(I let myself be talked into writing one more chapter for this story's upcoming second birthday. Since I expect to be busy then, I'm posting it a couple of days ahead of schedule. This will be the last update for a bit, as my other projects have been sorely neglected.)

Part 32: Despair, Rage, Envy

"...Dereliction of duty, sedition against the Arume state, insurrection against the Arume state, furious flying, lusting after a forime woman by the name of Kawashima Akane – "

"Objection!" Phil Darwin's powdered wig and rainbow tutu quivered with the force of his righteous anger. "The defendant's sex life is not on trial!"

Up on the judge's bench, Elaqebil toyed with her bottle of green hair dye disinterestedly. "Objection overruled."

Keiko smirked. "Thank you, Your Honor... I would like to begin with the most serious charge."

"The insurrection?"

"No, the lust." The prosecutor clapped her hands. "I call my first witness to the stand – Navigator Onomil!"

Azanael slumped as the slender figure walked past her chair, the shackles on her own arms and legs jangling. It can't be... She wouldn't..!

"Onomil, you are engaged to the criminal – "

"Objection!" Phil jumped up and stood on top of his desk. "That 'asn't been proven!"

"Objection allowed."

"I will rephrase the question, Your Honor." Keiko folded her arms. "You are engaged to the defendant, are you not?"

"Yes." Onomil smiled sweetly at her. "We're partners."

"Just so... And you have no agreement or understanding that she is allowed to see any other women during your engagement?"

"That's right."

"And this engagement has never been annulled, am I correct?"

Onomil nodded. "Of course."

Keiko grinned wolfishly. "And how would you feel if you learned she were cheating on you?"

"Oh." Onomil blushed demurely. "I think... being abandoned would be very painful for me."

"No!" Azanael shook her head frantically. "Onomil, I wouldn't – I would never abandon you!"

"Order!" Elaqebil rapped the bench with her dye bottle. "It is not your turn to speak."

Onomil and Keiko both ignored the outburst. "Thank you," said the latter smoothly. "That will be all."

"Loike hell it is," Phil muttered. "Yer Honner, I want to cross-examine that witness."

"Very well."

"Roight!" The defending attorney leaned forwards, peering intently. "Onomil, are yah not, in fact, dead?"

She smiled some more. "Why, yes."

Phil turned to the judge. "Yer Honner, no sane court would accept the testimony of a dead person as evidence!"

Elaqebil frowned at him. "This is not a sane court, Mister Darwin."

"Oh." The Australian went back to his seat with a dejected look. "No further questions."

"I will call my second witness," Keiko announced. "Wakatake Mari!"

Azanael's bad feeling got worse as Onomil went out and a teenaged Mari took her place. There was only one thing they would want her to testify about, and testify she did: how Azanael sabotaged Ekaril's ship during their date, how she lured Mari into a locked room, how she poisoned the girl's mind with slanders against Ekaril.

"...To further prove the crim – the defendant's subversive nature, I now call Group Commander Benacirael!"

"Objection!" Phil conjured a box of cookies and began handing them out. "...Yer Honner," he continued once he and the cookie box had made a round trip of the courtroom, "my next witness would loike ter settle things wi' the witness!"

Elaqebil licked her fingers. "Objection allowed."

The room's lights went dark, except for a single beam shining directly onto the center of the floor. Benacirael appeared on one side of the lit circle, wearing a long coat with leather boots and white breeches. She scowled beneath her bicorn hat, one hand tucked inside her coat and the other toying with the hilt of a saber. Her opponent was Roland Schuhart, in similar garb.

Elaqebil rapped the bench smartly. "FIGHT!"

Benacirael drew her sword. "Everything tells me I shall succeed!"

Schuhart whipped out a flintlock. "Victory or Westminster Abbey!"

Benacirael lunged but Schuhart fired first, projecting a thick cloud of smoke into the Arume's face. She reeled, coughing violently.

"FINISH HER!"

Dun-din-dunnn!

Schuhart raised his arms and a massive anchor dropped from the ceiling, crushing Benacirael.

"FATALITY!"

The lights came back on, the others in the court paying no more attention to the remaining length of thick chain or the jagged hole in the floor through which it passed. "As my fourth witness, I call – "

"Objection!" Phil leaped onto his desk, thick smoke swirling around his legs. "ME KILT IS ON FIRE!"

Before Elaqebil could rule on this latest interruption, he produced a set of bagpipes and sounded a shrill note on them. There was a great rumbling, a terrible cracking and finally a tremendous crash as the courtroom collapsed on itself. Azanael curled up with a whimper, trying to cover her head.

"Coward."

