Date Point: 12y10m2d AV
HMS Sharman (HMNB Folctha), Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Technical Sergeant Timothy “Tiny” Walsh
Gaoian gravball was a different game to human gravball. Gaoians just couldn’t take the crushing impacts that humans could, so their version of the game was a high-speed balletic display of aerial ninja-fu. It was graceful, it was rapid, it was difficult to follow… and Daar crashed through it like a truck through autumn leaves. The Whitecrests shook their head at his lack of grace but there was no denying his scores—he and Faarek almost invariably led the pack.
Daar was so pleased with himself, too. Every match, he came away panting and happy and affectionately teasing his ‘Cousins’ for getting out of his way. Only Thurrsto, the Whitecrest answer to a Protector, ever tried to meet him head on…And with practice, he was getting better at figuring out exactly when to do his bug-on-a-windshield act and knock the charging Stoneback off course.
It was good to see him back to his usual bouncy aggressive happy self. Daar had finally been inducted into DEEP RELIC only a month previously, and had spent that month wrestling with his conscience, his sense of duty, his sense of outrage, and the clear and bulletproof rationale behind not acting on it…yet. He’d torn a few training dummies apart with his bare bear claws, worked Walsh over really well on the mat, recovered, then went off to the burgeoning Stoneback farm some miles out of Folctha to do a Naxas cull.
He’d come back with a hundred kilos of fresh meat and with his coat washed but still reeking of blood to a degree that even a human nose could detect. Another reminder that Gaoians really weren’t fluffy.
At least they got some interesting food out of the deal. Naxas had a deliciously smoky, gamey quality that went strangely but well with its texture, which was more like that of a firm, meaty fish. Rich and light at the same time, so ‘Horse had made tacos.
That had been the pattern for weeks in fact, as he’d slowly worked through his conflicting responsibilities. He’d still been Daar, and when distracted he’d been great fun to have around…but it was nice to have him cooled down and not in a constant low-grade rage. The gravball games and the upcoming mission seemed to have burned the last of it out of him. He’d thrown himself into the game with unusual vigor this time, the Whitecrests had responded in kind, and the pack of them had emerged from the game chattering excitedly.
They all hated their helmets, though. They seemed to rub the wrong way and even once the Gaoians had extracted their ears from inside those hated head-buckets, their ears would be flicking randomly for half an hour no matter how much they scratched. In Daar’s case especially, those huge wolfish pointed ears flicking away and being scratched reminded Walsh so much of his old german shepherd that it was honestly distracting.
Naturally, Walsh was cheering for his buddy in every game, and coaching him afterwards. “Reckon Thurrsto’s getting better at intercepting you…”
“Yeah!” Daar chittered somewhere in the bass as he scrubbed at his scalp again for a second. “He nearly got away this time!”
They were among the last into the briefing room, which was already full of men just filling the seats, the corners, favored spots on the floor, or just piling on top of each other. Regaari sprang easily up onto Warhorse’s shoulders the second they entered the room, and once Daar and Walsh had squeezed themselves in there was barely enough space left over for the door to close.
Why the HEAT of all things had such a comically small briefing room just proved a well-documented and universal irony of military service: What the unit needed was almost always exactly the opposite of what it got.
Powell and Costello had a bit more elbow room at the front, on either side of the holographic emitter. Right now it was set to a full-scale map of the whole Milky Way. At a nod from Powell, Costello stepped up to deliver the briefing.
“Alright, Operation ZODIAC KEYHOLE. Coombes, Walsh, this one goes back to Egypt for you guys. Operation EMPTY BELL generated actionable intel about Hierarchy infrastructure and operations, specifically the existence of a communications…node, or relay, something like that, located at coordinates in the Messier 24 object.”
His galactic map rushed in to focus on the object in question, a cluster of stars three hundred lightyears across. “We have an intel source who tells us that this device, or facility, will be a good access point to the Hierarchy’s networks. Our intent at this point is to infiltrate, monitor, intercept and, if possible, invade the network. All of this must be done covertly, and that in turn will require several advanced skills. The purpose of today’s meeting is to determine which skills we already have in place, and where additional training is required.”
