"'The CrimCon's satanic motives are apparent to anyone who is familiar with the Legion's horrific orgy of racist genocide against all defenseless non-Outworlder peoples.'" The Assidic trooper was quoting from the d-screen. "'Life under the Variants would certainly be preferable to death under the Legion. We already know what the Legion represents, but all we know about the Variants is what the CrimCon's hateprop apparatus has told us. Inviting the Legion to "assist" us is simply insane. Our only goal should be to stop the killing. And that won't happen as long as the Legion is here.' Are those your words?"
"What does that have to do with anything?" the journalist responded warily. "Have we failed the Legion's political reliability test?"
"Stop the killing, huh? Who do you write for anyway—a journal for the feeble-minded? The O's would like us to stop the killing. It would make it a lot easier for them to slaughter your people."
"We don't know anything about the Variants!"
"Then why are you running from them? Why ask the Legion to evacuate you?"
"Our wife and children are being evacuated. The System told us the Legion would be doing the evacuation!"
"We'll help your family, Systie—but we won't help you."
"Why not!" The journalist was sweating profusely. "It's criminal to split up a family like this! And it's a crime against humanity to sentence people to death for expressing their opinions!"
"Death?" the trooper asked. "Don't tell me you're afraid of the O's? I thought they were preferable to the Legion."
"The Legion has maddened them! It's attacked them! They're only defending themselves!"
"I see. So we're responsible for everyone they kill."
"Yes! Yes! It's the Legion's doing!" He was wild-eyed and dripping sweat. He knew now there would be no evac for him.
"Look, Systie," the Assidic responded patiently. "We don't yet know the outcome of the battle for Uldo. That's why we're doing the evacuation. In the event we lose, at least some of the planet's human population will have been saved. But you have to realize we can only evac a very, very small percentage of the total. Well under one percent. The rest will all die, under the O's, if we lose. And there's nothing at all we can do to change that, if we lose. So you see we are under absolutely no compulsion, moral or otherwise, to evacuate anyone who asks. You've spent your adult life spewing hatred for ConFree and the Legion, and opposing everything we've been trying to accomplish. I can't think of a single reason why the Legion should expend any effort at all to move your fat ass off this planet. I'd suggest you take a walk, and ask the O's to stop the killing. Let me know what they say. Trooper, get this guy out of my sight."
I hustled Fatso back out of the hall, through the frantic mob, and he was screaming epithets against the Legion and demanding justice. Justice! Justice was what he was getting—Systies shouldn't ask for justice. I felt really good when I tossed him out the door. It certainly made my morning.
###
"Nothing on scope," Valkyrie reported. We were all on foot, A&A, carefully picking our way through the glowing rubble of Gadalpa. It had been Uldo's global governmental and administrative center. Now it was a flaming wilderness, scores of massive office mods looming above us under dark skies, enveloped in smoke, burning freely. The O's had been here briefly and the Legion had countered. We were far behind the attack, tying up loose ends until our recon mission was approved. I was on my knees by a tall, smoking stone wall. My armor glowed from the heat. The tacmap flickered on the lower left plate on my visor, and the safeties were off on my E. Valkyrie was right ahead of me, huddled against the wall, and Merlin was immediately behind us.
"It's good news, Thinker," Merlin remarked. "The fact we're here means the O's lost the engagement."
"Then why am I so freaking scared?" I asked him.
"Cover me!" Valkyrie was off, charging ahead in a low crouch into the smoke, then falling onto a pile of rubble. I fired another deceptor and it exploded above her, a shocking phospho burst of dirty yellow smoke, screeching electronic gibberish, showering the streets with hot hail, scrambling our screens.
I ran into the mess hunched over, breathing hard, E up and scanning, boots slamming down onto powdered rubble. Sweety, my tacmod, whispered sweet nothings in my ears. "All clear, all clear, no enemy in view. Systies remain in the records center ahead. Psybloc is close to max."
A fiercely burning aircar, resting on its roof. I hit the dirt behind it, then crawled to one end for a look ahead. The energy field from the burning aircar was a good place to hide. My armor glowed red as the flames crackled around me. I spotted the records center, a massive low building of white stone. Smoke curled out of the doorways.
"Looks like a ten, One." I reported. "No O's."
"All right, gang," Snow Leopard replied. "Our mission is to take that building. And don't forget there's a Systie squad in there. Let's do it." Snow Leopard was up ahead, as usual. He took off, making for the building. I raised my E.
###
"We've been ordered to secure the records center, and relieve any System units here," Snow Leopard explained to the DefCorps squad leader. "Your mission is over." There were six of them, clad in bronze-colored Systie A-suits, armed with SG's. We had found them in a great hall littered with rubbish, filling with smoke. We were all juiced up and had taken firing positions against the walls, centering the Systies in our field of fire. One wrong move and they would all die in a microfrac, torn to bloody shreds. I was already twitching inside my A-suit, my finger trembling on the trigger. I fully expected we would have to kill them.
"It doesn't know how good that sounds!" the DefCorps squad leader replied. "We never thought we'd be glad to see the Legion! Are there any V's out there now?"
"It's clear from here to the causeway," Snow Leopard said. "We were told to ask you to rejoin your unit. They couldn't contact you because of the deceptors."
"It doesn't have to say it twice! We're gone! Let's go, guys! We can hardly believe this! The V were all around us—we thought we were dead!" They hustled out the main entrance. Then the Systie leader turned back. "There's some civs in the vault downstairs—Government people. Out of their minds—they're Cit's problem now. Good luck, Legion!" And then they were gone.
###
The vault was full of smoke. A large fire burned at one end and the air was charged with glowing fragments of ash. Thousands of empty safeboxes covered the floor, and we walked through miniature mountains of datapaks. A muscular man with no shirt wielded a shovel, feeding scores of datapaks into the flames with his every movement. A young Outworlder with thin sandy hair staggered around, his arms full of datapaks and datacards and books. His face was grey with fatigue and beaded with sweat. He paused when he saw us, weaving slightly, taking us in silently.
"The Legion," he finally said. "Perfect. A fitting end. Shoot us," he said. "Please. We want to die."
"We're not shooting anyone," Snow Leopard replied. "What's the sit here, Systie? What are you doing?"
The young man gaped at One in astonishment, then looked around briefly at the smoky fire. His assistant stopped, leaning on the shovel, watching us. The young man wiped his mouth and laughed, turning back to One. "What are we doing? What does it look like, Legion? We're burning history! We're burning books! That's what we're doing! Get back to work, Rigo! You're barely into the Second Millenium. Faster! We can't leave anything for the future. We leave a clean slate for whoever survives. Let them figure it out themselves! We wouldn't want them following our example, that's for sure!"
"Professor!" A girl, face streaked with charcoal, appeared suddenly out of the smoke, clutching a single, leather-bound book. "It's the First Dynasty—the Ancient Books Collection—hundreds of them! Originals! Please let's save them, Professor—please! Nobody will ever know!"