CIRCE

xxiii

The camp they set up is shabby at best, a collection of tents and roughly assembled covers that curl around injured personnel and any supplies they've managed to salvage. They've retreated into the trees at the top of the cliffs that drop away into Cinio Claws, where the Outpost had been. It's a difficult spot. They have to use pulley systems to get both people and items up to the new camp. However, it's the best option they have considering how quickly they've had to work.

Most of the personnel have been retrieved from the Outpost's wreckage. Most. Forty-seven remain missing, likely buried somewhere beneath the rubble, beneath the waves that tug and toy with the detritus like violent vultures of sea foam that peck at remains. Still, as she stands at the cliff's edge overlooking the wreckage, a small part of Jaedah hopes that they're alive. Hopes that somehow, by some miracle, by the good grace of Circe, that the missing are alive.

She knows they aren't. If they haven't succumbed to their injuries, then they've drowned beneath the sea. It's been hours now and no one can survive for hours within water.

Jaedah hears someone cry out from the search party scouring the wreckage;

"Body!"

Several other officers nearby scramble to help out as they drag the body from the wreckage, untangling their limbs from where they had been buried beneath rubble. They're strapped onto a stretcher and hauled over the jagged planes of ruin, brought to the cliffside where they're hooked onto several ropes. From the top of the cliff, Jaedah and several others work together to hoist the body up, digging their feet into the ground and pulling the rope up.

The moment the body slides over the clifftop and onto solid ground, Jaedah's heart drops. She's bloodied and pale, but Jaedah recognizes her face immediately.

Noreen Lomidze.

No.

Jaedah kneels beside Noreen, her face washed into a grayish-brown, her lips cracked and bleeding, her hair wet. Jaedah grabs her wrist and presses her fingers to Noreen's pulse point, pleading for a beat, even just the faintest one. But Noreen is still. Her skin is cold and gray. She's gone.

Silence blankets the officers as they stand still around Noreen's body, heads hung. There are a few whose lips move in a voiceless prayer. The camp has stopped moving as well. Even the wind is still, halted in one last farewell as eyes and hearts turn to the deceased. Jaedah clenches her jaw, swallows the press of tears even if the tears themselves have long since dried, rung through in grief. Then a breeze drifts through the trees and the camp returns to motion. Jaedah rises to her feet.

"Set her with the other deceased," She murmurs.

Two of the officers unhook the ropes and haul Noreen away, toward the tent where the bodies of the deceased lay in a state of inertia, unsure of where to lay. Do they bury them? Try to get them back to Earth? What's the safest call? What's the most respectful?

With a quiet sigh between pressed lips, Jaedah falls back to camp, trudging through the trees to where a makeshift command center has been set up beneath a tent. She grabs a handheld tablet and pulls up the list of the deceased, 159 and counting, but stops. A gravelly voice, irritate yet also unfeeling, makes her freeze. Wicherek.

"Have you gotten in contact with ECOM yet?" Wicherek asks.

He speaks to a communications officer, one that he had brought that Jaedah barely recognizes.

"Not yet," The communications officer reports. "Our equipment has been roughed up. It's having difficulty with radio channels."

"Keep trying. I need to send in a request for support," Wicherek says.

There's something in that rubs Jaedah as odd. She isn't sure why. Support would be reasonable in a situation like this, but there's a gut feeling telling her that something is off. She reminds herself; It's Wicherek. Of course something is off.

In a flash of vexation, Jaedah steps forward, has to step forward because they can't risk another thing going wrong.

"What kind of support?" Jaedah asks.

Wicherek glances up at her and pauses. His slate brown eyes narrow, scanning her cautiously, his mouth a thin line and expression entirely neutral. No way to tell what he's thinking. Jaedah detests that about him.

"Medical and security," Wicherek says.

"Security?" Jaedah asks. "Why not transport? We should be getting the injured and deceased out of here. In fact, I think all of us should leave."

They've been here on a reluctantly given welcome for a year, a welcome that has since been rescinded since the arrival of Wicherek and his wrought of both the planet and diplomat relations. It's time for them to leave, of that Jaedah is certain.

"No," Wicherek says, sharp and swift. "We are not leaving. This is planet is under UNISED's administration. We are not giving it up just because someone decided to start a fight."

Anger bubbles up in Jaedah's chest, and fiercely she states; "Circe isn't ours."

For once Wicherek's pale cheeks turn pink as his wrath rises, sharpening into daggers that slice through his words; "Circe is under UNISED's authority. As far as I'm considered, it is ours. We found it. We got to it first. We control its skies. And we're not fleeing. If those beasts in the sky want to fight then I welcome them. They have no right to attack us and get away with it. What they committed was an act of war so war it will be."

Jaedah steps forward, nearly nose-to-nose with Wicherek as she meets his eyes, staring him down. His eyes are lit with a dimly stewing fury, something smoldering in their grayish-brownish color that Jaedah sneers at.

"You're going to get us killed."

"So what?" Wicherek hisses. "That is our job. We are here to defend UNISED's interests and protect those back on Earth. You signed on knowing that you could die should duty call for it. We stand as the first line of defense against those aliens up above, and we shall repay them with fervor for what they have done. It doesn't matter if we loose a few officers. It's a sacrifice that must be paid if UNISED is to sustain her power."

Her face twisted with disgust, Jaedah reels back from Wicherek. Revulsion is sticky in her throat, like acid to her palate as he spits at her. No. She didn't sign on to UNISED to die nor to become the next colonial power. She stands here because she had wanted to explore space, to be the hand with which Earth reaches out to find others. Not to bring destruction.

Jaedah shakes her head, slowly backing away. Odysseus isn't something she recognizes anymore. UNISED isn't the same. She can't be apart of this anymore. She can't even pretend. She retreats from the tent, out into the trees, marching in one direction as she skirts past officers. How could she let them reach this state? Why hadn't she done anything sooner? She should've been active. She should've tried to intervene sooner. She should've listened to Noreen.

Eventually, the rustle of camp disappears from her ears, and that's when Jaedah stops. She's somewhere in the forest, far enough away that there's no prying eyes or sneaking ears. Far enough away that she has a moment to breathe. The breeze is tepid on her face, not cold but enough to cool her storm of rage and repulsion and guilt. She takes a deep, steadying breath, in and out. What can she do?

A weight in her pockets draws her to her pager. One to Granger and Abbaas, another to her brother.

To the first, she sends a message; Wicherek is calling for reinforcements. He wants war. Alert the Pathfinder.

To the second, she warns; Odysseus crew need to be evacuated immediately. We've suffered a mass-casualty event. Go to ECOM for help. Director-General Wicherek is trying to start a war. He's acted out of line on Circe and has been ill-behaved in diplomatic situations while neglecting the state of his crew. He's ruined UNISED's relations with the ardeans and is calling for battle-ready reinforcements. Do everything you can earthside to try to stop him.