Archer stood on the field inside the palace grounds and made his way to the podium. He had been asked to take part in the ceremony inside, but had declined. His job was done. There was no need for the media to see his face. In fact, he was looking forward to the obscurity. I hope I can rebuild the family business…

  In front of him was what was left of Archer’s Avengers. They stood at parade rest, perfect formation. Some were bandaged. Some, like Colonel Chaffee, had to have help to stand even after the months of recuperation during the trip home. She, like everyone else, had come to this place, for one last ceremony…one last gathering.

  "My friends," Archer began, his voice hesitating and almost cracking. "And you are my friends. We began this fight back on our homes. We fought in the Lyran Alliance and even in the heart of the Jade Falcons honor. We went to Twycross and tangled with their best, plucking the wings right off of the Falcon Guards.

  "We all came for different reasons but for one common goal—to end the reign of a tyrant. That has been done. There is no longer a need for the Avengers, not now. Prince Victor has sent formal congratulations to us as a unit. We have earned our pay and earned the respect of the people we left behind. Moreover, we’ve earned the respect of the men and women who are no longer in our ranks, those that died at our sides on the field of combat." He paused, lowered his eyes for a moment. There were so many.

  "I was going to do a long speech," he said, wadding up his notes and sliding them off the podium, "but that isn’t necessary. What matters is this: the Avengers are family. If called upon again, we would serve. The time for service for most of us is now over. Some of you are being offered positions in the Thorin FTM. For those of you that take those commissions, I offer you the best of luck. I would say, ‘make me proud,’ but you all already have.

  "But that is the future. This is now. Usually when a war is over units like ours are disbanded. I have conferred with the Prince on this. We are not breaking up. You can’t break up a family like us. On the books, we will still be listed as active duty. The reason is simple, there may yet be a time when the Avengers have to take up arms.

  My final command to you, all of you, for now, is go home. Put this damn war behind us. Be with your loved ones. If you make as good citizens as you did fighters, our people will always be proud of you and so will I. Go to your families, return to your lives, but never forget our time together. Never forget when a handful of good men and women made a difference.

  "Avengers, I salute you." He snapped to a pristine salute. The troopers went to attention and saluted back. There wasn’t a dry eye staring back at him. The salt from his own tears stung at the edges of his eyes. He didn’t let his voice waver despite the desire to do so. Out of respect for those that faced him, he maintained his last bit of control and restraint. Not just for them, but for all of the troops he had commanded that were no longer alive, or were in a hospital somewhere. They deserved a moment of dignity.

  "Regiment," he barked out. "Dismissed!"

  THE BACK ROAD

  by Louisa M. Swann

  Lucas Farm

  Outside Nagoshima, Buckminster

  Benjamin Military District

  Draconis Combine

  17 August 3057

  Sometimes you have to take the back road to get where you want to go. Not the most direct route, perhaps. But when you’re running from the law, you learn to improvise or you end up dead. Somehow those winding twists and turns led me to where I’m standing now—a field away from my old home and twenty feet away from where I just buried my Special Forces uniform.

  "Hey, mister. There’s a dead guy in my daddy’s field. You know anything about that?" The question comes from a pitchfork-wielding mini person who somehow managed to get behind me.

  Smart on his part, not smart on mine.

  I study the youngster with interest. He looks to be about ten, yet I get the distinct impression he’s much older. He’s wearing a floppy brimmed hat so his eyes are in shadow. His work shirt and jeans are a bit on the big side, as if he’s wearing an older brother’s clothes.

  The boy’s accent is pure country, a breath of fresh air to my Dragon-stained lungs, and a reminder of just how provincial my childhood home has remained, in spite of being a prefecture capital. Buckminster always has been a place where people bow to the demands of life, not to the presumed authority of a conquering force, no matter how many years have passed.

  "What’s your name?" I ask, purposefully avoiding his question. I flex my calf, feel the knife sheath hard against my skin. Remember how effortlessly that knife slid into the cabby’s gut. Instinct—born from years of special forces training—rears its long-toothed head, makes my hand itch to pull that same knife, to excise the threat now facing me.

