Page 55 of Warrior’s Mate

A second tone joined the first.

"No," Maelis said. "Coolant pressure."

Kaiven looked toward the western relay building. The squat service structure sat half buried in the slope beyond the grain terraces, its armored communications mast extending above a stand of silverleaf trees. Smoke was already pushing from one side of the roof.

"How bad?"

"If the emergency sinks fail, we lose the local repeater and half the irrigation controls with it."

"Can you shut it down remotely?"

Maelis pulled up the relay controls on her wrist unit. The screen flashed twice before returning a string of errors. "Apparently not."

Another explosion rolled from somewhere east of the terraces. The ground shivered. A flock of blue-winged grazers lifted from the orchard in a single panicked cloud, wheeled once, and vanished behind the ridge.

The sight hurt in a way the explosions did not. Maelis had watched those birds steal seed from her grandmother's drying racks every harvest since she was a child. Now they fled across a sky crossed by smoke and the silver trails of military interceptors.

Kaiven was already speaking into his comm. "Daratu to western security teams. Report."

Static answered first. Then a voice, distorted but intelligible. "Captain, relay took a glancing strike. South service corridor collapsed. Two technicians accounted for, three missing. Cooling loop is unstable. We also have civilians arriving from the south farms. Maybe sixty."

"Any hostile ground contact?"

"Not yet. Air activity increasing."

Maelis was moving before the transmission ended. "There is a manual bypass in the lower pump room." Kaiven caught up with her in three strides. "Where?"

"Under the relay."

"Through the collapsed corridor?"

"There is another entrance from the irrigation service tunnel."

He gave her the look she had learned to recognize over the last several hours: the first instant of a commander's objection, followed by the visible effort of a man deciding whether the objection was actually useful.

"How many people know that route?"

"Right now? Me. Tarek if he's still alive. Maybe Suri at the north pumping station."

"Then show me."

No order to stay behind. No attempt to hand her knowledge to a soldier and remove her from the problem. The absence of it landed between them with more force than another apology would have.

They ran.

The irrigation access lay behind a line of storage tanks where nutrient slurry had spilled across the pavement, turning the dust black and slick. Maelis keyed open a maintenance hatch and started down the ladder. Kaiven followed without argument, sealing the hatch above them.

The tunnel beneath Wasaytu smelled of wet stone, mineral deposits, and the faint vegetal sweetness of treated irrigation water. Emergency strips glowed along the walls. Every few seconds the lights dimmed as the damaged relay pulled power from systems never meant to carry that load.

"Three hundred meters," Maelis said. "Then we take the upper branch."

"You have maps down here?"

"I am the map."

"I was afraid you'd say that."

Despite everything, she laughed once. It came out breathless and strange in the tunnel. Kaiven's mouth moved at the corner. Then the ceiling shook, dust raining over both of them, and whatever humor had surfaced disappeared beneath the next emergency.