Enryn

by Gerard Whittaker

  Enryn was sleeping with a huge grin when he went to work in the morning, she was still fainting after a life time's abstinence, but now beginning to feel safe and loved for the first time since childhood. Despite what he had thought of her at first Enryn was not a savage, she was as well educated as possible until her parents were killed ten years ago. Since then her only education was staying alive. And she passed that course with a straight A.

  That evening Ace returned home to find it empty. Enryn was nowhere in sight. He asked around to find the Military Police had swept the barracks, rounding up all the girls missing from the mess. Ace wasn't the only Marine to take advantage of the situation, and the girls were just as good at taking advantage of the Marines.

  They had been confined to the brig until a more secure means of controlling them could be found.

  Ace high tailed it to the brig, but couldn't find Enryn anywhere. "They took her away a few minutes ago," a blond girl called out. "Left at the corridor."

  He set off running to find a Marine Captain escorting her far from the Marine section of the Iowa. She was pulling back, franticly looking over her shoulder for him. Then she saw him running towards them and sighed in relief.

  "Begging your pardon sir," he saluted "But she is with me."

  The Captain made a show of looking for tattoos and brands, then checked a folder with her name, world of origin and photo on the cover, that was the only information they had on her, all the rest was blank. "Sorry Gunny, but she's been assigned to the Air Force officer's club."

  "But she belongs to me," he insisted.

  "In which way?"

  "I saved her life, so by her own customs I own her. It's in the Regs Captain. We have to respect local traditions," he said hopefully.

  Enryn looked optimistic for a second.

  "That's pushing it Gunny," the Captain growled.

  Her face fell once more as her hopes were dashed.

  Ace insisted, "It was good enough for the Percivals."

  "You are not a Percival!"

  She was getting used to the idea of being dragged off and never seeing him again, and realised how much that would hurt.

  "Look sir, there must be some way of solving this."

  The Captain looked through Enryn's documents, "There is the sponsorship option," he mused. "It's brand new, as of two days ago."

  "So what is it?" Ace snapped eagerly.

  "You pay for her," the Captain laughed. "We dock ten percent from your pay till we return to Earth, to pay for her necessities. But it's a one time deal, only the one girl and you still pay if you break up. So you'd better be damn sure you really want her!"

  Ace looked at Enryn, seeing her desperation to be with him, and sighed, "Where do I sign?"

  "One other thing, this is so new a lot of officers will be reluctant to accept it. So guard your back Gunny."

  "Yes sir!" Ace signed the papers and took control of Enryn's documents and her life.

  "Is ten percent a lot?" she sighed. "And don't be giving me a lecture on mathematics. I mean, out of your salary."

  "Put it this way, my Ex-wife is still claiming half of what I earn, so she's going to be paying five percent," he laughed. "And what can I spend on this tub?"

  "I'll make it up to you," she promised. "You'll not regret it Ace."

  "But changes will have to be made," he sighed looking at her smock with distaste. "You'll have to learn to fit in with the Marines."

  "Does that mean saluting officers?"

  "No, never. You're a civilian, never salute. I've got to get you fixed up, and that means the Quartermaster."

  "Damn it to hell Gunny, I can't do it. I can't dress her. This is the Marines, not Rodeo Drive."

  "Hell Bertram, I'm being docked ten percent for Enryn's necessities, see it your self. That means air, food and clothing."

  "Not in my store it doesn't! I'd suggest you pass that up the chain of command, right to the Navy Department."

  "And by the time I hear anything we'll be back on Earth. Look, all she needs is a couple of shirts, skirts, shoes and underwear."

  "When was the last time you dressed a woman?" Bertram scoffed. "Bring her in Gunny, but it'll cost you."

  "I've a bottle of scotch," Ace said sadly.

  "That'll do for a start. Come here girl, strip off and raise your arms. Pretend I'm a doctor."

  "And when was the last time you dressed a woman?" Ace scoffed.

