“We’re all slaves, Springer. We’re slave Marines. Bred to fight and die for the White Knights. Our bodies belong to them.”
“True. But sometimes I think female cadets are slightly more slaves than you are.”
He looked down at his friend who was staring wistfully up at the ceiling. She looked lost. Arun found himself echoing Sergeant Gupta’s words. “Life isn’t fair, Springer. Sometimes all you can do is suck it up and keep your head proud and high, the sign of a Marine. Wait for your luck to turn and then seize your chances with every fiber of your being.”
Springer twisted round and stared at him, astonished. Then she rolled her eyes and shrugged.
The words didn’t belong to him, and he felt an idiot to have spoken them. Arun didn’t know what else to say – he never did – so he hugged her.
At first Springer relaxed into his embrace, but then she wriggled free and slipped away out of his rack. She was fleeing, unsteady on her feet.
“Don’t go,” begged Arun. “I’m sorry for talking such stupid drent.”
“You didn’t,” she said. “I just want to be in my own bunk, is all.” She paused trying to catch her breath. Arun swung his legs out of bed.
“No!” she shouted, her back to him still. “Get back in your rack and wipe that frown off your silly face. I worked hard to replace it with a smile. Don’t you waste my efforts. There. That’s better. Goodnight… Cadet Prong.”
“I know you too well,” he shouted, angry because she was hiding something from him.
The unspoken rule of the dorm – and the entire hab-disk – was that you pretended not to notice when its residents moved between racks during the night. Now he sensed hidden eyes alert, their owners poised to intervene.
Springer finally turned back and looked him square in the face. Tears streamed from those eyes, but those eyes! They were blazing beacons of violet. The skin of her eyelids was scorching, her tears vaporizing into emotional steam. He reached for the water canister he kept beside his bed and drenched her eyes with its contents. Her eyes were shut now, the lids still steaming.
“More water!” he barked.
Someone got the hint and threw another water canister to him. Arun tipped the contents over Springer’s face, quenching the fire in her eyes.
“Thank you,” she said, blinking away the drips.
She sounded abandoned, frightened. He would never forsake her, but she was half-hidden behind a fringe of steam, and he could hardly blame her. He tried to hug her again, but again she pushed him away.
“Tell me, what’s wrong.”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t give me that. I know you too well. You had one of your visions, didn’t you?”
“It’s not a vision, Arun. I don’t see things. I keep telling you that. I just get a feeling. Just now I felt that you…”
“What, that Rekka would hand me my ass on a plate?”
“No, not her. I don’t know who. Really I don’t, so just drop it. Get some sleep, instead. Please, for me. You’ll need your strength.”
“Strength for what?”
“Change. Yes, that’s it. You’re going through changes. Metamorphosis. You’ll become something new. Or die trying. No – it’s gone. Whatever I thought I’d sensed… it’s gone. Arun, honestly, I probably just imagined it.”
Unconvinced, Arun framed her face with his hands. “Be fair, Springer. You can’t just dangle me by a thread and then cut the cord as if it doesn’t matter. Think! What kind of changes?”
She shook his hands away. “Leave me alone, Arun.”
Arun felt a confusing blend of emotions as he watched his friend pad away to her rack.
Then she stopped and turned around, bringing a flash of hope to his heart. “I’ll tell you one thing, Arun.” Her face creased into a frown. “At least you try to understand me. Have you noticed that since we made cadet everyone’s turning into emotionless robots?”
Had they?
“There’s not a single person in Detroit who could even attempt to understand me the way you did just now.”
“Thank you.”
She shook her head sadly. “I didn’t mean that as praise. I love you Arun, but I pity you even more.”
Yeah well, I love you too, thought Arun. But I wish you made sense sometimes.
Solving the mystery of Springer’s words would have to wait for another day. She’d retreated to her rack, wrapped in private thoughts.
