by John Bowers
The Horrors of War
“Throw out your weapons!” Nick shouted. “Do it now, or I’ll open fire!”
He heard what sounded like a slap, skin on skin—as if someone had clapped a hand over someone else’s mouth—and the whimpering stopped. But whoever was inside couldn’t control their breathing, which sounded harsh and strained. He waited five or six seconds, but nothing happened.
“Last chance! Throw out your weapons or you’re going to get a grenade!”
Five more seconds.
Nothing.
Nick fired two rounds into the shed at about head height.
“Okay, asshole, you asked for it! Fire in the hole!”
Nick didn’t have a grenade in his hand, but “fire in the hole” was the universal warning that one was on the way; he hoped that would be enough.
It was.
“Wait!” The voice was weak, gasping. “Don’t throw it! We’re…coming out!”
“Weapons first! Throw ‘em out!”
“We don’t…have any weapons. We’re unarmed.”
“All right, if you’re lying you’re dead. One at a time, real slow, come out of the shed. I’m not screwing around!”
He heard the whimpering again. The shed door quivered, then creaked as someone pushed it open from the inside. Nick stood and held his rifle aimed directly at the opening. The first thing that emerged was a head…or something similar to a head. It was red, raw, and blackened, with no visible hair. Nick winced as he saw the blistered flesh hanging from the face. The body followed, painfully slow, crawling on its elbows because the arms no longer had skin on them. The upper body was also bare and blistered, with just a few remnants of burned cloth clinging to it. The soldier had been wearing a white shirt.
The sight reminded him of a barbecued pig, swollen and blistered and oozing. The rebel soldier was sobbing with pain, but pulled himself agonizingly clear of the shed.
“Stop,” Nick told him. “How many more are in there?”
“Two,” the rebel whispered. “But I think…I think—one of them is dead.”
Nick studied the man for a moment. He was clearly unarmed, too badly burned to even hold a weapon, and without enough clothing to hide one. He stepped forward and pressed against the side of the shed, keeping his rifle on the wounded man. He peered into the shed, where the stench was overpowering. Fighting against his gag reflex, he identified two more forms in the dim light. One lay absolutely still, the arms bent at the elbows and curled up in the classic pose of someone who has burned to death. The other was still breathing, but his face was obscured by black, blistered skin that had swollen so badly Nick couldn’t even tell where the eyes were…or had been.
“Rudy, cover this guy, but don’t kill him.”
He stepped inside the shed and looked around. A thin sliver of daylight framed a larger door that opened onto the alley, which explained how the rebels got into the shed. Nick checked the corners for threats, but the shed contained only a few lawn tools. He knelt beside the rebel that was still breathing.
“Can you hear me? Are you awake?”
He heard a grunt and the wheeze of air through a swollen passage. The man tried to answer but his words came out like the mewing of a newborn kitten. Fighting nausea, Nick backed out of the shed and caught a breath of fresh air. He chinned his helmet mike.
“Sergeant, I need a corpsman up here. Seventh house on the street, north side, in the backyard.”
“Who’s hit?”
“Two prisoners, badly burned. Looks like they crawled out of that shopping center across the alley.”
“Okay, sit tight. We’ll be there in a minute.”
Nick knelt by the man lying on the grass. He was trembling with shock. More than half his body was burned, but if he reached a hospital in time, he might make it. The man inside the shed…Nick had doubts about him.
“What’s your name?” he asked the prisoner.
“Ez-zekiel. Please…don’t shoot.”
“If I was going to shoot, you would already be dead. Just rest easy.”
“P-Please…help us.”
“How old are you, Ezekiel?”
“S-Seventeen.”
“How long have you been fighting?”
“Since…since…” A coughing spell seized the kid. He spewed bloody phlegm, then lapsed into moaning.
“How long?” Nick repeated.
“Since the beginning.”
“Well, Ezekiel, the Star Marines are here now, so your little revolution is over. The good news for you is that we don’t mistreat prisoners. If you make it to a hospital in time, you’ll probably survive.”
Ezekiel coughed up blood again, then closed his eyes and nodded his gratitude.
“Th-thank you…for not…shooting us.”
You’re welcome…but I’m not sure I did you any favors.
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NICK WALKER, U.F. MARSHAL
Asteroid Outpost
Sirian Summer
Rebel Guns of Alpha Centauri
Bounty Hunter at Binary Flats
Gunfight on the Alpha Centauri Express
Manhunt on Tau Ceti 4
Assassin on Centauri B
Revolt on Alpha 2
STARPORT SERIES
Starport
Guerrilla Girl
Famine Planet
Prisoners of Eroak
Occupy Eroak!
THE FIGHTER QUEEN SAGA
A Vow to Sophia
The Fighter Queen
Star Marine!
The Fighter King
The Sword of Sophia
Acknowledgements
Even the best writer often can’t spot his or her own mistakes. That’s why we use beta readers to help spot them. I would like to thank Victory Crayne, Allan Kalar, and Mary Elizabeth Fricke for taking the time away from their own novels to help me with mine. You guys are awesome!
