Blind Man's Bluff

U.S.S. Dauntless

Some Time Later


To say that there was no love lost between Commodore Joshua Kemper and Captain Mackenzie Calhoun would be to understate matters considerably.

The Dauntless was a newly commissioned Galaxy-class ship, replacing the vessel of the same name that had been destroyed during the Dominion War. She had been on routine patrol in Sector 7G when word first came through that Calhoun had apparently gone rogue and single-handedly committed an act of war against the Thallonians.

The first thing that occurred to Kemper was, It was only a matter of time.

The second thing that occurred to him was, And he’s all mine.

Kemper was an unusually tall man who walked with something of an inherent swagger and radiated confidence the way suns radiate light. People tended to get out of his way when they saw him coming, which suited him just fine. He studied his smile in the mirror every morning to make certain that it was exactly right and then made sure to keep it affixed on his face the entirety of the day. It required a certain type of mind-set to practice one’s smile, and Kemper had that mind-set in spades.

It wasn’t as if Kemper was happy about the deaths of the people on New Thallon. He felt as much mourning as one can for a planetary disaster for which he was not responsible, involving people he didn’t know. If anything, Kemper was more upset over the fact that a ship of the line had been responsible for the incident. Any negative action taken by a starship was a black eye for the entire fleet, and it was incumbent upon every officer to do what was required in order to rein in the offending vessel and bring the criminals involved to a swift justice. And he felt it to be his obligation—no, in fact, a duty bordering on sacred—to be the one who managed to accomplish the job.

The fact that it was Calhoun was simply a bonus.

Kemper strode down the corridor with a bit more spring in his step than was usual. The doors to the turbolift obediently opened for him and he said briskly, “Bridge.”

“Hold the lift, please!” came a female voice from behind him.

It was Theresa Detwiler, his conn officer. He stepped aside for her to enter and she did so. “Good morning, Lieutenant Commander,” he said briskly.

“Good morning, Commodore.”

The doors slid shut and the turbolift headed toward its destination.

“Did you sleep well?” he asked solicitously.

“I did indeed. You?”

“Oh yes.” His carefully nurtured smile shifted a bit to allow a genuine one to come through. “Thank you.”

“No problem.”

Then he looked around with just a bit of apprehension, as if someone were watching them while they were in the turbolift. “You, uhm… you’re sure no one saw you leaving my quarters?”

“You realize I wouldn’t give a damn if someone did, right?”

“I’m just not entirely certain it’s wholly appropriate that we… that you and I… I mean, I am the Commodore…”

“Look, Josh, no one expects a starship commander to be a monk. Relationships are healthy and natural, and who else is the C.O. going to spend time with if not subordinates? You didn’t pressure me into anything, and I’m not seeing you as a means of advancing my career. My career was doing fine before I was assigned to this ship, thank you very much.” She studied him closely. “You’re not actually listening to anything I’m saying right now, are you.”

“Hmmm? Oh… sorry,” he said when her words registered. “Have a lot on my mind. After you left, I received some emergency intel about an old… friend. Maybe you remember him: Mackenzie Calhoun.”

“Of course I remember him. The cadet with the scar that you decided to give a hard time to back at the Academy. And he responded by kicking the hell out of you.”

“I wouldn’t have put it quite that way.”

“Really? Let’s ask Ray, because I’m sure that he would remember it pretty clearly, since—as I recall—he also got his head handed to him by Calhoun.”

“You,” he said stiffly, “are taking entirely too much delight in the recollection. And it’s not something to be joked about.”

“Why? What’d he do?”

Kemper told her.

She blanched upon hearing the news. The significance of a Starfleet captain embarking upon such an unprovoked act of war was not lost on her.

“And we’re going after him?” she said.

“Oh, hell yes. I knew the moment I laid eyes on him years ago that he was going to be trouble. This is an opportunity—”

“To settle old scores?”

Kemper clearly wasn’t thrilled with the way she’d expressed it just then. “I need to do my duty to Starfleet.”

“Well…” she said hopefully, “maybe he’ll surrender.”