"..!" The pilot raised her head sharply. Now she was kneeling on the debris-strewn deck of Novaal's dark and cavernous fighter hangar, long rows of aircraft parked on either side. Shivariel stood before her in the familiar cape and dark leggings, backed up by at least a hundred of the hated naval troops.

"We're disappointed," said the master commander haughtily. "We thought you could be a powerful asset, but you've always let your emotions control you... In the end, you don't even have the courage to die beautifully." Shivariel turned her back. "Kill her."

Azanael wasn't ready to die, nor even close to being ready. She tensed, her jaw clenching as her erstwhile comrades took aim... and then a black cat walked in front of her. "Don't have an exit?" an infomercial-narrator voice boomed. "Don't worry! Avtomat Cat will clear the way!"

An absurd impulse directed Azanael to snatch up the errant feline. Its fur was warm and soft to the touch, but she felt the angular outlines of something hard and metallic under its skin. Tucking its hindquarters under her right arm, she grabbed its forelegs with the opposite hand. The animal hissed, flatting its ears against its head.

Shshshshshshshoomf! Shshshshshshshoomf! Shshshshshoomf!

The cat wriggled out of her grasp and scampered away, acrid smoke trailing from its mouth and nostrils. Azanael blinked a few times, trying to see past the yellow-white afterimage of the starburst muzzle flash. It looked as if that had put paid to her enemies in short order, leaving her briefly at a loss for what to do now.

I need to get out of here...

Her personal craft, the nimble Getour, should be parked nearby. She grasped the pendant which hung against her front, tripping the hidden beacon circuit inside. There was an answering ping behind her: rising, the pilot went to find her mount. Azanael discovered it just around the corner of the next launching rack, a faint green light pulsing warmly inside the open cockpit.

Thank goodness.

Onomil's taunting voice came out of the shadows underneath the vehicle. "Oh – no – you – don't!"

"What – !"

Dun-din-dunnn!

Onomil's arm stretched out, a hand closing tightly around Azanael's throat and lifting the bigger Arume off the deck. "Naughty, naughty," she chided, fingers sliding up the inside of the outcast's thigh.

"Urrrgh..!" Azanael wanted to protest, but her constricted larynx made it impossible. The simulacrum of her dead lover didn't waste time with foreplay – the next thing she felt was Onomil's slim hand tunneling into her pelvis from below. There was no pain, only the sensation of herself stretching around the intruder... and then the violating fingers dug in and pulled hard. Something was torn loose inside, drawn downwards until it left her body with a wet pop!

"You don't need this any more." Onomil raised her hand, letting Azanael witness her own uterus lying on the phantasm's upturned palm for a few moments before it was crushed into a pinkish pulp. "She isn't interested in that."

"Hrrrnnnnnnnnn..!" The dangling woman kicked in a blind panic as that tormenting hand went back to her groin. Gore-slick fingertips traced the length of her sacred cleft, seized upon the tender nub at its apex and pulled. "Uuuaaaaaaaaagh..!"

"Now you have what she wants." Onomil released her plaything without warning, turned on her heel and strode away into the darkness. She left a bewildered Azanael sitting on the deck plates behind her, staring down at the long, limp thing which had appeared between her legs.

"...Azanael?"

"No!" The Arume clamped her thighs together, the thing stiffening grotesquely in response to that voice. "Don't look, Akane! Please don't look!"

"Shh." Strong arms embraced the terrified woman. "It's all right. You're safe."

Azanael clung to her like a drowning swimmer clutching at a buoyant log. "I never... I don't want..."

"Shh," the other repeated. "Don't be afraid... You aren't alone."

"...Eep!"

Azanael awoke with a jolt. She was lying in a narrow bed, clad only in forime underwear, with her limbs wrapped around a naked figure which was definitely female and definitely too small to be Kawashima Akane. It took her a second to remember where she was.

Antonov An-22V (tail code AChB-9243, property of Eto Delo Group)
G-hour minus 03:58.05
April 29th, 2016

"Who... who are you?"

"My name is Krag," a tranquil voice replied in Arumic. "Are you all right, Flight Chief?"

"Gosta..." Azanael squirmed away from the intruder. "Why is a gosta in my bed?"

"You were in distress." Krag shielded her eyes – and only her eyes – as Azanael located the switch for the cramped cabin's ceiling light. "I wanted to comfort you."

The adult wanted to ask this uninvited guest to remove herself, but a question came out instead. "Why?"

The artificial girl propped herself up on an elbow, looking innocently seductive. "I like you."

"Don't say that." Azanael would like to get up, but Krag was in her way. "Do you know what would happen to both of us if anyone heard you?"

