“All right, you little slime-bag half-breed,” Thorella whispered under his breath. “Let’s see just what color blood you’ve got.”
Reza ignored the stick one of the other trainees offered to him.
“Take your weapon, Gard,” Thorella ordered.
“I have no need of it,” Reza replied as he stepped onto the log. He felt clumsy in his combat boots and exposed wearing the flimsy camouflage uniform rather than his armor, but he thought he would be sufficiently agile for the job at hand. He waved away the helmet one of the trainees offered him.
“This is more like it,” Thorella said, impressed, as he removed his own helmet, tossing it aside. Even if Gard was a loser, he thought, at least he knows how to go down right. But he was also eager to see how Reza would look after the unpadded grip of the metal bar had been smashed across his shoulder blade. Or the side of his exposed skull.
Reza walked about a third of the way out onto the log and stopped, his eyes never leaving Thorella. His scarred, tan face was calm, his callused hands hanging at his sides.
“Well, come on, freak,” Thorella said, his mouth a cruel smile that split the lower half of his face like a crevasse.
Reza offered him a hand gesture that he had seen used by some of the other trainees. He did not know what the extended middle finger meant, but understood that it was entirely offensive in nature.
“You arrogant little prick,” Thorella said as he made a lightning-quick thrust at Reza’s midsection. Had it connected, he probably would have broken some ribs.
But Reza had somehow disappeared, and Thorella found himself flying through space, propelled by the enormous force he had put behind his own attack. “Shit!” he hissed as he fell, face-first onto the log, scrabbling desperately for a grip before he fell into the water. The hooked and padded stick slipped from his grip and disappeared into the stream with a splash, accompanied by a series of gasps from the watching trainees.
Quickly regaining his feet, Thorella found Reza standing casually a couple meters away, behind him, watching with that stare of his. But now he also wore a slight smile – something he had relearned from Jodi – on his face.
Thorella was incensed, but he kept it well beneath the surface, in the same place he kept all the feelings that seethed within him that could not be exposed to the light of public scrutiny. “Not bad, punk,” he said amicably as he flashed a wolfish smile at the onlookers. I’m going to tear your guts out for that, he screamed to himself.
Reza said nothing as he waited.
Thorella moved forward cautiously, his body fluidly transitioning into his favorite hand-to-hand combat stance, edge-on to Reza, his arms raised to their strike/defend positions.
Aquino was growing concerned. Thorella’s stance was not one he wanted to see practiced here: the technique he was intending to use was for killing only, and was only learned and practiced under very carefully supervised conditions. Still, he hesitated to say anything. Just as much as everyone else, he was curious as to what Reza would do.
Thorella was nearly within striking range. He was not planning any feints or drawn-out sparring contests. He wanted to hurt Reza, hurt him bad, hurt him now–.
Thorella’s cruel smile vanished, to be replaced with the feral snarl of a rabid animal. He darted forward with agility amazing for so bulky a body, making a vicious thrust at Reza’s midsection with his left hand, closed in a rock-hard fist.
Reza deflected the blow without discernible effort and stepped aside, his booted feet solidly balanced on the sloping side of the log. He felt it roll slightly and compensated for it; the log was not fixed in place. A few chips of wood fell into the running water below.
In this way Reza entertained Thorella for a while, parrying the larger man’s thrusts while allowing himself to be pushed toward one end of the log, ostensibly cornered.
“Stand and fight, you bastard,” Thorella snarled. “You’ve got nowhere else to run, now.”
The fist that lashed out like a knife toward Reza’s throat would have killed or crippled him had it found its mark. Instead, it found the wall of Reza’s palm, his fingers closing around Thorella’s larger hand like a vise. The sound of the impact echoed over the streambed like a rifle shot. Thorella tried to pull away, but quickly discovered that to do so was impossible: it was as if his hand had been set in concrete with reinforcing steel around it. He had never encountered a grip so strong.
“What is wrong, captain?” Reza inquired politely. He began to increase the pressure on Thorella’s fist, simultaneously canting it at an angle that began to force the captain to lose his balance on the log or risk having his wrist broken.
