Flower Ghosts -- A Flower War Story

1 - An Old Town in Summer

The old city burned under the hot summer sun.

Summers...they had always been too long. Heatwaves extending from late may to early November, turning the bricks and ancient concrete buildings red with warmth, while the waves washed against the shore, coruscant waters under the steel-blue sky.

The car rolled in silence down the street. It was an antique, a luxury automobile equipped with modern electric engines, a wasteful and mostly useless machine, part of a vast theater play the city was an integral part of. The car bore the emblems of the Open Hand, the USRE office tasked with enforcing the laws of the Union, when the socialist republics did not or could not do so. In this case, the Open Hand official carried by the old vehicle wasn't an enforcer, a judge or a field agent, but a Pale Referee, a Flower War arbiter, as the white poppy on their grey suit indicated. Their face was one of serene certainty, as was the case for every referee ever sent by the USRE. Sometimes, Eshe Kollontai wondered if they weren't androids, or clones — a funny idle thought, of course, considering that human cloning was strictly forbidden by most polities in Communal Space. She was also experienced enough in matters of robotics to determine who was an android and who wasn't, even when dealing with very life-like avatars. Still, it felt weird to find herself in the presence of a person that looked exactly like the referee she had met decades ago during her first Flower War, far away under the dying sun of a lone icy planet at the edge of known space. As she turned towards Amin, who sat right next to her in the car, she wondered if he felt the same. Amin Aqsa, sometimes known as the Asp, independent mercenary with a preference for small, neatly contained Flower Wars and a marked taste for spectacular melee engagements. His mech was a Type 117 — a simple, fast bipedal design whose radiator array had been modelled to look like one of these flags carried by samurais in ancient times. Eshe had yet to face him in this specific war, and while she did not really look forward to it, she knew it would be quite interesting, as always.

"I've seen your records." smiled the referee, hands crossed above a little haptic display. "You are, and by very far, the most experienced dogs of war in this Flower Conflict. Honestly, isn't such a squabble a little bit above your pay grade?"

One of the bird-shaped q-augs on Amin's forehead spread its wings in answer.

"What are you insinuating?"

"Oh, nothing demeaning, trust me. I am just quite surprised that the Socialist Republic of Occitania and the Solar Sea dedicated the funds and time to drag you both from Elora."

"What if we just enjoyed being here?"

Eshe tilted her head to the side. She knew very well that the arbiter was concerned with the possibility of their confrontation stealing the show from the rest of the mercenaries engaged in this Flower War. The pretend conflicts were a serious matter and they rightfully feared that the two high-profile fighters would rob the other belligerents of their catharsis. It was, after all, the real point of a Flower War.

The car came to a halt on the scattered pavement.

"Why did we stop?" asked the arbiter. The car's quasi-AI answered in a deliciously neutral, seraphic voice.

"It appears we are dealing with construction drones."

"Construction drones? Who schedules renovation works in the middle of a Flower War? I issued safety orders six months ago. Could you identify these drones, please?"

A small beep answered.

"Their ID hasn't been renewed in two years. I can't trace it to an active commune."

Eshe and Amin exchanged a gaze. They did not need to vocalize their fears: this looked like the perfect setup for an ambush. Of course, they both thought at the same time, no one would ambush an arbiter in a Flower War. It would not bring anything to any of the parties involved, but a swift exclusion from the conflict and an USRE-mandated defeat.

"Tell these drones to move."

"Already done. They won't bulge. Transponders are offline. They look very old and battered. Rogue units, perhaps? The city still maintains an automated plant for minor repairs."

Now, evidently, considered Eshe, if it was an ambush, such a setup was incredibly crude...though precisely, the crudeness combined with the context would have made it a rather great move. Too obvious and too meaningless to be considered as a possibility. Yes, she had used similar tactics in the past.

And then, the sea trembled.

At first it was just a rumble shaking the street, then the car itself, and finally a large dome of water bulged through the surface of the Mediterranean. When it burst, the dome revealed the bipedal shape of a semi-organic combat machine. Its legs were shaped like those of a bird, arched against the ground as it compensated for its jump on the paved shore. The cockpit was triangular, reminiscent of a spearhead, and a pair of multipurpose limbs emerged from its rubber-like surface, halfway between the animal and artificial reigns. Two weapon pods bearing rapid-fire coilguns deployed as the machine stabilized itself between two buildings. The referee told the car to accelerate, but Eshe could very well see that the old vehicle did not stand a chance in a race. A series of scattered sounds echoed across the street, like droplets sprayed against a warm wall. Coilgun shells, realized Eshe and Amin at the same time when they saw how effortlessly the badly adjusted shots had pierced a brick wall, missing the car by a few meters. She saw the bipedal mech jump above a house block, using its bird legs as gigantic springs, before firing another burst. Eshe switched her pencil on.

"Saiph, bring yourself over here, now!"