“What the hell are they doing in that gear?” asks the deck officer just before you shoot him with a needle stunner. He’s the most important person to take out right now. He’s the only one who can get legionnaires here on the double. Everybody else on the hangar deck is unarmed and only responsible for star craft. They have no trigger time. No one can stop you and your team from crossing one hundred yards of open deck to the force field.
After that you need one full minute of drop time to clear the Chiasm.
The mercs start to trot. Their bulky HOLO suits slow them down. But they need those suits.
You follow at a run. You feel your legs wanting to give out, because this is as real as it gets. Because you just killed everyone, or because you’re about to jump off a starship two hundred thousand feet from the planet’s surface, you don’t know.
Probably both.
Fifteen yards from the force field, someone starts shooting. One of the mercs goes down. The others keep moving toward the force field and the orbital drop.
Those are the orders.
One of them opens the drone and beckons to you as more blaster fire careens off the deck all around you. One of the mercs returns fire, covering, while the other two keep pushing and beckoning you to climb into the drone. Which you must do, because you’re not wearing a HOLO suit.
It’s a two-stage drone. Stage One is for you. It’ll separate from Stage Two. Stage Two is for the second MARO. You’ll pilot the drone and glide it right into Camp Forge. But just before it hits… you’ll disengage.
Or so you’ve been told.
What if you don’t? What if that’s Scarpia’s way of getting rid of you? He’s left other little greeting cards just like that for other espionage operations that failed to get close to him. That was definitely hinted at all throughout training. Scarpia is a crafty foe. But what can you do? This is the plan.
You climb in, and two of the mercs secure the hatch behind you. The mercs don’t need the drone; their HOLO suits will keep them alive during the drop. They’ll try to stay with you, keep you safe on Kublar for the few minutes it takes the extraction team to jump in and pull everyone out.
But again, what if they don’t? They don’t have to. Scarpia could just leave everyone in the clutches of the planet. A wild, hostile, alien environment teeming with counterinsurgents.
The blaster fire recedes and fades to nothing as the two mercs push your craft over the edge of the deck and away from the destroyer. One hundred thousand feet below is Kublar. You may feel like you’re floating in space, but you’re really falling, and rather quickly, into Kublar’s gravitational well.
One minute later, you’re orienting yourself once more to the drone’s simple control interface when you hear the Chiasm’s spine crack in half.
The MARO has detonated in the hangar.
And you’re practically straddling another bomb just as big as that one.
You begin reentry, and the drone shakes violently. Then you’re outright falling through the barest of atmosphere and locking in a glide slope for Camp Forge.
Only two of the mercs made it off the Chiasm. Both are off your wings when atmo begins to take hold. A moment later you’ve got the glideslope set for the end of the fall, and everything is green.
Far below you see Camp Forge. It’s just a tiny little outpost from way up here.
At ten thousand feet, you separate. The smaller glider, with the MARO, streaks straight toward Camp Forge. You drift down gently onto the wastelands of Kublar beyond.
The MARO hits hard, but not at the critical center. It penetrates the garage housing the Republic main battle tanks—and it detonates. In the blink of an eye, it fully destroys more than half the Repub outpost that was Camp Forge. But not all of it.
A hard landing. And now you have two hours of wait time before the extraction ship arrives.
You hear a full-scale battle in the distance. The resounding echoes of too much blaster fire, along with the reports of antique slug throwers. Rebels? Natives? Probably both. An epic defeat of Republic might, all arranged by Scarpia. You realize that you just made the target into a legend. He’s now done what others have only bloviated about.
Thanks, Tom.
Where you’re going next, you have no idea.
Oh, and you did land in time to watch the Chiasm burning reentry in atmo. Both halves of it. So there is that to live with for the rest of your life.
There is that.
You wonder if the stranded legionnaires saw it burn up. You wonder what they’re thinking.