“If you let me go now,” Thorella whispered threateningly, “I’ll let you off easy. Otherwise…”
“Do not threaten me, child,” Reza said contemptuously. “Your lack of honor and courage disgrace your bloodline, your peers. Were I not bound by my honor to the strange laws of your people, I would slay you as the beast that you are. Beware, captain.”
Thorella’s eyes bulged with outrage. “Why, you little motherfu–”
He did not have enough time to finish the sentence as Reza flicked him from the bridge as if he were no more substantial than a wad of paper. Howling obscenities, Thorella flew through the air until he hit the water, throwing up a tremendous splash that would be the subject of delightful recounting among the trainees for weeks.
There was another collective gasp among the recruits. Thorella had never been dropped by anybody, and Reza did it his first time on the bridge. With his bare hands. For a moment, there was total silence.
Eustus was the first to react, clapping and whistling his approval. “Way to go, Reza!” He was quickly joined by the rest of the trainees.
“What a belly-flop!” someone exclaimed amid the chorus of laughter from the trainees. Some of the instructors smiled. The little leather-faced Aquino nodded, impressed, and that did not happen very often.
“You mean to tell me that somebody finally got that asshole?” Reza heard a voice in the group ask, incredulous.
“Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” said another.
Thorella suddenly burst from the water, sputtering with rage. He slapped at the surface in impotent fury at having been bested. When he finally contained himself, he looked up to where Reza stood on the bridge, silently watching him. Thorella put on his smile again, the lower half of his face smeared with blood from his tongue where he had bitten it as he hit the water. The blood made him look like the water had washed away the skin of his face to expose the red muscle tissue and ivory skull underneath. He pointed a finger at Reza in warning. “Watch your back, freak,” he hissed. “Watch your back.” He winked like they had a mutual secret, and then he moved off toward the shore.
The hatred Reza saw in the man’s eyes left little doubt as to the future. He knew that someday he would probably have to kill him.
***
“What’s the matter, Marine?” Thorella sneered. “Can’t you take it?”
Ever since Reza had tumbled him from the bridge, Thorella had made even more of an effort to make their lives completely miserable. Sometimes he enlisted other officers and NCOs – and even some trainees – to aid him in his mission, but mostly he preferred to administer his harassment personally. The post command staff, while conscious of his singling out Reza and Eustus for special attention, generally made no move to interfere as long as Thorella kept his actions within the unwritten limits of cadre deviltry. For the most part, he complied. Grudgingly.
Eustus cursed to himself as he tried to keep from collapsing into the gravel. He had been doing pushups now for five minutes straight after a grueling five kilometer full-pack run with the rest of his platoon, and his traitorous arms were shaking like the bass strings of a harp, about to give out. His hands were bleeding from the jagged rocks under him, the edges of the sharp granite shards of The Pit doing their best impersonation of razor blades. He looked up at Thorella’s square face.
&n
bsp; “No pain, no gain, sir!” he huffed in a less than respectful voice.
“Yeah, Camden, but in your case it’s no brain, no pain.” Thorella got down, right into the younger man’s face, so close that a drop of sweat from Camden’s nose trickled onto Thorella’s. “You drop out on me, you start eating gravel, and we’re gonna take a nice long run through the bogs to warm up your legs, Camden. A nice long run.” The bogs were a notorious hell for the trainees, a series of ankle deep patches of soft ground and reeking standing water that made running more of an excruciating experience than it normally was. Thorella knew without a doubt that Camden wouldn’t be able to hack it after everything else he had been through that morning.
“Fuck off, sir!” Eustus hissed enthusiastically through clenched teeth.
“Keep it up, dickhead,” Thorella warned quietly, the ubiquitous smile etched onto his face. Eustus wanted to barf right between his eyes, but he didn’t have the strength to spare. “Let’s see how your buddy’s doing over here.”