Arun lay back down on his bed and closed his eyes, basking in the warm glow that came whenever he marveled in his good fortune at counting Springer as his buddy. Before long, though, his thoughts drifted along the passageway outside and down Helix 6 to hab-disk 7/14 where he pictured Xin asleep in her rack, the gentle ebb and flow of her breathing beckoning him.
Today Xin had acknowledged Arun’s existence. Everyone laughed at him for falling in love with a girl so far out of his league, but today she had noticed him.
And Arun had a secret weapon to win her.
The meddling in the human Marine genome threw up a host of surprising side effects. Not all were as pretty as Springer’s eyes. She had her visions of the future too, although they might be nothing more than vivid waking dreams.
Arun had his own special talent. Freakish genes might be what powered his ability. Or maybe he only thought he had a talent, and really it was a manifestation of psychosis. Whether true or imagined, if he set his mind a problem to be solved, on rare occasions he could feel his subconscious sifting through all the variables until an answer exploded in his mind, sometimes days later, leaving his brain feeling badly bruised.
He gave a brittle laugh.
So far he’d only used his ability to get into trouble.
He laughed again, softer this time. Getting into trouble was another talent of his. What else was youth for? No wonder Rekka was usually pissed at him.
Settling back into his pillow he immersed his mind in a new problem.
He held a woman’s face in his hands, idly caressing the infinitesimally fine down on her cheeks. Just like he’d held Springer’s face in real life scant minutes ago. The eyes regarding him from this face were not violet, though, they were as dark and dangerous as a Troggie tunnel. And this girl’s skin was as perfectly smooth as ablative armor.
How do I get you to notice me? he asked Xin’s face. Could you ever love me?
Xin gave the slightest of smiles, daring Arun to find out.
A sense of cogwheel teeth engaging filled his head, of noisy gears dripping with lubricant. It was a peculiarly mechanical sensation as if his mind were an apparatus constructed from brass, iron, hardwoods and oils. The gears turned faster; the smell of hot lubricant grew stronger. The floor of his mind rumbled with a low hum of power. This wasn’t imagination. This was real. He, Arun McEwan, could do something no one else could.
He felt his problem being analyzed from scores of perspectives. Xin was chopped, sliced, and spun around to be measured from every direction. Whole universes sprang into being, filled with strategies and tactics, and their likely outcomes. Unpromising solutions died away, replaced with more promising lines of attack in a fecund blooming and culling of ideas.
Satisfied that he’d unleashed his talent, Arun left the hard work to his subconscious and drifted off to sleep. As his day finally floated away, he noticed the common thread that connected the galaxy-sized rooms containing the most promising solutions to his question.
For some reason he could not explain, the answers all involved him playing Scendence.
—— Chapter 08 ——
The following morning, Arun settled for a gentle walk in place of his regular pre-inspection workout. He kept away from the busy spineways and transit corridors, settling for the quiet passageway to the neighboring 6/10 hab-disk and back. Gentle motion, nothing violent, and make use of your stick. That’s what the medic had said the previous night. She seemed to know what she was talking about. Given that less than a day earlier a claw had gouged a great chunk ou
t of his thigh, and a shrapnel fragment had cracked his knee, he’d told the medic he was amazed he could walk at all.
“Why do you think the White Knights spent all that effort redesigning us?” she’d said. “Blast us and we get up again and carry on fighting. But your leg is now mostly filler and wishful thinking. It will still take weeks for your muscles to fully regrow, and knees are always troublesome healers. You’ll have to recalibrate your battlesuit every other day to account for the changes in muscle strength.”
As his stroll drew closer to his own hab-disk, his breath quickened. It wasn’t the exercise; it was the sense of vulnerability. Rekka had left them with a threat and he felt sure it was aimed at him.
Before graduating to become a cadet, the worst punishment a novice could be given was to be discharged. Outside of the Marines there was a pale life of sorts in the Auxiliary, doing maintenance work and the dirtiest jobs in the mines here and on the moons. The luckiest Aux looked after the cadets and the Marines in the underground base as hab-disk servants. Now that he was 17 and a cadet, the penalty for insubordination or gross misconduct was public execution. And it wasn’t an idle threat. Arun shuddered at the memories of what he’d been forced to witness.