He clicked his button, and a straightforward white screen came up: a “smartboard” projection that he could write on with a finger, complete with haptic feedback. He quickly scrawled down five columns: Daar, Coombes, Walsh, Hoeff, HEAT.
“Daar. Your skillset is the least well-documented, you don’t have any of the formal certifications I can look at for the other three. I need to know exactly what proficiencies you claim to have, and which you feel able to acquire.”
Daar’s ear flicked again, and he made a visible effort not to scratch it this time. “Uh, I’ll get my training file sent over then, but if I suppose y’want me to fill in that board?”
Costello stood aside and gestured for him to step up.
“Well, uh, I’ll start with my formal education I guess…”
It was an impressive list. Daar’s handwriting was blocky and amateurish, but his resumé was anything but: He had a broad base in construction, industrial and primitive agriculture, landscape engineering, mining, and large-scale industrial management. Costello occasionally stepped in and highlighted a particularly relevant skill. Sometimes he even plucked a copy of a word off the screen and dragged it onto his own tablet.
“How about your military qualifications?” he asked, after a minute or two.
“Initiate of the Third Ring, Brother of the Rites, advanced instructor at Combat School, Master of War from Clan Highmountain, former Warleader of First Fang.”
Walsh had absolutely no idea what most of that meant, but the two officers both raised their eyebrows and several of the Whitecrests inclined their heads at Daar.
Powell cocked his head, intrigued. “Combat school instructor? Why haven’t we seen that?”
“Remember how First Fang ran their scenario?” Daar shrugged. “That’s the kinda thing I taught. Didn’t seem like something you’d want us practicing on each other.”
Walsh noted the susurrus that went around the room. He hadn’t been there to witness the now-legendary joint Human-Gaoian military demonstration for the British Prime Minister, but he’d heard all sorts of excited rumors about it from his friends across the combat arms. Word spread fast and First Fang in particular had gained some enthusiastic admirers on the Internet forums. Words like ‘brutal’ and ‘effective’ were bandied about admiringly.
Powell’s reaction was as understated as only a Brit could be. “…No issues there, then,” he grunted. “Weaknesses?”
Daar’s ears fell slightly, and the Whitecrests immediately fidgeted. Gaoians were not comfortable with admitting their weaknesses in any field, and even less comfortable watching somebody they respected do it. It was one of their own universal weaknesses, and an impediment to real military improvement: any human serviceman in the Western military tradition was well-conditioned to analyze their own failures, shine a light on them and adapt. Gaoians had a bad habit of flinching away from such introspection.
To his credit, then, Daar sensed the moment was important and soldiered forward.
“Well…okay. You have this saying, uh…‘when in Rome?’ Yeah. Something like that. So, uh, I guess my biggest weakness is prol’ly…okay. So y’know what the real difference between silverfurs and brownies like me is?”
“…Cousin…”
“Nah, they gotta know this about us, Regaari. It’s important.”
Daar looked to Powell, who nodded encouragingly. He took a moment to gather his wits and tentatively stepped into the breech.
“Well…we have some really old stories ‘bout this, but it’s…silverfurs? They’re the ones who advance civilization. Brownies like me, we’re the ones who keep it running. Does that help?”
“A little more straightforward, lad,” Powell spurred him, not unkindly.
“Well…” Daar seemed to give up. “Hell, fuck it. I really…I ain’t much of a dreamer, I’m better at thinking through a problem than around it, y’know? I’m as brownie as can be—” he paused at a quiet whine from one of the Whitecrests. “—yeah, I know we don’t like to talk about it Brother, but that don’t mean it ain’t true. You don’t get any more brownfur than a Stoneback and I am Champion. I won’t pretend to be something I’m not.”
The room held silent on an awkward, pregnant pause. Walsh broke the tension. “Um, maybe a better way to say it is that you’re an engineer, not an architect or an artist. You’d rather do.”
Daar considered and duck-nodded. “Yeah. Engineer, soldier, farmer…something like that.”
Powell gave him a nod, and handed the meeting back to Costello.
“Coombes,” Costello picked up smoothly. “You’ll be team lead on this. You’ll also be second man to the rest of the team, so you’ll need to brush up on everyone’s skills to some degree. Any areas you’re especially keen to work on?”