Reza was as solid as stone, Thorella noted despairingly. The big captain looked around for some sandbags or something to pile on the smaller man’s back, but he could find nothing nearby, and it wasn’t worth the effort to go looking too far. He might miss something. “How do you feel, freak?” He tugged on Reza’s hair like he might an animal’s tail. Someday he was going to cut it off and put it with the other trophies in his collection, he thought smugly.
“I am well, Captain Thorella.” Reza refused to call him “sir”.
“That’s good, freak. Know why? Your buddy over here’s starting to look a little tired, and I was thinking you might want to help him out. Camden!” He barked. “Recover and get your ass over here!”
Eustus heaved himself up and staggered to attention in front of Thorella.
“Stand on his back,” Thorella ordered. Eustus just looked at him, his face a question mark. “I’m talking to you, trainee dickhead. Mount up. Now.”
Eustus opened his mouth to tell Thorella just where to take it when Reza interrupted.
“Go ahead, Eustus.”
“No way, Reza. This is totally–”
“Just do as I ask of you.” He looked up. “Go ahead.” Eustus shook his head and did as he was told, placing his booted feet carefully on Reza’s back. He threw a look at Thorella that left few doubts as to his thoughts. The captain only smiled more.
“All right, Marine. Start knocking ‘em out. I’ll count cadence, trainee dickhead here will count repetitions. In cadence, exercise! Ooooooooone…” Reza lowered himself to the ground, his arms like hydraulic pistons. “Two…” He raised himself back up. “Threeeeeeeee… four.”
“One,” Eustus spat, enraged that this kind of thing was allowed to go on. He looked around, careful not to upset Reza’s balance. No other instructors were in sight. Unless they wanted to fight Thorella – he had no doubt that Reza could hammer him to the ground, but they would both get tossed in prison – they were stuck.
The pushups were brutal, a slow count down, a pause at the bottom, and a fast push up to be in time for the next repetition. If you got behind, you found yourself starting from zero all over again.
“Thirty.” Eustus was amazed at Reza’s strength. He was lifting most of his own body weight, plus the additional eighty kilos Eustus boasted. He imagined that someone as big as Thorella could maybe do something like that, but Reza was almost half the larger man’s size.
Thorella was beginning to get impatient, but he reminded himself of the old adage that good things come to those who wait. His smile became a toothy grin in anticipation. “Ooooooooone… two… threeeeeee… four.”
Reza made it, but he was beginning to slow down. His pace was just slightly off. “Thirty-one.”
“Bullshit,” Thorella snapped viciously. “It’s zero, trainee. Zero.”
Eustus snarled and was about to leap for Thorella’s throat, damn the consequences, when another voice joined in.
“That is enough, Thorella!” he heard Nicole bark. “Camden, get off of him! Reza, on your feet.” Greatly relieved, Eustus stepped down. It was like getting off a sheet of spring steel. He leaned down to help Reza get up.
Reza nimbly got to his feet, not even breathing hard, as Nicole stormed across the field like a miniature whirlwind, her normally neutral expression distorted with a very unprofessional look of anger. “What the hell is going on here? Reza, are you all right?”
“Yes, ma’am.” The lactic acid that remained in his muscles was already dissipating. But he was ravenous from the temporary change he had made to his metabolism. He would be making several passes through the mess hall line this afternoon.
“I’m not through here, ma’am,” Thorella tried to bully her. The only time the two of them came in contact was over Reza and Eustus, and then it was a clash of the titans, at least from Eustus’s point of view. “If you recall, I am in charge on this field.”
“Not anymore, captain,” Nicole snapped. “If anything like this ever happens again, I will put you up on charges.”
“Well, well,” Thorella chuckled, not the least bit intimidated. He stepped closer to the petite Navy officer, his bulk looming over her like a freight train beside a bicycle. “Not only is she going to pull rank on me, she’s going to write me up next time. Maybe I’ll get a spanking, too?”
Sadly, his intimidation was not having the desired effect. Nicole did not budge.
