by Greg Dragon
Rafian was intrigued and horrified at the same time.
“So these guys have us outmanned and outgunned, and they can put thoughts into our heads now?” he asked Val, but not in a way that Val could answer. “How exactly are we even winning on this moon with those odds?” Rafian mused.
Val gave a mocking laugh, injected a ration bar into his mask, and then sat back chewing for a while, as if the question was worth considering.
“Who knows, Raf. Maybe they’re letting us win for some greater strategy. But remember what I told you, in case you’re ever alone with one of them. You should keep Vani and her Memory off of the battlefield, where she’s safe.”
Rafian nodded and thanked his friend. Val then went on to make fun of him for having a thing for bad girls, a joke that apparently had made its rounds to Missio-tral from all the friends who knew him.
“Vani’s not a bad girl, Val. What has she done to anyone besides be annoying?”
Val looked genuinely surprised. “What? Do you not know why they made her a button-pushing navigator instead of leaving her on the admiral path that she was pursuing?”
Rafian shook his head, sadly awaiting what he assumed would be disappointing news.
“Well, your woman punched out the cadet commander after they had words one night, and the woman was carted out to receive multiple zaps to her face to keep her pretty. I’m surprised you didn’t hear about this. Look at you, thinking that you had a gentle wildflower all this time. It got bad, man. You must’ve been on a mission or something, but princess had to call mommy and daddy to bail her out, as the commander was a step away from shooting her out of an airlock for assaulting an officer. Her parents are powerful people so she got away with it, but you need to watch your back with Vani Narcila. That girl has a temper on her!”
Rafian chuckled. “She didn’t tell me about any of this when I got back with Aurora.”
“See? You and bad girls, man! First with Kim the Terrible, and now with Violent Vani. Hell, if you and Vani don’t work out, you can holler at Rueche SYN, the girl who tried to blow up the ship after she failed out of Special Operations.”
“Ha!” Rafian looked at Val and smiled. “What about Vestalia? Is she a bad girl?” he asked, still thinking of her beautiful face grimacing from the stasis.
Val got serious and made to get to his feet as he answered. “You’re not her type, Raf. Trust me, Vani would get her before you would. Either way, I’m gonna go take advantage of this chance to sleep, buddy. If I were you, I would do the same.”
Memory 08 | Arisani
The hot steam of the pressurized cleaning chamber felt good on Rafian’s skin as he scrubbed the sweat and grime that had accumulated on his body all those days he was in uniform. He had forgotten to remove the skin-tight 3B suit when they had forced him to put on his blues, and it was actually painful to remove. Something had changed with his body, and he couldn’t tell if he had been shot unknowingly and the atmosphere had seeped in, or if it was purely mental trauma from everything that had occurred up until now. He couldn’t tell how long he had been in thought when he collapsed, but the people who were waiting in line to use the chamber saw it happen, and he was rushed to a building that the field medics had converted into something of a makeshift hospital to treat all of the wounded marines.
When Rafian opened his eyes, he was strapped to a desk with wires running from nodes attached to areas of his naked body. He felt vulnerable and wondered why they hadn’t bothered to give him some underwear before tying him down to the cold hard desk to work on him.
“Am I all right?” he asked the doctor, who was an older man he had never seen before. Rafian thought that he was odd looking, because the military ships had nobody that looked like him. He was neither muscular nor military looking in the least, and his pallid face had the scars of someone who had come face to face with a detonator.
He noticed that the equipment around him had not been brought with them on their march through hell to take the city. The strangeness of it all and the man’s odd appearance made Rafian think that the doctor may have been flown in, just like the rest of the equipment, which meant that things were pretty bad for their tiny group.
“How long have I been in stasis?” Rafian asked, but the man was ignoring him, typing away at a panel and looking over notes the entire time.
“You’ve been here a week,” he finally replied, and then shifted his attention to another machine.
