Missing in Action

  Or at least…part of me misses him. Another part of me wonders if he ever existed at all.

  i.

  Topez Anat—red-skinned, round-jawed, with an open and eager face—was a young Thallonian whose father had served the House of Cwan. And his father before him had served it, and his father before him, and so on for as far back as anyone in the Anat family could possibly remember.

  The Thallonian Empire had collapsed, and Si Cwan had gone into exile, shortly before Topez Anat was to turn of age and begin his service in whatever capacity the House of Cwan wished him to. Naturally Topez Anat had had nothing to do with that collapse, and could not have prevented it no matter what. Nevertheless, despite the irrationality of his belief, he felt as if he had somehow let down his father and all those before him. They had served; he had not. The reasons didn’t matter. Only his failure to follow in their footsteps did.

  So Topez Anat was gleeful beyond his ability to articulate when New Thallon was established, the Protectorate formed, and Si Cwan put in place as Prime Minister. Topez Anat had been among the first to report for duty. He had knelt before Si Cwan, held Cwan’s hand reverently, and sworn allegiance. He was gratified to learn that Cwan remembered his ancestors’ service quite well, and had always thought fondly of the efforts they had made on behalf of the House of Cwan. Topez Anat had practically been apoplectic with joy upon learning that. The first—and only, as it turned out—meeting that he had with Si Cwan ended with him on bended knee saying reverently, “I pledge you my life and honor, my prince.”

  Not long after, Topez Anat had received his assignment. He was to work at Building Three of the planetary defense grid. At first he had been a bit disappointed over this notion, because he’d hoped to be serving Si Cwan directly in some sort of capacity, such as personal guard. Furthermore, with New Thallon at the heart of a vast systemwide alliance, it seemed pointless. Who would attack them? But he had offered not the slightest word of protest, since that would have been unworthy of his family’s proud tradition of service, and instead taken up his monitor responsibilities with due diligence.

  It would have been overstating it to say that Topez Anat was happy that civil war was brewing. Obviously peace and tranquillity were far preferable to the long-term good of the Thallonian Protectorate. But almost overnight he had gone from having a boring, dead-end job to being one of those charged with the responsibility of protecting the entire planet.

  The truth was that most of the monitoring process was automated. Topez Anat didn’t have to make any decisions as to identifying incoming targets, putting up the defensive grid, or opening fire. That was all done via computer. Topez Anat provided the living eyes and mind to monitor the computer and made sure that everything was functioning as it was supposed to. He was the flesh-and-blood fail-safe, as was the case with the other monitors at the other stations.

  Still, his was an important job. A vital job. And the reason he knew that beyond any question was because Lady Kalinda herself had said so.

  As he went through his routine duties on his last day of monitor duty, he was still shaking his head in wonderment over the encounter. There he had been, going about his business, and all of a sudden, the lady had shown up. He was astounded to be that close to her, as if she were just a normal person.

  Her smile had been as dazzling as he had heard, and when she spoke, it was like bells chiming. “My brother,” she had told him, “has sent me on a secret inspection tour. He wants me to make certain that everyone is particularly vigilant. Not that I think that’s a problem with you, Topez Anat.” She had reached out and gently run a finger along the line of his chin. He had trembled at her touch. “You are clearly taking your responsibility most seriously.”

  He had assured her that that was the truth. He had shown her the entire facility. He had watched in silent, trembling excitement as she had sat down in his chair to inspect the systems herself, and contemplated what it would be like knowing that henceforth he was going to be sitting in a chair upon which royalty had sat.

  Topez Anat reined himself in. It was inappropriate to think such things, and he would do everything he could to eliminate them from his mind.

  Even so, he still fancied he could feel the warmth of her as he sat in his customary station. He, along with everyone on New Thallon, was aware of the abuse that her new husband had tried to inflict upon her. Tiraud must have been mad. That was the only explanation. How could anyone try to bring harm to someone so perfect? Topez Anat’s only regret was that Kalinda had already dispatched the bastard. He would have given anything to be the one who attended to it.

  Indeed, he was in the midst of concocting an entire scenario in his head wherein he, as part of Kalinda’s personal guard, had heard a ruckus within the wedding night chamber and burst in to discover Tiraud abusing Kalinda. He saw himself charging forward, dispensing with the brutish Nelkarite, and the grateful Kalinda looking up with wide, limpid eyes and saying, “What is your name, brave soldier, to whom I am so grateful, and are you doing anything tomorrow night?”

  That was when he heard the explosions outside.

  Alarmed, he flipped on an exterior monitor and his jaw dropped in horror as blazing red spheres—pulse bombs—fell from the skies by the dozens. Outside the monitoring stations were the vast, hundred-feet-high ground cannons that were aimed toward the sky, ever vigilant. If some enemy came remotely close enough to New Thallon to drop any sort of bombs from orbits, as now seemed to be happening, the computers would have signaled the alarms, activated the defense grid so that none of the bombs would have gotten through, and then proceeded to blast the originating intruders out of space.

  But the guns remained silent, the defense grid inactive, and Topez Anat’s computer was informing him that it was a bright, sunny day and there was no imminent threat at all.

