By Other Means Read online

  A long, sharp black bear claw lay there. His heart sank. Naiche’s claw. Where had it come from? It had been lost in the fire, it had not been found—

  Then he remembered his dream, his Father, the bear, the Gulo. His mind raced. His heart soared. He gripped the claw and looked into the night sky.

  “Would you like to sit back down, Captain?” Shines Like the Sun said. “Do you need rest?”

  Victorio looked at his lieutenant, at his crew. He shook his head. “No. No rest for me, my friend. Suit up and strike the engines. We’re going to war.”

  Behind him, the Devil Dancers fanned out in Eagle Pattern, the portside of their carrier Justice shielding them from the radiation of the nearby star. It was a bright, white-hot sphere of the Pollux Cluster, a perfect backdrop to the frontal attack called for by Admiral Cho. The enemy fleet sat a mere thousand kilometers away, cruisers and carriers mostly, and they had already seeded the field with anti-matter mines, energy sears, and radiation dampeners. But Captain Victory did not care. He had mapped out the best approach, and in Eagle Pattern, they would fly through the prepared defenses like broad wings in the sky, and the powerful light from the star behind them would give them the advantage.

  “When we clear this field,” he spoke over the comm to Alpha Squadron, “shift to Raven Pattern.”

  “So soon, Captain?” Blue Bird asked. “We don’t even know the enemy fighter positions yet.”

  “Yes we do,” he said. “I’ve already seen it.”

  And he had, twenty days ago as he danced around the bonfire and his brother’s grave. He had seen everything clearly, concisely.

  Shines Like the Sun screeched as his fighter nicked a mine. It ignited and tossed the fighter out of the pattern. “Watch your periphery, Lieutenant!” Victorio said.

  Shines Like the Sun pulled the fighter out of its spin, rejoined the pattern, and said, “Yes, Captain. My apologies.”

  “Stay sharp, people,” Victorio said, tilting his head and shifting the squadron to port. “We do this for Naiche.”

  They cleared the minefield. Before them lay the cruisers Na-Ta-She and Vichu-Pa. The Devil Dancers had fought against these mighty ships before. In fact, they were never seen separately, nor were they ever more than a few hundred kilometers apart in a Gulo capital ship formation. Gulo chatter captured on broadband always grew more steady and rhythmic when these ships appeared on view. There was something sacred, something profound about these vessels that went beyond their military purpose. The Gulo treated these ships with a reverence that, to this day, was not fully understood by Union Intelligence. The fact that they were here, and on the front line, meant that the Gulo were serious. They had staked out their position and had no intention of giving ground. Victorio sensed his pilots’ apprehension at the sight of the enemy cruisers. “We’ve no worries about them, my Devils. Let them have their gods. Our target is much smaller.”

  Scores of red dots appeared on radar. “Enemy fighters, sir!” Red Moon said. “Straight ahead.”

  Gulo fighters did not fly in any defined pattern. Chaos was their pattern. As best as they could tell, there were no squadron leaders or captains in any fighter group. Every Gulo pilot was an individual weapon, whose mission was simply to find a ship that didn’t look like one of theirs and blow it away. They were extremely skilled at that, Victorio had to admit. But it was also easy to exploit their lack of order, divide them and pick them off piecemeal.

  “Raven!”

  Victorio pushed a button on his cockpit panel and the exterior of his Radiant turned pitch black. The others followed suit, and against the bright light behind them, they seemed invisible to the untrained eye, and in the chaotic mass of enemy ships that swirled into view, they would fly in and wreak havoc.

  The formation tightened, closing the wings. “Rockets!” Victorio said and pressed a button on his weapon’s pad with a quick jab of his thumb.

  Six rockets burst from each fighter, screaming through the deadly space between them and the Gulo. Such a large rush of munitions seemed to shock the enemy. They divided, some ramming into their own ships. The rockets spread out and captured the emission trails from Gulo fighters, locked on, hit, and exploded.

  Victorio’s cockpit windows grayed momentarily to protect him from the blast. The problem with Raven Pattern, unfortunately, was that your position was almost always exposed on the first launch of rockets. That’s what Blue Bird was concerned about, but now was not the time for caution. The rockets exploded and their sudden flash of light alerted the enemy fighters to the Devil Dancers’ position.

