“Yes, sir.”
“You have stated that you will seek revenge on her for killing your father. Is that correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Are you aware that she did not kill your father and that her grandmother did?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Any Federation officer motivated by vengeance is a hazard to themselves and everyone that serves under them. I hope if you learn nothing else this summer revenge makes you stupid. You make stupid mistakes and you endanger your fellow soldiers. Do you understand what I am saying?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You should also know that the other person in that ship was her father. Her father was my sparring partner in this program when he was in the Academy. We still correspond and see each other on occasion. What that means is that for the time you are here at Parris Island, you can trust no one, not even me. You have no friends here. There will be times when the only thing that will keep you alive this summer is the recognition that others’ survival depends on your survival. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“When the Swordsmen secession negotiations are complete, I assume that you will cross over to the other side. Remember this, once that happens, any of the officers you trained with, if they find you on the field of battle, will not hesitate to kill you. Everyone here expects that to happen. In battle, they will expect no quarter nor give any. You are on your own. I cannot guarantee your safety, but I will do my best to see that you survive your stay here. You will not die on my watch. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Cadet Emerson Winthrop the third, you are dismissed. Your sparring partner awaits on the parade grounds.”
“Yes, sir.”
Emerson found the summer to be as difficult as Colonel Connors warned him it would be. He sparred in the gym against motivated opponents. Even walking on the grounds he was not safe. He was caught in brawls as he walked outside his barracks. All summer long he fought. He grew stronger and faster, but the constant barrage took its toll on his spirit as the summer progressed.
Emerson did have one pleasant surprise that summer. The half dozen Jewish students in his platoon rallied around him to help defend him against the militantly Christian, the merely militant and those who blamed the loss of some relative who died in action against the Swordsmen on him personally. He asked why they did that for him since the Swordsmen hated the Jews so much. They explained that combat was one thing, but persecution was another. No one deserved to be persecuted like he was being persecuted.
Emerson grew stronger and wrote home frequently. He longed for the day when he could marry Harumi, the second daughter of the Swordsman clergyman who had adopted him and rescued him from the orphanage. The day would come when he would be a Swordsman officer and fight for the glory of his church, but for now he intended to learn everything he could from his future enemy.
DEPLOYMENT - CHAPTER EIGHT
SABRINA MAHONEY ASSIMILATED into the team that wrote training simulations for combat pilots. She became one of the “alpha” test specialists working with the new software before it hit the “beta” stage and a wider range of testers. In the multi-player games she was always assigned the role as the aggressor once the software designers discovered the depth of her skills. As Father Hadalski had suggested, she was happy to teach the space flight school faculty because winning the games was so much fun and because to win she often had to step outside “the rules” as they were taught. There was something of a perverse delight in catching the software engineers by surprise.
Sabrina attended Sunday Mass every week. She did not always make early Mass, but she always took communion. There were fewer than a hundred Catholics on the planet and most of them were clustered at the Federation installation. There were a couple of the Catholic officers who caught her eye and she thought about settling down with one of them, but every time she climbed into the flight simulator and felt the blood rush of combat, she decided against doing anything that would keep her grounded for very long. In confession, she would occasionally apologize for not marrying and making lots of good Catholic babies, but she knew that while motherhood was not out of the question, settling down was and the kid would just have to get used to living in a space ship.
Captain Alina Darwin was admitted to an intense psychological program intended to mitigate her anxieties about men. The program was a complete failure. In his frustration, Rev Schwartz made her substitute in his place teaching the boys’ upper level martial arts classes. Boys of that age normally radiate high levels of pheromones and putting her in their midst would certainly increase the intensity of their activity. He hoped that the exposure to their adolescent maleness would inoculate her from the mental associations she had made in the past. He trusted her to not kill one of them because she did know they were just boys and not grown men.
By the end of the second week, Alina was teaching all the boys’ martial arts classes even down to the youngest grades. They loved her and she basked in the light of their affection. She enjoyed teaching the boys so much that the girls became jealous and soon she was teaching them as well. She quickly progressed to coaching the wrestling team and assisted with the gymnastics team. Although she did not know gymnastics, she did know conditioning and the proper ways to exercise.
Alina and Sabrina got together at the end of their work days for dinner and would normally would head off in separate directions. They had agreed that except for ceremonial occasions as appropriate to their faiths, neither would partake of alcohol and they found other ways to occupy their time.
Six months passed like a day. Alina occasionally joined Sabrina in the combat simulators and they made a formidable team. Combat simulators were tremendous fun for them, if not for their opponents. One evening they challenged the flight school instructors. The game screens and displays were simulcast to everyone in the community who wanted to watch. The event drew as large an audience as some of the more popular sporting events, which, in a sense, this was. With only two simulated P I ships, they held off a much larger force of instructors for three days before finally losing the battle. The severity of the “casualties” they inflicted on their opponents impressed everyone.