"I do know," Krag answered unconcernedly. "Why should I care? The Arume want to kill me anyway." She flipped onto her belly, crossing her forearms and resting her head on them. "I've been watching you," the gosta confided. "I can see that you aren't like the others."

I can't deal with this. Not now.

"Listen to me," Azanael sighed. "I understand you want to help, but I... I need to be alone right now."

Krag didn't protest. "As you wish," she conceded, slipping out of the bed. "If you should change your mind, I think you know where to find me."

"Mmph..."

The girl left without putting on any clothes, and in fact seemed to have brought none with her. Azanael pushed the thought away and reached for her coveralls, mentally retracing her path to this situation as she guided her bare legs into the garment. The North Koreans' attack on Tokyo-2 had been halted and mopped up, and a new administration, allied with the Arume, was already directing affairs in Japan. Meanwhile fighting between government troops and the Kimist insurgents continued to rage in Seoul, with no clear outcome. The invasion of Shanghai had gone far better for the aggressors, who swarmed off their anchored ships and overwhelmed the overtaxed defenders like the proverbial lightning.

It was assumed from the start that the Sino-Arumic Liaison would not stand idly by, unlike its suspicious and self-serving warlord neighbors, even though the overrun Free City lay well outside the extent of its control. Plans for a counterattack were probably being drafted even before Colonel Kang and her retinue returned from Japan, the UN conference being no longer relevant to any realistic projects. It was no secret that the Liaison's armed forces were geared towards defense, and couldn't effectively project force so far from their home bases... but once again the friendly fellows at Eto Delo Group stood ready to make their task easier.

That had been the initial plan, anyway. The warlord ruler of Zhejiang Province, over whose territory the Liaison's troops would have to pass, balked at granting access to his own most probable enemy. Then the crisis was further complicated by the appearance of a communique, purportedly authored by members of the Shanghai government in hiding, which explicitly rejected any assistance from the Liaison. Instead the oligarchs sought relief from Landline Transnational, a South African mercenary company which had been executing a security contract in nearby Jiangsu. Nobody could miss the implied snub: Landline was owned by Omar bin Salaad, staunch opponent of the Arume and cutthroat rival of Roland Schuhart.

Still more players intervened. Eto Delo's stymied contract with the Liaison was rescued by the Japanese headquarters of the Nerv organization, which wished to keep the assets of its Shanghai branch out of North Korean hands. Alarmed by the potential threat of his rival in Jiangsu encroaching from the north behind Landline's expedition, the head of the Zhejiang clique reversed his opposition and granted limited passage to Eto Delo. His choice saved their plan of battle, and now the private army from Hong Kong – itself a city-state de facto if not de jure – was on its way to Shanghai.

Their strategy was audacious, on a par with Kang Li's maneuver to oust Lin Qinsong... and like that operation, it depended on a tightly coordinated application of air power. The suitable aircraft on hand didn't have enough range to make the flight from Hong Kong to Shanghai in one go, a problem solved by careful leapfrogging. Right now the advance elements were en route to the primary staging point, a small airport in central Zhejiang. The attack party would land only briefly, long enough to arm and refuel the helicopters, exchange their transit pilots for fresh combat operators, and embark the airborne infantry. The choppers would proceed straight to Shanghai from there, while their fixed-wing companions diverted to Hangzhou and set up a base of support. The objectives were simple: secure a foothold in Shanghai and keep the North Koreans off balance until heavier firepower arrived by air and sea.

It should have had nothing to do with Azanael, but Keiko Kovalchuka had other plans. One of Eto Delo's pilots was grounded with a broken wrist, she said. Azanael was the perfect substitute, she said. They could make it all legit, she said. Azanael had no doubt that Keiko's real motive was to keep her on a short leash, in case she did any more harm to Mari's cover. The Arume refused the offer point-blank, even after learning just how much she would be paid for her services... but then Keiko showed her the machine she'd be flying.

When Azanael was a cadet at Striving Boronia, mastering the fighter simulators by day and sneaking off to make out with Onomil in the woods by night, the teetering yet still ponderous might of the Soviet Union had been a very real concern for Arume tacticians. Her race had observed with great interest as the Kamov Design Bureau unveiled their newest model: the Ka-50's nimble single-seater design resembled the aliens' own construction philosophy. It was earmarked for further study, with an eye towards adapting it to post-invasion use by the coming conquerors... And then the USSR broke apart. Work on the Ka-50 continued, but the new Russia's economic woes hit hard and only a handful were in operation when the invasion finally commenced. Arume interest subsequently drifted to other designs, other scenarios... other problems.