  No use wondering how killing got so easy. All it takes is time and experience.

  "I said—you know anything about that dead man back there?" The boy shifts the pitchfork in his hand, angles the tines so they catch the sunlight oozing through overcast skies.

  There are two reasons I came back to this farm on Buckminster: One—to find my roots. Two—to find my soul. I did not come back to kill boys who pretend to be men.

  Sometimes the best way to bluff is to tell the honest truth. What makes the bluff work is the part you choose to tell. I jerk my chin in the general direction of the cab driver’s body. "He tried to rob me. Brought me all the way out here and then came after me with a gun."

  The boy licks his lower lip, turns the thought over in his mind. He keeps his eye on me, starts to lower the pitchfork—an opening I let pass—then stops, pitchfork still threatening.

  "Why don’t you tell that story to my pa?" He lifts his head and I get a good look at his eyes—dark brown, direct—Lucas eyes. Just like his daddy’s.

  The air smells of late summer—earth baked into laziness like a mother about to give birth. I glance around, check the area for anyone else who might be hiding in the hip-high grasses. A wheat hybrid, from the looks of it. I pull a stalk between my fingers, stripping chaff and grain into my hand. Smell the rich, nutty scent. Harvest was the one time my daddy and I could work together without fighting. "About time to get some AgroMechs working, isn’t it?"

  The question hangs in the air as I watch the boy’s face charge with emotion—anger?—and go flat.

  "Pa don’t hold with ’Mechs of any kind," he says.

  A breeze ripples across the field, takes me back down memory lane and it’s me standing in this harvest-ready field watching a MechWarrior stride down the road. Taller than the barn I’d grown up playing in. Aligned crystal steel armor on the outside, human heart and brain inside. Proud and ready to fight. I’d known then I was going to be a warrior. Not just any warrior. A warrior who could prove to my father just how wrong his simple beliefs were. I would become a member of the Draconis Elite Strike Teams—a dream I’d long ago realized.

  A dream that would take away my ability to touch my emotions, that would tear my family apart.

  "You’re Phelan Lucas’s boy, aren’t you? I heard your daddy bought this place. This used to be my home. I grew up here." I hold my hands to the side, put on my best good-old-boy smile, but the boy’s still suspicious. He isn’t buying what I have to sell. "Come on now, put down the fork. Then we can have a nice, civilized conversation."

  "How ‘bout I keep my ‘fork’ and you start moving."

  The kid is young, but that pitchfork is full grown, with three nasty looking tines it would definitely hurt to run into. I glance over my shoulder. Stare across the field on the other side of the road where the boy’s gaze keeps drifting.

  Nagoshima is a distant smudge against the slate gray sky. It’s not the city that draws the boy’s attention, though. The sounds of mock battle drift toward us on a slight breeze that ruffles the grass and tugs the boy’s hat brim. Familiar sounds. Even though they’re too far away to see, I know what I’m hearing as well as I know the lines on my face.

  BattleMechs. Engaged in a live-fire training exercise.

  My own gaze follows the boy’s and suddenly I’m back in the cockpit again, locking down my harness, stretching my chin to get comfortable as I slide the neurohelmet over my head, attach the biocables, and power up...

  I cut the memories short, feel sweat slick beneath my arms. Piloting ’Mechs had been only one of my jobs, but the inside of a cockpit is not an easy place to forget.

  The boy doesn’t seem to have noticed my preoccupation. The ’Mechs are far enough away he can’t possibly see much detail, yet a look of longing sits upon his face.

  Would he still wear that same look if he knew how it feels to bake inside a machine, weapons firing salvo after salvo, the stench of sweat and fear oozing from your body like pus, while all around you people—real people inside their own machines—are dying?

  I take a step forward and immediately stop as the pitchfork raises, its tines glistening with menace.

  "Don’t you come no further," the boy warns. His chin lifts and I see the challenge in his eyes. I toy with the idea of meeting the challenge, but that was the old me. The new me has made a different choice: Stop killing and go home.

  If only things were that easy.