Not wanting to be on his own, he slipped into the gym nearest to his dorm. There he found Osman pushing weights along resistance channels, and Springer climbing the endless wall.
Whether by coincidence or an empathetic sense of a squadmate needing support, Osman and Springer finished their exercise at the same time and left with Arun for the nearest shower room.
Usually, after stripping off, there would be a heap of banter between squadmates as they progressed through the various stages of the shower tunnel.
Shower time was normally a simple pleasure shared with friends. Not this morning, though. Today there was a new tension in Springer and Osman, something important but unspoken that poisoned the easy-going mood.
Eyes were averted
Laughter stilted
Was everyone else as frightened by Rekka as he was?
He thought that must be the explanation until they reached the spray booth at the end of the shower tunnel. Osman was pirouetting with both arms high while the booth sprayed a film of protective oils over his skin. That’s when he blurted out the explanation for the discord.
“Arun, I'm joining the Scendence team.”
Arun burst out laughing. “Is that it? All that edginess and it’s just because you’re joining the team? You bunch of dumbchucks. Have you worked out a team name yet? Here’s one: three girls and an avian creature descendant. No, that was frakking awful. Give me a minute and I’ll work out a better one.”
To the sound of Arun’s laughter, Osman walked out the tunnel looking mortified.
This was peak time in the showers. Arun, with his hands on his knees as he laughed himself silly, was holding up the flow of cadets in a hurry to get back in time for morning inspection. Springer pushed past and took her turn in the spray booth.
Tranquility’s sun was anything but tranquil. Violent stellar flares flung vast quantities of high energy particles at their planet. The hab-disks were deep enough underground that the danger here was minimal, but at the surface, radiation peaks could be lethal. Detroit wasn’t just a training depot, it was responsible for planetary defense too. It would not look good if an invasion force took Tranquility unopposed because the Marines delayed their deployment while they applied their sunblock.
“Moscow Express,” said Springer indignantly. “That’s our name. Majanita, Osman, Springer, Cristina. M-O-S-C-ow. Get it?” She lifted her arms and slowly turned around.
“Oh, I’m getting it,” Arun said cheekily.
Springer narrowed her eyes, daring him to stare at her body.
He dared.
She narrowed her eyes even further, which made him laugh all over again. It was all a game, he thought. Springer loved the attention really.
Springer got her retaliation in by pointing at his crotch. “Your Xin said she admired some impressive equipment. As anyone can plainly see, she wasn’t referring to you. She must have meant the Trog.”
Arun laughed even harder at that, which won a giggle from Springer.
He caught Osman’s attention. “You know,” he said raising his voice so that Osman could hear above the chatter. “I don’t mean to put a boot into a friend, but honestly? When it comes to Scendence, you’re as useless as Rekka in a sexiest legs competition.”
Osman winced. “I’ve no love for Rekka, but that’s a combat injury you’re mocking, man.”
“Yeah, sorry.” Arun colored with shame.
“You’re right, though,” Osman continued. “I stink. But they need a Deception player and it’s better than letting them down, don’t you think?”
“No, I can’t say I do. But that’s just me. Good luck to you, pal.”
Springer stepped out of the tunnel joining Osman in the dressing area.
Arun took his turn under the spray. He could glimpse Osman. It wasn’t easy to tell with his friend putting on his pants, but he looked genuinely unhappy,
“The only role I’ve any talent for is Deception,” said Osman. “And even with Deception, I get a red mist. Can’t resist going for the outrageous bluff. Promise me one thing. If the Corps is ever dumb enough to make me squad leader, I give you permission to shoot me first before my red mist gets us all killed.”
“Acknowledged, future lance sergeant. I will implement your order without hesitation.”
“Yeah, well. There is a way…”
“C’mon, man,” Arun said as he emerged from the tunnel, washed, dried and coated in protective oils. “It’s not like you to vulley around in circles. What’s your plan?”
