Jupiter's Halo: Unbroken

by A P Heath

  He never said that though. Rig never said anything of much.

  He’d learned early on that the world was a lot more complicated than his mind could make sense of and most times when he did choose to join a conversation, he was shouted down for his idiot opinion.

  There weren’t many things Rig felt confident he understood, but the incinerators were one of them.

  Max had explained it to him; the rubbish from the surface was brought to the tunnels to keep the surface clean, because the nobs up there liked it that way.

  The incinerators kept the tunnels clean, at least as much as they could, and burning the rubbish made the lights stay on. Rig didn’t understand exactly how the last bit worked, but he’d nodded along as Max explained it.

  He liked Max. Max wasn’t like the others. Max smiled at him and told him things, even if he didn’t understand all of them.

  Max didn’t seem to like the people on the surface much, but he didn’t shout about it all the time like Philp did. More than anything though, Max looked after him.

  He showed Rig where to find food and how to cook it. Where to find places to sleep whenever they were forced to move on from the current nook or hole they were squatting in and all he ever asked in return was for Rig to take things to people every now and then.

  Rig didn’t really know what Max gave to people, but he knew it was popular. Some days he’d have to run the tunnels for hours to find all the people Max needed to give things to and they were always happy to see him. They gave him things to bring back to Max and they must all really like his presents. They gave him food and clothing, trinkets, jewels and plenty of hard credits. It made Rig happy to think that so many other people liked Max too.

  The rats were nearly done.

  Rig had been hungry today. He hadn’t been able to find anything yesterday, or the day before and by the time he got back to Max his stomach was hurting and his legs were weak.

  Max had asked him about his friends, making sure he hadn’t missed anyone and Rig had gone through the list for the day, giving over everything they’d handed him in return for Max’s presents.

  There’d been a lot today.

  Mostly it was credits, the shiny little cards that Max was so fond of, but there had also been a thick blue jacket with a soft inside that felt warm over his arm as he carried it.

  A pair of men in the factory district had given him a shiny chain when he handed over their gifts and one woman had made him an offer he hadn’t quite understood.

  She seemed nice and she was very friendly when he gave her Max’s present; hugging him and stroking his arms and hair.

  She’d made a funny face at his smell, people often did, but it couldn’t have bothered her too much because she pressed his

  face right against her chest and held it there until he had to push away to catch a breath. She’d smelled sweet, like the caram-cream Max had given him once when he brought back a whole bag of the posh meat they ate on the surface.

  The woman had red hair, green eyes and her skin was soft and quite clean. Rig hadn’t been sure what he was supposed to do so he’d just stood and waited. Max always told him very clearly that he had to bring back any presents he was given right away. He told Rig that his friends would always have something to give him and never to leave without it. If he did they would think that Max wasn’t their friend and that would make them sad.

  This woman had kept making a strange face at him and pulling at the edges of her clothes. Maybe she’d lost Max’s present. Rig didn’t know so he asked her if she needed help looking for it.

  That had seemed to upset her, he wasn’t sure why, but she’d stopped smiling and spat at him instead. She’d muttered a few words that he didn’t hear clearly and then thrown a sack that was by her feet at his chest, called him a simpleton.

  He thanked her for the present and she laughed at him. Confused and feeling very awkward Rig had started to make his way back to Max, her laughter following him along the tunnel as he went.

  When he got back Max had seemed worried about something, he was pacing around a small fire in an alcove near the incinerators.

  It wasn’t the nicest place to sleep for the night. There was a lot of smoke in the air which made him cough and when he did his throat got sore.

  There was a lot of noise too. The incinerators were working all the time, teams of men and women walked back and forth among the piles, throwing items they found onto the big belts that ran into the machines.

  They talked as they worked, shouting to each other, laughing, cursing. Some seemed happy, others seemed sad or angry.

  Rig didn’t know why but when one started shouting about the nobs on the surface it wasn’t long before a whole group of them joined in and after a few minutes they’d started hitting

  each other.

  It hadn’t taken long for some of the workers to stop the men from fighting, but one of them looked like he was in a bad way.

  Rig didn’t like fighting. It made him scared and when the big man who’d started the shouting was on the floor in the circle of others he wanted to shout at them to stop. Max had warned him not to do things like that though.

  The big man was on the floor, being kicked and punched and no one was helping him.

  “Would you like that to be you Rig?” Max had asked.

  Rig didn’t know much, but he knew the answer to that question. He shook his head.

  “Then just you keep that sweet daft head of yours down and leave the political scrapping t’others, yeah?” Rig had nodded.

  Then he’d asked Max if there was anywhere else to sleep, but he’d said no. He’d been looking and looking while Rig had been off running the tunnels, but there just wasn’t anywhere else.

  The alcove was barely big enough for one person to lie down and Rig had wanted to say so. He thought better of it though. He was sure Max would know that, would have thought of something he couldn’t that would mean it would be okay.

  After he’d handed everything over Max had thanked him and told him to sit by the fire. The heat wasn’t necessary, this close to the incinerators the air was hot and dry all the time.

