Frays In The Weave 54 Skirmish: 3

He crawled down the slope and walked to where the Bloodhounds were making their equipment ready. Fly cams would make sure they didn't risk anything more than expensive equipment, and catching a battle, even a small one like this, was well worth a holo cam or two.

Behind him Ken popped his head over the ridge from time to time. Watch and Weave. At least he was true to his words. He watched, even if it meant taking a personal risk.

Arthur had no plans to join Ken. He vaguely recalled taking an arrow in his leg when he was rescued by Harbend and the others. Trai died there.

He quickly walked behind the hovercraft. Not all arrows fell short of the ridge, and even though they weren't really the target some idiot out there had decided that anyone who could be seen was also an enemy.

From what Arthur had managed to see those fighting didn't belong to any regular units in Keen, or at least none he had encountered. A few wore uniforms, but he could have sworn he saw the same uniform on both sides.

Probably armed idiots having a religious dispute.

He watched the cams take air, each one under the control of a crewman with a linked visor. A good cameraman could handle three or four cams. These were his old Bloodhounds. Twenty cams sailed over the ridge and spread out. Another ten were on their way, and from the bored face the fifth crewman didn't even plan to don her visor.

Arthur threw a sideways glance at a copse of bushes where Heinrich had led his group. They wouldn't take part of the fighting, but they were his bodyguards. That still grated in him, but he'd been given no choice when the matter came up.

At least Heinrich seemed to share his opinion about trigger happy lunatics in uniform. What he said about events around the launch port more than confirmed Arthur's worst prejudices.

Another arrow sailed gracefully over him and landed, point first, between him and the horses. Had they tied them too close to the skirmish?

He looked back at Ken who protected his head with a makeshift helmet and was busy watching the fight. Probably not. Ken had as much as promised that the horses would be safe.

A shift in the wind brought s whiff of smoke to his nose. Great! Just great! They had to add arson to the list of madness. He knew he could Weave all combatants into submission, at least if he got them within hearing range.

Ken would have none of it though. Still, if he found a way to keep strictly to the actual truth, or at least truth the way he experienced it. But that required him to have some awful truths to Weave.

And an idea was born.

Arthur grabbed the casing for a fly cam and headed back to where Ken lay. Watch and Weave. Oh, he would watch. He would watch until he had enough horrors worth Weaving, and then he'd use it. Maybe not the way Ken wanted, but within scope of the d.a.m.n rules anyway.

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Heinrich dragged another body away to the pyre. So fond of killing these devout soldiers of G.o.d, whatever G.o.d they happened to believe in. A sorry bunch of bullies and mercenaries in his book. Little better than pirates, and everyone knew what TADAT did to pirates.

Still that was everyone back home, and they weren't home any longer, and he had been handed very specific orders about when he was allowed to return fire. Civil war between fanatics were not included in the rather short list.

He stared at the hovercraft ahead of him. Neither was protecting the news team. Erwin had made that absolutely clear. Almost gleefully.

Heinrich wondered about that. It was an order he would disobey. He knew that. Erwin knew that. Something political probably. From the rules of a game Heinrich didn't want to play.

He lifted the body and threw it into the flames. It was the closest to a funeral they could give them. He hated having to watch the killing and see the dead left in the open. It wasn't right. No respect.

He turned and went back to the small shrine where they had found the scattered remains of whoever had taken refugee there. At least they had been armed. He didn't like the idea of weapon less families getting slaughtered in what was supposed to be a holy place.

He bent and picked the last body up. There had been six of them, all male. On his way to the pyre he admitted that he didn't like to see anyone slaughtered, with the possible exception of pirates.

There were always pirates. But he had a valid reason for his bias, one that would get him booted out of the TADAT if anyone ever found out. Everyone he had ever known dead before he turned seven. Pirates missing him by sheer dumb luck, and him permanently borrowing the ident.i.ty of another without learning it for over ten years.

That ident.i.ty had got him into training, and he held on to it because it gave him an opportunity to strike back. And because it was who he had become.

He stayed by the pyre at parade attention. This was not their duty but to his pride his entire unit joined him, including Granita even though she didn't even have a body walker. It didn't matter. Some things were just left unsaid, and respect for the dead was one of them.

There had been too many funerals like this the last days and he wondered if things would degenerate even further. They were packing and making ready to continue south when they did. A signal over the command line tagged urgent drew his attention, and as he listened in horror Granita's stricken face told him the news team had received the same message by their own channels.