Walsh gave Daar an affectionate scratch between the shoulder blades, which he returned with a happy rumble and a firm snuggle as the questions did the rounds. It didn’t take long.
“Okay…immediately I can see a hole in our skills coverage,” Costello mused. “Right now, JETS doesn’t have a demolitions specialist.”
“Sounds like one fer Daar, I reckon,” Sikes chimed in. “He’s already got defensive explosives down. Just needs to learn how to cut down a tree with C4.”
Daar wiggled in excitement. “Yeah!”
“…Daar it is,” Costello snorted and made a note on the board. “What else…? Walsh. You’re the intel weenie, seems like the network infiltration is up your street.”
There was a round of laughter and chittering. Walsh wanted to say many painful things about what an impossible billet he’d just been handed, but he chose the diplomatic approach instead. “I’ll do what I can, sir. Not that we know anything about Hierarchy networks anyway…”
“Exactly. You’re no worse off than anybody else would be.”
Firth put on his very best troll-face. “Pff, Hackerman’ll get it done. I got faith.”
This earned him a brotherly middle-finger salute. “Whatever. You’re a terrible flirt! Don’t think I’ll fall for you that easy, I’ve got needs.”
“Pff, you intel types always put out for real men like me.” He grinned ridiculously and the entire room erupted in bellicose jeers.
“Please, you could not satisfy me. You’re just mad Blac don’t let you top him anymore!”
“Like he could fuckin’ stop me.”
“No means no!” Starfall interjected happily. “Why can’t you love me like ‘Horse and ‘Base?”
“Listen, the sooner we get this done, the sooner you two can go roll in the hay, or whatever other fuckin’ euphemism you want,” Costello raised his voice just enough to make himself heard.
There was the small stirring from Murray which presaged him actually speaking and which made people shut up and listen. “Struggle snuggle?” he suggested.
“That sounds about right for Firth,” Costello agreed, earning a flurry of chitters and guffaws. “But not in my briefing, guys…Hoeff, I see you’ve trained as a sensor operator?”
Hoeff nodded with a grin. “And master diver. Both of those come in pretty useful sometimes.”
“Climbing?”
“Ayup, that too. I did the Eigernordwand a few years back.”
‘Horse nodded approvingly. “I always wanted to do that climb…”
Hoeff aimed an incredulous look at him. “…really?”
“Bro. I’m a PJ, remember?”
“Do they even make ropes that could hold you?”
‘Horse rolled his eyes but nodded. “Yeah, you smartass…we special order them, though.”
“They come pre-stretched,” added ‘Base. The Beef Bros exchanged a painfully loud high-five.
“Back on topic,” Costello repeated more firmly, earning the renewed attention of every man in the room, “I think that about covers the skillsets…Daar, you’ll need to get a demo certification. That means either we ship you back to Gao, or we ship you to Earth.”
“Earth,” Daar said instantly. “I can get the training on Gao anytime I want. And it’ll be good to compare.”
“Good.” Costello ticked something off on his tablet. “HEAT of course won’t be seeing action on the ground in this one, but will be held in reserve for emergency evac if things go south. Our training plan over the coming months will reflect that. Walsh, you need to expand your education on sensor emplacement in a big way. Research from ET sources as well as human. Coombes, tag along with everybody’s training, sharpen yourself up as much as you can. Hoeff, you’ll be practising difficult ingress with Colour Sergeant Murray. Any questions?”
“I’d like to take Hoeff out to the cliffs at New Belfast today, sir.” ‘Horse looked the little SEAL over appraisingly. Costello gave him a knowing, wry look.
“Both a training opportunity and a chance to show off, eh?”
“Well, yeah.” The big Protector was wearing his cheesiest, most boyish grin.
“Do it. Anybody else?”
Nobody had anything else to add.
“Right. I’m sure we’ll think of more as we go along, but this is a big enough planning nightmare as it is. We’ve got to do this carefully gentlemen. We have one and only one shot at a clandestine mission, and if we blow it we may never get access to an intel source of this level ever again. I don’t think I need to emphasize how high the stakes are. It may well be both of our civilizations are depending on us, and we are the men who will see it done.”
Powell’s only contribution was to nod, underlining the lieutenant’s words just by being there and not adding to them.
