Retribution_Downfall of the Republic

by T. C. Shrader

  “Absolutely,” she said.

  The group went on catching up, learning about each other, and making the most of their time before things in the Republic went from bad to worse.

  Chapter 66

  The training regimen for assault troops aboard the black ships was as rigorous as possible. Only the toughest members from the different military branches were recruited and when they arrived they were put through days of work without rest, physical drills until they vomited, and extremely stressful training simulations.

  The end result was a cadre of extremely tight knit soldiers hailing from hundreds of worlds and after graduation they were simply referred to as assault troops. The command structure was much more simplistic than would be found aboard a traditional naval or marine vessel, as nearly all troopers were considered equal. As missions came down from Republic High Command, they were delegated to individual cadres, groups of varying sizes that naturally formed within the ranks. Each cadre had a captain who would receive missions from the ship's commander and work with his cadre to decide force size and composition. Every member of a cadre was a highly intelligent decorated special forces operative, so rivalries and petty squabbles were virtually non-existent, despite the highly competitive nature of special forces soldiers.

  'Kill teams' was a colloquial term for the squads that would be sent out after planning and delegation among a cadre and were the most terrifying assault forces mankind had ever produced. They ranged in size, but were rarely smaller than five. No matter the objective, a kill team could be counted on to accomplish their tasks without any issue.

  There were still officers, of course, as well as assigned operating stations so that the ship could function. But as a whole, every trooper was expected to keep themselves in good shape, their skills honed, and their minds ready for whatever came next. An RSOC command destroyer was essentially a small floating fortress designed to operate autonomously with minimal support or interaction from High Command. They would receive a batch of orders for their designated area of operations and carry them out without fuss.

  Melanie Thatcher, a fourteen year old girl with dirty blonde hair and vibrant blue eyes, did not know any of this when she signed up to temporarily train with the Husk cadre. She knew that she was in relatively good shape and was becoming a decent shot, but nothing could have prepared her for the 20km run she was expected to join at 5:00 in the morning.

  Afterward the squad she had been assigned to would break to eat, then go on to an obstacle course in twice Earth normal gravity.

  She expected to hear snide comments about babysitting as she ran, but her squad mates were surprised that she had lasted as long as she did.

  Reaper, the only squad member she knew and the apparent captain of the Husk cadre, filled her in on some information after she'd finished puking her guts out. She'd survived the run, barely, but made it about a quarter of the way through the obstacle course.

  “The average age of my troopers is 37 years old. They've been through the shit, cleaned themselves off, and dove right back in. We've all spent at least two decades to get where we are today. Don't feel bad for having to cop out before lunch.”

  He held out his hand and she grabbed it after wiping the bile from her mouth and then her hands on her pants.

  “Let's call it for today. I don't want anybody to make me scrub toilets for working you straight into the med bay.”

  She tried to laugh, but just breathed funny instead. She was spent.

  As they called an early lunch, the entire squad made for the nearest mess hall. Reaper explained that his cadre of 62 troopers held over a millennium of combat experience. He'd personally enlisted when he was 16 and was drafted onto his first black ship at age 35. He'd spent years with the marine corps special forces, but as he proved his fearlessness and tenacity time and time again, the powers that be sent him to the marine corps academy on Titan. Upon graduation he'd been on a handful of missions until receiving a mysterious reassignment to The Vide. All of his personal items were stowed into a lock box that only his genetic imprint could open and shipped to a storage facility on Titan.

  He went on to explain the need for secrecy even on-board a black ship where comradery took precedence over all else and how the past several months have seen The Vide nearly attacked by several Republic naval vessels under 'strict orders' to conduct illegal searches of specific ships.

  “So I guess we're on the same side then?” Melanie asked. She knew he was divulging a lot of information to her, but figured it was because she wouldn't really be able to do anything with it anyway.

  “I doubt either of our Commanders could disagree on anything, honestly. I can see that Alistair and my Comm are close. Honestly, my Comm was the most hard-ass officer anybody on board had ever seen. He kept to himself religiously and expected us to be at 110% all the time.”

  “.. why are you telling me all of this?” she asked. It seemed uncharacteristically honest.

  Reaper let out a sigh and it was obvious he was asking himself the same thing.

  “Honestly, some day you're going to inherit this fucked up galaxy. All of the ships, soldiers, civilians fighting each other because some rich cunt needed another yacht. If Alistair is anything like The Commander, you're going to have a tough road ahead of you. We all are.”

  Mel straightened up on her bench and nodded. In front of her was one of the most decorated killers she'd most likely ever meet and she could feel the fear and pain coming from his otherwise calm and monotone voice. Few things gave Melanie pause, but when a professional lifelong assassin offered her words of warning, she took notice.

  The two sat quietly and ate their lunch after their conversation and tried to consider what they were walking into once they reached Kalinar.

  Chapter 67

  “60 minutes until we reach the Kalinar system, Commander,” the navigation officer said. Like all other crew members aboard the black ship, she was a distinguished naval veteran instead of a combat vet.

