Sgt. Golem: Royal Mech Hussar - Stubs Soon!

Hannah sat alone at the table as Alexander and Sam Golem walked away. She looked after them, frowning to herself. She wasn’t sure what the sergeant was worried about, but it left her uneasy.

"Hey, did you just get ditched?"

Hannah looked up and saw Tamara was approaching with her date, the still-befuddled-looking Polish officer she’d brought along.

“No, no. Sam was concerned about something.”

Tamara raised an eyebrow, pursing her lips. "Sam? Who's Sam?” She let the name trail off suggestively.

Hannah rolled her eyes. “You know. Sergeant Golem."

"Oh, right. I forgot. He's just one of those guys whose first name seems to be Sergeant."

Hannah laughed. “You’re not wrong. I think he’s the first golem I’ve ever met with a name.” Then she frowned again. “Then again, maybe I just have never bothered to find out.”

Tamara 's date made some excuses and wandered off. The Cossack woman sank down into a chair and flipped back her skirt to above her knee line. She crossed her right ankle over and started rubbing her foot. "Oh, my poor feet."

"Too much dancing?"

"No, it's him. He's certainly good-looking, but he dances like a lame goat. So where did the sergeant go?"

Hannah shook her head. "I don't know. Sergeant Golem seemed concerned about something, and they were going to go find a friend of Alexander's."

"Seems a bad time to be concerned about anything." Tamara yawned widely. “There’s dancing to be done! You have any idea what they were worried about?"

Hannah started to shake her head, then thought harder. "They were talking about the maintenance hangars."

"The Hungarian hangars?” Tamara looked puzzled.

"Normally, this place is one of them, but they cleared it out for the ball. The rest are a few buildings further down this row."

"Why would they want to do mech maintenance in the middle of the night?" Tamara’s face was easy to read as she showed her astonishment. “When there’s a party going on? I know Alexander prefers mechs to women but I thought the sergeant seemed to be enjoying himself!”

Hannah felt herself blush. “I don’t think Alexander likes mechs better, they’re just easier to talk to,” she mumbled. A sentiment she and Alexander shared.

Tamara was still carrying on. “I wouldn't put it past Alexander to want to do mech repairs instead of going to a fancy party. But if Sergeant Golem's concerned about something, then, well..."

Hannah nodded. Sam Golem had a lot of strange reactions, even for a golem, but he was generally pretty laid-back. If he was worried...

“Still, it's an awfully odd time to be doing maintenance,” Tamara concluded.

Hannah laughed. "Especially since all the riders are busy."

Tamara looked at her sharply, her brow furrowed. "That’s it. Nobody is supposed to handle mechs when the rider's not around, right?" Tamara turned and scanned the room intently, looking from couple to couple on the dance floor.

Hannah realized she was studying the dancing ladies.

"Ah," Tamara breathed.

Hannah looked herself, and then she started seeing. A stumble here, someone getting mad at their date there.

Something was going on in the maintenance hangar. There were people in there, moving around, brushing past the silent mechs. Maybe several people, by the number of girls being bothered.

It didn't look like anyone had caught on yet. Swirling skirts and the distraction of the party might be making it difficult for them to realize that they were feeling phantoms.

"How come no one has noticed?" Tamara asked, slipping her shoes back on.

"They probably have really good crews who never go in the maintenance hangars when the mech riders aren’t around. If the crews handle the mechs very carefully, using the proper lifting points, or storing them on platforms for forklifts to move, then there's almost never going to be that goosebumps feeling like we get when someone touches our mechs. An outfit like ours can't be that careful, not with the mechs bouncing around on the back of a trailer and getting impromptu field repairs."

"But that doesn't explain what Alexander and Sam think they're doing,” Tamara pointed out.

It was then that Hannah noticed a commotion near the main entrance. Alexander was standing just inside the door and talking animatedly with some of the staff.

