Marine

by Joshua Dalzelle

  "I'm sorry about your friend," he said. "I met him once. He seemed…nice."

  "He was the best of us," 707 said. "Far too great a mind for a simple soldier. Good luck, Lieutenant Brown." With that, he turned and rejoined the two other battlesynths, speaking shortly to Captain Webb before walking back towards an exotic looking transport with an open cabin design. Jacob supposed when you were constructed of impervious metal, there was little need for a sealed passenger space.

  "I can never figure out where they're getting their intel from," Webb said as he walked up to Jacob. "They knew who you were—who you really are—before I could even try to deny it. The fact they knew you were assigned here and that you were about to deploy means their information is in real-time. What'd they want, anyway?"

  "Just to tell me that someone I'd met a long time ago had died," Jacob said.

  "Lucky." Webb nodded. "We'd heard about that. Come on, they're waiting on us to depart. We'll talk more once we're underway."

  "Yes, sir," Jacob said, not at all looking forward to the prospect. All of these people, even the aliens on this planet, seemed to revere his father and hold him up on a pedestal. At first it had angered Jacob, but now it just left him confused. The more people he met who admired the man who sired him left him less and less sure that his anger wasn't misplaced somehow.

  Chapter 6

  The launch from Taurus Station was uneventful given the low volume of air traffic. Sully smoothly fed power to the gravimetric main engines, and the Corsair lifted off the tarmac vertically before accelerating along the course Terranovus Orbital Control had given them so they could enter into the pattern of outbound ships near the planet's equator.

  Gravimetric drives, or "grav-drives," as the engineers called them, were one of the first bit of serious tech to come from their alien alliances. The seemingly miraculous devices could create gravitational distortions that allowed the ship to move in three dimensions through space. Jacob had been told in one of his Introduction to Engineering classes that the only thing limiting what a grav-drive could do was the universal constant—the speed of light in a vacuum—and the power source feeding it. Intellectually, he understood the principles that made the engines work, but as the Corsair effortlessly lifted her bulk into the muggy Terranovus night sky, Jacob couldn't help but be impressed.

  "We've been released from Orbital Control. Setting course for our mesh-out point and prepping the slip-drive," Sully said, referring to the Corsair's second drive system that would push the ship out of normal space and into slip-space, the name for the faster-than-light propulsion method used by nearly every spacefaring species in the galactic quadrant. Jacob had little understanding of how the system circumvented Newtonian physics. All he knew was that he was never fully settled when a ship made the transition out of normal space.

  "You're cleared to engage the slip-drive at your discretion, Sully," Mosler said. The commander—captain while aboard his ship—was sitting at a station to the right of the pilot pit. On the Corsair, he would control the ship's weaponry and communications while the pilot flew the ship and handled navigation. Jacob looked around and saw that there were several other auxiliary stations, but he had no idea what they were for. When Mosler spoke up again, it was like he'd been reading Jacob's mind.

  "We have a crash course prepared for you to get you up to speed on the Corsair and her systems, Jake— Do you go by Jacob or Jake, Lieutenant?"

  "Jacob, sir."

  "Okay, Jake, like I was saying, you'll need to get with the program pretty fast. I don't expect you to be able to take her apart and put her back together, but as XO on this cruise, you'll need to at least have a passing familiarity."

  "I'll be like a sponge, sir," Jacob said, deciding not to make an issue of the captain calling him by the wrong name. As with most things in the military—especially for FNGs—this was a test. The crew would poke and prod him to see what sort of reactions they'd get, what kind of team player he was, and how far they could push him before they'd allow him to settle into any sort of normal routine.

  "Outstanding. No time like the present for a little on the job training," Mosler said. "Take the tactical station and make sure Sully doesn't run her into a moon. I'm going back to sleep."

  "That was one time, sir, and I didn't actually hit it," Sully spoke up. Mosler let out a sound that was half-grunt, half-growl and stomped off the bridge.

  "You hit a moon?" Jacob asked as he slid into the still-warm seat that Mosler had just vacated.

  "No. Well…the thing is— Look, there were a lot of bugs to work out on this ship, and we were rushed through trials and activated before we were ready," Sully said. "One of the things that didn't work so great was the master warning system that should have let me know that the landing gear wasn't deployed before I tried to land."

  "I see," Jacob said, not sure what to make of the story or how much of it he should believe. "So, technically—"

  "Technically it was an unintentional belly landing, but still a landing. I didn't hit the moon, merely brushed up against it."

  Jacob chose not to pursue the matter further. Instead, he began inspecting the tactical station the ship's commanding officer sat at, realizing again how unprepared he was for this assignment. When he touched the screen to his right, it went dark for a moment before it came back up with a new menu, his name and rank correctly displayed at the top. He was impressed with how seamlessly it was able to read his biometric data by the light touch and asked Sully about it.