  Alistair stood beside The Marshal on the bridge. True-to-form aboard an RSOC command destroyer, equality took precedence to rank. Alistair would have been just as happy lurking in the background, but The Marshal insisted they present themselves as equals regardless of where they were.

  He'd also decided to stop calling him The Marshal, at least for the time being.

  “We need to head back to The Ubik so we can launch as soon as we exit warp,” Alistair said.

  “Agreed. We've got the civvies from the Journey on board now. The poor freighter took a hell of a beating. It'll need some time in dry dock before it can fly again. So we've got a refugee contingent to worry about.”

  Alistair nodded. He knew all too well what The Commander meant.

  Reaper approached the command deck, gave a lazy salute to the men, and addressed The Commander.

  “My squad's all loaded aboard The Ubik, sir.”

  “Good to hear, Captain. Alistair,” The Commander said, “try not to run him too ragged. I remember how you used to get started and never quit.”

  Alistair just smiled.

  “I have to admit, you've kept that Osprey in great shape. I imagined at least a few dings on the inside, but it looks like it was built yesterday.”

  “I've tried. Just don't look in Mel's room. I know that she knows how to make a bed, but she still hasn't gotten a grasp on the why.”

  Reaper laughed. “Some things are beyond the reach of man.”

  “Alright, gentlemen,” The Commander said. “It's time we part ways for now. Good luck out there.”

  Alistair shook his old friend's hand as Reap gave a salute. They both made for the airlock leading to The Ubik, ready for whatever the Republic would throw at them.

  Chapter 68

  The plan was for The Ubik and the L'appel du Vide to split off immediately after existing warp and take separate trajectories toward their target, the second planet in the Kalinar system. Upon entering scanning range, both ships would target the points Alis
tair's crew had marked as possible refugee camps or defensive bastions.

  After initial scans, The Ubik would descend to the surface as The Vide was not built for planetary landings. The ground team would then search any areas that orbital scans determine to hold life.

  As soon as The Vide exited warp space on the outskirts of the Kalinar system, Achilles detached The Ubik and both ships headed out on their predetermined paths. There were no ships in the entire system, as far as they could tell.

  “Preliminary scans don't even show satellites in orbit above Kalinar II,” Cairenn said. She was reading the scan data as it came in. “It's like somebody removed them all. The planet is teaming with life, though. It's mostly dense forest and jungle near the equator. Our scanners are linked with The Vide. Whatever they see, we see, and vice-versa.”

  “Keep me updated,” Lili said. She hoped, perhaps more than anybody, that they would be able to find survivors. With The Vide in orbit, they had room for hundreds of refugees. The Commander had given her his blessing when she offered up the hypothetical situation of finding and retrieving them.

  “Ground team, you all packed and ready to go?” she asked.

  In the armory the insertion team was getting prepped for landing. They had initially debated using some of The Vide's combat shuttles for ground insertion, but decided to keep them docked in case of emergency. The Valkyrie class combat shuttles tucked away in The Vide's hangars could double as space fighters if need be and The Marshal wanted them kept as a contingency. This worked for Alistair, as he wanted his own ship there to provide fire support. He trusted Achilles more than any combat pilot.

  “Holy shit,” said Daisy, one of Reaper's troopers, when he saw Alistair's heavy shield. “I've got to get me one of those.”

  “When we get back, I'll show you the play-by-play of our last insertion into Acherus Station. He charged center like a linebacker while Stewart and I cleared the sides.”

  “We've used ballistic shields quite a bit, but nothing nearly as heavy,” added Trip, another trooper. “You have the schematics for that? How's it react to railgun fire?”

  “Yeah, I'll have Cairenn send them over before we touch down. Should stop anything a foot soldier can carry. Only tested it against energy weapons so far.”

  Alistair hefted up his shield proudly and handed it to Reap.

  “Yeah. I'd take one,” the man said as the servos on his suit whined under the increased strain.

  “Five minutes before ground insertion,” Lili said over comms.

  “Alright, ladies and gentlemen – our initial scans show life all over the place, with clusters in a few different parts of town. It's foggy as hell, about 5:30 in the morning local time. We'll be touching down about two klicks East from Kalys, the capital city. Keep in mind that the local census says about 55,000 inhabitants, but we don't know what's going on until we're boots on the ground. Stick together. Alistair and I will take the lead. Any questions?”

  The infiltration team, ten armored men and women, shook their heads before sealing their face plates and powering up their weapons. They all stood in formation with Alistair and Reaper front and center, flanked by four troopers on each side. Garcia and Stewart were on Alistair's side, along with Trip and Stump.

  “Good luck, ladies and gentlemen,” Lili said as the cargo ramp opened. The team raised their weapons and jogged out into the unknown.

  Chapter 69

  Kalys was situated in a flat plain between two sets of large hills. It straddled the Talik river, over which the townsfolk had constructed several bridges. It was somewhat modernized with actual asphalt roads that made up the center of town, but the majority were dirt roads constantly growing over with grass and shrubs.