  "I'm a married man with three daughters older than Enryn, and I always measured them like this," Bertram grumbled. He ran the tape measure over Enryn, taking down her details, and filling in the clothing section on her documents.

  "Let's see what we have. Underwear, four pairs, bra 32C, four, and they only come in olive. T-shirts, three, again olive. Shorts, three. Skirts, three. Shirts, three. Stockings black, six. Shoes, one pair, black. Trainers, one pair white. Towels, three. And if you want pantyhose, go see the flyboys!"

  "Can you tailor the shirts? She needs to pass muster."

  "You're pushing it! Okay Gunny, I'm not the sort to leave a job half done." Enryn started to dress, the panties she understood, but Ace had to help her with the bra; she jiggled it a little to find out what it was for. She pulled on the skirt and shirt and let Bertram take up the slack, running them under his sewing machine.

  When they left Enryn was half way to looking like a Marine. The dark skirt was knee length, with the tan shirt over hanging. There was no insignia at all. But she walked with confidence for the first time since boarding the Iowa. "So, what do you think?" she sighed, brushing her long black hair straight down her back till it almost touched her skirt.

  He pulled the shirt smooth, admiring the fit. "You'll pass Enryn," he gasped. "You'll pass just fine."

  "Am I pretty enough like this?" she asked seriously.

  "If you had any doubts you would not ask."

  "Smart man," she chuckled.

  In the morning Major Carline gave the inspection, and gasped in horror on seeing Enryn standing to attention to the right of Ace's door as he stood on the left.

  "And what are you supposed to be?" he growled.

  "Personal property, sir!" she snapped back.

  "Gunny, what the hell are you doing?"

  "Obeying regulations sir! I have sponsored Enryn, as requested, sir!"

  "Not by me!" Carline rang command, to hear the regulations had indeed be changed. "I can't stop you flaunting your girlfriend, but I can make it difficult. I want her bulling those shoes until I can shave in them. No Gunny, not you. Her!"

  "But she only has the one pair sir."

  "Then bribe Bertram into giving you a second pair. But I want to see her standing here tomorrow in gleaming shoes." Major Carline stormed away to take his displeasure out on lower ranking Marines.

  "I think he likes you," Ace laughed.

  "But he was horrible," she gasped.

  "Exactly, if he'd have been polite I'd have started to worry."

  On meeting Enryn and learning the score about the sponsorship deal, Sal agreed to include Ceri, even though Lady Gyor had already agreed to the girl serving the Marine. Gyor could say what she liked, but she wasn't a Marine.

  In the morning Enryn and Ceri stood to attention and let Major Carline shout at them, but both had highly bulled shoes.

  Two days later another of the privates sponsored a slave from the mess, and by the end of the month all the platoon had a girl living with them. But while they had been slaves, and had little idea of the life they were joining, they were very good at obeying orders.

  Enryn and Ceri had to constantly show them the ropes, even as Ace and Sal were teaching them.

  It was another month before Major Carline gave up trying to force them to quit, and found another way to annoy them. He instructed Ace to teach them drill. And after two hours of marching around the Iowa, they started PE.

  Enryn flopped into bed with every muscle in her body on fire, and for a week Ace could hardly touch her. There was no easy way to do it, he had
to follow the manual, even if it left all the girls in agony.

  Carline recommended that as he could not be expected to remember all their names they should have name tags sewn on their shirts, above their sponsors' names. And so Enryn Macintyre was soon sewn on left breast. It matched all her paper work, which read: Name Enryn, Sponsor, Macintyre. She had never had a surname.

  The slaves were in a similar situation, and if Ceri did have two names she wasn't telling.

  The drill increased in severity every day, as did the physical fitness, and the girls were in constant agony as they jogged around the endless corridors. They met Lady Gyor coming the other way and one of the girls begged for mercy.

  Gyor ignored her but came around that night with a potion bottle for each girl, to promote sleep and stamina. She met Enryn for the first time with surprise and a knowing smile. The love Ace showed the aching girl was something she understood all too well, but that Enryn loved him back through her pain was a surprise.

