I read the message again, then spat to the side when I realized my mouth had fallen open in shock and the nasty tar that coated me had seeped into my mouth. This was bad. Entire cities had been ransacked and razed, but never this close to the core of Arktria. This kind of thing happened in the less stable neighboring countries, or the rural and mountainous western fringes, not within a few hundred miles of our nation's largest military bases and Capital.

“Max!” I hissed, huddling closer to the sportrell tree I was hiding behind. “What’s happening dirt-side?”

The bastard didn't answer, so I tried again. “What the fuck is happening out there? I swear, unless you want to be a full time meat-bag pilot, you better f’n answer me.”

“Sheesh, calm down, I had to actually look. Plus, I’m still mad at you.” He replied dismissively. “Okay, I broke into some juicy communication lines, and it is actually getting pretty crazy out there. The consensus is that they have it under control, but I can’t get into the enemy comms so I’m only getting the Shepherds’ side through what they’re reporting to Katie. They’ve knocked down a surprising amount of your fliers with manpads though, so much so that they’ve grounded all drop-craft. They’re considering asking for supporting air-to-ground bombing runs from the base at Yehsa. Damn…” He hesitated for a moment. “There are a TON of them already in the city, the Sheps are holding a perimeter around the main center and keeping them out of the Travellers station and Link ship, but the hoard has swarmed over pretty much all of the outer posts.”

I sat there in the oily puddle, still crouched by the spongy tree sized mushroom, stunned by his description. I struggled to imagine how bad things had to be if the city's security forces had been pushed back so far. The Shepherds had outposts and sent patrols all over the area, and the Travellers station was like a fortress. The residency tower I was physically still within was built right next door. There was no way they could overrun such a stronghold, could they?

“Oh man, this is pretty gnarly. I got a feed from one of the surviving cams on the Travellers complex, check this shit out.”

My field of vision went all glitchy and fuzzy for a moment, a number of HUD icons and boxes opening and closing on their own and showing flashing error screens before a video feed popped up in front of me, standing out stark against the black and blue-outlining that had been my sight for the last hour.

The camera was surprisingly high quality, not some grainy store security cam footage like you might see on the net. On the screen, I could see about a half-dozen of the huge armored vehicles the Shepherds used parked out in front of the Link ship, all but two of which had been rolled over and set on fire. The billowing dark smoke was underlit by a strobe light effect from the muzzle flashes of the heavy guns mounted on the turrets of the two still functional vehicles, which had been parked right in front of the huge open doorway to the interior of the Link ship.

A formation of security forces had pushed the concrete barriers in place to entirely block off the door to the alien ship, and many of the huge riot shields that my old escort used to carry were being held in a shield-wall around the firing vehicles. The ground all around the disabled and flaming armor throughout the courtyard that was normally filled with protesters and the waiting line was strewn with broken bodies, some of which were still moving. Crawling, dragging broken limbs, or defiantly working to fire various small arms that seemed mostly ineffective against the vehicles and riot shields while they lay bleeding and unable to stand.

It was surreal, seeing the carnage on video without any accompanying sound. This was not some action movie or video game replay, this was ground I used to tread twice a day on my way to work and back. If things had gone differently for me I could have been caught up in that mess, or have been trapped inside of the ship as the security forces fought off the attack.

A small explosion went off amongst the bodies that scattered dust and people parts as a flame broke off one of the burning vehicles and arced through the air, smashing against the shieldwall in a burst of clinging fire. I looked just in time to see a power-armored enemy dart back behind the broken vehicle after they had thrown the fire bomb.

Captivated, I watched as a cloud of thick mist dispersed from the Shepherd's fortified position, stifling the flame. One of the turrets of the heavy vehicles ceased firing, long enough for me to realize that the four foot long barrel was starting to glow a dull red and smoking along the entire length. Before the barrel had a chance to cool, it started firing again, this time at the downed vehicle that the fire-bomb had been thrown from.

Huge splashing bursts of sparks flared from the downed vehicle as the turret cannon ripped into it, but I couldn’t tell if the bullets were punching through the upside down armored wreck to hit the attackers hiding behind. While the turret was busy, a mass of people pushed in from the maze of concrete walls on the far side of the courtyard, causing the second turret to open fire on them and sparkling flashes of rifles to join in through the gaps in the shieldwall.

The crowd looked ragged and dirty. Most of them carried wood-stocked rifles and wore old pre-link military body armor and helmets, many pulled their arms back and threw more fire bombs and grenades at the wall of defenders. Most of the thrown ordinance fell short and only scattered and burned the debris at the armored Shepherd’s feet.

The combined fire from the turret and rifles cut through them easily, dropping many almost as soon as they charged into line of sight. Yet the crowd was so thick and determined that they pushed their wounded forward, or climbed over top of them to take shots and charge the fortified line. The turrets swept back and forth through the crowd, chopping down and scattering most of them after a bloody few seconds, resetting the scene.

Again, the courtyard was littered only with smoking broken bodies and struggling yet determined wounded combatants. Explosions went off amongst the downed as un-thrown grenades detonated, more flames sprung to life, and fallen bodies twitched and jerked as rifles continued to fire. Some kind of rocket flew in through the smoke and smashed into the shieldwall, scattering a half-dozen Shepherds and disrupting their formation for a moment before the reserves plugged the hole and answered with a roaring wave of fire and lead.

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I closed my eyes and looked away as the next surge of people pushed into the courtyard, charging into the fire once again.

I couldn’t bear to watch any more, and told Max to end the feed. “That’s… slaughter. Turn it off, I’ve seen enough.” I breathed, reeling from the horrible sight. Some of the images replaying in my head, I sat there and stared out into the darkness, unable to think.