“That’s not an option.”

“What?”

The doors slid open and he walked out onto the bridge. Detwiler followed him and the night shift navigator stepped aside. Commander Ray Williams, the first officer, was already at his station. “Morning, Commodore.”

“Morning.”

“What do you mean, that’s not an option?” Detwiler said, clearly not finished with the conversation.

Before he answered, he turned to Williams. “You’re up to speed on the Calhoun situation?”

“Yes, sir, but—”

Kemper, having heard “Yes, sir,” wasn’t bothering to listen to the rest. He returned his focus to Detwiler and said, “Our orders are clear. If we find him, we’re to shoot on sight. Correct, Number One?”

“That’s correct, Commodore, but—”

“It’s out of my hands, Terry,” said Kemper.

“With all respect, Commodore, you don’t sound particularly upset about it,” said Detwiler.

“It’s not my job to feel one way or the other about it,” Kemper said, his carefully maintained smile fading ever so slightly. “It’s my job to do my duty and attend to Starfleet policies. A philosophy, I should add, that if Mackenzie Calhoun attended to, he wouldn’t be in his current fix. Emotions have to take a back seat to responsibility. We have no choice but to undertake this task as quickly and efficiently as possible.”

Williams cleared his throat. “Yes, Commodore, about that—”

But Kemper was looking at the viewscreen and he was frowning. “We’re not moving.”

“No, sir. I’ve been trying to tell you—”

Kemper turned to Williams with annoyance. “Why aren’t we moving? We know their last sighting. We should be heading toward Thallonian space.”

“We received orders to hold our position for a rendezvous.”

“Hold our position? Who the hell gave that order—?”

Hopkins, at tactical, called out, “Commodore, we’ve got a fresh contact at two-eighteen mark three.”

“Put it on-screen,” said Kemper automatically, even though he hadn’t yet been given a satisfactory answer to his previous question.

The newcomer appeared on the screen and Kemper recognized it immediately. “Is that an ETV?”

“I believe so, yes,” said Williams.

The Emergency Transport Vehicles were vessels that were intended for the exclusive use of top Starfleet brass to get them from one point to another as quickly as possible. They were outfitted with high-warp sleds, which enabled them to go at extraordinary speeds but only for a relatively short period of time, at which point their energy sources needed time to replenish. So, once having delivered their passengers, they were effectively dead in space until such time that they were able to get back up to speed.

Kemper couldn’t recall ever having seen one in actual use before. “Well, don’t just stand there,” he said impatiently. “Open a channel.”

“Dauntless,” a gruff voice came immediately, “this is the U.S.S. Hermes, Admiral Jellico speaking. Permission to come aboard.”

Under such circumstances, asking permission was merely a formality. It wasn’t as if Kemper was going to refuse to allow an admiral to board his ship, much less such a renowned hard-ass as Jellico. “Yes, sir, of course. But—”

“But?” There was a tinge of astonishment to Jellico’s tone. “Did I just hear hesitation in your voice, Commodore?”

All eyes on the bridge were on Kemper. He felt self-conscious for a fleeting moment and then he steeled himself. “These are dangerous times, Admiral. I’m simply inquiring as to the nature of your business.”

“The nature of my business, Commodore,” he said, carefully underscoring the difference in rank between them, “is to oversee your vessel during your attempts to track down the Excalibur.”

“Oversee?”

“That is correct, Commodore.”

“May I ask why my vessel has been selected for this honor,” said Kemper, “as opposed to the other ships that are going after—”

“No other ships, Commodore. Before I commit a sizable number of vessels to this endeavor, I’m going to determine for myself exactly what’s going on. And yours is the ship I’m using to do it.”

Kemper couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Admiral—”

Then he took control of himself. This was neither the time nor the place to square off against a superior officer, presuming there even was such a time and place. As soon as he had fought back his instinctive desire to balk at such presumption, he said evenly, “Bridge to transporter room. Lock onto signal and beam aboard passenger from the ETV.”

“Aye, Commodore,” came the acknowledgment from the transporter room.