  Max had turned out the contents of the bag and Rig was happy to see how big his friends smile was. It was full of food. Packed in plastics to keep it fresh and there were so many different things Rig thought it would keep their bellies full for days.

  Max had told him it wasn’t for them though.

  It would be nice, he’d said, but there were so many people in the tunnels that didn’t have anything to eat, if wouldn’t be fair for them to have it. Rig had nodded, his stomach growling.

  He wanted to eat the food, it looked so good. Maybe some of it would taste like the strange lady smelled. But he knew that was bad.

  Max was always thinking of the people in the tunnels. They

  needed clothes and food and medicine and credits so they could stay alive. There were people out there that had nothing.

  Nowhere to sleep, nothing to eat and they didn’t have the fire of the incinerators to keep them warm. If Rig ate the food he’d make someone else go without and that would make him a bad person. Max had told him so.

  Rig had sat by the fire and resigned himself to another night without food. But his friend wouldn’t let him go without. He pointed to the rubbish piled high just a few metres away and told Rig to watch it. Rig obeyed, wondering if he was supposed to see something more than the piles and then something had moved.

  A small black shape amongst the dirty greys and browns of the piles. It moved quickly, hopping from one tumbling heap to another and as he watched he realised it was not alone.

  There were hundreds of them!

  When his eyes went wide Max had smiled and slapped him on the back.

  “All you have to do is catch ‘em Rig.” He’d said, taking a cosh from within the folds of his long coat.

  “Catch ‘em, and whack ‘em over the head with this,” He slapped the cosh against his open palm.

  Rig
flinched at the noise it made, but took it when Max held it out to him.

  “Then you just gotta cook ‘em on the spit. They’re delicious.” He winked and smacked his lips to make his point.

  Rig couldn’t believe it. There were so many. He’d asked Max how many he was allowed and his friend had laughed.

  “As many as you want Rig. You can have as many as you want.” Rig thought he might explode with joy at those words.

  He couldn’t wait to catch one, to cook it and feel the pain in his stomach disappear as he filled it. He watched the piles, seeing the little movements everywhere he looked.

  Max had told him to cook them till all the fur was gone, otherwise they wouldn’t be good.

  Then he’d told Rig he had to take the presents to the people in the tunnels who needed them. Philp and Sparker were already

  off helping and he doubted they’d all be back before the turn of day, so when Rig was finished eating rats he could sleep in Max’s bed.

  Rig’s eyes went wide at that. The ‘bed’ was a pile of scraps, papers and threads, pushed against the alcove wall. It might not be what the nobs would call a bed, but to Rig, used to sleeping on the uneven tunnel floors, it looked like the comfiest place a man could ever wish to lay his head.

  When Max had gone Rig had set to catching rats. It was more difficult than Max had made it sound. They were fast and just when he thought he had one cornered, it would jump higher than he could have thought possible and disappear among the piles of rubbish.

  He lost his first, second and third catches due to the bites he received. For such little things they sure had big teeth.

  After he’d wrapped his hands with some strips from his shirt, another thing his friend Max had taught him, the bites weren’t so bad. It had taken a long time, but eventually he’d caught three.

  One was big and black, the other two a dark brown and slightly smaller. He’d been so hungry he’d bitten the black one straight away.

  It was bitter and squishy in his mouth, but he’d swallowed it down. The other two he’d spitted. Now they were nearly done and he was glad Max had told him how to cook them right. They smelled wonderful!

  He couldn’t see any fur left on either, although they were so black now it was hard to tell, so he pulled the spit from the fire with his wrapped hand and took a bite.

  It was hot, so hot his lips burned and he rolled the charred meat and flesh around his open mouth, desperate to cool it, but not for a moment thinking of spitting it out.

  It tasted good.

  Much better than the first black rat. Much better than anything he’d eaten in a long while.

  Rig chewed the morsel, blew on the spit a few times and bit down again.

  When the rats were finished he felt good. There was grease around his mouth and on his fingers. Some hairs had caught in the gaps between his teeth and the bites on his hands were stinging, but his belly was full.

  Rig lay back on the bed Max had given him and closed his eyes to shut out the light from the never ending fires of the incinerators.

  It was noisy, smelly and loud here, but he had eaten well and he had somewhere comfortable and warm to sleep. He knew there were a lot of people who weren’t as lucky as him and he knew he owed it all to his friend. His friend who was even now out there in the tunnels, making other people’s lives better. It was no wonder so many people liked him and wanted to give him gifts.

  Max looked after him. Max always looked after him.

  Rig smiled to himself as he settled down to try and sleep.

  I don’t know much he thought happily, but I know Max is a good friend.

  NINE

  “Officers on deck!”

  The marines of First Company stood to attention, their boots thudding together on the metal deck in unison as Captain Lanad led his lieutenants into the briefing hall.

  Dressed in the light grey combat uniform of the Deorum marines; a tight one-piece body suit made from a wired mesh material that would lessen the impact of incoming fire and could be adapted to secure a marine against almost any environment, including the perils of the void.