“Good. Master Sergeant Coombes, you and I will get a start on our planning. Walsh, Hoeff, Daar? Continue training with the HEAT until further notice. If there’s nothing else…dismissed.”
Date Point: 12y10m2d AV
Byron Group Advanced Aerospace Assembly Facility, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Doctor Clara Brown
Misfit had picked up a few scuffs and scars on her voyages. A sandstorm on Lucent had dulled her livery, the light of alien suns had bleached her, and extreme changes in temperature had ablated the ablative paint.
A gang of seven men were going over the hull, stripping off the surface material and restoring it. When they were done she was going to be pristine and perfect again on the outside, and the interior was getting the exact same treatment. By the time her crew moved back in, the accumulated dust and wear of eighteen months of use would be all fixed…though if Clara had anything to say about it, the designs Xiù had painted all around their living space would be staying exactly where they were.
Clara’s role was to oversee the actual upgrades. The latest round of technology coming out of her father’s labs, out of Scotch Creek and out of NASA’s JPL had suggested a thousand small ways in which the ship could be improved.
And of course, the computer systems needed replacing in their entirety. A team of serious men in fatigues and berets had stripped out every last device and taken them away under tight security, with Kevin’s blessing. Moses hadn’t liked that and Clara had liked it even less, but Kevin had just made that wry shrug he always used when the Powers That Be were in Don’t-Fuck-With-Us mode.
Oh well. Moore’s Law was still in full effect, and the ship could hardly be harmed by having more sophisticated hardware on board. She’d requisitioned a new set from IBM’s labs up on Ceres, and let Kevin handle the boss.
All of which meant that the crew needed bringing up to date. Allison especially was going to need some additional training, so Clara had eventually marched into the boardroom and dragged the three of them away from their meeting with that animated psychologist “moon laser engineer” Moses had hired. Misfit was going to fly again, and its flight engineer needed to know what was going on under their baby’s skin.
“New supercapacitors?” Allison was reading the summary with interest.
“Yyyup. Seven percent more storage than their predecessors, but we wouldn’t have bothered for just seven percent,” Clara beamed. “The L-series have much better safeties. You know that problem with the SEAF you were complaining about?”
Allison perked up hugely. “You fixed it?”
“Better than fixed it. Lookit the emergency shunt—”
And so on. Xiù and Julian were tagging along and listening with interest, but neither of them had the same breadth of education that Allison did on their ship’s systems. They were familiar with Misfit in different ways and while all three of them could sorta do each other’s jobs, none of them could actually completely replace each other.
They were going over the finer points of an efficiency upgrade to the kinetic thrusters when Clara’s phone rang.
“Ergh, sorry. I told them not to call me…”
“It’s no problem!” Allison assured her, still perusing the upgrade notes.
Clara walked away a few paces before answering.
“Kevin, do you really have to helicopter-mom them?” she asked, by way of hello.
There was a chuckle. ”Shit, Clara. Who pissed in your cereal?”
Clara wasn’t in the mood, but she did remind herself to chill out. “We’re behind schedule thanks to your friends showing up and gutting the whole control system,” she groused. “I hate being behind schedule.”
“The schedule’s indefinite. We don’t go until everything’s ready anyway. Just wanted to check the crew are in the AAAF.”
“Yeah, they’re here. Why?”
”You’ll see.”
Kevin hung up, leaving Clara to barely stop herself from some pointless gesture of irritation like tossing the phone away. She’d had a stressful few days, she didn’t need to compound it by breaking company property. Besides, while Kevin’s mercurial approach to executive responsibility often clashed with her more methodical and process-based approach to her work, she had to admit that it was sometimes a delight.
She sighed, pocketed the phone, and returned to Allison’s side.
She didn’t look around about twenty minutes later when the clang of the hangar’s door heralded Kevin’s arrival, but she did look up at the sound Julian made. It was almost like he suddenly choked on something.
“No. Way. No way!”
There were running footsteps and Clara turned around just in time to witness Julian colliding at a dead run into an enormous hug that picked up the skinny, messy-haired geeky guy at Kevin’s side.
For a heartbeat there was stunned silence from Allison and Xiù as well, before both of them dropped tools—literally, in Allison’s case—and joined the group hug at a full sprint.
