Desert World

[lit_gal]

I honestly don't know if I'm going to make NaNo or not, but I'm going to try.

Desert World Allegiances: Pairing: Shan/Temar. .

Desert World Rebirth: Pairing: Shan/Temar. 

Desert World Immigrants: Pairing: Naite/Verly.

Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven -Thursday

Chapter Eight - Friday morning




Eight

When Naite started climbing up the universe’s narrowest path, a path that led up the side of the cliff face, a cliff with no guard rail—Verly finally took the hint. If he wasn’t flying, he wanted to keep both feet close enough to the ground to avoid dying when he fell. That didn’t mean he wasn’t annoyed. He was finally making some inroads into the mystery that was Naite Polli, and part of him worried that Naite would take the time apart to repair some of his defenses.

With his primary path of attack blocked, Verly fell back on his favorite strategy. Flank and surprise. He needed information on Naite, and he had a pretty good idea who on this farm might crack like an overheated engine coil.

Verly headed back to the main house. Walking in without announcing himself still made him uncomfortable, but that might have something to do with the fact that Rula seemed to always hover in the background. This time, however, everyone had abandoned the house. Shan and Temar had gone to town to discuss the Blue Hope issue with Lilian Freeland who sounded like she was the real power behind the elected officials. However, Cyla had vanished along with the two AFP women.

With nothing else he could do, Verly pulled out a datapad uploaded with background information on Livre and settled on the sofa in the front room. Bars of sunlight came in through the striped fabric window covers, and Verly shifted so that the warm lines fell across his legs. After years of being in space, the natural light felt odd. Sure, he’d spent the required time in reproduced sunlight, but it wasn’t the same.

Until Naite came down or Cyla showed up, Verly decided to read all the government documents he could find. The first settlers had mostly signed on for short-term contracts. Most planned to spend five to ten years working the new world and then retire on a core planet.

The Polli ancestor had been an engineer. Pulling up Frente Polli’s official documents, Verly wondered if the man was as tough and stubborn as his descendants. Verly figured the man for Naite’s great-grandfather. Frente had once held one of the shortest contracts with three years required until he earned his bonus. That would have put him back on a core world before the war, but he seemed to have extended his stay.

Verly toyed with the idea of asking for permission to access the colony records so he could figure out why Frente Polli made that choice. Having taken command psychology courses, he knew he was displacing his curiosity about Naite, but at this point, he figured he had a better chance of understanding Frente Polli than he did Naite. That long-dead ancestor had degrees in mining engineering and geology, so he could have found a high-paying job on a developed planet if he’d chosen to go home at the end of his contract. He’d been born on the same planet as Verly’s mother, a woman Verly barely remembered. She’d died laying mines to protect the border from AFP raid ships.

With nothing more pressing to worry about, Verly spent the rest of the morning and the early afternoon reading about those early colonists. He found seven Freelands in the rosters and a single woman named Gazer who listed two of the Freelands as immediate family.

“Look who we have here.”

Verly looked up to see Natalie standing in the door. Verly sat up, slightly horrified at the thought that he hadn’t heard her come in. She closed the front door behind her.

“No Rula?” Verly asked. He worried about a soldier less than he worried about this woman with her overly perfect smile and eyes that never stopped scanning the area.

“Cyla is introducing her to some of the neighbors.”

Verly glanced over and the angle of the sun suggested hours had passed. “Is that where you’ve been?”

Natalie’s smile was cold and predatory. “Are you keeping track of my comings and goings?”

“I can’t say I am.” Verly put his datapad to one side, and not for the first time, he wished that the ambassadors had allowed him to bring weapons. He might have followed that rule, but right now he doubted that Natalie had.

“Funny. I got the feeling that the PA had a vested interest in making sure that we didn’t get a trade treaty with Livre.”

Verly shifted on the sofa and studied the woman. “What ‘we’ are you talking about?”

She gave the barest hint of a twitch and moved farther into the room. “I’m not here for the AFP.” She raised her chin, clearly ready to fight about this. Verly hoped she only wanted a verbal fight because he might have a good sixty pounds and six or eight inches of height on her, but he didn’t give himself good odds.

“Do they know that?”