Tamara noticed almost as soon as she did. "Let's go see what's up." They got up and weaved their way through the tables. Halfway there, Tamara stopped dead. Hannah almost bumped into her.

"Who is he?" Tamara pointed at a waiter crossing the hangar with a tray in his hand and a towel over his arm.

"Just one of the waiters."

"Yeah, but who is he?"

Hannah shrugged. "Just someone they hired for this, I assume. Why does it matter?”"

Tamara shook her head. "That man's a Cossack or some other cavalry man, someone who spends a lot of time in the saddle. You can tell by the way he walks.”

Hannah squinted but didn’t see anything particular about the man’s stride.

Tamara pushed the issue. "They brought in waiters from around Budapest and he just happens to be someone who spends most of his time in the saddle? Does that make sense?”

"Lots of people ride."

Tamara shook her head. "Not like this. There's a difference in the way you use your hips when you spend a lot of time riding."

The man had crossed to the back of the room and was now talking with two other waiters. Tamara stared at them intently.

"Weren't we going to go talk to Alexander?"

Tamara shook her head again. "Humor me. Just for a minute. Come on." She started working her way across the room towards the waiters in the back, not directly towards the men, but off to one side. She must not want them to see her coming.

Suddenly, Tamara turned. "Play along."

"What?"

"Just play along." Tamara threw her arm around Hannah's shoulders and leaned against her. "You're my best friend,” she slurred loudly.

Hannah went rigid for a moment. Tamara pretended to hiccup. "Let's find more drinks.”

Catching on, Hannah said, "Ah, maybe we should sit down.”

"You're a terrible actor," Tamara hissed in her ear. In the guise of drunken stumbling, she urged Hannah forward. Hannah tried to support her, but Tamara was staggering so violently that had she actually been drunk, they would have both ended up on the floor.

Fortunately, it was all an act. Tamara kept her feet and even kept Hannah from stumbling a time or two.

"I don't feel so good. Let's sit here." Tamara pulled out a chair and dropped into it.

Hannah sat more carefully next to her. "Are you all right?" she said.

"I'll be fine," Tamara slurred, and then slumped forward on the table. Hannah could see her adjusting her saber under the table.

They had all thought Tamara was silly for wearing a saber with a dress. It wasn’t remotely lady-like and ruined the lines of her dress. Now Hannah wished she had a weapon too.

A distant explosion shook the hangar, raining dust from the ceiling and knocking dishes off the tables. Shrieks of surprise and fear rang out. The supposed waiters in the back of the room did not react, nor did Tamara, who was keeping her gaze firmly on them. Hannah started to rise.

Through the wooden walls of the hangar drifted Wraith soldiers, black swirling clouds in the rough shape of a man. One, two, three, and then a fourth, farther down the hangar. They were just like Sam had described.

Icy fear clawed at her, and one of the waiters shouted in Russian, "Attack!"

Tamara burst from her seat as all three waiters tossed aside towels to reveal pistols.

Hannah was surprised, but her combat training took over. She rose, her hands lifting to shoulder height. The men leveled the pistols on the crowd and opened fire, but Hannah was ready. She drew on her magic, and her shield sprang into being, stretched out ahead of her. Istota burned as bullets slammed against her shield and bounced, rattling, to the floor.

Tamara’s saber hissed out of its sheath. She lunged for the wraith men. The first was just raising a white bone dagger when she reached him, sword flashing through the air. He went down in a tangle of black cloth and spraying blood, a strangled cry dying with him. The other wraith soldiers scrambled back. One of them pulled a bundle of gray cloth out of his swirling black robes and raised it to shoulder level.

"Look out!" Hannah shouted and raised her other hand. She threw a shield between Tamara and the soldier just in time. The soldier’s gray bundle roared once, twice. He had a pistol in a cloth bag. Sergeant Golem had said the touch of iron turned the wraiths solid again. Cloth would insulate them from the metal of the gun.

Tamara laughed. Her magic empowered leap covered the distance in a blink and she cut him down.