The little Kamov hadn't been completely forgotten, however. In the winter of 2735 – February 1996 by the forime calendar – an Arume infiltrator in Arsenyev obtained detailed information about the Ka-50. She relayed it to the nearest allied force, Shivariel's fleet, and a simulator with a perfectly detailed cockpit mockup was constructed aboard Novaal. As crew chief of the command ship's aviation detachment, it was only natural for Azanael to familiarize herself with the system... but as the years dragged by and no word came of Blue's condition or her beloved Onomil's fate, the simulator became a means of escape for the lonely woman. Unable to fly Getour or get away from the claustrophobic confinement of her deep-sea posting, she racked up thousands of hours in the sim-pods instead, soaring among voxel clouds in dozens of exotic airframes. The flawlessly replicated virtual Kamov had been her favorite by far.

When she reflected on that, it didn't seem so strange that her heart might have skipped a beat after Keiko led her to the landing field ten minutes uptown from Eto Delo HQ. "It's supposed to be our display model," the manipulator confided, patting the parked chopper's sleek nose, "but everything works. Wanna try it?"

And Azanael, who should have known better, said yes.

Tunk-tunk-tunk!

"...Yes?"

The cabin door opened. It was Krag again, now sporting a downsized facsimile of forime battle dress. "There is something you need to see," she intoned. "Come with me."

"Eh..?"

The gosta walked away without elaborating. Azanael stepped out of her cabin in bare feet, shutting the door behind her as Krag moved down the central hallway. This Antonov had been stripped by its present owners, the interior rebuilt into something halfway between a cheap hotel and a submarine's guts. Its alien passenger dimly understood that it was usually meant to be an inter-office transport for the company's staff, instead of an air truck for combat zone hauls, but this aging four-engine turboprop seemed a bizarre choice of platform...

Azanael gave a mental shrug and followed Krag. She hadn't closely studied the layout of the plane earlier, other than to locate the emergency exits, but she remembered that there were larger rooms at the forward end of this deck. Given the affinity of the gosta for communal living, they would be quartered there. Krag offered no hint of the destination until she suddenly stopped at one door, unremarkable among the ones she'd already passed, and indicated that Azanael should remain silent. Then she carefully opened it and vanished inside.

Mari was there already, leaning against the bulkhead on the other side of the doorway with her arms folded across the front of an olive drab vest. Catching Azanael's eye, she motioned for the Arume to come inside and close the door. The pilot did that, feeling a twinge of unease course through herself. She hadn't spoken to Mari since their forced reunion yesterday, and the other woman's face was an impassive mask. Better not force the issue now, she decided, and turned her eyes further inside the room.

This cabin was a long rectangle with a high ceiling, fitted with stacked bunks along both sides. It offered barely enough space for eight forime, but the gosta had crammed themselves into it by doubling up in the bunks. Most of them were lying on top of their blankets, some dressed and some just in their undergarments, silhouetted against the gentle glow of the orange night light bracketed on the farthest wall. Their attention, and now Mari's as well, was raptly fixed on the spectacle below.

A pair of the synthetic females lay nude on a blanket spread across the floor, their legs intertwined, thrusting their nether regions together with a slow but powerful rhythm. Their eyes were closed, their small breasts rising and falling steadily, their backs arching in time to each push. Their faces were so serene that they looked to be in a trance, utterly detached from their surroundings. As Azanael's eyes began to compensate for the relative lack of light, she saw that their skin had a fine sheen all over. It was too even to be sweat – had the pair coated themselves with some sort of oil before this... this performance?

She glanced at Mari, hoping for an answer, but Mari only gestured for her to keep watching the display. Azanael found her gaze perversely drawn to the nexus between the coupling pair. There was something there, she realized: a black rod or shaft, and the girls were impaled upon its opposing ends. It was flexible, with a soft or perhaps liquid core, and the visible part swelled with every thrust, distending the smooth labia between which it passed.

A sharp intake of breath from the nearer of the pair indicated that the ritual was nearly at its end. She increased her exertions, her partner hastening to match the effort. Azanael could only watch in mute awe as the climax took one and then the other, rippling through their bodies like water gushing along a rain-swollen stream. They must have been aiming to initiate orgasm simultaneously, but she knew from her own experience that even this degree of closeness was an impressive feat.

The gosta relaxed, settling onto the blanket, and lay still for several seconds. Azanael finally recognized them when they opened their eyes: the closer of the two was Harrington, this unique unit's sniper, and the other was her spotter, Richardson. Harrington seemed to contemplate the ceiling momentarily, then rose with a soft sigh and backed herself off of the rod's bulbous end. Reversing herself and crawling forwards, she carefully withdrew the remainder of its length from Richardson's quivering body and set it aside. There was a faint murmur among the spectators as the girl mounted her partner and drew her up into a deep kiss.