Alina and Sabrina were sitting at dinner a few days after the “big game” when a tall dark haired woman wearing the uniform of a Space Force Commodore approached their table. Slightly behind her was a man also in a Commodore’s uniform who looked vaguely familiar.
“May we join you?”
Alina and Sabrina jumped to their feet. “Yes, of course.”
They scanned the name badges and both their hearts skipped a beat when they read the name “Solomon” on both badges. They noticed that she carried the white beret of a ship’s captain, and he carried the black of a first officer. Their open mouths and wide eyes betrayed their feelings at having been approached by these two famous military geniuses.
The woman smiled. “Please sit. Greg, would you be a dear and get some coffee?”
“Sure.”
“Ladies, I don’t have a lot of time and I will jump right to the point. I wish I could get to know you two better and sometime in the near future we will have the opportunity to chat at length.”
“Excuse me, ma’am,” Alina interrupted. “Are you who I think you are?”
Avi smiled. “I am Avelina Bardwell Solomon and that is Greg Solomon and our daughters are Rachel and Wendy Solomon.”
“Oh my!” Alina exclaimed.
“Before he gets back, Alina, forgive me for getting right to the point, but when you kill someone does it feel good?”
Alina’s eyes popped open.
“Do you get a body rush that is unlike anything else you have ever done?”
“Yes,” Alina replied tentatively.
“Better than sex?” Avi pressed.
“Yes,” she grudgingly admitted the truth.
“And it frightens you,” Avi stated.
“Yes,” Alina said earnestl
y.
Avi continued, “You are afraid that there is a monster inside of you waiting to take over and you will go around killing for the fun of it because it is the best body rush you could ever get.”
“Yes.” She dropped her eyes in shame as she spoke.
Avi smiled. “Me, too.”
Alina gasped.
Avi continued, “I don’t like to say anything in front of Greg because I have him convinced that sex is better than killing, and it is very good, but it’s not better.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Alina asked.
Avi checked to see that Greg was far enough away to not hear her. “Because I don’t want you to make the same mistake I did, and I knew that there are only a few people you could hear this from that you would believe. Fear of the monster almost cost me Greg. I lost him once and I had to search the galaxy to find him again.”
“Do you get that, that, feeling?” Alina asked.
“The power? Oh, yes. I used to walk aboard a captured ship wearing combat armor with two laser pistols and shoot anything that tried to get in my way. It was like a drug. It was awesome and addicting. I did it because I liked it. You feel it too, don’t you?” Avi asked.
“Yes, I do. So what do I do about it?” Alina asked.
“Recognize it for what it is.”
“What is it?”
“A survival skill. It will keep you alive, but if you are not careful it could kill you. It is a loaded weapon. Use it, cherish it, know that it is as much a part of you as any other part of your personality. Most of all, be careful when you choose the man you want to love. He will need to understand how you feel, but he must not share your blood lust. If he does, you will kill many innocents.”
“Are there such men?”
“Greg is. There must be others.”
“Does the feeling ever go away?”
“I don’t think so.”
“That’s bad news.”
Avi turned to Sabrina. “Sabrina, it’s not like that for you is it? You’re like Greg. You like the chase, the challenge of the conquest, but once the battle is won, you don’t always know what to do with your conquered prize.”
“No, not really,” Sabrina agreed.
“Which is why you leave the messy parts for someone else,” Avi said.
“Yes.”
“You provide a balance for each other. Do what you can to stay together. You will be stronger as a team than you can be individually.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I have reviewed your records. I am recommending that you be returned to regular Federation service at the earliest opportunity. Admiral Sherman disagrees in that he hopes to keep you around. He thinks your presence is an asset to his organization and I can’t disagree with him. You are assigned to his command and you can’t leave until he gives his permission, but you are cleared to go anytime you can convince him to let you loose.”
Greg returned with the coffee and sat down. “I reviewed the simulation you two played against the instructors and I must say I am impressed. Years ago I told Admiral Sherman never to attack a pirate head on and he didn’t listen. You certainly took a piece out of his squadron!” Greg laughed.
“Admiral Sherman was playing?” Alina exclaimed in surprise.
“The second squadron was his. For a spook, he isn’t real subtle,” Greg said.
“A spook?” Sabrina asked.
“He was an intelligence officer before coming here. Still runs an amazing intelligence operation. If he decided it was important, he could find the names and current locations of all of your sex partners. He’s that good at intelligence. At strategy, he’s not so hot. I told him a dozen times to never try a straight in approach on a pirate. He didn’t listen and you took him right out of the game. Some people have to learn the hard way, right Alina ?”
“Some men have to learn the hard way!” Avi interjected.
“Ouch!” Greg laughed. “You should play against Admiral Sherman solo. You’d clobber him in a one-on-one. Try it sometime. Could be fun. Would serve him right for bottling you up here.”
“We’ll do that, but what if we like it here and want to stay.” Sabrina asked.