  Lanad stopped front and centre. Lieutenant Mentrim stood slightly behind to his right and Aitkin took up his position on his Captain’s left.

  “At ease.” Captain Lanad said. The men and women of the First took their seats along the benches of the briefing hall.

  Their order reflected the hierarchy of the company. The rows nearest the front were taken by the marines of 1C1 followed by 1C2 and 1C3.

  At the centre of each row sat the squad sergeants; Inchin Mathers, Koras Deneminjic and Augustine Johs. Directly behind the sergeant of the Third sat Imtel Johs, Aitkin’s first sergeant and the younger brother to Augustine.

  Sergeant Johs was a big man, even when compared to his marine brothers. He stood at least a head above every marine in First Company, with wide shoulders like something drawn in an old library scene depicting some ancient and long forgotten god.

  Whenever he was asked about his great height and girth, Johs would always give the same answer, “I was born with a really large head. It grew so large my body had no choice but to get bigger, just to hold it up.”

  He always smiled as he said it, “If it hadn’t you’d be looking at a very short man with a squashed neck right now.”

  He was a man who smiled wide and laughed loudly and did both often.

  Aitkin liked him hugely as a friend and valued him as a

  sergeant. As the first Sergeant of Aitkin’s reserve squads he often served as a trusted confidante.

  As a sergeant in the primary force of First Company, Augustine liked to joke that she saw more action than her brother both professionally and personally. He in turn referred to her as ‘my little big sister’, joking often that her advanced rank over his was more to do with her skills as a woman than as a warrior.

  She was almost a full Martian year older, but stood back to back, the top of her head barely reached his chest. Augustine wasn’t small it was just that her younger brother was so massive.

  There were plenty of marines in the six companies that wouldn’t reach past Johs’ chest either, Aitkin reflected. There was mutual respect and definitely love between the two sergeants, but you had to know them both well to spot it amid their constant jibes.

  Lastly were the gunnery sergeants and their accompanying marines that made up the over watch team, 1CG. Although they were within the Reserve section of the company, they were often seconded by Lieutenant Mentrim for missions that Aitkin and the rest of the Reserve played no part in.

  Captain Lanad had briefed Mentrim and Aitkin on the mission details prior to informing the rest of the company and Aitkin found himself quietly looking forward to seeing Sergeant Hinton receive the news that he and his snipers would not be taking part.

  It wasn’t that Aitkin disliked the gunnery sergeant particularly and he certainly had respect for the man’s prowess with the long gun, but Hinton was a hard man to get on with.

  He was arrogant, dismissive of his peers and all too keen to remind the rest of the Reserve that his squad was more often called into action than they were.

  In certain ways he reminded Aitkin very much of Captain Timonny of Second Company. He always accorded Aitkin with the respect deserving of his rank, but it seemed grudgingly so. He returned his attention to his Captain and the briefing.

  There was no presentation lectern in the briefing hall of First

  Company. Lanad had had it removed to allow for his tendency to pace back and forth while delivering the details of missions to his marines.

  He was stationary now, but Aitkin knew it wouldn’t take long for the captain to start moving, talking to sergeants and marines directly, as he was wont to do.

  “Marines of First Company,” He called out in his deep, melodious voice, “We have been called upon to investigate a distress signal from a Deorum supply station in orbit around Earth.”

  His mention of the abandoned planet drew breaths of surp
rise from a few of the seated marines, but the majority of the company remained silent. They were waiting to hear more and there wasn’t one among them who wouldn’t follow their captain down to the surface of that deathly planet if he commanded it.

  “We are tasked with breaching this station and confirming the source of the signal.”

  At his Captain’s words Lieutenant Mentrim keyed up the drone pictures and the schematic for the station they would be boarding. The images appeared above and behind Lanad’s head, bright against the dark polished metal of the briefing hall.

  “As you can see, our intelligence is limited. These pictures are the most recent captured and they don’t show us much.”

  Lanad stepped from his position, starting his walk along the front line of marines.

  “The station is labelled GS-114.66.1-Delta. It’s designated as a re-supply depot with a skeleton staff of techs aboard and the signal Command received contained coding that leads them to believe a hostile force is involved. I can’t tell you the station’s inventory, or give you a reason why they would be under attack. I can’t even tell you for certain that an attack has happened, but I can tell you there are eight citizens of the Deorum there who called for our help.”

  He stopped at the far end of the first bench and faced the last marine there, a thick bodied, dark skinned man named

  Barrington Winters. He looked directly into Winters’ face as he

  continued, “Are we going to ignore their call and abandon them to their fate marine?”

  “No sir, Captain sir!” Winters replied his eyes fixed straight ahead, his voice strong.

  A thin smile turned up one corner of the Captains mouth as he spun on his heel and began to walk back down the line of marines.

  “As you can see from the schematic of the station, there are three main entry points.”

  The display zoomed in to show the body of the station where darkened areas denoted each of the three loading bays. It was hard to gauge the size of the station from the images; there was no context to the picture that allowed for a comparison, but Captain Lanad had told his lieutenants that the primary and secondary bays were large enough to accept a military frigate through their integrity fields.