  Gulo energy beams sprang to life.

  “Scatter!” Victorio said, gunning his engines and rolling right, barreling down swiftly. Such a move was difficult to control, even for a pilot as skilled as himself. He lifted his head sharply to activate the stabilizing rockets so that the ship did not float against the vector too quickly, lose control, and drift aimlessly into enemy fire. Many Devil Dancers had been killed that way over the years.

  Victorio righted his ship and flew into a mass of Gulo fighters. Blue energy zipped around him, scorching his wings, but failing to find impact. He looped twice, flew upside down, tapped his weapons pad, and sent red laser light into an on- coming fighter. But before the beams impacted, Red Moon swooped down and blew the enemy away with a spray of anti-matter bolts.

  Victorio tensed as he burst through the shattered wing of the Gulo fighter.

  “Woohoo!!” Red Moon’s voice filled Victorio’s helmet. He winced at the young man’s screech.

  “That was my kill, Red Moon!” Victorio said.

  Red Moon silenced. “I’m sorry, Captain. I thought you were in danger. I was trying to, I was—”

  “Forget it! Next time, stay out of my frontage.”

  “Yes, Captain.” He paused for a moment, then said, “May I claim its pelt, sir?”

  All activity on the enemy fighter had ceased, and it was falling away. Inside its cockpit, Victorio could make out the brown and yellow pattern of the Gulo’s thick fur, riddled with holes, but still relatively intact. What a lovely display it would make on his wall. Victorio sighed. “Very well, you may claim it. It was a good kill.”

  Red Moon yelped. A tiny missile shot from his fighter and connected with the dead ship, splayed open, flashed red, and began emitting a signal. After the battle, they would salvage the wreck and Red Moon would skin the Gulo on the floor of the carrier bay, cut out its heart, and dance around the carcass. Victorio smiled. It was a good day for the young lieutenant.

  Where are you, Gingu-sha? He was out there somewhere, Victorio knew. Waiting, perhaps, behind the cruisers, letting less capable pilots weaken the Union force before showing himself. “Where are you, you white son of a bitch! Show yourself, or are you too afraid to fight?”

  The comm link was on and the others could hear him, but they dared not speak. Their captain was calling out an enemy, challenging him to fight. They would not give their voices to the challenge, but they would give their support, in any way that he asked.

  “Ganh Pattern!” he said. “I’m the clown.”

  He could sense Blue Bird’s apprehension, her fear for what was coming. Not because she was afraid of the fight. She was one of the bravest pilots he had ever known. But fear for what her visions, her own dreams, had shown her. She pulled her fighter up beside him. They looked at each other through the dim gray. She mouthed words so that they would not be heard across the comm, kissed her fingers and pressed them to the glass. Victorio smiled and kissed her back.

  Victorio gunned his engines, and into the swirling mass of enemy fighters, he flew alone.

  I am the lightning flashing and streaking! Over and over, Victorio mouthed the song, drawing strength from its cadence, its rhythm. My song shall encircle these dancers! In his mind, he danced around a fire, his face lined in red and white stripes. Mountain spirits whirled around him, filling his lungs, his heart, his arms and legs, holding him up, keeping him steady as the enemy’s weapons bo
omed in his wake. A Union fighter alone among the Gulo was a thing of respect, and a Devil Dancer clown always got the respect it deserved. Naiche had gotten it, Victorio remembered. They had parted before him, letting him fly into their midst as if he were one of them. And then Gingu-sha appeared, and the respect and the dance were over.

  Victorio tapped a panel to his right. Radio waves burst from the sides of his fighter in short staccato blasts. The Gulo had extremely sensitive hearing, especially in the high decibel range. Their radios would pick up these blasts and emit the noise through all the fighters until they changed their frequency. It was a short-term solution, but it gave Victorio a moment to work without hindrance. He rolled and tapped his weapons panel. Anti-matter bolts shattered the hull of a Gulo fighter. It ignited the missiles inside and breached the hull. The collateral damage took out another two fighters. Victorio skidded left to avoid the chunks of armor tumbling in his path.

  “Come out, Gingu-sha. Come out, come out!”

