The Lord of the Plains (33 page)

Chapter 24

The trouble didn’t start with Maztar, but it
ended there.

When it came to a head nobody found out
until after, after the body had been found.

Maztar was charged with the murder of
another gemeng. Whether he would be exiled, executed or imprisoned
was still up for debate.

Riley didn’t believe it. She didn’t know how
one day Maztar could be training with his unit and the next could
be charged with murder.

She remembered noticing he had been upset.
Upset like Jillia, she’d thought, but she hadn’t paid much
attention after that. There had been Peitar, her retest. Then she
had been busy trying not to draw attention to herself. She didn’t
want to be shot.

Had she been wrong in drawing a similarity
between Maztar and Jillia?

‘Did you hear?’ Jann asked morosely. ‘Geilar
seems kinda down.’

‘I didn’t hear.’ Riley lied. She’d heard
something, but that something didn’t make sense.

Jann sighed. ‘I guess this is why we train
so hard, so we can protect each other from this sort of thing.’

‘What sort of thing?’

‘Gemengs being… gemengs.’ he shrugged. ‘I
guess Maztar was born here so everyone thought he’d kinda had that
violence bred out of him. Do you ever feel like that?’ Jann asked
her, and for once he seemed serious as he looked into her eyes.

‘Feel like what?’ she asked uneasily.

‘I don’t know, letting your gemeng-ness out.
Hurting people.’

Riley stared. ‘What happened?’ she
demanded.

He dropped his eyes and sighed again. ‘You
know Alann from TU-7?’

‘Yes.’ Maztar’s unit, TU-5, and Alann’s unit
had often traded places on the leader board. One day Maztar’s unit
would be ahead, than Alann’s would take their place. They had an
intense rivalry with each other. The leader of Maztar’s unit had
been put on cleaning duty for three months because he’d used the
wrong setting during a training exercise with TU-7. Two members of
TU-7 had ended up with bad burns. Things had only gone downhill
from there.

‘Well… he beat him up so bad… he just… died.
They found his body in the park. Maztar turned himself in.’

Riley didn’t understand. She felt like she’d
been feeling that a lot lately. Was it really because of the
violence inherent in all gemengs?

Riley decided to go
ask
Maztar
himself.

He was being held by the military. There
were less than a dozen holding cells in Astar. Keeping people
locked up where they had to be fed and couldn’t contribute to the
defence of Astar was not considered an efficient use of resources.
People were rarely punished with lockup time for their crimes.
There were other ways to punish a person.

There were specific visiting hours so the
first time she tried to see him she was turned away. The next time
she came at the right time.

She was only allowed to talk to him through
the bars. As he was sitting on the ground, she sat too.

He glanced up at her then down. He looked
terrible. His face was covered in cuts and bruises.

‘Maztar.’ she said by way of greeting.

‘What do you want?’ he asked, not looking
up.

‘What happened?’

In a tone that suggested he’d said this many
times before and was well and truly sick of it, ‘my unit and unit
seven met at the park. They wanted me and Alann to fight, because
last time the humans fought they got in trouble. So we fought.
Then, I don’t know, I won, Alann was down a-and I don’t know! The
unit seven guys left after some shouting. Then, then, Garis just
told us to leave, so we left. Alann was on the ground when I left.
Ok? Are you happy?’

Riley felt something ease within her. ‘Where
is your unit?’

He shrugged. ‘Dunno. Celebrating?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean they’re not here! Why would they be
here? I was the one who h-hit Alann.’

Riley didn’t know what to say. As bad, or
worse than the bruising on his face, was the pain in his eyes.
‘Thank you for telling me.’ was what she ended up saying, feeling
that it was inadequate.

Maztar thought it was inadequate too.

Riley was satisfied to tell Jann it was not
because of any violence inside gemengs that Alann had been
killed.

She wanted to find out what had happened
with the rest of Maztar’s unit and TU-7. Clearly, Maztar had done
something very bad. But the other members in the unit had some
blame to share as well.

To say Riley was surprised when during the
next combat training session they were paired against Maztar’s
unit, minus Maztar and plus a new human member, was an
understatement to say the least.

‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded,
interrupting Colonel Hamnar.

‘Um, kicking your ass? What are you doing
here?’ one of the members of TU-5 answered.

‘So Maztar is out of lockup?’

‘No.’ Garis said. ‘He was executed last
night.’

‘W-what?’

Garis shrugged. ‘They couldn’t exile him
from Astar, he knew too much about our defences, and he was too
violent to stay in Astar. So execution was the only option. It’s a
bit of a shock, really, he was part of our unit for over a year and
then he does something like this.’

Someone was dragging her away. She didn’t
know who.

‘Let’s discuss our plan, ok? Twenty minutes,
remember?’ someone was saying. She didn’t know who was talking. Her
eyes were on Garis.

Riley was a defender this round. So she
defended.

She silently circled the base. She shot one
human. He walked off quietly.

She defended the base.

Geilar was also a defender, and Batar. She’d
had little part in today’s planning. If she had she might have
noticed the plan was more about keeping her and Geilar contained
than winning the session. Geilar was sitting in the base, a moody
look on his face. Batar was watching him like a hawk.

Riley defended the base.

She shot another human. That was two.

There was a sound behind her, she spun.

Garis.

His SIGPEW was raised. He was pointing it at
her. It seemed to move so slowly. The SIGPEW was aimed at her,
there was nothing she could do.

Wasn’t there?

But he moved so slowly, so at odds with the
light that came from the energy weapons so fast it seemed to be
just
there
. Riley could not follow that light with her eyes,
no more than a human could.

But Garis, he moved so damn slowly. She
could see how he pointed, his finger on the trigger.

Who said she had to avoid the light? The
light only came at the call of a human, and she could avoid a human
so very easily.

It was a surprise for both of them when the
light arced across the room and she wasn’t there.

In that moment when the trigger was being
pulled but not yet pulled, she moved.

He thought he’d missed.

Perhaps he had.

So she watched again, her eyes not on his
weapon but on his hands.

And he missed.

A laugh was bubbling up inside her. She
glided closer.

He missed.

She couldn’t avoid the SIGPEW, but she could
watch him and avoid him.

He was panicking. Somewhere she had let go
of her weapon. It hung by a strap around her body.

Closer, closer.

So close he could no longer hit her with the
large SIGPEW.

She grabbed his hands, his scrabbling
hands.

They were such weak hands.

He was making blubbing sounds.

She was alive to his every movement, his
every sound.

His wrists were so fragile beneath hers. She
squeezed a bit harder. So very fragile.

Could she break them?

She was curious.

She didn’t squeeze any harder.

But she was curious.

‘H-help!’ he’d been calling for some time
now.

How strong was she?

People were coming.

Riley smiled at Garis.

He was afraid of her.

‘Garis, you needn’t be afraid.’ she
said.

He fell quiet.

‘If I wanted to hurt you,’ she smiled,
‘you’d already be hurt.’

There was another discussion with Colonel
Hamnar after that.

‘That’s very impressive. I’ve seen gemengs
from outside Astar do that on occasion, very concerning when
they’re trying to kill you. Let me guess, you weren’t focussing on
the SIGPEW?’

Riley nodded.

‘Hm, well, that’s why we have RAWs, isn’t
it?’

Riley didn’t respond.

‘I understand you’re upset about what
happened to Maztar.’ he said, scrutinizing her with those steely
grey eyes, forcing her to meet his eyes with the force of his
gaze.

‘Yes.’ she bit out, ‘the other members of
his unit were involved. TU-7 was also there. They watched him fight
and then left Alann alone.’ she closed her mouth and glared at him.
‘What happens to them?’