  For half a heartbeat, Topez Anat was almost ready to believe that his eyes and ears were deceiving him. The computer was right and his own senses were wrong.

  That was when the first of the pulse bombs struck home, blasting apart the farthest gun. Several more bombs hit as well, and the gun began to tilt and twist with a rending of metal, which let out an agonized scream like a thing alive.

  The pulse bombs continued to fall, blasting apart cannon after cannon.

  Topez Anat tried to alert the other defensive stations on the grid. Nothing. The computer didn’t send out any sort of warnings to the other stations. It simply sat there and tried to convince him that he wasn’t in danger.

  That was when Topez Anat realized the steady, scythelike exploding track of the bombs was drawing closer and closer with each passing second. In no time at all the guns would be gone, and the horrific pounding would fall upon the bunker within which Topez was huddled. Either the ship above was moving along with a sense of inevitability, or it was just maintaining its position and the planet’s own rotation was bringing Topez Anat’s bunker directly toward its doom.

  He knew at that moment, without the slightest uncertainty, what his duty required him to do. He was to stay at his post, to continue trying to contact the other stations and alert them, to find out what was going on and solve it if possible. That was what his father would have done, and his father before him, and so on back down the line.

  But his panicked gaze flickered from the computer screen—which was still telling him that everything was fine, thanks—to the sight of yet another massive gun exploding. Before he even knew what he was doing, he was on his feet and out the door, running as hard and fast as he could. He left behind his post, his responsibilities…everything that he had supposed was more important to him than anything else. As it turned out, though, the most important thing of all to him was his life. His stinking, craven life which he had supposedly turned over to the service of Lord Si Cwan.

  Topez Anat stood there, looking up at the darkening sky, his heart thudding against his chest and his soul shriveling in his heart, and he had only seconds to wonder what he should do. Then he heard a creaking
of metal and looked up just in time to see the last of the massive arrays collapsing without having fired a single shot in its own defense…collapsing right toward him.

  If he’d made the slightest effort, he might have gotten out of the way. He might have survived.

  Instead he threw his head back and his arms wide, his red face streaked with tears, as he cried out, “I have no honor and no purpose. I am sorry. I have failed you, my Lord Cwan and Lady Kalin—”

  That’s when he realized. The image of the Lady Kalinda, seated at his monitor, apparently fascinated by the system. So wide-eyed. So impressed. So flattering. So—

  “She did something to the computers!” shouted Topez Anat. “That has to be it! I must inform Lord Cw—”

  In his shock over his realization, Topez Anat completely forgot about the massive collapsing metal array. When it fell upon him, crushing him to a bloody pulp, he was actually surprised, and had about a millisecond to consider that he had just failed Si Cwan not once, but twice, before blackness took him.

  ii.

  Si Cwan had chosen not to meet with the warlords in the vast chamber that had served as the council chamber for the Thallonian Protectorate. It was too depressing, and only served to remind everyone of what had been lost.

  On occasion he would stand there alone, looking at the empty seats, thinking about how they had a united Thallonian system right there in their hands…and some sort of insane misunderstanding had brought it all crashing down. He would keep running the events of the past days through his head, trying to figure out how it had all gone wrong. How could Kalinda have so completely misjudged Tiraud? How could Tiraud have been such a brute?

  He supposed that it shouldn’t have been completely surprising. After all, Tiraud’s father, Fhermus, was little better than a slightly refined brute. Swaggering, posturing, full of himself, perpetually bellicose. Perhaps it was nothing but folly to think that the two of them, working in tandem, could possibly have kept the Thallonian Protectorate together. Perhaps it was doomed from the start.

  Still…the manner in which it had all disintegrated…

  “My Lord Cwan…”

  Ankar, Si Cwan’s main aide and family retainer of long standing, had entered without Si Cwan’s even hearing him. Since Cwan was typically hyperaware of everything that was transpiring around him, it was an indicator of just how distracted Cwan had been. “Yes, Ankar?”

  “The warlords have assembled.”

  Si Cwan nodded in acknowledgment and started to head out. Ankar fell into step behind him and inquired, “Will you require my further services this evening, milord?”

  “Not at this time, Ankar…although if you wouldn’t mind looking in on my wife, I would appreciate it.”

  “Yes, Lord Cwan.”

  The towering Thallonian kept on going as Ankar headed off down another corridor. Several minutes later, Si Cwan strode into his secondary conference room, where the warlords were assembled. They were seated around a large, oblong table, and were looking up at him expectantly.

  Another war. Why does it have to be another war? The thought went through his head unbidden, and it disheartened him that that was his basic reaction. His father had lived for war, as had his grandfather. It was almost as if they welcomed challenges to their authority, because it gave them a sense of exhilaration to beat all such challenges down. It provided them…fulfillment of a sort.

  They would doubtless have little patience for Si Cwan’s attitude. This is your war, Cwan! Until now, the defining moment of your stewardship over our empire was to be there when it crumbled. You now have the opportunity to make up for that. You have the chance to get all the gnats, all the ants that crawl through Thallonian space as if they are your equals…you can crush them all beneath your boot.