Azanael was beginning to half-facetiously wonder if she ought to applaud when Mari tapped her arm: Show's over, time to go.

The Arume saved her questions until the two were back in the hall. "What... what was that?"

"An affirmation of love," said Mari matter-of-factly. "They've taken a rite from your ancestors' manufactured faith and adapted it to their own needs."

"I see." Maybe. "Um... Can we talk?"

"If you want." Mari turned around. "Come on, my cabin's closer."

"Mm..."

"There seems to be a lot of sex in your religion," the second layer exile observed quietly.

"Yes," Azanael agreed somberly. "There is."

"Did you practice it?"

"Only when Onomil wanted to," said the gray-haired one flatly. "As you said, it's an invented tradition."

"It's not the only one," Mari muttered, but didn't expand on that sentiment. "We're here."

'Here' was a cabin like Azanael's own, and no less barren of personal touches. The only immediate difference she noted was the long wooden case strapped to the deck under Mari's bunk. It was painted dull green with a star-in-circle done in red and yellow on the lid, and had a carry strap attached with a pair of metal swivels. "What's that?"

"My work piece for this job," Mari replied, sitting on the bed. "A PLA standard issue Type Seventy-Nine, if that means anything to you."

"It doesn't."

The expat nudged the case with her heel, verifying that it was still secure. "That's why you sky eyes need to learn that you don't kick the dog which guards you."

"The dog..?"

"Never mind." Mari crossed her arms again. "So what's troubling you, Flight Chief?"

"I..." Azanael hesitated for a second, wondering where to begin, then sat down on Mari's left. "Why did Krag want me to see that?"

"She must think you're a 'good person'."

Not a very enlightening answer. "She was in my bed when I woke up. Is that what these gosta do to 'good people'?"

"They aren't shy about showing affection." Mari seemed amused by the other's predicament. "Nikka did that, too. You'll get used to it."

Azanael was hoping for some tips on stopping it. "...Nikka?"

"Yeah." Suddenly Mari got up, crossed over to the bare bulkhead and leaned against it, facing the Arume. "My partner, you could say. We picked her up during the retreat from Kaliningrad."

The casual name-dropping startled Azanael. "Kaliningrad? You mean, in the second layer?"

"Where else?"

It was now a little more than two years since that city fell to the Arume armies, but the place had remained on Azanael's no-fly list long after the capitulation. "Why were you in Kaliningrad?"

"Why do you think?" Mari stabbed a finger at the rifle case behind Azanael's ankles. "Or do you suppose I only learned to use that yesterday?"

"...The resistance." Even after the standoff with the Butcher of Tallinn, Azanael couldn't quite accept it. "You were in the resistance."

"A foreign volunteer unit in the Free Europe forces," Mari corrected, "which stayed behind to protect the evacuation. The Arume dropped twenty thousand gosta to shake us up, knowing perfectly well that they couldn't self-destruct in that cold... The lucky ones froze to death on the first night."

"This 'Nikka' was one of them?"

Mari nodded. "When the main army pulled out, they left some light weapons behind to defend the boats from air attack – ZPUs and Bofors on trucks, and a few man-portable missiles... Our job was to keep enemy ground forces from getting to those." Her mouth became a thin line. "Errol found her on the third day after the dispersal." The Japanese woman returned to her seat on the bed with a sigh. "One of the other side's long-range recon teams had already picked her up, and those men had serious problems... They thought it would be funny to do some scrimshaw on her face before they killed her."

The word was unfamiliar to Azanael. "Skrem-shaa?"

"Carving." Mari covered the left side of her face with her hand. "Taking out their frustrations on her because she looked like an Arume, maybe. The freaks cut her up this much before Errol and Phil shot them."

"Errol and – wait, you mean... you knew the Darwin brothers before you came here?"

"I knew their equivalents," the sniper confirmed. "Errol named the girl 'Nikka' after a whiskey he liked... He probably got away with it because it sounded Finnish." She absently ran her fingers over the remains of her clipped hair. "And nobody dared change it after he heroically died in Helsinki."

"I'm sorry to hear that." It was trite response, and Azanael knew it.

"Mmf." Mari stopped to collect her recollections. "The twins put Nikka in my sleeping bag on the first night, and somehow she imprinted on me... No matter where we went after that, she always slept by my side."

"She loved you?"

"Calling it 'love' might be too simple," Mari mused. "Well, I know I was very fond of her. We fo-vo's all were... She became a kind of camp minder for us once she recovered, keeping things organized while we were off on the front lines." Another sigh. "I hope she's okay. Now that I'm gone, Phil is the only one left to watch out for her."

