If they are, they will kill me to keep their location hidden. It is what I would do.
“Who are you?” Marie demands.
I try to look tired, beaten, slumped on my rock. Inside I consider which to kill first, and worry that I cannot Change before her bullets rip my human skin to tatters. “I could ask the same of you,” I say.
“But you don’t have a gun.”
I shrug. “Makes no difference to me.”
Her hand tightens on the submachine gun, and I curse myself for the implicit threat. But I have dedicated myself to a role, and I must stick to it. I glare at her glumly, forcing myself to ignore the Changed Javiero still fidgeting behind me. I am the man too tired to care whether he lives or dies, and it is not a hard act to accomplish.
“Let’s kill him and be done with it,” Javiero suggests.
I continue to ignore Javiero. He is obviously not in charge. “Marie?” I ask. “You are from Bava?”
Marie does not move. The man beside her approaches me slowly. He holds his hands in the air, like an animal keeper trying to free a feral cat from a trap. I hold still, allowing him to check my tattered clothes.
“His belt,” the man reports, “is the kind given to Bava rangers. Pants, too.” He backs away from me as cautiously as he came.
“Deserter?” Marie asks. The question is not unkind, and it is directed toward me.
I tighten my jaw, realizing this is not a bluffing game I can win. “I could ask the same of you.”
Marie snorts. “We have no interest in deserters, but you can’t pass this way. Go back the way you came and we won’t kill you.” She lowers her gun and turns away from me, heading up the path while her two companions still regard me with suspicion.
I still wonder who they are. The regular military would execute me on any strong suspicion of desertion. Other deserters would not allow me to live, unwilling to risk me taking their location back to Bava. I dare to hope that I have stumbled on a friendly platoon, and I take a gamble. “I’m not a deserter.”
Marie scowls at me over her shoulder, crosses her arms. “Prove it.”
I search for a way to do that, but my mind is sluggish. “I’m a Changer,” I try.
“Changers desert,” Marie says.
“I am . . .” I hesitate to give my name and rank, as I realize that those won’t help. Anyone can desert. “How long have you been up here?” I ask.
Marie’s eyes narrow in suspicion. “Why?”
“Have you picked up an enemy mayday recently?”
Marie shakes her head, but her companion touches her on the elbow and gestures for me to continue.
“A week ago—no, nine days ago—we air dropped on an enemy cargo plane when they started to move their air base up. They got off a mayday before we were able to secure the plane.”
“And what happened to you?” Marie asked.
“Their pilot sacrificed himself to knock me out the cargo door.”
“Nobody tries air drops anymore,” Javiero growls, reminding me of his presence. He’s moved closer, and I try not to tense. “We have no planes, no pilots, and no runways.”
“Rodrigo is my pilot.”
Marie raises her eyebrows, the muzzle of her submachine gun twitching. For a moment I think she will shoot me, and then she laughs. “Rodrigo. Only that son of a bitch is crazy enough to try an air drop with one of our last working planes.” She purses her lips. “He’s with the Vicuña Platoon, correct? You have both a Smiling Tom and a Changer, which makes you . . .” She seems to search her memory. “Teado.”
I’m surprised she knows my name. “That’s me.”
She glances at her companion. He says, “The story checks out. The mayday said a Changer was on board. And if it was Rodrigo . . .”
Marie shoulders the strap of the submachine gun, letting it fall by her waist. “Stand up,” she tells me.
I allow myself to relax for the first time in over a week and climb to my feet. If they are going to shoot me, I decide, they would have already. There is a niggling doubt in the back of my head but I ignore it. I am too tired, too hurt, too alone to care. They are from Bava and they seem friendly, and I decide I will go with them even if it means my death.
“I am Marie,” she says, then gestures at her hitherto unnamed companion. “This is my cousin, Martin. Behind you is Javiero.”