“Thank you, Commodore,” came Jellico’s voice. “I will see you shortly.”

“Yes, sir,” said Kemper. “Looking forward to it.”

The moment the communication ceased, Williams said, “All right. That was unexpected.”

“Not entirely, no,” said Kemper. “Jellico used to hate Calhoun’s guts, but ever since Calhoun did him some kind of service—saved one of his family, I think—Jellico’s had Calhoun’s back. This has nothing to do with procedure and everything to do with favoritism. And I promise you this: I’m not going to allow any such attitudes to jeopardize the lives of anyone on this ship. Admiral or no, Mackenzie Calhoun is going to pay for what he did, and I’m not going to hesitate to be the bill collector.”





Xenex

i.

The incoming Brethren transport vessel angled toward the surface, confident that this exercise in absurdity was reaching its inevitable, if somewhat prolonged, conclusion.

Calhoun and his people watched the ship coming in. He was reasonably sure it was the same one that had arrived on that terrible day when his brother had been ruthlessly cut down by one of the Brethren. Even though he had immediately slaughtered D’ndai’s killer, the hurt, the fury were all still present and burning deeply within him.

The vessel wasn’t bothering to cloak this time. Perhaps they were under the impression that showing up in this manner would somehow intimidate the Xenexians. After all the soldiers they had lost in battle, one would think that they knew better by this point.

Calhoun felt it incumbent upon him to impart a lesson to them. With any luck, it would be one final lesson.

His people were massing around him, looking to the skies, in the shadow of one of the tallest natural spires in the area. His instinct was to tell them to keep hidden, to continue the guerrilla tactics that had enabled as many people to survive as had managed thus far.

But that wasn’t going to get it done this time. He needed to draw the Brethren in closer. Draw them in and then distract them before they realized what he was really up to. And challenging them openly was the only thing that was going to accomplish that.

Unfortunately, it meant that he was going to have to use the troops around him in a way that he was not looking forward to. If his plan worked, however, he would be able to put an end to this insane siege of his home world once and for all.

ii.

The Visionary wasn’t thrilled with what he was seeing.

Far below, the Xenexians were massing. There were so many of the damned creatures that, unlike when Calhoun had been out and on his own, it was impossible to pick him out of the crowd.

“I don’t like this,” said the Visionary. He addressed his comment to the Brethren commander. He had no separate title; the Brethren were not believers in assigned rank since they felt that all were equal. But there were those who, by dint of their personalities, became natural leaders and were simply recognized as such without receiving a separate designation. In the Visionary’s mind, he thought of such individuals as commanders and spoke to one now. “It’s too easy. They’re trying to draw us in.”

“They have no archers in higher positions,” replied the Commander. His voice was soft, almost purring, a stark contrast to his armored appearance. “They have surrendered the high ground. They are foolish to confront us.”

“You’re missing the point,” said the Visionary. “Calhoun would not be that foolish.”

“Obviously he is. And we will take advantage of it before they have the opportunity to think better of it.”

“Have you possibly considered—?”

“We have considered every possibility. Take us to within landing range,” the Commander ordered.

The ship had no navigator or pilot; it was completely automatic, all such duties handled by easily controlled computers. It was the philosophy of the Brethren that such duties were best left to machines since it allowed the Brethren’s time to be open for matters of far greater consequence, such as fighting, killing, and proving their superior strength by fighting and killing.

Having been issued orders, the ship descended. Shortly they were hovering close enough to the ground that the Brethren would be able to safely descend, cushioned within armor that would absorb the impact. There were limits as to what both the armor and the bodies of the Brethren were able to withstand, but those limits had been finely calculated and accounted for.

They came lower, nearing but not quite coming into contact with the uppermost reaches of the spires. There were weapons on board the vessel, but there was no point in opening fire on the masses below. What would be the sport in that?

The rest of the Brethren were assembling, preparing for the jump. As opposed to their initial appearance on Xenex, when they had landed one at a time, this time they would open the main bay door and descend en masse. They would present a united front of shock and awe, and thus would the Xenexians know that their end was imminent. With any luck, they would surrender. It would be excellent if they did that, because it was always entertaining to see the surprised expressions of surrendering people when you killed them.