"The only one?" Azanael questioned. "But you had a lot of comrades – "

"Not the kind I would entrust her to." Mari's expression turned grim. "To us she was our Nikka, but to everyone else she was 'Puolikuu' or 'Polovina Lun'... 'Half-Moon'." The hunter paused to check the time on a military-looking wristwatch. "You don't have any idea how gosta are treated by the free forces, do you?"

"No..."

"They're not liked and not trusted. Liberated gosta are mostly used as cheap labor – cooks, typists, anything that frees up able bodies for war service... The leadership forbids them from carrying weapons or learning to defend themselves. They can't marry or have children, and the men resent them because they won't 'put out'." Mari's nose wrinkled. "The women are encouraged to treat them as if every gosta is a would-be rapist, but behind the lines it's the gosta who are victims. Most cases go unpunished... It's a miracle there are so few suicides in spite of the abuse."

Azanael's fingers tensed, digging into the cloth of her coverall legs. "That's horrible."

"Don't get self-righteous," Mari replied curtly. "This past winter, Phil and I were assigned to a sector where Arume troops overran one of our forward camps." Sliding into a crouch, she faced the bed and began removing the restraints on the weapon case. "They slaughtered the men, carried off the women and tied the gosta to trees along the perimeter... wrapped in explosives and wired to a remote trigger." She lifted the case with a grunt and set it on the bed next to her guest. "It snowed hard that night. We heard the cries for help until about oh-two-hundred hours."

Azanael averted her face as the green container was opened, as if expecting it to be packed with the severed heads of Mari's enemies. "...Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I want you to understand why I did what I did." From inside of the box came a rifle with a long barrel topped by a long flash hider. "Hold that."

"Uh..." It was so long that Azanael had to point it towards the ceiling, the butt placed between her knees. "Is this what you used?"

"No, that was part of the welcome package when I joined Eto Delo."

That brought Azanael back to what she meant to ask in the first place. "Mari, why are you – no, how did you get here?"

"The Arume tried to kill me in Finland." While she spoke, her hands were rapidly unpacking the other items in the wooden case. "Somebody else intervened and brought me here."

"Somebody else... You mean Kataphel and her allies."

Mari didn't take her eyes off the gleaming bayonet blade under her nose. "I don't know anyone by that name."

Whoops.

Luckily for her, the forime seemed uninterested in exploiting her gaffe. "By the way," Mari remarked, returning the bayonet to its sheath and clipping it onto the side of her belt, "I hear you had one-on-one training with Keiko this afternoon. How was she?"

There it was again, that mystifying switch from ruthless killer to easygoing chatter which Azanael had seen with Keiko and the others after the Butcher was shot. "She's strange," the pilot mumbled. "She behaves very familiarly with me, like I'm someone she's known for a long time..."

"A long time," Mari echoed. "I wonder."

"What?"

"It's nothing." Mari plucked the rifle out of Azanael's hands and fitted a telescopic sight onto it. "Have you prepped your gear yet?"

"I did it before we took off," the Arume affirmed, privately wondering if she would ever be able to get the upper hand in these exchanges.

"Good." Mari checked her watch again. "So tell me, how did you come to the Liaison?"

"A friend in the bureaucracy arranged it," Azanael informed her. "She must have thought I would be safe there."

"And before that?"

The otherworlder shrugged. "I was a civil pilot... Cargo and small passenger flights."

"Uh-huh." Mari picked up a magazine, a curved steel box full of cartridges with bottle necks and beveled rims and three times the killing range of a navy pulse gun. "Do you keep in touch with any of the others?"

"Others... You mean, in Japan?"

"Yeah." The magazine went into a vest pocket. "Do you hear from Micchi or Tsubael anymore?"

"Actually, I... We're sort of a family now."

Those dark eyes finally met the blue-gray ones halfway. "You're what?"

"We stayed together after you left," Azanael explained quickly, hoping to tell the whole story before Mari could take it the wrong way. "Akane owns a restaurant, in Kobe, and Michiko and Tsubael live with her. I go there whenever I have time off."

"So Akane's dream came true." Mari smiled for the first time since the pair had begun talking. "What about Micchi, is she still writing?"

Azanael nodded. "Children's books, mostly... She really got interested in that after she had Yuko."

"Yuko..?"

"Michiko and Tsubael are married now." It seemed better to omit the details of how and why that happened. "Yuko will be six years old in a couple of months."

"Micchi's a mother?" The news drew a look of surprise and, thankfully, not of disapproval. "Then, what does Tsubael do?"

"She was, how do you say... She wrote computer programs. Then she was recalled to service at the same time as me, and put into the analysis division. I saw her here in the third layer, just this week, but only briefly."