“Pretty cool, right? Those bushwacker autocannons are pretty solid as far as human tech goes. Reports say they got this though, and they don’t seem to be able to breach the building we’re in. The whole bottom 20 floors are bristling with security measures even if they do. You Humans do this kinda thing all the time anyways, something like this happens somewhere like every other Tuesday. It’ll all blow over, no worries. We have our own fighting to focus on, remember? Keep your head in the game.”

“You’re wrong, this kind of thing doesn't happen all the time! How the hell am I supposed to keep my head in the game when there's a whole damned war happening on my doorstep!” I growled at him.

“Damn, Guy, keep it down. You’re going to give your position away, again. Just - shut up about this for now and get back to your babysitters. I’ll see what I can do dirtside without blowing my cover, alright?”

I clenched my fists, and wished I could punch the callous digital bastard, or that I could at least see him to flip him off or something. I was already off balance and arguing with a disembodied asshole that only lived in my head was infuriating.

I wanted to portal home, to go and do something, to somehow stop the bloody battle taking place in my own backyard. I couldn’t understand. What could possibly motivate them to throw themselves away like that? Another more selfish part of me was terrified that they would win the fight and make it into the building. What could I do against a force like that? While I didn’t feel like a noble, or that I belonged to the affluent crowd that lived within the tower, I did still live here after all.

I was paralyzed by the conflicting emotions warring within me, pulled between multiple senses of duty and instinctive self preservation. I hated seeing my own people warring with each other like this, even if I had been numbed by the regularity with which the isolationists, gangs, and separatists clashed with the State security forces. I’d never seen this type of fighting, raw and uncut, and it sickened me.

I’m not sure how long I waffled over my thoughts while the dwarves worked and play-fought around me. I was struggling to care about the mock battles of the juvenile dwarves who fought for status and risked only a delay to full maturity. I was eventually pulled back to the moment by another message.

CLE Admin K.S.R. :

Consul Spenser, there is an emergency situation taking place in our lovely city and your apartment building has been put into lockdown. Director Howard has issued a district wide shelter in place mandate and our first responders are making every effort to end the disruption so business may return to normal.

I wanted to reach out to you personally because it is very important to me that your vital work goes uninterrupted, and I assure you that every action necessary will be taken to make sure you can continue your diplomatic mission uninterrupted. Please, do not worry over what you might hear of the situation. I am aware that your team has already informed you of some of the danger. I assure you that we have everything under control and defending every patriot that works to represent us on the galactic stage is my number one priority.

Resolutely

Katie S. Roderegious

I grimaced at the message, recognizing the pandering tone of a politician that tinted her words. When the people in charge started talking like that, I knew things were bad. Everyone seemed to be reporting that things were under control, even Max seemed to agree with that. Yet things looked very much out of control to me. If Max was only listening to the same reports that Katie was getting, wouldn’t it make sense that he agreed? He was still young, and had shown himself to be somewhat naive to the world I lived in. What were the odds that the reports were overly optimistic, and things were actually much worse than anyone on the ground wanted to admit to?

So far, Katie had seemed like a pretty reasonable boss, and even Tevin had mostly good things to say about her after having worked under her for a while, but could I trust that? I knew I was sheltered from her by the nature of my achievements and position, and had not worked long enough for her to face any real audits or consequences. I wouldn’t find out how harsh she could be until after I had failed at something, and I was still mid-way through my first real test as a diplomat.

While I was still frustrated, being forced to think through the pragmatic thoughts of a working-class citizen faced with political doublespeak pulled me back to reality. I had to keep doing what I was doing. I had a security team, and the frontline Shepherds were a strong and capable defending force that had been reliable so far. The best thing I could do was to make sure my Row passed the trials with the highest accolades and that I could join the dwarven faction with the best status possible.

I steeled myself and forced myself back into action, driving my thoughts away and rising to a crouch to peek around the mushroom trunk I had been hiding behind. The way ahead looked pretty clear, with the rival dwarves a good 50 feet off to my right and my green highlighted allies straight ahead. I stayed low and took slow steps, weaving around the puddles of light still scattered around the room as I snuck back to my Row.

The dwarves working on the defenses were moving in complete darkness to mask their actions to the others, and I got within 10 feet or so before one of them noticed me.

“Gah!” They exclaimed, and I recognized the voice of Jozoic as he raised a hammer to strike at me. I dodged backwards and raised my hands.

“Hey, hey. Calm down, it’s me, Nick!” I hurriedly shout-whispered at him as his second attack whipped past my face.

He jumped back into a readied stance and held still, his weapon still raised. “You don’t smell like Nick.” he studied me in the pitch dark for a moment longer before relaxing slightly and stepping aside. Two of the other three dwarves who were working on the fortification, who I only now noticed had surrounded me as I had been distracted by Jozoic, went back to hurriedly stacking the large blocks of stone and melting them together into a barricade.

“Kaninak, come with me. Jozoic, you have command.” Bomilik’s voice came out of the darkness, and he led me back into the cave. We quickly passed a few more dwarves, busy bringing stones to the workers at the front. Sallis laughed and gave me a slap on the shoulder as we passed, only to pull her hand back and shake it off in disgust.

“Sacred stones, you’re slimier than the dusted squams.” She said before wiping her hand off on the wall and going back to her work.

Once we made it to the relatively clear and illuminated area where we had started our excavation of the passage, Bomilik stopped and sat down heavily on one of the blocky stones. He looked me over, one of his eyebrows raising as he saw how coated I was in the sticky black tar and smeared with bits of whatever else was mixed into the oily part of the slick.

“Report, Kaninak. I want to know everything.”