“Does the PA know you’re fucking one of the local slaves?”

Verly smiled. “I doubt they’d worry much about Naite’s honor once they met him. I may not understand their slave system, but I certainly don’t think it looks anything like my definition of slavery.”

That made Natalie narrow her eyes.

“But to answer your question, no. They don’t know I’m fucking anyone. Although technically, I’m getting fucked by,” he pointed out. Verly had the feeling that it was going to take a little more trust building before he got to do any fucking. He was looking forward to the chance to prove that Naite could trust him in that sort of intimate situation, but if Naite was anything like some of the other emotionally closed off and damaged soldiers Verly had known, that might take some time.

“You are sending back reports, though.”

Verly shrugged. “It’s better than burning those bridges. However, my reports are going to be rather limited. I can offer a report on the daily duties of a farm worker or offer a rather detailed report on Naite’s rather considerable sexual skills,” Verly said with a cocky grin. Clearly Natalie didn’t have the best sense of humor. She studied him with all the warmth of a school girl getting ready to dissect a snake.

“If you aren’t sending reports, you’re a fool. They’ll replace you,” Verly pointed out.

“Assuming they can.”

Verly leaned back and waited for some sort of explanation for that comment, but Natalie didn’t seem the sharing sort.

“The breakaway planets aren’t known for their patience.”

“And they aren’t known for trying to steal from younger planets and send the resources back to the central worlds, either.”

Verly sighed. “I think both sides played their games.”

Natalie’s eyes narrowed more. This woman was drowning in paranoia, but then again, if she’d been hiding a homosexual relationship with Rula and trying to navigate the military ranks of the AFP as a woman, she might have some justification. Verly wished that she would give him a chance to show that he didn’t want to be an enemy, but there was a lot of water under that bridge. Besides, he didn’t appreciate that she’d tried to tell Naite about his own dark past.

After staring at him for an uncomfortably long time, Natalie moved to one of the chairs and leaned against the arm, her body still coiled. “They did. However, I will admit that I didn’t expect a soldier to recognize that.”

“Because we’re all idiots?”

“Because you’re in the ships. You float over everything, and it’s hard to see the truth from the deck of a battleship.”

Verly could debate that, but he doubted an argument would improve their ability to share a planet. And this wasn’t the sort of well-developed, overpopulated planet that two people could share without running into each other.

“Were you on the ground?”

“Perhaps.” She didn’t put a lot of effort into denying it, but her body grew unnaturally still.

Verly took a wild guess. “You’re from Oneida. You trained there.” It would make sense that if she’d come through that version of hell she’d have a high rank, high enough to hide her illegal relationship.

Her voice grew soft. “This is dangerous territory.”

“I know,” Verly answered. “But do our pasts really matter here?”

“The butcher of Minga wants to be friends.” She placed her hand over her heart and offered him a look of mock adoration. “That gives me warm fuzzy feelings.”

Verly felt that same old punch in his gut that the mention of that planet, but he’d practiced grinning through that particular pain for a long time now. “I’m starting to understand why you needed a new start. I’m guessing you don’t make friends easily.” She didn’t react, but Verly didn’t make the mistake of assuming she would show her emotions. “This is a new world with new ideas and new people who don’t care about your war.”

“And do you care about it?” Natalie demanded.

“I don’t want the AFP here. I care about that,” Verly said honestly. “I don’t think anyone has a right to train children for their own wars.”

“And your schools don’t fill you with righteous indignation for anyone who chooses to be different?” Natalie gave a mirthless laugh.

“I don’t want the PA down here, either,” Verly admitted. “I don’t think that PA laws really work for this world.”

“Capital punishment, slavery, families making their own choices about what they want for their children… that breaks every rule the Planetary Alliance holds dear.”

“A planet full of homosexual relationships, churches that don’t use religion as a weapon, and a belief that people shouldn’t be allowed to starve. The AFP would be devoutly offended,” Verly shot back with just as much unctuous sweetness as she was using on him.

For a second, she blinked at him, clearly surprised. Then the moment passed, and Natalie settled down onto the seat of the chair. “Yes, they would be. They’d want to reform the planet only I think that Temar scared them a little.”

“He scared my officers a lot,” Verly admitted. “They couldn’t get a psych profile on him.”