“There is nothing that says you can’t stay. Settle down, find nice husbands and make lots of happy babies. Except I don’t think you’ll do it. Unless I misjudged you, the right ship will come through and you’ll race up the ramp to join the crew. Mark my words. To do otherwise would be a waste of your talents. The Federation needs people like you in command of its ships. Don’t let us down.” Greg replied.
“With all due respect, sir,” Sabrina said, “I have not been impressed with the support the Federation gave you in the battle at Homestead or the battle here. Why are they deserving of our support?”
“They aren’t worth much, but they are all that stands between us and lawlessness.” Greg replied.
“There’s a frightening thought,” Alina said.
Avi looked at Alina and said, “Which is why operations like the one Admiral Sherman runs are so important. Support them while you are here, but come back to us when you can.”
“I hate to eat and run,” Greg said, “but we came here to pick up a gaggle of specialists who will inspect the Swordsman nuclear plants to see if they are generating power or building weapons. They should be aboard the ship by now.”
“Before we go,” Avi said. “My mother, Rose Bardwell, works in the child care center. She understands women with your special problem. Talk to her. She can help you more than all those psyche idiots over at the hospital.” Avi paused and grinned. “I understand that half the boys in the school are having wet dreams over you!”
Alina blushed. Sabrina laughed.
“It’s good for them!” Greg laughed. “Take care of yourselves. We’re off.”
Sabrina and Alina sought out Rose a few days later. They spent several evenings together and they found, much to Alina ‘s surprise, that Rose really did understand the blood lust. They were even more surprised to find that Rose felt it, too. When she explained how she felt after she pulled the trigger that sent the bullet between the eyes of the man that raped Lonnie and what it felt like to watch his brains spray all over the wall behind him, they understood the power they were dealing with.
What they did not expect from this white haired grandmother who had killed perhaps a half dozen men, was that she was a radically passionate pacifist at heart. By the time she finished explaining her plan for peace by using counter balanced interstellar forces, Alina and Sabrina were as committed to the plan as Rachel and Wendy.
Sabrina and Alina found that they were comfortable with Rose and spent as much of their free time as they could with her and the babies in the child care center. Being around the babies did not make them want any of their own, but there was comfort to be found in handling their small bodies and nurturing their developing minds.
Sabrina challenged Admiral Sherman to a one-on-one in the combat simulator and beat him handily. Half a dozen re-matches later, he finally gave up.
DEPLOYMENT - CHAPTER NINE
FEDERATION INTELLIGENCE SERVICE Lt. Faye Anne Sherman walked unannounced into the closet in the corner of the shipyard’s administrative complex that Captain Rachel Solomon used for an office. She was followed by Commodore McGuire of the Judge Advocate General’s office and by Admiral Stonebridge.
Rachel looked up from her workstation. Whatever brought these three people into her office could not be good news. The last she had heard, her friend, classmate and flying buddy, Faye Anne was at Federation Intelligence Headquarters at Langley. Commodore McGuire, who had saved her from an ugly courts marshal, was supposed to be at Andrews. Admiral Stonebridge, who had “recruited” her for this assignment, was supposed to be dirt-side scaring up money for the project. She did not waste her time and theirs speculating on what could have brought them. She stood to greet them.
Admiral Stonebridge spoke first, “Let’s move to the conference room.”
Once se
ttled in the conference room, Faye Anne blurted out, “How fast can you get that bucket of bolts of yours space-worthy?”
“We could take it out now. The engineers have had it out of the dock a couple of times. It won’t run at the speeds the Space Force mandates, but it passed most of the engineering tests. It’s almost ready for us to start recruiting staff. Why?”
Commodore McGuire cut Faye Ann off. “How long would it take to recruit your staff?”
“Depending on how fast Staff Allocation works, could be six months.”
Admiral Stonebridge leaned across the table. “Captain Solomon, you have one month to be ready to ship out. Lt. Sherman will fill in the details. Commodore McGuire and I have to visit the President. Do not leave port for longer than twenty-four hours until you hear from us. Understood?”
“Yes, sir. But why, sir?”
“Lt. Sherman will explain.” The two men turned and left.
Rachel stared at Faye Anne for a minute before Faye Anne was satisfied Rachel was calm enough to hear the news.
“What?” Rachel screamed once Faye Anne had finished the explanation. “You want me to be completely operational and ship out in a month! Are you out of your mind?”
“Fifty thousand lives are at stake,” Faye Anne replied calmly.
“Why can’t they send a hospital ship and passenger liners? We can’t lift that many people!”
“There aren’t ships available and the people don’t want to be helped. We will have to shoot our way in to rescue them from their own stupidity.”
Rachel closed her eyes. She was getting a tension headache. Headaches were becoming an increasingly frequent occurrence. “If they’re that stupid, why don’t we let them die?” Faye Anne was turning a merely bad day into a horrible day.
“Because we are the Federation and not barbarians,” Faye Anne shot back.
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