It was hard to follow exactly what was going on. There was laughter, there were tears, all four of them were plainly delighted to see each other. By the time Julian put the little guy down his hair was even more completely mussed up than it had previously been, his spectacles were askew and he had lipstick prints on both his cheeks.
Julian kept a hand on the newcomer’s shoulder. “We thought you were dead! When Darcy told us you were still…Where—? What have you been—?”
The object of his outpouring of affection shared a dazed but happy elaborate handshake with him, grinning from ear to ear. “Dude. Long fuckin’ story.”
“Tell it!” Allison demanded. “Lewis, Jesus, when that forcefield went up-!”
“Really, really can’t. Seriously. Sorry, dude.” ‘Lewis’ shook his head looking genuinely torn up that he couldn’t share. He half-turned and gestured to the statuesque gal in the Canucks jersey who’d come in behind him, who was smiling with a shimmer of compassionate tears around her eyes. “Uh…Guys, this is Lucy. Lucy…well, you know.”
There was a round of handshakes. “It’s a real privilege to meet you,” Lucy gushed, obviously only an inch from geeking out. “I mean—” she cleared her throat. “Sorry.”
Xiù waved off the apology. “It’s okay…you’re from Vancouver?”
Lucy grinned bashfully and adjusted her ponytail. “Yeah…”
Julian nudged Lewis in the ribs. “Got yerself a Canadian girlfriend, huh?”
“Dude, that makes two of us. What did I say about you an’ a harem?”
“Careful, Beverote,” Allison told him indulgently, while XIù’s blush warmed up. “You get a free pass this time ‘cuz I’m glad to see you.”
“Right right. Ain’t a harem, it’s a triad,” Lewis waved a hand apologetically. “I get it. Shoulda seen it coming after that night you two had him servin’ drinks while you watched Mulan.”
Everyone grinned, though Julian went noticeably red around the ears. Lucy stepped in and rescued him.
“You can tell them about Kirk and Vedreg, babe,” she reminded Lewis.
“Oh, shit yeah! They’re good. Kirk sends his regards.” There were smiles from the Misfit crew, and Kevin grinned.
“He still gettin’ himself in trouble?” he asked.
“Kirk’s a badass, he can handle whatever,” Allison declared, and got an emphatic nod of agreement from Kevin.
“Less trouble nowadays,” Lewis informed them. “And Vedreg took up baking as a hobby.”
“…Baking? For real?” Julian laughed.
“Oh sure. Dude makes a killer apple pie, too.”
“That…actually, I can see that fitting?” Allison scratched her head.
“Seriously though, where the hell have you been? How long have you been back? What-” Julian tried to interrogate Lewis, but Lewis was having none of it.
“I can’t discuss the details of what my current employment may or may not be, dude,” he recited in a bored tone.
“Okay, so you’re definitely working for the government or something—”
”Dude.”
He packed so much disapproval into one word that it made Julian give up and Clara giggle, reminding them that she was there.
“Oh! Clara! Sorry!” Xiù turned and gave her a mortified smile, inviting her into the conversation. “Lewis, this is Doctor Clara Brown, she designed Misfit.”
“Well, shit. Consider me impressed,” Lewis shook Clara’s hand. “And she’s a beauty, lemme say. Real work of art.”
“You think so?” Clara brightened.
“Hell yeah. All function and no frills, I dig it.”
“Absolutely,” Lucy agreed and shook Clara’s hand with rather more grip strength than Lewis had just demonstrated. “You know it took AEC years to find a troop transport that can do what Misfit can? And you had working interstellar ships for years before you built her.”
“The early ones were off-the-shelf Dominion technology,” Clara admitted. “Only Misfit and Creature of Habit are completely home-grown.”
“Still. Big achievement.”
Clara smiled at the compliment. “Thank you! I’ll pass that along to the team.”
“I wish we could give you the tour,” Julian said.
“No big, dude,” Lewis assured him. “Our shit’s top secret too.”
“No shit?” Allison asked.
“Oh yeah!” Lewis nodded, looking smug and then flinched sideways as Lucy elbowed his ribs.
