by fantastically expensive gyroscopes, for example, or the Intruder's Krait missiles. Everything was networked via the Uniform Datalink; everything was designed to work in concert. In contrast the Sanganese favored a strategy of saturation: if every rocket only had a one in four chance of hitting its target, they simply fired eight of them to compensate. Even if all eight missed, they would've kept their target on edge and distracted.

In one of her simulations, they'd placed her in a CODA walker at the receiving end of a Kingdom artillery barrage — literally thousands of rockets. “Don't panic," the instructor had said. “None of them are going to hit you." Rationally, she knew that — her defensive computer had estimated the tracks, and she was in a quiet area where her armor would protect her. Against that sheer, overwhelming number though it was impossible not to panic — and tankers often did.

If all fifteen Type 44s fired at once, that would be more than a hundred missiles in the air, and no way to get lucky against every last one of them — no matter how reassuring the threat card was, and no matter how poor the performance of the IRON PENNY radar was supposed to be. Kalija did not particularly relish her sense of safety, though; it brought with it an accompanying sense of abject helplessness.

A sharp tone went off from her threat receiver — half a second later Woody was on the radio, voice sharp. “Polo, break right! Disco."

“Tracker Two-One, defensive," Polo acknowledged crisply. The Intruder jerked into a sharp right turn and a defensive program activated on the A-17E's jamming pods against the radar that had suddenly switched into target-tracking mode. “They launch anything?"

“Tracker Three-One. Negative, Polo. They're just playing with us."

Pinball herself was the next to be hit. There was nothing the Intruders could really do, except to stay low enough that the cheap Sangan-built radars didn't have time to lock on. That was all the Territorial Guard was really looking for, anyway: a means of harassing, as the threat card put it.

“Christ almighty," she heard Woody swear. “Pinball, Woody's defending SAMs at Charleston. DB Five and DA Three have me spiked. Sorry — DB Five, DA Three and DA Four."

“Visual, Two-Two. Notch left, three zero."

“Notching. That's one, Pinball. Fuck. Tracker Two-Two, mud spike, left seven."

“DB Three, this time," Alamo told her over the intercom.

Woody pushed his Intruder over into a dive, pulling out when he was only a hundred meters above the ground. “Pinball, Woody; request permission to engage." I'm getting tired of this shit, his tone of voice added as an exclamation mark.

“Nazca, Tracker lead. We're getting locked by multiple ground vehicles in the AO. Can we engage? Over."

Somewhere in the command and control center aboard the Margay, wiser men and women than Kalija were looking at the situation. Weighing the odds. “Tracker, can you confirm you have not been shot at yet?"

“Affirmative. Still just radar locks, for now. But if they do, it's going to get ugly fast."

“Tracker, you are not cleared to engage. Say again: do not fire unless fired upon."

“Copy that, Nazca." Kalija was surprised that Grace Putnam managed to maintain her composure so well — even the dog's teeth were gritted, and they were still well above the chaos of the evacuation area. “Woody, you heard the man..."

“Where the hell are the Kestrels?"

“That's a good question," Kalija asked her bombardier. “Where are they?"

“Holding. They're stacked between us and the rest of our squadron. Fifty klicks plus to the east. Cossack Four gets to about ten kilometers on a close orbit. You want 'em tagged?"

“Nah." She looked off to the east, anyway, for any sign of contrails or activity. “Aren't they supposed to be on a SEAD flight?"

“Might be, if we were allowed to suppress anything." Deadly as the Kestrels might be, with their highly precise anti-radar missiles, there was no point in wasting fuel on attack runs that were blocked by the rules of engagement. “Bit of a mess down there."

“They're supposed to be finished in the next twenty minutes, according to the mission brief." 

“Just might manage, too."

Kalija called up a map of the campus. Courtesy of the Uniform Datalink, the entire squadron was working to put it together — every pass by every Intruder updated the hologram, increasing the resolution and accuracy. By now they had flown over it so many times she could've zoomed in to read the letters on every mailbox, had she so desired.

The cargo trucks were all loaded and ready; the PMC's dropships were powering up, with a dwindling line of people waiting to board. The campus had been a research center for a genetic engineering firm; at least a thousand people had lived and worked there, and the company intended to leave nothing for the Pike government to loot.

