She exploded to her feet and surged forward up the simulated hill that had once been a level deck, running hunched forward to maintain her balance. It was the most difficult twelve-steps she had ever taken, a nearly vertical climb up the slippery surface, her feet sliding at its summit, but she reached the lever, reached up a hand, and yanked it down.
The ship canted further and she was hanging from the lever, the deck now a wall, and the computer banks below now the floor. The blood from the broken nail made her hand slippery on the lever, which had not been designed to be hung from, in any case, and she slipped free.
The distance wasn't far, but she crashed heavily into the wall of computer terminals, and lay wedged at their base, where they met the deck. She struggled but could not move herself under the increasing acceleration of the ship; Benefactor now fell straight towards the planet, like an arrow shot from a massive bow, completely vertical.
The Manual Override was malfunctioning as well, Rebecca could only surmise. As Benefactor continued to accelerate, black unconsciousness crept remorselessly over her as the forces mounted beyond that of the body's ability to cope. In those last moments she realized utter defeat. It was not her own life whose loss she lamented, but her duty; Colonel Rebecca Collins had never failed before, and the failure was . . .
Benefactor wrenched violently under her as the ship activated emergency forces, the AGP Drive activating the energies necessary for its survival. The ship possessed the power and capability of an instantaneous halt at this minute velocity, but no human inside her would survive, they would be smashed to pulp, so Benefactor had to direct much of her energy inward as well, to Environmental Gravity Controls, and she was unable to halt completely.
Benefactor crashed into the planet. The Prison Planet Colony World Bali. She came down in a thickly forested area in a ball of flame, smoke and debris that was seen for hundreds of kilometers around in every direction.
In her last effort, Benefactor slowed herself enough to salvage those within her, which was her priority above all else, though of all those who had been aboard originally only two yet survived. Swimming in half unconsciousness, all Colonel Collins could think was 'Get the Senator away from Benefactor, get the Senator away!' There would be no mercy for them in the local's hands, and Rebecca could hardly forget what Baldwin had been before his election to the Senate. At the moment, she could think of nothing else.
But it didn't help. She had been battered and abused, and the last, the crash, had been the worst. She fell off into unconsciousness, though it must be admitted, that she fell fighting.
Chapter 4
Squads were forming up now under the remaining CO's, but Carter wouldn't have reported even if he had not known their own Officer was down. He ignored the simulated bugle notes wafting on the slight breeze and continued with his offensive. Following some ridiculous green new-jack Lieutenant was a sure way of getting dead, and Lan Carter did not want to get dead.
His inability to follow orders, or unwillingness, was the reason he could not keep stripes on his shoulders, but stripes on your shoulders weren't good for much when you're dead. He had earned and lost more stripes than he could count, and had lost them all for exactly the same reason, over and over. 'Failure to Follow Orders'. Sometimes they changed it to 'Refusal to Follow Orders'. It was all one and the same. They might as well have called it 'Refusal to Throw Away Life Needlessly!' It was what it amounted to. Lan was not interested.
In the early years, it had always been the 'Three D's'; Disrespect, Disorderly And Disobeying. It never seemed to matter what he did, it always resulted in the Three D's. But the Three D's carried Corporal punishment, the most prevalent forms being caning or whipping, and kept him out of the fighting while he laid up recovering. This was counterproductive to the Corps' cause. When they determined finally, that no amount of caning or whipping would force Lan to throw his life away needlessly, they gave up that type of punishment.
Now he was only given the lesser violation, so he wouldn't miss the next mission. 'Missions' were what they called the exterminations of whole races. Genocide! Their friendly term for the horrors they perpetuated. Though the punishments had been agonizing, they always resulted in recovery time, and he actually missed them. Sounded crazy, even to him. Such were the good old days.
Lan was an anomaly within the Space Corps Infantry Division. There were a few others like him, but not many. He continued to survive, so he was now tolerated, but the tolerance only went so far. If Carter were ever to open his mouth, the Corps would eliminate him as if he had never even existed. No. To spread rumors or brag would result in a lot of pain, so Lan Carter kept his fucking mouth shut. The whole point being still, to survive. Talking was counterproductive to survival. The Corps had taught him about counter productivity.
The girl was looking back after the last forlorn notes had faded away, but seemed uncertain of what to do. She started to turn back, but when Lan failed to move, she checked her motion. She looked at him.
"We're supposed to regroup." She said tentatively, but her whole demeanor was uncertain. In Lan she saw a survivor and she very much wanted to survive. That was clear.
"Do what you gotta do." Lan told her after a brief glance. To urge her to disobey was 'Inciting Revolt' in a worst-case scenario. It was a serious offense. She would have to make her own decisions. Lan would not make them for her, as much as he would've liked to, he would not.
Without another glance or word to the girl, Lan slipped around the statue and ran for the line of debris that had been, only short minutes earlier, the neat dwellings of the reptilian defenders, but which now had been reduced to piles of debris and rubble, all along where they intersected with the Park/Memorial area.
