Dragon Team Seven

by Toby Neighbors

  “That’s a bit extreme, man,” Ty said.

  “I know, but we would do it for each other. We should do it for her,” Nick said.

  “She might lose that hand if we don’t get her some help,” Jules said. “I think Nick’s right.”

  “And if we run into another hungry animal?” Kal asked.

  “We just have to chance it,” Nick said.

  “Great strategy,” Kal declared. “We’ll just chance it.”

  “Do you have a better idea?” Ember demanded. “Because we can’t take her helmet off. We don’t have anything that might stop the venom from damaging her arm, and if we don’t get her the help she needs, she might die.”

  “Yeah, man, I don’t want that,” Ty said.

  “Me either,” Kal complained. “But I don’t want to die trying to save her.”

  “Look, we won’t take chances,” Nick said. “But we have got to push hard to get out of here. If things get dicey tonight, we’ll stop and get a fire going. I promise.”

  “That’s good enough for me,” Jules said.

  “Me too,” Ember added.

  “Alright, I’m fine with that,” Kal said. “I don’t want to lose the sergeant, you know. I’m just stressed is all.”

  “I get it,” Nick said. “We’re all running on fumes right now. But we can do this.”

  “Damn straight,” Ty declared.

  “Alright,” Kal said. “I’ll take the first turn on Gunny’s litter.”

  Ty joined Kal, each carrying an end of the litter. They marched all day, and it felt to Nick as if the day were lasting forever. They stopped only once while there was daylight when they needed to make some adjustments to the litter. By evening, Gunny Tveit was delirious, mumbling in a semi-conscious state. After taking turns carrying her through the day, the group decided to each take a corner once night fell. They kept moving until fatigue overcame their good intentions. With only a few hours of night left, they were forced to stop and take a break. Nick stood watch while the others stretched out on the ground and slept. It was a bleak couple of hours, and Nick felt the weight of failure pressing down on him from all sides, but he shook it off, let his friends sleep, and made up his mind to keep them all moving once the sun rose.

  Chapter 35

  “Who decided Nick was going to be in charge?” Kal grumbled.

  “Gunny Tveit made him team leader, remember?” Ember said.

  “She didn’t know what she was doing,” Kal said. “He’s clearly lost his mind.”

  They had been on the move since dawn, with only a few short breaks. Everyone was exhausted, and even though Kal was complaining about him, Nick knew his friend was simply trying to focus his mind on something besides their aching bodies. They were pushing themselves, which would have been difficult under any circumstances, but carrying the litter with Gunny Tveit wore them down much faster.

  “I’ve only got enough food for another meal or two,” Jules said.

  “Yeah, and my water is running low,” Ty added.

  “All the more reason for getting off this rock as quickly as possible,” Ember said. “How much farther do we have to go, Nick?”

  The truth was, they were close to the evac zone. Nick had followed the directional program in his helmet, but it merely showed them being close; he didn’t know what he was looking for, and to make matters worse, the sun was close to setting.

  “We’re close,” Nick replied.

  “Don’t give me that, dude,” Kal said. “I want to know how many more kilometers you plan on dragging us before we can stop for the night.”

  Nick glanced down at Gunny Tveit. She was still alive, but had been unconscious for hours, not even moaning in pain or talking in her fevered sleep the way she had the day before. It was frightening. They had covered a great distance through thick jungle and Nick didn’t want it all to be in vain. If they didn’t get Tveit help soon, she might die, and Nick didn’t want that on his head—not to mention how the Proxy might view the fact that his team had gotten their NCO killed in survival training.

  “We aren’t stopping,” Nick said. “The program says we’re right on top of the evac zone.”

  “What is the evac zone, exactly?” Ty asked. “I mean, is it possible that we might not see it?”

  “It’s gotta be a clearing in the forest, right?” Jules said. “A place where a shuttle can set down. So a clearing that’s level, I would suspect.”

  “So we find this place—then what?” Kal said. “Our com-links won’t reach into space, man.”

