“I understand.”
Tara’s voice was full of a multitude of unasked questions and unstated acceptances, and he knew that she must be thinking of Chang-An burning, and of everything that he would have lost in its destruction. Her blue eyes, bright with sympathetic tears, spoke of kindness, and perhaps of something more. Moved by a sudden impulse—it had been a long time since anyone had offered him a moment of fellow feeling—he moved closer on the couch, then bent his head and kissed her.
She kissed him back.
She was not hesitant at all now, but firm and decisive, like a general seizing a battlefield advantage. He wondered, in a moment of blurry reflection, if such an exchange of mutual comfort had been as long ago for her as for him; then he gave up on analytical thought altogether. His hands were unbuttoning her uniform tunic almost on autopilot; her hands were equally busy undressing him.
The curry burned, and they ended up dining some hours later on flash-heated meals-in-a-box from the Barracks commissary, but they didn’t care.
24
Benderville
Oilfields Coast
Northwind
February 3134; dry season
The narrow road wound southward along the coast from Fort Barrett. At first the task force passed through small towns built up around inexpensive retirement communities for Kearney’s senior citizens and beach houses for vacationers from the continent’s interior. These thinned out as the city fell more than a couple of days’ civilian travel behind. Instead, the road ran between fishing villages next to canning and freezing plants, where rusty trawlers unloaded their catch at the long wharves. Those, too, became further and further apart, until even the paved road gave out, replaced by a one-lane track of sandy clay, graded—it looked to Will Elliot—once or twice a year.
The progress of the task force slowed as the road got worse. Will and his fellow scout/snipers spent most of their time showing around pictures of Anastasia Kerensky to shopkeepers, local law enforcement officers, and (at the suggestion of Will, who was small-town born himself) old people on front porches and small children at play. So far, their inquiries had not produced any useful results—although the children and the elderly, at least, had proved full of acute observations about the doings of their friends and neighbors.
“It’s because they’re the ones who don’t have most of their minds taken up with work and all,” he said to Jock Gordon and Lexa McIntosh over field rations at the noonday break. The rations today featured barley-and-mutton soup from a self-heating can, just the thing for the dry-season heat. “They see things that most people miss.”
“If you can get them to talk,” said Lexa. A reminiscent expression played over her face. “Half the stuff that went on in Barra Station when I was a kid, none of us ever talked to the grown-ups about.”
“That’s because you were a menace to society,” Jock said.
“Still am,” she said. “Only difference is, the regiment gave me a pretty new laser rifle to menace with.”
“I suppose that makes you the expert,” Will said. “So how do we get the kids to open up about things they aren’t mentioning to the grown-ups?”
“Have you considered bribery?”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re not exactly millionaires here,” Jock pointed out.
Lexa gave a scornful snort. “There’s other things besides money.” After a thoughtful pause, she added, “Of course, money almost always works.”
In the event, bribery turned out not to be needed after all. They came that evening to the smallest town yet. Benderville was nothing more than a scattering of decrepit houses plus a combined fuel station and general store. Half a dozen children rode the district hoverbus every day to and from a consolidated school five towns back up the road. The task force halted there for its evening meal at the same time as the school bus dropped off its passengers and turned around to head back north.
Dinner this evening was more self-heating soup, this time chicken and rice. As they had at noon, Will, Jock and Lexa hunkered together in the lee of the Joust tank. After a few minutes, Will became aware of a skinny towheaded kid with his textbooks done up in a string backpack, standing a few feet away and shifting his weight from one foot to the other as he watched the soldiers eat.
When Will caught his eye, the boy turned red and visibly worked up the nerve to speak. “You from Fort Barrett?”
“Aye,” said Will.
“Whatcha doin’ way out here?”
Will glanced at Jock and Lexa. Lexa nodded—go for it, her expression said; this one’s a talker. “Looking for someone.”
“Are they lost?”
Will shook his head. “They know exactly where they are. But we don’t know where to find them.”
The towheaded kid’s eyes got bigger. “Are they bad people?”
“Nasty as they come,” Lexa said, with an evil grin that suggested she knew all about nastiness.
“Oh,” the boy said, in a more subdued tone.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “We kicked them hard the last time. Right, Sergeant Elliot?”
“That’s right, Sergeant McIntosh,” said Will.
To the boy, he said, “We need to know if they’ve come back, so that we can kick them again.” He took out the sheet of paper with the artist’s photorealization of Anastasia Kerensky’s current appearance, unfolded it, and showed it to the boy. “One of the people we’re hunting for looks like this—have you seen her anywhere?”
The boy shook his head.
“You may not have seen her at all, just her vehicle.”
The boy shook his head again. “Nobody’s come this way except you guys.” He paused, and his brow wrinkled. Will could almost hear him thinking. “Does an aircraft count as a vehicle? Because I’ve seen one of those a couple of times.”
Will put aside his can of soup and stood up. “I think the General wants to talk with you.”
“I don’t know—maybe I’d better—”
Lexa snaked out an arm and grabbed the boy before he could run. “Oh, no you don’t.”
“Hey!”
“Don’t worry,” Jock said. “She isn’t going to hurt you.”
“He’s right,” said Will. “Let him go, Lexa.”
Will turned back to the boy. “Nobody’s angry with you, and General Griffin is a nice man.” Moved by inspiration, he added, “He pilots the Koshi.”
The boy’s eyes went to the BattleMech, looming nine meters tall at the center of the task force’s small encampment. “Can I see it if I go with you and talk to him?”
“It’ll be hard to miss it. Come along.”
The boy followed Will over to where General Griffin, his aide Lieutenant Jones, and the company commanders were eating their own cans of self-heating soup conveniently next to the foot of the Koshi. Saluting, Will said, “General Griffin, sir. This young man says he’s seen aircraft.”
Griffin got an eager gleam in his eye distinctly at odds with his spit-and-polish soldierly appearance. “How many?”
The boy swallowed nervously and said, “Only one, both times.”
Griffin said to his aide, “Jones… your data pad.” He took the pad, then tapped and wrote on it with the attached stylus until he had called up pictures of several different aircraft. Will recognized all of them as known Steel Wolf configurations.
“Did they look like any of these?” Griffin asked the boy.
“It’s hard to tell. They were a long way off.” He pointed. “But I think it was that one.”
Griffin, half to himself and half to the boy, said, “Excellent. Now we know we’re on the right track. If there’s anything you’d like—”
The boy’s eyes grew very bright. “Can I see inside your BattleMech?”