I shake hands with Marie and Martin. Javiero ignores my offer. He shoves past me and heads up the path with a grunt, stalking along, still Changed. I watch him go, before turning my attention back to Marie.
“You’ve been heading north,” Marie says. There is an implicit question and I decide on a show of good faith.
“Returning to my platoon. The airdrop was quite a long ways from here. I’ve been walking since.”
She gestures for me to follow, and I fall in just behind her as we work our way up the mountain path. “Do you still have a long ways to go?”
“Six or seven miles how the crow flies,” I say. I curse myself silently, frustrated that I gave away our hidden location so easily. I should be more suspicious, even with friends. “Where are we going?”
“To our camp,” Marie responds. “We can give you one night succor, and supplies to see you back to your platoon.”
Rocks turn beneath my bare feet, and goose bumps form on my skin. I remember how soft and vulnerable it is to be human. Luckily I am not so removed from my childhood on the Bavares that I cannot walk barefoot in the mountains.
“Who are you?” I ask, jerking my chin toward the dark figure of Javiero up ahead. “I’ve never seen three Changers together before.”
“Special mission,” she replies. “Special circumstances. I’ll let Commander Paco tell you about it, if he thinks you need to know.” She hums to herself absently, then continues. “I’m surprised you made it this far. That new air base close to Bava has them running patrols all day, and they’ve even got a functional road.”
“Are you here to destroy the new air base?” I ask, even though I know we are far to the north of the base. I am immediately suspicious of conflicting orders, and hope that we—my platoon, and this special group—are able to stay out of each other’s way.
“I’ll let Paco explain,” Marie says.
Before I am able to press further, we reach the top of a ravine and pass over a ridge, and I am suddenly struck by a vision I did not expect this far into the mountains.
In the valley below us is a camp. It is much larger than Commander Giado’s camp, easily four or five times the size. I count sixty motorbikes and dozens of tents before I give up.
Martin taps me on the shoulder, and I realize I have stopped in the middle of the path.
It’s been years since I have seen so many soldiers in one camp, and that was back in Bava—not here in the wilderness, pushing back at the enemy’s foothold in the Bavares. There are cookfires, and the sound of generators, and electric lights. I see several mechanics working through the night in one corner of the valley. I am speechless.
“You have a Smiling Tom,” I say, watching the way the smoke from the cookfires disappears as it reaches the top of the ridge.
Marie nods, tight-lipped. I find my feet and follow her down the narrow incline into the valley. Now that I think to look for them I note tire tracks in the gravel at my feet, and I wonder how such a large venture—moving so many men up here into the mountains—was not reported to us when Rodrigo visited Bava over a week ago. Hell, they could have sent us a coded message to expect reinforcements. It would have raised morale something fierce.
We enter the camp. The few cooks and mechanics out at this time of night stare at me curiously, and I am suddenly more conscious of my bare skin and shredded clothes. Marie disappears into a large, dark tent in the center of camp. I can hear whispers, and she reappears a few moments later with a nod. “Commander Paco will meet you in the morning,” she says, “but he says to give you a tent and something to eat. I think we can find you some clothes, too. He’s pleased that you’r
e a friendly.”
I note that Martin and Javiero have fallen back, but are still watching me. There is some trepidation to their gazes. I try to ignore them. “How did you find me?” I ask Marie.
She leads me farther into the camp, over to the edge of the ravine beside a steep bit of scree. It’s close to where two mechanics work loudly on a disassembled motorbike by a floodlight, a generator rumbling beside them. Marie says, “Scouts spotted you two days ago. It’s not often you see a Changer heading across the plains at night, so Commander Paco told us to keep close if you came this direction.”
I think about my decision back at the foot of the mountain, wondering at my stroke of luck. Without the turn into the foothills I might have been sleeping out in the open again, hungry, cold. A real sleeping roll and a bit of gruel sounds like heaven to me.
