Thursday, February 3, 2011

Flight or Fight, Chapter 2

Trandafira became aware in stages, feeling the blankets around her, hearing the soft pop of a log in the fireplace, and the rustling of papers as Papa read in his favourite chair... she froze, remembering how she had left the fortress, and strained her senses.

The blankets had an odd silky feeling to them, and she surmised she might be wrapped in the parachute. Her boots were off, and her calf was sore but not painful enough to wake her. The scents about her were of the fire, fresh-cut unburnt evergreen boughs, and roasting meat. Her stomach rumbled, apparently loud enough to attract attention, from the chuckle that answered it.

She opened her eyes to see a rock ceiling, illuminated by firelight. Turning her head to find the Jägermonster watching, her heart leapt into her mouth as she noted what was in his hands. "NO!" she struggled to reach for him, and retrieve the documents. Tangled as she was in the parachute, he had time to carefully re-roll the documents and put them back in the tube and place it on the ground between them.

Then he put another document folio beside it. "Hyu need more information, but firzt hyu need to eat, and hyu dun vant to get rabbit all over de paperz. Vhen did hyu last eat, by de vay?"

The down-to-earth question, with the tone in the manner of one of the old aunties, made her stop and think. "I - ah, wait... I had tea and a journey bar when I broke camp."

"Und dot vaz?"

"Almost an hour after daybreak, I think... the cloud cover had made me oversleep."

"Zo, it vaz sunset ven Hy bring de firevood in, at least thorteen hourz, dot'z not goot. Here, hyu eat, und den ve take care of ketching each odder op, yaz?"

Trandafira shakily accepted the roasted leg of rabbit he had caught and hoped the Jägermonster had some idea of what was safe for unaltered humans to eat in the area. The old stories about the Jägermonsters said they were able to eat anything, and from what she had seen when the random patrols of them had come through the fortress, she could believe those tales. What with the Sparks mucking about with the local wildlife, one never could tell if cooking what you hunted would make it safe to eat or make it poisonous, but it smelled wonderful. While she ate, he filled her in on what had happened since the jump.

"Hyu had a grazing vound on you leg, und Hy had de medic'z kit in my pack. Hy tink hyu iz lucky, no bone hitz, no deep muscle demage; hyu might be able to valk on it in de morning." He passed her some greens that looked like watercress, and a canteen, "Hyu being tired und hungry means Hy don't haff to vorry about a head injury on hyu, vot mit huy pessink out. But Hy cleaned a good bit of blood out of hyur boot, zo eat. Hy alzo had to vash de blood out of hyur trouzer leg, so ve don't attract predatorz on de trail tomorrow."

Her mouth went dry as she recognised the feel of the parachute fabric on her legs, as opposed to the heavy twill of her hunting togs, but the Jäger continued on. His next statement made any embarrassment of being seen in her delicates irrelevant, in light of their situation, "Ve iz going to haff to cross some vild pocketz of de Vastelands to get to de nearest air-station held by de Baron’s troops. Hyur riding helm haz hunt-master ribbons on't. 'Zat for true, or vaz hyu given it for being Dama?"

The flare of anger she felt at the last question burned off the cold fear of crossing the Wastelands on foot. "I *AM* the hunt-master and lead rider for Fortress Adreev, and have been for five years!" she replied with some heat. Earning that had been grueling, and in no small part because her father had made sure she was trained properly. "I have been certified in trail safety and had three accredited monster kills in one season at the academy in Mustafa-Svilin." True, they were all group-kills, as were all student hunts, but she had been the hunting party leader for all of them. She glared at him, daring him to refute her assertion. Her aura of righteous indignation was somewhat disconcerted by his smile.

~=*=~

Dalibor grinned, glad that his guess had been right about her. When he had checked her wound, he had seen the scars from previous hunts, faded, but they were still there. Her gear was well-worn but also well cared-for, and the equipment she carried was that of a seasoned campaigner. If she was not a soldier herself, she was trained by a good one. She had a nice glare, good for staring down an opponent. And she smelled nice - not the way the one they were looking for would smell, but her scent was intriguing, just the same. "Hy'm glad, that meanz hyu can take a vatch tomorrow night. Hyu eat now, und rest. Vot hyur squad call hyu?"

She looked at him doubtfully over the canteen, "I have not hunted in a squad for a while."

Hoo, she is a solitary trail walker? This gets better and better, he thought to himself. She could still be blowing smoke, but to have the guts to say that, when she knew they were out in the wild, meant she was either that good, or that insane. Either way, what bliss! "Vot hyu name at home, then?"

She grimaced, and straightened up as she responded in a tone of rote, "I am Dama Trandafira Minka Evacska, daughter of Landsknect Arturus Radulf Hynter, Defender of Fortress Adreev in trust for Klaus, Baron Wulfenbach, in memory of the Brothers Heterodyne." Her posture triggered a far-distant memory for him, one that he squelched to regain his mask as “just another dumb soldier”.

He blinked at her twice, slowly, as the fire crackled quietly. "Hy iz juzt Sergeant Dalibor. Dot name hyu got iz a heavy vun to carry around vit hyu, iz too moch luggage - und too moch to schout in a fight. Hy vill call hyu Dafi."