“Change of subject,” she announced, firmly. “Can you talk about your friends you made out there?”
“Hell yeah we can!” Julian nodded, brightening considerably. “The more people we talk to about them the better.”
“I was thinking…I mean they were really lucky you found them at all. You found, what, two temperate planets out of…how many did you visit?” Lucy asked.
“Seven, total. And yeah: a lot of false positives,” Xiù agreed. “In the end we had to download a copy of the galactic archives to narrow the search.”
Clara was certain that she saw Lewis stiffen excitedly on hearing that, and then remember himself and become relaxed again. She tried not to giggle, and decided that she’d never play poker against the poor guy. It wouldn’t be fair to take advantage of him like that.
“It worked?”
Julian shrugged. “We think so? We picked our next target from cross-referencing the archives with our nav data, but that coulda just been a fluke, right?”
“Right. Not a big enough sample size,” Lucy nodded.
“The principle seems sound, though…” Xiù gave a small shrug. “I guess we’ll know for sure if and when we get back to exploring after this stuff with the People is…” she trailed off and looked to Allison and Julian, who nodded.
Kevin cleared his throat. “That’s a question for a lot later on,” he said. “Clara, why don’t the four of you show these two some of the non-sensitive stuff? I got a meeting with Mister Williams.”
“About the house?” Allison asked.
“Yeah. He might have a lead. I’ll let you know if anything comes of it.”
Clara nodded. “Okay. One public tour coming up. But Kevin?”
“Yeah?”
“Please don’t make a habit of this. I have a ship to upgrade.”
“Special occasions only, I swear,” Kevin held up his hand, crossed a finger over his heart, grinned infuriatingly and swept out of the hangar.
Clara snorted, then gave the expectant Lewis and Lucy a look up and down. “…Okay. Come on and have a look,” she said, and set about giving them a basic introduction to the ship.
Five minutes later, she was taking notes.
Date Point: 12y11m AV
The Second Ring, Clan Stoneback proving grounds, undisclosed location, Gao
Daar
Daar had never learned how to juggle. He’d tried, after watching Parata innocently keep three water bottles tumbling through the air, but had quickly found himself overwhelmed and fumbling, which about summed up how he was feeling about life in general for the moment. There were a lot of very valuable and fragile things depending on him to catch them.
And the more he learned, the more they multiplied.
For example: He needed to have words with Champion Genshi, especially about what he knew and when he knew it; maybe Daar could glean why Genshi sent him on that inscrutable pirate mission. He needed to egg Grandfather Garl towards a more aggressive recruiting and training effort for the Brotherhood, maybe scrounge up resources and favors to reactivate the retired Fangs, have a social “working hunt” up on the northern plains with the Firefang leadership and ask about a pilot exchange with the Humans…
And all of that was being done on top of shuttling back and forth between Gao and Cimbrean and having to go through the lengthy Cimbrean immigration and customs process every damn time so that he could continue to honour his commitments to the SOR.
Great Father, he had a lot of preparation to do. And quietly, too, so as not to give the chase away. But at that moment he had the most important thing to do: He needed to build a Brother.
And Associate Fiin was a truly rare specimen. “How is he doing?”
Brother Tyal—he actually held the rank of Father, but active Fang members were always titled as Brother—stood alongside Daar as they watched Fiin progress through the first round of trials in the Second Ring. There was so much to learn about the Clan and their doings in the Second Ring, the program front-loaded most of the physically arduous events at the beginning so they could focus on the classwork and field training later on.
Tyal licked at his chops and grumbled happily. “He did very well! Little guy dominated First Ring.” He shared the report with Daar, who perused its results quickly. Impressive, but…
Daar had some concerns.
“He’s Father-damned smart, looks like.”
“He’s maybe as smart as you, my Champion. His mental assay was close enough it’s hard to say who’s ahead between the two of you. He makes me feel like an idiot and he ain’t even trying.”
“Your testing was awfully good too, if I remember right…”
Tyal duck-nodded. “I’m very smart for a Stoneback. I’m even smart for a Whitecrest. But I’m nothing like you, my Champion. I can count on one paw all of the Stonebacks in our modern history who tested as well as you, and one of them is right there.” Tyal gestured at the monitor.