  "It's actually reading your neural implant," the pilot said. "The ship can monitor all the unique signatures our wetware puts out and determine where we are, what we might need, if we're under duress…that sort of thing. It's far less vulnerable to hacking than simply reading your DNA, and fingerprints won't work since not all the species that work with Scout Fleet even have those."

  "There are aliens actually serving in the Navy? Not just in an advisory capacity?" Jacob asked, surprised.

  "Yep," Sully said. "That battlesynth you were talking to earlier is actually a full colonel in the Marines. That's a formality, of course, since command can't actually order them around. It's just convenient when they do happen to help out with training or advising Fleet on certain areas of space if they have a rank and clearance. There are also a handful of refugees who have come to Terranovus through the Cooperative and have been placed in service on NAVSOC ships."

  "Interesting." Jacob wasn't sure how he felt about that. He liked to think of himself as evolved past the simple xenophobia most on Earth had about aliens, but letting them into the military? There was so much they didn't know about the universe they were stepping into, and it made him nervous to think about how much blind faith they had to place in beings that might look at them as no more than vermin.

  "If you're bored, go into the menu marked 'Crew Resource Management' and scroll through the training programs," Sully said. "The computer has your full profile and will shuffle coursework so that the most critical modules are at the top."

  "Why not," Jacob said and began drilling down through the training tabs to see what was available. He began with an overview of the Corsair, and then queued up two more modules on the practical applications of slip-space drives and the standing rules of engagement for Scout Fleet personnel when deployed outside of Terran space.

  The hours ticked by as he immersed himself in the material. He attacked it with a seriousness he lacked in school now that his status had been switched from student to operational. He'd been so engrossed he completely missed the slight shudder through the deck as the Corsair meshed-out of the Terranovus system and sent him streaking away from home faster than the light of its star.

  "You still salty about being forced into the Corps?"

  Jacob looked up from his tablet to see that Captain Webb had walked over and was standing on the opposite side of the table he was seated at. He was between shifts and had come down to the galley to grab a quick bite and do some reading that didn't involve technical
specifications of a Terran starship.

  "I'm not thrilled about how it was done, if that's what you're really asking, sir." Jacob moved his own tray out of the way and Webb correctly took that as an invitation to sit across from him.

  "Explain."

  "I'm not as stupid as people seem to think, sir." Jacob closed his book file and shut the tablet off. "I'm not here because I'm uniquely qualified for this duty, I'm here because someone found out about the…gifts…I inherited. I realized that as soon as I was being railroaded onto a career path I didn't want and, if we're being honest, it's probably the only reason I was even at the Academy to begin with.

  "Now here I am, lightyears from home and in well over my head. I can't imagine what you and Commander Mosler were thinking putting me on this ship before I had even been through the first bit of post-Academy training."

  "Are you finished?" Webb asked, sounding bored. "In the spirit of full disclosure yes, your appointment to the Academy was a favor, but we weren't sure what, if any, traits from your father you might have inherited until your little display in the woods on Terranovus."

  "My father." Jacob sneered. "If that loser hadn't been so—" that was as far as he got before Webb leaned across the table and punched him in the face with enough force to knock him back in his seat.

  "I think I've had about enough of your mouth regarding that subject," Webb said conversationally while Jacob spit blood onto the table, utterly shocked. He forced himself to remain still and had to fight the instinct to grab Webb and throttle him. The captain may have been a Navy SEAL before transferring over to the UEAS, but Jacob knew just how fast and strong he really was and didn't fear the over-the-hill ex-operator.

  "Your father was a victim of circumstance when he was taken aboard an alien ship. Jason Burke has sacrificed more for Earth than any one man should ever have to, and what did he get for his troubles? A planet that thinks he's a traitor to his species thanks to the politics of it. Oh! And a sniveling little shit of a son who spits on his name despite the fact he saved the planet from alien invasion not once but twice. He never asked to be ripped from his home and forced to fight for his life, but he made the best of it with what he had.

  "So, yes, your Academy slot was all but guaranteed. It was a backchannel favor from the United Earth Council to your father in acknowledgement of his sacrifices on behalf of Earth. Despite what you've heard, there's a standing order for any human ships deployed that Omega Force is to be considered an ally." Jacob sat stunned for a moment, the blood dripping from his busted lip hitting the table unnoticed.

  "Omega Force?" he finally asked.

  "It's the name he and his crew call themselves," Webb said and tossed a napkin at him. "I don't expect you to change your mind about your father just because I told you so. You'll have to settle that for yourself. Just know that he's not a criminal or a traitor and the reasons why he's been listed as such are classified far above your level. Shit, the only reason I even know is that I was there."

  "You've actually met him, sir?"

  "I was sent to try and kill him…once." Webb's eyes lost focus, and he shuddered before looking back to Jacob. "I can't say anything more about that. It was in the early days when Terranovus was little more than a forward base." Jacob did the math in his head and realized it must have been about the time the second alien attack hit Earth.

  "There are other things," Jacob said. "He may have taken the rap for something he didn't do, but that doesn't change things between him and I."