~=*=~

She finished the rabbit while thinking. Her hunger abated, she finally said, after she finished the greens, "No one has shortened my name before." At the sergeant's surprised look, she shrugged, "I have lived my whole life in a military fortification , and the fortress has always been run with rigidly formal organization." She stared into the fire a few moments more, and murmured, "I... think I like having a nickname." Stopping to lick her fingers, she mused, "Papa has... had stood on formality outside the family suite, because it was the way a fortification should be run, but I think it was partially to make sure no one got familiar with his daughter."

"Hyu Papa soundz like he vaz a tough commander - goot for soldierz, but maybe not so goot for femily?"

Dafi (odd as it was, she felt comfortable calling herself that) shrugged, "He could have shipped me off to the village after Mother died, but he said he did not want me to be that far away. The nearest village was a full-day's travel by cart, too far away for a young child to travel regularly, even with that area reclaimed from the monsters of the Long War. Papa was duty-bound, and he felt he could not leave his post for visits." She sighed, "It was hard for him to send me to the Academy, but I needed the certification according to the regulations."

The sergent's eyebrows shot up. "That vas hyur firzt time avay from home? Mustafa-Svilin vaz a tough schkool, bot a goot von, learnt lots dhere. They zend hyu by hyurself?"

Dafi winced at the memory, "I almost wish they had, but I got sent with a squad. Papa and the chaplain tutored me for the entrance exams, along with the half-dozen officer's children in house at the time. It was supposed to give me someone from home to talk to, but they did the formal confirmation as Dama and Papa's heir just before we left. So I got set up as the ranking cadet from my region when we got there" At 14, she had already felt the gulf of social hierarchy putting a wedge between her and her playfellows. The only time it was not as sharply felt was in the hunting pack, but even then there was the knowledge that they were supposed to protect her over themselves. Just as it would be her duty to protect them when she took control of the fortress. Something that had been an onerous certainty for her at that time was now a nebulous duty she hoped she would be able to take up again.

Would the Baron follow Papa’s wishes and install her as the ranking officer there? Papa had not had any second thoughts about that. He had said that his documents of succession had been filed with the Baron after her return home. He had also made sure the soldiers there knew she was not a straw leader, having her work her way through all of the crews over the years since her return from the academy. It was because of the help of her classmates that she had obtained the very incriminating documents, and had been able to get away on one of the ridge-running mounts, a horse with the sure-footed gait of a mountain goat and the stamina of a mine pony. Again, her squad from those days had acted in her protection, over their own. A dark mood threatened as she stared into the fire, when she suddenly remembered his phrasing. "Were you at the academy?"

He puffed up his chest, "Yaz! Clezz of 1557! Hy vaz verrrra goot before de 'brau, but now Hy em fenteztik!"

His preening surprised a giggle out of her. Then she turned thoughtful, and asked, "How much of the tactics classes did they give then, or do you remember?"

"Pfui, all that iz uzeful now from then vaz de cheneral t'eery und de lecturez on supply tactikz. Hy read op now, got to keep current." He handed her a rag to clean her hands, and shifted closer with the document folio from before. "Here, hyu read this, und say vat hyu see, ja?"

~=*=~

The girl took the folio from him, and read it through once. Then she started sorting the papers into piles in her lap, being careful to not get them on the floor of the cave. He noted, by the way she was organizing the information, she was seeing the same pattern he was. She was focused on the task to the point she was not watching where the parachute was covering (or not), and he leaned back to get a better view.

A difficult decision, watch her organize and assess the collected intelligence reports, or watch the flex of her back and the curve of her hip? She was fit, but it did not make her curves any less. As she spread out the parachute to make more "desk" area, he shifted with her to make more room. He thought he got caught ogling when she sat up suddenly. When she fumbled for the document tube, he turned his attention to her analysis. "Hy did this in my head, but I did not get a goot review of hyur information."

"It fills in the holes, see?" She unrolled the sheaf of papers, and pointed out, "The conspiracy ring is evident in what you have, but I have Travers, Evanier, and Chauncey's statements that make them responsible." She laid out the inner ring of the letters from her document case, in the areas that linked the reports from the airman. “Their letters also indicate they have many pawns in the game, but most of them had to be convinced, one way or another. When they got to the border outposts, they either got the blackmail they needed to put the outpost officers in their control, or where they had no hooks in the ranking officer, they... removed the obstacle. S-so, the random attacks on the Perimeter Road outposts... were not...”

He shifted his focus from the documents to her, the last letter trembling in her hand. He took it from her, and placed it in the pattern before answering, "No, they vere not random." A moment's hesitation, and he decided to play the 'ignorant-of-nobility-protocols soldier' and put a hand on her shoulder in a comradely fashion. "Ve vill take theze to de Baron, und he vill make sure theze traitorz are punished."

He nearly took his hand from her shoulder when she began to shake, then she suddenly turned her face to his shoulder and sobbed. It had been a very long time since anyone had turned to him for comfort, but he dimly remembered the way of it. After reading the reports in the folio, he had a good idea what had happened at her family's outpost, and knew her pain, as it had an echo in his past. To have lost all you knew, and not had a map for the next step? Centuries ago, he had been in the same place, a broken soul in a desolate wasteland.

He gathered her into his lap, gently holding her and murmured, "Ve vill meke chure they pay their debtz for de broken oathz, Hy promize."