  Enryn took one teaspoon full of the tonic and slept like a log, awaking refreshed and ready to go. From then on the exercise became bearable, if still exhausting.

  It was two months later that Major Carline gave up torturing the girls and started teaching them to be Marines. And so the Women's Auxiliary was born. Enryn was promoted to Cadet Sergeant, the job she had been doing all along, and Ceri to Corporal.

  Their uniform selection soon grew to include MARPAT combat dress, the Marines were wearing woodland camouflage and the WA desert.

  Then the training got serious.

  Ace showed Enryn to the firing range, introducing her to the standard Marine Replicator carbine. He held out the small crystal carbine, pointing out the lack of sights, magazine and ejection port. "Just hold the pistol grip and think what you want to shoot, then select your ammunition and you're ready to roll."

  She fired one shot down the range, hitting the target without even trying. "You can't miss," she gasped.

  "I'll show you the rest later." One wall held a display of bullets, from a point twenty two long rifle, various pistol cartridges, a 5.56mm, and a 7.62mm, but at the end was a full size point fifty round, that was nearly five and a half inches long. "That is what you were firing."

  "But you could barely fit one of those monsters in the carbine," she gasped. "I understand what you said about replicating ammunition, a bit, but that's crazy!"

  Ace took the point fifty round down and pulled the bullet from the casing, pouring the propellant into his palm, alongside the bullet. "Forget the brass, we don't need it. All we do need is the bullet and powder, and that we can replicate ten times a second. You saw me use a carbine to save your life so you know it works."

  "I'm still living, I think. Sometimes the Iowa seems like a dream, and I begin to wonder if I'm really dieing of fever and dreaming all of this."

  "I'll have to remind you tonight that you're still alive," he chuckled. "Right, the more advanced the round the longer it takes to replicate, so you can only fire a self guiding sniper bullet once a minute. And that can seem an eternity in combat."

  "Grenades?"

  "About one a second," he laughed.

  "What else can you replicate?" she gasped.

  "Beside food, air and water? You know the Iowa?"

  Enryn gasped in shock, "You replicated the entire ship!"

  "Well, if we'd built her it could have taken twenty years," he chuckled. "The thing is, we couldn't have built her at all. The technology, like the carbines, is way beyond us."

  "Then who?"

  "I'll introduce you to Eileen Percival sometime, she's the genius who figured out how to turn a borrowed replicator meant for food, into the Uber replicator that can create mile long ships out of nothing. Well, nothing and a massive fusion power plant. Funny thing is, everyone keeps telling her it's impossible to mix and match in a replicator. You can't decide what you want to have and what you want to leave, as you mix a dozen different kinds of ship into something like the Iowa. She always agrees with them, and does it anyway."

  "My kind of girl," Enryn laughed.

  He swapped the Carbine for a training version, firing bullet shaped sand bags. "There's a room next door with ten targets, I want you to shoot them all."

  She couldn't think of any problem and walked through the door to see a variety of terrain from urban to jungle. She took one step over the boundary and was shot in the left breast, she spun and was shot in the right buttock, and then again in the back. She didn't even see the snipers.

  Enryn stepped back from the room, rubbing her bruises. "Okay, what did I do wrong, besides dieing?"

  "It wasn't a fair test, they knew you were coming. But war is not a sport for gentlemen. I'll show you how to avoid getting shot, and tomorrow you can show the WA. Enryn, I'm not intending to take any of you into combat, you'll be giving support, nothing more. But shit happens."

  "You've taken a bunch of terrified slaves and made them Marines, so don't underestimate the WA. I survived on my own for ten years, hunting for food and being hunted to feed the Aelder. And I didn't have your training or equipment."

  "I know, that's one of the reasons I fell in love with you."

  "You did?" she gasped in shock, it was the first time he admitted it.

  "When I first saw you I thought you were a savage, you certainly looked the part, I never expected you to have a brain, a good one at that."