“How long were you in that 3B suit?” the doctor asked Rafian as he checked the computer rapidly, paging through the vitals on the screen.
“A little over a month, I think.”
He felt as if he had run a marathon, because his breathing seemed to get increasingly harder.
“Son, have they sat you soldiers down and explained to you what the 3B suit is and why you should use it sparingly?”
“Sure they have, doc, but that was a long time ago for me. We have always worn these suits—hell, for a time, they were a fashion statement on the base.” And he smiled at the Memory.
The doctor turned around with a serious look on his face and then gave Rafian some bad news. “Lieutenant, the 3B suit is a deep-space Zyrotech experiment that got pushed ahead way before it should have. It was due to the war that we went ahead and bypassed protocol to allow it, but this was contingent on the user knowing and understanding the risks. When you put on your marine armor, the suit should have been removed first. The suit is an alien technology that adapts to your environment and to the needs of the life-form wearing it. What has happened to you is, your body has adapted to the suit and vice versa. So when you took it off, your vitals panicked, and they are now trying to fix whatever it is that they assume is missing…even though you technically are healthy.”
The doctor’s lecture was the last thing that Rafian wanted to hear, as he had welcomed the thought of finishing the entire mission whole. He asked if he could just wear the suit temporarily to rejoin his comrades, but the doctor wasn’t trying to hear it. He sedated Rafian in order to prevent him from leaving—as most soldiers tended to do when told they were unable to fight—and then began working on fixing the damage the 3B suit had done. It took another week before Rafian was released and able to move around on his own without issues.
He found out that the legendary Hellgate had gotten killed. He asked if she was flying when it happened but was told that it was at her camp that the war maiden had met her demise. Of all the bad news throughout the war, this was the one that finally got to Rafian, and he struggled with his emotions and whether or not it was appropriate. Colonel Rend was using Hellgate as the mission codename for taking Arisani, and he came to the camp to give Relled ZEK the objectives before leaving with three soldiers for recon.
“That was my bloody call!” Rafian muttered under his breath as a young girl by the name of Levoria DRE told him everything he had missed while in recovery.
“So how do you feel, Lieutenant?” the young girl asked. She couldn’t be any older than fifteen and was only on the mission because her teacher (Wei Venthai), an expert anthropologist, died from a bullet upon deployment. Levoria was very knowledgeable about the geography of Meruda, so they sent for her immediately to aid in the affairs of the takeover.
“You are to stay here until you’re summoned,” she reminded him, as if to squelch any hope he may have had of being allowed to grab his gear and run after the squadron. It wasn’t as if he could, since his 3B suit was now worthless and had been sent back to Missio-tral for salvage. Rafian was not trained as an infantry grunt. If he were to try to leave, the heavy armor and automatic weapons would only serve to annoy him, since they were not the tools of war the academy had trained him to use.
“You know, Levoria, this above all else is worse than anything I’ve had to deal with since coming to this godforsaken moon!” Rafian yelled into the air.
But Levoria just shook her head and retrieved a scan pad. “We’re due for a storm any day now,” she said quietly, sitting wit
h her legs crossed and fingers poking and sliding rapidly on the surface of the pad.
“Sounds about right,” Rafian responded, sounding defeated. “I’m gonna take a jog and do some exercise…if I may have my leave?”
“You can go, Raf, but I need your word as a starfighter that you will not do something stupid like traveling to Arisani city.”
A starfighter’s oath was a guaranteed thing from a space marine like Rafian. During the course of training, drilling, and preparing for death, the boys and girls of the various bases were made to respect the oath as sacred above everything else. They were told that the oath was the one thing they could rely on when the universe went to hell and that breaking it would make a man or woman into the worst kind of soldier ever.
“I swear it!” Rafian said as he saluted her and exited.