  And then he was there, on the radar, a bright blue dot closing fast.

  The Union had customized its radar so that they could tell by color what kind of enemy fighters were closing. Gingu-sha now flew a new model, one that they had experienced only a few times over the past several engagements. Union designated Saw-class for its circular hull with extractable alloy teeth. Victorio gulped. If those teeth connected with a Radiant hull…

  The enemy ace did not give him time to think. He flew across Victorio’s vision cone slow and steady as if he were taking a mild stroll through a meadow. Victorio followed the ship with bursts of laser fire. Nothing connected. He turned the nose of the Radiant up and spun like a screw. Stabilizer rockets slowed the rotation and he dropped, tapped his weapon’s pad and released the last of his rockets. They swirled off-radar, twisting and turning like one massive torpedo, zeroing in on the Gulo’s emission trail. The Saw listed to the left, turned upside down. Scores of tiny needles shot out of the hull and shimmered madly like a swarm of hornets. Victorio watched in awe as each of his rockets, one after the other, fell into the swarm and exploded harmlessly. The Gulo righted his fighter and was gone.

  “Dammit!” Victorio said, gunned his engines and pursued.

  He’s playing with me, Victorio thought. This was the Gulo way, a kind of counting-coup: How many times could Gingu-sha avert death before ending the chase? How many times had he averted death against Naiche? Victorio could not remember. The moments of that fight were fuzzy now, a blur in the mind. You won’t play with me, Gingu-sha. Not for long.

  He followed closely, matching the enemy pilot’s every turn, every twist. Victorio kept his finger on his lasers, short bursts, then long, short, long, keeping the Gulo guessing, uncertain about whether to run or to stop and return fire.

  Blue energy beams slashed out of the Saw’s aft weapon’s pod, singeing the Radiant’s wings and knocking out an anti-matter bolt tube. The strike knocked Victorio away. He rotated his ship to compensate for the blast and tried to renew the chase. But that part of the dance was over.

  He slowed and watched as Gingu-sha looped back on the pattern, the brilliant, smooth silver hull of his round ship bristling with lights and activation queues. “Great mountain spirits,” Victorio said as he waited. He tapped his helmet to activate his comm. “Come and give me strength.”

  Scores of missiles launched toward him like shards of glass. Victorio activated his point defense and nudged his fighter forward, letting the missiles set their deadly path. A cloud of metal balls infused with passive sonar drifted out in front of his ship and created a glistening mesh. He waited, watching the tiny dots on his radar come closer, closer, closer, until he could wait no longer. He activated the mesh, then gunned his ship and turned hard to the right, tumbling over and over as each Gulo missile found a patch of balls and exploded. The shock wave of the strike pushed Victorio further than he wanted. He arched his back and pulled up. The radar screen still beeped with enemy munitions. Damn! The wall hadn’t gotten them all. A half dozen still moved toward their target.

  He flew, pushing his Radiant as fast as it could go. He twisted left, right, until the missiles were lined up correctly to hit his wings. He ignited his fore stabilizers and brought his ship to a halt. He waited, tensed against the impending strike, and closed his eyes.

  The missiles pounded his wings, one after the other like a line of meteors striking a moon. Victorio held the arms of his chair tightly. His security belt dug deep into his shoulders. With each strike he was tossed around the cockpit, banged left and right, as the Radiant lost power and tumbled away like a leaf in a strong wind.

  Then all was silent. The light of the Pollux star lit up his cockpit windows. He could not see, could not hear. The face of his father came to him, his brother, a loud, smoky room where he heard Naiche’s laugh for the last time. A bear. A clown. Earth. Mountain spirits.

  A shadow fell over his cockpit. Victorio looked up. Gingu-sha’s bright, white face was there, arrogant and proud, staring at him again through the cracked glass. His pale tongue flicked, his black teeth popped together. He was happy, Victorio could tell. Joy was a universal feeling. The Gulo was elated by the fact that he had his prey where he wanted him. His red eyes glowed hot and his beautiful, thick fur glistened in the starlight.