  She glanced down to see her name tag, Enryn Macintyre, "I like this name Ace."

  He looked hard into her grey eyes and saw her smiling, "So do I."

  "What will happen when we go back to Earth?"

  "Then my sponsorship ends," he sighed.

  "Can I keep the name?"

  "I think I'd like that."

  The Iowa continued across the galaxy, stopping to sample empty worlds for possible future colonies. There were many habited worlds, but most were living in low tech societies somewhere between hunter gathers and the middle ages. These were of no concern to Earth and the Iowa past on by. The majority of the aliens were humanoid, with different skin shades and features, but still having two arms and legs, two eyes and ears, one mouth and a nose.

  But, apart from Enryn and her few kin, they had found no race identical to humans. The refugees from Yag-Urth didn't count, they were from a different dimension. All she could say was that her ancestors crash landed on Tharsius thousands of years ago, and had to bury their ship to escape the hundred and twenty year night. Who they were and where they were from had been lost in the constant struggle for survival. While her parents had educated her well, she had never seen the ship and had no idea what it was like.

  The Iowa swept past a silent world, seeing the ruins of a once proud civilisation, with cities and landing fields across the globe, but all life had been swept from the planet leaving it a ball of sterile dust. The worst thing was it seemed to have happened within twenty years. And there was not the slightest hint as to what had murdered the world.

  They left the planet behind in confusion and ever mounting worry.

  Lady Gyor explained more about galactic history to Ace and Enryn, mentioning the terrible wars fought at the end of the First Age, and how ships damaged in combat were strewn across space, looking for worlds that could support them. And the survivors had had to adapt and mutate over millions of years, so that many of the races that looked so different could have common ancestors, and perhaps be able to interbreed.

  Enryn had never doubted her ability to have children with Ace, until now. They looked so similar but came from opposite ends of the galaxy, so could they ever have children?

  Gyor was happy to meet Enryn again, and thought they deserved each other; she invited them to the next ball in the Percival section, and caused Enryn to panic.

  She could take being shouted at by drill instructors, being hunted across Tharsius, and being chased by a stampede. But she had no idea about being put on display for the officers of the Iowa.

  Ace tried to bribe Bertram with a bottle of Sc
otch for something to make into a dress, but that was one thing not stocked by the Marines.

  Sal helped out with a bolt of black material that she had found by accident, and helped Enryn sew a short dress with a halter neck. And then fixed her long black hair up into a style that would reveal Enryn's willowy neck, then fixed her face with the first makeup she had ever used.

  When Ace slipped on his dress uniform and met Enryn at Sal's quarters, he hardly recognised his lover.

  Enryn had gone from beautiful to stunning.

  They linked arms and entered the Percival ball, mixing with the most powerful people on the Iowa. Ace was used to going with the flow, working alongside Jarheads in the day and officers at night.

  But Enryn was nervous, very nervous, and terrified of embarrassing Ace before the entire ship.

  A woman walked up, wearing an immaculate gown and a few bits of jewellery, her lush brown hair shone as she walked across the ballroom floor. She looked about thirty, with a handsome face and natural grace. "You must be Enryn, Gyor told me all about you. You can call me June."

  "Thank you June," Enryn gasped. "I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do here. This is my first ball."

  "They can be a bit different from the Marine mess," June laughed.

  Enryn pulled back in shock, thinking she was being insulted.

  "Don't fret child," June said gently. "I used to be a Marine myself, so I understand what you are going through."

  A tall girl with long black hair and grey eyes walked up carrying three glasses of Champaign. "So this is the Marine," she said gently. "And I though I was having it rough when you accepted me."

  "This is Essia," June introduced the girl. "One of your kin."

  "Tharsius?" Enryn gasped.

  Essia nodded. "There are a few of us in the family, and now we all call ourselves Percivals."

  "June Percival," Enryn gasped.

  "You were expecting me to look older," she laughed. "One of the benefits of having three Mages in the family. I've lost about fifteen years recently."