It must've been valuable research, indeed, to justify the expense — on both sides. Sending in the Territorial Guard to block the evacuation could not have been cheap. Ordinarily police would've sufficed, but Korablin obviously intended the operation as a show of force. It was quite a show, at that: they were far from the territorial capital.

At least it would be over soon.

“Elvis, check left. I've got an IRON DRUM radar in acquisition mode."

Sure enough, her threat receiver had lit up, with a bright line pointing straight towards the ground. “Okay. I'm gonna come right," she told him, and twisted the starfighter onto a new course, putting the radar directly off their port wing. “Tracker Three-One, mud, left nine at twenty. IRON DRUM-type radar." The threat receiver pulsed a continuous low, distracting warble.

“Keep an eye on it," Red answered. “I think we've got another one, your right one. UDL marked as Delta-Charlie Eight."

“Tally. Red, I'd really like to get a firing solution."

“Join the club," the other pilot said. “Keep your weapons safe, Elvis."

Before launch, she'd assumed there would be nothing significant about the sortie. Now, though, flickers of nerves were creeping in to mix with a rising sense of irritation. Twenty kilometers below them, some radar operator was — what? Getting ready to shoot at them? They knew the enemy was out there, showing clear hostile intent... and what was she supposed to do? Keep your weapons safe? 

Type 44s were standard infantry-fighting vehicles. The missiles they carried were mostly intended for use against other ground targets; they weren't all that maneuverable and the IRON PENNY radar was not especially precise. IRON DRUM was different. That meant a Type 30 radar truck and its accompanying Type 93 battery packed full of SM-5 SAMs. The SM-5-M10 'Fang Flash,' with a ceiling of 90 kilometers, is a highly effective medium-range SAM characterized by a cluster terminal stage splitting one SM-5 into four SM-14 ARH missiles.

Kalija suspected that the intelligence officer who'd written 'highly effective' had not had the chance to judge one in person. It was an extremely dispassionate phrasing. And now her threat receiver was clearly saying the Territorial Guard had brought at least one along. Type 93s had no practical use except against starfighters — or the transport ships that were being used to evacuate the civilian workers.

“Can you get a passive lock on them, Alamo?" 

“Already done, lefty. Probably won't be good enough for terminal guidance; we'll have to go active if we want to shoot."

Damn it. She stared longingly at the switch in front of her labelled 'MASTER ARM.' Closer to the ground, Pinball and Polo's elements were not having any more fun. The same radars were lighting them up on every pass — and they would have much less time to evade in the event that the Pike soldiers did “anything stupid." At least the evacuation was going smoothly: the mercenaries already had their dropships filled with passengers, and the last of the cargo palettes had been loaded onto a convoy of big Tarvos hovertrucks.

Two more search radars announced their presence in the following five minutes. By Kalija's estimation, the Pike government had sent at least two companies of the Territorial Guard — mostly infantry-fighting vehicles, but unlike the Colonial Defense Authority the Kingdom had long ago learned not to count on having air superiority. That was why Sanganese IFVs all had air-defense modes built into their missiles — even if, individually, they weren't all that useful.

“Be a nightmare if they decide to do anything..."

“Running out of time," her bombardier pointed out. “Transport ships are already almost airborne."

Neither party really wanted the standoff to become anything more. They were simply trying to provoke the other, and being very cautious about it. Whoever fired the first shot would lose, by legitimizing whatever response was employed against them. Kalija followed Red up another two kilometers as the dropships lifted off and the convoys started to make their way out. “Guess they're about to call it a day..."

Instead, the next voice came from Driver, Red's bombardier. “Tracker Three-One, dazzled, right twenty tack forty at twenty."

Barton tensed, and leaned forward to look at his scope. “Son of a bitch," he muttered. “Driver, this is Alamo. I think you're right."

“Alamo, Driver. Double-tap, mode two, channel two."

He took another few seconds to stare at the display. Driver had detected indications that someone was using a multispectral cloaking device, and was requesting their help. Two Intruders could link their sensor suites together, coordinating radars to overcome the jamming mechanism of even a fairly sophisticated cloak. “Lefty, can I get a slow right orbit?" 

“Sure." Kalija leaned Tracker 3-2 into a gentle bank. “You know what you're looking at?"

“Not yet. Reasonably good sized." He tapped at his computer in irritation before giving up. “Driver, Alamo. Sweet. And... visual."

“Confirmed, visual. Stand by..."

A flash of color in the dog's helmet marked the results of the sensor pulse. “Anything?"