Hannah felt bullets whistle past her and focused her attention back on the impostor waiters. They had reloaded their pistols and were all three aiming at her, trying to overpower her shield. She quickly strengthened it as another volley of bullets slammed against it. The air in front of her filled with small chunks of lead halting and falling to the ground like metal rain.

She stepped back, trying to clear the table and give herself room to move, while at the same time keep herself between the shooters and the crowded dance floor. The air filled with screams and cries as people rushing about. Somewhere in the room, someone was firing slow, deliberate shots, but she couldn't spare the attention to see if they were friend or foe.

Her foot hit a slick patch and she slipped and fell across a body. She lost her shield. Bullets ripped the air over her head. Hannah scrambled up, her dancing slippers sliding in a puddle of blood and ducked behind another table before concentrating on her shield again. Tamara was nowhere in sight. Hopefully that meant she was pursuing backup.

The fake waiters spread out, trying to get around her shield. She would have to pick one side or the other to block, leaving her exposed on the other side.

To her left, tables exploded into the air and slammed into the false waiter, crushing the man against the wood-paneled walls. Someone was unleashing force waves. Hannah's heart swelled. The Hungarian Hussars were getting in on the fight.

It had taken long enough. There were hundreds of people in the room, mostly military trained. She and Tamara shouldn’t have been the only ones responding. Clearly these Hungarian women didn't train with their mechs often enough. If they had come tonight with no reserves of magic, they would be completely useless for combat.

Where was Angelica? She looked around as the thought struck her, but the last two waiters were still here, one flanking off to her right and the other coming straight for her with a knife. She tried to keep her shield in front of both attackers but it was stretching thin.

Suddenly Tamara was back, standing behind the right-hand shooter, her sword flashing. The man's arm and head came away in a spray of blood.

Hannah choked on bile suddenly rising in her throat, but kept her eyes on the man in front of her. She focused her shield down and shoved him back hard, slamming him into the wall. The man dropped his knife and tried to raise his gun again, too late, as Tamara reached him, saber flashing. The man dropped. Hannah released her shield.

She stood panting. The room was chaos. Bodies lay scattered around what had been the dance floor. Crowds of people ran in all directions, cowering in groups or else rushing towards the exits. Shots still rang out on the far side of the room, but there was a crowd in that direction, and she couldn't see who was firing.

"We have to get out of here!"

Tamara grinned and swept her sword down, splattering blood across tablecloths and chairs. "No, we don't. We have to win!" She took off at a trot, headed towards the crowd and the shots.

The entrance they’d entered was the other direction. Now soldiers were pouring through the door and spreading out. They were in Hungarian uniforms, but could she be sure they weren’t imposters as well? Hannah raised her hands and prepared to throw up a shield, but they weren’t firing.

A flurry of shots rang out, and a soldier close to the door stumbled and fell. His companions turned and covered the entrance with the rifles. Bullets ripped through the wall. Someone was outside the building, shooting into them.

Hannah threw up her shield, weakened though it was, across as much of the room as she could cover, trying to shield the throng of people across the room. She moved pushed, placing herself in the line of fire, where she could make her shield even stronger.

Angelica appeared from wherever she’d been. She had her hands up as well, strengthening Hannah's shield. Angelica's skills at shielding weren't as strong, but every bit helped.

"Call your mech, Hannah! Call your mech!"

Hannah cursed herself for a fool and reached out through her bond. Her mech waited on the hauler, half a mile away by the barracks. She felt it respond. It was difficult to split her focus between the shield and her link.

She felt it climbing down from the hauler, casting off the tarp that had covered it and snapping the cables that had held it secure. Still feeding the command into her mech as she focused back on her shield. Help was on the way. She redoubled her efforts, burning her istota with wild abandon.

Bullets still ripped through the wall. The soldiers were clustered about the entrance, shooting their sidearms at whoever was outside, but they were losing. As she watched, two more staggered back and fell.