14
Norfolk
Skye
12 October 3134
An icy breeze blowing in off the distant North Inlet carried a hint of brine and the sharp, acrid smell of gunpowder into Norfolk. In the shadow of a partially completed Overlord, Tara Campbell pulled her wool overcoat tightly closed at her neck. She walked the edge of the DropShip’s “cradle” with Paladin McKinnon and Legate Eckard, ten stories up, surveying the nearby battlefield and the hive of activity that buzzed through the streets surrounding the Shipil Company dockyard.
It had taken less than an hour on-site for Tara to understand that the dockyards were the reason Norfolk existed. Its industrial center was twice as large as it would be for any similar-sized city. The commercial sector half again as small. There were no office building skyscrapers or high-rise apartments. Since nothing could compete with the thirty-story vessel under construction, the massive cradle that surrounded its lower third, or the multifactory complex nearby that required six months to turn out just one interplanetary drive for the mammoth vessels, no architect or construction company even tried.
“A people who know who they are,” McKinnon said when she voiced her observations. From the cradle’s north corner, they could look west toward the recent battlefield and, several kilometers beyond, the azure blue waters of the North Inlet, or east toward the low-lying sprawl of Norfolk. His hard eyes narrowed. “And now they know what they are.”
“A prime target.” Tara nodded.
Yesterday’s Jade Falcon raid had pushed no closer to the city than the borders of Shipil Company property, but that was close enough for most of the locals. So many had called in to take the day off from work—laying in provisions or moving their kids to relatives far outside of the city or just plain worried for themselves—that the corporation had dismissed everyone with pay for forty-eight hours.
Very few civilian vehicles moved on the streets. Tara easily counted two dozen Maxim hover transports, patrolling with a hastily scraped-together militia. A Praetorian rolled into the Shipil parking lot, establishing a local command post. A pair of Drillson hover tanks and SM1 Destroyers flanked the mobile HQ.
Tara pointed out a gap in the snow-dusted hills to the west. As she had hoped, the cradle gave them an incredible overview of the surrounding terrain.
“So they came through there in column formation. One Griffin leading a short company of hovercraft. The local defenders took a piece out of them just this side of the gap.”
Legate Eckard raised a set of field glasses to his eyes, nodded. “Shipil Company keeps a small mercenary force under contract. Last month I supplemented them with a lance of Condors and a Kinnol main battle tank.” Eckard was a small man, but had a bodybuilder’s shape. There was no mistaking the knuckle-whitening strength with which he gripped the field glasses. “If they had been on the ball, they would have plugged that gap with the Kinnol and shoved the Falcons right back toward the coast.”
“While we’re wishing,” McKinnon said with a nasty edge, “if they had been veteran troops, we’d be counting up Jade Falcon salvage right now.”
“So the defenders retrograde back toward the industrial area,” Tara continued, keeping the peace by drawing both men back to their purpose at Norfolk: to assess damage and make preparations for any follow-up raids. “They lose a pair of Condors crossing the river.” She couldn’t see the silver-blue stream they had visited earlier, but a winding cut in the woods to the west gave her an idea of where it was. “And they set loose some Gnome infantry in the forest to slow down the Falcon advance while they reset the lines right out there.”
Right out there was the wide-open ground where local tree farms had been harvested only a year ago. Several square kilometers of bare-branched saplings tied up to stakes, blackened craters, and burned-out vehicles.
“More room to maneuver,” Eckard said.
Sire McKinnon snorted. “More room for the Falcons too. You can’t stay on the defensive against a small, maneuverable force.”
Tara watched as a VTOL snaked its way down the river’s twisting cut. It dipped down low, beneath the treetops. “And a small force had no hope of taking the Shipil Company dockyards. So was this simply an intelligence-gathering raid? Or did the Jade Falcons hope to accomplish something more here?”
“They had a J100 salvage vehicle. They might be trying to replace some losses of their own.” But the legate did not sound too certain himself.
The Paladin turned his weathered face toward the city’s main stretch, then turned to look up at the DropShip that towered over them. Not all of its armored hull was in place yet. There were still weapon bays to finish and a docking collar to install, but engines and navigation were intact according to all reports.
“Could be they were thinking of grabbing the Overlord and fell back when they saw it wasn’t quite spaceworthy. Afraid we’ll get it finished and deployed before they make it back in force.”
“We will,” Tara promised. She wasn’t about to let such valuable hardware sit there for the Falcons to claim as battle spoils. Isorla, they called it. “We need to advance the manufacturing lines at Cyclops, Incorporated, as well.”
It was more a mental note than an opening for a new discussion. Neither man commented. Sire McKinnon continued to study the DropShip, the towering cranes that rose up from three corners of the massive cradle complex, and the work that would remain unfinished by the crews for the next day and a half. Legate Eckard focused his glasses on the VTOL, which jumped up over the tree line and skimmed above the nearby battlefield. A Cavalry, the craft had sharp lines that pulled back severely from the missile systems that blunted its nose. It thundered straight for the trio, as if intent on finding them, then banked into a long, slow turn that circled it back over the killing grounds.
“Company?” she asked. She shivered as the wind ran icy fingers through her spiked hair.
“Jasek.” Eckard waved a dismissal. “Never was one to be content with reports. Della’s been complaining about his people in the New London Tower, pulling every battlerom we’ve collected from the Jade Falcons’ first assault on Skye.”
Tara could understand that. Prefect Della Brown had a larger grudge against Jasek than anyone had, save perhaps his father. Legate Eckard had lost a handful of troops to Jasek’s Stormhammers. Brown had lost nearly the entirety of the prefecture’s standing army, and then had watched as the Jade Falcons rolled over worlds unopposed.
“We could do worse than listen to a fresh perspective,” Tara said, shading her own reservations with a touch of optimism. A large part of her position here as Exarch Redburn’s direct representative seemed to be bridge building. If Skye had any hope of standing free from the Jade Falcons, Tara could not allow demons from the past to set fire to her carefully constructed work.
Eckard lowered his field glasses. “I hear he’s been tearing into your plans for a counterassault as well.” The legate looked at her with curious brown eyes.
Why should that surprise her? She had copied the Stormhammers on plans she’d put together with Paladin McKinnon, hoping to draft them into her upcoming operation. So Jasek Kelswa-Steiner had some criticism to offer. So what?
So what if she wanted to bridle right there in front of the legate and Sire McKinnon, who now gave her the same careful attention he’d spent on the DropShip a moment before? Studying her. No doubt seeing the parts that lay open, unfinished, with work delayed by circumstances beyond her direct control. McKinnon knew a few of the areas that lay exposed, but he had avoided poking at them again since that evening in the O-club, and he didn’t say anything now.