“Parked vehicles. Gun trucks, might could be. Tally... six... eight?" 

She called up a holographic map of the area of operations. “Ambush for the convoys, huh?"

“Elvis," Red asked a moment later. “Does that look like an ambush to you, too?"

“Affirmative, Red." A series of flashing lines blinked to life in her helmet. “We have solutions plotted on all targets."

Red's bombardier had probably done the same thing as Alamo. She expressed no surprise — went straight for the command radio. “Tracker Lead, this is Tracker Three-One, we have unknown units at the south edge of the AO. They're positioned to intercept the second convoy." 

“Copy that, Three-One." Pinball's voice was, as ever, perfectly calm.

“What do you want us to do, boss?"

“Stay quiet and circle, Red. I'll ask Nazca."

Nazca — command and control aboard the Margay — remained adamant. They were not to fire unless fired upon; the convoy was only ten kilometers out by the time they were even authorized to inform the PMC of the impending ambush.

Kalija felt a sinking feeling, watching a catastrophe about to unfold. The convoy was mostly composed of civilian vehicles, loaded with the equipment they'd secured. Outnumbered and outgunned, they'd need to find a different way out of the area — and any retreat pushed them back towards the main body of the Territorial Guard, lingering around the campus.

“Tracker flight, egress east to point Watson."

She looked over at Alamo. “Bugging out?"

“Time to go, I reckon." He was clearly thinking the same thing as her: we're just going to leave them there?

“Red, Elvis. If we abandon those guys down there..."

The other Intruder was also dallying before taking an eastern course. “Tracker lead, this is Tracker Three-One. What about the southbound convoy?"

“Red, Nazca says it's not our problem. We're not authorized to engage here."

Kalija switched one of her radios to monitor the ground frequency, listening in. “— contact, just over that hill." “Let's pull back to the last highway..." “And get cut off? Oh, shit, signals — I'm being locked onto, here!" “Button up!" Her ears twitched in agitation. 

“Red, Elvis. Enemy vehicles have decloaked and gone hot."

“Pinball, Red. Hostiles look like they're engaging." Red also referred to the government vehicles as 'enemies' — though officially, of course, they were not. Not yet.

“Not our problem. Pinball, Elvis, turn right zero niner five and link up again at Watson."

“Boss, both of us up here have good solutions. We could take 'em out in one pass before they even know we were here."

“Negative," Commander Putnam answered immediately. “Tracker Three, disengage."

Silence from Red. On the ground net, the radio had become chaotic — the convoy, having refused to stand down, was taking incoming fire from the Territorial Guard. From so far up, it was a little hard to follow, except that it was obvious the civilians and their PMC escort were getting the worst of it.

“Roger, Pinball," Red said, her voice flat. “Pushing Aragon. Tracker Three-Two, form up." 

Kalija couldn't bear to listen to the radio any more, and clicked it off before twisting the Intruder into an easy eastward turn. “Red, Elvis. Your five, trailing ten kilometers." The plains below receded quickly when the attack planes picked up speed, leaving it behind. Dark green ocean stretched ahead.

“Tracker flight, we're clear of the red line. Fence check."

Six Kraits were slung beneath the A-17's wings; four rocket pods. A sensor array that could thread a Krait through the peephole of a basement apartment snuggled up under their belly. ECM designed to defeat the most accurate surface to air missiles tipped each wing. 

She turned them all off, and switched the maneuvering thrusters out of combat mode. “Tracker Three-Two, fence out."

A few minutes later Pinball called Tracker flight “out of play" as they climbed back for orbit — for the first time the throttle impulse of the Rolls-Royce engines felt less like a testament to the power she commanded, and more like a means of running away.

“What was that?" she asked Alamo. The planet was darkening beneath them as they streaked towards nightfall — already there was nothing but pitch black around the cockpit. “We just left them?"

“Yeah."

“Why? They didn't pay enough?"

“Don't go carin' when it ain't your job," he said, but his heart wasn't in the admonition. “Sure we'll find out soon enough." 

But what was the point? What was the point of putting nearly twenty starfighters through the stress and toil of an orbital sortie for nothing but show? “Just seems like a... a waste."

“Keepin' the peace, Elvis," Barton Glenn sighed. 

“Some 'peace.'"

“Oh..." He laughed — in the dark, ominous way he sometimes had. “Don't worry. They'll figure it out soon enough."