There were many injured warriors in the city now turned hospital where Rafian jogged. He saw many other restless marines playing games, priming weapons, and wrestling one another. He even came across a couple of older women pretending to tan themselves under the Merudian sun. Of course it was a joke, being that a skin-colored texture on a 3B suit fitted with a mask was truly nothing like the half-naked women on Vestalian beaches. The whole spectacle reminded him of the pathetic facade that was a soldier’s vacation. He recalled how philosophical he had been when they gave him leave after rescuing Aurora. He sat with Vani on the holographic beaches of Medine in old Vestalia, pretending they weren’t locked into a machine, allowing it to fool their brains that they were elsewhere. This was the reality he was supposed to have as a soldier of Vestalia, but he couldn’t accept that this was it for them.
“We are going to free Vestalia or die trying,” he said to himself out loud as he ran. His respiratory system was well again, and it felt good to breathe. After eight miles of rotations around the hospital-city-camp and a few brief moments when he ran into familiar faces and was made to stop to say hi, Rafian retired to a house that had been gutted for holo-vid entertainment and treated himself to the illusion of swimming in the oceans of his old world.
A day later, Rafian got the news that Colonel Rend had taken the city. He also heard that Val Tracker was with him, and that made him proud and happy for the success of his friend. It was all bittersweet because he wanted to be there. But he was happy for the memories that stayed with him of picking off all the Geralos with his rifle. What he wouldn’t have done to see the look on those lizards’ faces when Vestalian black uniforms emerged from every point on the compass, laying down deadly fire in their direction.
He imagined it was glorious, and Rend had delivered one of his famous prebattle speeches.
Rafian was sitting at a table eating by himself with his mask off. The disappointment he felt in himself for the suit situation was slowly eating him alive. This tour was his opportunity to finally take it to the Geralos after years of training, simulation, and reminders that he had no parents because of them. It was his first mission, and what was he doing? Rotting away at a table eating hard rations mask-less, a luxury afforded only to those lucky enough to be in their bubble-camp, with the Phalene pipes providing a safe atmosphere. Val and company were stomping lizard skulls, taking the city for humanity, and actually finishing the mission.
“You’re lucky to be alive!” Levoria had reminded him. She watched over him like his personal guard, and he was trying to figure out whether she had been hired for this duty to keep him out of trouble or as an excuse to get her out of the fighting. Levoria DRE was more civilian than soldier, as her primary study had been maps, civilizations, and weather since her tenth birthday. Though she was very introverted and odd at times, he appreciated her company and the fact that she never flipped out the way his girlfriend did.
Vani was extremely worried about Rafian, and he was only allowed to speak to her once every other day for a short period of time. Their communication was normally:
“Hi, how are you…?”
“Good to hear….”
“Stay safe!”
“Love you…”
He knew he was lucky to be allowed even that, as the marine brass was extremely cautious about sending signals that could be picked up by the enemy. For all the disappointment he felt about missing the final phase of the war, he was extremely lonely and wanted to see Vani soon.
A few days after the taking of Arisani, vessels began landing on the moon to replace troops, and a Veralyn medical cruiser was there to take the wounded back to their respective ships for treatment. Rafian was taken to the Helysian, where he was presented with a Platina panther’s skull for bravery in reconnaissance affairs.
It was an extremely high honor, and it was accompanied by a letter written by Hellgate herself, who had learned of his suit incident and hurriedly typed and sent in recommendations for him to receive the skull, in the event he didn’t make it. The letter was on rare Louinian clover paper and the ink was laced with stardust—very expensive. It was the written words, however, that held the true value of the award for Rafian, because it was a personal letter to him from his military hero. The letter read:
Lieutenant Rafian VCA, though we never met formally, I have followed your rise on the vessel Helysian and want to say that I admire your spirit. It is men like you who will win this war for us, and if the fates allow you to live past this night, I hope to fly wing to wing with you on the take back of Vestalia. Get well, soldier, and keep your head above water and your finger firmly ready to squeeze. For we are going to free Vestalia, or we will die trying.