  "I like your caution, kid. Caution helps you live longer." I keep my hands spread and move toward the farm house at the far end of the field. Even though he can’t possibly see the ’Mechs from where we stand the boy can’t resist one last glance toward the horizon as I pass by. His hunger matches the hunger I once felt.

  "You know what it’s like inside those machines?" I walk a little to the side so I can keep an eye on that pitchfork.

  "You ain’t no MechWarrior." In spite of his protest, the boy’s eyes are wide. He lets the pitchfork drop a little lower.

  "For awhile you feel like you’re on top of the world and nobody can knock you down." I remember well the feeling of accomplishment, of pride mixed with a bit of arrogance. "Then you start to get tired of the heat that bakes you like bread inside an oven every time you fire your weapons. Get tired of feeling scared. Get tired of the killing."

  "I knew you weren’t no Warrior. ’Mechs ain’t scared of nothing." The boy’s look turns to disdain. "One day I’m gonna be up there, riding one of those ’Mechs."

  We walk a few steps in silence, me trying to figure out how to get out of this mess, the boy chewing on his lip as if trying to make up his mind about something.

  "I thought your daddy didn’t like ’Mechs?" I ask, more to keep the boy’s mind occupied and his pitchfork in a less ominous position.

  "Pa thinks they cause more trouble than they take care of."

  "And you think he’s wrong." Didn’t surprise me to hear Lucas felt that way. He and my daddy went way back. I let my hands brush the heavily seeded grass as we walk, watch the breeze pick off the chaff and carry it away while the seeds fall to the ground.

  "All’s he cares about is planting and harvesting. ’Mechs take care of people." There’s definitely a note of bitterness in my new friend’s voice.

  "Planting grain is an investment in the future," I say, ironically mimicking my own daddy’s words. "Harvesting that grain is what keeps us alive, what keeps those warriors alive."

  It had taken me years to see the truth in those words. Years filled with bloodshed and death. Deaths justified by the code of the Dragon, but not by my heart.

  "They should be more careful when they come through, the ’Mechs, I mean. They’re so big, they can’t always see where they put their feet. I try to tell Pa that, but it don’t matter to him. All’s he sees are the crops they stomp into the ground."

  Rebellion isn’t new to Buckminster, a fact I can personally attest to. Rebellion had allowed me to leave home when I came of age; I plan on that same rebellion allowing me to return to that home.

  "Your daddy’s got a point."

  The boy’s point—a very sharp, metal point—presses through the back of my shirt. My cab driver’s uniform shirt. Something I’m sure I’ll have to explain when I meet up with Lucas.

  The smell of roasting meat fills the air as we approach the farmhouse. My stomach responds to the tantalizing aroma in an almost violent fashion, reminding me I’ve missed several meals already today.

  Telling me I’m home.

  Funny how it doesn’t feel like home. It doesn’t feel anything except a little bit familiar.

  I close my eyes and see chickens pecking in the yard, hear laundry flapping on the clothesline, taste the sweet tang of vine-ripe tomatoes. A small flock of Bucky browns, indigenous birds no larger than a ten-year old boy’s hand, wanders among the chickens. My father always claimed the birds were nothing but a nuisance, but my mother loved the undersize bits of fluff. She refused to use anything but the iridescent brown feathers in pillows and quilts.

  A cold, wet nose presses into my hand. I open my eyes, stare at the mangy creature sniffing my palm. A dune pup.

  "You’re quite a ways from home." I give the pup’s head a pat, then rub my fingers hard against my pant leg. No one’s quite sure where dune pups originated, but one touch of the wiry, sand-colored hair plastered against their skin like a thin sheet of armor is enough to set a body’s skin crawling.

  "This is his home," the boy says and I nod. Home for boy and pup, yes. But not the same home I left behind.

  We turn away from the white clapboard house with its sumptuous smells and lace curtains flapping in the windows and follow the mutt into the barn.

  "Got my first whopping in this barn," I say, but the boy doesn’t answer. I remember vividly the look on my daddy’s face that day. I told him I wanted to be a MechWarrior. He said there were only farmers in our family. A lot of things changed that day.