Memoriam
In memory of three schoolmates of mine who died much too young:
Lavon Prather, in Vietnam
Clyde van Valkenburg, in Vietnam
Wayne Juhl, in a traffic accident
Rest in peace, guys.
Dedication
Dedicated to my friend Orville St. Clair, a twenty-year veteran of the U.S. Army. Thank you for your inspiration.
A Faster Than Light eBook
Published by John Bowers
Copyright 2017 by John Bowers
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by John Bowers.
You are granted a non-exclusive license to this work. You may make copies or reformat it for YOUR OWN USE ONLY. You may not resell, trade, nor give this work away.
Created in the United States of America
First Publication: November 2017
Cover by Howard Milligan
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters are a product of the imagination of the author and any resemblance to any real person, either living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Nick Walker, Star Marine
Revolt on Alpha 2
by
John Bowers
The most vicious wars are holy wars.
Chapter 1
The war had been mishandled from the start.
Some politician in the Federation Senate had decided that the Rebel Coalition attack against the Alpha Centauri colony was not a real revolution, but a “minor uprising”; he characterized it as “similar to the Indian wars of
the Nineteenth Century”. Alpha Centauri 2 had a Colonial Defense Force, he said, that should be able to handle it.
The Colonial Congress on Alpha 2 did not agree—they asked for Federation troops to help out, and specifically requested the Star Marines. The Star Marines were ready to go. They had trained for it. They wanted it. They expected to be deployed.
But they weren’t.
Not for a whole year.
When the Colonial Defense Force, only twenty thousand strong, fell back in disarray before a hundred thousand determined rebels, the Federation Infantry was tagged instead. They were good soldiers, well trained and equipped, but only two divisions—about thirty thousand men—were deployed. Not until their casualty rate hit thirty-six percent did the politicians cave and, finally, send in the Star Marines.
By then—it was damn near too late.
Camarrel
Monday, 14 May, 0435 (Colonial Calendar)
Camarrel, Alpha Centauri 2
Thirty-third Star Marines began landing at 2200 hours, local time.
Both suns were down. Though Alpha Centauri B still cast a faint glow across the western horizon, most of the city was blacked out due to sporadic artillery fire that had wrecked several neighborhoods over the past couple of weeks. A civilian curfew had been in effect since 1900 hours.
The regiment landed in waves, one battalion at a time, ferried down from orbit in fourteen transports known as OLVIs (Orbital Landing Vehicle, Infantry). They were stubby, lightly-armed vehicles designed only for ferrying troops; their armor was thin, making them vulnerable to heavy ground fire, so they deployed after sunset and approached from the east over the Syracuse Sea. They were designed to land in all terrains, but the logical landing zone was the Camarrel Spaceport, which lay on the eastern skirts of the city.
Pvt. Nick Walker sat with his shoulders strapped to the outer bulkhead, gripping the overhead panic bar with both hands. He was no stranger to air or space flight, but the OLVI was the most unwieldy thing he’d ever ridden in. Stubby and boxlike, it had all the aerodynamics of a refrigerator, and he marveled that it could fly at all. Breaking atmosphere had been the roughest ride of his life, and five or six men had lost their dinner. Fortunately, Nick had anticipated the possibility of nausea and skipped eating; even so, the gastric fumes almost made him gag.
Forty-nine minutes after separating from the orbital transport, the OLVI set down on the north end of the Camarrel spaceport, and Nick released his breath. Everyone in the vehicle seemed just as relieved, and conversation—which had been largely absent during the descent—started up again.
“‘Bout fucking time!” muttered Alvin Kopshevar, sitting to Nick’s right. “I thought this bucket would burn up on the way down.”
“We don’t get off that easy,” Nick told him.
“What d’you mean?”
“Just what I said. If we’re gonna get killed, we’ll have to do it the hard way.”
Kopshevar opened his mouth to reply, but didn’t get the chance.
“Listen up!” Lt. Col. Dietrich, the battalion commander, stood in the hatch leading to the cockpit. “Exit the landing craft through the hatch to starboard. Form up outside by platoons and move toward the terminal buildings to wait for orders. Your company commander will be with you shortly. Move out!”
Dietrich disappeared back into the cockpit as the men stood and began shuffling toward the exit. The man nearest the hatch activated the controls and the door slid up into the fuselage. The OLVI had landed on its skids, so the ground was only one step down from the doorway.
Nick Walker was one of the last men out of the vehicle. The interior had been humid and stuffy, punged with puke fumes, but the minute he emerged into the open his lungs filled with the sweetest, freshest air he had ever breathed. For a moment, he felt almost heady, as if on an oxygen high.
The sixty men from Nick’s landing vehicle straggled toward a hangar building thirty yards away. As other craft swooped in to land, riding their vertical jets, the noise was overwhelming. The very ground vibrated. Three craft were already down and eleven more were approaching. Nick ducked his head against the rising decibels as he moved forward with the rest of the men.
“Echo Company, form up on me! Double-time!”