"Mm... Anyone else?"

"Let me think... Hiroko runs the Funatsumaru company. She's lost so much weight, you wouldn't recognize her now. Her nieces work for Akane... Those three girls who were always swooning over Ekaril do, too. I keep forgetting their names."

"So have I." Mari closed the empty case. "How about Headmaster Fukamachi?"

"He was never the same after the... the 'questioning'," Azanael reported gravely. "He's become like a hermit. Akane visits him every two weeks."

"Too bad." The soft words were concluded by a low rachak-click as the forime chambered a round and engaged the safety. "But I guess things have gotten better for most people over there."

"Maybe." The Arume swallowed. "Mari, what happened to Sugawara?"

"Ah..." Mari pushed the case back under her bunk before speaking further. "Sensei was with me until we got to Europe. When I joined the free armies, she volunteered for their intelligence service... After we pulled back from Helsinki, she was transferred off the front. I haven't heard anything since then." Mari bit her lip. "I try not to think about what could have happened."

"She's a smart woman," said Azanael, even as an image of the spy's clumsy schoolteacher persona flashed before her eyes. "I'm sure she's taking care of herself."

"Yeah... Hey, is Maiyama-sensei still around?"

The ace flier had met that shrill harridan face to face only once, and once was enough. "She moved away," Azanael replied. "I think she's in – "

She was interrupted by a burst of music from the airplane's public address system, an ear-blasting sample of Soviet kitsch rock selected explicitly because only the dead and the stone-deaf could possibly sleep through it. "All passengers, all passengers," a voice with a heavy Slavic accent recited. "Final briefing with the boss begins in ten minutes. Repeat, final briefing in ten minutes."

Mari slung the long rifle across her back. "Right on time."

Azanael stood aside as the other finished re-securing the green case. "Is it important?"

"Depends on how much the situation has changed... Let's go, before the seats are all taken."

Mari's hand was on the door when something compelled Azanael to speak out. "Mari... I really am glad you're all right."

"Don't get the wrong idea." Those chilly words froze the Arume in her tracks. "This is just my personal armistice... Maybe I've forgiven you, but my war isn't over yet."

"...And one last reminder while we're on that subject." Roland Schuhart wagged the tip of the pointer in his hand. "As I'm sure we all know, we can expect to encounter female combatants. Don't be tempted by them, no matter what they take off."

There was laughter among the rows of men seated in front of him. Azanael didn't join in it. Neither did Mari, standing beside her at the back of the Antonov's briefing room, nor Karan and Phil Darwin, on Mari's other side. Just in front of Azanael, some of the gosta were quietly discussing their prospects of bedding the enemy's women.

"Next, I have a small update on our competition." Schuhart clicked the projector remote he carried in his other hand, splashing a photograph of a man with buzz-cut sandy hair and a strong jawline across the broad screen at the head of the chamber. "We've obtained confirmation that Owen Lyttleton will be the ground commander for Landline Transnational's attack on Shanghai... Phil, a few words for the newbies?"

"Sure." Phil went up to the front. "Lyttleton's a former Saffa army man. I fought with 'im in Liberia... Kinda ruthless, but he doesn't go fer the under'anded stuff."

"Just so," said the one-eyed man. "We expect that Lyttleton will focus on his own mission and not start trouble with us, but we should exercise caution if we do meet Landline forces in the op zone." He clicked the remote again, replacing the photo with a vector image of sinister-looking firearms. "We also know that Landline's personnel will primarily be using weapons which interchange mags and ammo with the enemy's, the same as we're doing. It's going to be one big Kalashnikov party out there."

"Don't worry about that," Mari muttered when Azanael squinted at the display, trying to tally the differences between the AMD-65 and the AIMS-74. "You won't be anywhere near those guys."

Schuhart swapped the picture for a satellite photo. "The latest forecast predicts heavy cloud cover on the op zone, with rain likely late in the day... Anybody with a leaky poncho, see the quartermaster before you ship out."

Disused military airfield
Zhejiang Province, China
G-hour minus 02:24.16

Mari wasn't used to patrolling in the open, with no camouflage and sparse cover. Every unfamiliar noise made her want to dive to the ground, her persistent instincts still accustomed to the ways of the winter war. For this reason it was probably better that she was assigned to the inner circle, following a tight path around the parked jets and helicopters, rather than the first guard line just inside the airfield's perimeter fence. Right now a pair of her new coworkers were passing along that route, heading in the other direction about ninety meters away.

"How's it look?"

