Son of Justice (14 page)

T
hat’s what I must have looked like earlier
, Eli thought. The thought angered him.

“That’s one,” Twigg called out. His weapon was still aimed at the doorway. “I know there’s one more out there. Drop your weapon now and you’ll avoid a similar fate.”

Twigg glanced briefly at Eli and spat, “You’ll get yours in just a moment.” The Minith’s ears were laid back and his voice was a growl.

Eli was crouched on the floor, the staff held out in front of him. He wondered briefly how Benson would respond to the order from the Minith Sergeant, then realized he didn’t care. His emotions boiled as the scenario played out. He waited anxiously for whatever opportunity presented itself.

He didn’t have to wait long. Mirroring his own entrance into the room just moments before, his roommate rolled in low and fast. He was raising his weapon to fire, but Twigg was ready and got his shot off first. The pulse found its mark and Benson dropped, but the distraction gave Eli the opening he needed.

He struck forward with the butt of the staff and landed a solid blow to Twigg’s chest. The strike pushed the Minith backward and Eli darted ahead, landing a second thrusting strike to the sergeant’s chin. Not daring to give the larger opponent a moment to recover, he spun to his right and twirled the staff over his head, building up momentum and power. At the height of his spin, he delivered a backhand strike that connected with the side of Twigg’s head, just under his ear. It was an especially sensitive spot for Minith, Eli knew.

The Minith growled in pain and anger, dropped his weapon, and reached for the injury. Eli rolled and snatched the pulse pistol before it could hit the floor. He twisted left, swung the barrel of the weapon around and filled his sight with the sergeant’s broad chest. With a sense of enraged satisfaction, born from weeks of torment, he pulled the trigger.

The Minith warrior dropped like a stone . . . a twitching, mewling, pain-riddled stone.

Eli considered his next move for less than a second, before redirecting the barrel of the pistol toward Brek. The Minith was just beginning to rise from his seat.

With a determined grin etched across his face, Eli added a second Minith sergeant to the pile of twitching bodies that covered the floor.

He’s created quite a stir.

Yes, apparently he has, Sha’n
, Grant replied. The video of Eli’s latest brush with authority had just finished playing. Eli had involved the Telgorans in his latest activities. Enlisting their support against the Minith was rarely a good thing. Regardless of the alliance they shared, there were too many tensions still bubbling between the two races. Like two bullies who loved to fight, it was usually best to keep them at separate ends of the playground. Still, Eli had overcome a problem that wasn’t designed to be solved.

You are proud of him.

Grant waved the comment away. His feelings on the matter weren’t important. But she was correct.

“The Telgoran Alliance Council is assembling a formal review panel. There are some serious charges being cited by the Minith contingent.”

Yet, you will not become involved.

“No,” he conceded. “Eli was very clear. He wanted to succeed or fail on his own merit. What kind of message would I be sending—to him, or to the council—if I stepped in now? Besides, I have faith in the system we’ve put in place. Whatever justice they’ve meted out has already taken place. My involvement would only be after the fact.”

You think they will clear him.

You can read my thoughts, Sha’n. You know what I think. And what I fear.

The fact was Grant firmly believed Eli’s actions, while unconventional, were justified. His reasoning was sound. His problem-solving abilities were off the charts. But pitting the Telgorans against the Minith? That was the wild card. He didn’t know how things would play out—had already played out, he amended, recalling the comms’ delay—but whatever happened would take place without his interference or influence.

You are getting better at concealing your thoughts. You’ve been practicing.

That’s what you’d have me believe
.

The truth was that he could block his thoughts from being read only with intense concentration, and only for short periods. The Waa were a patient people. If Sha’n or any other Waa wanted to know what was in is head, it was just a matter of time. He couldn’t focus on blocking them forever—an hour or two, at best.

“So, what else is on the agenda this morning?”

Sha’n paused before replying. When she did respond, her unease was evident in her thoughts.

We have lost contact with Rhino-3.