“For me to not be in the team.”
Arun thought about that while he limped over to the clothing bins and selected underwear in his size. Just as he was about to step into his shorts, he paused. “No frakking way, man. You want me to take your place, don’t you?”
Osman nodded. “The way I see it, if you don’t then I will. If you think that’s a waste of time, an opportunity cost because we won’t be getting so many merit points elsewhere, then either way one of us will be wasting time on Scendence. So the way I figure it, there’s nothing to lose if you take my place.”
“That’s butchered logic,” said Arun, underwear on and selecting his pants.
“It’s not like you have to,” Springer told him. She was now fully clothed other than her shirt. “There are plenty of other good Deception players around.”
“But will you?” asked Osman.
Arun frowned, thinking about those hints from his planner brain. “Is this what all that awkwardness was about? Is it really such a big deal to ask me?”
“No,” replied Osman.
“Yes,” said Springer simultaneously. “Well… yes it is a big deal, but…” Her shoulders slumped as if she’d melted slightly. “We’re worried about you. I’ve never seen Rekka as angry as she was last night. She felt wounded, let down, and took that out on you. I’m not saying that’s fair but it’s the kind of drent that goes on all the time. Big deal. But what if someone more senior decides that they’ve been embarrassed? What if someone important goes looking for a scapegoat?”
“What? You mean a Jotun?” asked Arun. He hadn’t considered the outcomes of petty training missions would be noticed so high up.
“Maybe,” said Springer. “Who knows? It’s a crazy world we live in. Let’s face it, we’re G-2 cadets. To us, this world still doesn’t make sense.”
“Springer!” Osman shouted. “We agreed not to mention being worried about him.”
“Arun’s not stupid, Osman. Except when he’s vulley-dreaming about his skangat fantasy girl. I can’t waste time on a bad lie to a good friend.”
Osman didn’t argue. He didn’t agree with her either. He strode away back to the dorm, but at the shower room door he hesitated.
An instant later they saw why when Instructor Rekka bur
st into the room.
“Get your clothes on quickly and follow me.” Her orders were directed at Arun.
Arun stood there, frozen.
“Hurry up, there’s no time to waste,” said Rekka, grabbing his walking stick.
He finished dressing as rapidly as he could.
Osman slunk back into the room waiting with Springer. Watching.
The instant Arun’s boots were on, Rekka threw his stick at him. “You’ve been summoned.”
He tailed her out of the shower room but took a last look back at Osman and Springer, and their expressions of horror.
Were there tears in Springer’s eyes?
“Move it!” barked Rekka from the passageway.
Arun hurried after her as best he could. He wanted a chance to say a proper goodbye, maybe to say some things that had gone unsaid.
Too late. The next time he saw his squadmates, he expected to be on the wrong side of an execution squad.
—— Chapter 09 ——
In the end, Arun couldn’t just stand there as silent and rigid as a statue, having his ass chewed out in silence. It was beyond unfair: he was being set up for a fall. He wasn’t the sharpest blade in the set, but he knew nothing he did now would make any difference to his fate.
“Ma’am. Why me, ma’am?” he asked.
For a moment, it almost sounded like a reasonable question.
From the more comfortable side of her desk, Senior Instructor Tirunesh Nhlappo regarded him coolly. The braver cadets called her Shlappo behind her back, though they were always careful to do so very quietly. To look at her in a photo you would think she was nothing special: above average height, average build and with a shaven head that was probably the reason, Arun thought, why her ears looked ridiculously large. But when you meet Nhlappo in person you were struck by an intensity of personality that was so fierce you could practically see an aura crackling around her.
Nhlappo was one of the senior humans in the 412th, and one of her roles was as chief instructor for the 8th battalion. Until the handover to the veteran NCOs had completed, that meant the woman he’d just interrupted had power of life and death over him.
Marine Cadet (The Human Legion Book 1) Page 6