Free Sky Hunter by Chris Reher

those
charges done?”
    “ Yeah. Under my knee. Get anything
useful?”
    “ Not much. Air Command is sniping at
the front line to keep them busy but the bombing has stopped.
Rebels keep shoving civilians and Rhuwacs at them. We’ve seen this
before.” She looked at her hands that burned and had turned rough
with the use of the harsh disinfectants. She had seen battle and
she had been part of it. What she had not seen were places like
these, hidden away behind the front line where people came to die,
to have shattered limbs removed, to await arrest by Air Command who
rarely backed out of a battle once begun. To know that they existed
was a long way from living in one.
    He nodded and accepted a cup of water.
“Command’s not going to risk pissing off the governors by taking
the town back by force.” He squinted up at her. “No offense,
Lieutenant, but you look terrible.”
    “ Thanks,” she said. She pulled up a
blanket she had found somewhere and curled up beside him. “I could
sleep for a week. What do you think Command will do with this
place?”
    “ Wait them out, maybe. Cut off food
supply. By now they’re probably evacuating as many of the locals as
possible. Could end up dropping a little dust if the weather
clears.”
    Nova groaned. The dust he referred to would,
when dropped from overhead, blanket the town in a relatively
fast-acting aerosol drug that would temporarily incapacitate rebel
and civilian alike. Its effectiveness depended on how intent their
enemy was on taking revenge on the locals before succumbing to it.
She had been deployed for that tactic just last year, over
Tannaday. It had left her feeling intensely unclean.
    “ It’d be a last resort,” he said. “They
won’t like the idea of more coilers in here somewhere and the storm
isn’t going to let up for a while. We’re definitely looking at
no-fly. Did you get anything useful from the rebels?”
    “ Not much. Sounds like they’ve pretty
much used up the Rhuwacs they brought. The tether hasn’t been
compromised but that’s no surprise. Someone said that one of the
transformers got blown, though.”
    “ Any objective?”
    “ Same crap. They’re trying to get
Bellac’s governors to give up on the Union. Refuse the alliance and
keep the jumpsite neutral. Without a Union relay station at the
gate. As usual, they’ve got nothing to bargain with.” Nova closed
her eyes but an image of a little girl that had come in earlier
kept appearing behind her lids. There had been blood in the stiff
little braids on the child’s head. “I have no idea why this blew up
today, though.”
    “ Yes, seems odd. Unless someone really
fouled up, I don’t see the win here.”
     
    * * *
    Nova awoke a few hours later to the sound of
roars and curses outside. There were no windows at this end of the
building but she made out Rhuwacs and the voices of their handlers.
She pulled her blanket over her head for a moment to block the ugly
noise, hoping what she was hearing didn’t mean the end of a
captive’s bid for escape.
    She sat up, eventually, blinking and rubbing
eyes that stung from exhaustion and the dust still hanging in the
air from last night’s storm. The light of dawn had found its way
into the hall and some of the others moved among the injured,
waiting for their turn to sleep a little. She rose and bent over
Sergeant Reko. But he had not awoken to the noise and when she
touched his face it was hot and dry. She cursed quietly and checked
his injury.
    “ Morning, Sunshine. How is he
doing?”
    Nova looked up when Djari joined her. He
didn’t look like he had slept much these past few hours, either,
but his striking smile seemed to brighten this corner. “Got
infected,” she said and bit back another profanity. For some reason
it seemed to her that this man probably didn’t care much for foul
language even among soldiers.
    He checked Reko’s temperature by touch.
“Maybe today we’ll get out,” he said. “It’s been quiet.”