  My father.

  Me.

  I’d seen a lot of barns on a lot of different planets since then. One thing that’s standard in any barn—round topped or pitched roof, old or new, red or gray—is the sweet scent of animal sweat mixed with fresh mown hay. A scent I’ve missed without even realizing it.

  Funny how sharp memories can be when they’re connected with smells and how that same smell can bring fond memories forward to replace the bad. I can almost see my friends and I leaping from the loft into fresh cut hay, challenging each other to see who can jump the highest, the furthest. Who can do double somersaults...

  "Who you got there, Con?"

  It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. At first all I can make out is a shadow moving toward us. The shadow slowly resolves into a hulk of a man wearing the same type of clothes as the boy. Only the man’s carrying a rifle in one hand, tipped behind him just enough I can’t quite identify the make or model.

  "I found this guy in the field, Pa. He killed a cabby."

  Phelan Lucas pulls off his hat and wipes his forehead, looking at me all the while. He’s older than I remember. What’s left of his hair is steel gray. Wrinkles fill his leathery face. The wrinkles aren’t laugh lines, though. They’re the lines of a life hard-earned. The life of a man who doesn’t fool around with games, who believes that anyone or anything who threatens his family or his livelihood is better off six feet under.

  Like a bug under a microscope, Lucas examines me from head to toe without moving. I could tell him my name, but I wait, wanting him to reach out to me, to somehow crack the shell of numbness that’s grown so thick I can no longer feel the world. His gaze meets mine, probing, assessing. All the years of training have built a self-assurance into my body that’s almost impossible to hide. He sees this confidence. Knows I could kill him and the boy right now if I wanted.

  And he’s not intimidated. "You carrying any weapons?

  No partial truths here. The only way to deal with a man like Phelan Lucas is with total honesty. I move slow. Pull my right pant leg up high enough to show the edge of my ankle sheath. Let the pant leg slide back into place. The boy chokes back a startled yelp, but Lucas says nothing.

  Sounds outside are muffled, like someone covered the barn with a heavy blanket. A large animal snorts somewhere deeper in the shadows. A hen cackles for a moment, then goes quiet. I can hear Con breathing—quick, fast little breaths that betray his anxiety. His father takes slow, deep breaths. Quiet breaths.

  Breaths like mine.

  I let a touch of a smile reach my eyes. Lucas’s brow furrows in puzzlement.

  "I know you," he says. Then his brow clears and he laughs. The end of the rifle dips down toward the floor. "You’re Hendal’s boy, aren’t you?"

  "Yes, sir." I should feel relief, but the shell hasn’t cracked. Not yet.

  "Didn’t recognize you with that clown suit on and all." He pokes at the cabby’s shirt.

  "I borrowed this uniform from a man who doesn’t need it anymore."

  Lucas’s gaze gets a bit more appraising. I begin to feel less like a bug and more like a mouse beneath a cat’s paw. I lift my hands just slightly to ease his mind.

  "I’ve had a bit of a run in with the authorities, Mr. Lucas. Seems they and I don’t see eye to eye anymore." I visited my daddy’s grave on the way out to this place. Tried to tell him he was right about the ’Mechs. Right about everything.

  "Your pa always said you’d come back. Too bad he ain’t here..." Phelan Lucas clears his throat. "So you’re a deserter now, huh?"

  Deserter.

  The word rings in my ears. A man who should have killed himself rather than bring shame on House Kurita. Bad enough for a Combine MechWarrior to fail his duty—such a man would be dealt a swift death—but for DEST, death would take its sweet torturous time.

  I dip my chin in an almost nod, feel my face flush with heat.

  "You weren’t never no ’Mech." Con’s voice is filled with loathing.

  "That’s enough, boy." Lucas takes a deep breath and crams his hat back onto his head. He tucks the rifle into the crook of his arm and steps forward, right hand outstretched.

  "Good to see you."

  I take his hand in a firm grip, matching his strength, but not offering more. "Likewise, Mr. Lucas."

  Lucas chuckles and I smile.