  Victorio smiled back. “I know how you feel, brave warrior. I’ve been there before.” He straightened in his seat and mouthed the words though he knew the Gulo could neither hear nor understand if it could. “But you forget who you are facing. I am Victorio “Tomorrow’s Wind” Nantan, Captain Victory, leader of the Devil Dancers, and proud brother to Naiche “Blackclaw” Nantan. We are the lightning flashing and streaking. We are the Ganh. We are the mountain spirits. We are Apache. And we never fight alone.”

  Laser light and anti-matter bolts slammed into the Gulo ship, a relentless array of firepower that blew Victorio back into his chair and knocked his fighter clear.

  Blue Bird and Shines Like the Sun came into view, their fighters swirling, their weapons hot. The enemy ship looked like a pinball as Gingu-sha worked his panels desperately to get away, to fire weapons, to do anything, but it was too late. Rockets launched and slammed into its hull. Fire swept the cockpit. White fur burst into flames. Gingu-sha mouthed a silent scream. The Saw exploded.

  Victorio rested in the dark, cold cockpit of his fighter. He thought about something Father had said, something he had seen in his dreams. ‘The Gulo will sweep the Union away.’ He nodded. Perhaps one day, yes. The war was far from over, and the Gulo were still very strong. But not today. “Today, Father,” Victorio said, reaching into his breast pocket and pulling out Naiche’s black bear claw, “today, your son…your sons, prevailed.”

  Blue Bird pulled up beside him and launched a drag cable around one of his mangled wings. She pulled him close and they looked at each other through the glass. “Cutting it a little close, weren’t you?” Victorio said through his head gear.

  Blue Bird smiled. “Sorry, Captain. We were giving you a chance to win.”

  He smiled, nodded, and looked out toward the battle. The capital ships were closing. Torpedoes were being fired, ion cannons were belching. The war raged on.

  “What are your orders, Captain?” Shines Like the Sun asked.

  Captain Victory breathed deeply, tucked the claw away, and said, “Let’s go home, my Devils. Let’s go home.”

  The Oath

  From the Chronicles of the Radiation Angels

  James Daniel Ross

  The air smelled burned to death, carbon and ozone mixing into an acrid cocktail that whispered ‘war’ to all who knew to listen. The dropship revved engines that further scorched the barren ground as the incoming scream of mortar rounds pierced the sky. The auto-defense turret on top of the Seraphim’s Strike spun almost too fast to track, spitting two hundred centigram finned darts at eight times the speed of sound, swatting explosive shells off their flight paths. A hundred meters below the crest, one remaining Angel grasped at the bel
ts of grenades left by his team, pulling pins and lobbing them high into the oncoming enemy squads. It was a beautiful last stand, but even as the explosive orbs showered enemy soldiers with jagged shrapnel no one could doubt it would be, in fact, a last stand. Though many hid from the grenades, too many more were coming up the narrow ravine to replace the fallen.

  The Angel cursed violently as he fumbled through belt after belt and discovered no more ordnance. The constant beat of detonating grenades came to an end, and he readied his and an abandoned Mk4 21/3 Oberon pulse plasma rifle. Like an action hero, he propped them both over the denuded section of wall that served as cover just as several enemy soldiers decided the grenade rain was over and stood up. With a primordial cry, the Angel depressed both triggers and rode the recoil from the superheated packets of energy as he moved the barrels back and forth blindly.

  When set ‘full auto’ the Mk4 21/3 fluttered the magnetic chamber five times a second, draining one capacitor every time the magnetic bottle contracts, and thus ejecting three hundred superheated packets per minute. There were four hundred capacitors inside the stock of the Mk4. The integrated microfusion power plant could charge one capacitor every two seconds. It created eighty-eight seconds where fires hotter than found anywhere in hell cracked stone, vaporized flesh, and cratered armor. The weapons vibrated within a second of one another, signifying they were recharging, and the Angel dumped them to the ground. He yanked two more from the pile left by his team mates and levered them over the wall as well. This time, he alternated triggers, firing with one till empty, then firing the next, heating pieces of crushed cityscape until they ran like wax, setting plastics on fire, and killing two more soldiers.

  Then, there it was, the sweetest noise to any soldier on the field of battle. The Angel ducked down as the Seraphim’s Strike roared to full power from the top of the steep rubble hill. With eyes tearing up, he watched his team depart for safety and freedom.