“You can do whatever the fuck you please. Ma’am,” he told her, finally giving up on simple intimidation. “But on this field, I am in charge, regardless of what you say. And if you interfere in my business again, I’ll write you up.” He rendered her a mock salute and stomped away like a prehistoric beast, screaming at other gasping trainees doing grass drills, ordering them to recover for a quick run through the bogs before they hit the showers.
Nicole saw the blood on Eustus’s hands, then took one of Reza’s hands in hers, looking it over. She was shocked at how callused it was. The gravel had not made any indentations in the skin. “Both of you, I want you to go to the infirmary and get checked out. And I want you two to stay together so you can protect one another. I do not trust him.”
Reza did not trust him either, but he did not understand the depth of emotion Nicole felt. Perhaps, he thought, it is only a protective instinct. He turned back to her, his eyes blazing with a cold fire that had been ignited under an alien sun. He made an expression that might have been a smile except that his teeth appeared poised to tear something apart. “Do not worry, commander.”
“What a shithead,” Eustus mumbled as they walked back toward the compound. Reza frowned at his friend’s description, trying to conjure up a suitable image in his mind. After a moment, he smiled.
Twenty-Four
“C’mon, Reza, I can’t believe you’re not going to take this pass.” Eustus watched him with disapproving eyes, hands on hips. He had fashioned himself into a credible ersatz younger brother in only a few weeks.
Reza shrugged as he pulled on the black undergarment over his naked body. His skin tingled with delight as the smooth material glided on. He was always tempted to dress and undress several times simply for the pleasure of the sensations, of the memories that it evoked. But not now. “Thank you for your concern, my friend, but it is not how I would spend my free time.”
His roommate threw up his arms in frustration and sat down on Reza’s bunk, watching him dressing in his Kreelan armor. No matter how many times he watched Reza do it, it never failed to give him the creeps to see him change so totally into an alien.
“Look,” Eustus pleaded, shaking off the thought, “you’ve got to get out and see something of the universe around you, Reza. You’ve got to learn to have a little bit of fun instead of being so morose all the time. We’ve got a chance to go to town! Don’t you realize what that means?”
Reza smiled. “‘Booze, babes, and booze,’ as I heard someone say. Some others said ‘Booze, beef, and booze.’ I believe I would prefer the latter. T
he mess hall does not know how to prepare meat correctly. Perhaps the town has good beef, but I prefer to hunt my food myself.”
“No, no, Reza,” Eustus said impatiently. “That isn’t the kind of beef they’re talking about. They’re talking about beefcake.”
“And what is wrong with that? Can you not still eat it?”
Eustus shook his head, blushing. He was raised in a liberal home, but public talk of any kind about sex still embarrassed him. The thought of Reza and “beefcake” together in the same context was too much. “It means guys, Reza, guys! Men, not animal meat. It’s, well, a kind of reference to, uh, manliness, I guess.” He sighed. “Look, never mind. You just ought to come with us. You might enjoy yourself for once. All the time you’re sitting with your nose at the vidscreen or down in the armory messing with the weapons or just sitting in here in some kind of a trance. You never have any fun, Reza. We could have a few drinks, maybe see a kino or even a live show. We might even meet some girls or something. That’d be kind of nice, wouldn’t it? I mean, the female trainees are nice, but…”
He trailed off as he saw Reza stiffen and shudder slightly, almost dropping his breastplate.
“I have no need for females,” Reza whispered hoarsely. He recovered quickly, fastening the armor into place with a vicious snap.
Eustus panicked. He had never considered the possibility that Reza might be homosexual. While he did not care for it personally, it was a widely accepted practice in many parts of the Confederation. “Reza… I mean, uh, if you like guys, well, I guess that’s okay, too, but…”
“No.” He turned to his friend, smiling weakly. “I am not that way. I just need to be alone.”
Eustus saw tears welling in his friend’s eyes. “Hey, are you okay?”
Reza shook his head. “No, but there is nothing to be done about it. And I will speak no more of it.” With a quick yank of a leather strap, he secured the short sword to his back. “I wish you a good time, my friend. I will see you when you return.”
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