“Ironic.” She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “I can’t get a psych profile on you. I don’t trust you, not you or your judgment.”

Verly nodded. His own government had busted him from senior commander down to a lieutenant commander—three whole grades and the loss of every bit of respect he’d earned. He couldn’t expect this woman to offering him some show of faith. “I’ll admit that I have trouble trusting you. You loved a woman, but you went along with a government that tortures other people who make the same choice. You can see why that makes me wonder how you define right and wrong.”

Natalie leaned back in her chair. “It’s simple. If it protects Rula, if it protects both of us, it’s right. Do anything to make me think that we’re in danger, and that’s a wrong that I’ll have to correct.” Her smile made it very clear that she’d enjoy doing that correcting.

“You’re a cold bitch.”

“You have no idea,” she offered. “I wouldn’t hesitate to put a bullet between your eyes.” Her gaze travelled up and down the length of Verly’s body before settling near his crotch. “I wouldn’t hesitate to put one between your legs and leave you to bleed out.” With those closing words and one final smile, she stood up and headed for the stairs. Verly had to fight an urge to cross his legs. Threatening to shoot a man in the balls might not be original, but it definitely made her point.

“Is Oneida something I should know about?”

Sucking in a startled breath, Verly looked up to see Naite leaning against the door to the kitchen. Clearly Verly had been on his own in that surveillance shuttle far too long. He needed to pay more attention to his surroundings.

“You heard?”

Naite walked in and dropped wearily into the chair Natalie had recently abandoned. “I saw her coming in, and I wanted to make sure you two didn’t kill each other.”

“I don’t think I have a chance in hell of killing her.”

Naite snorted. “I think you could, I just don’t want you to try.”

“I guess I should be complimented that someone still thinks I’m important enough to be a risk. The lack of security around here sometimes makes me feel a little neglected. I expected guards and restrictions.” Verly made a joke out of it, but Naite didn’t understand Natalie if he believed that.

Naite looked at him. “What makes you think I’m not your guard?”

“Because you keep trying to get rid of me,” Verly pointed out. “If you were ordered to keep me under control, you’d use your very impressive talents in bed as leverage to make me play nice.”

Naite started to laugh, but after a mere second he stopped and looked at Verly in horror. “Fuck. Tell me that does not happen.”

“What? Fucking the enemy to get an advantage?” Verly asked. From Naite’s expression, that’s exactly what he meant. “It happens all the time, Naite. If you use an attractive agent, it’s called a honey pot.”

“You people are fucked up. Hell, you make Ben sound downright sane.”

“Ben?”

“The asshole who raped Temar. He’s dead now. So if I were you, I wouldn’t be bragging about how you people treat sex like a weapon.”

Verly nodded. Naite was an interesting man. He was uncomfortable getting a compliment from a lover, but he could comfortably have a conversation about rapists being killed and assassins. If Verly were a psych officer, he could write interesting reports on the people of Livre. He was starting to wonder if the people here were all shaped by this harsh, desert world into some alien psychopathy or if Naite and Temar and Shan were particularly strange, even on this world.

“You know, sometimes you act like a farm worker, and other times I can definitely tell you’re a council member with a good deal of power.” Verly gave Naite his best grin. “It’s a little sexy.”

The look that Naite gave him in return made it clear that Naite questioned his sanity.

Clearing his throat, Verly changed the topic back to a safer subject, like assassination. “So, Oneida. Leadership theory says that a good leader can adapt to different situations. But a chaotic situation is best way to get people to accept quick change and charismatic leaders. Put people in a panic—blow up a spaceport or release a bioweapon—and the population will embrace the most top-down military dictatorship you can find. If you are the person standing out as a pillar of strength when the world crumbles, the people are yours.”

“And that happened on Oneida?”

“During the war, they were the center of some of the worst fighting. Their entire capital was leveled when a battle cruiser took a full nuclear hit in orbit and crashed into the heart of the city. After that, they started turning out some of the most vicious, unrelenting fighters in the war. After the official truce, they accused the PA of a number of atrocities including a biological attack.”

“Were you guilty?”