Grant dropped into his seat and placed his hands on top of his desk. Rhino-3 was a small but important defensive outpost the Alliance had established on a planet called Song. Song was in a solar system located at the outermost boundary of their relatively small sphere of influence. The purpose of the units stationed on Rhino-3 was to patrol the edges of their territory for threats and to make known the Alliance’s claim on the region. Now, it was the second outpost in the last two weeks that had gone quiet. Reports had yet to come back on the status of the first, and he cursed his lack of intel.

It was no secret that powerful entities outside the Alliance coveted the agsel mines on Telgora. The Zrthns were the most likely, and best prepared, to make a move, but there were other races out there who knew where they were and what they owned. Grant could envision a time when one or more of those entities might make a move against the Alliance. If so, they were as prepared as they could be. There was still work to be accomplished, and additional defenses to put in place, but the twelve years that had passed since the end of the Minith wars were good ones for the Shiale Alliance. They were prosperous and peaceful, and much of what had been destroyed on Earth, Telgora, and Waa had been rebuilt. And because of Grant’s insistence, the years had also allowed them time to build a strong army and amass a formidable armada of spaceships.

He wondered if the time had finally arrived to put those forces into play.

* * *

“Do you understand the reason for this inquiry, Private Jayson?”

The question was posed by a Minith wearing the rank of an Alliance Defense Force colonel. He sat in the center of the main table. As the ranking military member at the table, he apparently headed up the review panel.

Eli considered the question and looked around the large room at the individuals that were assembled for the review. He had to force his right leg to be still. The nervous uncertainty of the situation made his body want to move, but a jittery, bouncing leg might send the wrong message to those who were here to judge him. He reminded himself that he had done nothing wrong, so had little to worry about. The mental reminder did little to quell his unease, though.

The setup reminded him of an ancient courtroom on Earth. The panel of six reviewers—two Minith, three human, and one Telgoran—sat facing him from behind a long, raised table.

One of the humans he knew well. Ambassador Titan was a long-time friend of his family and was the permanent human emissary to the Telgorans. On Earth, the man was shunned as a Violent, while here he was revered as a warrior. He was highly respected by the planet’s native race, having led them in battle against the Minith twelve years earlier. Although human, and a good friend of his father, Eli knew the ambassador was as loyal to the Telgorans as much as he was to his own race.

The other members of the panel were strangers. With the exception of Ambassador Titan and the Telgoran delegate, all were dressed in Shiale Alliance Defense uniforms. The colonel was joined by another Minith, a captain. The two humans both wore the rank of major.

As the subject of the inquiry, Eli sat alone at a much smaller table. His table was centered before the review panel, and surrounded by three meters of open space on all sides. He was a veritable island, seated alone and surrounded in the crowded room.

Behind his table, separated by a short pony wall, sat a mass of onlookers and witnesses. Most were Minith, but he noticed a scattering of his fellow recruits and the only other Telgoran in the large hall—Free.

Forming the right border of his personal space was a similar, small table like his own. That table was reserved for whatever witnesses would be called to provide statements and testimony. He suspected that some would speak in his favor, while others would not. He’d never been witness to a formal inquiry, so could only guess as to what was to come. He swallowed in an attempt to clear the growing lump from his throat and put his right hand on his thigh to quell a renewed round of jitter-bounce.

“Private Jayson . . .”

“Um. Sorry. Yes, sir, I believe so.”

“You believe so?” the Minith officer repeated. Eli could tell the colonel wasn’t looking down his greenish, apelike nose at him with respect. The repeated flaring of the nostrils, the flattened ears, the slight turn of the lips. All pointed to feelings of disdain and contempt flowing from the officer. As easily as Eli could pick up on the cues, he doubted that any of the other humans present noted anything other than the standard sense of grouchiness that the Minith usually displayed.