Daar ignored that. “He struggled through the early trials, though. He’s nimble but he’s small.”
“Yeah, but he’s growing fast like any good Stoneback once they’re eating and training properly. You knew he would though, otherwise why else would you have picked him?”
Daar shrugged. “I had a feeling about him and I’ve learned to trust what my instincts say.” He levelled a firm look at Tyal. “Do you think he’ll make it all the way through?”
“I have little doubt. Do you?”
Daar watched Fiin through the remote situation display. He was making very good time on the assault course, even compared with the more physically impressive clawmates he ran with…but they were running with a light load. A heavy assault pack would be difficult for him, Daar could tell.
But as long as they could build him up fast enough…
“He’s smart, and he’s brave, and he’s the right kind of aggressive,” he decided. “He’s almost perfect, I think…”
“Perfect for what, my Champion?”
Daar hesitated. His natural instinct was to share what he knew and what he suspected, and talk out the Most Biggest Problem right then and there. Brother Tyal was their senior Warleader after all, and he was trusted… But Daar didn’t have the authority to share anything about DEEP RELIC. Only Genshi did, and Daar wasn’t so fuzzy-headed as to miss what that meant.
Revealing that secret to a personal liaison of Champion Genshi would be the second stupidest thing Daar could imagine ever doing. Instead he sighed, and fell back on an honest but enigmatic answer that had served him well in the past. “The future, Brother.”
One trait most Stonebacks shared was a difficulty in containing their emotions. They were a passionate breed who had deliberately avoided the taming influence of civilization and had done so with Female approval from the outset. That meant that even a Whitecrest-trained liaison like Tyal couldn’t perfectly control the slight signs of relief in his body language and scent.
Which meant that Genshi had briefed Brother Tyal on DEEP RELIC, and not Daar…who was suddenly very unhappy. Now he needed to play a Game and games like that weren’t very fun.
Tyal tilted his head and flicked his ears forward. “The future?”
It was even worse, because that was a telling question. Daar now knew without any doubt that Genshi had decided to run a collection program against him through his most trusted Brother and, knowing Genshi, had probably found it distressingly easy to convince Tyal to agree. Genshi probably had very good reasons to do what he was doing, good enough that Daar likely wouldn’t hold much of a grudge against either of them…But now Daar’s trust in Tyal was shattered and would need to be carefully re-considered and maybe rebuilt. Nor could that level of internal meddling be allowed to run unanswered. It clawed at the lines that had to exist between Clans.
Poor Brother Tyal, the next little while would suck for him.
Daar looked back at the monitors. Fiin and his small claw had moved on to a large-scale environment puzzle which required good teamwork and strong leadership, and without any prompting or conflict he had fallen quite naturally into that role. It was encouraging, and Daar made his decision.
“Yeah,” he grumbled. “Big changes are coming and we’ll need ‘Backs like him ready and able to lead.” He gestured at the monitor. “Spare nothing and make sure he’s the best he can possibly be, Tyal. Fiin is your number one priority for now. Feel free to tell that to Genshi too, when you two get together and talk about our Future. I’m pretty sure you know exactly what’s at stake.”
Tyal’s shocked expression and the sudden whiff of fear confirmed it. But Tyal was a Stoneback, a full and true Brother of the Rites, and Stonebacks never lied. He owned up to the secrecy without breaking his Oath and earned a small point in his favor. “Y…You are perceptive, my Champion. I will do as you say.”
“Good boy,” Daar growled with no small amount of derision. Tyal could not be allowed to mistake leniency for forgiveness. “You make sure you tell Genshi that he ain’t so close a Cousin o’ mine that I’ll let him put any of my ‘Backs in double jeopardy. He can deal with me directly.”
“…Yes, my Champion.” Tyal responded with an almost defiant flick of his ear. Dumb move. Daar rose to his full, impressive height and let the flash of his claws show his displeasure as he turned around. Tyal was shorter than the Champion and much smaller, and made the mistake of exaggerating the difference when he cringed into a submissive posture.