  He knew he could. It wouldn’t take all that much effort; Fhermus didn’t present much of a threat to him, despite the fact that he had gathered some aggressive allies to his cause. There was no doubt in Si Cwan’s mind that, in the end, he would triumph.

  But what was the point? What was to be served by standing there with his foot upon the throat of his enemy?

  There is no point. It is an end unto itself.

  His heart wasn’t in it, though. That was the dark and terrible truth of it. He thanked all the gods there were that his father and grandfather were no longer around, because he was certain they would see through whatever words he might offer and perceive the sorrow that hung over him like a shroud. They would have seen his chance to annihilate an arrogant enemy as a chance to reestablish himself, but all he could see were the lost opportunities.

  Fortunately the warlords weren’t as perceptive. Instead they merely saw their leader, the regal and confident Lord Si Cwan, gathering his thoughts before addressing them.

  Most of them weren’t there, of course. To be exact, only four were there at that moment. The rest were attending via video-conferencing technology. They were the ones who were back on their worlds, still working on assuring skittish populaces that they had—to use an old Earth term—backed the right horse. From what Si Cwan understood, it was a difficult sell in some instances. A number of worlds wanted to stay out of the situation altogether. It was the job of the warlords to convince them that neutrality was far less preferable to forging firm alliances with the eventual winner.

  There was certainly a good deal to discuss with the warlords. Si Cwan had been putting together an attack strategy, determining how best to deploy the forces at his command. To go from a state of peace to a state of war was not an overnight endeavor. It required time, planning, careful consideration. He needed to anticipate what Fhermus would be expecting and do, instead, the unexpected.

  He was satisfied that he had managed to accomplish this.

  “My friends,” Si Cwan began, “thank you for coming. I—”

  The explosion that struck the imperial residence was so violent that it knocked everyone either off their feet or out of their chairs. Several of the warlords immediately ducked under the table, seeking refuge, as large pieces of the ceiling plummeted from overhead, smashing against the heavy stone table and shattering.

  A chunk fell straight for Si Cwan, and he threw himself back to get out of the way. It shattered right where he’d been standing. He had fallen on his back, but instantly he whipped his legs around and brought himself back upright. “Run!” he shouted, somewhat unnecessarily; the warlords were already in the process of doing so, falling over one another or pushing each other to get out of the way.

  The video screens flickered and went out. Si Cwan couldn’t even begin to imagine what they must have thought was going on, although if they assumed that New Thallon was under attack, it was probably a pretty safe guess.

  How?! How?! Where was the planetary defense system…? thought Cwan.

  There were screams in the distance, screams coming from all over the vast residence. Retainers, servants…

  Kalinda? Robin? Were they all right? What the hell was happening?

  The assault didn’t stop. Explosion upon explosion rocked the area, blowing out walls, crumbling ceilings. Statues that had been carved centuries ago were knocked to the ground and shattered, and priceless paintings were buried beneath collapsing walls.

  Si Cwan didn’t even remember getting out of the room. The next thing he was aware of was pounding down the corridor, shouting instructions to whatever servants he could find. Everyone was bewildered, staggering around, looking to him for answers. But his words were drowned out by more explosions. Suddenly Si Cwan felt himself being lifted through the air, propelled by the concussive force of yet another bomb. He tried to catch himself, to hit the ground properly and roll, and then there was another detonation, even closer this time. Si Cwan slammed up against a wall with almost bone-crushing force, and he slid to the ground. Instinctively he threw his arms up and around his head to protect himself as an entire section of the wall fell upon him.

  He lay there, breathing hard, trying to shove debris off himself. Th
e side of his face was wet with blood. He hoped that it was merely the result of a huge gash rather than that, say, the entire top of his head had come off and he just didn’t realize it yet.

  There was, however, something he did realize.

  This was a massive display of firepower, and not only that: Somehow a plan had been executed that had rendered the planetary defenses powerless. This sort of thing was not assembled and executed overnight.

  This had been planned. By Fhermus.

  It had been planned for a while. Planned long before the falling-out between Fhermus and Si Cwan that had led to this civil war.

  There, buried beneath debris, with the sounds of screams still ringing in his ears, Si Cwan came to the conclusion that the death of his son had not driven Fhermus to attack New Thallon and try to obliterate Si Cwan. Instead, his son’s death was merely the excuse. The plan for the attack had always been there. Sooner or later…Si Cwan’s great ally, Fhermus, was going to try and destroy him.

  It had simply turned out to be sooner.

  iii.

  Ankar was dodging right and left, trying to avoid the pieces of debris that were hitting the ground all around him. He was wide-eyed with terror, his blood pounding in his ears, and he kept telling himself that everything was going to be all right, that everything was going according to plan. Except that made absolutely no sense, because he could well be killed in the midst of all this, and his getting killed was most definitely not part of the plan.

  He made it to Kalinda’s room, almost being crushed once more in the process, and shoved open her door. He had no idea what he expected to find; there was every chance, he realized, that she might well be dead.

  Instead she was sitting there on the edge of her bed, her hands folded comfortably and resting in her lap. There were chunks of debris around her which had obviously fallen from overhead, but apparently they had avoided hitting her as if they had eyes.