Someone calls out Marie’s name from across the valley. She scowls in that direction, looking suddenly distracted, and indicates a nearby tent. “This belongs to one of our scouts. He won’t be back until tomorrow afternoon, so feel free to use his sleeping bag.” Her name is called again. “You have about five hours until everyone is awake. Sorry about the generator, but we only have so much room here so the mechanics have to work round-the-clock. Try to get some sleep.”
I’m about to ask after the promise of food, but Marie turns and strides back toward the command tent without another word. I stifle my annoyance, realizing I’m lucky to have a warm place to sleep at all, and crawl inside.
The bedroll is flat and uncomfortable, but it is better than the open plain. I lie on my back, unable to sleep, the sound of the generator grating on my nerves even though I have slept through bombing runs since I was a child.
A bundle is thrust into the tent without comment half an hour later. There are new clothes that prove a proper fit, if a little big, and an individual tin of army rations inside which I find biscuits, cheese, even tuna. I revel at the small luxury, eating slowly. I am wide awake now, and my mind turns these events over and over again in my head.
My platoon has been six months on the Bavares without backup, and only the barest supplies out of Bava. We have lost half our number during that time, but we have also done disproportionate damage to the enemy. I’ve always thought of us as valuable—indispensable, even—and told myself that we have received so little from Bava because they have nothing to give.
Yet here I find an immense camp of friendlies. There must be over a hundred and forty soldiers here, an army by our guerilla standards. They have motorbikes, mechanics, at least three Changers, and a Smiling Tom. This is a major operation.
Why not tell us about it? I’m a soldier, so I am used to being kept in the dark by the higher-ups, but this seems silly.
I stare up at the ceiling of my borrowed tent, fingers laced behind my head. The new clothes feel awkward, and I realize I hope that Giado has kept my old, ratty ranger’s jacket safe. I wonder if Marie’s superior officer, this Commander Paco, will let me take some rations to my platoon. I’m still not completely certain that we succeeded in the hijacking of that enemy cargo plane.
My mind keeps wandering back to the purpose of this little army. Marie did not answer my questions, but indicated I may get answers in the morning. I consider possible stratagems, trying to predict the orders that have found such a large group out here hidden in the mountains, and lay out the facts in my head:
We are, for all intents and purposes, behind the enemy line. This is the biggest friendly army I’ve seen in years. They have hidden up here for at least eight days—long enough to have heard the mayday of the cargo plane me and Selvie captured.
If they are here to mount a full-scale attack on the enemy, why did they not do it when the enemy was most vulnerable, back when they were moving their operation up to the new air base?
I leave my tent, troubled. No one has asked me to remain in quarters, and with my new clothes the few people awake at this hour ignore me. I am able to walk freely throughout the valley.
The freedom feels comfortable, like I’m back with my own platoon where we sleep and wake when the need arises and nothing stands on ceremony. But I remember the training I received as a boy and I know that this is not how a real army behaves. There should be military police, night watch, proper shifts. As a Changer I should have already met the quartermaster and commander. I should be apprised of current orders. I am technically an officer. After so long behind enemy lines, these realizations come back to me slowly.
There are several supply tents, and I am shocked to find them packed full of crates. Ammunition, weapons, grenades; tins of crackers, meat, cheese, biscuits, and even cookies. There is enough in just a few supply tents to keep an army this size moving for over a year. I lick my lips, and my face grows hot as I remember Rodrigo returning with just two tins of biscuits.
All the army could spare, was it?
I am confused now, and more than a little angry. There is so much I can’t explain, and the pieces that I do have don’t seem to add up.
I look around for a familiar face, but do not see any of the three Changers that brought me in. I find one of the mechanics working near my tent.
“Do you know where I can find Marie?” I ask.
“At this time of night? She’s either in her tent or with Paco,” the mechanic responds without looking up.
I cross the valley, looking on the camp with new eyes. It is too casual, too slapdash. I do not know where Marie is bunking down, but I want answers now, and I decide that I will have them even if I have to wake the commander.