Nick spotted Capt. Seals standing in front of the hangar and headed in that direction. He saw his squad leader, Sgt. DuBose, counting heads as he tried to account for his men. Lt. Jaeger of 3rd Platoon was taking reports from his sergeants as they became available. In less than two minutes, Echo Company, if slightly ragged, was assembled.
Seals, looking somewhat distracted, turned to face them.
“All right, men, stand to. We’ll be moving out as soon as the rest of the battalion is down. Everyone stretch your legs and then kiss your ass goodbye—after today, you may never see it again.”
Seals’ eyes glinted with humor as he scanned the disheveled-looking company before him. A few men were grinning and a few others chuckled.
“Any questions?”
“Where we going from here, Captain?” someone asked.
“We’ll be moving toward the front.”
“Where is the front?”
Seals flicked his thumb over his shoulder in a careless gesture.
“That way. Actually we’re going to Firebase Oscar, somewhere on the north end of the city. There you can get some hot chow and a few hours’ sleep. In the morning we’ll have a briefing so we know what we’re up against, and after that…orders will follow.”
He scanned the group again.
“Anything else?”
Nick lifted his chin. “I got a question, Captain.”
“What is it?”
“Who’s Oscar?”
“What?”
“Sir, you said we’re going to Firebase Oscar. I just wondered who they named it after. Was Oscar some famous Alpha Centauri-ite?”
Fully half the company broke out in laughter. Seals made a good-natured face of disgust.
“Go back to sleep, Walker. We’ll wake you when it’s your turn to die.”
This time the entire company guffawed. Nick only grinned. The men around him, tense and out of sorts just a moment before, seemed to relax a little.
“What about our gear?” another Star Marine asked. “We’re not going into battle like this, are we?”
“Why not, Carlson? You’re all Star Marines, aren’t you? You’re supposed to be the baddest asses in the galaxy.”
“Yes, sir!”
“Since when did Star Marines need more than their bare hands to kill the enemy?”
More laughter and a few lewd comments.
“How far is it to this firebase, Captain? Firebase Os-Queer?”
“I don’t know, Aquino, but I’ll tell you what—I’ll put you on point, so you can tell us as soon as you find it.”
Seals turned serious.
“Most of your equipment was shipped in a different OLV. It will be delivered to the firebase, but your rifles are being offloaded now. We don’t expect any trouble here in town, so keep your rifles slung. The Fed Infantry have it covered.”
This generated a stir of mutters.
“Fucking Infantry!”
“Hey, Captain, since when do we depend on the Fed Infantry to protect us? It should be the other way around.”
“I hear what you’re saying, Private, but give them a little credit—they’ve been fighting the Freaks for nine months now, so cut them some slack.”
“Yessir, but if they had done the job right, we wouldn’t even be here!”
Seals grinned and shrugged.
“I bow before your superior wisdom, Private.”
It took twenty minutes for the entire battalion to assemble. The men claimed their weapons and when everything was set, Lt. Col. Dietrich passed the order to his company commanders. Seals, upon receiving the word on his helmet comm, raised an arm and pumped his fist up and down.
“Echo Company, saddle up! Move out!”
The OLVI squadron had
already lifted off and returned to orbit for another battalion. The noise level dropped to near zero as the Star Marines, eight hundred men marching in companies, began their trek. Soon the only sound was the tramp of combat boots on hard pavement, their digital-camo uniforms blending into the night. Each squad stayed together in fire team formation; Nick’s fire team consisted of himself, team leader Cpl. Mateo, Kopshevar, and Rudy Aquino.
As they proceeded in a long parade down dark streets, Nick experienced a sudden case of the jitters. From the spaceport, the terminal and support buildings had blocked their view; now the city became visible half a mile to the west, but it didn’t look right.
Obviously it was a big town—how big he couldn’t determine—but it was silent as death. Dozens of tall buildings, skytowers, stood in stark relief against the sunset glow in the west. Other, lesser buildings that flanked the towers blended into a single dark shadow with irregular edges against the night sky. Not a light was visible in any of them, as if the power grid had been cut. Nor did they see any traffic. They did see vehicles parked along the streets, but nothing was moving. No cars, no people, no ambient city sounds, no voices, no music—nothing.
Not even a police car.
It was weird.
The scene reminded Nick of apocalyptic holo-vids he had seen as a kid. A dead city, no one left alive except the hero, who had to face the horrors emanating from the dark belly of the unknown.
Zombies, maybe.
Or vampires.
It made him shiver. Fed Infantry notwithstanding, he would be glad to reach their destination.
At least the air was fresh, and cool.
The battalion marched on, eight hundred men, walking more or less in cadence out of pure habit. Tramp-tramp-tramp. Their footfalls echoed down the side streets. Nick wondered if anyone was alive to hear them.
Their route took them two miles into the downtown area, then swung north along a major boulevard toward their destination. Soon they began to encounter residential neighborhoods, apartment complexes, and private homes. Once again, everything was dark. Everything was silent. Where were all the people?