08
I’m standing underneath the first hot shower I’ve had in I don’t know how long. My arms are propped against the tiles, and the water is pouring over my head like some never-ending baptismal font. For a brief moment, as the steam rises around me, my mind clears. I’m here, aboard the Mercutio, and for a sweet, blessed moment, that’s all. Just a guy in the shower. Enjoying how the near-scalding water melts the taut muscles around my neck and back. Heat. Steam. And solitude. Though Exo and Masters are only a few feet away, talking in low tones as they dry off, I feel like a man in his fortress here in this shower stall. I like to think that Kublar—all the dying, the fight on board the Ohio-class; I never caught what the ship was named—that all of that is just circling the drain.
And that’s what ultimately brings me back.
I look down at the drain and see a multi-colored swirl. Dirt and grime from Kublar mix in with red—human blood diluted by hot water. I remember the girl, and I think about how this last part of her to ever leave the planet is now going to be sucked through the plumbing for treatment and reuse.
I let the water spray against the side of my face, rinsing off the phosphorescent yellow blood of some koobs that I don’t even remember getting splattered by. All of it mixes at my feet and circles the drain like a whirlpool of sorrow.
I tap the tile and shut my eyes as the water gives way to foam cleanser, and then back to clear water to rinse until the scanners built into the wall determine that I am, in fact, cleaned to Republic regulations.
The water gradually moves from hot to warm. I’ve got about three minutes until it goes ice cold. A luxury afforded to me by a sympathetic sailor who had the access to increase the warm water time.
Because everybody on the ship knows.
And other than a cook that Exo had to threaten with castration in order to get the chow heated, we haven’t gotten any flak. We were give a wide berth once we landed from the Ohio-class with our prisoners. Even the sailors who were busy taking selfies in front of the shot-to-hell shuttles and starfighters—some never pass up the chance to look like warfighters to the people on their home worlds—even they grew quiet as we passed by.
Wraith wasn’t with us for long. When he transferred the prisoners to the deck officer, he was informed that his presence was necessary, too. Kags is gone as well; he was taken to rejoin his unit. Word is that more basics made it out than legionnaires. But that’s to be expected. I’ll find out which leejes made it out alive soon enough.
When the shower’s done. I’ll find out then.
There’s a moment where I feel a flood of emotion. I think of the leejes lost on Kublar, a place whose name I couldn’t recall just days ago. A place I’ll never again forget. I press my forehead against the tiles. In my mind, I can see a version of myself—maybe a better man—releasing this emotion. Silently weeping for all that was lost. For Pappy and the others.
But the tears won’t come. I feel hollow inside. No, that’s not right. Not hollow. Resigned. I feel resigned. It was their time. Someday it’ll be mine.
And so it goes.
I swipe the backlit control square, bringing my finger from top to bottom to shut off the shower. The white noise of the water cascading around me is replaced by the ringing in my ears from too much war without a bucket. With the steam still thick around me, I step out.
Masters and Exo are out before me. They’re each half dressed, wearing pairs of black training shorts
.
I wick away excess water with an absorption cloth. It sucks up the beads of water resting on my face and neck. I begin to dry off my chest, then halt at the sight of myself in a mirror. My face is peppered with cuts and scrapes. There’s a gash across the bridge of my nose, and I have a yellowish bruise beneath my left eye. A piece of my ear is missing—just the tip, maybe a centimeter of flesh. It seems that every part of me that wasn’t protected by armor has some sort of wound.
I guess it was more than hot water that caused the stinging in the shower. I stare at my reflection. Lost.
“Lieutenant!” Exo shouts. “Put some clothes on, for Oba’s sake!” He fans himself. “You’re gettin’ me all hot, standing there buck naked.”
Masters lets out a belly laugh. I crack a smile before toweling off my immodest places and pulling on a pair of my own training shorts, neatly folded and waiting for me on the sink counter beside an array of cleansers, balms, and all the other objects for personal hygiene available on a capital-class battleship. I toss my absorption cloth into a hamper, which beeps and then moves on a magnetic track to ferry the garment to the ship’s laundry conveyor.
“There,” I say to Exo. “Now can you control yourself?”