  “There’s got to be something there,” Nick said. “Some sort of indicator or transmitter.”

  “What if Gunny Tveit has a way to contact help,” Ember said, “only she can’t because she’s unconscious?”

  “She would have told us what to do,” Nick said, trying to convince himself. “When we left the river she was still herself. If we needed her to do something, she would have told us what to do.”

  “So we’re looking for a transmitter in a clearing?” Kal said. “Man, this place is like a maze. We could walk right past it and never know.”

  “I say we make camp and then we can search for it,” Ty said.

  “Make camp where?” Jules replied. “There’s no place better than any other here.”

  “It’s all just trees and vines and insects. Have you ever seen so many bugs in your life?” Kal asked.

  Nick had grown up with roaches that seemed to infest all the buildings in poor sections of Seattle and rats that thrived in the dark recesses of the old buildings, including their school. But on Delphi Green, the world was filled with small insects. Spiders built nests between the trees, worms and beetles crawled over the damp ground, and a host of strange insects made their homes on the broad leaves and long limbs of the tropical forest.

  Nick was just about to give in and call a halt to their long, tiresome march for the day, when he saw what looked like a break in the trees ahead. He was on point, hacking at the vines and bushes that hindered their progress. Hope fueled a burst of speed.

  “What’s he doing? Kal said. “Is he actually speeding up?”

  Nick heard his friend’s voice through the com-link but didn’t bother to answer. He pushed through the brush into a clearing. Excitement and relief flooded through him and he felt a little lightheaded.

  “What’s that?” Ember said.

  Nick turned and saw his friends as they pushed into the clearing. It was too dark to see their faces, but he could sense the excitement in their voices.

  “Oh yeah, we made it!” Jules said.

  “Yes!” Ty exclaimed.

  “Never doubted you for a second, Nick,” Kal proclaimed. “I knew you’d get us here.”

  “Yeah, right,” Ember said.

  Near the edge of the clearing was a metal locker. Nick went to it and raised the set of double latches that allowed the big metal box to open. The inside was stocked with food, water, medical supplies, and most importantly to Nick, a radio beacon. He picked up the simple handheld device. Instructions were printed clearly just above the activation switch. A quick read showed that all they had to do was lift the plastic cover and flip the switch that would send a signal to the rescue vessel in orbit. Nick hit the button and set the device on top of the metal cache.

  “So what now?” Ty asked.

  “We wait,” Nick said.

  “Any idea how long until help arrives?” Kal wanted to know.

  “I don’t have any idea,” Nick said. “But we’ve completed the mission.”

  “Not bad,” Ember said. “How long have we been here, a week?”

  “Almost,” Jules replied.

  “How’s the sergeant?” Nick asked.

  “The same,” Ember replied.

  “The skin on her hand has turned black,” Ty said. “And not in the good way.”

  “There’s a good way?” Kal asked.

  “Hey man, black is beautiful,” Ty joked.

  “Not when the flesh is necrotic,” Ember
said. “I can’t see how high up her arm the flesh has been affected.”

  “We could cut off her armor,” Nick said.

  “No,” Jules interjected. “The armor is the only thing keeping the swelling down. If we cut it off, her skin might split.”

  “That’s a nasty thought,” Kal said.

  “So we hang tight,” Nick said. “We can rest while we wait for the rescue shuttle. Who wants to keep watch with me?”

  “I will,” Ember said.

  “Fine,” Kal said. “Wake me when you need to.”

  Ty, Jules, and Kal curled up on the ground, using their backpacks as pillows and falling quickly asleep. Nick was tired. He hadn’t slept in two days, but the excitement of finding the evac zone kept him awake. Ember sat on one side of the metal locker, with Nick on the other side, facing the opposite direction. The night was in many ways just as active as the daytime in the tropical jungle of Delphi Green. Insects chirped, bat-like creatures swooped through the trees, and predators began their hunt. Nick felt fortunate that they hadn’t seen any of the bigger creatures since crossing the river, but he kept his eyes open and studied the tree line with his helmet’s night vision.