“Personally? No. I’ve never been near the planet. Was the PA involved in the attacks?” Verly sighed. “The first one or two, maybe. Probably,” he amended that. “But after everyone figured out what was happening on the ground, the PA didn’t want to add fuel to the fire. The rumor is that when the PA backed off, Oneida engineered their own terrorism.”

“Engineered?”

Turning away, Verly pushed the edge of the curtain aside and looked out onto the farm. Workers quietly moved about their business, laughing and chatting as they walked. A woman sat in the shade of the bunkhouse, her feet up on a barrel as she worked something in her hands, and two men ushered goats from one pen to another.

“They wanted the people of Oneida angry—the word is that the AFP had units dress as terrorists and attack, both at Oneida and on other planets. It’s a way of making sure people are afraid and willing to accept the dictatorship that offers protection. It’s an old game, Naite, and one the AFP plays to win. Or at least the upper leadership does. They’ve limited education so much that I’m not even sure their upper-level officers are aware of how common this strategy is used. State controlled vid service certainly doesn’t bring up the possibility.”

Naite wrinkled his nose. “And here I thought Ben was as evil as they got.”

Verly shrugged. “Oh, you have no idea what evil looks like. No matter where orphans are from, if they have certain talents or if they are beautiful enough to quality as a honey pot, they’re sent to Oneida. Oneida trains spies that will perform any sex act, any assassination, any act of terrorism in order to defend their world. Oneida is a code word for a type of spy that that strikes fear in the heart of wise men.”

Naite stood, and Verly abandoned his view out the window to watch Naite get up and cross the room. Having a man as large as Naite Polli hover over you was not comfortable, but Verly struggled to control that instinct to retreat to a safe distance. “And you think this Natalie is one of those?”

“I thought you didn’t care about our pasts.”

“I don’t give a fuck about what you did. I’m asking about one particular kind of crazy that you people have going on up there.” Naite poked his thumb toward the sky. “And I’m asking for your reasons for thinking Natalie is one of these assassins. I will then feel free to ignore anything you say that I don’t happen to agree with.”

Verly took a deep breath as he really thought about that. He didn’t want his words to get her kicked off the planet, but his gut told him that she was. She had a way of moving, a way of always positioning herself in the most defensible corner, a wariness that set his inner alarms off. “She’s suspicious.”

Naite snorted. “She’s not the sort of trusting fool to invite home the first soldier who’s nice. That happens to sound more like common sense.”

“She clears a room before she comes into it. She keeps close to lines of retreat. She has a control over her body that most people don’t—there’s not a wasted movement in her whole body, no nervous habits or tics.”

“And that makes her an assassin?” Naite clearly didn’t believe him.

Verly shifted so that he was squared off against Naite, but he didn’t stand up. “You run your thumbs over things,” Verly said, nodding toward Naite’s large hands. Even now he had his fingers of his right hand shoved under his belt and his thumb rubbed his shirt fabric. “Every time you’re uncomfortable, you find something to touch. Shan mumbles, and yes, he’s probably praying. He also tends to rock side to side. Temar twists his fingers like he’s twirling some invisible stick. Cyla…” Verly huffed, “don’t even get me started on Cyla. That woman has so many nervous tics that it’s not funny. She’s hurting, Naite. She’s seriously hurting. And Rula… every time she gets uncomfortable, she goes ramrod straight, like some officer is going to come in and do an inspection. We all have these nervous tics. Natalie doesn’t. She has perfect control over her body. Every move is graceful. Every step calculated. That isn’t a casual skill. I would never start a fight with her because I don’t doubt for a second that she could kill me.” Verly stopped. Staring up at Naite, he didn’t know how to convince the man to see the world the way he saw it. For a time, Naite looked down at him, frowning as though mentally reviewing memories he didn’t generally like.

“Huh.” Naite scratched his arm and looked nonplused before he turned and headed for the door.

“Naite?”

“I’ve got work,” Naite said as he headed out.

Well crap. Verly definitely could feel the tenuous connection between them straining. Naite didn’t want to believe him, and right now Verly didn’t care if Naite believed or not. He just didn’t want to give Naite an excuse to back away from this relationship. Tossing his datapad to the side, Verly chased after the man. “Hey, wait up. I’ll give you a hand,” he called.