Exo makes like he’s about to faint. “Those abs, sir. Too much. Cover yourself before Masters switches teams. It’s him I’m most worried about. He’s drooling, sir.”
Masters throws his absorption cloth into the back of Exo’s head. The leejes laugh as the bot controlling the hamper moves in to pick up the discarded article.
The truth is, we’re all outstanding physical specimens of humanity. Being in the Legion breeds maximum conditioning. Masters, with his shirt off, looks like an underwear model. Exo is every bit as cut, just thicker and more compact. He’s the sort of leej who looks like he could run through a duracrete wall without noticing it. Of course, no amount of abdominal muscles will stop a blaster bolt.
“There’s no pleasing you, Exo.” I grab the black T-shirt set out for me. It’s surplus from a squad of legionnaires stationed on the ship. I pull it over my head and slip on a pair of shower shoes emblazoned with the Mercutio’s name and hull number. “Any word on who else made it out from Victory?”
“No.” Masters shakes his head. Both he and Exo lose their mirthful expressions. I’ve killed the mood. “There’s an aide waiting for us outside who says he’ll take us to the barracks where the survivors are. He didn’t have any answers, though. Said he’d try and scrounge up a med list, but couldn’t promise anything.”
“I’ll see if Captain Ford can swing us something whenever he gets back from prisoner exchange.”
I unwrap an ora-tab, toss it in my mouth, and bite down, sending a wave of deffevmint across my palate. Yech. Not my favorite flavor. Tastes like a mix of tar and one of the heirloom mints. Smells good, though. My breath is immediately fresh, and the thick, rank taste in my mouth from too many days in combat operations leaves, while millions of nanite bots released from the ora-tab stay behind to clean my teeth and gums.
Wraith enters the refresher room. “Lieutenant Chhun, I need you to come with me.”
I nod at Exo and Masters, trusting them to make it all right to our barracks. We’re on board a Republic battleship, I remind myself. Your men are safe now.
Wraith walks at rapid pace, moving gracefully in spite of still being in his armor. I feel anything but graceful. With my gear off, and my muscles heated by the shower, my body is telling me just how banged up it got down on Kublar. I’m struggling to keep up. Walking with a pronounced limp. Alternating pains in my right foot and left hamstring with each step. My back feels pinched and totally out of alignment. There’s a trickle of water coming out of my ear that I missed. I wipe it away, rubbing the fluid off on my shorts. Wraith must see me struggling to keep up. He slows down, but doesn’t mention it.
“So where we going?” I ask.
“Legion Commander Keller,” he says, as though it were the most mundane thing in the world. Oh, we’ll just stop in to see Dad at work. No big deal.
It’s a huge deal. The legion commander has direct authority over the entirety of the 4th Legion. Up until a few days ago, that included the 131st Legionnaire Corps—of which I’m among the few survivors. He’s a battle-hardened leej sent by Legion Command to oversee operations on board the flagship of this sector of galaxy’s edge. And I’m on my way to see him wearing a kelhorned pair of shorts, a T-shirt a size too small, and a pair of shower shoes. Not to mention I haven’t shaved in days.
“I can’t report to the legion commander like this!”
Wraith looks me up and down. “You look fine. Besides, he didn’t want to wait. You think I would have left without getting in a shower if I didn’t have to? The purifiers in my helmet are struggling to keep up. Or starting to fail. I can almost smell myself. It’s that bad in here, Chhun.”
We stop at a speedlift. Wraith presses the button and we step inside. He keys for the bridge deck. The speedlift’s shaft fills with a soft, violet light as we’re scanned. I’m certainly not authorized for the bridge deck, but it looks like Wraith has some new privileges. There’s a ding, and the lights revert to their usual, daylight glow. A sailor attempts to join us, but Wraith waves him off. The lift’s door closes in front of us.
“So the smell is what keeps the helmet on?” I ask Wraith. I would have never talked to him like this before Kublar. But…we fought side by side through hell. And we’re both officers now—though I fully expect the loss of my battlefield promotion to be part of this meeting. Probably a simple debrief. I’d ask Wraith, but I know that he’d have already mentioned the reason for our trip if he was supposed to.