“I wish you would listen to me,” said the Visionary. “The wisdom of this move—”

“We leave wisdom to effete intellectuals such as yourself,” said the Commander.

The squadron of Brethren, more than a hundred strong, had now assembled and were ready for the leap to the planet surface below. The Xenexians were bellowing defiance so loudly that their voices were carrying up to the ship. The Brethren, by contrast, did not have any joint cheers or shouts of superiority. They preferred to let their fighting do their speaking for them.

“Go!” called out the Commander.

The bay door irised open. Below them, the shouts from the Xenexians were even more audible, and the Visionary was able to pick out certain words from amid the overall crush of noise. None of them was particularly flattering.

“Look at them,” said the Commander. “So fierce. So determined. So foolish.”

The Visionary strained to look down among them. He still didn’t see Calhoun. “Their leader isn’t present.”

“He’s doubtless hiding down there somewhere. We will find him. And they will see that their legend can die as easily as any of them.”

“That is not the plan,” the Visionary said sharply. “We have been over this. Calhoun has become a symbol of defiance to too many races. We need to maximize—”

“The plans have changed,” said the Brethren. “The last time we changed plans, we slaughtered others of your race. If you stand in our way, you can share the same fate.”

The Visionary regarded him for a moment and then said quietly, “Best of fortune in your endeavors.”

The Commander of the Brethren turned away from the Visionary then as if he no longer mattered and went straight for the bay door. With several quick steps he was out, and the rest of the Brethren leaped behind him. The ship tilted slightly with the sudden shift in weight, and the Brethren landed with such force that the entire landscape seemed to shake.

One member of the Brethren remained behind. He oversaw the targeting mechanism of the ship’s onboard weaponry, prepared to rain down punishment on the Xenexians should any of them attempt to gain higher ground and take aim with their bows and arrows. He was under the explicit instructions, however, to intervene only in that particular instance. The Brethren were determined to take on the Xenexians hand-to-hand, because such a death would be as painful and prolonged as possible.

The Visionary watched, waiting for the Xenexians to follow through on their ululations and outright challenges to the Brethren. There, on the parched and sunblasted land below, there would be a massive battle that the sword-wielding Xenexians would surely lose, and the ground would become stained with their blood.

And even as the Visionary looked on, the Xenexians abruptly fell back. The area around them was a maze of rocks and canyons, and no one knew it better than the beings that lived there. Seconds later, the Brethren were standing in one large group, as if they were collectively waiting around for a transport to pick them up.

“Again they retreat?” the Visionary said as he peered out through the still open bay door. “How long do they think they can keep these sorts of tactics—?”

And suddenly Mackenzie Calhoun was leaping in through the door.

It was only at that moment that the Visionary realized how close the ship had gotten to one of the spires. That bastard! He was hiding in the upper reaches! But how did he—?

Even as the thought went through his head, the Visionary shouted for the bay door to be closed. Instantly the door irised shut, and had it done so even a second earlier, the fast-moving Calhoun would have lost a foot and probably been a great deal easier to manage.

As it was, the door snapped behind him like a bear trap just missing its target.

iii.

No one saw Mackenzie Calhoun unless he chose to be seen.

That had never been more the case than now, when Calhoun crouched against the shadow of the nearest spire and watched the Brethren vessel draw closer. His followers had told him that the Brethren exited the ship through a hatch in the side, and that’s what he was counting on for gaining entry. If the Brethren suddenly started employing transporter technology, he was in a good deal of trouble. That was one of the many aspects he wasn’t wild about in this cobbled-together plan, but there simply wasn’t any way around it. He couldn’t allow this constant hunting of his people to go on indefinitely, but they were far too loyal to him to even consider the notion of giving him up to the Brethren. And D’ndai’s dying wish, which Calhoun was obliged to honor, precluded his giving himself up.