  Kalinar lended itself well to colonization as it was extremely rich in minerals. The soil was also almost identical to Earth's native soil and when seeded with life, the planet seemed to explode with flora. Residents found themselves having to constantly battle the unrelenting tide of mother nature.

  The infiltration team, made up of Alistair's and Reaper's individual squads, reached the Eastern hills overlooking the town and were dismayed that the morning fog greatly obscured their vision. Historical forecasts showed that fog was a routine occurrence thanks to the dense foliage blanketing the planet. Their sensors could dig through some of it, but the local forests were working on overdrive, it seemed.

  “We'll stick together for now and approach the town. For all we know, there won't be any hostiles. But don't get your hopes up,” Reap said.

  “Every time you've said that, there've been hostiles,” Daisy said jokingly.

  “That's why I finish with 'don't get your hopes up',” he shot back.

  The sun wasn't going to rise for another two hours, as Kalinar was on the longer part of its orbit. The team had landed during the end of winter. Still, it was a balmy 59 degrees Fahrenheit with 99% humidity.

  The fog pretty much necessitated that they use their floodlights instead of thermal scanners and they all mentally took note of how eerie the situation was. There was no sound aside from their suits and no movement in any direction.

  The team reached the edge of town and immediately noticed bodies and blood in the streets. Deformed colonists lay dead, some mutated beyond recognition while others looked relatively normal. The first group of structures they saw were habitation buildings, two story white structures made of steel and heavily insulated – the same style that the crew of The Ubik had helped construct for the families of Burmea. They were a common sight in the Republic.

  The housing structures in front of them were aligned in semi-circles to form cul-de-sacs. Small patches of overgrown grass and shrubbery separated them and dirt paths led up to their front doors. From what they could see as they approached, very few of the houses had lights on although it was obvious that the city itself still had power. Small green lights indicated the “readiness” of each individual unit and were installed on a corner of every door sill and window frame. Whatever had happened to this settlement had left the infrastructure untouched.

  “Guys, we've got some low pressure weather systems moving in. Looks like rain, but the humidity will probably add some lighting and thunder to the mix. Just a heads up,” Lili said over comms.

  “So now it's officially a horror movie,” Trip said. A few chuckles followed. It was obvious that every member of the team was calm and collected. They were all professionals, especially the troopers from The Vide. They took their posting quite seriously and 'the Call of the Void' ended up being a way of life for the men and women who served aboard her. They knew their limits and those of their enemies – and they also knew that they always came out on top.

  They made their way to the doorstep of the first housing unit they saw and realized they'd have to move a few small bodies to get the door open. Alistair locked his hammer to his waist and tenderly lifted the young corpses, placing them in a row face up beside the street.

  “Off to a fucked start,” Garcia said.

  “Walls are too thick for any reliable scans, at least from the suits,” Alistair said through clenched teeth.

  “Got your six big guy,” Reap said as his team instinctively took up defensive positions.

  Alistair slowly slid the door open and had to duck to get in as prefab doors were, at their tallest, 8 feet.

  What he saw when he entered was the embodiment of violence. The room, normally an eggshell white color, was smeared with blood. Hand prints, large and small, covered nearly every surface. Two more bodies lay on the floor, an adult and another child. They had obviously been infected and died in here.

  “Going to check out the second floor. Stewart, with me,” he said. Stewart tried to prepare himself for what they might find.

  “We don't need to search every house,” Reap reminded the group. “Just need a feel for what happened here and find some good fall back points.”

  Alistair slowly made his way up the reinforced steel stairs of the prefab, his shield and armor b
arely able to fit. Fortunately, powered armor suits were taken into account when modern prefabs were designed, as they also doubled as a temporary barracks.

  He reached the top of the stairs and found it to be mostly clear. His scanners told him nothing up here was alive and that the air was clear of the virus.

  “Contact on scans, forty meters due west. In the road,” he heard Reap say. “Hold your fire. No civilian casualties today.”

  Alistair and Stewart headed back down the stairs and found the two corpses covered in sheets. Trip, kneeling at the child, put two enormous mechanized fingers to her eyes and whispered something to himself.

  “Let's get outside,” Alistair said. His respect for Trip had just grown exponentially. He knew these were hardened killers, but to see that they still hurt when witnessing death helped him feel more at ease with them.

  The man walking down the street was clearly infected, something the entire team could see as he shambled closer. His anatomy had been altered, although to a minimal degree. His right arm seemed to be missing entirely, while his left was fused and mangled. It looked like it was trying to grow into a claw of some sort.

  Alistair, the marines, and the troopers all had their lights off and stood motionless as the man slowly stumbled down the street. When he was directly in front of them, about ten yards out, his head twitched as it methodically turned right – aimed directly at the group. He stared for a moment, as if pondering what he was looking at, then let out a hideous scream. His vocal chords had clearly been altered as well, as no human would have been able to produce such a sound. It sounded like multiple screams, low-and high pitch at the same time – entirely inhuman.

  He lunged forward but was only able to take one step before his skull turned into a fine pink mist, his body dropping to the ground. Reap stood up from his crouching position and walked over to the creature.