  "That's your problem." Webb shrugged. "And it's pretty far off-topic of what you asked. To answer your question: yes, your physical gifts you received from Jason Burke make you unique, but the results of your psychological evaluation and aptitude batteries locked you into this role. Very few people are suited for the challenges of serving on Scout Fleet ships, fewer still are able to deploy to the surface of alien worlds and function. Your test results indicate you can, though that's yet to be proven. There are things happening in the quadrant right now that have our allies scared, but they're being tight-lipped about it. In a perfect world, I would have been able to let you serve out your time on the bridge of a starship like you wanted, but our intelligence services think something big is on the horizon, and they've tasked us with finding out what it is. I'm shorthanded, and I just couldn't leave an asset like you off the board. Was there anything else?"

  "There is one more thing that you might be able to answer," Jacob said, hesitant to bring up his next concern. "I've always assumed my speed and strength were the result of alien DNA, that maybe my father was some sort of hybrid and passed them on to me. Mosler said that's not true."

  "I'm not hearing a question in there."

  "Is there any—"

  "Alien DNA in your blood?" Webb finished. "Of course not. What I'm about to tell you is highly classified, but I figure you have a right to know. One of the members of your father's crew had been a talented geneticist in his previous life. He, with the help of some former colleagues, have modified Burke's genetic structure over the years to maximize his potential. His speed, strength, and endurance make you look like you're stuck in molasses. He also has a few other enhancements like a reinforced skeleton and these cool ocular implants we've not been able to obtain for ourselves yet. As best we can tell, you were conceived just after his second round of upgrades. Some of what Doc—that's the geneticist—did to Jason was passed down to you."

  "How many rounds of upgrades has he had?" Jacob asked.

  "Four that we know of, but we're unable to track his status or position with any sort of accuracy" Webb said, standing up. "That's all I'm willing to say. I like you, kid, but I'm not going to risk my career for you. Chances are good you'll never cross paths with your father out here…it's a very big galaxy…but if you ever want to talk to him, it can probably be arranged."

  "I'll keep that in mind," Jacob said to the captain's retreating back. He didn't bother picking his tablet back up, now completely disinterested in any recreational reading. His hatred for his father had been one of the things that had defined his life, and he sure as hell didn't appreciate Webb punching holes in it.

  He looked at the clock on the bulkhead and decided to try and get a few hours’ sleep before he had to be back on duty. Mosler wanted him down on the engineering deck shadowing Scarponi for the entire watch to get hands on with the machinery that made the Corsair work. At least it would be something to break up the monotony of the extended slip-space flight.

  Chapter 7

  Once the manic energy and excitement of departure had passed, and the novelty of traveling on a ship going faster than light faded, Jacob was faced with the hard reality of interstellar travel: it was boring as shit. Days and days on end, staring at the same bulkheads and passing the same assholes in the corridors, he could feel his sanity slowly slipping away.

  The problem, he concluded, was that the Corsair was tiny. Unbelievably so. Even with only eight crew and one VIP on a three-deck ship, it seemed there was nowhere to go where he wasn't being loomed over or breathed on by someone else. Even with the distraction of the near-constant training regimen that Mosler had imposed on him and his Marines, there still seemed to be too many hours in the day with too little to do.

  "Today's the day, LT," Sergeant Jeff Mettler said. Jeff was a former U.S. Marine who had transferred over to the U.E. Marines when the initial call went out. Like Jacob, his psych profile had identified him early on as being suitable for Scout Fleet service, so he was rolled into NAVSOC almost immediately. Unlike Jacob, he was enlisted so he was never given the option of turning down the assignment and going back home. Now, he was one of four Marines directly under his command. When they were deployed, he also served as Team Obsidian's medic.

  "Day for what?"

  "We meet up with the Endurance," Murph said. "Then it's another three long weeks back out to the Kaspian Reaches."

  "At least it's a break from the normal tedium. I try to be a glass half-full kinda guy," Jeff said.
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  "Half-full, half-empty…in the Corps, it's still just half a glass of piss they expect you to take a swig of and say thank you," Corporal Angel Marcos said. Angel was the squad's weaponeer—an infantry designation specific to the new branch—and had been given the nickname "Machine Gun Marcos" after Obsidian's second mission. That had been shortened so that everyone now just called him "MG."

  "Is Taylor still on the bridge?" Jacob asked, referring to his tech specialist, Taylor Levin. They'd been in the Corsair's main cargo hold training on EVA operations for Jacob's benefit. Although unable to go outside the ship while in slip-space, at least in the large area they were able to disable the artificial gravity and let the new lieutenant practice basic maneuvers in a weightless environment. Jacob was comfortable and competent with the equipment, but the gut-wrenching sensation of freefall was still a distraction for him while his own men zipped about like they were born in zero-g.

  "Cap has him up there going through all the intel we have available on the target and the planet we're going to," Jeff said. "We've been through there once before. It seems nice at first but you get a strange vibe right as soon as you walk out of the starport."