So the only option left to him was to get the hell off the planet in a manner that would guarantee the Brethren knew he had left. Once he accomplished that, there would be no reason whatsoever for the Brethren to continue to harass the people of Xenex.

And this was the only way he could think of to do it.

The spire against which Calhoun was hiding was adjoined to a plateau that ended in a cliff. It was about thirty feet worth of fairly flat rock that Calhoun was sure he could cover in just a few seconds. And it was enough length to provide him a sort of crude runway for what he was planning to accomplish.

Now all he needed was for the ship to get close enough.

It had been a long, long time since Calhoun had any truck with the gods of Xenex. But he did so now, sending out a prayer that they bring the ship within proximity. “Let me spare those who honor you having to spill their blood on my behalf,” he said softly. “They worship me, they look up to me, and they count on me. But there is only so much that I can do, and now I need to do more than that. Please be with me. Please help me to be what they need me to be.”

The ship continued to descend and then slowed and stopped. It hovered at the same height that it had been when it first appeared on Xenex and discharged its soldiers during their initial raid… the raid that had resulted in the death of his brother. It was the altitude that Calhoun was hoping for, and why he had taken up this particular position at this particular height.

Unfortunately the ship was still a significant distance away. More than he thought he could reasonably jump.

A door irised open in the side of the ship and he watched as Brethren came dropping out of the ship like fleas from a newly bathed dog.

For all the difficulties that were part of this admittedly problematic plan, this was actually the most challenging: to see whether the Xenexians would do as he had instructed them.

They had not been thrilled about the prospect of running from a face-to-face battle. With the enemy right there, directly in front of them, the Xenexians wanted to turn from the strategy they’d been following of hit-and-run, guerrilla tactics and get into a straight-on mêlée. When Calhoun had told them that, no, he wanted them to hide one more time, they had initially balked at the notion. He’d had to use all of his considerable force of will to convince them that they were to obey his orders. But until he actually saw them do as he had instructed, he didn’t know for sure if they would.

None of it was going to matter, though, if he wasn’t able to get to the ship.

The entrance was right there, right in front of him, but by his quick calculations, it was a good twenty feet beyond the edge of the cliff. The ship didn’t look like it was going to draw closer, and the door could shut at any moment.

There was no time to wait for any other opportunites to present themselves.

Calhoun bolted from behind the spire and ran as fast as he could. His legs scissoring, his arms pumping, he dashed along the “runway,” building up as much speed as possible. He kicked up dust as he went, some of it blowing into his face, and he squinted against it. He was trying to calculate exactly when to jump and then realized that he was going to second-guess himself, hesitate at just the wrong moment and possibly send himself plummeting to his death far below.

Instead he turned himself entirely over to his instincts, trusting them to guide him as they always had.

He hit the edge of the cliff and catapulted himself through the air, his body outstretched as if he were performing a racing dive into a pool. He had promised himself he wouldn’t look down and yet he couldn’t help himself. He glanced downward for half a heartbeat and was pleased to see the Xenexians scattering like leaves before a stiff breeze. Then he looked up and time seemed to be slowing to a crawl as the door in front of him started to iris closed. From within he had a quick glimpse of a D’myurj that he suspected was the self-proclaimed Visionary, and though it was hard to tell, he thought there was a look of surprise on the Visionary’s face.

And then Calhoun was hurtling through the entryway, pulling his legs in to get them clear of the door. It slid noiselessly shut behind him, and he hit the deck and rolled, coming up with his phaser drawn.

The D’myurj was running.

That was a good sign. It meant that he was physically there.

Which further meant that Calhoun could kill him.

No. Don’t kill him. You might be able to make use of him. He could provide you information. Whatever you do, don’t kill him.

He took a split second to thumb the energy output on the phaser from “kill” to “stun” and leveled the weapon.

During that split second, the D’myurj, in a crackle of energy, vanished.

“Grozit!” snarled Calhoun. He realized that the Visionary must have had some sort of emergency transport device on himself, and it had required a few moments to fully power up. That brief time it took to reset his phaser had allowed the D’myurj to escape to some unknown location.