  For a while, Ember was silent, and Nick was satisfied just being off his feet. But it didn’t take long for fatigue to make staying awake in the dark silence difficult. Ember half-turned and tapped Nick on the shoulder.

  “How does it feel?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Leading us to victory,” she said with a giggle.

  “I wouldn’t call this a victory. Gunny Tveit is seriously hurt.”

  “But that wasn’t your fault. It was an unfortunate accident.”

  “I’ll be honest,” Nick said. “I hate that she got bit, but I’m also really glad that you didn’t.”

  “I should have seen the snake sooner.”

  “There’s a reason it was coiled in those tree roots. It was the perfect camouflage.”

  “You think she’ll be okay?”

  “I think she’ll survive,” Nick said. “The Proxy have the best medical facilities in the galaxy. Everyone knows that. They won’t want to lose a veteran like her.”

  “But if she loses her arm, how can she fight?”

  “I don’t know, but we’ve done all we could. There was no way to get her out of the jungle any faster than we did.”

  “You should be proud of that,” Ember said. “You really took charge when we needed you to.”

  “If I hadn’t, you would have, or Kal. On the next mission, someone else can make the calls. I’m just glad we all made it out of here alive. Especially you.”

  She leaned against him, and he felt every cell in his body come alive. For years Ember had been one of his best friends, and nothing more. There were moments when he felt something stronger than friendship stirring, but Nick always found something else to occupy his mind. Since joining the PMC, the five friends had depended on each other more than ever, and Nick’s feelings for Ember had begun to grow. He wasn’t sure that having romantic feelings among the group of Space Marines was a good idea. Ember’s plight in the river was the perfect example of why he should keep his emotions in check. She had fallen into the raging waters, but her armor protected her, and she was in no danger of drowning—yet he had been almost in a panic to rescue her.

  “Me? Why?” Ember asked, her voice pitched low with constrained desire.

  “You know why,” Nick said.

  “Because I’m your friend,” she replied.

  “You’re more than that, Ember. You’re family.”

  “Like a sister?”

  Nick looked down at his feet for a moment. He wasn’t sure if this was the right time for such a conversation. They couldn’t even look at one another without compromising their duty keeping watch. Still, the emotional damn he’d held in place for so long was beginning to crack. He knew that Ember was someone he wanted in his life, and while they had both dated other people in high school, his feelings were much more than mere friendship.

  “Em, I’ll be honest because I need to say this and you need to hear it,” Nick said, his voice trembling slightly. “I think...well, I’m sure that I—”

  “Dragon Team, this is Dragon Fly Lima. Do you read? Over.”

  The radio transmission was so unexpected that Nick and Ember both stood suddenly to their feet, as if a stranger had intruded on their conversation. Nick looked at Ember, who nodded encouragingly. He cleared his throat to answer the call from the shuttle.

  “Dragonfly Lima, this is Private Nick Nichols. I’m team leader. We’ve reached evac zone 18, but Gunnery Sergeant Tveit was bitten by a snake. She’s in bad shape. We need to get her out of here...over.”

  “Dragon Team, we read you. Help is on the way,” the voice on the radio said. “ETA six minutes. Have your people ready. Over.”

  “Roger that, Dragonfly. We’ll be ready. Dragon Team out.”

  “Another time?” Ember said.

  Nick nodded, then went to wake up his friends.

  Chapter 36

  The trip back into orbit was hectic. As soon as they were on the transport, the shuttle rocked upward. The gravity forces were intense, but the shuttle pilots were taking no chances with Gunny Tveit’s life on the line. When they finally broke free of the planet’s gravity well, Nick fell asleep in the jump seat he was strapped to. The next thing he knew, medics were running onto the shuttle and pulling Gunny Tveit off. They whisked her away to the Foundry’s medical facility, and Nick stood with his friends at the tail section of the transport ship.

  “What now?” Kal asked.

  “A shower, some chow, then sleep,” Nick said.