Glancing over her shoulder, Mari found Schuhart coming up from the rear. He was dressed for battle like herself and the others, even though she knew for a fact that he was going to be supervising the operation from a safe distance at the support base. "It's the same as before," the sniper said. "We're watching them, they're watching us."

"So I hear."

The warlord's soldiers were out there, monitoring their visitors from the darkness beyond the reach of the floodlights. "Has there been any sign of trouble?"

"Nothing so far." The varnished plywood stock of Schuhart's rifle took on an almost greasy sheen in the yellow glare of the scattered sodium-vapor work lamps. "I just thought I'd have a look around."

Mari felt a little better with his company. "You really like to do things hands-on..."

"An arms dealer who can't shoot is like a car dealer who can't drive," her employer chuckled. "Don't you think?"

"Mm-hm."

They walked together in silence for a minute before Schuhart broached a new subject. "So... have you talked to the flight chief?"

"A little." Mari turned about and walked backwards for a few steps, checking the rear. "Are you sure it was a good idea to bring her?"

"It was KK's idea," the man grumbled, "and I signed off on it because Dobrovolskiy isn't combat qualified. I don't think you need to worry about Azanael – she's got the easiest part of this run... As long as she watches out for Dushkas, anyway."

Mari nodded at that. In the Scandinavian campaign, the DShK heavy machine gun had been a common and dependable friend. In North Korean hands it would be a common and vicious opponent, though if her impression of Schuhart's methods was correct, 'Dushka' wouldn't remain in enemy possession for much longer. "You've written salvage rights into the contract," she pressed, watching him closely. "Am I right?"

"Damn straight," the man declared. "Nerv can't match the Liaison's kind of funding, so we'll have to take a loss in the short term. Receiving the Norks' equipment softens the blow a bit... And, ideally, a good performance now will draw more clients later."

"Of course."

"Be nice to have some peace and quiet for a change, though. Lately it's been one damn thing right after another – sky eyes, warlords, Norks, sky eyes again, Norks again..." Schuhart jabbed the AK-74 forwards, as if to thrust an imaginary bayonet at an imaginary foe. "I shouldn't get my hopes up. Odds are good for more warlord trouble as soon as this is over." His fingers toyed with the sight leaf and slider. "If we don't get a break before the next action, I'll have to pull KK off the line for a while."

Mari felt a pang of guilt mixed with wary curiosity. "Is she all right?"

"She's fine right now," said Schuhart. "It's the usual trouble, nothing to do with yesterday."

The usual trouble. Mari had heard that Eto Delo's operations director suffered from some intermittent malady of the mind, but those in the know were few in number and tight-lipped on the subject. Piecing together scraps of gossip heard from the gosta, the Japanese woman had thought it might be a head injury... but all bets were off after the encounter in the shower. "What is she?"

It was an ill-considered question, blurted out on the spur of the moment, but the arms dealer took it in stride. "That's for KK to tell you herself," said he. "If and when she decides she's ready to talk about it."

"Oh..." The conversation petered out again. Mari kept walking, kept her eyes on the perimeter, but she could no longer block out the remaining question which presented itself to her more and more insistently. "Schuhart?"

"Hm?"

"Why am I here?"

"Because you're good at what you do," Schuhart returned without missing a beat. "Well, that and to keep you close by in case the Butcher orders a retaliation." He stretched one arm, transferred the assault rifle between hands, and stretched the other arm. "But there won't be much sympathy for her if she attacks us when we're a valued ally undertaking actions beneficial to Arume interests."

"I hope so," Mari concurred, "but that's not what I meant." They came to the end of this leg in the patrol route. Mari turned sharply, following a new path which would carry her past the nose of the Antonov and the two Ilyushin transports accompanying it. Here, at the farthest distance from the bustle and din of the main staging area, it was possible to speak quietly. "What do your friends need me for?"

"Ah." Schuhart said no more for a minute... and then one minute became two, and two became three. "Yui will kick my ass if she finds out I told you this," he warned, just when Mari was about to apologize for overstepping the ambiguous bounds, "but what the hell, she brings me so much trouble already." Looking forwards, he noticed a flat stone lying on the tarmac and bent to pick it up. "It's not what they need you for, it's what they might need you for."

"What do you mean?"

"Your girlfriend stumbled across something they want." The limping man's volume dropped so low that Mari's ears strained to make out his words. "All the data has been lost, except a summary relayed to Arume command by Shivariel." There was an elongate puddle of water off to the left, formed by rain collecting in a depression in the runway surface. Schuhart headed towards it. "The sky eyes still have no idea how important it is..."

Leaving the thought incomplete, he flicked his wrist and the stone skipped across the shallow pool, spawning concentric rings which overlapped and engulfed one another as their progenitor landed with a final splash and sank from view.