You should have killed him.

There was no time for recriminations. Calhoun charged out of the landing bay section, completely unfamiliar with the layout of the vessel, but moving as quickly as he could through it in hopes of getting the drop on anyone else who might be left behind.

Without slowing, he charged through a hatchway into what seemed, to him, like the command center. And suddenly the deep-seated sense that always warned him of danger kicked in and, without even thinking about it, he ducked.

It wasn’t fast enough. A Brethren soldier was standing off to the left, and he swung a gloved hand that caught Calhoun on the side of the head. Calhoun rolled with it but lost his grip on the phaser. It clattered away, skidding across the floor.

Calhoun came up and tried to dart toward it, but the Brethren was in his path. He feinted to the left and right, trying to get the soldier to commit to a move, but it didn’t work; the Brethren just stood there, as if it had all the time in the world…

He glanced at the command center and was flummoxed; he saw what appeared to be a tactical station, but there didn’t seem to be anything having to do with navigation.

Sending out one more fast prayer to the Xenexian gods, who seemed to be in a generous mood this day, Calhoun made a guess as to how the ship operated and shouted, “Hard to stern, forty-five degrees down angle!”

Obediently the ship tilted. He was right. It was voice responsive, and the speaker didn’t seem to matter.

The move caught the Brethren completely off guard. The Brethren started to call out what sounded like it was going to be “Ignore that!” But he didn’t quite get the order out and then, with his arms waving wildly, he tumbled off to one side, skidding across the length of the deck.

An instant before the ship tilted, Calhoun left his feet. He leaped past the falling Brethren and tried to intercept the skidding phaser. It slid just out of his reach, and Calhoun let the momentum of the ship carry him after the weapon.

The phaser skipped away as if it had a life of its own, and Calhoun twisted around while on his back, just in time to see the Brethren soldier leaping toward him. Energy was crackling in the palms of his gloves, and then pulse blasts erupted from them. Calhoun’s head snapped to one side and the other, barely managing to avoid them, and then the Brethren landed heavily atop him.

The only thing that stopped him from searing the flesh off Calhoun’s bones was that Calhoun had drawn up his legs at the last second, bringing his feet between himself and the soldier. The bottoms of his booted feet were pressed against the soldier’s chest, and he tried to shove the Brethren away from him, but the bastard was just too heavy. He felt the heat starting to burn through the soles of his boots even as he fought to keep the soldier’s hands away from his body.

The soldier grabbed Calhoun’s legs, and he smelled cloth starting to burn. He knew that his flesh would follow seconds later. Worse, the gloves were starting to charge up again.

“Forty five degrees up angle!” Calhoun shouted, and the ship tilted back, straightening out.

The phaser slid across the floor and into Calhoun’s grasping hand. Just as the Brethren’s glove reached full power, he swung the phaser up, jammed it into the vent in the side of the Brethren’s helmet, and squeezed the trigger.

The Brethren shuddered violently and instantly became dead weight. With a grunt, Calhoun shoved him off. Then he clambered to his feet and ran to the tactical station.

He figured out the workings of it very quickly. Whatever strengths the Brethren had in terms of their armor and their combat skills, they had made their technology exceedingly simple. That made sense to Calhoun: Why overcomplicate matters?

Within seconds he had the Brethren targeted on the tactical screens. They were milling about and looking up, because their vessel had been tilting one way and then the other, and they were wondering what was going on up there. From the Brethren point of view, this operation was intended to go briskly and by the numbers: they would jump down, destroy the Xenexians, and then their ship would presumably land and they would climb back aboard and head off to wherever the hell they came from.

“New plan,” growled Calhoun.

iv.

The Brethren were just starting to discuss with each other what they should do when their ship’s weaponry cut loose.

Their armor was such that it protected them somewhat even from their own pulse blasts, but it didn’t insulate them from the concussive effects that the blasts were packing. Those who were directly hit by the beams went down, their armor severely dented, onboard systems screaming that extreme damage had been sustained. Those who were simply within range of the blasts went flying in all directions as the pulse cannons ripped into them, carried through the air by waves of concussive force.