  “That sounds like a plan to me,” Jules said.

  “I could eat something,” Ty said casually.

  “Do you think we should go check on Gunny?” Ember said.

  “After we get some rest,” Nick said. “We’ve earned it.”

  They set off across the hangar bay and were close to the hatch that led to the human quarters on the massive space station when a tall alien ducked through the doorway. Nick had seen quite a few Proxy since joining the PMC. Most had pleasant expressions and wore loose-fitting garments. The alien in front of them looked stern, with a military uniform and an officer’s beret on top of its bald head.

  “Come with me,” the alien said.

  Nick felt a sudden surge of panic. They had taken their helmets off and were covered with mud from Delphi Green. Nick wanted to ask his friends if they had done something wrong, but there was no way to speak without being overheard. They looked at each other, and Nick saw concern reflected in their eyes. A spark of anger threatened to turn into full-blown rage in Nick’s mind. They may not have completed the training perfectly, but if the Proxy wanted to criticize them for the way they handled the test down on Delphi Green, Nick thought he might explode.

  The alien led them to a small room with a row of seats facing a projection wall. The alien turned and waved toward the chairs.

  “Have a seat,” he said, his voice sounding mechanical from the universal translator at the base of his long mouth. “I’m Captain Dex’Orr and I’ll be your commanding officer. From this point forward you are officially Dragon Team Seven.”

  “Sir?” Nick asked.

  “I know, you haven’t completed your training,” Captain Dex’Orr said. “But something’s come up and we need a Dragon team. You’re the closest, so the mission falls to you.”

  Ember raised her hand and spoke. “What about Gunnery Sergeant Tveit?”

  “She’ll be looked after, Private Gracie,” the Proxy said. “All you need to concern yourself with is prepping for the mission. We leave in one hour.”

  “Oh, that’s beautiful,” Kal said sarcastically.

  Nick saw a look of confusion on the alien’s pale face. The Proxy’s thin lips pressed together, forming a straight line across the large, oval face.

  “One hour?” Nick asked. “Sir, we’ve been on the move for days. We hav
en’t slept more than a couple hours in the last three days.”

  “There will be time to rest in transit,” Captain Dex’Orr said.

  “But we haven’t completed our training,” Jules said.

  “That can’t be helped. I need a resourceful team of operators for a rescue mission. You’ll need to move fast through urban terrain. Once our ship docks with the station in the Quazak system, you’ll have just eight Earth hours to rescue two Peregrinantes hostages and get them back on board our ship. I suggest you get all the gear you need and return here as quickly as possible. I’ll give you all a full mission briefing once we’re underway.”

  Nick wasn’t sure what to say or do. Since arriving at the Foundry, Gunny Tveit had been in charge. She told them where to go, what to do, and even what to think at times. Being given orders to get ready meant they would have to figure out what they needed on their own. Nick stood up and saluted. Captain Dex’Orr returned the salute and left the room.

  “Is this part of the training?” Kal asked.

  “Gunny never mentioned it,” Jules said.

  “She wouldn’t have,” Ty said. “Maybe we’re supposed to do this on our own.”

  “Fine,” Nick said. “Where do we start?”

  “We know it’s an urban environment,” Ember said. “I think we should check with the technicians to make sure we have the right armor.”

  “And we’ll need weapons,” Kal said. “I don’t think we should attempt a rescue with just spears.”

  “What about food?” Ty asked.

  “They should have food on whatever ship we’ll be taking. The Captain said we can get some rest, too.”

  “So armor, then weapons,” Jules said. “What are we waiting for?”

  “Lead the way,” Nick said.

  It took the group longer than Nick cared to admit to find the work stations where the Proxy technicians who worked on their armor were located. Ember had been right to suggest them going there. The Proxy quickly changed out their armor and made adjustments to their helmet programs.

  “We’ve added urban camouflage and hard vacuum capabilities to your armor,” the lead technician explained. “The camouflage will activate via your helmet’s command capabilities.”