“You got me,” Wraith says. “I’m doing everyone on the ship a favor keeping my bucket on.”
***
The legion commander’s personal quarters were not where I was expecting we’d end up. The room is like a core-world studio apartment. It’s spacious; only the admiral’s and captain’s are larger. There’s an entryway with an overhead light shining like a spotlight onto a Legion crest woven into the carpet. To one side stand a miniature galley and a sitting room, and in the back, deeper in, is the commander’s bed, neatly made to drill instructor standards. I stand to the right of the entryway, before the commander’s desk.
Bald, with a crooked nose and a granite jaw, Legion Commander Keller stares at me from behind fiery blue eyes. I stand at ease, eyes forward to the Legion crest, the sword stabbing through the deci-number four, for 4th Legion.
“You boys,” Keller begins, his voice deep and full of the confidence of someone who’s been there, “did one hell of a job down there.”
“Thank you, sir,” Wraith and I answer in unison.
“The Republic,” Keller points to a datapad on his desk, “wants to control the narrative here. Hearts and minds. Right now, every citizen in the Republic is glued to their holos soaking up the details of what happened. Wondering how in God’s name an entire corps of legionnaires and the ship they flew in on are just lost”—he snaps his fingers—“like that.
“They’ll hear their reports. Families will grieve while the rest go on thinking… if it could happen out there, could it happen here? Only it damn well didn’t happen out there. Those backward-ass koobs threw in with the insurgents and the Legion made them howl. The Republic wants the heroes of the battle, the legionnaires who fought through hell and survived—sacrificed themselves so the basics could get out on the drop shuttles—they want those heroes back on Utopion so the citizens of the galaxy can say, ‘Look at what the Legion did. So few against so many.’ And feel safe again.”
He pauses. I start to feel uncomfortable. “Yes, sir,” I say, instantly regretting it. Stupid. Keep your mouth shut.
Keller smiles. “Hearts and minds. That’s what the House of Reason and Senate Council want right now. The killing’s done, and hearts and minds need to be won.” He stares at his hands, which rest atop his desk. “If there are heroes worthy of commendation, it’s
the two of you.”
He looks up at us. “But I won’t make you those heroes.”
I shift—imperceptibly, I hope. Where is he going with this?
“There’s a leej point—Devers—who’ll do the job. If he survives. Looks like he will.” Keller stands and clasps his arms behind his back. He stares at us, but it’s not a malevolent gaze. He looks at us like a proud father. “I know you leejes aren’t fond of points. Necessary evil. And I can still take it all back. Hand you fortune and glory and parades. But I don’t think I’m wrong. I know a pair of real leejes when I see them. Captain Owens.”
A legionnaire in black armor materializes from the shadows of the room. He moves to the legion commander’s side. This guy is Dark Ops. A legionnaire serving at the most elite level the Legion has to offer. The greatest tests of concentration and endurance, both mental and physical, the highest-priority ops… they all happen to those serving on a Dark Ops kill team. No doubt, this is a badass leej standing before Wraith and me.
I could have done without the theatrics, though.
Captain Owens pulls off his bucket and places it gently on the legion commander’s desk. He has a thick red beard. His hair hangs loose, almost to his shoulders. A far cry from Legion regulations, but Dark Ops have special exceptions. It would drive me nuts to have that much hair under my bucket.
The captain holds out his hand. “Captain Ford and Lieutenant Chhun, if I understand correctly?”
That surprises me. I figured Pappy’s field promotions wouldn’t last any longer than the time it took to leave Kublar’s atmosphere. We shake hands.
“No matter what, those ranks stay,” Keller says. “Colonel Hilbert was one of the best legionnaires to ever put on the armor.”
I nod. “Thank you, sir.”
Owens stares at us. “Sorry about coming in from the shadows. I’m a believer in first impressions. I wanted the opportunity to watch the two of you up close for a while. Make sure I liked the impression I got.”
Kill Team (Galaxy's Edge Book 3) Page 7