Юн Ли - Revenant Gun

Kujen took hold of his shoulder and turned him around. His eyes were earnest. “I am one of very few people who will never judge you for anything you’ve done, or will do, whether you remember it or not,” he said. “Because it is impossible for you to shock me. As for my safety, I have my defenses. You needn’t worry on my behalf.”

Jedao wasn’t sure he liked that. “But you’re a hexarch .” New thought: “Where’s your security?”

Kujen shook his head. “So young. Come on, let’s eat. The servitors have been setting out the food.”

The argument worked. Jedao had no appetite, but that was no reason to starve Dhanneth. (He wasn’t worried about Kujen’s ability to fend for himself.) Numbly, Jedao returned to his seat.

The servitors arranged the food carefully. They were robots in the shapes of various animals, with grippers and limbs and blinking lights, about half his size, with the ability to levitate. Jedao wondered how much of the conversation they had overheard, and what they thought of the whole mess. Neither Kujen or Dhanneth took any notice of them, so he assumed he should do the same. Still, Jedao was obscurely disappointed in Dhanneth.

Another memory-flash, again of the woman and the robots. This time the woman was bent over—paperwork? The robots were blinking their lights at each other, presumably holding a conversation, even if he couldn’t understand the code. He felt an overwhelming rush of friendliness toward the robots—servitors—even though he didn’t know why. It had something to do with the woman, though. Something to investigate later.

“You’re not eating,” Kujen said with a note of distress at odds with Jedao’s impression of him as someone who viewed people in utilitarian terms. “And the major won’t eat unless you do. You know how Kel are.”

“Yes, of course,” Jedao said, opening his eyes, and picked up his chopsticks. The thought of eating repulsed him. Everything he tried had an odd metallic aftertaste. Neither Kujen nor Dhanneth gave any sign that anything was amiss, however. At least the tea was tolerable.

“I woke you early because I figured something like this would happen,” Kujen said briskly. “You can thank me for my foresight later.”

“I defer to your judgment,” Jedao said.

Kujen blinked at Jedao’s sudden formality. “It would have been impossible to catch you up on everything at once. You do see that? But it’s as well you have your composure back. Kel get panicky when their commanding officers lose it. How much do you remember about formation instinct?”

“Formation instinct?”

Kujen dithered over two pastries, which looked identical to Jedao, then selected the one closer to him. “It’s a Kel’s emotional need to maintain hierarchy. You’ll find it useful.”

Jedao saw Dhanneth stiffen out of the corner of his eye. He was going to have to look into that, too, part of a whole list of mysteries. Still, this explained what Kujen had meant when he said he could guarantee the swarm’s loyalty. And it might explain the mixed signals he was getting from Dhanneth, half solicitousness, half resentment. “When did Kel Command institute it? And how?”

The bigger question was, why would the average Kel go along with what sounded like mass brainwashing? One more thing he didn’t remember.

Dhanneth was resolutely cutting up a stuffed pancake. Even through the gloves Jedao could see that he had a death-grip on his chopsticks. For a moment, Jedao thought that Dhanneth was going to answer for Kujen. Then Dhanneth took a large bite and chewed determinedly.

“It happened some time after your death,” Kujen said. He set the half-eaten pastry down and leaned back. “Your breakdown was a major inspiration, even though none of the Kel were culpable. Formation instinct is injected through psych surgery, and even then it’s not an entirely reliable procedure. The Kel do their best to recruit individuals suitable for the injection, and it works well enough for their purposes. Needless to say, your average Shuos isn’t remotely suitable.”

Kujen waited for a reaction. Jedao choked back his impulse to say, That doesn’t sound remotely ethical and instead smiled blandly at him. “Useful to know, thank you.” He forced himself to eat an apple slice. “When do I meet my officers?”

“Tomorrow,” Kujen said.

At the top of the chain would be Jedao’s tactical group commanders—currently four of them—and two infantry colonels, as well as the heads of his staff departments. There would also be a great mass of bannermoth and boxmoth commanders. He’d only had time to review the profiles of the commanders last night. Too bad he hadn’t known in advance that Kujen would be presenting him with Dhanneth, or he could have looked him up too.

While Jedao would be able to confer with the officers at any point during the campaign, it wouldn’t be the same as meeting them in person. There it came again, that flash of expertise he didn’t recall acquiring. He desperately wanted to flee to a game café and talk out the whole situation with Ruo or one of his other friends, someone he trusted. Too bad he didn’t have that option.

Jedao inclined his head toward Dhanneth when the latter had finished swallowing his current bite of pancake. “I read the profiles, but I want you to tell me about Commander Kel Talaw.” Talaw was in charge of the command moth, and therefore, of Tactical Group One. They were also an alt, which a notation had informed him was a rarity among the Kel. Jedao couldn’t see why, but perhaps the Kel had gained some prejudices in the last four centuries. Nevertheless, Talaw had an exemplary record. Jedao was curious how the Kel under their command felt about them.

Dhanneth’s mouth crimped. “Commander Talaw still holds the command moth, sir?” He glanced quickly toward Kujen, who paid him no heed, then lowered his eyes.

“What’s their reputation?”

“Strict,” Dhanneth said immediately. “Honorable. You are lucky to have them.”

Interesting. “You’ve served under them?”

Long hesitation. “No. But I am—confident of their reputation.”

Kujen was mixing three different kinds of fruit preserves on a toast point, like a bored child. He looked up and said, “What the major is trying not to express too crudely is that the commander was quite loyal to the swarm’s original general. Luckily, I was able to talk sense into Talaw before they made some typically Kel suicidal gesture.”

Jedao confined himself to a nod, wondering if he was ever going to find out what had happened to the original general. “What about Commander Nihara Keru?” She led Tactical Two. With his luck, she was also a time bomb.

“You may have an ally in her,” Dhanneth said.

That couldn’t be a good sign. “How so?”

“Commander Nihara is a believer in results,” Dhanneth said. “Whatever else people say about you, no one questions your ability to get results.”

Only his sanity. “I’ll try not to disappoint her,” Jedao said. He asked as well about the commanders of Tactical Three and Tactical Four.

“Neither Commander Vai nor Commander Miroi has shown any sign of disloyalty to the hexarch,” Dhanneth said.

“This is a crass question,” Jedao said, “but how does formation instinct interact with the whole tangle? The hexarch mentioned that his adversaries were led by ‘upstart Kel.’ How does that even happen?”

“Proximity,” Kujen said. “The military code failed to account for what people should do if all of Kel Command combusted. I scooped up this swarm on the strength of my position, even though I’m not a Kel.”

Really? Jedao thought. There had to be more to the story. Why would a Kel swarm submit to a Nirai, even a hexarch?