Lan had time to wonder what the sentient reptiles had done to bring down man's wrath, but the answer to that was probably simple. They were in man's way. No more, no less. It probably meant their complete extermination. He had seen a thousand races go the same way, and so many uncounted before his time in the Corps, but it was none of his business. His business was the survival of the Lan Carter race, and none other.
He thought about the girl as he dove into a pile of debris and came up in a prone firing position in a small depression of the rubble, his blast rifle poking out over a large chunk of debris that had been a section of an exterior wall of one of the rounded dwellings. Several projectiles whined away off the natural barricade the crumbled wall provided, but Lan was safe behind them. Maybe he did care about more than just Lan Carter suddenly, he thought. Was he still capable?
Lan didn't even look back this time at the approaching footfalls. She landed in the depression and rolled up against him. He smiled at her warmly.
"Hope you don't mind the company?" She said with a feminine giggle Lan found hard not to appreciate.
"You will be punished." He said.
"I'll think of you while it's happening. Misery loves company." She said. Lan could not help but admire her spunk, but felt guilt; she would have no idea how much caning or whipping could hurt! Hurt did not describe it. She would be learning, and learning it alone!
A projectile spanged off the debris in front of them and they both sprang up to reply. They both located the visible reptile and fired as one. The wall of the yet undestroyed dwelling erupted in a great geyser of ruin, but Lan could not tell if the reptile, which had ducked behind it at the last moment, had gotten away or not. Probably not. The concussion had probably gotten it. They ducked back below their protective embankment, and Lan turned to her.
"I won't be punished." He said, grinning, his mouthful of re-growths brilliant white. He couldn't help himself. She would have to learn the hard way, as he himself had had to do. It was more amusing than death however, so Lan couldn't help his grin.
She gave him a look of confusion, but all he noticed was how attractive she was, now that he really looked at her. Slightly slanted brown eyes, wide set, a large generous mouth and full lips on a face slightly darker than his own, and ve
ry feminine! Her confusion touched him, and he felt guilty for grinning. A first for him.
"They have given up on me." Lan said. "I haven't been physically punished in a long time. That doesn't mean you won't be. And they would kill me if they ever thought I was bragging about it. I'm not bragging."
"How many times have you been punished?" She asked. He hardly had the heart to tell her.
"I have been whipped or caned forty-seven times. Twenty-seven canings and twenty whippings." He said. She gasped incredulously. "But I'm still alive to show the scars. That's what matters."
He'd been scanning over the edge of their cover and now he leapt to his feet and raced for the debris pile created by their last joint attack. He dove in when he reached the pile, the bayonet extending from the end of his blast rifle leading the way, but the reptile was dead and half buried under the debris. He pulled up the blade at the last moment, landing directly on top of the bloody mass of shredded reptile. He landed with a wet slap.
The girl leapt in a moment later, to land in a pile of entrails which had spilled from the lizard's innards. She landed with a wet splat, and immediately began heaving up her own guts, all over herself. There was no room to get away from it, and the air above was full of buzzing death.
She heaved until it there was nothing left in her stomach to bring up, and then she was wracked by the dry heaves. It sounded pitiful.
"Get it out of your system." Lan said. Then he flipped over onto his back in a practiced movement, held his blast rifle up in his hands above the level of the surrounding debris, and began firing it as fast as he could move his finger. It took all his great strength to hold the weapon in place above himself while he was on his back, it trying to buck out of his hands, but Lan was a man of uncommon strength and he held it where it needed to be.
Explosions marched all the way around them as Lan fired his weapon. A flurry of projectiles whined over them, several striking the blast rifle, jerking the weapon around in his hands, but he ignored them and kept firing, until there were no more in the air over their heads. The blast rifle was glowing a dull red when he finished. He was careful not to let it bump either of them, as he flipped back over to peer over the edge, to scrutinize his work.
"Don't try that." Lan said unnecessarily. She had not looked as if she would, but he wanted to make sure. He had seen people blow themselves up that way. It took incredible strength, more than a woman had. Lan was not being chauvinistic. It was a simple fact.
He had seen people blow themselves up by overheating their blast rifles too. That was the blast rifle's limiting factor that they heated up under continuous use. In many cases, like when the Corps dropped you right into the hottest areas and you needed to use your weapon continuously, and not to be able to, often meant death. Troopers often times blew themselves up while over-run and struggling for their lives. Such instances were unfortunate.
Having regained control of herself, and holding their only operational weapon, the girl rolled over and began firing over the ledge of debris, and kept right on firing, though there were now projectiles once again whining around her dangerously.
Lan grabbed her by the ass of her fatigues as the enemy began cutting their position apart, and dragged her forcefully back into the depression and the cover of the concealing debris, back onto the reptile and her own vomit. She squished back into place.
After a moment he realized his hand was still tightly gripping the ass of her fatigues and he jerked it back. The look in her eyes as she appraised him, and the smirk on her lips now that he noticed it, told him that she had not minded. That maybe she would not mind it if he put it back!
"You're going to get yourself killed like that." Lan said to change the subject.
"Would that make you unhappy?" She asked that sly smile there on her pretty face. A smirking sly smile.
Lan looked at the slime and vomit covered girl and decided that no, he most certainly would not want to see that happen! Not at all!