That couldn’t stand at all. Daar could respect defiance to a point, but not if Tyal was going to ‘pussy out’ at the first sign of disapproval. Before Tyal could react, Daar bull-rushed him into the wall with enough explosive force to drive the breath out of him. Daar had worked extra hard on his speed and reflexes after Highland had so thoroughly and easily humiliated him on the pirate ship, and Tyal had never stood much chance even before then. Now, it was depressingly easy to win and looked more and more like it always would be.
Which wasn’t a nice thought, because Daar realized right then and there he needed a better successor. Tyal was big, brave, and smart, even for a Stoneback, and Daar had invested much quiet effort into grooming him for leadership…but he clearly wasn’t a strong enough personality for the role and that couldn’t be allowed, nor could he be fundamentally trusted. That Genshi could so easily lead Tyal was absolutely unacceptable for a future Champion—
…And maybe Genshi knew that too, and had wanted Daar to see it. He really hated these games.
Oh well. He’d worry about that later. For now he twisted Tyal’s arms, dug his claws painfully into the trembling Warleader’s flesh, and snarled right from the bottom of his stomach. Tyal instantly pinned his ears flat in naked surrender.
Daar was in no mood to be nice; he needed to teach an underling a very painful lesson. With a quiet, almost inaudible growl, “I will not have my ‘Backs keeping secrets underneath my nose, Brother. This is my Clan to protect and it is mine to lead. We are not Genshi’s playthings, I am not his weapon, and you are not his hapless pawn. Do I make myself clear?”
To drive his point home, Daar used a trick he’d learned sparring with Firth to squeeze with a terrible, inescapable pressure which he ratcheted up and up until he felt something about to pop. Tyal remembered his courage and gamely resisted…until he realized he could not breathe. He fought for several seconds before he finally panicked and keened his surrender with the last of his breath. Daar held it a bit longer until Tyal began to go slack, then loosened just enough to let him draw a few pained, ragged gulps of air and get oxygen to his brain.
Understandably, he didn’t respond right away. So Daar shook him a bit to prompt him. “Well?”
Tyal positively reeked of fear but managed to hold himself together. “Y–yes sir!”
“Good,” Daar snarled and quickly stepped back, but before Tyal could recover, smashed the First Fang warleader to the ground with a powerful swipe of his paw. Those terrible claws opened a brutal-looking wound across Tyal’s chest and painted the wall with a slash of spilled blood.
To his credit, Tyal snapped out of his fear-trance and bore the pain with a single sharp whimper, one which he quickly silenced. Daar wasn’t completely without mercy—the least he could do for Tyal after such a humiliation was to give him a decent scar. To his further credit he understood the lesson, made eye contact and submitted with proper respect. Good. No further violence was necessary.
Time to move on. Daar licked his claws clean and looked down at Tyal with a stern and slightly disinterested expression. “Well? Get going. We’ll talk later.”
Brother Tyal, a decorated Warleader of First Fang, one of Stoneback’s most terrifying warriors—indeed, one of the most capable warriors in the galaxy, not counting his human peers—fled from the room with his tail between his legs and a paw pressed to the matted and bloody fur on his chest.
All by itself that failure of personality convinced Daar that Tyal could never be Champion. Sadly, that knowledge came at a high price for both of them. His confidence as a Brother and Warleader could well have been shattered and that would get ‘Backs killed…unacceptable. Nor could Daar afford to replace his Warleader at the moment. He would need to repair their relationship starting tomorrow: mend hurt feelings, rebuild confidence, demonstrate his esteem and somehow renew trust…all things he didn’t have time to do but absolutely could not afford to neglect. He sighed, glanced back at the monitors, and watched. Fiin was…
The galaxy was changing after all, and Daar had spent a long time drilling into his HEAT Brothers that they needed to work smarter rather than harder. They relied too much on their raw ability, just like Tyal. And where had that got him? When confronted with someone far beyond his power, Tyal had folded up with no options, no plan and no hope. The future of Stoneback demanded better than that: It demanded smarter.
Fiin—smaller than any of his fellows but still keeping pace with them even as he naturally fell into a leadership role—was practically the embodiment of that thought uncompromisingly in action. A mixed breed he may have been underneath that thick brown pelt, but his soul—and Daar knew what that word meant better than most Humans did—was pure Stoneback. Maybe, just maybe, Daar was looking at the future Champion.
He would need to Test him again to be certain.