“Allow me to state the reasons we are here, Private.” The colonel glanced at the ceiling where a pacer recorded the proceedings and picked up a printed page from which he read. “For the record, you are charged with one count of failure to follow orders. One count of trespass. Eleven counts of abuse of authority. And fifteen counts of unlawful assault on ranking members of the Shiale Alliance Defense Forces.”

The colonel dropped the page onto the table top and refocused his attention on Eli.

“How do you respond to these charges?”

“They’re complete nonsense,” Eli stated simply. Despite his nervousness, he refused to cower before the panel or to admit his actions were anything other than appropriate. A chatter of various voices and exclamations arose from the gallery behind Eli. He couldn’t make out any specifics, but his assessment of the charges had gotten the attention of more than a few of the assembled. He experienced a brief moment of déjà vu and thought back on his previous meeting with Twigg in his office. He doubted this audience would be so quick to dismiss their charges as the Minith sergeant had been. He no longer had the leverage of involving a review panel to support his position.

The Minith colonel didn’t seem pleased with his reply; however, the slight grin Eli noted on Titan’s face before he covered his mouth with his hand indicated he had at least one ally at the long table. Eli paused a moment to let the din subside, then pushed ahead.

“My orders were very specific: Move to contact with the tower. Assault the defenders located there. I mean no disrespect, Colonel, but that’s exactly what we did.”

The Minith colonel issued a low growl and placed both hands on the table.

“You were expected to attack the tower from a direct approach, Private. That did not happen. Instead, you trespassed through Telgoran territory and launched a . . . less than courageous
 
. . . attack from the rear.”

The rage was immediate and hot. Eli wanted to spit an angry response at the colonel, but—for one of the few times in his young life—he held his tongue. Nothing that issued forth from his lips at this particular moment would be good, either for his present or his future. Instead, he clenched his jaws in a steely bite and stared directly into the dark, angry eyes of the Minith. The two locked gazes for seconds that felt like hours, each refusing to cede. Then, with a burst of clarity and understanding, Eli realized something important. The Minith colonel was pushing him toward a cliff and hoping—yes, there was a glint of expectation and hope in the other’s eyes—that Eli would take the bait. Jump at the taunt and chase it over the precipice to his doom. It didn’t matter what had happened during the training exercise if he failed here. He could be exonerated of all charges for what happened
then
. But if he acted out
now
, against a senior officer, in front of dozens of witnesses . . . there would be no exoneration for that insubordination.

Eli knew the Minith people, understood their culture, their tendencies, and their motivations. No Minith would sit quietly while another, regardless of rank, openly questioned their courage. To a Minith, bravery and aggression were the lifeblood of their core, crucial to their being and sense of self-worth. It was one of the key differences between their race and humans. Humans could sometimes interject rational thinking into the decision-making process, even when angry.

He refused to take the bait. The crushing sense of rage that had threatened to overtake his body and mind only moments before lifted. A knowing smile replaced the clenched-teeth grimace that he hadn’t realized was on his face until it was released. He took a deep breath, relaxed back into his seat, and winked—actually
winked
—at the colonel.

The colonel snarled and inhaled sharply. Before he could reply, Titan spoke up from the far right of the table.

“Colonel Drah,” he began. So, the colonel had a name. “As the Telgoran ambassador for the Shiale Alliance, I have been asked by the Telgoran people to speak on their behalf.”

Drah’s angry glare left Eli’s face with reluctance and slid sideways down the table toward Titan.

“Yes?”

“Colonel, the Telgorans do not agree to the charge of trespass,” the ambassador stated. “The private and his team requested permission to enter the underground caverns and were granted permission. The Telgoran’s reached
shiale
on that decision. As a result, that charge should be removed from the scope of this panel review.”

The Telgoran seated next to Titan was nodding his large, elongated head up and down in a slow, systematic fashion. Eli had no doubt he was relaying events to the rest of the Family and that they were in agreement with Titan’s statement. Drah must have also noted the words and the nodding motion of the Telgoran. He grimaced at the announcement, but had no option but to nod as well.