In no time the air was thick with dust and debris and confused Brethren staggering about, trying to determine what in the hell had just happened. The onboard sensory devices that enabled them to see were filled with confusing and conflicting information, and for the briefest of periods, the Brethren were effectively blind.

It was all the time that the Xenexians needed.

There were no screams or battle cries this time. Silent as night shadows came the Xenexians, moving in with quick, effortless efficiency. Their long knives and swords flashed. They wore coverings over their eyes to shield them from the dirt that hung in the air, and they targeted the Brethren with the sort of glee that only a warrior race in the throes of slaughter can know. The moment the Xenexians joined the battle, the blasts from on high immediately ceased. The field was clear for them to do whatever was necessary to take down their opponents.

They approached their task with gusto.

The Brethren fought back as best they could, and they did indeed manage to take some of the Xenexians with them, mostly through pure luck from the random placement of blasts that occasionally found targets. For the most part, though, that one damned vent in their armor undid them as swords and daggers plunged in with merciless efficiency.

Long minutes later, it was all over but the shouting, and the shouting came from triumphant Xenexians in full-throated roars of celebration. And the shout was the same name, over and over again: Not the name “M’k’n’zy,” but instead, “Calhoun! Calhoun!” In this way were they singing not only the praises of the man who had led them, but the territory on Xenex that had birthed them and succored them and given them a sense of national pride.

The doors that had previously discharged the Brethren army irised open and there was a brief pause in the cheers, one of apprehension since they had no idea whether even more Brethren were about to come pouring out. Instead the doors revealed their savior, their god of gods, Mackenzie Calhoun, framed in the entranceway. This brought the cheers up even louder. Indeed, one man among them started bleeding out his ears because the roars were so deafening.

Calhoun allowed them their huzzahs for some time, waiting for the enthusiasm to spend itself. When it didn’t seem to be happening anytime soon, he spread his arms as a signal that they should quiet down and, in short order, they did so, waiting for his next words.

“My good friends,” he said, “whether we wish to acknowledge it as truth or not, the fact is that my presence has brought hardship down upon you. Your loyalty has never been questioned, nor your bravery or determination. Now, however, is the time for me to take my leave of you.”

This immediately prompted some shouts of protest, and Calhoun could not help but smile at that. The Xenexians were born warriors, and he was starting to realize that their determination to protect him had been prompted by more than just loyalty. For some of them—hell, maybe for all of them—he had been a means to an end, and the end was that they really, truly loved a good battle and they hadn’t had one in quite some time.

But he could not continue to serve as an excuse for war. The stakes were far higher than any of his people realized.

He managed to silence them again and continued: “The fact is, my brothers in war, that my presence here continues to endanger all Xenex. I know, I know,” he went on before they could mount challenging battle cries, defying the entirety of the known universe to show up and attack them, “you are undeterred by that truth. Nevertheless, it would be irresponsible to the world that I know, and the people that I love, to remain here any longer than necessary. With me gone, the invaders will have no reason to continue their attacks. It is the best way to proceed, and all of us know that, whether we wish to admit it or not.”

“Take us with you!” came one shout, and then another, “Let us continue to battle at your side!” Soon they were all making similar declarations of devotion and determination, and it took Calhoun quite some time to bring down the volume yet again.

“What awaits me in the depths of space,” Calhoun said, “is my battle, not yours. Your place is here, not out there. Tend to yourselves, tend to your families. Elect yourselves a new leader—one who will, ideally, fulfill your needs even half as well as my beloved brother did. And when the wars I must now face are finished, I will return here and we will gather and I will tell you of what I encountered and the great battles that I fought, and we will celebrate our collective triumph over our enemies!”

He did not stay any longer to listen to the continued cheers, turning away as the doors shut behind him. Quickly he set a course toward deep space. He could not help but consider the notion that departing into the heavens was about as obvious a means of drawing a direct connection between himself and the gods as was possible.

D’ndai would have found it extremely amusing.