Commander Paco’s tent is no longer dark. I can see a gas lamp flickering inside, and the shadows of several people. The scratch of a radio being tuned catches my ear. I freeze just outside the tent as the frequency picks up the familiar chord of a popular violin concerto. I know from experience that it is an enemy propaganda channel.
I remain still, listening to the haunting sound, and I hear Marie’s voice suddenly cut across it. “I don’t approve,” she says, as if it is the continuation of some previous conversation.
There is a snort of derision. A male voice answers, “You don’t approve? So what if you don’t approve?”
“You said we could do this without getting our own people killed.”
“I said that to get you on board,” the other voice responds, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. I decide this must be Commander Paco. “But you’ve always known the options. We’ve been negotiating this thing for almost two weeks. If we don’t step on it now, someone back in Bava—someone who matters—is going to find out what we’re up to and then . . . well, I’d rather not face a court-martial. Would you?”
I realize I am still standing beside the entrance to the tent. I look over my shoulder to see if I’ve been spotted, then move around to the side of the tent and hunker down on my haunches, listening. My hands shake.
“No,” Marie agrees after a long pause. “But I still don’t approve.”
“So what?” Paco says. “Have you raised them yet?”
The music suddenly cuts off as the radio is tuned, and then blanks out. It takes me a moment to realize the user has switched to headphones. Some time goes by, and a third voice, male, says in clear, crisp monotone, “Echo-A, receiving, over.” Then he says in a normal voice, “I’ve got them, Paco.”
“Good. Tell them we’ve found Gift Horse.”
The radio technician repeats the claim. There is a long silence, and he says, “Confirm. We have Gift Horse location. Over.”
There is a long, tense silence. I can barely hear over the pounding in my own ears as I try to get some sort of grasp upon what is going on.
The technician speaks up. “Paco, they want to know the location.”
“Well, where are they?” Paco demands.
It is Marie who answers. “Their Changer says they’re camped about half a dozen miles due north of us. My own scouts haven’t been able to get their exact location, but we can confirm it if you give us three days.” br />
I see the shadow of Paco shaking his head and pointing at the radio technician. “I’m not giving it three days. Tell them we want amnesty now. Bava is breathing down our necks and we can’t hide out here for much longer. Gift Horse is six miles north of our position, but they plan on moving soon. Send a full strike team. We’ll give them the location, but then we’re coming in. Today.”
Gift Horse, I realize, is my own platoon. I am sweating now, trembling from head to foot. The implications are obvious; this isn’t a friendly strike force at all. This is an organized desertion. They’ve stolen supplies and motorbikes, and taken a huge core of Bava’s defense militia, and are going over to the other side.
The price of their amnesty, it seems, is the location of my platoon.
And I’ve given it to them.
I am a wreck now. This is something worse than the heat of battle, worse than flying on Benny’s wing. This is betrayal. It takes every instinct—and the reminder that Marie is also a Changer—not to barge into the command tent and try to kill them all where they stand.
These deserters—these traitors—would take me down eventually. There are simply too many for me to fight. But I wonder if it would be better to die now, cutting out their heart, than to allow myself to live knowing of this planned betrayal.
I try to come up with some kind of rationale, but I am unable to think through my rising panic. There is no excuse for this.
I listen, my limbs frozen, unable to will myself into any sort of action as the radio technician relays the message. There is a pregnant pause afterward, and then the technician says to Paco, “They say they’ll take care of Gift Horse at first light.”
“Our approach?”
“It’s been cleared,” the technician says.
Paco claps his hands. “Yes! You see that, Marie?” I see his shadow reach across and slap Marie on the shoulder. “We’re in.”
“So it’s done, then?” she asks in a flat voice. I can tell that she is not happy about the betrayal, but it is a distant consideration in the back of my head. At this moment I want nothing more than to gut everyone in that tent.