— Lt. Col. Helga ATE
The letter forced tears from Rafian’s painfully dry eyes, but he was still in his mask and suit, so he let them flow freely in the Vestalian custom of opening one’s heart to the dead.
“I will always fly wing to wing with you, Hellgate,” he muttered silently under his breath, and removed his helmet in a way as to allow his sleeve to wipe his face to remove the tears. Choking it all back was a task, but Rafian did so as he faced his commanders, saluted, and thanked them for the honor.
Vani was in the room waiting for him when he arrived. She ran to the door, and as she embraced him tightly, her chin dug painfully into his shoulder. The debrief from the mission had taken a toll on him. His commanding officers had queried him on every single detail about the mission and what had occurred, and they did not allow him to skip anything. He ran into Vestalia, who managed to survive her wounds and was decorated with a Platina tiger skull, the infantry version of his award.
Platina was a rare ore that was dug up from the destroyed world of Xaio-9, so it was used in jewelry and major decoration for the military. Its color was a shiny red that had a similarity to the Vestalian gem garnet, but like all things from Xaio-9, the surface of the metal held tiny starlike imperfections that glittered on and off.
Rafian expected that if Vestalia survived the affair and they were reunited, it would be a warm greeting of embraced exchanges and things that would probably make Vani very upset. Their greeting, however, was something formal and awkward, and Rafian managed to say, “I’m glad you made it out, Tali,” before feeling stupid for referring to her with a pet name that she had never given him permission to use. Her reaction was mysterious to him as she nodded and tilted her face slightly to look at him over her nose. But he realized it was her way of stifling a dimple-filled blush, so he knew she approved of his calling her Tali. The girl was beautiful and she was tough, so he reverted back to the shy stowaway he had been when he first entered the Helysian. This was not the way he wanted their reunion to be, but she kept moving to run to her family, and he wanted nothing but to run away from her as fast as he could.
Aurora SYN came by the apartment to see her brother, and he didn’t mind telling her the story of his week of boredom in the city of Copl—since everything else about his adventure was classified.
“I can’t believe we took Arisani!” Aurora exclaimed after he had finished talking.
Vani was next to her, beaming with a similar excitement. “Do yo
u know what this means, Rafi?” Vani asked as she clasped his hand inside hers. The trio was on the bed, and Rafian was inclined, looking up at the ceiling as they spoke. Vani had her legs across his torso with her back against the wall, and Aurora lay next to him with her right hand serving as a brace for her head.
“Well, I assume it means that sooner rather than later, General Ara is going to send his comets of doom to Vestalia to start a decades-long war to win her back before she gets terraformed,” he said.
“Why must you be so negative about it?” Vani pouted, and Aurora laughed at her the way she always did whenever Vani would make a funny face.
“I swear, Vani, you could be a holo-actress, as you are so funny! You’re as pretty as those girls, and you have loads more personality!” Aurora declared.
Vani, who always liked to be reminded of how beautiful and talented she was, ate it up with a smile. Things seemed to have cooled off between the two girls in his absence, and he noticed it almost instantly when Aurora came in and Vani regarded her in a familial way, rather than with the coldness she had customarily exhibited before he left. Rafian was right about the command to take Vestalia, but that effort would come along only after the planet of Geral was given the same treatment that their home world had suffered. General Ara was a man with a hardwired code for revenge against those who had slighted him. As such, it would only be a short time before the war on Geral was underway.
That night Rafian slept like a rock. It was the first real sleep he had had in months, and he dreamt of Vestalia the way it had been described to him before the Geralese invasion. He dreamt of walking her busy streets hand in hand with Vani, breathing air that was natural to their planet and not manufactured from a machine made to sustain human life. He wasn’t sure how long he was out, but it didn’t matter with a dream like his occupying his time. When he awoke, he was no longer in the plush apartment of a Vestalian city but a tiny military apartment, on a lumpy, metal-based bed with a beautiful young woman nestled in his arms, sleeping soundly as if there were not a worry in the universe as long as he was there.