"Would make no difference to me." Lan lied. "Anyway, you stink." She did, but she smiled anyway.
"You ain't hard." She said, and for whatever it was worth, maybe she was right, Lan thought. Maybe he wasn't hard at all.
Pretending he had not heard her, he stuck his now somewhat cooler weapon up over the ledge and began picking targets, setting up another swath of destruction around them, and silencing several of the weapons peppering them, but the enemy seemed now to pull back, and soon there were no new targets at all. Lan dropped back beside the girl and gave her a 'hell if I know' shrug.
Massive explosions began rocking the main force of the Infantry behind them. It was some kind of mortar or slow shell barrage, Lan estimated, by the sounds of their whistling approach. They might have been slow but they were powerful. They decimated the massed Troopers and sent clouds of debris and black smoke roiling up into the air. The shells came in a heavy barrage and completely blanketed the park area behind them.
"Run!" Lan yelled, leaping up, dragging the girl along by the scruff of her collar, and when she had gained her feet, they sprinted stumbling along together, and had made about two dozen meters when the shells whistled in and ripped apart the area where they had just been.
When they stumbled together into a new pile of debris, shrapnel ripping the air above them, he didn't mind it when her slime covered body fell on top of his own. Then they both laughed. Then their lips met. Only for a brief moment, but it was good. Lan didn't mind the taste of the vomit at all.
From that moment, until they were recovered four days later, Lan fought more ferociously than he had ever fought in his entire life, or so it seemed.
Their 'Failure To Follow Orders' somehow never came into question. There were no other survivors from their Platoon to tell the tale. They were both given field promotions for 'Survival Under Extreme Conditions', and once more Lan was sewing on stripes. One on each shoulder.
"Waste of time." He muttered as he sewed. He was sure they wouldn't be there long.
Chapter 5
Nago Bashin was half drunk on Thanalberry wine when the calm early evening sky above was split asunder! A massive fireball erupted through the cloud cover, vomited forth from the heavens above. For a time it seemed to stand still, but then its movement planet-ward became obvious. It was coming down right on top of them! It was coming quickly!
On his feet now but not remembering how he got there, Nago Bashin stared heavenward in horror! The fireball ripped a hole through the cloud cover and Nago could see through to the star-studded background of space beyond. The clouds roiled and closed upon themselves immediately, sealing away the view, but the fireball continued on, growing ever larger as it rushed down upon him.
But now it became obvious it would not come down directly on top of them. It was moving horizontally slightly as it fell, leaving a fiery track of black smoke across the whiteness of the clouds above.
Claps of thunder marched across the village, the footsteps of an angry God, and then stomped off into the distance as the fireball ripped a passage through the atmosphere, leaving its sonic footsteps as it passed.
Soon most of the village stood under the blazing fiery sky, falling to their knees or to lie prostrate on the ground. Some moaned hysterically while others chanted superstitiously to their Gods for deliverance from their fearful wrath.
The Gods were angered. That was obvious. Mere mortals could only quake and accept whatever judgment would be meted to them.
"Shut up!" Nago screamed furiously. "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!" Fearing Nago's wrath more than that of the angry Gods, they were soon quieted, though moans and whimpers could be heard among them here and there as the weakest were unable to contain themselves.
"They act like foolish women!" Jorg said, materializing out of the darkness of the shadows beside Nago's home. Nago had heard his approach even though Jorg had not meant to be heard. Purposeful stealth could be as obvious as no stealth at all. Nago could sleep through the loudest thunderstorm, but let the tiniest sound
that didn't belong there intrude and his mind immediately awoke him. Nago's was a very discerning perception.
Nago looked at Jorg closely in the daylight-bright light cast by the fireball passing above and wondered. What a perfect opportunity it could've been for Jorg if Jorg had found him as stupefied by the event as all the rest of the fools prostrating themselves on the ground within his sight, and this was no doubt the same scenario all over the village. Superstitious fools!
Had Jorg thought it would be so easy? Nago let none of his thoughts show visibly but he was aware of what had almost transpired. This was a treacherous land full of dangerous animals but sometimes the treachery came not from without, but from within.
The fireball accelerated across the sky, falling now at an ever more obvious angle. It would strike many kilometers distant from the village. There was to be no fear unless it was to fear Jorg, which he did not.
The fireball did not strike as he expected. At the last moments, as it neared the horizon of Nago's visibility, as the light cast by it passed away and the village was once again plunged nearly into the darkness it had been prior to the fireballs arrival; it slowed. The fireballs fall slowed! Then it slipped out of sight under the top of the forest around the village.
But not before Nago had seen the flames engulfing it flicker out of existence. It had slowed and then it had stopped burning. It had been a glowing ember as it vanished, but it had not been burning.
"It was a spacecraft." Nago told Jorg, who looked back uncertainly in the flickering light of a firebrand in a wall sconce that was now the only light in their immediate vicinity. The flickering shadows amplified the look, creating a specter of fear that Nago knew was not really there. Nago took another swill of the Thanalberry wine from the hollow wooden tankard before speaking again;
Duty, Honor or Death the Corps Sticks Page 4